Fingers pushed me into the hut.
I crashed right into some people inside.
It was the Emersons! They were being guarded by two more huge guys.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
“We’re fine,” said Mr. E.
Mrs. Emerson nodded. “But where is Zeek?”
“Not far!” snarled Fingers.
“Are you kidding?” I started in. “You’ll never catch Zeek. He’s a Mayville Marmoset! He’s probably at home already, munching potato chips while the army loads up to come and blast you. He’s so far you’d need a satellite to track him. He’s—”
FLUMP!
A big pile of straw and sticks and something else fell through the ceiling of the hut and landed at my feet.
“You mean him?” asked Fingers.
I looked down at the lump on the floor of the hut. The lump looked back up at me and smiled.
I helped Zeek to his feet.
“Sorry,” he said. “I was trying to help everybody escape.”
I pulled some straw from his hair. “Hey, it’s the thought that counts.”
Fingers whispered, and the six ninja guys blocked the door. Solid.
“You’d better let us go,” I said, “or else.”
Fingers stepped over, breathing hard and tapping those fat fingers into my shoulders. “What are you, some wise-guy kid?”
“Um, no,” I said.
“Then you must be a stooge” he snarled. “My big ex-football tough guys here like to squash stooges like you.” Fingers pointed and the big guys stamped their feet hard on the ground.
I gulped. “Well, no, actually, you were right the first time. I am a wise-guy kid.”
Zeek stepped up, too. “That’s right, he’s not a stooge. He’s a wise-guy kid. We all call him that at school.”
“Well, good. Because I kill wise-guy kids!” Fingers shouted.
“Oh,” I mumbled.
Then he grabbed me and started to shake me up and down. “I want the map! Give me the map! I want the map!”
Each time Fingers said “map” he jostled me extra hard. I felt like a salt shaker.
He was getting ready to turn me upside down and pound my head into the ground when Zeek stepped in.
“Leave him alone! Here, take your stupid map!” Zeek held out a wrinkly brown piece of paper.
Fingers pushed me over to the Emersons and snatched the paper from Zeek.
“Zeek! No!” cried Mrs. Emerson. “The Golden Lizard!”
Fingers held the paper up to the hole in the ceiling Zeek had made. He started to read the squiggly lines on it.
“Sorry,” Zeek whispered. “I couldn’t let him bust my pal’s brain. We need that brain to get us past those linebackers blocking the door.”
“Oh,” I said. “I’m supposed to get us out of here?”
“You’re the incredible plan man!”
Zeek was right. It was up to me.
I thought about it while Fingers traced his pudgy fingers across the map. I actually came up with two plans.
My first plan, charging the colossal big guys head-on, seemed pretty dumb. They’d crush us for sure. But I wasn’t sure how far we’d get if we tried my second plan.
My second plan was to jump really high through the ceiling and fly away.
That was impossible.
Impossible? Or dumb? I went for dumb.
“Okay,” I whispered, “what we do is—I ask Zeek a question.”
Zeek gave me a look. “What question?”
“What do you call this kind of building?”
Zeek made a face. “A hut?” he whispered.
“What?” I said.
“A hut,” he said a little louder.
“What?” I said again.
Zeek was getting annoyed. “A HUT! HUT! HUT!”
That’s when my plan really started to work.
SEVEN
It was awesome. It was amazing.
It was like three o’clock on Friday afternoon on the last day before April vacation.
When they heard Zeek yelling “Hut!” the ninja linebackers in the doorway thought they were back on the football field. They crouched low.
That’s where the really brilliant part of my plan came in.
Zeek and I dived over the guys, slid across their backs, landed on our hands, did flips, and hit the ground running.
“Do what we do!” I shouted to the Emersons. Zeek and I broke into our Double N–Double Z zigzag. The Emersons were cool. They did it, too.
Before any of the bad guys figured out what was going on, we were all deep in the jungle.
“Noodle!” Zeek cried, swatting leaves out of his way as he ran. “Incredible plan!”
