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Agent Blue turned and looked at me for a few seconds. Then he started toward the driver side of the van.

“Wait, aren’t you going to answer me?” I said, trailing him.

“Just stay put and wait for instructions,” he finally said.

“But . . .”

“Zero,” he said. “Stay here and wait for instructions.”

Then he got into the van and drove away. I stood there and watched the red taillights until they had turned the corner at the end of the alley. Then I went back inside my house. It didn’t feel much like my house anymore.

I cleaned up downstairs to try and make it look as if nothing had gone on. Then I went to the dining room and sat at the table. How had this happened? How could Pancake Haus, or whoever those guys were, have found out Olek was here?

A
T SOME POINT I MUST HAVE FALLEN ASLEEP AT THE TABLE
because before I knew it I was being woken up by my mom.

“Carson, are you okay? What are you doing up here?” she asked.

I sat up and looked around. It was morning. She was already dressed and ready to leave for work.

“Sorry, I couldn’t sleep and came up to get a snack. . . . I must have dozed off,” I said.

“Well, you and Olek are going to be late for the bus.
You better go get him up and get ready,” she said.

“Yeah, totally,” I said, and then hurried downstairs.

It wasn’t until I was in the shower that I realized that neither Nineteen nor Blue had come back during the night to give me any sort of instructions. Or tell me if they’d found Olek.

So I just went to school like normal. I didn’t know what else to do. At every stop on the bus ride, I kept hoping Olek would get on. But he didn’t. And I suddenly had a very bad feeling that he maybe hadn’t gotten away after all.

It was more than I could take. I hated even simple jobs like mowing the lawn or taking out the trash, so why had I ever agreed to take on a real adult job, one that related to things as important as other people’s safety and national security? The Pancake Haus had still gotten to Olek, probably, and I hadn’t been able to stop them.

Olek was not at school that day. And as the day wore on, I realized I was more worried about Olek than anything else. I no longer cared that I’d failed. I didn’t even care about the terrorists going free or the Agency failing to do its job. I just wanted to know that Olek was okay.

“Hey, I have to tell you something important,” Dillon said at lunch.

“Not now, I had a rough night,” I said. Understatement of the year.

“It’s
really
important,” he said.

I seriously doubted it would be more important than what I’d been going through since the night before, but at the same time maybe it would be nice to have one of his ridiculous theories distract me for a few minutes. So I was just about to tell Dillon to go ahead and tell me whatever he needed to when I found the message in my pizza, underneath the rubbery layer of cheese.

I quickly palmed it and put my hand under the table before peeking at the message:

Meet us by the track immediately
.

“What’s wrong?” Danielle asked. “You look like you’re gonna blow chunks.”

“Yeah, I don’t feel too well,” I said. “I gotta go, guys, sorry.”

“But . . .” Dillon started.

“I promise we’ll talk later,” I said, before basically running to the trash can to empty my tray.

Both Agents Nineteen and Blue were at the track waiting for me. Neither of them smiled as I approached, and I knew right then that the worst was true: Olek had not been found.

I was barely able to keep walking. But somehow I made it over to them.

“Zero,” Nineteen started, “nice work last night. You performed very well in a tough situation.”

I nodded, unable to say anything. I wished they would just say it, get it over with quickly, like ripping off a Band-Aid. Then Agent Blue did just that.

“Olek has been captured.”

“How can you be so sure? He might just be hiding,” I said.

“Because the Pancake Haus has released evidence that they have him,” Agent Nineteen said. “To notify interested bidders. The good news is that we know he is still alive for now, Zero. And we’re going to do everything we can to get him back.”

“How do you know he’s still alive?” I asked hopefully.

“Because the ITDO trial is scheduled for this evening,” Agent Nineteen said. “He’s no good to them dead. They released video footage time-stamped this morning, in which he was still alive and well. They need to use him as leverage to stop his parents from testifying, so we have until tonight to find where they are holding him. We have one possible lead, and we will explore it to its fullest extent.”

“What’s the lead?” I asked.

They looked at each other for a moment, exchanging one of those looks that told me what was coming next before they even had to say it.

“We can’t tell you that,” Agent Nineteen said. “Because the fact of the matter is that we . . .”

“We’re letting you go, Carson,” Agent Blue said flatly.

