Float high above the world, Van watches the world turn; he feels as though he is a very vivid dream. He looks up as the sunburns four times larger in the sky. As he looks back at the world, it is frozen, iced over with large glaciers gouging out the land. A great shadow passes over his head. He tries to see it, but the sun blinds him. "Where am I?" asked Van. He is suddenly caught in a tremendous gale that throws him helplessly upward.

He now floats in a vast darkness. His body is entirely naked; he feels a piercing pain in his side as he turns and grabs at it. Feeling no cut, he looks around and notices his body glows with a strange energy. His gaze draws upward as he is showered in a cascade of power; he begins to scream as he is ignited on fire. Burning into nothingness as his body turns to dust and blows away.

Van shoots up, screaming; he frantically looks around as he is nothing but the darkness and familiarity of his bedroom. He looks over at his clock as it reads 3:44 AM. "What the hell is happening to me!" while Van picks the clock up and pulls it out of the wall and tosses it against the wall, smashes it to pieces. He gets up and walks half-naked across his room. He opens the door and isn't surprised by the giant eyeball that is staring at him. "I see, a dream... going into a dream?" the eye blinked and moved back. Sunlight flooded his bedroom. As his room fell apart, he was drifting in midair. High above a large continent, he watched as the sun shone brighter than he had ever seen before. He glides above the island, and the shape was familiar to him, though he cannot remember why.

"Welcome to Lemuria." said a man who appeared next to Van. He was stunningly handsome and wore a toga-like garment tied around his waist with some kind of weaved cord.

"Lemuria? Where and what in hell is that?" said Van as the figure began to laugh.

"Hell?" said the figure as he let out another hearty laugh. "It is nowhere near there. See before you, you are currently looking at it, this is both ancestral homes of the not only the Daemon that threaten our very lives but of the Shaman that combat them."

"The what? Demons? How can I take you serious when your in a fucking toga." the man brushed his dark locks from his sight and closed his eyes as a gust of wind begins to blow.

"This is a garment that does not restrict me in battle, if you must know." said the man. Van is barely holding his place in the air.

"Don't fight it. The wind is never your enemy." as the man suddenly shot like a bullet towards the island. Van watched but forgot he was fighting that same wind, and just as quickly following after him, he begins to scream as he rockets past his mate. He reaches out towards the man who remained as calm as a cucumber.

"HELP ME YOU MOTHER FUCKER!" screamed Van.

"You are profane... Don't you listen? How can we possibly share the same..." as a gust of the wind whistled past Van's ears. Though he tried, he misses a large part of what the man is trying to say. "'ecially when you hold a familiar as reliable as the eagle."

"What do we share?" asked Van as his question was met with a rather annoyed look.

Then out of the corner of his eye, he spots something glistening on the horizon as the man grabs him and throws him out of the way of a large energy blast. Another moment passes intense silence as he is suddenly jerked in a different direction as volley after volley of energy spears rain from the sun. As vast darkness covers the once blue ocean, the darkness was moving, like an amoeba absorbing its food.

"I'm so sorry. I have completely forgotten my manners... and introductions! I'm Ra-hab... Shamshel." as he suddenly flew downward, towards what must be his inevitable demise as the island light up. With explosions that reached out and brilliantly shown every respective color of the rainbow.

"Wait?" as Van begins to be pulled up and away from the island. "Wait, goddamn it!" as his speed increases. "What the hell are these Daemon?!" Now back in his room, he opens his eyes and sits up. Dawn is just breaking, the sun just beginning to come through his bedside window. He looked down and noticed a puck-shaped device on the stand next to his bed.

[November 1, 2004. Forest Reserve.]

Deep within the Daemon's stronghold. Kirk sits in Wilna's study. He watches her as she measures various powders and liquids, adding them to her cauldron. "My Prince, you seem perplexed with some matters?" as Wilina's gaze strays from her task at hand and turns towards the Prince's.

