Chapter Text
It's not true that Krika never had any love for Zakaz.
He doesn't know what else to say. Don't try to get further explanation from him. The grey of the place, miserable. He doesn't mind the chill, but the constancy of the snow in the mountains annoys him, how it seems to wipe every day away beneath it, like time does not pass here, just stays, stays, stagnates in the air around him. The Skakdi do nothing but kill each other and bother him and further destroy this cheap chunk of rock. The spirits should have damned this place long ago. Maybe they did.
But it is not true that he never had any love for Zakaz.
He's reminded of that very much against his will as they travel down the mountainside. Or rather, Krika travels, Repulsing himself from the ground in the bastardized version of levitation which has long been a trademark of his. Kopaka has long since left him behind. He threw his swords at the snow as soon as they reached the slope and took off like a bird on a downdraught. Swords that can be used as skiis, how ridiculous. Why do they respect Artakha as a great creator, again?
Krika doesn't mind being left behind in the slightest. He's taking his own, slower route down when the suns begin to open. They bring a brilliantly white light, cold and pure. It drips over the mountainside. The snow begins to glow blue and gold. He hears the birds – his birds – singing in the crags.
Zakaz is before him. It glows too, just for a moment, despite all the sharpness of rock and the mottled grey of well-traveled-over snow. Krika sighs.
“If there's anything worth saving here,” he murmurs, without directing the words, “let it be saved.”
But there probably isn't. Just Spiriah's sickness and Skakdi cruelty and a whole lot of contraband explosive devices.
And one Toa who likes to pretend he isn't completely deluded about all of it, waiting for him at the bottom of the mountain, on those stupid swords. Krika shakes his head and keeps traveling. Alright. He's trying this. Because, at one point in his life... Krika did have some love for this wasteland.
“We want control of the whole of the island,” the general is telling him, waving his hands at the map in front of them. “It's our homeland. We have always – ”
“Control is not the right word,” Krika interrupts him. “As well you know, a Makuta's authority has nothing to do with the government or politics of the region where he governs. You are the rulers of Zakaz.”
“Then why do you try to draw our territories for us, force us to stay on this island,” cries another Skakdi, with less waving and more thumping. Kopaka is completely still at Krika's side, but Krika sees his blue eye tracking that movement. “You outlaw our weapons trade, our sailing – ”
“Your kind needs the extra authority,” Krika replies, making no attempt to hide his contempt. “You have destroyed Zakaz and fallen into your own violence like starving lohrak.”
“Your kind were the ones to bring the violence,” snarls what may be a female, though Krika has never been able to tell the difference, and Skakdi don't have gendered pronouns in their own language anyway. A chorus of agreement follows the words.
“I don't deny that,” Krika says. “Would you have been able to inflict a greater punishment on Lord Spiriah than that which my kind brought down upon him? We corrected his evil in the eyes of the Great Spirit. Spiriah acted outside our laws. I have never harmed any one of you in the ways that he did.”
The memory quiets the Skakdi somewhat, but the mention of Spiriah's name will throw them all into anguish if he isn't careful. Krika makes sure his protrusions are fully settled on his back before he leans down and touches the map around which they are standing, sheltered beneath an old gathering building in the capital of the easternmost Skakdi tribe.
“You are the least violent of the tribes on this island,” Krika says. “So I have come to you. I have brought Matoran to your island. You may not respect their kind, but with my help, they could return plant life and Rahi to Zakaz. Those plants and Rahi used to provide you with materials and trades other than weaponry – a trade at which the Vortixx would dominate you the second you tried to bargain outside of this island.”
There's a murmur of acknowledgment from one of the leaders nearby.
“You are not meant for that duty,” Krika says, at last letting a little genuine feeling into his voice. “As well you know. Let the Matoran and I do our duty here. If your tribe can cooperate with us and stop warfare with the other nations, you will be rewarded with my backing, and one day, the bounty of this country as it was.”
Stillness from the Skakdi. He's tempted to look at their minds, but there's such a range of unnatural powers in this room that he knows it isn't worth the risk. But maybe they think about it: Zakaz as it was. He doesn't let himself think about it. This morning was enough for him. What he will do is his duty in this place, if he can. If destiny allows. And it seems like destiny allows most anything, these days, for better or, more often, for worse. Krika sighs and stands back.
