S*W*A*G*G 1, Spook

by Jill Marshall

  And then she remembered. She didn’t have to drag it under cover. It was already under cover. Her arm was the most spy-like part of her. She was wearing most of a Girl Gauntlet – and what was it G-Mamma had said? It now had a new feature.

  She angled her head towards the gap, spotting a shoe only a few metres away.

  ‘Invisibubble,’ she whispered.

  Holding her breath, she hoped fervently that this would work better than the rest of the glove … and then she watched as her arm disappeared.

  Her heart raced beneath her tee-shirt; she placed her other hand over it, urging it to be quiet as the shoes approached. They weren’t steel-toed boots as she’d expected, however. They were women’s shoes, with a slight heel and a gently rounded toe in a shade of green of which even G-Mamma might have approved. The left foot was close to her arm – if the woman took too short a step, she’d kick Janey’s hand and then it wouldn’t matter that it was invisible. Holding her breath to combat the pain, Janey carefully curled her hand into a fist … and the foot touched down, just millimetres from where her fingers had lain, less than a second ago.

  The feet stamped by, and then a sharp voice cried, ‘She must have got out. I don’t know how. Get the car into forensics, and check the load stone.’

  Load stone? What was that? The female voice sent such shudders down Janey’s spine that she wasn’t really sure she wanted to know. It was Simone Varley, she was pretty certain of it, once more sending her security men after her. Which meant one thing for sure: the woman would recognise Janey if she saw her again.

  From now on, she’d have to tread very, very carefully.

  For the moment, there was nothing she could do but wait for the sound of the car wreckage being removed. At long last the corridor fell silent, and Janey slipped out of the room and ran to where it had crashed. Maybe she could text Jack to come and get her, or something. When she reached the end, however, she discovered that the dull light she’d seen earlier was an exit of sorts – a long steel ladder leading up to a manhole cover, somewhere in the grounds of the HOST offices. Janey clambered up it slowly, trying not to use her injured arm, until she found herself being hauled out by several welcome pairs of hands.

  ‘You shouldn’t have waited!’ she said sternly, although she was very glad to see G-Mamma, Tilly and Jack.

  Tilly laughed. ‘Don’t worry. We didn’t.’

  ‘What she means is,’ said Jack, elbowing Tilly in the side, ‘is that we powered back to your laboratory, gave the ambulance back to the poor confused paramedics …’

  ‘… and they had eaten all my doughnuts.’ G-Mamma glared at the three of them. ‘So I put that rifle in the empty box and left Trouble in charge of it.’

  ‘Then we came back for you, in G-Mamma’s mad squid van,’ finished Tilly.

  ‘It’s the Octobus,’ said G-Mamma with a sniff. ‘Invisibubbled, naturally.’

  Janey almost cried with relief. ‘Oh, thank goodness! I can use the Wower and fix my arm. Dislocated, I think.’

  ‘Half of it’s missing!’ cried Jack, turning a little green. ‘That’s not dislocated. That’s … chewed!’

  ‘Oh, I forgot. That’s not the injured bit. It’s just Invisibubbled.’

  ‘Wower? Octobus? Invisibubbled? muttered Tilly to Jack. ‘I don’t understand half of what you people say.’

  Jack shrugged. ‘You’ll get used to it. I have. Just about.’

  ‘Yes, but have they got used to you, Jack BC with the ancient head?’

  It looked as though another argument was brewing between Tilly and Jack, so Janey interjected instead. ‘Where’s Gideon?’

  ‘He’s minding the mad squid … the Octobus,’ said Tilly with a roll of her eyes. ‘He wanted to make sure you were okay.’

  And Janey was very glad about that – not just because he was concerned enough to wait for her, of course, although she had to admit that she was more pleased about that than she possibly should be, but because she’d now seen and heard so much more than when he took them on.

  It was time for Gideon Flynn to start talking.

  Chapter 14 - Catty Comments

  Gideon appeared to be standing randomly among the low-branched Japanese trees. Only the twin tyre tracks that ended near his feet gave away the presence of the Octobus, and Gideon himself, in his burgundy suit and with his dark hair and eyes, was nearly invisible in the lengthening shadows.

  ‘You made it,’ he said as Janey approached with the others. ‘Good.’ He gestured to the space in which the Octobus stood. ‘It looks as if you could do with a Wower.’