"Lina, I've a great many things on my mind..." as Kierka stands and leaves the room. He walks into the center room; Rime is sitting on the floor playing with the skeletal arm of one of the slain teens. He looks up, doe-eyed, but as he realizes that it is the Prince, he quickly shakes his head, and his face turns a grim shade. He quickly stands and tosses the arm to the ground.

"Mourning my Prince." Kierka shots a glance at Rime.

"Everyday, Chamberlain, and I will continue to mourn our people until we've... Until I have killed every single one of these damned Homo sapiens! Mornia!" as his Prince's sword appeared from out of the shadows. She immediately takes a knee.

"What is they bidding, my Prince?" as she remained kneeling.

"Hmm, go out to the city..." as he handed her a small ebon idol from his belt. "Take this and go collect manna, I don't care from where or from who." Mornia carefully cradled it in her hands.

"My Prince, what... What is that?" asked Rime. Kierka turned and smirked at Rime.

"It's is a relic from my father..."

Kierka's mind went back to a time long ago. He overlooked the horizon as his father flooded onto the balcony. His body was made up of the purest darkness, his face a statue of malice. Kierka a boy with the equivocal age of a human child around age six. He turns, looking gleeful towards his father. "Fafimikii, look! Isn't the sky pretty?" Vuidyfel looks on, not reacting to his son.

"Kinderchargen, when you look into the world, what do you see?" asked the King in a cold, emotionless voice.

"I see colors, blue, marigold... I can feel the wind on my face..." as the young Kierka turned to look at his father. The King, without even lifting his finger-picked his son up, choking him.

"Naivete... you lack all knowledge of this world... What you see are not colors, there are no feelings that you should feel... All I see is our manna enriched right that moves. When you can see the manna that flows like I do, then you will know a thousandth of who I am." as he tosses the child back into the balcony wall. "Stay out of my sight!" as Kierka ran back into the temple. Then his eye catches a glimpse of the ebon statue on one of the tables. He looks back a moment as a grimace covers the child's face. He snatches the idol as it makes a slight scraping noise. He glances back one more time before he bolted out of the room. Vuidyfel sees everything. His statuesque features soften for the briefest of moments as he allows himself to smile at his son's thievery.

"My Prince..." asked Rime. Kiera snaps out of his thought and looks upward. Sunlight shines through a hole above where they are standing. For a moment, he watches the dust circle around the two of them.

"I hate him old friend... I hate my father." as Mornia is long gone with the accursed keepsake.

Shugoshin Sentai Totemranger

霊神戦隊トーテムレンジャー (Guardian Deity Task Force Totemranger)

{{Opening theme:} Relient K "Who I am Hates Who I've been" from the Album: [Mmhmm]}

Divination 04: Ordeal.

[9:09 AM, Washington Memorial High School.]

Van is in his first-period class. The otherwise bustling room was in a lulled silence. It was just a typical day in his quiet first-period study hall. Sitting in the corner furthest from the door today. He sports a bright red hooded sweatshirt. He sat cross-armed, staring at the classroom clock that hung above the door. He was an ever-vigilant guard awaiting his subsequent shift to start and to get out of this class. He despised this class most of all. The preps and jocks were always gossiping about their teenage problems. Sometimes he envied that. But not today as much as he would like to deny it. Van was a straight-A student, a brain they'd label him. He scored 1190 on his PSATs.

He had been staring at the clock for over twenty minutes now. He was utterly bored to tears. He had been overhearing two girls' conversation about what looked better jeans that gave you an apple bottom or jeans that made you look taller. *"I wish you would both trip in the hall, roll down the stairs, and die. ~Sigh~ Oh, well, at least the class is almost done. If I have to listen to ten more minutes, I think I'd try to kill myself."* Then Van heard the sweet release as the school bell chimed its sickeningly happy chime. He got up and was out of the room long before anyone even realized that the bell rang.

