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Once, in a long, distant land, there were mice just like us, except they had gemstones. Each one had a meaning, and each one had a power. In this land, they rule over the mice of the mortals, the ones without the gemstones.
Suddenly, Obsidian, in a burst of fury, ran off to a distant mountain and hid in a cave. For years, he built his powers, controlling them and the mice that resided inside the mountain by his powers. Together, with his minions, he made an empire set out to destroy the town of gemstone mice.
Who will help the gemstone mice? No one knows...

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A blue and white mouse raced across the streets in a panic, shoving her fellow citizens out of the way with an "Excuse me!" or a "Pardon!" after pushing. She had to tell someone about what she saw, fast, before it was too late.
The Building of the Elders shone like a diamond in the sky, its marble pillars standing out starkly in the cloudy air. She burst into the building by pushing its doors, panting. "I need to speak to the Elders of the Gemstone Mice!" she shouted, out of breath. The guards understood that this mouse had something important to say, but interrogated her anyway.
"Aren't you one of the Moonstone Mice?" they asked.
"Yes, I am, but please hurry and get the Elders!" Her small body shrunk and grew with every breath, her clear blue eyes clouding.
"Ah, of course." The guards marched off into the midst of the building, padding across its checkered floors. They knocked on a door that shone like an opal. "Elder? It's a Moonstone Mouse. She must have a vision. She's panting fit to die, so you might want to halt your meeting for just a moment."
The door creaked, and then opened graciously, causing the guards to run towards the walls and lay flat across their dull white surfaces. A bronze table sat inside the room, with twelve mice with matted fur standing behind them. "Come in," one of them boomed.
The mouse ran at a slow trot into the court, careful not to use her energy as much as she had whilst running in the streets. She halted a few meters before them, still panting.
"State your name, first of all." The Elder called.
The mouse shook her head. "Melichu. Melichu is my name."
"And what is the vision? Is it important enough to halt our meeting?" The others chattered, the mouse catching some snippets of conversation:
"We were just talking about Obsidian... is it about him?"
"It is about Obsidian," the mouse replied. "I saw him in a mountain." Melichu shook her head. "No, not in a mountain, but in a castle on top of the mountain. Thousands of mice were treading to and from it. He- Obsidian got on top of the castle and cried, 'We're coming for you, Gemstone Town,
if it's the last thing we ever do!' And then I was swept into a dungeon, and I saw-- I saw a diamond mouse inside, and she was shivering, and--"
"That'll do."
The Elder stood up, trembling. His brown paws gripped the contrasting table. "If what she says is the word of a Moonstone Mouse, then we may have to prepare for the worst," he said.

Melichu staggered back in an almost tiring trot. The gray tiles that made up Moonstone Street shone almost lazily, changing from a wet stone color to almost like a pearl's hue. Their buildings, housing more than a hundred Moonstone mice, glittered as if someone had painted them with pastel blue confetti.
She halted. The buildings were now silhouetted against a ruby red sky. White mice of all sorts of attire were fleeing as the ground underneath cracked behind an army of normal mice with eyes the same color as the sky...
She blinked while shaking her head and her neighborhood turned back to normal. The sky was a cloudy gray, there were no mice fleeing, and the only sound head was the wind flowing through the land. She sighed in relief, but the feeling didn't last very long, though. Melichu could see visions, visions that came true almost all the time. That was what Moonstone mice experienced, after all. But she knew that she was more sensitive.
A click of a door snapped her back to reality as a group of white mice laughed and raced toward her. She could only utter a small gasp before the weight of seven wiggling mice crushed her. She knew they were children, but they still took the breath from her lungs.
"Can't...breathe..." she croaked, standing up so that they tumbled down onto the street, still giggling uncontrollably. They regained their balance, jumping up and down with excitement and impatience, typical for all children.
"Whoopsie!" one of the smaller mice exclaimed. "Sorry, Miss Mel! Was it me that crushed you?"
Melichu chuckled. "No, it was everyone!" she replied.
"Look Miss Meli, I had a small picture!" another cried. 'Picture' was the younger Moonstone mice's word for 'vision.' He cleared his throat almost comedically, and some of the little ones had to stifle their laughs. "It showed me," he began, "but I was bigger, almost as big as you--" he pointed at Melichu, and she smiled, silently urging him to continue-- "and it was... some sort of... holiday, I think? But I was with Kumie--she's cute, by the way--and-and we kissed and everything... and that's my picture."
Kumie's face reddened as the girls cried out things such as "Eww! Yuck!!" and the boys cheered.
"That was called a wedding, Storm," Melichu lightly corrected him. "A holiday was a close guess, but that's not correct. It is considered a ritual."
"A wedding?" Kumie cried. "No way am I marrying that jerk!" The girls tired to soothe her, but the effort was wasted. Then, they accused the boys of making up the vision, but they denied it. Melichu smiled at their outburst timidly until a white mouse stood up and interrupted their argument.
"Hey, Meli. I thought you might want to talk a bit about your behavior this morning," he called. The children paused, looking at him.
"Sorry, mister!" they exclaimed. "We'll leave now. Bye, Miss Meli!" They ran off, waving as they went. Meli waved back. Then, she faced her newcomer.
The mouse donned a simple gray eyepatch, with a blue-and-white fedora covering his gray hair. His single eye shined with intensity as the loop on his winged collar lightly collided with a ting and his moon tail jewelry swayed with each movement of his tail.
She sighed with familiarity. "Well, Connor, I suppose I can tell you about it," she decided.

