A lengthy Author's Note: What's up? First time writing in over 3 years, however, it's for something I wanted to work on for a little while ever since Elemental hit theaters (Excellent movie by the way, I highly recommend you check it out at some point or another.) What is this, exactly?

For the uninitialized. I am doing a full retelling of the movie itself (So yes, this entire thing will be PG (K+ in this site's terms) rated, for those that want to take this another way, we're going to have a massive problem! AND I WILL NOT BE PLAYING AROUND AT ALL!), however, what are the changes, you might be asking? Well, I'm not going to tell anybody here, I will let you guys find out all on your own as the whole thing goes on.

If you like what you see here, well… self-explanatory at this point, why am I one telling you guys this?

I'd also like to iterate that there were a few more things I wanted to add to the description, but this site has that damn character limit so... right now I only have Ember & OC picked for the characters, I have zero clue if this will change or not.

One last note, this is mostly in my POV (If it changes, you guys will know), and if I feel the need to, I can and will edit any portion I feel needs more in-depth explanation without warning..

Anyways… ON WITH THE SHOW! And I'll see you all at the end of this part!

Well, just another… wait just one minute! How rude of me, I didn't even get a chance to introduce myself. Who am I to just jump into the events with me just skipping out on who I was? So, let's take this from the top, shall we?

My name is Samuel Ripple, I live amongst the water folk here in Element City. I live with my mom (Olivia), my sister (Lola), and my 2 youngest kids (Yes, believe it or not, Marco & Polo, born on the same day). I had a few losses over the years, some tragic, and some that just changed my family. My dad (Paul) no longer lives with us since him and mom divorced some time ago, and that honestly broke me. My brother who I love more than anyone, Reid, moved out 2 years ago for further studies. And my oldest sister, JoAnne, has moved to somewhere very far away from Element City. As much as I want to, I can't say the same for my grandparents, Wes & Camilla. I lost them 3 years ago due to a water contamination disease outbreak. In that time, that was the biggest loss I've ever had to deal with.

Now, all my life, I've been asking myself… "why so blue?". Other than my appearance, despite the city being an excellent place to live, and just hang out overall, life wasn't always easy for me, in fact, other than the divorce or my grandparent's death, I've had more bad things happen to me as years went on.

Many years back, curiosity had overcome me when a janitor at my old school dropped a sponge on the floor, and of course, if you knew anything about being a water person, whatever you did, you stay away from sponges AT ALL COSTS! I was in there for about 60 minutes. However, one positive note to come from this. If it were not for this incident, I wouldn't have met my best friend right there & then!

His name was Max Tsunami. Him & I first met when he risked his own life getting me out of that situation, and ever since then, he basically became the equivalent of a brother that I never really had or knew. We did everything together. Whether it be birthdays, movies, sporting events, you name it! I had never let Max leave my side at all ever since we became official.

But there were still more troubles that I needed to discuss. You see, my grandparents owned a large firm, not unlike the one that Max has (more on this later). Their dream was that I was to take over for them when I was ready, of course, with the proper training that was. After their death, however, the place closed about a few months later, meaning the dream was no longer a set-in stone. And I ended up bouncing from job-to-job while trying to find something that would just make do until I got offered something that could make a profit and would provide for my whole family. And you'd imagine that I'd enjoy them, right?

Well… no. Sort of.

I started out in the Earth portion of the city at a boutique shop, I had the responsibility of selling even the prettiest flowers (what else were these places for anyway, right?). I thought things would be going great here! Until I got into a freak accident and got myself sick from a massive dirt contamination from some prankster that claimed the dirt was "the freshest they've seen". After I got the news about the disease, I knew that environment would be unsafe to work in. So, when I recovered from that, I handed in my 2 weeks then just up & left that one.

The next job I thought for certain I would like better, the Alkali Theater. A movie theater that sat in the heart of Element City and was said to be one of the most popular spots in town, about 1,000 people or more show up per day. Again, I jinxed myself into thinking I'd make a good profit here and just provide for my family. Nope! I ended up getting fired for something I never did. I didn't exactly remember what it was, even my boss knew I was never involved but still had to fire me anyway.

