Distant Elemental

Autumn and Blaise both shifted uncomfortably, their muscles aching from staying still so long in an upright position. It had been at least ten minutes since they’d heard the trucks driving away in the distance, but they weren’t about to let their guard down that easily. Eventually, however, Autumn got a cramp in her leg and couldn’t stop herself from twitching and crying out. She leapt quickly from a foliage and stared about and, seeing no-one, walked a few paces forward when, with a sudden jet of flame, Blaise emerged from his hiding spot.
“No-one here? Alright, let’s go.”

They traipsed their way back to the field, the bush parting a way for them with a sweep of Autumn’s hands, and they reached it not a moment too soon. A bickering pair came into view, flashing and teleporting all over the place.
“What the-?” Autumn asked, obviously confused.
“Was that Nova? It looked like him,” said Blaise, focusing on the flickering human-shaped people that kept disappearing and re-appearing in random places.
‘Blaise! Autumn!” a female voice cried. Fulgora was suddenly in front of them, a strained smile stretching across her face.
Nova appeared next to her suddenly, and made a grab for her arm. She dodged this, slapped his other arm away, and dived in between Blaise and Autumn, coming to stand behind them.
“Nova stop it! Calm down- no-one’s here!”
Nova glared at Fulgora before nodding at the other two and remaining where he was.
“Okay guys, what happened? Sorry I got here so late. Where... where is everyone else?”
“I was hoping you could tell us,” replied Blaise.
“Where did you go?” demanded Autumn, “if you only just got here?”
“Nova here can tell you,” replied Fulgora in a sickeningly sweet voice as she glared at him.
Nova said nothing, only looked down, his eyes just visible beneath his dark mask.

“Are you there?” Nayru slammed her hand onto the left wall of her cell.
“Yes, I’m in here,” came the reply in that familiar voice, wafting from somewhere behind the wall.
“Are you okay? What happened?”
“I’m fine, and I don’t know. One second it was only Bianca there, and then suddenly there were so many people... I blacked out shortly after.”
“Yeah that’s the same for me. Hey- how are we going to get out of here? Do you know where we are?”
“No, but... I think there’s something wrong. I- I can’t use my powers.”
“What?” Nayru was shocked. Not able to use her powers? What was going on?
“I woke up in here, and I think I was drugged or something, nothing made much sense. I haven’t been able to use my powers since. Oh- have you got any food or water in your cell? If you do- don’t eat it!”
Nayru looked across at the bread and water sitting innocently by the bars. The guard still lay outside, snoring softly. “Hang on,” she said. She slowly shuffled over, sat next to the food, and picked up the piece of bread. She raised it to her nose and there didn’t seem to be anything strange about it, but when she picked up the water, she knew instantly something wasn’t right.
“The water smells strange but more than that... I can sense something else in there, it’s not pure water. I think they’ve drugged it.”
“Well I ate my food when they dumped me in here; I think that might be why my powers aren’t working. I reckon they must have drugged us after they caught us; I still felt woozy when I found myself here. I can think clearly now, but my powers...”
“Don’t worry, you’ll be fine,” Nayru reassured her. That was when the guard awoke again. To her surprise, Andromeda started giggling.
“Nice work Nayru!”
“Thanks!” Andromeda could hear the smile behind the word.

“Okay, so we practically missed everything,” summarised Autumn.
‘What are we going to do now? Skye, Andromeda, Nayru and Ash are all gone, probably all captured, so we’re the only ones left. How are we to get to them?”
“You plan on a rescue?” asked Nova, sounding almost incredulous.
“What?” Blaise looked at him in surprise. “Why do you sound so shocked?”
“It’s too late. You can’t think of rescuing them now.”
Fulgora turned to him. “Alright, I think now’s the time for you to tell us exactly what you know about these people and why you’re afraid of them. Do you know where to find them?”
Nova’s turquoise eyes bore into her own, no change in expression betraying his emotions. Finally: “I know where to find them, but I will not take you there.”
“Uh, you don’t have a choice,” Autumn said, “you’ll tell us whether you like it or not.”
“That’s right,” Blaise added, fire burning in the palms of his hands, “because we’ll get it out of you one way or another, it’s better if you just tell us.”

