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100 random things about me

List (In order of weird to weirdest)
100. I am only doing this because i am bored
99. I am 13 and crazy.
98. I been to 26 different countries
97. USA
96. India
95. Fiji
94. Singapore
93. Australia
92. Britian
91. Austria
90. France
89. Germany
88. Croatia
87. Italy
86. Slovenia
85. New Zealand
84. I forgot the rest.
83. I have two cats
82. papu
81. mitu
80. I took apart a speaker
79. I am indian...
78. ...but I wasn't born there
77. I am the most disliked girl in school.
76. I am the most disliked person in all my grades.
75. I love (food items) waffles
74. Chocolate
73. pomengranites
72 i love (other tangible stuff)
71. lightning
70. Cats
69. Lists that go backwards
68. the world
67. cumulonimbus clouds
66. nice people
65. The big red button
64. electricity
63. the TV
62. explosives
61. Greece (been there too)
60. What I know and like
59. More lightning
58. Greek Mythology
57. Walmarts and Ikeas
56. High Voltage
55. SIMPLE programming
54. Travelling
53. Making lists
52. Making word searches
51. pranking
50. AFV
49. meteorology
48. What I wanrt and probably going to get within a year
47. The new pokemon game
46. A SSTC
45. A good friend
What I want but probably wont get for a while
44. MIT scholarship
43. a lightning detector
42. to meet the Mythbusters
41. to meet the Storm Chasers from Discovery in person
40. To capture an even closer lightning strike on tape
39. To learn to draw
38. To learn to program properly
37. To be accepted for who I am
36. To learn to type.
35. To discover something important
34. to win the Copley medal
33. Weird things about me
32. I somewhat control lightning
31.I zap kids with high voltage.
30. I like the feeling of just that.
29. I am eccentric
28. I can get along with adults better than kids
27. I want a tesla coil more than a typical teenage girl would want to marry justin beiber
26. I despise him and every other teen disney character
25. I am a girl, which contradicts with everything I juust said.
24. I bit my kitty.
23. I write poetry
22. I build stuff
21. I am slightly perverted (looks at this one tree...)
20. I live in orlando, FL, right near disney, but hate it.
19. I love lightning, but terrified of millipedes, and red, especially red millipedes (remembers a few days ago; shudders)
18. I believe in ghosts.
17. I am learning french (C'est vrai.)
16. I always seem to be charged with static electricity
15. I hate sports
14. I still trick or treat.
13. This is my age.
12. i can eat almost anything
11. There is a whole 'nother list of weirder things 'bout me.
10. I am not geeky; rather a mad scientist
9. I never plan to marry (there is seldom a person like me that I can like)
8. I love extreme sports.
7. I am the Queen of Weirdness and Improvisation
6. I am scary when angry
5. I hate to read
4. I am so clumsy
3. I am scared of depth and large spaces
2. I am messed up, have no friends, incoordinated, play the piano and trombone, wants to mess with dangerous voltages, and a MAD MAD MAD scientist.
1. I sometimes zap myself.


All of thse hold true as of 10/ 09/ 10. This list may not be reproduced, unless allowd with my permission. All rights reserved.
XD sorry. Had to do that. But, they all do hold true.

Second more awesome story. READ FIRST STORY UNDER FIRST!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The storm returns
Ch 1- I practically caught on fire
I had no idea what was going to happen. I was just walking along with Izzy, and my hair practically caught on fire. Now I am sitting in her room, experiencing weird powers. Puzzled? Let me take you back to the beginning.
The day was bright and sunny. It was the first day of the school year. As I walked to school, I bumped into this strange girl. She was approximately 5 feet tall, had intense blue eyes, had yellowy blond hair, and a calming smile. I asked her name; she said Izzy. She was my neighbor. I also noticed that she had a faint electrical charge around her. I told her my name. “Hello, Izzy! What school do you go to?” I asked her. “Umm… I go to Grovington middle. Hey Abby?” She asked. “What?” I replied. “What grade are you in?” she questioned. “Uhh… seventh?” I replied. Then I asked her a casual question. “Hey Izzy, if you had a superpower what would it be?” She seemed somewhat hesitant. “Uhh, the weather calls for thunderstorms later today.” she changed the subject with a random statement.
Finally, we arrived at school. We picked up our schedules, only to find out we are in the same classes. “Yippee!” exclaimed Izzy. We went to our first class. Advanced Geography. We sat next to each other and waited for the bell to ring. Finally it did. A beefy teacher walked into the classroom. “Hello class! I am Mr. Oztrhaliuh! For today, we will be reviewing the Code of Conduct! Let’s begin with…” Finally, the class ended. The rest of the day was pretty much the same.
School ended. We walked out. As Izzy forecasted, I could see cumulonimbus clouds hanging above us. The sky wasn’t so dark. We started to walk home, talking about our first day. About halfway home, I looked up realizing the sky was darker than before. I started to joke about the intense color difference of the cloud and the sky and occasional jokes about Zeus.
Then, all of a sudden, my hair stood on end. No, I mean it literally stood on end. I didn’t see anything scary, and I noticed Izzy’s hair was on end too. I knew this phenomenon all too well. I like science, so I research a lot. And one thing I learned is that if dark clouds are above you and your hair stands on end, it means that lightning is going to strike nearby and you should take cover. I told Izzy what was happening, and we steered clear of trees and ducked down low. Nothing happened for a minute, so I looked up to see what was happening. Then, right where we were standing a few minutes ago, 7 feet away, there was a bright flash then a LOUD boom, and I felt a sight jolt. I looked up and saw a smoldering patch where the lightning just hit. I turned to Izzy. “That looked so cool, don’t…” I was cut off by a wide eye expression on Izzy’s face. “What?” I asked. Izzy held out a mirror and I looked at my hair. I screamed. My hair was lit on fire- fire that constantly changed colors. It went through the spectrum about 3 times before ending just as quickly and quietly as it started. “Probably St. Elmo’s fire. Quite common when lightning strikes.” Izzy said.
After 5 more minutes of panic and screaming, I finally calmed down and walked home with Izzy. I asked my mom if I could go to Izzy’s house. She said yes, if I tell her about my day. I explained to her my day, but left out the part about the lightning and the fire. I mean if you walked up to you mom and said “Hey mom! I nearly got hit by lightning and got my hair on fire!” that would send her into a panic attack, wouldn’t it?
So I headed to Izzy’s house. I decided to forget all what happened. I thought, “Hey, it happens. Ok, people sometimes nearly are hit by lightning and most of the time, live. I caught my hair on fire. I’m fine now. Nothing will happen due to this incident right?” I was wrong. Horribly, horribly wrong.
Ch 2- Izzy spills her secret
The weather really got worse and worse. Night fell. At one point there was a torrential downpour and almost continuous lightning. I was sitting on her balcony, looking at the lightning. Izzy came up to me and sat. I guess she likes bad weather too. Then I remembered an unanswered question from the morning. “Hey Izzy? If you had any superpower, what would it be?” I restated. There was that hesitant look again. Finally, she answered, “Umm, I don’t really want any.” Then I told her mine. “If I had a superpower, I’d control the weather. I mean, I could make a snowy, or sunny day any time I wanted. I could create bad weather like this!”
We heard a loud boom. I suspected lightning hit the roof and that was just thunder. I realized now the weather became even worse. I checked the weather on my cell phone. Without even the weatherman saying anything, one look on the Doppler radar, and I knew instantly, from my knowledge of meteorology, that when there is a “hook” in the radar, that means tornadoes will form. So I looked up to the sky one more time. Instead of what I expected to see- rear flank downdraft, rotating wall clouds, hail, et cetera, wait. I didn’t mean to say no rotating clouds. I looked and I immediately froze at what I saw. It was like something out of the beginning of the War of the Worlds movie. The clouds were violently spinning, and I could see lightning flashing within the clouds. Then, like the Day After Tomorrow movie, a huge tornado dropped down about ten miles in front of us, what looked like an EF5, probably more powerful. Then, about a dozen satellite tornadoes formed around it. Izzy told me to get inside the house. I refused and exclaimed “Izzy, this looks so cool! I wouldn’t miss it for the world!”
Then I heard Izzy whisper something. “This looks familiar. All too familiar.” Then, finally I said, “Izzy? What’s going on? Tell me, please. I’m your friend. I can keep any secret.” Izzy hesitated, but finally said, “Abby, if I tell you a secret, will you promise not to tell ANYONE? You have to ankle swear not to tell. But you are not going to believe me and think I am crazy.” So I did the ankle swear.
“How crazy can it be? It’s not like you are going to tell me that you have an amazing superpower and you went off to another planet to save it! Go ahead tell me.” I said. Izzy bit her lip. “Ummmmm…” she quietly said. Then she let out a sheepish smile. I decided to play along. “That is a wild imagination Izzy! So what is the ‘superpower’ you have?” I asked Izzy, doing air quotations with my fingers when I said the word superpower.
“I swear, Abby. I control electricity. I am not kidding. I knew that you would think I was crazy.” she said in a complaining voice. I stared at her for a few seconds. Then I said, “Prove it.”
Izzy stared at me. She grabbed my arm, and held her hand about 6 inches above my hand. I saw a tiny arc of electricity jump from her hand to mine. “OW!” I yelled. “Ok, ok, I believe you.”
I just stared at Izzy for at least 10 minutes. Then I looked at her as if she were an alien. Then I quietly stuttered, “H-how-w d-did t-that h-happen-n?” “Long story. Really long story.” she said. Then she started going on about how she found a blue ball that resembled ball lightning but it wasn’t, how she took it home, how she dreamed of a few characters, how the characters from her dream came to life, how the ball gave her powers, how she went off to save this planet named Anika, and how she fought an enemy simply named X. How a storm also helped X and flew off into space, went into the solar system, and she thinks X will target Earth. By the time she was finished, I couldn’t believe what I just heard.
Then she said, “Still don’t believe me? Let me show you then.” She pulled out a thing that looked like a metal stick with a webcam and two buttons on one end. One read ‘send’ and the other ‘receive’. Izzy was about to press the send button, when a tune played from the stick. Izzy pressed the receive button instead. Then a hologram image screen popped out of the long side of the stick. Izzy turned her back toward the storm.
“Izzy! We’ve just… oh… my… gosh.” said a now frozen-faced image of a tall girl in a yellow suit. She just stared at the Storm. “Is that… did it… could it be…?” said yellow-suit. “It sure is, EG, it sure is.” exclaimed Izzy. Then the girl named EG (Elastic Girl) turned to me. “Who is that?” questioned EG. “That… is Abby. She is a normal human,” answered Izzy. I stared at her, and whispered, “As if you weren’t.”
“EG, I have figured out that the storm is back. Wow, it looks stronger than before. If only we could slow it down for a while. I wonder what it wants from this planet. It seems angry. It’s as if it wants something,” said Izzy. “Izzy, we’ve just got recent news that X was separated from the storm during an asteroid collision few days back. X flew into a new, hot, burning star. Moreover, I have no idea how to stop the Storm from continuing! It’s like we have to have a weather controller to stop it now,” said EG. The conversation stopped briefly when lightning hit a tree nearby, sending burning wood shrapnel toward us. It missed us by an inch. “I just now got word from the oldest Anikan around that a thousand years before she was born, there used to be a bunch of weather controllers. One specific one was chosen to fight this storm, a similar one to this one. She couldn’t stop it, but she slowed it down.” suddenly said EG. “Did she?” asked Izzy. “SHE didn’t. Unfortunately she died.” replied EG. “How?” asked Izzy. “She was fighting something similar to X, who had the same powers. As she was summoning a tornado, X got so annoyed and wanted to kill her quick. So X zapped her with a bolt of lightning. She died instantly, but a legend says that her spirit lives in every thunderstorm, as a colorful fire thing, looking for a host to transfer her power too. It says that if lightning hits nearby, and your hair is on colorful fire, then her power transfers to you and she goes to her afterlife. The other weather controllers were so moved by her attempt that they and other Anikans went to fight X.” explained EG. “What happened?” asked Izzy. “X got totally PAWNED! OWNED! However you want to say it.” replied EG.
“Wait. Did you say something about colorful fire?” I said shaking too much. “Yes. However, it was just a myth. But there are at least 6 planets in your solar system that has lightning and so many other planets in the universe have it too. It’s not like… wait. Did you see it?” said EG.
“Dude, her hair caught on fire! Colorful fire! I think she is the one! Hey Abby, try it. Concentrate to make the storm stop!” exclaimed Izzy. So I did. I felt a warm fuzzy feeling inside, as I heard the storm die down. Then, silence. I opened my eyes to see a starry sky, as well as a fainted Izzy and a wide-eyed EG. Ten minutes later, when at least one of us were able to speak, EG finally said “You are now part Anikan. Just like Izzy.”

Ch 3- I meet Kurt
“The storm didn’t disappear forever. It’ll keep returning until we destroy its core power source. We don’t know what it is, but we know it’s there. Right now, it is water vapor in the air. Who knows when it will reform? A day? A week? A month? A year? A century? I don’t know exactly when it will reform. All I can say is what you warded off was a very weak standard of the cloud. It doesn’t know there are super-beings on the planet. So it let itself very weak. Now it will come back stronger than ever, trying to reach something. If I am not wrong, it wants to reach Orlando, Florida. Electricity seems to make it grow stronger. Orlando has the greatest showcase of that in the world. What is it? It wants to use Florida’s almost continuous summer lightning source to power itself up. I’m guessing it has a nasty plan too.,” said EG over the communicator, now out of breath. “Possibly.” said Izzy.
