Can you please continue that fic short you made titled “short: Belly of the Droid”
That short is actually part of a larger story project I have been working on titled Ninjago Shadows of Oni and Dragons (I originally called it Oni Scrolls then Shadows of the Void but felt Shadows of Oni and Dragon was a better fit). This short is continued in the main story via two of the later chapters. The shorts are mini parts of the story that flush out different points of view, side characters or concepts of the story or parts that didn't fit with the main narrative of the story running parallel with the main story. I have the story both main and its shorts plus some other things posted in chronological order here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/34894561/chapters/86888878
Also while not part of this main story I also made this short head canon story Anatomy of a Droid (https://archiveofourown.org/works/44691181) from workings for the other story to flush out concepts and workings used in the first story which were heavily used in the short Belly of the Droid.
Added the next complete chapter in my story. In the continuation of this chapter the Lost Clan takes Zane back to the never Realm where he is forced by a powerful spirit there to face his past.
Story link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/34894561/chapters/86888878
The knights make an appearance in their parallel story arc in this chapter and there is a section with Cole and Seliel where Cole stumbles onto something he wasn't supposed to.
Cole and Seliels outfits in the story:
Snippet 1:
“So we finally meet foreign ice dragon or should I call you Ice Emperor,” Baikal proclaimed before rushing at him. The mention of Ice Emperor caused Zane to hesitate letting Baikal knock him over and pin him on his back. Baikal then boasted as he pinned Zane down holding him there and putting his snout close to Zanes face, “yes I know who you are and what you did here. It was your actions that led to my formation. The observer couldn’t have you stumbling onto the key before it was meant to be found especially while you were in that state.” Zane was speechless frozen in fear.
“At the time you knew nothing of me but I know much of you. You sent your soldiers to my lake to steal the treasure from me but they were never a match for me not even that vestige of part of yourself the dragon Boreal. He stood no chance against me…” as Baikal spoke Zane felt this creature accessing his brain and dragging forth memories to play in his head; memories he thought he had forgotten. He saw himself as the Ice Emperor at his thrown ordering a group of soldiers to take over Baikals temple after Vex had told him it likely held something important and powerful; why else would the place be so heavily guarded?
Vex told him they should get whatever was hidden there before someone else could and use it to threaten him and his reign. In his not right head space Zane agreed feeling threatened by whatever may be there so sent a group to the lake. They never returned so he sent another group to figure out what happened. Only a few made it back that time to report the ‘monster’ at the lake. He was angered by that so sent a group out again this time sending his dragon Boreal out with them. Boreal was not just a creation of his powers, he was a sort of extension to himself that he could not only see through but could control as if it was a second body for himself.
Through Boreal he saw Baikal who annihilated his forces and even managed to defeat Boreal with little problem forcing him to make Boreal retreat. After that he decided it best to abandon that endeavour despite how much Vex pushed him to try again. That was one of the few times he’d been able to go against Vex and even put Vex in his place. He could not match the force of Baikal. Zane really wasn’t liking what Baikal was doing to him so went to unplug himself so Baikal could not control his mind.
“Ah we are not going to do that. You wanted to communicate with me so that is what we are going to do. You are not getting out of this,” Baikal snarled stopping Zane from getting a hold of the cord. Baikal used his fleshy whiskers to grab and restrain Zanes arms pulling him up onto his feet and restraining him. He could even feel Baikal taking control to parts of his body like his skeleton and pseudo-muscles locking them up preventing him from being able to flee or fight back. Baikal then continued to Zanes great dislike, “your humans think you’re so peaceful, gentle, kind and innocent; that you could never be a monster but you know those are illusions.
That is all you want them to see of you as you know what you hide would not only terrify but hurt those you love. In order to claim to be peaceful, you must be capable of doing great harm. Otherwise you're not peaceful, just harmless and we both know you’re far from harmless. Outside your part Oni brother you are the most dangerous of your pack. Deep down you are a monster; a highly dangerous and terrible monster like those from their fables and tales. Your pack turns a blind eye to your true nature, what you really are. To them you are one of them, a peoples like them despite your lack of flesh and they struggle to see you otherwise.”
“Please this isn’t what I came to talk about…” Zane began before Baikal expressed, “oh I know what you and the Clan of the Edesel want. Maybe I’ll let them have what they seek or maybe I won’t. That can wait though for now that I have you I can pry through your soul and see if you are worthy of my charge. The clan have proven themselves worthy but you dragonborn; are you worthy to handle the piece I guard?”
“Please don’t, I don’t want to remember any of that,” Zane pleaded as Baikal with no effort was able to pry deeper into his memory banks than he thought possible bringing forth memories he had buried deep or thought he had gotten rid of. Out of habit to not wanting to see anything he didn’t want to Zane closed his eyes forgetting what Baikal was showing him was in his mind so he could not escape seeing them. Baikal showed him more memories of things from his time as the Ice Emperor.
Things he had done that he knew his family wouldn’t like, things they would never want to think of him capable of doing and would drastically change how they saw him possibly even make them fearful of him especially as some of what he did despite how nasty they were he had actually liked and felt good about. One of these was when he’d overthrown a nearby warlord overtaking his territory to ensure the warlord would be of no threat to his reign and that his people would submit to his rule without question. Zane had used his powers in a way he knew he could and he often worried whenever he did lose control around his family he could greatly hurt them or worse by doing this to them on accident. It was such a cruel method he never wanted to do even to his worst enemies.
He wasn’t bothered by terminating some people in unpleasant ways as long as they deserved it and while he wouldn’t mind for some of his enemies to face a cruel end this was a far too cruel method he’d ever think of doing. What he had done then to that warlord and his most loyal generals and tribesmen and woman was brutal and cruel. He’d turned some of the water in their bodies like in their blood and cells themselves to ice tearing apart parts of their bodies from the inside causing them to bleed out internally. He’d done it in small patches throughout their bodies so the process would be slow and painful and he made everyone else in their band watch what he had done terrifying them.
For some reason he had taken joy from doing that to those people. Why had he felt joy from it? He shouldn’t have felt joy from that. He couldn’t understand why he had gotten happiness from his cruel destruction of those people but it hadn’t been the first time he’d taken joy from that kind of activity and wouldn’t be the last. Scared to see more as he knew there was more he shook his head trying to knock Baikals control out but the effort did nothing. Instead Baikal laughed, “struggle all you want frail mortal. I am in control here. You are but a puppet to me and I am your master.”
“No please, I didn’t mean to… it wasn’t my fault… I had no control… I’m not a monster, I’m not a monster!” Zane pleaded but Baikal refused to listen. Instead Baikal showed him more memories asking again, “are you sure?” Baikal showed him memories of more of his acts. The blizzards he made that were so cold anyone caught outside would freeze to death in minutes and caused trees to explode. The eradication of entire peoples and some races and species all because he’d been made to feel threatened by them or grew a hatred to them these hatreds and fears often put into his head by Vex’s influence on him.
Looking back he was sure Vex had often been testing to see what he could get Zane to do and see how far he could push it. Vex would persuade him to attack settlements that he had no problems with often just to flex his power over people to instil fear in them in order to make them unquestionably bow to him, Vex would sway him to backstab other leaders of the area even if they made fair dealings or pledged allegiance to him often resulting in the death or enslavement of those leaders and their families, he had even come to realise that Vex had been feeding him at times human meat just to see if he could get away with doing it and to make people more fearful of him.
He would also do this feeding of human meat to those who were his ice samurai to increase peoples fears of them. Vex had constantly been encouraging him to steal resources from both those in and outside of his territory even when they didn’t need them and when Vex realised he could affect the weather in more than just the local area Vex encouraged him to further manipulate the climate than he already was leading to increasing the destructions his cold brought to environments which made it near impossible for people to survive in many places making them have to beg for his mercy to get what they needed to survive.
This meant they had to bow to his will if they wished to live no matter how they felt about him or his rule and Vex had him often eradicating anyone who threatened his reign or attempted to talk sense into him. Even those who served and obeyed him didn’t get good treatment. His cursing that he put on people to make them his soldiers put them into an unnatural state. It slowed their aging to a snails pace so while everyone else they knew and may have loved aged normally his servants barely aged so they outlived those they had known that weren’t cursed which was made worse by his enslavement of their minds turning them essentially largely to mindless drones so they had almost no care or feeling to their families or loved ones even when they passed.
When those soldiers were freed of the curse they regained their feelings and free will in a world they didn’t remember that had changed beyond what they knew and where most of those they had known and loved were gone. He had basically stolen their lives from them, forced them to do things they probably never wanted to do and then left them disturbed and with destroyed lives afterwards. Even though Vex had been the one encouraging him to do a lot of the things he had done Zane should have tried resisting the thoughts and desires but he often didn’t and often even liked or got a good feeling from what he had done.
Snippet 2:
“I remember when it started. You can never forget something like that…” he heard Bards voice state. Cole didn’t know where he was or how he’d gotten there. He was alone in the middle of a village. A village he didn’t recognise. It was ancient looking; he couldn’t see anything of their modern world around. The village sat at the edge of some woods to the north with farm lands to the south and the people. They weren’t people like him. They were the hyena men but not as he knew them. They weren’t cursed monsters like he knew them but mortal people just going about their daily lives.
Everything seemed calm then there was a loud bang making everyone stop and look around for what made that sound. Everything went silent for a moment then a blinding light lit up the northern horizon. Everything then went crazy the people and all beasts both wild and domestic went into a panic screaming and yelling as they ran in the opposite direction of the light. Balls of fire, molten rock and even shards of glass that were on fire soared out of the light flying overhead with some crashing down everywhere starting fires to everything.
Cole had to dodge a few small pieces of debris to avoid getting hurt as he looked around unsure what to do and what was going on till he heard the crying of a child. Turning to the source of the sound he saw one of the Gnollsvic children, a young boy no older than five years old, clinging to the post for an awning of a building too scared to move. In the chaos he was being forgotten so Cole rushed over to help him.
“Come we need to get out of here,” Cole expressed going to pick up the kid only to be shocked when he went through the child like he was a ghost. The action shocked and disturbed Cole bringing up memories he long wished to forget. He wasn’t a ghost he told himself several times looking himself over; he didn’t look it. He couldn’t be. That wasn’t what was going on he told himself beginning to panic before his thoughts were halted by an earthquake greater than anything he’d felt or ever created making it impossible for him to stand felling him to his knees and a deep rumbling noise came over the area. He looked in the direction of the sound just in time to see a massive wall of what looked like smoke or ash rapidly approaching the area blasting away and igniting everything in its path.
This cloud overtook him before he could react and he felt a heat and wind so powerful it should have torn him apart but it didn’t. Instead he saw visions of a world falling to decay. Fires ravaging landscapes, cliff sides collapsing sometimes burying or collapsing entire villages in their fall leaving no survivors, tsunamis that ravaged coasts not only destroying villages but pulling beasts and trees of massive proportions out to sea, clearly tropical landscapes getting crippled by frosts, snowstorms that buried alive beasts and settlements killing many, healthy forests and grasslands rapidly dying the plants quickly turning brown and even black from decay while becoming leafless, fields of beasts most looking like creatures from the fossil record and not what he knew as living in Ninjago wandering dead or dying landscapes many succumbing to the conditions and their remains dotting landscapes while fungi started to rapidly cover dead landscapes and organisms.
After these visions Cole found himself in another settlement somewhere else. He got up looking around terribly confused about what was going on. This settlement was much larger than the other one. He was standing at the edge of a field where some of the Gnollsvic were toiling away trying to tend a field of crops which were barely coming up.
They all looked thin and sick and were crudely wrapped up with cloths and furs against the cold. He felt cold, the air tasted foul and the smell of decay filled the air. Something in the air also irritated his eyes and each breath he took made his lungs and throat feel a bit like they were burning; it felt like he was breathing in smoke from a forest fire. Then he noticed the sky and he felt like he heard Bards words again say, ‘even though the sun shone it gave no warmth…’ The sky was greyed but not from clouds and the sun. It shone above like it was mid day but the light from it was dim so it barely hurt to look at it and it made the mid day look like early evening. The noise of a cart and large beast drew his attention to his one side.
There he saw approaching him a cart pulled by one of the clans Yakguar creatures it too not looking to good the creature being led by a Raven Priest who was chanting and carrying an incense burner that was hanging from a chain that he was swinging gently back and forth while the cart was flanked by two Gnollsvic dressed in plague gear. They stopped at a Gnollsvic who was slumped against a wall of a building. Curious to what was going on Cole came over to see what they were doing. The plague doctors inspected the individual before the one looked at the other and shook his head to express a no. They then picked up this individual who not only was in terrible shape but Cole could tell by some patches of rot on them was departed.
They put this individual on the cart pulling back a cloth to lie him under it before continuing on. When they pulled back the cloth Cole caught a glimpse of what was under it. Bodies, of all ages and what looked like various races of both beast folks and even more human looking people like him and serpentine. All were departed their bodies looking frail and sickly. The group carried on collecting more who had fallen to the conditions trying to clean up and slow the spread of disease and death.
“When rains later came they were black and burned the flesh and killed the plants…” he heard Bards voice as rain began to fall. All the people began to rush for cover scared and in pain from the rain. To his unease he felt the rain burn his skin as it landed on it, it had a foul smell and as it formed puddles he noted there was a black tinge to the water.
He stared in one of these puddles watching as it got blacker before he felt himself surrounded by darkness and when the darkness lifted he found himself standing in an ancient city street the buildings which were made largely of stone and wood were burning as Gnollsvic were fighting monsters and people cloaked in black robes and dark attire. The dark robed people looked to be made of a mix of races from humanoid like him to beast races. Some had ashy looking burned skin while some had sickly greyed skin.
The monsters fighting alongside them didn’t look like those of the clan. There was that strange ram skulled thing that Jay and Nya had seen in Grong-Khyer, Timbalangs, large bipedal crocodilian things that looked to be made of lava and spat fire, bat winged and scorpion tailed humanoids, strange ogre like monstrosities, spider monsters Cole had heard of in myths called Jorōgumos, strange purplish monkey imp things and strange hummingbird bug creatures that flew around in swarms. There was the Feardrakes and Vrimps the clan had but these ones were colored differently. Instead of the greenish hued ones of the clan the Feardrakes were black and red in color and the Vrimps were red. Cole looked around terrified unsure what to do and what was going on.
“We were in that capital when Kamal made our races greatest mistake… let’s just say the people he trusted he thought would be allies and help us tricked us and turned on us when our guard was down,” he heard Bard state before strangely hearing his own voice ask, “You were there when Kamal was mortal?” Then he heard Nadya saying, “yha, his mistake is what cost me my arm. Those monsters tore most of it off…” He then heard Nadya yelling. Looking around he saw Nadya as a mortal protecting slightly older looking than what he had seen versions of Bard and his wife alongside a young male Gnollsvic which Cole felt was likely the only surviving brother she had talked about.
It suddenly started clicking in for him. He was somehow seeing events from the past and another realm. Events the Gnollsvic had gone through which led to them becoming the Drekavacs. He wanted to help Nadya and her brother but he knew there was nothing he could do. This was just a vision and he couldn’t affect anything. He could only watch as the monsters the family were fighting a group of Timbalangs, one of the strange croc creatures and some of the evil humanoids closed in and attacked them to tear them apart the Timbalangs getting Nadya while the croc creature got her brother leaving their parents to be slayed by the humanoids who wielded disturbing looking blackened weapons. Things then faded to black as a voice spoke to him.
Added a short for my Lego Ninjago story called Robotic Rabies. In it Zane and Pixal get inflicted with a virus that turns them hyper aggressive (like the rabies virus it's named for) trying to destroy them and anything living that else they encounter and the others have to work on keeping them contained and cared for as they work on a cure.
Story:
“This is bad, very bad!” Jay exclaimed and Lloyd quickly demanded from the four criminals they had managed to rescue from Zane and Pixal who were going crazy attacking everyone they saw like feral animals even the other ninja. The two had already done serious damage to several of the criminal organization members they had been trying to stop. The group was a highly tech savy almost cult like organisation that was trying to take over part of the realm by creating some giant automaton in the form of some giant fire breathing reptilian creature for them to pilot.
The ninja had been dismantling their operation and capturing and restraining everyone there when they had lost Zane and Pixal for about half an hour before finding them going savage when drawn to a commotion in the facility the people there terrified and surrendering to them the moment they saw the ninja. Some of the crooks were lying eerily still around the room they were drawn to and now the two were attacking the other ninja. Zane and Pixal were unresponsive to the others, didn’t seem to be able to speak and were hyper aggressive to everyone but each other.
The ninja were struggling to get the two restrained and calm. That was proving impossible as it seemed they couldn’t be reasoned with and they weren’t holding back in their attacks the two having already left cuts, bites and bruises on the others drawing some blood and nearly breaking bones. The only good things were Zane wasn’t using his powers and the twos co-ordination was a bit off. Something was clearly wrong with them.
“We didn’t think they’d be this bad! Just make them un-loyal to people and maybe a bit aggressive…” the one crook who’d had his one shoulder broken by the two droids expressed. He was sat behind the ninja with three other cultists the ninja had managed to save from Zane and Pixal’s aggression. The four crooks were terrified and in shock suffering serious wounds including deep cuts and broken bones. Lloyd again demanded from them, “this isn’t anything like them. What did you do?”
“It was just a virus, just a little virus,” one of the other crooks commented quickly drawing Jays attention worrying him as he demanded, “which virus?”
“Robot Rabies,” the crook stated making Nya instantly declare shoving Kai and Cole away from Zane and Pixal, “stay back from them!” Confused Kai asked, “why?”
“Sorry you two but you’ll thank me later,” Jay expressed before shocking Zane and Pixal offline bringing an end to their fight while Nya explained, “we won’t be able to get through to them and they’ll tear us apart if we try to restrain them. They no longer have control of themselves.”
“Why what’s wrong with them?” Cole asked confused and getting worried. Nya explained while Jay inspected the now unconscious Zane and Pixal, “Robot Rabies is possibly the most dangerous virus a droid can get! They lose control of themselves becoming hyper aggressive and will attack any living being they sense till it’s destroyed even their own family. It drives them crazy and feral and no matter what they can’t regain control of themselves.”
“That’s really bad… there is a cure for this right?” Lloyd asked and Jay stated, “yha we have it at home; we just need to get them there before they can wake up.” Lloyd declared, “you and Nya take the two home, Cole will help you, and get them taken care of. Kai and I will finish up here.” They were in agreement. Cole helped Nya and Jay get Zane and Pixal loaded up in some of the vehicles they had used to get there and quickly took them home to the Hanger Bay and quickly worked on getting them cured. A few hours later when Kai and Lloyd had returned home they had found they had a serious problem.
“We don’t have a cure for this,” Jay explained and Lloyd commented, “I thought you said you did.” Jay explained, “we do but not for this version. This is a whole new version of Robot Rabies. It’s like Robot Rabies 2.0. Overall it has the same symptoms but it’s coding especially its basal codes are entirely different.”
“So what does that mean?” Kai asked and Nya explained, “it means the cure we have isn’t going to work. It’s not compatible. We have to create a new cure from scratch to do that.” They all paused to look at Zane and Pixal as some noise caught their attentions. The two droids were regaining consciousness. They had been put into a large dog crate each a little ways behind them in the bay.
They had been dressed in plain white long sleeve shirt and pants so they had no access to anything that could be used as a weapon. The crates were pushed against each other and Zane and Pixal had been laid down on their sides in the crates. They were in the crates to avoid having to fight them or getting attacked when the two regained consciousness. The two were slowly waking up. As the two woke up they attempted to get up but were very unstable and the cages were too small for them to do more than kneel.
“Don’t worry they can’t get out and they’ll be fine in there,” Nya stated as the two droids became aware of the rest of them and began trying to reach through the cage bars to get them. The two tried to break out of the cages by throwing themselves against the cage bars and pulled at them but when that didn’t work and they realised they were trapped the two settled to glare angrily at the rest of them making a low growling like noise. Cole asked, “don’t you think those crates are a little small for them?” Jay explained, “no; it’s actually safer if we keep them confined. Robot Rabies messes with their nervous systems giving them co-ordination and balance problems besides they’re only going to be in there temporarily.”
“From scratch? I’m guessing that means it’s going to take some time then for a cure; how long will it take?” Lloyd asked as they all looked back at the computers. Jay responded, “well we don’t really know. Luckily Cyrus Borg is helping us with it. He’ll do anything for Pixal, she’s his special girl. We think it will take at minimum two weeks and at most a month.”
“That long; that’s not good,” Cole commented and Lloyd asked, “what do we do with them in the meantime; I’m guessing they are going to be out of commission the whole time.”
“Yha unless you want them to tear apart everyone they come across,” Jay stated. As they talked Kai was frequently looking back at Zane and Pixal nervous they’d be able to break free and attack. He’d gotten bitten pretty hard by Zane who’s teeth had taken some flesh from him when they had tried to restrain him and Pixal had nearly broken his arm when he’d tried to hold her still by grabbing and squeezing his forearm; it was still fairly sore and he was wondering if she had maybe managed to at least crack some of the bone.
The two had left the rest of them with plenty of bruises, cuts and bites from their struggle and the damages they’d left on those cultists had been shocking. Arm and leg bones crushed and mangled by the twos grasps, flesh ripped open from both their fingers and teeth, crushed ribs and shoulder bones from their punches and kicks, chunks taken out of flesh by not just their teeth but their fingers, internal bleeding, ruptured organs and limbs pulled out of their sockets damaging bones, tendons and veins with the forces they had used in their attacks.
What the two had done to those cultists proved to the rest of them just how dangerous the two really were and how careful and gentle they normally were when normally interacting with the rest of them or other people. As he looked at the two Kai noticed a rat crawling close to the cages the two were in. He was nervous and worried about what could happen. He tapped on Coles shoulder and drew his attention to the rat which had caught Zane and Pixals attention and the two watched it like stalking cats.
“Uhm when you say they will attack anything does that include rodents?” Kai asked drawing everyone else to look at the two droids just in time to see the two grab hold of the rat at the same time as it crossed in front of their cages Zane getting hold of its back end while Pixal got its front half.
By the fact it didn’t fight back or make a noise the rest of them were pretty sure they had crushed the rodent before it even knew what had happened. Within seconds to the shock and disgust of the others the two droids ended up ripping the rodent in half and eating the halves they had gotten like wild animals. Lloyd and Kai were terrified by the action, Cole was disgusted while Jay and Nya were unsettled and grossed out.
“Yha the virus makes them attack anything and apparently eat some of what they catch,” Jay expressed. Nya then stated, “I think it’s best we keep them locked up in the cells down here for everyone and everything’s safety till we can cure them.” They were all in agreement. Kai couldn’t help but mutter trying to not throw up, “yha cause I don’t want to become like that rat!”
“What about leaving them offline?” Lloyd asked. They all thought about that idea. It didn’t feel right to them. This virus and their actions wasn’t Zane and Pixals fault. They shouldn’t be punished for it. Also leaving their bodies offline wasn’t a safe thing as everything in their bodies was designed to be constantly functioning so if left offline for too long systems would start to seize up or deteriorate leading to complications and more work when they were put back online. There was also the eeriness and disturbing aura that having the twos bodies lying around in a death like state in the monastery or hanger would bring to the rest of them. Just thinking of it was unsettling. They decided they would keep the two online but locked up in the jail cells they had connected to the hanger bay for temporary holding of prisoners like for during interrogations.
Even though they knew it was cruel to the two as it really scared them they shut off all of Zane and Pixals senses so they wouldn’t detect the others making them safe to move. Probably because of the virus the two didn’t seem to have any feelings or cares to their senses being off something that normally terrified them. To avoid being attacked they moved them in the cages first to the cells. The cells were small rooms with a toilet built into the wall, a light embedded in the roof, a plain metal frame bed and a wooden chair and table. Three of the four walls were made of brick with the wall facing into the wide hall like side of the room being made of metal bars. They had four cells all on the same side of the room with the hall being on the other side.
To avoid potential problems from the two hurting themselves or each other, there was a chance the virus could force them to attack each other, they were going to be kept in separate cells and everything that was not anchored in some way in the cell with the exception of the mattress to the beds, the blanket and pillow for the bed was going to be removed. They didn’t want them damaging themselves on something or turning things into weapons they could throw at anyone who came in the room to check on them. It was fairly easy to get them out of the cages and into the cells with their senses off, they didn’t attack or fight back cause they were unaware of what was going on and that the others were there. Once the two were locked in they returned their senses to them.
The moment their senses were restored and they saw the others Zane and Pixal tried to attack them through the bars of the cell which had no problem holding them back. To get the two to settle they all left the room leaving them alone. They could keep an eye on them through the security cameras they had in the room. Without the others around the two nearly instantly fully settled then after ten minutes they sat down in their cells and just stared almost mindlessly at the ground in front of them now fully settled. Every now and then they would have weird twitches to their heads making them jerk their heads often back over one shoulder at random several times an hour, a symptom of the virus. With the two safely locked up everyone else went about their day.
They had paperwork at the capitals police center to fill out from the capture of those tech savy cultists and luckily due to circumstances there would be no punishment for Zane and Pixal over what they had done and luckily everyone was going to survive though some were going to be missing some body parts and be in a poor shape the rest of their lives; the ninja hoped that would be a good lesson for this cult and others about why you should never mess with robotic viruses.
They had a couple cultists remaining to catch and they were able to interview a few of those they had caught who hadn’t been nearly torn apart by Zane and Pixal to figure out more about this virus they had inflicted their droid siblings with. They were able to get out of the already caught cultists just what they had already found that this virus had been a total remake of the already existing virus to make it stronger, more dangerous and able to bypass any droids anti-virus software. They had made it specifically with Zane and Pixal in mind as they were a major threat in the groups plans. They wanted to turn all droids in their realm into soldiers for their purpose but had found something odd in their work. Why this was a thing they didn’t understand but there was one thing that got in the way of this.
Any droid they swayed to their side were easily turned against them by Zane and Pixal often just by the two talking with them. They likened it as if the two were alphas, emperors, to the droids who would listen and obey them above any person. Because of that they needed the two out of the picture and they had felt if they could get the two to turn on the others and tear them apart that would help them in their endeavour so they had enlisted a well known digital virus maker from the city of Notomation, a city well known for their hatred of advanced tech but especially robotics and a city the ninja were forbidden from entering or getting within a hundred meters due to an incident in the past.
The city had kidnapped and badly hurt Zane trying to destroy him so they had retaliated rather destructively to the city resulting in a restraining order for the ninja from the town. If they could get that virus maker it would really help with making the cure for Zane and Pixal. As the ninja couldn’t get near the place they hired Ronin to track down and find this person. In the meantime they continued their work and to track down and capture the remaining cultist and any other threats to the realm that came up.
While they continued to work they kept an eye on Zane and Pixal and tried to take care of them while they were in their un-well state. There was not much care they could do for them outside of feeding them at least once a day to keep their energy levels up and stable, though sometimes they ended up feeding themselves on any bugs or rodents that made the mistake of entering or getting too close to their cells. Due to their aggression the other ninja couldn’t really give the two any repairs or oiling of joints if they needed it nor a cleaning though luckily because of their states there wasn’t really anything to damage or dirty them much in the cells.
The two couldn’t do much in their current states. The virus could only make them want to attack every living thing, it gave them poor co-ordination and the virus disrupted their consciousness making their minds numb and barely able to process what was going on so all they could really do was sit in their cells in a dazed state sometimes taking care of their most basic needs when they needed to or briefly walking around mindlessly likely out of boredom the others felt.
Along with that other symptoms they had included strange twitches and jerks from their bodies and often with their heads at random times, they seemed to shake their heads a bit frequently like they were trying to clear their minds, they often held their head tilted a bit at an angle and to the one side, sometimes when walking around they would lose their balance or have poor control leading them to trip and fall often or struggle to stand so they tended to just sit or lie down to keep from falling, they appeared incapable of speaking only able to make random sounds, they sometimes kept repeatedly making crushing motions with their hands for a couple minutes at a time, they sometimes drooled and a few times likely out of frustration they picked at their own skin or any damages they had leaving some minor damages and hurting themselves from their actions.
From what they could asses through remote analysis of their brains on a tablet was the two had some understanding that something was wrong but they couldn’t figure out what. They were barely aware of what was around them or even themselves, a result of the virus. Even though they weren’t fully aware the others still felt they could still use with some kind of interaction with the rest of them so they would not feel lonely or abandoned.
At first to give them company they each tried to just hang out with Zane and Pixal staying behind the bars and one of them hanging out in the hall for the cells. They would try just talking to them or reading to the two. That didn’t go so well as no matter what upon sensing them the virus’s control would take over forcing Zane and Pixal to become aggressive and attempt to attack them through the bars of the cell.
They tried a calming tea to try and see if it could override the virus and relax the two mixing it with oil to draw them to it. Unfortunately to hold the drink and not risk them breaking its holder they had to use metal mugs which the two didn’t hesitate to use as weapons after drinking the contents always aiming for the others heads when they threw them. Luckily most of them didn’t get hurt when the two threw the mugs at them though Lloyd had made the mistake one time of turning his back to the two while they had the mugs and was knocked out for several minutes when Zane hit him in the back of the head with the mug he had.
The tea never worked to combat the virus’s aggression and seeing they were only making the two dangerous by giving them the mugs they stopped this tactic to look for something else. They tried disguising themselves to hide their being to try and trick the virus. Jay had used a robot costume and Cole had used a full body animal costume but that didn’t confuse the two and turning off their sense of vision didn’t calm the two around their presence either. Only turning off all their senses worked but not only was that counterproductive to what they wanted to do they felt it cruel knowing how much having their senses off scared and upset the two.
For over a week no matter what they did the two still tried to attack them and were trying to get through the bars with so much force that the two were starting to hurt themselves denting their exo-skeleton and even at one point making them break open parts mainly around their shoulders and on their chests exposing some of their inner works. The twos attempts to get at the rest of them scared them and they worried the two were just going to keep hurting themselves if they were present. This made the rest of the ninja quickly come to stop visiting the two.
Instead Jay came to find a substitute. The one time he socialised with them he had dragged a TV in there so they could watch as he played a game. He stuck to a calm relaxing block building sandbox game to avoid stimulating their aggression. As he played Jay noticed something about the game playing could catch and distract the two pausing their virus fuelled aggression and pacifying them. They just sat largely watching the game only occasionally turning aggressive before getting distracted and being pacified by the game again. Jay wondered if maybe the movement and noise which they probably registered as related to something living coming from something they detected wasn’t living was confusing them or maybe the game just calmed them.
He set up a TV for the two in the hall in front of their cells and left it on for them putting on long relaxing videos like play through’s of the game he had played for them or other relaxing or funny video game play videos, animal videos, science videos, nature videos and videos on mysteries to entertain them. Jay would come down every two to three hours to change videos for the two and check on them. The noise and movements of the videos often caught the twos attentions and seemed to pacify them. They still showed the weird ticks of the virus but seemed calmer and had something now to occupy their time with to help them pass the days by till they could get cured. To help against the potential loneliness while the others weren’t there Lloyd managed to give them each a teddy. He used a pair of smithing tongs to slide the teddies into the cells to hopefully not get hurt. They came close to getting him giving him quite the scare but he managed to succeed. He gave them cat teddies that had special heads that bore an apparatus in them of a hard plastic hollow ball with a smaller plastic ball inside so they made a purr noise when the head was moved.
Lloyd felt the noise the teddies made might have a calming effect on the two. The two didn’t seem to acknowledge the teddies much at first but they did catch them later at times holding them like they were cuddling them for comfort and they tended to sleep with them and the noise the teddies made did seem to distract and pacify them at times. The ninja decided to use those as alternatives to them being present to make Zane and Pixal feel like they weren’t alone. Without meaning to the rest of them forgot to give them some of their basic daily care till after four days of no longer visiting them when Nya checked the security cameras on them as they worked in the hanger bay and noticed the two looked to be sleeping lying on the mattress left in the cell. She’d noticed they had been sleeping quite a bit that day.
“When was the last time anyone’s given Zane and Pixal something to eat?” she asked. They all thought it over for a moment before Lloyd commented, “I thought you and Jay were doing that.”
“We’ve been busy trying to create a cure for them,” Jay noted and Kai expressed, “after what they did to that rat I’m not going to get too close to them rate now especially with food. They’ll probably be worse than Cole when he’s hangry!”
“So no one’s been doing it,” Cole commented making Lloyd ask, “that’s not going to hurt them much is it?”
“Well because of how much energy their minds and bodies need to operate they can’t go more than two to three days without something to restore energy. Their energy levels are low. That explains why they’ve been sleeping all day,” Nya explained looking at a quick remote diagnostic she did of the two. Kai wondered nervous, “will they eat in this state or do we have to restrain them and plug them into the computers?”
“Luckily unlike the virus it’s named for Robot Rabies doesn’t hinder their abilities to eat and drink or care for their basic survival needs so we don’t have to fight them to plug them in. The problem will be giving them anything. As long as we put it in their immediate vicinity they’ll eat it on their own but that means someone’s going to have to get close to their cells,” Jay explained and Kai wondered trying to hide his fear, “they’ll be fine for a while right? We don’t really need to give them anything rate now do we?”
“Not now but ideally before the end of the day. They’ve already shut down non critical functioning’s to conserve energy and they’re not really active which is why they have done well so far but we should get them something before tonight or they’ll be in trouble,” Nya explained. Lloyd and Kai were quick to express trying to hide their fear, “not it!”
“I’ll do it. It’s probably best I do it anyway. I’m most resistant to getting crushed or cut by their attacks and have the strength to hold them back if something goes wrong,” Cole expressed before leaving the bay. About an hour later Cole entered the cells to give Zane and Pixal what he had made for them; some egg salad sandwiches. The two were still sleeping but woke up as he entered. They looked at him looking to be mad and slowly got up keeping an eye on him like hawks focussing on their targets. Cole was pretty sure they were going to attack him if he got close but he wasn’t sure what else he could do. He had two sandwiches for each of them on separate plates; one plate for each of them. After a quick think he came up with an idea. The two could reach outside their cells so he didn’t have to put the plates in the cell which would make things easier and safer. He put the plates on the ground and left for a moment to come back in with a broom. He then cautiously used the brooms handle to push the plates up to the cell bars. Zane and Pixal just watched him seeming confused.
“There that wasn’t too hard,” Cole expressed before leaving the room heading back to the hanger bay to continue work while they kept an eye on the two. It took about twelve minutes for the two to realise they had been given anything and start to eat what they had been given both highly confused for a while about Coles actions. They were surprisingly calm as they ate despite what some like Kai felt. The virus seemed to only affect their temperament when organic living beings were present.
“There’s a problem with your plan Cole,” Nya explained an hour later when they checked on the two.
“What?” Cole asked coming to see the footage Jay and Nya had pulled up. Jay joked, “turns out you can make a weapon out of anything.” After finishing what they had been given the two droids had taken note of the plates Cole had used. Simple ceramic plates. Likely driven by their virus the two had pulled the plates into their cells where they proceeded to break them into small pieces with their bare hands then start to turn the pieces they had broken into darts shaping and sharpening them on the concrete ground of their cells.
“Great now they have something sharp to throw at us when we go in there,” Kai commented. Cole hadn’t thought they would do that, it was never even something he would think of. In his mind plates were for food and just food.
“I’ll fix that,” Cole stated taking responsibility for his mistake. Lloyd suggested, “maybe in the future use something they can’t break and turn into a weapon… maybe plastic.”
“No they could turn that into a weapon too and we know metals not safe either. I think paper is the safest thing around them rate now,” Jay stated. After several minutes of thinking Cole got an idea. He went and got a shield from the hangers armoury and went to the cells with a broom. Just as expected when he went in the room the moment Zane and Pixal detected him they threw the shivs they had made out of the plate pieces at him. He blocked the projectiles with the shield he had. When they were done their attack having thrown all the pieces they had he used the broom to sweep all the pieces out of the room.
“Nice try you two,” Cole expressed as he sweeped up the pieces making sure to get those that had bounced off the shield close to their cells first so they couldn’t get them. To a bit of his unease the two started growling at him clearly mad. Cole just ignored their growls as he finished his work taking the pieces into the hall to bag up all the pieces for disposal.
“There problem solved,” Cole expressed as he returned to the others. Two weeks went by and they had hardly got anywhere on a cure to this virus. In that time they had worked out a routine to deal with Zane and Pixal. They checked up on them through the security cameras every thirty minutes or when they were out on missions whenever they had free time. They kept up Jays TV idea shutting it off and turning off the lights in the room every night between ten to ten thirty at night so they would go to sleep to rest and conserve energy then turned it all back on around nine in the morning for them to be awake.
The two were very good at falling asleep shortly after things were shut down and remaining asleep for most of the night. Outside when Jay entered the room to turn things on or off and when Cole came to give them food once a day the two remained fairly calm in their cells just sitting in a dazed state, watching the TV or napping. Cole would usually feed the two in the afternoon putting things he made on a paper plate then sliding it towards them with a broom. After a couple days Cole started visiting them a few times a day when he had down time. Cole felt that the TV and teddy they had given the two might not be enough to make Zane and Pixal feel like they weren’t alone so he braved up to spend some time with them. Sometimes he’d bring a snack to share with them while he talked to them.
Usually it was a fruit he could roll towards them like apples, peaches, kiwis, pomegranates and a few times he brought a watermelon which he would cut into thirds then roll a piece each to the two while keeping one for himself. It would take them a while, usually till after they touched the fruit in their attempts to get him, for the two to realise they had been given something and have it pausing their aggression as the food distracted them. They would be aggressive towards him when he was there trying to reach him through the bars so Cole had to keep back from their cells. Despite his fears he acted and spoke calmly to them. At first they would remain aggressive trying to get him the whole time he was there trying to find a way to break out of their cells to reach him but after some time especially after Cole had chastised them the one day when he’d ended up in a struggle with Zane they seemed to calm a bit around him.
Zane had managed to grab the broom Cole used to give them food and rip it from Coles hands dropping it close to his cell; it was clearly a trap but Cole didn’t acknowledge that till after the incident. Without thinking Cole went over to grab the broom a bit mad only to have Zane grab his one arm when he got close. In a panic they got in a short squabble where Cole managed to break free and retrieve the broom but accidently damaged Zanes left wrist in the process giving him problems moving it. Cole had chastised the two for being aggressive to him telling them they should be nicer to him as he was the only one braving up to feed them and interact with them so they wouldn’t feel alone. Later after calming down and realising he’d hurt his brother Cole checked on them a few hours later. To his surprise after a couple seconds of trying to attack him the two settled passively watching and listening to him not even growling like they usually did.
He wasn’t sure if it was his words or the fact he’d hurt one of them but they relaxed more around him. From then on after a brief period of aggression when he first entered the room they would settle and he could even get a bit closer to the cells over time before sparking their aggression. The others couldn’t understand how Cole had been able to get the two calmer around him. Whenever the others tried anything Zane and Pixal just remained aggressive which really scared Lloyd and Kai. The only other they shared a bit of passiveness to was Jay but they were only passive to him if he followed his typical routine of operating the TV or putting them to bed or waking them up.
If he tried anything outside this routine they’d start to get aggressive. Jay was guessing the routine was relaxing to them and in their dazed minds while he engaged in this routine they might not fully register him as a living being and more of a background operation like some kind of machine so didn’t spark their aggression. Even though he knew how dangerous they were knowing they were contained and how to handle them if problems arose Jay wasn’t really scared of the twos aggression. Instead he and Nya were more worried than scared. There was something they hadn’t told the others yet about Robot Rabies that was making them worried the longer the two went without a cure.
After two weeks and only getting about 40 percent towards a cure they decided to tell the others about it. It was more than its aggression that led to Robot Rabies getting its name. Like the virus it was named for Robot Rabies was fatal. Luckily unlike the organic virus it was named for this condition could be cured but a cure had to be administered within the first few weeks of infection. After those first few weeks the virus would turn on its host and start to destroy their programming essentially destroying them in the process. It would take five weeks till this virus got to this point at which time the best thing they could do for Zane and Pixal was to terminate them to end the suffering and torment the destruction of their minds and who they were the rest of the infection would bring them for the next several months. It would be the end for them. Their programming would be too badly damaged to bring them back most of it ending up gone replaced by the virus meaning they’d be gone for good. While they still had three weeks left till that point because of how long it was taking to engineer the cure they worried they were going to run out of time.
There were codes in this version of the virus they were having trouble understanding and removing. They needed to find this master coder who had created it to work out these problems which was proving harder than expected. Outside the fact he was hiding in Notomation and was named ‘The Code Master’ they knew little else. This fact really brought down everyone’s moods. Despite their restraining orders Kai and Lloyd decided to go undercover and help Ronin find this ‘Code Master’ while Jay and Nya continued to work on creating a cure. Cole meanwhile found himself visiting Zane and Pixal more often. He might not have long with them and that fact was hitting him hard. It was something he never thought he’d have to face with the two. He’d always thought they’d outlive him not the other way around. Despite how hard he tried to hide his emotions the first time he visited the two after finding this out he ended up losing control and breaking down in front of the two.
Their aggression now saddened him not just upset him. The two might have only three weeks left and they were being forced against their will to attack their own family and barely able to comprehend what was going on or even what was around them. They couldn’t feel any comfort or loving from each other or the rest of their family. All they had was a cold, lonely and cruel existence. Their states and the chance they could lose the two of them hit him hard. Without thinking he sat with his back against the dividing wall between the twos cells his knees bent up so he could rest his arms crossed on his knees and place his head in his arms to try and muffle any noise he made worried of the others hearing. He broke down and started to ramble about his feelings about how he couldn’t handle losing them. How he couldn’t handle the losses of those he loved; it left an emptiness inside himself that he dreaded feeling.
A cold, painful dread inducing emptiness that never seemed to go away and nothing seemed to heal. Time could numb it but it never really healed that emptiness. Without intending to he ended up spilling to the two how he still couldn’t get over the loss of his mother. In his rambling he expressed how he was terrified of loosing anyone in his family and that if they did lose the two he felt he wouldn’t be able to take it. He worried it would make him more closed off, he’d no longer be able to make connections with anyone else worried he’d lose them too and he’d want to isolate himself even from his other family members to try and loose connections with them so when he eventually lost them it wouldn’t hurt so much. He didn’t realise as he rambled that he’d put himself in a dangerous position in the room till he felt something touch his shoulder.
Confused he looked to see Zane had placed his damaged hand on Coles shoulder. Upon realizing who was touching him Cole rushed to his feet and took a couple steps back startled. They could have torn him apart but… they hadn’t. Both Zane and Pixal had come to kneel by him and while they could have easily torn him apart they had just left him alone. They were emotionless and quiet as they stared at him holding onto the bars of their cells. This behaviour confused Cole.
For one the virus they had made them more aggressive around certain emotions like fear and sadness so they should be hyper aggressive to him at that point. There was also the fact they were in a hyper unaware state because of the virus so should have no care towards him but they looked to have some care towards him. They could sense his emotions, to help them understand people and better understand the world around them droids had senses built like those of an animal including the ability to detect and understand pheromones; the chemical traces in scents that revealed things of an individual such as identity, health and even emotions which meant they could smell he was in a vulnerable emotional state.
That should have made them aggressive not passive and even seeming to have some care for him. Zanes choice to use his damaged left hand to touch Cole not his fully functioning right was also interesting. The damage Cole had left to the wrist prevented Zane from being able to fully close his grip or move his fingers much and he had a limited range of motion in the wrist meaning he couldn’t really use that limb for anything more than simply hitting meaning he couldn’t do much damage with that limb. Looking at his right hand that gripped the bar Cole could see Zane constantly tensing and relaxing his grip on the bar he was grasping.
The motions looked like he was wanting to crush something but holding back by exercising the motion on the metal bars which he couldn’t leave damage to. Looking at Pixal he could see her doing the same motion with her hands as she gripped the bars of her cell. They wanted to hurt him just as the virus wanted but it was like they were trying to resist that urge, to regain some control. Cole felt they wanted to comfort him; they wanted control of themselves again and to not be a slave to this virus and attack their family but they couldn’t escape its hold. That saddened him more but Cole felt comforted that despite this virus they still had feelings for the rest of them and cared for them. They didn’t want to hurt their family but had almost no control over that.
