The Elemental Warriors: Chapters 6-10

Coral
=== There is Somehow Even More Confusion than Last Night === The next morning in homeroom, we texted each other, our phones hidden under our table.

Sage: IDK about you, but I had a crazy dream about you guys last night

Sky: Same

Dreams come true? :P

Coral: involving a weird lady who is literally black and sage making a mound of dirt…?

Sage: unfortunately, yes

Coral: then it’s real

Ember: would explain a lot

Sage: YES

There was this thing that happened at target the other day

Sky: I heard

The lady never even mentioned paul, and apparently, he did all these weird telepathy tricks

Coral: I’ll talk to him now

Ember: seriously?

I walked over to Paul and peeked over his shoulder. He was on his phone too, texting his buddies something about Sage and a shield. I sucked in a breath and walked back to my seat.

Ember: WHAT THE FRICK DUDE

Coral: what was I supposed to say to him?!

Sage: I got this

She walked over to Paul like I did. For a few minutes she hovered next to him, then he looked at her. Sage said something to Paul, and he frowned and snapped back at her. Then Sage yelled a bunch of stuff that sounded like:

“I ONLY ASKED YOU IF ANYTHING WEIRD HAPPENED TO YOU LAST NIGHT! WHY DO YOU HAVE TO BE SO FRICKIN’ SECRETIVE? YOU KNOW SOMETHING IS WRONG, WHY WON’T YOU GIVE ME THE REST OF THE ANSWERS?!”

Paul said something else, and Sage yelled, “HEARING YOU SAY THAT MAKES ME THINK YOU’RE CONSPIRATING AGAINST US!”  Then her eyes grew wide, realizing what she had just said, and then Sage covered her mouth and speed walked away.

Sky: whoa

Sage: my throat is dry

When I asked him if anything weird had happened last night, he said “why do you need to know?” and got all secretive

Coral: and then you started yelling at him

Sage: well… yes

And after that, he said that if he hadn’t promised not to tell anyone, he would tell me

Ember: he seemed apologetic

Sage: Shut up

But anyway, he seems to be the only other person who can see through ‘the mist’

Sky: what is…

Oh yeah, like from Percy Jackson

Ember: but what the heck is happening with Paul?

Coral: Luna knows all

Ember: I cannot WAIT till tonight

So that night, I asked Luna about Paul. Luna frowned. “Yes, I heard what happened today. I am not sure you’re ready to know, because of what happened between their predecessors and you.”

“But if we get into more fights with Paul and his friends-“ Sage shouted.

“Yes, I know,” Luna continued. “If things continue to get tense between you-“

“When they do,” Ember corrected.

“-we will explain it a month from tomorrow,” Luna finished. We glanced at each other. Was a month a short enough time to keep people from getting killed?

Sage
=== I Get the-Wait, No, I Don’t === Why does this part of the book have to fall on me??? Let’s get started, if this is seriously going to happen.

The day after Luna got all mysterious, we decided to tell Paul about what she said-leaving out the part about Luna existing, of course. We still didn’t trust him.

Actually, it was more like we said, “Hey, if we get into another fight, try not to kill anyone, ‘cause if you don’t we’ll have this all explained by Sunday.” Sky was the only one brave enough to tell Paul that, and just barely then.

Paul frowned and said, “Weird. That’s exactly what In- I mean, someone else told me. I wonder if they’re like in sync or something. Or maybe they’re siblings.”  He shrugged. “I mean, you think I know everything about this thing. But really, we all only know half of the story.”

“Wise words coming from a mind-reader,” Ember whispered. She could definitely start a verbal fire too, if she wanted. One of Paul’s friends-Ethan, I think-turned around and glared at Ember. “What did you say?” he growled. Ember was silent. One smart thing to do for once.

''  ''

Relax Sky, she’s used to it. Anyway, Ethan said, “Oh, I heard what you said. I’m just wondering how exactly you knew.”

Paul whispered something in Ethan’s ear. “Oh right, that,” Ethan rolled his eyes. Then Paul whispered something else. Ethan murmured, “This isn’t tensions rising, Paul. It’s just a misunderstanding. Too late? How can you read his mind from here? Oh, great. It’s only been two days.”

