The Nightmare Vortex

by Deborah Abela

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted by any person or entity, including internet search engines or retailers, in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including printing, photocopying (except under the statutory exceptions provisions of the Australian Copyright Act 1968), recording, scanning or by any information storage and retrieval system without the prior written permission of Random House Australia. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

  Max Remy Superspy 03: The Nightmare Vortex

  ePub ISBN 9781742745084

  Random House Australia Pty Ltd

  Level 3, 100 Pacific Highway, North Shore

  http://www.randomhouse.com.au

  Sydney New York Toronto

  London Auckland Johannesburg

  First published in 2003

  Text copyright © Deborah Abela 2003

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the Publisher.

  National Library of Australia

  Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

  Abela, Deborah.

  Max Remy super spy : the nightmare vortex.

  For children aged 9+.

  ISBN 978 1 74051 858 1.

  ISBN 1 74051 858 6.1.

  Spies - Juvenile fiction. I. Title.

  A823.4

  Photograph of the author by Todd Decker

  Cover and internal illustrations by Jobi Murphy

  CONTENTS

  Cover

  Copyright

  Imprint Page

  Dedication

  Title Page

  Chapter 1: A Mysterious Happening

  Chapter 2: Be Careful Where You Step

  Chapter 3: A Country Visitor and News about the Time and Space Machine

  Chapter 4: The Personality Party and a Strange Guest

  Chapter 5: A Message from Steinberger and a Surprise Spy Trainer

  Chapter 6: Terror at Hollingdale

  Chapter 7: An Evil Interception

  Chapter 8: The Rules for Fighting Crime

  Chapter 9: A Dark and Terrible Secret

  Chapter 10: An Important Job and a Pair of Evil Hands

  Chapter 11: A Mission Begins

  Chapter 12: VART Landing and Kitty Litter Poo

  Chapter 13: Potatoes and Personal Flying Devices

  Chapter 14: The Annual Spy Awards Night

  Chapter 15: A Spy in the House

  Chapter 16: Traitors in Venice and Clumsy Double-crossers

  Chapter 17: A Slimy Reunion

  Chapter 18: The Nightmare Vortex

  Chapter 19: The Nightmare Has Only Just Begun

  Chapter 20: The Other Side of the Chasm

  Chapter 21: The Edge of Oblivion

  Chapter 22: One Giant Leap

  Chapter 23: Giant Crabs and a Daring Rescue

  Chapter 24: Mission Complete

  Chapter 25: Goodbye

  About the Author

  Max Remy Series

  Jasper Zammit Series

  For Mr and Mrs Pozzi

  It all started within the secret underground fortress deep in the subterranean labyrinth of Spyforce. Reinforced with three metre-thick cement walls poured around indestructible beams of titanium, the fortress had a laser-sensitive surface that detected and dealt with unwelcome elements in an instant.

  This was one of the most important areas of the Force.

  It was the mailroom.

  No mail entered or left the building without passing through the highly trained hands of an elite team of postage handlers and deliverers, equipped with the nerves and skills to make them unbreakable to all enemies of the Force. In the spy game if information falls into the wrong hands, the fate of the entire agency, even the world, could be at stake.

  Two small unassuming parcels entered the X-ray machine. The small ‘y’ inscribed in invisible ink and detected by the rays meant they were from Harrison, Chief of Spyforce and were bound for two new spies. The parcels were cleared and sent through a whirling maze of conveyor belts that zigzagged around the high-security operation to the delivery van of Agent Z11.

  Agent Z11 started the van. Like any other day, she’d completed a thorough inspection of the vehicle. Everything checked. Gaining clearance from High Command to leave the Force, Agent Z11 made her way out of the building through a secret network of underground alleys until she reached a quiet suburban street and was on her way.

  Agent Z11 whistled as she drove, oblivious as to what was to happen next.

  On entering a long, underground tunnel, traffic came to a standstill. A police officer approached her van and told her there’d been a breakdown. Road and Safety were on their way. She checked her watch. Agent Z11 didn’t like being interrupted in carrying out Spyforce business.

  Just then, the lights went out. An eerie glow filled the tunnel as headlights provided the only source of light.

  Agent Z11 tried not to think of the valuable seconds she was losing. She had never, in seven years, failed to deliver a parcel on time.

  Up ahead two drivers got out of their cars and started yelling at each other. More drivers got out as the argument became heated. Agent Z11 stayed where she was. Her priority was her cargo, not two hotheads losing it in a traffic jam.

  Agent Z11 got out of the van, locked the doors and circled the vehicle with her torch. Nothing had been touched. Nothing had been tampered with.

  Below the tunnel, in a large, smelly, rat-infested river of slime that ran through the city’s sewers, a man dressed in black with a mask and gloves lifted a steel manhole cover and aimed a silent laser beam up into the thick metal floor of a van. Within minutes, he lifted himself out of the sewer and into the van of Agent Z11. With an infra-red micro torch set in the side of his glasses, he sifted through the parcels, discarding most, until he found what he was looking for.

