CHAPTER FIVE

A few hours later, the Phoenix started to rumble and rattle.

Elliot and Uchenna had fallen asleep on each other, with Jersey stretched out between their laps. But all three jerked awake at the sudden turbulence.

“Are we there?” Uchenna asked, wiping her eyes with her sleeve. “Will we be on the ground soon?”

“No and yes,” Professor Fauna replied. “No, we are not quite there. We seem to be about three hundred miles south of our intended destination.”

Elliot stretched his arms above his head. “What’s the ‘yes’ part then?”

“Yes, we will be on the ground soon because we are out of gas.”

Elliot shot a panicked look at Uchenna.

“Don’t worry!” Professor Fauna held up his cell phone. “I have informed Mack, and he is driving down from Washington to meet us.”

Uchenna looked down at the forest ahead of them. “Those trees are big,” she said.

“They look like Douglas firs,” Elliot said. “Some of the oldest are thirteen hundred years old and over three hundred feet tall.” He suddenly turned on Professor Fauna. “We’re not going to try to land there, right?”

“Ah . . . ,” Fauna said, as the plane’s engine began to sputter. “Not exactly . . . You see, there is another very small problem.”

“Which is what?” asked Elliot.

“We lost our landing gear when we hit that truck on takeoff.”

“WHAT?”

“Sooooo,” Professor Fauna said, pulling hard on the yoke to level the plane into a glide, “we are not going to land among the Douglas firs. We are going to crash among the Douglas firs.”

Elliot grabbed Uchenna, who grabbed Jersey, who grabbed Elliot’s face. Elliot screamed.

And the plane plummeted into the trees.