by Tracey West
“Look, Migo is down there,” Meechee said. “He might be lost or hurt.”
“Or dead,” Fleem added.
“Fleem!” the other Yetis scolded.
“Oh, what? Now we’re not about finding the truth?” Fleem asked. “I’m just being honest.”
“I still say I should go,” Gwangi said. “I’m strongest and most prepared. I’ve trained myself to sleep with my eyes open. I’m asleep right now.”
“We’ve been through this,” Meechee reminded him. “He’s down there because I convinced him to go, so just lower me down so I can look around. Last time we dropped him because Thorp showed up, which he might do again, so let’s go!”
While Meechee talked, Migo was making his way up the mountain. He was so close that he could hear Meechee’s voice.
“Guys?” he called out.
Meechee didn’t hear him. “I won’t be able to live with myself if I don’t at least try,” she continued.
“GUYS!” Migo shouted.
“Ooh, I can still hear his voice in my head,” Kolka said.
“GUYS!” Migo repeated.
“It’s in my head too,” Gwangi said.
Meechee looked down and saw Migo climbing up toward them. “Migo! He’s here!” she shouted.
Kolka put her furry hand over her heart. “I know. And he always will be.”
“No, he’s here!” Meechee said, pointing. “As in over there!”
Gwangi looked down and saw Migo. Startled, he let go of the rope, and Meechee began to drop.
“Ahhhhh! Mystical creature!” Meechee yelled.
Gwangi quickly grabbed hold of the rope again. “I’ve got you!”
He pulled the rope with such force that Meechee swung up in the air and landed back on the cliff—right at the moment when Migo climbed up. She ran to him and gave him a big hug.
“Migo! I’m so relieved!”
Gwangi, Kolka, and Fleem joined them and flung their arms around both Yetis.
“Migo, my brother!” Gwangi said.
“Ooh, you’re alive!” Kolka squealed. “My visions had you dead, but I’m so happy they were wrong.”
“See, I told you he was alive,” Fleem fibbed. “Migo! I may or may not have taken some of your stuff.”
While Migo was happy to see them, he gently pushed them away. “Whoa, guys. Easy.”
His friends slowly backed up, and that was when they noticed the sleeping bag strapped to Migo’s chest. Percy’s nose stuck out of the top.
Meechee’s eyes got wide. “Is that . . .”
Migo unstrapped the sleeping bag. “Smallfoot Evidentiary Society, meet your mystical creature!” he announced.
He triumphantly set the sleeping bag on top of a rock. Percy wriggled around inside the bag, unable to get out.
“Uh, I hate to tell you this, but the Smallfoot doesn’t even have feet,” Gwangi said.
Then Percy managed to slide out of the sleeping bag as the circle of Yetis surrounded him. Quickly he got to his feet and began to film with his camera.
“Whoa! Four more Yetis,” he narrated. “It’s a whole squad! Oh, this is big. This is huge!”
He moved in a circle, getting them all on film.
“I knew it was real,” Meechee said, staring at Percy.
“I’m not crazy,” Gwangi said happily.
Kolka fought back tears. “It is so . . . beautiful.”
“And so short!” Fleem added. “I mean, it’s a lot shorter than me. I love it.” He approached Percy and raised his arms. “Fear me, creature! I am your god!”
“Fleem, what are you doing?” Kolka asked.
“Establishing dominance,” Fleem replied.
“No, we don’t dominate. We welcome it with open arms,” she said. She opened her arms wide—and accidentally knocked Percy off the rock! “Are you kidding? Did I just do that?”
She picked him up and pulled him into a hug. Percy’s face turned red as she squeezed the air out of him.
“Can I hold it?” Gwangi asked.
Kolka handed him over. “Sure. Here. Support the head,” she instructed. “There you go.”
Gwangi rocked Percy in his arms, and he and Kolka oohed and aahed over him like a newborn baby.
Meechee looked at Migo. “I can’t believe you did this,” she said. “You did it, Migo. You really did it.”
“I’d kinda like to think we did it,” he replied.
“We?” Meechee asked.
“Well, someone had to drop me off a cliff,” Migo answered.
