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Published by Lemonfizz Media and Scholastic Australia in 2010.
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Table of Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Emma Jacks and EJ12 will return in Book 2
Have you read them all?
Back Cover Material
It was Monday morning, a school day, but there was no way Emma Jacks could go to school. She needed a plan—ideally one that would keep her away from school for the whole week.
Could it be a stomach ache? Yes, that might work and actually, now that she thought about it, her stomach was sore. Quite sore. In fact, Emma was almost positive that she would soon need serious medical attention, and possibly hospital treatment. At the very least, her sore stomach would mean staying home from school and not having to deal with mean girl, Nema.
‘Come on Emma, hurry up! We’re going to be late,’ Emma’s mum shouted from down the hallway.
Emma was not confident that her mother would agree with her self-diagnosis. She often didn’t, which was irritating, so Emma would have to be clever about how she handled it.
‘Okay Mum, I’m coming!’ Emma ran down the hall. It would have been way too obvious to lie in bed groaning—it was much better to act as if she was desperate to get to school, only to be struck down with an illness. She bounced into the kitchen and sat down at the table. And then, just as she picked up her spoon, she put her plan into action. She doubled over and moaned loudly.
‘What’s wrong, Em?’ asked her mum, only briefly glancing up from the paper. Emma thought her mum should have been paying more attention.
‘I don’t know ... but all of a sudden ... my stomach really ... hurts,’ said Emma in her quiet-but-act-like-you’re-really-trying-to-speak-louder voice. She thought the pauses were a particularly good touch.
‘It’s probably your appendix,’ announced her older brother, Bob. ‘Mum, I don’t think we should waste any time with doctors. Let’s amputate immediately—from the neck down. I’ll get the bread knife.’
‘Hilarious, Bob! But Mum, now ... it’s really sore and ... I think...’ said Emma, in an even quieter voice, as she worked up to announcing her own diagnosis and treatment suggestion that she’d better stay home.
‘This is very strange, Em,’ her dad interrupted as he came out of the bathroom next door. (Although it sounded more like ‘is berry orange stem’ because he had a mouth full of toothpaste.)
‘What?’ said everyone but Mum.
‘Pardon?’ said Mum.
‘Sorry.’ He ducked back into the bathroom, rinsed his mouth, came out and tried again. ‘Well, I was just remembering how we have seen this illness before. Let me think ... it first struck last year on the first day of school, and then the night of the school concert and also on the day of the gym competition...’
‘Dad, it’s not that sort of illness at all,’ said Emma, in a voice that sounded slightly too loud and irritated for someone with severe stomach pain.
Emma’s plan was not going quite as well as she’d hoped. Her family knew her too well.
Even though they could be irritating at times, Emma knew she could always rely on her family. They didn’t change and they didn’t pretend to be anything else but themselves. Dad was always Dad, looking a bit serious but then playing rock music really loud; Mum was always Mum, looking more relaxed and then turning down Dad’s music; and Bob was always Bob, if you could get him away from his laptop. Mum, Dad, Bob. M-U-M, spelt exactly the same backwards and forwards, D-A-D the same again and even B-O-B too. Emma thought you could trust people with names like that. Suddenly Emma’s thoughts were interrupted by her mum.
‘Come on Em,’ said Mum, giving her a squeeze. ‘You know that tummy will feel just fine once you get to school and if it doesn’t, you can go to sick bay. Eat up now. We have to leave in ten minutes. And where did I leave my bag?’
Mum 1–Emma 0. Emma was left at the table, wondering what went wrong. She knew that look in her mum’s eye—it was pointless to continue. She would just have to face up to Nema.
Emma and Nema had been at the same school all their lives and they had even been at the same kindy. They had organised sleepovers and been to all of each other’s birthday parties. They weren’t best friends, like Emma’s friends Hannah and Elle were, but they were good friends. At least that’s what Emma had thought. Then near the end of Year Two, things had started to change for the worse. Nema got bossy, Nema got loud and Nema got mean. She was sneaky mean, thought Emma. Tricky mean—the kind of mean teachers never seem to see—the really mean mean.
Nema had changed and Emma didn’t like the new Nema nearly as much. Emma was pretty sure that she was still the same, but Nema blew hot and cold. One minute she was the nice Nema, chatting and laughing with Emma, and the next minute she would look right through her or worse. She would say mean things, talk about Emma behind her back, or make fun of something Emma liked.
Like the time Nema and some other girls were dancing in the classroom at lunchtime. The music they were playing was the latest song by the Pink Shadows and it really made Emma want to dance. Emma and Elle asked if they could join in. But Nema said no.
‘You’ll never learn the moves, Emma. You’ll just hold us up and we want to perform it in class tomorrow.’
