The Maze Arena

Chapter Five

Picture of Sarah at the side :)

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

"First of all I will show you the laboratory where we test the plants that have grown on the small islands we have found", said John, who had introduced himself as the lab technician. "plus we test the animals we find, but don't worry we only experiment on them when they are found dead." John walked towards the lab with our teacher and us ten students followed behind.

"Sir?" A blonde haired boy named Alex spoke up from the back, " Why do you experiment on these creatures?"

John turned round to face the group and all of us stopped abruptly banging into each other. Dirty looks were given to the people behind while they turned away sheepishly. John ignored the drama going on and answered the question, "We test them to see how they have evolved to this new enviroment around us and if they have adapted to the sea water. We want to keep up to date on what is happening in the world and if there is any sign of land reforming. Of course we have the small islands but they are too small to be a home to hundreds of people and they are already habitated by the animals who can't live in water. It's all very interesting."

I saw Alex nod his head in understanding then turn back to the room around him, concentrating on how all the technology worked.

"Psst." I twisted my head to Sarah who had whispered in my ear, "Look at what those people are doing in that room over there."

I looked over her shoulder and saw some scientists with a lifeless, strange shaped creature that i had never seen before lying on its side with it's belly split open. While I was staring at the very strange animal, that had a tortoise type shell, huge ears and fins as feet with a spiky tail coming out of the shell at the back, i heard the others gasp or whisper words like "Cool" or just turn their heads away with a disgusted look on their face.

John spotted what we were all looking at and started to walk towards it. "We call this a Torphant, because the shell is like from a Tortoise but the huge ears remind me of an Elephant so we came up with the name Torphant." John smiled proudly like he had just won the most amazing name ever in the world.

"Torphant..." I whispered the name under my breath. It was a very weird name but i understood why they chose it.

"It is very rare we find animals dead, so we mostly experiment on plants which are found easily. The Explorer's go on a mission by giving them co-ordinates on where we think there is an island using satellites, but they are very old so we don't know if they are right or not. There has been a few cases where we had found nothing when the satellite had told us there was land." John looked intently at all of us then walked down the corridor with doors leading off.

Many of the doors were shut, or had "Please do not enter! Strictly private!" signs on the door. I wondered what was behind them. I let my imagination flow from saying there is a dangerous animal or a top secret weapon or a new awesome technology they had made. Suddenly i was snapped awake from my daydream when Lance poked me in the shoulder,

"What are you thinking 'bout sleepwalker?" Lance smirked, "You nearly walked into a wall!"

"What? Oh, just thinking what was behind the shut doors." I shook my head to come back to the present.

Lance looked at me in amusement then turned his head back to John who had taken us to the plant laboratory. We all shuffled into the room keeping close to the door and looked over each other to get a glimpse of what was happening. I peeked between two heads and saw a scientist give a lifeless plant sea water. Instantly the orange and brown leaves turned bright green and healthy and the stem became thicker and stronger. We all watched in awe transfixed to what was happening before us.