Chapter 4
"Commander assigned us a new mission." Gempa said as he pressed on the control board, revealing a holographic screen that showed a planet that was purely brown.
"Woah- is that a planet for chocolate?!" Daun said, eyes wide and sparkling.
"No. It's actually a planet made of mud." Halilintar deadpanned as he pressed his own tablet, and the image zoomed in to reveal a wasteland filled with mounds and mounds of mud.
"Ugh... please don't count me in on this." Solar said in disgust while Thorn's eyes merely widened in excitement.
"Gempa! Please, please can I join?!"
"We're... going to need to discuss the plan for this mission and see what our best options are first." Gempa said, turning to Fang who gave him a nod.
"Alright, listen up. Our purpose for this mission is to retrieve a power sphere called: MudBot-" Fang was interrupted by Taufan choking on air and coughing.
"MUDBOT IS REAL!?" He exclaimed in surprise while Thorn perked up in interest.
"So does that mean, Api is really from the future?"
"Wait, what?"
"What does this have to do with—"
"I thought Gempa told you guys not to talk about that-"
"Okay! ENOUGH!" Gempa yelled and everyone immediately shut their mouths. He then turned to Taufan with a frown, "I think we should talk about that later. Right now, we have a mission-"
Fang surprisingly held up a hand, "Nope. Wait. I think I want to hear about this."
Halilintar glared at his friend, "I believe family matters should just stay within the family."
"I'm just saying... if it's connected to a mission, then why not hear him out?" The shadow manipulator said with a shrug, "And why are you guys even treating Blaze like he's some sort of a taboo topic?"
"It's... complicated." Gempa sighed, "Right now, all he needs is to recover. That's what matters. So let's just not talk about this-"
Yaya raised her hand, "Can't we at least know what Taufan meant? Maybe it's relevant to our mission."
"Uhh... hehe... well, not exactly." Taufan scratched the back of his head and Solar rolled his eyes and turned back to Gempa,
"There we go, it's not! So let's just continue on-"
"Then what was the whole 'Api came from the future' thingy?" Ying asked looking at Thorn with pure curiosity.
"Oh! Api keeps saying he came from the future— that's why he got sick." Thorn informed them and Gempa could only bury his face in his hands with a groan. He could already tell where the conversation was heading as their friends continued to look even more confused.
"What—how is that related to-"
"Blaze got sick because he nearly ran himself dry to the point of debilitating exhaustion and him using his powers only made it worse. We tried asking him how he managed to do that impossible feat—and he keeps insisting he's from a future where there's an evil power sphere who can turn good guys into bad guys and he had to fight us off because apparently—we got turned into bad guys and because he couldn't defeat us and his powers wouldn't work anymore, he decided to turn back time using Ying's watch. But of course, we all knew it was just a delusional dream made by his fevered brain." Solar said without catching a breath, before turning to Gempa, "Might as well tell them just so we can get this over with."
There was a moment of stunned silence.
"That..." Fang blinked, "...sounded way too specific to be a dream."
"Not specific enough... since no names nor much details were mentioned." Solar huffed.
"Well... to be fair... we didn't exactly give him time to explain himself." Taufan said, scratching his head guiltily, "But that's why I tried giving Api a chance to prove himself if he really did come from the future! So, I asked him about the power spheres we saved from his timeline and he mentioned MudBot!"
"Taufan," Gempa gave him a disapproving frown, "Doing that will only make things worse. He probably caught a glimpse of MudBot in one of the books Captain forced us to read. Trying to confirm this horrible future that he made up in his mind— it'll just stress him out more."
"Or maybe it won't..." They all turned to Yaya who gave them an exasperated smile, "When my little brother gets bad dreams, it always helps when he talks about it to me. He would talk about the monsters under his bed or hiding in his closet and he always look so scared."
"Well Api isn't a toddler anymore who gets scared over boogieman." Hali said, though he did look contemplative.
"No, he isn't." Yaya agreed, "But I can only imagine how scary it is to fight your own brothers who turned evil."
An uncomfortable silence settled amongst the brothers, before Ice, who had been surprisingly silent the whole time, spoke up.
"Then what do you propose we should do?"
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.
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"You won't get away with this!" Blaze growled out as he continued to struggle against his binds. His entire torso and arms were currently duct taped on Probe's back and for the past trip he kept pulling away by kicking and wriggling as much as he can but he finds himself starting to feel a bit drained.
He was obviously not fully recovered yet. (Ugh... he hated it when Gempa's right.)