After a quick check of the news, we found out that school would be back in, since the tornadoes and lightning only damaged a small building far away. When we entered first period the next day, we saw a strange character in the class. He had dark blonde-brown hair, had a calm cute kind of face. And when I say cute, I mean puppy-cute, not boy-cute. He was about as tall as me, with jeans and a black T-shirt. He had his hands in his pocket, and he smiled at us. He sat next to Izzy and me. “Hey Izzy! Long time, no see!” he said. “Kurt...” said Izzy. “Yeah. I heard about the storm and how it stopped so suddenly. Who or what could’ve done that?” said Kurt. “Actually this is the person who did it.” said Izzy, pointing to me. Then we both explained what happened.
“So Abby is a weather controller who supposedly got her power that according to a myth that if lightning strikes near her and her hair catches on colorful fire will transfer the spirit of the first weather-girl who went to fight X but was fried by a bolt of lightning and her spirit searched the skies for a host worthy enough to transfer her power to?” questioned a now gasping Kurt.
“Yes.” said Izzy and I in unison. I made a tiny cumulus cloud to prove it. Now a fainted Kurt lied down in front of us. Mr. Oztrhaliuh said “Class turn to page VII in the textbook. This is an informative page about latitude and longitude. After that, read pages 1-16 and answer the ‘Reading Check’ questions at the end of the section.”, and then helped Kurt to the nurse.
In the next class, Advanced Science, Kurt was back. He still seemed a little confused about last period. “We are going to have a fun project in class. Each of you are going to grab 2 partners and I am going to assign you each a different topic. You can do a diorama, a poster board, or a Power Point on your topic. Its due two weeks from now. You can turn it in when you’re done if you are done early. Demonstrations will be done. Each one of you should choose three different topics to show what is going on in the scene. When I finish talking, you can get up and get your partners. Go.” said a thin, short, female teacher. She preferred to be called by her first name- Mrs. Kriptun. I immediately grabbed Kurt and Izzy. They wanted us to be partners anyway.
“Ok, class, settle down. I am going to choose a random topic for each group by pulling the category out of this hat. Gregory’s group- physics, Thomas’s group- Biology, Kelly’s group- Technology, Anna’s group- Astronomy, Gabby’s group- Etymology, Manuel’s group- Geology, and Abby’s group- Meteorology.” called out Mrs. Kriptun.
One look, and we had the same crazy idea. We went to our other classes together for the rest of the day. For those who care, our schedules were like this-
P1- Adv. Geog. - Mr. Oztrhaliuh
P2- Adv. Sci. – Mrs. Kriptun
P3- Adv. LA. – Mrs. Buks (pronounced “books”)
P4- PE- Mr. Driller
P5- Adv. Math- Mrs. Adder
P6- Band- Mrs. Hornblower (Izzy plays trumpet, Kurt the clarinet and I play piano)
P7- Gifted math and science. – Mrs. Tuff.
We asked our parents if we could go to Izzy’s house. Why? Remember our crazy idea? Yeah. Since I’m a weather controller, Kurt a water controller and Izzy an electric controller, we had decided on making a thunderstorm scene. We took a cardboard box with a round hole in the bottom, and placed a glass plate of a similar size on top of it. We trimmed the box so it was one inch tall. We slid a pipe to attach to the hole. We decorated it, complete with a small lake, house mini tree, and person. The house even came with its own car, chimney and lightning rod. Our plan was for me to make a cumulonimbus cloud, while Kurt supplies the rain putting his hand in the cloud, and Izzy supplies the lightning by the same technique as Kurt. We tried it out, but the first time was a disaster. Kurt had accidentally let out a gush of water at the same time Izzy made a spark, which caused Kurt to get zapped. Kurt got up ten minutes later from his unconscious state, and redid the test. Kurt let out a mist this time, which looked exactly like rain on the small scale. We needed a slight change of design because Izzy’s lightning had made a near fire on the house. It also vaporized the person, which rather looked wrong to me. Therefore, we made everything out of plastic, except the tree, which was a mini real tree. We tested it again, and it worked. I was to say about the formation of clouds, Kurt was to say about rain, and Izzy was to spill her knowledge of lightning. I left the cumulonimbus cloud, because it might look weird to the other kids to see me making a cloud out of thin air.
The next day, we demonstrated our projects in class. We made the rain flood the lake, and the lightning to hit the tree, car, lightning rod and person (The people in the classroom stared at that.) “That might happen in real life,” said Izzy. Then we explained the processes in real life situations. Mrs. Kriptun was so amazed by the realism, accurateness, and speed of our projects. “How did you create the cloud and lightning, and make the rain so misty?” she asked. “That… remains a secret.” we said. “A+ for you guys! Class, they’ve shown that they can create a nice example. You can create as nice work as they can, if you try. Let this be a motivation.” said Mrs. Kriptun.
The weather started getting too ominous above. We heard a rumble of thunder in the distance. “Just a thunderstorm, there is no need to worry. You did a project on it so you should know what is going on” said Mrs. Kriptun.
Izzy and I didn’t think so. “You guys are just being pessimistic. We get thunderstorms very often. It is most probably not the Storm.,” said Kurt. “You’re right. We can’t go around thinking every storm is the Storm.” I said. Izzy agreed. Once again, we were wrong.
That night, we spent the night at my house. The storm got worse and worse. “Are you sure that isn’t the storm?” I asked Kurt. He seemed to begin to think he was wrong. “I’m only human… sort of. We make mistakes.,” he said. “Abby, go outside and try to cease the storm.” said Izzy.
So I went outside to try to stop it. I put my palms together, held my hands up to the cloud, and concentrated to calm it down. However, nothing happened. Then, all of a sudden, I heard a loud rumble. Was it thunder? No, it was a rocket ship. On the side of it were the words: Planet Anika. Izzy and Kurt came out of the house screaming, “Are you OK?”
When the ship landed, eight weirdly dressed people came out. One of them was on all fours. I then noticed that there were seven people- the ones that Izzy told about, and a strange animal of some sort. I will describe it. The animal was about as tall as a four year old. It was yellow, and fuzzy, with uneven black vertical stripes, like a tabby. The markings on one of his sides and forehead were slightly different from a tabby’s’ too. On one of its sides, was a typical “lightning bolt” marking. On its fore head, its stripes seemed to arrange itself into the symbol for ‘high-voltage’. Its tail was long, and split into two ends, with no hair on the ends, which showed a sickly shade of blue. Its face was somewhat cute: big brown eyes, a funny little smile with tiny fangs, a black lion-like nose, and long whiskers. It had horns, about 4 inches in length. Its paws were humongous. EG, who was taller in real life, said, “It is called a Milotar. His name is Sparky. Not very common for a pet, but it is one of the animals inhabiting Anika. Say hello Sparky.” Sparky came up to me and started to purr. He rubbed his head against me, affectionately. When he did that, I heard a crackling noise. I am guessing he is charged with a bit of static electricity.
“Izzy, Abby, Kurt, we have to stop this storm. We don’t know what it will do with Florida’s lightning supply, but it has to be a nefarious plan. Orlando is just 30 miles away. And it is still the thunderstorm season. We have to stop it, before it destroys us all! Oh, and the rest of the world, too.” spoke the person named Bat Boy (how original), BB for short.
Ch 4- We start to fight the storm
EG and the others slept in their ship, putting a cloaking device on it, so no one would see it. My mom was still asleep, which I do not know how she did with all the noise. In the morning, the storm was not any better. Although the system moved a bit more down south, it still hovered over us.
To fight the Storm, EG stopped the time in my house and Izzy’s house because we didn’t want any conflict with our mothers. “Abby, try to fly.” said EG. “What?” I said. “Fly. Even a part Anikan can.” said EG, snickering at her own comment. I concentrated on flying, but I couldn’t. I remembered that air flow on airplanes cause it to fly in desired directions (another trivial fact I know). So I lie down onto the floor, and concentrate on the wind to blow me up. Sure enough, it did. I found myself 100 feet in the air. “Isn’t this dangerous?” I yelled. “I mean, there is still a lot of lightning.” “Not to worry. SG, Solar Girl, will shield us,” said EG
At that moment, lightning flashed 3 feet in front of me, which caused me to be a little burnt. I stopped panicking and shouted, “Are you sure?”
So then, we were on our way. “Wait. What about Sparky?” I said. A big paw laid its hand on me. “He can fly?” I said in amazement, looking at the 300-pound Milotar. “Yes. All Anikans fly” said FG, Firegirl. “So then, since Sparky is Anikan, he can fly. It still confused me, as it defied the laws of physics. The higher we got, the windier it was. I tried my best to die the wind down. It was easy for me to fly, since I fly on support of rising air currents, but the others seemed to have a little trouble flying. The lightning shield did work though. Lightning had struck the shield, and like a Faraday cage, the current arced across the shield and discharged harmlessly to the ground.
“Where exactly are we going?” Izzy asked EG. “I don’t know where we are. All I know is that we want to head to Florida. Aren’t you using a GPS? I was following you!” she replied. Then, Izzy’s pager started beeping. A weird girl appeared on the screen. She then said “I just finished researching and studying the storm. Apparently, it wants to use the lightning to destroy Earth and conquer it for a home base. It wants to grow stronger there, take revenge on Anika, destroy our planet too, and set a second base here to destroy and conquer for bases the other planets in the area! You have to…”
A strong gust of wind blew us terribly off course. There was a bright white flash, followed by a deafening boom. This caused an electromagnetic pulse that terminated our signal. The only possibility was a superbolt (for those of you that don’t know about lightning, a superbolt is a streak of lightning with hundreds the times more energy and force than a normal lightning bolt.). We plummeted to the ground. How high up were we? It doesn’t matter how high up we were after falling for fourteen seconds, and we have. We have already reached terminal velocity. Then, I blacked out.
We woke up in a wet marshland, who-knows-where. It was pitch-black, except for the light of an occasional streak of lightning. I don’t know how we weren’t dead. I looked down, and through the light of a streak of lightning, I saw why. Mud. Deep mud. It absorbed the force of our fall. Yuk. Everyone else was covered in mud too. We walked out of the marsh, onto solid land. It was an open- field, with a distant forest. Nowhere near Grovington, I thought. “Yeah great. We are standing in an open-field during a severe electrical storm, with metal tools all over us. SG’s shield is broken, and it won’t reform for a day or so.” Said BB. We weren’t covered in metal, but instead mud. We had Kurt and WB (Waterboy) to blast us clean. FG evaporated the water. “How ‘bout Sparky?” I reminded them. “Yes, we shouldn’t forget him! Sparky! Here boy! Sparky? Where are you?” called EG. Sparky was nowhere to be seen. But in the distant forest, we heard a loud whine. “Sparky!” yelled EG. She started running into the field, so I grabbed her. No use to a friend who is elastic. “EG! Seriously! Wait for us.” I said. And we need to spread twenty feet apart to avoid attracting lightning. “Wait. We can’t just walk into an open field without getting hit by lightning!” said Kurt, who seemed uneasy. “You’re right. How ‘bout RUN!” said WB, who also seemed uneasy.
So there we were, running in an open-field in an electrical storm. This wasn’t smart either, because lightning also tends to hit moving objects more than stationary objects. I looked at Izzy, whose hair stood on end. “Everybody, lightning is about to hit somewhere. Duck down.” I yelled. Too late. I saw a bright white flash above Izzy, and then heard a boom of loud thunder. The lightning had directly hit Izzy. She muttered a word that I am not allowed to say. But she didn’t seem hurt at all. However, she looked a little dazed though. I looked back at Kurt and WB. They seemed a lot more scared than Izzy was. It took ten minutes to get them to speak a word.
“Abby, water avatars will die instantly by even a jolt of .1 amperes. Kurt and I are both water avatars. Izzy and other electric avatars won’t even have a scratch from even lightning. They may seem a bit dazed, but if that had hit either of us, we would have been vaporized. The other avatars will get the same effect of lightning on them as humans. Except for probably you Abby. You would have the effect but you wouldn’t die. That is why we have been uneasy around the Storm. We might not even survive this trip.” Said WB. Kurt was still frozen, so FG gave him a little burn. “OW! You didn’t have to do that!” he said. Izzy got up. I noticed she was sparking. I probably thought that since the ground was positively charged, and she was negatively charged, physics took over. That thought brought up lightning facts. I was about to say a few of them, when lightning hit again a spot ten feet away. I noticed it didn’t only leave a scorch mark, but also 3 figures rose from the spot. I then noticed that they were clouds, about ten feet tall. Saying how my life has been going so far, anything seems possible. I thought to myself.
“Izzy! We have came prepared this time! We will get Florida’s lightning supply! This time, you will not stop us with an elementary force electric arcs!” said a cloud being. Izzy groaned. “Not you guys again.” She said. “C’mon! Zap us! Or are you too chicken? BAWK BUK BUK BUK BRAWK! ” said the cloud being on the right. Then I realized what they were trying to do. Reverse psychology. They wanted the electric current to increase their size, the same way they wanted Florida’s lightning supply. They kept coaxing Izzy to zap them. Finally, Izzy cracked. “You think I cannot generate lightning-force arcs? Oh, I am very capable of that. I’ll show you lightning!”
