"Are we free yet master?" Spyro said sarcastically looking over at Elora. Elora glared at him as she counted the things that they had done. They had cleaned the bathroom, the bedroom and they had gotten her, a new TV, a new coat, and some cute shirts.
"Unfortunately yes," Elora said as she grabbed all the pictures that were blackmailing the males. "A deal's a deal," She tore up all the pictures and gave them to Spyro who used a flame breath to destroy them completely.
"Elora you really sunk low this time," Ignitus grumbled looking at her with anger. "If I had the right mind I'd…"
"You'd what?" Elora mocked him.
"I'd, I'd, I'd," Ignitus stuttered. Spyro laughed at Ignitus anger and Flame just rolled his eyes.
"Cool it Ignitus, she was just playing around," Hunter said with a smile. "She wouldn't release the pictures would you Elora,"
"Hmmmmmmm, probably not, but don't think that I wouldn't threaten to do it," Elora said laughing.
"So what blackmail did she get you with?" Flame said looking at his friends.
"I'd rather not say," Ignitus grumped as he walked out of the hotel room.
"What was the point of telling you when I just did all this," Spyro said pointing to the spotless hotel room.
"Ummmmmm, do I have to tell," Hunter said twiddling his thumbs. "It's kind of embarrassing,"
"I was kidding, I don't want to know anyway," Flame replied as he walked out of the room. As he did he could feel someone contacting his mind.
"Flame, this is Ember, Marcus and Mat want to make sure Spyro is the keeper, tell him to come to the meeting house pronto," Ember said. "Oh and…are you sure that it is alright to ask Spyro out, because I'm doing it tonight," Flame paused for a moment and then gave his answer.
"Of course it's alright," Flame said holding back his disapproval. He didn't want her to ask him out but he couldn't tell her what to do.
"Alright, but no spying on us okay?" Ember said sternly making sure she got her point across.
"Okay, I promise, my love," Flame said lovey-dovey like.
"Then I'll see you at the meeting," Ember said breaking the contact between their minds.
"Hey guys," Flame yelled as he poked his head through the door. Hunter was hitting Spyro with a pillow and Elora was on the ground laughing. "There is another meeting about the up coming mission that we have to go to,"
"Okay," Spyro said running out of the room leaving Flame, Hunter, and Elora in the dust. 'I'll race you,"
"No fair, you always get head starts," Hunter yelled and ran off.
"My God, do you guys always have to make a competition out of everything?" Elora complained running out of the room with Flame.
"Yep, and the girls always loose,' Flame said running ahead of Elora.
"Oh really," Elora said running after Flame with new found speed. They group raced down all the flights of stairs and out of the lobby. They sprinted down the streets until Hunter tripped up Spyro causing a pile-up. "Hunter, for a cheetah you're a klutz,"
"Spyro tripped me up!" Hunter complained as he moved Flames tail out of his face.
"We're going to be late if we don't hurry," Flame grumbled as he got out of the pile. The group untangled themselves from the pile and entered the meeting house. They were greeted by Babylon who was standing at the doors entrance. She gave them a great big smile and then focused her glance on Spyro. She immediately took her tail and slapped him over the face with it.
"You little dork, you set me up!" She yelled at him angrily.
"I have no idea what you're talking about," Spyro said nervously recovering from the blow. She whipped her tail around again but Spyro ducked.
"Don't lie; you knew what the massages were for!" Babylon shouted.
"For comfort and relaxation," Spyro said mockingly. Babylon swung her tail downward and swiped his feet out from under him.
"For young dragons having growing pains you dumb…" Babylon said but cut her self off at the end. "Brat,"
"But you looked so young, I figured you needed it," Spyro joked getting up. Babylon just glared at him and walked into the meeting room.
"Nice," Flame said looking over at Spyro.
"What?" Spyro said innocently. "I honestly didn't know,"
"When will the madness stop?" Elora said burying her hands into her face. When everything got settled Flame and the others took there seats to see Mat and Marcus fiddling with a case with a hospital sign on it.
"Great, everyone's here," Marcus said unlocking the case. "Now let's begin, to insure that Spyro truly is the "keeper", we'll need a DNA sample," Marcus said pulling out a big needle. Flame laughed as he saw Spyro go into shock. One of Spyro's fears were needles, he hated them.
"Not in a million dragon years are you going to touch me with one of those," Spyro said nervously.
"Oh quit whining, just suck it up," Elora said.
"Come on buddy, you can do it," Hunter said smiling.
"Spyro it won't hurt a bit, I promise," Ember said sweetly.
