Chapter 25 : Meet Him!

Haahhh, I'm so relief that I could end the TAPOPS test arc in the last chapter. Now, it's time to be serious! Hmph!

Fighting!(9｀･ω･)9

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After they got back, the TAPOPS station immediately went back to Tempur-A station to let them rest. It was late at evening when they landed at the station and immediately walked to their shared room as Admiral Tarung dismissed them. Once they reached their room, they fell face planted to the soft surface of their bed and knocked out cold for the rest of the night, except for the light elemental.

The next day came like a blur. Creatures similiar like birds started to chirp, welcoming the new day to start new activities. Morning breeze gently blew, bringing the freshness and the dampness of a morning air.

Trees swayed in rythm with the breeze and morning dew seemed visible on the surface of the leaves. The movement from nature brought peacefulness to those who see it with their own eyes. Perfect time for relaxing and lazying around. Moreover, it's Sunday.

Yet, even in such a peaceful morning, people still doing their hard routines like any regular days. And that's what brought us here.

In one of Tempur-A's room, we could see Taufan lying down on the training room's floor while covered in sweats and panting.

Halilintar was seen standing tall, not lying down and panting on the floor despite the brutal training they've been doing for the last 5 hours. Sweats also were seen pouring down his body, wetting his red shirt which wasn't covered by his red and black jacket. In the middle of their training, the temperature felt too hot to his liking, so he took off and tossed his jacket somewhere in the corner of the room, safely out of range from their attacks.

He wiped the sweat that fell down to his lashes and scoffed, "Get up. We're still not done, yet."

Taufan whined and rolled to his side, curling in to himself, resulting in him getting kicked by Halilintar in the butt.

"Hali, I'm tired!" He yelped in surpised.

"No rest until we reach 7. And if you stop before that, I will raise again the intensity of our training for the next time." Halilintar grabbed the water bottle from the side and chugged it down.

His eyes darkened and glinted dangerously as he pulled back from the mouth of the bottle and hummed, "7 hours training non stop. No rest, no whining, no crying, and no time to take a breathe."

He continued and smirking, "And now, you're stopping to take a rest and breathe. Tomorrow, 7 hours training, no resting. Any objection? No, okay."

Taufan gaped at him in disbelief. The pair of dark red eyes which shone brightly as his bangs covered the upper part of his face met Taufan's wide blue carribean eyes, causing him to flinch and shivered.

'Gempa.. where are you...? I feel like dying here. Help me...' He cried inwardly.

"Get up." Halilintar growled as red electricity danced around him, hat already tossed off to the side.

Taufan had no choice but to lifted his sore body up and stand straight. All his bones cracking in complain at the sudden weightness it had to support when it was already to tired to move causing Taufan groaned as he stood on his two feet.

"Hali, spare my live. You can't be this cruel to your own brother, right?" Taufan pleaded at him puppy eyes.

Halilintar only gave him a flat look and retorted, "There's no word 'spare' in my dictionary. But, there is a 'spar' without the 'e' which is I'm about to do it now."

Taufan couldn't react quickly when Halilintar charged at him with his Kecepatan Kilat[Lightning speed]. One hand curled into a fist as he aimed it to Taufan when he was distracted.

Yes, they've been training hand-to-hand combat for 5 hours.

Taufan quickly called upon his wind to shield him, but the strength from Halilintar's punch upon making contact with his wind still cause him to stumbled back and almost lost his balance.

"Is that it? You can't even properly shield yourself. I remember you said to me that your defence is already strong enough 5 hours ago. So, I asked you to prove it." Halilintar sneered at him.

Taufan nervously laughed as he slowly backed off, "I don– I mean.. I told you the truth! You're just too overpower, Hali."

Halilintar gazed at him with the sharpness of the edge of a knife, causing Taufan to became even more nervous than before. Eventually, Halilintar huffed.

"This once and you can go back to rest."

That statement made Taufan to cheered inwardly, but stopped as soon as he saw Halilintar launched another attack at him while smirking. The previously happy expression on Taufan's face instantly disappeared and morphed into a fearful and panic one.

"...Hali, you can't be serious..."

The thunder elemental only smirked at him, "Oh, but, I've always been serious, Upan~"

Taufan scrambled to called upon his wind because he surely will die. Halilintar couldn't be serious, but then again when was the thunder elemental ever be not serious?

Halilintar charged at him with his Tombak Halilintar[Thunderstorm Spear]. Red electricity danced around him, almost covering his whole body in blinding red spark.

