Chapter 6 Homeward Bound
Character Spyro
"Avalar! We're going home," Rayon, the crimson-gold son of Spyro, exclaimed as K indicated that DC was going to return to the home planet of Spyro and his kind.
"Going home is well and good but what might we find there," Cynder asked.
"Demons probably," Spyro said, "All of our good fighters are here with you K, no one was left to guard our home."
"Oh I wouldn't say that no one was left," K replied, "I did have an old friend look after the place for you while you were with me."
"I don't guess you'll tell us who it was will you," Cyril, the light blue dragon and Guardian of ice, said.
"I'll give you a name," K replied, "Grishnake."
"That is totally reassuring," Fiona replied.
"Guys before we contemplate leaving, why don't we look to who we are going to leave behind to safeguard this world," Volteer, the yellow-blue electricity Guardian said.
"Indeed, I for one am staying," Soap said, "anyone else going to?"
"141 is with you," Price, an ex-British special forces with a groomed mustache and light blond hair, said for both himself and Ghost, a member of Price's original team who is considered dead due to a betrayal and being almost burned alive; he now wears a mask to cover his face and full body armor.
"The Legion will stand with 141 in this," Lucas a black-haired blue eyed knight replied for himself, his sister Katarina who had long, straight, black hair and black eyes, a white, ragged, haired gray-green eyed man named Rehindheart, and a woman with long golden hair that she kept in a pony tail and golden eyes named Anjali.
"I will go with you K," Jackson, an American sergeant, with brown hair eyes and beard, said.
"That's seven," K said, "very good you all will stay here while we go to rout the demons and fight out way through to Lucifer himself."
"Then lets not waste anymore time," came Doug's deep grating voice, "Those who are staying remain on this vessel I will deploy several of my own spoors to assist you in this endeavor but other than that you will be on your own. Everyone else head to my flagship in the middle of the cluster and I will prepare to depart shortly."
"DC its been real," Ghost said as everyone else walked out of the ship.
"Hey Price," Spyro called out before exiting, "Take care and when all this is over come see us will y'all."
"I'll do my best,"Price replied, "Now hurry up we have a ship to catch."
Spyro left the ship to walk down a few miles of Doug's biomass created tunnels an into another ship where, Cynder, Ignitus, Malafor, Flame, and Fiona were waiting.
"So what do you make of this," Ignitus asked.
"What going home to what is possibly a demon filled ransacked planet," Malafor replied, "Well I tried to do that for years but it seems K has accomplished it in only about forty."
"Yeah but these demons will try to kill you to," Spyro added.
"True and that I won't stand for," Malafor stated.
"Then we are agreed," Fiona said, "No matter what we find back home we will not let the demons have our planet."
"I figured you would come to that conclusion," Carter said as he Cloak and the other Spartans walked in, "And seeing as Avalar is still my home even if I have a human body right now, I'm still going to fight for her."
"Aw and I though I was the only woman you fought for," Cloak said.
"No you are a better fighter than Carter," Tucker replied, "It seems more like you fight for him."
"Hey guys not helping," North said, "anyway we came by to say that if some of our own, not naming names or nothing, are going to help you out then we are all going to help you out, even the light bulb."
"Hey that's not cool," Church said, "Hey Tex I'll give you ten buck to punch him."
"You don't have ten bucks," Tex replied.
"Wow Tex you really are the team player aren't you," Spyro said, "How did you all manage to survive so long?"
"Yes about that we didn't," Wyoming replied, "If you recall your enthusiastic friend there came and broke us out of hell."
"Then why would you be of help," Malafor asked.
"Well we could always sacrifice Grif to the demons if they would give you the planet back," Sarge said.
"No," Carolina interjected, "Its because we are a team again, and back in our day there was no one and nothing that could stop this team."
"Yeah, but we never were a part of your team," Doughnut said, "I was actually dead for all that, to bad it sounded like a lot of fun."
"All you would have done would have been to run around and scream," Simmons replied.
"Hold up, ok the Freelancers, I can understand why you're all here, but why have you guys stayed around," Spyro asked the Reds and Blues, "You have almost no training, have almost been killed on more than one occasion because of us and yet here you are when we could have taken you back home ages ago."
"Well its because we really don't have a home," Church said, "All our lives we've been ridiculed, taken advantage of, used as target practice, and left for dead, but not here, here we've got a home with all of you guys, or dragons, or whatever, no offense Doug."
"None taken," Doug replied.
"Ok so your helping us but so is everyone here," Cynder said, "whats different?"