“I am not your old Makuta,” he reminds them again. “He would never have been able to keep a Toa at his side.”
Kopaka doesn't move at all, not even to stiffen at the words, but the eyes of the Skakdi turn towards him. Krika wonders if any one of them would believe him if he told them it was this undersized creature – standing at least half a head shorter than everyone else in the room – who has advocated for them with more passion than anyone in the Brotherhood has for the last century. It doesn't matter, but he does wonder.
“A bodyguard,” offers a Skakdi lowly. “Or a spy from other nations?”
“There are others who would take this country from us,” agrees the first general in a hiss. “Who believe the Skakdi are past the point of saving, and should be killed off.”
“I have never killed any one of you which hasn't attacked me or my own first.” Mata Nui, these endless circles of discussion and paranoia, constant, rehashed again and again. “The Toa answers to no one but me.”
Then his Hagah shifts.
Kopaka shoves himself in front of Krika.
Reaches for the shield on his back.
Krika's not sure he brings it to bear before something bursts from the corner and pierces through him like he's made of snow, bringing with it a flare of white heat. Kopaka crumples, multiple Skakdi yell out or draw weapons, and Krika grabs his Hagah, shoves him beneath the table which holds the map, and Repulses everything else away from him so hard that Skakdi go slamming into walls with grunts of pain, weapons flying dangerously out windows or onto the floor.
“Who was that,” says Krika, with the edge of a Power Scream to underline his words, more demand than question. He can hear Kopaka gasping and panting, though he doesn't cry out. “Who just tried to shoot me through with a burst-arrow.”
“We had no knowledge of this, Makuta, none,” one of the leaders is calling, something frightened in his voice. As it should be. “We didn't arrange this – ”
“Silence,” says Krika, like thunder cracking. “That one.”
He finds the assassin in the corner of the room, his bow fallen at his feet. He's the one who looks Krika head-on, determined not to be afraid, the one who must have slipped in and hidden himself behind the crude statue of an old warrior in the corner. His face is contorted with his rage for him, rage behind that built-in Skakdi smile. Snakes, murderers. He came here knowing Krika would destroy him. He came ready to die.
Krika's anger feels cold. Maybe because it's only half-anger. Maybe because he knew this would happen, of course. Of course, every time, another Skakdi trying to kill him.
Still. He has a right to punish, now. And he will punish.
“You tried to kill me,” he says.
The Skakdi starts to curse him in Zakazi, spitting out the words like arrows of their own. Krika steps towards him, his psionic powers roaming, checking the room for any other intent to hurt. There will be if he turns his rage towards the other Skakdi, but for now, they would rather keep their mouths shut and let this unfold. Only one of them starts yelling for his brethren, calling, “Takken, no, you fool, no,” but Krika ignores him.
He calls Disruption til the very air inside the palm of his hand is crackling from the power there. He steps towards the Skakdi who tried to assassinate him.
A spike of ice bursts up in front of him like a Matoran standing in his way.
“Enough,” Kopaka calls, voice barely strained. “There are prisons in the South which can hold him. Worse than death, so the sailors have told me. Send him there.”
Krika stands still, rolling this over in his head. He can't be seen to take an order from Kopaka in front of all these Skakdi, obviously. At the same time, he'll make them think the Toa is disloyal, or getting there, if he kills him against his express wishes.
Wait – how is the Toa not harmed?
Krika turns to look at him. Kopaka has steadied himself and stood up again in the middle of the room, the last one upright among a half-dozen Skakdi pinned against the walls. The white metal disk of his shield is scorched, and it hasn't saved him from the explosion – the musculature in his neck and shoulders is raw from the heat – but he wasn't pierced. Lucky creature. Or – perhaps – prepared, more than lucky.
That shield must have been sturdy as Makuta's armor. For this exact purpose, Krika supposes. Kopaka was designed to take a blow like this. To protect. Not to protect Krika, of course, but he's done as he was made to do, without hesitation. That's what he's doing now, too, with his ice spike standing up in front of Krika, guarding that Skakdi who just tried to put a burst-arrow into his body and kill him like a Rahi for meat. But he didn't succeed, and Kopaka will heal.
