Chapter 1: Training

1 TRAINING
Spy School Satellite Facility

Kenai Fjords National Park, Alaska

August 8

1700 hours

I was already having a miserable day when I got a surprise visit from my least favorite person on earth.

I had been on a forced march through the wilderness. Since five o’clock that morning, over extremely steep mountain trails. With a forty-pound backpack. And it was raining. Hard. It was the kind of rainstorm that makes you think maybe you should start building an ark.

No matter how waterproof your gear is, at some point, it will get overwhelmed by the elements and give up. For me, this had happened around eight a.m., which meant that for the past nine hours, water had been soaking through my clothes and puddling in my muck boots. I couldn’t have been more wet if I was underwater. I was also exhausted, aching from the exertion, and desperately hungry, as a porcupine had gotten into my backpack while I was taking a bathroom break and gobbled up all my trail mix.

This was not an unusual day at spy school.

A few months earlier, the CIA’s Academy of Espionage had been very different. For starters, it had been located on a campus full of old, gothic architecture in Washington, DC, where teenagers training to be spies attended classes in actual buildings. Those classes had often been dull, and the professors had occasionally been strict or grumpy, but we had generally remained warm and dry and there was a dearth of larcenous porcupines.

Then the campus exploded.

For decades, the academy had operated in secrecy, posing as St. Smithen’s Science Academy for Boys and Girls, but the truth about it had been leaked and an assassin had set off some bombs. Luckily, no one had been hurt, but the school’s safety was compromised and the CIA had no choice but to shut down the entire program…

Almost.

Under the guidance of Cyrus Hale, a highly respected retired agent, a few students had been selected to move to a top-secret training facility in a remote corner of Kenai Fjords National Park in Alaska. I was one of them, along with my friends Mike Brezinski, Zoe Zibbell, and Erica Hale. We had not been chosen due to seniority; in fact, Mike, Zoe, and I were still rather new to the academy. But due to a series of unusual circumstances, we had ended up on several missions well before we should have been activated and had proved ourselves capable. Meanwhile, Erica was an easy choice for the secret training; her spy skills were off the charts. Espionage was in her genes; her family had been spies since the American Revolution. Cyrus was her grandfather, and he’d been training her since birth. At the age that most children were only playing with cars, Erica was learning to drive them. Throughout our time at spy school, Erica had been unrivaled as the best student.

Until now.

A few weeks earlier, we had picked up a new recruit. Svetlana Shumovsky was the Russian version of Erica. She was the same age, had the same impressive skill set, and also came from a long line of spies. Her family had worked in Russian intelligence for generations and her grandfather was Cyrus’s nemesis. Despite all this, Svetlana had defected to our side to help thwart a dangerous Russian plot, and so we had happily welcomed her into our school.

Well, most of us had happily welcomed her. Cyrus was still suspicious of Svetlana, although his concerns had been overruled by our two other instructors, who happened to be Erica’s mother and father. And while Erica wouldn’t admit it, I was quite sure she felt threatened by Svetlana. Erica was used to being the best at everything she did; having a serious competitor was a new experience for her.

Cyrus had been leading us on our hike that day. Even though it was intensely grueling, Erica and Svetlana were both making a show of being unfazed by it. While Mike, Zoe, and I staggered back to camp, ready to collapse, Erica was still walking with a spring in her step, while Svetlana was whistling cheerfully.

On the other hand, Mike made no secret of how miserable he was. “I’m not sure who’s worse, our enemies or Cyrus,” he groused—once he was sure that Cyrus was out of earshot. (The moment we had come within sight of camp, Cyrus had hurried off to the latrine.)

“Oh, come on,” Erica chided. “This wasn’t so bad.”

“Yes, it wasn’t bad at all,” Mike agreed morosely. “It was horrible. I’m tired, I’m starving, and my underpants are saturated with enough water to drown a hamster.”

“Why would you drown a hamster in your underpants?” Svetlana asked curiously. “Is that something Americans do?”

“No,” Mike explained. “That’s only a metaphor. I’m just saying that my undies are really, really wet. And I hate wet undies because…”

“They chafe,” Zoe concluded. “We know. You’ve been griping about this for the last six hours.”

“Because I’ve been chafing for the last six hours!” Mike grumpily adjusted his soggy underwear. “Why doesn’t the CIA have someone working on this? One of the labs there ought to be developing chafe-proof boxers. Those would be a lot more useful on our missions than grappling hooks.”

“You know what would be really useful on our missions?” Erica asked. “A muzzle for you. Look at Ben. He’s not whining constantly.”

