Chapter 9: Deep Jungle Part 2
They all lunged towards the heartless, attacking them with full force. Percy was slashing at them with Riptide, Grover was attacking them with his nature magic, Tyson was hitting them on the head with his club, and even Tarzan was jabbing them with his spear. In no time the heartless were destroyed and the gorilla was saved. "Thank you" the gorilla muttered, nodding his head in appreciation, before bounding off towards the deeper part of the jungle.
"Where did they come from?" Grover asked. It was very peculiar; the jungle had every animal he could think of except the heartless. It was almost his paradise, you know if you added aluminum tin cans, satyrs, and his girlfriend maybe. Then out of the blue they appear and start terrorizing everything. This couldn't get any worse.
A worried expression crossed Tarzan's face and he said, "Save...Gorillas... Ee oo oo oo ah." Percy assumed this meant he'd get to go where Luke and Annabeth were, plus he understood what it felt like to save people you care deeply for, so he agreed to help him out. Great...thought Grover, let's just charge right into this dangerous jungle, but at the same time, he had hope that he might find the king where they were going, so they bounded into the jungle to save the gorillas from the heartless.
They ran past a wall of bamboo and into a clearing that was also filled with heartless. These things were everywhere! They were closing in on another gorilla, so they jumped in to the rescue. After slashing and stabbing, zapping and clobbering, all the heartless were defeated and the gorilla was saved. This one, like the first, mumbled a thank you before running away.
They ran through the jungle saving multiple gorillas from the terrors of the heartless. It wasn't long until the normal ones showed up with black bodies, antennas, and beady yellow eyes. They were fighting heartless non-stop, they fought them so much that whenever they entered a clearing the heartless attacked them. They came by the fives and the tens, there were so many of them. They went back to the tent to rest and report. "What happened?" Jane asked worried, Percy was catching his breath, so he took a big breath before saying, "Heartless...everywhere...loads of them."
"Oh dear, this is quite a problem." She said, even she-who knew nothing about the heatless in particular- knew that they were terrible monsters and had to be stopped. After Percy was rested he got back up to go out and fight them again.
This time they took the leafy green path, the one that lead through the tall trees and to hippo's lagoon. After hopping over hippos and climbing trees they found some more heartless in the branches of a tree terrorizing another gorilla. They fought and destroyed the heartless, saving the gorilla. The gorilla thanked them and ran away. So the Heartless can climb, they thought, Jane's right, this is a problem. The heartless could be anywhere and everywhere, they would never be able to get all of them.
The group travelled on to find the heartless had made it to the tree house. They were there terrorizing another gorilla. Percy jumped through the glass window into the tree house and the heartless started attacking him immediately. I hope this is making Tarzan happy, Percy thought, because this is exhausting. He pushed himself through it longing to make it to Luke and Annabeth.
They saved the gorilla and jumped down to the jungle floor below, the heartless were down there waiting for them. They appeared as soon as they hit the ground and swarmed the group, forcing them to fight them off. They finished them off and ran just to find another group of them waiting for them around the corner. When will this end, Percy thought as he fought them off.
Percy ran back to the camp to see that another set of heartless had found their way to the camp. Percy fought them off before heading inside the tent again. When they told Jane about what was going on outside, she said, "If they can go anywhere, then they can find Mr. Clayton. I do hope he's safe." That made Percy wonder what had happened to Mr. Clayton as well.
After he was all rested he exited the tent to fight once more, and as he did he heard a shot of gunfire off in the distance; should probably check that out, Percy thought. They ran towards the Bamboo thicket. When they came to the clearing, in the center of the clearing Percy saw Clayton's pipe. What could have happened for Clayton to leave his pipe behind? Percy wondered, just then a shadow crossed overhead. Percy turned, expecting to see more heartless, but instead he saw the form of Sabor the leopard looming in front of him.
Percy charged towards him with Riptide raised, but the leopard jumped over him and ran to the side. Sabor was running around so fast, Percy was lucky to get a swipe at him occasionally. Sometimes the leopard would jump into the bamboo thicket and jump back into the clearing from another point. Even with his friends helping Sabor was hard to catch.
Eventually, however, the best fell down dead. Tarzan went over and pulled one of his white fangs out of his mouth. He walked back over and gave the fang to Percy as a trophy.
Meanwhile, in other parts of the jungle, a gorilla was running. It was the gorilla that Grover had saved, and the one that had given him the gummi block. She ran past all the heartless in the jungle that tried to advance on her, and past the ones in the camp that glared at her menacingly. She ran until she made it into the safety of the tent which Jane was in. She plowed into Jane and knocked her to the floor. They hugged each other in comfort as they looked to the door of the tent, worry shown on their faces.
