Avak - Prisons

“Do you know what I did when I first joined the Dark Hunters?” asked Avak, dodging a hail of icicles. “I was a jailer. Other Hunters would bring in captives and I would lock them up.”

“You should have saved a cell for yourself,” Kopaka Nuva said.

“But there was one problem,” Avak said, ignoring the Toa’s comment. “Any lock can be picked. Any chain can be snapped. If someone wants to escape from a cell bad enough, they will find a way.”

Avak swung his pickaxe, narrowly missing Kopaka’s head. The Toa Nuva responded by freezing both weapon and hand. If he expected that to stop the Piraka, though, he was mistaken. Avak smashed his hand against a rock wall and shattered the ice.

“Now where was I?” said the Piraka. “Oh, yes. Once I realized no escape-proof cell could be built, I went to the head of the Dark Hunters with the problem. He sent me to the Brotherhood of Makuta, and they… did things to me.”

Kopaka hurled hailstones the size of boulders, only to see Avak bat them aside. Then the Piraka paused, as if lost in thought. The next instant, a cage made of flaming bars had sprung into existence around Kopaka.

“Now I make my own cells,” Avak finished. “Any kind I need.”

Despite the intense heat, Kopaka smiled. Tahu Nuva had tried to imprison him in something similar once, and a fraction of his power had been enough to freeze the flames. He unleashed his elemental energies and a thin sheen of frost formed on the fiery bars. Then it just as quickly melted away. Kopaka tried a second and a third time, only to see his efforts fail.

“I forgot to tell you,” said Avak. “The colder you make it in there, the hotter the bars burn. Eventually, you’ll use up your power and the heat will finish you off — if the smoke doesn’t get you first.”

***

Island of Doom, Chapter 9