War of the Cryptids

**War of the Cryptids** is the sixtieth chapter of Zak Saturday's Immortal Love Life. It was first published on February 29, 2016.

## Chapter

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**Zak's POV**
This is it. The war has begun. Time for me and Argost to face off, though I think my mom and Uncle Doyle will want to face off against him more than me, and knowing my mom, she probably does.
Argost was attacking Washington D.C. with part of his army. And so that’s where we went, coming up from the ground riding the worm cryptids we met in Africa on my birthday.
Argost was not happy. “That was my moment!”
The bird cryptid he was riding flapped its wings, causing a strong gust of wind and knocked us off the worm cryptids, but Zon and the flying cryptids in my control caught us.
“Get airborne,” I said. “This is it. Go!”
I fought to get in control of Argost’s cryptids and I was able to with some of them. Zon flew me above Argost and I slingshot the claw at him, but so did he at me with his.
“You’re fighting a sideshow and missing the circus, boy,” he said. “This is one battle in a global war.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. “And did you really think you were the only one with a cryptid army?”
Washington D.C. wasn’t the only capital city being attacked. Both of our armies were all over the planet.
Argost clutched his head in pain.
I jumped down on to his bird. “You can feel it, can’t you? You know you’re losing.”
He was about ready to attack me when Doyle flew in and tackled him off.
“Doyle!” I called.
I climbed back on Zon.
“Zak!” Sarah called. She was flying on her Charizard toward us. “Let him and your mom handle him.”
“I can’t,” I said.
“You would want to if you lost your parents like they did.”
“I know, but that doesn’t mean they can still do this on their own.”
I had Zon fly me toward Argost. Mom and Doyle had him on the steps of the White House. Mom was about to hit him with her fire sword, but I knocked it away with the claw. Argost then lunged at her, but I kicked him away and landed next to them.
Mom moved toward him, but I held her back.
“Mom, no,” I said. “You guys can’t do this.”
“Don’t get into this,” Doyle said.
“You know better than any of us what he’s doing right now, Zak,” Mom said. “The whole world needs him stopped.”
“I know, but I also know it’s not about the whole world for you guys right now,” I said.
My family, plus Sarah and her family, came around us.
“I’ve been fighting my own darkness too long to let you give in to yours,” I continued.
Mom and Doyle looked sympathetic now.
“There has to be a better way.”
“Yeah? Like what?” Doyle asked.
“I don’t know. But—”
“Guys!” Sarah called frantically.
Too late.
I heard the music and immediately began screaming in pain. Argost too. But I don’t think we were the only ones. We heard the music and felt the pain from it for, I don’t know, five minutes? It felt like a long time before it finally ended.
The Secret Scientists. It was them who was playing the flute of Gilgamesh. I noticed it broke off of Dr. Beeman’s aircraft.
“Doyle, the weapon,” I heard Dad say.
Doyle moved to get it, and he almost did, but one of Argost’s flying creatures got it, then his other flying cryptids grabbed him and they all flew off.
“No!” Mom said. She ran up to Van Rook. “Give me your jetpack.”
“What?” he asked.
“Hurry. I’ll pay for it.”
“You always did know the way to a man’s heart.”
“Drew!” Dad called. He was checking up on me. “He needs us right now. Anything else can wait.”
She sighed. Then she came over and pulled me into a hug. “It’s alright, sweetie. We’ve got you. Mom’s got you. It’s all going to be ok.”
“We’ll catch him,” Dad assured her. “I promise.”
“Ow,” Sarah said. “That really hurt.”
I looked at her and noticed that she, Zack, and Raylee were clutching their heads.
“I haven’t felt a pain like that in almost sixty years,” Raylee said. “And I’ve been pregnant since then.”
“Wait,” I said. “You guys were effected by the flute music too? How?”
“Zak, our powers can do almost anything,” Sarah said. “And a part of our powers are like yours. So, yes, the flute’s music hurt us as well as you and Argost, and it really hurt.”
“Makes me kind of glad that I no longer have my powers,” Set said, him having checked on her.
“Shut up. Oh, and Zak?”
“What?” I asked.
She glared at me. “You know what.”
I thought about what she meant for a moment, and I did know what. “I know. I know.”
“As long as you know it.”
Sarah knew that the Secret Scientists wouldn’t keep away from me for six months. It’s only been one month since we made that deal. And, unfortunately, she was right.