Around this time was when Max was handed all ownership rights from his father's firm somewhere near his place, and I was his first recommendation for working there. However, I had just got a call from City Hall telling me I was hired on the spot. One of my acquaintances from school got me this job, as they said this job will "get me into a place where it could become something I could use to provide for my family". That was my real dream at this point, just be the family man.

In true reality, while the pay was excellent, I REALLY hated this job more than anything! Being a City Inspector for any water person just translates to "janitor of Element City.". However, I got to connect more with Earth & Air people as well. And as much as I didn't like my job, I got a bunch of colleagues that I would eventually end up befriending.

So, I just cut my losses about wanting to leave, and grew used to the job. This sometimes meant working overnight, but again, it was worth every minute.

Ok, are we all caught up now? No? Fine, I'll share a slight bit more of my backstory.

After about 6 months on the job, I get told to stop by the office on my way out. I was surely thinking this had something to do with an incident where some other water person (identity unknown) had turned some of the City Officials (including a higher-up) into cement and tried to blame it on me. However, everyone knew who the real responsible person was for that incident. But this wasn't so, I instead was being told that my 1 write-up (for something stupid as leaving my post early without authorization) was expiring, and that they were impressed with my work skills and ethics that I was being promoted.

But where I was being promoted would prove to be more of an even hazardous work environment than ever before.

Fire Town.

If any water person lives under a rock and hears this town name, they should know one thing, this town is THE MOST dangerous place to mostly Earth & Water, and as such, is the only element that strictly could not mix with ANY element, try as they might.

Hearing this town name, however, I was super naïve about everything everyone has said about this town. Several people I knew & supported over the years were either badly injured or passed away due to fire related injuries. It sucked, I know, but I went with it anyway.

That still is not to say that any of it ended positively. It'd have to be a miracle for me to go even one day without being threatened by the other fire people. It was sort of a "either-or" situation, either you must work around the fire people or face the consequences. And believe me, I did EVERYTHING I could to work around them. But all were obsessed with me, for a slight reason.

So, with that in mind, I just tried to ignore them, but on an urgent case to clean the oil that these pranksters put in the canal that sort of connected to Fire Town, they weren't having it anymore. I became their target and… GOT DOUSED IN A GALLON OF LIGHTER FLUID! It was the worst pain I've EVER experienced, and for water people, that mostly means certain death if left untreated. Thankfully, I was treated almost on the spot, after passing out that was. I ended up receiving 3 months in the hospital. And I was thanked that my boss received every bit of information that was needed. So, I got all the compensation that I was looking for, and despite fire being an enemy to water, I got my first fire supporter, their mother made the fire person pay every cent of my hospital bill, and after I got out, I got to press charges on him, and that very prankster is serving life in prison for an attempted murder.

Alright, NOW we're all caught up.

1 month later

Essentially my boss never made me work on that urgent project again, only asking me to do light work around the city. I had several boring days, that everything just ended up taking me a few hours to complete anyway. For example, I would show up at my job at 9 AM, and would finish around 3 PM on a good day, 7 PM at the latest for any day. The latest I clocked out was at 3:15 AM, and that was only 1 time, thankfully.

Cut to about a few weeks after I get back from my injury recovery that was life-threatening, and the first thing I'm tasked with was to verify that every ounce of oil was removed from all canal's nearest Fire Town. It was still not any dangerous work or anything to that effect but was clearly still nervous to do it. After reluctantly agreeing to do so, I go to the canals and begin work.

What had happened was the crew that finished cleaning the oil (Which I hear from a few people was under 20, it started with about 70 people, as more people were injured from the idiot pranksters in Fire Town), but were not able to verify at all, so just called it a day and gave the task to me and another co-worker.

However, he had another task on his hands. For anyone that worked in City Hall here, when you wield the citations notepad, that means you stop EVERYTHING and report any citations, and it gets tracked too, so they know who has the citations notepad. Usually, it was the easiest way for anyone to have an early leave for any shift, no matter what. I got this opportunity only once, however. Oh, and if you do not report the citations before you clock out, you're instantly terminated from City Hall. As was the case with about 10 people who were all tasked with similar jobs. If anyone believed we reported them in error, they could plead their case, however, was sort of a tough thing to do, as the person behind this, wasn't the fastest tool in the shed. I got to plead several cases with others, mostly to great success, I think I only had one failure on such, and I was the reason their own business shut down.

