"I wouldn't do that." Skylor freezes at Viperae's words, hand hanging in the air in front of the master of ice's fallen form. "Not unless you want to share in his sorry state, that is."
Skylor had no idea what was going on with Zane, why he had seized up and then just collapsed, nor why ice was now creeping along the ground from his position. She might have taken the villain's words for mere taunting if she hadn't learned firsthand that her powers were not quite as gone as she thought they were.
If I can't touch him, how do I help him? Skylor worries. She glances over at Viperae, who was eyeing Zane on the ground. And what if Viperae tries something?
As if spurred on by her thoughts, Viperae steps towards the fallen nindroid. She steps forward so she's between the villain and the white ninja, a determined look her eyes.
"I was only going to put his soul stone back." He raises an eyebrow, looking unimpressed. "Unless you think he'd be better off without it?"
She doesn't take her eyes off the villain, knowing better than to underestimate him. One glance back would be all the advantage he'd need to get the drop on her.
"I'm not letting you near him like this."
"Funny… I don't know how you intend to stop me when you can't even touch me." The villain chuckles.
Skylor feels the blood drain from her face as she realizes the full extent of their mistake. She couldn't touch Viperae without being debilitated by the pain that the other was feeling, and she didn't know what would happen if she tried to touch Zane. He'd appeared to be in pain before his collapse, so it was likely that she'd end up debilitated no matter what… He'd played his hand so well, standing back and letting the ninja leave their most vulnerable members behind with him.
Seeing her doubt, the villain steps forward, forcing her to back up. He smirks and lightly says.
"We still have a truce, remember?"
"So I'm supposed to believe you don't have any plans to attack either of us?" She didn't believe him. Not in the slightest. Still, she backed up when he stepped forward again, feeling a bite of frost nipping at her heels as she did.
"You can believe whatever you want to." Viperae says easily, stepping forward again, finally forcing her to step aside or deal with whatever consequences would befall her should she brush against Zane right now. "I can only assure you I have no intentions of hurting either of you at the moment."
I need a weapon. She thinks urgently. But he'll notice me looking for one if I do it now…
An idea hits her, then. It'd be risky… but it was their only option.
She doesn't say anything, just steps back and eyes the villain wearily. He watches her for a moment before kneeling to examine the white ninja. She waits until she's certain he isn't watching her, and then quickly scans the area for something she can use against him.
There weren't any fallen branches laying around, they'd gathered them all for their fire pit…
Viperae lets out an annoyed sigh, which draws Skylors eyes back to him, her heart beginning to pound in her chest.
"You're right…" He's looking down at one of his hands, which are still trembling. He wasn't talking to her, so she can only assume he was conversing with Jay. Good. Maybe he knew she needed someone to keep the villain's attention while she got a weapon.
Stepping back lightly, she moves back where Viperae can't see her out of his peripherals. Looking around more freely, she feels the pressure of time on her back. If she took too long Viperae would do whatever it is he was planning, assuming he hadn't had the chance to weave some sort of spell already.
Glancing at the fire pit, she laments that none of the remaining pieces burning were big enough to use.
"…Calm down." Viperae sighs, and she glances over again. Still facing away from her. "I suppose there's little else to do."
He stands up, over the fallen nindroid, and raises a hand. Skylor rushes forward, because powers be damned she was not standing by while Viperae kills someone right in front of her. She grabs his arm, pain and this horrible, creeping darkness fill her mind. She tries to grit her teeth, tries to do something, but it's too much and everything turns dark.
Cole shifts awkwardly, trying not to think too hard about the fact that he was currently standing inside other people. Intangibility was pretty useful, he'd admit, but it wasn't like he'd expected it to be. When moving he didn't think about it too much, it was kind of like swimming, only he was the water instead… of course, that was only when he was moving. When he stood still in something, which happened often enough earlier on in his new ghostly existence, he could feel the object. It was like running your hands over something and feeling every detail, only it was your kidneys feeling the corner of the cold, granite counter instead. This… this had led to Cole's aversion to being intangible all the time. It was why, no matter how draining it was, he'd done his best to stay a solid mass instead (although he couldn't do anything about it when sleeping, so he'd just gotten used to waking up on top of his blanket instead of under it). So, the last thing Cole wanted to know was what the inside of a person felt like.
