CHAPTER SIX

With the confusion and chaos that Bailey and Tapeworm had faced back at Tapeworm's house, they couldn't get Ursa back to Christian's house for another five days. They had to make sure that Ursa was hidden every time his parents came around, and then had to deflect as many question as they possible could, hoping that it didn't bring up any more questions that they couldn't answer. When Tapeworm wasn't doing his classes online, he was watching his guardian, making sure that nothing was happening to him again.

Ursa seemed to have the same thought, as he refused to come off of or out from under Tapeworm's bed, even when the coast was clear and no one else was home. That wasn't the only thing that they had to get used to. Tapeworm, essentially, had to relearn how to use his powers. Once he had pushed himself away from his desk, to get something from the kitchen, and had forgotten about his newfound strength. The force of the push knocked him and the chair backwards a few feet. The chair had stopped short as it hit the carpet, but Tapeworm kept going, smacking into the wall behind him.

It was a miracle that he didn't bust a hole into the wall from the force of the hit.

Bailey helped the best that she could do during the whole process, but she had to get ready to go back to school as well. The next semester was starting up again and she was starting to wonder whether or not it was worth it.

It was Yale.

But things were changing on her end.

It was complicated.

The day that they were finally able to get to Christian's house, Bailey was a complete wreck. She couldn't get to sleep at all in the past couple of days, because she had been thinking so much about what had happened when Ursa was being taken over and how she had been able to use Geneva's and Gattaca's powers…she already had a notebook with twenty pages of different thoughts and facts about it written down. Now all she needed to go and see what Christian and Nathan had to say about it; and see what Zack, Cody, Crystal, Aaron, and the Jacksons thought.

There was so much to do in so little time.

Opting to act that they were going to go the gym, Tapeworm had Ursa change back to his small form and had placed him in a gym bag that he hung around his shoulders. He had to fill the bag with little slices of apples and crackers as Ursa's appetite hadn't changed since they had been apart. With all of the power that the guardians and elementals had, they found themselves eating a lot more than most people would. (Not that it really affected the elementals; their metabolisms seemed to skyrocket along with their power).

Tapeworm checked his father's office and his parents' bedroom before he motioned for Bailey to follow him downstairs. "Ok, so all we have to do is-"

"Christopher, where do you think you're going at this time of night?" Mrs. Michaels demanded as she came out of the kitchen. She briefly glanced at her watch and then back to her son and his friend, who looked back at her, eyes wide.

"To the gym." Bailey supplied quickly. "We haven't gone in a couple of days and-"

"I can't have you go out there!" Mrs. Michaels' eyes widened in fear. She looked at her watch once more, missing the confused expressions on Tapeworm's and Bailey's faces. "Didn't you hear? The city has a curfew now! After everything that happened a couple of months ago, when the city was evacuated, all of those weird storms and now people calling in and saying that they're getting strange animals in their homes-"

"What?" Bailey gasped.

"I thought we were the only ones," Mrs. Michaels continued, mistaking Bailey's gasp for concern, not blind panic. "But there have been calls flooding in all day, and the news is filled with video clips of what went on a few months ago. The strange lightning, the odd storm, some people even caught footage of people seeming to have some strange powers. As if out of a science-fiction movie." It was then that Tapeworm noticed the phone in her right hand.

"Where's Dad?" he demanded.

"On his way home from work, I'm calling him to try and get him to get here faster so he's knock blocked out of the city." Mrs. Michaels replied. "Along with the curfew, they block access in and out of the city except for-"

Bailey tuned Mrs. Michaels out at this point. She was going from panic to full-blown hysteria. It was a miracle that when she opened her mouth to breathe that she didn't start screaming and hyperventilating. There were just so many things going on that they had missed; the curfew of the city, the city being blocked off, people have footage…

I hope they didn't get a good look at anyone. It's going to spell nothing short of disaster. Why did everything have to happen at one time like this? Bailey rubbed her forehead and looked over at Tapeworm.

A light sheen of sweat had settled on his forehead and he was chewing his lower lip in worry. She could tell that he was trying to figure out what to do; tell his parents about his powers and risk putting them in danger…or just keep his mouth shut and pretend that nothing was going on, while continually putting them in danger.

With elementals, it was almost always a lose-lose situation.

"What's that?"

Tapeworm snapped out of his thoughts and looked over at his mother, following her gaze down to his bag. Every now and then a side of the bag would fly out, as if it was punched; Tapeworm knew that Ursa was getting restless at this point. But there was no way for him to 'go back into Tapeworm's body' without there being a flash of light and making things even worse.

