Something Wild – Lindsey Sterling Ft. Andrew McMahon
Calli gulped as she walked onto the stage. "Why did I agree again?"
"Because we asked, now get your butt on that stage." Amethyst eyes narrowed at Li who just grinned back but she didn't object.
"Let's just do this."
From the backstage the boys were looking at the scene. Quite amused at the glares Calli was giving to Pythor, who, no doubt, recognized her, even if she was dressed different than usual and had makeup on. Li had relinquished his place in the center to Saoirse. Both Li made sure his guitar was tuned, Dante took his place at the piano and Jake sat down behind the drums, leaving Calli at the right end of the stage, her face going from the glare the snake she looked at was returning, to a nervous look as she recognized several people in the audience.
I can't back down now. Just take a deep breath, close your eyes and pretend you're preforming for the dragons again. And that was just wat she did.
Whilst the boys could see she was still on edge with the whole situation, they were immediately impressed as soon as the girl started to move the bow over the strings with relaxed hands, unlike the rest of her stance. It wasn't until the chorus she seemed to completely relax. Moving along to the music with her eyes closed.
"If you're lost out where the lights are blinding
Caught in all, the stars are hiding
That's when something wild calls you home, home."
"Okay, why do we have to compete when they're that good?" Kai asked with raised eyebrows. No-one answered, Jay and Zane shrugged whilst Cole didn't seem to hear it. He was too focused on the stage to listen, much to the amusement of the others.
"So, when are you going to ask her out?" Jay joked as he elbowed his friend, effectively snapping him back to reality.
"I have no idea what you're talking about." He denied, glad that his mask was enough to hide his reddening ears. However, his friends weren't fooled, instead Kai and Jay grinned at each other.
"You might not make goo-goo eyes like Jay does at my sister, but you can't fool us. Just ask her out."
Cole glared and tried to object but had no time to do so as the said redhead al but dashed around the corner.
"Stupid snake. I swear I'm going to strangle tha-." She came to a halt when she noticed the looks. Cole was all but glaring at Jay and Kai, who both were on the verge of bursting out in laughter and Zane just looked on with a small grin. "What's going on here?"
"Nothing!" The black ninja cried. "Just watching you guys preform."
Smooth Calli thought with a raised eyebrow but she didn't comment on it. Even when Jay and Kai burst into laughter. "We got a 2 from Pythor and a 8 and 9 from the other judges. We're tied with the tap-dance act." She waved at the others that walked past. Mouthing she would see them later. Dante nodded and gave a thumb up before he followed his friends, arm tossed around Li's neck.
"Well I guess it's up to us then. We're gonna do this. I want everyone to see who we are!" Cole started a quick pep talk.
Zane shuddered. "I've got butterflies in my stomach."
Calli let out a shaky laugh. "I get Ya. Nerves are awful"
"No.." He objected. "I really have butterflies." And with that he opened his chest and low and behold a pair of butterflies flew out.
Jay broke the awkward silence. "Okay…..Glad he got that out of your system."
"Yeah but ye'd better have Nya check that out if we get back to the bounty."
"Last call for Spin Harmony!"
Cole snapped everyone's attention back. "That's us. Call-" The redhead nodded and gave a salute. "I'll keep an eye on those snakes for ya…."
"Let's do this, For Cole." Jay exclaimed, pumped to get some action.
Kai nodded enthusiastically. "If we pull off a Tornado of Creation we can score perfect 10's out there!" He cheered, obviously happy about getting some action.
"I can say anything and it will only go to improve our team unity." Zane grinned underneath his mask.
Cole smiled at his teammates as he looked at them one by one. "I'm glad you're my friends." He said before thrusting his hands up. "Let's do this!"
"You might want to give us some space." Jay grinned at Calli, she nodded and took a step back. Giving the boys the space to use their Spinjitzu.
"Ladies and Gentlemen! Spin Harmony." The announcer called and the boys lined up on the stage.
Pythor gave them his darkest look up until now and Calli couldn't help but burst into laughter as it seemed more hilarious then intimidating with his sagging fake beard.
The boys started their routine, using both dance and martial arts to garner the crowd's approval. And they did. Even Calli couldn't help but cheer, much to Saoirse's amusement. The silver haired girl had been watching her younger friend from a distance.
From his place from the judges-table Pythor signaled for a couple of snakes in the audience to get up the stage and remove the Ninja from the equation. But instead of going all in for a fight, the boys capitalized on it like pro's. Never breaking out of the routine as they went to kick their scaly butts. As soon as they had kicked all of the Hypnobrai off the stage, they ended with a Spinjitzu tornado. However, there were more snakes then that.
Calli noted one of them hanging from the rafters and wasted no time, she grabbed the first object she could find, which happened to be a lightbulb and threw it with towards the snake with great accuracy, hitting the creature square in the face.
