by Felice Arena
Contents
PREVIOUSLY…
1. NO CAN DO
2. TRUTH
3. FEAR
4. ZLOY
5. LISTEN UP!
6. CHASE
7. WHIRL OF BLADES
8. AGENT GRANNY
FROM THE AUTHOR
…WHEN YOU’RE HALF BOY, HALF MACHINE,
IT’S HARD NOT TO BE A HERO…
Andy’s not a regular kid, but he’s trying his best to act like one. His parents are government scientists, specialising in robotics.
After a terrible accident, they rebuilt him using their latest, untested research, giving him superhuman powers. They nicknamed him Andy Roid, but it’s more than just a nickname: it’s his government code name. And there’s a dangerous enemy – Dr Baffi and the Triple S – who want to capture him and use him as a human lab rat.
At his old school Andy used his powers to save his friend Molly’s life. Then he and his family had to go on the run. But the Triple S are once again hot on their trail.
Now a hired goon has kidnapped his parents’ boss, Andy’s friend Reggie won’t even talk to him, and Judd, Andy’s new best mate, has revealed that he’s actually a teen agent whose mission is to keep Andy safe.
Can Judd and Andy save the General from certain death, or will they be captured or killed in the attempt? And will Reggie find out the truth and blow their cover in the meantime?
‘I’m freezing!’ Judd said, his teeth chattering loudly. ‘My clothes are soaking wet. Aren’t you cold? Do you even feel cold?’
‘Of course I can feel cold! I’m not all machine!’ said Andy, feeling defensive. But the truth was he wasn’t as cold as Judd, and he didn’t really know how much of him was still human. It was something he was trying hard not to think about.
‘Andy? Andy? Are you still there?’ An urgent, whispered voice came from Andy’s left hand. Andy pulled on his pinky three times and a small holograph of his dad appeared above the screen.
His dad looked about and, seeing the dark forest around the boys, he sighed heavily. ‘Is there nothing I can do to stop you two going on this crazy mission?’ he said.
‘That’s a no-can-do, sir,’ Judd said apologetically.
Andy shook his head too. ‘Nup,’ he said. ‘We’re going to save the General. We’re going into battle.’
Andy’s father sighed heavily. He took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes nervously.
Andy knew he had hit a raw nerve. Andy’s parents were leading scientists, specialising in military robotics. They and Dr Baffi, the man who was now after them, were once colleagues who had worked together to create the most powerful armed forces in the world.
‘But you’re not a soldier,’ said Andy’s father, looking sadder than Andy had ever seen him. ‘We didn’t build you to be a soldier – we only rebuilt you like this to save your life.’
Andy’s dad looked quickly behind him, then Andy could see him tapping away in the air as if he was at a computer. ‘I’m remotely enabling night vision,’ he said, ‘and you already have heating and GPS. I wish I could do more.’
‘Seriously?’ complained Andy. ‘Stop doing that. I’m not some electronic toy that you can program with a remote.’
‘You know we can’t program you, Andy,’ said his father, sounding distressed. ‘The Turbo Dashboard can only initialise certain applications that have been installed. They’re all beta stage, never been tested. Just please, please be careful. Remember there’s no shame in running away. And, Agent, I’m holding you responsible if anything happens to my boy.’
Andy’s father seemed dejected as he signed off.
Andy looked at the GPS map glowing from the palm screen of his hand.
They had left the road and trekked in silence through the forest, climbing over fallen trees and pushing aside branches. Andy was still stewing over the fact that Judd hadn’t told him he was an agent – that Judd had been spying on him since the day they met.
Finally Judd spoke. ‘I know you’re cheesed off that I didn’t tell you,’ he said, his teeth chattering with cold. ‘But, Andy, I really would have been your friend anyway. In fact, this is all partly my fault.’
Andy kicked angrily at a stone.