Percy had decided to go show Jane Clayton's pipe as a way to answer her questions of his safety. How Percy wasn't sure. As Percy turned to go back, they were swarmed by heartless again, and were a bit delayed. After defeating the heartless they went back to camp, where they fought off the heartless surrounding the area. The heartless really seem to gather around here don't they? Percy thought as he them off. After defeating them, they entered to talk to Jane, but Jane wasn't there.
"Hey, where's Jane?" Percy asked, although no one had the answer. It was probably a good idea to move away from the camp, but heartless were all over the jungle, nowhere out there was safe for her. Grover, who could read emotions, felt something weird around Tarzan and asked, "What's wrong, Tarzan?" Tarzan didn't turn around, but he said, "Something coming. Jane, danger. Jane near... Near tree house." Tyson was looking very worried, so he said,
"Sounds like trouble. Let's go."
As they exited the tent, they saw these new heartless. They didn't attack them, they looked like big mushrooms. After Percy hit them a few times, they didn't get destroyed exactly, it's like they left.
The group travelled deep into the jungle, and up a tree. They heard Jane call out Tarzan's name, so they knew she must've been close. She was probably in the tree somewhere, but they couldn't see her. There was black fruit everywhere, and a lot of heartless, so they assumed that the fruits were sort of suspicious. They constantly fought off the heartless while trying to remove a large black fruit from its vine. After they defeated the heartless, Percy slashed at the fruit with his blade, and down it went.
Behind the fruit, hiding in the hollow of the tree, was Jane and the gorilla from before. They asked her what happened, and she replied, "Clayton came to the tent, and... that's the last thing I remember."
"Clayton?!" Percy asked. He thought Clayton was dead, or at least in trouble from the way he dropped his pipe. Then Tarzan started to speak,
"Gorilla's trapped. Terk ran." That must've been the name of the gorilla,
Jane cried out in fury, "We must help the gorillas!"
Percy suggested that Jane should go back to the camp, and that they would help the gorillas. He didn't know her that well, but he assumed she wasn't much into fighting. So they lead Jane through the treetops and back to camp, where of course they had to fight off more heartless. They followed Jane into the tent, rested a bit before asking her, "Are you sure you'll be fine here?"
"Yes, I'll be fine. Now go help the gorillas." So they ran out of the tent, past the heartless and into the bamboo thicket. Percy was in such a hurry he ran past all the heartless and to where he last saw the gorillas.
When he made it there, he saw a whole group of gorillas backed into a corner by a bunch of heartless, Clayton standing across from them with his gun pointed towards the female leader they had seen earlier (A/N: Tarzan's Mom). The group of heroes ran into the clearing, and Percy shouted, "No!" While Tarzan and Percy had Clayton distracted at that moment the gorillas used that as their chance to escape. "Clayton?" Percy asked the hunter, Tarzan turned to him and said, "Not Clayton! Ee oo oo oo ah! Not Clayton!" Then Clayton attacked.
Percy, Tarzan, Tyson, and Grover, all fought against Clayton and his heartless henchmen. When they thought they had one, Clayton turned his gun on them. The next thing they knew, the wall behind Clayton exploded. Tarzan ran up to Clayton, but was knocked back by some invisible force. Percy turned his attention from the knocked-back-Tarzan back to Clayton who was slowly rising up into the air.
A magical, invisible, barrier appeared behind them, as Clayton continued to rise, Gun trained on the group. He was apparently riding some invisible animal, for the next thing they knew the animal jumped at them. It jumped around, constantly. The good news was Clayton couldn't aim; the bad news was, neither could they. Like it was with Sabor, they were lucky if they got a shot in, for it was hard to catch.
They still attacked with all their might. Even though it was hard to fight an invisible animal, the floating Clayton above it kind of helped in that matter. With all of them fighting, the battle was over in no time. They learned if they hit it enough, it turned visible, and when it was an easy target it was easier to hit. That helped move the battle along a lot.
When the creature stood up, you could see the heart emblem on its chest, establishing it was a heartless. Otherwise, it looked like a giant chameleon. That explained the invisibility powers. They knocked Clayton off the beast, making him more vulnerable. They took him on, and weakened him greatly, while the other half took on the humungous heartless. It appeared though; the heartless was down for the count, so it wasn't a huge issue. The trick with Clayton was to hit him before he could aim his gun at you that was the trick.
