Chapter 37

See, I Do Take Advice

8:54 A.M.

Micha stirred up the fried eggs in the frying pan and set them aside on the kitchen counter. Another plate of sausage and bacon sat right beside it, still cooling down from just being cooked. Micha set the spoon she used aside and made her way into the living room where Torch was. He was there, more or less. He was laid back on the couch in a slouched, uncomfortable looking position daydreaming the morning away.

"Breakfast is ready," Micha announced.

Torch shook his head of his trance and sat up straight to a more comfortable pose. "Alright," he simply replied. He still sounded a bit congested from the cold he caught the other day.

Micha forced a smile and made her way back into the kitchen. By the time she rounded the corner her smile disappeared and replaced with something someone made when they were thinking about something someone said. In this case she was remembering what Cosmo told her about being forceful toward Torch and making him go to the festival with her. Then maybe he would realize on how much more Micha had to offer to him.

She leaned on the counter thinking of what the festival was going to be like. Games, singing, dinner, all under the moonlight. She looked over at the large window on the other side of the table and made her way to it and looked up into the sky. Didn't look like there were many clouds in the sky. She hoped it would stay that way.

The pink dragoness turned back around and made her way back towards the breakfast sitting on the counter. It smelled delicious yet Micha didn't want it. She wanted to eat with Torch, not by herself like she usually ended up doing. So she grabbed two wooden plates from an overhead cabinet and evenly divided the food between them.

She grabbed the two plates and made her way into the living room, walking on her two hind legs. Torch noticed and watched her hand a plate to him which he couldn't help but accept. Micha sat down right beside him and began eating some sausage.

When Micha swallowed she asked, "So you going to the festival with me?"

Torch sighed, "I don't know. I'm still a little sick."

Micha frowned and looked down at her plate, suddenly losing her appetite. Then she took in Cosmo's advice and turned to Torch, "Well, you're going whether you like it or not."

Torch looked over at her unexpectedly, "But I'm sick."

"You'll feel just as bad at the festival. You are going with me."

Torch looked down at his breakfast. He cleared his throat then went on, "Alright, if it's that important to you then I guess I have no choice."

"Darn right," Micha replied, taking another bite of sausage.

"So when is it?" Torch asked, picking up a strip of bacon.

"Tonight," she muffled, then swallowed. "At seven."

Torch took a bite of his bacon then swallowed a few moments later. "Alright. It's been a while since we went out anyways."

Micha smiled at that last sentence. "Yes, it has." She ate some more food then remembered a few minutes later about Cosmo. "I ran into Cosmo yesterday."

"Oh really?" Torch said in a livelier voice. "Where at?"

"Market. Would you believe me if I said that he never heard of Twilight Falls or the Valley of Avalar?"

"He never heard of those places?" Torch asked, chomping on some sausage.

"I had no choice but to show him Twilight Falls for myself," Micha answered.

"And?"

"What do you think? He loved it."

Torch grinned then asked, "Did you take him the valley as well?"

Micha swallowed some egg and answered, "No, he said that his friend was waiting for him."

"Spyro?" Torch assumed.

"Kali."

"Who's that?"

Micha shrugged, "Never met her but apparently Cosmo is living with her along with her pet cat."

"Are they mates?"

"I don't know," she replied. "Why don't you ask him at the festival?"

"He's going to the festival?" Torch asked, seeming as if he was excited all the sudden.

"Yep," Micha smiled. "If you don't want to go then that's fine. You can stay here, all by yourself, while me, Cosmo, and his friend Kali have some fun."

"Stay here? No way," Torch responded. "We're going there together."

Micha turned to her breakfast and began munching on some bacon, all happy on the inside.

Cosmo's Dreams

Cosmo didn't know where he was, other than he was surrounded by darkness. The dream somehow seemed familiar to him. He didn't know how or why.

He was surrounded by darkness, yet his night vision ability wasn't working like it should. He had the power to freely used it if he wanted to or not, but when he tried, nothing would happen. He only walked, feeling a stone cold flooring underneath him. But he looked down and didn't see anything to stand on. The only thing he saw were stars under him. Was he walking on the stars?

Then he felt a presence nearby. He couldn't see anyone but knew someone had to be there.

"Hello!"

The only response he heard was from a female voice, "At last, you have found everything you wanted. For that, you shall be rewarded. Please allow me to reveal your last hidden strength."

Then everything went dark.

Twilight Falls

9 A.M.

The birds morning chirping was barely audible over the waterfall, yet, they still sung to to the morning sun. A couple of squirrels hopped across the grass as well as the morning bugs, flying to and from various flowers and plants.

