Selena Yesman, Human

  Today has been frankly one of the strangest days I’d had in a very long time. The day had started off fairly normal. I’d arrived for my first day of college without much fuss. My first class was sickeningly early in the morning, but I could deal with that. As long as I can go to sleep early, waking up early is fine. I have no late night classes, so that works well enough. My day had been exactly how I’d imagine the first day of college being, all things considered. Well, until time stopped in the middle of class and something spoke into my brain.

  20 elementals have been selected

  voting begins in 30 days, 23 hours, 59 minutes, 59 seconds

  This message had left so many questions in my head, and likely the heads of everyone around. Everyone had, understandably, panicked. Professor Ron had managed to calm everyone down and get class moving again, luckily. Honestly, it was interesting, and had a lot of implications, but now wasn’t a good time to go over them.

  That was when the second weird thing happened. I had been drifting in and out of focus in my mind as I was thinking about the message. Was it a message? It felt more like an announcement. It left me with some questions, and now that I was in between classes, I had wanted to think them over. The first I had was what an elemental was. The second was what this voting was for. And when it said that elementals were “selected” what exactly did it mean by that? Did it select people? Animals? Another thing was that it was in my mind. Unless someone had made some of the most advanced technology in the planet and had used it to make time take a quick nap, that couldn’t have been made by man. So who made the message? Who “Selected” the elementals? Was it random? It was… confusing. So confusing. So interesting.

  Then, on the way to the cafeteria, I bumped into Will. William Trey, the kid I’d grown up with. The boy had always been good at reading people. It gave me good training for being hard to read. The only thing he seemed to never be able to understand is love. As much as I hate to admit it to anyone not myself, I grew a crush on him some two years back. The problem is that I don’t think it's mutual, so I’ve never brought it up with him. It's the girls who get to do the rejecting love confessions, not the guys! Anyway, as good as he is at reading people is as bad as he is at hiding his own cues. Well, that's not necessarily true. He can hide his intentions well enough, but when you live with someone your whole life you notice small tells. Like how he adjusts articles of clothing or fiddles with that cheap mother of pearl ring he got on the ferry to vancouver island some 8 months back. I knew in my head that he was probably just a little put off by the message, but something felt… I don’t know how to put it. Wrong? Off? So I decided to watch him for just a while. If he did nothing out of the ordinary I would chastise myself for being the mother of all creeps. If he didn’t, however…

  Then he went into the woods, and I immediately went “Oh, that’s not normal.” William has always been an indoor kid. He liked to read cooks, swim inside pools indoors, and play badminton. Beyond that, he lives on his computer. Seeing him go in the woods is to me like seeing a penguin in France. So I kept following him, feeling a little less like a creep. Okay, I still feel like a creep, but still.

  Then I saw him with the notebook, then the leaf, then…

  The image of that tiny ball of water putting such a big dent into that tree refuses to leave my mind. If that had hit a person…

  “So that’s what an elemental is…” I mutter to myself, looking through the currently sparse notes Will has of what he can do. We sit together on the log as I look through the notes, then back up at him. “So the announcement you got was different?”

  “Yeah.” He nods, a ball of water around the size of my fist flowing around from side to side in a figure eight pattern. “I’m mostly just testing what I can do.”

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  “The water elemental, huh? Doesn’t that imply a fire, earth, and air elemental?” She asks.

  “Why would I know?” He shrugs, then with a flick of a finger, the ball crystalizes into ice, landing in his hand. “Huh.”

  “What?” she leans forward, poking the ball. I pull my hand back quickly as the ball of ice lifts off and breaks into shards, floating around Will’s hand as he raises it up.

  “Seems I can control the ice too, but it’s harder. And I can turn the water into ice whenever I want.” He explains, before snatching his notebook back to note that down. Once he is done with his notetaking he sets it down on his lap and hums to himself. “This is… I don’t even know what to make of it.” He says. “What do we-” His voice is cut off by an alarm from his phone in his pocket. We both freeze. He pulls his phone out. It’s then that I realize it's coming from my phone too.

  This is an Alberta emergency alert. The southern Jasper National Park is currently experiencing extreme fire warnings. Multiple roads have been affected. The city of Jasper is currently experiencing a lockdown due to an unknown arsonist. All individuals within affected areas are recommended to prioritize personal safety, secure any belongings, pets, or children, and report any suspicious activity. Obstructed roads include-

  The alerts went on for a while longer, listing the affected roads, the possible appearance of the perpetrator, and a few other minor details. Me and William exchange a glance.

  “An arsonist, huh?” I frown. “Concerning, but luckily we don’t live too near the national parks. Jacobi is a ways east of them.”

  “I guess some people lost it after the weird events of today.” Will scratches the back of his head before shrugging. “Probably nothing too much to be worried about. Bad things happen all the time. It’s not like i can put out the-”

  “Nope.” I say immediately. “Like hell you are.”“Oh, come on.” He frowns. “I’m not that dumb.” I snort at that.

  “Will, you have 3 brain cells, and 2 of them are focused on video games and being a dumbass. The third is focused on physics, mechanics, and hydraulics, but you get my point.” He gives me a flat look before rolling his eyes.

  “I want to argue but I’d rather focus on my magic powers.” He says, lifting up water from the ground. The surrounding grass withers and dies as all its moisture is pulled out. I watch in fascination at the flow of it.

  “Do you think you could do that to a person?” I ask, poking the basketball sized ball of water with a finger. “Also, isn’t this ecoterrorism or something?”

  “Nah. No rule says not to suck moisture out of plants. It’s the plants' own fault for not living without moisture.” He grins, then makes the water flow in the shape of a long pole. The water then crystalizes and falls into his hands. He grins, waving his new botched attempt at a sword around. I roll my eyes.

  “Stop swinging that thing around.” I say, placing a hand on it, then immediately pulling it back with a hiss. “That’s cold!”

  “Cold?” Will pauses, then looks down at the ice pole in his hand. “I don’t feel it…”

  “You don’t feel the cold?” I pause, then feel a lightbulb light up in my head. “We are going to experiment with this.”

  “Yeah, that’s what I was doing out here.” He nods.

  “No, I mean- look, we have no idea what your powers can do. We should do some more proper tests. Like, on your blood or-”“Oh, that’s a good idea.” He says. “Can I control all liquids, or just water? And can I control blood?” He looks dubiously down at his hand.

  “Don’t cut yourself.” I say flatly.

  “I wasn’t going t-”

  “Don’t cut yourself.” I repeat, flat as a sheet of paper.

  “Fine.” He mutters.

  “And that’s not what I meant. We should have your blood and maybe a skin sample tested. For all we know, this could be a symptom of some alien disease!” I throw my hands up in exasperation. “Hell, you could be Poseidon reincarnated or something. We don’t know anything.” I grip his arm with one hand. “We already have some good information. We can’t risk being caught immediately. We need to tell someone who can help. But nobody else. This is dangerous. Very dangerous.”

  Will takes a second to take that in before nodding. He lets out a breath and slumps back onto his stump.“You’re right. I’m already a bundle of nerves, and testing out my powers just felt… But you’re right. For all I know, these powers could be draining my life force to power itself or something, even if I severely doubt that’s the case.”

  “That’s just it. We don’t know.” I sigh as well. “Come on. Let’s head back to classes. We can figure this out tonight.”“Agreed.” He pushes himself up and stretches. “Away we go.”