VIII

From The Old-World To The Future

~Emily~

For the past few weeks, ever since Luca ran away and I've been forced to stay away from him, people have begun to act strange.

Not strange as in they aren't acting like themselves, but everyone and I do mean everyone has one of these new crystals that suddenly appeared the night Luca left.

Almost as if this was all planned...

These crystals, depending on their color, seemed to amplify certain parts of people. Like red crystals caused people to act in a more rash manner compared to blue crystals which seemed to calm others.

Yellow and green crystals also seemed to bring out these types of emotions as well as behavior within people.

My crystal, which was a watery blue color, helped ease my mind during stressful situations which I now found myself in every time I woke up and realized that Luca was still gone.

"You need to give him time." Luca's sisters would tell me.

"He'll come back when he's feeling better." My mom would tell me whenever she'd see my tear stained face.

"Just ignore him. If he isn't back by now, then he didn't care about you." My brother tried to say reassuringly, but I just hit him and told him to leave me alone.

The thing was, everyone was trying to be nice and helpful, but I didn't want that. I wanted Luca, not their reassurance that everything was going to be fine.

Then, there's the dream I had about Luca.

The dream in itself was weird since the person I was following seemed to be Luca, but I wasn't 100% sure. Yeah, he sounded like Luca when he was older, yet for all I knew it could have just been someone trying to impersonate him.

Still, "Luca" was wearing a full-body armor vest underneath a military style padded winter jacket along with silver (I assume steel) greaves and finally a pair of silvery-white clawed gauntlets that resembled dragon claws.

His face was covered by a gas mask that only covered his nose and mouth, exposing his glowing silver, white, gold, green and blue eyes. The most prominent of these colors was green, which was Luca's original eye color while the silver, white, gold and blue were flaked in different spots, each glowing with an intensity of their own.

To be honest, it was kind of enchanting.

"Luca" seemed to be walking somewhere, occasionally looking around as if trying to find something.

Before long, he stopped in front of some kind of bunker.

The small, concrete building looking no bigger than a bedroom. Luca walked inside and I watched as he pulled the obsidian black arrowhead off of his necklace, flicking his hand downwards and seemingly causing the arrowhead to a black spear.

Can they all do that? I thought.

Before I could watch the figure use the spear, my dream ended and I woke with a start.

"Emily?" My mother called. "Are you awake? You still need to go to school. I doubt people almost being crushed by meteors is going to stop the government from giving all of you kids an education."

I could tell she was trying to joke around, but I really didn't want to go to school since Luca still wasn't around.

"Do I have to Mom?" I groaned from underneath my covers.

"Yes, now get dressed. Maria and Madison will be here soon to pick you up." Mom replied. Soon, I heard her footsteps leave from my door and decided to stay in bed just a bit longer.

School could wait.

It may have been two weeks since the "Night of a Thousand Lights" as the people on the news called it, but still school required us to attend.

In reality, no one was going to school to learn "Algebra" or "English" anymore.

The government had sent in different doctors and armed military officers in order to observe the effects of prolonged exposure to the crystals.

From what Maria and I could gather, we were the first of several hundred cities in America that was experiencing this.

Every other city was able to roam free with the crystals that, if my dream was real, could turn into armor and/or weapons...

"Emily? Maria and Madison are here!" Mom screamed from downstairs. "Are you still awake?"

Begrudgingly, I got out of bed still dressed from the previous day and walked downstairs to see Madison and Maria each wearing jeans, a long-sleeve t-shirt, and boots.

Our "doctors" said that everyone needed to wear these types of clothing because in their mind, we needed to be ready for something.

No one knew what that something was, but it was obvious to see that whatever it was, it made the scientists and soldiers scared.

"Ready, Emma?" Madison asked.

"Yeah, let's just get this over with." I said.

"Have a good day at school you three!" My Mom shouted as we got in their Mom's car and drove off towards the school.

As we drove to school, I couldn't help, but to try and shake the feeling as though something was going to go wrong today.

