Jump Start Read online

  EJ grabbed the vine with both hands and began to climb. At gym, her squad was always practising on the ropes. They climbed straight up with both their arms and legs. Then, and it hurt even to remember, they let their legs hang loose and climbed straight up, pulling themselves with their arms only. This vine should be easy compared to that. EJ gripped the trunk with her boots and started climbing.

  The first ten metres were easy, the next ten metres were easy-ish, and the next ten metres were not easy at all! Thirty metres up with at least another ten to go, EJ was beginning to wish she’d saved a little more energy at the start. Her arms and legs ached and she was struggling just to hold on. But she needed to get to the top. She took a deep breath and hauled herself up with her arms. One pull at a time, EJ continued slowly upwards.

  Finally, with one last heave, she reached the top of the vine. She had also climbed all the way up through the trees and was now on top of the rainforest canopy. If she had not already been out of breath, the view would have taken her breath away. EJ was sitting atop the most beautiful rainforest she had ever seen.

  Tall, tall trees shot straight up into the air and then exploded with a burst of leaves at the top. Deep green vines and brightly coloured flowers twisted around their branches, almost strangling the trees in shocks of colour. The flowers were enormous and the strangest, most unusual shapes and colours EJ had ever seen. Indeed, if she wasn’t seeing it with her own eyes, she would have said they were made up—like flowers in a cartoon. There were masses of orange and purple flowers that looked like huge balls of fairy floss stuck on the end of bright green sticks, all lined up in a row. There were pink and blue flowers with petals that looked like little drooping umbrellas. There were bright red flowers that shot through the light green vines like beautiful but dangerous sword-like thorns.

  Now she could also see all the birds she had watched from the river close up. In fact, EJ had a bird’s eye view of the birds. Parrots and toucans dashed between the trees, squawking and screeching. There were crazy-looking woodpeckers hammering into the tree trunks while tiny birds hopped from leaf to leaf.

  The first alarm. No time to admire the view I have to keep moving. Where to now? EJ looked around and noticed a second arrow, this time pointing left towards another thick green vine. She took her binoculars out of her backpack and looked carefully around her, scanning the trees. Then she saw it, another tree a short distance away, with another arrow and then another vine. And beyond that, there was yet another tree with an arrow and yet another vine. I get it, thought EJ. Jump arrows! EJ realised she had to jump from one tree to the next by swinging from the vines. This is going to be interesting, she thought. Why would anyone want to swing from vine to vine? She decided SHADOW must have monkeys for agents!

  There was nothing for it. EJ had to jump. The arrows would take her closer to Project Green Eye and the only way to travel through the dense rainforest was to jump from tree to tree.

  EJ felt her muscles tighten and her mouth dry out, just like when she was on the beam at gym. But hold on, that was Emma Jacks, wimpy gymnast—not EJ12, secret agent, code-cracker extraordinaire and current leader of the SHINE Shining Stars competition. And besides, it was jumping up that was the problem and this was jumping across. Okay, it was jumping from tree to tree. And it wasn’t quite the same as in the gym. But it was still jumping across. Even Emma Jacks could do that!

  It was just like the old movies she and her mum loved to watch together—the ones where the hero would swing her way across the jungle to save the boy who was being held prisoner by a secret jungle tribe. EJ knew exactly what she needed to do. Reach out for the vine, pull it back, then swing over and jump to the next tree. Timing would be important, and so was time, which was beginning to run out. EJ needed to jump straight in.

  She pulled back the first vine, leapt out of the tree and swung.

  Wow! It was as if she were flying through the rainforest! EJ had never had so much fun! In fact, she was having so much fun that she missed her jump and swung all the way back to the first tree.

  Okay, second time lucky and concentrate, she thought. She pulled back and swung again.

  This time, just as she reached the highest point in the arc of the swing, she lined up the next tree. Here it comes, here it comes. Ready, set, jump!

  EJ landed right on a branch, exactly where she needed to be, next to the second jump arrow. She had made it—and she couldn’t wait to do it again! She looked for the next vine and grabbed it.