And now he was stuck on a tiny ship, unable to move enough so that he wasn't phasing through somebody.
"Cole, could you move a bit?" Nya gives him an apologetic smile, wrapping their arms around her torso. "You're making me shiver."
So he steps to the side a bit, more towards Kai, who was like standing in a living furnace. A living… wet… squishy furnace.
Ah, don't think about it! Cole bites the inside of his cheek and wishes he had something to snack on instead. Please let this ride be over soon…
"Alright, I think I can see the temple of light." Ronin announces suddenly.
"You are not going to take us closer?" Echo asks curiously. "With as loud as your ship is, I do not think we will have the element of surprise even if we do circle around him."
"This isn't a matter of stealth." Ronin scoffs. "This is a matter of having just gotten my baby back. I'm not going to risk her again so soon."
Cole wants to scoff at that, but it was even weirder talking while standing inside somebody, even if he was taller than most of the other ninja. Kai probably had a similar thought, since he doesn't speak up either, which is unlike him.
"I take it you do not plan to help us fight, even after picking up the others?" Echo queries.
"Don't try to guilt trip me into helping you." Ronin scoffs. "You've got that demon assisting you, so I doubt there's anything I could do that would help."
"That isn't true." Nya pipes up. "The Bounty got damaged when the storm hit us. You could go there and get started on the repairs. Jay has a lot of scrap metal, wires, and other useful stuff stored, so you shouldn't have any issue with that."
"…Actually," Sensei Wu speaks up hesitantly. "I threw all of that overboard."
Cole winces in sympathy, both for Jay and for the fact that he knows Wu is going to be dealing with Jay's grudge over that for a while. As cheery as he was, he really knew how to hold a grudge… But, well, Cole knew how important Jay's inventions and whatnot were to him, it was obvious to anyone who knew him before he'd become all Nya-crazy. From that perspective, he understood why Jay would be so upset.
Seeing Nya's brows furrow and her pursed lips, it's obvious that the master of water understands that as well. Heck, since she also liked to invent things (more cool cars than Jay's random inventions, but inventions nonetheless) she probably understood Jay's feelings on the matter better than the master of earth.
"Well, in that case…" She says slowly, before entering some information into her bracelet. "My bracelet can't communicate over such a long distance without any towers, but you might be able to boost the signal with REX. I've set it up to send some supplies, once you're ready, so hopefully it'll be enough."
She hands the criminal her bracelet awkwardly, having to stretch a bit to reach past Echo. Ronin doesn't answer at first, but eventually he sighs and says.
"Fine, but you owe me."
"Oh, uh, Ronin?" Echo pulls out his the soul stone and the paper with the spell they'd been using. "Since you will not be fighting, could you keep this safe?"
"Yeah, fine." He huffs, roughly grabbing the stone and shoving it into his pocket. "Is there anything else you ninja need me to keep an eye on?"
"I do not think there is." Echo replies innocently.
Cole was certain that, had Echo not been right behind his seat and out of view, he'd have leveled the bronze nindroid with an unamused stare. As it was, he'd just rolled his eyes.
The ship drops, swerving to the left, and Cole sees a projectile flying past them.
"Looks like this is your stop!" Ronin yells back at them, swerving the ship to dodge another projectile and blasting a third.
Cole's the first to move, heading for the exit and yelling back at the others.
"Use airjitzu to break your fall!"
He doesn't have time to be relieved to finally be out of those close quarters, because he can see an army of shadow warriors waiting for them on the ground. He can see Clouse casting spells, now focused on trying to hit the falling ninja rather than the ship. A bright fireball heads in the magician's direction, which is blocked by some sort of magic shield.
