“Nope, they don’t even know to look for it. Don’t forget, Hale, that SRS can still see you on the cameras too. Go ahead and head toward the bathroom.”
“On my way,” I said, and went down to the administrative wing. There I swung into one of the bathrooms and waited by the sinks.
Step 2: Wait
This was the hard part—there was nothing more for me to do. I had to sit back and let everyone else play their parts for the next few minutes. I took a deep breath and leaned against the row of sinks.
“How are the new recruits holding up, Kennedy?” Ben asked.
“They’re good. Nervous, but good. I think everyone else just thinks they’re nervous about the performance. Walter is calming some of them down,” she said. “Is it time for me to go get Beatrix?”
Ben said, “Yep, go ahead.” Then he quickly doubled back, his voice sinking. “Whoa, everyone. Major problem—Fishburn hasn’t left his office yet.”
I put a hand to my forehead. Everything would fall apart if Fishburn didn’t go to the cheerleading performance.
Step 3: Break into Fishburn’s office (and don’t get killed doing it)
“Okay, okay, let me think,” I muttered at the empty bathroom. No one was free, exactly, to go off script and come get Fishburn. Except maybe . . . “Walter,” I said. “Walter will have to come get him. Kennedy, can you tell him?”
“Hey, Walter! Dr. Fishburn isn’t here yet. Can you go get him?” Kennedy immediately shouted above the fray. On the coms, everyone was silent; I wished that, like Ben, I could see the expression on Walter’s face. Of all the people to go off script . . .
“Sure,” Walter’s voice rang across Kennedy’s com.
“He’s going—Hale, he’s running,” Ben said, sounding satisfied.
“Right,” Kennedy said. With both Kennedy and Walter gone from the cafeteria, the noise on the coms faded into uneasy silence. I could hear the muffled sound of Walter’s feet slapping against the floor, which grew louder as he neared me. I stepped up so I could see the hallway, and we made brief eye contact as he flew past the bathroom door. You can do it, Walter. Don’t get nervous . . . He didn’t even have to lie to Fishburn, really, since You’re late for the cheerleading performance! was the truth. But based on what I saw back at Nelson Sports Academy, he still could choke.
Ben narrated. “He’s at the office, Hale. Okay, he’s going in . . . talking to Fishburn—yes! Fishburn’s up, they’re leaving, now Fishburn’s locking his door. Wow, Walter looks relieved—”
“He and I both,” I said, though I couldn’t deny I felt kind of proud of Walter. I waited until I heard Walter and Fishburn dash past the door to let out the deep breath I’d been holding.
Ben reappeared on the com. “All right, Fishburn is nearly to the cafeteria. Hale, hold your position. Kennedy, time to clear out the HITS room—”
“You’re supposed to be in uniform, Beatrix! And you guys are all supposed to be in the cafeteria for the performance!” Kennedy shrieked into her com unit. Well, not exactly over her com unit—she was saying this to Beatrix and the HITS guys. My com unit was suddenly filled first with the sound of grumbling, and then with the sound of computers chiming as they were shut down and locked up.
“Oh, come on! I don’t want to go!” Beatrix answered.
“You have to. You promised!” Kennedy argued with her for the benefit of the HITS audience. “Go change, fast. We’re starting in one minute.”
“Fine, fine,” Beatrix said. The sound of the cafeteria crowd grew louder in my com unit. A minute passed, then another—we were now officially behind schedule. I forced myself to breathe slower, waiting for Ben’s cue . . .
“Hale, you’re clear to go to the office,” Ben said.
I walked from the bathroom down the hall, then stopped in front of Fishburn’s now-darkened and locked office. This was it.
“All right, ready, everyone?” Kennedy called out to the other cheerleaders. The crowd hushed.
“Stand by, Hale,” Ben said. A click, and suddenly an explosive remixed pop song raged over my headset. I couldn’t hear Ben anymore, couldn’t hear anything but the thud of the bass and pounding melody. I had to trust my gut—it was time.
