It was nighttime locally when Dojo finally landed somewhere in some dry, craggy foothills of the Rocky Mountains in Colorado. The Xiaolin monks slid off the dragon's back, and he shrank down to his usual, smaller size. Raimundo hugged himself against the chilly night air; unlike Clay and Kimiko, who were wearing plain clothes, he'd been forced to come all this way still wearing the silk robes that marked him as Shoku warrior. Not far from where they'd landed, a dusty road passed by a lively-sounding tavern, though it was the only building in sight: the Obscura Bar.

"Remember, Raimundo," Omi immediately piped up, "you are looking for three-"

"Yeah, I know," Raimundo snapped. "The guardians of the Shen Gong Wu are always in a group of three, so I have to find three people who never separate. I don't get why we're going to all these lengths for a camera, even if it is a Shen Gong Wu - there's nothing in any of the ancient scrolls about it having any powers besides just taking pictures."

"Maybe the guardians will know?" Kimiko suggested. "Master Fung seemed pretty insistent that we do it this way, so there's gotta be a reason."

"I think the Fung-meister's just the kind of dude who can't let go of tradition," Rai grumbled, hugging himself again. Unlike Omi, he didn't normally leave the temple wearing his monk robes, and the thought of walking into any sort of public place dressed like this had him on edge.

The door to the bar opened, expelling a group of four people and the faint sound of music. It sounded like country music, and Rai cringed.

"Maybe Clay should take this one," he muttered.

"Sorry, no can do," Clay shrugged. "You're the leader."

"Of course, if it is too much responsibility for you, I would be more than happy to-" Omi began.

"Yeah, on second thought, I've got this," Raimundo said quickly, cutting the tiny monk off - even after years of training together, Omi's social competence had only marginally improved. Gathering all his determination, the dragon warrior of wind strode away from his comrades and into the bustling wooden building.

Sounds assaulted Rai as soon as he opened the door: talking, laughing, shouting, clinking glasses, and above all else, excessively loud country music. More aware than ever of how he was dressed - not to mention of the fact that he was underage - he edged into the cacophony uneasily, trying to scan the crowd in hopes of finding a trio of people right away.

Up on the stage, the offending music turned out to be a live performance: two cowgirl-looking women performed guitars and provided backup vocals while a third sang into the main microphone; Rai suspected Clay might find them attractive, given their country-bumpkin aesthetic. Among the tavern-goers, there were couples here and there, individuals lining the bar itself, and clusters of men and women in cowboy hats talking boisterously together, but no groups of three leapt out at Raimundo immediately. Everything about the scene felt like Clay, and he'd never wished to not be leader more than he did in that moment.

Just gotta find the three guardians, and then I can get out of here, he reminded himself, and he pressed up against the wall as he scanned the crowd again, quickly at first, then more slowly, trying to count the members of each group one at a time. One, two, four, two, five, one…three? What looked like a party of three caught Raimundo's eye, but before he could push his way through the room to say something to them, another man came from what Rai could only assume was the bathroom and joined them, making it a group of four. The guardians never separate, he reminded himself; that was what Master Fung had told them about the guardians of this Shen Gong Wu, and had been pretty much all the old monk had told them about who they were looking for.

Absolutely no one here appeared to be an exclusive group of three, and the music was getting on Raimundo's nerves. Swallowing his pride, he approached the bartender, who was wiping down a glass.

"Uh, excuse me," Rai said awkwardly.

The gray-haired man's blue eyes lifted to meet Raimundo's from under his cowboy hat. "You're a bit young to be here, sonny," he remarked with a drawl.

"Oh, I'm not here for a drink," Raimundo assured the bartender. "I'm looking for someone. Well, three someones. Do you know of a group of three who come here often? A group that never splits up, like, you'd never see one of them without the other two, ever?"

"A group of three?" the bartender repeated slowly, setting down the glass he'd been polishing to stroke his mustache. "Well…can't say that I do, aside from the Desert Flowers."

"The Desert Flowers?" Raimundo asked.

"Them," the man explained, waving his hand at the three performers on stage. "The three of 'em are sisters, and I swear they're more like one person in three bodies than anything. But if you were looking for them, I'd think you'd've said that right away. They're a bit famous 'round these parts."

Raimundo eyed the country girls again. The two on guitars were a tall, willowy woman with black hair and a slightly shorter, somewhat-chubby brunette, while the singer was a petite little redhead. "They're…sisters?" he asked, confused.

"Yup," the bartender confirmed. "At least, so they say. And if you knew 'em, you'd believe it, too."

"Uh-huh," Rai said. "Uh…thanks, dude."

"Y'all best be heading on home," the bartender added warningly. "Go on, boy, before I call the police. You're too young to be here."