"Oh, it's just…my science project." Tapeworm explained quickly. "I was going to drop it off with Cody before we went to the gym," he reached out and grabbed onto Bailey's arm, pulling her with him. "So that's where we're going. We'll be back before the curfew, I promise."

Before his mother could say anything else, the two of them were out the door and speed walking down the sidewalk.

"This isn't good." Bailey thought out loud.

"I noticed." Tapeworm replied before sighing loudly. "Did you have to go and say that things would fall apart?" He asked, only slightly joking. "I mean the fact that you have Geneva and now Gattaca's powers in you, you'd think that you would figure out something would go wrong as soon as you said it."

"You know me, I'll never learn." Bailey replied just as sarcastically. Tapeworm cracked a small smile as he bent down, allowing Bailey to climb onto his back. She wrapped her arms around his neck, loosely, yet tight enough so she didn't fall off. "Are we going straight to Christian's house?" She asked as Tapeworm looked around to be sure that no one was watching.

"Yeah, at this point, I think that Zack and Cody heard about the curfews and everything and are there already." Tapeworm replied. "Hell, if the Jacksons were here, they would have dragged us back there themselves."

Bailey laughed.

Tapeworm checked once more to be sure that no one was watching them before running towards the 'meeting spot' that he and his friends had. Being able to use his enhanced running abilities, he was at the house and through the front door in less than thirty seconds.

"Christian." Christian looked up from a monitor as Core hurried down the stairs in the basement. "I know," Christian said before Core had to open his mouth. "Things are falling apart down here, we're going to have to move fast if we want to keep it from exploding in our faces." He paused and swallowed thickly. "Literally."

"Is there anything that you think that we can do?" Core moved over to a filing cabinet and started to look through it. "We're not going to be able to get much done if we don't find that file!"

"You think I don't know that?!" Christian snapped, slamming the clipboard that he was holding onto on the ground. "We each had a copy; Reed's was destroyed almost as soon as we made it, just in case, who knows what happened with yours, it may have blown up with WingzCorp." He rubbed his forehead. "And mine…things have been moved around so much, I don't think that I'll ever remember where it is."

"Well, you better, because your daughter, your son, your nieces and nephews, and their friends are going to be in even worse danger than they have been before."

Christian turned and grabbed Core by the front of his shirt and slammed him against the wall. His show of emotion caused Core to break his normal calm facade and look shocked. His eyebrows twitched and he gritted his teeth at the sharp pain that hit his back.

"If we don't find that file, everyone that we know as well as everyone in this city will die!" He dropped Core back to his feet. "So don't tell me what I already know and just help me!"

Core shook off his friend, letting out a deep breath, waiting.

Christian shoved a few notebooks aside and then turned back to Core, looking at him.

Core nodded back in reply.

All was forgiven.

"So you heard about the curfew," Crystal noted as she turned to see Tapeworm and Bailey in the doorway of her house. She had been sitting on the stairs, waiting for the two of them. Zack and Cody were sitting on the couch, having leapt to their feet as soon as the two appeared in the doorway as well. "I thought that you would get here a bit sooner." She looked down at the moving bag. "Is that Ursa?"

"Yes," Tapeworm replied as he bent down and opened the bag, causing Ursa to poke his head out, shoving his nose into the air.

"Do you know how bad that bag smells, Master Tapeworm?" Ursa asked as he ran a paw over his forehead, taking in another breath of air. He stood up on his hand legs and hopped out of the bag. Tapeworm ignored him.

"How did you know that Ursa was in the bag?" He asked breathlessly. "Could you feel him? Is Dricer back with you?"

Crystal shook her head at both questions. "I assumed that you wouldn't have a random animal in your bag," she cracked the tiniest hint of a smile. "May I?" she asked, reaching her hands out towards Ursa. Tapeworm nodded and she bent down, taking him into her arms.

"You should think about becoming a Vet, Crys," Zack commented. "You're really good with animals."

"I've been thinking about it," Crystal replied as she looked the guardian over. "But with everything that's going on," she let out a sigh and shook her head. "I might as well forget it." She looked up and caught Zack's eye. He gave her a small, reassuring smile, which she returned, before turning back to Tapeworm. "So tell us how you got your powers back. Dad's down in the basement with Core, looking for something apparently," she paused, allowing the sounds waft up from the basement. "I think it's best if we wait to tell them what's going on after we sort through everything." She tossed her head, telling them to follow her to the kitchen. "While they're down there, Aaron moved some of the equipment to the kitchen so I can look him over."

