The Time Stone

by Jeffrey Estrella

  “We finally have some real firepower here” said Mercedes.

  “And that ain’t all” said Drax as he pressed a series of commands on the dashboard console appearing with a sliding motion before him revealing several buttons and screens. He pressed one red button and the front of the car split open into three directions the hood rising up before them and above them leaving room for viewing through the windshield while the sides split sideways each parting to its own way and the front a silver scorpion ensemble glowing bright orange with fierceness as the hood of the car continued to rise up and join with the trunk rising upward further to form a curving metal tentacle like the tail of a scorpion. The hood of the car displayed a raised metal relief form of a scorpion glowing bright orange in the darkness when the car was fully powered up.

  “Wow” screamed Mercedes. The orange light intensified into the night sky and spiked sideways expanding to form a large projectile as if ready for launch and then it stopped as Drax pressed another button.

  “That’s just a taste of this baby’s firepower” he said.

  “This car has got weapons?” Asked Mercedes.

  “This car is the weapon” replied Drax confidently.

  “Amazing” said Mercedes.

  “Let’s go” said Drax as he sat back down, hit the controls of the car and put both hands on the wheel and rode the vehicle forward with his comrades and then upward hovering into the night air ready for what awaited them in what has been called the cavern of lights above the dark forest.

  Throughout the rocky terrain of the mountainside, there stood a fearsome creature amongst the dead blackened trees and stillness of night under the pale moonlight, a hideous roar bellowed through the trees as the lion-faced beast stood perched above the cliffs, his long fangs reeked of blood, his mane long to the tail of his spine, and his dark fur glowing with moisture from his perspiration. He wore a long leather hunter’s coat and fedora-like feathered hat, he held a bayonet, and wore boots that fitted up to his ankles with shining buckles matching that on his belt and tunic underneath the coat, the symbol a familiar one to anyone who matched horns with his brethren, the swirling coat of arms of the culto de la piedra tiempo.

  The giant fly man flew through the air with rapid precocity as he grasped Tina in his arms. “So you don’t say much” said Tina as she marveled at the view of the dark forest from the impressive bird’s eye view above, as they passed dead rivers and dry lakebeds above the charred remains of the ancient dark forest and closer and closer came to the mountainside. “I have never seen a forest from a bird’s eye view before… uh I mean fly’s eye view” she joked. “So Alvin do you have a last name or do I just call you Mr. Alvin Fly,” she said laughingly and the fly creature made a silent unintelligible pitch from his rapid moving jaws and multiple layers of teeth. “Oh well hopefully we can find this Dark Star. The power it is rumored to have is got to be worth billions.” She smirked as the flight continued uninterrupted and the mountains were in distance. “We should get off near there” she pointed. Alvin then navigated past the rocky hills and made their way towards a precipice where they touched ground and Tina gladly stretched her legs. “Whoa that was fun” and as she said it with that Alvin the fly man took off and flew away from the mountains. “Wait where are you going, don’t just leave me” she yelled as she saw the fly man continue rapidly away until he was out of sight. “Well that’s just fine and dandy” she pouted sarcastically with her hands on her hips.

  Hovering above the intrepid calamity of the dark forest is the scorpion car with Drax and his dumbfounded cohorts. “There it is” said Drax pointing up towards the precipice of the cavern in the mountain terrain rapidly approaching before them. “We have to get up there to the cavern of lights” he said as the blue and red lights twinkling in the cavern before them as the approached got closer and closer. Upon landing slowly on the precipice, a stream of jet emissions unleashed before the vehicle’s underbelly lowering it to the rock face below them and the lights of the cavern ceased to blink leaving them in complete darkness.

  “Wow, I thought this was supposed to be the cavern of lights. So why is it so dark?” Asked Mercedes.

  “Yeah, it was lights a moment ago and now it’s not” said James.

  “Maybe it’s an illusion” added Drax “something to lure us here and now it is gone.” He replied putting on his light beacons from his wrist remote device illuminating the cavern before them and marching forward leading the trio behind their bright flood of light.

  -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

  Down below in the rocky terrain’s foothold near the only body of water surrounding the dark forest, a lone ship rested up against the rocks, a tall brigadier cruiser with metallic underpinnings attached to the wood hull and light diodes all around it, a series of metallic alloy wheels spun slowly in the light wind around the sail posts without sails and the large hull rocked gently on the rough waves as they crashed against the bow of the ship and the rocky shore around the ship.

  “Open sesame my mates, we are preparing for the journey” said a tall bowlegged man with a long beard, eye patch over his right eye, and old eighteenth century naval fleet attire in pristine condition, black with gilded highlights, long curly black locks behind him, a grit of determination in his hoarse voice, and corn pipe in his mouth. His wooden teeth were crooked, his breath smelled of rum, and his one good eye beady with redness to the cabin girl who raised up the stairwell from the lower cabin, a young woman with blonde locks and a sullen grin used to the harsh realities of life on the open seas.

  “Aye Sir, we are prepared below. We just need to wait for the Sergeant.”

  “Well done, Yulelka, we will wait for the rest to come,” with a high-pitched Scottish accent snarled Captain Rigel Cutlass of the doom ship Gorge Hunter.

