Otto awoke with a start. His Blackbox sat on his bedside table emitting an insistent bleeping sound. He picked up the device and flipped it open.
‘Good morning, Mr Malpense,’ said H.I.V.E.mind.
‘Good morning, H.I.V.E.mind. What time is it?’ Otto rubbed his eyes. He felt as if he’d only been asleep for five minutes.
‘It is 7.30 a.m., Mr Malpense. Breakfast will be served in the dining room at 8 a.m. and lessons will commence at 9 a.m. May I be of any further assistance?’ H.I.V.E.mind enquired politely.
‘No, not right now. Thank you, H.I.V.E.mind,’ Otto replied and the Blackbox went dark as H.I.V.E.mind’s glowing face disappeared.
Wing’s Blackbox was sounding the same insistent alarm but it seemed to be having little effect on him. He slept on, his face calm, seemingly unaware of the increasingly loud noise coming from the device. Otto gently shook Wing’s shoulder, trying to rouse him, and was astonished as Wing’s hand shot from beneath the covers, pinning Otto’s wrist in an uncomfortably firm grip. Wing blinked a couple of times and then, seeing that it was Otto, eased his vice-like hold.
‘I’m sorry, Otto; I forgot where I was for a second.’ Wing sat up in his bed. ‘Or rather I had hoped it might all be some kind of bad dream. Unfortunately that does not appear to be the case.’ He looked unhappily around their cramped new quarters.
‘Yes, still here I’m afraid. I’m just going to have a quick shower. Breakfast’s in half an hour.’
Otto and Wing quickly got showered and changed into their uniforms, new ones having been mysteriously delivered directly to their wardrobes during the night, just as Tahir had said they would be. Otto had placed a tiny mark on his uniform with a biro before he had put it away the previous night and now it was gone, meaning that this uniform had either been thoroughly cleaned or even, possibly, completely replaced. He made a mental note to check the wardrobe more thoroughly when they returned to the room.
They soon left their room and found that the atrium of accommodation area seven was filled with activity. What seemed like hundreds of students were making their way to breakfast, chatting and laughing, and Otto scanned the crowd looking for any familiar faces. After a couple of seconds he spotted Laura sitting in an armchair, looking slightly overwhelmed by the commotion all around her.
‘Look, there’s Laura.’ Otto pointed her out to Wing. ‘Come on, let’s go and say good morning.’
Laura gave the two boys a broad smile as they approached.
‘Good night’s sleep?’ she enquired, still smiling.
‘For Wing, certainly,’ Otto replied, ‘though possibly not anyone within a hundred yards of him. If whales snore, that’s what it sounds like.’
Wing smiled guiltily. ‘I did warn you.’
‘It’s a sign of a good healthy set of lungs, at least that’s what my dad always used to tell me,’ Laura said, chuckling, ‘though I think there were a few nights where my mum was not far from taking a kitchen knife and checking to see if his were as healthy as he claimed, if you know what I mean.’
Otto nodded in agreement. ‘I wonder if you snore after you get hit with a sleeper?’
‘Don’t even think about it,’ Wing replied.
The three of them sat watching as the other students who lived in this accommodation area continued to mill around the atrium. A few were already heading off to the dining hall, obviously keen to avoid the inevitable queues.
‘So, who are you sharing with?’ Otto asked Laura.
‘Shelby,’ she said, sounding rather exasperated. ‘She’s still up in the room, getting ready. I was only allowed to use the bathroom for five minutes because half an hour is apparently barely enough time for her to get ready properly. At least that’s what she’s told me about twenty times since she woke up.’
Otto laughed. ‘Just wait till she finds out that H.I.V.E. doesn’t have a beauty salon, then there’ll be hell to pay.’
Wing had spotted something over Otto’s shoulder. ‘Look, there’s Nigel and Franz.’
Otto knew that the two boys had been assigned a room together and he wondered how their first night sharing had gone. Both of them were still wearing the same looks of bemused nervousness that they seemed to have had all day yesterday. Eventually, the German boy looked over towards where Otto, Wing and Laura were sitting and waved to them, nudging Nigel and pointing over in their direction. Otto waved back, gesturing for the two boys to join them.
‘I hope you are all having a nice sleep?’ Franz ventured as he and Nigel sat down.
‘Yes, fine thanks. You?’ Laura replied.
‘Ja, I am being able to sleep, despite my great hunger.’ Franz gave them a serious look, obviously keen to stress the great hardship he was enduring. ‘Have any of you seen a snack machine?’
