The sun beat down on the field outside of the woods, temporarily blinding most of the people as they made their way out of the trees. An old man standing on top of a low hill smiled as he watched the people pause and blink, many of them not used to feeling the light without the semi protection of the treetops. Slowly the entire village gathered below the hill and took a seat in the grass. When everyone had arrived he lifted his hands as if asking for silence, but he kept them raised long after the voices had quieted down. Only when he felt the soft breeze on the back of his bald head did he lower them and begin to speak.

“Welcome!” His voice was soft and slower than it used to be, but it carried through out the crowd. “Thank you for joining us on this lovely day. Today, as you all know, marks the first day of our annual Universal Festival. For the next week all present are formally excused of all obligated duties!”

Enthusiastic cheers were shouted out among the people. Nothing was better than the sound of no work and no school for the next week.

The man waited for the shouts to die down again to make his announcements, “The chefs have prepared enough food and goodies to fill us all to the brim a hundred times over! The elimination games will begin at sun down today. For the rest of the week, eat, have fun and be happy!” More happy agreements were heard.

“But as for today!” He shushed them, “We gather to celebrate the few who have dedicated their lives to learning the old ways of the cosmos. Children who have been taught to bind their souls with the universe and become one with our world.” He turned his head and nodded to the few standing beside him.

Ten kids stood in a line at his right. Nine boys all around the age of ten and wearing the traditional clothing of loose fitting green leaf made pants and ribbons tied around their wrists. The last in line was a female, slightly older than the rest at thirteen. She wore similar clothing except with a green top and skirt instead of pants. In addition to the green ribbons on her wrists she had one tied around her head and a small one that held her shoulder length brown hair back in a ponytail. Under the ribbon she wore her usual hair binder that had two small bells attacked to it, that when she moved they let out a small soothing chime. While the others looked anxious and almost bored with the process, her eyes were filled with pride and a hidden look that seemed to laugh at everyone on the ground.

“One this day the young warriors will test the skills they have learned by taking a bit of the very fabric of our world and pushing it together to make a visible link between the seen and unseen universe! The wisdom will be available to all with an open enough mind to accept it, then at the end of the week they will return the energy back to the flow of space. For long ago when our ancestors first learned how to connect to that higher level they created a magical crystal. One for everyone to use at any time, but as the years passed they started to see that their gift was beginning to become a curse….”

Near the front of the crowd one figure sitting in the grass fought to keep his eyes open, “Yaawwwnnnnn…. ow!” the boy took an elbow in the gut.

“Haku, I tried not to take it personally when you fell asleep during my ceremony four years ago, but this is history being made!” his friend hissed.
Haku waved it off, “You can’t tell me old Genai’s stories don’t make want to take a nap Kai.”

Kaido shrugged, “I actually like his stories, I love hearing about the old ways and wars. Besides, it shouldn’t matter about that, your sister is up there!”

Haku stifled another yawn, “Yeah, yeah, just another chance for Sana to stand in the spot light.” He ran a hand through his thick un-kept brown hair and closed his eyes. Kaido sighed. A year older than the girl on the hill and a year younger than the lazy bum next to him, he had always found himself in the middle, never being able to completely understand one or the other. He learned the accept it. Even if Haku didn’t care, he was proud of Sana.

“So now!” Genai went on, “Let us open our hearts and minds as these young ones re-create the ancient crystal to enlighten us all.” He turned to the eager faces beside him, “You may start the ceremony.”

Haku opened one eye.

Sana grinned as she walked around and made a circle with the others. This was her chance to show everyone what she could really do. Everyone that had doubted her and tried to talk her out of going into the warrior training. She slowly raised her arms into the air. Her plan would come later. Now she had to focus. Blocking out all other sounds she listened to the hum of the universe. Clearing her mind, she began to feel the pulse of the world. Reaching out, she saw the souls of the bodies around her. One by one she locked eyes with the young boys then gave a light nod to signal the start.

Together they stepped back and reached behind them with their hands. Taking hold of the energy in the air they brought it forward and pushed it into the center of the circle. They went back and repeated the process. They did it again and again, each time gathering more and more energy into the middle. Visible waves formed inside the circle. It looked like the heat that came from the top of the fire and the person across became blurred. It was like putting air into a tire. Each time it became harder. The more they put in the more it tried to get out, and harder to add any in. It was an unseen force they had to control. Even when some of the boys had to focus all their attention on keeping the center stable, Sana reached out and brought more in. Her idea was only going to work if she helped created the biggest crystal the village had ever seen.

She lived in a society where people could connect to the very fabric of the world and manipulate the space around them. But it didn’t come naturally, they had to be trained. Traditionally boys started the training at age seven. Over the generations girls had tended to shy away from the warrior ways and Sana had been ten before she had convinced herself to go into it. Her father was one of the strongest people in the clan, so her and her brother were naturally gifted. She had worked hard her first year and quickly surpassed her younger classmates. After three years the class would show everyone what they had learned at the annual festival. By taking pure energy from the air they condensed it and bound it until it became a visible object in the shape of a crystal.

“Sa…na…!” The girl looked over and saw the boy next to her sweating, looking like he was going to pass out. She gave an apologetic smile and decided to move on. Once in a while she forgot the others didn’t have as big of limits as she did.

“Hai!” She gave the signal to move onto the next phase. Taking a step forward, they pushed the energy into itself even more. Condensing the power of the universe. Sana’s breathing became labored. It was like pushing on a big ball and trying to force it to shrink. They took another step. The longer they waited the more the energy pushed back at them, trying to return to the air. The balance had been disturbed. On the outside the wind was whipping around them like a tornado. Sana’s bells were being tossed around, the soft rings going against the rough howl of the wind.

One moorree. The group managed one more step in so they were almost shoulder to shoulder. Arm’s outstretched and now silvery waves of energy could be seen spinning, pulling apart, meshing together.

“HAI!” the last command. The last remaining ounce of strength was released through the palms of their hands. The direct pressure of the soul coming from every side wrapped around the energy. The two forces spun, creating a colorful whirlpool of light, visible even to those on the ground below. This was it. The moment they had worked and trained for. The moment she would finally prove to everyone that-

The core exploded. The ten warriors were engulfed in a wave of light. The world went black.

Confusion. Anger. Hurt. Sana opened her eyes to find herself in front of water? No it wasn’t water it was vertical and flat. Pictures were moving across so fast she could register them. Scenes of Genai and her father. Foreign objects on the water. Feelings of resentment and determination. There was something she had to do. Haku and Kaido. Short trees. Fake suns. Small spaces. She hated small spaces. Anger. What was all this? She didn’t like this. Make it go away! But she couldn’t move. Then, behind the confusion was sadness. A bond had been broken. Home. Someone was missing. The images were getting blurry, harder to see. A white light was getting in the way. Feelings were replaced with happiness, acceptance. Then the light took her over mind.

“We did it!”

Sana shook her head and opened her eyes. The wind had died, everything was quiet, she was still standing exactly as she had been before the black out, but in the middle of their group was a floating object. It was easily a foot high and wide with spikes coming out from all directions. It had a faint blue glow to it and seemed to be humming. A universe crystal.

Claps and cheers from below pulled them all back into reality. Sana turned and gazed down the hill at the hundreds of people getting to their feet and hitting their hands together. Her mind was still spinning with the images from the explosion, but this meant something….

“Oh yeah!” Quick as she could she gathered whatever power was still left in her, dropped to her knees and slammed it into the ground. Make this field sing with life, she commanded silently and lifted her hand. Instantly buds sprouted up all over the hill, covering it with beautiful multicolored flowers. People gasped in surprise and cheered even louder. Little girls ran forward and started picking them for bouquets. Sana smiled. Her revenge was complete.

“I don’t feel so well….” The boy next to her, the same one that had been having trouble before started to sway. He was pale and about to pass out. Sana jumped over and held out her arms to catch him. He was the smallest and weakest of the group. Sana often had to take care of him when he exhausted himself, but this time when he fell into her arms, her knees buckled and she went right down with him.

“I’m okay.” Was her automatic response, even though she had just proved to herself how weak that whole episode had made her. Can’t let the others see, she told herself and managed to sit up while holding the kid as he slipped out of consciousness. Parents were rushing up now to take care of their kids who were too weak to even make it down the hill.

“That was amazing!”

Sana looked over to see a blurry Kaido standing over her.

“That was nuthin.” It was hard to even keep her voice steady and full of energy. “Are you kidding? That was the best light show I‘ve ever seen, that crystal is huge! I bet it‘s bigger than the one Haku created!” The parents took the boy out of Sana’s hands.

“Haku was just baby during his ceremony.” Sana was out of an excuse to keep sitting now, but if she tried to stand up she was sure she’d just fall back over. “Congratulations!!” Suddenly Sana was smothered by two warm arms.

“Thanks mom.” She leaned on her in a half hug, but more for support and rest. “We’re proud of you honey.” Her Dad walked over and gave her a quick pet on the head, then went to join the growing crowd around the crystal.

“Up, up.” Sana’s mother helped her to her feet, “I’m sure you’ll want to take a nap after all that work.”

“Are you kidding? I could still knock down a few target…thiiings and still have energy to spare! But, I could use a little snack.” She was so out of it she couldn’t even think of the name of the things she had worked with almost every day for the last three years. They started down the hill and only her mother knew how much weight she was really putting on her. Don’t trip, don’t trip. She had to concentrate on the ground as they made their way back to the woods.

A pair of feet came up beside hers and started moving in step. She knew those feet. And she couldn’t wait to hear what their owner had to say.

“You did that last move just to spite everyone, didn’t you?”

Her head snapped up, “I just made the biggest crystal in history and that’s all you can say? No, good job? Way to go? How ya feeling? Not even gonna make a comment about how much energy that must have taken, just gonna skip right to the part where I spite the people who-” her foot caught onto a branch and she stumbled, catching herself at the last second and straightening back up.

Haku smirked, he wasn’t fooled by his little sister’s show, “First, you weren’t the only one that created it, and second I doubt it’s the biggest in history.” he stopped walking and turned to go back. Sana turned her head and stuck out her tongue at him before her mom led her into the shade of the trees.

A long hall. There was something at the end. She couldn’t see it and didn’t know what it was but she knew she had to get to it. So many things in the way. She didn’t like these things. They tried to grab her, stop her. She hated these things, she wanted to destroy them all! But it was wrong. She just had to focus on getting to the door. Everything depended on her getting to the end of the hall! Faster, go faster!!

Berry smell. The hall disappeared as Sana was slowly pulled out from her nap. What was that? What was I trying to find? None of it seemed as important now. Wait, when had she fallen asleep? She had just sat down on the couch for a second. Must have drifted off.

She opened her eyes. A steaming cup was on the table in front of her. That was where the wonderful smell was coming from. She sat up and pulled the cup, taking small experimental sips from the edge.

“Feeling better?” Sana’s mom, Mari walked in the room and sat down next to her. Sana smiled and nodded, “Much! But…during the ceremony…right before the crystal formed it was like…. I dunno, something happened.” It was one of the few times in her life Sana was lost for words.

Mari nodded knowingly, “You made a connection.” She explained, “You know how all week people will meditate in front of the crystal, hoping it will give them visions of the future? When you create it yourself you are more directly linked to its source. At the last stage when it separates from the whole of the energy, some of it escapes and those close to it are exposed of its power. Each one of you got your own little look into the future.”

“A look into the future?” Confusion, anger, loss, so many visions of alien things. That was her future?

Mari wrapped an arm around her daughter happily, “It was in my own vision that stopped me from continuing my training.”

“Really?” Sana’s Mom had taken the preliminary training when she was young but had stopped shortly after her crystal ceremony. All the years Sana had pushed to become a warrior no one had been more supportive than her mother.

“That’s right. In my vision I saw myself among the animals with a feeling of pure happiness. After that I went on a trip with the interpreters and I instantly fell in love with it all.” Mari was part of a group that worked with the animals of the region. They went out and communicated with the animals, learning how they lived and keeping the peace. Sana swallowed the last of the berry juice. Her energy was up and she was feeling back to her old self, “Hey, how long was I asleep?”

“Not that long at all surprisingly. Even your brother slept for a whole day after his ceremony. In fact, I think you can still make sun set if you fly fast enough.” Mari winked. “Why didn’t you say so before!” Sana jumped off the couch and ran out the door. She stepped out onto the hard wood of the tree and looked up. The canopy was a few miles up. Since her mother spent a lot of time on the ground they had always lived on one of the lower branches of the woods. It was darker out now but she could still make out the bridges and stairs hung from tree branches that were several hundred feet wide. There was little traffic going across it that night. Everyone would still be near the edge of the woods either watching or participating in the first games of the week.

Sana closed her eyes and took a deep breath, breathing in the cool air. She felt the hum of the universe again and blocked out all other thoughts as she focused on spell that had become second nature to her in the last three years. I am a shape shifter. I am apart of everything around me. There is nothing I cannot become. And she became the wind. Her eyes opened and her feet lifted off the ground.

“Time to fly.” she grinned and started to rise. Slow at first then faster. She shot through the air, the branches and platforms going past in a blur. A trick taught in the first year of their training. They learned how to move the air around them and use it to lift themselves off the ground. They learned how to fly. This is what she lived for. One of the main reasons she had gone into the warrior training. The feel of defying gravity and the wind in her face. The ribbons still tied around her wrists flapped behind, creating a hollow melody. Normally she would get yelled at for going that fast, but this time no one was around to yell at her. Tonight, the sky was all hers.

“You suck at this.” Kaido watched the board game lazily with his head rested in his hands.

“Be quiet you, eat some chips and salsa.” Haku pointed to the snacks on the end of the table and went back to concentrating.

“Holy crap they’ve got chips AND dip! I better watch out, this party is gonna get too wild and crazy for me now.” Kaido stuffed a chip in his mouth and rocked back and forth on his feet. Haku picked up a wood piece in the shape of a bear and moved it forward two spaces.

Kaido jumped behind Genai and voiced his thoughts, “Gasp! Not the bearsan, anything but the bearsan! Be careful Genai, he’s gonna get ya! He’s gonna get-“

Genai picked up a raspberry and put it in front of the bear. Haku’s eye twitched.

Kaido jumped to the side, “Ouch that’s gotta hurt! And the big question on everyone’s mind, what his he going to do now? What IS he going to do now?”

“Will you shut your mouth!” the old man dropped his hand on the table.

“I can’t help it.” Kaido stepped back and put his hands behind his head, “First day of the festival and all you two can do is sit and play boring strategy games. Sana’s asleep, the crystal is being blocked by the old warriors, everyone else is watching the elimination games, I’ve got nothing else to do!”

“Go wash your hair!”

Kaido put a protective hand over his head, “No way, this hair is awesome! Just wait and see, by the end of the week the girls will be all over this!” earlier in the day he had taken syrup and spiked his short black hair, then squeezed the dye out of some berries and added in blue streaks. It gave an edge to the normally dorky looking kid. What he failed to mention to people was that he had accidentally fallen in the syrup first and the rest was just a cover up to make it look intentional.

“Then why don’t you get a head start and go pick up some girls right now?” Haku gave him a look. He knew better than anyone how shy Kaido got around any female besides Sana.

Kaido wanted to argue but Genai was giving him the same challenging eye. They just wanted him to go away, “Well maybe I will then! And we’ll see who’s laughing when I come back with a whole herd of them behind me!” he started slowly walking away.

“Good luck Kai!” Haku shook his head.

“You just wait!” Kaido yelled before he turned on the path towards the games. He went until he was sure they were out of sight then turned again, this time towards the living trees. I probably look even more like a geek with this hair. Might as well just wash it and spare myself the humiliation. He lifted his feet off the ground and floated up to his family’s living hole in one of the trees.

