"The coast's clear," Nya hissed.
Zane, Lloyd, Little Leaf, and Nya cautiously slipped out into the open of a wide, thickly-furnished corridor, glancing about warily.
"Smell anything, Leaf?" Nya whispered.
Little Leaf shook her head and shrugged, making Lloyd's sweater hop loosely around her shoulders. "No. But that doesn't mean there's no one there. This whole castle just reeks with smelly humans and weird liquids like the ones they had in that big room where the Moon Tribe warriors attacked." She wrinkled her nose. "Ugh. Your food can be really stinky, you know."
Zane scanned the hallway briefly and saw a large wooden door. "Perhaps that leads to the dungeons, where our friends may be held."
"It's worth a shot," Lloyd muttered. He glanced up and down the corridor once more. "Let's go."
Fortunately the group found the door to be unlocked, and they entered to discover a steep, narrow staircase. The crooked steps winded down into the depths of the castle. A faint light could be seen flickering from the shadows.
"There could be someone down there," Lloyd cautioned. "Be quiet."
"And don't be afraid, too," Leaf added. "We're done for if any of the warriors smell your fear-scent."
"Oh, great," Nya muttered. "The werecats can smell fear, too?"
"Shh." Little Leaf led the way, stepping silently on her bare feet—she had rid herself of Lloyd's shoes earlier, for they were much too uncomfortable for her taste—and the ninja followed.
They reached the end of the staircase and entered another hallway, this one lit only by a single torch on the wall by the threshold. Everything but the doors were made of cobblestone. Several leaks from the ceiling dripped the sides and onto the floor, and apparently had been for a long time, for here and there clumps of mold and moss grew between the cracks of the damp stones.
Leaf paused. "There's a fresh scent here. A tom. He was sitting in that chair." She nodded to a single chair sitting in the corner, beside a small wooden table. "I think he was the guard."
Zane offered, "Perhaps his shift for watching the dungeon cells has finished, and he has gone in search of a replacement."
"If a guard was left here, then obviously that means there are prisoners down here," Lloyd realized. He cupped his hands around his mouth and called loudly, "Cole! Liana! Eagle Talon! It's us! Are you here?"
There was no response from the still shadows creeping around the cold cell doors.
"They could have been given the Dark Sleep," Leaf murmured anxiously.
"I sure hope not." Nya trotted down the corridor. "Let's see if they're here."
The group began searching the cells of the dungeon. They opened door after door, revealing empty cell after empty cell. No voice responded to their pleading calls. As their anxious search began to prove fruitless, fear rose for their friends.
"They— they wouldn't have done something else to them, do you think?" Nya murmured as she stared despairingly into yet another empty cell. "What if Black Blood—?"
"Don't say it," Lloyd said, clenching his jaw. "Surely we would have heard something if the Moon Tribe had just... killed them."
"This one is locked."
Everyone turned and stared at Zane, who was standing at a door at the end of the hall. He was tugging on the handle. "There must be prisoners in here, if not anywhere else. Cole! Talon! Can any of you hear us?"
Once again, no response.
"Stand back." Lloyd stepped up to the door, and Zane backed away. Lloyd held his hands out and summoned an energy ball. With a loud bang he shot it at the cell, and in a burst of green flames and smoke, the door came crashing down. Everyone raced inside and inspected the room.
Like the others, the cell was small, dark, and littered with pathetic piles of hay. Upon this hay lay two figures. Their limbs were splayed out around them, and if it weren't for the eerily-quick rise and fall of their chests, one might have believed they were not alive.
Quickly Nya and Lloyd crouched down by the figures and inspected them. Lloyd groped in the dark, and his fingers found a long, soft braid. He found himself staring down at the face of Misako. "Mom!"
"Ronin!" Nya cried out, equally surprised. She took his head in her hands and breathed quietly, "Oh, my gosh...!"
"Quick. We have to get them out of here." Lloyd grabbed his mother, and Zane swiftly joined to help him. While the boys hoisted Misako up, Nya and Little Leaf did the same with Ronin.
As Leaf helped Nya drag Ronin to a somewhat standing position, she asked, "You know them?"
"Ronin's a friend of ours, and Misako is Lloyd's mother," Nya explained in a grunt as she heaved Ronin's listless body against herself.
Lloyd stared anxiously at Misako's pasty face. "They aren't...?"
"It's the Dark Sleep. I've seen it before," Little Leaf murmured grimly. "See, they're alive. They're both sweating, and your mother is crying, Lloyd."
For the first time Lloyd saw the wet trails standing out on his mother's dirt-stained cheeks. His concerned frown deepened. "Come on. Let's get them out of here. We can get them to the Bounty and come back for Cole, Liana, and Talon."
When they dragged the unconscious prisoners out into the hall, they could get a better look at the appearance of the Moon Tribe's victims. Ronin's red rice hat was gone, as well as any weaponry he usually wore upon his bits and pieces of metal and armor. His shirt was torn by claws in several places, and a few red scratches here and there dotted exposed flesh. His complexion was wane and paste-colored. His already-unkempt mop of brown hair was shaggier than ever, and his rough stubble on his face had grown within the past few days, being without a shave for quite some time. Under his eyepatch, which fell askew on his face, he wore a pained scowl, but his quick breath was silent.
Misako looked similar to Ronin in the sense of her complexion and appearance. Her long braid was beginning to fall apart, adorning the sides of her face with a few gray locks. Her wire-rimmed glasses were twisted, and one of the lenses had cracked. Her shirt was tousled and her pants skinned at the knees.
