The Familia Guardian

"Dad, it's time to get up". I opened my dad's bedroom door, hearing him moan in frustration before heading to Sofia's room. "Sofia, get up, I'm heading to practice. If you don't get up on time you won't be able to eat breakfast", my sister sat up, her hair standing on end to my amusement. Sofia had this look of shock on her face before I closed the door so she could get ready for the day. Grabbing myself a quick muffin before heading out the door, being hit by the cool September air. The sun hadn't risen yet but the bike ride there was enough to fully wake me up, before arriving at the pool for the start of morning practice. The morning sky was still full of stars as I stepped onto the pool deck. I could see the girl varsity team finishing up their own practice. Couch Stephane blew the whistle signaling the end of the practice, the water steaming from the heated water being splashed around. Everyone started to pause to look at the couch. "All right girl, head to the showers and get ready for class", Couch Stephane yelled. As the girls got out, I started changing into my competing Speedo before diving into the pool and starting the warm-up. Couch Devis came out of the coaching office while the rest of the team started to warm up along the way. "Alright boys, here are your sets for the day get to it!" He tossed us water polo balls so that we could start our sets. All of us stopped when we heard the door slam close, some new guy. He looked fairly confident as his eyes seemed to scan landing on me. I felt an odd feeling in my stomach, his eyes flashing gold for a moment, a smile seemed to cross his face before he approached the couch, Devis handing him a physical slip. This guy was pretty tall and stacked like he had been carved out of the earth itself. He went toward, above, couch Devis, who was six-one, going by the height difference, he was around six-seven, but instead of being super skinny, he was raw muscle. "s**t, that dude is pretty!" Anthony, the first-string right wing for our team. I noticed that, as well with golden bronze skin sharp but youthful face, he looked like a model. His hair, when the sun hit, he had an auburn black color, made the golden eyes shine brightly. "Alright everyone, we have a new player. He's a senior and a transfer student, so I expect one of the other seniors to show him around the school after practice." Couch said as the new guy walked over in a black Speedo. "Everyone, this is Pete Devoto, your new teammate." Pete gave us all a smile and waved before jumping into the pool. As we all started practicing, I noticed how well Pete adapted to our team in how he moved and played with us. "Guys hit the locker room. Alfonso stopped by the office before you hit the shower." Following the couch, I found Pete waiting in the office. Davis looked at me. "Okay Alfonso, would you mind showing Pete here around the school today?" I looked at the new kid who seemed to be looking at me with interest, his eyes never leaving me. I couldn't stop staring at his chiseled features, not seeing a single flow in his face. "Yeah, couch, I don't mind following me. I'll help you pick a locker and show you around the school" He was quiet in the locker room while the guys were being a bit wild as they talked about typical stuff. "Hey Eric, is the locker next to you still empty," I asked, causing the team to look at me for a moment. Then their eyes followed Pete, as he walked passed me to the empty shower stall as the water started to heat up. I saw his eyes seem to glow as the steam started to build up in the locker. The guys got excited in the warm water. "Yeah, the locker next to you available? Dude, did they finally fix the water heater?" I grabbed one quickly, showering to get ready for the day. It didn't take long for me to get ready. As I closed my locker, I found Pete standing beside me. His shirt was off and I noticed a tattoo on his right hip. It was the symbol of protection from the Islands of Atlentica, named after the fact they were in the middle of the Atlantic ocean. "The largest island, Negra Platino, named for its platinum-like metals that were black instead of white, was around the size of Sweeden. The second island known as Socoya Isla, named for its unique redwood trees, stood around the size of Poland, the third island, which was the size of Portugal it was called Corbe Bestia Isla, the very last island, which was roughly the size of Ireland was simply called Gray Isla noted for it gray color and the fact all metals that mind from it had a gray color." the memory of my mother words played in my mind. I switched to Atlantic to see if he spoke the same language. "are you from Atlantia?" The question flowed from my lips with ease, even though I hadn't spoken the language since my mother passed away, beyond a few practices with Sofia to keep us fluent. The smile on Pete's face was one of joy. His eyes seemed to sparkle with excitement. "You are Atlantic". It looked almost as if he was ready to jump up and down at my words. It was simply a cute reaction to the situation. "I am from Gray island" he exclaimed happily as he looked at me, his golden eyes of his sparkled even more so. "Last I heard the