CHAPTER ONE

Bailey Pickett stuffed her hands into her coat pockets as she watched cars zoom in front of her, trying to reach their destination at all costs. Her eyes narrowed against the brightness of the snow around her, reflecting shards of sunlight from the partly cloudy skies above. Boston in the winter was beautiful to her; she wasn't used to the cold, though nights on the farm could be competition.

But the blanket of snow was a new beginning.

It covered everything in a cool blanket, when melted everything started anew, started over, allowing things to change.

But not everything could change.

Some things had to stay the same or else no one would recognize anything around them. She realized that fact pretty quickly; it was a part of her life now. Whether she wanted it or not.

Bailey looked up as the light signaled she could cross the street and she fell in with the masses as they all filed off in one direction. Bailey walked along, her snow boots getting excellent traction, keeping her upright though her feet threatened to slide out from underneath her with nearly every step. Bending down, Bailey picked up a handful of snow and clenched her fingers around it. Her fingers squished the snow out to the sides, allowing it to slide through her fingers and drip to the ground once more. After a few seconds of the mind-numbing cold, she turned her hand back around, letting the packed snowflakes fall to the ground.

Bailey tucked her hair behind her ears and continued walking along the slick sidewalks of Boston back to her house. It wasn't exactly her house, she was just allowed to live there.

After the SS Tipton…

She couldn't think about that right now. About the schooling she gave up, the friends she hadn't seen. She wondered how London and Woody and Addison and Moseby and Miss. Tutweiller were doing, how things had gone down after the SS Tipton had finally docked back in the port and everyone was taken off so damages could be worked on. She figured Mr. Moseby would have gone back to become a manager at the Tipton hotel, but this was different, too. Boston was only just getting back to the way it was before, though there were still big differences.

"Hey Bailey."

"Bailey, hi."

"Hope you're having a nice day, Miss. Pickett."

"Please stop by when you can."

Bailey smiled politely and nodded at everyone who passed her, greeting her by name. Before the big battle, no one knew who she was and she had liked it that way. The constant attention now, it wasn't something she was nearly used to. The searing looks, the expressions of pity, the proud smiles... She was almost nineteen and they were recognized even more than the biggest celebrities in Hollywood. As a young girl she had dreamed of that sort of thing, now that it was her reality she wanted nothing than for things to go back to normal.

Bailey stretched her arms over her head, letting out a loud sigh; a mixture of content and annoyance. She was never one that knew how to deal with attention.

"Don't worry Bailey, things will settle down soon," Geneva said.

"You'll get used to it," Gattaca added.

Bailey smiled to herself. "Thanks guys." It was good to know they were still there. They had grown to be some of her best friends even if they weren't technically real. They were real in a sense, but not real to the sense of being things you could touch. Depending on who you asked.

Bailey spotted her house in the distance and hurried up the street, into the house. "Hey I'm back!" She called, hurrying to close the door so the frigid fingers of the cold wouldn't seep into the house. "Sorry, I'm late, the bus was running kind of slow."

She dropped her backpack to the ground and walked into the living room. Tapeworm Michaels looked up from the book he was reading and smiled at Bailey. "It's alright, we haven't started yet. Mom and Dad aren't home." He used his thumb to mark the book and placed it face down on the coffee table. "How was class?"

"Not bad," Bailey said. She walked over and sat down on the other end of the couch. Bringing her feet up, she tucked them under the blanket that served as decoration. It was a beautiful blanket, hand-woven from his great grandmother, but right now she was using it as a means to warm her feet. Spring and winter in Boston were no joke, she was learning. "We were talking about morals and code of conduct and stuff." Bailey lightly rolled her eyes, running a hand through her hair. "Of course this was when students weren't constantly asking me about our last battle and everything."

"I thought it'd come up at some point," Tapeworm remarked. As he said this, Ursa appeared in his small form on his lap, curling up in a ball. "I mean, now we're able to go around without worrying about being captured or tested on, I've gotten more looks than usual. Everyone know my name now. Weird right?"

"Definitely weird," Bailey agreed.

