Hey guys, Once again... I apologize for not writing quicker. I have slew of other projects on top of school that I need to tend to, so I kind of bounce here and there, completing a little bit at a time. Alright, so here you go!

xxxxx

Chapter 8: Fear the Flower!

Garet hastily ran around his room in search of something. "Where are my work gloves? I'm going to be late!" He, Felix, Piers, and the other workers were going to work on the northern gate of the Vale area that led outside of town. He had forgotten all about it while cleaning up the mess Breeze's "accident" made in his room.

"They're under your bed," Ember responded. Garet knelt down and reached under there, feeling around without looking.

"Ah!" he yelled as he quickly retracted his hand. "I felt something slimy under there! And it was moving." He peered under the bed, but it was too dark to see.

"Oh! Those are mine!" Forge announced. "Those are the worms I keep to lure the birds to the window."

"You… keep worms under my bed!?"

The Djinni nodded rapidly, amused by Garet's expression that combined feelings of irritation and being completely creeped out. A chill ran up the adept's spine.

"Get rid of them!" he commanded loudly. Breeze swooped under the piece of furniture and kicked out Garet's gloves.

"Thanks, Breeze," he said, slipping his hands into them and moving towards the door. Ember and Gale decided to tag along and hopped alongside him. "I'll be back in a few hours, you and Forge behave and don't break anything else," he said, not realizing whom he was talking to. Forge's mischievous tendencies and Breeze's destructive mishaps are not a good combination, and leaving them together without supervision is ill-advised. Garet was in too much of a hurry to realize his mistake.

While Breeze was under the bed, he just remembered he had Mia's letter in his little mailbag. "Wait, Garet! I have a letter fro-" the loud slam of the bedroom door cut him off. Garet was already gone and running down the road. "Aw darn."

Forge turned to the sheltered Djinni. "Want to play a game?"

"Pending. What be this game?"

"There's this huge rock in the back yard. Wanna go toss it around?"

"Big, heavy object hurdling through the air!? Sounds dangerous… let's go!" Breeze responded ecstatically.

"Yay! Onwards!" Forge yelled in similar enthusiasm. He hopped onto the windowsill, but Breeze did not follow. He turned around and saw that the purple elemental remained under Garet's bed. "Breeze! Come on! What are you doing?"

The Jupiter Djinni giggled and sang, "I'm under your bed, eating your wooorms!"

Forge gasped loudly. "Don't do that! Stop! Those are the source of amusement for tomorrow!" he protested before hopping under the bed to try to save his bait, or whatever was left of it.

xxxxx

At the heart of the newly built portion of Vault was a square where all of the roads converged. The center consisted of a large, round arrangement of flowers that framed a small monument in the middle. The monument itself was a simple altar that held a dazzling purple crystal whose size was about half the height of an average man and just as wide. It was the sole psynergy crystal that was found amongst the ruins of Vale, so it was erected in the center in remembrance of their ancient home.

Two creatures hopped out of the clusters of flowers and out into the road encircling the monument. One was a Venus Djinni, and its associate today was a Mercury Djinni. The blue elemental shuddered slightly as it focused its abilities, and a thin rain cloud formed above the arrangement to drizzle life-giving moisture atop the parched flowers.

The Venus Djinni did a small hop, signaling the other to stop. "Very good! That'll do!" she praised, turning to the blue creature. "Thanks so much Shade! We haven't had rain in so long, I was afraid my little garden would wither away."

"My pleasure, Flower!" Shade bowed, "the weather is indeed a bit dry for this time of year. We might get more rain next month."

Flower looked upon the garden surrounding the crystal centerpiece with deep, glowing pride. "Everything just looks perfect! Without that sentient tornado buzzing around these parts, I was finally able to complete my arrangement!"

"Are you referring to Breeze?"

"Eek!" she shushed him, "don't say his name! I'm afraid he might come back-"

"Gang way!" a high voice yelled from the distance. The two Djinn's attention was brought down the southern road and they saw a huge rock hurdling through the sky, heading right for them! They both shrieked and ducked out of the way as the boulder, roughly ten times the size of a watermelon, bounced through the flower bed, leaving several dents of damaged flora in its wake, before eventually rolling to a stop. Thankfully, it missed the crystal centerpiece.

