Elemental Stones: The Return Of The Siren

Chapter 17: The Adventure That Lies Ahead

Jayce, Ryan, Sammie, and Adam then slowly opened their eyes. Slowly standing up, they looked around seeing a black void with a vortex circling around them at a steady pace.

"Where are we?" Adam wondered.

Jayce could feel something very familiar about it. The question that he could not stress was what are they doing there? Why would Hermes and Hades send them here?

Ryan even questioned it.

"Ryan, any clue?" Adam asked.

Ryan shook his head and continued wandering down a short walkway. Jayce then shouted, "wait," before Ryan took another step to almost falling into completely nothing.

"Going too far off of the void, you will become lost and never return." Jayce explained.

"I have been told about this place from my mom's stories. I only thought it was a myth."

Sammie then saw a white ball of light floating down slowly. She pointed up to it and Jayce looked up as the ball was getting closer.

"It can't be." Jayce whispered.

He then walked toward the light and touched it with his fingertip. The light then started to burst and started forming into human-like form.

Jayce gasped and Ashley's presence appeared as strange as it sounded.

"It is. This is the true realm of lost souls. Everyone here has died or are banished along the generations."

Ashley gave a smile then Ty, April, and Strike appeared from one side next to Ashley and the other. Jayce knew it was them after encountering his mother once before.

"You must get back, Jayce." Ty held out his palm with a glowing heart within it.

"But how?" Sammie wondered.

April smiled, "We may not be the ones you knew, but we are their true souls and what he is giving you is the soul of the siren. The last siren that would bring peace to the universe over thousands of generations. The sonic warrior."

"The four of us are all connected. You, Jayce, are the key to the siren's heart." Strike told him.

"Your father, TJ, gave his power up just so it could be savored for you. And you may have tried to give up your true purpose, but you know that can never come to be. This one heart holding every single soul of your loved ones from the Pierman family, is your only chance to stopping Sylvia's reckoning from continuing." Ashley smiled as she held the glowing heart against Jayce's chest.

Jayce took a deep breath and looked at his mother one last time, "But what about Blackheart? I cannot stop them both."

Ashley smiled and looked over at Ryan, "That is why Ryan is the only way of stopping him."

Jayce looked to Ryan as did Sammie then when he looked back to his mother's direction, her and the other souls of his family were gone. Jayce felt a tear run down his left cheek then gave a slight smile.

Suddenly, the ground began to shake. The black areas of the vortex started to close in around the four as they started to form around him.

"What's happening?" Sammie exclaimed.

Jayce watched as the floor started to rise and covering their feet up to their chests. Jayce could feel something in his body when the black water began to drown the four.

The water then gave a bright light shining from the inside and it then burst with the dark area completely depleting and Jayce held onto everyone. They saw wings bright as the sun attached to his back and flying through the air. A door then opened, and a bright light began to appear.

Minutes later, Ryan slowly opened his eyes to see him, Adam, and Sammie outside a village. Ryan leaned upward groaning as he placed his hand against his head.

"Everybody alright?" He asked.

Sammie and Adam groaned as they slowly leaned up then gave a nod. They both looked around searching for Jayce. From the skies all the way down to the ground ahead of them.

They looked up once more seeing a white dot shooting down toward them. Suddenly, whatever it was it slammed into the ground causing a patch of smoke to escape around it.

The dust then vanished and Jayce was different. The wings were still attached to his back and his eyes were bright blue as he gave a slight smile and walked toward his friends.

"Jayce?" Ryan whispered.

He then looked at his arms from up to down and clenched his fists with a chuckle. He could feel a stronger power even when he first gained the power of a siren.

"This is different." He smiled.

"I'll say." Sammie chuckled.

Jayce then looked past the village seeing a castle from a far distance. A very odd castle rather.

"Castle Oblivion." Ryan spoke up as he stood next to Jayce.

"I thought that was destroyed years ago."

Jayce then started walking toward the castle. It was like something was drawing him to it as if there was something so important there. The ground gave a bright blue glow with every step Jayce would take.

"What is Castle Oblivion?" Sammie wondered.

"It was the home of a dark siren by the name of Selene." Ryan replied as they walked closer to the castle.

Sammie then took a gulp, swallowing her fear back after hearing the name. She then stopped and Jayce stopped to turn to her.

"You three go ahead," Sammie shuddered, "I cannot go in there."

Ryan and Adam then looked at Jayce with a brow raised.

"Sammie," she then looked up at Jayce with fear in her eyes, "what are you not telling us?"

Before Sammie could say a word, her head started to make a loud high pitched ringing sound. She fell to her knees as she held her hand against her head then heard a maniacal laughter.

"I can feel your presence, daughter." She echoed.

"Sammie." Jayce kneeled down trying to help her up.

Sammie's eyes then gave a dark color and a slight smirk on her face, "You should not be near her, Pierman boy." She then swung up against Jayce's chin. Knocking him back to the ground.

Sammie's body then lifted up into the sky. Black wings came out from her back and she looked down at him with a nasty sinister grin.

"Jayce." Ryan looked over and Jayce held up his hand to wait.

"Sammie, this is not you." Jayce shouted.

"Shut up. You and that liar of a cousin of mine are keeping so much from her."

"Who are you?" Adam asked.

Selene gave a giggle and landed down with her wings floating off of the ground, "I am Selene. I knew your mother and father and it is so sad to hear that they are gone. Sammie deserves to learn the truth."

Jayce then charged toward her and grabbed her around the waist aiming up to the clouds. Selene chuckled as they gained closer to the eye of space then with her left wing, she swiped him across the arm and grabbed him by the throat.

Slamming him through clouds leading to Castle Oblivion and as they aimed closer to it, Selene threw Jayce through windows until he slammed his back against a wall. Jayce slowly sat up groaning. He looked at his arm feeling the blood drip down and he watched Selene, who was in Sammie's young body, walking toward him with a sinister laugh.

She then grabbed him by the throat and lifted him from the ground, "She will learn the truth. She is my path to return. She can help me be set free. You call yourself the sonic warrior but you do not see the big picture. Blackheart is just the beginning. Your end, young Pierman, is closer than you fail to realize."

She then tossed his body away from her and after Ryan and Adam rushed in, she was gone. With Sammie taken with her.

"Jayce, are you okay?" Ryan helped him stand.

"Scarlett is going to kill me." He whispered.