The waterfall fell on top of slate gray rocks and boulders, pouring into a crystalline lake that shone like a diamond. Perches existed here -- mouse-made perches, their shiny marble surfaces contrasting against the mossy stones. Green grasses grew, clinging to the rough rocks.
On two of the perches sat Connor and Melichu, meditating, calming their mind, clearing any doubt.
"Try harder, Meli," the white mouse intoned patiently, so the blue and white cloudy mouse attempted to, but--oh, the two visions had left her trembling when she thought about them. When she tried clearing her mind, it raced back to what she saw, except more vividly. Connor could feel her fur shaking.
He sighed, wrapping a paw around her shoulders. "I can tell something is wrong," he stated quietly.
Melichu nodded.
"Can you tell me?"
She looked at Connor with big blue eyes, panicked. It was as if one asks another to harm someone at first. But, when she saw no harm in telling her friend her visions, she calmed herself.
"It was about Obsidian again," she replied. "I don't know why, but I'm the only one having these visions and everyone else is living in complete bliss. ... I don't think anyone even believes me that there's going to be mass destruction in Moonstone Street..."
She sighed, put a paw to her forehead, and slunk down into a relaxed position. The paw was right below her blue tiara, which had her respective gem in it. "I sometimes wish I wasn't a Moonstone mouse..."
Connor didn't answer, thinking to himself. That was him; while Melichu was constantly snapping herself back to reality, he was constantly daydreaming about something else. She had had to splash water in his face before.
Just as Melichu prepared to hurl droplets of crystalline water at him, he straightened his position. "I was listening," he murmured drowsily. "You're not just a Moonstone mouse: you're Melichu. The children look up to you and the Elders trust you, so you're pretty special."
"And what?" Melichu burst without her knowing it. "And does that make you want to be me? To have disturbing visions every day and to select which is true or false?!"
She knew she had hurt his feelings a bit; tears brimmed at the corner of his eye. She shook her head and apologized quietly, embarrassed.
"No, don't apologize," he said quickly, wiping his tears away. "I guess some mice wouldn't want to be you if they actually knew you.
"Our Creator must have a plan if He made you sensitive to visions like that. Maybe there's some sort of prophecy we don't know about. I don't know."
It was now Melichu's turn to cry. "Why me?" she lamented. "Why can't I be normal like everyone else?" She cried into Connor's shoulder, her ear colliding with his eye patch. He allowed her to do so for a moment.
"Sit up," he commanded dreamily, and she obeyed, sniffling. "Listen. If you don't want to use your enhanced abilities for the good of Gemstone Town, that's fine. I'm not stopping you. But just remember that there is a higher risk of our kind, the Gemstone Mice, dying off quicker than usual. We're important to the safety of this town because of our power. Your powers, combined with ours, will help us have many generations living here.
"Think about it and come back to me later, alright?" Connor stood up from his perch and bounced down to the tiled street. Then, he slowly left, his body blending into the street. Melichu waited, watching him go. Then, she looked down and uttered one word.
"Alright."
~End of Part 1~

A mouse rested on top of a yellow-orange roof. Her hair glittered like a topaz, and she held something that looked like a burnt baguette (i'm sorry) on a stick. She nibbled on it absently, her eyes glinting in the light. They swayed from side to side, surveying her neighbors.
Another one joined her, a red headdress resting on her head. This one carried a strawberry. (The normal mice used strawberries as a currency named fraises.)
The topaz mouse smiled, looking at the newcomer. "Hey, Rashneil," she greeted, almost robotically.
Rashneil shook her head, chuckling. "You know better than to disrespect your elders like that, Shakra," she lightly reprimanded her friend, but had to hold in her laughter in order to compose herself accordingly.
Shakra grinned, but it changed to a frown, since she knew that Emerald mice such as Rashneil weren't allowed to interact with her kind. "So, you're the one that's breaking the rules now," she giggled silently. "And I thought you were the goody-goody two shoes around here!"
"Now you hush yourself," Rashneil put on a mean, menacing voice jokingly. "Or else I'm gonna put you in my stew."
"Your stew? Now I'm not sure whether I'd taste good anyway."
"Shakra stew--no, wait, Topaz mouse stew! Sounds yummy..."
"Ew, no, Rashneil!" The mouse pushed away her friend playfully, chortling.
"Yum, yes, Rashneil~" She threw her head up, her headdress swaying, laughing. "No, of course I'm joking about Topaz stew. Sounds icky."
The sun set over Topaz Avenue, giving it the glint of its namesake. Mice with sun-like fur were selling all sort of charms. Some of Shakra's neighbors paused, looking over the jewelry. Children ran in the streets, their tails behind them, gleefully waving around all sorts of contraptions: here was a necklace designed to ward off Obsidian's spirit, there was a topaz that pulsed depending on the wearer's mood, and so on.
"I don't believe in all of that charm stuff, though," Shakra voiced her thoughts suddenly. Rashneil looked at her, looking almost horrified. "Now, I'm not saying I don't believe in the story of Obsidian," she added quickly, for her friend was about to ask, "because I do. But I'm saying that it's really unnecessary to give out pretty necklaces to wear and to lie to buyers about its use."
Rashneil nodded. "What if they are right, that the jewelry can do all sorts of magical stuff?" Shakra pondered about this for a moment.
"I think that--"
The rest of Shakra's sentence was drowned, for the neighbors started yelling with startled voices.
We're caught together! both Emerald and Topaz mouse thought. But, on closer inspection, the mice weren't looking at the roof.
They were literally staring at a white mouse with an umbrella in their midst. The bell on her neck jangled as her short hair flowed behind her.
"A-A Moonstone mouse?! Running along here?!" Shakra stammered.
"No, it's a Diamond mouse. Look at the way she kind of glows..." Rashneil answered. As Shakra took a second glance at the stranger, she could tell Rashneil was right: she could just make out a white aura around the fleeing mouse.
The Diamond mouse passed their roof's house.
"C'mon!" Shakra stood up, taking Rashneil's paw. "We're leaving!"
"Wha--" the Emerald mouse sputtered. "No way! We could get caught! It's too dangerous to leave!"
"We're not 'leaving,' we're following that mouse!"
"Are you INSANE?!"
"Yep! Apparently! Now, let's go!" Shakra ran off, leading Rashneil around as they followed the mouse's direction on the roof.