"You really think that that's possible?" Cody asked nervously. "A couple of tests and-"

"Well, at this point, I won't know what I'm looking for until Tape tells me what happened." Crystal interrupted as she placed Ursa on the counter and took a few probes from Aaron and started to place them on Ursa's body, in the same positions she would if he was one of them.

Tapeworm quickly recounted the story, from when he got home and found Ursa being controlled, to Bailey being able to use light and darkness at the same time to help Ursa, to his powers coming back, to the curfew and the city being blocked off.

Aaron let out a loud sigh as soon as Tapeworm finished, seemingly distressed. Although you couldn't see it in his face, his sightless eyes keeping him from expressing many emotions, you could tell that he was just as nervous as everyone else. Things were rapidly changing for them and they didn't know if there was any way to stop it, if it could be stopped.

"Basically what our problem is that we thought that Gattaca was the end all be all enemy we had to defeat. " Cody said after he looked over Bailey's notes. "But now he's helping Geneva, using her body as a vessel once more."

"So what if the problem wasn't Gattaca," Bailey spoke up. "What if it was something in the elemental world? I mean, we purified Gattaca, Zhane is in the hospital somewhere, recovering from it-"

"And all we have to show for it is two friends who are dead and more questions than answers!" Zack broke in harshly. "Just so everyone doesn't forget that."

"How could we?" Tapeworm shrugged.

Pain flashed through his eyes, but he otherwise stayed silent.

Crystal tapped her chin as she scan a tablet that was in her hands, listening to the others as they spoke. The levels in Ursa were just the same as they had been before, very high. Nothing out of the ordinary. But what made it that he was able to get back to Tapeworm while the others still didn't have their guardians or their powers back? She made a mental note to remind Tapeworm to ask him about it later, usually the guardians don't remember much of their transition from the elemental world to the human world; it was complicated process from what she understood. But if she could pass along the info to her father, things may be easier.

Just a bit.

"I think, at this moment in time, our biggest concern is the footage." Zack said, breaking Crystal out of her thoughts. He looked at her-which is what she was named for-crystal blue eyes before looking at everyone else, his gaze landing on his twin and staying there. "Did they get any of us clearly on film? And what happens if it falls into the wrongs hands. We already had tanks and everything come through the city when Gattaca was around. Maybe…maybe it's as worse as we thought…" he shrugged as he trailed off.

That was their biggest fear, the elemental world being completely exposed. That's why if they had an idea that there was another elemental around, they wouldn't confront them, they would stalk the person for a long time. It was possible, you had a 1 in 5 chance of being an elemental and so far they hadn't found many. But that didn't mean that they weren't there, it just mean that everyone was afraid of being caught and didn't want to oust themselves unless it was absolutely necessary.

It was smart.

But in a way, it was also stupid.

"I hate to say it," Cody cracked his knuckles. "But the fact that there's a curfew on the city and the news is starting to question what happened a few months ago…I think we're slowly being found out." He said grimly. "Reed, Christian, and Core hacked into the government files to find out about the elementals for a fucking school project…it's got to be coming back to them."

"Then we're screwed if that's it." Aaron said, causing Crystal to give him a sharp, disapproving look. He merely shrugged in reply, letting the gravity of their situation cause everyone to fall silent.

"Cody's right," Bailey said. Crystal snorted as she continued to look over Ursa. Tapeworm gave a half smile, cracking his knuckles. "Speaking in statistics-"

"I'd rather you didn't speak in statistics so I can actually understand it." Zack broke in.

"The government keeps their things tightly sealed and they have the technology to trace things back very quickly." Bailey reiterated. Zack raised an eyebrow, but stayed silent. "All in all, if they haven't figured it out yet, they will. So agreeing with Aaron, we're screwed."

"Could you please not say 'screw' around my brother," Crystal asked, quickly tapping into her motherly tone. "It's bad enough that Riley or Rhuben taught him it, I don't need anyone else doing it."

"Personally, Crys, I think that's the least of our problems." Cody said gently.

Crystal purposefully looked away from him as she pulled the probes off of Ursa and handed him back to Tapeworm. Tapeworm gave her a smile of thanks as he placed him back on the ground. They were all silent at that moment, no one was sure what they should do or what to say. They didn't have any answers; all they had at this point was speculation and guesses.