They were currently crawling through the bigger vents of the ship trying to find a way to escape. Blaze tried making some noise by kicking the walls, but so far no one seemed to noticed while some just commented it to be some of Gopal's leftover test papers that he tried hiding around the ship from months ago and others seemed to be used to all the noises from the vents.
Adudu apparently had been lurking around for some time, (which is probably the reason why no one tried to investigate the noises Blaze kept making thinking it was normal by now) and had gotten gist of Blaze's predicament.
The alien then thought of a plan to kidnap the teen to brainwash him into becoming one of his henchmen to help him find more power spheres.
(Blaze managed to bite his hand when he tried patting him in the head while he explained his plan.)
"Probe, I thought I told you to duct tape his mouth!" Adudu said as he looked at his GPS before turning right.
"I did, Boss! He probably got it off again!" Probe twisted his head to try and tape Blaze's mouth but Blaze kept tilting his head away, "Stay. Still-! Got ya!"
"Mmmmph!" This time Blaze find it harder to get off since Probe had placed three straps over his mouth, much to his chagrin.
"...try to entertain him."
Blaze froze as he was sure he heard Yaya.
Adudu also stopped, looked back and hissed loudly, "Probe get back! You idiot! You led us the wrong way!"
"Try to listen what he has to say, and maybe he'll have a name about this evil power sphere he's been talking about. You can assure him that nothing from his dream will happen since we all know all the power spheres we've encountered are never evil. Just afraid and misjudged. And a power sphere capable of turning someone evil probably doesn't exist."
"And what if this power sphere was actually real?" Came Solar's question.
"But Boss! You're the one holding the GPS— ow! Ow!"
"Talking back to me, ha?! You were the one responsible with downloading this ship's blueprints! We're supposed to be on the medic bay by now!"
"Then maybe we can find it and prove Api it's not evil!"
Blaze stiffened as he realized what they were talking about. No... no! They can't! Everything will just redo itself and they'll get hit and he'll be fighting against them again—he had to stop them!
"Boss—Woah! B-Boboiboy! Stop moving around so much-!" Probe was now rocking side-to-side as Blaze desperately tried to free himself from the robot.
"Probe! Stop moving so much!"
"I-I'm trying, Boss! But—"
An idea then came to him as he remembered how thin the metal walls of the vents were in the meeting room.
"Oy! Keep it down! They'll hear us!" Adudu scowled, trying to kick Probe backwards.
Blaze ignored him and planted both his feet on the roof of the vent and pushed with all his might. The metal beneath Probe gave a heavy groan and the voices below immediately went quiet.
"Did you guys—"
There was a sound of the meeting room's door opening and followed by a panicked scream from Gopal, "Boboiboy! I can't find Boboiboy anywhere!"
"WHAT?!"
Blaze rolled his eyes at how Gopal was still insistent at calling them by their first names before giving one more hard push against Probe.
He was rewarded by the sound of the metal giving way and for a moment he was weightless, before gravity did it's thing and he was being pulled down with Probe.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH!"
CRASH!
Blaze kept his eyes tightly shut, before slowly opening them as he realized he hadn't ended up being crushed under Probe. Blaze craned his neck to see that it was Adudu who had ended up cushioning both Probe and him, instead.
"API!"
He turned to see his brothers and friends looking at them in stunned disbelief before Halilintar stepped forward with the scariest scowl Blaze had ever seen.
"Adudu, what is the meaning of this?!" With a flick of his wrist, a sword appeared in his hand.
"Err... ehe... PROBE TIME FOR PLAN B!"
"Aye aye, Boss! Mega—urhk!" Shadow hands suddenly appeared and grabbed Probe's entire frame, preventing him from expanding and getting off of Adudu who was still squashed underneath him.
"ARRGGHH! YOU WON'T GET AWAY WITH THIS—" Adudu was silenced when a red sword was suddenly stabbed in front of him, and he looked up to see Halilintar giving him the death glare.
"What do you think were you doing with our brother?"
Ice and Solar had gone to get Blaze as Halilintar continued to interrogate the green alien, their other brothers and friends just behind him looking every bit of intimidating.
With a carefully controlled light beam, the light manipulator was able to cut the duct tape and Ice quickly pulled Blaze out of his bind and into a hug.
"Ahk--! Would you stop it!" Blaze couldn't help but exclaim after peeling off the tape on his mouth and trying to push Ice off of him in embarrassment, "I'm fine!"
