The Elementals

“So,” I say, sitting down next to Oh’Rian. “Rian has an idea.” I motion for her to speak.

“Uh, yes,” Oh’Rian stutters. She explains her plan and the reactions are mixed. Stella nods, understanding the logic, and to my surprise, Maple does too. Sparky could care less. Caelum looks weary, Terra too. Coal has this rebellious fire in his eyes and I know he’ll take some convincing. A lot of convincing. Okay, I’ll probably have to knock him out and drag him, but I’ll find a way.

“Sounds great and all,” Caelum says, “But Izila can track us to the island and then connect the dots, right?”

Oh’Rian smiles slightly, and reaches into her pocket. Pulling out some small, sci-fi looking boxes with antennas and wires sticking out all over the place, she says, “Not anymore,” She twists some knobs and the antenna sparks, making some disconcerting zap noises. “These are essentially the towers on the island, but in miniature. They should last long enough to make it there.”

She tosses one to me. I catch it out of instinct, but toss it up in surprise as it crackles. “Are they safe?” I ask, fingering it nervously.

“Completely,” Oh’Rian says confidently, and goes on to explain all the science of it. Caelum and Stella listen intently, but it makes about as much sense to me as Greek. Or any other foreign language for that matter. Oh’Rian really likes this stuff, I can tell. Her movements are more sincere and exaggerated, voice stronger as she speaks. I get up quietly to collect more firewood.

The woods are silent in this not silent way, if that makes any sense. There are all these other sounds, like the last minute trills of the day birds, the beginning hoots of owls, crickets chirping and the branches rustling overhead, but it’s not noisy because these are the normal, natural sound that are part of the forest. I like it. There’s just something so pure about it. The only thing missing is the sound of running water. I forget why I got up for a minute.

“Are you ever going to stop finding people to adopt?” Coal comes from behind me. Right, firewood.

“Are you ever going to stop asking dumb questions?” I reply without even thinking about it. I bend down, back to him, and pick up some dry branches.

“You do realize the reason I have to ask these so called “dumb questions” is because of you, right?”

I gasp, turning. Again, the only way I can make out his figure is by the moonlight filtering behind him. “You mean you weren’t stupid before I came along?”

“No, so that means I had to have become an idiot from somewhere…”

He’s too far away to punch. He probably did that on purpose. “Maybe you fell of the cliff too hard.” I say. “On your head.”

“Or maybe I got in a car crash, attacked by a bear, shot, smashed into a tree, and then got yanked off a cliff by somebody.” He coughs, glaring at me.

“If I didn’t know any better, I think you liked falling to your death.” I say.

“And why is that?”

I laugh at his slightly offended tone. He has a frustrated, puzzled look on his face. “Your eyes change color when you’re annoyed.”

“They do not!” he says defensively, and I know I’ve found his kryptonite, so I keep going, pacing smugly towards him.

“Yes, they do. Normally they’re grey with gold bits, when you’re with any other human being they get darker, and when you’re mad they turn almost black.” I list, counting the colors off with my fingers. Coal frowns, and to my delight I see his eyes are pretty much black with reddish orangey gold flecks. “Like right now, for example.”

Slowly, his perplexed expression melts into a smirk. “So you’ve noticed?”

Crap. I thought I had the situation under control. “No.” I state, but it comes out more like a question. His smile grows wider. Why am I such an idiot? I gave him ground.

I punch him, and he smiles in this smug way that instantly gets on my nerves. “Well, well, well, not as hard this time. Is it me or do you actually care?”

“No!” I say in angered disbelief and he grins. Flustered, I stalk away back to camp. I almost run into Stella because I can’t see her in the dark.

“You act as if you want his injuries to heal, yet you still seem to enjoy physically harming him. I would suggest you consider not doing that.” She says carefully.

I scowl. “Well,” I contemplate darkly. “If I killed him, he wouldn’t have to heal would he?”

“You must learn to control your emotions,” Stella says, “before you do lash out at someone.”

