I tried to keep in mind Jack's personality this chapter, both the goofiness and how when he trusts someone he tends to trust them completely.
Thank you StarSymphonic (Guest), random bug, MO-5431, and demon654 (Guest) for reviewing last chapter!
Of Dragons and Wyvern Chapter Nine
Jack woke up. He stretched, yawned, and squeaked as he looked up to see a wyvern somehow perched on his headboard.
"Gosh, it's gonna take a while to get used to that…" He groaned and rubbed his face.
"…Sorry?" NJ sounded legitimately confused as how to take that.
"Number one there's a dragon looking creature above my head. Two there's a rather large creature who is somehow balancing on my headboard with only two legs and a pair of wings without falling off and still managing to sleep." Jack explained with another yawn. He sat up and pushed at a section of Enny's tail that had curled up around his shoulders. That thing was way too long.
"…Ah." Enny nodded.
"You don't get it do you."
"Yes and no. I understand the logic but I'm so used to such things I fail to be surprised by them." His head tilted. "Oh, and it's kind of like how a bird sleeps. Perching, it's called."
"Yeah yeah, whatever."
"Hey Enny! My Wu detector finally went off!" Jack waved the machine eagerly. It had gone off a lot while he was in the hoverchair but he'd obviously been unable to go for them.
The wyvern took one look at the location. "We're taking your jet. You don't want them to fully know you have me as a playing card unless needed."
"Because..?"
"Because wyvern are paranoid of humans and for good reason."
"…Right. Sorry."
"For your sake as well."
"…Of course it is."
Arriving in the forested area, Jack was upset to find everyone else had already beat them to it.
"…Jack, why the heck did you bring a little kid along with you?" Kimiko ground out. She was glaring fireballs at him.
Jack couldn't really fault her for being angry, NJ WAS technically a five year old who looked eight.
Enny on his part just looked blankly at her.
"Because he's AirMusica and can totally kick butt?" Jack smiled sheepishly under unapproving looks from even the Heylin. He didn't actually know how well Enny could fight but considering the epic pillow fight he witnessed he had to say wyvern knew how to fight.
"Just like Jack to bring a three year old to a showdown." Wuya hissed. "I bet the child's even better than he is!" She then seemed to recognize Enny. "You're the child who used that word!"
"I'm honestly surprised you even recognized it." Enny droned and Jack finally got a load of just how much emotion the kid was willing to show around him when they were alone. Right now it was like walking smack into a deadpan snark wall. A very epic deadpan snark wall, in his opinion.
"Why you little-!" Wuya seemed to stop herself when Chase sent her a dangerous look.
"Want me to go for it?" Enny asked quietly enough so that even Jack barely heard him.
"Nah, let's just wait." He whispered back.
"Jack, why do you come to a showdown while still injured." Chase demanded. He refused to acknowledge the strange child who was still sending defiant and disrespectful micro expressions at him.
"Because I'll be totally fine." Jack rolled his eyes and adjusted his crutches. "Now, why is nobody going for the Wu?"
Everybody froze for a few seconds in a 'duh' moment before they burst into action. Jack and NJ stood there and watched the action as the monks got to the Shen Gon Wu first and then proceeded to play monkey in the middle with the Heylin.
"Now Boss?" Enny tapped the compartment he'd slung over his shoulders when they'd left.
"Sure." Jack didn't know what he was going to do but it was bound to be cool.
With a sure, practiced motion the child slid the top of the sheath off and clicked a button. The chunk of metal whipped open to reveal a simple shaped mechanical bow. Whipping a metallic arrow out of the quiver on his back, Enny nocked it to the bow and then pulled.
It was obvious to anyone who was watching just how difficult the bow was to pull back and even more so how strong the child's arms were with how easily he did so. He didn't bother pulling back very far, aiming it with an experienced eye and then releasing.
Jack nearly jumped when air blew past them in slight recoil and a string was revealed to be attached to the end of the arrow. The arrow flew straight and true with a blur and hit the Shen Gon Wu head on even though it was currently in midair. The head broke into several small claws that grasped the object, a space black orb, and the arrow was retracted with a sharp tug to Enny's bow.