Sana touched down on the highest leaf of the highest tree around. The sun was already half way below the horizon. Glittering on top of the endless body of water. Someday I’m going to visit the beach. She promised herself that every night without fail. Yet in the two years she had been completing this ritual she still hadn’t gotten around to it. She spotted the hill beyond the trees where they had preformed the ceremony that morning. The valley and low hills went on for only a mile or so before the grass turned into sand and the Ocean started. Only the very tip of the sun was visible. Sana watched as the last rays disappeared over the water, then there was a bright green flash and the light disappeared under the water.

Something launched up from behind one of the hills. It was some ways away but Sana recognized it as a seagull. It cried out and started flying towards the woods. A moment later another followed, and suddenly a whole flock of them lifted into the sky. That was odd. Hundreds of birds made their way towards the trees. The only thing that could have moved that many at one time was another animal. During the festival when the universe was off balance it wasn’t unusual to get a few herds of animals gathering in their village. But when something walked over their ground the birds just responded with annoyance. As they flew over Sana’s head, their cries sounded more worried or confused. She looked back out towards the Ocean to see the water near the shore bubbling.

Kaido stood over the bowl of water looking at his hair. He really liked the different style. Maybe he would wait another day or so to wash it out and get more opinions on it. Sighing he forced his head away from the bowl and his feet out the door.
“Good evening Kaido!” Mari had just walked out of her house as well, “Why aren’t you down watching the games?”
“Hair dilemma.” Kaido confessed, “Is Sana still resting?”
“Not quite. She’s up and out already!”
Kaido smiled, “Quick recovery, not surprising.”
Mari started down the ladder on the side of the tree. “She went up to watch the sunset, you could probably still catch her if you wanted too.”
“I think I will, thanks!” Kaido lifted up again.
“Nice to see you!” Mari called out.
“You too!” Kaido flew out of range and wondered what Sana would think of his hair.

“There you are! How are ya?” Kaido touched down on the leaf.
Sana didn’t even look at him. She was staring out into the distance, “Something’s wrong.”
“What is it?”
She pointed out, “Look at the water. The thing sticking up near the shore. What is it?”
“A fish?” Kaido spotted it too. It was hard to see but it just looked like three round tubes sticking out of the water.

“That’s what I thought too but it hasn’t moved and since it showed up all the animals have been acting weird.”
“Weird how?”
“The birds have flown away faster than a migration, the life on the beach as disappeared into hiding and…look! There they are now!” Sana shifted her arm towards one of the hills close to the woods. At first it looked like the ground was moving, then Kaido made out several different creatures running across the grass. Cats, lizards, deer, fox, squirrels, all were making their way frantically across the plain. They were running from something. He started to get worried.
“You’re right, something’s off. You think it might have to do with the thing in the water?”
Sana turned and looked at him for the first time with a spark in her eyes, “Let’s go check it out.”
“What?! No, Sana, we should go tell someone and let them check it out. Genai or your Dad! You don’t know what that thing is!”
She loved it when he argued against her ideas. It meant there was risk, and the risk was the fun part. It just made her want to go even more. “Come on!” she stood up.
“It could be dangerous! Maybe it shoots stuff out of those holes and kills things! Why else would all the animals be running away?”
“We’ll stay out of sight.” Sana grinned and lifted her feet off the leaf, “Hurry up Kai, you’re going to come with me!”
Kaido stood but he had no intention of going along with her, “This is crazy Sa-AHH!”
Sana grabbed his arm and took off as hard as she could, dragging him with, “You’re such a baby!” she scolded, giggling with excitement, “You have to learn to take risks once in a while! Live life to the fullest!”
Kaido’s struggles were useless as they flew over the trees. Sana was younger but she had worked harder than anyone over the last three years, and her strength could match any of the grown warriors.
The girl rambled as they went, “You gotta take chances! Get in trouble, scrape a knee or two here and there!”
“I don’t think-“
“Have adventures! Explore new worlds! Make new discoveries! Think outside the box!”
“But this thing-“
“These are the things we’re going to reminisce about when we’re old and sitting in our rockers Kai, you gotta take advantage of youth while we’ve got it!”
“We do!”
“This is what life is all about!” They passed the last tree on the edge of the forest. The valley opened up below. Hundreds of heads could be seen milling around, a few were floating in the air but all were close to the ground. On top of the first hill a smaller group surrounding a blue light. Sana paused a moment to admire her handy work, “That really is the best crystal ever isn’t it?”
Kaido sighed and kept his mouth shut. He jerked his hand out of Sana’s grip and followed her as she took off again over the hills.
It didn’t take nearly as long to get to the beach than she originally thought, but the light was disappearing fast and the two were forced to descend to be able to see anything in detail. The three tubes sticking out were attached to something under the water. It was oval shaped and maybe fifty yards long. The thing that confused them were the voices that came out of nowhere. A long platform was rocking back and forth by itself through the air, but it didn’t seem to be attached to anything. Then there was a scream and a splash. A moment later a head popped up, only visible by the water drops that slid down its head. There were laughs around and the water person climbed back up on the thing slightly below the surface and splashed water around, making others working to hold up the platform visible.
“Aliens.” Sana whispered as they hovered noiselessly above.
They moved the walkway back and forth and finally set it down so it went from the shore to the first closest hole. With the work done, others jumped and played in the water. Their form was human but they were only visible when the moisture clung to their bodies and provided an outline.
Kaido was starting to get nervous. The longer they stayed the more chance they had of getting caught. These people were expecting something, and he didn’t want to be around when it showed up.
“Sana, we should probably-“
“Shhhh!” She held in a laugh as one of the water people looked up. She spun and hid behind Kaido but it was dark enough now where they didn’t have to worry.
He was tired of this. He turned around to face her but she followed his back, which led to a game of chasing the tail, “Seriously I think we should head ba-“ he stopped as something caught his eye. On the edge of the woods yellow, orange lights danced up the sides of the trees. A moment later Sana noticed it as well. The smile instantly left her face replaced by a look of fear. In a world where people lived in trees and ate the food of the forests, where they understood and lived in harmony with the animals there was only one thing that could destroy their homes and way of life.
Fire.

“Stand your ground!” Genai shouted to the few dozen men standing beside him, “Stay calm! Clear your minds!” He ordered as blasts of fire came out of thin air. The fireballs were aimed high as if meaning not to hit the people, but they fell into the bushes and grass, which led to the trees. One of the first ones already had flames going up its side, and the fire was spreading quickly.
“Wall on my command! Fifty by two hundred feet, now concentrate!” Genai yelled, “Gather the power…and NOW!” The warriors dropped to their knees and slammed their hands into the ground. Power flowed through them, transferring the energy from the air to the ground. Within moments the hills began to shake. Fifty feet in front of them the dirt began to rise up. It molded and grew until it towered two hundred feet above them. Dulled thuds were heard on the other side as the fire was smothered by the dirt. There was a sigh of relief among the men but Genai didn’t pause a second.
“Cowel! Hansa! Gather every weather expert you’ve got and work on getting those fires out!”
Half of the men grouped near the side.
“Dan! Take the farmers and evacuate the villagers to the far side of Deer Lake!”
“Yes sir!” Another two dozen ran into the woods, staying away from the fire.
“Chet, go find Teri and Eiko and tell them to see what they can do with calming to animals down.”
“Will do!”
Genai looked around at the remaining score of men around him, “We stay here and protect our home until we are certain the threat is gone.” Only then did he allow himself a gasp of breath. He was too old for this. It had all happened too fast. One minute everyone was just playing around and enjoying themselves, the next there were cries of fire and instant panic. The ground shook again as some tried to cover the ground fires. Wind shifted as they attempted to suffocate the high ones. It grew darker as clouds formed overhead.
“Genai, what’s going on? What’s happening?” one of the younger adults asked.
“Save your breath Ibok.” Genai scolded, “The attackers are human, though why they attack and how they are able to stay out of sight I know not. But save your energy. If they can control fire and make themselves invisible to our eyes then they will certainly find a way over that wall, only how long I don’t know.”
The roar of the fires was starting to die away. It was things like this that were the reasons the ancestors had started the training. Become one with nature so you can control it and defend it from enemies. In the old times before people had learned to live in peace there had been many wars between people and people, people and animals, people and nature. Then one tribe gathered so much power it condensed and formed the first crystal. The crystal gave them visions and power. Through dreams it told them which battles they would win and lose and in the end they had so much control they told the other tribes, join with us or you die. But the people still went through the tradition of training their young for everyday jobs. Growing food, controlling the weather to get just the right amount of rain and sunshine, making friends with the animals, creating shelter and goods out of the giant trees. That’s how things went from then on.
Genai felt a drop of rain on his head, “No you idiots, keep the water away from the wall!!” he yelled across the field, but the men were looking up at the sky as if they didn’t know any better than he did where the water was coming from. Thuds were heard again as the wall started to melt.

Pandemonium was the word of the evening in the heart of the village. Women and children who didn’t know how to fly were scrambling up ladders and across bridges trying to get to the safety of their homes. Haku was patrolling the grounds with other warriors too young to fight directly, making sure no one was left behind. Satisfied that everyone was on their way up, he flew to his own home and ran into the open door.
“Mom?!”
“Haku!” Mari dashed up to him looking horrified, “Is Sana with you?!”
“What? No, isn’t she-?”
“She woke up and left to go watch the sunset. She never came back and Kaido went to look for her but I don’t know if he’s returned either!”
“Kaido’s with her too?!” For the first time that night Haku felt real fear run through him, “Wait here!” He ran right back out of the house.
“Haku, no!” but he was long gone.
“Those idiots!” Haku flew faster than he ever had in his life through the trees. They couldn’t have been on the ground, one of the boys would have spotted them which meant they were still above the trees. He broke out above the leaves and into the open air.

Sana hopped in anxious circles around Kaido who was sitting on the edge of a leaf with his eyes closed, concentrating on the sky.

“We need more rain,” Sana mumbled, “Little spits aren’t going to put the fire out let alone get past the canopy…..Try and get more to go on the weird people so they can see them. There, yeah! No, keep it away from the wall! Split the clouds or something. No, bad, Kai stop! It’s collapsing, move it quick! Come ooonnn concentrate!”

“I’m trying!” Kaido’s eyes snapped open and instantly a downpour unleashed, soaking the two in seconds.

“Well try harder!” Sana wished more than anything there was something she could do to help but she hadn’t gotten to weather in her training yet. Kaido was only a year older than her, but he had started his training at the traditional age of seven, which made him four years ahead of her as far as the schooling went.

“It’s kind of hard when you’re hanging all over me!” he shouted above the rain. He closed his eyes again and suddenly as quickly as it had started the waterfall stopped. “Crap, that was all the rain in there.” Kaido gave up.

“Saannnaaaaa!” They looked over to see Haku zooming towards them.

“Haku!” Sana greeted him happily, “Help Kai make more rain, we need to help-!“ “What the hell are you doing?!” Haku cut her off as he touched down and grabbed her arm, “Get back to the house this second, do you have any idea how worried mom is about you?! She’s about to have a flipping heart attack!”

“We saw the fire, we had to do something!” Sana tried to pry her hand out but her brother had a death grip.

“The grown ups are taking care of it, don’t think you can jump in and do everything yourself, you’re just a kid!”

“But we know how to make them visible-!” her voice was drowned out by Haku’s yelling.

“It doesn’t matter what you think you know! You get to safety and let the qualified people take care of it! You’re just going to do more harm than good!”

“I can’t just sit and wait for someone else to take care of it!”

“Well too bad you don’t have a choice! We’re going back right now and-“ “GUYS!” Kaido’s voice was filled with panic as he got their attention. He pointed out to the valley where three damply outlined figures were running as fast as they could back towards the ocean. The front one was holding a bright blue ball. As the siblings registered what was happening the tree shook violently as it was hit with a volley of fireballs. Sana let out a squeak as they lifted into the air off of the leaf and out of immediate danger. Below them there was a crack and rip followed by a loud thud. Kaido looked out to see the rest of the water people retreating back. Haku shakily let go of his sister and floated out until he could see down past the burning branches.

“Genai!!”

As the fire died and the wall collapsed Genai ordered the rest of the men to retreat back to the woods and create another impenetrable wall out of vines, wood and mud between the trunks of the trees. As he stood alone at the bottom of the hill he once again bent down to the ground and asked for help, Wise old power from whom we take our food, our clothing and our shelter. Grant me the permission to redesign your form. Create a crevice long and wide down to the depths of your heart.

As he stood again the ground where the mound of mud now sat shook, then imploded. Everything fell away as the ground opened up. Of what he knew now, the attackers didn’t appear to be able to fly. If they could, this was pointless but if his assumption was correct, this would give them the time they needed to create their last defense.

Everything was lit up as a line of fire shot over his head. It was a hard constant attack that hit the end trees and alighted them once again. Genai turned to join the ranks behind the growing wall when something creaked above him. His last image was of a branch falling fast towards his head.

“No, Genai!!” All three kids found it hard to even get past the possibility of what had just happened. The old man had been their friend and teacher their entire lives. Sana was the first to snap. She dropped like a bag of bricks down to the ground and picked up the piece of wood a good fifteen feet long and five feet thick. But she didn’t stop to mourn the passing of her mentor. She rose right into the air again and bolted over the hill, after the water people.

“Sana-! Damn it!” Haku took off after her. Kaido was the only one who hesitated. Part of his mind argued that he should go and get help, it was possible he might still be alive…. No, trying as hard as he could, he couldn’t feel even a speck of life left in the old guy.

“Sannaa!” Haku’s voice was already fading. Kaido sniffed and wiped the moisture away from his eyes then flew after his friends. The last of the water people disappeared into the tube leading down to body of the thing in the water. The top closed and the thing started to move out to the ocean and sink down. It picked up speed fast and was soon getting hard to catch up to.

“Polters!” Sana took whatever grip she had on the branch she held and chucked it. It hit the water and splashed up, but when the surface settled the underwater tank was still moving unharmed. They had come out of nowhere. Ruined their festival, invaded their village, stole the most precious symbol to their culture, and killed the most highly respected and loved man they had ever known. She didn’t know how they had gotten there or why they had come, but she knew more than anything that she was going to make them pay.

Haku sat on the end of the log with his arms outstretched towards the water below him. He kept half his mind focused on circling the air through his arms and out his hands so it hit the water and propelled them forward. The sun was almost directly overhead, lunchtime. He looked back at where Sana sat at the front, her knees pulled up to her chest and arms wrapped around her legs. The wind blew past her hair, throwing around the tiny bells that filled the silence that had been looming over them for the past few hours. “They’ll have discovered Genai’s body by now.” Haku said to himself, though loud enough for his sister to hear, “The elders will be preparing a Spirit Awakening ceremony. The others will still be out searching for us. Mom will be calling in favors with the squirrels and birds to have them look around. Then some kid will notice the crystal is gone and everyone will panic. We should have gone back and gotten help instead of just rushing off. We should have yelled or gotten someone! I mean what are three kids going to do against an entire army of invisible people with fire power?”

“Dad will find us.” Sana snapped her first words of the day, “He’s the most powerful warrior besides Genai. He’ll feel us and come and find us. We find the crystal and when the back up comes, they can get it back.” She had it all figured out in her head but they both knew it wouldn’t be that simple in reality.

“I hope you’re right.” Was all Haku could say to reply.

“Land ho!” Kaido came flying at them from the sky and landed in the middle of the log, making it sway a bit, “We’re almost there!” he announced happily when everything had settled.

“Good, if we hadn’t seen an end by my next shift I was going to make this thing turn around.” Haku said.

“Where’s the land?” Sana turned around so she could see Kaido.

“It’s only a few more miles.” He sat down, “I saw the water thing stop on the shore and people get out with the crystal. They’re not invisible! They were only wearing things to make them look invisible.”

“How does that work?”

