Crane Fly Crash Read Online Free PDF Page A

first ignored her. This wasn’t so bad.

    â€œIt’s OK—they’re ignoring her,” said Josh. He chuckled. “She won’t like that!”
    â€œNoooo,” said Danny flapping along beside him. He dodged a rather heavyweight moth that was giving him a funny look as it bumbled past. “Her best friends ignoring her won’t do her any harm. It’s the bit when they try to kill her that is going to upset her.”
    He wasn’t wrong. Four seconds later, Jenny fluttered eagerly in front of Chelsea’s nose. A lot of shrieking split the evening air. Both Chelsea and Louise began to bash frantically at the creepy leggy thing in their faces.

    â€œUGGH! KILL IT! KILL IT! GET IT OFF ME!” squealed Chelsea.
    Poor Jenny did somersaults through the air, horrified. Josh and Danny swooped down and managed to catch her. “Stop!” yelled Danny. Josh restrained his sister from going back for another try. “Don’t bother, Jen! They’re not worth it!”
    â€œI never liked them anyway,” added Josh.
    Jenny sniffed. “I thought they were my
friends
.”
    â€œYes, but that was before you turned into a four-legged freak,” pointed out Danny.
    â€œAnd remember,” added Josh. “This is just a dream, anyway.”
    â€œOoooooh!” said Jenny. She began to flap her way toward something new. She flapped so hard she dragged Josh and Danny with her.
    This time it was an
orange
light. A bulb in an orange glass shade, which hung from the wooden beam above a front porch. It was a bit of a jumping, jiving hot spot. It was already heaving with the local nightlife. Three large moths were spiraling around inside it. At least a dozen midges were bouncing up and down in the cooler pool of light by the glass rim. A dozy-looking, see-through lacewing swayed about in one corner, gazing into a dazzling crystal cube up by the hot metal bulb socket.

    â€œOh not
this
again!” moaned Josh as he and Danny were dragged in with Jenny. “Jen! You know you’ll only end up getting hurt!”
    But Jenny was already head-butting the porch light. Danny was right up there next to her. Their cries of delight and pain echoed all around the orange glass room created by the outdoor lightshade.
    Josh shivered and made himself turn away from the light. The glow was so incredibly tempting! He peered out into the night sky and saw something black and arrow-shaped suddenly zoom past. It made him gulp with horror. He knew what that was. He had seen it circling their garden on many warm summer evenings. It was a bat. A pipistrelle bat. And pipistrelles liked nothing better than a mouthful of crane fly.

    Josh took a deep breath and turned around. Ignoring the dozy green lacewing as it fluttered past him into the night air, he dived back into the orange insect disco. He managed to tangle his limbs around Danny and Jenny and tug them back outside. “There!” he said, pointing a leg at Jenny’s bedroom window. “That’s the light we want! That one!” And he zoomed straight for it, dragging his siblings with him.
    The dark arrow flitted by so close that he heard himself scream. Then he realized it wasn’t his scream. The dozy-looking lacewing shot over his head, feebly flapping in the vicious teeth of the bat.
    Thud-thud-thud. They hit the bedroom window. Then Josh dragged Jenny and Danny up to the opening and shoved them through it. Exhausted, they all slid down the inside of the glass and landed in a quivering heap on the sill.
    For a few seconds there was peace.
    Until …
    VROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
    â€œWhat is THAT?” screamed Jenny.

Josh and Danny stared at each other, mystified. They had heard some weird noises when they’d been shrunk down to creepy-crawlies before but nothing like this. The howling, droning noise just went on and on. And it was getting louder.
    â€œUh-oh!” gulped Danny, as a gigantic figure