Stormborn

"Tears of a rattlesnake!" Hannibal Bean called.

Dojo skittered across the floor of the meditation hall, sprinkling the precious ingredients on top of a glass pentacle.

"Five wisps of finest silk. Two bristles from the beard of a drunken Spanish jai alai player! The horn of a unicorn! Three hairs from a naked mole-rat!"

"You know weirds me out?" Dojo said as he added those ingredients to the pentacle. "All of this was already in Master Fung's medicine cabinet."

Hannibal Bean pushed the King of Storms into the middle of the pentacle. "And now… one drop of blood from an ancient male dragon!"

"Huh?" Dojo murmured quizzically. "That… that wasn't in the medicine cabinet. I guess we can't finish the spell now."

"Dojo." The King said.

"Oh, okay then! Risk my life, why don't you?" Dojo said. He slithered into the other room and returned with a razor sharp knife. "Is this a dagger I see before me?" He moaned piteously. "To be or to be stabbed in the chest, that is the question! Let me die with from a blade plunged deep into my soft and malleable flesh! Aaaaaah!"

He carefully nicked the very tip of his smallest finger. A single drop of blood oozed from the tiny slit and landed on the edge of the pentacle.

"BE REBORN!" Hannibal Bean called, and he clapped his vines together imperiously.

The King of Storms was bathed in a brilliant aura of energy. The round ball of light that formed his spirit expanded and stretched out until it took the shape of a very tall man. Then the aura vanished and the man stepped out of the center of the pentacle.

He yawned.

Then he spoke. "Boy, does my neck hurt! Anyone got an aspirin?"

The Xiaolin monks fled in silence, not wanting to speak for fear of confirming their worst fears. It took Clay to break the silence, rousing from unconscious and rubbing his head dazedly. "What's going on?"

"The end of the world." Raimundo replied calmly.

"What, again?" Clay said softly. "Wake me up when it's done."

"What are we going to do?" Kimiko demanded.

Before anyone could answer, a flash of lightning cut through the sky, followed closely by the rumble of thunder.

"A storm. Fantastic. Absolutely fantastic." Raimundo muttered.

"A storm is an ill omen," Omi commented. "But all storms must pass in time. As we approach the peaceful eye of the storm, so too shall we approach the eye of Echidna's wrath."

There was a brief period of quietness before anyone else spoke. "Omi," Raimundo said. "Did anyone ever tell you that you're completely out of your mind?"

"I like to believe that I have achieved enlightenment." Omi retorted.

"Hey, at least Dojo and the others have found some clues." Kimiko said.

Raimundo snorted but didn't respond. The Temple was just up ahead. All of the monks desperately hoped that their friends had developed a way to save the world but all of them feared that Dojo and the others had had the same amount of bad luck that they had in stopping Jack from resurrecting Echidna.

The King of Storms ambled throughout the meditation room. He seemed unused to his body. He was constantly testing it, flexing his fingers, jumping around, and curving and stretching his spine as far as he could go.

Someone knocked on the door to the meditation room then. Dojo hurried to open it, only to find one of the junior monks standing there. "Dojo Kanojo Cho, come here quickly!" The monk rasped.

Dojo, Hannibal Bean, and the King followed the young monk dutifully down the hallway to the outside courtyard.

"Hello, Dojo," said a familiar voice.

Dojo couldn't believe his ears. "Uncle… Uncle Tiamat?"

The venerable black dragon was sitting there in the courtyard, surrounded by what looked like all of the dragons from the Dragoncircle Island. Dojo let out a delightful scream and ran into his arms, hugging his uncle fiercely.

"How did you… where did you… why did you come here?" Dojo sputtered.

"You have Master Fung to thank for that." Master Monk Guan said, stepping out from behind Tiamat. Master Fung was standing beside him, looking exhausted. "During our hunt for Chase Young, Master Fung persuaded us that we would be greatly served to enlist the aid of our scaly friends. He persuaded the dragons to come along with us both to Chase Young's lair and to my Temple."

"It is a good thing too," Master Fung added. "Because I sense that dark powers have grown very close to us. The forces of the Xiaolin will need all the help they can get."

Dojo extricated himself from his Uncle Tiamat and slithered over to Master Fung. "We've been making some allies of our own." He said. "Meet Hannibal Roy Bean – the new and improved Hannibal Roy Bean, turned good by the magical mojo of the Yin-Yang Yo-Yo."

Master Fung raised an eyebrow in surprise but seemed accepting.

"And also meet the King of Storms, the greatest fighter of evil dragons who ever lived!"

The King of Storms bowed. "I am no longer a King, I am afraid." He said to Master Fung. He swept back his golden hair and said, "You can call me…"

"Marduk!" Tiamat announced. "Can it really be you?"

"Yes," said the King of Storms. "A million years I've been trapped in the Earth, but now I'm free. Free to lead the dragon peoples to war against Echidna and Typhon, once and for all."

"It seems that you have been very busy." Master Fung remarked approvingly. He looked around. "Where are the young apprentices?"

"Present and accounted for." Raimundo said as he dropped down into the courtyard, followed closely by Kimiko and Omi. He hefted Clay off of his shoulder and lowered him onto the soft grass. "Well, mostly."

"What happened?" Master Monk Guan asked.

"Echidna happened!" Kimiko explained. "That idiot Jack brought her back to life. We tried to stop her, but she was just too powerful--,"

"She could use elemental attacks!" Omi yelled out.

"Could it be true…?" Master Fung murmured.

"Her abilities are great." Master Monk Guan noted. "But I confess that I am surprised to hear that she possessed elemental abilities as well. This makes the situation graver."

"Who's that?" Kimiko asked, pointing at the King of Storms.

"King Marduk, Xiaolin monks," Dojo said. "Xiaolin monks, King Marduk. He's going to lead the dragons against Echidna. Thanks to me of course. I sacrificed a bucket of blood to bring him here."

Omi bowed. "Dojo, you have truly outdone yourself."

Dojo blushed but didn't say anything.

"Now that the introductions are out of the way," Master Fung announced. "It is time to prepare. Echidna will strike soon, and we must be ready to vanquish her."

Raimundo nodded. "Come on, guys, let's get ready for a war!"

The monks and dragons filed into the Temple. None of them had any idea of what they were going to do. All they could count one was the hope that somehow, they'd come out all right in the end.