Operation: Golden Bum Read online

  Contents

  Tuesday 1522 hours: River Bosphorus, Istanbul, Turkey

  Thursday 1158 hours: Parliament Square, London, UK

  Thursday 1215 hours: MP1 Headquarters, London, UK

  Thursday 1244 hours: MP1 Medical Bay, London, UK

  Thursday 1349 hours: MP1 Laboratories, London, UK

  Thursday 1530 hours: MP1 Private Jet, 30,000 Feet

  Thursday 1731 hours: Back Street, Paris, France

  Thursday 1935 hours: British Embassy, Paris, France

  Thursday 2002 hours: British Embassy, Paris, France

  Thursday 2313 hours: MP1 Sports Car, Paris, France

  Friday 0032 hours: MP1 Private Jet, 30,000 feet

  Friday 0205 hours: Monte Carlo Casino, Monaco

  Friday 0305 hours: Storeroom, Monte Carlo Casino, Monaco

  Saturday 1522 hours: El Puertito, Tenerife

  Saturday 1600 hours: El Puertito, Tenerife

  Monday 1411 hours: Atlantic Coast, Morocco

  For Arran, who shares certain …

  abilities with the Great Disgusto

  The Fangs, Vampire Spy, series

  1. Operation: Golden Bum

  2. Codename: The Tickler

  3. Assignment: Royal Rescue

  4. Target: Nobody

  MP1 Personnel

  Agent

  Fangs Enigma

  World’s greatest vampire spy

  Agent

  Puppy Brown

  Wily werewolf and Fangs’s super sidekick

  Phlem

  Head of MP1

  Miss Bile

  Phlem’s personal secretary

  Professor

  Hubert Cubit

  aka Cube

  Head of MP1’s technical division

  Tuesday 1522 hours: River Bosphorus, Istanbul, Turkey

  Special Agent Fangs Enigma – the world’s greatest vampire spy – adjusted his sunglasses and calmly spun the wheel of the jet-black speedboat, sending plumes of spray over the children playing on the riverbank. They watched in awe as the boat roared off in pursuit of a larger, green-coloured vessel.

  Fangs flicked his tongue against one of the two pointed teeth jutting from his upper jaw. It began to glow a bright, shimmering blue. “This is Enigma,” he barked, turning the wheel sharply to avoid capsizing a local fisherman. “Target is in sight.”

  A tinny voice sounded from his other fang. “Good of you to check in at last. I was beginning to think you’d forgotten all about us.” It was Phlem, Fangs’s boss and the head of Monster Protection, 1st Unit, aka MP1.

  Enigma snarled.

  “Can you confirm the identity of the prey?” Phlem continued.

  “Puppy…?” Fangs said, without so much as a backwards glance. “Can you assist?”

  Puppy Brown, a werewolf and fellow MP1 agent, typed a few commands into her laptop computer, and an image, projected directly from Fangs’s sunglasses, appeared on the screen. After zooming in on the sole occupant of the speedboat they were chasing, she ran his scarred features through the facial-recognition software. The result was displayed almost immediately.

  “It’s Zed,” she announced.

  Fangs tongued his blue tooth to switch the line of communication back to MP1 Headquarters. “Target confirmed as the zombie Zed,” he said. “Permission to apprehend?”

  “Permission granted,” came the reply from Phlem, “but try to keep the destruction down to a minimum this time, please!”

  With a wry smile, Fangs pressed down on the accelerator. The boat picked up speed, and his long, black cape whipped out behind him in the breeze.

  A look of panic flashed in the zombie’s eyes as the MP1 speedboat pulled up alongside his vessel. After grabbing his shoe, he ripped his entire foot off at the ankle and hurled it at Fangs. The appendage bounced off the vampire’s head with a sickening thump.

  Puppy leapt to her feet. “Are you OK, boss?” she asked.

  The vampire cricked his neck from side to side. “Just toe-rrific,” he quipped. “But heel pay for that! Take the reins…”

  Still rolling her eyes at her boss’s bad joke, Puppy grabbed the steering-wheel as Fangs stepped up to the edge of the boat, gripping his cloak tightly with his long, sharp fingernails. “Are you sure about this, boss?” Puppy asked.