‘The Triple S have obviously seen your laser in the CCTV footage. They’ve figured out you’re on the east coast. They know they’re close. I should have told my boss. I should have had you moved to another safe house. But I didn’t want to have to start again. I thought warning you would be enough…’
Andy shook his head. ‘You’re such a fake,’ he said, unable to keep his cool any longer. ‘This is your job. I get it. Totally bizarre, but I get it. So you can stop pretending to be my friend. I’m risking my life here because I’ve known the General since I was a kid. This is just another mission to you – you wouldn’t understand.’
Andy could see the hurt in Judd’s eyes. He knew he had overstepped the mark. Judd lied to me, that’s true, he thought. But I didn’t reveal who I was either. Andy felt a pang of guilt.
They both knew the demands being made by the Triple S, and they both knew how vicious and ruthless the kidnapper was – if the Reid family didn’t surrender within the next couple of hours, then the General was dead.
Judd shook his head and covered his face with his hands.
Andy stopped. Was Judd crying? Maybe it was just his wet hair dripping in his eyes… No, he was definitely tearing up.
‘No, you don’t understand,’ Judd said, finally looking back up at Andy, his eyes red. ‘The General isn’t just my boss… He’s also my grandfather!’
Andy was shocked. He realised that for the first time he was seeing the real Judd, without the tough-guy act.
‘Sorry,’ Andy said. ‘I didn’t mean to call you a fake.’
Judd looked miserable, and he was shaking with cold. Andy tapped on his palm screen, bringing up the hotplate icon. He looked around for some good kindling.
The blue glow in his right hand became a bright, red-hot circle, and Andy fed sticks and leaf litter into his cupped hand until he had a small campfire in his palm. They sat together until Judd stopped shivering.
‘I just want him to be okay,’ Judd said, wiping the tears out of his eyes.
‘Before you ran into me,’ said Andy, ‘what was your plan? Karate-kick your way to your grandad? I mean, you didn’t even have a gun.’
‘Well, I’m not that sort of agent,’ Judd said. ‘Most of my assignments have been in schools and homes. I shadow kids of diplomats or important families. But you’re better than any gun, Andy. I mean, seriously, who wouldn’t want someone by their side with cybernetic limbs and superhuman strength and speed?’
Andy shrugged. I might have been designed as the ultimate weapon, he thought, but Dad’s right, I’m not a soldier. Could I ever actually take someone’s life? In his heart of hearts, Andy didn’t think he could – no matter how bad they were.
‘What about your mum and dad, can they help? Do you have any brothers or sisters?’ Andy asked.
Judd didn’t answer straightaway.
‘I’m an only child,’ he said finally. ‘My… my parents,’ he stammered. ‘They were also agents, but they were…’ He paused as if he didn’t want to say the words. ‘They were both killed on a mission last year.’
Andy gulped. He didn’t know what to say. Back before he was Andy Roid, he would have thought that Judd’s life was super cool – like something out of a computer game or a movie. But he was starting to realise how dangerous and scary it was. And how easily it could all go wrong.
Andy struggled to find the right words. ‘I’m really sorry, Judd.’
‘It’s all right,’ Judd sa
id softly. ‘I guess it comes with the job. But there are times I still can’t believe it, you know?’
Andy could tell by the way Judd’s voice cracked that he was obviously not as brave and cool about it all as he wanted to seem.
‘The General is my legal guardian,’ Judd added. ‘He’s my dad’s dad.’
‘Have you always been an agent?’ asked Andy. ‘Are there other agents like you – you know, teen agents?’
‘There are only a few of us,’ said Judd, ‘and we’re sort of born into it. I begged my parents to let me become an agent. They didn’t want me to, but the General convinced them that I’d be great. So I trained for it – I specialised in martial arts.’
Andy smiled for a moment as he remembered how Judd had put Hunter Wilson, the bully at their new school, back in his place with a EB03BodyTextIndentedlysing grip to the shoulder, and how he had taken down an armed robber with a knockout chop to the neck.
Maybe they could save the General, or maybe they didn’t have a hope, but they weren’t going to find out sitting around in the forest.
‘Then what are we waiting for?’ Andy said, closing his fist around the fire and putting it out. ‘Destiny calls and it’s shouting for you to karate kick some villain butt.’