We all looked at each other and shrugged. Sunday was going to be weird.

Okay, now Sky’s asking for a chapter break because Ember wants to add something that happened before that Sunday in. I didn’t actually get the weirdest chapter in the book! WOOHOO!

Sorry, Sky. But that means my chapter is going to be a lot shorter than my other ones, so WOOHOO! My throat won’t be dry!

Ember
=== My Little Sister Nearly Blows Our Cover === Doo do doo doop de dop! This is a quick sponsored announcement, the sponsor in question being me. This announcement that is… uh… very important is that… we will probably be discovered before Sky finishes this book!

''''

Yes. Seriously. It all started the day before that momentous Sunday (A.K.A. Saturday). My sister Ivy has mercilessly teased me since eternity, and she hit a point that day.

“You’re looking different today,” she said that Saturday. It was true. I’d been tired all week since I started middle school, courtesy of running back and forth to my locker and my classes. “I wonder why,” Ivy continued. “Maybe it’s because you’re in LOVE with a new BOYFRIEND.”  She whispered those sentences, but it sounded like she was yelling.

“Or maybe your friends are in a FIGHT,” she said, leaning closer to me. “Or maybe you’re part of a secret elemental SUPERHERO organization where everyone has superpowers.”

I was dumbstruck. How could she know? I froze up. My eyes grew wide. But that only lasted a second. “Why the heck would that happen?” I laughed. I hoped she couldn’t tell that laugh was completely fake. Ivy shrugged. “I don’t know. I ran out of things to ask. But I did notice you freezing up…”

Here comes the apocalypse. Oh no, I thought. Ivy continued, “I think this means that you thought I said something else. Maybe you have a GIRLFRIEND… or four…” I tackled her.

So yeah, that’s basically it. I’m sure Ivy will figure it out soon. She’s close to Sky’s sister Ash (it’s Ashlynn, but she hates that name and will kick us if we call her that), who for some reason knows EVERYTHING about Sky. (You may be imagining Ash with spiky black hair, but that’s completely wrong.  She has really long hair. That’s also black.  And before you edit me out of the book, Sky, it just means that Ash’s nosy.

So that ends our sponsored announcement, Elemental Warriors! Stay Sage… I mean safe! Doo do doo doop de dop!

Sky
=== We Meet the Sun === Great. Because of Ember, now I’m getting the weirdest chapter in the book. Well, here I go…

Thursday in September. We were in the forest sitting down on tree stumps (except Sage, who had figured out how to turn hers into a small but sturdy oak tree), like all the other nights since the first day of school. Only this time, Luna wasn’t alone. She was joined by a woman and a man about her height. The woman was hard to look at, because she literally glowed. Really brightly. She wore a lot of yellow, and was probably the personification of the sun (versus Luna, the moon). The man was harder to describe. He had purple skin-and not that stupid magenta-y purple people could mistake for pink, it was dark purple. He was wearing one of those South Asian hats, like a super wide, super short cylinder with the bottom cut off. It had crazy, colorful zigzag patterns in bright pink, blue, and purple. It had a tasseled string coming off the top like a graduate cap.

“Hello,” the woman in yellow said. “I am Sola, the day queen. I realize you have never met me before, even though you started on Tuesday.”

“Well, you never came to this place. You never even mentioned meeting the Warriors,” Luna reminded her.

“It only would have been polite if you had asked me,” Sola explained.

“Well, you were always asleep when I came to your palace to ask you!” Luna countered.

“Hey, break it up,” the purple guy said, coming between the two women. “I don’t think this would turn out good if you kept going.”  Luna rolled her eyes. “Show-off,” she muttered.

“Sorry about that,” the man said to us. “We don’t always get along well. I’m Intu, Luna and Sola’s younger brother.”

“Much younger,” Sola added. We gaped at them. So that meant… they were all siblings? They looked nothing alike. “Yes,” Luna said, seemingly reading our minds. “We are the Sky Siblings. I am the moon. Sola is the sun. And Intu… is dusk and dawn.”  Sola snickered. I guess Intu had to be something to make them the Sky Siblings, but he did not look like either dusk or dawn.

