S.T.I.N.K.B.O.M.B. (28 page)

The crabman’s pincer was clamped round Archie’s arm and squeezing so tightly that he felt as if his hand might get snipped off. Screaming in agony, Archie swung his free arm across
his body, driving his fist into Claws’s nose. The mutant staggered back, releasing Archie’s hand from his clamp.

Archie turned back to the control deck but as he leaned forward for the cylinder control lever he was yanked back by his hood. Standing up, he swung round and delivered an instinctive karate
chop to his opponent’s arm, snapping it off just below the elbow.

The bewildered crabman glanced at his stump but before he even had time to look back at the boy who was responsible, a size seven trainer smashed into the side of his head, knocking him out
cold.

At that moment he heard Gemma’s voice in his earpiece. ‘What’s happening, Yankee?’

‘Just disarming a bad guy,’ Archie murmured with an air of resignation.

‘Reverse transmutation will take place in – one second.’

Ignoring the severed pincer still clamped to his hood, Archie frantically grabbed the cylinder control lever and slid it down the panel. With a pneumatic hiss the glass tube glided down over the
sample and sealed itself with a loud suck.

‘Reverse transmutation commencing.’

Accompanied by a growing hum from deep beneath the floor, the cylinders housing Finn and the sample of pink jelly filled with smoke and glowed bright orange.

Archie waited and crossed his fingers.

The hum deepened to a rumble and the whole building started to vibrate.

The walls of instrument panels were awash with red lights of assorted sizes and brightness, flashing frantically as a klaxon sounded its deafening warning.

‘Danger, danger – system overload – meltdown imminent,’
the computerised voice announced, with a disconcerting lack of urgency.

Soon the magnitude of the building’s vibrations had increased to such an extent that Archie was forced to cling to the control deck to avoid being thrown from his chair.

A shrill grinding sound overhead was followed by a long squeal – like a door opening in a haunted house. Glancing up, Archie saw that one end of the sliding gangway had unhinged itself.
Instinctively he ducked down and covered his head with his arms just as the heavy structure crashed to the floor. The bridge came to rest at an angle, stretching diagonally from the floor to the
gantry above – miraculously missing his head by millimetres.

‘Evacuate, evacuate – total destruction guaranteed.’

Archie ignored the computerised warning and intently watched cylinder number two. The violent motion of the building threw him roughly from side to side and the klaxon was now accompanied by a
whole orchestra of different bells and sirens as more and more destruction warnings were set off.

Metal panels and sections of pipe began to rain down from the ceiling on to the glossy white floor. Glass dials exploded and cables snapped, spraying the equipment with sparks as the
Transmutator threatened to shake itself to pieces.

‘Stay calm,’ Archie muttered to himself. ‘Nothing serious – just a few peripheral items.’

Suddenly an almighty cracking sound echoed round the room. Archie spun his seat round to see a fracture about ten centimetres wide tearing through the floor as it snaked from one side of the
room to the other. With a sickening jolt one end of the building dropped about a metre, leaving the floor sloping down precariously towards the enormous tinted windows.

‘Yankee, this is X-ray.’ Gemma’s voice was shrill in Archie’s headset. ‘You have to get out of there now. The whole building’s about to collapse.’

‘In a minute,’ Archie replied calmly. ‘I just need to see if I’m right about something.’

‘Get out now!’ Gemma yelled. ‘That’s an order.’

The next voice Archie heard made him stop in his tracks.

‘Archie, it’s Dad. I’m coming to get you.’

‘Just a few more seconds, Dad. I promise – just trust me!’

‘If anything happens to you, my boy, there’ll be no pocket money for a month.’

Archie smiled to himself. ‘OK, Dad. I’ll see you in a minute.’

Archie watched the cylinders glowing a deeper and deeper crimson. The floor jolted again. The split in the floor had crept halfway up the walls. If it spreads to the roof, the whole arm of this
building is going to slip into the ocean, Archie thought.

He watched the cracks growing up the walls like poisoned ivy. He knew it was unlikely that he would escape unless he evacuated immediately, but he would not leave until he had done all he could
for Finn. Without him, Archie’s father would still be strapped into his Audi at the bottom of the sea.

