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  Born in Sydney in 1985, Chris Morphew

  spent his childhood writing stories about

  dinosaurs and time machines. More recently he

  has written for the best-selling Zac Power series.

  The Phoenix Files is his first series for young adults.

  The

  PHOENIX

  FLIES

  Chris Morphew

  contact

  The Phoenix Files: Contact

  published in 2010 by

  Hardie Grant Egmont

  85 High Street

  Prahran, Victoria 3181, Australia

  www.hardiegrantegmont.com.au

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publishers and copyright holders.

  A CiP record for this title is available from the National Library of Australia

  Text copyright © 2010 Chris Morphew

  The moral rights of the author have been asserted

  Illustration and design copyright © 2010 Hardie Grant Egmont

  Illustration and design by Sandra Nobes

  Typesetting by Ektavo

  Printed in Australia by McPherson’s Printing Group

  1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

  To Katie,

  Put your head in here.

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 1

  SUNDAY, MAY 17

  88 DAYS

  Someone’s phone was ringing.

  Jordan jumped to her feet, shoving her textbook into her bag and whirling around to see where the noise was coming from. Luke scrambled after her.

  ‘Peter! C’mon!’

  I chucked the rest of my chips on the ground and leapt up.

  ‘Shh!’ said Jordan, like I’d been talking. Her eyes darted back and forth. Then, without warning, she sprinted away across the grass.

  She does that sometimes.

  I caught up, running a few steps behind her.

  A working phone.

  How?

  I could hardly make out the sound of it over the noise of the park, but Jordan seemed to know exactly where she was going. She sped away, weaving between gardens and hedges and barbeques crowded with people, towards the line of trees at the end of the main street.

  Someone had done it.

  Someone had found a way past the communications shutdown.

  Someone who didn’t know or didn’t care how dangerous it was to let the whole town hear what they were doing.

  More people up ahead. Keith from Dad’s office, spreading out a picnic rug with his wife. He shouted something not very polite at me as I ran straight through their picnic.

  ‘Same to you, mate!’ I yelled over my shoulder.

  I pushed ahead until I was right alongside Jordan. My legs were already burning, still giving me crap from yesterday’s bike marathon into the jaws of death.

  But I wasn’t about to let her see that.

  Jordan powered forward, unstoppable. She shifted her path, cutting right in front a security guard. He gave us the eye as we bolted past him, and one look at his face told me he could hear the phone too. An instant later, he was running away in the direction of the security centre.

  We kept moving, tearing after the sound of the phone.

  But the sound of the phone was moving too.

  Whoever this was, they’d realised what a scene they were causing.

  Why didn’t they just switch it off ? Why were they running away with the thing still ringing?

  Other people were starting to notice that something was up. Some of them pulled out their own mobiles, adding to the confusion, making it even harder to work out who we were meant to be chasing. Others pointed at us as we flashed past, like they thought we were the cause of all this.

  ‘Idiots,’ I muttered.

  We hit the line of trees at the end of the park. The sound was louder now. We were close.

  I burst through the trees, almost bowling over Mrs Burrows and her dog coming along in the opposite direction. I jumped sideways over the leash, nearly stacked it on an empty bike rack on the other side, and ran to catch up with the others.

  We’d come out into the little alleyway that runs between the park and the primary school. There was no-one else in sight.

  Jordan was racing back towards the town centre, with Luke right behind her. I flew across the concrete, reaching them as they hit the crowded main street.

  And then the ringing stopped.

  No.

  Luke let out a grunt like someone had just stuck a knife in him. Jordan slowed to a stop, chest heaving, sweat trickling down her neck. I pulled up next to her, desperately scanning the street.

  On a bench across from us, Ms Benson was fumbling through her handbag. Nearby I saw Mike’s dad look over his shoulder and then drop something into a bin. Over at the mall, Neil the butcher was ducking inside with his hand in his pocket.

  That phone could’ve belonged to any of them. Or none of them.

  Jordan whipped around, braids spinning out from her head in a black halo. She was still shifting from foot to foot, ready to take off again at a second’s notice.

  ‘See anything?’ she asked. Luke shook his head.

  ‘Nope.’ I slumped over, resting my hands on my knees.

  Jordan rounded on me. ‘But you heard it, right?’

  The question was like a punch in the gut. After everything that had happened at the wall yesterday, she still wasn’t convinced I was on board with all this end-of-the-world stuff.

  As if I didn’t have good reasons for doubting it all before. It was ridiculous. All of it. All I did was believe what should have been true.

  Unfortunately, in Phoenix, what should be true is almost never what is.

  ‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘I heard it.’

  Jordan growled and kicked the low wall of one of the garden beds.

  ‘But surely –’ Luke looked around to make sure there were no security guards in earshot. ‘I mean, they haven’t put the phones back on, have they?’

  ‘Are you kidding?’ I said.