  -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

  “What the hell is all this?” Asked James as the trio wandered through the cavern seeing the walls through the light from Drax’s beacon. The walls depicted drawings of different people, places, animals, and things.

  “These seem to be pictographs” said Drax.

  “Much like the ones we saw in ancient Egypt.” Said Mercedes. “They are carefully preserved even this far into the future. How weird?”

  “It is weird but not impossible given the altitude of this cavern. This story is something I have read about before.” Drax points to a series of drawings depicting individuals in a sequence showing several figures hovering above a central one figure possessive of several objects and five dots surrounding the figure shaped like a pentagon.

  “This looks like the orbs in the time stone” said James.

  “Yes,” said Drax pointing to the figures hovering above and what looks like a sailing ship in midair between them with dots resembling stars and constellations and other symbols resembling writing that Drax studied briefly and understood. “This is an ancient story of a race of beings known as the Pregivers.”

  “Pregivers?” Asked Mercedes. “How odd? What do they give?”

  “The sky gods the Awondel tribe spoke about” James said.

  “Well, the story goes that they are visitors from another galaxy and came here long ago in a ‘white hot light orb’ and gave the gift of life to this world, the gift of law, the gift of peace and war.” Drax read.

  “War is a gift?” Asked James.

  “It’s all about balance” said Drax “so the story goes they build a device to transport through time and space, also known as the time stone but they had many powers at their disposal. They are one of the thirteen races we learned about before but there is more. They foresaw a time of great trouble for the world and knew there must come their return.” Drax read continuously.

  “What happened to them?” Asked Mercedes.

  “They just ceased but foresaw their return in one chosen to carry their infinite power a
nd wisdom onward towards the future, the legendary holder of stones, one of great power and ability who will... Hmm…!” Drax said.

  “What?” Asked Mercedes.

  “The rest of the text is blackened.” He held the beacon to it but the wall with the rest of the writing and pictures was dark and illegible. “The rest is lost to time, I am afraid.” He said.

  “Broad Staffnight called me the holder” said James shocked.

  “You do have incredible powers” said Mercedes.

  “I know. James is the holder of stones. With the rest of the writing erased, we cannot tell his ultimate purpose and destiny and must wait to find out.” Said Drax.

  “Hmm, it’s scary” said James.

  “When the time comes, I trust that you will have no fear of what needs to be done” said Drax.

  “Oh my goodness” yelled Tina seeing her cohorts. “I thought that was you. I thought that I would never see you guys again” she ran over to them from the other side of the cavern.

  “Tina” yelled James as they embraced.

  Mercedes joined in. “It’s good to see you.”

  “We thought you were a goner back there” said Drax.

  “You can’t keep me down” she replied.

  “We missed you” said Mercedes.

  “Thanks, same here. It’s good to be back with my buddies. It was so dark here for a while all alone but what is this place?”

  “Welcome to the cavern of lights!” Said Mercedes patting her arms up and down.

  “Not much” said James.

  Then suddenly they heard a loud roar from the far end of the cave like thunder.

  “What the hell was that?” Screamed Tina.

  “Let’s find out” Drax edged forward leading his entourage into the dark abyss of the cavern of lights.

  The noise became louder and louder as the quartet approached the end of the cavern and found a wall.

  “Dead end” said Drax.

  “Damn” said James.

  “What now?” Asked Tina.

  “There is nothing, not even more writing on the wall” said Mercedes.

  “So what do we do now?” Asked Tina as she leaned up against a part of the rock wall in the far end of the cavern that pressed inward forming a crevice in the rock face that caused her to tumble and fall onto the sandy floor below. "Whoa” she yelled as she landed on the sand and crawled around. Drax leaned over to help her up but felt he drop slowly into the ground.

  “I got that sinking feeling” said Drax.

  “Me too, it’s quicksand!!!” Screamed Tina as she crawled around and was pulled down on all fours her face closing into the sand.

  “Keep your head up” said James as he reached for her and pulled her head out of the sand but stumbled onto his knees as he fell into the sinking sand crawling around as well.

  “Oh no not you too” said Mercedes as she wandered around wobbling and waving her hands.

  “We need to grab hold of something” screamed Drax.

  “There is nothing” said James.

  “Stay calm, panicking only makes it worse” said Mercedes.

  Tina’s face fell into the sand.

  “We’re goners” screamed James sinking deeper into the sand.

  “Wait, look…” said Mercedes pointing upward as she remained calm while still sinking slowly. Drax looked up to where she was pointing and saw a series of blinking lights, red, yellow, purple, green blue, orange, indigo, each light from a diode embedded in the rock face above them. “I don’t get it” said Mercedes.

  “Uh, it looks like Morse code or something like it” said Drax dropping down as the sand sucked him around his waist.

  “Can you interpret them?” Asked Mercedes squinting on them.

  “I can barely see…” said Drax as he felt his face being submerged into the quicksand. Mercedes squinted up to them as she sank down to her waist.