"Alright!" Spyro yelled. "I'll do it," He walked up to where Marcus was and held out his hand. "Just do it and make quick,"
"It won't hurt a bit," Marcus said assuring him. Spyro closed his eyes and felt something touch him, which he thought was Marcus making sure he put the needle in the right spot. "Alright, we're all done," Marcus said patting Spyro on the back.
"What, you did it already?" Spyro said looking shocked. "All I felt was you touching my arm,"
"That was the needle you dork," Elora said half laughing.
"Oh, okay," Spyro said turning red. He made a huge deal out of a little needle. He was embarrassed; he paced back toward his seat next to Ember and sat down with out another word.
"See, I told ya it wouldn't hurt," Ember said smiling.
"Well if he indeed is the "guardian" then he'll have a special chromosome in him that will stand out from the rest," Marcus said typing on his laptop.
"This is much easier then last time," Mat said throwing his hands up in the air. "Last time we had to hold auditions, it took sixteen weeks,"
"Amen to that," Babylon said sarcastically. Marcus's laptop made some sort of buzzing noise and he turned on the projector hocked into his computer. The information was now spread across the wall onto a projector screen.
"Congratulations Spyro, you're not the guardian!" Marcus said burying his hands in to his face. "Time for auditions,"
"God Damn it all to hell," Mat yelled. "Not again," Babylon hit him with one of her claws.
"Show some control," She yelled at him.
"You mean Spyro isn't the guardian!" Bianca said shocked. For once, Spyro wasn't the one who was going to save the world. There was someone else out there who was going to, but who was it?
"Didn't see that coming," Flame said also shocked by the news.
"Well, we'll have a second meeting tomorrow because I still have to prep are equipment, not to mention give the coordinates to the prof guy," Mat complained.
"We can't, time is too short, we'll have to start them now starting with you guys," Marcus said preparing more needles. "Okay, single file line please,"
"Okay teacher, will we have any homework today?" Elora mocked stepping into line.
"Yeah, not to die," Marcus said coolly. "Vice will do anything to get those dark crystals, even kill," This comment made everyone feel uneasy, all the villains that they had versed before never mentioned killing, except for the Dark Master. They might of said get rid of but Spyro didn't connect that to killing.
"You look surprised," Babylon said cocking her head as she always did when she was confused.
"Well see, everyone except for a handful of the foes I versed never would kill as a first resort," Spyro began. "Gnasty Gnorc is too stupid to kill anyone, Ripto is a big softy, Red is probably too old to kill anyone now, and the Sorceress probably wouldn't want to get blood on her cloths!"
"Well then you've faced some pretty wimpy foes," Matt said laughing. "All the ones we've been facing are evil to the last bone of their body,"
"Well all except two," Spyro replied. "The Dark Master and…" He began to say it but stopped. He didn't want to hurt Cynder's feelings so he stopped.
"It's alright Spyro, you can tell," Cynder said looking at him sweetly.
"And Cynder," Spyro finished.
"Heh, doesn't this little girl have the same name?" Matt pointed out bluntly.
"It's just a coincidence right?" Babylon said giving Matt a dirty look.
"No, it's not," Spyro said looking down at the floor. "Cynder was once evil, she was possessed by the Dark Master so it wasn't her choice," Spyro held out a picture of Cynder back when she was possessed, it sent shivers down everyone's back.
"You telling me that this little sweetie over here was that," Matt said astonished. Cynder looked down at the floor by the comment, was she really that bad? She didn't remember any of it; the first thing that she remembered was seeing Spyro standing over her, his handsome body smoking with purple fumes. Right then and there she knew she wanted him as a mate.
"Heh, don't hurt her feelings, she didn't have a choice, she's not bad anymore!" Spyro shouted at Matt.
"Why you so protective of her?" Matt said frowning.
"She's my friend, that's……all," Spyro said but remembered not to hurt her feelings. It was too late though because the comment sent Cynder into tears. "Damn," Spyro thought as she ran out the door.
"Good job Romeo," Elora said rolling her eyes.
"Go, Spyro, apologize to her," Ember said gently.
"Okay," Spyro said as he sulked away out the door. He looked out into the hallway and saw Cynder enter the dragoness's bathroom. "Oh great!" Spyro thought as he threw his head into his claws. "She ran into the girl's bathroom and I don't even know how to apologize to her with out further hurting her feelings," Spyro went over to the door and knocked lightly.
"Go away!" Cynder shouted. She was really having the worst day of her life. She loved Spyro, and now everyone knew. "They probably already knew," Cynder thought. Spyro knocked again but he got the same response. "I said go away!"