"Yeah, I'll go after I find who I'm looking for," Rai snapped. "You can't call the police for me just being here."

Luckily, one of the customers called for another drink, distracting the suspicious man just long enough for Rai to slip away and mull over the tip. Three girls, in a country band? he thought, eyeing the women. That doesn't really scream 'guardians of a magical object' to me…then again, I guess it would be a pretty good cover - if I don't suspect them, no one else would either. He shook his head. Why all this trouble for a camera?

When the latest song finally ended, Raimundo tried to approach the stage, but the three girls exchanged one look and then all simultaneously headed for a door in the back. Rai started forward, alarmed, only to realize that the door was to the women's bathroom. The brunette went in, and the other two stood at the door and chatted.

They're inseparable, Raimundo realized. Sure, girls go to the bathroom together all the time, but that's a tiny, one-stall bathroom, and it's not like they're all going in. They just can't be apart.

Convinced, now, that he'd found who he was looking for, Raimundo made for the stage, not wanting to interrupt whatever girl ritual they were currently engaged in, parking himself just beside the steps they would climb to take back their places. It took several minutes before the brunette emerged, and the three started walking back over together.

"Excuse me," Raimundo said, stepping forward.

They turned to him, almost eerily in unison. Then, the redhead smiled. "Hello," she said cheerfully.

"Uh, hi," Rai said awkwardly, aware all over again of what ridiculous clothes he was wearing. "I, um…" Shaking his head, he lifted his chin. "I'm a monk of the Xiaolin temple," he told them; "I'm looking for the Camera Obscura."

All three girls stared at him for a painfully long moment.

"Is that so?" the redhead finally asked slowly, turning to her companions. "What do you think, girls?"

"He's dressed the part," the brunette commented, glancing at Rai again, "but would they really send someone so young?"

"And why is he alone?" added the black-haired woman. "We were told to never reveal our secrets to a solitary man."

"Why are you alone?" the redhead asked, turning back to Rai.

"Oh, I'm not," he assured them; "my friends are waiting outside. I'm the leader of the dragon warriors, so it was my job to come in here and find you three. You are the guardians, right?" It seemed obvious, but he needed to be sure.

The girls exchanged another glance, and then the black-haired one nodded. "We are," she confirmed.

"You certainly wasted no time in getting here," the brunette remarked with a smile. "We were going to wait at least another week for someone to show up, after the camera went active."

"Scar, we're gonna have to cut the performance short," the black-haired woman said to the redhead. "Could you tell our adoring fans that they'll have to come back tomorrow?"

"You got it!" the redhead said cheerfully, and she darted up the steps to the microphone.

"I'm Violet," the black-haired girl informed Rai.

"I'm Rose," the brunette inserted, and she waved a hand at the redhead who was getting the crowd's attention, "and that's Scarlet. We're sisters, and the up-and-coming country band, the Desert Flowers."

"I'm Raimun…" Rai tried to say, but Rose and Violet were already climbing the stage to pack up their guitars. "…do," he finished, bewildered.

"Folks, we'll be here 'til next Monday morning," Scarlet was announcing, "but unfortunately, we're gonna have to bow out a little early tonight." A chorus of disappointed groans swept through the bar. "I know, I know," Scarlet said, "we had a lot left to get through, but something's come up. Don't you worry, we'll be back performing here every night until our next tour, and I promise y'all, we won't have to cut any concerts short again. 'Til tomorrow, everyone!"

Violet and Rose already had their guitars slung over their backs, and once Scarlet turned off the microphone, the three of them walked offstage to a round of applause and whistles; it looked like they really were popular here.

"Uh, I'm Raimundo," Rai tried again.

"Nice ta meet ya!" Scarlet said cheerfully. "Let's go outside and meet your friends before we talk business, yeah?"

"Uh…okay," Raimundo said, though he needn't have bothered; the three sisters were already headed for the door. "So, um…the Desert Flowers?" he asked, trying to start some sort of conversation. "Wouldn't the 'Mountain Flowers' be more accurate?"

Scarlet laughed. "It ain't about accuracy, sweetie-pie," she told him; "a band name's gotta be catchy."

"The Mountain Flowers doesn't have quite the same ring to it," Rose agreed as they emerged into the chilly night air. "We talked about that once."

"Where are your friends?" Violet asked.

"Right over here," Rai answered, leading the girls around to the rocky bluffs where he knew Dojo and the other monks were waiting. "Hey guys!" he called. "I found 'em!"

Within moments, the others came running, and Rai heaved a sigh of relief.

"Took you long enough," Kimiko teased him, swatting his arm playfully. "I was sure Wuya or Jack were gonna show up before you got back."

"No sign of anyone?" he asked her.

