Hello! I'm back! After a temporary hiatus I'm finally uploading the final chapters. I'm editing all of the remaining chapters together in two parts, so I will be uploading the first one now, and then second one at a later date.
Part 1 of my final upload for this story starts now, and I am throwing in another one of my own twists with this chapter, as well as one of my favorites. Any of you who are a fan of superheroes will also delight in this, I think.
Ch34: The Eagle takes Flight
3 days passed, and things now seemed to be settling into a steady new normal. With the initial attacks thwarted, the wasteland party now split up into their original new homesteads. Or in Calidan's case, his old one at his desert hideout. Being back in his familiar surroundings gave him a moment of comfort before settling into his latest project once again. With the new power supply box from Haven he was finally able to make headway into completing it. Though after a quick analysis of the contents, Calidan realized he had indeed hit the jackpot! The modules he had acquired were compatible with what he was originally building, and the three day respite from the inevitable invasion allowed him to fit them in. Soon, all that would be left would be to test it.
Meanwhile, the break in activity allowed Jak, Daxter, and the dragons in Spargus to train and prepare. The dragons included the ones the citizens were most familiar with, Spyro, Cynder, Chloro, Saphira, and Terrador. Even though they had won, the recent metalhead attack encouraged Terrador to continue the acolytes training during the break between attacks. Upon the earth guardian's request, King Damas offered his aid by allowing the Spargus gun turret range to be used by the dragons. It was the same range Jak had once beaten Kleiver's top score on. Now the dragons were using it to sharpen their own skills by destroying the targets as they were propelled out of the water. It was also a great show the wastelanders thoroughly enjoyed, especially the children. The growing relations between the human wastelanders and the dragon acolytes was a sight that brought a smile to both Damas and Terrador's faces. It signified hope for how the relations of this alliance could progress across both their respective worlds.
While the acolytes in Spargus were training, the one remaining acolyte was busy studying back at the temple under their hosts. As Zaxto continued to learn the written Elorian language, Seem and the monks continued making headway on interpreting the runes. All the while the other two guardians made rotating shifts of keeping watch inside and outside the temple. Even though the recent swarm was exterminated, there was no reason to let down their guards especially with the Dark ship still approaching as its Day Star continued to grow brighter in the Elorian sky.
The target practice spectacle continued as Chloro fired at another red target, shattering it to pieces with a narrowed Earth Shot. Cheers were raving from the coast side crowd, while the dual leaders stood side by side above the shoreline. Damas commented on Chloro's performance.
"Your pupil's aim is practically dead on Guardian Terrador," said Damas upon observation, "frankly all of theirs are."
"Their performance compliments the years of practice they have already had," Terrador responded with pride, "Though as I once told Seem, Chloro has the greatest earth elemental mastery of his age, and he is not the only one who has stolen the cheers of your people."
"Hehe, quite right, any animosity that was apparent upon your arrival seems to have dissipated," Damas said, before turning to glare at a certain blowhard wastelander wearing a scowl on his droopy mustached face as he watched the dragon's target practice from within the cheering crowd. "well mostly."
Giving Kleiver no mind, Terrador said, "I only hope this will be a sign of good things to come."
"I can only hope the same, though it is fair I should give you a warning," Damas said with dismal tone, causing the green dragon to turn to him, "given Spyro's recent history in Haven, I highly doubt even they would be foolish enough to turn down an alliance with you, as opposed to the alternative. However, there are dozens of other cities and territories across this planet that may not be as lenient toward such an idea, or even consider it at all. I can even recall from old memories two such places."
Terrador slowly sat down on his stomach as he responded, "even in our Realms, dragons have been met with opposition Lord Damas, and most of them we have handled on diplomatic terms like here. Others well, we were forced to handle them like the metalheads a few days ago," he finished with edge, remembering altercations with dreadwings and apes.
"I take it they left you no choice then?" asked the king.
"Yes, it was either fight, or die, and after losing so many of our kind old and young over the years of the Great War, we could not afford to stand down," Terrador said, with his tone during dismal. Damas shared his pain, remembering how he had lost his own family before being exiled, including his son whom he thought about every day. Cheers from the crowd broke him out of his depressing thoughts as Spyro hit another target with a fireball, and the king was reminded once again not to mourn what he had lost, but rejoice in what he still had.
