by Stuart Gibbs
I ignored the pain and the nausea and kept going, though. Erica’s life depended on it. I staggered through the parking lot of the Ski Haüs, my stomach cramping, my lungs on fire, and pounded on the door to the room Cyrus shared with Alexander. “Cyrus? Are you there? It’s an emergency!”
I heard footsteps from inside. Then the door opened a crack and Cyrus peeked out, looking annoyed.
“Erica’s been captured!” I told him.
“I know,” he said.
“We were at the Arabelle . . . ,” I began, and then realized what he’d just said. “You know? How?”
“Because I’m the one who captured her.” Cyrus opened the door a little more, allowing me to see Erica, sprawled on his bed. Then he yanked me inside and locked the door behind us.
Now that I was in the room, I could see he was still wearing the black outfit. Erica was slowly waking, groggy from being unconscious. “Why did you capture your own granddaughter?” I asked.
“To keep her from getting captured by Shang,” Cyrus said.
“I wasn’t going to get captured,” Erica told him, already awake enough to be annoyed.
“You were darn close,” Cyrus shot back angrily. “That stunt you pulled was reckless and insubordinate. I am extremely disappointed in you.”
Erica cringed. “But I thought . . .”
“No,” Cyrus said curtly. “You didn’t think at all. Because if you had, you would have followed my orders and done things the way I told you to. Instead, you decided to disobey me—and the entire CIA—and do things your own way.”
“My way was working!” Erica exclaimed. “I could hear Leo Shang and his men talking inside the room! They were discussing their plans! I might have learned everything we need to know if you hadn’t interfered!”
“You would have been caught if I hadn’t interfered!” Cyrus yelled. He held his fingers a millimeter apart. “You were this close to getting busted! Which would have torpedoed this entire operation! You’re doggone lucky I was there doing recon myself and was able to bail you out!”
“How did you get back here so quickly?” I asked Cyrus, trying to change the subject before things got even further out of hand. “I mean, you beat me here, even though you were carrying Erica. And you had to get down off the hotel first.”
“I had my grappling hook at the hotel,” Cyrus explained. “I dropped down the far side while you were taking your skates off. And then I beat you here because, well”—he flexed an arm, displaying his bulging muscles—“I’m in much better shape than you are.”
I sighed. “I’ve been hearing that a lot lately.”
Erica sat up on the bed, pulling her phone out of her pocket. “By the way,” she told her grandfather, “I recorded the tiny bit of Shang’s conversation I overheard. I would have gotten more, but you knocked me unconscious. Me. Your own granddaughter.”
“I did that for your own good,” Cyrus told her. “It was the only way to get you out of there quickly. I couldn’t risk starting an argument out on that balcony. Or having you struggle against me.”
“Maybe you should listen to this before you start accusing me of being reckless again,” Erica said, then pressed play.
The conversation wasn’t easy to hear, as Erica had recorded it through a glass door. And it was impossible for me to understand, since it was in Chinese. Cyrus apparently knew the language, though. Despite his annoyance with Erica, he still listened to the recording intently.
Two men were talking, sometimes at once. They seemed to be having a heated discussion about something.
There were a few times when Erica’s “Shhhh!” cut into the conversation. “That was for Ben,” she explained to her grandfather. “He wouldn’t stop talking.”
“Only because the people you’d shoved me into were angry at me,” I pointed out. “And then I was trying to warn you that you were about to be attacked.”
“Shhhh!” Cyrus hissed at me, trying to listen.
On the recording, I heard a new voice. It was stern and commanding, and the other two people stopped speaking immediately to listen to it.
“Leo Shang,” Erica mouthed to me.
Leo continued a bit longer, but he was cut off by Erica asking me, “What part of ‘shhhh’ don’t you understand?” And then there was the sound of Erica being knocked unconscious. After that, Leo Shang’s voice faded away as Cyrus spirited Erica off.
“What did he say?” I asked.
