A. N. T. I. D. O. T. E.

by Malorie Blackman

  ‘I’m only going to get some more clothes – if I’m going to stay here for a while …’ I said quickly.

  ‘Of course you are. You can’t stay in your house all by yourself, can you?’ said Nosh’s dad.

  Actually, that was exactly what I wanted to do, but I knew Nosh’s dad would cut up rough about it if I argued.

  ‘I won’t be long,’ I said, heading for the front door.

  ‘You’ll be right back?’ asked Nosh’s dad.

  ‘I’ll be right back.’

  ‘D’you want me to come with you?’ asked Nosh’s dad.

  I shook my head. I wanted to be alone. I had a lot to think about.

  ‘Hang on a sec, Elliot,’ said Nosh. ‘I’ll come with you.’

  ‘No, that’s all right …’

  ‘No problem,’ Nosh insisted.

  I glared at Nosh, irritated. Nosh could be just as stubborn as his dad. Why wouldn’t either of them take the broad hint and leave me alone? I didn’t want to be around them or anyone else for that matter. I opened the front door and headed down the garden path as quickly as I could. It wasn’t quick enough. Nosh was right behind me.

  ‘You don’t have to come with me, you know. I think I can make it from your house to mine without getting lost,’ I snapped.

  ‘It’s no trouble,’ Nosh shrugged.

  With a deep, obvious sigh, I made my way up my own garden path. I opened the front door without a word and walked in, choosing to ignore Nosh completely. I’d barely taken a step when I stopped abruptly and listened. The house felt so strange, so empty. There were often times when I was in the house by myself, when Mum was late from work or was out shopping, but the house had never felt like this before. I supposed it was because I always knew that Mum was safe and coming back home soon. But not this time. This time, she was in trouble.

  ‘Your mum will be all right, Elliot. I know she will.’

  I started at Nosh’s voice behind me. To be honest, I’d forgotten that he was there.

  ‘I’d better go and get my stuff,’ I said quietly.

  I made my way upstairs to my bedroom. The envelope containing the disc my uncle had given me sat conspicuously on my bedside table. I hadn’t even had the chance to upload it onto Mum’s PC and see what was on it yet. It was almost as if I’d been given it in another lifetime, another world – a sane, normal world where Uncle Robert was just an ordinary uncle and Mum … Mum wasn’t on the run from the police … I picked up the envelope and fingered it absentmindedly. I had to do something. I had to find out what was happening. But where should I start? Just at that moment, the phone downstairs rang. I spun round, almost knocking Nosh flying, and raced out of the room down the stairs, stuffing the envelope into my trouser pocket as I ran.

  Let it be Mum. Please let it be Mum.

  ‘Hello? Hello?’ I panted into the phone.

  ‘Elliot? Thank goodness! Are you all right?’

  ‘Mum!’ I clutched the phone tighter. Behind me I was only just aware of Nosh’s gasp. ‘Mum, where are you? What’s going on? Mum, the police …’

  ‘Elliot, all that’ll have to wait,’ Mum interrupted. ‘I need you to do something for me – and you can’t tell anyone, not even Nosh.’

  ‘What is it?’ I asked breathlessly.

  As Nosh moved in closer, I turned my back on him. Usually I didn’t mind his nosiness. Now I did.

  ‘I want you to get my mobile phone from the top drawer of my bedside table and keep it in a safe place until tomorrow. I’ll phone you tomorrow at precisely nine-fifteen in the morning. I’ll let you know then where the two of us can meet.’

  ‘But Mum, the police are after you. They told me to let them know if you phoned me or tried to get in contact with me.’

  ‘Are you going to?’

  ‘Of course not,’ I said, shocked.

  I heard Mum chuckle down the phone. ‘Elliot, you are just the cutest! What would I do without you?’

  Yet despite Mum’s light, seemingly jovial tone, I could tell it was an act put on for my benefit. There was no mistaking the edge to her voice.

  ‘Mum, please tell me what’s going on,’ I begged. ‘They say you broke into Shelby and Whatsit with Uncle Robert and that they have pictures of both of you off the CCTV security cameras …’

  ‘Do you believe them?’

  ‘NO!’The word exploded from me like an ICBM. ‘Of course I don’t. But what about the security cameras …?’