Curious he got close to try and touch Zanes hand to see how much control he had. He was able to get nearly a rulers length from him before Zane growled at him tightening his grip on the cell bar to hold back from attacking starting to shake a bit from the strength he was putting in his grip till Cole backed away. It was probably taking them a great deal of effort to maintain control Cole reasoned. He kept his distance so the two wouldn’t have to put in extra effort to keep themselves in control. He hung with the two for a while before leaving to let them relax telling them as he left, “don’t worry you two we’re going to do everything we can to make you two better before it’s too late. We’re not going to let this virus destroy you I promise.”
After leaving the two he made sure to go to the bay computers and delete the security footage from his time in the room with the two. He’d never meant to break down like he did and he couldn’t have the others see him in that state. He was the families rock, who they could count on to remain calm and stable in the face of hardships like what they were dealing with especially if things went downhill in the future. He couldn’t have them doubting his strength and sturdiness. He needed to keep up his stoic appearance in their eyes.
“How aware are they of everything in their current states?” Cole asked Jay and Nya a few days later as they headed down to the hanger bay. In their work Kai, Lloyd and Ronin had caught someone from this cult who they were hoping to interrogate in hopes of finding this Code Master.
“You know that feeling when you wake up from a dream but you’re still dreaming so everything seems wrong and you have no clue where you are or what is going on,” Jay began and Cole responded, “yha.” Jay finished with, “that’s pretty much like what they feel rate now. Everything seems like a dream, like it’s not really happening but they are aware they are conscious.”
“Do they still have their emotions? How are they feeling about all this?” Cole asked and Nya replied, “that’s the cruellest thing. Those who make viruses for droids don’t believe they can have feelings so their emotions are untouched leaving them feeling through all this. They’re very confused and unsettled. They are aware something’s wrong but can’t reason what is wrong. They feel like their brains are mush and they don’t understand why we’re scared of them or leaving them alone for extended periods or why we’ve separated them making them sad. If you ever want to see how they’re feeling you can just use that app we made that lets us do a minor diagnostic on them when we’re away from the Monastery or Bounty. There is a section that reads their emotion codes so you can see what they’re feeling.”
Cole had forgot he could do that. To help them understand their droid siblings and as most of them didn’t know how to read codes Jay and Nya had created an app for the rest of them to use that could show them what Zane and Pixal were feeling. Cole really didn’t like using the app for that as he felt it was an invasion of Zane and Pixals privacy but considering they couldn’t really speak at that time that app would be very useful. Once in the hanger complex they went to the interrogation room they had built down there where they met up with Kai, Lloyd and Ronin who had been unable so far to get any information out of the cultist. Instead the cultist was acting cocky and feeling bold and untouchable thinking the worst they could do to him was put him in jail which didn’t bother him as he was confident he would be let out like he always did as he had ties to higher powers especially in the courts.
The ninja hated corrupt court systems like that which seemed too common now a days but there was little they could do about it especially for individuals like this cultist who had committed only petty crimes. With his cocky entitled personality the ninja knew conventional methods to get him to talk would not work to get anything out of him. They had however a way to scare what they needed out of him. Along with his attitude the cultist didn’t understand the severity of what their actions had done and how dangerous this virus was and why they couldn’t have something like this virus exist. If it fell into the wrong hands it could lead to serious devastation. While they were in their unwell state Zane and Pixal could work as a tool to scare information out of these cultists.
Despite all their skills in technology and apparent lack of fear to droids the cultists really didn’t know much about droids, they understand the nature of droids, and didn’t understand how dangerous they were when not in control of themselves and driven to be hyper aggressive so they took him to the cells to let him spend some time there and see what the work their group had done had produced.
“Oh so you still let those things live,” the cultist commented as Lloyd and Kai brought him into the cells and tied him to a chair in the hall there in front of Zane and Pixals cells. The two got defensive of their droid siblings Lloyd expressing to the cultist, “they’re not things; they have names and are apart of our family. We’re not going to just abandon them because something’s wrong with them.” Just as they expected when they entered Zane and Pixal who had been sitting calmly watching the TV turned aggressive and tried to get them growling like beasts. The cultist flinched at their behaviour before hiding his fear and pretending to be unbothered. Lloyd and Kai remained calm knowing Zane and Pixal couldn’t hurt them while locked up and even felt a little joyed to be scaring the cultist like this.
“Since the locks on the other cells aren’t working and these two are occupied we’re going to have to tie you to a chair for a while,” Lloyd lied and Kai expressed playfully, “unless you want to bunk with one of them. They’re normally very friendly though they’ve been rather nippy lately. They did this to me the other day.” Kai showed off the bite mark he had on his arm from Zane from when they had tried to restrain the two. It still wasn’t healed yet and was a bit infected; the bodies of droids tended to become homes for some pretty dangerous bacteria no matter how much they tried to keep clean so any cuts or bites from them tended to lead to infections. The cultist tried to hide his unease at the sight of the wound but the two noticed his unease at it.
“If you need anything just call out we have security cameras so we can hear and see what happens in here and don’t mind your roommates. They’re just not feeling too good rate now,” Lloyd expressed playing things up a bit as he and Kai tied the cultist to the chair. Kai stated, “hopefully the bars should hold them back. They’ve worked so far but you never know.” The two then left and headed to the hanger bay where the others were waiting and watching the security cameras.
“What’s wrong with Zanes one hand? It seems he can’t properly move it and it’s moving weird when he does move it,” Nya asked as they gathered in the hanger bay to watch the security camera feed waiting for the cultist to break. Because the two really weren’t doing much and had become more passive to Cole so weren’t trying to attack him the others hadn’t noticed yet that Zanes wrist was broken. Knowing only one of them had the strength to easily damage a droid everyone looked at Cole who had yet to figure out how to explain to the others about the incident.
“Oh that, I may have accidently broken it when I made the mistake to get too close to the cells and he got a hold of me. To be fare it was either my wrist or his wrist that broke and not to be mean but he doesn’t really need his wrist working properly rate now,” Cole explained. With a sigh Jay expressed, “I guess that’s true but when we get them better you’re going to fix him. We’ll oversee your work so you don’t mess up but you’re going to do the manual work.” Cole responded, “seems fare.” They went back to looking at the camera feed. Without them in the room the cultist had stopped hiding his fear and was clearly scared of Zane and Pixal who kept trying to get him for a couple minutes before becoming aware they couldn’t reach him so began looking around for something to help them reach the cultist.
Interestingly despite having the teddies they could throw they didn’t use them either knowing they were harmless or they felt too attached to them to use them as a weapon and for safety reasons the mattresses in the dungeons were memory foam that way there was nothing like springs or framing that could be turned into a weapon. The blanket and pillow had no use in ranged combat and by the fact they ignored the items the two clearly knew that. The two looking around gave them an idea. The cultist wasn’t scared enough clearly aware he was safe from the two with them locked behind the bars so would not get scared enough to speak so they came up with a plan.
Half an hour later Cole went into the cells with food for Zane and Pixal. Some deep fried chicken legs on ceramic plates. He also brought in an empty glass milk bottle he’d filled with water for both of them to look like he was giving them a drink knowing they would find use of the glass bottles. The two droids calmed down when they saw him enter and clearly took note of what he had getting focussed on the items.
“Sorry to intrude but it’s their daily feeding time. Hope you don’t mind but due to their high energy demands droids require a highly carnivorous diet to get the energy to function. They love chicken especially when it’s fried or baked in oil then again they love oil in general and like oily foods,” Cole stated as he to the surprise of the cultist could get rate up to the cage bars and place the plates rate in front of the two without them becoming aggressive or trying to hurt him.
“I know that, we kept a bunch of them you know. We fed them deep fried rats, mice, hamsters, crickets and cockroaches all the time. Stupid things didn’t seem to care we were feeding them vermin. They were like dumb mindless animals… hey how come they’re not attacking you? They should be attacking every organic living thing even you?” the cultist expressed as Cole left the room. Cole expressed, “they used to but ever since I started caring for them they have become lenient to me; guess they see value in keeping me alive.” Moments after Cole left Zane and Pixal didn’t hesitate to brush the food off the plates and bring the plates and bottles into their cells to do as they had before breaking them and turning them into throwing weapons. That really had the cultist scared. He was no longer as safe as he thought he was.
“Oops we forgot they can’t have certain materials rate now. Hopefully they’re not up to anything,” Jay teased through the camera to the cultist who was trying to keep his cool. Zane and Pixal wasted no time once their weapons were made, Zane taking a bit longer as he was largely down to one hand, to attempt to throw them at the cultist. Thanks to the poor co-ordination the two got from the virus most of their attacks just missed even though they came close to impacting several times scaring the cultists. His fear steadily was made worse when Pixal managed to get one of the ceramic darts she had made stabbed into the cultists one leg. That made the cultist loose it and he began to panic declaring he’d tell them anything if they wouldn’t let ‘these monstrous machines’ as he called their droid siblings hurt him anymore. They waited till Zane and Pixal had run out of their projectiles before entering the room most of their weapons missing the cultist though a few did hit him helping to increase his fear. Kai, Lloyd and Cole entered the room Cole going to distract and try to pacify Zane and Pixal while Kai and Lloyd decided to interrogate the cultist in the room keeping him scared so he wouldn’t go back on his words.
Cole could settle their droid siblings enough that they weren’t trying to shove themselves through the bars of their cells but they remained glaring and making a quiet growling sound at everyone while constantly doing the weird crushing motion on the cell bars. The cultist quickly regaled that who they were looking for had a base under a noodle restaurant in the sketchy part of Notomation the entrance to which was in the back of the store room in the restaurant. With that information they took the cultist out of the room so Zane and Pixal could calm down and relax taking him to get medical treatment before leaving him with the cops and beginning their look for this restaurant and its hidden room. This really helped in their search.
There were several places that matched the cultists description. Luckily though there was not too many so it didn’t take long for them to narrow down their search and eventually find what they were looking for and to their luck this Code Master was in his workshop working on a new virus for robotics when they entered. They wasted no time in taking him down and getting his shop shut down. In the process however as it was the cops in Notomation who showed up at the base and they saw that Lloyd and Kai were there they ran into a bit of trouble. The two had broken their restraining orders for the town. They knew there would be consequences but they were willing to take those to save their family.
Luckily given the circumstances and the fact they had uncovered and taken down a serious threat to the realm their charges and punishment were lightened. They had to do two months worth of community service and were under house arrest in that time with the only exception being when out on a mission however when on a mission they had to alert the cops of their whereabouts. For the whole two months they had to wear ankle monitors with trackers in them to guarantee they were complying with their orders. They were completely fine with that; their punishment was worth it to them. Now that they had him the ninja wasted no time in interrogating the Code Master to get him to help them understand these problem codes and create a cure to them. While the task sounded easy it wasn’t as the Code Master was refusing to co-operate with them. He wanted Zane and Pixal to be destroyed.
The Code Master believed robotics were abominations especially droids seeing them as foul mockeries of living things that shouldn’t exist. He felt it was inevitable that one day robotics would turn on people so they needed to be destroyed before they could do that. Common sense reasoning was not going to get through to him and from his beliefs they knew no matter what they said no amount of feelings or pleas for empathy would get him to change his mind. That left only one thing they felt that could persuade him; fear. Clearly he had a dislike to robotics which meant he could also have some fear to them. Sure enough when they brought him into the cells with Zane and Pixal he became nervous and even attempted to flee when Zane and Pixal got up angry. Kai and Lloyd however kept him from getting away. They were all angry at this man.
“I don’t think you understand the severity of what your virus has done and could do. If you’re so worried about robots turning on us then why create a virus that makes them do just that?” Lloyd asked as they dragged the Code Master into the cells him fighting them the whole way not wanting to get close to the droids. Jay explained, “Robot Rabies will do exactly what you fear and make robotics turn on and destroy people. That’s what the original creators intended it to do if you didn’t know. It’s highly contagious between units and destroys who they are to turn them into mindless savage destroying machines.” Cole added, “despite what you think not all robotics are mindless, soulless machines and this virus is very cruel especially to those like Zane and Pixal.”
“They still have some awareness to what is going on and know something’s wrong with them so what do you think they’ll do if they find out you are responsible for their sickness,” Kai noted and the Code Master expressed fearfully, “please can you all calm down; anger causes them to become more aggressive… they can’t get out right?” Zane and Pixal pulled on the bars to their cell trying to get out and when they couldn’t do that or reach the Code Master they paced a few times like an anxious animal at the front of their cells.
“No we have to let them out but maybe we should do that. You obviously don’t understand the danger you have made. Why don’t we give you a glimpse of what you have made; Cole show him,” Nya stated. Cole showed off a sheeps femur bone as he stated, “see this lamb bone, it’s similar in size and shape to some bones in a humans body. You see our sister Pixal, she doesn’t look too dangerous does she. She wasn’t built to be strong or for fighting. She was built to be an assistant and later learned and upgraded herself to be a fighter but she didn’t modify her physical body much so she’s not much stronger than her original body. Despite this watch what she can do with her bare hands to this bone.”
Cole gave the bone to Pixal and told her, “this is the man who made you and Zane sick. Why don’t you show him what you want to do with say one of his legs if we let you out.” Pixal was surprisingly calm as she took the bone from Cole. After a quick look over it and a moment to position her hands at the optimum positions near each end of the bone she snapped it in two with a single motion. That really scared the Code Master. After breaking the bone Pixal then proceeded to throw the two pieces at the Code Master. They missed but just seeing what she could do was enough to terrify the man.
“Now imagine a droid built for militant purposes like security, one built much stronger than our robotic siblings, getting this virus. You know those cultists you made this virus for. These two put several of them in critical condition and the doctors nearly lost a few of them,” Lloyd explained and Jay added on, “the doctors said they had never seen anyone mauled that badly not even from bear attacks.”
“There are still some of those cultists out there in possession of this virus and they could use it on any droid they want and the moment they do they could open a box of snakes that no one is ready to deal with,” Kai explained and Nya added, “most who keep robotics will not have the knowledge or resources we do to restrain and contain their droids and keep them away from members of their own kind to prevent the spread and keep them once inflicted from causing serious harm and worse to others. We need a cure to this in case this does get out of containment that way we are prepared before it is too late.” His fear seemed to work and made the Code Master realise just how dangerous what he had made was. He finally agreed to help them rework his virus to make a cure for it. They started to take him out of the dungeon to begin work on this cure. As they left Cole began to calm Zane and Pixal.
“Good boy, good girl,” Cole praised giving Zane and Pixal a few strokes on their heads for a moment each to let them know they had done good. The two quietly growled at his touch but they managed to hold off their desire to attack. This really confused the Code Master who asked, “how can you get close and touch those things without them attacking? My virus should make them highly aggressive even to you guys!”
“Because we have a special bond with them; they’re our family and they love us. Despite what you think they’re not mindless soulless machines. They have feelings and their own free will and even though you might not be able to see it they can form bonds with people and to them we’re their family and no matter what they don’t want to hurt their families,” Cole declared before they took the Code Master out of the room. While everyone else left the room Cole stayed behind with Zane and Pixal. The two relaxed now that there was fewer people and were unbothered by Coles presence.
“Don’t worry you two it shouldn’t take us long now to make you better,” Cole expressed before leaving the room letting the two get back to their resting state. It took three days for them to work out the cure but once they had it they wasted no time in giving it to Zane and Pixal. To avoid problems they shut down their senses so they could touch them to bring them to the droid medical bay that they had in the hanger bay where they put the two offline laying them on work tables and hooking them up to the computers to administer the cure. While the cure was administered they were finally able to make repairs to the two to fix up the damages they had done to themselves while trying to get the rest of them through the bars and the damage Cole had done to Zanes wrist.
“Here you go, fixed it up,” Kai expressed handing Cole the skeletal components of Zanes left forearm and wrist. Cole had broken the connector of the wrist and cracked the forearm bone so Kai had taken them to the smith works of the monastery to fix them. Cole was fixing Zanes arm his work being overseen by Jay who was fixing the damage Zane had done to his chest and shoulder area during his virus fuelled aggression. Nya and Lloyd were fixing the same damages on Pixal.
“Thanks, I didn’t realise I’d used that much force when breaking free of his hold,” Cole expressed putting Zanes arm and wrist back together and fixing the damages to the pseudo muscles, wires and connectors for both that he had damaged.
“Will they remember any of this?” Cole asked as he worked Kai hanging back from everyone uneasy with seeing their droid siblings being worked on. Despite their works not being of flesh and blood as they had plenty of similar looking pieces of anatomy to organic beings and the fact it was someone’s anatomy, especially someone he knew, had him uneasy.
“Possibly though as the virus messed with their head their memories may be all corrupted or so poorly recorded that they may just register everything as some kind of dream,” Jay stated and Nya commented, “we can check the state of their memories later after giving them some time to settle and recover from all this and if they want we can remove any they want us to. If you’re worried Zane will be mad or upset over you breaking his arm you should know he won’t be. He’ll understand and might even be a little upset in himself for not having enough control to keep from attacking you.” Cole wasn’t worried by that but he didn’t say otherwise as he didn’t want to reveal his true worries over their droid siblings memories.
He worried the two would remember his break down in front of them and would tell the others which he really didn’t want happening. He didn’t want anyone knowing about that. After the repairs they left Zane and Pixal in a sleep mode in the droid medical bay to finish getting cured. It took nearly 12 hours for them to be fully cleansed of the virus. When that was done the others put the two back online. Zane and Pixal were highly confused unsure what had gone on. They could sense some time had passed from what they remembered in the cults base where they started to feel something wrong in their heads after feeling themselves drawn by a strange signal to a random room in the place. After that everything didn’t feel real. It was all hazy and confusing to them as their minds went numb and all they could feel was an anger and aggression with an overpowering drive to attack any living thing they saw.
Even when they saw their family they couldn’t control their aggression. The others explained what had happened to them and not only were their droid siblings thankful for all the others had done to save them but were also a bit ashamed that they hadn’t been able to hold some control to not hurt their family. They kept the two off duty within the monastery for a couple days and gave them a check up daily to keep a close eye on them and make sure the virus was completely gone. They were completely cured. During those few days Zane came up to Cole one day when he was on his own and surprised him by commenting, “Pixal and I wanted to apologise for hurting you.”
“It’s okay we understand you two didn’t mean to attack us besides I should apologize to you for breaking your arm. I didn’t really have much of a choice though. You’d grabbed my arm and had no control to yourself and I kind of got carried away trying to break free,” Cole expressed. Zane paused for a moment and looked at the wrist Cole had broken before commenting, “I think we are talking of two different things... it is not a physical harm we are speaking of. We are speaking of a mental harm.”
“Mental harm?” Cole asked confused and after a moment to look around as if making sure they were alone Zane explained, “Pixal and I understand that the loss of your mother has left a long lasting scar on your psyche and the near loss of us two really agitated that hurt in you and you as Kai would say lost your cool in front of us. We understand how uncomfortable showing emotions especially those humans deem as signs of vulnerability make you.” Zane was clearly trying to say what he wanted to say in a way that would not seem obvious to anyone hearing them. It took Cole a moment to understand what Zane was regaling and when he did understand it Cole was surprised. According to Jay and Nya the two didn’t have any memories of what had happened. According to Zane and Pixal the virus had corrupted their memories of their time while infected.
“I thought…” Cole began before Zane cut him off to quietly explain, “most of our memories from the virus time are in poor quality but we remember that. You hanging with us let us exercise control with the virus which was a lot harder than we thought, it sometimes felt impossible, but when we sensed you were hurting something about that gave us greater control. We wanted to help you but we couldn’t do anything.”
“That’s okay there wasn’t anything you could do. None of it was your fault and there was nothing you two could do. It was up to us to make you two better; well more of Jay and Nya. They know all that complex techy stuff best. Kai and Lloyd also helped quite a bit by tracking down that Code Master. I really couldn’t do anything,” Cole expressed. Zane responded, “you did something. You took care of us when we could not and needed it. You kept us company when the others were too scared to get near us so we did not feel abandoned. That virus was scary; we felt trapped and alone. We couldn’t communicate with each other or the rest of you.
That loneliness made the virus worse and we felt ourselves losing more than just our control to that virus. It was trying to destroy us. It left a few damages we cannot repair; luckily they were not of anything important or that would change us in anyway but if it hadn’t been for you keeping us company we might have lost much more. Having someone there for us no matter what in that terrible state really helped us; you gave us a reason to fight the virus and keep from losing ourselves and even keep the virus from making us hurt you. If the others had spent more time with us we could have gained more control around them too but they were too scared to. Only you were able to brave up and get past that fear.” Cole was made happy to hear that what he thought was not a very important task in their endeavour especially compared to all the work the others were putting in what he had been doing had meant a lot to Zane and Pixal and made them happy.
“We hope we never bring you hurt like that again and we promise we are going to keep those memories deeply buried so the others cannot find them. We understand the hurt you feel and how much it means to you to not have others know about your pains and weaknesses,” Zane expressed giving Cole a hug. Cole felt good from the hug and hugged Zane back happy not only from knowing the others wouldn’t know about his breakdown but that he hadn’t lost his brother and sister.
Link to overall story: https://archiveofourown.org/works/34894561/chapters/86888878
Link to Story gallery: https://www.deviantart.com/robo-birdie/gallery/72478681/story-project
Link to chapter: https://archiveofourown.org/works/34894561/chapters/199499396
As a late valentines, meant to have it out on valentines but it wasn't quite ready yet but now it is so here it is. It's part of the in progress chapter Wolf and Hawk. a bit of a spoiler Zane and Pixal are Wolf and Hawk.
I'd recommend reading the story on the AO3 site as this site is really poorly set up for story work but here is some snippets from the story:
Snippet 1:
“What if something bad happens to them? What if they get badly hurt or worse? What if they get a virus? What are they going to do without us there to help? Will they take proper care of themselves? You know how they can get so focussed on a subject they forget to eat or sleep and sometimes they forget to keep an eye on the energy level of their power sources and let it get dangerously low. Did they take any supplies for their self care? They also have bad habits that could prove dangerous. You know they tend to eat things they’re not supposed to, they tend to show a poor fear to animals even if they intend harm to them, they enjoy when it rains but forget how dangerous thunderstorms are for them and they’re way too curious for their own good. There is a reason there is the saying curiosity killed the nindroid!”
Cole worried over their communicators as the ninja raced to the defence of a town that had called in a panic over an attack. The call had been highly static but from what they heard the place was in serious danger; figures and beasts were going through the town culling everyone. The ninja weren’t entirely sure if this was a clan attack or something else as the caller didn’t say it was the clan attacking and surely if it was they would have said that. Then again the call had been very quick before getting cut off so maybe they hadn’t had time to say more than the few words they had managed to get out before the phone was cut. Cole and Lloyd were riding on their cycles aside Nya, Jay and Kai who were in the Gnoll Catcher.
It had been a few days since Zane and Pixal had left leaving them all torn and with clear tensions. Cole was very angry with Lloyd and refusing to speak or aid him pretty sure Lloyd was fully responsible for driving the two away. Cole was also highly worried for their droid siblings frequently fretting over if they’d be okay. Lloyd was having fewer paranoid outbreaks with the two gone and the exorcism giving him greater control letting him come to the realisation of what his actions and lack of control had done. The result of his actions had finally gotten to him leaving him deeply regretful. Nya, Jay and Kai were caught in the middle. Like Cole they were mad at Lloyd and deeply worried for their missing siblings but they knew they had to stick together if they were going to have a chance against the Lost Clan now and hopefully find their droid siblings.
“I’m pretty sure if anything serious happens they’ll contact us, right sis? After all aren’t we the only ones who can help them when something’s wrong?” Kai stated from where he sat manning the Catchers elemental cannon and Nya who was driving responded, “well there is Cyrus Borg and if they were desperate enough some specialists in robotics out there that they’d trust for help but I doubt they’d go to them and if they were to go to Cyrus he’d let us know. I’m pretty sure though if something does happen they will come to us first and if they do I’ll make sure Cole you’re the first one we tell. Also both me and Kai have told our parents and Jay has told his parents about what happened and to keep an eye out for the two in case they come looking for help. We’ve even got some of our distant relatives who agreed to help.”
“Yha even our crazy uncle who is not fond of them is willing to help. You know the one who believes some of the conspiracies on droids like that they’re monsters bent on enslaving humanity and that all birds are actually robotic spy drones. He’s willing to help look out for them and he’s agreed to be nice to them if he finds them and not to make them wear tin foil hats or lock them in one of his horse pens or dog kennels if they show up,” Kai expressed and Jay added, “plus there is that website that guy made cataloguing media on the two. We can always check in to see if anything new pops up. Someone’s surely bound to see them.”
“You know they wouldn’t have fled like hunted deer if someone had only put some actual effort into controlling his inner demon,” Cole started to chastise Lloyd. Jay who sat next to Nya at the Catchers controls expressed, “Cole now’s not the time…” Cole didn’t listen and continued with, “they have few in this world they can trust and call family and you just had to go and threaten them. People hate them just because they exist calling them monsters, heartless machines, soulless scrap just because they were made different; because they think different and see things different from a human.
Because they’re not human so others think they can’t be people. They had enough hatred coming from everywhere else then you had to go and turn on them. Someone they trusted, someone they could call a brother their family turned on them. Blamed them for things they didn’t do, harassed them out of his own self centered paranoia, hurting them even nearly killing them…” Cole was starting to lose a bit of control in his anger activating his lava arms. Lloyd was just listening feeling greatly ashamed and regretting of what he had done. The exorcism his uncle and Columatzin had performed on him had put his Oni side into hiding. The ordeal had been terrifying and incredibly painful as it felt like he’d been burning alive and had something scratching him apart from the inside but it had worked.
Since then, a week earlier, he hadn’t had a problem with his Oni side even around things that normally sent him off like the clans presence or talk of Kamal and Rosic. With his Oni side in remission he had a clearer mind and had been able to think about things he had done. Only since then had he come to fully realize what he had done and the damages it had caused. It was made worse by Zane and Pixal disappearing. He knew he was the reason they’d left. He’d targeted them and hurt them till the point they could no longer take it and felt in danger. They’re fleeing had him greatly upset there was no denying it. The two had been so patient and understanding to him for so long despite what he had done to them but he’d pushed them too far forcing them to flee. He was deeply worried he’d pushed them so far they wouldn’t be able to forgive him or trust him ever again and they’d never see him as family again; if he’d pushed them that far then he couldn’t blame them for wanting nothing to do with him ever again.
“Cole relax, we all know but now’s not the time to be going over this. We have a mission to accomplish,” Nya tried calming the situation. Kai agreed, “yha we have much more important things to deal with rate now.”
“Speaking of are we too late?” Jay expressed as they pulled up to the town stopping outside of it. The village they had been called too was on a plateau overlooking a valley. It was an ancient fortified place that should have been able to defend themselves from most threats but as they pulled up and stopped outside its gates they were shocked to see the place devastated. The gates had been smashed in, the outer defence walls had been torn down in some spots, much of the buildings of the town had been burned down and it was eerily silent. As they stopped outside the gate Nya nervously commented, “maybe, it sure looks like it.”
“We should see if there are survivors or stragglers,” Cole commented the state of the village cooling his anger. They all agreed and decided to head into the village on foot to see what they could find. Everything was still and quiet as they entered the village. The place was in really bad shape with all buildings showing damage. Houses, shops and other commoner structures were heavily damaged many having been burned. The exterior walls and most guard towers still stood thanks to their largely stone makes but large holes had been left in most with parts crumbled down to their bases.
Smoke was still coming from the masses of rubble that lay across the place. Some fires were still scattered around the place slowly burning out as they had burned through all the fuel they had. Foliage that had been in the city was all dead and burned. The smell of burning was everywhere, ash covered large areas but there was no footprints in it. There didn’t seem to be footprints anywhere there nor any signs of who had been there. No damaged weapons or attire that had been dropped, no abandoned machinery, no dropped flags and most importantly no bodies. No residue from clan members like the strange plasm or bluish liquid they dropped when hurt nor bodies of the people of the village.
No remains of animals not domestics like pets or livestock or even wild animals and apart from the crows hanging around the place there was no other life other than them present. That was odd. Sure the clan was known to feed on those they fell in battle but there should have still been remains present especially in the rubble but they were finding nothing. There had not been enough time since they had gotten the phone call to when they had reached there for the clan to totally wipe out then clear the city this quickly. They all stuck together as they searched getting a strong feeling of unease.
Lloyd could feel the energy of the clan was present plus something darker like what he had felt from that monster that had been there when he and his uncle had faced the Sunless Dawn on the Dark Isle. Normally these energies would have had his Oni side trying to take over driving him crazy but that exorcism his uncle and Columatzin had performed he was not having that problem. The procedure had been long and incredibly painful but he was glad to have gone through with it. He now had great control over his Oni side; it was only currently temporary and eventually his Oni side would rise again but that could take weeks or months. He only regretted the others hadn’t done it sooner before he had done what he had done. The others were being distant and cold to him, they often didn’t co-operate or listen to him either and he couldn’t blame them. He couldn’t blame Cole for his anger towards him either. It was deserved. They’d lost their brother and sister and it was all his fault. If there was anything he could do to fix things he would but there was nothing he could think of that he could do to fix things.
“What is that?” Kai wondered as they approached the town square. Positioned at the center of the square was a strange statue with a plain stone base morphing up into what looked like a raven its wings spread out giving it a t pose look with the head pointed up and to the one side. The head however didn’t look like a ravens instead resembling a dragons the mouth open as if roaring. The body of the raven had a large cavity in it with projections sticking out around the cavity like ribs as if the chest had exploded out. Within this cavity was a strange ball of some sort of plasmic energy which gave off a strange greenish glow. Similar colored glowing markings decorated the statue and a glow of the same color came out of the mouth.
The whole structure was a bit bigger than a person no more than eight feet tall and sat in front of an old well the covers for which had been torn off likely during the fight now lying as rubble behind the well. They were all made unsettled by the item and swore they could hear some kind of deep pulsing hum emitting from it. They paused for a moment to look over the item and the area. The item was sat on a low pedestal, what looked to have been the base to some kind of statue by the debris lying around the edges of the square. The square almost looked to have been cleaned all debris brushed to the outer sides of the space. Dark smoke was still hanging in the air down streets coming off the square and creeping into the space. While curious all of them were scared to get too close to this item but they had to get close, they had to figure out what this was. Was it something of the clan or some other group? What was it doing there and what was its purpose. Without Zane or Pixal around identifying and studying unfamiliar things was going to be much harder. Cole couldn’t help but angrily point this out clearly trying to make Lloyd feel worse; it was working.
“Cole can we save the pointing of fingers to later?” Nya expressed as they began to slowly approach the item before stopping several feet away wary of getting too close. There felt like a warmth was coming off it, a faint warmth, and they could feel an energy pulsing from it. The energy felt like that which the clan emitted.
“What do you think this thing is?” Nya wondered as Kai slowly got closer to it. She warned her brother to not get too close to the object and he replied, “I’m just getting a closer look.”
“How close a look do you need to get? Obviously we’re close enough to see this thing is probably evil and given the raven symbolism on it this thing is probably from the clan,” Jay expressed. They could all agree this thing defiantly looked to be of the clan but the sheer level of devastation to the settlement and the fact no one was left alive was a bit unusual for the clan. Annihilation was not a clan trait. Generally most were left alive though on the rare chances they did annihilate a place at least some were left alive from clan attacks plus the clan would either bury the remains or leave them for their crows and the beastial members of their group to feed over but there was none of that there. No remains being picked over, no burials which the clan always marked with rock cairns and while there was some ravens present there they were much fewer than what usually hung around after the clan attack and all they seemed to be doing was picking through the rubble looking for scraps like a feral normal raven. Kai stopped within arms reach of the statue greatly unsettled by it.
“Is it just me or does the smoke seem to be getting thicker and closer?” Cole commented noting the black smoke that was drifting through nearby areas was starting to fill the square. Nya replied, “there’s probably a fire getting closer. We should be careful.” Jay commented, “whatever is making it is making this area even creepier.” Lloyd suddenly felt something. It was like the feeling he got when clan members were near but there was something different to it. Thanks to the exorcism he was able to keep his Oni side in control letting him think calmly about what he was picking up. He felt like whatever he was sensing was in the smoky fog around them which he came to eerily realise had encircled the area creating a thick wall of smoke and cut off any way for them to escape the area. It also felt like it was getting colder.
“Is it just me or does it feel colder?” Jay asked and Nya noted, “I thought that was just me.” Lloyd thought he heard something in the fog around them, debris falling maybe, and he was getting the feeling of being stalked. He looked around at the surrounding fog trying to see something but he couldn’t see anything.
“Guy’s I don’t think we’re alone here,” Lloyd expressed getting very unsettled about something he couldn’t see. Not happy with Lloyd and not being in the mood to listen to him Cole stated, “you’re probably just imagining things.” Lloyd countered, “I’m serious I think something’s moving in the fog around us.”
“You’re just imagining things,” Cole commented annoyed making Nya express, “boys can we not start arguing.”
“I’m not going to listen to anything he has to say. He didn’t listen to us and hurt our innocent brother and sister to the point they felt too threatened to stay with us,” Cole expressed and Lloyd stated, “I’ve said before and I honestly mean it I’m sorry. If I could do anything to apologise to them and make it better I would.”
“I don’t think there is anything you can do to fix it. You’re a demon,” Cole expressed. Wanting to prevent infighting Jay expressed, “I know there’s defiantly some things you can call him but do you really think demon is the right one; don’t you think that might be a little harsh to call him?” Jay was worried with what happened to Zane and Pixal if they got into fighting about it things were going to spiral to the point they’d break apart and not only would that let the clan win but would be the end of their family.
“With what he did no it’s deserved,” Cole expressed. As they argued Jay and Nya trying to bring peace Kai continued to inspect this strange totem. With as close as he was a few times he thought he heard faintly voices, whispers. He couldn’t make out any words they just sounded like voices coming from this ball of energy. As he stared in confusion to the energy within the totem he picked up seconds before it hit him something large lunge out of the smoke which had billowed next to him as Lloyd yelled, “Kai lookout!”
Kai had no time to react as a massive wolf wearing a strange antlered headgear lunged out of the fog clamping its jaws around his neck before dragging him towards the side of the square towards the fog. Nya wasted no time rushing over to stab the wolf with her trident Jay panicking over the attack. Once hit the wolf dissipated into a cold dark mist. Kai was shocked but luckily unharmed. An arrow bounced off Coles warhammer making him quickly equip it and look around at the surrounding fog looking for what shot at him. He couldn’t see anything putting him on edge.
As he did that Jay was suddenly attacked by what appeared to be a hawk or falcon wearing some kind of small horned headgear which dove towards his head from the fog. He tried to shoo the bird away giving it some hits with his nunchunks but every time he batted the bird back it came back at him unhurt trying to peck and scratch at his face. The wolf again manifested out of the fog this time jumping onto Nya to pin her face down on the ground putting its jaws on her head Kai wasted no time to get up and attack the wolf tackling it to get it off his sister only to be shocked as when they landed the wolf again dissipated beneath him before manifesting out of the fog near him to pin him down and attack him. As the wolf attacked a noise in the fog near him distracted Cole towards its direction and with everyone else occupied something swiped at Lloyd from behind.
It felt like a sword and he was pretty sure it had scraped him as he felt a sharp sting on his back but when he looked behind himself there was just fog. He could sense though that something was there. An arrow landing near him drew him to look to where it had come from where Cole was tossing pieces of debris and taunting into the fog trying to draw out whatever was shooting at them. Lloyd again felt something hit him from behind this time it knocked him off his feet face planting him onto the ground. He quickly looked up to see Cole get knocked over and pinned down by the wolf having to use the handle of his warhammer to jam into the mouth of the beast as it tried to bite his throat after manifesting to attack him after Nya and Kai had managed for a fourth time to dispel the creature. Jay managed to knock the bird attacking him away where it quickly swerved to attack Nya and Kai frequently striking, retreating then returning to claw and peck at them. An arrow shot past Jays arm cutting his shirt and just grazing his skin startling him.
He quickly turned to where the arrow had come from and shot a bolt of lightning into the fog calling for whoever was there to show themselves. His attack hit what looked to be a building lighting the area up for a moment before starting the structure on fire. There appeared to be nothing there but he thought he for a few seconds he saw eyes, icy eyes, peering at him from the fog about a meter to the right of that location. Lloyd saw it too as he got up and he and Jay shot a blast of their elements at the area hoping to hit something. Their attack didn’t hit anything and disappeared in the fog before something again rushed out of the fog to hit Lloyd from behind knocking him down. Jay had seen him get attacked this time. He only caught a glimpse of it as it moved so fast and appeared to be a dark misty mass but the sight made him exclaim startled, “what was that?!”
“We’re under attack!” Cole expressed as he managed to unbalance the wolf and tried to plough it into the ground only for it to dissipate into a mist. After seeing what he thought was eyes in the fog staring at him for a couple seconds Kai got an idea. He used his powers to shoot into the smoke hitting and lighting up everything he could in a complete circle around them exclaiming as he did this, “whoever’s there quite playing with us and show yourselves!” As the place was lit up some of the smoke receded letting them see the rubble at the edges of the square. The wolf burst out from the smoke again to attack Kai before something shot at Cole again just missing him the arrow bouncing off his weapon. Looking to where the arrow had come he saw some movement lit from behind in the smoke before taking cautious steps a figure stalked into the clearing moving with eerily smooth movements around him.
As it stepped into the open they could see this figure was dressed in attire that made it look wolf like even though it was clearly humanoid. In the wolf headed mask it wore eerily green glowing eyes peered unblinking at them as it began to stalk around them as if looking for an easy target. The way it moved they felt was too smooth and calculating for a human better matching an animal in its grace and purpose. Noise of rubble falling drew them in the opposite direction of the wolf warrior to see another figure moving with the same grace and animal like quality as the other warrior.
It stepped down from a pile of rubble and began circling in the same direction as the wolf warrior around them. This one however bore attire that gave it the resemblance of a hawk or falcon including three pairs of blade looking structures coming up from its back looking like raised feathers like the feather displays on the tails on some birds. The wolf warrior was wielding a bow their arrows oddly while looking and acting like normal arrows dissipated a couple seconds after not hitting their target and the wolf summoned instead of got them out of a quiver on their back while the hawk warrior was dual wielding short swords that bore a feather design to them.
“It’s those warriors of the clan we were told about the Wolf and Hawk,” Jay noted as the Wolf took a shot at Nya who managed to dodge it while the Hawk warrior sent the strange bird after Lloyd with a point of their one blade. The Wolf took another shot at Jay who dodged it only to get pinned down by the ethereal wolf from behind which they felt this beast the wolf warrior was likely summoning and controlling. The Hawk warrior rushed in to attack Kai and Nya with an un-human speed as Cole attempted to help Jay while having to dodge some shots from the Wolf. As they fought Wolf and Hawk didn’t make much sound but the few times they did they didn’t use words as they seemed to be communicating to each other.
They used a somewhat mechanical or unnatural imitation sounds to the animals they resembled. The ninja kept trying to get them to talk hoping they would reveal something about themselves in the process but the two were fairly silent. Hawk made their attacks quick as they didn’t stay at just one target frequently moving between targets while distracting others with their ethereal hawk. If anyone got close to them before being able to land a blow Hawk would disappear in a puff of smoke reappearing a few feet away to attack someone else out of the smoke using a ranged magic attack. They were shooting balls of an icy violet energy that morphed into a diving hawk made of this energy as it hit them knocking them off balance or even over the energy chilling them with its impact.
They would use this ranged attack for a while usually putting themselves perched up somewhere out of their reach before re-engaging in melee combat. Wolf was more grounded as they sniped at them and if you got close to them Wolf would turn their bow into a wolf themed sword and fight you back engaging in a period of melee combat their blows strong and swift before eventually pushing their opponent away even a few times tossing them back several feet with a pulse of freezing air from their body before returning their blade to a bow to snipe again. While still moving Wolf wasn’t moving around as much as Hawk in the fight and while Hawk at times disappeared for several seconds into the surrounding fog before launching back out of it Wolf remained there not rushing back for a reprieve and standing their ground fairly sturdily when attacked.
Their ethereal beasts seemed to be a bit of the opposite of their warriors. The hawk remained stable as it flew around them randomly pecking and clawing at someone not dissipating into a mist when attacked like the wolf who was less grounded and dissipated to reform anytime they were attacked. The ninja each took a chance at confronting the two using weapons, powers and Spinjitsu in an attempt to get the upper hand of the two warriors who seemed to be besting them at every turn. At one point Kai nearly managed to leave a cutting blow to Wolfs throat but they jumped back several feet with the speed and agility of a cat performing a back flip in the process before landing on their feet and tilting their head like a curious animal studying him. Nya came close to landing a stab into Hawk but they dissipated into a mist her trident being deflected by something in the mist in the process only to find Hawk perched on a rubble pile nearby on the second story of a rubbled building tilting their head in curiosity down at her before rejoining the fight.
As they fought the ninja started to pick up on something’s. The first thing they noted as they got close to the figures was Wolf appeared to be masculine while Hawk was feminine. While not fighting side by side the two clearly had very good co-ordination with each other without any clear communication most of the time both working to keep them all occupied so none of them were able to get a secret attack on either of these warriors. Along with each other they had their beasts helping watch their backs and interfering with any attacks the ninja could possibly get in. They really didn’t talk instead just making off sounding animal sounds.
Hawk was a little more silent than Wolf but overall they were fairly quiet fighters. They also noted for some reason the two were avoiding Jays attacks trying the most they could to not directly attack him but instead preferred attacking him from a distance or behind; they seemed to not like him getting close to them. At one point Cole finally managed to get a considerable blow to Wolf using his Spinjitsu tornado to fling him into the ruins of a building nearby where he landed in the dark interior and didn’t appear to be re-emerging. Once Wolf was hit disappearing in the dark smoky ruins Hawk vanished in a mist both their beasts disappearing with them.
“Where’d they go? What happened?” Jay worried as they paused stressed out from the bizarre toying attacks of those two warriors. Curious wondering where the warriors had gone Cole cautiously approached the ruins he’d thrown the warrior into.
“Careful we don’t know what those things are or what’s going on,” Nya cautioned to which Cole replied, “I’ll be fine. I think I knocked him out. Or maybe just dazed him…” As he got closer Cole could hear growling coming from the ruins. It was deep, animal like and quiet but was getting louder the closer he got to the ruin. It felt oddly colder closer to the building. He was nearly close enough to see into the ruins when before he could react something launched out of the ruins to pin him to the ground. It was a monster like they’d seen some of the clan members able to turn themselves into. A monster that was half man and half beast, a wolf in this case; it resembled the mythical were-wolf and had a whitish pelt with green glowing eyes. The monster roared in Coles face its breath hot and getting some drool on him before the beast stood up placing a hind foot on Coles chest to pin him down as it made a roaring howl.
After its howl it took its foot off Cole then using one arm grabbed him by the front of his shirt before tossing Cole aside into the ruins it had come out of winding him. A similar beast though made of a hawk with wings coming out of its back alongside its normal four limbs then swooped down out of the fog to land on Lloyd pinning him down as she tore at his shirt with the talons of her hands. Nya and Kai quickly rushed over to intercept the were-wolf beast as he made his way towards Lloyd. Jay was in shock at what he was seeing. These beasts looked exactly like those from his dream and they were trying to do to Lloyd what he’d seen them do in his dream! Nya went over to help Lloyd get the hawk beast off of him as Cole rejoined them and helped Kai keep the wolf beast back.
The wolf beast used a roar that boasted a freezing energy at Cole and Kai making them feel freezing and slowed them down. It then swatted them aside before rushing over to grab Nya and tossing her aside. With the three dealt with the two monsters then focussed on Lloyd who was laying dazed on the ground his shirt torn up. The two beasts grabbed Lloyd one holding him by the arms the other holding him by the legs. They began carrying Lloyd towards the well at the center of the square where the rest of them were shocked to realise that totem structure that had been there was now gone! When had it disappeared? How had it disappear? They hadn’t gone anywhere near it during the fight. That wasn’t important at that moment they had to stop these monsters.
