*****
You've hiked through Snake Canyon once before while visiting your Uncle Howard at Red Creek Ranch, but you never noticed any cave entrance.  It looks as though a recent rock slide has uncovered it.

Though the late afternoon sun is striking the opening of the cave, the interior remains in total darkness.  You step inside a few feet, trying to get an idea of how big it is.  As your eyes become used to the dark, you see what looks like a tunnel ahead, dimly lit by some kind of phosphorescent material on its walls.  The tunnel walls are smooth, as if they were shaped by running water.  After twenty feet or so, the tunnel curves.  You wonder where it leads.  You venture in a bit further, but you feel nervous being alone in such a strange place.  You turn and hurry out.

A thunderstorm may be coming, judging by how dark it looks outside.  Suddenly you realize the sun has long since set, and the landscape is lit only by the pale light of the full moon.  You must have fallen asleep and woken up hours later.  But then you remember something even more strange.  Just last evening, the moon was only a slim crescent in the sky.

You wonder how long you've been in the cave.  You are not hungry.  You don't feel you have been sleeping.  you wonder whether to try to walk back home by moonlight or whether to wait for dawn, rather than risk losing your footing on the steep and rocky trail.

[If you decide to start back home, turn to page 4.]

As you start walking back toward the ranch, you notice the trail seems very different than you remember it, though of course moonlight can play tricks on your eyes.  But you suddenly realize you are not walking on the trail at all, but on what seems to be a dried-up river bed.  You hurry back to the cave entrance.  You look around you and realize the whole landscape has changed.  While you were in the cave, torrents of water have washed out the trail; yet there is not so much as a puddle left.  You shiver.  It is cold, much colder than it should be at this time of year.  You take a jacket out of your backpack and put it on, but you are still freezing.

At least the world about you seems brighter.  It's getting light in the east.  The sun will soon be up.  You look at your watch.  It has run down, though you wound it only a few hours ago.  Nothing seems to make sense anymore.

You know you should get back to the ranch as quickly as possible, yet somehow you feel the only way to change things back to the way there were is to re-enter the cave.

[If you continue toward the ranch, turn to page 8.]

As it gets lighter, you realize you can't be on the right track.  The canyon seems shallower than it was.  The river bed is strewn with boulders that were never there before.  The cold wind chills you to the bone; yet it's the middle of summer.  As you climb to higher ground to get a better view, you notice patches of snow.  From the top of a ridge you survey a barren plain, frozen lakes, and, in the distance, a massive range of snow-covered mountains.  You begin to realize you are not merely lost -- you are lost in time, and you have somehow been transported to an Ice Age that occurred many thousands of years ago.

You walk toward one of the cliffs that borders the canyon, seeking shelter from the wind, and notice an entrance to another cave.  You are tempted to go inside, but you feel you should keep moving in hopes of somehow reaching familiar country.

[If you enter the cave, turn to page 17.]

As you enter the cave, you see a flickering light ahead and you smell smoke.  You make your way along a winding passageway and enter a large chamber.  Fires rise out of earthen vessels.

Several short, stocky people with straight black hair and primitive faces are painting pictures on the walls of the cave.  They are dressed in animals skins.  In a corner of the cave are beds of straw.

You stand, slightly afraid, as the save people drop their work and run over and stare at you in disbelief.  The largest man is carrying a long vine.  He steps forward as though he might seize you and tie you up.

[If you try to run for it, turn to page 28.]

You can see no future for yourself with these primitive people, so you run back toward the Cave of Time.  Fortunately, they do not follow you, and you are able to find your way.

By the time you re-enter the cave, you are hungry and exhausted.  They light is dimmer than before and you grope your way along, looking for a passageway.  you stumble and fall headfirst down an embankment, bumping your head disagreeably.  You look up and see daylight ahead.  A minute later, you walk out of the cave into warm, moist air near a forest of leafy trees.  A bird flies by.  You don't know when it is, but it looks pleasant enough.

[Turn to page 51.]

Suddenly you hear voices shouting.  You hide in a thicket.  An animal crashes through the brush.  In a moment some men rush by in pursuit, carrying spears and slings.  You imagine that you must be in an era long before the advent of civilization.  You follow an animal trail; it soon leads to a clearing, and you lie down in the grass to rest.  looking up in the sky, you see a long, thin, white streak.  You rub your eyes and look again.  It seems to be a vapor trail from a jet plane!  you may be living in the present time after all.

After several days of wandering through the jungle, you reach a settlement on the banks of a large river.  There is an airfield nearby, and within a few weeks you are able to obtain a ride back to civilization and return to your family -- just a month after you first entered the Cave of Time.  You are happy to be back home, but shocked at how much older everyone looks.  And they express the greatest surprise that after eleven years you haven't changed a bit!

The End