fanfiction The Stargate, a most unusual adventure

[rpicardi1]

Ark Survival Evolved; The Stargate. Work in progress.

 

This is a story loosely based upon Ark game play but without the Specimen Implant or any map in particular. All names are fictitious and unrelated to previous stories I have posted.

 

Cast of Main Characters for this adventure;

1. Dr. George Sanders. Head of the Archaeology Department of River Valley State University. Close to retirement, he is a bit of a stubborn know it all.

2. Dr. Sandra Croft. Assistant Head of the Archaeology Department with studies of ancient languages. At 54, she is easy going but still single.

3. Mary Reeves. Professor of Archaeology at the university. She teaches both ancient history and prehistoric earth sciences.

4. Joe Reeves. Outfitter of the expedition and owner of the sporting goods store supplying the equipment. Mary is his wife of 24 years. He is a Gulf War veteran of the second conflict.

5. Tod Reeves. 22 year old son of Joe and Mary. He is traveling with the team as a directed study grad student.

6. Sarah Wright. Directed study grad student and Tod’s girlfriend at collage.

7. Professor Narcy. Head of ancient Egyptian artifacts at the University of Caro.

8. Helena Walker. Researcher of antiquity and ancient languages at the Museum of Jewish History in Israel.

9. Ahab. Last name unknown. Grad student from the University of Caro.

10. Cleo. Last name unknown. Grad student from the University of Caro.

 

Chapter 1; A mystery in Southern Egypt.

 

Early Spring in Michigan has started out like any other spring with the weather being ridiculous cold, then very mild, then bitterly cold. Politically, the country has remained badly divided as a result of the 2016 elections which has carried on into the campus of River Valley State University. Between the disruptions caused by bad weather and now the nonsense of riots being created by far left Democratic organizations still trying to invalidate the 2016 elections, special need students that are on academic probation due to their poor grades, and bused in paid protesters supported by various left wing organizations funded by grants from an aging Hungarian billionaire, it has been a difficult time for the regular students and their educators to finish up with final exams and graduation exercises.

It is at the end of the turmoil of graduations in 2020 when Dr. Sanders receives a call from his old friend Professor Narcy about a discovery he has made in the Southern Sahara Desert in Egypt. The next day, Dr. Sanders is hand delivered a package from the University of Cairo by an Egyptian Diplomatic Courier. After studying the information contained in the package, he arranges for a private meeting the following morning with several of his colleagues and two grad students.

In attendance of that meeting are the University President, Dr. Rogers, Dr. Croft, Professor of ancient languages, Mary, instructor in archaeology, Joe, her husband that operates a sporting business, and two grad students Tod and Sarah. Dr. Roger’s report is as follows.

“Last week, Professor Narcy’s team made a discovery of a buried temple he located near the Sudan Border in Egypt. It was initially discovered by radar mapping by the Egyptian Government that was looking for an ancient underground river to tap for irrigation. Upon it’s initial excavation, his team has found the temple to be in pristine condition. Even though I have been invited to attend Professor Narcy’s expedition, I am unable to do so due to my duties as University President and due to the political unrest taking place on this campus. Therefore, I have given the tenured staff in this meeting permission to take a sabbatical to spend the next three months working with Professor Narcy on the dig. I also have permission to send along Tod, Sarah, and Joe on this trip. You need to be ready to leave by Monday morning and will meet here by 10AM. Arrangements have been made to take you to the dig site by private charter and Egyptian military transport. Joe has been given a list of what his outfitter store will provide for the expedition. The rest of you only need to take along your personal effects and a change of clothes for traveling to Cairo. The rest of your clothing will be provided for on the site. The area is so remote that your smart phones and netbooks will not have internet access, so, plan on being cut off from the rest of the world for quite some time when you bring those personal devices with you.”

“An all expense paid archaeological expedition to examine a never before discovered tomb in Egypt in the middle of the desert,” Mary tells the others after hearing of the details presented by Dr. Rogers. “What a great excuse to get away from the bad weather and the disruptive politics around here for the next couple of months.”

“Do you know who is sponsoring this expedition?” asks Joe.

“All I know is that the sponsor is some anonymous donor that has already advanced the University a sizable donation,” answers Dr Rogers. “They have already made the travel arrangements for the six of you including your passports and diplomatic status.”

“Diplomatic Status,” comments Mary. “That is most unusual.”

“Professor, Narcy’s find must be extremely important if he needs our help and the Government of Egypt is giving us Diplomatic Status to travel there,” answers Dr. Sanders.

With the meeting over, everyone heads home, or to their office, to start preparations for the trip that following Monday.

Joe, who runs a local sporting goods store in the area, already has most of the requested items in stock. What he doesn’t have arrives by that Friday via next day shipment from his supplier. He has it packed and sent to the University where it gets priority handling. It is then sent to MBS International where it is placed in the Air Freight Terminal and kept under guard by Airport Security.

Right on time that Monday morning at 10am, the airport limo arrives to take the party of six from the university to the airport. They bypass the main entrance and are taken through a service gate where they are waved through by Airport Security. The limo pulls up to an unmarked private jet waiting for them by the Air Freight Terminal. Their carry on is placed on the plane while the supplies are loaded into the cargo hold. As soon as they have been introduced to the hostess and pilots, they are seated with the private jet departing for a refueling stop in Newark, a second refueling stop in Madrid, Spain, then on to their destination of Cairo, Egypt where they spend the night in the US Embassy.

The following morning after breakfast, they take the embassy limo to the military airbase where they board a transport plane that flies them to another airbase in Aswan. From there, it is a two hour helicopter flight to the dig site which is guarded by the Egyptian Military with security fencing and armed security patrols. Landing, they are met by Professor Narcy who escorts them into his temporary office located in a prefabbed building in the shade of a sandstone cliff. They are then introduced to his two assistants Ahab and Cleo from the University of Cairo Egyptian Historical Museum and Helena Walker from the Museum of Jewish History in Israel.

“Last fall, the Egyptian Military was conducting ground penetrating radar sweeps of the desert looking for underground sources of fresh water.” reports Professor Narcy. “During that search, they spotted a buried temple of an unknown design under the sand. The University of Cairo organized an expedition, funded by an unknown donor, to uncover and study what might be inside this unusual find.”

“Two weeks ago, with the help of military engineers, we finally cleared away the sand burying the main entrance into the temple. We have found this structure remarkably well preserved from wind and other erosion. It is as if the entire structure was buried in one major sandstorm shortly after it was finished. Even more remarkable is the material used to construct it. The rock used for its construction doesn’t exist around here. In fact, it can only be found in the mountains of the Eastern Sudan, at the source of the Blue Nile.”

“The reason I have brought you into this expedition is because of what we have discovered when we first stepped inside the main entrance of the temple. The Hieroglyphs on the wall are in a language that predates all known written languages in Egyptian history. I brought Helena in on this expedition because these artifacts also predate the lost tribes of Israel prior to the time of Moses.”

“Unlike all of the other temples and tombs we have found in the past, this one doesn’t appear to have any connection with the burial of a king or worship of any of the known Egyptians Gods. Instead, it appears to be a library of sorts with ancient scrolls, paintings and statues.”

“Most remarkable are the paintings, drawings, and statues we have found in the main reception area. They are nothing like what you would find in the early cave paintings on Northern Europe or any other early Egyptian temples. What we have found in here are paintings and sculptures created in the finest detail one would expect to find during the Middle Ages. Many have been cast in bronze, some even a form of iron that shows no signs of rust ever forming on them. Many of the trinkets are cast in gold. Others are of fine carving from large pieces of flawless white limestone. Most remarkable are the subject matter of those quality works of art. Many of them are of scenes from a thriving civilization and their religious beliefs. Others are of the creatures both wild and domesticated that date back to the last Ice Age, some even to the Jurassic period long before humans first appeared as a specie on this Earth.”

“Even more remarkable are the paintings and sculptures of creatures that we have no records of ever existing. One looks like a camel like creature that is four times the size of the ones living at present. It looks like a cross between a camel and a dinosaur. A painting shows one wearing a saddle on it’s neck with a human riding on it. Another shows a painting of a species of trikes that I have never seen before. It too is saddled with a rider. There are also paintings and sculptures of various reptiles from the Jurassic Period. Some are depicted in battle with the natives, other are shown as having been domesticated by them.”

“That is most remarkable,” answers Dr. Sanders. “I now understand the presence of the Egyptian Military guarding this find. It would be very tempting for tomb raiders to destroy this site in search for gold and rare artifacts they could sell on the Black Market to billionaire collectors.”

“Our Egyptian guards are made up of their elite special forces, the best of the best.” answers Professor Narcy. “They take their work of protecting this site very seriously. This area is so hostile and remote that few outsiders ever venture into it. Even the refugees fleeing from the Sudan civil wars avoid it. They believe this area of the desert to be the home of evil spirits.

“You have running water and showers in the rest rooms,” Mary tells Professor Narcy after she comes out of the break room. “You also have Swamp Coolers for air conditioning. How is that possible in such a desolate area of the Sahara Desert where water is in such short supply?”

“The military has been able to tap into one of those underground water sources they were looking for.” answer Professor Narcy. “This site sits on top of an ancient river system that the sands have buried for centuries. We have all the water that we need to support the expedition, the support personnel, and the security forces staying here. We only need to make a supply run once a week for food and consumable materials such as fuel for the excavation equipment and backup generators. With abundant solar power in this desert, we are pretty much self sufficient.”

“If you are ready, I would like to take you to the Reception Room in the temple to show you what we have found so far. Bring your cameras and white gloves with you. We have plenty of LED lighting already set up to aid in your research.”

Leaving Professor Narcy’s office, the six newcomers follow him to a large excavation where a large prefabricated shed covers the temple proper. “In order to protect the exterior artwork from the harmful radiation of the sun and spy satellites, we have enclosed the entrance with this protective sunshade. The Mylar Blanket reflects both the sunlight and the heat allowing it to stay cool inside. You will also be surprised just how cool it actually is inside this structure given it’s location in one of the hottest places on Earth.”

“Remarkable,” comments Dr. Sanders when he sees the entrance to the temple. “It looks like it came directly out of a movie set for the Ten Commandments.”

“I can guarantee that it is not a movie set.” answers Professor Narcy. “This structure is made out of blocks of solid granite. That set was prefabricated plywood and Styrofoam.”

“How do we get inside?” asks Dr. Sanders.

“Just put on your white gloves and pull open the bronze door. “answers Professor Narcy. “It’s a well balanced door for being made out of bronze. The power cable and vacuum hoses go through that window. Rather then brush away any dust which just kicks it back into the air, we vacuum it off anything that we want to closely examine.”

With gloved hands, Joe pulls open the door. “That is finely balance for how big and heavy it looks,” Joe tells Professor Narcy.

“We still haven’t figure out just how the builders of this temple were able to hinge them let alone cast them into such a big single piece,” answers Professor Narcy. “When we are all inside, the door will slowly close on it’s own.”

“Incredible,” Dr. Croft tells Professor Narcy. “The hieroglyphs on the columns predate any known early Egyptian civilizations. The written language is most interesting. If you have copies of what you have found here, I would like to study them before we explore this place in detail.”

“I have copies of several historical scrolls you can study back in the office. I would be most interested in what you can tell me about the history of this civilization.”

“You are right about the paintings,” Tod tells Professor Narcy. “They look like they were painted using artist oils and acrylics.”

“This has had us puzzled. We tested one just to be sure that they were not fakes planted here. If it were not for the carbon dating of the media that was used to create them, they could be easily mistaken for modern artwork. We even found some of the paint that was used along with some high quality sable brushes. As expected, the pallet containing the dried up paint, carbon dated to the age of the painting and everything in here. Testing of the paints indicated that they nearly match the same chemical compositions currently used by artist today including the acrylic based ones. That is most unusual since the use of acrylic based paints is only a recent invention with the oils using a modern ceramic base alkali pigments, also a recent invention. Those also carbon dated to nearly 10,000 years ago.”

“That is most interesting,” Dr. Sanders tells him. “These discoveries could force us to reexamine all of the ancient discoveries of the world.”

“Lets all head back, get unpacked into your accommodations and meet at my office for supper by 7PM to plan out our day for tomorrow.”

[rpicardi1]

Chapter 2. The Star Chamber.

 

As is typical of the Sahara Desert during a clear night, it can get very cold by morning. This day is no exception as the sunrise temperature is down to 40*F before it will quickly rise to 110* by noon.

During breakfast, Dr. Croft is telling Professor Narcy about the contents of the copies of the scrolls she studied late into the night. “If I can deduct from the information you provided me with last evening, we will not find a burial site for some king or queen of ancient Egypt, or a place of worship to one of their Gods. What I have been able to determine from the writings and scrolls is that this place is some kind of a travel library and terminal, a gateway where the elite met to prepare them for travel to another world and back.”

“All temples we have found and studied so far have indicated that the Egyptians of importance were being prepared in them for their journey into the afterlife,” answers Professor Narcy. “Is this not of the same journey?”

“No,” answers Dr. Croft. “The scrolls described records of their visit and what they saw on that journey. The paintings and sculptures are of creatures they found and domesticated from those other worlds. No other Egyptian temple that I am aware of has even remotely suggest about anyone ever having returned from such a trip to the afterlife.”

“That is most remarkable if it is true,” answers Professor Narcy. “We know that the location and size of the Great Pyramids of Giza matches perfectly a pattern of three stars as they were observed during their construction. It is speculated that those structures were built to attract the attention of the Gods from that star system.”

“If what you speculate is true, that this place contains a gateway to another world and back, the security of this place just becomes more important then ever,” Professor Narcy tells them.

“Travel to another world,” comments Dr. Sanders. “That sounds so far fetched as to be totally unbelievable.”

After having their breakfast, the newcomers are briefed on the agenda for the day. With the netbooks, cameras, gloves, brushes, and portable gear that they will need, everyone heads down to the temple entrance to enter the Reception Chamber. They are met by the security commander Coronal Arafat with two of his soldiers that looked like they have seen ghosts.

“What happened,” asks Professor Narcy.

“Sargent Nevi and Corporal Alex heard what sounded like voices coming from inside the temple.” answers the Coronal. “When they opened the door and turned on the lights, they saw nothing. Then, they heard a voice speak to them in early Egyptian.”

“What did it say?” asks Dr Croft.

“It sounded like a warning about leaving this world,” answers Sargent Nevi in a shaky voice. “Then it spoke to us in a series of letters. They were X, IV, VII, II.”

“That sounds like a combination code using Roman Numerals,” answers Dr Croft as she makes a note of the letters. “That is most interesting if true. Was anything disturbed since our last visit?”

“No,” answers Coronal Arafat. “Everything is as you have left it when I secured the room for you after your last visit. I inspected it myself just a couple of minutes ago.”

“Has this happened before?” asks Dr Croft.

“One other time when we were cleaning the dust off of a panel next to the door to the next chamber,” answers Ahab. “It scared the wits out of me.”

“Interesting,” answers Professor Narcy. “Why didn’t you tell me this before?”

“I thought that you would think that I was playing a joke on you?” answers Ahab.

“Lets examine that panel when we go inside,” Professor Narcy tells everyone. “It may hold the key to opening that door without us having to force our way inside.”

“That would be excellent,” Dr. Sanders responds. “Lets get to work.” With their equipment, the group of ten researchers make the hike down to the shelter and enter the reception chamber.

“Everything appears to be in order,” Professor Narcy tells everyone after a quick inspection. “Lets go see what we can learn about the door to the main chamber.”

During their study of the door and the surrounding area, Dr Croft suddenly stops what she is doing having the appearance of going into a trance. “What’s wrong!” Dr. Sanders asks her in alarm.

“I’m all right,” she answers. “I just mentally heard that message when I touched the panel without wearing my gloves.”

“What did it say?” asks Professor Narcy. “Was it another warning?”

“It was not a warning,” answers Dr. Croft. “It was an invitation. I’m going to enter the numeric code into the panel I just received from that voice in my head.”

“Are you sure about that?” ask Professor Narcy.

“Yes,” answers Dr. Croft. “The message was in English.”

“Go for it,” orders Professor Narcy. With the code entered on the panel, there is a click, then, with a puff of dust that blows into the reception room from the seals, the bronze circular door rolls open. “Great! We have lighting inside. We won’t have to drag in our lights.” The door rolls back closed when everyone has entered.

“How do we get back out?” ask Dr. Sanders in alarm.

“Not to worry,” answers Dr. Croft. “According to the voice, we can open the door to leave at any time.”

“Lets leave it closed for now,” answers Professor Narcy. “This place is so clean that we don’t need to worry about bringing in the vacuum equipment. Lets leave all of that dust out there.”

A quick inspection of the chamber finds that a four meter diameter stone ring stands in its center. There are several hieroglyph symbols on the ring which has the upper half of a warrior on the top that contains a sword and a shield. Surrounding the ring are several statues of creatures not found on the Earth. One pedestal looks like it contains a control panel of sorts. The control instruction are in hieroglyphs. The outside walls are lined in paintings of Egyptian Kings and Priest engaged in various activities in a strange world. One shows a strange metallic object floating in the air surrounded by kneeling individuals that are watching another floating above an alter. A metallic sculpture of that same object is seen floating above a pedestal that looks like the alter base in the photo. The room is well lit with some form of artificial lighting similar to the LED fixtures that have been placed in the reception area.

“Where do we start?” asks Mary.

“Lets start with the paintings on the wall and work our way to the center,” answers Professor Narcy. The group of 10 scatter about documenting the wall paintings and murals of everyday life.

The artwork on the walls shows what life was like in this early civilization in Egypt. It shows the domestication of camels, goats, sheep, and cats. Others tells the story of farming in the Nile Delta, the farming of rice, cotton, and grains, building of ships for hauling cargo and trade, the early settlements and kingdoms, and the eventual breakdown of that civilization through slavery, war, greed, and overpopulation that resulted in disease and famine, a civilization that predates the known history of the early Pharaohs and the Pyramid builders.

Another set of paintings tells the history of the exploration on a new world. There is the land of the two suns, a semiarid world with strange creatures as well as familiar ones, a land that is a cross between the Jurassic Period and 10,000 BC. It is a far contrast to the sand desert outside of the buried temple. It appears that they ended up at war with something that looks like dragons and other large prehistoric creatures.”

“Sounds all too familiar,” Dr. Croft tells the others as she translates the hieroglyphs under each of the paintings and murals. “The map of that world has a familiar look, like it came from that HBO series known as ‘Game of Thrones.’”

“What a strange turn of events if it ever turns out to be that those books were written by someone that was actually there,” answers Mary.

“That would be most strange,” answers Dr. Croft. “If that were the case, there will be written records of such events having occurred. So far, I have seen no such evidence of those kingdoms or the characters in those stories from there in any of the hieroglyphs written in here or in those scrolls. Also, these paintings show stone Obelisks, Sphinxes, Pyramids, and that strange alien looking structure floating in the sky in their cities, nothing like those are ever mentioned in those series of books, or the movie series.”

Examining the carvings and statues, a wealth of information is being reveled about the creatures and individuals depicted by them. Most of them are of creatures from 10,000 years ago that include Megalasaro Elk, Mammoths, Mongolian Horses, Dire Wolves, early sheep, goats, camels, giant kangaroo. Then there are the creatures never before seen on Earth.

“Interesting,” Dr Croft says as she reads the description of the giant camel like reptile. “It is called a Morellotop. It appears to be a cross between a reptile and a camel. It even lays eggs. Here is another that looks like a monitor lizard with quills like a porcupine. I do not recognize this species of Trike in this sculpture even though it is described as a trike.”

“Well, at least there are no bird or dog head humanoids among the statues like I have seen in all of the other temples,” reports Professor Narcy.

“I have seen no references of those items anywhere,” reports Ahab.

“Oh, how interesting.” Dr Croft comments. “There are those Game of Throne dragons modeled here. If the human figure is the correct scale, it doesn’t look as big as Drogon was in Season Seven. It doesn’t appear to be as scary as Danarys dragons were getting. It’s closer to a Viking dragon in size.”

“Are you sure that it is not a wyvern?” ask Dr. Sanders. “After all, it has two legs and wings like one.”

“My understanding is that a wyvern was a small dragon that walked on its hind legs,” answers Dr. Croft. “This one is larger and is walking on it’s wings much like a pteradon.”

“That is most interesting,” answers Dr. Sanders. “It may explain the lore of dragons in Viking and mid evil European history even though there is no evidence of them ever existing on Earth.”

“I find this discovery even more interesting,” reports Professor Narcy. “There are no known records of dragons in any of my research into ancient Egyptian temples or any of their burial tombs. Even more strange is that some of these dragon sculptures look like that they were recently created and placed in here.”

“How could that be possible?” asks Dr. Sanders.

“That is something that we will need to find out,” answers Professor Narcy.

“What could be the significance of this huge stone ring in the center of this room with the viking looking warrior on the top?” asks Tod.

“I don’t know,” answers Dr. Croft as she examines the hieroglyphs on the side of the ring. “This is interesting, The hieroglyph describes it as a Star Gate.”

“You mean like a portal to another world?” ask Dr. Sanders.

“If inter stellar travel is for real, it would explain the paintings and sculptures of these dragons, dinosaurs, and strange creatures.” answers Dr. Croft. “It would seem that the builders of this temple was using this place as the staging point to travel to another world and back.”

“Dragons, Morellotops, portal to another world,” answer Dr. Sanders. “A fairy tale if I ever had heard of one.”

“I’m not to sure about that,” answers Professor Narcy. “Something is powering the lights down here and it is not us.”

“I don’t believe in that either,” answers Dr Sanders as he rest his ungloved hand on the console like device next to it. “After all, the night security heard voices down in here. So, someone must have rigged the lights in here during the night without telling them.”

With a click, the lights in the room start to dim as the glyphs on the ring start to glow. A shadow of light forms inside the ring which soon brightens to show a scene of a rugged desert badlands with snow capped mountains in the distance. Everyone is standing there in shock as Dr. Sanders, who has his back to the now activated portal, continues complaining about the fantasy of traveling to other worlds.”

Turning around, Dr. Sanders is startled to see the projected 3-D image of another world in front of him. He goes to touch it as everyone screams for him to get away from it. Placing his hand into the image, he decided to walk through the gate. In a panic, the rest of the researcher members run after him to pull him back. There is a problem once they have passed through the gate. There is no doorway for them to go back to the Star Chamber.

[rpicardi1]

Chapter 3. The Land of the Binary Suns.

 

“How in the hell did we get back outside?” a shocked Dr. Sanders complains to the others as they suddenly appear around him.

“We didn’t,” Professor Narcy tells him. “We were pulled through the portal when you placed your hand into it’s image. Look around you. Does this place look like the desolate sand dunes of the dig site?”

“You must have knocked me out and carried me out here.” complains Dr. Sanders.

“If we did that, where are our footprints in this sand leading to here? The tracks of a Land Rover? The landing skid from a helicopter?” asks Joe. “The only tracks around here are our footprints as we arrived. Look at the sky. Can you explain why there are two suns near the horizon? The snow capped mountain to the North? Those pyramids in the distance? That huge floating alien obelisk in the distant sky? Did you see anything like that back at the dig site? We were pulled through that portal when you activated, then touched the image it was projecting. Like it or not, we have just been teleported through that Star Gate into the world of the builders of that temple we were exploring.”

“Then, how do we get back?’ asks Dr. Sanders after he has settled down to the reality of what has just happened.

“Unless we can find the door to the Star Gate that takes us back to Earth, we don’t.” answers Dr. Croft.

“Lets take an inventory of what we have with us, then hike over to that structure in the distance before it gets too hot to travel,” orders Joe.

The quick inventory finds that the group have their clothes on their back, their netbooks, brushes, cameras, backpacks, and flashlights, but little else. “We better pray that we can find a reliable water source or we could be in real trouble by the afternoon. We better get started.”

The hike to the structure is taking them about two hours as they study the plant and animal life around them. During that trip, a lot of unusual plants are observed along the way. “Such interesting plants with the purple flowers,” comments Mary. “They contain a fiber that looks and feels like silk.”

“Are we in danger from these giant flying bugs?” asks Tod.

“No,” answers Helena. “They look a lot like some of the sculptures that describe them as Jug Bugs.”

“These Barrel cactus could provide us with a food and water source if we can find something to cut it open with.” says Joe. “We might be able to split some of theses stones to crack one into a sharp edge.”

In the meantime, Dr. Sanders has found that several of the bushes by him are loaded with colored berries. He starts to pick and eat them. “Don’t eat any of those berries!” Professor Narcy warns Dr. Sanders.

“But, the birds are eating them,” complains Dr. Sanders.

“There are species of birds that can eat berries containing lethal levels of stricknine,” answers Professor Narcy. “Can you?”

“I guess not,” answers Dr. Sanders as he throws away the colored berries he has gathered.

“Is that a Jarboa over there.” reports Sarah. “I thought that they only existed in my brother’s video game. Oh, it is so cute.”

“Be careful,” warns Mary. “It could bite you.”

“It seems friendly enough,” answers Sarah. “Oh, it likes those purple berries.”

“Well, this is most interesting,” reports Dr Croft as she finishes recording a short video of the event on her smart phone. “There is an app on my phone that describes the bushes and berries growing in this area. How is that possible?”

“I don’t know,” answers Helena. “I have the same app on my tablet as well. It describes the purple ones called Mejos as being very tasty to the herbivores. According to the app, Sarah will soon have a friend to travel with her that can warn us of extreme weather conditions coming our way.”

“The app describes the blue, red, and yellow ones are safe to eat. They can also be used to make colored dyes.”

“We have to avoid eating the black ones. Even though they have healing properties, they will put us to sleep. The white ones will give us a boost of energy but are very dehydrating. That is not good unless we can find a source of clean water.”

“How is it that our devices have access to an app that doesn’t exist?” asks Dr. Sanders. “Especially where there is no cell phone service out here?”

“I don’t know,” answers Professor Narcy. “Lets take advantage of the information the app is giving us about this alternative world for as long as the batteries hold out. Lets continue on towards that temple built into that rock face.”

They are nearly to the temple as they pass a pile of boulders when Joe orders everyone to take cover. The sounds of heavy feet and roars of some unknown creature are heard from a fight taking place up ahead.

There is a scream of pain as bones are shattered. Then a loud thud. Then, all is quiet until a bipedal prehistoric creature, covered in feathers soaked with blood, runs around the corner into view.

“What is a frackin Jurassic Park raptor doing around here?” Dr. Sanders says in alarm as his jaw drops.

“Run! To the temple!” screams Joe as the raptor races towards Dr. Sanders.

Before anyone is able to run any distance, six shots are heard being fired from a revolver Professor Narcy has pulled from his waistband. The raptor drops dead from the last shot.

“Where did you get the revolver?” asks Joe after everyone has calmed down and come back to check over the dead raptor.

“Coronal Arafat gave me his service revolver for my protection against anything hostile that may have been in the temple,” answers Professor Narcy. “Unfortunately, I do not have any ammo to reload it. We are now truly defenseless if any more of these prehistoric creatures show up looking for something to eat.”

“It looks like this raptor was already injured before Professor Narcy killed it,” answers Joe. “We better find some place to shelter and craft up some weapons to defend ourselves with.”

Heading around the boulders to see what has happened behind it, the researchers witness a most gruesome sight. “Is that one of those Morley things?” asks Cleo as everyone observes the large camel like creature that lies dead along with two other raptors.

“It certainly is,” answers Mary. “And it looks exactly like the statue back in the Star Chamber.”

“The raptors have me worried,” reports Joe after he inspects the fresh kills. “It looks like that they are pack hunters. That could make them an extreme threat to all of us if more of them show up.”

“My research has also suggested that they may be pack hunters as well,” answers Dr. Sanders. “Seeing what has just happened here confirms those theories. Lets get over to that temple and see if there is a way to barricade ourselves inside of it.”

Opening the big bronze doors of the nearby temple, the researchers are surprised by what they find hiding inside. Neatly packed in the corner are the supplies Joe had been told to gather for the expedition. “How did this stuff get here?” asks Mary as she and Joe unpack the boxes taking stock of what is inside them.

“I’ll worry about that later,” answers Joe. “This is a godsend. We have our tools, desert clothing, sleeping bags, survival rations, water purification tablet and testing, medical supplies, solar chargers for the cameras and tablets, extra SD cards, picks, hatchets, shovels, rope, tarps, and most important, four crossbows with bolts and hunting arrows.”

“We have a water source in here,” reports Sarah as she looks around. “There is a fountain with a basin over here in the corner.”

“This is excellent,” reports Dr. Croft. “We can close and barricade the temple doors if we need to. We should make this our base of operation.”

Everyone’s thoughts are then interrupted by a strange moaning sound they hear coming from the far end of the room that sounds like a cry for help.

“Watch out!” warns Cleo. “There’s something big hiding in the back corner.” Everyone makes a quick dash back outside to hide. Dr Croft and Tod light up a lantern they have grabbed from the supplies. They carefully go back inside to see just what is hiding in there.

“Does that look like a real live dragon?” Tod asks Dr. Croft in a whisper as the head of the unknown creature comes into view of the light of the lantern.

“Yes, it is,” Dr. Croft answers back quietly in both fear and excitement. “From the strong smell of blood in here, he must be badly hurt. Stay here. Hold on to my lantern. He appears to be more frightened of us then we are of him.”

[rpicardi1]

Chapter 4, Sandra’s Dragon.

 

Approaching him slowly, Dr. Croft eventually gets close enough to touch the frightened dragon on his nose. The dragon, about the size of the one in Game of Thrones, when Danarys first rode on Drogon, starts calming down as Dr. Croft talks to him softly. She is talking to the dragon in some ancient language. In pain, he answers her back in a similar language. She then looks at Tod who is staring at them in astonishment.

“It’s OK,” she says. “I’ve been able to communicate with him. He’s tells me that he has been hiding in here due to his injuries. Have someone bring that dead raptor in here and a bucket of water. He’s dehydrated, starving, and in a great deal of pain. And, leave the doors open so we can get some fresh air and light in here.”

“What’s going on in there?” asks Joe with concern when Tod comes back out.

“We found a real live dragon hiding in there,” answers Tod. “Dr. Croft seems to have made friends with him. She wants us to bring him some food and water. He’s not going anywhere. He’s been badly hurt.”

“There is a canvas bucket in the outfitter supplies,” Mary tells Tod. “Help me get it and carry some water over to Sandra’s new friend.”

“Ahab, Professor Narcy, Dr. Sanders,” orders Joe. “Help me drag one of those dead raptor into the temple.”

Mary and Tod are the first to come back to where Dr. Croft is with the injured dragon. They bring over the bucket of water to him where he carefully gets a long drink from it. “How badly is he hurt?” asks Mary.

“He has a deep laceration in his right leg.” answers Dr. Croft. “It’s no longer bleeding but it looks like it is badly infected.”

“Do you know how he got injured?” ask Mary.

“No,” answers Dr. Croft. “All I know is that he doesn’t want me to leave him alone in here. He started crying for me when I started to leave to see where the rest of you were.”