Flower stood there and looked upon her ruined masterpiece in utter shock. Shade hopped up to her, but before he could say anything, a Jupiter Djinni landed right next to them.

"Oh damn!" he cursed when he saw the damage the rock had done, "That missed pass left quite an impression!" He was about to laugh, but when he turned to the other two Djinn, the urge quickly faded. Flower's eye was twitching, but she remained still. Shade was trying to elicit a response by waving his tail in front of her. "Hey, guys! What's up?" Breeze asked in cheerful obliviousness to the matter at hand.

"Breeze, it's nice to see you and all, but… dude, I think you should run," Shade suggested fearfully.

"Why?" Before his inquiry could be answered, his feathers ruffled as he felt a surge of psynergy very close by. Flower, now over her shock and deep into a phase best described as bloody rage, was engulfed in an aura of yellow psynergy.

"I will crush you!" she bellowed in the most terrifying voice Breeze had ever heard. Two large fragments of earth burst up from the ground, and were angrily melded into the shape of menacing hands. The left one balled into a fist and was shot toward the purple elemental!

"Uh oh…" he murmured. He hopped into the air just as the fist-shaped boulder crushed the ground he was standing on mere milliseconds before. "Eeeyah!" he screamed as he tried to fly away along the north road. He attempted to gain altitude, but one of the stone hands cut him off.

"Flower!" Shade called out to her as she continued to try to pummel Breeze, "we can just redo it! You're going to cause more unnecessary damage!"

"Oooooh… I assure you, the damage I'm trying to cause is quite necessary!" she said with so much anger, it caused Shade to take a step back. Breeze was gaining distance from her, but she wasn't about to let him go. "Get back here!"

"F-flower-"

"No!" she interrupted, "his purple ass is mine!" A small circle of light erupted around her as the piece of land she was standing on rose out of the ground with her atop it and gave chase to her prey.

"Oh, Gods…" Shade lamented as she flew away. A Mars Djinni formed right beside him and watched as Flower was having at it with Breeze with stone fists of fury.

"Wow, Breeze really should've have caught that pass," he said, with ever-so-slight amusement in his voice.

"Forge! What were you and Breeze doing with a freaking boulder?!"

Forge donned a mischievous expression. "We were playing catch! Psynergy with really heavy objects is a lot fun, y'know?"

"And dangerous!" Shade added, becoming slightly irritated with their utter lack of judgment.

"I know, right!? You should play with us next time!"

Shade's brow twitched angrily. He just hoped Flower won't damage anything too badly in her must-destroy-Breeze rage. Not surprisingly, this wasn't the first time. His previous shenanigans have obliterated her flower arrangements and invoked her anger many times before, but there was always the fear that someone would get seriously hurt one of these days.

Breeze dipped and dodged through the air as he avoided all manner of earthly attacks. The enraged Flower started to throw sharply pointed rocks at him, and every tree he flew by seemed to spring to life and try to ensnare him with psynergy-infused branches.

"Crap, crap, crap, crap!" he repeated to himself as he tried to dodge all the Venus Djinni's traps and projectiles. One of the stone fists just barely missed as he dropped from the air, but a nearby shrub burst into a flurry of vines and branches, constricting themselves around the little elemental. "Ah! No!" he yelled, trying to struggle free. The vines let him go with just enough time for the stone fists to wrap their powerful grip around him.

After the prey was caught, they brought it back to the angry elemental controlling them. "So, what have you got to say for yourself?" she asked blandly.

"I'm… sorry?" he responded, barely able to breathe in the tight grip. Her expression didn't change. "Can we, uh, talk about this?"

"I was willing to talk about it the first forty or so times you destroyed my garden!" she hissed, "this time, I'm going to personally pound some sense into you!"

"Hm… I see," Breeze said flatly. His eyes quickly flashed purple before a bright blast of lightning shot from the sky and struck the stony hands holding him place. The earthy structures were shattered and left a blinding cloud of dust that disoriented Flower and allowed him to fly away.

Flower coughed as the dust cleared around her. "Where did he go?!" she growled. She looked around and saw him still speeding down the north road towards the town exit. "Caught me off guard that time, but we shall see if it happens again!" She transformed into yellow light and melted into the ground, traveling along the road in hot pursuit.

xxxxx

"Okay got it?"

