Artifacts by Pete Catalano Page A

the side. “No footprints, broken branches, or tamped down grass. Nothing to show us which way they took Mouth.”
    Crunch, Korie, and I helped him look, hoping to find something that would give us an answer. “Sorry, Tank …” I started to say when I felt like we were being watched. Looking up, I saw a few structures, each one connected to the other by bridges crisscrossing through the canopies of the trees. “Up!” I shouted.
    “What?” Korie asked.
    “They took Mouth up.” I pointed to a series of ropes, walkways, and makeshift zip lines hanging high above us. “That’s how they grabbed him and got him out of here without a trace.”
    “Of course, they’re living in the trees,” Crunch said, slapping himself in the head with the palm of his hand. “That’s where the Lost Boys live in Neverland.”
    “And that’s where they feel the safest,” Tank agreed. “We have to go after him.”
    I cracked up. “That’s easy for you to say. The only one who doesn’t have a problem going up Butt-Kiss’s Rope of Ruin in gym class. Crunch isn’t getting an inch off the ground.”
    “I can do it,” Crunch protested, running toward a rope hanging four feet off the ground, jumping into the air … and missing it completely.
    He face-planted into the ground.
    “Ooooh,” Crunch moaned, his face shmooshed into the dirt. “That hurt!” He didn’t say anything for a moment. “I got it,” Crunch muttered, waving from the ground. “I’m almost there.”
    “We can pull him up,” Tank said quickly. “He can’t weigh more than …”
    “A thousand pounds?” I said.
    “Guys, I can do this,” Crunch said, grabbing the end of the rope, wrapping his legs around it, struggling to hold his weight on the rope much less climb up to the bridge. He pulled, tugged, yanked, and still hovered only an inch from the ground.
    “Give him a boost,” Korie said.
    “A boost?” Tank laughed. “He’s going to need a crane … or maybe a rocket launcher.”
    “A boost,” Crunch repeated, nearly out of breath, taking big gulps of air, his face a bright red. “A boost would be good.”
    “He’s going to explode,” I said.
    “Oh, this is ridiculous!” Korie said. “The three of us will get up into the trees and get Mouth. Crunch, keep going through the woods until you get to the other side and wait for us.”
    “If you insist.” Crunch dropped off the rope, wheezing loudly as he collapsed to the ground.
    “That’s the only way to do it,” I said.
    Crunch stood up, brushed himself off, waved good-bye, and then stumbled down the path. Any shred of dignity was left in the dirt behind him. “Hurry up, though,” Crunch called back to us. “I’ll slice through these woods at blinding speed and I don’t want to have to wait.”
    Once Crunch was out of sight, Tank, Korie, and I looked into the trees and then at the rope that had given Crunch such a hard time.
    Tank was first up. He jumped on the rope as high as he could, and then pulled himself into the trees with his arms, not using his legs at all.
    Once he got up to the bridge and flipped over the edge, he dropped down two longer lengths of rope. Korie grabbed one and I grabbed the other. Pulling them tight, we used them to walk up the side of the tree.
    It was easy at first … then, it started getting harder.
    Finally, after like an hour, we made it to the top.
    “I’m going to die,” I said, burying my head into my arms as they rested on the edge of the rope handrail. “My arms are going to fall right out of their sockets, drop onto this bridge, and then I’m going to die.” I saw Korie standing on the other side of Tank, rubbing her hands, but not complaining a bit.
    A big smile came across my face. “Hey, Tank, that wasn’t too bad. Let’s do it again.” My mouth was moving waaaaay faster than my brain.
    “These bridges and walkways are unbelievable,” Korie said. “It’s like they built their own city thirty feet off the ground.”
    “It must