  ‘Yes!’ cried G-Mamma brightly. ‘I don’t know if you’re Wowing up or down, but if you don’t get into the magic gadget soon, your arm might need re-breaking.’

  Janey felt faint at the thought of it, so she waited until the van had been de-glamoured of its Invisibubble covering and hauled herself into the back. ‘Could you … could you guys wait here?’ It was one thing Wowing in a spacious Spylab with other people sitting in the same room; quite another when they would be just the other side of the Wower door.

  The rest of the ‘team’ shuffled uncomfortably, both Jack and Gideon snapping ‘Sure!’ in a vaguely embarrassed fashion. G-Mamma raised an eyebrow at them, then gave Janey a strange smirk. ‘Go make yourself beautiful then,’ she said.

  ‘It’s not that, it’s … never mind.’

  This team business is challenging, she thought as the Wower worked its magic on her pulverised shoulder. She wouldn’t be throwing any javelins any time soon, but at least it wasn’t pure agony to lift her hand to scratch her nose. Trying it out for strength, Janey stared at the silvery-white sleeve which now extended all the way up her arm. The Wower had encased her in full spy regalia, seeing as she’d climbed into it in normal clothes. She sighed. There was no point de-Wowing now – though it might be time for a bit of de-briefing.

  She opened the side door to the Octobus’s side door and stood back to allow everyone to climb in. With five people lined up among the screens and surveillance equipment it was rather crowded, so after a moment it was agreed that Jack and G-Mamma should get in the front and drive home while the other three discussed matters in the back.

  ‘It was you two I needed to talk to anyway,’ Janey explained, although her SPI:KE and canine friend would be able to hear what they were saying. Perhaps with Tilly and Jack separated like naughty kids, they’d be able to get down to business more quickly.

  Once again, Gideon shuffled uncomfortably and insisted on standing because of his ‘condition’.

  Matilda Peppercorn, too, preferred to stand. Whatever Gideon did, she seemed to do it too, thought Janey a little peevishly. It was like they were the original team, and Janey and Jack were bolt-ons.

  Tilly caught her eye and grinned. ‘I’ve got broom butt,’ she announced.

  ‘You … What’s that?’

  ‘Broom butt, you know, from sitting on the broomstick.’ She pointed to the offending area. ‘I prefer to stand on it like a skateboard but sometimes it’s not practical.’

  ‘Like when you’re flying over treetops,’ said Janey with a nod.

  Tilly winked at her. ‘You’re catching on. Get it? Cat … ching on. Cos I’m a cat.’

  ‘Well, actually, that’s what I wanted to ask about,’ said Janey, glad of the excuse to jump into the questions. She tried sitting down on one of the stools at the surveillance bench, but was suddenly aware that both Gideon and Tilly were looming above her. She stood up again, and they both gazed at her expectantly.

  ‘I … um … well, I saw some funny things in that HOST place, and then when you said you couldn’t let the guards see you, Tilly, I wondered why. Surely they shouldn’t have seen any of us? And Mrs Varley had already heard of you when you …’ Janey searched for the right word. Not hypnosis. ‘When you magicked the ring off her hand. You have to admit, it’s all a bit suspicious, and I think now that the game is hotting up and people are actually shooting at us – well, me, specifically – t
hat we deserve an explanation.’ Janey stopped short, feeling very warm around the neck of her spysuit as she realised what a huge speech she’d just delivered. For her, at least.

  Tilly glanced at Gideon. He gave her a small, almost imperceptible nod, and she began.

  ‘Well, Jane Blonde, I think there’s probably a lot you need to tell me too, you spy girl you, and one day you and I will just hang out like BFFs – although not really as we probably both already have actual BFFs - and then we’ll spill ALL the beanios,’ she said airily, hardly pausing for breath. Unlike Janey, she was evidently very used to talking. A lot. ‘But for now, you said the games were hotting up and that’s just about the truth of it. That’s why I’m here. For the games.’

  ‘The World Community Games,’ Gideon said, in case they’d forgotten. ‘It ties in with what you’ve just seen, Janey.’ She glanced at him for a moment. How did he know what she seen? He hadn’t been with her at all, while she’d scraped the rifle off the wall by de-commissioning the MRI machine in the blood-spattered room, or when she’d checked out the ruby manufacturing set up in the lower basement. ‘I’m guessing, of course,’ he said quickly, his familiar tight smile flitting across his face.

