Chapter 2

I was the first to awake the next morning. I looked around the cave and saw that everyone else was still asleep, so I quietly crept outside.

Once I was out side the cave, I stretched my stiff back. Sleeping on bare rock hadn't been a very good idea, but I didn't mind.

Since the others probably wouldn't be awake for some time, I decided to do some exploring on my own. I walked through the forest marveling at all the beautiful plants and flowers I saw, nothing like what I knew back home. The air was filled with the scents of the many flowers.

I had been walking for a few minutes, when I heard the last thing I had expected to hear: voices. They sounded young. I knelt behind some bushes and listened to what they were saying.

"So what do you guy's want to do today?" came a boy's voice, which sounded about ten or eleven years old.

"We could play at Bubbling Mud." suggested another boy's voice. He sounded a bit younger than the first, and he spoke in broken English.

"No, we did that yesterday." said a girl's voice. Her voice, had a bossy edge to it.

"Yeah, and it gets kind of boring." came another girl's voice, hers sounding younger than the first.

As I listened to the group, I suddenly sneezed loudly, louder than I thought possible.

"What was that?" asked one of the voices.

My heart stopped as I realized that they had heard me. I then heard the sound of approaching feet and the bushes in front of me began rustling. I turned and bolted in the direction that I had come from.

"Hey!" cried one of the voices. I didn't bother to see who it belonged to.

I ran for all I was worth through the thick undergrowth. I could hear footsteps behind me, which I took to be the voices. I tried weaving through the trees, but that didn't seem to stop them.

Suddenly, my foot caught on an exposed root, and I was sent sprawling forward, my head hitting a rock, and all went black.

"Do you think he's alright?" asked a voice.

"I think so." came another voice.

By now my head was pounding, and when I opened my eyes, I saw that they weren't focused properly, but I could see several blurry shaped around me: one was Brownish-purple, another was peach colored, another was olive green, another was brown, and the final was green.

"Ow," I said, closing my eyes and sitting up, clutching my pounding head. "What happened?"

"You tripped and hit your head on a rock." said the first voice.

"So what are you?" asked the second voice.

"Cera!" scolded the first.

"What do you mean by-" I started. By now my eyes were able to focus, and what I saw sent my head spinning; before me I saw a Brontosaurus, Triceratops, Hadrosaur, Pterodactyl, and Stegosaurus.

"WHOA!" I screamed, jumping a foot in the air, and scrambling backwards.

"Wait, we won't hurt you," said the Brontosaurus.

"Wh…wh…what's going on?" I stammered, trying to make sense of what was in front of me.

"How about you just answer my question," demanded the peach colored Triceratops. "What are you?"

"I…I'm a…human." I said nervously.

"What's a human?" asked the brown Pterodactyl.

"A human is a type of creature that exists in the future.' I explained as best I could.

"So what's your name?" asked the Brontosaurus.

"My name's Aron."

"Nice to meet you," said the Brontosaurus. "My name's Littlefoot."

"Mine's Cera." said the Triceratops.

"Me Petrie." said the Pterodactyl.

"Mine name is Ducky," said the Hadrosaur, then pointing to the Stegosaurus, added. "And this is Spike."

"So how did you get here?" asked Littlefoot.

"I wish I knew." I said, ribbing my head.

"What do you mean?"

"I'm not really sure how I got here," I explained. "I…just remember waking up and here I am. It's the same with my friends-

"Oh shoot!"

"What?" asked Cera.

"I almost forgot about my friends," I said, getting to my feet. "They're probably just starting to wake up. I gotta go."

"Wait, cant we meet them?" asked Ducky.

"Uh…sure, I don't see why not. Follow me."

It didn't take us very long to get back to the cave. Once we arrived, I told Littlefoot and his friends to wait outside.

When I entered the cave, I saw that everyone else was awake.

"Hey," said Samantha. "Where were you this morning?"

"I went for a walk," I said. "I didn't want to wait for you guy's, so I had to do something."

"Did you see anything?" asked Cain, putting his pistol in his holster.

"Well…you might say that."

"What do you mean?" asked Izy.

"Well…umm…" I wasn't really sure how I would tell them that I met a group of young Dinosaurs.

"Oh for Pete's sake," came Cera's voice from outside the cave, causing my friends eyes to widen. "Just tell them!"

"Who was that?" asked Cain.

"Why don't you guy's go outside and see for yourselves," I said, stepping aside. "I think it's easier if you see."

