Chapter 24:
"Sir Angelo! We are about to come under attack!", a soldier said as he came running inside the compartment.
"We know.", Angelo said as another soldier came running in from the other end. "I need you two to stay here and keep the princess safe while we go out. We're counting on the both of you."
"Yes, sir!", the soldiers said with a salute.
"Xolley. I need you to put up a force field up around yourself.", Angelo said to Xolley. "And keep it up until I tell you."
"Right!", Xolley said with a nod as she put a square energy force field up around herself. "Good luck to you all out there!"
"Thanks!", Hay Lin said as Angelo got read to open the door that lead to the outside.
"You two ready?", he asked Hay Lin and Irma.
"Ready as we'll ever be.", Irma said as she cracked her knuckles.
"Let's do it!", Hay Lin said ready to take flight.
"Remember to stay with the train.", Angelo said before opening the door.
Once he did, they flew out the train and landed on the roof of it and took positions ready to fight whoever would come at them. At the same time the other teams did the same thing. Seeing this, the man leading the men and women knew that they were in for a fight.
"What shall we do now, commander?", one of the men asked.
"Split up into teams of ten and go after the trains!", the commander said to all of his troops through a comm-link. "The real princess is on one of those trains! Once you get to her, make sure it's really her before you take her. We can not screw this mission up!"
"Yes, sir!", the troops said as they split up into three teams of three and flew off to the trains leaving the commander to watch the fights before he acted.
"You're there somewhere, Princess.", he said. "It's only a matter of time before I find you."
As for the Guardians, they saw how the troops splitted up and were flying towards them.
"Well, this'll be fun.", Cornelia said sarcastically as ten of the troops were coming at them.
"Take them down!", Will said as she fired a wave of energy at the ten troops only to hit two of them which sent them falling onto the train they were on.
As for the other eight, they landed smoothly onto the train and pulled out pistols and began to fire energy blast at the three Guardians. Lucky for them, Cornelia was there to put up a strong telekinetic wall shield keeping Will and Taranee safe.
"Thanks, Cornelia.", Will said.
"No problem.", Cornelia said.
"But how are we going to fight back?", Taranee questioned.
"This is how!", Will said as she flew up a bit above the wall shield and fired some lightning bolts at the troops before flying back behind the wall shield. "If we keep doing that we just might be able to take them down."
"That can work.", Taranee said.
"Think you can keep your shield up a long time?", Will asked Cornelia.
"Only one way to find out.", Cornelia said as she kept the shield up getting a nod from Will before she turned to Taranee.
The two of them nodded to each other before they took to the air and fired some attacks before going back behind Cornelia's telekinetic wall shield.
'Good luck you two.', Cornelia thought to herself as she kept the shield up for them to duck behind when they needed to.
As for Cassidy's team, they were hiding behind a wall of ice that Cassidy and Selece had put up to keep them safe from the fire power of the ten troops. While Cassidy kept the ice wall up and strong, with her powers, Selece and Alchemy would fly up from behind the ice wall and fire a thing of air and fireballs at the troops as a distraction while Caleb would fly behind the troops and pull a quick sneak attack by cutting a trooper's rocket pack and knocking them off the train and into the water to which said trooper would pull a string releasing a rubber raft to sit in. So far, three troopers were taken out. As Caleb was flying back behind the ice wall, a trooper flew after him and was about to blast him when Selece hit him with a ball of air sending him into the water.
"Ummm... Thanks.", Caleb said surprised by how well Selece saved his butt.
"No problem.", Selece said as she and Caleb landed behind the ice wall.
"How many left?", Cassidy asked.
"Four.", Caleb said as he saw another guy land on the train they were on. "Where'd he come from?"
"I think he's their leader!", Alchemy figured. "When the others splitted up, he was still in the air.
"He must think the princess is on this train.", Selece said.
"So if we take him out, the rest of them may give up.", Alchemy figured getting a nod of agreement from Selece.
"Hmmmmmmm...", Cassidy said thinking before she got an idea. "I have a plan, but it's going to take all of us working together for it to work."
