"Heave!" Shouted Wham-Shell as he and a small crowd of gillpeople pulled down a catapult loaded with lit bombs.

"HO!" Everyone shouted in unison as the catapult released and flung hundreds of bombs into the factory's pipes.

The fuse hit the gunpowder as soon as the bombs landed inside the metal contraption, and caused an explosion that could be seen island-wide! As everybody raced far away from the source of the explosion, they shielded their eyes as smoke cast throughout the land. When the smoke cleared, they opened their eyes to find that there was nothing left but clear sky, pristine waters, and the occasional shards of shrapnel.

"Looks like our work here's done, guys!" Chihiro proclaimed as she watched several gillpeople load the now tied-up trolls onto a large boat. "Time to go home."

With a wide smirk on her face, Chihiro brushed her hands clear of any contamination and beamed back at Zap and Wham-Shell. The three of them nodded to Gurglefin, who returned that nod with a beam.

Gurglefin made that same distorted whistle he did earlier in the day, and watched as Delilah sailed across the now decently-cleaner waters. As they all walked up to Delilah, Delilah's plank positioned itself onto the ground and allowed them to board—which is what they did!

"Another successful mission!" Chihiro chirped as she rested her arms behind her head, "We stopped the trolls, saved the island, and most of all, we put another dent in Kaos's plans!"

"When you say it like that, it sounds so easy," Wham-Shell chuckled as all four of them got on-board while the plank receded.

As the plank disappeared, however, Chihiro frowned and leaned against the deck's railing.

"There is one thing I'm still wondering about, though." Chihiro stood tall, clasped her hands against the railing, and looked back at Wham-Shell. "Wham, what was all that stuff about you being a king and all about?"

Wham-Shell stood wide-eyed and frozen, as if he was completely taken aback by her question, and Zap slapped a paw against his forehead.

Zap scooted over to Chihiro and pulled her over. "Chi—" Zap said before Wham-Shell placed a hand on Zap's shoulder.

"It's alright, Zap," Wham-Shell said with his tone somewhat weaker than usual. "The clownfish's out of the anemone now, so we might as well tell her."

Zap hesitated for a moment, and slowly skidded away from Wham-Shell and Chihiro.

"You see, Chihiro." Wham-Shell stood next to Chihiro and gazed over the ocean. "Before I became a 'lander, I used to be the king of a land called Crustacea…"

§

It started out a happy enough day; it was a wedding, actually. Wham-Shell—or Neptune, as everybody called him before he became a Skylander—was being wed to his wife and future queen. It was an arranged marriage, but one necessary now that he had taken the throne from his aging father.

He just walked down the isle, ready to start the ceremony, when out of nowhere the walls crumbled in on them! It started with small pieces of seashell masonry crumbling and falling atop his armored head. They were so small, in fact, that at first Neptune didn't even notice. It wasn't until the sound of drilling noises rang out, and a giant piece of masonry caved in from the ceiling and nearly crushed the wedding minister, that the panic set in!

It was then that everything dissolved into chaos—crustaceanoids screamed and made mad dashes for the wedding chapel's doors, and the soldiers that guarded the entrances scrambled for their cutlasses and scabbards. At the outside, there was nothing heard but the increasing sound of drills boring into the ground. It was like something out of a nightmare!

"Stay right there, sweetie," Neptune said as swam over to his bride and kissed her on the cheek. "I'll be right back."

Neptune swam over towards the bleachers, claimed his mace—a family heirloom passed down from his father—and made a mad dash for the battlegrounds. Then, when he slammed the chapel's doors open, he saw something he had only seen in his nightmares.

The rough, sandy grounds of his kingdom were cracked and quaked as the whole kingdom seemed liked it was falling apart! Entire seascrapers toppled over like nothing more than sandcastles, buildings crushed under the pressure of the drills; if not the drills, the quakes dragged them under while the citizens inside struggled to escape—the very sight of which set Wham-Shell's soul on fire with rage.

And the guilty parties in charge of this monstrosity? Were giant, troll-piloted drills made specifically for unearthing oil deposits.

"Soldiers, to arms! For Crustacea!" Neptune exclaimed as he drew his mace.

His shouts were barely heard over the sound of the drills, but his message got across. Every sergeant, every lieutenant, every private grabbed whatever weaponry they could find and attacked the drills, all in some noble hope to dent their progress. Neptune himself even joined in; he rammed into the largest of the drills with his mace, but no matter how hard he slammed into them, he barely made a dent! The others weren't much better off—not even their finest weaponry pierced through the cold, sturdy steel the drills were made of.

If that wasn't bad enough, the trolls that piloted the drills quickly noticed their opposition and retaliated! Their drills sent out weaponry of all kinds—mostly guns and cannons— from the pilot's quarters, all giant and imposed and charged within seconds. Surely from within the safety of their machines the trolls smirked, for they knew they had the upper hand.

As the weapons fired, Neptune's eyes widened. He was completely frozen to the spot where he stood, amd unable to move away as a plasma blast charged inside one of the larger cannons. The cannons fired, and the only sound heard over its charge was the sound of dying soldiers' screams and pleas for mercy, screams and pleas that were silenced as they watched their king blown to the surface by troll weaponry.