Kaido shrugged, “Not sure, but it looked like they were taking clothes off and all of a sudden I could see them plain as day, just like real people. There were easily over a hundred of them. They all took off through a mountain, not over it, through it! And that’s when I came back here.”

“So at least we’re not dealing with ghosts.” Haku said gratefully.

“Ghosts can’t kill.” Sana mumbled bitterly and turned back around. Kaido looked like he wanted to say something but sighed and went over to help Haku push the log on towards their destination.

By evening they had reached the shore of the new land. They pulled the log onto the sand next to the giant water carrier. The land seemed long with tall mountains circling around not far from the edge.
“Okay Kai show us where they went.” Sana ordered.
“This way.” Kaido hopped into the air. The other two followed as they flew low and slow over the ground. At the base of the mountain was a small forest.
“Cute baby trees.” Sana mumbled with little emotion.
“I don’t think they’re babies.” Kaido countered.
Haku descended and touched the end of one. He opened his mind to connect with the soul of the tree, “Holy polt these are almost as old as the ones back home!”
“What?” Sana dropped next to him, “But they’re so tiny!” the biggest one in the group was less than a hundred feet high!
“Things must just grow differently here.” Kaido shrugged, “Come on guys I wanna see where this goes before we lose our light.”
They flew over the forest until they came to a cave near the base of the mountain. It was a good ten feet high and wide enough to fit five grown men side by side. The interior was lined with metal with two black stripes going across the floor. The three stood there a moment, none of them willing to take the first step in.
Kaido bit his lip, “Looks dark.”
“Looks deep.” Sana stepped back.
“Looks like there would be no where to hide if anyone showed up.” Haku, the voice of reason.
They exchanged glances, “If you can’t go through it….” Kaido started a popular phrase of the game players.
“Go over it!” The other two finished together and they all shot up into the air. Going fast up the side of the mountain, for the tiniest moment Sana once again felt the thrill of freedom and adventure. This was a real adventure, one she had always dreamed about. Exploring new worlds without anyone there to yell at her or tell her what to do. When they got the crystal back she was definitely going to spend a little more time here.
No, bad, stop that. She scolded herself. How can she be thinking about fun and games at a time like this? They killed Genai, she reminded herself. She should be focused on revenge. They reached a cliff on the side that led to the back. Sana landed and continued on foot along the edge of the mountain.
“Be careful.” Haku warned, keeping pace right behind her. He shouldn’t have let them get even this far. Should have gone back for help and told someone. They could see now a whole circle of mountains going around for miles in one huge oval shape it looked like. A low valley stretched between them all.
“Woah.” Down in the middle of the valley were five giant structures. Four big square buildings with forty floors each, then in the middle connecting them all was a dome. Each one was silver, made out of the same metal that had lined the cave it looked like. There were only a few windows on each side and one door leading out, with stairs going down on the corners. They watched as a small group near the one on the right scrambled into the door before the sun went down behind one of the mountains.
“That’s gotta be the biggest storage area in the world.” Sana muttered.
“I don’t think that’s storage.” Haku said slowly, “I would have to bet that’s where the people live.”
“Live or are kept prisoner?” Kaido asked.
“No way people can live in there.” Sana stated, “How would they be able to find their way around in the pitch black?”
Haku shrugged. She had a point, no way the windows would provide enough light for the whole building.
“The crystal must be in there though.” Kaido yawned suddenly.
“Which means we’re going to have to go in and search each one to find it.” Sana didn’t like that thought at all. She hated being enclosed. Even in her house where the door was open all the time, she only went in to eat or sleep, and if her parents didn’t force her to do that much she would survive off of the land and sleep outside.
“Let’s do it tomorrow.” Haku said, “That way there might be some light that we’ll be able to find our way around.”
“And we can sleep.” Kaido rubbed his eyes.
“And eat.” Haku nodded. Sleep had been the last thing on their mind when they had been trailing the water machine the night before, but now they were on land and were able to get a grip on what was really going on, everything was starting to catch up to them. Not to mention there wasn’t a whole lot of food in the middle of the ocean. Sana shifted and mumbled something incoherently, but she knew the boys were right and followed them back down the path.
The group of trees, however small they were, was the most homely place they could find. As they entered some bushes nearby shook as a few squirrels ran out and away. Farther in some birds cried out and flew off.
“What they don’t like us or something?” Sana couldn’t help but feel offended.
“They sound disturbed.” Kaido said.
“They’re probably not used to humans.” Haku pointed out.
“Well blah to them.” Sana jumped ahead to a tree with some apples hanging down. She picked one and snorted, “Figures, the food is just as small as the trees.”

“Look at these grapes!” Kaido sounded amused, “You could swallow one whole!” he held one up to his eye. It was just a seed compared to the fruit back at their village that grew to be easily over three feet wide.

Haku went up, took it and popped it into his mouth, “Still tastes the same. Lets start early tomorrow. The faster we find the crystal the faster we can go home.” He started gathering more grapes and eating whatever it took to fill him up.

Sana bit into her apple and walked off. The increasing darkness was making her increasingly tired. She floated up to a sturdy branch twenty feet off the ground and leaned against the trunk, closing her eyes and dropping the core.

“Wouldn’t it be more comfortable to sleep on the grass?” Kaido looked away from the trees at Haku.

Haku waved it off, “Let her do what she wants, she’s had a hard day.”

“We’ve all had a hard day.” Kaido rubbed the back of his neck, “And I still don’t think I’ll be able to sleep much tonight.”

Haku nodded and sighed, “Maybe we can grab her while she’s asleep and start back tonight. Be home by tomorrow afternoon then get the real warriors to take care of the crystal. This isn’t our job. We don’t know what we’re doing, we don’t even know where to start looking! We just think we’re going to wander aimlessly through those dome things and hope it pops up right in front of us? Good chance of that, reeaal good chance.”

“Sana helped make it, some of her energy is built into it. If we concentrate hard enough we should be able to sense something of it.” Kaido argued, “Besides, if we go back and get others to go, by the time they get here and start their search we’ll have lost four days. That crystal needs to be released back into the universe by the end of the week or else it will start trying to force its way back.”

“And that will make it easier to find, making the expert’s job go a lot faster.” Haku reasoned.

Kaido shook his head, “That’s bad. Don’t you remember the one story Genai always told at the end of the festival?”

“You know I never paid attention to those.” And now he was kicking himself that he hadn’t paid more attention to his teacher.

“The separation story. When the first crystal was kept it became unstable because the people didn’t understand that it was part of the universe and had to be returned to the universe. Eventually it exploded and the force hit a small number in range. Those people became sick of the mind. They could hardly talk, they wrote in gibberish, and it just got worse and worse as time went on. Eventually they all went off into the forest and died of the mind disease. I hate to do it, but I’m going to agree with Sana on this one. Even if we’re all by ourselves, we need to find that crystal and disband it as fast as we can.” He held Haku’s eyes for a long minute.

Finally Haku broke off, “Fine. But we’re not going to just rush in there, we’re going to do things the smart way.” He held a hand out.

Kaido gave a small smile and helped pulled Haku up to his feet, “What about the insomnia problem then? We’re going to need to be more than awake to do anything tomorrow.”

“We hold our own Spirit Awakening ceremony.” Haku said firmly.

“But what about the village? They’ll want reassurance too.”

“No one ever said spirits only had to give one message before they moved on. They don’t obey time remember? They can be in two places at once.” Haku held the same spark in his eyes Kaido had seen in Sana when she first wanted to go look at the unknown object on the beach. They had only see a Spirit Awakening ceremony half a dozen times in their life and had never once taken part in one. They didn’t know what to say or what to focus on. All they had to do was hope Genai was watching.

“Okay, lets do it.”

Kaido tugged on the homemade ribbons around his wrists one last time to make sure they were secure. Perfect. He nodded to Haku and the two started slowly waving their arms around in a common pattern. They stood on the sand near the water, illuminated by the moonlight above. The wind caught the ribbons and a high melody filled the air. Concentrating on the sounds, they soon blended together and became a constant hum. In the old times the music was said to draw in the new spirit of a recently deceased and give them enough power to give one final message to their loved ones. Now they knew the spirits had all the power to themselves, the ribbons were just used for tradition.

When his mind was filled with nothing but the sound of the music, Haku started a low chant. “Spirits of air, spirits of water, spirits of fire, spirits of earth. Spirits we knew, spirits we know, spirits who guide the universe.” He had no idea what he was doing, he hoped that if he addressed them enough one would eventually listen, “A soul we love became one with you recently and now we ask for one final message from our friend and our teacher. Grant him one last moment to finish his business on this world, and grant us reassurance that he is happy and safe. Spirits, we ask for a sign, please fulfill our request!” They dropped their arms and the hum was slowly swallowed into the air. As silence fell upon them, the wind moved again.

Follow your heart, not your head. It took Haku a moment to realize that had not come from his own thoughts. It made a little sense, Genai had always told him he analyzed things too much, but…that was it? He had been hoping he would get some kind of message of profound wisdom or a glimpse of the future. That phrase was too old and Haku came out of the trance feeling a little disappointed.

Keep those two in line. Kaido smiled. It was exactly the kind of thing Genai would say. Sana and Haku clashed too much, he had a feeling he was going to have his work cut out for him keeping the peace for the next few days.

A soft ring sounded in Sana’s ears. She was pulled out of the light sleep as a tiny bell rang above her head. Opening her eyes she looked up to meet the eyes of a fat brown cat sitting on the branch above her. Around its neck was a string with a bell attached that sounded whenever the creature moved its head. Lazily she lifted her arms up. The cat was just out of reach but then it jumped down right into her lap.

“Wa-“ the surprise woke her up. She wrapped her arms around the cat and started petting it. It purred and took up a comfortable position. As Sana examined the little chime around its neck she reached back and jingled her own pair of bells attached to her hair. Genai had given them to her when she had first signed up to become a warrior.

“They should help you since you refuse to cut your hair.” He had said, “Many of the women warriors wore bells in the old days. The noise throws opponents off and if anyone tries to grab your hair you can just whack ‘em with them!”

Sana sniffed. The cat was looking into her eyes with so much more emotion than a cat should have had. It seemed to tell her, It’s okay, I understand. She had been though so much in the last few years and Genai had helped her so much through it all. Her eyes started to sting and she tried to fight it back. Crying wasn’t her thing. She was strong, she hadn’t cried since she was a baby. But she was so scared, scared she had made the wrong choice about everything in her life. About choosing to become a warrior and about coming to this place. She couldn’t look away from the face of this creature and the more she stared at it the more she could see Genai’s soul telling her everything was going to be all right.

Finally she lost it. She buried her head in the cat’s fur and cried. As she cried all her anger and fear disappeared. She understood this is what she needed to do. Letting out all the emotion she had kept inside her whole life. She cried until for one moment she knew every choice she had made in her life had been the right one, then she passed out.

The trees shook violently and a flock of birds took off into the air, screaming. A loud bang rang out followed by another vibration of the edge of the forest.

“HA!” Sana pushed her arm out, but when it stopped her energy kept going out of her palm. The invisible waves connected with the open air, causing a loud drum sound then continued to travel until it hit the trunk of a tree and exploded.

“HA!” she repeated the process three more times in a different direction.

“Good!” Haku yelled, coaching from the side. “Now bring it back in!”

Sana rooted her feet in the ground then held her palms out and started moving her arms around in slow circles. She felt the energy coming back into her body. Not only hers, but the energy of the universe as well. She felt where it had been and felt the harmony of the world. When she was sure she had taken it all in she put her arms down. “All right, now I hid the five rocks you had before. Go and find them!” Haku said. Instantly Sana lifted her feet off the air, feeling the wind gather around her and carry her up. She flew to the nearest tree and grabbed a rock sitting on one of the branches. Then she shot down and picked one from the middle of a bush. For the third she went to the ocean and took one from the shallow water. She returned to Haku and dropped them in front of him.

“Two more.” He reminded her, confirming she had gotten the first few right. Sana closed her eyes a moment and opened her mind to find her own energy. In the tree. Going back to the forest she discovered a hole at the bottom of a tree and the rock sitting wedged in behind a root. She grabbed it happily and added it to the rest.

Haku grinned, “Now where’s the last one?”

Again Sana closed her eyes and felt around. The trees? No. In the water? No. Ground, sand? Not there either. Where was it? What was she missing?

“You guys make too much noise for this early in the morning.” Kaido appeared yawning.

“Damn it!” Sana lost her concentration and whipped her hand towards the boy. A shot of energy blasted out. Kaido started and jumped to the side moments before a hole appeared in the tree he had been standing in front of a second before. Haku laughed and reached into his back pocket. Pulling out the last rock he tossed it in front of Sana. “Cheater!” Sana accused.

“Naw naw, perfectly reasonable.” Haku argued, “When you try and look for the crystal you’re going to have to get past every other energy source in those buildings. If you can’t even get past mine to find a rock, I think we’re going to have some problems.” “I can do it!” Sana promised, “I just didn’t think you’d do that and didn’t even think to check, but if I had, I would have found it!”

“That’s the other thing, you can’t over look things no matter how unlikely they may seem. Even If it’s a mouse hole, check it just to make sure.”

“And ready or not we have to try.” Kaido spoke up, “The sun will rise over the mountain and light up the buildings within the next few minutes. We should get in right when it hits so we can have as much time as we can get. Have you guys eaten yet?” They shook their heads and the small group headed back to the trees to get whatever food they could.

Not much was said as they floated over the mountain towards the big structures. This was the kind of thing adults should have been handling not some kids. Someone like Genai. But he was gone now. The night before had been the therapy they had all needed. They would always be sad that the old man was gone, but now they knew he was fine and it was time to move on.

“Start with the closest one I guess.” Haku decided and led the descent down to the valley floor. The buildings seemed a lot bigger up close. The three landed on the grass near the door of the building. Looking back up it seemed to rise forever.

“So, uh, do we knock first?” Kaido said staring at the big double doors.

“We should prolly just go in….” Sana suggested but didn’t move any closer.

“If we’re gonna do this we gotta do it.” Haku reached out his hand but he couldn’t seem to get it any closer either.

“Maybe we should go check the outside a little more first?” Kaido mumbled. That was when the sun rose over the top of the East mountain and a beam of lit hit the door. “No, I think that’s our que.” Haku reached forward fast before he could stop himself, turned the handle and threw open the door.

It opened up into a huge rotunda, easily a hundred yard diameter that went almost all the way up to the ceiling. There were bridges that went across it every other floor and stairs here and there. People walked across the floors quickly and purposefully. Many carrying different items in their hands. Their clothes were long and bright. Seemed to cover almost their whole body with dozens of different styles. They walked past the kids without hardly even glancing at them. But everywhere they looked there were walls. Walls with closed doors and tiny windows.

Sana’s breathing got heavier as she tried to get one more whiff of the grass and the flowers. This place was too tight for her. She couldn’t see the sky, she couldn’t feel the air, she couldn’t feel the sun, holy polt she couldn’t feel the sun, where was the sun? How can these people live without the sun? Calm down, don’t panic, stay calm. She tried to fight off the claustrophobia. But how can they live without the sun?! How could they see? How CAN they see without the sun? Curiosity kept her sane for one more second as she tried to figure it out.

“FIRE!” she lost it.

She turned to bolt back out the door but ran right into Kaido, knocking them both on the hard ground made out of metal, “Fire! Fire!!” she tried to get up and run again but Haku grabbed her and held her down.

“SANA! Stop it!” Other people were pausing now and looking at them. A hysterical girl being held to the floor and claiming there was a fire. One woman stopped and stared for a few moments then started running across the open space into the heart of the building.

“Sana! Calm down! It’s not going to hurt you!” Haku fought to keep a hand over his sister’s mouth to try and get her to shut up.

Kaido gasped, “Fire-!”

