Janey Brown ambled home after double English at Everdenn, trailing a stick along the fences down her street and wondering just what on earth had happened to her life lately.
She knew the answer. Precisely nothing. Nothing was what had happened to her life lately.
And she was starting to tire of it.
It used to be an adventure, her life, to rival anything that Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer or Harry, Ron and Hermione could ever come up with, and now it was … well, fine. Ordinary, and fine. Ordinary and fine and kind of flat, if she was honest. Rather like Janey’s hair.
She grabbed the end of a tendril of said hair as it floated past her in the breeze, attempting to analyse the colour. Sort of dark blonde. Maybe honey on a sunny day. There was nothing wrong with that – she remembered a time when it had been just dull, mousey brown, all the time. She’d learned to combat that herself with a toner from the pharmacy, so that at least it was glossy and healthy-looking and shot through with natural highlights. And she could always use straighteners, curling wands, rollers, trips to hairdressers, and any number of tricks and treats that her family had given her for Christmas to make her hair more interesting if she wanted.
Not so long ago, though, her hair had been blonde. Blonde with a capital B. A gleaming, platinum ponytail, thick and lustrous and useful, whenever she took a trip through the Wower which spat her back out into G-Mamma’s lab as sensational spylet, Jane Blonde.
There had been many amazing missions with her crazy, wanna-be-gangsta SPI Kid Educator and her growing network of spy-friends, and none so amazing as the adventure that placed Janey Brown firmly in the heart of her staggeringly great family: Mum and Dad; Uncle James; Uncle Sol and Aunt Maisie; and her irritating but brilliant cousin, Alfie. After years of it being just Janey and her mum, this was an adventure in itself.
And for a long time, that had been enough. Over many, many months, she’d got to know them all both individually and as a strange and wonderful group. She’d gone to a normal school doing normal things with her normal friends and her normal (ish) cousin, and for the first time, Janey Brown had been IN - not a member of the totally in-crowd, as such (and she didn’t think she’d really want to be) but with a set of close friends including Tish and Leaf and Alfie, who were fun to be around and made her feel like she herself was fun. They didn’t remember at all how wild they used to be when she knew them first, but they were still great company. There were good grades to enjoy, wins for the athletics team even without her Fleet-Feet super-powered spy-shoes, and a growing sense of just being at one with the world – no, not just with the world, but at one with herself. No longer two people, Blonde and Brown, but one strong individual, with all the best parts of both and the sum of the parts being bigger than the whole and all that deeply philosophical stuff they were being taught about in their ‘mindfulness’ classes at school.
Meanwhile G-Mamma, AKA Rosie Biggenham, had been leading an interesting double-life as a singing octopus called The Bigg Squid, at the same time as keeping Janey supplied with enough gadgets (homemade) and training (home spun) to single-handedly thwart the next world war, if it ever came about.
Which, of course, it didn’t.
Which, of course, was great. Nobody wanted war.
But a little tiny bit of fighting somewhere … a miniscule morsel of some kind of skirmish or combat to deal with … well, right now, thought Janey, that wouldn’t go amiss. Even just some in-fighting between different spy organisations would be welcome. After all, it was the kind of thing she used to do in her sleep – or rather, when she was meant to be asleep but was instead SATISPIing her way around the globe, battling baddies.
These days, the most mysterious thing to happen was that her new jeans had been lost among the laundry just when she’d intended to wear them for ‘own clothes’ day at school. Dull. Really dull.
It was ironic, really. Before her spying time, she’d been pretty much afraid of everything. Janey Brown was rather afraid that not being afraid of anything might be even worse.
She stopped short as her trailing twig caught in the fence and the silliness of her own internal discussion smacked her between the eyes.
‘You’re afraid not to be afraid?’ she asked herself aloud. ‘That’s ridiculous.’
‘No. Talking to yourself,’ said a newly deep voice that had only just broken, and still came out with the odd squeak that made her giggle. ‘That’s ridiculous.’
Alfie popped up from behind the fence, still holding the stuck end of Janey’s twig. So that was why it had got caught.
She swatted him around the head. ‘You maniac. Were you lying in wait for me or something?’
‘Yep.’
Swinging his long legs over the fence, her cousin shoved Janey across the path so that he could fit onto the pavement beside her.
‘The parents are all going to some concert or other, if you remember,’ Alfie said, ‘so I’m keeping you company until they’re back. Aren’t you the lucky one?’
Janey sneered, although she was actually very pleased not to be spending the evening on her own. Now she’d have an actual distraction from finishing her English poetry assignment, instead of getting herself into a tizz by leaving her homework to the last minute - for no good reason other than to feel some mild buzz of excitement at doing something even a tiny little bit reckless.
‘Aw. Do I have to babysit for you?’ she said airily.
‘I think I’m the one who has to babysit.’ Alfie hunched over till he was down on Janey’s level, then performed a very insulting and startlingly accurate imitation of her voice. ‘Ohhh, I’m afraiiiiid! I’m afraid to be home on my oooooown even though I’m totally old enough. I’m afraiiiiiid to be all alooooone in a big dark house with –’
‘Alfie,’ said Janey sternly, ‘you’ve got that completely wrong. I was saying the opposite of that. I’d love to be in on my own, all alone in a big dark house with no electricity and nasty noises coming from the basement. I’d love to be scared out of my wits, to be perfectly honest.’
