League of Extraordinary Robots, Yolanda Jackson [leveled readers TXT] 📗

out who ever you are,” he called. “My name is Wisker and I will not harm you.” Wisker listened carefully for an answer, but heard nothing more than whimpering and then a strong groan. Wisker turned around slowly and got the surprise of his life. “Porcupine!” he ejected. “Is that you? Is that really you?” Wisker couldn’t believe what he was seeing for indeed it was porcupine, whom the river had lost many days before. Both Porcupine and Wisker stared at each other in shock.
Porcupine reached out and gently touched Wisker, as if to prove to himself that he really was seeing what he thought he was seeing. He dropped on the ground by Wisker’s feet. “Am I dreaming?” he asked. “I thought you were surely dead.”
“No you’re not, “said Wisker. He used his magic wand to throw a splash of cold water in Porcupine’s face. Porcupine began to calm down but he couldn’t take his eyes off from Wisker’s face.
“I’m so glad, so very glad,” said Porcupine, He and Wisker hugged each other, “Some things just can’t be put into words,” he told his friend.
“I can see that you have had a rough time and that you have a story to tell,” said Wisker.
“Indeed I have,” answered Porcupine. “A chilling story. The river took me many miles away. I searched high and low for you, but no one seemed to know where you were or even to have ever heard of you, then I was enslaved by a woman named Glendora.”
“That is a name that is horribly familiar to me,” said Wisker. “But I’ll tell you more of that later.”
“Finally I was able to escape from the slavery camp Glendora had set up,” said Porcupine. A look of fright flashes in Porcupine’s eyes as he recalls the things he had gone through. “It was horrible, all the lands that were destroyed by Glendora and her monsters.”
“I know what she’s like, what they’re like, but they’re defeated now,” said Wisker. “Look,” he said, holding out his wand. “My wand is now fixed, we will free our land.”
Porcupine looked at Wisker in horror. “He doesn’t know,” he thought. “How do I tell him? After all he’s been through, how do I tell him?” He reached over and put his hand on his friends arm compassionately. “Wisker, two years have gone by,” he said softly. “There is no land!”
Wisker stared at Porcupine. “That can’t be,” he said. “That just can’t be!” He called upon his wand to give him the correct date.
“The time spent is many moons times two,” said the wand.
Wisker fell to his knees in disbelief. “I am too late,” he cried. “Too late! All the time I wasted fighting on the sides of others while my friends and family suffered. “It isn’t fair, it just isn’t fair. Why couldn’t I have known? Why couldn’t I have been given a choice?”
“You did your best,” Porcupine told him. “There is nothing you can do now. You can’t reverse time.”
Wisker stared at him, then jumped up and began to pace back and forth, faster and faster, deep in thought. Suddenly he stopped pacing and turned to Porcupine. “But maybe you can,” he told him. “Maybe you really can.”
“Huh? What do you mean? What are you talking about?” asked Porcupine, not sure what Wisker was talking about.
“Maybe we can reverse time,” answered Wisker. “I’m not sure if we can, but maybe we just can.”
“You’re still a dreamer,” said Porcupine, rubbing on his long beard, as he gave thought to what Wisker was suggesting.
“You look all worn and battered,” Wisker told Porcupine. “Let me see if I can help.” He touched Porcupine with his magic wand, from head to toe. Sending small shocks up and down is friend’s body. “Riberty, roberty, giberty, gend, with healing touches, touch my friend. Giberty goverty, friberty fru, make my friend as good as new.”
Wisker smiled as he saw that the bruises and cuts on Porcupine’s body were beginning to heal. He shook his wand and Porcupine’s beard disintegrated to the floor and withered away. His skin became clean and less wrinkled, the bags that sat like saddles under his eyes went away. His hair that slithered through his sharp spines was now black, instead of grey.
“Wow,” said Porcupine as he looked at his hands which had been so wrinkled and bruised and cut just moments before and were now healed and smoothed. “I feel so much better. I feel like I did years ago when I was much younger.”
“You look like you did when you were younger too,” Wisker assured him.
“We made your body go backwards to when it was younger and maybe we can do the same with time.” In part of my journey, I had to go through a strange forest Maybe just like we made your body younger, we can go through the same forest and the hands of time will be reversed.
“I am so very grateful,” said Porcupine. “And so very thankful too.”
“You are most welcome,” said Wisker. “Here, one more thing.’ He shook magic dust from his wand onto Porcupine’s tattered and disarrayed clothing and immediately it became like new. “I owe you more than you will ever know,” said Wisker, when Porcupine insisted on thanking him over and over. “You are the one who freed me.”
