Ch. 4: Tanaka's Dimension

Frank, Drew, and JT finally figure out what is going on with the others.

Brenden and John happily woke up the next morning since they didn't wake up in the middle of the night like the nights before. Brenden was getting up when he heard a sound from his phone. It was a text from Seth that said "u up? I'm heading to ur house." Brenden then texted back to him "Yeah I just woke up. Meet me and John in our backyard." After he texted that, him and John both ate breakfast then went to their backyard. A few minutes letter they saw Seth walking down the street they live on. 
"Over here!" Brenden said. 
"Okay!" Seth said, running. "I'm coming!" 
Once Seth got over to Brenden and John's house, they texted Tara, Anna, and Scarlett to come over too. A while later everyone arrived. 
"Should we invite Frank, JT, and Drew?" John said. 
"Well it's your house." Tara said. "So it's your call." 
"I don't think we should." Anna said. "They've been being mean since the whole dreams thing a few days ago." 
"I think we should give them a chance." John said. "If we show them our weapons, maybe they will believe us." 
Everyone agreed and then texted JT, Frank, and Drew to come over to John and Brenden's house. Once they got over, which they did in about 20 minutes, they went in the backyard to where the others were. 
"Hey guys!" Seth said. "What's up?" 
JT, Frank, and Drew looked at them. 
"Seth, why are your eyes brown?" JT said. "Weren't they blue?" 
"Huh?" Seth said. "I don't know. Probably a side effect from my element which is earth." 
"Yeah, element." Drew said. "It looks like all of of you guys are wearing colored contacts." 
"Yeah." Frank said. "Brenden, yours are blue, Anna's are a lighter blue, Tara's are red, Scarlett's are grey which is pretty creepy, and John's are purple. 
JT, Frank, and Drew chuckle 
"What's so funny?" John said. "Something wrong with the color purple?" 
"Well..." Frank said. "It's just that purple isn't a color that a boy would want to have for their eyes. That's all." 
"Well it wasn't my decision for my element to be poison." John said. 
"What do you mean element?" JT said. "Are you talking about a video game?" 
"No." John said. "Do you want me to show you?" 
Drew, JT, and Frank nodded. 
"Brenden, can you go get me a bottle of water?" John said. 
"Okay." Brenden said. "Are you sure about this?" 
John looked at Brenden and nodded. Brenden went inside then came back out with a water bottle. 
"Here." Brenden said. 
John took the water bottle. 
"What's he doing?" Scarlett whispered to Anna. 
"He's gonna turn the water into poison." Anna whispered. 
"Oh." Scarlett said. 
John opened the water bottle and started to drink its contents. While he was drinking it, it turned purple like expected. Drew, JT, and Frank however, weren't convinced. 
"What?" Drew said. "Did you put purple food coloring while you were drinking it?" 
Brenden then walked over to Drew then zapped him by poking him. 
"Ow!" Drew yelped. "P-Probably just static electricity." 
"Okay! That's it!" Scarlett said. "This'll work." 
"What are you doing?" JT said. 
"Something that'll blow you away" Scarlett said. 
Scarlett closed her eyes for a while. She opened her eyes and then shouted as loud as she could. Everyone tumbled to the ground. 
"Woah!" Everyone said. 
Drew, Frank, and JT were astonished. They didn't know what to say. 
"How did you do that?" Frank said. "That's impossible!" 
"We already told you you silly biscuit!" Seth said. "We have elements." 
"Okay." Drew said. "I guess you guys really do have elements." 
"What are all your other elements?" JT said, exited. "I gotta draw this!" 
"Draw?" Scarlett said, confused. "Why?" 
"I realized that I had a talent in drawing." JT said. "Wanna see a drawing?" 
"Sure." Scarlett said. 
JT pulled a notepad out of his hoodie pocket and showed Scarlett a picture. It was a sketch of a dog. 
"This is a picture of my dog, Lucy." JT explained. "Do you like it." 
"Yeah!" Scarlett said. "It's great!" 
"You guys should come meet Tanaka!" Seth insisted. "He's a pretty chill dude." 
"O-okay." Frank said. "How far away is it?" 
"An hour." Anna said. "Give or take a few minutes." 
"An hour!?" Frank said. "You've got to be kidding me!" 
"No." John said. "It's an hour. Well we usually stop at a gas station to get a snack." 
"Can't you just bring a snack?" Drew said. "I don't see why you would have to stop at a place just to buy a snack." 
"Yeah." Brenden said. "I'll go get us all a bag of chips or something." 
Everyone agreed, so Brenden went inside and got everyone a bag of his favorite kind of chips. They then started to walk to Green Street. After about 40 minutes, they got there. 
"That wasn't so bad." Tara said. "Right?" 
"Yeah." Frank said. "So this is the place?" 