"Well we had Cortana and her cyborg, robot, alien buddies cook up some techno-what-its for you how does super tough, semi-robotic, dragon sized, armor-plated, combat suits sound to you all," Sarge proclaimed.
"Ok can someone translate that," Flame asked.
"Spartan suits for dragons," John said, "I think you'll like them and since your bone structure is much stronger than an human's you should be able to move at your normal speed and not get injured by the increase reaction time of the armor."
"Well I guess we should try these suits since you went through so much trouble to get them," Spyro said, "Take us to them."
Character
Fiona
"Wow those are impressive," Fiona remarked as she and the other dragons watched Spyro take one of the suits through its paces.
"Remind me why he gets to go first," Flame said.
"Because dad is the best healer among us and he can heal himself much better than he can anyone else if something was to go wrong with the suit he has the highest chance of surviving it," Fiona replied.
"Ok but why does he get to go first?"
"Well if you want to risk getting cooked alive, exploded, melted, filled with metal shards or worse then go right ahead," Washington said.
"Oh right," Flame mumbled, "yeah ok Spyro can go first."
Fiona, along with Flame, Ember, Malafor, Ignitus, Cynder, and the Spartans were in the flight control room in one of the hangers on Doug's craft, outside, in the hanger, Spyro was with John, Cortana and Sarge as they walked him through the operation of one of the dragon suits. The armor was comprised of a light composite that provided strength and flexibility, weaved into a cloth like structure that was powered by nanobots and hydraulics. The suits were a silver-gray color and covered the body from head to tail, with twin sections that the wings could unfold into, and it even had metal coverings for the claws on the feet that were razor sharp, as the gashes in the floor of the hanger attested to.
Fiona watched as her father performed maneuver after maneuver in the suit. The speed and precision with which he executed the actions was astonishing, without the restriction of bone strength faced by the humans in similar suits the full capabilities of the technology was readily apparent.
"So that's why you were always faster," Carolina said to Tex, "Robot body for an AI."
"Yeah I guess that should have given it away but we were all distracted at the time," Tex replied.
"Yeah, with trying to kill each other," York said, "I prefer this situation to that one."
"I think we all prefer to have you helping us than killing each other," Fiona said, "Makes things easier."
"Not being dead helps," Main said.
"Guys look," South said, "they are going to shoot him."
"What," Fiona and Cynder exclaimed.
As they looked down Cortana had gotten into her Armored Command Unit and was taking aim at Spyro.
"What are they doing," Ignitus asked.
"Whatever it is Spyro seems to be ok with it, hes not fighting them," Malafor said.
"Don't worry guys," Cortana said through her intercom, "This is just a little blast to see how the armor holds up in lock down mode, Spyro whenever you are ready."
Spyro locked his claws into the ground and covered his head with his wings, then the armor started to glow red and Cortana fired. The little blast she was talking about almost destroyed the entire hanger, the glass that Fiona and the others were watching through got blown in on them, the ceiling almost collapsed, most of the plates that made up the floor were torn off and scattered around, one of them landed on Wash, but Spyro was right where he was before the explosion.
"That's what you call a little blast," Wash yelled, "could have warned us."
"Main, Wyoming, get him out from under that," Carolina said.
"Dad are you ok," Fiona called down.
"Yeah kid-o I'm just fine, these suits are very well made," Spyro replied, "Who wants a turn next?"
"Minus the explosion," Ember asked.
"Yes minus the explosion," Sarge and John said.
"What come on guys it was little for me my normal blast could have destroyed this ship," Cortana argued.
"Hey Spyro, John, Cortana, uh Spartans, Stop messing around," K said as he walked in to the room, "we have arrived, get suited up and get ready to fight Grishnake has got a heck of a battle that we are dropping in on so lets move."
"And who the blarg is Grishnake," Wash yelled.
"Dude calm down," Rodger said, "Man no wonder I was so successful against you for so long, well until you found me, Church."
"Yeah I almost feel bad about that," Church replied.
"Ah don't," Rodger said, "I did kind of deserve it."
"What no I meant saving Tucker," Church said, "No shooting you with the laser was freaking awesome."
"Thanks," Tucker and Rodger muttered.
"Okay come on down and get suited up," Sarge called, "get the rest of your friends too got enough for everyone."
"Okay lets go save our planet again," Ignitus said, "You know this does get pretty repetitive."
"Yeah seriously," York said, "And we haven't even been to your planet before."
