JJ's POV
Soon as we made it through the sparky portal, we were greeted by one of the guys who was marching around,
"Hey there folks! Welcome to the tropical Blazar HQ."
"Hey Jorge!" Dylan came up and bro hugged him before he asked him,
"Ship's ready?"
"Loaded and ready to go once the right rift opens within the hour so would you all like something to eat in the meanwhile?"
Almost on cue, a growling sound sounded and e'eryone looked at me and my face got hot as I snapped,
"What?!"
"Don't worry, we've got plenty to eat." Jorge winked at me before leadin' us to a long table where there was lots of plates of food.
Once we got some plates, everyone started grabbing stuff to eat and I was deciding between some spiky fruit, some kind of monster claws, or some fried-lookin' bits of stuff when Ash came up to me and asked,
"Are you feeling alright?"
"Yeah, why woul'nt I be?" I answered picking up one of the fried bits to take a bite as she told me,
"I could feel your unbelief from a mile away if I wanted to…"
"Somethin' just don' feel right here…"
"Like here here?" She asked using both hands to point downward at the ground.
"No, this whole travelin' back home thing. I really wanna believe we can bring it back but I can't shake the feelin' we don't know what we're gonna cause if we do."
"Is this about what Strange said about us being too powerful?"
I shrugged as I took another bite of the fried food, actually liking it, before asking Jorge,
"Mmm hey what's this stuff?"
"Oh those are fried gator bites." He told me and Ash grimaced while I kept eating and piled some more onto my plate as I commented,
"Hmm not bad…"
"Well every place has its own culinary tastes." Ash told herself as she grabbed some more of the yellow spiky fruit cubes and little, round orange fruits.
As we walked to the "kids table" where Groot and Xay were waitin' as he fed his mini dragon some of the little red monster claws, I playfully jabbed her side while asking,
"What? You a vegetarian or somethin'?"
"Yes." Ash answered with a raised brow as we sat and I went blank-faced as I muttered,
"Oh… OK then."
"Anyway back to before-" Ash tried to resume our convo from earlier until Groot saved me by yelling,
"I am Groot!" (You eat plants!) Scooting away from Ash and she threw her hands up defensively,
"Just the non-sentient ones!"
"I am Groot! I am Groot!" (That's even worse! They can't fight back!)
As Ash tried to argue back with Xay tryin' ta back her up, I just sat back and watched in amusement while tryin' not to think about the whole "power" thing…
You're not powerful enough… yet… but when you are.. you will win us our vengeance…
I shook my head at Skodor's voice at the reasoning he and the other Oajin scientists used for experimenting on me before stabbing another gator bite to shove into my mouth.
'JJ.. I can sense you're feeling troubled…'
A voice sounded in my head and I felt a warm wrapping 'round my wrist that made me look and see that Gora was stretching a spine all the way from the next table over from where she was sittin' between Dad and Zaruk.
'Gora.. what've we said 'bout lookin' into my head?' I thought back to her.
'I know but you have your sister to talk to about these things now so why do you want to hide them from her?'
'Cause we've already got crap we're pushin' through about mom and her secret history… don't need to be pilin' on with what that wizard told us about our powers while she's still tryin' to cure hers…'
I looked over at the bracelets on Ash's wrists remembering what she told me about them and how they help to filter out the dangerous radiation from her flames.
''Sides, shoul'nt you and the grown-ups be figurin' out how we're gonna be gettin' through that wormhole or whatever since we don't got a spaceship?'
"Yeah and maybe you should be helpin' us figure that out." Dad butted in and I leaned back ta see he was holdin' onto Gora's paw which meant he heard everything we were just talkin' about.
"Figure what out?" Ash looked over at us and I threw a 'really?' look at Dad before Ash's dad told him,
"Just let them eat in peace, we've still got some time before the rift opens-"
*WWWIIIIOOOWWWW*
Jus' b'fore a loud alarm went off and a screech sounded through some speakers as someone reported,
*We've got incoming entries through the stratosphere!*
And we all stood to look up at a couple o' smallish pods burnin' bright red as they were coming down through the planet's atmosphere diving right for us.
"Crap! Get down!" I shouted just as one of the ships fired and hit close to a nearby building with the shockwave sending the tables overturning and making a blast of sand blow into the air.
