Holy Irene I LOVE this picture! Special shoutout to whoever did this!

~StormWolf

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"Hey, wake up." I nudged Car with my foot. He mumbled, "No Dad, I don't want to go to the Guard Academy yet, I want to stay and play with Aqua."

Cute.

Garroth chuckled behind me softly and I turned and grinned at him before looking back at Car. "Ca-ar!" I sang quietly.

"Wha-at?" he groaned back in a bad melodic voice.

"Time to get up!"

"No."

"Yes."

"No."

"Yes."

"No."

"Yes."

"No."

"No!"

"Yes.... Wait.... DANG IT!!"

I grinned and hauled him up by his shoulders. He groaned and rubbed his eyes. "Why so early?" he whined.

"Car." I said. "It's nearly noon."

"Wait... WHAT?! WHY DIDN'T YOU SAY ANYTHING!!" He ran out, now wide awake, and I burst out laughing.

"I don't understand why he is so... childish." Garroth muttered.

I shrugged before walking out of the old Guard Tower and back in the direction of the docks. "He's just like that. I've known him since I was thirteen and even then he was like that."

"You have a strange taste in friends." I nudged him and ran on ahead. He continued walking up the path to Aphmau's house.

Oh, Garroth....

Castor, Ami, and Nicki were already at the area we wanted our house, Car was face-planted on the ground, probably because he was running too fast and tripped. I smirked and helped him up.

"So what are we doing?" Ami asked. That girl was so serious.

"Well, Ami." I started. "Personally, I think that we should decide what we want in the house first."

"I want a storage area, personally speaking." Car said.

"I figured. Let's start with the bedrooms. Castor, Ami, do you two want to share a room for people your age or do you all want to go boys and girls?"

"Share a room!" Castor said enthusiastically, complete with spread out arms. Ami shrugged and said she didn't mind that.

"I want a room where I can have sick animals if they need help." Nicki said.

"Nicki, Kiki already has her barn."

"I know, but for little animals, like birds!"

I smiled. "Okay, let's see what we can do."

Car said he didn't mind where his room was as long as he didn't have to share it. I agreed with that and I found that Nicki had carried the entire crate here.

That girl sure knows her stuff.

"Alright." I said. "Let's get to work. I don't want to sleep on the floor anymore!"

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Garroth and Aphmau watched from a window of Aphmau's home as the five newest members of Phoenix Drop divide the supplies between themselves equally before beginning the process of cutting down the trees to make a small area to build their home.

"They've come a long way, huh Garroth?" Aphmau said.

Garroth simply nodded, not taking his eyes off the form of Aquaphina as she lifted Castor up to chop the rest of the tree he was cutting down.

"Garroth?"

"Hm?"

"If you don't mind me asking, how and when did you first meet Aquaphina? You never really said-"

"I met her when she was getting bullied by another trainee. He kept blaming her for stealing his knife. He assumed it was her because after her parents were killed, she was a Street Rat for a year until her uncle found her."

"Oh... so what did you do?"

Garroth took his eyes off of the scene below and turned to look his Lord straight in the eyes. "Sit down and I'll tell you everything."

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"Yeah you better run!"

I laughed as an angry, but amused, Garroth chased me through out the Academy, purple paint dripping from his head.

Yep, I pranked him. I left a bucket of purple paint above his door. I knocked and when he opened it, "SPLOOSH!!", right on his head!

Now he was chasing me, trying to get me covered in paint too.

But I was faster!

I wove through the halls of the Academy and into the outside area where our tree hollow was. I wasn't watching where I was going.

And I fell right into the pond.

Normally, I am a great swimmer. But when I tried to swim upward, the weeds at the bottom unnaturally lashed out and tied themselves around my foot.

I couldn't breath!

My vision went red, then white, then slowly faded to black and my struggles weakened to nothing. I sank slowly, making my way to the pond floor. As my vision ended and I felt myself slowly drift away from my body, I heard a dark voice, like stone scraping on steel.

Finally.... I killed you, Fallen Angel! Good luck fulfilling the Prophecy of Five now, Divine Warriors!

Then I drifted away.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

"Twenty-nine, thirty! C'mon Aqua, breath!"

My eyes snapped open and I gasped for air. I rolled onto my side and coughed up a lung-full of water. Garroth sighed in relief and sat back from giving me CPR.

"What..." my voice was hoarse. "What happened?"

Garroth enveloped me in a hug, pulling me into his lap with my legs over the side. Geez, he must be really scared if he's doing that!

"You drowned. I couldn't find you but then I saw slip marks on the edge of the pond and I knew what happened. I swam to the bottom the cut the weeds around your foot. You weren't breathing and I couldn't find your pulse. I was so scared I was too late."

"Well..." I coughed. "I'm okay now."

"Yes.... Aqua... why didn't you swim to the surface?"

I told him what happened, including the scary voice. He looked confused. "We better tell the Headmaster on this. C'mon." He helped me up and lead me by the hand away from the pond and into the Academy.

I looked back at the pond one last time before the walls covered it.

What was that freaky voice?

Then another thought came to me and I gave a quiet whimper of fear, quiet enough so Garroth wouldn't hear.

Was someone trying to kill me?