Chapter 3 is here, where a diabolical partnership will begin...
Ch3: The Dark Alliance
At the temple, Spyro had gathered the others to discuss what he had found in the atrium. Cynder had returned to his side along with Cyril and his pupils Jace and Saphira. Jace was almost a mirror image of Cyril, color and all, except he had three horns instead of two on the back of his head, and a persistent attitude to boot. Saphira was a dark colored female with two horns on her head, as well as a soft calm voice and a sassy attitude to add to her nature, which made her quick friends with Cynder. After gathering everyone together, Spyro lead them into the temple and down the staircase. All of them, including Terrador and his pupils Vacu and Chloro were approaching the end of the staircase to see what Spyro was talking about.
"So what is it you have found exactly? Can't the rest of us just wait outside to keep it secure like you wanted in the first place?" asked Vacu.
"Quiet Vacu! If this is what Spyro thinks it is we all must confirm it," ordered Terrador.
"He's right, trust me, we have found our objective," said Spyro as they reached the bottom of the stairs. They all took in the sights of the atrium, however Cynder saw what he had meant when he looked at the end of the hall. She gasped at seeing the symbol with two scythes circling each other against a flat base.
"The Seal of Mar!" she exclaimed.
"That's it," said Spyro.
"You are familiar with this symbol?" Terrador asked them.
"Yes, from our last journey, Spyro you did it! You found it!" Cynder cheered.
"Yes, but what have we found exactly?" asked Cyril.
"My thoughts exactly sir," commented Jace.
"As I've told you before, the Precursors have hidden artifacts of various kinds on our planet, and this symbol was what marked their artifacts on Elorin, so it has to be the same here," explained Spyro.
"We had better do a thorough investigation of this chamber then, leave no stone unturned," proclaimed Terrador, and all of them spread across the chamber to get to work.
Setting: Dragon Realms Volcano
The aliens stood back slightly as the creature in front of them stretched its legs. The dragon had finished stretching its head and was now extending his wings before he spoke. It had been a long time for him since he last breathed fresh air, and he was relieved to finally move again, and hatch another plan. This time though, it was mainly for the prospect of revenge.
"Free…at last," Malefor darkly claimed. One of the aliens slowly approached him carrying some sort of disc in its hand. Malefor immediately looked up to notice the approaching creature.
"What is this? Another cretin?"
The alien said nothing and merely placed the disk on the floor and push a button on top to activate it. The disc lit up with a click and was illuminating light above it into some sort of static field. Soon an image was forming, one that nearly resembled a human head with long disfigured ears.
"Interstellar team report, answer me, have you completed your objective? Has he been released?" The alien he was talking to pointed its claw behind the image. The image quickly spun around to see the dark dragon face to face.
"Ah excellent, your objective was a success," the image commented the aliens before turning towards Malefor again, "greetings powerful one, I hope you are more comfortable now."
"Hmm, more than I have been, what is it to you?" the dark dragon asked bitterly.
"Just trying to be kind...Malefor is it?"
The Dark Master's eyes lit up ever so slightly, "How do you know me, who are you?" he demanded.
"Just a friend, an unfortunate tortured soul like yourself, who has been bullied similarly by other lower life formed pests. Like your old foe the purple whelp."
Malefor's eyes continued to be wide, "You know of Spyro?"
"Unfortunately yes, he has caused me a great deal of grief as well, along with his friend Jak," the image growled saying the name.
"You seem to know much stranger, more than enough to make me suspicious," said Malefor.
"I don't blame you, you really can't trust strangers these days, believe me I've been there, but seeing how I've gone through the trouble of freeing you from your prison, I would think you would like to hear what I have to offer."
Malefor stood still for a moment, then spoke with a stern gaze, "I'm listening."
"What I am proposing is a mutual partnership, everything 50-50, resources, soldiers, ships, sharing of plans, all for the accomplishment of our mutual goal: the annihilation of Spyro and Jak."
"Interesting proposal, though I am inclined to ask, what is stopping me from destroying your minions and crushing your little magic box and taking revenge on Spyro for myself?!" Malefor declared in the image's face. To his surprise the image appeared to be smirking, not feeling intimidated by his threat at all by appearance.
"I figured you might bring that up, which is why I should give you a brief preview of what lies ahead, and beyond." The image then disappeared, stunning Malefor for a moment, and then the disk lit up again, this time with a larger spherical layout of a whole planet, one with displayed regions and complete with an astronomical star map that encompassed it.
