Council of Evil (2 page)

“Hunter!” he said by way of greeting, chunks of half-chewed sandwich falling from his mouth. The others turned to acknowledge their unofficial leader.

Knuckles, aka Raymond Olson, was a little taller than Jake, and much stronger. His face was pale and greasy, and his small squinting eyes made him resemble some kind of rodent. He flicked his head to one side, then the other, like he'd seen boxers do before a fight. The result
was a hideous crack from somewhere in his neck. Jake was sure that wasn't healthy, but he tried not to react.

Scuffer was a small kid, who made up for his stature with a bad attitude. Warren Feddle was his real name, and he took time to punch anyone who dared to use it. Scuffer was the worst of the bunch. He had a real criminal mind and enjoyed inflicting pain.

Jake never did that. He beat up some of the kids who irritated him, but it wasn't
personal
. Jake merely saw it as the order of things, a food chain with the cunning predators at the top and the dumber animals underneath. But Scuffer, he was a nasty piece of work.
Everything
he did was personal.

“Look! It's the Professor!” Scuffer yelled with delight. They all followed his pointing finger. Sure enough the lone figure of the “Professor” was slouching as he walked to school, looking as miserable as Jake felt. His back was to them, and he hadn't sensed the sudden danger he was in.

“Let's grab his backpack!” Knuckles suggested with his irritating shrill voice that didn't fit his muscular frame.

And do what with it?
thought Jake. But already the gang was charging recklessly across the street, yelling at the top of their lungs:

“Hey! Professor!”

“Gonna pound you, geek!”

The kid turned, looking terrified, and fled as fast as
he could. Jake dimly remembered his name was Pete. He was as harmless as a fly; but then again, flies never punched back.

Despite himself, Jake cheered up a little and beamed as he joined in the pursuit. “The thrill of the chase,” he thought.

During classes Jake entertained himself by flicking pieces of soggy chewed paper at his victims across the class. The teachers shot him suspicious glances, but remaining undetected was an art form Jake had perfected over the years.

Jake and his gang prowled the yards at lunchtime, like sharks through a reef. But today people were avoiding them successfully, and there wasn't much fun to be had. So they ended up kicking a soccer ball around on an empty field. Of course, one of the teachers took exception to this innocuous activity and yelled at them to get off the field.

“Typical,” thought Jake. Do something harmless and they get shouted at, but when they were deliberately starting a fight they always got away with it. That proved to Jake that justice was more of a concept than a reality.

One of the few classes that Jake and Scuffer were actually in together was computer class. Jake sneakily surfed the Internet, glancing at the Web site of his
favorite rock band: Ironfist. He had been scrolling through the message board, where some fans were heaping praise on their new release, when Scuffer leaned over and tugged his sleeve.

“Look at this,” he whispered conspiratorially. He held up a USB memory stick.

“What is it?” said Jake.

“My uncle's computer got a virus. It's so new his virus software didn't pick it up. It trashed everythin' he had, all his documents, music, and photos. All gone. 'Cept he didn't realize that when he'd tried to back up his stuff, he copied the virus onto this. Wanna see what happens when we stick it into the school's network?”

Despite himself, Jake laughed out loud. The teacher threw a glance his way but was too involved in helping another student with a problem on her screen. Crashing the school network would be a terrible offense; and therefore carry great bragging rights if they could get away with it.

“Sure, go ahead.”

“Put it on your computer,” Scuffer said, forcing the memory stick into Jake's hand.

“No way! If they trace it to me I'll get expelled!”

“So?”

Jake knew he would never hear the end of that from his parents. He glanced at the boy next to him, who was staring between a problem sheet and his answer on
the screen. Jake didn't pause for thought. He reached out and scrunched the boy's question sheet into a ball, then threw it across the room. The boy looked at him with a mixture of fear and astonishment. He hesitated, then without breathing a word, climbed from his chair to retrieve his discarded sheet.

