TLOS: why we fight

Chapter 4

Hi everyone! Sorry for the long time between updates. I had a serious case of writers block, and my boss had me on for two weeks straight! Took a bit of thinking to pull this one out. And credit also goes to Twilight dragon god for helping with some of the editing. So here it is! enjoy

Cynder woke early the next day. She was up and stretching by the time the sun began to crest the mountains. As Cynder prepared for the day ahead, she realized that there wasn't much going on today, as she knew, so she decided to head into town and talk with Meadow. As Cynder flew over towards the village and to meadows house she wondered if Spyro would still remember all the things they had gone through. She remembered that last time they woke from the crystal induced sleep, they had forgotten a few things and had lost the use of most of their power until they could recharge them. Cynder made a mental note to ask Reed to have a green crystal on hand when they freed Spyro.

Cynder landed outside the village gates and walked slowly into the village, taking her time so as to let meadow have a chance to fully wake. "Hello again cynder!" Swift called with a friendly wave and a smile. Cynder smiled and walked over to him. "Hey Swift. Isn't this the third or fourth day in a row I've seen you working the gates near dawn?" Cynder asked quizzically. Swift shook his head with a small chuckle. "That sounds about right, but when your senior guard officer, they work you hard to make sure you stay fit and battle ready" Swift said in reply, "but besides that, what brings you here so early in the morning again?"

Cynder sat back on her haunches. "Honestly, I came here today to talk with Meadow because I didn't know what else to do. I'm still in top condition for fighting, and my elements are charged. I didn't want to cause any more ruckus amongst your cadets by tagging along, and I didn't want to spend the day watching Reed and Heather slowly chip Spyro out of his prison." She said calmly. "Well if you get bored talking with dad, you can come train with us. I'll make sure to keep the cadets in line and it won't be a burden at all." Swift suggested with a small shrug. Cynder smirked slightly, "I'll keep that in mind. Well, I'll talk to you later Swift. I'm off to talk to Meadow now." Cynder said as she stood. Swift said his goodbye before heading off towards the barracks.

Cynder wound her way through the village until she came to Meadows house. She walked up the steps on the porch and knocked gently against the wooden door. A few moments later
Meadow opened the door. "Cynder! Good morning and hello. Come in, come in!" Meadow bade. Cynder followed him in and sat across from him in front of a small table in the living room. Meadow grabbed a steaming cup of tea off the table and relaxed into the chair. "So what brings you here today?" Meadow asked between sips from the cup. "I was wondering if you could teach me about medicine and herbs and the like. I think it would be good to learn these things in case someone ever gets hurt while we are away from any healers." Cynder asked sheepishly. Meadow looked surprised at this, "of course I'll help you learn, though I wouldn't have taken you for one who would learn the healer's craft. We can begin now if you want to?" Meadow replied happily. "If it's no bother, that would be great!" Cynder replied. "Ok then, you already know how your species uses the crystals for most aliments, so we will start with a few basic herbs for things like stomach ache or headaches. The most common is…." Meadow began enthusiastically.
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Swift was busy working the cadets through some teamwork drills like capture the flag, and a few stealth drills. He would have the cadets split into four groups, (blue, green, red, and yellow) and set them up in two different games. One group would be working capture the flag with Breeze, while the other worked on stealth drills like an assassination game where one team had a V.I.P and the other team had to kill him before being noticed. Willow was leading these exercises. Swift was currently watching one of the capture the flag matches, and it was evident that the red team was more coordinated than the yellow team. They would send out a man or two right into enemy territory and to the left, while a larger squad came around the right. But the big thing was that while the yellows were distracted the reds sent their smaller and nimbler people through dense bushes or in treetops over the lines. They would go unnoticed and would hide very effectively whenever any yellows came near where they were.