The four men show up next dragging the dead raptor into the temple. The second Dr. Sanders spots the dragon, he is running out of there to hide behind the door. “Tod, help us drag this raptor in here,” orders Joe. They drag the dead raptor in front of the dragon.

“Now what” asks Joe “He wants to eat it but he can’t seem to be able to get the claw on his wing to hang on to it.”

“Can you guys butcher it up for him?” ask Dr. Croft.

“What if he tries to eat us?” ask Joe.

“He won’t harm us,” answers Dr. Croft. “Give me the pieces of meat you cut off the raptor. I’ll hand feed it to him.” The four men start to butcher the raptor with the hunting knives, first skinning the raptor, then cutting off pieces of flesh which they hand to Dr. Croft who hand feeds the dragon.

“For as hungry as he is, he is being very careful taking that raw meat out of your hand,” comments Mary. “I’ll go have a closer look at that injury.”

“Oh dear, that gash in his leg looks so painful.” she says. “It needs medical attention. How are we going to clean it out and stitch it together while he is awake?”

“Is it possible to put him to sleep with these Narcoberries?” asks Helena.

“If we can, that will make it a lot less stressful on him to clean up and stitch that gash back together,” answers Mary. “We have some heavy duty curved needles, cord, and disinfectant in the outfitter supplies. We can use a blanket for a bandage and duct tape to hold it in place.”

Sandra’s dragon has finished eating when Helena tells them what they want to do. “He will eat the Narcoberries for you.” she tells her after she has talked to him in a strange language for several minutes.

“That’s good news,” Mary tells her. “Lets get started. The App tells me that Narcoberries will speed up the healing process as they put him to sleep. I also have a recipe for a disinfectant solution made from the narcoberries to clean the wound before we bandage it up.”

The operation goes well as the dragon accepts the Narcoberry offering from Sandra and is soon sound asleep. The wound is quickly cleaned out and disinfected, then stitched together. It is covered with a bandage made from a disposable blanket and held in place with duct tape.

In the meantime, the rest of the group proceed to set up camp inside the temple. Joe and Tod head out to butcher the other two raptors. A drying rack is set up to preserve the meat after it has been cooked up on a fire. The Morley is also butchered with his meat placed in another drying racks. Some of the meat is placed in cold water in an effort to preserve it for the dragon when he wakes back up.

“I never knew that a dragon could snore so loud while sleeping,” Dr. Sanders comments when he finally comes over to look at him up close.

“I don’t know who snores louder in their sleep, you or this dragon,” Professor Narcy tells him.

“What are you going to do with your new pet?” Dr. Sanders ask Dr. Croft.

“I don’t know,” answers Dr. Croft as she is sitting next to her sleeping friend. “According to the App, you can tame the Morley, even the raptors that attacked it, you just cannot tame a dragon. This creature appears to be very intelligent. I’ve been able to understand what he want as he is able to understand what I want him to do. I believe that he may even be able to talk to me in a structured language similar to Celtic. I just need to learn how his language interfaces with Celtic for us to actually start talking to each other.”

“Impossible,” Dr. Sanders scoffs. “Talking dragons are a mid evil fantasy. No one has been able to communicate using a structured language with another species.”

“I don’t know about impossible,” answers Helena. “There has been success in establishing structure communications with large primates in language research. They were able to grasp the concept of our language and carry on conversations with us by learning how to use sign language for the deaf. They even taught it to their young.”

“I’ll believe it when I see it,” answers Dr. Sanders in disgust.

“That’s sound like a challenge,” answers Mary.

“As soon as I can figure out his language structure, I’m sure that we will be talking non stop,” answers Dr. Croft.

It is mid afternoon when Sandra’s dragon finally recovers from the effects of the narcoberries. “He is looking so much better.” she tells Helena as he is able to stand up on all fours and places his head down for Dr. Croft to rub his forehead. “He’s no longer in pain.” The two women give him some more water, then feed him some of the chilled raw meat. She motions him to come forward onto a bed made up of reeds from a pond that was found behind the temple where he lays back down making sounds like he is trying to talk to her.

“What kind of language is he using to talk to you?” Helena asks Dr. Croft.

“It definitely sounds like something similar to Ancient Celtic.” answers Dr. Croft. “I’ll look it up to become more familiar with it. It also sounds like he is trying to learn our English as well.”

“Spoken communications with another species. That would be a first,” answers Helena.

“Let me look up the Celtic language from my netbook,” answers Dr. Croft. “I could use your knowledge with your work with the apes to learn how we can talk to each other.”

It is half an hour later when Dr. Croft asks for everyone to sit down in a semicircle in front of the dragon. “I want to conduct an experiment with this dragon with everyone here,” asks Dr. Croft. “When I point to you, I want you to say ‘my name is,’ then say your name. I’ll start out by pointing to myself. My name is Sandra.”

“My name is George,” answer Dr. Sanders reluctantly.

“My name is Mary.”

“My name is Joe.”
“My name is Tod.”

“My name is Sarah.”

“My name is Alfred.”

“My name is Helena.”

“My name is Ahab.”

“My name is Cleo.”

Dr. Croft now points to the dragon who answers, “My name is Farrell.”

“That’s wonderful,” answers Sandra. “You have a name.”

“I don’t believe it!” Dr. Sanders scoffs. “You taught him to say that.”

“Sandra no taught me,” the dragon tells Dr. Sanders in English. “Farrell is my name,”

Dr. Sanders is in total shock with that answer as he leaves shaking his head.

Dr. Croft is now talking to Farrell in Celtic as he answers back in that same language. “It’s all right.” she tells Farrell as she rubs his neck. “It’s not your fault. George is just a stubborn old man.”

“I understand,” Farrell tells her in Celtic. Keep rubbing my neck. That feels so good.”

“What is that language you are using to talk to Farrell?” ask Professor Narcy.

“It is ancient Celtic,” answers Dr. Croft. “Farrell tells me it’s the dragon’s native language. This is a wonderful breakthrough. The ability to talk to dragons would have made Daranys very jealous. She only had basic mental communications with her dragons. She only rode on Drogon even though she could sense what all three of them wanted and they could sense what she wanted of them.”

“Danarys could ride us?” asks Farrell in surprise.

“According to the stories, from our ancient past, there were many dragon riders,” answers Dr. Croft in Celtic. “When you get your strength back, I would like to try riding on you if you if you’re willing to let me.”

“Are you actually going to become a dragon rider?” asks Helena.

“That will be up to Farrell,” answers Dr. Croft. “That will have to wait until he has healed up from his injury and has his strength back before I even attempt to go riding on him.”

“I’ll take you ride when I can,” answers Farrell in English.

“It looks like you are actually going to become a dragon rider,” answers Helena. “How did he get hurt?”

“He told me he got gored by a large horned beast.” answers Dr. Croft. “He got away from it, then flew back here to hide in the temple so his leg could heal up.”

“It’s a good thing that we found him when we did.” answers Helena. “With such a nasty infection, he would have died long before that leg would have healed up enough for him to get food and water on his own.”

“I do believe that he knows that,” answers Dr. Croft as she strokes Farrell’s neck while he start to doze off. “He’s back to sleep for now. This is so remarkable, to be actually living out my fantasy with those stories of those Game of Throne dragons I read as a collage freshman. It is going to be so exciting to actually go flying on one for real.”

“Will he eventually get to be huge and frightening when he is older?” ask Helena.

“No,” answers Dr. Croft. “He tells me that he is 17 years old and is just about fully grown.”

Later that afternoon, Joe has called a meeting to report on their status. “It appears that we had some outside help when we teleported into this strange new world. In spite of running into raptors, we lucked out when Professor Narcy gunned it down. With finding that our outfitter supplies were waiting for us in this old temple, we are now better prepared to deal with them with bolas, crossbows, and pikes. We also have the ability to recharge the batteries for our devices we brought with us. Most unusual, we are getting advice from our netbooks and smart phones from some mysterious apps that are providing us with important survival information. This temple has provided us with a secure place to stay for the night. It has a reliable source of fresh water. We also made good progress with preserving the meat from the Morley and raptors when an app shows us how to craft a preserving bin. The berries and mushroom types seem to be plentiful if one knows where to look for them. I have found carrots, potatoes, and other vegetables down by the pond along with a primitive fish called a Coe. So long as Dr. Croft’s new friend doesn’t eat us out of house and home, we should be just fine.”

“I believe that in a day or two, Farrell should be strong enough to go hunting for food on his own,” reports Dr. Croft. “He has promise to take me flying so I can do an areal survey of the surrounding area for you.”

“That would be great,” answers Joe. “He could cover a lot of territory at one time. That would give us an idea of where we need to go in order to find a portal back home.”

“There has to be one around here somewhere,” answers Professor Narcy. “Otherwise, there never would have been those paintings and statues of the unusual creatures living here in the Star Chamber back on Earth.”

It is early evening when Farrell wakes up and asks Dr. Croft to sit on him so that he can take her outside to go down by the pond to get a drink and hunt for food. “It gets dangerous as darkness approaches around here,” Farrell tells her in Celtic. “There are troogons that come out to hunt for small prey by the pond. You humans look like small prey to them. Their bite will put you to sleep. Then, they will eat you alive at their leisure.”

“Shut the doors when we go out to go fishing.” Dr. Croft tells Joe as she climbs onto Farrell’s back to sit on his shoulder. “Farrell tells me that the troogons come out to hunt about now. We’re going to go hunting for them.”

“The app says that they are nasty little predators about the size of a wolf.” reports Helena. “Stimm berries will counteract their toxic bite. Do we have any of those white berries in storage?”

“Yes we do,” answers Dr. Croft. “I have some on me along with my canteen.” The doors get shut as Farrell goes outside with Dr. Croft riding on him.

“Don’t you try flying with me on you at this time,” she tells Farrell in Celtic. “You’re still too weak to take to the air.”

“I’ll stay on the ground,” he answers as he goes to the pond to get a drink, then kills a coe in the shallows and eats it.

Several minutes later, Dr. Croft spots three pairs of glowing eyes in the bushes at the edge of the swamp. She whispers to Farrell about their location. “Thanks,” he quietly tells her as he aims his head in that direction. The three Troogons run directly into a wall of flame as Farrell torches them with a fire attack cooking them instantly. One Troogon runs into his mouth becoming an instant meal. Dr. Croft is sitting on him with a stunned look as part of the swamp goes up in flames.

“Wow,” Dr Croft says in astonishment at what has just happened. “I didn’t know that real dragons could actually breathe fire.”

“Our prey taste better when we can flame broil it,” Farrell tells her. Farrell proceeds to eat the second Troogon, picks up the third one in his mouth, then heads back to the temple.

“Open the doors,” Dr. Croft orders the two men that are stationed there. Farrell quickly heads inside as the doors are closed behind them.

“What is that thing?” asks Dr. Sanders in alarm as Farrell places the still smoking Troogon down in front of him.

“I believe that is going to be our supper,” answers Dr. Croft.

“Did your dragon just set that fire out there?” Dr. Sanders asks in alarm.

“Yes he did,” answers Dr. Croft. “They don’t call them dragons for nothing. He started that fire in the swamp when he roasted the three Troogons we found.”

“Those really are some nasty looking creatures,” reports Helena.

“Here, everyone share a piece of cooked Troogon,” answers Tod as he and Joe cuts it up telling Farrell thanks for the home cooked meal.

“I guess that you won’t eat us out of house and home,” Joe later tells Farrell after everyone has finished their unusual supper. “Here, have the rest of your kill. There is no way we can preserve it during the night. That was delicious. Who would ever think that dragon roasted Troodon would taste so good.”

“I have to agree,” answers Dr. Sanders. “It tasted like a high quality barbecue ribs.”

“The App mentions that dragons cannot be tamed.” reports Professor Narcy. “It doesn’t mention anything about becoming friends with them.”

“I have to believe that whatever is providing us with the info on these apps left that little detail out for us to discover for ourselves,” answers Dr. Croft. “Farrell has turned out to be a great friend. It looks like that we are all going to have our first sleepover with a real live dragon.”

“Does he have a mate?” asks Helena.

“Yes he does,” answers Dr. Croft. “He tells me that her name is Freida. He wants to go looking for her in the morning.”

“It’s been a most unusual day,” declares Joe. “Lets rotate staying on watch so that none of the predators get inside the temple. Then, we can go plan what we need to do in the morning in order to survive and find our way back home.”

[rpicardi1]

Chapter 5. The second day in the new world.

 

Unlike the Game of Thrones dragons, the ones in the world of the Star Gate are so much different. They look a lot like the dragons in that series of stories. The difference is that they are the size of a small child when they hatch, they don’t grow as fast, they reach their mature size at age 20, and, as an adult, are about the size of Drogon when he came to Danarys rescue in the Trial by Combat arena. They will still live to an age of 200 even though they stop growing at age 20. The closest size description from the Ark Survival Game would be the Tropical Crystal Dragons from that mod map.

It is early morning as everyone starts waking up for the day. “I don’t know how anyone could get any sleep with all of that snoring,” complains Joe.

“It wasn’t Farrell,” answers Helena. “He was sleeping quietly all night.”

“It was Dr. Sanders,” complains Professor Narcy. “He sounds like a chain saw cutting up logs all night long.”

“How are you feeling this morning?” Dr. Croft asks Farrell in Celtic as he wakes up.

“I feel so much better,” Farrell tells her.

“Let me check on your injured leg,” Mary asks Farrell. “Oh, that looks so much better,” as she removes enough of the band aid to inspect the wound. “It’s healing up nicely.”

“That’s good to know,” answers Farrell. “It was hurting so bad when you first found me. It feels so much better now.”

“Getting rid of the infection was all that was needed to start the healing process,” she tells Farrell. “At the rate you are healing, I should be able to pull the stitches in a couple of days and leave it unbandaged a day or two later.”

“There’s something big scratching at the door,” warn Joe as he is preparing to open it.

“Let me bring Farrell over here,”answers Dr. Croft as she gets on him where he positions himself in front of the door. “OK, Lets see what is out there.” Joe and Tod slowly pull open the door inward.

Opening the temple door reveals three raptors that have been scratching to get inside. Two of then take off running for the hills when Farrell hisses at them loudly. The alpha leader, frozen in fear, ends up dead from burns and crushed ribs as Farrell torches him, then grabs him with his mouth picking him up off the ground.

“Thanks Farrell,” Joe tells him after he spits out the dead raptor. “I don’t think that we are going to be bothered by raptors for a while.”

“Go ahead and butcher the raptor,” Dr Croft tells Joe. “We’re going fishing, then we’ll go looking for his mate.”

“Be careful when you go flying on him,” Helena warns her. “He still doesn’t have his full strength back yet.”

“I’ll be careful,” answers Dr. Croft.

“What do you think attracted those raptors?” asks Mary.

“Probably the smell of all the blood that is still back in the corner,” answers Joe. “We should see if we can clean it up while they are gone.”

“What’s going on?” complains Dr Sanders as he finally wakes up. “It smells like something was set on fire in here.”

“Go take a look at the front door,” answers Professor Narcy in disgust.

“A dead raptor?” complains Dr. Sanders as he sees its charred body laying on its side with blood all over it’s back.

“There were three of them out there waiting for us to open the door.” Helena tells him. “Farrell sent them packing.”

“Why were they out there trying to get in here?” asks Dr. Sanders

“To have us for their breakfast,” answers Joe.

“Really?” questions Dr. Sanders.

“Really,” answers Helena. “After all, we are no longer on top of the food chain around here.”

“What’s that sound like a herd of elephants?”

“Oh, it’s Farrell galloping down the pathway. He just took off flying! Dr. Croft is living out her fantasy. She just became a dragon rider!”

“Where are they going?” asks Dr. Sanders.

“They’re going to look for his mate,” answers Helena. “Help the rest of us clean up this mess in the back that attracted those predators here in the first place. Joe and Tod are going to be busy butchering the raptor that Farrell killed for us.”

After getting a drink from the pond and eating a Coe, Farrell has told Dr. Croft that he would like to try flying with her riding him. “Be careful,” she tells him. “You are not quite at your full strength.”

“Ow!” he says as he tries to launch himself into the air and falls flat on his face. “I can’t jump into the sky yet.”

“When Darnarys first flew on Drogon, he had to make a running start in order to gain enough speed to take her flying,” Dr. Croft tells him. Doing as Dr. Croft has instructed him, he makes the running start getting up enough speed so that when he unfolds his wings, he is able to start flying. “Oh! This is amazing. I feel like Danarys riding on Drogon for the first time in that Game of Thrones Story. When Jon Snow first rode on her green dragon, he told Danarys that she had spoiled him from horses. Farrell, you have spoiled me from ever wanting to go horseback riding again.”

“This is more tiring then I expected,” Farrell tells Dr. Croft in an exhausted breath after flying with her riding on him for a couple of minutes.

“Land on that nearby bluff,” she tells him.

“I’m sorry that I couldn’t fly you further then this,” Farrell tells Dr. Croft in an exhausted voice.

“That’s all right,” She tells him as she strokes his neck. “It’s not your fault. You are still too weak to do much flying at this time. You will get stronger as you continue to recover from your leg wound. Lets just rest here for a while before we head back. We probably should wait until tomorrow before you go flying any distance with me riding on you.”

“Stay on me while I am resting,” Farrell tells her. “It feels so natural.”

Dr. Croft unpacks her binoculars so she can observe the surrounding area as Farrell is catching his breath. “Such an interesting world,” she comments in Celtic so that Farrell can listen in to her thoughts. “I see a pyramid cluster in the distance along with some obelisks and other structures. There’s that giant floating structure in the sky. It looks like that there may be a settlement to the South. Oh! This is interesting. What color is your mate?”

“She is light green with a dark green chest and white trim on her wings,” answers Farrell. “Why do you ask?”

“Look up into the sky and to your left,” Dr. Croft tells him.

“That’s Freida,” answers Farrell as he tries to take off to fly up to her.

“You stay down here!” orders Dr. Croft in a stern voice. “You’re in no shape to go flying up there.”

“Freida!” Farrell yells up into the sky in Celtic. The green dragon looks towards them, then makes a hard banking turn to come into land next to him. There is a bunch of excited conversation in Celtic between the two.

“Farrell, Farrell, where have you been? I’ve been looking for you for days. What is that wrapped around your left leg? You have an Egyptian sitting on you!”

“It’s all right,” Farrell tells his mate. “She is my friend.”

“He’s had a very rough last couple of days,” Sandra tells her in Celtic. “We found him in the temple badly hurt. I shouldn’t have let him take me flying just yet, but he insisted on giving me a ride. I didn’t realize how weak he still was. We almost didn’t make it up here.”

“How is it that you can talk to us?” asks Freida in surprise. “No Egyptian have ever done that before.”

“It’s likely because they never learned to speak in Ancient Celtic,” answers Sandra. “I was able to figure out your language with Farrell’s help when we first found him hiding in the temple. I don’t think that he would still be alive had we not found him and taken care of his injured leg.”

“When Sandra first found me, I was so weak that I couldn’t even eat the raptor her friends brought to me for food.” Farrell tells her. “They cut it up for me and handed it to me a piece at a time.”

“Are you now their tame?” asks Freida with concern.

“No,” answers Farrell. “These humans tell me that us dragons cannot be tamed by them.”

The conversation in Celtic continues for the next half hour as Freida places her head where Sandra can stroke her on her neck. “That feels so good,” Freida tells her. “No wonder my mate has taken such a liking to you.”

It is about at that moment when Dr. Croft notices something dark approaching them from the distance. “Whats happening to the weather?” Sandra asks in alarm as a black wall of clouds is seen coming in rapidly from the West.

“Sandstorm!” warns Farrell. “We need to get back to shelter of the temple now! Freida, let Sandra ride on you. I don’t have the strength to carry her back to safety in time.”

“Oh dear,” comments Sandra in Celtic as she quickly gets off of Farrell, “I hope that you don’t mind me riding on you under these conditions.”

“Just get on me,” answers Frieda as she lays down so Dr. Croft to quickly get on her. “I’ll follow Farrell to shelter.” The two dragons fly to the temple as the sky turns black with the wind blowing the sand into their face.

Farrell lands in front of the door all out of breath shouting in English, “open the doors!” The two dragons run inside as Joe and Tod shut the doors and barricade it against the wind that starts howling with hurricane force.

“Farrell, are you all right?” Dr. Croft asks him with concern as he collapses from exhaustion on his bed as she and Frieda rush over to see him.

“I’m all right,” he answer while all out of breath. “I’m just still so weak from having injured my leg the other day.”

“No more flying until tomorrow,” orders Dr. Croft as she rubs his forehead while his mate nudges his neck with her head.

“Who’s your new friend?” asks Helena.

“This is Farrell’s mate Freida,” answers Dr. Croft. “Be careful around her. This is the first time she has ever been around other humans.”

“I bet that she is a pretty dragon in the sunlight,” Helena answers back in Celtic. “Freida, would you like something to eat? The men butchered up and cooked a raptor that Farrell killed this morning.”

“I’ll take you up on your offer if you will hand feed it to me like Sandra did with my mate,” answers Freida. She walks over to the bed and lays down next to Farrell.

“That is a most interesting request,” answers Dr. Croft. “I hope that she doesn’t bite you by accident.”

“I think that it is curiosity why she wants me to feed her that way after learning that you fed her mate by hand when you first found him,” answers Helena as she goes to take several strips of cooked raptor from the preserving bin that Joe has crafted up from a blueprint provided to him from the survival app on his netbook. Freida carefully takes the offering from Helena’s hand one strip at a time.

“That was very tasty,” Frieda tells Helena. “Do that forehead thing to me, then pet me on my neck.”

“What’s going on?” asks Tod as he watches Helena petting the new dragon.

“I think that they are bonding together,” answers Mary. “That would be so useful to have a mated pair of dragons as our friends to help us find the portal back home.”

The storm continues to get worse as the dirt comes filtering into the room. Then, there is a brilliant flash of lightning followed by a loud crash as it strikes close by. The dust suddenly quits blowing in when it starts raining and hailing by the buckets. Then, just as suddenly, the storm is over as the two suns show through the thinning clouds.

“Wow, that was something!” Tod comments.

“Actually, it is quite similar to a winter thunderstorm in the Sahara.” answers Ahab. “They come up suddenly and vanish just as quickly.”

“Lets go outside and check the damage,” orders Joe. With the doors opened, everyone steps outside as the light breeze blows out the fine dust from inside the temple.

“Wow! Frieda, you really are a pretty dragon,” Helena says as they step into the sunlight.

“If you don’t mind, I’d like to spend some time alone with my mate,” Farrell tells Dr. Croft.

“By all means, spend the rest of the day with her.” answers Dr. Croft. “Just don’t overexert yourself. Remember how tired you got trying to take me for a ride this morning.”

“I’ll take it easy.” answers Farrell.

“Thank you for taking care of him,” answers Frieda in Celtic. Both dragons are soon off walking down the path into the desert badlands.

“I wonder if that is the last we see of them?” asks Joe.

“I hope not,” answers Mary. “They just need some time together, away from us, after being separated for so long.”

“Lets get the dust out of our equipment, start charging our devices, and do a detailed examination of this temple we are using as a shelter.” orders Professor Narcy.

With the brilliant sunshine from the two suns and the clear skies, the solar panels are set up to charge the camera batteries, lantern batteries, netbooks and smart phones. Those devices are quickly charged up as measurements are made of the exterior of the temple. A portable power supply is used for the interior inspection and record keeping to Dr. Sander’s netbook. Clearing off of the dust, the two women finds a series of paintings on the interior walls of the chamber they have made their base camp.

“I wonder if Farrell is aware of this mural on the back wall,” Dr. Croft tells Helena as they clean the dust off of it. “It shows the dragons in a war with an Egyptian tribe that lived here.”

“Oh! I hope not,” answers Helena. “It must have happened long ago for them to not to tell us about it. Otherwise, your encounter with Freida could have been vastly different.”

“Still, it is part of their history,” answers Dr. Croft. “We need to let them know about this if they come back to see us. Lets continue our inspection of what’s still here.”

“There is a door in the back. Why didn’t we find this before?”

“Probably because it blends so much with the back wall,” answers Dr. Croft. Unbolting the heavy iron latch, the door is pushed inward reveling a tunnel into the hillside. “Interesting, there is no handle or way to unlock this door from the inside. Get Tod and Ahab in here with a lantern so we can see where this tunnel goes.”

Armed with the lanterns and a crossbow, the two grad students lead the way with Dr. Croft and Helena following. There is water from the spring flowing in a channel on the floor. “So that’s where the water drains from the basin.”

“I’m not sure that I like being in here,” answers Tod nervously. “This tunnel smells like old stale blood.”

“It’s probably dragon blood from when we washed the floor in the back this morning.” answers Ahab. “Oh, here is the end of the tunnel. I can see the snow capped mountains beyond all of this brush.”

“Lets leave it undisturbed,” answers Tod. “If there are Egyptians still living here, we don’t want them to discover the emergency exit from this temple.”

It is approaching evening as everyone goes back inside to file their report and close the temple doors for the night when the two dragons come walking back and walk inside. “We have made the decision that we want to stay with you for the night,” Farrell tells Dr. Croft in Celtic.

“Are you sure?” she asks Farrell.

“Yes, we are sure,” answers Frieda.

“Do you two know anything about the mural we discovered on this wall?” asks Dr. Croft as she shines a light on it.

“Yes,” answers Frieda. “If it wasn’t for the fact that you became good friends with my mate, I would have probably killed you. We have been at war with those Egyptians for thousands of years. So many have been killed on both sides. A hundred years ago, we stopped fighting each other when they offered a virgin sacrifice of two of their own to us. Every ten years, about this time, they offer a virgin sacrifice. They stay away from our territory. We stay away from theirs.”

“Ouch!” answers Dr. Croft. “Now I know where those European stories of dragon sacrifice come from. You’re telling me that there are still Egyptians living here on this world?”

“When I asked Helena to hand feed me, I was testing her to see if she would trust me, that I wouldn’t bite her hand off. She looks a lot like those Egyptians that live here. I was pleasantly surprised when she hand fed me, then rubbed my forehead and neck. I like her. She is a good person, like you.”

“We managed to get everything cleaned up while you two were gone. We even added to Farrell’s bed so the two of you can use it. Thank you for being so trusting of us especially with what your ancestors have gone through with the bad experience you faced in the past.”

“This looks really nice,” Freida tells Helena as she lays down by Farrell. “Come stay here with us overnight There is so much that we can learn from each other. I’ll even take you flying on me in the morning.”

“Thank you so much for your kind offer.” Helena tells her as she rubs her neck. “It looks like that I’m going to be spoiled from horses as well. I certainly couldn’t ask for a prettier dragon to go riding on.”

[rpicardi1]

Chapter 6. We are not alone.

 

It is quite a night with nine people sleeping together with the two dragons. Dr. Sanders hasn’t quite gotten over the facts that dragons are for real. He doesn’t want to have any contact with them after being embarrassed by Farrell talking to him. Besides, he still snores like a chainsaw cutting up wood all night long. At least, with the two dragons blocking off most of that noise, the rest of the expedition gets a good night sleep with their two dragon friends.

Food has been easy to find in the area with vegetables growing at the edge of the swamp, fish in the water, berries from the bushes, and the occasional game animal taken out by crossbow that comes into the area to get a drink from the swamp. The Troogon threat has been all but eliminated between the dragons and Joe and Tod with their crossbows. Being afraid of the presence of the dragons, the two remaining raptors are nowhere in sight.

On this third day, Farrell looks so much better now that he has his mate with him. Mary has unbandaged his injured leg and has decided that the stitches can now be removed. Freida has come over to look at Farrell injuries. “That is quite a scar on your leg,” she tells him. “What happened to you?”

“I was attacked by a horned beast,” Farrell answers. “I flew in here to get to a place of safety to heal up. The injury was worse then I though as it became infected leaving me too weak to care for myself. I’m so glad that Dr. Croft found me to help me recover. I agreed to let them put me to sleep with Narcoberries so Mary could take care of the wound as I slept. It felt so much better when I woke up later in the day.”

“This is likely to sting a little when I pull out those stitches.” Mary tells him.

“That wasn’t too bad,” he tells her in English after she removes the first stitch from his leg.

“Good, very good,” Mary says as she continues to pull out the rest of the stitches. “There are no signs of any infection. The wound looks completely healed. In fact, the stitches were starting to grow out on their own. You dragons heal up very fast. I don’t even need to bandage it up any more.”

“You make a good doctor,” Farrell tells her.

“Why, thank you!” Mary tells him.

Professor Narcy calls for a meeting to plan their activities for the day. “We need to survey the area for anything that looks like it will lead to the portal for getting back home,” he reports. “I would like for us to climb to the top of the hill this temple is built into so we can get a good look at the surrounding area from there. It is best that we all stick together due to the dangers present from predators in the area. Once we have done our survey, we can formulate plan to head to the distance objects that Dr. Croft has seen from Farrell before the storm closed in on them yesterday.”

“Farrell would like to take me to where his dragon friends are living,” reports Dr. Croft. “Frieda wants to take Helena with us.”

“You have my permission to proceed with your quest,” answers Professor Narcy. “If you can successfully ally his friends with us, it could make exploring this land so much quicker and safer.”

“We’ll make that our number one priority to become friends with them,” answers Dr. Croft.

Taking off with their riders, the two dragons land on the high bluff where they had first found each other. “You’re doing so much better,” Sandra tells Farrell. “You launched yourself into the air with me on you and you are not one bit tired after flying me over to the bluff.”

“I feel so much stronger today,” Farrell tells Sandra.

“Riding on you is so much better then horseback riding,” she tells him.

“I am finding it quite enjoyable,” Farrell tells her.

“This is very enjoyable,” chimes in Freida.

“I’m in agreement with Sandra,” answers Helena. “Riding on you is far more enjoyable then bareback riding on a horse.”

“I see a flock of dragons coming towards us!” warns Dr. Croft in alarm. She does not get a chance to finish the warning before both dragons take off heading straight to a dark brown dragon leading the flock. There is a quick exchange of words in Celtic between the dragons and Dr. Croft, then the entire flock follows Farrell back to the plateau landing there. It is a shocked looking dark brown male dragon, named Leader, that comes up to talk to Sandra.

“How did you know our language?” asks Leader.

“I learned from Farrell that your language is similar to Ancient Celtic,” answers Sandra. “Where were you heading?”

“We were about to attack the Egyptian Village when we saw you,” answers Leader. “We thought that they had broken the truce and killed Frieda when she failed to return to us last night.”

“Thank goodness that we found you just in time.” answers Sandra. “I had rescued Farrell from certain death due to his injured leg a couple of days ago. We found Frieda looking for him yesterday morning before the big storm hit. He hadn’t recovered enough to fly me to where you are living. In fact, Frieda had to take me back to the temple so we could shelter from the storm.”

“You mean the temple that is in the hill?” ask Leader.

“Yes,” answers Sandra.

“The Egyptians are suppose to bring us a sacrifice to the temple when the two suns merge as one,” Leader tells her. “That event will happen tomorrow at noon.”

“What happens during the sacrifice?” asks Sandra.

