Alejandra felt like the ground was shifting underneath her just enough to throw her entire balance completely off. Her adrenaline was still surging after the fight with the crab, but she knew that soon it would drain away leaving her fatigued and discombobulated for a time, just like it always did. And she couldn’t allow herself to be seen that weak in front of her family. Not if what Olivia said was true.

  A fantasy world. Dios mio was that even possible? Things like that didn’t happen in the real world. Not really. Oh she was familiar with the idea. She’d read The Chronicles Of Narnia with her children in grade school, and she’d glanced through Olivia’s collection of fantasy novels from time to time just to make sure her little girl wasn’t reading anything that was… Dangerous.

  But those were books. Fantasies. Stories for a young mind to indulge in without the fear of anything like it happening to them in their safe and secure life.

  But.

  But there was that monster crab, bigger than anything that would exist on Earth. But there were the trees behind them, wholly alien despite their familiar shape. But there were the floating coins, the miraculous healing of her husband’s wounds. And of course, the clam.

  How strange that out of everything, that was the one thing that did the most to convince her that Olivia’s wild theory was actually fact.

  “Wait,” Isabel said, still carrying Lucas on her back. “Are you for real? Like, actually a fantasy world? Like Narnia and Aslan and The Hobbit and stuff?”

  “Ehm, more like Sword Art Online or Rise Of The Shield Hero,” Olivia said, wobbling her hand back and forth. “But yeah, Narnia is a good example too.”

  “We’re dead?”

  Everyone stopped at the tone in Dinah’s voice. The smaller girl was hugging her arms close around her abdomen and staring at the dead crab, the look on her face was…

  Something Alejandra had seen before.

  “Yeah–” Olivia started to say cheerfully, oblivious to what was going on in her friend’s head. Alejandra cut her off, pitching her voice to carry.

  “No,” she said in her Command voice, and Olivia’s mouth snapped shut and her eyes widened in surprise.

  “We are not dead,” Alejandra continued more quietly now that she had the attention of the group. “For one, dead men do not bleed.” She jerked her thumb at Matty to punctuate her statement. “For another, were we dead, we would be with jesu cristo in heaven. And I am very certain,” she added, smiling a crooked smile, “that there are not dangerous giant monster crabs in heaven.”

  “Not in any bible I’ve read, anyway,” Matty added, his own smile coloring his voice.

  “Well, I guess my books could be wrong,” Olivia said, frowning. “Come to think of it most of them do get kinda vague on whether or not the main characters actually die or are just teleported somehow to the new world.”

  “There, you see?” Alejandra moved to rest her hands on Dinah’s shoulders, trying to give comfort to the girl. “We are not dead. Merely… elsewhere.”

  “Okay,” Dinah said, still subdued and not looking up from her feet. “I guess that’s better.”

  “So, how do we get back?” asked Bel.

  Another long silence came as they all looked to each other.

  “Um,” Olivia said, “sometimes there’s like a big spell that can teleport people back and forth between worlds. But, most of the time… They can’t. They’re stuck in the new world and have to make a new life there.”

  The silence grew heavier.

  “Okay then,” Matty said suddenly, clapping his hands together. “Then that’s our end goal; find the spell that brings us back home. But that’s the end goal. There’s a lot of things we need to do in between now and then. So let’s stop staring at each other like braindead fish, let’s figure out our next move.” He held up the scroll he’d gotten from the clam. “Olivia, it sounds like you’re our expert on this… Isekai stuff? Any ideas about this?”

  “Lemme see,” Olivia said, instantly perking up. She took the scroll from Matty and squinted at the writing on it, shoving her pink bangs out of the way to get a closer look.

  “So, a lot of times in the stories, when the hero gets transported to the other world, they get given some kind of Uber Power or high-tier item that gives them some kinda leg up in the world. This thing says it’ll give you a boon when you open it–Oh cool, that’s not English! I didn’t even notice! There must be some kind of system or magic or something that’s giving us the ability to read the writing of this world!”

  “We’re still talking English though, aren’t we?” Lucas asked, frowning as he listened to his own words. “So does that mean we can only read new languages?”

  “Maybe the magic isn’t doing anything because we all understand English and it doesn’t need to translate,” Olivia said, frowning. Then she perked up and turned to Dinah. “Hey, you never took Spanish in highschool, right?”

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  “You know I didn’t,” Dinah said, peering at her friend. “French was way better than Spanish.”

  “Cool,” Olivia said, slipping into the Spanish she had learned at her mother’s knee. “So you shouldn’t be able to understand this, right?”

  “What are you talking about, of course I can understand y–” Dinah paused and blinked. “Hey. That wasn’t English! But I heard it like it was!”

  “Oh that is so cool,” Lucas breathed.

  “Focus, mija,” Alejandra chided gently.

  “Right. Right.” Olivia turned back and handed the scroll back to Matty. “Okay, so, it says you get a boon. That probably means that because the system or the magic or whatever recognizes us as outworlders, it’s giving us some kind of super-present to make it easier for us to survive here. I guess you open it up and then pick whichever one looks best to you?”

  “This is unreal,” Bel said, shaking her head.

  “Alright,” Matty took the scroll, then looked around. “But not near the water. There might be more crabs, and I don’t want to get into another fight like that any time soon.”