The mouse darted to and from the streets. Here was one that shone like a ruby...there was one that had the rich deep purple of an amethyst.... Every single one left fellow mice gawking at her. But she couldn't pause to look. Right now, something was urging her onward, but she couldn't find this...forest that the voice kept talking about.
There's one more street; that's the one that takes you to the forest! the voice cried with the hint of leadership. The mouse sighed and went down the street that glittered like a moonstone. It seemed deserted; that was good. Even if it wasn't she'd be blended into the crowd. Well, unless they took a good, long look at the mouse.
Suddenly a mouse showed up at the end of the street. Behind him was the lush greens of the forest.
There it is!
She swerved around him, his gray hair ruffling. He looked behind, towards the forest, towards her. He opened his mouth to say something, but closed it. She smirked. Good. No one's gonna stop Akira when she's on her course. Specifically, that's me.
She halted at the crystalline lake. Another mouse jumped, startled. Akira looked at the greens, but saw nothing else. She paused, listening. Then,
she yelled something, facing away from the spectator.
"Who are you?!"
A rustling issued from a huge, leafy tree Its leaves gleamed like pearls.
"Show yourself!"

Rashneil and Shakra listened from within a bush. The Diamond mouse was literally screaming at a tree.
"She's crazy," Shakra muttered, and was shushed.
Something black issued from the tree. The mouse stepped back, shaking with fear.
"Obsidian!" Rashneil hissed. "Shakra, don't--" But it was too late. Shakra leaped from the bush, wielding an orange axe. Her friend sighed, and out came a jade-like staff. "Fine," she murmured, and followed Shakra.
"Leave her alone!" Shakra yelled at the thing, and it shrunk back. She swung blindly into the tree, hoping for a lucky hit. Rashneil had to pull her from the tree. Glass-like branches had been cut from it, leaving some of it bare.
"Calm yourself, Shakra," Rashneil snapped.
"That thing was gonna KILL her if we didn't step in, Rashneil!" she hissed with almost the same intensity as her friend's voice.

Melichu looked with horror. A Diamond mouse, Emerald mouse, and a Topaz mouse, within the premises of the Moonstone Pool? She had to get away before anything bad happened... She heard of mice that intruded the area and never came back.
All of a sudden, a low rumbling issued from the forest. "Run!" Melichu shouted. "Get out of here! Quickly!"
It worked; the group glanced upwards and ran into the street without taking a second look. She sighed. I'll have to find out who they are, she thought to herself.

Rashneil and Shakra crashed through the street with the Diamond mouse and slumped on the Main Square of the town, panting heavily.
"I'm not taking the blame for it this time," Rashneil wheezed.
Shakra looked over towards the mouse. "So, considering how we followed you, almost got caught, and literally almost got killed, why don't we get acquainted?" she asked.
"It's a pretty funny way to get acquainted, but I'll take it," came a reply.
"Okay! I'm Shakra, and this--" she gestured to her friend-- "is Rashneil."
"Nice to meet you. I'm Akira."
Rashneil straightened up. "Why were you running, anyway?"
Akira hesitated. Then she replied: "Well, this voice in my head told me to find a forest."
"So you are a Moonstone mouse!" Shakra cried.
"No she's not!" Rashneil snapped.
"Well, if she's not a Moonstone mouse--and this is going to be a crazy thought--then was Obsidian trying to kill Akira?" Shakra asked.
~End of Part 2~