"Yeah, let's go"

"Alright, lift!"

"Ah! Wait! Losing my grip!"

"Okay, okay, drop it!"

Two young men were attempting to lift a very large, uncut, beam of wood a little ways outside of town. It was extremely heavy, and near impossible for just the two of them to move by themselves. The tree it came from was obviously massive.

"Ugh," groaned one of them, "Piers, why don't we cut this up before we move it?"

The blue-haired Lemurian shrugged. "We probably shouldn't, Felix. I think they said they don't want it cut yet. The planners probably have something in mind for it near the northern exit." On his shoulder sat a Mercury Djinni who nodded at everything he said.

"Fine," he said while stepping back and moving a sweaty lock of brown hair out of his eye, "we're just have to use a bit of psynergy."

"Alright."

Both men positioned themselves on either end of the beam and held out a hand. Closing their eyes, they focused their psynergy and engulfed the beam in ghostly light.

"Now let's move slowly…" Felix said as he started taking steps. Piers followed suit and the oversized item floated between, keeping pace. The duo kept going down the road until the northern exit of the town was in sight.

"Almost there!" The Mercury Djinni on Piers' shoulder shouted. Both were showing no signs of tiring as they near effortlessly escorted the beam towards the work area, but they stopped when they heard a strange sound. It was brief, but very loud crackling noise.

"What was that?" Piers asked, being sure to stay focused on keeping the object airborne.

Felix shrugged. "It sounded like lightning." They both looked up and saw no clouds in the sky. "Well, we'll check it out once we finish moving this thing." They started moving again, but Piers stopped once more.

"Wait, I hear something else," he said.

"What?" Felix asked. They both stood quietly and listened.

"Uwaaah! Gotta hide, gotta hide, gotta hide!" they heard in a rapid, panicky voice far away. The two adepts saw a purple spec speeding towards them from the sky. They both recognized that it was a Djinni, but were unable to tell which one it was.

"Who is that?" Piers asked, squinting his eyes to see if he could distinguish it. It's not like he could, since they all look identical anyway. The Djinni kept flying at full speed and flew straight into Piers' chest, fusing with his body. The sudden entry caused the water adept to break his concentration, dropping his side of the log on his foot. The pain that surged through his crushed appendage was so intense; he wasn't able to get out the tiniest of screams.

"Uh-oh," Felix said as he began to lose control of his side. The end result was similar; it landed on the poor adept's foot. Both of them writhed in pain and their faces turned countless shades of red.

"Ah! Piers!" the Mercury Djinni cried out in concern, "Breeze! What the hell are you doing!?" Breeze, who was inside of Piers, felt the pain that he had indirectly inflicted upon him.

Eeep! Totally sorry about that! Just hide me from Flower for a bit! Okay?

One of the men near the northern exit saw what was going on and rushed over. It was Garet, who had Ember and Gale resting on his shoulders.

"Hold on, guys!" he said as he held out a hand. He concentrated intensely to muster the psynergy to push the raw material off of the other two adepts' feet. "You alright?"

"Don't worry Piers! I'll heal you!" the blue elemental said as she quickly engulfed his foot in blue light.

He sighed in relief. "Ah… Thanks, Spring."

Felix, whose foot was still throbbing, was left unattended to. "Excuse me!? My foot got crushed, too!" he yelled. Spring paid no attention to the ailing adept. Ember shot a glance at her and sighed. She was apparently too wrapped up in healing Piers to care to give a vermin's rear end about Felix, so the Mars Djinni hopped down and wrapped her tail around his foot, and began to heal it herself.

As the two were being healed, Flower appeared before them from the ground. "Where. Is. Breeze?" she asked in a caustic and demanding tone. From the way she sounded, Piers was unsure whether or not it would be right to hand the Jupiter Djinni over to her! He could hear the elemental whining and pleading in his head.

Shhh! Don't say anything! She's gonna eat meeeee!

Spring narrowed her eyes after she finished healing. She took no time in making her choice and painlessly thrust her clawed tail into the chest of a startled Piers.

"No! Don't do it! Have mercy!" Breeze cried as Spring pulled him out and tossed him in front of his pursuer.

