“Put this ball through this hoop?” Olek asked with a skeptical look on his face. “This makes no sense. It is not possible.”
Zack slapped his palm to his forehead. “Can we change teams?” he asked.
“Come on, let’s just play,” I said.
Zack whined for a few more minutes but eventually relented and we started a game. And after just a few minutes, he seemed resolved to take every shot himself. He only passed it to me whenever absolutely necessary, and never to Olek.
On our fifth or sixth time down the court, Zack got triple-teamed and dumped the ball off to me. Two of the defenders quickly switched back to me, leaving us all covered, except for Olek, who was standing in the corner behind the three-point line all by himself. I didn’t want to embarrass him, but I also thought Zack would kill me if I turned the ball over. And Olek was the only one of us who was open.
Olek held out his hands, asking for the ball.
I passed it to him, hoping he would at least be able to catch it. He caught the ball with ease and then before anyone could hardly even react, he sent up a shot that tore through the net with that satisfying swish.
Zack threw up his arms and yelled, “Nice three, Olek!”
Olek grinned at me and then pointed at the other team as they all gaped at him.
“Yes, I make it snow storm here,” he said. “Is a bad blizzard.”
“You made it rain, Olek,” I corrected him.
“Yes, this what I say,” he said, still smirking.
We finished the game, now with Zack and Olek basically owning the court, seeing as how I’m an average player at best. Our team ended up winning four out of the five games we played. Olek almost never missed a shot.
“So, maybe I’m crazy,” Zack said as we all sat around, cooling off before heading home. “But I think you’ve heard of basketball before.”
Olek laughed. “Yes, there are many players in NBA from countries near mine, like Mirza Teletovic, Toni Kukoc, Zydrunas Ilgauskas, Andrei Kirilenko, Vlade Divac, Darko Milicic, and my favorite player, Viacheslav Kravtsov.”
“Wow,” Zack said.
“Yes,” Olek said with a nod.
We were all too surprised to say much else. It was pretty awesome to be able to give him something he probably would never get to experience here otherwise. Which was just a fun game of basketball with friends. Real friends. He must have been really lonely before, just hanging out alone at his old safe house all the time. I was pretty sure that nobody at my school besides my friends knew how funny he was.
But having so much fun that day after school just reminded me again that it was all going to end soon. The ITDO trial was tomorrow night. I didn’t know what to make of it, but I did know that it was getting harder and harder not to think about how it would all be ending soon. And once it did, I had a feeling that North Dakota would feel even emptier and smaller to me than it ever had before.
CHAPTER 33
LATER THAT NIGHT, I FOUND MYSELF UNABLE TO SLEEP. IT WASN’T just the hard floor I was sleeping on because I’d let Olek have my bed. No, it was the same thing that had been bothering me all week. It was the realization that this would all end soon. The trial was tomorrow night and my mission of integrating Olek had worked like a charm. Nobody had seen anything suspicious since Monday after school when we saw those guys in maintenance uniforms snooping around the school.
I should have been happy. I mean, here I was succeeding so well with my Agency mission that the enemy wasn’t even looking anywhere near our school anymore. I’d basically saved Olek and, in a way, the whole country.
Plus, I’d gotten to help out real-life secret agents. I’d gotten to be a part of something important, something significant. So I should have been happier than I ever was before. But I wasn’t. I realized I was being selfish, but I just didn’t want it to end. I didn’t want things to go back to the way they were before. I didn’t want to lose my new friend. I couldn’t help feeling that way, even though I knew better. I knew I should be happy that Olek would get to go back to his family soon because of me.
But instead I was sad because we only had less than two days left together.
“Olek?” I whispered. “Are you awake?”
“Yes,” he said.
“Do you mess up all those sayings on purpose? To be funny?”
He rolled over in the bed and looked down at me like he had no idea what I was even asking him.
“What you mean? My English is near flawless execution.”
I smiled. “Never mind,” I said. “It doesn’t matter either way.”
“If question does not matter, then why ask?” he said.
“Yeah, good point,” I said.
“Let me ask you question,” Olek said.
“Yeah, go,” I said.
“What makes you want to be agent?”
“Well . . . it was partly because I wanted to help you,” I said.
“Me? But you were with Agency before me, yes?”
“No, you’re my first assignment. But that’s not the only reason. I also wanted to because I hate it here. This town is so boring. Nothing ever happens. And no matter what I do, I’ll just end up like everyone else, stuck in some boring job with no chance to get out.”
Olek was silent for a while. I wasn’t sure if he understood what I was talking about. Or maybe I’d offended him, complaining about being here when he was the one with real problems. I must have sounded like a jerk.
“I mean, I know you have it harder than me,” I added. “I shouldn’t complain.”
“No,” Olek said. “No, you can say this. I know how you feel. This is why I am stuck here away from my family also. In my country, things are always the same, too. My parents try to change things there, and look what happen to them. They try to make things better and now we are apart, and I am here. But I like it here. I like this town. To me it does not seem boring. To me, this place is weird and interesting. Example: Remember when I find perfectly good boot in street?”
I laughed quietly. “Yeah, I remember.”
