by H. I. Larry
CONTENTS
TITLE PAGE
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
COPYRIGHT PAGE
It was 4.30 p.m. School was officially over for the day. So why was Zac Power still stuck in a classroom, pretending to look interested in fractions?
Stupid Homework Club, he huffed to himself. Kids whose parents worked late did their homework at Homework Club while they waited to be picked up. But really, Zac didn’t need any teacher watching him while his parents were working. After all, he was a top international spy who’d been on heaps of missions by himself.
Zac’s brother Leon and their parents were spies, too. They worked for the Government Investigation Bureau, or GIB for short. Zac’s parents were taking an advanced code-breaking course. So Zac had to attend Homework Club all week, even though he was 12 years old.
Ms Tran, Zac’s teacher, was supervising Homework Club that day. Zac heaved a gusty sigh and flicked open his maths book. Ms Tran looked over at him and smiled. Isn’t learning maths fun? her eyes seemed to twinkle.
Zac tried to keep his eyes open, but it was so hot in the classroom. The air stank of ripe bananas and other people’s feet.
Suddenly, there was a knock at the door, and it swung open to a stern figure in a skirt and suit jacket. Mrs De Souza, the school principal!
‘Zachary Power,’ said Mrs De Souza. ‘Please step outside for a moment.’
Zac sat bolt upright. Zachary? This must be serious. Only his parents called him Zachary, and even then, only when he was in big trouble.
The other kids stared as Zac leapt up.
Zac racked his brains for what he could have done. He’d missed a lot of school lately. He’d been so busy on important international missions! But he didn’t think he was failing or anything.
‘Well, Zac,’ said Mrs De Souza, closing the classroom door. ‘I don’t usually interrupt Homework Club, but the young girl who delivered this insisted that I give it to you straight away.’
Phew! He wasn’t in trouble after all – but what was she giving him?
‘What was her name again? It started with C…’ said the principal, vaguely. ‘Never mind,’ she finished, handing Zac a glittering gold envelope.
Splashed across the front in curly black letters were the words:
For the urgent attention of Mr Zachary Power.
His next mission from GIB? It had to be! Although it was weird that everyone was calling him Zachary all of a sudden …
Zac didn’t think about it too long. A mission would get him out of Homework Club, and right now that was all that mattered.
Zac tore open the envelope. But it wasn’t a new mission. It was something even better.
Awesome! Zac was getting out of school, and he didn’t even have to stress over any difficult spy work. This time, things would be strictly Mission: Fun.
Zac looked at his watch. He had to get a move on if he wanted to get to Hollywood. The premiere was in 24 hours!
Mrs De Souza asked him how the Homework Club was going, and Zac smiled. But he wasn’t listening. Zac had noticed a strange sound – a kind of low hum unlike anything he’d heard before.
It was a bit like an engine, but it didn’t growl like the fighter jet Zac had trained on. It wasn’t an ordinary passenger plane either.
‘I should probably get going,’ Zac said, waggling the gold envelope at Mrs De Souza. She nodded and stalked away.
Zac fished around in his pocket for his SpyPad, the mini-computer that all GIB spies carried.
It had heaps of cool functions, including a powerful mini-telescope. If there was some weird aircraft in the sky, Zac was easily be able to spot it.
Zac raced outside. He looked up, SpyPad at the ready. But Zac didn’t need a telescope to see what hovered in the sky above him.
It was an enormous, shiny gold blimp. Across the side, in giant black letters, were the words Covert Operations. This blingcovered blimp must be Zac’s transportation to Hollywood!
How am I going to get up there, though? he wondered. But before he could blink, a rope swung down from the blimp’s cabin.
Zac grabbed the rope. His feet lifted off the ground.
He was headed for Hollywood!
It seemed slightly weird to Zac that GIB would send a flashy gold blimp to pick him up. Normally GIB was paranoid about being noticed.
But Zac didn’t dwell on his doubts for too long. The blimp was even cooler inside than it looked from the outside!
