Well, I finally got it done. FINALLY. I guess when I said two weeks, I meant four and a half weeks.. I think it was that long at least. It may have been longer. Anyway, I apologize to my loyal readers, and I will not make anymore promises I will have difficulty keeping, or cannot keep. I think I forgot something important that I wanted to do in this chapter, but it isn't extremely plot significant. That is what mostly postponed this chapter, because I was hesitant to continue writing as I forgot it. Well, that's what I get for not writing down as much as I wanted to.
I also figured out that the line breaks I was for the entire story so far weren't actually working. I decided to try something different in this chapter.
Reviews, comments, and criticism are all appreciated very very much. I also suggest giving every writer you enjoy, or even don't enjoy, a review. The reason 99% of us write on this site is to share our writing, and everyone loves reviews.
I also started thinking about what I'm doing to do after this story since this is almost done.. only about 3 chapters left. I have it partially written actually, so it will be up shortly after this story is completed.
Thank you for reading this somewhat lengthy author note.
-Begin Chapter-
Claus lifted his arm and rubbed it against his sweat drenched forehead. The sun was draining Claus, Lucas, and Ninten of their energy in the mountains north of Tazmily.
Ninten led them, having the most motivation and drive to reach Porky, and he was the only one who knew where New Pork City was. Claus was following about six feet behind Ninten, trying to keep going through the rough heat. Farther behind them was Lucas, whose energy was almost drained from the extended hiking in the heat, which he was least used to out of the three.
They had been mostly silent on the first morning of their travel to New Pork City. They had not gotten far in the night since all of them had their energy spent on the prior day's events. They were in the mountains at almost noon now, and it wasn't even the hottest part of the day yet. It would seem like they were in a desert when one took into account the sand that bedded on top of the mountains and the heat.
Claus groaned, "Can we take a break? We've been walking for hours and it's really hot."
Ninten looked back to Claus, "Why do we need a break? We can keep moving for awhile longer."
"Ninten, this is ridiculous," Claus answered him, "We're almost half way there anyway. Can't we just rest for awhile?"
Ninten glanced back again, to see both Claus and Lucas almost drained of their energy. Ninten himself then realized how tired he was, and decided Claus was right. "Fine," he reluctantly said.
"Thank goodness," Claus said, almost under his breath. Lucas sighed and sat against a brown, dusty rock, and Ninten joined him. "I'm going to look for some water or something," Claus left Lucas and Ninten with only each other's company and the unusual heat in the mountains.
Lucas sat against the rock hugging his knees, while Ninten was disappointed that they were getting 'behind,' according to what his 'schedule,' was.
There weren't many words between them. Lucas was too quiet in general to comfortably start a conversation, and Ninten was too agitated to say anything. Lucas was content with listening to the mountain birds and noticing how scenic the view of the forest was from the mountains.
"Lucas, I don't even know how we're going to do this," Ninten said, and it somewhat startled Lucas after the silence, which he enjoyed.
"You seem pretty confident in our abilities," Lucas stated in response.
"Yeah," Ninten sighed, "But confidence doesn't really do anything for us." Ninten's cold determination and pessimism were starting to get on Lucas's nerves, but Lucas understood and didn't hold it against him. "Porky is virtually invincible, and all three of us are probably outlaws all over the world now, so there's no way we're getting to him without any trouble."
"Porky can't be that bad," Lucas told him, "And in a crowded city people might not even notice us."
"Let me rephrase that," Ninten immediately responded, "Porky IS invincible."
Lucas blinked, wondering how someone could be as invincible as Ninten was making Porky sound.
"Lucas, he uses time travel to live forever," Ninten explained, "He moves farther into the future over and over and over again so that the medicines he finds can let him live longer and longer."
This was an interesting concept to Lucas, as it would be to pretty much anybody. "How does he do that?"
"I don't know, but it might have something to do with a giant robot spider he lives in," Ninten paused, waiting to see Lucas's reaction to that, "Or the five-thousand year old demon corrupting his soul."