Something caught Zane's eye. Gently, he took Misako's arm and inspected the wrist, pulled back the sleeve of her shirt. "This is the same scratch that we found on Jay."
The others glanced to see that Zane was inspecting the long red scratch running down the underside of Misako's left forearm. A quick inspection proved that Ronin had the exact same mark on his own left arm.
Little Leaf wasn't surprised. "That's the Dark Mark," she explained. "That's where the warriors get the blood they need to take their victim's form. It's like a signal that the prisoner is trapped in the Dark Sleep."
Nya grimaced at Ronin's own Dark Mark staining his arm. "Come on. We have to get out of here before—"
At that moment, the sound of footsteps began echoing faintly from the staircase entrance. Everyone on the dungeon corridor stiffened. They exchanged frozen glances with one another, thinking the same thing:
The guard had returned, and he'd brought back more cats.
Little Leaf's eyes widened in dismay. "Oh, ancestors help us!" she moaned. "I think I smell Broken Fang!"
"Broken—?" Zane began to ask.
Little Leaf shuddered, and her physique suddenly shifted once more to Lloyd's. Lloyd-Leaf turned to Lloyd and hissed. "Put your wig back on! If any of the Moon Tribe see me—!"
Lloyd nodded tersely and yanked the long-haired auburn wig out of a pocket of his dress, jamming it atop his head messily—and not a moment too soon.
Six people entered at the other end of the dark corridor and stopped. All wore the traditional ragged animal skins as the ninja had seen before, but four of them wore dark cloaks that covered their shoulders and fell gracefully behind their backs. Around each of those persons' necks hung a single crystal orb, and each shimmered dimly in different colors; one red, one amber, one silver, and one maroon.
Their eyes met, and Nya, Zane, and Lloyd stiffened with unexpected anger. Among the group of werecats they recognized Broken Fang: the lean, tawny-haired woman who had spied on the ninja when they had been eating at Mister Chen's, and had later pretended to be Skylor. Her eyes flashed with shock when she saw them.
All of them stared at the ninja. The humans didn't move.
Utter silence rang throughout the corridor. Each werecat and human, frozen with shock at the sight of the other, was waiting for the other to make the first move. For several moments that felt like hours, nothing moved.
Ronin twitched in his sleep and muttered, "Mmf, snnng... that's tan..."
Finally Broken Fang spoke. "And just where do you think you're going, little ones?" she sneered, revealing one chipped tooth among her feline fangs.
Zane's gaze was intense upon hers. "We are protecting those who have fallen under your wrath. You may have taken Kai and Skylor away from us, but you will not have these two." He stepped in front of his friends, as if to shield them. "We know who you are, and we know what you want... and you will not have it."
One of the cloaked warriors chuckled and stepped forward alongside Broken Fang. He was a slightly overweight man, quite hairy and bearing a dark gray beard. His eyes glowed amber from under his shaggy mop of dark hair, much like Broken Fang's. Zane wondered if they were brother and sister.
"I'm sure. Let's see what the Sons and Daughters can do against some of the most powerful Seven Sorcerers, shall we?" His gaze fell upon Nya, and his eyes lit up. "Well, well." He grinned nastily. "We meet again, Daughter of Water. Did you enjoy the little nap I gave you?"
Nya stared at him in puzzlement for a second. Then her eyes widened, and she shuddered. She recognized his voice. He was Rip Claw, the nekomata who had attacked her with what Matilda called a Nap Attack, back in Ronin's shop. The ugly vision of Kai lying bleeding surrounded by darkness and the memory brought back to life of her flirting with Cole still haunted her. Hearing that awful voice of Rip Claw's sent a cold shiver down her spine.
She didn't like how the nekomata had scared her that badly, and the twinge of fear was immediately replaced by anger. Her blue eyes blazed as she scowled back at the sorcerer.
"You're not cursing any more people," Lloyd—in his girl disguise, of course—said, glaring at the werecats. "Not on our watch."
From beneath his wig, Zane caught sight of Lloyd's eyes watering and puffing up, and he was beginning to screw up his nose. No doubt the cat allergies were about to attack.
"Looks like we may just have to take out the rest of the descendants of the Sons and Daughters," Broken Fang hissed with a grin. "I must say, I've been looking forward to this for a long, long time."
She had barely finished speaking when a whirring orb of some sort of dark energy began to appear between her hands. The power hissed and sprang toward the group of humans.
"No!" Lloyd—Little Leaf in Lloyd's form, that is—leapt in front of the ninja and summoned a burst of green energy from her hands. With a loud bang the two powers clashed and exploded, flinging the werecats to one side of the room and the humans to the other in a ray of light.
Nya dropped Ronin and sprawled on top of him clumsily, while Lloyd-Elizabeth staggered under Misako's weight and fell just before Zane and Lloyd-Leaf fell onto him. As they were all flung to the floor by the invisible forces, Misako was jolted roughly, making her voice a small cry.
Lloyd-Leaf sat up and blinked rapidly, looking stunned. "Did I do that?"
"Mmskumf," Lloyd-Elizabeth mumbled under her weight.
"Oh! Sorry!" Lloyd's figure quickly crawled off of Zane and Lloyd, who both sat up and stared at her.
Lloyd-Elizabeth shook his head as if to clear it. "Wha— how'd you get my power?!" He screwed his eyes shut and sneezed. "Ah-CHIEE! Aw, darn'b it!"
"It could be," Zane mused quickly. "That because she has consumed some of your DNA, she has inherited your power of energy."
"Great." Nya rolled off Ronin's limp body. "You just gave a werecat your elemental powers, Lloyd."
