"Dude!" Otto started off, before his sentence was quickly finished off by Twister, "Is that a Map?" Sam just smiled and with a single nod he answered, "Uh Huh." Otto Reggie and Twister moved closer to Sam's Laptop in order to try and scan the map, they've never knew that their was a passage way that lead away from Ocean Shores from the North.
"Dude this is amazing, I didn't even know that there was a pass leading North from our town." Otto said with excitement in his eyes as he pointed it out on Sam's computer. "But how do we know this map will lead us to our parents?" Twister couldn't help but ask as he turned from the laptop back to Sam with a large look of confusion in his eyes.
"Well, after conducting multiple searches online, from my Mother's notes that she had left me, I've noticed that she hadn't finished one, knowing that, that is not like her at all, I went to investigate, only to discover this." Sam explained as clearly as possible as Reggie Otto and Twister exchanged looks of both confusion and surprise.
"After conducting a few tests on the Map, I eventually discovered that this Map was not supposed to be here. Its as if some one didn't want it to fall into anyone's hands, and find out where they are holding the parents." Sam than added with a look of determination mixed with rage in his voice as he slammed his fist into his hand.
Otto couldn't help but turn from a completely confused kid, into an amazed kid. "Sammy! I take back everything I said to you 10 minutes ago, Your Awesome Man!" Otto praised as Sam just bowed as if he had just finished ending a show with an audience. "Thank you. Thank you." He playfully said as his friends laughed.
"Great job Squid" Twister praised while holding a thumps up, as he looked one last time at the map, before turning his gaze back on Sam. "Now we can give Officer Shirley this new discovery and we can see our parents again." Twister then said as he was about to close the laptop, only to be stopped by Otto.
"Whoa Whoa Twist, what do you mean give it to Officer Shirley?" Otto demanded as he released his hand. "With this map the police can track down the bad guys and we can see our parents again." Twister repeated with a shrug of his shoulders only to meet a small smile from Otto as he looked again at the laptop.
Reggie felt unedged by Otto's smirk, when he had smiles like this, it often meant trouble.
"No Twist! I got a better idea." Otto said as everyone looked at him with a look of curiosity, eager to learn what his plan was. "How about we follow this map on our own, and rescue our parents ourselves without the police."
Everyone accept Otto, became shocked at hearing this plan. "Otto are you nuts?!" Sam snapped only for Reggie to add "We don't know who these people are, they could be dangerous!" Twister than finished off the entire protest rant from all three friends by adding. "yeah and we're just kids dude!"
"No wait! Think about it guys." Otto started off in his defense as his friends glared at him. "If we go out on our own to save our parents, they won't think that we're babies anymore, and also think about this, how awesome do you think the people of Ocean Shores will react when they hear about this in Reggie's Zine," Otto than impersonates a News flash article as he waves his arm into the air. "The Four brave children who rescued their parents in their time of need. They never gave up hope, and loved their parents so much that they were willing to go and risk their own lives just to save them."
At first there was silence among the group, as Otto just stood there waiting for a reaction or word from either of them. No one said anything, until finally Twister spoke up breaking the silence.
"Otto I don't know about this." Twister felt unedged as he said those words, only for Otto to reach out and touch his shoulder. "I know it is scary Twist, but we've gone through dangers before remember? The four of us during that giant Storm last month?" Otto pointed it out which actually and surprisingly everyone one agreed to. "And there was Hurricane Maurice, along with the Incident in the grand canyon."
"You know Otto," Sam said thinking for a minute, before lifting his head back up to look at him. "Your right."
"Yeah Otto, we have gotten into alot of dangerous situations before, and we always got out safely." Reggie says with a small giggle in her voice as Twister soon smiled and looked up to Otto. "Hey man I was only joking, I mean it would be a lot of fun for us to go there and risk our lives for our parents."
Otto could feel a tear of happiness forming in his eye, as he slowly lifted his glasses to wipe it off. "Thats my friends and sister I know and love" Otto respectively replied as Reggie hugged him for comfort.
