One year earlier....
The waves of the pacific crashed against the shoreline, boats and sea life thriving. The day was crisp and bright, no doubt the work of a combination of Fire and Air, and even the mostly unwanted species of humanity was tolerable.
"Bring it in, boys!" said a dock worker, directing a huge crane to release a large, red shipping crate onto the shore. Several other workers popped the crate open, and began to dump barrel after barrel of toxic coal byproduct into the sea.
Water growled at humanity's desecration of his waters, his growl coming off as fiercer waves crashing down into the shore. 'Coal...' he thought, wondering what the significance of it could mean, before coming to a startling realization.
"Fire..."
---
The rural farms of the countryside dotted across acres of fresh plant and soil. Earth was content with anything that didn't harm him, and Nature was content so long as she could add her own creative touch to most of everything belonging to her father.
The humans, at least to Earth, were no bother except for those who choose to mine out the earth. Nature had a controversial view point on humans, however...
"Worthless weeds," Nature thought aloud, looking at the many humans planting corn. She knew the farmers, at least, were very helpful to expand her influence. But the lumberjacks, oil drillers, construction workers, and pretty much anyone save for the amish were ungrateful resource gluttons to her. Even the farmers used harmful pesticides that often times did more harm than good to her plants.
But she did value them, at the very least, as animals. Failed, gluttonous animals, but animals nonetheless. To follow in her father's footsteps, she insisted she would never harm humans, no matter how much harm they did... This insistence, however, would often cross her mind as idiotic.
Suddenly, a whirling vortex of wind scraped across the farmland, killing farmers, crops, and stone alike.
"AIR!" Nature said, a fury building in her heart.
---
"FIRE, COME OUT HERE RIGHT NOW!" Water said, forming himself a humanoid form within the orbit of the planet.
"Whaat?" Fire said with a groan, sleepily floating out from the earth's core and forming herself an equally human body as Water.
"Coal?! Really? You let them dump COAL in my ocean?!" Water said as he sneered, crossing his arms in a mix of disgust and anticipation for an apology and a good excuse. His aquamarine body rippled every now and then, slender and form-moving like a gentle wave. A darker blue vest wrapped around his torso, composed of denser deep sea water rather than the cooler and lighter water the rest of his form is composed of.
"What? It's not like I dumped it," Fire replied, her own form amber, feminine, and short. Every few moments, her body would wave and flicker like an untamed wildfire. Her hair stood up.and back in a massive hybridization of a bun and ponytail, its color being that of a deep red flame like that of an inferno.
"But you didn't bother stopping them?!"
"I was asleeeep. And besides, coal burning doesn't exactly hurt me." Fire laughed at the end of her sentence, stretching her 'arms' and flicking a flame in her thumb on and off out of boredom.
A low groan emitted from the earth as an earthen form emerged from the recesses of a chasm embedded into a sparse territory just below the destination of Fire and Water. The element's voice, condensing into a dull roar, rumbled, causing the entire place to shudder and tremble. Another figure clambered to the elemental's side, heavily disgruntled and exasperated, as Earth leapt into the stratosphere.
"Air! Come out right now you big... you big meany!" Nature said in her annoyingly high-pitched voice. Her form was green with the occasional thorn, and her face visibly flustered. Some patches of moss flourished abundantly on her 'skin'. Shorter than Fire, her form was more akin to that of a young girl than a full fledged element
.
The weathered earth comprising the surface of the other elemental shifted occasionally as he flexed his joints, as if he had been slumbering. "My child is discomforted," the elemental said, with a tinge of wisdom in his deep, churning, and ancient-sounding voice. "She wishes for you two to cease your quarreling. It is polluting her dominion... and she wishes for the destruction not to also encompass it."
"Uh, can't you see we're in the middle of something? Water here was just telling me how I should control humanity somehow because I'm obviously at fault for what they choose to do with coal, right Water?" Fire said, a noticeable tone of sarcasm throughout her words.
Water gritted his teeth and spoke through a barely open mouth. "They're harming Air just as much, Fire. You should know that," he said, stressed and angry at Fire's reluctance and noncommital attitude.
