Hello, my little dragonlets! :D Who's ready for the first big step into Act Two? I know I sure am! Like I said earlier, I think this is my favorite of the three sections of the story. It's actually my favorite game in the original trilogy! So I hope you guys enjoy, drags of cutscene and all. XD So let's switch discs, warm up those controllers, and get ready to storm Avalar! Enjoy the show! :)

You found a disclaimer!
Spyro the Dragon, both the game and all related characters (c) Insomniac. They own the Spyro that's in this story, so nyeh.
Spyro 2: Ripto's Rage / Gateway to Glimmer, as well as all related characters (c) blah-blah, same copyright.

CHAPTER NINE: Gateway to Glimmer

"There, I've got it!"

The old Professor adjusted his tiny glasses after placing the last orb into his newly-constructed super-portal. "That's the last orb in place. Now all we need are some coordinates, and the super-portal will be ready for travel!"

"How about 2-2-4-7-5?" the blundering cheetah spoke up. He gave a chuckle. "That's my birthday."

The young faun rolled her eyes. "Hunter, really - can you take ANYTHING seriously?" While she chided, though, the cheetah pounced over to the machine, punching in his coordinates. "Hunter? Hunter, no, wait, don't-!"

"Don't what?" Hunter asked, just in time to press the activation key on the super-portal.

The Professor's creation sprung to life, lighting up a stormy picture in its depths. Within moments, it gave a small ripple, and a tiny orange dinosaur in a black cloak popped out, tumbling into the bottom of the Winter Palace stairs.

Before the tiny orange one could get to his feet, another dinosaur followed; this one much larger, green, and landing directly on top of his companion. A third came to follow, just as bulky as his partner, but blue and biped, and gave a confused growl as he dropped his giant club.

"GET OFF!" the orange dinosaur snarled. "GET OFF OF ME, YOU USELESS BUFFOON!" The green dino dimly registered the commands and trotted to the side, freeing the small one in the black cloak, who seemed highly agitated. "AUGH! Why can't EITHER of you..."

His rant slowed as he got a look around. "Do...anything..." He found the Avalari, who all attempted to avoid eye-contact (except for Hunter, who waved). "Where are we?"

He didn't wait for an answer, instead taking a deep breath of the icy Winter Tundra air. Snow, grass, river...but no soot or smoke, the tell-tale smells of a fire dragon. "Hmm...no dragons. How wonderful!"

The orange dino waved his staff with a laugh. "CRUSH!" The blue behemoth looked up upon hearing the call. "Go back and pack my bags! We're moving in!" He then gave a sweeping bow as his delayed introduction. "And you all can say hello to your new king!"

"New king?!" In a panic, the young faun turned to the Professor. "Professor, quick! Go shut it down! Shut it down!"

The elderly mole ran for the machine, only to stumble in his rush, his tiny spectacles falling to the side. "Oh, goodness! I can't see the controls! Someone help me find my glasses!"

While the Professor struggled with the controls, the monster called Crush struggled with the concept of portal travel. "Crush, you idiot!" the tiny dino snarled. "Go THROUGH the portal! It's not that difficult!" But still, the beast struggled with the idea.

Seeing an opportunity, the young faun sprung into action, turning to the small fairy by her side. "Zoe, quick! You and the other fairies need to grab the orbs and scatter them across Avalar!"

"Got it!" the little red-head nodded, giving a sharp whistle that was inaudible to the dinos and Avalari. In moments, a sea of fairies appeared, each grabbing one of the glittering green orbs that powered the Professor's machine before skittering off. Without its power-source, the portal churned to a stop, its glimmering picture fading into nothingness.

"What? WHAT?!" The orange dinosaur fumed with rage. "CRUSH! GULP! Chase those things down and get those orbs back! NOW!" After a few moments to register the commands, the bulky behemoths slowly began their charge after the high-speed fairies.

The orange one spied Zoe flying off with the last orb, and grabbed onto it in a last-ditch effort to re-open the portal. (Needless to say, she was plenty capable of carrying both orb and intruder.) "AUGH! Drop the orb, you despicable little creature! I'll KILL you!"

When the unwanted visitors and the orbs were gone, Winter Tundra returned to its usual quiet. "Oh, this is bad," the faun whined. "This is very, VERY bad news for Avalar." Her turquoise eyes then fell on the cheetah, who was nodding in agreement to her words. "Hunter! Why didn't you chase after them?!"

"Oh! I, uh...I WOULD'VE gone after them, but...uh..." Unable to come up with an excuse that wouldn't earn him a hoof to the gut (as Elora was so prone to do), Hunter changed the topic. "Hey! Didn't that dino guy say something about not liking dragons?"

The faun's eyes lit up. "That's right! Professor, could we catch a dragon and bring it to Avalar to help us get rid of that creep?"

The Professor's beady eyes sparked as the equations began to race through his mind. "I think we could! Oh, yes, I most certainly think we could! We'll just have to move the portal into a world that's much better-aligned to the Dragon Realms...Glimmer should do the trick!"

"Then that's that! Come on, we'd better go right now!"

oo00oo00oo

Spyro hated the rain.

