The Purple Praetorian

Part 23.

I was paralyzed by the horrifying sight. The village of the P'Tuera was covered in jagged dark grey metal, even the fresh vegetation of the surrounding jungle was gone. But what was worse was the sight of at least 20 Yautjas also covered in metal, frozen in place as they were running away. Most of their skin was stripped from the metal to reveal the skeleton beneath, green blood dripping from them. Everything was covered in metal, everything was destroyed. I'm too late...

Scout was trotting around the former village, sniffing the frozen corpses and tilting his head. I slowly stepped out of my ship, the dark grey metal beneath my feet was jagged and sharp but it wasn't enough to hurt me. I was still shocked from the sight, was this destruction caused from those Seeds..? If it was, then the Cybertronian I was dealing with was far more dangerous than I thought.

"Hey Praetorian are we ho-" I heard one of the youngbloods click behind me.

I turned my head to see the horrified expressions of the young warriors, Takara and Nova. The ramp to the cargo hold lowered and Zexal exited the ship, the same look of shock and horror was upon his face at the sight around him.

"It's gone, it's all GONE." I snarled.

"How did this happen...?" Another Youngblood asks.

I growled, clenching a fist.

"The P'Tuera Elders did this...I know they did. They used those Seeds..."

"You mean those weird devices?" Takara asks.

"YES. They were planning to get rid of me, and if I had to guess they were trying to get rid of Nova and Zexal too. By any means necessary..."

"Why would they do that to us..?" Nova chittered.

"I don't know. Come on, there has to be survivors here."

Everyone was silent as we began walking around the destroyed village, searching for survivors. Nova, Takara and Zexal headed to the eastern side of the village while the youngbloods had split up to cover more ground, I on the other hand was headed towards my father's home. Scout was still sniffing around the buildings curiously, his fluffy tail wagging as he did so. When he came out one of the empty buildings, I saw his metallic nose twitching as he was prancing ahead of me.

Suddenly Scout stopped, lowering his head to sniff something on the ground. As he was further ahead of me I couldn't see what it was. My dog snorted and grabbed whatever it was in his large teeth, turning and trotting towards me. What he had in his mouth looked a lot like a thick tree branch, alas I doubt that could be a branch from how far it was from the trees that produced branches that size. The hound came up to me, took a seat and dropping his prize at my feet. I picked it up to get a better look at what it was, and that was then I noticed 5 fingers...After looking it over a few times, it clicks. Dear Pala, I know exactly what this is.

It's Kritos' cyborg arm, the one he replaced when he lost his arm in an engine accident. I felt my heart sink in my chest. No...he can't be dead. He was the one who convinced his brother to let me live, the one who taught me how to work on a ships engine. He was like an actual father to me during my first few weeks of life, when in reality he was my uncle. Kritos and Karna raised me from the beginning, Je'Trya did a good bit of raising me as well but not as much as those 2 did. If any of my family are dead, I will never forgive myself. Scout whimpered and nudged his head against me, looking up at me with his large glowing red eyes. Wait, if Lockdown's hounds were tracking hounds and I have Scout, maybe he could find them! I hold out the cyborg arm to my dog.

"Scout, sniff." I order in English.

He then sniffs Kritos' destroyed robot arm, his fluffy tail wagging slowly.