The moment the boy's back was turned Jake thumbed the USB drive into the computer port. He gave it a few seconds and hoped the virus was copying itself, before yanking it out just as the boy picked up the paper and spun back around, apprehensively returning to his seat.

Jake and Scuffer swapped grins, then looked enthusiastically at their own screens. From the corner of his eye, Jake saw the boy was straightening out his answer sheet, unaware that the virus was infiltrating his machine. Jake decided to check his e-mails as he waited.

The boy frowned when he looked at his screen, where a spinning hourglass had replaced the cursor, indicating his computer was busy. He experimentally jiggled the mouse. Nothing happened.

Jake typed in his password and accessed his e-mail. He had a few pieces from the Ironfist Web site, and one from Big Tony: a photo of a chimp riding a motorcycle. Jake shook his head; Big Tony was always forwarding junk to people on the assumption that if
he
found it funny,
they
would too.

“Miss Campbell,” the boy said in a timid voice.

Jake glanced at the boy's screen: the computer pointer was moving across the screen unaided, opening any file or folder it came across. This resulted in a mass opening of programs, all executing in a torrent of separate windows that flooded the screen. It was as though an angry poltergeist had taken over.

Jake hid his delight and checked another e-mail. This one was peculiar; the sender's name was the same as his own. The name “JAKE HUNTER” burned on the screen with the subject message:

“JAKE, JOIN ME AND RULE!”

He moved the mouse across.

“Miss Campbell!” screamed the boy so loudly that everybody turned to look at him. “I think my computer's got a virus!” His screen was thick with windows opening so fast that it flickered.

“Daniel, what have you done?” began Miss Campbell.

“ALL DATA ERASING” suddenly appeared on the boy's screen in letters big enough for the whole class to see.

“No!” he yelped as the computer screens on either side of him turned deep blue, and a mass of computer code raced across them. The Internet browser disappeared as Jake was about to click on the mysterious e-mail.

Computers began to crash like dominoes around
the classroom, leaving a wake of complaints from surprised students.

“Turn them off! Turn them off!” yelled their teacher, but it was too late—the virus had spread in a spectacular manner through the school network and onto the servers, where it would be particularly destructive.

Jake felt a flurry of activity behind him and braced himself for the reprimanding hand of Miss Campbell on his shoulder.

“What have you done?” she cried.

Jake looked up, relieved to see that Miss Campbell was towering over the boy next to him. The boy's face was a picture of shock, something that made Jake smile all the way home.

Jake managed to avoid spending too much time with his gang after school; he just wasn't in the mood to be standing around on a street corner as it got dark. He'd left them outside Patel's newsstand with the shopkeeper loudly complaining that they should hang out somewhere else.

Jake just wanted to head home. Lately he'd felt
something
was missing from his life. Everything he did seemed a little too predictable and boring. He was smart enough to know that only
he
had the power to change that.

Loud Ironfist tracks pumped from his computer
speakers, and with any luck the blaring music would bother his sister. Jake pulled up his e-mail and saw he had one unread message. He clicked on it.

FROM: Jake Hunter

TO: Jake Hunter

SUBJECT: Jake, join me and rule!

The sender's e-mail address was different from his own; in fact, following the swirling @ sign was a jumble of characters that seemed assembled from dozens of world alphabets. It was complete nonsense, probably just spam: junk e-mail. But with nothing else to do Jake sighed and clicked on it anyway.

The e-mail opened up in a separate window that drifted through several different languages before settling into English.

“Jake Hunter, unleash your true potential and click here to join me at VILLAIN.NET—the world awaits you!”

Jake hesitated, the mouse pointer hovering over the link. “Why bother?” he thought. As if in answer to the unspoken question the text shifted on the screen. Jake read it in surprise.

“Because you feel you need something
more
. I offer you the power to rule the world with a simple mouse click. Join me, Jake Hunter. It's in your blood.”

Jake frowned. Somebody had gone to a lot of trouble to make it stand out from the usual spam he got. Then
a thought occurred to him: “This must be just another of Big Tony's stupid e-mails.”