Lucas's head jerked towards Ninten away from looking at the forest canopy ahead of him, "What?"
"The reason he does all of this is because of the influence of Giygas, the evil being living inside of him," Ninten explained. "Porky is essentially just the physical embodiment of Giygas, under his complete control."
"How do you know all of this?" Lucas asked, scared at a small degree.
"I used to work for him, remember?" Ninten explained. Ninten's mood was definitely lightening up from when they had to stop walking earlier. Mostly he was just enjoying seeing Lucas's reactions to his explanations. Lucas was responding like a child hearing a scary campfire story to a certain point. "I regret it with every part of me," Ninten sobered the atmosphere to a more serious mood.
"But didn't you get brainwashed to go? Wasn't it not your fault?"
"It was my fault," Ninten said, "I wanted to go. I wasn't brainwashed either." There was a pause in his speaking, "I was brainwashed partially. It let it happen though. I listened to Porky and Fassad's suggestions, and I started doing what they wanted. I did that until you and Claus came along." This caused Lucas to listen more intently, trying to figure out what Ninten was saying, "When you told me about your parents being taken away and your home being burnt to the ground, it woke up my humane side again. I left my family, and gave myself over to an evil cause." Ninten stopped talking again, trying to not lose emotional composure, "I just hope I can see my family again."
Lucas empathized with that completely. "I know how you feel," he said quietly.
Ninten realized there were many more people like Lucas who had lost their family. "You shouldn't be involved in this. You are though. It is my fault too. You and Claus should be back with your parents in a town like the one you grew up in. You shouldn't be motherless and trying to kill evil king who only sees you as a resource to hurt more people."
Lucas had nothing to say. Ninten was right. He shouldn't be where he is now, but he was. The evil intentions of another put him there. There was another break in conversation. Lucas, generally quiet, didn't have the desire to respond to something that didn't need a response. The words sank into his mind though, and he wondered what his life would be like if Porky wasn't here.
The tense silence was broken by the chirp of a bright yellow bird. The bird hovered above them, tweeting wildly and flying in circles. They both noticed the bird.
"What's wrong with it?" Ninten asked.
"I don't know, but something's going on," Lucas told him. They listened and thought for a moment. "It's insane. It's speaking jibberish. Normally PSI lets me understand animals, but this one is crazy."
"I can tell." The bird started to fly away. Ninten looked around trying to see what was going on, "Lucas, I think we should go find Claus."
Somewhat irrational fear entered both of them. There was nothing apparent to be scared of. It was just a wild yellow bird, right? They walked across the rocky ground, it was almost flat all the way across. The rocks were hundreds of shades of colors ranging from brown and gray.
"Ninten," Lucas stopped walking, "What's that?" Lucas pointed to six large grooves in the ground. It looked like something had been clawing it for awhile.
"Probably something an animal did," Ninten answered. "It looks really big though."
"Maybe a drago," Lucas tried to assure himself. As far as they knew, there was really nothing to worry about, but they both couldn't help but think there was something wrong. "Let's find Claus and go."
"Claus!" Ninten called. There was no audible answer. "Claus!" There was still no answer. "How far could he have gone? It's been like seven minutes since we stopped."
"He's probably farther away than any sane person would think he could be," Lucas quietly laughed. His eyes traveled downwards remembering the situation. "I hope nothing happened to him." Lucas noticed something on the ground. It looked like a dinosaur footprint. "Hey, Ninten, I think it is just a drago. We don't have anything to worry about I guess."
"That's good," Ninten was also relieved that he wasn't being paranoid and the only worried one of them.
'Ninten, Lucas, shut up,' someone said to them.
"Claus?" Lucas called.
'Lucas, I said be quiet. I need help, we need to get out of here,' Claus seemed very cautious from the way he was talking.. or telepathically communicating.. or something.
'What's the probelm?' Ninten asked.