That's all Cole can see before the ground is closing in on him and he's forced to use Airjitzu to soften his landing. As soon as he's down, though, the shadow warriors hone in on him, and he doesn't have any time to worry about whether the other's got down safely or not.
Wu carefully gets up from the passenger seat and regards his brother, who was standing at the exit of the ship, obviously looking for a way down that wouldn't end in his demise. Echo, also, appeared to have a similar dilemma, as he didn't know airjitzu like the ninja did.
"I can get us down there." He says loudly, getting both of their attention.
"Then what are you waiting for?" Garmadon says urgently, trying and failing to hide the seething tone underneath his words.
He doesn't bother trying to say anything else to his brother. Now was not the time, and he is certain any attempts would end with his brother throwing his own words of hesitation back in his face. Instead he moves towards the exit, nudging Echo out of the way so he'd have room, and then summons his dragon.
The three of them waste no time hopping onboard the beast, barely giving it enough time to dodge another projectile. As they fly over the battlefield he can already see his ninja fighting the shadow warriors that Clouse had summoned. Finally they land, only for more shadow warriors to attack them.
"Backs together!" Wu calls out and Echo immediately complies, but his brother doesn't. As Wu's fighting off the shadows he catches glimpses of his brother fighting through the shadow warriors with his art of the silent fist technique, allowing him to bypass them easily. "Garmadon! Don't try to fight Clouse on your own!"
His voice is lost to the din of the battle, though, or unheeded by his brother. Whatever the case may be, Garmadon heads off to face Clouse alone, soon disappearing into the crowd of shadow warriors.
"Foolish girl…" Hykos sighs, eyeing Skylor on the ground.
Is she okay? Jay asks worriedly. What's even going on?
Jay had argued against Viperae messing with Zane earlier, mostly because they both knew their trembling hands wouldn't be able to handle any delicate machinery or wires. He wasn't going to let the other do any damage to the nindroid, intentional or otherwise.
"I told you that little stone you're so fond of didn't belong to you." Hykos raises his hand once again, puts his fingers to his mouth and lets out a piercing whistle. "It's a piece of this one's soul. Without it his soul will, essentially, bleed out until he dies."
What?!
"How many times must I tell you to calm down?" Hykos huffs. "He's obviously been gathering them up, as his soul's song is much stronger than when I first encountered him…"
Soul's… song? Jay's head was reeling from the panic he was feeling already, he wasn't sure what the other meant.
"It isn't important." Hykos waves off. "If he can complete his soul stone before he runs out of energy, then he'll be fine."
And… the snowflake is a part of that? Guilt follows that thought. If it'd been with Jay all this time, then did that mean he was keeping it from Zane and preventing him from fixing himself?
"Yes, it is." There's a rustling among the trees, and soon after a very badly beaten Cryptor steps out. "Ah, I was wondering when you'd arrive."
"M…My L-l-lord." He stutters out, static crackling in his voice.
Jay can't help but wonder what happened to him. He was missing an eye, there was some sort of gunk clinging to his legs… he looked like he'd gone through hell.
"How are your fine motor skills?" Hykos asks.
"Mo-tor… skills…. op-op-operational."
"Is it just your speech that's been affected?"
"Prosssssssessing speed… h-has been… redu-uced."
"That's alright." Hykos hands him the soul stone. "This needs to be replaced in… Zane, was it?"
Yeah, his name is Zane.
"Replace Zane's soul stone."
Cryptor doesn't say anything, but moves to do what Hykos demands. The villain moves to watch him work. Cryptor doesn't seemed to be bothered by the frost that covers his arms and legs as he opens up Zane's chest and carefully replaces the stone. Jay's surprised to note that it's almost complete, there's just a small piece missing now.
He really has been gathering up the pieces… Hykos hadn't been lying about that, at least.
Cryptor closes Zane's chest, done with his task, and stands before the villain once more.
"Good." Hykos praises, and pride appears in Cryptor's one remaining eye. "Give me the Ultra weapon."
He does so without question.
