A/N: Hey guys. Hope you've enjoyed my long series of Splatalot stories. Can't believe this is the last one! Enjoy! x

"Well Kyle, you better expect a call from your parents, you're on the ten o'clock news." Drake informed Kyle in the hospital waiting room. The others forced him to come here after what happened in the castle. They wanted their leader to be fully checked out. Kyle looked up towards the TV where they were showing the castle then he got what seemed to be the hundredth shock of my life.

"Arthur targeted me with a missile?" Kyle exclaimed quietly not wanting to draw attention to himself, "Round six was surviving a missile!"

"And you survived." Amy said looking at the TV, "Where are your parents today?"

"Back in Florida- much to the disappointment of the others. Kook persuaded the leader of the defenders to hold the next conference in Disney Land so I doubt they've seen this news report." Kyle explained, "They're probably on a roller coaster as we speak."

"Nice for some then." Josh muttered, "We're here trying to find some Gems that have apparently been around since who knows when along with some massive machines which Kyle should have been given for his 14th Birthday."

"Well his 15th Birthday is only two months away." Zoey interrupted, "But I get the point."

"Yeah those machines would have been nice to have during the JCD era. 2 week after my birthday was lost the JCD power." Kyle added then continued, "Maybe Ivar would have been defeated earlier."

"Do you think Ivar's a relative of the attackers?" Amy asked on the subject of Ivar, "He's been against the defenders for ages."

"Yeah but Gildar's a defender." Kyle pointed out, "It's just a personal vendetta that's got way out of hand."

"Going back to the Jungle Force Gems, do you have any idea where they might be?" Drake asked, "Because something tells me we don't have that much time."

"He must have had a house before he lived in the castle." Kyle muttered partly to himself and to the team, "I'll have to ask the other defenders. They must know something unless…"

"Unless…." Josh said.

"Well, there is someone else who may know where they are." Kyle continued, "But I haven't seen him for years, not since JCD."

"Who?" Amy asked intrigued.

"Just an old friend." Kyle replied, "And something tells me that after that news report, he may be heading our way."

The ex-Neon team mates looked at each other confused but decided to leave the conversation for now and focus on Kyle. He needed to be in peak condition to fight Ivar and Co. Luckily for them, Kyle was next on the list and immediately assigned to have the suitable scans and within 30 minutes he was cleared and discharged. Kyle didn't quite say 'I told you so' to his team mates but his raised eyebrows gave the same impression as he jumped off the hospital bed and made his way out of the building but instead of heading towards the Castle, like the others would have expected, he headed towards the boarder of Pearl Canyon.

"Kyle!" Zoey shouted after him, "Shouldn't we be heading back to the castle to look for more clues."

"No point." Kyle told his team, "The JCD gems never lived in the castle. The Neon gems did but that's because Charles put them there so the likely hood of these Jungle Force gems being in the castle is unlikely plus look…."

Kyle stood and nodded his head towards the castle. The others turned their heads to see what he was looking at. On top of the Castle hill, there were bright flashes of blue and red, "The police and probably ambulances are there so there's no chance they we would be allowed back in that Castle. Plus I doubt they would believe that I live there especially without any parents."

"I guess but that still doesn't explain why you're heading out of town." Amy stated, "If anything we should check if Charles owned a house here before he lived in the castle."

"Possibly but the way he was talking on that video about the defenders and the gems, it sounded like he has been involved with defenders for a long time, maybe even his family generations ago." Josh added, "He may not have even been in a normal civilian house."

"Really?" Zoey asked in disbelief, "Then where do all non-defenders live?"

"There is one place where he could have lived." Kyle butted in, "It's definitely as long shot and a lot has changed in the last 17 years."

"Where is it?" Drake asked intrigued.

"The place where all the non-working defenders live" Kyle said, "The Splat Hub."

"But won't they all be at these conferences?" Amy asked. She had heard how important it was for all defenders to attend and there would be severe punishments for those who didn't, "Plus what about your old friend?"