  “He hasn’t got a leg to stand on,” Fangs growled before leaping off the boat. His cape stiffened and he sailed across the churning water to land with ease beside the startled zombie.

  Fangs’s fist made contact with Zed’s nose, splitting it open and sending plumes of black snot flying everywhere. The vampire ducked to avoid being covered by gunk, and Zed took the opportunity to wrap his green, decaying hands around his opponent’s throat.

  Fangs Enigma’s usually white face paled even more as the zombie bared his few remaining teeth and hungrily eyed a pulsing vein. “Let’s see ’ow you like bein’ bitten, vampire!” Zed snarled.

  Fangs jumped to one side, accidentally pressing against the accelerator. The boat lurched forward and clipped a buoy. The zombie staggered and let go of Fangs’s throat. “Puppy! Now!” Fangs yelled.

  The werewolf grabbed a length of rope from the deck of her boat, tied a quick loop and then spun it around her head. She howled with delight when the rope caught first time, landing over Zed’s head and shoulders. “Get ready, boss!” she shouted, pulling the rope as hard as she could—

  And the zombie’s head came off.

  Fangs was still staring in horror at the stump of spine protruding from Zed’s neck when the boat careered into the riverbank and shot out of the water like a rocket.

  Puppy’s lasso had slipped off the headless corpse and caught round the boat’s gearstick. She pulled it taut with a deafening TWANG! The boat was too heavy, though, and Puppy was dragged off her feet and sent flying through the air behind the still-fighting vampire and zombie.

  Meanwhile, in the water below, the sleek, black MP1 speedboat smashed into a bridge and exploded in a searing hot ball of flame…

  Thursday 1158 hours: Parliament Square, London, UK

  I swung the pack over my shoulder and hurried to catch up with Fangs. He was several paces ahead of me, striding towards the statue of Winston Churchill, which stood in front of the Houses of Parliament.

  “Cheese!”

  I glanced round to see a family of Egyptian mummies having their photo taken in front of the famous building and then had to dodge to the side as a group of zombie school kids ran to catch a bright-red tour bus. Another typical day in London.

  We reached the Churchill statue just as Big Ben struck midday. At the sound of the famous bell, everyone in the square turned to look at the clock tower and Fangs took the opportunity to press his palm against a hidden sensor on the base of the statue. A secret panel slid down to reveal a staircase beyond. We were descending deep below London before the fourth BONG!

  An egg-shaped monorail car was waiting at the bottom of the stairs. Fangs disabled the self-destruct mechanism, designed to stop intruders, and we were soon whooshing silently beneath the River Thames.

  This is what my life has been like for the past three months, ever since I was teamed up with Agent Fangs Enigma. Although, to be fair, things haven’t been exactly normal since I first became a werewolf.

  You’ve probably read stories about spooky creatures like vampires and werewolves. Well, guess what? They’re all true. Supernatural creatures do exist. They have just spent centuries hiding away in dark castles and mouldy dungeons because humans kept attacking their homes, armed with pitchforks and flaming torches. But that’s all history now. Ever since the supernatural equality laws were passed, people of all shapes and sizes have lived happily side by side.

  Well, almost ev
eryone. Just like in the human world, the supernatural one has its fair share of bad guys, and it’s the job of MP1 to track them down and catch them – to protect the world from the very worst criminal monsterminds. And that’s where I come in…

  You probably know the legend: werewolves are perfectly normal people – apart from every full moon when they change into terrifying wolves. But that’s not how it works with me. Something went wrong with my first transformation and I ended up permanently stuck as a werewolf – claws, fur, fangs, the lot.

  My parents were, of course, surprised to suddenly have a supernatural creature in the family – especially such a hairy one. There were a couple of werewolves in my school, but unless you happened to be with them at full moon, you never saw them as wolves. I’m the exact opposite. The full moon is the one night a month when I change back into a goofy schoolgirl. I was a laughing-stock.