"How was I supposed to know?!" Lloyd exclaimed, sniffing.
"You say that like it's a bad thing," Lloyd-Leaf muttered reproachfully.
"It's not bad," Lloyd hastened. "It's just— you hab doe idea how to use by powers— aw, combe on!"
"Well, she's about to learn." Nya pointed grimly to the group of werecats, who were gathering themselves back up. "We've got company."
Broken Fang stood up and glared furiously at the humans. "Take them!" She summoned another burst of magic.
"Ninjaaaa...!" The ninja leapt to their feet and whipped into Spinjitzu vortexes. "Go!"
As soon as the opposing creatures leapt for each other, Nya knew the odds of winning were slim. It was six werecats against four humans, including Little Leaf, and four of them were sorcerers with the power to summon magic unlike anything the ninja had ever encountered before. Behind them lay Ronin and Misako, so they had to protect them while fighting the enemies at the same time. Lloyd didn't know how to fight in a dress and was struggling to stay in the character of Elizabeth Green—who didn't have the power of Energy, thus he had to fight hands-on, while sneezing repeatedly at the same time. Little Leaf didn't know how to fight using Lloyd's powers and was struggling to stay in the character of Lloyd. Even Zane seemed to be out of sorts out as they battled, though Nya didn't know why—he had seemed a little distant ever since they had left the deserted ballroom.
Zane was using flat shards of ice to defend himself from one of the sorcerer's attacks of dark energy. His movements began to grow wild and then frantic as the sorcerer sent flaming tongues of green fire upon the cold shields and burst them into pieces.
Nya was up against the two non-magical werecat warriors, who were in their human forms and swinging their transparent swords at her. She dodged backwards and sent gurgling streams of water in their faces, making them sputter and hiss angrily and edge back.
Lloyd-Elizabeth was frustrated to find himself frantically running and dodging the glowing orbs of energy a bony, auburn-haired man was sending him. The little man cackled gleefully as he blasted the magic orbs Lloyd's way. He hooted in triumph when one of them caught of the hem of Lloyd's dress and sent it aflame.
"You'll have to do better than that if you want to defeat Twig Foot, Daughter of No One!" he cackled at Lloyd's frustrated attempts to put out the fire.
Meanwhile Lloyd-Leaf was struggling terribly to use Lloyd's power of energy. She grunted and strained to work with the unfamiliar force, and the bright green flashes of light came out in random, spontaneous bursts that no one had any way of knowing where they were going. They could hit the enemy warriors or the humans; there was no way for her to control it. She was just as dangerous to the ninja as she was to the werecats she was trying to fight.
This isn't going well at all, Nya thought grimly.
The sorcerer Zane was defending himself from—a large man with shaggy golden hair and a matching beard—snarled in victory when he finally succeeded in breaking past the nindroid's icy walls in final burst of green flames. Zane cried out when he was flung backwards, and hit the wall behind him with a ugly thud. He groaned as he crumpled beside Misako and Ronin's bodies.
The blond-bearded man chuckled and ambled over to Zane. "A valiant effort, Son of Ice, but a futile one. You should have simply left your little friends to their fate and keep the rest of your team alive and well."
Feebly Zane grunted, "Ninja... never quit."
"Oh, ancestors help me." The sorcerer flicked his dark purple cape back and sighed dramatically. "Well, I suppose that would explain why you continue to go against us as if you had even the slimmest fighting chance. You're like a senseless dog chasing its tail; you're running around in circles, thinking you're so close to success, when really you're accomplishing nothing but getting dizzy."
"We managed to wrestle our friend Jay out of your grasp," Zane murmured with a small, wry smile.
The werecat scowled. "A lucky mistake. Without the Sister of Darkness, you are nothing. You have no idea how to protect your minds from our invasions." He sneered, "Allow me to demonstrate." He closed his eyes.
For a moment nothing happened. Zane stared at the werecat in puzzlement and opened his mouth to say something—then his visual screen flickered.
Little red warning lights flashed at the edge of his vision. He gasped as his central abdomen parts clenched together oddly—he could actually feel the metal gears and wires shifting and groaning in his metallic body. Pain flashed up from his legs to his head, and Zane voiced a brief cry before stumbling to the floor once more.
Pixal's face appeared before him, her green eyes wide with confusion and dismay. "Zane, some foreign force is trying to hack into your memory banks! I am trying to locate it, but it seems to have come from out of nowhere and has absolutely no trail whatsoever." She was forcing her voice to remain calm, though he could sense a tremor as she spoke. "Whatever is attacking your system, it has a very strange and very powerful signal. Perhaps from a high-power satellite..."
"That is no satellite, Pixal," Zane groaned between his teeth. "That is magic."
Another red light flashed at the edge of his vision. A small alarm began ringing repeatedly in his ears. Zane felt something crunch in his chest, and he groaned. His head was throbbing, his visual scan was flickering and swimming, and his audio sensors were breaking apart.
Pixal's voice was beginning to become chopped and blurry. "Some of your cranium organs are experiencing some kind of pressure, and your nervous system is frying! I can't find out what the problem is or— wht — to d— fizz — abou— Za—e!" Her face flickered.
"Pixal... stay with me..." Moaning, Zane sank to the floor.
Across the room, Broken Fang caught sight of the sorcerer standing over Zane, clenching his eyes shut and murmuring beneath his breath. As she shot a power blast at Nya—making the water ninja grunt as she dodged the dark spell by a hair—she called out impatiently, "Haven't you finished with the Son of Ice yet, Lion Claw?"
