He looked at the staff, and it read “No Fear”.
As he looked back to the sky, he heard a tremendous roar, like a lion or tiger, but much louder, thunderous would be the right word he thought.
Then a silhouette of a giant flying beast appeared above the cavern, he could only catch glimpses of it through the leafy canopy.
The beast folded its wings and dove, directly towards one edge of the cavern opening. Once through it, it spread its wings and circled around the edges of the cavern, slowly descending towards the glowing floor.
David looked over to the monk and saw a bead of sweat trickle down from his temple, fear written all over his face. But he made no attempt to move. David felt strangely calm, “How can that be?” he thought to himself. “There’s a massive dragon flying down through the cavern. What if it intends to eat us, or fry us in a ball of thunderous fire or something? Why aren’t I scared like the young monk?”
Then he remembered the staff, “No Fear.” David realised that the monk had reason to be fearful, “Why was that?”
The dragon slowed, flaring it’s wings like giant ailerons on a jet aircraft. It gracefully dropped the last twenty metres to the cavern floor about fifty metres away from David. When those giant talons made contact with the floor, the cobblestones tore out of the ground with a terrible screeching sound and they scattered for metres around them.
Finally at rest, the dragon turned its head and briefly gazed upon David, acknowledging him with its sapphire stare. David noticed its turquoise scales glimmering in the dappled sunlight, an astounding sight.
Its gaze fell upon the young monk, who, while still sweating, appeared as if he had no intention of moving. That’s when David realised that the monk was hiding something.
“You have guessed correctly young David,” the dragon’s voice boomed even though she spoke quietly and calmly. “This is no young monk,” she continued, “But the true ‘Tiger’ of ‘The Tiger’s Nest’.”
The monk’s eyes darted over towards David, sweat dripping continuously from his brow.
“David, this is the true beast of this land, and the one responsible for imprisoning me for hundreds of years. He attempts to appear innocent before you, that is why he has taken the appearance of a young monk. He is no such thing.”
David noticed the facial expression of the monk twisting painfully, as if he was trying to remain calm. But David realised that he was actually trying to maintain his form.
A strange voice emanated from the monk. It did not belong to that form. “You cannot kill me in front of the boy Druk. And trust me, you will remove me from this pedestal no other way. You will destroy his innocence and his mission will be over. By the time the next one is twelve years old, my mission will be complete. So live or die, I win. Mankind will be extinct.”
“Nothing would give me greater joy than to burn you where you sit,” Druk spat at the monk angrily. “But I am not foolish enough to fall for your trap. The boy has the means to remove you from your seat, I will have to wait for another day to finish the business between you and me.”
David was a little bemused, “what does she mean I have the means to remove him.”
David looked down at the staff and saw that it read, “It Burns.” It had little flames crackling above the characters. David almost laughed out loud.
He walked over towards the monk and noticed that he was shying away from him a bit. He pointed the end of the staff at him and slowly pressed it against the monk’s arm. It sizzled fiercely.
The monk immediately changed into the shape of a Tiger, and leaped away from the burning staff, revealing a large hexagonal stone that he was sitting on. It glowed iridescent green. As the Tiger bounded through a doorway on the far side of the cavern, David touched the staff to the stone. A grinding, rumbling noise started from below, and the hexagonal stone began to rise up from the floor.
David looked over to the dragon, as if for reassurance. Druk nodded her assent, “It will be an honour for me to witness this moment David.”
When the top of the stone reached about half a metre from the floor, it clunked to a stop. David looked at it and had no idea what he was supposed to do. He touched the staff on it again and a little hexagonal hole glowed brightly in the top surface.
The staff read “You Know This Bit David.”
David looked at the end of the staff, noting the hexagonal shape of the bottom end. He lifted the staff up above the pedestal and pushed the end into the opening like a key.
The colour of the pedestal changed to a golden glow, but nothing else happened. David remembered what Grandpa Jack had said, and turned it a quarter turn to the right. A whirring noise came from within the stone and a round section in the middle started to drop into it. The staff stayed exactly where it was and eventually just fell over and clattered to the floor.
David peered into the opening in the stone and noticed the metal bar at the bottom of it. He reached in and took hold of the bar, he remembered that Grandpa Jack had pulled on it, and he did the same. It was a very strange sensation to feel it pulling back away from him, it felt like it would pull his arm right in up to his shoulder. Then he felt this warm sensation, like another hand wrapping around his. It sent a shiver of revulsion up his spine, but he knew now that he couldn’t let go, even if he wanted to.
