Chapter 2:
Return to Warfang
The distant rumblings of many footsteps alerted the group of heroes that they were nearing the city. Spyro strained his body not to go up to full speed as he noticed that the rumblings were too coordinated to be regular footsteps, it was marching, the marching of an invading army.
"Hurry up, Warfang is under attack!" he shouted back to the others. Crash and Jak broke into a run but it still wasn't fast enough for Spyro. "Hurry!" he bellowed.
"Hey this might have escaped your notice, but not all of us have wings," Crash snapped back angrily. "We're goin' as fast as we can." Spyro huffed and continued flying forward at an increased speed. The rest of the company followed close behind the two dragons until an entrance presented itself. Warfang was famous for being continually war torn but now it was in an even greater state of disrepair. Spyro and Cynder easily flew over the ruins but the others were forced to clamber over the ruined domes and towers. They reached the courtyard and found that the main gate had been forced open and all sorts of Metalheads were making their way through. Several of the spinning Metalheads were racing along the courtyard and attacking the moles desperately defending the city. Of course the moles with their melee weapons could not take out the spinning Metalheads but Jak would make short work of those buggers. He took out the Eco Staff, pointed it towards the crowd of Metalheads and shot out a blast of Red Eco similar to the Wave Concussor mod on the Morph Gun. Crash leapt at several ape Metalheads and spun around, severely injuring the creatures. However, one managed to take its claws and swipe Crash down. Coco screamed, alerting Spyro to his fellow Hero's peril. He swooped down upon the creatures and unleashed an ice bomb which froze the Metalheads in place. One icicle tail swipe later, all the Metalheads in Crash's vicinity were down and out of the counting. Spyro then headed off for a large rhino like Metalhead which was giving Jak a lot of trouble. The front of the beast was heavily armored and therefore useless for attacking it but it would never turn his vulnerable back on him. Spyro swooped in while the beast was distracted and shot a powerful earth missile into its backside, taking the beast out for the count.
"Thanks," Jak panted in relief. He turned his attention to a crowd of ape like ones, charged a Peacemaker reminiscent orb of electricity, and unleashed it at the group. Spyro turned around with a terrible earth flail and knocked out the spider like Metalhead attempting to sneak up on him. The creature attempted to get up but was felled by one of Hunter's arrows in its unprotected underbelly before it could get on its legs. To his left, Crunch was giving a persistent Metalhead a left hook to the side of the head. It's head snapped to the right with a crack and slumped to the ground, dead. Coco and Kiera were defending themselves pretty well, one Metalhead getting Kiera's monkey wrench lodged in its throat while another had its neck broken by a fierce roundhouse kick from Coco. Crash had recovered and was spinning around into the smaller Metalheads assaulting a group of moles. It seemed they were winning until a roar erupted from the other side of the gate. It crashed open and revealed several dinosaur-like Metalheads trying to get in. Spyro turned expectantly towards Jak to see him cursing violently under his breath. He charged another Peacemaker blast on the end of his staff and fired it at the Wasteland Metalheads, unfortunately only angering them. Jak leapt to the side as one charged at him at the same time that Crash dodged the other. Spyro had a brainwave and flew towards his fellow Heroes to tell them.
"Jak, Crash, stand back to back and make the Metalheads charge at each other. Dodge out of the way just as they're about to crash and they should end up killing each other."
"It might just work," Jak muttered. "Let's do it." Crash nodded and stood back to back with Jak as their respective assaulters charged. They dodged at the last second and the Metalheads were sent careening into each other, their heads snapping towards where the two Heroes were situated with deadly cracks before they slumped to the ground like their brethren. Their celebration was short lived as more Wasteland Metalheads swooped in, charging and doing considerable damage to the already torn courtyard. Daxter could be heard moaning something that sounded like: "Where's Sig when ya need him?" and Jak muttering something back irritably. Just when it seemed like the Heroes' end was nigh, a gigantic earth missile connected with one Wasteland Metalhead and blasted it down. Spyro looked up and yelled triumphantly when he recognized the three remaining guardians.
