The Secret War (Jack Blank Adventure) (11 page)

Jack put his hands up. “Just … hear me out. I’ll tell you guys everything, but first you have to promise it stays between us. I’m bringing you guys in on this because I need your help, but it has to be
your
help. You can’t tell anyone else. Not yet.”

“Why not?” Allegra asked.

“Because I’m afraid of how other people might react,” Jack said. “What I’m going to tell you is a secret. You have to promise not to tell anyone else. Trust me, you’ll understand.”

Allegra crossed her arms and gave Jack a slightly annoyed look. “We better,” she said. Jack stared at Allegra, waiting for her to say the words. “Okay, I promise,” she said.

“What about you, Skerren?” Jack asked. “In or out?”

Skerren stood there cracking his knuckles with one hand and studying Jack with suspicious eyes. When he was finished cracking the knuckle on the last finger, he made a fist and stared at it for a brief moment. Eventually he looked up at Jack and nodded. “Let’s hear it,” he said.

Jack figured that was about as positive a response as he could hope for from Skerren. “Not here,” he said to Skerren and Allegra. He pointed at the steps going down to his basement. “Down there. In my lab.”

Jack asked the lights in the basement to turn on as his friends followed him down the steps and into his workshop. The fluorescent bulbs flickered on to reveal a
no-frills wreck of a computer lab if ever there was one. It was the exact opposite of the pristine, bright white facilities that Jonas Smart used for his experiments across town in SmartTower. Jack’s cramped, tiny lab looked like an auto-body garage run by the greasiest of grease monkeys. Old computer hardware components were stacked up on boxes and crates that were being used for makeshift workstations. Burned-out hard drives, memory chips, and circuit boards were piled high on shelves until they could fit no more. The lab was as untidy, chaotic, and disorganized as they came.

“Ewww,” Allegra said, scrunching up her face as she looked around Jack’s lab. She frowned at the countless old fast-food containers that looked like they should have been thrown out weeks ago. “This place is disgusting.”

“At best,” Skerren agreed, using one of his swords to flick an old slice of half-eaten pizza across the room into an open garbage can. He picked up a stripped-down Mecha skull as he walked around, checking the place out. “What’s going on, Jack?” he asked. “What is all this?”

“This is what I’ve been working on all year,” Jack said, motioning to the different models of android hands,
heads, and more that hung from his ceiling like pots and pans over a kitchen island countertop. Half-assembled Mecha body parts seemed to cover every inch of his lab. “This is my
real
secret project. But before I tell you about it, I have to tell you how it all started. It’s a long story, but just bear with me. This is going to be kind of hard for me to say.” Jack took another deep breath as Skerren and Allegra leaned in to listen.
Here we go
, Jack thought, and he opened his mouth to speak.

“You guys already know that last year Jazen Knight and I broke into SmartTower to find out the truth about who I am. What you don’t know is that we didn’t go in there on a hunch,” Jack told his friends. “We had proof. I had proof that Smart knew all about my family
and
my name. He’d been lying to me from day one. He’d been lying to everyone, all so he could use me to stir up fear about the Rüstov. As long as I was a mystery, I was a potential threat to this city, so that’s what he made me out to be. For a while there it worked pretty well.”

“Hang on, I don’t get it,” Allegra cut in. “Why didn’t you tell anyone about this? Why didn’t you tell us?”

“We didn’t have time,” Jack replied.

“You didn’t have time?” Skerren repeated. He sat down, and Allegra sat next to him. “You had a whole year.”

“I mean back then,” Jack explained. “I convinced Jazen we didn’t have time. It’s complicated. I had proof that Smart knew all about me, but I didn’t know what he knew. I wanted to hack his files before he realized we were on to him. I didn’t want to give him the chance to delete that info before I found out who I was.”

Allegra and Skerren nodded. So far Jack was making sense, it seemed.

“Also, we thought Smart might have been the real Great Collaborator,” Jack added.

Skerren and Allegra sat up in their chairs. Any ideas they’d had about Jack making sense just went out the window.

“Jonas Smart?” Skerren asked, nearly breaking into a laugh at the very idea. “You thought
Jonas Smart
was the Great Collaborator? Really?”

“How did you figure that?” Allegra asked, dumbfounded.