The many warriors gaped in shock as the child caught the arrow and orb with ease. NJ clicked another button to refold his bow and placed it back at the top of his quiver. Tapping the base of the arrow in a special sequence NJ made the claws open up and turn back into an ordinary arrowhead, which he held onto as his quiver was now closed.
"My name is Nock Junior. I am referred to as NJ. I work for the Boss." He announced and held the orb out to Jack.
"Thanks Enny." While Jack was just as surprised as everyone else he was getting used to wyvern weirdness and so was only grinning at everyone's reactions. "See you guys later," He waved and the pair started towards his jet.
"Spicer! Hand over the Lightless Orb!" Chase snarled and took a step towards them.
Jack froze in fear but then looked to Enny. The child looked furious and shook his head.
"Sorry, Chase, I really am," Jack turned around to look at everyone and grinned sheepishly, stepping backwards. "But I don't exactly appreciate being everyone's punching bag. I think I'll be on my own side now." He reached to activate his heliopack just as Enny threw something at the ground. Somehow knowing NJ would jump on, Jack concentrated on getting the pack flying away as fast as possible.
A huge smoke cloud covered their exit and Jack was remotely starting up his jet the second they were flying steady. Flying through the hangar door at the perfect moment, the duo made a clean getaway before the Heylin and Xioalin monks even had time to fully react.
"That. Was. AWESOME." Jack fistpumped. "Dude, we haven't done anything like that before! How'd we do it so…" He trailed was almost as if he'd known what the other was going to do. "Soul Guarded bond?"
"Soul Guarded bond."
"Sweet." Jack grinned. "So… 'arrows are a Brithyr thing'?"
"Yeah," Enny pulled his quiver off his back. "Why do you think my dad's name is Nock?"
"And the super cool arrows," Jack hummed.
"You can consider the ramifications of me having impeccable aim later. For now, I intend on having gotten blueprints for a forcefield generator from my dad by the time we land." Enny headed to the jet's control panel. "They won't be taking that well."
Jack frowned worriedly. "Yeah, they probably won't… even worse that they know where I live. Wait… a forcefield?!"
Wiping grease away from his forehead, Jack frowned and looked over the tablet holding blueprints.
"Hmm… I think I'm done." He announced, turning to look at the other tablet nearby with Nock on the screen.
"Did you check the electro-light transfer cables?" The genius prompted.
"Got it." Jack saluted with the screwdriver in his hand.
"Solid light energy convergence transmitters in place?"
"JB12?" Jack looked at a nearby Jackbot.
"Jackbots 1, 6, 9, and 15 along with NJ report the transmitters are in place." Jackbot twelve saluted.
"I think you guys are good. Is it alright if I have Yugiko transfer over to check?" Nock tilted his head, currently in secondary form. He looked a lot older surprisingly and his horns stuck out from the back of his head and curled almost like a ram's with the same small nose horn Enny had.
"Not at all, I'd be glad actually. This is pretty complicated." Jack scanned over the blueprints again. "I've played with the idea of forcefields before but this takes on an entirely new angle to accomplish it."
"Considering some of the places we end up at I'm not surprised. We've got our hands on all sorts of technology. And no I'm not going to explain what I mean by that. Yugiko?"
There was a spark of white electricity and Yugiko took over the screen in his little room.
"Put the tablet next to the main components and hold it there."
Jack complied and the electricity jumped across the air between. Jack watched in fascination as white energy flashed across all the wires and machinery of the generator. In less than a minute the energy was flashing back to the tablet and Nock was back on screen.
"All good?"
"So it would seem. Great job Jack, most rocket scientists would find those blueprints ridiculously difficult to read much less follow." Nock grinned. He looked off screen. "Hey, let me know how it goes alright? If I don't hear back in two days I'll assume those Heylin found you and I'll be hunting them down myself." He pointed a finger at the screen warningly.
