Chapter 21 - Discovered?

"Good morning people, I hope we enjoyed our long" Mr Jeffries said as he threw his bag on his desk, the rest of the class groaned, "ah Carrie what happened to you?" Mr Jeffries asked as Carrie came in. MI9 doctors had put her arm in a sling so she could get out of all practical classes, doctors had cleared her to go to school and had been put on desk duty, "Skateboarding accident sir". She sat down next to Shannon, "one day, I'm going to start asking questions" Shannon whispered, "Mr London and Rose turn up in weird uniforms and Jack's seriously injured, me and Tom get kicked out when Rose takes a phone call from Oscar about you." Carrie nodded, "One day Shan, I'll have answers for you, but now's not the time."

Jack and Frank weren't at the school until Thursday, and they both got called in to see Mr Jeffries and Mrs King to explain their absences. The full moon had come last night, and had healed all of Jack's wounds, although he still bared the scar running across his left eye. "So then, how do you explain it all then Frank?" Mrs King asked, "That's new" Mr Jeffries said, pointing out Jack's scar, unfortunately the moon couldn't heal that, he would bare that in both wolf and human form. "That was the issue Mrs K." Frank said, "I got mugged" Jack said, taking over from Frank, "they attacked me, took my phone and my wallet, I've got the note from the hospital" Jack reached for his rucksack and began rummaging for the fake hospital note MI9 had made, "and I can get you the police report if you need it Mrs K" Frank added, if Mrs King asked for that, all Frank had to do was call someone at MI9 and they'd make a fake one for the school. Mrs King and Mr Jeffries nodded and sent Jack back to class, "Everything okay at home? Adoption can be difficult." Mr Jeffries asked, Frank shook his head, "Everything's good Mr Jeffries, after it happened I panicked, they thought it was concussion, spent all the time at the hospital with him, it slipped my mind to call in for both of us." Mrs King offered a sympathetic smile, "It takes take to adjust, if you need anything, I'm here for you."

The team met up again in HQ on the following Monday, Stark, Stella and the Head of MI9 were waiting for them, "This isn't fair" Carrie said, "you were injured way worse than me, and you're fine now" Jack laughed, "I got this neat scar." The Head of MI9 wanted a run down of everything that happened from the time they left the St Hopes camp to everyone retreating. Jack and Carrie filled them in on what happened to them, how Jack had bitten James after he tried to shoot Stark and how James shot him. They spoke in great detail about the ordeal, the Head of MI9, Stark, Stella and Frank didn't ask any questions, they simply let the agents talk. Once they had finished, the Head of MI9 finally spoke, "So Jack, you carried on after getting shot, you saved Oscar at the cabin, you risked your life pulling Carrie off that mine." She said, Jack was quick to respond, "I couldn't let them get hurt, they're my team, we were outnumbered, there was over 100 of them and before the last half hour of the battle, there was 8 of us. I couldn't let them do it alone." "You deserve this" the Head of MI9 said as she produced a medal from her pocket, "You figured out the CHERUB issue, you performed brilliantly in battle, and overall you are an exemplary agent." Jack took the medal and smiled, "I made sure it wasn't silver" She joked, Jack was confused, "Werewolves and silver?" she joked, "but I'm not…. Ohhhh" he realised.

The team used the backdoor into the CHERUB system to try to identify as many teenagers as they could from what they could remember about the battle. "We know James was there" Jack said, "How is he by the way?" Stark laughed, "he was in the hospital with Carrie, needed 42 stitches, but he'll live, and the girl you bit, she's more shocked than injured, only needed a few stitches" Jack nodded, "They get tetanus shots? Rabies? Antibiotics?" he asked, Frank turned around in his chair, "they'd need that?" Jack nodded, "I'm not rabid, but better safe than sorry, I assume they'd treat it as a dog bite?" Stark shrugged, they carried on and Frank pulled Jack to the side, "aside from those two? Have you ever bitten anyone?" he asked, Jack became more alert, "You're having doubts about me?" he asked, Frank shook his head, "no" Jack put his hand on Frank's shoulder, "I'd never bite you Frank" Frank smiled, "In answer to your question, yes. But you have to understand, the wild is different, there was always people with shotguns wanting your pelts, coming through the camp, but you know as well as I do, I'm not a danger" Frank nodded and patted him on the back and they re-joined the others.

They were looking through the CHERUBs profiles, from the information that they got from one of the girls Rose unmasked, they knew there were at least all of the grey and navy shirt girls. "Okay, so" Rose said, "I've found how they rank the kids – just because we've all been wondering" The team turned and listened to Rose, "Red is for kids under 10, at 10 they go into a 100 day intense basic training and they wear light blue" "Basic training it where Kazakov is right now" Stella added, Jack nodded, Rose continued, "They can retake basic training three times, once they've passed their qualified for missions and wear the grey shirt. Then its up to Zara Asker, you get the Navy shirt for an exemplary performance on one mission, Black is for outstanding performance on multiple missions, once you age out of the service at 18 you get white, so if a staff member is in a white shirt" "Like Zara and Ewart" Jack interrupted, Rose hit him in the shoulder, "if someone is in white, then they're a retired agent. So, people like John Jones doesn't wear one because he wasn't a CHERUB" Rose finished. "Okay, so we weren't attacked by the best of the best – that's humiliating" Stark said as he rolled his eyes, "Would explained why Lauren wasn't there" Jack said, the rest of the team were confused, "She's a black shirt, here look at her file" Jack passed the document folder over to Rose, everything was in there, her family history, how she came to CHERUB, all her training and mission details, school grades, and disciplinary records. "If CHERUB closes, that's one kid I'd suggest taking on" Stella said. Stark and Frank looked at her like she had three heads. Oscar broke the tension by slamming a file down on the table, "Kazakov – born in Ukraine, joined the Soviet military – Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, Spetnatz Special Forces Unit – two medals of bravery. Joined NATO in '91 left '94, he designed exercises for our troops and the Yanks to learn Soviet combat techniques. Training advisor for British military and us til '06. Joined CHERUB the next year." Jack looked at the file, it was different to the others, "We couldn't find Kavakov's file on the system, we couldn't find any of the staff, how'd you get this?" Jack asked, the others we're confused too, they wanted information on Kazakov, Ewart and Zara, but they didn't know how to access it without being caught. "He worked for the security service, he's in our system" Oscar smiled, the rest of the team felt like idiots, they hadn't checked to see if anyone they were investigating was in their own system.

