Washed Up
Page 15
“Shoo, you stupid mutt!” shouted Veronica. She waved her free hand but nothing happened. Her powers were still spent. There was a clear look of panic on her face.
Steve whistled, causing Polly to charge towards her.
“No, wait, don’t!” pleaded Veronica.
I swear there was a glint in the pony’s eyes as she swung round and then bucked, sending a well-placed kick that booted Veronica through the cabin door. With some effort I slammed it shut and watched her fall back to what was left of the island.
Fin Del Mundo was shrinking, like a balloon having the air let out of it. Seconds later it disappeared completely. The portal had claimed the entire island, just as Veronica had said.
Unfortunately there was still one other thing to deal with – the minor issue of the plane having no power. I rushed to the cockpit where Agent Perkins was sitting at the controls.
“Did Pierre sort out that horrible girl?” she asked.
“Yes, but…”
“Oh, good boy,” she said as Pierre hopped back into the co-pilot’s seat. “Someone’s going to get an extra-special treat when we get home.”
“But Zizi… I mean, Agent Perkins,” I said. “We have no power.”
“Oh, that,” she said casually as the plane continued to tilt forwards. “I wouldn’t worry. The effects of a standard issue Time-Out only last for one minute and fifty-seven seconds.”
We were now in a full-on dive towards the sea. I could hear screams from the cabin. Yet Agent Perkins looked completely calm.
“Are you sure?” I asked.
“One hundred per cent,” she said. “Well, maybe ninety. At a push … eighty-five.”
The plane was hurtling towards the water. I could see the sharks circling.
And then the lights came back on.
“There we are,” said Agent Perkins, effortlessly pulling us out of our nosedive at the last second. “Oh, look, the weather’s clearing up now.”
She was right. Like the island, the black clouds had all vanished.
“Looks like it’s going to be a lovely day,” she said.
“This must be it,” I said as Lexi, Milo and I walked down a long wood-panelled corridor with a single door at the end. When we reached the door, I knocked and it swung open, revealing a rather grand office. The carpet was a dark green tartan and on the walls were paintings of serious-looking men and women. A good chunk of the room was taken up by a large antique oak desk, behind which sat the woman I had come to see.
“Hey, guys, come in.” Even after seven days, the sight of Zizi in a black suit was still hard to wrap my head around.
“How are you all?” she asked.
“Good,” we replied.
“Sorry about the hair, Sam,” she said, giving me a sympathetic look.
I frowned, putting up a hand to cover the bald patch on the back of my head from when the AIA had removed the Time-Out device. That tape really was strong.
She took a sip of coffee and turned to Lexi. “How’s the arm?” she asked.
“Getting better,” she replied. “Going to miss the Judo World Championships, though.”
Lexi didn’t seem particularly sad about that but Agent Perkins offered her commiserations anyway. “That’s too bad,” she said. “And I hear you’re planning on cutting back the number of sports you’re doing. Sounds like a sensible plan.”
She turned to Milo. “And you’ve officially quit the band?” she said. “A lot of young girls are very sad right now. Although since Steve’s to be your replacement, I’m sure they’ll be OK. People seem to be buying our cover story that he’s secretly been in a coma since the Hyde Park Incident, so that’s good.”
“Yeah,” said Milo. “And Polly is going to feature in their next video.”
“Well, thank you for agreeing to see me,” she said. “I promised to explain everything. So if you’ve got questions, now’s the time to ask them.”
The first question that came to mind was the thing that had annoyed me the most. “If you thought Agent Banks might be dodgy, how come you still let her go ahead with sending the three of us to the island?”
Agent Perkins nodded. “The operation was under Banks’s control but some within the agency suspected she was dirty,” she said. “Yet without proof there was no way they could get the authorization from above to shut her down. I was sent in as part of a top-secret parallel mission, of which Banks had no knowledge. The hope was she’d either make a mistake and reveal herself or I could find someone involved willing to flip on her. That’s why I talked my way into joining the Apocalytes. That and to maintain the secondary objective for sending me on the show – ensuring that there was at least one AIA agent looking out for you.”
