Chapter 7: The Darkside of a Legend
The next morning the brawlers were slow to wake up. Sonic thought that as usual he was the first one up so he was going for a warm up jog around the mansion. When to his surprise he saw a dark shape sitting on the roof. Thinking it was Shadow he leapt up using his spring jump to get the height he needed.
Cynder meanwhile was watching the sunrise when she heard the sound of someone landing on the roof behind her. Turning she saw a blue hedgehog looking around confused, "Oh hey Cynder I must have mistook you for Shads. See ya!" He called running and leaping off the edge of the roof again.
"Well that was weird." She muttered shaking her head before sinking into the shadows along the rooftop.
Meanwhile Spyro was still sound asleep in their room lying on his back, wings spread, one of his hind legs twitching. A line of drool hanging out of his mouth. Coming in Cynder sighed and started poking him in the side with her tail "Come on you purple goof wake up! I can't believe you're going to be late to your match because you can never get up early." Finally she took a step back and used a gust of wind to flip him over so that he landed on his stomach facing the opposite direction.
Jerking his head up he glanced around frantically "Huh? What? I'm up, I'm up."
"About time. Your match starts in less than 10 minutes!"
Leaping to his feet he started running from the room "Oh shit!" Following close behind was Cynder and the two of them raced for the main hall.
Fortesque watched as the two dragons raced down the stairs, Spyro hit the bottom of the stairs and started to turn himself only to skid some as he fought for traction. Seconds later Cynder leapt over the last couple steps and slammed into him causing both of them to skid into a wall.
"Next time we're running late I'm teleporting us down here with my cloak." Cynder groaned as she picked herself up off the floor.
"Next time don't leave me sleep till I only have ten minutes left. Why the hell am I such a heavy sleeper now anyway? We never had a problem with me getting up early during our last adventure."
"That was because you and I were chained together. So when I got up, you got up." She retorted as he climbed to his feet as well. Getting his one horn unstuck from the wall. Looking at the hole left by it she muttered "I hope they don't expect us to fix it."
They ran over to where the rest of them were gathered and the hand pointed through the door saying "Spyro you head that way. I promise we did not pick her as your opponent."
Heading through the door he muttered "You better not have."
Once in the arena the Commentators immediately got into their jobs. "Hey everyone. Sorry we weren't here for the first few matches but Adam here tried to pass himself through the wrong system and blew every circuit in the booth." Sparx opened pointing at the nearby laptop.
"What did I tell you? That stupid brother of Master Hand's pointed out the wrong access port for me to transfer through. Instead of the wireless system I tried to communicate through the power lines." A voice responded indignantly – if a computer can sound indignant – as a camera rose from the computer to peer over the edge.
"Keep it down you two. Fighting amongst ourselves is pointless. Besides that's the brawler's job." Rokusho pointed out before the two could continue.
Stepping forward Raven started talking in a bored monotone. "Okay while Rokusho breaks those two up. I'll do our actual job and introduce the match. This time around we have Spyro the Dragon versus an old enemy of his, Gaul the Ape King."
Gliding in from the edge of the Arena Spyro glanced up at the commentator's booth in surprise before muttering "Well he's better than them forcing me to fight Cynder I guess."
Looking across the arena he spotted Gaul, twin swords held ready. The gem in his one eye glowing bright green. Charging he swung both swords at Spyro, who's eyes glowed dark blue and time slowed as he leapt backwards dodging the slashes. Time sped back up as he loosed a torrent of flames at the massive ape scorching both forearms, a blind swipe from Gaul smacked Spyro back towards one of the walls. But instead of hitting it he curled into a boulder using his Earth power and rolled through the wall.
"Hah it'll take more than a simple smack to keep my brother down. Last time they fought he didn't have his elements on his side. So maybe this time he can beat Gaul without having to use Convexity." This last was an aside to the other commentators not wanting to pass such a cryptic comment onto the gathered brawlers.
Unbeknownst to Sparx, in the stands Cynder was even more nervous than he was. Her claws dug into the seat beneath her leaving long gouges. Last time these two had fought they- Spyro, Sparx, and herself –had ended up trapped in a crystal for three years, after the dragon she secretly loved had been partly corrupted by the same power that had twisted her years ago. "Please come out safe." She whispered gazing down at the fight. Behind her Phantom raised an eyebrow before looking over at Beyond who shook his head.
Letting loose a burst of lightning at Gaul he watched as the Ape blocked it with his sword only to magnify the damage as every arc was absorbed and transferred into him by the metal sword. Then he froze a layer of razor sharp ice along his tail and swung it down into Gaul's shoulder leaving a deep gash in the fur and muscle, shocking a roar from the Ape king. Shoving off its head he spread his wings and took flight launching several firebombs at him scorching the patchwork armor he wore, and singing the matted fur that covered his body.
"Hah. Ape Flambe anyone?" Wolf asked the audience from his seat in the commentator's booth. Getting a laugh from almost everyone except for a few people. Batman, Cloud, Shadow, and Samus cause they never laughed, barely ever cracked a smile. But Cynder because of her worry about her friend coming out okay. And the two brawlers behind her because of their confusion about what was wrong.
Sparx spotted a rainbow colored object floating through the air above the arena. "And there is the Smash ball! Once he gets it Spyro can use his final smash sending this little freak back to whatever pit he came out of."
Hearing this Spyro directed his attention towards the small object. Shooting several icicles at it he smashed it feeling a river of power flood into his body. Reaching into the depths of himself he tried to trigger his fury attack so that he could charge energy into it. But instead of triggering his fire fury something else began to happen.
A pair of moons seemed to fade into view above the arena centered above Spyro, they aligned perfectly one in front of the other. A column of purple energy rocketed down from them striking the young dragon and filling him with its power, a loud roar of pain echoed from the now obscured warrior. In the commentator's booth Sparx's eyes widened in fear at the sight. "No it can't be."
High in the stands Cynder had a look of fear and distress in her eyes. "Please tell me I'm dreaming, or hallucinating, anything would be better than this being a reality, not this, not now." She muttered in despair.
As the initial surge of energy faded and the light dissapeared a dark form stood in Spyro's place. The scales seemed to devour any light that touched them, an aura of darkness poured off its form. Dead, white eyes seemed to glare at the cowering Ape King. A savage grin twisted the once kind face as the shadow creature gazed upon his prey in savage delight, once bright golden horns now a dark, dim, bronze.
In the stands and the booth Cynder and Sparx whispered the same two words at the same time. "Dark Spyro."
The Dark hero let loose a savage roar of untameable rage and power. Challenging the whole world to think about facing him…
Author's Note:
Hah, a slightly shorter chapter and now CLIFFHANGER! I've been trying to work on them for a while now and am starting to get the hang of it.
Ready… Set… Brawl!