He is in a hurry, though he always liked to make the impression he could care less. As he walked, he scanned the faces he passed, memorizing how they move their habits, gestures. It was a game that he played, much like one plays solitaire. Then the school crowd parted just for a brief moment, but it was enough for him to catch a glimpse of his current obsession. Walking up to a dark-haired girl as she was bent over. She was rummaging through her backpack that sat at the bottom of her locker.

"Good morning, Matusha." as he leans up against a neighboring locker. After a moment, the girl looks up from her safe, their eyes meet. The girl looks a second later, going back to her previous task.

"Good morning, Van." said Matusha. They had an unspoken agreement to appear as non-familiar with each other as possible when in public situations.

"So, um... Do you remember what happened after the funeral." Matusha looked up at Van with a surprised and annoyed glance. She stood up and, through her gritting teeth, whispers.

"Of course... we went to the mausoleum." as a fellow student walked up to the locker, Van was leaning on. Matusha leaned back, "Sorry about your cousin she was a good person." Van grabbed her arm and looked her deep in the eyes.

"That's not what I'm talking about... After that, after we had that talk by the mausoleum when I left. Did you see where I went?" Matusha looked confused.

"No, after our talk... I left and went to my car and drove home." Van let her arms go and turned on his heel, and left her in the crowded hall.

He walked down the hall and to his own locker that sat around the corner in a nook by the second-floor girl's lavatory. He opened it and set it in a notebook he had been carrying. He grabbed his next period books, and a few papers fell out. They were wedged in between the books. He bent down and picked the pages up. He glanced at them and realized they were notes written to him from Lex. His jaw tightened as he crumpled them up and threw them into his locker. The bells chime once again. This time, it was the warning bell. Van walked out of his nook and backed down the hall; he rounded the corner and up headed right up the stairs to the third floor.

He walks right into the room as the final bell rings. Taking his seat, he was not the last one in the room, which was left for the stoners and the students in special ed. Those kids always had escorts. This was second-period Geography 3 or World Geography; it was the same class he had taken in middle school. But back then, you didn't run the risk of getting hit on by the teacher. As Mrs. Hoffner entered the room, she seemed to have an almost sick interest in younger men. Honestly, Van found it creepy, he probably wouldn't think it would be so bad, but she was a dinosaur that the ice age forgot. She had tried to hit on Van on a couple occasions, mostly waiting for the bell to ring and cornering him into awkward conversations. Van lets out a heavyset sigh at the memories.

"Today class." as she began to walk around the room, and to better illustrate, Mrs. Hoffner was a woman in her late 50's. She wore incredibly high mini skirts and her legs. You could see a map of blue veins that pulsate as Mrs. Hoffner walks around the classroom. She kept her hair back in a bun, but stray hairs fizzled out like an explosion, a matted mass of protein, and she wore the perfume that could have been much better suited as lighter fluid. It really was remarkable in a scientific kind of way, completely throwing Darwinism out the window.

Today was very odd, odder than most. No matter how hard Van tries, he just could not stay focused. This time Van stared at a window, and his mind was in a state of nothingness. He was still in shock about Lex's death. He had another thought in the back of his mind, he was supposed to do something today and then. He, as his eyes moved to see a small calendar that sat on Hoffner's desk. Like, a tidal wave crashing against the coastal rock, it hit Vance. He felt so dumb. Today was the day his parents died.

On November 1, 1996.

They were on their way back from a doctor's visit to Seattle. Vance had found out his heart was underdeveloped. He was born with only three chambers. They only caught it because he had suddenly collapsed during a session of afternoon recess. His older brother Jaycen had stayed with their grandparents over the few days that his parents spent. The operation was a success, and that day they were finally going to be heading home after his week of recuperation. A snowstorm had come over the state earlier in the week, and they had wondered if they should even attempt a drive home. They were second-guessing; the storm showed signs of ending, so they thought it all right to leave. The mixture of snow with rain on the drive home threw the family for a tizzy as their car became lost on a slick stretch of highway. A patch of black ice sent the car veering. They spun into oncoming traffic and were struck by a truck going over 80 mph, throwing the car into a torrent as it rocketed to the edge of the road, which then sent the car into a roll. Van's would be the only survivor, his father was severely injured by the crash but was ultimately killed by his own airbag, and his mother, on the other hand, was impaled by one of the trees that the car had unfortunately rolled over.

