Jason Boyd was twelve years old, fair haired, blue eyed and tall for his age. He was also pretty intelligent on a normal day-to-day basis. However, today wasn't normal and he hadn't been very intelligent. He stared with trepidation at the impenetrable bush surrounding the dirt path he stood on. He was in the middle of Lamington National Park, Queensland, Australia, surrounded by over twenty thousand hectares of lush bush and mountains. And, all he had with him was a backpack containing his jumper and camera.
He felt the cold chill of fear, freeze his mind. Realisation of his predicament turned his knees to jelly and his heart pounding wildly. With a choked off sob he finally faced the truth. He was totally and absolutely, lost.
Chapter 1
Three hours earlier Jason had been happily hiking the marked paths with his school friends; the hike a reward for getting good grades in their end of year exams. A couple of the guys father's had volunteered to guide and care for them. Everything had been going so well, his friends were full of high spirits, happily jostling each other and pointing out the wildlife to each other. Then, they had stopped for lunch. That was where he had been absolutely, totally, ridiculously stupid.
A huge, yellow crested, snow-white cockatoo had landed on a branch near his head; the biggest parrot he'd ever seen. It looked him steadily in the eye and then screeched a demand for food. The guys roared with laughter at the row it was making and threw it bits of their lunch.
"Hey Brian" he yelled at his best friend, "Get a photo of me feeding him will you?"
Jason held out a piece of apple and tried to encourage it to take it from his hand, but it was too canny for him and stayed just out of reach.
"I got a photo of you nearly feeding him from your hand," laughed back Brian. Jason gave up in disgust and went back to eating his sandwich.
Lunch break over the father's counted heads and then got everyone moving down the path again.
"Stay close and don't lose sight of each other, we still have another two hours walk until we get back to the car park," said Mr. Jenkins, Brian's father.
The guys all moved off with one father at the front and one at the rear of the group; all very sensible and careful, all well organised and safe. Safe that was, until they rounded a long bend in the path that put Jason out of sight of the father in the rear, just as he became distracted by the white cockatoo. It settled onto a branch at the side of the path and screeched a demand for more food right into Jason's happy face. A couple of the guys looked back and laughed at the performance it was putting on but, didn't stop walking.
Jason figured he could safely move into the bush a short distance, as long as he kept the path in sight. The cockatoo screeched a bit louder, bobbing up and down on a low branch just daring him to come closer. Gradually Jason drew nearer until finally, he was able to feed the cockatoo from his hand. Slowly he removed his camera from his backpack and carefully lodged it in a nearby tree- fork. Setting the camera on auto with one hand he continued to feed his new friend with the other. Ten seconds later the camera flash went off and Jason had his special photo. The cockatoo screeched in disgust and fluttered to another branch further into the bush.
"I'm sorry cocky, I didn't mean to upset you I just wanted your picture." Jason collected his camera then followed the bird deeper into the bush. "I've got to get going now so, you can have the rest of my apple to make up for frightening you." Jason threw the apple pieces under the nearest tree then, turned to make his way back to the path.
"Hey Brian," he shouted triumphantly. "I got the photo I wanted. Wait until you see it."
Brian didn't answer so Jason moved faster. A few minutes later he stumbled onto the path; he hadn't realised that he'd moved that far off it. Worried that he'd be in trouble for wandering off the path he started to jog in order to catch-up. It was several minutes later that he realised he was on the wrong path and that he was going to be in big, big trouble. The rules had been clearly spelled out. No leaving the path and no losing sight of the others. Jason took a deep breath and determinedly continued down the path.