Part I: Awakening

Ruby felt a flowing, pleasant warmth covering her entire body. The water was passing around her like she was a mere rock in the ocean, and making its way down to someplace else in a timely, uninterrupted fashion. It reminded her almost of the mud baths back home in the Great Valley, where it was so relaxing one could spend all day there without a care in the world. With a bit of an effort the fastrunner opened her eyes, unsure of what she expected to see. The result was a deluge of bright sparkling lights, the likes of which she had never seen before. Snapping back to life, she rose from where she had been laying and brushed back her frill, which was soaking wet.

"Wha… where am I?" she said out loud as she gathered her thoughts and observed the scene around her.

This place was probably the most unique and awe inspiring sights ever conceived in the past world, and it was a direct result of the tailings of the Whirlpool. The cavern was massive but well lit, and sparkled with an almost tropical glow that made it seem like they had dropped into a natural paradise. The air, as well as the water in the cave-wide pool was warm and pleasing. In the middle of the pool in which Ruby rested sat a large column of descending water, which rotated and churned as it fell from the roof into the hot spring pool. Apparently, the disaster that was the Whirlpool had a happy ending after all, as it ended up in this cave of wonders. Ruby looked around in awe for a few moments, before rising slowly to her feet. Droplets of water trickled off her feathers and her face and dripped into the shallow pool that she had been formerly lying in.

"Up already… it's about time," mocked Glide snidely from a nearby shoreline.

"Hey," called out Ruby with a smile as she turned, "Glide… you're okay!"

"Yeah," muttered Glide as he shook out his wings, peppering the nearby rocks and walls with droplets, "no thanks to any of you hatchlings… If I hadn't saved your skin I would still be up on the surface with the rest of the wingtails."

"But…where is everyone else?" asked Ruby with concern.

"Over here drying ourselves out of this downright nasty stuff," commented Gentry from a different side of the pool as he started clearing off himself and Chomper of greenish blue algae that had covered their skin from being in the pool.

"I'm glad you're okay Ruby," said Chomper as he looked up eagerly as Ruby waded to shore, "I was afraid you might not make it through the turning water."

Ruby stepped onto the hard gravel shore, and hugged Chomper once more as he came to greet her.

"I'm glad you're okay too," replied Ruby with genuine care.

Ruby had over the past couple months become a very important figure for Chomper, and in some ways he almost regarded her as a sister that he never had. There was no way to say how glad he was that she survived the Whirlpool, as it had been quite scary even for him as a sharptooth.

"What about Cera," commented Ruby as her and Chomper separated, "and Thylo… are they both okay?"

"Hah," interjected Glide as he crossed the water with a swift flap of his mostly dry wings, "those two are so reckless and headstrong they put me to shame."

Ruby, Chomper, and even Gentry all looked up at Glide in surprise, who had just admitted for the first time that he might be flawed.

"Really… I would never have guessed," commented Gentry smugly.

"Hey, shut up before I decide to pulp you," reconciled Glide in embarrassment, but it was only half serious and was silly enough to cause Chomper and Ruby to giggle.

Glide crossed his arms in displeasure.

"If you're done egg-stealer… could you please tell them where the others went before you all drive me off the deep end?"

Gentry pulled himself together after a moment.

"The threehorn and the annoying one left a while ago… not all sure where they went but they –"

"We're back!" declared Cera triumphantly as she entered the cave and the conversation, "and I think we have found a way out… come on!"

The gang took Cera's lead, and proceeded after her and Thylo into the caverns ahead. With the water gushing in from above and flowing out at the other side of the cave at a torrential pace, it was the only logical option.

Chomper was getting really sick of all this dark, dank caves. The sharptooth was eager to get back outside and breathe the fresh air again, so long had all of them been underground. On top of this he was hungry too, as his growling stomach constantly saw fit to remind him. It was so much that it was all he could think about, even occasionally getting a primal urge to take a snap at the one in front of him who happened to be Ruby. Trying to take his mind off it, he focused on something else.

"So what do wingtails eat?" asked Chomper over his shoulder, hoping Glide would answer.

"Anything," responded the black wingtail swiftly.

There was a bit of an edge to his voice that clued Chomper in that he must be hungry as well.

"Okay… but if you could have anything in the world right now, what would it be?"

"Water swimmers," said Glide as he licked his lips, "a few of the brown ones would make my day."

"Hey I remember having those," piped up Chomper, "back when me and Ruby first met."

Glide raised an eyebrow in curiosity.

"The runner?"

"Yep," answered Chomper with a smile.

"Hmm," the wingtail mumbled as if he was just registering the fact that they all had names.