Meechee nodded. “So, what was it like down there?”
“Meechee, there are answers to questions even you haven’t asked,” he replied.
She looked at him in awe. Gwangi turned to face them.
“We gotta bring this truth to the village!” he said. “Blow some tiny minds!”
Migo looked up the at the bright moon sinking into the horizon.
“Gwangi’s right,” Migo said. “Let’s wake ’em up!”
Chapter Eleven
Behold the Smallfoot!
In the village the feather alarm tickled Dorgle’s foot. He woke up and sat up in bed.
“Up and at ’em, Migo! Time to ring the gong!” he called out.
He walked past Migo’s room, made his way to the launchpad, and strapped on his helmet. Then, with all his might, he pushed the chair into launch position and climbed in.
“Aaaaand launch,” he said, but nothing happened. Without Migo to pull the lever, the chair wouldn’t take off.
“Migo?”
He looked behind him, and then he realized. “Oh yeah. Banished.”
He knew he’d have to hit the lever himself. He reached behind, twisting and turning, but he couldn’t reach it. He stretched out his leg and hit the lever with his big toe.
Sproing! The seat flung forward, firing him at the gong. But Dorgle’s aim was way off. He bent his body and flapped his arms, trying to correct his course.
It didn’t work. Splat! He crashed into the side of the gong tower, splitting his helmet in two. Then he slid to the ground.
Dorgle started to panic. No gong meant the Great Sky Snail wouldn’t wake up! They would spend the day in darkness! He’d have to get up and try again.
But when he got to his feet, the first golden rays of the Great Sky Snail were shedding light on the dark sky.
He stared, dumbfounded. “What the . . .”
All over the village, snails began to glow and Yetis started to wake up.
“What just happened?” Dorgle wondered. He hadn’t rung the gong, and yet the Great Sky Snail was awake.
He turned toward the village gate and squinted as a group of Yetis strolled through. One of them looked very familiar.
“Migo?” he asked.
Migo, Meechee, Gwangi, Kolka, and Fleem strolled through the village as curious Yetis stepped out of their homes. The five friends strutted down the icy street with confidence, like they were the coolest Yetis on the planet. They’d just found a Smallfoot!
Migo turned and spoke to everyone he saw. “Hey, listen, everyone. Stop what you’re doing and follow us. This is going to be the best part of your day!”
Meanwhile, as soon as the sun had risen without the gong, the Stonekeeper had sent Thorp out to investigate. The big Yeti stomped down the street—and spotted Migo.
“Hey, Migo, welcome back!” he said, and then he remembered. “Wait, aren’t you supposed to be banished?”
“Yep!” Migo replied cheerfully.
“Oh cool,” Thorp said. “Wait, what?”
Migo and the others marched to the tree in the center of the village. By now they’d gotten the attention of the entire village. The Yetis gathered round, sensing that something exciting was about to happen.
“Everyone, come here! Gather round. I promise you are gonna want to see this!” Migo declared.
By now the entire village had gathered around him.
“Fellow Yetis!” Migo began. “There are moments in our lives that a
re so important that we must pause and look deeper into the moment of the pace in which we are . . . to hold such beauteous gravitas, and take in the beauty—”
“Get to the point!” someone yelled.
“Yep. Okay. Here we go. Fellow Yetis! Behold the Smallfoot!”
Migo lifted Percy up over his head and removed his boot.
The Yetis gasped. Then they all began to talk at once.
“Is that . . .”
“Can it be?”
“Whoa!”
“It has a freakishly small foot!”
The toddlers climbed on top of one another, hoping to get a better look.
Percy didn’t mind being on display. He filmed the Yetis all gaping at him in awe.
“I can’t believe my eyes,” he murmured. “These aren’t primitive beasts living in caves. This is a complex civilization! Do you know what that means for the world?”
He looked into the camera lens. “A Percy Patterson network special! You’re welcome, world!”
Then the Stonekeeper made his way through the crowd. The Yetis respectfully moved aside and quieted down.
“So what’s all of this excitement?” the Stonekeeper asked.
“Migo found a Smallfoot!” one of the Yetis replied.
