toilet door and an empty cubicle. SHINE thought about these details. EJ waited while a protective shield clicked into place over the beanbag and then took her phone and keyed in âGOâ. And go she did.
EJ loved lots of things about being a SHINE agent. She loved the places she travelled to, she loved the gadgets she used, she loved the animals she encountered on missions and she loved goingdown the Mission Tube. Whizzing around corners at high speed, it was like a carnival ride that just went on and on, more than making up for having to start the mission in the toilet.
Finally the tube straightened and levelled out as EJ came to a stop at a small platform with a keypad. She had arrived outside the Code Room. Again she keyed in her pin code and waited, this time for the security check to commence. To ensure that there was no unauthorised access to the code rooms, SHINE changed their checks dailyâthere had been head scans and singing tests, eye scans and signature checks. EJ wondered what todayâs check would be. A tray with a small glass of water and a bowl came out from under the keypad and EJ heard a digital voice.
âGargle water and spit into the bowl. Please be accurate,â said the voice.
âEw! Thatâs gross!â said EJ but she did as she was instructed.
She took the glass of water and drank it. Ratherthan swallowing, EJ swirled the water around and around in her mouth and then tipped her head back and gargled.
EJ then took the small bowl and held it up to her mouth. Carefully she spat the water out again, into the bowl and put the bowl back on the tray.
The bowl slid back under the keypad. For a moment nothing happened.
Did I not spit enough back in? wondered EJ. But then she heard a beep.
âA little messy but agent DNA and identity confirmed. Please drop in, Agent EJ12!â
There was then one final beep, the floor under the beanbag fell away and EJ dropped down, beanbag and all, into a chamber underneath the Mission Tube. EJ had entered the SHINE Code Room. It was sparsely furnished, just a chair and a table and a clear plastic tube sticking out from the ceiling above the table.
EJ heard a whizzing sound. She put her phoneon the desk and put her hands out under the tube, catching the capsule that then popped out. Inside the tube were a piece of paper and a pen. EJ read the message on the paper.
EJ looked hard at the code, studying the writing, if you could call it that. She was pretty sure they were letters but what had been done to them? This was not going to be an easy code and she was already way behind on time because it had taken so long to get everyone out of the toilets. EJâs head started torush and her thoughts whirled around and around as she began to tap the pencil on the table. None of these things were good for code-cracking.
Calm down, she told herself, you need to look at codes slowly. There is always a clue somewhere. The code is broken up into parts, so just look at the first part.
EJ looked again, this time slowly looking at each letter of the coded word.
The fourth letter is a C, thought EJ. But why does it look normal and the others donât? But, actually, some of the others donât look that weird after allâthe B and the K just look a bit funny, sort of upside down.
And then EJ noticed that some of the code was reflected on her phone screen. The reflection picked up some of the words on the paper but now, when she looked at them on her screen, they looked completely normal. A mirror code, she thought. Can She then wrote the message out again. it be that simple?
EJ took her phone and switched to mirror app, then held the screen over the message, taking one line at a time. She wrote down what was reflected in the mirror.
She then wrote the message out again.
Itâs like a poem, thought EJ, but a bad poem, a really bad poem. And then it struck herâthere was only one person in SHADOW who used really bad poems.
EJ loved lots of things about being a SHINE agent. She loved the places she travelled to, she loved the gadgets she used, she loved the animals she encountered on missions and she loved goingdown the Mission Tube. Whizzing around corners at high speed, it was like a carnival ride that just went on and on, more than making up for having to start the mission in the toilet.
Finally the tube straightened and levelled out as EJ came to a stop at a small platform with a keypad. She had arrived outside the Code Room. Again she keyed in her pin code and waited, this time for the security check to commence. To ensure that there was no unauthorised access to the code rooms, SHINE changed their checks dailyâthere had been head scans and singing tests, eye scans and signature checks. EJ wondered what todayâs check would be. A tray with a small glass of water and a bowl came out from under the keypad and EJ heard a digital voice.
âGargle water and spit into the bowl. Please be accurate,â said the voice.
âEw! Thatâs gross!â said EJ but she did as she was instructed.
She took the glass of water and drank it. Ratherthan swallowing, EJ swirled the water around and around in her mouth and then tipped her head back and gargled.
EJ then took the small bowl and held it up to her mouth. Carefully she spat the water out again, into the bowl and put the bowl back on the tray.
The bowl slid back under the keypad. For a moment nothing happened.
Did I not spit enough back in? wondered EJ. But then she heard a beep.
âA little messy but agent DNA and identity confirmed. Please drop in, Agent EJ12!â
There was then one final beep, the floor under the beanbag fell away and EJ dropped down, beanbag and all, into a chamber underneath the Mission Tube. EJ had entered the SHINE Code Room. It was sparsely furnished, just a chair and a table and a clear plastic tube sticking out from the ceiling above the table.
EJ heard a whizzing sound. She put her phoneon the desk and put her hands out under the tube, catching the capsule that then popped out. Inside the tube were a piece of paper and a pen. EJ read the message on the paper.
EJ looked hard at the code, studying the writing, if you could call it that. She was pretty sure they were letters but what had been done to them? This was not going to be an easy code and she was already way behind on time because it had taken so long to get everyone out of the toilets. EJâs head started torush and her thoughts whirled around and around as she began to tap the pencil on the table. None of these things were good for code-cracking.
Calm down, she told herself, you need to look at codes slowly. There is always a clue somewhere. The code is broken up into parts, so just look at the first part.
EJ looked again, this time slowly looking at each letter of the coded word.
The fourth letter is a C, thought EJ. But why does it look normal and the others donât? But, actually, some of the others donât look that weird after allâthe B and the K just look a bit funny, sort of upside down.
And then EJ noticed that some of the code was reflected on her phone screen. The reflection picked up some of the words on the paper but now, when she looked at them on her screen, they looked completely normal. A mirror code, she thought. Can She then wrote the message out again. it be that simple?
EJ took her phone and switched to mirror app, then held the screen over the message, taking one line at a time. She wrote down what was reflected in the mirror.
She then wrote the message out again.
Itâs like a poem, thought EJ, but a bad poem, a really bad poem. And then it struck herâthere was only one person in SHADOW who used really bad poems.
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