Matt glared at Jani. “Answer the question.”

    She shrugged and tossed her hair over her shoulder, “Or what? You'll 'make another exception?'”

    Matt took a step towards her, “Listen you little-”

    That was when Joey stepped up behind him. “That would be a really, really, really, bad idea.”

          Matt jumped and spun around, “you too?”

Joey put his hands in the air, “I'm unarmed.” This was not quite true, he

had at least half a dozen weapons concealed on his person. Not that he had any intention of using them. It would be better that way. “Look, let's just talk this out.”

“Oh, talk!” spat Matt, “you want to TALK?! Maybe you should have thought of that before you almost knocked me unconscious!!!”

Jani shrugged innocently, “he started it.”

“I don't care who started it!” snapped Joey, feeling a lot like his mom. It was a scary feeling. He took a deep breath and reminded himself what was at stake. “Okay,” he said, “we are going to use our INSIDE voices and not our fists.” He sent an exaggerated glance at Jani. She took the hint.

Sitting down to look less threatening, she glanced up at Matt. She did not like having to look up at people, which was one of the reasons she wore thick-soled shoes. The other was that she found them very useful for cracking people's toes. “How old are you?” she asked, directing the question at Matt.

“What?”

“How. Old. Are. You.”

Matt goggled at Jani, “You dragged me out here, and now you want to know how old I am!?!?”

“It's a long story.”

“Tell it!”

Jani and Joey looked at each other and nodded simultaneously. Joey turned to Matt, “Okay.”

Matt sat down hard. They were spies. At least they said they were. After their explanation, he had almost burst out laughing. Then he had remembered what Jani had done, without even breaking a sweat. Could the story be true? Matt told himself it was lunacy, but he couldn't suppress a small voice at the back of his mind that whispered otherwise. And they wanted him, HIM, to take them on a train. Not just any train, a train to California. He had explained how he was eighteen, how he had just aged out of foster care and was looking for a job. He had explained that no one would look for him. They had also handed him a wad of money with advice not to look into its past. If half of what they told him was true, that was good advice. Of course they said it would be dangerous, and deadly, but Matt only pretended to listen to that part. He had always been a dare-devil. Then they handed him a gun. When he asked how they knew he wouldn't shoot them, Jani calmly explained that then he would die a slow and painful death. He believed her. When he looked up they were staring expectantly at him. There was only one thing he could think to say: “Yes.”

Chapter two: Infiltration

        Matt woke in the middle of the night, sweating despite the cold. He struggled to recall a rapidly fading dream; he, Joey and Jani had been running from...from..he couldn't remember. He couldn't help but feel that if he stayed with the others something awful would happen. It was as if the night had sucked out all of his resolve. He took hold of his bag and quietly opened the tent flap. They had camped in the woods, next to a stream. The train station opened in the morning. It would be easy to slip away...he made it a few yards before something tackled him. He went down with a strangled, “Blargh!” That was when he realized the something was a person. A person named Jani in fact. Obviously trying to prevent him from doing exactly what he was doing. He decided to try one more thing, “Can't a guy do his business in private?!”

Jani was unimpressed, “you're a bad liar.”

“That obvious?”

“Pretty much.”

“I'll go back to bed.” He decided that trying to escape wouldn't work. Anyway, it was only a dream.

The Mercenary crouched as they examined the SCAN control room. Normally they would have killed the guard, but the less evidence the better. He would sleep till morning. They stood up and glided toward the window, silently removing the pane. They had what they came for-they had to beat the recruits to California. They strode towards the nearby woods where they had hidden their vehicle. The black motorcycle made not a sound as The Mercenary started down the road. Being children would earn them no mercy.

Jani stepped down from the tree she had been sitting in. It was time to wake Joey for watch. Halfway to their tent she froze-she had heard a cracking twig behind her. Just a deer, she told herself, just a deer. Slowly she turned around. She didn't think deer wore ski masks and carried a nine-millimeter.

“On the ground. Now.”

Jani's eyes darted around, looking for other hostiles.

“Don't even think about it. We have you surrounded.”

She gulped. She could take one or two gunners, maybe three. But enough to surround their camp, no way. He-the voice was male-could be bluffing, but did she want to take that chance? Cautiously, she laid down. Were they Atlantis agents? She decided not, too sloppy. If they were from Atlantis she wouldn't have heard them coming at all. Her best chance might be 'little miss scared-and-wimpy.' “Pu..pu..please...don't h..hurt me.” He laughed condescendingly, and nudged her with his foot.

She bit her tongue to keep from dislocating his leg. A false tear trickled from her eye. She'd always loved acting. Gently she tried a subtle probe, “What do you want?” It was a challenge to put a tremble in her voice.

“Money-where do you keep it?”

She whimpered softly.

He kicked her, “Where!”

She could have ripped his foot off, but instead she groaned twice as loud as necessary, “You're hurting me!” she yelled in the direction of the tent she and Joey shared.

The hostile picked her up by her collar, “Shhh! Where is it?” he put the gun to her head.

She pretended to flinch. “In...in there.” She nodded to Joey's tent.

He raised a hand and a similarly dressed person appeared out of the woods and crossed to the tent she had indicated.

Either she had helped Joey, or she had killed him.

Joey was laying still, trying to convince himself he was asleep. So when Jani shouted out her warning, it caused him to sit bolt upright with a taser in his hand. Naturally that was when the guy with the gun came in. He scanned the room, waiting a second too long before he got to Joey. He made a loud thump as he fell to the floor. The hostile...oh geez, I'm becoming just like Jani...the hostile wasn't alone, that was obvious, but what if they were surrounded? He could take out one of them, two if he was lucky, but otherwise....they were toast.

The thump was clearly audible from where Jani was laying. She let out a sigh of relief. She still couldn't see the hostile's face, but she heard the intake of breath. It was with great pleasure that she dislocated his right foot, “o...oh...n....n...no I'm so...so sorr...sorry,” stuttered Jani with a look of pure glee on her face. Nobody hurt her friends. Or held them at gun point. She ran over to Joey's tent, throwing open the flap.

