CIA Academy of Espionage

Artillery Range

September 4

1300 hours

Zoe leaned against the doorframe, panting as if she had just finished running around the entire world. She stood up and ran toward us, her face looking as if she had some sort of news.

"SPYDER is back!" she practically yelled. Plenty of people within earshot turned their heads toward us, looking at the commotion caused by the sudden shout made by Zoe.

"Keep down your voice," Erica hissed, "everyone can hear you." She shot a death glare at the rest of the trainees and they quickly averted their eyes, pretending to practice although it was obvious that they were still trying to listen to our conversation. I hadn't even seen Erica come by and she seemed to appear out of nowhere, but it was normal as she was the best spy-in-training yet. Besides having an enormous capability to sneak on people, she was the most competent and beautiful spy, possibly in the world.

Having a crush on her the second she pinned me down at the first day of spy school, I had longed that she would return my feelings for her. And at Vail, while we tried everything to defuse the bomb that threatened to destroy a good portion of Colorado, she had kissed me, thinking that it was the end of our lives. It wasn't, unfortunately, and after that, she didn't give me much of a glance for a few weeks. She claimed that this was only to help me calm down and that she didn't want me to be a mess in my last moments but I suspected there was more to it.

Just a while ago, when I was trying to stop the Croatoan from accomplishing their plan, I had succeeded in stopping them and passed out due to exhaustion, but not before hearing Erica give praise to me, saying that I was the hero and had saved the building from the Croatoan's diabolical scheme.

It seemed that she might have wanted to kiss me or something like that, but it might have been my imagination and that thought was waved away when the Secret Service interrupted us. After that, I hadn't heard a word from her and wondered if she changed her mind about dating me, or at least given some thought to it.

"Yeah, but almost everyone in spy school already knows after we defeated them once and for all, I mean, at least temporarily," Zoe said, "so what's the point then?" Zoe, one of my best friends and biggest supporters when I first came to spy school (also had a crush on me at one point), had pretty much ruined our friendship by accusing me that the plan of the Croatoan hiding in a rooster was absurd and also that Erica had purposely fired a RPG at the CIA headquarters.

Once she realized the mistake, she asked for my forgiveness and I agreed but also acknowledged that our friendship would never be the same.

"What do you mean, spider?" asked Trixie as she walked by. Trixie was the newest member of spy school and she had questioned us about spy school after suspecting something. After some arguing, Cyrus had reluctantly agreed to let her take the SASCA. Although she might have not been able to throw a knife or defuse a bomb at age three like Erica, she surprisingly did well on the test and started training along with us, starting as a first-year.

"Oh," I replied, "I kind of forget to mention that at our interrogation. It isn't a spider, not that animal. SPYDER is an evil organization that we defeated while we were in Paris. And also, it's spelled S-P-Y-D-E-R."

"Wait a second, "how can SPYDER be back? I thought they were locked up in a maximum security prison. There's no way they could have escaped." asked Mike, confused as they had defeated them months ago.

"Um, I don't know," Zoe answered, "I just overheard Cyrus discussing it with the principal and other people in the room. Just know that we should probably be prepared if the principal calls us to his office by the way. Though I think Trixe might not be called as she just got accepted in."

                                                                       _______

As I walked toward Self-Preservation 301, I noticed that Cyrus was biting his lip and fidgeting with his hands. This was not like him and he looked rather uneasy and I had a feeling that this was connected to the potential mission to recapture the SPYDER operatives still lurking around somewhere. I decided not to question him and continued to walk to my class.

Self-Preservation was still my worst class but at least I had improved to get an average of a C+ in it. I glanced at my watch and saw that at this rate of walking, I would certainly be late and get a firm reprimand in front of the entire class, which would clearly be more embarrassing than being beaten by ninjas in front of Erica. I rushed to the class and when I entered, the instructor shot me a glare. I knew I had arrived just in time and the instructor was probably hoping to scold me for being even one second late.