“Here’s another one!” I yelled. “Into the trees!”
Zip! Zip! Zip! We jumped up into one of the really tall trees. It was great for climbing. Lots of branches. In a flash we were up near the top of the forest.
There were toucans and parrots flying all around, chirping and cawing.
Fuzzy little spider monkeys followed us up, hanging by their tails and swinging on vines.
“Eeep! Eeep!” they cried.
We all climbed some more, then I stopped.
“Hey,” I said. “Why are we climbing so hard? Fingers already has the map. He doesn’t need us anymore!” I sat on a branch and slumped down.
“Noodle’s right,” Mrs. Emerson said. “Fingers will find the Golden Lizard. All he has to do is follow the map.”
“You’re right,” Zeek said. “All Fingers has to do is follow the map.” He dug into his right sneaker and pulled out a wrinkly brown piece of paper. “Yeah, I figure he must be heading toward the Mayville School auditorium by now.”
“Auditorium?” Mr. Emerson said.
Then it hit me. “Of course! My plan to sneak into our classroom to get our speech! You gave that piece of grocery bag to Fingers! Man, you are one sneaky dude!”
“Yeah, well. If you can climb trees, then I can have brilliant ideas. By the time he discovers he has the wrong map, we’ll be so far away that—”
WOCKA-WOCKA-WOCKA!
A deep, angry whirring noise erupted through the air as six very loud, very shiny, very black helicopters came circling over the treetops.
“I guess he just discovered he has the wrong map,” I said. Zeek smiled a weak smile.
Suddenly, dozens of guys in black bodysuits started sliding down ropes from the helicopters.
“Last one on the ground is ninja lunch!” I said, jumping down to the next branch.
Swip! Swip! Swip! Leaves rustled on the jungle floor. I looked down to see Fingers pointing right up at us—and an army of guys in black jungle outfits climbing fast up our tree.
“Uh-oh,” gasped Zeek. “Ninja sandwich! These guys just don’t give up!”
My mind raced. My mind stalled. Nothing. No plans at all.
Just then, the monkey on my branch curled his tail back, caught a vine, and pulled it over to me.
“Eeep?” it chirped.
Some other monkeys pulled vines over for Zeek and the Emersons. It was just like in the movies!
“Are we thinking what they’re thinking?”
The ninjas closed in from above and below.
“I think so!” cried Zeek.
In a flash we were off, swinging like we’d seen the monkeys do.
Fingers stamped his feet, did his finger thing, and the ninjas started after us.
But we were too quick for them.
From vine to vine and branch to branch Zeek and I swooped like awesome Jungle Spider Danger Guys! “Danger Guys!” we screamed.
The Emersons seemed to like it, too. They swung after us and yelled out, “Danger Adults!”
A few minutes later we slid down our vines and landed on the jungle floor.
“Let’s go!” I cried, tearing off through the trees. “We’re off to see the Lizard!”
My heart was drumming. I pushed on. The jungle was dazzling, the air hot an
d misty, with sunlight flickering through layers of leaves.
I was really getting into it. Ziiiiip! I ran quickly over roots, through bushes, around trees.
“Faster!” I yelled. I dived ahead of everyone else. It was as if the jungle were calling me.
WHAM! It suddenly said “go away!”
In front of me was a mass of green so tangly and thick I couldn’t even see through it.
“This is one thick hedge!” I rubbed my nose.
Mr. Emerson stepped up behind me. He looked closely at the green tangly stuff in front of me. “This is no hedge. This is a wall!”
He was right. It was a wall, made of stone and overgrown with moss and vines and roots.
It was as high as a house, and it stretched away in both directions as far as we could see.
I listened. Something was different. The jungle was hushed. It was quiet all around us.
Zeek pulled out the map and studied it.
“This wall is hundreds of years old,” Mrs. Emerson said, running her hand over the stones. “There are ancient carvings under these vines.”
“What’s on the other side of the wall?” I asked.
Mrs. E. glanced back. She didn’t say anything.
