Chapter 1
					Lost To War

It was a sunny afternoon in the town of Sparex it had been two years since Reko was captured. Nova now 19 was trying to suprise Emerald and Jade for thier 14th birthday. They had not really done anything special for thier last couple of birthdays because Nova was very busy trying to provide for them and keep the house in working order. For the first time since Elemex took over Sparex things seemed to be going right for Nova, Emerald, and Jade. Nova had made plans for them to spend the day in town getting some of the things that Emerald and Jade had wanted but not had the ability to get. He had hoped to do something a little more for them as a sort of thank you for all the help they had tried to give and for them understanding that they couldn't do alot of the things they wanted too. Nova, who was laying on his bed staring at the ceiling found himself thinking of his parents, he was remebering his mothers beautiful face, he was thinking of how much like thier mother Emerald looked. He began thinking of the last time he saw her and how sick she had gotten before she died and quickly tried to find a happier subject to think about. He found his mind drifting to the times when Emerald, Jade and himself used to sit out on the front lawn and spend hours staring up at the sky trying to find shapes in the clouds. He remembered how peaceful things seemed back then, everything seemed alot simpler then. Now everything seemed so complicated. He had so many things to worry about, he had to keep Emerald and Jade happy and healthy, he had to find a way to pay for all the things they needed, he constantly worried about them while he was at work. He hated leaving them home alone but he had no choice, he had to work. Again he found himself trying to find a happier subject for thought. He rolled onto his side and looked out the window, he could see Emerald and Jade in the backyard playing a game of catch, they looked so happy to him, they weren't troubled by the same worries as him, they seemed to not have a care in the world, it was almost as if nothing seemed to exist outside of thier game of catch. Nova found himself envies of thier naive happyness. "We should do something for Nova sometime." Jade said as she passed the ball back to Emerald. "He does so much for us without ever asking for anything in return, and he's always so stessed out and busy trying to make sure he's providing for us. I mean have you really looked at him lately, it's almost as if all the happyness has drained out of him and all that's left is resposeabilty and work. He never takes time out for himself anymore." Emerald passed the ball back to Jade and looked over at the house, she saw Nova standing at his window watching them play, she looked at him for a moment and even though he had tried to put a smile on his face she could see all the worry and pain in him, he tried so hard to hide the fact that it was hard for him to do all the stuff that he did for them that it just added to his work load and made him look even more tierd and overworked. "We really should try and help him out more." Emerald said as she looked back at Jade. "Then it's settled tomarrow we will start helping him out around the house." Jade said as she passed the ball back to Emerald. "Emerald, Jade, come on inside and get ready to go." Nova called out to them from his bedroom window. Emerald looked over at Jade with a confused look on her face, Jade just returned the confused look and they headed inside together. When they got inside they headed upstairs together the get cleaned up and ready to go. They went up the stairs and down the narrow hallway into the room that they shared. It was a small room just big enough to fit two beds and a dresser with a mirror hanging over it. Emerald entered the room first and grabed the brush off the dresser to start brushing her shoulder lenghth green hair. Jade walked up to the dress and opened on of the drawers to pull out a tight deep blue t-shirt with a butterfly on the front, and got a pair of black pants out of the second drawer. She walked over to the door and closed it before changing her clothes. "Where do you think we're going?" Jade asked as she pulled the shirt down over herself. "I have no idea." Emerald said as she put the brush down on the dresser and started to pull her hair into two braided pigtails. "Your not going to wear your hair like that are you?" Jade asked as she picked up the brush. "Why not?" "No reason." Jade said with a slight snicker. "Whatever." Emerald replied as she finished up the second braid. Jade brushed her long green hair back into a single ponytail and aranged it in such a way to where you could clearly see the six blue streaks that had naturaly develeped in her hair. Emerald had changed into a pair of baggy blue jeans and a loose fitting pink t-shirt with a dragonfly on the front. "Ready?" Jade asked as she finished tieing her hair back. "Yep. Let's go." Emerald replied. They made thier way back down the hallway and down the stairs to find Nova sitting on the couch in the living room staring blankly at the wall. "You girls ready to go?" He asked as they got down stairs. "Yep, just need to get some shoes on." Jade replied as her and emerald made thier way to thier shoes over by the door. Emerald sliped into a pair of purple tenis shoes and Jade put on a pair of large black boots. Nova got up off the couch and headed outside. "So, where we going?" Jade asked as they all walked out onto the front porch. "You'll see." Nova responded with a smile. Jade looked over at Emerald, who just shruged at her and followed Nova down the front path to the road. They walked along the road, passing all the fields and hills in silence before reaching the edge of town. "Can we know where we're going now?" Jade asked looking over at Nova with a smile. "Okay I'll tell you now. I'm taking you girls shoping for some of the things that you've wanted but we couldn't afford to get." Nova said with a smile at them. Jade looked at him and realized that, that was the first real smile she had seen on him in a long time. "Wow, umm...Not to rain on the parade or anything but, well what changed? If we couldn't afford it before how can we now?" Emerald asked. "I've been saving up for this for a while now, I wanted to do something special for you birthday since we've not really been able to do much in a while." "Wow..." Jade said looking up at Nova. "I...I don't even know what to say....Thank you so much...For everything." She added as she gave Nova a hug. "Okay well we better get going or we wont have much time to do your shoping." Nova said as he held Jade out at arms lenghth and smiled at her. Emerald, Jade and Nova walked down the street, window shopping for about three hours before Nova stopped and pulled Emerald and Jade closer to him to talk. "Listen, there's something that I need to tell you, but I'm not sure how you'll respond to it." Nova started then