“Jazen put that part together,” Jack said. “He didn’t have to sell me too hard on the idea, though. It made sense at the time. We thought about how Smart consolidated
power after the invasion, and how much he’d gained from getting everyone so riled up about me,” Jack explained. “He was the only one benefiting from any of that. Also, the Rüstov were after me, and we knew that someone on the inside was tipping them off. Smart was one of the only people in Empire City who always knew where I was and when. We figured maybe he was playing both sides against the middle for his own gain.”

“And was he?” Skerren asked.

“No,” Allegra answered for Jack before he even had a chance to speak. “If he was, Jack would have said something about it before now, proof or no proof. Right, Jack?”

Jack nodded grimly. “You’re right,” he said. He was now at the hardest part of the morning’s ugly confession. “It wasn’t Smart tipping off the Rüstov. It was Jazen.”

“What?”
Skerren and Allegra blurted out again. This time their outburst was even louder than before.

“It’s not what you think,” Jack said. “There’s a reason it’s taken me up until now to say that sentence out loud. It wasn’t Jazen’s fault. He was infected.”

“Infected?” Skerren asked. “What do you mean? He was a Mecha.”

“The Rüstov have another virus,” Jack said. “A spyware sleeper virus that affects Mechas. It’s undetectable, but it’s real, and Jazen had it. The Rüstov saw everything he saw. They heard everything he heard. That was how they always knew where I was.”

Jack stopped for a moment to try to keep his emotions in check. He didn’t like talking about this, and the look on Skerren’s and Allegra’s faces made it worse. Silence blanketed the room. Jack would have wrapped himself up in it and gone to sleep for a hundred years if such a thing were possible, but it wasn’t.

“What happened to Jazen?” Allegra asked.

“Did you have to kill him because he was infected?” Skerren asked.

Tears welled up behind Jack’s eyes. “No,” he said. “Jazen died just like I said.” Jack swallowed, determined to get through this without crying. “He died saving my life. He wouldn’t even have been there if it hadn’t been for me, and I’m standing here now only because of him. Jazen was stronger than the Rüstov. He beat their virus. He overpowered it and ran two Rüstov Left-Behinds out through the tallest window in SmartTower, and he went
down with them just to make sure they didn’t get away.” Jack wiped away teardrops before they escaped his eyes. “I’ve been trying to find a cure for the virus ever since.”

“By yourself?” Skerren asked Jack, more angry than sympathetic. “Who else knows about this?”

“Stendeval,” Jack said.

“Just Stendeval?” Skerren asked.

“What about the rest of the Inner Circle? What about Hovarth?”

Jack shook his head. “Just Stendeval.”

Skerren made an astonished grunt. “You mean all this time, the virus has been out there spreading and you never said anything? How many are infected?”

“I don’t know,” Jack said. “But it’s probably a lot if Obscuro thinks there’s no way to stop the Rüstov from taking over the city in five days.”

“Four days now,” Skerren corrected Jack.

Jack gave a tired nod. “Four days,” he agreed.

“Where are you on the cure?” Allegra asked. “Are you at least getting close?”

“Yes and no,” Jack said. “I’m working on a cure-code. I have a prototype model to test it on, but it’s not ready yet.” Jack looked away from his friends, over at a dark corner
in the rear of his lab. “I thought I’d have this cured by now. I really did, but I …” Jack trailed off. For a second he thought about telling his friends the whole truth. How he’d heard the voice of his parasite waking up the last time he’d worked on the cure. That second came and went. “I’ve hit a wall,” Jack said. “It’s a problem.”

“A problem we need to tell people about,” Skerren said. “I can’t keep this from my king!”

“Skerren, you promised,” Jack said. “You can’t tell anyone. You gave me your word. This secret would tear the city apart.”

“What do you think the infected Mechas are going to do four days from now?” Skerren asked. “And what are
we
supposed to do to stop them? In case you haven’t noticed, I’m no computer expert.”

“Skerren does have a point,” Allegra said. “What do you expect us to do?”

“Help me find Obscuro,” Jack said. “We need to find the Rogue Secreteer.”

Skerren and Allegra looked at Jack like he’d just told them he wanted to find a raindrop hiding in the ocean.

“You’re out of your mind,” Skerren said.

“Why?” Jack asked. “Why is that so crazy? We can do this.”

