Quest for the Gaia stone

I woke up to the feeling of warm sun on my face, and a hard surface at my back. I opened my eyes, and immediately covered my eyes from the bright sun. It took my eyes a few seconds to adjust to the light. The air was warm and humid, and filled with a faint buzzing sound.

"Glad to see you're awake." came a voice. I looked up to see Izy sitting in the shade of a nearby tree. Her strawberry blonde hair was tied back in a braid, with her bangs hanging over her blue eyes. She had her Challenger pistol in its holster on her hip, and my pistol and Gateway Assault rifle were laying at her feet.

"Hey," I said, my voice dry and scratchy.

"Here," she said, handing me a canteen. "Drink up."

I propped my self against a tree and drank from the canteen. The water that came out was the freshest I'd ever tasted. It was cold and crisp. I looked around and saw that we were on a ledge of some sort.

"So where are we?" I asked after I finished the water. "And where are the others?"

"I don't know." replied Izy, shrugging her shoulders.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, "I have no idea where they are."" said Izy.

"Well let's see if I can get them on the Comlink," I said, pulling the small card sized device from my pocket. Turning it on, I pushed the red button at its base. "Cain, Samantha, you there?" Static. "Cain, Samantha, this is Aron and Izy, are you there?" More static.

"Great," muttered Izy. "No signal."

"But it also may be that their Comlink's are damaged," I said, rising to my feet. " Now, the first thing that we need to do is figure out where we are."

I walked over to the ledge and looked out at the landscape. I saw that below us stretched a forest of what could be described as Pine trees, at least I think they were. Beyond that was vast desert like plain, and I could see mountains in the distance.

"Well, we're not on Matana obviously." said Izy.

"I know," I replied, placing my pistol in its holster. "The question is where are we?"

"I think that we should worry about that later. We need to find the others."

"Cain I'm not so worried about." I said, slinging my Assault rifle over my shoulder. "With his ability, he'll pretty much find us on his own. Samantha's the one I'm worried about. Even though Cain and I have been training her to use a pistol, she's not very good at using it."

So Izy and I set off through the forest, trying to find the others. We had to climb down the ledge, which was risky, but doable. Once we were at the bottom we set off in what I deduced to be north. All the while, we were always listening for any signs of movement. Since we had no idea where we were, we had no idea what to expect; we didn't know what kind of dangers were out there.

We hadn't been walking for more than 20 minutes when all of a sudden, we felt the ground shake. It shook with such force that we were knocked off balance. When we tried to stand up again, the ground shook again.

"What's going on?" asked Izy. "Earthquake?"

"No," I said as the ground continued its rhythmic shaking. "It's to rhythmic. I've never heard of an earthquake like this."

By now the shaking had subsided. We crept over to a thick patch of ferns and peered through. What we saw blew our minds.

When we looked out through the bush, we both saw a large group of creatures. They looked reptilian and had brownish colored skin. But what really took us for a spin was the fact that they stood 17 feet tall, And had a long neck and tail, and whenever they took a step, their feet landed on the ground with a drum-like thud.

"What are those things?" asked Izy, her eyes wide.

"Not really sure." I replied.

"Do you think they're dangerous?"

"No, I think they only eat plants," I said pointing to one of the creatures as it ate from a nearby tree. "I think the only way they'd be a danger to us is if we got underneath their feet." Suddenly, I knew what these creatures were.

"Izy," I said. "I know what these things are."

"Well?"

"I read about them when I was a little kid," I explained. They're called "Dinosaurs." They were large reptiles that lived millions of years ago on Earth. They came in a lot of different species. I'm guessing that these are what's called a Sauropod."

"So what are you saying," said Izy, raising an eyebrow. "That some how we're back on earth, 70 million years ago?"

"Well, do you have any better explanation?" I asked. I became aware of beeping sound from my pocket. I realized that it was my Comlink, which I quickly took out.

"Hello?" I said, pushing the red button.

"Aron, is that you?" came a voice.

"Cain!" Izy and I yelled happily.

"Hey guy's," Cain said. "What's happening?"