"My point is we will learn to forge alliances where we can, and make peace with where we can't," Terrador said with Damas giving an understanding nod.
Although there was a large crowd by the waterfront, skeleton garrisons were still poised around the city walls as part of their new protocol. Under Sig's lead, the guards kept routine watch around the perimeter. Although it seemed near impregnable, nothing was ever one hundred percent guaranteed.
Scaling up the east side wall of Spargus, were more Dark Maker patrols. Following Errol's new instructions, their orders were to cripple the dragon's Elorin homestead from within and eliminate them. Errol had surmised as long as the dragons were defending the wasteland, the temple would never be open to attack, so he decided to destroy them first before destroying the only means of connection between the two worlds. Since the metalhead's recent failure, the dark abominations sought to succeed where the low-life bugs had failed. The first two patrols had finished scaling the walls, and peeked up to see a lone guard making his rounds. The guard remained unaware as his focus was toward the south of the wasteland, not the east, but his attention was soon gained.
Upon turning left he shouted, "What the?!"
"GRRAAARRRR!"
"AAAAHHHH!"
The yell drew the attention of all the guards on the wall. They saw two dark creatures pounce on one of their fellow guards, silencing his screams. While it was too late to save their doomed kinsman, another quickly activated the alert.
"Sound the alarm! We're under attack!" yelled another guard prematurely.
BLLAAARRR!
The familiar sound of the invasion alarm made everyone freeze in their tracks, or in the dragon's case freeze in midair. Everyone native and outlander turned toward the king who immediately pulled out his communicator once again.
"Alert guard report! what's happening?!"
"Intruders Lord Damas! They have just infiltrated the west side wall, they are swarming all over our arena section!"
Terrador saw something out of the corner of his eye, and immediately told Damas, "Your highness!"
Damas turned to the guardian who was pointing with his right wing at the mountainside near his palace. He went wide-eyed from seeing a hoard of dark purple creatures crawling along the rock toward the ground. They growled and hissed as they eyed their prey below.
"Dark precursors," Damas seethed.
"By the ancestors," Terrador gasped from seeing the creatures called Dark Makers for the first time. From the air, the pupils were stunned as well, save for Spyro and Cynder who were dreading the familiar sight of them. The alert guard gave another warning...
"Sir, the Scope is detecting a cluster of massive signals approaching us from over the sea, they'll be upon us within minutes!"
The king turned to his Spargus family to give the order, "People of Spargus! Invasion has begun! Proceed with protocols NOW!"
The Spargusians immediately switched their civilian mode to warrior, including Kleiver, and readied their firearms. Families including children were swiftly escorted away to barricade inside their homes or designated cover areas. Saphira broke from the dragon group to go protect them as they evacuated, while Chloro flew over to Terrador and Damas. As the scramble to new positions continued, Spyro and Cynder along with Sparx landed in front of Jak accompanied by Daxter.
Without hesitating, Spyro turned to Jak, "Contact Cal now." Jak nodded before reaching for his communicator.
Beep...Beep…Calidan immediately dropped the tools he was putting away back on the bench and ran over to his Striker to answer the beeping radio.
"This is Calidan," he said.
"Cal! Get over to Spargus now! Dark Makers are about to swarm the whole city! I don't know how, but you've got to get in here!"
"On my way!" Calidan said before hanging up. He first made sure his belt bag was fastened around his waist, and his goggles were set in front of his eyes. He then turned back to his new suit, currently mounted upright on the right end of his workbench. He approached and turned around to fit its straps around his torso like a rotated backpack. With both straps locked across his chest and waist, he pressed the main power button mounted just above its new power cell positioned in front of his heart. The suit hummed to life as Calidan hit the button on his garage door opener to clear a path for him, while Robin watched in naive suspense.
The Dark Maker hoard had made touchdown within the Spargus walls. They engaged the wastelanders on their own turf using their shields to effectively block their gunfire before firing back themselves. Fortunately all the Spargusians fought as a combined unit, as multiple shots from multiple people helped break their shields. Chloro flew in to provide aerial support attacking the troopers with elemental shots while Saphira stepped in to defend the retreating mothers and children. At the same time, the main hero group reached the city's dual leaders.