"I mean, Max always wanted to be able to have everyone knew her name, but that was from dancing or whatever." Tapeworm smiled, shaking his head. "If she saw how things were going down now, if anyone told her before, she would have laughed her head off." Tapeworm's smile waned for a second and he sat up straight, dropping his arms into his lap. "Then again, it gives us more freedom to do stuff instead of having to get all holed up all the time."

"Yeah, the progression of the world knowing all about elementals now is kind of cool," Bailey said. Suddenly, a feeling of dread washed over her. "Only, I'm sort of afraid knowing there's going to be a chance this will blow up in our faces."

Tapeworm's eyebrow twitched at the corner. "When does it not?"

Bailey smiled.

She and Tapeworm laughed.

"Cody, you need to wake up, right now!"

Cody Martin's eyes blinked open and immediately settled on the clock. It was only three in the morning. It was still dark, dark enough he couldn't see who was standing beside him and waking him up. There were only four options, one of which wouldn't work out as she wasn't supposed to be in there. However, the other three were probably sadistic enough to do something like this in their own ways. Wait until he was just starting to fall asleep and get rudely woken up again.

Well, five options. But the one he was used to wasn't there with him.

Cody smoothed his long hair out of his face. When had he gone to sleep? He couldn't remember now; too much work and time flying by.

"Cody!"

Cody let out a grunt of pain when something heavy landed on his back and head at the same time. I should be used to it at this point, Zack did this when we were kids all the time. Cody started to push himself up, at the same time the lamp clicked on. Cody groaned again, holding a hand over his face, nearly blinded. What have I done to deserve this? He opened his eyes as a shadow fell over him, and looked up into Christian Manning's face. The older man was peering down at him, a toothbrush hanging out the corner of his mouth.

"We're going to miss our flight," he said and then walked over to a door placed by the sink. He pulled it open, revealing the back to another door and knocked on it. "Crys? Hurry up, we gotta get going soon."

"I know, daddy, I'm packing up my stuff!" Crystal called back.

Christian closed the door and walked back over to the sink, spitting out toothpaste and saliva before running the sink water, rinsing out the toothbrush. He tossed it aside and grabbed a wash cloth to run it over his face.

Cody let out a heavy sigh, dropping his head back onto the pillow.

That's right.

They were in Canada, getting ready to take a flight back into Boston.

He momentarily thought about where Zack was, and figured he was on a plane back to Boston as well. Or maybe he was still at their house? He wasn't sure, the time difference was hard for him to calculate this early in the morning. They had all only been apart for only two months but it was enough. They all needed to get away from each other for the time being, to get away from the memories of what had happened at the fight with Mother Nature. Cody raised a hand up to his neck where he could feel a thin, puffy line. One of the scars remained from the battle, a constant reminder to how things used to be. Dropping his hand from his neck, Cody reached up and dug his fingers into the side of the body lying across his head.

Aaron laughed and rolled off of Cody's head as Sydney Jackson rolled off his back and the two landed on the floor with dull thuds. Just about eleven years old and the two of them were as rambunctious around each other as they had been when they first met, before Christian had adopted the blonde, sightless boy. It was still hard for Cody to see how capable Aaron was though he had become blind at such a young, impressionable age. He was willing to do anything he could without anyone's help even work with some dangerous chemicals when it came to the experiments Christian would ask his help with. His disabilities had to be helped by his intensely high IQ and ability to take care of himself.

Sydney, on the other hand, had known he was a genius from an early age, as he had been told. Teachers noticed how bored he had been in school fairly early and sent him out for testing. The results came back loud and clear, he was more advanced than other students in his class. His foster parent at the time, Robert—who coincidentally had the same last name as him and his siblings—decided to keep him in his classes as opposed to advancing him when he had the chance. Because of his increased brain power, he was able to understand even the most complicated equations, facts, and figures as well as wrote papers with some of the big name professors at big name universities.

It was still funny to see how childlike they could be even with some of the best opportunities they could have at their fingertips. Just like the one Cody had, why he and Zack had left Boston to go their separate ways. He hadn't gotten into Yale like Bailey had, and he had been pissed, but after Christian offered the position to be his assistant as he went back to a lab in Quebec, the area he had grown up, Cody knew he couldn't turn it down. So for the past two months he followed Christian around as he went to speak at conferences, have meetings with other scientists, and work on his own experiments and the whole while, they had all been recognized. Not for what Christian was doing but for the fact he was "one of the strongest elementals of their time" something he had been grown tired of hearing. He got it the first time, did he have to keep hearing it?