However, before he can reached Taufan, someone stood between them, barely withstand the attack. The room shook intensely and debris flying everywhere from the large crater they caused.

Both Halilintar and Taufan's eyes widened in surprise at the unexpected distruber, but Halilintar quickly recollected himself and once he saw the person who interfered them, hostility immediately took over his face.

"You..." He growled.

Admiral Amato smiled down at him, although a little bit forceful. Shoulders tensed and hand in his side clenched into a tight fist which Halilintar noted with his sharp red eyes. Such details might be went unnoticed for those who doesn't have trained eyes, unlike him.

The admiral withdrew his hand which previously held the thunder spear. His armor cracked despite made from power sphere. Or maybe that it's the power sphere.

"It's still early in the morning and you two are already occupying the training room while your other brothers are still sleeping soundly in their room. Well, except for the earth and light elemental I guess." He spoke up first despite the murderous glare he felt from the thunder elemental.

Halilintar snarled at him as he felt the urge to attack the man in front of him to satisfied his anger. But he had to hold back and kept reprimanding himself that this man in front of them was their owner's father.

He straightened and took a deep breathe slowly to calm himself down and oh, it was really hard. Sincw the start, Halilintar was never good with controling his emotions. Anger especially.

Taufan, sensed Halilintar struggled in calming himself, decided to take matter into his hands. Despite the hatred he bear to the man, he still had a good hang over his emotions.

Thus, he cheerily smiled up at the man, eyes crinkled perfectly like two crescent moons and walked in front of him, gripping both Halilintar's shoulder in tight grip.

"Hello there, admiral! We're so sorry if we somehow disturbing your peaceful morning with our intense training this early. So we will take our leave right away. Good bye, admiral!" He beckoned Halilintar to exit the training room hastily, feeling Admiral Amato's gaze at his back.

Halilintar could only let himself being pushed away to the exit by his cheerful counter part. Hands laid limply on his side as Taufan skipped on his steps while humming. The wind in the training room picked up and Halilintar's red and black hat float up to the two elementals direction together with the bottle drink and Halilintar's jacket.

Amato watched as the door shut closed behind those two before the smile disappeared from his face.

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"Solar?" Gempa asked to the trembling figure underneath the blanket in concern.

Blaze, Thorn, and Ice already went to the cafetaria to get their breakfast together which followed by Halilintar and Taufan after they're done taking their bath.

Gempa was really surprised when he saw the thunder elemental came with a dark look on his face and swiftly walked to the bathroom as the door slide shut behind him.

He looked at Taufan for answer and the wind elemental only shrugged his shoulder before knocking on the bathroom door.

"Hali, give me your clothes after you're done washing them so I can dried them up!"

The said elemental only gave a low affirmative sound from behind the door. All of a sudden, the bathroom door opened and before any of them could react, a bunch of clothes get thrown and smacked straight onto Taufan's face.

The silence was thick as the door slowly closed and the clothes slide down from Taufan's face and flopped to the ground innocently. He blinked dumbly as if still processing what was happening before he gasped loudly as if offended.

"You're such a meanie, Hali!" However, he still picked up the clothes on the floor and started drying them with his wind while pouting.

Gempa shook his head at that. These two will never change, won't they?

The blanket slowly pulled down, revealing a shaking light elemental underneath. He didn't wear his orange visor, so his silver eyes visibly wide as if traumatized and Gempa felt his eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

"Solar, what's wrong?"

Solar blinked his eyes slowly as he rasped out, "..It's nothing, Gempa."

Gempa frowned at that before nodding his head. He knew the light elemental was really stubborn and once he decided on something, he will be adamant on his choice.

"Okay. And if something is bothering you, just remember that we all here and you can talk to us." Instead, Gempa only sent him his usual motherly smile.

Solar pursed his lips and reached out his orange visor from beside his pillow and wear it. Seeing that Solar was getting ready to get down, Gempa quickly climbed down from the ladder which Solar followed after Gempa reached the ground.

Gempa looked up at Solar, still smiling, "Come on, then. The others must have been waiting for us at the cafetaria."

At the mention of cafetaria, Solar immediately shuddered as he also climbed down from the top bunker bed and almost lost his balance. The incident last night instantly replayed itself in his mind.

Gempa raised an eyebrow, confused at Solar's strange behaviour before exhaling through his nose. Together, they walked out of the room to the cafetaria, ignoring the confuse stares from the aliens in the corridor.

