Chapter 28: Repeat history
I awoke again to the smell of Grammi's fresh baked bread and some tomato soup. My head had stopped throbbing but my heart once again felt heavy in my chest. I turned to my right to see Eric once again sleeping in a chair at my bedside but my vision also beheld a small ball of yellow fur and green fabric in a far corner across my vision. At first I thought that Luna may have gotten curious and wore one of my tunic dresses, but she then shifted so that I got a good look at her face. It was me from the past that I remembered. She was curled up in a ball lying on a blanket near the corner of the room. I reached over and gently shook Eric awake and his light groan somehow awoke my younger self. I knew that I was a light sleeper but seeing me wake up to a small groan was uncanny. Eric and younger Sunni both stirred awake and lifted their heads and I looked at Eric with slight embarrassment and asked, "I fainted again didn't I?" Eric looked back at me with his kind and gentle gaze and answered, "No one blames you. A lot has happened in these past few hours. We're surprised that you didn't collapse the moment you saw Gruffi." Rather than getting flustered at his remark, I turned to look at myself nearly four months behind in age. She just watched and gawked at me, obviously a thousand intense questions circling inside of her head. I looked to Eric for some answers but all that he told me was, "We tried explaining the situation to the others but Gruffi refuses to allow us to say a word after seeing you faint like that, and he insisted even more when this one came home." I chuckled lightly at the memory of Gruffi's normal reactions toward the strange and unusual. "That's Gruffi for you. He only trusts a member of his family. Even other gummi bears aren't safe from him at times." "Clearly." Eric retorted. Suddenly, we heard a light chuckle come from younger Sunni.
After a few minutes of gathering my wits and calming my anxieties about seeing my dead family once more, Eric and young Sunni, who I began calling 'Sunn" for short, escorted me out into the main hall of Gummi Glen, the area where the upside down dome was located. I looked up and saw the small wild fish swim by and even sometimes get curious and investigate the piece of class with wood and gold lining, separating the glass panels to increase its overall strength. "So, are you going to tell us who you really are and why you look so much like our little Sunni?" Gruffi huffed at me. "More importantly, how did you come to acquire the ancient sime tone? Eh, uh 'time stone'. The only mention of it is in the Great Book of Gummi." Zummi added to Gruffi's statement. Eric looked at me just as curious and I found myself cornered into recounting my nightmare.
After I told the story of the soon-to-be destruction and murder of the gummies of gummi glen, I found everyone that hadn't come from the future staring at me bewildered. Gruffi was the first one to snap out of his dumbfounded state, "Come on, you really expect us to believe that tall tale?" Before I could start defending myself, Zummi stepped in, "It's possible Gruffi. She does have the time stone. And she looks exactly like Sunni." "Well if it is true then Igthorn has a lot to answer for. Killing us is one thing, but letting people like that 'Isaac Lavender' character create a clone of Sunni and let him treat her like dirt is completely cruel, even for him. And I only have one thing to say about that." Gruffi huffed again. "And what would that be?" Grammi asked while reading her rolling pin to punish him for any harsh words. "What, exactly, is a 'clone'?" Gruffi asked in pure curiosity and confusion. "That's a good question, Gruffi." Zummi stated and turned back to me for an explain. "A clone is an exact replica of another being by using DNA splicing to replicate the being in question. Normally the clone grows at the exact rate and can take up to nine months for fetal development. However, my husband used an aging serum to speed up the aging process and bring her up to Sunni's age. The downside is that the aging serum destabilizes the clone's genetic structure and dramatically decreases its life span. Without a regular dose of stabilizer, the clone then only retains a few years at the most to live." The moment Rose opened her eyes after giving her explanation, she found herself being stared at by even more confused looks. "I think I get it." Cubbi slowly said trying to bring down the level of awkwardness. "Look, Luna is a living copy of Sunni. In all rights, she is technically Sunni's daughter and sister at the same time." Eric translated for Rose. "So what was that about 'only a few years to live'?" Gusto asked clearly concerned about Luna. "That's how long I have to live." Luna answered. "Since I was aged by force, my life span drastically decreased. I'll only live till the age of twenty or so." Gusto then walked over to the poor gummi clone and embraced her in a sympathetic hug, trying to keep himself from crying more than her. "Huh, three Sunnis. We're not gonna here you two talk at the same time constantly are we?" Gruffi asked in another one of his moods. He crossed his arms and attempted to turn away from us while remaining where he stood. Grammi was about to clobber him with the rolling pin until Zummi answered, Most likely not Gruffi, even though they are the same gummi, they are from different points in their own timeline. The things that our Sunni thinks, says and does will be similar to the future Sunni's thoughts, words and actions, but in reality, she has already done all of that before. She'll just have her own thoughts while the younger Sunni has yet to think them... I think." "And because the future Sunni's here now, that'll change how the younger Sunni views and thinks. Inevitably they'll seem like identical twins." Rose added. "I've never had a twin before!" I heard myself say. "Trust me," Luna piped in after Gusto let go of her, "It's the coolest thing in the world."
I smiled at my younger self remembering how naive I used to be, having my biggest worries about the latest styles of clothing for the humans and finding Calla time to hang out with me. I also realized in the back of my mind that she needed to go to the future in order to maintain the series of events. "So, if there are two Sunni's, does that mean that there could be two time stones?" Eric asked. "An even better question, where did that stone come from?" Gruffi retorted in his usual tough-guy act. "The Great Book said that the sime tone, eh the 'time stone', was created by an ancient gummi wizard. No one knows how because he had a habit of casting random spells in his sleep. It had the power to control time itself and power like that was too great for any mortal to hold, so he locked it away in a secret location. Apparently, the three symbols on the stone represent the past, the present and the future." "Does that happen often?" Rose asked Zummi. "Ehdia, does what happen often?" He asked her slightly confused. "Mixing up words as you speak, it's a form of dyslexia." She answered. The two of them then went off on their own little conversation with Zummi asking whether or not dyslexia was good or bad.
"So, what do you want to do on our first day as sisters?" Luna asked my younger self. "Why don't we do each others' hair? You seem to have more than me." She responded. "You two go on ahead, I want to catch up with everyone." I told them. Young Sunni led Luna back to her room while Gusto and I watched as they made their way through the glen. "What's that thing that she is wearing?" Gusto asked implying to her jacket. "That is called a jacket Gusto. That particular one is made from leather or animal skin." I told him. He shuddered slightly at the mention of its material but understood none-the-less. "I'm pretty sure that you could go on about how tough it looks." I teased him. He chuckled slightly and retorted, "Maybe we should get Gruffers to wear it, huh." I began laughing at his little joke, simply being able to talk to another gummi bear was enough to nearly make me cry again, but I decided to hold back my tears. The next question was, now what was I supposed to do? I knew exactly what was going to happen in six days but if I stopped it, all of my new friends would vanish along with me and any memory of any of this. The choice still remained, save the past, or save the future.