Project Mc2

by Jade Hemsworth

  The Quail furrowed her brow. “You’re aware of Agent McAlister accessing the laptop?”

  “My dad works at Space Inc.,” Cam explained.

  “And we did some investigating of our own, like swapping out M’s pen for a homemade video-monitoring device,” Bry said, waving the camera pen in the air.

  McKeyla looked embarrassed. “I never had any reason to suspect it was a camera pen,” she explained sheepishly.

  “And I used an old family recipe to get her fingerprints off her pen,” Adri disclosed.

  The Quail nodded, taking it all in. “Since you already know more than you should, I will tell you that once NOV8 received inside intel that the prince’s mission may be in danger, we sent Agent McAlister to Maywood Glen to find out whatever she could first and then protect the prince once he arrived.” She fixed Cam, Bry, and Adri in her gaze. “I must say, I’m rather impressed with your keen instincts and experimental methods. NOV8 needs new recruits. If you’re interested, I’d like to test you out in the field under the leadership of Agent McAlister.”

  M’s jaw dropped. “With all due respect”—she nervously rocked back on her heels—“there’s an extremely tight deadline. We have just twenty-three hours until the launch, then I leave immediately, so I don’t think—”

  “I know you’ll do an impeccable job guiding these girls on this time-sensitive assignment before your next mission,” the Quail interrupted.

  M tried to turn her face into something normal. Was she rolling her eyes? She was probably rolling her eyes.

  It was just that she’d always worked on her own. McKeyla McAlister: smart, tough, and (most important!) independent. That was what she was known for. Now the Quail wanted her to have three trainees following her around like over-excited puppies? How exactly was that going to work?

  M looked up at the Quail, waiting for her to realize this was terrible idea, but the Quail didn’t say anything. She just smiled.

  “Of course, ma’am…” M finally agreed.

  With that, the screen went black. Adri, Bry, and Cam let out squeals of delight while throwing their arms around one another for a victorious group hug. Bry was jumping up and down on her toes so much the liquid in the beakers sloshed back and forth.

  When they threw their arms around M to include her in the celebration, McKeyla kept her hands stiffly at her side, unprepared to hug them back. She was used to working alone. In fact, she was not into taking risks involving other people. When she’d teamed up before, it had led to disaster.

  What would happen this time?

  * IS SHE ONE OF THE GOOD GUYS … I MEAN GIRLS?

  Chapter Five

  T.S.P.O.S.A.*

  The next morning, McKeyla leaned back in her desk chair, munching on her first bowl of cereal for the day. She’d hoped to wake up energized and ready to tackle the mission in front of her. But instead she was filled with dread. Just eleven hours until the launch, and she had three new recruits to train, unless she could convince her boss that she was better off working solo.

  This wasn’t going to be good.…

  “Is this really the time to be taking chances?” M asked, pushing herself around the lab in her chair. She looked up at the screen, studying the Quail’s expression. “The prince is unpredictable enough on his own.”

  “Yes, and the threat to his mission is very real,” the Quail said. “Since we have yet to verify its source, NOV8 wants you to have the extra support. Is that understood, Agent McAlister?”

  M let out a deep sigh. “Understood…”

  “Good.” The Quail smiled and her tone softened. “Now, remember to call Grandma. It’s her birthday.”

  “Don’t worry, Mom. I didn’t forget.”

  “Love you, sweetheart.”

  “Love you, too.” M closed the video chat, annoyed with herself that she couldn’t persuade her mom to let her do the mission by herself. She didn’t want to work with Adri, Bry, and Cam, but she had no other choice.

  “Ugh,” A.D.I.S.N. said from her station on the desk. Whenever she wanted to talk to McKeyla, her front cover glowed. If it was safe, M would open the book and speak directly to the screen displaying A.D.I.S.N.’s face—an emoji with a brown ponytail and glasses. “So much for getting out of working with those clingy troublemakers. I mean, as your bestie, and link to NOV8, I support you one hundred percent.”

  McKeyla smiled. For a secret agent’s computer sidekick, A.D.I.S.N. certainly had her own opinions.