The static of a television set could be heard throughout the small house. No one had bothered to shut the noise off; the mouse that should have been controlling the remote was fast asleep. He was slumped against a dull green sofa, softly snoring and uttering nonsense in his dreams. His snow-white fur contrasted, while his green hair stood out from the aged seat. He wore on himself a black and white headband and a similar scarf, except the scarf was striped instead of almost swirly.
A sudden CLUNK knocked him out of his dream. His hair suddenly flared, hot-pink, and his eyes opened, being the same color. He never rose out of the sofa to investigate, for a stern voice rang through shortly after the sound.
"Veran! Get your lazy body off my couch and come to breakfast!" it said.
"Just a sec," Veran answered. He shook his head, smiling, his hair and eyes returning to the green that everyone here knew. He knew the voice belonged to Ruby, whom had allowed him to stay at this place until his kind could find a suitable home. In short, he was an Alexandrite mouse in a Ruby house.
He wanted to get off the sofa, but, oh, was it so comfortable! He closed his eyes sleepily, dozing off again in a matter of seconds.
"Veran!" another voice called. "Please, don't make Ruby have to spray you with cold water, and come to breakfast."
"I'm coming," he murmured drowsily. The second voice was a Fluorite mouse named Flora, whom could relate to him. She had the same backstory as him: someone in their kind attempted to stop Obsidian but were obliterated, and so he destroyed their homes as punishment.
He could faintly see a sun-touched mouse with long, flowing hair and a scarlet gem approaching. In her paws was a bucket filled with water. He prepared himself for what was about to happen next.
No amount of preparing, however, could help him steel himself against the cold water that followed. He spit out water, shaking to rid himself of the icy drops, and glared at Ruby, who smirked and held the now-empty bucket.
"Alright," he snapped, "I'm awake."
He jumped from the sofa, still trembling. Now that he was awake, he could do certain tasks of the day. He walked over to the checkered floor of the white quartz kitchen, nodding towards a galaxy-like mouse with glowing purple hair. The sun was still not visible, so the kitchen was shaded. When he turned on the light, the mouse's hair turned almost pale green.
"The usual coffee, today, Flora, please," he muttered, clouded with sleep.
She smiled. "Here you are, Veran." A ruby red mug was passed to him, filled to the brim with rich, deep scarlet liquid. He could hear her mutter "That's the fifth time this week" as he added milk, sugar, and cream into it. As he drank, Ruby started to pack up for some reason.
"Where are you going?" Flora asked while she washed some filthy dishes. "Vacation time isn't until three months from now."
Ruby paused to mock-glare at her interrogator. "Like that wasn't obvious. Thanks for stating the obvious," she snapped. "I'm going away because of mysterious happenings in the forest. Black creatures. Mice mysteriously disappearing."
Flora gasped and Veran almost spit out his luxurious coffee. Ruby was, indeed, working for the Forest Inspection Crew. The native of the home shushed them. "But you guys gotta tell no one--I mean NO ONE--about this. It's being hushed up by my fellow workers, so it's only fair that you do the same," she added.
"Well, why did you trust us with this information, then?" asked Veran in a cool voice, yet apprehensive as well.
"I'm not a Moonstone mouse, of course," replied Ruby, "but you're my roommates, so I kinda know every move. Especially you, Flora." Her friend blushed. Ruby nodded.
"Well, see you after work?" both Veran and Flora questioned.
"Yeah, unless, of course, I die," Ruby giggled and went to the exit of the house, its wooden surfaces an orange-red. She shoved open the door and hurried out with a quick "Bye!" Veran set down his mug as the door shut.
He turned his head over to Flora, who now had a hesitant look on her face. She was a dog whose lips drooped down, which gave it a sad face; she had a depressed expression at the moment. Then, she asked, to no one in particular, "Will Ruby really be okay?"
Veran finished his beverage and set it beside the other dishes. "She will," he answered. Flora jumped suddenly, glancing at him fearfully, like someone caught in the act. "I know she will. If something does try hurting her, she'd kick its butt. She's strong." She turned back to her dishes and nodded.
He left, leaving Flora to her duties. He decided to return his seating place beside the TV. But, suddenly, as he was passing a window, something sped by. He paused. Then, he peeked out the dusty window...

"Why do these things keep coming back?!" Shakra groaned as she, Rashneil, and Akira sped down Ruby Drive, following the black creature just ahead of them. It had been three days since the first appeared to Akira in the forest. They had, of course, reported it to the Elders, but they were forced to be on the Pest Extermination Force for ignoring the Topaz and Emerald mouse laws. The Elders had informed the FIC, or Forest Inspection Crew, about it, and now both organizations had teamed up to rid the land of these things.
The beast roared deafeningly and climbed some of the walls of the crimson brick houses. Rashneil shook her head sadly and summoned her staff.
"It's probably because," she answered as the staff's emerald orb pulsed and charged up, "Obsidian sends them to check on the streets and to capture important mice."
"Well, if they really are capturing important mice, then why are the Elders still there?" Akira asked as the staff outbrightened her aura.
"Well, duh," Shakra interrupted, "it's because they're protected."
Akira glared at her.
"Thirty days of this?" the Topaz mouse muttered to herself. "I've seen better."
The staff shot out a green beam of light, striking the creature on its belly. It hissed, knowing that its time had come to die. It started to glow, almost jade-like, and it hissed more, unable to move.
"We're probably not going to see the end of it if we disobey them again," Rashneil answered, withdrawing her staff and letting the beam inside the thing do its job. Shakra mocked her by copying every move as she talked.
"Maybe Obsidian doesn't want to kill me. Or even get involved with me. The thing was in Moonstone Forest, right?" Akira pondered.
Rashneil nodded. "The voice was in your head though."
"Miscalculation?"
"No, maybe he did it to control you and capture a Moonstone mouse." As Rashneil finished her words, the creature exploded, finally out of its misery.

