The Enchanted Ruby

The Trip

 That weekend we were having a picnic with the world's best food when I saw words on the ground beside me. Having decided to ignore my dream I read them aloud. Then I noticed something odd. There was that red ball again that we had played with at school, but we hadn't packed it into the picnic basket and I could've sworn it was the same one. Then the world began to warp and darkness fell.

When I woke up I felt like I had been run over by a pickup truck, and I was lying on some grass in the middle of nowhere. Everywhere I looked there was just a sea of grass. I could see the mountains somewhere far off in the distance but they were so far away they looked like they would fit on the tip of my pinky finger. The only things I could see nearby were some wild horses, and my friends.

My friends. Oh god, I hadn't even thought about how they were. I ran over to the nearest body, it was Dexter's. He seemed to be okay, with no obvious injuries and his body was relaxed. I'd read somewhere that it meant that the person was having a pleasant dream. Next, I ran over to Kendra and Zoe's bodies. For some reason, they'd spawned beside each other. Kendra was like Dexter, but Zoe seemed to be waking up.

"Zoe!" I whispered-shouted in an attempt to wake her up without disturbing Kendra.

"Ummm," was all she said though. I sighed sitting on my knees. I had been hoping that she could help me with this. Next, I tried Carter, he woke up almost instantly.

"What?" He said looking around. Then a smile appeared on his face. "Yes!" He shouted. "It worked! We're here!"

I couldn't help but feel confused by his reaction. "What do you mean we're here?" I asked him." Now it was his turn to stare at me. " What do I mean? I mean that we're back where we were born! You see the day Mom and Dad died, I found a message to grandpa from mom. It said that she missed him and that though she wished she could come back, she had lost the Enchanted ball. After that, I started getting dreams about that red ball we had been playing with at school!" He looked like he had discovered Grandma's secret ingredient.

"Uh Carter, sorry to break your bubble but I think that we lost the red ball," I said, feeling grim.

"Why would we want to leave? Think about it, Levi! We've found a whole new world! We might finally solve the mystery of what happened to mom's parents! Our grandparents! The ones we never knew and mom said had died in a fire even though they have no tomb in the family graveyard and there hadn't been any fires that year!" He didn't seem to care that we might never see grandma and grandpa again.

"What are you guys talking about?" A voice said from behind us. When we turned around there was Dexter, Kendra, and Zoe looking like they had just gone through a tornado.

"Nothing," I said. At this Zoe stared at me as if I was crazy. But Dexter and Kendra just shrugged, which I appreciated.

"Come on. Let's look around. Maybe we'll find some clues as to why we're here." Dexter said, looking uneasy. At this, the group scattered searching for clues. At one point Kendra found some clothes and supplies in an underground home that seemed abandoned, and another when Carter found some saddles, bridles, horse riding gear, and rope. Which we used to tie up the wild horses to a tent peg Carter had in his jacket pocket. But that was all, and by then the sun was beginning to set and we were all hungry. So we looked through the house, decided we could stay here for the night, found some cold sandwiches, salad, and juice, set our sleeping area, ate dinner, went to the washroom, brushed our teeth, showered and got into bed.

That night I dreamed of the voices again. Except that this time, I could see these blurry figures.