Book 6 - Mystery of Shadow Mountain - Chapter 23: Good Day, Good Night

         Sleep.  It is a thing that is often over looked but is needed to function.  A viking cannot go long without sleep before it becomes detrimental to them.  For me, sleep is no problem.  Even if I get several hours of sleep I would still be tired.  Then when I get half that amount of sleep, I sometimes feel as though when I wake up that I slept for a whole day, well rested, and ready to tackle the day.  Also, when I am asleep, it is extremely difficult to wake me up.  There had been many occasions where I slept through raging storms, heated feuds, and even dragon attacks.  Often did I find myself looking through my room in my room back on Berk, with a few times it being on fire.  But merely shrugging if off and covering back off with my blanket.  I knew that if I was in any danger, my mother would make sure that I would be up.  Either that, I would get it in the rib by one of my sisters if it was anything else.  Once I am able to get to sleep then I am fine.

         Reason I say all of this is because the time of the season that it is: The Midnight Sun.  I am fine.  However, now that we are a little over halfway through the two weeks, I find that I think I am the only one that is fine.

         Waking up to a bright, sunny clear day, at least I think it is morning though I think I slept in and it is closer to lunch than breakfast, I find Mystery very still.  No movement.  No birds chirping.  No dragons flying around just my stomach growling.  Funny thing is I did not smell any food when I woke up.  Checking the kitchen, it has not been touched since last night.

         “Now this is a mystery on Mystery,” I said to myself out loud.

         Going further I check everyone’s huts.

         After checking the last one, Garth’s, I say, “Empty.  Where is everyone?”

         I then job up to the stables to check there.  A few minutes, I enter the stables to find only one dragon inside: Fredrick.  Being happy to see me I open the pen, saddle my dragon, lead him out, mount up, and fly him into the air.  I do stop back at the Clubhouse to put on my bracers along with the one that has my grappling hook.

         Doing a general scan of Mystery’s Edge, I see no activity or movement.

         I tell Fredrick, “Well, this is strange.”

         He snorts and tries to dive down.

         Pulling him back by the reins, I ask, “What is it?  Find something?”

         My dragon then gives more of a sigh than a snort as if to say, “Yeah.  Why else would I try to dive down?”

         With my right hand I lean forward and pat Fredrick’s head three times, signaling to him that he can take over.  As I hunker down into racing position, I hold on as Fredrick basically dives straight down.  Pulling up at the last possible moment before the tops of the trees, my Thunderdrum glides towards the center of the island and sets down on the south side of our Speed Stingers’ main cove.

         Curious as to why my dragon would bring me here, a thought occurred to me, “How do dragons deal with The Midnight Sun, especially a dragon type we don’t really know much about?”

         Now feeling a bit hesitant, I have Fredrick walk forward slowly.  Easing into the cove, I do not see anyone or any dragon.  What I was thinking is that depending on how The Midnight Sun affects Speed Stingers, would the Stingers go on a rampage of sorts and freeze anything in their path?

         The cove is about sixty feet in diameter and is in the shape of a circle.  There are tracks of Speed Stingers leading in and out of the cove and also further into their main cave.  Reaching the cave entrance on the other side, I reach for one of our torches on the cave entrance.  Using my viking made fire starter, I light the torch and enter the cave.

         I tell Fredrick, “That is one downside to having a dragon that cannot breathe fire.”  Fredrick huffed.  “But, at least I won’t forget how to start a fire the old-fashioned way and not.  Besides, anyone can have a dragon that can start a fire.  But does anyone else have a dragon that can literally breathe a fire out?”

         We continue on into the cave keeping an eye out for any Speed Stingers along the way.  Even though they are used to having us around now, when startled or threatened, they will still act like wild Speed Stingers.  As long as you ease up on the ones here on Mystery and just not bother them, they will not bother you.

         I have only been in these caves a couple of times, but not for a while now.  With solving mysteries, one tends to spend more time away from home than exploring one’s own home.  It would probably be wise to spend some more quality time at home to better fortify the island by making sure any access points are well accounted for.  Having Speed Stingers in these caves help, but one Dragon Root arrow from distance would take care of the dragons.