Nigel sighed. ‘Franz, we’re going to breakfast in ten minutes, what do you need a snack machine for?’
‘To be building up my energy levels for a long day of lessons, of course.’ Franz gave Nigel a slap on the back that, judging by Nigel’s pained expression, was a little overenthusiastic. ‘And you will be needing building up too, my friend. Do not worry, Franz will turn you into a real man.’ Otto noted the slightly frightened look on Nigel’s face and guessed that he was less than keen to be the first person to try the Argentblum Diet.
‘Anyway, why have vending machines when none of us have any money?’ Otto asked. The apparent lack of any form of currency on H.I.V.E. was something that Otto had actually given a lot of thought. He had finally reached the conclusion that if money truly was the root of all evil it might just be adding fuel to the fire to introduce the concept to H.I.V.E.
‘Ja, I have been thinking this too but I am hoping that the machines will be free of charge. That would be seeming sensible, ja?’
Otto doubted very much that the words ‘free snack food vending machines’ and ‘sensible’ should ever be used in the same sentence where Franz was concerned.
‘Well, I’m afraid I didn’t see any yesterday on the tour, and there don’t seem to be any around here, so we may have to do without crisps and chocolate,’ Laura observed.
‘Truly this is a place of evil.’ Franz looked dejected.
Otto checked the time on his Blackbox. ‘Come on, breakfast starts soon. We’d better get going.’
The five of them headed towards the exit and were just about to leave the atrium when they heard a shout behind them. It was Shelby.
‘Hey, wait for me, you guys!’ she shouted, hurrying to catch up with them. Clearly she had managed to make good use of the limited time that she’d had to get ready. She somehow looked more awake than the rest of them, not a single hair out of place. Otto also couldn’t help but notice that Laura looked less than delighted at Shelby’s arrival, and he wondered if there had already been some kind of argument between them.
‘Come on, Shelby, you’re going to make us late,’ Laura said impatiently.
‘It’s not my fault that they don’t give you enough time to get ready in the morning; I had to completely skip my aura cleansing.’ Shelby looked genuinely indignant at this outrageous state of affairs.
‘Well, I’m sure you’ll manage somehow.’ Laura replied sharply.
Yes, thought Otto as they all headed towards the exit, definitely some tension there.
They arrived five minutes early for their first lesson, Villainy Studies, and were now sitting at their desks, waiting for the arrival of Dr Nero. Otto was keen to see what this first lesson would be like. It would, at least, afford him the opportunity to study Dr Nero a little more closely, which he was sure would prove useful. It was Sun Tzu who had taught him that the key to victory was to know your enemy, and he intended to learn all he could about the mysterious Doctor.
Wing sat next to him, flicking through the pages of the textbook that they would need for this lesson, Elementary Evil.
‘Have you read any of this?’ Wing asked, looking slightly worried.
‘No,’ Otto lied. He had in fact read the entire book the previous evening. It had only taken him a couple of minutes but he didn’t want anyone to know about his sponge-like ability to absorb information yet. ‘Anything interesting?’ he enquired.
‘I’m not sure interesting is the right word,’ Wing replied, ‘more like astonishing and slightly frightening. I am keen to see what light Dr Nero can throw on the subject.’ He frowned.
Otto knew what Wing meant. The book seemed to suggest that evil was a job like any other and not a philosophical concept at all. It offered page after page of advice and practical examples of how the reader could improve their evil performance, helping them climb the career ladder of wickedness more quickly. Otto suspected that there couldn’t be many other books in the world with chapter titles like ‘Eliminating the Opposition’, ‘No Pain, No Reign’ and ‘Diabolical Performance Analysis’.
Suddenly the classroom door opened and the room fell silent as Dr Nero walked in and made his way over to the desk at the front of the room.
‘Good morning, students. I hope that you have all settled into your new quarters without any problems.’ Nero moved around the desk and slowly scanned the faces of the nervous-looking students. ‘You all know my name, but I’m afraid I don’t know all of yours yet so if I make any mistakes please bear with me.
‘The name of this class is Villainy Studies, and it is in these lessons that you will learn to embrace your true potential, to unlock the true villain that lurks inside each and every one of you. It is, however, important to make one thing very clear from the start. I am not interested in training you to be common criminals – six months in any typical prison would achieve that. Instead I will teach you to aspire to loftier goals, to push yourself further than you might previously have thought you could go. H.I.V.E. does not train bank robbers, burglars, car thieves, or muggers. In short, we will not teach you to be petty crooks. Nor do we advocate mindless violence – except of course in the Henchman stream – a true villain should not have to dirty their hands with such things. You won’t blackmail individuals, you’ll blackmail governments. You won’t rob banks, you’ll take them over. You won’t kidnap people, you’ll steal aircraft carriers.