Zeek slowly folded up the map and tucked it away. “We’re close,” he said. “I can feel it.”
A shiver went up my spine. I could feel it, too. There was something strange about this place. Something eerie. Something—
That’s when I spotted it.
A huge head carved in stone on the wall. It had big slanted eyes, a long snout, and jaws the size of a garage door. It was all overgrown, but I could tell it was a lizard head.
I said it out loud. “We’re here. The Kingdom of the Golden Lizard!”
Zeek bent closer to see.
Suddenly—KKKERRR-SLAHHH! With a horrible sound, the stones in front of us moved. The lizard jaws opened wide, grinding and grinding.
Gunky stuff dripped from the upper jaws, as if the stones hadn’t opened for hundreds of years.
Zeek and I peeked into the widening hole.
We were amazed by what we saw. We stepped forward into the jaws.
GRRR! The ground gave way under our feet!
We tumbled forward and—JUNNG!—the jaws slammed shut behind us!
EIGHT
“Zeekie!” I screamed as I fell through the stone jaws.
I smushed my nose. Again.
Zeek tumbled into me, and we rolled fast down a dark stone hallway into an open courtyard. Broken columns and crumbled archways stood all around. Every stone was carved with a lizard shape on it.
“Boys!” Mrs. Emerson yelled. “Are you all right?”
I stood up and brushed myself off. “Yeah, we’re okay. I think.” Zeek nodded.
“The entrance is shut tight,” Mr. E. called out. “We’re going to search for another way in.”
“We’ll explore a little,” Zeek called back. We could hear the Emersons tracking away on the other side of the wall.
I looked around. The light flickering through the trees on this side of the wall was different somehow. Brighter. Sunlight danced on the stones.
“Noodle?” whispered Zeek. “Do you get the feeling that…”
“We’ve just entered another world?” I said.
“Yeah, the land that time forgot!”
I ran my hands over the wall carvings. “There are lizards carved everywhere.”
Fat toucans with bright yellow beaks fluttered through the old archways. Their cries echoed among the stones.
Shadows moved here and there over the markings on the ancient walls.
The lizard carvings led to a narrow alley between two rows of big wild plants. Arrow-shaped stones between the plants pointed up ahead to a clearing.
“Looks like we’re supposed to go this way.”
“Careful,” whispered Zeek, grabbing my arm. “I read a book once where these two buddies discovered an ancient temple that was booby-trapped and—”
“Zeek, this is no book. This is real life!”
I stepped on one of the arrow stones, accidentally brushing against one of the leafy green plants.
Suddenly the leaves parted, and I could see a pair of little green jaws opening and closing.
I stopped. “Um … Zeek?”
An instant later—SNAP!—the jaws jumped out at me and took a bite out of my shirtsleeve.
“Whoa!” I stared at the jaws. I stared at my shirt. It finally came to me. “Flytraps!”
SNAP! SNAP! SNAP! An instant later, hundreds of tiny jaws leaped out of the plants and lunged for Zeek and me.
“Guytraps, you mean!” he yelled. “With an appetite! Run!”
But the plants were too quick for us. They blocked our way, forcing us to make a stand.
“Hey!” yelled Zeek, fighting back. “I eat vegetables—they don’t eat me!”
SNAP! SNAP! They lunged closer, biting at our sneakers. “Maybe it’s revenge?” I yelped.
“Whatever!”
In a flash I unbuckled my supply belt and began whipping it at the snarling plants. “Bad broccoli! Back! Back!” I cried.
For an instant, the plants curled away. It gave us the chance we needed. I grabbed Zeek and charged ahead past the wild flowery jaws.
WHACK! WHACK! I swatted and leaped.
“Take that!” I cried.
Finally, we were out the other side.
Zeek looked back into the alley of hungry plants and wiped his forehead. “Kind of gives new meaning to the phrase ‘Plant Food.’”
I held up my torn shirtsleeve. “No table manners at all.” We backed away from the plants.
GRRRR! A strange sound echoed around us.
I turned to Zeek. “Did you hear that?”