  A small unassuming parcel addressed to Max Remy.

  Agent Z11 rolled her eyes as the arguing drivers began shoving each other. She checked her watch again before doing another round of the van. Each second that passed was making her more and more uneasy.

  Using a special heat ray to unstick the glue, the masked man opened the parcel for Max Remy and removing a small badge, replaced it with an identical one. Almost as fast, he resealed the package, before carefully lowering himself back down into the sewer, welding closed the bottom of the van, so that even he had trouble noticing the intrusion.

  Suddenly the lights came on in the tunnel. The manhole cover was slipped quietly back into place. The two hotheads calmed down and drivers returned to their vehicles as the broken down car was towed away.

  Finally, thought Agent Z11. I can make up for lost time on the freeway.

  She started her van as deep within the city’s sewers, a masked man dressed in black splashed through the filthy green-brown slime to make a quick and unseen getaway.

  Max walked home from school with her notebook in hand and her eyes darting over the city like searchlights. There were suspicious people everywhere hopelessly entangled in a web of dubious activities and now that she and Linden were fully fledged spies, it was up to her to take note of it all.

  She opened the cover of her red chrome Spyforce micro-recorder watch.

  ‘3:30pm. Sydney. Australia. Agent Max Remy signing in. Each second of every day there are strange and mysterious happenings all around us that only the well-trained eye can see. A good spy will always be on their toes and always be careful where they step.’


  Just then, reflected in a shop window, Max saw a car racing straight towards her. She leapt out of the way at lightning speed, landing against a nearby wall, and only narrowly avoiding the splash of water from the gutter.

  ‘Trouble may be just behind you.’ She looked over her shoulder and walked on. ‘And a special agent must always be on the lookout for where it might lie … Aaaahhh!’

  ‘Foofff!’

  Max opened her eyes to see the world was the wrong way round and it was full of … coloured feathers.

  ‘Hey. Are you okay?’

  Max shook her head. ‘Ah. I think so. What happened?’

  A tubby, bald man looked down on her.

  ‘You tumbled into this crate of feathers we’re taking into the theatre. With skills like that, little girl, you could join the circus.’

  Circus? Little girl? She was an international spy who had saved the world. Twice.

  ‘Could you just help me out of here?’ But as she said this, a tall, skinny guy wearing a pair of oversized overalls, tripped up the curb sending his bucket of pink goop sprawling into the air. Max looked up and saw the whole thing in slow motion, just seconds before she was transformed into a giant feathered, sticky mess.

  ‘I … gee … sorry about —’ the guy started to apologise, but Max interrupted.

  ‘Just get me out.’

  After the two men helped her out, Max fumed as she made her feathered way home, thinking now might be a good time to move out and avoid another of her mother’s screaming attacks at how clumsy she was.

  As she opened the front door of her home, she heard her mother talking to her freak-fashioned boyfriend, Aidan. Max could not let either of them see her like this and quietly sneaking behind them, she tiptoed upstairs to her bedroom and locked the door behind her.

  Phew! Max sighed as she leant against the door, but just when she thought she was safe, her mother tried to force her way in.

  ‘Sweetie? Open up, I want to tell you something.’

  Max desperately tried to get undressed, but the goo and feathers had stiffened and her clothes wouldn’t budge. Her mother was still calming down about an expensive Persian rug Max had spilled a strawberry smoothie over. If she saw her like this she’d be grounded for life.

  ‘Tell me from there. I’m studying and I don’t want to lose concentration.’

  Just like knocking, accepting ‘no’ for an answer was something her mother never did. ‘Open this door now.’

  Max searched the room for something that would save her life. ‘Coming.’

  The door opened. Max’s mother entered and looked around.

  ‘Are you hiding something?’

  ‘No.’ Max wore a towel around her head and was draped in a long bathrobe. Her mother didn’t seem convinced but made herself at home on Max’s bed and began.

  ‘We’re having a party here to welcome a few new personalities to the network.’

  A party! Suddenly being covered in pink goop and feathers hardly mattered at all.

  ‘We want to make them feel like part of a family and to get everyone chummier with each other.’

  Max’s stony face stared. Great! They want to get chummy while I get invaded in my own home. But then she was struck by a thought. She’d asked if Linden could visit and didn’t want to do anything that might jeopardise that.

  ‘That’ll be fun.’ She tried to sound genuine. ‘What about Linden?’

  ‘Who?’ Her mum rarely remembered things that had nothing to do with her.

  ‘Linden. My friend from Mindawarra. He’s coming to stay for a week. You even signed a form saying you’ll look after him while he studies at my school.’

  ‘Oh. When’s he coming?’ Max’s mum stood up and walked towards the door.

  ‘Tomorrow. You were going to arrange it with his dad. Remember?’

  ‘I’ll call him tonight. I promise.’ And with that she left the room.

  ‘But …’ Max hurried after her but rebounded off a cardboard mountain blocking her way and fell to the floor.

  Bathroom stuff fell everywhere. Shampoos, conditioners, body wash, cologne. Stacks of it. Max looked up. It was Aidan. Each day he was getting more and more comfortable in their house and now it seemed he was moving in!