This worker (Also an unknown identity) & I were just looking for ways to get rid of all this oil when suddenly, we hear a loud crashing sound, and it was sort of deafening to hear. This sound would be the doors breaking over one of the canals, meaning there would be a massive overflow and potentially cause a nightmare situation for any part of the city, a flash flood. As for one thing, actually… I need to explain how that one part of the canal worked. So, a ship rolls by every now and then to remove any excess water, because there too was a limit on how much water could be around the perimeter of the city, so mostly the canals were used for over-spillage. Anyways, back to what I was saying… all I could hear from this co-worker was "RUN FOR YOUR LIFE!". And run for my life was what I did. Things did not end up good, however.

The co-worker was swept away but handed me the citations notepad. I never heard from him again, sadly. What happened next was surprising. I got sucked in a downward motion. My screams were very audible, but no one could hear me down there. I kept getting bounced around in the pipes, which was very painful. I have considered quitting right then when I felt myself hit some dirt path along the way. I asked myself one simple question after having the facts settle in right there & then. "Could my day get ANY worse!?"

15 minutes later…

Yup, nothing else was happening, or what it felt like. I genuinely believed I was going to be here for eternity when I felt what I thought at the time was an earthquake come through, and… the dirt passed right through me. I was thanked for it not contaminating me that time as that would've been the worst-case scenario. After having been swept away almost immediately after that, I had to think of an exit plan. Luckily, fate had plans for me that would be of something I was not expecting. I came out of a random pipe, and just braced for impact.

Now… a thought rushed to my head, the same one most people would get after waking up from a faint spell. "Where in the heck am I?"

I wouldn't know it yet, but I would end up someplace referred to as, The Fireplace.

This place was in the heart of Fire Town, and much like the Alkali Theater, was one of THE most popular spots in Fire Town. It was a family-owned business. It was a dream, so to speak, much like my grandparents' now defunct firm. It was basically like a convenient shop, or a "one-stop" shop for most fire needs.

Now, anyone could come in, but water, I can't say the same. Not especially after Max was wrongfully banned from the place because someone else got the excellent idea to water down EVERY sparkler the place had, but the big issue was that this dude had a 1 to 1 ratio of Max. However, that individual was still banned regardless. Max would try everything to get himself unbanned (mind you, The Fireplace had ZERO CCTV systems at all), but the owner (Who was essentially hated by more than half of my community) was not having it. And the last time he tried to get himself unbanned, no one was there, so he gets the idea to leave his damned phone number in case they changed their mind, this was to absolutely zero avail.

As for me, I was just trying to make the best of the situation, but still had a job to do. I had already reported several citations, as I just kept trekking around in the water that came from a supposed leak (also unknown to me yet). I tried to see where I ended up, and could sort of figure it out by now, which had me a little curious, so started looking for any artifacts to prove my theory. I found several things, one of which, I could make out a name.

"Lumen"

Ok, I am guessing that's the family name of sorts. Pretty interesting name if you asked me. Aside from all else I found; I also found a… family photo? My theory was correct. I knew I couldn't just stay here in the water forever (Yes, it's still possible to drown as a water person), so it was up to the surface I went. And what I found, was a MASSIVE number of pipes, most of which appeared to be bursting at the seams.

So, citation/ticket writing it was, I was just doing it in hopes no-one would notice me, but I could've sworn I saw or heard someone. Around the corner though, I saw… her. It was what appeared to be a fire-girl, wielding a pin on her outfit, making it out to "Red Dot Sale" (Which was The Fireplace's busiest day of all time). It was just something that made me think "Yeah… I'd rather lose my job to be honest…" that made me start having feelings that… I wouldn't even have. Am… am I falling in love?

This was more or less of where it all started…

And just like that, this will be our stopping point for Part 1 of this re-telling. Had a lot of fun making this project. Stay tuned, because I am still in the thought process of how to handle the next parts, but it's going to be fun, regardless of whether I believe this project is in any way considered "rushed", although I will not make any of them rushed. A quote from Toy Story 2 said it well, "You can't rush art!". Anyways, I'm getting carried away, LOL.

Ciao for now!