Julia Lelieveld and the fifth element
~32~

The next morning, just before the alarm clock, I awoke to the thunder storms outside. That was not a good sign. I immediately had the impression that it was because the practitioners of the elements were angry. I quickly shook off that bad thought.

In the mirror I saw that the scratches I had received yesterday were barely visible. If you knew they were there, you saw it, otherwise you wouldn’t.

I put on my dark blue skinny jeans that I could put on my black leather boots. This way my pants would get as little wet as possible in this weather. Then I put on a black long sleeve with a black waistcoat. I put on my black leather jacket and hoped to arrive at school in one piece. Just to be sure, I put a clean set of clothes in my bag. When I got downstairs, I was surprised to see my father sitting at the dinner table. At ease with a cup of coffee.

“Good morning.”

“Good morning Dad.” I smiled and gave him a kiss. He smiled too.

“I can’t bring myself to let you cycle to school in this weather. So I’ll drop you off before I go to work.”

“Thanks, that’s great.”

Fifteen minutes later I sprinted from the car to the platform at school. It was still early. But I didn’t want Dad to be late for work. I didn’t feel like waiting in the library, suppose the rest were there too.

Once in the school, the rain dripped from my hair down my back and dripped onto the floor. Then go to the changing rooms of the gym. I still had a towel in my locker, that would go a lot faster to dry than in the cold air.

I opened the door to the long hallway leading to the gym’s locker rooms. It was still dark outside. The light from the fluorescent tubes almost hurt my eyes. Once in the locker room I wanted to walk to my locker, only to see someone sitting on a bench in the middle with her back to me.

I saw it was Simone. The girl I sat behind in math. I recognized her by her red fluffy hair. I got a bit of a weird feeling about it. What was she supposed to do so early in the morning sitting alone in the dressing room on a bench?

I carefully walked over to her.

“Simone, are you okay?”

I was still standing behind her and watched her lift her head slightly. When she started talking, I barely recognized her voice.

“I’m fine, but I won’t think about you anymore.” She let out a high-pitched laugh.

The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end. What was she talking about?

As I thought that, she turned her head. I was completely shocked. I felt the panic growing in my body.

Her eyes had run out of color, her pupils had dilated and her eyes had turned black. In the whites of her eyes were all small burst veins, it was a very frightening sight. I shivered for a moment. I knew right away that this wasn’t right.

This wasn’t Simone, she was possessed. The fear had now reached my throat. I tried to swallow it and think clearly. What could I say against evil?

“What are you doing here?” I managed to say with difficulty.

“What am I doing here? Isn’t that clear then?” She smiled broadly.

“I’m coming for you.” She pointed her finger in my direction.

It got a little dizzy in my head. She had such a powerful aura that it was hard for me to turn my head. Which wouldn’t be wise either.

“Do you know? I didn’t even know there were practitioners here. But since Tuesday there has been an enormous amount of power coming from here.”

She looked at me admiringly for a moment.

“So you owe it all to yourself.”

“Oh and don’t worry, because if I’m gone and you’ve survived, there’ll be many more to come. That power of yours works like a magnet. We are addicted to it. So we come and get what we need.” She raised her eyebrows for a moment.

I felt my stomach twitch, a sickening feeling came loose in my body.

“Power?” I asked her.

“Yes, strength. Have you not noticed it yourself yet? You are special. You are not like the other practitioners. Compared to you they are nothing at all.”

I looked at her confused and angry.

“Child, child. You don’t know anything about it, do you?”

I shook my head.

“You’re not just a practitioner of an element. No, you are a practitioner of the fifth element.” She clapped her hands for a moment with joy, as if I were a lost treasure.

“You’re rare, you know. And I found you first.”

She was beaming when she said that.

“The fifth element?”

She nodded her big, terrifying eyes.

“You hardly know anything about it, because we practitioners like you can feel it deep inside us. Doesn’t matter where we are, even if we’re underground. When there is someone special and as powerful as you, we feel it and are attracted to it. And with so much evil looking for you right now, there’s little chance you’ll survive. That’s why your kind barely knows anything about it.”

This time I had to do my best not to throw up. The panic and fear were unreal. I tried to take a deep breath in and out.

“But don’t be afraid. The Boss wants to see you, so we can’t kill you. We have to take you to him.”

“The Boss?”

“Yes, the evil of evil.” She seemed lost in thought for a moment as she thought of him and smiled fondly. I looked around, where I might run away. But she probably saw it.

“Do not bother. We mustn’t kill you, but we can injure you.” And she smiled meanly.

“Another advantage. Even if we hurt you badly, you’ll heal very quickly, so if we’ve brought you to the Boss, you’ll probably be back to normal.” She gave me a wink.

“And another thing, because you radiate so much power from the very beginning, you hardly stand a chance of beating us. You possess an enormous amount of power and if you had already developed that, I would not be here anymore. But bad luck for you, now I can handle you easily.” She shrugged for a moment as if my fate was already known.

I knew I was in a very difficult situation here. I had to go with her. If necessary, she would injure me until I stopped struggling. I had to find a way out. On the other hand, this was an opportunity for information. Information Rob couldn’t give me.

“What can a fifth element do?”

She started laughing her high-pitched laugh again. I shivered for a moment.

