The sentinel stood atop the bluff watching the dark clouds gathering on the early morning horizon. He was a great warrior among the Warrior Clan, those sworn with the blood oath to stand at the doorway and fight with their last breath to protect the other clans from the death bringers. Behind him, sleeping around their fire pit were the others, each a fierce warrior, each seasoned and some scarred by many great clashes at the Seeing Stone.

He looked down at the other clans in the encampment at the base of the hill with its huge fire and constant activity. He was a warrior who understood weapons and how to kill with them. The others below in the encampment were different.  Some had skills that were a great mystery to him, some spoke in strange tongues that he failed to understand; yet they were all connected by the shared dreams that brought them to this place.

The most skilled of the Stone Clan used their talents to shape stones into tools while others hammered with the tools, chipping away at the black slate cliff as their fuzzy bluish reflections danced on the face of the Seeing Stone. Others of the clan used baskets to haul away the chips of black slate that accumulated below the huge crystal.

The Wood Clan maintained the great fire around which the exhausted ones slept. They foraged for dried wood and used stone tools crafted by the Stone Clan to cut green trees. The old ones of the clan with their mysterious skills used stone tools, shells and chips of the black rock to cut away the bark and carve the green logs into totems. Some of the massive totems were erected around the camp honoring the gods who spoke to them from the dream world. Other totems bearing the warnings were fashioned with great care, ends shaped into mysterious joints to be linked together, forming a framework to encase the Seeing Stone.

He looked back at the others. They knew only of their dreams and were oblivious to the approaching storm. They usually awoke when rested and used their skill with weapons to provide meat for all the clans. This morning they would be roused from their slumber to satisfy their blood oath. Soon he would walk among them, jabbing each one in the ribs with the blunt end of his spear. When the rude awakening came they would each know fire would soon rip through the sky and open the doorway. As he walked back toward the others he wondered which of the Warrior Clan would not live to see the bright sunlight and clear blue sky again. He jabbed the first warrior in the ribs as he thought of the others of his clan that had been lost to the death bringers from beyond.

The warrior sat up with a start and immediately looked up at the sky as thunder rumbled in the distance. He threw off the blanket of skins, jumped to his feet and started gathering his weapons as others were being aroused. Soon they were all awake, gathering their best weapons and provoking themselves and others into raging fury with chants and war cries. One of the warriors poured water from a skin pouch into a stone bowl of dusty plant pigment as the others surrounded him, pummeling themselves with clenched fists amid howls and screams for the blood of the death bringers. They each stepped forward, dipped their fingers into the color and painted their faces with personal war masks as another warrior mixed water with a bowl of hallucinogenic plant dust. Each warrior drank from the dark potion before sliding down the grassy embankment toward the Seeing Stone, weapons in hand.

The other clans cowered in fear at the far side of the encampment as the Warrior Clan gathered in front of the Seeing Stone, weapons poised to strike and screaming for the bloody confrontation to begin. They all inched forward with spears ready as a bolt of lightning dropped from the churning black clouds in the distance. Red crisscrossing lines spread across the face of the huge crystal, darkened for a moment, then faded away as thunder rolled across the sky.

Rain started to fall as a crackling bolt of lightning struck a nearby tree and the air exploded with thunder. The network of red lines again spread across the face of the crystal. The lines grew darker and expanded until the entire surface of the Seeing Stone was black tinged with red. As the warriors screamed their war chant and readied themselves the color started to break apart like dark sand blown by the wind until an alien landscape came into view.

In front of the ring of howling warriors on the other side of the open doorway was a dune of coarse white bone fragments. Beyond the dune in the distance were jagged mountain peaks rising into a crimson sky.

The warriors crowded forward as the first of the winged death bringers dropped out of the sky and landed on the dune. The creature moved across the dune toward the doorway between the worlds, reaching out with its raised talons and baring its deadly carnivorous teeth. It focused its yellow cat like eyes on the ring of warriors as more of the winged carnivores dropped out of the sky and onto the dune.

That stormy morning the Warrior Clan again reaffirmed their unyielding devotion to the Blood Oath amid war cries and alien snarls. The vicious clash exploded in the doorway with spears jabbing into alien bodies and talons slicing through human flesh. The deadly struggle lasted through the early morning. When it ended one of the Warrior Clan was gone.

The other clans went back to their work in stunned silence as the warriors returned to their camp to nurse their injuries and await the next confrontation.

If you have enough courage, press this button to catch a glimpse of the other world.