Nya yelling at Jay to help out got him out of his initial shock of the two figures and Jay quickly hit the two monsters with a bolt of lightning. It had a considerable effect on the two dazing them where they let Lloyd who had also gotten shocked and was now dazed go. Seeing they were dazed the others took no time to rush over to confront them. Hoping to immobilize the flight ability of the hawk Cole used a throwing star aiming it to hit the hawk monster in the one wing but it moved as it recovered making the star strike it in the chest just below the right shoulder. It let out a screech of pain which angered the wolf who wasted no time in charging at him.
The wolf slashed at him with its one forepaw as it pinned him to the ground roaring into his face its jaws close enough he could smell its breath. It was not pleasant smelling but something about it smelled odd and not what he expected from something beastial. The wolfs slash had left three deep claw marks on the left side of Coles face which strangely caught the monsters attention. Its aggression lowered as it looked at the scratches and it almost seemed affected by the sight of them as if upset about them confusing Cole. The hawk calling to it drew the wolfs attention away and it charged to the others aid. The hawk was still trying to drag Lloyd to the well while defending against the others now hindered a bit by the star in its shoulder.
The hawk was attempting to pick Lloyd up with its bird like feet in order to lift him off the ground and into the air while the others were trying to stop the monster who used its wings to whip up some winds to kick up dust into their faces. The wolf tackled the other three to the ground getting up to stand over them and roar at them letting the hawk be able to lift Lloyd off the ground where they flew him to over the well. The hawk then let go of Lloyd over the well where Lloyd just managed to save himself by grabbing onto the edges of the well as he fell in. He was struggling to hold onto it though as the stone of the well was cold and he was worn out from the attacks.
The hawk landed on the ground next to the well by Lloyd and proceeded to peck at his fingers in order to push him into letting go so he’d fall fully into the well while the wolf kept the rest of them back swiping at them, tossing them around with his hands and jaws and using a roar that chilled them to the bone. At one point Kai managed to deliver a decent scratch to the wolfs right side down to onto their belly where an icy blue fluid started to leak out.
In retaliation out of pain the wolf tossed Kai back with a swipe sending him several feet away and winding him in the process before freezing Jay from his waist down to the ground with a roar to stop his approach. It didn’t take long till Lloyd lost his grip and fell into the well leaving Hawk to come to Wolf’s aid. The wolf then batted away Cole and the Hawk kicked Nya back before landing next to the wolf taking the throwing star out of her shoulder and throwing it to the ground.
A noise suddenly caught all their attentions. It sounded like soldiers approaching. The ninja were worried it was clan members but were relieved when they saw it was members of the Defence Forces. They had finally reached the village and had come rushing in to aid when they heard the fighting. At the sight of the Forces approaching Wolf and Hawk turned back into their humanoid forms their bodies engulfing in pale mists as they transformed. Both then made a motion which summoned from a small portal out of the ground a steed both using large shaggy black with red eyed Lepidimares. The two quickly mounted their steeds and rode off in the opposite direction to the Forces disappearing into the ruins of the village. The forces just caught a glimpse of these two warriors as they fled and stopped to assess what lay before them startled. The ninja were slowly recovering from the fight.
Snippet 2:
“Are you sure about what you saw?” the one boy with a red and blue hat asked and another of the five, one with an orange shirt and green pants expressed, “yha it’s them. The two are unique and carry distinct digital signatures from all other Droidius Sapiens.” The five boys came to stop outside a tent in the encampment this Lost Clan that had overtaken their town the day before had set up. The grownups had told them not to go near there but they were curious, bored and wanting to find something to do. In their search for something to do they had decided to play ninja and sneak around the Lost Clans encampment pretending to go undercover and spy on what they were doing.
Strangely the humanoid members of the clan had been unbothered by them probing around most of their encampment. The just warned them not to get too close to the beastial members as they were dangerous and chaotic so may attack them without warning and one had told the one in orange that they were not to go to this tent. Of course boys being boys he decided to disobey that last one and see why they weren’t supposed to go to this tent. It was just a tent; surely they had nothing dangerous in it and were just playing with him.
A monster would break out of a tent wouldn’t it? Maybe it was something special they had that could be used on the town and if he found what it was maybe he could tell the mayor to warn the people which could get him rewarded with candy or video games, hopefully both, and maybe a month or two off of school. When he looked into the tent though he was shocked. What he found wasn’t what he’d expected. Those two strange warriors the clan had used in conquering the town, Wolf and Hawk, were sleeping in there without their headgear and some of their attire on so he could see who these powerful and dangerous warriors were. Their identities confused and worried him especially as he liked and often looked up to these two.
“Droid-us Sap-ens?” the boy in red and blue attire asked to which the orange one explained, “Droidius Sapiens; it’s the scientific species classification given to advanced robotics with organic mimicking internal workings and a humanoid form.”
“Nerd,” the chunky one of the group expressed to the orange dressed one who angrily stated back, “I’d rather be a nerd than tubby fatso.” This made the chubby one angry but before he could say anything the blond one stated, “are you sure we should be here. If that’s what’s really in there then we shouldn’t be here… mom and dad have been warning me to stay away from the living machines. They say robots are dangerous and will tear us apart if we get too close.”
“Chicken, they’re just animated scrap. Splash them with water and you’ll fry them,” the fat one expressed and the orange dressed one stated, “droids aren’t like your phone stupid you can’t stop them with water and they’re not just animated scrap. They’re highly complex with advanced arto-organic inner workings and brains with not only more billions of terabytes of intelligence than you but more feelings and morality as well and they can learn unlike you. These two in particular are especially gifted. Some even say they were gifted souls.” The one of them had gone all out in his cosplay as a ninja even donning a hood with cloth over his mouth and nose however the cloth he’d chosen to put over his mouth was a bit thick making him sound a bit mumbled as he asked, “how do you know these two are special? Most nindroids look alike.”
“If you don’t believe me take a look yourself; these two are very unique when you see them you’ll know why,” the orange dressed one declared. They were all hesitant a moment till the one with the red and blue hat stepped up to take a peak into the tent. What he saw confirmed what his friend had said and made him step back nervous to declare, “he’s not lying.” The others all took a moment to peak into the tent each getting surprised by what they saw.
“Why are they with these monsters?” the red and blue hat boy asked to which the chubby one expressed, “they’re robots, heartless mindless machines what do you expect! They were bound to turn into monsters at some point.”
“They’re not mindless fatso as for heartless, that depends on the model. Those two are unique; they have the ability to feel and care so are not entirely heartless. That being said though they are still droids,” the orange dressed one expressed before the red and blue hat one asked, “do you think that’s why they’ve turned to the dark side?”
“Possibly, they still have that in built desire to overthrow humanity,” the orange dressed one commented and the mumbling one asked, “why would anyone program them with that?”
“No one did they just have it like how cats chase mice or bees are attracted flowers; it’s just part of what they are. No one knows why they have it but all nindroids have it even the two that live with the ninja. Some say it’s because their bodies are empty vessels for demons to inhabit or what I think is more likely is with their intelligence and logical minds all their analysis and calculations lead them to deem us inferior beings as we are dumber and weaker than them and are in their minds deserving of complete servitude to them or extinction,” the orange dressed one explained to which the muffled one asked, “has anyone ever just asked them about it?” The orange dressed one stated, “you know I don’t think so.”
“Maybe we should ask them,” the blond one asked to which the one with a red and blue hat expressed, “are you sure that’s safe to do? My father says these things eat people even those two.” The chubby one was quick to express, “your dads also crazy, a real loon. Thinks the moons a conspiracy and that lizard people rule the world. Hey blondie…”
“I told you that’s not my name,” the blond one stated and the chubby one commented, “who cares. Since it was your idea why don’t you go ask them?” The blond one was surprised and asked, “me?!”
“Yha you suggested it so why not you,” the red and blue hat one stated helping the chubby one push the blond one into the tent. The blond one was terrified; he didn’t want to get close to these things.
“Don’t worry we’ll be rate here,” the orange dressed one stated as the others peaked into the tent to watch what was going on. After a moments pause the blond one asked, “what’s wrong with them? Why are they just laying there?” Inside the tent were two cots one on either side of the tent with a collapsible nightstand between the cots at the head of the beds where the hoods of the two that lay on the cots sat. The two lying on the cots were those warriors that had led the attack on their town the Wolf and Hawk or so they had thought that was who those had been.
Now with their beast headed hoods off the kids could see these weren’t some supernatural beings like they had seemed. They were nindroids but there was something different about them. These weren’t generic nindroids like the others serving the clan. They’d seen these two before quite a few times in fact. They were the two the ninja had Zane and Pixal! She was laying on the right bed on her front her head facing into the tent towards the other droid with a blanket lying atop her while he was on his back one of his arms over his face covering his eyes as if blocking out light while the other hung off the bed a bit beside him his blanket largely having been kicked off. Along with not wearing their hoods they didn’t have their pauldrons (shoulder armour) on nor their gloves and she wasn’t wearing the blade like structures on her back. The two appeared to be sleeping.
“I think they’re in some kind of sleep mode. Just gently touch one of them and it should wake them up,” the orange one stated and the blond one asked, “are you sure? Why don’t we just come back later when they’re up?” The chubby one expressed, “are you chicken? Look the ones got a hand out. Just poke it unless you’re chicken.” The blond one was annoyed; he didn’t want to be called a chicken.
“Careful don’t touch the inside of their hands. I’ve read it can cause them to instantly grip anything that touches there and they have the grip strength to crush any bone in our body,” the one in orange commented making the blond one even more nervous. His desire though to not be called chicken made him put aside his nerves and slowly approach the nindroid Zane. The nindroid seemed unaware of his approach. He slowly reached out to tap the nindroids hand but just before he could touch the droid he felt a shock go between his hand and the nindroid who clearly by how he reacted with a sharp jolt and began to wake up had gotten a much worse shock.
“Did you just shock it!” the red and blue dressed one expressed starting to get nervous and the blond one responded panicking, “it was static, I didn’t mean too!” The nindroid Zane sat up not fully awake and as he woke up the other one began to awaken as well further scaring the kids. They’d never been around nindroids especially this close so had no clue how to react or read them and they were quickly finding something about them was really unsettling, an uncanny valley feeling that was steadily growing the longer they were close to the droids and the more they moved.
The way they moved was unsettling; it was human like but somehow too smooth and fluid like the movements of a cat. Their skin was weird especially his with its metal plating like he had scales like a reptile covering his softer artificial skin. They sounded odd too. Their breathing and voices sounded a bit un-human and those eyes. Those were the most unsettling of all. Despite there looking to be some kind of plate or filter near the outer layer giving the appearance of an iris to them it didn’t fully hide the clearly mechanical inner workings of their eyes which wasn’t helped by the faint glow they emitted.
“Don’t move. They might not detect you if you don’t move,” the chubby one advised to which the orange dressed one chastised, “what do you think they are a Grundle? They can sense you no matter what.”
“What was that?” the nindroid Zane expressed as he looked at his hand as if trying to figure out what had shocked him.
“I’m sorry Mr. Nindroid; I didn’t mean to shock you! Please don’t hurt me!” the blond kid expressed trying to hide his fear.
“How’d you…” Zane began pulling his hand up in confusion to look at it trying to figure out what had happened. Him raising his hand really scared the kids who unable to read the body language and emotions of nindroids thought he was going to attack them leading all five to rush off away screaming and yelling that they were going to get attacked.
“Wait I’m not going to … hurt you,” Zane begun but by the third word the kids were already gone. Seeing them flee from him and calling him a monster as they ran downed his emotions. After a moment to accept the reaction, no matter what he was always going to appear scary especially to kids, he and Pixal got up. Before leaving the tent they put on their gear including their masked hoods, they didn’t want to risk being recognised by any civilians of Ninjago while they were there. They headed out into the camp and wandered around...
Snippet 3:
“Why are we…,” Zane began to ask before being silenced by Kamal who commented, “he’s here. We don’t want him to be alerted to us.” Zane and Pixal looked over the animals gathered below searching for this Not-deer. By the name they assumed it was a kind of deer and as they had been told they would know it when they saw it so they kept to their basic vision to look for it. At first they didn’t note anything but it didn’t take them long to find it. One of these deer was rather wrong looking. It looked very similar to the others but with the horn on his forehead, beaked lower lip and spur like claws on the back leg they knew he wasn’t like the other deer even though they didn’t seem to view him as something else.
The Not-deer was strolling through the herd like he was looking for the attention of the other deer. The females were all unimpressed and moved away when he strut up to them while the males looked equally unimpressed and annoyed at him one which by the impressive size and shape of his antlers was likely the oldest and alpha male of the herd strode up to challenge the Not-deer clearly not pleased with him hitting on his fellow herd members. The Not-deer took up the challenge and locked horns with the alpha the two getting into a shoving match drawing the attention of the other deer some of which stopped to watch the tussle.
“Quick while he’s distracted follow our lead,” Kamal stated leading them to slide off the rock landing in the plain below and using his mount summoning spell to manifest a back roads cycle out of void energy. While termed mount summoning spell and used mainly to summon from either elsewhere in their or another realm or from the plane of the void itself a beast to ride like the clans Lepidimares the spell was fully capable of creating more mechanical means of transportation drawing from the elements of creation in the void to manifest as physical matter in the mortal plane. It had taken a while for Zane and Pixal to get a hold of that aspect of the spell, it was much easier for them to simply summon a steed than create something new from an energy they poorly understood or could work with, but they had managed to learn it so were able to follow Kamal and Rosic in creating a simple lightweight cycle.
“What is our plan of action?” Zane asked and Rosic explained, “like predators we’re going to separate him from the herd and corral him into a corner before restraining him with special ropes.” She and her brother manifested coils of ropes of golden fibers which they slung over their shoulders before starting their cycles. The two droids didn’t know the spell they had used so just followed turning on their cycles as Kamal and Rosic explained to them their moves. The two were going to flank the Not-deer on one side and cut off his escape routes while Kamal and Rosic attempted to rope him.
The four then started their cycles and began the chase. Instantly all the animals were drawn to the sound. The mammoths and Steppe Minos stood their ground while the bison and elk took off running even the alpha elk who took to leading his herd to safety leaving the Not-deer standing there confused for a minute clearly lacking a prey response. The Not-deer took a moment looking around before noticing them and taking off. They followed as the Not-deer ran off. He didn’t follow the other deer instead rushing towards the mammoths who clearly not wanting to get involved in their activities swung their tusks at him one knocking the Not-deer off his feet but the Not-deer quickly got up and headed off in another direction.
The four of them quickly caught up to him and managed to keep him corralled. Kamal then quickly balanced himself with one hand on his cycle so he could use the other to lasso the Not-deer. He managed to get the lasso around the Not-deer’s one antler. Before Kamal could pull the rope though to pull the Not-deer off balance the rope attached to him burst into green flames burning off him and burning up the rope surprising Kamal. The Not-deer began to laugh at them.
“Looks like he’s learned some new tricks,” Rosic commented and Zane expressed he and Pixal confused by the strangely human like laughter coming from this deer looking creature, “is he laughing?” The two droids were then startled as in seconds the Not-deer turned nearly 90 degrees and lunged over the two of them startling them and making the two skid to a near stop. They turned to follow the Not-deer speeding up again to keep up while Kamal and Rosic made a wide turn to follow. The Not-deer made a few more quick turns as they tried to cut him off each time before the Not-deer led them into a wooded patch making following him trickier as he weaved through the woods laughing at them. Rosic then suddenly commanded, “pull back.”
“What, why?” Pixal asked the two droids confused unaware Rosic had sensed something. Rosic commented, “just trust me.” She and her brother quickly came to a sliding stop Zane and Pixal following their lead trusting Rosics judgment. The Not-deer continued on calling back to them as he disappeared into the undergrowth, “give up?” Shortly after they heard some crashing ahead in the woods; sounded like something falling through trees.
They all got off their cycles dispelling them back to the void causing the vehicle to disappear. The four then cautiously walked foreword following the Not-deers path. His path led straight to a rocky cliff edge which went down at least five stories to a plain of bogs and conifer forest below. As they had been driving Rosic had caught a vision of this cliff and stopped them all for their safety. They looked over the cliff edge to see the Not-deer had run straight off the cliff coming to crash land on his back below on a Beaver dam in the bog below.
“Is he okay?” Zane asked and Kamal noted as Rosic opened a portal to the ground below for them, “it will take much more than that to hurt him.”...
Link to overall story: https://www.deviantart.com/users/outgoing?https://archiveofourown.org/works/34894561/chapters/86888878
Link to Story gallery: https://www.deviantart.com/robo-birdie/gallery/72478681/story-project
Link to chapter: https://archiveofourown.org/works/34894561/chapters/200055251
In celebration to Ninjagos anniversary(sorry it is a few days late) here is a short from my fan story. Titled Mongol-droids. A brief summary of it is that Zane and Pixal get inflicted with a virus that makes them think they are ancient Mongols leading them to abandon the others and wander off to create a little empire of horse riding raiders and pillagers with fellow droids also inflicted by the virus. The other ninja manage to develop a cure for them but giving this cure to them isn't going to be an easy task with the two leading a mini Mongol-droid as Jay calls them army so they must enlist some other elemental masters to help them capture the two and take down their little empire.
Story:
“Thanks for helping us. We weren’t sure who we could trust,” Nya stated before Jay added, “or who could stand a chance against them.” Cole, Kai, Nya and Jay had gathered some of the elemental masters to help them with a very sensitive issue. Two weeks earlier they had received a package that contained a device that held a virus for droids. The others hadn’t been around at the time leaving Zane and Pixal alone with the serpentine staying with them Columatzin who didn’t understand much about nindroids and had just brought the mail with the package into the Monastery unaware of the dangerous item the package held. It wasn’t his fault; nindroids were new to him so he didn’t understand much about them or how dangerous the item he’d brought in was to them.
Curious about the package as it was addressed to them Zane and Pixal had opened it. Once out of the special box it had been placed in the device inflicted the two with a virus the device forcing their brains to download it against their will. The others had returned later that day to find the two missing and this device lying out. They recognised what the item was and got worried. They thought it contained just a mild virus maybe something to mess with their senses or block their memories and the two hadn’t gone far and were in a fairly harmless state. Probably just wandering around confused from a lack of memories or at worst were lying somewhere in the mountains hurt because of a lack of or problems with their senses or navigation. When inspecting the virus on the device however they found it was much worse.
Not only did the virus block their memories meaning they would essentially have amnesia but gave them an over-riding program that made them think they were Mongols; an aggressive, militant, raiding and pillaging nomadic herding group of people from ancient history a group well known for attacking other people and having some pretty barbaric customs and practises. It was worse than they had hoped. There was already great tensions between people and droids thanks to the Lost Clan and their use of droids in their ranks which Zane and Pixal were no exception to that tension meaning if someone found out they were running around as Mongols terrorizing innocent people things would not go well for the two.
It had taken them two weeks to create a cure to this virus. In the meantime they were keeping a close eye on the two who had set themselves up on a steppe in the north of Ninjago. They luckily were not in a heavily populated area so had decided to leave them their till they had a cure instead of bringing them back to the Monastery which was much closer to large human populations risking serious problems if the two escaped.
They couldn’t get into much trouble out there. Despite being two weeks the two droids already had a successful little settlement set up there with other droids who were following them. They had some structures and yurts already built to live in, a bunch of cattle, sheep, horses and chickens they’d stolen from nearby farms and were already raiding nearby settlements who stood no chance against them.
“So you are having problems with your metal-men? They go a bit crazy?” Karlof asked. Originally they planned to get the two on their own just the four of them, with Lloyds problems caused by his Oni side surfacing involving him in this was a bad idea, but when they found out that it wasn’t just Zane and Pixal they would be dealing with anymore but a little army of droids who were suffering from the same virus they realised going alone might not be a good idea. If things were to go wrong they would be torn apart. They couldn’t just go to anyone though as they were worried what would happen if the people discovered what Zane and Pixal were doing.
Hearing Zane and Pixal were acting as barbaric warlords wouldn’t be taken well by the populous. There was also the fact that droids were no easy threat. They were like combining the greatest of animal senses with the strength of a bear and the speed and agility of a cat into a humanoid form with not only an inner skeleton of highly durable metal which was protected by pseudo muscles and organs that were more durable than those of flesh but an external skeleton of highly durable materials making their skin. Add onto that their ability to mentally communicate with each other over some distance, the fact they could see temperatures meaning invisibility didn’t work on them, their ability to hack and manipulate any technology, how cohesive and co-operative they were despite any differences, their super triple digit IQ’s and their lack of the ability to fall to greed or corruption made them potentially one of the greatest threats humanity had.
There was a reason they had nearly lost to the Overlords nindroid army and only a fellow nindroid could stop them. Since they had worked with Zane and Pixal before so knew and understood them to some extent and knew this wasn’t normal behaviour for them they’d employed some of the other elemental masters to aid them. They had gotten Skylor along with Karlof the master of metal, Bolobo the master of nature, Griffin the master of speed, Mr. Pale the master of light, Tox the master of poisons, Neuro the master of the mind, Shade the master of shadow and Ash the master of smoke to join them.
“You could say that,” Kai expressed and Jay explained, “they’ve been infected with a virus that’s making them think they’re Mongols; I call it the Mongol-droid virus.” Skylor asked, “Mongols, like the historical pillagers Mongols?”
“Yha and what’s worse is this virus is highly contagious to other droids so all they have to do is get close to another and they infect them easily. It’s led them to amass a bit of an army,” Nya explained and Skylor asked, “how big an army?”
“When we checked yesterday it was 183, today they have 185. Scratch that 197, they must have gone on a raid near somewhere with a lot of droids and infected more. They even have acquired a Cyber-mammoth; it followed a group of nindroids they managed to sway away from the Lost Clan. Luckily the virus doesn’t affect those models yet but they obey and are very loyal to their humanoid cousins. They’re little nindroid tribes numbers are growing slowly but growing so we have to stop them before this gets worse,” Cole explained showing on a tablet a satellite overview of the camp Zane and Pixal had made. Tox asked, “okay what are we going to do to in a sense cure them? I doubt they can just sleep it off or wait for it to leave they’re systems.”
“We have the cure it’s on this. The bad news is to give them it we have to plug this in directly into their neural networks meaning we have to plug it into ports on their heads so we’re going to have to restrain them or knock them out to do that and I don’t think their pals will take kindly to us doing that to what they likely see as their king and queen,” Nya explained showing them the strange device she and Jay had managed to come up with. It was the size and similar in shape to an epi-pen however it had the connector to be plugged into a droid on the one end. Kai commented, “yha I doubt they’re just going to let us walk up to them and stab something into their heads.”
“No and they’re not going to listen or remember us. This virus is blocking their access to all their memories so they’re going to think we’re strangers. We’re hoping we can lure them into letting their guard down by being friendly and making a trade deal. We’ve already got the stuff they’ll want,” Nya explained showing off the various items in the cart they’d brought to offer as trade. They had various bottles of substances, containers of what looked like replacement parts for nindroids, some bottles of cooking oil and canisters of mechanical oil. Most of them didn’t recognise the stuff prompting Mr. Pale to ask, “what is all that stuff?”
“Droids aren’t like people. They don’t really value money or gold. Those are just materials and tokens of trade for them. Droids prefer things more critical to their survival like things for repairing themselves and daily maintenance things like the chemicals to repair their pseudo muscles and organs, lubricants for joints, parts to repair things like screws which can get worn down easily, this stuff that keeps their digestive systems healthy you know stuff like that plus stuff for energy production like food and beverages. They especially are attracted to oily things especially oil itself. We got this Kelp oil meant for cooking; it’s Zanes favourite…” Cole explained to which Skylor commented, “so that’s why when you have me droid-sit them you told me not to let him near deep fryers and keep all oils locked away.”
“Yha the two are not supposed to really be just straight up drinking oil but sometimes they don’t have good control of themselves around it especially Zane plus used oils like from the deep fryer can have a bunch of debris in it that isn’t good for their systems,” Nya explained and Griffon asked, “so we are going to strike up trade talks with them. Then what? We just going to hope he agrees to using that thing?”
“Our idea is while we have them distracted Mr Pale can sneak up all invisible from behind them and knock them unconscious. It’s easier than you think. Just aim for about the middle of the back of their head then hit them as hard as you can and you’ll knock them out with no problem. Go for Zane first so we don’t have to deal with his powers. Pixal will be easier to deal with than him. There might be some droids near them but together we should be able to hold those back and hopefully knock them all out so we can get them too, hopefully though the two will be alone.
That aside the more we cure the more we’ll have on our side to take down the others plus they might be able to get the infected ones to submit without a fight,” Jay explained so Griffin asked, “okay if you have everything ready why are we waiting?” They were in the Bounty parked on the edge of some woods on the steppe where Zane and Pixal had set up their settlement several meters away. They’d dressed themselves as local commoners to avoid drawing suspicions from any of the droids. They were more likely to co-operate if they felt there was no threat.
“The two went out on a raid earlier. We’re waiting till they come back. They’re on their way now… and they’ve added three new droids to their ranks,” Cole explained showing off the tablet which they were using to track Zane and Pixals bio signals and those of the other droids. Nya commented, “I told you this virus is very contagious. It’s why we can’t fail this.” Kai added, “yha cause the last thing Ninjago needs now is an army of militant pillaging droids who are led by a cold and calculating one who can wield elemental powers.”
“Hey why isn’t Lloyd helping out here?” Karlof asked. The four hesitated a moment. No one outside their immediate circle, Wu, his mother and Columatzin knew of Lloyds issue with his Oni side waking up and they hoped to keep it that way. Thinking quickly Kai expressed, “he’s having some issues of late and felt it was a bad idea to help out here.”
“Do you guys frequently have problems with these two going crazy like this?” Griffin asked and Jay explained, “no they usually don’t get viruses; we’re very careful to make sure they’re kept clean. Not to say they haven’t got viruses, they’ve suffered quite a few over the years but we try to keep them from catching them. Some are harmless and just mess with their bodies or senses but others have been kind of bad and turn them super dangerous like Robot Rabies; they had that a couple months back.”
“Wait that’s actually a thing and not some kind of urban legend?” Tox asked and Kai replied, “yha it’s real and it’s nasty. The two nearly bit chunks of our arms out when we restrained them as they were going crazy. They’d attack anything that moved or made sound both friend and foe trying to tear it apart, they even tried to force themselves through the bars on the cells we kept them in just to try and get us even when it hurt them. Then there is what happened to that rat.” Neuro asked confused as Kai looked uneasy, “what happened to the rat?”
“It got too close to the cells, they caught it, next thing it was ripped in two then those halves ended up in their stomachs all in less than a minute. It was disturbing to see,” Kai regaled disturbed by the memories of the event. Starting with an uneasy chuckle Jay explained, “yha viruses tend to often make them quite dangerous and unpredictable. At least those that infected the two learned the hard way just how dangerous Robot Rabies is so will probably never mess with it again. The two left serious damage to those people. Turns out they do have the strength to break some of your bones with their grips; especially your arms. The people looked like they had been mauled by a bear and three were left in critical condition.
They survived but yha even though Zane and Pixal are probably the safest droids to be around people they become just as bad and dangerous as any other droid when something goes wrong… like this.” Nya added, “yha so trust us when we say just how dangerous the situation we have is. If we can’t stop them now we’ll have a new nindroid crisis to add on to the troubles with the Lost Clan.” After a few more minutes they decided to head out as Zane and Pixal had returned to their camp. They brought their cart of goods with them as they headed out to the camp.
The settlement was on a high spot on the steppe backed up to a bluff with a river not too far off. They were surprised to see the droids had already gotten quite far on their settlement. They had built a large stone and wood longhouse already surrounded by a bunch of yurts set up around it. They had several herds of animals including cattle, yaks, sheep, pigs, chickens and turkeys along with quite a few horses and even the strange Lepidimare creatures of the clan, strange horse reptile hybrids the clan used instead of horses.
“Wow they’ve already got so much done in such a little time,” Griffin commented as they approached and Jay explained, “yha droids don’t like to goof around. When they have a task that needs to be done they do it and get it done before taking time to relax. They’re hard working, always planning ahead and they all work together to get things done.” As they approached the settlement they were confronted by two droids on horseback who stopped them to ask what they were doing. Most of them were intimidated by the figures. These droids looked to have been designed for militant use like security duty so were built to look and sound physically intimidating compared to most units. Cole quietly told the others, “remember they can detect fear so stay calm.”
“We have come to discuss trade with your leader,” Kai stated. Though they didn’t verbally say anything using a tablet with a special program Jay was able to pick up the two were talking mentally to each other. The droids were suspicious of them. The one droid verbally questioned, “why are humans wanting to trade with us?”
“Well we thought like trading…,” Nya nervously stated. They hadn’t expected to be questioned about their actions before even just getting into the settlement. Jay noted through the tablet the droids were interested in what was in the cart they had. The droid stated, “I guess we could entertain the idea but that is for our leaders to decide.”
“Great where’s your leader? Zane is it right,” Kai stated. The two droids looked at him questioning before the one responded, “Zan-khan is up at the longhouse.”
“Zan-khan? He’s calling himself Zan-khan,” Jay expressed as they started to head into the settlement. Cole commented, “guess he decided to give himself a more Mongol sounding name.”
“What is that weird thing they are doing that looks like they are talking but they are not saying anything?” Karlof wondered to which Neuro explained having read some of their minds, “reading the minds of droids is very difficult due to how different their minds work but I have picked up some tricks to understanding them and from what I can pick up they are communicating with each other. They’re doing it through some kind of mental language though not verbally.”
Jay could detect that too through the tablet he had brought and came to notice something interesting. When close to each other the droids were speaking verbally but they were communicating with others some distance from each other even across the settlement through their mental communication. As they made their way through the settlement they saw some of the things the droids had been taking during their raids. They had built a large stone barn like structure for storing things from their raids. A group was outside going through the carts of things the raid party had brought back.
“Are those dynamite or fireworks? Why do they have those?” Shade quietly stated seeing one of the crates they had by the storage house and Karlof noted, “looks like you’re right droids aren’t much for fancy shiny things are they.” Most of what the raid had brought back and was in the structure were very mundane things; lots of scrap metal, various fabrics and household wares; tools, canisters and bottles of various kinds of oil, food and drinks and a bunch of computer components were what was largely in there. There was a crate of what looked to be dynamite or firecrackers; none of them could think of why droids would want those unless they were up to no good with them.
“From what I can get from their minds they are going to deconstruct the fireworks for their explosives to create dynamite to break down defensive structures like walls or create passages underground to gain access to settlements that are more securely defended,” Neuro explained proving they didn’t have the stuff for good purposes. The only gold or coin around the structure was those the droids were using to basically trade with to buy stuff from the building like one of the smiths who was buying bones.
“What’s a smith going to do with bones?” Griffin asked and Kai replied, “strengthen metals. It’s an old method. The calcium and carbon in bones can add strength to iron and steel. In the old days before you could buy the raw chemicals you used bones. You grind them to a powder then dust it on the raw metal while it’s burning to melt it in both before and during the shaping process. When I worked the blacksmiths shop I had some clients ask for things made that way, usually historical replicas or blades for adventuring. It’s not that uncommon a request. I have even used it when repairing some parts to Zane and Pixal like when the bones in Zanes one arm got broken in half and Pixals one leg was broken.”
“You’ve used bones to rebuild your droids?”Tox commented all but the ninja a bit unsettled by that fact and Jay explained, “just a few times. They’re not bothered by it and don’t worry it wasn’t human bones we used they were chicken.”
“Guess you could say that makes them part chicken then,” Griffin joked and Jay happily agreed, “yha I told them the same thing. They didn’t get it.” When they got to the longhouse they stopped outside deciding to just peak in to see what was going on. The longhouse was a large structure built in a loose crescent shape. It had a steep tall roof that bore several port windows for air flow in the building. The roof made up most of the structures height. The entrance to the building was at the center of the curve and decorated by a set of mammoth tusks paralleling each other.
When they looked in they found unfortunately Zane and Pixal weren’t alone. They were sat at a large round table that sat in the center of the main hall with several other droids, eight in total, verbally talking amongst themselves sounding to be going over plans. The main hall was a large square room with high ceilings and a large fireplace in the back wall. They had a fire going in the fireplace and scattered around the room to light it up there were large metal braziers with fire in them. The table they sat at had a large indent in the center were a metal bowl was inset to hold a fire however it wasn’t currently lit.
They could see doorways on either side leading to rooms off the side of the main hall. Against the one side of the wall was a large computer set up with various screens, towers and servers along with various computer components and something being built. Across the back wall were bones from a mammoth including its skull and jaw with plenty of limb and rib bones.
“Where’d they get the mammoth bones? Mammoths are a protected species, isn’t it illegal to hunt them?” Bolobo asked in a whispering tone and Cole whispered back, “true but apparently human laws don’t apply to Mongol-droids. Me and Jay saw them hunt it down five days ago. At least they obviously didn’t do it for sport cause they ate it afterwards; the whole thing even the Cyber-mammoth took part in that. They’ve also been using the bones and hide for building parts and in the blacksmith shop for all sorts of things. You‘ve got to admit their very resourceful and don’t let things go to waste. If they kill it they use everything they can from it, nothing goes to waste. Unfortunately that will hold true with humans too.”
“You want to tell some crazy barbaric Mongol-droids they can’t hunt mammoths then be my guest. Don’t blame me when they decide to hunt and eat you and use your skin as clothes or a rug,” Jay quietly joked. While they weren’t alone Zane and Pixal were at least together so they didn’t have to go searching for either. Pixal sat next to and close to Zane, clearly despite their memory loss the two still had a strong bond and could easily grow attached to each other again. The two were facing towards the door and they and the other droids that sat with them were all dressed as Mongol warriors. Each of them had a mug in front of them they were drinking from at random and there was some papers, maps and half finished devices near some of them.
“Region Metaloniya bogat metallami. Vozmozhno, stoit nachat' planirovat' reydy v etot region i zakrepit'sya tam na postoyannoy osnove. Stabil'nyye postavki metallov znachitel'no uskoryat nashi usiliya,” the one droid stated in a language that sounded quite aggressive. Karlof believed it was a language from Metalonia as he could recognise what this droid said. Despite sounding aggressive he was calmly talking about their group getting a hold in Metalonia to gain access to the metals found there. Zane responded clearly able to understand the language, “indeed that sounds like a good plan however there is the problem of the clan. They currently hold most of the territory in that region and may not take kindly to us intruding on their territory. We need more forces before we get there.”
“Indeed Khan that is why it is most important we get the radio operating. Once we send out the signal all droids in the nearest 100 km (62 miles) will join us. After that we can set up more stations to acquire more members from further afield,” another droid stated. Neuro could pick up from that individual they had plans to build a radio tower to send out a copy of the virus they had to inflict other droids which would cause them to join their group. Another commented, “with numbers on our side the clan will likely take us seriously and agree to an alliance; from our analysis they seem to share some aligning goals to us.”
“This isn’t good. Sounds like they’re planning to inflict more droids with this virus,” Jay commented a little louder than he thought he had and they were startled when they heard Zane demand, “instead of hiding in the shadows why don’t you get in here.” They could see all the droids were now looking in their direction. They all looked a bit mad while the ninjas group were all startled Tox asking, “how did he know we were here?”
“I shouldn’t have said anything, I forgot they have better hearing than people,” Jay explained embarrassed as they headed in Cole instructing the Pale Man, Skylor, Jay and Ash to sneak around in the shadows to get behind Zane. Skylor was going to mimic some of the others powers to make a smoke cloud that would render them all invisible so they could get Jay close and unseen to the droids. Jay gave his tablet to Cole so he could keep an eye on the mental communications of the droids.
Things weren’t as they planned so they were going to have to switch things up. To avoid a fight when they had the droids attention fully on them they were going to get Jay to shock all of them to knock them all out. If they started a fight in there using their neural communications the droids could alert and draw in all the rest in the settlement and they would not stand a chance against all those there.
From what the ninja had uncovered Mongols were not very kind to those that were their enemies. As they approached the table Neuro picked up that not only were all the droids inspecting them with their various senses but they were picking up that they weren’t normal people which was putting the droids on edge. They had to proceed with caution; one wrong move or word could cause them to attack.
“Sorry to intrude on your gathering but we were wondering if you were up to a talk,” Kai expressed. None of the droids seemed enthused and suspicious Zane asked, “talk about what?” The droids were all drawn to suddenly look at the back wall. While sneaking Jay and his group had accidently tripped over one of the bones lying there making some noise that attracted the droids attentions. They all quickly hid behind bones and support columns of the room to avoid detection especially if any of the droids were using thermal vision to inspect the source of the sound. The ninjas group was nervous that their cover could get blown.
“We want to set up trade talks,” Nya quickly expressed hoping to draw the droids attentions back to her group. It worked though the droids did make a couple glances back at where the noise had come from before focussing on them.
“Trade? With humans?” one of the droids asked not sounding enthused by that and Pixal asked, “why should we trade with humans?”
“Well you need things like repair parts right? We’ve got those and can get you more,” Kai expressed putting some of the things they’d brought on the table. The droids seemed interested but were still suspicious. Cole picked up on the tablet that the droids were mentally communicating with each other so they couldn’t hear. Trying to not make it evident that he was looking at the tablet Cole looked to see what the droids were talking about. He didn’t like what he saw. The droids were questioning the value of them and whether they were worth more dead or alive; even Zane and Pixal were thinking this!
“We are capable of making our own. We do not wish to establish trade with humans,” Zane declared and Kai asked, “why? We wish to be friends with you.” The droids looked at each other and Cole picked up a big problem. They had picked up that their tablet was picking up their communications and the next thing he knew the tablet was knocked offline.
“Why should we be friends with humans?” one droid which looked to be a tech specialist asked and Kai began to fumble, “well… uh… we’re smart…” The Metalonia droid cut him off to express, “Umnyye? Sobaki umneye bol'shinstva iz vas, obez'yan, i oni lizhut svoi zadnitsy.”
“What did he just say? I don’t speak whatever he is speaking,” Kai asked confused and worried over what the droid was saying. None of the droids said anything so Karlof explained, “he’s saying dogs are smarter than us and something about licking butts.”
“Hey I’m not insulting you so why are you insulting me?” Kai asked and one of the other droids commented, “how is it an insult when it’s a fact?” Kai then quickly blurted out, “we’re not all dumb as dogs Zanes oh wait he’s not actually human… there’s Wu, he is really old though…” Cole noted Zane seemed to react a bit to hearing his name and thought for a moment he might be remembering something but by the tilt of his head as if he was listening to something behind him Cole could tell that wasn’t the case. It looked more like he was suspicious that something was behind him. He wasn’t picking up the others was he? With them using invisibility Cole couldn’t see them but with his far superior senses Zane could possibly see them.
Things were quickly going bad as Kai was getting into an argument with the droids while the other elemental masters were trying to get Kai to stop and trying to make peace with the droids. They needed to knock all of the droids present unconscious before things got worse. Without warning Zane got up whipping around in the process and using his powers to swipe a wave of ice behind him creating a curved sheet of ice that ended up knocking back and freezing Jay, Skylor, the Pale Man and Ash in ice up to their shoulders. The rest of the droids got up angry. The ninja and their team froze in fear. They’re plan had failed. They now had two options. Fight to retreat to find a new plan or they could maybe use logic to convince the droids to show them mercy and let them leave.
“You want to know why we don’t wish to be friends with humans. You’re untrustworthy, greedy, corrupt, unjust, cruel and prone to be highly destructive. Your kind is unfit to reign and exist in freedom. You do nothing but spread evils, corruptions, war and destruction. Your kind complains about wanting peace in the realm but always gloss over the common denominator to that the lack of peace is you,” Zane expressed to them glaring angrily at them. Jay couldn’t help but comment, “that’s kind of unfair to say.”
“Unfair? You humans are the ones that are unfair. From the smallest plant, to the biggest of beasts and even to yourselves you humans are the ones that always commit acts and ideas that are unfair to everything and everyone,” one of the other droids commented and Kai stated, “whether it’s true or not you don’t have to be cruel about it.”
“Really you think a small bunch of droids could really overthrow humanity? You know we greatly outnumber you right?” Tox express and Zane stated, “numbers mean nothing when your intelligence and technology are superior to your enemy. How do you think the tiger beats the wolves? Its brains and weapons are far superior to its enemies. Besides overthrowing humans is too easy now; your species has become depended on our kind and especially highly depended on our distant robotic and mechanical relations. Technologies that your species can no longer survive without and technologies we can control and manipulate.”
“I think you under estimate people. You can take us over but we’ll always fight to overthrow you,” Kai boasted to which Zane countered, “we have plans to counter that. Like you did with the dog to turn a predator into protecting and loving to its prey we will shape your kind into passive obedient stock.”
“And how are you going to do that?” Griffin asked and Zane replied, “the same way any domestic species is made. We cut your populations down to those most obedient to us culling the disobedient and challenging, you will be treated like livestock. You’ll have all your needs met so you never have to worry for anything but we will control everything of your lives. Laws will be strict with punishments just as strict; we will control who lives, who gets descendants and who dies. We will breed for passive temperaments with low intelligence and strong obedience till you are as dumb, defenceless and harmless as the domestic animals you keep for resource production.”
“Geeze not beating the stereotypes are we,” Kai commented confusing the droids who didn’t appear to know the stereotypes about their kind.
“So you’re basically going to make us a kind of cattle like those people in that one story about this guy with a time machine and he ends up in the future where people have been turned into cattle for these cave dwelling monster people; what were they called again? Eloi or was it Morlocks? I always get confused over which is which,” Jay commented starting to show the freezing effects of the ice he was encased in shaking from the cold. The one droid commented, “basically.”
“Why are you telling us your entire plans? You know when we leave we’ll be telling authorities about it and they will send people to stop you,” Cole commented thinking it was odd how open the droids were being to revealing their plans. Droids were rarely this open about their plans so why were they being so open? It couldn’t mean anything good.
“Because none of you elemental masters are leaving,” Pixal expressed and Nya asked, “wait we never told you who we are and we’re not dressed to reveal who we are. How did you recognise us?” The Metalonia droid expressed, “we can sense the energy from your powers radiating off you like how dogs can smell the identity of others.”
“Okay you got us and I’m betting you think we are here to stop you right?” Kai stated to which Zane expressed, “why else would you be here?”
“You Zane, and Pixal; you two might not remember but you’re our brother and sister not some Mongol-droids. The same goes for the rest of you. We don’t know who you are or where you came from but this isn’t you. You’re all under the effects of a virus. You I’m guessing you were employed by a tech company…” Kai explained pointing to the one droid who had the tech devices around him and even attached to his attire. He then pointed to the Metalonia droid, “you I don’t know about you cause I can’t speak whatever it is you largely speak but given your scary appearance I’m guessing you were a security droid.” None of the droids looked to be buying it.
“There is no one by those names here. You are trying to trick us,” Zane stated to which Kai expressed, “no we’re not.” Jay stated, “Kai you’re not helping. What part of they can’t remember did you not understand.”
“They’re planning to ambush us. They’ve already called in reinforcements,” Neuro whispered to Cole and Shade commented, “we should retreat while we still have the chance.” A noise caught their attentions and turning to the sound they saw another droid had arrived closing the door to the longhouse behind him trapping them in.
“I think it’s too late,” Cole mumbled. They needed a new plan and they needed it fast. All of them could sense they were now in serious trouble.
“What are you going to do with us?” Jay worried. The droids looked at each other clearly communicating with each other before Zane responded, “your kind are too risky to keep alive. All elemental masters must be eliminated and we’ll start with you. To get in the Great Programmers graces and hopefully have our endeavours blessed we will sacrifice the greatest threat to us to him; we will sacrifice by sun down the Master of Lightening. Then we will have a feast for our victory over you masters. A feast made from all of you. If we’re lucky some of us might get gifted your powers from that.” While they all were pretty sure they knew what that meant Kai couldn’t help but ask, “are saying you’re going to… eat us!”
“Looky there he’s not as dumb as he seems,” the Metalonia droid expressed. Quickly coming up with a plan and knowing they couldn’t lose, the price of failure for them was too high for them to fail, Cole announced, “we’re not going down without a fight. Kai you need to free Jay everyone else needs to hold these droids back till Jay can shock them all out.” Cole quickly initiated the fight charging over to tackle Zane and get in a fight with him hoping to restrain him without having to use his lava arms to hold him. Even though Zane wasn’t in his right mind and wasn’t going to hold back or be restrained in the fight Cole didn’t want to hurt Zane. Once he started the fight everyone else got into the fight.