"So what's the plan?", Alchemy asked.
"Okay. Listen and listen good.", Cassidy said. "Cause we may only get one shot at this."
Meanwhile, on the final train, Irma was using her powers to keep up a wall of ice that she and Hay Lin had made for cover while Angelo and Hay Lin were working together to take down the troopers. Whenever they saw an opening, Hay Lin would go invisible and fly behind one of the troopers that was closer to them and pull out a wire to their rocket pack, shutting it off. She'd then go back behind the ice wall, turn visible and give Angelo a thumps-up. He would then jump over the ice wall and throw his shield at the trooper knocking them back followed by blasting said trooper with a thing of electricity shocking them enough to make them fall off the train and into the sea to which they'd unleash their rubber raft to sit in. He'd then catch his shield as it returned to him before jumping back behind the ice wall. So far, they had taken down five troopers.
"That's five down for us.", Angelo said as they hid behind the ice wall. "Time to find out how the others are doing."
"Right!", Hay Lin said as she began to focus on Taranee and Alchemy.
'Taranee! Alchemy!', Hay Lin called out hoping they would hear her thoughts. 'How are things you guys?'
'Well, thanks to Cornelia telekinesis, we're doing pretty good.', Taranee said. 'We've taken down at least six for these guys.'
'Four fo us.', Alchemy said. 'But Cassidy has a plan to get rid of the rest of them. How about you guys?'
'Five for us so far.', Hay Lin said. 'The other five should be as easy to take down.'
'Good luck.', Taranee and Alchemy said.
'Same to you guys, too.', Hay Lin said as Taranee and Alchemy cut their link.
"The others are doing just as good as we are!", Hay Lin shouted over the noise.
"Good!", Angelo said as a laser blast got through the ice wall. "Whoa! That was close!"
"To close if you ask me!", Irma said.
"I think it's time for that tempest thing you mentioned the other day.", Hay Lin replied.
"Whoa! Wait a second!", Irma said. "We haven't even tested that move out yet! What if it backfires?"
"It won't if we all do our part.", Angelo said. "Here's what we're going to do."
Now back on Metamoor, the Honor Guard was on horseback riding towards a beach where there have been sighting of what some said looked like Lurdens with metal skin riding large metal turtles. So, of course Elyon and Micheal figured that it was more robots that were up to something. Elyon would have went, but Drake proposed that the young queen let the Honor Guard go alone to show the people that they are capable of protecting the people without aid from their queen, the Guardians, or Regents of Earth. As much as she wanted to help, she knew that Drake was right and allowed them to go without her. Which brings us to now, where the Honor Guard has just come to the beach to see that there were robots there. Thankfully, they were on a hill which was a good distance away from the robots. As for said robots, there were five tank-sized robotic turtles with a cannon on it's back and a seat on each side of their shells where there was a Lurden robot sitting in. Each with what looked like a blaster of some kind in front of them.
"I take it that those things riding the robot turtles are Lurdens.", Micheal said. "But what's with the giant turtles? Do they grow that big here?"
"Actually, yes.", Miriadel said. "A man, who studied the creatures, believes that it's certain berries that they eat that causes a mutation that makes them grow larger."
"Now how would the one who is creating these machines, know about any of the creatures on our world?", Aldern questioned.
"Good question, mate.", Raythor said. "Maybe we can try and nab one of the metal Lurdens and get some answers out of it."
"Can we actually do that?", Tynar questioned.
"If we can get one without damaging it.", Micheal said.
"So we crush all but one metal Lurden.", Vathek said as he readied his mace. "That works for me!"
"Then let's get to work. Before they get close to that village.", Alborn said as they all charged at the robots on their horses. "Ha!", he said as he got his horse moving with the rest of the Honor Guard by his side.