"Blaze! Are you okay?! Does it hurt anywhere?" Gempa had approached them next, face full of concern.
"Yeah, yeah, I'm good- LOOK OUT!" A hidden compartment from Probe's back opened and shot out a round beeping time bomb.
Adudu saw this and went pale, "Probe you idiot! That's the wrong bomb!"
Ice quickly pulled Blaze behind him while Gempa positioned himself in front of them and Solar, "Earth Shield!"
Fang cursed and swung his arm, releasing Adudu and Probe.
"RUN!!" The two yelled as the beeping started getting faster.
There was no time to run, however, when the bomb made its final beep and Fang barely managed to pull Halilintar and create a shadow shield for him and his friends when the whole room flashed with a bright light and a loud explosion soon followed after, shaking the entire station.
Despite the earth pillar, Blaze and his brothers find themselves being thrown back by the powerful force that erupted from the thunderous explosion.
Blaze felt Ice's grip on him disappear and something hard slammed against his head, and he finds himself blacking out for a moment.
A few moments of silence and darkness and there was this ringing in his ears as he struggled to wake up and fight for consciousness.
"Is everyone—"
"—get a medic!"
"—fine! It's just a sprain—"
"-aze?! Where's—"
"BLAZE!"
The fire-manipulator pouted at Gempa who looked at him disapprovingly, "What?! I'm helping you look!"
"Setting plants on fire does not help." He sighed for the umpteenth time that day before turning around to move some shrubs aside, "Can't you be serious for once?"
"Well, can you not be serious for once?" Blaze said with an eyeroll, ignoring the now tensed silence that settled between his friends and Thorn who had gone along the mission.
"I knew this was a bad idea." Gempa grumbled. Blaze bristled at hearing this, his playful pout now transforming into an angry scowl.
"What did you say?!"
"Blaze... now's not the time—" Thorn tried intervening but Blaze ignored him.
"No! You know what— I think it's time you actually stop being the goody-two-shoe leader and just tell me why you hate me so much!" Blaze approached Gempa who turned to look at him with an affronted look.
"I don't hate you-!"
"Well I do!"
The silence that followed was deafening but Blaze didn't let this stop him, "I hate that you don't trust me enough to join missions! I hate that you keep treating me like I would mess everything up every chance I get—and I hate that you think I can't redeem myself after that one mistake—"
"That mistake almost cost our friends' lives and for the power sphere to be stolen!" Gempa turned to him, eyes blazing with fury, which was so uncharacteristic for the usually calm and collected leader, "You never think before you do something stupid! You're too unpredictable and you never follow orders! So, I'm sorry if I do believe that you'll always find a way to mess everything up!"
Blaze could feel his heart pounding hard against his chest as his face heated in shame and anger. He wanted to lash out and say just as much hurtful things to Gempa, but his mouth had gone dry and his thoughts were in shambles.
He finds himself looking down instead, unable to meet those golden eyes anymore and this action seemed to have snapped Gempa out of his moment of rage as he let out a gasp and put a hand over his mouth.
"Blaze- wait no—I didn't mean-"
"I should go back to the ship." He firmly said, giving Gempa a glare before turning away to head back.
"Blaze—"
A rustle.
"Wait-! LOOK OUT!
And everything suddenly happened too fast. The last thing Blaze saw was a red beam heading his way before he felt something heavy collide against him and he was on the ground.
He could hear his friends screaming and Fang putting up a barrier around them, unsure of where the attack had come from.
"It hit Gempa!" Thorn exclaimed while Blaze pushed himself up with his elbows and saw Gempa's prone form not too far from where he had been standing.
"Gempa!" He scrambled towards his brother as guilt consumed him when he realized this wouldn't have happened if he just kept his mouth shut—
He froze when he noticed some of Gempa's locks turning white.
"What...?"
Gempa shifted and started pushing himself up. The others were about to approach him but Fang held up his hands, also noting that something didn't feel right.
A soft chuckle was heard from the earth-manipulator and it sent chills down Blaze's spine.
He backed away while Thorn ran next to him, trying to help him up but his eyes were still looking at Gempa with worry.
The said teen had stood up and was now dusting himself without a care in the world while everyone else was staring at his strangely calm behavior.
"Gempa..." Came Thorn's scared voice as they all looked at their brother warily, "Are... are you okay?"
Gempa smiled, eyes no longer golden and warm and hair now strands of silver.
He looked wrong. He looked jaded. He looked ominous.
"I've never been better."
End of Chapter
One flashback done, many more to go. Lol.