‘Now I know what at least some of you will be thinking. Isn’t this evil? Isn’t this wrong? Well, let me answer that for you.’ Nero paused, as if trying to spot those in the room who might harbour these doubts.
‘Evil,’ he continued, ‘is a woefully misunderstood concept. Most ordinary people would define evil using words like “bad” or “wrong”, but it is my intention to show you that its real meaning is much deeper and more complex than that. These might be the definitions that ordinary people choose, but you are not like them – you are extraordinary, and as such you do not need to live your lives within the suffocating restraints of their moral codes. You are all capable of evil – everyone is – but the real challenge before you now is to understand that evil does not mean wrong. Evil must have purpose, a determination to get what you want by any means necessary, strength in the face of adversity, intelligence in a world ruled by stupidity. You are the leaders of tomorrow, men and women who can, and will, change the face of this planet for ever.’
Thermonuclear weapons could change the face of the planet for ever, Otto thought; it didn’t mean to say that they should be viewed as role models for the ambitious go-getter.
Nero continued, ‘I’m sure that there must have been times when you have read books or watched films and found yourself secretly wishing for the villain to win. Why? Isn’t that against the rules by which our society lives? Why should you feel this way? It’s simple really; the villain is the true hero of these tales, not the well-intentioned moron who somehow foils their diabolical scheme. The villain gets all the best lines, has the best costumes, has unlimited power and wealth – why on earth would anyone NOT want to be the villain? But you see, that’s the real problem. If the masses realised how much more fun life would be if they could all wear the black costume, where would that leave us? What would become of society if people understood that in the real world the hero rarely wins against overwhelming odds and that the villain always has the last laugh? The world would be locked in a perpetual state of anarchy, in all likelihood. So it is important that such an education only be given to those who deserve it, those who have the intelligence and strength of character to understand the power that they wield. Let the masses have their fantasy heroes, and meanwhile the best of what the world has to offer will be yours for the taking.’
Otto had no doubt that Nero had given this speech many times before. It had the ring of a well-practised hard-sell routine. That wasn’t to say it didn’t work. The class sat quietly, listening intently to what Nero was saying. A couple of the students were even taking notes, much to Otto’s amusement. The way that Nero described it, embracing life as a villain was an opportunity not to be missed.
‘Of course the best way to learn anything is to study the masters of your chosen craft at work, and so we will examine the greatest villains throughout history in an attempt to better understand what it is that distinguishes the true evil genius from the gifted sociopath. Throughout history there have been men and women who have demonstrated that villainy is not just a job but an art form, and these people shall be your role models, your heroes, the examples that you should seek to follow.’
Nero looked around the room again – he made a point of ensuring that he taught this particular course to the new Alpha students each year. It was always a delicate balancing act making sure that the school produced leaders and not monsters. Each and every child in this room had the potential to be either and it was his job, as the head of the school, to ensure that H.I.V.E. did not unleash any pupil on the world who would tip the delicate balance of world power towards anarchy. Creating such chaos, attractive as it might be to some, was not at all the type of thing that Nero wanted from his pupils, they had to learn the importance of discretion and style in this new line of work.
‘With this in mind I intend to start today by looking at the illustrious career of one of our past alumni, the now sadly departed Diabolus Darkdoom.’ Nero picked up a small remote control from the desk and thumbed a button. A screen slowly lowered from the ceiling behind him, showing a picture of a strikingly handsome man. He wore a long black frock coat and held a duelling sword, its tip resting on the ground. His head was completely bald and his calm expression seemed to convey a sense of self-confidence and capability.
Otto glanced over at Nigel, who did not look happy that his father was going to be the topic of that day’s lesson. Nero had to be aware of the fact that Nigel was Diabolus’s son, and it seemed that he was deliberately choosing, for whatever reason, to put him in this uncomfortable situation.
‘As some of you may already know,’ Nero walked over and placed a hand on Nigel’s shoulder, ‘a member of the Darkdoom family is actually here with us today, and I would like to start by saying that I’m sure we all wish to pass on our condolences on the recent loss of your father, Nigel.’
