by Georgia Byng
Malcolm flicked channels to look at the global weather and news reports. Lots of other countries were having strange, often fatally dangerous, weather, too. One channel showed a weather map of the world. It showed that Canada, America, Europe, and Russia were having snowstorms and blizzards, and Asian countries were having typhoons. Other countries were suffering from severe wet weather conditions similar to London’s.
“But look!” Micky pointed to the world map on the TV. “Ecuador and other South American countries don’t seem to have been affected at all!”
“All flights from British airports have been delayed,” a newsreader reported.
“Not good news,” said Malcolm, watching the birds’-eye TV footage of miles and miles of traffic stuck in a jam on the motorways to the airports. The massive queue looked like an electrical river, as the thousands of cars in it beamed out their red rear lights into the dark night.
“So what do you think?” Micky asked Lily. Lily narrowed her eyes and then softened, pleased that someone valued her opinion. She knelt down on the floor next to Micky. “You see,” Micky went on, “we’ve got to get here.” He pointed to the atlas page that showed northern Ecuador. “To the top of that squiggly blue line. That’s the Coca River.”
“And it’s definitely the place where the weather can be changed? Where the Logan Stones are?” Lily asked.
“Hope so,” Micky said, making a face. “Because we’re going a long way away for a mistake if we’re not right.”
“It all seems a bit vague to me.” Lily sniffed.
Black, who’d been tapping away at his computer, now leaned back in his chair. “The source of the Coca River,” he announced, “is unknown. But the first signs of it are high, high up in the Andes, high above the cloud forest. At least they give GPS coordinates for this. So we can go there.” Black squinted at his computer. “We have to fly to a city called Quito in Ecuador,” he concluded. “And then drive from there up into the mountains.”
“Or we could get a helicopter,” Molly suggested. “That would be quicker.”
Lily suddenly frowned at her dad. “You’re not thinking of going, are you, Dad?”
Black turned. His face blushed slightly, as though he had done something naughty.
“Well, I had thought, erm, I ought.”
Lily Black’s face now turned red as a temper rose up in her. “There is no way you are going,” she said with a firmness that was a bit scary. “You know what the doctor said. You mustn’t fly. Your heart can’t take it. You will have a heart attack.”
“What?” Micky asked.
“Dad is absolutely not allowed to go on planes,” Lily explained. “If he does, he might have another heart attack.”
Black swiveled around, his face now crestfallen.
“Lily’s right, I’m afraid,” he said. “Molly and Micky, I would love to come, but the condition of my heart just won’t allow it. Firstly, the flight wouldn’t be good for me, and secondly, my doctor has given me strict instructions that I must not go to areas of high altitude. High altitudes are dangerous for people with weak hearts, you see.”
Molly shrugged. “Okay. We’re used to doing things on our own. But it would be good if Malcolm would come. Will you come, Malcolm?” Malcolm nodded. “Thanks,” Molly said, relieved. “Anyway, Mr. Black, we’ll need someone here. Someone who knows what’s going on.”
“We’ll need walking boots and clothes for a steamy climate,” said Micky, his appetite whetted for the trip. “And detailed maps of the area. Actually, who knows what it’ll be like in the cloud forest? We’ll need matches, water-purifying tablets, food rations, bug repellent, penknives, flashlights, a few necessary medicines. How about tents and sleeping bags and mosquito nets?”
“Well, your plans are already over,” said Lily, hoisting herself up onto the back of the sofa and pointing at the muted TV. “The airports are closed.” As she spoke, thunder rumbled overhead. Petula jumped off the sofa and buried her face under Molly’s leg.
“You’re right,” Molly said.
“Hell,” Micky cursed. “If we can’t get out to Ecuador, we’re skewered. This is the end.”
“Mr. Black,” said Molly, “couldn’t we hypnotize people at the airport and then hypnotize a pilot?”
“We could,” Black mulled, “though it would be quite something to hypnotize a pilot to do this. It will be dangerous flying, you see. The pilot should really be fully alert. And as you know, some people, when hypnotized, are not fully alert.”
