Michael woke up the next day as one of the suns had risen. He walked out into the kitchen to grab some of the food left over from the previous night. They ate seafood that was freshly caught from the purple sea except for Azav who joined the table for dinner, but didn’t eat. Surely Azav had to have eaten at some point, but like most things he preferred his privacy whenever eating, and it seemed likely he would spend the day on his own again. Michael knew there was something Azav wasn’t sharing with him. Azav clearly had thoughts and feelings, and was to a degree empathetic, but it was always a guessing game how receptive he would be for a conversation. Even while the rest of the crew bantered Azav would hardly make comments. There was still something about him though, some indescribable quality that he could shift the tone of any discussion. To receive a complement from Azav was a high honor as they were genuine, but also hard to come by without doing something truly impressive. Michael grabbed some leftovers from the refrigerator which was heavily ornamented with engravings in the chrome metal. He heated up the leftover food and walked out to the balcony to eat his breakfast. As he was standing there eating his meal while enjoying the sunlight and the smell of the salt in the air the door leading out to the balcony opened. Ellop walked onto the balcony to greet Michael. “Good morning. Enjoying it so far on Tribabi?” asked Ellop.
Michael swallowed his mouthful of food quickly to answer Ellop’s question. “It’s quite pretty here, but I don’t think I got the true Tribabi experience yesterday as me and Tiki just went shopping for computer parts,” said Michael.
“Not into computers much?” asked Ellop.
“Not really, they’re interesting, but too complicated for me,” said Michael.
“I was going to visit Tribabi National Park today. It’s galaxy famous. Would you be interested in coming along?” asked Ellop.
“Sure, on my home planet we have plenty of national parks, but I haven’t been to any yet,” said Michael.
“Well, there’s no better place to start than here in Tribabi,” said Ellop.
Michael smiled at Ellop for once again going out of his way to make kind gestures.
Ellop went back inside and Michael finished his meal before also going back into the hotel. “Are you ready to go now?” asked Ellop.
“Sure, I don’t have any other plans now, and I’m ready to go,” said Michael.
“Great, let’s get going now then,” said Ellop.
Michael and Ellop walked out the door and over to a bus terminal which offered service directly to Tribabi National Park. They stepped off the bus when they got to one of the park entrances. The park had forests of slender trees with bright pink leaves and smooth trunks. Ellop’s eyes immediately lit up by the sight of all the trees. Michael and Ellop looked at a map. “So that’s where we’re going,” said Ellop pointing to a cave on the map. Michael and Ellop walked along the path through the pink trees. “This is the first time I’ve ever seen pink trees,” said Ellop.
“Yeah, they’re neat. I’ve only seen pink trees once in my life. They’re cherry blossom trees,” said Michael.
“Maybe if I visit Earth one day I’ll get to see them,” said Ellop.
“First I got to find a way out of here, then I’ll let you know,” responded Michael.
They approached the cave and the grey stone stood out from the surroundings. A small stream exited the cave into a larger body of water. Ellop and Michael entered the mouth of the cave. The dripping of water could be heard echoing throughout the cave. The interior of the cave was dark with the natural light of the outside barely seeping in. Ellop pulled out a flashlight he had in preparation of exploring the cave. The light illuminated the cave walls which had grooves and areas carved out from the dripping water. “Water really is an artist. These intricate paths the water followed made these beautiful grooves,” said Ellop.
Michael wasn’t as amazed as Ellop was, but humored him. Afterall, Ellop had always been friendly, and Michael didn’t want to kill his mood by showing disinterest. “I heard somewhere that they mapped these caves out using sonar technology,” commented Ellop.
“That’s quite interesting,” said Michael still humoring Ellop.
“C’mon, let’s head down further into the cave,” said Ellop.
Michael followed Ellop down deeper into the cave and they reached an area with several stalagmites hanging from the ceiling and poking from the ground. “Be careful, the stalagmites are very brittle and delicate. If you touch them they might snap off,” said Ellop.
Michael walked carefully past the stalagmites with Ellop. In boredom Michael ran his hand along the cave wall when he felt an unusual and abrupt edge on the cave wall. That’s odd thought Michael. Upon further inspection it appeared to be a perfect rectangle on the cave wall. “Hey Ellop, I found something weird, take a look it’s a perfect rectangle,” said Michael.
Ellop walked over to inspect Michael’s discovery. “Hmm, this reminds me of some of some of the ancient pressure plates on Zogan,” said Ellop as he took a closer look.
Ellop pressed the rectangle with his finger. “Nope, it’s nothing, just a little rectangle the water carved for us to discover,” said Ellop demonstrating several times the rectangle was solidly attached to the cave.