“A lot of people think Luna and I are twins, but Luna is much younger-“ Sola started, but Luna interrupted, “Look, the Guardians are finally here!” I saw four… things appearing out of some portal in the sky and falling down to the earth with sonic speed. There was a huge oomph, and I winced. There was no way they couldn’t have gotten injured.

“Well, I hope they’re okay,” Ember said, her eyes wide with fear. “They’ll be fine,” Intu assured her. “I’m sure Jake will heal them.”  We raised our eyebrows. It had definitely sounded like bones had been broken. “Heal broken bones? Ohh… that must be one of his abilities.”

Sola and Luna were asking the same question. “You’re saying you think he can heal broken bones after a month of practices?”  Sola asked, raising an eyebrow. Intu frowned. “They’re progressing a lot quicker than I anticipated. Maybe it’s because they might be the ones that-“

“Shh,” Luna told him. “They’re not ready to know yet.”

Upon that sentence, four boys appeared in the (now much larger) clearing. I recognized most of them. Paul was in that group. So was his angry friend Ethan, and a boy I recognized from my fourth grade class… Allen, I think his name was. I didn’t know the last kid’s name, but I recognized his face from homeroom and science. Then I remembered that Intu had mentioned someone called Jake. That must be him, I thought. He looked exhausted.

“Hi guys, what did we…?” Paul began as they sat down. “Whoa. This is huge.”  He noticed us. “See Ethan, it is tensions rising. I told you!” Ethan rolled his eyes. “Yeah, that’s what Intu thinks. It might not actually be ‘tensions rising’.” He made air quotes around the last two words.

Sola interrupted their bickering by introducing herself and Luna to the boys. “Now, I know that things have been very tense between your two groups of children. So I want you two to be able to stop keeping secrets. Elemental Warriors, these are the four Natural Guardians. They each have very unique magical powers:  of healing, teleportation, telepathy, and… well… Allen’s power is hard to describe. You’ll see for yourself.”

“I call it charmspeaking,” Ethan volunteered. “Why?” Sage asked. Clearly she hadn’t read the Heroes of Olympus. Oof. I did ''not ''like the idea of charmspeak. I was not going to cross paths with Allen anytime soon. He was the prankster of the crew, if I remembered fourth grade correctly.

“Anyway,” Sola continued. She introduced us Warriors and our elements. “Now, I want you to work together in your partnerships. I’m sure you could find out some way to combine your talents.”  Most of us were extremely confused. Partnerships? Who was our partner? We realized that they were sitting right next to someone else. For me, that person was Allen. I mentally groaned.

We looked at each other awkwardly. Finally, Allen broke the silence by telling me, “Slap your face as hard as you can.”  Before I could register what he said, my hand hit my face. It stung harder than a nest full of bees. “I hate charmspeak,” I grumbled. It would be a long night.

And so it was. We trudged through several ideas to no avail. Finally, just when it seemed like we were getting onto something, Sola said, “I think that they have done enough work today, don’t you?”  Luna and Intu agreed, and the world faded away once again.

Coral
=== I Swim in Crater Lake === The day after the whole Warriors-meet-Guardians thing, the Sky Siblings had a surprise for us. Mind you, it wasn’t a very fun surprise, but still pretty cool.

At practice that night, Sola announced, “Today two of you are going to be going on your first quest. Quests are missions to defeat monsters. Some are easy and some are harder, but they always have rewards.

“The first two quests you do, you will be granted permission to shapeshift into an animal, but not of your choice. Elemental Warriors, it will be somewhat based on your element. Natural Guardians, your two animals will be somewhat related to your powers.

“The third quest you complete, you can choose any animal you like to also be able to shapeshift into. After that quest, no more species will be added on.

“So when you complete three quests, all of you can shapeshift into different animals. Two are not your choice, but one is.”

Luna coughed. Sola said, “Yes, enough about the rewards. Usually a month or so after you would become Warriors and Guardians, you would endure your first quest, but you are progressing quickly. The partnership that will defeat the monster that is on the loose right now is…”

I could feel the tension in the air. I was almost sure the partnership would be Sage and Paul. They had gotten some good stuff done last night.

“…Coral and Ethan!” Sola announced.

Wait, what? We had gotten nothing done last night. Ethan looked shell-shocked too.

