The Swamp
by Roy Lang, age 8

But then, they heard a scream. Joey said, "It sounded like a girl. I bet an alligator ate her!" Then they drove on to park their car. There were lots of cars there, but no people. "Where could all the people be?" said Joey.

Mom says, "Hey kids, looks like we won't be in a crowd!"

So they went off down the path into the swamp. It started off to be ground. But then the ground shaked and shaked and holes began to open. Then a pathway opened up through the swamp. They walked through the pathway until they saw an alligator sneaked up behind them. Jane screamed and screamed. Joey said, "Shuddup!" His mother told them both to be nice, "I know it's scary but we'll be fine."

Then Joey looked at the alligator and stared it in the eye. Alligators only like to eat people that run and since Joey was so brave and stared at it he scared it away. Then they went on down the path.

Jane quickly got the binoculars out of the box that was there. She wanted to see what was in the swamp making noise. When she reached for the binoculars there was a frog on them and it jumped on her face. And she screamed and screamed again! Joey went over and smacked at the frog but ended up smacking her in the face instead. She wasn't happy about the frog on her face but was even less happy about her little brother smacking her.

They went on again down the path. There has to be people somewhere in here. Then Joey saw a little girl walking in the distance. She was screaming like the scream they heard in the beginning. So they quickly went over to her. Joey said, "What's the matter?" The little girl answered, "I lost my parents and I'm lost too and there's lots of scary noises. I walked all around and can't find my way out. I don't know what happened to my parents." She was crying now and Joey's mom took her hand so she wouldn't be so afraid. Then they went to find her parents.

They saw the road where the car was parked. But there was no path to it. They tried to go back up the trail they had just come from but the ground was becoming mushy behind them. They jumped to the side as they could see the trail being sucked into the ground, like something was approaching. Sucking up the ground in mushy holes.

"It's a swamp mud monster!" screamed Jane. Her parents told her "No, it couldn't be, there's no such thing!" But the ground still was shaking, and the holes kept forming and growing, and the ground was getting soft and mushy under their feet. Jane was pulled down into the ground and was screaming stuck half way in the muck. Joey helped her dad get big sticks so they could reach her and pull her out.

Then her dad realized what was wrong. It wasn't a swamp monster, it was an earthquake! They held on to each other and tried to make their way to the car. But when they finally reached the parking lot all the cars were gone. They had been sucked in the ground.

The ground stopped shaking now, the earthquake was over. There still were no people and no cars and they didn't know what else to do so they started walking home and took the little girl with them.

The end