Michael felt disappointment the rectangle he found just turned out to be a coincidence and was back to feeling bored of the cave. It would’ve been more tolerable if Ellop wasn’t so fixated on the cave walls and was willing to talk just a little bit more, but he was fully concentrated on examining the cave. Michael and Ellop continued further down the cave past the stalagmites and stepped over an area of the cave with cracks in the ground. Suddenly, both Michael and Ellop fell through the crack in the cave and fell several feet into a large body of water. The cold water sent shivers down the spine of both Michael and Ellop as they swam up to the surface peaking their heads out of the water to breath. Ellop’s flashlight continued shining as he pointed it up to where he and Michael had fallen from. They spotted an area which they could climb up on just above the water and swam over. “When I said I wanted to explore the cave and the rock formations, I didn’t mean I wanted to explore uncharted territory,” said Ellop.
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The two of them climbed up onto the step above the water and looked around. Michael and Ellop spotted an opening in the wall and both made their ways over with Ellop and his flashlight leading the way. They crawled through the space and came out on the other side. “Wow, look at this,” said Ellop in awe.
Michael and Ellop were overlooking what appeared to be an underground city lit up by Ellop’s flashlight. There were houses carved into the stone which appeared to span a great distance. “Should we take a look?” asked Michael.
“Of course we’re taking a look,” said Ellop as if it were obvious.
A flight of stone stairs led them down from the cave they entered to one of the streets in the city. The buildings looked primitive in design, but had other more advanced technologies like windows made of glass. “It’s like they used the cave as protection for their city. I wonder why?” said Ellop.
Michael and Ellop walked up to a building dissimilar from all the others. While most of the buildings contained simple designs of carved stone the building was heavily ornamented, almost baroque. Ellop pushed open the doors to find the interior decorated with gold and jewels. “Guess we found what they were hiding,” said Michael.
“This is odd,” said Ellop stumped.
“Yeah it’s odd, it’s not everyday you come across an underground city that was possibly home to thousands,” said Michael.
“No, I mean this is really odd. The design of so many of the buildings look primitive, but then there’s some like these which have technologies that seem advanced. They must’ve melted the gold down to get it like this inside this building,” said Ellop.
Michael and Ellop both took a step in to further examine and the doors slammed loudly behind them. “Here to take my treasure?” asked a voice.
Ellop frantically searched with his flashlight to who had said that. “No, we’re just passing by I swear,” said Ellop.
“It’s true, we didn’t even know about your treasure. We were just exploring the cave,” said Michael.
A creature with eight legs like a spider and large teeth approached Ellop scaring him and causing him to drop his flashlight.
“Tell me then. If you’re not here after my treasure why are you two here?” said the creature.
“We just fell through a crack in the cave,” said Ellop nervously.
“One doesn’t simply stumble here on accident,” said the creature threateningly approaching Ellop.
“We did, we didn’t mean to come here,” said Michael in fear.
Michael and Ellop were both cowering in fear.
“Oh alright, I’ll take this as an honest mistake, but I require you leave me a gift for disturbing me during my thousand year sleep,” said the creature.
Ellop reached into his pocket pulling out his screwdriver he used at Point Nebula Penitentiary in the vents.
“Here,” said Ellop as he handed the screwdriver to the creature.
The creature bit down on the screwdriver before spitting it out in disgust. “Seems like garbage, but I’ll take it,” said the creature.
The creature looked at Michael. “And what about you? What’s my gift?” asked the creature.
Michael looked around nervously as the only thing of value he had was his Galactoband. “Um, my offering was the light on the floor,” said Michael as he pointed to the flashlight.
“Very well then,” said the creature.
Ellop looked at Michael and threw his hands up and Michael gave an apologetic look. “One more thing sir,” said Ellop catching the attention of the creature.
“Do you think you could help us find a way out?” asked Ellop.
“Well, I don’t see why not seeing as you are both clearly friends,” said the creature.
The creature grabbed Michael and Ellop in his arms and ran with them up to an exit of the cave within a few seconds before letting go. “Thank you,” said Ellop, but it was too late as the creature had already left.
Michael and Ellop exited the cave and found themselves at another part of the park. It was unmistakable given the trail before them as well as the familiar trees of the forest. “So, left or right?” asked Ellop.
“I guess we’ll go right,” said Michael.
Ellop and Michael walked along the path until they eventually found a visitor center up ahead.
“Should we tell anyone about what just happened?” asked Michael.
“Some things are better to just leave to rest. Besides, that guy seemed happy down there anyway,” said Ellop.
At the visitor center Ellop and Michael received information pertaining to the bus schedules and returned to the hotel later in the afternoon. Michael and Ellop both kept their word not telling anyone about their earlier encounter as Tiki and Sheerya both shared about their days. Although boring at first, Michael shared another great experience with Ellop helping to build a bond between the two of them. As for the creature he remains undisturbed in his underground city with his new screwdriver and flashlight.