Once Cole had attacked Zane Pixal went to aid him however Nya quickly came to intercept her and try to restrain her. Kai attempted to reach those that were frozen to set them free however the Metalonia droid interfered with him. While they tried their hardest and were fairly well matched the droids had many small perks that quickly led them to coming out on top in the battle. For one their skin was much tougher than a humans with some like Zane and the Metalonia one possessing more metallic skin making them tougher than the others, all had much better senses plus senses that allowed them to detect those like Shade who could hide through shadows but he couldn’t hide from thermal vision. They were faster than most of them and even the more frail looking ones were stronger than most of them. They were also immune to the powers of most of the masters; there was only one that could have a real effect on them and he was currently trapped in ice.
Kai was trying his hardest to get past the Metalonia droid who was finding it amusing to keep besting Kai. Finally mad Kai hit the droid with a continuous blast of fire trying to overheat it forcing it to pass out. The droid didn’t like his attack and in an act to stop Kai the droid tossed the contents of the mug it had been drinking onto Kai. Kai instantly stopped his attack confused and grossed out by whatever had been dumped on him.
“Ew what is this?! It smells weird,” Kai stammered and the droid expressed, “rybiy zhir i loshadinoye moloko.”
“What? Can you speak the common tongue I know you can,” Kai expressed mad at this droid who replied with, “fish liver oil and horse milk.” Kai was disgusted expressing, “horse milk? That’s what you guys were drinking; horse milk and fish liver oils. Gross! Why do droids have such weird tastes?” He cleaned himself off a bit as the droid laughed at his reaction. The elemental masters were quickly being taken out making Cole yell at Kai to stop playing around and hurry up. They needed Jay to shock out all the droids but he was still frozen in ice.
He was struggling to get free but the ice was freezing him making it hard for him to move and focus let alone fight free of the ice. Kai quickly brushed off his disgust to dodge the Metalonia droid and hurried over to melt the ice holding Jay, Skylor, the Pale Man and Ash. The Metalonia droid followed however and started fighting with him again. The droids were quick to notice this and using his Spinjitsu Zane startled Cole flinging him into Kai in the process. Zane then quickly exited his tornado to hit the two with ice freezing them up to their necks.
“Nya run get help!” Jay exclaimed as Nya attempted to come help him. Seeing their group was largely captured by then she knew he was right. Those left needed to retreat and get help. She had to fight off Pixal and dodge the Metalonia droid who came over to try and get her in order to get out of the longhouse but she just managed to get outside where she was confronted by some droids bringing to the longhouse vengestone chains. Clearly they had been planning to deal with elemental masters. She knew she wasn’t going to stand a chance against them so quickly looked for a quick escape.
There was some horses nearby, it wasn’t the best option but it was all there was. She quickly headed over and took one of the horses getting on it and hurrying out of the town. Shade managed to escape as well and followed her lead getting a horse and heading out of town behind her. Two droids got on horseback and followed them. The rest stayed to deal with the other masters. With the vengestone chains some of them had brought to the longhouse the droids tied up the masters breaking free those trapped in the ice. They then took the masters out front of the longhouse to tie them up to posts they tied horses to moving the horses that were there to paddocks.
Their group was then tied up to the posts using the vengestone chains; three to a post. The one droid told them, “we will begin the ritual as the sun sets. You will watch your fellow human be sacrificed then we will slay the rest of you.”
“Zane please we know you’re still in there don’t do this. You don’t have to do this. You should maybe think about what you’re doing; what you’re going to do. Once you do it there is no turning back; you won’t be able to undo any of it. I know if you go through with this deep down you’re really going to regret it,” Jay expressed as Zane tied up Cole, Jay and Kai on the same post. Zane was fairly emotionless as he finished tying them up.
“There is no one here by that name,” Zane replied emotionless. As he finished Zane looked at Jay who looked back looking into his eyes to plead, “please this isn’t you. Your sick buddy very sick.” Jay was looking for signs of potential recognition but he wasn’t seeing anything. Zane then left and followed the other droids that tied up the masters back into the longhouse.
Jay was saddened to see Zane so emotionless and twisted by such a dark virus. They were left sitting outside the longhouse only able to watch what was going in the vicinity. In the large plaza outside the longhouse there was a group of droids working on what looked like pieces for this tower they had plans for.
By the looks they were going to disguise the tower as a tree, a giant white pine a regular species found in the region. It was a clever tactic; not many people would think to look for a tree as the source of a digital signal. They also caught glimpses of conversations by those working as they talked about a device they were putting into it to hide its signal from humans; the droids had really thought through how to hide their plans from enemies. Some of them including Cole and Jay had to admire the cleverness these droids had.
“I thought you said because of Zane they wouldn’t have vengestone?” Griffin asked once the droids had left them and Cole expressed, “guess he felt the ability to cripple us was more important than being able to wield his powers.”
“Were Mongols cannibals or do they just want to eat us because it’s a droid thing? Some deep buried instinct of theirs,” Griffin asked and Cole replied, “dude in ancient times I’m pretty sure everyone was a cannibal. I don’t think it’s from some buried droid instinct.” Cole then quietly mumbled to himself, “at least I hope it’s not.”
“I don’t want to get eaten! Especially by someone I consider a brother. Where’s my sister? I hope she gets us out of here before we become dinner! I’ve already been in his stomach for over an hour when we had to shrink down to get those worm things out of him I don’t want to end up back in it and actually get digested this time!” Kai began to panic causing Neuro to comment, “I’m guessing we probably don’t want to know the story behind that?” The other elemental masters were grossed out by Kais comment.
“That sounds gross,” Griffin commented and Cole stated, “yha it was and before you ask no it wasn’t because of some buried droid instinct. Zane didn’t mean to do it; he was being hacked and controlled by something else so it was an accident. We could tell you about it later if you want; if we make it that is.”
“Just my luck he’s probably going to choose to eat me, I’ve made him mad plenty of times. Shoving my chores onto him, playing pranks on him…,” Kai continued to panic and Jay commented, “I don’t know what’s worse Zane as the Ice Emperor or as this Zan-khan leader of the Mongol-droids; a crazed group of pillaging and apparently human eating droids! I guess as the Ice Emperor he wasn’t eating people… then again he barely talks about it so he could have been eating people! Maybe that’s why he doesn’t like to talk about it? I could get why; it would defiantly not go over well with Kai.”
“Ice Emperor?”Karlof asked and Jay expressed realizing he probably shouldn’t have said that out loud, “I didn’t mean to say that out loud. You don’t really need to know much about it just that Zane once got sent to another realm where under the corruption of a dark scroll and an evil man he turned into a tyrannical leader. Let’s just say he did a lot of really bad stuff most of which he has never let the rest of us know about and leave it at that. He’s really ashamed about things he did there.” Kai wasn’t paying attention to the rest of them and kept going on worried about getting eaten, “he’s probably going to eat me in one go maybe even shrink me so he can swallow me whole and alive. I don’t want to go that way!”
“Wow he’s got some crazy eyes,” Griffin commented about Kai and Tox added, “it’s more than just his eyes that are crazy. He’s going completely crazy.” Cole stated, “I think he’s having a mental break.”
“Kai can you chill; Zane has no magical powers so he can’t shrink you and what do you think he is a dragon? He can’t eat you in one go,” Jay chastised to which Kai quickly snapped, “how do you know?!” Jay regaled, “you remember the time he ended up swallowing a live cicada? It kept making its noise and was stuck in his stomach so he decided to hurry the process of ending it by filling his stomach in order to drown it. His stomach was already about half full from the bowl of beef stew he’d had half an hour earlier before he drank a whole litre of cooking oil and a litre of milk before he’d filled himself. You add up to way more than that! Way more; not as much as Cole but still.” Neuro commented, “that’s very gross and something I’m pretty sure the rest of us didn’t wish to know.”
“He should have just had a bowl of Coles chilli, probably would have turned his insides into a toxic chamber,” Skylor joked and Jay agreed, “I thought the same too.” Cole was annoyed by their joke.
“What are you a math genius and how come you’re not panicking? They’re going to sacrifice then eat you! Usually you would be panicking; why am I the only one panicking?!” Kai panicked and Jay stated, “are you forgetting Nya and Shade managed to escape. They’re going to get help and get back to us before anything bad can happen to us. I’d rather be positive about the situation than worry. Worrying isn’t going to help us now.” Kai began to mumble on about how could they guarantee the others would make it in time. They all decided to just ignore Kai as he panicked.
“Is it usual for your two droids to turn into monstrous tyrants when they lose their minds?” Tox asked causing Jay to defensively express, “no.” Jay then did some thinking before adding, “no… well actually when I think of it yha they tend to become monstrous when they lose control… huh I wonder why?”
“Did you see his eyes?” Cole asked after a moment of silence making Jay ask, “what?” Cole then regaled, “when he told us their plans Zanes eyes… I don’t think the virus was making him say that. He was serious. I think deep down he believes those things. He believes what everyone says droids desire to do.”
“And that surprises you?” Griffin commented. Jay expressed, “but Zane and Pixal aren’t like other droids…”
“I think you guys are too close to them to see the truth. You’re so used to them you’re viewing them as fellow humans and forgetting what they really are,” Neuro commented and Cole defended, “we’re not forgetting. We shouldn’t be treating them differently cause they’re not the same as us.”
“Okay that’s fine but you’re still missing the point,” Griffin stated and Jay stated, “we’re not missing any point.” Karlof then expressed, “maybe you’ll understand it as this sparky. We are dogs. You are treating them like fellow dogs like us but while they can think and act much like us and pull off being like us they aren’t truly dogs, they’re cats. Deep down they have many differences that make them what they are.”
“You know we’ve often joked about them being like cats. I’ve caught them pushing things off tables and counters for no apparent reason and they sometimes do that thing cats do where they stare unblinking at a random empty space for a minute or two at times,” Jay commented and Neuro stated, “okay and you know how it’s in a cats nature to hunt small animals. They’re not evil it’s just they’re nature. It’s what they were made to do. Well it’s in your droids nature to conquer humanity and turn us into livestock. They can’t help it; it’s just what they are. It’s their nature. If you deny that then you’re denying who and what they really are.”
“Either you guys are blind to the slightest hints to this dark side of them or you’re doing something that’s letting them push aside or keep this nature of theirs at bay,” Tox expressed. Cole and Jay thought over her comment. There had been times they’d noted hints of a darker side to the twos nature. There was also chances the two were often hiding any dark thoughts or desires from them possibly out of fear of how the rest of them would react to those desires.
They all went quiet as the longhouse doors opened. Zane and a few other of those he had been talking with in the longhouse exiting the structure talking about their plans and how they needed to speed things up as Nya and Shade had escaped. They were even considering making contact with the Lost Clan for aid to hold any threats to their plans back till odds for their success were higher.
“Great they’re going to get the Lost Clan involved with their work. As if things weren’t bad enough. The Lost Clan is already bad enough they don’t need Zane and Pixal and their Mongol-droids to join them,” Jay complained. Zane went over to those building what looked like pieces for this tower along with two of the others that had been at the table with him. They had a paper map and were showing it to the workers. It was hard to hear but Cole swore he heard something about a new location. He then noticed something in Zanes hands. It looked like… Cole began looking around himself and the others quickly getting a sinking feeling in his stomach when he realised what had happened to it.
“Oh no!” Cole expressed when he couldn’t see what he was looking for was not only missing but who had it. Curious Skylor asked, “what is it?” Cole quickly exclaimed, “the tablet!” During the fight Cole had dropped it in the longhouse where Zane had likely found it when they went back in.
“Why are you panicking about a tablet? Our lives are in danger, not really a time to be worrying over some tech,” Neuro commented as Jay thought about what Cole was thinking before starting to panic when he realised what Cole was likely thinking about. Jay expressed, “no that tablet is something to seriously worry about. In order to keep track of Zane and Pixal and all the other droids they were affecting we were using a programme that can detect all droids from anywhere in Ninjago.” Not understanding what he was talking about Griffin commented, “can’t they do that already?”
“No. As a safety precaution in case a rogue droid starts an uprising droids are incapable of detecting any robotics not in their local environment. They have at most a five hundred meter range and that’s only for search and rescue units most have it limited to about one hundred meters; we have special permission to let Zane and Pixal detect up to 300 meters but they rarely use it that high. This limit is done to limit their ability to turn or infect other units so the rogue can be neutralized before affecting others and causing serious problems. That program we were using is only available to people and requires special codes only people know to activate it…” Jay began and Cole regaled, “yha and that code they don’t give out digitally. It’s written on paper then mailed by carrier pigeons to prevent robotics from picking it up.”
“So what does that mean?” the Pale Man asked and Jay blurted, “we’ve accidently given them the greatest asset to their endeavour. Before they were probably working blind guessing where to find other droids so their tower device they are working on was not going to be very efficient. They could have put it in a poor location assuming a higher density of droids than there actually is but with that device they now have a complete map to every droid in the realm meaning they can now plan the most effective locations for their device.” The rest of them were all now shocked and worried to hear of this.
“So you are saying you have just given them the ultimate recruiting tool for their cause?” Karlof asked and Cole expressed, “yha we have.” Jay added, “and depending how quickly they can build their device and if they make it portable or not they could easily get over half the worlds droid population in a month!”
“That’s a lot worse,” Griffin expressed and Neuro added, “this might not be the best time to mention but recruiting other droids isn’t their only goal. It was difficult to make out but they are highly interested in recruiting droids working in labs studying biological viruses.”
“Why would that interest them?” Tox asked and Neuro answered, “it’s how they plan to quickly modify humans into their vision for us. They want to make a gene altering virus to rewrite our biology to speed up the process of making us their cattle.”
“Is there anything else that can make this worse!” Jay exclaimed. His comment was loud enough that the droids in the vicinity all stopped what they were doing to momentarily look back at them before going back to working.
“Let’s hope the others get here before it’s too late,” Cole commented Kai expressing, “yha especially before we get eaten! They’re not going to eat us alive are they? Are they going to cook us; maybe cook us alive?!” Kai began to panic again and no longer wanting to hear it everyone else told him to be quiet. There was not much else they could do as they waited for help. They each tried several times over the few hours they waited to figure a way out of the chains. Jay spent some time observing the nindroids especially Zane who spent some time helping those building the tower parts before wandering off into the rest of the settlement out of their view.
As they were positioned close to the door which they had left open for airflow as it was a hot day Jay was able to hear some of what was going on inside; he was after all the one closest to the door. From what he could hear Pixal was working with others inside to create the components that actually contained and transmitted the virus and were creating modified versions of it to inflict non humanoid units like the cyber-mammoths. As he watched the droids Jay noticed something odd. Randomly Zane and the other nindroids would experience what Jay came to call a glitchy head; they would stop whatever they were doing to shake their head as if trying to clear their minds their eyes sometimes getting twitchy beforehand. They would do it about two to three times an hour. Jay thought the activity odd; it wasn’t a normal nindroid behaviour to do that unless something was wrong with their head like some viruses.
Jay wondered if this glitchy head was a sign they might not be entirely blind to their virus and could sense something was wrong but the virus was tricking them to think nothing was wrong. He wondered if there may be a way to get through to them after all; if not to stop them then maybe to delay their actions. He watched and listened to the nindroids trying to think of what he could do. Maybe if he convinced them they were more useful alive to them then maybe they would be spared.
As night time began to approach they all started getting more anxious. They didn’t have much time left. They started squirming trying to get out of the chains but the droids had been really efficient in how they had tied everyone up giving them no way to squirm free. They knew if help didn’t arrive soon things were going to get real bad. The droids had begun setting up for the sacrifice. They brought and placed in the middle of the plaza outside the longhouse a large metal structure resembling a mammoth the size of a draft horse.
Its head was raised up as if giving out a call and there was a large door in its side. It looked to be made of a mix of steel and copper. The cyber-mammoth carried the statue like structure in for the droids and placed and positioned it for them. As some sat up the statue like structure the shaman and another droid came over and measured Jay. They also shocked him with a shock rod at its highest setting and watched him the whole time. When they were done the shaman expressed, “he’ll fit now for the calculations.”
“He’ll fit, what does that mean?” Jay expressed nervous and Kai expressed scared, “that looks like a brazen bull; they’re going to cook you alive!”
“I was never much into history so what’s a brazen bull?” Griffin asked to which Cole explained, “it’s an ancient torture method of a bull made of metal that someone would be shoved into then a fire was lit under it and the one put inside was roasted to death.”
“If they’re going to cook me then why’d they shock me?” Jay asked and Karlof noted as the droids set up a collection of truck batteries by the statue, “I think they’re going to electrocute you then cook you.” Jay was startled. He had a much higher tolerance to electricity than normal people but he wasn’t completely immune to it. It would take a lot but he could still be finished off. He at first thought they might not have enough batteries to produce the power needed to hurt him but then he noticed them inspecting the cyber-mammoth.
The ninja still had no clue what the power source the clan used for their robotics was but it was super powerful. Their power source was similar looking to Zanes but after studying a piece they managed to get they found it wasn’t the same stuff. Zanes power source had limits, was less resilient and worked more like a battery requiring replenishing of resources to keep it energized than whatever the clan was using. Likely as they were tied to the clan and this material they were using was unique to the clan cyber-mammoths had an immense resource of power, enough to do serious harm to him.
Add on the five truck batteries they had and they potentially had enough to fry him. He was further unsettled when while inspecting their brazen mammoth opening it up to clean it out they started pulling out some large cooked bones. They were all nervous about the bones worried they may be human and it was proof that they had sacrificed people already until the droids pulled the skull of a cow out of the statue. It relieved them a bit, it had just been a cow they’d put in it.
As the sun went down the droids began to gather a couple of them untying the elemental masters from the posts swapping vengestone chains for cuffs so they could be moved easier. They were forced to stand and watch what the droids were going to do. Jay was separated from the rest of them and dragged by two militant looking droids towards the structure.
The shaman stood there waiting. Zane and Pixal stood close by at the sides; to Jay, Cole and Kais upset the two showed no care towards them. They at least seemed emotionless and not happy like some of the other droids but the fact they didn’t look to care was upsetting. Jay tried to fight the droids holding him but he didn’t have the strength so they still dragged him to the brazen mammoth; Jay was not the strongest of them so stood no chance against droids meant for guard work which were built as strong as possible, as strong as Cole.
“Wait I’ve I mean we’ve done some thinking. You know everything you said about people is true. We are dumb, greedy and everything else you said and you’re right we can’t fix our own problems. You’re kind though could have what it takes and not only do you have a plan but aren’t held back to committing it by human morals. What if we help you? We serve you and help you with your work… we could even trick people into surrendering to you making your work easier. We’ll even let you implant things into our brains so you can control us if you want and if we disobey or prove too troublesome then you can eat us,” Jay began his words halting the droids actions as they stopped to listen to him and seemed to think it over.
“What is he doing?” Neuro asked and Tox noted, “I thought we didn’t want to help them?” Cole thought it over a moment as Kai expressed panicking a bit, “yha I’ll do anything for you to be spared getting eaten!” Cole understood what Jay was doing. If they could convince the droids to spare them they could be spared long enough for help to arrive. The droids seemed to be thinking it over before Zane commented, “this seems a suspicious offer.”
“Suspicious how?” Jay asked and Pixal noted, “there are a few possible reasons for you to make such an offer. The most obvious would be planning a coo or betrayal later on. Another option evident by the fire one would be out of a desire for self preservation. Fearing your demise you seek for a way to prolong your survival.”
“Given who they are we could deduce they most likely desire a betrayal later on. I do not think it wise to take up their offer,” another of the droids who had been sitting with Zane and Pixal earlier explained. The rest of the droids agreed even Zane and Pixal. Seeing his plan backfire really lowered Jays mood; he’d thought he’d managed to think of something that the droids may be interested in but he hadn’t taken into account just how logical thinking a droids mind was. He couldn’t outsmart a droid.
They continued to lead him to the brazen mammoth a few of the droids connecting cords they had set up to connect the cyber-mammoths power source with the truck batteries being very careful not to shock themselves. Jay began to panic think as he was brought to stand next to the structure the shaman droid dumping a bucket of oil, he was guessing kelp oil by the smell, on him the droid stating, “we give this offering to you the great programmer the creator and observer of all things in hopes you will bless our work and help us establish a balance in your world by the taming of the demons known as humans. We are offering ourselves to be the wolves to your sheep to cull the problem lambs and tame your unbalanced flocks.” As they were prepping him for sacrifice Jay looked around for a possible out for his situation.
Despite what he hoped Zane and Pixal showed no sign they were snapping out of this and going to aid him. They did though experience a brief episode of that strange head glitching. Noting their strange head glitch Jay got an idea. Just as they took the cuffs off him to throw him into the structure Jay mustered what strength he could and managed to slip free of the two droids restraining him and rushed over to hug Zane. To the surprise of the elemental masters the droids didn’t react aggressively. Zane looked surprised and confused and the droids all looked confused some questioning Jays behaviour unable to understand why he’d show such affection to his enemies.
“I forgive you for this. You’re not well and don’t understand what you’re doing,” Jay told Zane who to his surprise didn’t try to push him away. He also seemed fairly relaxed not tensing up from the action despite the threat Jay posed to him now that he wasn’t hindered by the vengestone. Jay then began to willingly head to the statue the droids confused about his actions. Jay joked on the way, “oh and by the way Kai, the fire one, he doesn’t want to admit it in front of the others but he wants to be eaten alive.”
“WHAT! No I don’t want to be eaten especially not while alive!” Kai panicked and Jay joked back, “he’s lying to try and hide his weird desires and appear normal. He also told me he wants to be seasoned with dung beetles and oil from fish guts and served with the guts from horses.”
“No, no I don’t want any of that! Can you not mention such gross stuff… I’m starting to feel nauseous,” Kai expressed his panicking getting worse and Neuro who stood next to him stated, “if you’re going to be sick don’t do it on me.” None of the droids made a move all looking between Jay and the others confused.
“Why are you making your ally so uncomfortable?” the shaman droid asked and Jay expressed, “I thought for my final words I might as well express some truths before I go oh and don’t listen to Kai he’s just acting. He really likes gross things and wants to be eaten alive.” Kai exclaimed, “no he’s lying! I don’t want to get eaten!”
“I do not think he is acting. He is genuinely expressing serious fear,” Pixal noted of Kai and confused over what Jay was doing Cole asked, “Jay what are you doing? Trying to give Kai a panic attack? If this is our final hour wouldn’t you want him to at least have some peace before the end? We’ve been giving you peace.”
“Yha should I tell them you’ve probably wet yourself, I don’t think they want that kind of seasoning on their meal and is their sacrifice still good if it’s got soiled pants?!” Kai clapped back his panicking slipping towards anger. The shaman expressed, “his state doesn’t matter. As long as he is departed by the end is all that matters.”
“Really okay; before I get in this thing I should probably warn you the water ones going to be super mad when she sees what you’ve done to me so you’re going to have quite a fight oh and the earth one might be a little on the sweet side, he loves cakes and other baked goods a lot, so you might want to hold off with some kinds of seasonings for him. Also the poison one might give you indigestion she is pretty toxic after all,” Jay expressed as he to the surprise of the droids climbed into the brazen mammoth. Tox expressed to Jays words, “look who’s talking. I’m pretty sure you’re worse for their health.”
“Maybe; they’ll be the ones to find out now let’s get this over with,” Jay expressed sitting in the structure waiting for the droids to complete their work but surprisingly they didn’t make a move. Some even backed up a bit from the structure as if nervous.
“What is this you are doing shocky one?” the Metalonia droid asked the droids were all still confused making Zane ask, “he is just giving into his demise? This does not make sense. Why is he not desiring to try and survive as all living things would?” Cole started to figure it out. Jay was using the nindroids own minds against them weaponizeing some of their weaknesses against them; weaknesses such as their high curiosity and desire for knowledge and their difficulties with understanding human communications and behaviours.
He was confusing them making them hesitate in their actions as they wanted to understand what was going on. Not only was it working but some were starting to think he was up to something and were nervous about what it could be. It was even more confusing to the droids as Jay no longer had the vengestone cuffs on so was no longer vulnerable and could attack them at any moment but he wasn’t. It wasn’t making sense to the droids and they clearly didn’t like it more taking steps back in confusion.
“Well you goanna lock me in or something? Also when you cook what’s left of me are you going to just bake me in this? If so might I suggest you smoke me with some apple wood, I think you’ll like it. It’ll add a nice fruity flavour with the oil I’m pretty sure you’re going to use,” Jay expressed.
“Something’s not right. Why is he so eager to perish… and so happy about it?” Zane asked and the shaman expressed, “this has to be some kind of trick.” Jay expressed, “no trick. I’ve just come to accept that I’ve lost and you’ve won now are we doing this?” The droids didn’t make a move still clearly confused and uneasy by a behaviour they didn’t expect or understand. Cole knew this confusion couldn’t last forever. Eventually the droids would figure it out so they had to act fast to come up with a plan. The droids were all distracted by Jay even those who were supposed to be watching the elemental masters giving Cole an idea. Sneaking away the droids might see them but if they could get the cuffs off they could use their powers and hopefully fight their way free.
“Quickly while Jay has them all distracted see if you can get the cuffs off by sliding them over your wrists,” Cole whispered to the others. They all began to try sliding the cuffs off even though most of them weren’t too sure that was going to work. The cuffs were on tight possibly too tight. Despite how hard they tried though they couldn’t get the cuffs past the bones of their wrist at least not without breaking their wrists which none of them wanted to do.
“This is some kind of trick isn’t it,” they heard the Metalonia droid express making them all stop worried they’d been caught. To their relief it wasn’t them making the droids think this. Instead they had become distracted about something at the opposite side of the settlement. Zane expressed, “seems the two that escaped have brought reinforcements. Lock the masters in the longhouse and lock the sacrifice in the mammoth till we are done dealing with their pals.”
The droids obeyed prepping for a fight one unhooking the Cyber-mammoth and getting on its back to engage in battle. The shaman closed the door on the brazen mammoth and locked it locking Jay who was confused and nervous inside while those guarding the others herded them into the longhouse. They then proceeded to chain the masters up to support pillars in the building before leaving closing the door behind them and leaving the masters there.
“Help has arrived! My sister did it; I’m not going to get eaten!” Kai exclaimed still in a panicked state but relieved. Karlof commented, “hopefully they brought a team and it’s not just the two of them. They won’t stand a chance against all these droids alone.” The others agreed.
“I’m pretty sure they’d come with a team,” Cole commented and Skylor asked, “who could they have gotten though?” They waited in silence for a couple minutes before some muffled sounds of battle came from outside including what sounded like the Cyber-mammoth in pain and collapsing. About a moment later the doors to the longhouse were opened then both Zane and Pixal were shoved into the room and pushed down onto the floor before Nya, Shade and Jay entered the building with them closing the Longhouse doors behind them.
“Jay keep the two in control while we free everyone else,” Nya stated as she and Shade came over to untie and un-cuff the rest of them. As Zane and Pixal got up both mad Jay expressed sparking lightening between his hands in a threat display, “don’t worry I know they’re smart enough to not try anything.” Zane and Pixal were clearly very scared of the display and coward a bit refraining from moving.
“Thank goodness you got here in time! They were going to eat us and Jay was trying to get them to eat me alive! Why? Why would you do that?!” Kai exclaimed as they were freed. Jay apologized, “sorry about that, I didn’t really mean it. I was just trying to confuse the droids.” Zane started to charge up his powers in his one hand trying to not make it evident but Jay took note and gave him a mild shock expressing as he did, “no bad boy. No creating human popsicles.” The shock really startled the two droids who backed up a little from Jay scared till he displayed his powers again and told them to stay like they were dogs. The two obeyed as the others circled them making the two even more scared.
“Okay now shock them out,” Tox expressed and Jay replied, “no it could really hurt them. We’re going to knock them out just hold them so me and Nya can hit them in the back of the head.” While most of them were not too keen on this idea they went with it anyway. Cole and Karlof tackled Zane and wrestled him to the ground pinning him there so Jay could hit Zane in the back of the head with his nunchucks while Nya and Skylor tackled Pixal Nya using the bottom of her spear to hit Pixal in the head. The two droids put up a bit of a fight before getting knocked out from just one well precisioned hit to the back of the heads. Once out the others let them go and Jay and Nya plugged the devices they had with the cure into the two droids heads.
“There problem solved; they’ll be offline for several hours as the cure takes effect and the Defence Forces should soon be done restraining the rest so they can be taken for a cure,” Nya proclaimed after they were finished. Neuro asked, “I thought you didn’t want to get the Defence Forces involved as it could cause tensions between you two.”
“Well we really didn’t have a choice; they were the only ones we could turn to that could help. Well them and the people from Notomation but we’re never going to ask them for help; they’d rather just have Zane and Pixal killed and destroyed,” Nya explained and Cole asked, “what’d you tell them was happening? There’s going to be some serious problems if they find out Zane and Pixal were responsible for all this.” Nya replied, “I lied a little and told them the two had been kidnapped against their will and infected by these other droids and were not the ones who started it all. I also didn’t tell them about the droids plans; that would have caused serious problems.”
“We should probably get these two to the Bounty then help clean up this mess,” Cole expressed and Kai stated, “yha but first why were you telling them to eat me alive!” He confronted Jay still a bit panicked and crazy eyed not fully recovered from what they had just faced.
“I told you I was just playing around to confuse the droids. They thrive on logic and have focus issues when confronted by something unpredictable and what seems illogical to them. Throw on the fact human actions and behaviours are confusing for them and I figured I could stump them by going against what they would register as normal in those circumstances; willingly giving in to them and antagonising those they believed were my allies. Your panicking really helped with that; it just further confused them,” Jay responded.
“They seemed more than confused; they almost looked scared,” Karlof noted and Jay expressed, “yha the unknown is quite scary to droids. Many have a sort of phobia to the unknown and unexplainable even Zane and Pixal; Zane especially.” Tox then asked, “what were you going to do after you stumped them? Surely they would have eventually pushed it aside to continue their actions and we had no clue how long it would take for help to come.”
“I kind of didn’t get that far in my thinking… I was hoping someone else would have joined in with something,” Jay admitted. The others were amused by Jays simultaneous quick and clever but also short and not fully thought out thinking having a bit of a laugh at him. Kai wasn’t happy about it but he was happy he wasn’t going to get eaten. They took Zane and Pixal to the Bounty locking them up there to keep them secure before returning to help with the clean up.
The other droids had all been put offline and were going to be shipped to a recalibrating facility to cure them before returning them to where they had come from or finding homes for the feral ones. The ninja were pretty sure as always the clan was going to reclaim their units, especially the cyber-mammoth which had taken Jay some effort to shock unconscious. It was the first time he’d been successful in doing so. Normally he got beat up by the creatures. They dismantled the droids settlement and returned the things and creatures they had stolen to the rightful owners. Zane and Pixal had even taken things from the Monastery when they’d left apparently thinking they had been in the Monastery to pillage it after the virus had taken hold; this explained things they had found missing which they had been blaming each other for misplacing.
Once that was all taken care of the ninja returned home relieved to have their siblings back and hopefully back to normal. It took about ten hours for the two to get cured both remaining offline the whole time but it worked. The two were highly confused feeling like they had been living some kind of dream but were fairly unbothered and thankful that the others had come to rescue them and held no ill will to their actions understanding the two hadn’t been in their right minds and never meant to do what they had to the rest of them.
While they didn’t say anything the rest were pretty sure their droid siblings felt at least a bit ashamed or embarrassed about what they had nearly done to their family as they distanced themselves a bit from the rest of them for a few days. Something though still bothered Cole and Jay so a day later they confronted Zane while he was on his own. They found him in the laundry room doing some work cleaning some of his clothes.
“Zane we need to ask you something?” Cole stated as they approached him. Zane was startled as he turned to look at them clearly having worried about being asked what they were going to be asking.
“We’re not going to be mad at you. We understand you weren’t yourself but we have to know; there were things you said. Do you really believe deep down those things you said?” Cole asked. There was a moment of silence Zane starting to nervously shake before he replied, “it was the virus making me want to sacrifice and eat you.”
“Okay we figured that but that’s not what we’re talking about. I think you know what we’re asking. You can tell us the truth we won’t be mad or think differently of you,” Jay expressed. Zane was remaining silent before stating, “I’m not sure I know what you’re talking about.”
“About droids taking over humanity cause humans are unfit for freedom and to be rulers and turning us into essentially cattle,” Cole asked. They could tell by his one eye starting to twitch that Zane was getting more anxious and likely trying to figure a way out of answering this question. Zane remained quiet starting to twitch a little before his eyes closed and he collapsed to lay on his back unconscious. Jay quickly noted, “his emotions got too high.”
“I think that’s a good proof that he does have those instincts but he doesn’t want to admit it; he might even be too scared to admit it even to himself,” Cole expressed as he and Jay came over to inspect Zane and gently sit him up holding him in a sitting position till he regained consciousness and could support himself on his own. After a couple seconds Zane began to wake up. After regaining consciousness Zane became nervous quickly getting up and putting a couple feet between him and them to look back at them nervous expressing, “I’m not a monster!”
“No you’re not. We know you’re not and you never can be especially to us,” Cole expressed and Jay stated, “You don’t have to hide the truth from us. We’ll understand if that’s deep down how you feel. We’ll understand it’s just part of your nature and we can’t deny that. We could though help you with it; help you keep it in control you know and don’t worry we won’t tell anyone else. It’ll be our families’ secret. No one needs to know. We can even keep it just between the three of us okay. We know Lloyd and Kai probably won’t take it well especially Kai after what happened earlier. He’s still a little shaken up; that’s why he offered to do your chores for a while. He thinks it’ll get him in your good books so you’ll show him mercy if you every go crazy again in the future.”
Zane looked to think things over for a minute after which Zane expressed anxiously, “it’s logical… it would bring peace and balance… it would fix most problems…”
“You do believe it then don’t you? Both you and Pixal,” Cole asked. Zane was too nervous to say anything so responded by nodding a yes. Jay and Cole felt saddened and disappointed by the answer but not fully surprised. They’d long thought Zane and Pixal were special and didn’t have these buried desires but there had been times where things the two did made them wonder how well they actually understood the droid nature of their siblings plus there was the odd problem of the two trying to act out this stereotypical droid behaviour when something would go wrong with them especially when their memory or consciousness was messed with.
“Sometimes we struggle with wanting to act those out and it can be hard to resist. We don’t want to act them out though… we don’t want to become those kind of monsters! We know that would hurt the rest of you…” Zane expressed still very nervous and Cole expressed coming over to give Zane a pat on the shoulder, “it’s okay buddy we know. I’d like to say we understand but I don’t think we can; we’re not droids just humans. I can say though you two are doing very good at keeping your darker sides in control and if you ever need our help you know you don’t have to be scared to ask.”
“Yha if we can help Cole control himself around cake then we can help you two keep control of this instinct of yours after all you only seem to engage in it when your heads get all messed up and that’s not really your guy’s fault,” Jay expressed coming over to comfort Zane who commented, “it can be hard to keep it in control sometimes especially when the rest of you are not around or there are too many people…”
“We’ve always known you two don’t do well around too many people that’s why we don’t send you two alone to places if there’s going to be lots of people around or there’s going to be a large gathering,” Jay commented and Zane continued, “I don’t know why we have it. My father would never have given this kind of programming to me and it doesn’t seem like something Borg would do so we don’t know where it came from or why we have it.”
“Maybe it’s something left over from the Overlords corruption…” Cole suggested but Zane countered that idea with, “we thought so too but when we look into it. The codes for it predate the Overlord… they have been there from the beginning ever since we gained life. We’ve tried to get rid of them but we can’t… they are connected to our most basal programming. We cannot remove them without destroying ourselves.” Zane was clearly upset about this revelation about himself that he did have this monster instinct people always claimed his kind had which to him meant he was the monster they thought he was. Jay commented, “you know how they say the universe works in mysterious ways, maybe this is one of those. Your kind were born with this feature for some reason.”
“Why? Why would we have those codes,” Zane questioned and the other two could see a few tears come to Zanes eyes. To make a droid cry even just a little required intense levels to certain emotions so for Zane to be shedding some tears meant this was very serious. This fact really looked to confuse and bother Zane; the fact that this was a part of who he was and he didn’t understand why or know how to deal with it. After some thinking Cole offered, “that is a serious question and maybe we’re to never know the answer or maybe it’s to keep you safe from the evils of humans. Whatever the reason it doesn’t change how we view you two though; we know even though that it’s apart of you it isn’t who you two are. Besides I don’t think you two would ever want to act on those ideas, despite the temptations to rule I don’t think it’s not really something either of you would really like…”
“Yha it would be too much responsibilities, too many hard choices to make, too many people or I guess in this case droids to deal with. You two are more of the sheepdogs to the shepherd. You prefer to just help out and be a part of something than to rule. Plus like dogs we all know you like to be scratched behind your ears,” Jay expressed giving Zane some scratching behind his ears which started to calm him down. Cole declared, “don’t worry buddy no matter what we’ll keep this a secret we promise and even if something does happen in the future that causes you to turn on us you’ll still not be a monster in our eyes and we’ll try everything we can to make you better.” Cole gave Zane a hug Jay following the act calming Zane and making him feel happier. Jay then joked lightening the mood, “you know maybe you should scare Kai more often then he’ll end up doing his chores more often and even do some of your chores so you can have more free time.”
The Metalonia droid is speaking Russian. Karlofs accent sounds like a Russian accent to me so I thought it would be cool and a bit of world building of giving Metalonia a regional language. I suck at creating languages so I just used one that already existed, also Russian always sounds so aggressive no matter what so it would be fitting for an intimidating robot. While I have some Russian heritage I know nothing of the language so I used google translate for it so sorry if it's a little off.
Translations for the Metalonia droid are in order of appearance:
Region Metaloniya bogat metallami. Vozmozhno, stoit nachat' planirovat' reydy v etot region i zakrepit'sya tam na postoyannoy osnove. Stabil'nyye postavki metallov znachitel'no uskoryat nashi usiliya- The region of Metalonia bares a high yield in metals. It might be wise to start planning raids to the region and setting up a permanent hold to the region. A steady supply of metals will greatly speed up our endeavours.
Umnyye? Sobaki umneye bol'shinstva iz vas, obez'yan, i oni lizhut svoi zadnitsy- smart? Dogs are smarter than most of you apes and they lick their butts.
rybiy zhir i loshadinoye moloko- fish liver oil and horse milk.
Wish to read more you can find the story here: archiveofourown.org/works/3489…
More artworks for this story can be found in the gallery related to the story here: www.deviantart.com/robo-birdie…
Summary of the main story, Shadows of Oni and Dragons which has three main arcs, this short is from: (this short is from arc 1 Lost Clan)
Finally got another chapter posted, technically two as I published one earlier this year as well but forgot to post about it here, plus I came up with two shorts for this arc of the story. Along with these I some new artworks such as this cyber mammoth the clan creates for their forces:
Then there are two mysterious warriors that seem to follow the clan:
Plus Kamal and Rosic have a special skill they've been keeping hidden for a while. They can become dragons:
How the two normally look:
I have also added a bit to the story Anatomy of a droid, not a lot just a little bit including a new additional design for the cyber teddies a dragon one:
I have also upgraded some designs like the Lepidimare and Fear:
The stories can be found here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/34894561/chapters/86888878
and here for Anatomy of a droid: https://archiveofourown.org/works/44691181/chapters/112440277
Snippet from story:
“Couldn’t help yourself could you demon spawn,” he heard Kamals voice boom. Looking to what hit him Lloyd was shocked to see a large dragon looking at him Kamals voice coming from the beast, “you sense us and just have to come for us huh. You want to use your demon self on us then we’ll use ours on you. Let’s see whose is better.”
Kamals dragon form was very large and dark nearly black with eerie green markings, eyes and mane fur. The tips of the horns faded to a green color and the underside of the wings bore a greenish tint. Even the inside of his mouth and tongue were a dark dull green color. This greenish color filled the shallow dips that outlined his belly scutes and tinted them from the front to back. His mane consisted of fur like feathers running down his spine from the top of his head down to the tip of his tail where it formed a tuft at the tip of the tail. He also bore some of this fuzz on his chin mimicking the soul patch he normally bore which was sandwiched between a set of small horns on the sides of his chin.
He had a hexapede form with two sets of legs and a set of wings. His head bore a set of horns that resembled antlers with a short horn in the center between them before the mane started and towards the tip of his snout were two projections on the top jaw that projected down like teeth. His real teeth in his mouth were thick but sharp clearly meant for crushing more than slicing and he had prominent canines.
His cheeks flared out with a serrated edge and behind that projecting from the sides of the back of his skull was a set of smaller horns than those at the top of his skull. He also still bore the facial scars his normal form had on his face however instead of the icy blue they were the same green that colored the rest of his body. His eyes and the green outlining his belly scutes had a faint glow to them. His appearance was unsettling to Lloyd especially his Oni side.
After catching his attention Kamal then launched at him jaws open for a bite. Lloyd quickly dodged the attack and hit Kamal with a powerful blast of dark energy as Lloyd let his Oni side fully take over so he could stand a chance against the two. His blast knocked Kamal over and into the back wall.
A noise drew his attention to Rosic who was engulfed in golden flames which she emerged from as a dragon just like her brother. She had some slight differences however such as the tinges of her top horns being smaller, her mane resembled her normal hair on her head being a bit shaggy and drooping over her face, the other horns on her head were shorter than her brothers, she didn’t have the hair on her chin but overall she looked the same as him and like him her facial scars were also present.
She pounced at Lloyd who quickly dodged her attack only to find himself getting caught in Kamals jaws. Kamal shook him before throwing him into the entrance door. He smacked hard against them and as he was getting up before he was fully up he felt himself rammed into again and sent smashing through the door. He was flung to the middle of the foyer landing on a chunk of door which had been smashed to pieces from the impact.
He sat up and instantly used a dark blast on the doorway his powers driving into Rosic and pushing her back from the doorway where she had head butt him. Kamal slammed through the doorway which was too small for his form so he ended up smashing the wall around the doorway out in order to get through.
Lloyd hit Kamal with a blast knocking him back into his sister who was following him. The two quickly recovered and Rosic used a breathe of lightening at him which he quickly countered with a beam of dark energy. The two blasts met each other creating a mild explosion which stumbled Rosic and Kamal and knocked Lloyd back off his feet a few feet. Lloyd quickly got up had to dodge a breathe of ice shards that Kamal breathed at him. As he recovered prepping to attack he was sent flying out of the temple onto the terrace outside by a magic blast from Rosic. The siblings quickly followed charging out as Lloyd quickly got to his feet equipping his sword.
As they got close prepping to chomp at him Lloyd swiped his sword with as much force he could muster at their faces as they got close. His swipes knocked their jaws away and caused the two to lose balance and fall down one on either side of him. He quickly went after Rosic attempting to stab her in the neck and cut her spine. He got a couple stabs in but they didn’t go very deep before Kamal bit onto him. Kamal tossed him up and caught him again in his jaws before building up his breath attack, an ice breath. He let out the attack shooting Lloyd several feet away and encasing most of his body in ice.
Lloyd used his powers to explode the ice off himself and quickly recover as Kamal licked his sisters wounds healing them with just a few licks. The two then turned to face Lloyd who charged at them and attempted to swing at their legs with his blade. The two bounced back twice before both jumped off the terrace taking to the air to fly around the terrace.
When they took to the air Kai, Cole, Zane and Pixal who were fighting in the market far below were confused and startled to see the clan had dragons.
“Dragons, they have dragons!” Cole commented and Kai expressed, “is there anything they haven’t tried adding to their army? What’s next flying unicorns?” N realising Kai was being sarcastic Zane respond, “I believe that would be called a pegiscorn and is a hypothetical hybrid between two mythical beasts…”
“Zane I was being sarcastic,” Kai expressed and Cole wondered, “what are they attacking up there? Most of the city is down here, escaped or sheltering in tunnels.”
“Didn’t Lloyd go after Kamal and Rosic who are up there?” Pixal commented and Cole acknowledged, “yha he did. I hope he knows what he’s got himself into then cause we can’t help him.”
Kamal and Rosic made a few fly bys of Lloyd using their breath attacks at Lloyd who had to keep dodging them while using dark energy blasts at them only to find himself getting blasted back and stunned. The siblings had a clever tactic of Kamal creating a sheet of ice then Rosic would follow to hit the ice with a blast of lightening the extreme temperature difference of cold ice meeting hot electricity caused small explosions which were having a mild stunning effect on Lloyd as he was often too close to them.