The computerised voice said something.

Archie wasn’t sure if he’d heard it right.

He replayed the announcement in his head. It had definitely said, ‘Reverse Transmutation complete.’

By sliding the appropriate levers up the control deck Archie raised cylinders two and four then jumped down from his chair. As the floor rocked beneath him he battled his way towards cylinder
number two, staggering from side to side. He waited for the thick column of smoke to clear, and as he waved it away he saw at last that by risking his own neck and initiating the disaster-inducing
reverse transmutation he had saved the life of . . . a fish?

It was flapping about helplessly on the floor of the cylinder, eyes staring blankly as its thick lips opened rhythmically.

Archie felt a sense of immense anticlimax but it lasted only a split second. He had hoped to return someone who was part man and part fish to his normal self. If he had returned a fish to normal
in one cylinder, then surely in the other cylinder . . . ?

He heard someone coughing and turned to see a boy staggering from the plume of smoke billowing over the base plate of cylinder four.

Archie grabbed the boy, pulling an arm over his shoulder and supporting his weight. Glancing sideways, he saw the boy’s short bleached hair and a stud piercing his eyebrow, glinting as it
had done in the laboratory, and he knew he’d been right.

‘Come with me, Jason,’ Archie instructed, pulling one of Jason’s arms over his shoulder. ‘I’m going to get you out of here.’

The boy’s mouth snarled up on one side. ‘How do you know my name?’ he asked.

Archie smiled. ‘Long story’

Archie supported Jason’s weight as the pair fought their way up the rocking stairs to the balcony.

Using the railing as a foothold, Jason clambered up and levered himself through the escape hatch. Archie pushed Jason from below then followed him on to the roof just as the balcony came away
from the wall and crashed down below. Outside on the roof, Archie could see the helicopter hovering about a mile out to sea. The thought of his father, Gemma, Barney and the other two boys
anxiously waiting spurred him on as he ran across the rooftop towards the Dragonfly, still taking most of Jason’s weight.

‘Jump in!’ he yelled to Jason as he stood in the foothold on the side of the plane and unlatched the canopy. Still looking dazed, Jason did as he was told and hauled himself into the
Dragonfly’s passenger seat. Archie’s hands blurred across the instrument panels, flicking switches and buttons as he fired up the plane’s jet engines.

Suddenly there was a crack like gunfire behind them and Archie knew immediately what had happened. With an agonising groan the whole arm of the building listed sharply downward, leaning towards
the rocks at a terrifying angle.

Archie slammed the throttles forward but the plane didn’t respond – its engines were still accelerating.

Suddenly the building gave way beneath them, dropping away like a trapdoor.

Archie felt his stomach flip as the Dragonfly went into free fall. The plane tipped forward as it plummeted towards the precipitous rocks waiting to smash it to pieces far below.

Just as it seemed all hope was gone, Archie felt the engines roar to life, cushioning the plane’s descent then forcing it upward, away from certain destruction and straight up into the
air. As the Dragonfly powered skyward he eased the aircraft back to an even keel, allowing it to climb a hundred feet above the ridge before speeding out to sea.

When he was sure the Dragonfly was far enough away from the destruction he’d left behind, Archie banked into a steep climbing turn and glanced over his shoulder. Through the glass canopy
he could see the whole section of Villenemi’s lair sliding down the mountainside. It was now broken into three pieces that bounced and skidded on the rough terrain before plunging into the
ocean, sending sheets of water high into the air. Where one arm of the building had broken away a gaping hole offered a clear view of the inside of Villenemi’s hideout. The Transmutator was
now glowing an incandescent white while the ground around it was slowly caving in.

Then a vast fireball billowed high into the sky in eerie silence. A split second later the sound of an immense explosion filled the sky, violently shaking the Dragonfly as lumps of sandstone
arced into the air like meteors.

‘Whoo-hoo!’ Archie immediately recognised Barney’s voice in his headset.

‘Hey, Agent Zulu,’ Archie beamed. He could see the helicopter about three miles away in his twelve o’clock. ‘You were right about the trapdoor to the shark tank after
all.’

