Chapter 3: Water

Location: Cozumel, Mexico

March 8, 2008

Erika was sitting in a beach chair on the beach, soaking up some sun. She was on Spring Break and enjoying every minute of it. Back in St. Petersburg, Florida she could have easily gone to the beach, but there's nothing quite like the Spring Break in Mexico atmosphere. Her friends had all gone back to the hotel for a break from the sun and to grab some drinks, leaving Erika to guard all the beach gear. She decided to get up and stretch a bit, and then went down towards the water.

She got out about 20 yards out when she heard a screaming in the air. She looked up and saw what looked like a fireball tearing down through the sky heading for the ocean about 100 yards farther out from where she was. she immediately started swimming back to shore, but then the thing hit the water, sending a shock wave (and literal wave) all around it, sweeping her up and spitting her out on the shore.

"What the hell was that Rika?!" screamed one of her friends
"Are you ok?!" yelled another, running towards her.
'' Uh...yeah, I'm ok...I don't know what that thing was...I just started swimming back as soon as I saw it." said Erika

Just then, out from the steaming patch of water where the object had fallen, a light shone up from the depths and erupted upwards, making a shining pillar. Erika stepped forward seemingly against her own will.

"What are you doing, Erika? Somethings down there and you're walking towards it?!"
"Yeah...I can't explain it, but I think it's...safe. Whatever it was is drawing me to it, I can't look away."

As Erika reached the water's edge, the light suddenly stopped, revealing a small, bright object floating in midair. The object slowly started to move towards Erika, and she kept walking out in the water. When they were about 5 feet apart, they both stopped, and the object shot a beam of light into her face, like it was scanning her or something. Then, it glided down to her and rested in her hand.

The moment it touched her hand, there was a -crackle- noise and then a flash of light. The next thing Erika knew, she was back on the beach, standing with her hand stretched out to the water. The object in her hand was a crystal. She picked it up with her other hand to look at it and realized she had a strange mark on her hand where the crystal touched. It was the shape of the ancient symbol for water, something she had seen in her History class just a few weeks ago. It kinda looked like a tattoo, but also looked almost like a burn mark to her...

"Umm, Erika?" said a friend of hers, Marlene. "Erika, what the hell are you doing? and Where did that crystally looking thingy come from?"

"Uh, I've had it this whole time...Christmas gift." Erika lied. "I'm gonna go back to the hotel...I'm feeling tired. Gonna go take a nap, no need to come if you wanna stay."

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Erika lay on her bed in the hotel room, twirling the crystal in her fingers.

"What on earth is this thing?" she asked herself. "And why couldn't anyone else remember that whole thing with this falling out the frickin sky? How can you forget something like that, especially since it JUST happened?"

She thought long and hard, and decided to keep this whole ordeal a secret...at least for now. She and her friends would be heading back to Tampa tomorrow, and she hoped that she could just move on and try to forget this happened.

She decided to get a shower and clean up, because they were gonna go out for a night on the town for their last night...and left the crystal on by the sink as she got in. She just stood there a minute, letting the water run through her hair and massage her scalp...she liked that feeling. She thought about what had happened and it made her even more perturbed...

"I just don't get it...how can they not remember? It was like the most dramatic thing that has ever happened in the history of forever to us...and they completely forgot about it. I'll see if they are just messing with me when we go out..." she mumbled.

Soon after, she was getting out of the shower and getting ready to dry off. she realized she had forgotten her towel in the room, and let out a "UGGH!" in frustration. She felt warmer all of a sudden and realized that there was no water on her arm anymore...or the rest of her body for that matter. She was completely dry, and without even using a dryer or towel or anything.

"Ok, what is going on here?" she asked herself. "There's something freaky about this crystal thing...I know that has to be it. "

She heard people coming up the stairs outside and quickly hid the crystal and grabbed some clothes before diving into the bathroom.

"Rika, you in here?" asked one of her friends.

"Uh, yeah...just getting out of the shower." she answered

"Oh! your towel is still out here, you want it?" her friend asked.

"Nah, I'm dry...must be the shampoo or something...quick drying." she quickly lied.