"Listen I just want to say I'm sorry, I didn't mean to hurt your feelings, I didn't know you liked me like that," Spyro said. He lied, he knew she loved him but this was the only way he could apologize with out hurting her feelings.
"Really?" Cynder said in a less gloomy voice.
"…Yeah…," Spyro mumbled. Cynder finally came out from the bathroom and looked at Spyro. She ran to him and hugged him, throwing her head into his chest. Spyro was caught off guard at first but then returned the embrace. "Cynder…I don't like you that way though," Spyro finally said looking down at her. Cynder's heart dropped, she felt something inside her break into tiny pieces. Then it was replaced with something she hadn't felt in a long time. Something that she thought was gone from her for good, hatred. She hated Ember; she was the one who stole Spyro from her.
"It's alright, I understand completely," Cynder said disguising her true feelings. "I'm going to go home and rest okay," Spyro looked at Cynder's face, it didn't look sad or mad, it looked blank.
"O-kay," Spyro said watching her as she paced away. He made his way back into the meeting room just in time to hear the results.
"Okay…Bianca, negative, Ember, negative, Hunter, negative, Ignitus, negative, Flame, POSITIVE!" Marcus said happily.
"What in all the Gods do you mean I'm it!?" Flame said dumbstruck. "How could I be a guardian, I don't even know what they do!"
"Were you paying attention at the first meeting?" Babylon asked.
"I drifted off toward the part about the force field," Flame said shrugging his shoulders. "I figured Spyro would be the only one who had to worry about it,"
"Honestly I fell asleep too," Spyro said taking his seat.
"Is there anyone who didn't fall asleep?" Marcus asked angrily.
"I didn't," Bianca said standing up. "You said something about the guardians opening the force field, then you would blow-up (Split) the meteor,"
"Good, at least someone pays attention," Matt said sarcastically. "I didn't, fell asleep too,"
"I dislike a lot sometimes Matt," Babylon said frustrated.
"How do I open the force field?" Flame said scratching the top of his head.
"Ummmmmm, we don't really know, they just do it," Marcus said.
"Are you sure I'm the guardian, I mean I don't feel like one. How accurate is that machine of yours?" Flame spoke.
"It's only been wrong once, and that's when we lost……," Marcus began but then looked down at the ground.
"Damnit stop dwelling in the past Marcus, we got to move on!" Matt yelled at him. "It won't do any good to bring it up," Marcus stared at Matt angrily; he swung his fist at him and hit him in the lower jaw.
"You didn't care for either one of them," Marcus swore at him. "So shut up!" Babylon stepped in-between them and stopped their fighting.
"Stop acting like kids, I miss Florence and Sophia too but nothing we can do can bring them back, we all cared for each other and they sacrificed their lives for ours," Babylon yelled at them both. "What would they think of us if they saw us fighting?"
"I'm totally lost, who are those people?" Hunter asked startled by the sudden violence.
"It's a long story, to make it short they were members of are team, on one of our missions they sacrificed their lives for ours," Babylon said. "I'll never forget the last thing they said to us, Go on, you think this meteor scares the mighty duo,"
"They were brother and sister, I...I loved Sophia, and Florence was like a brother to me," Marcus said. "But I got careless, and it cost them their lives,"
"Okay, that's all for right now, you guys should soak up the free time today because tomorrow will be prep time for the mission," Babylon said patting Marcus on the back. "If you need us, our ship is parked at the professor's,"
"Okay," Ignitus said dryly and walked out. The only one that wanted the meeting not to be over was Ember. Her feelings were mixed up on whether to ask Spyro out or not.
"I don't want to break Flame's heart again, but then again he said I could, be we kissed and that would be cheating, but Spyro and I also kissed," Ember's thoughts screamed in her head. "Okay," she thought. "I won't ask him but if he asks me then I'll go out with him," She agreed that was a perfect compromise being fair to everyone's feelings. Flame was depressed though. He knew that if Spyro and Ember went out he wouldn't have a chance.
"Well I knew this would happen," Flame thought to himself. "She'll forget all about me and go with Spyro," He noticed though that he wasn't alone, in his mind.
"So is that how you think?" Ember said angrily to him. "Well here's the deal, I'll be fair to everyone's feelings," "If Spyro stays quiet then I won't ask him, if he asks me I'll say yes…fair?"
"I guess," Flame sighed. He remembered what Babylon had said and decided to forget about his love problems for the moment and go enjoy himself. "What to do," he thought silently in his head.
"How about you go do something fun with Hunter, or try to cheer up Cynder," Ember said, still contacting his mind.
