S.T.I.N.K.B.O.M.B. (25 page)

‘We’ll see about that,’ Archie snorted.

‘Well, well, I admire your fighting spirit,’ Villenemi chuckled. ‘But save your energy – I don’t want you to be too tired to enjoy what I have in store for
you.’

‘And what might that be?’

‘Only the culmination of a lifetime of genius,’ Villenemi announced. ‘For the last decade I have been studying the science of genetic engineering. I secretly developed my
techniques while I was employed by the British government but they didn’t share my passion or my vision for the potential benefits of cross-cloning. They had some
ethical
problem with
me testing my procedures on humans.’

‘Some people are so unreasonable.’ Archie muttered.

‘They tried to lock me up but I escaped,’ Villenemi declared defiantly. ‘One female agent pursued me with impressive dedication and she nearly caught me too – but
unfortunately she came to an untimely end.’ The evil professor allowed himself a devilish laugh. ‘They came after me all guns blazing and thought they’d destroyed me. But I
outsmarted them and started again from scratch. Using the groundbreaking techniques I’d developed in the government labs, I created the incredible equipment you see before you.’ Dr Doom
gestured grandly at the glass-domed contraption. ‘With my revolutionary Transmutator I have the power to genetically isolate and extract particular attributes from individual samples and
combine them to create a single superior human.’

‘Your guards are far from human,’ Archie countered.

‘You’re very observant, Master Hunt,’ Villenemi sneered. ‘I wanted my creation to possess some characteristics that don’t occur in the realm of humans but can be
found elsewhere in nature.’ Pressing a button on the panel in front of him, Villenemi mumbled, ‘Bring him in.’ The door at the far end of the room slid open and Barney stumbled on
to the operations platform, his hands bound in front of him. Striding in behind him, with a long bony arm resting authoritatively on Barney’s shoulder, was the gangly stickman. He guided the
boy roughly to a position just yards from the control deck where guard and captive stood side by side.

Barney gazed around, taking in his surroundings with hungry eyes. His face was a mixture of terror and wonder.

‘You have already met Antony, I believe,’ Villenemi said cordially to Archie, as if introducing guests at a party. ‘He is ten times as strong as a normal man because he has
been transmutated with an ant. Unfortunately he has also inherited an ant’s impossibly sweet tooth – he simply can’t help himself where chocolate is concerned. In one of my
earliest experiments I cross-cloned myself with a close cousin of the chameleon in the hope of being able to blend in with my surroundings should MI6 ever catch up with me.’ Villenemi touched
his face involuntarily. ‘I wouldn’t say that procedure was a total success. I have some characteristics of the reptile but camouflage is not one of them.’

‘In other words you failed?’ Barney taunted.

‘On that occasion, yes,’ Villenemi snapped. ‘But I have since perfected the process by trial and error.’

‘Where did you find your guinea pigs?’ Archie enquired.

‘While working for the British government I secretly made contacts in the criminal underworld, mixing with all sorts of dangerous characters. It was easy to pay a group of hoodlums to
intercept a prison van full of violent convicts for my purposes. You’d be amazed what these desperate criminals were willing to submit themselves to given the promise of money and
power.’

‘So all your experiments were carried out on dangerous criminals?’

‘Nearly all,’ Villenemi said with a smirk. ‘I had some success with these procedures but I realised eventually that the strands of adult human DNA were too brittle to be
modified satisfactorily. I acquired a young boy and discovered that his DNA was much more malleable.’

‘When you say acquired . . .’ Archie probed.

‘OK, so I kidnapped him,’ Villenemi boomed. ‘But he was a miserable little scrap so I’m sure no one missed him. The animal quality I finally decided to include in my
creation is most readily found in sea creatures and he was my first attempt at a transmutation of human and marine DNA.’

‘Where is he now?’

‘Oh that’s very good, Master Hunt,’ Villenemi laughed wickedly. ‘Do you take me for a fool? I think you and I both know exactly where he is, don’t we?’

Archie held his breath. Villenemi’s laughter subsided and he continued, ‘I know as well as you do that you captured Finn in Hamburg,’ he said smarmily. ‘I also know that
an RAF Hercules was sent to fly him back to the UK for interrogation. The funny thing is they won’t get anything out of him – he can’t remember his own name some days.’

