Hey, guys! Welcome back! :) Are we ready for a light-hearted, cheery chapter about fun, love, and tolerance? [cheers] TOO BAD GOIN' TO HURRICOS LET'S GO
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 FOURTEEN: High Voltage
"Oh, goodness me! Goodness me! Goodness me!"
Zapp sprinted through the valleys of Hurricos as fast as his spindly legs would carry him, desperate to keep the diode away from those obnoxious grinder-monkeys. He cringed as he heard the purple beast's bellowing laugh, felt its massive arms pound away at the land behind him.
One of the Gear Grinders could hear the chase scene approaching his surveillance area. Looking between his wrench and the switch that activated the force-field, a dull idea bubbled forth in his mind. Right as Zapp sped towards him, the grinder jammed his wrench into the switch, flipping the force-field on just in time to capture the young electroll.
Zapp had built up far too much momentum. He crashed into the electric fence before even registering that it was there, knocking the young electroll unconscious and sending the diode flying. It was quickly caught by the grinder-monkey, who gave an excited giggle before running off.
The Gear Grinder laughed. Hah, shiny things.
oo00oo00oo
Spyro hated the rain. So you could imagine the dragon's delight when their flight into Hurricos immediately greeted them with stormy clouds and a downpour of rain. "Man, I thought we were doing this to get OUT of the rain," Sparx buzzed.
Spyro tried to ignore the rain, as something else attracted his attention: a little blue electroll scurrying to escape a burly, leather-decored Gear Grinder. "Hey, are you alright, little guy?"
Zapp paused to examine the crack in his glasses. "No worse than usual, I suppose."
"Are those Ripto's bullies?"
"Oh, no, not at all!" Zapp dissented. "Ripto doesn't like it here - says it's too noisy and too wet. Those Gear Grinders have always given us trouble. It's just that they've built these new force fields all over the place, keeping us from getting around."
Spyro gave a small huff of smoke. Not being riptocs didn't spare these Gear Grinders in the slightest. With Ripto messing up every other corner of Summer Forest, the last thing they needed was a war between the locals. "Well, if you tell me how to get rid of those fields, I'd be happy to wreck them for you."
"You'll find little bulbs lying around with the Gear Grinders," Zapp explained. "Those are diodes - you can use them to shut down the force fields and move through Hurricos." The electroll mildly adjusted his glasses. "I'd, uh...love to help you, stranger, but...well, those Gear Grinders kind of broke my glasses..."
oo00oo00oo
Ignoring the rain, Hurricos wasn't a terrible place. Just filled with terrible locals.
The Gear Grinders were obnoxious; Spyro couldn't help but wonder how a species so content with just beating everything with their wrenches could build up such impressive force fields. Alarms and gears were constantly active, filling the pastures with ear-wrenching noise. Factories and robots littered the otherwise-grassy plains of Hurricos, turning the electrolls' home into a mechanical mess.
It reminded Spyro far too much of the Beast Maker swamps, back when Gnasty's gnorcs had turned the entire place into an electric junkyard. Hurricos had the same wet air mixed with smoggy machinery, (and as he found when Amper asked for his help maintaining the lightning-ball towers, the same giant, annoying monkeys).
Metal, machinery, gears...it was all above Spyro's head. The only thing he knew about any of it was that he couldn't burn through metal, but so long as he had his horns, that would never be a problem.
One thing that WOULD, though, was the last similarity between the Hurricos Gear Grinders and Gnasty Gnorc. It came to him in a factory, where he promised the electrolls he would cut off the Gear Grinder power supply.
Kosmo and Watt had asked him to glide to the factories and shut them down to prevent the Gear Grinders from abusing them any further. For the most part, it wasn't difficult to reach. Over a few fans, across a few gaps - no great challenge for one of the best young gliders in the Artisan lands.
The thing that sat between him and Spike was a final stretch of metal. One final wall, one simple glide. Except that the path was made up of moving platforms.
Spyro took his time approaching the final challenge, trying to ignore the clanky groans of the platforms as they slid in and out of their wall-projector. Despite the chilling rains of Hurricos surrounding him, the Artisan found his face getting hot, almost able to visualize the bubbling lava of Gnasty's factories filling the cloudy abyss below.
Come on, Spyro, it's just over there. Don't chicken out now. With a re-energizing breath, the Artisan kicked off of his safe platform, landing on the metal outcrop with little difficulty.