“That’s one guess,” the Stonekeeper said calmly.
Migo’s jaw dropped. How could the Stonekeeper deny what was right in front of his eyes?
“But, Dad, look at its small foot!” Meechee said, pointing to Percy’s foot.
The Stonekeeper shrugged. “Don’t yaks have small feet?” he asked. He reached out toward Percy. “Let me take it into the palace, consult the stones, and determine what it is.”
Migo and the others glared at him.
“What if it is a Smallfoot?” a Yeti named Garry blurted out. “Does that mean a stone is wrong?”
Gwangi fake-coughed into his hand. “They’re all wrong.”
The villagers began to murmur to one another. Garry had a good point.
“Everyone, please!” the Stonekeeper cried. “What do the stones tell us about questions? That we take them in . . .” He took a deep breath, and then made a pushing motion with his hands. “And push them down.”
The Yetis all took a deep breath—but they didn’t push down their questions. Instead they ran to Migo, and their questions poured out like water from a faucet.
“Migo, is it dangerous?”
“Can I pet it?”
“Does it do tricks?”
“WHAT IS HAPPENING?”
“What other stones are wrong?”
Garry grabbed his head in pain. “I have so many questions!”
The Stonekeeper had lost control. Migo sat down on a rock underneath the tree and talked to the Yetis, while Percy happily filmed it all.
“Where is it from?”
“Why is it pink?”
“How did you get it here?”
“What does it eat?”
“How does it think with such a tiny little brain?”
“Honestly?” Migo replied. “I have just as many questions as you do.”
A rock fruit peddler offered a rock fruit to Migo.
“Is it hungry? Does it want a bite of fruit?”
A female Yeti looked at Percy in wonder. “How is it here if a stone says it can’t be?”
Migo hoisted Percy onto his shoulder and carried him through the village streets, flanked by Meechee, Gwangi, Kolka, and Fleem. A fever of curiosity was spreading among the Yetis. They had spent their lives pushing down questions, and now the questions were all spilling out. Suddenly they had questions about everything and wanted to ask them! Migo beamed. He loved seeing how excited all the Yetis were. It felt great.
The Yetis on unicycles stopped pedaling. The ice-chopping Yetis stopped chopping. The ice ball polishing Yetis stopped polishing. They looked at the world around them with new eyes.
“Is that really a snail?” one Yeti asked, looking at the sun.
“What if it’s not?” another Yeti wondered.
Migo put Percy’s backpack down for a moment. A few toddler Yetis raced forward and rummaged through it, inspecting each item. Percy was trying to explain what they were.
“That’s a snood! It’s sort of like a scarf. And that’s a sock. It’s sort of like a lining between your foot and your shoe.”
One of the toddlers stared at Percy as he slurped up the sock like a strand of spaghetti.
“Okay, that’s really not what you’re supposed to . . . okay,” Percy said.
Gwangi was suddenly standing in front of Percy. He handed him the roll of toilet paper. “The scroll of invisible wisdom,” he announced to the Yetis.
“Oh! That will do quite nicely,” Percy said. He took the roll and ran behind a rock.
“It doesn’t yet trust us with its wisdom,” Gwangi said.
Fleem followed Percy behind the rock to see what he was doing. He quickly returned to the Yetis with a disgusted look on his face.
“It is not wisdom, and it is definitely not invisible,” he said.
Dorgle joined the crowd, nervously listening and watching. His son was really stirring things up!
The procession continued to the palace. One Yeti stepped in front of Migo.
“If the stone is wrong, could another be as well?” she asked.
Dorgle gulped. He turned to see the Stonekeeper towering over him, glowering. Did the Stonekeeper know that Dorgle had missed the gong? Anxious, Dorgle scurried away.
The Stonekeeper looked down at his daughter. “Do you see what you’ve started?”
“Yes!” Meechee replied with a confident smile. “Do you?”
The Stonekeeper shook his head. “You have no idea what you’ve done to them.”
“They’re just curious,” Meechee countered. “What’s wrong with that?”