“Izzy, no!” I yelled. But she had already shot a lightning bolt that made Zeus look like a woolen winter coat. When I looked back at the clouds, they had increased their size twelve times. “FOOLISH GIRL!” the cloud being bellowed. They then did something unexpected. They piled themselves vertically, so now they towered approximately three-hundred-sixty feet in the air. They were trying to form a lightning rod. If a superbolt were to hit them, they would grow so large and squash us. I had to think fast. They are made of water droplets. Water will evaporate at 212 degrees Fahrenheit. Since electricity enlarges it, I can’t use that as a heat source. The only other option is… Then I realized what we had to do. “FG! Shoot a column of flame at it!” I yelled. “Why?” she said. “JUST DO IT!” I yelled. So she did The air turned orange and hot for a moment. I shielded my eyes. When I opened them, the clouds were gone.
“We should go now! Sparky is waiting.” Said EG. We ran into the forest. We were searching for about an hour. Then, a fluffy, yellow with black striped object came into view. Sparky’s tail was trapped under a rock. He lifted his head and looked at me. “RRRREOWWRR!” he moaned. “Rockboy(RB), do something!” said EG. So RB blasted through the rock with a single sidekick. Sparky jumped up and bounded towards EG, and tackled her. If she weren’t elastic, she’d have been squashed. Sparky jumped up from her and bounded towards me. I noticed something about him. Between his horns and tail, was a small electric arc. That’s probably his namesake and explain the markings on his forehead and side.
“Sparky, no boy. Bad Milotar. Don’t squash Abby. No. Bad...!” I yelled. If you have been hit by a car that is charged with 5000 volts, you have a pretty good idea of what being tackled by a Milotar is like. “ Yoo-u-cr-aazz-yyyy-Mi-i-l-o-t-aaaa-rrr-get-offa-meee” I yelled as much as I could. He started licking me affectionately. Sparky was pulled off of me by EG. “Bad boy. No zapping or tackling Abby.” She said. When she stroked Sparky, well, he sparked. “Looks like he is all right.” I said. Kurt yawned. “I’m sleepy. Let’s continue in the morning.” He said. So we fell asleep.
Ch- 5 We go off to Florida
The next morning was beautiful. Warm, sunny, wait. Where is the Storm? I woke everyone up. “Oh no. Where is it now?” said Earthboy(EB). Izzy checked the News 13 weather, as it was some minte ending with the number “1”, on her IPhone. The meteorologist had started to speak. “Well, over the Atlantic ocean, there is a very severe electrical storm headed this way. As soon as it hits land, it is supposed to be the strongest, most powerful, most dangerous thunderstorm ever recorded! There will be at least 60 cloud-to-ground lightning strikes a second, and at least 100 cloud-to-cloud strikes a second. This system is moving northwest at a speed of one mile an hour, expected to hit land tomorrow late afternoon. Over land, a crazy supercell has formed, that is producing torrential rain and tornadoes. The supercell will continue southeast towards Florida at 30 miles an hour. The two storms will merge over the I-4 corridor, forming a long band of storms, stretching from Orlando to Gainesville. You need to storm-proof your house. To buy storm windows and surge protectors, call…”
“Oh no. It has almost reached. We need to hurry. If it gets Florida’s lightning supply, it will control the lightning to destroy the residents and buildings, and then continue TO DESTROY THE WORLD!” said EG. “Ok, I got a little overdramatic, didn’t I?”
“The question is, where are we?” I said. Izzy pulled out her pager, and transformed it into a GPS. “There isn’t any signal. But I am guessing we are in Georgia, at Lake Okefenokee. Way north of Grovington.” Said Izzy. Then she transformed it into a compass. “Southeast is that way.” She said.
Everyone took off. But for some reason, I couldn’t. “Silly me! It’s an area of high pressure now! There won’t be any updrafts.” I said. I created a small area of low pressure above me, and then created a cumulus cloud. I needed the cloud to be above me all times, so I just stayed in it. I created another layer of stratus clouds below us, because it would look weird for a bunch of teens and kids and a cat-like thing to be flying 2000 feet above the ground. I wonder what people thought about a cloud appearing out of nowhere but it would look less strange at least.
We continued moving in this lost direction for hours together until we saw a weird wave-like cirrus cloud. We looked ahead and saw the body of what I realized as a cumulonimbus cloud. It wasn’t the storm. It was far too small. It’s a satellite cell (a smaller thunderstorm that forms around a larger one), I thought. “We can go under it, and risk getting caught. We could go over it, and risk choking to death because of lack of oxygen. We could go around it, and risk being delayed. Or we could go through it, and risk high winds, freezing rain, and lightning strikes. Our best bet is through it, if SG’s shield is working. But that only protects us from the lightning.” Said BB.
“I say we take the risk of flying through the thunderstorm. It’s less risky than the other options.” Said EB. “Is your shield working SG?”
“Barely. It’s enough to shield me and two others.” She replied.
“Good. We need it for WB and Kurt. They can’t risk the lightning. We have to bear the freezing rain, wind, hail, and lightning. Poor Izzy and Sparky, although. They will attract a lot of lightning.” He said.
SG let out her shield. Kurt and WB flew into it. As we got closer to the thunderstorm, our hair rose. At a distance of ten miles, an arc of lightning flashed past us, singeing our hair. We increased our speed. Despite the humidity, the air got more and more charged as we flew closer to it. After twenty minutes, we were close to the cloud. Sparky started whimpering. I rubbed his fur, finding it to be wet. “FG, Can you make a small fire near Sparky so that his fur isn’t wet?” I asked. A small flame appeared next to Sparky. It seemed to calm him down.
We got closer and closer to the storm, and then PIFF. We were in the cloud. We stayed twenty feet apart to avoid attracting lightning (lightning will hit an area where people are crowded together because of increased conductivity). We were dodging hail, fighting the wind (although I had no trouble flying), drenched in rain, and evading the lightning. At least everyone but Izzy and Sparky were dodging the lightning. We evaded every lightning bolt, at least thirty so far, in the past ten minutes. Yeah, it’s three strikes a minute, but we managed it. But for every two bolts we dodged, one directly hit Izzy or Sparky. I hope what WB said was true. Outside she might look fine, but I’ve heard from the news of people getting hit by lightning saying they are fine, they look fine, but after a while, they get a heart attack. A huge hailstone smacked my head. “Ow.” I quietly said.
That’s how it went for the next hour (For those that’d want to calculate the amount of times Izzy and Sparky got hit by lightning, I’ll do it for you. That is 30 hits to each [60 total]). We plummeted out of the cloud. By then, Izzy had first-degree burns. “Aww, it’s nothing. It’ll disappear after a while.” She said.
“Well at least we were going the right way. Look! There is Disney! And there is the Storm! Its anvil is so high! Extending way above the stratosphere!” I said. I looked in the direction opposite to the Storm, on the horizon. Sure enough, a storm was brewing, and I could see heat lightning in the clouds. If I have to see one more flash of lightning, I will puke, I thought.
“We need to find the core of the storm to destroy. If we don’t stop the core and completely destroy it, it will reach the lightning storm and use its energy to conquer the universe, one planet at a time. It may take days to get a hold and control of the googolplexes of watts of energy and zap the universe. We can’t fly into wait…” I said. “Why can’t I just stop the lightning storm?” I said. “Oh, I am SO stupid! @&$%!”
“There is no need for cussing. Especially THAT word. But you got a point.” Said Kurt. So I looked at the lightning storm and concentrated it to stop. For some reason, it was resisting. Resisting? A lightning storm? Why not CONDUCT? I made a funny! I thought. “The Storm must be already slightly controlling it. It wants it BAD.” I said.
“I will inform our messenger in Anika to ask a scientists to do some research on the Storms’ core power. Only then, we can destroy it completely.” Said EG. She took Izzy’s pager and did just that. “This’ll take a few hours. Why not kick it in Disney for now? We’ll land in Animal Kingdom, in a more remote area. But Sparky has to hide.” Said Izzy. Sparky whimpered, sad to miss out the fun. We’re only going to be there for an hour or so. What’s the worst that could happen? I thought. Unfortunately, there is no wood to knock on a thousand feet in the air.
Ch-6 We get delayed because of Disney
We had to pretend to skydive into the parks’ wild animal area, behind trees to prevent arousing suspicion. “Get out of your costumes! Put these clothes on!” I said. Don’t ask how or why I had them. Okay, I always like to be prepared. Happy? I had brought along a purse, and there just happened to be eight sets of clothes in them. They were for both genders. I gave them to the rest of the team. The boys changed behind a bush. The girls changed here. We wandered to the edge of the area and got out. “Animal Kingdom is boring. Let’s go to Epcot. It has more rides” Said SG. So we took the shuttle to Epcot. We went to the Epcot ball, where Space Mountain, a superfast indoor rollercoaster, in a pitch-black room. We waited in line. We finally got on the ride. It started to accelerate. “This’ll be fun!” said a little boy next to me. He was the only other full human on the car. We then moved faster and faster to a point I couldn’t move or even blink. “Eeeeeeeeeeeyyyahoooooo!” I yelled. The ride slowed to a stop a little too quickly. I was squashed to the safety bar. I hate inertia and momentum, I thought. It wasn’t the end of the ride either. It was literally stuck, on a track with cars zooming at a hundred miles an hour. I leaned to BB. “We need to get this kid off of the track without him knowing we have powers. I think I have an idea. The rumble of the next car came into range. We had about half-a-minute to fix the car before the other car crashes into this one. “I think its main wire got cut. Check the back Izzy. These normally use a very high-voltage current, so just do your stuff.” I said. I hoped I was right. I was. We hurtled faster than you would think this thing would go. We slowed to a stop at the entry-exit place. “I guess it worked.” I told the little kid, hoping he didn’t understand what Izzy did. We exited Space Mountain. Little had we known how much time had passed and how much Izzy’s pager was ringing. We picked it up. “What took you? I have been waiting for an hour!” said the messenger. “ It’s been that long? Long story.” I replied. “Well, anyways, the scientist said that the core power source is a large, powerful cloud-being. It resides on the top center of the cloud, but you can’t reach it without choking to death because of lack of oxygen. You can’t use pressurized cylinders either. If you were to be hit by lightning or even nearly, it would explode. You have to wait until it comes down to challenge you, or play Zeus and throw lightning. I say, as soon as it gets the supply and drops down, fight it. Fight it with all your might. Dodge the lightning. Other than that, I have no help.”
I looked up. It was bright. Not with sunlight, but lightning. So… much… lightning. You know, even though I saw far too much lightning in the past week, I still like it. Izzy and I looked up. We were mesmerized. “It looks so nice. Ahh. If only everyday was like this.” I told Izzy. WB and Kurt were mesmerized, too. But I guess it was fear. They ran inside the gift shop. Everyone stood close to Izzy (this particular storm emits negative lightning. Since like charges repel, we stayed close to Izzy). Her aura of negative charge acted like a shield against the lightning, as we saw an arc of lightning aimed right at us that twisted wildly at an angle away from us, and hit a nearby lightning rod. “Let’s get Sparky. The other animals probably annoyed him to a point where he hurt them by now. Probably he has even killed some. Hopefully the rangers blame the lightning.” Said EG. She knocked on wood. We found Sparky chewing on a rodent. We let him finish eating it and we took him. We passed by a dead deer too. Sparky did kill a few animals.
They started closing tall rides and roller coasters for safety. “Bah. Who needs lightning safety? Not me!” I thought. I saw that the lightning got more and more intense. “I hope nobody was golfing or fishing or holding a broken umbrella.” I said. The cloud seemed to want to destroy everything everywhere. Lightning hit a tower far away, and blasted it to bits. “Ooh. I hope no one was in the building at the time!” said EG. The same boy we saw earlier in Space Mountain was standing about twenty feet away. Then lightning hit ten feet from him. I never suspected a first grader to cuss every possible dirty word there is. He ran into the gift shop. Then I noticed something. The lightning seemed to try to hit the people, but it miserably failed. Then something weird happened. The lightning paused. Then all of a sudden, a lightning bolt streaked by us and hit Sparky. He shook it off, but he is negatively charged. The only possibility was a positive lightning bolt. Izzy takes a whole hour to convert her charge. We separated from Izzy, and just in time too. She attracted at least one-hundred lightning bolts, in three minutes. By the time the show was done, the hair was singed off our arms, and Izzy’s golden-blonde hair got very black on the edges. “This must be the con of having electric powers.” Said Izzy. We still had a residual electrical charge on us. We started sneezing like crazy, because of the charge irritating our nose hairs.