The snake lost his balance and fell down, nearly hitting Jay's tornado if it weren't for Zane's quick reflexes, jumping up and kicking the snake away. Meanwhile the other three fanned out to push back another horde of upcoming snakes.
The female redhead behind the stage had a few snakes to deal with herself, after her stunt with the lightbulb they made a point to surround her.
"I'm not in the mood to play boys." She scoffed and took action, kicking one snake in the face to break the circle and slipped behind him. The redhead knocked him out with ease and grinned. "But it would seem I don't have much choice."
Calli grinned at the unconscious snakes. Taking them down had never been difficult. Once she was sure they had been taken care of properly – Binding them against every table she could find – she turned her attention back to the stage. Zane, Jay and Kai stood on one end of the stage whilst Cole took out three snakes after each other in a perplexing amount of grace, though she shouldn't be surprised at that, he was both a ninja and a dancer's son after all, but this was something different.
Cole had managed to do the Triple Tiger Sashay.
The crowd went wild and the judges, sans Pythor, had been left speechless. Calli giggled as the announcer practically went to worship the black ninja, who's eyes seemed to convey the message of; This is awkward, please get up.
The others finally snapped out of their daze and all but doggy-piled him as they cheered him on.
The two human judges didn't need any time to decide their scores, holding up the 10's with loud cheers. The purple snake however gave them a 0. But not for long. In a scene more akin to a horror movie, the judge that Pythor had swallowed tossed his arm out of the mouth of the snake and shakenly put a number akin to a 1 next to the 0, turning the low score in a perfect one.
"It's a perfect score!" The announcer cried as Pythor's protests fell to deaf ears. "Spin Harmony wins!"
Calliope had half a mind to dash onto the stage to congratulate them but decided that waiting patiently was the better option. No need to draw more attention to her then needed. The boys accepted the trophy and Cole held it up high. They had won, and they did it their way.
"I have never felt so alive!" Zane exclaimed as he and the others moved backstage.
Jay laughed out loud. "We did it!"
Kai however argued. "No." He told the others. "Cole did it."
"Thanks. But go and celebrate without me." Calli frowned as Cole passed the trophy to Jay and she put her hand on Cole's shoulder. "Winning this just doesn't feel the same without my dad-" Having heard the mixture of footsteps and a cane before the others did, the redhead turned her friend around, much to his confusion.
"Cole." Lou moved towards his son, carefully avoiding the still tied up snakes.
The black Ninja looked taken aback to the point both Calli and Jay had to push him forward. "Dad."
"I saw it all Son, I saw It all." The elder man spoke with a soft smile as his son made his way towards him.
Cole came to a halt right in front of his father. Lou opened his arms and after a small moment of hesitations, the dark-haired Ninja embraced him.
"You saw me dance?" Asked Cole as he removed his mask from his face.
Lou nodded his head. "More importantly." He stated with pride in his voice. "I saw you fight.
Those serpentine were up to no good, trying to steal the show and I saw you stand up for what is right." The elder man released his hold from Cole's shoulder. "I was wrong... I shouldn't have pushed you so hard to follow in my footsteps. Everyone is born with a special talent inside, waiting to get out." He now smiled. "And you were born to be a ninja."
"Y-you're not mad?" Cole sputtered, overcome by feelings of surprise. This made Calli giggle as she and the others joined them. Both son and father gave the girl a quick look, Cole one of both embarrassment and annoyance whilst Lou had a more knowing one, before the elder continued.
"How can I be? My son's a hero!"
The reunion, however was short when Calli suddenly pulled the small dagger out of her boots, eyes narrowed in anger and suspicion. The others soon noticed why.
"I'm sorry to interrupt this lovely reunion. But did you know…" Pythor stopped to create a dramatic pause. "It's me?"
Calli raised an eyebrow with a look that screamed just how stupid she found the statement but didn't bother to respond to it.
"You couldn't fool us, Pythor." Cole sighed in exasperation, clearly done with snakes today, as he and the others moved towards the serpentine leader.
The long-necked snake laughed. "I wouldn't want you to miss our big showstopper." Before anyone could react, he gave the order to two constrictai to untie the knots that held up part of the backstage rafters and backdrops. Those hanging right above Lou.
Cole reacted faster than any of them, tossing himself over his father as everything came crashing down on top of them.
In the confusion, Pythor slithered away with the trophy and thus, with the Fangblade.
"They got the Fangblade!" Jay rasped as he tried to clear his lungs from all the dust that had clouded the room.
"Not important right now!" Calli cried as she tried to clear her vision. Right now, they had to focus on the fact her friend was buried underneath a heap of theater supplies. She knew Cole could handle a lot, in fact he most likely was the most resilient of them all, but she doubted he would be able to survive this with only a few scratches.
However, when she wanted to go and help them, Kai stopped her and pointed to the case that held all their weapons and she couldn't help but breathe a sigh of utter relieve.
