Chapter 10

I do not own 'Ice Age'. I only own the characters you don't recognize from the movies.

Roshan and Diego walked back to the rest of the herd together from their successful hunt as Diego had already eaten his share of the rabbit and Roshan carried the rest wrapped in a secure bundle in his bag. Roshan was the most excited as this was the first time he was actually truly successful in a hunt without that annoying girl, Milanaka, to distract him. He was so proud of himself that he couldn't help but smile almost the entire way back making Diego silently chuckle at the boy.

"You're obviously very happy about all of this." Diego said and Roshan turned to him.

"Why shouldn't I be?" Roshan replied, "I have you to thank for making this hunt so successful. I can hardly remember the last time I was this successful."

"Alright simmer down, kid. Save that excited energy of yours for traveling tomorrow, we still have a long way to go before we reach anywhere near glacier pass."

Roshan nodded as he did his best to restrain himself and they soon reached the rest of the herd who had settled around a small fire.

"Welcome back" Manny greeted, "How was your hunt?"

"Amazing" Roshan answered excitedly, "Diego taught me some new tips about hunting and I actually caught something for once!"

"When have you never caught something?" Peaches asked.

"Well technically I just wasn't able to catch what I wanted and ended up with something worse."

"Ah."

"Remember what I said" Diego reminded, "Save your energy for the trip ahead."

"Right, sorry." Roshan replied.

"Well, now that everyone is here and accounted for" Manny said, "it's time we all got some sleep; we have a long day tomorrow."

"Aw but we're not tired!" Eddie whined.

"Can't we stay up and tell ghost stories?" Crash suggested.

"I don't think so" Ellie said, "last time you did that, you both had nightmares for weeks."

"Fine." The two possums chorused as they climbed up into the closest tree and hung upside down from a sturdy branch to sleep.

Manny and Ellie settled down next to each other while Peaches settled herself down nearby and Roshan wrapped his cloak around himself and settled close to Peaches who didn't mind in the least bit. Sid made himself comfortable on a nearby flat rock as he was positioned rather awkwardly on the rock but to him, he was comfortable. As the others settled down to sleep, Diego stayed awake for a little bit longer making sure that the area was safe for the night and he turned his head to look at the small shape of the mountains in the distance. Diego could clearly remember the events that took place sixteen years before when he, Manny, and Sid had traveled to glacier pass to return a baby Roshan to his father. He knew what dangers could be lurking in those mountains but for now, they were safe as Diego turned and made himself comfortable near the fire to sleep.

The next morning, everyone began to wake to the morning being slightly cold than they remembered it to be. As they woke, small flakes of snow began slowly falling from the sky and everyone turned their attention to the falling flakes of snow.

"Winter is coming fast" Diego said, "We need to head out as soon as possible."

"I think that might be a good idea." Manny agreed and so did everyone else.

They managed to be able to eat breakfast first but they had to be quick to beat the snow fall that was beginning to slowly quicken. Instead of going out hunting, Roshan retrieved some of the rabbit from the hunt last night and gave some to Diego and some already cooked for himself. With the quick breakfast done, everyone began to head out as they hurried to escape the snowfall.

They were only somewhat lucky as they managed to travel without much more snowfall but unfortunately, even that didn't last long. As they neared the mountains and climbed higher, the weather began to get worse and worse. Soon, there was an entire snow storm brewing uncontrollably around the herd. Roshan wore his cloak to keep warm and the hood was pulled over his head and he struggled to keep it on his head as the strong wind blew. Peaches walked next to Ellie as the two had their trunks wrapped around each other in attempt to keep warm and to keep moving as best as they could. Crash and Eddie almost fell over from the strong wind and they could have been blown away if not for Ellie who quickly grabbed her brothers and placed them on her back. Manny was in the front with Diego as they tried to force their way against the wind but the wind was strong and began to slow the whole group down.

The wind blew hard and cold just enough as it began to even form small icicles as some began to form on the end of Roshan's cloak. Some icicles even began to hang from the three mammoths' tusks and Diego's two long front teeth. Even Sid had icicles forming on him but they were forming from his nose as he shivered behind the rest of the herd.

"Manny!" Ellie called and everyone stopped as they turned to her, "We can't go on like this, we have to get out of this storm before it gets worse than it already is."

Diego began looking around for any form of shelter for the herd and he was only just able to spot a small dark spot not too far from them. A cave.

"There's a cave just over there" Diego said, "Follow me."

Everyone obviously agreed as Diego lead the group towards the cave. As soon as they reached the cave, Diego began ushering everyone inside but Sid was somewhat reluctant to go in for some reason.

"There is no way I'm going in there" Sid said, "I have a bad feeling I'll die if I go in there."

"You'll go in there or freeze out here." Diego replied.

"Nuh uh no way, tiger."

"Move it!"

Diego's roaring voice echoed through the mountain and as it echoed, a rumbling sound was heard. They looked up to see the large clump of snow and rocks just on the edge of the cave roof, threatening to fall at any second. And that second was now. The snow shifted and began to crumble and Manny reached out with his trunk as he grabbed Sid, pulling him inside and Diego quickly followed.

"Get back! Get back!" Diego demanded and everyone hurried to get out of the way as the large clumps of snow and rocks fell and blocked the entire entrance way of the cave. Everyone remained where they were in silence as they took a few moments to calm themselves down.

