Season Three – The Lost Armor – Episode Ten
"Sage…"
Light passed over the blonde man's face, intermittently, as if coming from a swinging lantern that flared and faded with each swing. He groaned as the pain in his neck and back flared.
"Sage?"
Then he remembered what had happened. His eyes swam uncertainly as he struggled to wake up, to move…his vision blurred, then focused on the face of the man that bent over him.
"R—" He tried to form the word with frozen lips, "Ro—"
"Hey, you're awake," He said quietly, "Let's get you to a cot."
Sage was picked up gently and laid on a bed that felt as hard as the snow that he had been dragged through. He struggled to sit up, but the man would not let him.
"You look like you didn't go down without a fight," He said, smirking, "They gave you extra special care when they dumped you in here. Seems like you gave them a heck of a run for their money."
"Rowen—" Sage finally got the name out through pain and ice.
"Yeah," The blue haired man's face was lit up by the sporadic flashing, dimming, and swinging of the light source.
"So cold here…" Sage groaned and tried to flex his painful fingers.
"Don't. You could make it worse," Rowen warned, "Why you aren't wearing gloves is beyond me, but I have mine."
Sage felt Rowen put his black driving gloves on his hands, "No, Rowen—you need them…"
"Not as much as you," His voice turned grim, "Bishkaki made me watch everything. Ryo could have been dead now if you hadn't given up those keys and your grip. If Cye hadn't tackled him away from you…"
"I know, I know…"Sage grumbled and raised his hands to his head. Nothing but static came through the speakers anyway, so he gingerly pulled off the helmet and dropped it on the floor, "Help me sit up."
"After the beating they just put you through? I don't think so, buddy," Rowen shook his head.
"I don't remember…" Sage grimaced, raising a hand to his forehead. The warmth of the gloves was thawing his fingers painfully, but he knew the stabs would fade into pinpricks eventually, "I—I get flashes, but nothing else."
"I wouldn't want to remember any of that either, hey," Rowen grimaced, "They caught you a long time ago. One hour for every goon I smashed with my armor."
"You have your armor now?" Sage pushed himself up and leaned his back against the wall. He sighed from the effort. Rowen just shook his head
"Yeah, I put it on as soon as I saw those eyes," He shuddered, "I fought back, but I barely had time to grab my briefcase before they pulled me under. I didn't get treated half as bad as they beat you up."
"Mine…I left it with Ryo…and the keys," Sage shivered uncontrollably, his teeth chattering, "I didn't want these creeps to get it…"
"Idiot! If you had kept your armor, their beatings wouldn't have hurt half as much, and you wouldn't have passed out every other hour!" Rowen snapped, clenching his fists, "I knew that you didn't have your armor, and it hurt me to have to watch that!"
"I didn't want to take the chance…" Sage grimaced at Rowen's outburst.
"Chance? What chance do we have at escaping with you in a condition like this?" Rowen sighed and sank back, his anger spent.
"With my armor orb…Ryo can use the energy to create the Inferno armor," Sage smirked with dry, broken lips, "Snow melts, my friend."
"You need four armors," Rowen reminded him, then slapped his own forehead, "Anubis' armor! But…Wouldn't Mia's Kayura armor work too?"
"Didn't wanna take that chance," Sage coughed from frozen lungs.
"You need to relax," Rowen said, "Sorry about blowing up. I—I didn't mean to call you an idiot."
I just hope Ryo and the others have better luck than we did,
Sage thought as he closed his eyes. He couldn't fall asleep again, but the pain…it dragged him back into the realm of darkness and unconsciousness."Did you find it?" Ryo called through the headset.
"No! Are you sure he didn't take it with him?" Cye responded.
They were combing the snow, trying to find the small orb that Sage had slipped to Ryo along with the keys. It had fallen when Cye had tackled him to get him away from the Wintry-Shard's eyes.
"It could be anywhere now," Ryo grumbled, "We need to find that orb!"
Hours later, and hundreds of square feet of snow later, the armor orb for the Armor of Halo was still missing…and they were all still in danger of being captured. Snow still fell, heavier than before.
"It's gone," Ryo hung his head and clenched snow in his fists, "They must have it!"
"Ryo, you can't just give up like this," Cye said, "We still have the other armors."
"Forget the armors, we need to find a way into wherever they took Rowen and Sage," Ryo grimaced, flexing his fingers. He got to his feet, "But how are we supposed to find a way into a place where we don't even know where it is?"
"We have to find a way…" Cye shook his head.
"There was one that Talpa sent to defeat Bishkaki," Anubis said aloud, through the howling of the wind and the static wave that suddenly passed across the speakers, "A creature he called Unicorn. It took the form of the myth, a one-horned horse, and was very deadly."
"Let me guess, he destroyed the Wintry-Shards," Ryo snapped, not meaning to sound angry, but he came out enraged and pissed.
"No, Bishkaki defeated it," Anubis admitted, leading them into the tree cover, "But, besides Talpa himself, Unicorn came the closest to ever defeating him."
"It? You mean it isn't male?" Cye asked, sitting on Sage's snowmobile. They had been forced to move them all out of the snow by hand and under the trees as they could, for fear of them being buried.
"If anything, Unicorn prefers taking the female form, for the horse-like form was female. Unicorn itself was just an wandering spirit," Anubis looked at the drifted wall of snow that stood beyond the shadow of the trees. The branches cracked under his feet as he took a step towards his snowmobile, "We must go."
"Why? Are they coming back?" Ryo moved to Sage's and pulled the keys from his pocket. None of the other snowmobiles had spares, which was strange in itself.
"I remember that flash of static from when Sage was attacked," He said, starting up the engine, "We have, perhaps, a minute before they arrive."
"Well, let's get going!" Cye jumped on Sage's snowmobile with Ryo, holding onto the strap across the seat.
They took off into the shadow of the trees, where it would be easier to get atop the snow. Once they reached the surface, however, there was a surprise waiting for them. Ryo growled angrily.
"Cye, take control, then follow Anubis! I'm going to take care of these jokers myself!" He handed over the snowmobile and jumped off in front of the white creatures with their black eyes.
"You want a fight? You got it!"
Armor of Wildfire, Dao Jin!
The familiar red armor encased him, and the two katanas fit perfectly in the grip of his hands. He hadn't known if this would work, because, no matter how hard they had tried, it had not come when bidden.
Now it did.
The creatures screeched and faced him, their black eyes following his every move. He lined them up with a smirk and the handles of his swords fit perfectly together.
"Flare Up…" He leapt into the snow filled air, "NOW!"
Vaporization…
The flames instantly disintegrated the creatures, leaving only a small disc behind. Ryo landed on the wet soaking grass and looked up at the head high trench that he had created in the snow.
"Not too tough," He grumbled. The Wildfire armor pulsed with a red glow and disappeared.
But the Wildfire swords remained.
He slipped them into the sheaths that had become a part of his subarmor.
"How cool is that?" He said aloud, "Maybe I can even use my attack out of armor…"
"Ryo!"
Cye's head appeared over the edge of the trench, "Are you all right?"
"Definitely…" He whispered, looking over his shoulder at the trench and the Swords of Wildfire. He turned his grin to Cye, "Very, definitely all right."
"That's good," He reached down, "Come on, we need to get home! Anubis thinks Mia might be in serious trouble."
"All right, let's go!"
Two pairs of raven black eyes followed their movements, counting how many Wintry-Shards they had destroyed and calculating the level of danger that their master faced.