Lion Claw opened his eyes and growled in frustration. "I can't get into his head! I don't know what the problem is..." He threw up his hands in exasperation. "It's like I can't connect to his consciousness! Like he's not alive!"
"He's not alive, mouse-brain!" Broken Fang snarled with a roll of her eyes. "He's a machine—a computer, one of those human things they build! All you can do is break him like a stick! He has no real life in him!"
"He has to—otherwise he wouldn't be able to wield the power of ice!" Lion Claw spat back. "The Son of Ice of our generation wasn't a machine! Anyway, there's some sort of life in there— I've never felt something like this before... it's strange, like a—"
"For the love of Ember Star and all the first ancestors!" Broken Fang snarled, exasperated. "Just finish the Son of Ice! You don't need to give him the Dark Sleep, just kill him!"
"Fine." Lion Claw rolled his eyes. "But it's way more fun when you see them squirming and screaming in their sleep. Just saying."
Zane was on his hands and knees, staring off into space and shuddering oddly. Machinery from his torso and head groaned under the pressure of Lion Claw's forces, and here and there electricity streaked from under his gi and ran up his metallic arms. Any movement seemed to be causing him pain. He raised his head with a small groan and watched Lion Claw blearily as the werecat morphed his hands into nekomata paws and stepped over the nindroid. His blade-like claws glinted in the torchlight.
"No!"
Nya spun around and sprayed Lion Claw in the back with one hand, causing him to curse and sputter. He whirled around with an angry yowl and flicked one paw at Nya. "Sleep!"
Not again! Nya almost groaned out loud when an invisible force suddenly closed down on her eyelids and the sound of battle faded into silence. For a moment all was still and silent, and she couldn't see a thing.
Then—light.
Bright sunlight. Warming her face. Nya blinked and scanned her surroundings. She was standing on soft green grass, and daisies surrounded her, waving gently in a soft, warm breeze. She was in a garden. The sky above was bright and blue, and a grove of trees sat nearby. Birds chirped and sang in the distance. A couple of bright yellow butterflies fluttered carelessly above the rows of white flowers. One of them flew over Nya and tickled her hair. Nya frowned and waved it away—and when she did, she thought her arm felt a little... stubby.
What in the world...? Nya stared down at herself. The uniform Cyrus Borg had given her was gone. In its place was a small red qipao dress, much like the one she usually wore in the ninjas' earliest fighting days. What made her own appearance unsettling for her, though, was the fact that she was very, very, short.
I'm— I'm a kid! Nya realized with a jolt. She was in her body when she was a mere toddler—no more than three years old. Her legs were short and chubby, her arms and fingers were fat and clumsy, and her cheeks were soft with youth. She shifted, but instead of walking, she fell upon her butt. Her legs felt like mushy noodles or something. Nya scowled with frustration and clenched her tiny fists.
Werecats have a really lousy sense of humor, she thought wryly.
She gazed at her surroundings, observing the garden in which she sat and the little cottage sitting nearby. There was something strangely familiar about this place... not to mention, something familiar about this scene...
This was a memory.
She remembered now. The Four Weapons shop. She recognized the back of the building now; there was the windowsill of the kitchen and the back door, with the old wooden frames that seemed to gently creak under the weight of the house and sigh, Welcome home. There were flower boxes full of red flowers on the windowsill.
This was the backyard—the garden in which she and Kai would play in when they were young. She recalled times Kai had tried to make her eat a butterfly, telling her that it tasted like butter. (She only fell for it once.)
How long ago it was since they worked in that shop! How long ago since the metal hissed and the great hammer pounded on red-hot steel, its sharp and cheerful bang echoing throughout the little village, reassuring the people of the presence of their smith. How many years past... She and Kai had visited the Four Weapons only several weeks ago, during Day of the Departed in honor of their parents, yet it still seemed like forever since she had last seen her childhood home.
What was the point of all this? Showing her the house she lived in as a kid? Perhaps Lion Claw was not as experienced in digging up his victim's painful, embarrassing memories as Rip Claw was. Sure, the vision felt as real as life and was really creeping her out, but she knew it was just some mind-trick the the Moon Tribe sorcerers did. Surely her friends would fight back the cats soon and find a way to make her wake up.
Nya's stomach clenched. What if Zane, Lloyd, and Little Leaf couldn't fight back against the sorcerers? Things were looking pretty bad when Nya was hit by Lion Claw's spell. How could things have improved, especially considering that she was gone and unable to help? They could be captured by now, or worse... and she'd still be stuck in these visions!
Nya pushed her toddler self to her feet and shivered. Is this what it's like for the Dark Sleep victims? No, Matilda said that it was more than just reliving bad memories; it was way, way worse. Still... what would happen here? Nya couldn't recall what had happened here, but she decided to brace herself for something bad. No telling what kind of messed-up trick the Moon Tribe sorcerers would pull—
"Nya."
Nya jumped. That voice... She swung around and peered over the tops of daisies springing, standing on the tippy-toes of her little bare feet.
There, sitting close by, was a woman. A fairly young woman, one wearing a long, simple gown with a mix of light and dark blue colors threaded in white. Long, wavy black hair framed her face—her face! Why, for a split second, Nya thought she was staring into a mirror. The woman's face was finely-shaped, with simple lips curving into a sweet smile and a pair of bright, ocean-blue eyes matching her clothes—very much like Nya's own face.
Nya knew this person. She remembered when they were kids, Kai would sit on her bed with her and describe how she looked, for out of the two of them he was the only one who really remembered their parents. He told his little sister about their mother so many times, Nya practically knew her face by heart. Yet, to see it in real life—to see it in front of her, in a living, breathing form...