'There's a giant red lizard thing. It started chasing me, and it doesn't seem friendly,' Claus explained, and paused a moment, 'Well it seems friendly with that yellow bird on it's head, but it's been breaking rocks and trees and stuff.'
'Ninten, could that be the yellow bird from earlier?' Lucas asked him.
'Well considering how many yellow birds could potentially exist-' the beginning of a witty comment from Ninten was cut off by Claus.
'Ok, ok, seriously guys. We do need to get out,' Claus focused them.
'How about we start by you telling us where you are?' Ninten suggested, 'We've been looking for you for awhile now.'
'I'm hiding behind a rock,' Claus told him, trying to keep himself calm, 'If I move too much, or make any sounds, it'll see me.'
'When you say, "it," you mean the giant lizard thing, right?' Ninten asked.
'No, I mean the panda bear hiding in the castle- Of course I mean the giant lizard thing,' Claus answered bitterly. 'If you climb up that little rocky hill, the lizard will be right behind it. So be careful.'
Lucas and Ninten looked in front of them to see the miniature-mountain on top of a mountain that Claus was talking about. They started to climb it. It wasn't difficult to climb or anything, it was more like walking with a few awkward steps. They were cautious though. Both were careful to make a minimal amount of sound with each step. Surely enough, when they reached the top, they could see the giant red lizard.
It was about forty feet from them. It looked awful. It's teeth looked metallic, like knives or spear heads. It's mouth stretched half way down it's abdomen, and opened so wide that when it roared one could see it's stomach. It's yellow eyes pierced through the air, even from the distance. Lucky for Lucas and Ninten, it didn't see them. They both crouched down to make themselves less visible.
They could see Claus, partially exposed to them from behind the rock.
"It looks like some sort of chimera," Ninten whispered, frightened of the beast seeing them. They took note of the dragon wings, the muscular lion-like, scaly body, and the sharp, metallic, snake-like teeth.
"How are we supposed to make it move?" Lucas whispered back. "It can probably outrun us."
"I don't know," Ninten rubbed his forehead and thought. "It looks like it's resting or something. But the bird is still there. It might wake up the lizard thing if it sees us."
"So do we distract the bird?" Lucas suggested.
"I don't think that will work," Ninten answered, "We need to remove the bird."
"How?"
"You don't have any offensive PSI that won't disembowel everything in a ten foot radius, do you?" Ninten sighed, "I don't know then. We shouldn't try to attack the creature directly, because it might be resistant to PSI, and we don't want to wake it up." Ninten and Lucas sat for a moment, while Ninten quietly spoke all of this thoughts. Ninten was analytical, and logical, while he also had a very free flowing, creative side to his thoughts.
"I don't like how this is turning out, but Claus might just have to get out that mess himself," Ninten continued. "We don't have any safe options, and it would be easier for him to walk away than for us to do anything."
Lucas didn't seem very fond of the idea of having his brother walk in the face of potential death like that, but Ninten was almost completely right. "Okay..," Lucas responded.
Ninten telepathically told Claus what he would need to do.
'It's asleep anyway,' Claus answered, mostly to assure himself, 'It probably won't notice me.' None of the three wanted to think about what might happen if it did notice him.
'Claus,' Lucas said to him, he paused a moment, 'Be careful, please.'
'Don't worry about me, this isn't even a huge problem,' Claus replied.
Claus stared to lightly place his foot out of his hiding place. He tried to make no sound. There were no audible sounds as he set one foot after another down on the rocks. Claus got about half way to Lucas and Ninten, who were in dramatic suspense hoping Claus would make it back.
A quiet humming started sounding throughout the mountains. The three looked around to see where the sound could possibly be coming from. Neither of them found the source, but it started getting louder and louder.
As it got louder, Claus began to pick up his pace, attempting to get as far away as possible before the chimera beast woke up from the crescendoing sound. The chimera stirred in it's sleep, startling the three boys. As the sound got louder, the chimera was disturbed at increasing intensity. Claus looked at how far he had gone, and how far he had to keep going. He was half way there. Twenty feet done, twenty feet to go before he was safely out of the chimera's visibility.