I withdrew the RoBEN from my utility belt and wound the little bird up. I set it on the office window ledge and then backed up, pinning my palms to my ears. The RoBEN screeched, a sound so impossibly high that it made my sinuses hurt. Just like Ben promised, the window shattered into a thousand tiny pieces that fell to the floor like bits of rock candy.
“You’re a genius, Ben,” I said into my com, though I didn’t know if he’d heard me, since at that exact moment the alarms went off. Lights flared, sirens wailed, and I knew every single room at SRS had identical alarms going off—letting the entire building know of a Gold Level security breach.
I didn’t care.
I mean, I did, but what I really cared about? The thick stack of papers just ahead, resting patiently on Fishburn’s printer.
Groundcover.
Chapter Twenty-Six
“All right, Hale, it looks like the HITS guys are running back to their desks . . . Yep. They see that it’s you on cameras four and five. For what it’s worth, they look more concerned than angry,” Ben muttered in my ear. I could barely hear him over the noise on everyone else’s coms. I reached through the broken window, unlocked Fishburn’s door, and ran inside. I snatched the stack of still-warm papers from the printer. I badly, badly wanted to look at them, but it wasn’t exactly a good time to sit down and do some reading.
“Got the file,” I answered. I tucked the papers under my arm and hurried back into the hall, away from the cafeteria.
“Perfect. Uncle Stan, you’re in position, right?” Ben asked.
“Dr. Oleander and I are pulling into Castlebury now, Ben, and awaiting your order!” Clatterbuck said brightly.
“Good. All right, Hale, it looks like Fishburn is about to make an announce—”
Ben was cut off by the sound of Fishburn’s voice. “Attention, SRS: Hale Jordan has violated a Gold Level security entrance. Please locate and detain Hale Jordan at once. All senior and junior agents on deck. Hale Jordan.” He said my name the last time like he couldn’t believe it. And from the murmuring I heard over Kennedy’s com, no one else could believe it either.
Step 4: Hide the new recruits in plain sight
“All right, how are we looking, Kennedy?” Ben asked her.
“Hale!” Kennedy screeched, and for a second my heart stopped—but then she went on, and I realized she was yelling for effect. People had to be staring at her right now, what with her brother being the subject of a manhunt and all. “How could he? Ugh—come on, Walter. Help me find him before he does something stupider.” Her voice was gravelly and rageful, almost unrecognizably so. I heard Walter shout in agreement.
“Good job, Kennedy,” Ben said. “Now you and Walter have to get out of there. That Quaddlebaum woman is heading your way to collect all the new recruits,” Ben said urgently.
“Come on, everyone—let’s go look upstairs. I just want to find him before everyone else—maybe there’s a reason. There’d better be a reason,” Kennedy fumed loudly. “Hurry—we’ve got to run.” The last word was full of weight for the new recruits.
“Perfect,” Ben said. “Hale, the SRS cheerleading squad has split up into four separate search parties.”
“Can you tell which one has Kennedy and Walter and the recruits?” I asked.
“Not really. They all look the same in their uniforms. The recruits should be out of the building and to you, Uncle Stan, in thirty seconds,” Ben said, sounding pleased. “Fishburn is on his way back to you, Hale. Let’s get you out. Take a right and go back toward the cafeteria, and you should be able to avoid the closest pack of agents,” Ben said over the com. I nodded and jumped back into the hall.
Step 5: Get the recruits (and myself) as far away from SRS as possible
“How’re we doing with the recruits?
” I whispered into my headset as I hurried along the hallway. I could hear voices a few halls over, but I had to trust that Ben would guide me along.
“We’re loading up now!” Clatterbuck said. If all had gone according to plan, he was just outside SRS’s cafeteria loading docks in a giant yellow school bus, dressed up as its driver. I wondered if Oleander had arrived in costume as well. Somehow, I doubted it.
“We’re out, Hale,” Kennedy said.
“Everyone’s safe?” I asked.
“I’m on board,” Beatrix said.
“All here, Hale,” Walter said after a brief rustling from him putting his com on. “But my mom figured out that all the recruits are missing. She tried to run after us but couldn’t figure out which group of cheerleaders the recruits were from the back, so I think she went to tell Fishburn and the HITS guys that she doesn’t have them.”
