My stomach flipped. There she was with blond hair.
I knew Alex Creevy. Only I knew her as Pamela Oleander.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
My hands shook for a moment before I forced them to be still. How could I have missed this? There were clues, clues that screamed at me in hindsight. She hadn’t just guessed the name Agent Smith in the car with Walter and me that day; she knew Agent Smith worked in Tactical Support. She hadn’t pressed so hard about Groundcover because The League needed to know; she’d done it so she could find SRS’s security weaknesses. She hadn’t even asked me how to get to the Disguise Department only a few moments ago when she was breaking in to “rescue me.” Why would she ask? She knew where the department was. She was an SRS agent.
“Guys, Alex Creevy. She’s—”
The door to the archive slammed open. Someone punched at my arm and the com bracelet went flying. I whirled around, but another hand struck the side of my temple. It didn’t knock me out, but the world went sideways for a minute, and I couldn’t tell where the ground was. There were voices, I was caught, but I had to warn the others about Oleander. I mean . . . Creevy.
“You mean me,” Oleander/Creevy said, and I looked up. “You were mumbling out loud. It happens sometimes with a blow to the head,” she added.
“You just punched a kid in the head, Alex,” someone else said. I was surprised to see Otter standing in the doorway.
“I just punched a rogue agent who is double-crossing us,” Creevy corrected. Otter shrugged and collected my fallen com. Then he dropped it into his pocket and shuffled all the Groundcover papers together.
“Let’s go, Jordan,” Creevy said, hauling me to my feet.
“You’re not really Oleander,” I said dizzily. “How can you . . . How could we . . .”
“I’m very, very good at my job, that’s how,” Creevy said.
My vision was becoming clearer, but my mind wasn’t. It felt like my entire brain had been tossed around until everything I knew was true was mixed up with everything I knew was a lie. Oleander was Creevy. Creevy was Oleander.
Villains don’t always look like villains.
I felt sick.
In the hall outside the archive room were Fishburn and dozens of agents—junior and senior—staring. I couldn’t get away with this many people watching, even if I could somehow overpower Creevy—who was obviously pretty willing to hurt me. Fishburn walked in front of me with Creevy and Otter just behind. Everyone was looking at me with shock and disgust, and I heard mutters like “How could you?” and “This would break your parents’ hearts.”
Fishburn gave his broken office window a dismayed look when we walked inside. “Ah, here we go. Agent Otter, would you mind watching the door while Agent Creevy, Hale, and I speak?” he said. His voice was still calm, like this was some sort of bizarre parent-teacher conference rather than my doom.
Otter nodded. “Yes, sir.”
“Thanks for helping us find him. I can’t believe you were right. I didn’t peg him for a hider,” Creevy said, smiling as she passed Otter. She gave him a look that made me think they didn’t like each other very much, and made me know that they went way back. They were about the same age; I guessed they were in SRS classes together when they were kids.
“I’ve known Jordan longer than you have,” Otter answered. “The key with a kid like that is remembering that he’s not going to do what the other kids will do. He’s not fast enough or strong enough to actually make it out of here past all the search parties we had. All he can do is hide, really.”
I gave Otter the nastiest look I could muster, but I wasn’t sure how much good it did. We moved into Fishburn’s office, where I was forced into the chair across from his desk, the same chair I sat in when Fishburn had told me that my parents had been compromised. I assessed the situation. Dozens of agents outside, Otter at the door, and no way to contact anyone at The League. I still had on the utility belt Ben had made for me.
Creevy reached forward and clicked the belt, then yanked it off. She tossed it to Otter in the doorway.
“Stop, Hale.” Fishburn sighed at me. “I can tell you’re still looking for a way out, and you know, I respect that. But stop. There are a lot of angry agents out there. Teresa Quaddlebaum alone is reason enough to stop, if you ask me.”
Creevy nodded. “I’ll talk to her, if you want. I think you can still get Walter back for SRS.”