"Wait a minute, you don't know who everyone is… we haven't introduced ourselves," mentioned the little sharptooth, "I'm Chomper, and the threehorn up front is Cera."

"Cera," repeated Glide with a snort, "and the other two?"

"Uh…"

Poor Chomper couldn't remember the names of their new friends. With so much that had happened over the past few days, it had slipped to the back of his mind.

"Gentry at your service mate," said the egg-stealer as the single-file group rounded a corner, "the annoying one is Thylo."

Thylo turned around in anger.

"Hey you're annoying too! With your funny voice and funny colour and we never know what you're saying half the time and you're really mean all of a sudden and I don't feel like arguing because I'm hungry and you…"

Cera sighed and rolled her eyes, shooting an urgent glance at Ruby hoping she would find a way to end the argument. Unfortunately, the fastrunner just waved in their direction dismissively… sometimes it was best to let these things solve themselves.

In truth Ruby's mind was else ware, and she was thinking about far more serious things then a small argument. She thought about that evil wingtail, and how he had treated her so cruel the day before. He was mean and heartless, and thanks to her help he wiped an entire valley off the face of the earth. She knew it wasn't her fault, and yet she couldn't help but blame herself for what happened. And all those wingtails… they looked at her like she was vermin and she didn't understand why. All of them except that one… Ruby didn't know her name but that wingtail was so kind, she would never forget that.

…

After almost an hour in the complete dark the group of them encountered a cliff-face which led directly down into another underground pool. The runoff from the Abyss Lake above flowed into the subterranean basin to be filtered before finally leaving to flow down the Farwalker Gorge and eventually into the ocean. There were tons of protruding rocks in the pool revealing that apart from the volumes of water passing through it was still shallow like the last one. These ended up catching Chomper's eye.

"Is it just me, or are those rocks down there moving?" mentioned the sharptooth in bewilderment.

Everyone else turned towards the source and looked closely over the edge, trying to make out the sight in the partial darkness. Sure enough, the rocks were moving… at least some of them were. There were living creatures down there.

"Well, you don't see that every day," commented Cera in disbelief.

Glide was suspicious, and sniffed the air testingly.

"Shell swimmers," the black wingtail stated with a slight bit of contempt.

"Wow…they're so pretty!" said Thylo in wonder as she gazed down at the sea turtles milling about their business.

Gentry snorted.

"Until one snaps at your toes for his next meal… nasty creatures they are."

Strangely, that thought only made Thylo admire them even more.

The reality was that this cave was known by the Sea Turtles as Spring Cove, and it was where they would come to nest every year following the cold times. They were migrating creatures by nature and seldom stayed in one place for long, continuing on their cycle from the Dawn Valley up the coast past the Mysterious Island and up the river into Spring Cove for the breeding season. When summer came around, they would depart once more and set out for the warm seas where they belonged.

"They could be friendly," suggested Ruby, "you would never know until you know from asking them."

Cera silently debated on what to do next… to ignore them and carry on or to stop and ask for directions out of this blasted cave.

"What would Littlefoot do?" thought Cera to herself.

An image of Littlefoot popped up in her mind, instructing her on what to do next.

"You're asking for help?" the longneck said cynically, "what kind of leader are you anyway?"

After a moment of thought, Cera concluded that's probably not what Littlefoot would say. If anything, he would probably ask for the help just to make a new friend…

"Okay," concluded Cera, "lets see if they know a way out of this cave… what's the worst that can happen?"

"We get eaten…" mumbled Gentry, but nobody was close enough to hear it.

Before they reached the bottom of the path, Ruby jumped ahead and blocked the path bringing them all to a halt. She looked a little bit worried.

"I don't know how to say this so it is said right, but Chomper I think you and umm…"

The black wingtail hadn't introduced himself yet, so Ruby didn't know his name.

"Glide," muttered the black wingtail in annoyance, driven to an edge by the blisters on his feet. Being a creature of the air, even one with his robust physique would struggle with having to spend so much time walking.

"Chomper, you and Glide should stay here. We don't want to scare them away."

The young sharptooth looked disheartened, but agreed.

"Alright… just wave when you want us to come out."

Without another word, Ruby and Cera, Thylo, and Gentry all rounded the bend to were the sea turtles had gathered.

"Hmm, some friends you have sharptooth," commented Glide with displeasure as he crossed his arms, "Bah… wingtail kids would never be allowed to deal with racially sensitive matters like this in the Feral Forest. Where are your parents?"

It was a rhetorical question for sure, since Chomper knew Glide had heard all about his parental situation back in the prison cave. Now it was best to just sit back and wait, and hope for the best.