"Oh, ok..well, we're just dropping off our stuff and we'll be in the lobby waiting for ya, mmk?"

"No problem. I'll see you in a few." she said right before she heard them all leave the room.

"Phew" she said, sinking down the wall to the floor. "Ok, somethings definitely going on here. I guess it can wait for dinner, I'm starved."

She threw on the rest of her clothes and then dug out the crystal from her bag. She couldn't help but want to take it everywhere with her.

"Maybe I can find a pretty chain or something to try and put this thing on...it's even already got a little hole at the top, how awesome!" Erika said.

She put it in her pocket and then shot straight downstairs to her friends waiting in the lobby.

"Ready to go girls?" she said, beaming.

END Ch. 3

Chapter 2: Thunderstruck

Location: Somewhere in the Eastern United States

"Master! The Spirits have begun to fall back to Earth!" said Koichi

"Ah...can you get me a location of the closest one, Koichi?" he said

"Let's see...Ah. right here, Master." Koichi said, pointing to Florida. "According to this map, this area is called...Flow-Reeda. What an odd name."

"Strange or not, it's our next destination. We need to prepare to leave at once. I'd prefer to get to as many as possible without them coming into human contact...same goes for us. It might be best to avoid humans for the time being." the Master said

"Right. I'll prepare our gear right away." said Koichi as he scurried off to gather the necessary items.

"I know that some of them will probably come into contact with humans...but I hope that we can at least obtain this one without problem. If there's a hold up with this first one, we can basically be sure that they will all be found before we get there." The Master thought to himself
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Location: Tampa, Florida

After Dinner Drake decided to test out his newfound...ability, so he went to the park on the other side of his neighborhood, the one without a huge crater in the middle. It was relatively desolate at this hour, so he pretty much had free reign of the grounds.

"Well, let's get to it." Drake said, pulling out the crystal and examining it. "There's got to be some way to make this thing give me a little more juice. Maybe if I hold it when I use it." he thought aloud.

He held it firmly in his hand, and then with his other hand focused on doing what he did last time. Again, a small spark emitted from his palm.

"Hmm...well, it's a start. At least it's not limited to my fingertip." he said.

He tried again, and managed to keep the spark going for a few seconds. After about 20 minutes worth of attempts, he had progressed enough to maintain a spark long enough to light something, like a leaf or twig, on fire.

"Phew. I think I'm definitely making some progress here...after a week or so I might be able to even do something bigger." Drake said

"With the right training, it won't take anywhere near that long, my boy." said a strange voice from the darkness.

"Wha? Who's there?!" Drake Exclaimed, hiding the crystal in his pocket quickly.

"No need to fear." the voice said as a man stepped into the lighted area in front of Drake. "I am a friend, I'm not here to hurt you or harass you in any way."

"OK, then who are you then?" asked Drake apprehensively.

"Put simply, I'm the caretaker and guardian of the crystal you have in your pocket. Well, that, and others that represent other elements. The crystals were sent into space about a day ago, and they begun to fall back to Earth just today...I'm guessing you found this one in that area a few miles away...the one with the massive crater?" asked the man

"Uh...yeah" said Drake. "If you're the guardian, then how and why did they get sent into space? That is, if I am to believe what you're saying."

"Well, the crystals had been sealed in a temple in what you would call the North Pole of the Earth a long time ago. When the crystals were sealed, I was placed in a sleeping state and was to be awakened if and when someone found and released them once more. I was freed yesterday from a cave in...Colorado, i think you people call it." he said

"Alright...I'll believe that for now, i suppose. What is your name, friend?" asked Drake

The man chuckled.

"Well, I have many names, for i am known in many places. Or rather, I was known in many places. anyway, the name i had grown most fond of was Beschermer. It's Dutch for Caretaker, which I felt was fitting, and it adds a bit of mystique, eh?" he said.

"Yeah, I suppose." Drake said, face smiling. "My name's Drake. Drake Trager." he said quietly.

