by Tracey West
“These are Smallfoot things,” Migo said. “But where did they come from?”
“Our ancestors brought them,” the Stonekeeper said.
He banged his staff on the ground twice, and snails lit up, revealing a wall carved with images. The pictures looked like they told a story.
“You see, Migo, there was a time when Yetis lived beneath the clouds,” the Stonekeeper explained. “We lived happily for a long time, until we came across a group of Smallfoot—also known as humans.”
Migo studied the wall to see carvings of humans with spears chasing Yetis.
“They attacked with their spears, and their sticks of smoke and thunder,” the Stonekeeper continued. “They called us Sasquatch. They called us Abominable. They chased us and tried to hurt us.”
Migo couldn’t believe what he was seeing. His Smallfoot wasn’t dangerous. He had helped Migo when he was hurt! Could these humans really have tried to hurt Yetis?
“We had to run and hide,” the Stonekeeper said. “So we climbed this mountain, where we knew the Smallfoot could not survive. And then the first stone was written: ‘Our world is an island that floats on a sea of endless clouds.’ ”
The wall carvings showed the Yeti mountain, surrounded by a ring of clouds.
“Then we wrote more laws,” the Stonekeeper explained. “It was the only way to protect ourselves from the humans. So it’s just best to leave things the way they are.”
“But my Smallfoot—he’s not like that,” Migo protested.
“They’re all like that,” the Stonekeeper replied. “Tell me, when you found him, did he meet you with open arms?”
Migo thought back to his first encounter with the Smallfoot. He had thrown a ski pole at Migo—or had it been a spear? And he’d tried to fire a gun at Migo, just like the gun in the carving on the wall. (It had been a tranquilizer gun, but Migo didn’t know that.)
“They don’t care about us,” the Stonekeeper said, “which is why we must protect our future.”
He slammed his staff into another slot on the floor and pushed down. The wall opened up, and a hiss of hot air hit Migo’s face. The sound of rhythmic clinking called to him from inside a room full of steam.
The Stonekeeper motioned for Migo to enter, and he obeyed. After a few feet the steam cleared, and Migo stared at a big, strange machine.
Part of the machine was a giant fan, its blades slowly turning. The machine sat in a huge hole bored out of the mountain, and continued to pump out steam. Through the fan the two Yeti could see a blanket of clouds stretched across the blue sky.
“Wait, are we below the clouds?” Migo asked, confused. “Our village is above the clouds.”
“Or so it would seem, but look closer,” the Stonekeeper said.
The truth suddenly hit Migo. “Those aren’t clouds. It’s steam!”
The Stonekeeper smiled. “The stones are working,” he said.
“The stones?” Migo asked.
The Stonekeeper led him around the corner, to where another machine hummed.
“You might think that the jobs in this village are pointless,” the Stonekeeper went on. “But each one is important. Every task insures that this machine keeps churning to make the clouds. Those below the clouds won’t look up—and those above the clouds won’t look down.”
Migo looked at the second big machine. Ice balls dropped from the machine into an enormous cauldron, where they melted and became water. A beam of light shone on the cauldron, creating steam. The fan turned the steam into the clouds that surrounded and hid the mountain.
Migo looked at the whirring blades of the fan, which were connected to long rods that stretched way, way up. That was when it hit him—the Yetis riding unicycles had been turning the turret that powered the fan!
“So none of these stones are true?” Migo asked. “They’re all lies?”
“Good lies,” the Stonekeeper replied. “To protect our world.”
Migo thought of all the Yetis, and how excited and happy they’d been to see the Smallfoot. How they had come alive when they’d started asking questions.
“They need to know the truth,” Migo said.
“Oh, do they?” the Stonekeeper asked. “I was young once too, Migo. But as I got older, I realized that the need to protect the Yetis was more important than any misguided search for the truth.”
Migo shook his head. “But the truth is important.”
“Protect the lie, and you protect our village,” the Stonekeeper said. “Lives are at stake, Migo. Your friends, your father, Meechee. You want to protect them, don’t you?”
Migo felt a heavy weight on his heart. The truth was important. But so was being safe.
