Dan Barry: A boy named Isaiah Polk went off one day to see what he could see. He scaled a chain-link fence at the back of his tired FEMA trailer park, where fetid water gathers, and escaped into woods declared off-limits by his mother after reports of poisonous snakes.
On that hot July afternoon, Isaiah and two friends hunted for tiny crabs, threw dirt bombs and visited the cemetery across the creek where his grandfather, who used to give him firecrackers, is buried. They also found treasure: a mysterious black duffel bag that came with them on their return climb over the wobbly fence separating the forbidden from the forgotten.
The bag was jostled, kicked, and finally opened to reveal strange things, including a pair of pliers, some tubing, nail clippers and a two-liter plastic bottle filled with a milky liquid. Isaiah waved a younger boy away from the bag, then bent over to zip it up. He heard a hiss and then BAM!
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