Zak and Embertooth II

Zak and Embertooth II
The Skeleton’s strike back
BY CALEB PINNELL

All was quiet. Zak slept peacefully. Embertooth, who was in his cage, was wide awake, as his kind of dragon (Hungarian two foot) was nocturnal. Zak stirred; he was having a dream, a bad dream…

…All was quiet in the house. Suddenly a big skeleton smashed through the house. Smaller skeletons scuttled in and took Embertooth! “Noooooooooo!” Shouted Zak…

“Noooooooooo!” Zak woke up. Embertooth looked startled. “Come on, let’s get some breakfast, it’s morning time,” Zak sighed. He fed Embertooth, and went down the stairs and had his breakfast. After breakfast, he decided to go for a little walk. Embertooth, who didn’t like to sleep, followed. They strolled in the woods. But something troubled Embertooth, but he didn’t know what.
“What is it, Embertooth?” Zak asked. There was no reply, not even a grunt from Embertooth. Then suddenly some bushes rustled. “Must be the wind,” Thought Zak.
Embertooth flew up and around in the air, trying to see anything that moved except Zak and himself. But he didn’t find anyone. Back on the ground, Zak felt someone else was there then there selves…
He peered through the bushes. Suddenly a skeleton jumped roaring! He had two swords in his hands! Zak picked up a strong looking stick and they battled. Embertooth flew down to save Zak, but then a sword got flung at him! It hit him, but it wasn’t the cutting bit. He fell on the floor, knocked out. The skeleton got distracted by this, and Zak lunged at the skeleton, and killed him. But this time there were no wires – it was a real live skeleton! Zak was frightened. He picked Embertooth up (he’s only a small dragon after all) and ran back to his home. He put Embertooth back in his cage. And for the rest of the day he was researching about skeletons.

The next morning, Zak woke up and fed Embertooth. He went down for breakfast. He decided not to go for a walk today; instead he would go to town. He and Embertooth were in the café with their friends, Dax and his pet phoenix Chirpy. “You’ll never guess what happened yesterday!” Zak exclaimed. “What?” Dax asked. So Zak told Dax all about the skeleton. “Wow!” Dax said. Suddenly, Chirpy squawked loudly and Embertooth growled. “What is it?” asked Zak. “THAT!!” shouted Dax. Zak looked outside and saw a big skeleton army! Some skeletons smashed into the café! Everyone screamed. They picked up everybody’s pets, including Chirpy! Embertooth escaped the clutches, though. One of the giant skeletons which were holding Chirpy came to Zak. He tried to snatch Zak, but Zak dodged. Embertooth got a piece of string and passed it to Zak, who tied it round the big skeleton’s legs! The Skeleton fell down and smashed apart. “I don’t why they stole our pets.” Zak said…
The next morning, Embertooth woke Zak up, by chirping very loudly. Zak decided to explore more about the skeletons, so he would have to go in the woods. Embertooth decided to stay and sleep.

At the woods, Zak saw a hole in the ground. He heard somebody talking. He listened. It went a bit like this:
“Now we’ve got mostly all of the pets in town,” said a leader-like voice. “Except two, boss,” replied another craftier voice. “What’s that?” asked the first voice.
“A phoenix and that infernal dragon,” replied the second voice. A third more stupid voice asked, “Durrh, why do we need the pets?”
“To turn them into big evil creatures to take over the world!” The first voice exclaimed.
“So that’s what they’re doing.” Zak said quietly.
“Ok…I’m just going out of the hole to stretch my legs.” The second voice said. Zak worried. He had to hide somewhere! Suddenly, a human exited out of the hole.
“Hey! What are you doing here!?” he said. It was the second voice alright, the craftier one, who was probably the brains of the bunch. The two other ones came out too; it was the owner of the first voice, a skeleton with a helmet on its head which had the leadership out of the three and then the third one was a dumb looking goblin who had the muscle of the bunch. They ran after Zak and before he could escape, they captured him and put him in a cell.

Embertooth woke up from a long nap – he wondered where his master was. He decided to fly over the town and the woods but he couldn’t see Zak but heard someone screaming for help “HHELP!” and even if it wasn’t his owner’s cries for help he followed the sound until he came to a dark, gloomy cave. The cries were getting louder, so Embertooth zoomed through the cave until he heard more sounds. It was the three guys talking. Embertooth sensed immediately that they were bad guys and hid. Just then a door opened and the Skeleton with the helmet on his head, the crafty and clever human and the dumb looking goblin exited out the door. The walked away, talking. Embertooth crept into the room and saw Zak, in a cage. “Embertooth!?” Zak exclaimed. “Is that you?” Embertooth nodded and got the keys which were lying on a chair. He passed them to Zak and Zak opened the cage and got out. “Thanks Embertooth.” Zak said, and they ran out the prison door. They crept around the building past the skeleton guards until they got to a door called: Creatures Prison: DO NOT ENTER. Zak, who still had the keys from the prison, opened the door and saw all the citizens’ pets, lying down, sad. Zak quietly opened the cages and whispered to the animals: “Go, get the skeletons!” And all the creatures rushed out, and bit at the skeletons’ legs and arms. Soon a big battle commenced between the creatures and the skeletons. Zak and Embertooth dived in and out of the scenes of the battle and confronted the crafty human, the Skeleton with a helmet on his head and the goblin. “Where do you think you’re going?” The Skeleton said menacingly.
The three drew swords out. Embertooth found a sword on the ground and passed it to Zak. A big sword fight commenced. Zak swished his sword around, he didn’t really know how to sword fight. He ducked and lunged at one of the three, but missed all of them! The Skeleton with a helmet on his head swished at Zak and Zak just dodged it. Then he swished his sword at the skeleton…and knocked the head clean off! All the other skeletons stopped fighting and tried to retreat, but the loose creatures tackled them to the ground. In all the chaos, Zak saw the crafty human and the goblin trying to escape. Zak ordered Embertooth to warn all the people in the town, and went to confront the human and the goblin. “Stop! What are your names?” Zak asked. “I am Cando, soon-to-be ruler of all!” the human said. “Er…I’m Steve.” The goblin said.
“Soon to be ruler of all? Not if I can help it!” Zak shouted and lunged his sword at Cando. They had a big fight, sword to sword. Suddenly, Cando kicked Zak and Zak fell to the floor. “Time to die!” Cando shouted, lifting up his sword to stab Zak…when suddenly Embertooth jumped on to Cando and started biting! Zak found out that Embertooth had led all the townspeople to the cave. They all fought of the skeletons and reunited with their pets. Dax and his phoenix came up to Zak. “Wondered where you went!” Dax exclaimed. Zak was about to say something back when he saw Cando in front of him. “Guess what I have!” He exclaimed. “A teleporter stone!” holding a purple stone in his hands. “They only teleport one person! What about me!?” Steve said. “I don’t care about you!” Cando said, and teleported away.

The next morning, everyone was happy. Everybody was reunited with their pets but one thing bothered Zak: Where had Cando teleported to? Maybe it wasn’t such a happy ending after all…