She nodded and then pointed at herself before she pointed at her clone. I turned to look at the other Emerald, and she nodded as she smiled at her other self.
“This world looks like a clone of your world?” I asked.
Both of them nodded and then Clone Emerald pointed to her eyes and then to mine.
“Yeah,” I admitted, “it looks a lot like mine too. Why do you think that is?”
Both of them shrugged and then shook their head.
“You don’t have any theories?” I asked, even though I knew it would be hard for them to explain what they could be thinking.
Original Emerald pointed to her eyes, and then she tapped her chest, gestured to the surrounding trees, raised her hands to the sky, and then pointed at Clone Emerald.
“I’ve been thinking that this world might be synthetic, too. Like, maybe they looked at our worlds and then made a copy?”
Both Emeralds nodded, and then the Clone Emerald gestured to the distant valley and then held her hands out in a box shape.
Then she made the box shape smaller.
“The thing is…” I sighed. “When the black-skinned asshole with the bat wings flew me up into the air, I got to see the curve of the planet. It is definitely a planet, and the gravity feels just the same on my world. So it has to be about the same mass.”
Original Emerald gestured to her clone again, and then she pushed her hands together before she pulled them apart.
“So you think it’s an exact copy?” I asked. “I guess it could be, my world isn’t--”
Emerald shook her head and raised her hand to interrupt me, and then my eyes opened wide when she pointed at herself, her clone, and then me.
“Wow,” I gasped. “I hadn’t thought of that. Maybe? I guess we could all live on different copies of the same world, but that also raises other questions. Are our overlords that powerful? Is each of our planets part of the experiments? What do they want with us? Like, okay, I know I’m not supposed to think that my home world is totally awesome, especially given that I’ve now met actually species of great people from other planets, but I still want to think that Earth is unique, and that we weren’t put there as some sort of weird control group in some super powered over lord experiment.”
The Emeralds both shrugged, and the clone smiled at me and tapped her temple.
“Yeah, I know you are just throwing out theories. I appreciate it.”
Clone Emerald nodded, and then she pointed to her mouth, frowned, and made a motion like Ariel from the Little Mermaid movie when she couldn’t first talk to Prince Eric.
“Yeah, I wish we could talk as well, but we are kind of getting it done now. Let's get going. We can talk more while we get down from this mountain that I’m sure Sheela thinks is just a slightly bigger than average hill.”
Both Emeralds smiled at me, and then I ordered Nicole to begin walking down the path that descended on the south side of the slope.
The sun was probably about an hour away from kissing the edge of the ocean, and the light was already starting to turn golden, so I knew we didn’t have a ton of time to find a suitable camping spot for the night.
Fortunately, the path down the mountain was much easier than the path up. The switch backs on the southside were longer than on the north, and that meant that the slope was a little less steep. I looked down into the valley below as we descended the trail, and I spotted a grove of banyan trees that were gathered around one of the hill’s edges. It looked like it created a bit of a natural barrier, and I guessed that we could get the entire crew inside of the trees for the night. It was also about sixty-yards from a small creek offshoot from the main river, and I guessed we’d be able to find fish or at least wash up there.
“How about setting up camp there?” I asked as I pointed to the bottom of the hill. “We’ll still have an hour or so of sunlight left to set up a fire and make a small hut.”
Original Emerald tapped her purple gemstone on her forehead and then gestured to the sun.
“I guess you could just light up the camp with your powers,” I said, “but I don’t want to waste any of your energy. Besides, we’ve had a long day where we almost died a few dozen times and we’ve accomplished our goal of crossing the mountain.”
The Emeralds nodded, and then they both raised their thumbs up.
We made it down the rest of the mountain and to the chosen site about half an hour later. The spot was actually about a hundred yards away from another stream, and I let the dinosaurs go in shifts so that the Emeralds and I could have a bit of extra protection while we worked on our camp.
The banyan trees were large and magnificent, and the grove was tightly knit around the side of the hill’s slope. There was really only one spot where Nicole could squeeze inside of the circle of trees, but I thought this was perfect because it meant that we could easily guard ourselves from any large predators.
I didn’t really need to give the women orders, or talk about our plan, we just kind of knew what we were going to do, and one Emerald made the first batch of tinder while the other Emerald unpacked our weapons, tools, baskets, and jugs from Nicole’s saddle, and then we gathered some old wood to make a fire.
Once the fire was burning, the three of us took the group of troodons a few dozen yards out of the grove of trees to where we had seen a small gathering of tall bamboo. The three of us again worked in perfect sync, and we soon had enough posts to make a small hut and some ferns for a light roof.
The sun was nearly down by the time we had the small bamboo hut made, and my muscles were developing the not-so-pleasant ache achieved only by exhaustion. I almost didn’t feel like eating, but I still took a palm sized chunk of dried and salted meat from Original Emerald and ate it while we relaxed by the small fire.
Once we had finished eating, both of the Emeralds turned to me, and the orange glow from the fire reflected in their white predator-like eyes.
“Do I have some food on my face?” I laughed as I moved my fingers, cheeks, and chin.
