Running Through the Raindrops

Chapter One: The Stone Circle

Mei's POV

"Did you find that book!" I called over to my friend, Zoé who was walking back over to the study table. We were in the library doing a research project on local history. We chose to do it on the forest nearby.

"Quiet down a bit, we're in the library." Zoé scolds me.

"Our only escape from reality." we both said, laughing at the same time.

Zoé sat down and opened the book while I snuck off to look around. As I wandered around I felt a strange pull towards the back section of the library. I could tell that this section was really old, like older than my nai nai. 'Why do they still keep these around?' I thought to myself. I went to the corner and saw a leather book, it almost looked like it was glowing. I decide to grab it and head back to Zoé because I feel like this is something that we both need to look at. Especially Zoé, she seems to analyze things better than I do. Once I got to the table Zoé opened up the book and a note fell out.

"'Make things right.' I wonder what that means," Zoé said.

"I don't know, but look," I point to a name on the first page, "That's the woods, why don't we go there tonight?"

With that we leave the library to go grab something to eat. I wanted tacos but Zoé wanted pizza, we just decided to get both. Then we got to a parking lot and sat there eating. Zoé went inside the store once we were done and came out ten minutes later with supplies for our hike in the woods.

"Why do you need a knife?" I ask, confused.

"Because we might need to slice something. I don't trust this random book," Zoé tells me

"Well, let me carry the knife because I don't trust you with it." I said, and Zoé gave me the knife, she always would cut herself.

With that we drove to my house so I could get something warm and an umbrella. I walked in and went upstairs to my room, not even looking at my older sisters. My two older half-sisters were fraternal twins, RenRen and Kira. They were completely japanese while my mother was native-american, I was the baby of the family and it showed. We lived with our nai nai, or grandmother if you're american, she was very old fashioned and hated my mother. My sisters always took her side so most of the time I felt like cinderella. Always cleaning, getting in trouble for things I didn't do, and always got the hammy-downs. Why do you think I spent so much time at the library?

After that we headed to her house, so she could grab combat boots. To be honest I've never been inside her home, her family was very christian while I was a die-hard atheist, so I just decided to stay clear of her family. Once she comes out she gets back in her seat and we drive to the forest.

When we get there I can feel the wind coming. As we got deeper into this supposed haunted forest I felt a weird pull, and I can guess Zoé felt it too as she started to run towards a clearing up ahead. Did I forget to mention that she had the book on her and she didn't even check it out, well I didn't, I was better at stealing things. I wondered why she was so eager to do this, but I can't distrust my only friend. I want to be there for her, but she's kept secrets from me, and vice versa.

As we run through the forest Zoé pushes through the branches in our way. Once we reached the clearing we looked around, the ground wasn't dirt it was stone, like some ancient ruin, there was the thing jutting out in the middle, I thought it was a tree stump. So I kicked it. "Shit! That's stone!"

I grabbed my foot and looked back at the stone pedestal. There were vines covering it, this place was definitely old, it looked almost as old as the book. Zoé noticed this to and started to try, and failed, to rip the vines off. I grabbed my pocket knife and started to cut the vines.

When it was cleared we both saw the pedestal, it was covered in ancient runes and crystals. "What do you think this is?" Zoé asked.

"I don't know." I said running my fingers on the top, "Ow!" I looked at my finger and saw that it had been cut on the stone and I had blood running down my hand. I closed my eyes and heard something I thought I existed only in my memory.

My mom's windchimes.

When my parents died and nai nai took me in she made sure nothing of my moms had stayed with me. I remembered playing on the house's porch with my dolls to the sound of mom's windchimes. I opened my eyes as the soft notes faded. I looked to my left and saw that the engraving on the stone was glowing an emerald green color. "What the hell?"

Zoé hand grazed over the pedestal and she yelped with her finger was cut too. She had a look of euphoria on her face and then looked to our right. I saw that the stones on that side had an electric blue hue to them.

Zoé and I looked at each other with confusion, "What is going on?!" Zoé asked me, I just gave her a shrug and looked around the circle more. My eyes wandered to the pedestal and saw that there was a dip in the stone like something was supposed to go there. I acted on impulse, as usual, and snatched the book from Zoé.

"Hey! What are you doing!"

"Just trust me on this." I placed the book on the pedestal inside the dip. When the leather touched the rough stone the pedestal started to glow and dark purple, basically black. Zoé and I looked at each other with a worried look and both went in to touch the book.

"Ah!"

"Shit!"

We both screamed, a blast of white lightning hit us both and it hurt like hell. I closed my eyes and almost fainted from the pain. When the pain finally subsided I opened my eyes and saw that Zoé was on the ground clutching her right shoulder, I was just on one knee and I soon I felt an ache in my left arm.

I got up and went to help Zoé. Once we both were standing I looked around and saw that we weren't in the woods anymore. We were in some kind of astral plane where the stone circle was the only thing there. "What the heck?" Zoé asked.

"Maybe this is all a hallucination?"

"That we're both having? Nope."

I still felt an ache in my left arm and decided to check what it was. I unzipped my jacket and moved my shirt so I could see it. Zoé decided to do the same and we just stared at each other, running from my heart to my left elbow was a tattoo of a universe. Planets, stars, galaxies, it almost looked real. Zoé had the same running from her right collar bone to her right elbow.

"WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON!?" I yelled, zipping my jacket back up. We both looked back to the book and saw that it had been flipped to a page about twenty pages in. It was in a language I didn't recognize and it seemed like neither did Zoé. I heard something, grabbed my pocket knife and looked across the circle of stones.

Two hooded figures appeared, they were flickering in and out like holograms in bad sci-fi movies, one was tall and had a blue cloak while the other was about my height and wore a green cloak. "Let the stories come to life. You two have been chosen to save your world along with others," the blue one said.

"We have failed and now it is up to you two to fix our mistakes and make things right," the green one said, and just like that the holograms disappeared, Zoé looked shocked, I bet my face looked the same.

"Huh, I guess you would've never guessed that quiet girl you met in the dark corner of the library would ever go on an adventure like this with you," Zoé says.

"Nope, but this is going to one hell of an adventure." Zoé smiled at that, our friendship has come a long way since we first met.

I looked back at the book and saw that now I understood the language, I looked to Zoé and she gave me a nod. I grabbed her hand and we started reading the top of the page.

Next thing I know we are falling through the sky and our clothes were completely different. The adventure has begun and let's hope I survive falling through the roof of this mansion.

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A/N: at the time of writing this Captain Fandom did not realize that the two holograms from the book was similar to Bartelby from Winx Club Secrets of the Lost Kingdom.