"Over here, Nya." Maya's voice was gentle and soothing. She beckoned to her little girl standing a few feet away. "Come to Mama."
Nya choked. She knew this wasn't real. Her mother wasn't here. Her mother was dead.
A new voyage will fill your life with untold memories...
For some inexplicable reason, the words of the fortune cookie came back to Nya—the one she had opened that evening at Mister Chen's, alongside everyone else. Nya nearly laughed out loud bitterly. This was an untold memory, all right. Some voyage this is.
Nya knew perfectly well that the woman sitting in front of her—gazing at her with so much love and reaching out to her, her arms calling to embrace her and reassure her of her mother's presence and comfort—was all but an illusion; a mind trick played by the Moon Tribe sorcerers. This was an old memory, one that Nya had forgotten long ago. And yet...
Yet Nya found herself—her past self, though it was she of the present controlling it—pushing the tall blades of grass and daisy flowers aside to reach Maya, reaching out her little arms to the mother she had lost so long ago. Before she knew it, Maya grabbed Nya gently and pulled her into her lap, curling one arm around her protectively and holding her to her chest, then rocking her and softly murmuring words she couldn't hear.
Nya pressed herself into her mother's warm embrace and closed her eyes. One part of her was willing her mother to never leave her and stay with her forever.
The other part was yelling at Zane and Lloyd for taking so long in defeating the Moon Tribe warriors.
* * *
"Nya..." Zane groaned. Nya sank to the floor with barely a murmur, cast under the spell.
Lion Claw turned back to Zane. He leaned down and snatched the nindroid by his throat, then raised him up in the air. Zane's feet dangled helplessly above the floor. Feebly he grabbed Lion Claw's paws and tried to fight back, but his entire body was shuddering and groaning. Spurts of electricity jumped to and fro, his head was swimming with pain, and so many different alarms were going off in his head that he could barely make out Lion Claw's sneering chuckle.
"I thought humans were the weakest creatures to ever walk the earth," the werecat sorcerer hissed, grinning wickedly into Zane's face. "I was wrong. The weakest creature to ever walk the earth are the fake copies they make of themselves. You're just an outdated old computer spitting snowflakes, Son of Ice." His golden eyes narrowed to slits, and his grasp tightened alarmingly around Zane's throat. "Say goodbye to your friends, machine."
"Zane!" Lloyd cried out from the other end of the room. He started toward his friend, but was immediately yanked down the floor by the hem of his dress. He scrabbled for some kind of hold and frantically tried to fight back against the nekomata cats digging their teeth in his clothes and dragging him away. "No—! Ah-CHIEE! Ah-CHIEE!"
"Pixal," Zane wheezed. "Are you... there?"
His visual screen was flickering so rapidly and flashing so many strange lights that his retina scanners were beginning to hurt. He thought he caught sight of Pixal's distraught face several times, and heard a blurred, choppy sound of his name, but he couldn't be sure. He was malfunctioning in so many places he didn't know where to start. His usually cool, analytical train of thought was on the verge of panic by the fear of the loss of Pixal.
Zane choked on the pressure restraining his breathing tubes from Lion Claw's paws. He could feel the sorcerer's claws growing and digging into the titanium covering. The metal screeched and moaned under the strain, but thankfully it was so strong that Lion Claw didn't break through—yet.
Then Lion Claw began to murmur strange words, gazing intently at Zane and chanting under his breath. Zane thought he caught several syllables that came from Ninjago's ancient language.
To his horror, the titanium flesh covering his body began to crack. Terrible screeching sounds screamed through the corridor, wails from the metal body that had been faithful and true to Zane for so long. Several wires jutted out from the larger cracks. Broken pieces of equipment spat electricity into the air, making both Zane and Lion Claw's faces glow blue in its light.
Lion Claw was single-handedly destroying Zane's body of titanium.
How is this even possible? "This—does not—compute!" Zane rasped.
"And thus, the last Son of Ice was destroyed for good," Lion Claw cackled.
The pressure around Zane's throat tightened. His limbs, torso, and head screamed as pieces were being torn apart by invisible forces. His visual screen flickered black. Zane blinked blearily and tried to breathe. He thought he heard Lloyd's voice crying out his name in the distance, beyond the alarms blaring in his head and the titanium molds groaning and cracking—or maybe it was Little Leaf's voice he heard—or Pixal's.
Just as Zane felt he was about to pass out, he caught sight of the torch attached to the wall of the hallway. It sat a few yards away from the vicious skirmish, so the little fire wasn't really disturbed by everyone's movement. When Zane happened to glance at it, however, the flames were flickering oddly—like when one swipes their hand by a candle and makes the little flame dance wildly. Yet strangely, nobody was near the torch... as far as he could see.
Then, a small shadow caught Zane's eye. It darted from under the torch and into a dark corner. There was something about the shadow that was distinctly catlike.
Be on the lookout for coming events; they cast their shadows beforehand.
How odd that the words of the fortune cookie from Mister Chen's happened to appear in Zane's head at that moment. Perhaps the damage being done to his body was disturbing his memory banks, though Zane sincerely hoped not. Whatever the reason, he recalled them at the moment...
And it gave him an idea. A rather illogical, desperate idea... but an idea nonetheless.
Suddenly, Zane grabbed the arms of Lion Claw that were wringing the life out of him. With his remaining strength, he shot a blast of freezing ice out of each hand. The ice ran down Lion Claw's paws and arms, and reached down to his shoulders.