The cabin was carpeted in white fluffy rugs. Chocolate frogs were heaped into crystal bowls dotted around the cabin.
And although the blimp could have carried lots of people, it looked like Zac was the only passenger.
A woman in a white apron appeared. Zac had never seen her before. Strange, he thought. He knew pretty much all the local GIB staff. Maybe she’s from the Hollywood office?
‘Please make yourself comfortable, Mr Power,’ she said smoothly.
Zac’s reclining seat was soft and wide. He had never travelled in such comfort!
‘You can access all the latest movies here,’ explained the woman, pointing to a massive plasma screen.
‘And this,’ she continued, as a machine sprang out of Zac’s armrest, ‘is your personal popcorn popper.’
The trip was ten hours, which wasn’t long enough to enjoy everything on the blimp. First, Zac watched a movie. Then he had a foot massage and head rub. Then he discovered the in-seat virtual-reality roller-coaster rides.
He was still riding Iron Gutz, the world’s first virtual-reality roller-coaster, when suddenly he felt a bump for real.
Zac checked the time on his SpyPad. It was 3.03 a.m. – nearly time to touch down. Perhaps the bump Zac felt was just the blimp coming in to land?
Then –
The blimp lurched sideways, leaving Zac’s stomach behind. This is no ordinary landing! Zac thought, worriedly.
He rushed to the window. Below, the lights of Hollywood lay spread out like Christmas lights. Mansions clung to the steep cliffs, a shimmering aqua swimming pool in every yard.
But none of it explained why the blimp was flying so crazily all of a sudden.
Inside the cabin, crystal bowls smashed on the floor, scattering chocolate frogs everywhere. The lights flickered. What’s going on? Zac hoped they weren’t about to crash.
Zac scanned the skies for an answer. Then he saw it. A chopper was weaving in and out of the blimp’s flight path!
What kind of idiot would fly so close to another aircraft? Zac thought furiously. The chopper’s blades, whizzing so fast they were a blur, would slice through the blimp’s outer lining in a flash!
Zac looked closely at the chopper. Inside the cabin sat a woman with blonde hair piled high on her head. A hairless dog with bulging eyes and a diamond collar lay curled in her lap.
The woman waved her fist in Zac’s direction. Zac noticed the sharp red nails, like claws, at the end of her fingers.
The woman looked an awful lot like Chrissie L’Estrange, the Hollywood actress. Everybody knew her – it was impossible not to. Chrissie and her little dog Poppet were on the cover of every magazine. Zac hated her movies.
Zac looked again. Now Chrissie was screaming something in his direction!
Zac was glad of his lip-reading training. He could understand her perfectly.
‘GET OUTTA MY WAY, JERK!’ she screeched. ‘DON’T YOU KNOW WHO I AM?’ Her chopper swooped in front of the blimp.
Inside the blimp, Zac heard an announcement.
Zac thought he heard the captain mutter, ‘Even thou
gh we were here first.’
A few minutes later, the blimp touched down on the helipad. Chrissie L’Estrange was already there, surrounded by fussing personal assistants.
I’ll just go over there and clear things up, thought Zac to himself. But as soon as he took a step in Chrissie’s direction, flashbulbs exploded in his eyes.
‘Who are you? Are you Chrissie’s latest boyfriend?’ someone cried out of nowhere. ‘What’s your name? Who’s your agent?’
Zac’s mouth fell open. The paparazzi! Where did they come from?
‘He’s no-one,’ Zac heard one of them say. ‘Let’s follow Chrissie.’
And with that, the photographers and reporters scattered from the helipad.
I’m not no-one, Zac wanted to reply. I’m a top spy here for a big premiere!
Zac turned back to the blimp. But in the commotion, it had flown off without Zac noticing. Zac’s backpack lay on the helipad. All of a sudden, he was alone in Hollywood – the strangest of all strange places.
Zac’s ears popped as the super-fast lift swept him up to his penthouse on the 51st floor of the Hotel Deluxe. The doors opened directly into the suite, which was equipped with an ice-cream machine and a wide-screen cinema.
