Hello and welcome back! Here is probably the most anticipated chapter so far, nothing like a reunion between good friends, hope you enjoy!
Ch5: Reunion
As the shimmering light illuminating the temple subsided, another small event was taking place at the temple entrance. A warp gate stationed near the temple entrance was coming to life, for someone was coming through. In fact it was two, as Jak and Daxter emerged from the gate returning from their volcano expedition. Looking around the atrium, Jak saw something on the far wall, another dark precursor idol, the same one that activated his invisibility powers in the volcano. He knew the guarding eye of the door that led into the temple would not allow him to pass while he was still visible, so using common sense he walked over to the idol with Daxter on his shoulder and reached out his hand to touch the idol and activate his invisibility. Now invisible, he walked over to the guarding eye and strolled right passed it. As soon as he approached the door at the end of the hall, the eye vanished and he resumed his visibility.
"Now that was out of sight," Daxter remarked.
"Terrible quote Daxter, terrible quote," Jak said shaking his head.
"Eh, everyone's a critic"
They entered the staircase leading down to the temple depths, only to find themselves in the midst of a group of black widow spiders!
"Yeeekkk! Not spiders!" Daxter cried. Jak immediately drew his blaster and opened fire at the creepy crawlies. Within five shots they were all dead, allowing them to pass further into the temple.
Spyro woke up with a blistering headache, his ride through the tunnel took quite a number on him, screwing up his senses. He lifted his head and tried to shake the exhaustion off. He slowly stood up as his strength slowly returned to him. He observed his surroundings, he was in an open spherical room with an open exit right in front of him, he looked behind and saw an even greater open space embedded in the wall. At the end was another familiar sight, a large arch with embedded channels, the only thing missing was the large gem that supposedly powered it.
"Wow, two interstellar travels in just a year, if this keeps up I'll start to spend more time and distance traveling then I do at home," he said with light humor. But it quickly vanished, as he realized something.
"If those aliens went through before me, where are they?" Spyro asked himself looking around, but the aliens were nowhere in sight, he figured they must have been sent somewhere else. But then he had another terrifying thought.
"Cynder, oh I hope she didn't come in after me, I don't want her to fall in and end up somewhere else, these portals always seem to transport in random locations." He looked around and started walking toward the open entrance in front of him. He was astonished by what he saw, a large group of orange colored statues with extended arms mounted in the center of another large chamber in front of him. The chamber appeared to have multiple openings in front of the statues, verifying that they could be some sort of entrance or exit. As for the statues, they appeared to have platforms in their hands, and large heads with elongated noses. Spyro was unfamiliar with these statues, but they did catch his interest, as if he already knew something about them. The sound of an opening door alerted him, and he dove back into the room that he had just arrived in.
"What is going on here?!" a stern voice sounded. "A shining light envelops the temple and you can't find the explanation for it?"
A soft voice answered, "I am sorry, this sort of phenomenon is foreign to us, it may even predate the chronicles of our elders."
"Then I suggest you do your research, I want an explanation soon, now what are the results of your additional study related to the catacombs?"
"Slow, and unfortunately inexplicable, the texts are many and…"
"I want no excuses! You told me this could be done, now make it so!" Spyro peeked around the corner to see who was speaking, the stern voice belonged to a tall man in some sort of business suit, and the soft voice belonged to a young woman with a painted face. Spyro also noticed the elongated ears they both had, 'It can't be, I'm back…'
His thought was interrupted by the woman, "but we have so little time, the Day Star approaches, you know what it brings!"
"Unfortunate yes, we will deal with that as soon as I have full access to the catacombs, just continue your work and I will deal with those idiots in Haven, I promise you will meet your makers!" the man in the suit appeared to sneer before he turned to leave down the connecting hall.
'Haven' thought Spyro and he finally realized where he was.
'I'm back on Elorin! I found another way back to Elorin! Jak's world' He felt relieved that he knew where he was, and even better that it was the world of a friend. However, he knew he would have to find him in Haven City, which location as of right now was unknown to him. He looked again, and saw that the two people were now gone, the coast was clear. He decided now was the best time to leave, and took flight to the left and down to another floor which led to a door. He had just landed, only to be halted by a booming voice.
Greetings great warrior, your return brings us great hope, this planets future is at a critical juncture.
Spyro looked around for the source of the sound but saw nothing, at least nothing that was moving.
Jak and Daxter, having entered the chamber and listening to Count Veger's orders to Seem, the head temple monk, knew something big was about to take place. Once they saw that they had vanished from sight, they came out of hiding. Now they stood at the foot of the statue as it continued speaking.