         Still continuing to go further into the caves, I start to notice a few things.  There are markings on the walls.  Back tracking a little bit to see if I missed anything, I return back to where I was, and then going a little further I get the full story.  There are markings of what has gone on this island in generations past, mainly centered around the Speed Stingers, but some vikings have traversed this island in search of a treasure; some of them probably etched these markings.

         Going deeper into the caves still, I come to the secondary cavern where the Speed Stingers hang out.  It has the look of a donut with a hollow column of rock supporting the cavern.  Most of the young Speed Stingers sleep in there.  Nobody home, but that would be strange if we did not have abnormal Speed Stingers.  Our Stingers are not nocturnal but work around the clock and more or less have the same kind of a schedule as your average Deadly Nadder or Monstrous Nightmare.  Frankly, our Speed Stingers are the opposite of nocturnal and can be seen out and about during the night.  But like sane dragons, they will actually go to sleep when it is night.  Now that The Midnight Sun is here, maybe they too see this as an opportunity to get a lot of things done, even in the second week.

         Making the rounds in their cubby holes, I check to make sure all is good and that they do not need care with anything.  The cave does continue on, but if my memory serves me correctly, all it will do is continue going north and then open out into the northside bay.

         Circling around back to where I came in, I then go into the center hollow column.

         Not more than a second that I am in there do I fall through the floor!

         Fredrick calls out to me as I fall with torch in my left hand.  Thinking fast because I know not what is below me, with my right hand I grab for my grappling hook on my left forearm.  Firing the hook into the wall of the hollow column, I press the fire button again to stop letting out line.  My body jerks to a stop, slapping the side of the column wall, and my left hand loses the grip on my torch; I watch as the torch continues tumbling downward.  To my surprise, it falls about twenty or thirty more feet.

         I hear another call from my dragon who starts clawing at something causing some dust to fall down on me, “I am okay, Fredrick.  You need to stop, more of the column may collapse on me,” I yell up to my dragon.

         Between my yelling and the acoustics of the column to magnify my voice, Fredrick heard me and stopped.  Looking down to spot my torch again -oddly enough it is still lit-, I press and hold the catch release button on the side of my grappling hook and slowly lower myself down.  The line lets me go down far enough that I am within three feet of the bottom.  With my grapple at the end of its Gronckle Iron chain, I combo pressing the fire and catch release buttons to let go of the chain completely so I could fall to the bottom.

         Taking in my surroundings, I see that I am in a somewhat narrow but long cave tunnel.  As if by themselves, a line of torches out of nowhere catch fire and light fills the room.  I then see at the other end of the tunnel is a pedestal with something on it with a light showing down on from above.

         There are several blocks, walls, ledges, and bridges spanning a gap of about fifty feet.  To my surprise again, all of the blocks and such start moving in random directions, but always in a back and forth motion.

         Rubbing my hands together, I say to myself out loud, “Shall we play, ‘Cross the river and don’t fall in.’?”

         I climb up on a block that is not moving and look at what I have to deal with.  Taking a minute to plot my path across, I study the moving sections of rock.  There are a few select stacks of rock that are not moving that will help me get across.  I just need to get to each one of them

         As a bridge comes in front of me from the right to the left, I step onto it.  It continues to my left and I climb onto the first stack.  Seeing two ledges going up and down beside me with their flat, long faces point at me, I then spider climb upward.  When I climb the length of them, three feet, I see a platform below me, and the next stack in front of that.  However, there is about a two-foot gab between me, the platform, and the next stack.  But I have to time it when the ledges are at their peak because the platform is moving and is only in front of me when the ledges are at its peak.

         Waiting a few seconds more for the moment, I jump down, and then dive forward, and then perform a somersault roll onto the next group of stacks to absorb the shock of the landing.  This stack is about a three-yard square top with a wall to my left.  There is a ledge up above me to the right.  I am able to stand upright beneath the ledge on the edge of the stacks on the right side.  I run to the wall and wall jump by leaping onto the wall to jump back to my right onto the ledge.

