“Helpless”

Pohatu stared as the six creatures he had spotted came closer. Their bodies were sinewy and powerful-looking, covered in gleaming metallic armor of various shades — red, blue, silver, bronze, green, and black.

“What are those things?” Onua murmured.

“They look sort of like Bohrok,” Pohatu said. “Only meaner.”

Gali grimaced. “Let’s just hope there aren’t swarms of them somewhere,” she commented. “These six look to be enough to deal with.”

“And deal with them we will,” Tahu said grimly, tightening his grip on his magma sword.

By then the creatures had nearly reached the Toa Nuva. One of them, the one with the reddish-colored armor, stepped forward.

“We are the Bohrok-Kal,” it announced in a hard, smooth voice. “We search for Cahdok and Gahdok, queens of the swarms.”

Pohatu’s eyes widened in surprise. The queens? So he had been right — these must be a strange sort of Bohrok. The original swarms had been controlled by the queens. But these creatures seemed to function all on their own.

“Tell us where you have hidden the Bahrag, and then stand aside. We have no wish to harm helpless foes.”

“Helpless?” Lewa exclaimed, charging forward. “Toa Nuva are never helpless!”

The Bohrok-Kal raised its greenish metal shield. “No amount of speed can save you from my magnetic force,” it said coldly as a wave of power rippled out from the shield’s surface.

Lewa was stopped in place so quickly that he nearly toppled over. “My feet!” Lewa cried. “Magnetized to the ground! I can’t move!”

Onua grabbed an enormous boulder and lifted it above his head. Even without his elemental powers, his strength remained awesome.

Before he could throw the boulder, another Bohrok-Kal lifted its shield and sent a wave of concentrated power toward it. “Your rock is no threat, Toa Nuva,” the creature said as the boulder dissolved into magma. “And neither are you. Give us Cahdok and Gahdok — now!”

Tahu leaped toward Gali, Pohatu, and Kopaka. His mask was glowing brightly.

“The Mask of Shielding will protect us for now,” Tahu said as his mask’s force field surrounded himself and the other three Toa. “Bohrok-Kal, your quest must fail — the creatures you seek have vanished from Mata Nui.”

“You lie!” the black Bohrok-Kal hissed. “They are here and we will find them. Your shield cannot stand before the crushing power of gravity, Tahu Nuva.”

A second later Tahu hit the ground hard. Gali gasped as she saw him struggling to lift his sword. His weight, multiplied a hundredfold by the Bohrok-Kal’s gravity power, crushed the stones beneath it as he sank into the ground.

“Tahu!” Gali cried, horrified to see the bold and powerful Fire Toa made so helpless.

“The shield is down,” Kopaka said grimly. “Defend yourselves, Toa Nuva!”

“There can be no defense against Tahnok-Kal’s electricity,” the reddish Bohrok-Kal said.

“Or Kohrak-Kal’s sonic power,” the silvery one hissed.

“And Lehvak-Kal’s vacuum blast,” the greenish creature added.

Gali gulped. A second later, she felt herself flung backward by a blast of combined energy so strong that she could hardly tell where one force ended and the next began. Air, electricity, sound — all surrounded and overwhelmed her, filling her mind and body so that, for a long moment, they seemed to cease to exist.