Maybe it was just the usual Monday jitters?

At least, that's what I hoped...

~Luca~

As I looked around, it was hard to believe that this is where I had gone to school.

My High School had been turned into some kind of military facility where the students were the test subjects.

"How the Hell did any of this happen?" I asked aloud.

"It probably had something to do with the crystals, don't you think?" Someone replied from next to me.

I turned my attention towards Rose who, for some reason, had been following me.

"Obviously, but why did the crystals appear on Earth? Wouldn't NASA, or some form of Space-Watch from our government have informed us about this?" I questioned, however I already had an idea. Well, a few of them anyways.

If the government knew, they either didn't tell anyone because they were the cause of this or, they wanted to watch us.

However, there was also a possibility that they didn't know about any of this and were just as surprised about that night as we were.

All I do know is that there was something going on here.

"Are we going down there?" Rose asked me.

I looked at her and nodded.

"Of course. We need to get an idea of what these scientists know. Plus, I need to make sure my family and friends are safe." I told her as I proceeded to walk towards the front gates to the school.

As Rose and I made our way towards into the school, I could see different Soldiers look at sheets of paper, possibly making sure that we were actual students here.

After making it towards our first period, I was greeted by Ms. Grace and Ms. Violet Holloway.

"Luke! È bello vederti (It's good to see you)!" Violet said, extending her hand towards me. "Dove sei stato (Where have you been)?"

Smiling at the woman before me, I shook her hand.

"Il, solito. Sto solo cercando di evitare di essere colpito dallere meteore (Eh, the usual. Just trying to keep from getting smashed by meteors)." I said, causing Violet to gasp.

"Veramente (Really)?! Eri così vicino a uno (You were that close to one)?!" She exclaimed.

"Can you please just speak English?" Ms. Grace asked, glaring at Violet and I.

"Sorry, Ms. Grace. Luke and I were just talking about what happened the day he was absent from school." Violet said.

"What happened?" Ms. Grace inquired.

"I was almost squashed by a giant meteor. Though, to be fair, I was saved by my next door neightbor, Rose-Mary." I told her, gestering towards Rose who looked away sheepishly.

"Wow, we have a hero in our class." The nerd I had met several weeks earlier said, earning a glare from Ms. Grace. "What?! I meant it as a compliment!"

"I'm sorry about that, Luke. I had originally thought you had skipped class before our test." Ms. Grace told me. "I heard you were in detention for standing up for your friend." She whispered from beside me.

"Eh, it's not a big deal." I replied. "Just me being me."

"Well regardless, you will still need to take the test. Though, today we're going into the new Gymnasium for the physical exam." Ms. Grace said before walking over to er desk and proceeding to take role call.

By the time we were done, it was a little after 8:15.

As everyone walked in a straight line down the halls leading to what used to be the football field, I took notice of all of the armed soldiers and scientists keeping an eye on everyone.

Once we were inside the large tent that encapsolated the football field, I could see what appeared to be every student, teacher and faculty member from the school.

One by one, each student and teacher was told to hold out the crystal, or crystals, in their possession before they were examined with several handheld devices that would either make a beep or cause a bit of static to be heard from all around the room.

Anyone who made the devices beep were taking to one side of the tent while anyone who caused the static sound were taken to another.

I watched as Rose was put through the same examination, however she didn't make the devices beep or cause a static sound.

"Hmm... This is odd." The scientist said. When he picked up her crystal, he immediately dropped it into her hand as if just touching the object, even with gloves, was painful. Instead of getting angry, the scientist seemed far more intrigued than anything. "Talk her to room 32 with the others."

I then continued to watch as several armed soldiers grabbed Rose and took her out of the tent.

When it was my turn, the scientist scrunched his eyebrows together as I took out my black crystal and showed it to him. Evidently, this warrented him to call more scientists as he made a simple gesture to one of the soldiers standing guard and within a few moments I was surrounded by several scientists, each of whom were taking notes and proding me with different equipment.