"Glad to meet you, Drake." said Beschermer

"Now, what did you mean by 'The right training?' are you going to be training me?" asked Drake

"Well, I had originally hoped to find the crystal before any humans found it. you see, once they come into contact with a person, they literally bond with that person...as evidenced by that mark inside your hand." he said, looking at Drake's hand. "Oh yes, i can see it. I can sense the crystals and their bearers, and I can always tell if someone is in possession of a crystal, for I can see the crystal's imprint on their owner."

"To answer your question, yes, now that I have found you, I plan to give you some training... however, I must check in on the other crystals before anything starts up. I've come into possession of one of these...cell phone devices you humans use. Quite handy, really... I think that would be the best way for us to keep in contact. keep each other informed of goings on, and I can give you basic instructions of things to improve your abilities while I'm away. If you would, program your, umm...number into mine, please." continued Beschermer.

"Right." said Drake, taking the phone and entering his phone number into it. "So, when will you be leaving?"

"Well, we need to be heading out pretty much right away... we need to get to as many as possible in as short a time as possible." he said

"We?" asked Drake

"Oh, that's right...I forgot to mention my assistant, Koichi. He's a nice lad...I think you might get along well." he said, pausing to think a second. "Thank you for accepting this all so readily. I know it's a lot to take in at once."

"Gladly...I've been hoping for something this exciting to happen to me for a long time now. It's just the thing I need to add something exciting to my life." said Drake

"Well, I'll leave you be now...I'll keep in touch. Any time that is best to call you?" Beschermer asked.

"Umm, perhaps text messaging would be best. Do you know how to do that?"

"Yes, actually...I had read up on the manual. genius concept...I'm very impressed at the technological advances since I was placed in my slumber."

"Alright then...feel free to send a text any time...and we can set up a call time from there."

"Right then...goodbye for now, Drake."

"See you around, Beschermer...good luck."
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End Ch. 2

Chapter 1: Thunder

Location: Earth, upper atmosphere.

Date: March 8th, 2008

Nearly a day had passed since the temple had been awakened, and life was seemingly back to normal...the earthquake was passed off as nothing but a minorly newsworthy blurb on the evening news. "Nothing special" said the various anchors and reporters.

The "heat sources" had indeed made it into outer space, and had somehow managed to cool down and seemingly disappear from radar completely. The military and scientists had no way f tracking them.

Just as suddenly as they had reached outer space, a day later they all came streaming down towards the planet again, shooting like meteors heading on a collision course with the planet.

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"Sir, it looks like those unidentified heat sources from yesterday are returning to Earth...they're falling from the atmosphere as we speak." said a control officer.

"What?! Where are they heading...the people need to be warned." said the commander.

"There's no time, sir. They've almost reached the surface...they should impact withing 60 seconds. I'll get data on all the crash sites right away." he said.

"Good, we'll need teams dispatched to each site fairly quickly to ensure that no one gets a hold of them, whatever they are, and causes us unnecessary problems." said the commander

"Uh, sir. You might want to check this out." said the Control Officer. "It appears that each of them actually split in two while still in the upper atmosphere...there are now twenty objects falling, and they're just a few thousand feet above the surface!"

"Good granny, what's next?" the Commander said.

Suddenly the ground shook beneath them, apparently one of them had struck near enough to them to have a shockwave strong enough to be felt.

