Chapter 16
"I don't understand. It should be here."
Lucas grew annoyed that he and Lloyd couldn't find the raindrop Lucas drew to tell them the location of the venom. From training all day yesterday, both ninja's were exhausted and slept most of the day away and woken up with the sun setting. Lucas kept searching across the empty lots of each entrance to find his mark; but couldn't. He and Lloyd figured the ninja's removed it when they were captured; believeing they had them, but the two ninja's escaped. Lucas plopped himself against a fence and couldn't think what to do next.
"Can't we just go in any entrance and find it like before?" Lloyd asked.
"It's not that simple Lloyd." Lucas replied, "Our brothers took the picture I had and they removed the billboard that we used to help locate it before. I'm suprised they didn't take my smoke pellets and flash bangs. But if we go in, we'll be walking aimlessy without knowing a way to go."
"But you said it's now or never. And I think now is the time to save them, or we'll be running for the rest of our lives."
Lucas sighed to his cousin's comment and knew he was right. He got himself up to his feet and walked over to the nearest entrance. He removes the cover and see's the ladders were still gone. He and Lloyd threw down their hoods, Lloyd hops onto Lucas's back, and Lucas jumps down in the darkness of the sewers. Once they reached the bottom, Lloyd hops off, and starts to shake a little as he heard a hiss in the distance. Lucas's see's him shaking and suspected that they could be close. He pats his cousin's back to relax him and the two ninja's venture in the sewers.
The two ninja's walked like ghosts through the sewers. Making choices, walking into dead ends, and waiting patiently for a couple of serpentine snakes to move away from them. After a couple of hours of walking in complete darkness, Lucas turned his head to a tunnel and saw something green glowing that caught his eyes. He nudges Lloyd in the ribs to tell him that they found the way. Both ninja's run down the tunnel and could hear the hisses growing louder. When they stepped out of the tunnel, they found themselves in a moon-lit corridor, but no sign of the venom and could see the green light glowing in the next tunnel.
"Where do you think you're going?" a voice hissed.
Out of the shadows comes out Skales, Acidicus, Skalidor, and Fangtom, taking guard of the tunnel to the venom. Lloyd took a step back at the sight of Skales and hid behind Lucas's back. Lucas understood the history his cousin had with the Hypnobrai general, drew out his sai's and took a defensive stance.
"Let us through you over-grown reptilian worms." said Lucas.
"How dare you insult us!" Skales shouted at him, "We are snakes not worms. We are already annoyed with the boys father using the ninja's as servants , but it allows us to be free. Now that it's just you and the boy, it should be a sssnap to capture you two. Ssserpentines attack!"
Out from the shadows and from the ground, a small army of snakes surrounded the two ninja's. Lucas charged at a Constrictai, kicked it in the chest, and sent it flying into a few serpentines. He went back to Lloyd to protect him and grabs a Hypnobrai's arm and throws it over his shoulders and into a wall. Lucas kept pushing the serpentines away from them, leaving some unconscious, or running away, while some were still up to fight; which made Lucas tired from fighting until he got tackled to the ground. He struggled to remove his attacker and was turned around to see a Fangprye was pinning him down. He tried to squirm out the snakes grasp, but was tired from fighting and looked up to see the snake was ready to bite him. He closes his eyes to embrace two thin-like needles entering his body till he heard a cry.
He opens his eyes to see the snake covering his right eye in pain. Lucas struggled to get his right arm free and uses his elbow to knock the snake off of him; unconscious. He stood up and found a small trail of water leading to Lloyd. Lucas smiles to see his cousin doing his water whip trick and stood next to him.
"I see you're getting the hang of water." said Lucas, "Now lets get rid of these snakes and general's."
"Ninja-Go!" they both shouted.
The grey and green torandos spun around at their spots; daring a serpentine to come at them. The sight of the spinjitzu made the soldiers scattered away or dig underground. Lucas and Lloyd stopped their torandos and stood infront of the four general's.
"Comeback here you cowards!" Skales shouted at the retreating snakes, "Never let a soldier do a general's job. Forget Garmadon's plan, capture the boy."
The three other general's nodded and slithered towards them. Lucas glared at them and moved Lloyd behind him and took a defensive stance.
"Why is he important to you?" he asked them.
"Because you fish head," Skales came back at him for being the water ninja, "We know Garmadon's plan is to take over Ninjago and he cares about his precious boy. But we want to rule Ninjago at our image and we are helping him until we make our strike. That's where the boy comes in. With him as our hostage, his father would have no choice but to follow us. Acidicus, Skalidor, take care of this ninja."
The Venomari and Constrictai nodded and stood infront of Lucas. Acidicus spits out green liquid from his mouth and into Lucas's eyes. Lucas groaned as the venom hit his eyes and tried to rub it out, but the venom began to disoriented his vision. He looks at the two general's and saw Skalidor use his tail to knock him aside; making him drop his sai's and away from Lloyd. He looks at the snakes, or what use to be snakes, as the venom began to take more effect on him, to change into two giant spiders and were heading towards him. Lucas, having a fear for them, backed away slowly from them till his back was up against the wall. The spiders laughed at him and one used one of its eight legs to knock him aside and he landed infront of a puddle of water.
He looks up to see the puddle, but also see's two more spiders heading towards a small fly, who was stuck in a corner; cowering in fear. Lucas easily could tell that the fly was Lloyd and the two spiders were the other general's. His blood was boiling that they were going to hurt his cousin and needed to remove the venom from his eyes. He crawls up to the puddle, picks up two small drops of water and places them on his eyes. He concentrated his healing power till it made a dim blue light and disappeared. He opens his eyes and his vision was back to normal and looked at the general's near his cousin and behind him were no longer the spiders. He had to get rid of the toughest general's to save his cousin and decided to play a trick on them. He crawls up more to make it like he's trying to save Lloyd and pretended to lay on the ground unconscious.