He sighed. “So, what do you want me to do?”
“Tell everyone you were lying about the Smallfoot,” the Stonekeeper replied.
“But they’ve already seen it,” Migo argued. “They’re not going to believe me.”
The Stonekeeper grinned. “You’d be surprised what they’ll believe.”
Migo turned to the carvings on the cave wall and stared at the drawings of the humans hunting the Yeti.
“Knowledge is power, Migo,” the Stonekeeper said. “The question is, What are you going to do with all that power?”
Migo didn’t know. He was sure of only one thing: this was the hardest decision he’d ever had to make in his life!
Chapter Thirteen
Betrayal
Gwangi, Kolka, and Fleem had known something was up when they’d seen Thorp trying to keep the turrets spinning all by himself—and when the Stonekeeper had brought Migo inside the palace.
It had been Fleem’s idea to slide down the ice ball tunnel and see where it led, so he went first. He landed inside the hidden room of the palace, in front of the giant fan. Gwangi and Kolka landed on top of him.
The three friends stared at the machine for a moment, stunned. Then Gwangi turned to Kolka. “And everyone thought I was crazy.”
• • •
Meanwhile, Meechee had taken Percy back to her home. Now in her room, the Stonekeeper’s daughter was trying to learn all she could from the Smallfoot. Because they didn’t speak the same language, Percy drew a series of pictures for her, in order to describe the human world. Meechee tacked the drawings all over her wall and studied them while Percy filmed her.
“Okay, it’s a little fuzzy, but I think I’m starting to put it together,” she said. “You live in a ‘city’ which is part of a ‘country’ which is one of several countries that make up an entire world.”
Although all Percy heard were growls, he had an idea that this Yeti was very smart. Fascinated, he tried to keep the camera focused on her, but his hands were shaking and his whole body was shivering.
“C’mon, P-P-Percy. Steady, mate,” he told himself. “Crikey, it’s cold up here!”
He lowered the camera to fix the focus, but Meechee looked blurry to him without the camera too.
“And your job is to tell stories to the Smallfoot through a small box that transmits pictures through the air in some sort of binary code system that projects a series of colored images in rapid succession at a constant rate, which is your main form of entertainment,” Meechee rattled on. She turned to Percy. “Am I even close?”
Percy wobbled toward the wall of drawings. “You’re an amazing creature. I wish I could stay, but the cold, the altitude—I’m not well. Feeling poorly, understand?”
He pointed to a drawing of a house with a roof. “Home. Hoooooommme.”
He motioned to Meechee’s room, then made a triangle shape with his hands, and then pointed down.
“Down the mountain,” Percy said. “Down.”
Meechee gazed at the house drawing and nodded. “I get it,” she said. “Home. And you need to get there to feel better.”
Migo heard Meechee’s voice as he walked through the palace halls. He entered her room and found her with Percy, who was shivering under a blanket.
“Migo! Look!” Meechee pointed t
o the drawings. “I figured out how to communicate with it! I’ve learned so much about it and its culture. This is a Smallfoot cave. I think they call it a ‘house,’ but I could be way off. And these are more Smallfoot.”
She pointed to some stick-figure drawings of humans that Percy had made, to give her some idea of how many humans were actually out there. Meechee was smiling, excited, but Migo imagined them all carrying spears.
“But look. I don’t think this Smallfoot is well,” Meechee told him. “He’s cold, and his breathing is off.”
Migo heard the Stonekeeper’s voice in his head.
We knew that up here, the Smallfoot could not survive.
“We need to take him home,” Meechee said.
“What? No!” Migo protested.
He swept Percy up in his arms. The Smallfoot could not go back to his world! If he did, the Yetis’ whole village would be in danger!
“Why not?” Meechee asked. “There might be more down there. I want to see it! What was it like? Did you see homes like this? Is this what their caves look like?”
Migo couldn’t tell her the truth. “Just . . . stop asking questions!” he snapped.
Meechee flinched, hurt by his words. “Stop asking questions?”
