"Sam," The upbeat girl held up the volleyball. "Do you mind if Tanya, Christina, and I use your account to react to a drama called 'Close Lane'?" Then she spiked the ball.

"Sure," The wind warrior dove in and hit the ball over the net. "As long as there is no political commentary. I might get more views and subscribers if I have girls on my channel." The ball was sent to Christina. "Although, we would have to react to a movie, the six of us... or seven if Tina wants in."

"Depends on the movie." The young girl watched as the water girl hit the ball.

Jake cupped his hands as the ball came at him. "What kind of movie?" He knocked it to the brunette.

"Something we have not seen before: obscure, classic, or recent."

"I can get behind that." The spiky raven watched as the ball flew out of bounds. "We lost, Sam."

"Yep," He chuckled. "Remember, we have to at least act shocked during the movie."

"Movie?" Tanya approached them.

"We get to use his account to do react videos." The water girl picked up the ball. "Then we have to come together to react to a movie we have not seen before."

"Bad movies?" Smirked the braided girl. "That would be painful to watch? Okay!"

"And comment on how bad it is." said the spiky raven. "We need to scour the internet."

"DUDES!" The group glanced at the spiky redhead near the grill. "Are you coming to eat or not!? I WILL EAT EVERYTHING!"

"Then you'll get a stomach ache after!" The short, raven-haired girl shouted. "Don't want a repeat of last year?"

"He stopped eating hot dogs for five months." The brunette giggled.

"We better save him." The faded-cut teen nodded as he walked over.

The group made their plates and sat at the table.

"So..." Jake spoke. "We defeated Mistress M, saved the city, and I think we upgraded our power."

"And we got weapons." grinned Ryu. "I looked it up: a three-sectioned staff, aka the coiling dragon staff. Nunchucks that act as bo-staff."

"My eyes are orange now." said the cheerful brunette. "I looked myself in the mirror to see if anything had changed, only the eyes."

"My eyes are more eggshell than white." spoke the braided girl.

"We couldn't have gotten that upgrade if little sis didn't encourage us." The wind warrior smiled at the non-powered person.

"Thank you for calling us out." The water warrior nodded to Tina. "'Be hardheaded, find resolve, and kick ass.' That's going to be our motto."

The girl blushed deeply. "I did not know what to do. I was hearing what she said, and I just... I wanted to do something. I can't go there, so I turned up the volume and screamed."

"That picked us up." The light girl spoke sincerely. "I don't want to imagine if we gave in."

"Not in this timeline, of course." The electric boy said while his mind wandered. "Although, that can be classified as the dark timeline, and this can be the light timeline."

"Let's not worry about that timeline." said the wind boy. "Thinking about the multiverse is a headache."

"Then don't think about it." The fire boy waved off the idea. "The only universe and timeline we should focus on is this one." He took a bite of his burger. "Juicy."

"I put all my heart and soul into that burger." grinned the redhead. "Every ounce of soul."

"I thought it tasted corny." smirked the spiky-haired teen.

They laughed.

"Okay, so we got the rest of August to have fun until school starts or in case the others need us." Amy looked around them. "What should we do?"

"Scary movie night." spoke Sam.

"We haven't been to a theme park," Jake said. "That carnival does not count."

The group discussed ideas on what to do. Ms. Ishida poked her head and smiled at them, and then her phone started to vibrate. She picked up to answer.

"Hello? Dad?" She smiled. "See you soon."

----------------------------------------

-Salem, Mass.-

Javo and Reinstar walked through the forest with a mana-tracking tablet designed to track specific artifacts. For added measure, they disguised their appearance to look human.

"Err." growled the muscular canokian. "This city still feels wrong. When will the rep come to clean this?"

"Who knows." The shinobi walked and stared at the tablet. "A maiden like myself does not need to feel mad."

"This does not feel as bad as yesterday." the man whistled. "Even though we were stopping it from moving, that much power still affected us. I remembered enemies that ticked me off, people who chose the wrong path, and... my brother."