“You're not dead,” Krika says. “How lucky for this Skakdi. A life for a life.”
He turns his gaze back to the Skakdi. “Since you are not dead, Toa, he won't die either. General?”
He releases the strongest Skakdi from his place against the wall. He falls to the floor, sucking in a deep breath, and looks up at Krika with a cautious orange gaze.
“We did not plan this,” the general breathes out.
“You will send this Skakdi to be imprisoned in the South,” Krika says. “If I find that you have not done so – and I will know – I will raze your entire village as if it never stood here.”
Krika returns to the table and picks up Kopaka's sword, which he had dropped when shoved to the ground. He inclines his head at the Toa, a clear command to follow, and moves towards the door of the gathering hall, dropping Skakdi from his Repulsion as he goes.
“An airship is coming for my travel in three days' time,” Krika says, stopping only for a moment in the open door. “Give me your answer by then, or remain my enemy.”
He steps out of the hall and leaves, Kopaka at his heel. There are Skakdi outside waiting, and they fall back in deference or fear or hatred. It doesn't matter. Krika walks out of the village.
It's only when they are well beyond the gaze of even the most mutated Skakdi that Kopaka lets out a sigh like a groan and falls to one knee, sucking in deep breaths.
Krika crosses his arms over his chest. “Must have been hot. How bad is it?”
Kopaka drops his shield in the snow, which steams slightly in response. His structuring is marked with ash from the burst, and the musculature around it is blackish instead of grey, burned.
His hand draws ice across the burn, and he lets out a hiss, sitting back onto the rocks for a moment. He doesn't answer Krika, so Krika does it for him.
“It will heal in a few days,” Krika says.
No argument from Kopaka. A rock crab gets annoyed by their presence and reveals itself over his feet, scuttling towards the trees. Kopaka shifts his leg to let it pass and rubs at his mask.
“Was that everything you thought it would be?” Krika asks sarcastically. “Are you satisfied by your attempts to save them, noble one?”
“If they agree, it will have been worth it. You should have given them more time.”
“I don't want to be thinking about them when we're at the gathering, and neither do you. You have thought of little but meeting your brothers in the last week, and you will not have space for the Skakdi.”
“Stay out of my head,” says Kopaka, without much heat.
“I don't need to be in it. You expel thoughts of them like smoke from a jungle fire.”
Kopaka shakes his head. For a second, as he leans back, he lets both his eyes slide close, scope clicking.
It's quiet out here, beyond the village. The crab has found something to get in a small fight with in the bushes.
“You took an arrow for me,” Krika says.
Kopaka sets his jaw, eyes flashing open. “Maybe I should have let him shoot you. You deserve it with how ready you are to kill any one of them.”
“'Any one of them,' as if he didn't just try to kill one or both of us first. You seem to think that you've found a hands-clean alternative, ice-weaver, but that prison has never caused anything but more violence and hatred among them. It would be better for every other living being in the universe if he were killed. Probably better for him, too.”
“Sometimes, when you're that much more powerful than someone else, violence in return for violence is too simple, Krika.”
“Enough of your lecturing.” Krika gestures towards the keep. “We have preparations before our travel.”
Kopaka doesn't protest, though he still seems sullen, not that it matters. He sets his shield gingerly back over his shoulder and strides off towards the keep.
They walk in silence, Kopaka on top of the snow, Krika levitating above it.
“Did you mean it, that you should have let him shoot me?” Krika asks eventually, somewhat amused by the idea of Kopaka just standing aside and glaring as the arrows started coming.
“No,” Kopaka says sharply. “Of course not.”
The snow is nearly soundless beneath his feet. He touches the ash mark near his heartlight, letting out a long sigh, and Krika feels the anger draining out of him, melting down into the snow. Krika wonders if maybe he knew, too, that of course this would happen. Maybe he set out from the keep this morning already planning to take that arrow to the chest for him. Krika notices the length of his strides and realizes that Kopaka is walking fast to stay ahead of him, his body between Krika and the wilderness, a shield.