"Awww man!" cried the young brunette as he felt the first blobs of moisture jab his outheld palm, causing both he and his blond companion to pick up their pace.
The two cousins had just returned from a debriefing by their college professor after their eventful trek of the floating island that appeared over China and now were on their way back to their apartment on Midtown.
The few droplets had quickly become a downpour and the pair were completely soaked when they reached their flat.
"Told you we shoulda taken the car Ben!" the blond moaned shaking the water from his hair like a shaggy mop.
"Relax dude!" Ben recanted picking a few towels from the dry room and tossing one to his cousin, "we're home now and not too soon!" and collapsed on the sofa. "This sofa needs a bit of loving!"
Greg had more energy and wandered about the flat, passing by the many pieces and artifacts that they had collected during their travels, an ornate onyx effigy of a fish and a bust of an unknown emperor and a puzzle box encrusted with semiprecious gemstones. Walking into the connecting open plan kitchen he spied a parcel resting on the breakfast counter.
"Uh! Ben! you might wanna see this."
Ben didn't want to move off the sofa, but he managed to peel himself off and stumbled to the breakfast bar to see Greg pulling the packing tape off the top of the parcel.
"Dude! what the hell?" Ben scolded, "you could've blown us sky high! You know how many enemies we've got!"
"Give me a bit of credit!" Greg retorted, looking up from the opened box with some odd looking goggles over his eyes. "I didn't wear this ridiculous scanner for nothing you know!" and fished around the pool of packing peanuts and pulling out a book.
"Whoa!" Ben stared at the book. It was a leather bound hardback, 2 inches thick with gilded corners. A huge round glassy cloudy hemisphere of a jewel nested in the centre of the cover, hich appeared to be held in place by four gold metallic straps, much like a metal strap of a watch, that stretched towards each corner of the book and wrapping around and connecting to a smaller jewel in the back cover, keeping it shut.
Greg ran his fingers down one of the straps. There were symbols engraved and he pointed this out to Ben, who then went off to grab the deciphering tool (Basically an application he designed for his hi-phone).
However, as he took his eyes off the book, something nicked the fingertip running down the gold. He instinctively sucked on the injured finger and looked down to where he hurt himself. Some of his blood had smeared on the strap and seemed to fill one of the engraved symbols.
He heard a click and the strap unlatched from the jewel.
Still sucking on the injured finger, he wondered if the other straps would loosen the same way and tentatively dripped a bit of blood on the other straps.
As he expected, the straps did unlock but the jewel in the middle began to glow red and without warning two of the straps snaked their way around Greg's wrists.
Greg dropped the book and tried to pull the straps off, but they seemed to melt and the joints sealed forming solid wristguards. In the furore, another strap leapt from the book while carrying the back covr jewel, wrapping around Greg's neck and before he could react to it, that too melted forming a solid gold collar with a glassy green jewel centred over his adam's apple.
Ben had run back after hearing the scuffle but was too late. He could see Greg trying to feel for a break in his new neckwear.
Quick-thinking Ben looked down at the book, wondering whether there was a solution in the book itself and picked it up.