"After this, the commander and admiral want you to tell them the result of your research about the power sphere we found together with Nut. Is that okay with you?" He asked softly with concern.

Solar visibly brightened at that, "Of course, Gempa. I am very delighted that I can share my findings with them."

Gempa then added upon seeing the happiness pouring out from Solar, "Are you sure? I'm not doubting you since you are our smartest element, but there will be another admirals and agents present at the meeting room and will be watching your presentation."

Solar stopped midway on their way to the cafetaria, complexion paled, "There will be a meeting? When?!"

Gempa glanced at his watch, "At 9 o'clock sharp. Though, it's still thirty-five past seven, so we still have much time to have breakfast."

Gempa then looked at Solar as he scrambled to reach into his pocket. Solar pulled out a piece of paper from his pant pocket which was folded into a smaller piece.

In confusion, Gempa watched as Solar opened up the piece of paper while facepalming.

"If so, then I must prepare well for the presentation. I can't disgrace our name as elementals if my presentation doesn't live up to their expectation. What will Mast– I mean Boboiboy said if he hear that my presentation is really bad?" Solar started to muttering on himself.

Overthinking is bad. Solar knew that, but he couldn't help it. The fear of being abandoned by Boboiboy slowly take over a part of his mind, causing him to overthinking.

His heart dropped and he felt coldness spreading all over his body at the thought of the others slowly leave him in the darkness, all alone. But then, he felt a gentle tap on his shoulder, a salvation to the darkness part of him, bringing warmth and melting the coldness feeling he was experiencing.

He turned and his pair of silver eyes made contact with a pair of warm golden eyes. Gempa gave him a reassuring smile to appease him.

"Everything's will be fine, Solar. I know you did your best already and I can also assured you that Boboiboy won't forsake you. Do you think that I don't know about you staying all night for your research about the power sphere?" Gempa's eyes became cold at his last word.

Solar chuckled nervously as he scratched his cheek, the habit they got from their owner. The previous feeling completely swept away from his heart, but the uneasiness still stand in the depth of him.

"But, still I need to revise the data I collected– Wah!" Solar was about to turned to the direction of the power sphere room when he was yanked back by his collar.

Gempa grabbed Solar's collar with his earth gloved hand while smiling sweetly. Despite the sweetness radiating from him, Solar knew not to believe the appearance easily.

He gulped as he watched Gempa leaned closer to him. The upper part of his face darkened, making his golden eyes shone intimidatingly.

"Where do you think your going, Solar?" Gempa asked sweetly.

Solar trembled at the danger he felt in Gempa's sweet tone that was directed to him.

Solar whimpered, "T-to the p-power sphere room...?"

He flinched really hard when Gempa suddenly giggled at his statement.

"Oh yeah? I though we'll be having breakfast at the cafetaria together." Gempa emphasized his last word clearly to the trembling light elemental.

"O-of course, Gempa!" Solar quickly agreed at him, still to nervous to reasoned with the earth elemental.

Gempa looked satisfied with the answer given by Solar and dragged him to the cafetaria, again, ignoring the stares they received from the aliens nearby.

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Extra Chapter~

[Last night on Tempur-A station]

Silver eyes stared intently at the hologram screen, revealing the data Ice has obtained from the place where they took their last test, Planet Umbra. The orange visor he wore reflected the light coming from the screen in front of him, covering the exhaustion he felt at the moment.

"Solar, why don't you take a rest while I'm dealing with this power sphere?" Nut asked somewhere in the room from behind him, voice laced with concern at the hardworking light elemental that reminded him of their fellow ally.

This evening, he saw the elementals arrived from their last test with exhaustion seeping from their faces. Blaze and Halilintar looked more grumpy than before the trip, which was scaring him. Taufan and Thorn still had their happiness, though still looked disheveled and tired.

Ice passed out on Gempa's shoulder which the latter carried him without any complain. Solar quickly went straight with their tasked power sphere to the power sphere room for further examination together with him.

It was in the middle of the night and they are still examined the mysterious power sphere since evening. Nut yawned and almost dozzed off before he snapped awake and wrote the report with his clumsy writing.

Solar frowned at his question, took off his visor and messaging his tired eyes. Once he deemed the exhaustion disappear, he wore back his orange visor and wrote down the informations he summarized inside his brain.

Face distorted in full concentration while mumbling occasionally to himself.

"I won't get any rest before I can get a satisfactory result." Solar answered before looking up to the screen again.

Nut sighed and shook his head in helplessness, "You're the same as Boboiboy. So stubborn and hardworking."