"Nope," Clay confirmed, tipping his hat. "Quiet as a mouse 'round here."

"Probably because it's just a camera," Rai muttered under his breath. "Anyway, uh, these three are Violet, Rose, and Scarlet, and they're the guardians of the Camera Obscura."

"Hi," Kimiko said to the girls cheerfully, "I'm Kimiko. That's Omi, that's Clay…"

"Much obliged," Clay said, tipping his hat to the girls.

"…and this is Dojo," Kimiko finished, gesturing to the dragon inching his way along the ground beside her.

"Dojo?!" Rose and Scarlet exclaimed, and Violet's eyes widened.

"Are you really the dragon who gave our ancestors the task of guarding the Camera Obscura?" Scarlet asked the little dragon.

"Yup," Dojo said proudly, "that's me! Good to see you guys found a way to keep the whole three-guardians-thing going."

Rose gave an earsplitting shriek, then lunged forward and scooped Dojo up in her arms. "Cuuuuuute!" she squealed, crushing the dragon against her chest and nuzzling him. "Oh, aren't you just the most adorable little thing?!"

"Th…thank…you…I…think…?!" Dojo choked, struggling to free himself from the woman's embrace.

"Rose," Scarlet chided, laughing, "don't smother him!"

"Oh, but he's just so precious!" Rose squeaked, but after one final squeeze, she let him go. "Sorry, pumpkin," she told him, "but I could just eat you up!"

"We were told the dragon who gave us our task was big enough to block out the sun," Violet said passively as Dojo got his wind back.

"Yeah, bit of an exaggeration there," Kimiko chuckled.

"Hmph!" Dojo huffed, crossing his arms. Addressing the sisters, he added, "I can change my size, but I'll have you know, I'm not that big."

"You can change your size?!" Scarlet exclaimed. "Ooh, show us!"

"Yeah, let us see!" Rose concurred excitedly.

Dojo blinked; Rai got the sense he was surprised to have so much interest focused on him. "Well," he said modestly, "if you insist…" Without further protest, the dragon expanded, coiling his lengthening body around the rocks until he took his full dragon form.

"Cool!" Rose exclaimed, her eyes perfect circles as she looked up at the now-massive creature.

"Now that is mighty impressive," Scarlet agreed. As Dojo shrank back down to his usual size, she turned to Rose. "Rose, you thinkin' what I'm thinkin'?"

"The music's already playing," Rose responded, a grin splitting her face.

"And I've got the lyrics," Scarlet agreed. "This one's gonna be a winner!"

"Girls," Violet said sternly, and Rose and Scarlet turned to their willowy sister. "We have a sacred duty to perform," she reminded him. "Music can wait until after we've done our job."

"Aw, at least lemme write the lyrics down," Scarlet whined, already taking a notebook out of an inside pocket of her vest. "You know my mind ain't like Rose's, if I don't write it all down I'll forget it! I promise ya, it's a good one!"

"Oh, fine," Violet sighed, though her redheaded sister was already scribbling something. "But make it quick."

"Thanks for inspiring us, Mr. Dojo," Rose added to Dojo. "We promise to turn you into our newest big hit."

"You're writing a song about me?" Dojo asked, his eyes wide.

"They're country singers," Rai informed the little dragon. "So, you know, don't expect it to be any good."

"Ugh!" Rose scoffed, wrinkling her nose at Rai. "Uppity swine!"

"That's going in it," Scarlet remarked, jotting things down so quickly that Rai wondered if it would actually be readable later.

"Ahem!" Violet cleared her throat pointedly, shooting an admonishing glare at her sisters, and Rose scurried over to stand at her side; still writing in her little notebook, Scarlet slowly walked over to stand in front of the other girls. "There will be one final test to see if you are worthy of claiming the Camera Obscura," Violet declared to Raimundo and the other monks. "However, we will not tell you what it is. If you are truly from the Xiaolin temple, you should already know it."

"Yeah, we know," Rai said, and he reached into his pocket and pulled out the three golden medallions Master Fung had given him. "Each of these belongs to one of you, right? And I have to guess which is which."

"Well, 'guess' makes it sound-"

"Hush, Rose!" Violet snapped, slapping her sister's arm before the brunette could finish her sentence.

"It's a silly test anyway," Rose pointed out; "the power of the Camera Obscura is outdated. Heck, I could take a picture with my phone right here and now."

"Ours is not to question," Violet told her as Scarlet finished writing and put her pen and notebook away.

"Yeah, we agreed, we're gonna do what we were tasked to do," the redhead concurred. "Even if taking pictures ain't no thang nowadays, magical artifacts aren't to be treated lightly."

"I know," Rose grumbled.

