Part V:
“If this is the Land of the Mists… where’s all the mist?” asked Chomper
“I don’t know,” admitted Sky as he searched along the horizon and beyond with his eyeglass, “but I intend to find out.”
The trip down the cliffs was a smooth one as Sky did an excellent job finding a safe enough path for the gang to transgress. He also scouted ahead to make sure there were no immediate threats, such as sharpteeth or quicksand and whatnot. With the mists no longer there to conceal them, it paid to be careful.
“Say, how come you never did any of this for us?” asked Cera of Petrie.
“Me too scared of getting lost,” the flyer replied.
“Humph,” grumbled Cera, “that doesn’t seem to bother him.”
As the group of young adventurers crossed the land of the mists, Ali was amazed at how far she could see now. She had grown up here, and recognized nearly all of it. It was a joyous feeling – now that all the mist was gone her herd could come back!
“Hey Littlefoot now that it’s not so misty anymore… we can come home!” she proclaimed.
“I wouldn’t be so sure Ali, something doesn’t feel right about this,” Littlefoot replied.
“Right you are Littlefoot,” added Sky as he landed in front of the two longnecks. He held out his wing to halt their progress.
“What is it Sky?” Littlefoot asked.
Sky glanced about slowly and intensely, as if he knew something was out of place in the surrounding trees. It was dead silent. After a moment he waved them onward.
“It’s too… quiet,” Cera said with unease.
In Sky’s experience when things were really quiet it hinted that there was a predator stalking the woods, and that even the birds stopped singing to avoid giving themselves away. In this case though there was something definitely off… not only was all the mist gone, but the entire valley was lifeless. He hadn’t even seen any insects since he got here, which could only mean one thing – poison.
“Aww… what’s that awful smell,” Chomper said as he covered up his nose.
“Whatever you smell Chomper, I can’t smell it,” Ruby said in a puzzled manner. Ducky sniffed the air too.
“I cannot smell it either, I can’t,” she said, and Spike tried sniffing too and made a gesture that he too couldn’t pick it up.
“Keep up, we must hurry,” insisted Sky.
Soon the gang came to a river, or what used to be one. The entire bed had dried up, leaving only scattered patches of mud. All around dead fish and other water dwelling creatures littered the muddy ground. Everyone was covering there noses now, even Sky. The wingtail had smelt dead fish before, since in his homeland he lived right next to the lake, so he knew that this wasn’t that smell. It was something different.
“Ewe this is disgusting,” commented Cera.
“I don’t think we are coming back after all…” put out Ali as she started coughing even though her paw was covering her nose.
“Where did-id all the water go?” asked Ducky as she lightly pulled on Sky’s wing, hoping he knew the answer. A grotesque bubbling sound reached his ears, and with a glance down steam the answer suddenly became clear.
Not a hundred metres from them a giant volcanic sinkhole gashed the earth taking up an area the size of a lake. When the strange earthquake had violently passed through this area it had not only split the ground and knocked down trees, but it also caused a part of the valley to collapse that had lied for hundreds of years across a dormant natural gas deposit. Now that the vent was open not only had it sucked down the water, thus removing the mists, but it also released its devastatingly toxic burden into the lowest recesses of the valley causing mass suffocation and death. For now the gasses had subsided, but they could rise again at any moment.
“We have to go… now!” called out Sky in alarm. Everyone took his lead and moved to obey, except for Cera.
“Oh no you don’t… I’m not going anywhere until you tell us what’s going on here,”
“Cera, we have to listen to him he knows what he’s doing,” Littlefoot insisted.
“What’s wrong with you Littlefoot… like it or not we have no idea who this flyer is and where he’s taking us, and I’m not listening to any more of his sudden ideas until I get some answers.” Cera stomped her foot in anger.
“Very well… you see what happened to all these creatures? If we don’t leave immediately it will happen to us, and happen to us very soon,” Sky told the threehorn.
“Like what… it’s not like we live in the water or anything,” Cera shot back. She thought it was because the water was gone.
“True… but nothing can live through this,” Sky said as a loud hissing sound reached the trio of dinosaurs, and he pointed behind him to its source. He had expected to use the sound as his warning, but little did he know that a cloud of sickly yellow sulphurous was heading right for them.
Littlefoot and Cera didn’t need to be warned again, it was like something out of their nightmares. They both screamed. Sky turned and saw it too.
“This way, hurry!” Sky called as he swooped over them. The longneck and the threehorn sprinted after him as fast as they could, ducking under branches and jumping over logs as they went. Cera looked behind her to see the leaves melting off the trees – it was utterly terrifying.