I thought I detected a certain emphasis on my name. As if by saying Carson instead of Zero, he was driving the point home.

“What?” I asked.

“Olek has been compromised,” Agent Blue said. “They know who he is now, and so your prime directive is no longer part of the mission. We can take it from here. Please don’t blame yourself.”

“I’m sorry,” Agent Nineteen said. “You did a good job, but ultimately there’s nothing more you can do. We will contact you to collect any Agency-issued equipment within a few days.”

I nodded. There was clearly no point in arguing.

“Did you find out how they knew? I mean, I thought the plan was working,” I said.

“We did, too,” Agent Blue said, shaking his head. But he offered nothing further.

“We need to go,” Agent Nineteen said. “Consider yourself relieved of duty, Carson.”

Then they turned and started jogging toward Swallow Nest Hill without answering my question. I assumed that they simply didn’t know and were maybe too embarrassed to say so. But either way, it wouldn’t have changed the facts:

D
ILLON AND DANIELLE WERE WAITING FOR ME BY MY LOCKER
after detention that day.

“Hey guys,” I said, trying my best to act as normal as possible.

“I need to tell you something,” Dillon said breathlessly.

“I still think he’s nuts, but I have to admit I’ve never seen him so worked up about anything before,” Danielle said.

“Okay,” I said, not really caring either way. “Let’s hear it then.”

“The circus!” Dillon said almost before I’d even finished. “The circus, it’s, they’re . . . evil!”

“Everyone knows that,” I said. “They abuse all the animals and make like forty clowns live in one small trailer together.”

“It’s not just that,” he practically shouted. “They’re a front. I mean, the circus is a front for some terrorist cell or evil spy organization of some kind. And they’re planning something huge here in town. I just know they’re bent on world domination.”

“What makes you think all of that?” I asked.

“Because, I just know,” he said. “It all adds up. Remember a few weeks ago when I told you I saw a spy dressed as a lion tamer snooping around the water treatment plant?”

“Yeah, so?” I said. “Seeing a lion tamer creeping around doesn’t mean that the circus is the front to an evil terrorist cell.”

“But it’s not just that!” he said. “Hear me out. Then, there was the bearded lady I saw with a duffel bag of machine guns outside the Burger King near my house. Remember? Plus, I’ve noticed all these guys creeping
around the school lately. At first they were wearing business suits, but then earlier this week a bunch of them were wearing maintenance uniforms of some kind.”

I nodded. I did remember him mentioning seeing a bearded lady with guns outside of Burger King. Plus, he was right about the guys hanging around the school because I’d seen them, too.

“What do the guys in uniforms have to do with the circus, though?” I asked.

“Well, at first I thought they were posing as phone-company dudes. But then I realized why their uniforms looked so familiar to me. They’re the same ones that the janitors and ride-maintenance guys always wear at the circus every year! They’re unmistakable because they all have the same patch on them. The one with that MCMC logo on it. The same logo on the circus tickets the past few years.”

“MCMC is the phone company, Dillon. It stands for Minnow Communications Management Company, remember?” I said.

“I know, but that’s just a coincidence. The phone company might be MCMC technically, but they actually go by just MCC and their logo is way different. Look.”

He held out a piece of paper. He’d printed a picture of
the phone company logo. Next to that was a photocopy of a circus ticket. And next to that was a grainy photo of one of the maintenance guys who’d been around our school earlier that week. And he was right, the logo on the uniform was from the circus, not the phone company.

“And there’s more,” he said. “That day of the goat prank I saw two guys abducting another guy on the corner of Sixteenth and Burdick. I saw it from the goat trailer after I released them.”

I knew he wasn’t making that up, because I’d seen it, too. I realized that Dillon would have had a perfect view of that from where his cousin had parked the goat trailer in an alley across from the school.

“How does that connect to the circus?” I asked, remembering that the guys had creepy white faces.

“Well, the two guys had painted white faces,” Dillon said. “Which at first didn’t make sense to me. But then after I remembered the lion-tamer guy and added up all these other things, I realized that their painted faces fit right in.”

I tried to swallow, but my throat didn’t seem to be working anymore.

“Like clowns,” I said.

Dillon grinned and then nodded. “Like clowns,” he agreed.

