Crane Fly Crash by Ali Sparkes

A horrific murder was about to take place in a dark alley. The victim fluttered helplessly in the shadow of a terrifying spiked weapon that pounded against the wall. It missed only by inches.
    The murderer was cold. Unfeeling. Able to kill with a single blow and then turn away without a moment’s remorse. The victim knew time was nearly up. One more attack and there would be nothing left but a mashed corpse.
    The spiked weapon swung forward.
    â€œJenny! Stop it!” Josh leaped across his big sister’s bedroom floor. He grabbed her arm just before it swung the hairbrush down again.
    â€œHey! Get off!” yelled Jenny, trying to shake her little brother off her arm. But now his twin,Danny, came running in too. With an excited whoop he threw himself at her other arm.
    â€œYou’re a murderer!” shrieked Josh. “Killing innocent moths! How could you?”
    The poor moth in question flapped limply up the wall from behind Jenny’s bed and bumbled against the windowpane, trying to get away.

    â€œIt’s just a
moth
, Josh! Not a cat or a dog or a person!” snapped Jenny. Her long blonde hair whipped about as she wrestled with her brothers.
    â€œJust because it’s small, doesn’t mean it doesn’t have feelings,” said Danny. He climbed onto his sister’s back and made her spin round furiously.
    â€œDanny!
Get off!
” Jenny whacked her elbows back. Danny fell onto her bed. Josh had let his sister go. He was now peering closely at the brown moth. Jenny shook her head at Danny. “You don’t even
like
creepy-crawlies. You go nuts if one lands on
you
!”
    â€œTrue,” shrugged Danny. “They can be creepy. But they are quite amazing too. I should know. I’ve been a spider, you know. And a bluebottle. And a grasshopper. Oh—and an ant. That was amazing!”
    â€œYeah, right,” snorted Jenny. “Well, you always creep
me
out, anyway!”
    Danny laughed. He knew Jenny couldn’t possibly believe what he’d just said. Even though it was true. He and Josh
had
been all those creatures over the summer. Ever sincethey stumbled into the secret laboratory in their neighbor’s garden, they had discovered something incredible.
    Their neighbor, Petty Potts, might seem like a batty old lady, but it turned out she was a genius scientist. She had invented S.W.I.T.C.H., a spray that could turn you into a creepy-crawly. Only Danny and Josh knew her secret since the day when they had accidentally got sprayed and turned into spiders. They’d been afraid of her at first. But now they were helping her by searching for some special missing cubes. They’d got four already. If they found just two more, Petty would have the code to make a new S.W.I.T.C.H. spray, which could change you into a reptile. They could find out how it felt to be snake or a lizard or even an alligator!
    â€œYou don’t
have
to kill him, you know,” Josh told Jenny, still examining the moth. “All you have to do is open the window.”
    â€œI’ve tried that,” huffed Jenny. “But it just keeps flying back in!”
    â€œYou need to turn your light off,” explainedJosh. He reached over and switched off Jenny’s bedside lamp. “Moths get confused and think it’s the moon. They keep flying toward it.” He eased open the window, blew gently on the moth, and smiled as it flew away into the night. “Off you go, hawky!” he called after it. “Go get your tea!” He closed the window and glanced back into the room. Danny was squirming on the bed with Jenny’s foot on his head. “It’s a hawk moth. They feed on nectar by moonlight. Isn’t that sweet? And they can smell their girlfriends from miles and miles away.”

    â€œUgh,” commented Danny.
    â€œYeah, thanks for the biology lesson, you freaky little bug geek,” said Jenny. She released Danny and switched her lamp back