“You wouldn’t have to hypnotize me to do it,” Malcolm piped up. Everyone turned to look at Malcolm Tixley. They stared at him as though he had just announced that he’d laid an egg. “Come on, Molly,” he said, “you’ve been in my head. I’m an air force pilot.”
“Of course you are!” Molly exclaimed. “But…but what about a plane? Can you get us one?”
Malcolm thought. “I know the man to hypnotize to get a plane authorized. I can arrange to meet him at Northolt Air Base tonight.”
“Will it be safe to take off?” Lily asked. “I mean, the weather’s really bad.”
“Oh, I’ve flown in hundreds of storms before,” Malcolm reassured them. “We just need to get up above the cloud as quickly as possible. Then it will be plain sailing.”
“Airplane sailing?” Molly said with a smile.
“You got it.”
Miss Hunroe was perched elegantly on a green baize stool in a clearing in a rain forest. A wall of rock was the backdrop to where she sat. A thin stream of mountain water gurgled from a crack in the rock there. It filled up a small pool and then drained deep into the earth beneath.
All about were luscious, broad-leaved trees, with vines climbing through them. Bushes and long-stalked ferns covered the ground nearby.
Two huge, teardrop-shaped rocks flanked her. One was a fiery red-and-orange color and the other blue, though not merely one blue. This stone was turquoise and azure, and sparkling blue flashed from deep within it. Two more granite “eggs”—one of these made up of complicated gray tones with flecks of fluffy or wispy white in it, and another a cacophony of greens—were in the clearing, too, completing the circle of Logan Stones. Miss Oakkton, stout as a stuffed cabbage, sat on a low box between the blue stone and the gray stone. Miss Teriyaki sat cross-legged on a brightly woven rug on the ground between the gray stone and the green stone. Miss Speal was on a rough, makeshift, wooden bench between the green stone and the red one.
In the middle of the ring of Logan Stones was an ancient termite mound the size of a giant toy wigwam, with turrets and twisting towers like a mad sandcastle. A mist of low cloud hung in the air above and draped the trees like a silken veil. It filtered the sun’s rays so that the space where the ghastly women sat was filled with warm green sunlight.
Miss Hunroe wore a smart khaki-colored suit and a gauze scarf over her head. Batting flies from her face with a white-gloved hand, she suddenly slapped her neck.
“Blasted bugs! Why is it they always want to eat me?”
Miss Oakkton, cloaked in green, squatting on her box and puffing away at her tortoiseshell pipe, said, “Zay don’t seem to like the smoke of my pipe. Would you like to borrow it?”
“Certainly not,” Miss Hunroe retorted, curling her rosebud lips. “I don’t like your smoke either.”
Miss Teriyaki dug in her pink silk bag and produced a small white canister. “Repellent?”
Miss Hunroe shook her head. “I’m already doused in it. Any more and I’ll be highly flammable.”
The four women were still in silent concentration for a moment. “It’s not as easy as it seemed it might be,” Miss Hunroe commented. She pulled out her coin from her pocket and began flipping it along her fingers.
“No, but ve vill get ze hang of it,” Miss Oakkton replied optimistically. Miss Hunroe sighed happily. Miss Oakkton chuckled like an old turkey. “And is everyone over the altitude sickness?”
“Yes.”
“Yes.”
“Oh, y
es,” the women lied.
“Good. So everything is going as planned. And almost all of us are doing so well,” Miss Hunroe said mysteriously. Immediately the group was set on edge. “Miss Teriyaki…” Miss Teriyaki looked up with a terrified look on her face, expecting a terrible scolding. Miss Hunroe quelled her fears. “I admired the way you intercepted Black’s bag and made off with it.”
“Thank you so much, Miss Hunroe,” Miss Teriyaki said, as though she’d just been given a prize. “I’m glad you noticed.” She smiled smugly at the other women.
“And Miss Speal,” Miss Hunroe continued, “the cake you made today was splendid.” Breathing out a huge sigh of relief, Miss Speal started tittering nervously and idiotically. “But that’s enough hysteria,” Miss Hunroe added sternly. Miss Speal was quiet.