"Jak I need you on the gun, we have incoming movement from over the sea, they'll be here any moment!" ordered Damas which Jak nodded to. Damas turned off to engage the troopers with his people while Jak immediately ran toward the turret ladder, hoping that Calidan would also arrive soon and find some way into the city to aid them. The young dragons were thinking the same while Sparx flew off to look over the wasteland sea.
"What is he talking about? I don't see any…"
SHOOOMMM...SPLAASSHH!
Sparx's comment was interrupted by a heavy whistling sound made from an incoming meteorite from the sky. Only it wasn't really a meteorite, for it glowed purple, and once it made contact with the water, its true shape was shown. A Dark Maker Walker taller than any dragon emerged from the disturbed ocean and prowled its way slowly toward the Spargus shore.
"Never mind," Sparx said to himself before flying off to join the evacuating citizens to be safe and hopefully somewhat useful. Jak had activated the gun turret with Daxter sitting on his shoulder and was taking aim at the approaching walker. Gripping its trigger controls, he positioned its targeting sight and fired his first shots, causing the walker to recoil and even screech from the heavy fire.
"That's it! Aim for its joints, and shoot the incoming missiles!" Damas said over the communicator.
Jak obliged as he kept firing, and just like he was warned, the walker started shooting its own missiles from its back mounted cannon. They were large purple spheres flying through the air on a trajectory toward the sentry gun. Jak shot the first two out of the air while returning fire back to the walker.
Spyro and Cynder were back in the air as the walker continued to advance from the sea. They were about to engage themselves until the earth guardian flew in front of them, "Not this time young ones, I will aid Jak on this, help Damas and his citizens against the city assault, that's an order!"
Terrador left no room for them to argue, and knowing the guardian had his mind made up, they merely nodded before turning the other direction. Watching Spyro and Cynder fly off for a second, the earth guardian returned to his old battle mode and headed directly for the walker out at sea. Jak kept firing at the approaching threat before seeing the green dragon guardian fly up over his sentry gun. As the dragon neared the walker, the guardian let loose his first elemental attack since coming to Elorin, with an Earth shot that pushed its high mounted head back and knocked off the two tendrils that were attached to it.
Seeing that Terrador gave him an opening, Jak didn't waste it and fired at the joint on the left leg. It's weakened state didn't stand a chance as the leg shattered, causing the walker to plummet into the water. Several wastelanders on the shore cheered at their first win in this battle.
"Yes!" Jak cheered.
"That's how we do it!" Daxter added on.
Both of them turned toward Terrador hovering several yards out to sea who returned their gaze. The guardian gave a smiling nod whom the two of them returned with a dual thumbs up. They were quickly snapped out of their celebration by a familiar approaching sound.
SHOOOMMM...SHOOOMMM...SHOOOMMM...SHOOOMMM
More like sounds backed by sounds, as four more purple meteors descended from the skies and landed a little further out from the first landing near the Spargus shore with their own SPLASH. Four more walkers stood upright and started their approach. The sight of an even heavier force made Jak and Terrador scowl while Daxter just cringed.
Terrador turned toward Jak at the sentry gun to yell over the noise, "I'll take the two over here to the right, Jak take out the ones on the left!" The dragon flew to engage his new opponents while Jak repositioned the gun to target his own.
Kleiver was firing along with a wastelander trio at a duo of Dark Maker patrols with their shields up. Despite their frustration, their continuous fire was making the shields turn red, before they finally broke and allowed them to pelt the troopers with heavier gunfire. The troopers dropped dead, making Kleiver smirk at his new kill.
SCREECCHH...The unsettling sound caused them to turn about, and see another hoard of Dark Makers totaling four jogging towards them.
"Smoke em!" yelled Kleiver as he and his fellow wastelanders adjusted their aim and opened fire. They managed to make a few hits, but they were still too close. As they were just a reach away from them, a dense cloud of black smoke rained down upon them, enveloping all of them but one. The wastelanders were stunned, halting their fire, as was the one trooper that was missed, until it was sucked up into the air in front of the natives eyes by a certain black dragoness. The wind twister Cynder had created brought it up to her level, before she blew it away with a poison bomb finishing it off. Down on the ground, the shadow cloud she had created dissipated, and the troopers were nowhere to be found, further stunning the wastelanders especially Kleiver. As Cynder landed on the ground in front of them, he confronted her…
"What was that all about?!" he shouted.