Both of them shook their heads, and they smiled sweetly.
Well, it would have been sweet looking except for their intense stare.
“Did you figure out how to tell me more about your world?” I asked to change the subject. “You know, this war you were fighting, how your culture worked, whatever. I’d like to know more about it.”
Original Emerald nodded and then gestured to her chest, then she pointed at her clone before holding up one finger. Then she held up two fingers, then three fingers, then four, until she had ten fingers up.
Then Clone Emerald held up ten more, and both of them pointed at me and frowned.
“So… uh… you made a bunch of clones, and they fought over a guy?” I asked, even though I knew it wasn’t the correct answer.
Clone Emerald shook her head, and Original Emerald bit her lip and looked into the fire thoughtfully. The problem we had was that I really had no basis to even begin a discussion about her people. Each of my friends had a completely different world and culture from Earth. Kacerie actually seemed to be the closest, but her society was run by super smart AI computers, and everyone was forced into roles that best suited their personalities and capabilities.
Without being able to talk to Emerald, it was going to be really hard to figure out the kind of world she came from.
Unless I started at the beginning.
“I’ve got an idea,” I began, and both Emeralds looked at me hopefully. “I’ll just talk a bit about my world, and you can let me know if your world has similar stuff. Cool?”
Both Emeralds smiled and nodded, so I stared into the fire for a bit and tried to figure out where to begin.
“So, I was born from a mother. She had a womb in her stomach that carried me as a baby. I was connected to her organs through a tube that attached to my belly button. I’m guessing that’s the same with you, since I saw that you had a belly button earlier.”
Both Emeralds nodded, and the Original smiled as she lifte
d up her stained blouse a bit so that I could see the lean muscles of her abs and her bellybutton.
“So that means that a man impregnated your mother?” I asked.
They both nodded, and Clone Emerald raised one finger.
“Well yeah, I’d guess it would have been one man,” I laughed, and they each smiled at me as they shook their heads.
“Wait, so a female can be impregnated by multiple men?” I asked.
They both shook their heads and then pointed at me. Original Emerald held her arms up as if she was flexing her muscles, and Clone Emerald bowed her head to her.
“A king?” I gasped. “Or some other sort of ruler?”
Both of the women clapped their hands and nodded at me. Then Original Emerald raised her hand very high and then widened her arms as wide as they could go.
Then she pointed at me.
“Okay,” I chuckled. “Now we are getting somewhere. So, your father is the supreme ruler, or king, or whatever? He’s the best?”
They both nodded.
“Should I call you Princess Emerald now?” I asked as I raised an eyebrow and stuck my tongue out at her.
Original Emerald shook her head, but then Clone Emerald beckoned to me, pointed at the other woman, and then bowed her head again.
“Queen?” I asked.
The other two women smiled wide and nodded at me.
“I should have guessed that from what you told me about leading billions of people into war,” I said. “So, did your father die then? How about your mother?”
Emerald nodded.
“I’m sorry,” I replied. “Mine died as well. I think I told you. Car accident.”
The Emeralds nodded and frowned.
“How did your parents die?” I asked.
Original Emerald reached into the small pocket of her tight black slacks and pulled out one of her flint knives, then she made a stabbing motion.
“Jeeze,” I said. “Who killed them?”
Clone Emerald gestured to her stomach, and then pointed to Original Emerald, then she made a motion down between her legs and shrugged.
“You had a sibling?” I asked.
They both nodded and then pointed at my crotch.
“Ahh, a brother.”
They nodded again.
“So, your brother killed your parents, and then you went to war with him?”
They both nodded enthusiastically, but then Clone Emerald wove her fingers together and then started forming imaginary knots with invisible rope.
“Ahh, it’s a bit more complicated than that, but I have the basic idea?”
They both nodded again and then Original Emerald gestured with wide sweeping arms at the ground surrounding us. She raised up five fingers in her right hand, and then grabbed first one, then two, then three, then all of them. Then she continued to do the movement six more times as she smiled at me. Then she finally pointed at her chest and nodded proudly.
“You conquered thirty other nations?”
They both nodded, and then Clone Emerald gestured to Original Emerald, reached out as if to hug her, but then Original Emerald waved her hand, shook her head, and pushed her other body away. Then they both turned to me and smiled.
“You asked them to help you fight your brother, but they said no, so you conquered them?”
The two beautiful women clapped their hands together enthusiastically and smiled with delight.
“So, it was you against your brother, and each of you had massive armies? Like billions?”
They both nodded.
“What kind of weapons did you have? Was it like spears and arrows like what we have? Or did you have guns, ehh, those are like projectile weapons that shoot small metal rocks. They are attached to a metal casing filled with explosive power. When they are lit, they shoot the metal slug down a barrel that spins the bullet. It can shoot way farther and more accurate than arrows.” As I spoke, I gestured with my hands and fingers to show how I would hold a gun and what the bullet looked like.
The Emeralds looked confused for a few moments, so I continued.
“Or like cars or planes? Those fly in the air with engines that we power with fossil fuel.”