Miss Hunroe went on. “Miss Oakkton and Miss Teriyaki…” The two women’s eyes widened as they awaited Miss Hunroe’s words. “You have been marvelous hunters! Miss Teriyaki, I am glad your leg is better, and I am impressed by your use of the poison arrow pipe, and Miss Oakkton, you throw knives with the accuracy of a circus performer! Without you two, we wouldn’t have had fresh meat. Thank you!” The two women in question nodded their heads as they accepted their praise and sniffed at the other woman in the circle.
“Miss Speal!” Miss Speal sat up like a child who’d just been caught smashing a window.
“Yes!”
“Well done, Miss Speal, for the lessons you have given me on weather morphing. Your personal experience, having owned that blue stone for so long, has been invaluable. But—”
“Yes, Miss Hunroe?” Miss Speal replied in a timid, spooky half whisper.
“But, I am afraid, Miss Speal, there is a problem.”
All eyes turned on Miss Speal, who sat on her bench looking as though a pack of tigers surrounded her. Miss Hunroe glanced at the cloudy sky, as if in despair, and then moved her gaze to the thin woman. In a tight, quiet voice she began.
“Everything was so nice, Miss Speal. So tell me this. Why, why oh why, did you go and spoil it? What did you think you were doing to that bird when you cooked it? Giving it a trip to hell and back?” Miss Speal was speechless. Miss Hunroe went on. “You ruined it. It was disgusting. Burned to a cinder and baked to a dry mess.”
“But Miss Hunroe,” Miss Speal whined in self-defense. “I followed the recipe exactly—”
“Nonsense!” Miss Hunroe interrupted. “It was quite the most disgusting meal I have ever eaten. When I think of all the trouble that Miss Oakkton and Miss Teriyaki went through to get it!”
Miss Speal sank into her bench as six hard eyes bore into her. She bowed her head and shook it from side to side.
“Forgive me. I will take more care next time, Miss Hunroe, I promise. I promise. I promise.”
Twenty
Molly, Micky, Petula, Lily, and Malcolm sat in Black’s Mercedes as he drove it to Northolt Air Base. There was very little traffic on the roads.
“These puddles are dangerous,” said Black as the car’s wheels cut through one, spraying the pavement and dousing the underside of the car. “They’re more like little ponds.”
“I think we’re traveling too light,” Micky complained. “Malcolm, are you sure we’ll be able to find places to stay? I mean, we’re heading for the Andes Mountains and for the jungle. I feel like we should have more than just our normal clothes and a parka.”
“Think of it as an adventure, Micky,” Malcolm replied. “I agree it would be nice to have properly packed suitcases with changes of underwear and socks, but there just wasn’t time. Besides, we can get everything there. We can use jeeps and guides and eco lodges.”
“Eco lodges?”
“They’re like tiny hotels, usually with huts for rooms, that don’t damage the jungle and the environment. They use solar power and collect their own water from the mountain rainfall. They compost their rubbish and have their own sewage systems.”
“With sawdust loos?” Molly suggested.
“That sort of thing,” Malcolm agreed. “Anyway, they are properly set up with snake-venom antidotes, medicine, and food and water. We really don’t need anything. The waterproofs you have on now are fine for this expedition. T-shirts, sweatshirts, and sneakers are good.”
Molly felt comforted by Malcolm’s military background. He had been on lots of expeditions, and he knew how to make shelters, how to collect drinking water from dew, how to forage from the wild, and how to hunt. So even if worst did come to worst, they’d survive. He spoke Spanish, too, so there wouldn’t be a language barrier in Quito, the large town they were flying into.
From Quito, the plan was to get a helicopter to the small high-altitude village near the start of the Coca River. Then they could begin their search for the spring and the Logan Stones—and Miss Hunroe and her horrible friends.
“Have you got any matches in the car?” Micky asked Black. “Probably do, since you like the odd cigar.” Black nodded and reached into the glove compartment as he drove. Finding a packet, he chucked them over his shoulder to Micky, who stuffed them into his parka pocket.
“Thanks.”
“So you don’t trust me?” Malcolm smiled. He loved a challenge, and he loved to work in a team. Discovering that Molly was not an alien had been a disappointment at first. But he had taken on this new mission with zeal. He was a good man and understood the prospect for the world if Miss Hunroe and her evil friends weren’t stopped. Full of gusto and determination, he was now fully focused on his new job.
