Remember that exploding bottle of glue that Arwin invented in the episode where everyone is looking for treasure in the Tipton? This story takes place after that episode. Hope you enjoy :)

The title for this story is "Rise from the Ashes", which is the title of a great song by Quietdrive.

Disclaimer: I don't own TSL.

Rise from the Ashes

The wind was howling fiercely as dark clouds started settling overhead in the Boston area. Cody Martin drew his coat tighter against his neck while he made his way home from the library. Zack, his twin brother, wouldn't come with him, as usual, so Cody walked the cold streets alone. Zack didn't care about school as much as Cody did. He wished Zack would take more of an interest in school so the two could have intellectual conversations with each other, but he knew it wasn't going to happen. Although he could still dream...

Cody looked up to see a flash of lightning pierce the sky like a jagged knife, so he began walking faster. He knew a big storm wasn't that far off, cringing as the thunder crashed so loudly that it sounded as if it might take down a few buildings.

Cody ran into the Tipton Hotel, his home, just as the rain began to leak from the sky. Shaking his head and shivering slightly, Cody felt the goosebumps rise all over his body as he drank in the warmth of the hotel.

"I could really go for some hot chocolate," Cody thought, trudging over to the elevator and pressing the up button.

Once outside his door, he began digging in his pocket for the key to his family's room. Swiping it through, Cody opened the door to reveal his brother passed out on the couch, snoring softly. Cody smiled to himself. He placed his schoolbag and coat on the table and walked over to Zack, grabbing the afghan that was lying on the edge of the couch. He gently took the remote control out of Zack's hand, turned off the TV, and placed the covers over his brother. Just then, Cody heard the door knob wiggle, turning in time to see his mother, Carey, enter the room. He rushed his index finger up to his lips, motioning his mother to stay silent. Carey raised her hands defensively and smiled. Cody walked over to her.

"How was your day, sweetie?" she asked in a hushed voice, hanging her keys on the hook next to the door and putting her coat, along with Cody's, in the coat closet.

"It was ok. I finished most of my history project in the library today," Cody said quietly. He went over to the cabinet in the kitchen and pulled down the hot chocolate mix, along with the marshmellows. "You want?" he asked his mom, showing her a packet.

"Sure," Carey said, making her way towards the bathroom. Cody put a pot on the stove and poured some milk into it, stirring the contents occassionally. After a few minutes, Carey came out of the bathroom and Cody handed her a mug of hot chocolate, which was overflowing with marshmellows. Cody knew his mother's favorite part was the marshmellows.

"Thanks honey," she said, kissing his forehead.

"Mom, is it ok if I go down to Arwin's office? He told me I could use some of his tools to work on my science project," Cody said, dropping a handful of marshmellows into his own mug.

"As long as you don't cheat this time," Carey said sternly. Cody winced. Then he turned around, standing rigid, and put two fingers in the air.

"I promise," he said with the most serious face he could muster. Carey shook her head.

"Go on," she said, sipping her hot chocolate.

"Thanks, mom!" Cody said quickly, smiling at her. He grabbed his mug and schoolbag, and walked out of the suite. A few minutes later, he was in Arwin's office, setting up his books. Arwin wasn't at the hotel today because he was spending the day with his mother, but he had told Cody yesterday that it was ok for him to borrow some of his equipment. Cody opened a book about hydroelectric power, which he checked out of the library, and glanced over it for a moment. Putting it down, he looked around the office. He really didn't feel like working on his project, but with Zack sleeping, London out of town, and Maddie on her break, Cody didn't have anything else to do.

After working for a half hour, Cody put down his book and rubbed his thumb and forefinger over his eyes. Glancing around again, his eyes rested on a small wooden box, which was open on a table at the other end of the room. Curiosity getting the best of him, Cody stood up, stretching his arms, and glided over to the table. He picked up the contents of the box, which was a small, clear tube with some sort of substance in it. He was thinking that it looked awfully familiar as he read the label.

"New and Improved?" he said out loud, looking confused.

"What's new and improved?" someone said loudly from behind. Cody screamed, throwing up his hands and letting go of the bottle, which flew upwards toward the ceiling. He turned around to see Zack standing in the doorway, laughing slightly.

"You scared me so bad, you doofus!" Cody said, joining in the laughing. Then he remembered the tube that was in his hand. "Uh oh," he said, looking around.

"What were you looking at on that bottle?" Zack asked, crossing his arms. Cody shook his head.

"Well, I won't know until I find it. Where did it land?" he asked, getting on his hands and knees, looking under the table. Zack joined him.

"How did you know I was down here?" Cody asked, rolling one of the steel workshop tables to the side to look behind it.

"Mom told me," Zack said matter-of-factly, looking under Arwin's cot.

"Duh," Cody mumbled under his breath and shaking his head.