  But Luke had already pulled his phone out of his pocket. Two weeks after arriving in Phoenix, he was still carrying it everywhere with him. He hit a number on his speed dial and put the phone to his ear. He held it there for a sec, then sighed and snapped it shut again.

  Jordan rested a hand on Luke’s shoulder.

  ‘No chance, mate,’ I said, watching her hand out of the corner of my eye, ‘even back when the phones were working, we never got mobile reception out here. It was only the landlines, and even they were pretty dodgy.’

  ‘How do you explain it, then?’ Jordan asked, finally letting go of Luke. He pocketed his phone and stared down at the bike path under our feet.

  ‘I can’t,’ I said. ‘It doesn’t make any sense. Who could’ve –?’

  I broke off, seein
g Luke bend down to pick something up from the ground. A sheet of paper. Couldn’t have been there for more than a couple of minutes, or else the cleaners would’ve picked it up already.

  ‘What is it?’ asked Jordan, looking over his shoulder.

  Luke straightened up, wincing slightly at his still-bruised stomach. He flipped the paper over and I caught a flash of red at the top of the page. A fiery bird with its wings curved up into a circle.

  ‘Shackleton letterhead,’ I said, moving around for a better look.

  ‘It’s some kind of list,’ said Luke slowly, scanning the page. ‘Like building materials or something. Look: 15-5PH steel plating, bullet-resistant glass …’ He ran his finger down a long line of materials, all spelled out with precise sizes, quantities and measurements.

  My eyes dropped to the bottom of the page.

  ‘Page seven,’ I said.

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘This isn’t the whole document. It’s page seven.’ I pointed to the number. ‘See? The rest of it is probably –’

  Jordan cleared her throat loudly. The security guard from the park was coming back up the street towards us. Luke stashed the paper in his pocket and tried to act natural.

  Luke acts natural about as well as a penguin in the desert.

  I flashed the guard my most winning smile as he closed in on us. He was one of the newer officers. Hadn’t been here long enough for me to know his name. He glared back at me, but I guess he didn’t suspect us of being anything other than normal no-good teenagers, because he walked past and headed back to the park.

  I waited until he was well away from us before I started breathing again.

  ‘So,’ said Jordan when he’d disappeared completely. ‘What’s page seven of a Co-operative building plan doing in the middle of the main street?’

  ‘Someone must’ve dropped it,’ I said.

  ‘Obviously. But who would’ve –?’

  ‘Someone who was in a hurry,’ I said, the pieces snapping together in my head. ‘Like maybe someone who just got sprung with a working phone?’

  Luke pulled the paper from his pocket and smoothed it out again. ‘So the phone …’ He stabbed the Phoenix logo with his finger. ‘You’re saying it belongs to one of them?’

  I hesitated, not liking where this was going. ‘Y-yeah. That’d make sense.’

  Luke looked up at Jordan. She shrugged and nodded. The same horrible, considering-something-that-could-get-us-all-killed look spread across their faces. I cringed, stomping down the urge to tell them both exactly how insane they were.

  ‘You want to try and find this person, don’t you?’

  ‘We have to,’ said Luke. ‘We need to warn everyone about Tabitha, and finding that phone is the closest thing we’ve got to a plan for doing that.’

  One day off between suicide missions. Was that really so much to ask?

  ‘Awesome,’ I said. ‘Here we go again.’

  Chapter 2

  MONDAY, MAY 18

  87 DAYS

  I happened to run into Jordan on the way to school the next morning. After waiting at the bottom of her street for twenty minutes, I happened to step out in front of her just as she walked around the corner. Funny how these things work out.

  ‘Hey,’ she said. ‘Have you seen Luke?’

  ‘Nah, not yet.’

  Forget Luke. I’d figured out a way to get more info on that list we found yesterday. A way to prove to Jordan that I was on her side.

  We walked along behind the school, headed for the back entrance. It would’ve been faster to jump the fence and cut through the primary school, but I wasn’t in any hurry.

  ‘So what do you reckon it is?’ I asked, reaching for a topic I knew she’d be interested in.

  ‘What do I reckon what is?’

  ‘Tabitha. What’s Shackleton’s big plan to wipe everybody out?’

  Jordan shrugged, but I could tell she’d given it plenty of thought. ‘Probably a code name for something, right? Some kind of poison, maybe? A password that sets off a bunch of bombs?’

  ‘Alien death ray?’ I suggested.

  ‘There’s no such thing as aliens,’ said Jordan.

  ‘No such thing as super-powered homeless people either.’

  Jordan looked at me like she didn’t think the end of the world was something to joke about.

  I noticed she’d redone her braids since yesterday. Usually she only did them every couple of weeks, but I guess our death-defying trip out to Phoenix’s massive secret prison wall was reason enough for her to –

  ‘What? ’ said Jordan, catching me looking at her.

  ‘Hey, about that list of building stuff,’ I said. ‘I was thinking, why don’t I ask my dad about it?’

  ‘No,’ said Jordan.