"Aaauuugghh!" Lion Claw yowled in pain and wrenched his frozen hands off of Zane's neck. He flung the nindroid to the wall with a loud crash, baring his teeth and hissing in pain from the ice clinging to his arms.
Zane voiced a weak moan as he once more sank to the floor. Blearily he watched Lion Claw stalk toward him, his arms coated in thick white frost.
"Think you're pretty clever, don't you?" His golden eyes gleamed dangerously in the dim light. "You're like a little mouse, desperately nibbling on the paw of the cat whose grasp is already tight around its prey. Don't think you can escape, Son of Ice." Lion Claw's arms shuddered, and his nekomata claws burst out from the surface of the ice coat. "It's over."
"Go climb a tree, kitty-cat!" Matilda's voice rang out.
Lion Claw screeched when a blast of pink light burst out from behind him and flung him to the wall. The area where he was hit was suddenly flaming in magenta sparks and flames, licking his dark cloak. Lion Claw yowled and transformed into his small bakeneko form, whirling around in circles ridiculously as the fire burned his golden fur. Finally the two-tailed feline raced past the other werecats and fled up the stairs, his panicked screams echoing faintly.
Thin hands grabbed Zane by the shirt of his gi and raised him up. He blinked and smiled weakly in the face of an old woman wearing a patched-up hat.
"Hello, Matilda."
"Hello, indeed," she snorted. "Sit tight, kid, your sensei and I need to chase off the rest of these mouse-eaters."
Matilda set Zane down against the wall and whirled around, brandishing her wand. She shot a blast of light at Broken Fang, just as the werecat was bending over a struggling Lloyd-Elizabeth to finish him. Broken Fang hissed and stood up, and stared at Matilda in shock. "Matilda? Is that you?"
"Long time no see, Broken Fang." Matilda shot another blast from her wand at the werecat.
Broken Fang raised one hand in the air and blocked Matilda's spell. The spell was flung off-course and crashed into the opposite wall, spitting golden sparks. The old werecat woman narrowed her eyes at Matilda, ignoring Lloyd wiggling away from her. "I thought you'd be dead by now. Raven Frost said he finished you off when he took the moonstone you had."
"Raven Frost said that, did he?" Matilda grunted. "That old tom says a lot of trash." She shot another spell.
Broken Fang blocked it again, barely giving the whizzing burst of light a glance. "He's not the only one."
"At least I don't talk just to hear the sound of my own voice, unlike some I know," Matilda retorted snidely.
"I must admit, I've been hoping we'd meet again." Broken Fang strode up to Matilda. "It's been so long."
"Let's get this happy little reunion started, shall we?" Matilda growled.
The two witches battled one another's blasts of multi-colored light furiously, ignoring the other action taking place in the hall. Whilst their bursts of green fire and pink sparks lit up the stone corridor, Zane was relieved to see Master Wu running up from behind Rip Claw and the two other werecat warriors, who were closing in on the two Lloyds.
"Ninjaaa-GO!" Wu spun and burst into a golden Spinjitzu vortex, and proceeded to blow the two warriors aside and smash them to the wall. One cat's shoulder crunched sickeningly upon impact, and he limped away rapidly with barely-suppressed whimpers. The other staggered to his paws and snarled at Wu. Wu's vortex evaporated, and he swiftly turned and smacked the nekomata upside the head with the end of his staff. The cat hissed and lunged for him, but again and again Wu fought back with heavy blows.
His defensive moves were simple: once the cat came close enough, give it a good whack on the noggin. Wait for it to shake its head and come back, and repeat. Over and over again—bam, bam, whack, bam, bam, whack—until the cat was so battered and beaten blood trickled from several gashes on its head. After a final blow, the nekomata staggered to the floor, completely knocked unconscious.
Meanwhile the two Lloyds were left to face Rip Claw. He was in his human form, but had morphed his forearms into paws. He knocked Lloyd-Elizabeth to the ground, where the ninja in disguise rolled and fell still with a brief moan—and another weak sneeze.
Lloyd-Leaf stared at her fallen friend in dismay, then jumped back when Rip Claw strode up to her, chuckling ominously. "That pretty little female can't help you now, Son of the First."
Lloyd-Leaf held her breath as she held up her hands and aimed her palms at the sorcerer, willing the element of Energy to help her. Please work, please work, pleasepleasepleasework, she prayed silently.
Shimmering green light burst from her hands and shot for Rip Claw, but he only waved his own paw and summoned a dark cloud of something that looked like smoke to evaporate Lloyd's power. Desperately, Lloyd-Leaf shot another energy blast at him, but he blocked that, too. Panicking, she shot blast after blast of Lloyd's power, her terror growing as Rip Claw foiled each of her attempts and approached.
"Poor thing," he cooed mockingly. "What a pity your lot relies so much on physical strength and elemental powers passed down by your ancestors. You may look pretty impressive against simple human or man-made villains, but you are as helpless as baby mice when you find your self facing—"
His sentence ended in a pained yowl when a blast of pink sparks suddenly hit him in the back of his head. He blinked, voiced a brief groan, then stumbled to the floor and fell still. Behind him stood Matilda, wand still aimed at the place where he'd been standing.
"It's not usually a good idea to run your mouth when fighting," she said.
Lloyd-Leaf gaped at her rescuer, then glanced behind the witch to see that Broken Fang too was lying limp on the floor, her eyes closed and face stuck in a frozen scowl. "Did you—? Are they...?"
Matilda snorted, "Of course not. That's merely a spell I made up myself for knocking your opponent unconscious. They should be awake and spitting mad in about twenty minutes or so." Her eyes fell upon Lloyd lying on the floor. "Who's she?"