Behind them, Fleem’s head bounced into view at Meechee’s window. Then he dropped out of sight. Migo and Meechee hadn’t seen him disappear.
“Yes! There are things you don’t understand,” Migo said.
“Try me,” Meechee shot back.
Fleem bounced into view again. “Meechee!”
This time they noticed him. Meechee ran to the window and saw Fleem drop into Gwangi’s arms. The big Yeti prepared to hurl Fleem up again, but stopped when he saw Meechee.
“Meechee, you won’t believe what we found!” Kolka called up to her in a loud whisper.
“There’s a machine right beneath us, and it makes the clouds!” Gwangi finished.
“Oh sure, you tell her,” Kolka said, and sulked.
Meechee turned to Migo, who looked panicked.
“Migo, did you know about this?” Meechee asked.
“I told you to stop asking questions!” he said, and then he ran off with Percy. Percy looked up at Migo as though he wanted to say something, then passed out.
• • •
Gwangi’s loud whisper had reached several other Yeti ears, and now rumors of the cloud machine were swirling around the village. A Yeti named Peaches approached Gwangi, Kolka, and Fleem.
“What did you say this machine was?” she asked.
Gwangi looked uneasy.
“Well, I guess this is happening,” Fleem said.
Gwangi took a deep breath and bravely stepped forward. “Okay, listen up,” he began. “Everything you thought, you better rethink your thinking, ’cause I’m about to blow your minds.”
A small crowd had gathered around him.
“We. Make. The. Clouds!” Gwangi announced.
Migo ran up, carrying Percy under one arm, and burst into laughter.
“Good one, guys,” he said. “Quit pranking us. We’re not that gullible.”
“What’s ‘gullible’?” Gwangi asked.
Kolka put her hands on her hips. “Migo, what are you doing?”
“Trust me, okay?” he said, leaning in to whisper to them. “You need to stop.”
“But this is big,” Kolka reminded him.
Gwangi waved to the crowd. “Come on! We’ll show you!”
Migo quickly stepped between Gwangi and the crowd. “No, stop!” he yelled. “Oh sure, yeah! Let’s follow crazy Gwangi to the magical cave with the underground cloud machine that’s right next to a poison ice maker that’s corrupting our minds.”
“Wait, what?” Fleem asked.
“None of what these guys are saying is true!” Migo shouted.
Meechee stared at him. “Migo? Why are you saying that?”
“Yeah, you haven’t even seen it!” Gwangi growled angrily. “Or maybe you have.”
“No, I haven’t,” Migo replied.
“Well, then how do you know it’s not true?” Kolka asked.
“Because it’s in the stones!” Migo cried.
He hated to do it. He hated the betrayed looks on his friends’ faces. But at that moment he felt the Stonekeeper was right. The secret had to be kept.
The crowd quieted down when Migo mentioned the stones.
“And if we don’t follow the stones, really, really bad things can happen,” Migo finished.
“Well said, Migo!” The Stonekeeper stepped out of the palace. “You see, everyone? Migo has realized the strength and security that the stones give us, which is why he is officially un-banished.”
Migo looked at Meechee. “Isn’t that great? I think we should just focus on that more. The good news.”
She turned away from him and spoke to her father. “What about the Smallfoot? You can’t deny he’s real. I mean, he’s right here! We can all see it!”
“Tell her, Migo,” the Stonekeeper said.
Migo looked down at his feet. “Uh, it’s not a Smallfoot,” he said. “I was wrong. It’s a yak.”
The Yetis began to murmur. Meechee stepped back away from Migo, hurt.
Migo held Percy up over his head. “The Stonekeeper was right,” he announced. “I slipped and fell and got something in my eye, and this is what I saw on the cliffs. A pygmy hairless yak.”
Percy, meanwhile, woke up for a moment.
“Feeling a bit woozy . . . ,” he said weakly.
The Yetis looked confused and disappointed.
“You know that’s not true, Migo,” Gwangi said.
“It is true,” Migo retorted with as much conviction as he could muster. He appealed to the crowd, pointing to his friends. “These guys will tell you it’s not true. But you know them. They’re the village weirdos. They’re just . . . straight-up crazy.”
