Welcome to Gaia! ::

THey came to a large set of stairs deep in the heart of the temple. Most of the stone had chipped away and was crumbling. But there was a small portion still reletively intact. They ascended the stairs, and were halfway up, when they heard the first explosion of shells being fired. "Uh oh ..." Lance said. "We better get a move on it." he said to his team, and they raced up the rest of the stairs and into the final central chamber.

"Holy crap!" (actual word censored for sake of decency) Lance wasn't sure which of his team said it, but he was thinking the same thing. There, in the middle of the circular chamber at the heart of the pyramid, was eight statues arranged in a circle. One of them were partially destroyed, and two were missing entirely. But the remaining five were intact. Each statue was carved differently, and they looked like ancient warriors wearing some sort of armor. In the center of each warrior's armor was a crystal, each one of a different color. One was purple and shaped like a circle. One was orange, in a rectangular shape, and another was red shaped like a diamond. The last two were a blue heart shaped crystal, and a green triangle.
"What are they? ..." Lance said curiously as he reached out to touch the last one (green triangle). At the same time the rest of his team were reaching out for the other colored crystals.

Unknownst to them a beam of white light projected from the top of the pyramid. It was very bright, even in the daylight, and the pillar of light reached higher than the eye could see.

As Lance touched the stone he got a tingling feeling that spread up his arm and into his chest. It sent a spasm through his body that cause him to fall to the floor. The same thing had happened to the other members of his team. But they never hit the floor. In a flash of light from the crystals all five of them disappeared, along with the crystals themselves.

Outside, five colored beams could be seen spiraling upward, following the white pillar of light.

The small patrol squads outside mount a valient defensive... using guerilla tactics to last as long as possible. They manage to take out many of the drones and several enemy Titans. However they are severely outnumbered. The last one retreats towards the shore, where it leaps out into the water and disappear under the waves when it reactivates its camoflague. The wreckage of the other three burn from the damage they took, before exploding according to their self destruct programs.

'Where am I?' Lance's thoughts seemed to echo in the dark nothingness. He couldn't see ... anything. 'Where is my team?' his thoughts echoed.

"DO NOT WORRY YOUNG ONE ... THEY ARE SAFE ... AS ARE YOU." came a booming voice. A single dot of light appeared in the distance. It was small, yet it illuminated everything. It was so bright in fact that Lance found himself sheilding his eyes.

Back on the planet. The white beam of light began to shrink and taper off. It finally withdrew back into the pyramid, with the bodies of five people carried down with it unseen. Inside the central chamber the remaining statues began to crack ... and then the fell apart in an explosion of rock and dust. On each statue's base stood a human figure.

Lance opened his eyes ... and saw everything was different...

(hee hee little cliff hanger there.)

Lance looked down at his hands and said "WHat happened to us?" Just then he heard the first explosions as the ruins began to be blown apart. "Uh oh ... we have to get out of here guys!" Then he and his team ran for the exit. They got down the stairs but then the ceiling over the exit collapsed sealing them inside. "OH no ... we're stuck in here." But as he said this he began to glow, as did his four teammates. Strange metal armor grew out of his body. 'What is this?' he thought before the rest of the ceiling collapsed on top of the five of them, burying them underneath it.

In the ruins of the temple, a pile of stone began to move. A single hand, covered in green armor, pushed up through the rubble followed by the bodies of five armored humans. "Good thing we had this armor. We would have been crushed otherwise." Lance said aloud. He looked around but saw no sign of the guards. "Uh oh... this could be trouble..." he said quietly to his team over their private comm system.

Lance and his team carefully walked out into the dense jungle. They eventually came upon the wreckage of one of their scouts. "Geez ... back to the Titans ... NOW!" he told them. They all turned around and raced back to their Titans, which were cleverly hidden just outside of the temple's perimeter.