  She was off again. This time it was a longer vine and therefore a longer, slower swing. But EJ timed her jump perfectly and landed in the next tree, right beside another green jump arrow. She jumped and swung, swung and jumped all the way through the rainforest. If only Lauren could see me now! If only Nema could see me now! This would stop her mean comments. Part of her was hoping she could go on swinging and jumping forever, but eventually she landed on a branch next to an arrow that pointed straight down.

  Down? This time there was no vine to swing on and no branches below her to help her climb down to the forest floor. And then suddenly, EJ heard a crack. She turned quickly but there was nothing to see. Despite this, EJ knew that something, or someone, was close by.

  For the second time that day, EJ had the feeling that someone was watching her. She hated that feeling. She turned her head slowly from side to side, scanning the treetops around her. After a while, she saw them: two shiny black eyes, blinking quietly in the dappled sunlight. These eyes didn’t look threatening though, they looked curious, even friendly. But what did they belong to?

  Suddenly EJ had an idea. She grabbed a round-looking fruit that was hanging from an overhead branch. Slowly and quietly, she broke it open and put a small piece in the palm of her hand. Then she stretched out her arm, stayed perfectly still and waited.

  Nothing happened but EJ could see the little eyes still looking at her. Hmmm, she thought and then said out loud, ‘Oh well, I guess I’ll eat it then.’ She put some fruit in her mouth and chewed. Not bad, and maybe her little trick would work. She took another piece of fruit and put that in her hand and held it out again. Just as she began to move it towards her mouth again a little furry arm appeared and snatched the fruit from her hand. EJ presented another piece. ‘That was nice, wasn’t it?’ she whispered softly. ‘Come down here where I can see you!’

  Four pieces of fruit later, a tiny monkey jumped lightly onto EJ’s lap and looked straight up at her. She was so cute – small with a tiny little black head and a white face. She looked as if she was wearing a mask, like a little bank robber! A little baby monkey bank robber. But what sort of monkey?

  As the monkey nibbled on the fruit, EJ eased her phone out of her pocket and snapped a photo. Within seconds, the screen displayed text about her new little friend. She was a squirrel monkey.

  ‘So where are all your friends?’ EJ wondered aloud. The little squirrel monkey seemed to be alone, but she was still only a baby. EJ saw some nuts and offered them. The monkey seemed to like them even more than the fruit, so EJ put some extras in her pocket. Then, the squirrel monkey suddenly leapt off EJ’s lap and jumped down. EJ peered down below after her. She saw that the monkey had landed on what looked like a bed of ferns, growing out of the side of the tree trunk a few metres below. ‘Hey!’ she called. ‘Are you telling me that’s the only way down?’

  EJ was heavier than the monkey but the ferns looked very soft. She grabbed hold of the overhead branch, dropped her legs down and put one foot on the ferns. So far, so good. She put her other foot on the ferns, then let go of the branch. Bad move.

  EJ fell straight through the bed of ferns and bounced from leafy branch to ferns to leafy branch down the length of the tree.

  Just when she thought it was getting slightly ridiculous, EJ realised she had finally reached the ground. And there was her little monkey friend, sitting on top of the bush that EJ had just landed in. The little monkey had found herself a nut and was chewing away happily.

  ‘
Thanks a lot for that—I think!’ said EJ as she picked herself up and brushed herself off. The monkey almost looked as if she was waiting for EJ—at least until she turned tail and scurried off into the rainforest.

  ‘Hey, wait for me!’ shouted EJ. She pushed her way out of the bushes and chased the monkey through the undergrowth until they both arrived at a clearing. Except it wasn’t a natural clearing: it was more like a track, a man-made track that had been carelessly hacked through the rainforest.

  This man-made track has destroyed some of the rainforest trees, thought EJ. It’s ugly and wrong!

  It had to be something to do with SHADOW. And sure enough, nailed to one of the sawn-off tree trunks was another green arrow.

  ‘You know, you’re a pretty useful mission buddy,’ said EJ to the little squirrel monkey. ‘And if you’re coming with me, then you better have a name and given you love them so much, how about Nuts?’