It didn't take the robots long to notice the Honor Guard coming at them. As the Honor Guard got closer to the robots, the roboturtles took aim at them only for Miriadel to fire an arrow at the head of one of the robot turtles with one of her special arrows, piercing it and hitting it's main cpu shutting it down causing it to drop to it's belly. This gave Drake time to whack off the head of the Lurden robot on the right of the turtle his mace while Alborn hacked the head off of the one on the right. As for Tynar, he took his spear and pierced the head of another robot turtle shutting it down while Raythor jumped off of his horse and took out the two Lurden robots riding it. He then jumped to another turtle and took out the two Lurden robots there while Micheal jumped off his horse and hacked off the head of the robot turtle with his broadsword.
"That's three down.", Micheal said as he turned to one of the two robot turtles left.
As for one of the robot turtles, Aldern was able to take out the robot Lurdens with his axe while Miriadel shot the head of the robot turtle with another arrow leaving one robot turtle and it's two Lurden robots which Vathek made short work of by smashing the head of the robot turtle followed by flipping the machine over on it's back. He then ran to the right side of the robot turtle and crushed the robot Lurden that was crawling out from under the robot turtle.
"Ans now for the other one.", he said as he walked around the robot turtle to find the other robot Lurden crawling otu from the toppled over machine.
After crawling out from under the robot turtle, the robot Lurden got to it's feet only to have the Honor Guard surrounding it with their weapons at the ready.
"Stand down!", Raythor demanded. "You are surrounded."
The robot Lurden said nothing as sword blades came out of the back of it's hands as it flexed it's claws.
"Something tells me that rather fight us.", Tynar said.
"Tell me, Micheal. Do we need all of it to get it to talk?", Vathek asked his fellow Honor Guardsman.
"As long as it's head is intact, we should be able to get some info out of it.", Micheal said.
"Good to know.", Vathek said with a smirk as he charged at the robot who charged at him.
Once close enough, the robot swung at Vathek with its right blade who caught it in his hand. Thankfully he had a thick leather glove to protect his hand from the blade. Yet the robot Lurden was about to swing at Vathek with it's other blade only for Micheal to block the attack with his broad sword giving Vathek the opening he needed to take his left hand and palm the robot Lurden's head and rip it off of the body.
"Will this do?", Vathek asked Micheal as he held the head in his hand.
"It should.", Micheal said. "The main cpu should be in it's head. If it can be hacked into, we might be able to find out who is behind these attacks and how they know about the creatures here."
"Sounds like a plan.", Miriadel said. "But how do we get the robot to talk?"
"The Quintessence Guardians can talk to machines like this.", Aldern replied. "Maybe they can get something out of it."
"Then let's head back to the palace.", Alborn said. "We can have some soldiers come back here and take what's left of these machines to where we've put the other robots that have been defeated."
The Honor Guard then mounted their horses and headed back to the palace. Vathek had put the robot Lurden's head in a side bag on his horse's saddle to keep it safe. As they rode off, the members of the Honor Guard were hoping that they would be able to get some answers from the machine. Back on Florana, the Guardians were still fighting the troops that were trying to kidnap Princess Xolley. Both sides were just about dead even. But the Guardians had a few tricks up their sleeves and were ready to use them.
"You ready, Taranee!?", Will asked as they were standing behind the telekinetic wall Cornelia had up keeping all three of them safe.
"I'm ready.", Taranee said. "I just hope it works. We only tried this once. And it was at one target."
"Well, this will be a test for more than one target.", Will said as she charged electricity in her right hand and a thing of energy in her left while Taranee had a thing of fire in both of her hands.
They looked at each other and nodded before they took to the air together. Once they were high enough, Will combined her electricity and energy together and fired a beam of electro-energy down at the troopers. As she did this, Taranee combined her fire with the beam making it even stronger! The beam right in the middle of the trooper unleashing a powerful wave of electrified energy that hit them all sending them flying off of the train and since their rocket packs got damaged from the attack they wouldn't be coming back anytime soon. But one of the female troopers wasn't about to go down like that. As she was falling, she took aim with her blaster and fired a shot that hit...