The chimera briskly tightened its muscles. Lucas and Ninten were watching, and they silently gasped in suspense. Claus stayed completely calm, however. The situation required him to. If he panicked, he could be done for.
The chimera growled as it opened its sickly yellow eyes. It surveyed the surroundings. Claus hoped that he wouldn't be noticed if he didn't move. Lucas and Ninten didn't realize how large the chimera really was until they saw it stood, on all four of its feet, almost two times taller than Claus. It was nearly fifteen feet long, as well. The chimera sharply turned towards Claus. He was spotted by the beast. It roared, and Claus was almost paralyzed by fear.
Claus came to his senses as it lunged towards him, and attempted to move out of the way. His efforts were no use. It was too fast.
"Claus!" Lucas shouted, as he fired a PK Love towards the chimera. PK Love made contact with the chimera and the ground around it, and a cloud of dust erupted. The next thing that emerged from the dust cloud was the beast running up the rocky hill towards Lucas.
All PK Love did was take the attention from Claus to Lucas. Lucas began to run, as did Ninten who was standing beside him. It targeted Lucas specifically, and ignored Ninten. It was at least intelligent enough to identify a threat. Lucas would be in a great amount of trouble if it proved itself to be more intelligent. For now he thought he could outsmart the chimera, maybe distract it.
Lucas created an explosion of rocks with another PK Love to cause the chimera to stumble. It tripped and this let Lucas get farther away from the threat. He hid on the opposing side of a boulder, using it as a visual barrier. The chimera roared as it flailed its head and tail angrily.
Lucas took the risk and peeked over the boulder. The chimera had its head turned, looking around. No doubt it was looking for Lucas. Lucas surveyed the area. His adrenaline was pumping with the threat of an invincible beast hunting him. It didn't even seem harmed from PK Love, which was unusually powerful for Lucas. It was only annoyed. As Lucas was straining his mind for something, anything, that could get him, Claus, and Ninten away from the animal, he noticed something. It was on the chimera's back right below its scaly neck and between the dark purple wings.
A gray colored strip which appeared very out of place. Above the strip, there was a word, 'On.' Below it was the word 'Off.' There was a power switch on the chimera's back for some reason. It might have been partially robotic. Lucas raised an eyebrow, confused. All he'd need to do is turn that switch, right?
However, that was much easier said than done. The chimera was fast, and it was looking for Lucas, constantly spinning and shuffling in the rocks.
"Hey!" Claus shouted at the chimera from on top of the rocky hill. The chimera turned its attention to Claus. It began to prowl towards Claus. It was slowly coming closer, and being cautious of another enemy it may need to fend off.
Lucas came out from his hiding place and tiptoed behind the chimera. Claus noticed this, and was about to make him stop.
'Claus, just keep it facing that way,' Lucas sent to him telepathically. Claus didn't want to question his brother's method, and focus on the giant red dragon-lizard-snake-lion chimera thing that was trying to kill him.
It was slowly making its way towards Claus, getting closer every second. Lucas followed it, making sure he didn't attract any attention. Lucas nearly lost his balance in doing this, but he refused to let his nerves get the better of him when he would normally be in too much panic to do anything.
The chimera was close to Claus at this point- very close. Almost ten feet away. 'Lucas, you wanna do something quick, I'm kind of running out of space here,' Claus said, doing is best to keep himself facing the chimera, and uncomfortably walk backwards.
Claus nearly tripped, and the chimera growled. It would be attacking soon. Claus was already out of room to run, but the chimera didn't know that. The chimera roared loudly. It was ear-shattering. Then it jumped towards Claus and everything was a blur.
"Ah!" Claus yelled, expecting to be in a considerable amount of pain. "Wait, what happened?" He noticed the chimera was just lying on top of him, unconscious. "Lucas, help get it off of me, it's heavy."
Lucas did his best to lift the colossal chimera's head off his brother's legs and torso, and Claus barely managed to get out from underneath it.