Then, they touched the crystal.

As soon as the man touched the crystal, he seemed to lose all color in his face as if emotionally drained, or terrified.

Instead of getting away from me, the other scientists took note of this and scanned the crystal while in my possession.

"Odd." One scientist commented. "The electrical charge around this one is far more than any of the others..."

"Do you have any more crystals in your possession?" Another scientist asked. "We need to document the effects of different crystals in someone's possession."

"Why?" I asked.

Instead of getting an answer, a female soldier walked up to me, grabbed my arm, and yanked me away from the scientists before leading me into a solitary room.

"We believe there's a war coming." The soldier said.

I looked at her name tag which read 'Blackborne'.

"Aren't we always in war?" I asked. "I mean, we've been at war with people since before the founding of our Country."

Officer Blackborne just shook her head.

"No. I mean a war that has humanity as the prize." Blackborne said.

For a moment, I looked at her as if she was crazy.

"You mean to tell me that Angels and Demons, Hell and Heaven, God and the Devil are going to be coming to Earth and fighting for humans?" I asked, making it obvious I thought she was crazy. "And what? Humanity will need to fight for their lives!"

The soldier didn't flinch at my sarcasm, or even appear angry.

Instead, she took out a remote and pressed a green button revealing a video on the wall to start playing.

On the video, there was humanoid beasts in cages screaming at soldiers and scientists, pleading to be let free.

In the corner, I could see a female woman with the lower half of a snake comforting three little children, one being a child with cat-like features, the other a child with dog-like features and finally a little boy who had partially scaly skin and tail.

"No. I mean a war where fantasy meets reality. A war where every mythological beasts, Deity, extra terrestrial being is either fighting to preserve humanity or destroy it." Officer Blackborne said.

"Fine." I replied, taking out the other crystals I had tucked away. "I have more at my house."

She looked at me with curiosity.

"Why are you carrying so many?" She asked.

"Because, there are different things you can do when you have more than one on you." I replied.

"Like what?" Blackborne asked, completely intrigued.

Instead of replying, I closed my eyes and willed the my black crystal to form a Colt 1911.

I then unloaded the gun right before her eyes and showed her that each of the crystals had formed a perfect .45 caliber bullet.

"Interesting... What else can you do with them?" She asked.

I then willed another crystal to form a silver gauntlet on my hand, then several others to form greaves around my pants and boots.

"Not only can they be used as weapons, but they can be used to protect the user as well?" Blackborne gasped. "Can you fire the gun?"

I just pointed the barrel at a wall across the room, leading outside and pulled the trigger.

Unlike a regular bullet, this one punctured through the wall and straight into the ground.

"Do you need to constantly reload the gun, or how do you supply the ammunition?" She inquired.

"The crystal detached part of the crystal vanishes once it's been returned back to it's original form." I told her. "This means that you could have, in theory, an endless amount of ammunition."

"What about something bigger? Could it form an automatic weapon?"

"You would need to know the ins and outs of the weapon you're creating. Each individual part would need to be considered when creating intricate devices like this, otherwise you'd probably end up hurting yourself."

"Interesting..." She whispered.

"Before I help you any further, I want to see Rose-Mary Lillith Johnson, Maria and Madison Kennedy, Emilia Ginger Brooks as well as Megan, Ella and Clementine Walker." I told her.

I watched as for the first time since we met, she'd finally stared to become angry.

"What makes you think we need your help anymore? You already showed me everything I need to know about these crystals." She replied angrily.

"Because you don't even know what I did in order to create those things. That, and there's a stronger and weaker version of these crystals." I said. "I'm sure you're superiors would like to know that these can break."

For a moment, she seemed to contemplate what I had told her before she looked at me and groaned.

"Fine. I'll take you to see them." Officer Blackborne replied.

We proceeded to walk down the hall and towards room 32 where the scientist from before had taken Rose.

As we walked inside, I found that the only occupants were the only people I wanted to see...

