The Amazon Experiment

Cover

Copyright

Imprint Page

Dedication

Title Page

Chapter 1: A Menacing Downpour and a Request from Steinberger

Chapter 2: The New Agent

Chapter 3: Inflatable Vehicles and an Urgent Call from Harrison

Chapter 4: The Scene of the Crime

Chapter 5: Agent Dretch and Some Bad News from Steinberger

Chapter 6: Guilty Fingerprints and a Lethal Sleep

Chapter 7: A Dire Prognosis

Chapter 8: A Vile Plan and a Deadly Gift

Chapter 9: A Man-Eating Bladderwort and Another Collapse

Chapter 10: Mission: Triatoma

Chapter 11: The Express ardrobe and a Shocking Disappearance

Chapter 12: A Call for Help and a Deathly Plunge

Chapter 13: A Rude Awakening and an Almost Fatal Step

Chapter 14: A Suspicious Muffin and an Attack of Nerves

Chapter 15: A Treacherous Rescue and a Perilous Pursuit

Chapter 16: Plan B and an Unexpected Fall

Chapter 17: An Unusual Catch and a Terrible Discovery

Chapter 18: A Can of Worms and an Important Deduction

Chapter 19: Spyforce to the Rescue!

Chapter 20: Goods Carriers, Hospital Beds and Prison Cells

About the Author

Max Remy Series

Jasper Zammit Series

The rain plummeted in sheets as Max scurried through the twisting, cobbled streets of Venice. Water poured from burst downpipes, washed into moored gondolas and overflowed from canals into alleys and homes, as if the ancient city was finally being consumed by the sea. Rats that hadn't yet found shelter ran across Max's path or were swept along in the rising water swilling into every crack and crevice.

In the splatters of lightning that punctuated the darkness, shadows moved in and out of doorways and around corners, like thieves stealing into the night. Max stopped running and took shelter beneath the stone archway of a church. Drips from the giant stone cross above fell like a fountain around her. She folded her arms across her chest and jiggled her feet in her wet shoes, desperate to drive away the aching cold gnawing into her bones.

Another lightning flash splintered into the alley, creating even more shadows, as if Max was surrounded by a gang of faceless strangers.

But one shadow was real. Its distorted human shape slithered along a darkened wall as if preparing to pounce.

Max knew the figure was here for her.

She took a deep breath and ran. The shadow followed.

She turned to catch a glimpse of him but he was hidden in the folds of the miserable night and a swirling black cloak, until lightning snagged at his face and Max saw him. He had sharpened cheekbones, a pencil-thin moustache and a sneer chiselled out of pure malice.

The alley narrowed into a sharp turn. Max jumped over a small pot of limp, drowned flowers and rounded the corner, but halted, arms flailing, as she realised her fate.

The alley ended abruptly against the swirling waters of a canal.

Max's pursuer stopped and edged slowly closer. Thick, sticky rain fell down Max's face like waves of tears. The canal boiled before her like a blackened cauldron, but it was what was above it that stopped her heart.

Linden was suspended from a balcony, twirling at the end of a rope against the cruel whips of wind and rain.

‘Save me, Max!' he yelled over the ear-crushing deluge.

It was a set-up. She thought she was outrunning her pursuer, when she was really being driven to a
terrible end. Max fought against the storm and the stabbing fear of losing her friend forever.

‘I'm coming, Linden. Hold on.'

But then her cloaked pursuer took out a knife and with precise marksmanship threw it at Linden's rope, severing it in two. Linden fell into the canal and was swept towards the swollen waters of Venice's darkened harbour.

‘No!'

A deep-throated laugh cut through the air as Max ran forward, balancing at the water's edge as she tried to see her friend. Where was he? Which wave was he caught under? She had to find him and pull him out before it was too late. Before

Max leapt up, gasping for breath as water washed down her face and onto her clothes. Her mind was full of Venetian streets and canals, rain and blinding lightning strikes, but as she wiped her dripping hair from her eyes and focused on what was around her, she realised she was in the sleep-out at Mindawarra.

She also saw the reason for her own private downpour.

‘You!' she snapped at one of Geraldine's chicks, which was innocently pecking its way along the windowsill above her bed. The same windowsill that up until moments before had been holding a glass of water.