Judd nodded. He didn’t look sad anymore – he just looked determined.
Andy lit up the path at their feet.
‘I’m going to turn the lights out now,’ he said. ‘We’re getting close to Moose Falls and the cabin where Zloy is holding the General. Let’s hope they’re still there.’
‘Whoa,’ said Judd, as Andy dimmed the blue glow. ‘I can’t see anything. You’ll have to lead the way with your night-vision eyes – I gotta say, the whole thing is cool. Your mum and dad are kind of awesome!’
‘Shh!’ Andy hissed. ‘There’s someone coming.’
It was eerily silent, but in the distance Andy could hear the faint sounds of people walking through the forest.
‘Can you see anything?’ asked Judd. ‘It’s pitch black.’
‘Hold on a sec, I’m looking…’ said Andy.
Andy scanned the dark woods around them.
‘Oh no!’ he gasped, seeing shadowy figures deep in the forest. A faint light was swinging beside them. ‘There are two of them, and they’re heading this way! What if they’ve seen us?’
‘I can just see their light now,’ Judd whispered. ‘There’s no way they could have spotted us yet. Hurry! We need to hide!’
The boys slipped behind a large rock and waited for the strangers to step into the open.
One of the men was carrying a dim camp lantern. He was walking with his other arm pointed at the man beside him.
The light swung backwards and forwards and the shadows of the trees made the clearing look spooky and alien. The other man was bent over as if he was in pain.
Andy heard Judd take a sharp breath.
It was Zloy and the General.
Andy’s heart skipped a beat when he finally got a close-up look at Zloy.
He was tall and built like an oil drum and his head was thick and round like a bowling ball. A tattoo of a snake wound its way around his neck.
His face was just as menacing and scary as Judd had described. His stare was cold and dead. Milky streaks across his pupils made him look like a great white shark when it rolls back its eyes to attack its prey.
‘Start digging!’ Zloy ordered, jabbing his hostage with a gun.
The General did as he was told.
With his night vision, Andy could clearly see that the General had been beaten badly by the thug. Half his face was swollen with black-and-blue bruises, and there was blood on his clothes and his white beard.
Judd gasped. He had obviously seen his grandfather’s injuries in the dim light of the lantern.
‘Don’t!’ Andy whispered, grabbing hold of Judd’s arm and stopping him from charging out. ‘You’re no use to him if you’re dead.’
‘I know, I know,’ whispered Judd. ‘But Zloy is a cold hard killer.’ He looked upset and shocked to see his grandfather in such a terrible state. ‘You know that gold tooth he has? It was ripped out of another man’s mouth, just before Zloy blew him away.’ Judd’s voice sounded scared and his hands were shaking.
‘Hurry up!’ barked Zloy. ‘I haven’t got all night. You just better hope I hear from Baffi that the Reids have blown their cover.’
‘They’re not going to,’ puffed the General, slowly chopping and scooping chunks of leaves and dirt with the shovel. ‘And, believe me, I will die before I reveal their location.’
‘That’s fine with me. That’s your grave you’re digging,’ Zloy snarled.
Andy couldn’t believe what was happening. His heart was racing and his mouth was dry. He was frightened for the General, for Judd, and for himself. What if his dad was right? What if it was a trap? Maybe he was putting everyone in danger just by being here.
‘What are we going to do?’ he whispered. ‘I can’t do anything while Zloy has the gun so close to your grandad.’
‘We’ll have to distract him,’ said Judd. ‘I’ll have to get him to step away from the General. That’s when you do your robot thing. You’ve got the night vision so you’ll have to make your way around to the other side and I’ll position myself behind them.’
‘And then what?’ asked Andy. ‘What is my thing? What am I supposed to do?’ Andy tried to swallow his fear.
‘Use one of your cool super-apps,’ hissed Judd. ‘Or some of that super strength and speed you have. You’ll work something out. Just make sure you don’t get shot – or worse, let me get shot.’
Andy could feel his heart thumping wildly as he tiptoed carefully around the clearing. This was all happening too quickly.