"Yep." Seth said. 
"There's nothing here though." Drew said. "Are you sure we're at the right spot?" 
"I'm positive." Seth said. "We just have to wait for his hut to get here." 
"What do you mean?" JT said. "Will it just magically pop up out of nowhere?" 
"Yes!" Scarlett exclaimed. "I know it may seem crazy, but come on. You just saw me summon a gust of wind." 
Frank, Drew, and JT agreed, although they were still having doubts. About 10 minutes later, they heard and saw the red flash and, as expected, Tanaka's hut was there. 
"Woah!" JT, Frank, and Drew jumped in shock. 
Tanaka stepped out of the hut, saw the three astonished friends, and laughed. 
"Waahahahaha!" Tanaka laughed. "Who are these people you brought with you?" 
"They're our friends." Tara said. "That's JT Burton, over there is Frank Cantrell, and that one is Drew Berry." 
"It's nice to meet you." Tanaka said. 
Tanaka walked over to Drew and shook his hand. As he was, Drew looked over his shoulder and noticed that there were six cases behind him. 
"What's with the cases?" Drew asked. "Are you going on a business trip?" 
"No." Tanaka chuckled. "Why don't you all show them what's in the cases." 
Brenden, John, and the others went over to the cases, opened them, and took out their weapons. JT, Frank, and Drew were astonished. Again. 
"Are those real?" Frank said. "They look sharp!" 
"Yeah, they're real." Scarlett said. "Do you like mine. They're wind daggers." 
"They're all cool!" Frank said. "It would be cool if there was, like, a whip weapon." 
"Yeah." Drew said. "Also a bow or something because none of your weapons seem to be long ranged." 
"That's not true." Tanaka said. "Avalanche shoots ice balls." 
"Which weapon is Avalanche?" Drew said. 
"Mine." Anna said. "It's a staff." 
"You are right though." Tanaka said. "A bow and a whip would be useful. I think I'll make them! Do you two have any experience with those two weapons?" 
John and Drew looked at each other, confused. 
"Uh... We were just making suggestions." Frank said. "We don't have any battle experience." 
"That's okay." Tanaka said. "Neither does everyone else. Tara, John, and Seth got their powers yesterday. Brenden, Anna, and Scarlett got them the day before." 
"Let's say, if me and Frank did get powers, what elements would we get?" Drew said. 
"I know two that the others don't have." Tanaka said. "Water and Nature." 
"Water?" Drew said. "That sounds lame." 
"Not necessarily." Tanaka said. "It is more of a defensive slash long ranged element." 
"So it is a bow?" Drew said. "I gotta admit. That's pretty cool sounding." 
"Wait." Frank said. "How are we gonna be as good with our weapons as them if they are the "Chosen Ones"? It doesn't make sense." 
"A little thing called magic training." Tanaka said. "I believe Brenden and the others have already heard this term before." 
"Oh yeah!" Scarlett said. "You never told us what it was though." 
"This is the basic explanation." Tanaka said. "I teleport Frank and Drew to another dimension where time moves much faster than here on Earth. Then they train. In the dimension it would be two years of training, but here it would feel like about an hour. They don't age two years though because since they were born on Earth, their aging system goes on Earth time." 
"That sounds so cool!" JT said. "I wish I could do it." 
"Sorry lad." Tanaka said. "As far as I know, there are only eight elements." 
JT started to tear up a little. He then started to walk away. 
"I think I'm gonna head home." JT said. "I don't feel that well." 
"Okay." Everyone said. 
"Are you two ready to start?" Tanaka said, staring at Drew and Frank. "Oh wait. I have to make the weapons. Be back in around an hour." 
Tanaka went inside his hut and teleported. About an hour later he came back out with two cases. He opened the cases and pulled out two weapons. 
"Drew, this is Aqua Missile, a bow that has the longest range of any bow made on Earth." Tanaka said. "It also has extremely high accuracy and velocity. Along with it is Hydro Quiver. It infinitely creates arrows from thin air as long as there is less than 40 arrows in it." 
"This is so cool!" Drew said. 
"Frank, this is Crystal Vine, a whip made from vines from a different planet." Tanaka said. "Each individual vine is reinforced with a special kind of flexible diamond which also came from a different planet." 
"Woah!" Frank said. "Intergalactic stuff!" 
"Now, are you two ready?" Tanaka said. 
"Heck yeah!" They both said with excitement. 
Tanaka put his hands on their heads. And teleported with a red flash. Everyone else waited for their arrival by practicing with their weapons. 
"Ice wall!" Anna said trying to make a barrier of ice. "I said... ice wall! Dang It!" 
Anna kept on trying to make a wall of ice. 
"Focus..." Anna said. "ICE WALL!!!" 
She shot her staff forward. Ice started coming out of it. Instead of making a wall in front of her, it created a ball of ice around her! 