"Well, besides learning that we're all separated, and that we're 70 million years back on Earth, nothing much." said Izy sarcastically.

"You came to the same conclusion that I did?"

"I did actually." I said "So are you ok?"

"Yeah, but I'm worried about Samantha."

"Same here." said Izy.

"I'm in the process of locating her right now," said Cain, his voice covered by heavy static. "I'll find you guy's once, I find her, or-" his voice was ultimately cut off by the static at this point.

"Crap!" I muttered, shoving the Comlink into my pocket.

"Now what do we do?" asked Izy.

"Well, we can't stay here," I said. "We should look for some kind of shelter, cause I don't want to be caught out in the open come nightfall."

"You want me to scout around?"

"Sure." I said, turning around. A few seconds later, I heard a small twittering sound and I felt something land on my left shoulder. I looked to see a small brown sparrow that rubbed it's head against my cheek.

"Just get up there and have a look around." I said and the sparrow, Izy, flew off into the air.

Izy is a Shape-shifter, which means that she can physically change her body into that of an animal. Her favorite animal forms were Sparrow, House cat, Tiger, and a Corn snake.

She was like the rest of us; we each had our own special abilities. I had telekinesis, which means that I can move objects with my mind. Samantha can heal just about any injury with her mind, which is pretty helpful. And Cain is what's called a "Remote Viewer;" he can view an event without physically being there.

After a few minutes, I saw Izy flying back towards me. As she landed, I again turned away, and after a few seconds she stepped out from behind a tree.

"So what'd you see?" I asked.

"There's a river a little ways to the north," she said. "Which runs west. I think that's our best bet right now."

"Yeah," I said, slinging my rifle over my shoulder. "I think that that sounds like a good idea."

Izy and I started trudging through the forest to the river that she had seen. Along the way we had to take off some of our outer clothes cause of the humidity. We marveled at all the plants we saw; some were quite large and others were quite colorful. I found myself having a difficult time believing that this was what the Earth looked like millions of years before any of us humans were alive, and at the same time I found myself depressed that we would eventually destroy it.

It took us a few minutes to reach the river, which was running down a gorge, but indeed flowing west. We followed it, and one point it leveled out, and we were able to find a place to refill our water bottles; I'd never tasted such fresh tasting water, even back home.

After a few hours of following the river, and observing some of the Dinosaur herds we saw, the sun was beginning to set, and Izy and I were utterly exhausted.

"We need to find a place to rest." said Izy, wiping sweat off her brow.

"I agree." I said. We started looking for a place to sleep; I didn't want to sleep in the open, so we looked in the nearby forest, and we quickly found a nice spot under the roots of a large tree.

In a few minutes I had a small fire going, and we had our sleeping arrangements, if you could call the that, laid out. We had been able to find some berries to eat, and they tasted pretty sweet, a bit like ripe Strawberries. We munched on them in silence.

"Do you think we'll find the others?" asked Izy after a few minutes.

"Of course we will," I said, popping another berry into my mouth. "Just stay positive."

It was then that we both heard it, a small moaning sound coming from somewhere nearby. Chills went up my spine as I grabbed my assault rifle. Izy instantly shifted into her Tiger form.

"Come on, let's check it out." I said. We crept through the bushes, following the sound through the thick undergrowth. We soon came upon the sight of a girl wearing blue cargo pants, a purple shirt, and blue sandals. Her blonde hair was matted with dirt, and there was a large red spot on her left side.

"Samantha!" I cried as Izy and I ran over to her. The red spot on her side was a bit damp, and she was unconscious. I lifted her shirt and saw a large gash on her side, which needed to be healed right away. I carried her back to our camp, with Izy following close behind us. Once back, I tore of a strip off of Izy's sweater as she shifted back to human.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

"I'm using it to bandage her wound," I said. "Besides, I thought that you hated this sweater anyway."

After I bandaged Samantha's wound, we decided to go to sleep. It had been a long day, and we needed our strength for tomorrow.

I was the first to wake up the next morning. I walked around, finding some more of the berries from the night before. When I got back to camp, Izy had waken up, and she was tending to Samantha's injuries.

Shortly after I started a fire, Samantha stirred.