“ ‘I want a helicopter tomorrow,’ ” Erica translated, then gave Cyrus a hard stare. “Obviously he’s planning some sort of aerial reconnaissance.”
“Or he just wants to go helicopter skiing,” Cyrus replied, unimpressed.
“What’s that?” I asked.
“Skiers can have a helicopter take them out into the wilderness for the day,” Cyrus explained. “No lift lines, plenty of untracked snow. It’s quite popular with those who can afford it.”
“That’s not all Shang said,” Erica went on. “He also said, ‘If all goes well, everything is on track for the thirtieth.’ ”
“You think he’s planning Operation Golden Fist for that day?” I asked.
“It seems pretty obvious,” Erica replied. “Only, I don’t have any idea what Operation Golden Fist is, because somebody knocked me unconscious before I could hear about it.” She glared at her grandfather.
If Cyrus felt bad about this, he didn’t show it. Instead, he returned Erica’s glare. “For all we know, he was making further ski plans.”
“The whole point of this mission is to find out what Shang’s plotting,” Erica growled. “Based on your intel that he’s plotting something. And now you’re telling me that he’s not plotting anything at all? He’s simply here to go skiing?”
“All I’m saying,” Cyrus growled back, “is that you’re jumping to conclusions based upon an insufficient amount of information.”
“Well, I would have had a lot more information if it hadn’t been for you!” Erica yelled. It was the first time I’d ever heard her raise her voice in my life.
“Use that tone with me again,” Cyrus warned, “and you’re grounded.”
Erica lowered her voice but remained impertinent. “What are you gonna do? Send me to my room?”
“Worse. I’ll boot you off this mission.”
Erica’s eyes widened in surprise. “You wouldn’t. This mission would be a disaster without me.”
“It was almost a disaster tonight because of you,” Cyrus retorted. “Ben’s the primary agent on this. He’s the one who’s crucial here, not you.”
“That’s a mistake,” Erica said coldly. “He’s not ready for this. He’s already showed feelings for Jessica Shang.”
Cyrus wheeled on me, concerned.
Suddenly, the frigid room seemed like it was a hundred degrees. I could feel my face turning red in embarrassment. “That’s not true,” I stammered. “I’ve barely even seen her. I just thought she was cute is all.”
“Ben gets flummoxed around girls he’s attracted to,” Erica told Cyrus.
“I do not,” I said.
“You get flummoxed around me,” Erica pointed out.
“That’s because you’re always doing things like shoving me onto a crowded ice rink to create a diversion for you without telling me first,” I shot back.
Erica started to say something else, but Cyrus held up a hand, silencing her. He kept his gaze locked on me, though, carefully assessing me. Finally, he said, “There’s another reason we selected Ben as the primary agent on this mission, Erica: He’s a team player. He follows orders, he works well with others, and he doesn’t go running off half-cocked anytime an idea pops into his head. Now, you might have tons more raw talent than he does, but you could still learn some things from him.” He turned back to face her. “If you pull one more stunt like you did today, I will deactivate you and ship you home faster than you can say ‘jackrabbit.’ ”
Erica didn’t say anything in response. She just gave Cyrus a stare so cold
it seemed to lower the temperature around us.
Right at this moment, Alexander Hale returned. He barged through the door, whistling happily, and completely failed to pick up on the tension in the room. “Great news!” he cried, holding up a grocery bag. “I got everything we need to make s’mores!”
Cyrus squinted at him crankily. “Now, where the heck do you expect to do that?”
“The fireplace in the lobby,” Alexander suggested.
“The fire in the lobby’s a fake,” Cyrus informed him. “Boy, your observation skills stink on ice.”
“That’s right,” Erica told Cyrus tartly. “Everyone in this family’s a lousy spy except you. And no matter how hard we try, we’ll apparently never be good enough.” With that, she stormed out of the room and slammed the door behind her. A cheap framed ski poster fell off the wall and busted on the floor.
Cyrus rolled his eyes and muttered, “Teenagers.”
