(The New) Power of the 8 Elements: Part One

Chapter Four: Virus

"You have enemies? Good, that means you've stood up for something sometime in your life." - Winston Churchill.
PRESENT DAY
TERRY

"I'm so glad I get to eat over at your house," Amaya says.

Terri, Amaya, and I are walking back from getting pizza. Mom had suggested that we go get pizza since we were inviting Amaya over, and she was too busy with auror-stuff to cook us dinner. We could put on a movie and wait until Amaya's mother got back from her work.

"I apologize if our house looks a little cluttered. We weren't expecting a guest," I say, knowing that we hadn't cleaned anything up and not wanting to be embarrassed.

"I just wish Mom had gotten the pizza herself," Terri says, holding one of the pizza boxes. "It smells so good! I think I'm gonna to die!"

"We're almost there. Anyways, I think this builds responsibility. If we can at least bring pizza back to the house without getting kidnapped, can't they trust us to do other things."

"--ooh! Like go to parties!"

"Not what I was thinking."

CRASH! A loud bang interrupts us, and we all stop dead in our tracks, looking around to find the source of the sound.

"Let's go!" Terri whisper-shouts, attempting to make a run for it. I grab the hood of his jacket and pull him back.

"We're not running."

"WHY?!" He whines.

"Shut up!"

"Mysterious..." Amaya chuckles.

Where we were walking, there was a set of small stores. It's awfully suspicious. I know that there's something out there. Terri begins shaking out of fear, however Amaya seems just as intrigued as me. We hear another clatter followed by the sound of voices.

"What was that?" I ask.

"Unevolved racoons probably. I don't care. Let's just get the heck out of here!"

"Unevolved don't talk, Terri. That's...impossible." I find myself beginning to grow a little afraid, but deep down I still want to investigate.

"This is so scary..." He mutters as I hand him the rest of the pizza boxes, so I can have my hands out free.

"This is so awesome..." Amaya says.

"Shh!" I say.

I turn around the corner to see two beings. One of them is incredibly tall and possesses a set of insanely long, Freddy-Krueger-like fingernails and are dressed in a long coat. They appear to be trying to pick the lock on one of the stores—an electronic store. The other figure is very short and has frizzy hair that's matted all over the place. The shorter figure is a girl and is constantly telling the taller figure to hurry up with breaking inside the building.

"Why are you so loud?!" she exclaims.

"Shut up! I can't concentrate," the taller figure says.

"I thought you were a professional lock-picker."

"Godd*mn it, I am!"

"Then why aren't you doing it?"

"Fine." The clawed person stuck his finger out of the lock and then threw their hips against the door, shattering the glass on it. "Fine! You happy?"

The shorter figure began smiling and turned the clawed person. "Look at you, Shakira."

"Shut up, little b*tch."

"Whatever," she says as she begins to sing "My Hips Don't Lie" much to the clawed person's annoyance.

They step inside, and I turn to Terri and Amaya in confusion and surprise.

"That was strange," Amaya says.

"Are you kidding me? That was hot!"

The two of us look Terri confusedly.

"What?" He asked, dazed.

Our attention turns to the figures who have now stepped out of the building. The shorter figure holds a glowing object in her hand, shoves it into her pocket, and then nods at the taller figure. As they begin to leave, the taller figure stops. A part of his face begins opening up leaving a gaping hole that appears to be an ear.

"We should go," Amaya whispers.

The face appendage closes immediately, and he stands up straighter, holding up his claws.

"Sh*t! We've been busted," he says.

"How? What?" the smaller figure says, perking up and turning around sharply. "Oh...no..."

The taller, clawed figure steps into the light revealing a thin long-legged, slender figure with bright yellow eyes. His hair is long and purple. He wears a long, black coat with a white collar and blood red tie. Near his feet, I can see a pair of heeled boots. With the click of the boots, he ominously steps towards us.

"You three seem to be an awfully long way from home," he says. He? I struggle to tell whether he was a male or female. My eyes fall upon his large bust which seemed to be composed entirely of fur though his voice holds a rather strong New York-Italian accent.

"Strange danger, stranger danger," Amaya repeats as we huddle close to each other.

"What are you?" I ask, staring directly into his large, bright eyes.

The figure laughs and turns away. He begins to walk away without a fight which I find confusing. Amaya sighs with relief. The shorter figure suddenly turns around throwing a sharp blade at the three of us. Subconsciously, I catch it. I had no idea I was capable of doing anything like that, and I took a few seconds to stare at what I'd just done.

"Oh sh*t..." I muttered, looking at the knife and then at the two criminals.

"Give my blade back," The smaller figure snarls.

The taller figure laughs and smiles slyly. "Seems they want a fight."

"No, we don't," Terri jumps in. "In fact, we won't even tell the cops we saw you!"

He blinks several times and reaches inside his coat. My eye goes wide as he pulls out a gun. He holds it up to the three of us.

"I hate to see you go, but you understand how it is-"

He begins to pull the trigger. Instinctively, I shoot a blast of ice at him. The bullet never comes as I notice that his entire left hand has been frozen in a block of ice. He hisses like a wild animal. "H*ll no..." He holds out his free hand which drags me to his face. A set of tendrils shoots out from his back causing him to seem even more taller than he is since he's levitating off the ground.

"I'm going to make sure you regret ever doing that to me." He makes an X-motion in the air with one of his fingers causing an X-mark to appear on my neck.

He throws me to the ground and turns away. The smaller figure grins and sticks her tongue out at us both, but a stray tendril comes from the dark alley and snatches her away.

"What just happened?" Terri exclaims.

"You heard him; we're dead."