The dark ones have found your world again, and fate hangs in the balance where the past and the future collide.
"Do you have any idea what he just said?" Daxter asked Jak.
"Speaketh a normal language okay?" he told the statue while comically moving his figures in faux sign language.
You will need all the power you can muster to survive this terrible test great one.
"I can handle it," Daxter replied.
I was talking to the tall one shorty!
"Hey!"
Spyro's ears perked up, he had just heard a loud squeaky voice, a voice very familiar to him, though he hadn't expected to hear at this very moment.
"No, it couldn't be" he said.
Look into the light, and receive the power hero
Spyro flew up and peeked over the statue to see a fortunate and shocking sight, he didn't believe he would find them this fast! Jak and Daxter were on the adjacent platform ahead of him, although something strange was happening to Jak, he was levitating, engulfed in some strange blue light.
"Okay, now you're scaring me," Daxter said observing. Jak's feet touched the ground again as the light disappeared.
"Dax, the dark eco, it feels...far away, I feel better." Daxter was dumbfounded, but immediately figured it was another weird precursor trick. When it came to Jak he was always the magnet for unusual events. He jumped back onto Jak's shoulder, and the hero turned around to leave, only for a surprise to swoop in from above!
"WOAH!" they yelled for a moment, until realization struck them.
"Spyro?!"
"Jak! Daxter!"
"SPYRO!"
"I can't believe it's you guys! I never expected to see you again so soon!" Spyro exclaimed.
"We're just as surprised as you are!" Jak replied.
"Yeah, and what happened? You seem to be a little more pudgy than I remember," said Daxter.
"Hehe, everyone grows up Daxter, that includes dragons, though I'm still a ways away before I'm fully grown," Spyro explained.
"Don't tell me you're going to be so large I'm going to have to strain my neck to talk to you," Jak said with a grin.
"Probably," Spyro said shrugging his shoulders.
"More importantly what are you doing here? How did you get here?" Jak asked with utmost curiosity.
"Same as before more or less, I found an ancient structure inside some old ruins and examined everything I could see," Spyro began, "Only this time I didn't activate it, there were these strange dark purple creatures, unlike anything I've ever seen. They had this crystal, and it was emitting some eerie kind of glow, and they placed it into this compartment embedded in the structure, and the next thing I know, there is another blue vortex that opened up, and it seemed to be directed toward your world again."
Jak was astonished by what the purple dragon was telling him, exactly how many portals did exist on his world, and did they lead anywhere else? "Talk about a series of unusual events."
"Your telling me, but that isn't all of it."
"What do you mean?" Jak asked.
"The ancient structure marked many unknown inscriptions, but there was one identified marker, the Seal of Mar," said Spyro.
Jak was befuddled, the Seal of Mar? On a world other than his? Clearly there was more between these portals than originally thought. Not only were they apparently made by an alliance between Precursors and Dragons that predated them by roughly 500 years, but they seemed to securely link between his world and the dragons, so their planet's history could very much be intertwined with Spyros'. Too bad Onin wasn't here, he would love to question her again, since she was the one who first helped shed some light on this subject before.
"The Seal of Mar on a foreign planet? I'm thinking I might have to take a trip to your world to do some investigating of my own, if I can," said Jak.
"We'll see, I would definitely be willing to give you and everyone the grand tour," Spyro replied before asking a serious question. "By the way what was that that happened before with you? You seemed to be levitating, and you were surrounded by a blue light, and I could sworn I heard the statue talking!"
"Let's just say I've been endowed with some new tricks, and I have no idea how many more may be coming," Jak explained.
"Does it have anything to do with your," Spyro slowly spoke while thinking the right way to ask this question, "other powers? From Dark Eco?"
"You could say that, though I think I've just been given a counterbalance to them," Jak replied.
Spyro nodded in understanding, he was well aware of Jak's dark eco powers. How it turned him from a mild mannered warrior into a fiercely aggressive and terrifying creature. He had seen first-hand the kind of damage that creature could do, and the last thing he wanted was to be an enemy to it. Though he remembered how much that particular ailment was what made him and Jak quick friends, how they both had to struggle with an inner darkness that threatened to consume them if they weren't careful. Never the less, the fact that they had shared a similar pain granted them mutual respect for each other. Though after hearing Jak's recent explanation, he also wondered if Jak's dark side could be counterbalanced, could his be as well? He had often talked to Ignitus about ridding himself of this turmoil, but he never asked if it could be balanced. Honestly, Spyro would love nothing more than to just get rid of it all together, for the last thing he had ever wanted was more power. He was already a purple dragon, granting him more powers than any dragon alive, though he wished that wasn't the case.