“What about Kennedy Jordan?” Fishburn asked.
Creevy snorted a little. “Not a chance. It’s a pity too—she would’ve been a great junior agent.”
“She would have. And plenty of those kids would have been perfect assets all over the world,” Fishburn said, turning a steely eye back to me. “But now we’ve practically got to start over with Operation Evergreen, thanks to you, Hale. You must be feeling pretty pleased with yourself.”
I firmed my jaw. “For freeing a bunch of kids you kidnapped? Yeah, I am.”
Fishburn’s eyes widened, like I’d said the most offensive thing possible. “Those kids would have had amazing lives! They would have become princesses and heirs and presidents! And now they’re going to be, what, top chess players? Junior Olympic swimmers? The tall girl, we were going to get her married to the prince of England. Now where is she? Back to being some diplomat’s boarding-school daughter?”
“You still kidnapped them,” I said, ignoring Fishburn. “And you put my parents In the Weeds.”
Fishburn slammed his hands down on his desk, and it took every bit of willpower I had not to jump. “Your parents were going to let everyone know about SRS. We told them what Groundcover was all about—we thought we could trust them—and the next thing we know, they’re digging into SRS itself. This organization raised them, sheltered them, fed them, and educated their children. They’re traitors.” There was a pulsing vein in the middle of his forehead that reminded me of Ms. Elma’s scar.
“My parents betrayed you, maybe, but they did what was right,” I said.
“Abandoning you and your sister here?”
“Refusing to work for an organization of monsters. Just like I’m refusing. I quit, Fishburn. How do you like that?”
“Oh, Hale, I’m sorry, but I won’t be accepting your resignation. We need you,” Fishburn said. His voice made my spine crawl in the worst way.
“Whatever it is, I won’t do it,” I growled.
“You won’t have to do much. See, we’re going to hold you here to draw your parents back. We’ll need to get information across the appropriate channels—Alex, write this down, please.” Creevy looked annoyed at being given a job usually reserved for a secretary, but she lifted paper and a pen. “Make sure it gets out that we have the Jordans’ son. Tell the Carraway brothers, MI9, the guys from Pakistan—we’re willing to trade him for the two of them.”
“They won’t come in,” I said. “But go ahead. Waste your time. Lock me up.”
Creevy spoke, her voice dark. “SRS has plenty of holding cells, Hale. We can waste as much time as it takes, because they’re not going to get away with this. Your parents wanted to blow a mission that’s cost me ten years of my life. Steve was a shoo-in for the deep cover assignment, but then, noooo, he had to go and wreck Acapulco—”
“That wasn’t my fault!” Otter snapped from the door.
“Whatever, Steve. You don’t have to go back to The League, so be grateful. That whole place is one giant dead end. I can’t believe we didn’t realize their funding was being cut before they installed me as director. What a career-killer.”
“You think Clatterbuck and the others will let you come back to The League?” I scoffed.
“You think we’re going to allow you to tell them who I really am?” Creevy answered, folding her arms. I began to see just how great a spy Creevy was—because the woman in front of me was nothing at all like the Pamela Oleander I thought I knew. Her cover character was truly remarkable.
“I already told them. The minute I saw your picture. Sure, I
didn’t have time to go into detail, but they’ll figure it out.” This was a lie, of course, but I couldn’t let Creevy go back to my sister and my friends.
Creevy looked at me, and I could tell she was trying to study if my pupils were dilating—one of the easiest ways to spot a lie. Mom had taught me how to keep them still, though—by breathing slowly and focusing on something close by—so in the end she looked at Fishburn for advice.
“Well, if they know, we’ll have to eliminate them,” Fishburn said, shrugging.
Spies were supposed to keep a cool head. We were supposed to think clearly even in the most stressful of situations.
But I basically snapped.