To be fair, most dragons had an aversion to stormy weather. Dragonflies disliked the rain, and when a dragonfly's uncomfortable, the dragon follows. This aversion tended to worsen in the fire-breathing dragons (like a certain hero of the Dragon Realms), as the wet air made it difficult to warm the fire glands. On top of all of this came Spyro's old fear of the water.

Spyro hated the rain.

The purple dragon sighed. The stormcloud over the Artisans had been overhead for days, and didn't seem to be going anywhere. Normally, he would've fled to the hot and sunny deserts of the Peacekeepers, but Marco refused to fly through the storm, and the still-flightless dragonlet had no other way to traverse the Realms.

So he remained in the Artisans, tucked under a tree, waiting out the storm. And if there was one thing Spyro hated more than rain, it was sitting still.

"Ugh, is this rain EVER going to stop?" the purple Artisan groaned, watching a small herd of sheep prance by. "I forget what the sun looks like."

"Well, what are we gonna do?" Sparx buzzed, settling onto his dragon-brother's snout.

Spyro sighed, stretching his front paws. That was the new million-gem question. The novelty of being the young hero of the Dragon Realms wore off rather quickly, especially since Gnasty's defeat brought a new age of peace to the kingdom. And just like the old age of peace, it was BORING. No roaming gnorcs, no crafty thieves, no rescuing dragons and reclaiming treasure - it was back to dragonlet training, chasing sheep with Delbin and bashing crates with Magnus.

Granted, he was still the young hero, and it had its perks. He could come and go throughout the Realms as he pleased, which was still a nice change, even a year later. (He still steered as far clear from the Dream Weavers as he could manage, though.) He had mastered all of the speedways, which was no easy feat, and managed to post times that put even the fastest of the full-growns to shame. He practiced his charging in the High Caves, practiced his glides in the Tree Tops, and even put in his time cleaning up the Dragon Junk Yards. (He made it his self-appointed duty to keep the full-growns out of Gnasty's treasure cove, for fear that they would discover his lair still intact and force him to do away with it.)

But a year moves quickly in the Dragon Realms. At least, it does if you're Spyro. So their long list of things to do and areas to explore evaporated long ago. The Artisan grew up with the itch for adventure, but now that he had his first taste, he wanted more. Not at the cost of a new evildoer capturing the full-growns and taking over the Dragon Realms, but...just a little bit of adventure. Just something else to do.

And right now, the rainclouds were standing between Spyro and Sparx and their "something else to do".

"We just need to get out of the Artisans," Spyro finally said. "Y'know, go somewhere warm and sunny. Just to get out of the rain for a while."

Sparx flickered in an excited sparkle of gold. "Spyro, that's it!"

"What's it?" Spyro asked, crossing his eyes to look down at the dragonfly on his nose.

"Dragon Shores!"

The purple dragonlet smiled at the idea. With all of the scrap metal left over in the Junk Yards and Beast Maker swamps, the remaining gnorcs who weren't part of Gnasty's self-made empire decided to do something nice to honor Spyro and thank the dragons for doing away with their vicious overlord. And so, they created Dragon Shores. In one of the sunnier areas of the ocean that housed the Junk Yards, the gnorcs found a deserted island and used all of the scrap to build the perfect arena to house their young savior: an amusement park. It was filled with thrilling coasters and tons of games for the dragonlets, as well as a sparkling beach for their guardians to relax. (It also featured a Tunnel of Love, which Spyro was unlucky enough to pass by when the pink dragonlet from the Dream Weavers appeared. Yuck.)

It was, at its core, a thank-you gift to Spyro and Sparx from the gnorcs, but the heroic duo had only been to the park once, on its opening day. After that single day of play, they immediately dove back into their goal of conquering the Sunny Flight speedway.

It had been a whole year since then; a long, busy year. A little vacation couldn't hurt, right? Just until the storm blew over?

"Alright, sounds like a plan! Last one there's a gnorc!"

oo00oo00oo

Elora paced nervously, peeking around the corner every few minutes, eyes darting across the sparkling landscape of Glimmer in search of the invading riptocs. "Oh, I can't take this anymore! Is it ready yet, Professor?"

The elderly mole continued calmly scribbling notes onto his clipboard, eyes glued to the sparkling green and gold globes in front of him. "Almost. I've just got to make a few more adjustments to the orbs, but we're close."

Hunter's attention was on the stormy picture beginning to form in the white marble arch. "A-Are you sure we should be doing this? I-I mean...maybe this isn't the best idea! What if we get the dragon here, and it just makes Ripto angrier?"

"Oh, stop fidgeting, Hunter!" Elora snapped, giving the cheetah a quick kick to the leg. "Stop being so nervous, you're making me nervous."

"Of course I'm nervous!" Hunter replied. "Did you SEE the Professor's books? Their teeth are, like, THIS!" He made an exaggerated gesture with his hands. "A-And claws like THIS!" Again, he exaggerated the gesture. "A-And they spit fire! That sounds WAY worse than Ripto!"

"Hunter, that's the POINT! A dragon's our only chance to get Ripto out of Avalar! Besides, bringing in the dragon was YOUR idea."