“Looking out for us?” I said. “I don’t remember seeing you doing much to save Lexi from those alligators.”
“I was about to go for the gun before Cruul beat me to it,” she said defensively. “I suspect Lexi would have found a way out of that situation herself, anyway. She’s remarkably resourceful.”
Lexi beamed at this.
“Any other questions?” said Agent Perkins, grinning back.
“Are they gone?” I asked. “For good?”
Agent Perkins’ smile faded. “We don’t know,” she said. “From what we understand the island and everyone on it disappeared through the portal. It’s likely that they’re back in the darkest dimension. But they escaped from there once. We can’t rule out them escaping again. They also talked about new powers they had picked up. We obviously didn’t see them at full strength this time but we need to think about the possibility that one day we might. Which is actually something I wanted to talk to you three about.”
“Us?” I said.
“Well, as you might have gathered from my office, my work on Fin Del Mundo and the job opening created by the sudden departure of Agent Banks has earned me a promotion. I’ve been given the task of assembling a brand-new team. Agent Speed will be joining me. And I was hoping you guys would too.”
Lexi, Milo and I exchanged confused looks. “Sorry, what?” said Milo.
“We’re not planning on sitting around waiting for the Horsewomen to show up again,” she said defiantly. “If they’re still out there, we’re going after them. And who better to do that than the only people to have defeated them twice?”
I couldn’t believe what she was asking. “That’s funny,” I said. “Because on both occasions, instead of telling people that we defeated them, you guys covered the whole thing up. All those news reports of most of the cast and crew from End Games going missing in the Bermuda Triangle?”
“Well, to be fair that is pretty much what happened,” said Agent Perkins.
“It leaves out the bit about the return of the Four Horsewomen of the Apocalypse, though,” I said.
Agent Perkins stared at me for a few seconds. “OK,” she said at last. “I see what the issue is.”
“Oh, you do?”
“Sure,” she said. “You want recognition for what you’ve done.”
“Yeah,” I said. “That would be nice.”
“Well, that’s not how it works,” she said. “For years I pretended to be a complete airhead. But I saved lives. You know why? Because when people dismiss you, they underestimate you. And when people underestimate you, they hand you the advantage. That’s what Cruul did. He thought he knew how people worked, how they could be manipulated. He even thought he could tear you and Milo apart but he underestimated your friendship. And the Horsewomen have underestimated you from the very beginning and always will. That’s why we need you, Sam. But if recognition is more important to you than saving the world, then you should go. Because the public will probably never know about what you’ve done.”
I stood there for about a minute, taking in what she had said.
“What about school?” I asked.
“You’d still have to go, obviously,” she replied.
“Would we get paid?” said Lexi.
“Well, a gove
rnment salary, but yes,” she said. “And you’d have the entire resources of the AIA at your disposal. Lexi, you’d receive elite combat training. Milo, you’d have access to technology decades before it hit the market. And Sam… Um… We get ten per cent off at some shops, though you have to be employed for six months for that… It’s all in the welcome pack. But anyway, are you guys in?”
“Obviously!” said Lexi.
“Of course,” said Milo.
After Hyde Park I’d wanted a normal life again but I knew now that wasn’t possible. Not while there was a chance the Horsewomen were still out there.
I let out a sigh.
“Which shops?” I asked.
COPYRIGHT
STRIPES PUBLISHING
An imprint of the Little Tiger Group
1 Coda Studios, 189 Munster Road,
London SW6 6AW
First published as an ebook by Stripes Publishing in 2018
Text copyright © Tom Nicoll, 2018
Illustrations copyright © David O’Connell, 2018
eISBN: 978–1–84715–980–9
The right of Tom Nicoll and David O’Connell to be identified as the author and illustrator of this work respectively has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
All rights reserved.
Apart from any use permitted under UK copyright law, this publication may only be reproduced, stored, or transmitted, in any forms, or by any means, with prior permission in writing of the publishers or, in the case of reprographic production, in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
www.littletiger.co.uk