‘It doesn’t look that hard,’ Emma had replied.
‘Well it is, so sorry, you can’t,’ Nema had said.
‘Who made you the boss, Nema?’ Emma had asked.
‘I did,’ Nema had snapped back. ‘And it’s my CD. Do you have a problem with that?’
Emma had wanted to say yes, she did have a problem. But with Nema staring her down, she had felt like she was melting away. In fact, every time Emma was about to stand up to Nema, she seemed to melt away.
There was the time in Year Three when Nema stopped everyone playing chasey so they could watch her new gym routine. No one knew why they should but no one knew quite what to say either. Or the time when Nema took down other people’s poster projects in the art room so her own project could go in the centre. Again, every
one was so surprised they just let it happen.
So at least it wasn’t just Emma. Nema seemed to boss everyone around and everyone seemed to let her get away with it. Why was that? Emma thought. And now there was Nema’s birthday party to deal with.
Nema was having a party and she was making sure that everyone knew about it. Obviously it was going to be the ‘best party this year’ and ‘not a silly little girls’ party’ but a ‘proper one’. Nema and her friends would be ‘dressing to thrill’. They would be collected in a stretch limousine (complete with a television and mocktails) and taken to see a movie in a special cinema with big seats and party food to eat during the show.
‘It will be fabulous, just awesome,’ said Nema to no one in particular in a whole group of girls outside the lockers. ‘But you know, it’s really special and really expensive, so only a select group can come. I don’t know how I’m going to choose from all my friends!’
Emma couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Nema was talking about her party in front of everyone—when everyone knew that you were supposed to keep quiet about parties that not everyone was invited to. Everyone except Nema, Emma thought to herself. She was pretty sure she could guess who had been invited.
There was a group of girls who were always buzzing around Nema, giggling at everything she said and following her around—they would be on the list for sure. But who else? Emma couldn’t think, so she nearly fell over when she received an invitation too. She didn’t think she and Nema were friends anymore. Why is Nema asking me—and what will the party be like with all those giggly girls? She also wondered who else might have received an unexpected invitation. If I’m invited, then surely Elle and Hannah will be too. That might be okay—it might even be fun!
But it wasn’t okay and it certainly wasn’t fun. The morning after Emma received her invitation, all the girls were hanging around their lockers waiting for class to start.
‘Hey Elle!’ shouted Nema. ‘Did you get the invitation to my party?’
‘No?’ Elle turned around with surprise.
‘Oh that’s right,’ said Nema sweetly. ‘I forgot—I didn’t invite you! Why would I? You probably wouldn’t be able to see the movie with those glasses on.’
There was a hush and then the girls around Nema giggled and Emma watched as her friend’s face turned red and her eyes blinked hard.
Elle isn’t going? Well, who else is going, she thought and why would Nema be so mean about it? Why would anyone say something like that? And in front of everyone too! She thought Elle’s new glasses were totally cool, but she knew that Elle was still feeling funny about having to wear them.
‘Nema...’ Emma started. She wanted to tell Nema that what she had said was really mean. She wanted to tell her that you shouldn’t treat people that way. She wanted to...
‘Yes Emz?’ asked Nema innocently. ‘I do hope you can come. It will be great having all the popular girls together.’
‘But Nema, you can’t...’ Emma felt her voice melt away.
‘I can’t what?’ Nema’s voice suddenly changed. It was sharp and icy cold. ‘What can’t I do, Emma? I can’t talk? But I am talking, listen to me!’
The other girls with Nema giggled.
‘Nema, you can’t...’ Emma tried again.
‘What Emma? Has the cat got your tongue? Anyway, let me know about the party by Monday or you won’t be able to come either. I have to confirm the final numbers. Come on girls, we’re out of here!’
Nema and the girls flounced off, chatting as they wandered down the corridor. Elle looked crushed and embarrassed and Emma felt awful. She should have stood up for her friend. She had let Elle down. But it was so hard to be brave and say the right things when Nema was so mean. In fact, Emma found it difficult to say anything at all.
‘Elle, I’m so sorry, I should have stood up for you,’ she said to her friend.
‘It doesn’t matter. Who cares what Nema thinks?’ said Elle, but she didn’t look as if she believed it.
‘We don’t! But what she said to you was so mean, Elle,’ Emma replied. She put a comforting arm around her friend, who still looked as if she might burst into tears. ‘And so untrue—your glasses are cool as. I bet Nema’s secretly jealous!’
‘Maybe,’ said Elle quietly. ‘But it doesn’t matter. Em, did Nema really invite you to the party?’
‘Yes, but I don’t know why. Her mum probably made her because we’re still in the same gym squad. We’re not really good friends any more.’