Molly and Micky, on the other hand, were very nervous. Rain pounded on the roof above them. The car’s wipers were battling with the weight of water that sluiced down the windshield. And every crash of thunder gnawed at their confidence in the plan. But neither voiced their worry, for this trip was necessary and unavoidable now. Petula kept her head under Molly’s arm, where she could pretend the lightning wasn’t real. She didn’t feel safe, though. For she sensed and smelled the nerves in the car, and the uneasiness was infectious.
Lily sat between Molly and Micky, uncharacteristically quiet, zipping and unzipping her padded parka and patting her trousers. She and Black had had a big argument before they’d left the hotel, for she had wanted to go on the trip.
“Don’t be daft, Lily,” her father had told her. “It’s far too dangerous for you. And you don’t like flying even in good weather!”
After an hour of driving, Black pulled into the parking lot of Northolt Air Base. Moments later, Malcolm was inside the building with Molly at his side. He had called his superior, AH1, who, fascinated to meet an alien at last, was ready and waiting. Molly did the rest. AH1 was quickly hypnotized, and he procured them an army plane. He efficiently obtained permissions for the plane to take off and for Malcolm to fly it.
Within half an hour, Molly, Micky, Petula, and Malcolm found themselves on board a silver army plane.
Molly and Micky were in its doorway, waving down to Black, who stood, umbrella over him, on the runway tarmac. Lily wasn’t with him. Furious that she had been banned from the trip, she had huffed a good-bye and stayed in the car.
“Good luck!” Black shouted, and gave them a big thumbs-up sign.
As if in answer to their apprehensive prayers, the skies had quieted and the rain had died down so that now it was merely spitting outside. Malcolm sat in the cockpit, with a dashboard of electronic screens and bright symbols in front of him. It was quite beautiful, Molly thought, getting a first-class view of it from her front seat. Micky sat beside her with Petula on his lap. They watched with fascination as Malcolm made fastidious safety checks, clicking switches and pressing buttons.
Behind Molly and Micky, the rest of the plane was airy and spacious. It was an aircraft equipped to carry thirty soldiers sitting along its sides. Their equipment, rucksacks, and parachutes would normally have been firmly strapped onto the high racks in the top curves of the plane’s torso. But today there were only a few parachutes hanging at the stern of the plane. They were lik
e ripe fruit, ready to pop open.
Halfway along the aircraft was a galley that Malcolm had organized to be quickly stocked with some meals and drinks. “Everyone should drink lots of water on a long-haul plane trip,” Malcolm had said. Molly was already sipping at a glass of concentrated orange squash. Micky had cracked open a can of the fizzy drink Qube.
The plane had been kitted out, too, with duvets and roll-out mattresses, so even though it would be a ten-hour flight, Molly, Micky, and Petula could sleep for most of it.
It was only Malcolm who had to remain awake. Molly felt sorry for him. She could see why he had made himself a thermos of coffee. And she admired how he had changed into official pilot mode. He wore earphones now and was talking to ground control about the weather ahead and about the flight path they were to take.
“Okay, crew!” Malcolm’s voice came over the intercom. “You’ll be pleased to hear that the weather has calmed down enough for takeoff. The runway is all clear, so buckle up. We’re heading out.”
The aircraft began to taxi toward the main runway. Once on it, Malcolm drew the throttle back, and the plane picked up speed. In five seconds, the aircraft had accelerated sufficiently to lift. Malcolm pulled the steering controls toward him, and with a tilt they were up in the air. Molly looked out the side window and watched the land and the glittering yellow, orange, and white lights of Northolt drop away behind them.
The plane shuddered as its powerful engines pushed it upward. Its insides shook and rattled. Then they came to the first tower of rain-filled cloud. The plane bumped its way up through it, like a motorboat setting out over high waves. Bump, bump, the plane bounced on the thermals of air that crowded the sky. But Molly wasn’t too worried. She knew that the bumps were a bit like the uneven ground a jeep had to drive over when it was off-roading. She knew the aircraft was built to fly through bumpy air.
