“Come on Billy, we’ll be late for school,” said Hermie.

“Oh, I’m not feeling too good,” replied Billy

“Hey, you’re always saying that when it’s a school day but on the weekends

you’re fine,” said Hermie.

“Now, Hermie, don’t be like that. I reckon I have some sort of flue bug. You go

on and I’ll catch up later,” Billy said with several coughs.

“Sure,” Hermie remarked, shaking his head, “but you know what Mum will say

if you go off playing.”

“Don’t worry about me younger brother,” smiled Billy.

Hermie headed for school, while Billy dawdled along. Picking up a stick and

running along a fence, making a rat-at-ty-tat sound.

“I think I need a little sea air,” Billy said aloud to himself, as he headed for the

beach.

Scruff, the town’s care-free stray dog, walked alongside of Billy.

“Hey, what do you want Scruff? You’re not coming with me you little mutt. Go

on back home. Go on. Come to think of it, where’s your home? Mmmm!!! Oh,

okay, you don’t have one, come along then. As the saying goes, ‘Life’s not a tea

party, it’s a wild adventure!!!’”

A short time later Billy and Scruff were running along the beach having a grand

time. They were jumping on large piles of seaweed. Chasing seagulls. Looking

under seashells and rocks for crabs. Jumping like frogs in and out of the

shallow water.

With the warm sun on his face, Billy laid down on the sand gazing up to the

brilliant blue sky. Scruff was off digging into the sand nearby.

This was the life. Not a person around. And a gentle breeze swept off the

glistening ocean with a beautiful sea air scent, as seagulls squawked with each

other in small groups along the seashore.

After a little while Billy noticed Scruff still busily digging. It was now a deep

hole. Actually it was so deep that Billy could only hear Scruff panting and madly

scratching away, and lots of sand flying out.

Billy got up and went over to check out Scruff’s work.

“Scruff, what are you doing? Come out of there, you whacky dog.”

But Scruff kept tunneling away.

And then, all of a sudden, he stopped and started biting hard at something at

the rear of the hole.

“What have you found? Come on, let me see”

Scruff backed out. Billy, thinking Scruff may have found a bone, stared into the

hole. Nothing at first. Then he saw a green object further back.

Billy laid down and wriggled and squeezed into the burrow. Stretching his right

arm he scratched a little into the sand and grabbed the item. It was hard.

Larger and bigger than he imagined. It was a bottle. A peculiar looking glass

bottle.

Billy wriggled out of the hole with his prize. “So this is what you were after

Scruff?”

“Wow!” Quickly calculating how Mr Strapple at the secondhand store might

pay him cash for the bottle, on account it was rather unusual.

Billy brushed the sand from the bottle and held it up toward the sun, looking

firmly through it.

A strange red haze appeared within the bottle.

Billy yanked at its top. Thinking it might pull out like a cork, but it didn’t budge.

Meanwhile, Scruff was jumping around excitedly, wide eyes fixed on what Billy

had in his hands.

With a hard twist Billy tried unscrewing it. It moved slightly. He tried again, and

this time the top came out.

No sooner had he done this and the bottle began to shake crazily in his hands.

Billy threw it to the ground. At that moment a thick reddish smoke began

whooshing out. More and more. Rising higher and higher.

Together, Billy and Scruff gazed up, awestruck by the imposing figure that

started forming above them.

Scruff started barking. And then he dashed round and round the bottle several

times, through the red smoke. Then he stopped.

Billy was mesmerized. He was looking up at a young woman (well, half of her at

least, from her lower waist up), and she must have been a good five to six

metres tall. He closed his eyes quickly. And then opened them just as quick.