“It’s controlled!” Haku snapped before his friend went off the wall too. All over on the ceiling of every floor were dozens of bowls hanging down. The bowls gave off a whitish yellowish glow that looked like fire inside of it. They lit up the halls and explained how the people could see inside of the enclosed structure.

Haku forced Sana to look at it, “See?! It’s not going anywhere!” Sana looked at it and finally her breathing slowed almost back to normal. As it did her face turned bright red as she realized the scene she had just caused.

“Are you okay now?” Haku asked letting go of his hold on her.

Sana nodded and pulled herself up to her feet, “Sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

And then the sirens went off.

A loud squealing noise echoed throughout the building. The kids instantly clapped their hands over their ears. Everyone around them had stopped and was looking around in confusion.

“REMAIN CALM.” A booming voice came out of nowhere, “AN ORDER HAS BEEN ISSUED FOR THE EVACUATION OF THE ENTIRE SOUTH QUADRENT. EVERYONE PLEASE MAKE YOUR WAY TO THE NEAREST EMERGENCY EXIT. THIS IS NOT A DRILL, I REPEAT, THIS IS NOT A DRILL.”

Suddenly people started rushing towards the three and the doors behind them. “Get out of the way!” Haku could barely hear himself above the sirens as he dodged to the side, Kaido and Sana staying close to him. He tried to look around for a place to hide. If they stayed near the doors someone would notice and force them out with the rest. They had to stay inside. The voice was repeating the message. Where the hell was it coming from and how did it get so loud without the wind to carry it?!

Kaido took his hand away from his head for long enough to point up. On the second floor they could see the tops of some trees! Haku gave a quick nod of agreement and the three took one big leap, flying up over the railing and landing next to the trees sitting in pots. He realized then the trees were too small and wouldn’t do any good to hide them. This time Sana found it. Not far down was an open window leading into what looked like a kitchen. Being careful not to run into the people heading towards the exit, they leaped through the window and settled down behind the counter and out of sight. Thankfully the occupants had all ready left.

It was a long five minutes they sat there. The kitchen they were in was made out of odd things. More metals and stuff that wasn’t metal but it wasn’t wood either. There were boxes and cupboards tons of different shapes and sizes. After it seemed like it would never end, the sirens stopped. Cautiously Sana took her hands away from her ears. None of them really knew what to say about it. They had never heard anything so loud and horrible in their lives. Haku stood and looked out the window they had come in.

“Sana now.”

“Huh?”

He looked back, “The entire place is empty, this is better than we could have hoped for! Search for the crystal quick before everyone comes back and messes with your head!”

Easy for him to say, he didn’t have to try and block everything out after he had been scared half to death. But he was right. She closed her eyes and took several deep breaths, slowly letting her mind clear and connect with the energy around them. Too many walls. She shook her head. Had to get past the walls.

“It’s not here.” She felt her own energy somewhere but it was faint.

“Find it.” Kaido encouraged her.

Her eyes opened and she hopped back out the window, then started floating fast down the hall. The boys stayed right on her tail as she zoomed around corners, past bridges, in and out of more archways than they cared to count until Kaido started to wonder if they would ever find their way out again. Sana was completely focused. She was being drawn to her own life force within the crystal and she could feel it getting stronger the farther they went.

They came up on a huge open doorway. Hanging above was a glowing sign that read KI DOME. Sana plowed right through the door and into the new structure. Haku was right behind her but Kaido paused and stared at the sign. There was something about that name….

“Kai!”

Kaido dismissed it and took off. He hadn’t gone more than a few feet when a hand reached up and pulled him down. Haku and Sana were standing again. There were people around now and something told them flying might attract just a little too much attention. This building was different than the last. The whole thing was in the shape of a circle and there was lots of more open space compared to the last one. Light came in through the glass roof above and Sana savored the natural lighting. Trees and bushes scattered the area all in pots. A fake pond wasn’t far in front of them. Vines clung to poles and stairs all around. It looked like a huge entertainment area. Unfortunately they weren’t there to have fun.

“You still got it?” Haku asked.

“Yeah.” Sana said though not very convincingly. She started off at a fast pace staying near the wall on the side. Kaido couldn’t keep his eyes off the scenery as they went. It all looked so alive but it didn’t feel right for some reason. As they passed a long flower garden Kaido reached down. They’re all fake. That’s why he didn’t feel anything, there was nothing to feel!

“Through there!” Sana had accelerated to a light jog now. She headed for another big doorway with a sign above it reading WEST HOLE. They ran under it but as soon as they entered the new building she stopped again. This one looked similar to the first but there were five times as many people wandering about. Men and women covered every hall and staircase they could see.

“No.” Sana whispered as she looked around at the endless crowd of heads, “No, no, no.”

“What?” Haku put a hand on her shoulder, “You still have it right?”

Sana’s mouth was hanging open as she slowly shook her head, “It’s here. I know it is…. I just don’t know where.”

Haku tightened his grip slightly, “Concentrate, you have to get it back!”

Sana closed her eyes but after a moment she shook her head again, “Too many people.”

“Try harder!”

“Leave her alone!” Kaido snapped, “She all ready got us farther than we could have hoped for the first day. She says it’s in here somewhere, well that means we can eliminate the other four buildings. A half an hour into the search and we’ve got it down to one out of five. That’s pretty good.”

Haku couldn’t argue with that. He let go of Sana and stood in silence as they tried to figure out what to do next. Groups of kids were going in and out of the crowd now. They all carried bags and had a colorful piece of cloth tied somewhere around their body. Some had it around their arms, others had it hanging out of a pocket. A tiny chime rang out. Sana looked down in time to see a brown fuzz ball run past her feet.

“Kitty!” Sana took off after the cat. He had been gone when she had woken up in the morning. Seeing him now was like the sign she had been waiting for.

“Sana!” The boys tried to follow, but the thick crowd made it difficult. The cat was smaller and able to jump over feet and dodge legs. Sana refused to loose sight of the creature. She had a few near collisions but managed to stay close to his heels. For Haku and Kaido, all they had to do was follow the looks and mumbles of annoyance at the rude girl running around.

The cat turned down a side hall that led to more homely looking doors and windows. He stopped in front of one of the doors. Sana slowed too as three girls with green bandanas wrapped around their bags walked past her.

“Did you hear they had to evacuate the entire South hole this morning?”

“Are you serious?”

“Yeah! Apparently there was a rumor about a fire.”

“Scary! So the whole building was shut down?”

“That’s what I heard.”

“They probably won’t have to go to school today either.”

“Lucky!”

The cat meowed as they approached.

“Hey Sachi are you coming or what?!” one yelled into the window above the cat. The door opened,

“Yeah, yeah!” Another girl stepped out with a piece of bread hanging out of her mouth. She had long blondish hair that was held back by the green cloth. She looked maybe fifteen or sixteen years old. She closed the door as the cat started rubbing against her leg.

“Cinnamon!” she stuffed the bread in her mouth and swallowed then picked up the cat happily, “There you are! Jeeze how do you get so fat when all you do is run around all day?” she set the cat inside the window on the ledge and closed it. Sana twitched. That cat was her guide, she couldn’t just lock him in there!

“Sachi did you hear about the South hole being evacuated?”

“You’re kidding me!” The four girls headed back the other way and didn’t give Sana a second glance as they passed by.

“Sana!” Haku and Kaido caught up to her now, “Did you find it?”

She shook her head, “Thought I was on to something but I guess not.”

“Well what are we going to do?” Kaido sighed.

“Kai, you and I should try looking. We’ve had more training than Sana and we know what she feels like.” Haku decided.

“What if we think it’s the crystal though and we follow the trail but it just leads right back to her?” That had happened to him more times than he liked to admit.

“We’ll make her stay in a certain area so we know where the real thing is all the time, and we can focus on other areas.”

“Why do I suddenly feel more like an object than a person?” Sana glared. “Don’t.” Haku assured her, “How about this, you stay on the ground floor here and see if you can sense anything besides the people around. Kai and I will go up and see what we can do.”

“But-“ but she didn’t want to be left alone in this scary place with the walls and the people that seemed to have no meaning to the words personal space….

“You’ll be fine.” Haku gave her a quick pat on the back and began to slowly walk back into the open common area. Sana’s mouth opened and closed but her pride was keeping her from making any objections. After she had just proved how undeveloped her tracking skills were, the last thing she wanted to do was seem weak on top of it.

Kaido understood her more. He knew he wouldn’t want to be left alone in this strange place either. At the same time though he knew their number one priority had to be finding the crystal, and even though they had it down to just the one building they had a lot of space and forty some floors to search.

He gave her a small smile of reassurance, “We’ll meet you back here in three hours okay?”

“Okay….” She watched him walk off. So what now? Sana sighed and looked back. The cat was sitting in the window staring out at her, “Yeah I know, I don’t wanna be inside anymore either.” It was horrible. She had finally gotten what she had always wanted. She had an entire new world to see and explore, but this wasn’t the world she had expected. She shared one last sad look with the kitty then walked off.

The crowd almost disappeared after about an hour. Everyone off to work or school, it made traveling through the halls without running into people possible. Haku and Kaido slowly weaved through the first few floors, trying as hard as they could to pick out Sana’s energy apart from the thousands of others flying around.

“This is the most boring thing ever.” Kaido complained. They had been searching for hours and they were still only half way through the fourth floor.

“Don’t get lazy.” Haku warned.

“I know, but there has to be an easier way!”

“Well unless you want to yell fire this time, I don’t really think we have any more options.”

“Hey! You kids!”

The two turned around to see a man in a brown suit walking fast towards them. “What are you doing out here? Why aren’t you in school?” he demanded.

There was a moment of panicked silence.

“Fire!” Kaido blurted out.

“Huh? Oh are you from the South Hole?” he seemed to calm slightly.

“Y-yes!” Haku spoke this time, “They weren’t letting us back in so we decided to come here…for a while…until….”

“The building was cleared a half hour ago. If you two go straight back I won’t report you. What school section do you go to?”

They had no idea what that was, “The one in the South…hole?”

The man got a look on his face like he didn’t like jokes, “Funny, which corner of the South Hole? Blue, White, Yellow?”

“Blue!” Haku said a little too loudly.

“Okay then. I expect you to go right there and don’t try skipping out again!”

“We won’t.” they mumbled replies as they slowly started to walk backwards. The man watched them until they had disappeared around a corner. As soon as they were out of range they both burst out laughing.

“Holy crap that was scary!” Kaido leaned back against the wall.

“We’ll have to be more careful.” Haku shook his head trying to calm himself down.

“We can use that though. Blue school in the South Hole. It’s not a bad cover up.” Haku nodded, “It would probably be better if we split up too. One kid walking around is less suspicious than two together.”

Kaido shifted, “This place scares me.” He didn’t want to be left alone.

“Same here but we can’t afford to draw attention to ourselves. And we’ll cover more ground that way.”

“Stop making so much sense!”

“Sorry?”

“Fine then, I get the upper levels then because I’m sick of seeing the same thing over and over again. All we’ve covered is housing so far. How many people can they fit in here anyway?!”

“Apparently a lot. I’ll continue down here then. Have fun!”

“You too!” Kaido rolled his eyes and walked to the nearest stairs, “I’m hungry.” He stepped onto the automatic stairs. They moved on their own! It was the freakiest thing in the world, but by the fourth floor he knew they wouldn’t hurt him. Kaido traveled up until finally the scenery changed. Instead of the block square look, this new floor had open rooms with tons of tables sitting out. Colorful signs lined the halls with weird names. And the smell of food filled his nose.

There were a lot more people walking around, some with food in their hands. Kaido tensed every time he passed one, but none ever stopped or questioned him. He came to a smaller shop with samples of the goodies in a window. His mouth started watering.

I can be the guinea pig for the others. He decided, If I turn purple they’ll know its not safe to eat! With that he ran into the store. He waited as a woman picked up a bag and a cup then he stepped up to the counter, “Can I get one of those please?” he pointed to a muffin on the top shelf.

“Yep, that will be two fifty please.” A young man reached down to grab it.

“Two fifty what?”

He stopped, “Dollars.”

“Dollars?” Kaido looked around. By the look he knew this was something he was supposed to know, but he didn’t! “Umm….” He reached into his pocket and pulled out two pebbles that had gotten in there.

The kid behind the counter just looked at them, “Is this some kind of prank?” Kaido snatched them back, “I don’t have any…dollars.” Now would prolly be a good time to go!

“Then I can’t give you any food.”

Yep, time to go! He bolted before the guy could say anything else and ran up to the next level without even trying to look for the crystal.

Okay work! We have to find this thing! He told himself when he had settled down again. He closed his eyes and reached out with his mind. What the-! There was intense energy everywhere but it wasn’t human energy! It felt more like during a storm.

“I’m sorry, I don’t know what to tell ya. I’ve tried everything I could think of.” “There has to be something else you haven’t thought of, things don’t just crash for no reason!”

Kaido opened his eyes and started walking down in the direction of the voices. He took one turn when he saw a store on the left. The bold sign above flashed THE GAME HOLE. Inside there were dozens of colorful machines all giving off the electric energy. In the front there were three older men sitting around one of the bigger machines, looking inside at a maze of wires and plugs. Sneaking up behind them he could feel the energy flowing into the machine but then it stopped like it wasn’t getting to the right place it needed to be in. The men were getting louder and more frustrated now. It was slightly obvious that they couldn’t feel anything. Kaido was starting to realize the entire society was completely cut off from the unity of the world.

“God Damn Polting-!“ a big heavy man with little hair on his head swore and stood up, brought his leg back to kick the thing but one of the others grabbed it and the man fell to the side. That was when the last looked back and noticed Kaido watching from the side.

“What are you doing here?” he demanded. Not again, He shouldn’t have let his curiosity get the better of him!

“Uh, I’m from the South Hole?”

The three men composed themselves, “Isn’t that the one that got evacuated this morning?”

“Yeah, some idiot called a false alarm on a fire.”

“Stupid people.”

The big man nodded to Kaido, “So what do you want kid? Here to play some games? Go ahead, just save your tickets for some other time.”

Kaido shrugged and stepped closer, “I, uh, maybe I could look at that machine there…I might be able to help a little.”

“We got it covered.” One them replied quickly.

The big one threw a glare at the one who had spoken, “At this point I’m willing to try anything. What do you know about electronics kid?”

Again Kaido shrugged, “I know that the energy isn’t flowing where it needs to go and if you let me look around I might be able to make the connection.”

“What the heck does that all mean?”

This time the big guy whacked him across the arm, “He’s got an open mind, that’s exactly what we need right now. Take a look kid.” He moved out of the way. Cautiously Kaido stepped forward and bent down to look in the box.

“There was a crack in the main power line.” The little man next to him pointed out a wire, “We replaced it and it worked for about an hour before it crashed and we haven’t been able to figure out what went wrong.”

“It’s a good wire!” the last one spoke up, “They all are, it has to be some internal bug problem.”

“There’s no bug.” The big one snapped.

Kaido reached inside. The energy was flowing through one particular wire that went through the machine. It should have been working, “Where is the energy supposed to go?”

“Right there, right where it is!” one of them pointed to where it connected to the front of the machine.

“Hmm.” Kaido followed it back to the source and found three wires connected to the initial output of the energy, “Ahh.” That’s where the block was. The big wire wasn’t getting enough while a smaller one was getting too much and creating a block within itself. He reached in and pulled them both out. As he switched them the machine began to hum and come to life.

“Kid you are a freakin’ genius!” they complimented him as he pulled his head out. The big man put his arm around Kaido’s shoulders in a half hug, “You saved my shop! Why don’t you come to the back and look at a few other dead games that have just been sitting there?”

“Uh….” He really didn’t have much time to waste. Didn’t want Haku to yell at him.

“I’ll pay you for it!”