‘Memory can be a funny thing,’ Archie said. ‘Some things are never forgotten.’

‘I’m not here to talk about my specimens anyway,’ Villenemi hissed impatiently. ‘I want to talk about
me
, and tell you how I brilliantly devised a machine capable
of genetically extracting up to two attributes from each of three separate donors, as long as the donor is a teenager, or indeed younger. As if that wasn’t mind-bendingly clever enough, I
have perfected the process of adding a single animal attribute to my genetic super-being. I did experiment with adding multiple animal traits but my trials just ended up creating useless blubbering
masses.’

Barney turned to Antony and whispered, ‘Did you hear what he called you? I wouldn’t stand for that if I were you.’

With a grunt the mutant shoved Barney.

‘Why are you designing this super-being anyway?’ Archie asked.

‘This is Operation RALLY,’ Villenemi declared. ‘By creating the genetic blueprint of the ultimate soldier I am about to
rally
against those who rejected me. With this
being’s DNA I will clone the soldier hundreds of thousands of times. Then I shall sell whole armies to any despicable warlord who happens to have a grudge against Britain – oh, and
billions of pounds to spare. My made-to-measure mercenaries will destabilise the balance of world power, bringing misery to the British government in the process. By retaining the blueprint of the
ultimate soldier I will dictate who possesses military supremacy in the world and I will be rich beyond my wildest dreams.’ Villenemi threw his head back and let out a laugh of pure evil
satisfaction, ‘Mwah, ha, ha, ha.’

‘Why Operation RALLY?’ asked Archie. ‘Why not Operation ULTIMATE REVENGE or something?’

Villenemi dropped his shoulders slightly. ‘That would have sounded a little more menacing, I agree, but we evil geniuses have to give our brainchild an acronym and I couldn’t think
of one for U.L.T.I.M.A.T.E. R.E.V.E.N.G.E.’

‘What does RALLY stand for then?’

Villenemi cleared his throat and said, ‘It’s the operation to Reak Almighty Lawlessness Lots, Yahoo.’

Silence filled the huge room for a moment.

‘Is that the best you could do?’ Archie sniggered.

‘That doesn’t even make any sense, does it?’ added Barney.

Yuri Villenemi shifted awkwardly in his seat. ‘At least the word RALLY gets the message across.’

‘Except you don’t spell wreak like that,’ Archie pointed out, trying to sound helpful. ‘It’s W,R,E,A,K, not R,E,A,K, so actually you’ve named your
life’s work Operation WALLY. Is that the sort of message you were hoping to get across?’

Villenemi didn’t say anything for a while but the scales on his head changed from green to vivid red for about a minute before cooling down to their original colour.

Turning to his guard, Barney whispered, ‘Honestly, these Odious Masterminds are so condescending! First you’re a useless blubbering mass, now you’re a wally.’ Antony
responded with another angry shove.

‘Why have you chosen these samples for your experiment?’ Archie asked.

‘A-ha,’ Villenemi exclaimed, grateful for the opportunity to show off again. ‘Master Ulrik is a champion biathlete so he has been selected for his marksmanship and sheer
endurance, while our young mountaineer, Master Schumaker, possesses extraordinary climbing ability and unparalleled courage. I will include my secret characteristic from the marine world but my
final volunteer is not your father at all.’ Villenemi allowed himself a moment’s pause before announcing gleefully, ‘It is you, Master Hunt.’

‘Er, yeah,’ Archie whispered. ‘I gathered.’

Villenemi looked crestfallen once more. ‘Oh, come now. Please don’t try and pretend you knew already,’ he chuckled uncertainly. ‘Did you?’

‘Of course I did,’ Archie insisted. ‘As soon as I saw my father next to those two kids I knew he didn’t fit in. But even if I hadn’t worked it out then, you just
told me that adult DNA is too brittle for your crackpot procedure.’

‘Did I?’ Villenemi mumbled. ‘Drat. I didn’t mean to give that away so soon.’