After that Clayton stood up again, clutching his side. He was clearly wounded, but he wouldn't go down! Then, his heartless mimicked his movements, and stood up as if getting a second wind. The truth of the matter was, neither of them had the energy, and the heartless fell on top of Clayton, crushing him. The last sound Clayton made was his terrified scream. A glowing light erupted from the heartless' body as it disappeared and its heart floated up into the sky; Clayton was nowhere to be seen.
The gorillas gathered around their saviours, and the leader approached. Kerchak grabbed Percy's shoulder, and threw him up into an area above. Percy landed with a thud, Grover and Tyson following closely behind. Tarzan climbed up by himself, and together they looked back at the gorillas. The gorillas just walked away. Tarzan walked over to the other side's edge, the other's following close behind. On the side was a huge waterfall. "Tarzan, home." He stated, and the others understood.
Percy was overjoyed, Luke and Annabeth were supposed to be at his home. They ran inside the waterfall's cave, and Percy searched everywhere for them, but could not find them. They made it to the center of the cave, Tarzan was there waiting for them. There on the cave wall was a glowing blue light.
Jane and Terk came up behind them, apparently they didn't stay put. "Ee oo oo oo ah." Tarzan said slowly, Percy tried to understand,
"This is your home? But that means..." he stated, Tarzan held up a hand to stop him, and then cupped his hand to his ear as if to say 'listen'. "Huh?" Tyson said,
"The waterfalls..." Jane stated, "They're echoing all the way here."
"Ee oo oo oo ah." Tarzan stated, "Friends there. See friends."
"Oh, now I've got it." Jane said, "Ee oo oo oo ah means heart. Friends in our hearts..."
"Heart..." Tarzan repeated, as if comprehending it,
"Oh," Percy said disappointedly, "So that's what it meant." It turned out his friends weren't here after all.
Tarzan continued to explain, "Friends, same heart. Clayton, lose heart. No heart, no see friends. No heart, no friends."
Percy turned to Grover, scratching his head. He said, "Sorry about what I said."
Grover replied, "I'm sorry too." Tyson interjected,
"All for one, right?" The others nodded their heads in agreement, and Tyson smiled.
Then, the glowing blue light turned out to be made from butterflies, and all the butterflies flew away, revealing a large keyhole like the one before. Now Percy knew what to do. He summoned Riptide, and shot a beam of light into the hole. It made a loud clicking sound as it locked, and the hole disappeared leaving a keyhole shaped imprint where it was.
A gummi block fell from where the hole used to be, and Grover picked it up.
"A gummi!" Tyson said,
"But it's sure not the kings." Grover added in despair, looks like who they were looking for wasn't there either. Then Terk nudged Grover affectionately. Jane smiled and said in a sing-song voice, "I think someone has a new admirer."
Grover looked to Jane then back to Terk and shook his head, "No, no, no! Juniper would kill me!" Then Percy and Tyson laughed.
Meanwhile, back in the far away world, that mysterious group of people were discussing the events that recently occurred in the world Percy was in.
"What drew the heartless to that world?" the silky male voice asked,
Maleficent responded by saying, "The hunter lured them there. It was his lust for power that was the bait. But it seems the bait was too tasty for his own good." A spooky male voice laughed in response,
"Yeah," it said, "He got chomped instead!" Then a man wearing red and black robes and a twisted beard holding a serpent shaped staff stepped out of the shadows, in his silky male voice he said, "A weak-hearted fool like him stood no chance against the heartless." Jafar continued "But the boy is a problem. He found two of the key holes."
Maleficent didn't look worried, "Fear not." she said, "It'll take him ages to find the rest." A holographic image of Percy, Tyson, and Grover walking appeared on the table in front of them. She continued, "Besides, he remains blissfully unaware of our other plan."
A deep female voice from the shadows spoke up, "Yes, the Princesses..."
Maleficent looked up, "They are falling into our hands, one by one." she answered, she looked to the entrance of the room, where a princess had just been pushed in, "Speaking of which..." she said, as she stared at the trembling form of Alice.
A/N: Sorry I took so long to upload this next chapter, but I've been focused on other things. Things like getting a job, spending time with friends, studying for my driver's test, my mom's birthday which is tomorrow, that sort of stuff. The reason I'm not totally stoked for summer being I'm still busy. Don't blame me that me and my parents have different views for how holidays should be spent. My idea is leisure; theirs is catching up on work. Anyway, I'm also sorry for the repetition in the beginning of the chapter, but in the game they constantly do the same thing. I tried to mix it up a little, but it's harder than it looks. So to summarize, I'm sorry. Tell me what you didn't like and I'll try to fix it as best as I can.
Love22