  ‘Elliot, that footage is faked, I promise you,’ Mum said seriously. ‘There’s no way they have me on camera breaking into Shelby’s.’

  ‘Then why can’t you just go to the police and tell them that?’

  ‘It’s not that simple.’

  ‘But if you didn’t do it …’ It seemed that simple to me. Perfectly simple.

  ‘Elliot, I’ll explain when I see you. In the meantime keep my phone somewhere very, very safe,’ said Mum. ‘And don’t tell anyone about our conversation. Not Nosh, not the police, and especially not anyone from ANTIDOTE.’

  ‘Is that because someone there is working for Shelby’s?’ I asked.

  ‘I knew you were listening at the door, you nosy hound! You’re as bad as your friend Nosh,’ said Mum. There was a sudden clatter at the other end of the line, as if Mum had dropped the phone.

  ‘Mum? MUM?’

  ‘Elliot, I have to go now,’ Mum said with breathless haste. ‘You be very careful. I’ll try and sort all this out as soon as possible and don’t go to your uncle’s house – it isn’t safe.’

  ‘Mum, don’t go yet …’

  ‘I have to. Elliot, until you hear from me – trust no one.’

  ‘Mum …’But the phone purred continuously at me. She’d gone.

  ‘Elliot …’ Nosh began uncertainly.

  I clutched the phone even tighter, willing Mum to pick up her phone again and call me. It didn’t happen. I slammed the phone down on the receiver and glared at it.

  ‘Elliot …’

  ‘Nosh, bog off and leave me alone,’ I fired at him.

  Nosh seemed to shrink into himself. He gave me a look as if I was something really unpleasant he’d just stepped in. Then, without a word, he turned and headed for the front door. He’d opened it before I cooled down enough to speak.

  ‘Sorry, Nosh.’

  Silence.

  ‘I’m sorry. I’ve just … I’ve just got a lot on my mind.’

  ‘I’d figured that out for myself,’ Nosh replied dryly.

  ‘If you really want to help, you won’t ask me to tell you what Mum said. And you won’t tell your mum and dad that I’ve even spoken to her,’ I told him.

  ‘You’ve got it!’ said Nosh.

  I smiled at him gratefully. ‘Come on, then,’ I said. ‘But no questions – OK?’

  ‘I promise.’

  But I couldn’t get over the feeling that soon I was going to need not just Nosh’s help, but all the help I could get.

  Chapter Five

  Password Protected

  MUM’S PHONE WAS just where she said it’d be.

  ‘What’s that, then?’ asked Nosh, forgetting that he wasn’t supposed to ask any questions.

  ‘It’s just Mum’s mobile,’ I replied.

  Nosh raised his eyebrows. ‘I thought you said she never let it out of her sight?’

  Which was true – so why had she left it behind? Mum always swore that it would take surgery to separate her from her mobile phone.

  ‘Do you know her PIN code, then?’ asked Nosh.

  ‘Oh yeah,’ I replied. I’d seen Mum type in her PIN loads of times. And it wasn’t hard to remember because it was the day and month of my birthday! ‘But her PIN only gives me access to the basic stuff – contacts, voice-mail and stuff like that. Any private stuff she has is stored in an application called VAULT. And VAULT has its own password – a great big eighteen-digit long essay of a password! And I don’t know it!’

  ‘That’s a fat lot of good.’ Nosh was not impressed. ‘So what does
your mum keep in there, then?’

  ‘I dunno! Work stuff?’

  ‘Then why all the secrecy?’

  ‘Search me. Mum thinks I’m nosy enough already without encouraging me to snoop on her phone.’ I looked at Nosh pointedly. ‘She must be confusing me with you.’

  ‘Bloomin’ cheek!’ Nosh snorted. ‘I’m not nosy. I’m just interested in things, that’s all.’

  ‘Yeah, right!’

  I slipped Mum’s phone into my right trouser pocket. It was the safest place I could think of for the moment. Then I looked around the room – Mum’s room. I don’t know what I was hoping for. Maybe I expected a piece of paper to drift down from the ceiling with EXPLANATION written in big, black letters across the top! Anyway, it didn’t happen.

  ‘What about your mum’s desktop PC?’ Nosh piped up from behind me. ‘Maybe that has some info on it that would help.’