"What? You said smoke them, so I did, my way," Cynder replied, smirking. Her jest made the other wastelanders chuckle while Kleiver continued to seethe.
"Very funny miss dragon, now where are they?" he asked, curious about the troopers remains. Rather than terrify him with an answer even she wasn't sure of, Cynder just shrugged before taking flight again to continue the fight elsewhere, while Kleiver just scowled at her departure.
Having split up, Spyro engaged another hoard of Dark Makers as they attacked another group of wastelanders. They were firing at their shields until the purple dragon swooped in above them and fired an electric stream which engulfed the troopers stunning them. Their newfound state made them drop their shields, and allowed the wastelanders to finish them off with their combined gunfire. The wastelanders roared momentarily as Spyro gratefully watched.
Chloro flew in between the Spargus housing, knocking down troopers left and right with his tail, allowing the wastelanders to shoot them down in vengeance. Saphira continued to defend the homesteads where a majority of the women and children were hiding. Anytime a trooper tried to get close she either shot an ice shard, froze it solid before shattering it with a tail swipe, or knocked it away with a severe headbutt. Her defense of them made the children cheer her name, while the mothers gave warm grins.
Jak continued to fire at the two approaching walkers from the left. But he kept having to break time in between shooting at them and then at the missiles they were firing at him. He knew however that he was damaging them from the continued screeches coming from them.
Terrador had begun his attack on his pair of walkers. He started off by firing Earth shots at the missile launchers on their backs, disabling them. Experience reminded the old guardian that when facing newfound adversaries, that their primary weapons should be disabled as soon as possible. The walkers appeared to notice the dragon flying around their heads, and deployed their secondary weapon as their tendrils appeared to stretch out in an attempt to grab the earth guardian. Terrador just noticed at the last second and barrel rolled to slip in between them, though he did feel the unsettling slime of one tendril on his skin.
Back by the Spargus main gate, the remaining guards were doing their best to fight off the troopers. Sig was part of the final unit, shooting at a trooper that had brought up its shield. Sig pulled up a communicator to speak to anyone who was listening…
"This is General Sig from the gate, can one of the dragons get over here? We need backup quick!"
"Well I ain't no dragon, but I got you covered General."
Sig recognized the voice immediately, "Cal?! Where are you?"
"To your right."
Sig kept firing at the trooper in front of him, while at the same time looking right over the wall to try and glimpse Calidan's Dune Striker coming from the wasteland. But what he saw instead made his one eye go wide. Some sort of giant bird like figure was approaching from the wasteland, but it was no bird. Flying across the sky with a harness of mechanical wings built from slivers of scrap metal linked together in a form which mimicked feathers, and propelled by a newfound jet backpack harness powered by a newly installed power cell from Haven, was Calidan!
Upon approaching from the sky, Calidan made sure to keep a firm grip on the wing controllers fastened onto both wings. He never had time to test this harness beforehand, so he hoped it would survive this maiden flight, as well as himself! He neared the gate, catching the surprised attention of all the Spargus wastelanders and Dark maker troopers standing atop it. He took aim for the one in front of Sig, and then proceeded to knock it off the gate wall with an aerial double kick, like a bird of prey. As the Dark Maker fell to the ground screeching, Calidan readjusted his trajectory and flew above the center of Spargus's main section. Everyone there lifted their heads in astonishment to see the rogue wastelander hovering over their heads in a wing style jetpack.
"Dang, I've gotta get me one of those," said an astonished Sig.
Calidan looked down to see more troopers gazing at him. Taking advantage of his surprise entrance, he realigned his aerial position so his left wing was pointing at them, along with his modified blaster he now had built into his left gauntlet. Pressing the trigger, he showered the troopers with blaster fire, making them scatter.
"What are you waiting for?! Finish them!" Calidan yelled to the ground wastelanders. Snapping out of their stupor, the Spargusians fired at the frantic Dark Makers, subduing them. As the fire shower went on, all the Dark Makers within their vicinity dropped dead. Calidan then turned to face the gate where he knew Sig was.