3rd Person POV
Through the cloud of sand dust, everyone was getting up from where they had been tossed aside while coughing to get the sand out of their lungs as they struggled to see their incoming attackers through the haze.
"Ahh!" Bruce yelled out in pain as his leg had been caught under the flipped-over table and he'd landed on his bandaged arm.
"Bruce!" Zaruk wedged one of their staffs under the table to pry it up enough so Dylan could grab him and pull him up and out.
"Thanks…" Bruce winced at the pain still in his arm as the dust cloud finally started to fully settle.
"Xay!" Ash shouted pointing to the burning building that got somewhat hit and survivors were heard still trapped inside.
Let's go!" He shouted back and the two of them along with Wickity went to go help the people in there while Rocket got his gun off his back and started trying to shoot the pods down, succeeding in blowing one up.
"Oh yeah!"
Just before six Oajin soldiers in their black suits and reflective visors ejected downwards from the ship's wreck and landed on the ground unscathed with their weapons raised.
"Aww c'mooon!" Rocket whined before JJ yelled,
"Groot!"
"I. AM. GROOOOOT!" (LET'S DO THIS!) He yelled and grew his arms out and they charged at the soldiers with Gora following right behind.
Groot stabbed his arms into the ground to make root-like branches dive up and down out of the sand and Gora and JJ ran on top of them to jump down on two of the soldiers.
Gora wrapped one up in her spines to crush their weapon and gear before throwing them to the side with a hissing snarl and her fur puffed up and JJ landed on the shoulders of the other, gripping her hands on the side of their head to short out their comms and suit with an electric charge before rapidly leaning back to swivel around, landing in a crouch with them unconscious at her feet and they continued taking down any that came their way as more ejected out of their pods.
Meanwhile, Ash, Xay, and Wickity had managed to get most of the fires under control enough to evacuate some of the Blazars who managed to get away with only some minor burns and wounds.
"Duck!" Xay rushed to Ash and pulled her down with him as one Oajin was standing outside of the building wreckage trying to shoot them through the dwindling flames.
"Looks like I'm still the main target…" Ash muttered in disbelief as she glared at the soldier while they were reloading their weapon.
"At least the others are safe-ish…" Xay tried to assure her but she sent a fire blast out before shaking her head as she reasoned,
"You don't know what they're willing to do…"
And right she was since, at the same time, two more Oajins were firing at Bruce, Dylan, and Zaruk with the intent to capture Bruce and use him to get to Ash.
"Stay behind us Dr. Banner!" Dylan told him as they all hurried to cover behind another building as gunfire rained down on them.
"How the hell did they find us?" Bruce questioned as Dylan started pounding around on the wall with a fist.
"Perhaps they somehow tracked Strange's portal signature here? Maybe they have another core tracker? Who knows?" Zaruk threw out suggestions as they used one of their staffs to send a blast of green energy and took out one of the Oajin's weapons but more were on the way from the landing pods in the distance.
"Got it!" Dylan shouted in triumph as they opened some kind of secret hatch in the side of the building and took out a large device.
"Is that a weapon?!" Bruce asked in disbelief.
"Don't worry, it's non-lethal! Only gives off 50,000 Volts!" Dylan shouted back before readying the device and aiming for two of the soldiers and firing electrified cables with bolas at the ends of them tangling around their torsos and legs causing their gear to overload and drop them unconscious.
"OK that works." Bruce gave a head nod at the nonviolent and effective way of dealing with the enemies.
Other Blazars could be seen gearing up with stun launchers and taking down incoming Oajins but a few managed to dodge the blasts to make it back to the pods in the distance.
*WWWIIIIOOOWWWW*
"Now what?!" Rocket yelled frustratedly at the alarm that went off before they all hear a loud *BOOM* in the distance and saw a storm gathering over the ocean in the distance from the shore.
"The rift's opening!" Zaruk yelled as they absorbed a laser blast with their staff and sent it back to the shooter.
"We have to get to the boat!" Dylan told Zaruk and Bruce as he used the last of his launcher's ammo.
"Everyone move!" Ash out of nowhere ran out to the frontline, dodging laser blasts before she suddenly stopped with her arms and hands flared out at her sides with flames licking around her hands and climbing up her arms with her head tilted down.
