Free The Order of Odd-Fish by James Kennedy Page A

a mighty yawp and leaped to his feet, pointing at the TV in horror.
    “The Belgian Prankster?” he howled.
“The Belgian Prankster?”

I T was completely dark. Jo couldn’t feel anything, couldn’t see anything. Only after a moment did she remember how the
Indignant
had been shot down, and she had been screaming, and then everything had ended.
    She heard herself say, “So this is the afterlife.”
    “Do you think we’re really dead?” said Sefino somewhere.
    “I’m certainly dead,” came Colonel Korsakov’s voice.
    “
I’m
not dead,” said Aunt Lily.
    There was a long silence.
    “Pretty dark, though,” said Jo slowly.
    “There’s no way
I
survived,” said Sefino. “Crashing into the ocean, sinking, explosions everywhere, water flooding through the cracks and holes and—”
    “That’s strange,” said Jo. “Are you wet, too?”
    “A bit soggy, yes.”
    There was a pause.
    “I thought the afterlife would be drier than this,” said Jo.
    “Or better lit,” said Sefino.
    “We’re not dead!” insisted Aunt Lily.
    No one spoke for a while. Jo fidgeted uncomfortably in the wet darkness. Her body was coming back, and it ached all over.
    “Pretty dull afterlife,” said Sefino. “I must have been more of a sinner than I thought.”
    “I expect it picks up later,” said Colonel Korsakov.
    “Listen to yourselves!” said Aunt Lily. “I don’t see how we could’ve survived, either—but isn’t it obvious we’re alive?”
    Jo coughed up some salt water. “Does anyone have a light?”
    “In the compartment above your head,” said Colonel Korsakov.
    Jo opened the compartment, found the flashlight, and clicked it on. The plane was destroyed, its hull torn and flooded with black, swirling seawater. Jo’s beam of light swung over the oily murk, in which floated waterlogged books, lamps, boxes—all of Sefino’s and Korsakov’s possessions, soaked and ruined.
    “Where are we?” said Jo.
    “I have high expectations of heaven,” said Korsakov. “My grandmother said that if I lived a good life, all my wishes would come true in the next world.”
    “You must have exceptionally weird tastes,” said Sefino.
    “C’mon, let’s get out of this plane before it totally falls apart,” said Aunt Lily. “Jo, you’ve got the light. Lead the way!”
    They got out of the plane, squeezing through the gash on the side. Jo carefully lowered herself down into the darkness, and into more water, which came up to her waist, warmer and slimier than she expected.
    Jo didn’t think she was dead, either. In fact, she buzzed with strange exhilaration. She felt as though she was on the verge of something big, that she was coming close to a destination that had been pulling at her ever since the package fell from the sky.
    Soon they were all wading in the slimy water. The ground was squishy and uneven, and the dark, humid air seethed with living smells. Jo’s flashlight swept around the damp cave, in which everything pulsed and squished about in the most sickening way.
    Colonel Korsakov was fiddling with the plane. “I’ve fixed the lights…Mind your eyes….”
    The plane’s lights switched on and a great length of the cavern was lit up—a dim tunnel of glistening pink walls, soft and quivering, with dozens of tubes leading in and out, spilling juices; a red, ribbed, dripping passage, leading off into forbidding darkness.
    With a whoop of delight Colonel Korsakov slogged ahead, wading excitedly into the treacherous goo; he looked around with awe, with astonishment, and finally with an unrestrained boyish glee. He turned around, and smiling, held his arms out wide.
    “Grandmother was right! My wishes have come true!” he exulted. “It cannot be denied—the miracle of it all!
We are inside my digestion!
”
    “I have been sent to hell,” said Sefino.
    “The organs! The entrails! The enzymes and juices!” rhapsodized Korsakov. “At long last, reward! An eternity to spend
in my own