“We sit up on the hill to watch the proceedings. Their entire tribe comes out to watch from the base of this plateau. The two priest will escort a young couple to the front of the main gate. They will then say a chant that the young couple will repeat. Then, they slit their throat, say another chant, then leave.”

“How brutal,” answers Helena in Celtic. “What do you do afterwards?”

“We wait until they leave, then we leave when the two suns reappear.

“What happens to the slain young couple?” asks Helena.

“The resident raptors will show up and eat them,” answers Leader.

“That’s why there were three raptors clawing at the door the other day,” answers Helena.

“How was this ritual ever established?” asks Sandra.

“It took place when a truce was called ending our war with the Egyptians. I do not know any of the details since those took place long before I was born. I do know that the sacrifice occurs every ten years when the two suns become one.”

“Have the Egyptians done anything to harm you dragons since they established a truce?” asks Helena.

“No,” answers Leader. “While we have landed near their village to observe them, they have left us alone as we have left them alone.”

“There has to be another way to maintain the truce without requiring a sacrifice,” Sandra tells Leader. “Come back with us to the temple. We need to talk to Professor Narcy to formulate a plan that doesn’t disrupt your culture aor the Egyptians.”

“Firefox and I will come with you,” answers Leader.

All the other dragons head back to their northern home as the two new ones follow Dr. Croft back to the temple. Professor Narcy and Ahab come down from the hill to have a conference with the four dragons with Helena and Dr. Croft acting as translators.

“A human sacrifice,” comments Professor Narcy. “It is not unheard of in ancient cultures. Still, there must be a way to end such brutality without disrupting the truce that was established so long ago.”

A discussion soon takes place about the details of the sacrifice in front of the temple gates between the four dragons and the four explorers.

“Are the doors to the temple open or closed when the sacrifice takes place?” asks Ahab.

“They are always closed,” answers Leader.

“Have the young couple being sacrifice been bound in any way?” ask Ahab.

“No,” answers Leader. “They have always walked willingly unassisted to the temple gate with the two priest behind them.”

“I have an idea,” answers Ahab. “I wonder what would happen if the doors were to open during the chant and two dragons, with someone riding on them, appeared inside the temple in front of them.”

“It would probably be totally unexpected to see two dragons coming out of the temple with riders on them,” answers Professor Narcy.

“Then, lets try this,” answers Dr. Croft. “Lets have all of the dragons sit up on the hill as they have always done before. I’ll have Mary watching from the window by the door. When the chant starts, Tod and Joe will pull open the temple doors where Farrell and Frieda can scare the priests out of their wits as Helena and I are sitting on them. That may give us a chance to rescue the sacrifice. We’ll improvise from there.”

“That sounds like it could work to break the cycle of human sacrifice,” answers Professor Narcy. “It may even set up a chain of events that results in a permanent peace between the dragons and the Egyptian tribe living here if they see you two riding on them.”

“Lets do it,” answers Dr. Croft. “We’ll go find the village and observe it from a distance with our binoculars.”

“I’ll go tell my friends what your plans are going to be for tomorrow then come back to see you before sunset,” answers Leader.

Back on Freida and Farrell, the two women take flight heading South where they land up on another ridge. From there, they are able to observe a small farming settlement along a stream where there are some stone structures under construction. Here, the dragons rest as Sandra and Helena study the settlement up ahead with their binoculars. They talk to each other in Celtic so that the dragons can listen in to the conversation.

“I was expecting a city of thousands,” Helena tells Sarah. “This village looks like maybe a couple hundred people at the most counting their children.”

“I see domesticated Morleys among the sheep, goats, horses, and cattle,” reports Sarah. “It looks like there are wheat, rice, corn, beans, and cotton fields in the irrigated farming areas.”

“Are their any other settlements around here?”

“I don’t believe so,” answers Farrell. “This is the only one that I have seen.”

“No wonder they sought a truce so long ago,” Sandra tells him. “That war was probably wiping them out too.”

“Still, this village could have been easily wiped out with fire from the 20 dragons I counted in Leader’s flock,” answers Helena.

“Maybe not,” answers Sandra. “I see crossbow turrets set up in the watchtowers on the edge of their village. The books that I have read about mid evil history indicated that those thing could kill dragons. In fact, in the Game of Throne story, Jon Show's green dragon was ambushed and shot out of the sky by them. He was already six times bigger then Leader.”

“Then, it is a good thing we spotted Leader when we did,” answers Helena. “It looks like that we have prevented a massacre on both sides.”

“Lets get back to the temple and file our report with Professor Narcy, then let Leader know what we found out about the village when he comes back to visit this evening.”

Back at the temple, the two women meet with Professor Narcy. “We found their settlement,” Dr Croft reports. “It is definitely an early Egyptian farming community. However, it is only a small settlement of less then 200 individuals. Farrell tells me that there are no other settlements out there.”

About then, Leader and Firefox come back to visit before the two suns have set. Dr. Croft asks them the same question. “That is the only settlement out there that we know about. We have been to the pyramids city but no Egyptians are living there. We have not seen any others around our hunting territory or during our long rang exploration.”

“It’s a good thing that you didn’t attack them even though you could have easily wiped them out,” Dr. Croft tells Leader. Their village is defended with crossbow turrets. Those are known dragon killers.”

“What are crossbows?” asks Leader.

“Joe, show him what a crossbows can do,” orders Dr Croft.

Joe takes Leader outside to the edge of the swamp where a troogon has been captured in a snare trap a few moments ago. He fires a bolt from 50 yards into the troogon’s chest which kills it. Leader jumps in shock when he sees the power of the shoulder fired crossbow.

“Let me draw you a picture of what the Egyptians have in the village compared to the crossbow we just used to kill that troogon in the snare.” Leader is looking at them in shock when he sees the size comparison of the two weapons as Joe draws them out in the sand indicating just how far they can shoot accurately.

“You have saved us from certain disaster,” he tells Dr. Croft. “I’ll support your plan for ending our conflict. What do you want us to do?”

“We will go with the plan for the sacrifice where you dragons will watch from the hill as always. When the priest come with the sacrifice and start their chant, we will open the doors where Freida and Farrell will be waiting inside. When we have rescued the sacrifice, you two can come down inside with us while the rest of your flock keeps watch. If I am right, the Egyptians will either stay where they are to celebrate a successful sacrifice, or run back to their village in a panic. Have your friends up on the hill sound off a celebration in return. If you can determine that the sacrificial teens are worthy, see if you can become friends with them.”

“We will be here for the ceremony,” Leader tells Dr. Croft as they get ready to fly back home.

[rpicardi1]

Chapter 7. The Sacrifice.

 

Day four finds everybody getting ready for the upcoming ceremonial event. Ahab and Cleo have found and dressed in traditional Egyptian garb. Dr. Croft and Helena have done the same. The dragons have spent another peaceful night with their human friends. Even Dr. Sanders is coming around as he finally does a detailed study of these fantasy creatures.

“I wonder what that creature looked like that left that scar on Farrell’s leg,” asks Dr. Sanders.

“It has to be about the size of a woolly rhino.” answers Dr. Croft. “There were statues of them in the Star Chamber. They could be living up in the mountains with the dragons.”

“Are you sure that his injury wasn’t cause by a crossbow bolt from the Egyptian village?” asks Dr. Sanders.

“Yes,” answers Dr. Croft. “A bolt would have either gone through his leg or it would have been embedded into the bone. His leg looked like something just ripped it open. Besides, he told me he was injured by a horned creature, not by any Egyptian weapon.”

The two suns are now rising high into the sky as they start touching each other. The now larger red one is moving over the much brighter yellow sun causing the darkening sky and terrain to take on a strange red cast. Right on time, the dragon flock flies in landing on the hill above the temple with Leader and Firefox landing on the roof above the main gate. A procession of Egyptian villagers is seen marching to the base of the bluff across the valley. They assemble single file as the two priest escort the sacrifice couple towards the temple.

“Showtime,” announces Mary as she watches them reach the gate.

With the priest chant underway, Joe and Tod pull open the doors. The two priest are in shock as they find themselves staring at two angry looking dragons with Egyptian costume riders on them. They drop their sacrificial daggers not knowing if they should run away or not. The two teens stare at the dragons petrified with fear.

“Come inside,” Dr. Croft orders the sacrifice in Egyptian as she is sitting on Farrell.

Ahab and Cleo, who have also dressed themselves in a traditional Egyptian costume for the ceremony, come out to escort the sacrificial couple inside as the two priest remain outside staring in shock and disbelief.

Leader and Firefox now jump off of the roof landing behind the two priest and hiss loudly at them. The frightened priest scramble inside. The two dragons are close behind them as the doors are shut. The priests are then herded to the back by the two dragons where Professor Narcy orders them to open the door in the back and go into the escape tunnel. He pulls the door shut locking the bolt so that they cannot get back in.

Outside, a loud cheer is heard coming from the direction of the plateau. It gets answered by the loud calls from the dragons up on the hill.

“What’s going on out there?” asks Dr. Sanders.

“They are celebrating a successful sacrifice,” answers Professor Narcy.

In the meantime, two very frightened young Egyptian teenagers are being escorted by Ahab and Cleo as they talk to them in Egyptian assuring them that they are now safe. Both Leader and Firefox are very curious about them, this being the first time that they have ever been up so close and personal with what has been considered their enemy for so long. All the dragons are laying down so as not to be so big and scary to them. Ahab and Cleo introduce the two teens to the dragons.

“The dragons frighten me,” Lucy tells Cleo.

“It’s all right,” answers Cleo in Egyptian as she takes her over to the female dragon. “We are able to talk to them in their language as they are able to talk to us in ours. This is Firefox. She would like to be your friend. Go ahead. Let her get to know you by hand feeding her these strips of cooked meat, then petting her on her forehead. Talk to her in Egyptian. She wants to learn your language.”

Ahab is getting Ramsey II to become acquainted to Leader. “I never knew that the dragons would be so gentle around us,” he tells Ahab after conducting the ritual of feeding him some strips of cooked meat, then rubbing his forehead. “We were always told that they were a threat to us.”

“You are among the royalty in the dragon world,” Ahab tells him. “He is their Alpha Leader.”

“What is the significant of hand feeding the dragons with strips of cooked meat, then rubbing them on the forehead?” Asks Ramsey II.

“It is a ritual of trust that Frieda taught us,” answers Ahab.

“Then, he could have easily bitten my hand off but was careful not to do so,” answers Ramsey II.

“I’m certain that those Priest would have lost theirs,” answers Helena.

“I am honored to be in Leader’s presence. We have tamed nearly all of the creatures of this world for our use. As much as we have tried, we could never capture or tame a dragons. How did the members of your kingdom manage to tame so many of them?”

“We didn’t” answers Ahab. “You have to become friends with them.”

“I notice that they are able to talk to you and each other. What language are they using? It’s unfamiliar to me.”

“Dr. Croft calls it Ancient Celtic.” answers Ahab. “It is an old language from a land what is now known as the United Kingdom. She’ll help you to learn it as the dragons start to learn your Egyptian.”

“What happened to the two Priest that were escorting us to the sacrifice?”

“We sent them out the escape tunnel.” answers Ahab. “If they are honorable, they will make it back to your village. If not, the predators near the swamp will take care of them.”

“I never did like them,” answers Lucy. “They were always trying to take control of our lives through their rituals and threats of the Gods. I’m sure that they rigged the lottery for this selection of the sacrifice when Ramseys started criticizing their religious teachings and attempts to change history.”

“You are safe here,” Dr. Croft tells them. “As soon as it is safe to do so, we would like to establish contact with your Ramseys to end the sacrificial ritual and establish a permanent peace with your people and the dragons. You two could be the key for doing just that. Are you willing to become the ambassadors between Ramseys, your village elders and these two dragons?”

“Yes,” both teens answer.

“Excellent,” answers Dr. Croft. “This is the first time that Leader and Firefox has ever allowed any humans to touch them. We only made contact with them yesterday when we went looking for their flock. It looks like that they are already starting to like you.”

“Will we ever become dragon riders like you? Lucy asks Helena.

“That will be up to your new dragon friends,” answers Helena.

“Take all of the time you need to become friends with Leader and Firefox.” Dr. Croft tells them. “They will be the key to finding a peaceful solution to your past conflict with them.”

With the merging of the two suns over, the members of the Egyptian Village have left to return to their home. Joe and Tod open up the doors to let the light inside. Two from the flock of dragons above fly down to talk to Leader. They then fly back up to the hill where they all take off to the North. “Leader has told them that he and Firefox are going to spend the rest of the day and night with their new friends,” reports Dr. Croft to the others. “We’re going to take this opportunity to learn everything we can about this Egyptian culture from out guest. When we are ready, we will go pay the village elders a visit and consolidate the terms of a peace treaty. We better double the size of this bed if we are going to have four dragons sleeping in here tonight with the rest of us.” A detail gets together to gather more reeds from the edge of the swamp thus enlarging the dragon bed to twice its size nearly filling the back end of the chamber.

“Those two dragons are really enjoying all of that attention,” Dr. Croft tells Professor Narcy as she has been observing them for some time. “Does that sound like they are purring like big kitties?”

“If it is, it’s a side of dragons that I never knew existed,” answers Professor Narcy.

The two teens, with the supervision of Ahab and Cleo, continue giving both dragons lots of massaging along their neck and forehead as they talk about their life in the new world. They are picking up the language of Celtic as the two dragons are picking up the language of Egyptian. It is a most unexpected move an hour later when the two teens step back, the dragons get up, then kneel on their forearms so the two teens can get on their shoulders.

“That is remarkable,” Helena tells Dr. Croft as she witnesses what is taking place. “They are going to become the first Egyptian ever to ride on dragons. And, not just ordinary dragon. They are riding on the Alpha dragons, the leaders of this world. That is going to be a first.”

“Ahab, Cleo, come with us,” Farrell asks them. “We’re going flying with Leader, Firefox, and their new friends.”

“Stay away from their village for now,” Dr. Croft warns the dragons and their riders in both Celtic and Egyptian as they walk outside. "We’ll plan for a formal meeting to conduct peace talks when you get back from your adventure.” The two dragons take off with their teen riders in a flight towards the North. Ahab and Cleo join the flight on Freida and Farrell.

“Where are we going?” Ramsey II asks Leader in Celtic.

“I want to show you my homeland,” Leader answers in Egyptian.

“This is wonderful,” Ramsey II tells Leader. “We both understand each other’s language.”

“It looks like this is going well if Leader is going to take them to your homeland,” Ahab tells Farrell.

“I was going to take Sandra to my homeland yesterday to see Leader, but he came to us instead,” Farrell tells Ahab. “You will like the terrain where we live. It is at the edge of the great forest and the mountains.” With his digital camera, Ahab is getting a lot of pictures of the changing terrain as well as photos of the two Egyptian teens riding on their dragons.

In the tundra forest, the terrain has the look of what Earth must have been like at the end of the Ice Age. A herd of Mammoths are seen grazing on the brush growing in the pines. “Is that the creature that injured your leg?” asks Ahab as he spots a Woolly Rhino with a young one.

“Yes,” answers Farrell.

“With the size of that creature and the size of her horn, you are lucky that she didn’t break your leg when she hit you.”

“As it was, she threw me over her back when she hit my leg with her horn,” answers Farrell. “It was my fault. I didn’t know that she had an infant so close by when I landed next to her.”

“A painful lesson that you learned about a newborn and their mothers,” answers Ahab.

The flight has reached the edge of the forest near a volcanic field where the dragons live. Ahab and Cleo counts over 100 nesting locations where female dragons are either sitting on an egg, or a baby dragon resides in it.

“Helena was concerned when she thought that there were only 20 of you in the flock and no youngsters,” Ahab tells Farrell. “I now see that there is a sizable population of dragons out there with nest and young ones. That is good news for your species. It means that you are thriving.”

“Before the truce was agreed upon, our numbers were under 50,” answers Farrell. “We have been slowly growing in numbers since. We will soon start spreading out to other parts of this world when the next generation of dragons are ready to start raiing their families.”

“Hopefully, the same will happen with the Egyptians over in the valley so the both of you are able to occupy this entire new world together.” Ahab tells Farrell. I’m glad that Leader has decided to show our guest his home world. When we get back, we will make plans to show him Ramsey II world and seal a permanent peace agreement with his people.”

The four dragons land by a cluster of nest where several dragons come out to visit. They are astonished when they learn that the two Egyptian teens can speak their language as well as Ahab and Cleo. Lisa is allowed to walk up into a nest to look at an egg, then a second nest to touch the youngster that is about her size. “This is an honor for you to show me your families,” she tells the two female dragons in Celtic.

All too soon, it is time to fly back to the temple as evening approaches.

That evening, the planning meeting takes place. “In the morning, we will fly to the village to asks for Ramsey and his queen.” reports Leader. “If they agree to it, Firefox and I will bring them back here to conduct negotiations.”

“That sounds like a good plan,” answers Professor Narcy. “I wish you success in negotiations in the morning.”

[rpicardi1]

Chapter 8 The peace agreement.

 

It is 8:AM in the village of New Alexandria when an alert is sounded from the watch tower at the village gate. “There are two dragons that just flew in and landed near the gate.” the watchman reports to Ramseys.

“They have never landed that close to the village before,” answers Ramseys. “They have always watched us from the hill beyond like they did the other day. What are they doing?”

“They are just watching us,” the watchman answers. “They look like the two dragons that were sitting above the temple gate for the ceremony that came down and went inside with the sacrifice.”

“Have they done anything that could be threatening to us?” asks Ramseys?

“No, they are just watching us and appear to be talking to each other.”

“Ramseys, Jenny, come out to see us!” the two dragons announce in Egyptian.

“Did I hear dragons calling for you?” asks the gatekeeper.

“You most certainly did,” answers Ramseys. “I never knew that they had a language let along could speak to us in our language.”

“What should we do?” asks the watchman.

“Open the gate so I can go out to talk to them,” orders Ramseys. “Jenny, come with me.” The two dragons watch as the gates open and Ramseys and Jenny walk out towards the dragons.

“Are you Ramseys and Jenny?” Leader asks them in Egyptian.

“Yes,” a surprised Ramseys answers back. “How is it that you can speak our language?”

“Ramsey II and Lisa taught us how to speak in your language.” Firefox answers back. “They are safe back at the temple waiting for you.”

“What do you want us to do?” asks Ramseys

“If you are willing, we want to fly you back to the temple to conduct peace talks,” answers Leader.

“Give me a minute to talk to my commander,” answers Ramseys.

Ramseys walks back to talk to the watchman as Jenny talks with Firefox. Half of the village along with the palace guard and several warriors are now up on the wall watching the proceedings. Ramseys orders his personal guards to stand down, that he will go with the dragons. He soon returns as his personal guard goes back inside closing the gate.

“We will go with you,” Ramseys tells Leader.

“Come, climb up onto our shoulder. When you are seated, hold on to the spikes on the back of our neck and we will fly you there.” Leader tells them as he and Firefox lay down.

“Are we actually going to ride on dragons?” asks Jenny.

“Yes,” answers Ramseys. “Our son and his bride to be must have made a good impression on them in the temple if they trust us to ride on them.”

“Wave to your people when we fly by the gate before heading to the temple,” Leader tells Ramseys. “Enjoy the ride.”

“I will do so,” Ramseys tells Leader. He soon takes off with Firefox following, circles by the gate, then heads North to the temple.

The trip to the Temple is a smooth flight with both Ramseys and Jenny engaged in discussion among the dragons about the events of the past day.

Landing by the open temple gate, they are greeted by Ramsey II and Lucy. “We thought that you were dead,” Ramseys tells his son as they embrace each other.

“We are very much alive,” answers Ramsey II. “Ahab and Cleo escorted us inside as Leader and Firefox escorted those priests to the back exit and kicked them out of the temple. Then, we performed a ritual of trust with the two dragons that brought you here and became good friends with them. We have learned their language as they have learned ours.”

Jenny is also embracing Lucy as she tells her about the experience with the dragons and their visit to the dragon homeland. “It was wonderful to be allowed to see an egg close up and actually pet one of their youngster that was about my size.”

“Come inside,” Helena asks the two Egyptian leaders and their teens. “We need to talk about our future together. But first, you will need to perform a ritual of trust. Then, we can proceed with negotiations about a peaceful settlement with the dragons of this land.”

“No!” a strange male voice shouts in Egyptian as he charges towards Ramseys with dagger in his hand. Leader suddenly lunges towards the stranger that is charging out of the shadow setting him on fire. The stranger is writing in pain as he collapses in front of a shocked Ramseys and soon succumbs to his injuries.

With crossbow at the ready, Joe and Ahab runs over to the smoking body. “Who was he?” asks Ahab.

“That was Judas, one of the Priest that escorted us here,” Lucy tells everyone. “I never did like him.”

“Ahab and I had better go looking for the other Priest,” Joe tells the shocked group. It doesn’t take long to find him cowering in the corner. He is searched and found to be unarmed.

Helena orders him to come out and face Leader. Helena then hands him a strip of preserved meat and orders him to perform the ritual of trust. Shaking with fear, with two crossbow weapons aimed at him, he offers Leader the strip of meat while saying nervously in Egyptian, “It was not my idea to attack my Pharaoh.”

Leader grabs his hand with his mouth holding firmly on to it. He has an angry look on his face as the Priest tries to pull his hand out cutting the back of it on one of Leader’s sharp teeth. Everyone else is now watching in shock wondering what is going to happen next as blood starts running down his arm.

“Why did you order a sacrifice?” Firefox tells the Priest in Egyptian in an angry voice.

“It was part of my training to do so,” the Priest screams back in fear and pain.

“Who ordered that training?” asks Firefox in an angry voice.

“Alexander the Third, when he first negotiated a truce with you dragons,” answers the Priest in fear. “It was never a part of their agreement to hold the sacrifice of the suns.” Leader waits a couple of seconds, lets out a growl, then lets the priest go. A broken tooth is clearly seen where he had grabbed the priest’s arm in his mouth. The priest collapses from shock.

“You are lucky Leader bit you where he was missing a tooth,” Dr Croft tells him as she and Mary bandage up his hand. “He would have bitten your hand clean off for what you Egyptians did to the dragons in the past.”

“Lets us continue with negotiations,” Helena tells Ramseys and Jenny. Ramseys takes the strip of preserved meat from her and offers it to Leader.

“Relax, I will not bite you when you perform the ritual of trust” Leader tells a nervous Ramseys as the strips of meat are handed to him.

"Thank you for having faith in us,” Ramseys tells Leader as the ritual strip of meat is gently taken from his hand and he rubs Leader’s forehead. “What do you want from my people and I”

“To live in peace with us. To be our friends.”

“That is certainly an easy enough agreement,” Ranseys tells Leader as he rubs his forehead. “We should have done this a long time ago.”

“What should we do with Conway?” asks Helena in Egyptian.

“Since he was a student of Judas, he may not have been a willing participant in the attempt to kill me,” answers Ramseys. “Leader will be the judge of that when he performs the ritual of trust the second time.”

“I will follow your request,” answers Conway with a nervous voice. He takes the strip of meat from Mary and offers it to Leader. This time, it is carefully taken out of his bandaged hand and shared with Firefox who is next to him. “Thank you for accepting my offering,” Conway tells him as he rubs Leader’s forehead.

“We believe that you’re not responsible for conducting the sacrifices,” Leader answers back.

“Your kingdom is invited to study life in my village,” Ramseys tells Dr. Croft and Helena.

“We would be delighted to visit and study your village life,” Dr Croft tells him. “Lets plan on us coming to your village in the morning. Leader has already told me that the dragons will take the four of you back home, then he will come back for Conway.”

Ramsey and Jenny are soon on Leader and Firefox as Ramsey II and Lisa hitch a ride on Farrell and Freida. They take off heading for the Egyptian Village.

“Where should we land?” Leader asks Ramseys.

“Lets land outside of the gate,” answers Ramseys. “No one in the villages knows that we have made an agreement of peace.”

“A wise move,” answers Leader. The four dragons land in front of the main gate as their riders dismount to a crowd of curious onlookers with the Palace Guard that comes out of the open gate. Leader flies back to the temple as the other three dragons are introduced to the villagers.

It is quite an amazing sight with dozen of villagers coming out to see the dragons up close and personal. The villagers are even more amazed that the dragons can talk to them in Egyptian as well as that the two teens of the sacrifice can speak directly to the dragons in their own language. Both the villagers and the dragons are enjoying all of the unusual attention.

Leader has now arrived back at the temple to pick up Conway. “Are you sure that you want to let me fly on you?” Conway asks him.

“Yes,” answers Leader. “Biting you was a test to learn the truth about how the sacrifices got started. I’m sorry that I had to do that to you. It was necessary after what Judas attempted to do to your leader when I was forced to set him on fire.” They soon take off to fly back to the village where the two of them engage in extended conversation over how the Egyptian religious belief function among their people.

“I will honor your request that you are not a God,” Conway tells Leader after they have had a discussion on that topic. “I will declare you as being our friends.”

Landing in the village commons next to the other three dragons that have relocated there, Conway dismounts and starts talking to the gathered crowd. “I declare the dragons as our friends. Treat them as our guests, not as our gods.” The rest of the afternoon is spent in celebration with their new dragon friends.

All too soon, the reunion needs to end as evening approaches. Farrell and Frieda promise to be back in the morning with the archaeologist team as Leader and Firefox return to their home world to spread the word that a peace has been established among them.

[rpicardi1]

Chapter 9. Visiting the Settlement of the Dragons.

 

“That went far better then expected,” Farrell tells Professor Narcy as he is debriefed about returning the Egyptian royalty to the village and his visit with their people. “Conway told them that we should be treated as guest and not Gods. It turned out to be a most pleasant visit as Ramsey’s people showered us with all kinds of attention. Leader was even impressed.”

“That was a wise move on their part,” answers Professor Narcy. “I will be interested in learning just what their beliefs are in comparison of what we have learned about their past back in Egypt.”

“It has been extremely interesting learning about living dragons and comparing what we have learned about you and those stories of the Vikings and Europeans in the Middle Ages. Do you know when Dragons adopted a form of Celtic as their language? I find it interesting given that Celtic was the native tongue of the early inhabitants of the British Isles.”

“I do not know,” answers Farrell. “It has always been our native tongue.”

“I wonder if it is possible that there may have been other Stargates located around our world. Stonehedge has been one of the mysteries that dates back to our early history. There is speculation that it may have formed some sort of Stargate that was active when our Sun shined it’s light on it at a the Summer Equinox. If true, then it’s possible that we were visited by dragons who picked up Celtic as a language back them.”

“A couple of days ago, I was in total disbelief that real living fire breathing dragons exist, let alone ones intelligent enough to talk to.” Dr. Sanders chimes in. “Now, I am both in disbelief yet most interested in what Farrell is telling us about dragons and their history.”

“You need to visit where we live,” Farrell tells him. “You can learn so much about us in our homeland.”

“As you know, my field of study is archaeology, the study of prehistoric creatures of our past. I have learned so much from studying some of those creatures I have seen living here. I will take you up on your offer to study what we have considered as a fantasy one of our past. Dragons have influence the cultures of the Celtics and Vikings where they were used as figureheads on longboats and decorated the sails, banners, and shields of those kingdoms. I would love the opportunity to study your world to compare fact with fiction.”

“I thought that I would never see the day where Dr. Sanders would ever sit next to a dragon, start petting it, and carry on a conversation with it.” comments Dr. Croft.

“Lets let them continue to get to know each other,” answers Mary. “That could become a most unusual friendship.” Indeed it does as Dr. Sanders sleeps with the rest of the group that night next to Farrell. In fact, it is a quiet restful night as for once there is no loud snoring from Dr. Sanders to keep everyone awake for a change.

At the morning planning meeting, it is decided that Dr. Croft and Dr. Sanders will visit the dragon homeland. It will be an all day study of their culture and home life. The rest of the group are going to hike over to the Egyptian Village to study their early culture.

“Let us get up on the temple so we can get some photos of Dr Sanders riding a dragon,” Mary tells Farrell.

With cameras ready, they get pictures of Dr. Sanders climbing up onto Farrell’s shoulder and sitting on his back. Farrell does several fly bys for close up photos. “This is exciting!” Dr. Sanders announces. “I never knew it could be so much fun riding on a dragon.”

“We have found it quite enjoyable as well,” Farrell tells Dr. Sanders.

“That’s wonderful,” Dr. Croft tells Farrell. “It always felt like you dragons were enjoying taking us flying.”

With pictures over, the two dragons set course North to the mountains and their homeland near the volcano. It is about a half hour flight with all four carrying on a conversation about nest building and raising their young. They soon arrive at the nesting site.

This homeland is located on a rugged slope of the volcano at the edge of the pine forest. Nest are organized on top of rock piles to discourage any predators from getting at the baby dragons. As from the previous trip, there are about 100 nest counted that forms the Dragon community.

“Do you have a nest?” Dr. Croft asks Frieda.

“Yes,” answers Frieda. “I just don’t have an egg or youngster in it at this time. As we live a long time, we will only lay one egg every five years until we reach 90. Not all of them are fertile.”

“That explains why your kind hasn’t overpopulate this world,” answers Dr. Croft. “According to the Game of Throne stories, dragons laid clutches of eggs that were about the size of coconuts. However, they never took care of them so many ended up not hatching unless they were properly prepared by the Targarians rulers who hand hatched and raised them.”

“That’s awful,” answers Frieda. “My friends find hatching their egg and raising their youngsters quite enjoyable.”

“Your eggs are so much larger then those in the stories. How long does it take your eggs to hatch after you lay them?”

“About 14 days,” answers Frieda.

“How old are you two?” asks Dr. Croft.

“We are both 17,” answers Frieda.

“Then, you are still teenagers by our standards.” answers Dr. Croft. “Will you continue to grow any larger?”

“No,” answers Frieda. “We are nearly our adult size.”

“That’s good to know,” answers Dr. Croft. “Drogon in the Game of Thrones story was already four times your size at age 7.”

“Those are giants,” Frieda answers in alarm.

“Indeed,” answers Dr. Croft. “And, according to the fictional stories, the older ones could be four times Drogon’s size or even larger.”

“I’m glad that we stop growing when we reach adult hood,” answers Frieda.

“I am too,” answers Dr. Croft. “You are just the right size for a dragon as described in our European and Viking history.”

“This is my nest,” Frieda tells Dr Croft as both dragons lands next to it.

“That looks marvelous,” she tells Freida after doing a detailed examination of it. “It is woven together like a large basket. How do you manage to do such delicate work.”

“I’ll show you,” Frieda says as she takes off to gather some materials from the nearby forest. Two minutes later, she is back to demonstrate how she can weave the materials she has gathered into the nest.

“This is fantastic,” comments Dr. Sanders as he examines the nest. “The quality of the construction with the materials being used is outstanding.” Several notes with photos are taken as he continues the study.

Two other dragons come over out of curiosity to see what is going on. They are the two that visited when Ramsey II and Lucy flew out to the home world on Leader and Firefox. As Dr. Sanders is not yet fluent in Celtic, Dr. Croft talks to them. “We have come out to study dragons and their culture in your home world.” she tells the two female dragons. “That was so kind of you to trust Ramsey II and Lucy to visit your nest two days ago.”

