The Emerald Speckled Ring: Part 1

by James
(Sydney, NSW)

This is a story I wrote in 2009.

It is about a boy...

The Emerald Speckled Ring

Jumun was in his father's space shuttle on the way to the new space city. He was eleven years old and born in the year 2173. The new space city was one of five, all of then them being in different galaxies. He was in first class, for his father was the chief designer of the city. He pitied all the other passengers in the standard class.

Then the captain called out, "We are just passing an unidentified planet and I now know the reason why it never showed up on the star charts. It has a high energy source that jams the scanners. If you look out the window you will now see it." Jumun looked out. The planet was covered in a desert, a hostile world for sure."

Then he overheard the captain talking to the co-pilot. "That's strange! The planet is documented as a water planet- 95% water and 5% extreme heat, normal for a planet. But from what I can see the planet is at least 60% desert."

Jumun was puzzled. Then an explosion ripped through the back of the shuttle and all the passengers screamed.

Thinking quickly, Juman made for the escape pods. He opened the hatch and climbed in. The ship vaporized, setting fire to its engines. The pod streaked towards the so called desert planet. Jumun leaped towards the front of the pod to escape the heat of the fire, looking back at the ship, he saw it was gone. Then the pod was hit by the debris of the vaporised space shuttle. Rattling through the atmosphere the pod started to break apart. Luckily for Jumun, the pod suddenly smashed into the ground and threw him out on the sand. He looked up; the heat on the barren world was almost as bad as in the pod. He looked around. There was just endless sand. Jumun turned around and saw the pod. Some bits were still on fire or smouldering. There was no way to get off the planet by the pod. He heard a huge roar and footprints were pushed up in the sand like someone was walking under ground. The footprints came closer and closer, Jumun was getting nervous so he ran until he tripped over a smooth bit of metal lying five meters away. The footprints plonked away and Jumun had a brain wave.

Jumun picked up the piece of metal; it was not burnt or hot. It was also not sharp at the edges. Jumun had just realized that he was standing on a sand mountain; it had a steep slope down to the bottom. He may as well have some fun; he was going to die of thirst in a few days anyway. He sat on the metal piece and pushed off. His toboggan was racing down this mountain like a snake. "Yaaaaaaahoooooo!" he yelled. Meanwhile a drift of sand blew up in his face. "Ahhhhhhhh, my eyyyyyyessssss!" he yelled. Subsequently the piece of metal slipped out from under him, and launched him up into the air. Jumun flew, yelling, eyes closed down the mountain until he felt himself touch the ground, then everything went black.

Jumun woke to find himself lying in the sand. He picked himself up, to find that nearly every bone in his body was sore. Sitting right next to him was the piece of metal. He found that it was cooler on the lower slopes because the sun was not glaring down on him like a pair penetrating eyes. Looking ahead, to his amazement he saw a weather beaten palace. Jumun now knew where the next stop on this tour was: the palace.

Jumun trudged up the final steps to the palace. He had been walking all night and was exhausted and hungry. He had not eaten or drunk since he crash landed and on a desert planet he reckoned that wasn't too healthy. But there was a chance of there being food in this palace and that kept him going. The palace was magnificent, great pillars supported the overhanging porch and were lime green in some places. He wondered what civilization had lived on this planet. He shoved the doors open to find cool air flowing at him. Jumun ran in and closed the doors. The air was wonderful. But suddenly he backed a way from a wall. Laying there was an octopus like skeleton. His hair prickled and Jumun ran into the next room. Luckily there was some food that he recognized, grapes, apples and oranges. He was amazed and quickly ate until he was full. Then he found a cup full of water and drank it all. Satisfied, Jumun walked in to the next room. He was wowed. The ceiling was very high and the room stretched out before him.

Without warning the smooth stone floor exploded and a giant monster rose up out of the floor and glared at him. "How dare you eat and drink at my table?" it said. Jumun looked at the monster; it had scales like a fish and walked upright. It had two arms and his head didn?t touch the roof. He concluded in his mind that it must be one of the fabled monsters of the solar system Vulpix, a Gorax. As it trudged towards him, he noted in satisfaction that because of its enormous weight several of the roof stones were becoming looser with the Gorax's every movement. One of the stones fell, striking the giant in the temple. The Gorax roared, shaking the palace. The huge thing fell backwards and died with out a sound.

In the front room of the palace life stirred that had been not touched for centuries and it awoke. The slimy creature picked its self up and was joined be five others.