I plopped down in my chair while the instructor began his lectures. I hadn't slept well last night as I tossed and turned, wondering about what SPYDER's next plans were. My eyelids felt heavy as the instructor carried on, babbling about how to defend yourself if cornered by three people. I almost drifted off to sleep when the instructor snapped. "Ripley, are you paying attention?"

I jumped up in my chair, causing the chair to wobble. I tried to stop it from toppling and immediately said, "Yes, of course."

"If you were paying attention, then what did I just say? Huh?"

"Um..."

"Ha!" the instructor exclaimed, "come up here, I'll teach you the lesson by demonstrating on you."

I gulped and slowly stood up from my chair and walked toward the instructor. Whispers and snickers came as I nervously passed the rows of chairs.

When I arrived in front of the instructor, he balled up his fists and prepared to strike at me. Fortunately, just then, there was some fumbling in the loudspeaker and some cursing, most likely the principal, also known as the idiot; his nickname was made by Zoe due to his stupidity and clumsiness. The only reason that he was still here at the CIA as he was known that he could never be trusted with a secret and would even leak out the CIA's most classified information to enemy agents if bribed.

"Is this dumb thing even working?!" the principal shouted. A loud screech soon followed and everyone covered their ears and winced.

"Yes," grumbled the instructor. His expression had turned into a scowl probably due to the fact that his little "lesson" with me was interrupted.

"Um, Benjamin Ripley, Zoe Zibell, Mike uh... whatever your last name is, and Erica Hale, please report to my office," the principal said over the loudspeaker. Ooh's rippled throughout the class and the instructor set a glare that immediately shut everyone up. This was the normal response when someone got called to the principal's office, but in spy school, it most likely meant that you were going on a mission. I grabbed my bag and quickly hurried out of Self-Preservation 301 class before the instructor could embarrass me any more and ran towards the principal's office. I made it to the office in record time: 23 seconds.

I just hoped I wasn't late.

When I pushed the door open, I saw Erica tapping her foot, waiting for us. She glanced at her watch and made the tiniest of smiles for just a moment but then her expression went back to her normal appearance, cold and emotionless. Zoe came in just a bit later and Mike soon followed. I looked around the room where Cyrus, Alexander, and the principal were standing. Alexander, who had been a fraud for many years and when the CIA finally caught on, they threatened to kick him out, he finally proved himself useful and was allowed to stay. Cyrus, on the other hand, was one of the most respected agents in the whole CIA and had taught Erica, his granddaughter, everything single thing he knew.

"Okay, as you all probably know, you're on a mission," Cyrus started to talk, shooting a glare at Zoe, "SPYDER is still operating and preparing its plans but the weird thing is, Mrs. E is still locked up in prison, meaning someone else must have taken control. We also have spotted SPYDER operatives prowling around at Ben and Mike's old school."

"Wait, Joshua couldn't have taken the position, we clearly saw him fall off a building in Paris on one of our previous missions. But if he survived, then he could have. Right?" I asked, sensing something, "and what about our mission to thwart Murray's plans?

"Right on track!" exclaimed Alexander, "you're right, that is the only known possible explanation for this. And also, our plans to stop Murray will be postponed as this mission is much more important."

Cyrus ignored him and kept on going. "So, the thing is, the previous mission with the Croatoan, you had to go to your old school to make the letters appear on George Washington's letter and—"

"Oh yeah, I remember that. We left the entire building on fire with our explosives and stole an ambulance for a getaway car," Mike interrupted.

"Yes, you did that and definitely earned a not so good reputation with the school principal and the other staff members at the school. So we've decided to not disguise you or pretend you are exchange students but to let you slink around at night, and to discover where the escaped SPYDER agents are hiding."

"Also, you will have little cameras and microphones clipped onto your hair so that Zoe and Mike can observe what you are seeing and report the information back to me," Cyrus added, "you are to also wake up tomorrow at 0100 hours so we can prepare for the mission and get you all geared up."

"But that's only one-o'clock," Mike complained, "if we wake up by then, we can only get like, 4 hours of sleep."

"I know what one-o'clock is," Cyrus growled, "now get to sleep if you want to be fully awake and alert on this mission."