"Good," said Izy. "Your awake. You had us worried."

"What happened?" Samantha asked, trying to sit up, but winced in pain.

"You shouldn't try to sit up yet," I said. "I'm not sure that your wound is healed."

"Wound?" she looked down at her side, and saw the red stain on her purple shirt.

"So what happened to you?" said Izy.

"I was trying to find you guys and Cain," Samantha explained. "I was following this river east, when it started to get late. I climbed a tree to see if I could find anything, but I fell, and I must've scratched myself on the way down. So where are we?"

"Well, as hard to believe as it is," I said. "We're back on our home planet of Earth, but millions of years in the past; during the time of the Dinosaurs, to be precise."

"You're kidding, right." asked Samantha, raising her eyebrow.

"Did I joke when I said I had Telekinesis?" I asked.

"No."

"Do you think you'll be ok?" asked Izy, pointing at Samantha's wound.

"Yeah." said Samantha. She took off the bandage, and pressed her hand to the spot and closed her eyes. In a few minutes, she took her hand away, and the wound was gone. She then tried to stand on her feet, but she soon fell to her knees.

"I don't think you should try walking so soon," said Izy, rushing to her side. "Your still a bit weak. Give yourself a day, and then we'll see if you can stand on your feet." Samantha nodded.

"So what do we do know?" asked Izy.

"We try to find Cain." I answered, slinging my Gateway over my back.

Izy, Samantha, and I trekked west, following the river. I carried Samantha on my back, since she couldn't walk. We walked fro a long way, experiencing a few more Dinosaur herds. Samantha looked like a kid in a candy shop as she stared in wonder at the prehistoric creatures.

We had been walking for most of the morning, and already our feet hurt, we were thirsty, and hungry. We stopped for a rest, and Izy found some more of those berries from the night before. We ate in silence, beginning to feel the almost stifling humidity.

Suddenly, the bushes to our left, rustled. I jumped to my feet, drawing my assault rifle, while Izy shifted to Tiger form. Again the rustling came, a little closer this time. We waited in tense silence, wondering what was out there.

"Wait here," I said. "I'll see what's there."

I slowly crept through the thick undergrowth, trying to make as little noise as possible. Every so often I would hear the rustling, and I would follow it. Soon, I came to a clearing, and looking through the bushes, I saw what had been making the noise.

There, in the middle of the clearing, was a Velociraptor. It stood about three feet tall, and had a mouthful of sharp fangs, but the one thing I noticed, of course, was the large, curved claw on its feet. It apparently hadn't seen me, and I wanted to keep it that way. I slowly stepped back…right onto a twig.

The twig snapped under my foot, and the snap seemed to echo through the forest. I looked up as the raptors head turned in my direction, and I swear I felt the color drain from my face.

I ran back towards Izy and Samantha as hard as my legs would go. I soon reached them and grabbed both of there arms, trying to get them to follow me.

"Hey," said Izy, obviously annoyed. "What are you doing? What's going on with you?"

I was about to answer when the raptor that I had seen jumped through the bushes behind them. Shoving Izy out of the way, I slammed the raptor into a nearby tree with my telekenisis. By now Izy's and Samantha's gaze had traveled to the raptor as it squirmed on the ground.

"What is that!" yelled Samantha.

"That's a raptor," I said. "Izy, you take Samantha and get out of here. I'll distract this thing."

As Izy carried Samantha away, I held up my rifle and pointed it at the raptor. It stood up, shook its head, and then looked at me with its carnivorous eyes. It slowly circled me, and I kept my eyes on it the whole time.

Suddenly, it leapt at me, and Ii fired a small burst at it. The bullets grazed its side, and it screeched in pain, but kept coming at me. I fired another burst, and this time, the bullets hit it in the leg, causing it to stagger.

I took this opportunity to run. I ran through the thick ferns in the direction that I saw Izy and Samantha run. After a few minutes, I caught up to them.

"Did you take care of it?" asked Izy.

"Yeah," I panted. "I wounded it, so that should give us sometime to get out of here."