“We did so because Leader brought them here,” answers Tammy. “I was so surprised that they could speak in our language. My egg is about ready to hatch so I need to get back to my nest.”

“Can we watch the blessed event?” ask Dr. Croft.

“You may do so,” answers Tammy.

“We’ll stay back so your newborn can imprint on you,” Dr. Croft tells her.

“What is imprinting?” asks Tammy.

“When all creatures are born from egg laying creatures that incubate their eggs on a nest, the newborn is genetically hard wired to accept the closest creature it first sees as it’s mother.”

“I never knew that.” answers Tammy. “Follow me back to my nest.”

Tammy lands in the nest as the rest of the dragons land nearby. With her camera ready, Dr. Croft quickly examines the egg from inside the nest to get a reference of it’s size, then steps back to the edge of the nest as it starts to crack open. The top half soon pops off where the baby spots Tammy, climbs out of the shell, then goes over to her to nurse.

“That, was outstanding,” Dr. Croft tells Tammy. “Can we examine the shell close up?”

“Yes,” answers Tammy. Dr. Croft and Dr Sanders go over to the egg shell and place the top half back on it. Dr Sanders stands next to the egg so that Dr. Croft can photograph it for a size reference. Then they switch places.

As it has finished nursing, the newborn comes back over to the egg shell to check out Dr. Croft. He is the size of a six year old child. With Tammy’s permission, she places her hand on top of his head for a photo. “We better leave you now so your baby can get some sleep. Thank you for allowing us to experience the hatching of a newborn dragon.”

“You are so kind,” answers Tammy. “Silvia would like to show you her young child.”

“I’d be delighted to see her,” answers Dr. Croft.

Over at the nest next door, they visit the youngster that Lucy had petted the day before. “She looks marvelous,” Dr. Croft tells Silvia about the youngster that is about her size. “How old is she now? How soon before she is able to fly and eat solid food.”

“She is two years old,” answers Silvia. “She is already eating solid foods and can fly a short distance to visit her friends that are her age. We are able to have one of us babysit them as the rest of us go out hunting or to gather materials to enlarge our nest.”

“That is an excellent social structure not unlike us humans,” answers Dr. Croft. “How long do your youngsters stay with you before they become independent as teens?”

“At five, they live as a group that are supervised by our senior dragons. By the time they reach 15 years of age, they start to pair up and start to build nest of their own. When they reach an age of 20, they will be capable of raising a family of their own.”

“Does that means that our two dragon friends will not start raising their young until they reach 20?” asks Dr. Croft.

“Yes,” answers Frieda.

“Who are your parents?” asks Dr. Croft.

“Silvia is my mother. Tammy is Farrell’s mother,” answers Frieda. “Our fathers are out exploring the western wastelands to look for a place for us to expand our settlement. We need to split our flock soon in order to reduce overcrowding and hunting.

“Now I understand why your parents took an interest in us,” answers Dr. Croft.

“They were extremely curious about you being our friends.” answers Frieda.

“I’m so glad that we were able to make friends with Farrell when we first found him hiding in the temple of the sacrifice due to his being injured.” answers Dr. Croft. “It set the stage for us to become friends and establish a permanent peace with the Egyptians.”

“How long will your tribe remain in our world?” asks Frieda.

“We will return to our world once we can find where the Stargate is hiding.” answers Dr. Croft. “Until then, we are going to learn as much about your world as we can.”

A strange dragon flies over to the four to talk to them in Celtic. “Draco wants to see the human strangers before he leaves our world.” Paragon tells them. “He is now too weak to fly over here.”

“Who is this Draco?” Dr. Croft asks her.

“He is one of the elders,” answers Paragon. “At 217 years, he is the oldest dragon in our flock.”

“We should go talk to him,” answers Dr. Sanders. “He will have extensive knowledge of the war with the Egyptians and how they established a truce.” They fly over to meet the elderly dragon.

It is a most unusual sight as Dr. Sanders is introduced to Draco with Dr. Croft acting as interpreter. Draco provides him with the history of the dragon Egyptian war and how a truce was finally established. The old dragon is at peace as he is soaking up the attention of the two humans comforting him by petting his neck and forehead. Leader comes over to talk with Drago.

“So, our war is finally over?” Draco asks Leader in a tired weak voice.

“It officially ended yesterday when I let their leader ride on me to finalize peace talks,” answers Leader.

“Then, it was his son and bride to be that you first established contact with and brought over here to visit us?” ask Draco.

“Yes,” answers Leader. “They were the latest sacrifice from the Egyptians. We even learned each other’s language.”

“Then, I am pleased that I have lived to see the day when we would finally be at peace with the Egyptians,” answers Draco in a dying voice. “I can now go peacefully to that great beyond knowing that us dragons will be living in this brave new world in peace with the Egyptians.”

“Rest easy, my friend,” Dr. Croft tells him as he closes his eyes with his last breath. There is a moment of silence for the next several minutes as Dr. Sanders is taking notes on his netbook as the older dragons gather around to pay their last respects. Each one of them insists on getting a pat on the forehead from the two human strangers.

“What will happen to his body?” Dr. Sanders asks Farrell.

“We will gather dry wood to form a funeral pyre as is our custom when one of us leaves this world.” answers Farrell. “When it is finished, we will all set it ablaze to bid our old friend on to Valhalla.

“It is the same practice that many of our early cultures conducted when someone of importance left this world,” Dr. Sanders tells Farrell.

“That is most interesting,” Farrell tells Dr. Sanders and Sandra. “When you are ready, we will fly you back to the temple.”

“Thank you for letting us share the experience of your lives from the hatching of an egg to when one of you naturally leaves this world.” Sandra tells the dragons in Celtic.

[rpicardi1]

Chapter 10. The Egyptian Village.

 

Without dragons to provide them quick transport, it is a one hour hike to Ramsey’s village. The rest of the team has prepared for the hike with Joe, Tod, Ahab and Professor Narcy armed with crossbows in case they are attacked by any predators that are known to roam in the badlands. It is mostly flat land as they travel around the plateau and start a gentle descent into a fertile valley where a stream runs through it.

The trip is made with no problems from any predators. They do spot a couple of raptors. Those turn out to be the ones Farrell had scared off which promptly flee from the sight of the eight explorers.

Reaching the village gate, they are greeted by both Ramseys and their mates. “Where’s Farrell, Frieda, Dr. Sanders and Dr. Croft?” asks Ramseys.

“They went to visit the dragon home world to study their culture,” answers Professor Narcy.

“That’s wonderful,” Ramsey II answers. “It was a fabulous place when Leader took us there for a brief visit. I would love to spend some more time there to see how they live.”

“Perhaps, when you see Leader again, you could arrange for an exchange visit between their nesting sites and your village,” suggest Professor Narcy.

“Let us give you a tour of our village,” answers Ramseys.

Entering the village, everyone is taking notes on how it is laid out. A security wall has been built of stone to protect the living and shopping areas of the village. There are two main gates and several smaller access doors to allow the residences to tend the farm fields that are outside the wall. Crossbow turrets up on the watch towers. There are several tamed Parasaurs observed in pens next to the watch towers and main gate.

“What is the purpose of having the Parasaurs in pens at these locations?” asks Helena.

“We have found that they have a special ability to warn us when dangerous predators are approaching,” answers Ramseys. “Otherwise, we saddle them up and will take them out on a berry run in the scrubland when we need to travel fast over a long distance.”

“That is most interesting,” Helena tells him. “I have confirmed that information in my netbook about them. You are able to tame them by just feeding them their favorite food?”

“Yes,” answers Ramsey II. “In spite of their size, they are very gentle creatures. They would rather run then fight. Just don’t take one of the eggs you find in the wild because Mama and sometimes her mate, will get upset and start pecking you in the head with their beak.”

“I believe that is true with any egg laying female that doesn’t abandon the nest,” answers Mary.

“We now breed and raise our own Parasaurs to both improve the breed and enhance their warning ability.” Ramsey II tells Mary. “Let me show you the youngsters over in the paddock.”

Visiting the Parasaur paddock, Ramsey II and the newcomers are mobbed by the baby and juveniles for attention. “Such wonderful creatures,” Mary comments. “Dr. Sanders would never believe how intelligent they are. Then, it took him a while to warm up to the dragons after he first met them when Farrell embarrassed him in front of the rest of us when we proved that they had a structured language.”

“That horn on their head is likely how they developed the natural ability to detect danger like some sort of a threat radar,” Professor Narcy tells everyone. “Ramseys, what dangers do they detect for you?”

“They warn us of the presence of the spitters, raptors, carnos, and the occasional T-Rex. This is why we had to build the crossbow turrets. Strangely, the Parasaurs don’t consider the dragons as a threat even though the Trikes we use in the fields do warn us about their presence when they develop an orange glow around their head.”

“That is most unusual,” answers Professor Narcy. “What do you use the Trikes for?”

“We use them to till the fields. We also use them to defend ourselves in case a Carno shows up to attack us while we are preparing the fields for planting. They can charge a Carno impaling it on their horns. They also scare off the raptor packs especially if we have a mated pair of Trikes with us. If a Rex shows up, we lead it into crossbow range to eliminate it’s threat. That is safer then trying to take it out by charging into it’s belly. It takes a long time to passive tame a wild trike. Therefore, we breed them and raise their young to adults for our use.”

“What can you tell us about these camel like creatures with the reptile head?” ask Professor Narcy.

“They are called a Morralotop,” answers Ramseys. “They are very useful for taking long trips into the desert towards the distant pyramids. They make good pack animals that can carry a lot of supplies as well as us on their neck saddle. While a single Morley will run off if attacked, their friends will rush to their aid to attack their attacker. The raptors will leave them alone when they see a convoy of them traveling together. They can live on just about anything that is growing in the desert and are great at gathering the silk from the purple flowers that we can use for weaving hot weather gear. Best of all, that large hump can store water. It taste like piss but can be a life saver if we are ever caught without water in a desert heat wave.”

“What is over at the Great Pyramids?” asks Professor Narcy.

“They serve as the burial chamber for our kings as well as a marker for the Gods from the stars.” answers Ramseys. “Alexander the first is buried in the largest pyramid. Once a year, we send a delegation over there to pay our respects to out past leaders.”

“It is a similar situation back in our world in Giza,” Professor Narcy reports. “The only difference is that the Egyptian culture is no longer based upon the Pharaoh rulers. It has been replaced by a form of representative government with an elected President and a representative form of Congress where there are over 100 parties vying to get representatives elected to serve there. In reality, it appears to be a form of military dictatorship under the leadership of their President. There is now a population of about 95 million people living in the country.”

“That is a lot of people,” comments Ramseys. “How can the desert support that many?”

“The present day Egyptians built a huge dam on the Nile to use it’s water for year around irrigation,” answers Professor Narcy. “They are able to raise enough food for everyone living there. Still, that is not enough water to reach other areas of the Sahara to irrigate it. The search for underground sources of fresh water is how we found the Stargate Temple that sent us into your world.”

“It sounds like an interesting world you come from,” Ramseys answers.

“You would not be happy in the world where I come from,” Professor Narcy tells Ramseys. “It is very crowded country with a religious civil war being conducted by the leaders of Radical Islam against anyone that is not a believer. They are known to capture young girls to make them their sex slaves. They also will stone and behead anyone that they consider an Infidel. They will even blow themselves up in order to kill as many non believers as possible under the belief that there will be a harem of virgins waiting for them in Heaven. So far, the military has been able to keep that religious conflict from exploding into an all out civil war. How long that peace will last is anyone’s guess. This religious war is not just confined to Egypt, Radical Islam has spread to just about every country around the world. It could someday explode into a war that the Christian Bible describes as Armageddon, the ultimate showdown between good and evil.”

“Your world here is so much friendlier, so much nicer with your people living in harmony with the land and it’s creatures. You should stay here, turn this place into a paradise that it is capable of becoming. It will be a refuge for humanity should our world end up being destroyed by an all out global war over Radical Islam.”

The group of researchers now get a tour of the irrigated surrounding farmland. Several crops of rice in various states of growth have been planted in the lower flooded fields. The higher land has been planted in wheat and rye. Pastureland has been established for the sheep and goats. Date palms and other fruit trees grow in the village proper. Helena is amazed of the variety of vegetable crops in cultivation that include potatoes and corn, crops that are unheard of from the Middle East before the time of Moses.

“The agriculture skills of your people are amazing,” Helena tells Ramseys, “They are up to par with what is occurring in modern Israel. What do you use to fertilize the fields?”

“We gather up all of the poop along with the crop waste in the field and place them in compost piles.” answers Ramseys. “When it is ready, we spread the compost on the fields in preparation for the next planting. We also have a mine in an old cave where we have been able to gather the poop from the bats that live in there. It is rich in a mineral that we cannot find anywhere else. We also rotate the crops in the fields with a plant that produces a mineral that enriches the soil. This has made for a very efficient use of the irrigated land for our crop needs. The occasional predator that attacks us ends up supplying us with most of our meat. We cook and dry the meat in order to preserve it.”

“You are doing everything that the apps on our devices have been telling us to do in order to provide us with food,” answers Helena. “It is a good system you are using which has allowed you to stay in your village ever since you established it.”

“Do you know when your ancestors first arrived here and when?”

“I am told that they came through a portal called a Stargate some 10,000 years ago.” answers Conway. “It was in a temple built by the Gods that allowed our people to visit this world and return from it. Our ancestors stayed here when they were trapped in the temple by a sandstorm that buried it. The Gods abandoned this world when they became involved in some sort of an intergalactic war that wiped them out. No one has seen them since. In fact, I don’t think that anyone has ever seen them for real.”

“It would explain the statues of dog and bird headed figures we have seen in the burial temples but none in the Stargate one,” answers Professor Narcy. “Do you know where the Stargate is that returns you back to the temple back on Earth?”

“Yes,” answers Conway. “It is in the temple of our central Library. Unfortunately, the control unit is no longer with it so the gate here no longer functions.”

“I wonder if it is buried in the spot where we first arrived?” asks Professor Narcy.

“That is unknown,” answers Helena. “We should have been trapped under the sand instead of being placed on the surface. It is likely that the gate has lost its calibration to this room due to the missing control unit. We will need to find it and see if we can get them reconnected to each other. At least, we know that we are on the correct world given the creatures we have observed living here so far.”

Returning to the village, the researchers are escorted by Conway to the temple in the village center. It is like a library to the past and present with it’s many scrolls and artwork. “This is where we have stored the scrolls of the history of our people,” Conway tells them. “We also have our artwork here along with artist that continue to paint and craft sculptures. At one time, we sent those works back through the Stargate located in this temple to store them in the other temple, but that is no longer possible given that the control unit had vanished 20 years ago.”

Heading further back into the temple, they enter the room of the Stargate. “You are correct about the control unit missing,” Professor Narcy tells Conway. “If this Stargate is connected to the temple back in our world, the missing control unit might explain why we ended up in the badlands instead of inside your temple. It looks like that we are going to have to go find it if we have any chance of returning to our world.”

“Any idea what could have happened to it?”

“It vanished about the time that Judis became head priest,” answers Conway.

“Then, he must have taken and hid it somewhere,” answers Ramseys. “Unfortunately, Leader ended up killing him when he tried to attack Ramsey with a dagger.”

“If the gate and the control units are linked to each other, it’s possible that it could be located where we first materialized in the badlands,” Professor Narcy answers.

“That’s going to be very difficult to find where we first appeared,” reports Joe. “I’m sure that all traces where we first arrived have long ago vanished as a result of the sandstorm that hit several days ago.”

“Still, we will need to go look for it,” reports Professor Narcy.

“I agree,” answers Joe. “That should be our next priority once we have finished our study of this culture. I just wish that we had some sort of ground penetrating radar to find it.”

“Lets worry about that when we go looking for it,” answers Mary. “Lets finish our research in this temple before we proceed further.”

It is mid afternoon when Ramsey II comes into the temple with news for the researchers. Farrell and Frieda are here with Dr Sanders and Dr Croft. “We had a most wonderful visit at the dragon village,” Dr Croft reports to the rest of the group and their Egyptian escorts. “We got to see an egg hatch. We also helped to comfort an elderly dragon on his deathbed learning a lot about the truce of 100 years ago before he passed away.”

“You got to meet Draco?” ask Ramseys.

“yes,” answers Dr. Croft. “He was very pleased that you have established peace with them.”

“That’s incredible,” Ramseys tells her. “I didn’t even know that he was still alive.”

“I’m told that he was 217 years old,” answers Dr. Croft.

“That’s extremely old even for a dragon,” answers Ramseys. “What will happen to his body?”

“He is to be cremated in a funeral pyre in the morning,” answers Dr, Croft.

“If they will allow it, I would like to place his ashes in the Great Pyramid,” Conway answers.

“I believe that it would be allowed,” Farrell informs them. “The ashes normally remain until they are blown away by the winds.”

“Then, let us plan to honor him in an Egyptian Funeral at the Great Pyramid once the ashes have cooled down from the cremation.

[rpicardi1]

Chapter 11. A Surprise Visit.

 

Freida and Farrell have gone back to the dragon homeland for the night so they can participate in Draco’s funeral. Dr. Croft has gone with them to observe the activities that will take place at dawn. Dr. Sanders has joined in with the rest of the research team to complete their studies in the village temple. As it has taken all of the rest of the day to complete their research, they are invited to spend the night in the village as Ramsey’s guest.

The evening is spent in a celebration of the new friendship with the researchers and their dragon friends. A feast is held in their honor in Early Egyptian tradition of dance and toast. That is followed by stories of their history. Professor Narcy and Helena add in to the history lesson as well.

“This has become a special couple of day,” announces Ramseys in a toast. “We have made friends with the dragons and have established contact with our new friends from our past.” The celebration continues well into the night with stories of their life and that of the present world.

It is early the following morning when the night watch files a report of spotting a tower of flame and smoke on the northern horizon. “Has the volcano erupted?” asks Ramseys.

“No” reports Helena after observing the smoke for several seconds through her binoculars. “It is the funeral pyre of Draco that we are observing. It must be a big one.”

“That’s going to be burning for a long time,” reports Dr. Sanders. “After they move his body to the funeral pyre, the dragons were gathering up dry wood like crazy.”

After eating breakfast in the village, the research party has started on their hike back to the sacrifice temple. They are about halfway back when they spot two confused strangers up ahead. “Who is that up there?” asks Mary with concern. “They are definitely not dressed like the Egyptians.” The strangers head their way when they spot the researchers.

“Dr. Nasser?” asks Professor Narcy when he recognizes the stranger as they get closer to them. “How did you and Clara end up in this world?”

“We became concerned when your research party was reported missing for over a week,” answers Dr. Nasser. “So, we flew out to the dig site to find out what happened to you. During our search in the temple, we accidentally activated the Stargate and ended up here in the middle of nowhere.”

“The Stargate on this end was sabotaged by a rogue Egyptian Priest about 20 years ago.” answers Joe. “He removed the control unit and buried it somewhere. That is why you ended up in the badlands and not in the Star Chamber at the temple in this world. We think that the control unit may be buried out here somewhere. We cannot get back to our world without it.”

“There are actually early Egyptians living in this world of the two suns?” asks Dr. Nasser in surprise.

“There is a village of them to the South,” answers Professor Narcy. “They are the descendants of the original travelers that went through the Stargate some 10,000 years ago. They became trapped here when the temple was buried by a sandstorm back on Earth.”

“Be on guard, that pair of raptors is following us again,” warns Tod.

“Raptors?” answers Clara in alarm as she sees them nearby. “Are those things for real.”

“Yes,” answers Mary. “Prehistoric creatures from the Jurassic Period, as well as from the end of the Ice Age, are actually living here in this world. Those are the two raptors that Farrell scared off. I’m thinking that we should see if we can tame them since they have become so curious about us.”

“Tame them?” questions Dr. Nasser. “How is that going to be possible?”

“We have been getting apps on out tablets and smart phone that have been providing us with all kinds of information about this world including how to tame it’s creatures.” answers Mary. “The Egyptians have domesticated many of the unusual creatures living here. We may try it with those two raptors once we can find a way to confine them so they can’t attack us.”

“How is that possible when there is no cell phone or Internet service available on this world?” asks Dr, Nasser.

“We don’t know,” answers Dr. Croft. “I discovered the app when I used my smartphone to record one of the unusual desert creatures that became friends with Sarah.”

“Who is this Farrell?” asks Dr. Nasser.

“You are about to find out,” Professor Narcy tells him. “Here he comes with Dr. Croft and his mate.”

“Oh My Gosh! Are those real dragons?” asks Clara in a panic.

“They’re safe,” Professor Narcy tells her. “Farrell is a good friend of Dr. Croft. In fact, she is riding on him.”

“Incredible,” responds Dr. Nasser as they come in to land by the research party. “I always though that they were fantasy creatures from the European mid evil past.”

“We learned from Farrell that the dragons living here have a structured language.” answers Dr. Sanders. “Their native language is a form of Celtic that was spoken in the Celtic world of the British Isles. Farrell has also learned to speak in English and Egyptian.”

“That is very interesting,” answers Dr. Nasser. “I saw the statues and paintings back in the Star Chamber. It was reported in Celtic and Viking history that there was human interaction with them. I never knew that they actually existed or ever had a spoken language.”

“Dr. Croft and Farrell learned each other’s language when we first found him,” Professor Narcy tells him. “That happened when we found him hiding in the temple badly injured. Those two quickly became good friends.”

“That is amazing,” Dr. Nasser responds as introductions are made between the two dragons and Dr. Croft. “They are such remarkable creatures.”

“How did you two get here?” asks Dr. Croft.

“We ended up in the badlands when we accidentally activated the Stargate,” answers Dr. Nasser.

“Can you show us where you first arrive here?” asks Dr. Croft.

“We’ll take you over to the spot where we entered this world.” answers Dr. Nasser. It is a short hike to where the footprints first appear.

“Lets mark this spot with some of the nearby stones,” orders Joe. “Can someone go back to our camp in the temple and get us some digging tools?”

“Farrell and I will go get them,” answers Dr. Croft.

“Where do you think Judas could have buried the control unit?” asks Joe as he studies the ground looking for any signs that something may have been buried there.

“I have an idea” reports Helena. “I’ll fly on Freida to the Egyptian Village and be back with some additional help.”

As Helena leaves for the Egyptian Village, Dr. Croft is the first one back with the digging tools. “Damn, without knowing exactly where to dig, we are lost,” reports Joe after inspecting the ground around the marker. “I can’t find any place that looks like it has been dug up.”

“We definitely need some ground penetrating radar,” comments Professor Narcy after a half of hour of searching for a place to start digging. About then, Helena is flying back as a parasaur is seen with someone riding on it. It turns out to be Ramsey II riding on one of the sentry parasaur.

“This is Perry,” Ramsey II tells the group. “He has some other special abilities beyond his his ability to detect threats. Give me a couple of minutes to adjust him to look for the control unit.” It is several minutes of working with a control panel on the saddle when Perry activates his alert. A red circle glows nearby in the terrain as an audible ping, similar to sonar, is heard by everyone. “Try digging at his visual marker for the control unit.”

“Good, the ground feels softer in this spot,” reports Joe as he starts digging at the marker. At about three feet down, the control unit is found.

Heading back to the village, Professor Narcy and Helena now has a chance to ask Dr. Croft about the dragon funeral. “It was extremely interesting how they honored Draco to send him off to a place they call Valhalla. At dawn, a dozen male dragons formed a circle around the funeral pyre, then after a prayer was said by the dragons to the Viking Gods, the males set fire to the pyre with their flame attack. It didn’t take long for that huge pile of dry wood to form a tower of flame that looked like a tornado. It burned like that for almost an hour as the dragons watched it in silence.”

“We knew that it was a big one,” answers Helena. “We could see the smoke and flame pillar from the village.”

“The Celtic language, a prayer to Valhalla, They must have had contact with us in the past even though no physical evidence, other then drawings and carvings on Viking Longboats of that existence can be found.” comments Dr. Nasser.

“Lets get this control unit back in the Stargate so I can report directly to Coronal Arafat before he completely panics,” orders Professor Narcy.

Back in the Star Chamber, the control unit is fitted back in it’s stand. Placing her hand on it, Helena activates it. The light dims in the room as the image of the other Star Chamber appears. Coronal Arafat and one of his senior officers can be seen in the room as Professor Narcy and Dr. Nasser step through the gate. “Everyone is safe.” Dr. Nasser reports to the coronal who is surprised by their sudden appearance. “We just couldn’t get back because someone on the other end had sabotaged the Stargate.”

“Was it one of the researchers?” ask the coronal.

“No,” answers Professor Narcy. “It happened some 20 years ago when an Egyptian Priest took it, then buried it in the badlands. It was with some unusual help that we were able to find the control unit and place it back in the Star Chamber to activate the Stargate on the other end. Thank you for loaning me your sidearm,” he tells the coronal as it is handed back to him. “It saved our lives from an attack by a most unusual predator.”

“What kind of predator was it?” asks the coronal.

“This one,” as Professor Narcy points to a statue of a raptor.

“Incredible,” answers the Coronal.

“Now that we have established a two way portal to another world, it is most important that no one else should know about it’s existence at this time.” orders Dr. Nasser. “We plan to explore that other world for several more days before we return. Keep everyone out of the Star Chamber while we are gone. We are learning a great deal from the people and creatures living there about our early history in the world of the two suns. It could be the most important world find since Columbus stumbled upon the Americas while looking for a shorter trade route to the Far East.”

As they reactivate the Star Gate, Coronal Arafat can see for himself several of the researchers, along with the Egyptian king, over through the portal of the other side. Farrell is easily seen in the background watching the proceedings, the temple doors and Star Chamber one being big enough for him to come inside. “Is that a live dragon in the room with them?” asks Coronal Arafat with some concern.”

“That is Farrell,” answers Professor Narcy. “He is proof that our early mid evil European ancestors may have had contact with dragons in the past. He was the key to making everything happen in our favor when we first arrived in that world.”

“We’re headed back to study more of this new world.” reports Dr. Nasser. “Tell President Janus of the university not to worry about us. Let them know that Clara and I have joined the research team, that we plan to be gone for the next several days. We will establish contact every couple of days to let you know what we are doing and what we have found.”

With that message, the two Doctors step through the Stargate into the chamber of the other temple. With a touch on the control unit on the other side, the image vanishes as the lighting returns to normal. “Place a 24-7 guard on this door,” orders Coronal Arafat. “No one enters the Star Chamber without my permission.”

[rpicardi1]

Chapter 12. Bad News from back on Earth.

 

“What was that all about?” asks Professor Narcy as the Stargate is shut down.

“A lot has happened in the world since you discovered the Stargate and entered into it’s world,” reports Dr, Nasser. “The world has exploded into a global war with the religious forces of Islam. So far, our secret here is safe, but, I don’t know for how long before Egyptian High Command becomes compromised by the Muslims in it’s command and starts to interfere with our research so they can use this world for their base of operation. To make sure that the Stargate doesn’t fall into Islamic hands, Coronal Arafat plans to rig the gate with explosives. We had best keep everyone out of this chamber given that we don’t know what will happen here if the gate on the other end is activated by the explosion.”

“When did that happened?” asks Professor Narcy.

“Two days after you arrived at the dig site, coordinated terrorist attacks were launched all over the world. As feared by various conservatives and ignored by the liberal politicians and their media allies, the soldiers of Radical Islam had infiltrated into those countries through the refugees and illegal immigrates flooding across the mostly unguarded borders. They chose May 23rd to launch their coordinated attacks to hit the infrastructures of the countries, shopping malls, major churches, anyplace where chaos could be created. They even managed to set off nuclear weapons in the port cities of New York, Seattle, Las Angles, San Francisco, Houston, London, Madrid, Rome, Tokyo, Hanoi, Hong Kong, Israel, and even in Saudi Arabia. The current situation has resulted in rioting and violence everywhere those infiltrators have established themselves. Martial Law has been declared in the US, Canada, the UK, Japan, China, India, France, Germany, and just about every other country in the world. Saudi Arabia is embroiled in a holy civil war with the Muslims as a result of the city of Mecca being vaporized by a suitcase nuke.”

“I have no idea what is happening in the world outside of Egypt since the nukes went off. With the internet and cell service down, what information that is coming through has been severely restricted and censored. Clara and I were lucky to be able to catch a ride to the dig site to find and alert you to what is going on.”

“How do we protect the Stargate if Coronal Arafat is unable to prevent it from falling into the wrong hands?” asks Professor Narcy.

“I think that I have the answer,” reports Dr. Croft. “I’ve pulled up an app on the gate operation. If we disconnect the power supply from the control unit, no one can activate the control head to this world from the Stargate back in the buried temple.”

“Then, lets get to work before we are paid a surprised visit that we cannot deal with.” answers Joe.

With the tools that Joe has in his backpack and the info from the app, the control head is removed, a cover plate on the base taken off, and a plug disconnected from the power unit. “I hope that the app gave us the right information,” reports Joe. “If an armed party were to force their way through the gate, I don’t even think that our dragon friends could stop them. If this doesn’t work, we may be forced to throw the control head into the volcano.”

“The app info says that the gate at this end will not connect without the link signal from the control unit.” reports Dr. Croft. “They will only open a portal into space. It’s the reason the Star Chamber is built like an airlock.”

“What happens if they open the Stargate to the vacuum of space if they have destroyed the door in order to get in?” asks Joe.

“Without a link signal, the Stargate will shut down on it’s own after one minute,” answers Dr. Croft. “By then, the entire dig site will likely have been sucked out into space.”

“Then, will we lose out ability to leave this world?” asks Dr. Nasser.

“No,” asks Dr. Croft. “There are other places that we can travel to. We just need to find the address to those location.”

In the Star Chamber, the glyphs on the gate start glowing bright red. “Someone is trying to activate the Stargate!” warns Joe.

Just then, Dr. Nasser’s smart phone alerts him to a text message. Reading it, the message is from President Janus of the University of Cairo. It is a warning that Islamic radicals have invaded the museum and are destroying the artifacts there. A second message comes in as Dr. Nasser is texting a reply. It is from Coronal Arafat warning him that a rebel force has taken control of the dig site and are forcing their way into the Star Chamber. A second text describes a massive implosion in the dig site that sucks all of the sand and everything not tied down into it. There are no further text messages from Coronal Arafat. One more text message comes in from President Janus smart phone as the gate glyph are still glowing. It just says “Allah Akbar.”

A shocked Dr. Nasser passes on the bad news to the rest of the researchers as the glyphs on the Stargate return to normal. “You disabled the control unit just in time.” he tells Joe. “Some rebel forces attempted to activate the Stargate to this location. From the description Coronal Arafat sent me, they opened the gate into outer space. The suction from the vacuum has destroyed the dig site. I’ve lost all contact with his phone.”

“We are definitely stuck here for the time being.” reports Dr. Croft. “There is no going back until Armageddon has ran it’s course.”

“What’s happening,” asks Ramseys as he reenters the Star Chamber and notices the somber look on the faces of the researchers in there.