"Witness the dawn of a new era, one without limits, one without rules, nothing but eternal conquest settled in locations of our choosing, this world, significant as it is, is only one of many bodies outlying the expanse of the universe," the display quickly changed, to reveal an outlying plethora of planets, their moons, galaxies and nebulas, and other astronomical bodies.
"A universe that lives only for the mere prospect of peace and unity, quite small minded if you ask me. But imagine if we could extend that livelihood, could broaden the regions of the universe with our image, spread it across the cosmos to serve our means," the image then faded down to show only the face again, "our own individual means of course."
Malefor seemed completely stunned silent by what he was hearing, but one could tell he was processing it currently.
"That is what I meant by 50-50, not just the shared satisfaction of revenge, but the shared domination of the universe, and with both of our resources combined, it will be assured, provided we get rid of our mutual foes together, once and for all."
Malefor was blank for a moment, as he finished processing everything he had heard from the stranger. His eyes closed for a second and then, he started chuckling, very darkly and eerily.
"Hehehe, you have a way of piking ones interests stranger, you have made quite a proposal."
"So, do we have a deal?" the image smirked, with his dark purple alien team eagerly waiting for his response.
"Deal, and who might I have the honor of addressing?" asked Malefor. The image grinned darkly before giving his new partner his name.
Setting: Dragon Realms Precursor Temple
The search party had just finished surveying the atrium for anything that led to more clues about the Precursors, but aside from the Seal of Mar, there was nothing else except for some more old runes they couldn't decipher. They had decided to contact Ignitus, and see if his expertise could interpret the runes for them. They had used some tracing paper the moles back in Warfang had given them to inscribe the runes upon, and then made their way back outside the temple together to set up contact. Once together, Terrador reached into the sack around his neck and pulled out a white glowing gem, a mystic gem courtesy of the White Isle, their only means of contacting Ignitus the Chronicler. Terrador placed it on the ground in front of them and touched it on the hem with his paw. The gem lit up with a blinding glow and enveloped the dragons, causing their eyes to squint. Soon, the image of Ignitus had shown itself amidst the light.
"Hello my friends," said Ignitus.
"Hi Ignitus," said Spyro relieved to see his old mentor again.
"Greetings," said everyone else.
"I can presume you've discovered something of great relevance," Ignitus stated.
"Yes, we found the symbol of Mar in the atrium of this temple," Spyro began, "we searched the entire vicinity inside but found nothing else pertaining to the Precursors."
"We did find some old runes on the walls," Terrador spoke up while bringing out the tracing paper, "I cannot identify one symbol, we were hoping your documentaries can shed some light on this carvings."
He showed the paper to the Chronicler, and he looked at it accordingly. They waited patiently for him to decipher it, though Vacu was uneasily twitching for obvious reasons. Ignitus analyzed the paper from top to bottom, reading every rune carefully attempting to interpret it, unfortunately he too seemed to be stumped, as he seemed uneasy while reading the paper. Finally, he relaxed his shoulders and took a breath.
"Humph, I'm afraid I cannot interpret one character," he dismally spoke, causing everyone else to go wide eyed.
"But you're the Chronicler!" Cyril exclaimed, "If you can't interpret this then there is nothing…"
"Wait Cyril," Ignitus interrupted him. "I said I couldn't interpret it, and yes through my whole library I have never seen any resembling this form of language, but that does lead to one logical conclusion."
"Which is?" Cyril asked.
"We have definitely discovered a place created by extraterrestrial beings, for their language is completely different from anything our race has ever created, therefore we can conclude we have found our first clue," stated the Chronicler.
Everyone seemed to understand what he was saying, and then Cynder asked, "Could we compare these runes then to those on the Armageddon Arch? When we first found it there was also some strange runes on that we were unable to interpret, that way we can link the two together?"
"That can be a step in the right direction Cynder, we shall make that verification tomorrow, right now it's getting late and I'll do some more research into these ruins, there may be something that I overlooked," Ignitus said before his image faded out, and the shine from the mystic gem died down. Terrador picked it back up and pocketed the gem.
"Good call on that Arch Cynder, you really do have the brains that everyone talks about," complimented Saphira.
"Thanks," Cynder replied with a smile. She then turned to Spyro, who followed up on the comment with a nod.
