Nathan Charles and Luna Fang: Into the Dragon Realms

By Mutitoon90

Chapter Ten

The group of six males ran off to locate Ripto, and while the group ran, Nathan's mind was divided; Nathan was foucsed on catching up with the dinosaur that cursed Luna, and yet he could not stop himself from being curious about how Nina, his younger cousin, was able to come in contact with the wizard as well as being able to get herself in the Dragon Realms.

Then, Nathan reminded himself that he would find out how as soon as he either catches up with Ripto or after he defeats the villianous dinosaur, as long as he does not forget to ask at the very least. With that resovled in his mind, the human's full attention was on capturing the self-named wizard that was Ripto.

As soon as the males reached the top of the tower, which was a complete surprised to them, the six males found Ripto and a large saucer-shaped aircraft.

"Hold it right there, Ripto!" Nathan shot out an authorative-sounding command at the wizard, who turned to the group with a deadly glare that said, 'How dare you give me an order!?' Nathan ignored the death glare and continued to speak.

"You've got some explaining to do as well as correcting a few of your mistakes!"

The response from Ripto was not apologetic, nor was it expressive of any kind of fury; Ripto's reply to Nathan's opening statement was mocking and dismissive.

"Well," laughed Ripto, "that was certainly unexpected! Ha, for a moment there, I'd thought that was actually going to be something of a threat or something like that!"

"Don't think for a mintue that we won't stop you!" Crash shouted out as he reached to Nathan's side, surprising Nathan greatly, since Crash is not the bravest creature in the world.

"Oh, please!" Ripto rolled his beady eyes, "Like I'm going to believe that you idiots aren't going to TRY to stop me! I'm not that little fool, Nina!"

All eyes, including Ripto's, were on Nathan, who only sighed out, since he knew that Ripto was correct about Nina's foolishness.

"Odd." Ripto was truly surprised at Nathan's reaction, "I was expecting a bigger reaction than that."

Nathan shrugged his shoulders and said with a sheepish expression, "Can't aruge with the truth."

"Anyway," Ripto returned to his rant, "you fools are too late! When this flying saucer hits the air, the cannon that Nina built for me will fire shots of my sleeping curse all over the realms!"

"Not if we've got anything to say about it, Dinosquirt!" Agent Nine hopped up before he charged at Ripto and his aircraft.

Nathan, who had noticed that Ripto had set up an energy shield in the room, shouted to the trigger-happy monkey, "Wait!" However, it was too late, and Agent Nine was repelled by the unseen shield, causing Nathan to hurry to the fallen mammal's side.

"Are you okay?"

"I don't know." A dazed Agent Nine replied with a slight slur in his voice, "Did Ripto cast a cloning spell on himself?"

Seeing that Agent Nine was not in the right state of mind to fight, if he ever was, to fight Ripto, Nathan called out to Hunter.

"Hunter, over here!"

The cheetah obeyed, and when he reached Nathan's side, he already knew what Nathan wanted from him: "I'll get Agent Nine out of here!"

"Thanks." The human nodded to the cheetah, who was able to pull the primate to his feet and hurried out of the room, allowing the four remaining males to deal with Ripto, who was mocking the group once again.

"Oh, boy! This ought to be good; how are you four morons going to get me when you can't even reach the other side of the room!"

Nathan shook his head at the wizard; he hated being mocked, but he did liked how he could prove his foes wrong. With a fast pull, the human aimed his gadget at one side of the room and fired it, and the energy projectile hit its mark, causing the energy field to shut down and caused Ripto to became dumbfounded.

"H-h-how did you do that!?" Demanded a panicking Ripto, and he got his answer from Nathan, the ex-Cortex.

"Ya know, Ripto," the young man explained, "I've found it very interesting that most people think that it's a smart idea to use an energy shield that is, literary, wall-to-wall, instead of using something that doesn't require a lot of installment into the building."

Ripto's confusion quickly turned into anger as he shouted in response to Nathan's somewhat cheeky statement.

"You think you're so smart, but that's only because you were raised by mad scienists; if you weren't, you'd be cowaring at my presence at this moment!"

"Well," Nathan remarked in a thoughtful tone of voice, "I guess that's one of the few things I'd consider to be a good thing of my up-bringing."