Me and my family and Sarah and hers and Van Rook went back to the airship and looked at a holographic map of the planet on the war on every continent.
“We’re still good,” I said. “Argost’s cryptid army—” I stumbled.
Fisk checked on me.
“I’m ok. Just tired. Still not use to this much power. But the good news is, Argost is doing worse. His cryptids are losing strength, even pulling back in some battles. Beeman’s flute weapon must’ve hurt him more than we thought. If we go after him now, we may be able to stop this whole war.”
“I’m in,” Mom said.
No surprise there. Everyone else agreed.
“I’m with you ’til the end, Zak,” Dad said. “But how are we suppose to find Argost?”
I activated my powers. “I’ve got some guys on it.”
The bunyips, to be exact, and it didn’t take long to find him. He was at Weird World, no surprise, so that’s where we headed.

We put our airship in camouflage, made with Raylee’s help, which Komodo was very grateful for, and moved in close.
“Hold it for another minute, Raylee, and we’ll be ready to move in,” I said.
“I’m pretty sure I can hold it all day,” she replied. “Maybe.”
“It’s not a ‘we’ this time, Zak,” Dad said. “You’re sitting this one out.”
“What?” I asked in disbelief. “But I’m the one who knew he was here. I’m Kur.”
“And that’s exactly why you’re staying in the airship,” Mom said. “Argost has Beeman’s flute weapon, the one thing we know can destroy you.”
“What if he’s got more cryptids in there? You need me to—”
I felt a sharp pain in my head and clutched it, screaming.
“Zak?” Dad asked.
I was seeing a lot of different things in my head. “Argost. Something’s . . . happening. They’re not . . . trying to fight anymore. They want . . . a master. So much rage, it hurts.”
I screamed in pain again and collapsed.
Fisk caught me.
“Zak!” Mom called.
“Fiskerton, stay with him,” Dad said. “Everyone else, we’re going in. Now.”
And they left, but Sarah gave me a quick kiss on the cheek before she went with them, and they were gone. A little while later, the bunyips were showing me something inside Weird World.
“Nagas,” I said. “Fisk, we have to go.”
He didn’t argue.
Into Weird World we went.

Everybody was having a really hard time fighting the nagas. There were so many of them, and they had them surrounded.
“They can taste the elimination of your species,” Rani Nagi said. “We have found the one true Kur in V.V. Argost, and His Majesty will devour this world.”
“This world’s already got a Kur,” I said, which surprised them, and a family a little bit.
Fisk and I attacked them. I was good, if I do say so myself, knocking and hitting Rani Nagi. I stood strong with my family and friends.
Rani Nagi was about to attack Fisk when she got interrupted.
“Enough!” Argost said. He appeared right in front of us. “This is my home. Please mind the décor. I came to offer a truce. All I want is my young Kurling. If the boy comes with me, everyone else goes free and the war of the cryptids will be haltered immediately.”
I found that kind of surprising.
“Argost,” Mom said. “Shut your blood thirsty lying mouth.”
She grabbed her fire sword and stood in front of me, but Rani Nagi knocked her away, Mom dropping her fire sword in the process. Rani Nagi was about to attack her again, but Sarah stopped her with her fire.
“Don’t you dare,” she warned.
Rani Nagi looked at her closely, then at me. She kept looking back and forth between us.
“You,” she told Sarah. “You have his heart.”
In response to that, Sarah’s diamond on her necklace began to glow.
Rani Nagi lunged her tail at her, wrapped it around her neck, and lifted her up into the air, choking her.
“Sarah!” I called.
She definitely couldn’t breathe. She was choking and her head was beginning to turn pale.
“If you wish for me to let her go, you go with Argost,” Rani Nagi said.
I didn’t know what to do. I looked up at Sarah, and seeing her struggle like that hurt me to the core. I was not going to allow her be hurt anymore because of me.
“Let’s go,” I told Argost.
Rani Nagi threw Sarah into a wall and she collapsed to the floor, coughing. Raylee checked on her.
I walked toward Argost.
“No!” Dad called.
My family ran to me, but the nagas blocked their path.
I looked at Sarah from in between them. She looked at me, and we made eye-contact. I mouthed the words “I love you”, then left the room with Argost.

**Sarah’s POV**
Zak had left the room with Argost.
I was still processing what he told me. He said he loved me, or mouthed it at least. I’ve been waiting for him to tell me that for the past few months, and me working up the courage to tell him myself. He finally said, or mouthed, it to me at a moment that he could die, which is common for most tragic love stories.
But I didn’t want ours to end tragically. And I think my necklace agreed with me, because the diamond was glowing. But the worst thing about this: I didn’t tell him I loved him back, and I do. And now it was too late . . . Or was it?
People always say that, if you love something, let it go. But my mom has always told me that, if I love something or someone, fight to keep them forever until the end as long as that person feels the same way about you as you do about them.
I knew Zak felt that way about me. And that’s exactly what I was going to do.
I had my powers teleport me to Zak.

