The Innocent Assassins

by Pema Donyo

  My mind flashed back to the first day of CO training. At one point, I remember the executive saying, "You're going to get those bad guys." We'd all cheered at the vague statement at the time, a semiautomatic rifle the last thought on our minds.

  Bad guys and good guys weren't definable, I realized as my feet slammed against the conveyor. There were two choices: go to jail and die or spy and escape.

  The man in the white lab coat pressed a button on the panel and the treadmill slowed to a halt. He was like a machine himself, silent and automatic in movement. I stopped as the treadmill slowed to a halt, and the man made a checkmark on his clipboard as I suppressed my boredom.

  "Remarkable," he muttered. "Not out of breath at all, yet nearly two hours running on the treadmill."

  I thought about responding to the scientist about how CO agents were trained to withstand extreme tests and physical challenges, about how there was nothing remarkable at all about my behavior. I shut my mouth, thinking better of it. Even if I agreed to serve as a spy for CO, the less I gave away the better. There was no use in revealing information if it wasn't required for me to do so.

  "If you have something to say, by all means, share." A figure stepped out of the shadows.

  My eyes flashed in recognition. It was the man who'd called me a "little girl" in the hospital. I jutted my chin out. "What are you doing here?"

  "CIA Agent Tristan Morelli." The man stepped closer to me. He handed me a towel. I took it and wiped down the sweat from my forehead and cheeks, all the while keeping a wary eye on him. "I know we didn't meet in the best of circumstances. I'll be your informant for the CIA. All information you have about CO will go through me, unless otherwise instructed." He winked at me. "Glad to know you're working with the good guys, kid."

  I rolled my eyes and dropped the towel on the floor. His expression remained unfazed. "This has nothing to do with being good or bad. I'll do my job." My scar began smarting the moment I brushed past him. I grimaced and pressed against my abdomen where the stab wound lay. Tristan spotted my movement.

  "Pretty nasty wound you got there." He walked up next to me, but I chose to avoid his gaze. He nodded at the scientist. "This will be all for today, Dr. Shroeder." I heard the doctor scuffling away and almost wanted to cry for him to come back. Anything as long as I didn't have to deal with this guy. What kind of CIA official winked at girls they'd just met?

  I left the room and walked toward the cafeteria in silence. He followed my trail, struggling to keep up with my pace. When I'd reached one of the first empty tables, I whirled around to face him. "Why are you following me?"

  He chuckled. "Trying to get to know you, Lu." He stuck his hand out. "Friends?"

  I flinched at the mention of the word. Friends. My mind flickered to images to Lucy and Emma and Adrian. How were they? Where did they think I was?

  I took his hand, trying to keep my expression emotionless. "Colleagues."

  "Fair enough." He followed me as I picked up a tray and walked toward the sandwich bar.

  "You didn't seem like you wanted to be friends when we first met," I couldn't help but add as I made my sandwich. Tristan didn't make anything for himself; he watched me assemble my food and walked me back to my table when I was done. "What's with the sudden change of heart?"

  "I've never met someone who crossed over from the dark side to the light side before.”

  He studied me as I lifted up the sandwich and began eating. Okay, the staring was getting a bit much. I looked beyond him at the cafeteria we were sitting in front of. For a place run on government money, the CIA center here in Pittsburgh was amazing. One-way glass covered the walls, and even the cafeteria possessed minimalist colors and silver surfaces. There was a look of sleek elegance to the place, different from the lavish Gothic look to CO's headquarters.

  "We better make our friendship worth your while." He smirked. After I could see him close up, I noticed his jaw was more chiseled than I'd originally thought, and his face was kind of flawless. I wasn't into him, of course, but I could appreciate a good-looking guy when I saw one.

  Still, it was unnerving for him to be so nice to me. I still remembered the shackles chafing against my wrists. Not cool. Suddenly he was smiling and watching me eat lunch? Something was up.

  "Okay. What do you want?"

  He coughed. "What?"