"So Its decided then? We're going after these guys? Sam asked with a confident look on his face. Otto just smirked and said "Oh yeah, We follow the map on your laptop Sam, take the perpetrators by surprise, rescue our parents and get out before they knew what hit them." Otto revealed as part of his rescue plan.
"That actually might work Rocket Boy," Reggie agreed as Otto looked at his friends who just nodded their heads in agreement. "This is going to be Awesome! Everyone start grabbing your backpacks, supplies, Skateboards, Helmets and bicycles, we head for that North pass today, and Twister gather as much food as you can." Otto yelled with a smile as he raced out of Sam's house with Reggie.
"You got it Otto man!" Twister replied as he quickly followed the Rocket siblings out of Sam's room. As the four friends began to pack numerous supplies for their trip, Sam had quickly gathered every piece of equipment that he needed including the charger for his laptop.
A half hour later, the four kids, except Sam, who was instead being towed in a bicycle trailer, were on their bikes racing North towards the unknown pass that was highlighted on the top portion of the map, just below the unlit portions. Just as the four friends race for the region, they notice that the map is taking them outside of Ocean Shores and into a heavily wooded area on a cliff.
"Dude how far is this place?" Twister complained as he was almost out of breath already from pedaling so much. "We're not that far." Sam called out from the bicycle trailer, that was being towed by Reggie. "Wait Guys Stop!" Sam than called out, as all three bicycles slammed to a stop and Sam went flying out of the bicycle trailer.
"Sammy are you okay?!" Reggie asked with a worried look on her face, as Sam sat up and adjusted his glasses. "Yeah I'm fine."
"Why'd you stop us for?" Otto demanded, only for Sam to open his laptop and look at the map, revealing that the path to the North has been reached and that somewhere in the area, a large hill is located somewhere.
"According to my laptop, the map is saying that their should be a giant hill somewhere, Look around you guys." Sam instructed as him and his friends looked left and right, only too see a large hill moving up to what appears to be a large mountain canyon.
"Dude There it is!" Twister called out. "Thats it! lets go!" Sam instructed as the four friends made their way to the top of the hill, however the higher they went up, the hotter it was becoming, this was a huge surprise to the four kids. "Whoa, It is hot!" Otto groaned as he wiped sweat from his brow. "Otto man, I feel like I'm about to pass out." Twister moaned as he was agreeing with his best friend.
As soon as they got deeper into the canyon, the name of the highlighted northern pass, that was once unknown quickly changed into Magma Rock. Horrified Sam yelled for everyone to stop, and so they did only to find their bike wheels about 4 inches from the canyon's volcanic soil.
Fear swept the four of them as they stared down the fiery canyon. "Whoa!" Otto said with a stunned look as he almost felt that his eyes were about to fall out of his sockets. "How do we get passed this?" Reggie asked wiping sweat off and tugging the collar of her shirt, trying not to faint from the heat.
"I say we go back now!" Twister automatically answered as he attempted to turn his bike and return down the hill only to be stopped by Otto. "No dude! We all agreed that we would do this to save our parents, and we will find away to get across."
"Oh yeah how?!" Twister snapped angrily only for the two friends to stare down at Sam, who was trying his best to ignore all the heat and find another way through the pass, unfortunately all he got was the same result, until suddenly he found an upper layer of rock towering above the canyon over 30 feet from the fiery soil, it was unstable, but it was the only way to cross Magma Rock.
"Guys I think I found something" Sam quickly said as everyone gathered around, where he slowly began to explain about an upper pathway that led to the other side of the fire canyon.
"You mean, we've gotta climb all the way up their and race as fast as our bikes can go in this heat before the path comes down?" Reggie asked feeling a bit unease, only for Sam to respond with his normal "Uh huh," expression.
"And ugh... What happens if we fall off the path?" Twister than asked feeling even more scared than ever. "You get fried, by the heat of the volcanic soil." Sam answered much to Twister's horror.
"Alright everyone, there is no time to chicken out, Lets try to get up there." Otto instructed as he climbed off his bike and quickly moved it towards the spot where the group would have to climb rocks in order to make it up to the upper path.
