Chapter Text
22 March 2268AD Martinique, Caribbean Sea
Stardate 4209.082
A tiny ice-cube floated through the turquoise tropical sea. One might wonder where the ice block had come from. After all, it was a scorching hot day in the Caribbean. Icebergs usually didn't even drift much further south than New York.
What was even stranger was that there were two objects preserved in the ice. One was a large, treacle-brown acorn. The other was a grey-furred, bushy-tailed squirrel-like creature; a sabre-tooth squirrel…known as Scrat.
Ever since he had been fast-frozen almost 20,000 years ago, trying to reach an acorn under a thick sheet of ice, he had been trapped inside a glacier. Only recently had his iceberg split off the land and floated out to sea.
The ice block slowly drifted towards a large tropical island, covered with tropical coconut palms. Finally, it washed up on a wide sandy beach and beached itself on the sand.
Slowly, under the hot tropical sun, the ice began to melt. Scrat and his acorn were exposed to the air for the first time in thousands of years. As more and more of his body was freed from its icy prison, Scrat tried to reach out for his acorn. It was so tantalisingly close, yet his claws could not even reach its smooth surface.
As its encasing layer of ice slowly melted away, the acorn tumbled onto the sand/ Straightaway, a wave swept up the beach, picking up the acorn…
…and washing it out to sea.
Scrat's eyes bulged as he watched his acorn disappear into the turquoise Caribbean. Letting out a tortured scream, he completely broke free of the ice cube and raced blindly up the beach.
WHAM!
The grief-stricken squirrel smacked straight into a tall palm tree with such force that the tree toppled over and crashed into the sand.
Scrat, clutching his aching head, stared down at the toppled tree. What had he done now? What was going to happen?
Instantly, a crack rushed inland from the fallen tree, weaving through the tropical forest and searing rocks in half. It whipped up the rocky slopes of a large volcano that towered over the island.
With a pop, the crack broke through the lava dome that blocked the crater and disappeared into the depths of the mountain.
There was an ominous rumble.
Then, with an explosion that echoed across the entire island, the volcano erupted. A huge column of black ash burst out of the crater and began to stain the clear blue sky, while a huge avalanche of red-hot rocks and poisonous gases rolled down its slopes…directly towards Scrat.
The sabre-tooth squirrel let out a strangled whimper. Why did this always happen to him?