Thanks for the reviews Cowgoil10, DreamingNik, and Fehr's carebear.
Cowgoil10 - Michael is a good dad.
DreamingNik - Glad you like the story and thanks for the suggestion. I made a list of all the kids and their powers for the next chapter. I hope that will help make things less confusing.
Fehr's carebear - Making them act like their total opposites has been fun, I'm glad you like it too.
Chapter 17 - Pod Squad Meeting
When Zan and Beth got back to the apartment they immediately started looking for anything that could help them figure out who The Following were. By the time they were done Michael's apartment looked worse then Amy's house. While she was looking in her father's bedroom, Beth happened to come across a box full of papers that she had seen earlier that day when they had been looking for the crystal. Before she had just glanced in the box but since the crystal wasn't in there she moved on. But now she looked closely at the contents of the box. The stack she picked up was several papers printed off of the computer, they were papers copied from a website. When she saw what the site was devoted to she called her brother.
"Zan! I've found what we've been looking for!" He quickly came in the room.
"What is it?" he asked.
"There're pages from The Following's website." she said showing him what she had found.
"Well that was easy." Zan said. He picked up the box and carried it into the living room so they could look at them.
"You take some and I'll take some. Read every page, we need as much info on these people as possible." he said. She nodded and grabbed more out of the box for herself.
Looking through the box they found more than just copies. There were sketches that had been drawn of the crystal, some papers with scribbled notes of dreams or visions (they weren't sure which), as well as photographs and maps of a building that was owned by The Following.
Seeing all this they realized what had happened. Either Michael, Maria or both of them had seen visions of the crystal and had found out that The Following were keeping it in the building in the pictures. They had apparently stolen it and were curious as to what it did and used it, which was why Zan and Beth had suddenly appeared in their parents time, and since the crystal had been stolen from them The Following kidnapped Amy to get it back.
"What have they gotten us into?" Beth asked to no one in particular.
In the early morning hours they had both nodded off to sleep. Zan had been sitting on the floor leaning on the couch, while Beth was sitting on the couch with her legs pulled up beside her. And that's the same place they were when Zan woke up to the midday sun.
Zan woke up startled at first, not knowing where he was. But then the events of the past day came rushing back to him. Man, what a long night. He thought as he looked at his watch to see what time it was. 11:30! We slept all morning! We should have been up hours ago! He said to himself as he got up off the floor to wake his sister up too. Wanting to have a little fun amidst this tragedy and not wanting to wake her up himself, for fear of what she might do, he used his powers to make an alarm clock beside her head. Then he just stood back and watched the fun.
Beth was having a dream about her and Andon. She had finally gotten up the nerve to tell him what she really was. When she had finished her story she looked at him hoping he would be able to except it. He was silent for a little while, but then he opened his mouth to speak, BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!
Not wanting to lose her dream she kept her eyes closed as she lifted her hand and used her powers to set the clock on fire. BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! Irritated she quickly froze it and sent it flying across the room where it hit the wall and shattered. Zan knew she would only go back to sleep so he quickly made another.
Beth had just started to fall back into her dream when BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! Completely confused as to how the clock still worked and mad that it kept interrupting her dream, she jumped up and turned to the clock only to find it untouched. She starred at the clock sitting before her baffled. Then she heard laughing and looked over to find Zan rolling from laughter on the floor.
"I can't believe you did that!!" she screamed.
"Well you needed to get up and I didn't want what happened to that clock to happen to me." he said when he had finally stopped laughing. Glancing over at where he had pointed, Beth saw the shattered remains of the charred, frozen clock. She smiled realizing that she probably would have done something to him, maybe not that extreme but something.
"You still shouldn't have done it." she said not wanting him to know that he was right.
"If I make you breakfast will up forgive me?" he asked.
"That's a really nice offer and all Zan, but I really want something more than toast for breakfast." she said thinking about his cooking skills or lack there of.
"Hey, I'm not that bad." he said defending himself.
"Okay, you're not that bad, but how about I make breakfast anyway."
"Only if you make me my favorite." he said smiling.
"Bacon, eggs, and Tabasco it is." she said as she headed for the kitchen.
"Zan we can't do this!" Beth said frustrated. After breakfast they had started to form a plan from all of the information they had found.
"We don't know how to do this secret agent, spy stuff!" she said when he didn't seem to hear her.
"Beth, this has nothing to do with spies." Zan stated.
"Mom, Dad, and the rest of the adults know how to handle this stuff but we don't. We've never had to, they made sure of it." she said ignoring his last statement.
"Well if we want to get Gran back we're going to have to learn." he said. She glared at him.
"You're right." he said at last.
"I am?" she said surprised that he would admit it. They were both stubborn, just like their parents.
"Yes, you're right. The adults know how to handle this stuff, they've done it many times before. Which is why I think we should tell them what's going on."
"What! Are you insane? We can't let them know we're from the future or…."
