Everyone Ages (XIAOLIN SHOWDOWN)

Great Change

The first we heard of it was when Raimundo came running down the hall that lead to outside. I forget what Kimiko, Clay, and I were doing when Raimundo flung himself among us. I believe Kimiko was setting the table. We were beginning to think about lunch, and I'd had some mending. Omi would have been at his new school. We hoped. The xiaolin monks were becoming more modern as the years passed.
"Rai, calm down," I told him. I am Alice Caterwell, the xiaolin monk of void.. One of the lesser elements unfortunately. Raimundo had lost his breath and was trying to find it. His eyes rolled around the room. He'd tracked it mud on the clean floor. "But listen to this-"
"Raimundo," I said, "did you go outside of the temple. No Shen gong wu revealed itself?"
"Yes," he gasped. "I was in a hurry, but listen to this-"
"Rai, you know master Fung told us it wasn't wise to leave the temple while the heylin side is advancing! We never do that!"
Raimundo was reckless, is reckless, and forever will be reckless.
"Nobody saw me!" Raimundo heaved. "Nobody ever does!" He meant the evil forces, the heylin.. They have been advancing in power for about two years now forcing the good, the xiaolin into the temple only to reveal themselves for Shen gong wu. We Protect the world even if it costs us out safety. "I'm fast an awesome, they never see me!"
"Katnappe has seen you, Raimundo...." I reminded him. "Katnappe has seen quite a lot of you. Many times you sneak out int the dead of night. You talk about nothing, and she talks to you about nothing. She tells you things. Dead of night, Rai, when everybody is suppose to be asleep. When you're supposed to be asleep."
"Sure, but.." Raimundo admitted. "But I haven't seen Katnappe right now.. Well I did.. But it's not night!"
"We know it's night, Rai." I said, "she's right, partner!" Clay agreed.
"I've been in chase's palace!" Said Raimundo.
Kimiko, Clay and I leaned in, listening in interest.
"All the heylin idiots were there!" Raimundo made big eyes at us. "They wouldn't have seen me even if I wasn't wearing my rad ninja suit! They were all talking at the top of their lungs as if yelling at each other."
"Jack is rather loud," I remarked. "And Wuya, with her eerily scratchy voice."
All the heylin characters are from somewhere odd. Not that we aren't, hell I'm from Britain!.
"You couldn't hear yourself think," Raimundo said. "Even Spicer was getting fancied up!"
"Fancy? Spicer?" Kimiko piped up. "Why?" She stood their in awe nearly dropping the tea cups. Raimundo drew himself up importantly. Master Fung leaned down upon us. We waited.
"They're going away."
Omi's eyes were bigger than his head, which was saying something.
Away? Where? Where did the entire heylin association ever go? And it was springtime, not summer. In the summer, people went places, people, not entire leagues. It took Jack Spicer three days to decide to go into a shop to buy a pair of leather gloves.
"Where are they going?" Omi wondered. "Does Raimundo not mean going away forever? Leaving us, the better group to win?"
"I'm not sure what I heard, exactly." Raimundo wavered. "It's something about Chase." Raimundo's mind was in a muddle. "I didn't understand most of it, but Wuya went on and on about Chase his chance."
My eyes narrowed. I am Alice Caterwell, the xiaolin monk of void, I needed to understand everything. "Where are they going, Rai?"
"Europe," Raimundo said. Just that one word like Mala-Mala Jong all over again.. Certain doom. Europe is across the ocean. Water is not a happy subject with me in particular, especially not after the mermaid girl accident. What a bitch. I glanced up at Master Fung looking down at us. "They are going to Europe to find Chase a Heylin Queen," he said. "They are going to marry Chase to a heylin woman."
"Is that what I was hearing?" Raimundo said, astonished.
"That's exactly what you were hearing,"Master Fung said, because it was.
"But why?" The monks and I gibbered.
"Because there is no young Heylin women around here that would dare wed Chase Young."
That was another true fact.
We stood sobered by the thought.
Then I said in a small voice, "well, I hope it works out for them. I wouldn't miss the heylin forces, particularly. As long as they bring Jack back." Gladly nobody heard me.
"Will they rule the world if they find one?" Omi asked
"We'll manage," I said. "Life will go on."
But I saw change coming, and that's always a worry, especially if you are a xiaolin monk.