Hearing this, Crash, Spyro and Sparx snickered, seeing the truth that Nathan heard in the words that was supposed to mentally distort Nathan's mind for a moment. However, Ripto was not very pleased by the result that came, since it was not what Ripto wanted.

"Aw, forget it!" Roared the dinosaur-like spellcaster, sounding as annoyed as he appeared to be, "I've got the realm to conquer!"

Hopping into the UFO-like craft, Ripto was able to activate the engine and open the roof of the tower without any outside assistance within seconds. Ripto's mocking laughter was heard from the ship and by the remaining heroes of the the Dragon Realms and the Wumpa Islands.

"We've gotta stop 'im!" Spyro announced urgently, however the shout of concern was not needed as Nathan and Crash ran towards the slowly rising craft. Upon seeing the two foreginers pursue after the dinosaur wizard, Spyro chased after his two new allies, while Sparx flew almostly behind the purple dragon.

"Hold on tight!" Nathan shouted out to the others as he and the other three reached and grabbed on to the flying craft.

"No need to tell us that!" Crash shouted to Nathan as he used his naturally-equipped claws to cling onto the craft, and the claws tried to go into the metal as Crash felt the gust of cold wind blast onto his fur, which did little to protect the Bandicoot's skin from the sharp sensation of the wind's temperture.

Spyro's talon-like claws unintentionally aped the Bandicoot's claws, although the reason was not acted by the dragon's instincts by itself. Sparx, the dragonfly, could not hold on to the metal was well as the larger males, but the insect held on to Spyro's scales as strong as the human male, who had no claws to assist him in maintaining his grip on the airship.

Carefully, Nathan started to crawl up the ship to where Ripto had vanished into the aircraft, and the dragon and the Bandicoot followed the human, knowing that Nathan was going after Ripto as well as he was the only one of the group that, at least, had a less vague idea of what Ripto's next move was.

If they had waited for a few moments, they would most likely had been discovered by Ripto; as the trio, and Sparx, climbed towards the area, where Ripto might be at, the area, which Nathan assumed was the cockpit, opened up and exposed Ripto and some of the inside to the windy air. The three males were on one of the parts that moved upon its opening, and that took them by surprise.

"HOLD ON!" Nathan commanded louder as he attempted to hold on to the aircraft with all of his strength. However, his fingers slipped...

"Gotcha!" Crash shouted in relief and trimph as he grabbed Nathan with a free hand, knowing that there was a good chance that he would have fallen, if the rescue attempt had failed.

Nathan, having failed to realized what had happened, found himself in Crash's grasp and looked up at his best friend and said with a chuckle, which was made out of shock, "Thanks."

"Not a problem!" The Bandicoot smiled widely, both pleased with his actions and the result of them, and then, Crash said, "Let's get us a dino-squirt!"

With a strong nod, Nathan said with a determined tone of voice, "Right!"

Quickly, Nathan managed to return his grip onto the airship with some help from Crash, and just as swiftly, both friends with Sypro and Sparx started off towards Ripto, who was at the exposed part of the cockpit, chuckling at the despicible thoughts that raced though his twisted mind.

"This is going to be fun, but where to cast the spell at first? Maybe Alavar? They did kick me out after that dragon torched me... Hmmm... Of course! Why didn't I think of it before?! That Spyro got me removed from Alavar when I became the king, so why shouldn't I cast the spell over his homeland? It's the perfect revenge! Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!"

As Ripto laughed at his thoughts of revenge, which were mostly of Spyro's face twisted with defeat and dispair, he failed to see that he had a few stowaways that had reached the area he was at, until Spyro made a comment to Nathan and Crash.

"See, guys! He's gone crazy!"

Hearing the statement, the uni-horned wizard whirled around and saw the three heroes, hardly noticed Sparx, and growled at them before shouting at the foursome, "How did you make all the way up here!?"

"That doesn't matter right now." Spyro boldly stated off, and Nathan finished by saying in the same bold tone as the dragon, "The only thing that matters is for us to stop you from casting that curse."

"Don't be so smug, future bad guy!" Declared Ripto at Nathan, who did not like the insult and managed to conceal that fact from the spellcasting wizard, as he pulled out his ruby and gold specter, "Playtime's over!"