Now that was a different story, “Dollars?”

“Yes, in cash! Fifty bucks sound good to you?”

“I don’t….” Was fifty a lot?

“Okay fine, seventy five but no more!”

“Uh, alright, sure!” it had to be worth something if he was making a big deal out of it! Kaido smiled as the big man led him through the store to the back. He was going to get some money and get them some real food instead of living off tiny sized fruit!

Haku continued to weave around the lower floors all day. It was pretty dead until one point when there was a sudden rush of kids coming down the stairs. School must have gotten out. When he was surrounded even he couldn’t get past all the confusion to try and focus on Sana, and going against the crowd was beginning to get to hard. He turned and started heading back down, blending in perfectly with the hundreds of kids his age. He paid little attention to the conversation of the group of girls in front of him.

“Card club tonight right?”

“Yeah, come to my house at five!”

“Sorry guys I’m gonna be late tonight.”

“Why?”

“Dad just got back yesterday so mom wants us all to go out to dinner and all that fun family bonding stuff. I should be able to get out after desert.”

We just got in yesterday. Haku thought. Wait. We just got in, the invaders must have gotten back early yesterday as well!

“Hey!” he stepped forward and the small group turned with confused looks. Which one had said her dad had just gotten back? “Sorry, I just…couldn’t help but hear the last part of that and uh…” what the heck was he doing? “Where did your Dad just get back from?” he looked at each one not sure to address the question too.

“Why?” a girl on the end with long blond hair gave him a weird look.

“Just because….I’m interested to know?” very convincing. Haku wanted to kick himself.

“No where, it’s none of your business.” She turned and kept walking, the rest quickly followed.

“Crap.” He totally ruined that. Can’t do that! He scolded himself. Can’t rush into things without thinking. That was Sana’s job! Even so he dropped back so he wouldn’t scare them even more. He watched as the girls descended all the way to the second floor where one of them broke off then the last three continued down. The blond continued to near where they had stood earlier with Sana. She disappeared into one of the doors.

He had to talk to her father. If he could somehow get him to say anything about the crystal-! It was too much to hope for. For all he knew he might not even have been one of the invaders. It could all be a coincidence. But still it was more than anyone else had found all day. He’d keep it in mind at least.

Suddenly he felt Sana’s energy. A strong pull to the right. He turned and rushed down the stairs, through a hall and into another big rotunda area. In the middle was a plot of fake grass and trees with a playground on top of it. He noticed Sana sitting near the edge, her eyes closed as she meditated. For one brief moment he had thought…. Haku sighed and walked up next to his sister.

“I don’t know about you but I’m going to go crazy if I have to look at one more of these moles.” He said.

Sana opened her eyes, “It’s like they’ve all got walls around them. They don’t know how to open up.”

“That’s what happens when you cut yourself off and live in these…things.” Haku looked around in mild disgust.

Sana nodded and stood up, “Let’s get out of here. I need to feel some wind.”

“Haku?! Sana?!” Kaido dropped gracefully to the ground near the edge of the woods, a big bag in his hands.

“Hey Kai.” Haku appeared, “Sorry we didn’t tell you when we left.”

“It’s all good.” Kaido set the bag on the ground and started pulling stuff out, “Look what I got! You have to try some of this food, it’s amazing!” he unwrapped a brown circle with white stripes and bit into it eagerly.

“Where’d you get all that?” Haku knelt down to look at the stuff.

“This guy gave me money for fixing some of his machines!” Kaido said with a mouth full of food and pulled out some of the coins.

“Looks like you got over your fear of the place anyway.” Haku mumbled and picked up a round crumbly thing with colorful dots scattered on it.

“Yeah.” He swallowed, “That place isn’t so bad once you figure out how it all works.”

Haku looked up, “How does it all work?”

“They live off of energy, just like we do. Only they use machines to transfer it from place to place instead of bringing it through themselves. Their way has a lot of limitations though obviously, but they can also power things with the energy! Make them move on their own! That’s how they get the signs to light up and the stairs to move, it’s amazing!” he finished off the mini chocolate cake, “Where’s Sana?”

“Out watching the sun set.” Haku pointed in the general west direction.

“Oh man she has got to try these things.” He dug out a bag of little multi colored beans, “I’ll be back in a while, don’t eat everything before I get back!” he jumped into the air and flew off.

Haku watched him go then took a tiny bite out of the cookie, “Not bad.” He hated to admit it, “Not bad at all.”

“This is where I found Cinnamon last week.”

“Aahh that’s so pretty!”

“We have to come back here later to star gaze!”

“It’s a cliff with a view big whoop.”

“It’s a cliff with a pretty view!”

“We should make a fire.”

“Hey sticks! Does someone wanna sword fight?”

“Yeah!!”

Haku quickly shoved everything Kaido had dropped back into the bag and ducked behind the trees. Up on a ledge on the mountain a group of six kids appeared. Haku quietly flew up and landed on a high branch, but even that was still far below the group. He picked out two guys right away and four girls. His shrunk down in embarrassment. It was the same girls from earlier. What were the odds of that? He watched them hit some sticks together for a while. It was sadly amusing, none of them had any idea what they were doing.

It quickly got darker and the edge of the moon appeared. Finally one of them looked at their wrist. “Guys I gotta go home so I don’t get yelled at.”

“Yeah me too.” The bulk of them started back.

“Hey guys I’ll catch up with you in a sec!” Haku saw one stay behind. The blond that he had freaked out earlier. She picked up one of the sticks and started lazily twirling it around. Slow, rhythmic movements not unlike the low level training routines. She held a small smile as she turned and her hair fanned out around her. Haku couldn’t take his eyes away, she was like a beautiful ancient warrior, and the low lighting just made it seem all that more real.

There are no coincidences. One of Genai’s old sayings came into his head. The girl set down the stick carefully then ran off after her friends, but Haku knew what he had to do. He had to talk to her father.

“I’m not going back there.” Sana declared the next morning, “I’m staying here to train and maybe Dad will feel it.”

The boys felt like they should have argued, but arguing with Sana was always pointless, “Well then, there’s lots of food if you get hungry.” Kaido reminded her.

“Don’t go and get lost.” Haku warned and the two flew off to the West Hole. Kaido handed Haku some coins when they walked into the door then they split up again.

Sana got through some hard core meditating in the early part of the morning. She needed to get a lot stronger in a very short amount of time. As she sat among the trees, visions flashed through her head.

Sana stood in the giant dome in front of the pond. She stepped onto the water but didn’t sink. She walked across as if it were as solid as the ground. When she reached the middle she turned and lifted her arms. The water bubbled and became a fountain, lifting her several feet into the air. She happily took in all the confused and surprised looks around her then started swaying back and fourth, moving her hands in a simple dance. All around in pots and gardens real flowers popped up. Bushes sprouted out, living vines covered the fake ones and grew to hang over every railing in sight. Everything became covered in green, but she wasn’t about to stop there.

Her eyes snapped open. She knew what she had to do

Around noon she had a quick bite to eat then flew over the mountain towards the buildings. Surrounding the outsides were random groups of kids playing games and one class even had their books in front of them while they listened to a teacher speak. Sana watched them from the sky then landed on the edge of the huge dome in the middle of the other four structures. After searching around for a few minutes she found a door that led into the top floor.
“All right. Time to show these people what real plants look like.” She figured if she couldn’t help look for the crystal she could at least help educate the hermits on how life was supposed to be lived. Hopping down a few floors to the first small garden, she reached in and put her hand on the dirt. Remember the life that once sprung from your soul, she released all the energy in her hand. It took longer than usual but in a few moments buds appeared in the dirt. They grew and sprouted into a mix of colorful flowers. Sana smiled and took a second to admire her work then quickly dropped down to the main floor where some real work could be done.

“It’s definitely somewhere around here.” Haku mumbled angrily. He stood with Kaido on the playground where he had found Sana the day before. The two had met up again, following the same scent. They could feel the crystal in the area, but it was too faint to pin point and the energy was the same from the ground all the way up to the top of the last floor.
“At least we got it down a little more.” Kaido reasoned.
“Not that much.”
“Well….I’m gonna go back up to the middle and look around there.” Kaido started walking towards the nearest stairs.
“Good luck!” Haku called after him and watched until he was out of sight. Then he turned and went to find the home of the girl he had seen the day before.
Kaido was glad to split up again too. He went up to the floor with the game shop. The shop owner had expected him to go back to school that day so he wasn’t supposed to show up for another hour. He stood outside the store and looked in at all the lights and colors. The game he had fixed the day before was sitting right out in front. It was a box with a round screen and pad in front. With nothing better to do, he stepped onto the pad and the screen hummed to life.
“Pick up the sword.” The words came up.
Kaido glanced around then picked up the wooden sword on the side.
“Slash the one you want: Beginner, Average, Expert, Master.”
Kaido was a little confused at this, he moved to touch the Beginner level one. As he moved a picture of the sword came on screen! When he moved it left, the picture moved left, when he moved it closer, it thrust forward.
“Sweet.” He slashed the word Beginner and gripped the sword.

A chime of bells shot out of the door as it opened. Two hands shot down and scooped up the cat, bringing him up to her chest.
“No, no, you’ve had your fun this week.” Sachi scolded and went in, closing the door behind her. She set Cinnamon onto the floor and dropped her backpack onto the kitchen counter.
“Dad?”
“In here!”
Sachi followed the voice into the living room where she stopped dead. Her father was sitting on the couch opposite of a boy with a notebook in her hand. The same stalker boy from the day before! They both stood up and Haku nodded slightly.
“Sachi, this is Haku. A reporter from the South Blue school. He had heard of the Renion Ocean expedition and wanted an interview.” He turned back to Haku, “Was that all you wanted to ask?”
“Yes, thank you for your time.” Haku smiled and shook that man’s hand, then headed out the door.
It had been more or less a waste. The man had refused to talk about anything. All he said was, everything regarding it was confidential and the information would be posted in the paper the next day. So they were going to have to wait another day to find anything out! All he really knew was they were indeed the ones who invaded their home and killed their teacher.
“Hey! Wait up!”
Haku turned around to see the girl running after him.
“I…I just wanted to apologize about being so mean to you yesterday.” She said softly when she had caught up, “I didn’t know you were a reporter….”
“It’s okay.” Haku cut her off, “It was my fault for not telling you and just jumping into the conversation. I would have been a little freaked out too. I admit it’s a little odd when people you don’t know just go up and start digging into your life without so much as an introduction.” He smiled.
“No kidding!” Sachi looked relived.
“I’m Haku by the way.”
“Sachi. Nice to meet you…formally.”
“You too!”
There was a moment of awkward silence. The ring of a bell ran past them. For a split second Haku feared it was Sana, but suddenly Sachi gasped and took off running.
“Cinnamon!” she yelled and followed the fat brown fuzz ball.
“Eh?” Without thinking Haku went after them. He quickly ran past the girl and caught up with the cat. Reaching down without slowing, he scooped up the cat just as his foot got caught on a stray bag. He flew forward, somersaulting across the hall and banging right into a kiosk full of books. No sooner than he had gotten his wits back when he felt hard edges drop on his head and back.

“Ow.” As soon as he was sure the attack was over he shifted around and sat up properly. Sachi came running up and holding her side. She was laughing harder than he had ever seen someone laugh before!

“What do you think you’re doing?!” the kiosk owner suddenly burst into the scene. She thought it was anything but funny.

“S-sorry.” Haku gave an apologetic smile and handed the lady a book.

“Oh my god, are you okay?” Sachi could hardly get the words out without laughing.

“The cat is fine.” Haku held up Cinnamon who was still struggling in his arms, “But I might need some help walking for the rest of the day…and sitting, and eating, and getting into bed….”

“You’re just fine!” Sachi called his bluff and took her cat.

“Doesn’t hurt to try right?” Haku picked up the remaining books on the ground and handed them to the shop owner.

“That was awesome.” Sachi was still giggling as they walked away, “You looked just like Miker in the KU holoflick!”

“Who’s Miker?” Haku rubbed his back.

“You’ve never seen a KU holoflick?!” the girl was stunned.

Haku shook his head.

“You have to go see them, they’re the funniest things ever!”

“Where do you see them?”

“Oh that’s right, you probably don’t come to the West Hole often do you? They’re on the thirteenth floor on the dome side.” The confused look on his face didn’t go away, “I’ll show you!” Sachi said finally. She dropped Cinnamon off back at her house then led Haku back up to the upper levels of the building.

The whole way Sachi rambled on about these holoflicks. She recited random quotes and Haku laughed more in the few minutes than he had in the last month. As they stepped onto the eighth floor they passed a huge group of kids cheering and yelling in front of a game store.

“What’s going on there?” Haku muttered.

Sachi waved it off, “Some kid with no life showing off how pathetically good he is at some stupid game. Come on, this way!” she led him towards the next set of stairs, the shouts disappearing behind them.

“On your left!”

“Did you see that?!”

“You can do it!!”

“Watch out!”

Kaido zoned out the voices, they just confused him. He brought the sword up and down, slicing a zombie on the screen in half, then he turned and slashed one through the middle. The picture moved forward to the next challenge. After trying a few of the moves he had realized this was exactly how Genai trained the beginning warriors. All the first years learned how to become expert fighters because to control your energy you had to learn how to use it first by knowing the limits of your body. That was how Sana had gotten so strong. He was surprised none of those skills had faded over the years and he jumped right from Level one to Master. One kid who had walked by had seen his score and freaked. It was only a matter of time after that until a whole horde of them were gathered around, cheering him on.

Four zombies jumped up out of nowhere. Kaido cut through the first one that landed near him, spun and sliced through the second then jumped up over the head of another as the last two came down. They turned and followed but he tripped the one and stuck the sword into the gut of the last. More were pouring out now, but one after another Kaido chopped them all down. The shouts became louder and Kaido grinned. He knew all that cheering was for him.

Suddenly the attacks stopped and one huge zombie materialized out of the ground on the screen. Kaido went for its legs, then its arms and chest, but every attack hardly even scratched the beast. It took a few swings at him and did more damage than he had gotten the entire game. Kaido jumped up, avoided its swinging arm and landed in the thing’s head. He thrust the sword down into the Zombie’s eye. A loud screech sounded and the giant collapsed.

The screen was still for a moment then the words. THE END appeared. He had beaten the game. Some guys behind him were having a hay day now. Kaido wiped the sweat from his forehead and couldn’t help but laugh. He couldn’t believe what he had just done. The score board came up with a blank in the #1 spot. Kaido eagerly drew in his name with the sword, happy to see his score was a good three digits higher than anything else on there. When it was done he turned to face the fans.

“That was crazy!” people surrounded him with praise and questions. How he beat this, how he got past that. It was all easy stuff but Kaido savored every minute of it. He had never gotten this much attention before in his life! Back home there were always more interesting people to look at. For the first time ever he got to experience how the spot light felt. And he loved every second of it.

Sana stood on the beach looking out over the water. It was getting darker, the sun would be setting soon. There, in the sky a tiny shape appeared. A seagull descended and landed on the sand. It gave a quick cry and Sana smiled and nodded. She took a short ribbon and tied it around the bird’s leg. Then pointed out. The bird gave another cry and flew off again, back over the water.

“Sana!” Kaido appeared next to her. He grabbed her hands and started spinning them around, laughing happily, “You’ll never guess what happened to me today! I was playing this game and won and everyone was like woo! And then the manager came and was like stop crowding! But then he took me back and was like, you’re the best thing that ever happened to this store I want to officially hire you part time! And it was so great!” “What?!” Sana tugged her arms away and tried to get her balance back, but before her head could stop spinning something landed on her and knocked her to the ground. “Crazy, it works!” Haku’s crawled off of her.

“Finally get to see Sana get pinned!” Kaido was laughing hard.