  I considered, then shrugged. It was worth a try. We walked into the back bedroom which Mum used as her work room. There, on a large pedestal table against one wall, was Mum’s all-singing, all-dancing PC. To be honest, I was really proud of Mum’s machine. It was a lot better than the ones we have at school. It not only played all sorts of CDs and DVDs but it also let you upload digital videos or stills from a camera – and you could edit them as well. What’s more, you could get TV channels on it, but Mum had disconnected that facility. She said she didn’t want to encourage me to watch even more TV than I did already, especially when I had to use her computer to do my homework. Next to the screen was a scanner which looked a bit like a small photocopier. All you had to do was put in a document, a page at a time, and the information was automatically transferred to a file or the screen, which meant you didn’t have to type the whole document again. You could also talk to the computer through a microphone – just dictate to it in a normal voice - and the computer would type out your words like some kind of robot secretary. In fact Mum said the only thing her machine couldn’t do was make the beds and that was just a matter of time!

  ‘We’d better make this fast before Dad comes knocking on the door to find out where we are,’ Nosh warned.

  I switched on the machine and sat down. Nosh dragged a chair next to mine and we watched as the machine booted up. In less than a minute, we were into the word processor and a file called ANTIDOTE. CONFIDENTIAL. The file came up automatically, so it was obviously the last thing Mum had been working on.

  ‘This must be the memo that Uncle Robert gave to Mum,’ I said. ‘Mum must’ve scanned it into the computer.’

  Nosh and I both leaned forward for a closer look, then we looked at each other.

  ‘So it’s really true. Someone at ANTIDOTE is working for Shelby’s. I’ll print out this letter so that we have a copy of it,’ I said, hitting the key.

  * * *

  SHELBY AND PARDELA PHARMACEUTICALS

  Electronic Memo: Page 1 of 1

  To: Joshua Shelby – JSHELBY

  From: Marcus Pardela – MPARDELA

  cc:

  Status: Strictly Confidential

  SUBJECT: ANTIDOTE

  For goodness’ sake! It’s all under control. ANTIDOTE are a minor but necessary annoyance – nothing more. You know that as well as I do. Just remember whose idea all this was in the first place. Now stop bombarding me with e-mail messages. I’ve already told our ‘mole’ at ANTIDOTE to focus that organization’s attention elsewhere. Failing that, we can always implement phase 2 of our contingency plans.

  Pardela

  PS Delete this message as soon as you’ve read it.

  * * *

  ‘But how do we find out who? And how does that help us find out what’s going on with your mum? And how will we …?’

  I raised my hand to stop Nosh’s questions. I didn’t have any immediate answers any more than he did and I didn’t like feeling so feeble. I picked up the print-out of the memo and studied it again.

  ‘I wonder what that bit means?’

  ‘Which bit?’

  ‘“Just remember whose idea all this was in the first place …”’ I pointed to the relevant section of the letter.

  ‘Hhmm! No idea.’ Nosh shook his head.

  ‘It’s a strange thing to say. I wonder what idea he’s talking about?’ I mused.

  ‘We’ll never know,’ shrugged Nosh. ‘And besides, that’s not the important bit of the memo. What’s important is, you have proof about the Shelby agent.’

  ‘So now what? We must do something,’ I said, frustrated.

  ‘Like?’ Nosh sat back, his arms folded across his chest as he waited for me to answer.

  ‘We have to prove that Mum didn’t break into Shelby’s,’ I began.

  ‘How? Do we walk up to Marcus Pardela and demand to see the evidence? “Excuse me, Mr Pardela, but we want to see the CCTV footage you’re supposed to have of Elliot’s mum. We think you’ve doctored it in some way and we want to try and prove it,”’ Nosh said scornfully.

  ‘Well, the police must have a copy …’

  ‘They’re about as likely to show it to us as Marcus Pardela is.’

  ‘Maybe we could get someone at ANTIDOTE to help us? After all, Uncle Robert works for them,’ I thought out loud. ‘We could look up their address and phone number in the phone book.’

  ‘And then what? Someone at ANTIDOTE is an agent. A spy! A traitor! And we don’t know who. If we go blundering around, we could make things worse for your mum and your uncle – not better.’

  ‘Then what would you suggest?’ I asked, annoyed.

  That shut him up!