“Our world is destroying itself in all out religious war,” Dr. Croft tells him. “We just blocked an attempt by a rogue military force to invade and conquer your world. The Star Chamber on that end has been destroyed. There is nothing for us to go back to at this time.”

“You’re all welcome to live with us,” Ramseys tells them.

“Thank you for your generous offer,” answers Professor Narcy. “We can safely live in the sacrificial temple for now while we continue our study of this world. With the help of our dragon friends and these apps we have been getting from some unknown source on our devices, we may eventually find a way to return to what is left of our world once things return to somewhat normal.”

“We better get back to the temple, take an inventory of what we have there, and see what we need to do to become self sufficient for the foreseeable future.” orders Joe. “It appears that we have become an experiment in survival of the human race on an Ark until the day arrives when we can return to what is left of the Earth to repopulate it.”

“It would explain the finding of the Star Chamber temple, the anonymous donor, the selective invitations to research the site, the fact that most of us are already paired up with a spouse or girlfriend, some higher power must be conducting an experiment with us as the world explodes into Armageddon.” reports Helena. “They must have known that our world was about to erupt into all out global war, so, they made arrangements to shelter us on an ark until that war was over.”

“That means that whatever interstellar species that constructed the Stargate must have survived their intergalactic war to continue this experiment of theirs.” answers Dr. Croft.

Dr Sanders and Dr Croft are back on Farrell and Freida who fly them back to the temple by the swamp. “It is most unfortunate,” Dr. Sanders tells Farrell. “We found the way to get back to our world and had to abandon the attempt thanks to our world deciding to destroy itself while we were gone.”

“What were those men standing behind Coronal Arafat carrying?” asks Farrell.

“They were armed with assault weapons,” answers Dr. Sanders. “The Islamic rebels that attacked them have weapons far more deadly then what his soldiers were carrying. You could have been easily shot you out of the sky with them.”

“Could they have hit me from way up here?” asks Farrell.

“Yes,” answers Dr. Sanders. “They could have done so as easily as Joe dropped that troodon with his crossbow.”

“That is so frightening,” answers Farrell.

“Politics and Religion,” chimes in Dr. Croft. “Those two things have so badly divided our world the past several years that something awful was bound to take place sooner or later. It’s a good thing that we didn’t take you through the Stargate to visit our rapidly deteriorating world. We could have lost you for sure had we been unable to return to your world.”

“Our world has been a far more dangerous place for dragons since the time your ancestors visited it during the Dark Ages,” answers Dr. Sanders. “Now, it has become too dangerous even for us to return to it.”

“Then, is my world is going to have to be your new home?” Farrell asks him.

“We will make the best of it so long as we have friends like you,” answers Dr. Croft. “I can see us having some most interesting adventures together for our foreseeable future. We’ll spend the next several days making the temple our new home. Then, we will start exploring your world to look for clues to other places we can visit.”

“That’s sounds wonderful,” Farrell answers. “You have turned out to be such great friends. Frieda and I have enjoyed being with you researchers. We’ll help you any way that we can.”

“You both have been so enjoyable to be with.” Sandra tells Farrell and Frieda as she lands outside of the temple.

 

[rpicardi1]

Chapter 13. Building their settlement.

 

It is about noon when everyone has arrived to the sacrifice temple. After eating lunch, a planning meeting is held with Joe in charge to turn the temple into their new home. “Are you sure that you want to stay with us?” Joe asks Farrell.

“Yes,” he answers. “If Sarah had not found me hiding in here, we would have never became friends with you.”

“I feel so sad that you can’t go back home. Yet, I feel very happy that you are going to stay with us in this world. You have given us dragons a new purpose in our lives. The ability to work together with you humans instead of fighting with each other is so much more enjoyable.”

“What about your nest back in your rookery,” asks Dr. Sanders.

“We could move it back into here if that is OK with your tribe,” answers Freida.

“What about your friends and parents back at the rookery?” asks Dr. Sanders.

“I’m sure that Leader, our parents, and the rest of our friends won’t mind,” answers Freida. “We can always go and visit each other. Besides, the younger dragon pairs will be moving to new locations as soon as the males have found suitable hunting grounds to become establish in.”

“Go ahead and bring your nest back here,” Sandra tells them. “We will help with babysitting when the time comes for you two to start a family.”

“We’ll go let our friends know what our plans are for your future.” answers Farrell. “They will help us bring our nest back to the temple.” With that bit of information, the two dragons are off to their village.

As the meeting continues, Joe and Mary lay out some ideas for the community of researchers to become a self sufficient community. “The low area next to the swamp looks to be quite fertile soil.” reports Mary. “If we have our dragon friends relieve themselves nearby, we can compost their poop for fertilizer. We can also add our poop to that pile as well. With the other minerals from the back of the hillside, we should be able to properly fertilize the soil for growing the root crops. Using the water from the spring in the temple, we can irrigate some of the land back in the exit for rice and cotton. The valley beyond appears to have enough bamboo and other saplings that we can use for fencing to keep the wild herbivores out of our farming plots.”

“What about those two raptors that have been hanging around?” asks Dr Nasser.

“We should see if we can tame them,” answers Helena. “The taming app has given me instructions how that can be done. Their presence has kept the other predators away from the temple. Perhaps, they can be our guard dogs to keep the Troogons out of our village until we can build a proper stone fence.”

“I have an app on my phone that will guide us in crafting pioneering tools,” reports Joe to the group. “We should be able to build a small lumber mill to process logs from the Northern Forest into planks that can be assembled into furniture and beds. A refining forge and smithy will enable us to smelt metal from the ore bearing rocks so we can craft up new tools, a loom and spinning wheel for the cotton, nails for the planks, even a black powder musket.”

“How can we bring those logs back here?” asks Dr. Sanders.

“We can tame up some of those Morleys or even some Trikes and use them to pull the logs back here.” answers Helena. “Later, we can craft a logging wagon to bring back a lot more wood at one time.”

It is mid afternoon when a flock of dragons is seen coming from the North. Four of them are carrying a nest suspended from poles as they fly in a staggered formation so that their wings are not hitting each other. Six more are carrying cedar logs. The nest is landed at the front gate.

“I was wondering how they were going to carry a nest, Says Dr. Sanders in astonishment. “That was very clever to suspend it between poles.”

“Now, we have to try to get it inside in one piece.” answers Joe. “Everyone, grab on to the end of the poles closest to the door so we can drag it inside.” With the poles having been weaved into the nest, it becomes easy to drag it inside, then maneuver it into the back of the existing dragon bed to Freida’s liking.

“Have you ever moved a nest before,” Dr. Sanders asks Leader.

“No,” he answers. “This is the first time we have done so.”

“Your method of moving it was brilliant,” Dr. Sanders answers. “How did you cut the logs you brought for us? Oh, I see how you cut them. You blow torched them to length.”

“That had to be a lot of work for you to cut them,” answers Joe. “We’ll put them to good use. You don’t need to cut any more of them for us with your flame attack. We have axes that we can use to cut down the trees we need. Later, I will be able to craft up a saw which will make cutting lumber so much easier.”

“Can you take Tod, Ahab, and I to where you found the cedar trees?”

“Sure,” answers Leader and Firefox.

“Thank you so much,” answers Joe. “Right now, I need cedar logs of a certain size for a fence. Save your fire, that has to be extremely draining of your stamina. So long as you dragons can carry them back here, we’ll cut down the ones that we can use. We can cut them down a lot faster then you can burn through them.” The dragons fly them to a nearby cedar swamp that is thick with saplings of the size needed for poles and post.

“Joe, you are right,” Leader tells him when he sees how fast the ax takes down a six inch sapling. “It was so tiring to have to slice through them using our flame attack.”

“If I cut them to length, it will be a lot easier for you to carry,” answers Joe.

It is about an hour’s work as Joe, Ahab, and Tod drop dozens of cedar saplings up to 10 inches in diameter and cut them to length. The dragons find that the eight foot length is so much easier to handle as they are able to pick up at least three of the logs with their claw foot at once. It is a shuttle of ten dragons carrying logs as Joe and Tod cut down the trees they want to length. Being so tall and slender, the cedars yield at least six logs per pole.

“That’s enough work for one day,” Joe tells Leader as everyone hitches a ride back to the temple.

“That was actually quite enjoyable,” Leader tells him.

“Wow! We sure did cut quite a pile of logs.” Joe tells Leader as he sees the ten foot high pile outside of the temple. “Thank you for your help.”

“Would it be OK if Tammy, Tarmac, Marty and Macy moved their nest to the top of the hill?” asks Leader.

“I would suggest that they place it behind the top of the gate where you and Firefox waited for the sacrifice,” answers Dr. Croft. “They would have the protection of the cliff side in case another one of those wicked sandstorms takes place.”

“Thank you,” Tarmac and Marty tells her. “We’ll check out the area that you suggested and prepare it for our nests.”

Dr. Croft heads up to the top of the gate as the four new dragons land there to check out the area. “You are right,” Tammy tells her. “The cliff makes an excellent sheltered area behind the gate. This will make an excellent nesting area for us.” The four dragons spend the rest of the day preparing the area to accommodate two nest. Joe gives them the two poles that were used to bring Freida’s nest to the temple.

“That’s wonderful that Farrell and Freida are going to have neighbors,” answers Helena when Dr. Croft comes down from above.

“It’s so unbelievable that those dragons want to live with us.” answers Dr. Croft.

“It must have something to do with their adventurous younger generation,” answers Helena. “They have seen the friendship you have made with Farrell and want to share that experience among themselves.”

“It’s even more interesting what Leader has told me just before he left with Firefox and two other young dragon pairs,” Dr Croft tells Helena. “They are heading to the Egyptian village. The two teen pairs are interested in wanting to live with them.”

“That should be an interesting match,” answers Helena. “I hope that Ramseys, Jenny, his son, and Lucy pair up with them.”

“Leader said that he would introduce them to Ramseys,” answers Dr. Croft.

“What are you going to do with all of that wood?” Dr Sanders asks Joe.

“We’ll start by splitting the cedar into planks, then crafting up some beds and furniture.” answers Joe. “The unusual material list I was handed when we started this expedition is now making sense. Those pioneering tools are going to be most useful for us to build our settlement here.”

That evening, there is a surprise visit by Ramseys and Jenny. They are riding on Ricky and Ronda, one of the young dragon pairs. “You have dragon neighbors too,” Jenny tells Dr. Croft.

“They are going to live above the temple,” Sandra tells her.

“That’s great,” Ramseys answers. “Our four new friends are going to nest on the Stargate Temple roof. They will be great for keeping our farm and pastures clear of any predator threat. Flame and Torch are busy soaking up all the attention my people are giving them. It’s so wonderful to be at peace with these dragons. I can’t wait to see them start raising their young in the village.”

“In a couple of days, when we are all established, we will be ready to go exploring again.” answers Professor Narcy. “I would like to visit the pyramids and compare them to the ones in Giza.”

“We can do that and take Draco’s ashes with us to place in the tomb of the kings.” answers Ramseys. “I’m glad that my son and his bride to be have learned to speak in Ancient Celtic. It has helped us a lot working with these new dragons friends of ours.”

“Take your time learning each other’s language,” Dr. Croft tells him. “It will be well worth it when you know each other’s language.”

“We’re heading back home,” Jenny tells them. “We’ll see you in the morning.”

[zayde]

That is amzing 10 out of 10

[rpicardi1]

Most interesting how this story has involved intelligent dragons into it. It just seem to evolve on it's own when Farrell was found in the sacrifice temple by Dr. Croft.

 

Chapter 14. Exploration.

 

It has been a busy couple of days in the world of the Star Gate as the researchers establish a permanent residence inside the temple of the sacrifice. Their dragon neighbors, Tammy, Tarmac, Marty, and Macy, have brought over and set up their nest on the roof above against the cliff. Joe has helped them design a roof over the nest to shelter them from sandstorms and any rocks from above. It is a pole barn frame that is easy to construct from the cedar poles brought in from that forest. With the help from Tod, Sarah, Ahab, and Cleo, who have soon became friends of the new dragons, they complete the roof by weaving up sheets of nesting materials. It makes for excellent shade from the hot noontime sun.

With the nests and shelter complete, the dragons and their grad student friends have been helping Joe with gathering materials for the construction of improvements in their home base. Both dragons and grad students are getting good in learning to speak in Ancient Celtic, English, and Egyptian as they go about their tasks as they are enjoying each other’s company.

Down below, Joe and the others have completed making furniture from the cedar poles and other materials. With nearby ore and a forge, metals, such as copper, bronze and iron have been smelted and forged into various tools that were not in the supplies.

As part of an experiment, a pen was built from stone and bamboo to contain the two raptors that had been hanging around the temple. Tarmac and Marty have captured them by snatching them off of the ground while flying up from behind them. They soon settle down when they learn that their captors are not going to be a threat to them. By the second day, they are allowing themselves to be petted behaving like big domesticated dogs with Ahab as their pack leader.

Dr. Sanders has been thrilled to be able to examine the two raptors up close and personal. “This has been an experience of a lifetime,” he tells Professor Narcy. “With this mated pair, we may be able to observe how they interact with raising their young.”

“The app tells us that we can even craft a saddle to ride on them like horses.” answers Mary. “That could be a most interesting experience.”

Dr Croft and Helena have spent the past couple of days flying on Farrell and Freida exploring in the East for up to 50 kilometers away from the temple. A map is being sketched up from photos and notes made during the exploration flights. The two dragons have enjoyed the leisurely flight into areas they have never seen before. With a Jarboa to warn them of approaching storms, they have been able to avoid the worst of the bad weather the badlands are famous for.

“This world is looking so much like Game of Thrones,” Dr. Croft tells Helena. “Still, we haven’t seen any signs of those cities or castles in those locations where they are in the stories. Terrain and weather wise, this world is very similar to that one in those stories.”

“What is all that flat blue terrain up ahead of us?” Freida asks Helena as they reach the end of the badlands in the East.

“Have you ever seen the sea before?” asks Helena.

“No,” answers Freida as both dragons land on the beach to look out onto the horizon of blue. “That is an awful lot of water.”

“This is as far East as we can go,” Sandra tells Farrell as she checks out the map on her smartphone. “If this map is correct, you could be flying for days before you would find land again.”

“That’s too far to go flying at one time,” answers Farrell. “What if we have to land where there is no place to land other then in the water?”

“Give it a try, but stay close to the shore in case you can’t take off from the water so you can swim back to shore.”

Farrell flies over the water turning towards shore as he lands in the sea. He imminently finds out that he is totally out of his elements as starts thrashing about in a panic.

“Awk!” he hollers as he starts freaking out in the deep water. “I don’t like this!”

“Calm down!” Dr. Croft yells at him as she jumps off to swim alongside. “Pretend that you are walking on the land. Your wings will act as paddles to propel you to shore.” Farrell, seeing that Sandra is swimming in the water by him, does as she has orders him to and is soon in shallower water where he feels more secure with solid footing under his feet.

“I haven’t been that frightened since the day you first found me.” Farrell tells Sandra as he reaches the shore coughing and spitting out water. “That water taste terribly salty.”

“That’s OK,” Sandra tells him as has his head pressed tightly on her chest as she rubs his forehead to calm him down. “I should have had you wade in the water first until you were swimming. At least, you listen to me so I could tell you how to swim back to shore before you completely freaked out and ended up drowning. Seawater is always very salty. That is why you don’t want to drink it.”

“Drogon, Danarys young dragon in the movie series that I have seen, was able to dive into the sea for fish, get back into the air, toss and flame it, then catch it again to eat it. When you feel brave enough, wade back out there, do some swimming, and try taking off from the water. Don’t be afraid to slap those wings into the water when you go to take off. It will actually start feeling solid enough for you to push off on it.” After a couple of minutes to think about it, Farrell cautiously wades back out until he is floating with Sandra swimming nearby, then does what She has told him to do. With a bit of effort, he gets back into the air landing on the shore back next to Sandra and Freida.

“You are right,” he tells her as he becomes more confident about being in the deep water. “It’s possible to land in the water, then take off again.”

“Good for you,” Sandra praises Farrell as she gets back on him. “You have proven that dragons can land, swim, and get back out of the sea into the air.”

Feeling brave, Freida enters the water with Helena’s encouragement. She is soon swimming around with Helena riding on her. “That is not as bad as I feared,” she tells Helena as she gains confidence in swimming.

“See if you can take flight with me riding on you,” Helena asks her. Slapping the water with her wings while paddling with her legs, Freida is able to get airborne.

Both dragons spend the next hour with their riders playing in the water. Farrell even does a dive catching a sea bass in his mouth, then tossing it in the air to flame broil it before catching it to eats. “That was awesome,” Sandra tells him in surprise not expecting that he would ever attempt to do such a thing.

Seeing that the two suns are getting lower in the sky, Helena decides to call off the swimming adventure. “That’s enough fun for the day.” she tells the dragons, “We better start flying back to the temple before we run out of daylight.”

Back at the temple, as the suns are starting to set, there is a lot of excited Celtic chatter up on the temple roof. “What is that all about?” asks Dr. Sanders.

Farrell and Freida are telling their dragon friends all about today’s adventure.” answers Dr. Croft. “They went swimming in the sea for the first time in their lives. Once they got over their fear of the deep water, they had a blast playing in it. Farrell even went diving for fish and caught one. It’s a good thing that my smart phone and camera are water resistant. It was a wild ride when he just dived into the water to grab that fish. It’s so great that they are no longer afraid of the sea. We were over in this location when we ran out of land to fly over.”

“That’s a long ways from here,” Professor Narcy comments when he sees how far they had flown that day. “You need to head over to the pyramids next. Take the grad students with you on their dragon friends. It will be a good experience for all of them.”

“We should takes Ramseys with us,” answers Dr. Croft. “The ashes from Draco’s funeral pyre should be cool enough to take with us to place in the burial pyramid.”

That evening, all the dragons are together in the temple with the 12 researchers. They lay out their plans for the trip to the pyramids. “We’ll head to the Egyptian Village to pick up Ramseys and his dragon friends. Then, we’ll head for the dragon rookery to get Draco’s ashes. Then, head for the pyramids so Ramseys can place Draco’s ashes into a place of honor.”

“Will we need to be concerned that Freida, Tammy, and Macy could be laying their eggs soon?” asks Clara.

“According to Freida, they won’t be capable of laying an egg until they have reached the age of 20,” answers Dr. Croft. “All the dragons with us are about the age of 17. Their culture has them maintaining a nest even though it won’t contain an egg until they are old enough to lay one.”

“That is most interesting,” answers Clara. “I thought that they would lay clutches of them, then abandon them like the sea turtles do.”

“That is only true in those GOT stories,” answers Dr Croft. “I had been invited to see their nests by Farrell and Freida’ mothers. They only lay one egg that is about this size. It hatches in 14 days. I had the honor of watching an egg hatch, then visiting a two year old baby in another nest. Their mothers take very good care of their youngsters. They have a complex social structure that lets them share child rearing among them, then raising the older kids as they are educated by the older dragons when it becomes time to lay another egg.”

“That is most interesting,” both Dr Nasser and Clara tell her as they watch the video of that event taking place. “Is that Dr. Sanders with them?”

“Yes,” he answers. “It was a most interesting study. I have learned so much that separated the facts from the fiction on these creatures.”

“We’ll keep a record of our trip for tomorrow,” Dr Croft tells everyone.

[rpicardi1]

Chapter 15. Resurrection.

 

It has been quite an interesting night at the temple with the new dragons. The four grad students have slept with their new dragon friends up above as Dr Nasser and Clara have been with Farrell and Freida. The four grad students have solidified their friendship with the young dragons. “This has been so wonderful,” Tammy tells the others in Celtic. “Becoming friends with humans was the last thing that we ever thought would happen with us. I’m so happy that we decided to move down here with them.”

“With the stories that I have read about dragons, the last thing that I ever expected would happen is us making friends with you,” Sarah tells her in Celtic. “It is like a dream come true to be able to talk and fly on you. Finding Farrell and becoming friends with him has been the key to all of us becoming friends.”

“Have you ever been over to the Pyramids?” Tod asks Tarmac.

“No,” he answers. “I’m looking forward to flying over there to see them up close.”

“It should be a most interesting day when we take Draco’s ashes over there to place them in the burial chamber of the Kings.” Tod tells him.

Back in the temple after having their breakfast, the grad students, among with Dr Croft and Helena prepare to depart on the Pyramid Expedition. They bid the rest of the researchers good bye as they get on the dragons for a flight to the Egyptian Village. They are met part way by Ramseys, his son, Jenny, and Lucy on their four new dragon friends. They all turn North as the conversations continue in Celtic so that the young dragons can easily join in.

At the rookery, Leader and Firefox, along with several of the other dragons including some of the elders, meet the ten dragons and their riders. They soon fly over to to the ashes of the funeral pyre. Ramseys dismounts from Ricky and walks over to the ashes carrying a ceremonial urn he brought with him on a backpack. With Leader and the other dragons watching, Ramsey II says a ceremonial prayer in Celtic as he fills the urn with the ashes from the funeral pyre. As the other dragons say a ceremonial prayer in return Ramseys, with the help of Jenny, seals the urn with melted wax.

Drogon, one of the younger elderly dragons, has asked to come along to observe the final internment of the ashes. “You are more then welcome to join us,” Ramseys tells him.

“Fly on me out there,” Drogon tells him. “We have a lot to talk about.”

Ramseys is left speechless by the request, then finally answers, “I would be honored to fly on you.” He greets Drogon by rubbing his forehead, then gets on his back as Drogon has laid down to make getting on him a lot easier.

“Have you made contact with us before?” Ramseys asks Drogon as they take flight to the pyramids.

“Yes,” he answers. I was 20 when Alexander the Third conducted negotiations with Draco at what you call the Sacrifice Temple.

“Part of the terms of the peace agreement was that at the time of the merging of the two suns, your people would select a young teen pair to serve as your representatives. Your Priests would bring them to the temple where they would serve as ambassadors between us and your people. 10 years ago, something must have went wrong when those priest slit the throats of the representative teens instead of leaving them at the temple. There were also efforts to capture some of us for what you called taming. I’m so glad that Leader found Farrell and his human friends to stop what could have been another nasty war with you Egyptians had there been another sacrifice during the merging of the two suns.”

“During the peace talks, I learned the truth of who was responsible for the sacrifice when Judis tried to kill me.” answers Ramseys. “We found out that he was responsible for sabotaging the Stargate as well as starting the sacrifice of ten years ago. We have Dr. Croft and her friendship with Farrell to thank for starting a chain of events that ended the conflict and misunderstanding between us.”

“Thank you for that explanation,” answers Drogon. “It has been so enjoyable having you ride on me.”

“All of you dragons have been telling us that,” answers Ramseys. “It is as if they are being rewarded for taking us riding on them. Land here next to the statues at the door to the North Pyramid.”

“Is this the only way in to the burial chamber?” asks Dr. Croft after getting off of Farrell.

“Yes,” answers Ramseys. “I now see the problem. The entrance door and passageway to the internment chamber is too small for dragons to come in with us. There is no way we can take a dragon in there with us to observe the ritual of internment.”

“That is disappointing,” Drogon tells him. “I wanted to observe your ritual of internment.”

“Drogon, Can I show you a recording of the ceremony when we get back?” asks Dr. Croft.

“What is a recording?” asks Drogon.

“Let me show you,” answers Dr. Croft. She shows Drogon the scene where the ashes have been collected from the funeral pyre.

“You have a visual on that device of Ramseys collecting Draco’s ashes!” answers Drogon in astonishment.” I never knew that such a thing was possible. Record that event for me. I want to see everything that takes place in there.”

“I will do so,” answers Dr. Croft as she enters the pyramid for the long trip into the center.

“You are not going down with the others?” asks Drogon of Ahab and Cleo.

“It is not necessary,” answers Ahab. “If the burial chamber is anything like the one in the pyramid of Gaza, it will be very crowded in there. Besides, someone needs to be up here with you dragons. They are going to be gone for quite a while.

It is 25 minutes later when Cleo’s Jarboa warns them of an electrical storm moving in. “Everyone shelter under the entrance canopy,” orders Cleo as the lightning flashes overhead. A huge electrical discharge cracks over the tip of the pyramid they are sheltered in as the storm rages around them. Like the sandstorm of the other day, it ends as abruptly as it has arrived.

It is about half an hour later when the rest of the group returns to the entrance. “What happened down there?” asks Ahab as he sees the Egyptians and the bewildered group of researchers return from the burial tomb.

Drogon, Ahab, see for yourselves when I play back the recording.” answers Dr Croft. The recording shows the walk down into the tomb, the placement of the urn among the others, and a ceremony conducted by Ramseys and Jenny. Then, it shows the urn starting to glow as an electrical discharge crackles around it only to vanish.

“What happened to the urn?” asks Drogon.

“We don’t know,” answers Ramseys. “It just vanished along with the urn of Alexander the First. Nothing like that has ever happened before.”

“We had a nasty electrical storm up here about the time that you would have been in the burial chamber,” reports Ahab.

“I wonder if that storm was intentionally sent by our Gods?” asks Ramseys.

“Something unusual is going on,” answers Helena. “Look over at the floating Obelisk. It’s electrical discharge has changed color.”

“Had anyone ever been over at the Obelisk?” asks Helena.

“No,” answers Ramseys.

“Lets fly over there and see what’s going on.”

Taking flight, the entire group makes the half hour trip to the base of the huge alien obelisk. It continues to glow a strange color with a purple beam of light pointing to an alter at its base. “Stay here while I go check it out,” orders Dr. Croft.

“Be careful,” Farrell tells her with concern. “I don’t want anything bad to happen to you.”

“I’ll be careful,” Sandra assures Farrell as she rubs his forehead.

A strange alien hum and pulsating purple light bathes the area as Dr. Croft walks over to the alter. “Interesting,” she says as she activates a control panel that visually shows up in her vision. A familiar shape materializes above her, then steps back to look at her. Everyone outside of the area is looking on in astonishment. “Draco?” She asks the familiar looking dragon in Celtic.

“Yes,” he answers. “I am the Draco you told to rest easy as I closed my eyes to travel to that great beyond.”

“You look so young!” Dr. Croft tells him as she rubs his forehead in greeting. “You are wearing a saddle. Who is that riding on you?”

“I am Alexander,” answers the stranger in Celtic as he dismounts from the saddle. “Draco is my good dragon friend.”

“How old is he?” asks Dr. Croft.

“We are both 18,” answers Alexander.

“This is a miracle,” answers Dr. Croft. “Draco was 217 years old when he died in my arms from old age three days ago.”

“That’s incredible,” Alexander answers. “I knew that dragons can live for a long time. My Draco lived to be 217 years old? That is outstanding! I was killed by an assassin at age 23 when my village was attacked by a rival kingdom.”

“How did you resurrect us?”

“I don’t know,” answers Dr. Croft. “We had just placed Draco’s ashes into the pyramid when his urn just disappeared along with yours. The glowing Obelisk hinted of something unusual going on so we made the trip over to it. I found both of you uploaded in status in the alter of this Obelisk. Let me introduce you to the others.”

“The Gods must be pleased with the both of us to let you bring us back into this world in the prime of our youth,” Alexander tells her.

Drogon is staring at the young Draco in shock as Draco comes over to talk to his old friend. “You never told me that you ever had a human friend,” answers Drogon.

“He is my friend from 210 years ago,” answers Draco. “I had been captured by the Egyptians at age 7. I was thoroughly tangled in a net that had been hung over an archway in a canyon. He had enough knowledge of Celtic that we were able to talk to each other. With no one else from his tribe around, he decided to cut me loose from the net. He took a liking to me as I became his secret friend when he realized that dragons could not be tamed. At 17, he had been captured by a rival kingdom. I came to his rescue when his kingdom attacked their village. Their King, his father, had this war saddle crafted for me to help protect me in future battles. My friend was killed three years later by an assassin when we were in battle with that rival kingdom which was defeated forever. With my friend gone, I left the Egyptians to live with the dragons. No longer needing a saddle, my dragon friends took it off of me. We remained at war with the Egyptians until his grandson Alexander The Third sought me out to negotiate a cease fire.”

“Ramseys, I am so happy to know that our war is finally over. It is so wonderful to see my old friend and all of these young dragons with their human friends. They look so happy being with each other.”

“We all have Farrell to thank for this great friendship,” answers Dr. Croft. “Had I not found him in his hour of need, none of this would have happened. He has been the key for bringing us humans and the dragons together in friendship.”

“It looks like we are going to have to come back another day to study this area,” answers Helena. “I see another celebration both in the Egyptian Village and in the rookery when we get back to our homes.”

[rpicardi1]

Chapter 16.

 

It is a most interesting flight back to the rookery. The discussion is endless about the events of the day. Ramseys is back on Ricky as Drogon is flying next to his old friend. It is a most astonished group of elder and younger dragons staring in disbelief when a saddled Draco land next to the funeral pyre with Alexander riding on him.

The group spends the next hour with the rookery dragons which soon swells to a crowd of over 100. They all have to see for themselves the miracle of the return of Draco and the mystery of his Egyptian friend riding on him on a saddle. With all of the introductions over, some 100+ adult and teen dragons sit in a group to listen to the story of the events of the day. As evening approaches, Dr. Croft is presented with a surprise that six of the adult male dragons have volunteer to fly the rest of the researchers back to the Pyramid City in the morning. Draco brings them over to introduce her to them. Drogon volunteers to travel with his old friend back to the Egyptian Village for the night. He wants to go with them and the research group to learn more about the pyramids that allowed his old friend to be resurrected.

It is one big celebration over the surprise that Alexander the First has been resurrected, along with his loyal dragon, which turns out to be Draco. “Help me unsaddle him,” Alexander asks Ramsey II. “He no longer needs to wear this.”

“We’ll place it in the library of the Stargate,” Ramseys tells them. It takes four people to carry the heavy War Saddle into the temple to place it on a temporary sawhorse.

“We’re going to do some hunting before it gets dark,” Alexander tells Ramseys. They soon take off to the South to follow the river to look for predators for Draco to feed on.

“I have forgotten just how heavy a war saddle is,” he tells Alexander as they go flying. “This feels wonderful flying you bareback.”

“This feels so much better riding you bareback,” Alexander tells Draco. “There some Troodons down there.” They soon end up as his supper. They make it back to the village as the two suns are setting with the distant Obelisk now displaying it’s normal colored electrical discharge.

The Egyptian leaders are the first to arrive at the temple in the morning. Conway has rode out on Drogon to join the expedition. Mary has now taken the time to inspect and re-bandage his injured wrist. “It’s healing up nicely,” she tells Conway.

“How did he get hurt?” asks Draco.

“I bit him,” answers Leader in Celtic who has just joined the other six dragons that have just landed. “It was necessary to learn the truth about the sacrifice. It was fortunate that his wrist landed where I have a broken tooth or I might have bitten it clean off in anger.”

“He did apologize for biting me,” Conway tells Alexander. “He even gave me a ride back to the village from here.”

“What brings you out here today?” Dr. Croft asks Leader in Celtic.