Alexander glared at him, still smarting from his insult. “See if I ever buy you campfire treats again,” he said, and then stormed out himself.
Somehow, with them gone, there was even more tension in the room. Cyrus was prickly on his best days, but now he seemed ready to blow. I edged toward the door, desperate to get out of there, hoping he might simply ignore me and let me go.
He didn’t. His angry gaze now fell on me.
“I should probably be going too,” I said as cheerfully as I could. “I’ve got a big day tomorrow with the mission and all, so I want to turn in early and get a good night’s sleep. . . .”
“Do you have the hots for Jessica Shang?” Cyrus asked accusingly.
“No!” I lied, selling it as hard as I could. “I don’t even think she’s that attractive. In fact, to be totally honest, she’s kind of ugly. I actually feel sorry for her. . . .”
Cyrus didn’t buy this for a moment. “Erica may have made a lot of mistakes tonight,” he told me, “but she was right about one thing: If you want to succeed on this mission, you need to keep your heart out of it. Once you let your emotions get involved, it’s trouble. And I don’t want any trouble. Is that understood?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Dismissed.”
I slipped out the door as fast as I could.
The parking lot had filled up with the cars of returning skiers, but Erica was nowhere to be seen. Neither were any of my fellow spies-in-training. As I passed the lobby, though, I could hear Alexander speaking to the guy who ran the motel. “I understand the fire’s electric, but it still generates heat, right? I promise not to get any melted marshmallow on it. And I’m happy to share.”
I headed back through the frigid night to my room, worried about the mission. I was afraid that I really did have a crush on Jessica Shang—and that Erica was right that it would compromise my abilities. I was concerned that I might fail to befriend Jessica, dooming our operation. I feared that Erica might go off and do something dangerous on her own, just to prove she was right, and get herself in trouble. The only thing I knew for sure was that things had gotten off to an extremely rocky start. If they continued like this, Operation Snow Bunny was going to be a catastrophe.
CONNECTION
Schüss Ski Rental
Lionshead Village
Vail, Colorado
December 27
0830 hours
“According to Ostby’s Manual of Practical Undercover Work, there are four steps to proper acquisition of information,” Zoe said, trying to cram her foot into a ski boot. “What are they?”
“Introduction, ingratiation, inquisition, and deflection,” I rattled off.
“Meaning . . . ?”
“Introduction is making the first connection with the target. Ingratiation is making them want to be friends with you. Inquisition is subtly getting them to tell you what you need to know. And deflection is convincing them that you’ve never done any inquisition at all.”
Zoe beamed at me. “That’s exactly right!”
At normal schools, kids quizzed each other before their exams to make sure they were prepared. We were prepping for our mission the exact same way, only instead of algebra or Shakespeare, we were reviewing the finer points of espionage. And the penalty for failure wasn’t an F. It was death. After which, we would also get an F, posthumously. So I was a bit more nervous than I had been before tests back at normal school.
Zoe and I were at the ski rental, getting our equipment before beginning our mission. Erica, Chip, Jawa, and Warren were also there, but we had lost sight of them. The room was a sea of people. The week between Christmas and New Year’s was the busiest of the ski season, and everyone appeared to have shown up at once. Our fellow renters stood in long, snaking lines, waiting for equipment, or clogged the benches, trying said equipment on. All around Zoe and me, people were desperately trying to wrestle their ski boots on. Many were losing the battle. I had managed to wedge my feet into mine, but it had taken five minutes to figure out how to do it.
As far as the mission was concerned, we were on our own. Cyrus and Alexander were busy tailing Leo Shang, who was helicopter skiing. His caravan of car-tanks had left the Arabelle a half hour earlier. Cyrus and Alexander had followed in a rental car, while Hank had remained at the Ski Haüs to coordinate the mission with CIA headquarters. That left the rest of us without any adult supervision for the day, which was both liberating and daunting.
The harried rental room employee who’d given us our boots stopped by to check on us. He was a young guy with a tan line where his ski goggles normally would have been, making him look kind of like a reverse raccoon. “How do those boots feel?” he asked me.