Swift began talking to Breeze while keeping his eyes on the game "well so far it looks like red team is going to win." He said. "Sure looks that way Swift" Said breeze with a sigh. "That will put red up five to two if they win. Yellow group is going to need a lot more personal training time with one of us." Breeze said sadly. Swift nodded in agreement before snapping his head over it the right. A yellow cadet was running headlong towards his own side with the red flag and not a red in sight. The cadet sprinted with all his might towards the line, a few short meters away, when suddenly a wall of a cadet on the red team seemed to rise from the ground. He grabbed the yellow and smashed him into the ground. It was sufficed to say the poor yellow cadet was out, and had a few broken ribs too. Then a small red sprang from a tree and onto red ground, with the yellow flag in tow.

Breeze blew a small whistle as loud as he could, signifying the end of the game. When all the cadets were gathered he began his talk. "Well done by both sides, but the victory goes to the reds for the day," at hearing this, the red team yowled and hooted in victory. "But it was a very valiant effort on the yellows part. They fought well, but you need to coordinate and work as a team! The points you did score were only made because of a few lucky cadets. The point of this exercise is to teach team work and proper battle strategy. Reds will be moving over to stealth games tomorrow and yellows will face whoever gets sent over here. Tomorrow will be a simple battle exercise. Team verses team. Prepare yourselves yellow, and ready a strategy you see fit. Remember that traps and ambushes are expected! Dismissed!" Breeze finished with a smile.

Swift was happy with how the exercises had gone. The cadets seemed more attentive when it involved actual competition than when it was just forced march. He checked the suns position in the sky to see that it was about an hour after noon. He decided to take the rest of the day to visit with his father and Cynder. He began the walk back to his house with an air of content around him.

As Swift walked into the house, he heard his dad finish talking to someone about how rotwort would cause the afflicted person to expel any poisons that had been ingested. A wonderful topic to intrude on. "Hello! I'm back." Swift yelled to keep his father from rattling on for much longer. "We are in here." Meadow called from the kitchen area. Swift walked in to see Meadow with a large assortment of herbs in front of him on a counter and Cynder standing at his side looking slightly flustered. "Ah, we were just finishing up for the day. Cynder wanted to learn about medicine and healing." Meadow said to Swift before scooping up most of the herbs and carrying them into a storage closet. "Yeah? And why do you want to know all that stuff, Cynder? I thought those red crystals healed you dragons right up?" Swift asked. "That they do, but there have been far too many times when Spyro and I have been injured and without a red crystal around to heal us. It got annoying and I want to be able to help even without them." Cynder said sharply. "Ok, ok, jeez. Sorry I didn't mean to sound like an ass." Swift said with a light laugh. Cynder exhaled heavily. "Sorry I snapped at you. I'm just a little confused and trying to process all I've learned today." She said tiredly. Swift walked up to her and patted her on the shoulder "its ok Cynder. I was like this too when he tried to get me into the medicinal field. Except I kept combining the wrong ingredients and making poisons not healing tonics. That's when we decided maybe medicine wasn't the thing for me." Swift joked. Cynder laughed at that and her mood brightened noticeably. "Thanks, I needed that." Cynder said.

Swift was preparing to reply when the front door of the house flew open with a crash. Heather stood in the doorway. "Come quick! We are only a few minutes away from freeing Spyro!" Heather said excitedly. Cynder whooped loudly before turning and grabbing a large green crystal off the counter and running out the door before taking flight towards the cave. Swift ran ad grabbed Meadow and told him to start on his way over before running towards Chief Prowlus' house, vaulting flipping and climbing over anything in his way. "Chief Prowlus! Reed is about to free Spyro! We are headed there now!" Prowlus looked delighted at this news and joined swift in running to the gate. Swift didn't realize that Prowlus had learned Parkour before. He felt surprised that the older cheetah was still so nimble.