Jaycen had decided, since he was older, by almost 10 years, to drop out of school so that he would support the both of them. By the time the courts could arraign any hearings, he was already past 18 and had 2 steady jobs. He was awarded custody of his brother and did his very best now that he was to be his sibling and his parental figure. But every year, no matter how busy they both were, they took the day off from everything to pay tribute to their parents.

Now that he felt stupid, he felt horrible, how could he have forgotten such an important date like this? Then, it hit him. All those silly dreams he had been having had screwed up his thinking. He had to make this right. So, he raised his hand, Mrs. Hoffner looked over at him. "Yes, Vance. What is it, honey?" Van winced a little and stood up, walking over to her, he had a reputation to uphold, and he didn't want anyone to pity him.

"I have to leave, I have an appointment." said Van.

"Do you have a note?." asked Mrs. Hoffner.

"Uh, no..." said Van as he rolled his eyes and began to leave the class.

"Without one you can't leave that's in the student handbook." as he walked away, he flipped her the bird. "Mr. Ergovich detention!" as Van stopped dead in his tracks, he turned ever so slowly and looked like a somewhat twisted thought in his head.

"Well isn't that nice... You mind upgrading that to a suspension for me?"

"Why would I do that?" said the teacher. Van smiled as he was waiting for just this sort of moment.

"Well, for one. You're an old moldy, dried up crone. That attempts to feel sexy hitting on guys, centuries younger than you. You get your jollies off, thinking about pubescent boys touching you? You skanky, old, dusty bitch!" said Van as he turned around and walked out of the room.

Another teacher had heard some kind of commotion and poked his head out of his class. He noticed Van as he walked nonchalantly past his classroom.

"Mr. Ergovich, now where are you off to?" Van stopped and looked at his least favorite math teacher.

"Well, Mr. Nattily, I've a very important place to be right now." Mr. Nattily had had Vance as a student for almost his entire high-school career. They both didn't really like each other, but they shared respect for one another. He nodded his head and closed the door. As Van again began to walk down the hall, he reached the third-floor staircase and skipped down them. He was now down to the second floor. He decided to go into the office.

As he walked into the office, he immediately noticed that the lights were off except for flickering over his head. Generally, as you enter the high school offices, you would be greeted by the three administrative assistants, aka the secretaries, but Vance saw no one to be seen on this venture. He did really even notice or care, fewer people he would have to explain himself to. Van turned and looked down at the first desk to his left; he picked up the phone. The thought had occurred it would be a lot easier to just use his cell phone; however, in case a rare case that anyone should catch him, he did not want to have it confiscated for 4 weeks. Van rolled his eyes at that thought and began to dial his house. As he waited, his eyes lingered around the room. He noticed papers as they lay scattered all over the desks, the floor everywhere. One of the wheeled chairs was partially embedded into the drywall adjacent to where he was standing. He could swear he heard someone rustling through papers, but as he looked around, he saw no one. Just then, Jaycen answered the phone. He sounded like he had just awoken.

"Hel... Hello?" said Jay.

"Hey, Jaycen... I'm calling to ask if you remembered what today is?" Van can hear him shifting through a stack of papers.

"Oh! Man, it's that day... Van, I have to call work... I have to tell them I'm taking the day off... Um, can we meet up by the school?" said Jaycen.

"Nah, Let's meet at the waterfront... you remember that park we used to visit? How about we meet there?" said Van. There was a long pause where Van could tell Jay was either thinking or still trying to wake up.

"That's on the other side of town... are you sure you want to walk all that distance?" said Jaycen.

"Ah, don't worry... I'll head to the park now. I'll meet you there and we can do our thing." said Vance.

"Alright... I'll call work and take a shower then I'll head over to the circus."