What are you going to do with that? Jay asks warily. The power coming off of it seemed to resonate in their bones in an uncomfortable way, and Jay feels the ache crawl over their skin in response.
The other doesn't respond at first, just looks over the golden staff.
"…You care for the master of ice, don't you?"
Yes? Jay isn't sure what this line of questioning is about, but it wasn't exactly a secret that the ninja were all friends, so he saw no point in lying or refusing to answer.
"You wouldn't want him to suffer, would you?"
Don't you dare try to hurt him!
"I'm not going to hurt him." He laughs. "…What I meant was, as he is, he'll end up suffering greatly."
What? Jay can feel his anxiety rising again.
"Calm down." Hykos chuckles. "We can prevent his suffering."
With the Ultra weapon? The blue ninja asks softly, dread building up.
"Yes."
Why would you want to do that?
"…Hm~." Hykos hums, both amused and thoughtful at the same time. "I suppose I'm a sucker for the past. So what do you say, should we help him?"
While he had implied he knew Zane before, somehow, Jay didn't think that was it. Still… a part of him found he didn't particularly care, so long as Zane was alright in the end.
You're sure you can help him?
"Positive~!" Hykos apparently didn't need any more of an answer than that, because he immediately goes on. "I wish that not-Gollum friend of yours had a normal, human body."
The Ultra weapon glows and then three golden orbs shoot out from the staff, one hitting Zane and infusing him with its golden light, the other two going flying off into the sky.
"…Huh." Hykos says after a beat of silence. "Guess I should have been more specific with my wording."
The sound of the REX returning fills the air, and Hykos quickly wraps up the Ultra weapon and hands it off to Cryptor.
"You know where to take it."
"Ye-esssss… My Lord." Cryptor put it on his back and heads back into the forest.
So… Jay draws out, watching Zane intently. Nothing's happening.
"Give it time." Hykos says a tad dismissively. "Any ideas on getting two unconscious people up a rope?"
Uh… No?
"This is going to be a challenge, then."
"You look like crap." The words slip from Ronin's mouth as soon as he gets a good look at Viperae. A chill of horror immediately follows those words, realization setting in quick that he'd provoked the one person who had full control of his contract. "Uh, I mean…"
"Save your platitudes." Viperae says airily, even as his eyes glint darkly. "Did you enjoy your hunt?"
Dread sits like lead in the criminal's gut, an animal instinct telling him to get away from this monster. He takes a steadying breath, and instead meets the demon's eyes head on and asks.
"Why did you take my ship? I thought we were in the middle of a game already." If he couldn't trust that the other would follow the rules he'd set out, Ronin couldn't be sure any little thing wouldn't cause the other to change his mind about taking his soul.
"I already told you~!" Viperae laughs, dark eyes glittering in amusement over his question. "Something lost can easily be stolen, and treasure could easily be something highly valued by someone. You never amended the rules, and so I figured I'd use the last treasure I'd have to get as part of the next game."
Ronin grits his teeth, because he couldn't argue against the other's logic.
"What are the other's waiting for?" He asks instead. "They too busy chatting to get up here?"
"About that…" Viperae flops down into the passenger seat, sitting sideways to face him. "Zane and the master of amber are both unconscious."
"…Why?"
"Don't give me that look." The other huffs, crossing his arms. "I had nothing to do with it… not intentionally, anyway." Ronin wasn't sure he believed that, but he didn't push the other on it. "In regards to our unconscious allies, I have an offer to make."
He pauses, obviously wanting the criminal to ask what it was. Ronin curses the ninja for making a truce with this devil before he queries.
"What kind of offer?"
"Five hundred thousand yen per body."
"…I'm not going to kill them."
"Oh, no, that isn't what I meant~!" He laughs, shaking his head. "I just meant that I'll take off a million yen if you bring them both up here yourself."
That was a lot of money… although it wasn't nearly enough to free him of his debt.
"How can I be sure you'll honor this agreement?"
"I always honor my word." Viperae straightens up in his seat, offense clear on his face, and Ronin tenses just a little bit more. "What kind of man would I be if I didn't?"
