The Pursuit of the Ivory Poachers (10 page)

BOING!

This time he sprung even further. One more time, thought Jack, and he'd be next to the trees.

BOING!

The Power Pogo thrust him towards an acacia tree. As he came down, he grabbed onto one of its branches and held on. His feet were dangling down. The Power Pogo fell to the dusty ground, almost hitting one of the male lion's head.

“ROOOOAAARR!”

The male lion wasn't happy. Using the strength in his arms, Jack pulled himself onto a branch inside the tree. Perched there for safety, he glanced down at the lions below. Their “easy” breakfast had
completely disappeared. Jack smiled. Things were finally going his way.

Taking a moment, Jack remembered what Trevor had said. He needed more ivory. Guessing that's where Trevor was off to now, Jack looked at his Watch Phone and punched a few buttons. The Transponder that he'd dropped in Trevor's car was showing a location
just ten miles away. Since the blinking light wasn't moving, Jack started to worry.

Jack had to get to Trevor before he killed another elephant. He looked out the other side of the tree from where he was sitting. There was a gentle drop from the hill to the savannah. Peering through the branches at the lions, he saw that they had given up on catching him. The pride was heading somewhere else in search of food. Lowering himself down, he collected his gadget, packed it away, and scrambled through some bushes to the top of the slope. He slid down it towards the flatter land below. Perfect terrain, Jack thought, for one of his favorite gadgets. It was the GPF's Flyboard and it was waiting for him in his Book Bag.

After snapping the Flyboard together, Jack hopped on. Punching the “air” button on his Watch Phone, the jets fired up and Jack and the Flyboard took off. Given the distance and the speed he was travelling, Jack worked out he would arrive at the Land Rover within moments.

He soon saw Trevor's car up ahead, and it looked as if he was just in time. Directly across from the car was a family of elephants. They were bumping into
trees and grasping at branches with their trunks. Trevor was standing up in the vehicle with another man. It looked like the waiter from Mr K's lodge – the one who served Jack his ostrich kebab. So, that's Trevor's accomplice, thought Jack. That's who left the set of messy footprints at the shed.

The two men were wearing hunter's vests and pointing their guns towards one of the female elephants.

“No!” screamed Jack, urging the Flyboard to go faster.

But Trevor and the other man couldn't hear him; he was still half a mile away. They leaned their ears on the guns and looked through the sights.

“Stop!” yelled Jack.

At that last shout, Trevor must have heard him, because he lifted his head and looked in Jack's direction. By the time both men had registered Jack's arrival, he was nearly there.

“You?” snarled Trevor, clearly unhappy to see that Jack had escaped a second time. “What are you doing here?” he yelled. “Go away! We have some business to do.”

“No, you don't,” said Jack. “I'm not going to let you kill these elephants!”

“Oh, yeah?” said Trevor, swinging his gun so that it was now pointing at Jack.

Jack flinched.

“Hapana!”
the other man yelled in Swahili, aiming his gun at Jack, too. The female elephant sensed the danger and was leading her family in the other direction.

As Trevor put his head down on the gun, ready to fire, Jack pulled his Lava Laser out of his bag. Even though it looked like
an ordinary pencil, the GPF's Lava Laser was powerful enough to make metal burn as hot as lava, so that whoever was touching it would have to drop it.

Trevor put his finger on the trigger. Jack fired the Lava Laser. A ray of light shot out of the gadget and struck the metal on Trevor's gun. Almost instantly, the gun started to glow orange with heat, burning Trevor's hands.

“Owwww!” he yelled in agony, dropping the hot metal object.

“Hapana!”
the Kenyan man yelled, lowering his face to his gun. He was about to fire.

But Jack and the Lava Laser got him, too.

“Ahhhh!” he howled, shaking his hands and trying to cool them. Jack guessed that a cry of pain sounded the same in Swahili as it did in English.

Realizing that they weren't going to kill either Jack or the elephants, the two men dropped in their seats. They were going to start up their car. Trevor tried to turn the key in the ignition, but his hands were too sore and blistered to touch anything.

“Arrgh!” he yelled, obviously disgusted with what was happening.

Panicked and desperate, the two men jumped out. They started to run in different
directions. Jack reached into his pocket and pulled out his Transformation Dust. He opened the packet and directed the Flyboard over to the waiter from Mr K's lodge.

“Rhinoceros,” Jack said as he blew some of the dust onto the man's face.

“Kifaru?”
the waiter said, repeating the word for rhinoceros in Swahili. As the dust flew into his face, he coughed, spat, and shook his head. Almost instantly, he was transformed into one of the most hunted and endangered African animals – the black rhino. Jack then sped over to Trevor, who was sprinting as far as he could, but not fast enough.

“Please, don't!” Trevor screamed as he looked at his accomplice and realized what Jack was about to do. “Noooo!”

“Elephant,” said Jack as he blew the dust. On that very spot, Trevor was turned
into a two-ton female elephant. Trevor lifted his trunk and blew a sound of fury.

“Now,” said Jack, pleased with himself. “Let's see how you like being a hunted animal.”

Although Jack would have loved to keep them that way forever, he knew the GPF's
Transformation Dust would only last an hour. No problem, thought Jack. It was a clever enough way to catch the poachers and teach them a lesson at the same time.

Jack phoned the Kenyan police, who arrived fairly quickly, but not soon enough for both Trevor and the waiter, who were being sniffed at by a pack of hyenas.

Once the criminals had changed back to themselves, the police officers arrested them and hauled them off.

“You're going to pay for this, kid!” yelled Trevor as the van door shut behind him.

No,
thought Jack to himself.
You're the one who's going to pay.

Now that the bad guys were locked up, it was time to pay a visit to Chief Abasi. After all, Jack was supposed to meet him this morning and he was already late.

He jumped on his Flyboard and headed for the homestead. As he zoomed towards the gate of the Maasai village, Chief Abasi came out of a hut to greet him.

“Hello, Jack,” he said, using his stick to walk over. “Has anything happened since we last spoke?”

“You wouldn't believe the morning I've had!” said Jack. “I was nearly bitten by a poisonous boomslang and mauled by a pack of lions!”

Chief Abasi's eyes widened at the news.

“But everything is all right now,” said Jack. “I caught Trevor and a waiter from Mr K's trying to kill more elephants. They were the poachers responsible for those tusks in the shed.”