Keela's hammer echoed across Ferra's workshop. For the past four days, the Toa of Iron intermittently welded, folded, heated and cooled several metal pieces over and over again. At times, they had been the only sounds throughout Nilkuu Village… aside from the constant debates between Ferra and her villagers.
"What was it this time?" Keela asked Ferra without looking away from the anvil.
"The same thing. Going on about increasing security on the Divide and making sure to look for Norii. Haven't been anything, but trouble," Ferra grumbled as she entered, and Keela said nothing. Norii, though half of the Stone Tribe, shook the village with her disappearance to some degree. "Speaking of trouble, where are your 'helpers?'"
The answers entered from the shop's backdoor. "C'mon Waya, hold up your end!" said Mizu, carrying a long metal slab with his brother.
"I am-oof!" Waya had said before knocking against the door frame at the sight of the Stone Protector. "Uh, hello Protector…"
"Well, they have been helpful," Keela told Ferra, gesturing for Torren's son to bring the metal to the pile next to her. The Toa of Iron found it strange when Torren's sons asked to join her. Perhaps, it was another plan of theirs, if Keela heard correctly from Voriki and Ferra. She would have to keep an eye on them.
For now, Mizu put the metal aside and said, "Whew! That's a large one!"
"I'll say. Hopefully, this gets us what we need," Waya agreed, but the Stone Protector cut them off.
"Don't get comfortable. As soon as she's done with you, it's back to your father. Got it?" Ferra hissed before heading out of the back door.
"Mizu, stop it!" Waya whispered, and Keela amusingly saw the older brother give a rather rude gesture to the departing Ferra.
"You should take it easy on her," Keela told the brothers in between hammers, catching their attention. "Things have been… tense, as you've seen."
"Doesn't mean a protector should act like the rest of her people," Mizu said, and Keela guessed the irritation was from all the looks he and his brother had received. "They are supposed to be leading them by example after all, or some urdak dung like that."
"I don't know much about politics, but I understand there's a history with your protectors… particularly after this invasion," Keela said. Mizu shifted like the flat blade Keela held, falling silent while Waya perked a little with interest. "I guess you lived through it?"
"Well, we were little, then. Mizu remembers more than I do," Waya spoke up and went on like a good student in a class. "I've heard stories of the protectors leading the defense against the invaders. Protector Hanu used to be known as the Great Cleaver. He could cut sink an invader's ship with just one cut from his scythe."
"Well, that's what the stories say," Mizu droned with skepticism, "and that was before he got injured."
"Stories can have some truth to them. In a way, your protectors now almost remind me of us Toa," Keela remarked, sparing her first glance to the brothers' surprised looks. "Yes, we weren't too different from you. We had powers, but some of us didn't know what to do with them."
"And what about those who knew?" Mizu asked, curious.
Keela's voice fell a few decibels. "Well, some used it to protect the innocent. Others did the same but for fame or glory, more in service to themselves. And others… well, they could be more forceful than the rest."
"What about you?" Waya asked.
Keela folded a metal rod she pulled from an iron stove. "I was a little different than others. I wanted to learn more. Understand how things worked. It turned out to be the best for these people here."
"Maybe you should come over to Kivoda City," Mizu said. "You can be our Toa instead of Voriki."
"Mizu!" cried Waya.
"What? No offense to Voriki, but he isn't much help at home outside of making a few lightning bolts."
Keela chuckled, recalling when the Toa of Lightning had shocked the Skull Spiders on the beach. Another Toa ended the moment of brevity by entering the workshop with a breeze blowing away the smoke. "Keela," Kaze said with his ever-gravelly voice.
The hammer stopped, and Keela turned to the boys who were frozen at the sight of the Toa of Air. "Why don't you go in the back? There should be some more metals I can use. And look for the purer metals," she instructed. After Torren's sons shifted out of the backdoor to do so, Keela told Kaze, "I'm sorry. I guess they're still unsure about you from what they've heard."
Kaze's hands clenched and unclenched, a sign of annoyance and tiredness after practicing with his bow. "Are you still working on your protector's 'pet project?'" he asked.
"I've already finished," Keela answered as she went back to work. "I've been modifying a couple weapons for the other Toa."
"Is telling stories part of the process?"
Kaze's gruff question almost put an uneven crease in Keela's handiwork. "It's the only way to focus. Keep my mind off…" Keela stopped herself from remembering how she couldn't save Norii. She couldn't afford any weakness. Not now. "Anyway, are you sticking to the plan?"
"... Yes," Kaze answered after a second. "I'll meet with Maram in the Region of Fire. From there, we'll meet on Vizuna's Tortoise. I came here to check."
Feeling Kaze didn't just mean her, Keela dipped her work into a bucket of water. "Well, everything is alright here. Has anyone given you any trouble?" she said. Kaze shook his head, but Keela spoke again as the Toa of Air turned to leave. "Kaze, I don't know what happened, but I know it was out of your hands. Whatever you did… whatever you saw, it's passed us… all of us. Anyone can fix their mistakes, if given a chance."
Kaze's red glare turned from Keela. "We'll see, maker," was all he said before he left the workshop.
From its smoking inside, Keela watched Kaze leave. Maker, he had called her. She hadn't heard that in millennia. Keela supposed the title, however antiquated, fit her well as she pulled a familiar scythe from the cooling waters with two short blades on either end.
Not long after Kaze's departure did Keela leave Nilkuu Village on Norii's motorsled-with permission from Ferra. The small thing carried her across the desert in a few hours, give or take, sand trailing behind. At the end of those hours, her scope caught the black volcano resting in the light tan desert. The closer she approached, the clearer it was to recognize the petite Toa of Shadow waiting several feet from its base.
