Milton was usually an early riser, but he slept late the next morning because it turned out traveling for twenty-six hours straight on three airplanes (one of which had almost certainly nearly plummeted into the ocean on numerous occasions) was extremely exhausting. He slept and slept and slept so hard that when he woke up his face was covered in sleep lines and there was a puddle of drool on his pillow.
Uncle Evan was gone, but there was a note on the silver icebox that read:
Milton,
I didn’t want to wake you. I’m heading to the research station, but I’ll be back for dinner. Help yourself to anything on the shelves.
Uncle Evan
While he ate a breakfast of canned spaghetti and meatballs (which appeared to be Uncle Evan’s sole source of sustenance), Milton considered his plans for the day. Uncle Evan seemed to think he’d be gallivanting about outdoors from dawn till dusk. While Milton did plan to go on a brief expedition or two this summer, the only thing he wanted to do right now was get back to Isle of Wild.
He retrieved his HandHeld from the couch-bed, but when he pressed the Power button, the screen remained blank.
The battery was dead.
Milton glanced around the cottage, searching for an outlet, but he didn’t see one right away.
He scanned the walls, every square inch of them.
No luck.
Then he checked the floor and the ceiling and under the couch-bed and even behind the composting toilet.
Still no luck.
The truth came to Milton like a lurch of seasickness. Uncle Evan had done his cooking on a camp stove. The only light was an oil lamp.
This cottage was powerless.
Milton grabbed his HandHeld again, but no matter how many times he pressed (and then jabbed and then mashed) the Power button, it didn’t turn on.
Milton’s thoughts, however, did.
Now that he was no longer traveling, now that he’d had a full night’s sleep, the seriousness of his situation was making itself known.
Milton was five thousand miles away from home on a mostly deserted island.
His parents (very nearly Officially Divorced) were halfway across the world.
His former best friend didn’t even know where he was (not that he would care).
And if all that wasn’t horrendous enough, now he couldn’t even play Isle of Wild.
It was just him. Alone.
Milton P. Greene.
What was he going to do?
He plunked down onto a stool at the driftwood table. The sun started shining directly into the windows and the air grew stiflingly heavy, but still Milton sat. He sat and stared at his blank HandHeld, wishing as hard as he could that it would turn on because the last thing he wanted to do was spend an entire summer thinking and thinking and thinking about the Most Totally, Terribly, Horribly, Heinously Rotten Year of All Time.
And then his HandHeld did turn back on.
There was some kind of blip, a momentary battery surge, and Sea Hawk’s voice (distorted but still supremely awesome) belted out, “Onward! Ever onward!”
Milton shoved the screen up to his face. He pressed the Power button again and again. Nothing else happened.
But it was enough.
Milton got to his feet. He put on his vest, hiking boots, and utility belt. He hung his neon-green binoculars around his neck, unzipped his pocket-covered pants into shorts, and donned his explorer hat.
There were no mirrors in the cottage, but he took a peek at the top of Uncle Evan’s icebox and saw himself peering back. In that blurry surface, he looked like an explorer. He looked like a naturalist.
He looked like Sea Hawk.
He wasn’t going to sit in this cottage thinking rotten thoughts for another second.
Sea Hawk had urged him Onward, and Onward he was going to go.
He was going to find an outlet.
And maybe some of those never-before-seen creatures too.