Melichu attempted to meditate more, but something was nagging her. Something. Or someone...!
In a flash, the peaceful serenity was shattered by the black creatures racing toward the street, defiling the sacred ground... No! It's a vision! She shook her head violently, attempting to silence their calls... She was losing control... And someone was laughing insanely...
Melichu.
She jerked awake, the blissful water of the pool softly caressing her cheek. Another one... she grumbled silently. The creatures weren't there, and no one was laughing insanely.
Or was there?
The short, piercing laughter resounded again, echoing through the sky. Melichu stood up, alert and trembling. It seemed to be further in the forest...
It would need to be worried about later. Right now, she had to decided whether to help Gemstone Town or not.
Melichu.
The intruder's voice in her head shocked her. But who had that power? She checked off mice that she knew didn't have telekinesis. After checking off ten kinds, she gave up. "Who are you?" she asked, waiting for the stranger to answer.
I am one of your kind, and I can help you greatly.

The black ruler trembled greatly, concentrating. A crowd of guardian mice were standing around him in the dark room. It was circular, and a crimson chandelier dangled from the equally darkened ceiling.
The green mouse could see it, but she couldn't get through. She attempted to nudge her way through, but was shoved away. She landed into the black wall with a dull "OOF!" and glared up into the scarlet eyes of two of the spectating mice.
"Rude," she huffed.
"The Master is busy," they intoned, ignoring her short outburst. "He is recruiting."
"Well, I have a message for ol' Obsidian right here," she replied, gesturing to herself. "Now, by order of an exiled Gemstone mouse, MOVE YOURSELVES!"
"He is recruiting," they spoke. "Go away and come back in four hours."
"Well then. You tell him that a Peridot mouse wants to see him. Alright?" She waved and exited the room patiently, its doors sliding closed with a dull THUNK behind her.
~End of Part 3~

"La-bas. C'est las betes noires." The bot lifted a paw to the mouth of a cave further in the woods. In it, the creatures were gathered, infesting natural territory.
Ruby and the rest of the crew stared. Surely they wouldn't camp so close to the town! Yet they were there, and they were causing chaos near Moonstone Street. A change in their behavior meant something...
"Obsidian wouldn't put his things here so soon..." One of the mice muttered.
"Can't this thing speak English?" Ruby asked, smacking the robot mouse on its back. It shuddered, its mouth gaping open and arms flailing around. The translator, a stout mouse named Frances, started to glare at the leader of the group, but the bot whipped out a choppy sentence.
"I am sorry," it managed to belt out, but the Robot-Communicacion can not speak English but French only. Very much thanks." Then, it reverted back to itself again, its eyes darkening. Frances chuckled darkly.
"That's why RoCo here needs translators such as myself," he added, gesturing to himself. Ruby glared at him with as much intensity as he had at his spiky hair.
"If we actually had interpreters as gems, we wouldn't need you, mortal," she murmured. She peeked at her watch, but still no sign of the PEF newcomers. The Moonstone mouse she had recruited temporarily glanced as well, keeping watch for them. The other members gathered to theirselves, deciding on a plan.
"They were fighting another creature in Ruby Drive," the mouse patiently intoned, "and now they're speeding their way here."
"I'll let them off THIS time," Ruby replied. Inside herself, she was grumbling. This infestation was getting out of hand. If left unattended, then they...
The Moonstone mouse shuddered suddenly, her eyes focusing somewhere beyond their words.
Ruby smacked her back. "Snap out of it." The mouse fell over. Oops, too hard... It didn't seem like she would rise... but she sat up abruptly, alert. Her eyes glanced to the left, then to the right. She sighed as three varied mice sped over, covered in black goo, panting.
The red mouse walked over to the Topaz one and booped her nose. "You're late."
"We KNOW, Ruby," Shakra muttered, "but we unfortunately had a traffic jam." She gestured to a dark blob on her arm.
Rashneil facepalmed. "Shakra, please."
"As a certain mouse residing in the mortals' Leisure Lounge would say... RASHNEIL STOP THIS SHIT!"
Akira rolled her eyes and stood near a tree. "You both are crazy," she called.
"Says the one that's a Diamond mouse obviously glowing in the daylight," Shakra muttered, a silly grin starting to grow on her face.
"H-Hey! You cut that out!" The white mouse stood on her hind legs in mock outrage. "I can't help it if I glow like this!"
"Oh really?" The grin stretched wider.
"Really!"
"Prove it!"
Akira suddenly pounced on Shakra, giggling. The victim fought back, the smile unwavering as she also chuckled. Rashneil sighed, backing away from the tussle as if it were some diseased object and muttered something like "They oughta be more serious about this".