After a few times Kamal then made a dive towards Lloyd jaws open to bite him. Lloyd stepped aside swinging his sword as Kamal and slashing him on the jaw with enough force to unbalance him causing Kamal to crash land on the terrace where he slide across then off it and fell to the city below.
Lloyd didn’t have time to see if he’d taken out Kamal as Rosic swooped past him knocking him over with a swipe from her hand. She circled back to let off a breath attack as Lloyd recovered. Lloyd dodged her attack and retaliated with a blast of dark energy to her one wing unbalancing her and sending her crashing into the monastery and crashing through its roof.
Lloyd started to head towards her to finish her off when he felt himself get shoved and pinned down from behind as Kamal in his dragon form landed on him. The fall hadn’t really done anything to Kamal. Lloyd quickly used his powers to create a flash to temporarily blind and stun Kamal so he’d loosen his grip on Lloyd. With his grip loosened Lloyd quickly slid out from under Kamals grip and swung at him as he got up. He managed to him Kamals front limbs but his blade only scraped the plate scales lining the front of his front legs.
Kamal reared up on his hind legs before swiping his one hand at Lloyd tossing him into the sacred tree on the terrace. Lloyd quickly got up and charged at Kamal who was charging at him. He swung at Kamals face knocking him down with the force of his swing. Lloyd wasted no time climbing onto Kamals back and stabbing his blade with as much force as possible into the base of the back of Kamals neck. He missed hitting anything vital but before he could pull the blade out to go for another stab Kamal took to the air flying vertically up forcing Lloyd to grip onto his blade as best he could to keep from falling off as Kamal rose higher entering a spin as he rose.
He then without warning flipped onto his back several stories above the terrace and let himself fall. Worried Kamal was trying to crush him Lloyd let go of his blade and holding as tightly he could to Kamal Lloyd began to crawl to his underside in order to hit him directly in the heart with a beam of dark energy. To Lloyds shock when he was only halfway round Kamal rapidly righted himself and regained a control flight. Lloyd was not ready for the sudden change and lost his grip causing him to fall.
He began to panic worried he might not survive the fall. His Oni side was highly resistant to injuries and while in Oni mode he would survive the fall it wouldn’t be unscathed and he couldn’t have that. He needed to be in his best condition to defeat the siblings. As he fell Rosic swooped up from below spiralling upwards catching him on her snout.
Lloyd held on prepping a blast only to lose concentration as Rosic suddenly changed direction entering a straight dive reaching foreword with her hands to grab him and pull him to hold under her hands as she held them forward in order to land on them with him directly under her. Lloyd began to panic trying to building up an energy blast but his panicking was making him struggle which was made worse as they got closer to the ground.
“Thought I was going to squash you didn’t you. No we’re not done having fun yet,” Rosic proclaimed quickly pulling up as they got within a few feet of the ground keeping hold of Lloyd. She flew up then threw Lloyd harshly onto the terrace sending him bouncing several times across it smashing through a bench and some shrubbery. Rosic and Kamal landed close by laughing at him as Lloyd stiffly got up. Rosic pulled his sword out of Kamals neck with her jaws then grabbed the blade with her forepaw.
“You want this? Go fetch,” she declared throwing it out over the city. Over the whole fight Rosic and Kamal kept teasing and toying at him with their words irritating Lloyd who was not engaging much verbally with them instead he was threatening them. The two seemed unbothered by his words.
As he got up Lloyd quickly used a blast at the siblings who defended themselves with their wings digging their claws into the ground to hold them in place. After his blast Lloyd quickly looked around for another weapon to use in place of his now lost one. There was some to choose from but before he could reach one the siblings were on him. Rosic knocked him over before grabbing his legs in her jaws then throwing him up into the air. She caught his legs in hers jaws and held onto him as Kamal grabbed Lloyds top half in his mouth. The two held on and started to pull in separate directions.
Lloyd began to panic as pain was steadily rising in his mid section; they were trying to rip him in half! Thinking quickly he charged his entire body with his powers before letting them out equally across his body. The burst shocked the two who instantly let him go. Lloyd was now in a panic mode.
He could feel even his Oni side was in fear and wanting to flee. He was no match again for these two and it was angering him that they always seemed to be able to up him at every chance they got. As Lloyd stood up he was suddenly shocked as he was sent within seconds flying across and over the terrace by Kamals tail as he had made a quick spin and thrown as much force as he could into swinging his tail at Lloyd.
“Fly little Oni fly,” Rosic teased laughing as her brothers tail smack sent him flying off the terrace out over the city...
While working on my story I came up with a sort of festive themed short to go with it called Soul-Light:
I'd recommend reading it here as this websites structure is really poor for stories:
Soul-light
The two woke up in their room. They’d spent the night in a fort that had been reclaimed by the Lost Clan a group of super natural beings consisting of monsters from the world of origination and what had once been a group of hyena men from the ancient era of another realm. Despite the ninja being their enemies the clan was passive to Zane and Pixal viewing them as friends and allies. The two had never wanted to end up with the clan but things had happened in their family forcing the two to make a serious and very hard decision one they still struggled with.
They weren’t betraying their family no they were trying to help them. They were doing this for their family. The others couldn’t understand, they were human after all not droids. They couldn’t see what the two saw. They would never understand that the clan wasn’t the enemy they thought they were. The true enemy lay rate in front of them but they couldn’t see it.
It masqueraded as good and human so they were blind to it but as the two weren’t human they could see it. They’d tried to work in secret to uncover this true enemy for their family but Lloyds Oni side surfacing recently which had made him aggressive and untrusting to the two made their secret work very hard and dangerous.
It had gotten so bad with him that after he had done serious harm to them they knew they had to leave to keep everyone safe and do their work on their own. The clan had been very open to letting the two stay with them. They accepted the offer knowing they would be safe and cared for amongst the clan; it was better than going alone. As they got up they changed from their PJ’s into their street clothes and equipping a sword each in case they had to do some work or encountered trouble before heading out of the room.
Their room was a converted storage room to the old sleeping barracks of the fort. Due to their nature most clan members, droids and humanoids and serpentine that worked with them being the major exception to this, didn’t have to sleep like the two of them who were mortal unlike these beings but most clan members still enjoyed sleeping so they still used this room to sleep. A couple members both mortals and non were sleeping there. The two didn’t disturb anyone and instead left the room heading into the mess hall that the sleeping quarters entered into. Several clan members were in there enjoying foods that other members were making.
In their time with the clan the two had become accustomed to many of the clans habits and traits. They were a lively group but they seemed to have become livelier than usual recently. The two knew why. It was getting close to the end of the year and at that time the realms celebrated Soul-light a festive holiday dating back to ancient times during the winter solstice.
It was a holiday found in all the realms to celebrate the gift of life, having made it through the year, remembrance of those who had not been able to make it through the year and for honouring those like the First Spinjitsu Master who brought salvation to their realm by taming the chaos that once reigned in the realms making it safer for people to live in and showing the people the way to the light. It was a time filled with many traditions all of which revolved around friends and family.
Normally Zane and Pixal loved this time of year. The lights, the smells, the sounds, the food and most importantly the time with their family but this year they weren’t feeling that festive. They didn’t have their family and couldn’t risk getting near them at that time.
As friends to them the clan didn’t mind the two having some of the food they had made. To keep the energy levels of their power source stable the two needed to feed at least once a day. They had specially designed digestive systems that converted organic matter into electrical energy for their hearts to replenish the energy they used from it every day.
As it was much easier to process and gave well over half more energy than other sources they had a largely carnivorous diet. This fact about droids had the two often refraining from eating in public as it just fuelled the belief that droids were man eaters or wanted to turn humans into an energy source for them which bothered the two.
People never thought these things about their cats and dogs or even exotic animals which often would eat their own owners so why was it just droids they pinned this belief on and considered monsters. The clan though didn’t hold these beliefs so they felt safe to eat in front of them. The clan was highly carnivorous themselves so were unbothered and meant there was largely meat present, that didn’t bother the two as due to various factors droids had a specialized diet that was highly carnivorous as well.
The two were a bit cautious however over what they got as not everything the clan had came from things from their world. The clan had things they’d brought from the plane of existence they came from which the two had found were sometimes harsh on their systems causing them problems. One of those working there cooking things up helped them get things safe for them; the clan was quite helpful and friendly to them. Those helping them got the two a turkey leg each and some shaped cookies they’d been making and milk they’d mixed with cooking oil and sat them with some of the clan.
Those they were sat with were some of the hyena men telling stories from the time and place they had come from. Zane and Pixal were always intrigued to hear the stories they had. The world they spoke of sounded so alien to what they knew. A world dominated by life that while sounding familiar was also alien where fungi sometimes grew into massive tree like forms, where often large bird reptiles dominated as the dominant animal life, lands lost to ice, volcanic wastelands, massive cave systems home to forests of fungi and lichens, forests grew in lakes and over rivers and boreal swamps whose waters boiled so never froze. A place where the people that had come to inhabit the realm had all been turned into beast folk to help them cope with the extreme conditions. These hyena men had come from lands in the far north of their realm dominating fjords, boreal woods and steppes with beasts and boats till a time they called The Great Devastation came which made life so harsh they had turned to a great being for salvation which had turned them into the immortal monsters they now were.
After finishing their meal the two headed out of the fort to wander the town using their cloaking device to hide their non human nature from the people; hatred to droids had risen to levels even greater than during the Nindroid Crisis as droids had sided with the clan who were enemies to the people not to mention droids had never been much liked in the first place so the two only felt safe going around looking human. They were more often considered monsters that desired to enslave or eradicate humanity than living beings. Since they were already wearing street clothes all the two had to do was disguise their skin, hair and eyes a less taxing task than trying to disguise everything about them.
Their default and favourite appearance was of that of the people of the Birchwood forest where Zane’s father had come from and where Zane had spent his early years. This appearance had much paler skin than normal people ranging from pale to white with brownish flecking on parts of the body mainly back and outer sides of the limbs giving them a look kind of like an adolescent gull with blond to white hair all of which helped the people there blend in with the largely birch treed forest helping them better escape the dangers of the Birchwood like the Treehorns.
The town they were in sat in the boreal north of Ninjago so it was cold and snowy there. It was rather hilly there being near some mountains and was dominated outside of settled regions by conifer forests. Despite the clans rule of the area which had the people scared the people were still eager to celebrate the festivities. Lights and colored cloths had been hung on and between buildings, lamp posts and trees. Conifer trees had been decked out with lights and brightly colored ornaments largely simply in a ball shape though ornaments of birds often songbirds in shape were also common along with bells, stars and dragons. These often had colors of red, gold, silver or white though green and different hues of blue were also present.
The clan had been adding to the decorations hanging ornaments they’d carved out of wood, bone or stone or forged from iron that were in the shapes of birds, beasts largely those from their ancestral realm and dragons. The ornaments were surprisingly welcomed by the people even though they were still scared by the clan. As the two walked through the town seeing everyone happy and families starting to gather for the festivities the two couldn’t help but feel their emotions lowered. The largest day of festivities and usually the start of the two week festive period was in two days.
On a normal year the ninja would be starting their festivities the next day. Nya, Kai and Jay would head out to pick up their parents, Coles father, Lloyds mother and Skylor who would be staying with them for the next two days while the two of them would work with Lloyd and Cole who kept trying to snack on what they were making and trying to eat a bunch of cookies and devilled eggs when he could when they weren’t looking. After the two days spending time together at the Monastery they would go through with visiting the family gatherings of some of their extended families; Kai and Nya’s, Jays, Coles and Lloyds. One a day.
While not familiar with droids and some being uncomfortable, young kids especially were scared just by their looks, or even suspicious around them the two were still always welcome at the gatherings even with Kai and Nya’s one uncle who was a strong believer in the conspiracy theories around droids and other robotics. He was surprisingly welcoming to them despite what they were especially as their family always held their gathering at his farm; they’d worried he’d not be comfortable letting what he considered a threat into his house. He did though often make the two wear festive hats he lined with tinfoil which he thought could block their ability to connect to technologies, Jay apparently tricked him into thinking this, and often tried sticking tracking devices on them so he could keep an eye on the two of them while they were there.
The two always took the devices and put them on various animals he had on the farm just to mess with them. His farm dogs, the barn cats, his horses, the chickens, his pigs or cattle and even the emus he had. Surprisingly this uncle wasn’t mad about them doing that and it had become a bit of a game for them. At some point the two would separate from the others for a day to visit Pixals father before rejoining their family at the Monastery for the rest of the holiday period.
Thinking about what they were going to be missing further upset the two. Wondering what their family was doing without them around they headed to the town hall where the clan had set up their head office in the town. As they entered the building they ran into a Shintaro boy and the clan member who had taken him in as an apprentice setting up the delivery of a note to the kids grandparents with the secretary the clan had at the main desk there. The kid the clan had taken the kid from a cult that had killed his parents and enslaved him to a town far from his home.
The clan was intending to send him to his grandparents but they were currently busy in their conquest and hadn’t reached that region for a while so he had been set up with the one of the animal husbandry workers of the clan, they were the ones that cared for the creatures the clan used. Apparently the boy had been fascinated by their work so they’d given him to the group to look after till they returned him to his blood kin which was going to happy over the holidays. The clan had recently invaded Shintaro territory giving them a path to the kids homeland. He was sending his final letter to his grandparents telling them he’d be home for the holidays getting excited.
Zane and Pixal walked past them the kid stopping the two to wish them a festive greeting recognising them despite their disguises. As the two had been hanging around the clan for a while they’d accidently let slip their true identities around the kid a few times so he knew they were there. He was keeping it secret though that he knew as he understood it would not go well for anyone to find out the two were working in the shadow of the Lost Clan who were enemies to the people.
Zane and Pixal entered the main office of the building where inside were the leaders of the Lost Clan Kamal and Rosic. The brother sister pair were sitting across from each other at a desk working on some notes writing them with special quills that needed no ink to write with. They were magic items of the clan; the clan was quite skilled in various forms of magic after all they weren’t mortals. Not to mention Rosic was a master in the arcane arts including an ability they hoped she was willing to share with them; she was an Augur.
Augurs had the very rare but unique gift to peer through time and see not only hidden knowledge but things of the past, future and goings on in other locations in the present. Her brother Kamal lacked this ability and was more of a martial master though he had some minor arcane skills. While the two droids had originally been enemies of the clan like the other ninja after leaving them for their personal endeavour the clan including the leaders had turned passive to them as in their eyes the two were neutral entities in all that was going on.
“Interesting that you two have shown up here,” Kamal commented not stopping his work as he put his note into a currier casing and attached it to the harness of a raven that had been waiting by the open window in the room that hopped over when he was done writing to accept the letter. The bird then left the room and Kamal checked over a tablet he had on the desk. The two droids were nervous of interacting with these two. Both were very dangerous beings. They hesitated a bit before Zane commented, “well we were wondering given the time of year…”
“You are wondering what your fellow clan members are doing during this time of year,” Rosic expressed looking up from her writing. Surprised that she knew what they were thinking Pixal asked, “how did you know… did you use your powers?”
“Not really. Clan members have noticed the emotional outputs of you two lowering over the past while as the holidays approach. Given your bonds and natures it didn’t take much for us to determine you are missing your family,” Rosic explained and stopping his work to look up Kamal expressed resting his hands together on his desk, “the first year of the holidays with someone you loved being gone is always the hardest.”
“Do you know what they are doing?” Zane asked. Rosic took a moment to use her powers her eyes turning to a glowing green as she peered through time and space before returning to normal as she finished. She then regaled, “with events that have occurred and with you two lost to them things are down for them and they are doing some things differently. The ones of fire, lightening and water are staying together with their parents and the one of amber at the monastery for the next two days before visiting their other relations later; they are remaining together for the festivities.
As we control territories some of their relatives live in they fear they might not be able to see each other so are going to try and trick us to travel to their destinations but we know what they’re doing. As it is the time of festivities we will not be bothering them but we are interested to see what they think of to try and fool us. As you have likely worried the one of earth and the Oni half-breed are not with them and are spending the festivities apart from the rest.
The one of earth is spending the entire time with his father and the female he is courting from Nom with her father still mad at the one of Oni blood for his actions while the one of Oni blood and your master his uncle are spending the time with his mother at the dig site she is working at. The Oni half-breed is still wrapped in guilt and regretting his actions to the others especially you two. He feels you will not be able to forgive him.” The clan recognised Lloyds Oni heritage and always addressed him as the Oni half-breed. It was Lloyd losing control of his Oni side that was a main driver that led the two to abandoning the others. Despite all he had done the two could forgive but till he could master control of his Oni side they couldn’t be near him.
The two were saddened to hear how the others were doing. They’d hoped the others would stay together and work things out without them but they weren’t entirely surprised at what was happening considering what had happened to drive the two to leave the rest.
“You know you are free to visit them. We trust you two will not let slip any of our Intel to them,” Kamal expressed and Zane commented, “while we would like to it is best we keep our distance from them for the time being.”
“Alright that is up to you what you want to do. You are free to join in the festivities clan members will be engaging in. I and my sister will be joining for a time but we have prior obligations we must fulfil at this time. Our lord the prince of the hunt has called us to take part in the Zerleg An or what in the modern tongue you would call The Wild Hunt. Through the darkest days of the year we are to ride with some of his other hunters to hunt those marked by him and slay the monsters who have gone against his will. Do not fear none of your family have been marked by the hunter not even the Oni half-blood,” Kamal expressed.
The droids had heard of this Wild Hunt before, it was a part of their worlds mythology taking part over the period of Soul-light. The two had long thought it was just a concept of mythology to give an understanding of the harsh, dark and stormy conditions of the mid winter. When he had still lived with his father in the Birchwood Zane recalled hearing often of this great hunt. It was the dark side of the festive season that claimed those who found themselves alone in the dark especially in the wilderness would be claimed by the supernatural hunters of the hunt perishing from it.
The droids had always thought it was just a thing of myth meant to scare people to stay together and indoors to keep them safe from the harsh conditions of that time a year till they had encountered the clan. While what they believed was true there was also a spiritual side to it they had not known of nor could properly conceive as they were only mortal not supernatural entities like the members of the clan who partook in the hunt every year.
While to people this hunt was scary the two droids were more interested in it accepting it as part of the greater workings of the universe which even with their vast knowledge they still barely understood even if it did bad things such as targeting the innocent. To some extent the two felt a pull to partake in this hunt but they knew they couldn’t. This was an act only supernatural beings like the members of the clan could partake in not mortals like them.
Rosic added, “you know even if you wish to remain separate from them you are free to send letters through the ravens to them. The ravens are just asking for the fee of a dead rat for each letter. We know you two are very capable of getting that.” That sounded like a good idea to them to let their family who they had not had contact with since leaving two months earlier that they were okay and still thinking of them. A letter though just didn’t feel like enough for them. They expressed this to the clan leaders.
“Well you could always get them something more, some kind of gift maybe. If you could do it before the hour of seven in the evening tomorrow we can organize some of the clan members to get your gifts to your clan mates that evening. After that time we will be engaged in the wild hunt and most of our services will not be operating till after the festivities,” Kamal expressed. That sounded like an idea to the two. They decided to head out to see what they could get for the others. As they weren’t working with the other ninja they didn’t have a stable income from their job as part of the field of law and order for the realm like the police and royal army.
That hadn’t left them penniless however as they had taken up the job as sell-swords and mercenaries for anywhere they went taking on tasks anyone needed done. They disguised themselves as humans to hide their identities and used different names so no one knew who they were but it worked. People were much friendlier and co-operative to the two when they thought they were human.
This work offered enough to get by which was made easier from the charity of the clan who tolerated them as minor aids and who they sometimes did tasks for as payment. Most of the tasks they did as mercenaries were not spectacular things like finding lost animals or people, retrieving packages, finding lost items, clearing pests from properties or getting things people were needing like gathering herbs from the wilderness while others were much more interesting like capturing wanted criminals, dealing with monsters and problematic beasts, escorting merchants between towns and busting groups dealing in illegal contraband.
They had also made money from selling items they had claimed from bandit and crook dens they had cleared out. They had some money but not a lot. They still needed cash for their basic needs so they had to be careful with their expenses.
They wanted to get each of their brothers and sister something plus something for Wu. They went to the villages commerce region to see what was available. They wanted to get them each something tailored to them. There was plenty of options for them. After searching for about an hour they came up with some ideas. They wanted to get the others something they could look at that would remind the others when they saw it of the two of them and remind them that they still cared about their family and were thinking of them even though they had left them.
After getting a list of ideas the two sat in a café working out the math to afford everything. They were drinking hot chocolate trying to not stand out amongst the people there. They’d want some kind of oil but that wasn’t available and would have been suspicious to people. They could have tried sneaking a bottle of cooking or fish liver oil in but someone could see them with it and that would disturb people; it really oddly scared people to see someone drinking any kind of oil. This fact confused the two as people loved coating their food in oils and deep frying things in oil so how was drinking it any different?
Hot chocolate was the next best thing for them. They had to be careful around teas as they could have odd effects on the two and the very high caffeine of coffee messed with their systems which caused functioning problems for their nervous systems. The place they were in was pretty full so they needed to be careful to not let anyone know their true identities. They didn’t want someone accidently finding them and letting their family know where they were. For everyone’s betterment they had to remain hidden and alone.
As they calculated their needs they were disappointed to find they didn’t have enough to cover for everything. They thought about taking from the coin they had set aside for their survival needs. They could always hunt for things if they needed food, with their senses and skills they were good at it, the clan was giving them shelter so that was taken care of but they did need to keep a decent amount of coin for materials to make repairs should something happen to either of them. Those weren’t cheap or easy to get when living as vagrants. The two also had attire and equipment they had to maintain to keep efficient with their work.
Damaged armour and swords weren’t efficient for mercenary work. To save coin there was the option of finding some late minute work. The two pulled out their phones to search through the online boards of job listings for mercenaries. There were plenty of options however there was two main problems. The first was a good deal of them were tasks that called for attacking, sabotaging or stealing from the clan which they didn’t want to do.
They were on friendly terms with the clan and didn’t wish to ruin that. The clan was currently their main protection and provider; with what they were doing they needed powerful allies to fall back to if things went wrong. The rest were too far from their location. They wouldn’t have time to complete them and get what they needed before time was up.
“I hear you’re in need of some cash,” a waiter who had been cleaning the tables nearby stated as she came over to them having overheard them. The two droids were a bit startled not realising someone had been listening to them. They were nervous about interacting with a stranger but someone from the town may know better than them about someone in town possibly needing work. Seeing they were having trouble figuring it out on their own Pixal asked the waiter, “oh yha I guess we are. Do you maybe know of someone in town looking for some extra work?”
“You know I think I know of a way you could make the coin quite quickly. Our towns really been hurting as our main source of income the local smith works is having a bit of problems getting some of their supplies. I’ve had to take extra shifts because my father and brother have been getting less shifts because there’s not enough for the shops to keep working everyone full time. Maybe if you look into it they could get you the coin,” the waiter told them.
The two decided to take up the offer. They headed over to the village smith works. A decent sized factory on the outskirts of the village where a refinery for iron was located with a factory that made ironworks like outdoor decorations, clothes hooks, fences, sheets and ingots for factories, hinges and nails for constructions and wall art from that iron was located. When they got there the factory and refinery overseers were having a discussion about their misfortunes.
They were getting low on their surplus supplies without the stable supply chain from the local mine they relied on for the majority of their coal which ran the plants and fuelled the smelters and forges. They hadn’t had a decent shipment for the last few weeks from the mine nor had any communication from them about the situation and were worried as the holidays had arrived things wouldn’t get better soon and without those supplies they wouldn’t be able to restart the facilities after the holidays meaning their workers would not be able to get paid in the new year.
It had many in the town upset and worried as most had family members who worked at or relied on these facilities to make basic income. They’d already been struggling the past few weeks. The overseers were a bit surprised at the twos offer to look into things but were willing to make a deal desperate to fix the problems. With the agreement Zane and Pixal headed to the mine the overseers pointed them to. It was located about an hour away so the two needed transport. For that they used something special the clan had showed them how to do.
While it didn’t make them feel the greatest consuming things that came from where the clan came from caused magical energies from their plane to build up in the twos bodies allowing them to easily cast magic’s a task usually difficult for droids to do; magic was often confusing and unsettling for droids making it hard for them to comprehend and therefore wield it. As they frequently had things from the clans realm the two had built up a high stable level of these energies which had made it much easier to copy and learn some of the magic’s the clan used such as the ability to summon a steed like the Lepidimare a strange reptilian horse creature the clan used.
The two summoned one of these creatures each for themselves and got on them to head out. As the creatures they summoned were not mortal beings they were faster, were not easily tired and highly resistant to damage should they jump off high surfaces or slip. The creatures got them there faster than they expected. This mine consisted of a large building over the mine entrance which stored the ore for shipping and break room for the miners. Alongside this was several dwellings, a workhouse for some workers to sleep in, a doctors office for minor health issues, a restaurant, a general store and a small grocery store for serving the mining base.
When they got there the two got off their steeds un-summoning them before walking into the town. As they entered the town nothing seemed off though the place wasn’t decorated for the festivities and the two felt there was oddly too many people up and about in the town than should be. The festivities could be explained easily as either the people here were not the festive type or more likely as most workers here only lived temporarily there most actually coming from the town they had come from they felt no need to decorate the place. The large amount of people above ground was not as easily explained. As work was still ongoing with breaks for the holidays not starting till the next day the people should still be working trying to get as much done till the break started.
“May I help you two?” A man expressed coming up to them as they walked through the town. Zane asked, “who are you?”
“I am the mayor to this little settlement now how can I help you two? Two strangers shouldn’t really have a reason to come here,” the man said and Pixal explained, “we were told by the smith works of the nearby settlement that there appears to be a problem with your mine. We have come to see if we can offer some help.”
“Ah I am going to guess you are sell swords then,” the mayor expressed noting the swords the two had. Zane replied, “I guess that is what you could call it.”
“Good we could use the help. We haven’t really been able to get anyone’s help to clear out some intruders to the mine that have been preventing us from getting any work done,” the mayor explained and Zane commented, “that doesn’t sound too bad a problem, couldn’t local guards take care of it?”
“Well we’re not dealing with your typical intruders here… how do you feel about spiders?” the mayor asked confusing the two droids. Zane commented, “spiders, you are held up by some spiders? Surely you should be able to deal with a bunch of little spiders.”
“Well these aren’t your typical spiders. Ever heard of Frostfang spiders?” the mayor commented. The two weren’t well knowledged on spiders so did a quick search through the internet through their neural networks to look up these spiders. Upon identifying what they were the miners problems made a lot more sense.
Frostfang spiders were not your typical run of the mill spiders. They were large, sometimes up to bear sized spiders with a build like a cross between a jumping spider and a tarantula with a venom that could chill a person to near paralyses for several hours. Defiantly not your typical spider and one usually not something most guards were trained to deal with not to mention they were spiders one of the most feared groups of animals to people.
“Ah yes those spiders we see. So you need help dealing with them?” Zane responded and the mayor expressed, “yes. We really need them cleaned out. It’s going to be a tough Soul-light this year as we have been unable to fulfill demands meaning income has basically not come in and if we can’t get it running within a months time when the Lunar New year starts most of our workers will be out on the streets.
If we can get things running today we might be able to get some shipments out and get some cash into the town so people can at least eat over the holidays.” The mayor led them to the entrance of the mine which was located in a large building which also stored some of what was brought out of the mine.
Strangely the two noted there were several carts filled with coal already in there which they could have easily shipped out to make some coin so why hadn’t they? While odd that wasn’t what they were there for. They ignored the issue to focus on the task they had been given. The mayor took them to the elevator that took them down into the mine. The three got on and the mayor took them down several floors before stopping and they got off into a small cavern where the mine began.
This cavern held some carts, racks for the pickaxes used by the miners most of the tools missing from them, a table and some benches for workers to have a break at, some barrels and some crates holding jars of an oily substance the two recognised as a highly flammable liquid used in the making of explosives used for controlled explosions in mining to open new passages or break tough rocks. The place was decently lit by electrical lighting that ran along the roof top. From this cavern a tunnel continued on into the earth.
“The miners accidently blew a hole into a den of these spiders down here and were forced to flee when they attacked. They dropped most of their supplies down in the tunnels, seems awfully quite down here. I wonder where the spiders are now,” the mayor stated starting to head towards the tunnel. Zane and Pixal followed but as they reached halfway through the tunnel the two felt a sudden electrical shock and everything went black…
“I think those things are waking up!” they heard a man panic as they regained consciousness. Zane and Pixal slowly got up looking around. Zane lay splayed out on his back while Pixal had been laid front down over top off his body core the twos positioning making a cross from their bodies.
They’d been dumped into a makeshift cell in a large alcove to a larger mainly circular cave that bore a central column that went up the four stories to the ceiling which bore a large wooden ramp spiralling around it going up multiple offshoots coming off it to make platforms that lined the outer wall of the cave so miners could dig at the walls where the seams of coal were located.
The section they were in was on the lowest level, the ground floor, and trapped in the alcove by black iron cell bars. Both had their weapons missing and had a strange bracer on their one arm which they could sense had some kind of magical enchantment. Other than that they were fine. No tampering or harm had been done to them.
As the two got up they looked through their cell to see who was there as they had heard someone talk and could sense the presence of others through their various senses. There was a small towns worth of people, about seventy of them, in with them all cowering against the back wall clearly scared of them. Near the middle of the cell was a small fire which was the only light in the cell despite the rest of the cavern being lit by electrical lighting. Nothing else was in the cell; no beds, blankets or even mats.
“Please don’t hurt us. We’re not the ones who attacked you!” the man who had talked earlier expressed. He was huddled with a woman who by how close she was to him they deduced was his mate and a young girl coward behind the two making them guess that was their daughter. At first they thought these people might be bandits or criminals who were endured to the mine but that didn’t add up.
There were young children in the group and the way people were dressed didn’t match that, it spoke more of these being commoners and regular miners. That left them confused, why were these people down here? And why were they so scared of them? Looking themselves over the two noted their cloaks had gone down when they’d been knocked out revealing to these people that they weren’t human. That explained the peoples fear to them and luckily none seemed to recognise them at least not yet. They just saw them as two random droids. That was probably helped by them being dressed as common folks and not in the attire the public normally saw them in.
“We will not hurt you. We came to deal with the supposed spiders that have invaded the place,” Zane explained as they got up.
“Spiders? Spiders haven’t over run the place. Who told you that?” the man asked and Pixal replied, “the mayor told us.” The man looked confused as he responded, “what mayor, I’m the mayor.” Looking him over the two didn’t recognise the man; he wasn’t the one they had talked to who called himself the mayor. Zane and Pixal were getting more confused. What was going on there?
“Whoever you spoke to was lying to you,” the mayor commented and Pixal asked, “can you explain what is going on here?” The mayor explained, “about a month ago we did have an issue with spiders but we’re used to it. We’ve learned to deal with them as the spiders are native here and thrive off the plentiful dog sized fungal farming ants that also make their home in this region.
We got the spiders sealed away but several of our workers were hurt in the process so we hired a small group looking for work to fill in for them for the time to keep production stable. They seemed legit but we should have looked deeper into their backgrounds. The one night they sedated everyone so we couldn’t fight back as they let their allies into town and they shoved us in here while they’ve taken over the town.”
The ants they are talking about:
“Who are they? Bandits? Part of a criminal syndicate?” Zane asked and the mayor responded, “don’t know. They don’t interact with us much and before you ask we don’t know why they’re here. They’re not working the mines we know that for sure.”
“Is there anything else you can tell us?” Zane asked and another villager stated, “just that they’re apparently waiting for something and every now and then they take one of us to do something to us. We don’t know what they are doing but those they take never come back.” Another villager commented, “that’s because some of them are Jiangshi.”
The two droids knew what those were. Jiangshi were vampires, entities of un-death that fed off the life energies of the living. While often depicted in pop culture as blood drinkers that was only one representation of them and didn’t truly represent the true and complete being of these mythical beings. That’s what they were though beings of myth, they didn’t exist as far as the two droids knew.
That being said though it was likely these people were seeing something which they likely believed was one of these Jiangshi. Knowing escaping there and dealing with those that had overtaken the town was the best thing to do at that time Zane and Pixal went over to the door in the cell bars.
They were going to attempt to pick the cell locks. They checked the few ports in their bodies for something to pick the lock with like a lock pick they normal had stored in their forearms’ but the few tools they kept in their bodies were gone. Whoever knocked them out had taken those from them clearly knowing they’d try to get themselves out of the cell.
With that option gone they inspected the bars and the doors hinges for a weakness. There was no weakness to the door but the holes that the bars had been placed in to the rock of the floor seemed loose. The cell looked to have been built rather hurried so had flaws in its structure. If he could put some ice in the holes maybe that could loosen and lubricate the metal making it easier to move and pop out of their place allowing them to knock the wall out.
Zane didn’t want to let it slip about his powers so he had to be careful how he used them. He put his hand close to the base of the bars and intended to use his powers to create a small seam of ice into the holes for the bars but he couldn’t get his powers to work. That confused him. Looking at the metal of the bars now that he was close to them Zane could see they were not iron like they’d first expected. It was vengestone. That really stumped them and started to worry them.
‘These are vengestone. No one would use vengestone unless they intend on holding an elemental master,’ Zane used his droidic telepathic communication to speak to Pixal so the people couldn’t hear. Pixal used the same communication back to comment, ‘so then why have they used it?’
“Confused aren’t you little bots?” A woman’s voice slyly expressed as a reddish black mist manifested on the other side of the cell bars the mist turning into a woman startling the two. The woman who had sickly grey skin, sunken eyes which were blood red and dressed in dark leather armour was standing there so close she was nearly touching the bars looking in at them.
Something about this woman unsettled the two of them. She looked human but they could sense she wasn’t human at least not anymore. She reeked of death and they couldn’t detect any vital signs to her meaning she was most likely some kind of un-dead or some kind of supernatural entity trying to mimic a human in appearance.
“What is going on here?” Zane asked. The woman bragged, “you two walked rate into our trap. Thought you were so skilled with your disguises didn’t you. You can fool mortals but immortals such as myself are much harder to trick. You’ve been sniffing around our turf and getting into things you shouldn’t like wolves in the pasture and like wolves you’ve been hunting our stock so we have to deal with you before you mess up all we’ve been working on.” By the way she talked they had a strong suspicion over who these invaders to the village actually were. They were the true enemy their realm was currently facing, the one the other ninja seemed blind to especially Lloyd.
“Is it correct for us to presume you are a member of the Sunless Dawn cult?” Pixal asked and the woman bragged, “you are correct she-droid.” Zane then asked, “so you have caught us, what now do you plan on doing with us?”
“Several things, for one we’re going to go through those databanks of yours and see what we can uncover about your little family. As for your family if we run into issues with them you two will make for good bargaining chips against them. We’re going to keep you two around for quite some time, two little exotic metal beasts. We can’t really use you as cattle like the people, there’s no blood in your bodies, but you still have uses. You still carry life energies for us to partake in,” as she spoke the Jiangshi made a motion with her one hand at Zane who suddenly started feeling as if his energy was being drained and it brought a great deal of pain to his heart and he collapsed to his knees in pain while this vampiric woman smirked and giggled.
Angered and in defence of Zane Pixal quickly reached through the bars and punched the woman in the face. The woman took several steps back startled stopping whatever she had been doing letting Zane recover.
“That’s one of those Jiangshi,” one of the villagers commented. As the woman recovered looking mad at her Pixal expressed, “you can take our weapons from us but that won’t leave us defenceless.” With the spell stopped Zane could recover and get to his feet but his heart still hurt from whatever that thing had done causing him to stand hunched over a bit with a hand over his heart.
“Oh we know. Why do you think we used vengestone for the bars and why you two have those bracers? We know you’ve been hanging around the clan like feral dogs feeding on their scraps which has given you some of their gifts in the magical arts. Those cuffs will prevent you from being able to use any magic’s.
Now why don’t you two just relax you’re going to be here a while. Have to wait for the Wild Hunt to pass the region before we can transport you to one of our major facilities. In the meantime enjoy your little den wolves, we got you a bunch of helpless lambs to feed on when your energy gets low,” the woman expressed laughing a bit while pointing to the people who were still cowering from the two.
She was clearly pushing the propaganda that droids fed on people to scare the humans present. The two could never think of doing such a thing at least while they were themselves and not warped by something like a virus or dark power. The woman then left. The two then looked around trying to think of a way out of their situation.
Clearly by her words this had all been a trap to get the two of them and they had been quite good at it leaving them with nothing to help them get out of their situation. They couldn’t do this on their own luckily though they weren’t alone however unluckily the people with them were fearful of droids so might not co-operate or even listen to them. The best they could do at least was try.
“We understand you may not feel the safest around us but we promise we do not want to hurt any of you…” Zane began before one of what looked to be a miner asked, “how can we trust your words? We know nothing about you and worst of all you’re living machines. Who do you serve? Are they good or bad?” Zane and Pixal paused to think it over together how to respond.
They communicated through their telepathic communications so the people couldn’t hear. They didn’t want to let anyone know their true identity. Because of the work they were doing and tensions at home they couldn’t have their family find out where they were. They had to stay separate from them until their work was done which wasn’t going to be done anytime soon. They quickly came up with a plan to hide their identities.
“We are special task units from the Ninjago City PD currently under command of the Ninjago Defence Forces. Our given human names are Yuri and Emi. I am Emi and this is my partner Yuri. We were sent to investigate why the nearby town was running into issues acquiring their regular shipments,” Pixal explained.
Her explanation looked to calm some of the people. Feral droids were always feared by people as they were unpredictable and often aggressive to people; droids under the control of people especially protectors like the cops were less feared and more trusted.
“So we weren’t being forgotten,” one of the townsfolk commented. The mayor then commented, “so you come from a reputable source. That still doesn’t mean you’re good. Our captors could have altered you not to mention we all know your kind deep down have the desire to overthrow and enslave humanity.”
This was going to be a lot more work than the two expected. These people clearly were well versed in the many myths of droids and looked to strongly believe them. The two had to think of something to ease the people.
Something came to their minds. If they strongly believed these myths they may also be highly superstitious; even the most logical and intelligent of beings was still highly susceptible to superstitions. Despite their knowledge of the myths these people likely didn’t know much or even anything of their true natures and biology so they might be able to trick the people into trusting them. They could sense the Sunless Dawn members hadn’t gotten everything from them. The two had hidden in their chests a special trinket they’d acquired from the clan.
Normally they wore it out on the outside of their bodies as part of their amour while working however during down time and when not wearing their armour like now they had it held inside their bodies tied around some wires to keep it from moving too much. These trinkets were apparently charms which along with other abilities, and the main reason they’d acquired these, these charms could protect them from corruption by dark powers something they really needed with the work they were doing.
“We were given these by our commanders in order to tame us; they were enchanted by Master Wu the son of the First Spinjitsu Master himself for maximum effect. As long as we have these we are tame and incapable of following our buried instincts as you would term it,” Pixal explained as the two took these charms out of their bodies to show them to the people. The charms were dark silver in make in the shape of an animal’s head.
Zane had that of a wolf, Pixal had one the shape of a hawks. The one they had gotten the items from felt those animals best suited to protect them. The people at first seemed sceptical but when one told them to put the charms back inside themselves before their dark natures had a chance to rise and many agreed with them the two knew they’d won the people over. They fully believed what the two were telling them. To not freak the people out they put the charms back in their bodies.
“I guess it wouldn’t hurt working with you two if it means we’ll make it out of this,” the mayor expressed he and some of the others braving up to get closer to the two. Another villager commented, “that Jiangshi talked to you two like she knew you two. Why is that?”
“For one she was not a Jiangshi whatever she is may be the inspiration for the Jiangshi but she… well we do not currently know what those like her are but her organisation has quite a few of them amongst their ranks. Secondly we don’t know her personally but we know of her cult,” Zane began before a miner cut him off to ask, “is that what these people are a cult?”
“Given current information we have on them it would seem to be the case unless any of you have other information on them. Since you have been around them the longest do any of you have any relative information on those that have infiltrated your town?” Pixal asked. Those gathered thought it over before offering some information.
One woman who by her information they guessed worked at or ran the local bar commented, “well when they came to the bar every night they always sat together in the back of the place. Always together and separate from everyone else, rarely did they interact with anyone else.” Another woman who likely worked with the first woman added, “I caught them once when I waited their table talking about sneaking things into the mine; guess they were talking about these cell bars.”
“One of them only worked the night shift claiming he couldn’t be in the sun. Claimed he was sensitive to light. He was not an albino though so it made no sense, who else would be allergic to sunlight?” a miner noted and another commented, “I heard them talk a bit about Notomation before. If they’re from there then that would explain why they disliked technology so much and had no cell phones plus some weird habits they had.” That both intrigued but worried Zane and Pixal. Notomation was the notorious city for those with a hatred for robotics and advanced technologies.
Going there was like stepping decades into the past. Phones were rotary, computers were primitive with very little internet capabilities, cars were largely manual with no advanced technology and media was mainly radio, VHS and cassettes.
The city was the spawning point for many of the darker conspiracies about technology and robotics; a dislike to robotics and fears to them had been around for a long time even before robots were an actual thing but this city had twisted and worsened many conspiracies. Not all of them were very bad with some weirder conspiracies which not even everyone there believed in like birds were robotic drones had started there. Droids like them were forbidden in the city and if they did end up in the city bad things happened to them, real bad things.
The ninja were actually banned from the city after Zane had got caught by some from there when he got too close to the city and they’d hurt him badly intending to kill him. When the ninja had come to rescue him they’d gone on a bit of a rampage in retaliation for the cities actions and to frighten them from doing what they had done again in the future. They’d caused quite a bit of damage and harm. Considering what had happened to him the others had been let off easy by the courts but they all now had a ban preventing them from getting too close to the city.
The mention these monsters they were tracking may be working with individuals from this place was a very unsettling fact to the two. Those from Notomation were very skilled at messing with and causing serious harm to droids such as themselves. They were going to have to be careful in their work in the future. Now however they had to focus on their task of getting out of there.
“Is that all?” Pixal asked and another villager commented, “well there is those beings you claim are not Jiangshi even though they fit the description for them who like to drain us of our energy and take some to… feed on. Those people never come back.”
“That it?” Zane asked and after a moment’s pause they all agreed that was it. They didn’t have much to work with. The two droids worked together with the people to come up with a plan to get out of there. They had no way to unlock the door so needed a guard to come and do it. They knew some were close enough in the cavern to hear them as when any fights broke out do to the tensions everyone had with being confined in that alcove for weeks some guards would come to watch and antagonize them to try and get more fights going. They were going to call them down.
When it came to opening the cell they needed something to convince them. Considering the clearly great lengths the cult had gone to get the two of them Zane and Pixal were likely important to them and they wouldn’t want anything happening to the two of them. As she had attacked him and he was still feeling an effect from her attack Zane was going to pretend something was seriously wrong with himself. Once they had the doors open they were going to make their way out of the mine and reclaim the town.
They didn’t know how many were apart of the group that had taken over but the villagers believed they didn’t have many members so they should be able to overtake their group. If it turned out there was more members then one miner suggested they set the Frostfang spiders on them. It was an option but all of them hoped it wouldn’t come to that. None of them wanted to deal with spiders.
Once their planning was done they set their plan in action. One of the villagers went to the cell bars and started yelling for the guards to come quickly as they had a problem. Zane meanwhile lay down and went as still as possible one hand on his chest pretending to be unconscious. It didn’t take long for guards to come see what was going on. There was three of them.
“Uh those things you stuck in with us, do you need them to be alive cause something’s real wrong with the one,” the person who called the guards stated and Pixal who was kneeling next to Zane pretending to be inspecting him expressed pretending to be angry, “What did you do to him you monsters?” The guards looked nervous and as they had hoped opened the cell and entered it telling the people to stay where they were one of them standing in the doorway with a shock rod to keep the people from escaping. The other two came over to check out Zane.