"What's she doin'?!" Rocket questioned as he, Groot, Gora, and JJ managed to regroup together.
"Oh man…" Bruce seemed to recognize what she was doing as he watched her with growing concern and his suspicion was confirmed when Xay and Wickity ran over to them and told them,
"Let's go! Ash's buying us some time to get to the boat by self detonating!"
"WHAT?!" Everyone but Bruce and Xay seemed to exclaim at once before the latter told them all,
"Get moving! I have to stay behind to grab her once she's done!"
And everyone took that as the cue to start running to the boat at the dock, leaving Xay behind as, in the distance, a fiery glow was surrounding Ash and, combined with the radiation of her flames, all the Oajins' tech malfunctioned once they came close enough for them to be affected.
Time meanwhile seemed to move in slow motion for Bruce as he remembered something while the others had to drag him away from Ash in the distance,
'Hey Ash?'
'Yeah Dad?'
They were sitting on the porch of Bruce's island lab looking out at the sunset in the distance on the first night of them living there as Bruce asked her,
'Thor told me about how you.. self detonated when you first arrived on Sakaar..'
'Yeah…' Ash shrunk down in place a bit in shame as she was reminded of that unpleasant experience.
'How did you do it?'
Ash thought a bit before holding up a hand to let a small candle-like flame appear in the palm as she tried to explain,
'All I really remember was that.. in the moment.. I was terrified.. not of being captured but of never making it back home where the others and I thought you were…'
Everyone made it onto the boat and Dylan started rushing to get the boat moving as Bruce and JJ stayed toward the back to watch what Ash was about to do.
The boat was surging forward away from the shore out toward the enlarging storm in the distance when Gora leapt up on the railing between the two of them to look Bruce in the eyes as he looked back with muted horror and she put a paw on the back of his good hand as though to ask his permission to see what he was remembering and he flipped his hand over to hold onto her paw while she extended a spine out to JJ so she could see as well as he remembered asking,
'So you used fear as the fuse?'
Ash had shaken her head and used her other hand to start cupping over the flame in her palm to where it threatened to go out from the lack of spaces in her hands for air to come in as she continued,
'No.. I've been afraid my whole life.. fear always makes me freeze up… makes me feel like I'm suffocating under the pressures of people needing me but I couldn't do anything cause I was so paralyzed with fear…'
Back on the frontline, some streams of red and orange started streaming around Ash as winds picked up to swirl around her in a violent torrent that even Xay and Wickity had a hard time holding their own against to stay near her.
'So, when I was threatened with the thought that I was going to be kept from going back home and seeing you all again, even though you always taught me to keep it in check…-'
Ash's face lifted up to glare in her narrowed eyes.
'-instead of fear-'
Both her eyes blanked to burn a glowing bright orange
'-I used anger to light the fuse…'
The winds stopped abruptly before-
The small candle burst into a small explosion that forced her hands back open and she left her hands hanging in the air as she stared listlessly at the dissipating sparks that flew into the air above their heads before fading.
'Then let's try not to use that move again if it can be helped..' Bruce told her as he took one of her hands in his and gently rubbed circles over the back with his thumb comfortingly as he told her, 'I don't want you losing yourself to anger to where you won't be able to rise back up again…'
'OK Dad…' Ash leaned her head against his shoulder and he kissed it before leaning his against her as they watched the sun fully set in the distance.
*BOOOOM!*
A large mushroom cloud burst in existence from the explosion Ash made and the shockwave was powerful enough to knock the Oajins away, hit most of their pods with a powerful EMP blast, and sent waves big enough to push the boat faster and further out to sea.
"I. Am. Groot…" (That was… incredible…) Groot managed to muster out as he watched the smoke from the explosion rise into the air.
"Yeah who knew Little Miss Quiet had that in her…" Rocket commented mildly impressed but the statement JJ snapped out of her stupor when she couldn't see where her sister or her friend had been because of the smoke as she panicked,
"Does 'nyone see'em?!"