Zac dumped his backpack on the huge king-sized bed.
He clicked on the remote control and a giant TV screen dropped from the ceiling.
An announcer with a stiff wave of blonde hair was beaming at the camera.
‘Stay tuned for a Channel One exclusive report into spying in the modern age,’ she was saying. ‘We reveal how spy agencies are looking for ways to make their investigations quicker and more efficient.’
Leon would probably watch that, the big nerd, thought Zac, smiling to himself.
Someone was knocking at the door of his suite – loudly!
‘Room service!’ called a voice.
Zac got up and opened the door.
‘Hot dog?’ said the pimply guy standing in Zac’s doorway. He held out a tray of hot dogs zig-zagged with yellow mustard.
‘Er, I didn’t order a hot dog,’ said Zac.
‘Take one, they’re delicious!’ said the guy, and then he leant in closer.
‘I’m a GIB agent,’ he muttered. ‘We tracked your arrival in the blimp. We’ve actually been trying to get in touch with you since yesterday, but it seems the lining of the blimp interfered with your SpyPad receptor, and blocked all incoming messages.
‘No-one at GIB knows why you’re in town,’ he added, ‘but you’ve got a new mission. Now take the hot dog.’
He handed Zac a hot dog and left, singing ‘have a nice day!’ as he went.
Zac stared after him, feeling confused. Why didn’t GIB know why Zac was in Hollywood? After all, it was GIB who invited him to the premiere of Covert Operations! And if they didn’t, who did?
I guess I’d better find out what my mission is, thought Zac as he checked out the hot dog. There was a sticker on the bun, so tiny he had to squint to read it. It said ‘FTP enabled’.
The mission must be a file inside the hot dog! But there was a problem. How was Zac going to upload a mission into his SpyPad from a hot dog?
Without smearing mustard on the casing, Zac held the hot dog up to his SpyPad. A green light flickered on. His SpyPad was bluetooth compatible... and so was the hot dog. The mission was uploading wirelessly!
As Zac read the new meassage on the SpyPad, he realised he had two missions. To solve the ThoughtVision mystery and to figure out who’d invited him to the premiere. But the premiere was only 12 hours away!
Before leaving the penthouse suite, Zac paused in front of the mirror to slick some product into his hair. There was no way he wanted to look scruffy on the stylish streets of Hollywood!
Zac supposed that the obvious place to start the ThoughtVision investigation was at the Cinemania Studios. But before he could hail a taxi, a vehicle pulled up right in front of him.
The passenger door opened and a voice wafted out. ‘Please, come inside.’
Zac had to step back to take in the full size of the car. It was a yellow stretch Hummer. Its engine rumbled loudly.
Zac climbed in. But there was no-one driving the car! The voice, which was obviously computerised, said, ‘Welcome to AutoJeeves, the driverless chauffeur service. Where would you like to go?’
‘Cinemania Studios,’ replied Zac.
Ah, the Hollywood lifestyle, thought Zac, as the stretch Hummer took off.
The Hummer pulled up outside the fancy iron gates of Cinemania. Through the fence, Zac could see row after row of sets from old movies. There were people everywhere, zipping around the huge studio lot in white golf carts, or sitting around in canvas chairs with their names on the back. The studio must keep shooting movies all night!
A security guard stood at the gates, where a queue of people waited to get in.
‘Yes? What business do you have here?’ asked the guard mechanically.
‘I have a script meeting with Mr Spielford,’ Zac heard someone say.
‘I am Chrissie L’Estrange’s new plastic surgeon,’ said a woman just in front of Zac.
‘You?’ the guard asked Zac.
A big part of spying was pretending to be someone you weren’t. But Zac was totally exhausted. It had been a long night. For once, he struggled to think of a false identity. ‘I’ve got an appointment with Poppet L’Estrange,’ blurted Zac at last. ‘I’m … I’m … I’m her hair stylist.’
The guard eye-balled Zac silently.
I’m such an idiot! Zac panicked. Who’d believe a hairless dog has its own hairdresser?