Ch 7- We try to fight the Storm
The clouds started twisting downwards. Sparky whimpered and winced. “Is that a tornado?” said a man next to us. “No, it is a swirling ball that is travelling downwards with enough electrical energy to zap everyone in Florida to death.” I said to him. “Huh?” he said. “No really look!” I said. The man saw what I pointed to, and he screamed and scurried to the gift shop. “The gift shop seems to be the refuge for the pussycats.” I told Izzy. I watched the churning, black, ball of cloud and charge, charged with millions of googolplexes of volts, drift slowly to the ground. It was massive! I couldn’t believe it. It probably spanned three miles! “Is that the main cloud being? “How are we going to fight it? It’s monstrous! This won’t be like the teeny ones we saw earlier. This dude will be nearly impossible to defeat! How the heck are we supposed to defeat it?” I said. We were contemplating that idea for about a minute. “I could go up to it with Sparky and drain it of its energy. It’s probably suicide, but I have to do it. Then we could destroy it, after Abby weakening it a little bit.” Said Izzy. “No, it has far too much energy concentrated into a tiny ball. It will fry you.” I said. “Besides, we are down two members of the team. We can’t risk Kurt and WB with the lightning. We can’t risk losing them. We aren’t going to lose you either. We will either win the battle together, or go down fighting it together.”
We looked back at the ball. It grew three times in size! Let me put it this way. It increased its volume eight times. When that Anikan said “large”, I thought she meant “fairly large”, not “so large that it looks as if it will engulf Orlando with a swirling mass of electric charge and H2O vapor”. Then I had an idea. “We could combine our total power and destroy it. I could lower its defenses, Izzy and Sparky be the lightning rods, EB shoots leaves for combustion, and FG shoots fire to combust the leaves, to vaporize some of the water. SG could spotlight it, blinding it, EG parries its direct attacks, BB flaps his wings fast to slow it down, and RB could toss some rocks at it to distract it. WB and Kurt have to cower in the gift shop. I hope this works.” I said.
“Well, there is only one way to find out. Come on.” Said Izzy. She seemed very disturbed when I asked her to be the lightning rod. We flew toward it. I think the people will be a little too delusional from the lightning to understand that we were flying. The cloud being took form. I stared at the cloud. I concentrated on it to stop. BB started flapping his wings. It seemed to annoy him a little. It growled in pain and swatted. EG parried the attack. It started firing lightning at us. Izzy groaned once again at the fact that she and Sparky had to be the lightning rods. She and Sparky went and bared the strikes. The thing growled, angry that it is missing us. It sent a superbolt, which hit Sparky’s horn. He hissed and swatted. That wasn’t a good idea. The cloud being grabbed him. Sparky started to bite it. That only annoyed it, but it didn’t seem to be hurting either of them. “He sure is smart, not zapping it. Quick, RB, toss some rocks at it. You need to make him drop Sparky! He’ll get hurt, otherwise!” Said a frantic EG. She spoke too soon. The cloud squeezed harder. “REROOOWWWRRR!” called Sparky. He was obviously in pain. “RB! NOW! CAN’T YOU SEE HE IS HURT?” she screamed. RB closed his eyes. I heard a rumbling in the ground. Three ten-ton boulders came into view. He tossed the boulders at the cloud being. Instinctively, it dropped Sparky and caught the boulders. EG went rushing after the unconscious, falling Milotar. “SPAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRKKKKKKKKYYYYYYYYYYYYY!” She yelled, as she hurtled downwards to her beloved pet. She couldn’t keep up with him. She stretched her arms thirty feet and caught him. She struggled to lift him up. I went down to her. “He’s badly hurt. I have to tend to him. You just have to work with the others, without me. I will take him down to the now abandoned gift shop, where Kurt and WB can help me revive him, without touching him.” Said EG. She flew down to the gift shop. I flew back up to concentrate on the cloud. I just had to stop it somehow. The cloud being heaved the rock, with ȕberprecise (extremely accurate) aiming. It slammed into RB, and he tumbled down. He groaned, pointed to the gift shop, and flew in there. “Great. Another one down.” I said. EB tossed leaves into the air and FG lit them. Then EB tossed the fireballs into the cloud. That was supposed to be the plan to destroy it. It seemed to hurt it a little, but not totally. Its rage was building. SG somehow created a beam of sunlight, in an attempt to blind it, to make its aiming off. EB and FG kept doing their process. SG’s attempt to blind it worked for a moment. The cloud being looked away, swatting at us. Then it got angry. It grabbed the three of them. He held them in his ginormus hands. He held them for about a minute, and then let go. He had suffocated them with his intense electric charge. They fell to the ground. I caught them, and flew them over to the gift shop, where EG will tend to them. I flew back up to the cloud. I growled at it, angrier than ever. I also noticed that it wasn’t firing lightning anymore, which was good, since Izzy looked like she was in a bad shape now. BB was getting tired of flapping his wings. The cloud being made it rain on him, making him wet and unable to flap. “Abby and Izzy! It’s up to you now.” He said. He could only glide downwards in his state. He was also exhausted. He went into the gift shop. I got so angry. I stared at the cloud. I had been so angry, that I had forgotten to concentrate on it. So I did. It growled. Now I understood why he wasn’t shooting lightning. He was conserving his charge to destroy me. He looked at me. Izzy looked as if she was ready to collapse. “Even though she can bear a lightning strike, is there a limit to how many she can bear at once” I thought. The cloud being balled his fist, and it began to spark. He was going to discharge all of his charge all at once. “HEH-HEH-HEH. I GOT YOU NOW! THERE IS NO ESCAPE NOW!” It bellowed. It put his fists together. “SAY BYE-BYE!” It bellowed. “NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!” screamed Izzy. The cloud being released the most spectacular bolt of lightning I have ever seen. I couldn’t even begin to imagine its voltage. I braced for impact. But I didn’t feel anything. I looked down and Izzy was falling. I immediately grabbed her and screamed. “Izzy, no!” She was breathing, but severely hurt and unconscious. I flew down to the gift shop and gave her to EG. I was alone, now. I flew back to the cloud. “GRAWR. THAT’S NOT … SHE WASN’T… OH @#$*!” It growled. Anger filled me. I had new-found energy and strength. “YOU! YOU CAN SPLIT US UP, DRIVE US THROUGH TROUBLE, BUT NEVER, WILL I LET YOU HARM MY FRIENDS.” I screamed. I totally lost control of my anger. I used this new-found energy and released it in a form of pure, white light, aimed directly at it. “RAAAAAAAAAARGH!” it yelled, in pain. Then all was quiet. I looked up and around. No cloud being. It was over. Then, I blacked out, and fell.
Ch 8- I discover my true power
I woke up in the gift shop. It was day. “She’s awake,” said BB. “Is everyone ok?” I asked. “Yeah, everyone but Izzy. She is still unconscious. That was one of the bravest things I have ever seen. You guys rock.” Said EG. “What did you do up there? I saw that bright, white light. Pure energy. I thought that was a myth.”
“What myth?” I asked. “A long, long time ago, the oldest Anikan’s grandmother, foretold a part-Anikan that will be the only one for 10,000 years, will receive the power to control his or her prana (life force). This will allow them to have any power of the six elements- water, fire, earth/plants, air, ether/space/time, and electricity, and then including your current one. But it will only come to a person who is the strongest. A second one will come along, who will never die by an outside force. This one will be the bravest.” Said EG. “I think you are the first one, and Izzy is the second. Try, Abby. Try and heal Izzy. Wake her up from her comatose state, and heal her.”
I went up to Izzy. She had burns all over her, and she looked like she was in pain. I held her hand. “Izzy, I know that you can hear me. Please, wake up.” I said. I started crying. She might die by an inside force, like a heart attack or starvation or something.“Izzy, please. Wake up. You’re my best friend. I won’t let you go. Pl-ee-he-hease…” I sobbed. What I wasn’t aware of was that wherever my tears landed on her, her burns faded. I felt warm inside, but I thought it was my own body heat. I continued crying. “Ugh… Abby? Is that you?” said Izzy. I stopped crying and looked up. “IZZY! YOU’RE OK!” I yelled. I hugged her. “That… what you did up there…protecting me from that million gigawatt lightning… that was really brave. Thank you Izzy. You certainly are the bravest Anikan, Izzy. You deserve to be both the first and second one, but you are only the second one.” I said. “Huh?”She said. EG explained to Izzy.
“…and you deserve to be the second one.” EG concluded. “Wow, you really think so? Thank you.” Said Izzy. “And thank you, Abby for reviving me. If it weren’t for you…who knows what could have happened?”
“You’re welcome. I will never let my best friend die when she can be helped. I will NEVER ever allow you to get killed.” I said. I noticed Izzy’s burns were gone too. Izzy was completely healed. “I am pretty sure that the people would have been too delusional from the lightning and thought they imagined the cloud being. They will blame the destruction on the lightning. Knock on wood!” I said, knocking on wood.
Izzy got out of the cot. “C’mere” I said. “Give me a hug!” I ran up to Izzy, and gave a hg of success. “Hopefully school isn’t cancelled due to this. That would mean masses of make-up work.
“Well, I guess this is it, for a while at least. EG, Sparky, and the rest of y’all, I’m really gonna’ miss you guys.” I said. “But who knows? Maybe tomorrow will lead us to another adventure. Maybe we’ll meet again sooner than you think,” said EG. And with that, they boarded the rocket. “Oh, wait! I almost forgot!” said EG. She pulled out something and pressed a button on it. “That’ll keep your mohers and fathers un-frozen!” I thanked them, and Kurt and I waved goodbye. “Bye!”, said Izzy. They then took off and hurtled through the mesosphere. “I’m going to miss them.” I said. “But you may see them very soon. ‘cause who knows what can happen in a nanosecond. Anything, that’s what. So don’t give that long face, and be happy!” said Izzy.
“Well, I guess I’ll be going now. Good bye,” said Kurt. We headed home. Where there used to be a small wooded area, was now a smoldering patch of burnt pine trees, proving the lightning storm. I went into the house. I was about to go up to my room, when my mom called me over. “Honey, did you hear about a lightning storm yesterday? I really do not remember a lightning storm. In fact, I don’t remember anything that happened for a long time. Oh well. I just wanted to ask, that Did you get to see the storm?” “You bet I did.” I replied. I ran up to my room, jumped on my bed and checked News 13. It wasn’t time for Weather on the 1’s yet, but still they talked about yesterday’s lightning-y weather. “I wonder” I said. “What do you call it when lightning is occurring outside? Lightning-ing?”
The reporter was talking about how lightning caused many small areas to be on fire, but no big fires were documented. In these fires, no injuries or deaths were reported. Surprisingly, only one man suffered from the lightning. He is alive and recovering…” I changed the channel to News 9, where they announced the schools that were open, and not. “The schools open are on the screen. Check it, so you won’t send your kids to a school closed on accident.” I checked the list. Grovington was on the closed list, as a bolt of lightning had hit a nearby tree, which evidently fell on the “900 Building” wing. It caused minor structural damage, and school should be in after four days, and since it was Thursday, that would mean Monday, school would restart.
I went to Izzy to tell her. “I actually want school to open now. I want a normal life, for at least a week. Ever since I met them, I didn’t have a full amount of time to rest.” She said. “I have a feeling it’s going to be at least a week-and-a-half.” I said. “ A half more than a week? L-O-L, you crack me up. Anyways, on a random thought, I don’t think I’ll be watching or making lightning for a while. A few days that is!” Izzy said.
“Well, let’s leave that to fate, and let’s go do something.” Asked Izzy. I got a fifty on me. You?” “Seventy. Wanna go get some ice-cream?” “Sure!” she replied, and off we went.

First crappy story

When my dream came real

Ch. 1- Izzy
Yes, it started out like any other day, but Izzy didn`t know what was up for her. She walked to school on September 23rd, 2008. “Hmm… what should I do after school today?” thought Izzy. Through the steps to school, (Izzy counted 345 steps, on average) she was thinking about the possibilities of that. 1st, 2nd and 3rd period passed. (Izzy is in 6th grade) Then it was lunchtime. But for some reason, she wasn`t hungry (She probably had too much for breakfast); so she sneaked out of school. Izzy is cute and mischievous. She could ‘puppy-eye’ her way out of anything. She went over to Grovington Park. Then she saw something glowing in the pond. (It is very small and has only 3 fish.) Had one of the fish taken on bioluminescence? She went over. It wasn’t a fish. It was this irresistibly pretty object about the size of a tennis ball. She was so intrigued by the object, she took it home. But her school found out that Izzy sneaked out of school grounds, and she got sent to juvie. Just kidding. (Remember? She could puppy-eye her way out of anything). She called the object ‘storm’ because of its resemblance to ball lightning. That night she slept next to ‘storm’ and used it as a night light. Then she drifted off to sleep. As soon as she entered her dream land- A big storm hits a mountain of 7 super heroes. 6 of the people can sort of fly, but only one capable of true flight. A crystal that looks like ‘storm’ but is green appears. Then all of a sudden Izzy heard a big boom. She woke up. Everything was fuzzy and the air was electrically charged. The air cleared out. And there, were the 7 characters from her dream. Then she fainted.