Geraldine was a chicken who decided from the moment they met that Max was there for her to harass. Linden thought she was crazy to think a chicken could get personal, but Max knew it was true. She could see it in the bird's beady eyes. Geraldine had created chicken poo traps, spooked Max by flying at her in a flapping frenzy and then had three chicks she was training to do the same.

Max didn't have a great affinity with the animal kingdom, but when it came to this particular feathered part, lines had been drawn for outright war. A kind of guerrilla war, only in this case it was a chicken war.

She reached for the towel Ben had left on the end of her bed and wiped her face and pyjamas. She'd arrived in Mindawarra the night before. Her mother's wedding was only weeks away and despite demanding Max's help, she'd now decided she was too busy with the final preparations and it would be best if Max went to the country. Only when Max's
mum had said ‘too busy', what she really meant was that Max was too clumsy.

So what if she'd spilt a little raspberry juice on her mother's favourite rug and accidentally left the iron on so Aidan burnt his hand; and the shower curtain was old anyway, so the candle burning it to a small pile of blackened soot was really only doing them all a favour.

Her mother, of course, hadn't seen it like that, and Max was sent away as quickly as it could be arranged. Normally Max loved every chance to be away from her mother and her manic ways, but she'd actually started to enjoy being with her, and even though she still wasn't ecstatic about the idea of Aidan being her stepdad, the wedding was starting to sound like fun.

That is, if she was still invited.

A high-pitched cheeping interrupted her thoughts.

‘I bet you stand in front of the mirror practising looking innocent, don't you?' Max glared at the young chick prancing up and down the windowsill as if in some kind of victory parade. ‘You lice-infested, ground-scratching …'

But just then a drop of water slid from her hair
onto her face, and the last part of the dream crept into her mind.

The part where Linden fell into the canal.

And she couldn't save him.

She'd been having dreams like this since she saw Linden fall to his death in Blue's torture chamber in Hollywood. He fell because Max couldn't control her temper and Blue decided to take it out on Linden.
¹

They were always the same kind of dreams: Max being chased until she came across Linden suspended from something. A cliff, a building, a scaffold. And then he'd fall.

When they went on their first mission, Linden had made them say a pact promising to always look out for each other. It had seemed silly, even embarrassing, but after what happened to him, Max had made her own pact: that she'd be there for Linden always.

And that she'd curb her temper.

Max heard the sound of tearing paper and looked down. Geraldine was showing her young chick how to use her beak to tear the pages of Max's spy notebook.

‘That's it!' Max threw the towel aside and went to leap out of bed, but as she did her foot got tangled in the sheets and she landed headfirst on the floor in a sodden mess.

‘There are easier ways to get up, you know.'

Max sighed into a soggy spot on her blanket. ‘Why does there always seem to be someone around to watch me make a fool of myself?' she mumbled as she tried to sit upright.

‘You mean these things don't happen when you're on your own?' Linden crunched into some peanut butter toast while Ralph wagged his tail beside him.

‘Of course not,' Max lied, then frowned.

Ralph whined as if he sensed something was wrong.

‘Are you okay?' Linden asked.

Max looked at the mess around her and wondered where to start.

‘I had a nightmare.'

‘What about?'

‘All sorts of stuff.' Max still felt bad bringing up Linden's death with him.

‘Mum used to say nightmares usually mean there's something going on in our lives we're unhappy about.'

Geraldine chose that moment to cackle loudly, her feet still firmly planted on Max's mauled spybook. Max reached over and grabbed the book, sending Geraldine squawking for cover.

‘Hey,' Linden said, ‘I think your palm computer has an incoming message.'

Max sighed. She always seemed to get the most important messages when she was in her pyjamas.

She turned on her computer and activated the link.

It was Steinberger, Spyforce's Administration Manager. ‘Ah, Max and Linden. Great to see you again. Having a bit of a sleep-in, were you, Max?'

‘Kind of.' Since the nightmares had started, she'd been sleeping badly and usually woke up late.

‘Well, I think I have some news for you that you're going to find very exciting.'