  I put down my sandwich and picked up a white paper napkin, wiping away the sauce from my fingers. "You want something from me, don't you?"

  "I don't know what you're talking about." He pushed his chair back, like the distance between us would stop my suspicion.

  I folded my hands on the table. "You're hiding something."

  “No.”

  "Your upper lip is trembling; you're rubbing your neck out of nervousness; you're avoiding my eye contact and tapping your foot against the ground." I leaned in closer. His foot tapping stopped. "So I’ll ask you again: What do you want?"

  He hesitated before answering, like he was afraid someone else would hear him. "Moscow."

  "Awesome city. Extremely cold. Beautiful cathedrals." I'd only been to Moscow twice on missions, but I remembered the city well enough.

  "Last year," he continued, "I had a mission of my own." He stared down at the table in front of us with an intense gaze, lost in thought. "I was assigned to find out about Russia's existing nuclear program and deliver the information the country keeps hidden.”

  "But you got caught."

  He glanced up in surprise, as if the fact wasn't clearly obvious. "Yeah. Yeah, I was."

  "What does your story have to do with this mission?"

  His foot started tapping again, and the table shook as his foot hit the table legs. "Don't you get it? I was a spy. The mission went wrong." He grimaced. "I’ve been demoted to an informant now."

  The puzzle pieces began fitting together. "Will they promote you if this mission is successful?"

  "Possibly." He shrugged. "I have to prove my worth again, kid. If helping you is what it takes to get back to my former job, I'm all in."

  "So we've both got something to lose."

  "And something to gain."

  "What’s new?”

  He laughed, genuine instead of mocking. "You're not so bad, kid. Thought you were some crazy cold-blooded murderer, but you've switched to the good side after all, helping the CIA.”

  I pressed my lips together. Without another word, I stood up with my tray and walked toward the trash cans. I pushed my sandwich plate and napkin into the trash and laid my tray on top of the trash can. Tristan’s footsteps stopped behind me. Before turning around, I said, "It's not about a good or bad side. It's about surviving."

  He followed me again as I walked away from him and toward the briefing room. The CIA quarters in Pittsburgh were so much smaller than CO's. Then again, the CIA had multiple headquarters while CO had one. I learned my way around the CIA quarters within the first day or two. My routine was simple: wake up, eat, train and be tested by scientists, face more questioning about CO, sleep, and repeat. I was biding my time, I thought, waiting it out until I could return back to CO with a new purpose.

  Tristan's voice snapped me out of reverie. "I'm joining you in the briefing room. Marge wants me to be in on the information too, so I know what to look for.”

  I stopped walking, finally annoyed enough to face him. "And how are you going to look out for me? CO doesn't let anyone into their headquarters unless you're an operative."

  "What? No, an informant isn’t going to join you undercover. I'll be around; I'll keep an eye out and contact you when you're not in CO quarters. Now, kid, if you'll hurry up, we've got somewhere to be." He winked at me again. Tristan gestured toward the briefing room and started walking in that direction.

  I huffed. This "kid" nickname and the winking and the smirking irritated me. I jogged up to catch up with him, walking in silence until we reached the briefing room.

  I knew the day's information was going to be different. Since I'd met my insolent
informant, the woman who I'd first met when I'd arrived at the CIA quarters (who apparently, according to Tristan, was named 'Marge') would probably be giving me the low-down on how I'd be spying for the CIA.

  My friends, my teachers, Adrian... I tried to contain the excitement inside me as Tristan and I sat down in the cool metal chairs. I missed CO. I couldn't deny it. I was going to spy on them and remember my parents' death and think of all the innocent targets but I missed everyone at CO like crazy.

  I wondered if he even missed me. Adrian never strayed far from the front of my mind. I tried to swallow the lump in my throat. I’ll see him soon enough, I thought.

  But I actually saw him a lot sooner than I thought, because right as Marge walked into the metal room a projector clicked on and the name “ADRIAN KING” appeared on the screen.

  "Adrian King," Marge identified. "Do you know him?"