“It was a move from a holoflick I saw today.” Haku explained happily, “You have to see one Kai, they have this stage then in the blink of an eye things appear! It’s gone, it’s there, just like that! People too! They walk and move and talk, but its all fake and all projected by lights or something, I didn’t get it all but it was amazing, and it was funny! I swear I haven’t laughed that hard in years.”

“Getting you to laugh at all is pretty good!” Kaido agreed.

“I know! But I saw this thing and I was just like, this is incredible!”

“Same with those games, you have to try some you’d probably be better than me!” “Only if you agree to see this flick.”

“You don’t even have to ask!”

Sana watched this exchange from the side with growing annoyance. Haku was excited about something. Haku never got excited. About anything. Ever. She didn’t even know her brother could DO excited. Same with Kaido. He was going on like he had found his Utopia.

“What is wrong with you two?!” She finally snapped.

They stopped and looked over at her, “What?”

“You’re a pair of idiots, have you completely forgotten why we’re here in the first place?! We have a mission! These people are not our friends. They stole the very symbol of our culture. We’re here to get it back then go home. Have you forgotten about our friends? Our families? Have you forgotten what these people did to Genai?! The creatures living in those buildings are heartless beasts. If they knew where we came from they would probably kill us too!”

“I don’t think they would kill us.” Kaido protested quietly.

“You don’t know that!” Sana countered.

“Neither do you.”

Sana glared at him for a minute then pushed off the ground, “Don’t wait up for me.” She called back as she flew off.

Haku watched her go then sighed, “She’s got a point. We should try harder. Tomorrow morning we’ll get an early start. We know where to look. If we can pin point it any more than that we should be able to find it pretty quick. Then Sana can disband it and we can go home.”

Kaido just shrugged and walked back to the woods.

“Everyone’s still asleep.” Haku observed as they walked down the dim halls, “We should have brought Sana with, she could probably work in these conditions.”

Kaido shook his head, “By the time we got back with her everyone would be up and it would have been a waste of time.”

“Let’s go then.” They hopped up so they were floating slightly above the ground. Flying was faster than running and this way if anyone came they could touch down quick. They followed the feeling of Sana’s life force back to the playground where they had been the day before. The feeling was stronger which meant the crystal was starting to fight against itself to rejoin with the bulk of the universe.

“It’s here.” They both felt it. They looked all around. Under equipment, in the branches of the fake trees. They went up a few floors and searched all around there, but in the end they had nothing. People were waking up now and their energy was starting to get in the way.

“Let’s get a muffin or something and wait until everyone goes to school and work.” Kaido suggested and they walked up a few floors to the fast food places. They got their breakfast and watched the people walk by. The crowd got thicker, then slowly thinned. But after about an hour it still hadn’t disappeared. Everyone looked tired and pale. They sneezed and coughed and moaned, until the boys realized they weren’t going to go away.

“You’re sick too?” they heard one man greet another in line.

“Yeah, find someone today who isn’t. It’s like national be sick day.”

“It’s allergies.” A woman sniffed and joined the conversation.

“Can’t be allergies, I haven’t been outside in months and how can every person get it in the same day?”

“Some idiot planted real flowers in the Dome so now they’re all blooming and giving every polting person in Holes allergies!” the man behind the counter slammed his hand down.

“Real flowers?”

“Yeah! They just appeared. Sure they smell good but damn they’re annoying!” “Now that you mention it, every time I passed through the Dome yesterday I saw this girl sitting by the gardens. It was a different one each time, but she was always there.” Haku twitched, “Mysterious girl and instant flowers?” he mumbled so only Kaido heard him.

“You don’t think….”

“Who else could it be?”

“Sana you idiot.” Kaido dropped his head down on the table.

“I just hope this all clears up before the festival on Saturday.” The woman in line said more to herself.

“What festival?” all the men looked at her.

“The festival they just announced this morning.” She pulled a paper out of her bag, “Look, Saturday, big event in the Dome. All Holes invited. Lots of Music, Food and Fun. The Ocean expedition crew apparently made some life altering discovery or something.”

Haku and Kaido leaned closer.

“It’s probably bull. I heard their funding was going to be cut after this last trip. Of course they’re going to pretend they found something so the big people will hand them some more money.”

“I don’t know, they’re making a pretty big deal out of it. They even say they’ve got a piece to show off. The greatest treasure of the century it says.”

The crystal. They had heard enough. They bolted out of the coffee shop and ran around until they found a paper of their own. After reading through the article several times they sat down to think everything over.

“If we just wait until Saturday they’ll bring it out into the open and we won’t even have to search.” Haku said quietly.

“We won’t get anything done today, that’s for sure. What day is it anyway?” “Paper says Thursday.”

“So how many days until Saturday?”

Haku had to read through some of it again, “It says just two days from now.” “How can we even read the paper?” Kaido wondered out loud, “We’re from a totally different place, how is it we speak the same language and write in the same characters? Anyone else find that just a little odd?”

“You’re thinking too much.”

“Still seems weird.”

There was a minute of silence.

“So, uh, since we can’t search anymore, do you think you might wanna go try one of those games?” Kaido muttered.

Haku looked at him and for a moment Kaido feared he was going to scold him for slacking off again.

“One game then I get to take you to see the holoflick.”

Kaido grinned, “Deal!”

Sachi sat lazily doodling in her notebook. It was the last class of the day and like everyone else she was anxious to get out of school. All around her were groups of kids goofing off and talking. One looking around for a green marker for who knew what. Another sitting on a stool reading a comic. She picked up random parts of conversations.

“Just have Bressman go up there and be like ‘what the hell?!’”

“Can I hit you over the head with a book?”

“I had fire fire arrows flying all around and she kept spitting at them!”

“What is this? Resule, resutho, is it French or something? Take better notes! Get better handwriting. That’s like a gene for girls, good handwriting! No, no, gimme the notes back!”

“Okay everyone take a seat!” the teacher stood up from his chair in front of the desk, “Everyone got the warm up done right? Let’s start with number one. X to the zero power. Where will it cross the graph?”

“One.” the response was slow.

“Right. The nice thing is that every single number will go through this point because any number to the zero power is one! Twenty to the zero power is one. Two million five hundred and thirty three point six to the zero power is one. Mr. Lang to the zero power is….”

“An idiot!”

Laughter erupted through the class. Sachi giggled and looked up for the first time. As she did someone walked past the door and caught her eye. Mr. Lang turned back to the white board. She dropped her pencil then quietly stood, grabbed the pass and slipped out the door.

“Hey!”

Haku turned. Crap, busted! Too late for an escape, “Uh, hey!”

“What are you doing here?” Sachi caught up with him.

What AM I doing here? “I uh, we…got out early and I…wanted to see…what other schools…were like…I guess…and uh, do a report…on them.” worst excuse ever!!

Sachi didn’t look like she believed it either, “At least your out.” he was grateful she didn’t push it, “I don’t wanna go back to class.” she groaned.

“Then don’t.”

“What?”

What was he doing?! “Don’t go back to class. I want to see more of this place.” his mind was no longer in control of his mouth.

“I’ve never skipped class before…but he all ready took attendance….”

It took some convincing but Haku eventually got Sachi to abandon the pass in the middle of the hall and sneak out of the school. It was so unlike him. Mr. Always work hard and follow the rules or else you won’t get anywhere. He was suddenly breaking off from his duty to the crystal and talking a girl into skipping class. It was so not like him, yet he felt no guilt. More of the opposite. He felt happy and energized. Unlike a lot of things he did in life, it felt right.

We’re here, the crystal is here, come find us. Sana sat on the beach trying to reach out in hope that someone back home would feel her and come looking for them. As she finished up the meditation a string of pain sliced through her head.

“Ahh!” she grabbed her head. Something was dieing, and not in a peaceful way. She stood and looked back towards the forest. It was coming from there. She lifted off and flew fast over the tops of the trees trying to find the source.

“Move you pansies! We need enough wood to fill up the entire dome, come on!” Sana followed the voice to the edge of the forest. She stopped at the last tree carefully glanced over the end. Men stood near the trunks of the trees. Close to fifty of them, and over half with big loud things in their hands. She watched as one went up to a tree, took the machine he was holding and cut right into the tree! Sana’s stomach sank. They were all doing it! There was all ready a pile of trees off to the side where others were trimming off the branches and leaves. They were murdering the forest! Her hand clenched into a fist. She should stay out of sight, not get involved in it. The sound of the metal hitting the wood let out a high pitched scream.

The same hatred she felt when she had seen Genai’s body laying on the ground built up inside of her. She had vowed that she was going to avenge his death. Now was her chance. She was going to make them pay.

“STOP IT!” Sana dropped down from the trees next to the trunks in the pile. She grabbed the first one and picked it right up.

“What the-!” the men around all stopped and stared at her until the trunk came flying at them. It rammed into three and knocked them hard to the ground. They were all stopping now and yelling at the crazy girl who was picking up another trunk with ease that it would have taken five of the men there to lift up. A few ran at her but she tossed it at them and she went down with the others.

Panic broke out. The smart ones started running back towards the mountains. The dumb ones stayed and tried talking Sana out of doing anything else. Then there were two last guys that had no idea what was going on and were still cutting down the trees. Sana picked up a tree that still had some leaves on it. She swung it around warningly at the men trying to get close to her.

The wind came up behind her and jingled the bells in her hair, “Leave the trees alone!” she warned, her voice unnaturally loud, “Do not kill another living thing or I will come back and kill YOU!” She tossed the tree out and the men scattered.

Mild thunder was heard as another tree tipped and crashed to the ground. Sana’s head snapped over, a deadly fire in her eyes. She jumped into the air, over the heads of the remaining men and landed next to the one who had just cut it down. He jumped back in surprise when she appeared and turned off the saw.

“What are-AAHH!” He didn’t get two words out before Sana kicked the machine to the ground then thrust her hand out, stopping it inches in front of him. Her energy continued out of her palm and barreling into the man’s chest. He cried out and stumbled back, clutching his heart.

“Get out!” Sana screamed, “Don’t ever come back!!”

The men’s eyes were filled with fear now. They helped up the injured and quick as they could started making their way back to the buildings.

“Someone get Bob!”

Sana looked back. There was one last one still going at a tree. Before any of the others could rescue him she flew over and tripped him. He went down, the saw went up. Sana reached to grab it when the hot spikes sliced through her hand.

“AAHHHHH!”

The saw dropped to the ground, still going and spinning. The stunned man was hastily pulled off by the others. They turned back one last time to see Sana stop the saw then break it in half with one chop.

Kaido was on his back playing with some wires under a broken race game. The big guy boss, Dan stood on the other side of the door. The noise of the game music was easily heard through the thin wall. He heard mumbled conversations between the big guy and costumers. Suddenly the door opened and he walked in the back room with another pair of feet following.

“So what’s the big news?”

“I came straight from the Dome to here.” The voice was low and shaky, “We were constructing some of the seating for the festival on Friday when all of a sudden the cutting crew comes running in all hysterical. They claimed they had been attacked by a demon!”

“A demon? What kind of drugs were they on?” Dan laughed.

“I don’t know but some of them were all bruised up, one had a broken arm! They rushed them off to the North Hole hospital. I just heard bits of the report to the supervisor. They said a young girl attacked them and warned them not to cut down any more trees. Threw full grown trunks around like twigs!”

Kaido jerked and hit his head against the machine.

“You okay?” Dan spoke up.

“Yeah!” Kaido winced and rubbed his head.

“So you’re telling me a little girl did all that damage?” Dan turned back to his friend.

“I guess, that’s just what I heard. I thought you’d like to hear the story.”

“That is a good story, best laugh I’ve had all day!”

Kaido managed to wiggle out from under the game, “I’m going on break!” he announced and dashed out the door.

Dan nodded and went right back to the conversation, “So getting off the subject of tree demons, how’d your date go last week?”

“Sana?!” Kaido dropped through the trees. The young girl was sitting against a tree, fussing over her hand and mumbling incoherently, “Sana?” he landed softly in the grass, then quickly picked his feet back up. All around the grass was stained a deep red. The girl didn’t even look up at him as she attempted to wrap a covering of leaves around her wrist. Her shirt and arms were covered in blood.

“Sana…what happened?” Kaido found a dry spot on the ground next to her.

She kept mumbling as her hands stumbled and the dressing slipped off for the tenth time.

Kaido quickly reached down and picked it up, “Here, let me.”

Sana offered up her arm. She had a deep gash going from between her thumb and index finger, down her palm and stopping in her wrist.

“Holy crap.” this wasn’t some cut you could fix with a cover up, and blood was still coming out! Kaido dropped the bandage and took Sana’s hand between his both of his. She tensed with the feel of pressure on her wound.

“Stay still.” Kaido focused on the veins in her arm. Healing had never been his specialty. Well, nothing had ever been his specialty, but he could at least stop the bleeding.

“I hate them.” Sana’s words became audible as the tissue started to heal.

“Hm?”

“I wanna go home.” She said a little louder.

“I want to go home too.” Kaido agreed softly.

“I don’t care about the crystal anymore Kai, I just want to get away from these people. I hate them. I hate them all.”

“They’re not that bad.”

“They’re murderers. They killed Genai. They killed the trees. I’m getting out of here before they decide to start killing people too!”

“They’re not going to kill people-”

“How do you know?!” Sana looked up at him for the first time. Her eyes were red, “These people aren’t like us Kai. We don’t know how they think. They could turn on us at any time! I don’t want to look at another single one of them!”

“Sana, calm down, it’s gonna be all right. No one’s going to turn on us.” He wrapped his arms around her shoulders in a hug. Her hand still had a deep scar but there was nothing he could do about that.

She leaned against him and closed her eyes, he could tell she was exhausted, “Yes they will.” she muttered, “I wanna go home….” and slipped into sleep.

Haku finished off the last donut in their food stash and licked his fingers.

“Where were you last night?” Kaido came up behind him.

Haku winced, “I was exploring the whole place. Didn’t get back until late, sorry.” “Don’t be sorry to me.” Kaido sat down next to him, “Your sister was the one that really needed you last night.”

The boy waved it off, “Sana never needs anyone. She can take care of herself better than most adults.”

“But she’s still a kid. We’re all still kids. And sometimes our emotions need to be treated like it.” Kaido’s voice had a demanding edge to it.

Haku looked at him, “What do you mean, Sana suddenly turn back into a baby last night?” he smirked, but Kaido glared at him until the smile went away.

“I mean she can’t handle this. Somehow she can’t take it all in and make sense of it. She still sees these people as barbaric beasts. Last night she was ready to go home the instant you came back.”

“We can’t go home!” he said a little too loudly, “Yet…. The crystal will be brought out tomorrow. If we can hold out until then we could easily get Sana to it so she can disband it and then we can go home and not worry about it.” He tried to reason. Kaido shook his head, “That’s my idea too but Sana doesn’t care about it anymore. She’s ready to leave even if it risks the few extra days to get the grown ups to come back and finish the job for her.”

Haku took it in, then sighed and stood up, “Tell her I wanted to get a head start on searching again. If she wants to leave she can come and hunt me down herself.” He jumped up and flew over the mountain.

What’s his problem? Kaido watched him disappear, He was the one that wanted to go back in the first place. He finally got what he wanted, now he doesn’t want it anymore? Something wasn’t right. Sana might not go after him but Kaido was willing to go see what was up.

Haku wandered all around the first part of the morning. At noon he made his way to exit into the Dome. He stopped near a fountain and sat down.

Is he taking a break or something? Kaido watched from a few floors up. He sat there a few minutes then Haku stood up and waved. A girl ran into sight and came up next to him then the two went into the Dome together. Kaido almost fell over the rail. That was the real reason Haku didn’t want to go home?! He was in shock, part of him was furious, another was confused and the last part wanted to laugh out loud!