“No,” Ben said. “She’s actually running back to the dorms, I think. Hale, you’ll have to take a left up ahead, because there’s a group of senior agents at the end of the hall. They have their backs toward you, but go fast.”
“Got it,” I said, taking the left. I wanted to look back over my shoulder and check where the senior agents were, but no, I had to trust Ben and keep moving. I heard the bus squeal forward over my com, followed by cheering from the recruits; the sound made something in my chest melt a little. If everything else went wrong, at least we got them—and Beatrix, Walter, and Kennedy with them—out.
“Hang on, Hale, take another left here,” Ben said.
“If I take a left, I go farther from the exit,” I said.
“I know, but Fishburn is headed back toward his office. And then—wait, Hale. Mrs. Quaddlebaum just kicked down the door to your bedroom. She sees the BENoculars! She’s—” Ben took a sharp breath. “I’ve lost my feed,” Ben said. His voice was dead for a second, and then he repeated himself, panicked. “I’ve lost my feed! Hale? She unplugged the BENoculars. I can’t see the cameras anymore. I have no idea where you are or where anyone else is—”
“It’s fine,” I answered, even thought it wasn’t. I froze in the hall and tried to listen back to the sounds of voices. Focus, Hale, I told myself in a voice that sounded a lot like my Dad’s. I wanted to do anything but focus. I wanted to freak out and run and hide. But that wouldn’t help me right now. Spies existed long before computers and Right Hands and cameras and BENoculars. I could do this.
I cut right, jogging down past the secretary’s office. There were people in there, but they were preoccupied with sneaking up to a door in the back where I guess they thought I was hiding. More footsteps ahead, and I recognized the sound of Fishburn’s fancy shoes on the tile. I hung another right and circled the hall block to pass just a few yards behind him. I could hear the breathing of my friends over the com, but no one was speaking, like they were all afraid a single sound would break my concentration. I dared to peek around another corner—there was Ms. Elma, walking my way.
“Walter, Kennedy,” I whispered into the com. “I’m in the back of the admin hall. Ms. Elma is coming toward me. Fishburn is already back in his office. I need an out. Help me think.” I had to move—I dropped to my knees and crawled under the Disguise Department’s front window. I could hear more voices now, younger voices. The other junior agents, probably still in their SRS cheerleading uniforms, were starting to filter down to this part of the building.
“Oh, what about through the shooting range?” Kennedy asked.
“Give me the com,” Oleander said, apparently snatching Kennedy’s. “Hale? I’m coming in to get you.”
“What? No, you’ll get caught,” I protested. “Don’t.”
“You’re the most valuable asset we have, and I’m not letting you get trapped in there. I need to know exactly where you are.” I heard the bus air brakes exhale over the com.
“I’m in the Disguise Department—”
“I’ve got an idea!” Walter interrupted, his voice a little shaky. “Dr. Oleander, don’t go in after him—wait, where’d she go?”
“I’m already inside. I’ll be the backup plan,” Oleander whispered through her—well, Kennedy’s—com. “What’s your idea, Walter?”
“Okay, Hale—there’s an emergency stairwell near my mom’s office in the admin hall, not too far from the Disguise Department.”
“What? I’ve never seen a stairwell there.”
“You’d never know it was there if you didn’t go into her office all the time—just trust me! It should be a straight shot from where you are. The door’s locked, but it gives if you shove it hard enough—Cameron and Michael and I used to sneak out that way all the time. We’ll park the bus right outside—just make it down the hall and up the steps. Come on!”
I paused. “I’ll have to pass Fishburn’s office. And there’re other agents down there helping him by now, and I think a few of the junior agents would see me at the hallway intersection.”
“It doesn’t matter! We’re right here. You just have to stay a little ahead of them on the stairs.”
I exhaled. “I can’t do that, Walter.”
“What? Why not? It’s perfect! Look, Clatterbuck says he and Ben put some sort of fancy engine in this bus. They’ll gun it the moment that you hit the door and boom, we’re gone. You can do it!”
“No, Walter. You can do it, maybe. But I won’t be able to stay ahead of them on the stairs. I’m not fast enough. Hale the Whale, remember?”