"Get teams on it NOW!" bellowed the commander.
~~~~~~~~
Location: Tampa, Florida. United States

Drake Trager was just walking home from school, it had been a good day, but he was glad it was over. He'd had this feeling all day long nagging at his mind. The feeling that something big and important was about to happen, but he had no idea what.

Drake had just turned into the vacant park near his neighborhood when he heard a screaming noise in the air above him. He looked up and saw an intensely bright fireball streaming down and it was heading for the middle of the park itself. He tried to run away, but couldn't make himself move. He stood there, rooted on the spot and watched the fireball crash right into the fountain, sending up piles of rubble and steam and making a small crater. The shockwave spread to him almost immediately, and he was thrown to the ground.

"-the hell?!" he exclaimed

After a few seconds, he got up and peered down into the crater, trying to see what it was, but saw nothing. Then, out of the dirt shone a bright golden light. It shone directly upward, almost like a signal beacon, but then stopped. Right in mid-air in the middle of where the light had been, what looked like a crystal was just floating there. it hung there for a second, and then shot towards Drake and landed at his feet, glistening in the sunlight.

"What is going on here?!" he said "Was this the feeling I was having?" he asked himself as he bent down and apprehensively picked up the crystal.

The moment it touched his skin, he felt an intense jolt of electricity surge through his body and he was again knocked to the ground. Once he was coherent enough to think, he looked down at the crystal in his hand. The thing had left a mark on his hand in the shape of a lightning bolt, but it looked too ornate to possibly be a coincidental scar or bruise. After about 10 seconds, the mark seemed to melt away into his skin, and it looked perfectly normal again.

Drake got up and started walking back home, pocketing the crystal and picking up speed. He figured ti best not to stick around because the cops might show up and he didn't even want to think about what might happen.

He arrived at home and found nothing out of place...his parents and sister seemed utterly unaffected.

"Did they really NOT feel that?" he asked himself.

He grabbed a couple cookies from the container in the kitchen and rushed up to his room to "Do his homework." He closed his room door and locked it, then proceeded to put his stuff on his bed and sit down at his desk. He took the crystal out and looked at it again...no shock this time, it looked like any ordinary crystal that fell from space should...very conspicuous. It was a goldish yellow color and on the inside, it looked to have a few internal cracks in the shape of a lightning bolt.

"What is it with this thing and lightning bolts?" he asked himself. "It almost looks like that mark was carved inside it with a laser or something..." he said as he mimicked the motions of carving. As he was motioning, a little -CRACK- sounded near his fingertip, and he felt a burn on his finger. He waited a second, and tried it again...-CRACK- -CRACK- a little spark appeared at his fingertip and disappeared just as fast as it had appeared.

"No way!" he exclaimed. "Did this thing give me like...some sorta electric powers or something?"

"Drake!" a voice from downstairs sounded. "Are you ok in there?"

"Yeah, mom, I'm fine!" he said back

"What was that, were you yelling something?" she asked

"No. Well, yes...I got a paper cut, but it's fine. I cleaned it off and bandaged it up already." he said

"Well, ok then. Dinner'll be ready in an hour. See you then!" she said

"Phew...That was close." he said, reaching for a band-aid. "I definitely need to tinker with this thing... this could be nice, very nice indeed. " he said with a huge smile on his face.


End Chapter 1

Prologue

Date: March 7, 2008

Location: The North Pole

A team of archaeologists and researchers have been searching the area for what they believe to be an ancient temple that was discovered using thermal satellite scan technology. The location had been pinpointed, and now they just had to dig through the over 1 mile of Ice and snow just to get there.

"Hey, Doctor Richards, you might want to come and look at this!" screamed one of the diggers towards the hole opening.

"Coming!" said the doctor, almost tripping over his own feet in his excitement. The doctor made his way down to the digger that had called for him and saw what looked like a great stone spike sticking out of the ice. "My my, what have we here? How did the stone survive these conditions?"

"Well sir, I don't know about all of that, but this looks like the top of a tower or something like that..." said the digger.

"Yeah, maybe we found Santa's Workshop!" screamed one of the other diggers from across the area.

"Shut up Jones! This is serious stuff." the digger said.

"Right you are, my good man. Now that we've breeched the ice sealing, we need to get the secondary team in here to get the ice away from the structure." said the doctor. "Mr. Jones!" bellowed the doctor. "Get the secondary team on the line and tell them they're up!"

"Sir." said Jones, saluting.
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Another day passed and finally a majority of the structure had been revealed. The exploration team was preparing to enter for the first time, and spirits were high.