When he finally got his head together he ran through the fifth floor entrance, the glowing KI DOME sign above him. The faint smell of flowers was still in it and Kaido happily took a deep breath, but he had other things to worry about. He followed the couple through the construction going all around, and after a good ten minutes they came to another exit. NORTH HOLE the sign said. This was the funniest thing Kaido had ever seen! His friend was deliberately abandoning his post by the crystal to have a carnival day with a girl!

The North Hole wasn’t any different than the others. He weaved down halls and over bridges in attempt to keep Haku in sight. It was a little harder when they started going up stairs and unintentionally coming towards him. But Kaido managed to stay out of the way. It helped that Haku was totally absorbed in this other person. On the seventeenth floor they finally went into a place labeled HISTORICAL MUSEAUM. It took time for Kaido to travel back down, but once he got in there the going was slow.

The two had to stop and look and talk about everything there was. Haku’s never been interested in history before. Kaido thought. He had never paid any attention to old man Genai’s stories back home. This wasn’t like their history though. The place was filled with old machines and objects. It really was fascinating. The only history they had back home were stories. These people actually had proof and items they could hand down.

Kaido listened closely to each story the girl told about this or that. Then when they moved on he would look on to what she had been talking about. She had brainwashed his friend but the more she talked the harder it was to hate her. As they moved to the next room again, Kaido slipped in and gazed at the early invisibility suits. Nothing more than mirror shards, but genius all the same. He walked around then spotted an almost hidden door with the dim words ANCIENT KI. There was that word again, Ki. Why was it so familiar? He knew he had heard it somewhere before and not just from the name of the Dome.

The voices were still strong in the next room over. Kaido looked around then ducked into the small door. The few artifacts inside were scattered. All of them old and rusted from the pre-technology era. There were bowls and spears. Like the spears our ancestors used to use for hunting. Kaido smiled. There were farming tools and toys, old scrolls for writing and furniture. All of it reminded him of the stories he loved to hear about the old times.

Then something caught his eye at the end. Covering the whole back wall was a mural with writing under it. Above it was labeled, “Separation of the Ki”. Kaido went over and started reading. As he read his eyes grew wide and his pulse went up.

It started out with pictures of an ancient society. Thousands of people who were a part a great tribe that lived in the woods. They lived a busy, peaceful life, but it was all centered around the great treasure. It was a gift from the stars and the people worshiped the glowing blue sphere. They asked it for good luck and advice, and it served them well. Until they day it exploded.

On that day, a small group had formed around it to ask for a good hunting morning. Before they had a chance to finish the prayer, the treasure burst and hit them with a radiant light. Those who were hit were blessed. Given visions of a wondrous new world and creations. When they tried to explain their visions to the others, they were turned down and called crazy. They tried to go back to life the way it had been, but the more time that passed the more clear the visions became. In the end the small group constructed a boat and left their friends and families to go build the new world.

Kaido just stared at the early sketches of the domes and buildings. It all made sense now. It explained why they spoke the same language and wrote the same. These people are our ancestors. He looked at the title again, Separation of the Ki…Ki….KI! It finally hit him where he had heard that name before! Ki had been the name of the tribe that created the first crystal and joined the rest together under its power! It meant something…tree! That’s right they had called themselves the Tree people!

Kaido was hopping up and down now from excitement. He had finally figured it out, it all made sense! It was all the same only a different side of the story. He had always heard it as the people had gone insane and went off to die and end their misery. But no, the ones who had been hit saw it as an enlightenment! These people were once of the same blood, they probably still were!

“There are our people.” He suddenly had a new goal in life. He was going to go home and tell people the real story of the first crystal!

“Oh hey I think we missed this room.”

“Wanna check it out?”

“Sure why not.”

Kaido froze. Sure enough not a second later Haku walked in followed closely by the girl. He stopped short as he spotted Kaido in the back.

“Kai…wha…are you….” The coincidence was too much, it dawned on Haku he had been followed. Oh great, how was he going to explain everything? He couldn’t! Kaido didn’t move, his mind had gone numb. Sachi looked back and forth from one to the other. They obviously knew each other from somewhere.

After the silence was becoming too much Haku knew he had to come up with something. He pointed to Sachi, “Friend!”

Kaido managed a small nod.

Haku cleared his throat, “I, uh, her Father was one of the ones that went on the…expedition and I met her when I talked…to him….”

Kaido snapped out of his trance, “You talked to one of them? And you didn’t tell us?!”

“He said nothing worth telling!” Haku defended himself.

“You still have to keep us posted on these things I mean you found the identity of one of them! We could have gotten Sana to do some spy work and then-!”

“Oh, I get it, are you from the school paper too?” Sachi interrupted.

Both of them realized who they were speaking in front of.

“Yes! He’s from the paper too.” Haku said quickly, “Uh, Kai this is Sachi, Sachi, Kaido.”

Sachi gave a friendly smile, “Nice to meet you.”

“You too.” Kaido nodded to her.

Haku scratched his head, “Um, Sachi can you give us a minute please?”

“Sure?” She found the request odd but walked out of the room.

Haku let out an exhausted sigh, “I’m sorry Kai. I know I should have said something, but, I dunno, at first it just didn’t seem big enough to tell about, but now I guess I should have, I didn’t realize it would go this far….”

“Yeah, yeah.” Kaido waved until he got Haku to shut up, “Stop rambling, its not like you. Do what you want, I’ve got nothing against this girl. I only have one warning.” He paused so Haku knew he was serious, “The crystal will be released tomorrow. And when it is, we are going through with our plan. As soon as it’s over we’re going home. All I’m going to say is, don’t get attached. To anything or anyone. Once we get back the parents are going to be so paranoid they are going to strap us to a tree and never let us come back if we want to or not.”

“I know.” Haku stared at the floor.

“Good.” Kaido took a step towards the door, “I’m going to work then tonight Sana and I will make the final plans. If you don’t get back until late again I’ll fill you in tomorrow morning.”

Haku felt another grip of fear, “Don’t tell Sana!”

Kaido looked back and gave a mock laugh, “Hell no, are you kidding me? The girl would skin you alive. I’m not going to make excuses for you, but I’m sure not gonna be the one to tell her the truth!”

Haku gave a relived smile, “Thanks.”

“No problem. Just remember what I said.”

“You sound like the old man.”

Kaido grinned, “Good.”

In Sana‘s dream she was sitting in a tree. Squirrels and chipmunks sat on her shoulders and legs. Birds perched on her arms, every kind of woodland animal gathered around her, all filled with the feeling of freedom.

Sana woke. She had seen where they were being held captive. She knew it was her job to set them free.

Haku followed Sachi through the thinning crowd of grown ups. They passed a bridge where a good sized group was crowded around.

“Why can’t we go over?!”

“I’m sorry, this passage is closed until further notice!”

“Is there something wrong with it?”

“There has been a break in at the zoo and some of the animals were set loose, but don’t panic! We caught onto the problem quickly and are working as fast as we can to retrieve those who got out!”

“Who would do that?”

“Some animal rights fanatic.”

“We don’t have the name of the suspect yet, but the cameras show a young girl with short hair.”

Haku winced.

“Crazy stuff going on lately.” Sachi commented as they walked out of hearing range.

“No kidding.” Haku quickly pushed it out of his mind. He didn’t want to worry about Sana. He had been having the best day of his life and he was not going to let anything ruin it. The sky could fall down and he would still be on top of the world! The more he saw of this place the more he loved it. He wanted to see everything, experience it all, learn how it worked, what made it tick, he wanted to know the people, eat the food, explore the halls. And he wanted to do it all with the girl walking next to him. He had never wanted anything more in his life. He openly dreaded the next day when the crystal would be disband and he would loose his excuse for staying. The two went all the way up to the last floor, then after some searching they found a door that led to the roof. “Beautiful!” Sachi ran forward to look at the world below. Haku smiled and watched her. While being in the sky was second nature to him he had to remind himself that she wasn’t used to being up high. He sat down and watched as the sun slowly sank towards the tops of the mountains. Sachi soon came and joined him. For the first time he understood Sana’s obsession with watching the sunset every night. Sachi sat next to him, their arms leaning against each other comfortably, and Haku knew he would never be this content again in his life. He savored the peace and the quiet, but most of all the happiness he felt every moment he was there.

Back home everyday was the same way it had been for generations. It was old, boring and repetitive. People had always bothered him about being too serious, working too hard, well what else was there to do? Nothing, that’s what. But in this new world life changed almost every day. They had evidence of the progress they had made just in the same few decades! There was always something new to see or try. He had never known he could be this excited about anything before. Then tomorrow they would have to go back and the chaos would begin. They would have to tell to everyone where they’ve been and why they’re not dead, why they didn’t go back for help etc, etc. It was going to take a lot of explaining and of course he was going to have to be the one to do all the talking because Sana and Kaido sure weren’t going to take it upon themselves to do the hard work for once in their lives, oh no. He just wanted to stay there. Right there, just as it was, for the rest of his life.

What if you did? A little voice in the back of his head popped up. He instantly dismissed it. There was no way he could stay. He had too much waiting for him back home.

Like what, a home you don’t feel right in? People you don’t feel comfortable around? Genai was the only one and now he’s gone.

The sun disappeared behind the mountain.

“It’s official, you two are the biggest pair of idiots in the world.” Sana stood at the playground where they could feel strong vibes from the crystal. There were people all around. The festival was that day and very few people had work or school.

“But it’s around here somewhere isn’t it?” Kaido asked.

“Yes, but it’s not pulling from anywhere up here.” Sana explained and knelt down, “It’s coming from under here.”

“There’s more space under the ground?!”

“Hence the name West Hole.” Haku caught on quick.

“Is there any way we can get down there?” Sana started poking the fake grass.

“If there was any kind of obvious entrance Kai and I would have found it by now.” Haku told her.

“Then we’ll just have to wait until they bring it out later.” Kaido suggested.

Haku looked around. He had been anxious all morning, “I’m gonna go snoop around a little more.”

“Don’t be late tonight.” Sana warned.

“Don’t worry. By the time the crystal comes out there will be so much fog in that place you won‘t be able to see two feet in front of you!” Haku ran off. Sana watched him go, why had he been acting so strange the last few days?

Kaido went over, put his hand up on her shoulder and gave a reassuring squeeze, “How ya doing?”

“I’m fine.” But her voice was on the edge. She was surrounded by the people she hated the most and she was fighting to keep her emotions under control.

“Come on, I’ll buy you some jelly beans.” Kaido slowly led her away from the park and up the stairs.

“New world discovered!! Primitive society unveiled! Come read about people who live in trees and worship mythical magic gods!”

“What’s all this?” Sachi pulled Haku over to the man who was standing on a chair, yelling and handing out magazines to people. She handed Haku her ice cream and took one of the articles.

“What is it?” Haku leaned over to get a look. Crowds swarmed all around them. All four Holes had been invited to the Dome that day. There were countless booths set up with games, food and entertainment. Random music was being played every few feet by armature musicians. Everyone was happy and laughing, the energy was amazing! It was ten times better than any festival back home.

“Oh my god.” Sachi giggled as she read the paper, “Look at this! The Ocean expedition crew found land on their last journey and this primitive society!”

“What?!” If Haku hadn’t had his hands full with ice cream he would have ripped it away from her.

“Yeah! It says they carve holes into trees to sleep. They get the animals to trust them, then shoot them for food? That’s cruel!”

“That’s not right!” Haku was desperately looking for a way to free up his hands. They didn’t just shoot the animals, the old ones came to them willingly and they killed out of mercy! The animals were their friends!

“Women are treated like slaves, forced to do all the cooking and work while the men pray to different Gods to give them food and water.” Sachi went on.

“They are not!!” Everyone choose their path on their own free will! There were men cooks too! If anything the women were more lazy than anyone else. And they didn’t even believe in gods!

“They wear clothes made out of leaves and mud. Gross, there’s even a picture!” Sachi held the paper up and Haku almost choked when he saw ten young figures standing on a hill wearing the traditional outfits of their ancestors. He couldn’t speak, this was wrong, this was all wrong!

“I can’t believe people actually live like that.” Sachi smiled and shook her head. “Maybe it’s the only way they know!” Haku defended.

Sachi rolled her eyes, “It’s just interesting how people can still be like that after all these centuries.”

“They’re very strict on tradition.”

“And how uncomfortable would it be to sleep in a tree? What if it started to rain, or a storm came along?”

“There’s nothing wrong with rain.”

“Children are taught violence through games and are praised when they fight with each other! That’s evil!”

Haku kept his mouth shut.

Sachi went on reading, “When some of the crew attempted to make contact with society they were brutally attacked. Land mines were set off in front of them. They quickly retreated and thankfully no one was badly injured. But one of the locals was crushed when a stray lightning bolt hit a tree and broke a branch off-”

“It was NOT some stray lightning bolt!” Haku snapped, “Kaido isn’t even strong enough to make lightning! The branch fell off because one of your people burned it down! And you attacked us first!” “

What?” Sachi looked confused, “What do you mean, your people, how do you know all…this?”

Haku was in too deep and too frustrated to turn back now, “Women are not slaves, we don’t pray to gods, kids only fight to learn how to focus their energy, do I look like I’m wearing mud?!”

Sachi’s mouth opened and closed but no sound came out. She didn’t want to believe what he was saying but on some level it made sense. He was constantly asking odd questions and fascinated by the simplest things.
Haku was horrified at himself. He had just ruined any chance of staying in this wonderland, “Look.” He sighed, “Your people stole something from us. Something very powerful and very dangerous. We had no choice but to follow them here to try and get it back. When I heard your father had been one of the people that had been there I thought I could get him to tell me where it was, but…he didn’t. We think it is going to be revealed sometime today and we have to be where it is to destroy it.” He paused to let that sink in.
Sachi was still trying to register the first part, “So you’re…not from the South Blue school paper?”
Haku almost laughed and looked at the ground, “No, and neither is Kaido. We came here a few days ago from across the water.”
Everything was finally starting to click, “So…any other secrets you’ve been keeping?”
Haku gave an embarrassed smile, “You know the mystery girl that’s been causing all the trouble the past few days? That would be my little sister.”
“What trouble?”
“The fire alarm in the South Hole, the flowers in the Dome, letting all the animals out of the zoo…. See, she’s temporarily connected to the thing that was stolen so she’s been a little unstable.”
“Wait, one girl caused all that? How did she get all the flowers into the Dome without someone noticing?”
“She loves to grow flowers. She likes to show off because growing things takes just as much talent as skill.” The ice cream started to drip down his hands. He tossed them in the nearest garbage can and took the magazine from Sachi.
“She grew them all in one day?”
Haku slowly started to lead her through the crowd towards the exit. For one thing he wanted to stall a little so he could sort out how to explain everything, for another he didn’t want to have a million people around who could over hear.
“A long time ago my people learned how to…talk to the world. We learned how it worked and how to control it. My sister, Sana, has a natural talent of being able to talk with the ground and persuade it to grow flowers instantly.”
“You can talk to the ground?!”
“Oh we can do much more than that.” Haku winked and opened the door out into the sun.

As the day went on the Dome slowly transformed from a fair into an auditorium. Stadium seats were brought in and placed on every floor. Cameras and screens were brought out. A huge stage lifted up from the middle of the floor.

“It’s going this way.” Sana dodged through the massive amount of people, Kaido staying close on her heels. He knew the crystal must have been wildly unstable for Sana to be able to follow it with so many other energy sources around. It usually didn’t get this aggressive after only a few days, but he had to remember it was bigger than normal so there was more energy fighting to get back out. It was moving under them as well, heading towards the stage.

They had learned the plan for that night. From seven to nine there would be performances on the stage. Famous singers and comedians. Then after that the Ocean Expedition President would go up and speak, talking about their discoveries and the proof of their findings. All they had to do was steal that proof.

