Molly Moon & the Morphing Mystery

small silver canister into the bag with Petula and switched it on. The mask was big for Petula, but if she pushed her face into the front of it, she got the oxygen that was gushing from the canister. Molly strapped and tightened the mask about her pet’s face.

“Breathe, Petula,” Molly said, and Petula, her eyes shining from confusion and fear, panted. Molly felt like crying. But there was no time for tears now. Molly put a scarf and a sweater around Petula to keep her warm. Then, double-checking that the whole bag was strapped properly onto her, she tightened its drawstring and held it close. Then she put on the gloves that came with her kit. Now Molly stood ready. She could feel Petula’s heart beating through the bag, and Petula could feel Molly’s heartbeat, too.

Molly leaned forward. “I love you, Petula,” she said. “Whatever happens, remember that.” Then Molly took a deep breath and tried to find some sort of calm in herself. She tried to think logically. She’d often watched sky dives on TV, and it occurred to her that people all over the world jumped out of planes every day of the year for fun. Bolstered by this thought, Molly steeled her nerves.

I can do this. I can do this. I can do this, she said to herself. She watched Malcolm putting on his parachute while flying the ailing plane at the same time.

I can do this. I can do this. I can do this. Molly let her mantra wash through her.

Micky walked toward her, steadying himself on the walls of the plane. Lily clung on to him like a limpet. They were ready to jump.

“I can’t believe this!” Micky shouted over the moaning of the engines. He sounded confident, but his eyes betrayed how terrified he was.

Then Malcolm’s voice came over the speaker again.

“I am going to open the parachute door at the tail of the plane. When I say go, you go. I will be following right behind you.”

Molly nodded. She couldn’t believe this was happening. Her fear came back again in thick, fast breaths. She, Micky, and Lily linked arms and moved to the tail of the aircraft. And then, with a rumble and a screech, the bottom of the plane began to open. The noise of the engines and the wind outside was now deafening. What was more, the children felt themselves being pulled toward the ever-widening opening.

Molly’s hands were sweating profusely as apprehension tore through her body. Petula curled up into a ball in her bag, pressing her nose into her mask. She felt Molly’s terror and was full of dread herself. She shut her eyes tight and tried to think of meadows and long grass, of streams and flowers. How she longed to be at home in her safe basket.

“Oh, no,” Molly whispered, her heart pounding. “This is bad.”

“Get a grip, Molly,” Micky shouted over the raging noise. “Remember people do this for fun!”

“Not in storms!” Molly yelled back as the tug of the cold air outside became so strong that she could hardly stop herself from being pulled into it. But then she smiled. For she was touched that Micky had had the same thought as her. “You’re right, though, Micky.”

“Look!” Micky shouted. “There are compasses on your straps. See—the numbers on it change as you move. Just kind of steer your parachute toward 0, 08.00 South, and 78, 10.49 West.” He linked his arms through Molly’s and Lily’s again, and together they resisted the pull of the wind outside. Molly nodded and bit her teeth together hard as she forced bravery to overtake her natural instinct, which was to cry. She looked at Lily, who had gone all quiet and limp, and wondered whether she stood any chance at all of reading her compass. Molly held Lily’s arm firmly, and Micky’s, too. The threesome made a ring.

“Ready?” Malcolm’s voice grated loudly over the plane’s intercom. “Holding hands. All together. But let go of each other before your parachutes open at twenty thousand feet. Keep your legs together when you land. Now… GO! GO! GO!”

Molly put a thumb up at him, and in the next moment the bottom of the plane clunked fully open. It gaped wide, showing nothing but chilling blackness. At the same time, the air outside sucked like a massive, noisy, death- wishing vacuum cleaner so that everyone began slipping toward the dark void.

“One! Two! Three! JUMP!” Molly cried, and as though in a dream, and as if simply jumping into an inky pool, everyone leaped at once.

Twenty-two

Molly’s body hit the air. Freezing cold, it smacked her face. For a moment, Molly wasn’t sure whether she was dead or alive. She felt tiny, as though she were the size of a speck of dust tumbling in a gale-force wind. She was falling and spinning—flipping like a coin that had been tossed by some crazed devil.

“Heads you lose, tails you die!” These words screamed through her head as though the icy wind was shouting at her. “Heads you die, tails you die!” Molly felt that Miss Hunroe was the fiend who had tossed her.

And then Molly remembered to breathe. With a deep breath into her oxygen mask, she tried to take control. But it was so cold and she was so dizzy that she could hardly think. She realized with horror that she could no longer feel Lily linked through her left arm, but that Micky, with his arm through her harness, was still attached. For a brief second, Molly opened her eyes to see whether Lily was still holding Micky’s arm. Micky’s face, grimacing with fear, flashed in the moonlight, but there was no Lily beside him. And it was too difficult to make out anything else. So Molly didn’t know where Lily was at all. Nor did she know whether Petula was still breathing or not. The sharp air stung Molly’s eyes so much that she had to shut them again.

Molly and Micky were alone, careering down through the icy air together. The out-of-control spin that they were in was horrible. Molly fought through her brain’s utter confusion. With a huge effort, she pushed herself through the torrent of rushing air to swing her left arm toward Micky. Her helmet crashed into his. Terrified, they clung together and continued to fall.

The crescent moon shone down on them. The two twins held on to each other as they had done eleven and a half years before—before they’d been born. They dropped as one like a spinning black ball, down, down, down through the subzero night sky. The moonlight reflected off them, spotlighting them as they plummeted. It was bitter cold, and their bodies were numb. Molly’s face burned, her eyes hurt, and her stomach had swollen from the high air pressure. And she felt sick from the turning and falling.

Then she remembered watching a program about skydivers, and she remembered what to do.