"Well men," said the doctor "I know you all know this, but i want you all to be extremely careful in there. There hasn't been a lifeform in this place for probably thousands of years, and it could be very dangerous in there. Good luck, and be sure to bring back anything interesting that you can."

With that, the team set out, and proceeded to open up the massive stone doors leading inside. Amazingly, the place seemed to be in pristine condition, the doors worked perfectly, and sunlight streamed in, illuminating the entire entryway with semi-warm light. They proceeded down the entryway until they reached what seemed to be the main chamber. Inside there was a round chamber withs eating along the curved walls, as well as what looked to be a large altar or platform in the center. On top of the platform was a raised cylindrical column with 4 holes in the sides that looked like something should be inserted into for some reason.

"Hey, Commander, look at those holes...they're square." said one of the men.

"Yeah, I noticed that...I wonder what goes there." said the Commander.

"Commander! I think I found something over here!" said another man. "They're like...batons or something, and the ends are perfect squares, just like the holes in that thing over there."

"Call in the Doctor...we don't want to do anything he doesn't want done yet." he said.

Five minutes later, Doctor Richards showed up with a logbook and flashlight in hand.

"Yes, Commander, you've found something, I take it?" he said.

"Yes sir, take a look at this column over here and these...batons, or whatever they are." said the commander.

"Curious...very curious. It looks like these-batons, you called them?- would fit perfectly into those holes. I think we should give them a try." said the doctor.

"As you wish, Doctor Richards." said the Commander "Place the four batons in the holes, men."

All four of the remaining team each picked up a baton and slid them into place on the column. However, nothing happened.

"Hmm...Ah! Maybe you should try turning the column. The batons should provide enough support to use them to twist the entire column around!" said the Doctor.

The men once again did as commanded, and after one full revolution, a loud "Click" resounded all through the room. All of a sudden the chamber itself started to shake and then the symbols on the walls lit up with a bright, white light.

"Remarkable...these symbols...they're the ten elemental symbols of the ancient world. Look." he said as he pointed to the one that looked like a flame. "Fire, water, wind, earth, ice, metal, wood, thunder, light, and darkness!" he said, pointing to each symbol in turn. "This seems to be a temple dedicated to the very elements themselves!"

The commander scratched his chin. "But, I think there must have been some purpose to all that besides lighting up these symbols, sir." he said.

"Yes, there must have been, but for now, this is a wonderful start. I want pictures and video made of the entire temple, we need to document this." said the doctor.
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Location: Global monitoring facility in up-state New York, United States.

A shallow rumbling could be felt even in America as the temple shook.

"Sir!" a control monitor said to his commanding officer "There's ten separate traces of intense heat signatures coming from all over the globe...that earthquake must have been some sort of trigger."

"Yes, but what are these signatures?" he asked

"Well sir, it's hard to tell from here, but-" he began, but was cut off by a loud alarm beeping on his control area. "Oh no, it looks like whatever those signatures are, they've left the ground and are now heading for outer space!"

"Can we track them?" asked the officer.

"Not at those speeds and that altitude...I'm afraid that's beyond this department's capabilities. Perhaps NASA, or some obscure branch of the NSA or FBI, but not us sir."

"Get NASA on the horn then...we need to find out what the hell is going on!"
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Location: undisclosed. somewhere in the Colorado Rocky Mountains.

Deep underground, in a cave unknown to any person in the area, a bright light shone in the pits of the cave. A massive shelf of the wall fell apart, revealing a statuesque man, sealed within an ancient cocoon-like casing.

The casing cracked open and fell to the floor, revealing the unobscured face of the man, whose eyes were now open, looking around.

"I'm awake? I can't be awake! This means someone must have found the temple and unlocked the elemental seals! I must get up North as soon as possible. " the man said "Koichi! arise...we have work to do. The spirits have been released!"

As he spoke those words, a small creature, similar to a dragon, but somehow looking human appeared from beneath the rubble of the cocoon.

"Master, is it true? Have the spirits really been released?" said Koichi

"Yes, Koichi, they have. you know what this means...we're going to have to track down the spirits and hope that no humans have found them yet...it will be much easier to re seal them if they have not been found yet."

"Yes, master. Where to first?"

"The Temple...we need to check and be absolutely sure that the pedestal has been completely turned. If not, then the spirits are still safe and we can warn the humans if need be."
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End of prologue.

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