* * *
Johnny ran down the stairs leading to the first floor and the area where the Chip was to be exchanged. The United Order was paying a lot of money to get a computer processor Chip from a group of scientists who claimed that they found a way to make CPU Chips faster without burning out from the heat build up. If the United Order was able to duplicate this Chip before anyone else, they would have the fastest computers on the planet. Not that they even needed to do that, it sounded like just having one of these Chips would be enough to dominate the entire world’s technological resources.
There were a lot of guards on the floor, seven to be exact. That was supposed to be a lucky number, thought Johnny. The guards patrolled the floor with a bored and sloppy demeanor, none of them were expecting anything to happen. That would be Johnny’s biggest weapon, the element of surprise.
He slowly snuck around a few crates until he could get a good view of the center of the warehouse. There were three scientists speaking to someone in the United Order, not a guard, someone who actually looked important.
The man turned and Johnny got a good look at his face. He had a big scar that ran down from one side of his face to the other. He was also very, very tall, towering over everyone near him. The three scientists all seemed very nervous around him. And the man, Johnny decided to call him Scar, loomed over everyone, intimidating them with his ugly glower.
“Let me see it,” Scar demanded.
The scientists all motioned to each other nervously. Finally, one of them, the one at the very back of the group, shook his head.
Scar raised his eyebrows in warning.
“We would like to see the money first,” the Brave Scientist spoke with a scared and squeaky voice. “Please,” he added, taking away much of his show of strength.
“Of course,” Scar replied.
Scar raised his hand, palm out, towards the Brave Scientist.
His colleagues around him instantly parted, leaving the Brave Scientist standing all by himself. A blinding white light shot out of Scar’s hand and completely enveloped the Brave Scientist.
Johnny was forced to look away from the brightness, but he heard the scream that followed. When the light finally died down, Johnny looked back and saw a steaming skeleton lying on the ground where the Brave Scientist used to be.
Johnny’s mouth hung open in shock.
The rest of the scientists looked from their dead partner and slowly back to Scar.
“I hope, for all your sakes, that he was not the one carrying the Chip,” Scar boomed.
“No, no, I have it right here.” One of the scientists held up the Super Chip.
Without a word, Scar snatched it from his hand and examined it.
Scar brought out what looked like a small, green lens. He looked through it at the Chip and was able to see the Chip magnified hundreds of times.
“As you can see,” the scientist continued, “the Chip uses light as registers, being able to withstand heat and process computer instructions at speeds of up to ten times or more than the best modern computers. With this Chip you would have a huge advantage over the rest of the world.”
Scar checked the connections and the registers as the scientist blabbed on until he was satisfied that he was holding the right processing Chip.
“This is the one,” he said at last, lowering the magnifying lens.
“And now our payment?” another scientist asked.
Scar motioned to the seven guards around him, who instantly surrounded the scientist and brought up their guns.
“But…we brought you what you asked for, and we didn’t try to double cross you,” stammered a scientist in protest.
“You did,” admitted Scar. “How very foolish of you.”
With an icy cold stare at the scientists, Scar nodded his head.
The seven guards instantly fired white beams from their guns, similar to the beam that came out of the device on Scar’s palm, but without nearly the amount of brightness or power.
The scientists shrieked as they were melted down to their skeletal form, and then they all fell over each other to form a pile of bones.
It was too late to save the scientists, but Johnny B. Fast had to act fast before Scar got away with the Super Chip.
Peeking out from his hiding spot, Johnny planned his attack. All the guards were standing very close to each other, which was the perfect time to strike. Still, he waited until Scar started to walk away. There was something about him that Johnny didn’t like. It wasn’t that he was scared of him, Johnny B. Fast wasn’t scared of anyone, but still, it didn’t hurt to be safe rather than sorry.
Once Scar was far enough away, Johnny bolted.
He came running out of his hiding spot, throwing out what looked like a yo-yo as he ran.
The guards all yelled in surprise, but before they could mobilize, the yo-yo shot out and wrapped around three of the seven guards. As the string started to go around them, it grew in length and stuck to their clothes, creating a sticky web that kept their arms pinned to their sides.
The other four guards would be more of a problem. They were far enough away that Johnny couldn’t use a similar gadget to stop them.
They brought up their laser guns and aimed them at Johnny.
Johnny slid to the ground and threw an egg at the floor. As soon as the egg hit the ground it exploded into a strobe of multiple colors, flashing and blinding everyone in the immediate area except for Johnny, who had kept his eyes closed when the egg burst.
Lasers shot randomly over his head.
Johnny stayed low to the ground as he quickly ran toward the nearest guard.
When the lights stopped, Johnny figured he would be taking down the four guards before they would have a chance to recuperate and figure out what happened. He just had to position himself to be at the right spot at the right moment.
That’s what being a spy was all about.
The strobe light stopped, and Johnny was ready to take down the…
Five guards?
Six?
Where did that other one come from?
Seven, no eight guards. Plus the two in the back.
Johnny wasn’t sure what happened. There were only supposed to be four guards, and now he had to deal with ten?
Things were not turning out as they were supposed to. If Johnny could get out of this in one piece, he would have to strongly consider taking a year off the spy business.
The ten guards, who could now see, brought their laser guns up in Johnny’s direction.
He had to think of something, fast.
Really fast.
Johnny froze.
“Uh oh,” he managed to say.
It looked like turning fifteen wasn’t going to work out very well for Johnny B. Fast.
But then she appeared out of nowhere.
Dropping down on the first guard from the half floor above, she knocked him out and instantly sprang toward the second.