‘Excellent. What is it?' Linden gave the last of his toast to Ralph and took an apple from his pocket.

Before Steinberger could continue, Ben and Eleanor walked into the room, wondering why Linden was taking so long getting Max to breakfast.

‘Steinby! How are you, you old sausage?'

‘Very well thank you, Ben. Hello, Eleanor.'

‘Morning, Steinberger.' Eleanor stood behind
Ralph and ruffled his fur. ‘How's everyone at the Force?'

‘Couldn't be better. Smooth sailing on all fronts, and last night was the Spy Industry Bowling Championship.'

‘Let me guess,' Eleanor smiled knowingly. ‘Quimby won?'

‘Of course. Put those funny-looking shoes on her and she can do no wrong. Oh, but that reminds me. She's invented a new range of foldaway, inflatable vehicles, and we'd like Max and Linden to come to HQ to do a little training.'

‘Training?' The colour drained from Max's face like water from an unplugged bath. The last time she'd done training, she might as well have worn a neon sign around her neck saying ‘Mobile Danger Zone'.

‘Yes, Max, but this time I think you're really going to enjoy it.' Steinberger loved Spyforce and his unstoppable sense of optimism would make the Force millions if they could package it and sell it.

‘Sure,' Linden said in between chomps. ‘When?'

‘Today, if you're free.'

‘Sounds good. Will they be back for dinner?' Ben asked, as if kids all over the world got this request every day.

‘Most certainly. A few hours should do it, I'd say.'

Linden's food radar spiked into life. ‘What are we having?'

‘Lasagne.' Ben smiled broadly.

Linden sagged at the possibility of missing out on his favourite dish. ‘Really? Lasagne?'

‘It'll be here when you get back,' Eleanor promised.

‘Excellent,' Steinberger cried. ‘We'll see you here in about an hour.'

Max showered and got into some dry, chicken-free clothes, and despite her excitement, she managed to finish a little breakfast before the four of them made their way to the yard to prepare for their trip to Spyforce Headquarters in London.

Max saw Larry moving cardboard boxes around his pen. Larry was Ben and Eleanor's pig and according to them, the weather could be predicted by his behaviour.

‘Don't tell me,' Max began. ‘There's going to be a storm.'

‘Nope,' Ben answered.

‘A flood?'

‘Not likely,' Eleanor replied.

‘Rain? A heat wave? A tornado?'

‘He acts in other ways for those,' Linden added.

‘What is it then?'

‘Ernie Sullivan's coming to visit today with his pig Gwenda and Larry wants to impress her.' Ben watched as Larry's cardboard construction came together. ‘He's doing a pretty good job of it, too.'

‘He's sweet on Gwenda,' Eleanor leant towards Max and whispered. ‘Only he doesn't like us making a fuss about it.'

Max looked at the three people standing in front of her admiring their pig and decided that was all she wanted to hear about Larry's love life. ‘Time to go, I guess.'

They walked a little further away from the house before stopping.

‘This should be a good place.' Ben pulled the original Time and Space Machine from his pocket. He and Eleanor had given it to Max as a present, but took it back after Max misused the Matter Transporter Mark II on their last mission.
²

‘Travel carefully.' Ben had a way of getting emotional at goodbyes and his eyes were already quivering with tears.

‘We will. I promise.' After disappointing them
during their Hollywood mission, Max was determined not to let them down again.

Eleanor patted Ralph's head as he stood calmly at her side. There was a time when he'd almost kill Max just saying hello, but since Linden had trained him, he was much more restrained.

‘See you, buddy. You've done well.' Linden nuzzled his nose into the fur on Ralph's head, knowing he would have loved a pre-flight rumble.

Max prepared the machine to transport them to Spyforce as Linden stood beside her.

‘Be careful on those new vehicles,' Ben cautioned. Ralph edged forward and whined in agreement.

‘Okay,' Max answered.

‘And come home as soon as it's all over.' Ben's voice rose higher as Ralph let out a small yelp.

‘Gotta go now.' Max was keen to avoid any situation where she'd have to face an adult crying, but just as they were about to leave, Ralph couldn't contain himself any longer and leapt at her for a final goodbye. The two rolled onto the ground in an exploding whorl of dust.