Darkness Rises (Vines part 29)

Vines looked up from his push ups to see the small girl slowly approaching. He was positioned directly above the area Death had appeared. The ground had healed fully but for the one patch he had stood on.

Vines stood up and stretched, waiting for the girl to make her way there. She seamed to be relaxed in her approach, but he could sense the fear radiating off her.

"You had the dream?" Vines asked, more of a statement then a question.

"You and I have eight days," she said with a straight face.

"Then let's begin."

"First of all show me what you can do so far."

Vines nodded then placed his feet firmly on the ground. He'd been practicing all morning and had finally mastered the move. He concentrated on his hands an summoned the air into a solid ball. When it was the right size he flung it forward and it sailed forward, straight towards a fallen tree. It collided with enough force to split the tree right down the middle.

Vines turned and saw the girl standing right beside him.

"That's a good start, but you need to summon it through you. Not too you."

"What do you mean?" Vines asked, twisting his head to the left.

"Your trying to pull the air to you. Try calling it. Let it gather around you then ask it to concentrate at your hands."

The girl stood tall, then with a sudden rush of wind, was surrounded in a small bubble. It swirled around her for a few moments before rushing down her arms into a small ball then continued on colliding with the same tree. Nothing happened for a second, then with a bright flash the wood exploded.

Peaces of bark seemed to rain down apon them and once the shrapnel had finally settled nothing remained of the tree.

"That was amazing," Vines said with his jaw hanging open, "How did you learn to do that?"

"She taught me," the girl said with a grin.

"Who?"

The girl faced him with a questioning look. "The wind of course."

"I'm not following?"

The girl gasped. "You don't know, do you?"

"I honestly have no clue what your talking about?"

The girl sat down on the ground then patted the spot beside her. "This is a long story so you may want to take a seat."

"This story goes back to the beginning of the universe. In the beginning there were four elements. Earth, water, fire and air. They existed amongst each other peacefully till one day they began to argue. Nobody knows what they argued about but it lead to a massive fight. Fire summoned great orbs of fire and sent them flying at the other three but most of them missed. They continued floating till they eventually stopped and remained there. One of the orbs hit water and a mist was sent gliding among the orbs of fire. Earth saw this and began sending rocks. His rocks were smaller then Fires but just as powerful. A few of those orbs hit Air and were suddenly surrounded in orbs of compressed air. Water sent jets of water out at the enemy but Fire turned them to steam before they got any where near him.

Air watched the chaos unfold around her and quickly took control of the situation. While the other elements battled beside her she started shifting the orbs around them. She moved orbs into orbits of larger orbs and after a few minutes finally had them all under control.

The four elements were worn out and as each of them inspected the area around them they realized the devastation they had caused. Instead of reversing their mistakes air convinced them to help make it look beautiful. She told them they'd been in the dark to long and it was time they turned it into something great.

With the help of the other elements they crafted a thing of wonder. Fire and earth created splotches of color and light. Water cast an eery yet amazing mist over their portrait and then air added movement. All the orbs spinning around a center point as if dancing.

They gazed at their creation but something wasn't right. Air noticed it first. A small empty space. Their last touch.

Earth made a small orb and placed it in the space. He moved the dirt around and formed ditches and high points. Then water pored pure love from her inner well over everything. This caused small green plants to sprout over the land that was showing. Air added an orb around it. Unlike the others, this orb was made of pure air. She hardened the outer layer to keep there creation safe.

Fire stood off to the side knowing if he tried to add something he'd possibly destroy it, but Air wouldn't hear of it. She guided him a little way away and told him to creat a small ball of flame. He did and suddenly the final creation burst into life. At first he thought he'd damaged it but then he realized the green plants were growing towards him. It was as if they craved his energy. He cheered and laughed.

Earth formed a few more orbs to fill the spaces but the main orb remained the centre peace. When they finished Air gave it a nudge and the worlds began to spin, joining  the dance of the universe. The Elements watched the dance for a while but eventually they had to leave. If they'd remained much longer their bodies would have called pack the peaces of themselves and the portrait would séance to exist.

As a parting gift, Earth created an orb which he placed right beside the master peace. This orb would allow him to see their creation no matter how far away they were."

"That's amazing," Vines said in disbelief. "I don't understand though. What does this have to do with our powers."

"Calm down," the girl said giggling, "I haven't gotten to that yet."

