The location of the relatively new juvenile detention center at the academy was supposed to be a secret, but of course Orica knew exactly where it was. Orica knew the academy grounds better than anyone—including most of the professors—and trying to keep a secret from her was like trying to hide candy from a kindergartner. It turned out, the holding area had been built underneath the security campus, down on a secret subterranean level.
Orica figured that the best time to infiltrate the academy would be in the middle of the night, when everyone was asleep, and her mother reluctantly agreed. So I spent most of the rest of the day recuperating at the old British embassy.
I had to keep a low profile, though. Despite Omelia's assurances that the British Odd Squad owed me thanks, that didn't mean they wanted her harboring me at the embassy. In fact, Omelia had gone rogue by rescuing me, and she warned me that if anyone realized who I was, they'd probably alert the Odd Squad immediately. Omelia found me a small bedroom up on the third floor, which looked as though it might not have been used since the Thatcher administration.
Despite its apparent neglect, it was warm and cozy with extremely stereotypical British furnishings like paintings of the countryside, ceramic bulldogs, and a bust of Winston Churchill. After my recent adventures and my nearly sleepless night, I was exhausted, so I collapsed onto the bed and promptly fell asleep until well after nightfall.
When I woke, I was famished. Thankfully, Omelia had realized this would be the case; she had already made me a meal and left it on the dresser. There were several peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (no crust), two thermoses (one with chicken soup and one with tea), a package of English "crisps" (which turned out to be potato chips), and some unidentifiable puddinglike substance that I figured must be a British food I'd never heard of. Normally, I might have avoided it, but I was hungry enough to eat jackalope kidneys, so I gulped it down with everything else.
There was a TV in the room, so ancient that it actually had an antenna attached to it, though it was also connected to cable. I flipped between 24-hour news channels as I ate.
Unsurprisingly, the news was all about me.
Even though it was well over a day since my "attack" on the Big Office, the ongoing manhunt for me was still the top story. This late at night, the news channels were mostly rerunning the same reports they'd had on all day. While there was a general consensus that I was now public enemy number one, there was considerable debate about my motive. My attempted assassination was blamed on everything from video games to Social Media to a misguided crush on the Little O.
Nobody mentioned THE ORGANIZATION. But then, it was doubtful any of them knew about THE ORGANIZATION at all.
I terminated that interview instead, switching to a different channel, where I found Jason mouthing off about me. It wasn't an official interview; instead, Jason had been posting about me on social media—probably without his cousin's permission—and the news was wantonly parroting everything he said.
Unsurprisingly, Jason was being awful to me—and very supportive of himself.
"My cousin would have been dead if it wasn't for me," Jason had proclaimed on his blog. "I suspected AJ was a possible assassin all along. The kid was real weird. So when he came over, I was on guard. When I heard his jacket ticking, I risked my own life to rip it off him. Sucks that it blew up my cousin's office, though. And that the security dorks let him escape. Losers."
On Oddstagram, he had been much more succinct: A picture of him doing that weird inward peace sign and underneath the text saying "Stopped #AssassinAJ from killing my cousin today. You're welcome."
Since Jason wasn't actually giving interviews, no one could ask him why he'd invited me over for a playdate if he suspected I was an assassin all along. Somehow, none of the news commentators thought to point this out either.
For about the thousandth time that day, I found myself thinking about my parents and wishing there was some way to contact them.
I flipped off the TV in disgust and wolfed down the rest of my food.
I had just finished it when there was a knock at the door. "OJ?" Omelia asked. "Are you awake?"
"Yes. Come on in."
Omelia stepped in, carrying the sort of box that clothes from a fancy store came in. Only, there was no store name on the box. It was completely black. "Oh, good. You've eaten," Omelia said. "Did you enjoy the trifle?"
"Er . . . yes," I said, deducing that that's what the puddinglike substance has been.
"Wonderful. I hate to disturb you, but Orica feels the time for your covert mission is nigh."
"I figured as much."
"Although, before you go, I thought you might want to wear something a bit more . . . appropriate." Omelia handed me the box.
I opened it and gasped with surprise at what lay inside. It was a sleek black outfit, like the ones Orica had worn on our trip to the Toronto Harbour Lighthouse, except tailored for a boy. It even had its own utility belt. "Wow," I said.
"Do you like it?"
"I love it."