"There is a boy in the main hall, Leader." one of them reported to him.
"Good. Has he killed the Gorax?" the leader asked.
"Ah yes, leader. We will get all the information we can from him. We will lure him to our ship and capture him."
"Yes leader," they replied and they all turned towards the main hall.

Beyond the body of the monster, Jumun noticed something gleaming on the floor. He picked it up and saw that it was a ring; but not a normal ring. It had speckled emeralds embedded in it. Jumun put it on and turned away from the monster's dead body to be confronted with a slimy octopus like creature.

"Who are you?" it asked.
He looked the animal over. The marks it made were very similar to the waves of sand he saw outside. But that was unusual for the creature seemed to crave moisture like a frog, and would definitely not of survived the heat outside.
"Who are you?" the creature said again.
"Ah, I'm Jumun Vaster." Jumun stammered.
"Well, how did you bring us back to life?" it asked.
"Bring you back to life?" Juman questioned with a look of surprise.
"Yes, you brought us back to life after we were killed by the Gorax."
"Well I don't know you came alive again, but how did you get here in the first place?"

A few more of the creatures entered the room.
"That's a long story but I will tell it," said the creature.

"One day our ship, the Explorer, crash landed in this planet. At that time the planet was water, so the ship sank. Being amphibians we adapted perfectly in our water flooded ships. We even invented engines that worked under the water. We also found a human on this water planet. He had built this palace and is now in our ship. We liked the planet but its nothing like our home so we fired up the engines to leave. Unfortunately that woke the Gorax up. He killed us all and we know, but you don?t know, the law of Gorax's. When a Gorax is asleep the planet becomes a water planet. When he awakes the planet becomes a desert and when he dies the planet turns back to water and all the people the Gorax killed come back to life. The Gorax chained our ship to the ground so we can't take off and he now patrols our ship by walking upside-down underground. The reason we even came to this sector is because of an Emerald Speckled Ring, a legendary ring that has the power to turn any planet to a water planet. It's just what we want, being amphibians."

"How did you find this all out?" Jumun asked.
"Oh, there are many ancient manuscripts that tell us that our species once had the ring and of the great things we did with it," the creatures answered.
"Do you want to come and see the human? He might be someone you know."
"Ah. No thank you creatures but..."

The creatures didn't wait for an answer. The leader yelled something and they all turned on him. Jumun ran backwards and he suddenly felt an urge to lift his finger at one of the creatures. He did and a light burst forth out of his ring and knocked the creature down flat. Jumun did the same with the others. Now all but one, who had ran away, lay dazed. He ran out of the room to palace door. It broke and a cold wave of water swept him out of the building. The palace promptly collapsed under the waves. He looked around there was nothing but water. Another wave swept him underwater and he saw a ship in chains. Deep rumblings shook the world. Jumun was scared.

"Where was all the rumbling coming from?" he thought. He then thought about the human and dived deeper into the sea. He wanted see if he could find him.

The Emerald Speckled Ring: Part 2

by James
(Sydney, NSW)

Jumun thaught about the human and dived deeper into the sea. He wanted to see if he could find him...

The Emerald Speckled Ring: Part 2

The creature had just climbed out of a secret door in the side wall of the palace escaping death inside. When the palace collapsed, he was bursting with news. He now knew that the boy had the ring, his people's ring! Being their leader he wanted to wear it, but the boy had it. He now doubly wanted to capture him. The creature delighted in being in the cold water and he also realized that there was no playing around. There could be side affects to this human wearing the ring. The creature knew that his species when wearing the ring could turn the planet that they are on into water and there was no telling what the boy could do. With that thought he swam down to the ship under the sea.

Jumun clambered on to the ships slimy surface and slipped in an air lock. Overriding the controls he opened the access door. He was now in the ship. Sneaking round a few corners he located a small, inbuilt data bank. Pressing one of the buttons he brought up main screen. He searched the word, human. It was about five minutes before some thing came up. It came up with the name Grenville Hunter and his living quarters number 1452. Jumun memorized the number and name, and then started on his search.

The octopus leader sighed; he had just ordered one of the five battalions on the ship to the room number 1452. It wasn't a room but a hanger but that didn't really matter. The boy would think it was a living quarter. He had also entered a name assigned to the so called room so it looked like a human was living there. Then the creature remembered the boy's name: Jumun, Jumun Vaster. The leader started moving towards the general?s room. He would have to put the most trusted guards to stop any one escaping in the one man fighter craft they had created before they Gorax had killed them. He also needed to visit the old and wise historian to find out about the side affects of a human wearing the ring.