The screen suddenly went black.

Jake felt a moment's dread and hoped he hadn't just infected his own computer. The screen changed to a blinding white that hurt his eyes before slowly fading to reveal a plain-looking Web site. A banner declared:

“VILLAIN.NET—WELCOME!”

Underneath was a single animated icon. Jake clicked on it, waiting for something stupid to appear. Several new icons appeared below a message.

“You have been selected to receive a free gift that will allow you to conquer the world.” As long as the gift involved shooting something, then he wouldn't complain. A game would help him relieve the boredom. He continued to read. “You will be granted a single temporary power for demonstration purposes. After you have demonstrated your ability you will be met by one of our representatives. Click below.”

Jake glanced through the range of icons on offer. Some were stick figures with various lines and shapes emanating from them, others were just shapes and logos. One particular logo seemed familiar, but he couldn't quite place it. He clicked on it.

The screen rippled as though made from liquid and he could have sworn it warped into a slender finger that tapped him gently on the forehead. The whole
experience was over in a second, leaving Jake a little dizzy and doubting anything had actually happened. He certainly didn't feel any different, and when he looked back at the screen, the Web site had vanished.

“Stupid site,” muttered Jake. He must be more tired than he thought. With resignation, he cranked up the music, turned his attention to his TV at the foot of his bed, and started up his Xbox console. Within a minute he was lost in a world of rampaging monsters. Midway through the game he noticed a symbol on a door within the game's environment. It was the same as the one he'd clicked on earlier and now he recognized it.

It was a radiation-warning symbol.

Jake awoke with a surprising spring in his step. He met his gang and thoroughly enjoyed chasing the Professor; delivering a wedgie to him that was so severe they could hear his boxers rip. Leaving the geek on the floor, writhing in agony, the bullies strolled into school.

Jake nonchalantly asked Big Tony what the Web site link was supposed to be, but Tony had such a blank expression that Jake assumed he must have already forgotten that he'd sent it.

Maybe it was because he was feeling unusually cheerful that the day was passing quickly, and at lunch he noticed a pretty girl with long brown hair smiling at him.
Jake felt a little embarrassed and was thankful he wasn't with his gang. He had seen her a few times before and knew her name was Lorna, but he had never summoned up the courage to speak to her.

Now he found they were walking in the same direction.

“Hi, Jake.”

“Hi,” he mumbled, staring at his feet.

“What are you doing over the break? Any plans?”

Jake felt his mouth become dry and had a sudden attack of nerves as she looked at him with deep brown eyes. “I … um … nothing. Usual stuff, probably. You?”

Lorna shifted nervously but didn't stop smiling. “Same. Nothing new.”

They stopped outside the art room, Jake's destination. They looked at each other in silence for an uncomfortably long time, lost for idle conversation. Then Jake noticed three kids, a couple of years his junior, were picking on a boy who was clearly cornered and outnumbered. Seeing an opportunity to break the silence and act the hero, Jake intervened. The three bullies made a quick escape, thinking that Jake was protecting his standing as school thug—while their victim stared wide-eyed, thinking Jake wanted the honor of beating him up instead.

“Hunter!” screamed Mr. Falconer, the art teacher, as he rushed from the classroom. “Stop that right now!”

Jake looked confused. The bell suddenly rang and a
friend of Lorna's came up and pulled her toward her classroom and out of sight. Mr. Falconer was upon him, bristling with rage.

“I saw what you did!” rumbled the teacher, obviously misunderstanding.

Jake frowned and looked around for the boy he had saved, but the kid had vanished into the mass of students filing into their classes.

“What're you talking about? I was helping that—”

“You can explain yourself in detention!” snarled Mr. Falconer.

The last place anybody wanted to be on a Friday, just before winter break, was in detention. That included the teachers and it made Mr. Falconer's temper all the more heated.

“This is unacceptable behavior, Hunter,” he snapped as he paced back and forth.

“I told you, I was stopping that kid from being beaten up!”