To The Rescue?: Part Three

     ~*~*~*~

There were three things I knew:

     1. Jet and I are deep inside the same ruby mine that Gargrall had used six years earlier to enslave petpets.

     2. There are a lot of dangerous things, fatal lava, falling stalactites, magma rivers etc.

     3. I was about to fall into a river of flowing lava when suddenly I was saved by the petpet of the Shoyru who was the older brother of the Xweetok who's the reporter that wrote the article of our investigation.

     Confused? Yeah, I would be too. I was falling to my death when suddenly Ello the pink Faellie zoomed out of my arrow case and grabbed my cloak, somehow able to fling me to safety on the cave floor. I met her yesterday and she belonged to the Shoyru, Chris.

     How in Fyora did she end up in my arrow case?

     "Ello?" both Jet and I asked incredulously.

     She flew on top of my head and cooed, "Safe."

     Slowly, I reached my paws over my head and grabbed Ello. "Hey there," I said kindly, "What are you doing here?"

     She stared at me with big black eyes. "I'm here to fight the meanie," she said simply.

     "Jet?" I asked. "You're here to fight Jet?"

     "Yes."

     "Why?"

     "He called me a pipsqueak."

     Jet laughed. "I call 'em like I see 'em, pipsqueak."

     Ello turned at him and growled. I kept my hold on her. "Well, Ello, thank you for saving my life. But how did you get here? Isn't Chris worried about you?"

     She nodded. "I'm sure he is, but no worries about me being in danger, I'm a ninja. I slipped into your backpack when you were through talking to Rachel yesterday. I stayed in your backpack and munched on the cookie you packed, and then when you switched your backpack for your arrow case, I jumped in there." Ello flew out of my grasp and went on my head to glare at Jet.

     He smirked up at her. "So, you only came here to beat me up, eh? Well, bring it on."

     "You two aren't fighting," I commanded. "Is that really why you're here, Ello?"

     "No, it's not the main reason. It's Rachel. She's been so sad about her missing Puppyblew, Max, and I hate to see her so sad. Plus, Max was my friend as well. So I'm here to help you two and to save all the petpets. I can be of assistance, I'm a ninja and a practitioner in magic spells."

     "Yet you're no bigger than my foot," Jet mused.

     She growled again.

     "I don't want to separate you two," I warned. "Alright, Ello. It's clear you have no choice but to help us now, we're too deep in the caves. But please, try and get along with Jet and listen to us when we tell you things. Please?"

     The Faellie nodded. "Fine. But meanie has to promise not to call me pipsqueak."

     I turned to Jet. "Apologize."

     He scoffed. "She called me a meanie!"

     "You're not exactly a basket of roses."

     He crossed his arms. "That's not fair!"

     "FINE!" I yelled. "Ello is sorry for calling you a meanie and you're sorry for calling her a pipsqueak. Okay?" Both of them muttered 'fine' under their breath. "Good," I sighed, "now let's get going, shall we?"

     ~*~*~*~

     "Kurro arananita erro la era!" Ello chanted. Silver sparks shot out of her paws and swirled around the cave, like someone lit a sparkler. I resisted the urge to reach out and touch the bright sparks. All too quickly, the sparks evaporated into thin air and it was dark once again. Ello opened her eyes. "There are petpets, and they're close. We need to turn left."

     Jet and I nodded and we turned left instead of right in the fork of the cave. It didn't take long until we came across another obstacle: rolling stone boulders. If one hit any of us... well, we'd be flatter than pancakes.

     The ceiling of the cave was filled with stalactites (big surprise) and was also low to the ground. If I stood on Jet's shoulders, I'd hit the ceiling. A low ceiling meant the stalactites didn't have much distance to cover when they fell to the ground... which meant we couldn't waste time.

     There was good news with our new surroundings. Snorkles, Babaas, Anubises, Buzzers! All of those poor neopets trying to mine rubies and stay alive! What a nightmare!

     "How are we supposed to get all these petpets back to safety?" I asked Jet. He shook his head as he tried to think. We can't get all these petpets back from where we came, that'll be too dangerous!

     Suddenly Jet snapped his fingers. "We can put them all in this bag!" He took out a potato sack.

      "You're kidding, right?" Ello asked.

     "Jet, all of them won't fit," I told him.

     "Wait! I have a spell to perform so they can!" Ello exclaimed. "I can use my magic so that when we throw the petpets in the bag, it'll be like they're in a room made by a potato sack. It's the storage spell. The petpets will still be safe." I nodded yes. She moved her paws round and round and chanted, "Expollio tara na ka!"

     ...

     ...

     ...

     "Nothing happened," Jet grumbled.

     "Why don't you jump in the potato sack and find out?" Ello challenged.

