Takanuva stalked through the darkness--well, dimness, for you could not then call anywhere the Toa of Light stalked “dark” and came at last to a great cavern, and there, in true darkness where the Avohkii met its match, stood the titanic figure of well-built figure.
“The Makuta,” breathed Takanuva, more to himself than to the dark figure, though he continued. “You don’t look like a swirling vortex and a Matoran.”
“You don’t look like a Matoran now, either,” said the Makuta, “though you might still be a chaotic vortex of fears and insecurities.”
“I am not afraid,” said Takanuva, confidently enough, though not strictly truthfully. “I am here to fulfill my destiny: to defeat you and awaken the Great Spirit!”
“My brother shall not be awakened,” rumbled the Makuta, and the shadows about him deepened and he seemed to fill the entire space. “You cannot awaken the dead.” He paused, aware of the approach of the Toa Nuva, Turaga, and sundry Matoran. “An audience gathers for your final failure, Toa of Light. Did you summon them yourself?”
"Maybe they will not see me win today,” said Takanuva bravely, “but the matoran will go on, and someday they will triumph!”
“What is triumpt to a Matoran?” mused the Makuta. “Surely, your Mask cannot lead you actually believe I would let them return? Return to what? They will not leave a land of fertility and freedom to inhabit a dying, sunken world. Now I will protect Mata Nui from you.”
"Protect him?” Takanuva had no idea what the Makuta could mean. Wasn’t he Mata Nui’s foe, his opposite?
"Sleep spares him pain,” said the Makuta, almost quietly, almost speaking of himself. The world of Mata Nui, the world he had once thought to conquer, was gone, and whatever his Rahkshi had reported of the sunken lands beneath, it was dying. “Awake, he suffers.”
"You are not protecting him!” shouted Takanuva, in full conviction, launching himself at the Makuta, who laughed silently to himself. Of course he wasn’t protecting the Great Spirit! The Great Spirit’s domain had been cast down into the seas through his, Teridax’s, actions. It was his right to rule, to assert the will of the superior being over the minor ones, and the Cataclysm itself had not destroyed him, though it had destroyed the Matoran Empire.
The Makuta parried Takanuva’s attack easily. The Avohkii had transformed Takua’s strength and reflexes and given him weapons and skills he’d never dreamed of, but Takanuva was little more than a Matoran, so inexperienced was he, and with a single sweep of his staff, he knocked Takanuva to the ground and loomed over him, one great hand on his throat.
"My duty is to the Mask of Shadows!” he said softly. How else to tell a Toa--any Toa, but especially one transformed by a great Mask--that allegiance was ultimately only to oneself."
“Then let’s take a closer look, behind that mask!” Takanuva choked out the words, not trying to pry the Makuta’s arms off him, but tugging at the Kraahkan. His own Mask flared with power, and the Makura realised in that moment exactly what a Toa of Light was: his anti-self, not a being of greatness and diverse magics to confront him on his own turf, but a Matoran of pureness, with an elemental power distilled from those of all the Toa: energy purified beyond heat, waves beyond water, air beyond transparency, and the earth beyond solidity. Takanuva’s elemental power was reality and he had nothing beside it, but beside him the all the might, physical and mystical alike, of a Makuta had no power, but was truly shadow.
The Makuta knew in that moment that he could not achieve victory by force of arms, not though he was he was thrice Takanuva’s size, far more experienced, and pressing on his throat. Even if he choked off the life of the one who had been Takua, the Avohkii had been made, long ago, probably even during the ancient wars, specifically to render him mortal, to do what the Cataclysm had failed to do, to kill him.
But Takanuva did not know this. Probably, it was Teridax alone on the island of Mata Nui that did. He couldn’t defeat the Toa of Light, but he could suborn him.
Teridax released himself, surrendering--inviting the Avohkii to do work upon him, dissolving himself in a swirl as he had faced the Toa Mata only a few years before. Takanuva fell for it, letting his own power give chase, and they were dissolved together as the light expanded, mixing with the diffuse, swirling shadows.
The Toa Nuva arrived only a few minutes later, as the coalescing light and shadow had taken shape as one being: Teridax was completely limpid, allowing Takanuva full control, full knowledge, as shadow must give way to light, but this was his cunning, for the Toa of Light was still a Toa, an exalted Matoran, and he could not hold or comprehend all that the Makuta knew, and the flood of knowledge hid the specifics of Teridax’s plans and self.
You want to open the way to Metru Nui? Together, we can--nothing that hides below can face our conjoined might. What is Metru Nui?
Millennia of images raced through the part of Takutanuva’s mind that was still Takanuva, however grown, images of countless Matoran in a city that had been wiped from his own memories--or was it just blocked? Memories of Vakama and Jaller, escapades and adventures. There were Toa once: tall and shining and countless. Was that Vakama he saw last, flying through Ta-Metru, catching him off the very ground as the sky darkened and thundered? He clutched at Jaller, hauling him off the ground, nearly dragging Toa Vakama down before his jetpack stabilised.
“What is that?” it was the voice of Tahu Nuva, dragging Takutanuva’s attention back to the chamber below Kini Nui. Metru Nui, the thousands of forgotten memories, dragged him away from the present, but the giant being paused.
“Light and shadow,” said Whenua. “They have become one.”
“Light has revealed the will of Mata Nui!” Teridax spoke in the joined being, easily nudging his other half in the direction he wanted: open the gate! Open the gate! Return to Metru Nui! “Our brother must be awakened.”
And with a crash of their great staff onto the ground, Takanuva’s power over the elements and the might of the Makuta opened a chasm, a hole in the floor of the chamber, a passage that went down, down below the island of Mata Nui. Not the winding crevices Teridax’s Rahkshi had scouted, but a straight passage down into the dome of Metru Nui.
Exhausted, even the great being that they were, Takutanuva sank to his knees, the Toa Nuva and others gathering around him. Exhausted, but not utterly exhausted. More was needed. Teridax noted Jaller’s Hau, still on the Ussanui
“Go!” Takutanuva commanded Macku, one of the Ta- and Ga-Matoran who had followed the Toa and Turaga. “Run! That mask...”
“Jaller’s mask!” Macku grasped his meaning, starting to run across the space, but Nuju chittered and with a twitch of his mask, yanked the golden Hau across the chamber. Takutanuva, wearily kneeling, one hand on the ground, caught it with the other.
The elements of earth and water swirled, the discarded material of the tunnel reshaping itself into mechanical parts and fleshly sinews, fire and air igniting life into the newly shaped body, and Takutanuva expended all the power he could muster to blast a beacon of light through the roof of the cavern. Outside it was night and the Red Star was overhead. Lightning cracked through the new-blasted shaft and struck the body even as Takutanuva placed the Hau on his face.
Tahu Nuva looked down at the new-created body and saw looking up at him Jaller, Captain of the Ta-Koro Guard.
“Where is Vakama?” said Tahu in a voice of wonder, knowing the Turaga had been attending, well, Jaller’s body. “He must be told.”
“I will find him,” said Kopaka Nuva.
A few miles away, above a different hole in the dome of Metru Nui, Vakama and Hahli had just dropped Jaller’s corpse into the Cave.