         Now, there are three sets of ledges like before where I will have to spider climb through them.  The trick is that I have to wait as each one lines up with the other one to continue on but also climb downward with each spider step.  I jump into the first one by pressing my hands outwards against the ledges as a lodge my legs on the ledges and then locking my knees to stay upright as I did before.  Moving forward three times, I wait for the next pair of ledges to come.  I reach forward and a tad lower into the next pair then just by my arm strength do I keep myself locked in place as I transition my legs to the new pair of ledges.  When I get to the third pair, I repeat the same process.

         On the forth and final stack, now I simply wall run on a ten-foot wall and jump to the other side, doing a somersault roll to absorb my landing as I did before.

         Finally, I am standing in front of the pedestal.  The spotlight on the pedestal is too bright for me to make out what the prize is.  Whatever it is, it can fit in a breadbox.

         Upon grabbing it, it feels as though it is a small chest.  Out of the darkness, I hear a rumbling noise, followed by the ground shaking, and then the walls starting to crack and then… BOOM!

         Bursting through the wall in front of me is a Catastrophic Quaken rolling at me.  In fear, I run for my life back up the tunnel!

         I run as fast as I have ever run before, but it seems like the faster I run the quicker it catches me.  Moments later it is nearly on top of me.  I yell as if that would make me go faster.  For some reason a wall appears in front of me with an opening down on the bottom near the floor about three feet high.  Running through it is no option, so I slide feet first through the hole and start falling.  Only five feet and roll to keep my momentum forward.  As if the wall did not even exist, the Quaken demolishes.  Three more walls come at me with the same as the first.  After the last slide through and roll, a cliff is in front of me showing down to the ocean.  I have no choice but to jump off the cliff with the Quaken bearing down on my neck.

         I do a beautiful nose dive off the cliff and start falling forward.

         Suddenly, I quickly sit up and wake up screaming.

         Then it hits me, not the Quaken, but where I am and what had happened.

         It was a dream!

         “What’s with you?” a figure to my right which I instantly recognize as my older sister Asvord.

         “Where am I?” I ask her.

         She replies, “You are in your room, stupid.”

         “Huh?” I say, still not believing where I am.

         Asvord goes for a pulley which attaches to a latch that…

         “Ah,” I grunt, as I use both my arms as a shield block the sunlight flooding my room.

         That brought me back to reality as I sat up and put my legs over the left side of my bed.

         “What a dream,” I said.

         “Dream?” Asvord echos.  “You just got in bed!”

         “What?” I question her.

         Asvord rolls her eyes, “I followed you in here, wondering what you were doing, only to find you getting back in bed with no answers as to why you paid zero attention to us for the past couple of hours and what that thing is you brought home.”

         Looking at my sister as if I knew exactly what she meant… I groan and lean back on my pillow, putting my legs in bed, covering back up, and rolling over to face the wall.

         “Oh, come on,” Asvord as I hear something a sound like her slapping her hands on her sides.

         Asvord throws my blankets off of me, and pulls me out of bed, I stand, but she pushes me towards the door, and out of my room.

         Taking my hands, rubbing my face and then shaking my head to wake myself up… I am then greeted with a face full of cold water.

         I stand, motionlessly, looking forward as I see my younger sister running away.

         “Ah, well,” Asvord states.  “That was perfect timing.”
         Taking a deep breath in… and out… …I look at Asvord and state calmly not angry one bit, “What was that for?”

         “Oh, she’s been doing that all day,” Asvord informs.

         Furrowing my brow, I turn to say still in unbelief, “What?”

         Asvord walks over and reaches onto the big table to grab a towel and throw it at me.  Catching it, I start to dry my face off.

         “If you hadn’t realized by now, it is the final days of The Midnight Sun,” Asvord informs me.  “For whatever reason, Elsa thinks everything is on fire, and when she sees it, she has to put it out as quickly as she can by running with her bucket and getting water to put of the so call ‘fire.’  We’ve had to dodge her all day.”

