The Lost Track of Time

by Paige Britt

  color — midnight blue, mossy green, burnt umber — and this color, whatever it

  was, was the darkest shade it could be. As the color moved up the mountain, the

  shade grew lighter and lighter until it reached the peak. The peaks were glorious

  pastels, shimmering with only the faintest pigment. There were about a dozen

  mountains surrounded like an island by the desert of rocks and rubble.

  “Look!” cried Penelope and nudged Dill with her elbow. “It’s the Range of

  Possibilities!”

  Dill peeled one eye open and then, suddenly alert, the other. “But where

  are all the mountains?” he shouted against the wind.

  “What do you mean? They’re right there!” Penelope pointed at the peaks

  ahead.

  “But how can that be? There used to be hundreds! Where did they all go?”

  “Coo-coo,” called the bird. “I’ll show . . . you-you.”

  The little group of mountains huddled below them, but instead of land-

  ing, the Coo-Coo caught the wind and let it take them higher. Dill groaned in

  protest and closed his eyes again. Soon they were soaring over a brilliant blue

  peak on the northeastern edge of the range, heading straight for a dark cloud

  swirling above its summit.

  As they drew closer, Penelope’s heart began to beat faster. This wasn’t a

  cloud. It couldn’t be. No cloud was this dark — this thick. It covered the sky

  like a blanket, casting the translucent peak beneath it into a dull gloom. At

  that moment, she realized exactly where they were headed. They had come all

  this way to escape from the Shadow and now the Coo-Coo was taking them

  directly to it!

  Penelope clutched the bird tightly as she felt a cold force emanating from

  the Shadow. She opened her mouth to warn Dill, and the cold slipped down her

  throat. “Dill . . .” Penelope gasped, before her voice gave out.

  Dill leaned forward, daring a look over Penelope’s shoulder, his face turn-

  ing a slight shade of green. “Turn back!” he shouted at the bird.

  But the Coo-Coo only flew faster, heading straight toward the Shadow

  until it enveloped them. A cold shock hit Penelope like icy water and she felt a

  painful pressure seize her upper body. The deeper into the Shadow the Coo-

  Coo flew, the greater the pressure became. It spread up her chest and into her

  throat, cutting off the air. Even though the great bird flapped his wings harder

  and faster, Penelope couldn’t tell if he was moving or not. Everything inside the

  Shadow was so still. Penelope gripped the Coo-Coo’s neck as a horrible thought

  crossed her mind.

  Is he flying? Or falling?

  Just when Penelope felt the blackness creep across her eyes, they burst

  back into the day (or what passed for day under the Shadow). Penelope gasped

  for breath and let her eyes adjust to the dismal light. They had crossed over the

  peak. On the other side, the earth was barren, marked only by a strange black

  grid. There were no trees or greenery of any kind. Drifts of smoke climbed into

  the gray sky, filling the air with a horrible acrid smell. Penelope’s eyes stung and

  her throat felt as if it had been turned inside out.

  The Coo-Coo dropped lower. Penelope saw that the grid was a series of

  freshly tarred roads, crissing and crossing one another for miles. The farther

  the Coo-Coo flew, the more roads they saw. There were all kinds — highways,

  byways, toll roads, back roads, front roads — each very long and very straight.

  Giant trucks crawled like insects across them. Every scrap of earth not already

  paved was covered in digging, scooping, drilling machines.

  Boom. Boom. Boom.

  Waves of sound shook the air. The Coo-Coo veered back toward the

  mountain range in the direction of the sound, flapping his wings with renewed

  vigor. A massive pillar of smoke hovered at the foot of the mountain they had

  just flown over. They drew nearer to the smoke until they were almost engulfed

  in it, and then, as if on cue, the booming began again.

  BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

  The Coo-Coo faltered in midflight. Penelope’s stomach dropped to her

  toes, while Dill grasped her waist painfully. The bird regained his balance and

  flew on. By now they could see the pillar wasn’t smoke at all. It was dust.

  BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

  The mountain shuddered.

  BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

  With a horrible crash, a massive chunk of indigo-colored rock tumbled

  to the earth. As it fell, the color faded until it hit the ground and broke into a

  million gray pieces. With each blast of dynamite, more and more of the

  mountain shattered. Great gashes appeared in its side and the peak wobbled

  dangerously until a final explosion sent it crashing down. The shimmering blue

  vanished in a pile of rubble.

  When the dust settled, Penelope watched in horror as a swarm of

  bulldozers scooped up the rocks and dumped them into a great toothy machine.

  CRUNCH. CRUNCH. CRUNCH.

  The machine ground the rocks to bits and spat them out into a line of

  waiting dump trucks. Once a truck was full, it drove down a six-lane highway

  that stretched out of sight.

  “I’ve seen enough!” cried Dill.

  The Coo-Coo flapped his gigantic wings and up they went, into the

  Shadow waiting above.

  Penelope held her breath and closed her eyes, bracing herself for the sickening

  cold of the Shadow. When it hit, she tried to stay calm by counting down from

  one hundred.

  99, 98, 97 . . .

  Her teeth began to chatter . . .

  86, 85, 84 . . .

