Jay Gridley gave a quick, emphatic nod.
Megan noticed, however, that “Hangman Hank” Steadman’s nod wasn’t as positive.
Jay Gridley took over the meeting again. “Think of it as Captain Winters finally being able to take some vacation time. We all know how hard the man works. A little peace will do him good,” he said. “While Captain Winters is away, your Net Force Explorers liaison will be Agent Len Dorpff.”
Megan finally turned her attention to the fourth man on the stage. Compared to the rest of the men, Agent Len Dorpff looked like a kid. In fact, several of the kids in the crowd facing the podium looked older than he did. Dorpff had an eager, awkward kind of face. With freckles. Worst of all, at least from Megan’s point of view, his ears stuck out.
“Agent?” David Gray muttered in scorn as he looked at the man. “He doesn’t look old enough to have finished college, much less the FBI Academy. Looks to me like Net Force scraped the bottom of the barrel to come up with him.”
“Looks like it,” Leif Anderson agreed. “In Gridley’s defense, it was short notice, and a temporary assignment at that. He probably didn’t want to put someone too valuable into the position.”
Dorpff stepped out front and center, like a cadet about to speak to his class.
“Men,” he began. Then he broke off, his face going a dull red as he scanned his audience. Roughly half the kids there — maybe more — were girls. Megan wasn’t the only girl who bristled at the agent’s unthinking comment.
“People,” Dorpff hastily changed his opening. “Young…people.”
He’s babbling, Megan thought.
The young agent finally got back to his prepared speech, seemingly grabbing at his cue cards like a drowning man at a lifeline. “I’ll be stepping into some pretty big shoes for this assignment, but Captain Winters has been kind enough to brief me—”
“Clearly not enough,” a female voice said with enough volume to make Dorpff blush again.
“I hope we’ll be able to work together to keep things running during the captain’s absence.” Dorpff’s words came out in a desperate rush.
Megan glanced around at her friends, who looked about as stunned and unhappy as she did. She didn’t care how old Dorpff was or what he looked like as long as he was up to the job. But Megan wasn’t sensing a comfortable level of competence about this man. He was in over his head and going down three times — almost before he even started.
We’ve got to do something, she thought. With this clown running things, the Explorers won’t last a week!
4
The crew that Megan liked to think of as the “D.C. Nine” got together after the surprise Net Force Explorers meeting to talk. Matt Hunter’s virtual workspace was as crowded as the O’Malley living room had been during the broadcast of Winters’s interview — although, thanks to the miracle of Net technology, the visitors didn’t have to worry about having enough chairs to sit on or space to park them in. Megan, Andy Moore, Maj Green, David Gray, Catie Murray, Daniel Sanchez, and Mark Gridley floated among clouds and stars around the unsupported marble platform Matt was using as a desk these days.
The non-Washington members of the group were a bit later linking in. Leif was in New York City, but he appeared virtually in Matt’s space soon enough, rubbing the sides of his head as he took his place in the crowd. P. J. Farris was in Texas with his father. He was the last to “arrive,” dressed in the boots, brush-popper shirt, and blue jeans he often wore when he was on his family’s ranch.
Even though Matt was the one who had invited everyone in, Megan started the ball rolling. “I can’t believe anybody here is happy with the dimwit they brought in to replace the captain,” she said.
“Tell us about it,” Maj grumbled. “Why would they bring in somebody so wet behind his ears? From the way he shot himself in the foot just by opening his mouth today, you have to wonder what he was like on the firing range.”
Megan was in no mood for joking. She came right out with what was on her mind. “We’ve got to do something to get Captain Winters out of trouble and send Agent Dork back wherever he came from.”
“It’s just for a little while,” Matt pointed out.
“Yeah?” Megan shot back. “Then how come nobody mentioned exactly how long that ‘little while’ would be? If this was going to be an open-and-shut sort of investigation, wouldn’t somebody have given us an estimated time of completion? And even though Winters tried to pass it off as a pain-in-the-butt standard annoyance, I noticed that ‘Hangman Hank’ Steadman didn’t lighten up. He looked about as serious as a hearse throughout the whole thing.”
“Megan, you’re making it sound like Winters is going to be fired,” Mark Gridley protested. “My dad would never—”
Megan cut him off. “A week ago, you’d have told me your dad would never have suspended the captain.”
Mark opened his mouth, then shut it.
“So what are you suggesting, Megan?” Andy wanted to know. “You thinking of sending nasty e-mail to Jay Gridley? That would be kind of cool — trying to flame the head of Net Force—”
“For however long you got away with it,” David, the usual voice of reason, cut in. “I figure the FBI would be knocking on your door in about fifteen minutes.”
“I don’t think that’s the way—” Matt began.
“So we’re just supposed to sit like statues while Captain Winters gets crucified?” Megan demanded. She rounded on Mark before he could even speak. “And don’t try telling me about how he’ll be protected. The minute Tori Rush put the story on Once Around the Clock, it became political. And everybody knows how politics runs in this city.”
“Okay, then. What can we do?” Leif Anderson asked sarcastically. “Are we supposed to turn the reign of terror from whatsisname — that McGuffin guy — to this news-babe instead?”
Megan didn’t have an answer, and Matt jumped in. “Now, wait a minute!” he said. “The captain asked us specifically to leave McGuffin alone. If we do anything to a network newsperson, it will just make matters worse for Captain Winters.”
“But we’ve got to do something,” Daniel Sanchez said. “Maybe you guys can afford to blow off an adult who believes in us — who listens and tries to help out. I can’t.”
Megan glanced at this unexpected ally. She knew that Daniel had a tough family situation — a lot rougher than anyone else in this group. But he had a point. Most of the kids in this room were able to depend on their parents and some of their teachers in a pinch. But none of the kids had enough adults they could count on to back them in a tough spot that they could afford to lose one.
Even Matt was silenced by Daniel’s words. He thought for a second, and a glimmer of an idea began to form. “Maybe we can do something to show that we back Captain Winters one hundred percent,” he said. “Even the captain couldn’t complain about us showing our opinion of him — as long as we don’t go after someone else.”
“That sounds good, but I don’t think it goes far enough. The HoloNews network headquarters is up in New York,” Leif said. “Maybe I can poke around up there and see what’s going on.”
“I want to help, too,” Mark Gridley unexpectedly spoke up. “I could try to get into Dad’s files and find out how the investigation is going.”