‘Em! You’re not going to go, are you?’
‘Um...’ Emma didn’t know what to say. She hadn’t expected to be invited, but she thought that the limousine ride and the special cinema might be fun. But now she knew that her other friends weren’t going, she wasn’t so sure.
‘Emma, you’re not really thinking about it, are you?’ Elle raised her eyebrows.
‘Um, well, no, I don’t think so ... but she did ask me and I don’t want to...’
‘You don’t want to what? Upset Nema? Would you rather go to a party wearing silly dresses, makeup and movie star hair—which you hate—with a whole lot of girls who are mean?’ Elle was starting to sound a little annoyed.
‘No, but Elle, maybe...’
And then the bell went and Emma had gym practice straight after school so she didn’t get to finish talking to Elle. And then it was the weekend and she couldn’t talk to Elle because her whole family was away at a wedding.
Emma felt bad. First she had felt bad for not sticking up for Elle when Nema was mean, and then Elle made her feel bad for thinking she might go to the party.
Is it bad to think about going to the party? Is that a bit like not sticking up for my friend? Does Elle think I’m mean now too? And what will Nema say if I say I’m not going? What will Elle say if I go? Which is worse—Aaaaaaaaaaargh! Emma couldn’t think properly anymore but she knew one thing—she really wished she had never been invited to the party.
And then, much too soon, it was Monday. She had to let Nema know whether she was going to the party. And what was she going to do now that her cunning ‘too sick to go to school’ plan had failed?
Only one thing could save her now—a mission alert from SHINE.
Emma Jacks, average ten-year-old girl, was also EJ12—a field agent and ace code-cracker in the under-twelve division of SHINE, a secret agency that protected the world from evil-doers. And while Emma Jacks often found it hard to deal with mean girls, irritating brothers and other everyday problems, EJ12 was unbeatable. Compared to dealing with mean girls at school, saving the world was easy!
Emma hadn’t planned on being a spy. It just sort of happened. There had been a primary school maths competition and Emma’s school was competing. Emma was beyond excited about the competition. She loved maths and she loved solving problems. When she found out she had won, she was beyond whatever beyond excited is.
She had imagined receiving a certificate and maybe even a medal, which might be presented in school assembly. Everyone would be clapping, her friends would be cheering and Emma would feel a little bit embarrassed, act completely embarrassed, but secretly quite enjoy the fuss. She knew her parents would go on and on about how proud they were and even Bob would mumble something that she would take as a compliment. She would quite like that as well.
Emma had never imagined that she and her mum would be picked up from home in a large black car with dark windows that would take them to a shop—a light shop of all places. Feeling a little surprised, she had followed her mum into the shop and told the woman at the counter who they were.
‘Oh yes Emma, we’ve heard all about you. Congratulations!’ said the shopkeeper.
Emma couldn’t think why a lady running a light shop would have heard about her, let alone congratulate her, but she didn’t say anything.
‘And welcome! Just take the lift on your right and press the button with the light globe on it,’ the shopkeeper said smiling.
Welcome to what? Emma thought this was wei
rd but her mum didn’t seem too surprised.
‘Maybe maths people just do things that way,’ she grinned.
Emma didn’t think that was a very good explanation. She entered the lift, held the doors open for her mum, then pressed the light globe button and waited. The lift jolted and began to go down ... down, down and then down some more—twenty floors down in fact. And then the lift stopped, the door opened, and Emma found herself standing in front of an old-ish lady with long white hair whipped up into a slightly messy bun with a few pencils sticking out of it.
‘Welcome to SHINE, Emma Jacks. I’m A1.’
‘To SHINE?’ said Emma. ‘But I’m supposed to be collecting my maths prize.’
‘And so you are Emma, but maybe it’s not the prize you were expecting. SHINE is an underground agency,’ A1 explained.
‘Well I know that,’ said Emma. ‘We just came down twenty floors in the lift.’
‘No, Emma,’ smiled A1. ‘I mean it’s a secret agency. Mrs Jacks, would you like to take a seat in our lounge area while I explain SHINE to Emma?’
‘How lovely,’ replied Emma’s mum.
Emma thought her mum should have said something else. Something like, ‘Perhaps I’ll just stay here and see what happens to my daughter twenty floors below street level in a secret organisation!’ But no, she didn’t. And strangely enough, Emma didn’t really mind. She could tell immediately that A1 was someone she could trust.
‘Come with me, Emma. I’ll show you around,’ said A1. She pushed a button and a door that Emma hadn’t even noticed slid open to reveal a large room filled with desks and an enormous flat screen flashing images and numbers in the middle of them. Everywhere Emma looked there were women sitting at the desks, working in front of screens, talking on head-sets and typing furiously on keyboards.
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