Porcupine smiled. “Together I think we are ready to tackle what lies ahead,” he said.
Wisker pointed his wand toward a hole into which he had just seen a large rabbit disappear. “Kibbledy, dibbledy, though it sounds absurd. Turn that rabbit into a flying bird.” Within seconds, the magic began to form. The rabbit came back out of the hole and slowly started growing wings that expanded to two to three feet.
Porcupine reached out a hand tentatively towards the large flying rabbit and the rabbit rubbed its left ear over Porcupine’s hand in a friendly manner.
“Now we’re off to save our land,” cried Wisker, hopping on his own flying friend.
“Now that’s the Wisker I’m used to,” said Porcupine, as he climbed into the saddle of the flying rabbit. “Now we’re ready to tackle whatever lies ahead.”
The two flew through the air, passing all of the destruction and pandemonium of Glendora. The further the men went towards home, the more destruction the saw. “I wonder what my land and home will be like,” thought Wisker. “Will it all be destroyed or will we find a way, to reverse time, to be able to help our friends and families?”
Flying through the air faster and faster in a rush to get back home, the two men hardly said a word to each other. They were both nervous to see what awaited them. If they still and family and friends or if they even had a land.
As Wisker and Porcupine passed back through the magical snowy, forest it was lifeless. “There are no large tigers or lions, no beautiful snakes that his by, the land is freezing cold, everything is solid ice,” thought Wisker. Wisker used his magic to make himself and Porcupine thick coats that kept them both from the cold air. “Come, let’s land, I have an idea,” he called to Porcupine. Wisker immediately landed his bird and began to look around. Porcupine landed shortly behind him. “I can well see that Glendora has been here once again,” he said. “The smell and her green slime is very visible. All of the trees are down and coated with ice. There isn’t an animal to be seen.” Wisker stood deep in thought. Suddenly he pulled forth his magic wand and tapped it on the ground. “I demand that the ice melt and the land come back to its original state,” he cried. Wisker’s wand sent out colors of magic flying through the air. Up and over the large chunks of ice they went, melting everything in their path. As the ice melted, it showed what really went on. There were hundreds of dead animals and even more dead elves who had died trying to stoop Glendora. Wisker was not pleased with what he was seeing but he wasn’t through. “Awaken the elves from their deep sleep,” he commanded his wand and one by one the elves tiny bodies began to awaken. They shook the dust of show off of themselves and jumped to their feet. Looking around, they saw that their environment had returned to normal and that there was no sign of Glendora and her allies.
They saw Wisker and Porcupine standing in their midst and realized that these were the ones who had returned their land to normal and restored them from their deep sleep. Totain, the chief of the elves stepped forward, his hand outstretched in friendship towards Wisker and Porcupine. “Whenever you need help call on us, he told them.
“But no one ever sees elves in this forest,” said Wisker.
“Well, just knock on any tree and the door will open, said Totan. He reached out and knocked on the trunks of two nearby trees and something magical happened. The trees split right down the middle and inside each tree was a host of elves, all waving to Wisker and Porcupine.
“Once again thanks,” said Totan, as all of the other elves clapped in appreciation for Wisker and Porcupine. The elves who had magically appeared vanished back into their trees. “We will always be available to you should you need us.”
“Thank you,” said Wisker. “I feel proud that we were able to be used to help you. Now we must leave. I want to get home very badly.” The two men jumped on their flying transport and away they went, From above they could see that the land didn’t have the dead look anymore. It was not a ghost town; the animals were starting to return. The snow leopards came from their caves and gave out loud roars that Whisker and Porcupine could hear from miles away.
“There can be no more stopping,” Wisker told Porcupine. “If we want to return to our land while it still exists, there can be no more stopping no matter what comes our way. We must reach our land during a certain time frame or it will remain dead as will our family members and friends.”
The two flew in the skies at the speed of light. Out of the snow land they came and with a big bang suddenly they went back in time. But they found waiting for them nothing more than death and destruction.
“It is obvious that Glendora made her way through the magic path and it seems as if she destroyed every land that she came upon,” said Wisker. He landed his bird at the place where he had lost Porcupine and with sadness in his eyes mumbled. “There wasn’t anything I could have done.” Then he shouted it as loud as he could. “There wasn’t anything I could have done!”
Porcupine patted him on the shoulders. “I don’t hold anything against you,” he told him. “You did what you could for me and the best thing you