  Max was furious, but she couldn’t think about Aiden right now. Her towel had wriggled off her head and her mother’s face was twisting into an expression of maximum anger.

  ‘What on earth have you …?’

  Max tried to explain what had happened but it did no good. Her mother filled the next few minutes of Max’s life shrieking about how she had the clumsiest daughter in the world.

  She also, as always, had the last word. ‘If you want your little friend to stay you’ll have to be very careful where you step, young lady.’

  Max hated when she called her that. First, she never wanted to be a lady. It was so girly. And secondly, whenever she was called ‘young lady’, it meant if she did anything wrong over the next few days, her life was cactus.

  Max got off the floor and walked into the bathroom to start washing her feathered outfit away. She was so angry but knew if she wanted Linden to stay she’d have to do everything her mother’s way. Which included pretending to like Aidan.

  ‘And I thought saving the world was hard,’ she muttered. ‘Pretending to like Aidan is going to make this one of the hardest weeks of my life.’

  Superspy Max Remy slammed her pick into the side of Popocatepetl in Mexico, a volcano that rose almost five a half thousand metres above sea level to a snow-covered, blue-sky summit. She was climbing to the top in an attempt to infiltrate the secret hideout of Count Blackheart, one of the world’s deadliest fiends. Closely behind her was Alex Crane. The two spies were the best in the business and since becoming partners, were also inseparable friends.

  ‘Max? How long until we reach the top?’

  Max brushed snow from her goggles and saw their destination a few metres above. ‘About thirty minutes.’

  ‘Good. My foot’s got this itch I’m dying to scratch.’

  The two laughed until the hook securing Alex’s rope snapped and she swung away from the cliff with nothing more than Max for support.

  ‘Alex!’ Max reached out to her friend but the wind buffeted her away. She loosened her rope to reach further, but it was no good. Alex fluttered like a burst hot air balloon battered by the icy winds.

  Max had another plan but just as she was about to try it, a helicopter swung over the edge of the summit, whipping the snow into a blinding storm and the winds into an even greater frenzy. A man carrying a large shiny knife was lowered on a long, metal cable.

  ‘Farewell, ladies.’ Blackheart’s voice reverberated from a loudspeaker.

  Max needed to think fast. She had to get to Alex before the knife-wielding man did and before the force of the helicopter tore them both off the mountain. Before

  ‘Max!’

  Max’s head spun round. She wasn’t climbing the summit of Popocatepetl. She was in her room and that was the sound of her mother calling.

  The door opened. Why didn’t her mother ever knock?

  ‘There’s a parcel for you. It’s from overseas.’ She handed it to Max and stood there waiting for her to open it. Max put it on her bed and kept typing.

  ‘Thanks. I’ll open it later.’

  ‘Don’t you want to see what it is?’ asked her mother, curious to see who the parcel was from.

  ‘Yeah. I just want to finish this first.’

  ‘Okay, sweetie. I’ll be downstairs.’

  After her dad left them for his new actress wife, Max’s mother hadn’t mentioned his name once. It was a kind of rule between them, but that didn’t mean she didn’t want to know what he wrote to Max.

  When her mother was far enough away, Max locked the door and opened the parcel. It wasn’t from her dad, it was from Spyforce. She picked up a small handheld device. The screen lit up and a soft voice spoke.

  ‘Max Remy fingerprint identific
ation complete. And now a word from our leader.’

  Harrison’s face appeared on the screen. He had a bandage around his head and a whiplash collar on his neck. Next to Harrison, Max didn’t seem clumsy at all.

  Hello, Max. How are you? Of course you can’t answer me, this is a recording. Don’t mind the bandages. A little accident with a hair dryer and a food processor.

  This parcel has some things you’ll need over the next few days. I’m talking to you from a palm computer. The best, most secure way to contact other rangers … I mean, agents. It also has a complete library of Spyforce literature with Internet access for updates. You’ll find A Brief History of Spyforce, which tells of the beginnings of the agency and has a few favourite recipes as well. There’s also The Guide to Spyforce Missions, subtitled, How They Did It, which lists every Spyforce mission ever completed. There’s a Training Manual to read for your exam and finally, the secret badge of Spyforce. Steinberger will be in frogfat … that is, contact, to tell you more.

  Snood fie … Oh golly, I mean, Goodbye.’

  Max opened The Guide to Spyforce Missions and looked up Alex’s name. She watched as full-colour pictures showed Alex abseiling in the Andes, diving in the Mediterranean and hiding in the markets of Marrakesh, Morocco. She’d outwitted baddies from Budapest to Broome, but not only that, her father had been a spy too and they’d completed lots of missions together as Spyforce’s only father and daughter team. But there was something else. One mission had been deleted. When she opened the page, it was blank.

  ‘What happened here?’

  Max’s alarm went off. She’d set it to remind her to check if her mum had called Linden’s dad. She put the palm computer away, slipped the secret badge in her pocket and went downstairs.