"Hey, do you smell something burning?" Zack asked, sniffing the air. Cody turned around and copied his brother's movements.

"Yeah..that's odd," he said, looking from side to side. Suddenly Cody remembered why the bottle looked familiar. Arwin must have tried to tweak the glue invention he was working on, and that's why it said "new and improved." Cody's eyes grew wide and he slowly lifted his head, looking towards the ceiling, his mouth gaping.

"What?" Zack asked, putting his hands on his hips.

"Zack..we gotta get out of here..." Cody said slowly, pointing to the ceiling. Zack looked up. There was the bottle, stuck to the ceiling, and it was smoking. Cody ran over to Zack and grabbed his arm.

"Come on!" he yelled. They started to make their way to the door when suddenly there was a massive explosion, throwing the twins back with a considerable amount of force. The lights flickered and died as debris fell from the ceiling, along with sparking wires flailing around from above and broken pipes dripping water.

Cody lay stunned for a few minutes, trying to catch his breath after having the wind knocked out of him. He looked at his hand, which was bleeding, and tried to sit up. Sharply contorting his face with pain, he whimpered and coughed. He glanced down at his side and noticed a thick shard of glass embedded in it. He slowly wrapped his fingers around it and pulled a little. He screamed out, letting go and lying his head back down on the ground. Closing his eyes for a few seconds and letting out a few breaths, he grabbed onto the glass again, pulling hard. He felt hot tears rolling down his cheeks as he finally removed it, throwing the glass in front of him. He heard scared and confused voices shouting from above and turned his head on the ground, noticing the cash register from the front desk lying a few feet away from him.

"Oh man, Mr. Moseby is going to kill us," he thought to himself, pulling a handkerchief slowly from his pocket and placing it on the gash in his side. "Us! Oh man, where's Zack?" Cody said out loud as the panic began to sweep over him. He lifted his head up with a great amount of difficulty, and looked around. He saw Zack lying, unmoving, to the left of himself.

"Zack," Cody said hoarsely. He went to stand up, but cried out as the pain shot through his body, causing him to fall back onto the floor. Once again breathing in and out heavily, he coerced his body to crawl along the floor until he reached his brother.

"Zack," Cody whispered, practically on top of him, shaking him lightly. Getting closer to his ear, Cody said loudly, "Zack, you gotta get up." Cody heaved his brother over onto his back and noticed a large wound on his head. He wrinkled his face and layed his head on Zack's chest, just to make sure his heart was still beating. Picking up his head and looking at Zack again, Cody rubbed a hand over Zack's face.

"Wake up, please," he pleaded, as new tears began to sting his eyes. Zack's head began to turn from side to side as he began groaning and swallowing hard. His eyes fluttered open and Cody gave him a lopsided smile.

"Can you move at all?" he asked, backing up a little to give Zack some room to breathe. Zack tried to sit up, but swooned and layed his head back down.

"I don't think so," he whispered softly, turning over to his side. Cody looked towards the door, which was completely blocked off by huge chunks of debris from the broken building. Looking up, he noticed a small hole in the ceiling, where he could make out some of the wall in the Lobby.

"I guess that stuff was defniately improved," Cody said quietly, causing Zack to cough out a small chuckle. Cody smiled and closed his eyes. He looked up and noticed an electric wire dancing around right above Zack's head.

"Zack, I need to move you away from that wire," he said, wrapping his arms around Zack's body and trying to lift him up, ignoring the massive amount of pain shooting through his side. Zack moaned and tried to help move his body.

"Something's wrong with my leg," he said, gripping his left shin with his hand. Cody peered down at Zack's leg and frowned, noticing the dark bruising around it.

"It looks broken, Zack," he said, shaking his head. He dragged himself and Zack a little further from the wire, leaning his brother against the only undamaged wall in the room. He moved next to Zack and the two sat listening, hearing more shouting and sirens blaring from above.

Cody was hanging his head slightly when Zack nudged him.

"Stop," he said.

"Stop what?" Cody asked, furrowing his brow.

"I know you, and you're sitting there blaming yourself. You're thinking 'this is all my fault' and 'Zack's leg is broken because of me'," Zack said leaning his head back against the wall.

Cody rolled his eyes and looked at Zack. "Your eyes are glazed over, you probably have a concussion," he said, wiping his brother's hair out of the bloody gash on his head.

"Wouldn't be the first time," Zack said wearily, closing his eyes. Cody closed his too, then shot them open and whipped around on Zack.

"No, open your eyes. If you have a concussion, you can't sleep. Open," Cody said, hitting Zack's cheeks lightly.

"I'm tired, though," Zack said sleepily, shutting his eyes again and slumping further down the wall.