  “Who knows?” M said. “Maybe they’ll pleasantly surprise us.”

  Just then, the doorbell rang. McKeyla went to the foyer and was surprised to be greeted by three girls in over-the-top spy costumes. Cam was dressed like Sherlock Holmes, while Adri and Bry looked more like modern James Bonds (if James Bond were a teenage girl with long, flowing hair and the right shade of lipstick). Adri held out a plate of treats and said, “One smart cookie? Before we go protect the prince and save the world from evildoers?”

  “I like that you’re all so … enthusiastic,” M started, quickly stifling a laugh. “But before we go anywhere, I’d like to get a sense of your skills. Consider it an ops test.”

  “Sounds official,” Cam said eagerly.

  “Just point me toward your supplies and I’ll whip something up!” Adri offered.

  Within minutes, they were in M’s lab. Adri was hunched over a row of beakers and ingredients, while Cam tinkered with a pile of wires and batteries M had lying around. Bry was hacking into social media sites on M’s computer.

  An hour later, M visited Adri, who’d baked a giant volcano cake, which she’d covered with gooey chocolate frosting.

  “Sweet volcano cake,” M said. “But how exactly will this help us protect the prince?”

  “Well,” Adri said, raising her eyebrows meaningfully, “what if there’s a special occasion that calls for … an explosive distraction?” She poured a cup of liquid into the volcano, and thick pink foam exploded from the top!

  “Promising.” McKeyla nodded … and then she looked down.

  “Oops, got some lava on your cute kicks!” cried Adri.

  “And it’s oozing into my socks,” M said with some annoyance.

  Before she could go clean off her boots, Bry held a phone in M’s face, snapping a picture. “Ops test, my turn. Smile!”

  Bry hit a few buttons on her screen, and M’s picture appeared on every computer and tablet in the room. M panicked and ran from one to the next, trying to power down the screens or cover them.

  “While I appreciate your tech aptitude, I can’t afford to be on every social media site in the universe,” M said. “Maybe you’re not getting the secret part of secret agent?”

  “Exhale,” Bry said, holding up her hand. “I just hacked into your lab’s wireless system and posted it to the IP addresses on the devices in this room. Only we can see it.” Bry tapped something into her phone, and all the pictures of M disappeared. “There! Insta-gone!”

  “Thank you.” M breathed a sigh of relief. She heard a noise and turned, catching Cam as she drilled the last screw into a board with wires coming out of it. She had headphones on, but the music was blasting so loud the rest of them could hear it. She looked like she was heading to a party in her sparkly skull tank top and pink head kerchief, instead of engineering some serious equipment. “So your special skill is torturing the enemy by bursting their eardrums?” McKeyla asked, baffled.

  Cam kept her head down, bobbing in time with the beat. It took her a second to notice M was looking right at her. “Hey, I’m finished!” she said.

  “What is it?”

  “Well, it was a bunch of useless parts,” Cam said, “but now it’s a portable police scanner with added features. I call it … Cam’s Portable Police Scanner with Added Features. Remember, good with gadgets, not at naming them.”

  M put the headphones on. With a flip of a switch, the music changed to the police’s radio frequency. M went through a few different channels, listening to conversations abou
t neighborly disputes, cats that had gotten stuck in trees, and neighbors arguing about how the cats kept getting stuck in their trees.

  “This can help us locate the prince through the security detail they’re planning for him,” McKeyla said, smiling at Cam, amazed. “Nice work!”

  Cam stood there, waiting for M to go on, but she didn’t. Bry and Adri were right behind her. “So…” Cam started to ask for all of them. “Did we pass the ops test?”

  McKeyla was still studying the handmade scanner. She nodded as she turned the knob to a different channel. Bry jumped up and down on her toes. She’d worn her luckiest shirt today— a neon tank with white stars—and she knew it had done the trick. “Yay! Go, us!”

