CIA Academy of Espionage

Washington, DC

Bushnell Hall

June 1st, 2018

1445R

Alex POV

Normally, a faux-graduation takes place in a rented space elsewhere in the city, so as to put on a good show for the parents and families. However, the Department of Misinformation sent out a message that graduation had been canceled due to widespread hay fever of all things, so we instead had a small affair with students, faculty, and staff instead of families; and caps, gowns, and diplomas were replaced with formal wear and transport paperwork to wherever each student hailed from.

Rather appropriate, given that this was the last class of the CIA Academy of Espionage. The graduates—along with those with enough age and academic excellence in the next class—would continue their CIA careers as though nothing had changed, while the rest would be shipped back to their normal lives. Faculty and staff would be reassigned or retired, with Principal Sidebottom being among the latter.

I heard the staff talking about safety code violations that would cause the school's shutdown—building laws and whatnot—with a falsified gas leak being in place so that any stories of a CIA school would be nothing more than the product of carbon monoxide-induced hallucinations and/or brain damage (almost literal gaslighting). Further disincentivizing students and retired faculty and staff from blabbing would be the threat of immense fines, juvenile detention, and even federal authorities (namely the ATF, DEA, IRS, and FBI).

That aside, in a move that surprised all of us, Barnabus fucking Sidebottom of all people delivered a surprisingly insightful speech to close the graduation:

"All of you know what's happening and where you're going after today—whether you be students, faculty, or staff. Graduates continue, faculty and staff move or retire, and the rest go home. Few things to keep in mind: firstly, if you really want to come back, you can... with a college degree. There's nothing stopping you. There ain't shit keeping you from continuing down the Agency path. Relish the time you get with your family, because you don't ever get time back. Enjoy the damn normalcy. Hell... can't believe I'm saying this, but don't lose hope. Shit happens all the damn time and setbacks are normal. You don't need to blow sunshine and rainbows out of your ass, but push through the bullshit. Good fucking luck."

Notice how I didn't describe his speech as eloquent. But Sidebottom had a point: setbacks were part of life, and while you couldn't quite control the outcome, you could certainly control the effort you put in. I had to say, it was probably one of the better commencement speeches I've heard in my lifetime from an academic administrator.

He's still a jackass, though... even a broken clock and the mainstream media are right every now and again.

"Well, you did it," I remarked, shaking the hands of Zoe, Mike, and Nate—the last three kids I knew thanks to their entanglements with SPYDER—after the ceremony was over. "Good work, you three."

"Thanks, Alexander," Mike replied with a wistful smile. "Couldn't have done it without you."

"Nah, you're a smart kid."

"Where are you three heading now?" Cath asked.

"I'm going Navy," Nate replied. "SWCC—er, Special Warfare Combatant-Craft Crewman—basically a spec ops boat driver."

"Army, something related to communications and/or intel," Zoe answered.

"Air Force PJ. Paramedic with a gun," Mike added. "All three of us gotta report to bootcamp in August."

"Paramilitary? Are... are you sure about that?" Cath asked, sounding concerned. And she had every right to be, considering their history—Zoe and Mike were part of Operation Fox Hunt while Nate was kidnapped and beaten by SPYDER operatives in Scotland in 2015—and one would think they'd had enough danger for a lifetime. Even Zoe, whose focus wasn't combat, still had the possibility of experiencing such violence if she became a human intelligence collector.

"Hey, think of it like we're smokejumpers boutta parachute from the plane. Like my cousin-in-law once said: 'you're either okay or dead!'" Nate joked, eliciting a horrified expression from Catherine.

My dear Catherine, you've worked with the craziest motherfuckers the United Kingdom Special Forces has to offer... how the hell are you still not used to the crazy dark humor?

"I think they'll be okay, Mom," said a new voice to my left—none other than Erica, eliciting shocked expressions from the young graduates. "Hey, guys. Congrats."

"Did... did I just get congratulated by Erica Hale?!" Nate exclaimed without a hint of sarcasm. "Holy crap!"

"It's like that time I saw Cyrus smiling... gotta take a pic and send it to the museum!" Zoe joked before reaching out and giving my daughter a hug, which she hesitantly returned after a moment of surprise. "Good to see ya, Ice Queen!"

"Erica," Mike greeted, outstretching his hand, eliciting further hesitance from her, before she finally shook it back. I suppose it made sense, considering that they didn't part on the best of terms at Erica's graduation two years back. "So... good to see you under... better circumstances, I guess."