The humming that woke the chimera up had not yet subsided. "Where the heck is that soundcoming from? And where's Ninten?" Claus looked around, and he spotted both of his answers at the same time. Ninten stood, talking to the driver of a floating limousine.
Claus and Lucas went to Ninten, nearly exhausted from dealing with the chimera. Lucas noticed that Claus was undoubtably annoyed. "Ninten, what the heck?" Claus asked, "So a giant animal tries to kill us, and you talk to a limo driver. That was definitely the appropriate response to that situation."
"Sorry, but I was trying to see what was going on," Ninten said, "But apparently that was called the Ultimate Chimera, and it was recently engineered by Porky's scientists to find those three guys Porky is looking for."
"Do you mean-" Lucas was about to ask if 'those three guys,' were themselves, but then Ninten stopped him, and gestured towards the driver.
'He doesn't know anything except for what I told you, and everyone from New Pork City knows what I just told you,' Ninten explained. Lucas glanced over to the driver.
"It's a shame that it started attacking innocent people," the driver said, "Porky sent me over here to come pick some guys up," he pulled out a clipboard from the passenger seat of the vehicle, "and I guess you are those guys." The driver smiled somewhat surprised. "So you can get in and we'll start driving in a moment." The driver walked around to the other side of the vehicle and got into the driver's seat.
"Is this safe?" Lucas asked Ninten.
"I'm sure it is. This guy is completely clueless," Ninten pointed out, Claus nodded in agreement, "We could stop him if he tried anything, too. It's a free ride to New Pork City."
"Okay..," Lucas hesitantly followed Ninten and his brother into the floating limousine.
It wasn't loud on the inside like it was on the outside. There was red carpet on the floor, and the interior seemed much larger on the inside than what it would be contrasted to on the outside.
"This is nice," Claus said, sitting down. Lucas sat closely next to Claus, still questioning the authenticity of the driver's behavior.
They sat in silence for awhile, not wanting the driver to eavesdrop on their conversation. Lucas nervously tapped his foot on the floor. When he did this he noticed something he put into his pocket the night before. He reached his hand into his pocket and pulled out the metallic Franklin Badge that Ness gave to him.
"I wonder what Ness, Paula, and Kumatora are doing right now," Lucas stated, breaking the silence.
"I'm sure they're trying to get someone to help," Claus answered, "Isn't that what they said they'd do?"
Ninten was silent, and felt no need to talk. He was too busy in his own thoughts, quietly staring at the floor. Lucas picked up on Ninten's anxiousness.
"Ninten, are you okay?" Lucas asked him.
Ninten didn't respond for a moment, and kept blankly staring at the floor. "Yes." He was quiet for a moment longer, "I'm worried about my family."
"We understand," Lucas slightly smiled, "we'll help you." Ninten didn't talk until they reached their destination.
By the time they reached New Pork City, it was nearly evening. It was farther than they had initially thought it was, because the outer part of the town was large, and dangerous. They might have not made it there safely if they hadn't found a ride.
New Pork City was gigantic. There were skyscrapers, which neither of the twins had seen before while living in a mostly rural environment. There were very long roads filled with cars and other vehicles. There was barely a point in using the roads because of how slowly the cars were going. The sidewalks were crowded as well, as people stood almost shoulder to shoulder, trying to walk faster than the person in front of them.
"Here we are," the driver said, as the limousine descended in a designated area between two buildings. "Have a nice stay at New Pork City."
"So Porky didn't want anything to do with us?" Claus questioned. Lucas and Ninten looked equally as confused as the red-headed boy.
"Well, these're all the instructions I got," he waved his clipboard. "See ya." The driver clumsily walked into the building on their left.
The three boys stood there, clueless about where to start.
"What do we do now?" Claus asked.
"We need to sleep tonight," Lucas suggested almost immediately, "If we're going to determine the fate of the world tomorrow, we need to be mentally and awake."
Claus sighed, "Lucas, that will just waste time."