         Now that my face is dry and most of my hair, I let out a quick sigh and inquire of my sister, “What did I bring back and where have I been?”

         “You won’t believe it unless you see it,” Asvord shakes her head.  “Come on,” she waves to me and I follow her out of the Clubhouse.

         She leads me to Annabeth who is holding the same small chest that I had in my dream.

         “Hey, that is-,” I begin to say but Asvord interrupts by continuing my sentence though with a different answer.  “-Is my breadbox!”

         Hesitating for moment, I repeat, “You’re what?”

         “My breadbox,” Asvord says again.  “I have been wondering where I put that all day.  I put the breadbox in a safe place to protect it from the pumans that come out of the wordwork when it is cold and put ice on the bridges when it freezes in the winter after it snows.”

         Asvord proceeds to, with her right hand, grab a piece of bread out of the breadbox, bits into the bread, and turns to walk back to the Clubhouse.

         She, however stops to quip to me, “Why are you perspiring?  I know you are all wet, but don’t sweat it.  I’ll be fine.”

         Asvord taps me on the left shoulder with the back of her right hand, holding the piece of bread, and then walks back into the Clubhouse with breadbox under her left arm.

         “What is that all about?” I ask Annabeth.

         “Oh, it is just that we have hardly had any sleep all week and this is just the sight effects of it,” Annabeth answered.  “We are all affected by it.”

         “You seem alright,” I say.

         “I feel alright, but,” she pauses as she tries to take a step forward but literally falls into my arms.

         I catch her, but look down at the boardwalk and state, “We need to replace these boards, that is the second time.”

         “No,” Asvord shakes her head.  “It isn’t the boards.  I have seemed to have lost all sense of coordination.  Other than that, I think I’m fine.  I am more than fine.  You might say that I fell for you.”  Annabeth chuckles, “Get it?  Because we are in love, I have fallen for you.  Now, I have finally showed it.”

         I could only lift my head to look straight ahead and slowly blink, “Nice pun,” I said with disgust as I walked straight into that without taking a single step.  “I need to go back to sleep and wake up again.”

         “Go back to sleep?!” Annabeth stood up.  “You’ve been sleepwalking all day!”

         This time I really furrow my brow and look at her as if she just denounced corn as the best vegetable of all time, “What?”

         “Yeah,” Annabeth assured me.  “You have sleepwalked the entire day, ignoring all of our efforts to wake you up.  Nothing worked even when we were able to land a few good attempts.  We followed you into the small Speed Stinger cave, walking right by them as if they too did not exist, and jumped around the cave and rolled around the ground, scaring the Stingers in the process, driving them out, and for some reason took the breadbox Asvord was holding and then ran all the way back here to her bed.  And the thing is you had a saddled dragon already but decided against using that.”

         I open my mouth to remark to Annabeth… although nothing came out.  I am too tired to comprehend what Annabeth just said.

         Finally, I shook my head as if a shiver came across me from a cold draft as if I had just gotten out of water.  Then I realized that I am still wet from Elsa’s “present” and so started walking back to the Clubhouse.

         “What I did in my dream was a lot cooler than what you just described,” I told her.  “I am going back to bed to see the end of my dream.”

         “Sweet, or in this case cool dream,” Annabeth waves to me.

         I halfheartedly wave back with my left hand by reaching across my body.  I am legit tired, not so much sleepy but worn out.

         Annabeth adds, “Survive three more days, and then we can finally get some much-needed rest and sleep, then everything will be back to normal.”

         “It isn’t as if I got up out of a perfectly good bed just to go back to sleep.  ‘Wake up!’  ‘What?’  ‘Just wanted to remind you to go back to sleep.’  ‘Oh, thank you for the reminder, I would have never remembered for I was asleep.’”  I talked to myself as if I were two different vikings; I enter the Clubhouse.

         As soon as I got back to my room and started to get back in bed, I asked myself, “What is normal around here?”