"Well" Manny said as he broke the silence, "No turning back now."

"Yeah, we kind of figured that." Roshan muttered as he pulled his hood down from his head and the group turned to each other to figure out what to do next.

"What do we do now?" Peaches asked with slight fear in her voice, "How are we going to get out of here?"

"Calm down, sweetie" Ellie assured her daughter, "We're going to be just fine."

Peaches nodded as Ellie looked at Manny for an answer. Manny looked around the cave for a few moments before realizing something.

"Hey, Sid, Diego" Manny said, "Doesn't this cave look familiar to you guys?"

The sloth and saber looked around the cave for a few moments before turning back to Manny.

"Not really" Sid said, "Then again, you know me. I'm terrible with directions."

"This place is pretty familiar" Diego said, "And if it is what I think it is, then we can easily get out of here."

"How?" Ellie asked.

"Just follow Manny and I."

With that, Manny and Diego began leading the way deeper into the cave as the rest of the group followed behind. As they walked, they passed by beings frozen in the cave walls of ice and Roshan's and Peaches' eyes widened.

"Okay, that's creepy." Roshan said as they passed by a piranha fish frozen in the ice wall as it stared right at them, its sharp jaws gapping open.

"Makes me thankful its in here rather than out there in the creek." Peaches replied and Roshan nodded in agreement as they continued to follow behind.

It wasn't long before Crash and Eddie began to get bored as they jumped down from Ellie's head and slid down her tusks and jumped down onto the cave floor. The two possums dashed off in front of the group and it wasn't long before the group heard their voices up ahead.

"Dude! Check this out!" Crash said.

"This is so awesome!" Eddie replied.

Roshan and Peaches glanced at each other in question before going ahead to see what those two possums were up to.

"Uh, guys" Diego called after them, "You might want to be-"

Diego didn't even get to finish his sentence as the remainder of the group heard Crash, Eddie, Roshan, and Peaches all either scream from either fear, excitement or both. "-Careful." Diego finally finished.

"Oh great" Manny said, "We've lost them. Now what?"

"Calm down, Manny" Diego replied, "We'll just meet them at the end."

"At the end of what?" Ellie asked.

"The ice slide." Manny and Diego answered at the same time.

"Oh yeah, I remember that now!" Sid said, "… Didn't we crash?"

"Yep."

Ellie began to laugh, "C'mon, we might as well hurry up and meet them at the end." she said, "One of you has got to lead the way."

Diego decided to do the honors as he began leading the way towards the end of the ice slide. By the time they reached the end, Crash, Eddie, Roshan, and Peaches hadn't made it to the end yet but Manny, Diego, and Sid knew it wouldn't take very long. Sure enough, after a few minutes of waiting, all four of them came down at once and landed in the large snow pile waiting for them at the end to cushion their fall. Snow flew in every direction as they crashed down and they were practically almost entirely covered in snow. Crash and Eddie immediately jumped up in excitement as they high fived each other and cheered.

"That was so awesome!" Crash said.

"Let's do that again!" Eddie suggested.

Ellie grabbed the two possums just in time before they could take off. "I don't think so" Ellie said, "Once might even be too much right now."

Roshan and Peaches glanced at each other for a short moment before quietly laughing at the situation they were in. The two began to stand as they shook the snow off and moved to follow the others.

"We are so coming back to do this again!" Peaches whispered to Roshan and he nodded.

"Totally." Roshan agreed and the two smiled at each other.

As the group continued through the cave, they finally saw no more snow and ice but instead saw stone walls. At first the walls were just plain stone walls but as they walked through, small pieces of pictures and images bean showing up bit by bit making everyone look around a the pictures. Roshan was especially interested in them as the drawings and pictures were obviously done by other humans and he stared at almost every picture he could. There were pictures on every side of the stone walls and even on the roof. Pictures of predators hunting and deer and elk grazing, pictures of different animals everywhere and even pictures of some humans hunting and living village life.

"This is incredible." Roshan gasped as he continued to look around.

"It really is." Ellie agreed as she too was looking around as well and the others were too.

"Wait a second… what is that?"

Roshan had spotted a certain drawing and he headed over to it now as he looked closer at the drawing. It was a drawing of a man and a woman with their baby son and Roshan then also spotted the other drawings that continued that one as if in a story.

The man and woman were happy with their family but it didn't last long as a small pack of saber toothed tigers suddenly appeared and began to surround the man, woman and baby child. The man quickly ushered the woman away from the pack with the baby child in her arms and she ran away from the chaos. Other hunters began showing up to assist the man with the sabers and they all tried to get the sabers away from them. One saber got away as it took off after the woman and the woman tried her best to get away. But it wasn't enough as the saber cornered the woman on a cliff's edge by a water fall and the woman had to make the decision whether to jump or face the saber. The woman held the baby child close as she jumped and the saber roared.

"My father must have made this" Roshan quietly said as he lifted his hand and gently placed it on the stone wall beside the image of the small family. "I remember him telling me about these drawing years ago, I think I was five. He said I would one day be able to tell my own story on these walls someday when I was old enough. Did… did this really happen?"

Diego sighed as he moved to stand next to Roshan, "Yeah, that's how it happened" Diego said, "Sorry, kid."

Roshan was slightly confused, "What are you sorry for, Diego? It's not like you were there."

"Actually… I was."