Page 42 of Elemasters

“I’m so glad you’re okay,” Dustin said as she approached, “how do you feel?”

“Like the world’s most gorgeous Swiss cheese,” Chloe deadpanned, though she still winced when the bandage on her arm shifted slightly, “any word on Chris?”

“He’s okay, but still unconscious. But the doctor said they’d let us see him as soon as he’s awake,” Dustin replied.

Chloe nodded, taking her seat alongside the group and casually brushing dried blood off her eyebrow.

“Well, in the meantime we need to figure out how we’re gonna move forward,”

“What do you mean?” James quirked an eyebrow.

“We just went up against a fraction of Qin Shi Huang’s power, and got our asses handed to us,” Chloe lowered her voice, and looked around the room just to make sure no one was within earshot, “if we’re gonna stand any chance against him at his full strength, we need to train our asses off,”

“Don’t be so negative!” James brushed her off, “that was our first major battle as The Elemasters, and we survived it. That’s gotta count for something,”

“Hold on,” Bailey giggled, “’The Elemasters’? Is that what you wanna call us?”

"Yeah, I mean, why not?" James shrugged, "it's like Animorphs! Elements, masters… boom! Elemasters!"

“It’s kinda catchy,” Dustin affirmed, kissing James’s cheek, “but Chloe isn’t wrong. We only made it because Bailey’s powers saved us. It’s only gonna get harder from here,”

“I guess you’re right… wait, what about the Palace of Radiant Clouds? It doesn’t seem like time passes normally whenever we’re there, so we could train there for a few hours after school every day without missing much. And we wouldn’t have to worry about people seeing us,” James suggested.

“Hold on now, is that an actual smart idea from our resident airhead?” Chloe teased, “don’t let me find out you’ve been holding out on me Zhang,”

“I’m more than a pretty face and a huge… bank account,” James winked, “but the question is, how do we make sure Sima Yao lets us in?”

“I can answer that, Master Zhang,”

The sudden voice in their heads made everyone jump, and elicited a surprised shriek from Bailey.

“Jesus CHRIST Sima! You can’t just do that!” she hissed.

“Apologies Lady Yu,” Sima Yao’s pillow soft voice continued, though it came without the slight head-pain that normally accompanied it, “now that all five of you have awakened your power, my tether to this plane is more powerful than ever. I can now maintain my corporeal form, and allow your rings to transport you here at will. All you must do, is attune your minds to one another, and concentrate on this location,”

“Well, it looks like we have a plan then,” Dustin said, resolute. Now all they needed was to wait for…

“Ah, you all must be here for Christian Ying,” the nurse’s voice got everyone’s attention as he came into the waiting room, “usually we only allow two visitors at a time, but he’s shaken up and I think seeing his friends will do him some good now that he’s awake,”

Within minutes, the group was standing around Chris’s hospital bed, with Bailey clinging to him like she was simultaneously trying to commit the feeling to memory and choke him to death.

“You scared us to death you fucking idiot!” she screeched, “I thought you were gonna die!”

“Alright, easy! You can’t kill me right after I just survived!” Chris protested, but he didn’t push her away, “what the hell happened back there? Last thing I remember is that thing slamming me into a wall before I was out cold,”

“Sima Yao told us you were in danger, and we managed to… I stopped him,” Dustin explained, “we’ll talk about the details later, right now I’m just glad you’re safe,”

Dustin noticed the subtle shift in Chris’s eyes; the same shift that happened when he used to lose in Mortal Kombat. He wouldn’t admit it, but the fact that Dustin stopped Leo when he couldn’t? That clearly got under his skin.

“Well, I’m glad you guys were able to take care of it without me,” Chris replied through clenched teeth, “so here’s what we should do next. First, we need to…”

“We’ve already settled on a plan,” James cut in, “we’re going to use the Palace of Radiant Clouds as a place to train,”

“Ah, perfect,” Chris grimaced, letting his head rest against his pillow, “well, good job you guys,”

“Don’t feel left out,” Bailey leaned over and adjusted the wrappings on his head, “we’re absolutely gonna need you if we’re gonna survive the next fight. But don’t you dare almost die again,”

Chris’s cheeks reddened and he sheepishly nodded.