Before Hunter could continue to argue, the Professor interrupted. "I got it, I got it!" he exclaimed, the green orbs bouncing and sparkling in tune to his excitement. "I got the dragon!"

The portal gave a shudder as a flurry of purple and gold rolled out of its stormy skies, and the Avalari nervously stepped back as the otherworldly creature got to its feet.

Spyro took a few seconds to reorient as he stumbled to his paws. The Dragon Shores portal was new and known for being faulty, but he had never suffered such turbulence between worlds before. "Ouch...someone needs to fix the wind tunnel on that portal, that's one rough landing."

Once onto his feet, Spyro looked around, immediately noticing the lack of sparkling beaches and miles of ocean that typically greeted goers of Dragon Shores. "Uhm...did they move the portal, or did we take a wrong turn?" Sparx buzzed confusedly.

"Not sure." Finally, the Artisan laid eyes on the strange beings before him. "Uhm...hi, guys! ...Do you guys know which way to the beach?"

Spyro took a nervous step back as all eyes were on him. Immediately following the fall of Gnasty, there was a bit of star-shock that followed him around, but Spyro was known throughout the Realms for his wandering, so sightings became less precious. He hadn't received weird looks in ages, and it was slightly bothersome. "What's the matter, you guys never see a dragon before?" he sneered.

Hunter was the first to speak the question on everybody's mind. "Wait...YOU'RE a dragon?"

Spyro knew that 'wow, you're a little small to be a dragon' tone ALL too well. "You got a problem with that, pussycat?" the purple Artisan snorted, blowing hot steam in the cheetah's direction. With a panicked meow, Hunter ducked behind Elora for safety.

Before he could pry the strangers for answers (or directions), the ground shook as thunderous footsteps ran towards them, and all were blown aside when a large fireball came down and shattered the marble portal.

The Avalari looked up in panic as they saw Ripto's giant dino-cronies looming overhead. "Well, well, well, what have we here?" Ripto laughed, sitting comfortably on Gulp's head. "It looks like you all forgot to invite me to the party!"

Before anyone could stop him, Spyro stepped forward. "Sorry, shorty, maybe you'll make the guest-list next time. You mind taking your little rock on a stick and getting out of our way?"

Ripto jumped back, doing all he could to maintain a look of ferocity. "Dragon?! You brought a DRAGON into Avalar?!"

"Seriously, has nobody ever seen a dragon before?" Sparx asked with a buzz.

The sorcerer angrily brandished his staff, stamping a foot on the dim-witted Gulp's head. "OOOH! I HATE dragons! How DARE you bring one of those things into MY kingdom?!"

"In case you forgot, Ripto..." ZAP! A small fairy flew into the fray, delivering a swift bolt of lightning to Ripto's hide. "Avalar isn't YOUR kingdom!"

Ripto gave a yelp, then turned his attention to the fairy. "Oh, not you little brats again! Crush, kill it! KILL IT!"

Crush took a moment to look at the hefty club in his hand, then took a clunky swing at the red-headed fae. She quickly flew out of harm's way, leaving Crush's club free to continue its path and knock Ripto to the ground with an oof! The orange sorcerer dropped his staff, leaving it to glimmer helplessly in the colorful lights of Glimmer.

Gulp mistook it for a treat and promptly swallowed it, giving an explosive belch afterwards.

Ripto fumed, shaking with rage and frustration. "GULP! YOU IMBECILE! You ATE my scepter!"

As if apologetically, Gulp ducked under Ripto's tiny form and flung the orange dino up onto his back. Now facing down his new archnemesis without his most powerful weapon, Ripto and minions had no choice but to retreat...for now. "Consider yourself lucky, dragon! I'll deal with YOU later!"

Spyro scoffed. If he had already locked horns with Gnasty and friends, he wasn't about to be afraid of a dino barely bigger than he was. "Who was THAT jerk?"

"That was Ripto," Elora was quick to explain. "And we need YOU to get rid of him. He's been causing all sorts of trouble in Avalar!" She looked off into the distance, where Ripto had just ran off, then shook her head. "But I don't have time to explain."

She tossed Spyro and Sparx a grayish-brown book. "Here, take this guidebook - you'll need it. I need to go follow Ripto and see what he's up to! Find the Gemcutters, they'll help you out. I'll see you in Summer Forest later!"

Elora ran off, quickly followed by a panicked Hunter, who seemed desperate for ANY excuse to get away from the dragon, leaving Spyro and Sparx alone in this mysterious new world.

"Spyro, how do we get into these messes?" Sparx buzzed with a sigh.

The young Artisan, on the other hand, couldn't be more excited. "Sparx, are you kidding? Weren't we JUST saying we need a new adventure?"

"No, YOU were saying we need a new adventure. My wings still hurt from that speedway run we did last week."

"Point is, Sparx, we're heroes now. Heroes do hero stuff. Ripto's just one more gnorc to add to the list! Come on, let's go!"

Welcome to Glimmer, everyone! Hope you enjoyed, and thanks for reading! See you next time! :)

§ Tucker's Mayflower, signing off! §