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Jimmy glanced at this first question, his mind went completely blank...

Chapter 8 - Checkpoint Quiz
    Next to Jimmy, Missy was already putting Monster into gear, setting off after Chip and Sammy without even looking inside her envelope.
    “I don’t like to waste time hanging about,” she yelled over to him. “I’ll do my thinking on the go!”
    Next to each answer there was a numbers. A light bulb went off in Jimmy’s head and he dashed back to his seat to get the papyrus map they had been given.
    “The answers have map co-ordinates next to them,” he said.
    “So as long as we get both the right answers, we get the right co-ordinates, and we can find our way to the overnight rest stop?” asked Cabbie.
    “Yep,” said Jimmy. “Now, where have I heard the answer to this one?”
    His thoughts wandered back to the classroom on the Leadpipe airship. He remembered Sir Rupert telling them all that the largest desert in the world was...
    “Got it!” he said aloud. “It’s Antarctica.”
    “Are you sure?”
    “Absolutely! Sir Rupert was giving us the answers in that lesson all along.” Jimmy traced his finger next to the answer and saw the number fifteen. He noted down the first co-ordinate.
    Just then, he saw something out of the corner of his eye. It was Horace, sitting ten metres away on the bonnet of Zoom. He was staring at his piece of papyrus, but he didn’t look like his normal, smooth self. He had taken off his helmet and his hair was sticking up in different directions like a radio mast. He was red in the face, but Jimmy didn’t think it was all down to the desert heat. Jimmy saw the familiar frown that he recognized from sharing a class with Horace for years. He was trying to work out the clues, and if Jimmy remembered correctly, Horace had been using his mouth much more than his ears in the classroom. Now he puzzled over the questions, grimacing like a gorilla with toothache.
    “OK, hit me with the next one!” said Cabbie.
    The paper was slippery in Jimmy’s sweaty hands now, and he could feel a trickle of perspiration running down his back from the uncomfortable heat. But he forced himself to turn his attention back to the paper and concentrate on the second question:
    How much rainfall, on average, do deserts get each year?
    Is it less than:
    a) 25 centimetres
    b) 250 centimetres
    c) 2,500 centimetres
    “Oooh, I’d say a?” guessed Cabbie. “No, b. Although, c could be right...”
    Jimmy racked his brain for the answer. He remembered Sir Rupert talking about deserts. He’d said that deserts could contain ice and snow as well as sand, because a desert meant that there was very little water, not that it was hot. And hadn’t Sir Rupert said something about rain...?
    “Got it! It’s less than twenty-five centimetres!” he said as the memory became clear in his head. “Definitely! Thank you, Sir Rupert!”
    He quickly checked the co-ordinates matched to the answers he’d chosen and used them to take a reading on the map. Then he ran back around to Cabbie’s driver’s seat. He was about to pull the door shut when he heard the roar of an engine and Zoom surged forwards, skidding right in front of Cabbie. Jimmy’s path was blocked.
    Horace leaped out and grabbed Cabbie’s door, keeping it open. “Not so fast, Jimmy!” said Horace.
    Jimmy couldn’t tell at first what was wrong. Something was different. Something he couldn’t quite put his finger on. “Horace, are you smiling ?” he said at last.
    And he was. Horace was smiling from ear to ear, but not in his usual ‘I’m better than you’ way. This was more like an ‘I want to be your friend’ smile, and Jimmy didn’t like it one bit.
    “Hmm? Oh, don’t be silly, Jimmy, old mate!” he said. “Hey, remember back in Smedingham how you used to let me look at your homework answers?”
    “No,” said Jimmy, trying to close the door. “I remember you stealing my school bag, ripping my homework out of the exercise book and handing