Johnny B. Fast: The Super Spy Part One

  * * *

  Johnny quietly opened the door to his room and slipped inside.

  His room looked like an average enough room, in keeping with his secret identity; there was a desk, computer, chair, and all his clothes dumped wherever there was a spot on the floor.

  His walls were all white, and there wasn’t a single thing on any of them, and his bed was up against the wall directly opposite from the door, nothing you would expect from a super spy.

  Johnny quickly changed out of his spy clothes and into a T-shirt and a pair of jeans. He picked up his cast-off clothes from the floor and rummaged through them. Johnny pulled out an assortment of spy gadgets and weapons. He put them down in a drawer in his computer desk, removed the ear piece out of his ear and tossed it in with everything else, then slid the drawer closed.

  Johnny looked at the computer and sighed. It looked like it was older than he was, with a monitor so small that laptops had bigger screens.

  The computer was turned off.

  He leaned over and started typing on the keyboard: ‘Johnny is the best spy in the world!’

  As soon as he hit the exclamation mark, a small humming noise came from all over the room. Panels in the wall slid up to reveal multiple display screens, the ceiling opened up slightly and a projector slipped out, turning on and displaying a holographic display of even more screens and a keyboard, all hovering in the air before him.

  Johnny walked over to the floating keyboard and started typing in midair with furious speed. One of the monitors against the wall lit up with an image of an irate Agent Ackers. Pimples covered his entire face.

  “I’m going radio silent now,” Ackers started mimicking Johnny with heavy sarcasm. “Gee, that was only, I don’t know, a million years ago!”

  “We weren’t alive a million years ago,” Johnny said.

  Ackers froze him with a look. Johnny glanced apologetically at Ackers’ face. There was a two way video connection with them, so they could both hear and see each other.

  “I’m sorry Ackers, something came up,” Johnny explained.

  “Something is supposed to come up!” Ackers explained. “You’re on a mission, things are supposed to come up and I’m supposed to help you deal with them.”

  “I know, it was an oversight.”

  “Oversight? What’s that? I think it was more like an over-mind, as in it was over and out of your mind to think about keeping me in the loop. How am I supposed to help you if you don’t let me help you?”

  Johnny shrugged.

  “If it wasn’t for this,” Ackers gestured to the pimples all over his face, “I’d be out there with you in the field. Instead, I’m locked up here in a basement, nurturing my skin condition and wondering what happened to the agent I’m supposed to be backing because he put me on radio silence!”

  Johnny had to lean back and listen to Ackers yell. Ackers didn’t mean to get so upset; he was really a good guy. Johnny could understand the frustration he must have felt at not knowing what was going on. Still, Johnny didn’t understand why pimples on a face would keep someone from being out there in the field. Johnny suspected it had more to do with Ackers’ courage than his pimples.

  “I’ve been thinking,” Ackers continued. “They shouldn’t even allow you to be able to put me on radio silence. It shouldn’t even be an option that you have. I’m supposed to advise and guide you during missions, and if I think you not being advised or guided by me is a bad thing, then you shouldn’t be able to do it.”

  His rant should be coming to an end soon, thought Johnny. They usually lasted a certain amount of time, and Johnny could tell that Ackers was beginning to slow down and run out of things to say.

  “I think I will put in a request for having that option removed before your next mission,” but Ackers kept going. Maybe he had a bit more left to complain about.

  Johnny liked Ackers. How could he not? He knew Ackers meant well.

  There was a knock at the door. It was his dad!

  Johnny sprang into action. He couldn’t let his dad see all the computers and gadgets.

  “Sorry Ackers, have to go.”

  Johnny had two choices, he could type in his password into the old keyboard lying on the desk, or he could hit enter and put the whole system into sleep mode.

  “Son, can I come in?” his father asked from behind the door.

  There wasn’t any time to type in the whole password.

  “Just a moment dad!”

  “I suppose you’re going to go radio silent again?” Ackers asked sarcastically.

  Johnny didn’t even bother to reply, he slammed the Enter key on his old computer as hard as he could.

  All the panels slid down covering the monitors, the projector from the ceiling turned off, killing the holographic displays. The projector then slid up, allowing the hole in the ceiling to close. Within moments Johnny’s room looked just like an ordinary room again.

  Johnny jumped onto his bed and grabbed a comic.

  “Okay Dad, come on in,” Johnny called.

  The door opened and his dad, Henry Clunker, walked into the room.

  Johnny’s dad was about medium height and slightly pudgy. His hair always looked a bit uncombed, and his glasses were always a little crooked. He was easy with a smile and quite clumsy, getting into accidents more often than he cared to admit.

  “What was taking you so long?” Henry asked.

  “I had to clean up my room a bit,” Johnny answered.

  Henry looked around the messy room; there were clothes still on the floor and things still out of place. Henry would have hated to see what it looked like before Johnny cleaned.

  “Don’t worry, I’ll get to it,” Johnny said, seeing his dad’s bemused look.

  “Oh, of course,” Henry said.

  Henry wasn’t big into discipline, so he usually made a small attempt, and then ended up giving in with an, “oh, of course,” to whatever reason Johnny had for not doing what he was supposed to be doing.

  “It’s kind of late, isn’t it?” Henry asked.

  “Yeah, I was just going to do some homework before going to bed,” Johnny offered, before realizing he was holding a comic. He quickly shoved it aside.