Joey almost tasered her in the stomach. “Jani, are you okay? I heard your warning. Were they from Atlantis? How many of them were there? Is Matt okay? Are we going to leave now?”

Jani only really registered one of the questions. “Matt!” she gasped, running over to his tent. They hadn't trusted him enough to share. She shoved her head through the flap. It was empty. Then, with impeccable timing, she heard the cocking of a gun behind her. She turned around and there was Matt. She wished he had been alone, but he wasn't. In fact, he was gagged, with his hands tied behind his back.

“Mmmmfff!” he groaned, too late to do her any good.

She assumed that this was the last hostile, but she'd comb the camp after they took care of him.

“Oh look, a little girl,” said the mugger sarcastically. “Your friend here put up a fight, let's hope you're more cooperative.” He never got to finish threatening her because Joey tasered him in the back.

Matt didn't go back to sleep. He doubted he would ever sleep again. They would go on the train at daybreak. Until then, Jani's advice was to 'Shut your gob-hole and close your eyes,Wintergreen.' It was harder than it sounded. It felt like he had been laying in his tent for eons when Joey came to tell him they were leaving. He put his bag on his shoulder and crawled out through the flap, turning to pack up the tent. He wouldn't admit it to anyone, least of all himself, but he was scared.

Jani was surprised at how confident she felt as they boarded the train. The ticketing had gone as well as they could have hoped. While they were on the train, they had agreed, Matt was their cousin Fred, who was kindly escorting young Johnny and Sarah to their great aunt Wilson, who was dying of bowel cancer. She had added a few well-placed tears and nose-blowings for effect. Only a few days until California. Mentally, she sketched out an attack. Time to make a plan.

Matt peeked into Joey's pack, the lemonade looked inviting.

Joey saw him looking. “Leave that alone,” he said forcefully, nodding at Matt's hand.

Matt was furious. How dare Joey keep the good stuff for himself while everyone else was stuck with reddish tap water? Joey turned to Jani; Matt took his chance, quickly sticking his arm into Joey's bag. When he took a swig, his face crinkled. It tasted really odd. “Someone pee in this?” he meant it as a joke.

“Well...” said Joey, breaking into a smile, “the line for the bathroom is really long and...um...Nature calls”

Matt dropped the bottle and began clawing at his tongue.

Early the next morning, Joey was shaken awake by the screeching of train brakes. It was the last day of their ride. He looked at his watch; they wouldn't be at their next stop for an hour. Still shaking off sleep, Joey stumbled towards the front of their car. He gasped. The Mercenary was here. The first thing Joey did was pinch himself, then he ran.

Jani was watching when Joey got up and walked toward the front of their car, so she was also watching when he started running back in her direction.

He was mouthing one word, “Mercenary.”

She was paralyzed for a second. The Mercenary!??! He, or it, was a horror story at ATF. A rogue agent, disbanded for using...distasteful...methods. That must have also been a lie. She tackled Matt to the ground. A moment after that, a bullet embedded itself in her seat. Then the screaming started. People running in every direction, alarms blaring, attendants trying in vain to restore order. Throughout the chaos Jani tried to drag an extremely confused Matt to where she had last seen Joey.

Matt was not as clueless as Jani had assumed. In fact, he too was trying to get to Joey, a process made a great deal more difficult by Jani yanking on his arm. When Joey had started running back towards them mouthing “mercy, canary!” he had known something was wrong. That hunch was confirmed when a bullet landed where Jani's head had been. He reached for the gun they had given him. He flicked the safety off. When he pulled the trigger, a small flame came out of the tip. It was a lighter. He should have known Jani and Joey wouldn't trust him that much. They were screwed. Matt turned and saw two men and a woman wearing police uniforms launch themselves up at the hooded figure before them. Then Joey set off a smoke bomb. Through the clouds of acrid smoke, Matt saw the silhouette of a knife jutting from the back of an officer. It was an image Matt would later stay up late trying to forget. Then Joey was beside them, and they were blending with the crowd gushing out of the train, like the blood of a giant snake. Jani grabbed the two of them and shoved them, along with herself, toward a junk yard.

The Mercenary silently cursed themself, they had let the children escape. If it hadn't been for the officers... They were only obstacles, but they were also distractions... They popped a handful of nuts into their mouth. They didn't eat much since the accident, but they still required sustenance. They shook thoughts of the past from their head. They had lost the battle, but the war was far from over. That thought reverberated in The Mercenary's head as they put up the kick stand. They would not fail again.

They had slept under cars in the scrapyard that night. Passing around a water bottle and a small bag of crackers they had found in someone's old driver seat (they had bought food at the train station, but were reserving it). Joey woke up before dawn, exhausted yet aware of his inability to go back to sleep. When he crawled out from underneath the car, the others were waiting for him.

Jani looked grimly determined, “we need to stay ahead of The Mercenary. If ATF wants us this much, we're in trouble.”

Matt was confused, “who's this 'mercenary' you keep talking about?”

Her look could've melted a block of ice, and Matt flinched. “The Mercenary, is- was, an agent, one of the most talented that ATF had ever seen. Rumor is he, it, went bad, some horrible accident in the lab. We were told...it...was incarcerated, Atlantis has a secure prison where they put assets too invaluable to kill and too dangerous to set free. That must have also been a lie.”

Matt changed the subject, “I want to learn to fight. I can throw a punch, but, you know, not like you do.” She stood up. He was unable to tell if she was going to slap him or not-much less consent. So when she grabbed his arm and flung him to the ground, he thought he was a goner.

She stretched a hand out to him, “think you can do that?”

It had been a long evening. The three of them had agreed that they needed to stay on the move. So as a result Matt was left attempting and often failing, to dodge Jani's punches on the move.

Joey pulled out his smartphone, “we should be there soon, due west.

Twenty minutes later they were crouched at the top of a hill looking down at the HQ of The Matrix.

“Okay,” said Jani, “this is how its gonna go down.”

I shivered as I was led into a room. At least I thought it was a room, they had blindfolded me while I was asleep. The light stung my eyes when it was pulled off, they were drawn to the needle not an inch from my neck. It stung sharply when in it was inserted.

