Yo yo! My peeps! Wazzup? This is RobotMonkeys4Ever coming live (well, not live if you're reading it after I typed it) from her computer desk in my lovely house, OFFICIALLY putting for the final chapter of my romantic masterpiece, Binds of Love! Please sit back, relax, and refrain from pelting me with snowballs if it doesn't turn out the way you wanted it to. Just read and review. Tell me what you thought of the whole story, or just this chapter, whichever you want. I'm all up for long reviews as well as shorter ones. (But longer ones are much more fun!) Anyway, enjoy and appreciate the final chapter!
Chapter 8
Chiro gasped for air as his strength returned, the Power Primate flowing back into his veins, giving him new and extra strength and vigor. The pink binds weakened, and with a strong pull they were ripped and Chiro landed on the ground, standing tall. The bubble that had once held the Power Primate had burst, popped like bubble wrap.
"No!" called the Skeleton King, "the process was not yet complete!
Gibson opened his eyes and observed the situation, and feeling his strength return he decided it was the perfect time for a scientific analysis. "Ah, yes, by removing the Power Primate you created a kind of vacuum! And it wasn't until you could close off the connection between us and this machine completely that the Power Primate would be completely removed! The Power Primate would most definitely return to us if such suction power was removed from the source! It all makes perfect sense now." Then Gibson, feeling the clear tubing also weak, yanked himself free. He was soon after followed by Antauri, Otto, and finally Sprx-77.
"What happened? How did we get free?" asked Sprx-77, wildly glancing around the room. His eyes settled upon Nova, lying motionless in a heap in the corner. "Nova!" He started to run towards her, but before he could take a step, he felt the ground quaking.
"NO MATTER!" The Skeleton King yelled, "FORGET THE POWER PRIMATE! I SHALL JUST TAKE YOU OUT OF THIS PICTURE!" He charged towards them with his staff horizontal. The team dodged and Skeleton King crashed into the wall. He shook his head, and then turned to face the team, who was all flying in the air, say for Chiro and Sprx-77, whose jet pack remained broken.
"It's a fight you want? Sure! We'll take ya!" Chiro grinned, "Hyperforce, Go!"
"Two saves in one day?"
"Sparks! Look out!"
"I never miss."
"Nova!"
"Sparks! Get down!"
"It must be love, must be love, must be love, must be love…"
Nova's head soared, she was in a dream. At least, that's how it felt. Her life played for her like a CD on shuffle. Images flashed before her eyes. She was in the Super Robot, Gibson screaming about Thingy. She was on Tollmac 3, joking about Sprx-77's giant of a girlfriend. She was flying around Shuggazoom, trying to find the absent Chiro, battling formless. She was on top of the Super Robot, watching the sunset with the rest of the team.
"Scritch Scratch Doomthrower!" She heard Otto yell, far off, way far off. It didn't sound how the visions did, nor did she see it. She was simply aware of it.
The visions continued. She was banging on a door to save Sprx-77 from Scrapperton. She was battling a giant snake-woman. She was awoken in the middle of the night by Antauri. She was trapped in a dream with him and Chiro. She was… she was in a lab…
"They are completed, Nova." The Alchemist said.
"Ooh, can I see them?" she asked, her bright eyes shining.
"Well, I don't know. None of the others have seen theirs, so…"
"Pleeeeeeeease?"
"Well, alright." The Alchemist gently attatched her new bright yellow hands the end of her arms. "I'll be able to attatch them more permanently with a little mechanical engineering. But what do you think?"
Sprx-77 walked up to the pair. "Hey gorgeous, what's shakin'?"
Nova quickly whammed him with her newly attatched fists and he went flying into the opposite wall. She turned back to the Alchemist. "They work great!"
The images once again resumed, racing through her life like a racecar in a time zone. She recognized most of it, but once in a while…
"Mandarin? What's been wrong with you lately?" They were both in the Super Robot.
"Nothing! Why do you monkeys keep asking me that?" Mandarin took off, rushing to his orange tube to be somewhere secluded.
She suddenly felt a warm hand on her shoulder. "Don't fret, Nova. He's just upset," came the soothing voice of the Alchemist.
She turned to meet his gaze. "But why? What does he have to be upset about?"
"Nova, I, I have to leave. I have to get out of here."
"What? Where?"
"Far away," he stared off into space, "somewhere you will hopefully be unable to find me. Or more, somewhere I won't be able to find you."
"No! No, you can't leave! We need you here!"
"You don't need me, you are the perfect team. I designed you that way!"
"But you're our leader."
"Mandarin will lead you now."
"But I still don't understand. Why are you leaving?" She gulped, feeling tears rising to her eyes, "Don't you love us anymore?"