Getting back on topic, Jak decided to ask a question, "so where is this portal that brought you here?"
"It's over on the other side of the statue," said Spyro, "against the wall of a small chamber."
"Show me," the human asked.
"No problem," Spyro said as he took flight, he hovered above Jak for a moment allowing him to grab on to his legs for the ride. Spyro flew around the statue with Daxter clinging to Jak's shoulder to prevent him from falling off. Honestly he wanted to get out of this temple sooner rather than later, unfortunately business came first in this case, and Jak didn't want to leave here without every question answered. The chamber was within sight, and Spyro lowered down so Jak could jump onto the platform. He landed as well and all of them walked into the chamber, and there it was, the large archway that had transported Spyro, now dormant. Jak analyzed the whole structure of the archway, seeing if anything peculiar stood out. But as far as some ancient Precursor runes outlining the full scale of it, there was nothing that stood out.
Spyro knew what to look for, the same chamber the aliens had opened up, he was currently searching for a similar mechanism on this one, though nothing seemed to stand out. Surely this portal should swing both ways right? Then again, he remembered that when he last entered the Armageddon Arch, that transport ended up landing him in the center of Haven City at random. However, this time he came out through another arch, but on the other hand, the aliens had come through it before him, and they didn't end up here, nothing about it made sense.
"Nothing seems out of place, and nothing seems to stand out either, did you say they had some sort of crystal?" Jak asked.
"Yeah, they put it somewhere on the left side, yet I'm not seeing anything on this one that remotely resembles that," replied Spyro.
"Eh just label it as more precursor junk, that stuff gives you nothing but trouble," complained Daxter, "it has been since day one, and it just gets worse."
Jak remained silent for a moment, then decided it was time to put it aside for now, there were other things to attend to. "I promise we'll look into it Spyro, but I don't think we'll be finding out anything today, let's come back when we have more information."
"Okay, lead the way it's your world," said Spyro. They turned to leave the chamber, Spyro took flight again and grabbed Jak by the shoulders. He flew slowly over top of the statue and back towards the warp gate that was waiting at the end of the walk way. Spyro asked something he was curious about since arriving here.
"Where are we anyway? This doesn't look like Haven."
"We are in a Precursor temple, on the outskirts of the Wasteland," Jak explained.
"Wasteland? Where we infiltrated the metalhead nest?" asked Spyro.
"That was the another isle of the Wasteland, this one stands alone as being the largest," Jak further explained. They approached the warp gate ready to enter.
"I'm sure you remember how these work," he told Spyro. The dragon nodded to him, although he was fed up with portals at this point, but Jak assured him that this was the only way out so he kept his bias aside at the moment.
"Been through too many to forget," Spyro commented. With that said, Jak and Daxter jumped in first, followed by Spyro right after them.
Setting: Dragon Realms Precursor Temple
Cynder didn't waste any time returning to the guardians to wake them up after what she saw in the atrium. As soon as she had their attention, all of them and their pupils followed her quickly down to the atrium toward the open wall where the portal was still open. They had just entered the staircase and were moving down quickly but carefully to avoid slipping.
"Spyro fell in you say?" Terrador asked Cynder as she ran right ahead of them.
"Right in front of my eyes, he yelled at me to not come closer, and I honestly wish I could have been there with him, but I knew coming to all of you was the best option," she said frantically.
"Hunter did the same when you first disappeared, you made the wise decision Cynder," Terrador assured her.
"Man why does Spyro have to disappear when things finally get back to normal?" Sparx asked as he buzzed right beside the others, "If I didn't know better, I say he asks for these adventures to happen."
"Sparx, now is not the time for your opinions," Cynder threw back, which of course made Sparx glare, both of them seemed to always irritate each other to no end.
"What are we supposed to do when we get there? Jump in after him?" asked Jace.
"If we have to, though it would be prudent to leave a party here to keep watch from the other side," Cyril replied. The end of the staircase was within their sight, as was the portal, or so they expected. For as soon as they looked up, they noticed the portal had closed!
Cynder felt herself overwhelmed with worry. "No…no…no…it can't be." She ran to the wall tearing up, the others stood back, feeling it wasn't best to disturb her in her current state, though they too were disappointed as well. Cynder placed both of her paws on the wall, wishing the portal would reopen, but it was to no avail.
However, little did she know a small glimmer of hope was lying in the room, a small glowing shard that could be their only chance of reopening the portal.
Please feel free to comment, constructive criticism is a must!