Cody began to think wildly. "Hey, remember the time that kid Thomas pushed you off the slide, when we were in elementary school?" he asked hurridly. He knew Zack hated that kid; to this day, he still talked about him.

Zack opened his eyes and huffed. "That stupid kid, I could have taken him. I would have jumped him if I hadn't sprained my ankle," Zack said madly, and Cody breathed a sigh of relief. Suddenly they heard a voice calling out from the hole in the ceiling.

"Boys? Can you hear me? Answer me if you can hear me."

They looked at each other and shrugged. "We're here," Cody called, his voice still a little uneven.

"Oh thank God," they heard. It was their mother.

"Zack? Cody? This is Nick Gordon, I work for the fire department. Are either of you hurt?"

"Well, I think Zack has a broken leg and a concussion and I'm..." Cody said hesitantly as Zack looked at him. He could hear his mother sobbing. "Well, I'm ok, just a few scratches." Cody knew that if he told them about the deep wound in his side that his mother (and Zack) would be frantic, so he decided to keep it to himself.

"Listen, boys. We're doing everything we can to get you out of there. The door is sealed by debris and this floor is unstable and unsafe because of the electrical wires. What we're going to do is have the power around the area surrounding the hotel completely cut off, and we're going to break through the flooring, but not until we stabilize the floor. Did you understand all of that?"

Cody and Zack nodded their heads. "Yes," they said in unison.

"I need you to stay away from this area, ok?"

"Ok," they said again.

Zack turned his head and looked at Cody. "We're going to be in so much trouble," he said laughing. Cody couldn't help but join in.

"Like you said, wouldn't be the first time," Cody added.

The two sat in silence for a few minutes, looking up when the wires stopped lashing around above them.

"Guess they turned off the power," Zack said, rolling his head around to look at Cody again. "Wasn't your science project about power?"

Cody smiled to himself. Zack, asking a question about science? Maybe this was his chance for an intellectual conversation.

"Yeah, hydroelectric power. I was going to create a miniature village that runs on hydroelectric power," Cody said. For some reason, he could barely hear himself. He knew he had lost too much blood as he felt his body getting heavier. He looked down to his side and noticed the blood had soaked through the handkerchief and onto the outer layer of his shirt. Zack looked down as well, shifting his eyes nervously from Cody's side to his face.

"You ok? What's that?" he asked, lifting up the side of Cody's shirt. Zack took in a sharp breath. "Cody?" he whispered, looking at Cody with a creased forehead. Cody felt Zack peel the handkerchief from his side and gasp.

"It's nothing," Cody heard himself mumble, barely coherent. In the distance, he heard the sounds of drilling, along with Zack's fuzzy cries. Looking over at Zack he noticed the blood dripping heavily from his head, so he wrapped the sleeve of his shirt around his hand and wiped some of the blood that was trickling on the side of Zack's cheek. He felt Zack reach up, grab his hand, and look him in the eye.

"You asked me to stay awake for you, so you have to stay awake for me, too," Zack said in a shaky voice. Cody shook his head and watched the tears stream down his brother's face.

"Too dizzy," he said. "Love you, Zack" he added before closing his eyes.

One month later

Cody stood in the west driveway of the Tipton hotel, watering the plants that lined it with a long hose that was attached to the side of the building. Zack stood next to him, his leg wrapped up in a bandage.

Zack had gotten his cast taken off a few days ago, but he still needed to keep his leg covered. Cody couldn't remember anything from the explosion that happened after the fire department had the lights turned off. Zack told him that he had fallen unconscious about fifteen minutes before the rescue team made it down the hole in the ceiling.

Cody had lost a lot of blood and needed a few transfusions once they made it to the hospital. He woke up a few days later to his mother, who began crying joyfully and scolding him at the same time.

Cody tried to take all the blame for what happened, but neither Zack nor Arwin, surprisingly, would let him. And after London had a long talk with her father, vouching for the boys, they all agreed that, once the twins were able, they would do odd jobs around the hotel to help pay for the damage they caused.

Now Cody and Zack stood watering the plants that lined the west driveway.

Cody glanced over at Zack. "Do you want to go to the library with me tomorrow, after school?" he asked timidly.

"I'd rather play video games," Zack said. He looked over at Cody, who hung his head, and sighed.

"Ok, I'll go. But on one condition," Zack said, folding his arms. Cody looked up, smiling brightly.

"What?" he asked, holding the hose losely in his right hand.

Zack jumped over and grabbed the hose, spraying Cody with it.

"Don't get mad at me after I soak you!" he yelled, aiming right at Cody's face. Cody yelled out, sputtering water out of his mouth.

"Now I'm going to make you come to my book club meeting!" Cody called, laughing, as he and Zack chased each other around the driveway for the rest of the afternoon.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Once again, cheesy ending. Ok, hope you liked it, and I hope you let me know what you think!