Disclaimer: PoM and ToS do not belong to me.
"A cursed weapon with an evil, dark aura."
If there was one thing everyone could depend on, it was Mort's obsessive love of Julian's feet. Even as they continued on what could be the most dangerous quest of their lives, he stared at them in a state of bountiful bliss. He was hypnotized by the three toed feet of the 'King' of the Lemurs. As they walked forward, the fur on them seemed to glisten in the sunlight...
"Mort! Pay attention!" The wide-eyed little lemur looked up at his aye-aye companion, watching Maurice glare at him, unamused and irritated, "Come on, we have to keep up with Julian. If we don't," Here, his expression turned sour, "Who knows what kind of trouble his royal pain will get himself in."
"Okay!" The hyperactive mammal responded, skipping along. Maurice rolled his eyes and walked after him, ignoring the humming the little lemur was doing.
Unfortunately for Mort, Maurice was the only one who ignored it.
"WHAT," King Julian snapped, "Is this hideous melody that is assaulting my eardrums?" He hit the side of his head with his hand, as though that would make the sound go away, "It is irritating me to no end and won't," He hit his head again, "Go," another hit, "Away," Here, he hit himself hard enough to knock himself over. Placing him right in front of Mort.
"Hi!" He shrieked in his high-pitched voice, then resumed humming the somewhat annoying tune.
"Mort," King Julian spoke in a surprisingly soft, sweet tone. The kind he used only when Mort's 'annoying levels', as the king called it, reached skyrocketing levels.
"Yes?" The Dormouse lemur asked, completely oblivious to Julian's annoyance. Maurice, however, recognized the tone, and stepped away from Mort, so the younger lemur wouldn't end up kicked in his face.
"Shut up a little," The king mock-cooed.
Large eyes widened somewhat, and Mort hopped forward, hugging his king's feet, "Okie-dookie," He responded in his normal, high-pitched tone. Julian's eyes, to anyone who was paying attention -in other words, just Maurice- seemed to be glowing a bright red.
He snarled, "OFF. DA. FEET!" His foot shot forward. Mort lost his grip on the ankle of Julian and was flung into the air at a one-forty degree angle. He flew deeper into the park, crying, 'WEE!' and crashed into a tree a ways away.
Maurice stared until Mort was out of view, then turned to his king and asked, "Shouldn't we go after him? The Park is kinda dangerous."
"Do we have to?" Julian whined, but a glare from Maurice guilted him into it, "Ugh, fine, let's go get da penguins."
Meanwhile, Mort crashed into several trees, bouncing off one onto another, crying, "Ow! OW!" until he fell to the ground, "Oof!" lying on his stomach. Then, he got up, brushed himself off, and said, "I'm okay."
Then he looked around.
He wasn't quite sure where he was. Reasonably, as he'd rarely been out of the zoo and even then, usually with the penguins or Maurice. Julian and Marlene didn't count, as one didn't care about him, and the other couldn't leave the zoo because of a few 'monster issues', or so he'd heard.
A branch from above, one he'd crashed into on the way down, broke and fell down upon him. The only thing that seemed to indicate he was a live was the slight twitching in his tail and limbs, which were sprawled out. Something else fell along with the branch. Mort pulled himself out from under the branch and gasped at the sight of what had fallen.
They were two strangely shaped items, identical down to the last detail. A gray sculpted face, with piercing red eyes stared back at the dormouse lemur. Just above it were tan eyebrows, that wrapped around the frame of the strange thing. On the sides of these things were what appeared to be tan feathers, twitching ever so slightly. The bottom of the strange faces had a horizontal row of sharp, tan ornaments that appeared to be teeth. One was stacked on top of the other, a strap keeping them from falling apart.
Now, anyone else would have looked at these things and thought, 'AHH!' Or, if you a part of Skipper's group, you might have shouted, "AHH! A Devil's Arm!" Mort, however, was ignorant and -as most of the team would openly say- stupid. So when he saw the skull faces, his first thought was, 'Ooh, masks!'
And he didn't even think to question why there were two of them, or why they were out in the middle of nowhere.
One mask was placed upon his head. The other was held in a firm grip. Hearing his voice being called out, Mort hid behind a nearby bush.
"Mort! Oh, Mort!" Private called, waddling through the bushes. Mort grinned. Here he comes... just a bit closer...
"AHHH!" The lemur jumped out in front of the youngest penguin. Private screamed in pure terror, falling back. Mort took off the mask and laughed. At the sound of young Private's scream, the others rushed to the scene, only to be shocked at Mort, laughing on his back, and Private, curled up and shaking softly.
While Julian was obviously amused, Maurice quickly scolded the younger lemur, "Mort, that was NOT cool! We're all at the ends of our wits right now!"
"You could have caused a panic attack!" Kowalski snapped at him, "Do you know what would've happened then? He would've been unable to breathe, and probably lose consciousness!"
Rico grunted in disapproval, standing besides Kowalski. Skipper was too busy trying to calm the frantic youngest soldier to chaste him as the others had.
Mort looked down with wide; sad; regretful eyes, feeling bad. He'd just wanted to have a little fun!
Trying to draw everyone's attention away from Mort, Private picked up and examined the masks Mort had found, "Hey, aren't these Devil's Arms?"
"They sure are!" The unusually cheerful voice of their employer came seemingly out of nowhere as she swung into the scene, grabbing the masks, "Give me the rest of the Devil's Arms."
Rico complied, spewing them up. Private started shaking lightly, though only Mort, who was standing right next to him, noticed. The Private backed away from them, slowly, as not to cause suspicion. Mort frowned, but turned his attention back to the Arms.
They all started floating around the baboon, who eyed each one carefully, "Well, no fakes, that's good... they're not damaged too badly..."
"Are we done yet?" Skipper asked, "We've been searching for days! How many more are there?"
"Just one," The baboon smiled, "And that's the Heart of Chaos. My magic can't locate it, though... I fear that, like Disaster, it may be in the possession of someone. Let's hope it's someone that, like Fred, is too stupid or too ignorant to understand the power of the Arms."
"Have no fears, miss. We'll take care of it, right boys?" Everyone nodded.
"Good," The baboon turned her gaze to look at all of them, ending on Private. Mort blinked as the penguin's fearful eyes tried to mask themselves from the baboon lady. But it was too late. She'd already glimpsed inside his soul, and smirked to herself, walking away.
Mort watched them for a few moments, before shrugging. Whatever was going on there, was someone else's problem. He had another, more pressing matter to deal with.
"MORT! OFF DA FEET!"
Okay... you know the drill. Notes:
The Devil's Arm Apocalypse is actually a greave, a type of weapon equipped on the leg, over the boots, to enhance the power of one's feet. The character that uses them doesn't use his hands for a personal reason. Makes his fighting style a little unique compared to the others.
Thanks to Pip4 for the help with this chapter. It took a little while to actually write.
Hopefully, I can decide on what I'm going to do next. I have a few ideas, and since this stories only two chapters away from the finish, might as well start planning, right?