“Truth serum,” said a voice from behind me, “you will tell us what we want to know, Oakley Dogwood.” Then alarms started blaring.

Jani jumped the sentries at the front door, grabbed their guns, and tossed one back to Matt. Joey had hijacked the fingerprint scanner on the door and placed a virus (a polymorphic one, whatever that meant), into The Matrix's system. Matt was now positioning himself to cover her from a bush nearby. Jani poked the tip of the guard's AK-47 in the building first, pausing to see if there was anyone guarding the door. She charged in, placing a bullet in the leg of a hostile. She would try to avoid dropping bodies. The alarms were going off, she cursed herself, of course they would have an independent power source. She put a finger to her ear, “Joey?”

“Jani? Is that you?” Joey's voice rang through her ear.

“No! It's Pinocchio! Of course it's me.”

“Watch out for lasers,” there was a note of excitement in Joey's voice, like a young child watching a new movie.

She slipped on some stylish black sunglasses; immediately the room was lit up with beams of infrared light. If she touched one of those, steel doors would close over every possible exit. The same would be true if she triggered the pressure pads or went in front of the cameras. Across the room was an elevator with a fingerprint reader. She thought Oakley was probably being held underground. Jani did a back-handspring over the first one, stopping just in time to avoid another. She vaguely realized that, big as it was, the whole Matrix couldn't live in this mansion. They must turn the security off for scheduled times a day, maybe they should have clocked it and come in then. Before she knew it, Jani was at the elevator door. Pulling a smartphone out of her pocket, she held it up to the scanner and was about press an app on the home screen but a gun pressed up against her neck first. The sentry was on the ground unconscious in two seconds flat. Jani pick the phone back up and held it to the scanner. Less than a second later, the door opened. She knew she had made a mistake as soon as she started moving. A sound reminiscent of a fire engine split the air at the same time that the elevator stopped dead. Of course there had been a motion sensor! Jani could have slapped herself if she hadn't been unscrewing a panel in the roof of the elevator.

I grabbed the gun from the thug and shot her in the leg. When she was on the ground groaning, I slammed and locked the door behind me and veered toward the elevator. It was jammed! Next I tried the computer panel on the wall; all I got was a repeated message 'LOCKDOWN!' Suddenly a loud clang came from behind me. It was followed by the sound of the door to the elevator opening.

Jani heard a screech from below; it startled her enough to make her drop her screwdriver. Swearing, she bent to pick it up. A quake strong enough to throw her to the ground ran throughout the elevator. When she stood up, she barely recognized the boy in front of her. It was Oakley...and yet, it was not Oakley, not as she knew him. He had been the kind of kid to put gummy worms in his ears, just for the sake of it. He had had smile lines upon smile lines, and a constant twinkle in his eyes. Those eyes were dark, and untrusting now. He was also pointing a gun at her head.

“Jani?” his voice was cracked, “is that you? How-”

Jani jumped to her feet. Now that she knew Oakley wasn't going to shoot her, they needed to get out of here. “Long story. We need to go, like, right now!” She nodded at the elevator, “we can climb the cables.”

I looked up at Jani as she climbed the elevator cable, pulling herself up, hand over hand. She looked older than when I had last seen her. More wary too, like she didn't think she could trust anyone. Once she made it up to the door, she took a crowbar from her bag and pried it open. Ducking out of the way to avoid the hailstorm of bullets, she slipped on a gas mask and dropping the crowbar, tossed a grenade in. A cloud of green gas filled the room, followed by the sounds of unconscious bodies hitting the floor. Jani slipped on a gas mask, quite at odds with her sunglasses, and slipped into the haze. I

put on the mask she had tossed down to me and shimmied up the cable. I couldn't see Jani, but I could see the spiral staircase to the second, third and fourth floors. The vague diagrams I'd had seen all indicated that the control room was on the second; and if I couldn't find Jani, I also needed complete my mission.

Jani looked around for Oakley, where is he? She had a clear route to the exit. She spotted him, running towards a thick metal door, he was trying to complete Operation. Two things flashed through her head, one: he is a total idiot, two: he doesn't know about Atlantis. “OAKLEY!” she yelled, but the mask muffled her cries. She couldn't stop him, not if she didn't want to hit him with a rhino tranquilizer, and there wasn't enough time to explain everything. Jani caught up to him when he reached the lock on the door. He was fumbling around with the fingerprint reader, when Jani spoke, “Its on lock-down, nothing we do with the scanner will open it.

“I'm not leaving until I...we, complete Operation.”

That's Oakley, loyal to a fault. She grimaced as she pulled a blow torch from her bag, “who said anything about leaving...”

Joey and Matt were debating the best model of computer when Joey's radio buzzed to life.

“Kssssh...Joey do you read,”

He jumped to respond, “yeah Jani, whats up.”

“We're coming outt-ttt-tt-t-t...” the transmission died to static, and the sound of bullets ricocheting echoed out of the mansion.

Jani, true to her word, came running out of the door dragging Oakley by his arm. The moment was somewhat disrupted by the goons racing after them.

Matt didn't realize he had pulled the trigger until bullets were flying. One of the pursuers fell to the ground, clutching his leg. Jani jabbed the other in the neck with her elbow. The next few minutes were a blur of motion as they raced through the woods, into the nearest town, and hailed a taxi. the middle-aged man who was driving looked concerned,

“hey kids, are you lost? Maybe I can call you're paren-”

The wad of money Jani shoved under his nose, drove all concern from his mind.

“Where to?”

“the nearest motel.” she staggered into the taxi. Once inside, she rolled up her pant leg. Through a patch of otherwise pale skin stretched a trail of blood that led back to a gruesome rent in the flesh. She'd been shot.

Joey pulled down the glass separator between driver and passenger and pulled some tweezers from his pocket, “we're going to need some asprin.”

Joey had taken thousands of simulations on the the subject, but nothing prepared him for this. He felt the tweezers going in, trying to pretend he was looking for a chocolate. At last he hit something hard, he gave it a jerk.

Jani screamed and passed out.