"Gotcha!" Flower cried triumphantly as vines sprouted from the ground and tangled themselves around Breeze.

"Dammit…" He turned to the one who ratted him out, "Spring, you suck."

Felix, now fully mended by the kind Ember, stood up and walked over to them. "Okay, what's going on here?" he asked, crossing his arms.

"Breeze here took it upon himself to destroy weeks of painstaking work!" Flower answered.

"Again?" wondered the three adepts and their Djinn.

"It was an accident!" Breeze cried in his defense.

"You always say that!" Flower yelled.

Felix walked between them as Flower was about to lunge at the captive elemental. "Hold up! Flower, just repair your garden, you've done it several times before, so you can do it again."

"But-" Felix held up a finger and silenced her.

"Now, Breeze," he said, turning to him, "You stay far away from Flower's garden!"

"Ooookay," the Jupiter Djinni submitted drearily.

"I mean it!" Felix said sternly. Breeze nodded rapidly, and Felix waved a hand and dispelled his vine prison. Flower let out a loud "humph" before turning away and hopping back in the direction of her shambled arrangement. The earth adept looked down the road and saw the damage that was caused by the chase and shook his head. There was stone debris and malformed plant-life all down the road, but none of the buildings were damaged… this time.

"Great… now we have to clean up the mess you two made," he said, glaring down at Breeze.

"Thank you oh great and powerful leader!" Breeze chanted.

"Piers would make a much better leader," Spring mumbled under her breath.

"What was that?" the Lemurian asked.

"Nothing, nothing!" she lied and quickly tried to change the subject. "Is your foot okay?! Let me make sure!" she began to heal his foot again.

"No, I'm fine, thanks anyway," he said, raising a hand to assure her.

The Mercury Djinni blushed a bit. "Oh, ok…"

Breeze saw this out of the corner of his eye, and tilted his head curiously.

The next few hours went by rather quickly. Breeze rambled on and on in the background about the reasons he left the company of Ivan and, in his own opinion, the "evil witch known as Sheba" while the adepts worked alongside the other workers and began putting together a fairly nice archway that framed the exit. Much to Felix's irritation, Piers had misheard the workers who did, indeed, want the beam to cut up into planks. He quickly got over it as Piers had already paid for it with the crushing of his foot.

Garet had once again entered his distant state of mind where he worked and responded very little to what people were saying to him. His companions worried about him hurting himself again, so they dismissed him. Felix and Piers said they would take care of the "Djinni damage" on their own.

"Oh, wow," Gale said in amazement as he glanced left and right at the large stones on the sides of the road. "She was really trying to kill you!" The three Djinn hovered around Garet as he walked home.

"Oh, yeah… totally," Breeze responded, sounding a bit distant himself. Garet's mood was certainly affecting him. He could feel how far away his mind was and the strange combination of fear and sadness that he kept bottled inside. From the looks of it, Ember was feeling the adept's mood as well.

The four passed by the square with the ruined patch of flowers shortly. Garet paid little attention, but Ember and Gale winced at what they saw. The source of Flower's anger was clear. Breeze tried to keep his attention on the road, but he saw Flower amongst the flora out of the corner of his eye. She gave him a hateful death-stare so angrily that it burned holes into his very soul. The Jupiter Djinni stiffened, trying to keep his sight ahead and hoping the angry Venus Djinni wouldn't launch a second attack. Thankfully, she didn't, and returned to repairing her garden. It occurred to him that Dew wanted to pass a greeting to her, but now was definitely not the time.

The four returned to Garet's home without incident. On his way up to his room, his grandparents greeted him, but he didn't respond any more than with a simple wave. He laid down on his bed and stared at the ceiling. It seemed that's what he always did when he got in this mood. Strangely, Forge was nowhere to be found.

Gale flew over to the window. "Well, guys, it's been fun, but I'm going to head back over to the mountain range to the north."

"Aw, so soon?" Ember said, and Gale nodded. "Then it was nice seeing you, again. Come visit whenever," she added cheerfully

"Breeze, if you ever get lost again, I'll be where you found me, or where I found you, I should say," he teased at his kin's directional shortcomings.

"Yeah, yeah," Breeze replied, slightly irritated, "see you around then, bro." Gale nodded and dematerialized outside the window into a light gust that blew northward. Breeze let out a low sigh.

