MI High are recruited to a special project. They will work with the Deputy Prime Minister to find the mole in her organisation. They have friends and enemies, but will they be able to tell the difference ? Keeping promises.

"I am extremely mature," complained Tom, pulling himself up to his full height.

"Biscuit ?" asked Keri.

"Ooh, where ?" asked Tom, searching all around him.

Frank sighed. Back to normal then.

Keri was puzzled when she got a text from Dan asking her to help him with something. Firstly, Dan knew she was shopping and how seriously she took shopping. Additionally, this was a shopping trip in London. Yes, London ! Like what was there not to get about that ? The second thing of course was that Dan was asking her to help him. Dan never, ever, ever asked for help. This was obviously the only reason she was currently dragging herself up the stairs to their flat carrying several large bags. It seemed like the more expensive the shop, the longer the cords on the bag had to be. One shop seemed to think that nobody under six feet tall would dream of crossing the doorstep. If Keri had been an inch shorter, the bag would have been dragging along the ground.

Keri balanced all of the bags along her arms while she tried to get the door key into the lock. She scrabbled about, unable to balance the weight and get the key into the slot. After several failed attempts, the door opened revealing Dan looking slightly puzzled. "I have never heard anyone take so long not being able to open a door," he said, looking at her in disbelief.

"Yeah, well, maybe a hand with the shopping ?" suggested Keri, the bags all sliding down to her shoulders as she raised her hands in exasperation.

"God ! How much stuff have you bought ?" asked Dan in disbelief. Taking all the bags from one arm, he peered at the contents. "How many shoes do you need anyway ?" he asked idly.

"Well, Mr. eight pairs of identical Vans !" said Keri sarcastically. "Some people like to have shoes which actually look different to each other !" she added, dumping the remaining bags inside the door. "I'll sort them out later. What did you want ?" she asked finally.

"Uh, yeah. Sorry about that. I wasn't getting anywhere," mumbled Dan, rubbing his head. He no longer had a dressing covering the cut on his head, but the bruising and gash were still visible behind the fringe which he had attempted to cover it with. He was supposed to be resting in their apartment since being discharged from hospital. He was also supposed to have somebody with him at all times in case of fainting, but everyone had wanted to go out that morning so they had effectively abandoned him on his own.

"I thought you were supposed to be resting," said Keri, feeling a little bit guilty now. She was at least pleased not to find him lying on the carpet when she got back. "What did you want me to help you with ?" she asked.

Dan waved her into the sitting room where a laptop lay open on the coffee table. "Whales," he said.

"Wales ? What do you want to know about Wales ?" asked Keri. Dan stared at her meaningfully. "Oh, yeah, those whales," said Keri, feeling embarrassed. Then she felt surprised. "You're not going to try to do something about whales are you, just because Preston asked you to ?"

"Why not ? He did ask and he would have done something himself if he had got picked to come," pointed out Dan.

Keri looked at Dan fondly. He really did want to help out the most irritating boy in school. "So, what could you do to help whales ?" she asked.

"That's basically the problem. I don't know," admitted Dan, dropping on to the couch glumly. "I have absolutely no idea. I have been looking up stuff for ages and I can't find anything I can do," he complained. "It's not like I can stop the Japanese whaling fleet, or go out and rescue stranded whales off the beach and stuff. What can I do ?" he asked. He looked miserable.

Keri sat down beside him and put her arm round his shoulders. "Well, you know what Tom always says," she said with a smile. Dan looked across at her with a frown. "One and half brains is always better than one," she said, grinning.

Dan laughed. "Don't listen to him. He's only teasing !" he said. "You've got a brain. In fact, you're cleverer than me. You get B's and A's and stuff. I mostly get C's and, yeah, well let's not go there !" he mumbled.

"So why do whales get stranded on beaches anyway ?" asked Keri. "They're supposed to be smart aren't they ?"

"One theory is that they get confused by ship and submarine sonar," explained Dan. "It's in one of these articles," he said, moving the cursor around the screen. "There !" he said pointing.

