True Love!

by Katrina Kahler

  Oh, I have to give Paula credit. She really came through, both against the walruses and by keeping me from hurting them. Plus, giving me this compass will make sure I find the North Pole. Surely Paula can see that we’re better as a team than apart. Of course, she may not care. She may simply be using me just to get out of this dimension. I can only hope she will learn from this. Right?

  At least now I know why Luna has been attracted to Zeke. It was just a clever ploy to get us to lower our guard. To confuse us and to get us to trust her.

  The Attack

  Running outside, I leaped up into the air. I started heading north. I pushed myself as fast as I could. I created a sonic boom almost instantly. It felt weird not having Mac to tell me my direction or speed. I could tell, though, I was flying faster than I had ever flown before. I curled my fists. I thought that might help me cut down on wind resistance. Plus, I had a lot of anger towards Luna.

  It was bad enough that she’d tried trapping Paula and me at the South Pole. Worse though, she seemed bent on destroying the happiness of millions if not billions of people. This North Pole created happiness for our Earth, and perhaps even countless other words. I felt very angry that Luna wanted to destroy all that.

  As I pushed forward, I checked Paula’s compass, making sure I stayed on the right track. The air on this version of Earth smelled slightly different than on our Earth. A normal person wouldn’t have even noticed, but my enhanced senses could pick up the differences, especially way up here, miles above the ground. I had detected scents of cinnamon, cocoa, and apple pie. Those scents, though, seemed to be getting a little weaker. I didn’t know if that was because I was flying so fast or if it was caused by some sort of change going on around the planet.

  An image of Luna appeared in front of me. “Ah, Super Teen. I see you are sprinting to the rescue!” She laughed.

  “Yep!” I replied.

  “You are a hero of few words,” Luna’s image said. “You know, though, I can’t let you stop me from taking over the North Pole.”

  “I don’t expect you to let me, but I also don’t see how you can stop me from stopping you!” I told her.

  “Please, I could snap my finger, and you’d become a harmless worm! So give up now and go fly away!” Luna said.

  “If that was the case, why didn’t you just turn me into a worm before?” I asked.

  Her image laughed. “I love to have fun and be cruel. Just turning you into a worm would have been too easy. You wouldn’t have felt anything…”

  “Then why give me a chance to turn around and fly away?” I asked, pushing forward at great speed.

  “I kind of like you! You have guts, unlike the others around here!” she said. “I’m an elf, so I love being sporting.”

  “You’re scared of me!” I said.

  She laughed and laughed. “I am the most powerful elf in the worlds now. Why would I be scared of you?”

  “You tell me!” I said. I continued flying. I figured the more I kept her talking, the better chance I'd have of reaching her.

  Luna shook her head. “I’m not. I just had a tiny bit of respect for you because you seemed capable of getting the job done! I thought you’d be smart enough to run. Oh well. I’ll just crush you first!”

  “I have another question!” I said.

  “Sure, go ahead!”

  “How could you possibly be more powerful than Santa, Mrs. Claus, and Nitivia? They are all older than you. Correct?”

  “Wouldn’t you like to know?” she responded with a sly crooked grin.

  “Let me guess; you’re just bragging, blowing hot air out your mouth. You’re not nearly as powerful as those three!” I taunted. Yeah, it’s not nice to taunt, but I needed to get her to talk.

  “Fine!” She said, almost spitting out the words. “They wanted me to help out more around the Pole. They wanted me to accept my role at the Pole. Be a leader, you know?”

  “Nice rhyme,” I said.

  “Thank you; it’s an elf thing.”

  “I get it, you’re now totally embracing your role as a leader, but why go so overboard? Why the evil rage?” I asked, still pressing forward faster and faster.

  “It’s very good that you caught on to that!” Luna said.

  “Ah, it’s kind of obvious that you are on the dark side now,” I replied. “Just not sure why.”

  She sighed. “Fine, I kind of wanted to bring this up anyhow. Santa, Mrs. Claus, and Nitivia all wanted me to take on a bigger role here. Part of me wanted to. After all, I do want to help, and it is kind of what I was born to do. Still, another part of me just wanted to have fun. Be free! After all, I’m not even 300 years old yet. I’m just a kid. So I used my magic to split me into two versions of me. One to do the work, one to have fun.”

