Uh-oh,” Javi said.

Kira was gazing at the green-tipped straw. After a long moment, a soft smile curled her lip. Akiko looked like she was about to cry.

Molly stepped forward. “Maybe we should—”

“She’s too young,” Yoshi said. “I’ll do it instead.”

Kira must have understood. She let out a burst of angry Japanese and waved the straw in Yoshi’s face.

She wasn’t backing down. Her white streak of hair flashed in the sunlight.

Javi edged a little closer to the pile of green berries. They looked ripe and sweet, and his taste buds were tired of pretzels.

“Let me,” Molly said. “This was all my—”

“You already chose a straw!” Yoshi cut in. He switched to Japanese and started arguing with Kira.

Javi reached for the berries. It was easy, really, because he’d always known it would be him. He was always the loser at rock-paper-scissors or coin tosses, all the way back to his first eeny, meeny, miny, moe. Kira had just gotten in the way of the natural order of things.

Besides, he was really hungry. And those berries did look good.

He picked up three and ate them.

As he chewed, a taste flooded his mouth … not a good one.

There was a metallic sharpness to it, like pennies on his tongue. And also a pasty, flowery flavor—ground-up chalk mixed with the contents of his grandma’s fancy soap dish. On top of it all, a fierce bitterness twisted up his mouth.

The awful taste must have shown in his expression, because the others fell silent.

Javi started to take a breath, but adding air to the chewed-up berries was a bad move. The smell of rotten eggs filled his head.

His eyes watered, and he felt Molly’s hand on his shoulder.

“You okay?”

“Spit it out!” Anna cried.

He managed to cough once, and a gob of green flung itself from his mouth. Everyone leaped back, like they expected the berries to come for them next.

But the taste was padlocked to Javi’s tongue. Its tendrils were crawling down his throat, making their way toward his stomach. And every time he managed to take a breath, the rotten-eggs smell expanded. His vision went fuzzy, and he felt himself drop to his knees.

“Javi!” Molly cried. “Drink this!”

She waved something—a water bottle—in front of his face, but Javi pushed it away. Water would only carry the acid tendrils farther down his throat.

But they reached his stomach anyway, and it was like a switch was thrown. His whole body lurched, and everything he’d eaten since reaching camp that morning leaped from his stomach. Hot and salty, it streamed up his throat and into his mouth, then out through his lips and onto the ground.

Two more gigantic heaves came from him, emptying his stomach completely. A moment later, Javi found himself curled up in the dirt, gasping and clutching his belly.

“Um, are you okay?” Molly asked from about ten feet away.

Javi didn’t answer. The thought of his abdominal muscles flexing again, even to push out a single word, was too much.

But the weird part was, he didn’t feel that bad.

He felt clean inside. His vision was sharp, his eyes washed by tears. Even his sinuses were clear. The half-digested airplane pretzel smell that filled the clearing was particularly crisp, if not very pleasant.

“I’ll live,” he whispered.

“Whoa,” Anna said. “That was fast. It was like those berries were designed to make you puke.” Anna knelt beside him, looking into his eyes. “Your pupils look normal, as far as I can tell. This is kind of perfect.”

Javi stared at her. “Um, which definition of perfect are you using? Because I give those berries one star.”

“Sorry. It sucks to barf. But this is exactly what we need for food testing!” She looked up at Molly. “If anyone gets sick, we can use the green berries to flush them out. It’s like having a stomach pump on call!”

“Just what I’ve always wanted.” Javi sat up and reached for a water bottle.

Kira knelt down in front of him, staring into his eyes. She reached out … and flicked his nose.

“Ouch,” Javi said. “What was that for?”

She said something in Japanese.

Yoshi smiled. “She says wait your turn and don’t play the hero. But I think you were brave.” He bowed.

Before meeting Yoshi, Javi had never seen anyone bow, except maybe as a joke. It seemed somehow formal and heartfelt at the same time. “Thanks.”

“Kira says she’ll go next,” Yoshi announced to the group. “And I’ll go after her.”

“I feel like the straws aren’t being respected,” Oliver said.

Molly sighed. “Maybe random chance isn’t the best way to make decisions. I’ll go after you guys.”

“Not necessary, Molly,” Anna said. “We only have two more kinds of berries. But the rest of you don’t have to worry. There’ll be plenty of other weird stuff to try. We haven’t tried eating a bird yet, and those big green insects might be a good source of protein. You might envy Javi by the time this is all over.”

“I wouldn’t go that far.” Javi stood up. His legs were a little shaky, and his mouth tasted bad. The grandma’s-soap-dish taste had been washed away, but the tang of stomach acid was still there. He tried not to look at the puked-up airplane pretzels on the ground.

He stumbled to a rock and sat down heavily.

Yoshi gestured to Kira, indicating the other piles of berries—blue and red. She leaned close to inspect them, giving each a sniff.

After a moment, Kira picked up a few of the red berries, closed her eyes, and popped them in her mouth.

She chewed a few times, then opened her eyes.

“Omoshiroi,” she said.

“Interesting,” Yoshi translated.

Javi leaned back and took a sip of water. “Omoshiroi,” he repeated. That was one Japanese word he figured he would always remember.

Kira ate another handful of the red berries and shrugged. She rubbed some of the juice into the white streak in her hair, and it instantly stained red.

She smiled at this, and Akiko gathered her into a hug.

“My turn,” Yoshi said.

He approached the blue berries and picked one up. After a deep breath he cautiously ate one, then another.

“Whoa. These are really good.” He reached for more, a sudden look of hunger in his eyes.

“Not too many,” Anna said. “You guys should wait a couple of hours, just to make sure there’s not some kind of slow-acting poison in them. The moment you start feeling weird, eat one of Javi’s berries to get rid of everything inside you.”

“They aren’t called Javi’s berries,” Javi said. “As their discoverer, I do not permit that!”

Anna laughed. “Okay, so what are they called?”

Javi thought for a moment. “From now on, they shall be known as … pukeberries.”

Everyone nodded in agreement, and Javi took another sip of water and closed his eyes.

His work here was done.