I lunged forward at Fishburn—to do what, exactly, I wasn’t sure—but I flung myself over the desk and toward him, shouting curse words that would have gotten me grounded for years if my parents had been there. Creevy leaped at me and tried to wrestle me back into my chair, but she couldn’t do it alone; Otter jumped into the office and, between the two of them, they managed to force me back down. I tried to control my breathing—I shouldn’t have done that. Shouldn’t have let them know they’d gotten to me.
Though, they shouldn’t have threatened my little sister.
Now that he wasn’t in danger of being pummeled by a twelve-year-old, Fishburn looked indignant. He smoothed his hair and glowered at me, shaking his head.
“Really, Hale? You attacked me? I guess you must really think you’re something. You go on a few missions, dodge a few agents, start to feel like you’re not a failure, and next thing you know, you’re so arrogant that you’ll attack your own director. Let me tell you something—do you think I just decided to ignore the physical requirements for fun, to give the chubby boy a chance to go on a mission or two? Don’t be ridiculous. I lifted them so you’d have something to do that kept you returning to The League. I hoped that you’d tell Clatterbuck or ‘Oleander’ or even those twins something that would lead us to your parents. It wasn’t because you’d earned a place on those missions, Jordan. Look at you. You’re no field agent.”
I didn’t let my expression change. Eyes locked, mouth firm. But inside, everything felt broken. It had all been fake. Every bit of it. I wasn’t ahead of them—they’d been ahead of me the entire time.
I really was trapped.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
“Take him to holding,” Fishburn said. “Both of you, just in case he gives you trouble. Don’t let anyone else get close to him.”
“Yes, sir,” Otter said. He flung my utility belt over his shoulder, then reached forward and plucked the stack of Groundcover papers off Fishburn’s desk. “I’ll get these shredded too.”
I rose, and Otter produced a pair of plastic handcuffs from his pocket. He looped them around my wrists, and then he and Creevy walked on either side of me through the office door. The crowd was still there, though now they were mostly silent. I didn’t look at anyone’s face. I had to focus on the mission. Only, there was no mission anymore. So I focused on the wall. We broke through the crowd, and they led me down several hallways, toward intake. Never had the word sounded more like “prison.”
“So, Steve. What’s it like being a teacher? When’s the last time you went on an actual mission?” Creevy said. Her voice was teasing, but not in a fun way.
“Just the other day, actually. With Jordan. For Evergreen. He . . . well . . .” Otter cleared his throat. “He did a fine job on it. Improvised well. Surprised even me, and let’s be honest—I’ve never liked the kid.”
Creevy’s voice filled with disdain. “That doesn’t count. I mean a real mission. That hospital thing was just a distraction to make Hale feel good about himself.”
“It was a real mission!” Otter said. “We had another junior agent slated to play the part before Hale turned them all purple. Which was also impressive, I have to say.”
“Oh, write him a love letter already,” Creevy said, rolling her eyes.
“My point is, Alex,” Otter said, making her name sound like a bad word, “that SRS clearly trained him up well. He broke into The League, he ran point on those missions, and he broke a dozen recruits out today and got his whole team out. If you weren’t an SRS agent, he’d have gotten away with it, all without passing the physical exam. That’s a hell of a thing for a fat kid.”
“Thanks a lot,” I muttered, wishing he’d shut up. Otter shoved me in the back a little, and I tumbled, just barely catching my balance. Creevy laughed under her breath and didn’t look over. Which was a good thing, because even with all the spy training in the world, I was totally incapable of hiding my surprise.
The handcuffs on my wrists weren’t tight.
I only noticed because when Otter shoved me, I tried to put my hands in front of myself to keep from smashing into the ground. I hadn’t needed to, but trying alone made me realize that they were big. Big enough that with a little twisting and maybe a few pinches, I’d be able to pull my hands free. Did Otter realize? I wasn’t sure. Either way, I needed to wait until I had a possible exit to try anything . . . which was going to be really hard with Creevy just a half step ahead of me and Otter a step behind.
“You know, Alex,” Otter spit as we took another turn, “we don’t have to fight every time we’re in the same room.”