Character Grishnake
"By the blood, that was to close," Grishnake exclaimed as he, a blue-green dragon named Chris and a cheetah general named Malcolm slid out from under a collapsing bridge that the Demons had just hit with another round from their catapults. Grishnake was an orc, eight feet tall, five feet wide, and seven hundred pounds of mean, green, muscled, killing machine. His general body structure was almost identical to a humans except his arms were slightly longer in proportion to his body, and from his bottom jaw jutted two huge fangs,each one a good six inches long and just as sharp as the ax, daggers, and crossbow bolts that he carried. He wore a mixed matched assortment of armor, light on his arms and legs with heavy on his chest and head, other than the ax and multiple daggers that he was quite efficient at throwing, he carried a large crossbow that was dual stacked, it was designed so he could load and fire multiple rounds in rapid succession, and two laser sighted nine millimeters. Yeah Grish had gotten around a bit in his relationship with K and had made the most of everything he had run across.
When K had transported him to Avalar Grish was first annoyed but had slowly grown to actually like the backwater planet, and now that a demon invasion was threatening the whole planet that had him a little angry. "That's it," Grish announced, "I'm going to go out there and rip those catapults apart myself if I have to!"
"If you do that you'll be endangering the whole city," Chris said.
"And if we remain here their won't be a city," Malcolm replied, "I agree we need to slow the demons down a bit if nothing else, I will gather what men I can spare to send with you, Chris see if there are any dragons willing to go out to help destroy the catapults."
"Well I'll go, and you can count on Jack and Ve as well," Chris said.
"I'll be back in a minute," Malcolm said, "Warfang is a big city could take me a minute to gather the men."
"Well I'll be by the eastern gate," Grish replied, "meet me there."
Malcolm and Chris both took off while Grish weaved his way between broken buildings and piles of rubble. The siege had been going on for a week now and every day the demons had gotten closer to the gates, in another two days if the city wasn't leveled the demons would be pouring in through the holes in the walls. Grish was going to have to stop the demons before that happened.
"For the love of blood would you stop throwing blarg," He exclaimed as another catapult round crashed down near by. He stopped a couple of paces away, "No explosion," Grish said to himself, "could have misfired,..." He ducked as a spike of fire and darkness passed through the space his head had just occupied. He continued forward and down turning the duck into a spinning roll and he came up with crossbow in hand and facing a large demon with two quill filled arms, a head made of fire and the rest of the body a black mist.
"Oh that is just so typical," Grish said as he shot a bolt through the demon, "Demons never play fair." The demon shot another quill, which ignited as it left the creatures arm, at Grish. Grish dodged the quill and fired another bolt, this time at the head, which went right through the demon. As he dodged more quills an idea hit him, he ducked behind a wall to reload his bow and waited. The demon came around the wall and Grish fired four bolts in rapid succession into the demon's arms then jumped onto its shoulders and fired another two bolts directly through its head and into its body, then he jumped off and ran towards the eastern gate, he rolled again and spun around to see the demon failing around as fire burned through it.
"So you don't like stuff jamming up your firing sequence huh," Grish said as the demon fizzed out and died, "Thought stopping your little quills from leaving might stop you." He resumed his walk towards the gate and arrived to find Chris and Veronica, a hard gold, female, dragon with ruby wings and one large horn adorning the top of her head. "Where is Jack?"
"He got held up with some demons inside the city looks like its just going to be us two," Chris replied.
"Grish, I got no extra men for you," Malcolm said as he walked over, "everyone is either dead, injured or over worked as it is."
"So its just us two and Grish," Ve said, "well talk about suicide."
"I am going with you as well," Malcolm said.
"Yeah because against the demon army one extra person will make all the difference," Ve replied.
"It might," Grish said, "But your right, Malcolm you need to stay here if your men are in as bad a situation as you say they are then you can't die out there with us, just make this worth it."
"Grish if you don't plan on coming back in," Chris started.
"I know, and I don't but you two just drop me off near the first catapult and get yourselves to safety, I'll keep them busy for a while," Grish said.
"Screw that I'm going with you," Chris replied, "If we don't stop these demons there won't be anywhere safe."
"For reasons I will never understand I'm in to," Ve added, "either this works and we don't all die or it doesn't and we all die anyway."
"My mind says to go with you for those very reasons," Malcolm said, "But my heart tells me where I am needed most, I wish you luck my friends." As Malcolm waded back into the city Grish mounted Chris and the three took off into the sky.
"Ok the demons are going to be expecting attacks from the air since they are fighting dragons after all so lets go in low and fast," Grish yelled over the wind.
"On it," Chris said, "Ve fly high distract the demons for as long as you can while I insert Grish."