  Nuts tilted her head first one way and then the other and let out a loud shriek.

  ‘I’ll take that as a ‘‘yes,’’’ smiled EJ. ‘Hey! Where are you going now?’

  Nuts had taken off again, running and jumping down the track, and EJ had to run as fast as she could to keep up. Suddenly the little monkey stopped dead in her tracks. Actually, the whole track stopped and the whole forest stopped too—or rather, it dropped. The rainforest floor dropped away sharply to a canyon, hundreds of metres deep.

  Luckily for EJ, there was a bridge across the canyon to get to the other side. Unluckily for EJ, it was a rope bridge—with lots of holes. EJ took out her binoculars and turned them to the land across the other side of the canyon. She could hardly believe what she was seeing. There was no rainforest and no giant towering trees. There were no more enormous colourful flowers, twisting vines, leafy canopy or squawking parrots and toucans. Where the rainforest should have been, there was just brown dirt and blackened trunks of burnt and sawn-off trees. The forest had been cleared and in the middle of the bare ground stood exactly what EJ had been looking for. A huge satellite dish with the letters S-H-A-D-O-W written on the side! EJ had found Project Green Eye.

  EJ’s alarm was going off again and now there was just one hour left, at the most, before a SHADOW agent—or agents—would arrive to save what EJ12 now had to destroy.

  EJ grabbed her phone. It was time to report back to SHINE HQ.

  ‘EJ12, go ahead,’ said A1.

  ‘I’ve located Project Green Eye,’ EJ started.

  ‘That’s excellent, well done.’

  ‘But I’m not there yet. There’s a deep canyon between me and the site,’ EJ continued.

  ‘That’s bad.’

  ‘There’s an old rope bridge across the canyon, with a kind of platform in the middle on top of an old wooden tower,’ EJ explained.

  ‘That’s good.’

  ‘But the rope bridge is full of holes and the tower looks as if it might collapse any second. That’s bad,’ EJ finished.

  ‘No, that’s good!’ said A1 on the other end of the line. ‘You’re a gymnast, EJ12. And gymnasts know how to jump!’

  This one doesn’t, thought EJ miserably. But she wasn’t going to tell A1 that. Then she heard a buzzing noise coming from SHINE HQ.

  ‘EJ12,’ said A1 urgently. ‘That was the SHADOW alert light again. It’s what we feared. SHADOW knows that we intercepted the second message and has set the third and final message to self-destruct. That may take some time, but according to our calculations, you probably have less than an hour to find the third message and crack the code. Good luck, EJ12. SHINE out.’

  EJ picked up her binoculars and looked across to the Project Green Eye site. She was so close and yet so far. The rope bridge reminded EJ of a challenge she had done at school camp last year. You had to cross a small creek on a set of two ropes, holding on to the top rope with your arms and moving along the bottom rope with your feet. But that rope bridge had only been about one metre above the water – this one was quite a bit higher and above a canyon. Well, thought EJ to herself, it’s a bit different from school but really the same challenge. I need to concentrate and I need to have balance.

  Nuts certainly had balance. The little monkey took one big leap, landed on the bridge and ran along it nimbly, without a care. After a few metres, the monkey stopped and looked back at EJ.

  ‘Smarty monkey!’ she shouted, her voice echoing across the canyon below. A1 was right—I’m a gymnast, thought EJ as she climbed nervously onto the rope bridge. I have balance too!

  The bridge was made up of three main ropes. There were two ropes at the top, and EJ grasped one tightly with each hand. There was a single rope at the base, which was joined to the top ropes by smaller loops—many of which were broken or missing. EJ balanced her boots on the bottom rope and slowly began to edge her way across.

  If this was a movie, EJ thought, people would say, ‘Don’t look down! Whatever you do, don’t look down!’ And now, as EJ looked down, she understood why. It was a long, long, long way down! In fact, the more she looked down, the more she thought about falling instead of moving. EJ paused. What did that remind her of? Her mind went blank. Oh well, no time to think about it now. She had a super-wobbly bridge to cross.