"Looks like I arrived just in time huh Sig?" Sig heard Cal over the communicator.
"Cal you crazy nut, where have you had that all this time?" Sig asked.
"I just finished building it as a matter of fact, don't you think I would have used something like this sooner if I had it?"
"Right, can you help clear this wall then?" Sig asked.
"Stand back," Calidan spoke one more time before flying back to the wall again to engage the remaining troopers. One by one, they fell with the same aerial kick tactic. Those that did survive the fall were gunned down by the wastelanders below. He then reached the last one whom he finished merely by shooting it over the edge.
"Nice work birdman, we are nearly in the clear here," Sig said.
"Yeah, well the same can't be said for the coast. I'm heading there now, we'll wait up for you guys."
"Affirmative," Sig gave a nod to the hovering wastelander who returned it before leaving.
Calidan said one last thing before that, "also for the record...its not birdman, the codename is Eagle."
Having disabled the weapons on his walker opponents, Terrador proceeded with one of his signature moves. Flying toward the pair of walkers, he began forward rolling while activating his Earth powers, forming an Earth boulder, though with greater force than any other Earth dragon currently alive, including Spyro. Both walkers were in line of his attack as he busted through the first one's head, and broke through to the next, breaking it in half at its torso. The walkers' remains fell into the sea as Terrador skimmed the sea surface before hovering again.
Jak kept firing at his pair of walkers with heavy sentry fire, one was smoking while the other decided to shield itself behind its partner from the attack. Jak's targeting finally paid off as the Spargus gun finally broke off the left biomechanical leg joint, making the walker topple into the water. At the same time, the other one was finally exposed, but that did not stop it from firing a volley of missiles, which Jak was forced to target instead.
Seeing that Jak and Terrador had reduced their approaching opponents to one, Spyro and Cynder re-grouped together to fly out and aid their human friend. However, before they could reach the shore, the sound of an aerial engine made them turn around. Their curiosity led to shock as they watched what appeared to be a giant bird of prey fly over their heads out to the sea to attack the enemy.
The sounds and sight caused by the new aerial wonder made everyone in Spargus turn their heads up, other than the aerial dragons who just turned to be surprised! Jak and Daxter in the sentry gun looked to their left to see in shock what and who had arrived. Calidan had reached the coast in seconds and was flying out to engage the one remaining walker, which only fired another missile, this time at him.
"Woah!" Calidan cried before barrel-rolling out of its way, "alright my turn!"
He had come up behind it and pointed his blaster gauntlet again, letting loose gunfire which only seemed to irritate it. He may have modified the blaster to fit into his gauntlet, but unfortunately its damage rate was the same and was only scratching the outside of the walker's hide, who kept approaching the Spargus coast.
"Well this is embarrassing," Calidan said to himself before turning to the sentry gun by the coast and its gunner.
"Jak keep firing! I can only distract it for so long!" He relayed over the communicator.
"Cal? Is that you?! Was this what you were building?!"
"No time for that now, let's get back to the fight!" Calidan argued back. Jak didn't respond, but the sentry gun did let loose more gunfire at the walker, making it screech. Seeing that he gave Jak an opening, Calidan reignited his thrusters to fly for the coast again to take out more troopers.
Spyro and Cynder flew out to the coastline as they originally had planned and reunited with their new teammate. Calidan met up with the young dragons in the air over a small open section of Spargus where a dark satellite once crashed. The wastelander smirked at their stunned expressions before saying, "guess who learned to fly?"
Cynder grinned before responding, "most impressive, guess I should start calling you fly boy."
"And I say to you now, the name is Eagle," stated Calidan aka Eagle.
"Eagle? That's actually quite fitting," said Spyro, seeing a resemblance despite the giant mechanical difference.
"Just as well, I never gave Jak another name so you'll always be dirt boy," Cynder said, still grinning.
"Yeah, Don't push it," Calidan responded. Although as he finished the conversation, the familiar sound of more incoming meteors directed them to the skies again.
SHOOOMMM...SHOOOMMM...BAMMM!...BAMMM!
The meteors made impact this time within the city walls, making touchdown at the ends of the alleyways that led up to the city's dividing wall. Spyro, Cynder and Calidan watched with horror as two more walkers emerged from the craters they had made upon impact. Back at the gun, Jak received word from Damas after finishing over the sea.