  Bry and Cam broke into a familiar dance, hip-bumping and waving their hands in the air in unison. “We passed, uh-huh,” they sang. “We passed … Oh yeah…”

  “Me too,” Adri added, dancing along with them, even though it was hard in her Mary Jane heels. “With you … Me too…”

  M ignored them as she turned the dial and found a station where police officers were talking about the prince’s movements around the city. Dozens of Maywood Glen police were looped in on his comings and goings, and they were discussing his transportation to the launch.

  “He’s heading toward Reardon Road,” a man’s voice said over the headphones. “We should be at the space station facility in a half hour or so.”

  M grabbed a notepad, furiously jotting down the details of the route. When she was done, she looked at her trio of trainees and grinned. Maybe her mom was right—maybe they could be helpful on this assignment.

  Or at least not totally mess it up.

  * THE SECRET PART OF SECRET AGENT

  Chapter Six

  A.D.W.P.C.*

  Adri peered through NOV8’s signature spy glasses, taking in the scene outside the space training facility. There was a security booth, one guard at the main gate, and a high wrought-iron fence that ran along the perimeter. There was no easy way to get inside and reach the prince.

  She scanned the rest of the property, stopping at a black car parked near the main building. “Oooohhh, do you see that car?” she asked. “Looks muy suspicious to me.”

  Cam took the glasses. “Hmmm … tinted windows. No license plate. Sketch.”

  Bry agreed, “Super sketch.”

  She passed the binoculars to M, who zoomed in on the emblem on the front of the car. It had a strange star logo on the hood. “That’s got to be them. Whoever wants to stop the prince, they’re moving in fast,” M said. “We have to get past that guard and get to the prince before they do.”

  “I got this covered,” Bry said confidently as she typed something into her phone. Within seconds, the guard at the front gate heard a sound, walked into the booth, and started watching something on his computer screen that made him laugh like a little kid.

  “Amazing.” M smiled. “What’d you do?”

  “I just rerouted his computer to stream an endless loop of funny cat videos,” Bry said. “He should be distracted for at least an hour.”

  “Impressive,” admitted M.

  “Now, let’s hurry before he catches on.…” Cam started toward the front gate, waving for the others to follow. She’d brought her skateboard, strapped over her backpack, knowing it could help if they needed to make a fast getaway.

  The girls scurried past the security booth, ducking below the window so the guard wouldn’t see. Not that anything would distract him from the brave kitten meeting a dog for the first time.

  Adri, Bry, and Cam tiptoed exaggeratedly next to M, trying to be as sneaky as possible. Instead, they looked like they were bouncing.

  “Since NOV8 wants me to guide you,” McKeyla said, “here’s lesson number one: Secret agents don’t bounce.”

  “Oopsies!” Adri whispered.

  “And they don’t say ‘oopsies,’” McKeyla added.

  M maneuvered down a long corridor, finally spotting an open hangar they’d seen the prince go into an hour before. She imagined it was where he was preparing for the launch. There was only one problem: Stationed outside the hangar were three guards and a man in a black suit—the same man who’d stood near the prince in all his interviews.

  “Hey, hey, hey, where do you girls think you’re going?” the man in the black suit asked in a thick British accent. “And how did you get in here?” This must be the prince’s bodyguard, M thought. “There are no visitors inside. You lot will have to go home and swoon over the prince’s Snapbook, like all the other fangirls.”

  “Uhhhh … you’re mixing up your social media,” Bry said in her classic zippy tone. She wanted to help this man, who, obviously, wasn’t social media savvy.

  “Sir, you don’t understand,” M started, lifting the brim of her fedora so he could see her face. “I work for an elite organization of woman operatives from all over the world—”

  The guards grabbed each of the girls by the arm and started escorting them away.

  Cam looked to M, panicked. “Is this what normally happens?”

  “No. Not when I’m on my own,” McKeyla grumbled.

  “What do we do now?” Adri asked.

  M kept walking with the guard, pretending to leave, silently noting a fire alarm box on a pole as they walked past. She waited a beat and then said, “This is what I call a red alert.” She stopped suddenly, twisting both arms free from the guard’s grasp, and ran for the fire alarm. The other girls watched in awe as McKeyla executed a totally fierce high kick, aiming her red boot perfectly at the glass covering the box and smashing it open. It set off a loud, screeching alarm and startled the guards.