How am I going to take on an armed, cold-blooded killer? he wondered. I couldn’t even bring myself to shoot a gorilla, let alone a person!
‘We know about the boy,’ said Zloy to the General. ‘It didn’t take a genius to figure out what the Reids had done. Once Baffi saw the footage from the zoo, he knew the Reids had managed it, that they’d broken the final barrier in bio-robotics. They’d turned their own boy into a science project.’ Zloy laughed without humour. ‘Fools. The parents are the silver medal. It’s the boy we really want. He’s the gold.’
Andy gasped. Actually hearing Zloy say that confirmed his parents’ greatest fear – in saving Andy, they had put his life in danger.
But the General wasn’t giving anything away. He stopped digging and looked up at Zloy.
‘I’d tell Baffi to employ a new investigation team if I were you,’ he said.
‘Oh, don’t pretend you don’t know,’ said Baffi. ‘The future of technology is changing, and the boy is the key to controlling that future.’
‘We’re all lost if men like you find a way to control it,’ snapped the General.
‘You think you and your government are any better?’ Zloy growled. ‘You’re advancing technology for your own country’s military power. And making big profits from it along the –’
It was the sound of a branch breaking. Judd had obviously tried to distract Zloy by making him turn the gun in his direction.
But Zloy was too careful for that. He was startled by the sound, but he kept his gun on the General and grabbed him by the arm. Zloy dragged him to a nearby tree and cuffed him to a low-hanging branch.
Andy watched, breathless, as Zloy held the gun closer to the General and cocked the trigger.
He felt helpless.
‘Whoever you are out there…reveal yourself now! Or I’ll kill him!’
After a moment’s hesitation, Judd stepped out into the clearing.
The General dropped his head, clearly distressed.
‘I knew it!’ grunted Zloy, recognising Judd. ‘I knew you were involved in this somehow!’
Let him go!’ pleaded the General as Zloy moved over to Judd and grabbed him by the neck.
‘Beg all you want, old man,’ snarled Zloy. ‘I guess I’ve found
something that means more to you than your own life. And if the boy tries any of his kung-fu karate crap on me, I will shoot you both.’
Judd’s face was frozen with terror.
Andy panicked. He didn’t know what to do. Zloy was way too edgy. Andy knew he could shoot Judd at even the slightest provocation.
‘Where’s the bionic boy?’ Zloy shouted. ‘Talk about making this easy for me. I set a trap for the parents, but I got the main prize instead!’
‘What are you talking about?’ cried the General. ‘It’s only Judd. Isn’t that right, Judd?’
‘Yeah, it is,’ choked Judd, struggling to breathe.
‘I don’t believe you,’ growled Zloy, tightening his grip on Judd’s neck. ‘Bionic-boy, I know you’re out there and I’m not afraid of you. I’ll pull this trigger, even if I’m shot. I’ll pull this trigger if you or anyone else gives me the slightest bit of trouble. I’m giving you to the count of ten to come out or your friend here gets it…’
‘NO!’ yelled the General, trying madly to break free from his handcuffs.
Andy held his breath. He felt trapped and helpless. No matter what he did, someone was going to get hurt…or killed.
‘One…’ Zloy started to slowly count out loud.
Oh man, oh man. He’s not bluffing, thought Andy, cupping his hand over his mouth, his mind spinning and his heart racing.
‘Two…’
Then it came to him. There was only one person who always knew what to do in a crisis. His mum.
Andy crouched behind a large rock and called home on his palm screen.
‘Andy? Where are you? Andy?’ His mum’s image popped up on the screen. She was in her pyjamas and her hair was sticking up everywhere.
Andy sighed with relief and put his finger to his lips.
‘Andy?’ his mum whispered. ‘Are you all right?’ She looked terrified, seeing the fear on his face.
‘Four!’
‘I need help, Mum,’ he whispered. He quickly explained what had happened.
‘Right, listen carefully,’ whispered his mum, her face becoming serious with concentration. ‘I’m initiating another application.’