The Stonekeeper’s gaze traveled around the village. The Yeti had not only stopped working, but were also trying new things. One Yeti hollowed out a ball of ice to make a drum. Another had carved a xylophone out of ice. The drummer started drumming, and the other played a happy melody on the xylophone. The Stonekeeper heaved a heavy sigh.
“Daddy, they have questions,” Meechee said. “And you can give them answers. Be a great leader and give them what they need.”
He nodded. “You’re right, sweetie. That’s what I intend to do.”
Meechee hugged him. “Thank you.”
She thought her father was on her side, but the Stonekeeper had other thoughts. The turret had stopped turning. The ice elevators weren’t moving. And nobody was dropping ice balls into the statue’s mouth.
He knew what he had to do.
He had to get the villagers to stop asking questions, before there would be consequences.
Chapter Twelve
The Cave of Secrets
Migo left Percy with Meechee and went to find his dad. In the excitement, he’d forgotten that his father must have been worried about him. He found Dorgle sitting on the rim of the aiming circle. Migo climbed out onto the platform and joined him.
“Migo, what do I do?” Dorgle asked, gazing at the pieces of broken helmet in his hands. “I missed the gong. But the Sky Snail came up anyway.”
Migo didn’t take this as bad news. “So another stone is wrong?” he asked. “This is amazing.”
“What’s so amazing about it?” Dorgle asked. “The stones are supposed to be . . . stones! You know? Reliable. Sturdy. Like your mother’s ankles were. And now the snail is rising on its own?”
“If it’s even a snail,” Migo said. “Meechee thinks it might be a flaming ball of gas.”
“GAS?” Dorgle wailed. “I’ve been banging my head on that thing to wake up a gas ball? That’s usually what wakes me up.”
“Dad, I know all this change is scary,” Migo said. “But being with everyone today, asking questions, thinking, wondering—I’ve never felt so alive!”
“But if I don’t ring the gong, I’m not the Gong Ringer,” Dorgle said. “And
if I’m not the Gong Ringer, then what am I?”
Migo didn’t have an answer for that. The father and son sat in silence for a moment, thinking. Then Thorp called up to them from below.
“Migo! My dad wants to see you, pronto!” he barked.
Migo hurried to the palace, where the Stonekeeper waited for him on the steps. Gwangi, Kolka, and Fleem observed them from nearby.
“What’s up with that?” Gwangi wondered.
“No, what’s up with that?” Kolka asked.
She pointed toward the turrets, where Thorp pedaled a unicycle, slowly moving them all by himself.
Gwangi and Kolka exchanged glances. They both knew that moving the tower must be really important if Thorp was trying to get it going.
“What? What am I missing?” Fleem asked.
Without answering him, Gwangi and Kolka turned toward the palace entrance.
The Stonekeeper led Migo inside and walked him through the great hall, past a line of statues.
“Look at them. The great Stonekeepers of the past,” the Stonekeeper said. “Each one adding new stones as they received wisdom about what was best for the village.”
Migo studied the statues. The earliest Stonekeeper wore a single stone as a necklace. The next one wore a vest of stones. With each Stonekeeper, more and more stones had been added as more rules had been made.
“The robe looks heavy,” Migo said, nodding to the Stonekeeper’s robe of stones, which touched the floor.
“Oh, it is,” he replied. “It requires a strong backbone.”
He stopped at the end of the great hall and stuck the bottom of his purple staff into a hole in the floor. Then he turned the staff. Behind them a wall lowered from the ceiling, creating a small room with no visible exit.
Then the Stonekeeper twisted the staff in the other direction. The sound of rock grinding on rock groaned as the floor beneath their feet sank, revealing a stone spiral staircase.
Migo’s eyes widened. “Whoa, secret stairs.”
The Stonekeeper motioned for Migo to go ahead.
“Where are you taking me?” Migo asked as they walked down the dark staircase.
“You have so many questions,” the Stonekeeper replied. “I think it’s about time I gave you some answers.”
The stairway ended, and the landing opened into a massive cavern that housed a collection of Smallfoot objects: airplane parts, a scrap of a hot-air balloon basket, a metal piece of a satellite. Migo didn’t know what they were, but it was clear that they were not from the Yeti world.
