CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN


London let out a yelp of pain as her hair was tugged, lifting her to her feet. She twisted behind her to see that an army man had grabbed onto her hair, second before she tripped over her feet, being forced towards the door of the barracks.

"Wait a minute!" Mr. Moseby got to his feet, hands outstretched in protest. "Where are you taking her?"

"Don't worry, she won't be hurt," the army man said. He pulled London to his chest and put his arm around her neck, periodically pressing a bit harder so that she would get the message not to try to escape. "We just have some questions we need to ask her and then we'll come back and ask you. You're not going to die. Not yet."

London tried to protest, but her cry was cut off into a choking couch as the man pressed his arm across her throat once more. She looked over at Kurt, Carey, Esteban, and Mr. Moseby as they all kneeled on the ground, looking up at her in despair. "Don't worry about me," she managed to choke out. "I'll be fine." Roughly twisted around, London was dragged out of the barracks and across the compound, feet dragging behind her. She was pulled into a nearby building and forced down into a chair, hands tied behind her back. "Alright, I'm here. What do you want?"

The army man walked around in front of her, face hidden in the shadows of the dim lighting. She couldn't see that his eyes were nearly completely black, the obvious sign of having been taken over by Uriel, part of his soul being stuck inside him. A puppet of sorts as the real Uriel sat in a protective hideout not too far away.

"What do you know about the Elementals?" The man demanded.

"The what?" London replied. She shook her hair out of her face. "I…I don't know what you're talking about."

"Of course you do, the Elementals. The people that can control different elements and have their guardians with them at all times." The man leaned towards her. "Surely you know who I'm talking about. You're with them all the time."

"My name's not Shirley," London said with a roll of her eyes. "I'm London, London Tipton. You know, even if you're going to destroy the world, I'd think that you would know who me and my father are. I mean, we are the richest people in the world."

The man reached out and struck her across the face, striking her so hard that she and the chair she was sitting on fell over. London yelled as the pain flamed across her cheek accompanied with her weakened body hitting the ground. Tears fell from her eyes as she was straightened and the man got into her face, eyes boring into hers. She shrank back. His eyes were soulless, the pupils having grown so big it was like there was no other color in his eyes. And as she continued to look at him, the pupils got bigger and bigger so that it took over the whites of his eyes.

"The Elementals," the man repeated. "The Fire and Water bearers. I know you know who they are. They're always around you! I need to know their whereabouts right now!" He paused and as London continued to look at him in confusion, he rolled his eyes. "They go by Zack and Cody…"

London lowered her head, realizing she was trapped in that moment. They knew she had been lying, that she didn't know anything about the Elementals. Carey and Kurt had filled them in on everything they knew about their sons and the powers they had and what they had done to save the world over and over again.

"I…for a long time I didn't know what they could do. I mean…I always thought they were weird, but I never knew it was this bad. I didn't know what was going on when they were around, the things they managed to do and I still don't know a lot." London lifted her head. "I don't know where they are."

"You're lying!"

"I'm not," London insisted. "In fact, I didn't know what it was that had happened, what they had always been doing, but the last thing I knew was they were constantly running around, doing something but I never knew where they were going or what they were doing. They never told me, I just found out."

The man continued to look over London, as if reading her inside and out. Then, finally, he backed away from London, crossing his arms. He pulled a rifle from behind his back and leveled it at her. "What makes you think I should believe anything you're saying?"

London started to tremble, keeping her eyes on the gun that was pointed towards her. "Because you have no reason to keep me around," she said, stuttering over her words. "You won't care whether or not I live. If there was something I was hiding, you'd want to know what it was without needing to take me like this. You need me and the others for…bait for them. That's the only reason you're keeping me, not to believe what I'm saying."

The man held the rifle up even higher before turning it away from her. He placed it back on the holster that was strapped around him and walked over to London. He smacked her across the face once more and she fell limp, succumbing to the abuse against her. The man walked behind her and untied her arms from the chair and looked up towards another man covered in military gear entered the hut.

"Take her," the first man instructed to the second. "And bring the rest to me. If I don't get any information from them, I'll have to start forcing it out."

The second man nodded and dragged London out of the hut, arms and legs hanging lifelessly as she went.


"I need you to deliver a message," Sydney said to Reed. He looked over at Aaron who moved closer to the ghost of his adoptive uncle. "To Uncle Christian. I'm sure he knows by now, but we're in the Element World and have found out a lot about Uriel and what he plans to do. I'm not sure how much time we have left before he does a lot more damage to Earth. We've already seen what he can do with his powers of life and death; but we need the time here to learn more about the background of the Element World and Elementals in general so we can find a way to beat him."

Reed nodded. "I can give him the message but I can't guarantee that he'll listen to it, yeah?" he said. "Nor can I guarantee that he'll be able to understand what it is I'm trying to tell him. You of all people now how bloody difficult it is to transmit ourselves into dreams."

"I know," Sydney agreed. "It took me a while before I was able to clearly get you, Mom, and Aunt Kristen through." He looked down at his feet, where the magic circle continued to glow under his feet. "Unfortunately it seemed that Uriel had the same idea, because he had tormented Zack when he was young, which proves that this has been going on longer than we thought."

Reed glanced sadly down at his youngest son before shaking his head. "A lot longer than you think, Blue. He was the one that your Mum, aunt, uncle, Core, and I had come across when we first heard about elementals. In many ways, none of this would've happened if we hadn't had decided to try and figure out what was being hidden from us."

"Guilt isn't the best emotion to be led by Dad," Sydney commented flatly. "That's what you used to say, yeah?"