…

All eyes turned to the group of young dinosaurs as Ruby, Cera, Thylo and Gentry revealed themselves to the gathered sea turtles. Most of them had been eating, talking with one another, playing, or even getting some sleep on a land that was thankfully free of natural predators. There was at least a hundred hard-shells watching the group with mixed looks of either concern or curiosity. Ruby, who had some experience being the centre of attention, decide to speak first.

"Hi," she said nervously with a friendly wave, silently remembering the last time she was in the company of potentially dangerous creatures, "Me and my friends are lost, and we were hoping that you could help us become not lost anymore."

There was a sea of whispers amongst the cavern. After what seemed like a minute, one of the older turtles spoke out.

"Tell us strangers, how is it that you have come down upon us?"

"Well," answered Cera, "we were pulled down here by the angry water and it somehow dropped us in this cave. Listen, we are really tired and hungry and we just want to go home… do you know the way out?"

Again, there were more muddled whispers as the turtles discussed the matter amongst themselves. Many of them seemed sympathetic, demonstrated by their frequent glances in the landwalkers' direction.

"Very well," answered the old one, "one of our own can guide you to the surface, provided there is one who is willing."

"Kepsla can do it," suggested another male from the other side of the cavern, "my son knows of the landwalkers and would be more then happy to assist."

Kepsla groaned as his dad volunteered him for the unsavoury task. Surely though, he had a good reason for sending him so the turtle obeyed.

"Yes dad."

The shell swimmer slipped into the water, and swam underneath coming up right next to Ruby and clamouring onto the shore. Nearby, Thylo had got into a bit of a splashing game with group of young turtles who looked nearly as happy to have found a new friend as the spiketail did. It was distracted, and Gentry ended up getting splashed mutlitple times by accident. He wasn't too happy about it either. As the business concluded, the gathered sea-turtles went back to their usual business and everything became much less awkward for the gang.

"Hi, I'm Kepsla," said the young turtle, "follow me and I can lead you out."

"Thank you Kepsla," replied Ruby with a smile, before turning back towards the way they had came, "Chomper, Glide… it's okay you can come out now!"

Unfortunately, the fastrunner didn't even think about what was going to happen next, and as Glide and Chomper stepped into a beam of light from the cracks in the ceiling all hell broke loose.

"WINGTAIL!!!" shouted one of the turtles in alarm, before sucking back into his shell.

All around the room shell swimmers rapidly retreated into their shells, slipped into the water, or dove under the surface in panic. Thylo's new friends squeaked in fear and dove under the water to meet their parents. Soon the entire place was silent, save for the spiketail's giggling.

"Ha-ha, scaredy eggs scaredy eggs!" she taunted light heartedly.

Ruby's mouth had opened in mid sentence, and now remained open in surprise. She held a finger to her chin in puzzlement and concern.

"Oops."

The fight at the Sonicron had inflicted a heavy toll on the wingtails of the Feral Forest, and everywhere one looked they could see it. As the day passed and the night came on the trees were full of cries of grief and anger. Among the dead were mothers, fathers, sisters and brothers. Like almost all birds wingtails had a song, but it was only during times of great emotional outpouring that they actually did sing. The wingtail's song ringed through the forest, so much that even the sharpteeth prowling the woods below noticed it and listened.

Cinceel and the two remaining elders were at the Elders' tending to their wounds, along with a fair number of others who were injured. The place had become something like a hospital, with all those who knew about health and aid gathered in a single location. It was busy, but the three of them had managed to reserve a private corner as was their right as councillors.

"What are we to do Cinceel," asked Theanol the green wingtail with concern, "Tenebron and the others are lost, and the forest floor is overrun with sharpteeth."

The female elder ignored him for a moment, tending to other matters.

"That's enough dear… I'm fine," she said quietly to her daughter, who had been busy licking the bloody gash on her mother's side.

As her daughter rubbed her nose briefly in affection and departed, the venomous elder addressed her compatriot's question.

"We stand at a crossroads Theanol," she said with a brief rustle of her wings, "now more then ever we need a strong leader to watch over us during these trying times."

"Who do you have in mind?" asked the green wingtail expectantly, hoping he was the one.

Cinceel sighed… this was not an easy choice to make. She turned towards a guard who had been watching them from a branch away.

"Find Eybron," she commanded, "tell him he is needed in the Elders' Tree at once."

"As you wish," the dark blue female replied, and she left to obey.

Theanol scowled his displeasure at the thought.

"I don't like this at all… Eybron is unstable and I personally think that he is also –"

"We don't have a choice Theanol," interrupted Cinceel with authority, "he knows the most about our new enemy – from experience – and for all his flaws he is working for the best of our people."

Having no alternative, Theanol nodded his head slightly in agreement.

He had a bad feeling that this decision was not going to end well… for any of them.