Samantha, Cain, and Izy walked outside, and shortly after, just as I predicted, yelled in surprise.

I walked outside to see Cain, Izy, and Samantha pressed against the wall outside the cave, their eyes wide in surprise, and Littlefoot and his friends staring at them, their faces full of confusion.

"What's wrong with your friends?" asked Ducky.

"D…did it j…just talk?" asked Izy, her eyes wide.

"You know guy's," I said. "If it's any consolation, I'm still getting used to this myself."

"So these are your friends?" asked Littlefoot.

"Yep." I said.

After a few minutes for introductions, my friends reaction had subsided to a degree. We explained how we got to the valley, and answered any of their questions as best as we could. Then Littlefoot and suggested that they introduce us to their parents. We were all apprehensive about that, but they assured us that it would be fine.

We spent most of the morning being taken on a tour of the valley. We met Ducky's and Spike's mother, and then we met Petrie's mother. They both seemed a bit uneasy at first, but after a few minutes, we were able to let them know that we wouldn't be any danger to them or their children.

It was after Petrie's mother that we went to meet Cera's father. The way that they shuddered as we got near Cera's "home" made me worried; and we had every right to be.

As we turned a corner and rounded some trees, we came to see a full grown Triceratops. It was dark grey, with a light grey frill above its head, and three long, pointed horns.

"That's your dad?" asked Cain.

"Yep." said Cera.

"Wow, he's big." commented Samantha.

"Come on," said Cera. "Let me introduce you to him."

We started to follow her, when I happened to look back and saw that Littlefoot and the others weren't following.

"Aren't you guy's coming?" asked Izy.

"No, we wait here." said Petrie with a nervous edge to his voice.

The fact that the others weren't coming made me nervous. As Cera led us closer, I observed that Cera was walking with a slightly nervous step, and that in turn made all of us nervous.

Cera's father suddenly turned his head to face us. I could see his eyes widen, and he charged at us. Samantha and Izy dove behind me and Cain, who had his hand on his pistol. It took every ounce of self control to keep myself from using my power to throw him aside.

"Cera, get away from those things!" he yelled.

"But Dad," said Cera. "They're not going to hurt me."

"Honest, we wouldn't do anything of that sort." said Cain, slowly taking his hand off his pistol.

"No we wouldn't." said Samantha and Izy, poking their heads out from behind us.

"Well, than tell me one thing," said her father, his aura that of a high ranking military officer. "Exactly what are you?"

"We're humans," I said. "Our kind exists in the far future, though we're not really sure how we got here."

We talked to Cera's father for a few minutes, finally able to convince him that we weren't dangerous.

After that somewhat scary experience, we went to meet Littlefoot's grandparents. It didn't take us very long to reach his nest. As we rounded a group of trees, we saw two full grown Diplodocus. They stood about 11 feet tall at the shoulder, while their necks were about 26 feet and their tails about 45 feet. Cain, Samantha, Izy and I looked at Littlefoot, and then at what we guessed to be his grandparents; we estimated that Littlefoot stood about 4' 6" at his shoulder, which was about my stomach or chest area.

Talk about a growth spurt. I thought to myself as we drew closer.

"Grandma," Littlefoot called. "Grandpa!"

"Hello Littlefoot," said his Grandma, looking down at us. "Are these new friends of yours?"

"Yep." said Littlefoot.

"So what are their names?" asked his Grandpa.

Thus began the same routine all over again: we introduced ourselves, told them what we were, where we came from, and that we weren't any danger.

"So, do you four have any place to stay?" asked Littlefoot's Grandpa.

"Uh…." said Cain, not sure what to say.

"Well, can't they stay with us?" asked Littlefoot.

"That would be fine," said his Grandma. "But the final decision is up to them."

"Yeah," said Izy. "We'll think about it kid."

"So what are you kids going to do now?"

"Explore, I guess." I said, shrugging.

"We'll be back later," said Littlefoot as we walked away. "Bye Grandma, bye Grandpa."

Littelfoot and his friends led us off across a field of waist high grass. There was plenty of other Dinosaurs around, which meant plenty of opprotunities for awkward looks directed at us.

I tried to distract myself by looking around at the scenery; it worked. I was amazed by the beauty of the valley. Matana was nothing like this, with all the bright colored flowers and such. The grass was the greenest I had ever seen, and the trees were huge.

