Spyforce Revealed (4 page)

As Max and her mother drove away from Hollingdale, Max thought about what had happened in the last few hours. She'd been humiliated in front of the whole school, was covered in brown smelly muck and her Spyforce notebook was ruined as it lay at the bottom of her bag in two torn, mud-smudged pieces. Her life was so miserable at least things couldn't get any worse, Max thought. But when they got home, things got much worse.

Her mother was in one of her ‘I'm-not-going-to-talk-to-you-until-you-learn-to-behave' moods. Which would have suited Max fine if she had been able to stick to it. These moods only ever lasted a few minutes regardless of how determined her mother was to keep quiet. Her need to talk was like an out of control train and no matter how much anyone tried, she could never be stopped.

‘Max, you and I need to have a serious talk.'

Serious talk? Max knew trying to strangle Toby wasn't the smartest thing she'd ever done, but even prison would have been better than one of her mother's serious talks.

‘I am very concerned about your behaviour lately and just for your information, so is Ms Peasley.'

Her mother paused to give Max time to say something. Max pushed a clump of muddied hair behind her ear and had nothing to say that she thought would help, so her mother continued.

‘We've decided a few things need to change and that perhaps your complete lack of regard for other people, including that sweet boy you so viciously attacked, is perhaps connected to the lack of time you and I spend together.'

Sweet boy! Toby was a lot of things but anyone who thought he was a sweet boy was having serious problems with reality!

‘So we thought you and I could change that by making plans to be together.'

What! Max thought. She'd just had one of the most traumatic days of her life and all that Peasley and her mother could come up with was a recipe for making it worse. She could just hear them now. Peasers blathering on about how all the world's problems could be solved with a ‘pinch of love' and a‘dash of kindness' — Nos 43 and 45 on Peasers' Guide to a Better World — and her mum going on about how mothers and daughters really are best friends they just sometimes forget that — she would have dug that up from some women's magazine. And both of them finally agreeing to a
whole lot of sickly, honey-coated stuff that would have been better off on the closest compost heap.

Max sighed as she waited to hear how this mother and daughter bonding time was going to be played out.

‘So, instead of spending Easter on the farm, you and I are going to take a holiday together,' Max's mother said proudly, like it was the best idea she had ever had.

‘Sorry?' Max asked, feeling like someone had sucked all the air out of her so she could only just whisper the question.

‘You and I are going to Queensland!' she announced like she was telling Max she had just won the lottery. ‘We'll book a hotel, go to the beach, eat at fancy restaurants. Spend some real time getting to know each other again. Won't it be great?'

Peasers' talk had done more damage than Max had expected. Her heart sank as she saw her time with Linden, Ben and Eleanor fading and her hopes of being in London for her Spyforce meeting disappearing in a cloud of New Age drivel.

Max would have rathered a ban on television, a stern talking-to, a thousand lines saying why she would never try to strangle Toby again — no
matter how much he deserved it — but not a holiday with her mother!

‘That sounds great,' she mumbled unenthusiastically.

‘I thought you'd like the idea.' Her mother beamed unnaturally, like some alien had taken over her face and was pushing up the edges into a smile.

Then there was this pause where neither of them knew what to say until Max said, ‘I think I might go to bed.'

‘Okay, sweetie.' Her mother sounded relieved that the awkward silence was broken.

Max made her way to her room leaving a scattered trail of grass and dried mud behind her. Her shoulders drooped like two heavy weights had been tied to them. She turned on the computer and had two messages. One from Linden telling her how excited he was about her visit and one from Spyforce confirming their meeting on 20 April. Steinberger said he would send more details in time and even added what an honour it would be to meet them. An honour!

This only made Max feel worse. She tried to write a reply to Linden, but didn't know what to say. How was she going to tell him she couldn't go to London with him? She had to think of a way out
of this holiday with her mother. If she turned down this opportunity to visit Spyforce they may never want to meet her again. All her hopes of being a Superspy would be smashed forever. She turned off her computer, picked up her pyjamas and made her way to the bathroom knowing only two things: first, she needed to wash away the mud that had glued itself to her and, second, by tomorrow morning she needed a plan to save her from a trip that would be a holiday from hell.

Alex Crane stood against the long, metal beam bound by titanium rope as the ragged jaws of chained crocodiles leapt towards her, missing her by centimetres.

But it wasn't the crocodiles that worried her most.

It was the spit-firing, giant Echidna that posed her greatest threat. The pink-haired, evil overlord, Sugarlips, had lured Alex to her dungeon hideout during a mission to save the world from another of her harebrained plans. This time Sugarlips had, Pied Piper-like, enticed the children of some of the world's richest people into her lair by means of a giant mountain of fairy floss that floated sweetly above the bedrooms of the children as they slept. Their dreams became filled with images of sweet mounds of sugared heaven which drew them, sleepwalking, towards the overlord's hideout. What the children didn't know was that once they were in her sugared palace, she would place them at the mercy of the spiny-backed Echidna, until their parents paid the hefty ransom she demanded of them.