CLANK! As he moved to jump again, a wall shot forth, immediately stopping his progress. Spyro looked about in a sudden panic, ready to leap from the shrinking plaform under his paws. Gnasty Gnorc's snorty laugh rang through the storm, taunting the 'widdle baby dwagon', challenging him to cross such a treacherous chasm. Spyro stumbled as the platform nearly escaped him, forced onto his right legs as the left ones pedaled across air.
CLANK! The wall moved, snapping the Artisan back to Hurricos, allowing him to jump from the fallen metal outcrop to safety. Not this time, Gnasty.
But the trial was only half-over, as Spyro was quick to notice when he approached the shivering electroll and heard the roar of something far too loud to be thunder and lightning from the adjacent room. "That's the room where the main power switch lies!" Spike explained, shouting to be heard over the buzz. "But it's REALLY noisy in there! The sound reverberations shattered my glasses, and now I can't find my way around! Can you get in there and shut it down for us?"
Spyro gave a nod, then turned and stepped inside the factory, shuddering as he was greeted with the world's most unpleasant sound:
Zap. Zap. Zap. Zap.
Static ran rampant in the air, making the generator room hot and unwelcoming. The Artisan fought to shield his eyes from the blinding blue light that bounced from all of the metal surfaces. Tubes filled with surging electricity were everywhere you looked, vacuuming energy to all of the other Gear Grinder factories across Hurricos.
Spyro stumbled to find the deactivation switch. The large, red button stuck out amongst the blue glow of the room, but as he reached out to push it, a lightning-tube went active right next to him, filling the room with a deafening ZAAAAP! Spyro cringed as he felt the surge under his scales, flashing back to the metal floors of Terrace Village. He could feel the char burning into his flesh, feel his muscles locking up from the shock, hear the gross laughter of the metalhead gnorcs as they prodded him again and again with their shock-sticks...
"SPYRO!"
Snapping back to reality, the dragon found himself face-to-face with the big, red button, which he was quick to press. Within minutes, the factory grinded to a silent halt, sending the room into a cool, pleasant darkness.
Sparx gave a concerned look to his partner. "You alright, Spy? I thought I lost you for a second there."
Spyro, on the other hand, couldn't tear his eyes away from the lightning-tube, despite the fact it was now powerless. When Claude warned that electricity stung, he certainly wasn't kidding around.
oo00oo00oo
With the machines shut down and the force-fields deactivated, Brainy asked Spyro for one more favor before he left Hurricos. "We can't thank you enough, Spyro! Hurricos is ours once again!"
"Really, it was nothing," Spyro lied, hoping his forced smile would quicken this 'last favor'. Brainy had asked to meet him in the depths of one of the mecha-mazes, and just the sight and sound of being boxed in by metal was making the dragon anxious. Not only did the electricity have him on edge, but the darkness of the Gear Grinder factories was far too similar to another metal maze he was forced to manipulate. Spyro couldn't help but twitch at every creak and clank, ready to run if the floor began to retract.
Finally, they reached their destination - a small, golden gear. "We've done our best to protect our talisman from the Gear Grinders," Brainy explained, passing the Gear of Power to their heroes, "but we've come to a consensus that it'll be much safer in your hands. We'd like you to have it as a reward!"
"...Just so long as it doesn't generate electricity."
oo00oo00oo
With the Gear Grinders put back in their places, the electrolls had plenty of time to retake the area before they could regain their footing. One Gear Grinder in particular seemed extraordinarily upset that his precious shiny things had been taken away from him.
That's when he saw it. A shiny thing! Unable to hold back his excitement, the Gear Grinder ran forward to recapture the shiny thing.
ZAP! At the last moment, the shiny thing had been pulled away, and the force-field zapped him backwards. He gave a sad groan. This was the fourth time today that happened.
The electrolls on the outside, however, couldn't be having more fun. They giggled endlessly at the Gear Grinders' blind stupidity, swinging the diode bait in celebration. Brainy even gave Zapp a hearty slap on the back.
...Which inevitably broke his glasses again.
Funny how I absolutely HATE Hurricos, but this turned out to be one of my favorite chapters in the whole story. XD Anyway, hope you guys enjoyed! Thanks for reading; see you next time on Legacy!
§ Tucker's Mayflower, signing off! §