A jolt of recognition or déjà vu sent Melichu into a temporary daze. She KNEW she had seen the trio before, somewhere... but where?
Connor would know.
She then realized that he had never seen them before, let alone gotten to speak to them. There was no way he'd know for sure! But, he was a Moonstone mouse, after all...
Suddenly, as if saying his race did the trick, she remembered the trio near the sanctuary pool three days ago...
A vision reared its ugly head at that same moment, only this time it wasn't as frightening as the visions of Moonstone mice fleeing normals and black beasts defiling the town. This time it was of eight mice in total, adventuring to find Obsidian. She recognized Connor, the friendly Moonstone companion; the trio, their differences clearly visible in the daylight; and her scowling, no-nonsense leader, the Ruby mouse. She couldn't make head or tail of what the two others were, but the third... she thought it was herself.
It wasn't frightening. Instead, it was almost mystifying.
And it would happen. She was sure of it.
"Hey, Moonie!" Ruby's voice.
"Meli," she corrected her temporary superior, sliding out of her daze.
"Moonie, Meli, whatever." Ruby halted, her face masked with concern. "While you were dozing or whatever, some of our guys got attacked."
Meli squinted, confused. Goodness gracious, how long had she been out?
"It's been 3 hours. We had to put you under a tree for safety," she went on, as if she had read the Moonstone mouse's mind.
"Are they alright?!" Meli sat up, shaking with fear.
Ruby chuckled. "Our guys are okay. Frances I'm not too sure about. The monsters are not alright. The PEF newcomers did a pretty good job disposing of them."
Meli sighed. When would this nightmare end?

Connor sat, the sound of rushing water from the waterfall soothing him. As usual, he was daydreaming again.
A green figure emerged from the distance, intent on a thing that wasn't clear, but...
"She spells trouble," he sleepily purred, his eyes glancing at the pool. If he guessed correctly, the mouse was speeding near where Melichu said she would be working temporarily. And should she encounter it...
He shuddered, standing on all fours and leaping ahead, making haste. He had to hurry.

Veran was sitting alongside a Diamond mouse, one of the newcomers of PEF. She was humming, her face twisted with concern, but he had reverted back to his healing form.
"You've got a couple of scratches here," he muttered, pointing at her belly. "Are you sure you're alright?"
"Of course I'm sure," she replied, a bit too quickly.
He glanced towards Flora, who was trying to make conversation with a Topaz mouse and an Emerald mouse. She bit her lip nervously. Veran could tell she wasn't the best at this type of this.
"I find that hard to believe," the Alexandrite mouse stated, facing his patient again.
She frowned. "But it's true--"
"STOP!"
A harsh voice could be heard across the camp. Veran's hair flashed hot-pink and he faced the intruder, ready to attack.
At the same moment, another mouse emerged from the forest and inhaled sharply.
Standing in the distance, out of breath, was a Peridot mouse, her green fur matted.
~End of Part 4~

Melichu staggered back in an almost tiring trot. The gray tiles that made up Moonstone Street shone almost lazily, changing from a wet stone color to almost like a pearl's hue. Their buildings, housing more than a hundred Moonstone mice, glittered as if someone had painted them with pastel blue confetti.
She halted. The buildings were now silhouetted against a ruby red sky. White mice of all sorts of attire were fleeing as the ground underneath cracked behind an army of normal mice with eyes the same color as the sky...
She blinked while shaking her head and her neighborhood turned back to normal. The sky was a cloudy gray, there were no mice fleeing, and the only sound head was the wind flowing through the land. She sighed in relief, but the feeling didn't last very long, though. Melichu could see visions, visions that came true almost all the time. That was what Moonstone mice experienced, after all. But she knew that she was more sensitive.
A click of a door snapped her back to reality as a group of white mice laughed and raced toward her. She could only utter a small gasp before the weight of seven wiggling mice crushed her. She knew they were children, but they still took the breath from her lungs.
"Can't...breathe..." she croaked, standing up so that they tumbled down onto the street, still giggling uncontrollably. They regained their balance, jumping up and down with excitement and impatience, typical for all children.
"Whoopsie!" one of the smaller mice exclaimed. "Sorry, Miss Mel! Was it me that crushed you?"
Melichu chuckled. "No, it was everyone!" she replied.
"Look Miss Meli, I had a small picture!" another cried. 'Picture' was the younger Moonstone mice's word for 'vision.' He cleared his throat almost comedically, and some of the little ones had to stifle their laughs. "It showed me," he began, "but I was bigger, almost as big as you--" he pointed at Melichu, and she smiled, silently urging him to continue-- "and it was... some sort of... holiday, I think? But I was with Kumie--she's cute, by the way--and-and we kissed and everything... and that's my picture."
Kumie's face reddened as the girls cried out things such as "Eww! Yuck!!" and the boys cheered.
"That was called a wedding, Storm," Melichu lightly corrected him. "A holiday was a close guess, but that's not correct. It is considered a ritual."
"A wedding?" Kumie cried. "No way am I marrying that jerk!" The girls tired to soothe her, but the effort was wasted. Then, they accused the boys of making up the vision, but they denied it. Melichu smiled at their outburst timidly until a white mouse stood up and interrupted their argument.
"Hey, Meli. I thought you might want to talk a bit about your behavior this morning," he called. The children paused, looking at him.
"Sorry, mister!" they exclaimed. "We'll leave now. Bye, Miss Meli!" They ran off, waving as they went. Meli waved back. Then, she faced her newcomer.
The mouse donned a simple gray eyepatch, with a blue-and-white fedora covering his gray hair. His single eye shined with intensity as the loop on his winged collar lightly collided with a ting and his moon tail jewelry swayed with each movement of his tail.
She sighed with familiarity. "Well, Connor, I suppose I can tell you about it," she decided.