They all looked for any sign of the two kids when, through the dark smoke, a bright light was seen making it way out and Xay burst through with Ash clutched to his side and her arm over his shoulder where he kept ahold of her hand speeding as fast as he could to catch up to the boat before landing in a stumble in the middle of the dock panting in tiredness.
"And yet you claim to be 'just friends.'" Rocket snarked teasingly as Xay kept ahold of Ash by his side since it looked like she passed out from exhaustion.
Xay looked like he was about to snark back when they heard a large tremor coming from shore and they looked to see that one last pod, bigger than the others, was rising from the forest in the distance.
"Seriously?!" JJ questioned half crazed with disbelief before Zaruk told her as they headed towards the ship's stern,
"JJ, on my signal, send as much power as you can into the boat."
"What signal?!"
Zaruk didn't answer but instead rummaged through their satchel to grab something that they put on the end of one of their staffs before reaching over the railing to lower it toward the water in the boat's wake.
As soon as it touched the water, a bright green trail was left in the wake and, when the pod flew lose enough, Zaruk sharply raised their staff into the air and several kelp-like vines rose from the glowing trail imprint into the air before they swung their staff back and forth in arcs and the vines copied their movement as they thrashed around, trying to snag the pod as it managed to dodge them all and continue pursuing them.
"Guess that's it!" JJ shouted as she vaulted over the dividing railing to make it to the bridge where Dylan was steering the ship and planted her hand against the control panel to send a surge of energy into it that propelled the ship to go even faster.
At the same time, Zaruk had managed to grab the pod with a vine and they held their staff like a bat to swing it like one so the vines would do the same as they tossed the pod far away.
It crashed and sank into the ocean with the pilot and soldiers narrowly ejecting from the pod before it fully sunk and it seemed like the last of their pursuers had been thwarted.
"I am Groot?" (What was that?) Groot questioned once Zaruk walked back to the group before they opened their hand to show them the small dried leaves and tiny grains in their hand as they told them,
"Seeds."
"Huh I was wonderin' what they kept in there." JJ side muttered to Rocket motioning to Zaruk's satchel before the ship jolted from going over a rough wave and their attentions were turned to how they were nearly under the eye of the storm where the rift was starting to open but the winds that were pushing out from the rift's center made it nearly impossible to push forward anymore.
"How long's that thing gonna stay open?!" JJ questioned while yelling over the winds and Dylan looked to the ship's radar that showed the storm's activity would be fading and with it the rift would close.
"We've got less than 2 minutes!" He yelled back and as they all stood at the bow of the ship trying to figure out how the heck they were supposed to fly through a rift thousands of feet in the air with no flying craft.
"We're not gonna make it!"
From Xay's side, as soon as he said that, Ash's eyes snapped open but they were burning a bright yellow to match her armband and it rose to the air, manifesting into its staff form, before she grabbed it and whirled it above their heads as they were all encased in individual glowing bubbles.
"What the-?!" JJ slipped around in her bubble before they all lifted up into the air off the ship with Ash leading the line of them all as they shot toward the center of the rift.
"Ash! What are you doing?!" Bruce tried to call out to her but she didn't respond and her glowing yellow eyes stayed focused on their target as they were rapidly approaching the rift from below.
"Everybody brace yourselves!" Zaruk warned everyone before-
*SCHOOOM!*
They all disappeared through the rift and it closed behind them with an implosion of bright reddish-orange light.
AN- Back in school! I think maybe some structure is what I need to keep writing cause the whole time over break I just felt really unmotivated to write and in addition to the writer's block I'm having in writing everything leading up to the big climax event, I just ended up not working on this chapter the rest of break until I got back up to campus last Friday.
I'm going to be working a lot more in addition to classes since I still have some stuff I need to pay off for school but I'll be trying to stick to my weekly update schedule on either Fridays or Saturdays while also trying to finish up the new cover for this story.
On that note, I'm taking a Radical Graphics art class this semester so I'm hopeful that some of the projects and art pieces I create throughout the semester will be posted to my Deviant Art account along with some of the other pieces I've already got done but can't post yet since I don't want to spoil anything that's going to happen in future chapters.
Last note I swear! Who else is pumped for the second episode of Season 3 of The Owl House airing tonight?! If you can't watch it live you can find it and the other episodes on . I'm so excited! ^O^
Until the next chapter, Bye!