"Terrador, Cyril, Volteer!" he shouted.
"Need a hand?" asked the large green Earth Guardian as he swept his mace like tail at another Wasteland Metalhead.
"Things seem a little hot down there, how about I cool it down a notch," the ice blue Ice Guardian laughed, the only one to do so because of how bad the pun was. He breathed a stream of snow down upon the assaulting Metalheads, freezing them in place.
"How about we make them do a little jig?" hinted the bright yellow Electricity Guardian, sending down a stream of electricity which made all the Wasteland Metalheads spasm in response. Jak finished whatever he had been doing and now turned his Eco Staff (the end of which was now glowing a bright electric blue) to the Wasteland Metalheads and fired a pill shaped blast which flew up and then to the ground. The courtyard was obscured in light for a moment until it lessened and a miniature mushroom cloud became visible. All the Metalheads in the courtyard had been incinerated while the innocent citizens had been spared. The Heroes yelled triumphantly, quickly followed by all the citizens and Guardians. A little yellow spot flew towards Spyro and collided with his muzzle in a hug.
"Sparx?" he asked incredulously.
"Spyro mah brother, how ya been?" Sparx asked excitedly. "Not too good, you see learning about a plot for universal domination really puts a damper on your spirits," Spyro chuckled.
"Right, yeah, like how you left me alone again to go with her again," he said dramatically, pointing at Cynder.
"Great, if having Daxter around wasn't enough, now we have Daxter, and Sparx," Cynder moaned.
"Yeah I missed you too Cynder," Sparx said sarcastically.
"Hey," Jak butted in before Cynder could retort, "we do have a mission to do here don't we?" Spyro turned to Jak.
"Yeah, does anyone know what's going on?" Spyro asked around. His response was greeted with mutters of "no" and shaken heads.
"However," Terrador said helpfully, "the Chronicler might be able to give you answers." Spyro hesitated; he had never really liked the old dragon known as the Chronicler.
"Spyro, we don't have any choice," Cynder said. "We have to know what's going on." Spyro sighed and turned to his fellow heroes.
"Alright, but how are we gonna get all you guys to the Celestial Caves?" he asked. "You have to fly to get there and Jak's the only person other than Cynder and I who can really fly." Jak chuckled.
"Well, it's a good thing I brought this then." He brought out a communicator and called into it. "Torn, Ashelin, requesting Hellcats on Dragon World, coordinates (45, 30)," he said. They waited for a minute when suddenly, two forms materialized. The forms turned out to be two sleek, triton shaped aircraft, one blue with yellow stripes and another green with orange stripes. Crash pointed at the green and orange Hellcat and said: "Dibs on the green one." Jak chuckled and ruffled Crash's auburn hair.
"That one was intended for you guys, that blue and yellow one is my Hellcat," he chuckled. Crash nodded then walked over to the green Hellcat and leapt into the cockpit. Jak did the same with the blue one and was followed by Kiera and Daxter while Coco and Crunch followed Crash into the green one. Crash picked up a headset located on the dashboard and put it on.
"Hey there, this is…" he looked at the dashboard to see the identification, "…Hellcat 2 requesting permission for takeoff." He waited awhile until Jak called him back.
"Hellcat 2, this is Hellcat Leader saying all systems go," Jak called back as he hit the start button on the blue Hellcat. Crash repeated Jak's movements and placed his gloved hands on the steering pitch. The jet boosters activated and both Hellcats took off into the blue.
"Alright guys, follow me," Spyro ordered before turning so that he was facing the direction of the Celestial Caves and flew off towards the ancient island.
Author's Note: You know the drill: review and I update. Soon enough updating will slow down significantly because I am finally catching up with where I am in actually writing the story. I am currently one chapter away from the end of Act II so Act III should take a while to update come that time; Geek out.