"Ha-ha, one down, one to go." Skalidor laughed.
"Lets get this one to Garmadon." said Acidicus.
As the two general's reached down to grab his arms, Lucas bolted up to his hands and launches himself back to kick Acidicus, while Skalidor dodged it and burrowed his way underground. Acidicus laid on the ground in pain, and Lucas, not wanting to deal with Skalidor, quickly picked up his sai's and ran to save Lloyd.
"Look into my eyes boy." Skales commanded as he used his hypno powers to control Lloyd.
Lucas quickly got behind Skales and stomps on his tail. Skales yelled in pain and felt his tail being grabbed and was spun around till he flew into a wall. Lucas heard his cousin scream and turned to see the Fangprye general cornering him with both heads ready to bite.
"It won't hurt Lloyd." says the two headed snake, "It's just two, maybe four, neddle-like teeth piercing your skin and you'll be like one of us."
The two heads darted at him. Lloyd was cowering in fear has the two heads were about to bite and closed his eyes to embrace the pain, but didn't feel anything. He opens his eyes to see Lucas infront of him and was holding onto the heads where the head met the neck; preventing them from biting them both. Lucas ignore the pain as the general punched him in the chest and sides, while the general saw the hatred in his grey eyes.
"You. Will not. Hurt my. Cousin!" Lucas shouted through his teeth and started to raise his voice, "Ninja-Go!"
The Fangprye general and Lucas were surrounded in a grey torando. Lloyd watched as his cousin's spinjitzu spun strong and watched as Fangtom flew across the room and laned roughly next to Acidicus. Lucas stopped his torando and went to check on Lloyd.
"You alright?" he asked.
"Yeah, I am now." Lloyd replied.
Lloyd felt something move underneath him and moved his head aside to see something coming out of the ground behind Lucas. He squints his eyes to see a black and orange tail and instantly knew it was Skaildor about to squeeze the life out of him.
"Lucas, behind yo-" Lloyd tried to warn him, but was interrupted as a hand was wrapped around his throat.
Lucas was late to respond as a tail was wrapped around his legs, pinning his arms to his sides, and around his throat. Skalidor crawled the rest of his body out of the ground and turned his head to face the two ninja's he had in his grasp.
"Awe, did you forget about little old me?" he sarcastically asked them, "I'll be happy to give you both the big squeeze.
Lucas could feel the air escaping his body as the snake squeezed him with his coils. His vision starting to cloud up and darkness was creeping up to him. He could feel his ribs pressing against his lungs as the Constrictai was squeezing him harder. He looks at the other general's recovering and started to slither towards them. He looks at Lloyd, who had his hands at Skalidor's hand trying to break free from his grasp and could see he was starting to turn purple. Lucas needed to act fast if he want to save him and had an idea. He moves his hand from the coils to reach into his pouch, and pulls his hand out to see a white dot, and smiles that he pulled out the right one.
"Must think relax." he says to himself and thought about the ocean and freed his right arm from the snakes coils.
"Ha, I always thought of you as weak." Skalidor said and presses his face infront of Lucas's, "You've done everything to protect your cousin, and you can't get yourself out of this."
"Ac...actually...I...th...thought of...th...this...through." said Lucas, "Lloyd...co...cover...your...ears."
Lloyd nodded and lets go of Skalidor's hand and feebly covers his ears. Once they were covered, Lucas lifts his arm high in the air and smashes the white pellet on the brook of the Skalidor's nose. The bang forces Skalidor to drop his staff, release Lucas and Lloyd to cover his ears and scream in pain to the ringing in his ears and slithers away from the venom. The remaining three general's were too screaming in pain and covering their ears to the noise and slithered behind the black and orange snake. Lucas coughed and gulp down breaths of air after being squeezed and looks at Lloyd, whose face was still purple and wasn't moving. Lucas slowly realized that since Lloyd is small, his lungs would be small to get air into his system after being choked and spots the Constrictai's staff infront of him. He heard a breifing from his father that the venom from the staff is able to let people breath again after being squeezed and quickly picks it up.
He removes Lloyd's hood, opens his mouth, removes the gemstone in the staff, and pours a small drop of the venom in his mouth. Lloyd jolts up breathing and his face wasn't purple no more, but back to its normal tan color. Lucas places the gem back in the staff and tosses it aside. He helps Lloyd to his feet, while Lloyd throws his hood over his face, and they both run into the tunnel that leads to the venom.
Once they enter the other corridor, they could see the area was deserted with no-one around. In the center of the room, they could see the large pool of the Great Devourer's venom and looked up to see Sensei and Nya, in the cage hanging above the venom.
"Dad!" Lucas shouted to him and ran to them with his sai's drawn out.
"Lucas wait!" Nya shouted to him.
"It's a trap!" Sensei said to warn him.
"What do you me-hmpf." Lucas says and gets tackled to the ground with his sai's knocked out.
Lucas was on his stomach, while his attacker was on his back. His attacker grabbed his backpack, which Lucas easily squirmed out of, and reach for his sai's, but were kicked away from him. He looks up to see that Cole was the one who kicked his weapons away, and Cole grabs his arms and forces them behind his back. Lucas struggled against the earth ninja's strength, but could feel ice forming around his wrists. He looks over his shoulders and saw that Zane was his attacker and saw Kai and Jay were holding onto Lloyd's arms. They all turned their heads to the sound of echoing footsteps and saw Garmadon coming out of the shadows, evily grinning at them.
"Welcome my son." he says to Lloyd, then looks at Lucas, "And welcome my apprentice."