"Okay, I'll get Hunter to do something," He said sighing. "Not to be offensive to Cynder but she still creeps me out a little,"
"Hey, that's not nice!" Ember said sternly in his mind. "She has gone through a lot lately, give her a break!" With that Flame felt Ember's presence fade away from his mind.
"Why do I even bother?" Flame said out loud. He couldn't understand how Ember could be so insensitive about his feelings. Then he realized something, if Ember ignored Spyro's feelings she would be insensitive about his feelings. She was just trying to make everyone happy.
"Excuse me, its Flame right," Babylon said slyly stepping up to him.
"Yeah, what's up," Flame said glancing over his shoulder.
"Do you happen to know where Ignitus is?" She asked nicely.
"Ummmm, he would be at the cemetery, but aren't you supposed to be at the ship?" Flame said.
"Marcus said I could go mingle with you guys, I've never been around my own kind you know," Babylon said. "But why would he be at the cemetery?"
"To pay respects to Erika," Flame said.
"What happen to her, he mention her before," Babylon said. Flame though for a moment until answering.
"It's not my place to tell you, ask him if you want to know," Flame said looking at her. There was a long silence before anyone spoke.
"Oh…okay I'll ask him myself," Babylon said walking away hastily. Flame was sure of it now that Babylon had a crush on Ignitus. No one had ever loved him that way since his late mate Erika.
"Fun, right," Flame said turning around. He stopped in his tracks and just sighed. "Who am I kidding, I can't have fun…I might as well go home," Flame thought to himself. He walked in the direction of the ship so he could find out more about what they had talked about during the meeting. If he couldn't have fun he wanted to know more about what they were up against. "I'm tired of all this drama, I need some action," Flame joked to himself. He followed the directions that Babylon had given him just before she left and saw a grey metal mass with jet boosters sticking out the end. It had a huge symbol on it that read I.P.R. He didn't no where to enter so he just banged on the ship. He noticed a hatch open up and Matt pop his head out.
"Huh, oh it's just you, come on in we're not doing anything important," Matt said waving him on in. Before he could press the button to lower the stairs Flame spread out his wings and hovered up to where he was standing. Matt was taken aback by this but he stepped aside and let Flame enter. Instead of seeing Marcus getting ready, he was simply playing with a machine that Flame was not familiar with.
"What's that?" Flame asked poking it with his claw. He saw two buttons and pressed the one with the light on it. The machine opened up and revealed a disk shaped plastic object spinning around on a circle. "Oops, did I do something wrong?"
"Nope, you just opened it up," Matt said closing it. Flame looked over to the screen where Marcus was focusing his attention on. He saw a human on a board with wheels doing various flips and grinds on bars and cars.
"It's a video game," Marcus said pressing a button on the controller and looking up. Flame examined it closely but soon lost interest in it when he remembered why he came over here.
"Hey, can you tell me more about the whole guardian thing, I want to know more about it," Flame said sitting on the floor. Matt looked at Marcus and laughed as did he. Flame was irritated by their laughter, what did he say?
"Sorry Flame, it's just that we don't know anything about the whole guardian thing, nobody but you knows," Marcus said.
"Oh," Flame said sitting up. He began to leave but was stopped by Matt.
"Hey man, don't leave yet, we'll teach you how to play "Ultimate Skater 5"," Matt said leading him to his seat. Flame began to laugh and forget about all the drama and worry about everything going on. All he was concerned about right now was to get the high score.
Babylon made her way up to a hill that contained many graves. She had received directions by a nice young dragon how to get to the cemetery. She spied Ignitus looming over a large grave at the edge of the hill. She approached slow and carefully but she soon found that he already knew she was there.
"Why are you here?" Ignitus asked solemnly.
"I just wanted to know if you were okay," Babylon said genteelly.
"Oh……," Ignitus said but trailed off in the middle of his thought. Babylon looked down at the grave and saw the name Erika on it. She looked at Ignitus who seemed to be looking at something else, something in the past.
"So, you really liked Erika," Babylon said softly.
"I loved her, she was my life back then, and we were mates for life," Ignitus mumbled. "Until…she died," Ignitus let out one single tear, one single drop left his eye and slid down his snout and fell to the ground.
"…how" Babylon said looking concerned at him. Ignitus looked at her with a new perspective; he saw not just beauty on the outside, but beauty on the inside.
"Well…I had a best friend by the name of Infernos," Ignitus began. "He had a crush on Erika as did I," "Erika couldn't break any of our hearts so we began to quarrel about her," "Finally as a last ditch attempt to try to win her over, Infernos kidnapped her," "I pursued him until I found him at a Volcano by the name of Vulcan," "As we fought amongst ourselves, Erika…she, she died," "I don't know how she just died," Ignitus cried out in agony. He bawled as he began to remember the events that took place that day.