The heat of the canyon, combined with the weight of gear, worn by the kids, along with the pulling of bicycles. made it extremely difficult to make it up to the upper path, at one point Sam almost lost his footing almost falling from the cliff. "SAM!" Reggie cried and quickly saved by him, by catching his hand before he fell.
"Thanks Reggie." Sam said in relief as she pulled him up. "No problem Sam, just be more careful next time okay."
"Dude we made it!" Otto called out, as Sam stood back on his feet and looked straight ahead at the rocky pathway over the volcanic soil of Magma Rock. "Wow that doesn't look stable." Reggie commented as she noticed several parts of the rock were shaky, and several others appeared to be a bit cracked.
Twister gulped in fear, as Otto had just adjusted his helmet and prepared to get back on his bicycle. "Alright everyone just follow me, we'll make it through this." As quickly as everyone could do, they all climbed back aboard their bikes while Sam entered the bike trailer again, and with one swoop of speed the four went racing down the rocky path.
The rock shook violently, as several holes began to erode in the structure, forcing the kids to quickly break left and right, hot gasses from the ground below broke through the rock and almost fried Twister, but thanks to Otto yanking his handle bar to the left, he didn't get hurt by the gases.
"Uh oh! Look out, we gotta jump ahead!" Otto cried as he peddle faster urging everyone else to do the same. Several holes eroded to their left and right as Sam covered his eyes in terror. With one large leap from a large ramp like structure, the kids sailed across the gorge, and managed to make it on the other half of the weakened path.
However the impact of the landing soon caused the remains of the rocky pathway to erode from beneath them.
"Oh know!" Twister yelled as he looked behind noticing that the rocky path was now starting to collapse. Otto turned and screamed in horror as he raced faster trying to stay ahead of the falling rock. "Come on guys! We gotta get outer of here!" Reggie cried, as the three kids peddled hard and as fast as they can go, Sam still had his eyes closed in the bike trailer, as the trio missed several more hazards in their way before lunging off one more ramp and onto a grassy surface below.
"Wahoo We Made It!" Otto yelled in happiness, as Twister quickly jumped off his bike and kissed the cool grass, much to Otto's disgust. "Wow that was close." Reggie than added as her heart was beating fast and out of control, she was breathing heavily from all the heavy pedaling she had been going as she turned and watched the remainder of the upper rocky path collapse into the soil.
"We made it, you can open your eyes now Sam." Reggie insisted as he held Sam's shoulder. "Did we make it?" he asked only to see that the area around him was not rock, but grass. "Yahoo! We did make it!" Sam praised as Reggie laughed.
"So we're across, now where do we go?" Twister asked, as he looked at the spot where they just came from and sighed, "We won't be able to go back, that's for shore."
"Hang on Twister, let me see." Sam was amazed as he noticed that another portion of the map was trying to light itself up, but for some reason it was refusing to do so. "Ugh know!" Sam groaned getting everyones attention. "Yo what up Sam?" Otto asked, as Sam turned to his friends from his computer screen. "Guys! My network is down! I can't get the other part of the map to light up"
The kids just growled with annoyance. "Dude we almost got killed! How can the network go down like that?!" Twister demanded, as Sam tried to find a possible explanation for this interference. "I don't know, I can't get a glimpse of anything."
"Guys!" Reggie called out getting all three of their attention. "Looks like there is a pass here." Reggie pointed at a large pass which appeared to be heading North towards the sea, the sky was dark and blackish grey, but oddly enough there was no rain coming down, all that was heard was thunder from above.
"Looks like its going to rain soon, we better find away out of here." Otto said hopping back aboard his bike, as everyone else, but Sam, who instaead went back into the bicycle trailer, did the same. The four followed the pass Reggie had found only to bring them to a large coastal town.
Upon arriving, the four kids are horrified at what they see. The oceanic bay town was being bombarded by flaming bowlders, and there was a strange flying object, on what appeared to be a large airship in the sky over an unidentified location across the bay. A small Island stood out off the coast, while small bridges and planks separated most of the docks from the town stadium.
"Wha-What happened here?!" Otto asked in shock as he couldn't believe it, the others just shrugged not knowing how to answer. "I'm not sure Otto, but I suggest we look around." Sam insisted only to find a large metal looking hut on the rocks in front of the town.