  How was I supposed to answer? Uh, I've been hooking up with him the past year? He's a good kisser? I see him on the dock a lot because we're afraid of CO finding out about us? He could be better at using his tongue?

  "Yeah, kind of.”

  Marge nodded. "Good, good." She sniffed before she said her next sentence, as if she was above the practice herself but recommended it to others. "You're going to be as close to him as possible."

  I choked on invisible water. WHAT?

  Tristan started laughing too. "Marge, what are you talking about?"

  Marge glared at him with eyes like lethal lasers. "Morelli, you are to listen and pay attention." She focused her attention to me and switched her kind expression back on. "To be blunt, yes. You are going to get to know him, talk to him, and follow him as much as possible during your time as a spy for the CIA."

  I licked my lips. "Why him? There are so many other operatives."

  "Because he may be next in line."

  "Next in line for what?"

  "To be Chief Executive Officer of Covert Operatives."

  My heart beat faster. "How do you know?"

  "The CIA intercepted a coded e-mail between the current Chief Executive Officer and another client, who was inquiring about the leadership transition for Covert Operatives. We can't be completely sure the code is correct. It is only a suspicion we have. The Chief Executive Officer mentioned an agent named Adrian King." Marge aimed her pointer at the screen. "Your task is to first confirm whether or not he is next in line. If he is, he's going to be exposed to special CEO training during the next year, and he's the most powerful connection among the operatives for information.”

  She narrowed her eyes. “Central Intelligence keeps him under special surveillance. He may be the key to unlocking CO's secrets, do you understand?"

  I nodded. Voices swirled inside my head again. The argument with Adrian on the dock… what had we said?

  "You want to take over CO?"

  "Maybe. Why not?"

  He'd known. He had known then. He'd already been told. All his insistence about me staying with CO, saying we couldn't be together if I wasn't in CO. He knew.

  The air was sucked out of my lungs as I drowned in information. Why had Adrian kept it a secret? When was he planning to tell me? As if reacting to stress alone, the scar in my abdomen started aching again. I pressed against it, wishing for more painkillers. Anything to stop thinking about Adrian.

  "Remember, we're not sure yet. You have to discover whether or not he is next in line. The CIA decided the best way for you to be close to him, considering your similar ages and association, may be to become his best friend, his lover, or girlfriend, or whatever title you choose. The purpose is the same: be closer to him than anyone else, find out more information from him than anyone else, and hear secrets from him he would tell no one else."

  I gripped the chair beneath me, as if the cold metal could force me to say something intelligent the harder I pressed on it. But no words came out. I agreed, nodding my head and refusing to call this what I knew it was.

  Tristan called it instead.

  "She's supposed to sleep with him, lie to him, deceive him, and turn him in?"

  "Turning him in is irrelevant. We need information."

  I forced my tongue into action. "How long is this supposed to last?"

  "A year, maximum."

  "I'll be over eighteen in a year."

  The woman nodded. "You shall, which is why you will apply to be an executive."

  I could only nod again. So Adrian would get what he wanted after all. No college for me within the next year. Instead, there would be more CO and espionage.

  "It will be worth it."

  I looked up at Marge's sharp tone of voice.

  She continued. "When the year is up, we will make sure you leave CO with safety and security. The CIA will pay for your college tuition, we will compensate you, and you will be free from government persecution for your crimes." Her voice dipped lower. "It would be unadvisable for you to double-cross the CIA and re-join CO. I believe you know why."

  For the first time, Marge's voice was menacing. Of course I knew why. I recognized my chance at freedom; I realized deceiving and betraying everyone I loved was the one chance of living the life I wanted.

  It's all so messed up, I thought, as I laid back in my bed later, away from Tristan, away from Marge, away from briefings and investigations and secrets. Crickets chirped outside my window. The whir of the ceiling fan served as the soundtrack to my thoughts for the night. Marge briefed Tristan and me for another hour after she told me about Adrian. I doubted she suspected a thing: she hadn't brought him up for the rest of the conversation. And yet she'd clearly made him my own little espionage target for the year.