You're not a man. Ronin thinks, biting his tongue to keep from speaking those words. Whatever it is that you are, it isn't human.
"Deal." Regardless of whether or not Viperae would do as he said, Ronin didn't want to incur his wrath while he was alone with the demon. He sets REX to hold her position and gets up from the pilot's seat and moves to leave.
"Before you go," The demon speaks up, voice airy once more (probably happy about getting his way). "that soul stone you've got… were you aware it belongs to the winter spirit?"
"You mean Zane?"
"Yes, him."
"I know."
"…You should give it back to him, then." The other hums lightly. "It'll be much harder to do so later."
Ronin wants to question the other about that, but the demon turns so he's sitting properly in the passenger's seat, obviously considering the conversation over.
Once the criminal is down on the ground, he sees both Zane and Skylor unconscious on the ground as Viperae said they'd be. Neither one looked injured, but that wasn't a relief to the criminal. Viperae probably knew some way to knock people unconscious without leaving a mark. A layer of frost covered the ground around Zane, giving Ronin a clue as to what happened to cause him to fall unconscious, at least… that only left SKylor's condition up in the air.
Going to the restaurant owner's side, he moves to check her pulse, just to make sure. She groans, her eyes fluttering, and shifting to sit up.
"Careful." He warns her, but she only jolts up and glances around.
"Ronin." She looks at him with urgency. "Where's Viperae?"
"He's on my ship."
"And Zane? Is he alright?"
"He looks like he had a vision and passed out."
"A… vision?" Confusion furrowed her brows, and she moves over to the edge of the frost carefully.
"Yeah, a vision." Ronin repeats, moving to stand next to her and looking at the unconscious nindroid as well. "Apparently he blew up his soul, or half of it, and now he has power freak outs where he either falls unconscious and turns where he is into his own personal freezer, or he acts out what he's seeing while still turning wherever he is into his own personal freezer."
"I, uh… I'll just ask the other's later." Skylor rubs the back of her neck. "Can you check to make sure he's alright? Viperae looked like he was going to do something to him before I passed out."
"Is there any reason you can't check him yourself?" He couldn't say he knew Skylor well, but from what he did know of her she seemed the type to always do something herself if she were able.
"It's… a long story." She says reluctantly. "Listen, if you do this, then I'll give you a free meal at Chen's."
"I never said I wouldn't do it." He shrugs, stepping towards the fallen nindroid. "But I will hold you to that."
She rolls her eyes and motions for him to go on.
"Well, he doesn't look damaged on the outside…" Now the 'fun' part. Checking to make sure that his wires hadn't been crossed or whatever. Not that Ronin knew what would be out of order, he could only check for general damage. If Viperae really had rewired him, then Ronin wouldn't know until one of the ninja more familiar with his machinery looked him over. "Huh?"
"What is it?" Skylor presses, inching forward. "Is he hurt?"
"No, I… I don't think so."
"Then what was with that sound you made?" She shifts a little closer too, eyeing the machinery that was usually hidden away.
"You see this glowing rock?" He points to the soul stone. It was cyan, with white lines were the stone appeared to be 'healing' back together, like scarring. "I've been helping gather the pieces, and I know how much he should have."
"Okay…" Skylor eyes the stone. "It only looks like one piece is missing, though."
"That's the problem." Ronin pulls out the stone that Echo had given him for safe keeping and carefully pushes it into place. "We were still looking for the last piece when we got your distress signal."
"So… You think Viperae give him his missing soul piece…?" She appears to be thinking back, and slowly nods. "Yeah, that makes sense. He was saying something about something belonging to Zane that he had, and it looked a lot like that stone you pulled out."
"Okay, case solved." Ronin closes Zane's chest. "Now the only question is 'why?'"
"…He'd probably think he had something to gain by doing it. Although what that would be, or why he'd think that, I can't say." Skylor says slowly, looking up at the rope leading to his ship. "Either way, though, we need to get to the temple of light and help the other's fight Clouse."
