Agent 21 (4 page)

Zak felt himself blushing. ‘You could be describing anyone,’ he said.

‘Not quite anyone, Zak. But you’re right. These attributes in themselves aren’t enough to set you apart from the crowd, so to speak.’

‘Then why are we having this conversation?’ Zak asked.

Zak sensed that Michael was choosing his words carefully.

‘Forgive me, Zak, but would I be right in saying that, since your parents passed away, there are very few people in the world who would actually . . .
miss
you?’

Zak felt a sudden emptiness in his stomach. He walked on in silence. Deep down he knew it was true. Apart from Ellie and her parents there was no other family close by, no real friends. Zak had always been a bit of a loner. He knew people saw that in him, and they kept their distance.

Michael was speaking again. ‘Your uncle and aunt are reluctant guardians, are they not?’

‘Yeah,’ said Zak. ‘You could say that.’

‘From the information at my disposal,’ Michael continued, ‘the arrangement is not a happy one.’

‘You’ve got a lot of information at your disposal, haven’t you?’

‘Yes,’ Michael said. ‘I have, haven’t I?’

Another silence as they carried on walking.

Zak was interested, despite himself. Interested enough, at least, to start asking some questions of his own. ‘When you say “working for you”, what do you mean?’

‘The duties are varied,’ said Michael, and Zak couldn’t help thinking he was avoiding the question.

‘Spying?’ he asked. Better to get things out in the open.

Michael looked straight ahead as he walked. His expression didn’t change. ‘That’s not a term we use,’ he said. ‘But yes, the gathering of intelligence comes into it. If you accept our offer, however, you’ll be trained in many other skills.’

‘Like what?’

‘Skills,’ Michael repeated. ‘There are situations, you see, when having a youngster like yourself would be a great asset for us. These situations would not be without risk. It’s important that you are equipped to deal with this risk. To cope in scenarios where you’re by yourself, undercover, with only your training to help you.’

As Michael spoke, a cloud drifted in front of the bright morning sun, just as it had the previous day. Zak fought off a shiver, but he didn’t know if it was the shade that caused it, or Michael’s words. They had
reached the edge of the park, where iron railings with spikes on the top ran into an open gate that led to the main road.

‘If you decide to accept this offer, Zak, you need to understand what you’re taking on. Your life will change. You’ll never see the people you know again. Zak Darke will disappear.’

‘I can’t just disappear.’

‘It’s something we would deal with. It may be, Zak, that you like your life the way it is. That the future appears rosy. That number 63 Acacia Drive and its flowery wallpaper holds the key to your happiness. If that’s the case, I urge you to forget about everything I’ve said today. If it isn’t, well then, you should think about it carefully. Once you decide to go down this path, there’s no turning back. None at all.’

Zak looked around. They’d walked a fair way – the playground was a few hundred metres in the distance and the noise of traffic had replaced the sound of playing children.

‘I’m not interested,’ he said. ‘To be honest, I don’t even believe you’re who you say you are. So stop following me around unless you want me to go straight to the police.’

Michael acted as if he hadn’t heard Zak. For the first time, the old man removed one hand from his coat pocket and held out a business card. It was entirely
plain, with a telephone number printed in black on one side. No name. No nothing.

‘Don’t feel you have to make a decision now,’ he said. ‘Or even tomorrow, or next week. Just when, and if, you’re ready.’ He kept holding the card out until Zak eventually took it. As he shoved it in the back pocket of his jeans, Michael spoke again. His voice was light, as if this was just an afterthought. ‘Of course,’ he said, ‘there are certain advantages to our line of work, Zak. We get to learn things about people. Information.’ He looked directly at Zak, and his gaze seemed to pierce right through him. ‘You might even find out, for example, the real reason your parents died.’

Zak stared at him.

