The Elementalists

EMMA

   I tell the others to get closer to me—it's easier to make a force field around a cluster of people than it is to make one around people who are spread out, according to Robin.

Robin...she's putting all of her trust into me to protect these people. I have to make sure that her trust isn't in vain. I'll show her that I can be just as useful as her—I won't let her down.

She is my best friend, after all.

"Is Robin going to come back?" Liz asks, her voice full of worry. She clutches Cooper's hand as if her life depends on it.

"She will, but she has to do some things first," I reply, remembering what Robin had told me earlier.

I want you to protect the others, she'd told me. Jamal, Mark, Daemon and I have to stop Time. I'm entrusting you and the others to protect the town while we do so. She had put her hand on my shoulder and smiled, adding, Don't doubt yourself, Emma. I know you can do this.

And I believe her—I know that I can do this. Even as I struggle to maintain the force field, no doubt arises within me as to whether or not I can do this. Because I have to do this—if I fail, everyone next to me, all of my friends, could die.

This time, it's not Robin who's keeping everyone alive, it's not Robin who has everyone's lives on her shoulders: it's me.

I hear Liz whimper, and then Cooper's voice, "It'll be alright. Emma's here," and I begin to realize the feeling of pressure that Robin must've felt this whole time. The pressure of being in charge of the lives of others who trust that you'll keep them safe.

Now all I have to figure out is how the heck to keep the town safe.

Surely they've been told to go somewhere safe because of the tornado—surely they know of the tornado. They have to be able to see it—it's huge. I hear John cry out as a nearby tree is ripped out of the ground, and I begin to panic. How can I protect both them and the town?!

As if reading my thoughts, Cooper looks over at me and asks, "Emma, what about the town...? Our families... Our friends..."

I frown and reply, "I don't know," with my voice unintentionally cracking on the last word. "I can't just leave you guys, and there's no way I can make a force field big enough to cover the entire town..."

"I wonder," John says thoughtfully, "that, if he were here, could Jamal stop the tornado? He's the air Elementalist, after all."

"I asked Robin about that earlier, on the way here," I admit. "She said it's too big for even her to stop—she'd need herself, Jamal, and another Air Elementalist to comple-tely stop this. Time's thought this through..."

Liz screams as another tree gets ripped up out of the ground and flies through the air. Cooper pulls her closer towards the center of the force field and says, "We can't just let the forest get torn up like this! If it's doing this to the forest, imagine what it'll do to the town!"

"I'm thinking!" I yell. "Let me think, for Pete's sake!" A thought forms inside of my head, and I yell, "That's it! Peter!"

"What do you mean?" Cooper asks. "We have no idea where Peter is!"

"I know that, but if we somehow find him," I say, "we could get him to build up a wall of rock around the town! It'd have to be pretty thick, but it might work!"

"What makes you think he'd even help us?" John asks, surprising me since he and Peter were rather close. "If we were even to find him, that is."