“Way too tight,” I replied. “Like they’re two sizes too small.”
“Perfect,” the guy said. “That’s exactly how you want them to feel.”
“Really?” I asked skeptically. “They’re pretty painful.”
“It takes a little getting used to,” the guy told me. “You want them nice and snug, though.” Before I could protest any more, there was a clatter as Warren knocked over a dozen sets of rental skis across the room. “Nuts,” said the rental guy, and ran off.
“Snug?” I muttered, trying to wiggle my toes inside my boots. “When I fail to get Jessica Shang to give me the info, maybe we can just use some ski boots and torture it out of her.” I probably wasn’t supposed to say things like that out loud, but the room was so packed, it was like being in a train station at rush hour. I could barely hear myself over all the other voices.
Zoe gave me a hard stare. “What’s wrong?”
“My feet hurt.”
“Besides that. You just said ‘When I fail.’ Not ‘If I fail.’ ”
“Did I?”
“Yes. You’re not going to fail, Ben. You know your stuff backward and forward. You haven’t gotten one of my quiz questions wrong all morning.”
I sighed. “That doesn’t necessarily mean I’ll succeed. There’s a big difference between knowing what I’m supposed to do and actually being able to do it.”
“You’ve succeeded against the enemy before.”
“This time is different.”
“Why?”
I hesitated for a moment, then owned up to it. There wasn’t much point in keeping secrets at spy school; everyone would find them out soon enough anyhow. “This time I’m supposed to get a girl to like me. I don’t know if I can do that.”
Zoe giggled.
“What’s so funny?” I asked.
“You are. You’re actually worried about getting a girl to like you? Last time you went on a mission, the bad girl totally fell for you. What was her name? Ashley Spritz?”
“Ashley Sparks,” I corrected. “And she didn’t fall for me. She only liked me as a friend. Which didn’t mean anything because there hadn’t been anyone else for her to hang out with for the past year. She would have made friends with a baked potato.”
“You’re an idiot,” Zoe told me. “She totally liked you. Like, liked you liked you. She invited you
to go to Disney World with her, for Pete’s sake! You don’t invite someone to go to Disney World with you unless you’re really into them.”
“Not necessarily,” I said. “I’d go to Disney World with you. But that doesn’t mean I’m into you.”
Zoe stopped smiling, like I’d said something wrong. “C’mon,” she said coldly. “Let’s go get our skis.” Then she clomped away in her ski boots.
“Wait up!” I called, then tried to run after her.
Running in ski boots was even more difficult than I expected. In addition to being exceptionally tight, the boots were also heavy and oddly balanced. I got exactly one step, then pitched forward and landed on top of two small children, knocking them flat. Just my luck, it turned out to be the same family I’d wiped out on the ice rink the day before. “You again!” the father snarled, while his kids started crying. Several other adults glared at me accusingly. Behind them all, I caught a glimpse of Chip and Jawa, laughing hysterically.
“No hablo inglés,” I said to the father. Then I hurried off before he could pound me, doing my best not to crush any other preschoolers.
I found Zoe at the ski counter, trying to act like she didn’t know me in front of everyone else. I wasn’t sure if this was because she was angry at me—or embarrassed to be seen with me after I’d just made a scene. “That was smooth,” she said under her breath.
I glanced around the rental area, examining all the other faces as carefully as I could.
“What are you looking for?” Zoe asked.
“Jessica Shang. If she saw me wipe out like that, it’ll be a hundred times harder to win her over.”
“Relax,” Zoe told me. “She’s not here. When you’re as rich as Jessica Shang, you don’t rent skis. Your daddy just buys you a pair. Heck, she probably has a different set for every day of the week. I got yours, by the way.” She pointed to a pair leaning against the counter next to hers. They were slightly shorter than I was, chipped and scarred from the abuse of a few hundred previous renters, and they were a disturbing fluorescent green.