“I want to join your expedition,” he answers. “I’ll take Conway with me so Drogon can take it easy.”

Introductions are now made to the other six dragons to the rest of the expeditions that don’t have any rides. It is the first time that any of them have ever been around other humans so close and personal.

“How do I get on a dragon?” asks Dr. Nasser who has been paired up with one of the adult males.

“When he lays down, just climb up on his shoulder and sit on his back,” answers Dr. Croft.

“How do I control him in flight?” asks Dr. Nasser. “I am not familiar with their Celtic language.”

“Just hang on to the two spikes on his back,” answers Dr. Croft. “He will respond to them as if they are reins on a horse. Actually, you don’t need to do anything. He will just follow us to our destination. He will land when we do. Enjoy the ride.”

With everybody on a dragon, they all take flight with Draco in the lead to the Pyramid City. It takes a couple of minutes for the ones that haven’t flown on a dragon before to get adjusted to flying on them. There is constant communication between the experienced riders that have learned Celtic and those that are riding dragons for the first time. Soon, everyone is flying in balance with their new friends.

The trip goes well where the dragons land in the courtyard of the Kings. The six researchers that have not had any dragons they would ride on thank them for bringing them out to the city.

“That was remarkable,” Dr Nasser tells his dragon friend.

“He tells me that it was quite enjoyable,” Dr. Croft tells Dr. Nasser. “Once you got your balance, taking you for the ride was a breeze.”

“You’re right, they are like riding on flying horses, “Dr Nasser tells her.

“Is it OK if I take the dragons that volunteered to bring your researchers here to go look for suitable nesting sites for our expansion?” Leader asks Dr. Croft.

“By all means, go ahead,” answers Dr. Croft. “We won’t need to go back until later in the afternoon.” Eight dragons are soon flying off to the North West with Leader, as the researchers, with their Egyptian friends, lay out plans to explore the abandoned city. Alexandera tells Dr. Croft that he had better join them. “I have a bad feeling about where they are headed,” he tells her before he leaves. “There is something out there they may be unable to deal with that they may run into. I just don’t know what it is.”

“What was that all about?” asks Helena.

“He may have the knowledge about something that we don’t know about,” answers Dr. Croft. “After all, he has spent a considerable amount of time in the great beyond where he may have had access to knowledge that only we can dream of existing.”

The research group has now split up into groups to explore and study the Pyramid City. Farrell and Freida have taken an interest in the work Dr. Croft and Helena are doing. Dr. Nasser has taken Professor Narcy, Ahab, and Cleo with him to study the interiors of the three Pyramids. Marty and Macy fly their two friends to the top of the Pyramid as Dr. Nasser and Professor Narcy enter the narrow passageway to check out the burial chamber.

“This is interesting,” Ahab tells Marty as they fly to the top of the pyramid. “The Pyramids in Giza have plenty of places you could have landed on the slopes. This one has smooth sides of marble from the ground on up to the cap piece on the top. There is just no place I can land you up here that won’t send you sliding back down.”

“Is that a copper cap on the top?” asks Cleo as Macy brings her in close to examine it.

“That would explain how it was struck by lightning without being damaged,” answers Ahab.

“Lets check out the top of the other two,” Marty tells him. Flying over they find a copper top on the second one. Gliding over to the smaller, then the Queens Tombs nearby, the same construction has been observed. Landing back at the entrance shelter, Ahab dismounts and paces out the measurement of one side of the base as they wait for the rest of the group that went inside.

“This measures out to be the exact size of the biggest pyramid in Giza.” Ahab reports to Professor Narcy as he emerges from the burial chamber. “We couldn’t land on any of the pyramids due to their smooth sides. We found a copper cap on the top of all of them.”

“These must represent Giza at the time it was first completed.” answers Professor Narcy. “At one time, those pyramids had smooth sides until invadors stripped off that smooth layer for the value of it’s high quality marble.”

“They must be what gives this place it’s special powers.” reports Dr. Nasser. Every air shaft, every light shaft, all have been placed into this pyramid during it’s construction with precision to serve a purpose.”

The village area is being studied by Dr. Sanders and Ramseys group. “So that’s what the Spinx looks like with it’s nose” comments Mary.

“I heard that some idiot soldier shot it off during WW2,” answers Joe.

“Actually, no one knows for sure how it lost it’s nose,” answers Dr. Sanders. “At one time it was reported that one of Napoleon's soldiers hit it with a cannon ball. That was soon proven false as well. It is believed that the nose was removed by a Muslim ruler that was offended by the people worshiping the Spinx praying for rain to water their crops. He was later executed by an outraged mob of Egyptians that removed him from power.”

“I never knew that there was a temple located inside it,” answers Mary after she has examined the alter at the paws in front of the giant statue that is carved out of the sandstone. The inspection finds that it is a small room used by Egyptian Priest to prepare for the ceremonies that were conducted to the people that came to worship the human headed lion.

Continuing on, the group enters the valley of the Queens. “It’ sure nice to be able to explore this area free of the trappings of the souvenir hawkers and all of the gawking tourist.” Mary tells Ramseys. Like the two other large Pyramids, most of the Queen’s tombs are found to be empty. It’s not that anything has been removed from them, it is if they are waiting for the time that they will be occupied.

At the temple of kings, Dr. Croft and Helena have been exploring inside with Farrell close behind given that the structure is large enough for him to come inside with Freida. “This is really interesting in here with the paintings and sculptures,”Farrell tells Sandra.

“I never knew that you dragons would take such an interest in our history,” Sandra tells him.

“All of our history is taught and kept in our memories by the elders,” Farrell tells her. “We find it most interesting how your history has been recorded in writing, paintings, and sculptures.”

“I just hope that there is a world left that we can return to so we can share these discoveries with the rest of our colleges.” Helena tells him.

The conversation is interrupted by Ergon, one of the mature male dragons that has flown back to look for them. “Alexander needs you to fly over to where he is at.” he tells Dr. Croft in Ancient Celtic. “Bring your med kit. He needs your help.”

“I hope that he is not hurt,” answers Helena as she grabs the med kit from the supplies and gets on Freida.

“He’s OK,” answers Ergon. “We found another human and her dragon. They both needs your help.”

[rpicardi1]

Chapter 17 Hilda and Jerrie.

 

It is a chaotic scene that Sandra and Helena fly into as Ergon is bringing them in as fast as everyone can fly. Alexander is next to an unconscious young lady as Draco lays next to a paralyzed female dragon that is just freaking out in terror. Close by is a dead Thorny dragon. The burned remains of other thornys are nearby as the rest of the dragons have formed a protective circle around the two victims.

“What happened here?” asks Dr. Croft in alarm.

“It appears that these two were attacked by thorny dragons,” answers an anxious Alexander. “The young lady was knocked out by them. She appears to be OK but her dragon is paralyzed with fear. I don’t know how she is remaining conscious with all of those quills in her face. She need your help, she is not responding to Ancient Celtic.”

“Helena, go check on Tergon. He is lying unconscious over there. I think that he got hit by thorns in his neck.”

Helena does a quick check on her smartphone about the Thorny Dragons as she runs over to check on Tergon. He is unconscious with three thorns in his neck which she quickly removes. “We need to get the quills out of that dragon as quickly as possible,” she reports as she runs back to help Sandra. “They contain a knockout toxin that is causing all of the trouble.”

“I was able to remove a dozen of them from her face,” Alexander tells Helena. “She must have bitten the thorny that attacked her friend. I just can’t get the ones out of her mouth with her being so freaked out about what just happened.”

A quick examination of the female dragon confirms what Alexander has told Dr. Croft about her. With a hunch, she asks Draco a question. “Has any one of the eggs in the rookery ever been stolen by humans?”

“We lost one 18 years ago,” answers Draco. “We couldn’t determine if it was stolen or taken by a predator.”

“I am willing to bet that this dragon is an egg tame,” Helena tells them. “She looks to be about the right age. The young lady is dressed in what looks like Viking garb. Try talking to her dragon in Norwegian.”

“That’s working,” Sandra tells them as she is now able to touch the paralyzed dragon on the neck to start pulling out more of the quills in her face. “She’s starting to calm down.” The dragon breathes a sigh of relief, then drifts into unconscious as she realizes that the danger has passed.

“Lets get those quills out of her mouth,” Helena tells Dr. Croft. “I’ve never seen anything fight so hard to stay conscious.”

“She must really like her rider to put herself into such a stressful situation.” Draco tells them. “No dragon in their right mind ever bites a Thorny without torching the quills off of them first.”

“She must not have had the chance to do otherwise,” answers Dr. Croft. “Alexander, help us hold her mouth open, She has quills stuck all over the inside of her mouth.”

It is quite an operation to get dozens of quills out of her jaw, tongue and roof of her mouth, but the job finally gets done. Draco has to grab the horn on the back of her head so that it can be lifted up for Dr. Croft to pull out more quills on that side of her face. They finally get them all.

“How did she remain conscious with 42 quills in her face and mouth when it only took three of them to knock out that mature male dragon?” asks Helena.

“I don’t know,” answers Dr. Croft. “It looks like Tergon has finally woke up. I’ll check on him, then tell him to take it easy for the rest of the day so his body can get rid of the toxin.”

“I think that we had better spend the night here,” answers Helena. “The app tells me this dragon is going to be out for hours. The cure is going to be rest and time. She won’t be in any shape to go flying for quite a while.”

The young lady is starting to regain conscious as Alexander is by her. “What happened?” she asks him in Norwegian.

“You were attacked by Thorny Dragons,” Alexander tells her. “Their quills contain a knockout poison.”

“Oh NO!” she says when she spots her dragon lying unconscious and tries to run over to her. “My poor Hilda!”

"She’ll be all right,” Dr. Croft tells her. “She’s going to need a lot of time to recover. She got stuck with all of these quills when she bit the Thorny that was attacking you. She learned the hard way about biting a Thorny before torching it. Let us help you over to her so can comfort her while she is sleeping.”

“It’s my fault,” the young lady answers as she starts crying. “I was in her line of fire while she was trying to protect me.”

After a while with her dragon, the young lady has regained her composure. “How were you able to obtain your dragon?” Dr. Croft asks her.

“We were paired together at birth by my parents,” answers the young lady. “She was hatched the same day that I was born.”

“Then, she is an egg tame,” answers Draco in Celtic as the other males gather about. “In all of my 217 years, I have never known of one that was so protective of their rider that they had the strength to fight off the effects of so many Thorny Dragon quills in an effort to protect them. We need to make an exception with this one if you are all in agreement with me. We will do her no harm. We will accept her as one of us.” There is a short discussion among the other dragons as they quickly come into agreement with Draco on his decision. He then comes over to nuzzle the sleeping dragon on her neck. “Wake up soon,” he tells her in Celtic. All the rest of the dragons follow suit.

“What was that all about?” asks the young lady as she is regaining her composure.

“Their culture has an extreme dislike of egg tames,” answers Alexander. “They not only shun them, they have been known to actively seek them out to kill them. Your egg tame’s loyalty to protect you has so impressed them that they are making her an exception to that practice. You have made dragon history today. She is the first egg tame dragon that has ever been accepted into the flock.”

“You mean that these dragons with you are not your tames?” she asks.

“No.” answers Alexander. “They are our friends. They are all here on their own free will. They are all wild.”

“Thank you so much,” she tells him in Norwegian. “I don’t know what I would do without my Hilda.”

“Has there ever been any other eggs stolen from your rookery?” Dr. Croft asks Draco.

“Not in my lifetime,” answers Draco. “The ones we have lost we found later with broken shells as a result of predators taking them.”

About then, there is a groan as Hilda starts to wake up. “Take it easy.” Dr. Croft tells her in Norwegian as she is becoming aware of her surrounding. “You are among friends here.”

“Jerrie,” she answers back in a tired voice as she sees the young lady. “I’m so sorry that I couldn’t have better protected you.”

“There’s nothing to be sorry about,” Jerrie tells her as she gets hugged by the neck. “I’m so happy that you are alive.”

“Those other dragons,” she asks with concern. “Are they wild!”

“It’s OK,” Jerrie tells her. “They are our friends. They saved your life when the Thornys attacked us.”

“I’m just so tired,” Hilda tells her. “I was so afraid that they were going to kill me if they found out that I was hatched by humans.”

“You had a most stressful experience being hit by so many quills at once,” Dr. Croft tells her. “Their leader has agreed to accept you into their flock. Get some rest so that you body can rid itself of that poison. We’ll stay with you until you are strong enough to fly back with us.” She is soon back asleep resting much more comfortably.

“How am I going to get back home so I can let my parents know that I am OK?” asks Jerrie. “I don’t want to leave Hilda alone here.”

“I’ll stay with your dragon,” answers Dr. Croft.

“I’ll escort you back,” Alexander tells her.

“I’ll let her fly on me,” Tergon volunteers. “I believe her dragon is my daughter she grew up with.”

“Are you sure that you are up to the task?” asks Helena.

“I feel much better now,” Tergon answers her.

“Jerrie, you have a ride back to your village,” Alexander tells her in Norwegian. “Tergon believes that Hilda is his daughter.”

“That is wonderful,” Jerrie tells him. “How do I ride a wild dragon if I don’t know his language?”

“Just ride him like you do Hilda,” Alexander answers.

“Thank you so much,” she tells Tergon as she hugs him before getting on his back. “We have really enjoyed raising your daughter.” Both dragons take off as Terrie is able to guide him in the direction of the village.

Plans are now made for an overnight stay to protect the newcomers. Leader volunteers to go tell the others they will be staying out in the wild and to bring back Tod and Sarah with supplies.

“What happened out there?” Joe asks Leader when he lands in front of him.

“We found a Viking girl and her dragon,” answers Leader. “They got ambushed by Thornys and took a beating. Everyone is staying with them until her dragon is strong enough to fly back with us. Sandra also asked us to have Tod and Sarah come out to join them.”

“I’ll find and get them outfitted with supplies for an overnight stay,” Joe tells hum. “It looks like that all of us are going to be in the field for a while.”

Back with Alexander, the flight to the village is going well. “You’re right,”Jerrie tells Alexander. “Tergon handles exactly like his daughter.”

“He tells me that he likes you.” answers Alexander. “He tells me that his daughter couldn’t have found a better human friend to be with.”

“It’s so hard to believe that I am riding on a wild dragon, especially the father of my Hilda,” Jerrie tells him. “Here is our fishing village up ahead.”

It is quite a surprise for the villagers to see two strange dragons flying in with riders on them. Recognizing that their daughter is on one of the male dragon, they run up to her as Tergon lands in front of them.

“Where’s Hilda?” her father Eric asks Jerrie with concern.

“She’s resting back there with some of our friends,” Jerrie tells him. “This young man and several other dragons came to our rescue when we were ambushed by Thornys. I believe that Tergon is Hilda’s father.”

“Does he know that we raised her from a stolen egg?” asks Eric with concern as he hugs his daughter.

“Yes,” Jerrie answers. “They were so impress with how Hilda fought to protect me from the thornys that they have formally accepted her into their tribe as an equal.”

“That’s wonderful,” answers Eric. “We won’t have to worry about wild dragons attacking her when you go exploring together.”

“I have to get back before Hilda wakes up and go looking for me.”

“Take care of yourself and this young man.” Eric tells her. “We’ll be looking forwards to the story of your adventure when you get back.

“Was our daughter riding on a wild dragon?” her mother asks Eric as the two dragons take off together.

“I do believe so,” he answers.

“That’s outstanding,” she answers. “I never knew that wild dragons would let humans ride on them.”

“As soon as we can, we will need to teach the both of you Ancient Celtic,” Alexander tells Jerrie as they are flying back. “It’s the dragon’s native language.”

“That would be wonderful,” she tells Alexander. “I would so love to talk to the wild ones like I can talk to my Hilda. While they have not been a threat to my people, it is a risk we were concerned about after my parents told me she was hatched from a stolen egg.”

“We were paired up when I was born and Hilda was hatched from her egg. We grew up together to become inseparable friends.”

“That’s so remarkable,” answers Alexander. “I first found Draco at 7 when he was tangled in a net. He became my secret friend until he was old enough for me to ride on him. We rode together in battle until I was killed by an assassin when I was 23.”

“You were killed at 23?” asks Jerrie. “How was that possible when you look like that you are my age?”

“I don’t know,” he answers. “My Draco left our tribe to live with the wild dragons until he died from old age at 217. Dr. Croft was the last human to be with him when he died in her arms a couple of days ago. We were both resurrected as age 18 with our past memory intact just yesterday.”

“That is most remarkable,” answers Jerrie. “How did that happen?”

“I don’t know,” answers Alexander. “All that I know is that Dr. Croft found us in status in the terminal of that Obelisk over there and downloaded us from the great beyond. Oden must have been pleased with us to allow our return to this world.”

Back at the camp, several of the other dragons have been taking turns going hunting. Tod and Sarah have arrived with the overnight supplies. They are over by Dr. Croft who is with Hilda who is now standing having woke up from sleeping off the effects of the dart poison.

“You look so much better,” Jerrie tells her as she runs over to give Hilda a big hug.

“Take it easy with her,” orders Dr. Croft. “She is still recovering from the effects of those darts. Tod and Sarah are preparing some food for her so that she doesn’t choke on it. Her mouth is still very tender from being speared by all of those thorns. You can hand feed her when they have it ready.”

“Thank you for what all you have done for us,” answers Jerrie as she starts carefully feeding Hilda the processed food.

“We’re going to stay here with you overnight,”Dr. Croft tells her. “Hilda should have recovered enough by then so that she can fly back with us to the pyramids.”

[rpicardi1]

Chapter 18 An Unusual Dragon Crisis.

 

It is early the next morning as everyone is waking up to prepare to return to the Pyramids when Alexander asks Draco a question. “Has any dragon ever attempted to kill an egg tame?”

“No,” answers Draco. “It was a rumor that got started long before I was born to discourage humans from attempting to steal our eggs. If we had ever killed one, it was because it was being used to attack one of our flock.”

“I’m glad to know that,” answers Alexander. “I was really fearful that Hilda might have been targeted for death when you learned that she was an egg tame.”

“She proved to us that she was worthy of living when we saw just how hard she fought to remain conscious until she knew that her lifelong human friend was safe.” answers Draco. “I really like her. With all of my 200 years of knowledge, I’m at a loss over what to do about my feelings towards her. I’ve never felt that way about a female dragon before.”

“That would be wonderful if the two of you were to become mates,” answers Alexander. “It looked like that you two were doing a lot of talking last evening before you went to sleep next to her last night.”

“I’m glad that I know the Norwegian Language.” answers Draco. “We need to teach her and Jerrie Ancient Celtic so they can talk to the other dragons in our flock.”

“That’ one of the things Dr. Croft and I are going to work on as soon as we find the time,” answers Alexander

“You and Jerrie should get together and become mates,” Draco tells Alexander. “She would make a wonderful queen for you.”

“I would prefer that she does so of her own free will,” answers Alexander. “It makes for a far better relationship then the pre arranged marriage I had when I became a King so long ago. I’ll have a talk with her about how you feel about her dragon. If her Hilda has the same feelings towards you, I feel confidant that she will give you her blessing about the two of you becoming mates.”

“Thank you,” Draco tells Alexander. “I feel so much better now.”

“Is everything OK?” asks Dr. Croft.

“I believe that I am now dealing with a love sick dragon,” answers Alexander. “He has taken a serious liking to Hilda. In all of my past experience, I’ve never had to handle such a situation before. He’s never had a mate before. In spite of over 200 years of experience, he doesn’t know what he should do about his feelings towards her.”

“I seem to be having the same problem with Hilda,” Jerrie tells Dr. Croft as she joins them. “She has fallen head over heels for Draco. She’s at a loss over how she should handle her emotional feelings towards him.”

“I’ll have a talk with Farrell and Freida to see if they have any advice for your unusual problem,” answers Dr. Croft. “From what I have learned about the flock, most dragons get paired up at 15. At 18, these two dragons have never experience that emotional connection before. We better get this taken care of if we want to get anything done at all today.”

Sandra calls over Farrell and Freida explaining what she is dealing with. “I understand the problem,” Farrell tells her. “It’s because neither one of them has ever been formally paired up at the age that pairing normally takes place among us dragons. I find it so hard to believe that a dragon, with over 200 years of our knowledge, is at a loss for how to deal with such emotions.”

“Even though the process of us humans becoming mates is so much different from yours, it’s not uncommon among us humans to suffer from what Draco and Hilda are facing as they fall in love,” Dr. Croft tells them.

“Let me have a talk with Draco.” answers Farrell.

“If you can translate for me, I’ll have a talk with Hilda.” Freida tells Dr. Croft.

“Lets get it done so those two can feel a lot better about what is happening to them.” orders Dr. Croft.

“What’s going on?” asks Helena as she comes over to see what the meeting is all about.

“I can’t believe it,” she answers. “I am about to become a marriage counselor for dragons. Take notes for me while I conduct this most unusual session.”

The next hour is spent with the four dragons, with Sandra translating for Hilda, discussing in details their emotional feelings for each other. Both Alexander and Terrie keep assuring their dragon friends that they are happy with the two of them wanting to become mates. The session ends well with all four individuals content with what has taken place.

“We had better look for a nesting site when we fly out to the Viking Village,” a very happy Hilda tells Jerrie.

“Helena tells me that you won’t be ready to lay an egg until your 20,” answers Jerrie. “We’ll still look for a place for you and Draco to make a nest. Farrell, Freida, and the other young dragons with them have built nest where they are now living with their human friends.”

“That is good to know,” Hilda tells her.

“That’s one of the plans for today’s exploration flight by the adult males,” answers Jerrie. “I’m going to ask my father for permission to start dating Alexander. He is a most wonderful young man.”

“That would make me so happy to see you two become mates,” answers Hilda.

“Lets fly over to the village and have a talk with my parents.”

It is a most unexpected turn of events that morning as a total of ten dragons with four riders fly in and land next to the home of Eric, the Viking leader of the village. “Hilda, you look so marvelous,” Eric tells her. “Alexandra and his friends did a good job in taking care of you in your time of need.”

“She wants to become Draco’s mate,” Jerrie tells her father. “I want to start dating Alexander as well.”

A shocked Eric has to think about the request as he observes how Hilda and Draco are talking to each other in Norwegian. Finally, he answers after talking with his wife. “You have my blessing.”

“Thank you, thank you so much,” both Hilda and Jerrie tells Eric as it is one big group hug.

“Where will you plan to live?” Eric asks Alexander.

“I would like to move by your village with some of my Egyptian friends and set up a trade route,” answers Alexander.

“What about the dragons?” asks Eric.

“These mature males are looking for new nesting sites where they may hunt and explore in peace,” answers Alexander. “Draco and Hilda want to stay with you to raise their young.”

“That would be marvelous,” answers Eric’s wife.

“There is a cliff side along the sea just North of here.” Eric tells him. “Tell your male dragon friends to check it out.” There is a short discussion in Ancient Celtic among the dragons which soon take flight to the North.”

The rest of the village leaders have assembled in the Great hall with Alexander as they talk about the event of the day. “It would be to our advantage to have wild dragons as our allies living on the cliffs near our seaport,” Olaf tells the others. “Just their presence would keep the raiders away from our village. How do we make that happen?”

“I’m sure that they would agree to do so as long as you live in peace with them and don’t attempt to steal any of their eggs,” answers Alexander.

“It is an old Viking tradition among our people to steal a dragon egg, then raise it’s offspring with one of our children,” answers Eric. “Raising Hilda from an egg was a difficult task at the least. It had been over 200 years since it was last done with any success. If the mother dragon is not opposed to allowing one of our children to grow up with her offspring, we could maintain that same tradition without the need to steal an egg. One thing that we will need to do is learn their language.”

“Draco and I can certainly help you with that.” Answers Alexander.

“I’m certain that Hilda will allow us to let a child be with her baby,” answers Jerrie.

“They can then set the example for a universal friendship of trust,” answers Eric.

About then, the dragons have arrived from their exploration trip. Dr. Croft comes inside the great hall along with Farrell and Drogon. “They have found the cliff area to be an excellent site for an expansion rookery,” she reports to the assembled leaders.

Alexander now talks to Drogon in ancient Celtic as Dr. Croft translates for the assembled leaders. She translates his response to them.

“You have a deal,” she tells them. “Come pet Drogon on the forehead as you thank him in your language and with these words in Celtic.” The ceremony takes place becoming a total success.

“Where are you headed for now?” Eric asks his daughter after the meeting.

“We’re headed back to the Pyramid to pick up the rest of my friends.” Jerrie answers. “Then, we will fly back to their village.”

“We’ll be back in a couple of days for a visit,” Alexander tells him.

Flying back, it is becoming obvious to Farrell that the two dragons are having a difficult time concentrating on what they are doing. He brings it to Sandra’s attention. “What’s wrong?” asks Jerrie as they land on a protected plateau.

“Draco and Hilda need to have some quality time together as soon as possible,” answers Sandra. “Until they do so, they are only going to get more frustrated trying to control their emotions towards each other.”

“I have to agree with Dr. Croft on her decision,” answers Alexander.

Sandra has the two dragons come over to her for a talk with their riders. They assure them that they are all right. “I’m ordering the following cure for your emotional issues,” she tells them. “Starting right now, you two go spend some quality time together. Take as much time as you need. The more you two enjoy the moment, the happier you will be together.”

“Is it OK if we stay with our dragons?” asks Jerrie and Alexander. “They want us to be with them at this critical time in their lives.”

“If they feel more comfortable with the assurance of you two being with them, I don’t see any problem.” answers Dr. Croft.

“We’ll see you later,” answers Jerrie.

After returning to the Pyramid City, Dr Croft files a report with Ramseys and Dr. Nasser. “The dragons have found a suitable location for a rookery by the Viking Village. Most amazing is that they came to an agreement for living with them. I believe that friendship is going to work out well.”

“Where’s Alexander and Jerrie with their dragons?” asks Ramseys.

“I ordered their dragons to spend some quality time together.” answers Dr. Croft. “Their emotional feelings towards each other was getting the better of them.”

“Oh,” answers Ramseys. “Good for them.”

It is later in the day before the two dragons with their riders are spotted flying back to the Pyramid City. “They all look so happy,” Helena tells Dr. Croft as she observes them with the spotting scope. They come in to land in front of Sandra.

“Thank you for all you have done for us,” both Draco and Hilda tell her. “It was, wonderful.”

“Congratulations,” Dr. Croft tells them as she goes to pet both dragons on their forehead. “The both of you look so happy being together.”

“I’m glad that you let Alexander and Jerrie stay with us.” answers Draco. “They kept assuring us that everything was going to be OK.”

“It gave us both some quality time to be together as well,” answers Terrie.

“Congratulations to the both of you.” Dr. Croft tells them. “It looks like having your dragons taking my advice was an outstanding success. We’re ready to head back when you are. You can fill me in with as little or as much details as you want to share with me later this evening.”

[rpicardi1]

Updated the content.

Chapter 19 Back at the Viking Settlement.

 

“Thank you for sharing your experiences with me,” Dr. Croft tells Alexander, Terrie, and their two dragons. “That was, beautiful.”

“It’s been a most interesting couple of days,” answers Alexander. “Rescuing Terrie and her egg tame dragon, then us falling in love with them, that was the last thing that I ever expected would happen to us.”

“What are your plans for your future?” Dr. Croft asks them.

“We plan to set up a trading outpost next to the Viking Village,” answers Alexander. “Our dragons want to live next to Jerrie’s parents to raise their young.”

“That’s wonderful,” answers Dr. Croft. “I wish you a long and happy life together.”

“Thank you so much for serving as a marriage counselor for our dragons,” answers Alexander. “Your advice has made all of us so much happier. You have given us a new purpose in our new lives.”

The morning meeting has resulted in plans for the researchers to fly to the Viking Village to study their history. The mature males have volunteered to take their human friends over there with them. Their mates have made arrangements so they can come along. The rest of the young dragon pairs that want to move into new territory, are coming along to check out the cliff side nesting sites.

“How many dragons are coming along with us?” asks Joe.

“I count at least 40,” answers Dr. Croft. I’m not going to remember all of the names of our newcomers.”

Alexander and Draco has made the introduction to all of the new dragons as they are filled in on the mission of the day. The Ramseys join them on their friends with four additional Village members that are going to help set up the trading outpost.

“We definitely need to learn Ancient Celtic so we can talk to these dragons,” Jerrie tells Alexander.

“If it is all right with Hilda, I’d like to ride on her to teach her the dragons language. You can ride on Draco so he can teach you their language.” With the approval of the two dragons, they swap riders for the two hour trip to the Viking Village.

Taking a break at the Pyramids, Jerrie and Hilda have picked up enough of the dragon’s language that they are able to carry on a conversation with several of the new dragons. “They seem to be doing quite well,” Dr. Croft tells Alexander as they interact with the new dragons. “The new dragons have taken quite an interest in how Jerrie’s parents were able to raise Hilda from an egg. They are asking them both a lot of questions about her life growing up with her human parents.”

“She has adapted quite well to the change in her life,” answers Alexander. “Come to think of it, so has Draco in those years after I untangled him out of a cargo net from so long ago.”

“It’s surprising to know how the younger dragons have accepted her into the flock.” answers Draco. “I had forgotten that the policy of having nothing to do with egg tames was abandoned 100 years ago.”

“They are both enjoying all of the unusual attention,” Dr. Croft tells him as everyone gets ready to continue their flight.

It is an hour later at the Viking Village when Eric spots the dragons flying in from the southeast. “My God! The sky is full of dragons,” an alarmed elder tells him.

“It’s OK,” Eric assures him. “Hilda and Draco are flying in the lead. They are coming in to visit us.”

“We definitely need to learn their language,” Olaf tells Eric. “Over half of them have someone riding on them. Isn’t that your daughter riding on Draco?”

“Yes, it is and Alexander is riding on Hilda.” answers Eric. The two dragons are the first to land in front of Jerrie’s parents.

“How come you two switched dragons to ride on?” asks Jennifer.

“We switch dragons so Draco could teach me the dragon’s language. Alexander has taught Hilda the dragon’s language. She has already made several friends among the other dragons.”

“That’s great,” answers Jennifer. “That was one thing we had no way of providing. There were no dragons other then the wild ones from the mountains that she could have interacted with. With us not knowing their language, we didn’t want to take the risk of them attacking her.”

“Our dragons are now mates,” answers Jerrie. “When the time comes, Hilda wants to build her nest here.”

“That’s wonderful,” answers Jennifer. “I’m looking forward to her becoming a mother.”

“What brings everyone here today?” asks Eric.

“We’re going to establish the trading outpost,” answers Ramsey II. “The new dragons want to stake claims on new nesting sites. Ricky and Ronda want to learn Norwegian so they can serve as ambassadors between you and the cliff side flock.”

“Farrell and I will serve as your teacher,” answers Dr. Croft. “He wants to learn your Norwegian as well.”

“Excellent,” answers Eric. “I would love to learn their language.”

“May I join in on the class as well?” asks Olaf.

“You most certainly can,” answers Eric.