Before Johnny or any of the other guards knew what was happening, the young girl had already knocked down four of the ten guards. They looked to be unconscious, and Johnny wasn’t exactly sure what she was able to do to knock them out so fast.
The girl was wearing a black outfit and her brown hair was tide back in a ponytail. She moved so gracefully and quickly that none of the guards had a chance to react.
Reaching into a pouch at her side, the girl threw out a rubber ball at the group of six guards that were left. The ball hit one of them right in the chest and then exploded out into a net that covered them all. One of the guards managed to get out as the net fully caught and then electrocuted the remaining five.
Johnny and the guard looked at her in awe.
“Are they dead?” Johnny asked.
“Just unconscious,” she replied.
Johnny and the last guard looked back at the net. It was at that moment that they both realized they weren’t on the same team. The guard brought up his laser gun, but Johnny quickly knocked it aside and pun
ched him out.
“Nice move,” the girl commented as she looked at the nine guards she had taken out all by herself.
“Thanks. Um, you too, nice move, I mean moves, because you did more than my one.”
The girl laughed at him; it was a nice melodic sound, but Johnny didn’t like the fact that it was directed at him.
The warehouse was now empty, both Scar and the Chip were long gone.
The girl got a closer look at him.
“You’re that boy from school, Johnny something…Clunker! Johnny Clunker.”
Johnny hated his real name. What kind of a name was Clunker? It was the sort of name that guaranteed you wouldn’t get picked for teams, or get to hang out with the cool kids. It practically begged teachers who saw it on test papers to try and find any way they could to give him a failing mark. No matter which way you looked at it, Clunker was not cool. Which is what he capitalized on in school to keep his super spy identity secret, but that didn’t mean he had to like it.
“That’s not my real name!” he blurted out before he could really think about it. Why did she make him so nervous?
“No, it is my real name. But it’s not the name I’m going under right now,” he tried to correct himself.
“What’s the name you’re going under right now?” she asked the obvious question, her eyebrow arched up in an amused glance.
“I’m Johnny B. Fast,” he said, holding out his hand. “And I’m a super spy.”
The girl looked at him for a moment and then burst out laughing again.
Johnny felt really foolish holding out his hand for her to shake while she was laughing at him. He slowly retracted his hand.
“Thanks,” he mumbled.
She quickly composed herself.
“I’m sorry. I never met a spy who introduced themselves as a spy before.”
“Maybe I admitted I was a spy to throw you off and make you think the last thing I was was a spy?” Johnny tried.
She looked like she was going to laugh again. He had to get a hold of himself; why was he so nervous?
“Forget it, that just sounded terrible,” he admitted.
She could see he was suffering, and her heart went out to him, “I didn’t mean to laugh,” she offered.
“Yes you did,” he shot back.
“I guess no one ever means to laugh when they laugh. That’s the whole point of laughing, it takes you by surprise,” she reasoned.
What a strange girl she was. Still, Johnny couldn’t deny the fact that she had flawlessly taken out ten guards by herself.
Nine! Johnny had taken care of the last one, even if he was preoccupied at the time, it still counted.
Trying to make up, she held out her hand for him to shake.
“My real name’s Nancy Korrins, but you can call me Seventy-Seven.”
“Seventy-Seven?” Johnny asked.
“Yup,” she offered back, her hand still stuck out between them.
“What kind of a name is that?”
“It’s my spy name,” she replied, taking back her hand.
“That’s not a very cool spy name,” Johnny said.
“Spy names aren’t supposed to be cool, they just are.”
Johnny shook his head.
“What’s the point of having a spy name if it isn’t going to be cool?”
“That’s just guy talk. Guys are always trying to look cool, or be cool, or have cool names,” she reasoned. “Besides, the whole point of it all is to save the world from evil.”
“I think the world would rather be saved by Johnny B. Fast than by Seventy-Seven,” Johnny shot back.
“I don’t think the world cares who saves it, as long as it’s saved,” Nancy, or Seventy-Seven, replied.
As they were talking, a lone guard, the last one left in the warehouse, crept slowly toward them. He had a laser gun in his hands, and he made sure to keep it lowered as he approached. Both Johnny and Nancy were too involved in their argument to notice.
“Spy names aren’t even supposed to be known, they’re supposed to be a secret!” Nancy argued.
The guard got closer. He could have taken the shot then, but he wanted to get even closer so that he couldn’t miss. Maybe he could even take both of them out in one shot?
“You know, I didn’t ask for your help,” Johnny stated.
“But you needed it.”
“No, I had everything under control,” Johnny replied.
“I’m sure that’s what you thought, before you jumped in the middle of that group of, was it ten people?” she asked, feigning not knowing how many guards there had been.
“I was right about to take care of them.”
“I’m sure you were.”
“I had several ways of doing it!” he practically screamed at her.
“I’d like to see one of them,” she stated coolly. “And until I do, I’m going to assume that I saved you and that you need to thank me.”
The guard was in position, he wasn’t going to get a better shot than this. He raised his laser gun up high, set it for an explosive blast, and aimed it at the two of them.
“Well, for one thing, I could have done this.”
In one quick movement, Johnny leaned sideways and threw a handful of marbles past Nancy.
At the same time, Nancy turned around and brought a whistle to her lips, letting out a sharp trill that caused the guard to drop his laser gun and grab his ears in pain as he was lifted off his feet from the blast.
Meanwhile, the marbles Johnny threw reached the guard and exploded, drenching him in a kaleidoscope of multicolored extra sticky paint.
The guard passed out.
Johnny and Nancy turned to look at each other.
“I got him first,” Johnny stated.
“You did not,” Nancy replied.