  ‘Like, not actually tell him what we found,’ I said quickly, ‘just –’

  ‘No,’ she said again. ‘Peter, don’t you dare.’

  ‘But –’

  She stopped walking. ‘No, Peter.’

  Frustration flooded into my voice before I could stop it. ‘Listen, this thing you guys have against my dad is really getting –’

  ‘No-one’s got anything against your dad,’ Jordan snapped. ‘We agreed not to tell anyone about this. Calvin and Pryor are just waiting for an excuse to come after us. You really want to risk giving them one?’

  ‘Fine,’ I said. ‘Forget it. Just a suggestion.’

  Jordan didn’t answer. She started walking again, hands sliding into her pockets. I followed behind, furious at myself for snapping at her. So much for that plan.

  Something jolted inside me as we turned in through the school gate. After everything that had happened over the weekend, after seeing what this town was really all about, school felt like a completely different place to the one I’d left on Friday.

  I should’ve known things around here were too good to last.

  They’d already started falling apart, even before Tabitha. Friends ditching me for no reason. Dad getting more and more obsessed with his work until I hardly even saw him anymore.

  And then Jordan had arrived, and for a while, things were looking up again.

  And then Luke showed up.

  And then the world was ending.

  ‘Why would your dad know about construction stuff, anyway?’ Jordan asked, lowering her voice as we walked past a bunch of Year 8s. ‘I thought you said his job was writing press releases for the local paper.’

  ‘It is,’ I said, which was as at least part of the truth.

  Dad was part of the original Shackleton Cooperative team that got Phoenix up and running before the rest of us got here. He’d flown in close to a year ago now – four months before me, and ten or eleven before Jordan and Luke. I’d never been completely clear on why they needed their public relations guy there so far in advance, but up until now, it hadn’t really seemed like a big deal.

  Jordan pulled a face. ‘If that’s all he does, how would he know anything about …?’

  She trailed off, her attention wandering to the other side of the playground. There were about fifty people crowded around the side of the English block, pushing in for a closer look at whoever had been pinned up against the wall. Usually, a scene like this meant a punch-up, but I had a feeling that wasn’t what was going on today.

  We went over to join the crowd. As we got closer, I could hear people yelling out questions.

  ‘How’d you get out?’

  ‘What did you do to him, anyway?’

  ‘Why didn’t you just pull his beard? That’s what I would’ve done!’

  We stopped behind some hobbit-sized Year 7s. Luke was standing in the middle of the crowd, looking exasperated. It was his first day back at school since Crazy Bill beat the living crap out of him last week. The school had been buzzing about it ever since. And now the vultures were coming in, looking for a blow-by-blow of the whole thing.

  ‘I already told you,’ said Luke, gritting his teeth. ‘I didn’t do anything to him. He just charg
ed up and started laying into me!’

  No idea how to handle a crowd, I thought, shaking my head.

  In front of me, the hobbits were whispering to each other.

  ‘I heard Crazy Bill eats human hearts,’ said one of them, leaning forward for a better look at Luke’s bruises. ‘That’s why he was attacking him! He was trying to cut his heart out!’

  ‘No way!’ said the other kid. ‘My dad was there when it happened. He said that guy’s girlfriend jumped on Crazy Bill’s back and tried to pull him off.’

  My gut churned and I shoved them both out of the way. ‘Luke!’ I called, pushing my way through the crowd, Jordan behind me. ‘C’mon.’

  Luke shot me a grateful smile and started moving towards us.

  ‘Hey, wait! What happened to Crazy Bill?’

  ‘They arrested him, right? Officer Calvin took him to the security centre.’

  ‘No, he got out again. My brother saw him escaping on Saturday night!’

  ‘I don’t know where he is,’ said Luke, shouting now. ‘Just get out of my face, will you?’

  The bell rang just as he pushed through to Jordan and me.

  ‘What in the world is going on out here?’ grunted a voice from behind us.

  I turned around and came face to face with a balding old ranga who’d just come storming out of the English block.

  Mr Hanger. The biggest tool in Phoenix. And in a town plotting the extinction of humanity, that’s saying something.

  ‘Peter Weir,’ he sneered. ‘Why am I not surprised?’

  ‘It wasn’t me, sir!’ I said, imagining his head exploding. ‘I was trying to break it up!’

  ‘It’s true, sir,’ said Luke. ‘Pete was just trying to get me out of –’

  ‘Thank you, Liam,’ said Hanger, cutting Luke short. ‘I’m quite capable of asking for your opinion if I want it.’ He looked out at the rest of crowd, who were still hanging around. ‘All of you: straight to the hall. The principal has called a special assembly.’

  ‘Another one?’ someone shouted. ‘What for?’

  ‘Why don’t you go over and find out for yourself?’ said Hanger, which is Teacher for I have no idea, but I won’t admit I’m not in the loop.

  The crowd broke up and started heading across to the hall.