Or else …

‘Ms Crane, time is almost up. If those parents don't deliver that ransom soon, I'm afraid some
pretty nasty things will happen,' Sugarlips said with a voice like melting ice cream on a hot day. ‘And this lovely bell here will tell us when that time comes.'

Alex flinched at the sounds of Sugarlips' sickly words as she pointed to a large brass bell.

‘It's no use struggling either,' she advised. ‘I assure you the titanium rope that binds you is as strong as any substance the world knows and you're wasting your time if you think you can get free. Besides,' and at this her voice became syrupy and thick, ‘if you could free yourself, you would be making my precious baby very happy.'

At this, the Echidna sent a soaring spitball through the air. When it landed against the opposite wall of the dungeon, it spawned a fiery explosion and once the smoke cleared, a gaping, terrible hole could be seen. If the spitfire had hit a human there was little guessing how much of them would be left.

Alex was trapped. Caught in a world where she didn't belong with one of the most sweetly vile people she had ever met, one of the most evil of pets and a bell set to ring out the terrible fate of innocent children. Her choice was to stay and be mauled by hungry crocs or resist and become the main course for a freakish, oversized pincushion.

Would she manage to escape and save herself from certain doom? Would she be able to free the children who had been tricked into entering this grotesque world? How was she going to stop the bell from tolling certain doom?

Brinnnggggggggggg.

‘Aahhhh!'

Max shot up in bed like the mattress had been spring-loaded. One minute she was dreaming about a terrible overlord and her pet, the next she was … she was … it took her a few seconds to realise where she was. Then everything became clear. The phone was ringing downstairs. She was in her bedroom. It was the morning of another school day. Then she remembered the worst bit. She was still the girl who was doomed to spend her holidays with her mother.

Max sat there while the phone rang and watched her life fall into a tragic heap. There was nothing good about it. Nothing to look forward to. Everything was against her.

But then something happened.

‘Max?'

It was her mother knocking at the door.

‘Yeah?' answered Max, turning and falling into
her pillow face first, hoping this would make the world go away.

It didn't, so her mother kept talking.

‘Max?' She was now at close range sitting on her bed. ‘I've had a call from work.'

She paused like she was getting ready to say something difficult. ‘There's a new show we are launching much earlier than expected and they want me to do it.'

Max closed her eyes even tighter waiting for what calamity it would mean for her. The world had better be careful, she thought. There's only so much bad news an eleven year old can handle before terrible things happen.

‘Now I know this is going to be disappointing for you, sweetie, but I'm afraid we are going to have to postpone our trip to Queensland.'

Max opened her eyes. Did she hear right? Not going to Queensland? She was so happy she wanted to jump out of bed and swing from the light fitting.

Her mother watched as Max continued to lay face down in her pillow.

‘I'm so sorry, darling. I know it was going to be so wonderful with just the two of us, but I will book another trip as soon as I can. I promise. For now
though, it will mean spending your holidays at the farm.'

Max thought for a minute. If she was clever, she could really play this to her advantage. She sat up next to her mother, ready to lay it on as thick as she could.

‘That's okay, Mum. You couldn't help it. Sometimes your job must come first. There'll be lots of other times you and I can spend together later.'

Max's mother was impressed.

‘You really are the sweetest kid a parent could ever hope for. Now, how about I make you some breakfast and we get you off to school.'

She kissed Max on the forehead and sprang out of the room.

It worked! Yesterday, Max was the pebble in the shoe of her mother's life, condemned to weeks of punishment, today she was the sweetest kid a parent could ever hope for. She leapt out of bed and got ready for school like it was the best day of her life.

The Easter holidays were only four days away. Max woke every morning and struck the days off her calendar like they were layers of wrapping paper hiding a present. Nothing could upset her. Even Toby's teasing about her mother's performance at
school didn't bother her. All she could think of was seeing Linden again and going to London.

Finally the day arrived. The last day of school before the break. Max was waiting at the school gate for her mother to pick her up. Toby tried one parting shot before he left.

‘Waiting for your mother, Max? After trying to strangle innocent children, I'm surprised she hasn't packed you off to reform school with all the other social misfits.'

Max wasn't biting and besides, she could see her mother's car driving towards her and with only seconds of Toby left in her life, she didn't even bother coming up with anything nasty to say to him.

‘Bye, Toby. Have a great holiday,' she said brightly as she opened the car door.

Now this did two things for Max: first, it totally freaked Toby out and, second, it looked good in front of her mother that she was being nice to the boy she was trying to strangle only days before.

Max got in the car and kissed her mother hello. As they drove off, she watched Toby, his mouth gaping wide open in shock, get smaller and smaller in the rear-vision mirror. She thought, today is a good day.