Cody yawned, swinging his legs out of the bed. He stretched his arms over his head and bent over, cracking his back. Once he was upright again, he used his super speed to race around the hotel room, gathering his things and pushing it all back into his suitcase, zipping it as far as it would go. Once he slowed down enough, he went over to the sink. He looked down into the empty tub and held out his hand, a blue hue surrounding his hand as the familiar feeling of energy moved through his body, reaching his hand in a strong buzzing feeling. As he concentrated water snaked its way out of the faucet and followed his hands movements, creating a ball of water that floated in the air.

Cody spread his hands and the water thinned then, bringing his hands closer to his face, he manipulated the water to move over his face, the warmth opening his pours. Flicking his wrists, the water turned cold and he felt his pores snap shut. Cody then moved his hands back down and the water fell into the sink, falling down the drain.

I've never been happier to have my powers than right now, Cody thought. He ran his hands through his hair then ran around the hotel room getting dressed. As he moved about, Christian, who was moving at normal human speed, appeared to move an inch every second Cody moved at excess of 100mph. Finally, Cody sat down on top of his suitcase, patiently waiting as Aaron and Sydney played some game on Christian's iPad.

"I'll be ready in a few minutes, guys," Christian said. He was now standing at the sink, shaving. "We're not going to miss the flight." At the sound of a knock on the front door, he reached over and grabbed onto the door handle, pulling it open.

"I'm ready to go," Crystal said, wheeling her suitcase into the hotel room. She leaned over and gave Aaron and Sydney a kiss on the top of the head before giving her father a side hug. She turned to Cody, sitting down on top of her own suitcase, spinning a hotel card key in her hands. "How'd you sleep?"

"I would have slept better if those two didn't keep me awake," Cody said, pointing over to the younger boys. They were still so preoccupied with their game they didn't look up. "They kept tossing and turning and kicking each other and…I thought Zack was worse but that's laughable now." He snapped his fingers, flicking his hair out of his face. "Oh, and they jumped on my head to wake me up."

Crystal laughed a little, then pushed her glasses up her nose. "Yeah, they do that sometimes. I should have warned ya." She then placed her hand over her mouth. "Actually, after how long you've been out here, you figured you would have learned after the first time."

'Yeah, well, that's the point of learning, you don't actually get the idea of it until it literally hits you," Cody replied. He yawned again, resting his chin in his hands as he studied Crystal. The two months they had spent together was the most they had talked in a while, they were actually friends again, not having to worry about the past relationship they had. They didn't bring it up much anymore, it was like the fight with Mother Nature showed them what mattered and what didn't matter and everything was clearer.

Crystal clear…

Cody smiled to himself.

"What's so funny?" Crystal raised an eyebrow.

"Nothing." Cody held out his hands and formed a ball of water between them. He juggled it back and forth, it steadily increased and decreased in size the more he passed it back and forth. Crystal held out a hand, hers glowing a light blue, and hardened it into a ball of ice. Cody's eyes lifted to hers and he turned it back into a ball of water. "So I think the last conference went well, what with the announcement that Elementals are now being regarded as citizens and everything. Which is weird because they were before, people just didn't know who they were. It's a weird thought though, those that never awakened now can if they want, and those that decided to hide who they were, they can reveal it."

"Yeah, well, with every good thing, something bad happens," Crystal reminded him. Cody gave her a look. "I'm not being a pessimist, I'm being realistic. We're going to be up on this pedestal as long as we need to, but who knows what's going to happen since Mother Nature."

Cody reached out and grabbed onto her hand. "Everything's going to be ok, Tally."

Crystal's face twitched before she pulled her hand away from his grasp. "Can you promise that?" She shook her head, answering his own question. "I doubt it." She brushed her hair behind her ears and smiled a genuine smile. "But let's not worry about it now, we're going home and we're going to see our friends. We deserve some happiness, god knows it's been a while since we've all been completely happy."

Cody nodded back, giving a genuine smile as well.