Moments earlier, on the train Cassidy and her tam was on, Cassidy had told her team of Alchemy, Selece, and Caleb her plan.
"I know it sounds risky, but if we do it right, we'll be rid of these guys.", Cassidy said.
"And if it doesn't work?", Caleb questioned not liking Cassidy's plan.
"Then we go back to what we were doing.", Cassidy replied.
"I don't like it.", Caleb said referring to Cassidy's plan. "We may not be able to pull it off."
"Why do I have the feeling that if it was Will who had made up this plan, then you wouldn't even think twice about it.", Alchemy said. "But seeing as it's Cassidy's idea, you don't trust it.", giving Caleb a stern look.
"That's not about trusting Cassidy!", Caleb snapped.
"Then you should be willing to take the risk then.", Selece said.
"Fine!", Caleb said. "But if this doesn't work, don't say I didn't tell you so.", Caleb replied to which Cassidy rolled her eyes.
"Okay. Selece and Alchemy. You're up first!", Cassidy said. "Go!"
Nodding to each other, Selece and Alchemy took to the air and combined their powers to create a pryo-twister and sent it towards the troopers who got to their feet and began to fly off when Cassidy took parts of the ice wall and fired them at their rocket packs damaging them causing the troopers to fall into the ocean to which they had their emergency rubber rafts at the ready. Once the troopers were gone...
"Okay girls! You can stop!", Cassidy said to which Alchemy and Selece called off their attack.
But when they did, they all saw that the commander of the troops was still standing there.
"I thought so!", Cassidy said as the commander unsheathed a sword. "The leader never leaves unless he has to. He's all yours, Caleb!"
"No problem!", Caleb said with a smirk as he unsheathed his sword.
Caleb then spreaded his wings and flew at the commander ready to fight him. The commander took a fighting stance as Caleb flew towards him. As Caleb closed in on the commander, he saw something out of the corner of his eye that changed things. He saw will get shot in her right arm by one of the falling troopers from the train she was protecting with Taranee and Cornelia.
"WILL!", Caleb shouted as he suddenly changed course and flew towards the other train.
"What is he...!?", Cassidy questioned. "Come back here, Caleb!", who ignored her as he continued to fly off.
"Why that stupid... Ah!", Alchemy cried as she got hit in the shoulder by shot from a blaster the commander had in his hand.
"Alchemy!", Cassidy and Selece cried as they saw their friend fall towards the sea.
"I'm going after her!", Selece said as she flew after Alchemy.
"Go! I'll keep this guy busy!", Cassidy said as she took to the air and called up some ocean water and began to fire powerful streams of water at the commander.
"Try all you want, Guardian!", the commander said as he took to the air with his rocket pack and began to dodge Cassidy's attacks. "I will get the princess! It is my mission!"
"And who gave you that mission!?", Cassidy said as she continued to fire her attacks.
"Someone who wants to make the princess happy!", the commander said. "And your water attacks won't stop me!"
"I kind of figured that!", Cassidy said. "Which is why I'm only stalling you.", she said with a smirk.
"Stalling me for what?", the commander questioned before he felt a burning hit from behind that damaged his rocket pack, causing him to fall to the ocean.
"That!", Cassidy said.
As he was falling, the commander looked up to see that the Guardian he blast was hovering behind him with the aid of the Guardian that went after her.
"Well played, Guardians. Well played.", the commander said as he pulled a string releasing his rubber raft before he landed in the water.
"You okay, Al?", Cassidy said as they landed on the train.
"I've been better.", Alchemy said as she winced from the pain in her shoulder. "Ow!"
"Hold still.", Cassidy said as she called up some ocean water and covered her hands in it. "This may sting a bit.", she said as she touched Alchemy's shoulder as gently as possible to which Alchemy winced a bit. "Sorry."
Suddenly, the water began to glow as Cassidy was focusing her powers. About a minute later, the wound was healed.
"Wow! Thanks, Cass!", Alchemy said as she felt that her shoulder was healed.
"No problem.", Cassidy said with a smile.