"Same, I know of a fellow shinobi I had a falling out with. Let's say she did not like the clan's ways and wanted more freedom."

"Luka cried that night." frowned the man. "Being a medic can be a difficult job, and I am sure there are other things she is angry about. Pilot probably felt angry about that time." He narrowed his eyes. "Shame what happened."

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

"A traitor in his previous team caused a mess." Narrowing her eyes after she first heard about it. "I heard his old team was good."

"That's how Pilot the Crimson Blade was born and, according to Selen-ja and Jin, his current personality."

"Oh, so he wasn't always a stoic stick in the ass?"

"No, he was a troublemaker with Yojo and Jarlon. More willing to crack a joke, break curfew, and be more jolly. Then, after the incident, he traded most of his humor to become the man we know now."

"That is why he is serious in training." She hummed. "We all are, but he is more... what do humans call it...Drill Sergeant. Yes, more of that than us."

"How important is the rank?"

"Don't know, but his way is working." She chuckled before sighing. "I hate tracking jobs; always boring."

"I know, but we have to make sure this thing is still here for us to collect and lock up. Reminds me of the last time the two of us were on a mission together."

"That ended with us in the middle of the woods like this." She frowned. "I lost my pants in the middle of that escape."

"But we are alive." He laughed.

"Yeah, yea- huh?" She looked down at the tablet, her eyes widening as it shook. "Huh, looks like we found what we are looking for."

"Finally!" The man smiled joyfully. "We don't have to search all of Salem."

----------------------------------------

-Ishida House-

Once the donuts were ready and placed on a plate, the group grabbed a donut as they moved to the living room, where they lounged around.

Ryu took a bite of the donut. "These are great!"

"Amy and I made them with passion." Tanya spoke up with a smooth smile. "Be sure to eat all of our passion."

The redhead nearly choked while the others chuckled. The joker gave her a glance. "So... our food was." He grinned. "Soulfully passionate."

There was a few seconds of silence until Jake spoke.

"Lame."

The redhead shrugged. "There is someone out there who is laughing, no matter how corny or bad it is."

"Speaking of corny." Sam looked through his phone. "The DVD of 'Time of a Cackling Spinster' was just delivered. When do you want to react?"

"We can try tomorrow." said Christina. "I read that it was so bad people left the theaters."

Before anyone could respond, the doorbell rang.

"I'll get it." called the matriarch as she approached the door. When she opened the door, she smiled brightly at the appearance of a smiling elderly man with a beard and a white suit. "Dad."

"Keiko."

They both hugged each other, then the man let go and grabbed his two rolling suitcases. He looked around at the interior as he walked in. "The neighborhood is nice, and the house is not bad." The man stopped at the entrance to the living room and gazed in.

"Grandpa!" Tina leaped up and embraced him. "I forgot you would come today."

"My little firefly." He hugged her back. As he let go, he saw Jake approaching. The two of them hugged. "And the grasshopper."

"Hey, grandpa." He let go as he grinned. "I'm glad you came."

He nodded. "I figured why not visit your new home." He looked at him. "You seemed downtrodden in the last video call before your move." He looked past him at the others. "But you seem to have that spark back."

The spiky-haired teen chuckled. "I'm fine. These are my friends. Gang, this is Grandpa Masaru."

"Hello!" They greeted respectfully.

"Hmm... that is odd, speaking in unison. It's like you are all rehearsed for greeting your elders." He eyed them. "Sometimes the innocent act means you are hiding something." He narrowed his eyes. "You all aren't hiding anything, are you?"

"No." Jake responded as he grinned widely while sweat dripped from his face. The others had blank looks while smiling.

He stared for a few moments before chucking. "I'm messing with you all. However, you are growing up... getting into mischief is what teenagers do. You don't smell of alcohol, nor do I see any evidence. Your mother would punish you and throw the rest of you out. Ah, you all are planning a road trip."

"None of us can drive."

"That never stopped me." He wiggled his eyebrows. "In my youth, I took my father's car, then drove to the roughest part of Japan and almost got killed in an underground roulette competition."