The large human arms picked her up and cradled her like a small child. "Of course I love you. But I fear…I fear that if you knew who I was, you wouldn't be able to fight as you should. Some shade of compassion would shadow your heart and keep you from fighting evil."
"No we wouldn't! We would fight ten times harder with you here!"
"I'm afraid you wouldn't Nova."
"What are you talking about?"
"I can't tell you. But rest assured. I'm making the right decision."
The clips of life moved on. They continued through subconscious hours, for she had no real grasp on time, no idea how long she had been there, or maybe she wasn't there, wherever there was. She didn't know.
Though throughout this biographical screenplay, she had been aware of something else going on. She heard shouting. The yelling and screaming of attacks. Calls of victory, screams of pain. But it all sounded miles away, and yet close by. She heard a low gruff voice that sounded somewhat familiar cursing at her team, crying out in the pain from each passing attack. Then she heard a loud smack as some large slender metal object was stabbed into the ground. And the earth shook, something large was breaking, ripping. Then she heard the sucking of air though this separation, soon followed by the sucking sensation ending, and the gap closing, sealing.
Something new. Someone or something was next to her. She could feel it. Though the reeling pictures she knew someone was beside her. His head lay on to her stomach and she heard sobs, and recognized her beloved Sprx-77. She wanted to tell him to stop, she was okay, but she couldn't move, and wasn't sure that she was okay. He picked her up, and the pictures began to spin around her, circling, like water going down a drain. They began to spin faster and faster, they swirled into a flurry of blackness.
Though as all light left in the space before her, she saw the blurry image of her red lover and heard echoing sound as the pictures swirled around and knew not if she was truly hearing, or if it was another memory "Nova, Nova, I love you."
Antauri, Sprx-77, Otto, Gibson, and Chiro all gasped for air, out of breath. They viewed the wall that now stood where the section of the Citadel of Bone where their adversary had once stood, the wall had regenerated itself as the citadel does. It must have been a weak attempt by the Skeleton King to trap them inside, but it would be easily broken though.
Chiro gritted his teeth. "He got away…"
"Worry not," said Antauri, setting his hand on Chiro's arm, "our purpose her was not to defeat him, it was to save one of our own."
"Nova!" Sprx-77 was at her side, he cradled her in his arms, holding her close like a precious treasure, his eyes teared, but he tried to hold them back, to be tough in the presence of his team. He didn't know if she was alive or... or not. "Nova, Nova, I love you." And for a moment he knew beyond the shadow of a doubt that she was okay, that she was alive. But then, suddenly he didn't. The feeling came and went in less than a second. He spun around to find the team closer to him than he though they were. "We've got to get her back to the robot!"
Sprx-77 sat in his room, bouncing a rubber ball repeatedly against the wall. The team was back on Shuggazoom in the peace and quiet of the warm spring day. But Sprx-77's mind was too preoccupied with other things to notice. He had stood by the unconscious Nova in the sick bay for hours without learning anything. He didn't even know enough to be sure she was alive. Gibson had been unable to discover anything else until they returned to Shuggazoom, and once they had gotten back, Gibson suggested Sprx-77 take a break so he could work.
So here Sprx-77 sat, in the cold room, bouncing a rubber ball and listening to the dull thud of it ricocheting off of the metal wall. He remained almost immobile except for the arm with the ball, reflecting on the events of the past two days. Two days. The light of morning had brought the second anniversary of that fateful morning when both he and Nova had been pulled from the normal realm into one filled with fear, pain, hatred. Two days. Those must've been the longest two days of his life. It felt like a week. A month even.
He shook his head, as the rubber ball whizzed past his hand and flew behind him, finally settling in front of the door. He sighed, but didn't move to get the lost toy. He couldn't lose Nova now, they were finally together. In his wildest dreams he had only imagined himself together with her. The last few hours had been Heaven in Hell, the pain, the torture, but the love, the commitment. There was nothing like it. He had made a lot of wise cracks and used loads of bad pick up lines, but now, now he was in love, and love was worlds apart from a crush. Crushes pass, but love is eternal.
He got up and walked to pick up the rubber ball, but when he did the door whooshed open and Gibson stepped in. On a normal day Sprx-77 would have told him to get out or at least have pointed out the lack of knocking first, but today was not a normal day.
Gibson wore an uneasy smile as he walked in. "Sparks, I have some good news."
"Really?" Sprx-77's spirits rose, "What? Is she awake?"
"Well, yes. But-"
Whatever Gibson was going to say it no longer mattered. Sprx-77 was out the door and running for his transport tube.
"Sparks, wait!" Gibson turned and ran after him. "There's something you need to know!"
Sprx-77 ran past Otto, Antauri, and Chiro who were standing outside of the med bay. He opened the door and ran into the room where Nova was sitting up on a flat bed in the middle of the room. The beautiful gold she normally bore was tainted to an ugly mustard yellow, she had several random dents in odd places and her body movements were small, probably for lack of potential movement. But to him, she was the most beautiful creation in existence. She smiled weakly when she saw him come in. "Sparks," she sounded as weak as she looked, "I should've known that you'd be the first one in here to make sure I was alright."