“That’s because I’m too hungry to whine,” I said. “I’m definitely on Mike’s side here. I think your grandfather has gone way overboard on the survival training.”

Erica gave me a withering look. “This training is absolutely vital. What do you think will happen if you need to survive in the wilderness?”

“I have needed to survive in the wilderness,” I reminded her. “On several missions. And to be honest, it was easier than this. I mean, I get that it makes sense to stay in shape, but is it really necessary to do it in such crummy weather?”

“Do you know what we call weather like this in Siberia?” Svetlana asked. “Summer. This would be a nice day. It is merely raining, not snowing or sleeting or hailing.”

“Yeah, Siberia sucks,” Mike said. “We’ve seen it for ourselves. But a lot of this planet is really lovely. Why don’t we ever train for missions in those places? What happens if we have to pose as billionaires on the French Riviera and need to know what kind of caviar goes best with champagne?”

“That’s highly unlikely,” Erica said dismissively.

“It’s highly unlikely that anyone our age would ever need to defuse a nuclear bomb,” I pointed out. “And we’ve already done that. Twice. So who’s to say some training on the French Riviera might not come in handy?”

“I agree,” Zoe added.

Svetlana turned to her, surprised. “You really think you might end up on a mission on the French Riviera?”

“No,” Zoe said. “But it’d be fun to visit there with you.”

“Oh.” Svetlana smiled warmly. She and Zoe had been smitten with each other from the moment they met; that was one of the main reasons Svetlana had defected. “That’s a good point. I vote for this French Riviera training too.”

“Well, it’s not going to happen,” Erica said curtly, seeming annoyed with all of us. “This isn’t the movies. Spies don’t get caviar-level expense accounts and stay at ritzy hotels on the French Riviera. Most likely, you’re eating cold room-service borscht at a run-down hostel in Vladivostok.”

“That’s still better than this,” Mike grumped, indicating the rain.

Since our camp was located in a stand of old-growth forest, the thick canopy of leaves above was protecting us from the elements somewhat. Out on the open mountain passes we had been constantly drenched; now we were only getting moderately drizzled on. However, this wasn’t exactly a good thing, as the drier ground had attracted bears.

Dozens of bears lived in the area surrounding our camp. They were all black bears, which meant they were significantly smaller than the grizzlies that roamed much of Alaska, but that didn’t mean they were small. Each weighed at least a hundred pounds, and some of the adult males were five times that. In addition, the bears had far more sense than we did and had sought shelter from the rain, rather than hiking in it for hours. They were all lurking in the forest around us. I had caught sight of a few in the distance, ripping apart logs in search of grubs or curled up and snoozing in dry spots.

In general, the bears stayed away from us, but that wasn’t because they had signed a treaty. They were still wild animals. It was always possible that one might feel threatened and decide to attack. Being close to so many of them at once felt like being a mouse walking through a room full of cats.

“Maybe this training is a little extreme,” Erica acknowledged, “but all of you have to admit, you’re much more physically fit than you were before you got here.”

“That’s true,” I conceded, and Mike and Zoe quickly seconded that.

“Not me,” Svetlana said. “This is all child’s play compared to what my grandfather would make me do.”

Erica tensed as though she’d been challenged. “Me too. When I was younger, Granddad used to make me hike twice this far in one day. With a backpack full of rocks.”

“You had a backpack?” Svetlana asked. “You’re lucky. My grandfather made me carry all the rocks in my arms while I hiked. And I could only eat whatever food I could forage.”

“Granddad wouldn’t let me eat anything,” Erica said. “So my body would know how to handle starvation.”

“After the hikes, my grandfather would make me swim five miles,” Svetlana claimed. “In frigid arctic water.”

“Arctic water?” Erica sniffed. “That’s nothing. Cyrus made me swim through class five rapids. Upstream.”

“You both realize that your grandfathers were terrible, right?” Mike asked. “Grandfathers are supposed to do nice things for their grandkids, like taking them to the zoo.”

Svetlana looked at him curiously. “How is going to the zoo supposed to hone your survival skills? Did your grandfather throw you into the wolf pit?”

“No!” Mike exclaimed. “Going to the zoo has nothing to do with survival skills. It’s supposed to be fun.”

“I guess you won’t be any help if we get attacked by wolves,” Svetlana muttered under her breath.

We arrived at the edge of our compound. The first structure we passed was the latrine. Our accommodations were too rustic to have indoor plumbing. The latrine was a rickety wooden outhouse with room for only one person, and since the door was closed, we could tell that Cyrus was still using it.

Our cabins came next. They were simple, one-room buildings, which had first been built for the army back in World War II. Mike and I shared one, while the girls shared another.