  ‘Just look up!’ EJ told herself and she took a deep breath. Then she forced herself to look straight ahead and told her body, not her mind, to do the walking. It was working well, until halfway across EJ’s right foot slipped on the base rope and she fell through one of the loops as she tried to regain her balance. Clinging on to the top ropes and staring down into the valley far below, EJ gulped. She would have to be more careful. She swung her feet around to find the base rope, hauled herself upright, put one foot forward and started again. At last she made it to the platform in the middle. Halfway there, but she was running out of time.

  From her perch on the platform, high above the canyon floor, EJ could see the Project Green Eye site more clearly. And she could hear it now too. There was a whirring noise, lots of whirring noises actually, but where were they coming from? EJ pulled out her binoculars and took a closer look.

  Moving around and around the satellite dish was a small army of little machines on wheels. The machines seemed to have arms, arms holding building tools. Robots with building tools? Builder robots? Buildbots!

  How could she not have picked that one? EJ did sometimes wonder how she had got into the code-cracking division! However, these buildbots weren’t building—they weren’t doing anything except going around and around in circles. EJ knew from her SHINE training on spy satellite systems that it was the satellite dish, not the things building it, that was supposed to go around in circles. So that had to be the problem SHADOW had written about in the first message. Somehow, the buildbots had lost the plot! A1 had been right, there must be a problem with the Master Control that ran the buildbots.

  And then, as she scanned across the building site, EJ noticed something else. Just past the satellite dish, EJ could see rows and rows of large wooden crates. She adjusted the binoculars so she could make out the label on one of them.

  Ship what? What has SHADOW packed in the crates? thought EJ. She re-adjusted the binoculars and scanned the crates again. This time she saw another label.

  Live animals? Being shipped to SHADOW? Away from their home in the rainforest? It looked as if SHADOW was stealing wild animals from a World Heritage protected area. But for what? Private zoos? Collectors? Or something worse? EJ couldn’t bear to think about it. It was bad enough that SHADOW had destroyed part of the animals’ home, but to collect them all up and steal them was outrageous. Would SHADOW stop at nothing? EJ wondered. Do they really think they can get away with it?

  ‘I don’t think so,’ EJ said to herself. ‘No way, not with EJ!’ And despite being in a tense situation, she smiled, feeling rather happy with that little saying. There was no way these animals were going anywhere other than back into the rainforest.

  EJ stuffed her binoculars into her backpack. Now more than ever, she needed to get
across the last stretch of bridge. And she had to do it quickly.

  Now that she was closer, EJ discovered three things about the last stretch of the bridge. First, it wasn’t really a whole rope bridge anymore. No doubt it used to be a whole rope bridge, but now it was more like a series of holes with a bit of rope joining them together. Big holes. The sort of holes you always saw people falling through in the movies.

  Second, for the last couple of metres before the bridge reached the cliffs on the other side of the canyon, there were only the two top ropes left. No bottom rope.

  And the third thing EJ noticed made everything else a lot worse. A strong wind was starting to blow. All the birds were hang-gliding in the stiff breeze rather than flying, and the bridge was starting to swing from side to side.

  Now EJ felt sick—really sick. She swallowed deeply but her mouth had gone completely dry. She felt her legs tighten and then go wobbly, like jelly. She knew exactly what needed to be done and that was exactly what was making her feel sick. All of a sudden, she felt more like Emma Jacks than EJ12. She would have to jump across the end of the bridge with big jumps, really big jumps, and she was not totally sure that she could.

  And then, just to make matters worse, it started to rain. Not little spots of rain or a light shower, but big wet rain. Rainforest rain. Excellent, thought EJ. The whole mission now depends on me being able to do enormously big jumps in the howling wind and pouring rain.

  EJ needed something extra to help her do this. It was definitely time to use the BEST system.

  EJ flicked her phone to video mode and called Hannah.

  ‘Hey Em, where are you? Okay, I know you can’t answer that. What’s up?’ asked Hannah cheerily.