NINJAGO: The Beastmaster

CHAPTER FOURTEEN - A Team Effort

Taiki thrashed against the chains wrapping around her legs and wings, pulling against the Crows as they handled her over to the stage. She let out a shriek and a snort then moved her tail and launched one of the guards away. As the Crow crashed back-first into a building, Medua looked on as the work was done. She smiled, then turned back to the cage holding the Ninja.

"Show time's soon," Medua told them. "And look at all who decided to show up!"

Ahead was a crowd of several Reatanians who looked at the stage and Taiki with a mix of concern and curiosity. Lloyd looked at them all and he shook his head.

"Medua, your plan to destroy Ninjago won't work," Lloyd said as he grabbed hold of the bars. "It might not be us, but someone else out there will stop you."

"Oh dear, my goals are far beyond your understanding," Medua remarked, then waved one of her guards toward the cage. "What I want right now is something I should've had years ago, do you know what that is?"

The Ninja looked at her with questions.

"Respect! Guards, make the green one into the Beastmaster, I'm sure the audience would love to watch him become... liberated," Medua said, then turned on her heel and stepped out onto a moving platform. "Ta-ta, now and forever!"

"You won't get away with this!" Lloyd yelled after her, and Medua turned around with a vile smile across her face.

As Medua drifted away, the Crow guards quickly slathered black and white face paint on Lloyd to make him look just like the Beastmaster. They set a hat upon his head, pulled a black jacket over him, and as he went to take the hat off his head, he found that another guard snuck him into a pair of Vengestone handcuffs that wrapped around one of the cage bars.

"Not good," Lloyd uttered under his breath.

"I don't get it, the Vengestone should be doing something when we try to channel our powers through it," Kai said, pulling at some other bars.

"It's not even letting us use our powers," Zane commented.

In the meantime, Jay was looking at the cage closely, pondering on why it was refusing to do what they wanted it to.

"The energy coursing through it..." he mumbled to himself, then gasped. "I know why it isn't working! This Vengestone doesn't have the same energy running through it!"

"What's that supposed to mean?" Kai asked, giving the bars in his hands one more strong pull. "And how can knowing that help us?"

"Ryo used elemental lightning in order to forge the Vengestone into weapons, right?" Jay said. "What if some of that energy gets stuck inside of the stone and makes it more powerful?"

"Like the Vengestone is alive?" Kai asked. "Like in the sense Frankenstein was alive?"

"Yes! Exactly like that!" Jay remarked, then rubbed his hands together. "Maybe this'll work..."

Jay stepped back from the bars and charged a lightning bolt. It wasn't very big, but hopefully it would be enough to do something--maybe.

Right now, they had nothing to lose if he tried.

Jay shocked the Vengestone bars of their cage and the stone absorbed the elemental energy like a dry sponge on a spill. Jay then messed with the bars again, but nothing happened. It didn't work.

"Well, it was worth the shot, Jay," Kai said. "Maybe your lightning isn't strong enough in here for it to work."

A trumpet was sounded off, and on cue, the Crow guards around the Ninja's cage picked it up and started walking it toward the stage.