He started having strange memories. Memories that he couldn’t remember having. David realised that they were from his very early childhood, those memories that no-one remembers. “Why is that?” he thought to himself. He realised that the device was scanning his memories, but he could see what it was seeing, like a series of movie clips. He was suddenly in Grandpa Jack’s house, where he had grown up. There were lots of people there, his family, his cousins, but more importantly he recognised that he was in his mother’s arms. It was sad but exciting, he realised that it was a farewell party. This must have been just before they left for Gamma Cygnus Three. The movie reel rolled on, he couldn’t control it, he was being scanned.
The movie reel ended, with the final scene being that of him leaving his cousins on the knoll outside the monastery. The overwhelming feeling was one of love, and just as the device let go of his hand, an image flashed before his eyes like a text message. “You Must Visit The Princess.” And suddenly, it was gone.
David pulled his hand out of the pedestal as a loud clunking sound emanated from below. Stone grinding on stone became louder as the ground beneath him began to move.
David felt hot breath on his neck and turned to see a massive blue dragon’s head right behind him.
“Would you like a ride?” whispered Druk, “We need to get out of here in a hurry.”
The floor lurched suddenly upwards. He noticed that small things were starting to topple over and fall from the walls, it looked like the cavern was going to collapse.
David grabbed the staff just as it was about to fall into a crack that was opening up below it. He jumped onto the base of Druk’s neck. Luckily this part of her neck had none of those massive spikes that were everywhere else. Conveniently there were two to hang onto, just like handle bars on his bike. He wondered if that’s why they were there.
He was flung backwards as Druk launched herself into the air with her massive rear legs. Her wings spread and swooped slowly downwards, creating incredible lift with each stroke. The acceleration was causing him to almost black out, but he knew he had to stay focused, or he would fall off into the collapsing cavern behind them.
Very quickly they shot out of the opening and rocketed into the blue sky above. Finally, David felt ok again, he wasn’t going to black out completely. Druk levelled out, and he could see the mighty Himalayan mountains all around him, what a spectacular sight.
They started to descend. Behind them, all David could see was a plume of dust rising from the collapsed cavern. “What Now?” he wondered out loud.
As Druk came into land on a snow covered saddle between two smaller peaks, she said to him, “What now indeed David? You shoul
d know what’s next. You should have received a message. Please tell me you received a message.”
They landed in a flurry of snow that was stirred up from Druk’s wings. David hopped gently down onto the soft snow.
“Thank you Druk,” said David. “You saved my life. And yes, I did receive a message. But I don’t know what it means.”
“You must tell me what it was David. But there are things I must first explain, stay close to me and you will stay warm from my body heat.”
“I want to hear what you have to say, but I need to find my family now. I am seriously worried. More to the point, I have been gone so long, they may have given up hope, and left. We need to look for them now.”
“They are safe David, and they are waiting for you exactly where you left them. You have only been gone a little over twelve hours.”
David looked at Druk with an astonished expression. “Twelve hours? It feels more like three days. How can it only be twelve hours?”
“Night is short in the mountains this time of year David, the peaks are the first to see the sun rise and the last to see the sun set. It is now six a.m., but the sun has been up for two hours, if you look down into the valley you can see that it is only just getting light.”
“Wow, I am so exhausted,” he said, resting against Druk’s warm belly. It was actually very cold.
Druk brought the conversation back to the task at hand. “David, we need to discuss your next steps, and the importance of your continued success.” She wrapped a wing over him like a tent, trying to keep him warm while also allowing him the magnificent mountain view.
She continued, “Whatever the message you received, together you will work out what it means and eventually, this will lead to you being given a series of tasks. The device has been activated, and as you know, there has been much speculation about what the device does, but I am the only one who knows for sure.”
David, there are two possible outcomes, either way, balance will be restored to the environment on Earth. The tasks, or missions, that you will be given are an opportunity for Human life on this planet to continue. Fail at any one of the missions and the device will newly terraform Earth, without Humans. So, you could sit here and choose that humanity isn’t worth the effort and allow that to occur, or you can choose that humans have potential, potential to live in harmony with the Earth.”
“You must receive your first mission by the next full moon, which is four days from now. Then, the device will re-set to allow you a set amount of time to achieve that mission. If you are successful, it will deliver you the next mission and so on, until you have changed humanity’s mind about whether to survive, or not.”
David sat there, warm but exhausted, and now incredulous that he had been given this burden. Why was it up to him to save these dumb people who are too stupid to look after themselves. But then, maybe it’s an opportunity, to perform the ultimate service to humanity. Certainly, he knew that he didn’t want to cease existing. And neither did he want his cousins, or Grandpa Jack, or Aunt Lauren to die. They are worth fighting for, Love is worth fighting for.
David looked Druk in that incredible sapphire eye. “Let the adventure begin.” He stood up boldly, “Any chance of a ride?”
“I like the way you are thinking young fellow. Hop on, and where to?”
“I need to re-join my cousins, and let them know what’s going on. Then we will have a riddle to solve, again.”