He was right. Pancake Haus had been operating under the guise of the local circus all along. The very thing that I had come to see as the epitome of a boring North Dakotan existence had been the key to everything the whole time. Then I remembered Agent Nineteen telling me that they knew Pancake Haus had been operating in the area for at least a few weeks. Right around the same time the circus came to town. And this weekend was their last one before moving out, conveniently right after the ITDO trial scheduled for tonight.

It all fit together perfectly.

“You believe me this time, right?” Dillon said hopefully.

“How would you guys like to go to the circus right now?” I asked.

The biggest smile I’d ever seen spread across Dillon’s face. It was probably the first time I’d ever agreed to investigate one of his theories with him.

“Are you nuts?” Danielle said. “You can’t possibly be serious! Don’t encourage him.”

“I think he might be right this time,” I said.

“What? Why? Just because some guys wearing
uniforms with the circus management company’s logo on it were at the school one day? That doesn’t mean anything!”

“Maybe not, but maybe it does,” I said. “You can’t know for sure either.”

Dillon looked too happy to even be capable of speaking. I don’t think he’d ever heard someone else defending a theory of his before. I could only imagine how awesome that must have felt.

“So, are you coming with us or not?” Dillon asked her.

Danielle sighed. “Okay, fine.”

She even let a grin sneak onto her face. As much as she got fed up with Dillon’s theories, she still loved a good mystery and fun shenanigans as much as we did. Even if she thought it was all made up.

Except that I knew that this time it wasn’t made-up shenanigans.

We rode the school bus to my house so I could get a few things that I thought might come in handy. Then we would head toward the city fairgrounds, where the circus was held every year.

When we got to my place, the first thing I did was find my Agency transponder and press the red button. The problem was that I had no idea when they’d respond.
I didn’t even know if they were still paying attention to my transponder. Should I wait there for them to contact me and explain what was going on, or just head toward the circus on my own?

As I debated this, I grabbed my backpack full of gadgets and then went to the bathroom to reload and strap the smokescreen gun to my wrist so Dillon and Danielle wouldn’t see it. I reloaded the tranquilizer pen and also strapped on the false palms. After all, there was really no point in holding back.

By the time I was ready to go, there was still no sign of any Agency personnel. But it was already almost five o’clock. There just wasn’t time to wait any longer. I’d have to do this on my own. The ITDO trial was just a few hours away now. I might already be too late as it was.

Besides, Agency participation might only look suspicious and tip off the Pancake Haus if Olek was actually being held somewhere on the fairgrounds. It was likely incredibly irresponsible of me to put my friends in danger like this, but at the same time what could possibly be more unlikely than a kid secret agent? Well, besides a monkey secret agent that is? The answer is three kid secret agents. Having Dillon and Danielle with me instead of trained agents might be the only thing that would help
keep my cover as we looked around. I’d be able to infiltrate the circus much better without the Agency. This was my fault, my problem, and my choice. I was going to make it right again.

So we hopped on our bikes and headed out, just the three of us. I rode my bike, and Dillon and Danielle shared Olek’s bike.

Once there, we paid the admission at the circus main gates and went inside. The circus in our town was more like a circus–fair hybrid. There was still a giant tent where there were shows every four hours on the weekends consisting of elephants and trapeze artists and all that stuff. But there was also a whole other section with a few carnival games and rides and a freak show and a fun house.

“So where do you suppose the actual headquarters for this evil organization is at?” I asked once we were inside.

“It’s in a small gray building behind the fun house,” Dillon said.

“Are you sure?” I asked.

He nodded as if I’d asked the most obvious question possible.

“How do you know that?”

“Because I saw suspicious-looking guys going in and
out of that building when I came here to investigate last week.”

“You came out here investigating last week?”

“What? You think that just because you never come with me that I don’t still check things out? The world doesn’t revolve around you, you know? I don’t need your approval to believe in my theories.”

His words stung, but only because they were so true. Was I really all that great of a friend to Dillon? I mean, hadn’t I really just been using him for my own enjoyment all these years? I realized how selfish I’d been all this time, never truly considering that he actually took his theories seriously. And it hurt even worse now that I was starting to realize he’d probably been right about more of them than I ever would have guessed.

“You’re right. But I’m here now, and I believe you. So how do we get into this building?”