Flash Back
Ignitus charged at Infernos with his horns raised. Infernos dodged it and shot a deadly ball of ice at him.
"Give it up Ignitus, I was always the strongest one," Infernos laughed as the ball nearly hit him. It shattered into pieces that projected everywhere. Infernos felt something hit him in the stomach. He looked down to see a shard of ice lodged inside of himself. He fell down almost instantly, and a pool of blood formed around his body. Ignitus was left unharmed, but as he looked over at where Erika was standing she had a small shard of ice stuck inside of her. Ignitus quickly ran over to her and held her in his arms shaking her.
"Erika, Erika wake up!" He cried as tears fell from his eyes. She opened one eye slowly and began to speak.
"Good job…you got him but…he got me," Erika slowly said. "I want…you to know that you…you…were," Erika said but began to fade off.
"Were what?" Ignitus spoke gently into her ear.
"…a f-a-t-h-e-r," Erika said with her last breath. With that she slowly slipped away in the arms of Ignitus as he screamed and cursed everyone and everything for what happened.
Babylon looked at him as he cried into one of her shoulders. She felt so bad for him, yet she could think of nothing to do but feel overwhelmed by the pain and sadness of somebody she felt close to. She just looked down at him, she just wanted to make him happy, get a smile out of him but it was no use. He cried and cried and cried until he was dry of tears.
Ember was a little surprised about how things had turned out. She had expected to have Spyro come out and confess his love for her instead he had simply asked her if they could go do something together, which she felt was like going out. Ember had picked a favorite spot of hers, the woods. She loved the woods because it was quiet, private, and beautiful. She was simply sitting there admiring the view when she noticed Spyro starring at her. When she glanced over at him he didn't look away but continued to stare. She just giggled and returned it. Spyro just couldn't look away, he was entranced by her.
"You're so beautiful," Spyro blurted out. He immediately got red and looked away. Ember on the other hand moved closer to him.
"Really, how beautiful?" Ember said softly looking at him. Spyro was tongue-tied at first but he soon found that he could comfortable talk to her.
"The most beautiful I've ever seen," Spyro said as he met her gaze once again. Little did they know that the forest wasn't as private as they thought. Among them was a stalker, a jealous heart broken one. Cynder sat behind the bushes watching the two stare at each other.
"No…," She thought as she watched them. She knew they were going to kiss, and everything else that followed. "No…," Anger built inside of her and she lost control of her thoughts and her feelings. She began to have thoughts of destruction and evil, of murder. Her last thought was that she felt something enter her, something that she had felt before but she couldn't remember what it was. She grew three times her regular size, but Ember and Spyro were to busy staring at each other to notice. Cynder started forming an electric sphere in here hands. She put all of her rage and all of her sorrow into and with one last thought of pain she shot the ball at the pair.
"DIE!" she screamed as the ball raced toward the couple. Spyro and Ember looked over in fear as the ball bounded toward them and directly hit Spyro. Ember was hit by the bolts that came off the ball. The two were both sent flying back into a tree. As Cynder regained control of her feelings she looked in fear of what she did.
"No…Noooooooooooooooooooo!" She screamed as she ran away. She ran as fast as she could, away from everyone, away from everything, and away from herself.
"What?" Flame questioned to himself as he was walking in the meadow. He had just left the ship after he began getting tired and was walking home. He had felt someone contact his mind, it was only brief but he had made out two words, "help" and "woods". He could also tell that it was Ember and that she was in distress. With that combination in his mind he raced across the meadow with new found speed. He now saw the trees rise up on the horizon. He entered the forest and began searching the woods for anything that was a clue to what could of happened. His clue was a large gaping whole in a tree. He followed the trail until he found two limp bodies of Ember and Spyro. "Oh my Gods," he shouted as he ran to his friends. They both looked dead, like they had been struck by lightning. He examined Ember more closely to find that her chest was slowly rising and falling. He crawled over to her and shook her. "Ember, Ember!" Flame yelled as he shook her. She opened one eye then the other.
"What are you doing…here?" Ember said coughing.
"You contacted me…what happened?!" Flame said softly to her. She began to fade off a little but she kept talking.
"Cynder…she attacked us…Flame…do you…still love…me?" Ember said gasping for breaths. Flame was puzzled by the question; she had to be out of her mind.
"Of course I do, I always will, for an eternity and forever," Flame said holding her tight up against his chest.
"Good," Ember said and went unconscious.
"Ember no come back, Ember, EMBER!" He yelled into the night shaking his beloved. He called for help and stayed there, shaking her until he realized it did no good, she was gone.