Raimundo eyed them, then looked at the engraved gold discs in his palm. Master Fung had described them as being a king, a queen, and a jack, like in a deck of cards. As leader, it was Rai's job to figure out which of the three discs belonged to which guardian, and he only had one chance to get it right. But he'd never been much of one for riddles… "Uh…you girls know which ones are whose, right?" he asked them.

"We're not allowed to give any hints," Violet responded coldly. "You already have all the information you need; you only have to realize it."

"Well," Rai said slowly, "this one's the king, this one's the queen, and this one's the jack." He laid the three medallions out on his hand in order. "Um…so…one of you is like the king in a deck of cards, one of you is the queen, and one of you is the jack. And, uh…"

"Are we allowed to help?" Kimiko asked.

"Master Fung said it was my job as leader," Rai reminded her.

"Yeah, but…" Kimiko frowned. "We're never really supposed to fight any battles alone. And it's just a camera anyway."

"I'll be fine, Kimiko," Rai told her, though he favored his almost-girlfriend with a small smile. "Relax, I got this."

"Liar," she teased.

Still smiling, Rai turned back to the three guardians, trying to think over what little he knew of them, besides the fact that they were inseparable. Somehow, he had a feeling Rose wasn't the king - Scarlet was the lead singer in their band, and Violet was the most commanding, so the moniker of king had to belong to one of them. And Rose's behavior seemed too girly to be a jack… "Rose," he said, "I think the queen belongs to you."

The slightly chubby brunette was fidgeting as he walked over and handed her the queen medallion, though he couldn't tell if she was struggling not to tell him he was right or struggling not to tell him he was wrong.

"As for you two…" It's fifty-fifty, he thought, eyeing Violet and Scarlet. Omi's tiger instincts would sure come in handy right now…What kind of person is a jack? 'King' is easy, but 'jack'…I mean, I guess they're younger, so more energetic, maybe? And Violet seems like she's kind of in charge…I can't really see Scarlet as the king of this group, lead singer or not… "You're the king, Violet," he decided, "and that makes Scarlet the jack." He handed them the discs.

"Hooray!" Rose cheered from behind him, and he turned to see her jumping up and down in excitement. "You got it!"

"Well done," Violet said. "You have proven yourself, and your allies, to be worthy of the Camera Obscura."

"Follow us!" Scarlet said cheerfully as Rai's friends heaved a collective sigh of relief.

Together, the Xiaolin monks followed the three guardians through the rocky wasteland surrounding them.

"So," Kimiko said after a moment, "do you three know what the Camera Obscura really does?"

"It takes pictures, silly!" Rose laughed.

"Yeah, but where's the magical power that makes it special?" Kimiko asked. "My phone can take pictures just fine."

"The Shen Gong Wu are ancient artifacts, made in ancient times through ancient magic," Violet said calmly. "Many centuries ago, to perfectly capture a moment in time in an image, exactly as it was, down to the most minute detail, took powerful spells. The ancients could not have known that mankind would one day find an easy means of replicating the effect in a completely non-magical way."

"But it's still a powerful magical object," Scarlet added, "even if its power is kinda pointless nowadays. Ya don't mess around with magic."

"Here," Violet said, the three coming to an abrupt stop in front of an unremarkable boulder. "Girls? We all know what to do, right?"

"Of course," Rose said, almost indignantly.

"Simple as a tune!" Scarlet chirped, hopping forward.

Together, the three girls slotted their medallions into a line of small indentations in the rock's surface, Violet's at the top, Rose's underneath Violet's, and Scarlet's beneath that. Each holding the discs with one finger, they pressed them in a sequence: Violet, Rose, Scarlet, Violet and Rose simultaneously, Rose and Scarlet, Scarlet and Violet, and then all three at once. Light began to radiate out from under the golden circles, and then the top two-thirds of the boulder crumbled away to reveal a glowing box with a lens on the side, a little smaller than a melon.

"There you are," Scarlet told the Xiaolin warriors as she and her sisters took back their medallions. "It's all yours!"

"It's…really just a camera," Kimiko said, sounding distinctly unimpressed. "An old-fashioned camera."

"It's still a Shen Gong Wu," Raimundo reminded his friends, though he privately agreed with Kimiko. "Let's just grab it and go home."

The leader of the Xiaolin warriors reached out to pick up the ancient artifact from its pedestal. A faint rustle reached his ears moments before a shadow flashed past him, leaping over his head and landing across from him on the remains of the rock that had held the Camera Obscura, one hand coming to rest on the object at the exact same time Raimundo's did. Startled, Rai looked up, and was surprised to see slitted, catlike pupils in copper eyes gleaming at him in the moonlight.

"Raimundo," Chase Young declared, "I challenge you to a Xiaolin Showdown."