island was practically deserted at this point" he shifted uncomfortably for a moment. "Yes, the island only has a population of only a million at this point and it is still decreasing. The town I was born in is completely deserted. I was the last one there when I left" I felt some pity at his words. I could guess what event had caused the population to a degree. Ten years ago, Gods from all around the world had been popping back up, and with their return came magical gates that held creatures from mythology. As a whole, the world's population had gone from seven billion down to three billion in a year. Some small nations had nearly been wiped out. This was even with the help of the gods stepping in and granting some mortals power or directly fighting for mortals, in the case of Ares, Thor and a few other war gods that first jumped in to protect humanity. "O man, this is great! They finally fixed the water heater." I could hear Steven yell out before I could continue talking. The rest of the team seemed to echo his reaction to the temperature changes. "Let's wash up and grab some breakfast", I jammed my thumb back, indicating for us to hit the shower. Pete seemed to have no shame, as after showering he quickly got naked in front of the other switching to his other clothing like it was nothing, and I couldn't deny that he had no reason to have shame. The man was large in height and muscles, and, well muscle, his spear, even in its sheathed state, was large in every way possible. When he noticed me looking, he gave me a wink, causing heat to bloom inside of my body, but as I adverted my eyes I noticed something important, the tattoo on his waist that came down to the very top of his thigh was the same mark as my mother's clan marker. "Hey big brother who's this guy," Sofia asked, redoing the final touch-up on her makeup almost indifferent to us. "Sofia this is Pete, Pete this is Sofia, my little sister". She put down the mirror for a moment to hold out her hand. Pete took it without really saying anything to her, giving me a questioning look. While my sister picked her mirror back up to finish her right eye. I gestured for Pete to follow me to the food line. Today was breakfast pizza, an apple and some milk like always. Grabbing my tray, I led us back to where my sister sat. Anthony was next to her but at this point, she was applying her lipstick with my friend watching her every move like a big blockbuster movie. "You have the confidence of a queen". I couldn't keep the smile off my face as Sofia completely paused her movements as Atlantic was being spoken by someone other than myself. You are Atlantic". A few other questions hung in the air but had yet to be asked. I instantly toned out my sister's voice as she started rattling off question after question, pulling out snacks that I had made previously and offering them to him. Pete seemed fully overwhelmed by my sister's questions but he answered them with humor and grace. It wasn't till I heard him mention that he was from Gray Island that I started paying attention again. "Really, what has the island been like." Sofia seemed very interested, as it was our mother's home island. He seemed to smile even more. A look of sadness entered his eyes though. "It is a lovely place. The volcano, of course, is why the island has its color, but it also creates a fertile social this for the forest around the land. I'm sure you have heard how the island has a unique ecosystem with plenty of rare plants and plenty of the animals on the island are monotreme" the bell rung signaling it was time for us to get to class. "Pete, do you need me to escort you to any class?" he simply shook his head. "Okay, see you guys at lunch" My first class of the day was AP English. I instantly noticed Jasmine sitting at her desk plopping down next to her. She looked up with a bored expression on her face. "Did you finish last night's reading?" "Yeah, I even have the essay rough draft completed". That was Jasmine always getting things done before the rest of us. "over achiever as always" Eric sat down next to me, his green eyes sparkling with some mischief in them. "Well it's better than doing everything at the last minute, Jasmine countered. The banter continued for a few more minutes till Ms. Silva stepped into the class, calling our attention to the front. We were discussing the lord of the flies and what the author had in mind for the story's symbols that were left along with foreshadowing of the story. For most of us, it was a simple assignment I found completely boring, but the class went by quickly. Then Ms. Silva assigned the next reading for the night with the expiration that our essay's first draft was due tomorrow. I waved bye to Jasmine as Eric got up to follow me to AP economics. Before we got to the class Eric wrapped his hand around my waist. I felt him look around as he did, so "hey I have something to show you after during our free period" "Yeah what is that?" I turned around, giving him a smirk as I noticed that no one was around. My friend had a sparkle in his green eyes. We had been hooking up for a while now, though neither of us had any desire for a relationship. "Not that you perv, but maybe after I found