Zack Martin watched the fluffy clouds slide across the cerulean sky. The sun was shining, there was a balmy breeze, the grass underneath him was cool and comfortable; he was indeed in paradise. Too bad he had to leave it soon. He understood all the hype about it, why people always wanted to go to the beach and never wanted to leave. It was relaxing and there were times he found himself sleeping for long stretches of time, just enjoying the sunshine around him.

Zack sucked in a deep breath and let it out through his mouth. The sun warmed him in a way that made him sluggish, refusing to let him move from the spot on the ground.

There was a sharp peck on his forehead, a tiny pinprick that caused searing pain. "Ouch!" Zack's eyes flew open just as a tiny eagle flew over his head and landed on his chest. The red feathers blended into the rustic brown of the rest of his body. "Blazen, what'd you do that for?" He brought his hand up to rub his forehead, but was met with a long, pink, tongue slathering up the side of his face.

"Yeah, he's awake."

Zack brought his arms up around his face as he felt little pin pricks on his cheeks and tongue moved over his nose and mouth. "Ugh!" Zack sat up and turned so he was sitting on his heels. Blazen flew out from underneath him before landing on the ground with the other guardians were surrounding him. "I'm not a buffet!" He laughed, dragging an arm across his face. "What d'you want?"

"Mistress Rhuben asked Master Patrick to be sure you woke up," DeathLiger, the lion of darkness, explained. He walked around in a circle, his mane being pulled by the wind, then sat down with Blazen, DalFang, ThunderTatsu, SilverTatsu, and a full grown lion who was sitting off to the side of them. "So we came and woke you up."

Zack turned a glare over to the large, golden lion who was sitting on the ground, running its front paw over his forehead. "Did you have to do that? I mean, if you wanted to kiss me, you could have just let me know before you ran your tongue all along my face." The lion gave a snort and before Zack's eyes, morphed down so Reihu was kneeling on the ground in front of him. The teenager stood up and shoot his dark brown hair out of his golden eyes.

"What would have been the fun in that?" Reihu smirked, crossing his arms over his chest. He tilted his head back towards the large house behind the two of them. "Besides, Rhuben told me to do it, she thought I'd be funny."

"Do you listen to everything your girlfriend tells you to do?" Zack brushed off the seat of his pants and held out his arm, allowing his guardian, Blazen to land on his forearm and hop up until he landed on his shoulders, sitting down, digging his talons into Zack's shirt.

"Not everything," Reihu said. His smirk widened. "But I have a better time of keeping my ass from getting kicked like you do."

Zack smirked back. "That's only because I enjoy it so much."

He laughed and leaned over, grabbing his shoes from the ground and started to walk back up the sloped backyard, the guardians running around his feet in their small forms. His eyes swept around the pool, with the cool tiles surrounding the water, the slide which led into one side, a bar sitting on the other. The picnic tables around the plastic chairs, flanking the sides of the fire pit sitting on a slab of concrete by the basement door. The trampoline sat in the back corner of the yard along with two hammocks resting from trees which gave shade to the backyard. He walked up the steps of the wooden deck, eyes moving over the backyard, the spacious backyard he always dreamed of having.

One of his biggest life dreams was to be able to have all of the money he could think of to make sure his family would be ok. He had an obsession with it, growing up, because of all of the material things he could get. After watching his mother try and save money for years he started to think about it different, wanting to be able to save as much as he could to help her out if she ever needed it. So he stashed some money away, but openly talked about the money he spent or stole from Cody. What would his reputation be if he was found out to be someone who was smart about his money and really did care about his brother and mother's wellbeing before his own? There were the rare moments he would show it, otherwise he'd kept it quiet.

"Zack, are you coming up?"

Zack turned and saw Patrick Jackson standing in the doorway to the kitchen, holding the glass door open. He nodded and went inside, waiting for the guardians and Reihu to pass him, before closing the door behind him. The cold air from the AC blasted him in the face, stinging his bare arms from his t-shirt sleeves. He rubbed his arms for a moment before stretching them over his head. "So what's for lunch?" He asked, pulling himself up to sit on the counter.

"Pizza," Rhuben replied. She opened the oven door and pulled out a large cardboard box out of the oven. She placed it on the island before pulling out three more. "Just came in about ten minutes ago. Unfortunately when Noah ran it in, it got cold." She turned around, closing the over door with her foot, and leaned against the island. "So we had to reheat the stuff."