"Turn around Jak! They're attacking the city!"
The gun turret automatically turned 180 degrees, allowing Jak to see the additional walkers that had landed within Spargus. Daxter spewed out, "oh great, and this place was barely holding together already!"
Jak just adjusted his targeting scope toward the one on the left. He saw his aerial friends fly for the one on the right. He knew and believed that between all of them they would get this done.
Calidan/Eagle made a fly around the walker's head, while Spyro and Cynder let loose a torrent of their signature elements, fire and poison. The walker was screeching, apparently feeling the pain of their attacks on the front of its head, yet it still let its tendrils loose to break them away. Eagle retaliated with blaster fire to draw its attention, knowing his gunfire wouldn't harm it but draw its attention. It worked as the tendrils came for him, and he quickly propelled higher to avoid their reach.
He pushed a switch on each of his hand controls, shifting to an automatic lock so he could free his hands while staying aloft. As he hovered, he reached into his side bag, and pulled out two Omega bombs he had brought along for the ride. Gripping each of them with half a hand, he retook control of his wings and flew down again.
Spyro and Cynder had just evaded the tendrils again as Eagle landed just behind its head. He slapped both bombs on both sides of the walker's head before jumping off to fly again. Once he reached a higher altitude, he freed his gauntlet hand again and pressed the trigger signal.
BOOOMMM!...The walker's head exploded with the detonation, before the rest of it collapsed to the ground.
Over with the other walker, Jak sentry fire was holding it at bay, until he was forced to redirect it toward the guided missiles it was now firing at the turret in an attempt to destroy its opposition. Fortunately, while Jak was shooting the missiles down, the remaining dragons flew in to aid while the wastelanders continued to push back the invading troopers.
"Follow my lead young ones!" Terrador ordered Chloro and Saphira who followed him promptly behind. Terrador approached the walker before ordering his pupil, "Chloro, fire a Earth shot at its head now!"
"Yes sir!" Chloro responded with the most potent Earth Shot he could muster aimed at the walkers head. The shot drove its head back while knocking all of its tendrils straight into the air. Terrador hovered a little higher to use a new technique, and with a swipe of his earth energy enhanced tail, he let loose a cut of energy that severed all the tendrils, much to the acolytes' shock.
"Saphira! freeze its body, keep it in place for a final attack!" Terrador's next command shook Saphira from her stupor and responded with a high concentrated freeze breath at its head. Just like with the metalpede, the head turned blue as it became frozen in place, allowing Terrador to give his pupil the chance to destroy this opponent all the same.
"Finish it Chloro!" He ordered, making Chloro smirk. He raised himself in the air a little higher, before beginning another barrel roll toward the stationary walker. Using his mentor's trademark move, he shattered its main body to pieces, making the rest of the legs collapse onto the vacant area surrounding it. Chloro blanketed his wings to keep himself in the air after the impact, and brought himself back up to Terrador and Saphira's level in the air.
Chloro smirked at them as he hovered near them, "not a bad day of training, right master?"
Terrador merely raised an eye before turning to the battle ridden city below. The loss of the walkers forced all remaining troopers to fade away in a dark flash, leaving the wastelanders behind bewildered but still alive. Seeing the enemy retreat made the Spargus crowd cheer.
"YEEEAAAAHHHHH!"
The noise was enveloped together as the hero party and the visiting allies looked on. Spyro, Cynder and Calidan smiled while hovering near the ruins of their destroyed walker. Jak nodded while grinning from the sentry turret along with Daxter. Damas merely looked up to the Spargus dragon trio with a grateful nod.
"Not a bad day at all," Terrador finally responded while trying to keep a straight face.
Surprise! Marvel comics were always my favorite superhero comic books growing up, I even have my old Spiderman collection still. Just as the Inheiritance Cycle inspired me with Saphira, I was inspired by Marvel to come up with my version of the Falcon. In Calidan's case, its the Eagle, I actually threw in what is known as an Easter Egg in the last chapter as a prelude to this. I couldn't imagine a better way to write this chapter if I tried, Dragons fighting alongside an Eagle, I love it...