Ch. 2- The gang
Izzy awoke with a rush of water, noticing the air was still electrically charged, but now also hot. The 7 of them introduced themselves. The boy in a green outfit, said he was Earth Boy, EB for short, that he was 9 and controlled plants. He had curly black hair, about 3 inches long. His real name was Paul. Then this spiky haired kid came up, and said “I’m the one who doused you with water.” His hair was jet black. And he was this little midget kid who was 12 years. He controlled water. He was Water Boy, WB for short. His real name was Aaron. Then this Korean kid came up, he was 16. He was wearing a brown outfit, but unlike the others, was wearing a black belt. A karate black belt. He is Rockboy, RB for short. He said he controls rock, and is a master at martial arts. He is a 10th degree black belt. He also had black hair that was spiky, but not as spiky as WB. His real name is Jong Khu Lee. Next a girl in a red outfit stepped up. Her name is Firegirl, FG for short, and she controls lava/fire. She is this little 5 year old. She has pink hair. It probably was 5 inches. Her real name is Maryll. Then came a girl who was wearing a black outfit. It had a yellow circle in it. She was Solar Girl, SG for short. She was a red-head, with long hair and freckles. She controlled solar energy. She was 13. Her real name is Sonya. Then came this really tall girl, whose name is Elastigirl, EG for short. She is very stretchy. She is 21. She has yellow-gold-brown hair. She wears a yellow outfit. Then out of nowhere, a black figure appeared. This one had bat wings. His name was bat boy, BB for short. He is nocturnal, like a bat, and echolocates. He is 18, and also has spiky hair, that is extremely pointy. His power is radar, and he is the only one of the group capable of true flight.
Ch. 3- Why are you here?
“Aren’t bats more like sonar, but they use the Doppler effect?” asked Izzy. EG replied “Yes, but it’s a superpower. Anything is possible.” “Why are you here?” asked Izzy, now getting dizzy due to the charged, hot air. All of a sudden this bright flash was there. It showed pictures of this mountain, next to a huge black cloud. On the mountain, there was this cave. And in the cave there was this crystal. Just like in her dream. Just like ‘storm’ except it was green. EG explained “Deeper in there, is our lair. The storm that is coming is no ordinary storm. BB will take it from here and explain the storm.” BB stepped up and said in a surprisingly low voice “The storm is almost completely solid, and I’ve traced it down to one location, that is the area the storm originates. It is 3542 miles away. But it is a magic storm. Whatever it is, it is trying to get to our lair. But it is moving at a fast 250 miles a day. We’ve seen other far weaker, smaller teams go in there, but never come back. We are the final group there is, and if we don’t solve who is behind this, our world would turn evil, and it could get the crystal stolen. The crystal is a powerful object in which, keeps our powers strong. If the thing grabs it, they will become powerful, and we would become weak. Then he could overpower us and the rest of the world. So we need to get into the storm. And need protection.” Then Izzy said “Why come to me? Why come to a scrawny little girl?” BB replied “The thing you call ‘storm’. It really is a locator that looks for a person who has the strength and power, but doesn’t know how to release it. We programmed it to look for a person crazy about technology and weather, and it can only be seen by the person it has found. We can only be heard by you and our planet inhabitants. After the locator has found you, it triggers a signal to us, and we arrive by night. The locator is supposed to take form of something intriguing to a person. It is different to most everyone. It sends subliminal message to a person making them take it with them. We needed a person to protect from the fury of the storm. Not even we are immortal. For 164 years the storm has been approaching. We’ve looked all over. Generation after generation. Planet after planet. No people there the locator found. FINALLY we found you. The air is electrically charged because when you found the locator, it gave its powers to you. It only does it to the person it finds. The charge will be with you forever. You have to get used to it. You must come with us. This might take years, maybe decades to accomplish. But when we accomplish, IF we accomplish, we use this contraption that we can make you young again. First, let me scan you with it.” Izzy saw a bright beam of blue light sweep across her body. “There. Now later I can push a button that can make you this age again. Sadly, it only works on extraterrestrials. We also freeze time everywhere but our planet, so everything will remain just the way it was right now. Are you ready Izzy?” BB finished off. “Ready.” Replied Izzy eagerly. “Are you ready gang” said BB. “Ready.” They all said in unison. And they boarded the ship. “Oh. And one more thing.” Said BB. He let out a team of robots. “These will clean up the mess while we are gone.” Then they were off.
Ch.4- Off to Planet Anika
Once they went out of the Oort cloud, which then EG clicked this button. An electronic voice said “Now engaging hyper-drive”. All of a sudden we were pushed against the back wall, and they entered Planet Anika’s atmosphere. Then they crashed into a mountain. They tumbled and tumbled, on and on. Finally, they landed on a flat platform. Then EG said that this is it. They exited out of the ship. The first thing Izzy noticed was the storm that was slowly approaching them. Then she looked to the side and saw the crystal, and the lair, protected by a force field. FG disengaged it, and they went inside. Then Izzy said “Cool! This looks awesome! What does this have with it?” “First, your uniform. The last ElectroGirl used this, until something mysterious happened to her 164 years ago. We believe it had to do with the storm. You will use her set from now on.” said RB. He gave Izzy a bright blue uniform, and a belt. It was white, like the others (except RB). It had this gadget that can perform as any electronic gadget. It also has Swiss army knife functions. Then she noticed everyone else only had pagers. “Wait.” said Izzy. “If the old ElectroGirl had a pager function in her gizmo, why didn’t she page you?” “Because, the pager back then wasn’t as sophisticated than it is now. The storm blocked out the signal, when she went in, and she was destroyed, possibly. You see, all our powers have its pairs, and opposites. The storm destroys all who doesn`t have that ability, we’ve found in the recent years. Sadly, we didn’t find it out soon enough, to stop the other teams, and ElectroGirl. ElectroGirl is the head of all of the teams. Sort of like queen of the world. Now you have to take her space, until if she is alive or not.” said SG. Then WB said “Wait. Where is the locator? You brought it with you, right? Good. The locator is part of the crystal. Hold the locator next to the crystal. It will become into a fine mist and soak into the crystal.” Izzy did as he said. “We will rest for 2 nights, for Izzy to get used to herself, and practice her powers. For the next two nights, that’s just what they did. Izzy knew her powers by the starting morning, and almost completely got used to the charge. Then the search for the others began.
Ch. 4- From start to… trouble already?
EG pulled out a paper. “It is said this poem is supposed to tell a way of how to get there safely. The old ElectroGirl went to a sorcerer, who everybody thought was wicked, so they never went to her. But ElectroGirl was brave enough to go to her. She got this poem and she sent it to everyone in Planet Anika. We believe that either, it’s a fraud, or they didn`t use it properly. It is different for every person. But this is the original one. :
The nine of you must complete,
A treacherous task that must be beat.
Face the storm with no fear,
It grows closer every year.
The storm will knock out eight brave hearts
For it might tear the team apart
the storm will choose only one
who if they win the task is done.


Nine? There are only eight of us? Who cares. It is just a piece of paper. Who knows if it could be telling the truth, or lie. All we know is that if we don’t stop ‘it’ in the next 5 years, (I will call it X) X will take over Anika! Let’s go team!” And off they went into… trouble?
Ch.5- The giant cloud
For the next 5 hours, they were flying with BB in the front, to guide them. EB was getting tired. “Already?” said Izzy. Then soon, WB, EG, FG, SG, BB, and Izzy started to notice too. FG said “The storm… it wants us away. Izzy gave everyone subtle shocks to wake them up. And they went on like that. That was the recessive part of the trouble. They were thirsty. So they went down to the ground where WB supplied them with water. “It is getting dark. BB, go find us some food, please?” said SG. They waited. And waited. But BB didn’t return. Then they heard a piercing scream. “BB! Nooooooooooooooo!” screamed SG. And she ran after BB. “SG! Wait! BB is right… here.” Said Izzy. Then we heard another scream. We followed it, to a spot where we saw SG trapped in a cage. “Help!” she said weakly. “LET`S GIVE THEM A BIG HAND PEOPLE!” this booming voice came. Then, from 3 miles away, from the storm a large chunk ripped away and landed in front of them. It took a form of a person, and trapped them in a cage. “CONGRAGULATIONS! YOU FOUND YOUR FRIEND! YOUR PRIZE IS… JOINING HER!” the object said.
“No!” screamed Izzy. “Take this!” A spark flew from nowhere and flew at the cloud monster. He just seemed to absorb it, and said “FOOLS! I AM PART OF A THUNDERSTORM. THAT TOO A MAGICAL ONE! NO ELECTRICITY OR WATER OR BASICALLY ANYTHING CANT HARM ME!” Izzy thought and thought about it. Then she had an idea. She quietly whispered to her teammates “Guys. If we combine our powers, we might be able to entrap him, and destroy him.” They agreed. Then all at once, Izzy sent sparks flying, EB sent vines whipping, FG sent lava flying, RB sent gravel hurling, EG grabbed a loose iron bar and sent that flying, WB sent water squirting, SG created light and shone it, and BB sent high pitched screeches, all at the cloud monster. It completely destroyed him, and exploded the cage. It sent them hurling off in different angles and directions. But they all caught their balance in mid-air and floated to one spot. They were so exhausted, and they plopped to the floor. “I think the storm will stop now since we destroyed the cloud monster.” said EB. Everyone else agreed. But they were wrong. So very wrong.
Ch. 6- Where are we…me
10 hours later, Izzy woke up and said “Guys, I think we overslept… guys… hello?” Izzy opened her eyes, and looked around. It was pitch black. She wasn’t where she was supposed to be. She felt for her special pager, and it wasn`t there. “It must have fallen off when I was flying. I can`t find it.” Izzy thought. Then Izzy heard a clatter behind her, and sent sparks flying as a defense reflex. But whatever that caused the clatter, had absorbed it. Then out of the shadows, a dim light appeared. Then she could see where she was. It was supposedly in a extremely insulated room, that was gray, and concrete. Water, that had soaked through, was dripping from the ceiling making soggy, wet puddles on the floor. There was a tiny table with a few objects and pencils. Next to it was a solid concrete door. Mildew and that mucky, yucky, slimy green fungus, was growing on the ceiling, walls, and floor. She was in an iron cage that was all rusty, and grimy. Rats were scuttling across the floor. The cage seemed to be in the middle of the floor. Then she looked at the source of the light, and saw a striking image of herself, only looking like 1 year older.
She was holding the pager. Then she spoke “ I am ELG. 164 years ago I was captured and put in here. One week later, I was so starving and weak. When I touched the metal bar, I paralyzed myself. I somehow got preserved. When a figure opened the door, the sudden noise made me lose my tight grip onto the bar, which made me alive again. I didn’t want to wake you up, because you were sound asleep, and I didn’t want to paralyze you too with my electric touch. But then I heard a noise, and heard you stirring, I let the light on. Or should I say produced an electric light. Then I saw that you were wearing the same uniform as me, so then I assumed you are the one who is filling in for me. This whole 10 hours, I refrained from touching metal. Do you have something on you to eat? I am starving.” Izzy checked her pockets and found a half eaten extra-caffeine candy bar that she ate a few days ago. She gave it to ELG, and said “Let me get this straight. You’re the first and powerful superhero on planet Anika, and you’re the ones that all teams have gone looking for you and failed? Why did they only capture you? Where are the other team members? Where are we? Who is the one responsible for it? Why…” ELG cut her off. “I don’t and didn’t know any of those questions or statements, except probably the first one. Yes I am the Emperor of Anika. We have to get out of here. After I eat this candy bar.

Ch.7- The Great Escape
ELG and Izzy thought and thought for a way out. Then Izzy got an idea. “ELG, lets combine our powers, so that we can bust this cage! Use high voltage electricity so that it can melt the iron.” said Izzy. They both sent high voltage sparks flying. The cage vaporized almost instantly. They ran to the door. Inch by inch, the door opened. “We have to find the others.” said ELG. They opened the door to a long corridor. There were two doors on either side of the corridor. ELG opened to the right, Izzy the left. Izzy opened and what she saw, she was instantly paralyzed. Her friends along with some other residents of Anika were trapped in cages. They were separated into different cages by like powers. Their cages were made of the persons’ powers weakness. For instance, the fire controlling people were in water cages, and the water controlling people were in electric cages. “What happened here!” exclaimed Izzy. Izzy ran around to check if everyone was alright. A guy from a fire cage, a leaf controller, called for help. Then Izzy hatched an idea.
“Hey! If we blast through the water cages, then maybe the fire and solar controllers can blast through the rock cages and so on!” The people looked around as if she were crazy, but they realized that was their only hope. Izzy and ELG blasted through the water cages. The fire and solar controllers melted the rock cages. The water and electric controllers came out. The water controllers doused the flame cage, letting out the leaf controllers. Finally, after a lot of blasting and escaping, Izzy and ELG had their own army to fight X.
They ran into a corridor, past ELG’s cage room, past a voluminous room, into a dead end. They walked back to the voluminous room. It was open to sky. The room seemed to be perpetual. They decided to turn back, saying there was nothing much in this room. But where the entrance used to be was a solid wall. ‘What is this place?” a team member exclaimed. They started to walk. Then, Izzy exclaimed “Ok. We need to split up. My original team members come with me. The rest of you, divide yourselves into seven teams and head opposite directions. If one team finds an exit, page the others.”
So Izzy was back with her team again. They continued forward. Izzy looked up again. She realized she was right under the eye of the storm. It was a huge swirling mass of clouds. Lightning flashed within the clouds. Then right in front of her, a huge, powerful bolt of lightning hit. She was fine, and she looked at her team members. They were in a bit of a daze, but otherwise, fine. She looked back to examining the smoldering patch. But instead of finding a burnt patch, she saw an old lady, who was really angry.