"Right." He agrees. "You go on ahead, I'll be up with the walking, talking AC in a second."
He waits until Skylor's had enough time to climb up before he even gets started. It took some work to get the nindroid over his shoulder, and he was certain that the metal he was made of made him heavier than a person his size would normally be. Once that was done he grabbed onto the rope, made sure his foot was secure, and then gave the whistle to signal REX to raise the rope back up. It was a bit of a struggle to maneuver Zane into the ship, but he managed it.
"Good job~." Viperae says cheerfully as Ronin, panting from the effort, let's himself drop back into the pilot's seat. "I'll remove five hundred thousand yen from your debt as soon as this is all over."
"Wait, you said you'd take off a million." The criminal can't help but speak up, disbelief and affront momentarily letting him forget his unease with the other.
"Assuming you'd brought them both up." Viperae makes a little tsk noise that only agitates Ronin further. "Since she got up here under her own power, you only brought one of them up."
"Of course…" He sighs, mumbling under his breath. "Petty jackass."
"What was that~?"
"I said hold on." The criminal lies. "Things're gonna get hectic."
Error, several systems have been damaged.
Cryptor had no choice but to ignore the various error messages he kept receiving. There was nothing he could do to fix himself at the moment, and he was certain that his Lord would fix him as soon as he was able. In the meantime he had to take the Ultra weapon to the end of the river, as his Lord wanted.
This unit will function at a diminished capacity until fixed.
I will not fail my Lord. Cryptor thinks, feeling his pride well up as he remembers the compliment he'd gotten. Even if I do not like, nor understand his interest in that blatant clone of me.
The rustling of the trees registers and Cryptor just barely manages to catch the flash of green before the metallic shlk of metal on metal sounds out and his head is cut from his body.
Error, His systems tell him. Critical damage sustained.
He can feel someone taking the Ultra weapon from his back.
Emergency shutdown initiated.
"Kei, Roy, Bob." Lou greets the other Royal Blacksmiths as he walks up. They were all together, which wasn't unusual, they were a rather tight knit group. "I wanted to talk to you gentlemen about something."
"What is it?" Roy asks, looking up from their makeshift game.
"Whatever it is, I bet it's more interesting then this…" Kei grumbles, only to be elbowed by Bob.
"Edna asked me to try and make Cliff feel more welcome, and I can't think of a better way to do that than a song!" He meets each of their eyes, none of them seem to be against the issue.
"Cliff… why does that name sound familiar?" Roy mutters.
"Isn't there a big star named Cliff?" Kei asks.
"Yeah, Cliff Gordon." Bob replies. "He's here too."
"Are you sure you're not trying to network, Lou?" Roy gives him a knowing smile, which he scoffs at.
"Of course not! It never crossed my mind that he might enjoy the musical stylings of the Royal Blacksmiths so much that he would commission us to record some songs for his next movie!"
"Of course not…" Bob says with mock sympathy.
"Did you want to sing one of the classics or write something new?" Kei asks, getting them back on track.
"I think something new would be more appropriate." Lou replies. "Something with a more personal touch."
They get working on the song and Lou finds himself losing track of time. It's only when Kei says he's hungry that they decide to take a break. Lou thought they made a decent amount of progress, but it'd still be a couple days before they would be ready to perform.
Of course, I'm certain that Edna wouldn't appreciate me ignoring Cliff until we've finished. He thinks. Perhaps I'll ask him if he'd like to have a cuppa?
With that in mind, he heads off to locate the actor.
End chapter forty eight
AN: Time keeps slipping by. Kind of feels like it was Monday just a day or so ago. n I'm so close to the end, I don't want to slip up now (although I've already uploaded two kind of late as of now), but we are getting dangerously close to the chapter I'm currently working on. Hopefully that won't happen, but life has been a bit crazy and I'll admit I'm kind of feeling a bit worn out. Regardless, I'll do my best to finish this story!
Last, but not least, thank you to everyone who favorited, followed, and reviewed my story so far.
-Kit