  My mum and dad did their best to help, by shaving my arms and legs every morning in an effort to make me look like a “normal” person. It didn’t fool anyone. I looked like a chihuahua in a dress.

  Then I was recruited by MP1 – and suddenly I wasn’t just an overly hairy kid. I was Puppy Brown, trainee secret agent!

  “Puppy!” Fangs’s voice jerked me back to the present.

  We had arrived at HQ.

  Thursday 1215 hours: MP1 Headquarters, London, UK

  “FANGSH! IT’SH YOU!” screeched an adoring voice as we stepped into one of MP1’s sleek offices. Miss Bile is the big guy’s secretary and has a major crush on my vampire boss.

  I feel sorry for her. She’s definitely not Fangs’s type. Besides, it can’t be easy for a middle-aged banshee to lose all her teeth. It has made talking very difficult. Mind you, listening to Miss Bile is no picnic either and I am always wiping globs of spit off my fur when I come to deliver paperwork. There’s a rumour that an agent called Sissy Soss resigned after nearly drowning during Miss Bile’s half-hour briefing on stage-six state secrets.

  Fangs whipped off his cloak, tossed it onto the coat rack and flashed the banshee a wicked smile. This was too much for Miss Bile, and she fainted, face first, onto her desk – accidentally sending off a half-written email about goblins and stapling her tongue to a pile of receipts.

  I was dragging the banshee back into her chair when a voice gurgled through the speaker phone on the desk. “Enigma! Is that you?”

  Phlem, the head of MP1, didn’t sound happy. But then he never is. Meeting him for the first time is quite an experience. People say he’s the only swamp beast ever to have survived away from the murky depths of the legendary black lagoon.

  “Drink?” he slobbered as Fangs and I entered his office next door.

  “Thank you,” said my boss, easing himself into an armchair. “I’ll have milk with a dash of blood.”

  I watched as the head of the greatest supernatural counter-intelligence organization in the world frothed up a glass of milk with a whisk and then added a few drops of human blood from a decanter. After spotting the tendrils of slime coating the glass he handed to Fangs, I declined a drink of my own.

  Phlem took a long sip of his favourite cocktail – frogspawn on the rocks – and glared across his desk at us. “Do you know how much trouble you two caused in Istanbul?” he said. “We’re having to replace two minarets on the Blue Mosque and rebuild an entire spice market!”

  “I know how much trouble we saved the local community from by bringing Zed to justice,” Fangs replied.

  “That’s another thing,” bubbled Phlem. “Why isn’t Zed in the cells?”

  “I can answer that, sir,” I said, untying my pack. “Only Fangs and I survived the boat crash to any real degree…” I angled the bag to show him the collection of rotting zombie body parts inside. “We weren’t quite sure what to do with him.”

  Phlem sighed – it sounded like someone emptying a bath of custard. “Get him down to the medical bay,” he ordered. “They can stitch him back together and then you can put him in the cells.”

  Fangs drank the last of his milk, his tongue lapping hungrily at the drops of blood at the bottom of the glass. “Will that be all, sir?” he asked.

  “You don’t get off that easily, Agent Enigma,” barked Phlem. “Our contacts in Turkey say Zed was over there to buy supplies for a wizard…”

  My hairy brow creased with interest. “A wizard, sir?”

  “Yes, Brown,” said Phlem. “A wizard we’re certain was involved in the robbery at a dinner party at the German Consulate last week. Every single guest blacked out at the same moment, and when they came round, all their belongings were missing.”

  “What made them black out?” I asked.

  “That’s the problem – no one seems to know.”

  “But you think this wizard might be involved?” said Fangs.

  Phlem nodded. “We don’t know much about him. He hasn’t shown up on our radar before. All we have is a single picture of him, caught by the German Consulate’s CCTV shortly before the robbery.” He pressed a button on his computer and a photograph was projected onto the office wall behind us. A photograph of quite possibly the most hideous-looking person I’d ever seen – and I work for a disgusting swamp beast!

  The wizard’s skin was pockmarked with scars and spots, and his small, beady eyes were so close together that they almost met in the middle. Add to that a broken nose and thin, twisted lips, and you’ve got a face you’d never forget – no matter how hard you tried.