something cool in the woods the rest of the guys are gonna join me and I wanted you to come with us. Trust me, you'll find it really cool." "Alright, alright. Just understand I'm going to be tired after practice" He didn't say anything more, just had his goofy grin on as we entered the classroom, taking our seats. Our instructor, Mr. Brooks went straight into the lecture explaining the basics of how the stock market works. It was pretty boring, but I got the basics of everything. My eyes drifted to Eric for a moment. His large frame was extremely focused on the subject, causing me to chuckle. When he caught me staring, he just gave me a wink with a flex of his large bicep. After that, it just became a game of flirting between us while also doing our classwork. The bell rang signaling that class Brooks had just waved his hand, dismissing us. I gave Eric a quick fist bump before heading to Spanish for Spanish speakers finding Pete in the class, he was speaking to several of the other students. He seemed to be flirting with both the boys and girls. His amber colored eyes flashed when the light from the sun seemed to reflect off of them. It felt like gravity was pulling me towards him. The feeling had hit me during practice as well, it unnerved me how easily he had matched and moved with me in a perfect rhythm to my style of play. "Hello Alfonso" he spoke in Spanish, which was required by Ms. Garcia, when we entered her class. For the most part, she wrote the vocabulary on the whiteboard for us, gave us our assignment for the day, and then answered questions. As long as we finished the class work for the day and only spoke in Spanish, we could act how we wanted. "How is it going Pete, are you settling in?" "Yes, I have made a few new friends. Everyone at this school is very friendly." I smiled, thinking to myself that with his looks it made sense people would flock to him. Then you added the charm that seemed to ooze out of him in waves. It was very clear why so many of the girls were sitting there twirling their hair, some seemed to adjust the shirt they were wearing to be a bit more revealing while Pete seemed to notice it glancing his intense stares remained mostly focused on me. "You might want to avoid Alfonso. He's a maricon", Rosa one of the more extremely prejudiced girls at the school, spoke up. Before I could even respond to her, Pete had turned his eyes on her and, for the first time, I realized it wasn't light reflecting from his eyes that made them glow. Pete was supernatural. His eyes blazed with energy, a small aura of golden energy. I felt something pull from me as I noticed once that his tattoo was glowing. The glow faded quickly. It once more only came off as if the sunlight had hit him, but when I saw the tattoo glowing, I knew what it was. "You little-" I stepped between them. His eyes swirled with some energy. "Hey man, it's not worth it. Calm the f**k down, you can't just use the power of the gods to smite a random brat." "She insulted you. The proper term for one who lays with the same s*x is Floro", he spoke in Atlantic "Rosa Principles office now" Ms. Garcia spoke up harshly in English, causing Rosa to angrily stomp out "Now all of you back to work. No more talking about unrelated subjects". The teacher started to lecture us on the lesson, taking full control of the class now. The rest of the class quickly went by without incident. The lunch bell rang and we all quickly headed out to grab our lunches, but I grabbed Pete instead of pulling him to the side before going to get my lunch for myself. I was a bit irritated about it by his reaction to the whole situation more than anything. "Alright, that tattoo on your hip is the Arevataino clan symbol, right" "Ah, I see you notice but you are half correct about that. It is the symbol of Piedrodevoto, the guardian deity to the clan. I would assume you are a member of the clan. Which part of the clan are you from". He seemed excited when he asked this. "Not that it matters since I don't carry the name but I'm from the Corapiedro family on my mom's side," The look on his face was ecstatic, like he had just won the lottery, but I felt uncomfortable about all of it. While my mother had taught me about the clan and passed on the culture to me, I knew that only Sofia and myself were left, but since Pete had the symbol on his hip and knew the clan name he likely came from a branch family. "Ah my lord, then you should know I'm a priest of the Dioses Doradoes, one of the last remaining." I shifted a bit uncomfortable again. I still felt the pull to him but I didn't feel comfortable with it. I decided I would deal with it at a later date and just ignore this till I understood what was going on between us. It was odd how no one else had noticed the use of magic right in front of them, but I didn't want to bring that up to him at that moment. "Cool look man, I don't care if you have been chosen by the gods or whatever, don't mention it to my sister, who knows what weird things she might ask you to do. I don't need her trying to contact our mother and disturbing her rest now that we have a priest around" I could hear the annoyance in my voice. Pete seemed to have this look of sympathy