Freida, Helena, and Raganor join in the learning session as the rest of the visitors go about on their tasks for the day detailing life in a Viking village. Alexander has taken some Vikings and the Egyptians to survey out the site for the trading village. The rest of the dragons with Drogon in charge, stake out nesting claims and start constructions along the cliffs by the harbor.

The language learning session is going quite well. Just like what took place with Leader and Firefox, both Ricky and Ronda are laying down soaking in all of the attention that Eric and Olaf are giving them.

The session has just been completed when Draco flies in asking for everyone to come over to the front gate. “What’s wrong,” Eric asks him.

“Drogon found 20 dragons that flew in from the sea,” answers Alexander. “They are not from Draco’s rookery. They are from a rookery on the other side of the sea named after Tyrion, their leader. Several of them are badly hurt from fighting with the Viking Raiders. They are here only because Draco and the other dragons were able to convince them that we would not harm them.”

Assembling outside the front gate, the explorers, several of their dragon friends, Eric, Olaf, and Raganor go to meet the nervous newcomers. “Be cautious around them,” warns Alexander who is on Draco. “They are very frightened of us.”

All the dragons with the explorers have just flown in to see the newcomers when a warning horn sounds from the docks. Jerrie on Hilda, now flies in to warn everyone that viking raiders have shown up in their longboats.

“Raganor, stay here with Jerrie, Hilda, and these injured dragons.” orders Eric. “The rest of us to the docks.” Farrell, Freida, Dr Croft, Helena, and Mary stay behind to triage the injuries. The rest of the dragons fly to the dock with several of Eric’s vikings flying on those members of Draco’s rookery.

It is a shocked viking leader aboard the lead longboat when he sees a gathering flock of dragons flying in to land by the dock. “How did they get so many egg tames?” asks Rollo in alarm as he sees over a dozen riders on the growing number of dragons. “I thought they only had the one that was old enough to ride on.”

“They can’t be possibly be all egg tames!” answers Alex in alarm as he places a spyglass on them. “There are mature dragons in that flock with riders on them. Most of them I have never seen before.”

“Anchor the fleet and get Loki over here,” orders Rollo. The fleet is anchored just outside of the harbor as more dragons are seen flying in to line the harbor area with over 50 dragons and all of the armed men of the village.

The spy Loki is brought aboard to face Rollo and Alex. He is grilled for the next couple of minutes about his failure to report that Eric now has more then one dragon allied with his warriors. “How did you get your face burned?” Rollo finally asks him.

“I was trying to listen in on a meeting when Eric’s daughter caught me hiding in the shadows.” Loki answers. “Her dragon flamed me when I tried to grabbed her to get away.”

“What are we going to do?” asks Alex. “That many dragons could overwhelm our defenses and burn us all to a crisp with ease.”

“Order the fleet to remain where they are,” answers Rollo. “We’ll land and see if we can talk our way out of a confrontation. Loki, you’re coming with us.”

The one longboat with Rollo and Alex rows their way to shore to land next to the assembled leadership of Eric, Olaf, Alexander, Joe, the warrior escorts, and several dragons. It is a tense meeting of the two Viking Kingdoms as several of the dragons hiss loudly at Loki when they spot him.

“What do you want?” asks Eric sternly.

“To apologize for what Loki tried to do to your daughter.” answers Rollo. Ricky and Ronda, along with several of the new dragons that are standing behind Eric and Olaf, promptly hiss loudly at his answer.

“My dragon friends think otherwise,” answers Eric with contempt. “Turn your invasion fleet around and head back to where you came from before they decide to set fire to your longboats.”

An angry Rollo, knowing that he has just been checkmate, tosses Loki out of the party towards the side. Draco promptly sets him on fire as the rest of the Viking raiding party runs to the longboat and start rowing furiously out to sea. He blindly runs into Ricky and Ronda who both flames him as well before he runs into the sea screaming in pain. A shark shows up to finish him off. Draco orders all the dragons to stand down as the longboat heads back to the fleet. They soon all hoist sail and head out to sea.

“Wow!” Dr. Nasser tells Eric. “I never knew that dragons could get so angry at the presence of strangers.”
“All the dragons of this world are an excellent judge of honor and intentions,” answers Eric. “Given their past encounter with Rollo’s raiders is why they became friends with us and have come to the defense of this Viking Village.”

“Who is that riding in on one of the wild dragons from Tyrion’s rookery?” asks Olaf in alarm.

“I don’t know,” answers Eric. “He is not one of us or of Alexander’s party.”

“Whoever he is, that dragon has appeared to have accepted him as a friend.” answers Draco.

“Lets go talk to him,” answers Eric.

The dragon lands in front of Eric. It is one of the mature adult males from the other rookery with his mate that lands alongside. The stranger gets off of the male, proceeds to hug him around the neck as they exchange some words in Celtic, pets his mate on the forehead, then asks Eric for asylum.

“I have learned from our dragon friends that they are an excellent judge of character,” Eric tells the stranger. “Based upon what I have just witnessed from the two dragons that brought you here, I will grant you your request.”

“Thank you,” answers the stranger who is in his 20s. “My name is Logan. My dragon friend is Terry. When I saw him among the other dragons that came to the defense of your village, I took the opportunity to jump ship and get away from my oppressors that had captured me 10 years ago in a raid on my homeland.”

“How did you meet up with Terry?” asks Eric.

“I found Terry caught in a trap a year after I was captured,” answers Logan. “That’s when I found out that the dragon’s native language was the same as mine. He allowed me to let him loose from the trap. He was able to get away as the viking raiders showed up to take him away. I would have taken him up on his offer to fly me back to here but I knew that we may not have been able to cross the distance he would have to travel with me riding on him, so, I told him that I would look for him when I could escape from my captors.”

“That had to be one most unusual adventure,” answers Eric. “Olaf, organize a detachment to keep an eye on those longboats. I need to get back to see about our injured newcomers.”

Back where the injured dragons are, Mary has completed the initial injury inspection. Most are from arrows and spears that have punched holes in their wings. Arrows that are still in the wings are easily pulled through. Three dragons have spears and arrows stuck in their neck and shoulder. Dr. Croft and Helena proceed to take care of those injuries first. Those are carefully removed with the wounds treated to prevent infection.

“What are we going to do with that bolt that is stuck in Tyrion’s leg?” asks Raganor.

“I don’t know,” answers Mary. “It’s stuck in the bone. He need to be put to sleep so we can remove it. It is just that he is too frightened of us to let me put him to sleep with Narcoberries.”

“Help me with talking to him,” Raganor tells her. “I want to show him something before I try to pull that bolt out of his leg.” Mary helps with the translation as Raganor drops his pants, then shows Tyrion that he has no leg below his right knee when he unfastens his artificial one. It is a startled Tyrion that realizes that Raganor had lost his leg to the same weapon that he has stuck in his.

“I’ll let you pull the bolt out of my leg,” Tyrion finally tells him with a painful answer. “I just want to be awake when you do it.”

“Before I do so, I want to warn you that when I go to pull it out, it is going to hurt like hell,” he tells him. “I can tell you that it was no fun when our surgeon cut off what was left of my mangled leg. At least, you will still have your leg when we can get the bolt out of it. Mary, go get something to put in Tyrion’s mouth. It will keep him from biting his tongue off when the pain from pulling out that stuck bolt hits him.” A padded chunk of wood is prepared by Mary. She explains what is going to happen as she places the pad in his mouth so he can bite on it.

With the assurance from the other dragons, Tyrion finally gives Raganor the word to go ahead and remove the bolt in his leg. “Brace yourself,” He tells Tyrion as he looks him in the eye. “This is going to hurt like no pain that you have ever felt.”

“I’m ready,” Tyrion tells him reluctantly as Mary positions the pad in his mouth and gives a nod. Raganor now pulls on the bolt as hard as he can.

One could hear the scream of agony for miles as the bolt gets removed from Tyrion’s leg. The pad in his mouth is literally bitten in two, then set on fire as it is spit out. Mary manages to push a Narcoberry soaked disinfectant pad into the wound which soon deadens the intense pain and stops the bleeding. She is then able to wrap a bandage around it as Tyrion starts crying. “It’s over,” she tells him as Raganor shows him the bloody bolt that has been pulled out of his leg.

“You have got to be the bravest dragon that I have ever seen,” Raganor praises him. “Get some rest. Your leg will feel much better soon.”

“Thank you for pulling that thing out of my leg,” Tyrion tells him as the pain is subsiding. “I never knew that there were Vikings that were friendly to us.”

“You and your flock are more then welcome to live among us,” Raganor tells him “If I get the chance, I’ll personally take out that evil Rollo for you. His raiders were responsible for causing me to lose my leg a year ago.”

“Stay with him while I go tend to the injuries of his friends,” Mary tells Raganor. “Rub him here on his neck. The dragons find it quite relaxing.”

“Lay down here on your side so that your injured leg is elevated.” Raganor tells Tyrion. He does as Raganor has instructed to get his neck massaged.

“That feels so good,” Tyrion tells him as he starts to doze off. He is soon sound asleep.

The injuries to the other dragons are quickly taken care of by Mary and the others. Raganor’s wife, Clara, has taken a liking to an injured female that has lost her mate. They both head over to a resting Tyrion where she lays down next to him and dozes off as Clara massages her neck. The rest of the injured dragons proceed to gather by the sleeping Tyrion and are soon asleep as well. “That is the best medicine that can be given to them at this time,” Mary tells the others. “Let them rest with their new human friends so that they can get healed up and recover from their bad experience.”

[rpicardi1]

Chapter 20. The raid.

 

It is late afternoon when Eric calls for a meeting with his war consul. Joe and Professor Narcy are also in attendance. Logan has been asked to attend over the objections of three of his head warriors. “If there is one thing that I have learned today, it is to trust the judgment of our new dragon friends,” Eric answers the warriors questioning his decision to have Logan attend the planning session. “You saw how our dragon friends reacted to Rollo’s pathetic attempt to justify his visit. Then, you saw how trusting they are of Logan when he showed up riding on one of the mature males from Tyrion’s flock with his mate to ask for asylum.”

“You’re right,” answers Raganor who has just become a close friend with the leader of the Tyrion flock. “What better judge of human intentions then one of the wild dragons when they meet someone for the first time. I just don’t trust Rollo to keep his word about leaving us alone. Before I left him to come to this meeting, Tyrion told me that four members of his flock were fatally shot out of the sky by those crossbows turret on Rollo’s longboats. His mate was one of them.”

“I do not trust that he will keep his word either,” answers Eric.

“I’ve already have dragons taking turns shadowing his fleet of longboats,” reports Alexander. “They tell me that they are just sitting there beyond the horizon to the North of the nesting sites with their sails and masts taken down.”

“It sounds like they are waiting for darkness before they return to conduct a night raid,” answers Olaf. “They would likely strike before dawn, when they assume that we and our dragon friends are all sleeping.”

“Just what are Rollo’s Vikings capable of doing?” Eric asks Logan.

“They came mostly armed with spears, shields, and swords with crossbow turrets to protect their longboats,” answers Logan. “That would suggest they plan to conduct a hit and run raid on our village.”

“I’ll have the dragons keep shadowing their fleet,” answers Alexander. “Judging from the lay of the land around here, they will avoid the cliffs of the North where they know the Dragons are nesting and could alert us to their presence. They will likely land at this beach after dark, then hike around the hills to come up behind the village before dawn to strike when they figure that we will all be passed out drunk from celebrating our victory.”

“Is there any way we can detect anyone spying on our activities?” asks Eric.

“Farrell tells me that the dragons can see in infrared at night,” reports Dr. Croft. “They could watch for anyone that attempts to contact Rollo’s invasion force once it gets dark out.”

“Then, lets plan this,” answers Eric. “In the evening, we’ll have most of the dragons head for their nesting site. They can get back here when we know that the invasion force has landed. We’ll hold our celebration as if everything is normal. When one of the dragons flying air cover spots our spy, he will take him out. Ramseys will keep watch on the fleet and the landing force with his dragons. When they reach our village outskirts. Alexander will hit them from above with the rest of the dragons. Our land force will keep them together by ambushing them from the farms with arrows and spears. Ramsey’s dragon force will then disable their longboats cutting off their escape.”

“Dragons,” Alexander warns them in Ancient Celtic. “Pass the word on to all of your friends. Be very careful when you engage Rollo’s vikings. You have already seen what they did to Tyrion and several of the members in his flock. Flame them, then get out of the way before they can fight back. Dr Croft, have your researchers that do not have any combat experience stay with the injured dragons for their protection.”

The researchers are now called together by Dr. Croft with Eric in attendance. Most make the decision to stay with the Vikings so that their dragons can participate in the defense of the village. Dr. Croft and Helena inform Eric that they will help out by using their dragon friends to shadow the invaders and report their location to Joe using their two way radios. Eric agrees to let him, Tod, Ahab, and Professor Narcy stay with his command forces when he shows him what their crossbows are capable of doing to a shield and chain mail armor. It is a unique opportunity to study the preparations for a battle and to participate in it.

“You realize that we may not be able to protect you once the fighting starts,” Eric warns the researchers.

“We are aware of the risk,” Dr. Nasser tells him. “Most of us are veterans of wars far worse then what you will be soon involved in. We can take care of ourselves as our dragon friends can bail us out if things get out of hand. Mary, Sarah, and Cleo plan to stay with the injured newcomers.”

It is close to midnight when Jerrie flies in with Hilda to report that the longboats are landing on the beach to the North of the cliffs. Dr. Croft on Farrell and Helena on Frieda are keeping watch from the hills on their movement as Rollo’s forces form up on the beach to head South around the hills. With a set of personal communication devices, they radio in to Joe who is stationed with Eric’s command staff. Tod, Ahab, and Professor Narcy are with him. All four researchers are armed with their modern crossbows.

“This is a blessing from our Gods, to have a constant report on what our enemy is doing,” Eric tells Joe. “That will allow us to get into a position where we need to be in order to stop their attack.”

Drogon, who has been guarding the injured dragons, has spotted the spy in his infrared vision and soon takes him out. He hides the body next to Tyrion, then continues to look for any other spies.

All is quiet in the moonlit sky as the invasion force proceeds to their destination, their location under constant surveillance by Farrell and Freida with radio reports of their progress being sent back to Joe. The defenders quietly move into position in the east side of the village to lay their trap.

“So far, so good,”Rollo quietly tells his viking raiders. “We made it ashore undetected. Now to find our spy so he can lead us inside the village.”

“I have a bad feeling about this raid,” Comments Alex to Rollo.

“Why is that?” asks Rollo.

“It’s so quiet, too quiet. It is as if we are being watched by something hiding in the shadows that can see us while we cannot see them.”

“No one gets away with checkmating me,” answers Rollo in anger as his land forces continue their march to the back of the village. “Lets get this over with so we can celebrate our victory on the way back home.”

Nearing the village, Rollo is becoming concerned that his spy has not met them where they have agreed to be. “Where can he be?” he asks in a whisper as the outline of the village start to show on the horizon ahead. They continue on reaching the East Gate which happens to be open and unguarded. The attackers start to file through the open gate into the outskirts of the village finding it strangely deserted. The moon becomes obscured by clouds as it gets very dark making it hard for the invaders to see where they are.

Suddenly, the night is lit up with the flames from dozens of dragons as Rollo’s forces find themselves under a heavy fire bombardment. They turn tail to run when Eric’s men comes charging out of the darkness with spears. The night is now lit up with flaming enemy raiders as they start falling by the wayside.

“Shield Wall!” orders Rollo in a panic as he tries to turn the tide of the battle. With the moon back out, he has his forces charge towards Eric’s command forces only to end up being pushed back by flames, spears, and four modern crossbows who’s bolts are powerful enough to punch through the metal shields of Rollo’s elite warriors. He loses his metal shield when a bolt penetrates through it causing a crippling wound to his left arm. Alex loses his when he gets burned by his shield that is getting so hot that it starts to glow red.

The attackers are now on the run back to their longboats as the dragons and Eric’s forces start picking them off one by one. The light of the dawn is now showing as they round the hill only to find that their longboats have been moved South along the beach by the cliffs, their crossbow turrets having been disabled, with more dragons waiting there to ambush them. Rollo and Alex manage to hide in a nearby cave but are soon located by Logan and his dragon friend Terry. They try to make a break for it, but without their shields, they are defenseless as Terry sets Alex on fire and Rollo gets impaled with Logan’s spear. The survivors quickly surrender and are rounded up to be placed on the open beach where the dragons can keep an eye on them.

The casualties among the defenders are minor with only some cuts and bruises. The dragons have only suffered a couple of holes in their wings from spears they dodged after their fire attack on the raiders. Of the attackers, about two dozen have survived by either outright surrendering, or hiding in the darkness until they could be rounded up. Two wounded conscripts are allowed to stay when the dragons that have rounded them up determine that they are honorable. The rest are herded into a Longboat where Eric gives them a warning sendoff to never return followed by the loud hiss of several angry dragons from Tyrion’s flock. It is a shocked crew of survivors that become even more shocked when Drogon flies over the longboat to drop the body of their spy into it. They quickly hoist the sail setting a course to the North West.

The rest of the morning is spent cleaning up the battlefield where the bodies of the dead are placed upon a common funeral pyre. A bunch of fine swords and several metal shields are collected to be added to the armory. Some chain mail armor is also recovered. Joe gets most of the bolts back for his crossbows. Anything else has been burned to the point of being useless.

Draco and Hilda are given the honor of lighting the funeral pyre. “Without our Hilda, Draco, and all of their dragon friends, we could be all dead or taken hostage by our enemies.” Eric speaks to everyone both in Norwegian and Ancient Celtic as the pyre is lit. “Our enemies will now know to leave us alone if they value staying alive. Thank you, everyone, for helping us to defend our homeland. We are forever in our debt to Alexander and his Egyptian friends, Dr. Croft and the researchers, and all of our dragon friends.”

“That was sure an exciting adventure,” reports Professor Narcy. “To observe and even participate in defending a village from a viking raid was just outstanding.”

“I find it unique that Eric’s forces allowed the survivors to return to their homeland,” answers Dr. Sanders. “They normally execute their prisoners.”

“I’m not sure that you even know what was taking place during the raid,” Professor Narcy scoffs at Dr. Sanders. “From what the dragons have told me, you spent the entire battle hiding with the wounded dragons shaking in fear.”

“Don’t be too hard on Dr. Sanders,” Mary tells him. “He has never experience combat before.”

“Eric allowed his enemies to return to their homeland so they can spread the word that attempting to raid him will only result in their destruction,” Dr. Croft tells him. “Given Eric’s new alliance between the Egyptians and the dragons it will be a long time before his enemies ever launch a raid in this direction.”

“Stay with us for the day,” Eric asks his new friends. “Help us celebrate the marriage of Terrie to Alexander. Tell us how you became friends with Farrell and the Draco Dragons. Tell us your stories about the world that you came from.”

“We will do so,” Dr. Croft tells him. “This has been a most interesting experience. We have learned so much about your culture the past couple of days. Eventually, we should be able to return to our world with the knowledge of your history and culture. It will be so exciting, yet a sad day when we return. I will so miss my dragon friend Farrell. He was the key that has made this adventure possible.” Indeed, the rest of the day and far into the night is spent in celebration of friendship, the wedding, and the plans for their future together. It goes on into the wee hours of the morning as Alexander and Terrie sneak away on their dragon friends to go on their honeymoon back in the Pyramid City.

[rpicardi1]

Chapter 21. The Return.

 

“Ohhhhh, my head,” Farrell tells Dr. Croft when he wakes up the following morning after the big celebration.

“I don’t believe that it was wise for you to drink all of that Mead Eric offered you last night,” Dr. Croft tells him. “It has quite a kick to it.”

“You are so right,” Farrell moans in pain from his throbbing headache.

“What’s wrong with Farrell this morning?” Mary asks Dr. Croft.

“He did a little too much celebrating with us last night,” answers Dr. Croft. “He’s suffering from a hangover.”

“A dragon with a hangover,” chuckles Mary. “That is so funny.”

“I wish it were,” answers Dr. Croft. “He’s in misery from it’s effects.”

“I have a cure for that,” Mary tells them. “I’ve made up a tonic from a recipe in an App to cure his hangover. Have him take a swig of this, then give him a drink of water from this bucket.”

“Oh, gross!” Farrell tells Dr. Croft in pain as she gives him the hangover medicine. “That taste awful!”

“Here, get a drink of water to wash the taste out of your mouth,” Mary tells him. “Then lay back down and get some rest until your head clears. We’ll wait until noon before we fly back to the temple. You’re not the only one suffering from drinking too much Mead. Half of the Viking men are suffering from hangovers from drinking all night. Several of your dragon friends are in the same shape as you are. My son drank too much of it last night as well.”

“What was in that hangover medicine?” asks Dr. Croft.

“It contained a mixture of stimm berries, spark powder, mejo berries, and narco berries,” answers Mary. “The stimm berries and spark powder are responsible for the bitter taste. Now, he needs some rest to recover from the effects of the Mead. Stay with him and rub his forehead. It will help him relax until he is feeling better.”

“That feels soooo good,” Farrell tells Dr. Croft as she rubs his forehead while he is laying down. “I’m never, ever, going to drink Mead again.”

“Just take it easy,” Dr. Croft tells him. “I don’t think that anyone knew that a dragon could end up with a hangover from drinking too much of what we humans call Adult Beverages.”

“It is certainly a new experience for him,” Helena tells Dr. Croft as she and Freida comes over to check on Farrell.

It is just after the noon meal when the researchers gather with the dragons they rode out with to bid farewell to Eric and the Vikings in the village. The dragons of the Tyrion flock have agreed to live with Eric’s Vikings. Raganor is making plans to send an expedition of longboats across the sea to where the Tyrion dragons are living to help them transport their nests, eggs, and youngsters back to their new homes in the cliffs above the Viking Village. Mary has shown Raganor how to change the bandage on his leg until it gets healed up. They are both learning each other’s language as they become close friends. Tyrion has taken the dragon that Clara was comforting to be his new mate. Everyone has finally recovered from the big celebration of the night before. “We’ll be back when we get the chance,” Dr. Nasser tells Eric. “Let Alexander, Terrie, and their dragons, know that we wish them a long and happy married life.” With the farewell, everyone gets on their dragon for the long flight back to the Temple.

“How are you feeling?” Dr. Croft asks Farrell as they take off in flight.

“I feel so much better now,” he answers. “Mary’s brew, along with some rest, helped an awful lot in getting rid of that horrible headache.”

“A dragon with a hangover from drinking too much Mead,” comments Sandra. “It may seem funny but it is not. I’m glad that you are feeling so much better. You are too nice of a dragon to have to suffer from a hangover.”

“Those are such kind words,” answers Farrell. “I’m so happy that we found each other. You are such a wonderful human friend.”

The flight stops for a break at the Pyramid City where Alexander finds them in the common area. Everyone wishes them a happy honeymoon. “We’ll come visit Ramsey when we are ready to build the trading settlement,” Alexander tells them. “In the meantime, the Gods have invited us to spend some time in the Tropics on Crystal Isle. We were about ready to leave for there when we saw you coming in to land. Dr. Croft, thank you for everything you have done for us. It has been a most remarkable second life the Gods have given us in this world.”

“That is most remarkable,” Sandra tells them. “It is proof that there are portals to other worlds besides this one. We may need to visit it sometime. Have a most wondrous honeymoon on Crystal Isle.”

It is late afternoon when the researchers with their Egyptian friends reach the temple. Ramsey’s party takes flight for home as the new dragons that joined in the adventure bid their new human friends good bye and head for the rookery. Ramsey II and Lucy have stayed for the evening.

“This has been quite a week,” reports Dr. Croft during the evening meeting at the Temple. “We have observed so much, from a resurrection to a Viking Raid. But, most important is the friendships that have been established among all of us in this new world.” It is at that moment that a text message comes in to Dr. Nasser’s phone.

“What is it?” asks Professor Narcy.

“It seems that someone or something pulled a prank on us so that we would stay in this world to see if everyone would become friends or not,” answers Dr. Nasser. “Our world falling into chaos did not happen as was reported. Everything is where it was when we first arrived here. We are free to return to the Star Chamber in the morning.”

“According to my text message, Coronal Arafat is expecting us to return in the morning,” reports Professor Narcy.

“I’m getting the same information as well,” answers Dr. Croft.

“It looks like that we can go back home,” answers Helena.

Farrell now gives Dr. Croft a stunned look. “I’m so happy that you can now return to your world, yet so sad that I may never see you again. Of all the humans that I have got to know, you have to be the best friend that I have ever had, ever.”

“Farrell, I will definitely miss you the most.” Sandra tells him as she hugs him around the neck. “Don’t give up hope. There is always the chance that we will return for a visit. You have been my dragon dream come true. I will never forget that.”

“It’s going to be so lonely here without you and your friends,” Farrell tells her.

“I believe that we can take care of that,” answers Ramsey II. “Some of my people would be more then willing to move over here. “The land by the swamp has proven to be fertile and will support our crops. Ahab’s raptors will be most useful as guard dogs. This will make a good area for a satellite village for us. Some of us were getting ready to form a new village before we were selected for the sacrifice and met you. This temple would make for a most ideal settlement. My friends would love to establish a relationship with your friends that have settled up upon the hill.”

“That would make for a good relationship,” answers Dr. Croft. “We’ll get everything prepared for our return. We’ll leave everything for you that we don’t need for our return.”

It doesn’t take long to pack up the research materials. Mostly, the spare SD cards and netbooks are placed in their carry cases. Cameras are packed with their bags and portable chargers. The plans are to leave all of the supplies behind for Ramsey II which includes the hunting crossbows and other survival gear.

It is a crowded night in the temple with ten dragons and 14 people. Leader and Firefox have joined them for the farewell party. Leader promises rides for everyone in the morning to the Egyptian Village so no one has to walk there. Six familiar dragon friends arrive to take their friends on a ride for the last time.

It is 10:00 AM when everybody arrives at the Stargate temple to say their goodbyes to Ramseys and the dragon friends. Entering the Star Chamber, Joe reconnects the power to the control head. It apparently is only needed in order to activate the gate on our end,” he tells Ramseys. The gate is activated with the view on the other end showing as normal. Coronal Arafat and his two officers are there waiting for them.

“Take Draco’s war saddle with you,” Ramseys tells them before the party of 12 goes through the gate. Professor Narcy, Dr. Nasser, Joe and Tod take the saddle with them as they go through the gate. With the last person through, the gate is deactivated.

“What is that thing you four are carrying?” asks Coronal Arafat in surprise as the group returns.

“This is the actual war saddle that was used by Alexander the First on Draco,” Professor Narcy tells him as he points to the statue. “Ramseys wants us to keep it in this travel library.”

“How were you able to obtain such an unusual artifact?” asks Coronal Arafat.

“It was given to us by Alexander the First,” answers Professor Narcy. “He told us that he no longer needed it for his dragon. With their wars being over, he prefers to ride on Draco bareback.”

“You actually got to see him and his dragon?” asks Coronal Arafat.

“Yes,” answers Dr. Croft. “We made friends with him and over 40 other dragons. Farrell was the first dragon that I made friends with. He was my favorite. He was the key to ending the dragon wars with the inhabitants of that new world. I am going to so miss being with him.”

“That must have been a most incredible adventure,” Coronal Arafat tells her.

“Lets head back to the research center,” orders Dr. Nasser. “We have an awful lot to talk about when we get there.”

Back in the research center, everyone has transferred the contents of their SD and simm cards to backup storage and to the main computer. Several photos have been printed up with the researchers among their new friends. “There’s the proof that Dr. Sanders got to ride on a dragon,” Professor Narcy kids him in front of everyone.

“It was like riding on a flying horse,” answers Dr. Sanders. “At least, they were not huge and scary like the Game Of Thrones dragons were. They turned out to be quite friendly and about the right size for a dragon to be. Once we learned each other’s language, we found them to be very intelligent. They were very helpful in learning how they lived and were able to interact with us.” It is about then that a text message is received on all of the smart phones from an unknown source. It reads as followed.

(expect some changes here in the near future.)

“To all that experience this great adventure to the land of the two suns, we want to formally thank you for participating in a most wonderful experiment. It was most unexpected to see how you reacted to becoming friends with Farrell when you first found him hiding in the temple. He became the key to establishing a peaceful contact between your group and the rest of the dragons. That contact proved to be key to a permanent peace agreement between the Egyptians and the dragons.”

“Your solution to ending the sacrifice was most interesting. That it enabled the establishment of a friendship between the Egyptians and the dragons was most satisfying.”

“The alliance that was created between the Egyptians and the Vikings was something that was unexpected. The fact that they had successfully raised a dragon from a stolen egg was unusual in itself. How Dr. Croft handled the unexpected issue of the resurrected Draco with their Hilda became the perfect solution for an alliance between those two cultures.”

“To answer the question on everybody’s mind, will you be able to return for a future visit, the answer is yes. You will be notified when the time is right for that visit to take place.”

“Thank you, everyone, for exceeding our expectations in our grand experiment to study how you researchers would handle the unexpected. Enjoy the rest of your stay at the Stargate Temple.”

“Signed, the anonymous donor.”

“That is most interesting,” answers Dr. Nasser.

“What are our plans for the rest of this expedition?” asks Dr. Sanders.

“We proceed to wrap up our research here, then stay in touch with each other until we are invited for the return visit.” answers Professor Narcy.

“It’s going to be so hard to wait,” answers Dr. Croft. “I hope we can see everyone’s new family when we have the chance to return.”

 

[rpicardi1]

Addition;

 

Chapter 22. Back at the Viking Village.

 

With the expedition heading back to the temple, Raganor has been placed in charge of organizing an expedition to head to Tyrion’s homeland to help him move his rookery to the Viking Village cliff side. One of the Viking Longboats is being modified so that Tyrion can ride on it near the bow.

During the preparation for the trip, a dragon is spotted swimming in the sea heading towards the dock area. Logan rides out on Terry as a longboat is quickly sent out to reach it. The dragon, spotting the longboat heading for it, heads away from it in a panic as Logan reaches the struggling dragon. “Lisa, It’s all right,” Terry shouts down to her. “These Vikings are my friends.

“I’m so afraid,” the struggling Lisa tells him in a choking voice as she is spitting out the seawater. “I don’t want to die.”

“Terry, can you swim?” asks Logan.

“Yes,” Terry answers.

“Land next to Lisa so we can help her before she drowns,” orders Logan as he sheds his boots, helmet, weapons, and most of his clothes. Landing in the sea, Terry swims to the struggling dragon so that Logan can grab a horn on her head. The dragon, which turns out to be one of the missing females, is too tired to resist letting a human help keep her from drowning. She is still freaking out as she sees the approaching longboat.

“It’s all right,” both Logan and Terry assure her as the longboat pulls alongside. “No one is going to harm you.” A rope is lowered from the side of the Longboat so Logan can place it around the horns on her head to keep it above the water. With the situation under control as the very tired dragon realizes that she is being rescued, Terry swims out away from the longboat and takes off flying to the dock.