  “How about over there?” Lucas pointed up the beach at a half-moon clearing about thirty yards away where the jungle was less dense.

  They agreed that was a better spot and headed there, Alejandra leading the way and trying to not shiver as the adrenaline finally started leaking out of her. They reached the clearing and Matty broke the seal on the scroll. It unfurled by itself, raising up and hovering in front of him.

  “Okay, let’s see what we’ve got,” Olivia said, snugging in close to her dad’s side so she could get a good look at the scroll. “Oh hey, it’s got pictures and stuff too.”

  The rest of the family and Dinah crowded around as well, and stared at the scroll.

  Thy Efforts Hath earned thee a boon, Sojourner. Take thy time and [eviscerate] thy choice [ecstatically], for thou may only choose a single boon from this scroll.

  There were a dozen entries, each one with their own picture next to a description. But…

  “Oh that’s weird,” Olivia said, frowning. “The images look like they’re corrupted or something.”

  Indeed, the images next to almost every item on the scroll were marred and muddy, making it almost impossible to tell what they were. And their descriptions were no better.

  [Fishlips] of the Wanderer - A [laughable] [barrel] of [UNDETERMINED], this boon shall increase thy [whimiscality] tenfold at the cost of a portion of thy [nudity]

  “Are they all like that?” Alejandra asked, frowning. “That doesn’t seem at all useful.”

  “Whatever translation thing is working with us right now must be on the fritz,” Matty said, eyeing the strange scroll. “Or maybe something deeper is wrong that we don’t know about. Regardless, I don’t really feel good about making a choice when I don’t know what it is I’m choosing. Especially not with things like that ‘at the cost of’ proviso.”

  “Agreed,” Alejandra said, eyes skimming down the scroll. Every item was like that, garbled and nonsensical with a picture next to it that was utterly useless… Oh, except for that one.

  “Matty,” she said, pointing.

  “Oh now that’s interesting,” Matty agreed.

  Thy Possessions Returned - In [contrivance] of a boon from this world, thou may instead have all the possessions thou had with thee upon thy [coronation] returned to thee. Beware, choosing this option may make thy time upon this world more difficult!

  “Big whoop,” Bel said. “So you get your shoes and your watch back. So what?”

  “Look at the picture, Bel,” Matty said, pointing. The picture, the only one that was not a muddy mess, was that of a stylized white ship.

  The Dilligaf. With its radio, and its first aid cabinet, and its solar panels and its water purifier and everything else she couldn’t remember what they had brought on board right now.

  Matty looked up at her and caught her eyes, asking the question with nothing but his gaze. She considered for a long moment… But really, what other choice was there? Take a gamble on one of the ‘boon’s, or gain back what could be a true wealth of resources in the form of their yacht.

  And come to think of it, there was that other coin still by the giant crab, wasn’t there? So even if this did not pan out, she would be able to go back and grab that one and maybe try again?

  She nodded at her husband.

  He nodded back. “Alright. The Dilligaf it is.” He took a deep breath and brought his finger down on that option on the scroll. The text flashed gold and white, then all the writing disappeared to be replaced by new words.

  Thou hast chosen to have thy possessions returned. Thy boon is now active, and thy possessions shall reappear shortly.

  There was a papery noise as the scroll rolled itself back up, and then vanished in a puff of white light. Alejandra glanced around, but did not see anything different.

  “Do you think it worked?” Lucas asked, peering around over the top of Isabel’s head.

  “I’m not sure…” Matty started, then glanced down and his eyes bugged out.

  “MOVE!” He roared, grabbing Olivia and Dinah’s hands and sprinting back towards the waterline.

  Alejandra reacted on instinct, seizing Bel’s hand as well and taking off like a shot behind her husband.

  Rule one: A trusted ally at a dead run outranks everyone else. What had he seen that had scared him like that?” She glanced down as her feet hit the sand… And then she got it.

  She did not have a shadow. Or rather, she did, but it was obscured by another larger shadow. That was growing very quickly.

  She looked up to see the hull of the Diligaf falling towards the clearing where they had been standing like a bright white ICBM.

  “Get down!” she shrieked, throwing herself face-down on the sand and forcing Bel and Lucas down beside her. Just ahead of her, she saw Matty do the same with the others.

  She covered Isabel and Lucas wit her own body, then wrapped her arms around her head and tried to get as small as she could. She waited for the explosion, for the impact of a 50-ton pleasure yacht approaching the earth at speed that would be like a damn bomb going off.

  When it hit, the impact was less than she was expecting. Instead of a massive crater-making impact, there was a heavy crash and the sound of breaking wood, as if someone had drove a car into the side of a building at mid-range speed. She felt splinters pelt her, but not with the life-ending force she would have expected.

  She held herself there until the noise faded away–again, much faster than she had been expecting. Then she raised her face up and looked back over her shoulder.

  The Dilligaf filled and overflowed the clearing. Her keel was smashed to pieces, her hull punctured and split in a dozen places. The pilot cabin was just gone, and the prow looked like it had been smashed flat by the fist of an angry god. And as she watched, she saw a halo of golden light wink out from around it, and the vessel settled even further down, groaning as it tilted into the trees around it.

  Something slowed its descent, her scout’s mind reported. It was the only explanation.

  “I think I hate this place,” Bel groaned from underneath her. “Can we go home now?”