"Well, the elements watched for many millennia until, one day a strange occurrence took place. Earth saw a small movement on the surface of the orb. He looked closer and noticed a small creature curled up in a cave. He admired this life form for a while before showing the rest of the elements.

They all gazed through the earths eye at the life form and watched as it went about its day. The form looked after a family of others and the form seemed to be very protective of the smaller ones. It along with one other larger one guided its smaller smaller forms around and showed them the world. As the elements inspected the creatures they noticed more and more of them, but something was wrong. The creatures were growing weak. Earth and Water came together and created something to help. They sent their gift through the canvas to the orb and when the gift and orb came together the color began to change. Purples, yellows and reds were added among the blues, browns and greens. Soon all the creatures were happy again.

The elements continued to watch and once again the creatures ran into a problem. When the orb faced away from the 'Sun' as fire called it, they grew cold. Fire and Air thought together and came up with another plan. Fire sent a small spark to the planet and with the help of Air they nurtured it into a small flame.

The creatures marveled at the gift, but quickly learnt of its painful touch. Instead of destroying the gift though they studied it and learnt to make more. Soon, each family of beings had a small flame to keep them warm at night.

The creatures ran into many more problems and eventually the Elements came up with a new idea. Each creature came up with many more creatures, each with a small peace of the element inside of them. Finally the sent their creatures to the 'Planet' that the 'humans' called Earth. The humans marveled at the new creatures and although some feared the creatures others embraced them and worked along with them as friends. The two species couldn't communicate but this didn't stop them from working together.

After all of this the Elements had grown weak. They now gazed from their perch at what they had created. This is how it was for many years until one day Air had an idea. Humans evolution had began to slow down so as a way to help Air, Earth, Water and Fire chose one candidate to take their power.

They soon realized that the full gift of their power would destroy their creatures so a new plan was formed. A small amount was given to one each generation. The creatures would live through their lives guiding the world around them and when they passed the power would move to the next suitable candidate. This went on for many generations and with the help of the mini-elementors new elements were created. Lightning, Ice and Metal are a few examples.

The Elements watched down happily for many millions of years until one day everything changed.

The elements come in different stages of power. No two elements can be dominant at any time so as a result the energy would flow from one to the next. One generation fire will be dominant and the next air and then after that water followed by earth. That is the flow it is supposed to take to keep balance until one day that all changed. It was airs tern to be the supreme power, but then it happened. The Mini fire Elemental discovered something. A hidden power. He absorbed this power and became stronger then air. This sent the world into disarray and the order of the universe was thrown off balance. Earth and Water felt cheated and quickly guided their apprentices towards this power. With the constant shifting of powers and the increasing flow of power and energy the universe began tearing itself apart. Air knew if her apprentice took the power the universe would tear itself apart and in their weak states that's the way it would stay.

Air guided her apprentice away from the power, but she didn't realize what this would cause. The increased power of the other elements over whelmed the Air apprentice.He couldn't take the constant conflicting energies and sadly passed away. Air was devastated. She sunk so low into herself that the other Elements feared she'd given up on their creation. Then she heard it. A small noise coming from the humans planet. The sound of a young girl crying. Air gazed at the small creature and felt a pang of sadness. The girls family had died when a tornado had torn through her home, leaving her an orphan. Air steeled her resolve to save them and went to work studying the strange power which had caused this.

After many hours of investigating she discovered its one weakness. It couldn't affect humans. She searched the world once again for the young girl and gave to her Airs strength. She filled the girls soul the the bursting point with pure energy and then guided her to her fait. The young girl faced the other three elements and with her power defeated them and sent the power to the next world. With the amount of power she had used the young girls body couldn't recover. She passed away with the other three elements. The sudden disappearance of the powers that threatened to tear the universe apart balanced it out again, but the energy also caused something else to happen.

The space between life and death was stretched and in between lay a new land. Limbo. The elements crafted a tunnel from Earth to the next life through limbo, but they also found other uses for it. They created a small pocket Limbo for the souls of great warriors. From here they could help guide the human world without actually being a part of it."

Vines listened dumb struck. He couldn't believe any of it and yet inside he knew it was true.

The young girl looked up at the sky and noticed with a frown it was getting dark.

"Well that's it for today. I'll finish the story tomorrow, then I'll begin teaching you how to better control your powers."

Vines went to sleep that night with more questions then answers. He lay their and gazed up at the stars realizing that if the story was true then four very powerful beings could be watching down at him right now. He smiled and soon fell into a deep slumber.