Lionboy by Zizou Corder Read Free Book Online Page A

tottered up to Aneba’s side and was now reaching out to pat the cub, who squirmed away from the needle. Aneba gasped, the syringe fell, and a few small drops of blood appeared on the fur. Charlie laughed. The cub, alarmed, put out a claw and scratched, hard. Drops of Charlie-blood were on the cub; drops of cub-blood were on Charlie’s bleeding arm.
    The leopardess and Aneba looked at each other. The cub and Charlie yowled again: in unison.
    Each parent grabbed its child and ran—the cub hanging from the leopardess’s tender jaws like a kitten, Charlie tucked firmly under his father’s arm.
    “Ab ab ab baby one!” cried Charlie happily.
    “Mrrrrow!” scrawled the leopard cub.
    “Mrrrrow!” called Charlie.
    And after that, Charlie talked with cats as much as with people. He was mystified by their constant feuding. Though he understood their language, he didn’t exactly understand their feelings and their mysteries, but he loved them and they were his friends. His parents studied him endlessly: They knew what must have caused it, but they couldn’t work out why.
    “He’s modified himself,” said Magdalen. “Here’s everybody fussing about genetic modification methods, and young Charlie here’s done it to himself.”
    “And can the leopard cub talk English now?” Aneba wondered.
    Another thing—he wasn’t allergic to cats, when so many other kids were.
    “Fascinating,” said his parents, over and over again. This was after Magdalen had shouted at Aneba for three days about getting their child into such danger.
     
    Charlie had been really happy to be more clever at something than his parents were. But now—well, it would have been useful if they’d had that particular knack too.
    Before the afternoon sun grew too low, Charlie set up his solar panel to recharge his phone. He’d recharge Mum’s as well if there was time. There might be messages on it. There might be something to give him a clue.
    Clue!
    For goodness’ sake, thought Charlie. I have a clue. His mum had given it to him herself. He reached into his bag and there it was, carefully folded.
    Charlie had a bit of a feeling in his chest as he took it out.
    This was her blood.
    So what had she written?
    Oh.
    Letters and numbers. Some in brackets, some not. Mostly normal size, some little tiny ones up at the top of the bigger ones.
    It looked like very complicated math. It made no sense whatsoever to Charlie.
    He looked at it for a moment, wondering if it was a code. He’d played code games with his mum before, and if it was a code, he’d like to think he could work it out.
    But nothing they’d ever done had had all these brackets and tiny numbers.
    “I know what this is,” he said to himself after a while of staring. “This is a formula.” He knew what formulas were because scientists use them all the time.
    So it wasn’t nonsense. But it was nonsense to him, because he hadn’t learned nearly enough science yet to work it out.
    He folded the paper up and put it away again. He’d learn what it was about. He would find someone who would tell him. He’d be careful whom he asked, though. It didn’t seem like something he should show to just anybody.
    And in the meantime, it did him no good at all. He still didn’t know why his parents had been taken. Apart from him, who would want them?
    He thought about it for a bit.
    He ran over in his mind the phrases that had come up. New job . . . Work business . He knew that the most valuable thing about his parents to other people was their intelligence, and the work they did.
    Charlie’d read enough stories.
    “Somebody’s after their brainpower,” he said. “After something they know, or can find out.”
    He felt happier then. Just having worked that out made him feel he had something to go on.
    Plus he had that piece of paper.
     
    The reasons why Aneba had not answered his phone were: 1) because there was no reception under water and 2) because skinny snivelly Sid had swiped it from him