"Yeah, you too, Mike," she replied with a shrug. "At least nothing's too crazy at the moment. Oh, Nate, nice work. You've come a long way since... well, the poison ivy incident."

"Please do not remind me," Nate groaned, making Cath and I raise our eyebrows in curiosity. "But what are you doing here? Where've you been?"

"Well, just some analysis work, for the most part. A little translating here and there... no overseas deployments or anything like that, just in Langley."

"Oh, HQ work. Cool! You stayin' there?"

"Uh... we'll see."

"That reminds me, you kids have rides back home?" I asked.

"Yeah, everyone's getting a plane ticket, bus ticket, or taxi—paid for by the Agency—to get themselves and their stuff back to where they came from," Mike answered, patting his pocket. "We all gotta be off campus in twenty-four hours. I hope they'll at least let us stay in contact with one another."

"Take it from me, son: no such thing as a former CIA officer, former FBI agent, or anything like that. Your communications are gonna be monitored for life, courtesy of the NSA. Maybe you can contact each other with private commo, but damn near nothing's gonna be private."

"... oh fuck."

"Yup."

Cyrus POV

While my family kept yakking with the young graduates, I wandered off to find a few men in particular—five living legends within the Special Activities Division (now Center, but who cares?) and almost certainly the men partially responsible for the shutdown of the Academy. And I found them in a quiet, shaded corner outside the building. The five men I was once tasked with killing in Operation Charybdis alongside the British Special Air Service: Mason, Woods, Hudson, Bowman, and Weaver.

"Well, if it isn't the paramilitary patriarch himself... Cyrus Hale!" Weaver said dramatically, the one-eyed former Soviet taking a drag from his cigarette.

"Surprised you old bastards are even alive right now," I replied. "I mean, I know your dossiers: Bowman got his head bashed in by a Spetsnaz operative..."

"Huh, I was wondering where my TBI (traumatic brain injury) and deformed head came from!" Bowman sarcastically remarked, pointing at his head.

"Mason was shot..."

"Turns out that Woods here is a lousy shot," the retired Force Recon captain joked, lightly shoving his best friend.

"Ah, shaddap," the retired Marine master sergeant shot back.

"Woods got his knees blown out by a goddamn shotgun..." I added.

"Hey, somethin' called modern fuckin' medicine... buncha shit I can't even pronounce, let alone understand."

"Hudson got his throat slashed by Raul Menendez in Panama..."

"That's... why I have so much trouble talking," Hudson seriously replied in his hoarse and gravelly voice. "Crappy vocal cords and everything."

"Still a goddamn ice cube... I knew I shoulda fragged you in 'Nam," Woods grumbled.

"And Weaver... actually, I have no idea what the fuck happened to you. Nobody does."

"You think I know? I remember the words 'Requiem' and 'Maxis...' no clue what they fucking mean," Weaver muttered. "Some shit I dreamt up in my 'coma,' apparently."

Ah, a "coma..." codeword for a man-made amnesia or classified information... wonder what the hell "Requiem" and "Maxis" are, though... maybe I'll have a look.

"Well, you're here now," I said. "So why'd you do it?"

"Do what?"

"Don't play me for a jackass. None of you. You're the only professors in the Academy's existence to not be prior students, and only became professors because you know far too much for your own good to be sent elsewhere."

"And what would that be, oh-so-mighty Mr. Hale?" Bowman dismissively asked.

"You blackmailed the brass. You shut down the Academy. And frankly, you're the only ones with the balls to pull a move like this."

"Oh, wow... the great Cyrus Hale just complimented us!" Mason sarcastically gasped. "Shoot me, Woods! I must be dreaming!"

"Brilliant detective work, Gunny," Woods mocked, invoking the rank I had when I left the Corps. "So what the fuck are you gonna do about it? Make us? Kill us?"

"Nonono, he's just gonna make you read Hudson's academic papers," Weaver joked. "All that wordsy bullshit is gonna be too much for your leatherneck brain."

"Hey, I have an extensive vocabulary, a vast pool of knowledge, and a great deal of experience in understanding the inner machinations of academia."

"... damn, Frank. When the hell did you get educated?" Mason laughed.

"I'm a goddamn onion, Mason. You should know that," Woods scoffed.