"What!?" Mocked Crash, "you mean you weren't being serious before?"

Angered by the remakes made towards him, Ripto rised his staff into the air, and the ruby started to glow. Lowering it, the wizard aimed it at the group and unleashed a portion of its power at the three males, who were quick to dodge it.

Nathan ducked to the control panel, and he started to figure out how to lower the aircraft without causing a great deal of damage to the group and the land below the ship; it was part of a plan that he, Crash, Spyro and Sprax came up with, while Ripto was kept busy by his own rantings

By enraging the wizard enough to attack so quickly and without a good enough time to aim well, it gave Nathan enough cover to reach the cockpit's controls, while the others distracted the small wizard. However, there was a couple of flaws in the plan: one was if Ripto recovered his senses to realize that he had been tricked, he would try to used Nathan's postition to his advantage, and another flaw was if Ripto became desperate enough, he would destory the console to destory Nathan.

Then, Nathan started to worry about what would happen, and he started to think about what Ripto said about him in the second and third encounters. Nathan almost went into a crazed panic, when he felt something fall out of his pocket.

"Huh?" The shaking human asked to himself as he reached for the fallen object, which was the unknown item that Sash, Luna's cousin gave to him at the beginning to the adventure. Noticing that an exposed part of the item was shining out of the cloth that matched the one that held Luna's bento box, he untied the cloth and saw that the miko/moon mystic had given him a mirror that was nearly the size of his hand.

"Why would Sash give this to me?" Nathan asked out loud before looking into the piece of cloth for an answer, which he did find.

In the cloth, there was a clipping of a newspaper article that spoke of Nina's disappearance, and that caused Nathat to see that Sash and/or Luna had a feeling that he would encounter his younger cousin on the journey. Stuffing the paper into his pocket, the human looked back at the mirror and wondered why would a miko of a shinre gift him with an unexpected object.

Nathan's thoughts filled with worry and self-doubt as he started to feel that the mirror was a describation of he felt of his own usefulness...

"Wait a moment!" Nathan commanded to himself and looked into the mirror, taking a long look at himself.

His hair, black by birth and long enough to drape passed his shoulders by choose, framed his tanned face, which was pale when he lived with his father and at the academy years ago, and the face held his dark-red eyes, which had a unexpected glow within them. Nathan saw himself in the mirror and noticed that he had changed over the years; he was no longer the boy that was running away from his fate for his own sake, but he was, now, the man trying to change his fate for the sake of the world.

"So, that's why, Sash..." Nathan murmured and smiled to himself, "You wanted me to see what I've become, not what I was told to be."

With that said, Nathan, renewed in confidence and hope, went to work on the controls and managed to put the aircraft into a slow descent to the ground below.

Once that task was completed, Nathan returned to his friends, who were tired and nearly unable to move out of the way of Ripto's magical projectiles. Worried about his friends, he rushed to their side, and he would have succeeded, if Ripto did not call him out loud by saying, "Please, spare me the 'good friend' act; I know that you're just using them."

"Really?" Nathan, who had stopped in his tracks, looked at his opponent and cocked an eyebrow, "And how are you so sure about that?"

Rolling his beady eyes, Ripto half-shouted back, "How? You're a Cortex, a cowardly, excuse of any human I've met, and that's after meeting and fooling Nina!"

"So, you're comdemning me to that catergory after meeting one human?" Nathan expressed a look of confusion at the dinosaur, "So on that note, you want to be the pot or the kettle?"

A loud hiss rang from Ripto before the wizard shouted out, "If you're truly so noble, why don't you just say right there and let me curse you?"

"Sure. I'll right here." The human quickly and bluntly answered, earning a shocked response from Crash, Sprax and Spyro, who shouted out to Nathan.

"Don't do it! He's trying to trick you!"

Nathan heard the yells of the purple and yellow dragon, and the human chose to ignore Spyro, while he quietly muttered something about how Spyro would forgive him from his own actions.

"Just stay right there." Ripto chuckled in a dark glee in his voice and a sinster shine in his eyes, "It'll be over in a few moments."

"Get it over with!" Nathan announced; whether or not the human was oddly brave or being unusually foolish was anyone's guess at that point.

