Page 6 of The Otherworld

By midafternoon, the sun tucks herself behind a blanket of clouds and leaves the rest of the day smudged in shades of gray. While Papa goes fishing at the cove, I sneak off to walk the beach and collect shells, my linen pants rolled up to my knees and Lucius tromping at my side. He loves to splash through the surf and bark at seagulls, making them scatter.

The tide is going out, leaving behind all sorts of new treasures. Thanks to Papa’s books and charts, I can identify most of the shells I find: silky white scallops, gnarled gray oysters, ribbed brown Astarte, and one huge empty Macoma that opens up like a pair of butterfly wings.

Then, lodged between rocks in a tide pool, I spot something unusual: a thin bronze chain coiled around a fat strip of kelp. I reach down, sifting through a tangle of seaweed, and pull it out.

It’s a compass, small and finely crafted, strung on a chain and dripping with saltwater.

Where did it come from?

I look to the horizon, squinting to see if there’s anything else unusual in the receding tide. But there are only gray waves upon more gray waves. My gaze slides back to the beach, where Lucius hops over driftwood, barking happily at the gulls.

That’s when I spot something ahead washed up on the sand. From here, it is nothing more than a black lump that the tide is beginning to release from her frothy fingertips.

A dead seabird, no doubt.

“Lucius, come!” I holler, gripping my handful of shells and running down the beach toward him.

Lucius has a habit of putting nasty things in his mouth. He also has a habit of defiantly running away from me when he thinks I have a mind to deprive him of fun. He looks back at me with a crazed spark of adventure in his eyes and bolts down the beach for the dead bird.

“Lucius, come!”

I sprint after him as fast as I can, splashing through the shallow water and dodging branches of driftwood. As I draw closer, I see it’s not a dead seabird.

Lucius trots to a halt and sticks his nose in the black lump, sniffing and sneezing ferociously.

“What is it?” I say, slowing to a stop.

It looks like a sack of some kind—battered and black, strangled by a long string of kelp. Zippers and buckles are stitched into the bag, and two long straps hang off one side, reminding me of my harvesting basket. Perhaps it’s designed to be worn on the back?

I peel the kelp off the sack and turn it over in my hands, undoing one of the buckles and pulling the zipper open. To my surprise, the interior is completely dry. Feeling around, I find a flashlight, a clear bag with fishing lines and hooks, a tiny box of matches, and a fold-out knife.

Then, without warning, the sack begins to vibrate.

“Holy mackerel!” I gasp, dropping it as I jump back.

MMM-MMM-MMM, hums the sack.

“What on earth?” I whisper, creeping a few inches closer. Whatever is making that strange noise, I’m more curious than I am afraid of it.

Moving carefully, I pull back the zipper of the top pocket and peer inside. A small rectangular device hums at the bottom of the pocket. Just as I pull it out into the light, the vibrating stops. Lucius prowls closer with caution, sniffing as if to ask whether the object in my hand is edible.

“Is it… a phone?” I murmur, turning it over in my hands. The little device has an antenna sprouting from one side, but there is no number pad. Only two strange words written on the side: Motorola StarTAC. “It doesn’t look like any phone I’ve ever seen.”

I pull the compass out of my pocket to take a closer look at it. Could these strange treasures be related? Have they come from the same place?

I lift my eyes to the gray horizon once more, my heart racing with a thrill of anticipation.

They have come from the same place.

They’ve come from the Otherworld.

2

You’re On Your Own, Superman

JACK

Altitude: 1,200 feet.

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