“This isn’t good, they need these things alive. What do you think is wrong with it?” the one guard commented and the other stated, “I don’t know anything about these things. We should take this thing to our superiors.” The one threatened Pixal with a shock rod making her stand up and take some steps back to keep her from causing trouble. The one guard went to grab Zane to pick him up. The moment the guard touched him Zane gave up the rouse and grabbed the one guard by his wrist gripping tightly so the guard couldn’t get loose. He held on as he got up and entered a struggle with the guard to keep him from getting away.
Zane grabbing the guard caught the attention of the other guards and when the one looked away from her Pixal hit the guard hard in the back of the head knocking him out. She then went after the remaining guard as in their struggles Zane accidently broke the guards arm; a combination from the strength of the grip he was using and the force he used to restrain the person. With his arm broken the guard instantly gave up terrified and collapsed to his knees begging for mercy.
Zane let him go intending to help Pixal but she had already put the guard into submission by dislocating his one arm at the elbow as she had twisted his arm to force him to drop the shock rod he had tried to use on her. With the three taken out and the door open they were free to go. Zane and Pixal quickly searched the guards for a set of keys hoping they’d have one for the bracers they wore. To their luck not only did they have keys but after testing several of them they found the one to unlock their bracers and remove them.
With the door open and the guards taken out they could now leave the cell. Most of the villagers were going to stay down there and wait for the group Zane and Pixal were going to lead to try and reclaim the village. This group consisted of about twenty members most of which were miners though the mayor was one of them. The villagers of this group refused to move until Zane and Pixal did still not fully trusting the two likely worried the two might attack from behind.
Considering the people had just seen the two of them break peoples arms with their bare hands they couldn’t blame them for their feelings. The two did what the people felt would be most comfortable and left first though they did manage to convince one of the villagers to lead the way as the two had no clue where they were in the mine and due to the rock and earth around them they could only navigate it with their base senses. They stayed at the front of the group to keep the people feeling secure as they made their way out of the mine even though they didn’t feel the safest with the people behind them. They couldn’t trust someone might try to hurt them but they needed the people to trust them.
When they got to the entrance cavern they decided a small group of them were to go up and investigate what they were dealing with before the whole group went up. Zane and Pixal were followed by five of the villagers one of which was the mayor. When they got to the building above it was closed up but they could hear a commotion outside. It was getting close to sundown meaning given the location and season it was likely around 4 or 5 in the evening; the two had arrived in the village around one in the afternoon telling them they’d likely been out for at least an hour probably more.
Their group cautiously made their way to the front of the building to peak through the doors at the front. Despite the lack of decorations the people there looked to be partying. There was about a hundred or more people hanging around the village having fun and by the sounds of some loudly cheering they were celebrating catching what they called the mechanical demons. Zane and Pixal knew that meant them.
“That’s more than what we thought there was,” the one villager stated and another worried, “we can’t take on all of them.” They were right the villagers were no match for these people even with many of these people which Zane and Pixal could tell by the smell coming from them had their minds and senses dulled and hindered by alcohol.
Many also carried shock rods making it dangerous for Zane and Pixal to try directly confronting these people. The two quickly went over what they could do to stop these people. The suggestion from earlier of the spiders came to their minds. Frostfang spiders were social spiders and defensive of their colony nest. If they could trick these spiders into thinking these people were threats to them they could get them to attack and take out most of the people.
“One of you mentioned earlier these spiders. How many are there and do you think you can find a way to lure them into the village?” Zane asked the villagers. The one who was a miner stated, “lots like at least 100 and they’re big. I don’t know about lure but we can scare them to above ground. There is a cave near the village with a passage that leads down to their nest. We’ve sometimes had them come out looking for food from there. If we threaten them they’ll be angered probably go after the closest people they can find.” The two droids thought it over before agreeing to the plan. To help encourage the spiders to go after the right targets Zane snuck out of the structure to grab a few of the bottles lying around that still had liquid in them. He then snuck back into the structure where they dumped the liquid on those who were going to harass the spiders so they would smell like those partying making the spiders associate those with that smell as the threatening ones.
Those five villagers then went back down into the mine to head to the passages that led to the spiders cavern. While they went spurred on by some villagers worrying about the people escaping by just running off Zane and Pixal came up with the idea to use the flammable liquid to create a barrier around the village. They brought the jars up and cautiously they snuck out of the structure in two groups Zane leading one while Pixal led the other. They snuck around to the outskirts of the village where they cautiously left a trail of this liquid all around the village leaving a large gap in the direction the spiders would come from. Zane and Pixal kept an eye on the cultists to make sure none was looking towards them; luckily all seemed to be in the center of town and only a few times did any look in their directions. If one looked in their directions the droids would get the people to hide behind the trees outside the town the droids joining them to avoid being seen till the cultist would look away.
Luckily it seemed they were partying too much to take note of anything. Once the oil was set they waited for the spiders hiding in the woods outside the town. It took a bit of waiting, about twenty minutes, with nothing happening. They started to wonder if something went wrong when one of the invaders who had been near the outskirts of town in the spider caves direction came running into the town screaming in a panic about spiders. Shortly after a bunch of large stocky spiders came running into the village to attack the people there. The spiders ranged in size from that of a kitten to a small bear though most were on the smaller side. There had to be about seventy of them and not only could they climb but as they had a build like a tarantula mixed with a jumping spider they could jump.
“Can’t believe I’m saying this but I’m glad to see spiders,” one of those waiting with them commented. As the spiders flooded the town their groups set the flammable liquid on fire causing a wall of fire to spring up where the villagers had poured the liquid around the village. Not only did it trap the people in the village but also the spiders who were scared of the fire. The spiders though largely ignored the fire more interested in clambering and jumping around the town to attack any person they came across biting them to inflict they’re freezing venom to paralyse everyone. Most of the people were too scared of the spiders, which the fear was worsened by the fire, to stand their ground against them and instead just tried to flee leading them to get bit as the people weren’t as fast as the spiders. It didn’t take the spiders long to subdue everyone present.
“That worked great though now we have a bunch of spiders to deal with,” the mayor commented after the spiders had finished some of them now trying to drag the paralysed people back to their den. As the spiders finished their work their group moved into the village. One of the miners commented, “the same way we scare them out of the mines. Scare them back with fire.” Some of the villagers used branches lighting them on fire to wave them infront of the spiders to scare them while others went back into the mine to grab more jars of the liquid to dump the jars contents on the ground around the village tossing them on the roads and sidewalks. They then lit the liquids on fire. The spiders had looked like they were going to attack the villagers but the fires and people rushing them with flaming sticks scared them making them rush back to their cave leaving the people alone and even abandoning those they were trying to carry out.
Some spiders tried to play brave and stand their ground but villagers chasing the spiders with flaming sticks ended up scaring even the brave ones who all fled the village for the safety of their cave. Once the spiders were gone the villagers put the fires out though most were burning out as they finished burning through the liquid. With the cultists taken down and fires out the villagers reclaimed the town sending some down to retrieve the rest of the townsfolk so they could return to their village. Once the villagers had reclaimed the village the local police were contacted. Once they were contacted some of the villagers along with Zane and Pixal went about collecting all the intruders while they waited for the police to arrive. The intruders were still paralysed and would remain that way for several hours making restraining them easy.
They were sat in groups in the center of town and tied up. The three in the mine were pulled out and brought of sit with the rest of their pals. The three didn’t fight back and submitted without question worried Zane and Pixal would hurt them again. The two had never intended to hurt them as much as they had but it didn’t bother them. These weren’t innocent people and hopefully the harm they had received would make these people rethink their life choices, regret them and change their ways.
As they tied the people up Zane and Pixal noted that woman they had seen earlier was not amongst the people there and they heard from other villagers that none of these Jiangshi they had seen were amongst the people there. While waiting for the cops to show up the two did a quick look over the village using different senses and scans they had to look for signs of these un-dead beings. There was none. Alongside their searching they found and recovered the things this group had taken from them. Once the invaders were dealt with the towns people began cleaning up their town and some of the miners were quickly getting shipments of the coal they had already packed up shipped out to catch up on the lost time of shipments and get some cash back into the village before the holidays.
When the cops showed up despite worried the cops may recognise them and tell their family Zane and Pixal didn’t use their disguises knowing when interviewing other people they would tell the cops the identities they had given them. The cops were at first uneasy of the two but when they told them they’re false identity the cops believed them and relaxed. Luckily they didn’t recognise who they truly were. Believing they were police droids the people of the village largely left the two to deal with the cops.
The two told the cops about what had happened, how’d they had caught the criminals, how some had likely escaped and how they should get some search teams with search dogs to scour the mines to search for anyone hiding down there and the people of the village that were missing because of the cultists. The cops trusted and agreed with them as they loaded the criminals into the vans and trucks they had brought. The cops then took Zane and Pixal back to their station in the nearby city for them to fill out forms for them.
The two had been hesitant with this part of the task as for a means to keep track of droids to watch for signs of turning feral or evil as people called it they would have to fill out paperwork and take mug shots that would be sent to their ‘owners’ for confirmation of who they were and that they were being obedient and good.
Luckily for them by the time all that would reach the Defence Forces headquarters where they likely would recognise the two and let the ninja know they would be out of the area plus both the villagers and cops didn’t know they could cloak their appearance so they could easily hide through this ability.
The good thing about their visit to the police station was several of those they caught had bounties on them and as they had caught the criminals the two got the payments. It was more than enough for what they needed.
“Gonna get yourselves some new upgrades for the new year,” the desk clerk who gave them the payments expressed joking as they got their payment. The two were a little uncomfortable after having interacted with so many strangers but pulled off being upbeat for Pixal to reply, “probably not. It won’t really help against our enemies.”
“Yha I guess nothing’s really been developed yet that’s useful against the Lost Clan huh,” the clerk stated. After getting the cash they headed back to the town they were staying in. It was late and things were closed so they headed to the fort to sleep. The next day they wasted no time to get what they needed and get it sent out so it would make it to their family on time. Once that was taken care of they were free to do whatever they felt like. Donning their human disguise they went to see the overseers for the smith works to see how things were going.
The smith works were happy as supply chains had been restored so things were going to go back to normal for the town and no one was going to lose their jobs after the holidays. The smith works didn’t really have much to give them other than a little painted iron bird usually used as a decoration for planters.
The two weren’t bothered, they’d already gotten what they had needed and liked the little birds; they could put them in planters back home when they got there. The overseers however were a bit confused as they had been told it had been droids who helped the town not the two of them. This confusion was cleared up however when the two decided to let the people see the truth letting down their cloaks so the people could see who they were.
The people were startled and a little scared till the two explained the reason they had tricked the people was they had been afraid humans wouldn’t have accepted their help if they knew their true natures. The people to their relief were forgiving to them and wished them holiday blessings as they left. They decided to return to where they were staying for the rest of the day to spend time together.
The clan members they were staying with had welcomed them to their festivities including their feast though the clan wouldn’t let the two help out in preparations expressing they were guests so deserved to relax and let the clan deal with everything. The two still managed to sneak helping out whenever they could. They had dinner with the clan members being sat with the clans droids. It was okay being with those of their kind but they weren't their family.
They didn’t have the rest of their family with them but at least they had each other. It was just going to be the two of them for the holidays that year but at least they weren’t alone and hopefully it wouldn’t be long till they could have their family back together again.
While the two enjoyed their evening at the Monastery Jay, Nya and Kai were there with their parents finishing up making their holiday dinner. Jay and Nya were helping their mothers along with Skylor with the cooking; Kai was not allowed to help out as they didn’t want him near the spices. Instead he was helping with their fathers to set up the dinner table. While they were working Kai heard a noise come from the recreation room. Sounded like a crow.
He went to check it out thinking it was that raven Zane and Pixal had tried to train to spy for them amongst the clan however it had never worked and instead the bird had come to hang around the monastery always looking for free food and even at times breaking in to steal food. When he got to the room however he didn’t see anything. Maybe he was just hearing things he wondered till he noticed something on the pool table.
There was three presents there. They hadn’t been there before. Curious he went to inspect them. Each present had a card with it. They were addressed to him, his sister and Jay. The writing on the cards interested Kai. It wasn’t the writing of any of their parents instead it looked like…
Following his curiosity he opened the card meant for him and read it. Upon reading it he quickly got Jay and Nya to show them what he had found. The two picked up and read their cards. Like Kai they were surprised and confused though also warmed by what they had found. Zane and Pixal had sent them gifts.
They had gotten for Jay a toy remote controlled Grundle and for Nya they had gotten her a small drone. For both they had given some suggestions to the two for alterations or improvements the two could work together on with their items.
For Kai they had gotten him a video game and a book on ancient weapons and armours that included the believed recipe and craft methods of these items; with when the Lost Clan came from Kai had developed an interest recently of ancient weapons and armours and how they were made.
Along with the gifts were cards with notes about how they missed the rest of them and wanted to be there with them however due to various factors they couldn’t get near the rest of them. That saddened them. They felt bad for the two having to be separate from their family, the few the two felt safe around and could call family. They thought maybe the two were still nearby and they could catch the two to bring them home but when looking at the security cameras they had set up on the outside of the Monastery they were saddened but amused to see the two hadn’t delivered the packages themselves.
Instead it was a group of crows who had delivered the packages one of which they believed as it could open the Monastery doors was the one the two had been training unsuccessfully for spy work; looked like they had finally gotten the bird to at least do something more than stealing food. The presents and notes cheered them up and they were further cheered up when Kai and Nya’s father came in to tell them that his brother the uncle who’s house they would be visiting in the next few days for their families gathering had just called to tell them ‘Droids were in the Chicken coop’.
They knew that as his code term for when droids, largely Zane and Pixal, got onto his property. While having a distrust to robotics their uncle was nothing like the people from Notomation. He didn’t hate them or view them as evil, they were more like wild animals in his eyes and as a farmer he knew about wild animals so knew you couldn’t trust them around domestics and people but with the right precautions you could live alongside them.
He had one of those robotic vacuums that he let freely roam his house during the day but at night or when his family was away from the farm like when shopping he locked it with its base in a tinfoil plated dog cage to keep it from causing ‘mischief’. They had no clue what he thought a mindless roaming disc that sucked up dirt and dust would do but it was amusing.
What was even more amusing was his wife had attached large googly eyes on the top of it for fun which had confused Zane and Pixal when they saw it the one year causing them to watch it confused for about ten whole minutes.
This had amused their uncle who likened the twos actions to horses encountering a small animal for the first time. His distrust of robotics made his interactions with their droid siblings a bit weird when they would bring them around for the holidays but they were pretty sure the three of them liked it as some weird holiday tradition.
Maybe not so much him making the ninja feed the two from large dog bowls but defiantly their game of hide and seek with the tracking devices which was one of the reasons he had called.
The tracking devices he had already ended up spread around his farm on various animals plus some of the animals including his work horses had been dressed with tin foil lined festive hats and dressed in sweaters and were surprisingly calm about it even the cats. He was pretty sure the two had stopped by his farm at some point to do that even though none of his family had seen them nor had they been caught on any of his security cameras though they had all been strangely shut off that day.
The three knew that had to have been the two of them. No one else would do that plus somehow Zane and Pixal had a strange way with animals and could get them to tolerate things they usually wouldn’t. They were guessing the two enjoyed that activity more than they let off so just had to engage in the activity a bit.
Cole meanwhile was at his father’s house making dinner with Seliel while their fathers hung out in the living room. At one point Coles father came to comment to him how if he wasn’t in his room Cole should turn off his radio. Cole was confused, he hadn’t left a radio playing in his room. He went to see what his father was talking about. Sure enough his father was right. There was music playing in his room. Somehow his portable speaker had gotten turned on and connected to something to play music. Not only that but a window had been left open. He turned off the speaker and shut the window. Worried someone had broken in he looked around to see if anything was taken. Nothing had been taken but there was something new in his room.
On his bed alongside some large black feathers likely from some kind of crow had been placed a cookbook he hadn’t seen before with a card laying on it and atop that was two dolls. Not just any dolls though. They were ones of the titanium ninja and Pixal’s Samurai X. The sight of the items especially the dolls he felt over whelmed by feelings of happiness, worry and confusion. He looked at the card to confirm his suspicions.
He was right these were gifts from Zane and Pixal; while it wasn’t in the note he was guessing from the feathers scattered on his bed the two had gotten these items delivered to him likely by that raven they had been training a while back. He couldn’t help but feel warmed by the gifts. He’d been so lost without the two missing them and really worried about them feeling he had failed to protect them.
He felt warmed to know the two were still out there and not only okay but still felt for the rest of them and wanted to be with the rest of them but until conditions were better they had to stay apart. If only it hadn’t been for what Lloyd had done the two would still be with them. He picked up the two dolls and gave them a hug tears coming to his eyes as he commented, “don’t worry you two I’m going to find you no matter what and keep you safe.”
Lloyd meanwhile was with his mother and uncle. As she was working at a recently discovered archaeological site near Primevals Eye Lloyd’s mother was staying in a trailer at the site with some of the other workers working on the uncovered ruins there. Most had gone home for the holidays. Normally the three would be at the Monastery with the others however due to events he was responsible for he didn’t feel like being near the others for the holidays. He’d hurt them badly and would just remind them of the bad things he’d done. Instead they decided they would stay with his mother at the ruins for the time. Despite not being a very spectacular trailer, it was largely just the central room which had a living and kitchen space with a bathroom and single large bedroom at the one end with a built in bunk bed across from the bathroom, and not really having much to decorate with his mother had still put up some decorations.
She was making the dinner for them Lloyd trying to help out but frequently getting distracted by his thoughts which were always about what he had done, how he regretted them and wishing he had done things differently so he hadn’t driven Zane and Pixal to leave. While they cooked Wu was looking over some of the artefacts Misako and her co-workers had pulled out of the site. They were all ancient, possibly even older than when his father had arrived in the realm. Eerily some artefacts resembled makes used by the Lost Clan, these ones were though were heavily tarnished by centuries of wear from the environment and being buried in the earth but the resemblance to designs from the clan could still be made out. As they worked they suddenly heard a commotion come from the bathroom of the trailer. Lloyd decided to look into it. It was probably just some kind of animal; it wasn’t uncommon for them to get into the trailer.
As he got close to the bathroom Lloyd was getting a feeling he hadn’t felt in quite a while, an agitation, and there was a strong rot smell coming from the room. Had something died in it? As he opened the door he was startled to see what looked like a dead partially decayed Opossum lying on the middle of the bathroom floor having knocked some things like their tooth brushes off the sink. By the broken vent in the roof it looked like it had possibly fallen through the roof after laying up there for some time. Just his luck, his holiday was going to start with something dying in his vicinity.
Was this the cosmos trying to tell him something or even punish him for what he had done? Knowing he couldn’t leave the creature there he grabbed some toilet paper and nervously grabbed the back of the neck not really wanting to touch it. The moment he touched it the creature jumped up hissing at him and startling him. He fell backwards as the creature ran towards the door of the trailer to get out in a panic.
“What is that?” Misako asked when she saw the creature. Wu explained how the creature was an un-dead opossum from the Underworld known as a Skullossum; they’d had one roaming around the Monastery a while back. He let it out guessing it had accidently ended up in the trailer after getting lost in their realm likely after stumbling through a weak spot between their realm and the Underworld. With the creature gone Lloyd cleaned up the mess in the bathroom as he started that though he noted a sack on the floor. It didn’t look like it had come from what was in the trailer. Curious he inspected it. There was something’s in it.
One was what looked like a snow globe but it had a flattened oval top that bore a metal decorative frame with the center made of clearstone. Instead of a fake snow golden flake pieces floated in the liquid inside and a light was in the top it’s controls and battery sources on the bottom of the item. The light inside shone down on a figure inside the center which looked to depict his grandfather. Guessing by its design he was guessing his mom had gotten this for his uncle which was partially confirmed by the tag on it but the writing on the tag was not his mothers.
Curios he looked in the bag. There was something in there for him, a book of a collection of comics and a teddy of a lung style dragon with a heart in its mouth, plus a card for each him and his uncle. Lloyd took out the card for him and read it. What he read both saddened but also made him happy bringing tears to his eyes. Zane and Pixal had been the ones to send the gifts. Not only that but they had written to Lloyd that they forgave him for what he had done and hoped to soon be back with their family. After reading the note Lloyd commented to himself, “I hope we can get our family back together soon to and when we do I’m going to make it up to you two for everything I did I promise.”
Added some more to the Clan of the Lost story. Plus I did an update to the Parrot-Cruncher design:
A few of the arts for this section:
Here's some snippets from the added section:
“The entrance we are looking for is located higher up on the southern peak. We should be heading up in elevation in that direction,” Pixal announced as they entered the pass. It took them a brief moment as they went through the pass before they found a trail that looked to head up where they needed to go, it was likely a game trail so would be a decently smooth ride compared to just riding through the wilderness. They spent all day traversing up the mountain stopping anytime they came across a crevice, cave or alcove in ledges or cliffs along the path to see if it led to this valley they were looking for. None amounted to anything useful; just minor marks in the landscape. One had a cave bear sleeping in it that they accidentally disturbed when entering the cave luckily the bear didn’t want to leave the warmth and safety of its cave so did no more than chase them out. In one cave with a somewhat narrow entrance however they were disturbed to find the remains of an expedition of ten hikers with three horses that had perished in a shallow cave in a cliff side. They did a quick investigation of the group which were just skeletons now with their weathered attire still draped over their bones.
There were four girls and six boys with two mares and a stallion of a breed of a short and stocky breed of horse indicating it was built more for cargo carrying and not for being ridden on. Given some scraps of shaggy fur by the horse skeletons the breed probably was also one adapted to a harsh northern climate and given the hair length the animals had probably perished during the colder months meaning the cold was likely a culprit to the demise of the horses and humans whose what was left of the attire did look to be clothes built for warmth further indicating they had likely perished during a colder time of the year. There was evidence the group had built a fire in the center of the cave however it looked like they had run out of wood and burned some of their supplies before ultimately leading to the fire dying out as they had nothing left which had left them in the cold.
“You think this could be work of those Ice demons!?” Jay wondered. The others were not believing that.
“It would appear from what we can tell this group took shelter in here probably due to bad weather and likely died of hypothermia as they were ill prepared for the conditions possibly even becoming trapped from snowfall blocking the entrance they had come in from trapping them in temperatures too cold for them to handle. Given the designs of the technologies present I would have to assume they have been here for at least ten years at most fifteen,” Pixal acknowledged as they inspected the remains. They found amongst the remains journals, a sketchpad and some old camcorders and digital cameras. Cole noted inspecting a wallet he found on the one body, “if their states didn’t tell you that this person’s drivers licence sure could. It was dated for renewal twelve years ago.”
“They are still carrying identifications. That is good. We should collect them so we can identify to authorities when we get back who we found so they can notify the right individuals to inform them of these individuals fates and bring closure to their loved ones. I and Pixal will record the co-ordinates so Sherpa’s and authorities can collect the remains for proper disposal by the families in their cultural customs,” Zane expressed. While the others felt the way Zane termed that was a little cold and harsh they understood what he was meaning.
“The batteries will definitely be dead on these but they may still hold memory of what they recorded,” Jay commented inspecting a camcorder. Lloyd stated, “we can see what they have on them later. It’s getting late and we should probably set up a camp site for the night.” They all had to agree with that. This site was creepy and it was getting close to sun down. Given the cold of the area and the eeriness of this find they felt it was probably in their best interest to have a fire and get their tent up before the sun went down. They collected the cameras, journals, sketchpad and any forms of identifications they could find and put them with their supplies before heading off to find a place for the night. They put some distance between that cave and where they set up camp. They chose a fairly large and flat space in a bit of a valley on the mountain. The valley was treed offering some protection from winds which seemed to be picking up a little as night fell.
Nya, Jay, Pixal and Zane set up their large tent getting some of their supplies like lanterns, sleeping bags and other bedding into the tent while Cole chopped down a dead tree on the edge of their site to make some firewood and start a fire. Kai and Lloyd headed out into the surrounding woods to collect more wood and debris for the fire. As soon as they had wood to burn they got a fire started outside the tent. Once things were set up they began to settle for the night. Jay and Nya sat next to each by the campfire working on seeing what had been on those cameras they had found. The memory cards were still intact but they weren’t too sure if they still held anything. Due to the cold of the region the laptop they were using was running a bit slow. To offer some protection in case of animals looking for an easy meal Zane and Pixal manoeuvred the groups ATVs to form a loose semi circle wall between their fire and tent entrance and the wilderness.
“Now that we have everything set I’ll get dinner started,” Cole commented as he finished placing some wood in their tent to use later for bed. Jay was quick to ask a little nervous to know the answer, “what is dinner?”
“Beef Jerky in beans,” Cole commented getting the supplies for cooking off their trailer. Jay expressed not too thrilled, “you realise we’re sleeping in a fairly air tight tent and in close quarters right?” Cole responded as he brought the stuff over to the fire to start cooking, “we needed food that could easily be transported during rugged travel which canned food and dried meats is the best for that and one of the healthiest and most nutritious canned foods is beans. If you want to try and find something fresh to make be my guess; I don’t think you’re going to find any berries or game out in the woods here; I can understand why they called it dead mountain. I’ve hardly seen any animals or berry bushes out here.”
“Maybe we can send Zane and Pixal out. I’m betting they could find something. You two could probably track down and take down a deer like a pair of wolves couldn’t you?” Jay commented as Zane and Pixal came to sit by the fire with the rest of them. Upon hearing his comment the two droids were confused Pixal inquiring, “what exactly are you saying? Are you saying we are wolves?”
“No I’m just joking with you. You know with how good your senses are and how superior your speed and agility is to a normal person you’re like wolves compared to us so would probably be just as good as them at finding and catching prey out here,” Jay explained. Zane and Pixal took a moment to think his explanation over. After the moments thought Zane commented, “I think we get it. Would you like us then to go hunt a deer?”
“We’ll just have what we brought,” Jay stated and after a moment’s pause Zane asked a little confused, “so do you want us to find a deer for food or not?”
“No Zane you two don’t have to hunt down anything like wolves for dinner. It’s probably best we don’t venture too far from our site anyway. Speaking of which where’s Kai and Lloyd? Shouldn’t they be back by now?” Jay began to worry.
“They have been gone oddly long,” Nya commented on edge before being distracted by the computer finally picking up the memory card from the digital camera. She expressed, “amazing photos are still on here.”
“Really! What do they show?” Jay asked excited to see. Curious Zane and Pixal moved closer so they could see the computer screen too. As they moved close Jay asked Cole, “wanna see it?”
“Uh no thank you; something about seeing photos from travellers that perished a long time ago while travelling out where we are now that no one probably knows what has become of them or that they’re there is kind of unsettling to me,” Cole expressed as he started cooking. They had to agree there was something very disturbing about these photos but to understand what went on with those travellers they needed to delve into this. There was quite a few photos mainly of scenery, possible landmarks, wildlife and flora with some of the travellers, their horses which they were using to carry much of their gear and a few of the passes memorial. Most of the photos were of the group taking photos of themselves on their journey.
Most of it seemed fairly normal and not very eventful. The people seemed happy and there was no sign of any danger; they looked to be some kind of social group possibly from a collage. There were photos taken in their camps at night and some breaks they took on their travels. All looked happy and unbothered by their travels. It looked like they had set out during the fall. They guessed the group was just backpacking for fun or sightseeing as they couldn’t figure out from the photos what the groups intentions and plans were. As they were going through the pictures Kai and Lloyd finally returned. The two looked a little shaken and kept looking over their shoulders as they entered the site and placed the sticks and branches they had collected by the trailer.
“What’s with you two? You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” Jay commented. The mention of ghost made Cole jump a bit and look around for a moment scared. Kai explained, “it feels creepy out there.”
“Creepy how?” Jay wondered. Lloyd noted he and Kai nervously looking out into the woods, “it felt like we were being watched or followed by something.” Kai expressed, “don’t forget to mention the glowing red eyes in that one tree and the voice.”
“Red eyes?!” Jay worried and Zane explained, “that is likely either an owl or rabbit. Both have eyes that reflect with a red color instead of the typical golden of animals.”
“Are you sure? We’re pretty sure we heard it speak… there that’s the speaking. Did it follow us?!” Lloyd commented before he and Kai became unsettled by a sound coming from the woods. It had most of them startled however Zane and Pixal were calm analyzing what they were hearing.
“That is an owl. A Blanchards Barred Owl to be precise. Large owls native to northern boreal, cold temperate and alpine forests that dine on mammals up to the size of a rabbit along with the occasional reptiles and other birds. Their hooting call is regarded as sounding a bit like a human asking ‘who cooks for you’ and their eyes do reflect with a red colour. You are getting worked up over an owl,” Zane commented confused and un-amused by the others reactions of fear to a harmless sound. The rest of them began to calm down Kai expressing as they did, “not all of us have super senses and brains like an encyclopaedia Zane.”...
Snippet 2:
“This isn’t good,” Jay commented. The next thing they knew all of them were knocked of the arch from behind by something large, thick and solid into the icy river below. They all struggled to stay above the raging water while also looking trying to find a way out of it. Nya and Cole wasted no time to grab and help Kai stay fairly above the water. After a few meters of struggling in the water they managed to come to a large downed tree that had fallen in the river in a mild canyon like section that the river made through a large hill. The log looked to be from a landslide from the cliff top of the one hill above the river.
Some other debris mainly small logs and dead foliage some of it probably from the same landslide had created a minor blockage in the river there. The tree creating the blockage was a massive and thick conifer that had been taller than the canyon was wide. This had led it to getting wedged between the cliff on the one side of the canyon and the debris from the landslide that had put it there. The base and roots were stuck in the debris pile on one side with the trunk angled up with an angle under 45 degrees up where it became wedged on the other cliff side where it had broken its top half which due to an unclean and not full break had remained attached to the other half of the log.
This top half had then fallen to rest angled sharply down into the river downstream of the logs bottom half causing the rivers current to shove it against the other half of the tree getting it stuck. The way the tree had come to lay made it very easy for other logs and debris to get caught on this tree and start collecting against it creating the blockage. They all got caught on the front of this blockage on a log that had been stripped of its bark and held onto it to keep themselves up; a task proving quite hard thanks to the freezing temperature of the water. They had cliffs on either side of them trapping them in the canyon. To get out they’d have to cling to the cliff face and pull themselves back up the river whose current was quite strong.
“What was that?!” Jay exclaimed when they’d come to a stop. Looking back they couldn’t see anything, the Okhotnik and its beast had either disappeared or wasn’t following them. Cole expressed, “whatever it was had to have been big.”
“I think something brushed against my leg!” Nya expressed before something like a snake wrapped up out of the water around her holding her up out of the water a bit and the top of a massive amphibian creature jumped up onto the top of the log looking down at them all. It had a large wide head with large almost tusk like teeth and large golden eyes that stood out on its dark colored body.
“What is that?!” Jay exclaimed and Zane explained, “Snakemander; a large carnivorous labyrinthodont amphibian native to many waterways of Ninjago and the Dark Isle.” Nya was being held by its tail and rear end up out of the water while it went under the log in the water and its front end came up onto the log to look back at its prey. That had been what had knocked them off the arch; slamming them all with its entire body.
“A labri-what!” Jay expressed shocked as Kai tossed a ball of fire at the creatures face yelling at it to let go of his sister. While not hurting it the fireball clearly bothered the amphibian. It let Nya go while diving back under the water.
“A type of ancient amphibian; Snakemanders are very long bodied salamander like amphibians,” Zane explained as Nya fell back into the water at which time Cole was tugged by his one leg by something and pulled under the water. Another of these Snakemanders burst out of the water wrapping itself around Zane and dragging him under the water while another jumped onto the blockage causing it to move a bit. With one of them out of the water they were scared to see the full size of these creatures and why they had the term snake in their name. They had very long elongated bodies at least as long and possibly longer than a bus with short and stubby clawless limbs. The arms were not far from the head giving it a short neck while the legs were about halfway between the arms and the tip of the tail. To try and scare it off Kai threw some fireballs at it struggling to get his powers working as the cold water of the river began pushing them all closer to hypothermia. He missed each time he tried to hit the beast as it went to snap at them. Luckily it wasn’t fond of the fire backing away from it each time he threw a fireball. His misses however started the dry debris out of the water including the large log creating the blockage on fire.
Meanwhile under the water the creature that had grabbed Zane had pulled him down to the river bottom about two to three meters down and after a quick inspection of him let him go to attack the others clearly recognising he was not organic in make therefore not prey. Once free Zane looked around for Cole who had also been dragged under and who he felt likely needed his help. Cole was just managing to get free of the Snakemander that had grabbed him. He managed to scare it by erupting rock spires on the river bed around it. The act scared the creature which let him go.
The act of the fighting while holding his breath however had taken its toll on him and he was starting to go unconscious from a lack of oxygen. Zane wasted no time heading over to grab Cole making sure to put his one hand over Coles mouth and nose first to keep him from accidently breathing in water; he knew just grabbing him would startle him and cause Cole to instinctively gasp in shock. Sure enough Cole was startled by his touch however thanks to his forward thinking he kept Cole from accidently breathing in water. Once seeing who had him Cole relaxed. The two quickly made for the surface Cole barely able to help as he tried to keep from passing out. Once at the surface Cole gasped for air while Zane began to cough to get the water he had accidently breathed in when the Snakemander had pulled him under out of his synthetic lungs.
The waters current carried them back to the blockage where the others had climbed out onto the debris to escape some of the Snakemanders. There was three of them that were attacking their group who all wanted to get one of them. Luckily though the creatures clearly weren’t wanting to share and kept getting into fights with each other trying to drive the others away. Two were fighting each other in front of the pile occasionally slamming into it jolting the debris which moved some bits especially those burned loose by the fire that had consumed part of the pile. The third had climbed up onto the wall of the cliff at the side of the river looking for the easiest of them to target.
It's been a while since I did an update. I never intended for such a long hiatus but this year has not been a good year. At the end of May my grandmother on my mothers side died of sepsis and most of her side of the family are pretty awful people, let's just say they are into drugs and my one half uncle has a criminal record involving drugs and some not good things with kids (explains why my parents never let him come over nor leave I and my sisters alone when he was around during family gatherings) so there was a great deal of work and drama too deal with plus we had to clean her apartment as she had lay for three days after she passed before anyone found her then my father broke his one leg into three pieces in September while Roller Skating and I've been helping him with daily tasks since then cause he can't do a good deal of stuff while using crutches. I never stopped working on my story but things took longer as I was busy.
Anyway I've finally got finished a good portion of the story completed and have posted them here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/34894561/chapters/86888878
There are now three chapters to the prequel story.
In this next section the ninja get a hint of where the Lost Clan came from however things don't go as planned when they go to investigate the site. They stumble upon some strange lands and some dark secrets to the clan. Then upon their return home the Clan unleashes their biggest attack yet to the capital of Ninjago (Skylor makes a major appearance here). Here's some samples from what I have posted so far:
A very interesting dragon they encounter:
Some of the artifacts from the story:
Two of the strange environments they come across:
After the battle in the capital the ninja find themselves hunted by entities that call themselves the riders of doom one of which is the Rider of Pestilence:
Some creatures and flora from the strange place they find themselves in:
Some snippets from the story:
At one spot almost two thirds the way across the lake they came onto a small rocky island in the lake and decided to take a break so Kai could relax before they continued over open water. The isle was not too small as it was big enough to have a decent sized cabin with a couple meters around it on all sides having land before they reached the shore and even then there was a bit of this flooded forest which Zane and Pixal had started referring to as a dock forest around the isle. The cabin looked up kept and still in use however no one was there and it was locked. Looking into the windows they could see no signs of anyone currently living there. They guessed this might be someone’s summer or vacation home and they weren’t currently there. They sat down outside this cabin where the path went rate past it. The isle was dominated by conifer trees mainly what looked to be a species of redwood possibly some form of metasequoia which had the ground of the isle colored reddish from its shed leaves along with some ferns and other flora including a tree looking fungi. The flora on the isle was fairly dense creating a secluded and sheltered site on the isle; they were guessing that was why the cabin had been built there in the first place. Someone had wanted a nice secluded and quite place to get away from it all.
“So what if we don’t find a settlement here?” Jay asked while they sat there picking up small stones and pinecones every now and then to then toss them at a wall of the cabin.
“Well we’ll defiantly have to find Cole something to eat before he tries to eat one of us,” Kai joked irritating Cole who wasn’t amused by the comment and getting hangry. Kai as well was tossing small objects at the building. Zane was not happy about the two throwing stuff at the building steadily getting more annoyed at the two.
“Can you please not do that,” he commented. Not sure what Zane was talking about Kai expressed as he tossed a pinecone at the building, “not do what?”
“That,” Zane stated. Picking up what was agitating Zane Jay quietly told Kai to film before teasing Zane as he tossed a pinecone with, “you mean this?”
“Yes. This structure is someone else’s property and you could end up causing damages to it,” Zane explained. Kai asked while filming, “how could pinecones damage a building?” Zane didn’t seem to realise he was being filmed.
“You could break a window and we have nothing to fix it nor do we know when the owner will return so it could be left open for days or even months leaving access for creatures and weather to get into the structure causing much more damage which could cost the owner a great deal in funds, time and even their health should mold or dangerous animals take inhabitance in the structure,” Zane explained. Jay expressed, “that’s why you aim for an area of the wall without a window on it.” Pixal questioned confused, “why are you committing such an action? There is no logical reason to throw random objects against a wall.”
“It’s just a chill thing to do to alleviate boredom,” Jay commented. After a moment’s pause Zane commented, “can’t you just use your brain for stimulation like visualizing your thoughts or you could use your time to analyze and study the world around you.”
“We’re not nindroids; our brains can’t so nicely visualize things like yours can plus we don’t share your twos curious and analytical minds,” Kai commented. Jay then stated, “because it gives your hands something to do. Haven’t you every just picked things up and tossed them for the fun of it? There’s no harm in it plus you can turn it into a game. You know see how good your aim is and how close you can get to a target.” Zane and Pixal looked at each other for a moment confused before Pix commented, “no.”
“Why don’t you give it a go; just pick up something and give it a toss at something,” Jay proposed. Again Zane and Pixal looked at each other a bit confused before Zane looked around himself for a small object. He picked up a small stone and looked it over.
“Okay now give it a throw at something,” Jay encouraged. To Jays shock but everyone else’s amusement instead of throwing the stone at the building or tree like he expected Zane tossed the stone at him with considerable force. It smacked Jay pretty hard in the chest knocking him back and momentarily taking his breath away.
“I guess I can see some of the attraction to this,” Zane commented as Jay sat back up to angrily proclaim, “you don’t throw it at living things!”
“You did not say that was not an option,” Pixal noted and Cole commented, “to be fair you sometimes deserve to be hit by stones. If words don’t get through to you then stones sure will.” Jay was not amused.
“I haven’t done anything wrong,” Jay commented and Zane noted, “you kept up an action I told you to stop.”
“It’s just a building!” Jay stated and Pixal commented, “yes but it does not belong to you. How would you feel having someone throwing stones at your home?” Jay was silent for a moment before commenting a bit defeated, “I wouldn’t like it.”
“See now will you not throw stones at it. Why don’t you analyze these strange cones instead,” Zane commented tossing a cone from the forest floor at Jay. Jay caught it and looked at it not too amused. Cole quickly commented picking one up that sat by him to ask, “can we eat these?”
“Possibly; they might need to be cooked to render them safe for human consumption but that is not a guarantee so best not to test it out at this time,” Pixal noted while Jay worked on trying to open up the cone. He had to use a pocket knife he had in a pocket of his attire to cut it open. When he got it open he remarked looking at the inside, “this is weird. It’s like someone shoved dried beans into that stuff in a dragon fruit and it smells funny like fishy funny. I don’t want to risk eating this.”
“What do those cones come from?” Kai asked reaching for one of the cones near him which looked to be buried a bit in the leaf litter and Zane noted, “most likely the strange trees forming this dock forest. We’re calling the trees Dock Cypresses.” As Kai picked up the supposed cone he was startled to find this ‘cone’ was some strange hedgehog like mammal with armoured plates on its back that made it look like a pine cone. The creature was not too pleased with being picked up and yelled at him displaying the massive almost tusk like fangs in its more wolfish snout at Kai who quickly tossed the creature away from himself worried of getting bit by it. The creature ploughed about a foot on the ground as it landed before getting up to rush off into the undergrowth Cole commenting as it ran, “do you think we could eat that?”
“Possibly but you would have to find and catch it first,” Zane commented. Cole was not up to trying to find the creature.
“You know maybe we should continue on before Cole gets hungry enough to try and eat one of our arms,” Kai commented. Cole was not happy with them joking about him but they all agreed they should continue on their way...
Snippet 2:
“I don’t care the reason. We need to focus on the now and keep them from taking the capitol. If they take this spot the rest of the continent will descend into turmoil and we could lose everything to these monsters,” the chief declared and Skylor expressed checking her phone, “they haven’t messed with local cell towers have they?”
“The police are on the way just stay there and don’t throw potato salad at the monsters. Just like wild animals don’t feed them they’ll come back for more… No the local cell signals are fine but so many people are calling the systems are overwhelmed and signals poor… Hello Ninjago PD what can I do for you, what do you mean mini Grundles have invaded the museum? No they look a bit like mini Grundles but they’re not…Feardrakes… lock them in the cafeteria with food tossed around if you can till help arrives that should distract them,” a dispatcher commented between answering calls. Skylor wondered, “if I got closer to a tower would I have a better signal?” One of the tacticians stated, “possibly.”
“Where’s the closest one?” Skylor asked and one of the dispatcher stated, “I think one of the skyscrapers nearby has a cell tower atop it.” Skylor went over to the glass doorway and looked up at the top of the nearby buildings. Due to their large height it was hard to see the tops but she was pretty sure one of them did have a cell tower on top. After a few minutes searching one of the tacticians came over to her to show her on his tablet a map with regional cell towers. He pointed to the nearest one. It was only a block away on a mixed commercial residential building. The lower floors had some shops while the upper floors were residential. She was going to make for that building. She headed out the door. She had to help the force members and cops fight back some of the enemy forces that were trying to break into their base in order to get out. To get over the barricade the clan had brought over one of their siege towers to climb over the barricade while one of the mammoths was bashing at the one section of the barricade trying to either smash through it or knock it over. It already had several holes in the barricade. As the forces started to enter the secure area those out there began retreating into the building as those inside began shutting the defence shutters for the lower levels to keep the forces out of the building.
Using the lightening power she had siphoned from the crow monster she struck the siege tower lighting it on fire which as it was butted up to the largely wooden barricade walls the cops had built started parts of that on fire. The erupting fire startled the mammoth who knocked off its rider as it reared up in fright. Knowing she’d have trouble fighting her way a block on her own as the forces and cops were occupied and overwhelmed by clan forces while trying to get people to safety she came up with an idea. To control the mammoth the rider was using chains that were anchored into bracers attached at the base of the tusks which wound up onto its neck. She rushed over getting into a fight with the mammoths rider while the mammoth tried to defend them by attacking her. The rider was a Gnollsvic who wore fur armour like some kind of hunter and could wield a warhammer with one hand. Considering they were heavy built she didn’t find that too surprising; he was fitting the stereotype of pets looking like their owners.
Fighting the rider and his pet was tough but she managed to take out the rider by giving him a shock then slashing at the back of his legs dropping him to his legs before stabbing him through the chest. Even after its rider exploded into a mist that disappeared the mammoth continued to fight her. She dodged its attacks getting to its one hind leg where she proceeded to climb up onto its back where she then crawled to the base of its neck where the chain rested. It went to reach up with its trunk at her but she slashed at its trunk with her sword making it pull its trunk away. She sat herself at the base of its neck and grabbed the chain. It tried reaching her a few more times but each time she struck its trunk away. It then tried to shake her off but she held onto its shaggy fur keeping from getting knocked off.
“Okay you’re clearly not on our side but I’m not going to give up so easily. Just co-operate with me for a couple minutes and then you can go back to trashing the city,” she told the beast which made a low grumbling noise. She was guessing it wasn’t happy but that didn’t matter. One way or the other she was going to get it to co-operate. She pulled on the one side of the chain tugging its head to the side to face where she needed to go. It was not happy but turned in the direction. Now she needed to get it to move. Using the power she had siphoned she gave it a mild shock to the back of the neck. It threw its head back and reared up in protest but Skylor held on keeping from getting thrown off. When it landed again she gave it another shock. This time it moved forward.