“To high ground… follow me up the cliffs!” hollered Sky over the roar of the gas cloud.
They just made it. As Littlefoot and Cera crested the cliff the burst of gas finally ran out of momentum and began to collapse back into the hole from whence it came. Both of the young dinosaurs collapsed, breathing heavy. They had never ran so hard in their lives.
“That was close, far closer then it should have been,” commented Sky seriously as he watched the toxic cloud recede leaving nothing but dead husks of trees in its wake. They had been lucky. Littlefoot glanced angrily at Cera.
“Okay so I was wrong about the death mist,” she admitted to Littlefoot, “but he should have told us before it was about to kill us.”
Above, the rest of the gang had made it out and were coming down to greet them.
“Oh Littlefoot, I’m so glad your safe,” called out Ali, and she nuzzled him. Littlefoot blushed, prompting Ali to step back in embarrassment. She hadn’t meant to be that open about her feelings. Cera saw it and looked disgusted.
“That yellowy mist was scary, it was,” commented Ducky.
“It so fast we almost no outrun it,” added Petrie.
“Yeah, and that must’ve been what I smelt with my sniffer,” Chomper said as he pointed to his nose.
“I think that was just the dead water swimmers,” frowned Ruby. Chomper wasn’t too sure, but it sounded reasonable. He would have thought smelling pre-killed food would be more appealing.
There was a small ring as Sky put away the Occular, and turned to address the gang. He spoke to Ali specifically.
“It would appear as though the Land of the Mists is now unliveable, I regret saying this but Ali your herd may never come home.” Sky donned a look of sincere sorrow as he passed the news to the young longneck.
“It’s okay… we’ve been wandering for a long time now it would’ve been hard for us to change,” she replied.
Ali felt empty now that her home was gone, but there another feeling too and like a furled night flower it seemed to keep itself locked inside. Sometimes when she looked at Littlefoot it started to bloom, but then withdrew just as suddenly as it came. On top of that weird things were starting to happen to her, like she was changing and there was nothing that could be done about it. Where once the world had been so clear, it was turning into a Land of Mists.
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Sky led the gang up the steep rocky slope into yet another jungle-like forest that Ali had never been to before. She remembered vaguely her parents forbidding her to go there when she was a hatchling, so this was the farthest she had ever been in this direction in her whole life. The same applied to the rest of the gang, excluding Sky, and all around there were sounds of small birds flying in amongst the trees and small animals making their way through the branches. Some of them stopped to look at the strange group of dinosaurs passing through their lands, but most simply ignored them and carried on with their lives.
“They are here to escape the gas… which is why it’s more crowded then usual,” lectured Sky as he pushed his way through the dense underbrush. Littlefoot and Ali followed behind him.
“I wonder if Tickles is here,” Ducky said aloud, and Spike started to turn side to side and scan the trees – just in case.
At the rear of the group Chomper felt hunger gnawing at his stomach. He hadn’t eaten since they left the Great Valley and up till now he had kept silent about it, but it was proving quite overwhelming. Ruby heard his tummy growling and decided to address it.
“Hungry Chomper?” she asked.
“You bet I am… I hate to say it but Cera’s tail is looking pretty good right about now,” Chomper looked longingly at the threehorn’s tail wagging back and forth in front of him.
Sometimes his natural sharptooth instincts were very hard to suppress, but luckily Ruby knew him enough to understand. If he told any of the others how he felt, they might take it the wrong way and come back at him.
“We’ll find you something,” Ruby said positively as she looked around, but unfortunately there was nothing that a sharptooth would eat – and she couldn’t just kill an innocent little animal for him. It was a sensitive situation for the both of them.
“Why don’t you ask Sky if we can stop by a river so you can catch me a water swimmer?” Chomper asked, “I’m sure he won’t mind.”
“Oh I’m not sure Chomper,” said Ruby uncertainly as she looked at the ground, “I don’t think he likes me too much.” Chomper’s grin turned into a look of concern.
“Why?” the sharptooth asked.
Cera had been listening casually, in case Chomper decided to come after her tail, and at Ruby’s comment she turned around to hear the answer.
“Well, he’s been ignoring me ever since we were introduced, and last night…” Ruby paused, unsure what to say, “… last night he stood me up.”
“He did WHAT!?!” yelled Cera. It startled Chomper so much he actually jumped. Ruby on the other hand wished she hadn’t yelled so loud, as now Ducky and Spike were listening too. She had hoped to keep it a secret.