"Good point." Kyle replied. He hadn't thought of that. There was no way of knowing if this friend would actually show up here or he would stay where he was…where ever that was.

"Also, how are we actually going to get there?" Drake asked, "I'm taking a stab in the dark here but I'm guessing the Splat Hub is miles way."

"No really, lucky for us it's in Ottawa." Kyle replied.

"Oh yeah cause that's that not far away at all!" Zoey exclaimed annoyed. Clearly her leader did bash his head rather hard as he wasn't thinking straight.

"It's closer than Handsomeville." Kyle replied back, "Listen I know this all sounds muddled up and unorganised but Charles obviously recorded that video for a reason and I think those 5 remaining gems were a backup for the JCD ones and not to mention the machines which were obviously meant for us. If there's one thing I can thank Arthur for it's this. When that missile struck it occurred to me how powerful he is alone. Guys, he almost defeated the Jr defenders over two years ago! It also showed me how vulnerable we actually are. My suit just about protected me and the Neon suit is the strongest power that I've had out of all four! Every second we're powerless means that every second Arthur is becoming more powerful and frankly he seems like the biggest threat now and while Ivar and Neri play in the shadows, we need to focus on him."

The others nodded in agreement and understanding but Amy spoke up, "What if the Jungle Force Powers aren't as strong as we hope? I mean, they were designed first and the others were created afterwards…"

Drake then butted in, "Only out of fear which hypothetically means…"

"The Jungle Force gems should be more powerful." Josh finished, "Otherwise they wouldn't have been so worried about them."

"So we're all in agreement?" Kyle asked, "We're going to look for the JF gems."

"JF gems?" Zoey questioned.

"Jungle Force." Kyle replied, "It's quicker to say and quite catchy but going back to the topic, anyone know the train time table to Ottawa?"

"I'll search it up." Josh replied getting out his iPhone 10 air + and tabbing away at the screen. Silence feel over the teenagers like a shadow in the dark and no one dared speak in case they knew for certain what it was or what was happening. Josh scrolled down his screen and looked back at Kyle, "There's one in 40 minutes but the tickets are not cheap."

"Leave that to me." Kyle replied heading towards the nearest ATM.

"You're seriously, on top of everything else, saying that you've got like $150 dollars to spare in your account including food and transport to and fro the train station?" Zoey asked in disbelief.

"Annaka's Great Grandad is my Great Grandad and he's the Graphum with all the money. He distributes it out to all of his great-grandchildren, including me and my mother's side of the family. $150 to them is like $2 to us." Kyle explained as he requested for the money, "Of course he gets the bill to check that we haven't been over spending. I'll just have to say it was for presents."

The money beeped and pushed it way into the ATM and right into Kyle's grabbing hands. The yellow defender wasn't going to stop at anything to get these Jungle Force gems, if not for himself then for them -them, of course, being the Jr defenders. It was their legacy that Kyle was continuing more than anything else in this nightmare. Arthur had wronged them and they'd stopped him, now Arthur had wronged Kyle and he was going to stop him. Perhaps maybe not their legacy he was continuing but more what it takes to be a Jr defenders. Of course, K yle had an unwritten list comparing his first team with his second…although he knew that he shouldn't have but during that time of great metal instability, one had formed and handed left his mind.

"Wait! What about our parents?" Amy asked stopping everyone in their tracks, "It's already noon and if it takes two hours to get their then…"

Comparison one: The Jr defenders could take train journey's anywhere because their parents a) had been kidnapped, b) had a spontaneous job and there wasn't anyone to ask, c) was in a defender conference while his normal friends couldn't take a train journey anywhere because their parents a) were at home baking bread or whatever, b) had 9 till 5 jobs so would notice their disappearance, c) had conferences that lasted 2 hours tops. It was a hard life being a normal human boy. Kyle had of course only realised that when he became a defender but even before he lived in the castle, they were pretty relaxed about anything Kyle did and they didn't have any jobs, they exchanged some of the castle treasury for dollars and survived for 13 years.