Before Nut could realized what he had said, Solar's shoulders already went tense. His hand stopped writing on the paper, despite the technology nowadays, and hung his head low.

Nut nervously watched as Solar's figure slumped onto a seat before letting out a frustated sigh and laughed.

"But he never make the same mistakes twice. There's still difference between us." Solar laughed.

Nut frowned at that because Solar's laugh sounded forceful and humorless. He walked closer and patted the light elemental on his shoulder comfortingly.

"But you saved us all. The time with Captain Vargoba, you did make a mistake that time. You were being too arrogant and prideful, but you fix your mistake by defeating him."

Solar frowned at the memory, "I endangered Boboiboy, my own owner."

Nut racked his brain to think for another reason, "Captain Kaizo saved him, though..?"

Solar gritted his teeth, "And that was supposed to be our job as his elementals! To save him, not to put him in any danger!"

Nut could only scratched his head, confused in how to persuade the light elemental from his depressed state.

"Does Boboiboy ever get angry to you?"

"...One time.. I... think..?" Solar mumbled.

Nut raised an eyebrow in disbelief, he can't imagine the boy ever get angry other than towards the enemy "Describe it to me."

Solar looked hesitate before he slowly explained the situation after their fight with Captain Vargoba to Nut, "After our fight with Captain Vargoba, I went out from the power watch because I felt that Boboiboy was calling me. It was late at night, I was really anxious and the atmosphere wasn't helping."

The both of them went silent. Nut wait for Solar to continue as Solar fidgeted with his gloved fingers.

"I couldn't see his face as he stared outside the window, ignoring me. So all I could do was stand in front of his bed and saying 'I'm sorry' while looking down in shame."

All of a sudden, Solar chuckled, "Afterwards, he turned around and his brown eyes, devoid of any emotion, stared straight at me. My guilt immediately increased and weighed down to my legs and without realizing it, I started crying..."

Solar was a prideful person, and if someone says about him crying, he would denied it right away and saying that he never cried. But now is not the time. He threw aside his ego and told Nut everything that had been bothering him. He took of his orange visor and put it on the table.

"He talked to me coldly, even colder than Halilintar, and asking me why did I do that and my recklesness would cause so many unwanted death. I never felt that scared on my entire life as elemental. The scared of being useless. The scared of being a burden. The scared of being left alone with him and the others. I was just... so scared and am still scared right know."

He continued despite the ache he felt in his chest, "But, he forgive me in the end. I felt so relieved and the guilt in my chest was instantly washed away when I got back to the power watch. I even swore to myself that I will do better for him."

"However, that bastard decided to came visit us and took us from Boboiboy. I was angry, we were really angry. I want to defeat him with my own power because I believed that I was already strong enough to defeat him and did the last attack..."

Solar leaned back and put his arm to cover his eyes, "I was cocky. I didn't stop when Boboiboy shouted at me to stop my attack. But it was too late, I found myself already went inside his mind, the same as Hali, Taufan, and Thorn."

"That time, I forgot he was my first owner. The first owner and hopefully will be the last owner who use me for bad deeds. I gave up.. I gave up because it's impossible for Boboiboy to defeat him! He only had three elementals left with him, while Retak'ka had four elementals within his grasp. Four! All in third tier form! What can he do?!" Solar raised his voice at the end of his sentence.

Solar frowned, "But Hali said firmly to me to not give up and trust Boboiboy and the others that they will get us back. I didn't believe him, but I also didn't say anything. Taufan agreed to him and tapped me on my shoulder. 'Be patience' was the only thing he said to me before he went to comfort Thorn."

"I waited. I was really waiting for them. We watched as Retak'ka went to Planet Gur'latan to strengten his voltra elemental and defeated Laskar Guruhan, who was known as the strongest. We watched as he went to Planet Bayugan to strengten his tempest power, luckily Fang, Yaya, and Ying managed to evacuate the habitant before he reached there. Still, they were defeated. Then, one of those crystal digger told him about Earth."

"Retak'ka was ecstasic when he heard there was such planet. We knew because we could also feel his emotion in the inside. We were desperate to go out. To stop him. And before he could absorbed the elemental power nearby, Gempa's previous owner came and distracted him. What's shocking us is that he had his crystal elemental power with him. That meant Boboiboy only had two elementals power remaining, the twin." Solar sighed as he remembered Ice and Blaze behaviour with each other.