Staying with the swimming dragon, Logan hangs on to a second rope as the crew carefully rows back to the shore. “You’re safe now Lisa,” he tells her in Celtic while rubbing her neck as she starts crying from the stress of her ordeal. “What happened to you?”

“I was hit in the shoulder by one of those crossbow bolts,” she tells him in tears. “Even though it went through my shoulder, the wound left me unable to keep flying. I have been swimming ever since trying to find the shore.”

“What an awful ordeal to go through,” he tells her. “Heidi and I will take care of your wound as soon as you can get ashore.”

With the longboat now in the shallows, Lisa struggles ashore with Logan by her side and collapses on the sand totally exhausted. Eric’s villagers has brought over food and water for her as the wound on the shoulder gets treated and bandaged. Several other dragons of the Tyrion flock are by her side to assure her that she is with friends.

Tyrion has limped over to see the rescued female. “We may have Lisa’s egg in my nest,” he tells Heidi as she and Logan finish treating the wound in her shoulder.

“We’ll know for sure once she can get over there,” answers Heidi. “If not, I could use her help in raising the youngster.” Following them to the nest, it is a most happy dragon that spots the egg which turns out to be hers.

“I’ll raise my offspring right here with yours,” she tells Tyrion after crying tears of joy. “Everyone has been so nice to me.”

Laying in the nest next to her egg, Lisa tells everyone what happened to the other three dragons that got shot out of the sky. “Tyron’s mate had taken a bolt through the chest. She dove into the water and never came back up to the surface. My mate took a bolt through the neck. He told me to swim in the direction those longboats were heading before falling into the sea sinking under the surface. Willman had a bolt in his back that left him unable to swim. It was so shocking to see him struggling in such a panic to stay afloat before he slipped under the water and drowned.”

“We made Rollo, and his raiders, pay for their crimes against you and your friends when they attempted to raid our village,” Eric tells her as he massages her neck to comfort her. “Stay with us as our friend. We are going to move the rest of your rookery over here in the morning.”

“Thank you for rescuing me, I’ll stay here with you.” the exhausted Lisa tells him as she lays in the nest next to her egg and is soon sound asleep.

Drogon and several other dragons that have stayed in the Viking Village now take a flight to Tyrion’s Rookery with some of those dragons to coordinate the move. Eric and Jennifer has flown with them. It is a relieved community of dragons when Terry tells them what has happened the day before, that the eggs have been recovered, that they have made friends with the vikings that have defeated the raiders, and that most of the dragons that went after the raiders are now safe back in the Viking Village. Drogon, Terry, Eric, and Jennifer return back to the fishing village by evening.

“You’re lucky that your leg wasn’t broken by the bolt,” Heidi tells Tyrion as she and Raganor change the bandage that evening.

“Unlike the other day when it was hurting so bad that I didn’t want anyone to touch it, It’s feeling so much better now,” Tyrion tells her. “I owe the both of you a ride.”

“It’s looking a lot better,” Raganor tells him. “You still need time for the bone to heal before you take anyone flying. The fleet is ready to go to your rookery in the morning to move everyone back here.”

“Terry tells me that everyone there is excited about the move tomorrow.” Tyrion tells him. “They are ready to meet you Vikings and make the trip back here.”

“That’s wonderful that they are so trusting of us after what Rollo did to them,” answers Raganor. “We’re looking forward to becoming friends with the rest of your flock.”

“You’re dragon friends from the Draco Rookery were a big influence in their decision to come here,” Tyrion tells him. “Terry tells me that they were impressed by the visit by Eric and Jennifer.”

“The dragons with the rescued eggs have already got their nest built.” Heidi tells him. “We rigged up a sling so that they could carry them to their nest. Sandy has told me that the two eggs in your nest will be hatching in a couple of days.”

“That is such good news,” Tyrion tells her. “I thought that they had been lost forever as a result of the raid and our failure to recover them.”

“You get some rest while Sandy and Heidi tends to the nest,” Raganor orders Tyrion. “We’ll leave first thing in the morning to go to your rookery. You can ride in the bow of my Longboat.”

It is morning as the bandages are changed on the two wounded dragons. “You are healing up nicely” Jennifer tells Tyrion. “In a couple of days, you should be healed up enough to no longer need the bandage on your leg. Lisa’s shoulder wound is looking a lot better as well.”

Tyrion is able to walk to the dock with less of a limp as the longboat crew helps him get into the seat prepared for him near the bow. “I’m going to owe everyone a ride for your crew giving me one back to the rookery.” he tells them.
“Helping us defeat our enemy was reward enough,” Eric tells him.

The fleet sets sail with Tyrion in the lead to steer them to the rookery location. Several other dragons fly ahead to ensure the rookery that friends are coming to help in their move.

Reaching the rookery by noon, Eric finds that the dragons remaining there have moved to the beach. Logan, along with several other Vikings that flew ahead on dragons, have already constructed a temporary dock. Eric’s longboat has beached nearby so that Tyrion can talk with the dragons there and help supervise the move.

Everything goes smoothly as each longboat pulls alongside the temporary dock and gets loaded with nests and young dragons. With the Viking wives and their children on board to interact with the young dragons, all the newcomers soon settle down accepting that they are not going to be harmed. It takes about an hour to load all the longboats which soon sets sail back to the village. The adult dragons are flying escort with the fleet. The young dragons are soon enjoying the unusual ride and attention of the Viking families on board. The fleet reaches the docks by late afternoon where the Longboats unload their unusual cargo. By evening, all the nest and youngsters have been relocated to their new homes.

It is quite a morning the following day with some 40 additional dragons joining the flock already living at Eric’s Viking Fishing Village. It looks like more of a dragon rookery along the south side of the dock area as nest now occupy the perimeter of the village at that location. Eric’s men and teen have taken up the task of building a new fence to secure the nesting area from predators and possible raiders. The dragons there are helping out with ferrying materials down from the nearby forest in that construction. This Viking village is becoming a dragon village as there is now a dragon to pair up with all of the men living there with older youngsters paring up with the teens. Even Lisa has found a Viking friend to be with her.

It is the following day when the two eggs hatch in Tyrion’s nest. Lisa is so happy to have her youngster with a friend as Tyrion’s egg also has hatched under Sandy’s care. Lisa’s shoulder wound has healed up enough where she is able to make short flights from the nesting area. Tyrion is now able to make short flights as is injured leg is getting stronger.

That afternoon, there is a surprise visit by Alexander and Jerrie on their two dragons. They are met by Eric and Jennifer. “Where did you find all of the new dragons?” asks Jerrie.

“Tyrion decided that they should move in with us,” answers Eric. “We helped him move the rookery using the longboats. They are proving to be so enjoyable to be with in spite of their bad experience with Rollo’s raiders. We even rescued Lisa who survived 24 hours swimming in the sea. Her egg was the orphan egg in Tyron’s nest.”

“That is remarkable.” answers Draco. “She has to be as brave as Hilda when she tried to protect Jerrie from the Thornys.”

“From the time that we raised Hilda from a stolen egg, I never dreamed that so many of our children would ever have a young dragon friend to grow up with along with their parents.” Eric tells him.

“We all have Dr. Croft and Farrell to thank for the friendship that they formed which led to the turn of events for having all of the dragons becoming our friends.” answers Alexander. “How is Tyrion doing?”

“His leg is nearly all healed up.” reports Raganor. “I’m going to take him up on his offer to give me a ride tomorrow.”

“Go for it,” answers Alexander. “Take your wife and Sandie along with you. Hilda and Jerrie can babysit with Lisa if you need them to.”

Logan and Terry have joined the group for the evening. Have you ever been back to your homeland since you were kidnapped by Rollo’s raiders?” Alexander asks him.

“No,” he answers.

“Where is your homeland located?” Alexander asks him as he lays out a map of the known world. Logan shows him the location on the map. “That distance is quite doable using dragons to fly there. Do you think that any of your family members are still living there?”

“I don’t know,” Logan answers.

“We should plan a flight out there in the morning,” answers Raganor. “Tyrion, do you think that you are strong enough to fly such a distance with me riding on you?”

“Get on me and I’ll let you know” Tyrion tells him.

Raganor gets up on Tyrion for the first time to ride him. They take off on a flight with Sandie following. They fly a circle around the village as Raganor flies with him in a gentle climb, then puts him through some flight maneuvers that includes some strong climbs, sharp turns, and dives to test Tyrion’s flying abilities.

“You did quite well,” Raganor tells him as they land back by Alexander and Draco. “You’re in better shape then I would have expected from recovering from such a nasty leg injury. You are more then ready to make that long leisurely flight tomorrow to Logan’s homeland.”

“That was very enjoyable,” Tyrion tells him. “You are a good human to have become friends with.”

It is early morning when ten dragons assemble to make the flight to Logan’s home world. Alexander with Draco, Hilda, and Jerrie has joined the others for the trip. Tyron, his new mate, Raganor and his wife are flying on them. Logan on Terry is in the lead. His mate does not have a rider but has been fitted with a backpack to carry supplies for an overnight stay. Four other dragons from the Draco flock have come along with their new human friends from the viking fishing village.

It is a long flight across the sea that takes all morning before land is sighted. It resides far beyond where Tyrion’s flock had been living. The terrain is mostly temperate forest and open grasslands that are above on the chalk cliffs that outline it with the sea. An old church with the remains of a village sits crumbling on the edge of the chalk cliff. It shows damage from a raid that took place long ago. The ten dragons land next to it to rest from the long flight they have just made.

“What happened here?” Alexander asks Logan.

“This place was ransacked ten years ago by Rollo’s raiders,” answers Logan. “At 12, I was kidnapped and made a slave of his vikings.” It is at that moment that Draco warns the group that they are being watched by a large flock of dragons with armed riders on them.

[rpicardi1]

Chapter 23. The Land of the Celtic.

 

“Stand down,” orders the clan leader Montgomery in Celtic as he sees that the nine riders with the ten dragons by the destroyed Abby are unarmed with women and female dragons among them. “Danny, fly out with me so we can see what they are doing here.”

“Hold your ground,” orders Alexander as the two dragons fly in with their riders. They come in to land facing the ten dragons as Tyrion, Terry, and the two stranger dragons start talking to each other.

“Tyron, do you know these dragons?” asks Raganor.

"Yes,” answers Tyrion. “They are members of our flock that split off from us 15 years ago”

“What an unexpected turn of event,” answers Raganor in surprise.

“You have wild dragons as your friends,” Montgomery answers in astonishment after listening to the conversation between Tyrion, Terry, and his two dragon friends. “I thought that we were the only clan that had ever became friends with the wild dragons.”

“It is a long story how we made friends with Tyrion’s and Draco’s flock,” answers Raganor. “How did you become friends with these dragons?”

“We discovered that we both had the same language shortly after the Viking raiders destroyed the Abby,” reports Montgomery. “We found their rookery up in the hills and decided to pay them a visit. They decided to become our friends after Danny and I conducted peace talks with them. Rollo had attempted to raid their rookery for eggs. We offered to help protect their rookery from Rollo’s raiders. What brings you out here?”

“Logan is looking for survivors of the Abby raid where he was captured as a slave by them,” answers Alexander.

“I do remember him when I was 14,” reports Danny. “Logan, is that actually you? How did you manage to get away from the Viking Raiders that had captured you?”

“I was able to escape when they attempted to raid Eric’s fishing village,” answers Logan. “When I saw my dragon friend Terry among the dragons that had came to the defense of the village, I jumped ship in the confusion and swam to shore. Eric accepted me into their clan when he saw me ride in on Terry.”

“That is a remarkable story,” answers Danny. “What caused that scar on Tyrion’s Leg?

“Several days ago, Rollo’s forces raided Tyrion’s rookery for eggs,” reports Raganor. “They managed to get away with eight of them as Tyron’s flock gave chase. He was hit by a crossbow turret bolt in the leg. It was a most painful injury to take care of. He was so frightened of us at the time when he and his injured friends landed by our village. It is only now that he has recovered enough for me to ride on him. He has turned out to be a great friend.”

“Four other dragons from his flock that were giving chase were shot out of the sky by Rollo’s raiders. Only Lisa survived by swimming all night towards our fishing village. The other three dragons died from their injuries in the sea. We were later able to recover all of the stolen eggs for them. Their mothers and foster mothers are now raising the young at our village.”

“That is remarkable,” answers Montgomery. “What ever happened to the raiders?”

“Rollo made the mistake of attacking our village after dark.” answers Raganor. “He figured that we would have all been sleeping after driving him away in disgrace with the show of force when his fleet first showed up. We and our dragon friends were waiting for his raid to take place during the night. With the help of Terry, Logan was able to kill Rollo when he tried to escape the battle by hiding in a cave. As most of Rollo’s forces were killed in that raid when we ambushed them with the dragons, it’s going to be a long time before they are ever a threat again.”

“That is really good news,” reports Montgomery. “The rest of our dragon friends will be happy to hear that the threat of raids to their nest is now over.”

“Do you know if Rollo was ever able to successfully steal any eggs from your dragon friends?” asks Raganor.

“I don’t know,” answers Montgomery. “Why do you ask?”

“Rollo may have been trying to raise a flock of dragons loyal to his raiders,” answers Raganor. “He knows that is is possible to raise a dragon from a stolen egg. He knows that we were able to do just that with Hilda.”

“Now I know why he was trying to steal as many dragon eggs as he could find,” answers Montgomery. “Can you imagine how devastating a dragon flying force would be for raiding other settlements?”

“Rollo’s raiders found that out when they tried to raid our village during the night,” answers Raganor. “We should probably pay a visit to his settlement to see if anyone there is raising dragons from stolen eggs.”

“Tyrion, have any of the eggs from your rookery ever been successfully stolen?”

“Not that I am aware of,” answers Tyrion.

“None of our eggs have been successfully stolen either,” answers Maxamus, the dragon Montgomery is riding on.

“Logan?”

“If he was raising egg tames, it was kept well hidden from us slaves,” answers Logan.

“We should still pay them a visit just to be sure that they aren’t raising a flock of dragons for raiding,” answers Danny.

“If we do so, we want to be very careful,” reports Raganor, “Their longboats have crossbow turrets on them that are capable of taking out a flying dragon. They could have the same weapons protecting their settlement.”

“How far is it from here to their settlement?”

“They are about three hours of flight time from here to the North,” answers Montgomery. “We have been over to their island but since we had to be hidden from his sentry outposts, we never got a good look inside the main compound.”

“We should check out their settlement while they are at their weakest,” answers Raganor. “There will never be a better time to do so then now.”

“Come spend the night in our village,” Montgomery tells everyone. “We would like to exchange stories about your experience with your dragons the past several days. Lets plan to observe the raiders village in the morning and go from there.”

It has been quite a night of stories with the dragons as even they are exchanging stories with each other and their human friends.

“What are we going to do if we find egg tames in Rollo’s village?” asks Montgomery.

“It will depend on their age and behavior towards us,” answers Raganor. “I would like to be able to return them back to their home flock if at all possible. The last thing I want to do is to be forced to kill any of them.”

“Lets see what tomorrow’s recon mission finds out,” answers Montgomery.

That following morning, a recon party is put together from the ten dragons of Maxamus flock with the nine riders and ten dragons with riders from Tyron’s flock.

Making the three hour flight across, they land up on the rugged cliffs overlooking the village. Using spotting scopes, the village is scanned for defenses and any signs of anything unusual. “I see harbor defenses,” reports Montgomery. “There are crossbow turrets on the village ramparts as well. Nothing from here that indicates that they might be raising a dragon.”

“I see nothing different from when I was last in the village,” reports Logan.

“Don’t move or I will flame you!” Terry suddenly warns the stranger that he has detected spying on them. His mate Sally has flanked the stranger with the same warning.

“I surrender,” the young Viking lady tells Terry in Celtic.

“She has an egg tame nearby,” warns Sally.

“I’m scared!” something in the bushes whimpers nearby.

“Come out into the open before we flame the bushes,” orders Tyrion. The Viking lady comes out with a dragon about her size with it’s head trying to hide in her chest.

“Don’t hurt him!” she asks her captors as her young dragon is crying in fear.

Sally goes over to the frighten two checking out the young dragon. He is not quite two years old being the size of a 12 year old human child. “Do no harm to this dragon child,” she announces. “He has not been corrupted.”

“How did you manage to keep this egg tame hidden from Rollo?” asks Logan.

“It wasn’t easy,” Vickie tells him. “Rollo was so obsessed with forming a dragon army that he was raiding rookeries all around his territory for eggs. With the help from my friends, I managed to hide this one from him when we were able to convince him that it has spoiled.”

“Does Rollo have any more egg tames?” asks Montgomery.

“No,” answers Vickie. “Rollo found it to be extremely difficult to tell when there would be eggs ready for stealing from a rookery.” By now, the young dragon is no longer crying in fear as he is calming down in the presence of the adult female dragon. Vickie’s two friends that have been helping her raise the young dragon, have been rounded up and are soon introduced to the recon flight. Soon, there is a warning that they may have been spotted by the other villagers.

“We had better get out of here,” warns Raganor.

“How are we going to get him back without a longboat?” asks Logan. “There is no way a dragon that young can fly such a long distance.”

“I can carry him if someone will help hang onto him,” Sally tells him. “Besides, he needs a dragon mother.” Laying down, the young dragon is lifted up to lay on Sally’s neck by her shoulder as Vickie volunteers to fly back on her. She makes a short flight to confirm that the arrangement is going to work, then the entire patrol takes off heading back to Montgomery’s village. They make the long flight back with no issues other then a very tired Sally from carrying double.

“Thank you for rescuing Daniel from Rollo’s raiders.” Vickie tells everyone.

“One of the dragons can take you back in the morning,” Raganor tells her.

“No,” answers Vickie tells him. “I cannot go back. I will be killed once Rollo’s Vikings find out that I helped you rescue Daniel.”

“You can stay with us,” Logan tells her. “We’ll find us a longboat in the morning to bring you two back to the fishing village where I am now living.”

“That is most kind of you,” she tells Logan. “It looks like that Daniel’s new foster mother likes him. “Doesn’t she have a child of her own?”

“She lost her egg to a predator a year ago,” Logan tells Vickie. “As it takes five years before a dragons can lay anther egg, becoming a foster mom has made her very happy. You are the first person that she has ever let ride on her. You may have just found yourself a new dragon friend as well.”

“That would be so wonderful,” Vickie tells him. “Sally had quite a conversation with me asking all kinds of questions on how I was able to raise Daniel after we hatched him.”

It is that following morning that a longboat with volunteers from the Celtic Village, has been outfitted with a platform for Sally to ride in with her new foster child. Vickie rides with them as Raganor and Logan also man the longboat. The rest of the dragon patrol fly back to the fishing village with Terry staying to fly escort. They arrive at the fishing village by evening.

[rpicardi1]

Chapter 24, Ten Years Later.

 

It is Spring of 2030. The world is slowly returning to normal as a result of a bitter world war that had erupted between the forces of good and evil. It had been a bitter wake up call to the sleeping people of the Western World to the threat that Radical Islam had created world wide. That war was launched worldwide by a coordinate series of attacks on September 11, 2024. It had mostly been a nasty uncivil war involving the military, the National Guard, law enforcement, and local hastily formed militias as the fighting against the radical religious terrorist has erupted everywhere. There had been a nuclear exchange between Iran and Israel, another between India and Pakistan. Several Terrorist smuggled in nuclear warheads have been set off in various port cities around the world. China has had to put down a major Islamic rebellion in it’s country in spite of it’s past effort to contain the Islamic threat by rounding up it’s believers by the millions. There was also a short lived nuclear war in Korea. The city of Mecca is vaporized by a suitcase nuke. Still, much of the worldwide fighting had been of a Civil War nature within the countries as the believers of The Religion of Peace, that infiltrated into the countries through encouraged illegal immigration, then sheltered in the Sanctuary Cities by the bleeding heart Progressives, had launched their attacks in those countries worldwide.

The elections of 2024 has taken place in spite of the country being involved in a bitter most uncivil war. It has been a most difficult time for voting due to the violence taking place in the Sanctuary cities, the 24 hour martial laws making it difficult for voters to reach their polling place, the censoring of news both by the Socialist loving news media trying to influence the voters and the social media providers that were censoring the post of millions of their subscribers, and the massive voting fraud that soon surfaced in Democrat location causing their candidates lose big everywhere. Eventually, it all gets sorted out although the inauguration of President Pence had been threatened by the numerous lawsuits financed by that same aging billionaire and the Hollywood elite, who’s illegal activities are eventually exposed resulting in numerous arrests for treason. This uncivil war finally ends by 2026 as the inner city purge gets complete, the military moves in using high tech killer drones to eliminate the last pockets of terrorists activity, the surviving leaders are executed or deported to Gitmo, and their surviving enforcers get locked up in hastily reopened mothballed prisons.

It had been a costly uncivil war with the populations of most major cities being all but wiped out by the violence as local law enforcement, the National Guard, and an army of armed volunteers from the suburbs have formed a defensive ring to confine the rioters to their urban neighborhoods. Mostly, those rioters end up completing the destruction of their neighborhoods as they lose their mobility due to a gasoline shortage, then fighting each other for any remaining food, drugs, ammo, and gasoline.

As a whole, the smaller towns and rural areas of the country, has been spared the worst of the violence. Between local law enforcement and an armed population, any terrorist activity in the suburbs and rural areas has been quickly put down with deadly force. Basic services and overall food distribution gets slowly restored as the residents of those areas work together to become self sufficient. Barter becomes the new currency in those communities given that all electronic forms of money are suddenly unavailable with cash being in short supply. Overall, the world ends up losing half of it’s population in this brutal war of Armageddon.

As the economic crisis caused by the war gets sorted out, 2030 has found the country to be in the beginning of an economic boom far greater then what occurred at the end of WW2. Large areas of the destroyed inner cities, that were not destroyed by a nuclear weapon, are being turned into new economic zones of growth as they are first mined for recoverable resources, cleared, and rezoned to encourage construction of a modern urban center which combines specialized manufacturing, luxury apartments, shopping centers, and produce agriculture, much of it accessible on foot or by battery powered transport.

It is during the spring of 2031, at the end of graduation, that Dr. Rogers calls for a meeting with Dr. Croft, Joe, Tod, Sarah, and Mary Reeves. Dr. Sanders has long ago retired and moved to Florida. “Yesterday, Professor Narcy has informed me that the Stargate at the dig site has become active again. He and Helena have been able to visit the land of the two suns. You have been invited to return there to visit your friends and document the changes that have taken place since your last visit.”

“That’s wonderful,” Dr Croft tells her husband. “I can’t wait to see Farrell and his Egyptian friends again. When do we leave to go see them?”

“You will be picked up here next Tuesday at 10AM by the airport limo.” reports Dr. Rogers. “Bring your cameras and a change of clothes. Professor Narcy has informed me that everything else will be provided for. Unlike your last trip, I will be attending the expedition with you. I’m looking forward to seeing your dragon friends.”

The trip to Egypt goes by private charter as before. Landing in Cairo, the city is in a rebirth as it’s ruined sectors are being rebuilt into a modern community with large areas of irrigated cropland. Like many Arab countries, nearly 3/4th of it’s population had been wiped out in the unholy war of Armageddon.

The next day, the trip is made to the dig site by special charter. It now has several permanent installations along with a paved runaway for aircraft. A private security company headed by a retired Coronal Arafat provides protection for the installation. The temple that has been covered with a permanent tent like structure to protect it from the hot sun. A small oasis has been established using the water from the buried river for irrigation. About a dozen researchers from around the world have been working at the site the past couple of years in secret. Pioneering adventurers have also become part of those expeditions. It is all supported by the anonymous donor with Ahab and Cleo being placed in charge of the study of the temple, its artifacts, and the new world beyond.

“We were fortunate to have escaped the fighting that took place thanks to the remoteness of this location,” reports Ahab as he takes everyone on a tour of the temple village. “As you can see, we have become nearly self sufficient being able to grow most of our food in this new oasis. Much of this independence we have to thank our Egyptian friends from the land of the two suns. They have helped us set up our farming operation along with the exchange of pioneers that have taken up the challenge of living in a new world.”

“I thought that the Stargate had remained inactive until now?” asks Dr. Rogers.

“That has been the official report,” answers Ahab. “We have been in contact with our Egyptian friends there since the war ended. We obtained free use of the Stargate in the spring of 2027. In addition, we have found the addresses to seven other worlds in addition to the one of the two suns.”

“The first world we were able to visit was where Alexander and Jerrie took their honeymoon. It is a land similar to the fictional world of Pandora. It has a beautiful tropical island jungles inhabited by colorful friendly dragons that wear crystal bonnets. To it’s west is an expanse that looks like the floating mountains of Pandora. Another area has huge trees growing in there. In spite of the paradise feel of this land, there are areas that we have had to avoid that are extremely dangerous to even the dragons that live there.”

“The second world we saw we gave the name of Extinction. It is a world where the advanced race of beings living there went extinct. It is dominated with huge ruins of several cities with a dome protecting it. The surrounding wastelands are extremely hazardous due to the heat, radiation, meteor showers, and corrupted creatures that attack anything on sight. So far, we have explored two other biodomes containing some very unusual creatures living in them. We also found a massive cave system with unusual plant and animal life living protected inside it. As the planet is tidally locked, there is constant daylight where we have explored with constant weather. Eventually, we may launch an expedition to explore other parts of that world but we will need to use mechanical transport for our protection against the heat, cold, and corrupted creatures. Given that there is no way to stargate the vehicle needed there, it will have to be sent there in segments and assembled on the site.”

“The third world we have been to we have called Thieves. It is a water world of numerous islands of various sizes. Many most unusual creatures live there along with several terrifying fantasy ones. The human society there is dominated by several clans of pirates straight out of those Pirates of the Caribbean movies. Their life is that of exploration, building settlements, and creating trading outposts on the islands they discover. They have managed to tame most of the unusual creatures that live on them, but they tend to get involved in battles over claims on their occupied islands. Interesting is that among their 16th century technology are some 18th century Steampunk style inventions. One of the clans has a Jules Verne style submersible for exploring the deep ocean where they have found an Atlantis style city. Another has a huge flying airship they use for exploration. Still another clan has built torpedoes they have used to sink rival galleons. All have a common enemy known as ‘The Damn.’ They are ghost of the past that attack their ships at sea, defend buried treasure, and guard a Fountain of Youth.”

“A fourth world is one we called Scorch Earth. It is a desert badlands with areas of desert much like you see around here. Several of the same creatures found in the land of the two suns also live there. The dragons there are aggressive having been treated badly by the emperor of the now abandoned desert city. Nomads are currently living off of the land given that the original inhabitants of that empire were killed during a great earthquake and volcanic eruption that is responsible for the present conditions on that world. The sand desert is extremely dangerous due to the giant sand worms that inhabit those area. Vicious sand and electrical storms can blow up suddenly. The sand storms sap one’s strength while the electrical ones disable all electronic and electrical equipment. The mega heat waves are the worst. One of our exploration parties lost most of it’s members to heat stroke with the survivors suffering from brain damage and second degree burns over the exposed areas of their bodies. The temperature in that one registered 75*C.

“A fifth world that we found we called Frozen. It looks similar to our Earth with the abandoned cities containing huge skyscrapers and ghetto neighborhoods. It looks like that the residents attempted to move underground when an ice age froze their world. No one survived the freezing extinction that followed. There are many strange and unusual creatures living there along with mechanical bots roaming both on the surface and below in the ruins. Another planet with an ocean and atmosphere dominates the sky at night. We do not know if it is inhabited or not.”

“A sixth world is one of vast open plains, steamy jungles, huge swamps, rugged badlands, a vast desert, and a frozen mountain arctic where the temperature can drop to -60* C. No humans inhabit this world at present, yet we have seen horses and sheep roaming in flocks in the grass highlands. There are numerous ruins of castles and other structures indicating that this world was once inhabited by a sizable society of midevil age humans. There are dragons living there along with a species that uses a freeze attack to stun their prey. The reason that the sheep and horses can thrive with the dangerous predators we have seen there is because the dragons are managing those flocks and herds. We also found a creature that cannot exist, yet it does. It is half eagle and lion, a Griffon. We have no idea how they can thrive given that the ones we have captured are neither male or female. Given that we have observed unicorns among the horses, this world remains a mystery waiting to be solved.”

“A seventh world we have sent pioneers to it to inhabit an island where we found signs of the previous inhabitants that were recently wiped out by some toxic material that they ingested from the giant crabs found living there. They have been able to deal with the crab threat. They are only just exploring that world using some of the ships that have been found tied up to the dock and repaired. They have found their livestock roaming on that island. They plan to explore the adjacent islands as soon as they get established a camp in that village in this 1700s styled world.”

“Farrell, what are you doing here on this side of the Stargate?” asks Dr. Croft in surprise as a familiar dragon flies in landing next to her with a young man in Egyptian garb riding on him.

“Helena told me that you were coming to visit,” Farrell answers. “She told me that it was safe for me to come into this world to see you. She says that we cannot be picked up on your radar or infrared detectors.”

“I so missed you,” she tells him as he gets a big hug from her. “Who is the young man riding on you?”

“I’m Clarence from Ramsey’s village,” the young man answers. “I’ve been working with Farrell ever since you had left my world. He is a most wonderful dragon friend. We wanted to see what was out in this world, but so far, it is just endless sand beyond this oasis.”

“You were right when you told me that this was not a friendly world,” Farrell tells Dr. Croft. “There is nothing out there but endless sand.”

“Actually, had you flown far enough East, you would have reach signs of our civilization,” Sandra tells him. “That would have not been a wise thing to do. You would have placed yourself and this installation in extreme danger had the rest of our world found about your existence and this place. When we have the time, I will show you some video of the better places of my world.”

“I’m sorry if I have placed everyone in danger,” Farrell answers.

“No harm done,” Sandra tells him. “You would have had to flown all day to the East before you would have reached the Nile River and the edge of our civilization.”

Dr. Rogers is standing there in shock as he watches the physical and verbal exchange between Dr. Croft and her dragon friend.

“Farrell is the dragon that made our visit the success that it was,” report Dr. Croft as she introduces Farrell to him. “He made it possible to end the war between them and the humans living in their world.”

“You are exactly what Dr. Croft has told me about you,” answers Dr. Rogers. “I’m still in awe that you exist for real.”

“Come back with me to see my family,” Farrell tells them.

“As soon as we get unpacked, we will make the trip through the Stargate,” Sandra tells him. “I can’t wait to see Freida and your children.”

“When you have unpacked, gather at the entrance to the Stargate Temple,” Ahab tells everyone.

“We’re going to head back to the village so we can let everyone know that you will be visiting soon,” Clarence informs the group.

Unpacked in their village accommodations, the group assembles at the temple with their research recording devices. Ahab gives everyone a quick orientation of what it is like in the land of the two suns before they proceed to the Star Chamber. “Do we still have net service in Ramsey’s world,” Mary asks Ahab.

“Yes, we have up to date secured service via the Stargate,” answers Ahab. “We still have the apps available through the Keepers of that world.” With that info, everyone enters the Star Chamber where the gate is activated and they step through into the chamber on the other side where Ramsey’s II and Farrell are there to greet them with their children.