Now that the kids were asleep, everyone sat down.
Sprx rested on Otto's and Nova's lap while his tail wrapped around Chiro's arm. He was the most exhausted out of the six. Everyone else was somewhat more awake in comparison. They figured it would be a good time to do something together before they went to sleep together for the first time in a while. They agreed a movie would be a good idea.
It didn't take very long for Sprx to fall asleep. They couldn't get him off Chiro, so they let him be for the time being. That was only until they heard things being moved and tossed around. They all stopped the movie and got up. Antauri and Nova transformed their hands in case someone somehow got into the Super Robot.
Everybody quietly began investigating. They checked every room, thankfully nothing being touched nor a trace of anyone being there. They then started checking the bedrooms, starting with Nova's room. Otto turned the light on, Everything lit up in a matter of seconds. In that instant, the sounds they were hearing before grew much louder. Nova ran to the exact spot and nearly shrieked seeing the culprit.
Jasper was moving some of the weapons Nova kept in there. Some were scattered on the floor like someone just threw them onto the ground while others were merely pushed aside. The orange monkey looked at Nova with those big, slightly blue eyes of hers. Color faded from her face and tears started building up, like Jasper was afraid and ashamed she got caught.
Nova immediately grabbed Jasper Skye and pulled her away from the weapons. Thankfully Jasper didn't put up a fight when she was picked up. Everyone else came over and looked at the two; Almost everyone looked in worry, the only one who didn't was Otto. Nova checked her all around to make sure she didn't have any cuts or bruises. She let go a sigh of relief.
"Is she okay?"
"Is she hurt?"
"What's she doing in here?"
"...Did she grab anything saw related?"
Everyone looked at Otto.
"What?" He blankly asked.
"Otto, now's not the time for that." Gibson stated. "Besides, she's not old enough to have a weapon yet. She cannot have such things in her possession."
"Furthermore, we have to see why she's up at this time." Antauri added.
Jasper jumped out of Nova's hands and held onto her body. She buried her face into her chest as she sobbed. Her words were muffled, but it was clear she wanted Nova. Nova wrapped her arms around her and tried to rock her without moving her off her chest. All she could guess what happened was her having a nightmare and trying to look for Nova for comfort.
"It's okay, sweetie, we got you." She soothed before looking over to the others. "I guess we'll have to cut movie time short tonight."
"It's okay, we at least had some time to ourselves at least." Chiro chuckled.
"Les go ta Chiro's room," Sprx sleepily said. "We can have da whole bed ta ourselves."
"Get back to sleep, you're still tired." Chiro told him.
Antauri couldn't help but smile. "You guys can go on ahead. I'll check on the other kids first."
She kissed his cheek. "See you there, 'Tauri."
After Gibson picked everything up and put them back where they belonged, everyone walked out the room. Everyone went to Chiro's room while Antauri walked to the kids' room. Aside from Jasper, everyone was in their beds. Magma Cloud, Peridot Gears, Aero Driver, everyone was there. He was glad to see all of their kids were alright.
While Antauri anticipated to see them be older, he dreaded the day that they would be old enough to have their weapons.
Jasper Skye had the biggest smile on her face.
Her tail swung back and forth as she made her way to her parents. It felt like an eternity until she and her siblings could get a weapon. She wanted to fight alongside her parents, she wanted to do more than just sparring with her family. Jasper couldn't wait a second more, and she wouldn't doubt any of the others felt the same way.
All of them were instructed to design their weapons, all completely unique to themselves. She didn't know what everyone else went for, but she was excited to get hers.
When she got there alongside all nine of her siblings, they all lined up. They were given their weapons through modifications of their hands, in Aero Driver's case his tail and in Hermodactyloides's case bands onto their feet. She didn't think those areas were an option, but she wasn't regretting her choice in the slightest. Jasper transformed her hands for the very first time, revealing sparkly white sporks.
Magma Cloud was the second one to transform his hands and looked over at Jasper. His eyebrow raised when he looked at her weapons.
"Sporks? Seriously?" He questioned.
"Oh they're not just sporkth, Magma!" She swung towards him and they elongated to long claws. Magma blocked with ease using his gauntlets. "They're clawth!"
Magma rolled his eyes. "Of fuckin' course you went for a bait-and-switch."
Gibson glared at him. "Language, Magma!"
"Beurla!" Hermo stated.
Magma and Gibson glared at them while Jasper chuckled and high-fived them. Diamond groaned, wishing Jasper and Dactyle would just stop. Everyone else showed off their own weapons, revealing what they had.
Aero Driver had a magnetic saw at the end of his tail. Diamond Galaxy had blades that when combined become scissors. Marino Obsidian had katanas while Soma had a scythe. Emerald Tinker and Peridot Gears had a shield and sword respectively. Hermodactyloides had combat boots. Finally with Astral Wrench, he had a war hammer which surprised everyone.
"Huh, I thought you'd go with something easy to use like I don't know, a dagger?" Diamond commented.
"Warhammers are interesting!" Astral huffed. "...Besides, I can pull my weight around sometimes."
"At least you're not blatantly ripping off our parents." Diamond leered at Aero and Magma.