‘I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again.’ Alfie stared down at her from his great, lanky height – he must have shot up by a whole half-a-body in the last year. ‘You’re very strange, and I can’t believe we’re related.’
Neither can I, thought Janey. However, she didn’t bother to explain to him that for a long time, he’d been first an enemy and then her co-spylet and buddy, until she’d done some creative looping of time and he’d turned up as her cousin. After the crazy looping, she’d spent many hours trying to catch him out, seeing if he really remembered anything about their past activities working for Solomon’s Polificational Investigations (SPI). Even though he’d always been a very good spy and wouldn’t have given anything away easily, she knew that by now she’d have found some tiny Achilles heel, some chink in his armour to get him to confess if he had any recollections of his spy past. He never did. It was definitely sad but true: Alfie was no longer an agent. He was just a tall, irritating, sarcastic relative who happened to be in her class and was also a very good friend. Her best friend, in fact.
And that was great. Really great. Would she go back to the old days though? Just at that moment, she wasn’t at all sure …
As if to prove how flat her life was and how annoying he could be when he really tried, Alfie spent the evening skulking around the house after her, turning out lights and flicking the curtains to try to scare her. When that didn’t work, he upped his efforts, disappearing outside and scratching down the windows with a garden fork while he made wailing noises and shouted, ‘No, no! Don’t murder me!’ When even that failed, and Janey just carried on eating the pizza they’d been allowed to order, he rummaged through her parents’ DVD collection until he got hold of the scariest film he could find, and switched off all the lights so it was pitch black.
‘Alfie, it’s not going to work,’ said Janey, laughing. ‘Even the child catcher in Chitty Bang is not going to terrify me.’
‘But he’s hideous,’ hissed Alfie. ‘I had nightmares about it for years! And anyway, your family doesn’t have –’
There was a thud, and his words cut off abruptly.
‘Doesn’t have what? A DVD horror collection?’
Silence wafted around the sofa like a chill wind. Even the child catcher had ceased his monstrous mewling search for hidden kids, so the film must have gone off too.
Okay, so maybe that was a little bit more effective.
‘Alfie, dearest cousin of mine, you are not going to scare me by being quiet because that would, of course, be the answer to my prayers.’
Still nothing.
Absolute and total nothing.
In fact, it was the kind of nothing she’d experienced before – when she’d plummeted through space or down time-twisting helter-skelters; when it felt like the world had collapsed in on itself and nothing existed beyond her own skin.
How had he done that?
Suddenly a voice sliced through the darkness in a way that froze her to the core. It was hollow – a dark, hacking noise that sounded like someone speaking from the deepest pit of their own body, amplifying the horrible rasp through their stomach. It was vile. Cold.
Frightening.
‘Are you afraid now, Jane Blonde?’
She tried to laugh into the darkness, but the dank, soul-less air around her swallowed the sound. ‘Don’t be silly, Alf.’
‘You are afraid,’ said the voice. ‘Very afraid. That is good.’
‘Why … why is it good?’ said Janey, rather than admitting that she was actually getting a smidge freaked out. Very freaked out. ‘Alfie,’ she added for good measure.
‘I am not your cousin,’ croaked the voice.
‘Course you’re not,’ said Janey, trying not to let nervousness creep into her voice. ‘You would say that, wouldn’t you?’
There was a long pause during which she tried to remember where the light switch was, pulling her school cardigan around her against the ever-decreasing temperature. This was getting a little weird.
Then suddenly the voice growled, ‘This is your cousin,’ and the frozen white face of Alfie was thrust into her vision, illuminated by a sickly green glow. His head was turned away as if in horror, his eyes screwed tightly shut in fear.
Then the voice continued, and it definitely wasn’t coming from Alfie because his dead-looking white lips didn’t even twitch.
‘So do you believe me now, Jane Blonde? Are you afraid?’
Her chest was so constricted with terror that she could hardly speak. Why was she still in her uniform? At least in her spysuit she’d have had some chance of finding out who was talking. And saving Alfie. What had happened to him? Was it really as bad as it looked?
As anger at this … this thing that had hurt Alfie vibrated through her, Janey recalled the power that used to pour into her from the Wower. There was strength in anger, she remembered - a force in turning fear outward against the enemy.
‘Yes, I believe you,’ she said, stalling for time and wishing beyond all else that she could still see Alfie’s face. It had floated back into the black vacuum surrounding her. If she reached out to attack the voice, she might damage Alfie in the process.
Then she remembered the first rule of spying that she had ever been taught by G-Mamma: surprise, surprise, surprise.
‘And yes,’ she said, dropping her voice to a whisper.
As silently as she could, she hunched down towards the sofa and groped for the one thing she knew was in arm’s reach and might possibly save her and Alfie.
‘Yes,’ she repeated, even more quietly. ‘I’m very, very afraid.’
A small sob escaped from her lips, and another and another, until soon she was gently crying.