The Mercenary's phone buzzed to life. The message displayed in bright letters across the screen: we know where the children are, there is a traitor in their midst.

Their grin was a terrible thing.

The Betrayal

        

         I slowed from a run and looked down at the knife in my hand. My grip tightened on it. I wouldn’t use it unless I had to, but if I was cornered… No, best to think about escape. I rounded a tree and came face to face with a guard. I tried to neutralize him without anyone getting killing (myself included). Let’s just say he’ll wake up in a few hours with very nasty headache. I could hear the sound of search parties; they were covering the whole forest. I had to scram or they would find me in minutes. Plus that guard’s unit couldn’t be far behind. I turned around, trying to decide which way to go. I knew I had waited too long when I felt cool metal against the back of my neck.

          “Drop the knife, and you live...”

          It’s hard to describe having a gun pressed against you. Knowing that all that stands between you and death is a finger; and that if they want to kill you, there is nothing you can do to stop it. That is what I was going through all the way to the base. Now ordinarily this might be bad, horrible even, but given that I knew who I was going to see, this was catastrophic!

          When you picture 'military base' you think big green building with turrets, right? Not this one. It basically looks like a big fancy house in the woods. The troop stopped and one of the guards pulled out a syringe from a bag he had been carrying. The thing about being tranquilized is that even as you try to fight it, you can feel yourself slipping. The last thing I remembered was a guard with an eye patch waving good night to me mockingly. “How sweet…” I thought as I fell into darkness.

          Waking up hurt. I mean it! It actually, physically hurt. The spot on my back where the tranq had gone in ached like crazy. My leg was in agony! They must have implanted a tracker. Since you’re wondering who ‘they’ are, they’re the Matrix. No, not like the movie, like the secret military/spy operation whose HQ are in northern California. Of course, the Matrix might have shipped me to another base. If that’s true I could be anywhere in the world.

           My name’s Oakley Dogwood (I know, right?)  if you were wondering. I’m 12 years old and, as my mom would say, ‘I’m in a pickle.’ My cell is bigger than last time: maybe 8’x 8’ or 8’x 7’. I guess I’m a VIP (very important prisoner). Oh well, time to get some sleep. Without warning a door directly opposite me opened to admit a very normal looking middle-aged man. Everything about him appeared to be tailored to make him look ordinary. Wearing a suit and tie, with small glasses, I’m not sure if I would have noticed him in a group of three. He had a small bald spot and a fatherly warmth to his eyes, but I knew better. I was looking at Kay Hutch, founder of the Matrix.

          “Well Dogwood, I wasn’t expecting to see you.”

          I almost fainted. I’m not kidding, I almost fainted. As in ‘fell down unconscious.’ I knew I was going to see him, but there’s a difference between expectation and reality. Now this reaction might seem a little extreme, but given that Kay Hutch had walked in, I thought it was pretty reasonable. If you’re wondering why I’m so afraid of him; some of our teachers have seen him kill people for looking at him too long. And that's just the PG stuff. You’d never know it by looking at him though, he REALLY doesn’t stand out.

          “Oakley?” Kay’s voice startled me into reality. “You didn’t answer my question…Why are you here? I knew there was an intruder on campus, but you? I thought Atlantis would send one of their senior agents.”

          I spat at his feet. Direct hit! Hutch wasn't worth explaining myself to. And anyway, I couldn’t tell him why I was here. I would make something up, but Hutch has an innate sense of if people are lying. It comes with the job…

          Hutch had left a few hours ago. At least that's what I thought it was. They had taken my watch while I was knocked out. Good for them they did, there was a fifteen caliber pistol in it.

          He didn't torture me. Right now I'm laying on my bed (lump of cloth), watching a mighty beast (spider) crawl down the wall. It could have gone better. Okay it went terribly. Really, really terribly. Since you're wondering what 'it' is, it's the Operation. Action music please! No really, Operation is a name for a mission that I have been assigned to. Hey, I didn't name it. Who assigned me? Atlantis did, the rival organization of the Matrix. So the point of Operation is to retrieve Intel on the weapon status of the Matrix. I guess it could be a good thing I got captured. 'Could' being the key word. I COULD get info from the inside if I COULD escape my cell and COULD work my way into the control room. Oh, and COULD escape. I don't like my odds. It might seem weird that Atlantis would send kids on missions. Not to brag or anything, but I'm not just any kid. I've been trained ever since I was born. I had a plastic pistol when other kids had teddy bears. My parents are high up in Atlantis, able to pull enough strings to get me the best training. My earliest memory is knocking my martial arts trainer unconscious. I was four. I'm not even the youngest recruit! My sister Elisa was gathering information about the Mafia at seven. So back to business, how to escape...

          I've been thinking for a while, a day maybe, and I think I have a plan. Kay Hutch has tried to get information out of me. Not directly of course, side stepping my questions, stuff  like that. But Atlantis has a little information, nothing important, but it might help. Or not. We'll see. So what I do know is that security is mainly focused around the main entrance: there are pressure plates, lasers, trip wires and did I mention lasers? Plus, guards are everywhere. The place is. A. Fortress! Security is on, 24/7, patrols included. The control room is protected by a foot-thick steel door. It has fingerprint recognition and retinal scans to identify personnel. The problem is timing. I have no idea when patrols are or when the control room is accessed. Not to mention the exact location of the pressure plates, lasers, etc. 

          Meals are horrible! I'm home-schooled although I do get spy training at ATF (Atlantis Training Facility). But I know from books how bad cafeteria food is. This is about that bad.

          If this was an action movie, I would rip the door off my cell and say something cool like 'run to mama.' Then I'd single-handedly defeat all the guards on base and avoid the pressure plates, lasers etc. That wouldn't be so bad would it? But no. I have to sit in a cell while my sister is preventing a bombing in Turkey. Right now, life sucks. But it's okay. I've been in worse situations than this. I mean, I can't think of any at the moment, but I'm sure its happened. You might be wondering about my plan. If so, you'll find out later.          CLANG! The door of my cell banged against the wall. A hulk-on-steroids type guard marched in holding a machine-gun in one hand. He grabbed me around the waist and slung me over his shoulder.