Omelia beamed. "Orica's told me that you've been having some trouble accessing hammerspace so I had a utility belt sown in. Unfortunately, they don't come fully loaded and I didn't have time to procure much for you. All I could get on short notice was a silly string-inator, knockout capsules, and some chewing gum. Try not to get them all mixed up."
"Thanks," I said, and then, even though I barely knew Omelia, I gave her a hug. After being accused of treason and insulted in the press, I was feeling awfully emotional, and she gave off such a maternal vibe, I couldn't help it.
Omelia hugged me back, comforting me. "There, there, now. Everything will be all right."
"I don't know," I said. "It's all pretty messed up."
"Yes, but you have my daughter on your side."
"And the entire Canadian Odd Squad on the other."
"Perhaps. But who do you trust more?"
I didn't have to think about that too long. "Orica."
"Exactly."
I pulled away from Omelia, feeling better. Not a whole lot better, but at least a little bit. "Do you have any idea how my parents are handling all of this?"
"Ah. I suspected you might want to know that. I've done my best to keep tabs on them while you were asleep and . . . well, it's probably no surprise that this has been very difficult for them. The best I could do to allay their grief was to send them an extremely secure e-mail claiming to be from the Big Office, in which I stated that you had been zapped by an evil-twin-inator and your copy took up the name of AJ and had been the true culprit behind the attack."
"Do you know if that made them feel any better?"
"Sadly, I don't. We can only hope. Of course, it will all be a load of poppycock unless you and Orica can actually rectify the situation. So, why don't you try on that outfit and we'll hit the road?" Omelia gave me a reassuring smile, then slipped out of the room to give me privacy.
I put the suit on. It was extremely snug, but besides that, it felt great. When I checked myself out in the bedroom mirror, I looked rather suave and primed for action. I performed a few test karate chops and jujitsu kicks then modeled some debonair poses. "The name's J," I purred smoothly. "OJ."
It was at this point that I noticed Orica standing in the doorway.
"What on earth are you doing?" she asked.
"Nothing!" I said quickly. "Just testing out my suit."
"Save it for the bad guys. We have to go."
When I looked back at the mirror again, I no longer looked that suave. Instead, I was bright red from embarrassment. In my black suit, my head looked like a maraschino cherry atop a chocolate sundae. I wadded my old clothes into a ball and quickly followed Orica out the door.
By that time, most of the embassy employees had gone home. In the dark, the guard on duty didn't even notice Orica and me hunkered down in the back of the minivan when Omelia drove us out.
The embassy wasn't far from the Odd Squad Academy. Omelia drove us to a residential street a block from the academy, where we all synchronized our watches. "I'll pick you both up right here in ninety minutes," Omelia said, as though she were a normal mother dropping us off at a movie. "If you're not back by then, I'll have to assume something's gone wrong and come looking for you. . . ."
"Nothing will go wrong," Orica said confidently. Like it was a fact, rather than a guess. "I know this place inside and out." With that, she hopped out of the minivan and started down the street.
"Good luck!" Omelia called.
"Thanks for everything," I said, then followed Orica.
In our dark suits, we blended into the shadows perfectly as we made our way to the academy force field.
"You're aware that what we're doing here is insane, right?" I asked.
"It's the last thing they'd ever expect us to do," Orica replied.
"Unless they're expecting us to do the last thing they'd ever expect us to do, in which case, this is exactly what they'd expect us to do."
"Shhh," Orica warned. "We need to be quiet. And your logic is making my head hurt."
There was a small keypad installed on a tree that would let us disable to forcefield temporarily.
"Why don't we use that?" I asked.
"Because my grandfather knows I know about it," Orica replied. "So he probably has security checking to see if anyone enters the code."
Instead, she pulled out a shovel-inator from behind her back and dug a hole underneath the forcefield. We shimmied under it.
We ran to the security campus and Orica tapped a secret brick. With a loud rumble, the entrance to the tunnels opened.
Although the campus above us was closely monitored with security cameras, the subterranean levels weren't. There wasn't enough money in the school budget for that, and the designers had figured that anyone who knew about the tunnels was probably on our side. This allowed Orica and me to move quickly, without fear of having our presence recorded.
Orica led the way through a mind-boggling series of lefts and rights—pausing every now and then to let guards wander through distant intersections—until we found ourselves outside a door mundanely marked C414. There was a coded keypad entry for security, but Orica knew the code. The door clicked open, allowing us in.
There was also a heavily armed guard, lying unconscious on the floor.
Uh-oh, I thought.
At which point, someone leapt out and attacked us.