The voice started to laugh. The icy air around Janey pulsated with the dreadful sound as the voice’s owner drew breath to speak. ‘I knew it–’
‘Kidding!’ shouted Janey, and in that same moment she grabbed the DVD remote control and pressed all the buttons at once. Even with the TV off, the DVD player might do something helpful – and it did, opening up the DVD drawer to spit out the film, flashing a vibrant blue beam across the lounge …
There was just enough time and sufficient light for Jane Blonde to grab Alfie by the collar and whirl the dead weight of his body round onto the sofa, then leap on top of who or whatever was crouched behind him like some diabolical puppet master. She flung herself onto the creature, not sure if it was human or some spy-created abomination such as she’d witnessed in the past. She felt fur beneath her palms and a soft, yielding presence like a … like a trampoline. Or a sprung mattress.
Had she misjudged and fallen onto the sofa? Hoping she hadn’t, as that would mean Alfie getting even more injured, Janey bent her leg and skewered her sharp knee into the side of the body.
The grating, hacking voice erupted into shouting. In the same moment, the air got distinctly warmer, and the lights all came on at once.
‘Get your bony bits off me, Blonde!’ screamed the voice – only now it was a voice that Janey recognised all too well, with nothing sinister and chilling about it (although it was certainly someone of whom she could, from time to time, be very afraid).
‘G-Mamma! What are you doing? You’ve killed Alfie!’
With Janey still straddling her SPI:KE’s well-upholstered ankles, Rosie Biggenham heaved herself over onto her back on Janey’s living room rug. ‘I have not killed Alfie, tempting though it is. He’s neither use nor ornament these days, since you de-spied everyone.’ She flipped her hands at Janey. ‘Get off me, and I’ll show you.’
Janey obliged, and then helped lever G-Mamma to her feet.
The spy pointed to the gadget in her left hand. It resembled a small torch, and looked completely unremarkable. ‘It’s just a stun gun. Sort of a Taser, only gentler. He’ll be up in about seven minutes when the effects wear off.’
‘Good. I’m glad he’s okay.’ Feeling suddenly weak-kneed, Janey sank onto the sofa. ‘But what was all that about? And how did you do that voice? It was … scary.’
There it was again. ‘Are you afraid, Jane Blonde?’
‘That was me.’ G-Mamma sniggered as she waved the instrument in her right hand in Janey’s face. It was a megaphone – the same megaphone she had employed to shout at office workers in London during Janey’s first ever mission, several years ago.
‘We-- I put a voice refrigeration module onto it,’ G-Mamma explained, pointing to the large white cube bolted onto one side. ‘I call it a vox-pop. Freezes my words and the atmosphere around it.’ Behind fluttery fake eyelashes in virulent yellow, G-Mamma’s large blue eyes sparkled merrily.
It looked like she was really enjoying herself - which led Janey to her next question.
‘So did you seriously just want to try out a new spy-buy? Because knocking Alfie out and invading my living room with both our parents due back any minute is a bit mental. Even for you.’
G-Mamma stared at her, and Janey experienced that same chill-and-thrill she got whenever something exciting was afoot.
It was as she thought.
Hoped.
Dreamed …
‘I was just making sure you’re really as ready as you’ve been saying. Luckily, you passed the test. On your feet, Blonde,’ snapped G-Mamma.
She got up warily, half-expecting to find her socks secretly transformed into Fleet-Feet without her knowledge. G-Mamma grabbed her by the shoulders and pushed her big moon face up to Janey’s.
‘It’s what we’ve been training for, all this time,’ she said breathlessly.
‘Not a … It can’t be …’
She could hardly believe it, and yet her gut instincts were fizzing madly. Janey knew for sure that something huge was about to happen.
G-Mamma nodded. ‘We have a mission, Blonde. We meet tomorrow.’
‘Oh!’ squeaked Janey, delighted. ‘That’s brilliant!’
‘You bet your Blonde booty it is.’ G-Mamma’s eyes snapped left as Alfie began to stir on the sofa, and she tapped her watch. ‘Spylab, this time tomorrow. Be there or be no longer a spy.’
‘Try stopping me. I’ll be there!’ said Janey.
A key turned in the front door. In her usual fluid and surprisingly agile manner, G-Mamma scooped up her gadgets, hastened Alfie’s recovery by giving him a tiny zap in the neck with the stun gun in reverse mode, and disappeared out through the back door to flit across the garden and back to her own house.
‘What happened?’ moaned Alfie plaintively.
‘You passed out, I think. Afraid of the child-catcher in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.’
‘Was not,’ he replied, although he didn’t sound entirely sure.
It was only later that Janey realised she hadn’t had time to ask what the mission was going to be.
Or how it was that, an hour or two after she’d gone to bed, her bedroom suddenly grew very cold and still, and a voice as brittle as perma-frost whispered to her.
‘Are you afraid, Jane Blonde?’
But G-Mamma had taken the Vox-pop with her as she left.
Oh yes. She was terrified.
And it felt fantastic.
After a long period of flat-lining, Janey Brown – and Jane Blonde - finally felt alive again.