  Henry nodded and beamed. That was his son, always staying on top of his school work.

  “That’s great to hear son, I’m so happy you take your school work so seriously.”

  Johnny smiled weakly. He was going to have to put more time into some of his subjects. Truth be told, being a super spy was a difficult business, and he didn’t always find time to fit school into his schedule as much as he liked, especially when it came to Ms. Sniders and her English class.

  “I just got this note from school,” Henry continued, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a paper on school letterhead. “It’s from Ms. Sniders. I believe she’s your English teacher?”

  Johnny swallowed uneasily. How bad could it get? He thought of the woman, and she somehow reached out from across space and time to torment him.

  “Uh, yeah, she’s my English teacher,” was all Johnny could say.

  “Are you having some trouble in her class?” Henry asked, a concerned look on his face.

  Johnny’s dad would believe anything he said, and it was because of that very reason that Johnny hated lying to him.

  “I just don’t get some of the things she teaches very well,” Johnny said.

  He didn’t tell his dad the part about her being a lousy teacher who couldn’t teach a newborn baby how to breathe if she had to. Or the fact that she could suck all the happiness and motivation out of a classroom just by giving students her evil glare.

  Henry leaned back against Johnny’s computer desk and accidentally hit the Enter key on the keyboard as he was settling down to read the note.

  Instantly, all the panels slid up, the projector came down from the ceiling and projected the three dimensional keyboard right behind where Johnny’s dad was leaning.

  Ackers’ angry and impatient fa
ce came up on the screen at the far end of the wall on a screen almost as big as the wall itself, magnifying every aspect of his pimples and his disgruntled scowl.

  Henry missed all of this as he was studying the note.

  “Yes, it says here that you haven’t been handing in all your assignments, and that you don’t do very well on some of the essays,” Henry continued.

  Johnny had to do something! He couldn’t let his dad see all the super spy equipment that Johnny had installed in their house.

  “I’ll try harder dad,” Johnny started to say as he tried to move, without drawing too much attention, to get near the keyboard with the Enter key that would hide all the advanced technology.

  “She just doesn’t explain some of the concepts of English very well, like all those words and sentences and things,” Johnny wasn’t even thinking about what he was saying, he was just trying to find a way to get to that keyboard.

  Henry put the note down and looked at his son. Johnny froze.

  “I just wish you would have come to me sooner about all of this. I’m pretty good at English. I used to do well back in the day before we had all these computers to do our spellchecking and thinking for us,” Henry patted the monitor of the ten year old computer he was leaning beside.

  Johnny looked from the old, antique computer beside his dad to the three dimensional keyboard and super flat monitors behind him, not to mention the larger than life display of Ackers on the far wall who was still glowering and scowling and looking generally put out and neglected.

  Henry put his hand on his son’s shoulder.

  “Son, we’ll do what we can to bring your mark up. Don’t worry about this, your dad is on the scene now, and together we can do anything!”

  Henry was always super optimistic about everything. Not that that was a bad thing, but sometimes Johnny felt that his dad, as much as Johnny loved him, was a bit naïve about how the world worked.

  Johnny felt guilty as soon as he had the thought. His dad was just trying to help.

  “We’ll start studying together tomorrow,” Henry said as he turned to walk away.

  “Dad!” Johnny cried out.

  Henry turned back in alarm, having just missed seeing the advanced computers behind him.

  The giant display of Ackers shook his head in the background, and slapped a supersized hand against his supersized head. It made a small noise and Henry almost turned around again.

  Johnny grabbed his dad’s shoulders and spun him around to face him again.

  “What! What is it son?” Henry asked in alarm.

  “I just wanted to let you know that I appreciate what you’re doing for me. And that I won’t let you down. Math might be a hard subject for me, but I think that with your help I’ll be able to get through it.”

  As Johnny spoke, he slowly made his way around to get closer to the keyboard of his ten year old computer.

  “Are you having trouble in Math as well?” Henry asked.

  “I meant English,” Johnny corrected himself.

  Ackers just shook his head in the background, exasperated.

  “It makes me really proud to hear you say that,” Henry said, beaming. “I know that if your mother could see you and your dedication, she would be proud too.”

  Johnny finally made it to the keyboard and quickly hit the Enter key. All the computer screens were instantly covered with a panel sliding down. Ackers opened his mouth to say something, but he was shut out before he could make a noise.

  The projector in the ceiling retracted up and out of sight, the three dimensional display of the keyboard disappearing along with it.

  Johnny let out a sigh of relief.

  His father turned around then, to see what had troubled Johnny so much. Seeing an ordinary looking messy room, Henry turned back to face his son.

  “Don’t worry yourself so much, you don’t have to clean your room tonight. I can see that this is a big commitment from you,” Henry said, holding up the letter, not knowing the truth of Johnny’s distress.

  “We’ll start first thing tomorrow morning. Don’t you worry, we’ll get a tutor, several if we have to! This seems to mean a lot to you, and I won’t let you down!” Henry’s father clamped a hand down on his son’s shoulder, giving it a reassuring squeeze.

  “Now it’s late, get some sleep,” Henry turned and made his way out of the room, but not before he ran into the desk and door on his way out.

  “Excuse me,” Henry said as he exited. Johnny’s dad was very clumsy; it somehow fit with their last name: Clunker.

  Johnny fell back on his bed and closed his eyes in despair.

  He hated English class.