Luna smiled. “This should not be too shocking to you. We are unable to determine the special ability-or perhaps abilities-of the monster, only that he is causing havoc around… oh, what do you humans call it?”

“Power & Light,” Intu volunteered.

“Ah, yes, that,” Luna continued. “Your versatility in your partnership makes you the most likely to defeat the monster in the Kansas City Power and Light district.”  I frowned. I wasn’t a huge fan of the city, and the bright neon lights in that part of town only made it worse.

“Wait,” Ethan said. “Surely the other people will notice us fighting a monster and teleporting all over the place...?”

Intu replied, “Well, haven’t you noticed that no one besides you notices all the weird things going on? Don’t you remember the first day…?”

Ethan and I said at the exact same time, “The teacher thought it was a Gatorade bottle…”

“I call it the Smoke,” Sky volunteered. “What does that mean?” Jake asked. Sky answered, “It’s like the Mist from Percy Jackson, but cooler.”  She and Ember high-fived.

Intu smiled. “Yes, exactly. Now, Ethan, I want you to teleport to somewhere around that Price Chopper in the Power and Light District. You will find the monster in that Price Chopper, probably in aisle nine.”  Ethan nodded, grabbed my hand, and the world faded into the city.

We appeared on a sidewalk, facing a brightly lit sign reading COSENTINO’S PRICE CHOPPER. I was breathless. “So this is what teleporting is like,” I said in awe. I sucked in a breath, and we walked straight towards the automatic sliding doors…

And straight into them. They must have been locked.

Ethan rubbed his forehead. A goose egg was appearing out of nowhere. “Okay, that definitely did not work,” he grumbled. “We can just teleport through them,” I suggested. “I dunno…” Ethan mumbled. “I need to save my energy…”

His eyes widened. Something was behind me. I turned around, and a man was sneering down at us. “Frick. He’s a teleporter,” Ethan whispered. “Great,” I whispered back. “Yes, I am,” the man said, hearing our quiet conversation. “And I am going to take you far from home,” he promised.

Our eyes widened. He grabbed us, and the world flashed before our eyes. We were in Paris. London. Somewhere really cold. And the monster finally let go of us on some paved trail. A giant deep blue lake was right next to us. It was chilly, even though it was also late summer. This made no sense until I realized where we were.

“Crater Lake,” I said. Ethan was confused. “What?” he asked, a quizzical look on his face. “We’re right next to Crater Lake. That’s what that is.”  I pointed to the blue water next to us. That’s when I noticed the monster, running towards us as fast as possible, maybe a hundred yards away. “I have a plan,” I whispered to Ethan. I didn’t tell him what it was, because my ‘plan’ was more like a stupid motion. All I told him was, “Don’t follow me. Teleport back without me.”  He nodded and shimmered away, hopefully going back to the forest.

I eyed the man running towards me. “You wanna get me?”  I yelled. “Come and get me!”

Then I jumped into the lake.

Yeah, this is why I called it a stupid motion. I thought I was going to drown. Instead, I noticed that there was some sort of air bubble around me, but I could still swim. I swam down further, and saw the monster dive in after me in an explosion of bubbles. He was obviously having a hard time swimming down to catch me. He looked like he was running out of air quickly. I looked away before the depressing stuff happened, and kept swimming to the bottom. Coral, you may be thinking, why would you do something stupid like that?  Well, I can sense stuff in water, and I sensed something that was pretty powerful. There was no other explanation.

Sure enough, when I got to the bottom (it took a long time-don’t ask), there was a set of elevator doors. There was a pair of up-down buttons floating next to it. Weird, I thought. Not knowing what else to do, I pressed the down button. Waited. Waited some more. Finally, the doors opened, and I walked into the (dry!) elevator.

After a lot of testing which button went where, I finally decided to press button 4.  I felt the (unfortunately familiar) sensation of being squished as I went up. I arrived a few steps away from the clearing.

After I recounted my experience, Luna said, “Well done, Coral. While you were talking, I granted you your first shapeshifting animal. Just think about it and you will shapeshift into it.”

At first I was confused. Then I just squeezed my eyes shut and thought to myself, ''Okay, just shapeshift into… whatever you can shapeshift into now. '' I opened them and looked down.

Flip.