I realized he was right. It was all about perspective in a way. His family had done exactly what I’d been trying to do my whole life. Of course, they had done so in a real, meaningful way. That was the difference. All I ever did was put on stupid pranks. They had risked their lives to make a difference. That’s why North Dakota felt so much bigger to me now. Because now my stupid pranks, like getting Olek detention, actually were making a difference in a bigger way. Which only brought me right back to the harsh reality that pretty soon I’d have to go back to meaningless pranks that would only make things seem better in the short term. Good for cheap laughs and nothing more.
“I know I’m probably not supposed to ask this, but what’s your real name?” I said.
“To pronounce correct I need to cut out your tongue,” he said.
“Seriously?”
“Of course not,” he said with a grin, but then said nothing else.
“So, are you going to tell me your real name?” I finally asked.
He leaned back in the bed and seemed to think it over. Then he shook his head.
“You’re my friend,” he said. “Olek is my name to you. Whatever name I had does not matter anymore. That old name is no more. This is my home right now; Olek is my name while I stay here, the name that my new friend already calls me.”
“We are real friends now, aren’t we? We’re not just fake friends for the good of your cover?”
“Yes, Olek and Carson are like vinegar and cabbage,” he said, holding his first two fingers together.
“Vinegar and cabbage?”
“Yes, is good combination, no? Is best meal. Number one tasty mixture.”
“In America, we would say we’re like salt and pepper, or peanut butter and jelly.”
“Peanut butter and jelly?” he said incredulously. “This make no sense.”
I was pretty sure all countries had heard of peanut butter and jelly, but maybe not. Or maybe he was just
messing with me again. But it didn’t matter. Because either way, the sting of knowing that in two days I likely wouldn’t get to hear his jokes anymore washed out everything. So I didn’t say anything else. Instead, I just lay there on the floor and tried to remind myself that I should be happy that I was saving my friend and the country.
CHAPTER 34
SOMETIME IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT, I BECAME AWARE OF someone shaking me. Hard. In fact, I was being shaken so hard, I was getting a headache. At first I thought I was dreaming that I was inside a blender, getting pureed into a Medlock Custom Milk flavor. But I quickly realized the shaking part was not a dream.
“Carson!” someone whispered.
I opened my eyes and saw Olek’s terrified face peering down at me. He shook me again and I sat up.
“What’s wrong?” I whispered.
“Somebody is inside house,” he said.
“It’s probably just my brother. He stays out late a lot,” I said, and started to lay back down.
“No,” Olek said. “He come home two hours ago. I hear it. It’s them, Carson.”
The stairs creaked. The third stair always creaked. I glanced at my alarm clock. It was 3:36 a.m. Olek was right—someone was in our house and coming downstairs. My room was the only one in the basement other than the laundry room and the den. There was no reason for anyone in my family to be coming down here at three in the morning unless my mom had developed a sleep-laundry habit.
My first thought was that it couldn’t possibly be the Pancake Haus. For one, how would they have even found out he was here in the first place? And two, how did they get past the Agency protection that I’d been told would be stationed around my house 24–7 while Olek was here?
But then I looked at Olek’s terrified face again. And I knew his instincts were right: this couldn’t be a good thing. I didn’t know what was going on, but I knew that I was the only one who could do something about it.
I shot out of bed and crawled over to my closet. I opened the duffel bag containing all of my secret-agent gadgets and grabbed my Agency transponder. I didn’t think about anything. All I did was act. I pressed the red emergency button for ten seconds, then put the bag on my bed and climbed on top of my desk so I could reach the basement window near the ceiling in my room. It was a pretty small window, but I thought Olek might be able to squeeze through it.
“Olek, I’m going out to the hallway to investigate. If they get past me, go out the window and run, okay? Don’t look back.”
He nodded.
I clicked the window latch open and pushed. It swung open slightly. I peeked outside and saw a pair of black combat boots just a few feet away. They shuffled and turned toward the window. I closed it and climbed back down off my desk.
“Never mind,” I said. “Can’t go that way. Stay right behind me. We’ll have to fight our way out.”
He swallowed and nodded. I thought for a second that he might puke and I wouldn’t have blamed him. I thought I might puke myself.
But there wasn’t time to think about barfing. I grabbed the smokescreen tool and strapped it on my wrist. Then I put in the night-vision contact lenses. I heard a soft shuffle from the den just outside my room. They were close now. I grabbed the tranquilizer pen and stuck it into the pocket of my flannel pajama pants.
The bedroom door was slightly ajar. I eased it open with my finger and peeked into the hallway. The night vision contact lenses worked amazingly well—it was almost as if every light in the house was on. The hallway was still empty, but I could feel the presence of at least one enemy agent lurking out in the den, just out of view.
My heart was in my throat. Maybe Agents Nineteen and Blue would get here before I actually had to do anything? But I couldn’t bank on that; I shouldn’t even have been hoping for it. If these guys had gotten past the Agency protection outside, then they likely would be ready for any reinforcements that arrived.
While shuffling back into my room, I debated what to do. Basically all I had going for me was the element of surprise. They likely still didn’t know that I knew that they were in the house. I had to somehow use that to my advantage.