          A lot of clunking through hallways later we stopped at a big door. I mean really big, like eight feet tall big. I decided that going in might not be good. Then the door opened and my convictions strengthened tenfold. Sitting around the table inside were all the Matrix big shots; Kay Hutch, Gray Mack, Brandy Lee, you get the idea. I knew their names because at ATF, their photos were on dart boards.

          Brandy spoke first, “nice to meet you...?”

          “Bond,” I replied, “James Bond.” 

          “Ha Ha Ha,” she trilled then the smile was wiped from her face. When she spoke again her voice was dangerously calm. “What is your name, Boy?” She made the last word sound like a curse. I realized I should probably tell her.

          “Oakley Dogwood,” I said. She looked at Hutch for confirmation. He nodded.

          “Okay good. Why are you here?” A deadly smile played across her lips, “lying would be unwise...”

           

          Joey Switt and Jani Palmer ran across the campus. They were going to be late for class, and today was gym. It would be epic. When they arrived most of the kids were already there. Their teacher Maya was lining them up against the wall; they were  playing dodge-ball. At Atlantis Training Facility, or ATF, dodge-balls, or 'thumpers' as they're affectionately called, contain a neurotoxin that penetrates clothing on contact and renders the victim immobile for up to an hour. The players wear special gloves made of Kevlar that prevent the toxin from entering through their hands. Joey was out first. Dodge-ball didn't match his skill set. In the end it was up to Jani and a kid named Kyle against two kids twice their size. Jani's team won. After gym was math. Almost everyone except for Joey hated math. It was his favorite subject. He had been doing calculus by five. Not that it was easy, there were rocket scientists designing their courses. After a class that all but made their heads sweat, the kids went to the playground. It had to be the coolest playground ever! The monkey bars had pressure plates and lasers, the slides had trip wires and net guns. And one wrong step in the sand box could detonate a landmine filled with the contents of the sewers. It was great!

          “So,” Joey asked during recess, “when do you think Oakley will be back?”

          “Could be any time,” answered Jani,  “we don't even know WHERE he is.”

          “But what do you think?”  pushed Joey.

          “Maybe...a week?”

          “I hope so.”

          “Yup. Hey...”

          “What?”

          “Tag! You're it!” They ran off, having no idea that hundreds of miles away their friend was being questioned by the Matrix...

          It's Oakley here. I didn't tell them anything. I don't think so anyway. Maybe they got something I didn't realize, but I tried. I'd tell you it wasn't easy, but that wouldn't do it justice. I've been trained for eight years. That might seem like a long time, but some of the Matrix's operatives have been senior officers for decades. I'm still a junior and I will be until I'm twenty five, thirteen more years. One of the first things you learn as an agent is to gain Intel without anyone realizing what you did. I'm not bad, but someone like Kay makes me look like a dog trying to pick a lock.

          But back to the plan I had a while ago, time for the big reveal. So here it is: I've clocked the guards in front of my cell. There's a one minute gap, I plan to use it. If I can get into the hallway, I can hide out while everything calms down and then get into the control room; maybe swipe a guard's key-card. Then I can hack into the secure files and complete Operation. Getting out will be another story; but I'll cross that bridge when I come to it.

          I didn't even make it down the hallway. The guard was gone, but when I picked the lock on the door (I used a needle sewn into my shirt), I took five steps before I hit a pressure plate. I'm in the basement now, with three guards and a steel door. Note to self: watch my step. I'll hatch another plan...

          Eureka! Just kidding, I got nothing, nada, blank, zilch... well you get the idea. So I'm in trouble. Deep trouble.  Now I'm not the kind of person to sit and let someone else have all the fun, but I can't see any options. I'll sleep on it.

          “Come on!” yelled Jani to Joey, “we're going to be late!” Grabbing him by the arm, she dragged him into the building and pressed power on the laptop on a desk. “Oakley's taking a big risk streaming a message to us!”

          “I'm confused,” said Joey, “why is  he talking to us again?”

          “It's a status report, and WE got picked to receive it.”

          “Cool.”Joey sat down impatiently as  the PC powered up. “Come on, come on, come on!” He urged. When it booted up there was one app on the home screen, a streaming app that would only work once. He opened it  and waited while it established a connection.  When  a  face  came  on  the  screen,  Joey screamed. It was  Kay Hutch's  face.

          “We...ll,” he crackled, his voice thick with static, “th...ats wwwhat this doooes.”

          Joey slammed the laptop shut, his mind racing. That was Oakley's personal laptop. He would guard it with his life, so if Hutch had it... No! There was another option. There had to be.

          Jani Palmer almost jumped out of her skin when she saw Hutch's face. She just did a better job of hiding it than Joey. She instantly came to the same conclusion as he did and instantly dismissed it for the same reason. She reached for the laptop but Joey got there first, slamming it shut. “We have got to tell ATF command about this!”

          Joey couldn't answer; he was having trouble breathing. Jani grabbed him by the arm and pulled him out the door. The PC was useless. The app would have been deleted by now.

          Jani stopped at the locked door at the top of the command tower. She waited for Joey. When he caught up to her he was breathing hard. They had run all the way up. 

          “Should we knock?” he asked her, then they heard the the voices inside.

          “ooooor... we could listen!” suggested Jani with an exited twinkle in her eye.

          “No!” whispered Joey “No, no, no! What if we get caught?”

          “Let's do it!”

          “Were you even listening to me?!”

          Jani pulled something out of her pocket.

          “Hey!” objected Joey, “you're only supposed to use that in class.”

          “So?” Jani inserted a small metal tube under the door. She plugged some headphones into the cylinder. Her eyes widened as she heard what came out of the tube. She yanked it out and grabbed Joey's arm, “we have to go right now!” she hissed in his ear.

          “Why, what did you-” she clapped a hand over his mouth.

          “Trust me, okay?” said Jani. He nodded, and let her lead him downstairs. When they got outside she led him into her dorm. “Can you promise me that you won't tell ANYONE about this?”

          “Not even Command?”

          “No one.”