At the very mention of Air's foul name, Earth cringed. Air had done countless damage to his dominion simply by existing, for air often oxidizes stone. Reluctant and slightly disgusted, but still determined, Earth shut his heavy eyelids and let out a loud bellow. Quickly, clouds on the planet dispersed, agitating Air and summoning her to the meeting.
"I was having a rather nice nap until you so rudely awoke me. Can't you show some empathy? Come on. What have I been summoned for?"
Earth's guttural, booming voice again echoed through the distance, rebounding from several distanced walls. "These two are at unrest once more. It seems that the more time carries on, the more our aggravation expands. We will learn to loathe and despise one another as this develops, which is why it must be mended," he said.
"And, and, you made a tornado on the farms again, Air!" Nature said with a hop, interrupting Air before she could even comment.
"You... what?" Earth questioned. "Nature, why have you not told me this until now?"
Nature frowned."I told you we had to have a meeting, remember?! You should have known what it was about!"
"Air. Why create a tornado and interfere with humanity? We only create disasters such as those when the time calls for it."
"I do it a lot, actually. And it isn't just me. Water here has done over three tsunamis in the last ten years. Fire has a super volcano ready to detonate at any moment. Electricity even makes stor-" Air cut herself off as Fire kicked her in the shin, forcing her to stay silent to avoid getting Electricity in trouble.
Towering above the other elementals by likely a considerable amount, Earth hefted a limb and implanted his fist into the ground, spraying the surrounding area with debris-like chunks of earth which spiraled from its position and into the water. Its glowing eyes of magma drifted to divert its full attention to each of the elementals, sparing a second's glance at each. "Remember the last time our arguments reached inconceivable levels. Will we begin it again? Or shall we remain passive and cautious?"
"Hm. I rather quite like their bickering," A mysterious voice said, shocking and scaring each of the elementals. Never before have they heard an unknown voice. 'A new element?' Earth thought to himself.
"Who the hell is that?!" Fire said, borrowing the term 'hell' from her strong connection with humanity.
"I... don't know..." Water said, panicking and darting around in a mad attempt to search for the voice. "Fire, I swear, if this is some kind of foolery..."
"Oh, lighten up. You've never heard an element such as I before? Why don't I introduce myself..."
A cloud of black smoke came up from the planet, along with sludge and waste. Swirling around, it formed a grey-skinned male form wearing pollution-black clothing. An awful smell, or energy aura in elemental terms, filled the area.
The figure smiled, a grin on his face. "I am Corrosion. I don't think we've been properly introduced."
"Silence, insufferable wretch. We do not WISH for a proper introduction to one such as yourself. You dare invade our..." Earth's voice trailed off, realizing that the stench radiating from the entity filled him with a feeling of dread and utmost corruption. Except, the 'corruption' neglected to further expand. It was more a warping and deformation of his emotions. He willed himself not to speak.
"Why not bring the whole party along? It's clear I'm not wanted, but maybe the others have a different opinion?" Corrosion said, condescension in his voice.
Misty substances encircled the area in seconds. 'Could it be?' an astonished Water thought to himself. 'No...It cannot...Can it?' Water was uncertain until the mist coalesced into a vague representation of a humanoid, albeit with minor or major influential alterations. A snicker resonated from the creature's shimmery form.
"A bit slow on the uptake, father?" a feminine voice said, the hands of the form extending with claw-like edges. "As expected from one so dull," she said with a laugh.. "Has your confidence been shattered, yet? Have you faltered? If so, congratulations. If not, why? We all know that you will inevitably be the first to relent, as it has always been."
Water groaned, rolling his eyes at the aggressive and exaggerated form she chose for herself. "Ice..."
A crackle shocked around the elementals, then a bolt. In the bolt of lightning a figure formed, one of navy blues and electric purples. More wild and wavy than Water or Fire's forms, the figure flashed between female and male before forming half of its form as male and the other half as female.
"A new element? How? Better yet, why? I don't trust... it," Electricity said, walking, or rather floating, to Corrosion and eyeing the tar-clothed man up and down. Electricity's voice echoed, half of it being feminine, and half being masculine. Regularly there would be a flicker in his body, flashing one of the halves into a full form for a few moments before reverting back.