‘I know.’ Barney sounded hyper. ‘But is it me or are Evil Masterminds’ lairs really going downhill these days?’

‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Archie replied. ‘I think we just witnessed a property boom.’

‘Zulu, this is X-ray, do you copy?’ Gemma sounded stern.

‘Go ahead, X-ray.’

‘What kind of stunt were you playing back there? When I told you to evacuate, that was an order.’

‘Sorry. I just had to do something that was important to me.’

‘I thought we’d agreed you can’t just do what
you
want? STINKBOMB is a team.’

‘I know.’ Archie levelled the plane at eight thousand feet. ‘That’s why it was important to me to show you I’ve learned not to be selfish all the time.’

‘How do you mean?’

‘I’ve got something for you.’

‘For me? What is it?’

‘Oh, nothing special.’ Archie glanced at Jason and smiled.

After a moment’s silence, Jason spoke into his microphone. ‘Hey, Sis.’

The squeal of delight that Gemma emitted was so loud and shrill that Archie had to remove his headset in case his eardrums burst. When eventually she had composed herself enough to speak she did
so with mock annoyance. ‘Jason, where on earth have you been? You were supposed to be home months ago. Mum and Dad are going to go mental.’

‘I know, I’m sorry.’ Jason shrugged. ‘I haven’t been myself lately. Thanks to Archie though I’ll be home in no time. It’ll be like I’ve never been
away.’

‘Archie, are you still there?’ Gemma asked. ‘How did you know Finn was my brother?’

‘I started to get suspicious in the hotel in Hamburg,’ Archie explained. ‘He called you Gemma even though you’d been introduced as Agent X-ray.’

‘Pretty sharp,’ Gemma said.

‘When I saw the sample in Doom’s lab I recognised Jason’s eyebrow stud from the photo you’d shown me,’ Archie continued excitedly. ‘And the test tube was
labelled 24121600.’

‘Which means?’

‘Twenty-four, twelve is the date,’ Archie said. ‘And sixteen-hundred is the time.’

‘Four o’clock was about the time Jason went missing on Christmas Eve last year,’ Gemma muttered.

‘That’s what I guessed. It’s the same code Doom used for the snatch at the gallery.’

‘Quite the detective, aren’t you, Agent Yankee?’ Gemma remarked with a smile.

‘Don’t worry,’ Archie said. ‘You can thank me later.’

‘Thank you?’ Gemma laughed. ‘I could kill you. He’s always taking my stuff without asking and embarrassing me in front of my friends. Have you any idea how annoying a kid
brother he is?’

Archie and Jason exchanged a high five.

‘Listen, kiddo,’ Richard chipped in. ‘Nice work back there – I’m proud of you.’

‘Thanks, Dad.’ Archie paused and when he spoke again his voice was quiet. ‘Dad? I can’t believe Mum was an agent . . .’

‘I’m really sorry, Archie,’ Richard replied warmly. ‘I was going to tell you when I thought you were old enough. Looks like that time has come. Let’s talk on the
ground – we’ve been cleared to land at Nice airport. The wind’s a tricky north-easterly so take it easy near the deck. I’ll see you on the helipad.’

‘Archie?’ it was Gemma again. ‘I’ve got IC on the phone. She knows what happened and she just wants a quick word. I’ll patch her through over the RT.’

‘Agent Yankee, this is IC. Well, it looks like following orders is hardly your strong point, doesn’t it?’

Archie hesitated for a moment, unsure how to explain his actions.

IC continued, ‘However, it looks like defeating odious masterminds certainly is. Well done, Yankee.’

‘Thank you, IC,’ Archie replied.

‘Someone else here wants to have a word.’

He could hear her passing the phone over.

‘OGM, Agent Yankee!’ enthused Holden Grey. ‘There is only one word to describe what STINKBOMB has achieved –
spectacular.
Oh, and brilliantly
swashbuckling.
Come to think of it,
intrepid
sums it up quite neatly too. So I guess I’m saying there are a number of words to describe what STINKBOMB has done for the nation of our country. Mr Figo
is suitably impressed by our monumental success and I made it quite clear to him that it was not all down to my technological je ne sais rein. Enough respect.’