  Her hands grew numb . . .

  63, 62, 61 . . .

  Her head grew lighter and lighter until she forgot what number she was on.

  55 . . . or was it 45?

  And then, just when Penelope couldn’t hold her breath any longer, the

  Coo-Coo burst out of the Shadow and into the clear evening sky. Penelope took

  a huge gulp of warm air and willed herself to forget the bitter chill.

  The bird headed toward a plum-colored mountain directly below them.

  Very near its peak a house sat perched on top of two enormous boulders. The

  house looked like a Swiss chalet covered in elaborately carved figurines. A huge

  wooden bird sat with outstretched wings on top of a steep roof. Carved oak

  leaves curled upward on either side of the wooden bird and then cascaded down

  chapter eleven

  the house. More oak leaves formed a bed for a gigantic pair of wooden squirrels

  resting at the base.

  Instead of a door, there was an opening with a platform directly under

  the pitched roof. Below the opening was the most striking feature

  of all: A clock face took up the entire front of the house.

  “It’s a cuckoo clock!” gasped Penelope.

  Dill didn’t even bother to look. “Are we

  there yet?” he whimpered.

  The bird landed expertly on the plat-

  form and scurried toward the entrance.

  Once inside, he knelt so his guests

  could dismount. “Coo-coo . . . kick off

  your . . . shoe-shoes. Make yourself

  at home,” he sang.

  Penelope slid to the floor and looked around the room. Her gaze immedi-

  ately settled on a giant bird’s nest in the far corner.
Instead of twigs, the

  Coo-Coo had fashioned his nest from logs. Tucked inside the logs were various

  odds and ends that spilled out of the nest and onto the floor — an old lawn

  chair, a bit of fencing, even the chrome handlebars of a bicycle.

  The rest of the room was a mess. Every nook, every cranny, every corner

  was filled with stuff. Not just any stuff, though — shiny stuff. Bits of aluminum

  foil and old street signs papered the walls. A chandelier fashioned from hubcaps

  and hung with silverware lit the room. Old toys, glass bottles, and knickknacks

  sat on shelves strewn with silver tinsel.

  Penelope found a metal folding chair and sat down, while Dill collapsed

  gratefully onto a bedraggled sofa. “This is terrible! Horrendous! Unbelievably

  bad!” He took out a handkerchief and began to wipe his forehead. “Chronos is

  expanding his reach in every direction. Now I know why the Shadow is over my

  meadow. Soon the entire Realm will be one big city!”

  “But why do they have to tear down the mountains?” asked Penelope.

  They were so beautiful. So . . . so extraordinary. She couldn’t believe anyone

  would want to destroy them.

  “To make room for . . . new-new . . . buildings and roads,” said the bird

  with a sigh. “These mountains used to be home to an entire flock of . . .

  coo-coo . . . birds. But now there are only a . . . few-few . . . of us left.” The bird

  shook his head, unable to continue, and his elaborate tail drooped.

  Penelope remembered the Mountain Lopers making their way across the

  wasteland. No wonder they looked so sad. Their homes had been destroyed. She

  looked around the Coo-Coo’s house. Soon it would be a pile of rubble, too.

  Dill rested his head in his hands. “Chronos must be stopped,” he wailed.

  “If only we could find the Great Moodler —”

  At the sound of the Great Moodler’s name, the Coo-Coo snapped

  to attention. “COO-COO . . . COO-COO!” he screeched, erupting into a series

  of coo-coos so loud, so vigorous, he nearly hit his head on the ceiling. Once

  he’d recovered, he scooped up Dill with his wings. “Only the Great Moodler

  can . . . undo-do . . . this destruction. She can moodle up a whole . . . slew-

  slew . . . of possibilities and restore the Range! I’ve been hoping someone

  would find her.” The bird dropped his startled guest and stepped back, wings

  outstretched.“And now here . . . you-you . . . are!”

  “I’m afraid you are mistaken,” objected Dill, straightening his jacket. “I’ve

  already tried to find her and failed. Penelope is the one —”

  The bird spun around and snatched up Penelope.

  “Wait! You don’t understand —” insisted Penelope, but her objections

  were muffled in the bird’s feathers. Once the Coo-Coo finally let her go, she

  tried again to explain. “You don’t understand. I can’t find her either. I even tried

  the moodle hat and nothing happened. I have no idea where she is.”

  “But I . . . do-do!” sang out the bird and dashed over to a pile of junk in the

  corner. He began rummaging through it, tossing things over his shoulder as he

  did. Penelope ducked just in time to miss a metal trash can followed by its lid.

  She stood back up, only to drop to the floor again as bits of tin roofing and

  aluminum foil sailed past.

  When the bird spun around, he was holding a shiny, glittering ball for Dill

  and Penelope to see. “It’s a . . . clue-clue,” he said with great reverence.

  Dill and Penelope leaned in for a better look. The ball was made of pure

  light. Etched on its surface were a series of words, each one glimmering faintly.

  The bird turned the ball this way and that so they could read what it said:

  Look in the least likely place.

  “What is it?” asked Penelope in a hushed voice.