The waterfall fell on top of slate gray rocks and boulders, pouring into a crystalline lake that shone like a diamond. Perches existed here -- mouse-made perches, their shiny marble surfaces contrasting against the mossy stones. Green grasses grew, clinging to the rough rocks.
On two of the perches sat Connor and Melichu, meditating, calming their mind, clearing any doubt.
"Try harder, Meli," the white mouse intoned patiently, so the blue and white cloudy mouse attempted to, but--oh, the two visions had left her trembling when she thought about them. When she tried clearing her mind, it raced back to what she saw, except more vividly. Connor could feel her fur shaking.
He sighed, wrapping a paw around her shoulders. "I can tell something is wrong," he stated quietly.
Melichu nodded.
"Can you tell me?"
She looked at Connor with big blue eyes, panicked. It was as if one asks another to harm someone at first. But, when she saw no harm in telling her friend her visions, she calmed herself.
"It was about Obsidian again," she replied. "I don't know why, but I'm the only one having these visions and everyone else is living in complete bliss. ... I don't think anyone even believes me that there's going to be mass destruction in Moonstone Street..."
She sighed, put a paw to her forehead, and slunk down into a relaxed position. The paw was right below her blue tiara, which had her respective gem in it. "I sometimes wish I wasn't a Moonstone mouse..."
Connor didn't answer, thinking to himself. That was him; while Melichu was constantly snapping herself back to reality, he was constantly daydreaming about something else. She had had to splash water in his face before.
Just as Melichu prepared to hurl droplets of crystalline water at him, he straightened his position. "I was listening," he murmured drowsily. "You're not just a Moonstone mouse: you're Melichu. The children look up to you and the Elders trust you, so you're pretty special."
"And what?" Melichu burst without her knowing it. "And does that make you want to be me? To have disturbing visions every day and to select which is true or false?!"
She knew she had hurt his feelings a bit; tears brimmed at the corner of his eye. She shook her head and apologized quietly, embarrassed.
"No, don't apologize," he said quickly, wiping his tears away. "I guess some mice wouldn't want to be you if they actually knew you.
"Our Creator must have a plan if He made you sensitive to visions like that. Maybe there's some sort of prophecy we don't know about. I don't know."
It was now Melichu's turn to cry. "Why me?" she lamented. "Why can't I be normal like everyone else?" She cried into Connor's shoulder, her ear colliding with his eye patch. He allowed her to do so for a moment.
"Sit up," he commanded dreamily, and she obeyed, sniffling. "Listen. If you don't want to use your enhanced abilities for the good of Gemstone Town, that's fine. I'm not stopping you. But just remember that there is a higher risk of our kind, the Gemstone Mice, dying off quicker than usual. We're important to the safety of this town because of our power. Your powers, combined with ours, will help us have many generations living here.
"Think about it and come back to me later, alright?" Connor stood up from his perch and bounced down to the tiled street. Then, he slowly left, his body blending into the street. Melichu waited, watching him go. Then, she looked down and uttered one word.
"Alright."
~End of Part 1~

