Through the Earth

Gold, Ethan, Liam, and I climbed out of the car and walked through the forest to the magical crater. Gold and I discussed her plan last night and don’t know if it will work, but it’s the only way that we can save the world.

Gold and Ethan stepped away from Liam and me. It looked like they wanted to have one more moment together before Gold and I left. I turned to look at Liam, relieved that he fully recovered from the hit.

Liam looked back at me with sorrow. “I wish we had more time together. There are so many things I could have shown you.”

“Don’t worry,” I assured him. “I’ll survive this. And even if I don’t, maybe I’ll see you in heaven.”

“Yeah, but when you succeed, you won’t have a reason to come back here. Your home is...down there. And I’ll be up here.” He was right. The core is my home. Would I really want to give up all my friends that I’ve known for thousands of years? “I...hope that you’ll find your purpose after this.”

“You, too.” I turned to leave, but I had one more thought. “Liam, why did you save me?”

Liam looked down. “I didn’t want to see you hurt, even if you wouldn’t go through as much pain as me. I know it wasn’t the most logical thing to do, but something in my heart told me it was the right choice.”

Before I realized what I was doing, I wrapped my arms around him in a hug, and he hugged me back. “Thank you for being there for me.”

“You’re welcome.” I got on my tiptoes and kissed him on the cheek.

“Goodbye, Liam.” As I let go, I spun around and my human clothes were replaced with my white dress. It was still torn at the bottom but I didn’t care. I walked down to the crater where Gold was waiting. She had also changed into a dress that was gold, good for fighting in, but still fashionable. She looked up at me with a sly smile.

“What?” I asked.

“Oh, nothing. I just think you two are cute.”

“Let’s just start the plan,” I said, irritated. Gold held out her hand to do an enhance spell on me. I felt my magic increase but knew it wouldn’t be permanent. Before opening the portal, I looked back at Ethan and Liam. I waved goodbye, formed a green portal at my feet, and jumped in with Gold.

#

As I fell, I just felt drained, but as we grew closer to the other core, my strength returned bit by bit. The reason I opened the portal was that we would need to open two portals, one to enter the tunnel, and one to exit. Since getting past the crust is easier than getting past the outer core, the person with the weakest magic had to make the first and easiest portal, also known as me. But my magic isn’t strong enough to make a portal all the way on the other side of the crust, so Gold had to enhance my magic.

So far the plan worked and I was able to open my portal. Now all Gold has to do is use her magic to open the portal to the core once she gets within range. Gold told me that she could have opened the portal whenever she wanted, but if she jumped through and didn’t get enough strength back to do a second portal, then she would crash into the outer core and die.

I was really hoping that this would work and kind of regretted doing it, but if I stay on Earth I’m going to die anyway. I noticed a magical light start to grow at the end of the tunnel. I looked over at Gold, who looked to be struggling.

“Come on, do it.” I was panicking, but Gold didn’t hear me because we were going too fast. The light grew closer and I could start to tell that it was coming from a body of magical liquid. It was far away but we probably only had a minute until impact.

Gold looked like she was about to cry. I reached out and tapped her on the shoulder and she looked up. I inhaled and exhaled to symbolize to her that she should relax. Gold closed her eyes and followed my instructions. For a few scary moments, nothing happened and the outer core was getting dangerously close, but in no time at all a golden portal opened below us and we hit a hard floor.

I sat up and looked around as a few strands of green hair crossed my line of sight. I’ve never been so relieved to see my hair.

We were in the room that held the Time Diamond, and lucky for us, it was in its place. Even though it wasn’t a part of the plan, I grabbed it out of its beam. I could use this later, just in case, Gold’s plan doesn’t work.

I turned to Gold and she was really pale, but I knew that being in the core was going to help her regain her strength faster.

“Go,” she said. “Follow the plan and try to find Ruby. You need to convince her to help you.”

“Are you sure this will work? I don’t think Ruby would want to listen to me.”

“That’s because she doesn’t feel loved. You shoved her away and she took that personally.”

“I was wrong.” I exhaled nervously. “Maybe if I admit that to her, she will join us.”

“That’s the spirit. Now go. She’s the only one that hasn’t turned into a true werewolf that could possibly help you.”

Holding the Time Diamond, I thought about Ruby and it teleported me to a small, round room with no furniture. Ruby was standing there in her werewolf form, staring out of the only window.

“Ruby.” I spoke softly so I wouldn’t startle her too much.

“Emerald! I took you to Earth. Nobody has seen you in a week. Did I get the coordinates wrong? Queen Silver will destroy me along with the others if I mess this up.” She sounded angry, but there was fear in her voice.

“I did go to Earth, but I came back.” I took a step forward, but Ruby inched away from me.

“There is something I need to say. I’m sorry for how I treated you for all those years. I shut you out because I was tired of doing the same thing every day and no one understood. Not you, Sapphire, or anyone. I shut everyone out, but the only one that noticed was you because you are persistent. Will you ever forgive me?”

Ruby thought for a moment, and I wasn’t sure if I should be excited or nervous since she was using her poker face. To my surprise, she jumped forward and gave me the biggest hug she’s ever given me.

“That’s what I needed to hear. Last night, Sapphire was turned into a werewolf and at first, it didn’t faze me, but then Silver started taking all of the goddesses that were trapped in conceal spells and turned them into werewolves. She said that they were weak and deserved to die with everyone else, and it made me rethink everything she did. I don’t know how I didn’t see it before, but Queen Silver is evil. I can’t stop her on my own, but maybe with your help we can do something.”

“Even better,” I said. “Queen Gold is here and is going to help us take down Queen Silver. We will need her if Silver is going to be backed up by all the werewolf goddesses.”

Ruby turned to look out the window. “Actually, the goddesses won’t be a problem. Look.” She pointed out of the window and I could see a rainbow of werewolves standing in perfect lines. “Silver is in the process of getting full control of them, and they’ve been frozen like that since.”

“Don’t worry. Gold and I have a plan.”