"I said ice wall not ice ball!" Anna said. "Uhh... help. Please. I'm kinda claustrophobic." 
"I got this." Tara said setting down her scythe. "Hold on." 
Tara walked over to the ball of ice Anna was in and put her hands on it. It started melting. Once there was a big enough hole for Anna to go through, she crawled out of it. 
"Thanks Tara." Anna said. "Good thing it was hollow!" 
"Ground smash!" Seth said. 
Seth took his cudgel, jumped, and slammed it on the ground. This caused a small quake and everyone tumbled to the ground. 
"Man." Seth said. "I've got to get better at that." 
John and Scarlett were pushing there weapons together. 
"This is fun!" Scarlett said. "This is just like arm wrestling, but with daggers!" 
Scarlett was about to break John's stance. 
"Don't think you've won yet!" John said. "Haiyaaah!" 
CHING!!! Scarlett tumbled to the ground. 
"Oh sorry." John said, walking toward her. "Are you okay?" 
John held out his hand. Scarlett grabbed it and pulled John down with her. They laughed for a while. 
"Just get up." Brenden said. 
"Brenden, how come you haven't been training?" Anna said. "Is something the matter?" 
"No." Brenden said. "It's just that... I feel sorry that JT couldn't get powers like we did." 
"We do too." Anna said. "But that doesn't mean you can't trai-" 
Anna got interrupted by a small red flash. Once it subsided, they saw Tanaka, Drew, and Frank. 
"Hey guys!" Frank said. "Miss me? It's been a while." 
"Not really." John said. "It's only been almost an hour." 
"Oh yeah." Frank said. "To us it's been a while though." 
"They did very well." Tanaka said. "They're probably stronger than you all now." 
"Well of course they are!" Scarlett said. "They've been training for two years and we we've only been training for when we were waiting for you to come back!" 
"Would you all like to come to the training dimension and train?" Tanaka said. "We'd have to get in the hut since I can't teleport all eight of you at once." 
"Sure!" Everyone said. 
"Alright." Tanaka said. "Follow me.", 
Tanaka walked into the hut with everyone else behind him. He then teleported it. There was a big red flash for a few seconds. Once it subsided, everyone looked outside the hut and saw multiple training areas. What's weird was they had no roofs. Everyone looked up and all they could see was black. Not a star or moon in the sky. 
"What is this place?" John said. "The training dimension?" 
"Yes." Tanaka said. "It has many different training areas including practice dummies, obstacle courses, and 1v1 arenas." 
"So, where should we start?" Anna said. "I'm fine with whatever." 
"Let's start with the dummies." Scarlett said. "They sound like they'd be fun to slice into a million pieces!" 
"Okay!" 
Brenden, John, Scarlett and the others ran towards a building with the word "DUMMIES" over the door. Everyone went through the door and inside was a blank room. 
"What's the deal?" Scarlett said. "There aren't any dummies." 
"Uh huh." Seth said. "Right there." 
Seth pointed at Scarlett. 
"Hey!" Scarlett said. "I'm smarter than you are! I think." 
"Tanaka." John said. "How come there aren't any training dummies?" 
"Huh?" Tanaka said. "Oh. Here you go." 
Tanaka walked to one of the walls and put his hands on it. When he did that, holes opened in the floors and the dummies came out of the ground. 
"There you go!" Tanaka said. "Now, train up! I'll be leaving now. If you wan't to leave then step in the red circle that you came through." 
"But we came here with the hut." Tara said. "Is it under the hut?" 
"Yep." Tanaka said. "Also, if you want long ranged targets, they are in the room to your left." 
"Thanks." Drew and Brenden said. 
"Oh yeah!" Anna said. "Tanaka! I want to be a healer!" 
"Okay." Tanaka said. "I guess I won't go then because your going to need help with that." 
"Yay!" Anna said exited. "Where do I go?" 
"Go get one of your friends and then follow me." Tanaka said. "Perhaps one that has a bruise or scratch." 
"Okay." Anna said. "I'll get John since he burned his hands yesterday." 
Anna walked over to John and told him to follow Tanaka with her. They went into a small room with nothing but a chair in it. Tanaka told John to sit down. 
"Focus your staff on his hands." Tanaka said. "Don't do it too much though or you may freeze them." 
"Okay." Anna said. 
Anna pointed her staff towards John's bandage-wrapped hands. Once she did, small snowflakes started to fall over John's arms. 
"What are you doing?" John said. "It feels strange." 
"Healing your burns." Anna said. "I hope." 
Anna did this for while until she thought that it was fully healed. She then took the bandages off of John's arms and saw that they were completely healed. 
"Woah!" Anna said. "I'm a healer!" 
"Thanks!" John said. "My hands feel much better now. When I was holding my swords earlier my hands were really hurting!" 