"Alright, see ya then." as Van hung up the school phone. He turned, and out of the corner of his eye, he saw something flash. He stopped and turned, walking past the desk, down a small hallway, he saw a pale figure hunched over. As he entered the little room filled with numerous filing cabinets. The figure heard the rustle of his feet on the papers and turned. Van felt a sinking feeling in his stomach as its head turned. Its single eye just caught the incoming light and shimmered a bright crimson. It began to growl as it stood dropping what Van recognized as one of the receptionists. Another appeared a little further down the hall dragging the school counselor's body with him. Van could see very shallow breathing. He turned his head slightly, and the one down the hall dropped its victim and launched itself towards him.

Van surprised stumbles back and over his own feet. He falls onto his back as the creature jumps and 11-inch blades grow from its left hand, it pierces down very fast, and he just barely moves his face out of the way as two of the claws graze his cheek. The other began to pull on his legs, ripping his pants. He looks and grabs a pen he jams it into the creature's eye. As it throws itself back. He manages to pull his legs away from the other and, with both feet, kicks the first one back. He manages to scurry up and saw the paper cutter. He ran towards it and grabbed the arm. He started undoing the nut and turned just as the second creature ran at him. He picked up the entire unit and swung it into the Serum. Just then, the nut twisted off as the blade comes off the cutting table, falling to the ground with a loud thud.

Van picked the Serum in the stomach, the creature hunched, and he swung the blade down, lodging it into its head. He lets go of the edge and falls back onto his butt as he looks at his hands tremble. He begins to hear the door open as he leaps to his feet and runs out, pushing another teacher out of the way. He turns as another small group of Serum comes bursting out of the wall of lockers. He turns and begins to run, bolting towards the stairs. A few of the faculty suddenly come out of their classrooms as he finished descending the steps. He stops, and as he leaves the building, he grabs the fire alarm and pulls it down.

[Silent Meadows Community and Technical College. 9:45 AM]

Alex walks up to the college's main doors. He feels an echo from across the spiritual plains as his head begins to flood with the screams of multiple people. He leans up against the door and grabs his head. Alex's knees buckle, and he falls over out cold.

Alex was now traveling through a shaft of innumerable points of light. His body was unburdened by weight, constrictions of clothing, only existing as the abstract ego-ethereal ghost. Is body is draw with extreme speed to the sight of the school. Serum patrolled the hallways as multiple teens, firefighters, and now police lay dead or dying. Then he was drawn as Mornia paced the nearly empty halls with a creature that resembled a gigantic leech, another accompanied them. Alex felt a great disturbance as the additional person was dressed in an outfit similar to his warrior form. This outfit had a distinct difference, but it appeared that a shaman had joined the Daemon. Then the figure looked up, and Alex suddenly began to feel tremendous pressure surrounding him.

"Stay out of my way Shaman! Do not try to interfere with our plans!"

Alex opens his eyes and sits up, his head spinning. He looks around, seeing no one around him. A small wave of relief washes over him, he picks himself up. "I've got to get to the high school!" as he starts to run, somewhat hesitantly, back over to his motorcycle. He jumps onto the bike, rolling the helmet in his hands as he slides it over his head. He turns the key and starts his cycle. He suddenly thinks and pulls out his totem dial. Turning it to the communicator, he calls out, "Sameji... Can you head to over to the high school?" called Alex.

"Which one?" asked Sameji. Alex thought and called back the image of the school.

"Meet me at Washington Memorial." as he clicked the motorcycle into gear and sped off towards the high school.

{Ending theme:} Ace of Base "Blooming 18" from the Album: [The Bridge]}

Next time on Shugoshin Sentai Totemranger...

Subjugation. A rising with powers that are to be developed. The joining by unseen allies begins. New members are met, and the advanced training will begin. The ocean will churn, Lightning will strike only to be interrupted with a new threat.All paths eventually connect, and the past is simply a stepping-stone for the boulder that wades in the ocean that will become our tomorrow.