All right, so the girls are all drained except for Bloom, which is a good thing, believe me. She's the only shot the girls have of getting their powers back. But no pressure, right? And like I said in the last post, something bad is happening to one of the girls. Read on and find out.

Chapter 10: Fatal Power Drain

Bloom hovered in the air for a minute, knowing that she was losing energy rapidly. Though she had won the battle for the time being, she was exhausted physically from what the witches had put her through. Finally, she could barely stay awake, and her Winx powered down. She started to fall back towards the ground, not able to summon her wings back on her back for just one minute to land properly.

"Bloom, hold on!" yelled Sky. There was a small humming sound as the force field keeping the boys away came down, and they were able to reach the tired fairies. Sky ran forward, his arms outstretched, ready to catch her. She landed right there, desperately trying to keep her eyes open. "I've got you, Beautiful," he whispered soothingly to her. She just smiled up at him, too tired to speak.

The rest of the boys meanwhile, were hurriedly untying their girlfriends. Each girl was so tired, she just barely had the strength to stand. The guys were all wondering if they were going to have to carry them out or not.

"Are you okay Stella?" asked Brandon, as he helped her up.

"Aside from my hair being ruined and my favorite accessory now in the hands of three power hungry, with absolutely no sense of fashion witches, I'm fine," she said. Brandon just shook his head and gave a little smile. Hearing her talk about her hair and appearance told him that she was all right.

"What about you Layla?" asked Jason.

"Relax, I've been through worse," she said.

"Always the tough girl," Jason thought to himself.

"How are you holding up Musa?" asked Riven.

"I'm just a little tired," she said, trying to stand up, but her knees buckled. Riven helped her up and led her out of the tunnel. Both blushed as he held her hand to help her, a very un-Riven thing to do. But she didn't object to it, she liked having his hand around hers.

"Flora, are you all right?" asked Helia, worry written all over his face.

"I think so," she replied. But when she tried to stand up, she fell back to the ground. She tried again but her legs wouldn't support her. She gazed helplessly up at him, clearly asking for aid.

"Come on," he said comfortingly. He knelt down next to her, put his arm around her shoulders, and took one of her hands in his. He pulled her up and began to help her walk out of the cave, keeping his arm around her in case she fell again.

They started for the cave entrance in total silence, each girl just thinking about how tired they all were. They were so tired that they didn't notice they were missing one of their own. They were all about halfway out of the cave when they heard Timmy's frantic voice yelling, "Tecna! Tecna!"

Everyone turned around and saw Tecna lying on the ground of the cave still unconscious with Timmy leaning next to her, shaking her hard to try and wake her up. But she wasn't responding to anything he did. The poor boy was reaching near hysterics, trying desperately to make her open her eyes, but she didn't. She didn't look so good either. They all saw that she had turned as pale as snow and she was having trouble breathing.

"What's wrong with her guys?" asked Timmy.

Layla walked over and put two fingers on Tecna's wrist. She frowned for a minute, trying to think of where she had seen symptoms like this before. Comprehension dawned on her face as she remembered. "Oh no!" she said. "We have to get her back to Alfea. If what's happening what I think is happening, she doesn't have much time left."

"What do you mean she doesn't have much time left?" asked Timmy, panic stricken.

"There's no time to explain, let's just go," said Layla.

They got out of the tunnels as quickly as they could, which wasn't very quick considering the condition the girls were in. Timmy carried Tecna all the way out, trying hard not to ask the others to go faster, and trying even harder to keep his temperament under control period. None had ever seen him like this. It looked like he was about to come apart at the seams, and all knew that they didn't want to be there if that did in fact happen.

When they got back to Alfea, they took Tecna to the nurse's office. Layla took Nurse Ophelia aside and told her all her suspicions. From the way the nurse was nodding her head and giving small sounds of ascent, they could all tell that she agreed with what Layla was telling her.

"Layla do you want to tell us what's going on?" asked Bloom.

"Something you guys are really not going to like," she replied. "Most of the time, when a fairy loses her powers, she's fine, just exhausted like all of us. But sometimes, her power drains too quickly for her body to handle, and starts to shut down, like hers is doing."

"What are you saying?" asked Musa.

"If we don't get Tecna's power back, she'll…she'll," Layla broke off, tears starting to form in her eyes. The others just remained silent as they realized exactly what she meant. They jumped as Timmy's anguished voice rang out through the room.

"No!" he yelled, grabbing Tecna's hand.

Suddenly the color returned to her face, and her breathing was more even and controlled. Everyone stared at her, wondering exactly what had happened that had made her recover. Timmy, shocked that she had started to recover, let go of her hand and as suddenly as it started, it stopped. Her breathing became ragged again and her skin became pale.

"Timmy, take hold of her hand again," said Stella. He did as she said and for a moment, it looked as though Tecna was going to be all right. "I knew it." Stella continued. "Your strength is keeping her alive."

"But it won't last for more than a few hours," said Layla. "Meaning we've got to find the witches and fast."

All right, so they've got a problem, and they've got a solution, they just don't know how to carry it out. All right, that's a problem in itself. So, try and take guesses as to how they're going to recover their powers and save Tecna. I finished this fanfic months ago, so I already know how they're going to get through this. But you guys are allowed to take guesses as to how you think they should solve their predicament. What do you think?