The Mysterious Island by Tony Abbott

One

The Storm
     
    Keee-kkkk! Lightning crackled and flashed outside the windows of Eric Hinkle’s basement.
    But he and his friend Julie could only look at the soccer ball in the corner.
    Boooom! The thunder two seconds later told them the storm was only a couple of miles away.
    “Neal is going to freak out when he sees,” said Eric. Neal was Eric and Julie’s friend.
    Julie stared over his shoulders. “I’m freaking out already,” she said. “Let’s call him. His eyes will bug out. He’s got to see this – now.”
    The two friends ran up the basement stairs to the kitchen. Eric picked up the telephone and punched in Neal’s number. Another flash of lightning made the phone crackle in his ear.
    “Hello, Neal?” Eric said when his friend answered. “You’ve got to come over right away.”
    “Are you kidding? There’s going to be a humongous storm in five minutes,” Neal replied. “Besides, I’m getting ready to eat. It’s lunchtime.”
    “It’s always lunchtime for you,” Eric said. “Forget food, Neal. This is important.”
    Neal sighed. “It’d better be, for me to pass up one of my mom’s tuna fish sandwiches. I’m coming.”
    After Neal hung up, Eric and Julie glanced out the window. The sky was getting very dark.
    Eric began to smile. “Good day to hang out in my basement.”
    “You mean, hang out in Droon,” Julie added.
    Eric chuckled. “Of course that’s what I mean.”
    In Eric’s basement there was an entrance to another world.
    A world that Eric, Julie, and Neal kept secret. The mysterious and magical world of Droon.
    Droon was a place where a good wizard called Galen Longbeard and a young princess named Keeah battled a very evil sorcerer by the name of Lord Sparr.
    Droon had all kinds of strange creatures, too. Galen’s assistant, Max, was a spider troll, half spider, half troll. He could climb up anything and spin sticky webs with his eight long legs.
    And then there were the Ninns. They were Lord Sparr’s nasty, red-faced warriors who flew around on big lizards known as groggles.
    And a witch named Demither. And –
    Boom-ba-boom! The sky flashed outside, and thunder boomed just as the back door opened.
    “Yikes!” Neal charged into the kitchen. “I think that storm followed me!”
    Eric opened the basement door. “No time for talk. Everybody downstairs.”
    The moment they got to the bottom of the stairs – kkkkk! – the basement flashed white, and – ba-boom! – the walls rumbled, and – splish! – rain splashed hard against the house.
    “ Hello , storm,” Julie said.
    “All right,” said Neal, stepping into the basement. “What is more important that tuna fish sandwiches?”
    “That.” Eric pointed to a corner of the basement. The soccer ball – Julie’s soccer ball – was sitting on the workbench.
    Actually, it was sitting above the workbench.
    It was floating in the air.
    “Whoa!” Neal gasped. “I repeat – whoa!”
    “Not only that,” Eric said. “You remember the first time we went to Droon and the soccer ball came with us and then it did that magical thing when we came back? Well, Julie and I were looking at it before and –“
    “Shhh!” Julie whispered. “It’s doing it again!”
    By the glow of the ceiling light they watched the ball begin to change.
    The black and white patches moves slowly across the surface of the ball. The patches became the shapes of countries. And the ball itself became a globe of another world.
    The world of Droon.
    “It means we need to go,” Julie said, looking at her two friends. “What else could it mean?”
    “Last time, our dreams told us to go to Droon,” Eric said. “But this time is different. I think it’s a sign from Keeah.”
    Neal took a deep breath. “What if something bad is happening? What if Lord Sparr is, like, attacking Keeah? Or Galen?”
    Kaaa-kkk! The room flashed white.
    The lightbulb in the ceiling flickered and dimmed.
    “There’s only one way to find out,” Eric