"Tell them that my parents are taking us camping." Kyle replied as he continued walking towards the train station.

The train station in Pearl Canyon was located near the park. No one knew the reason why…well no ordinary person did. When Kyle brought up the topic to Knightriss, she had immediately replied with, "its propaganda my dear. You see the park will be the first place any tourist or potential house buyer sees. They would register how family friendly and beautiful the park is and want to move or stay here. Of course, back in the day, the defenders that once lived here before us used that park to hide invaluable treasures."

The train ride didn't drag out as much as Kyle instantly thought it would although the ticket checker did kindly give Drake a biro which he constantly clicked for 15 minutes straight until Josh knocked it out of his hand. Amy had been reading about the train's history in a free handout book that lay on the table in front of them. She flicked through the pages with Kyle reading her shoulder. Amy tried to ignore the closeness between them by engaging herself in the handout.

"This train has been running since 2001!" She exclaimed excitedly, "Imagine how many people have been sitting in these seats."

Zoey, Drake and Josh took no interest in the history of the train and continued to look at their phones while Kyle took the information on board and thought about it. This train also went to Handsomeville. The yellow defender looked around the carriage and smiled as he imagined Gildar, Kook, Ballista, Thorne, Shaiden, Crocness, Skabb, Knightriss, Annaka, Danny, Zsa-Zsa and Jack riding on this train going to Handsomeville. Gildar and Kook would have been messing around while Thorne would moodily look out of the window trying to ignore them. Time jump 20 years later and you have Annaka, Danny and Zsa-Zsa playing out the same roles.

After the train had arrived and Kyle located a taxi, the others drove through Ottawa at an expensive rate to the end of a street. Kyle explained that he couldn't give the taxi man the address, it would be an invasion of Defender privacy plus the Hub has guards so the poor driver would easily be targeted at. Walking down the street and entering the Hub wasn't as hard as Kyle thought it would be. They might as well have not had a door, just some wall with a large rectangular gap in it.

The group of teenagers bravely walked up to the front desk where a middle aged woman sat reading Splat Weekly. She glanced up at Kyle and his friends, looked them up at down before coming closer to them.

"Name." She commanded.

"Kyle Temple."

"And those?" She asked pointing behind Kyle.

"My friends."

She tapped away at her computer for a second before glancing back up at Kyle and saying in the most sardonic tone, "Oh so you're a Jr defender? How lovely it must be growing up with defender parents."

Kyle chose not to reply and instead grabbed the passes and gave them out to his confused friends. He thanked the lady because Faetal always stated that manners are important and left.

"What she got against you being a Jr defender?" Drake asked.

"I'm one of a kind…well 5. Defenders don't normally marry each other. They leave and get married to well you guys so new defenders aren't as well trained as I am." Kyle explained briefly, "I have the same skills as an intermediate defender."

The others took the explanation as Kyle led them down a corridor. Despite not being to the Hub before Kyle clearly knew his way round. In all honesty, he shouldn't. It was only because he had found the Hub blueprint in Danny's room once and intelligently took it away for the fear of what the young prankster would do.

Stopping at a door marked 'Canadian Defenders', Kyle pushed open the door and entered the abyss. The room was pitch black. No one could see a thing! Amy grabbing hold of Kyle's arm as they walked further into the room before….

All 5 of them landed with a bump. There were groans and muttered complaints and from Kyle could tell he couldn't blame them. They had fallen roughly 10ft! The lights of where ever they had just ended up turned on one by one. Blinking in order to see, Kyle stood up and smiled as in front of him were all 3 of the defender crafts. From the shape of them, he could figure out that he had found numbers 1, 2 and 4.

Kyle walked towards 1 and stepped into the open platform door. His friends were still getting their act together. The yellow defender took a few steps forward before smiling. He crossed his arm and tilted his body to the right while leaning back slightly.

"Well, judging by the news, I was hoping that you would make it here." Luke Johnson replied with a familiar brown box in his hands, "I'm sure you know what these are."

A/N: So, what did you think?