A mouse rested on top of a yellow-orange roof. Her hair glittered like a topaz, and she held something that looked like a burnt baguette (i'm sorry) on a stick. She nibbled on it absently, her eyes glinting in the light. They swayed from side to side, surveying her neighbors.
Another one joined her, a red headdress resting on her head. This one carried a strawberry. (The normal mice used strawberries as a currency named fraises.)
The topaz mouse smiled, looking at the newcomer. "Hey, Rashneil," she greeted, almost robotically.
Rashneil shook her head, chuckling. "You know better than to disrespect your elders like that, Shakra," she lightly reprimanded her friend, but had to hold in her laughter in order to compose herself accordingly.
Shakra grinned, but it changed to a frown, since she knew that Emerald mice such as Rashneil weren't allowed to interact with her kind. "So, you're the one that's breaking the rules now," she giggled silently. "And I thought you were the goody-goody two shoes around here!"
"Now you hush yourself," Rashneil put on a mean, menacing voice jokingly. "Or else I'm gonna put you in my stew."
"Your stew? Now I'm not sure whether I'd taste good anyway."
"Shakra stew--no, wait, Topaz mouse stew! Sounds yummy..."
"Ew, no, Rashneil!" The mouse pushed away her friend playfully, chortling.
"Yum, yes, Rashneil~" She threw her head up, her headdress swaying, laughing. "No, of course I'm joking about Topaz stew. Sounds icky."
The sun set over Topaz Avenue, giving it the glint of its namesake. Mice with sun-like fur were selling all sort of charms. Some of Shakra's neighbors paused, looking over the jewelry. Children ran in the streets, their tails behind them, gleefully waving around all sorts of contraptions: here was a necklace designed to ward off Obsidian's spirit, there was a topaz that pulsed depending on the wearer's mood, and so on.
"I don't believe in all of that charm stuff, though," Shakra voiced her thoughts suddenly. Rashneil looked at her, looking almost horrified. "Now, I'm not saying I don't believe in the story of Obsidian," she added quickly, for her friend was about to ask, "because I do. But I'm saying that it's really unnecessary to give out pretty necklaces to wear and to lie to buyers about its use."
Rashneil nodded. "What if they are right, that the jewelry can do all sorts of magical stuff?" Shakra pondered about this for a moment.
"I think that--"
The rest of Shakra's sentence was drowned, for the neighbors started yelling with startled voices.
We're caught together! both Emerald and Topaz mouse thought. But, on closer inspection, the mice weren't looking at the roof.
They were literally staring at a white mouse with an umbrella in their midst. The bell on her neck jangled as her short hair flowed behind her.
"A-A Moonstone mouse?! Running along here?!" Shakra stammered.
"No, it's a Diamond mouse. Look at the way she kind of glows..." Rashneil answered. As Shakra took a second glance at the stranger, she could tell Rashneil was right: she could just make out a white aura around the fleeing mouse.
The Diamond mouse passed their roof's house.
"C'mon!" Shakra stood up, taking Rashneil's paw. "We're leaving!"
"Wha--" the Emerald mouse sputtered. "No way! We could get caught! It's too dangerous to leave!"
"We're not 'leaving,' we're following that mouse!"
"Are you INSANE?!"
"Yep! Apparently! Now, let's go!" Shakra ran off, leading Rashneil around as they followed the mouse's direction on the roof.

The mouse darted to and from the streets. Here was one that shone like a ruby...there was one that had the rich deep purple of an amethyst.... Every single one left fellow mice gawking at her. But she couldn't pause to look. Right now, something was urging her onward, but she couldn't find this...forest that the voice kept talking about.
There's one more street; that's the one that takes you to the forest! the voice cried with the hint of leadership. The mouse sighed and went down the street that glittered like a moonstone. It seemed deserted; that was good. Even if it wasn't she'd be blended into the crowd. Well, unless they took a good, long look at the mouse.
Suddenly a mouse showed up at the end of the street. Behind him was the lush greens of the forest.
There it is!
She swerved around him, his gray hair ruffling. He looked behind, towards the forest, towards her. He opened his mouth to say something, but closed it. She smirked. Good. No one's gonna stop Akira when she's on her course. Specifically, that's me.
She halted at the crystalline lake. Another mouse jumped, startled. Akira looked at the greens, but saw nothing else. She paused, listening. Then,
she yelled something, facing away from the spectator.
"Who are you?!"
A rustling issued from a huge, leafy tree Its leaves gleamed like pearls.
"Show yourself!"

Rashneil and Shakra listened from within a bush. The Diamond mouse was literally screaming at a tree.
"She's crazy," Shakra muttered, and was shushed.
Something black issued from the tree. The mouse stepped back, shaking with fear.
"Obsidian!" Rashneil hissed. "Shakra, don't--" But it was too late. Shakra leaped from the bush, wielding an orange axe. Her friend sighed, and out came a jade-like staff. "Fine," she murmured, and followed Shakra.
"Leave her alone!" Shakra yelled at the thing, and it shrunk back. She swung blindly into the tree, hoping for a lucky hit. Rashneil had to pull her from the tree. Glass-like branches had been cut from it, leaving some of it bare.
"Calm yourself, Shakra," Rashneil snapped.
"That thing was gonna KILL her if we didn't step in, Rashneil!" she hissed with almost the same intensity as her friend's voice.

Melichu looked with horror. A Diamond mouse, Emerald mouse, and a Topaz mouse, within the premises of the Moonstone Pool? She had to get away before anything bad happened... She heard of mice that intruded the area and never came back.
All of a sudden, a low rumbling issued from the forest. "Run!" Melichu shouted. "Get out of here! Quickly!"
It worked; the group glanced upwards and ran into the street without taking a second look. She sighed. I'll have to find out who they are, she thought to herself.

Rashneil and Shakra crashed through the street with the Diamond mouse and slumped on the Main Square of the town, panting heavily.
"I'm not taking the blame for it this time," Rashneil wheezed.
Shakra looked over towards the mouse. "So, considering how we followed you, almost got caught, and literally almost got killed, why don't we get acquainted?" she asked.
"It's a pretty funny way to get acquainted, but I'll take it," came a reply.
"Okay! I'm Shakra, and this--" she gestured to her friend-- "is Rashneil."
"Nice to meet you. I'm Akira."
Rashneil straightened up. "Why were you running, anyway?"
Akira hesitated. Then she replied: "Well, this voice in my head told me to find a forest."
"So you are a Moonstone mouse!" Shakra cried.
"No she's not!" Rashneil snapped.
"Well, if she's not a Moonstone mouse--and this is going to be a crazy thought--then was Obsidian trying to kill Akira?" Shakra asked.
~End of Part 2~