"Does getting into an altercation with a hillbilly over a cliff count?" the redhead raised his hand.

"You still have not told us the entire story." The gossip girl glared at him.

"Son, whatever happened, I'm sure it counts."

"Fighting beasts and a crazy woman obviously counts." whispered the young boxer.

"Beyond natural." whispered the brunette. "Maybe we could challenge skater boys to a competition."

"No..." whispered the lawyer's daughter. "That's not life-altering enough, but still no."

The old man perked up, sniffing the air. "Oh, what is that smell?"

"We made donuts." The brunette spoke up. "You can have some if you want!"

"Thank you." The old man gazed at the suitcase and walked over. "I also bought you two gifts." He unzipped one of them and took both boxes. He passed one to Jake, with his name on it to him. The boy opened it up to reveal an analog wristwatch.

"Interesting, is it a Rolex?"

"No, paying more than a paycheck for something that tells time is not worth buying. 50 dollars." He handed his granddaughter a long rectangular box. "That, I walked into another shop and bought."

Tina opened the box, and her eyes widened at the beautiful twelve-inch red-orange feather. "It's pretty."

"It's a hair clip. The owner told me a long and compelling story about it."

"It is nice." She turned to the others. "Jake, what do yo-." She stopped speaking at the slightly perplexed look on his face, then turned to others who were also looking in her direction with equally perplexed looks."

"Uh..." Jake spoke up. "What is the story?"

"I can tell you later." He walked away. "It is nothing of importance... now, if you excuse me, I am grabbing a donut." He waved them off as he left the room."

The young girl watched them leave, then looked to the others. "How bad is it?"

"It's not bad." said the older brother. "I was surprised."

The brunette approached the girl and looked at the feather. "It feels... warm, kind of like a toasty fire on a cold evening."

"Accurate." The braided girl stood up. "It does not have a mighty prevalent presence of mana. It's... small."

"The question is." The short-haired raven female approached the sister. "Are we going to expect something dangerous?"

"Dudes," The prankster stood up quickly while excited. "A mysterious feather belonging to a strange bird. That's our next adventure!"

"You say that," The young boxer walked up. "But is it? For all we know, nothing will come from this feather. Your old man bought it from a suspicious clerk."

"You just don't like birds." The redhead smirked in his direction.

"Only those stupid geese and crows, that's it. They are the true monsters!"

"I think we should tell Guardian." spoke Christina. "They should at least know."

"No," replied Tina. "Not until Grandpa leaves. What if they take it and lock it up somewhere? You all said it's not dangerous."

"We said it has weak mana," said Tanya. "Does not mean it is not dangerous."

Jake looked at the others. "I think it's fine. We'll let them know as soon as grandpa leaves."

"Right, let's not think about any doom or gloom right now." Amy smiled. "This is just a party for friendship."

"And donuts!" shouted Ryu. "Get some more before you old man decides to eat them all."

"Yeah..." Sam had fire in his eyes. "Let's go."

The gossip girl glanced at the feather and shrugged. "We'll keep it a secret."

"Thank you." smiled the younger girl.

----------------------------------------

-The Hub, Science Lab, Evening-

The four Guardian members stood before a table. It held a tool that appeared to be a metal backpack with a suction tube attached.

"Does it have to be ridiculous?" asked the annoyed redhead.

"Yes," giggled the bird woman. "They believe this will be the most efficient way to gather the leftover rage in Salem. Just stand on the highest plane and activate it."

"I like it." laughed the muscular man.

"Eh." the shinobi shrugged. "Figured it would be more unique."

"Luka, tomorrow you will head to Salem." Pilot turned left and then approached a large cylinder container at the end of the room. A stern gaze on his face. "Then there is this."

"Even at the bottom of a lake, it looks brand new." Reinstar frowned deeply.

"If I could destroy it there, I would have." growled Javo.

Luka shook her head. "Dreadful."

In the container, floating in liquid, was a 16-inch tall bronze-looking stone tablet with a red eye and four black rectangles encircling it. From how it looked, it was as if it was staring straight into your being with hatred as it cursed your existence.