  Fangs was the first to comment. “Looks like the ugly club’s got a new president.” He smiled. “Where’s he based?”

  “We’ve no idea,” admitted Phlem. “We’re hoping Zed can shed some light on the German Consulate robbery and then tell us whatever else his wizard boss may be planning.”

  “What’s the wizard’s name?” I asked.

  “We couldn’t find his real identity on file anywhere,” said Phelm. “Just the professional wizard name he goes by.” The slime beast downed the rest of his drink. “He calls himself the Great Disgusto!”

  Thursday 1244 hours: MP1 Medical Bay, London, UK

  Fangs led the way through the maze of corridors and secret testing rooms that make up MP1 Headquarters until we reached the medical bay.

  The whitewashed room was filled with stainless-steel tables and trays of pristine yet lethal-looking medical equipment. Padlocked cabinets held medicines of every description, and the walls were covered in posters featuring graphic images of almost every disease known to man or monster – plus a couple of particularly nasty ones that weren’t yet public knowledge.

  Fangs rapped a scalpel against a specimen jar, making the glass ring like a bell. “Shop!” he called out. “Who’s on duty around here?”

  A surgeon in a long smock, face mask and surgical cap appeared in the doorway to the operating theatre. “Can I help you?”

  “We want this miscreant put back together,” said Fangs, untying the bag and dumping its decomposing contents all over a nearby table. “He went to pieces when I arrested him.”

  The doctor examined the various zombie parts. “This could take some time, and it won’t be easy…”

  “You can do it, though?” I asked.

  “Of course,” said the surgeon, pulling off the cap and face mask.

  Fangs stared as long blonde hair tumbled free, falling down to frame a beautiful female face with piercing blue eyes. “Wait a minute,” he cried. “You’re a woman!”

  Never let it be said that my boss isn’t observant.

  The surgeon removed her baggy surgical gown to reveal a slender dress. “I’m also the new head of this department. Doctor Olga Nowkoff.” She held out a perfectly manicured hand for my boss to shake, but instead he lifted it up and delicately kissed it.

  “The name’s Enigma,” he crooned. “Fangs Enigma.”

  I sighed. If my boss has one weakness, it’s beautiful women – and Doctor Nowkoff was as gorgeous as they come.

  “You haven’t told me what time you get off work, doct
or,” Fangs went on.

  “No,” agreed Doctor Nowkoff. “I haven’t.” She selected a long needle from a tray of equipment and threaded it with a length of artificial ligament. Fangs gazed at her lovingly as she began to reattach the henchman’s limbs. I knew my boss would stay in adoration mode for a while, so I took the opportunity to search Zed’s jacket for evidence.

  “I’ve got some grains of something here, Fangs,” I said, pulling a few flecks of brown dust from one of the pockets.

  “What is it?” Fangs asked, barely taking his eyes off the doctor.

  “I’m not sure. It could be gunpowder – although…” I held the tiny specks up to my snout and sniffed. “It smells like … mushrooms!”

  “Mushrooms?” repeated Fangs.

  I nodded. “May I use one of your microscopes, Doctor Nowkoff?”

  The doctor gestured towards a bench. “Help yourself.”

  I quickly scattered the grains onto a glass slide and looked at them through the lens of a powerful electron microscope.

  “It is mushroom,” I announced.

  After flipping open my laptop, I found an online database of fungi, yeasts and moulds. I sifted through the entries until I found a match. “It’s a type of mushroom called tigertop, or Tricholoma pardinum.”

  My boss didn’t appear to be impressed or even interested. He was too busy blowing softly into Doctor Nowkoff’s ear.

  “Are you listening to me, Fangs?” I demanded.

  He jumped at the sound of his name and accidentally spat a glob of spit onto the doctor’s neck. Thankfully, she was so absorbed in reattaching one of the zombie’s arms that she didn’t notice.

  “Of course I’m listening!” Fangs hissed while trying to subtly wipe the spit away with his cloak. “What’s so special about Zed having bits of mushroom in his pocket? He might have been making himself a pizza.”