"Well then, we've put in a hard day's work, its best we retire for the evening, we'll follow up Ignitus's lead tomorrow," said Terrador.
Hours went by, and the dragons had made camp outside the Precursor temple and were sleeping away peacefully. Crickets were chirping and the twin moons were shining brightly over the night sky. Below on the ground, Spyro and Cynder slept together comfortably, it seemed nothing could disturb them. Unfortunately their comfort was their ignorance in this case, because across the night sky, an invading force was on its way toward the temple, with a dark agenda in mind. The aliens from the pod were flying at top speed with the Precursor temple in their sights, the land creatures flying atop their aerial counterparts. They flew in low around the coast side of the temple, attempting to sneak past the dragons as silently as they could. The land aliens jumped from their aerial mounts and grasped the temple exterior with their claws. They started crawling their way up the side of the wall making their way toward the surface. The dragons continued to sleep as their unexpected visitors kept crawling closer. They made their way to the stoop overlooking the temple entrance, and jumped down to the ground, barely making a sound as they hit ground. They looked to the dragons still asleep for the night. One alien crept closer as if he was stalking them like prey, ready to attack. However another stopped him by the shoulder and shake of the head, indicating they still had a job here. The alien huffed, and followed his compatriots toward the temple entrance. All of them disappeared into the darkness, all the while there was a stirring behind them.
Spyro snorted and shook his head slightly awake, then slowly opened his eyes and turned towards the temple, he swore he could sense something in his sleep. The sound of soft breathing grabbed his attention, and he looked dreamily toward Cynder as she slept peacefully. Not wanting to disturb her he slowly rose to his feet and tiptoed toward the temple to check it out. As he approached the entrance, he could smell something odorous, it was also unfamiliar, and he wrinkled his nose and shook it off and made his way forward. He walked carefully through the hall making sure he didn't upset anything, until he saw something that made him gasp! In front of him was a footmark, a footmark unlike anything he had ever seen, it was completely foreign to him, for no creature he knew could make a footmark like this. He tensed up, he knew now there was something else in this temple now, and he didn't know if it was friendly or not. He approached the staircase silently, and made his way down with a wisp of his fire breath to light the way. He slowly made his way down, putting one foot in front of the other. Eventually he reached the bottom of the staircase and extinguished his flame. Though he didn't need it, for something else was glowing in the atrium, an eerie purple.
Spyro immediately ducked down to a small step located on the floor and looked ahead with wonder and shock. Eight foreign creatures were looming by the wall which housed the Seal of Mar. One of them was running his claw down the face of the wall, as if it were searching for something. It kept creeping along it until it stopped near the bottom, it moved its claws against an extrusion on the wall and then opened its hand up. Purple lightning was eroding from the hand and making contact with the wall. Spyro watched intently, wondering what was happening. Suddenly an opening occurred within the wall, some sort of drawer had opened up. The lightning stopped, and the creature turned toward one of its compatriots, another one reached out its claw, within it held some sort of dark crystal. He made its way toward the wall, without knowing that one shard had fallen off the crystal as he walked forward. The creature set the crystal in the open drawer. The drawer seemed to close automatically, and then the real show began.
There was a shift that rocked through the temple, making a small tremor that shook the dragons slightly, stirring them in their sleep, but not all the way. Although Cynder opened her eyes briefly and looked around slightly, and noticed that Spyro was missing.
Spyro watched in awe as the whole wall seemed to glow with an intermittent light. The Seal of Mar that encompassed the wall began to split apart at the seams, one scythe went to the left, and another went to the right. They both revealed an open swirling vortex that grew so immense that it eventually took up the whole wall. Spyro knew immediately what this was and thought, 'Another interstellar portal.'
The creatures looked to each other speaking in their foreign language as if they were discussing some sort of plan. They then took their first steps toward the portal ready to enter.
"HEY!"
The creatures spun around immediately, to see the purple dragon standing in the atrium with a serious look on his face. His paws gripped the dirt and he spoke to them aloud, "I don't know what all of you are, but you are trespassing on protected property, and I'm going to give you one chance to turn around and don't come back, understand?"
The creatures to each other again upon hearing the dragon's demand, needless to say, they didn't consider it. The quills on the back of their heads twitched as they slowly hissed at Spyro with their claws drawn.
"I guess we do this the hard way then," Spyro said as he got into a fighting stance, "Bring it."
Chapter 3 is up, hope you all enjoy!