  ‘Yeah, that’s what I thought,’ I said. Now it was my turn to be less than impressed.

  ‘You’re the ideas person in this partnership,’ Nosh told me. ‘I’m just the voice of logic and reason.’

  ‘Since when?’

  ‘Since five seconds ago!’

  I folded up the print-out of the letter and put it in my pocket with Mum’s phone. I came out of Mum’s file and had a hunt around the hard disk for anything else that might throw some light on what was going on. Nothing jumped out at me. As far as I could see it was just a load of ordinary-looking data and text files. I didn’t really know what I was looking for. To be honest, I wasn’t even sure why Mum needed all the PC equipment she had, I was just glad she did. I’d never thought to ask her before. I guess I’d just been too busy enjoying it. And now Mum was missing and I couldn’t even ask her – at least not until I spoke to her next. All at once, knowing why Mum had all this stuff seemed terribly important. It was as if I was waking up from a long, long daze and for the first time I was seeing and hearing things that I’d been too preoccupied before to notice.

  ‘Anything?’ Nosh asked.

  I shook my head. ‘Not that I can find. Just lots of files and documents sorted into job numbers. Lots of job numbers.’

  ‘Job numbers?’

  ‘For each different job Mum does, it looks like she holds all the files and documents to do with each separate job in a different directory – and each one of those directories has got a different job number. But I can’t tell what any of the jobs are by just looking at the numbers.’

  ‘Why don’t you go into some of the files and have a look?’ Nosh suggested.

  But before I could answer, the doorbell rang. Nosh and I exchanged a look.

  ‘Dad!’

  ‘Your dad!’

  Nosh and I spoke in unison.

  ‘We’d better get going,’ Nosh sighed.

  I took one last look at the computer screen, then switched everything off. I decided to have a closer, more detailed look the following day after meeting Mum. I ran into my bedroom to shove a few things into a carrier bag whilst Nosh went to the door.

  ‘Elliot, I think you should come over to our house now,’ Nosh’s dad called out from the hall. ‘We don’t want you in here brooding.’

  We? Who was ‘we’? I shook my head at my reflection in the wardrobe mirror. Nosh’s dad sounded just like a grown-up! I noti
ced that my pockets were bulging so I took out Mum’s phone and Uncle Robert’s disk and placed them on top of the carrier bag. I didn’t want Nosh’s dad asking me questions about what ‘we’ might have in our pockets! After a moment’s thought, I stuffed them down under my clean pair of trousers, balled up at the top of the bag.

  My thoughts turned to Uncle Robert. I was slightly ashamed of myself. I’d been so busy concentrating on how Mum was doing and what she was going through that I hadn’t really thought about my uncle. Maybe I could visit him at the police station tomorrow? Maybe with his help Mum and I would get all this straightened out and life could return to normal. With one last look around, I left my bedroom and switched off the light.

  As we left the house, Nosh nudged me and indicated across the street with his head. Two men stood watching us. The moment it was obvious we were looking at them as well, they turned and started talking to each other.

  ‘Who’re they?’ I frowned.

  ‘Must be the police,’ Nosh whispered back. ‘Maybe they’re hoping your mum will turn up tonight and they’ve been sent to grab her when she does.’

  ‘Or maybe they’re just waiting for someone who lives in the house opposite,’ I said dryly.

  Nosh was getting totally carried away! He always did have a vivid imagination. Much more of an imagination than me.

  ‘No, I reckon I’m right,’ Nosh insisted as we headed up his garden path. ‘Or maybe they’re reporters waiting to do an exclusive story …’

  ‘I thought you were meant to be the voice of logic and reason,’ I reminded him.

  ‘Oh, yeah! I forgot! In that case, like you said, maybe they’re just waiting for someone to come out of the house opposite.’ Nosh grinned.

  As we walked into Nosh’s house, I took one last curious glance back across the street before Nosh’s dad shut the door. The two men were both looking my way – watching me intently.

  Chapter Six

  Halle

  I FROWNED DOWN at the VAULT application’s password screen on Mum’s phone. Why had she wanted me to get hold of this in particular? What was on it? I needed to crack her password and to do that I had to try and think like Mum. What sort of password would she use? I sighed. Knowing Mum it could be anything. I glanced across the room at Nosh, who was in his own bed, deep into his Spiderman comic.