Chapter 9 – The Time Machine

 

 

The scene now changed to an area, high in the sky… around a few hundred metres to be exact. The sky was night, with not many clouds in sight with the stars spread across the sky behind them.

In this area, was a large ship-like aircraft. It seemed to be hovering there, almost motionless in midair. It had a design similar to what you’d see in Dr N.Tropy’s other machines he owned in the past, before they were destroyed. The portal opened up on an outside decking area of the ship, with Crash jumping out eagerly, along with Coco and the rest of the team. The portal remained open for the time being, and Coco stood in front of everyone,

 

“Ok guys, we better be cautious around here! I’ve never been here, and neither has Crash and… any of us! So who knows WHAT might be around!”

 

“Ehh, calm down Coco. I’m sure it’ll be fine… but I’ll still be wary though”

Crunch replied.

The group of them headed around the outside of the ship, until they finally found the main entrance. They entered through, after bypassing a few of the locks, with the help of Coco’s intelligence, and the elementals minor tricks. They finally arrived in the main area, and it looked deserted….

 

“Huh? No one is here…?”

“Hmm be careful now… looks might be deceiving…”

 

Aku-aku said, and Crash and Coco were the first to walk out into the area, before Crunch quickly shouted

 

“Look out!!!”

 

The somewhat large and metallic looking figure appeared out of nowhere in front of the barred bandicoot siblings, who looked very startled! They looked up to see who it was, and they were quickly familiar with him… for obvious reasons.

It was their old nemesis, Dr Nefarious Tropy. But he did look different, this time around. He seemed slightly taller, probably thanks to his new armor, which was now a more golden brass colour than copper. And the portable time machine he wore didn’t produce the smog like the older one did, but it still had the pistons on the back of his shoulders. And where his left arm once was, was now a very, out of proportion sized arm replacement… a robotic one, which seemed to be part of his armored suit now.

He looked down at Crash and Coco angrily,

 

“What are you meddling rats doing in here! You both better leave now, before I lose my patience!”

 

“Dr Tropy… we don’t want to have to fight! We need to…”

As Coco spoke, N.Tropy quickly placed his left metallic arm out and his turning fork appeared but this time, it was different as well. It appeared to have sharp points on the ends of it… probably for stabbing any unfortunate victims. He faced one of the sharpened points in Coco’s face, made her gasp in shock while Crash frowned angrily and pushed the staff out of Coco’s way, then Tropy frowned as well and pulled back his staff….

 

“You better cut that out right now… Tropy!”

 

Crunch’s deep and gruff voice said, with a growl. N.Tropy was somewhat surprised, he stood up straight quickly, with his turning fork… standing in a fighter-like pose. He seemed to be a lot tenser now, as he knew that voice from anywhere. Crunch walked forward out of the dark hallway, up to Crash and Coco, who had now stood back a few steps to avoid any trouble with Tropy.

 

“You know what happened last time you messed with me… so I suggest you back down now, and listen to what we have to say!”

 

“Shut your mouth, foul vermin! You are the one who is trespassing here… so I can do as I please!”

 

He said, and didn’t hesitate to suddenly sway his turning fork at Crash and Coco, who were the closest targets. They both were thrown to the right side of the room in surprise, but they landed on their feet, still feeling slightly shocked though. Crunch snarled angrily and charged forward to give a strong punch, directly in Tropy’s chest. Tropy still was angry, but grinned slightly… as his new armor was a lot stronger than his old one. Crunch went to lash for Tropy yet again, with another fist; Tropy used his turning fork to strike at Crunch too, which the bandicoot managed to stop with his metal paw. They kept lashing out at each other; with loud clangs heard each time metal was hit against metal. Almost like a sword fight, but with a turning fork against a metal and flesh, clawed pawhand.

 

Crash and Coco stood back and watched as the taller warriors fought each other. Coco simply sighed

 

“Cant Crunch just go on and defeat him? We need to hurry up! Hey, you masks… why not help speed this up a bit now?”

The elementals hovered over, with Aku-aku still floating there among them.

 

“If you ask me lil fuzzhead, Crunch seems to be enjoying this fight!”

“Yeah I say. It’s almost as if he knows he’ll win anyway but will just fight for the fun of it…”

Py-ro said after Rok-ko. Coco looked up at them with a ‘oh really’ sort of expression. But Crash was watching the fight closely, and noticed that Crunch really was smiling, slightly. Not even giving off aggressive grunts now and then, like he usually would when fighting seriously.

On the other hand, Tropy was becoming frustrated. He noticed this in Crunch, he looked so confident. N.Tropy decided to start using his teleporting tricks, to try and confuse the burgundy creature. The bandicoot siblings still stood back, as Tropy started to freeze time and teleport as often as he could, though as great as his powers were, they were still limited, like Crunch’s elemental tricks. Each time he’d teleport, it would make him lose his energy quick, as time stays frozen for a moment, but not his mind and body.