The Emeralds shook their heads and then they both tapped on the purple jewel embedded in their foreheads.
“Uhh, you use your gems to fight?” I couldn’t even disguise my confusion.
They nodded, and then Original Emerald’s gem began to pulse and glow the soft purple light that I remembered from when we had to make the late night trip to Quwaru’s camp to help save Zoru.
Clone Emerald’s gem also lit up, and the two identical women turned to face each other. For half a second, they just stared at each other, and the strange purple light just reflected in their white eyes, but then I blinked my eyes and let out a gasp of awe.
It kind of looked like the light between the two women was pushing against each other.
They were both identical shades of purple, or violet, or whatever you called the soft but bright color, but there seemed to be a slight break between them that rippled like an angry tide.
I’d never seen anything like it.
I had heard that light particles did different things, and I recalled spending an hour or so on Youtube once watching this experiment they did that showed that light could be both a wave and a particle, but you weren’t supposed to be able to see that shit with your naked eye.
Suddenly, the two womens’ lights turned off, and they both faced me as they took deep breaths. Whatever had happened between them had seemed strenuous, and I actually saw a bead of sweat drip down Original Emerald’s throat while another bead descended Clone Emerald’s forehead.
“I don’t quite know if I understand everything that just happened,” I began, “but you fight with light?”
They nodded, but then Clone Emerald also pointed to the spears, and the Cricket Bat of Doom.
“Also handheld weapons?”
Original Emerald nodded and then gestured around us before she shrugged her shoulders. Then she opened her right hand wide, raised her pointer finger on her left hand and then closed her fingers into a tight fist over it.
“You’ll use whatever weapon you can use to win,” I said.
They both nodded.
“How does the, uhhh, light-fighting power work?” I asked as I tried to keep concern out of my voice. “Can you kill someone on Dinosaurland with it?”
They both shook their heads and then pointed at the gems on their faces.
“Ahh, so it only works on your species?”
They both shrugged.
“It’s really interesting,” I said. “I never thought light could be a weapon. I know our armies have flash bangs, and those can light up an area really quickly and blind enemies, but it’s more to distract them, and less as a direct attack.”
Clone Emerald nodded eagerly as she raised a finger and pointed at her gem. Then she gestured to the rest of her body, closed her eyes, and made a quick spasm movement. As she did so, Original Emerald pointed at her chest again, and then squeezed her pointer and thumb together as she narrowed her eyes at the space. Then she put her other hand over her eyes as she pointed at her clone.
“Hummm,” I said as I tried to piece together what they were telling me. “Your light attack blinds the cells in your body so they stop moving and just start spasming?”
They both clapped enthusiastically and smiled at me.
“Shit, that’s crazy,” I laughed as I scratched the back of my head. “It’s so interesting how different we all are. Everyone in our tribe has such different home worlds.”
The Emeralds nodded, but then they both tapped on their chest and pointed to me.
“Yeah,” I laughed. “I like you too. It’s interesting to hear about your world. I do wish we could talk, that would make it easier, but I think we are understanding each other better every day.”
They both nodded, and their predatory eyes stared at me without blinking.
I clea
red my throat, grabbed a stick, and then adjusted the wood burning in the campfire. I was pretty tired from the long day of traveling, fighting, and taming, but I also realized that it was still pretty early in the night.
I glanced up at the Emeralds again after I’d adjusted the fire, and they were both still staring at me.
“Sooooooo,” I began as I drew out the “o” sound. “Can I ask you something and you won’t take it the wrong way?”
They each tilted their head at me a bit like a confused dog, and their long green hair descended over the matching shoulder. The two women almost seemed like a mirror for a moment, but then I realized that they were both Emerald, and they would respond to a question just like how Original Emerald would answer, so it would sometimes look like they were moving in sync.
“You stare at me. A lot.”
They both blinked with surprise and then began to wave their hands at me as if they were apologizing urgently.
“It’s okay,” I laughed. “In my culture, it’s just a bit weird when someone stares at you for a long time without blinking.”
Original Emerald’s shoulders slumped, but Clone Emerald actually pushed her forehead into the palm of her hand.
“I’m not offended,” I laughed. “I, ahhh, just want to make sure that’s normal in your culture. If it is, then I won’t worry about it anymore.”
Both Emeralds looked at each other and then smiled widely, then Original Emerald turned to me and tapped her chest before pointing at me.
“Yeah, I like you too,” I replied.
She shook her head and then tapped on her chest with a bit more authority before she pointed at me.
“You love me?” I asked before I could even realize that the words were coming out of my mouth.
Both Emeralds nodded, but before I could open up my mouth to argue that we hadn’t really built any sort of relationship yet, and she kinda shouldn’t really be in love with me, Clone Emerald gestured to both of them, pointed at her crotch, me, and then tapped her temple while shaking her head.
“The men on your world are dumb,” I said.
They both nodded, and Original Emerald pointed to my crotch, then she pointed at her stomach, and then she pointed to the small shelter we had made from bamboo.
Tamer- King of Dinosaurs Book 6 Page 13