Magma growled. "What the hell do you mean?! I wasn't even thinking of Mom's weapons when I designed mine!"
"Well it clearly came through subconsciously, which is still ripping her off!"
"You wanna go, DG?!"
"I can kick your bluggy arse any day!"
Marino separated them with the side of his blades. "Enough, you two. Does it matter if we have similar weapons to our parents? What matters is we're able to defend ourselves now whenever we need to with weapons we personally wanted to have."
"Besides, I don't mind if you kids have our weapons." Nova added.
Otto held Aero's tail with his eyes sparkling. "I'm happy you did!"
"However, we have to remind you," Chiro started, "you still need some training and we can't allow you into real battles yet. You have to get used to using these weapons."
Jasper furrowed her eyebrows. "Wait so you're telling uth we still can't join you guyth in battle?! We still have to train?! We're seventeen yearth old, we're practically adultth by now! Why can't we be out there now?"
"Jasper Skye, take deep breaths-"
"No, Soma!" She snapped. "I've been waiting yearth for thith, but we still have to do training!"
"Jazzkie, I know it sucks, but-"
"But what, Uncle Chiro?" She turned to him with tears in her eyes. "We're still 'too young'? We're not experienced yet? You got to be out there when you were younger than uth! You became firtht-in-command the day you got here, what'th so different with uth?!"
"I mean… I don't mind if we have to wait." Peridot commented. "Em isn't that big on it either."
"That'th not the point! The point ith that if we want to be out there, we should be able to!" Jasper continued. "Magma, help me out here!"
He looked at her as his hands turned back to normal. "Hey I'm pissed about this too, I wanna be out there as badly as you do, but you know they're not doing this to be mean. They've always said that everything they do is for a reason, and it's hardly ever just being mean to us."
Jasper groaned. "I thought you'd be on my side for onthe!"
Soma and Marino tried to put their hands on her shoulders, but she smacked both of them away from her. Jasper's fists clenched up. A tear fell down her face. She turned around and ran out of the room. Chiro reached out for her. Before he could chase her, Nova grabbed his wrist.
"Let me get her." Nova said. "She has always calmed down when it's me."
Chiro nodded before she ran after Jasper.
Jasper sat at one of the corners of her shared bedroom. She had herself hidden behind stuff that was close to the wall intersection. Her light purple jacket hung on her head while her tail gently tapped the floor. Jasper hated how right Magma was and she hated that she couldn't be out there with them fighting by their side just yet.
Aside from pranking and collecting gems, all she ever wanted to do was fight evil, help her parents keep the universe safe. All the adults in the Hyperforce told them stories of their adventures plenty of years ago, there was no way she wouldn't want to do the same thing they did. Magma was the same way, in fact they were able to bond with one another because of them wanting to be like their parents in that way.
Footsteps entered her line of hearing. She stopped tapping her tail. Jasper focused on the sound. She didn't know who was coming closer. The door whooshed open. The lights turned on. Jasper quietly moved closer to the wall.
"Jasper, sweetie?"
It was Nova. It was like she knew she'd be in here.
"Please, come out of hiding. I just wanna talk to you."
"I juth wanna be alone right now…" Jasper's voice cracked.
Nova immediately walked over to where she was. Once she saw her, she sat down right next to Jasper. She lifted the teenager's jacket so she could see her reddened, teary face. Jasper harshly sniffed before grabbing part of her jacket to hide her face again while she looked at the wall.
"Jasper, I know how much you really wanna be on the battlefield, but I don't want you to go out there yet. We don't want you to be out there." Nova started. "I know we have to let you kids fight at some point other than just train, but it's dangerous out there and we don't want you to get hurt."
"There'th seventeen of us, including Aunt Jinmay, we have each other. It'th not like we'll get badly hurt or anything."
Nova sighed.
"It's not that simple," she continued. "I know you'll have your siblings to protect you, even me and your dads, but we won't always be able to save you if you need it. Your dads and I always have had each other's backs, but there were times we were close to losing someone or thought we did. I mean, we lost Antauri once and we were lucky to even have him back. We almost lost Sprx several years before we even thought of having you kids."
She held Jasper's hand and lowered her jacket once more.
"What we do is dangerous, so much so that we came close to losing someone for good. We don't want to lose you too. We're not doing this because we want to be mean or keep you from doing what you want, we're just trying to make sure you're truly ready for what we have to do out there. We don't want you kids to go out there prematurely and have something happen to you."
She half-heartedly chuckled.
"This almost reminds me of when you were around four." Nova started. "I think you had a nightmare and you were going around my room to find me. You were wandering around in the dark so you didn't know where anything was. You knocked over the weapons I collected and, man, it was a miracle nothing hurt you. You could've died from that-"
Jasper threw herself into a hug. She held onto Nova like there wasn't a next day.
"I'm sorry for what I said out there. I'm sorry I'm so impaphent. I didn't mean any of it."
Nova hugged her back. "It's okay. Are you feeling okay now?"
She shrugged.
"Well, if it makes you feel better, we can go pull a little prank on papa Sprx and daddy Gibson."
Jasper pulled away and her bright blue eyes lit up with a smile across her face.
She always knew how to cheer her up.
