Chapter 120

Lewis frowned as he examined the darkening sky.

"It doesn't look good, does it?" Cleo commented, arriving at her husband's side and wrapping one arm around his back.

"No," Lewis said. "The forecast said that we are expected a big storm in a few days – but it looks like it is coming early,"

"We'll have to postpone the beach volleyball, it is getting quite windy," she responded as a strong wind made the trees groan.

"Probably a good plan, the wind is definitely picking up" Lewis replied.

"I'll go break the bad news to the kids," Cleo said, kissing his cheek as she left.

OoOoO

An hour later torrential rain hammered the village. The older kids were camped out at the Dove household playing board games together. After a few hours, everyone met in the dining hall for dinner. The water movers sheltered everyone by holding the rain off them as they walked to and from the dining hall. It was one of the benefits of doing everything together. After dinner, Lewis, Will, Zane and Ash did the storm proofing in their rain gear - securing everything that might have blown away or been damaged. The kids returned to the Dove household to continue their board games.

"Not another two!" Jennifer groaned as the dice landed on a two yet again. When playing Snakes and Ladders you didn't want to roll the low numbers.

"Haha," Charlie said with a grin. "I'm way ahead now,"

Jake rolled the dice. Quietly he moved six spaces, gaining on Charlie.

"Your turn, Charlie," Jake said as he handed the dice over.

Charlie shook the dice for longer than necessary. She finally let it go. It was a five.

"Oh no," Charlie whinged. She had to go down the longest snake on the board.

"You asked for it," Leila laughed, pushing her twin's shoulder gently.

The wind whistled loudly as it blew past the gel houses.

"Once you finish that game, it'll be time to go and get ready for bed," Emma said.

"Awww," chorused the children.

"Mum, can't we play on more game?" Eric asked.

"Not tonight, honey, I think we should all be in bed with this storm," Emma replied. "You can always play another game tomorrow,"

"Okay," Eric replied.

About ten minutes later, Jake ended up winning. This started the slow exodus to each family house. It was slow because the kids tried to pull every excuse or delay in the book.

"We can't go home because of the rain! We'll grow tails!" Charlie whined. Emma rolled her eyes.

"Charlie, we went through the rain to dinner. We go through the rain all the time. Alright, no more excuses!" Emma said. "Jenny, can you please make sure everyone gets home without getting wet?"

"Yep," Jennifer nodded.

"See, you'll be fine," Emma said to Charlie.

Jenny, Jake, Leila and Charlie left Eric's home, and went out into the storm. Jenny held the water away from the group. The rain looked like it was hitting an invisible wall above and around the kids. Jenny dropped Jake off first, and then walked with Charlie and Leila toward the Bennett household.

Rikki opened the door for them as she saw them approaching.

"Who won the last game after dinner?" she asked.

"Jake did," Leila replied as she walked inside.

"Good on him," Rikki replied. "So you're not undefeated anymore, Charlie?" she asked her daughter with a smirk.

"Sadly not," Charlie said dramatically. "But I am far superior in the realm of board games so I will beat them all tomorrow,"

"Far superior?" Jenny questioned indignantly.

"Good night, Jenny! In the games tomorrow, I will beat you as usual," Charlie said with a smirk. Charlie walked inside.

"As if!" Jenny laughed. Just as Charlie was closing the door, Jenny suddenly gathered a small ball of water and hurled it at Charlie's back.

"Gah!" Charlie exclaimed as she felt the water seep through her shirt. "Jenny!"

"Serves you right," Jenny yelled as she ran towards the McCartney household.

As she ran away, Jenny only heard the sound of Rikki and Leila's laughter, and the sound of Charlie groaned as she slumped to the floor, tail sticking out the front door.

OoOoO

Rikki couldn't sleep. This storm was crazy. The sound of the rain thundered against the roof and the powerful wind whistled loudly as it navigated through the village. It was so loud that it was drowning out Zane's snoring.

Rikki pulled herself closer to Zane and rested her head against his chest. Zane stirred and brought his arm around her, pulling his wife snugly to him in his sleep.

Rikki had just started to doze off when she heard an enormous 'crack'!

She sat up startled.

"What was that?" Zane asked groggily.

The sound of baby crying came to Rikki's ears.