  “But with magic, there’s always a catch. Right?” I said.

  “Hey, for a human you’re pretty smart!” she replied. “What I didn’t understand was that to split myself, I needed to split my good and my bad side. The good me, though, is totally useless. She’s spending all her time being friendly with that annoying Zeke! She’s so darn good, and she can’t see how wrong that is.”

  “Well now, that makes sense!” I said. “I mean, I like Zeke as a bud but I couldn’t understand why you’d like him so much so soon.”

  “Yeah, my good side is way whacked!” the bad Luna said. “Now that I don’t have any good left in me, my powers are unrestricted. I can do whatever I want. I do want to run the place, but all by myself. I’ve got the elves in my power. I have Mom and Dad in a nice ice prison. Nitivia is on the run, but I will find and freeze her too.”

  “What about Zeke and the good Luna?” I asked.

  “They’re wandering around somewhere. They’re no threat to me!” the bad Luna laughed. “Basically, you are the only minor threat left.”

  “Good, then bring it on!” I said. “Or wait for me. I should be there in a few minutes.”

  Luna laughed. “Please, I am way too powerful to deal with you myself. I’ve sent the flying reindeer!”

  “Wait, Nitivia told me there we no flying reindeer!”

  Luna nodded. “I made some!”

  Laser blasts hit me from all angles.

  “Oh, I also made them capable of firing lasers from their antlers!” Luna said.

  Spinning around, I saw six large reindeer with pointy antlers surrounding me.

  “I’m Comet!” one yelled.

  “I’m Zapper!!” another bellowed.

  “I’m Blaster!” another shouted.

  “I’m Beamer!” another squawked.

  “I’m Lightning!” another screeched.

  “I’m Ralph!” the sixth barked. “We ran out of cool names!”

  Holding out both of my hands, I said. “I don’t want to fight you guys!”

  “That’s okay!” Comet grinned. “We don’t mind blasting you anyhow!”

  “Yeah! It will be a lot easier on us if you don’t fight!” Zapper said.

  “I wish I had a cooler name,” Ralph said.

  “Let me rephrase what I said,” I said. “I don’t want to fight you guys, but I will!” I clapped my hands together, and the force from my clap sent the deer flying away, spinning towards the ground. They all stopped before striking it. They glared up at me.

  “So that’s how you want to play this game!” Comet shrieked.

  “I’m not playing a game!” I replied.

  They all aimed their antlers toward me. Blurs of red-hot energy fired at me. As I dodged a bunch of them, they kept firing. Finally, to show them how futile it was, I let the laser blasts hit me. They stung, even through my suit and my invulnerability. These deer meant business.

  Still, I wanted to give them a chance to make things right. They were just being controlled by Luna. I didn’t want to hurt them. Of course, I didn’t want to let them hurt me either. And they seemed very determined to take me out.

  “How do you guys like the cold?” I asked them, dodging more lasers.

&n
bsp; Comet answered. “We live in the coldest place on earth, of course, we can handle the cold. We are actually a bit offended that you asked that.”

  “Just checking that if I put you on ice, it won’t hurt you too badly!” I said. Before they could react, I inhaled, then exhaled hard towards them. Exhaling, I thought cold thoughts…ice down the back, stepping in snow with bare feet, ice cream headaches.

  My icy cold breath hit the reindeer, coating them in ice, freezing them solid. Listening, I could still hear their heartbeats. They were slower but still beating away. I had stopped them for now. Hopefully, it would be long enough for me to stop Luna.

  Flying towards the Pole, I could see the toy shop coming into view. All the elves ran out of the shop. Each one bent down and grabbed a handful of snow. They formed the snow into snowballs. Oh man, I didn’t like the looks of that.

  I tried concentrating on seeing if I could hear their thoughts. I knew my future self could read minds. I hoped this would be the time I gained that power. Sure enough, I heard them…

  We must stop Super Teen.

  Luna must be protected.