          “I...I guess,” stuttered Joey.

          Jani held up the tube and pressed play on the recording.

          “...and if you fail we'll make sure you will be the one lying in the grave, not him.”

          Joey gasped.
          “I know,” said Jani, “and it gets worse.” While Joey listened, she ran around the room stuffing gear in her backpack.

          “Don't let the recruits know, either, or we could have a riot on our hands. Then the whole operation could go south...”

          “Recording ends,” stated a robotic voice.

          Joey was speechless. It was common knowledge that Atlantis sometimes assassinated individuals when it was necessary, Like warlords who refused to negotiate. But threatening an operative? That was something the Matrix did. The silence was broken by a knock on the door.       “Open up! ATF security!” yelled a voice similar in pitch to a rock slide

          Jani stuffed the listening device into her pocket.

          “Repeat! Open up!”

          “Get behind me,” said Jani, stuffing her feelings of shock and betrayal away for when she could deal with them. The rage and hate, she kept; they might come in handy. You have got to pity the guards.

          The door crashed open, spraying wood splinters everywhere and four burly guards glared in at them. “Command wants to see you,” growled the biggest one, “now.”

          “Uuuuuum...” said Jani thoughtfully, “no.”

          The words took a few seconds to sink in. The guard was more than a few sandwiches short of a picnic. And wasn't used to its assignments talking back. Not that it was his fault. ATF genetically modified apes for guards.

          Jani didn't wait for him to react. Grabbing the lead guard by the arm, she stepped to the side. The fact that the guard was extremely top-heavy, combined with hundreds of pounds of centrifugal force applied to his arm by the force of her spin and the placement of her feet, caused the guard to hit the ground with enough force to dislodge a bird from a nearby tree. It was her favorite move in the art of Supaijitsu, a discipline specialized to kill or incapacitate silently. She had adapted it for the situation. One guard tried to run, he made it less than ten feet before Jani caught up with him. He was on the ground before he knew what hit him. She grabbed Joey, who was staring slack mouthed at her.

          “We need to get to your dorm!” she hissed at him, “all your gadgets are there.”

          Joey nodded. The two remaining guards were too shocked to do anything but watch.  

          Running through the woods that bordered ATF, Joey trailed behind Jani. “You're scary sometimes. You know that, right?” he asked, his voice shaking.

          “Thanks,” she replied without turning around, “I try. Let's hurry up, we wasted some time packing.”

          When they got to the ten foot tall electrified fence with razor wire, Joey pulled a small computer out of his pocket. “We can use this little miracle to shut down the power to the fence.”

          “Cool,” said Jani, “where did you get it?”

          “I made it. It was going to be used for a prank, but this works too.”                   

          “Nice!”

          Joey snapped the alligator clip onto the fence. On the screen some code popped up. Joey tapped a few buttons and the device let out a small 'bling!'

          “It's safe,” said Joey. “Let's go. I also released a few nanobots I designed into their system. They should damage the generators enough to slow their response time.”

          “Where do you come up with this stuff?” asked Jani as she scrambled up and vaulted over the razor wire. She looked through at Joey, “come on. It's easy.” She had to pull him the first half of the way. 

          “What are we even looking for?” asked Joey for the hundredth time, knee deep in that half-water, half-muck glop that surrounds ponds.

          “Duh. Oakley.”

          “You said that already. How are we going to find him? Walk to California?”

          “Don't you have some satellite hacker do-hickey thing?” asked Jani, without a trace of humor in her voice.

          “You brought us here...” Joey was gasping for breath, he took a long sip of Gatorade, “on the assumption that I have.......that!?”

          “No.” replied Jani, smiling, “I brought us here because of that.” She reached forward and pulled away some branches. Across a four lane highway, and behind some hills, was a giant satellite array.

          Joey recognized it immediately, “the SCAN institute of technology.” He had always wanted to see it. Under different circumstances, of course.

          “Yup,” said Jani smugly.

          “I thought you fell asleep in that class.”

          “I'm smarter than some people think.”

          “Whatever, let's go!”

          “You can hack it, right?”

          “I...yes.”

          “I was right!” said Jani triumphantly, “let's do it!”

          Joey took a guilty step backwards, “Do you know how much trouble we could get into? We could go to juvey!”

          Her grin cut through the twilight like a razor, “we don't get caught.”

          ATF was in turmoil. The guards had run for the alarms, but shortly after they were triggered, something had shut down the power to the base. The back up generators were online now, but had inexplicably been damaged. Suddenly, everyone froze where they were.  All eyes were on the entrance to ATF command. A tall figure stood in the doorway. It was Alicia K. Ill, director of ATF. She had a cold glint to her eyes and her hair was put back in a braid

          “What the blazes happened here?”

          No one answered.

          “I said, what happened. You!” she pointed at the nearest worker. He was a pale, bearded, middle-aged janitor. Though he paled considerably more once she addressed him.

          “Yes ma'am. Security heard something suspicious on the bugs. They sent some guards  to deal with it, but apparently, a kid gave them a whupin.”

          “Jani Palmer, by any chance?” she had known that kid would be nothing but trouble, why hadn't she listened to her instincts?

          “Yes ma'am.”

          “Very well-”

          “But ma'am, security said there was another kid with her.”

           A look of surprise flickered across Alicia's face. The janitor took the opportunity to scurry away.

          “Did we get a photo?”

          “Y...yes ma'am. Joey Switt,” a stammering guard replied. He must have been two feet taller than her. “We put an APB out on them. They won't get far...”

          “The SCAN institute of technology (Satellite Control And Navigation) boasts nearly three hundred dishes, only five of which are linked to their own satellites in orbit. The rest are dedicated to the SETI project (Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence). It has relatively high security, but nothing major: cameras, around twenty guards and staff, and number pads on doors. The main door has a key pad and two cameras, one on either side. They're meant to cover each other+s blind spots. All security is monitored 24/7 and cataloged digitally and there are alarm boxes strategically placed throughout the building,” recited Joey from memory.

Joey

          “Wow,” said Jani, slightly pessimistically.