“I don’t care how wet my clothes are,” Zoe said. “I need food. Anyone else?”

I loudly chimed in agreement, while Erica and Svetlana begrudgingly owned up to being hungry.

“It’s not like my other clothes will be that comfy anyhow,” Mike groused. “Everything here is always damp. It’s like living in a giant armpit.”

“You know, all this complaining doesn’t actually help anything,” Erica informed him. “All of us are experiencing the exact same hardships as you.”

“No you’re not,” Mike said. “I have it worse than any of you. Because you all at least get to be with your crushes here, while I don’t.”

Erica didn’t reply right away, recognizing that Mike had a point.

Erica was my girlfriend. And Svetlana and Zoe were together. Meanwhile, Mike’s girlfriend, Trixie, didn’t even know where he was.

Trixie was Erica’s younger sister. Her family had deemed that she didn’t have the necessary skills to be a spy, but I had always wondered if she was being unfairly compared to Erica’s incredible abilities. To me, Trixie was far more capable than most people I had met. In particular, she was extremely smart, with near-encyclopedic knowledge on a variety of subjects ranging from World War II aircraft to minor surgery.

The Hales had managed to keep what they all did a secret from Trixie until Mike and I came along. We had accidentally revealed the truth about her family within only minutes of meeting her, which the Hales were still peeved about. Despite this lapse, they continued to withhold information from Trixie to protect her. Trixie didn’t have the security clearance to be told where we were. She and Mike hadn’t seen each other in months.

“You still get to write to her,” Erica said weakly.

“That’s not the same thing as getting to be with her,” Mike argued. “Not by a long shot. And your grandfather intercepts her letters to me and redacts all the good stuff.” Mike stormed into our cabin and grabbed one of Trixie’s letters. “See?” He held it up as evidence.

It was a handwritten note on fine stationery that smelled as though Trixie might have spritzed it with perfume. However, as Mike had said, almost every word of it had been blacked out with a Sharpie, save for “Dearest Mike” and “Love Trixalicious.”

“You can’t be sure it was my grandfather who did that,” Erica said.

“Yes I can,” Mike replied. “Because he attached a note saying he’d done it. And then he said that if I ever wrote anything remotely spicy to his granddaughter, he’d neuter me.”

I nodded understanding. Cyrus had made many similar threats to me, which meant I had to be extremely careful in camp. If he caught Erica and me so much as holding hands, he’d make me muck out the latrine.

We all shrugged off our heavy packs and left them in our cabins. Normally, we would have brought them all the way to the mess hall, because if we left any food in our rooms, it would lure bears, badgers, mice, squirrels, and wolverines, but each of us had consumed every last edible morsel we were carrying.

Unburdened, Mike, Zoe, and Svetlana quickly headed for the mess hall.

Even though I was desperate for food, I didn’t hurry after them. I let Mike, Zoe, and Svetlana get ahead so that I could talk to Erica alone.

“Is there any chance you could talk to Cyrus about how much he’s forcing us to do?” I asked her. “I get that he wants us to toughen us up, but I think he’s going too far.”

Erica gave me a look that I couldn’t quite read. She seemed like she might have been surprised by my comment. Or disappointed by it. Or possibly a bit of both. “All the hard work we’re doing is really paying off. You’ve gotten in much better shape since we came here. And so have the others.”

“I know,” I said, “but there’s more to spying than just being in shape. Good morale, for one thing. And right now, we don’t have that. Mike’s obviously miserable. Zoe won’t admit it to you, but she is too. And…” I paused before saying the next words, but then forged ahead. “So am I.”

Now, Erica was definitely surprised. “You are?”

“Yes! I mean, I’m glad that I’m here with you and my friends, but beyond that, this place has felt like a prison camp lately. In fact, it’s probably been less fun than prison. Prisoners don’t have to go on forced marches for twelve hours in the rain.”

“You didn’t find that invigorating?”

“No! It was awful! And yet, it was still better than half the things Cyrus has made us do here. I don’t know what’s gotten into your grandfather, but he needs to start going easier on us—or we’re going to quit.”

Erica frowned at me. “You can’t do that.”

“Yes we can. We’re under no obligation to stay here. I figured I’d ask you to tell Cyrus, because he actually likes you. But if you don’t say something, I will.”

We finally arrived at the mess hall. It was the largest building in the compound, since it had to house all our food storage and our rudimentary kitchen, but it still wasn’t much bigger than a standard school classroom.

Erica said, “Ben, there’s something I need to tell you.”

“What?” I passed through the mess hall door, ready to devour the first bit of food I came across.

And then I froze in horror.

Standing right in front of me, in the center of the room, was our school principal.