     "Okay," I said, "I believe you, Ello. Let's start rescuing, shall we?" Jet snatched the sack from me and started maneuvering through the rolling stone boulders. "Be careful!" I shouted to him.

     He smirked. "Whatever, Red." He jumped forward and just missed a flying boulder. Had his long furry tail stayed down, it would have flattened. Okay Sky, watch out for your tail. You can do this. Go!

     I jumped out into the danger zone of the boulders, running right to avoid one. The problem was, some boulders were rolling right; some were rolling left. So because of that, you had to wait for an opening on one side to get to the other. I had to wait for an opening on the left, but that didn't mean boulders weren't coming at me from the right.

     Quickly I leaped left and just missed the boulders from the other side. "Sky! Above you!" Ello cried.

     I didn't need to lift my head up to know a stalactite was coming my way! Left or right? Where's an opening? There! I desperately jumped right into an opening. When I landed, I could feel the ground shake from the stalactite crashing. Wow. This really is dangerous!

     "Help! Help!" a tiny Buzzer pleaded He was small enough to cower between the boulders so he wasn't hit.

     I ran towards him but had to quickly jump back. I waited for the boulder to pass and then hurried and grabbed the Buzzer. "It's okay, little guy, you'll be okay."

     "No, I won't," he sobbed.

     "Don't say that, little guy! You'll be okay!"

     "We're going to get crushed by a stalactite."

     Huh? Oh! "Eep!" I squeaked as I jumped back to avoid another one. "I'm really starting to hate those things," I muttered. I had to hold on to the Buzzer until Jet tossed me the sack, and Jet was occupied with, you know, staying alive and stuff. Only three more rows of boulder dodging to go, and at the end was a small Anubis. "Be brave, little guy!" I exclaimed, and then broke out running to avoid the boulders.

     When I arrived at the Anubis, the little petpet crawled up my shoulders. "Thank you, ma'am!" he squeaked. "You sure are pretty."

     I blushed, not expecting that. "Oh, well, uh, thanks, I guess," I smiled.

     "Hey! Shove them in the sack!" Jet yelled.

     Suddenly the potato sack smacked my face. "Ugh, jealous much," I grumbled. "Okay, little guys, in you go." I gently set the Anubis and Buzzer in the bag. Two down. Who knows how many to go. When I lifted the sack it only weighed a pound. Wow, Ello's spell was convenient.

     Speaking of Ello, she zoomed through the air carrying an Angelpuss, dropping the petpet in the sack. "You haven't seen Max, have you?" she asked.

     "No, I'm sorry," I said. To add encouragement I added, "But that doesn't mean we won't."

     She nodded. "I know. Thanks. Well, back to it." Ello zoomed off again towards a Babaa.

     I looked and saw Jet leaning against the cave wall, where it was safe, catching his breath. Quickly, I ran towards him, and leaned against the wall with him. When he saw me he panted, "Just catching my breath."

     "I know, me too." I held up the potato sack. "I got two, Ello got one."

     He nodded. "I got three."

     "Well, that's six."

     "Thank you, I wouldn't have been able to figure that out," he replied sarcastically. I rolled my eyes. Jet smirked and wrapped his paw around my waist in an embrace. "I have a theory," he said softly. "I don't think Gargrall is behind this. I think someone is recreating the incident after him. I think whoever is behind this, emulates Gargrall and wants to do everything like him."

     His words made sense. "So if that's the case, whoever is behind this wants everything to be the same from six years ago."

     "Right."

     "Does that mean... he's expecting someone to rescue them like Samuel?"

     Jet chuckled. "I don't think he planned on someone figuring him out. Come on Red, let's get to it."

     "Don't call me Red."

     "Whatever, Red." He smirked before jumping on a stone boat rolling along a pool of magma.

     The stone boats were like the boulders; one row went left, one row went right. So, you had to wait until the stone boat was close enough for you to jump on. The danger? If you waited too long to jump, you could smack into the cave wall and fall in the lava. If you jumped and missed, you'd fall into the lava. The stone boats were going at different speeds; some were flowing fast, some were flowing slow, so you had to keep timing in mind. And (of course) the stupid stalactites.

     Jet picked up a Puppyblew, but he was blue, not green, so it wasn't Max. I hoped for Ello's sake we found Rachel's Puppyblew. I jumped onto my first stone boat and nearly lost my balance!

     Careful Sky, careful. I waited until the next stone boat was in front of me and jumped again. Then again. And again.

     A Snorkle was on a stone boat a few rows in front of me. "I'm coming!" I exclaimed. He was shaking vehemently and whimpered in response. I jumped another row and regained my balance. The current boat I was on was flowing slow; I had to wait longer for the next one. All of a sudden, I realized I was out of time! "Look out!" I cried. "Stalactite!"

     The Snorkle wouldn't move! The stalactite from the ceiling pounded down and there was a loud--

     CRASH!

To be continued...