          “So, how do we get in?” asked Joey, “knock?” They were looking down at the door to SCAN from a nearby hill.

          “Very funny. Haven't you noticed all the cameras? What, do you think, they would just be like, 'oh look. Two suspicious teens. No biggy.”

          “Okay, okay. I don't start screening a place as soon as I walk in. I think of that as a GOOD thing.”

          “You would,” said Jani, trying and failing to hide a smile.

          “Whatever. Let's get on with the job,” he answered grumpily. “What are you planning anyway?”

          “I get you in the building, you hack them and find Oakley, then I get you out.” Without waiting for agreement she slid down the hill and dove behind the left wall, looking for all the world like 007, albeit a slightly smaller version. Reaching into her pocket she pulled out her tools: a folded piece of paper and a wad of gum. She put the gum in her mouth and chewed quickly. When it was sticky and pliable, she rolled the paper into a tube and inserted the gum into the bottom. With a quick blow, she always had been good at blow darts, the gum was lodged on the lens of the right camera., leaving a blind spot right over the key pad. This was the tricky part; she didn't know how many tries at the pad she would get. But she could improve her odds. Jani stuffed her hand into her pocket and removed a small bag of flour. “So glad I packed,” she said to herself. Gently, Jani sprinkled the flour onto the pad. It clung in some places while in others it simply fell off. Lightly, Jani blew on it. Now the only flour that remained was in the shape of fingerprints, fingerprints from when people had pushed those keys. Jani knew she had to hurry. They would be sending maintenance to deal with the 'broken' camera. She could deal with them but that would arouse questions. It would be better if no one knew they had been here. There were three keys with prints: a two, a four and a six, but it was a four digit pad, she could tell by the model. One of the keys had to be pressed twice. With a moments hesitation, Jani decided it was the six. It had the most prints on it. Was she willing to bet their lives on it? If they got caught, Atlantis would find them, and there was only one punishment for traitors. She didn't have a choice. Hastily, she put in a combination, 2-6-4-6. The light on the pad stayed red. Next she tried 6-4-6-2. Nothing. Could her luck be this bad?!! 6-6-4-2, no result.  6-6-2-4. This time something happened.

          An electronic voice came out of the pad, “you have ten seconds to input the correct combination or security shutdown protocol will be initiated.” Jani whispered a word not suitable for print. “ten.” 4- “nine.” 6- “eight.” 6- “seve-” 2-. The door slid open. Jani motioned for Joey to join her. He slid down the hill and came to a stop next to her. They scurried into the building. Joey gently shut the door behind them. The hack was in progress.

          Joey was terrified. He could infiltrate almost any system on earth; knew how to access  nuclear missile silos; and he understood the FBI's computer network better than their own tech manager. And although it was fine in theory to hack into the SCAN institute of technology, it was another matter altogether to follow through on it. Not that he let on to Jani of course. As far as she knew he was dying to break into something.

          “Are you okay?” Jani's question startled him.

          “What? Oh, fine thanks. Let's get on with the job.” He pulled a set of bulky goggles from his backpack and waved them at Jani, “thermal imaging, I-”

          He didn't get to finish. A half-asleep guard on the night shift rounded the corner. He took a moment to register what he was seeing, and then that moment ended.

          “Security!” he yelled, running for the nearest alarm box. He made it three feet before Jani caught him. He was out with a quick thump to the head.

          “Too close!” gasped Joey, “too close!”

          Jani didn't answer. Instead she peeked around a corner and gestured for him to join her. When he was beside her, she grabbed the goggles from him and put them on, “all clear.”

          The door to the briefing room opened. The Mercenary walked in. Their gender was unclear, their face shrouded in a hood. A collective gasp  went around the room when they entered. The Mercenary was as infamous as death.

          “What do you want from me?” their voice was like nails on a chalkboard and did nothing to reveal whether they were male or female.

          “We-” the man at the head of the table gulped, “We need your special...skills. We have a breach.”

          “Where is Alicia?” It said something of The Mercenary's status that they referred to the ATF commander by her first name. “I wish to speak to her.”

          “She is bu-”
          The door flew open, “I am here.” A silhouette stood in the doorway, back-lit by large windows. “We need two deserters to disappear. Soon. You will of course be compensated handsomely for your services. Be warned, they are skilled agents. That is why we are asking you.”

          The Mercenary bowed low, “at your service.” They glided past Alicia and out the open door.

          “Did we do the right thing?” asked a flabby man in a white suit, after he had closed the door. “They're just kids!”

          “They,” countered the man at the head of the table, “are breaches. And we have a policy for breaches.”

          Joey was in the system. Dodging around and under firewalls. His hands flying on the keyboard, this was what hacking was all about: the adrenaline rush. Jani would think it was weird, that's just how she was. But Joey loved it. Pretty heavy security, he thought absentmindedly. Maybe I'll copy it onto my phone. His iphone already had security systems from banks around the world: the industrial and commercial bank of China, the JPMorgan Chase bank (US), and even BNP Paribas (France). Not to mention some less famous ones.

          “Are you done yet?” asked Jani impatiently.

          “Sort of,” replied Joey, not really listening, “I still need to calibrate my Trojan.”

          “Are you done yet!?”

          Joey sighed. “No.”

           A Trojan, or Trojan Horse is aptly named. It is a malicious program disguised as a valid one, sometimes hiding a virus. It is also Joeys MO. Joey grinned as he pushed enter. They wouldn't know what hacked em'. 

          Jani looked at the door to the computer room, no guards. Yet. She shifted her gaze to Joey. He was grinning like a mad man as he typed in strings of code. “Hurry up!” she snapped, harsher than she'd intended. Joey wasn't even phased, but she got the feeling he wasn't really listening.

          Joey let out a whoop, “I'm in!”

          Jani was puzzled, “weren't you already in?”

          “Well yeah, but now I'm IN, in.” He grinned condescendingly at her.    “As in 'has access to everything,'”

          Jani was too happy to punch him. “Great! What now?”

          Joey's grin got wider and slightly more villainous. “Remember the laptop that-” he swallowed,“that we saw Hutch on?”