stopped and looked around. "I'll tell you in the forest." He said and started walking down the street leading back up toward thier house, and the forest a few blocks behind it. "What? I thought we weren't supposed to go there." Jade said with a confused look on her face. "You weren't, but the circumstance has changed." Nova responded. They walked up the street a bit and stopped at the intersection that lead to thier house. "Okay now listen up, this is really important." Nova said as he stopped and took Emerald and Jade by the arms. He knelt down on his knees and looked them both in the eyes before contiueing. "If anything should happen and we get seperated I need you to get to the forest. Misty is waiting there for us, she'll know what to do if I'm not there." "Wait, what do you mean 'if something should happen'? What's going to happen?" Jade asked with a concerned look on her face. "Hopefuly nothing. We just need to be prepared for anything." Nova said with a grim expresion on his face. "Now come on, we have to hurry." Jade followed behind Nova and Emerald with a fearful look on her face. When they reached thier house they quickly dropped off all the stuff they had bought while they were out and headed for the back door. "Okay listen up I have one more thing to say before we head back out." Nova said as Jade reached for the door handle. "If for any reason you can't make it to the forest here try you hardest to find another way in, and if you can't then just find a safe place to hide and stay there, Misty will come for you and she will be able to lead you into forest. Now I need you to promise me that you will continue into the forest without me if for any reason we get seperated or I can't keep up." "What? Nova what are you talking about? Your scaring me." Jade said with a ver scared look on her face and tears welling up in her eyes. "Just promise me." Nova replied with a very serious look on his face. "I promise." Emerald said in a slightly scared voice. "I...I ca...I promise." Jade said with a tear sliding down her face. "Okay now we need to go." Nova said in a monotone voice, that Jade and Emerald knew was covering up his fear and sadness for making them make that promise. They opened the back door and started to make thier way down the street towards the forest, they made it about two houses down when Nova suddenly stopped and looked up at the sky. "What is it?" Jade asked as she also looked up to see what he was staring at. "Shhh...listen" Nova said not looking down from the sky. Emerald and Jade listened for a moment before they heard it, a plane was flying toward them. Jade knew that this was what Nova was afraid of, this was why he had said all those things and made them promise to continue without him if required. "This way! Hurry!" Nova suddenly yelled out and turned around and started running the other way holding onto Emerald and Jade's arms as hard as he could. "Nova, slow down" Jade panted, she was having trouble keeping up. "I'm sorry Jade, but I can't. We have to get out of here as fast as we can. Because when that plane gets here it's not going to be good." Nova responded, as he kept running, he ran about another forty feet before he felt Jade's arm slipping as she fell behind. "You got to keep going." He yelled back at her. Jade could tell that he hated make her run like this but he obviously thought they had no choice. She found it within herself to keep up for a little longer before her arm slipped free of his grasp and she started to fall behind. "NOVA!!" Jade yelled from behind him, she was running as fast as she could to catch back up to him but she just couldn't. "Jade!" Emerald and Nova yelled back to her. Nova, never letting go of Emeralds arm turned back to get her, as he reached her he looke up at the sky behind her and saw a whole fleet of planes flying in, he also saw that one of them had dropped a bomb not to far from where they were. He grabed Jade and swung her around so that she was in front of him and his back was to the explosion and tried to shield Emerald and Jade as much as posible. "Are you two all right?" Nova asked as he let them go and started to look them over and see if there were any obvious injurys. "Yeah we're fine." Emerald and Jade said in unison. "What about you? Are you okay?" Jade asked looking into Nova's eyes. "Yeah I'm fine. Now come on we have to get into the forest before they land." Nova responded as he grabbed Emerald and Jade again and started running. They ran down the street and back to the intersection, they stopped there for a split second where Nova looked down the each street before desiding to turn the the left and run. They ran down the street for about three miles before they heard a large group of people running the other way. "RUN!! HURRY YOU HAVE TO GET OUT OF HERE!!" Someone in the crowd yelled as they ran past Nova, Emerald, and Jade. Nova tightend his grip on Emerald and Jade's arms and started making his way through the crowd, right as they reached the end of the crowd and throught they were going to make it out of there a last group ran by and pushed past Nova, the force of the push ripped Emerald and Jade out of his reach and pushed him down the street. "NOVA!" Jade yelled as she tried to run after him. "JADE! NO! GO TO THE FOREST!" Nova yelled back as he got pushed out of sight. Jade tried to run after him but Emerald grabbed her arm. "Jade, no, he wants us to go to the forest." Emerald said as she tried to pull Jade down the street toward the forest. "What about Nova? Are we suposed to just let him go?" Jade asked tears streaming down her face. Emerald didn't say anything in response, she knew it was going to be hard for Jade to just let Nova go without even trying to follow him, but Nova left very strict instructions and they did promise. Emerald just got a tighter grip on Jade's arm and started running toward the forest. They continued to run toward the forest, dodging explosions and crowds as they went. When they finaly reached the edge of the forest they stopped and turned back to face the town they had always called home. What they saw left a pit in the botton of thier stomachs. The town was completly destroyed, all that was left was rubble. As they stood there looking over the town a second squad of planes flew over the town and destroyed anything that was left. "Nova..." Jade whispered to herself as she looked out over the town. Emerald looked over at Jade and grabbed her hand, "Come on." She said as she turned to head deeper into the forest. "We have to find Misty." Jade looked down at the ground, a tear running down her face. She quickly wiped it away and looked back up at Emerald. "Let's go." She said in a monotone voice. Emerald and Jade started walking deeper into the forest, turning thier backs on everything they had every known and walking into the unknown. With one last look over thier shoulders, Emerald and Jade left behind thier childhood and thier home.