  ‘But why?’ she said. ‘Why is Tilly involved because of the Games?’

  Tilly hauled in a great breath for her next instalment. ‘Because of my kickboxing,’ she said. ‘You see, it’s really hard to get noticed for kick-boxing and they’ve only just started covering it as a full sport in competitions like the World Community Games. It’s even been hard to get ordinary belts and stuff in kickboxing. It’s just not treated like the other martial arts, which makes me incredibly cross!’

  ‘I bet.’ Janey imagined that a cross Tilly would be very formidable indeed. ‘But I still don’t understand how that involves you, Gideon, and …’ She tried out the name of Gideon’s creation – his team. ‘How it involves us. SWAG, I mean. And you shouted, Tilly, that they couldn’t see you – but they’d already seen you at that reception party.’

  Tilly was obviously preparing herself for another volley of words, but Gideon held up a hand.

  ‘I paid for her,’ he said simply. ‘I needed an athlete accepted into the games, one who nobody knows or has seen before. If she happens to be a living legend with special powers, well, so much the better for me. Us.’

  ‘Oh, stop it!’ cried Tilly, although she sounded as though she was actually quite pleased with the flattery.

  Gideon laughed, then turned back to Janey. His penetrating eyes were watchful, searching for her reactions, and once again Janey felt her neck flushing uncomfortably.

  ‘I paid a large amount of sponsorship to the WCG committee to get Tilly admitted as a contestant. That’s why she was happy to be seen at the Games Reception – because she’d been invited, although she sneaked in via an open skylight just to suss the place out first. The only other thing they might have suspected was Mrs Varley willingly handing over a ring to her but they didn’t, because of her spell. But Tilly definitely couldn’t be seen in the basement of the HOST head office, wheeling a body around the car park. They’d smell a rat then, and they would have vetoed her acceptance.’

  ‘You want her to win the Games?’ Janey felt her anger rising. ‘But that’s not even ethical or … or fair. She’s magic, and a … a cat, apparently, although we haven’t seen that yet. She’s bound to be able to win.’

  ‘I do want to win, it’s true,’ said Tilly with a laugh.

  Gideon shook his head slightly and Tilly stood back, but not before Janey’s voice had risen another notch.

  ‘Is it to get more money? Is that what we’re doing stealing rings and rifles and helping you smuggle a sure-fire winner into the Games? I can’t believe we fell for it. Jack!’ she cried, pretty certain that the lovely Jack wouldn’t have wanted to be involved in cheating at sports. ‘Are you hearing this?’

  A tousle of fair hair appeared from the front seat. ‘Actually I am, and that’s really not on,’ he said evenly.

  But Gideon was shaking his head again, his expression more pinched and pained than ever. ‘No, of course not. I don’t care if Tilly wins or not – I just needed someone on the inside, going through whatever it is that HOST is planning.’ His eyes meet Janey’s. ‘You know they’re up to something. Why else would they have a security detail guarding the basement car park? They shot at you all, Jane Blonde. You know it’s not right!’

  As Gideon railed at Janey, they all fell silent, only the quiet thrum of the Octobus engine permeating the air. Gideon continued to stare at her, and it was only after she’d managed to calm her temper a little that Janey realised he wasn’t angry with her. He was deeply, deeply sad – and he was imploring her to believe him. To share this with him. To say what she’d seen.

  And the thing was, she knew he was right. She’d known it hours now, or even days.

  She had to break the awful silence and put Gideon out of his misery, even if she didn’t agree with his methods.

  ‘Something is going on in there,’ she said. ‘Something not right. There was blood all over the wall of one of the rooms on the same corridor as the operating theatre, and on the fifth level down …’

  She reached into the pocket of her jeans for the ruby, then stopped when she found her pocket wasn’t even there. She was in her spysuit. Without explaining, she brushed past Tilly to reach the Wower, wrenching open the door.