Cosmo stirred, silently moaned, and creaked his eyes open. The morning sun made him squint until his eyes adjusted so he could open them all the way. He was going to rub them but noticed something else. Kali was sound asleep, cuddled up in Cosmo's embrace. One of her wings laid over Cosmo as a warm blanket and Kali was warm by snuggling up with Cosmo's chest with he head near the base of his neck.

He guessed they must have fell asleep last night. Or this morning more like it.

He couldn't bring around to waking her up. She looked so happy and comfortable where she was and he didn't want to bother her. Cosmo just looked over at the waterfall and watched it for a few minutes. However it wasn't long before Kali began moving. Cosmo looked down at her to see her stretching her limbs with her eyes still closed. She yawned, then opened them. She saw that it was daylight and was about to get up until she noticed the position she was in. She looked up at Cosmo and he looked right back down at her, both of them smiling in happiness.

"Morning," Cosmo greeted. "Sleep well?"

"No thanks to your snoring, yes," she replied, showing a smirk. "What time is it?"

"I don't know," Cosmo responded. "Morning time."

Kali looked over to where the sun was and could tell it was still morning. She forced herself up while Cosmo gave her that 'why' look. "Come on, we gotta get back home."

"Not my fault you fell asleep," Cosmo said, getting up himself. He stretched his bones and looked at the waterfall one last time before they left.

"You fell asleep. Remember? You said that if I fell asleep, you would wake me up? Instead of me, you fell asleep."

"So why didn't you wake me?" Cosmo curiously asked.

"Same reason why you didn't wake me up earlier," she answered. Kali spread her wings and looked at Cosmo, "Shall we get going?"

Cosmo grinned, "Right behind you."

Meanwhile

Spyro spent most of his day with Ignitus. Cynder, on the other hand, spent it watching Star. Felenia would occasionally check in and see how she was doing then head on back to her duties. Star slept most of the time, but when he was awake, he showed a liking to Cynder. The dragon rarely cried. When he did it was only because he wanted something to eat. Felenia took care of that. Afterwards, Cynder played with Star after she took him out the crib. He slowly crawled around the room, grabbing anything that looked interesting, play with it to the best of his abilities, then move on to the next object that caught his little eye. It amused black dragoness while she sat on the bed, keeping a close eye on him.

Cynder thought about having a child of her own. It was just being with Star made her think a lot about it. Maybe one day, her thoughts would come true.

Then her thoughts vanished as two dragons entered the room. One large, the other her size. It was Ignitus and Spyro. Ignitus set his eyes on Cynder, watching Star in Felenia's place.

"Hey," Cynder simply greeted, not taking her eyes off Star.

"Hey Cynder," Spyro replied.

"I trust you had a good morning?" Ignitus added.

Cynder nodded, "Yeah. I thought Star would be more . . .-"

"Troubling?" Ignitus finished.

"Yeah," she responded. "But he hasn't. Are all the baby dragons like that?"

Ignitus looked over toward the crib where Star was. He was sitting on the floor, fiddling with a small ball made just for him. He seemed to love it. "Well, during my time I've seen it only a few times. I wouldn't call it something out of the ordinary."

"So you mean that it's rare?" Spyro asked.

"You can say that," Ignitus answered, looking toward the purple dragon looking up to him.

Star mumbled something that no one could understand. The dragons looked over at him to see him looking over at Ignitus and Spyro.

"All I heard was blah blah blah," Spyro said.

Cynder regarded to Spyro, still watching Star, "Of course you did, a baby his age can't talk. But at least he's trying."

Somewhere Beyond the Tathric Range

Rita studied the map, while Frederick and Isaac packed up the tent and supplies. She figured they were somewhere in the forest considering all the trees that were around them. They ran into a few more frogweeds and bulb spider the night before, but it was nothing that they couldn't handle. A bulb spider nearly got Isaac at one point by sneaking up behind him. The spider was quickly dealt with by Rita's bow though so the spider went nowhere fast.

When everything was packed up, the last thing Frederick did was kick some dirt over the ashes of where they made a fire from last night to make sure it was out. Then they headed out using Rita's map and Isaac's compass as their guide. If they headed northwest they would eventually end up at the coast of the ocean where the hero supposedly flew over to get to the Parched Desert. Their plan was to find the ocean's coast and follow it. Pretty simple.