“We don’t? But I enjoy it so much,” Creevy said, flashing a smile I’d believe if I didn’t know her to be totally evil on all levels.
“We don’t. We’ve got the same goals, Alex. So we’re on the same team.”
I swallowed.
Because I knew then that Otter wasn’t talking to Creevy. He was talking to me. My parents had said the same thing to him ages ago, back in his office. It took me a long time to process what this meant, because it seemed even more impossible than Pamela Oleander being Alex Creevy. It meant that Otter, of “Is that what you call a sit-up?” fame, was helping me.
Creevy was slowing down—we were about to take another turn, and if the giant metal door she meant to go through was any indication, this would be my final stop. She approached the door first, and when she looked down at the handle, I glanced at Otter.
He gave me the smallest of nods.
I yanked my hands from the handcuffs in one swoop. Otter dropped my utility belt and the Groundcover papers and dived for Creevy, who immediately began to fight him off. Otter was quick, though, and he held his own against her. I dropped to the ground and grabbed my belt and as many of the Groundcover papers as I could. The alarm began to sound again, even shriller down here in the land of tile floors and heavy doors—they’d spotted us on the cameras.
“Go!” Otter grunted at me, reaching into his pocket and flinging my com unit at me. Creevy kicked him in the stomach and lunged for me, but I ducked and set her flying over my head. She rebounded, but Otter cut her off again. She was in better shape—it wouldn’t be long before she got the best of him.
Otter was going to pay for this. As often as I’d wanted to make him pay, I couldn’t be happy about that.
But I ran. I raced down the hall the way we came, lungs tightening and muscles begging for rest. There was the heavy door, probably with agents on the other side. I clipped on my utility belt as I huffed along, then jammed my com back onto my ear just as I heard the sound of Creevy’s heels on tile, racing after me.
“Ben! Ben, are you there?” I wheezed into the com.
“Hale!” Ben shouted triumphantly, and I heard cheering. “You’re alive!”
“For now—I’m trying to get out. What does the HellBENder do?”
“Huh?”
“The HellBENder! I’m about to run into the SRS hall, alone, and that’s the only thing I’ve got left. You said it was a last resort”—I had to stop to take a big gulp of air—“but I can’t use it if it’s going to blow up the building or kill everyone or something—”
“Hale, again with the dark stuff. Do you seriously think I’d invent something—”
“What does it do?” I said, hacking into the earring. The
door was growing closer. There wasn’t any time to stop and talk this through, not with the sound of Creevy bearing down on me.
“Take it,” Ben said confidently. “Just take it. It’s a last resort, but don’t worry. We’ll be here to get you when it wears off, so long as you can make it out of the building.”
I had no idea what he meant. I didn’t even see how I could take something that looked like a tube of lipstick. But I reached down for my belt and plucked the HellBENder off, and then I pulled the cap off the tube. Sure enough, what looked like lipstick turned out to be a single fat pill. I lifted it to my mouth as I hit the door that led into the hall.
Agents. Senior agents, not junior ones. Staring at me, fingers flexed, heads down, wearing sleek black SRS uniforms.
I swallowed the HellBENder.
I didn’t know how I knew this, but I was pretty sure that the moment the HellBENder took effect felt exactly like what eating the sun would feel like.
My whole body was energy. All of it. It was like my chest was full of sun and volcanoes. Suddenly my lungs didn’t seem too small—they seemed too big. Adrenaline raced through me in ways I’d never known. I tossed a handful of the Groundcover papers at the senior agents and then barreled through them. They lashed out at me, kicking, punching, backflipping, but I forged ahead, strength I’d never known blasting through me.
A few more agents were in front of me, racing to get down to where the alarms were sounding. They braced themselves, but I was past them before they realized what was happening. I threw another handful of papers in the air at them and kept moving. The elevators would be shut down, but the garage exits might still be open. I flew toward the cafeteria, ignoring the faces of my classmates, my teachers, the very confused HITS guy that I was passing . . .