The Gizmo

Marty was tired, but far too excited to rest.

His bedroom was much bigger than the one he had shared with Luther at the boarding school. It had a king-size bed, a television, and a private bathroom. No more running down the hallway trying to avoid painful towel snaps from the older boys. He wasn't happy about the circumstances that had brought him to Cryptos, but he was pleased with the island, the squid, the bedroom, and the house-even though it was a little spooky.

In the corner of the bedroom was a desk. On top of it was something about the size and shape of his Game Boy, which he had lost to Luther in a bet.

Marty,

The computer's yours. We call it a GIZMO.

Enjoy....

Wolfe.

It was the smallest computer Marty had ever seen. He carried it over to the bed, flipped open the cover, and pressed a button beneath the little screen. The computer booted up and eight icons appeared.

GPS

TELECONFERENCE

E-MAIL

KEYBOARD

CHAT

LOCATE

VIDEO

CYBERVAULT

Marty found a stylus attached to the underside of the cover. He took it out and tapped the KEYBOARD icon and a small keyboard appeared on the screen. "Cool."

He tried the TELECONFERENCE and CHAT icons, but nothing happened. He skipped the E-MAIL icon, figuring it wouldn't work without an e-mail account, and clicked the CYBERVAULT icon.

To establish vault

please insert your disk.

"Don't have a disk," Marty said. He clicked the VIDEO icon. The screen went blank for a second, then filled with an aerial image of the Coelacanth. He saw Phil's seaplane still tied to the dock, then the camera swooped across open water. They must be using the helicopter to film this, Marty thought. But why? The camera circled back around and passed over the top of the red kayak. It was now resting safely on the beach, which he was glad to see. The camera plunged downward over the parking lot, where Marty caught a glimpse of Phil and the back of another person getting into a Humvee. A moment later, the Humvee drove away and the camera followed it up the road for a while, then veered off into the trees and rose above them. The tops of fir trees flashed across the screen. In the distance he could just make out two small lakes with the last glimmer of orange sunlight reflecting off the surfaces.

Video Terminated

The seven icons reappeared. Marty whistled. "The computer we built can't do that. Wait until I tell Luther!" He clicked the LOCATE icon.

Who do you want to locate?

Wolfe Grace Vid

Phil Sr. Marty PD Continue to next list

Phil Jr. Bertha Bo

Marty clicked his own name. An instant later a floor plan appeared on the screen. In the southwest corner of Bedroom #6 was a small gray square.

He carried the Gizmo from the bed over to the desk. The gray square moved across the little screen at the exact same pace he was walking. When he stopped the square stopped, when he moved the square moved. "Weird," he said, opening the bed room door and stepping out into the hallway. The gray square was now in the hallway. He knocked on Grace's door. There was no answer. He walked in. The gray square moved into Bedroom #5. "Very weird."

He glanced at Grace's desk and saw that she had a Gizmo identical to his. He sat on her bed and stared down at the gray square. "How does the Gizmo...?" He noticed the identification tag dangling from his neck and suddenly realized how it knew where he was. He clicked Grace's name. A blue square appeared in the Library.

Grace had stayed in her bedroom less than a minute before heading back downstairs, clutching the one armed monkey for security, which she was badly in need of after the day's events.

Mrs. Kouts, her English teacher, had told her that if she was curious about someone, all she had to do was look at their books. "You can read a person like a book by the books they read" was how Mrs. Kouts put it. And Grace was desperate to learn more about

their guardian.

She hadn't noticed it when she was in the library earlier, but along the walls beneath the balcony was a glass display case. In it was an ancient illuminated manuscript, hand-lettered on parchment, beautifully illustrated, and written in a language Grace had never seen before. She stood in front of the case for a long time, staring at the two open pages, trying to decipher the words; but she could make nothing of them and finally turned away, walking up the spiral staircase to the library.