They made their way through the forest, only for it to turn into an unexplored jungle. The trees grew thick and the bushes blocked the path. Isaac was made to take point and use his sword to make a path, cutting and slashing through limbs and leaves that blocked their way. Pretty soon, the jungle wildlife began making themselves known to the three explorers. The humans heard exotic birds and monkeys, which they would occasionally see up in the trees. During the whole exhausting trip, for Isaac at least, they did not spot any deer whatsoever. They spotted nearly everything else. From a hedgehog to a red fox, there were many of them. However they didn't suspect any danger.

Then the three of them heard a roar of some kind coming from behind them. They all turned around to see the source, only to see a panther running straight for them.

"So that's where the deer went," Isaac said, readying himself. Frederick noticed his offensive stance.

"That probably won't be necessary Isaac," Frederick indicated. "Rita?"

"I'm on it," she replied. She withdrew her black bow and nocked an arrow onto it. She carefully took aim as the panther closed in, then she let the arrow fly.

The arrow flew and hit it's target right in the head. The panther fell and it's body tumbled a few feet before stopping on the new path the humans made for themselves. Rita smiled in satisfaction and strapped the bow back onto her back.

"Well that takes care of that," Rita turned toward Frederick to see him nodding in appraisal.

"Good, now shall we continue?" Frederick urged, looking back toward Isaac.

Isaac looked down as his compass, turned to face the northwest, and continued his hacking and slashing "So when will we arrive at the ocean?"

"Probably a few hours," Rita answered. "Maybe more, depending if we run into any more obstacles on the way there."

"Obstacles?" Isaac went, cutting another piece of limb that hung over their path.

"Like the panther," Rita said like she didn't expect him to ask that.

Isaac looked back with his eyes while he still walked, "Well it seems you know how to take care of them easily."

"Of course," Rita agitated. "A quick shot to the head would kill anyone."

The rest of the trip was mostly quiet with the exception of the noises of wildlife. They traveled for another twenty to thirty minutes until Frederick took point to give Isaac's arm a rest. Isaac gladly lended his sword over to him while they traveled.

When Frederick chopped through some bushes, he began walking some, not paying attention to his front-side. As he went to take his next step, he began to fall. Luckily, Isaac was right behind him to grab his backpack and pull him out of it.

"You need to pay more attention," Isaac grunted, heaving Frederick back toward him.

Frederick looked down to notice one of those obstacles that Rita was talking about. It wasn't a living obstacle like the panther though. It was a large chasm that dropped down into a darkness, from which there on, Frederick couldn't see.

"Where did this come from?" Frederick scratched his head. The chasm stretched as far as the eye could see. "Rita, was this on the map?"

"Hold on a second," Rita said, pulling out the map from Isaac's bag. After a few minutes of pinpointing, she found the most suitable spot of where they could be at and noticed that the chasm wasn't on the map. "Sorry, it doesn't look like it's on here."

"Looks like we're on uncharted ground," Isaac indicated. "So how long do you think this chasm is?" Isaac examined the chasm himself. It sure was long, but it was a little slim. It was only fifteen yards across to the other side.

"Should we see if we can walk around it?" Rita asked, looking down the jungle, following the chasm.

Frederick nodded. "Yeah, it would be best." He looked up into the treetops to see the tree limbs on the other side, stretching over to their side of the chasm, rubbing up against the tree limbs on their side. The sunlight barely leaked through any gap that was in the jungle.

Later

Kali's Home

Cosmo and Kali finally made it back home at ten in the morning. Cosmo opened the door, being the gentleman that he was, and let Kali in first. He followed in afterwards, closing the door behind him. The first thing they looked for was Isis. The note was still in the same place Kali put it, but the cat was gone.

"Isis," Kali called out. "We're home."

Cosmo waited for the cat just to pop up out of nowhere as she always did. Somehow, Isis ended up behind him without either of them noticing.

"Yeah?" Isis said. The sudden voice made Cosmo turn around, a little startled as he did.

"How do you do that?" Cosmo asked. Putting a paw on his chest.

"Natural talent," the cat simply answered with an amused tone. She returned to her more serious tone when she asked, "Did you two have fun?"

"Yes," Kali said for both of them. "At least I had fun."

Cosmo looked over at Kali, "What do you mean by that? I had fun just as much as you did."

Kali grinned, remembering what day it was. "Well we're gonna have even more fun tonight."

Cosmo raised an eyebrow, trying to decipher what she meant. "What's tonight?"

"The festival silly," Kali giggled. She looked down at Isis who stood beside Cosmo. "Are you going Isis?"

Isis shrugged her little shoulders, "I'll check it out I suppose."

Kali looked back up at Cosmo, "And you're going as well I hope?"

"Of course I am."