“What have we done wrong this time?” Barn whispered.
Jimmy put on a headset with a small microphone attached and spoke quietly into it. As he was talking he began to type quickly on the computer keyboard.
“Barn! Diddy Dave!” Major Cowper beamed at the horrified kids. “How would you like to come over to my quarters tonight? We can watch Strictly Come Dancing on the television set and I’ll show you my collection of bullet-proof vests.”
Simon looked up from his notebook, eyes wide. Dave shook his head in disbelief.
“You’re havin us on, man. I mean Major Cowper, sir.”
A slow smile was spreading across Barn’s face.
That’s not Major Cowper, is it?” he said. “He’s never that nice.”
“Good lad Barn. You’re right, it’s a virtual simulation.” Jimmy Hicks removed the microphone, tapped a button and the image froze, a manic grin still on its face. Diddy Dave gave a shudder.
“I found this image on an old database,” Jimmy smiled. “It’s part of a simulation they used to run when they were training security personnel.”
“They probably stopped cause Cowper’s face was putting aff the staff.”
“That’s the whole point. A few tweaks and you can’t tell it from the real person.” Jimmy turned back to his console and typed some more. On screen the chief of security flickered, then seemed to materialise next door in the children’s dormitory.
“He’s right opposite mah bed, man,” Dave wailed. “That’s freaking me out.”
“That’s exactly where I want the Ops Centre to think he is,” Jimmy said, putting the headset back on. “I set up some transmitters that will allow us to broadcast his image right onto their screens.”
Major Cowper came to life again but now his unnatural grin was replaced by the security chief’s normal dour expression. Jimmy Hicks spoke into the microphone and the Major's lips moved in synchronicity with his own.
“Cowper here.” His voice was indistinguishable from the real thing. “My men have reported a possible anomaly in some of the security coding systems. I need you to shut down the cameras in the West Wing for a couple of minutes then bring them back online. See if that does the trick.” He tapped the console and Cowper froze.
“Put him in a tutu an make him break dance, Hicksy! I’d pay serious coin tae see that.”
“I can make him do or say whatever I want,” Jimmy grinned. “It’s like having the real security chief on our side.”
“You are kidding me!” Simon had overcome his incredulity enough to finally speak. “You will never get away with this!”
“Cowper will kill you.” Barn agreed.
“He’s never going to find out.”
“You better hope so, man.” Dave was still envisaging outlandish costumes for his adversary to wear. Colonel Cowper was not popular with the boys. As Head of Security, he was against the idea of children on a military base and made no secret of his opinion. In fact, he seemed to be against kids in general.
“So what do we do to help?” Simon asked.
Jimmy opened a drawer and pulled out a handful of tiny devices, identical to those he had planted in the corridors earlier.
“These receive signals from my computer and boost them. Place one near any transmitting or receiving equipment on this base and I can affect it.” He handed them one transmitter each. “Hide these on yourselves somewhere. You’ll all be outside at some point today, even if it’s just for exercise. Plant one wherever you can get away with it. The wider coverage we have, the more places Major Cowper can crop up.”
“That’s a frightening thought,” Cruikshank said laconically.
“I have a few more things to arrange.” Jimmy flicked the hair from his eyes and switched off the computer. The screen on the wall went blank. “But Operation Go-On-My-Date begins at six o clock sharp.”
“Aye, aw right, General Patton.” Dave rolled up his sleeve. “Ye want us tae synchronise our watches?”
Cruikshank goggled at the gold plated timepiece the size of a small sundial on Dave’s wrist.
“Where did you get that thing? Off the front of Big Ben?”
“Dinnae diss ma bling, bawheid.”
“Sure we’ll synchronise our watches. We’re in the army aren’t we?” Jimmy Hicks smiled a thin smile and for a moment he looked far more like a soldier than a kid.
“Let’s show them how a real military operation should be run.”
11.00
Jimmy Hicks and Leslie sat in Pinewood’s canteen. It wasn’t a very romantic location. Naked strip lights sputtered overhead and glass fronted vending machines lined the walls. Half a dozen posters gave warnings about the disposal of hazardous materials and a big red board proclaimed that today’s special was Scotch pie and chips. Everything else was painted army regulation olive. A few dispirited sprigs of holly dangled from the ceiling in a vain attempt to give the place a festive atmosphere.
At this time of the morning the canteen was almost deserted. Two squaddies silently drank coffee in the far corner. Near the door a group of men and women in white lab coats devoured sandwiches while talking to each other in urgent whispers.
“Why the hell is the inside of the canteen painted olive?” Jimmy Hicks asked. “To hide the food?” Under his wavy fringe, his face was long and solemn.
“No need to get upset about it, Hicks.” Leslie grinned and sipped her milkshake. “Soldiers like the colour. It’s trendy as well as good camouflage.”
Leslie had her own kind of uniform, Jimmy thought◦– ripped black jeans, combat boots, a black T-Shirt and leather arm bands. If it weren’t for a dyed stripe of crimson in her bobbed black hair, and the fact that her T Shirt usually had a picture of some Thrash Metal band on the front, she would have passed as a member of a covert night operation. But Leslie was a teenager, like himself.
“Hey Hicks,” his prospective date sniggered. “If you have pasta and anti-pasta for lunch, do they cancel each other out?”
“You’ve got a very sunny disposition for a Goth.”
“Goths vanished in the mid 1980s.” Leslie glanced dismissively down at her sombre attire. “I’m just me. I don’t fit into a category.”
She looked at him over the rim of her drink and fluttered long dark lashes in mock modesty. Behind the thick eyeliner, her huge almond eyes made Jimmy’s heart leap.
“Tonight is still on?” she asked.
“Tonight is still on.” Jimmy glanced around but nobody was showing the slightest interest in them. Then again, who paid attention to a couple of kids sharing a milkshake, even if they were hyper-intelligent?
“I’ll be glad to get out of this place, even if it’s only for twelve hours.” Leslie said enthusiastically.
“Me too.” Jimmy said solemnly. “You have no idea.”
Something in the way he said it made Leslie pause. She took the milky straw out of her mouth.
“How did you end up here? You’ve never told me.”
Jimmy sat back and thought. He seemed unsure of where to start.
“There was a bully at my school, used to pick on me all the time,” he said after a pause. “He was called Frank Nitty.”
“That’s the same name as a Chicago mobster from the 1970’s.”
“I doubt Frank was aware of the irony.” Jimmy shrugged and lowered his head. “I don’t really like to talk about it.”
“Did I tell you my dad was an ex-soldier?” Leslie asked, although she knew she hadn’t. “He got wounded three times in the Falklands and even won a medal. Then he became a fishmonger.”