GRRRR!
“You mean that?” He shivered. “That noise?”
“Yeah.” The sound faded away.
He shook his head. “Maybe it was nothing.”
I nodded. “Probably nothing.” We stepped into the clearing. On the far side was a high stone wall, and straight ahead, a doorway. “The Golden Lizard must be this way! It looks easy.”
Zeek came up behind me and glanced over my shoulder. “Except for that,” he said, pointing.
“Oh, that,” I said with a smile. He was looking at an ancient stone bridge over a stone pit. We had to cross it to get to the doorway.
“No way,” said Zeek. “Pits are where I really draw the line. I don’t go over old bridges that are booby-trapped to fall into old pits.” He started back toward the killer vegetables.
I grabbed his arm. “Hey, pal, that bridge has been here forever and will be here forever. Besides, big deal, there’s a little pit down there. I mean, what could happen?”
What could happen? Did I really say that?
I started across.
“I can’t believe I’m following you, Noodle. This is sure to end up bad. We’re not just going to walk over this bridge. Oh, no. We’ll fall. And I know there’s something waiting below!”
“Don’t worry,” I said, shooting a look down. It was shiny. “Just a little water in a little pit.”
But Zeek is usually right about things like this.
GRRRR!
He was right this time, too.
NINE
At the exact moment I heard that GRRRR!, the stone bridge, the one that had been there forever and would probably be there forever, tipped forward into the water, and we tumbled off.
Splash! The second we hit the water, the bridge went back to being a bridge again.
Ah! The old booby-trapped bridge trick!
Then I heard something sloshing around at the other end of the pit. The old killer animals in the pit trick?
CHOMP! CHOMP!
“Zeek,” I said. “We’re not alone here.”
Some bumpy things flashed across the water.
Zeek stared. “Maybe they’re friendly?”
CHOMP! CHOMP!
“Or maybe not!”
Two long alligators sloshed toward us. Their jaws opened and shut with a loud snap, practicing for when they ate Zeek and me.
“What’s with everything trying to eat us?” I cried.
“We’re tasty?”
I was about to say my last good-bye to Zeek when—
FWING! FWING! Two vines suddenly appeared dangling above us.
“Who? How? What?” Zeek sputtered.
I looked up into the trees and saw some little, furry brown monkeys swinging away. “Hey, that’s two we owe you!” I yelled.
An instant later, Zeek and I were climbing up the vines, hand over hand. We swung over and jumped down to dry land. The alligators snapped at the open air for a while before going back to their corner of the pit. No lunch for them.
“Whew! Somebody sure doesn’t want us to find the Lizard,” said Zeek. “What next?”
I scanned the trail behind us. We’d survived man-eating plants and man-eating animals. Going back didn’t look too appealing.
We stepped up to the doorway in the wall. “There’s only one way to go.”
Slowly I peeked into the opening. More high stone walls stood in every direction. Each had an opening. Through the opening I could see more walls and more openings. Sunlight flickered down on the walls.
It came to me in a flash. “It’s a maze, Zeek! This is a test! In fact, everything so far has been a test. To see if we can make it!”
“I like Mr. Strunk’s tests better.”
“Oh, I can feel it,” I said. “This is it. The final challenge!”
“You mean, the one that’s going to kill us?”
I made a face and stepped carefully into the maze. I walked from one little room to another, trying to figure out how it worked. It reminded me of something. I wasn’t sure what.
“Don’t worry, pal,” I said, “we’re close to the Golden Lizard now. We’re so close, I can taste it. Which reminds me. Do we, like, have any snacks? I’m hungry.”
Zeek didn’t answer. I turned. No Zeek.
“Zeekie!” I yelled.
“I’m over here!” came his voice from somewhere far away.
“Where are you?”
“I don’t know. I’m getting lost.”
My heart raced. What if there was something deadly in the maze? What if Zeek got lost and never made it out? What if I got lost? What if—
Then, it hit me. Food! I couldn’t stop thinking about food as I walked.