Nigel seemed to shrink slightly in his seat as he became the focus of attention of everyone in the room.
‘Thank you,’ he mumbled, his pale face turning slowly crimson.
‘For those of you who don’t know, Nigel’s father was one of the greatest villains the world has ever known. His exploits upon graduating from H.I.V.E. have become the stuff of legend, and I can think of no better role model for you all to adopt over the coming years.’
Apart from the dying prematurely part, Otto hoped.
‘To truly understand what it was that made Diabolus such an exceptional example, we must look more closely at his history and the details of some of his more famous schemes. One of the best examples was when he succeeded in kidnapping the American president a few years ago and replacing him with an android replica. It took nearly three weeks for anyone to notice . . .’
For the next hour Nero continued to chronicle Darkdoom Senior’s life, detailing one nefarious plot after another, each one seemingly more devilishly cunning than the last one. It was quite unlike any history lesson that Otto had previously experienced – Nero was giving them a glimpse of a world that the majority of the planet’s population weren’t even aware existed. This was a world where the massed legions of villainy were engaged in a never-ending struggle with the forces of justice that was kept entirely secret from everyone else. Otto couldn’t help but be astonished by some of the events that had taken place right under the unsuspecting noses of the general public. But, thanks to a suspiciously convenient lack of coverage by the media and some gargantuan cover-ups by national governments, the vast majority of people remained blissfully unaware of this clandestine war that was going on around them.
Otto kept a close eye on Nigel throughout this exploration of his father’s life. There would be an occasional look of astonishment on his face as Nero would detail some event or plot that his father had been responsible for that suggested that there were things that even his son hadn’t known about him.
As the end of the lesson drew near, Nero invited them to ask questions about what they had seen. Multiple hands shot up around the room and Nero pointed at a boy with curly blond hair at the back of the room.
‘Yes, Mr Langstrom. What would you like to ask?’
‘What happened to Darkdoom?’ the boy asked.
‘Well, you will understand, I’m sure, if I don’t want to go into detail concerning that, out of respect for Nigel’s feelings. You must remember that these events, while of historical interest to you, are still painfully recent memories for him,’ Nero replied.
Otto was glad that Nigel would be spared the details of his father’s death, but he couldn’t help feeling curious himself. From the way that Diabolus had been described it was hard to imagine a situation that would lead to his demise. Judging from the pained expression on Nigel’s face it was likely that he knew exactly what had happened to his father and that it was not a pleasant memory.
The boy nodded. ‘Yes, of course. Sorry, I wasn’t thinking.’ Nigel looked relieved that the subject was not going to be discussed in detail.
Nero picked out another raised hand, inviting a girl with her hair in dreadlocks to speak.
‘It seems like some of the elements of his schemes were pointless. Why build a fully manned space station with an orbital laser cannon mounted on it when it would have been easier to just put the laser into orbit and control it from the ground, or even just destroy his targets with conventional weapons? Why risk detection by going to all that trouble? It’s not like all that extra effort made his plan any more effective.’
Nero smiled. ‘A very good question, and one whose answer lies at the very core of what we hope to teach you at H.I.V.E. What Diabolus understood, and what I hope you will all come to understand as well, is that a scheme must have style; a plot must have a plot, if you will. There are people all over the world who have the talent and the ability to put together a simple criminal scheme, but we must always strive to elevate ourselves beyond that level. Is it necessary to build a giant robotic squid to destroy shipping? Why not just use torpedoes or sabotage? Because it’s been done before. When you graduate from H.I.V.E. you will be the trailblazers, the cutting edge of evil, leaders for whom the conventional should never be good enough. As such your schemes should never rely on what has been done before – they must be original, cunning and, above all, stylish. Let the common criminal follow awestruck in your footsteps while you push ahead, searching for the next challenge, always innovating, never standing still.’
Otto noticed that many of the students in the room seemed slightly confused by this, but it made perfect sense to him. It was as if Nero was describing something that Otto had always been aware of, this need to not only win but to win with style. He couldn’t deny that it sounded attractive, and for the first time since he had arrived on the island he found himself wondering if there really was something that H.I.V.E. had to offer him.
MWAH, MWAAAAH, MWAH!!!!
The school bell rang to signal the end of the lesson, making Otto jump. Nero raised his voice as the children began to pack their books and notes away.
‘For next week’s lesson I want you all to have studied the first three chapters of Elementary Evil. There will be a short test and I expect you all to get full marks. Class dismissed.’