  “I don’t get it.” She cried as she sank down to her face and felt it submerge slowly. The foursome was then completely subsumed by the quicksand in the small rock tunnel and quarry leaving a surface of running sands on the empty cave floor.

  Then in a flash of yellowish hazy light emanating in the rock face above, the temporal wormhole appeared and fizzled above the sand. Another Milton Drax stuck his head and body out of the event horizon partially submerged as a light ball covering the bottom half of his body as he wore a uniform that was partially red and partially blue with a golden insignia on his right breast side. He was older with slight wrinkles around his eyes and dark grey tones in his hairline. He reached out to the blinking lights and pressed the red one then the purple one then the blue one and suddenly the quicksand ceased moving and the floor was solid again with the foursome resting sprawled across and laying on the sandy rock floor. With that the second Drax in the temporal wormhole looked down at them and then looked at the rock quarry with the crevice having vanished as the rock face pulled itself back into place leaving it the way it was. He pointed his wrist device, aiming a new silvery device on top of it that he did not have before, at the cave wall above the hidden button and pressed a trigger mechanism on the device with his other hand. A single white thin projectile of hot white light emanated from the silvery device and struck the rock face causing a small explosion and a hole was created above the hidden button on the rock face. The explosion caused debris to fall onto the floor below and he noticed the foursome started to move around waking. With that he retracted and vanished back from where he exited and the light portal vanished.

  “Huh?” Said Tina rising up. “What just happened?”

  “I don’t know” said James rising up and helping Tina up.

  “I think we died. Is this heaven?” Asked Mercedes rising up.

  “I don’t think we left the cave” said James.

  “Look” said Drax coughing and getting up as he pointed to the cave wall above them as the rubble and debris cleared. They all stared at a new hole created in the rock face and as the smoke cleared, they saw a pictograph in ancient Egyptian form with several men standing and balls of light and animals around them.

  “How did this happen?” Asked Mercedes.

  “I wish I knew” said Drax. “But it’s a riddle.”

  “What does it say?” Asked Mercedes.

  “Well, it doesn’t translate well into English but loosely…’Two sides of old at odds now one, an ancient story boldly, a cosmic dream, a crisis doom, both history and destiny convert upon, you must fight great odds but the end result, change …something otherworldly.” He sighed finishing.

  “That rhymed well but I think it finishes… great conflict” commented Tina.

  “Well I try but you are skilled too” said Drax.

  “She’s brilliant” said James. Tina blushed.

  “What does it mean?” Asked Mercedes.

  “Well… it obviously means something about a great conflict” said Drax.

  “Like the one Alana told us about” said Mercedes.

  “Maybe” said Drax, “I am worried about this whole thing. How did we survive that quicksand?”

  “Maybe we have a guardian angel” said Tina.

  “Humph… we should get moving.” Drax said.

  “Where?” Asked James, “there is no way to go but back way down the cliff in your hooped-up souped-up scorpion mobile.”

  “This riddle may hold the answer,” said Drax, “two sides at odds meaning conflict… ancient meaning possible eternal… history and destiny … change to something otherworldly, meaning perhaps a symbol of some godly regimen.”

  “Eternal conflict, good vs. evil, darkness vs. light…” started Mercedes.

  “A ying yang!” yelled Tina excitedly.

  Then suddenly the panel of inscribed rock before them vanished in a glow of white light. They shielded their eyes as the intensity blinded them and surrounded the entire part of the cavern. A strange humming sound emanated from the wall as the light intensified. After a few seconds, the light and sound ceased and
they opened their eyes and unshielded them.

  “Where are we?” Asked Mercedes.

  “At least we know now why they call this the cavern of lights.” Said Tina.

  “Wow” said James as they looked about and were now standing in a precipice in an underground cavern, the rock walls spanning miles around glistened with purple lights, and smaller lights representing the various colors of the rainbow spectrum, a series of small cave inlets and openings surrounded the cavern culminating in a large central opening above with some light coming down from the intense light from the bright hot lava flow at the core of the mountain. A narrow suspension bridge made of a metal-reinforced wooden framework stretched across to the other side and a pedestal rested their on a narrow rock platform. Something lit up brightly on the platform.

  “What is that?” Asked Drax.

  “I can barely make it out” said James.

  “Let’s go check it out” remarked Tina.

  CHAPTER 72

  They followed the bridge in single file with Drax valiantly taking the lead.

  “How deep do you think this is?” Asked Tina looking down at the seemingly endless black void below.

  “Got to be at least a million miles” said James.

  “There is no telling based on geological findings about how deep the Earth central core is. It is simply a very long way down so best to keep your eyes straight and think of something else” said Drax nervously brave.

  “Anyway, what do you think all this is for?” Asked Tina.

  “It seems like an advanced society once occupied Chronix Bay but also other parts of the world as their amazing abilities are evidenced all throughout history. We seem to find a lot of them.” Said Mercedes.

  “That makes sense,” said Drax. “The mysterious lights in the sky over Brazil, Egypt, and now here with these ‘vocal oriented transportation links’.”

  “Funny” said Tina.

  “We are almost there” said Drax.

  “Any idea what those mysterious creatures were in the dark forest?” Asked Mercedes.