“Find a Secreteer?” Skerren replied. “It’s impossible.”

“Nothing’s impossible. We do the impossible every day here.”

“How is finding Obscuro going to help stop the virus?” Allegra asked.

“This guy knows something. About the virus
and
Glave. If we put whatever he knows together with the work I’ve already done, maybe I can finish the cure-code.” Jack tapped Skerren on the shoulder, ready to drive the point home. “Or if the Rogue Secreteer can lead us to Glave, then we can finish
him
.”

Skerren locked eyes with Jack. Jack knew he was always on board with anything that involved killing Rüstov. There had been precious few opportunities to do that over the last year.

“We have to do this ourselves,” Jack said. “No one can know about the spyware virus. Not yet. After what people have already heard from Obscuro and Glave, the truth about the virus would put them over the edge. It’d be chaos, and that’s not gonna help stop the Rüstov.”

Skerren rubbed his chin, thinking. “It’s not a
terrible
idea,” he admitted. He looked like he was starting to come around. “And we do have to take on solo projects for the School of Thought,” Skerren said, thinking out loud. “Can you imagine the look on Trea’s face if the three of us bagged a Secreteer?” He grinned.

“How are we supposed to do that?” Allegra said. “Nobody can find a Secreteer who doesn’t want to be found. Nobody.”

“Actually,” Jack began. “I’ve got an idea where to start looking.”

“Where?” Skerren asked.

“In your part of town,” Jack told Skerren. “Varagog Village.”

The idea came to Jack out of the blue. He didn’t know much about Secreteers—no one did, really—but what little experience he’d had with them had led him to believe he could find one in Skerren’s backyard. After taking a few moments to rummage through his lab and gather supplies, Jack, Skerren, and Allegra headed south to Varagog.

Like all parts of the Imagine Nation, Varagog Village was a fascinating corner of the world. The medieval borough of Empire City had a mystical quality that went far beyond simply mirroring the culture and lifestyle of a
centuries-old era. Varagog Village didn’t just
look
like the Middle Ages; it was actually
in
the Middle Ages.

The walls of Varagog surrounded what can best be described as a pocket in time. Inside those walls it was forever the year 1404. Time in Varagog repeated in an infinite loop. It snowed and rained on the same days, year after year. Flowers bloomed and died on the same days, year after year. The only things that changed in Varagog were the people who lived there, and the people who lived there were not fond of change.

As Skerren led Jack and Allegra down the cobblestone streets of his home borough, Jack marveled at the view. He passed grand castles, towers, and other stately manors that had been built over winding stone streets. He climbed great stone stairways lined with shacks, shanties, cabins, cottages, and inns. Varagog was a true old-world village. The people who lived there had jobs like blacksmith, tanner, miller, jester, knight, squire, and king. People of every class were packed into every inch of Varagog. They were all very much attached to their medieval ways and held fast to them despite the availability of modern conveniences that could be imported from the neighboring boroughs.

Varagog was a magical place. Technological devices didn’t work inside the walls, but the people got along just fine without them. There were no NewsNets in the village, but countless magic mirrors reflected SmartNews broadcasts using sorcery that Jack couldn’t begin to understand. In addition to the medieval nobles and peasant townsfolk, the borough was inhabited by all manner of magical creatures from the English realm of Faerie, the Russian Thrice-Ten Kingdom, and countless other places. Secret passageways to the old enchanted lands could be found all throughout Varagog Village if one knew where to look. Jack would have loved to spend hours exploring for such things if he ever had the chance, but he rarely made it down to Empire City’s medieval district. The people of Varagog still had yet to warm up to Jack, and thanks to the Rogue Secreteer, the villagers’ attitude toward him at present was hostile at best and violent at worst.

“A pox on ye, Rüstov!” an old lady yelled at Jack from the window of an inn, and a bucket of dirty dishwater splattered down, just missing him. Jack looked up to see who had poured it out. The perpetrator, a middle-aged woman, made no effort to hide.

“Fool! You missed him!” her ancient neighbor scolded from across the street. It appeared that the recent newscasts had gotten the villagers a little extra worked up.

“Jack, try not to walk so close to me,” Skerren said with a chuckle. “I don’t want to get drenched the next time someone throws their dishwater at you.”