2 Crash Landing!

Chapter 2 CRASH LANDING! The GNAT was zigging and zagging. It was flying in circles. It was doing loop-de-loops. "Aaaaaaaaack!" hollered Judy. "Get this thing back to the house, Bug-Brain!" Uncle Al's yard was a blur of green. The wind whooshed against them. Leaves slapped Andrew's face. Andrew yanked at the steering wheel, but the GNAT was out of control. He quickly pressed some buttons on the remote, but his invention seemed to have a mind of its own.

"The GNAT isn't working right," said Andrew. "Urf!" said Judy. "I feel sick!" "Stop pedaling," said Andrew. "The GNAT will go slower. Maybe then I'll be able to land it." As the GNAT slowed, it flew more smoothly. Andrew could steer it now. He glimpsed a silvery glint below. Sunlight on water! he thought. It's the pond! The GNAT was gliding down.

WHRRRRRRRRRRR… came a sound like the GNAT, but louder. At first all Andrew could see was a bright streak rushing at them. Then it turned and shadowed them—a long, slim green body and a blur of wings. meep… "Dragonfly!" squeaked Thudd. "Fierce hunter! Eat anything that move. Catch prey with legs. Eat and fly!" Andrew watched as the swift dragonfly dropped lower and kept pace with the GNAT. The insect's prickly legs looked like a spiny cage. The GNAT jittered in the air. The dragonfly's mouth opened wide. It was so close that Andrew could look up and see inside. Two sets of jaws, one inside the other, were lined with needle-sharp teeth. Andrew shuddered. His head would fit nicely inside those jaws. The dragonfly dipped. The tips of its clawed feet scratched Andrew's cheek. Judy leaned over the side of the GNAT. "I see something that looks like a little raft below us,"

she said. "I'll try to land us there," said Andrew, dodging a dragonfly foot. Andrew nosed the GNAT down steeply and gained speed. They were going so fast, Andrew could feel the air pulling at his face. With a jolt and a bounce, the GNAT landed on a bumpy surface and stopped. "Woofers!" said Andrew. He scanned the sky for the dragonfly. It was a foot above them. A smaller dragonfly was trapped in its cage-like legs! The big dragonfly began to chew on the smaller one. "Holy moly!" said Andrew. "A cannibal dragonfly! But at least it's not eating us." Judy looked down at the bumpy raft they had landed on. "Yikes!" she hollered. "What's going on here?" The bumps on their landing place looked like the tops of tiny Ping-Pong balls. Some of them were popping open. Buggy little heads were waggling out!

meep… "Drewd and Oody land on raft of mosquito eggs!" said Thudd. "Wormy thing called larva hatch from egg." "Eeeeuw!" hollered Judy. "We're on a mosquito island!" As soon as each wriggly brown larva squirmed out of its egg, it disappeared into the pond. RHUUMMMMM… RHUUMMMMM… RHUUMMMMM… The deep sounds from somewhere in the pond made Andrew's chest rumble. "Cheese Louise!" said Judy. "What's that?" meep… "Bullfrogs!" squeaked Thudd. There were other noises, too—chirps and whistles and trills. But the frog croaks were the loudest.

The air smelled like low tide and autumn leaves. Andrew scanned the pond. Huge lily pads floated on the greenish water, and tall cattails swayed skyscraper-high above them. On the surface of the pond, nothing was still. Long-legged water striders skittered around the mosquito raft. Their feet made little dents in the water as though it were a sheet of thin plastic. A spider many times bigger than Andrew raced along and stopped nearby.