A dozen or so feats of magical horticulture later we came to a clearing. Vlad stopped us and looked at Mia with a half smile and said nothing.

Mia grinned, “What is it, Uncle?”

Vlad raised his eyebrows and said, “You tell me!” His face grew mischievous and turned to me “Or perhaps Max will?”

My eyes widened, then narrowed at Mia, to find I was mirroring her expression. Half a second later we were each scanning the clearing, and half a second more, we, as one, started walking towards the center--lockstep miniature Sherlock Holmeses, hot on the case.

I noticed that Mia was focusing on the grass below us, so I decided to relax my focus and see if there was something special about the overall place we were in.

It was by appearances simply a clearing, soft grass speckled with daffodils and surrounded by plain averaged sized trees with green leaves. Maples maybe? I didn’t know that much about trees. I looked up in the sky; nothing special. I looked back at Vlad; no help--he just raised an eyebrow and kept up his mysterious wizard facade. Typical.

Mia shouted a little ways off to my right “I see it!” and pointed to the middle of the clearing, where there was nothing to see, I believed.

“And what is it you are seeing, my darlink?” Vlad was giddy. I was confused and a little disappointed.

“It’s a door! Aww max!”, she noticed I was confused and beckoned me toward her. I took two steps toward her and I saw a shimmery magical portal come suddenly into sight. Come into magesight? Wow.

“Wow!”, I said, sagely. Mia grabbed hold of my arm with adequate enthusiasm.

“It’s a door, right?”, Mia asked with sudden trepidation.

“Indeed, my darlink, and well spotted. It is a door to… well, I will not spoil it, of course. Please!” Vlad gestured as if to say “after you”, but I was feeling a whole lot of...

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“Hang on a minute!” Yeah, that’s what I was feeling.

“Seriously?” incredulity filled Mia’s eyes.

“Um”, I said with confidence, “I’d just like to ask a question or two about this floating magical door in the middle of the forest, is that okay?”

Mia rocked her head to one side, “Fine, I guess.” She looked at me expectantly and began tapping her foot. I laughed.

“Vlad, uh…”, I struggled for a moment with the question I wanted to ask, “How do magical doors work?”

“Ah! Such a cautious one, Max,” he began. “Well, when we are moving something through space…” he opened his arms expansively, “we are telling the pieces of that something to change what they are, to become something that is similar but is in a different place, yes? a million times in the blink of an eye, so fast, we could never see the flicker. All motion is like that, many blips across a screen that runs in all directions. This door,” he gestured to the shimmering glow, “tells pieces to be extra different” He looked thoughtful for a moment, “so different, they are somewhere very much else from here.” He finished with a grand smile.

I realized that I could only nod and go with it. Magic, yo.

“Okay, I guess.” I said lamely. Mia grinned excitedly. Vlad repeated his after you gesture. And Mia pulled me into the portal after her.

SPLOOSH

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“EW!”

The first thing I noticed was I was not covered in cold jello, like I had thought I would be. I was now in a stone hall alighted by a torches. Maybe we teleported inside a castle?

“Ha! Can you believe that max?”

Then I noticed was there was no Max. And no uncle Vlad. And no magical door back. Okay, don’t freak out, Mia. Maybe the magical jello door has a delay and has to recharge per person.

I began to freak out.

You’re freaking out, Mia. Calm down. Think this through logically. It’s either a test or a terrible disaster and either way, you’ve got to keep it cool and figure out what’s going on.