"Great, it woke Fi up," Rikki said with a groan. "You find out what that noise was and I'll settle Fi,"

"Okay," Zane said sitting up and flipping on the bedside lamp.

Zane wondered if a tree outside had made the cracking noise as it fell. He made his way into the living room. His half-asleep brain took a few seconds to process what was going on as he walked into the space.

His feet were wet. That was not right. Zane looked down.

Oh no. Over by the west wall, the floor was wet and becoming increasingly more-so. A crack was running from the top to the bottom of the wall.

"Rikki, I think I found the problem," Zane said quietly, coming into Fi's room.

The luxury of having a house made of water, meant that you could do renovations whenever you wanted – they had created a tiny room next to their bedroom for Fi's cot when she started sleeping for longer periods of time. The 10 month old had been their easiest baby so far.

Rikki was standing, snuggling Fi against her chest, rocking gently. The sight made his heart melt. As much as Rikki adamantly said that she didn't do kids, Rikki was an amazing mother.

"What is it?" Rikki said quietly.

"It looks like our house is cracking under the pressure of the storm. I don't know whether something blew into the side first to cause the crack or not."

"Cracking?

"Yeah there is water all over the floor in the lounge. We might need to get Bella over here to make some quick repairs,"

Rikki reached out with mindspeak to Bella.

'Bella?'

'What is it Rikki?' Bella replied. Rikki could hear the half asleep groan over the mindspeak connection.

'Our house has a big crack in it, which seems to be getting bigger and bigger. Can you fix it?' Rikki asked.

Bella groaned again, eyes closed.

'Fine,' she replied. 'You owe me for this,'

Rikki laughed. She handed Fi over to Zane.

Bella got up and pulled her rain boots, ran pants and rain jacket on. She pulled her hood up, put a wide brimmed hat over top (to keep the water off her face), and put her waterproof gloves on. She made sure the pants were pulled over the top of the boots. She was not going to grow a tail tonight if she could help it. For a mermaid that couldn't move water (and didn't always want to walk around surrounded by a gel shield), the human rain protection was necessary.

She opened the front door. Wow, the rain got so much louder. Gah, Rikki owed her big time for getting up in the middle of the night in this weather.

The water puddle was growing. Rikki couldn't go far into the living room now. Rikki took another step back. The gel house was really not enjoying this storm.

Rikki heard another mighty crack above her.

"Oh, great," Rikki said as water started pouring through the new crack – right onto her head.

Giving up, Rikki walked over to the now damp couch and sat down. A few seconds later, she had her tail.

Bella held tight onto her hat as she walked the few metres between hers and Rikki's houses. She felt as if she might blow away at any minute.

"I'm here, this had better be…" Bella trailed off as she took in the sight before her, "Rikki," she laughed, "You look so uncomfortable,"

Rikki was sitting on the edge of the couch with her tail resting in the puddle.

"It beats the floor, Bella," Rikki replied with a smirk, "Could you please just fix the house?"

"Yes, yes," Bella replied still laughing.

Bella stretched out her hand and turned the water in the roof and wall to gel. This used the rain water to plug the cracks. She then made it solid. Water stopped coming into the house.

"I'll use the rainwater on the outside as well," Bella stated, "That should strengthen the house against the storm,"

"Sounds good," Rikki said as Bella stretched out her hand again.

Rikki started to evaporate the water inside – drying up the puddles, the couch, and her tail. Shortly after, Rikki was back to her human form.

"You're welcome," Bella said with a smirk.

OoOoO

Bella managed to get a few more hours sleep before she was rudely awoken again. It was now just before sunrise.

"Ladies, wake up!" Lewis yelled. "I need you now!"

Alarm struck her heart. Lewis sounded very panicky. She got up again and went outside as quick as she could. What she heard and saw made her heart skip a beat.

Lewis had woken up to the sound of creaking and crashing. He got up quickly and walked outside. It was no longer raining In the distance, lit by the moon and beginnings of the sunrise, an enormous storm crashed angrily across the horizon. The darkness quickly moving towards them made Lewis's stomach drop.

It was a giant tornado, moving up from the sea. The angry shape spat out trees as it moved ominously towards the mer-village.