I didn’t want to say it out loud any more than my friends wanted to hear it. Walter made a few halted sounds like he wanted to argue, but he stopped himself. Beatrix and Clatterbuck began shouting other suggestions, panic rising in their voices. Oleander chanted over and over that I should stay put, that she was making her way to me.
I sighed and then looked down at the stack of Groundcover papers in my hand. Once I was caught, I’d never have the chance to look. Never have the chance to learn whatever my parents had known that had forced them into hiding. Never have the chance to pass all of it along to The League, so they could stop SRS.
I couldn’t escape SRS, but at least I could get some answers. I reached up and pulled the com earring off, then slipped into the archive room, where I dropped to the ground and began to read.
Project Groundcover
Mission Start Date: 01-01-84
Projected End Date: Indefinite
Objective:
Project Groundcover seeks to place young agents into deep cover across the globe, where they will be able to infiltrate government, cultural, and religious agencies, assuring SRS’s control of said agencies.
[Operation Evergreen, sub-program, will seek out potential candidates for these missions, as well as replace absent SRS students who are assigned to Groundcover.]
I stared. SRS was planting kids across the world. Of course they were—it made perfect sense. It was genius, even. A few kids here and there, and boom, suddenly they controlled the planet. This was what my parents meant, when they said Project Groundcover would give SRS too much power—it would give them all the power, practically, and with more kids coming in through Operation Evergreen, they’d continue growing and growing until they ruled everything. The next few pages included maps, diagrams, blueprints, and information on the places SRS planned on sending junior agents. Then there were dozens and dozens of junior agent files, and from the looks of it, Groundcover involved kids from different SRS facilities all over the world.
Eleanor, from my class, was supposed to go to a stodgy boarding school in France, where she’d be able to befriend diplomats’ children and spy on their parents. Michael would, in two years, be sent to Russia, where he’d work his way up the ranks of its navy. Walter was going to Spain, where he’d be put in place to—oh, gross—impress the president’s daughter, who had a thing for shoulder muscles, and hopefully start dating her. I flipped another page and was surprised to see my own file—I guess Fishburn was serious about letting that whole physical exam thing go. It appeared I was slated to go to
Norway, where I’d be . . .
I rolled my eyes. Where I’d be helping out a butler in the royal household. Walter gets a Spanish girlfriend and I get to deliver the paper. Some junior agent.
I shuffled through the papers till I got to the section where senior agents were listed. There were plenty I didn’t know, but it didn’t take me long to find my parents. Their sections were thick, full of long mission reports and transcripts. The cover pages were the most informative.
[Senior Agent Assignments]
Katie Jordan
Role: Research
Shallow Cover - French Embassy
Shallow Cover - Home of French President
Shallow Cover - House of Lords
Shallow Cover - Russian Parliament
New Agent Placement
Mom was supposed to take kids and set them up in their undercover roles. No wonder she didn’t like it. There was an official SRS photo of her on the last page, and underneath it, smaller photos of her in various disguises.
Joseph Jordan
Role: Research
Shallow Cover - French Embassy
Shallow Cover - Home of French President
Shallow Cover - House of Lords
Shallow Cover - Russian Parliament
Opposition Removal
And Dad was supposed to stop anyone or anything that got in Mom’s way.
I tried not to think too hard about what that might mean. I looked at Dad’s photo longer than I should have, seeing as how I could still hear running in the halls, and then I turned the page.
Alex Creevy
Role: Research
Shallow Cover - French Embassy
Shallow Cover - Home of French President
Shallow Cover - House of Lords
Shallow Cover - Russian Parliament
Deep Cover - The League
I read it again.
And again.
What?
I flipped the page, to where the photo of Alex Creevy should have been. There was a pretty woman with black hair looking back at me, though the photo looked a little old. I was surprised—Clatterbuck had made me think Alex Creevy was a man, but I suppose he’d just assumed, and Alex was one of those names that could go either way. I looked down; underneath the official photo were dozens of photos of her in disguise, just like Mom’s page. Here she was as a redhead or wearing a hijab or with blue contacts in or with her eyebrows overpenciled. Here she was with blond hair.