Crunch came slightly close to being hit with Tropy’s weapon, as he kept trying to catch Crunch by surprise from behind…there was even a point when the sharp end of the fork almost cut his skin… as it quickly swiped through his thick fur, causing Crunch to lose a bit of fur in that very scene. They continued their fight, and Crunch even stuck Tropy’s armor a few times...

 

“Heh, it does seem your armor really is a lot more protective than last time… makes fighting me a lot safer, doesn’t it?”

Crunch said, in an attempt to taunt the Time master.

 

“It can withstand many things… including your pitiful attacks! This time, you won’t get a cheap shot at me… that is for sure!”

 

He shouted back, but Crunch didn’t seem to care much at his attempts to anger him. He could actually sense something more than just anger from this man, he could sense fear. Tropy was now becoming a lot more exhausted from the hand on hand combat, and he stood back, with

Crunch still standing there in a fighting stance.

“Just give up and listen to us… you’re too worn out to fight me now! We need to ‘borrow’ your time machine for something!”

“Never am I going to let you rats use my time machine for anything!”

He shouted out angrily and stood up quickly and held his staff up high… and suddenly, a huge flash of lasers from both sides of the fork blasted! Crunch’s eyes widened and he jumped up high, while Crash and Coco ran to the sides to avoid the blast, which hit into the wall and caused a slight explosion.

After it cleared… Crunch had landed a few metres further away from Tropy. He looked over to see him, and noticed Nefarious looked even more worn down now. He simply walked over to him, and spoke

 

“I’ll say this again… we only need a look into the future, so hurry up! We don’t have all night!”

 

“…make me!”

Crunch was becoming more and more impatient now, so he simply called onto Rok-ko and his eyes glowed… a bright red colour, much like Rok-ko’s. And within seconds, Tropy felt something familiar. He was becoming enclosed within rock, again! Much like years back, except during that time… Rok-ko did it, and even sealed up his face. Crunch had a little more mercy though, and only sealed him up, to his face. And even made the rock a lot thicker, to avoid him getting free too easily. Crunch’s eyes stopped glowing, and he looked down at N.Tropy. The man could only give off a glare, a glare that looked like one saying ‘ok, you win this time…’ which Crunch noticed.

 

“Good work Crunch! Now we can maybe FINALLY get to have a look at the future…”

Coco said, as she walked over towards the main controls of the Time Machine. It only had one main portal this time, which was currently switched off. She looked around at the controls, to try and familiarize herself with it. Tropy angrily glared back, but then laughed suddenly. Surprising Crunch and Crash

 

“You fools. You should know that the future changes all the TIME. Depending on the changes of the Present! The outcome of looking into the future is different almost every time!”

“You idiot, we’re simply going to have a look at the future for OURSELVES, to see what it is like if we took the elementals…”

Crunch replied to him.

N.Tropy thought for a moment though, why on Earth are they doing this anyway? Why are they so determined to take the elementals? He started to think… maybe they’re trying to avoid something bad from happening. Tropy did know though, that the future he came from was a future he disliked… maybe these are the ones who ‘ruined’ his future? He honestly didn’t know, despite being as intelligent as he is. But he knew it was dangerous to try messing with the future too much, as it might create paradoxes that could even destroy himself.

 

Coco worked at the main computer now and had already learned the basics of the Time Machine.

 

“This is a piece of wumpa cake, easy as! Kind of… well Crunch, how many years should we look into the future?”

 

Crunch and Crash walked over to Coco, who was at the main computer. Crunch held his hand on his chin, in a thinking gesture.

 

“Hmm well Brio said the changes take thousands or even millions of years…”

“Unfortunately though, this time machine only goes up to the thousands! 9999 years is the maximum!”

“What?! Oh man… hmm, well let’s try… 8000 years”

 

“8000? Well, alright then. Sounds like a good test to me! Oh boy, I wonder if there’ll be flying cars and weird stuff like that everywhere?!”

 

Coco said after Crunch, and looked kind of excited. Crunch didn’t seem as excited though, but Crash did. The elementals floated over as well, to join in the convocation

 

“Heh, I bet the apocalypse has happened! No wait, it can’t if I’m not around…”

Py-ro said, and laughed manically. No one seemed amused though.

“Come on you lot, I was just joking… I am as curious as you all to see what it will look like”

“We better prepare now then, Coco is going to set the portal up…”

He said. Everyone walked over to the portal area as Coco finalized it… it opened up, in a large ball-like figure, with sparks of electricity sounding it, very much like the warping portals Crash and Coco had witness years ago on their adventures. But to Crunch, this was completely new.

Coco walked over to the two male bandicoots, and 5 masks and gave them all the nod of approval. Crash decided to head into the ball-like portal first, with Crunch coming next, Coco and then all of the masks…

 

And in a flash, they were gone.

 

 

Chapter 10...