With a glow in his specter, Ripto threw a red ball of light at Nathan, who was as still as a scarecrow in its cornfield.

"NATHAN!" Crash and Spyro shouted in unison, however their shouts would prove to be needless and useless.

Nathan proved that he could beat Ripto without breaking his word; when the spell was close enough, Nathan pulled out the mirror that Sash had given him and used it to deflect the curse back at Ripto. It was an insane idea, but it was executed prefectly.

Without any time to realized what had transpired, Ripto failed to evade being cursed by his own enchantment. Also, having lost his temper and casted many spells, Ripto instantly fell into a deep sleep, unlike Luna, who spent hours fighting off the curse.

"Looks like I'm the victor of the game, Ripto." The human smiled trimphantly as he noticed Crash, Spyro and Sparx coming to him.

"Man, Nathan..." Crash was still experiencing the fear that he felt when he hear Nathan's response to Ripto's 'question,' "You gave me one heck of a scare! Now, I know how you felt everytime one of us does something crazy!"

"Maybe it'll be enough to lessen the crazy attempts." Nathan flashed a knowing smile, since he knew that it was not very likely that it would happen.

"Don't know honestly." Crash confessed honestly, "Maybe it might, maybe it won't. I just don't know."

Nathan chuckled softly, pleased that the Bandicoot was done with worrying about him and went to a different matter.

"Hey, Nathan." Spyro pulled the human from his thoughts, "Where'd you get the mirror?"

Nathan looked at the hand that held the mirror and realized that he had not put it away, but the human smiled and was about to give his response, when Crash interrupted him unintentionally.

"Yeah, Nathan! Where did ya get that from?"

Instead of becoming annoyed with interruption of the Bandicoot, Nathan smiled and started to explained the mirror, and he added the revelation he had before facing Ripto.

"So, Sash gave ya the mirror for personal emergencies, huh?" Crash eyed the mirror in Nathan's hand as he spoke, "That sounds like her style, if it isn't Luna pulling those kind of things."

"Huh?" Spryo was confused, and so was Sparx, and Nathan saw that and quickly gave them a short summary of the females cousins and their wily ways, which caused the two friends to laugh a little.

Then, the aircraft jerked, causing those who were standing on the ship to fall onto their backsides or stomachs. Looking around as they returned to their feet, the four males looked for whatever could have caused the ship jerk in that manner.

"What was that?" Crash asked Nathan, who responsed with shrugged shoulders, "How should I know?"

"Whatever it is," Spyro chimed in his own thoughts to the others, "it might be bad for us."

"You've got a point there, Spyro." Nathan commented to the dragon's words as a concerned expression placed itself on the human's face.

Then, a huge dragon of purple-blue appeared next to the ship in full flight and shouted at the males with cupped claws.

"HEY! ARE YOU BOYS ALL RIGHT!?"

Mimicking the action of flying dragon, Nathan cupped his hands around his own mouth and yelled back, "WE'RE OKAY! IS THERE SOMETHING ATTACKING THIS SHIP?"

"NO!" The burly dragon answered back, "WE'RE GOT THE SHIP, SO IT WOULDN'T LAND ON ANYONE OR ANYTHING!"

"THANKS FOR THE INFORMATION!" Nathan shouted back at the bigger creature, "RIPTO'S ASLEEP, THANKS TO A CURSE, AND THE SHIP'S ON SLOW DESCENT!"

"THANKS FOR THAT!" The bigger dragon shouted for the finally time, "WE'LL MAKE SURE THAT THIS FLYING MACHINE DOESN'T USE SOMEONE OR THEIR HOME FOR A LANDING AREA!"

With a loud flap, the purple-blue creature vanished from sight, leaving the group relived and Nathan with a sore thoart.

"That's good news!" Crash laughed out of relief as he sat down, considering about taking a quick nap before going back to the Wumpa Islands.

"Good thing that some of the dragons saw this ship, or else, we'd be in a little bit of trouble." Spryo chuckled, which seemed to be out of character for the small purple dragon.

"Uh-Huh!" Sparx buzzed in agreement, and the dragonfly flew around the purple dragon happily.

The group laughed, although Nathan, whose throat was sore from yelling out a conversation, could barely join in at first, until the aircraft safely reached the ground.