Druk leaped into the air with a flurry of snow. Two wing beats saw them at the edge of the cliff. Druk folded her wings and plunged over the edge, “We might as well make this fun,” She yelled, as David hung onto his ‘handle bars’ and his staff, tightly.
Chapter 32
“And, Down Again”
Flynn was lying on his back, as close to the now dead fire as he dared, trying to draw a little warmth from the ground. It was now light, but the sun’s rays hadn’t quite reached them yet. They had all decided to stay wrapped up in their yak wool blankets until the sun had risen. There was no firewood left within easy reach, and no-one was prepared to venture further into the dark looking for some. There was just too much risk of plunging over the edge of a cliff.
“I hope David’s ok,” Flynn said, inching a little closer to the embers again. “It’s been awfully quiet since that rumbling stopped.”
You’ll be on fire in a minute,” said Wayne. “If you get any closer to that fire, it won’t matter if David’s ok, because you won’t be,” he laughed.
Timothy was about to say something smart when he noticed movement at the top of the gorge. High above Takstang, on the top of the cliff, was another smaller temple, perched right on the edge. His jaw dropped.
Skye noticed where he was looking and immediately reinforced the shield bubble that protected them. Something was moving fast, very fast in the air just above the small temple. And then, it plunged over the edge and fell into the gorge. She realised that it was the dragon, Druk. But it appeared to be falling, its wings tucked up against its sides. “That’s not my definition of flying,” she said.
Flynn said, “Yeah, usually you need wings for that.”
“I can hear screaming,” said Timothy.
“Is that?” Skye pointed. “Oh my god. That’s David on the dragon’s back. He’s screaming as they fall into the gorge. Shit! I can’t watch this.”
And yet, no-one could look away.
They watched as the pair, Druk and David, plummeted down into the gorge. Their deaths assured if a miracle didn’t happen. It took just a few seconds for them to pass the level of the knoll that they were standing on.
At that moment, Druk’s wingtips started to extend from her sides. Her wings started to catch the air and they began to slow down, to level out. David whooped with delight as they shot out of the gorge into the main valley. Druk banked around into the sunlight and began to lift in a thermal rising off the valley floor.
Flynn looked over at Lurch and said quietly, “I hope you got that one mate.”
“4k at 240 frames per second,” said Lurch. “That will be going into the preview clip, no doubt about it.”
Flynn went to high five him, but Lurch interrupted him. “Still filming dude, don’t interrupt the camera man.”
Skye tore her eyes off David and Druk to shoot them both a stare.
As she looked back, Flynn said, “What? We might as well make a movie out of this as we go. Don’t you think? Epic adventures get made into movies all the time, and if we’ve got actual footage, we’ll make a fortune.”
Skye couldn’t help herself any longer, and started to raise her finger to give Flynn a piece of her mind when he said with a laugh, “And you just got cast as the grumpy cousin.”
Skye turned away exasperated.
Lurch said quietly to Flynn, “Getting an uplink from the camera we hid on David, it’s uploading the footage now.”
Skye just shook her head and watched as Druk came closer, they were going to land very close. Dust started to blow up all around them. They all had to close their eyes and look away until it settled.
The knoll overlooking Takstang, was barely large enough for six young monks, four Aussie kids, one synthetic and a humongous blue dragon.
Druk was very careful, but there is a definite correlation between forward speed and lift. She beat her massive wings one last time to avoid crashing in to everyone and nearly blew them all off the knoll. She stretched out her legs and landed gently on the ground, furling her wings and lowering he neck to allow David to jump off. “All in all, that wasn’t too bad for my third landing in over seven hundred years,” she said to David.
David just looked at her with a strange look, and then he realised what she meant. “It was really you who was being held prisoner all those years wasn’t it,” David asked, “not the Tiger.”
“That’s right David, the monastery across that chasm is definitely the ‘Tiger’s Nest’, but I ask you to keep that to yourself. When all of this is over, I will have my own revenge to se
ek. But for now, the re-union.”
At that moment David was swamped with hugs and shouts and whoops of joy, even the monks joined in, keeping one wary eye on Druk.
“You have no need to fear me young monks, I am your friend and protector. I am honoured to meet you,” she said in a gentle voice.
The monks were astonished to hear the feminine voice and bowed in acknowledgement of her friendship.
“I must go, and you have much to talk about. Also, you should all leave here as soon as possible, the danger has not yet passed. But first, David, I need to know the message you received from the device, I believe I know it, but I need to confirm it, so I can let you Grandfather and Grandmothers know.”
David started to open his mouth, but then he thought about it for a moment. David was thinking whether he should repeat the message in front of the monks, could he trust them? So, he spoke telepathically to Druk, “It said, ‘You Must Visit The Princess’.”
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