"I didn't say we would tell them we're from the future." Zan said cutting her off. "I said we should tell them what's going on. As in Gran being kidnapped."
"Do you really think we should tell them?" she asked unsure.
"You said yourself that they know what to do and we don't, besides Dad and Mom would have told them as soon as they had found out if things hadn't got messed up like they did."
"I guess your right. But how are we going to get them all together to tell them?" just as she finished speaking the phone rang.
"Hello?" Zan said wondering who would be calling.
"Michael, is Maria with you? None of us have seen her all day and I've tried calling her cell and her home but no one answered." Liz said.
"Yeah, she's here."
"I was so worried."
"Do you want to talk to her, Liz?" Zan asked.
"Could I?" Zan handed the phone to Beth.
"Hey Liz, what's up." she said.
"Maria, I was so worried about you. I'm glad you're ok. Why aren't you at school?"
"I'll tell you later." Beth said not sure what else to say.
"Promise." Liz said
"Promise."
"Okay. By the way there's a Pod Squad meeting at Michael's after school. Well I have to get back to class."
"Ok. Bye, Liz." said Beth
"Bye." Beth hung up and looked at her brother.
"What's a Pod Squad meeting?" asked a very confused Beth.
"I don't know why?"
"Because apparently there's going to be one here after school."
"What! We have to much stuff to do. You're going to have to call her back and tell her she has to have her stupid little meeting somewhere else." he said.
"I can't call her back she's at school." Beth said.
"Well then we better clean this place up. We both know mom would not stand for even a stupid meeting to be held in this mess."
"I'll take the kitchen, you take the living room and bathroom, then we'll both do the bedroom." she said getting up.
"Aye Aye, Captain." Zan said then dodged the pillow that came flying at him.
All to soon the others had arrived and they all were sitting around the living room waiting for Max to explain why he had called the meeting.
"Ok I think we should start by telling everyone what happened to you two yesterday." Max said to Zan and Beth. When they had finished their story everyone, but Max and Isabel who had already heard it, started asking questions.
"Are you two okay?"
"Why did it happen?"
"Why didn't you guys tell us this sooner?"
"Quiet everyone!" Isabel yelled over the talking. "They are both fine and they told you now so calm down and let us get back to the main reason we are here."
"If that wasn't the reason than what is?" asked Liz.
"I believe that would be Kyle's question, Why did it happen?" Max said. Kyle smiled.
"We know why it happened." Zan said before anyone could say anything else. Everyone including Beth looked at him. "The crystal did it." he said after a minute.
"What do you mean the crystal did it? You told us you didn't know where it was." Isabel said, hurt that they would lie.
"What crystal?" Alex asked.
"It's from our home planet. And they told us it's for time travel not crazy wind storms in the granolith chamber." Max said, also hurt. At the mention of time travel Alex, Kyle, and Ava where shocked into silence. Only Zan noticed that Liz was not fazed by the revelation.
"Are you saying that there is some crystal that can take us back in time! This is awesome there are so many things I want to change!" said an excited Kyle.
"Dude, haven't you ever watched time travel movies? You can't just go back and change things without serious consequences in the future." Alex said.
"Guys, can we focus here please." Liz said politely trying to get back on the subject. "How do you know the crystal is responsible and do you know why it did that?"
"We're not sure why it did this to us." Beth said avoiding the first question.
"Do you know where it is?" Alex asked.
"No, we went to the chamber yesterday to find it, but it was gone. Do you think someone could have stolen it." Zan asked worried.
"No one stole it." Ava said.
"How do you know?" Kyle asked his girlfriend.
"Because I have it." she said as she pulled it out of her coat pocket and set it on the table. "I went there yesterday, because I needed some time alone and I saw this sticking out of the granolith. I didn't know what it was so I took it. I was going to bring it up later in the meeting." Beth took the crystal off the table and looked at Zan.
"Do you know what this means." she said happily.
"We can save her." he said smiling.
"Who can you save?" Liz asked.
"Why have you two been so cryptic lately?" Max asked.
"Gr....Mom's been kidnapped." Beth corrected after Zanelbowed her in the side.
"What?!"
"Who?"
"When?"
"Why?" Were the startled replies.
"The Following has her. They want the crystal back." Beth said.
"What do you mean back?" Kyle asked, but before he could finish Zan brought out a box and set it down in front of the group.
"This box contains everything we know about The Following. They had the crystal originally, but we stole it. Now they want it back." Zan said.
After the group had looked through most of the contents of the box, they began to plan what to do next.
"I guess the best place to start is for you to tell us how you got in the first time." Max said to Zan and Beth.
"We have to do it don't we." Beth asked her brother, he merely nodded.
"Well......uh......we can't tell you what you want to know." Zan said.
"Why not? Why are you two constantly keeping us in the dark?" Max asked.
"Yeah, what's really going on?" Alex asked.
"Ok.......it's because were.......well....."Zan said trailing off, but then beth eldows him.
"We're not Michael and Maria." he said.
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