"I said I was sorry," Noah commented. Zack looked over at the table, only just noticing Noah and Riley were sitting at the table, waiting for the pizza to be ready. Noah passed a paper cup back and forth between his hands. "I didn't think running so fast and using my powers to keep it aloft was going to cool it down so quickly."

"No worries, No," Riley said, bent over a magazine. Her cheek rested in the palm of her hand, angling her head down towards the glossy sheets of paper. "It's still going to taste good." She then sat up and winked at her brother. "Besides, the only reason I didn't offer to heat it up was because I was afraid I'd turn it to charcoal."

"Like last time?" Patrick teased.

"That was Zack's fault, not mine," Riley protested, pointing over to her boyfriend.

Zack made a sound, chewing on his fingernail. He brought his hand down from his mouth and crossed his arms over his chest. "Sorry, I was distracted," he said with a grin, causing Riley to roll her eyes and shake her head. "Lack of oxygen to the brain can do that to ya." He tapped himself on the temple before jumped down and taking one of the empty seats at the table. Reihu took the seat directly to his right and Rhuben sat down next to him, placing the pizza on the table in front of everyone. Zack jumped at the sound of a low growl and glanced over at Reihu, who rubbed his hands together before grabbing four slices of pizza and sliding them onto his plate.

"I thought I told you to stop doing that," Rhuben said, casting a side-eye to her boyfriend.

"No, you asked me to stop doing that when we were making out," Reihu said. He grabbed a slice and took a large bite, almost completely swallowing it in one bite. "Besides, I can't help it anyway, it's part of my lion genes and everything."

"What time are we leaving tomorrow?" Zack took a couple of bites of his pizza before ripping off a large chunk and dropped it onto the floor, letting Blazen hop over to it and started pecking at it to eat himself. He ran a hand over his face. "Early, I bet."

"Bet," Patrick agreed. "No point in even going to sleep, mate. Just stay up, get through customs. Sleep on the plane." He looked at his watch, frowning at the face for a moment. "I can never read this thing," he murmured.

"That's ok." Noah shrugged and slowly smiled, keeping his eyes on his plate. "You can't count past one anyway," He laughed along with Riley and Rhuben as Patrick shook his head, not taking any offense to his joke.

Zack pushed back his chair and tilted his head back so he was staring up at the high ceiling. He didn't think he'd be going to back to Boston so soon. He had been waiting for it, waiting for the time he would go back to the city and have everyone know who he was. Being in Australia it was hard to go anywhere without being stopped, it wasn't bad though, it wasn't his home. Going back to Boston would be better, it was a sense of comfort, being able to go home. And with everyone knowing the things he can do, it would be easier to live there, instead of wondering who was going to jump him at the last minute. Now he could go around the Tipton hotel and the park and wherever else he wanted to go without being paranoid.

He didn't have to hide, he didn't have to act like something he wasn't.

He could finally be himself.

Though there was a tiny part of him that wondered how after the battle with Mother Nature they were able to keep their powers. He also wondered why he had felt the small pang of annoyance when he found he did still have them. Everything was so complicated, there weren't any answers, no matter which way they turned.

"Zack, are you ok?" Noah asked.

"Yeah." Zack lowered his head. "Just thinking."

"Don't hurt yourself," Riley teased. Zack stuck his tongue out at her before flicking his hair from his face. He was going to need a haircut soon. She noticed his frown but didn't ask him about it, knowing it was better for him to work through his problems and ask for help on his own time. "Have you finished packing yet?" At Zack's humming sound she shook her head. "I'll take that as a 'no'."

"Dude, I can get it done in, like, five seconds," Zack protested. "Besides, that's not the problem."

"Then what is?" Rhuben and Reihu chorused.

"The feeling I'm constantly being watched."

A/N: I wanted to have this one focus on Zack, Cody, and Bailey because the three of them are the main-main characters with Sydney and Aaron along with them, and everyone else is main too. Considering he'd usually be with his siblings, Julius wasn't shown in this chapter on purpose, of course I have a reason for it. Next chapter will be up soon.

Cheers,

-Riles