Chapter 1

Hey, everyone! This is Devony, once again. So anyway, the Sandlot is one of my all-time favorite movies. Okay, I'll just say it: The sequels sucked. This has almost the same plot as Heading Home. Samantha Smalls is Scotty's daughter. She's twelve going on thirteen and she lives for baseball. After the large part in italics, I'm going into first person because I like it better, and I'm too lazy to retype the first part.

Disclaimer: I own Samantha and the girls on her team. I do not own the Sandlot or its sequels.

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"Balls in! Comin' down!" Samantha yanked down her catcher's helmet and held out her glove. "Get ready Nat! Comin' to you!" The second basemen charged into position as Mallory swung her arm around and snapped the ball down the strike zone.

A light flick of her friend's wrist proved how much power Mal had. Sam's hand was aching when she ball slammed into her glove and caused a cloud of dust to explode from her mitt. But her aching hand didn't stop her from performing a power throw.

The ball soared through the air and landed in Natalie's glove. She grinned, pulled her arm back and chucked the ball to the pitcher.

Samantha stood up and glanced at the stands. As usual, her shoulders fell in disappointment. Neither her mother nor her father had come to watch the game. Sam's mother was a lawyer, always busy no her trips, and her father was a commentator at Dodger's stadium. And because of that, Sam knew the players. Her favorite, of course, was her Uncle Benny. Benny "The Jet" Rodriguez wasn't really her uncle. Just a good friend of her fathers. Ever since she began to talk, he'd been her "Uncle Benny."

"Batter up!" roared the ump. Sam cringed, but got into position. Umpires, especially the ones with loud voices, sometimes scared her. Not a lot, but a bit.

"Ready position, ladies!" The girls their gloves ready, and Mallory wound up, and the ball shot down the zone, resulting in a perfect strike. Within a few minutes, there were two outs and no one on base. The third batter was a small, skinny girl who looked like she had no experience with baseball at all. The bat seemed to be too heavy for her as she struggled to lift it on her shoulder.

Sam rolled her eyes. "One more out, Mallory! Make my hand sore!" Sam gave her helmet a yank, punched her glove, and put her free hand behind her back.

Whoosh. Whiff.

"Strike one!"

Well, at least the kid had spirit enough to swing.

Another whoosh. Another whiff.

"Steerike two!"

Can you yell any louder?

The girl swung the bat for the last time, but it snapped off the bat and shot in the air. The girl, shocked by the hit, just stood there while Sam tore off her catcher's helmet and leapt to the side to catch the ball.

"GO CLARA!!!" the opposing team screamed. The batter charged down the line.

"DROP THE BAT!"

There is one all time greatest moment in the history of sports. And it happened in the 1932 World Series. The story goes that in the bottom of the ninth inning, with two outs and a timed run on base, Babe Ruth raised his arm and pointed toward the center field bleachers. No one believed it, because nobody had ever done it before. But the Babe was calling his shot. On the next pitch, the Great Bambino hit a towering four hundred foot homerun. And although he'd already been a hero before that, that's pretty much how he became a legend. Thirty years later, a kid named Benjamin Franklin Rodriguez became a neighborhood legend. It was in the greatest summer of my life, when he taught me how to play baseball, and he became my best friend. And he got me out of the biggest pickle I'd ever been in.

Pickle…why did dad always say pickle? A pickle is a food. Mom told me that, once upon a time, it meant "problem."

Oh, god, my head hurt. Anybody care to explain to my why I feel the need to remove my catcher's gear when there's a good hit?

Lung problems?

Hmm.

Heat and light blasted through my closed eyelids. I lifted a hand over my face as I sat up and struggled to lift my eyelids open. I felt like they had been glued shut. When they decided to open again, my eyes hurt even worse.

I fiercely rubbed away the black spots that were appearing in front of my eyes. I stretched my back and arms out. They were simply sore. My nose was killing me.

That little brat must have thrown the bat at me, I thought angrily. I was afraid of touching my nose, as though it might be broken.

After crossing the heck out of my eyes to check the damage on my poor nose, I took the time to look around. I was still at the field where my game was at…but it was different. There were no stands filled with cheering parents and friends. The dugouts were filthier than they were before, and the rusty old fence that Mallory oh-so-creatively named "Old Rusty" seemed to be disintegrating.

Poor Old Rusty.

I suddenly got that weird feeling that someone was watching me. You know- the hair on the back of your neck stands up, the whole nine yards?

"Hey."

When I turned, I was face-to-face with my Uncle Benny.

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Heh. Uncle Benny…yeah. I hadn't seen the Sandlot until a free day at school. Before I thought it was just some stupid movie about some stupid boys and their stupid psychotic dog….

…

Anyway, I'm in love with the movie now. Next chapter up as soon as I can!

--V