But no sooner had I said that, the raptor leapt out of the ferns at us. Before I could fire some rounds or use my telekinesis, a shot rang through the forest, hitting the raptor right between the eyes. The raptor fell to the ground at our feet, dead.

"You guy's need some help?" came a voice to our left. We looked to see a boy with black hair and Blue eyes. He was wearing, brown sneakers, blue jeans, a grey shirt, and he had a backpack slung over his shoulder. In his hand was a small Challenger pistol.

"Cain!" the three of us yelled at the same time.

"Hey, what's up?" he said, leaning against a nearby tree.

"You mean besides the obvious?" said Izy, pointing to the dead raptor on the ground.

"Look, can we skip the formalities for now," said Samantha. "We need to figure out what we're going to do next."

"I agree," I said. "I'm thinking that we should continue west, following the river."

"What makes you say that?" asked Cain, holstering his pistol.

"I'm not sure. I just have this feeling that tells me to go west."

"Sounds fair to me." said Izy.

"Same here." said Samantha.

"Ok, that settles it," said Cain. "Westward we go!"

We had been walking along the river for a few hours. We had filled each other in on what had happened to each of us. We filled Cain in on how we found Samantha, and he told us what he had been doing for the past day.

Along the way we spotted a few Dinosaur herds: Sauropods, Hadrosaurs, and plenty others. We also saw a few packs of Raptors along the river, so we were careful to avoid them.

Half way through the evening, we saw a large mountain range in the distance. It stretched from the north to the south. We decided to climb over the mountains and see what was on the other side, though we suspected that it would be pretty much like this.

Scaling the mountains was a bit of a challenge. Cain and I sent Izy up a head in her Sparrow form to scout out the best possible paths to take, while Cain and I shared responsibility of caring Samantha up the slope. We had a few close calls on our accent, but we were able to make it, and with only a few blisters.

Once we were at the top, we were able to see what we could only be described as a paradise. Below us was a vast, lush valley, that stretched for a mile ahead of us. A large river ran the length of the valley through the middle, and there were huge fields and a few small forests here and there. We could see plenty of Dinosaur herds that obviously called this place home.

"Wow," said Izy, back in her human form. "This place is amazing."

"I know." I said.

"I agree." said Cain, putting his hands on his hips.

"Kind of reminds me of Matana." said Samantha.

"Yeah, it does."

"Well, I think we found us a good place to stay, we just need to figure out where we're gonna stay," I said, looking up at the setting sun. "Izy, do you think you could-"

Izy was way ahead of us. She flew down the slope in her sparrow form and disappeared from sight in the trees.

A few minutes later, Izy flew back to us and shifted back to human form.

"There's a small cave at the base of the mountain," she said. "It's big enough for all of us to sleep in. And the entrance is covered by huge ferns."

"Alright," said Cain. "Lead the way."

The decent down the mountain was a lot easier than the accent. I carried Samantha down, and soon we found the cave that Izy mentioned.

She was right when she said that it was big enough for all of us. The ceiling was high, and there was plenty of floor space for each of us.

By now, we were exhausted, and didn't even attempt to start a fire. We just found a spot to lay down, and drifted off to sleep.

I slept fitfully that night. My dreams were filled with images of people in lab coats, syringes, monitoring equipment, and other laboratory equipment. The people in lab coats crowded around me, and as hard as I tried to fight them off, they wouldn't back off.

The next thing I knew, I was sitting bolt upright on the floor of the cave, my face and chest drenched in a cold sweat. I looked around wildly, running my hands through my shaggy brown hair.

"You ok?" came a voice. I looked to my right to see Izy sitting with her back to the cave wall.

"Just a bad dream." I said, wiping the sweat off my forehead.

"Was it the Lab again?" asked Izy, moving to sit next to me. I nodded.

"Was it as bad as usual?"

"Same as always." I replied. I started to feel tears well up in my eyes. I wiped my eyes quickly, hoping that Izy hadn't seen them.

But she must have, cause she shifted into her house cat form: a strawberry blonde cat with blue eyes that seemed to glow in the night. I laid down, and she curled up next to me. I ran my fingers through her fur, and I heard her purr.

I continued to pet her, and soon I fell asleep.