Chapter Thirty Two
Moments later, and the seven of us were jogging along the dark shore line back towards the port. The twinkling city lights sparkled against the starry night sky, and the roar of the waves crashing against the sandy beach filled my hazy head.
I still couldn’t quite believe it. We had saved my sister’s life. We had all used our powers to bring her back from the brink.
Visola jogged merrily in front of me, as if nothing had even happened. She smiled to herself and inhaled deeply, drinking in the sea salt air. The image of her skewered onto the twisted piece of metal appeared in my mind, and I tried to push it away. It made me feel sick. The entire ordeal had. So much death and destruction, all because of us: The Elementals. A World War. Genetic engineering. A new breed of super soldiers, designed to listen only to our enemy. And now we had two. HE would surely discover SHE’s real intentions, and then they might both be after us.
Unless they killed each other first. Which probably wouldn’t be such a bad thing.
“What are we going to do now?” I called out to the group.
“We’ve got to get off of this island and back to ours,” Shasa answered authoritatively, “We have to let the Elementus Populas know what’s going on.”
“We have to do something about the boat!” Sefarina cried out.
She was right. The boat we had just left was full of toxic waste, and was barrelling towards the bottom of the ocean. It would surely destroy countless oceanic ecosystems, not to mention polluting the nearby human population. I shook my head, realising that perhaps we too would be harmed by the contents of the shipping container. Maybe it infected us. Perhaps we would all get ill and die. Then SHE would win after all.
“There’s nothing we can do,” Niyol replied, panting slightly, “We can’t exactly lift a boat out of the water now can we?”
“Why not?”
Sefarina’s matter of fact response made everyone stop in their tracks. We were almost at the entrance to port, with the busy road on our left hand side. Cars whizzed past nosily as we all stared at each other, trying to decide if we could in fact lift a two hundred thousand tonne cargo ship from the bottom of the Atlantic.
I shook my head in defeat. It wasn’t possible.
“It just doesn’t make…”
My words were cut off by the huge explosion that happened about a mile off of the shoreline. Huge orange flames ripped through the black sky as a deafening roar enveloped us. The blaze swelled yellow, continuing to sit atop the sea like an otherworldly bonfire. People on the street behind us stopped in their tracks, and cars screeched to a halt. The fire was mesmerising, but also terrifying.
“What is that?” Gamba asked incredulously.
“It’s the oil rig,” I said aloud, only just piecing it together.
“What oil rig?” Niyol wondered, turning towards me. I looked over at him, finally dragging my gaze away from the brilliantly bright blaze. He stared at me in desperation, looking at me as if I had all the answers and knew exactly what to do. The tangerine light flickered across his back, making it look as if he was wearing an orange suit that was crawling across his shoulders.
“Your mother, Sue, she mentioned that she hated fossil fuels, right? And Mr Price, he said at the dock that he had just invested in a new oil rig. Do you remember?”
Niyol shook his head. “In all honesty, I wasn’t really listening.”
I understood why he may not have been paying attention, especially when his own mother was trying to murder him.
“SHE was talking about starting a World War by making Mr Price and his company look traitorous and morally corrupt. He had just bought an oil rig, because she destroyed his shipment of precious cargo in Southampton. SHE sunk his boat to show him as a villain, but I think she just destroyed his oil rig to get back at him and destroy his company’s reputation. Or make it look like sabotage. Or murder.”
“It was sabotage and murder!” Visola correctly pointed out.
“Yes, we know that, but who else does?”
“Enough talking,” Shasa interjected, “we can discuss this later. We must get back to Aqua Island. We’re not safe here.”
“But what about that?” Sefarina cried out, pointing at the towering fire with wide eyes.
“What about it?” Aura questioned.
“We might not be able to pull a boat out of the sea, but surely we can stop the oil from reaching the shoreline?” Sefarina’s eyes were wide and wet, and the outline of flames danced across them.
“Stop the oil…?” Shasa repeated to herself, suddenly realising the impact the oil spill would have on the entire West Coast of the continent.
“And how exactly would we do that?” Gamba asserted aggressively.
Sefarina shook her head. “I don’t know but we must do something. Isn’t that why we’re Elementals? To save the planet?”
“But we might die!” Niyol added, looking towards Visola meaningfully.
“Enough people have died today already!” Aura agreed.
Sefarina pleaded to all of us. “But think about what will happen if we just leave! The oil will destroy the city. It will kill thousands of animals! Add that to the contents of the container ship and what will the long term effects be for this country?”
She was right, of course, about the oil and the waste destroying everything in its path. The consequences would be catastrophic for the entire nation, and its neighbours.
Aura grabbed Sefarina firmly by the shoulders. “I agree, Sefarina, we should do something, but it’s too dangerous. We’ve never really worked together before, and never for something this big…”
Sefarina shrugged her off defiantly. “A few months ago no one knew that I could create a hurricane, but that happened, didn’t it? And together we stopped Valeska from destroying an entire city! Well this time there are seven of us, not three, so it should be even easier! And just a few minutes ago we brought Visola back to life!”
She had a point. I nodded in agreement. Shasa saw my reaction.
“Madz! Do you agree with her?” Shasa’s tone was not accusatory, but probing. I could tell that she was weighing everything up, and trying to make a decision.
“Yes, I agree,” I declared. “We just escaped a sinking ship and saved someone’s life: all of us working together. Who says we can’t save the city?”
Gamba stepped forward, protectively blocking Visola. “I can’t let anything happen to any of us again. I can’t.”
Visola pushed her brother to one side, gently. “I know you mean well, all of you, but I’m fine, and the longer we talk, the more oil is heading towards us. I agree with Sefarina and Madz. We have to do something. It is our duty. I’m not afraid of getting hurt again, not if it means saving innocent lives.”
Gamba grabbed her shoulders softly. “I don’t want you to die, Visola. Not again.”
Visola smiled kindly. “I’m not going to die. Not yet, anyway. I didn’t die before…”
Another explosion rocketed into the night sky. The steely outline of the oil rig’s metallic structure was beginning to fall into the ocean beneath it.
“If we’re going to do something, we’d better do it. Right now.” Niyol’s voice was commanding.
“Let’s do it,” I said, “Let’s go to the oil rig and see if we can stop the leak.”
“How?” Aura asked.
My brain scanned through all of the options as fast as one of Niyol’s bolts of lightning, and I suddenly had a plan.
“The Ventus will go back to the helicopter with Gamba and Visola. You five will fly out to the oil rig, and do your thing from the sky. Maybe you can create another hurricane or something… And Shasa and myself will take Mr Price’s speed boat from the dock and meet you there. That way we can work together from above and below to sort this mess out.”
“It sounds insane,” Aura commented, “but what have we got to lose?”
“Our lives,” Gamba stated, matter of fact.
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nbsp; A third explosion made the waves roar and the ground tremble. We had no time to lose.
“Okay then, let’s go!” Niyol shouted, as the five of them headed off towards the main road that sat next to the sea front. Shasa and myself headed back towards the dock, not knowing exactly where to go or which speedboat to look for. I tried to remember what Mr Price had said earlier… a dock around the corner from The Conqueror.
As we began climbing over the metal fence to break back into the docks, Shasa turned to me. “How are we going to steal the speed boat?”
She got to the top of the fence, avoided the barbed wire rim and jumped down, grunting as she hit the concrete floor. I followed her lead, and as we rushed towards the rows of wooden beams that jutted out into the amber tinted ocean, I fished around in my pocket.
Taking out the motorboat keys that I had grabbed from Mr Price’s body, I waved them at her so that they glinted in the moonlight.
“It’s not stealing when you have these.”