on his face which just served to annoy me more than I already was. He only nodded in understanding as we started to head towards the cafeteria to grab our lunches. It didn't take long since, at this point, we had already taken time to talk and the line was shorter than it would have been. Finding my group, Pete followed me to sit by them. He quickly took on his bright demeanor but his eyes kept glancing toward me. "What's wrong," Jasmine asked without even having to look at me, "I'll tell you after practice today, are you still coming over to work on your engineering project" "Yeah, I'll be there after practice. My parents are going to buy us pizza since you are helping to test it out." I smiled as Eric sat down next to us. He pulled out his chicken lunch and a baked potato, alongside the school's spicy chicken sandwich. I just shook my head as he started digging into his food. I watched him with interest as Jasmine asked when we would start dating using sign language. I responded with a simple, we are just friends" while Eric watched us talk silently, his eyes darting back and forth. "That's not fair. I want to know what you're talking about," he whined to our amusement "Learn signs then and you won't have a problem" Sofia commented on her side of the friendship circle. "Hey don't encourage your brother" Eric whined even more. "Dude, they have known each other since they were in diapers. Just be glad they are using a language you can learn instead of the silent conversation that long-term friends can do." Anthony sat next to Sofia holding her hand. "He's right Eric, you can't expect to compete with me when it comes to Alfonso. I know all of his secrets" Jasmine's smirk was the most hilarious of them. since she didn't even try to hide it. I noticed Pete watching the situation. He seemed amused by everything going on but also satisfied by everything as well. I caught him looking at Eric with some curiosity, as he looked back at me, catching me staring again. He raised an eyebrow as if to ask something Sofia stopped him. Tapping his shoulder and whispered into his ear, a look of understanding reached his eyes. "Yo Eric, are we still checking out that thing in the wood during the free period" Alex stopped by with the other wrestlers, who looked a bit excited. "Yeah, Alfonso is going to be joining us. It's at the top of the waterfall about a mile from the ocean". The guys nodded and started heading out. "So five of us are going." "Yeah don't worry, I will have snacks". Eric smiled charmingly. "That wasn't my concern, but I'll talk to the couch and just say I gotta take Sofia to the doctor in case we don't make it back in time." Sofia, while eating, took a bite out of her sandwich lunch, went on with all of us making plans to meet up after the little exploration, if I knew Eric, he was just going to want to fool around and play in the water rather than do anything serious. The bell signaled for us to head to our final classes for the day. For me, waving bye, I hit my TA class. The class went by. While I graded the first-year student homework, most of the students averaged a C, but that was all that mattered was a passing grade. I met Eric in the parking lot, he stood by my truck, his bag already thrown into my truck as I sliced my stuff into the back. He hopped into my passenger door like always. He just did things without saying anything. The drive through the forest was a great scene. It took only ten minutes for us to reach the location he was talking about. The lake had a greenish-blue color to it because of the water's clear color, but the emerald deposit underwater gave it a green glow as the light reflected up. The wildflowers around it and the tall trees just made a beautiful scene as the light reflected. For a moment, I just took it all in. "Stop daydreaming and follow me" Eric started hiking up the path to the top of the waterfall, which was surprisingly a smooth walk. The view around us was just wonderful and I couldn't deny that Eric added to the view as well. As we got closer to the top of the path where the waterfall would be, the hair started rising on the back of my neck. Something seemed wrong with the air. The animals got quiet as we reached the top of the waterfall. To my horror, there was a swirling vortex, a deep beautiful blue color like the sea, causing me to feel a great deal of anger at that moment. "Eric, are you f*****g stupid! Why didn't you report this?" he looked at me a bit sheepishly "O come on man! If it was a low-grade gate, we could go in to defeat a monster and go through an awakening". The quilt told me he knew how horrible of an idea this was. "Dude, if it's a low-grade gate, we aren't supernatural, we have no way to tell! Look, let's just head back. I can call my dad to report this gate location and we can get a finders fee for it. Shoot if you want to go into a gate to get awakened, why not find a hunter to go in with you and help you go through it? We don't even have any weapons us to take with us" My words were cut off as he pulled a dagger out of his bag and a spear. I knew both of these weapons belonged to his father who was a collector of medieval weapons. These two were some of the sharpest weapons