The golden Scythe was glowing.
"He found his true potential!" Zane exclaimed equally as relieved and no sooner had he said or a bright glow emitted itself from the small open spaces of the pile.
The large speaker on the top of the pile suddenly moved, slowly at first but after a few seconds it was lifted upwards, revealing Cole and his father.
The Black Ninja tossed the object out of the way and helped his father stand.
"How did we survive." Asked Lou, his voice a bit dazed before his eyes widened at the sight of his son, who's aura glowed a mixture of bright gold and light brown. Calli shuddered at the sight. Whereas with Zane the temperature had dropped even more or with Jay when you could feel the electricity in the air, this didn't have any of it, instead the whole room suddenly smelled like upturned earth and freshly cut grass.
Zane quickly explained the situation as he and the others helped the elder man down. Kai however, while happy for his friend, went to sulk about him being the only one without special powers.
Cole suddenly snapped out of it, shaking his head as if it was a bad thought and jumped down the pile "Is everyone all right?"
No-one had the time to answer when someone threw her arms around his neck, nearly tossing him back. "We're supposed to be asking ye that."
At this Cole couldn't help but laugh as he circled an arm around the redhead's waist. Calli couldn't help but feel her ears heat up as she realized what she had just done, but she swallowed her pride, he could've just died if it weren't for his true potential unlocking. One hug wasn't a problem, was it?
"But that reminds me." She turned away to face Kai. "Ya better unlock your potential outside a life or death situation like this, mister."
The group all went back to Cole's house after what happened. Calli had changed back into her comfortable garb and rid herself of her makeup. She was currently in the living room, seating on the floor with her legs crossed and was tuning the violin she had used during the show, Li had given it to her to keep. The rest of the group was in another room celebrating the victory. A small smile graced her features as she could hear their enthusiasm from where she was sitting.
She didn't expect herself to be alone for long and she was quickly proven right as the boys came in again. Happily chattering.
"So, when where you going to tell us how good you are with that thing." Kai grinned smugly.
She shrugged, not braking her gaze from the instrument. "I'm not that good."
"Yeah, right and Cole can cook." Jay grinned at his friend's glare but Cole didn't rise to the bait any further.
Calli carefully put the instrument back in its casing. "It's just a self-taught hobby, nothing else."
"Either way. I still need to thank you, I know how much you hate standing in the spotlight." No-one missed the tint of red that graced her cheeks and it was at this moment Kai al but tossed out Jay and Zane out of the room.
The other two noticed this and whilst Calli raised her eyebrows and Cole, whilst he rolled his eyes took this opportunity to press a small peck in her cheek. "Thanks."
And with that he left the room, leaving Calli to wonder what just had happened.
I couldn't help that ending xD sorry not Sorry. Jeez one epsiode spread over 3 chapters was a pain to write but I love how these came out :)
Soooooo... I was wondering if you guys had any thoughts or theories on this story. I mean I love your reviews but i have just been wondering what your point of view on it is. :)
On another note: Can i rant here for a bit? Am I the only one that has gripes with the fact Cole's powers came from his mothers side?
I mean, she passed away when he was about 14 to 16 years of age (that's when he ran away at least) and yet he knew nothing of his heritage? I am calling BS on that or at least somewhat. She could have been one of those parents that didn't know how to tell her son but i don't think that.
We know others that didn't know their parents were elemental masters; Nya and Kai, but Ray and Maya had an excuse.. their kids were 4 year and under, too young to understand what that actually meant.
So back to Cole. I would've found it more believable if he got his powers from his Fathers side of the family. Now hear me out.
In my head this was actually the canon before the producers told us the Earth Ninja got his powers from his mom.
It's shown in this episode that being part of the group is basically family tradition. to the point Lou forced his son to follow in his footsteps. And i'm willing to say that this happened for his ancestors. So what i would've done is that because of this it became a Taboo to talk about powers in the family to the point that newer generations didn't even know about powers.
I think this would be a lot more interesting then just; oh he got it from his dead mothers side. And end rant xD this is why I usually don't go on rants.
And congratulations if you've gotten this far, because we go on to the reviews:
MightyShipper: Haha, sometimes a simple sentence is enough :)
Pappilie:
Glad you like it. I like writing shipping scene with the most mundane of things xD
Le6Mew:
Thank you for the review, I'm very glad you like this story and Calli. I've spent over a year trying to perfect her background so i'm glad to see that paying off :) As for my upload schedule: I post a new chapter on every tuesday (at least tuesday for me...) and with the holidays coming up i can probably write more if my work schedule allows it, so don't worry about it.
Aurro sister of Morro: Don't worry, you'll get them ;) As for Calli, she has just a few abilities, i thought making her an elemental master would be too easy and that is a bit overdone in my opinion... But more will become clear in the next chapters :)
Well, I hope you enjoyed and I'll see you next chapter. :)