The words crushed Gwangi, Kolka, and Fleem. But Meechee’s eyes narrowed in suspicion.
“Why are you lying?” she asked him.
Migo knew that the villagers might think Gwangi, Kolka, and Fleem were weird, but they loved and respected Meechee. He had to make sure they didn’t believe her—for their own good. For Meechee’s own good. The mental image of the humans and their weapons spurred him on.
“Oh, I’m the liar?” Migo countered. “Who’s been lying to her dad the whole time?”
Meechee shot daggers from her eyes at Migo.
“Meechee, lying about what?” the Stonekeeper asked.
Meechee took a deep breath and went to stand with her friends.
“We have a secret society,” she told him. “S.E.S. The Smallfoot Evidentiary Society, dedicated to finding the truth about the Smallfoot. And I’m the leader.”
Her father’s face fell.
“I’m one of them, and I’m proud to be,” Meechee continued. “I had no choice. You wouldn’t listen to me. So, what are you going to do? You going to banish your own daughter?”
“Yes,” the Stonekeeper said flatly.
The Yetis gasped.
“To your room,” he said.
Thorp moved toward his sister, but Meechee brushed him off. “I know where my room is, Thorp.”
She headed inside the palace, and the Stonekeeper faced Gwangi, Kolka, and Fleem.
“And you three. Recant your false claims and tell the truth, or suffer the consequences,” he said.
“The truth?” Gwangi repeated. “I don’t think anyone around here really cares what that is.”
Thorp then escorted the three Yetis out of the village, and the remaining villagers turned their eyes to the Stonekeeper.
“Everyone, back to work!” he commanded, but then his voice softened. “Let’s make it another perfect day.”
Confused and unsure, the crowd nodded obediently at their leader and slowly began to return to their jobs.
“Now we can go back to the way things were, before this ever happened,” the Stonekeeper said. He nodded to Thorp, who took
Percy from Migo and walked into the palace. Percy was breathing heavily.
“Wait. Where are you taking him?” Migo asked.
“We’re taking him back to the cave where you found him,” the Stonekeeper replied sternly.
“But I didn’t find him in a cave,” Migo protested.
“But you said you did. Therefore, it is true.” The Stonekeeper turned his back to Migo and walked toward the palace.
“But—you promised—” Migo stammered.
“To protect the village,” the Stonekeeper finished for him. “Just like you did.”
Crushed, Migo walked away, past his father, who had witnessed everything. Dorgle looked confused.
Then Migo looked up to Meechee’s window. She glared at him and shut her blinds.
A large door of ice slowly dropped over the entrance to the palace. Migo knew that the Smallfoot could not survive in there. Saving the village was one thing, but did the Smallfoot have to die?
“Stonekeeper, wait!” Migo yelled, racing toward the entrance.
But the ice door dropped in front of him, blocking his way. The Stonekeeper looked at him through the see-through barrier. Next to him, Thorp placed Percy into a box made of ice.
“You’ve done your job, Migo,” the Stonekeeper said. “Go home.”
Chapter Fourteen
Where’s Meechee?
Dorgle thought it would be best to let Migo have some space, so he watched as his son wandered away from the palace. But Migo didn’t turn up for supper, and he didn’t come home when the Great Sky Snail left the sky and everything became dark. Dorgle fell asleep, hoping Migo was all right.
A noise woke him while it was still dark. He looked out onto the launchpad and saw Migo, wearing his helmet in the Gong Ringer’s chair, and staring blankly forward.
“Migo, what’s wrong?” Dorgle asked. “What are you doing?”
“I was thinking about Stone Fifteen,” Migo replied.
“Stone Fifteen? ‘Ignorance is bliss’?” Dorgle asked.
Migo nodded. “That one is true. Ignorance is bliss. Or at least, it was. It was bliss not to know about the Smallfoot, and what great friends the S.E.S. would be, and how amazing Meechee is. It would be bliss not to know that they hate me and that the Smallfoot is locked in the Stonekeeper’s palace and will probably never get home.”