The Tree People - Part 4

Blaise nodded, "Maybe I can help you guys."

"How could you do that?" Luthien scoffed. "You do not even know why we are here."

"And I don't need too, at least not much. You are not familiar with this world though. How will you find where you are going? And then, how will you get there? I can take you wherever you need to go. I have every kind of transportation available to me."

"Why though? How does helping us benefit you?"

Blaise sighed and told them about his mother and sister's disappearance. "You see, I was hoping that, eventually, if I help you and you finish your mission, you could help me find them. I know they are alive, and I think you may be the key to finding them."

Elonira and Luthien looked at each other. Luthien finally nodded and Elonira turned back to Blaise. "Okay, we'll help you, but only after we have completed what we came to do."
* * * * * * * *

Elonira and Luthien followed Blaise through the forest quietly, exchanging only occasional soft whispers as they walked. Finally after about a half an hour of walking, they reached a large garage with a rounded roof. Elonira looked at the building questioningly.

"This is your home?" she asked.

Blaise laughed, and pushed open the door. "No, this is the airplane hangar. I thought we should get on the road as soon as "What's wrong?" Elonira and Luthien had stopped when they stepped into the hangar and were now staring at the airplane with looks of fear and confusion. Finally Elonira looked at Blaise.

"What is that?"

"An airplane? Have you never seen an airplane before?" He glanced at them again, getting the answer to his question by the looks on their faces.

"It's perfectly safe, I promise. It, uh, well, it's a flying machine, I guess you could say. Um, let me run talk to the pilot " that's the person who flies the airplane " and then I'll take you inside it."

When he was out of sight Luthien shot Elonira a look that clearly said she was crazy to agreeing to this, but he didn't say anything. A few minutes later Blaise was back. He led them onto the airplane, grabbing some fruit out of the refrigerator for each of them on the way in.

"So, I stand by what I said when I said you don't have to tell me about your mission. But I do need to know where we are going."

Elonira nodded. "The southernmost point on Earth. Can you get us there?"

Blaise looked surprised, but nodded, "the south pole, huh?" Then he continued mumbling about it being more difficult than he thought and about calling someone to make arrangements, and pulled out his cell phone.

"What is that?" Luthien asked.

"Uh, it's a cell phone. It communicates with other devices similar to this, that are somewhere else in the world."

"And you can use it anywhere? To talk to anyone?"

"Almost. There are towers that transfer the information, so I have to be near one of those, as does the other person. And the other person has to have a phone as well."

Luthien nodded, looking overwhelmed. Elonira put a hand on his arm and Blaise got up and walked to the front of the plane, leaving them with a little privacy.

"Loni," Luthien started. "This is so different from home. I feel like I'm in a dream, except I could never have dreamed all this up! Flying machines, talking boxes, all the huge buildings. I mean, just this machine is bigger than any of the houses in our city!"

Elonira nodded, instead of being filled with confusion and fear, she was full of wonder and amazement. "It's all so beautiful. I never imagined Earth would be anything like this!"

Just then Blaise walked back toward them. He sat down hesitantly, and then started explaining about the takeoff. Soon the three of them had their seat belts buckled, and the airplane was taxiing out on the runway. Blaise began talking, attempting to distract them from the take off. He was nearly successful with Elonira, the only sign that she was nervous was her knuckles turning white in Luthien's hand, but Luthien sank lower in his chair and held onto Elonira's hand as tight as he could.

"So, this flight will take us about 8 hours. We will then land and get on another plane, and that trip will take about 21 hours. Then we'll have one more flight that will take about 7 hours. So we'll be there in 2 days if all goes well."

The next 2 days seemed to drag on forever. Blaise's airplane was by far the most comfortable. When they left his plane, they were on an military base in New York. They went into town for a few supplies and then returned to board a military cargo plane. This plane was cramped and uncomfortable, and they were forced to stay in their seats for most of the 21 hours. The last flight left from Australia and was a small ski plane. They felt every bump and drop in this plane. By the end of the 7 hours, Luthien had declared that he would walk back before he would ever get onto an airplane again. They finally landed, a much more rough landing than the other 2, due to the plane landing on it's large skis on the ice, rather than wheels on a runway, and walked off the plane.

They were in the middle of a huge valley, the only building in sight was a research facility. In every other direction, the only thing in sight was snow and ice. It covered everything. Blaise threw Luthien and Elonira the warm, children-sized jackets they had bought before leaving New York. They quickly put them on and began following Blaise to the research facility.