Izzy stared at her, wondering how she got there, but then again, what she previously saw in her life before this was technically impossible. Izzy laughed at her, not knowing that was a horrible mistake. The old lady immediately changed form. She was now a huge thing with angry red eyes. Izzy stopped laughing. The thing stared at her, and then in a screeching voice, said “GIVE ME THE CRYSTAL!” then, it charged.
Ch 8- The battle with X
Before they could reach their pagers, X swiped them away and crushed them. X doused FG and ELG with water. FG couldn’t ignite her flame, and ELG’s powers were shorted out. X zapped EB and WB with an arc of lightning. EB lit on fire and started running in circles. WB was on the floor unconscious. X kept destroying her friends. The storm will knock out eight brave hearts. Izzy remembered that line from the paper. She looked around. All of her friends were lying down in pain. She was the last one.
“DESTROY MY FRIENDS, WILL YOU? I’LL SHOW YOU!” screamed Izzy. Izzy balled up her hands into fists. She began to glow an aura of blue. She put her hands together, and shot an arc of magnificent blue lightning toward X. X shot a red arc, in an attempt to parry her arc. For a moment, everything was just bright and loud. X taunted “You cannot beat me! I am the most powerful monster in the universe!”
For a moment, Izzy was losing to X. X taunted again. Izzy’s arc became shorter and shorter. She struggled to push back. Then, she looked back at her friends. “You can do it! Save Anika, please! You’re our only hope! We believe in you!” said a very exhausted ELG with her last strength. Then she collapsed.
Then, Izzy’s electric aura grew brighter and stronger. “RRRRRRAAARRRGGGHH! NOBODY, I MEAN NOBODY HURTS MY FRIENDS!” she bellowed. All of a sudden, her arc grew brighter and stronger too. She screamed on, and she found hidden, inner strength and pushed on. Then, X’s arc grew shorter and shorter. “WHAT? THIS ISN’T POSSIBLE! I AM THE STRONGEST MONSTER IN THE UNIVERSE!” X screeched. She summoned up cloud beings like the one before, and rallied a battle cry “ATTACK!” That was just before Izzy let out a loud yell, sending her arc to hit directly onto X’s chest. X shuddered as the super powerful electric current arced through her. She vaporized almost instantly. The wind swept her remains away. Izzy turned to the cloud beings. “Invulnerable to electricity, eh? I’ll show you electricity!” screamed Izzy.
She sent a spark flying to a cloud being. It vaporized on contact. “NOW WHO WANTS THIS? LEAVE THIS PLANET FOREVER, OR I’LL VAPORIZE ALL OF YOU!” Izzy bellowed again. The clouds didn’t hesitate. They bunched together and rejoined the cloud mass above. It became into this small, extremely dense ball and zoomed off into the stars.
Izzy collapsed, super exhausted after that fight. By that time, the other seven teams came and saw the nine exhausted team members. They flew them back to the cave. The task was complete.
Ch9- The new note
Izzy awoke to find herself in a cot. She looked around. It looked just like her bedroom. “So you mean this was a dream? All along I was dreaming?” she exclaimed. As she screamed, the image of her room dissolved away. “She’s coming to…” a distant voice said. Izzy sat up only to find herself back on the bed in Anika. She was dreaming that she was dreaming. A loud cheer came up from a crowd.
Izzy had defeated X. “Ohh… what happened?” she groaned. ELG stepped out of the crowd. “You magnificently defeated X! Anika is saved!” she exclaimed. Then, a water controller came out of the crowd. “Hello, earthling. I am Kurt. From a distance, I saw what you did. Amazing!” he said. “How long was I out?” said Izzy.
“About three days! We were worried!” said Kurt. “And by the way, I picked up this paper from the fortress. I thought you might want to read what was on it.
Mwahaha! You might have defeated
me on this planet, but I have gone to attack with
my cloud onto another random planet to destroy!
With the vastness of the universe,
there’s no way you will find me!
Izzy stared at the note. “Well, X is right. The universe is so vast, there’s no way we’ll find her! It’s up to another person to stop her now.” she exclaimed.
EG walked up. “Well, Izzy? Do you want to return to earth now?” she said. “Well…” said Izzy hesitantly. She looked at her friends here, and how she was a hero on this planet. But then she remembered Earth, still frozen in time, and her family, her friends down there. “I’d really like to stay, but, I’ve got family. I will miss you all very much.” she finally answered.
“Very well. Convey your good-byes and we will go. Our old ship was destroyed somehow. The new ship only has room for three.” said EG. “Ok.” said Izzy. She was in great sorrow when it came time to leave.
They were at the ship docking port, when they heard “Wait! Take me with you! I have no family and I want to see earth!” Izzy looked around to see who it was. It was Kurt’s. Kurt seemed eager to come to earth, and since they had room for one more, they let him on board.
Izzy and Kurt said their final good-byes. Then EG said a count down. “T minus 10…9…8…7…” Izzy took a look back at Anika. “3…2…1… Blastoff!” completed EG. And they were off. When they were in space, Izzy had one final, last look at Anika. “Good-bye my friends” she whispered, as a voice said “Engage Hyper drive”. Then in a millisecond, Anika was gone.
Ch-10 Izzy returns
Izzy was now travelling much faster than light. Some force around her ship was preventing her from being ripped to shreds. She was pinned to her seat. Finally a voice said “Disengage Hyper drive.”Inertia propelled the ship forward, as EG slammed the brakes. As EG angled the ship right for re-entry to the atmosphere, Izzy heard a loud boom, the sonic boom that usually happens when you blast through an atmosphere. Then a crash followed the boom. They had landed in a lake, five miles from Izzy’s house. After the ship became neutrally buoyant, EG, Izzy and Kurt got out of the ship and swam to shore. They walked back to Izzy’s house. Izzy realized it was still night time. She thought back to the time the team first got her. Then she realized something. “Hey EG, how long has it been since you first recruited me?” she said. “Oh! One minute let me check. You were gone on September 23rd night. Now it is December 29, 2010. You were gone, umm, two years, three months and six days in earth terms.” Replied EG.
“It really didn’t feel that long! I thought it was only one month!” exclaimed Izzy. “Time is relative. When we were travelling in space, way faster than light, time sped up on earth, or instead sped up for us. Anika also has a much longer day and night, but you really couldn’t tell the difference because of the storm.” said EG. “Now let’s get you back to your look on September 23rd, 2008.”
EG pulled out the device EG had scanned her with in the beginning. EG held the button and a blue light swept over Izzy. Izzy looked down at an 11 year old version of herself. Izzy got to her house and went to the bedroom. She had totally forgotten the team of cleaning robots that EG had sent out a long time ago. They seem to have gotten bored and started cleaning the whole house instead. Now they were lying down on the floor doing nothing. EG summoned the cleaning robots to go fix the return ship. They gladly rushed off to fix it.
“Well, I guess this is it. I will really miss you.” said Izzy. “Yes. I will miss you too. We will all miss you.” replied EG. “Here. Take this.” EG handed Izzy a small communicator with a screen. “If you ever need help or want to talk to us, use this to call us. I know, I know. You will say ‘the signal will take forever to reach Anika and back!’ so I developed a special technology to let the signal have only a one second delay.”
EG gave Izzy a very stretchy armed hug. “Keep the suit and the pager. Your powers will remain with you forever. If you ever need help and we are not there, ask Kurt, right Kurt? Kurt?” said a very confused EG. “Oh well, he is probably out wandering in Grovington park.”
Izzy said her final good-byes to EG. Her ship and the robots were waiting out in the lawn. EG pressed a button that un-froze time, and boarded the ship. EG must have invented something to silence the ship because it had a silent take-off. Izzy said a good-bye, as the last twinkle of the ship ascended into the infinite darkness of space. Izzy went and plopped onto her bed. She put her pager, suit, and communicator under her pillow and slept.
Ch 11- Izzy’s life returns to normal, sort of
Izzy woke up bright and early the next morning. She walked to the bathroom to brush her teeth. As she was brushing, she remembered about her intense adventure. “Was it all a dream?” thought Izzy. She finished brushing her teeth and checked under her pillow. Sure enough, the suit, pager, and communicator were there under her pillow. She smiled, and created an arc of electricity to jump between her fingers.
She walked downstairs to get her breakfast. She decided not to tell anyone about her trip to Anika. They would think she was crazy. Her mom asked her about her sleep. Izzy replied “Oh, just fine.” and smiled.
Izzy went along with the school year. Izzy kept in touch with the Anikans often. The end of the school year came. As she was talking to EG and BB one night, Izzy was saying to them “I just feel like something big is going to happen. Kurt thinks so too. But I don’t know what!” “If you keep asking questions, you keep getting answers.” said BB
Summer vacation passed. The week before school came. One night, an Anikan called with an urgent message. Apparently called Kari, she said “I’ve just got news that the storm is headed to your solar system. I don’t know what planet, because there is just as much chance as it landing on any other planet than earth. Just keep your defenses up until we are sure it landed on your planet.”
Izzy smiled, thinking about her and Kurt’s predictions. “Ok. We will.” she replied. The day before school came. Izzy smiled and thought about her future 7th grade year. “I wonder what it will be this time.” mumbled Izzy, as she drifted off to sleep. She had no idea what she will have to put up with the next day.

To find out what happens next, read the sequel, “The Storm Returns”!

The below post

I wrote the below post as a project in 7th grade. I forgot to add Ben Franklin in it, so I'll tell about his experiment now. Don't try this experiment unless you have proper equipment. Ben Franklin was most known for his lightning experiment. During a thunderstorm, he tooh a kite attached to a long string and tied the string end to a silk string. To the string, he tied a metal key in a glass jar (a Leiden Jar). He flew thw kite and then went inside. when he brought his finger near the key, it sparked, proving lightning is electricity. Contrary to popular belief, lightning never hit Franklin.

Lightning Info- Everything you need to know at this point.