Zac’s spirits plummeted. No way would he get past the security guard and into Cinemania now!
Was the unthinkable about to happen? Was Zac Power actually going to fail a mission?
‘Poppet L’Estrange?’ repeated the guard.
‘Er, yes,’ said Zac, uncertainly.
‘What time is your appointment?’
Zac checked his watch. It was 5.37 a.m.
‘Six o’clock,’ Zac said, sounding more confident than he felt.
‘It’s that trailer over there,’ said the guard finally, opening the gates. The guard shook his head in pity. ‘You’re Poppet’s fourth stylist this month.’
I guess nothing’s too weird for Hollywood, Zac thought.
Zac headed in the direction of Poppet L’Estrange’s trailer to avoid suspicion. All the stars (and their dogs) had their own luxury trailers to sit in between filming scenes. The more famous the star, the bigger the trailer.
That must be someone really important, Zac thought as he passed a silver trailer the size of a road train, complete with a satellite dish on top. There was a name on the door in a star-shaped tag that said ‘Caroline’.
I wonder who that is? thought Zac.
Then Zac noticed a golf cart puttering to a stop nearby. A woman got out, yakking into her mobile phone.
‘We aim to supply each unit with a camera by next year,’ she said.‘It will cost a lot at first, but think of the savings later on.’
The woman was so wrapped up in her conversation, she left the keys in the golf cart’s ignition as she walked off.
Seizing his chance, Zac jumped into the golf cart and sped off. Now he could search Cinemania properly!
Zac was flying over a speed bump when the golf cart’s radio crackled to life.
‘Attention all security units. A golf cart has been stolen. Suspect has cool hair, repeat cool hair. Likely identity: Zachary Power.’
Ah-ha! Cinemania was definitely not a genuine movie studio! Otherwise, how would they know his name?
Suddenly, Zac heard a weird crunching sound behind him. There, not ten metres away, was a security guard in a golf cart, cracking his knuckles!
The guard’s neck was as thick as a power pole. He looked more machine than human. And he was heading in Zac’s direction – FAST!
Zac slammed his foot on the accelerator. His cart shot forward, but not fast enough. The guard was cl
osing in! Zac sped towards what looked like the Wild Wild West. It was actually an old film set, cluttered with horse troughs and abandoned mine shafts.
Desperately, he wove between the obstacles. This was harder than Mario Kart! And if he crashed, Zac knew he couldn’t just start all over again.
Zac slammed into a barrel and sent it flying. The cart flipped. Zac flew out and …
He landed flat on his face. The barrel slammed into the guard’s cart, knocking him over like a skittle.
Zac jumped up and ran for it.
Gotta hide, he thought. His face stung from where he’d landed on the gravel.
Up ahead, Zac saw a haunted house set from a horror movie. The windows were boarded up, the door nailed shut.
Perfect … if I can figure out how to get in.
Frantically, Zac rattled every board on every window.
A board came loose and Zac wriggled through the window. Velvety darkness swallowed him up instantly.
Blindly, he felt his way further inside the house. All of a sudden, Zac went cold. What was that sound?
Footsteps!
‘Zac Power!’ thundered a voice.
The room flooded with yellow light. Zac’s eyes throbbed. He’d been caught!
Standing in front of him was the guard from before! Hang on, hadn’t Zac left him behind outside?
Wait … thought Zac. What’s that weird lump on his neck?
An ON button! No wonder this guard looked like the one from the cart.
And like the one at the front gate, Zac realised.
The guards were all androids!
A new GIB ruling required all spies to wear PitStink capsules under their arms in case of android attack. When broken, the capsule releases a vile stink from the armpit.
As hard as he could, Zac pumped his right arm up and down three times until he felt a blast of gas.
‘Halt, Zac Power,’ boomed the android.
Zac lifted his right arm. Powerful stink waves wafted out – a cross between rotting meat and dog farts.
‘Halt, Zac Pow– errrrgh!’ screeched the android. It dropped to the floor, holding its nose. Smoke curled from its ears. The PitStink had short-circuited its wiring!