Ve nodded and increased her altitude, Chris aimed low and skimmed right above the ground, arrows arched up out from the demon camp and a couple of ballista harpoons sailed through the air at Ve who was raining down large boulders at the demons. Then Grish and Chris were in amongst the demons and Grish jumped off as Chris vanished into a cloud of mist only to reappear higher up and circle around breathing a dissolving shadowy vapor on the demons. Grish pulled out his nine mills and began to make his way as stealthily as possible towards a catapult. There were not as many demons as he had thought there would be in the army and he arrived at the first catapult without incident. There were, however, a dozen guards around the war machine. They were horrible machinations of metal and flesh, the horrendous result of the demonic influence on condemned prisoners of war.
"Lucky for me I pack overcharged rounds," Grish whispered as he rolled into view and opened fire. The small, but fast, armor piercing rounds worked to dramatic effect on the mostly metal demonic creatures and Grish was able to hijack the catapult without much of a fight. As he started to turn the catapult so he could use it to shoot the other ones, the demons that he had just downed started to pick themselves up. Grish used one hand to fire the remaining bullets from his pistols while turning and firing the catapult with the other. Luckily the demons stayed down this time and his shot was right on target taking out another catapult, but now the remaining eight catapults were starting to aim towards him and several squads of larger demons that looked to be made out of blood and bone were heading his way.
Veronica came crashing down next to him, huge holes torn in her wings from the ballistas and a particularly nasty looking gash in her chest. Chris reappeared nearby, he was limping and leaving a trail of blood behind him. "They were more prepared for us than you it would seem," Chris said as he staggered to Ve, "Go take out the other catapults, we will buy you as much time as we can."
"I'm sorry you two never got to have a normal life," Grish said, "But for what its worth, Thank you." Chris nodded his acceptance and Grish was about to leave the two alone for their final minutes to go after another catapult when he heard a song. A song that he hadn't heard in thirty years, the song that K said was his signal, "Carry on my Wayward Son" by Kansas. As Grish looked up what he saw astounded him, he knew K was resourceful but the sight that greeted him was above and beyond even for K. At least thirty dragons were diving out of the clouds followed by four giant robot-like constructs and no less than eight large ships that Grish assumed were filled with more backup. "K you bloody fool, I give you an A+ in timing," Grish said.
"Impossible," Ve said, "Chris look its them its Spyro and the Guardians they've come back."
"Well never thought I'd see them again," Chris said through labored breaths, "guess this means I owe you one Grish,... assuming I can last that long."
"Once Spyro or Xavier gets to you you'll be fine," Ve said, "Just don't close your eyes."
Grish looked back to see the other catapults firing on their position, but he needn't to have concerned himself because as the rounds left the machines a huge platinum colored dragon swooped down in front of him, Chris and Ve, blocking the rounds with its gigantic wingspan. Then eight streaks of light shot out from the dragon, blasting the catapults apart as the dragon shrank in size and turned around, Grish was shocked to see K of all people standing before him, but not just K riding on his back were several individuals that Grish had encountered before, Janelle, Dameon, Satan, and Lucifer, the four most powerful members of the magic users from the inverse of his own planet.
"Hey Grish," Lucifer said, "Surprised to see us?"
"Considering who your with and what we are fighting," Grish replied, "No, this time I am actually glad to see you four."
"So you figured it out then," K said, "We're fighting my brother."
"Lucifer I know," Grish replied, "Meaning I'm going to have to start calling you Lu and K you have to tell me how you got all shiny again, last I heard you had gotten back with C."
"Long story," K said as he walked over to see to Chris and Ve's wounds, "Who might you two be?"
"I'm Veronica, and this is Chris," Ve said, "You a healer?"
"One of the best," K replied as he mended Chris' lacerated leg and belly then Ve's wings, "I think you'll find yourselves good as new if not better."
"I'm just glad not to be dead," Chris said, "When Grish had the idea to take the fight to the demons well, I kinda figured I wouldn't make it back."
"God it seems works in strange ways," Spyro said as he landed next to K, "Warfang looks like a wreck, what kinda friends have you invited over in our absence? Actually more importantly where are they this is far to few demons to be all of them."
"Good question, they have been trying to get in for a week now with no luck," Grish said, "Where else could they attack from and what is with the robotic suits?"
"The old tunnels," Spyro said, "Cynder and I used them the last time we fought Malafor, they are probably still clear."
"Then lets get in there and stop them," Grish snarled, "Spyro, I heard good stuff about you give an old orc a lift will ya."