He continued with heavy tone, "The possibilty decreased as my deduction was proven true. Hang Kasa was defeated and Boboiboy came using Blaze. His appearance looked tired, dirty and disheveled, but he still fought with his best. Like I said, what can he do? In the end, he was also defeated. Hang Kasa said something to him, but we couldn't hear him."

Solar huffed with pride look and Nut truly could understand what he feel, "I think it was a buff? Blaze and Taufan always said something about that. And the next thing we knew, Blaze and Ice appeared and they fused. I never knew that we could do that. Frostfire appeared in their place, the exact fusion of those two. He took crystal power back and fused Ice with Gempa. He did that again until he got us back. We could sense how tired he was, yet he still called me and Halilintar out. We fused and I felt a whole different feeling surged in my body. Completelt different from when we used combo attack."

"We made sure that we used our strongest attack to threw him out to the space. We burnt him, punched him, kicked him, anything! But... we might be overdid it." Solar winced as he remember Gempa's earth gloved hand made contact with his and Hali's head.

"I didn't get any chance to apologize to Boboiboy after he wake up from his unconcious state, though." He sighed.

Nut blankly stood there beside Solar, "...I thought we're gonna talk about the two times destroyed TAPOPS station and Boboiboy's anger.."

Solar shrugged at him, "I feel better that I finally can get it all out from my chest, furthermore who cares if this station got destroyed again? Not us elementals, though."

"...I don't think that Boboiboy was angry to you." Nut started.

"What?" Solar looked at him weirdly.

Nut scratched his head, "It was maybe dissapointed..? I don't think so.. but I knew he didn't angry. It was like.. you know... when a mother gave a disapproving glare to their children because they've been a bad child, I think that's how to describe it."

Solar thrummed his fingers on the table, "Sooo.. he was a little angry?"

"Uh-huuh.." Nut nodded his head in agreement.

Solar snorted an amuse laugh, "Yeah. There's still the 'angry' word."

"But he didn't hate you to the point he hold grudges to you, right? He still accept you, all of you, despite knowing how destructive you guys are. It's normal to get angry at someone after that someone did a mistake. What's important is that you feel guilty for your action, that's all."

Solar went silent as he processed Nut words. It did make sense to him. However, the anxiety in his heart still not completely disappeared. It's lighten up a little after he poured out his feeling to Nut, but still evidence.

He didn't even know why he said all that to a stranger. Maybe because they both had the same resemblance since they both liked science and technologies?

He sighed, wore back his visor and stood up, "I feel tired. You sure you can finish collecting the data by tomorrow alone, Nut?"

This time, Nut gave a weird look at him, "What do you mean? You've finished collecting all the data from earlier, Solar."

Solar blinked at him, "Really?"

"Yes! That's why I told you that you can take a rest since we finished all our works! If not because of you, I might have to stay up for the night here. Thank you so much, Solar!" Nut beamed at him.

Nut really reminded Solar of Thorn for their constant positiveness in every situation. Solar huffed at him.

"No need to thank me. I always like to do a research since I'm from intelligence. Then I will take my leave."

Nut waved at him, "See you, Solar!"

Solar walked in the empty corridor. Only a few aliens still working at this hour, mostly patrolling after the last incident happened at this station. Solar expression darkened as he clenched his fists tightly.

He made a turn to the cafetaria. A mug of coffee seemed good for tonight. As he reached the cafetaria, the place was empty and dark and Solar was forced to use his power watch as the flashlight.

He went to the kitchen room behind the cafetaria and opened the door. When he almost stepped his foot to the kitchen, he saw something in the corner of the room. For someone ordinary, they might be not noticed it, but Solar as an elemental, had a sharp sense for his surrounding

A pair of baby blue eyes shone in the darkness as the mysterious figure, he couldn't see their face, crouched down beside the fridge.

It stared straight at Solar's pair of silver eyes while chewing on something, if the sound of echoing crunch explain his reason. On reflex, he directed his power watch to the figure's face.

"Hey, Solar."

Solar blankly stared at the figure before swiftly turned around and walked back outside with his heart thumping in his chest, fast.

He walked straight to their room stiffly, face hardened and brain completely shut down. Right now, he only walked forward relied on his memory of the direction.

He barged into their room after the door slide open at his presence. The room was also dark and quiet, save for Blaze's loud snores. Solar climbed up the ladder and threw himself to the bed.

His hat and visor still on as he blankly stared at the ceiling on top of him. Solar let the darkness and the loud snores washed over him to covered the sound of his loud heartbeat thumping in his ears.