The Three Gems
The Three Gems
Once upon a time, like most people start stories — but I am not going to start my story that way.
My name is Brook and I am a seventh grade science dork. Sometimes my teachers let me do things on my own because I am at the top of my class and they don’t want me to give all the answers to the other kids. I have two friends. Chara loves to read and she’s great at doing presentations in front of the class. Coul loves, loves, loves, homework and can do super hard math problems in his head. We all like science and always hang out at my house after school doing experiments.
But one day, one day, something happened that was way different.
I decided to make a time travel machine to see if it would work. My friends and I wanted to go to a different time where there would be good memories like when we won the Texas State Soccer Championship two years ago. Our time travel machine (TTM) was a small vacuum that sucked you in with a special red button on the side to turn on the time travel. We turned the dial to the year that I wanted to go to. 2007: the year we got the trophy.
Coul turned it on, we got sucked in and WHOOSH; it spit us out on a grass field. We were no longer in my room and the TTM was nowhere in sight. We looked around and we were so confused.
“Where are we?” Coul asked. Chara saw a man from far away with her good vision. He was an old man who looked like a wizard. He had a staff for walking. He came up to us. He told us we had a problem.
“My name is Click. But I have a problem for you kids. Your planet is breaking apart.”
“PLANET EARTH?” Chara asked.
“Yes, Planet Earth, “ explained Click. “But the only way you can save Earth is if you find the three gems.”
“What are we going to do?” we screamed, all together.
“We are too young!” Chara said, so frightened.
“But we can try our best,” Coul said, a little nervously. “Besides, it is Earth that is dying and nobody else knows about this terrible news but us.”
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“Come on! We have to give it all we got. We can’t just leave Earth dying!” I scolded them.
Click looked us in the eye and spoke with a French accent. “You will not be able to return home unless you find the gems. Good luck, mis enfants.” Coul knew French and told us that mis enfants meant my children. With those words, Click disappeared into thin air.
We all split apart. Three gems. Three friends. Coul ran west into the mountains and saw tons of minerals. But right in front of him, he saw a green shiny gem stuck in the wall. He found a big heavy rock, took it immediately, and smashed it into the wall. The green shiny gem fell out. He grabbed it and ran back to the field.
Chara ran east to a wheat field. She saw something blue and thought it was a rock. She got close to the rock, which was as blue as the sky. The gem was beautiful, like nature. She tucked the gem, which weighed about eight ounces, into her pocket and ran back to the grass field.
I went north to the forest. I looked around and saw tons of trees, plants, flowers. I saw something shiny and red in a flower bush. The light was shining through the trees. The red gem was reflecting a big red light over the forest. I knew what it was. I grabbed it and ran back to the grass field.
Click had returned. We ran back to our spot where the TTM had left us. We were all surprised, tired and thirsty. Click was not surprised at all. He knew that we were smart enough to find the gems because of our teamwork. He knew we had won the soccer tournament. He knew that we would find the gems because of our curiosity.
“Now,” Click told us, “Put your gems together! And that will bring you back to the TTM. And back home!”
As we connected the gems together, we WHOOSHED right back into my room and my friends, Coul and Chara, went back to their homes.
Maureen Tran
Age 8
Illustrator by Jessica Jones
Maureen Tran is eight years old and in the third grade. She loves to draw and has a great imagination. She is a resilient person.
Jessica “Cosmicninja” Jones was born and raised in Oakland, California. Influenced by her mother, an artist and writer, and her grandmother, a fine artist, she began her artistic journey when she was a child. Jessica is mainly a self-taught artist who likes to learn new techniques to help bring her imagination to life. She loves to travel and get inspiration from the cities she frequents. She is heavily inspired by space and the universe. She plans to continue to embark on this creative journey and she hopes to inspire the world.
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