"He has a point," Ninten backed up Lucas's seemingly childish argument. "We do need to be able to function if we're going to do this right. And we're all exhausted after fighting the Ultimate Chimera, and then having our nerves eat us for four hours."
"Fine," Claus said, "Let's sleep."
They all walked down crowded roads. Claus and Lucas were easily becoming agitated from all of the pushing and shoving of the other people surrounding them. Ninten wasn't as bothered by it, being somewhat used to New Pork City after working for the Pigmasks. They struggled to keep each other visible, since most of the crowd were adult men, commuting from work, and were taller than the teenage boys.
They finally reached a place that was less crowded, and searched for somewhere to spend the night. "Hey, what about there?" Claus asked, pointing at a building. It seemed like a nearly run down motel in the bad part of town. Ninten and Lucas glanced over to see what Claus was talking about.
"It looks cheap," Ninten said, "And it's the only place we can find anyway."
"Oh, I forgot," Claus rolled his eyes, "We actually need to pay."
"Don't worry about it, I have money," Ninten replied, grinning to Claus's prior statement.
The trio made their way through the street to reach the motel. A poster on the wall caught Lucas's attention. It was a 'Wanted,' poster, and the three of them were pictured on the bottom of the page. There was also a bounty, and it seemed like a very large one. Lucas fretfully looked around to be sure no one noticed him or his friends, just to be sure no one knew about their location. People in an environment like this would likely do a lot for money. Lucas shoved the paper into his pocket without his brother's or friend's attention.
They entered the motel, which wasn't very nice. On the way in, there were cockroaches crawling all over the walls. The interior flooring looked like withered and broken concrete without any carpet or covering.
The receptionist spotted them as they walked in. She sat behind a counter. She was an old lady, whose greying hair was drawn back into a ponytail. Her eyes were squinted behind her bifocals and she stared at the boys curiously as they approached her. "What do you want?" she spoke in a rough voice.
"May we have a place to stay tonight?" Claus asked her.
"No," she responded, "minors cannot rent a room." She immediately went to filing papers in a cabinet behind her.
"Ma'am," Ninten said, digging around in his pocket, "I think this might convince you to let us stay." What Ninten pulled out was his Pigmask military badge. It was of course illegal for him to use it in this way anymore, but the old woman wouldn't know that. Lucas and Claus were both surprised by Ninten's action.
The receptionist seemed somewhat astonished. "Hmm," she squinted, inspecting the badge for authenticity. "Fine. But don't tell anyone I let this happen." Ninten nodded in agreement, and paid the fee in return for a room key, and he walked away with the twins following behind him.
"It was good I kept that," Ninten said, "I figured it might be important for something."
"Why didn't you use that to let us stay in a nicer place then?" Claus asked.
"I guess there would be less people there," Ninten said, "so we'd have more room to talk about stuff."
"We could've just used telepathy to talk," Claus mumbled. Lucas was amused by his brother's reaction.
"But that actually takes energy," Ninten replied playfully.
"Barely," Claus shot back.
They continued their banter, while Lucas enjoyed the entertaining conversation between them. Desperate thoughts then came into Lucas's head. What if they messed up tomorrow, and didn't beat Porky? What if Porky had Ninten killed for treason, and had Claus and Lucas separated to never see each other? He had a hard time sleeping with these thoughts constantly going through is head.
But eventually he found peace, and fell asleep alongside his brother.
-Then some time very early in the morning-
Lucas was woken by footsteps outside the room. He quickly sat up in bed, alarmed. He saw shadows of men through a window. "Claus," he said quietly, and tried to shake his brother awake. Claus still slept however. "Claus?" he tried again as his blood pressure rose. There was pounding on the door, and it suddenly burst open.
People walked inside quietly. The silhouettes reflected those of pigmask soldiers. Lucas recognized the threat, and jumped into using PK Love. PK Love barely missed the target pigmask, and he felt a warm mist engulfing him, and he slept the rest of the night.