Nothing.

Crystal suddenly turned to the phone and dialed in a number onto her phone and put it on speaker. Ringing filled the air and the phone was picked up after the second ring.

"Hey Crystie, what's up?" Sydney asked, his accent reaching their ears.

"I hope I didn't wake you." Crystal apologized quickly.

"No, its 2PM here, you're fine." Sydney replied. He paused for a moment. "Something tells me I'm on speaker and everyone else is there, which means that something else went on." He let out an impatient sigh. "And I thought that nothing could happen in Boston while we weren't there."

"Nice sarcasm, Syd, if I didn't notice it, I would have thought that you were serious." Cody spoke up.

"Thanks." Sydney said with a hint of pride. All of a sudden there was a clacking sound; he probably pulled up a word document on his laptop. "Now what's going on?"

"First," Bailey jumped in. "Are the others there?"

"No, they went out." Sydney said quickly. "But I'll fill them in when they get back.

"Speaking of," Bailey then turned to Crystal. "Where's Reihu?"

Crystal didn't look at her; she kept her eyes on Bailey's notebook. "Dad and Core sent him to do something top secret. We'll find out later. Can I tell him what's going on, please?"

Zack made a cat hissing sound with his mouth and laughed a little bit. "Looks like the Kitty has some claws there. Calm down, girl." His smile widened when Crystal glared at him, before reading out of the notebook. The clacking filled the air as he typed up everything that Crystal told him.

"That's… not good." Sydney managed to say as soon as he heard everything. "I really don't know what else to say, but, after this one, it's probably not a good idea to use public phones, just in case things get too close to coming back to us."

"Good idea." Zack agreed. He scratched his head as he heard more rustling come from downstairs. "You said that Core and Christian are looking for something," he said to Crystal, who nodded. "Has anyone thought that it could be back in Australia? Maybe whatever they're looking for, Reed has."

There was silence. He could tell from that silence that n one had thought about it. Even Sydney was stumped. The fact that the little boy then uttered a curse, something that he tried VERY hard not to do, let him know that he was really the only one that thought about it. Zack grinned. He even laughed.

"What's so funny?" Sydney asked curiously.

"I figured out something before the genius did." Zack's smile was the biggest one that he had since he had awakened. He hadn't smiled this much in a long time. He was so deliriously happy that he nearly giggled. "I am totally enjoying that. I'm just going to gloat here for a minute."

"Enjoy it," Sydney snarked. "It may never happen again."

"Oh believe me, I know that." Zack said his smile undaunted.

There was a lengthy pause on the other end and Cody looked at the phone, checking to see if they had been disconnected. They hadn't.

"Hello?"

"I'm still here," Sydney said as he tapped his chin. "I can't believe…I never thought of that. Cody, there's a reason that I have you as my lab partner now and again." Zack burst out laughing as Cody tried to figure out whether or not he should have been offended or not. "We'll get started on that as soon as we can. I don't know if we're going to come back anytime soon, just in case, but if we do, you know something went wrong."

"Things have gone wrong since Gattaca started Halo Syndicate by taking over people," Bailey pointed out. "It's going to get a lot worse before it gets better."

"You got that right." Sydney agreed. "I'll let the others know what's going on as soon as they get back."

"Syd, that reminds me," Tapeworm quickly spoke up. "The watches that you designed. What makes them work?"

Sydney hesitated. "I don't have time to explain that right now. Keep in touch as much as possible, if you guys get your guardians back, or if one of us do; which with everything that's going on, I'm sure is going to happen soon, we need to let each other know. And don't forget to tell Christian and Core."

"Got it." Crystal replied. "I'll call you guys later." She hung up the phone, looking pensive.

"What?" Cody asked, noticing.

"Well, if you and Zack had felt or seen Blazen and Phantom before…and Ursa is now here…" Crystal lifted her eyes to Cody's. "How is it that you guys haven't got Blazen and Phantom yet? It just makes me wonder, if the thing that was controlling Ursa is keeping them from getting to you."

Cody's eyes widened and he looked over at Zack.

They hadn't thought of that…

A/N: Alright, so this was a short chapter because I just got back home, so this chapter was short, but I hope that you guys still like it. So one of my main ideas of the story was mentioned in this chapter, I kind of foreshadowed it with the last chapter. I think that owlhero caught it, actually.

Next chapter has more of Reihu, the others of WingzCorp that haven't died, and the Jacksons.

Cheers,

-Riles