Lewis' panicked shouting woke everyone up. The adults rushed outside. No one had to ask what the problem was. Faces paled. In a few minutes, the tornado would be upon them.

"What do we do?" Anna asked shakily. "We're all right in its path. Do we try to run?"

"We might be able to fight it," Cleo said.

"Maybe, yeah. Tornadoes form from warm and humid air colliding with cold and dry air. People say that tornadoes can be disrupted and stopped if their circulations are interrupted due to cool, stable low-level air flowing into the tornado location," Lewis replied, looking like he was reciting something he had learned in his weather research.

"Lewis, just tell us what we need to do!" Rikki exclaimed.

"We need to cool it. We need to cool the base," Lewis answered firmly. "Heating the top would be too risky,"

"Okay, Em and Ben, you're up," Will said.

"You need to cool the water in the air," Lewis said told Emma and Ben quickly. "Anna and Ben will send it into the base of the tornado,"

"I can help too," Cleo said.

"No," Lewis responded. "You need to try and hold the winds back – hold the tornado from reaching too close, you're the only one who can control the winds,"

Cleo's eyes widened with the pressure in that statement.

"Daddy, what's happening?" Andy asked, rubbing her sleepy eyes as she came out of the house.

"Get back inside, please sweetie," Lewis replied. "We're going to try to send the storm away,"

"Okay," Andy said in a scared voice.

'Kids,' Rikki projected across mindspeak, 'Please stay inside, it's all okay, we just need you to stay inside,'

A chorus of 'okays' resonated in Rikki's mind.

The winds became even stronger as the daunting tornado approached them.

"Let's do this!" Cleo shouted.

Cleo raised one of her hands and closed her eyes, focusing on the raging winds of the tornado. The best way to describe how the water in the winds felt was angry. The hot and cold were fighting each other as they spun around and around and around. They definitely did not like being pushed by Cleo's wind.

Cleo raised her other hand. She pushed hard against the tornado. It was exhausting. She braced one foot forward to strengthen her stance.

"You're doing it, Cleo," Will encouraged. "It looks like it is slowing down. Keep it up,"

Cleo gasped as the tornado fought against her control. She was red with exertion.

"Hurry up, I won't be able to hold this long," Cleo said breathlessly.

Ben cooled the water in the air around him and sent it into the tornado. Emma did the same with the water Anna was controlling. They tried to make the water move the opposite way within the tornado vortex.

"It is…not…weakening much," Cleo ground out.

"Emma, Ben, try using your powers directly on the tornado's base, maybe freeze the ground," Lewis said quickly. "Anna, send more water into it – maybe giving it more water to deal with will unbalance it,"

"On it," Anna said.

The ice and water users directed their powers where Lewis had said.

"It's working!" Cleo gasped. The tornado was visibly reducing.

"Keep going!" Bella cheered.

Unbelievably, a minute later, the tornado had dissipated. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief.

"That was a close one," Zane said, squeezing Rikki's hand gently. She nodded mutely.

"Well done, Cleo," Will congratulated.

"Yeah," Emma said, "If you hadn't have slowed it down, we would've been run over before we could stop it,"

"Crazy," Ash said, "Look how close it got!"

Ash pointed to the destroyed trees not far from the start of the village clearing.

"I am glad that's over," Cleo exhaled.

"You did amazing, honey," Lewis said, kissing Cleo's cheek.

Everyone got inside before it started raining again. The worst of the storm appeared to be moving off. Possibly, with some influence from Cleo's wind control. While the mer-village was now physically safe, the crazy weather change over Mako Island overnight had made it to the local news again. The mers hoped that it wouldn't gain any attention from the wrong people.

A/N: Hi everyone! I had a great Christmas break and an awesome trip over to Australia (visited Brisbane, the Whitsundays and Sydney) in January. I am crazy busy at work again now that the school term has started back :P

So, sorry for the wait! (Also sorry that the content of this chapter wasn't related to Ryan's plotting if anyone was excited for that - this storyline just wrote itself for some reason). Let me know what you think! I hope to update again soon. Thanks for reading and reviewing.

Thanks especially to the following people for reviewing :D It helps me know that people are still out there reading this:
YaleAceBella12, CrazyHayniac, fandommatchmaker19, Icy-Petals, Guest

See you all next update!