After a few minutes of walking, we heard a deep rumbling sound coming from the distance. It got louder as we drew closer, an suddenly, we were at the foot of a waterfall. The water pounded into the lake at the bottom, which drained into the lake that we had seen when we first got here. There was a pleasant spray that came off of the rocks, which was nice, cause by now it was getting hot outside.

"So what's this place called?" asked Samantha, yelling so she could be heard over the waterfall.

"This is Thundering falls." said Cera.

"Wow," said Izy, raising her voice. "It's amazing."

"Yeah."

"Hey, what do you guys say we do some swimming?" I asked. Ripping the pack off Cain's shoulder, I opened it up, immediately grabbing my pair of swim trunks; we had actually all discovered a pair of our swim suites in the pack the night before.

After grabbing my trunks, I ran behind a nearby bush, and hastily stripped off my clothes and threw on my swim trunks. By this time, Samantha, Cain, and Izy had also gotten their swim gear on, and we ran to the lake. I wore a red pair, Cain had a green pair, Samantha had a purple bikini, while Izy had a blue bikini.

"Hey, how you guys do that?" asked Petrie a moment before we jumped into the water.

"Do what?" asked Izy.

"Change the color of your skin like that?" said Ducky.

" "Change the color of our skin"?" asked Cain. We looked at ourselves and each other for a few seconds.

"Oh, you mean our clothes!" I said when it finally clicked. "That's not our skin; it's called clothes. We wear it cause our bodies can't regulate body temperature."

"Then what are you wearing now?" asked Cera.

"They're called "swim suites'," said Izy. "We don't really wear our clothes when we go swimming, cause it's uncomfortable to walk around in when they're wet, so we wear these instead."

"Enough talk, let's swim!" I said, jumping in to the clear blue water. It was a bit colder than I had expected, but it was a relief from the heat.

As I resurfaced, I saw Cain cannonball in, sending water shooting into the air. Samantha and Izy waded slowly in, while Littlefoot and the others charged in, splashing cold water in my face. I splashed them back, but in the process I got Cain as well. Thus began a "splash war."

After a few minutes of that, I swam out into a deeper part of the lake. I floated on my back and closed my eyes, feeling the warm sunlight on my face, the cool water at my back, and the roaring of the waterfall all around me. I opened my eyes, and stared at the clouds, lazily drifting across the sky. I looked up at the cliff that was in front of me, seeing the almost natural ledges that were formed on the rock face. That's when I had a thrill seeker idea: I was gonna do a bit of cliff diving.

Swimming over to the cliff, I placed my hands on a low ledge, and hoisted myself up onto it. The rock was damp, obviously from the spray of the waterfall, and I was worried that I would slip. Looking around, I saw another small ledge, and reaching up for it, hauled myself onto the slick surface.

I was sure that my friends had seen me, but if they had tried to tell me to stop, I hadn't heard them: the roar of the waterfall was deafening, and it filled my ears. I climbed higher and higher; at least, that's what it felt. I was tempted to look down a few times, but I didn't.

Soon I came to a ledge that was big enough for me to stand on. I turned around, and looked out at the lake below and the valley in front of me. From where I was standing, I estimated that I was at about the height of the roof of a two story house, but of course, since I was looking down, it seemed a lot further. From where I was standing, my friends looked like toys, but I could swear that I saw the "he's a moron" expression on their faces. I looked down at the lake below me, hoping that the water was really deep. Then, saying a quick prayer, I jumped.

Time seemed to slow down as my feet left the cliff, and my stomach traveled into my throat. I'm not sure if I yelled at all on my trip down, but all I can really remember is the blue of the lake rushing up to meet me. Then, the next thing I know, their's this tremendous splash, and then I'm surrounded by water. My prayers were answered; the part I landed in was pretty deep, with enough water to slow my fall.

Once I entered the lake, I just floated to the surface and stayed that way, my brain still trying to process what had just happened, and the adrenaline still surging through my veins.

Suddenly, I feel hands grab my shoulders and arms, dragging me back to shore. I then remember seeing Cain, Izy, Samantha, Littlefoot and the others standing over me while I lay on the shore of the lake.

"Aron." said Cain, gently shaking me. "Aron, are you ok?"

"That…was…AWSOME!" I cried, sitting up and thrusting my hands into the air, nearly hitting my friends. "Dude, that was so cool!"

"Idiot, what were you thinking?" asked Izy.

"I was thinking that I was gonna get an adrenaline rush." I replied simply, a huge grin on my face.