My sisters. My friends. And...

"LUCA!" Emily screamed as she surged forward and wrapped her arms around me. "Oh my God! Where were you?!"

For once, I was far to surprised to even move.

Emily had, for once in the time that I'd known her, screamed. Not her usual, soft tone of voice scream, but an actual, full on high-pitched vocal scream.

"Wait...Luca?" Rose asked. "I thought your name was 'Luke'?"

"That's because he and I regressed in age. We were originally 19 a couple of weeks ago. Now, we're 15 and kicking asses." Maria told her.

"Luca? Luca... You mean Luca Evens Walker, correct?" Officer Blackborne asked.

I nodded.

"My superiors have been trying to find you for several months now." She said. "You need to come with me."

"You can't take him!" Emily exclaimed, back to her more timid voice. "I just got him back and now you're taking him again?!"

"I need to, Ms. Emilia Brooks. All of you may be more advanced when it comes to the uses of these crystals, but Mr. Walker here literally wrote the book on Psychic Energy and it's purposes on this Earth." Officer Brooks said. "With him, we could learn how to save humanity before the war is lost."

"Wait...What war?" Madison asked. "What do you mean 'save humanity'? What are you trying to save us from?!"

"It's okay, girls. I'll be back before you know it." I told them, gently forcing Emily's hands off of me. "I'll be back soon. You'll see."

We ended up leaving Emily crying with my sisters and friends holding her.

I hate to say that it hurt leaving her like that, but I have to. For her sake and for the sake of the people I care about.

At least, that's what I'd like to tell myself.

We proceeded to get into a car, well military style hummer decked out with a large gun on the roof, then take off towards the back streets of my town.

We drove for several hours before ending up at an Private Airport.

Before I even got out of the vehicle, my door became surrounded by several armed soldiers who opened the door and dragged me outside and towards a small building a few yards away.

I looked over to Officer Blackborne and found that she wasn't being dragged. Instead, she was walking just a few feet beside the soldiers and only stepped in front of us to talk to what I assumed was some kind of General.

"Sargent Blackborne. It's a pleasure to see you." The General said. The General, for some strange reason, looked a lot like Ms. Blackborne.

"Of course, General Blackborne." She replied. "I've brought Mr. Walker. He seems to know more about these crystals than any of our scientists."

Of course. I thought to myself. They're mother and daughter.

The General looked at me and waved her hand, causing the soldiers to let go of me.

"I apologize for the harsh treatment, Mr. Walker." She said. "But, you must see why we're so up tight, even for a Military Research Facility."

"You're studying the other life-forms that have come to our world. That, and you're conducting research on the crystals that appeared on the Night of a Thousand Lights, am I correct?" I asked, to which she nodded.

"Glade to see you're more informed than most citizens." The General said. "Though, we're also conducting studies on Psychics."

At her last words, I felt my blood freeze over.

"Yes, we know about your books on Magic and Auras. We also know that you wouldn't have been able to write those, and with such accuracy, unless you were a Psychic as well." She said, seemingly noticing my shock. "Although, that was thanks to your principal, Mrs. Devine."

All I could do was curse in my head as the one person, outside of my friends and family, who knew about me being psychic had told the government about my previous abilities.

"Then you should know that I no longer have any abilities." I replied. "I lost all of my abilities before the Night of a Thousand Lights."

"Yes, we had figured that as a possibility since Ms. Devine could no longer sense you." Sargent Blackborne said, cutting in on her mother's and my conversation.

"Then what do you want with me now? I mean, I no longer have powers so what use am I to you?" I asked.

"You have more information on these crystals than any one of our scientists. You know what these crystals can do. You have experience with Psychics and the things they can do." The General said. "You can also teach our soldiers how to better defend themselves against what's coming."

"You mean the Apocalypse, right?" I inquired.

"Something like that, yes." Her daughter replied.

"Hail to the Apocalypse." I joked as I followed Mother and Daughter further into the base.