Romantic music went off in Sprx-77's head. This was the happy ending he had been waiting for. He ran up to her and embraced her. "I thought I'd lost you," he said. He moved closer to kiss the one he had almost lost, but felt a sudden and strangely firm kick in his stomach. Okay maybe she wasn't as weak as she looked. He stepped backward, clutching his stomach.
"Please, Sparks," she also didn't as weak anymore, "just because I'm frail doesn't mean I'm desperate."
"Huh? But…" Sprx-77 stuttered. Behind him he heard the door whoosh open and the sounds of a panting Gibson.
"Sparks, hold on" he was gasping for air. "First of all," he paused, "how did you learn to run that fast? And two, there's something you desperately need to know." He regained his breath and walked over next to Nova. "From slamming into the wall, I'm afraid Nova suffered from a concussion. Unfortunately, this concussion led to something worse: amnesia."
"Amnesia?" Sprx-77 asked.
"Yes, I'm afraid that the near fatal blow wiped out a lot of short term memory. And this short term memory, in addition to a great amount of trauma, has caused her to lose all memory," he sighed, "of the last fifty five hours. I'm sorry." He looked up at Sprx-77 and Nova. Neither spoke. He decided that now that the news was spilt it was better for him to leave the two together.
Nova finally spoke, "The last thing I remember was going to sleep what was apparently two nights ago then, I woke up here, my head throbbing like I'd been hit with a hammer, and Gibson telling me I've suffered a head injury. I've heard something about being kidnapped and saving the day, but I honestly don't remember any of it."
Sprx-77 felt his heart drop to his feet. "You, you don't remember anything? Our adventure together?"
"No," she answered, "tell me about it."
Sprx-77 spilled the story, expressing the deepest and most humorous moments, reproducing images with vivid and intense detail. His voice grew penetrating at the most suspenseful moments, and soft at the most lonely. His eyes teared up at the most romantic times, and his body movements reenacted the pain he had endured. Through the story Nova listened with fascination and wide-eyed wonder, until Sprx-77 got to the end, and closed with, "and that was our adventure."
Nova looked into Sprx-77's eyes, and for the second time he thought things might be alright after all. At least, he thought so until…
"Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!" Nova burst out laughing, "No Sparks, really!" She said, laughter still escaping from her lips "that was an amazing story, but I don't believe it for a second!" She wiped her eyes, which had teared from laughing so hard, and then took a deep breath. "Okay. I think it's adorable that you thought of this story for me, but you'd have to be loopy to think I'd believe it. Sorry Sparks, nice try. But it would take more than a good story to win my heart."
"But, but you saved us! The whole team saw that!"
"Look, I don't doubt that we went off on some adventure and I ended up saving your butt! But there's NO WAY I fell in love with you! How stupid do you think I am?"
Sprx-77 sighed as he walked away from Nova and towards the door. "Well, feel better Nova." When he pushed the button for the door, all four other members of the team fell into the room. Sprx-77 jumped to get out of the way of the group that had quite obviously been leaning with one ear on the door.
"Heh heh, nice story Sparks, very clever. You ever consider a career as an author?" asked Otto, who had landed on the top of the heap.
"Otto," said Chiro from the bottom of the pile, "can you do me a favor?"
Otto looked down at him, "Sure! What do you need?"
"It'd be nice if you'd GET OFF OF ME!" yelled Chiro.
"Oops, sorry."
The monkeys climbed off of each other and ran over to Nova, who had been laughing once more at the team's antics. They asked her how she and told her about the final battle scene. Gibson went over to his computer to check stats and numbers, and then hooked up a scanner to the back of her head.
Sprx-77 still stood in the doorway with the door wide open, allowing some light into the dark room. He thought about staying, but decided that he and Nova had been together plenty over the last two days. Maybe it was time to let somebody else give her some attention. As he stepped closer the door, he smiled. It was true, his love had forgotten that they were ever more than friends, but it wasn't the end. Nay, it was the beginning. For there was still hope that it was possible. If she fell for him once, she could do it again. And would someday.
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.
-1
Corinthians 13:4-8a
The End
Okay guys, don't hate me for making Nova forget everything. Just remember, it's not up to me to change the course of the series. I just write fictions that I believe could be inserted into the series without having a major impact. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this chapter and this story, and whether you did or didn't, please drop me a review to tell me what you thought, and even what I need to work on. B'cause I'm far from perfect. Thanks guys, for reading my fic and be looking for an update on Spoiled Utopia soon!
-RobotMonkeys4Ever, One of the Great Mysteries of the Universe