“The only way to get in is through a secret entrance in the fun house mirror room,” he said.

“How could you possibly know that?” I asked.

“Pfft,” he said. “Because I know. It’s kind of obvious, if you think about it.”

I didn’t know how that made any sense, but as usual with Dillon it was best to not try to make sense of the
way his mind worked. Besides, after how badly his words a second ago had cut through me with their brutally sharp honesty, I wasn’t about to start arguing with him about his theories again. At least not so soon.

“But that’s definitely the headquarters?” I asked.

“Yeah, I know it is,” Dillon said.

“Well, let’s go, then.”

“Is this really such a good idea, guys?” Danielle spoke up.

She had come along because I imagine she thought this all might be kind of fun. But now she looked really worried, as if there was a chance she thought Dillon might be right as well. Because if he was right, then she’d know like I did that this was no game.

“Isn’t this kind of dangerous? I mean, what are you planning to do if we do break in and you’re right?” she added.

“We’ll take them down, of course,” I said.

Which was sort of true, but really my primary directive was what it had been from the beginning: to find Olek and keep him safe. That’s all I was really focused on at the moment.

Dillon nodded, and so, with a sigh, Danielle relented. We all headed to the fun house. Once we got to the hall
of mirrors, we stopped and Dillon looked at me.

“Well?” I said.

He looked unsure of himself for the first time. Then he started inspecting the various mirrors, his distorted concentration reflected all around me. I watched him with interest, wondering if this was really going to go anywhere.

There
was
a nondescript gray building behind the fun house. We’d all seen it as we approached. So he was right about that, at least. But it looked to me like it was probably just a maintenance or utility building. The only thing that kept me from abandoning the plan was my pure desperation to save Olek.

“It should be here somewhere,” he muttered.

“You don’t really know if there’s a secret entrance, do you?” I asked, too anxious to keep waiting.

He sighed and shook his head. “No, but I really do think that building is where all the evil plots go down, because of what I saw the first time I came here.”

Danielle nodded. “You know, I came with him that time, and even I have to admit, now that I think back, there was something kind of sinister about the guys going in and out of the building that day. I didn’t want to admit it to myself, but . . .”

That sealed it. Danielle had never once agreed with her brother. It must be the right building. Which meant we had to find a way in.

“Wait,” I said. “If you saw them come out, then that means the building has its own door?”

“Well, yeah, duh,” Dillon said. “I just assumed it was locked and that there had to be a secret entrance somewhere.”

I rolled my eyes, and wanted to laugh even in spite of the situation. But I didn’t. I couldn’t even smile until I found Olek, let alone laugh. Time was ticking away. I kept forcing myself not to think about the possibility that it might already be too late. And also the scary fact that I’d pressed the red button on my transponder almost an hour ago and still hadn’t heard from the Agency at all. What did that mean? I forced myself to forget all that. Now was a time for action.

“Come on, let’s go,” I said.

We left the fun house and circled around to the back. There was a chain-link fence that blocked us from actually getting to the building behind the fun house. I mean, we could easily climb it, but there were several guys milling around near the building’s front entrance.
They would definitely hear and see three kids climbing the fence.

Not only that, but then there was the problem of how to get past those guys and into the building even if they didn’t catch us climbing the fence. And suddenly I realized that I shouldn’t be thinking in terms of “we” anymore. There was no way I could let Dillon and Danielle come inside with me. Not with how dangerous I knew this would be.

“We need to create a diversion of some kind,” I said. “So I can get in there.”

“Why are you getting so gung-ho about this?” Danielle asked.

“Because, what if Dillon were actually right for once? I mean, we need to stop these guys!” I said. “I’ll check it out, but I still need your help.”

“Why don’t we just call the cops?” Danielle said.

“No way!” Dillon said. “The cops are in on it!”

“I agree with Dillon,” I said.

“What?!” Danielle said.

“I mean, not about the cops being in on it, but do you really want to call the cops with no proof whatsoever? What do we tell them, that our crazy friend has this
theory that the circus is a front to an evil organization with aspirations of world domination? They won’t even hesitate before hanging up on us, let alone send out any uniforms to investigate.”

“Good point,” Danielle ceded. “Plus, this will be more fun, right?”