No Matter What (a SRMTHFG fanfiction)
Chapter One
After a year of war against the resurrected Skeleton King and his undead army, Shuggazoom was a safe-haven once again, but for how long, none could say. Everyone else assumed victory, but the Monkey Team knew from their experience that the enemy was only waiting for them to drop their guard. Unless they can destroy the Skeleton King permanently, the war would never be truly over, but at this point, that would take a miracle. Many lives were lost, and during that year several of those corpses ended up on the enemy side before it's discovered that cremation prevents that, which struck a nerve in Sparx. After all, this war would've never started if he never allowed the Fires of Hate to awaken his darker side.
The red monkey wasn't the only one on the team shaken from the war. Antauri, the silver monkey, hadn't meditated in months, and was re-adjusting the fung-shui in his room dozens of times in one day just to make up for it. Otto, the green monkey, was trying to find a new hobby since tinkering has become a chore to him. Gibson, the blue monkey, found it harder to focus on his experiments with each week, and was eventually sent to bed after he was found in fetal position on the floor singing "Pop Goes the Weasel" to himself. Nova, the yellow monkey and the only female on the team, discovered that she had exhausted her temper, and wasn't herself until Otto, with Sparx's paper-bag puppet, tried ventriloquism. Even their leader, the human boy Chiro, was upset. He wanted to get out of his hyper-mode, but had stayed in his hero uniform knowing the war would continue at any given day. He even went to bed wearing it! It wasn't until a visit from his girlfriend, the team's honorary member Jinmay the robot girl, that Chiro relaxed even a little.
Knowing the only city on the planet was the enemies' main target, Jinmay was put in charge of monitoring the secret shelters. It was a fitting role for her, as she discovered that she had a talent for taking care of little kids, and things ever took a turn for the worst, she was able to expand her size and power almost surpass that of the Super Robot, making her the perfect last line of defense. Even though the war wasn't officially over yet, Jinmay's sunny personality was enough to lift the spirits on every member of the team, especially Chiro, but her visit wasn't entirely social this time. During her search for the safest parts of the underground jungles called the Savage Lands, in hopes of taming them enough to create another shelter, Jinmay made a discovery worth reporting: an abandoned treehouse.
"This is all I could bring back from there while you were gone," Jinmay said, pulling out a double-photo picture frame out from behind her back, "before the preditors of the Savage Lands even knew I was there. Not that they have a taste for metal or anything, but they do scare me, you know?"
Chiro was willing to comfort her, but what she brought back really caught his eyes. One photo in the frame was more faded then the other, but the image couldn't be clearer. In that photo, he recognized the Alchemist... the good soul among humanity who was corrupted into becoming the Skeleton King in the first place... along with six familiar baby monkeys. It was the two children cradling those babies in their arms, a boy and a girl, that really caught Chiro's attention, for in seperate ways, they both looked like him! It wasn't until he saw the other photo that he got an explanation for it: that same couple, all grown up, were holding a bouncing baby boy of their own... and that baby WAS him! Calling the rest of the Monkey Team to the main hall of the Super Robot, Chiro showed them the photos and received the same look from them that he gave himself.
"Impossible!" Gibson exclaimed, "How is it that your parents were involved with our lives and you never told us?"
"Maybe because I didn't know that myself!" Chiro answered, "I have been on my own for as long as I could remember. I don't know anything about my parents."
"That does explain a lot," Antauri nodded, smiling in nostalgia when he saw the earliest image of his black-furred, organic self, "yet it is hard to believe that time had hidden such a valuable secret from us, and that much raises so many questions."
"Right," Sparx said, rolling his eyes, "like whether or not they knew anything about the Alchemist becoming the Skeleton King, not like that would help with what's going on today."
Nova gasped at the sight of their previous leader, an orange monkey named Mandarin, pointing at young Sparx for some reason, which explains why her younger self seemed to be yelling at both of them, ready to feed one of them a knuckle sandwich. "I know one thing," she said, "times hadn't changed that much."
"Hey! Go easy on him!" Otto laughed, snatching the picture-frame from her hands, "We were probably in our terrible twos then." Before anything more can be said among the group, Otto noticed something sticking out from the back of the frame... it would look like an ordinary piece of paper to anyone else, but to those connected to the power primate, it was glowing! Curious as ever, Otto just had to pull it out to see what it was, but as soon as he touched it, a burst of light came out of his hands and filled the room! The next thing the six members of the Monkey Team were in a dark, unknown area, and the glowing page floated before them, and out from it formed the full-grown version of whom they began to believe was Chiro's Mother, dressed as though she were a mixture between an angel and a jungle-princess. She even had the same hauntingly beautiful voice both are known for when she spoke.
"Chiro! Monkey Team Hyper Force! My dearest son and foster children! I'd say how happy I am to see you all again, but what you see before you is nothing more then a memory. Besides, if what's been fortold is true, and you've recieved this much of my help in what's written as the 'Eye of a Storm of Despiration', then this is no time for joyful reunions anyway. No matter how much I wanted our little family to come together. Anyhow, since you found this, I say the time has come for you to know, there is a way to counteract the final threat of the Skeleton King once and for all. You see, when I was young, I chanced upon the Jewel of Hope, a small yet powerful artifact that's believed to counteract evil, though at first I only used it to purify the underground river from an essence called 'oil', and to enchant diary pages like this one. Even if you could find that artifact on your own by chance, you might not be able to use it unless you restore every page written in both my diary and your father's journal, which we enchanted together and scattered, not just back on planet Shuggazoom but other parts of the universe as well, knowing that the more memories those pages reveal, the stronger the Jewel of Hope will become when you find it. You'll need every page to end this war once and for all."
At this point, another haunting image formed next to that of Chiro's mother. It was Chiro's father, dressed in a tuxedo that seemed to be designed for the industry, though how he wore it, like his smile, was somewhat sloppy and casual. His voice also seemed to fill the room.
"Everyone, I would let you know that although we were despirate to hide this knowledge from our friend-turned-enemy, we didn't scatter the pages helter-shelter. You'd have to find them in places involved with the past of the Hyper Force: The Verron Temple of Korralidaul, The swamps east of the Dojo on Galaxia, The main office of Campus 13 of Cranius-Epsolon, the control room of Vertigo-a-go-go Intergalactic Amusement Park, The Carrington trade-center of Neonhack, and Dr. Takeuhashi's private study on Tobaratikara. Knowing old bone-head, you might want to check the locally hidden pages first, starting with the ones kept in the back room of the Alchemist lab, which has been sealed against its former owners access. From what you might see in the past there, you might be able to figure the rest own on your own. Such visions from the past might not be much relief from the war you are in now, some of them might be even worse, but if you are to know the truth as to what you're really up against you'll have to endure this little quest no matter what. We hid the covers to our books in the same place you found these pictures, to help you contain the energy we placed in the pages until it can be returned to the Jewel properly. Good luck everyone, and remember, you've done more then enough to make us proud in making it this far."
With that, the vision of the two adults vanished, and the Hyper Force was back in the Super Robot, next to a very confused Jinmay. "Are you guys alright?" she asked, "You all just sort of blanked out back there."
"We're fine," Chiro said wiping the tears from his eyes, "really, we just were given a hint as to how to get out of this mess once and for all, starting with finding this treehouse you found and seeing it for ourselves. We'll explain on the way."