"What's the matter?" Ember asked.

"Garet seems unlike himself. He's really killing the mood all up in here!" he said, flailing his wings.

"Ah, so you noticed too?" She turned to the aloof adept. "It doesn't take much to wonder why."

A candle lit up in Breeze's head as he remembered what he wanted to give Garet earlier that day. He hovered over to the desk and pulled a piece of paper from his pouch.

"Gareeeet! I has somethings to cheers you ups!" he sang in intentionally poor grammar as he flew over to the bed. The adept sat up and took the paper.

"What's this?" he asked. Ember also eagerly waited to hear what it was.

"It's a letter from Mia!" Breeze answered cheerfully. The response shocked Garet and he quickly unfolded the letter and glued his eyes to it.

"Why didn't you say you had that earlier?" Ember asked, turning to the Jupiter Djinni.

"With the window crashing, the unconsciousness, the worm-talk, and the being chased by the blood-thirsty mistress of flora, it kinda slipped my mind once or twice," he smiled.

"Ah, good points," Ember nodded, "You sure do get into a whole lot in such a short time."

"I have a knack for it, I guess!"

Breeze watched in silence as the fire adept's eyes moved left and right as he scanned every line of the letter. The tone of the room quickly changed as he finished. It was much less dreary, but not exactly the happy and carefree feeling Breeze was hoping for. Garet looked up and donned a contemplative expression before reading the letter over again. Breeze was quickly losing interest, but there was a knock on the door that broke the quiet.

"Garet, supper's ready," announced a female voice. It was Garet's older sister, Kay. He didn't respond, so she knocked on the door again. "Garet, you in there?"

That time, she broke his focus and he answered. "Yeah, I am! I'll be down in a second." His response was followed by light footsteps heading downstairs. Garet folded up the letter and stuck it in his pocket before following his sister down to the dining room, leaving the two elementals in his room. In polar contrast to Forge, Ember was much more responsible. She'd keep an eye on Breeze.

Once he reached the bottom of the stars, he saw Kay staring out of the window, captivated by something. He quietly walked up behind her and peered over her shoulder without her noticing. She was staring at Piers, who was walking down the road. Garet was a bit surprised. They must of cleaned up the damage quite quickly.

"What's this I see?" Garet smiled, "has my exotic friend caught the eye of my dearest sister?"

His teasing snapped her out of her daze and she blushed angrily. "W-What? No, I was…" she stopped when she realized that objecting was futile. "Okay, fine, you caught me," she huffed. Garet put his hands on his hips triumphantly.

"Why not talk to him, Kay?" he asked, "he's more approachable than most guys I know." He was probably referring to Felix, who's silent and intense demeanor made people run away.

"No…no," she turned away, "He looks like the type who likes younger girls. Isn't he about your age?"

"Not exactly," Garet chuckled to himself. He was far older than either of them because of the longevity possessed by the denizens of Lemuria, the ancient city hidden in the Eastern Sea. If he did happen to like younger girls, then he had quite a lot of people to choose from! Even his grandmother was eligi- wait, what? Garet shook his head to prevent any other disturbing thoughts from floating into his head.

"And another thing… That little fairy thing with the crab-tail that's always with him…" Kay began, unable to remember what the creature was called.

"What, you mean Spring?"

"Yeah! It just… creeps me out!" she admitted, wrapping her arms around herself. "It gives me this… evil look every time I look in his direction!" Kay turned back towards the window, and spotted Spring on the Lemurian's shoulder. As if on cue, she narrowed her yellow eyes and glared at Kay. "See! It did it again!"

Garet leaned forward and saw what she was talking about. "Huh, that's strange. She's not one to be mean."

"Kids, come on! We're waiting on you," their father announced. They both gave one last look at the strange Mercury Djinni before heading to eat. After they left, a light gust whirled around and Breeze formed out of it.

"Ah, very interesting," he thought to himself, taking note of everything he heard as if he was on a mission of information gathering.

xxxxx

Meep! Tell me what ya think. I needs feedback... it sustains me! Oh, I used X's cause it seems like it won't save my usual way to divide scenes... weird. So little x's shall take the place of my beloved dashes.