Suddenly Gaia stands as the sphere itself. She is now the very center of the star. Bars surround her on every side. There is no escape. She is imprisoned in a cage. She knows not by whom or where her captor may be, realizing only that she was rendered unconscious shortly after her visit from Iboga. There are many others around her bound and gagged. She is in a cave, and all is dark and lifeless, except for the prisoners. Deep calls unto deep in the dank cold caves. She calls on plants to aid her and yet still she sits caged and unanswered. Shaking and trembling with fear and doubt Gaia knows only her prison and her echo. She grows weary of the flailing bodies that moan and wail for audience but finds only rocks and crags. Days slip by into weeks. Weeks morph into months. Months cascade into damned piercing seconds; wait: seconds! She feels he inner life unraveling. It is the onset, the beginning of the cage fever brought on by isolation. Finally, just before she breaks, she sees a small cave-biter upon the ground in the form of a small furry animal with six rows of small diamond-hard teeth and she whispers what could be a name...
"I called to the creature. I called to it desperately," spoke Gaia for the first time. "It could not hear me or refused it to. I never felt more...detached from the earth spirits then I was during those months. I...I remember crying myself to sleep in that blasted cage and feeling sorry for myself, until finally a bat fell into the cave. None of the people would allow me to help them. Their minds were too far gone. Every time I tried to assist with their wounds or their gags or bandages they would bite at me and try to push me into their hive. "
As if queued by her thought a bat flies into the cave where she is caged. It is obviously wounded and limps across the floor of the cave squealing in pain. Gaia picks up the bat much to it's dismay and recognizing what's wrong she places some of the algae growing on the cave side upon the bats wing before tearing her shirt to hold the wing in place while it healed.
"For a month I nursed that bat to health in a part of the cave that was as far away as I could get from the other prisoners. It was as much for my sanity as it was for the health of the bat. It was only then the cave biter took interest in my presence."
Finally the cave biter began to scrutinize the cage. It would come and nibble the bars a bit ...randomly at first, as if to test my resolve. The bat kept me company for a long while, but finally when it could fly away I could stand the cage no longer.
"I asked one last time fellow cave dweller. I promise to devote every following moment to the pursuit and protection of life itself. I will forever be its servant. Please get me out of this cage I beg thee."
"The biter looked at me one last time before traipsing over to the cage and grinding the bar down to nil. It consumed the next bar the following day and I was released. I have never forgotten my oath since, and I am reminded of it now...thank you and...thank you for bringing me here."
With that the creature began to glow luminescent with light blue and as if on queue Gaia picks up the creature. She is no longer the sphere. It is now centered upon Adahn.
She comes back to the circle and everyone is smiling at her for she now has a living breathing pet that fits into her palm. Her very own cave biter and she names him: Poe.
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