"To answer your question, Woods," I interrupted the friends. "No, I'm not doing shit. I've got better things to do with my time. I just wanna know why."

"I've got a son," Mason replied quietly after a moment. "Bowman too. Hudson's got two kids. Hell, last I checked, you've got a boy of your own... granddaughter too. I never wanted my kid to get caught up in this shit. None of us did."

"Honestly, every mission we ever went on as Company men was illegal," Woods muttered. "Some of the shit in the Corps was too... but even us, even fucking Hudson—who I hate with a passion thanks to his immersion in the Agency and his wet blanket personality—has a line."

"Your brotherly love touches my heart," the former 101st Airborne major sardonically shot back. "But he isn't wrong. Getting kids involved in this shit was a fucking mistake from the beginning. But as long as we were stuck here and silenced, we figured we might as well try to help these kids stay alive."

"And we shoulda figured that the Company was lyin' to us—you know, 'cause it's run by fuckin' spies—but we were told that kids weren't bein' sent on ops," Bowman fumed. "And lookee there: we were wrong."

"And now Ripley's dead," Weaver solemnly sighed. "He was a good boy. Persevering student. Didn't deserve an end like that."

"Better shot than beheaded like the poor fuckers who get captured by those jihadist assholes over in the Middle East," Woods growled, throwing his spent cigarette down and stomping it into the pavement. "But you wouldn't get that, would ya, Hale? You're perfectly okay with entanglin' your son and granddaughter in this sh—"

"Lighten up, Woods. No need to go self-righteous on us," Mason interrupted before turning to me again. "You asked a question, Hale. That was your answer. So what now?"

I mulled over their reasoning, feeling especially uneasy over Woods' stinging remark. I thought of my deceased wife Janet: she, like I, would have preferred that Alex stayed as far away from the CIA as possible. Our late night conversations revealed that she hoped for him to be, at minimum, an honorable man—whether that be as a butcher, baker, businessman, pilot, doctor, even a lawman or serviceman... but not a Company man. Especially during the Cold War, it was a one-way ticket to insanity or death. But after my wife was killed by that street hoodlum, I all but threw Alexander headfirst into the Agency, with Erica following. But I still had a good reason.

Quit kidding yourself... they're child spies, not child soldiers, but the principle still remains. What would Janet think?

"Well... we'll just have to wait and see," I replied. "I made my bed... just like the rest of you. Better fuckin' lie in it."

"You might just be an honest man yet, Hale," Bowman said with a small grin. "You just might be."

I turned around and walked away without another word, still pondering the whole situation. It was certainly a historic moment for the Agency—at least, for those that knew about the Academy's existence—only time would tell if the director's moral-driven decision to shut it down would be helpful. The voice in my head—call it my conscience or my insane half—wasn't wrong. But it still hurt my head to think about it.

I need a fucking drink.

The issue of morality in the world of gray men rises again... where do we draw the line? I can't truly answer that myself, but you can probably guess my opinions from the way I write. I'd imagine it's a question brought up every now and again in-universe... still, doesn't stop me from reading and writing it, as the overall premise behind Spy School is an interesting one.

Also, cameos! Recognize anyone?

I'd like to end this chapter by recognizing a man whose name is not nearly as famous as it should be, though his deeds speak volumes more. Meet Sergeant Major (US Army Ret.) and Paramilitary Operations Officer (CIA Ret.) William "Billy" Waugh.

[in the picture of ODA 594, Waugh is the man on the far left]

SGM (R) Waugh spent more than fifty years between US Army Special Forces (right after a stint as a Rakkasans paratrooper) and the CIA, with his achievements including conducting the first combat HALO (high altitude, low opening) jump, surveilling the elusive Carlos the Jackal, and even deploying to Afghanistan in support of Operation Enduring Freedom in 2001, being one of the first Americans in country to topple the Taliban and hunt for al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden... at 71 years of age (make sure to check out Surprise, Kill, Vanish: The Secret History of CIA Paramilitary Armies, Operators, and Assassins by Annie Jacobsen, which includes many of SGM (R) Waugh's tales of service).

This man was the real Cyrus Hale and quite possibly the character's inspiration. He recently passed away on April 4th, 2023. While we will never truly know the entirety of his story—there is still much about him that will remain classified—what we do know makes this man an absolute legend in the world of special operations and intelligence, and his name will rightfully live forever.

Rest easy, Sergeant Major Waugh. You did your nation proud.

- ADF-2