The same Toa, after greeting Keela, gazed at the remade scythe now in her hands. Her gaze widened at the fact she could split the weapon into two halves. "It's… it's…"
"I knew you would like it. Hopefully, it can help with this," Keela said kindly before her gaze rose up the dark volcano. "Has there been anything new?"
Recombining the scythe, Zala held it tightly as she stared up the volcano. "No…" she said with a quiet tone that almost hid the lie.
Keela spared a stoic glance. "Are you sure?"
"I…" Zala began, and she shivered with terror. "... He's there. I can feel him waiting… watching…"
Keela shouldn't have been surprised. Fifteen hundred years ago, a Mask Maker tried his infamous Mask of Ultimate Power here, only to be sealed away in the same realm Zala once thought as her home. A millennium later, the crater grew into a volcano as a minion tried to free that same Mask Maker. Of course, he would be here, under this great black behemoth of stone.
"Can you get me inside?" Keela asked, and looked back to a blinking Zala. "I mean, inside the volcano's shad-"
Zala instinctively stepped back from Keela. "That's why you want me out here?!" Her pink eyes darted to the volcano then to Keela. "You know I can't! He's-"
"Zala," Keela said calmly, "I understand it is hard, especially after what you've been through, and I won't force you to do this, but I need a look. That's all. One look to understand what we're really up against."
After her shudder faded, Zala slowly and shakingly held out a hand for Keela to take. Her other gripping tightly on her new scythe, Zala meekly asked, "Just one look, okay?"
"Alright," Keela said, squeezing Zala's hand for assurance. That same hand took Keela's and placed it against the volcano's dark and shaded base as Zala gently submerged the both of them-
-and Keela's gaze widened more than she thought possible. She and Zala had partially dipped in with only their masks and upper torsos like they would into an ocean. In this particular ocean, purple and white bits swirled like miniscule grains in a swirling water of deep darkness. At the bottom laid a canyon with a city in the center. A city of dark towers coated in a corrosive purple, Keela found with her scope.
"Can we go now?" Zala asked, her timid voice echoing slightly.
"We will," Keela said, scanning the city. "I just need-"
Fear skyrocketed in Keela's mind with the great surge of dark red flame appearing in front. She fought it down and held firm, unknowingly holding Zala back from fully pulling out of the dark realm. Keela stared at the flames, watching them coalesce into a mass large enough to blot out the city.
"So, you have come here," the flames rumbled, its eyes catching Zala, "and you have brought her."
Keela pushed back the wave of bitter fear emanating from the flame. A flame she could attach a name to. "Makuta," Keela said over Zala's terrified whimpers.
"Ah, so you know, but what good is it? Why are you here?" Makuta said as he inched closer to the two Toa.
"To know you. And I have an idea of what you are now, Mask Maker."
Makuta stopped several meters short, but he was so large Keela couldn't really tell. She did notice his eyes narrowing. "I am more than just a Mask Maker, and I will be far more with the mask. Now, where is the Stone fragment?"
"Safe. From you and from Uram. No one can get to it! Not even you or Uram!" Keela said defiantly, unlike Zala who held her scythe to keep Makuta back out of fear.
"You are resilient, but I wonder if you will last longer than her?" Makuta chuckled and darted his eyes towards the quiverying Zala. "Do you wonder what I had done to this pathetic Toa? Do you want to know what I made her see?"
Keela didn't need the answer. "Zala, now!" she shouted, loosening her hold.
Zala yanked Keela out with all she had. It was a blur in the first second. In the next, Makuta had swarmed forward as the mass of dark flames lashing out everywhere. Keela swiped her free hand forward to keep them back. Something, a cold tendril, brazed across that hand, and Keela could see it: dead bodies lying all around, a heavy figure with a giant mace and green eyes of envy, and a mask of-
Pulled back into reality and falling on her read end like Zala, Keela gasped like someone holding her breath for a long time. The sandy air of the Stone Region's desert filled her with every following breath. The ashy scent did too and caught Keela's glare on the looming volcano that was as dark as the deepest pit.
Keela whirled and asked Zala, "Are you okay?" No response other than more shivering, save for the light jump when Keela put a hand on the Toa of Shadow. "It's alright. We're safe now, alright. We're safe."
Given how much Zala shook, she only believed that as much as Keela did herself: not much. Nonetheless, Zala looked at the Toa of Iron and asked, "D-did you see what you wanted?"
"Yes," Keela answered quietly, "yes, I did."
Zala stood up in a second. She tried putting on a brave face, even as her legs shook. "I… I should get going," Zala said. "My protector is waiting for me."
"Of course," Keela said and remembered where Zala was heading for. No doubt, Voriki and Rhem would be there.
That thought got Keela over to her motorsled and grabbing a satchel on it. "Here," Keela said, handing the satchel to Zala, "this is for Rhem. Can you please bring that to him? It's his new weapon."
"I-I will," said Zala who took the satchel.
"Thank you. And Zala?" Keela said as the Toa of Shadow was about to leave. "I'm sorry to put you through that. I didn't want you to get hurt again, but believe me, you helped me understand our enemy better than before. I just wanted you to know that."
The heartfelt emotion warmed Zala-briefly, Keela noticed. "I... I hope so," Zala said and turned her shivering body, never letting go of her new weapon or Rhem's for an instance.
After watching Zala walk off, Keela went for the sled. Before getting on, she stopped, looked at her hand, and casted aside the dark flames worming around her hand.
AN: Whoops! Meant to put this up yesterday. Don't know how I missed this. Sorry about that!
Raika out.