Lightning is one of nature’s most beautiful phenomena. It is fascinating but deathly. Having tremendous power and vigor, it doesn’t get the respect it deserves. The fear of lightning is known as keraunophobia, and the fear of thunder and lightning is brontophobia (sounds more like fear of brontosaurus dinosaurs, so don’t get confused), but really there is nothing to be afraid of, as long as you take the safety measures. And as I say, “Lightnin’ ain’t fright’nin”, for it isn’t. With over 2,000 thunderstorms occurring above the earth at any given time, it is no wonder that lightning flashes 50-100 times per second. There is so much to say, so I will separate it into many “easy-find” sections. 1-Numerical info 2-Lightning Physics 2a-Thunderstorm Meteorology 2b- The “Charge Reversal” Concept 2c-Types of Lightning 2d-Thunder 3-In Mythology/Religion 4-Probabilities 4a-Odds 4b-Statistics 5-Safety 5a-What to Do if You are Stuck Outside During a Thunderstorm 5b-Lightning and Objects 5c-Lightning’s Effect on Humans 5d-Types of Lightning Strikes to Humans 5e- Advancing Technology- Lightning Detection 6-Lightning and NASA 7-USA’s Lightning 7a- Florida’s Lightning 8-The “Heat Island” Effect 9-Other Random Lightning Facts 9a- Lightning’s Good Side 9b- Lightning Idioms and Myths 10-Conclusion 11-Bibliography 1-Numerical Information An average lightning bolt has 20,000 amps, 100 million volts, and is about 30,000˚F. It has enough wattage to power a 100-watt bulb for three months. It can reach temperatures of 54,000˚F, 8 times the surface temperature of the sun. Lightning’s voltage is proportional to its length, meaning that longer bolts are higher in voltage. This is because a higher voltage is needed to jump larger distances- as in capacitors. Lightning can reach voltages as low as 1 million, and as high as a billion. Its amperage ranges from 10,000-200,000. The wattage may soar to a trillion. You have all probably heard the saying “lightning never strikes twice in the same place”, meaning two of the same bad things can’t happen to the same thing, but its literal meaning is ironically false. In fact, the Empire State Building gets hit many times a year. Roy L. Sullivan was struck seven times between the years 1942-1977, and lived. Lightning very often does hit the same place or person twice. Will we be able to harness lightning’s energy? It is very impractical. Even though lightning looks as if it produces a large amount of energy, it really doesn’t, the reason being the time frame lightning takes up. When you factor physics in, lightning duration of only a few milliseconds doesn’t produce sufficient Coulombs. The amount of Coulombs is the energy amount. One Coulomb is a unit of electrical equal to the amount of charge transferred by a current of one ampere in one second. So if you multiply the 20,000 amps by about three milliseconds, that’s 20,000 × .003. This is equal to 60 Coulombs. That isn’t much, as one electron produces 1.602 × 10 to the power of -19 Coulombs. 2- Lightning Physics Scientists are perplexed by lightning. Lightning held, holds, and will hold great mysteries to scientists. Why lightning happens, how lightning happens, and when lightning happens are some of the mysteries that it holds. This is a very unpredictable force, and is hard to predict, for it is so sudden. For knowing what we got so far, you have to know the basics. 2a- Thunderstorm Meteorology To better understand how lightning works, you have to understand how a thunderstorm works. Thunderstorms can form over land, over sea, or move in from a place. For a thunderstorm to form, you need a low pressure system, a source of moisture, and warm air. What is a low pressure system? It’s when the air is forced upwards, creating updrafts- rotating, rising columns of air. You can sometimes see birds circling the updraft. The updraft carries the moist air to a cooler area of the atmosphere, condensing into cumulus clouds. If the pressure is low enough- meaning that there is a strong updraft, and the humidity is high enough, these clouds continue to grow into what is known as cumulus congestus clouds, towering cumulus clouds that are larger than a normal cumulus cloud. If you see these, it means a thunderstorm may be forming. The storms over the ocean are generally stronger than land-formed ones- unless the cause is of inter-coastal seabreeze (works similarly, but coastal winds collide to create these clouds), because of increased moisture. If the moisture supply continually is fed into the cloud, it will grow into a cumulonimbus cloud, sometimes bringing monstrous thunderstorms. These storms have updraft and downdraft regions- downdrafts are a region in the cloud where there is a downward rush of air. Inside the cloud, water collects around a single particle of a pollutant, like dust or pollen. This gets forced into the updraft, which freezes, and then falling due to the downdraft, melting of the temperature. As it melts, it gains a bit more water then repeats the downdraft/updraft cycle. These ice crystals are called graupel. When graupel gets heavy enough to resist the force of the updraft, it falls back into the downdraft region and out of the cloud, melting. This is what we call rain. It occurs mainly in the downdraft region. This is important to know, as it plays a role of lightning formation. 2b-The “Charge Reversal” Concept Lightning creation is one of the most controversial aspects of lightning science, as there is little known on the formation of it. Scientists have many theories, but one, the Charge Reversal concept is by far the most popular. Think about the rain formation. There are a lot of little drops in there. Don’t you think that the graupel will smash into other particles? It does, and in this process, scientists don’t know why that the tiny particles that break off become positive and the larger unbroken particles become negative. Tens of millions of these events happen at any given moment in the cloud. Since the smaller particles are so light, they travel to the top of the cloud, making that region positively charged. That means, that most of the time when you see the “anvil” of the cloud (trust me- you have), it’s positive. The negative graupel sinks to the bottom of the cloud, making that, well, negative. The charge spread out across the cloud is hundreds of millions of volts, about the same explosive energy as a small atomic bomb. This immense charge is enough to force the ground’s electrons deep into the earth, leaving the surface positive. This creates a natural “capacitor”, with the supply being the cloud’s base, and the receivers being the top anvil or the ground. In electronics, a capacitor is a tiny device that makes wavering voltages spike into one continuous voltage by sparking two plates. This works by collecting an amount of charge on the positive part. When the charge reaches a potential where it can arc across the gap, it does. Similarly the charge in the cloud continually grows until it reaches a point where the voltage is high enough to arc across two points. When it does reach a potential where it can arc across, the cloud lets out a “stepped leader”, named because it seems to follow a path of distinct ‘steps’, which is a plasma channel, about 2 centimeters wide, 50m long. There are about 100 of these in a lightning stroke. This heads for the ground, branching into several paths to the ground. When it is about 150 feet from a point, a “positive streamer”- a positively charged channel of electricity, jumps from many objects. The leader continues down, and one of the branches touches with one of the streamers. The part closest to the ground drains first, and then successfully higher, which reaches the cloud. Then a “dart leader” heads to the ground really fast along the same channel, discharging to the ground. Then a “return stroke” heads upwards about ten times slower than the dart leader, along the same channel. The dart leader/return stroke cycle repeats itself about 3-4 times, but can be 2 times or up to 15 times. This is what creates the “strobe-light effect”. The charge drains and the leader detaches and dissipates. All this happens in a few milliseconds. Sometimes there is a positive stepped leader, and a negative streamer, but the physics are the same, except that positive lightning is more powerful than negative lightning. Fulgurites are an impure form of glass that forms when the intense heat of a lightning strike fuses the sand together to form a lightning shaped “tube” of glass. The next time a lightning storm is in your area (which here, not too long from now), and you see lightning hit the ground, wait till after thirty minutes after the storm has passed, and dig carefully in that spot. If you come across a tube-shaped, porous, branchy thing about 2 centimeters thick, you may have found a fulgurite. Keep it and show it to your science teacher and explain what it is. You may impress him/her. To generate “mini-lightning”, all you need is a cat, a woolen or synthetic fiber cloth, a dark room, and a cold, dry day. Rub the cat with the cloth very quickly, and pull away the cloth really fast. You should see sparks of static electricity jump to the cat. The cat will remain unharmed, and it won’t hurt it a bit, although you might annoy it by you rubbing it with something. 2c- Types of Lightning There are very many different types of lightning, either positive or negative. It occurs at varying heights, and some of the events are rare. Cloud-Ground(CG’s)- Lightning that arcs from well, cloud to ground. Ground-Cloud(GC’s- Same as a cloud to ground, except that the ground lets out a stepped leader and the cloud a streamer. Ground-Ground(GG’s)- A rare type of lightning that arcs from a charged region of the ground to another region of the opposite charge. Those types of lightning account for 20% of all lightning. The others are all in the cloud. The rest of the lightning I am going to describe is a mix of terms and names. Cloud-Cloud(CC’s)- Lightning arcing from one cloud to another. Sheet- Lightning occurring within a cloud, seen from the ground as flashes. Heat- Lightning occurring over the horizon, seen only as a flash. Dry- CG Lightning occurring without rain, making this a forest fire hazard. Anvil Crawlers- Lightning arcing from the base or anvil of a cloud, “crawling” on the surface, and then entering back in the cloud. This type of lightning has been known to stretch 75 miles or so. It has more energy than a normal CG, so if it ends up arcing to the ground and not back into the cloud, it could have devastating effects. Ball- An extremely rare phenomenon, looking like a floating ball of electricity, although it is made up of plasma. This can last for a few seconds, although it is known for it to last 14 seconds. This mysterious phenomenon can pass through glass, breaking it into shards, or without a scratch. It is also known to go in circles and even chase people. The chances of seeing this is .01% in your lifetime. Blue Jets- Another rarity, this type of lightning is a bright blue flash, starting from the core of a cloud and extending 15 miles into the mesosphere. Sprite- The rarest form of lightning, seen only by low orbit satellites, is a red flash above the cloud, reaching 10 miles high and 15 miles wide. It is one of the least known lightning phenomena known about. Staccato- Lightning that seems so sudden and at once. Bead- Infrequent lightning that seems to look like a string of luminous segments rather than a single flash. Its causes are unknown, but one theory suggests differentiating thicknesses in the channel’s radius created different amounts of light emitted Positive Giant- Lightning that arcs from the positive anvil striking somewhere about 10 miles away. This is a very powerful form of lightning, and is often referred to “a bolt from the blue”. In idiom expressions, this means “something totally unexpected and random”, and in literal, it is, as it is often seen in clear skies, far from a storm. Superbolt- CG lightning with hundreds the times of energy of a normal lightning bolt. Very destructive. 2d- Thunder Thunder, lightning’s grumbling partner, is caused by the rapid heating and expansion of air near the stroke. It expands so fast, it explodes. Since light travels about 5 times the speed of sound, you can use the following formula: l= (1/5) t for miles, and l= (1/3) t for km, where l= the distance lightning hit, and t= time between lightning and thunder. For example, if there is a time frame of 18 seconds, it would be 3.6 miles or 6 km. If thunder and lightning were music notes, lightning would be a staccato quarter note, while thunder is a fortissimo whole note. Why does thunder roll and last longer than lightning? Imagine if you asked a thousand trumpeters to line up in an uneven pattern, so they resemble a lightning channel. The trumpeter closest to you, you hear first and the loudest. The trumpeter furthest from you is the faintest and the last to be heard. Make them do the same pattern in a place with tall buildings. The sound seems to distort. So the lightning’s jagged path creates different distances from you. The different sound waves reach you at different times. The sound also echoes of objects, totaling for a loud, long, rolling effect. Because thunder surrounds the channel, a very close strike cannot be heard. 3-In Mythology/Religion When you think of mythology and lightning, you immediately think of Zeus (got his thunderbolt because the Cyclopes honored him), right? But he isn’t the only lightning god out there. In fact, almost all of the mythological gods that control thunder and lightning are of the highest rank of deity. Other than that, one of two other major gods I know is Thor, Norse god of thunder and lightning. We name a day of the week after him- Thursday (Thor’s Day). It’s no joke. The Roman god, Jupiter, also controls thunder and lightning. We honor him by naming the solar system’s largest planet after him. In my own religion, Islam, it is said in the Quran that-"Have you not seen how God makes the clouds move gently, then joins them together, then makes them into a stack, and then you see the rain come out of it.... (Quran, 24:43)" The preceding verse, after mentioning clouds and rain, speaks about hail and lightning, "....And He sends down hail from mountains (clouds) in the sky, and He strikes with it whomever He wills, and turns it from whomever He wills. The vivid flash of its lightning nearly blinds the sight. (Quran, 24:43)" (taken from Ask.com) 4-Probabilities Lightning can strike anywhere and anytime there is a thunderstorm. What are the odds of being hit this year, if you aren’t in Florida? What are the chances you will be hit in your life? What are your chances of surviving lightning? What are the odds you will die by lightning? How many people die by lightning a year? How many people die by lightning in Florida? What states receive the most and the least lightning? These questions and more will be answered in this next section. 4a- Odds What are the odds of being hit this year? The normal chance, if you’re not in Florida, is approximately 1 in 600,000. But we are in Florida, so our chances increase by 350%. Now you divide 600,000 by 3.5, and you get 210,000. So our chance of getting hit is 1 in 210,000. What are the odds you will be hit in your life? The normal odds are 1 in 3,000. But when you factor in the 350%, it is 857 1/7. Our chance is a scarily high 1 in 857 1/7. Can your chances increase? Those two approximates is if you follow the safety measures. But if you are like me, who doesn’t really follow the safety measures, but instead goes out to watch the lightning, or just really stupid and (as an example) go play golf on a hilly open course with a lot of iron concentrates in it every day during a lightning storm in July and August here in Florida, your chances will drastically increase, got it? So don’t go to the roof of a three story building having a seven foot long metal pole and start running in circles when you see lightning outside, unless you’re deliberately trying to hurt yourself, ok? What are the chances you will get hit and die? It’s a relatively small number, for a year, 1 in 2.32 million. One in 87,000 bolts hits someone. One in 345,000 bolts kills someone. Comparatively, can you give an analogy to say how low or high this chance is? You are 6 times more likely to be hit by lightning than win the lottery. You have 90% chance surviving lightning. But if you survive a hit, you will suffer many permanent damages. 4b- Statistics Of a 2005 estimate, 473 people got hit that year in Florida alone. Approximately 2,000 people around the world die in a year, meaning that about 20,000 got hit. In America, 1,000 people get hit, and about 100 die. The state that gets the most lightning is none other than our Florida, receiving the second most lightning than anywhere else in the world. The cities are that of particularly on the I-4 corridor- mainly Tampa (that’s where they get the team name Tampa Bay Lightning), and Orlando. The states that receive the least lightning are Alaska and Hawai’i, having zero reported lightning deaths. Florida receives the most lightning deaths and injuries overall, more than all the states combined, but New Mexico receives the most lightning deaths per million. Most lightning victims (84%) are men. July is the most dangerous month for lightning. Here in Florida, it is July and August. 3 PM is the most dangerous time for lightning, 5 times more dangerous than 9 AM, anywhere in the world. The most lightning prone region in the world is a small village called Kifuka, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, receiving 158 strikes per square mile (I am so visiting there when I get money for a plane fare and I am old enough). 70% of all lightning injuries occur in the afternoon. Lightning strikes only one person 91% of the time. In the US, 85% of lightning victims are under 35. You have 60% more chance being hit when standing under an oak tree than a birch tree because of its vertical roots. 