  The other girls acted fast. Bry pulled out her cell phone, aiming it right in one guard’s eyes. “Say cheese!” She clicked the turbo flash setting, then snapped a photo, momentarily blinding him. It was just the chance she needed to break free.

  Cam twisted out of the guard’s grip, but there were two of them blocking her and Adri’s path. She whipped her skateboard from her back and set it on the ground. In one swift motion, she hurled it toward their feet, knocking the guards off balance. Then Adri and Cam darted down the corridor after M and Bry.

  But Adri, trying hard to keep up in her dainty Mary Jane pumps, was going half as fast as Cam.

  “Next time we try to save the world,” Cam said, “wear flats!”

  “I would never!” Adri said in her lilting Spanish accent.

  The four girls ran toward Prince Xander’s bodyguard. He darted in front of the hangar, trying to block them. Adri stomped her heel into the center of his foot, causing him to hunch over in pain. She sniffed in satisfaction, threw her purse over her shoulder, and teetered quickly after the others as they raced inside the hangar.

  “L.C.T.O.F.A.C.,” yelled Bry.

  “Yeah, Let’s Call That Our Flash And Crash!” cheered Cam.

  Prince Xander was standing in front of a table of flight equipment. He was wearing the Space Inc. uniform, a blue jumpsuit with black stripes at the shoulders. Bry, Cam, and Adri stared, their mouths agape. They were in the same space as a real, live prince, breathing the same royal air!

  McKeyla knew she had to be precise and quick with His Royal Highness. “Prince Xander, we’re here because—”

  “My apologies, sir,” his bodyguard said, rushing in behind the girls with the other guards. They started to pull the girls away.

  “Wait, wait, gents,” Prince Xander said, smiling. “I’d like to know just what this pretty lady thinks is so important that she had to interrupt my final training session before I leave the planet.” He gestured at his assistant. “Jillian, my mouthwash.”

  Without waiting for a reply, he walked toward M, taking her hand in his own. She immediately slid her fingers out from underneath his. The prince might have a pleasant face, but his head was bigger than Mars. She could never be interested in someone so shallow and obsessed with himself.

  “Prince, sir,” M started, “I’m afraid your life is in danger. I’m a
highly trained operative sent to protect you until you are safely on that capsule.”

  “Now, that’s a good one!” The prince laughed, exposing his pearly-white, perfectly straight teeth. “You fangirls come up with the craziest stories just to get an autograph. Jillian, a pen!”

  His assistant, a tiny, bird-faced woman with her hair pulled into a bun, fumbled around in her purse. Prince Xander waited all of a second, then strode over to a scientist in a lab coat and yanked a pen from his pocket.

  “Oh no…” M clarified to the pompous prince. “I’m not a fan.”

  “Not a fan? Not a follower? But you are a girl! After I sign this for you,” the prince went on, “you all have to go. It’s not fair if you get to stay while the rest of my followers have to wait for the launch tonight.”

  Bry jumped forward, hoping to connect with him and become fast friends. “Hi, I’m Bry—well, Bryden is my full name. Bandweth. That’s my last name. Bryden Bandweth. I’m an operative, too. Well, operative-in-training.”

  Bry curtsied, then turned to her friends. “I just rambled in front of a prince,” she whispered, her words running into each other. “Hashtag I rule!”

  The prince furrowed his brows. “Operatives, you say?”

  “Yes! We work for this amazing organization of incredibly smart women,” Adri said, tossing her blond hair over her shoulder with an exaggerated flair.

  “Actually, I work for them, and the three of them are just helping out—though not so much at the moment,” M said to stop the fangirling. She turned back to the prince. “Prince Xander, we have strong reason to believe there’s a plot in action at this very moment. People out there could be trying to kidnap you.”

  “People want to kidnap me?” the prince asked with feigned shock. “Of course they do! Look at me!”