          “Of course. Wasn't it untraceable?”

          “That's what I thought,” said Joey, “then I realized, a signal that strong can never be completely untraceable. It would just have to be within the 'acceptable anomaly' range for it not to attract attention.”

          Jani caught on, “but if we're looking for it...”

          “Exactly!” said Joey, “we should be able to find it.”

          Then the guard came in. She looked surprised that the culprits were young enough to be her children, then her training kicked in. She was good. She almost managed to draw her gun before Jani was on her.

          Jani looked over her shoulder at the SCAN institute of technology for  the last time. California. Oakley was in California. How were they supposed to get there? Hitch hike!?! Well, at least Joey knows what he's doing.

          I have no idea what I'm doing! thought Joey. How on earth were they going to get to California!?! California, for crying out loud! After taking a moment to calm himself, he said, “so. How are we going to get to California?”

          Jani jumped; He had just voiced the question that was repeating itself over and over again in her head. “I brought money. We could ride a train,” she suggested.

          Joey glanced sideways at her. “I look twelve, maybe thirteen, you look about fourteen. We need an adult.”

          Jani nodded agreement.  “What about a bribe?” she mused, “some people would do anything for money, even be our parents.”

          Joey gesticulated excitedly. “This could work!”

          They walked for a while until they found a bush large enough for them to crawl under. Jani fished two candy bars out of her pocket and handed one to Joey.  He gnawed on it as he drifted off.

          After an all-day hike and a double priced Uber ride (the driver needed some convincing to take two unaccompanied kids)  they arrived at the closest train station. After a quick but scrumptious lunch, with no adults around to make them “eat healthy,” they scoured the back allies for drunks or other people likely to have nothing better to do than an unplanned trip across the country.

          After a few minutes of searching, Jani leaned over to Joey. “Ten o' clock,” she muttered, “brown jeans and a hoody.”    

          “I see him.” They split up, converging from different directions. The man was too deep in his stupor to notice them. He started noticing them when Jani pressed a switchblade against his neck.

          “What the heck?!”said the man, trying to turn around without getting impaled.

          Jani leaned closer, pressing the knife harder. “Come quietly and no one gets hurt.” Once he turned around she realized he was only a few years older than herself. Tall for his age, true, but more of a boy than a man. He had bangs almost covering his face. Some stubble was encroaching on his mouth. His blue eyes had the intensity one normally sees in alley cats, and something about his childish expression reminded her of her uncle Edward. Then he bolted, tearing across the parking lot and into the nearby woods. Jani sighed, “I didn't want to do this...” She took after the boy, easily doubling his pace.

          Joey stared after her; he felt sorry for the guy.   

          The boy whom Jani had accosted was worried. He was hiding behind a tree in the woods next to the parking lot and fighting the urge to sneeze. When the girl had pressed a knife to his neck, he had run (what else would he do?). Now he was watching her bearing down on him at a sprint – far faster than he had run. At least he thought it was a sprint. She looked like she could keep it up all day. Who was this girl?!? He hadn't wanted to hit her in the beginning, which is why he had run. Now she left him no choice. He wouldn't hurt her more then he had to. When she caught up with him, he edged around the tree so he could see her. “I  don't want to hurt you,” he shouted, “Leave me alone and I'll let you walk away.”

          The girl snorted as if he had made a joke. “I don't think so.”

          He was surprised by the confidence in her voice. Maybe she was faking bravado to unbalance him? “Last warning,” he yelled in her direction. The girl kept walking towards him. Mustering his strength, he took a deep breath and leaped at her.

          Jani was surprised at the sloppiness of the attack. Even for someone untrained, he must not have much of a street reputation. It was a simple matter of stepping to the side and grabbing his jacket to cause him to land on his back on the ground in front of her. She then reached down and poked a tendon in his wrist, making him drop the stick he had picked up. He stood up, shaking himself.

          Jani smiled at him condescendingly. “You're probably thinking that was a fluke,” she snickered, “let's go again.”

          Hopping up and down to loosen up, he said, “I'd never hit a girl.”

          “Fair enough,” Jani replied. In a fluid motion, she reached forward, grabbed his wrist and flipped him over her back.

          “However,” he growled from next to her feet, “I can make an exception.”

          Jani shrugged nonchalantly. “Your choice.”

          He launched himself up at her, swinging his fist toward her forehead.

          The boy, whose name was Matt, was shocked. One minute he had been about to teach this stuck-up-bag-of-garbage a lesson, and the next, she had simply not been there. After that, events followed too quickly for him to keep track of. His leg had been grabbed and he had been jerked to the ground. A few seconds later, he was on his face in the dirt with his arm painfully bent behind his back and her elbow digging into his neck. His vision began to cloud. Just as he estimated he was about to pass out, the girl let him go.

          “Maybe just chance?”  she suggested mildly.

          He shook his head in disbelief. She was about six inches shorter than him and probably thirty pounds lighter. How could she have done that? “who,” he said, still gasping for breath, “who are you?”

          “Jani.” She answered, as though they were drinking coffee in the park, and you are...?”

          He hesitated before answering, then decided he couldn't do much more damage, “Matt...Where did you learn all...all...all that karate-zen stuff?”  

          “It's called Supaijitsu if you want to know, but you don't. You're wondering why I brought you here, am I right? She said all this very fast and it was almost too much for Matt's oxygen-deprived brain to take in.

          “Supai,” said Matt numbly, struggling to remember a class he had taken a few years ago. “That means 'spy' in Japanese.”

          Jani looked impressed. “Not bad,” she stretched out an arm to Matt.

          He didn't take it. Cautiously he stood up on his own. “ Okay, you've made your point. What did you want from me in the first place and why did you jab a knife at me!?!”

          Jani didn't look one bit abashed, “sorry about that,” she said, not sounding sorry at all, “but would you have come if I had asked?”

          Matt glared at her. “Answer the question.”

          She shrugged and tossed her hair over her shoulder, “Or what? You'll 'make another exception?'”

          Matt took a step towards her, “Listen you little-”

          that was when Joey stepped up behind him. 

   

TO BE CONTINUED...