"Leave him be, Electricity. This is so typical. A new element is formed, and they get picked on," Ice said, glaring toward Water as she finished her sentence. "Even their parents..."
"Oh, but dear Ice, I have no parents. In a way, you're all my parents. The pollution from humans and Fire, the death from natural disasters, the stones that wither from time, the rotting bodies of plants and animals alike..." said Corrosion.
Rock-like formations began to erupt from the mountains below as Earth raised his hand.
"Cute. And really marvelous. But I'm not at all tempted to sway from my current doings. They're far too entertaining." Corrosion said, unafraid of the structures, or of Earth.
"We can't harm him even if we wants to," Earth said with a stern look on his face. "Remember the Element Wars?"
All four original elements nodded in agreement and silent remorse, while the children elements gasped and went wide-eye at the mention of the event they had only ever heard stories about.
A smooth stream of molten silver slithered up, forming into the shape of a woman with a bored and unmoving expression on her face. Her form was shorter than Fire but taller than Nature, and her platinum white hair ended in jagged edges and points. Her hair was extremely long, stopping just before her ankles.
"Why would we even want to harm him?" Metal said in a blunt and monotone voice, with her question lacking any hints of actually being a question. "All he did was introduce himself. So what if he's artificially created. I represent an artificial element too."
"Yes, Metal, but you're-" Fire cut herself off, staring into Metal's bored expression. "You're-" she cut herself off once more, growing agitated and slightly weirded out by the blank expression. "Would you stop that?!"
"What Fire is trying to say, Metal, is that your respective element existed before you came into existence. Small in number, yes, but still in existence. When Fire and Earth combined their elements to form you, all it did was separate Earth's jurisdiction over ore and Fire's jurisdiction over molten metals and give those respective abilities to you," said Water.
"And Corrosion forming without an element's interference makes this different somehow?" Metal said.
"It does, Metal!" said Water, his wave-like body beginning to crash and move wildly like a tsunami or hurricane.
"If you say so."
"Oh, are you trying to start a fight? I'll give you a fight. Right now!" Water's body waved forward like a tsunami and a whip of water struck forward Metal, knocking her back.
"Please don't," Metal said as she slid across the stratosphere without so much as a flinch.
Water raised his hands and send them back down, firing a wave of water up and toward Metal's chest. "Shut UP!"
"Stop it, Water. You can't harm Metal anymore than Metal can harm you," Earth said while walking in front of the strike, deflecting it entirely. "Or at the very least, you can't kill her."
"Sometimes I wish we could kill each other..." Fire mumbled under her breath, looking away from the fight. Water dashed over and stared her in the eye.
"Take it back."
"No."
"Do you wish you could kill me?"
"..."
Water, shocked and slightly hurt, slid away. "You take Air away from me... and now you pretty much tell me you don't even like me in the slightest?"
Rumbling distantly exited the still gaping chasm from which Earth had ascended. "You have all forgotten our truce, then... forsaken...you have committed such an atrocity...how dare you do so under the will of the earth, which crumbles and consumes below your very beings, slowly engulfing the world?"
"I'm sorry, Earth. I didn't mean to lash out. It's just that the others..."
A blue flame lit up across Fire's arm. "Oh, us? That's your problem? I didn't take Air away from you, I just loved her more," she said, just before firing the blue flame toward Water.
Water's chest reformed, and he turned around in a hurry. "Fire, enough!"
A blast of lightning struck Earth's form and singed it, Electricity arcing the lightning between his fingers. "Don't tell us what to do. You may be the oldest, but you don't know best. Neither do you, Water."
"Are you all this unstable? All I did was introduce myself," Corrosion said with a smirk, a black puff from the lightning strike quickly sticking to his skin and clothes.
Ice stepped in and raised her claws. "I may not be an artificial element, but I know very well that Corrosion isn't the cause of your bickering. I'm with him."
Bickering erupted between all the elements as they foolishly chose sides. The world would never be the same.
A war had just begun.
ELEMENTAL
