Molly Moon & the Morphing Mystery

River.

Lightning lit the sky again, and now Molly saw the land below, a vast, inhospitable jungle. With every flash of light, she searched the skies for the others. They must be out there somewhere, she thought, but she couldn’t see them. Trying not to think about how alone she and Petula were, Molly concentrated on steering herself down.

The closer she got to the ground, the faster she seemed to be coming down, and the warmer the air felt. The rain forest was huge and mighty and packed full of trees. Molly really didn’t want to land in one. Glad for the lightning now, she looked for a clearing. Spotting one, Molly turned her parachute so that the rain was hitting her in the face, and she shot toward it. Then she loosened the fastenings on Petula’s bag and took off her pet’s mask. She took off her own, too, and breathed in the clean, warm air.

“Hold tight, Petula. This is going to be over soon!” she shouted.

Molly held her legs together as Malcolm had instructed, and she made them as bendy as she could, not knowing what sort of surface she was going to encounter.

Closer, closer the land came. Rushing up at her. And then, there was impact. And with the impact came coldness.

It took Molly a few seconds to realize why everything was suddenly so cold. She had landed in water—in fast-flowing water. Wet and cold as she was from the icy air thousands of feet above, she hardly felt it. A panic gripped her. What kind of water had she fallen into? she wondered. Desperately, she tried to keep her head above the torrential stream. And then she began to worry about Petula, who, she realized, must be half drowning in her bag. As the river tossed and threw her about, Molly did her best to lift up Petula, still in her bag, to make sure that she didn’t drown.

The water knocked Molly and Petula, then carried them and submerged them, like some dreadful sprite that was playing with them. Molly swallowed mouthfuls of mountain water. It shot up her nose, stinging her sinuses. It crashed over her as its rapids splashed over her head. She and Petula were washed downstream like two bottle tops that had fallen into a rain-filled gutter.

A few miles away, Miss Hunroe cracked open a bottle of champagne. With a pop, the cork flew out of the bottle’s neck and shot up into a tree, sending a parrot squawking.

“Good shot!” Miss Oakkton cried, clapping. She, Miss Teriyaki, and Miss Speal, all in their night-clothes, raised their glasses.

“Well done,” Miss Speal congratulated Miss Hunroe, her voice greasy and deferential. “Your weather- manipulation skills are now fully honed.”

“Yes, Miss Hunroe, those storms you conjured up tonight were perfectly directed,” Miss Teriyaki, in a flowery kimono, agreed.

“Far better to have zose Moon kids ten feet under,” added Miss Oakkton, glugging back her champagne.

“They are tiny particles in the air, not under the ground,” Miss Teriyaki corrected her. “That explosion will have blasted them into billions of bits.”

“It vas a manner of speech,” Miss Oakkton informed Miss Teriyaki, irritated. “Ten feet under means dead and buried.”

“Well, it was a beautiful sight to see that plane drop from the sky and to watch its explosion, wasn’t it?” Miss Hunroe said dreamily. “Now there is nothing to stop us! What a relief!”

Twenty-three

Everything was still now. Petula came to her senses. She was soaking wet and half drowned and the nylon bag about her was cold and clammy, but she wasn’t in water anymore. She was still reeling from the ordeal of hurtling down through the storm clouds with Molly. And the river had nearly killed her. It had mercilessly rolled her and Molly in its rapids. But then, like a careless small child throwing a toy aside, it had flung them onto its banks. Petula could feel that Molly was underneath the bag. She poked her head through its opening and struggled out.

The moon shone down, and Petula saw that the cold water of the river was still lapping about Molly’s legs. The rest of Molly’s body was lodged on the muddy bank. Her head was supported by a hard, flat rock, and Petula could smell Molly’s blood.

Molly had cut the back of her head. Petula clamped her teeth around a good chunk of Molly’s jacket, and using all her strength, she began to tug. Molly’s body shifted an inch or two, which was enough to give Petula encouragement.

Fifteen minutes later, Molly was fully out of the water. The air was warm, but Petula could feel with her nose that Molly was very, very cold. Being cold and wet all night could kill Molly, Petula knew—if a wild animal didn’t come first and eat her. The smell of Molly’s blood would alert all sorts of creatures. Right at this moment, animals would be sniffing the air and detecting that something had been wounded. Petula’s only hope was to get another human to help—though whether any people lived in this dense, dark forest was uncertain. Still, Petula had no choice but to hope, and so she began to howl.

Birds in their nests were woken. Pacas and armadillos, jaguars and bears stirred in their sleep. Rodents, owls, and other nocturnal creatures pricked up their ears and smelled the air.

Petula howled so long her throat hurt, but still she howled more. Though each howl cut like a knife, she kept on until she was hoarse and could only whimper.

There was a rustling in the bushes behind. The beam of a weak flashlight cut through the dark, and the light of it fell on Petula. She scrunched up her eyes and saw that a tall, thin figure had emerged from the undergrowth. It was a man. He wore earth-covered brown linen shorts and a waterproof parka and heavy walking boots, and he smelled to Petula of cloves, parsley, leaves, and campfire smoke and paper and ink and dog. Clicking his tongue to Petula, he crouched down over Molly and laid his palm on her forehead. He listened to her breathing, checked her body, and unclipped her harness so that she was no longer attached to the parachute. Then, swiftly, he lifted Molly up. Raising her onto his shoulders, so that she hung on either side of his neck like a human scarf, he clicked his tongue again to Petula and set off into the forest.

Petula followed blindly. She’d never been so pleased to see anyone. The man was like an angel. Any second now, Petula thought, wings would sprout from his back.

Ignoring her body’s exhaustion, Petula trotted after the man along the jungle paths. His booted feet pounded