A Reluctant Encounter
Team Up
Artemis had pulled Cortex out and started digging in the rest to pretend to find others when Nefarious knew that he was just looking for something to steal and worst it was his property that the Markazian was stealing. He ignored the bandicoots for a minute to approach the thief, "What are you looking for?" he said calmly.
"Um for more survivors," Artemis lied keeping a straight face and pretending to call out to no one in particular.
"Oh really then you won't mind if I send your thieving ass all the way to florana!" Nefarious shouted and shoved a gun in the Markazian's face.
"What are you getting at I'm not stealing anything! Artemis cried defensively with his hands up.
"Stop this, and how can you say that, he was doing nothing and if anyone was doing something suspicious it would be you!" Coco said pointing at Nefarious.
Nefarious glared at Coco and as soon as Nefarious turned around to face Coco, Artemis found his chance and grabbed hold of Nefarious's wallet without attracting any attention what so ever and then accidently dropped it. "I would have annihilated you all hours ago if you didn't know how to rid the galaxy of that false, army stealing, imbecilic reject!" Nefarious argued back while Artemis slowly backed away in the background.
"You're false!" Coco said crossing her arms and making Nefarious shake with fury.
"Enough of this pointless fighting, none of this is going to get us anywhere, we need to find out how Cortex got here on this ship," Aku-aku said.
Crash was curious and while they were arguing crash picked up the wallet then looked it over.
"Um, hey buddy that's mine," Artemis said pointing to the wallet.
Crash looked at the ID and looked at Artemis, Crash wasn't sure because the picture didn't look like Artemis, matter of fact it looked a lot like Nefarious but in confusion he scratched his head and loaned it back to the Markazian who was relieved.
Artemis was sure he would be caught but was now thankful that the creature that picked his treasure up was completely stupid and so he would make sure to praise all the stupid people in the galaxy, once he'd completed his plan for the future but that will be a while and he will have to wait until all this fighting with this Nefarious guy is done.
Crash walked back wondering how Cortex ended up here; he had thought he was with N. Tropy planning world or galaxy domination.
"Awww, how'd he end up here?" Crunch asked in confusion.
"Umm, pardon me outsider but who is he?" Jerold asked waving a hand.
"That's Neo Cortex, our enemy from the beginning and why we came here," Coco said.
"What and his partner isn't here!" Nefarious shouted out in disbelief and falling on his knees, wishing it was that easy to capture, torture, and kill the imposter. But instead it had to be the guy that he worked with, but this guy could be of use and a big use.
Cortex began to stir, his head ached and he wondered if he was dead "uhhh, is this heaven," he said as he sat up holding his head and then jumping when he spotted the bandicoots. "Crash bandicoot, and your meddling family, oh I am dead but why do I hurt so much," Cortex groaned.
"Quite being a fool, you aren't dead!" Crunch yelled grabbing and slapping some sense into Cortex.
"Jabba-gahibba?" Crash said, probably meaning "are you ok" as he walked over to his long-time foe.
Artemis was making an escape for his ship while everyone was distracted by the now conscious Cortex "oh no it is you, why do I always end up with you?" Cortex complained rubbing his cheek that was now red from Crunch slapping him.
"Enough of this where is your pathetic friend now!" Nefarious said jumping a little to close towards Cortex causing him to fall back screaming. "Oh, so this is the guy that I heard screaming like a girl!"
"Ahhhh, don't kill me!" Cortex screamed hiding behind Crash. Cortex was expecting Crash to be on earth but he should had known that the bothersome bandicoot would have found a way to find them no matter were he went but he wasn't expecting the bandicoots to have company, scary company that was glaring at him in a sinister manner and this robot wasn't at all like the ones that he had as body guards like he thought all the robots were like in this galaxy, no this one looked like he was much smarter than the guards, commanding, and very pissed off.
But at the same time as this psycho glared at him his right eye fell down out of place, in which Cortex noticed that there was a long scar running straight down through his eye causing it to fall out of it's original spot, Cortex thought this hilarious and couldn't help himself but chuckle as did all the bandicoots, it also made the robot less scary to him.
Nefarious noticed that the bandicoots were laughing at him along with this sad excuse for a scientist "you all think this is funny do you?"
The vullard Jerold raised a finger "I didn't know that happened."
"Yeah, did he tell you that he plays soap operas in his head?" Coco laughed as she fell on the ground.
"No, you do and I could fix that!" Jerold offered to Nefarious who looked like he was about to explode.
"Shut up Jerold and no I don't, their just saying that!" Nefarious yelled, only to hear Jerold start snoring.
Cortex had to stop laughing and ask "Um Coco, so who are they?" Cortex knew everything would come to him saving the world or galaxy along with his worst foe Crash again, who was now picking things up from the debris and he had to know who they were with, the red reptile looked harmless but the robot looked like he had murder written on his face.
"That sweet guy over there is Jerold," Coco smiled pointing to the sleeping vullard, "and that over there is mister I hate everyone Nefarious," she grumbled.