  “It’s a possibility,” answered Dill. He looked up at the bird in awe.

  “Wherever did you find it?”

  The Coo-Coo inhaled a deep, shuddering breath that ruffled his

  feathers from the top of his head to the tip of his splendid tail. Exhaling, he

  settled them all back into place and then began his story.

  “After the Great Moodler disappeared, I . . . flew-flew . . . over the Range

  of Possibilities every day, looking for a . . . clue-clue . . . to where she went.

  And every day, my hopes of finding her . . . grew-grew . . . smaller and smaller

  until I gave up altogether. On that day a violent storm . . . threw-threw . . . me

  off course. The wind carried me higher than ever before and I saw, out of

  the . . . blue-blue . . . a shimmering mountain of white light. I was blinded for a

  moment. When I regained my sight, the mountain was gone from . . .

  view-view . . . and this was falling from the sky.” The bird nodded at the

  possibility.

  “ ‘Look in the least likely place,’ ” said Dill, almost to himself.

  “But where is the least likely place?” asked Penelope. She sank down into

  the couch, but sat right back up again. A thought had occurred to her: The least

  likely place the Great Moodler would go — and the last place in the world

  Penelope wanted to visit — was Chronos City!

  No sooner had the thought come to mind, than — woop — the possibility

  began to grow.

  “Coo-coo!” called out the bird in surprise.

  Dill turned to look at Penelope. “Are you considering the possibility?”

  he asked.

  Penelope nodded.

  “And . . .”

  Penelope cringed. “I think it might be Chronos City.”

  Wooop. The possibility grew even bigger.

  Dill put his hand on Penelope’s shoulder. “Looks like that’s a real

  possibility,” he said.

  The bird began hopping from one foot to the other. “Please go look for her.

  Please, please! Chronos has decreed all . . . Coo-Coo . . . birds Impossible. We

  keep our own time, which is . . . taboo-boo. If I went into the City, a . . . crew-

  crew . . . of Clockworkers would snatch me up. But the . . . two-two . . . of . . .

  you-you . . . might have a chance.” He gave Dill and Penelope a pleading look.

  “But isn’t it dangerous?” asked Penelope.

  “I’m afraid it is,” conceded Dill. “Chronos City is unsafe. Risky. Outright

  hazardous. But we can’t stay here and we can’t go home. We’re surrounded

  by the Shadow. We have to try.”

  “Yahoo-hoo . . . yahoo-hoo!” hollered the bird. He began dancing around

  the room, knocking things off shelves and sending the chandelier shaking.

  Penelope watched the Coo-Coo dance about. She didn’t think there was

  much to celebrate. She and Dill were heading for the worst place in the world

  to find the one person who could help them. But Dill was no good at

  finding things anymore and Penelope was an anomaly, a failure. Still, even

  though the whole expedition seemed doomed, Dill was right. They had to try.

  Finding the Great Moodler wasn’t just about getting Penelope’s ideas flowing

  again. The homes — maybe even the lives — of Dill and the Coo-Coo and the

  poor Mountain Lopers depended on it.

  At that moment, a chime began to ring. It was seven and the clock was

  marking the hour. “That’s my . . . cue-cue,” trilled the bird. He tucked the

&nbs
p; possibility away in a corner and rushed outside. Soon they heard him singing

  along with the chime. “Coo-coo, coo-coo. Coo-coo, coo-coo . . .”

  Dill and Penelope walked over to the opening of the great clock and

  together they watched the bird sing the hour into existence. When he finished,

  the sun settled lower along the horizon and the noises of the day receded

  to a hum.

  “I’ll be back in a . . . few-few . . . minutes,” called the Coo-Coo and leapt

  into the early evening sky. The bird dropped down through the high mountain

  air. Once he reached a lower altitude, he began to dart this way and that, his

  wide beak snapping.

  “What’s he doing?” Penelope asked.

  “Catching Time Flies, I suppose,” answered Dill. “I’m surprised there are

  any left considering Chronos has decreed fun Impossible.” Dill glanced in

  Penelope’s direction. “Time flies only when you’re having fun, you know.”

  Penelope nodded. Oh, yes. She knew.

  Dill stretched out his arm and swept it through the air as if to embrace the

  horizon. “The skies of the Realm used to be filled with Time Flies and Fancies,

  but now they’re almost extinct.”

  “What are Fancies?” asked Penelope.

  “Giant, fantastical creatures that whiz and bounce through the air. Used

  to be people were always taking off on Flights of Fancy and going on

  adventures,” said Dill. “Chronos insisted Fancies were only figments of the

  imagination and soon everyone ignored them until they disappeared. Or starved

  to death. That reminds me . . .” Dill rummaged through his many pockets,

  pulling out one thing after another — a ball of string, three pairs of glasses, an

  assortment of screws. Suddenly a smile spread across his face. “Ah, yes! Here

  they are.” He whipped out two small brown-paper packages and held them out

  to Penelope. “Mushroom butter or mushroom loaf?”

  Penelope pointed to the one on the right. “I’ll take that one.”

  “Mushroom butter it is! Wise choice.”

  Penelope peeled back the wrapping on her sandwich. A nondescript gray