I motioned for Olek to follow me and then quickly crawled out of my bedroom and to my left, away from the den. I moved as quickly as I could while trying not to make a noise.
We crept into the laundry room adjacent to my bedroom. I poked my head out the door and saw an empty den. Maybe they weren’t in the house after all? Maybe we’d both imagined hearing the noises? But how did that explain the dude with army boots just outside my window?
Then I saw someone in a ski mask and black fatigues crouched behind the couch. He was turned away from me and making hand signals to someone behind him. In his hand was a machine gun.
I ducked back into the laundry room. I scooted to a position where I could see my bedroom door without having to extend any part of my head past the laundry room doorframe. I would wait until they moved inside my room, then I’d make my move.
Olek was shaking beside me. He wasn’t crying or anything; he was just shivering slightly. From fear or from being cold, it didn’t matter either way. The fear was there regardless, I knew that. Even if he wasn’t scared, I was scared enough for both of us.
How did they know Olek was here? Maybe Agent Nineteen or Agent Blue had been compromised and they’d forced it out of one of them? That thought made me sick to my stomach, so I pushed it out of my head. Knowing how this had happened wouldn’t help us, anyway. I just needed to focus on the problem itself.
Then the enemy operatives made their move. Before I even realized what was happening, two of them rushed inside my bedroom. A third strode past, heading right for the laundry room.
He saw me just a second too late. I hadn’t even remembered taking the pen from my pocket but somehow it was already in my hand. I lunged forward just as he reached the doorway and pointed the gun at my face.
I jabbed the pen into his leg at the same time I clicked out the needle. I quickly clicked it again. The gun clattered loudly to the floor a second before the unconscious body thumped down on top of it. There was no way the other intruders hadn’t heard that.
For a moment, I debated going for the machine gun the guy had dropped. The problem was that I honestly would have no idea how to use it. I’d never actually held a real gun before. In North Dakota almost everyone hunted, but for whatever reason my dad never took it up as a leisure activity. So I was one of the few kids in the state who had never been hunting, and thus didn’t know how to use a gun. Not only that, but I wasn’t sure I’d actually be able to point it at a real, live person and pull the trigger, anyway.
But I knew I had to act quickly either way since the first of the two intruders who’d entered my room was now in the hallway. I backed into the laundry room and quickly reloaded the pen the way Agent Chum Bucket had instructed me. I turned to Olek.
“I’m going to distract them,” I whispered, “you just get out of here, okay? Run right past us and get outside and then run and hide somewhere. Nineteen and Blue are hopefully on the way.”
He started shaking his head, but we didn’t have time to argue about it. I turned away from him and fired three discs from the smokescreen gun strapped to my wrist. I aimed them at the hallway, at an angle so that they’d ricochet toward my room as they went off.
It worked and I heard a surprised cry from the hallway as it filled with smoke. The fire alarms did not go off, which made sense. The chemical fog must have been treated not to set them off.
But it didn’t matter. I grabbed Olek and pulled him into the hallway. It was too foggy for me to see anything at all, even with my night-vision contacts in, but this was my house and I knew it better than Olek knew Jimmy Buffett songs. As soon as we exited, I turned left and put my back against the wall, pulling Olek with me.
A few seconds later, a black combat boot landed inches from my leg. I swung the pen toward where the calf attached to the foot. It connected with something, and I clicked the toxin re
leaser.
The guy fell unconscious to the ground right in front of me.
Then I jumped to my feet and ran with my elbow out in front of me toward the den, bracing for impact. I was definitely much smaller than the third intruder, but he couldn’t see a thing and had no idea I was coming. So the force of my elbow running full speed into whatever part of him I hit sent him reeling backward with a grunt.
“Go, run!” I yelled. “Back door!”
There was a brief separation in the fog as Olek passed us. Through the edge of the fog, I could just see a pair of legs scrambling up the stairs at the far end of the basement den. Olek had made it out of the basement at least. I just had to hope there were no other enemy operatives outside other than the guy I’d seen standing by my bedroom window. Or that he’d be able to make it past them somehow.
I got up to follow Olek out, but a hand that must have been made of steel grabbed my ankle and pulled me backward. Then there was suddenly a knee pressing down onto my neck and cheek. It felt like the top of my head might just explode all over the carpet like a zit.
I tried to call out but I could barely even breathe, let alone make a noise. My vision started going black and then I heard a crack. Suddenly the pressure was gone and I saw the guy falling over.
My brother Austin stood over me, looking down with a baseball bat in his hand.
“Carson, what’s going on?” he asked.
Before I could even open my mouth to reply, a hand came up behind him. A hand holding a syringe. It plunged into my brother’s neck. His eyes rolled into the back of his head. A pair of arms emerged from the fog and caught my brother and gently laid his unconscious body on the floor.
“Zero, where is Olek?” a familiar voice said.
I sat up and saw that the guy with the syringe was Agent Nineteen. He rushed forward and dropped to a knee next to the assailant my brother had hit with the bat. He also stuck him with a syringe. Then he turned back to me. The smoke was clearing and his face was calm, except for his fierce and wide eyes, which cast about the shadows of the basement urgently.
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