‘Don’t feel bad,’ said Barney, rolling his eyes. ‘You’ve only had, let me see, your
whole life
to prepare this little speech.’

‘Where was I?’ Villenemi frowned at Archie. ‘Ah yes, I intended to kidnap you and stage a car crash to kill your father, leaving no one who would care enough to come looking
for you. When my fake police officers bungled the job I thought I’d have to make do with a substitute. But then you appeared in Hamburg determined to save Daddy dearest and I realised that I
could use your ingenuity to my advantage.’

‘So why didn’t you grab us as soon as we landed on your roof ?’ asked Archie.

‘Oh, I considered it when I saw your little plane approaching.’ Villenemi smiled smarmily. ‘But it seemed a shame to interrupt you when you were doing such a marvellous job of
coming to
me
. Besides, I was enjoying the thought of you scurrying around like a little lab rat. It was really quite tantalising.’

‘Why did you choose me in the first place?’ Archie asked.

‘From you I shall be extracting your ability to fly and your inherited predisposition to excel at all martial arts. No other child in the world has your proven skill at the controls of a
jet plane, while your aptitude for hand-to-hand combat will make my soldier especially valuable in guerrilla warfare.’

Archie remembered his father telling him he would turn out to be a natural at martial arts and he felt strangely uncomfortable – like he was the last one to be let in on a secret.

‘Why does everyone keep going on about me being some sort of kung fu expert?’ Archie asked. ‘Even
I
only just found out I can kick the living daylights out of people
– so how come you knew?’

‘By all accounts you handled yourself exceptionally well in Hamburg,’ Villenemi argued. ‘And the spinning back kick in the security suite was quite something. You have
certainly inherited the potential to be almost unbeatable in hand-to-hand combat.’

‘When he was in the forces my dad was trained in self-defence, but I don’t think he was any kind of expert,’ said Archie.

‘My dear Master Hunt.’ Villenemi’s patronising chortle made Archie’s skin crawl. ‘I wasn’t talking about your father. I was talking about your
mother.’

‘My mother?’ Archie could barely breathe.

‘Yes, your mother.’ The evil mastermind’s scales turned a brilliant shade of orange. ‘As I’m sure you know, she was a highly trained government agent and an expert
in a multitude of martial arts. She was the operative who tried so hard to track me down when everyone overreacted just because a few orphans didn’t survive my genetic
experimentation.’

‘My mother was an MI6 agent?’

‘Oh dear. I seem to have let the cat out of the bag.’ Villenemi feigned embarrassment.

‘Did you know her?’ Archie asked weakly, although in his broken heart he already knew the answer.

‘Oh yes – your mother and I played cat and mouse for some weeks. She nearly caught me too.’ Villenemi drew a satisfied breath. ‘That’s why I had to kill
her.’

‘Y- you killed my mother?’ Archie stammered.

‘I’m afraid I did. My bad,’ said Villenemi. ‘If it’s any consolation, she was too good an agent to be killed in the line of duty. That’s why I had to find out
where she lived and run her over when she was off duty. It was the only way I could get her off my case.’

‘You monster,’ Barney snarled.

Archie was speechless, rage and hatred coursing through his veins. His head throbbed with an almost overwhelming desire for immediate revenge but fighting his instincts he said and did nothing.
Clenching his teeth, he waited for his anger to subside. He knew he had to stay calm for his plan to work. Your time will come, Doctor Doom, he thought. Sooner than you think.

‘Well, I think I’ve talked for long enough,’ Villenemi announced. ‘If I went on much longer you might get the impression I’m some sort of twisted
egomaniac.’

‘No chance,’ added Barney. ‘I mean, so far you’ve come across as being extremely well-balanced and humble.’

‘Anyway, I rather fancy taking over the world now,’ said Villenemi, as though he’d had a sudden yen for a cup of tea.

‘Will the experiment hurt?’ Archie asked.

‘Absolutely not,’ Villenemi replied reassuringly. ‘I won’t feel a thing. You, on the other hand, will experience searing pain like you never thought possible.’
Everyone waited around awkwardly while Villenemi indulged in another peal of wicked laughter. ‘Claws, wire up our final volunteer into cylinder four, would you.’