“You have guts, I must admit. Doesn’t matter, to buy time, but go ahead. The fifth element can control all four elements. But that’s not all. You heal quickly, can absorb emotions and so on. I won’t reveal more, then the surprise will be completely gone.” And she clapped her hands again in delight.

“Then why can’t I feel you?”

“Of course you can’t feel me or anyone else of evil. We are protected from your spirit forces. Then the fun is all gone, isn’t it? It wouldn’t be nice if you could feel us coming.” She skipped a little like a young girl.

“What about e-warriors?”

She shrugged nonchalantly.

“They’re just like you, but they’re on our side. But they are just people, with special genes, but still.” She seemed to think again for a moment.

“You know, I hate those e-warriors. They take all the fun toys from us.” And she looked at me sweetly, as if I were a puppy.

“And I can’t stand that they can feel you and us, but we can’t feel them.” She seemed to get angry when she thought of that. Shit, this was going the wrong way.

She took a step towards me.

“You’re smart, you distracted me quite a bit, but I haven’t forgotten what I came here for.” She glared at me and took another step toward me.

I took a few steps back until I felt the door. As fast as I could, I turned and ran down the long hallway toward the door toward the school hall. I heard her high-pitched laugh echo down the hall. I was almost there. Suddenly I felt a gust of wind pass me and before I knew it she was standing in front of me. Between me and the door to the hall. She gave me a piercing look with her bloodshot eyes and raised her eyebrows. “You would have thought so.” And with those words she gave me a hard push against my left shoulder. And by hard, I mean really hard. I didn’t fall right away, no I was launched. I felt myself rushing down the hall and at the end near the locker room door, falling to the floor with a loud thud. I felt the pain in my left shoulder all over my body. I moaned and tried to get up. I tried not to lose contact between me and Simone. I was afraid that if I lost sight of her for a second, I wouldn’t beat her. She came very slowly towards me with that evil grin still on her face and her scary eyes.

Suddenly I heard the door on the other side of the hall open. I looked past Simone and saw Tim come in. He looked at me confused and stood still for a moment. Simone was distracted too, she turned and with a flick of her hand Tim slammed against the door and fell to the floor with his eyes closed. A pang of anger overcame me. She couldn’t do this. This was between her and me. She wasn’t allowed to involve innocent people in that.

She was still looking at Tim, suddenly I felt this was my chance. I tried to focus all my energy on my powers. I saw how she was already about to turn around. Again it seemed as if the world passed me by in slow motion. I took my hand off the ground in great pain and tried with all my strength to blow her over. I felt my arm retract automatically and make a hard movement in her direction. I saw a kind of air orb hurtling towards her. And before she could react, the orb hit her full on her chest. She flew across the hall against the door and fell to the floor next to Tim. Before I could think about it or look at it any further, I stood up in great pain and difficulty and ran through the locker room to the gym. I unlocked the emergency door and walked through the pouring rain across the schoolyard to the main entrance. Luckily I didn’t notice very much, because everyone was running in the square. As I walked onto the landing, I shot through the crowd and ran up the stairs to the first floor. I pushed open the big doors of the library and came to a stop just in front of the big benches. Somehow I knew they would be there. The circle and Rob looked at me startled. Rob got up and walked over to me. I could barely breathe. I bent over and rested my hands on my knees and tried to breathe in and out. What was barely possible, that’s how fast I breathed. I felt Rob’s hand on my shoulder and I tried to get up.

“What happened?” He looked at me concerned. I saw that the others had also stood up and stood with me. They all looked at me concerned, even Kate.

“Gosh Julia, what have you got there?”

Sara walked over to me and pointed her finger at my chest, just where the zipper on my jacket was open. I followed her finger and saw a large red vein running across my skin. I quickly opened my coat and pulled my sweater aside. Right where Simone had hit me was a large red spot just below my shoulder that spread through red veins running across my skin. They came from under my sweater. The veins were about four inches long. I rubbed my hand over them, but they didn’t go away. The pain I felt when I touched them was barely bearable. Rob took my hand when he saw my face twisted in pain.

“Don’t touch it, it will pass on its own. Where is it?”

He knew. He knew it was because evil had touched me there.

“In the hallway to the gym.” My voice sounded hoarse. Suddenly I felt panic welling up in my chest. “Tim! Tim is still there. He’s with her.” I looked at Rob scared. I didn’t want to go back to that hallway at all, but I couldn’t leave Tim there with her anyway. I wanted to turn around, but Rob stopped me.

“No, you stay here with the others. I will go take a look.” He walked quickly to his office and picked up weapons that he could easily hide under his clothes.

“Close the door behind me,” he said to Max. Max nodded and he followed Rob. When Rob left the library, Max locked the door and walked back to us.

“Come on, let’s sit down.” Sara grabbed my shoulder and led me to the benches. I sat down. Not at all comfortable. I couldn’t take it if something happened to Rob. He had no powers like we had.

“We have to go help Rob,” I told them. They all looked at me confused. “With what?” said Max.”

“By what? He will get hurt! She is much stronger than him.”

“Who is stronger than Rob?” Leo asked.

I looked at them confused. Didn’t they know? Rob knew immediately when he saw the weird spot on my shoulder. Judging by their looks, they really didn’t know.

“Julia, who is stronger?”

I shook my head. They didn’t know anything yet. I didn’t want to worry them, but on the other hand. They should probably start fighting soon. Then they had better be well prepared.

“The evil. It’s here in the school.”

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