"Wh-what that's Nefarious, the Dr. Nefarious that was mistaken for N. Tropy," Cortex said in alarm. He hadn't thought that this Dr. Nefarious was a robot, one with so many problems, and all he knew that people were talking like he was dead, it also means that this robot wants his lab partner dead, and it wasn't any of they're fault that people thought that N. Tropy was him and he really couldn't see how people would mistake his lab partner for a robot. All he and his group wanted was to go home and take over earth, but with the mention of a clock N. Tropy was set off, now Tropy was going overboard.
"Yes, but we'll make sure that he doesn't do anything stupid, he's all talk and no bite." Coco said.
"Umm, Coco we shouldn't underestimate that guy, you did see how much power he had earlier," Crunch said, Cortex gulped and Crunch faced him "and you have some explaining to do."
"Yes you do!" Nefarious growled overhearing their conversation.
Cortex was forced to tell them everything from when he and his group arrived to how he ended here.
"You were attacked by zyhoids, we were told that's what those mushroom creatures were by fungoids, and as you can see they got Crunch, otherwise I don't know what those giant reptiles were because we haven't encountered any yet but I'm sure someone might know," Coco said glaring over at Nefarious and tapping her foot annoyed because Jerold was in one of his sleeping spells and the only one who knew anything was a big fat jerk.
"Children we might have a problem, that fellow that found Cortex is gone," Aku-aku said floating over.
"He wasn't nice enough to offer us a ride!" Crunch said annoyed "he knew I was in need of help, so what was his problem!"
"He's a damn thief you stupid animals, why am I the only one who sees it! Nefarious yelled frustrated.
"No, he probably didn't have room or was running out of gas and anyway we'll find someone else for a ride," Coco reassured, making Nefarious glare at her, and she returned the glare then stuck out her tongue.
Crash heard his and everyone else's stomach rumble, he hadn't had anything to eat ever since they've arrived and all he had was dirt which caused his mouth to dry. Crash could see his whole group was in the same condition as he was and he knew they had to have something to fill they're stomachs before they starved to death.
"You know hearing Cortex's story of trying to find a restaurant is making me want to find one," Crunch said rubbing his stomach.
"Um, at least a safe one!" Cortex replied quickly.
"Ok, well I don't think there's going to be one for miles and I don't know what we can eat out here and I'm sure I don't want to eat any of those weird purple tumble weeds I've been seeing every so often," Coco said in disgust. "But maybe some robot might be able to find a place for us to go," Coco said looking over at Nefarious.
"What are you looking at; I'm not a GPS system!" Nefarious said about to lose it.
"Can't you do anything, I'll just borrow Jerold's labtop," Coco said, missing her labtop that broke in the crash, but thinking while she's here she could soon buy another labtop just like Jerold's as she looked through it. Most of the stuff was confusing but her high I.Q eventually got her through everything and she soon learned they were on planet Lumos in Krell canyon and that they were close to a vullard settlement, that she guessed was Jerold's species which made her eager to go because there was a café, small hotels, spas and swimming pools.
"All right I found out we're on a planet called Lumos, the bad thing about it is that this planet is mostly desert-like and there are things called Tetramites crawling around here that can eat through anything.
"What's the good news," Crunch asked, hating from ever coming to this galaxy in the first place because everything and everyone wanted to kill them.
"Eh-hem, the good news is that there is a vullard settlement nearby," Coco smiled.
"Oh no why, I can't even stand one of them let alone more," Nefarious started complaining, thinking about a whole crowd of Jerold's surrounding him and driving him insane.
"What is that bad, are they creatures that want to kill anyone that steps on their territory!" Cortex asked desperately remembering the wedgie he'd gotten as a surprise when he entered the bar.
"I doubt they're anything bad if Mr. naughty shoes over there is complaining," Coco said scratching her chin and smiling at the thought of Nefarious being questioned and if they were lucky there might be police.
Crash could just dream of a nice hot meal and bath, then a extremely long nap that he'd never wake up from and he would dream of all the pancakes in the world to eat, he only hoped they had pancakes.
"Well fools don't just stand there lets get moving, Crunch isn't going to stand here hurting, and oh I don't think I could help move your new friend Jerold, he looks heavy," Crunch replied looking at the sleeping vullard.
"I think we should ask the vullards for some sort of medicine to stop him from falling asleep whenever we have a conversation," Coco said. "Well we need some volunteers to help move Jerold and Crunch can't do it," she said looking slyly over at Crash, Cortex, and Nefarious.
"No way I can't pick that thing up," Cortex quickly said and looked over at Crash and Nefarious.
Nefarious looked at Crash and Cortex "see you at that filthy settlement I'm not touching him!" he then shot up in the sky flying away.
Cortex's mouth was wide open as were the bandicoots "don't look at me I didn't know he could do that!" Crunch said shrugging his shoulders.
Crash and Cortex were stuck picking up or dragging Jerold along towards the settlement, Coco was going to tell that Nefarious a piece of her mind when she arrived, and she'll make sure of it.