"That's Lloyd," Lloyd-Leaf explained.
Matilda blinked. "That— what?"
Little Leaf shifted her figure from Lloyd's tall, muscular form to her own feminine body, still wearing his green sweatshirt and dark pants. "He's in disguise so the Moon Tribe wouldn't catch him and give him the Dark Sleep. I took his place." Before Matilda could reply, she scurried over to Lloyd and bent over him. "Lloyd?"
Lloyd groaned and sat up, his lady's wig slipping off his head. Wu—standing over his defeated opponent—stared at his nephew in confusion, then surprise. Quickly he crouched by Lloyd's side. "Are you all right, Lloyd?"
"Yeah... just a little dizzy... Ah-CHIEE!" Lloyd sniffed, blinked, and stared at the people surrounding him. "B— Baster Wu? B'atilda?" He rubbed his nose.
"We're not Moon Tribe warriors in disguise, but I suppose if we were, we wouldn't say so, now, would we?" Matilda remarked dryly.
"Yup, d'at's B'atilda," Lloyd muttered. "Where are all teh cads?"
"We chased off the two guards who came down here for their shift," Wu explained. "Matilda took care of Lion Claw, Broken Fang, and Rip Claw."
"Wait." Little Leaf stiffened. "Twig Foot was down here, too. One of the sorcerers. What happened to him?"
Wu and Matilda exchanged a glance. "We didn't see him," Wu murmured.
"Then where—?"
A wild cackle rang through the dungeon corridor. A bony, tortoiseshell nekomata leapt from the shadows of one of the corners and barreled into Little Leaf, slamming the young girl to the floor.
"So!" Twig Foot hissed triumphantly. He grinned wickedly at Little Leaf, who was staring back up at him under his paws with horror. "Little Leaf, daughter of Silver Mist, half-sister of Black Blood, a training warrior of the Tribe of the Moon, is a friend to man!" He cackled, "Oh, this is just too delicious! I was on my way to tell Black Blood that her dear brother Eagle Talon was a traitor when Broken Fang called me to inspect the Dark Sleep prisoners, and I was feeling rather glum about it. But now I've learned Black Blood has not one, but two treacherous members of her family!" He giggled wildly with glee. "Ohh, this is just too much! I shall enjoy telling her about this, indeed!"
"Fox-breath!" Matilda growled and she, Wu, and Lloyd started toward the two werecats. Twig Foot whipped a transparent knife from under his cape and pressed it against Little Leaf's neck. Leaf stiffened and stared fearfully at the weapon and her captor, barely daring to breathe.
"Careful, Sister of Darkness," Twig Foot growled, baring his teeth at the humans. "It won't take much to gut this young cat like a fish."
The three humans froze and glared furiously at the sorcerer, helpless to avail Little Leaf of her plight.
Twig Foot chuckled in satisfaction. "Now, if the lot of you will be so kind as to come along quietly with me to see dear Black Blood, I'm sure your precious spy won't suffer too much harm from her angry tribe—"
His sentence ended abruptly in a choked sputter. Everyone stared in surprise to see ice suddenly running up from behind Twig Foot's back and coating his body from the tails up.
He looked down at himself and realized what was happening. He opened his jaws in a panicked cry, but his voice was muffled under the thick coat that continued up and covered his face. Before they knew it, Twig Foot was covered head-to-paw in white frost.
The now-frozen statue of Twig Foot shuddered, then tumbled to its side on the floor with a loud clatter. There, standing in the sorcerer's place, was a heavily battered and beaten Zane, who was blinking blearily against the fizzing electrical sparks spitting from inside various parts of his body.
"Looks like a cat... got his tongue..." Zane's murmur ended with a soft moan as he sank to his knees.
Lloyd darted to the nindroid's side and helped him up, pulling his half-mangled arm with wires sticking out across his shoulder. "Bat was an b'awful pun, Zane'b," he joked with a weak smile.
Wu helped Little Leaf to her feet. "Did he hurt you?"
Leaf shook her head, staring at the frozen Twig Foot. "I'm— I'm all right."
"Goodness." Matilda jammed her hands on her hips and scanned the corridor of fallen bodies. "This party got wild quickly." She stepped over Broken Fang and Rip Claw's limp bodies and crouched down by Nya, who was still asleep. Briskly she flicked her wand over Nya's face. "Wake up, Sleeping Beauty."
Nya jolted up with a gasp. For a moment she simply sat there, blinking stupidly. Then her eyes scanned her surroundings. "Wha—?"
"Another Nap Attack?" Matilda asked in a matter-of-fact tone.
Nya nodded weakly. "Yeah."
"Get up." Matilda gently helped Nya to her feet. "We ought to get out of here—before Lion Claw and that other warrior bring the rest of the Moon Tribe down here."
"Wait," Leaf said.
"Wha'?" Lloyd asked.
"Those necklaces—on Broken Fang, Rip Claw, and Twig Foot." Little Leaf gestured to them. When the others looked, they could see the strange crystal orbs on silver chains around their necks, still glimmering faintly. Even the one on Twig Foot could be seen glowing from beneath the sheet of ice.
"Those are Lifesources. They hold the consciousnesses of the Dark Sleep victims... Like they're the actual spells," Leaf explained.
"Cole told us about those!" Nya exclaimed, perking up. "Eagle Talon told him about them—if they're broken, our friends can be freed!"
"Actually, it's more likely it'll kill them," Leaf cautioned.