Translation: I need to take a chill pill before I go psycho. I nod, knowing she’s right, but still fuming. I drop the sticks into the fire and the flames roar up, feeding on the wood hungrily in an unnatural way. I spin around angrily on my heels and glare at Coal, his smile the only thing I can see, lighting up the shadows like the Cheshire Cat. Jerk. He shrugs arrogantly and stomping past him I sit down irritably next to Caelum. Instantly, Coal’s superior smile vanishes, and his features harden. I tilt my head innocently at him and he narrows his eyes, turning away crossly.

“You should probably get some sleep.” Caelum says, though he doesn’t seem to mind that I’m in his way. “You know, lots of walking and stuff ahead.”

“I’m not tired.” I mutter.

“Well then, we can keep watch.” He said “we” so naturally it takes me second to process it.

“Sure. Fine.” I say quickly. Then, trying to hide the eagerness in my voice, I add, “Whatever.”

Caelum smiles, but somehow it doesn’t get on my nerves as much as when Coal does. It triggers the same amount of erratically placed heartbeats though, and for a second I think I’m having a stroke. I stare intently into the fire until it stops. The moon crawls into the sky and my eyelids grow heavy. I stubbornly refuse to fall asleep.

“You need to stop worrying and thinking about things to get some rest.” Caelum says. “It clouds your mind.”

“How do you know that?” I stifle a yawn.

“I used to be friends with psychic Elemental. She said when you thought about too much, your brain was too crowded to shut down and sleep.”

“How long did you know her?” It annoys me that I feel a spark of jealousy. I don’t even have anything to be jealous of, right?

Caelum smiles again, but this time it is masking pain. “Until she died.”

“Oh.” I hate myself for the small bit of relief I feel. “Sorry.”

“It’s alright,” he sighs.

I slide closer to him. “No it’s not. What was her name?”

“Sienna.”

“Was she a good friend?”

“The best.” He laughs shortly and again I feel a spike of jealousy. “We met when I caught her trying to escape out the orphanage window four stories up.”

“Did you use your powers to get down?”

“No,” He says, then pauses. “Well, sort of. Sienna went into my mind a little so I came with her, and made me use my powers so we didn’t die from the fall, but I didn’t know I had them yet.”

“Did you know she was an Elemental?”

He nods. “She told me first thing. Sienna didn’t like secrets.”

“So why didn’t she tell you about your powers?” I feel invasive asking so many questions, but I don’t like secrets either. Other peoples’ secrets, I mean.

“Honestly, I don’t know,” Caelum shifts. “I think she got protective and didn’t want me to live with that sort of responsibility, but that’s what killed her in the end.” I give him a questioning look. “We were being chased, by a bunch of guys in hunter jackets-”

“I know the type.” I say, nodding in understanding.

“Yeah, and they surrounded us,” Caelum changes position again. “We were tired from running and I guess Sienna read their minds or something, and they were after me in particular because, you know, I’m gravity.” I nod. “So we’re standing there, ready to fight, and then Sienna just jumps in front of me out of nowhere. She took a bullet,” Caelum’s eyes are sort of glazed over with the pain of the memory. His voice catches a little and I want to give him a hug. “It hit her in the stomach. It was meant to hit me.”

There’s so much pain in that statement that I do move over and press my shoulder reassuringly onto his. “There was nothing you could do.” I say, because I can’t think of anything else. My brain is kind of shorting out with sleep deprivation and the fact that I voluntarily touched Caelum. And that he’s warm. And my shoulder fits perfectly against his.

“Yes there was,” He says quietly. “If she had just told me. If she had just told me about my powers before she got shot, I could’ve done something. Afterwards, I can’t remember completely clearly, but I know I used my powers, and when I can remember, the men were gone. And Sierra was dead.”

We sit there, silent understanding of shared pain connecting us. My eyes start to close. “What was she like?” I ask, trying to stay awake.

Caelum smiles down at me in this almost broken way, like a shattered piece of glass put carefully back together, but still not perfect. He lowers his voice, recognizing my fatigue. “She was amazing. She loved all the small things in life, like rain and fog and fall leaves. She was smart, caring, pretty.” I nod sleepily. “She was a lot like you.” He whispers quietly.

“Oh.” I mumble. I’m too tired to really process what he said, but I know it gives me nice feeling inside, and I drift off to sleep, holding onto the warm glow like a security blanket.