  The stone lay on the floor of the cabinet, now a vibrant blood-red and roughly the size of her thumb. Reaching out her left hand, she’d only just touched it when she noticed that it was pulsing, vibrating gently rather like the MRI machine. ‘Ouch!’ The sharp edge of the sliced across her thumb, a droplet of blood spilling out onto her skin. Instantly her head spun. It was almost as if the malevolent hum was inside her head, filling her brain with noise and sensations that caused her ears to ring and her vision to blur. She withdrew her bleeding hand instantly and grabbed the stone with her Gauntlet instead.

  ‘They’re making these,’ she said, holding it out for the others to inspect. ‘They’re much smaller – the Wower has increased its size, its colour and … well, everything, I think. I didn’t know it was buzzing like that.’

  Gideon stared at it, repulsed, then he pointed to the open window beside G-Mamma. ‘Get rid of it,’ he spat.

  ‘But it’s beautiful!’ cried Tilly. ‘Like the ring.’

  ‘It’s vile.’ Gideon could hardly bear to look at it. ‘Please, Janey. Throw it out. Besides, we don’t want them to know we’ve got it. Not yet anyway.’

  Janey frowned. ‘But there were hundreds of them. They won’t miss one. We could take it to the Spylab and test it—'

  ‘No!’ Gideon’s retort echoed around the van. ‘We’ll be able to inspect them soon enough, but that one has had its powers increased by the Wower, and we don’t know how much and what it can do. It could have a trace on it. It has to go! Just … do as I say.’

  The bitter silence multiplied a hundredfold as Gideon rapped out his order. Janey swallowed, her cheeks flaming. How could he talk to her like that? How could anyone talk to … well, anyone like that?

  But then she looked at Gideon’s face and saw the horror upon it, and suddenly worked something out. Whatever harm this stone could do was nothing compared to whatever had happened to Gideon. ‘Did it … did you get your condition because of a stone like this?’

  ‘More or less,’ he replied, calmer now.

  Not saying another word, Janey simply trained her Ultra-Gogs on the crack in the window to work out the exact trajectory to get the stone as far from them as possible, then flung it out of the van. It glanced off G-Mamma’s neck, causing a round of violent rapping before it flew like a missile between the top of the open window and the frame of the car, and was gone.

  As soon as it had disappeared, the atmosphere inside the Octobus cleared slightly, but Janey still felt shaky, somehow, and she finally allowed herself to sink onto one of the stools.

  ‘Thank you,�
� said Gideon, so quietly that she suspected she was the only one who’d heard it. They’d all heard him yell at her as if he was a prefect and she was some lowly year seven, but not that he’d thanked her for it.

  And they definitely didn’t hear him as he mouthed, directly at her: ‘Sorry.’

  She nodded to reassure him that it was okay - and somewhere deep in her being she knew that it probably would be - but right now she was angry with him, possibly angrier than she had ever been in her life. He might have persuaded her to get rid of the stone, and she certainly felt massive sympathy for anyone who had obviously suffered as much as he had, but it was going to take a very, very long time – and a whole lot more positive evidence – before Jane Blonde would trust Gideon Flynn again.

  ‘We’re at your home,’ called Jack from the cabin. ‘Need a lift inside?’

  ‘No thanks, Jack. I’ll de-wow, grab a book that I’ve supposedly been out to get, and then go and pretend to my parents that everything’s normal.’

  ‘And I,’ said G-Mamma, rubbing her neck, ‘am ordering at least three takeaways and testing that evil ring, once I’ve made sure that the flying ruby didn’t slice through my jugular.’

  Jack laughed. ‘Well, I feel like a run, if that’s okay?’

  He addressed this to Gideon. Janey almost yelled out that they didn’t need permission from Flynn, any of them, but Gideon just smiled sadly at Jack, then nodded.

  ‘If you’re running, Dogboy, then I’m racing you. It will be good training for the Games,’ said Tilly.

  ‘You’ll never catch me with those little legs,’ said Jack kindly.

  ‘Hey! They may be short but they’re mighty powerful. And anyway, I won’t be using these legs.’

  Tilly stretched up to her full, not terribly great height, and arched her back. ‘Here we go,’ she cried, and then Janey and Gideon watched in awe as she changed before their eyes into a large brown cat with leopard-like markings on its pelt. Winking a distinctive amber eye, Matilda Peppercorn bounded smoothly out of the van window and waited for Jack to follow.