The old man looked up at the sky just as the sun came out again. ‘What a beautiful day,’ he said, his voice suddenly breezy. ‘I think I’ll continue this delightful stroll. You won’t see or hear from me again, Zak. Unless, of course, you decide to call that number.’

And without another word, Michael turned and walked back the way they had come. Zak stood and watched him, until the old man mingled with the crowd around the playground, and disappeared from sight.

For the rest of that day, Zak paced around North London. His mind was a jumble as he remembered snippets of the conversation with the man who called himself Michael:

I work for a government agency . . .Try to persuade people we exist and they’ll just think you’re imagining things . . . There are situations when having a youngster like you would be a great asset for us . . . You might even find out the real reason your parents died
. . .

It was that last statement that rang in his head most clearly of all.

And when, later that afternoon, he made his way back to Acacia Drive, he noticed something. At no point since Michael had walked away had he sensed anybody following him. As he stood with his back to the door of number 63, everything was as it should be. Nobody was watching. He went straight up to his
room, where he mulled over the events of the day until it was time to sleep.

The weather turned the following day. Grey clouds and drizzle. Ellie had flu, so she didn’t leave the house with him like she normally did. Zak decided to skateboard into school. He was the proud owner of an Element board with Ricta wheels – the last present his mum and dad had ever bought him. His parents had never had much money, and Zak had been surprised when they’d given him such a cool board. He looked after it carefully now, keeping it under his bed – not least because every time Aunt Vivian saw it, her eyes nearly popped out of her head and she referred to it as ‘that filthy thing’.

Outside the house, Zak slung his school bag over his shoulder and kicked off. At the end of Acacia Drive he turned right and a few minutes later he was steaming down Camden Road, expertly swerving out of the way of other pedestrians. He had just boarded past Jasmine Mews, however, when he braked. Two boys had clocked him and they were blocking the road. Zak felt his heart sink. Marcus Varley and Jason Ford were both in his class and had a habit of making a nuisance of themselves. Zak was one of the few people who had stood up to them, but it hadn’t made them back off and he’d learned just to keep out of their way. They
had big grins on their faces and that was always a bad sign.

Zak tapped one end of the board and it flicked up into his hands. He jutted his chin out. If these two bullies thought they were going to intimidate him, they had another think coming.

‘Something wrong, lads?’ he asked.

‘Give us the skateboard, Darke,’ said Varley.

Zak rolled his eyes. One thing was for sure – nobody would be asking
these
two to do anything dangerous or exacting. In a situation requiring brains and fitness, they’d be as much use as a chocolate teapot.

‘Don’t take it personally, guys, but actually I’d rather stick my head down the toilet.’

Jason Ford sneered. ‘That could be arranged,’ he said, and he pulled something from his pocket. It was a knife – about four inches long and gleaming sharp. ‘Hand it over.’

‘Don’t be an idiot, Jason,’ Zak breathed. ‘That’s not a toy.’

‘What’s wrong, Darke? Scared? Hand over the board.’

Warily, Zak laid the skateboard on the ground and stepped back. The two boys grinned at each other again and Jason stepped onto the board. You could tell he’d never used one before. He stretched out both
arms to balance himself, waving his knife around in the air as he did so.

‘Be careful,’ Zak said.

‘Shut up, Darke.’

It was Marcus’s fault that it all happened. He clearly thought it would be funny to give Jason a little push. He didn’t check the road, so he failed to notice the double-length bus that was speeding towards them.

‘Marcus, no!’ Zak shouted, but too late.

Jason rolled backwards. When the skateboard hit the kerb, he tumbled and fell onto his back.

The bus was only ten metres away and the sound of its horn cut through the air. Marcus froze and Jason, lying in the road, just stared in horror at the oncoming vehicle.

It was up to Zak to act. He jumped off the pavement and pulled Jason up by the scruff of his neck, before hurling him back off the road. The bus sounded its horn again and Zak leaped back onto the pavement – just in time to see the bus’s wheels crush his skateboard to splinters.

