Hey everybody! Thanks to topazchick08, harryrulesmyworld, HeartFout, Bubble Gum, Irma, Evil Jay Lin, mickey & Elementalflame for all of the AMAZING reviews! I just got a GREAT idea for the explanation of all these events, so expect some really good last chapters.

Irma: YES! It's finally over!

Hay Lin: Weren't you listening last chapter? There's a little thing called a SEQUEL coming our way.

Irma: …I HATE this author.

KaNdRaKaRgrl: I love you too, Irma. I don't own WITCH, just like I haven't for the last FOURTEEN chapters.

Chapter 15

Red & Blue

Five days had passed since the purely lucky freedom from the Heatherfield County Jail, five long days, every minute stretching into its own mini eternity, five long days that gave each guardian twenty four hours to let their thoughts on the entire sordid situation run a marathon through their scrambling heads.

Will Vandom, leader that she was, consumed herself in worry, worry of her friends, of Candracar, worry of what would happen to W.I.T.C.H. if this kept up any longer. Irma drowned herself in the sooth of her radio, her voice carrying her off to the land of what could have been. Taranee spent most of her anger on the basketball court, slamming the ball through the net every time the reality that she didn't know what was going on boiled up into her thoughts. If there was one thing Taranee Cook couldn't stand, it was not knowing.

Cornelia, however, couldn't help but feel her face flush with resentment as she thought of Irma. She never had completely trusted her, mostly because of the fact that there was never a moment of peace once they got a fight going. But she guessed that it was because of what the water girl had been accused of. Irma had before abused her powers, and now, she was only further proving that she might just be unfit for guardianship.

Hay Lin was the only one able to sleep peacefully. Getting Irma out of prison was a burden that her conscience was able to heft off her shoulders. Now, she simply waited in slumber for an alarm clock to slice through her dreams, dreams of red and blue winding down below her, coming up to meet her, and waking up before anything else could happen.

When dusk began to fall and Hay Lin's musings ceased, Will had corralled the entire group, save Hay Lin, over to a park nearby.

"Okay, before Hay Lin gets here, we need to get to the bottom of this. Irma…"

"Way ahead of you." Irma closed her eyes, hands out in front of her, and minutes later she unsheathed her vision to the mirror image of herself, the astral drop she loved to hate.

"Okay look, I need to know what you remember from the night the Silver Dragon flooded," Irma said, tone interrogative all the way.

Astral Irma put a finger to her chin and looked up, obviously faking deep thought. "Hmm…I know! Hang on, I lost it." After five minutes of the magic disappearing memory trick, Irma marched up her astral drop and cracked her knuckles threateningly. "Tell you what," she said. "If your memory meets your mouth, I'll cancel my fist's meeting with your face!"

The water girl's slew of menace only served her copy's smirk. "On the night the Silver Dragon was flooded…we broke into what was left and stole Chen Lin."

Irma stood stock still, one hand behind her back, shoulders quaking with bottled angst as she absorbed the truth. "So…" she started, and while Taranee, Will and Cornelia started to back up out of fear, the astral drop stayed put, apparently amused at Irma's show of seemingly complacent fury. "It was…it was YOU! YOU CAUSED THIS WHOLE MESS YOU AREN'T EVEN SUPPOSED TO BE ABLE TO BE REAL WITHOUT ME SAYING SO SO WHY ARE YOU EVEN HERE!"

Irma finished her tirade; face flushed with anger, and revealed a bowling ball-sized sphere of water hovering just above her hand and sent it flying into the astral drop's smiling face. With little rivers making themselves at home on skin, the astral drop simply lifted her hand and within seconds, her face was perfectly clear, the smooth, creamy skin unblemished.

"Oblivious as always," the copy smirked. "Typical Irma. You really have no idea what you're up against, do you?"

"Yeah I do, a copy who thinks she's all that and can't just say stuff straight out!" Irma threw back, silent red tinges of anger rising up to her face in a furious blush of rage.

Before the astral drop could open its mouth in reply, Hay Lin came tearing through the park's open gate, head snapping over her shoulder in fear. Reaching the group, she ran behind Irma and clamped her hands on her shoulders, cowering behind the friend she hadn't spoken to in five days straight.

"Hay Lin, what in the name of Candracar–"

Fast forward about ten seconds, and enter Hay Lin's astral drop, touching down from a chasing flight through Heatherfield. Eyes of near black and blue locked in a stare of fire as the astral drops faced each other, as if a grudge of tainted friendship had after centuries rekindled now. The girls could only stand by and watch as the copies stood opposite each other, looking about ready to kill the brave one to speak up and interrupt their staring contest.

Finally, Irma stepped forward, getting sick of silence. "Okay, would someone, anyone, mind telling us what's going on here?" Hay Lin nodded along, stepping out from behind the shelter of her best friend.

The drops' eyes strayed over to their hosts, pearly white teeth gleaming, reflections of malice voiced by none. And before they regained their place in the girls' souls, Irma and Hay Lin could have sworn they saw a flash of scales, a metallic flurry of fang and tooth and nail before white engulfed their vision, control seeming to disappear as fast as consciousness as they felt spurts of power come as often as the cries of concern made their way out of the mouths of the other three guardians. And as the girls were whisked away, only broken past filled their heads, an image of two mountains, and a pink crystal hanging in their middle.

Okay, not exactly my best chapter ever, but this was only meant to set up the next three or four, which will be a LOT more exciting & revealing. So the faster you review, the faster I update! Let's make it…82 reviews & I'll update. So hit that magic GO button & send me your review!