“He…umm…” Ruby stammered, and mashed her hands together nervously, “I tried talking to him but instead of talking back he looked at me like I was…” Ruby was shaking - she didn’t like talking bad about other people but it was coming out anyway, “… a smelly spiketail.” Spike looked offended.
“And your just going to take that?” demanded Cera.
Ruby just stood and looked at something else, wishing she was anywhere but here. She looked apologetically at Spike.
“If you’re not going to be mad then I’m going to be mad for you!” asserted Cera, and she stormed off towards the front of the line.
“Cera wait! Do not talk to him when you are mad, you will only make things worse,” called out Ducky. She knew from experience that acting when you’re mad wasn’t smart, especially since when it happened to her during the first cold time and her brother almost left because of it.
Cera didn’t listen and kept right on going, barging past Littlefoot and Ali on her way up to the very front where Sky was busy scouting their path ahead from the air. From the start she had smelt a rat, and with all these bad things happening around them she was sure that this wingtail was to blame. Now that she had proof he’d done something wrong, it was time to wring some answers out of him.
“Get down here Sky, we need to talk!” the threehorn girl hollered into the trees, and sure enough he came on his own. Doing his signature flip, Sky landed in front of her and bowed.
“How may I be of service?” he asked. Cera found his whimsiness very annoying, on top of everything else.
“Why are you being so mean to Ruby, she’s only trying to be your friend,” Cera asked forcefully. Sky looked a bit uncomfortable at the question. After a moment he composed himself.
“Understand, where I come from our kind and the jungle runners are bitter enemies. They are thieves and murderers, sneaking into our nests at night and taking our unborn children. As for your friend… I’ve given her the benefit of the doubt, but I believe it may take some time.” Sky ended with a slight glance towards Ruby, but it was quick and unreadable before he had turned back to Cera.
Sky didn’t believe in blind racism, but hating someone because of their race and hating someone because they were your enemy were two completely different things. He, along with all the other adults his age, had been taught to loathe the jungle runners since the day they hatched. It was fair to ask for some time in the matter, at least by his thinking, because Ruby had yet to prove herself in his eyes. For all he knew she could be plotting behind their back.
“Oh yeah well it didn’t take you too long to accept the ëfriendly sharptooth’ did it?” Cera argued, and her point was a good one, “I think you’re just being stuck up.”
“Cera,” Littlefoot interrupted, he had been surprised to learn that Sky had been rude to Ruby, but this conversation was going on too long to keep friends so he had to stop it, “remember how long it took the adults to accept Chomper when he came to the valley.”
“About one Great Circle rise when you and your grandparents started sticking up for him,” Cera parried, “but where are you now? Siding with your new friend instead of sticking up for your old ones.”
Cera had completely caught Littlefoot in a blank. He tried to come up with a response, but he couldn’t. It was true – he should have stuck up for Ruby. He would never forget what it felt like when they lost her in the river – it made him realize just how vulnerable they were. Maybe this adventure wasn’t such a good idea after all.
“Now you apologise to Ruby or we’re not going anywhere,” Cera insisted of Sky. Chomper looked unsure for a moment, but then chose a side.
“Yeah that’s pretty mean, you should say you’re sorry,” the sharptooth suggested. Ruby looked at him direly, as if she didn’t want him getting involved. Sky on the other hand, looked troubled and uncomfortable. He slowly looked over at Ruby, who was pretty distressed about it. The wingtail sighed.
“I’m afraid I cannot.” Sky wasn’t about to apologize for something he wasn’t sorry for. Considering the things he’d seen the jungle runners do, it was perfectly reasonable in his mind to act as he did.
“Then I’m leaving!” snorted Cera, before turning to Littlefoot, “good luck with your new friend. The rest of us can get eaten by sharpteeth for all you care.” And Cera left, charging through a nearby bush on her way.
“Cera wait!” Littlefoot called out, and he moved to go after her. Ruby stopped him.
“I’m thinking that I don’t think it’s a good idea you go, she may be mad at you but she’s not mad at me,” she said as he smiled at Littlefoot, “so I’ll go.”
“Okay, we’ll wait for you then,” agreed Littlefoot.
“Wait for me!” called out Chomper as he ran to catch up with Ruby as she skirted through the bushes. One thing that fast runners were good at – running fast. When the three of them were out of earshot Ali took her chance to speak up.
“I can’t believe her… talking to Sky that way,” Ali fumed, “I’m glad you didn’t cave into that snotty little…”
“Ali,” Littlefoot asserted, “she might have a bit of a temper but she is still our friend. We have to stick together here, instead of tearing each other apart.”