"No problem." Anna said. "I just like to help my friends." 
"Your a natural at this." Tanaka said. "Go find someone else and come back." 
Anna went and got someone else to heal. Meanwhile, Brenden and Drew were having trouble figuring out how to make the dummies pop up. 
"How did Tanaka do this?" Drew said. "Didn't he just put his hands on the wall?" 
"Yeah." Brenden said. "But that obviously isn't working." 
Drew and Brenden tried putting both their hands on the wall. They couldn't figure it out so they decided to go to Tanaka. They went to the short ranged dummy room and asked John where they went. 
"To the right of this building is a big room." John said. "They are in the small room behind it." 
"Okay." Brenden said. "Thanks." 
Brenden and Drew went out of the room and saw a big building beside it with the words "TEAM BATTLE" on it. They went behind it and they saw the small room John was talking about. Drew opened the door and they saw Tanaka, Anna, and Scarlett. Tanaka was watching Anna as she was pointing her staff at a bruise on Scarlett's leg. 
"Uhh..." Brenden said. "What are you guys doing?" 
"I'm healing Scarlett's leg." Anna said. 
"What do you two want?" Tanaka said. "Need help?" 
"Yeah." Drew said. "We don't know how to make the dummies pop up." 
"You put your hands on the wall directly on the other side of the door." Tanaka said. "About three inches apart." 
"Okay." Brenden said. "Thanks." 
Brenden and Drew went back to the long ranged dummy room and tried it. It took them a while to get the right hand positioning, but they got it. 
"Yes!" Drew said. "Man, do I feel like an idiot." 
"We can train now!" Brenden said. "So how does this work?" 
"You gotta focus your energy on your weapon." Drew said. "Watch this." 
Drew grabbed 5 arrows from his quiver and shot them all at once. When they hit, a ball of water formed around the dummy and exploded. 
"Woah!" Brenden said. "Let me try." 
Brenden charged up his bo staff and sent out a giant lightning bolt at the dummy that made it explode and catch on fire. 
"Wow!" Brenden said. "That was cooler than expected." 
Everyone got to training and checked out their cool moves. 
"Hey John." Frank said. "Watch this." 
Frank jumped with his whip in front of him and slammed it down on the top of the dummy, splitting it in two. 
"Wow!" John said. "How about this?" 
John readied up his swords and sliced the dummy's head off. 
"Scarlett's turn!" Scarlett said. 
Scarlett stabbed the dummy multiple times and then pushed it back with a gust of wind, slamming it to the wall. 
"Scarlett look!" Tara said. 
Scarlett looked at Tara as she impaled the dummy, ripped it off of the stick it was sitting on, caught it on fire, and slammed it onto the ground. 
"Woah." Scarlett said looking at a dummy that got smashed halfway into the ground. "What happened there?" 
"I think Seth did that." Tara said. "With his cudgel." 
"Where is he?" Scarlett said. 
"I think he's getting healed by Anna." Tara said. 
As soon as she said that, Anna walked in. 
"Tanaka told me to tell you to go to the room I was healing you guys at." Anna said. "He said he had something important to tell us."

Reviews

[Marcel Darrow]

Who are Frank, Drew, and JT? What do they matter to the story you are setting up? Did you need more characters to fulfill certain roles later on? It seems rather convenient that there are two additional elemental powers when the “prophecy” only needs six of them. JT totally got the brush off here and I hope because of that unique outcome that we will see more of him later.
“Don’t think you’ve won yet”  Why is this not followed by an action? How am I supposed to know how he knocked her to the ground beside the fact that there’s the sound of colliding metal?
Whoa, why is Tanaka an hour away? How does this affect your story? Is he far away because he’s a recluse? Is there a more convenient way to travel, like by car or bus?
The training dimension doesn’t immediately make sense to me- why is it weird that the buildings/areas don’t have roofs? Also, why is it initially described as areas if the group is going to enter a building that houses dummies (what I mean to say is area does not denote or suggest buildings, so why describe it as that)? If the sky is black (no stars/moon/etc.), is there any sources of light or how can people see?
Why does Anna just get to be a healer? Does her element assist in healing- why? How does logic jump from ice powers to healing abilities? Why does she prefer this role as opposed to a more offensive role?
Why is there this tangent where Drew and Brenden don’t know how to work the tech? Like, yeah it makes sense that they wouldn’t know how to do it, but it doesn’t add anything to the story that they don’t know how to do it. At best, it gives them an opportunity to see Anna heal (which the reader already knows about) or it allows them to reveal character by being self-deprecating (which is new info but could be relayed better).
I enjoy the action at the end, though I can’t help but wonder why Tanaka wasn’t training them personally (like what is implied for Drew and Frank’s case). I look forward to the next chapter and the revelation it will have.