"No problem Nock." Jack smiled, even knowing that Nock was actually very serious about that, and turned off the tablet. "Alright, let's do this." He rubbed his hands together. Enny walked out of the elevator just in time to see him back off from the forcefield generator. "THROW… THE SWITCH!" He yelled loudly, hand going up in the classic claw. When nothing happened he looked to Enny expectantly.
NJ shook his head and smiled slightly but scurried over to the generator. Jack repeated his line overdramatically and the kid turned it on at the right moment.
With a small hum the machine came to life and the security cameras showed a slight shimmer to the air several yards around his house.
Scanning over it Enny finally relaxed. His Soul Guarded wasn't going to be hurt by those morons.
Chase stalked up angrily to Jack's house.
That incompetent, traitorous idiot! When Chase got his hands on him-
*bonk*
"SPICEEEER!"
Jack looked up from his terminals and flipped over to the security cameras.
"Oh hey, they're here." Jack pulled a handful of chips out of a bag and started casually shoving them in his mouth. "Inchereshding, i' schops ghoshcs." Wuya seemed to be screaming obscenities in Latin.
"Fascinating." NJ tilted his head. "We should inform my dad. He would be interested to hear that."
"'Kay," Jack typed out a message quickly.
"You are surprisingly confident in my dad's blueprints." Enny commented.
"Well yeah," Jack swallowed. "Your dad's a genius. I could tell just walking into his lab, not to mention Yugiko. THAT really says it all about how capable he is."
"True. But most humans would be cautious of even a slight mistake."
Jack was about to speak but paused to think. "…I think, maybe, I don't really know, but wyvern seem to be the kind of creatures that… don't do anything by halves. I feel like you guys either do something or you don't. If you can't, you learn to or you fix it. There's not really an 'in-between' feeling around you guys."
Enny blinked. "That… describes us rather well, actually."
"Nice." Jackk grinned. He was getting better at this! "So, when am I going to meet any other wyvern?"
"Not anytime soon."
"Dangit!"
FireKimi At~SwirleeGuggles: Hey Jack… were you serious about being on your own side?
Jack looked up oddly at the chatbox when Enny nudged him.
"Respond, Boss."
"Do I have to?" Jack whined.
"Yes."
"Dangit…"
SwirleeGuggles At~FireKimi: Yes. Yes I was. And if you're gonna say I should join you guys, that OBVIOUSLY didn't work last time.
FireKimi At~SwirleeGuggles: We wouldn't trust you anyways.
SwirleeGuggles At~FireKimi: I'm fine with that. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a working robot to make out of sandstone, slime, and redstone.
Kimiko didn't say anything else for a few minutes, probably surprised by his response. When she finally did Jack snorted.
FireKimi At~SwirleeGuggles: Look… Clay says he's sorry for hurting your foot. All of us are. We didn't realize you were that hurt.
"Please, they don't care." Jack rolled his eyes. "Probably just trying to soften me up." He'd known all along that they most likely hadn't realized he was injured that bad. But they still forgot about the entire thing while he was held up in the wheelchair. If they noticed he was gone (even taking forever to do so) they should have connected a few dots. It's not like it was even that hard to guess.
Since Jack was obviously going to be bitter and stubborn about it Enny responded to her.
AirMusica At~FireKimi: I accept your apology but I doubt Boss does. Now begone.
Seeing how much the wyvern twitched while typing that Jack raised an eyebrow at the obvious lie. The lashing tail and the way his scales lifted and bristled in discomfort (and wasn't that odd to see) were easy to read. NJ was way too overprotective to forgive them.
Human form feels like being stuffed in a tiny box. Secondary form while a lot better and far more comfortable is still uncomfortable to stay in for extended periods of time. Therefore, Jack gets to see NJ in his Primary form a lot. Not to mention the "problem" of having to use crutches is solved when Jack can just sit on Enny's back and get carried everywhere. (It's a very very VERY bumpy and jerky ride, unfortunately)
Hope you guys enjoyed this chapter! I've had chapters saved up from prewriting up until here so the others after this point may come in fits and starts. Please Read and Review!