Sana stopped when they had reached the beginning of the stage, “It stopped.” “Great, it will come up through the middle and once Haku has everyone blinded we can grab it.” They had everything worked out, “We just have to wait.” They turned back and claimed two of the front row seats.

After a few minutes of silence Sana spoke up, “What’s Haku been up to the last few days?”

Kaido tried to answer as calmly as he could, “Learning more about this place.”

“I haven’t seen him hardly at all.”

“We all know he works too hard.”

“He seems…different.”

“Like how?”

“Anxious, happy, just strange.”

“You’ve been acting weird too.” Kaido told her, “I understand the flowers and the animals, but physically attacking people? That’s a bit much, even for you.”

“I haven’t been feeling right.” She confessed, “I just need to get my force from the crystal back, then I’ll be fine, I promise.”

“If you say so.”

“You children need to move, these front five rows are all reserved!” A large woman came stomping towards them.

“But we got here first!” Sana argued.

“Out!” the woman wasn’t even going to hear it, “These seats are saved for delegates of the OEC and counselors of the Holes. Move now or I will be forced to call security!”

“Fine, fine.” Kaido grabbed Sana’s arm and dragged her back before she lost it. The girl was steaming as they grabbed more seats as close as they could without getting yelled at.

“That woman is going to fall off the stage and break her foot.” She mumbled. “Caaalllmmm.” Kaido patted her hand.

“Kaido!” Kaido turned around to see Dan, his boss pushing through with a box of pizza in his arms.

“Hey Dan! Close down the store today?”

“Had to, everyone was here!” the big man sat down, “You comin’ in tomorrow?” “Sorry, can’t…actually I won’t be coming back at all.” He gave him an apologetic look.

“No! Why not?” Dan was crushed.

“Going on a trip tomorrow and I won’t be back for a long time. This is my friend Sana by the way.” He leaned back and poked Sana, but she was staring at the stage. The annoying woman had walked up on it and was directing people around. One of the dancers slid down a trap door as two men pushing a huge podium came from the other way. The woman casually stepped out of the way of the podium, but her heel caught the end of the hole and a moment later she disappeared from sight.

Sana grinned and turned to Dan and nodded.

“Nice to meet ya little lady.” Dan greeted back then shook Kaido’s hand, “I’m gonna miss ya at the store. I’ve never had so much business in my life.”

“I’m gonna miss being there too. Call me if anyone ever beats my high score!” “Will do.” Dan gave one last nod then stood and walked off, forgetting Kaido had never even given him a way to reach him by.

“Doctor?! We need a doctor!” a skinny guy was yelling of stage, “Supervisor down! Thinks she broke her foot, can anyone get a doctor?!”

Kaido’s head snapped back and forth from the stage to Sana who was giggling softly, “Holy crap Sana, how’d you know that was going to happen?!”

“I don’t know.” She refused to look at him.

They were going through a dress rehearsal now. Groups of people went on and off, doing a one minute preview of their act then letting then next one up so everyone could get a feel of where they would be going and how much space they had. A couple walked up and did a quick salsa dance.

Sana started laughing again.

“What now?” Kaido asked.

“He’s going to step on her dress and rip the bottom half off!” she covered her face with her hand to try and stop herself.

Kaido watched as they twirled for a minute then walked off the side with the rest, “No, he didn’t they’re fine.”

But Sana kept laughing. The seats around them filled up fast. Everyone there was a good few hours early for the show, but you had to be to get the premium seats.

When the place was filled to the top the show started. Haku was no where in sight but Kaido didn’t worry thinking he had gotten stuck somewhere in the back. People sang and danced and did skits. There were lights, holograms and special effects that made even Sana sit up and pay attention.

After the first few acts the salsa couple came on again. Wearing bright clothes and high shoes they did moves that inspired amateur dancers. About two and a half minutes into their routine, the guy stepped a little too far and caught the long end of his partner’s dress. It tore at the seems and fell around her feet. There was a moment of stunned silence in the huge building, then the two ran off stage as the Dome filled with noise. Security rushed on stage to escort them to their dressing rooms. Kaido had his mouth open as he turned to Sana who was practically rolling on the floor.

A little bell chimed at their feet.

“Kitty!” Sana reached down and picked up the fat cat. It sat in her lap and purred as she petted the animal, “You can talk to other cats right?” she bowed her head down and buried it in his fur. Kaido glanced over with the corner of his eye to see both cat and girl go oddly still as if in a trance. After a second Sana opened her eyes and the cat shuddered. He jumped down and ran off between the feet of the crowd.

“What was that?” Kaido wondered.

“He’s going to go get help.” Sana said simply with a smug look.

Kaido raised an eyebrow and reached out towards her. A big shock jumped at him before he had even touched her! Her energy was just as unstable as the crystal! It was jumping out, connecting to the universe and coming back in. That’s how she was able to predict those things. Her subconscious mind was taking over her rational thoughts.

The next act went up and finished fine, as did the next and the few after that. As the night went on Kaido started getting more and more anxious. The plan was simple. Haku would limit people’s sight with fog and provide a distraction, Kaido would get the people off the stage, then keep them off until Sana was able to release the crystal. When it was done they would make a fast get-a-way.

Things started to wind down. Kaido kept watching for the first few signs of fog. He had to trust that Haku knew what he was doing, but it sure would have been nice to get a little reassurance. Then an older man walked up on stage and started to speak. The president of the Ocean Expedition Crew.

“This is it.” Kaido sat up.

“Haku’s not here.” It wasn’t a question.

Kaido froze as Sana confirmed his worst nightmare, “He has to be here, where else would he be?”

“Outside.” Sana had her eyes closed.

“What are we going to do? I don’t have time to make all the fog myself!” “Everything will be okay.” She opened her eyes and looked straight at her friend. Kaido stared back and instantly all the fear and doubt melted away. There was something higher in those eyes. A strange power that could change the world. Kaido gave a tiny nod and Sana broke away. As soon as the look was gone, all the anxious feelings came right back.

The man spoke for a long time. He described their journey over sea, discovering the ancient society, he even had a slide of pictures. And he told all the same lies that had been in the magazine. This was the first time Kaido had heard this and he had a hard time keeping his mouth shut. He expected Sana to blow up, but she was disturbingly calm through the whole presentation. Then the moment of truth came.

“We were able to salvage one treasure from this tribe!” the man announced, “A small crystal, a symbol the people used to remind them of their God’s power and what could happen if they stopped worshiping it. It is our gift to you, the people of the Corner Holes!”

A trap door opened in the middle of the stage. A platform rose up with two men holding a glass container. Inside, giving off an almost blinding blue glow, was the universe crystal. Sana stood up.

Distraction, we need a distraction now! Kaido stood up with her and prepared to unleash a blast of energy at the back all.

RAAWWWWRR!

The whole audience turned and people started screaming. In the back four big cats, two lions, a tiger and a cougar, came waltzing in. The closest started scattering. Kaido felt something brush against his leg and looked down to see the cat from before rush past him. That was what Sana had talked to it about. She knew they were going to need a backup distraction. He opened his mouth to comment, but she was gone!

“Sana?!”

Everyone around him now was up and either confused or making their way towards the stairs. He floated up so he could see over the people’s heads. There she was! Climbing up onto the stage! He dropped down and started pushing his way through to get to her.

Sana could hardly hear the chaos around her. She was focused on the crystal and nothing but the crystal. People got out of her way as if there was an invisible wall around her. As she got closer the crystal got brighter and the two men holding it were wincing. Someone yelled at her as she jumped up onto the stage, “Hey, get off of here!” Sana didn’t even look as she casually waved her arm at him and sent him flying off. She slowly arched it back around and straightened it in front of her towards them holders, “Get away.” A blinding light burst out from the crystal. The men dropped the container and ran off the stage as it hit the ground and shattered. The crystal floated back up until it was level with Sana’s head.

Kaido reached the end of the stage and stopped. She clearly had everything under control.

“KAI!” Haku suddenly dropped down next to him.

Kaido did a double take, “Where the hell have you been?!”

“I’m so sorry!” he looked tired, “I tried to get back on time-“

“It doesn’t matter now!” Kaido shut him up and focused back on Sana.

The girl lifted her hands on either side of the treasure. A violent wind came out of nowhere and started blowing her hair around, the bells ringing out. The glass was cleared away, and chairs were knocked down as it circled the stage in an invisible tornado. Blue whips started snapping out of the crystal. The light leaving marks in the eyes of any that could look at it. It started changing colors, going from blue to white to pure black, then back to a deep blue. The whips got bigger and longer, some passing right through Sana, but the girl wasn’t effected. Finally she grabbed one of the strands and pulled. The crystal spun, the chain came apart until the last holding energy fell off the ball, and it exploded.

Sana’s world went black. When she opened her eyes she was floating in space. She saw stars in the distance and transparent fog of every color surrounding her. Everything that had happened since she had landed on the land started flashing through her head. All the feelings of anger and hate and restlessness. The strong desire to find the crystal, but knowing that she couldn’t because she was too weak. She had been so mad at herself for being so weak, so she had taken her anger out on the people.

“Sana.”

Sana turned around, “Genai!” Tears sprung up as she discovered her old teacher standing there. She ran forward and hugged the old man.

He returned the embrace then let her go, “Sana.” His voice was hollow, but still held emotion, “I’m very disappointed in you.”

“What? Oh please Genai, don’t be, I’m so sorry, I know what I did was wrong but I couldn’t help it, the people were torturing them selves, killing trees, they attacked-“ “Sana.” The spirit cut her off from her rambling, “I am disappointed because I thought you could control yourself. I was wrong. You forgot my lessons.”

“But the crystal-!”

“Yes, it played a small part, but you still had the common sense to remember my teachings, if you had wanted too.” He knelt down to her size, “Do you remember what I said when you first asked to be one of my students?”

Sana sighed not really sure what that had to do with anything, “You said, Okay. You didn’t argue, you didn’t try and talk me out of it, you didn’t even pat me on the back and say ‘good for you it’s about time‘. You said okay, and that was it. Bugged me for weeks.”

“And how did I treat you?”

“No different than the seven year old standing next to me.”

“Exactly. People are still people, no matter their age, gender or life style. You would have found that the men and woman in that society are just like us, if you had taken the time to look around more. Instead you chose the same path as those who invaded our village.”

“I am nothing like those murderers!”

“Shush. You both refused to go past the surface of appearance and first impressions. If they had come in and tried to talk to us, learned about the crystal first instead of just taking it, they would have found us much different than the stereotypes they placed on us. You did the same thing with all your vandalism, and purposely injured another being!”

Sana kept her eyes on the ground, gilt flooding through her, “I’m sorry….”

“Sorry won’t do any good.”

“Then what should I do?”

“Go back to our village, tell them of your mistakes and warn them not to do the same. You and Kaido will make strong guides for our people. The years to come will be hard, but this time I believe you will have the power to do what is right.”

“What about Haku?”

“He has a much different path, but the goals will be the same. You three will help bring peace to this world. But you must always remember to keep your mind and heart open to anything that may come your way.” The image of the old man started to fade away.

Sana looked up and tried to reach for his hand but hers fell right through, “No, don’t leave yet!”

“Remember….”

“Are they following us?”

“No, but the beach will be the first place they look! We’ll have to leave now.”

“Is Sana awake yet?”

“No, wait, she’s moving!”

Sana felt the wind on her face and two strong arms holding her. She opened her eyes. Haku was carrying her. He was flying over the mountain, towards the forest where they had stayed, Kaido was right next to him.

“Are you okay?”

Sana nodded instinctively, then after a moment shook her head, “I feel dizzy.” She had never admitted a weakness before.

“The energy trying to stabilize again.” Haku explained. They flew over the forest and landed on the sand near the shore.

“It’s still here!” Kaido ran up to the big branch half buried in sand. The five foot diameter trunk they had used as a raft on their first journey there. Haku set Sana down and let her hold on to him until she could stand on her own.

“Let’s go, with any luck we can make it over the horizon before they show up!” Kaido was pushing the gigantic raft into the water. Sana started to hobble her way over. Haku couldn’t being himself to move his feet. He looked back at the mountains. He couldn’t leave. There was no way he could go back to his old life. He knew it wasn’t possible. But he couldn’t stay either. Not after half the people in the entire place had seen him and Kaido jump fifty feet in the air with Sana in his arms.

He took a step towards the branch.

“Haku!!”

All three looked over to see Sachi running through the sand.

“Who’s that?” Sana muttered.

“Oh no.” Kaido had a bad feeling about this.

Haku froze, “Sachi, go back!” if she was there he knew he would never be able to make himself leave.

“What?” She caught up to him, “Why? Come with me, something’s going on. It looks like everyone in the entire place is coming outside!”

“Sachi, I….” How could he tell her he was leaving?

Sana suddenly gasped loudly, “It’s her!”

“Oh no.” Kaido held back all urges to throw Sana in the water.

It dawned on her. It was this girl. She was the reason Haku had never been around. Why he had been acting so strange. It was her fault he had missed his cue that day and Sana had to call in the cats!

“Haku!”

He turned around, a calm and peaceful look came over his eyes, “Sana, I’m not going back home.”

That hit them like a ton of bricks.

“What do you mean you’re not coming?!” Kaido spoke first.

“I’m staying here.”

“No you’re not!” Sana couldn’t believe what he was saying.

“Yes. I am.” His tone was final. Somehow the other two knew there was nothing they could do to change his mind.

This is what Genai meant when he said Haku had a different path, but it didn’t make Sana feel any better, “Fine then. I hope you’ll be happy.” Her voice was cold.

Haku walked towards her, “Sana, please try to understand. I can’t go back. I won’t be happy there.”

“Are you sure?” Kaido’s voice was choked.

Haku smiled and nodded.

Kaido sniffed and fished something out of his pocket, “Here.” He dropped three coins into Haku’s hand, “You’ll need these.”

“But what are you going to do? Where are you going to live?!” Sana’s pathetic attempt to get him to change his mind.

“I’ll figure it all out.” Haku was confident.

“On the…thirteenth floor.” Kaido was trying not to cry, “Go to the game store I took you to that one day. Ask for Dan, tell him I sent you and you want a job. Just fix something for him and he’ll love you forever. He’ll give you money and help you with whatever you need.”

“Thanks Kai.” Haku smiled then gave his friend a small hug, “I won’t be gone forever.”

“You better not.” Kaido eventually forced himself to let go and move back to the water. Haku had been his best friend since they were babies. Life was going to be hard without him around. He walked past Sana who was staring at the water, refusing to look at her brother.

“Don’t be like that.” Haku begged coming up behind her, “I don’t want you to go home mad at me.”

“I’m not mad.” Sana said in a small voice. She turned around, her eyes were red, “First Genai left, now you’re leaving me too. Everything’s changing.” she squeaked.

“Hey hey. I’m not leaving for good.” Haku wrapped his arms around her, “If you ever need me, I’ll be here.”

Sana hugged him tightly, “I’m gonna miss you.”

“I’ll miss you too. Say hi to everyone for me when you get back.”

Sana nodded.

Echoes of voices came from the forest.

“Sana, we should go.” Kaido gave the last push that sent the branch into the water.

The young girl finally separated from her older brother. She forced a smile and nodded, silently telling him she was okay with everything. Haku grinned and gave her one last pat on the back then pushed her towards the water.

She took off into the air and landed gracefully in the middle of the raft. Kaido instantly started pushing the air at the water like a motor and the branch picked up speed. Chimes went crazy as a cat suddenly appeared running across the sand.

“Cinnamon!” Sachi gasped. The fat cat leaped out over the water and landed on the edge of the branch.

“Kitty!” Sana gratefully hugged the cat. Kaido smiled and increased their speed feeling the last passenger had arrived. Sana stood next to him and waved as the two figures on the beach slowly disappeared into the distance.