The Journey Around The World, In Order To Save Spring

You've Gotta be Squidding Me

The two wolves continued rowing the canoe, which had now reached halfway across the lake. Amaruq sighed. He was really bored. They had been on the canoe for hours already. He could tell, since he was wearing a watch. He looked at his wristwatch and wondered. If other people had these, then... could they transform too? When he was little, he discovered how his amulet was able to make him transform into eight versions of himself. Eight personifications of each aspect of his personality. Now that feeling of specialness was gone. Not that it mattered at the moment. They had to appease Asiaq so that she could make winter leave them alone.

Then, the canoe rocked violently along with the water's surface. The trio let their guard up. "W-what's going on?" Atsuguk asked. The canoe was suddenly overturned, dumping its passengers into the frigid lake. Fortunately, every member of their tribe had to learn to swim, since they depended on the Ocean's bounty. Out of the depths of the black lake appeared huge tentacles, each one as thick as a person. They lashed everywhere, splashing water and creating waves. The trio had to dodge the tentacles while trying to stay afloat. "It's a squid! And it's colossal!" Amaruq yelled out. "Yeah, we can see that," retorted Taggak. "Seems more like a kraken to me," Atsuguk commented. Amaruq never knew freshwater squids existed. Or was this a kraken? Nevermind. What's important was staying alive.

"Looks like I don't have a choice," Amaruq said as he raised his arm above the water. "What do you mean?" "Your shoulder's still wounded." He heard Taggak and Atsuguk say. Amaruq focused as he disappeared, leaving behind a circular wall of hard golden light. On it were three emblems coloured silver, blue and yellow, evenly spaced out in a triangle. The circle shattered and out of it came three people named Cyclone, Blaze and Ice. Blaze was dressed the opposite of his twin. He wore shorts, a high collar short jacket and inner vest, both sleeveless. His attire was themed in red-orange, orange and a little bit of black. His eyes burned orange.

Cyclone went to his teammates and lifted them onto his hoverboard, a motorised personal vehicle which looked like a floating cerulean board. "Ow!" He groaned as the lifting hurt his shoulder. Atsuguk held his back, concerned. "I-I'm fine," Cyclone tried to reassure him, fruitlessly. While he was busy grabbing their friends, Ice prepared to lift the creature up using the lakewater. It was a little hard as the creature weighed tons. A giant hand made out of water lifted the creature high up. "Now, Blaze!" Ice prompted him. "You got it!" Blaze replied. Above his head he held a giant fireball which had taken some time to make, as big as the squid itself.

"Take this!" Blaze yelled as he hurled the burning ball of plasma at the colossal squid. It shrieked before getting hit by the sphere and continued shrieking as it fell into the deepest lake in the country. "Phew," all three elementals said in relief. Cyclone then transported the two wolves to the shore on the other side of the lake, with Blaze and Ice close behind on a floating ball of water. Once they touched down, Blaze and Ice went back into Cyclone's body, turning him back to Amaruq. "Well, now the plan's ruined," he mentioned. His teammates knew what he meant. They were going to take the canoe down Slave River to Fort Chipewyan. "Well, whatever. We can still make it on foot, can't we?" He added. "Since we aren't forced to stick to the river, then we will go to Pile-of-Bones instead," Taggak objected. Amaruq agreed with him. That'll save them some time. Though that did not change the fact that he still thought the town's name odd.

They then left for the strangely-named town. Amaruq loved this part, as he got to see all kinds of things. New trees, rivers, rock formations and mountains he had never seen before! However, as they travelled, they noticed something. "Oh no!" Atsuguk cried out in realisation. "What is it?" Taggak asked. He and Amaruq had stopped in surprise at the sound. "All our possessions in the canoe! They're at the bottom of the lake now!" He said in despair. Only the items that were on their persons were left. "Wait, wait. Does this mean that- Aw, man! All I have are berries!" Amaruq had checked his pockets for food, and the results had turned out disappointing. "I've got some jerky," Taggak said monotonously as he held the strips in his hand. Amaruq wasn't amused. These would not feed them for long.

So they sought a watering hole and found one the next morning. These would be great for hunting. Many animals were attracted to them. "Now, all we have to do is wait in the bu-!..." Taggak relayed the plan before pausing, and cursing. "What? What is it?" Amaruq asked, a little offended at the dirty words that came out of the black wolf's maw. "I just remembered. Our weapons have sunken too!" That brought out frustration in Atsuguk too, who facepalmed. Amaruq was just disappointed, but he quickly had an idea. "I have an idea! Stay here," he said as he dashed away. Taggak and Atsuguk just looked at the gap he left through, dumbfounded.

Solar had a great plan. All he needed was wood, copper, tin and some manpower. Which was why he had chosen to split with Quake and Blaze. Quake, the leader of Amaruq's forms, wore a jacket and pants with many pockets themed in gold, beige and black. His eyes were golden. Blaze and Solar then set off to find materials. Blaze used his fire chakrams to chop wood while Solar used his solar beams to blast pieces of metal from their ores in rocky outcrops. Once they have brought the pieces back to Quake, Solar told them the next steps. Blaze took a deep breath and let out a huge flaming breath which burned the two metal at temperatures above 1000°C.

Quake then summoned his Earth Golem out of the ground, and made it alloy the two metals together as well as shape it, by using its rock-hard fists. After everything was said and done, the three returned to their teammates who looked up from their bonfire. They were lounging around it and had even taken a short nap earlier. "That took some time," Atsuguk remarked. "Woah, what's that you got?" He asked them, looking at their creations in their hands. "Heheh. You see, having been in Yellowknife and seeing all the uses metal had, I thought 'hey, why not we make weapons out of it?' and voila! New spears, bows and arrows and clubs! But made of metal!" Now that excited the two males. Their old stone weapons can stay sunken for all they care. "But that's not all. I thought about how metal atoms slide easily so I devised a way to overcome that. Instead of using 100% pure copper, I fused it with tin at the ratio of 22:3 to create a whole new metal I call: bronze".

Now the two were just confused. But they pretended to agree with whatever Solar had just said. Solar and Blaze then retreated into Quake's body again. "Now let's get back to hunting!" He said, smiling. His teammates nodded at him determinedly. They crept back to their spot in the bushes with their new weapons, biding their time. To ambush.