"What's a 'Roc'?" Lani asked.

I stared up at the beast, "No time to explain. Just run!"

I ran down the tall mountain, trying my best not to slip on any loose rocks or pebbles. I knew he danger of that beast, but right now, the only thing I was really focusing on was running and trying my best not to die. 

I look behind me and see Lani slip on some pebbles, luckily grabbing on to a nearby tree before hitting the ground. She struggled to get up.

"We have to keep going!" I yelled as I picked Lani up from her fall.

Yoshi and Lani followed behind me, dodging trees and brush as they ran. We didn't dare to look back, for we knew it would slow us down. Even just a little ground it gains on us could result in death. We had to keep running until we found cover.

"Why don't we just wait for it to stop following us? I'm sure it would get tired eventually." Yoshi exclaimed, obviously running out of breath.

"It has a ton of stamina, way more then any of us do. Besides, it's persistence with following it's prey is crazy." I responded.

I glimpsed to my right, seeing the tall metal fence. I thought for a second and realized something.

"Crap," I said, "the gate's on the other side."

They both acknowledged it, but didn't say anything. All they did was keep running. 

A few minutes later, we arrived at the bottom. Now all we had to do was figure out how to escape. Why didn't we talk about this on the way down here!

"Where did it go?" Lani asked as she looked into the dark sky, the only thing lightening it being what you can see of the sun.

"I don't know, but I don't want to find out! What are we gonna do?" Yoshi asked.

I looked around, hoping to find a way out somewhere. No luck. How where we going to get out of this situation? Just when we all thought all hope was lost, I had a plan.

"I have a plan, guys," I said as I looked at the Roc, appearing out of a group of clouds, "Just get out of the way!" 

Lani and Yoshi looked at each other, nodded then both ran towards a large tree that could give them some cover, potentially protecting them from it. I looked at them and glimpsed back up, seeing the Roc as it's razor sharp claws hurling towards me. 

"Oh, please work." I said to myself as I stared at it.

It came closer and closer, it's intention still to kill me. All I had to do was time it perfectly, and...

"Siltenio!" 

I turned into a phoenix, making me smaller, causing the Roc to miss me. It fell, smashing into the gate and leaving a large hole. I slowly flew up to it, watching for any movement.

"Onto slavis." I say, looking closely at it's eyes.

No movement, I thought, could it be dead? No, there's no way. After all these years of it being alive, how could a little fall kill it?

I slowly back up, that thought swarming through my head. I call for Lani and Yoshi to come to me, knowing that I could need some backup in a second.

"Do we just leave now? I mean, it's not our problem if it's dead. In fact, it could actually be useful." Yoshi says.

"I mean, he does have a point," Lani says, "Let's just go."

They both walk out the broken fence, practically hugging it to stay away from the Roc. I didn't judge them, though. It did almost kill us, so really, I don't blame them.

Yoshi stared at the beast, not being able to take his eyes off it. He was in a shock, I guess. Me and Lani noticed it and looked at each other, slight worry in Lani's eyes. 

"Hey, you ok?" Lani asked Yoshi.

She was always use to taking care of him when he was younger, so I guess some of instincts just kicked in. To be honest, she did always baby him, I just never said anything. I mean, I never actually saw her baby him, but she always told me stories and acted like he was crazy.

Once, she said that she saw him using a kitchen knife- sorry, a 'sharp' kitchen knife- and disintegrated it so he wouldn't get a cut. 

"Yeah, yeah. I'm fine. Let's just keep going. I don't think we'll be there by tomorrow afternoon, though." Yoshi responded.

"Yeah, maybe try something like 2 days from now..." Lani said, "What if Nimroth has already made it there by then? We were supposed to have a lot of extra time to prepare!"

I looked at them, then looked at the ground. How, out of all the things I have thought about, that one wasn't on the list? Is all hope lost?

"I- I don't know what to do. Let's just find a place to stop for the night, then we'll start up again in the morning." I said.

We continued walking towards the West, hoping we didn't run in to anything else soon, or really at all. I looked off in the distance, seeing something that gave me a little more hope. Hope to be able to actually make it to the West. Hope to maybe even make it there by tomorrow.

I wasn't sure if it was even what I thought it was, because it was almost pitch black now, but I eventually was %100 sure of what I saw.

"Guys, look," I said as I pointed to something in front of us, "It's an indention in the mountain. We can get ourselves together there rest there for the night. Who knows, maybe there'll even be some berry bushes there that we can eat!"

Lani and Yoshi's faces started to look a bit more enthusiastic, knowing that things will probably look up from now on. 

"Yeah, but maybe this time, let's not get berries that make us itch." Lani said, looking at Yoshi. 

Yoshi snickered under his breath, knowing that she was referring to him. We continued walking and eventually made it up the mountain to the indention, luckily not running into any more problems. 

I took some nearby brush and started a fire. Ahh, it feels good to be able to turn back in to my normal self again. I wonder why it did that in the first place, anyways.

I guess that's the least of our problem right now, though. Tomorrow, we continue on our quest to the West and hopefully get there before Nimroth does. Hopefully.