  Get ready to fire.

  We stand united with Luna.

  Luna rocks.

  Luna is the future.

  Santa is old and out.

  Mrs. Claus must go too.

  Even Nitivia can’t stand the power of Luna.

  Defend the Pole from the evil, stinky, Super Teen.

  Okay, that last one really hurt.

  Moving in closer, I kind of figured that snowballs from a bunch of little elves would be pretty harmless. The elves spotted me and let their snowballs rip. The snowballs left their hands and then disappeared.

  “What the?” I said.

  All of the snowballs, which had to number in the hundreds, appeared next to me. They all smashed into me at once. The force of the snowballs sent me flying backward and then crashing to the ground.

  Hitting the ground with a hard THUMP, I made a huge crater in the snow.

  “Ouch, that hurt…” I groaned.

  Luna appeared at the top of the crater. She looked down at me. “Silly Lia, you can’t even beat a couple of hundred minor elves, how do you expect to beat me?” I laid in the crater, looked up at Luna and said, “You know…I was just thinking the same thing myself….” I hated to admit it, but so far this Luna girl was kicking my behind. Heck, I don’t think she’d even started to try very hard yet.

  I needed a plan. I have fought beings more powerful than myself before. I’ve always managed to come out on top, but that was because I had my team with me. Here, my team was Paula (now trapped at the South Pole) and Zeke (who was, well, Zeke.). Luna with her seemingly infinite magic might be more than a match for me.

  No, no, no! I couldn’t give up. I had the happiness of the world on my shoulders. I had to get up off my butt and show this Luna that I never gave up. I was a fighter! I had goodness on my side.

  I pushed myself up off the ground.

  Luna laughed. “Silly girl! Stay down!”

  ‘“No!” I replied.

  Luna pointed at me. I felt the weight of the world push me back down to the ground.

  “It wasn’t a request,” Luna said. “It was an order!”

  Luna pushed the invisible force down harder on me. If I didn’t stop her soon, I’d be a pancake.

  Forcing my head up, I blasted Luna with heat vision. The force of the blast sent her reeling backward. I felt the pressure on me disappear. I flew out of the crater.

  Luna clutched her shoulder. “That hurt!” she shouted.

  “Yeah, well, to quote some famous dude, I haven’t yet begun to fight!” I told her. I blasted her feet with more of my heat.

  Luna snapped her fingers. She disappeared in a puff of snow. All the elves came charging at me. I hoped that driving Luna away had broken her hold on them.

  They all screamed, “Get her!”

  I quickly deduced that they were still under Luna’s control. They all bent down and picked up more snow. They formed the snow into balls.

  Holding out my hand, I said, “Come on guys, let’s talk this out!”

  The elves, working as one, fired a new round of snowballs at me. Once again, the snowballs disappeared the second they left their hands. The snowballs appeared right next to me. I prepared to be clobbered again.

  The snowballs froze right before they hit me.

  “What the?” I said.

  “What the?” the hundreds of elves said.

  Nitivia appeared behind me. She had Tanya with her. “I sent for reinforcements!” Nitivia explained.

  Tanya smiled. “Man, you get into a lot of trouble without me!”

  Tanya waved her fingers. All the snowballs disappeared for a split second. The snowballs reappeared right next to the elves who had thrown them. The snowballs smacked into the elves, knocking them down.

  “Okay, now you should be able to free the elves from Luna’s control,” Nitivia told me.

  “Can’t you use your magic?” I asked.

  Nitivia shook her head. “Nope, I can’t counter another high elf’s magic.”

  “Hey, elves!” I said in my command voice. “Listen to me. Your minds are your own. Luna is not in control of you!”

  The elves all sat up at once. “Hey, we’re free of Luna’s control!” they all shouted.

  The elves walked over to me. They each patted me on the back. “Sorry, about clobbering you!” they told me.

  “No problem, guys and gals. I knew you weren’t in control of your actions. But any idea where Luna went?”

  Nitivia shook her head. “Sadly, no. Just like I don’t know where Santa, Mrs. Claus, the good Luna and Zeke are.” She looked at me. “Where’s Paula?”