  A voice jolted me out of thoughts, and then an actual nudge. "We're leaving," Tristan whispered.

  I didn't say anything in response. I stepped down from my bed and followed him out into the corridor. The light in the long hallway guided us to the lift and we rode the elevator down in silence.

  The apartments for CIA agents in the Pittsburgh center were definitely better than I'd thought they would be. They weren't quite the three-bedroom penthouses CO agents received, but they were still roomy and furnished enough to live comfortably.

  But it wasn't home. CO was my home, I thought, as Tristan led me out of the elevator, past the apartment lobby, and into the cool night air of the complex. He opened my door with an exaggerated bowing motion.

  "I can manage on my own, thanks."

  His cheeks lifted in amusement. "My job is to manage you, kid. Get used to it."

  My cheeks flushed in indignation. "I don't need a handler." The words came out harsher than I'd intended.

  Tristan shrugged. He handed me a duffel bag as soon as the car started, driving toward the direction of Pittsburgh International Airport.

  "Passport, ID, cell phone, all inside." He handed me a pile of clothes, and I almost doubled over at the shock of seeing them. They were my old clothes I'd been captured with, but they looked brand new. No blood stains, grime, or filth from the alley. No rip where I'd been stabbed. "Here's your original clothes. Now repeat to me your story."

  "I was admitted to the hospital in the ER, had my wound stitched, and I escaped before the CIA could shackle me. I missed the blue light to guide me back to CO, so I stole the identity of another person and faked the passport."

  Tristan shook his head. "Why would they believe that? I swear Marge could have invented a better story.”

  "Because it happened to the current CEO."

  Tristan furrowed his brows. "What are you talking about?"

  I stared out the window, watching the lights of the cars race beside us on the freeway. I wondered if any of them were headed back home to California, like me. "In CO history lessons, we were taught the current CEO got away from the police, faked his passport, and traveled back to CO headquarters alone." I bit my lip. "No one knows if it's true, but everyone pretty much buys the story, so they'll buy mine."

  "Who is this CEO?"

  I let out a short laugh, then rum
maged through the duffel bag. "No one knows. I've never met him. He's the stuff of legend." I pulled out a smaller bag inside the duffel bag and pointed to it. "What's this?"

  Tristan took the bag away from me and opened it up. He pulled out a pink lipstick container and unscrewed the top. After he opened the compact mirror, he mimicked the motion of putting on lipstick. A man in his late twenties with muscular arms and a scar across his left cheek putting on pink lipstick? Yep, the sight was as ridiculous as you'd imagine.

  Tristan wasn't embarrassed at all though. Because once he mimicked the motion, the bottom of the lipstick automatically pulled back another bottom, with tiny perforated holes right next to the mouth. Tristan handed me the lipstick 2.0. "A microphone which will automatically call me and let me hear whatever you say into it." He showed me the compact mirror, which had a blue tint to it. "Mirror serving as a webcam. This mirror is always connected to my phone, and the CIA headquarters here in Pittsburgh." He pressed the top of the compact mirror. "Camera. Press here and a picture is texted to me and back here to Pittsburgh."

  I leaned back in my seat, impressed. "What other toys do I get?"

  Tristan laughed. His eagerness to laugh reminded me of Adrian, and how often he'd try to joke around with me. My heart felt suddenly like it was being squeezed. I couldn't think about Adrian anymore.

  "Something else." Tristan pulled out a rubber band, a perfectly normal black elastic clasped in silver. "This is a GPS tracker. I'll always know where you are. Press the silver part three times in a row, and it's a distress signal so I know when to be there right away."

  The car slowed to a halt in front of a US Airways terminal. I pushed out my own door this time and grabbed the duffel bag. Tristan started to follow me, but I stopped him.

  "CO has webcams at all the major airports. You can still sit in my same plane, but wait for at least ten minutes until you follow me."

  Tristan scoffed. "Yeah right.”