"They worked through the night looking through files, compiling all of the information that they needed to make their case to the intelligence minister solid and to make their case stand up in court. They needed all of the evidence that they could to make sure there was no way that any lawyer would try to dismiss the case when they brought James and Kyle in for questioning. They had all fallen asleep in HQ and woke up to the sound of the proximity alarm, "Great, Jeffries then Flatley" Carrie yawned, but the alarm got louder, and they realised that it wasn't the school bell. "Proximity alarm?" Carrie said shaking Frank awake. "It's worse than that, someone's coming" Jack said watching the lift doors, instinctively he transformed to protect his family. Frank woke up and reached under the desk pulling out a handgun and two stun guns which he passed to Carrie and Oscar. He looked around for Stark and Stella, but he saw a note on the desk saying they had gone home when the others had fallen asleep. The lift descended and the doors opened, "What the…." They heard a familiar voice say, recognising the voice, Carrie, Rose and Oscar ducked into the interrogation room, so they wouldn't be seen. "Frank? What is this place?" Mr Jeffries said confused. Jack growled and followed him as he started to walk towards Frank. "Caretakers workshop Mr J" Frank lied. Mr Jeffries started to look around, he saw the files on the desk that they hadn't managed to get rid of in time, "CHERUB? MI9? What is this?" He picked up the files Jack jumped on the table, knocking the file out of his form tutors' hand. "I can explain" Frank said, he paused, and realised he didn't know what to say, Rose came out of the interrogation room, the three of them had decided they were going to try to get in the lift and up to the school as Mr Jeffries back was turned, but it didn't go to plan. "Rose? Carrie? Oscar? What is going on down here?" Jack jumped off the table and went into the interrogation room and transformed back into a human, he too came out of the room and joined the others. "Jack?" Jack smiled and walked across the base, "Sit down sir" he pushed a chair towards his form tutor, he went through to the kitchen, "What are you doing?" Oscar said, "we're going to have to leave" Rose and Carrie nodded in agreement, Jack smiled and unlocked a box that was at the back of the cupboard, "Whitewood left me a package after she died, all her research she'd been doing. I've been continuing some of her work and this is the result. Compound B67 The Amnesia Pill – otherwise known as Retcon." He dropped the small pill into a glass of water and watched it dissolve, "Colourless, tasteless, and is going to make Jeffries forget the past 24 hours, he'll be asleep in ten minutes, we move him, and he'll wake up forgetting all of this." Jack added. The other three weren't too sure, Jack started to walk out of the kitchen, Carrie grabbed his arm and pulled him back, "How do you know this works?" she asked him, Jack looked at the floor, "Who did you give this too?" Jack turned around, "I gave it to Tom, put it in his drink the day after we came out of surgery. Have you noticed how its only Shannon asking questions? That's because Tom doesn't remember that day, and Tom's walked out of the kitchen and into the main base.

"This must be a shock for you sir" Jack said handing the glass of water to Mr Jeffries, he nodded, he kept looking around the base asking Frank questions, but Frank wasn't answering. He took a few sips of his drink, "So MI9? I didn't know it went past MI5" he asked, "Well we're more advanced than them" Jack said, Frank looked concerned, but Jack smiled. Rose, Carrie and Oscar came out of the kitchen waiting to see if Jack was right, Jack saw them and turned the heating up, within minutes they were all sweating and Mr Jeffries had finished his drink, Jack turned the heating down when he was sure the glass was empty. "That's why you're always skipping lessons" he said, "but, but, but…." Mr Jeffries grabbed his head, forgetting what he was going to say, "maybe I should have stayed in bed longer." A few moments later, and Mr Jeffries was out cold. "Retcon, a miracle drug, now lets get him into his office, I halved the pill, he'll forget all about us, and probably the last ten hours or so, but he wont be asleep for longer than two hours" Jack said.

"They had managed to get Mr Jeffries to his office and were back down in HQ by the time other staff members started to arrive. "So where did the Retcon come from?" Frank asked, Jack shrugged, "it was part of the documents Whitewood left for me, I recreated it." They were still flicking through CHERUB profiles trying to identify agents, but they were getting nowhere. "How long till Kazakov returns to the UK?" Oscar asked, "a week or so, not long" Carrie replied, "So we find his flight, grab him as he lands?" Frank shook his head, "they'll be landing back on campus" Oscar smiled, "So we divert the plane, CHERUB uses RAF pilots, CHERUB is classified as a military base, we can't touch the plane when its in their airspace, so we do it before" Jack had an idea, "The Russians owe us right?" Frank slowly nodded his head, not liking where this was going, "We borrow a Russian plane – make it a commercial airliner, force the CHERUB plane to make an emergency landing at…." Jack paused as he spread out maps on the table, tracing a line from the CHERUB campus to the nearest airport, "for them to land at Luton, we take Kazakov straight off the plane." The rest of the team nodded in agreement and headed upstairs to class.