"Where's Kai's?" Nya let go of Matilda's grasp and eagerly crouched down by the fallen werecats. After a moment, she voiced an excited cry and grabbed Broken Fang's necklace, yanking it off her neck. She stood and showed the crystal orb to the others—it glowed a fiery red.
"This has to be Kai's!" Her eyes brightened with hope.
Something on the ground caught Wu's eye, and he bent over to pick up another necklace like the one Nya held. "I believe this is the one Lion Claw wore, before he fled." His eyes widened when he saw the silver glimmer of the Lifesource. "This must be Misako's!"
Lloyd let go of Zane, allowing the nindroid to lean wearily against the wall. Lloyd crouched over the frozen Twig Foot statue and used his foot to kick the ice away from his neck. After several quick blows, the frost fell away, and Lloyd stood up holding a crystal that shimmered amber. "I think I found Skylor's Lifesource!"
"And I suppose this one belongs to your friend Ronin," Matilda grunted as she too yanked a necklace from Rip Claw's neck. This one was a dark, maroon color, glowing dimly.
"There's still hope for our friends!" Nya cried.
"Seriously, it's probably not a good thing if you break them," Little Leaf said warningly.
"Keep the Lifesources safe." Wu slung Misako's Lifesource around his neck. "If these have even the slightest chance of saving our friends, we must protect them at all costs."
"Are you guys even listening to me?!" Leaf snapped.
"We need to get them to the Bounty as soon as possible," Nya said as she slipped Kai's Lifesource over her head.
"I'm right here," Leaf growled.
"Will they be all right until we get d'hem here? Bith all the cads crawling around, it'll brobably be a long trip 'till we can get d'hem to safety." Lloyd tucked Skylor's Lifesource under the neck of his dress.
"Did I become invisible all of a sudden?" Leaf muttered.
"Wu and I found a way to get in and out with a pretty good chance of not being seen." Matilda slipped Ronin's Lifesource around her own neck. "We ought to get there in good time."
"Will you hear me if I say something weird?" Leaf asked.
Lloyd turned back to Zane and gazed at him with worry, for the nindroid's body was torn and battered in many places, and he was staring blankly into space. "I think we need to get Zane'b to the Bounty soon, too. B'atilda, can't you use your magic to fix him or something?" He sniffed, "Ah, I think'd my allergies are getting a little bedder."
"Are ducks really ducks, or are they just small geese?" Leaf asked sarcastically.
"Corpus bones, child!" Matilda snorted. "I'm a witch, not a mechanic! If I don't know what exactly I'm trying to fix or how it works, I may very well end up hurting your friend Zane instead of helping him. He'd be better off seeing someone like that Cyrus Borg fellow."
"I'm a platypus," said Little Leaf.
"We still need to find Cole, Liana, and Eagle Talon." Wu looked worried. "Nya and Little Leaf, help me take Zane, Misako, and Ronin upstairs and to the Destiny's Bounty. Matilda, I suggest you and Lloyd go search for Cole, Talon, and Liana. We will keep in touch using Nya's radio bands."
"Fine." Matilda nodded, then turned for the door, stepping over the unconscious werecat warriors. "Come on, Miss Garmadon."
"Har, har." Lloyd rolled his eyes and followed, picking up the hem of his skirt.
"I once built a snowman out of sand," Little Leaf said.
"Then how is that even a snowman?" Nya asked.
"Oh, now you hear me!" Leaf exclaimed in exasperation. "I was beginning to think you'd all gone deaf!"
"Sorry, Leaf," Nya shrugged sheepishly. "We're all pretty worried about our friends."
Leaf granted a good-natured smile. "It's fine. I'll help you get your friends to— wait, where are we going?"
"Who wasn't paying attention to who now?" Nya smirked. Before Little Leaf could reply, she suddenly gasped, "Oh! Hang on a second!"
Leaf and Wu watched Nya curiously as she knelt down by Ronin and dug into the pocket of her ripped jeans. She produced a small syringe and inspected it.
Wu raised his eyebrows "OWCH.14."
"What-now?" Little Leaf looked puzzled.
"It's some kind of medicine," Nya explained to the werecat. "The doctors gave it to Jay when we took him to the hospital, and it may help the other Dark Sleep victims. It's supposed to keep them from hyperventilating or something... I think it kinda helped Jay, even if it did make him start rambling." She took the covering off of the syringe, then drew Ronin's sleeve back to that the skin of his upper arm was exposed. Nya took a breath, steadied the needle tip, then jammed it into Ronin's arm and shot a small dose of OWCH.14.
"Mmnnno more grapes!" Ronin yelped in his sleep and jolted awkwardly, smacking Nya in the face with one flailing hand. After several moments of trembling and moaning unintelligible words, Ronin stilled.
Nya couldn't tell if the medicine was helping him or not, but she went ahead and did the same for Misako. Like Ronin, she gave a small cry of pain and trembled as if in fever for a little while, then her struggles stilled.
"I'll take Ronin." With a grunt, Nya leaned Ronin's body against her and slung his arms around her shoulders. "Leaf, would you mind helping Zane?"
"Sure." Little Leaf allowed Zane to lean wearily on her, and helped him walk across the hall. Wu took Misako into his arms and carried her lightly, as if she were only a small child.
"We need to get to the Bounty as soon as possible," Nya said as she half-dragged Ronin toward the door.
"I can't work, mmng... they can't blow a hairdryer," Misako muttered blearily from Wu's grasp.
"I think that medicine you shot into them is messing with their heads, Nya," Leaf observed from Zane's side.
"Their heads are already messed up," was Nya's curt retort. "The sooner we get them to professional medical treatment, the better."