Skye flew down slowly, hovering above an old warehouse looking slightly decrepit where it stood. Lights were blazing from the windows, but it was so far from anywhere as to be safe from unwanted visitors. Well, almost. Crumbling letters across the top read ‘Stewart Industries’ but from what Skye could guess, this wasn’t a painting business or some furniture storage facility. She flew around the back, very high above the building that looked the size of a T.V from where she was, and saw a separate building attached to the back where the truck, a small dot to her, drove in, through a large opening in one side clearly designed for vehicle use. As Skye started to hover down closer she saw doors begin to roll down, the opening becoming smaller and smaller. Was this her last opportunity to learn more about the place her friends might have been taken to? She considered diving down...

“Urgh...”
“Nayru, feel like knocking him out again?”
“Sure...” Nayru lifted both her hands, thought for a little bit with her tongue between her teeth before simply shooting a blast of water straight at his head. The man gave a surprised half yell, half gurgle, before hitting the opposite wall and sliding back to the floor. Nayru could hear Andromeda giggling as she could see what was going on though they couldn’t see each other. It was time to change that.
“Okay Andromeda stand back, I’m going to do something about this wall.”
“Okay... I’ll move next to the bars at the far corner. That help?”
“Yep.” Nayru aimed a massive torrent of water at the wall which hit it and blasted away a small portion of the wall so she could see into Andromeda’s now slightly damp cell. Andromeda’s face came into view, looking slightly tired but smiling contentedly. Nayru continued to work at the wall, dampening the gypsum and slowly eroding it away until she could clamber through to Andromeda’s cell. There they sat talking, trying to decide what to do. About half an hour later, Andromeda found to her surprise and pleasure that she could lift slightly from the floor. It looked like things were getting better when they heard the screaming of a rusty door opening from a distance and the clack of shoes along the polished floor where the guard lay unconscious. Three figures appeared in front of the cell they occupied. All three were men, two middle-aged and another younger figure. One of the middle aged men gave the guard a hearty frown, but the other two ignored it and stared in fascination at the girls now glaring at them. All three received a wet welcoming gift in the face and spluttered in an annoyed fashion, but with a sudden motion from one of them, Nayru and Andromeda found themselves back to back and unable to move.
“Screw you!” Andromeda spat.
“Hush now, you’ll be coming with us, little pests. Oh, you have no idea how long we’ve been waiting for this.”
“What, for a chance to resemble a pancake? You just wait!”
“Quiet now.”
Nayru and Andromeda felt the force tighten on them the in seconds they were being hauled from the room and flew through the air towards the rusty door standing open. They wound through numerous corridors, floating eerily along in the air before coming to a wide room. The air stank of an off-putting antiseptic smell, so strong the two girls felt as if their noses were burning from the reek, and they noticed the separate chambers laid out in this wide room. It was clear this was a lab for experiments, and the two specimens had just arrived.

Skye sped down to the ground, even making the wind pull her along as she attempted to make it to the closing doors just in time. She couldn’t breathe, black was lining her vision and she felt a horribly tight sensation in her chest, but she ignored it all, concentrating hard on the door. All else had become blurry to her, so it was no surprise that when she was hit from the side with a bullet it took her longer than it usually would have to cry out in pain and catch herself in the air, her escapade forgotten. It was only then she could hear the gunfire, many rounds going off simultaneously and slowly aiming in her direction as the people shooting at her realised she had stopped. Skye turned, sobbing from pain, and quickly sped up and away. Blood dripped from the leg she clutched as the wind tore her back up into the sky, well away from the bullets whining uselessly through the air.

Nova dropped to the ground from the effort it had taken to teleport them this far. Fulgora bent down to check that he was alright as Autumn and Blaise looked around. A wide fence towered up in front of them, and they stood on a sloping hill, looking down at a massive run-down warehouse the size of two football stadiums joined together.
“Holy shit,” said Autumn, staring at the lit-up mass of a building that looked quite imposing from where they looked.
“You can’t... go in there.” Nova said between breaths.
“Don’t you understand, Nova?” asked Fulgora, grabbing him by the shoulders and forcing him to look at her, “we have to. These are our friends, we can’t let them get captured.”
“It’s too late now. There’s nothing you can do, they can’t escape.”
“You did, didn’t you?” she fired back at him.
Nova remained silent, looking down at the floor, red wisps of hair looking deadened in the dark night.