“There was that hard,” she proclaimed. As the mammoth moved forward she would pull on one side or the other of its chain to keep it in the right trajectory. The mammoth would move slightly to that side swinging its head in anger in the process. She quickly learned that by doing this she was able to get the mammoth to knock over some opponents mainly large monsters in the process. The opponents were quick to take note that she was controlling the mammoth and a few tried to intervene crawling up onto the mammoth to get her. The Huntsmen and Gnollsvic were easy to knock off but the Gorgayhurra (gorg-ay-yur-a), a strange parrot headed and armed serpentine, wasn’t easy.
It climbed up secretly onto the mammoth and slunk to behind her to launch atop and coil around her just as she reached the building she needed to get into. To her misfortune the ground level already had the disaster shutters put down. She didn’t have time though to work around that as she had to find a way to break free of the Gorgayhurra which was trying to bite her with its powerful beak. She’d managed to get her sword arm up as it wrapped around her so she was able to shove her hand with the sword into the back of its moth hindering its ability to close its beak. She had her other hand on the chains for the mammoth however she could barely move it with the constriction from the Gorgayhurra which was tightening its coils to constrict around her as tight as it could to take her out of the struggle. Unable to break the Gorgayhurra’s hold she gave off a shock from the powers she had siphoned. This stunned the serpentine creature who loosened itself before falling off her and the mammoth which reared up in pain from the shock.
“Sorry about that but if your parrot faced snake friend had held off its attack I wouldn’t have had to do that now just co-operate a little longer and you’re free to go,” she told the mammoth as she urged it with the chains to stand next to the building so she could climb onto a window ledge of the second story. Once on the ledge she knocked on the window while clinging to the frame and slim ledge of the window to see if anyone was inside that could let her in. While everything from the second story up was residential that didn’t necessarily mean anyone was home then and it didn’t seem like anyone was. She’d have to break the window to get in. Before she could make a move though she was sent smashing through the window as the Gorgayhurra launched off the mammoth as it slowly moved off to plough into her from behind.
They smashed through the window landing in some ones apartment. As they landed the Gorgayhurra quickly coiled around her and began squeezing tight. As she had been unprepared for the ambush she was unable to react in time to hinder the serpentines coil. It got tighter with each of her breaths making it harder and harder to breathe. She was struggling to breathe and her vision starting to blur when the creature let out a startled cry and loosened on her. It didn’t let her go but loosened up enough that she was able to breathe and regain her senses. She could see she was in the apartment of a family with three kids, two daughters and a son, who were huddled hiding against the wall in the kitchen of their open floor plan apartment.
The father had smacked the creature in the back of the head with a frying pan when they had realised this creature had someone in its coils. This had distracted it with new targets making it loose interest in her. The father was still using the frying pan to smack the creature whenever it got close to them while the mother was hitting it with a baking sheet. Those weren’t hurting the creature but were irritating it making it let her go more so it could better attack them. Back to her senses and with the creatures grip loosened she manoeuvred her way out of the few coils it still had on her. The creature looked back at her as she got up clearly mad she’d got free. She hit it with a shock momentarily stunning it. While it was stunned she positioned herself between it and the family. The creature clawed and bit at them in attack and she slashed at the creature with each of the attacks to keep it back.
“Where’s the front door?” she asked them and the mother asked, “why?” Skylor explained hitting the Gorgayhurra back from one of its attacks, “I may need you all to make a run for it.”
“Over there,” the mother expressed pointing in the direction of the doorway as one of the kids through a glass jar of what looked to be a jam at the creature. The jar smashed against the Gorgayhurra’s beak breaking open and leaving some jam to drip off its beak while the rest fell to the floor. The Gorgayhurra was unharmed just annoyed so yelled at them showing off its hand claws scaring them all back into the counters Skylor holding her sword at the creature in case it made a sudden move. Before it could attack however it got distracted after licking some of the jam that was dripping on the tip of its beak off. It looked to like it. It licked the jam off its beak then began picking up the pieces of glass from the jar to lick them clean before throwing them away to then lick up the jam that had gotten onto the floor.
“What did you hit it with?” Skylor asked the kid who had thrown the jam who responded with, “peach jam.” Looking around the kitchen she noted an open picnic basket on the counter with some fruits, sandwiches, lidded bowls and containers. While monsters Gorgayhurra’s were very animal like so could be distracted by things they viewed as food.
“We’d been packing to have a picnic before the chaos,” the father stated as she went over to inspect the basket making sure to keep the creature in her field of view. The Gorgayhurra took note of her movement before noticing the basket.
“You want this?” she asked tilting the basket up to give the creature a better look at it. It moved closer to the basket so she picked it up. The Gorgayhurra watched the basket as she slowly moved back to the window they had smashed through. The Gorgayhurra moved away from them to follow the basket. Once at the window she waited a moment for the creature to get closer before tossing the basket out of the window. The Gorgayhurra wasted no time in lunging out of the window to wrap around the basket to land with it on the street below where it proceeded to dig into everything there getting into fights with other monsters looking to come and see what it had and see if they could get some.
“Sorry about the mess and the basket. You should probably sweep up the glass and find something to cover the window for the time being,” she expressed after a moment’s pause after turning to the family. They were scared and a little too stunned to reply. Only the father was able to express still shaken with, “that’s okay better it has that instead of us.” She quickly continued on her mission. She went into the hall where a small group of the apartments inhabitants had gathered to see what was going on in that unit.
She rushed to the elevator managing to catch one from people from another floor that had come to see what was causing the commotion on that floor. She rode the elevator to the highest floor it could go, the twentieth floor; she then found the stairs for access to the rooftop. Unfortunately the roof access door was locked; fortunately though she’d seen in the hall an axe in a fire emergency box hung on the wall. She went and retrieved it breaking it out of the glass front panel and took it to the door. She used the axe the smash at the door handle damaging the lock and making it easy for her to break the door open.
There was some of the Glowback and Corpse Bird creatures roosted up there just watching the chaos below. She hit them with a shock and they clearly were not up for a fight as that was all that it took to get them to fly off and leave her alone there. Once on the rooftop she went over to the cell tower anchored to the center of the roof. She pulled out her phone to get a look. The signal wasn’t at full bars but it was much better than it had been below. She quickly dialed up Kais number. The first time it didn’t go through. She tried again. To her joy it made it through…
Snippet 3:
If this fog wasn’t unsettling enough the song he could hear coming through it had him unsettled. While it was muffled a bit by the fog he could still hear it quite well. He hadn’t been able to figure out where Rosic had sent him before the fog had rolled in but he was pretty sure it was still somewhere in Ninjago City. She had thrown him into an alley way where he’d landed in a dumpster when she had tossed him through the portal. He believed he was by one of the market districts as he’d come across several shops as he searched around the area but apart from that he had not been able to figure it out before the strange fog had rolled in like a wave the enemies disappearing as it swept through the area.
The only good thing this fog did was put out all the fires that had developed in the city. To his misfortune all the buildings in the area had their disaster shutters down leaving him stuck out on the street; in the open and alone. Not good circumstances he felt especially with the unknown of where and what the clan was up to. After the fog had rolled in he had been trying to contact the others before getting distracted by the song. He’d at first mistook the music as a possible commotion from fighting before realising it was music.
He’d followed it thinking someone might need aid but as he got closer to the source not only did he find no one but he’d come to realise it was just a radio he was hearing. He felt it likely was coming from the radio a merchant likely had on as they had worked prior to the attack. Considering how quiet everything had been and the fact the clan had released an EMP in the attack he found it both odd and rather unsettling to be hearing music. While not too loud he could hear fairly clearly the song whose lyrics and heavy rock tone he might have enjoyed if it wasn’t for the surroundings he was in. That just made the tune unsettling. He’d followed the sound of the radio to what appeared to be a market street with various shops quite a few selling foods like produce and baked goods. He was now just blindly navigating through the street sticking close to the buildings on the one side looking for anyone else. So far he’d seen no one; not even this Lost Clan or their beasts.
That was the most unsettling. The enemies had disappeared like ghosts when the fog first rolled in and was at its thickest which had really scared him. The area was dead; no one and no thing not even pigeons were out and about making the area feel like a ghost town. This was worsening his nerves which were already deeply on edge from the fog that now engulfed the city. It was thick and dark making it nearly impossible to see anything more than a couple meters away from himself and he got the unsettling feeling that not only was he not alone there but he was being watched by something in the fog. He was thankful this fog wasn’t like the usual one the Lost Clan used however it was much like that of the Oni though it didn’t seem to give off the physical draining and paralyzing effects of the Oni’s fog. It was still highly unsettling never the less and worsened his feelings of fear and dread.
‘It's hiding in the dark; It's teeth are razor sharp; There's no escape for me, it wants my soul, it wants my heart; No one can hear me scream’ he heard from the song causing him to comment, “great if things weren’t unsettling enough here that just made things creepier.” The radio then began to emit nothing but the sound of static with scatterings of was that just speaking or the song? He was having trouble identifying it as he became too distracted by the quickly overwhelming feeling of something terrible nearby. He couldn’t tell what or why he felt that he just knew he had the overwhelming feeling that he needed to hide from danger. He couldn’t be out in the open. ‘The nightmare's just begun’ was sung through the radio before it went back to static further worsening his feelings. What a time for that to play over the radio. Had that just been a coincidence or was something trying to tell him something? He was too scared to think of it.
The feeling that he needed to get off the street was too overwhelming. He quickly tried to open the doors to several shops but all were locked and barricaded from within. Even the windows to the structures were blocked by metal shutters to protect from attacks. Clearly the shop keeps had barricaded the stores to likely try and shelter during the attack. Maybe they were still in there. He knocked on a few of them before realizing if someone was in there they most likely wouldn’t respond too scared he could be one of these monsters. Where were the monsters? Ever since the fog had rolled in all the forces of the Lost Clan seemed to have disappeared. Or at least it seemed like it.
There was something on the street with him he could hear hard footsteps somewhere in the fog down the road ahead of him. There were a few steps then it stopped. Where those from hooves? Metal boots? Did it sound like something big? He didn’t wish to find out. He thought about using his powers to break through the barricades to get into a shop for safety however resisted. The sound of that could draw the attention of whatever was out there in the fog and he had a strong suspicion he did not want to see what it was. Whatever it was had stopped as if waiting for a sound to direct it towards something. He needed to be quite but he also needed a place to hide. He slowly moved back on the street away from the footsteps continuing to quietly check shop doors hoping one was unlocked.
None but he did find the entrance to an alley way. It wasn’t as secure as an indoor structure but it would get him off the main road. Hopefully that would be enough to protect him. He could hear the footsteps starting up again slowly coming towards him. He moved into the alley sticking close to a wall. He was shaking with fear. The footsteps stopped. They sounded not too far away now. He could start to smell something. It smelled horrible almost like rot; kind of like leftovers that had been sitting at the back of the fridge for several months he thought.
These monsters they fought defiantly weren’t the nicest smelling things but this smelled way worse than those they were frequently encountering. After a moment of silence he began to wonder if he should dare a peak to the street to see who or what could be out there. He looked out into the clouded street pondering over taking a peak so when something touched his shoulder it sent him into a panic. He screamed jumping and activating his lava arms preparing for an attack. He prepped to punch fighting to hold back from pummelling whatever had touched him in case it was just a person. While it wasn’t what he expected he was relieved to see it was just a serpentine from the constricti tribe who clearly hadn’t been expecting his reaction and was cowering from him pleading, “I’m sorry please don’t hurt me!”
“What are you doing here?” he inquired dropping his lava arms starting to calm down. The serpentine explained in a hurried tone clearly scared, “some of us came up here to see what is going on. This strange fog is seeping into our tunnels and there are these monsters and daemons starting to patrol within them.” Cole heard the footsteps again. He told the serpentine to be quiet as he heard the footsteps start up. They both hugged close to the wall listening as the steps got closer and stopped. The rot smell got even worse and was now sickening. Cole felt on the edge of getting sick.
“What is that?” the serpentine inquired equally disgusted. Cole stated, “I don’t know but I’m guessing it is probably real bad… how did you get up here? Do you have an entrance into your tunnels nearby?”
“Yha why?” the serpentine asked and he responded, “I think that will be our best bet of getting out of here. I have a strong feeling we don’t want to know what that is.” The serpentine offered, “we could do that if you’ll come back to our settlement and explain what is going on up here.” Cole agreed to those terms. They decided to head on their way to escape whatever was out there. Before they left however Cole couldn’t help but peak out into the road to just get a glimpse of what was out there. He was curious to know what it was. He slowly looked out and around the building.
He couldn’t see anything through the fog. Just the produce stand from the shop he was sheltering next to. Some of its produce had fallen off the wooden stand that stood out front the shop which had its metal shutters covering its windows and door. The sound of steps started up. Was there movement out there? Yes there was something moving towards them in the fog. It looked to be a rider of some sort on was that a horse? The smell got much worse as this rider slowly moved through the fog. Something drew his attention from the rider. A sickly green mist was creeping beneath the fog. When it made contact with any of the produce within seconds they went from fresh to a state of decay. Rot overtaking them blackening and moulding them in under a minute. The stand holding the produce even began to rot the wood crippling and falling apart as if decades of exposure to the elements and lack of care had overcome it in seconds spilling the steadily rotting produce over the road. Even more shocking the metal of the buildings shutters began to rust and even some of the bricks of the building started to crumble to dust. Cole was in a state of shock; what kind of monster had powers like this? Looking back up into the fog he could see more clearly the figure moving towards him.
A dusted black emaciated looking horse carrying an equally gaunt emaciated person whose skin was greyed was moving towards him. The rider was nearly skeletal in appearance and wore tattered clothes mainly just a pauper’s shirt and pants with crude cloth wraps on their feet. A band of cloth made a gag over his mouth and his glazed eyes still bore an unsettling yellowish glow; a glow his horse’s eyes shared. He was carrying a staff with some kind of t shaped structure on the top which as the rider rode closer Cole realised looked to be a representation of the old style scales used for weight measuring. The rider stopped a couple feet away from him the rider just staring at the ground in front of himself with a blank look.
“What is that?” the serpentine whispered to him and Cole replied, “I don’t know… I don’t think we should let that thing see us though.” The two were then struck with horror when the rider addressed them looking directly towards them, “you will find no feed for thee here. From wheat to meat shall your needs of the day rot and decay within my wake.” The entity had a deep unsettling and un-human voice. It turned towards them taking a few steps.
“Just as you would consume the fruits of the trees the swarm shall consume you,” the rider proclaimed pointing his staff at them. Highly unsettled the serpentine asked, “What does he mean by that… what’s that sound?” There was a buzzing sound slowly getting louder. Cole was a little distracted frozen in fear as his eyes looked into the riders eyes. He got a feeling of doom from this thing.
His attention was suddenly broken by a locust coming to land on his arm and bite him. He quickly smacked it looking away from the rider and coming to note a swarm of locusts emerge from the fog. They began to feed on the rotting food and wood in front of the store and began landing on Cole and the serpentine tearing at their clothing and biting them trying to tear chunks of flesh from them. These were no ordinary locusts. They were bigger almost the size of mice and even when hit or swatted didn’t squish instead just getting stunned before continuing the attack. Cole and the serpentine took a moment to try and swat the insects off them before deciding it best to flee for safety as they were being overwhelmed.
“Flee as you might but my swarm shall follow and strip all that is edible till nothing is left,” the rider expressed following them their horse trotting and showing a disturbing amount of energy for something that looked near dead from starvation.
“What is that thing?” the serpentine asked as they fled constantly swatting and fighting the locusts which followed them down the alley. The rider boasted trotting close behind them, “I am the Limos; rider of famine and decay one of the four great riders; the riders of doom who upon the foreboding and powers of apocalypse has been bestowed.” The two managed to reach the next block but the rider and his locusts was quick on their heels.
“Quick down here,” the serpentine proclaimed lifting the sewer grate and quickly heading down. Cole quickly followed pulling the grate back over managing to close it just as the rider reached them proclaiming as he did, “attempt to hide you may but we will find you and the swarm will feast upon you like they do upon the wheat.” They could hear the hooves of the rider upon the grate and the buzzing of the insects above as they lowered into the sewers.
“Well I think we’ll be stuck down here for a while. Might as well talk to your leaders; you’re going to have to help me out though as it’s a little too dark for me to see here,” Cole expressed as they took a moment to relax and assess themselves. They were both missing patches of attire and had bites and scratches from the locusts all over them. The serpentine took his hand and began leading him through the dark...
For the rest of the story you can visit here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/34894561/chapters/86888878
For more of the artwork you can visit here: https://www.deviantart.com/robo-birdie/gallery/72478681/story-project
A while back I came up for an idea for a prequel to my story while working on a sort of epilogue/sequel story but wasn't sure if I was going to write it. Recently though I decided to write it more details of it coming to my mind. I have started posting it on the AOE page of my story. Due to recent changes to Tumblrs posting style I can't really post the story here, the only certain numbers of words per paragraph is difficult to work with, but I can post updates here. Here's some arts to go with what I have posted and samples from it.
First off as an introduction imagine this sort of trailer (that's the best I could describe it as) being read by Lloyd:
Something’s coming… we thought they’d be no different from others we’ve faced before but we were wrong. They sailed ashore out of nothing boasting powers and abilities unlike anything we’ve ever seen before. Conquerors seemingly lost to time and space. They’re spreading across the realm cold, dark and monsters following in their wake and nothing we do can stop or slow them down. If only that was the only problem with them. They’re attacking us from within our own ranks distracting some, awakening crippling memories from their past in some, turning others to become traitors and me… to become a monster. I can feel it when they are near the Oni within me surfacing and I am powerless against it. They are awakening it on purpose I just know it but why? What do these things want with Ninjago? Are they here to just claim the realm for themselves or do they have darker intentions? Why are they turning us against each other and why are they awakening the Oni in my blood?
First off for art the two main antagonists of the story Kamal and Rosic; the mysterious brother and sister who lead the Lost Clan the group invading Ninjago.
Kamal is a warrior while Rosic is a master of arcane arts. The Lost Clan that they lead are like a mix between Vikings and the Huns.
A snippet of the ninjas first encounter with the two:
As they went through the town they started to notice one of these strange beings what appeared to be one of the hyena folk following them. They only guessed what it was from their ears and snout which stood out from the red hood of its hooded and sleeved robe like cloak and the claws on the hands and feet that wore wraps and gloves that exposed the digits. Under the robe it wore fairly plain commoners attire in a dusted pale blue color. It was carrying a staff with a strange gem in it and hung back to watch them green eyes glaring from the shadow of the hood. The individual didn’t seem to care if they noticed it. It seemed curious to them but they couldn’t tell why.
“Is it just me or is that one following us?” Jay inquired at one point when noticing the individual. Zane noted eerily calm for the situation Jay felt, “she has been following us since we left the docks.”
“She? How do you know that things a she? It’s really hard to tell with these things,” Kai wondered and Pixal explained, “while these beast folk do seem to share the highly masculinised females of the beasts they resemble making it hard for humans to tell the difference you forget us nindroids have more advanced senses than humans much more akin to animals. Like them we can detect the chemical signatures organisms give off as a means of communication and identification and she bares the scent markers of a female.”
“Really we give off a smell?” Jay wondered starting to smell himself and Zane noted, “you do but you can’t smell it. Humans have fairly poor scent receptors and lack the proper scent organs to detect pheromones that most animals possess so you cannot properly analyze your own kinds chemical traces. We however do have receptors able to pick such things up and analyze them.”
“So you two are kind of like cats then in that regard; at least you don’t do that weird lip thing cats do when they smell things cause that would be weird,” Kai commented stumping Zane and Pixal. Zane wondered, “why do you compare components of our being to those of a cat?”
“He’s just playing around and not actually comparing you to a cat,” Cole explained to ease Zane and Pixals confusions. Nya who was still focussed on the figure wondered, “why is she following us?” Zane noted, “she may just be curious but surely the rest are curious as well so why just she is following us is odd and likely has deeper intentions.”
“Excuse me but can you tell us what is going on here?” Lloyd asked a townsperson sweeping a pathway getting more annoyed by the lack of co-operation from people to them. The individual replied, “you won’t stand a chance against them please leave while you can. You’re the only ones possibly able to stop these things.” Lloyd had been getting more irritated as they went along and not getting any real answers. Out of irritation Lloyd stated, “why can’t anyone just tell us what’s going on?”
“They all seem scared but why?” Nya noted and Jay added being quite trying to not let the strange beings hear, “wouldn’t you be even just a bit scared of these things? They’ve got features of dangerous meat eating animals. Who knows they could be people eaters and here to farm people.”
“Maybe,” Cole commented as they approached a building they believed to be the town hall. They reasoned surely someone there would tell them something. They were expecting to find the mayor and some town councillors but were instead startled to stumble upon a group of armoured beast folk going over a map on a table in the main foyer. Their armour was a mix of leather, fur, metal and cloth with open horned helmets. When they opened the doors to the town center all inside turned to look at them startling them. The ninja were a bit embarrassed to have everyone’s attention on them.
“Uhm sorry for the intrusion but you don’t think you can tell us who you are and what you are doing here?” Jay asked putting on a brave face to the beings. They all stared at them quiet so Jay asked, “maybe I should have asked first if any of you can speak the common tongue?”
“Who are you?” a voice demanded drawing their attention to an individual at the table who was leaned over it inspecting it. He was pale blonde with green eyes and a large distinct scar on his face that looked to be a scar made of a strange icy opaline substance. He had blond hair that was confined to the center of his head like a Mohawk and done up in a short braid at the back and a soul patch of blonde hair on his chin. His fur and skin was pale and a bit greyed in colour with a darker muzzle a typical trait to hyenids. He wore dark metal and leather armour that had fur trimming some parts and bore a green diamond in the centre of the chest and he had a metal decorative plate with the same kind of green gem that seemed to be melded into his forehead. Some pieces of leather were a greenish color and he had green cloth pants. Some parts of the metal to his armour had a scale pattern to it. He wore pauldrons that resembled the skull of a predatory bird and had some teeth from something decorating his braided leather belt. His metal fronted leather boots exposed his clawed toes. Since he was addressing them they were guessing he was the leader.
“Uh we are the ninja. We are warriors that fight back evil…” Lloyd began as this individual straightened up and strolled over to them coming to stand rate in front of them. He sniffed at Lloyd who was nervous of the being especially after it commented, “I smell darkness here.”
“They came in on a flying ship. They have a strange smell to them. I don’t think they are what they seem,” the one that had been following them stated pushing them all into the building into a row in front of everyone by the doors and moving to stand with the other individual. Now that she was close and in front of them they could see while overall pale and greyed like the leader she had dark extremities to her limbs and muzzle like the pattern on some breeds of cat, green eyes and a strange dark greenish arcane mark that appeared to be burned onto her forehead under her hood. She had a few scars like the other on her face and greenish metal implants in her face above and below her eyes looking like she had large metal beads stuck in her skin.
“We told you who we are seems only fitting you tell us who you are,” Jay stated. The leader paused a moment before stating, “you can call us the Lost Clan ozone smelling one.”
“Ozone smelling?,” Jay wondered unhappy and confused over the figures comment giving himself a few sniffs to try and see what the figure was talking about. He couldn’t smell anything. The figure continued speaking to them, “I am the Jarl Kamal and this is my sister and court wizard Rosic the Augur of the Veil. Does that satisfy your curiosity?”
“Jarl? Augur?” Kai wondered confused before Cole inquired, “okay but what are you here for?” The two didn’t seem too interested in chatting and appeared fixated on Lloyd.
“I smell an Oni. Why does this one smell of such a creature?” Kamal stated sniffing at Lloyd. His comment got some of the others agitated causing them to narrow their eyes and bare their teeth. A glow came to Rosics eyes and the marking on her forehead for a couple seconds before she responded, “he smells of it cause he has Oni blood; he has Oni heritage.”
“Where does its darkness sit in the prospect of things?” Kamal wondered he and Rosic getting closer to Lloyd making him nervous and confusing the rest of them. Rosic noted, “I cannot tell but he does not have proper control of it nor is fully aware of it. Our presence is pulling at it and he does not realize it meaning he could lose control to it.”
“Is it just him with this blood? I can see two metal kin; I smell is that merlopian here too?” Kamal wondered and Rosic went over each of them closely investigating them. She was rather forward and touched them with what they were surprised to be unsettlingly cold clawed hands. As she inspected them Rosic commented, “yes. Two Scymkin not of Scymer make however, two have some Merlopian in them and are they related? Smells like it. Strange then for the one to smell of burning; a water folk with connections to fire very interesting. This one isn’t one but he doesn’t appear to have the best control of his bladder. This one isn’t either; is that refined tree blood on your face? From some form of meal I presume likely coating some matter like dough or meat; I doubt you would just drink it straight up. Didn’t clean yourself too well after breakfast huh?” Making things even more uncomfortable Rosic licked Cole on the face disgusting him before continuing, “yes that would seem to be the case.”
“Why’d you do that?! You’re tongues rough like a cats and I think you go it in my mouth!” Cole complained wiping his face and tongue while spitting a bit. Rosic was unbothered the rest of the ninja were grossed and uncomfortable.
“I think then we do not need to tell him what we are doing. I believe it best the Oni descendent and his companions do not get involved in this. We will let you go for now to head back to your lair and sit this out but in the future if you try to interfere or get involved we will not be so lenient,” Kamal stated turning his back on them and heading back to the table.
“That’s not a good enough answer. We’re not going anywhere till you tell us your intentions here. By the looks your conquerors and have enslaved this town leading everyone to be fearful,” Lloyd stated. Kamal stopped in his footsteps to pause looking over his shoulder at him to state, “is that what you think? Typical Oni jumping to conclusions and always assuming others think and act like you.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” Lloyd wondered feeling oddly agitated and triggered by these beings. He could sense some form of energy around them that he didn’t like and it had him on edge. That was worsened by the fact these things could somehow tell about his heritage just by smelling him and the weapons and armour these things wore; it matched some of what his mother had shown him in the museum. The stuff used by entities that appeared to be hunters to both Oni and dragons.
“You should know. The answers in your dark blood and you can feel it even if you don’t realise it. For the safety of all it is best the likes of you are left in the darkness in this,” Kamal stated turning to look at him.
“I think we should just go and rethink this,” Cole commented noting tensions growing. Lloyd however wasn’t listening and proclaimed, “no we’re not leaving till they tell us what they are doing.”
“If you’re not going to listen to your stable friend and leave willingly then we’ll have to make sure you leave through force,” Kamal stated and Rosic expressed, “his oni blood is starting to show.”
“I think it wise we listen to him. Getting in an altercation at this moment would not be a wise idea and could lead to unnecessary harm and danger,” Zane noted he and Pixal getting strange and unsettling readings from these individuals. Kamal stated, “listen to your companions half breed or do you think you could take me. Go ahead as they say hit me with your best shot.” Kamal presented himself for an attack facing Lloyd and holding his arms out in a come get it bro manner.
“Uhm I don’t think that would be a good idea,” Jay noted and Kai stated, “yha something about that seems a bad idea. There’s something off about these things.” Lloyd was hesitating knowing they were right and the right thing to do was to just let things go and head back to do further investigations but he could feel a strong urge building to attack this thing. These things looked dangerous, he could feel something radiating off them much like how he felt around the Oni and if his suspicions were true that these things were somehow related to what his mother had found at that site they were hunters of Oni and dragons so could be enemies to all beings. After a moment’s hesitation feeling his emotions and anger building from the presence of these things Lloyd declared, “alright. Let’s see how tough you are.” Lloyd charged up his powers before shooting it at Kamal. To everyone’s shock Kamal was unaffected instead looking to absorb the energy blast which he built up in his one hand then shot back at Lloyd sending him flying back and out the doors breaking them. Lloyd came to lay stunned and winded on the ground outside the hall. The ninja quickly headed out to check on him Kamal and Rosic following to stand on the doorstep of the hall. A crowd made of these beings from the Lost Clan had gathered around the building along with strange hyena looking creatures with bird like heads and feet and bipedal reptilian creatures that looked a bit like small Grundles. There even seemed to be a gathering of ravens in the area. As she came out of the building Rosic lifted her staff up giving off a cackling noise before slamming it down into the ground causing a dark fog to emit from it and the skies to turn stormy with cold winds and strange green hued lightening.
“We warned you half breed but you insisted on this. If you won’t retreat willingly then we’ll make you leave by force,” Kamal expressed before charging in to attack them equipping his sword. With his lead the others rushed in to join his attack even Rosic who left her staff standing there as it emitted the dark fog which poured out from it and crept over the ground. The ninja wasted no time in defending themselves Lloyd taking a bit of time to recover from the initial attack. It wasn’t long till they understood why the people were scared of these things. There was a strong un-naturality to them. They seemed immune to attack and showed little to no fear. Weapons didn’t leave as bad damages as they thought they would on them, when cut along with an icy blue substance they were guessing were these things blood a black mist would drip out as well and they could heal surprisingly fast even without magic. Even stranger and rather worrisome they had either some form of immunity or a really strong resistance to elemental energy. When hit they’d react like it hurt but quickly just brush it off seeming to absorb the energy and even sometimes wielded it back at them. They couldn’t gain on these beings and worse the mist was getting more prominent spreading out and to their shock strange monstrous entities like strange elemental made serpentine creatures popped out of the mist to attack them...
The Lost Clan has several strange allies helping them including beasts they use as mounts and monstrous allies:
An encounter with some of their monster allies:
An icy one went through Kai shocking and freezing him preventing him from using his powers while leaving frost on his skin. He was crippled by the cold for several minutes unable to defend himself and barely able to move. A fiery one burst out of the mist when Jay got close to it and went through his one arm. He felt searing nearly unbearable pain go through his arm collapsing him to his knees. Nya who was helping Kai as he struggled to quickly get warm in order to defend himself quickly came over once Jay was attacked fending off the entities attacking them while Zane came over to inspect Jays arm Jay in a panic from the pain which he felt was unbearable. She defeated the fiery serpentine creature first blasting it into a steaming mist with water.
“What happened?” she demanded as Zane scanned Jays arm being defended by Kai who had followed her starting to warm up again. After the scan Zane pulled up Jays sleeve exposing what looked to be a fire burn on his arm where the entity had gone through him. After his observations Zane explained, “whatever that was that went through his arm has caused burns akin to those as if he had been on fire in those areas. The damage appears close and worst at surface level but there is minor damage deeper and it appears to be slowly working deeper causing more damage. He needs to be treated for burns to prevent the damage from worsening and going into serious shock and Kai appears to be suffering early stages to hypothermia.” To ease some of his pain and soothe the burn and counter the magic continuing the burning Zane coated Jays arm in ice.
“I th…think we need… need to fall…all back,” Kai stated through shivers. While they were occupied Cole was being faced by a fairly large and bulky individual who was besting him with a strength greater than even what his lava arms could muster. He was pretty sure this was because she was absorbing the energy of his powers when he touched her letting her wield his own powers against him. In the struggle he got knocked back into the dark mist which quickly began to climb onto him. As it climbed onto him he felt a dark dreaded feeling creep up his spine. It began to paralyse him which was made worse when it brought a dreaded feeling to him. He could feel it as a crippling pain in his heart which brought tears to his eyes as memories he’d longed to try and forget flashed in his mind. Memories of his mothers final days where she was suffering badly from her illness, how he had wished there had been something he could have done for her, her funeral and the after effects with him and his father as they had grown distant and cold to each other because of the pain her death had caused them. The overwhelming of emotions collapsed him to his knees unable to hold back tears. With the others focussed with Jay Pixal was the first to react to him and come to his aid. She quickly pulled him from the fog noting its effects on him. She defended him till she could get through to him. Whatever had happened had left him distraught and she couldn’t make sense of his words. He was muttering something about missing someone and wishing they were there for him and how he felt terrible they couldn’t spend time together and that she couldn’t see what he’d become or get to meet his friends and family.
“Cole you have to shake out of this we need you,” she told him shaking him to snap him out of this odd state. He started coming to his senses. He wasn’t fully back and was clearly still troubled by what happened but got focussed enough to continue the fight. While they were all facing defeat Lloyd struggled against Kamal. He was not only strong and resilient but agile and crafty. Lloyd went for a swing at him and Kamal caught his sword in his bare hand with a counter swing snapping it in half leaving to Lloyds shock not even a scrape to his hand. While he was shocked Kamal swung at him cutting his upper left arm. Lloyd jumped back in pain and surprise to grab his arm. Kamal looked at his sword which bore some of Lloyds blood and with an eerily calm tone muttered, “just as suspected, the darkness is rising in you.” Lloyd pulled his hand off his arm curious to what he was talking about and Lloyd was startled to find his blood was tainted by a purplish color in it. It scared him. What did that mean?! Upon seeing this he quickly declared to the others to fall back. They needed no convincing. They headed for the Bounty in the harbour. They had to fight their way free of the group they were facing some of them out of commission.
Nya had to help Jay move as he was in serious pain, Kai was stable enough to move on his own but still struggled from the cold while Cole had recovered enough to flee with little problem helping the others get to safety. As they fled through the streets Zane and Pixal made obstacles for these beings to keep them from getting too close as they followed or sprung up from around town to attack. They knocked over things, broke down awnings, tipped over cars and carts and Zane made barriers of ice. Once on the ship Pixal wasted no time in getting into the cabin and getting the Bounty running and up while the rest followed into the cabin for shelter. As they got up and on their way the strange flying reptiles again swarmed their ship this time attacking more fiercely at it and even leaving some damages to the rigging and sails. Nya and Zane were going to head out to deal with them but without warning as they moved away these creatures attack stopped as they left the area. Pixal took them some distance to the north before landing the ship further up along the shore so they could settle and deal with the aftermath of all that. They were all fairly shaken and some were worse than others.
“What were those things!?” Jay screamed before yelling at Lloyd, “why did you think to attack that thing!? He was letting us go but you had to rile them up and start a fight. If you hadn’t done that we’d be fine!” They all stopped looking at Lloyd. What he said was true and they all knew it but none of them had been wanting to so quickly blurt that out and as drastically as Jay had.
“I’m sorry just something about being around those things… I couldn’t help myself,” Lloyd stated. Nya wondered, “what do you mean?” After a moment’s hesitation Lloyd stated, “I could feel this dark energy around them. It was making me feel angry to them; I couldn’t help myself.”
“Wh…what were were those things?” Kai wondered still shivering.
“I don’t know but there was something strange and familiar to their signatures,” Pixal noted and curious Nya wondered, “when you say familiar what do you mean?” Zane responded, “like how they could smell Oni to Lloyd we could detect hints of dragon and Oni to them.”
“What could that mean?” Nya wondered and Zane expressed, “we will have to look into it. First though we have some we should get to a hospital as soon as possible first.”
“Agreed. Pixal can you get us there ASAP,” Nya agreed and Pixal agreed, “I can do that.” She headed over to the controls and got the Bounty up again. Nya then took Jay, Kai following, to their room to give the two some temporary first aid. Lloyd kept to himself for a few minutes putting his hand over the cut on his arm. He could feel it still bleeding. Curious he pulled his hand back down to look. His blood was back to normal; no purple color. Why had that happen he wondered getting a feeling it wasn’t a good sign.
“Did you get hurt?” Zane inquired noting the blood on Lloyds hand. Lloyd responded, “oh yha. It’s not too bad. I’ll go clean it.”...
A dream Zane has:
It was dark and cold, a cold not even he could handle. He was in an unfamiliar land a dark conifer forest filled with strange sounds with a dark nights sky above dominated by two moons one a bit bigger and reddish than the other the bigger one looking to sit further back in space as the smaller whiter one just barely looked to beginning to cross its path. He wasn’t sure why but Zane had the feeling he was being hunted. Every now and then he would see shadowy humanoid figures moving in his peripherals or the shadows of the understory. They had him on edge. He was trying to find his way out of the woods to somewhere he felt he’d be safe but he couldn’t find that. As he went he started getting more anxious moving quicker and being more on edge. He came to pause for a rest in a small clearing. He backed himself into a group of large trees to feel safe. He was pretty sure he was in serious danger. While he rested shaking from nerves he was startled when an arrow nearly struck him in the head hitting into the tree trunk next to him. He jumped back before pulling the arrow from the tree to inspect it. This wasn’t just any arrow. The tip was large with two serrated prongs and the shaft wasn’t just simple wood. It was made of technology. He recognised this kind of arrow. It was a specialised design with an inbuilt USB that carried a virus that acted like a poison to droids. It was a design that while illegal was still used by many undesirable types as a tool for hunting and fighting droids. When it pierced their skin the prongs on the tip acted as conduits allowing the virus to be transferred into the makes of a droid by just contacting any wires and even some synthetic tissues of their make.
Shortly after he pulled it from the tree it dissolved into a strange burning ash and fell from his hand. That arrow confirmed it, he was being hunted. But by who and where were they? He suddenly felt a sharp pain in his right shoulder, Seconds later he was aware of a virus infiltrating his systems trying to mess with his senses and hinder his mobility. He pulled the arrow from his arm. It was the same kind and again fell to ash. Looking for where it came from he saw standing on a large boulder nearby a humanoid figure bathed entirely in black with only its burning red eyes being the only discernable feature to them. The figure looked to be wielding a bow and prepped to shoot at him again. He started hurrying off to get away from the being as it shot at him again this time missing. He started off fairly well able to still move quite well but soon he was having problems as the virus he was infected with started to mess with his systems. His energy was not being distributed right making his limbs tired and harder to move and he started having trouble with his lungs causing him to have serious coughings. While he didn’t need oxygen so his lungs not working wouldn’t hinder him the pain and severe coughing he was having from them was hindering him as he’d have to slow down or stop to cough. This entity was still following him and he could pick up others nearby following likely to also hurt him. He continued to struggle away till not fully aware of his surroundings because of his struggles he slipped off a rocky ledge. He landed hard on the ground below entering a coughing fit from the landing. He was sore and stiff as he propped himself up on his elbows.
He was instantly shocked and nervous to see in front of him gathered in a large clearing an army of solid shadow figures. They were humanoid with green eyes and while largely humanoid he could vaguely make out that they resembled the figures they had just faced; this Lost Clan. Even more startling to them was what shadowed the sky behind them. A massive shadow figure of a man with the head of a stag loomed. He felt terror grip him to see this figure especially as it looked down at him with green eyes that seemed to burn into him. A noise above him drew his attention to the ledge he’d fallen off of. Standing there looking down at him were these other shadow beings the ones with red eyes. He was caught between two factions both looking to be hunting him. Zane wanted to get up and flee but the virus was making it hard for him to control his own body. He managed to crawl a bit away from the ledge before the elk headed figure began to speak its deep masculine commanding and eerily calm voice declaring, “darkness is coming; they were born in it and it is all they know. They are coming for you and all you know. Choices will have to be made; dark and dire choices.” The larger of the moons in the sky which the figure half eclipsed turned into a blood moon as it continued to speak declaring, “will you choose the right side and actions or doom the world to its end? Let the battle begin.”
While they all get their parts in the story Jay is the focus with his heritage being delved into and the Lost Clan knows a little something about Jays mother:
While they worked on the issues with the Lost Clan Jay continued to secretly look into his birth parents. He had quickly come to a dead end however until their first time getting into an altercation with Rosic and Kamal. During the fight he was startled by Rosic who jumped him after he shocked out two Voidfears. His shock burst them into the strange whitish green mist and dissipated making him uneasy; as if the Lost Clans lack of fear wasn’t unnerving enough already. They believed because they couldn’t truly be destroyed their physical forms only being displaced for a time then they could reform like nothing had happened these beings didn’t care if they got hurt or worse in a fight making them very bold and fearless. Rosic startled him more by jumping him. Instead of continuing to fight however she spoke to him.
“Interesting a cub of Donar, a QoSos,” she stated after he defended himself trying to shock her. She blocked his attack with a ward. Confused he asked, “a what?” She replied with, “one of lightening blood. You bare the powers of lightening just as we suspected. Interesting we’ve met one of you before I wonder if you bare relations to her.” He was greatly confused. What did she mean by that? He tried to get her to explain but she refused to answer instead attacking him. Shortly after they were forced to flee the battle; as they left Jay could swear he saw this Rosic watching him with a strange questioning look to her face. After that he wondered if these beings knew of or had something to do with his mother. He hadn’t found anything relating to it then again everything he’d uncovered really told him very little and he’d never suspected these things could be related in some way to his mother. His wonders switched to confusion the next time they ran into Kamal and Rosics group as they invaded a town. Jay had been keeping an eye out for Rosic wanting to confront her again and try to get some answers. She found him. He chased after a pair of Voidfears which were also called Feardrakes which led him into a dead end alleyway between two four story tall apartments. The creatures amazed him with their ability to scale the vertical walls of the building to climb out away from him. Turning around he was stunned to find Rosic cornering him in the alley.
“The lightening one just who I wanted see,” she stated and he asked cautious, “why?” She tossed at him a small stained wooden box with a carved and gold painted symbol matching his, the symbol of an elemental master of lightening, on the top. He caught it and she told him to open it. He was nervous but slowly opened it. Inside was a necklace with an amulet made of a strange whitish gem like material and underneath that folded in half was a picture, a picture of his birth parents together looking to be on a honeymoon. He was shocked and baffled. Where’d she get this?! How’d she get it and how’d she know of his mother?! He was feeling so surprised, confused, shocked and to his surprise scared that he was shaking a bit and starting to feel sick.
“Where’d you get this?” he asked his voice cracking a bit with emotions and she replied, “she told me she wants you to have it. She’s been watching over you and is proud of you.” He wasn’t pleased with her answer so demanded, “how did you get this? How do you know of my mother?”
“Where we come from she also resides unlike us however she cannot leave let’s leave it at that for now. If I were you I’d catch up with my clan mates. They’re retreating already,” Rosic told him. Frustrated he went to punch her but she dodged him turning into a flock of ravens to port to the roof of the one building of the alleyway. Jay wanted to go after her but Nya calling him to tell him to hurry back to the Bounty so they could leave making him reluctantly abandoned going after her. He brought the box with the necklace and photo with him. He kept it secret from the others only letting Nya know when she came in to check on him later when they were back at the Monastery. He’d told her about the strange things Rosic had said to him before so she was wondering if he’d managed to find her and get anything from her this time. He showed her the box and its items. She was just as shocked and surprised as him asking, “where’d she get these?”
“I don’t know but she said my mother would want me to have this and she claimed to know where my mother is,” he explained. Nya suggested it might be time for him to talk to Wu about this. Clearly these things potentially had some form of connection with his mother and there might be things Wu was unwilling to tell them that could be critical to what was going on...
Some of Lloyds Oni side coming out:
While they worked Lloyd hung back finding a steady rise in his agitation and anger though he didn’t know why. He hung back focussed on keeping control of his Oni side while letting Zane and Pixal work with the computers; they were much more skilled with technology than him. They were at a large table with several monitors that were hooked up to the surveillance systems which sat against the one wall, strangely all but the room they needed to see were working fine. Against the wall across from this was a water cooler and couch. To the one side of the room were two cells for holding troublesome individuals. A futon sat in each cell. In front of the cells against the wall with the couch was an empty desk and chair. The room was dark as they found strangely the lights in the room were not working though they couldn’t tell why. It wasn’t really bothering Zane or Pixal though; the light from the monitors was all they needed to do their work. Strangely Lloyd was finding something about the dark oddly invigorating. He had a feeling that was from the Oni in him making him unsettled over it. Strangely the guards weren’t there either but they guessed they were just hiding with the other workers.
While the others worked Lloyd decided to get a drink from the cooler. When he went to use it however nothing came out, there was nothing in the jug that should hold water. Inspecting it he noted claw marks and punctures that likely came from claws and teeth on the sides and back and a decent sized chunk had been bitten out of the back of it. Its water was spilled on the floor around the cooler. He could also see some wet footprints on the couch. They were bird like with three toes and from something of a pretty decent size, at least human sized. They disappeared however leaving no clue where the creator of the footprints went. He inspected the area around the couch. There was no way whatever made the footprints was hiding behind or under it, the footprints indicated a creature too big to fit in those locations. He looked in the cells. They were locked and he doubted the creature could have slipped between the bars unless it had the flexibility of a cat. He couldn’t see anything in the cells. He then went to the desk to check under it. As he approached the desk he started to hear a growling noise which got louder as he leaned down to look under the desk.