5- Safety Lightning is a powerful, dangerous, force. You do not want to get hit by it. I guarantee you, you’ve probably been within a thousand feet of lightning at least once. So unless you are like me and crazily love lightning, or just plain idiotic, and don’t care about the safety measures, follow them. 1. Do not use the computer or any other electronic devices directly connected to the building circuit. This includes stoves and washing machines. I know a guy in my taekwondo studio that got hit this way. If lightning happens to hit your house, 4% of lightning fatalities are because of people failing to follow this and the next safety measure by thinking that the building’s grounding wire will save them. You don’t have to get way too precautionary, for I have used the computer, television, and phone thousands of time during a thunderstorm, and nothing has yet happened, and hopefully nothing will happen in the future. 2. Do not use water connected to the main system, as if lightning hits the house, the current may find its way into the system. I know quite a few people who know people who suffered lightning strikes this way. One of the main things a person does is take a shower or sit on a toilet seat during a thunderstorm and puts their life at risk to a lightning strike. Once again, don’t get too much safety concerned, as once again, I have taken showers and been in the bathroom hundreds of times, and nothing has happened yet. 3. Do not be outside during a lightning storm, unless you are someone like me, who loves lightning more than anything, and have large pine trees in your neighbor’s backyard, and have a tall oak tree in your own backyard to direct most lightning strikes away. 4. Do not stay next to large windows or doors, as lightning has been known to enter through windows and strike people. If you have a metal cage near the window, like those that cover our pool decks, then it’s safer, but not totally safe. 5. Do not do recreational activities outside during a lightning storm, such as golf, fishing, boating, playing or watching sports while on a raised area in large groups, etc. 48% of lightning injuries and fatalities occur this way. 6. Do not go out on an open field or a body of water. You may be in danger of a lightning strike. 7. Do not wait until you hear the first rumble of thunder or the first flash of lightning to go inside. Many lightning injuries and fatalities occur this way. In fact, go inside as soon as you see very large cumulus congestus clouds. 8. Do not swim during a thunderstorm. Lightning may hit the pool while you are in it, and you might be zapped. 5a- What to do when you are Stuck Outside During a Thunderstorm Maybe you didn’t heed my warnings and still did whatever you are doing, and you sense lightning is going to strike near. You ask yourself- What do I do? What do I do? I should have done whatever that report thingy said! This is what you do, and for Pete’s sake, pay attention this time! 1. If you are stuck in an open field, and lightning is about to strike, which you can tell by looking at metal objects to see if they are sparking or crackling, or if your hair is on end, and there is nothing around but flat, flat, land, duck down into the “lightning desperation position”, where you basically crouch down as low as possible, and put your hands on your head. Don’t lie down; as you give a greater surface area for the current could travel through. 2. If you are stuck in an open field with a ditch near you, go into the ditch and once again, take the lightning desperation position. 3. If you are stuck in an open field with many people, spread 20 feet away, to decrease conductivity, and all go down into the lightning desperation position. 4. If you are under a tree, get out from under it and go take shelter. 5. If you’re in a car, stay in it. 6. If you are outside plainly, go into the nearest shop or building that you are allowed in, or go home. 7. Cancel that event you were planning! Don’t risk it. 8. Get off that lake. Do I even have to explain why? 9. Stop golfing. I mean, you’re holding a metal pole in an open field during a thunderstorm. Doesn’t anything occur to you? 10. Don’t take shelter in a cave. Caves may have traces of conductive material in it, and the air is humid in it, so both can conduct electricity inside of it. 11. Don’t take shelter under a tarp. Lightning hitting the ground nearby still has enough potential to arc underneath it. 12. There are more, but just to keep it simple and no worries about these things, JUST STAY INDOORS!!! 5b- Lightning and Objects CG lightning has to hit something. And what it hits does have different effects. Trees- the sap inside it instantly vaporizes and explodes, sending burning wood shrapnel everywhere. Some sight to see. I’ve seen a burnt tree like this in a forest before. It looked like a chair, and there was a message board talking about it. Ground- Nothing really happens. Maybe a burnt patch, sometimes if grass is very dry, a fire. Might create a fulgurite. Nothing much here. Water- Vaporizes some instantly, may kill or paralyze marine life. Airplane- Perfectly safe from a lightning strike. Have tiny poles on it called “static discharge wicks” that prevent the buildup of a charge. An average commercial airliner gets hit at least once a year. Although it protects the people from the electricity, it has no protection from its magnetic field. House- Has various safety measures. May, but rarely, catch fire. Car- As long as you don’t touch the metal body of the car, you’re fine. A properly managed gas tank will not ignite. A Metal Pole- Nothing, if it is conductive. It grounds the current. Transformer- May blow. May cause power outages. Gun Powder- Situation highly unlikely, but big explosion Person-Explained in next two sections. 5c- Lightning’s Effect on Humans Even though it is unlikely, lightning does strike people. 10% die, mainly because of cardiac arrest. Of the other 90%, 70% suffer long term injuries. It includes, but not limited to, serious burns, mood swings, memory loss, pain, hot flashes, risk of cardiac arrest increase, etc. If a person was having a metal object on them at that time, it could’ve melted on them. If the person had been carrying a device on them, it would be fried. Cotton has a low burning point, so that would explode if a person were wearing a T-Shirt or pants of that. Why then, do these people survive, if 650mA can kill? Lightning’s current doesn’t go through a person, but around. A thin layer of moisture coats a person at all times, and this is the path it takes. A person can limit burns if when they get hit, they are soaking wet. If you see a person that got hit, and is unconscious, first check to see if the person is alive. Check their pulse, and then take them to the hospital for further assistance. If possible, contact the family of the person to notify the event. 5d- Types of Lightning Strikes to People A person doesn’t have to be directly hit to be affected. There are a few different ways a person can be affected. The following info is copied from a page on howstuffworks.com. Direct strike - a cloud-to-ground lightning strike hits you or something you're holding, like a golf club, dead-on instead of reaching the ground. Side flash - lightning strikes something close to where you are standing and then jumps from that to you. Contact potential - while you're touching something, like a fence-post or a tree, lighting strikes that object and the current travels from the object through the point of contact into your body. Step voltage - you're sitting with your feet together in front of you, knees up and rump settled on the ground near a spot where a cloud-to-ground lightning strike hits. As the lighting current disperses, it travels through your body by entering one point, say your joined feet, and exiting another, your rear end. Surge voltage - while you're using some type of electrical appliance or a telephone, lighting strikes the source of power or network connected to the device and you receive a shock. 5e- Advancing Technology- Lightning Detection While there is no technology yet to say where and when lightning will hit, there are technologies that can tell when and where a strike is prone. This technology is used in many companies and studies, such as NASA and Lightning Science studying students in the University of Florida. In Camp Landing, a UF research site, students launch a rocket with 2,000 feet of metal wire when a strike is prone in the area, to create a “triggered strike”. They use this information collected from various meters, and form a data file. But they do not launch without having a prone strike, so they use this technology to find that out. You can also buy tiny units that tell where the lightning strikes are happening, when lightning may strike in your area, and how far away a strike you saw was. 6- Lightning and NASA Who made those technologies though? It’s none other than our 40 mile away friend, NASA. They pioneered lightning detection. Why did they do that? What do they need that technology for anyway? November 14, 1969. The Apollo 12 mission was just about to start the countdown. It had been a stormy day. The officials thought it would just pass over. They were just about to start the countdown when lightning had struck the shuttle. Everyone inside the shuttle was ok, but the shuttle was nearly shut down due to the fact that the circuits were fried. KSC launch just happens to be smack center of Lightning Alley. Per kilometer, it is hit 40 times a year. So nowadays, if there is a lightning strike within 10 nautical miles of the launch pad (mainly launched from 37A and 37B), the launch is scrapped. 7- USA’s Lightning The areas that east of the Rockies do not see much lightning. The Rockies itself and Florida sees more lightning than anywhere else in the US, with Florida seeing more. The Central Plains also receive a lot of lightning, not as much as Florida, though. Alaska and Hawai’i are the least lightning prone. 7a- Florida’s Lightning Since Florida is the second most lightning prone region in the world, we really don’t have to chase the lightning. We can watch it right in our own backyard, although that isn’t advised. Lightning is Florida’s prominent weather phenomenon. Particularly central Florida, you can watch lightning, occurring mainly at 3-5, but I once witnessed a tremendous lightning storm last 9 hours. Florida peaks in lightning during July and August, being the least in February. Our “Sunshine State” title attracts tourists from around the world, not knowing most of our sunny days are in the winter. They come during the summer to enjoy our famous tall Disney and Wet n’ Wild rides, not knowing that lightning may spoil their plans. What an unfortunate place to build these touristic places. Right dead center of Lightning Alley. These theme parks have a rule- if lightning is seen, or thunder is heard, all rides are subject to close for 30 minutes until after the last strike. I had been on a ride when a first strike was spotted, not knowing it was lightning. 8- The “Heat Island” Effect Austin, Texas. Second in line to Florida for amount of lightning. This is a very large polluted city. Even Orlando and a few other Floridian cities encounter this effect, which makes lightning activity more potent and increasing. The “heat island” effect is a theory that in a large city, the pollution makes very hot air collect in an area. When a cold front moves in, it slides over the hot air mass. Since hot air rises, and cold air sinks, the hot air circles upwards, cooling. The cold air circles downwards, warming. This cycle creates powerful updrafts. When you add moisture into the equation, the updrafts carry moist air which cools in the cold front air. This condenses to form clouds. The unnatural hot air keeps forming these updrafts, in turn making larger and larger clouds. They soon grow into cumulonimbus clouds. Along with these updrafts, pollutant particles also follow. This means that one- acid rain may form, and two- there is more graupel. More graupel means more graupel crashes, means more charge forming, leading to more lightning. 9- Other Random Lightning Facts  Lightning’s color greatly varies. If you have ever seen lightning arcing from the top of the cloud purple, reentering the cloud, and then arcing back to the ground orange, it is because of different chemical compositions changing its color.  Lightning creates a chemical reaction with the air, producing nitrogen.  Lightning may have a link to why life started on earth.  The animal that gets killed by lightning the most is the giraffe (I’m not surprised).  Lightning kills more people than hurricanes.  It would take 7 lightning strikes to get you below 50% (landing heads or tails when choosing one) survival chance.  It would take 44 strikes to get you below 1% survival rate.  Lightning has recently been known to produce gamma waves.  Lightning occurs also on our gas giant planets, not only earth.  Jupiter’s lightning is far more powerful than earth’s.  Lightning has also been known to occur in pyrocumulus clouds, or clouds made from smoke. Lightning can also occur during a volcanic eruption, due to the ash cloud. 9a- Lightning’s Good Side Lightning has a very destructive side, but it has many good sides too.  Lightning’s ability to create nitrogen is amazing. “What is nitrogen good for anyway?” you may ask. Nitrogen is a natural plant fertilizer, which makes it good for the environment. It also thickens the ozone layer, making less UV rays enter earth’s atmosphere.  Some plants only release their seeds in the intense heat of a forest fire. Lightning helps speed up the process.  Lightning may be linked to the formation of the first life. Back when the earth was a tumultuous young fireball of a planet, lightning was constantly striking the earth. When it did, a small amount of amino acids were produced- a necessary ingredient for thriving life. 9b- Lightning Idioms and Myths i. The saying “a bolt from the blue” means “something totally unexpected”. It comes from lightning terminology. In lightning terminology, it refers to a Positive Giant arcing from the top of a cloud and striking somewhere totally unexpected, mainly in clear skies, making it like the idiom. ii. The saying “lightning never strikes twice” is a false representation meaning “two bad things can’t happen to the same person”. In fact, lightning often strikes the same place twice many times. Tall buildings often get hit many times a year. I guess that’s why bad things keep happening to one person. Better scrap that saying. iii. Contrary to popular belief, Benjamin Franklin was not hit by lightning. When he flew his kite, a charge built up on the kite. When he touched the key, a spark leaped to his hand. iv. Talking on a cordless phone during a thunderstorm will not get you zapped. I mean, it’s only cordless. v. Lightning rods do not attract lightning. They just draw lightning away from your house or whatever you don’t want it to hit, and ground it. vi. Tall objects don’t always get hit by lightning. Tall objects are more prone to get hit than other objects, for the stepped leader is closer. Lightning always tries to take the path of least resistance (literally), and resistance is (here is more physics) increased if the object has less electron holes in its valence electron field. So lightning can hit anywhere. vii. Lightning doesn’t always hit metal objects. Metal is just the path of least resistance. Metals have a large number of electron holes, and all of those electrons were pushed into the ground. This leaves a large positive charge on the metal, allowing it to be more likely to be hit than other objects. viii. Waiting ‘till you hear the first bang of thunder or first strike of lightning isn’t the smart thing to do. You then have already put yourself at risk for thirty minutes or so. Many deaths occur this way. ix. Judging how far a storm is by counting seconds is highly unreliable. That just tells how far away lightning had struck. Lightning can hit 15 miles from the storm’s main core, so it really won’t do much help to you if you want to know how far the storm is. x. Wearing many metal objects can get you hit is a debunked myth. Metal can increase your chance, but unless you are the tin man walking in the middle of an open field in Florida during a thunderstorm on a July day, it will not make you certainly get hit. 10- Conclusion Lightning has been mystifying scientists for many centuries. Lightning has become so inexplicable and sundry of types and structure, it has become a class of its own. What was mentioned in this report is subject to change in the next century, for lightning is a very litigious topic. This fascinating force has captivated a few with its beauty, but intimidated most others. The force doesn’t receive the admiration it deserves. Lightning truly is awesome. I know awesome is a greatly overused word, but the meaning of it is “full of reverence and awe”. I really do find that in lightning. Lightning has baffled scientists for centuries, and I have a feeling it will continue to do just that. 11- Bibliography “Lightning: When Nature Strikes Back” Discovery. Silver Spring, Maryland. 29 May, 2009. Television "Lightning." Lightning. Ask.com/Wikipedia, 20 May 2010. Web. 23 May 2010. Neer, Katherine. "What If I Were Struck by Lightning?" Www.howstuffworks.com. Discovery. Web. 23 May 2010. Lux, Jim. "Lightning Facts." Http://home.earthlink.net/~jimlux/lfacts.htm. 1997. Web. 23 May 2010. Greene, Stewart. "Facts About Lightning." Http://climbing.about.com/od/staysafeclimbing/a/LightningFacts.htm. About.com. Web. 23 May 2010. "Facts and Stats On Lightning." Http://www.needful-things.com/batlightning7.html. Web. 23 May 2010. Faidely, Warren. "Lightning." The Ultimate Storm Survival Handbook. Nashville, TN: Rutledge Hills, 2006. 69-87. Print. Lightning Nature’s High Voltage Light Show Written by Noorul Hassan for a project in 7th Grade