Keri read the article. It explained how some scientists thought that the low frequency sound waves of the sonar confused the whales direction finding and somehow made them run ashore instead of going out to sea. Keri leapt to her feet. "Oh, so Mr. Whale is swimming around, making those little noises he bounces off stuff," said Keri, making whales song sounds and flapping her arms up and down as she cruised around the furniture. "Then the ships start making those ping, ping noises, Mr. Whale thinks he needs to turn left and, whammo ! He's straight up on the beach," said Keri, belly-flopping herself on to the couch opposite. She looked at Dan expectantly. Dan was looking thunderstruck. "What ?" she asked.

"That has to be the weirdest thing I have ever seen you do," he said evenly.

Keri looked despondent. "I'm not really helping am I ?" she asked.

Dan laughed. "Oh, I don't know," he giggled. Keri always managed to make him laugh. "Maybe there's something about sonar," he said, getting inspiration. "I haven't tried that yet," he added.

Keri climbed off the couch and walked round to sit next to Dan as he typed. "Result !" exclaimed Dan. "Tomorrow's defence sub-committee will be considering a request by Greenpeace for a moratorium on sonar use in large sea estuaries," he read out from the screen. He paused. "I'm not sure what that means," he admitted.

"I means, they are thinking about banning the use of sonar in large sea estuaries for a while to see if it makes any difference to the whales," explained Keri. "I think," she added hurriedly.

Dan waved his finger excitedly at the screen. "That's it ! That's it ! The whale thing," he said.

"Are we going to a defence sub-committee meeting ?" asked Keri doubtfully.

"Yes we are !" said Dan, sounding determined. "How do we do that exactly ?" he asked after a moment.

====================== 000 ========================

The next day, after a phone call with Mrs. Brash, Dan found himself once again in his suit, sitting in a room full of people who all looked terribly important. Mrs. Brash had taken over, to the obvious annoyance of the older man who was supposed to be in charge. "Really, Mrs. Brash, this is quite against protocol !" complained the older man peevishly.

Mrs. Brash smiled at Dan and then lifted herself to her full height. "Mr. Attlebee, thankyou for your contributions, but Her Majesty's Government has made a promise to Agent Morgan, and that promise is going to be kept. There will be a moratorium on the use of sonar and I would be grateful if you see to it that the appropriate studies are commenced to determine its effectiveness," she said in tone of voice which clearly did not expect any further argument. The man's mouth opened and closed.

"Very well, Mrs. Brash," said the man, backing down. "We will see to it," he said.

Once the meeting was over Dan was called over by Mrs. Brash. "Well Dan, I was a little surprised by your choice, but I do think it a very noble one. Are you very interested in whales ?" she asked kindly.

"A bit," Dan said. "Well, actually it was a promise I made to a school friend. They wanted to come, but they couldn't. They didn't know it was an MI9 mission," he explained. "It's hard for the other kids sometimes, because we get to do everything and they don't," he added shrugging.

Mrs. Brash smiled widely. "Well, I'm glad I could help," she said, shaking his hand. "I have a feeling we will be meeting again in the future," she said, before walking away with one of her advisors.

================== ooooo ============================

The following week, back at St. Heart's Dan was collared in the corridor by Preston. "You did it ! You actually did it !" said Preston, looking astounded.

Dan shifted uncomfortably. "Well, I tried," he muttered.

"Tried !" Preston pulled out some sheets of paper. "Look, at this," he said and started reading. "From September there will be a full moratorium on the use of sonar around British estuaries, as part of the 'Daniel' amendment to the latest legislation," he read out. "How did you do that ?" he asked in astonishment.

Dan shrugged in embarrassment. "I guess I made the right friends," he said. "You would have done it better. You know loads more about it," he said honestly.

Preston looked down despondently. "No I wouldn't !" he muttered. "I would just have annoyed everybody and nothing would have changed," he groaned.

"Well, you got me to do something, and I'm an idiot," said Dan.

Preston looked at Dan and smiled slightly. "You're no idiot Dan. And thanks for doing it. I really appreciate it," he said.

Dan felt quite touched by Preston's sincerity. Preston really did care about the environment after all and Dan felt a bit of pride in the eccentric boy's attempts to protect the world. After all, that was also what Dan was trying to do in his own way. "You keep on asking Preston. Who knows what will happen ?" suggested Dan, patting Preston on the shoulder. "You might just save the world !" he said with a grin.

THE END