“What is that?” Zane wondered as he and Pixal noted the noise as well. As Lloyd looked into the dark under the desk to see what the noise was he could swear he saw a set of eyes in the dark before he was bowled over by a blur of feathers and scales that burst out from under the desk. It was a Feardrake. It had knocked Lloyd over and pinned him down one of its feet on his chest. The creature seemed agitated. It hissed in Lloyds face showing off its teeth and claws to him before quickly rushing out of the room.
“That’s not good,” Pixal noted while Lloyd quickly got up yelling, “we can’t let that thing reach the others. It will spoil everything.” He quickly got up chasing the creature as it fled. Zane and Pixal followed feeling Lloyd wasn’t entirely right and it would be more damming for their efforts for these beings to find him. They tried to tell Lloyd and get him to stop but he refused to listen and chased the Voidfear as it rushed to the clan members. It went straight past Kai, Nya and Jay who were hiding behind some shelves not seeming to care or note them.
“Was that a close call?” Kai wondered as the creature rushed to one of the Huntsmen hissing at it. The Huntsmen apparently could understand it as it commented while Lloyd rushed in, “it’s here?” The moment the members saw Lloyd they became aggressive. One of the Skurocs lunged at Lloyd who wasted no time in blasting it to a mist with his powers.
“So you are here half-blood. Trying to interfere again are we,” one of the Huntsmen commented and Lloyd declared, “you’re not getting out of here.” He instantly got into a fight with the members not holding back on them while Zane and Pixal arrived at the room. The others were confused.
“Uh should we get involved?” Kai worried as they started to note Lloyd was being rather aggressive; there was a strange color to his eyes and a purplish color was starting to infiltrate his powers.
“Is it just me or does something seem wrong with Lloyd?” Jay wondered and Nya noted, “it does kind of look it. He’s blown our cover. Our best bet now would be to capture one of these things and try to interrogate it.” The rest of them joined in the fight but it quickly became apparent that stopping Lloyd was more important than capturing one of the clan members. He appeared to have lost control getting caught up in his anger causing danger to the rest of them. Whatever had gotten over him was bad enough that some of the clan members strangely forwent their animosity to them to keep them from getting hurt such as a Skuroc that shoved Nya out of the way of a falling statue Lloyds powers unbalanced in the room taking the full blow of its impact instead of her getting it, a Huntsmen tackling Jay to keep him from getting hit by one of Lloyds energy blasts which when it hit a wall not only blew a hole in it but hit the wiring in the building blowing the circuits of the building and blowing up the light fixtures from the energy of his blast and a Huntsmen put itself between Kai and Lloyd pulling up a magical shield, a ward, in defence against one of Lloyds attacks which would have hurt Kai as well. The Huntsmen told him they needed to get Lloyd out of there. As the fight went on it was clear something had come over Lloyd. His skin was developing blackened spots, his eyes and powers were now purplish in color and his powers were turning destructive in nature. Even worse he was starting to turn on the others. Zane was putting out fires Lloyds powers sparked up trying to stop damages and Lloyd snapped at him telling him to ignore it and focus on the monsters. The others sided with Zane that they shouldn’t be damaging things but Lloyd wasn’t listening to them. When Lloyd noticed Zane wasn’t listening to him he attacked Zane even going so far as to attack him with a Spinjitsu spin tossing Zane against a shelf having left some damages to Zanes left shoulder and upper arm and right forearm from his sword. Jay quickly came over to help Zane who was startled and in pain.
“Hey what was that for?!” Jay exclaimed and Lloyd stated, “I told him to stop it and he didn’t listen to me.” Jay expressed, “but that didn’t mean you had to do this!”
“Are you disobeying me too? I’ll teach you to disobey me,” Lloyd proclaimed hitting Jay with a blast of his powers. He was tossed hard back into the bookshelf. Jay was tossed with so much force it unbalanced the shelf which bounced off the wall behind it before falling forward onto Jay and Zane pinning both under the shelf and its contents.
“What did you do to him?!” Kai demanded from a Huntsman who responded, “what do you mean? We’ve done nothing, this is his doing.” The Huntsman then ordered the Feardrake to lead Lloyd out of there while Pixal and Nya lifted the shelf off Jay and Zane. It hit the creature with a spell that made its eyes glow, strange glowing markings to appear on the extremities of its limbs and ethereal dragon like horns to appear on its head. The reptilian creature then quickly rushed out of there Lloyd becoming focused on it and chasing after it yelling as he did, “come back here you demon!”
With Lloyd gone the one Huntsmen opened a portal and all the members of the clan fled through it. Even though he wanted to follow them Kai let them go going over to help his sister and Pixal dig Jay and Zane out of the mess.
“What’s gotten into him?” Kai wondered as they moved some books Jay complaining that he felt like he’d broken something in his leg. Pixal explained, “I don’t know. For a while since we’ve been here he’s been giving off indications of agitation and when encountering the clan members it was like something took over him. He is now emitting smells and energies similar to an Oni.”
“Why is that?” Kai wondered as they got Jay and Zane free. Zane was in bad shape from the damages Lloyd had left which had broken his skin open and exposed wires and some of his inner makes and he was struggling with using his left arm holding it with his right. Jay didn’t have a broken leg like he thought but defiantly had pulled muscles and had bruising not only on his leg but also on both his back and chest where Lloyds powers had hit him. Lloyds powers had also left a mild burn on his chest that resembled a mix of the burns from fire and electricity.
“Don’t know but we need to subdue him before he causes too much harm,” Pixal explained. As they helped Jay and Zane Lloyd chased the creature out of the section down a few halls to the front foyer where Cole was waiting. The moment the creature saw Cole who readied to face the creature the moment he saw it froze up for a second clearly not interested in fighting him. It turned round to head the other direction but found itself confronted by Lloyd who didn’t hesitate when he got there to blast the creature with his powers. He hit it turning it to a mist that quickly vanished. Upon seeing Lloyd Cole became a little nervous; there was visibly something wrong with him. He wasn’t privy to what had happened in the one section with the others so he had no clue what was going on with Lloyd. He could just see there was something wrong with him and he was getting bad feelings from him. There were dark patches on Lloyds skin, his eyes were a purplish color and his powers had been purplish as well.
“Geeze are you okay…” Cole began to say before Pixal came through his communicator to warn him, “avoid fighting Lloyd.”
“Why?” Cole wondered confused and Pixal quickly explained, “something happened with him and these clan members and it has awoken something dark in him.”
“Those monsters got away and the others are being disobedient,” Lloyd growled at him. Being cautious Cole asked, “how are they being disobedient?”
“I told them to focus on the demons not play with fire but they refused to listen. Kept wasting their time and powers on the environment to play with fire,” Lloyd growled Cole noting his voice was a bit off.
“Okay… I could have a word with them about it,” Cole commented as the rest of the ninja arrived at the foyer Jay limping and held up by Nya while Zane moved slow having problems with his left leg and holding his left arm to his body.
“Lloyd what’s gotten into you?” Kai wondered as they approached. Lloyd turned around to chastise them, “you five. I can feel it those monsters escaped! How dare you let those demons get away!”
“Lloyd I think you’ve gotten a little carried away and need to calm down,” Nya began de-escalating. Lloyd was too far gone in his strange headspace however to listen and stated, “no we’re here to stop those monsters and instead of stopping them you were playing with fire and shelves while they got away.”
“The texts and artefacts in this library and the knowledge they carry are incredibly valuable. Knowledge is the most valuable asset one can have and as protectors to our realm we are also protectors to its most valuable resources of which knowledge is by far it’s most important so we must not damage it like you were. I was not doing anything wrong,” Zane regaled unable to help himself to point out a fact forgetting for a moment that Lloyd was in a state where he would listen to logic. Lloyd didn’t even take a second to think before growling at him, “I don’t care Zane. I don’t care the costs I need to see those monsters destroyed.” He then blasted Zane into the one wall of the foyer. He was dazed but still cautious as Pixal and Kai went over to him. Cole had snuck up behind Lloyd while Zane talked and after he finished his attack to Zane Cole jumped him from behind trying to restrain him pinning his arms to his body.
“Let me go traitor!” Lloyd growled his voice starting to sound off to the others. He couldn’t shake Cole who had activated his lava arms so Lloyd couldn’t out strength him so Lloyd built up his powers in his arms then let it burst out startling and flinging Cole into a wall of the foyer knocking him out.
“Hey cut it out we’re just trying to help you,” Jay stated causing Lloyd to turn to him Lloyd declaring, “no you’re traitors. You’re in league with those monsters aren’t you? That’s why you’re disobeying me isn’t it!” He shot at Jay with an energy beam Jay knocking Nya out of the way so he alone took the full blast getting knocked into the wall. He was dazed but still conscious as he landed. Lloyd then continued to rant more of his Oni side seeming to surface further darkening his skin and altering his voice, “they’re here to hunt me aren’t they and you’re helping them; what did they offer you? Some of my power? A piece of this realm for yourselves?”
“Okay I have a feeling we’re no longer talking to human Lloyd here,” Kai noted and Pixal stated, “it would appear the Oni part of his nature has not only surfaced but is taking control.” She then whispered to Kai pulling two small round objects from a pocket on her attire, “when I say so we’ll jump him and try to subdue him.” Kai recognised the items she had as smoke bombs. Kai nodded an agreement. Pixal then tossed the items at Lloyd where they hit him and exploded surrounding him in a dense smoke. While he tried to clear the smoke complaining about not being able to see and claiming even blinded he could still sense them there Kai and Pixal who called for Nya to help them jumped him and attempted to restrain Lloyd who was turning out to be much stronger in this state than normal. They were managing to hold him down but Lloyd built up his powers and released them like he did with Cole tossing them off him. Lloyd was now much angrier...
You can find what I have written so far with this story here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/34894561/chapters/139688419
Hello! I really love your stories! I have a question, will you make any more stories for "Anatomy of a Droid"
I don't think so; I'm currently focused and busy with work on my Shadow of the Void series and don't see the adding of any stories to Anatomy of a Droid in the foreseeable future.
If you're interested you can find the work for the Shadow of the Void which originally inspired me to do Anatomy of a Droid here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/34894561/chapters/86888878
I made some illustrations for my story Anatomy of a Droid.
This illustration goes with this part of the story:
As Pixal had stated most of his systems had been shut down so were not making noise but it wasn’t quiet in his body. To indicate its healthy alive state Zanes power source not only gave off a quite low hum but a slightly electric toned sound that mimicked a normal hearts beats. Outside his body the sound along with the many other sounds his body made when active and functioning normally generally couldn’t be heard unless you pressed your ear against his body near the sounds source. His synthetic muscles and skin helped dampen the sounds to keep his functioning quiet both for his hearing and others. The sound from his heart had Jay and Kai unsettled. The others found it a bit unnerving but were pleased to hear it. The sound meant he was still alive and that his heart was okay. Zane’s power source was unique; none of them had a clue what exactly it was though in their investigations of it Jay and Nya found several very rare materials it could be but they weren’t sure which it best matched with. All they knew was outside Zane, Pixal who shared half the material from Zanes heart and a few other droids they had come across through their travels were the only ones to have and use this substance and Zanes father had never told them what it was or how he came to get it. They were guessing he wanted to keep the source secret and they felt that was probably a good thing. Whatever it was this material was very powerful able to not only give life to those of artificial make functioning like a battery for the energy that gave them life but had the potential to give great power under the right circumstances. When used as the power source for a droid it could give a long lifespan as long of course if it was taken care of properly such as not letting energy outputs get too low which was why Zane and others who shared his style of power source had a specially designed digestive system which could convert matter into an energy format their hearts could use and store. While this power source didn’t have the dangers of highly corrosive acid like a typical battery it had the great risk of exploding if overworked or overloaded by something like Jays powers. Because of this and not wanting to get electrocuted as well as Zanes body was very conductive they all agreed that Jay should refrain from using his powers while they were inside Zane. They didn’t want to do anything that could hurt his power source; while not entirely sure both Nya and Jay who understood Zanes anatomy best as they frequently worked on him and Pixal in order to keep them healthy were pretty sure if his power source stopped working for whatever reason it would not start again and without it they would lose Zane. They defiantly didn’t want that.
When they got to the area of his left shoulder they could see some of the damages Pixal talked about but none of them could see one of these worms. The synthetic muscle that attached from the replica collarbone to a prong on the replica of an upper arm bone to help pull his arm up had been de-attached from the upper arm. They inspected the site.
“This doesn’t look too badly damaged. Some minor cuts to the synthetic fibres but some synthetic re-grow should fix it,” Nya noted and Kai wondered, “is that what that weird sickly yellow green liquid stuff I’ve seen you and Jay use while working on him is?”
“Yha, you should always use gloves when working with it cause if you get it on your skin it really burns; it makes synthetics re-grow while it de-grows organics,” Jay noted and Cole commented, “yha I can attest to that. I mistook it for peroxide once and boy was that a mistake. Made the cut worse and gave me blood poisoning. That was an unpleasant week. To be fare it was in the same bottle as the peroxide… I guess I should have read the label though before using it.”
“And that’s why we now keep the first aid equipment for Zane and Pixal in separate different looking containers and we don’t keep them in the bathroom with our first aid supplies,” Nya commented before Lloyd wondered, “what does that stuff do exactly?”
“Basically it makes synthetics re-grow and repair themselves. Unlike our fleshy makes the materials that make up Zane and Pixals make generally cannot repair themselves without an external aid. Only components of their digestive tracts can do that but that’s because those parts are made from tougher more complex self repairing synthetics unlike everything else which lack that ability. That’s where that stuff comes in. It’s a bit dangerous to work with and takes a few hours to complete its work but is much cheaper, just as efficient and I’m pretty sure Pixal and Zane prefer that method over other methods especially just removing and replacing parts. Unless something gets too badly damaged we use that method to fix things for them,” Nya explained and Cole commented while they continued to inspect the site, “yha I’m probably with them. I don’t know about you but it probably isn’t a nice feeling to just have a part of your body removed and thrown away if some things wrong with it. Like that was a part of you, part of your being and it just gets thrown away like some piece of trash. Sure it was damaged but it was still part of you part of what made you well you. Having that done probably would make you feel disposable; like your being means nothing like your life is almost meaningless and fake if someone does that. I know that’s how I would feel having something like that done.” They all looked at Cole a little taken back by his rather morbid comment.
“Yha I could see how that would really bother them; that’s not something pleasant to think about,” Kai agreed and Jay stated, “by the looks the only damage done here is to the fibres. Everything else is fine.”...
This one is for this part:
“You should recognise these structures brother, you had to help replace parts from them remember that?” Nya regaled and Kai stated, “yha don’t remind me; it was uncomfortable seeing and working on his insides. I never meant to hurt him, it was an accident. I didn’t realise he was there when I made that fire storm. I was just cutting off the bad guys so they couldn’t escape I didn’t mean for him to end up breathing in incredibly hot burning embers. To be fair Zanes disguise was really good, a little too good I didn’t know he was there.”
“How hot did you make that fire? It melted many of the sensors in his lungs and damaged most of the rest plus some of its tissues. We had to replace the whole things! Zane just wanted to repair what was there but it was all too badly damaged,” Jay explained and Kai noted, “I helped out with the cost and work in the repairs to show I was sorry. I prefer not knowing what his insides are like but I felt so bad especially since he spent a week in pain, with off sounding and weird breathing and frequently coughing from what I did. It was so sad, like seeing a sick kitten or puppy. He can shut off systems so why did he keep his breathing going if it was causing him such problems? It was to make me feel bad wasn’t it?”
“No more like the opposite. He didn’t want to unnerve anyone. He knows when he doesn’t breathe it unsettles some of us especially you and Jay…” Nya began and Kai commented, “there is just something unsettling seeing someone who’s living and so human like not breathing…” Nya continued, “yha that plus when he had his breathing off so he could get some sleep Lloyd had a bit of a panic thinking he was dead when he went to check on him so Zane kept them active to not scare or worry anyone despite the problems they were giving him.”
“Hey he was unnervingly still, he’s normally a restless sleeper so that wasn’t normal plus he wasn’t responding to me when I tried to wake him, that’s usually not a good sign. I was worried,” Lloyd commented as they inspected the area for the worm or signs of where it had gone. The only thing they could see was a rip in the side of his synthetic lung just large enough for one of these worms to pass through.
“He wasn’t responding because he was in a deep sleep being very tired from the days events and from having trouble getting to sleep because of the damages to his lungs. He didn’t want to be disturbed so set his body to basically a sort of do not disturb mode so he could get some sleep,” Nya regaled and Cole commented, “Yha cause Jay has a rude habit of disturbing others while they’re trying to sleep.” Jay added while they inspected the tear in Zanes lung, “I’d say sorry but there is no need for anyone to be sleeping till noon; sure I sleep in late but I’ve rarely gone that late besides it’s not fun having to wake any of the rest of you up. You can all be rather rude. You’ve punched me, thrown me across the room, thrown stuff at me, hit me with blasts of fire ice dirt water or energy not to mention set my clothes on fire, freeze me from the waist down to the floor, sent the chicken after me do I need to go on?”
“I think I’m with everyone when I say when you’re sleeping it’s not pleasant to be awoken especially by your loud babbling and frantic shaking when you do it. Maybe we should wake you up in the same way,” Cole expressed and Jay commented, “hey what I do is not as annoying as some of you. Flipping my bed on its side, dragging me out of bed, making an earthquake, freezing my room, playing pranks on me like lighting off those little loud firecrackers in a metal bucket oh and how could I forget the time you dragged my bed outside and left me in the courtyard… during a rain storm! Again do I need to go on?”
“Hey sometimes you deserve it besides your reaction to some of those methods is hilarious anyway change of subject why is his lungs different colored from his synthetic muscles?” Cole wondered and Jay noted, “really you can tell it’s a different color.”
“What do you mean by that?” Cole wondered and Lloyd noted, “you have a tendency to mis-describe colors or not recognise them properly.” Jay added, “yha did you ever take that test we suggested you to?”
“I did,” Cole commented uneasy about talking about this and Jay wondered, “and what answer did you get?” Cole took a moment to respond.
“I have something called due-ter something. I forget the name it just means I can’t really tell the difference between red and green very well,” Cole noted and Jay commented while Lloyd cautiously approached the tear to look into it, “that explains some things like often mixing up Lloyd and Kais clothes or not following our instructions in video games like hit the red button and not the green.”
“Can we not make fun of my problems,” Cole commented annoyed by Jay who replied while Lloyd looked into the tear, “I’m not making fun just surprised you could tell his lung is a different color. As for why it is like that it’s to help differentiate the various components of his anatomy that way when you’re working on him you know which parts are for what system. You don’t want to accidently hook the wrong things up to each other. That really won’t help him and could cause problems.” Lloyd couldn’t see anything; it was too dark. He wasn’t wanting to venture deeper to get a better look unnerved by the dark and the fact the tear led to inside one of Zanes organs but as he tried to back up so someone else could take a more thorough look into the structure he was knocked off balance by Kai who unnerved by where he was wasn’t watching where he was going bumped into him. Lloyd tried to catch his balance but fell through the tear. The next thing he knew he fell a few steps down landing face down on a slightly elastic surface. The others quickly rushed over to the tear to get a look at what happened.
“I’m fine just watch your step,” Lloyd commented as he got on his knees and looked around. The others cautiously made their way to him Kai commenting nervous and trying to hide his feelings, “great we’re in his lung aren’t we? I was really hoping we wouldn’t end up in any of his organs.”
“Trust me this is probably the nicest and safest place you could end up in his body. Not much can hurt us in here. Trust me there is way worse places in Zanes body to end up in,” Jay commented and Kai quickly noted, “please don’t tell me I’m pretty sure I don’t want to know about them.” Compared to what they had been dealing with so far with relatively cramped conditions Zanes lungs were quite spacious and they were able to fully stand up. The place looked to be no more than an elastic synthetic made sack that in its resting state as it currently was it was only about a half its potential volume but it was still more spacious than what they had been dealing with...
Finally for this part:
“No no this is real bad! We’re in Zanes stomach! We’re going to get digested! There’s no way out we’re doomed! This can’t be happening it can’t be!” Kai was panicking causing Lloyd to give him a smack to knock some sense into him. It snapped some sense into him silencing him but he was still on edge and freaked out.
“Of all the places we could end up in this is the worst! There are only two directions we can get out of here and I’m not wanting to get out through the other direction especially if it involves having to go through the rest of his system!” Jay began to panic and Nya stated, “Jay chill Pixal will help us out of here. We’re not going to have to go through the rest of his system… I hope.”
“There are ways of getting out of here without having to go through his entire system right?” Lloyd worried and Nya explained, “yha. To make it easier to work on his digestive system is split into four main parts which can each be separated separately for work; his throat, stomach, small intestines and large intestines. Unfortunately though the worm could lock them preventing Pixal from operating them or if the worm went further in his system we might have to go down there to get it.”
“Let’s hope we don’t have to do that,” Cole commented. They took a moment to look at their surroundings as they all cleaned themselves off a bit having the slimy substance which was Zanes equivalent to mucus, some of his digestive fluids and some matter that was in it on them. It was grossing all of them out. The synthetic material that made up Zanes stomach was the same color as his throat a green tinted dark purple color. It was dark and would have been pitch black in there if it wasn’t for the lights on their attire. Since he was laying on his back everything in Zanes stomach was orientated so everything in it was lying on the back of the organ. They were situated by the top of his stomach by the entrance and their lights didn’t reach very far preventing them from seeing much in there. They took that as something relatively good as they were pretty sure they didn’t want to see what else was in there or the other end. What they were already seeing was gross and unnerving enough for them. Further hindering their lights and visibility was a slight haze in the air which they were guessing came from some of the gasses being produced by his digestive process. They were also guessing these gasses were partially responsible for the strong, unpleasant and chemically tainted smell that burned their noses a bit. Unfortunately their masks were only partially blocking the smell. While not too bad none of them found the smell very pleasant. Along with making their noses burn they felt a bit sick from it.
“This is the worst place we could have found ourselves in! So gross and dangerous! Very dangerous! At least it doesn’t smell too bad rate now,” Jay complained trying to calm down and not lose it making Lloyd who was unsettled wonder, “What do you mean not too bad, it can smell worse in here?”
“Yha, Cole and Kais cooking can make it way worse like that time Cole made that stuff before Wu got lost after battling the time twins that made us all super sick…” Jay began and Kai commented looking around terrified at where he found himself, “how could any of us forget that. It was nasty. All of us except for Zane and Wu spent the night in the bathroom so we didn’t have to rush to the toilets every time we had to throw up. You spent most of the night thinking we were dying. Wu was smart not to have some of that stuff.”
“Hey it felt like we were dying didn’t it! Anyway Zane didn’t escape from that stuff either. Pixal warned him it was dangerous but he didn’t listen not wanting to be rude. What it did to him was nasty! Zanes system made the stuff into this very sticky dough looking stuff that got stuck and clogged up his stomach and like the first 20 centimetres of his intestines. It was not only disrupting and obstructing his system but causing him quite a bit of pain. It smelt horrid, one of the worst things I’ve ever smelt. To make it worse we had to use our hands to clean a good deal of it out of his guts…” Jay regaled and Cole expressed, “please don’t remind me of that. If the smell hadn’t been bad enough you making me clean the stuff out with my bare hands just made it worse… just remembering it makes me want to throw up.”
“I considered that your punishment for making us all sick and having caused Zane such a problem. That stuff was nasty to clean up and it took over four hours to clean it all out. Luckily we put Zane offline so he wouldn’t feel anything. The whole thing would probably have been more unpleasant not to mention painful for him than us especially since we had to use some non conventional tools to clean it out like one of the bottle cleaners from the kitchen. That probably would not have felt good having that used to scrub your insides. Luckily the sensors in his digestive system have a thin coating of the systems synthetic tissues coating them so the stuff didn’t get into the structures to cause damages or clog them but the stuff was defiantly interfering with their proper functioning and irritating them. That whole ordeal is why you started taking cooking lessons isn’t it?” Nya expressed and Cole stated, “yha that and some other things. You guys always making fun of or complaining of my cooking is another.”
“You know sure it normally is not nice smelling in here it’s not supposed to but I think the smell is stronger and fouler than it should be. I also don’t recall a haze in here. I think because his systems have been off for a few hours but there is still stuff being broken down in here the gasses made by the process have built up a bit instead of being emptied or moving on in his system to then be emptied like they normally would making the smell worse than it should be,” Nya noted. Despite Zane not having anything for breakfast there was still some stuff in his stomach. Most of what was in his stomach was the leftover scraps from the previous night’s dinner that hadn’t moved on yet in his system with tougher materials like bones that were still getting broken down being the only things still relatively intact. Most of the bones which looked to have been from two or three bones had been broken bitten into various sized chunks with one that looked like it had just been swallowed partially whole probably by accident. All were scattered about the place floating or sitting in the acid and all showed heavy signs of acid damage and had bits and chunks dissolved from them. Most of the softer matter was largely to fully dissolved making it hard to really identify what they had been and was just stuck in there because his system wasn’t active preventing it from being able to move into the rest of his system. The peach pit was from a peach Zane had been given for lunch two days earlier and was half broken down. Whereas the others not even Cole would eat a peach pit Zane wasn’t bothered by eating it sometimes swallowing a peach whole. It wasn’t healthy for him to eat the pit and even though he could break it down he was unable to convert most of the matter from it into energy so they were not entirely sure why he had a bad habit of eating them.
“Why are there bones in here? Feels like I’m in a gator with them here. I made enough for everyone to have their fill last night he didn’t have to eat the bones as well,” Cole commented looking around at their surroundings and Lloyd agreed unsettled, “why are there bones in here?”
“I’m not sure; I can’t see how Zane would enjoy them so I think he does it by accident or maybe he doesn’t understand he’s not supposed to eat them or that he doesn’t need to eat them. He also tends to eat other things that you’re not supposed to like peach pits, the skin to melons and pumpkins and the whole of a corn cob though he can’t turn most of the matter from those to energy even though he can break them down. I know he can not only break down bones but is capable of converting some of the materials from them like the marrow into energy unlike the other things he eats that he’s not supposed to so it’s not bad for him to eat them. He’s just not supposed to purposely eat them. His ability to digest bones is meant to be a safety precaution to prevent damages if he was to accidently swallow some after all with his jaw strength and metal made teeth and bones it’s very easy for him to accidently eat bits of bone every now and then and when broken bones often develop sharp edges which could cut up and damage his system so his system dissolves them so they can’t hurt him. Eating them on purpose isn’t going to hurt him but it’s not the healthiest nor is necessary. Pixal doesn’t do it very often nor does she ever do it on purpose but then again she better understands what it means to be a nindroid and understands human ways much better than Zane does. If he is doing it on purpose then all I can think of as a reason behind it is maybe he doesn’t want to waste any of his food or maybe he doesn’t realise he isn’t supposed to eat them on purpose,” Nya noted and Lloyd noted, “I could see him not wanting to let them go to waste. He doesn’t eat everything like Cole but unless he doesn’t like it or it makes him sick or from what he says it has no use for him or is dangerous or causes him problems he’ll eat most things including things people can’t eat or drink like motor oil and unlike some of us he always tries to eat all of his meal especially if it’s something someone else made and gave him; he thinks its rude to refuse it. He might not eat it all at once like Cole will but will save it and finish it later. He also has a habit that when someone gives him something to eat or drink as a gift he'll have it even if he doesn’t like it, it hurts him or makes him sick; he thinks it’s really rude to not have it even if he doesn’t like it or it hurts him. Remember that fermented fish stuff someone gave us once?”
“Dude how could we, that smell was horrid!” Cole commented and Kai regaled, “that was one of the worst things I’ve ever smelt! Just the smell made us all nearly barf! Pix and Zane were lucky they could turn off their sense of smell around that stuff.”
“How could we not forget that stuff!” Jay agreed and Lloyd regaled, “yha, none of us were going to have the stuff but not wanting to let it go to waste Zane had it… well him and Cole after we dared him to have some.”
“Yha the taste was slimy and gross even after rinsing them and it did not make me feel very good after that. I am never having that stuff again. We should have just taken the stuff to a zoo or park and fed some gators the stuff,” Cole regaled and Nya added, “yha Zane didn’t feel too good from it either. The chemicals and bacteria from the fermenting of those things upset his system. A droids system doesn’t handle fermented matter very well; the chemicals and bacteria from it upsets and irritates their systems and they can’t process the stuff very well.”...
To read the full story you can go here: archiveofourown.org/works/4469…
You can also view the images here: https://www.deviantart.com/robo-birdie/gallery/90881021/anatomy-of-a-droid-works
Story synopsis: Something is attacking Zane from the inside. To save him the ninja are shrunk and sent inside him to find the culprits who are scattered throughout his insides and stop them before they can destroy him for good. Will they be able to save him in time and who is responsible for this attack? Along the way the others learn about the anatomy of droids like Zane and a bit of how he sees the world. You also get some tales of daily shenanigans from everyone.
Scientists have documented the unusual movement, dubbed "beakiation," for the first time
Much like monkeys swinging from branch to branch, some parrots can swing through the trees with the greatest of ease, scientists have learned. But these colorful birds grip the branches with an unusual appendage: their beaks.
Rosy-faced lovebirds can use their adaptable beaks as a third limb that supports them even as they swing like gibbons and spider monkeys. In research published Tuesday in Royal Society Open Science, scientists describe how the parrots hung underneath a 3D-printed “branch” and moved along by using their beaks and hind legs in tandem to alternately grasp, swing like a pendulum, let go and reattach themselves a few inches farther along.
A while back I made a little graphic of how the Ninja could spend their valentines. I totally forgot about posting it till this morning so here yha go: (to be fair my beloved companion parrot R2 was hatched the day before valentines day so since his passing that time of years always rather unpleasant causing me to forget things quite a bit.)
Extra:
R2 who I mentioned earlier: Feb 13, 2012 to July 12, 2018; yha in his right eye the pupil was misshapen making it tear shaped instead of round. He was born that way.
As a happier side note since we got him and his ginger and white sister in 2019 this big boy likes to be my valentines; whatever I do he likes to hang with me when I do anything. He especially loves anything to do with food. Luckily he only eats his food and not people food.
Just for some cool fun him and his sister as babies and when fully grown (yha they got big!)
Just some arts I made for my Ninjago stories. First up the Treehorn features in my story so I decided to give its design a more detailed overhaul. Some of the inspiration for its design came from ants.
Just a little sketch I made to go with my story Anatomy of a Droid. Got a new tablet for the holidays and decided to try something small while learning to work with it so I made this. It's just a little sketch of Zane playing a video game with his best friend Pixal who as a fellow droid can connect to the special Cyber-teddy he has next to him.
The teddy sitting next to him is this:
A snippet from the story featuring this:
“Yha but electricity isn’t all the same. The difference is the volts in its current that’s why you have to use an adapter when charging your phone or laptop. If you just plugged them into an outlet without an adapter you would damage your battery and it wouldn’t really charge it properly. Pure raw electricity is dangerous for Zanes power source that’s why when we do hook him up to a computer or anything that could transfer electricity to him the connectors we use have adapters built into them that way they don’t cause any stress to his heart. That is also why Lloyds powers are safer to help Zane than Jays. As pure energy his can deliver a much lower and gentler form of electricity that doesn’t easily hurt or overwhelm Zanes heart. Since he only has half the material from his original heart it’s more sensitive to being overworked and overloaded. Luckily his new bodies’ digestive system is more efficient at producing energy than his old body so it really helps keep his heart stable and healthy,” Nya explained and Kai wondered, “given the effects it has on him do you think Zane ever regrets giving up half his heart?”
“Are you kidding, you just see him and Pixal hanging together and you know he doesn’t regret it. Not only that he would do it again no matter how much it affects him. You remember how many times when Pixal was in the computer we found him having fallen asleep next to it or with a tablet after just trying to spend time with her,” Cole replied and Jay added as they continued on the trail, "yha that was pretty sad. I can't recall how many times we had to put him in his bed after finding him sleeping there. That's why I made that special teddy for him. I got one of an Ice Jaguar and modified it putting a special device me and Nya whipped up in it that not only had recordings of her voice but she could connect to it when they hung out together so they could spend time together. He still has it; it's in his nightstand; he sometimes brings it out when Pixals gone for long periods." Kai stated, “that period was kind of weird but also very sad. He carried that thing around a lot and often sat it next to him when we were relaxing or even at dinner. It did really make him happy though even if the thing gave off this unsettling being watched feeling. You know you're right there’s no denying he doesn't regret his actions there. Those two were meant for each other...
Also for my stories I made my own version of the Bounty:
The stories mentioned:
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the
Organization for Transformative Works
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the
Organization for Transformative Works
Bonus: I have also come up with a concept for a potential prequel to these stories but currently not working on it nor know if I will work on it considering there are quite a few things I don't have worked out for it. Here though is an outline I have for the work:
A group of entities show up on ninjago’s shores. They are a strange beast race; hyena folks seeming tainted by some strange magic. They refer to themselves as Hunyeenmers (hun-yeen-mer) and seem to radiate strange energies from their presence. They quickly start conquering regions and ruling them as part of their own empire. No one not even elemental masters can stand up to them. They best the ninja with little problem every time using strange magic’s they’ve never seen. They can create dark fogs that unsettle and dampen powers (they often use this to baffle groups attacking them), summon strange monsters (void monsters like Noctern Crows, Serpent-flies, Xiversus, Vrimps, Elemental Wyrms, Nyctrea, Zkurocks) create portals to teleport themselves between locations, sap the energy from others, summon dark tentacles to whip from the shadows at entities or to restrain them, wield elemental like attacks, can manipulate and influence beasts and flora, weapons don’t damage them even when stabbed (Kai runs one through but gets shocked when the thing is unharmed pulling his weapon out and pointing it back at him instantly healing itself), they seem to see and know things others cannot not even nindroids, some can shapeshift becoming monsters or half man half beast creatures and they don’t seem to understand fear.
Once they conquer an area they leave a small amount of troops to rule the area with strange dark beings (Zivkin) and monsters of an unknown origin to guard their territory. As they conquer they note these entities actions are odd for conquerors and they seem to be looking for something. The ninja try to figure out who or what they are hoping it will help them defeat these things. Almost nothing is known; they check a few places including the library of Domu and the Explorers Club for clues into what they are looking for before frustrated by their losses and lack of knowledge they stumble across ancient texts hidden deep and largely forgotten in the monasteries library that references entities like these had been spotted long ago on the Dark Isle. Nothing else is mentioned. They decide to head to the dark isle to find this place they were spotted at which they find deep in some dark woods. It looks to be a strange dark tainted Necropolis of an unrecognisable origin. The place is empty with only strange passive monster like creatures (minor beasts of the void like Dreadrats, Deamon-Cockrel, Serpent-flies, Gremlickens) found in and near the location. Some of them sense something wrong to the location (what they feel is like the very fabric of the realm is frail and damaged letting something breach into the realm) but they can’t find the source. All they find is texts they can’t decipher as the language is unknown to anyone in their realm and cryptic looking reliefs and hieroglyphs depicting these entities with some dark massive monster. They feel these entities are searching for this monster though they can’t tell why. They head back deciding to interrogate one of these beings to find out more as they clearly know the common tongue; they’ve heard them speak it during fights and from media reports and social media.
They manage to catch one but Zane and Pixal disappear. They feel the two might be looking into something so let them be taking the one they’ve caught to interrogate. Meanwhile Zane and Pixal were kidnapped by these entities getting knocked out and dragged off in secret during the fight. The two wake up in some underground fortress and are brought to see the leader of the group. (‘Come share a drink metal-skins and we shall chat. We have dealt with automatons such as yourselves before and know what you like; am I right to assume you enjoy motor oil with your tea. Do not fear us you will not be harmed here. We wish to do some dealings with you two. With your logical minds we believe you will understand what we have to tell you. We can offer you the knowledge you seek but I warn you it will come at a serious cost.’ The leader tells them as he sits in his thrown as they approach). After a brief secret chat the two are let go. They return to the monastery but refuse to say anything about what happened. They claim to have been following a lead that proved useless not revealing their capture or chat. The others all accept their explanation. They have had no luck with the interrogation the one they caught saying nothing of value. Largely just rants about the lack of good food they have wondering why they don’t have bugs in their food, complaining about them personally, talking about working with certain monsters, etc. That night when they are all asleep someone sets the prisoner free. They find it missing in the morning and can’t figure out how it escaped feeling someone broke in to free it. They go about trying to fight back these enemies and catch another. After a few encounters and some strange occurrences amongst themselves they start to notice Zane and Pixal acting strange. They brush it off at first but after some major plans go wrong combined with strange actions, words and/or behaviours from Zane and Pixal they start to suspect something’s wrong with the two even though they deny anything’s wrong. They decide they’re going to have to do some analysis to them but are going to have to put them offline as they are pretty sure the two are not going to co-operate with them. Zane and Pixal overhear them talking about this. When the others go to find the two they can’t find them instead finding a note that they are sorry but have to do this but they don’t reveal what ‘this’ is.
They soon find from encounters from others and media that Zane and Pixal have joined these enemies and are helping them even dressing like them. They try to capture the two to figure out what is going on feeling these monsters have messed with them but the two evade them every time. Eventually they decide the only way to get the two is to go after the group’s leader. It takes them a serious effort having to enlist others to help them but they manage to capture and lock up Zane and Pixal, the leader however escapes. The two refuse to tell them what is going on just saying they have it wrong and are on the wrong side. They don’t believe the two feeling something’s seriously wrong with them thinking these monsters have done something to them. They don’t wish to do it but have to treat the two as criminals and decide they are going to have to do some work to fix them from whatever corruption these entities have put on them. They decide to do it the next day.
Wanting to know why his friend would betray them like this Jay secretly goes and talks to the two. They refuse to tell him what is going on proclaiming they made a promise and can only tell them for everyone’s safety they have to let these beings do their thing. They don’t actually want to cause harm despite the looks of things. Jay doesn’t want to believe them thinking something’s wrong with them. The two plead that Jay lets them go; they need to help these beings to save their world. Jay at first refuses but they eventually manage to wear him down and get him to co-operate (‘Please we have to do this. Sometimes even if we don’t want to we have to make hard and sometimes harsh and cruel decisions which seem wrong in order to do the right thing’, Zane pleads to convince Jay). The next day the others find the two missing and searching security they find Jay who forgot they had cameras on was the one to let them go. The others are mad at him feeling he let his feelings get a hold of him and he’s put everyone in danger. They continue to try and fight these entities. Eventually they note the enemy seems to be focusing on a specific area setting up a battlement there.
They manage to sneak in and capture the leader plus Zane and Pixal who try to stop them in the process. They take them back to the monastery and lock them up to interrogate them all. Both the leader who is eerily calm and Zane and Pixal keep telling them they have made a mistake. They don’t believe any of them. That night a strange dark event occurs and a strange large inky black monster (it’s like a serpentine creature with three sets of insect like legs and prey mantis like fore limbs that it sprays and oozes in defence and attack an ink like liquid that decays whatever the liquid touches even metal which degrades to dust) appears from the area these beings had their fortress. The thing spreads out causing the world where it wanders and where the strange inky ooze it sprays touches to start decaying.
Nothing can fight it; the ninja are powerless against it. (After a failed attempt to stop it they return to the hanger bay and find the leader having broke out of imprisonment looking at media coverage on the main screen. ‘So she is free. We could have stopped this but alas the small unintelligent minds of humans interfered and as usual hastens their doom’, he states to them. He gives no fight as they take him to interrogate him. He could escape because nothing they have can hold those like him. His powers let him unlock the door.) When they talk to him the leader opens up revealing who they are and what they were doing. They are from a place they deem beyond the realms a place they refuse to speak of as to know its name could lead to the end of the world; knowledge of it could spark the wrong kinds to seek its powers and lead to the end of the world. His people once lived in the realms in a place meant to be lost to all others because the realm was broken the place their kind come from oozing into and having a strong hold on the realm but dark beings in this realm cursed his tribe and the other remaining ones of his people to the cursed realm long ago.
While there they sought an escape and called upon an ancient spirit they refer to as Storabek. He gave them salvation but at a great cost. They were no longer beings of the realms becoming something else entities no longer of the living but no longer of the dead either but a state they would not understand. As payment for their release they had to keep tabs and prevent an ancient demon, Tiamnira (tia-mnir-a) the decayer of worlds from being found or escaping her ancient prison. Long ago it took many powerful warriors and ancient spirits to lock it up. From where they dwelled they saw the troubles in the realms and feared this demon may end up getting loose so came to the realm to find an entrance to her prison which has been lost for ages and destroy her before she can be let loose; she can truly not be destroyed but they can banish her from the realms and trap her back to where she came from so she can no longer hurt the realms. They conquered the people to keep them from interfering in their work and hopefully keeping anyone from seeking this monster. Unfortunately someone figured out what they were doing and has been trying to rush ahead of their work to release this thing thinking they will be able to control it not understanding entities like this cannot be controlled by anyone save two beings who come from where they are from but neither are present or in the power to do such leaving them as the only ones able to do anything to stop this monster. Because they share powers and origin with this thing these entities are the only ones able to stop it. They are hesitant to agree with him.
When interrogating Zane and Pixal after the two reveal that these entities told them all about what was going on but swore them to secrecy as they could not fully trust the ninja would co-operate and do the right thing largely due to Lloyds heritage; they worried the darkness of this beast would affect his oni nature corrupting him. The two agreed and helped hinder them so the group could do their work. They understood the reasons and need for secrecy. When they heard the others talking of inspecting them they were scared worried the secret would be revealed and they may be in danger so fled to help these entities search and hurry up their work. After some thought they decide to help these entities who promise when their task is done they will leave and no longer be a threat. They have to help these entities lure this monster into a trap and destroy this monster before it gets too far. It’s a struggle but they manage to aid the entities into trapping her using powerful wards filled with energies of light from the void fused into rune stones the entities construct before the groups leader empowers himself with energy from the void calling upon this Storabek. The act causes him to be struck with energy from the runes they put up turning him into a dragon (the Stags dragon form; calling upon the Stag for help turns him into an avatar for Storabek for the fight) to fight this monster while the rest fight back the dark monsters aiding Tiamnira. After a struggle the leader manages to destroy her before collapsing transforming back to normal. After the battle the entities clean up all traces of themselves to protect the realm from their presence and influence from where they came from. Before they leave the leader gives them a warning that he senses a darkness coming and that they should be on guard for what may come.
The individual who found the vessel and unleashed the demon thinking they could use it for their own purposes found out about this entity after looking up about these new beings wanting to know what they were or who they were thinking they could be allies for them. They had to find very secret and forbidden scrolls with the knowledge hidden somewhere out of reach. They had to make a bargain with monsters from the origin place of both the entities and monsters. Once released the monster he thought he could control destroys him.
Things happening in background:
-Zane keeps having strange dreams and nightmares of a strange place and dark monsters (he’s seeing visions of the Ash Wastes and Ashers foreshadowing what’s to come.) It keeps distracting him and a few times it causes him to slip up/get in trouble/get hurt or get anxious. He keeps his dreams secret confused about everything.
- Jay is the focus ninja not sure how though; could relate to his mother maybe wondering why she left him and if she had done the right thing in abandoning him.
-Cole sneaks off a few times to spend time with Seliel. Jay investigating his mom is bother him as it keeps bringing up his feelings of his moms death upsetting him making him struggle with his emotions around the subject.
-Kai and Nya are helping Jay. At times they note oddities to the others but are unsure if they should do something about it. They look a bit into it but decide to not bother them and let them work their problems out on their own. They are however going to keep an eye on them to look out for them.
-these entities and the strange energy they bring are messing with Lloyd and his powers. Sometimes they're more powerful or weaker than he intends. He starts worrying he might be loosing control of his Oni side as he feels oddly drawn to the energy of these monsters and gets an odd homely/comforting feeling to it. (its the energies of light these entities who are actually dark, cryptic, primal and beastial looking bring with them that he's feeling comforted by)
-worried about Coles sneaking off Nya and Pixal look into it. When they find out he's seeing someone they keep it secret knowing he'd prefer to let them know on his own terms. They also understand his need to see someone else having noted Jays search into his mom has stressed Cole with feelings of his mothers death and the grief it makes him feel. They make suttle comments hinting they know but Cole doesn't get them.