"Look guys there is a house over there, maybe someone in it can tell us whats going on!" Sam insisted only for Otto to agree and also add "or maybe our parents is somewhere in this town! Come on!" Otto leads the group to the house as they enter it, only to discover it being a mess, and completely damaged.
"Whoa! Dude." Twister said with intense horror as he looked around.
"This place really got trashed." said Reggie with surprise in her voice as she noticed several scattered notes on the floor, a damaged machine on the left wall, several overturned book shelves, and buckets of water everywhere.
Sam ventured towards the window of the room and looked through the window telescope. "Wow what ever is doing this to these people must be really bad." Sam groaned with mourns as he looked back at his friends.
"Alright," Otto started off as everyone turned their attention towards him, "Its time we take a rest after that experience we had at Magma Rock, we will settle here for the night, than tomorrow two of us will check on the town and come back with an update, and hopefully the squid will get the network running again." Otto said as the others agreed and began to unpack a couple of sleeping backs and get ready to call it a night.
Otto and Twister were the first to fall asleep, but Sam is too focused on trying to reset his laptop's network in order to care about going to sleep. His laptop was plugged into a charger on the wall, and he was sitting near the out lit, close to the window with the telescope.
With his legs crossed in a butterfly style, Sam continued hard and valiantly to try and get the image of the new map piece to light, but each time he tried it had always failed. Reggie who was also asleep for some odd reason slowly opened her eyes, unknown to Sam.
"What are you doing?" Sam was startled at the sudden voice but turned to see it was just Reggie looking up at him with a concerned look. "Nothing Reggie, I'm just trying to get the network back up." Sam replied with a smile as he turned his attention back to his laptop screen.
"Sam, we've been through alot today, you need rest." Reggie stated as she rose from her sleeping back and sat back down looking at him, while stretching her arms a bit. "Don't worry about it." Sam said as he was still staring at his computer screen not knowing that Reggie slowly got up and was walking towards him. "Just give me five more minutes and I'll-" Sam was cut off by his laptop closing right before him, by Reggie's hand.
"No five minutes, Sam Dullard, Bed now!" She instructed pointing to his sleeping bag, that was actually close between Otto's and hers. Sam just sighed in defeat, realizing that Reggie has a point and just gets up. "Yes ma'am" he groans as he walks over to his sleeping bag, and tries to get comfy inside. Reggie went back to hers and laid back down.
"Sam I know your trying your best to help us find our parents, but you can't go pushing yourself like that." Reggie said laying down on her tummy looking at him with a look of worry. "You scare me sometimes when you do things like this Sam. Sometimes I worry that my friend will work himself to death."
Sam sighed, but agreed to what Reggie was saying. "I know Reggie, it's just that, I really wanna see my mom, I want her to tuck me in back home, in my own bed, and always be there to smile at me when I am hurt." Sam says while tears formed in his eyes as he continued to speak. "I wanna do this, so I can see her again." Sam finished off, as Reggie reached into the pocket of her pajamas and gave Sam a tissue for him to blow his nose.
"Thanks Reggie." Sam said with a smile as he tossed the tissue into one of the destroyed empty small buckets that was towering over his sleeping bag. "I know how you feel Sam," Reggie said as she held his hand. "I miss my dad alot too and-" Reggie was soon cut off by an annoyed, cranky and sleepy Otto. "Hey could you two quiet down?"
"Go back to sleep Otto!" Reggie barked as Otto just snapped back. "Go to sleep yourself!" Otto turned his back towards the two and fell back asleep, as Reggie just sighed with embarrassment as she face palmed herself. "Otto is right Sam we better get to bed." Reggie than crawled into her sleeping bag and lie down looking at Sam, she smiled as Sam had already fallen asleep.
"Good night Sammy," Reggie said in a soft voice, as she turned on her sleeping back and now had her back facing Sam Otto and Twister's sleeping bags. She fell asleep within seconds, hoping that tomorrow her, her brother her friends could find their parents in the bombarding town tomorrow.