‘
NO!
’ he shouted, and tears suddenly welled up in his eyes. ‘My board!’
The board my parents gave me
, he shrieked silently.
Their last present ever
. . .

He spun round. Marcus looked like he was about to run away; Jason was lying on the ground, all the colour drained from his face. He had dropped
the knife, which was lying on the pavement about a metre from him.

Zak picked it up and Jason started to gabble.

‘Give us it back, mate . . . it’s not mine, is it? It’s my brother’s . . . if he thinks I nicked it . . .’

Zak looked over at the remnants of his skateboard and fought back the tears. There was no point picking the bits up. It was ruined. Instead, he stepped back to the side of the road, bent down and held the knife over a drain grille.

‘What’s the matter, Jason?’ he said through gritted teeth, trying not to let the emotion sound in his voice. ‘Scared?’

He dropped the knife, waited to hear it splash and stood up again.

‘See you in class,’ he muttered at the two boys, and he continued making his way to school on foot.

He got there just as the bell was ringing and hurried down the busy corridors to his first lesson: physics. He was almost looking forward to seeing Mr Peters, to staring him down and working out from the reaction he got whether Michael’s story about the teacher was true. Zak was good at reading people’s faces. When he got into the classroom, however, he had a surprise. Peters wasn’t there. Instead, standing in front of the whiteboard, was the deputy head, Mr Jobs – or Jobsworth, as everyone called him.

‘All right, you lot – settle down,’ Jobsworth called above the racket of the pupils taking their seats. ‘Settle
down
!’ He looked around the class. ‘Has anyone seen Marcus Varley or Jason Ford?’

Zak said nothing.

‘Where’s Peters, sir?’ called someone from the back of the class, and there were a few laughs.

‘It’s
Mr
Peters to you,’ Jobsworth said. ‘And I’m sorry to say that he’s been called away on family business. We don’t know when – or if – he’ll be back.’

Nobody in the classroom appeared at all concerned by this news. Nobody, that is, except Zak. He sat down at his place, slightly stunned.

It made sense, of course. If Michael had been telling the truth about Peters, and he’d been at the school just to evaluate Zak, there was now no reason for him still to be here. Zak raised his hand.

‘What is it, Darke?’

‘What sort of family business, sir?’

Jobsworth looked offended by the question. ‘Are you part of his family, Darke?’

‘No, sir.’

‘Then it’s not your business, is it? Now then, what were you doing in your last lesson?’

A groan from the class. ‘Transistor radios, sir.’

Jobsworth’s eyes widened in astonishment. ‘You
shouldn’t be doing that for another two years,’ he said, clearly a bit annoyed.

‘Yeah, well we couldn’t,’ a voice piped up.

‘Except
Darke
,’ someone else added. And then in a whisper: ‘
Swot
.’

Laughter. Zak ignored it. ‘Settle
down
!’ Jobsworth shouted. ‘Open your text books at page fifteen.’

And the lesson began.

The day passed slowly. Zak was glad when it was over, but he still dawdled back to 63 Acacia Drive. Michael’s voice echoed in his mind.
It isn’t really home, is it? Not really
.

No
, thought Zak.
It isn’t. It’s just a place I live – if you can call it living
. He remembered the skateboard. It upset him and his thoughts drifted, as they so often did, to his mum and dad.
You might even find out the real reason your parents died
. . .

It was quiet back at his uncle and aunt’s house. The grown-ups weren’t yet back from work; Ellie was sleeping. Zak plonked himself in front of the family computer and launched a web browser, glad he had set things up so nobody would be able to track his searches. He Googled
SECRET GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS
. All he found were weird sites filled with absurd conspiracy theories. He tried to track down Mr Peters, even Michael. Of course, that was
just a dead end. It wasn’t like they had Facebook accounts. And so his Internet session finished like they all did, with him looking at the various news reports of the tragic food poisoning in Nigeria that had killed his parents.