Ali looked a bit ashamed, and decided not to talk about it anymore.
“I do not want to get eated by a sharptooth,” said Ducky to Spike, who nodded in response.
“Me neither… watching them fight make my head hurt,” added Petrie, who had landed on Spike’s back during the argument. Suddenly they heard a loud growl from nearby.
“If you are hungry Spike, you should eat,” suggested Ducky. But Spike wasn’t hungry. He rocked his head back and forth and grunted to say so.
“If that wasn’t Spike, then who-” began Littlefoot, but he didn’t finish the sentence. Sky noticed that the entire woods had gone silent again – this couldn’t be good.
Two fast-biters jumped out of the brush, and one of them screeched and while the other licked his lips. The gang’s reaction was immediate.
“Sharptooth!” Ducky screamed. Ali panicked.
“Littlefoot what do we do?” she asked desperately.
“This way, all of you,” Sky called out, “I have a place we can hide but we have to run!”
A desperate chase ensued.
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“This way… it’s not far,” insisted Sky as he flew over the heads of the remaining members of the gang. He was leading them towards an old system of caverns he knew called the Icy Caves, which lied under the Icy Mountains. These mountains were called this because they were so high up that snow always covered their top reaches. He was hoping that the caves would be unoccupied, and the sharpteeth wouldn’t see them go in there. As it would turn out he was wrong on both accounts.
“I don’t think… I can run…. anymore,” puffed Ali as she breathed hard. They had been running for a while, and the two fast-biters weren’t giving up. They were so fast they were snapping at Spike’s tail, and the only thing that was saving him for the moment was how the two sharpteeth were pushing each other out of the way to get the first bite. Littlefoot got an idea.
“Ali, help me get a hard water ball ready,” he asked.
“What are you talking about?” she inquired, bewildered at the concept. As Littlefoot pushed one together through the snow, Ali finally understood. Together they formed a huge snowball that they could roll down the hill at the sharpteeth. It was a trick they had used before.
“Incoming,” yelled out Littlefoot, and a terrified Spike dodged out of the way just in time. The snowball came down fast, but the fast-biters were faster and managed to dodge it too. They were momentarily distracted though as they landed in the snow and Spike made some ground while they got themselves back together. The Spiketail clamoured his way up the snowy hill until he was on the same level as Littlefoot, Ali, Petrie, Ducky, and Sky and safe from the jaws of death.
…
The wingtail led them into a cave just ahead, and from the darkness inside it led very deeply into the mountain. He was sure they would be safe there. The smaller gang veered through the half lit passageways inside the cave system, and eventually ended up in a large open space with a medium sized hole in the roof where a small beam of sun cast itself onto the floor. Through the middle the cave, a river ran through that was comparable in size to the one in the Great Valley. They were all relieved to be stopping.
“I am glad we got away from those mean sharpteeth, I am,” said Ducky as she eyed the water with longing. It had been a long time since she had had a swim, and now that they were safe she would have the chance.
“I wouldn’t be so sure,” Sky asserted, and just then the cursed shadow of the sharptooth duo appeared behind them on the cave wall. The wingtail bade them to be quiet with a finger to his mouth, and escorted them into a dark corned to hide. He took up watch himself on a high perched rock near the gap in the ceiling.
Thankfully the sharpteeth couldn’t smell them over the dust in the caves, and sniffed around confused at their new surroundings. Suddenly the Occular began to vibrate once more under Sky’s wing, and he cursed under his breath. The sharpteeth howled in pain as the sound reached their ears, and they rolled on the ground in an attempt to block it out. It was a good thing that sharpteeth ears were more sensitive then leaf-eater ones, as the gang covered their ears to block out the sound. Sky was afraid there might be another earthquake, but this time it didn’t come.
As the sound thankfully faded, the confused and deafened fast biters got up and glanced around in fear. Their instincts told them to leave this place, and they intended to do so as fast as possible. A dark shadow passed over the hole in the roof, but nobody noticed.
“Okay I think we are safe,” Sky called down. A set of hands wrapped themselves around his mouth, and gripped tightly. Sky began to choke in agony.
“I’ve been waiting a long time for this,” Glide hissed in his ear. As the rest of the gang watched in horror Glide rammed Sky’s head against the side of the cavern, nearly knocking him out. Ducky screamed.
Not far down the cave the two sharpteeth heard the sound and licked their lips in anticipation. Their prey was here after all – it was feeding time.
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