"Yeah. You and your brothers and sister and your cousins have greatly improved with your powers, so much o hat you're not using the full potential when you get the chance, just so that Zack and Cody can tap into the their full potential and realize how powerful they really are. They already are the strongest Elementals without the use of the Element stones, the prophecy says that. But now that they have the stone sin their possession, they're even stronger than ever. Make sure they realize their potential and with Bailey's help, things'll be restored in both worlds."

Aaron then stepped forward and placed a hand on Sydney's shoulder. "Wouldn't that mean that we'd all lose our powers?" He questioned. "If everything is restored?"

"That's a risk that needs to be taken," Reed said. "That's always a chance that's going to be taken as death is inevitable in what you all are doing. That's what the rest of us risked when we found out about Uriel in the first place and he succeeded for the most part." He clenched his hand into a shaking fist and it was then that Sydney realized his father was angry. Not just angry because of the sudden death he had endured, leaving his children behind, but because there hadn't been enough time for him to adequately save the world before things had gotten so out of control.

He's definitely related to us, Sydney thought with a smirk, watching as his father did his best to calm himself down. "But I don't know what to do. Then again, none of us ever really know what's going on or what happens until it's too late."

Reed smiled and reached out, placing a hand on his youngest son's head. Sydney smiled up at his father, allowing his hair to be ruffled. "But I know you guys can do it. Don't give up. You can contact me whenever you need to, it does help with the practice of your powers."

Sydney nodded and reached up, grabbing onto his father's hand. Despite him being a sprit, cold to the touch, he could still feel the warmth that his father always radiated. Kneeling down, Reed moved his hands to Sydney's shoulders and looked him in the eyes, a glint of determination held there, before disappearing from sight as the magic circle under Sydney's feet disappeared.

Aaron moved to Sydney's front, where Reed had just been standing. "So what are we going to do now? It's not like we can snap our fingers and have Zack and Cody suddenly becomes stronger than they've ever been before."

"You're right, Aar," Sydney agreed. He placed his hand on Aaron's shoulder and started to lead him out of the room. "This means that we're going to have to practice a lot. And if that's the case, then I'm sure that Mother Nature, Father Time, Geneva, and Gattaca would find the means to help us with it."

Aaron's eyebrow twitched upwards. "Are you sure about that? Especially considering Mother Nature was the one that had caused so much damage and destruction before." He waited as Sydney opened the door to the room and the two walked out of it. "I'm not saying we shouldn't trust them, I'm just saying that for the most part we don't know what we're up against."

"That's always the point, isn't it?"

"I guess."

The cousins smiled at each other before they left the room to go find their friends to tell them everything they had figured out. Aaron suddenly stopped and tilted his head to the side. Turning around, he focused himself towards a stained glass window that had darkened as he stood there. Tilting his head in the opposite direction, Aaron started to glow a bright white in color.

"Whoa." Sydney took a step back. "What's going on?"

Finally, the light faded and Aaron turned back to Sydney. "It's the moon," he remarked. "We're going to be in some trouble. We need to get back to Earth as soon as possible. There's something big coming and we have to be ready for it."

"Could you see it?" Sydney pressed.

Aaron shook his head. "It doesn't work that way," he reminded his cousin. "I'm not really sure how it works exactly, but it's not something to be taken lightly. I need to get back to Dad and figure out what's going on, it hasn't happened for long, just since I got the Element stone of light." He stated to glow again and Sydney took a step back and held out his hand, summoning his staff just in case. "And we're going to have to get the others inside. Something tells me that Uriel is aware we're not on Earth anymore and wants to find us."

Sydney rolled his eyes. "What else is new?"


"So this is the nursery?" Bailey looked around at the cradles lined up along the cave walls. Some infants cried quietly as woman dressed in brightly adorned robes walked around, doing their best to console them. "You saw it in your dream?"

Tapeworm, who stood in the middle of the room with Canis by his side, nodded. "Yeah, this is where I found her." He gently patted Canis on the head. "This is where the guardians come back to be resurrected after their wards die."

"What about the ones that die themselves?" Bailey asked. When Tapeworm didn't respond to her question she knew immediately what he meant. So guardians can come back to life if their wards die, but if they die themselves then they can't come back. The bond between them and their duties as a guardian is more complex than I thought. She went over to a cradle and looked down at the baby that quietly rested inside.

She gave a soft smile as she looked at the baby as it squirmed and fell even further into sleep. Reaching out, she gently trailed her finger down its cheek. It was hard to believe that something so innocent was going to either grasp its destiny and gain the powers of its animal spirit or continue to be a human and work throughout the rest of the Element World. On Earth it wasn't like that; babies were born, grew up, went to school, got married, had kids, and went on with the rest of their lives. None of them were expected to get roped up in something like this, in something that would risk their lives every day.

Something that caused them to question their morality and what they believed in, in terms of being able to save the world each time someone new came their way. How do they keep doing this day after day? Those in the Element World…the Elementals on Earth…how do they keep themselves going after all this?

Once she was the cause of a few deaths, she couldn't get the thoughts out of her head. She couldn't keep the images of their lifeless bodies lying around out of her head; it caused her to bury herself in her studies before having been ripped away from Yale.

Let's be honest, Bailey. You were never destined to go to Yale. You wanted to see the world and now you're seeing more worlds than you ever thought existed. Bailey stepped back away from the cradle just as the sound of drums filled the air. She looked around as the women in the nursery started to take the babies out of the cradles and disappeared around the backside of the cave wall. Tapeworm picked up Canis and followed the women, when he came back, he was empty handed and Ursa appeared on his shoulder.

"That's the Mystic Melody," Bailey cried.

"What's going on?" Tapeworm asked his guardian.

"We're being attacked," Ursa said.