Cynder was first to reach the cave and ran into the central chamber and looked excitedly around, prepared to finally get to be with Spyro again. The four cheetahs showed up a few minutes later. Reed looked at the group before asking bluntly, "is that th' lot o' ya then? Or should I wait a bit longer?" Prowlus looked at the cheetah with exasperation. "this is all of us" Prowlus said. "Then let's get our savior out o' there!" Reed said "Heather! Be ready to catch this piece o' th' crystal!" Heather walked over to the indicated spot and stood ready. "On th' count o' three!" Reed yelled. He prepared his chisel and hammer. "One…..two….three!" on the last syllable he swung the hammer into the chisels base when the hammer connected, the crystal around Spyro exploded outwards and nocked Reed and Heather flying. Cynder covered her head and chest with her wings, while Swift and prowlus threw up their arms and crouched low. A baseball sized chunk bounced off Meadows chest and forced him into a sitting position before it landed in his lap.

After everyone had recovered, Cynder looked over to see spyro lying unconscious on the ground. She ran over to him and began to sniff about his head and neck, checking for a pulse, no one noticed that Reed and Heather were still unconscious from the blow. Swift and Prowlus soon joined her. "Spyro? Spyro wake up." Cynder kept saying over and over. Prowlus got sick of it and lightly slapped the side of Spyro's head and yelled "SPYRO!" Spyro's head quickly shot up before he snarled and jumped into a defensive stance. He looked around a bit before relaxing slightly. "C-c-cynder? Prowlus? What's going on? Did I not save the world? Are we all de-"Cynder cut him off "No! We aren't dead! You did it spyro! You saved the world! Somehow you brought us to the surface and encased yourself in that yellow crystal like before when we were trapped for three years. I don't know how I wasn't, but you're alive!" she shouted happily before bounding up to him and twining her neck around his.

"Umm…Cynder?" Spyro asked a bit confused. Cynder opened her eyes and realized what she was doing. She quickly untangled their necks and backed away a few steps. She was blushing like mad. "Sorry Spyro. I'm just so happy to be able to talk to you. I've been so close, yet unable to for weeks." He smiled back at her "Its ok Cynder, I just didn't expect it. I don't mind having you near me. So how long has it…?" Spyro trailed off and staggered a bit before flopping onto his side in exhaustion. Cynder gasped before remembering the green crystal she had. She put it down in front of him and placed his paw on it. A green energy began to slowly flow from it into Spyro.

As everyone was gathered around Spyro, no one noticed meadow had regained his senses. He shook his head and looked around at the floor before noticing the yellow crystal sitting in his lap. As he looked at it, Meadow noticed a small flicker moving around within the crystal. He looked in awe before picking it up and bringing it closer to his face to see it more clearly. As Meadow stared into the crystal the flicker began to take form. It looked like a thin tendril of darkness within the crystal. As he watched, it seemed to whip towards him. The shadow tendril then whipped out of the crystal and entered his agape mouth. Meadow yelled in surprise and dropped the crystal.

Spyro had regained enough energy to get into a sitting position. Everyone was crowded around him when they heard Meadows yelp of surprise. They all turned to look at him and spyro was able to see past them as they parted to give him a view. Meadow was kneeling on the ground clutching his head. He yelled out in pain before going silent and looking up at the group. Swift gasped in shock and prowlus took a step back in horror. Spyro and Cynder sat paralyzed as they looked at Meadow. His eyes were completely black and seemed to seep shadows. Meadow looked around before looking at his paws and raising one hand above his head to look at it. He then snapped his head back down to gaze at the group in front of him.

Meadow looked at them for a while before standing up onto his two feet. He grinned twistedly. What happened next struck fear into all their hearts. Behind him, Meadows shadow began to grow and change into a shape the two dragons knew too well. Meadow looked spyro dead in the eye before whispering "Hello again Spyro. Didn't I tell you you could never defeat me?" he said with a sneer. Spyro gasped as Meadow let out an evil laugh and disappeared into the shadows. Swift and Prowlus looked dumbstruck while Cynder shivered violently against Spyro's side. Spyro shook his head in disbelief before tucking his head in against Cynder's. Malefor was back.

Dundunduun! Malefor is back! And he isn't happy that he lost his elemental powers. So I don't know how long it will be until the next update. As you can see, this one took a decent amount of time to finish. Ill try to keep it at weekly or every two weeks, but no promises! Thanks for reading! Let me know what you think!

JVuk out