in the collection. Both were made from obsidian, making them sharp enough to pierce the majority of living creatures' flesh, even magical ones with tougher hides. Then he followed up with two bows with a few different types of arrows. The sheepish look on his face made me know he had this planned out for a few days. "For f***s sake man, when did you find this gate?" I was worried about how he was acting. "A week ago nothing came out of it, so it's not like a break is happening." Gate breaks were called such as a gate would destabilize and the creature in it would start pouring out of the gate. It was rare that most of the gates simply stabilized and someone would eventually close them, or they would just disappear over time as they lost stability, but a gate break would mean the gate world and the real world would start merging, creating a whole new area or just the creatures within the gate started pouring out of it till all the creature within it had been released. Gates could also collapse by damaging the world inside of it, causing things to pour out onto our world. If it was a high-level gate, the effect could be devastating like what originally happened when they first appeared. "So, instead of informing the hunters so they could, I don't know, make sure it is a safe one to train in or won't eventually collapse into our world, causing a disaster. Look Eric, this is just too dangerous. What if a creature within it has wandered out." I was trying to plead with him, a little concern, hitting me. "Come on, the other guys are already gonna be reporting it as it is. All we have to do is stay near the opening and take out the weaker creature inside!" Everything inside of me was screaming to not do this but the look on Eric's face was wearing me down. I weighed the pros and cons of it at the moment and the desperation on his face, sighing to myself. I knew what I would do. It was risky, but I couldn't deny that financial gains were huge for this. If we are lucky, the creature will be a peaceful type and not outwardly attack us. Instead, we could find something within there to awaken him if he wanted it too badly. "Fine fine, I know you're going to go in there even if I leave, so I might as well go with you, but we stay near the entrance." The way he smiled had me annoyed as he knew I would have to do that. I grabbed one of the bows and the spear as he kept the knife, picking up the other bow to prepare for everything. Eric grabbed me and gave me a long kiss that I hadn't expected he had never actually kissed me outside of a bedroom. It helped me steady my nerves about everything. I pulled out my ambulate, letting out a prayer to Pierdodevoto for everything to go well. "I have a few sandwiches with me so we should be fine for like an hour" he smiles smiled, his green eyes shining. "Let's hope it's a small realm then and we aren't going to be trapped for a few days. You are going to owe me a date after this". The feeling of dread remained, though, as we got closer to the gate. The shy smile that followed brought some joy to me. By squeezing my hand, he jumped onto the gate, a wooshing sound taking him into it. taking a deep breath, I went to step in. "Don't" ring in my mind making me pause "dangerous" sounded again, but at that word I resolved myself that even if I was being guided if this was dangerous then I couldn't leave Eric alone inside of it. I jumped into the portal, hearing a zipping sound as I found myself standing on a rock, Eric right in front of me lying on the ground. I instantly recognized why if the gods spoke to me they warned me not to enter this place. "Dragons" Eric's words hit me as I squatted next to him. Eric didn't understand these weren't just any dragons but Dracians. They were a secondary type of dragon. Four legs and no wings came in four elemental types. The reason they were classified as greater dragons was their high intelligence and ability to use elemental breath weapons. I knew this type of dragon because my mother had drilled into my mind about our native mythology. "Eric be very still, we need to leave. O f**k" I said warned him even though the dragons where very intelligent they where still known to be deadly creature, the dragons while none aggressive most of the time didn't take well to any none colony member entering there domain but what really had me concerned was that these dragons while ignoring us had battle scars. Dracians were powerful only high dragons, gods and a handful of other supernatural could really hurt them. While i racked my brain I then noticed a man walking forward the dragons bowing there head as his golden eyes looked at me, a gentle familiar feeling of warmth and safety went throughout my body. I knew who this man was the very god i had made prays to this very morning, the way he walked towards me seemingly to ignore Eric. The god stood in front of us holding out his hand towards me, the smile seeming to grow even wider than it had been before. I felt Eric shift in front of me standing between me and Pierdodevoto causing a laugh to ring out. His golden eyes seemed to burn brightly with interest at the action taken in front of him. "My child welcome to my dungeon" The god spoke.