"Now what about Caleb?", Selece asked. "Cause I'd like to smack him for ditching us!"
"Later.", Cassidy said. "We first complete the mission.", Cassidy said getting nods from Alchemy and Selece. "Besides. If I'm right, Caleb is going get it from Will big time.", she said with a grin getting some giggles out of her fellow Guardians as they headed back inside the train.
Now moments earlier on the train Angelo, Hay Lin, and Irma were on, the trio was ready to do their attack.
"Let's do it!", Angelo said. "You're up first, Hay Lin!"
"Gotcha!", Hay Lin said with a wink and smile as she took to the air and created a twister.
"Your turn, Irma!", Angelo said to the Water Guardian who nodded as she took to the air.
Irma then called up some water and was about to add it to the twister when she saw Will get hit by a blast from one of the fallen troopers of the train she was protecting with Cornelia and Taranee.
"Will!", Irma cried as she took off towards the train letting the water fall on the troopers there.
"Get back here, Irma!", Angelo yelled yet Irma kept going ignoring Angelo.
"Come back, Irma!", Hay Lin cried out, to her best friend, only to get hit in her left wing by one of the trooper's blaster. "Ahhhh!", she cried as she fell from the blast canceling the twister.
"Hay Lin!", Angelo shouted as he flew up and caught his future cousin. "I got you!", he said as he landed back on the roof of the train only for the troopers to begin firing at them. "Aw, crap!", Angelo said as he used his shield to block to shots.
Thinking they were done for, Angelo remembered that the troopers were wet from the water the Irma let fall on them before she flew off.
"Worth a shot!", Angelo said as took to the air with Hay Lin in his arms and fired a bolt of electricity at the troops which spread from one trooper to the next shocking them all as well as shutting down their rocket packs causing them all to fall to the sea to which they called out their rubber rafts. "Good riddance!", he said as he headed back inside the train with Hay Lin in his arms. "Hang on, Hay Lin! Hopefully Xolley will be able to heal your wing."
"She... abandoned us.", Hay Lin sadly said in a weak voice. "She abandoned... me.", she said as a lone tear ran down her face.
'Dang it, Irma!', Angelo thought to himself as he carried Hay Lin to Xolley hoping she knew how to heal.
Now when Will got blasted in her right arm, she began to fall only for Taranee to catch her and land safely on the roof of the train they were guarding.
"Is she okay?", Cornelia said as she ran up them.
"Her arm has been shot!", Taranee said. "Other than that, she's fine."
"I can heal her.", Cornelia said as she had her hands glowing ready to heal Will when...
"Will!", came Caleb's voice as he came flying at them.
"Caleb?", Taranee questioned as she saw Caleb flying at them.
Not even thinking, Caleb landed and knocked both Cornelia and Taranee away from Will and almost knocked them off the train just as Irma landed there as well. Thankfully, they were able to fly instead of fall.
"Is she okay?", Irma asked as held Will's head up.
"I think so.", Caleb said.
"What are you two doing here!?", Taranee questioned. "You should be with your teams! They could be in danger!"
"I saw Will get shot and came here!", Caleb snapped at Taranee. "So I came here!"
"Same here!", Irma said.
"And left the others in danger!", Cornelia said.
"Back off, Blondie!", Irma snapped. "We need to get help for Will!"
"That's what Cornelia was doing!", Taranee said. "She can heal you know!"
"I'm not letting her touch Will!", Caleb snapped before turning to Cornelia. "So stay away from..."
*SMACK!*
Surprised by what just happened, Caleb and Irma looked down at an angry Will who had just slapped Caleb.
"Why are you two here?", Will asked as Caleb and Irma in a tone that said she was not happy.
Not happy at all.
A/N: Uh-oh! Looks like Caleb and Irma are in trouble! Because of them Hay Lin and Alchemy got hurt. So you know they're going to get it. And what of the robot head, the Honor Guard captured? Will they be able to get any info from it? And if they do, what will they do with said info? Find out in future chapters.
Please review.