If there was one thing Jumun noticed the most in his search it was the cold damp air and the moisture. He was soaked from the moisture and also needed to be careful. He was actually in the enemy's ship. Then he reached it. Door number 1452, Jumun opened it and stepped in side. The so called room stretched out below him. It actually wasn't a room, it was a hanger and that was when he realised that he had been tricked. He was on a high smooth metal catwalk. And below him on the floor were about forty heavily armed creatures. Near the opening in the hanger were five beautiful one person fighter crafts. Jumun knew he had been tricked because there was not a human in sight and why would you need to have forty heavily armed soldiers for five fighters? He knew that they were waiting to capture him. Jumun looked at his finger and the glazing beauty of the Emerald Speckled Ring. He knew they were after the ring. Well he found it and he was going to keep it. Then Jumun slipped and landed with a resounding clang that echoed all over the hanger and all the soldiers looked up.

The leader was shocked to the end of his suckers on his tentacles. The old historian had told him that when a human wears the ring for the first time, the planet he is on breaks in half. Right now he had volunteers working with laser guns on the chains that bound the ship and he only had one chain left. If only if they could hurry up. They were going to die out there if they didn't hurry up. The creature moved towards the nearest inbuilt data portal and turned on the red alert status. All across the ship sirens blared.

Jumun ducked as lots and lots of lasers were shot at him. One in particular hit a weak spot in the catwalk, a huge section collapsed and he slid down it. He took a glance at the floor thirty meters below and felt the instinct to raise both hands. He did and he felt his hand touch something. He grabbed and his arms were nearly torn out of their sockets. Jumun was now hanging from the edge of a lower catwalk that had been dislodged by the upper part that had fallen down. He pulled himself up on the cat walk and ran along it. Lasers zooming, the soldiers kept shooting at him. Jumun then turned around and his finger danced all-around so fast that it was a blur. A rainbow of light exploded in front of his face and the guards fell dazed like dominoes all over the floor. Soon there were no more soldiers to knock down. He felt like he only moved his arm a centimetre but it had moved all-around, and he also thought his arm would ache after all that jerking around, but every thing felt normal. Jumun ran along the rest of the length of the catwalk and down the stairs. Reaching the floor he stepped through the twisted pieces of broken catwalk and reached the fighter craft. It was a ball with two wings through it; one along on the ship vertically and a short one along the ship horizontally. It had no controls apart from a joy stick so he guessed that the controls were projected on a hydro static bubble on the front. He jumped in the blue fighter craft. Instantly a filmy but see through bubble covered over the entrance and made the ship airtight. The star charts, controls and tracking sensors all were displayed on the bubble, just as he thought. He pressed a large blue button the top of the joystick and the ship rose up and moved slowly out of the hanger.

The leader creature was puzzled and worried. Puzzled because there was a ship leaving and worried because in any second the world would break in half. He had all the technicians working on getting the engines fired up, but there still there was that unidentified ship. He looked closely and saw Juman.

"Ahhh, no!!" he yelled.
Jumun Vaster was slowly but surely moving away from the ship in a fighter craft. The creature picked up the inboard radio, "Four fighter craft intercept and bring back the escaping ship." Answering calls from the fighter craft sounded. The leader knew Jumun was now caught.

With a huge sound from the depth of the earth, the whole world started to split open. The glitter of space shone through the gap and Jumun pushed the stick down and pulled back the speed lever. The ship sped down the gap like a wasp followed by more than a thousand ton?s of water. He left the other fighter craft still in the water. The water crashed down the chasm into the infinity of space like a waterfall. Then it happened; the two parts of the planet broke apart, huge pieces fell between the two walls.

The five other fighter craft smashed into the flying rocks. The creature's ship ripped off the last remaining chain and tipped off the edge. Countless creatures were caught when the planet split and they fell through the gap. Others were dashed against the rocks by the water and were killed. Jumun could now see, the creature?s ship was trying to start its engines as it was falling. If it couldn't it would be crippled by a large rock heading for it. The rear end of the creature's ship, the Explorer, lit up and the huge ship side swiped the rock, crippling it anyway. Jumun dodged all the flying rocks and water. He loved this blue fighter craft because it responded to his touch perfectly and he zipped out of the chaos.

The smoking and crippled Explorer slid down towards another planet below which was covered in wet jungle. The water from the split planet was poring directly onto the hips damaged hull. This shorted out thousands of electrical circuits. Jumun looked one last time at the planet He fired up the light speed engines and rocketed off towards his father at the space city. The Explorer was left crippled.

Schoolhouse Teachers 

Schoolhouse Teachers Art Courses

DIY Homeschool Planner 2021- 2022

Homeschool Planner