  “I had to leave her at the South Pole. Luna tricked us into going there.” Tanya laughed. “You’ve always been gullible.”

  “I do try to look for the good in others,” I replied.

  “There is nothing wrong with that!” Nitivia said as she snapped her fingers.

  “You have to say that, you’re an elf!” Tanya scoffed.

  Paula appeared in front of me. “Wow, what a way to travel! Is it over?”

  “Just the first round,” I said.

  “Who’s winning?” Paula asked. “Please say us.”

  “It’s more of a draw so far. One on one, Luna can kick any of our butts.”

  “Hey, I haven’t had a chance to go one on one with her yet!” Tanya said.

  “But as a team, I think we can take her!” I said in my best rah-rah voice.

  Nitivia nodded. “I agree. Of course, we need to find her.” Nitivia sat down in the snow and crossed her legs.

  “Isn’t that cold?” Tanya asked.

  “No, not to an elf!” Ntivia held her hands open and hummed. “Ummmm, Yummm, Ommmm” She popped open an eye. “Elves, help me out here!”

  All the elves sat crossed legged on the ground. They repeated, “Ummm, Yummm, Ommmm!”

  Nitivia opened her eyes. “I can’t sense Luna, at least not the bad one.”

  “Can you sense the good one?” I asked.

  Nitivia nodded. She pointed up.

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “It appears that Luna, Santa, Mrs. Claus, and Zeke are above us! Trapped!” Nitivia said. “Way up! Like, in space!!”

  Dear Diary: Okay, Luna is a tough cookie. So far, it has taken everything I have, plus the help of Nitivia and Tanya to even fight her to a standstill. Luna has a big advantage over us. She, being all bad, doesn’t care about any harm that she causes. She’s completely unrestricted and free. She seems willing to do anything to complete her mission. Even if that means trapping her father, mother, her better half, and Zeke up in space. Yeah, she’ll stop at nothing.

  The good news is that we fought her off. We forced her to retreat. I think we actually hurt her. She’s now licking her wounds, trying to plan her next steps. We know our next steps. I’ll fly up into space and save Santa, Mrs. Claus, Luna, and Z
eke. Once we have everybody back together, I feel confident that all of us can stop Luna once and for all.

  Am I overconfident? Possibly, but I don’t think so. History has taught me that when my friends, my team, and I work together, we become an unstoppable force. Plus, we have right (as opposed to wrong) on our side!

  The Rescue

  Looking up and using my super-vision, I saw a round snow globe floating way above us. There, trapped in the globe, I saw Santa, Mrs. Claus, Luna, and Zeke. Not wasting a second, I took off, flying upwards as fast as I could.

  They were so high up, I knew I wouldn’t be able to breathe up there, so I’d have to hold my breath. I had been training in the lab for situations like this. I could now hold and store my breath for three minutes. I didn’t know if that would be enough time to rescue them, but it was going to have to be.

  “Hey wait!” a voice called from behind me.

  I kept pushing myself upwards.

  “Stupid, stop now!” the voice sounded louder this time.

  I stopped and turned. I saw Paula in full armor, flying towards me.

  “Even you need to breathe!” she scoffed.

  I hovered there, unimpressed. “I am aware of that!”

  “They are literally in space, which means you won’t have air to breathe up there!” Paula lectured.

  “Once again, I am aware!” I replied. “Look, Paula; I don’t need a science lesson here! I understand how space works! Well, at least I understand there is no air to breathe.”

  “You might not need a science lesson, but you do need a teamwork lesson!” she countered. She pointed to her armored head. “My suit manufactures oxygen.”

  “Great, you’re super smart,” I said. “But I doubt you have enough power to guide that globe back to Earth safely.”

  “No, but the two of us certainly do. Plus, I have a spare oxygen supply that I can let you breathe from. It should let you last long enough up there,” Paula said pointing upwards.

  Wow! I had been such a thick-headed jerk. I had totally forgotten about the other members of my team being able to help me. Paula may have previously been a rival, but she could be helpful if she wanted to be. Apparently, she wanted to be.