When I reached him, he and Argost were just a few feet in front of me.
“Zak!” I called.
He turned around. “Sarah? What are you doing here?”
I ran to him. “To be with you. Zak, I’m not leaving. If this is where it ends, I want to be there with you until the end.”
“Sarah—”
“You would do it for me.”
He sighed, but smiled. “Forever and always.
I clutched my still glowing necklace. “Forever and always.”
I wanted to kiss him and tell him I loved him, but not in front of Argost.
“How touching,” he said.
I glared at him. He continued to walk down the hallway, and Zak and I followed.
“So, what?” Zak asked. “Now we fight one on one? Kur versus Kur? Or anti-Kur? Whatever you are.”
“Tempting,” Argost replied. “But having seen your full power in action, I must answer no thank you.”
I laughed.
“Did you honestly think this would some kind of exercise in chess puffing mutt chismo? Dear boy, you’ve been watching far too much television.”
He led us down some stairs into a room, then a small tube came down from the ceiling and encased him in it.
“So much more sensible just to steal that power from your lifeless husk,” Argost said. “Goodnight, young Saturday.”
We got our weapons ready.
Something came out of the wall about thirty feet away, a manikin of some kind, and it was holding Beeman’s flute weapon. It played the music. Zak and I both began screaming in pain. I could seriously feel my powers begin to be sucked from me.
We attacked Argost’s soundproof tube, but the music really hurt us that we couldn’t put enough power into our swings to break it.
“Sorry,” Argost told us, clearly not meaning it. “Sound proof and impervious. But, please, keep struggling. I need some amusement in the midst of so much tragedy.
Zak slingshot his claw at the flute and I helped him try to pull it away, but it was no use.
“A power transfer worked so well with your antimatter double ganger, the Monday boy,” Argost said. “I hope you’ll forgive an old showman his need for an encore. Now open up and saw ‘Aww’.”
He grabbed a couple of Devonian Annelids from his cloak sleeve, attached one end of each to his head, and the other ends to Zak through the tube.
He screamed in pain even more than before. I crawled over to him and tried to hold him in comfort, but the music started to become too much for me to bare any longer. It was unlike anything I’ve ever felt before.
I tried to fight to stay with Zak, until the end, but I just couldn’t anymore. I reached my end.
I collapsed onto the ground and became unconscious.

I woke up lying on a bed, in my house, but it wasn’t in my room. It was actually Emily’s. And the scary thing was, I wasn’t the only one lying in the bed. Someone had their arms around me and my back was to that person.
I was afraid to turn around and see who was holding me, but I knew I had to eventually. So I did, after working up the courage to.
It definitely wasn’t Zak. I actually didn’t know who he was. I just knew that I wanted to get away from him. So I did the logical thing: I screamed my head off and fell out of the bed trying to untangle myself from his arms, which woke him up.
“Are you ok?” he asked.
I was able to get a good look at him now.
He appeared to be about sixteen-years-old at least. He had sandy-blond hair and blue eyes that looked friendly, but at the same time, dangerous.
“WHO THE HELL ARE YOU?” I asked him.
He looked confused. “Uh, your boyfriend.”
That surprised me.
I shook my head. “No, you’re not. I don’t even know who the fuck you are.”
He stood up from the bed and came close to me, but I took a step back from him and summoned fire to my hands. “Stay back.”
“Are you alright, Emily?” he asked. “Did you hit your head or something? How could you not remember who I am? I think your powers keep you safe from having amnesia.”
My ears were ringing.
“What did you just call me?” I asked.
“Emily. Isn’t that your name?”
Emily? Why did he think I was Emily? Then again, I didn’t know who the hell this guy even was.
Something was very wrong with my world right now.

Cliff hanger! Honestly, I think these next few chapters were my favorite to write for this story. You may even know why once you read them. But what do you guys think happened to Sarah? Who's the guy that she woke up in bed with, and why does he think she's Emily, her baby sister?
Please review **here**.

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## Character Appearances

### Main Characters

* Zak Saturday
* Sarah Hollinger
* Doc Saturday
* Drew Saturday
* Zack Hollinger
* Raylee Hollinger

### Minor Characters

* Doyle Blackwell
* Set Monday
* Leonidas Van Rook
* Emily Hollinger (mentioned)

### Pets

* Fiskerton Saturday
* Komodo Saturday
* Zon Saturday
* Pikachu Hollinger
* Shillow Hollinger
* Amber Hollinger
* Kimbia Hollinger
* Kika Hollinger
* Chewie Hollinger
* Toto Hollinger
* Honey Hollinger

### Enemies

* Argost
* Rani Nagi