by Stuart Gibbs
“What do you mean?” I asked innocently.
“You don’t look like you were working hard at all,” Hank said.
“Neither does Jawa,” I countered.
“Jawa’s a freak of nature,” Hank growled. “You’re just a freak. No way did you run that whole six miles.”
“You’re right,” I said. “I only ran the first mile, then cut out, somehow found a shortcut through a wilderness area I’ve never seen before, and then jumped back onto the trail with only a few minutes to go.”
Hank frowned. The truth actually sounded harder to believe than the lie. “Maybe later today you can prove to me how good a runner you are. Maybe we should do ten miles this afternoon and see how refreshed you feel then.”
I gulped. This hadn’t worked out the way I’d hoped. Of course, SPYDER planned to either kidnap or kill me by lunchtime, so chances were that I wouldn’t have to do the run anyhow.
Just then, Woodchuck emerged from the woods, carrying a string of freshly speared brook trout. He was wearing a bearskin cloak and homemade moccasins along with his standard loincloth. “I’m afraid there won’t be time for another run today,” he said.
“Why not?” Hank demanded.
“Because young Ripley here is leaving camp right after breakfast,” Woodchuck told him. Before Hank could protest, he added, “That’s not my decision. It’s an order straight from the top.”
Hank scowled, wondering why I merited such special attention, then stormed off to berate the Muskrats who’d arrived later than I had.
I was surprised to find myself feeling somewhat relieved. So the CIA had a new plan: get me out of spy camp before SPYDER arrived. I liked that much more than the previous plan: wait for SPYDER to arrive and pray Alexander Hale didn’t screw things up.
“Where am I going?” I asked.
“Far from here,” Woodchuck replied. “And into some serious wilderness.”
The feeling of relief instantly vanished. Since my life was on the line, I’d been hoping to hear that I was going someplace more like a maximum-security underground bunker with a hundred heavily armed agents assigned to protect me. “This isn’t serious wilderness?” I asked, waving to the woods around us.
“This?” Woodchuck laughed. “This place is a spa compared to the real thing. But rest assured, there’s nowhere safer. Your enemies will never be able to find you out there. Not with me by your side.”
A thought occurred to me. “Does Alexander Hale know about this plan?”
Woodchuck shrugged. “He must—although I haven’t seen him since last night. I suspect he’s been ordered to focus on SPYDER while I keep you safe. We’re leaving in an hour. Go get yourself a good breakfast. We’re only going to eat what we can forage for the next few days.” With that, Woodchuck slung the fish over his shoulder and headed up to the mess, whistling happily.
I stared after him, wondering what I’d gotten myself into now.
WILDERNESS SURVIVAL
Shenandoah National Wilderness
June 14
1100 hours
Woodchuck and I weren’t the only ones who set off from spy camp that morning. An entire busload of students rolled out the gates. In part, this was to cover my evacuation: Just in case SPYDER was tailing us, at some point Woodchuck and I planned to surreptitiously slip off the bus, which would then continue on with everyone else on board serving as decoys. But in addition, Woodchuck had felt that my entire class was in desperate need of some wilderness training. In the single day that the first years had been at spy camp, one student had been bitten by an opossum, one had gotten sick from drinking scummy water, and one had nearly blown up the latrine by striking a match dangerously close to the methane-rich trench. To top it all off, poor Nate Mackey had made a pit stop in the woods during our morning run and then wiped himself with poison ivy. His bottom was now covered with pustules. Every time the bus jounced, he whimpered in pain.
Woodchuck decided that, as long as he was dragging the first years out to the sticks, he might as well bring all the MI-6 kids, too. And then he needed all of our counselors and a few other older kids to wrangle everyone—so both Chip and Hank Schacter ended up along for the ride.
I was relieved to have some friends along for the first part of the adventure. I sat with Zoe, which meant Warren had taken the seat directly behind us, where he could glower at me every time Zoe’s back was turned. Chip sat next to him, taking up most of the seat and forcing Warren to squash himself up against the window. As we all had orders to keep mum about the mission and were surrounded by future spies, everyone avoided the topic and talked about standard spy school things like what the best way to poison an enemy agent was and which professors we should avoid the next year. This was actually a relief. It was nice to be distracted from SPYDER for a while.
The scenery provided a diversion as well. I had thought that spy camp was located as far from civilization as one could get in the eastern United States, but it turned out I was wrong. Our bus was heading way off the grid. We began our journey on country roads, then shifted to one-lane tracks through the woods, and finally ended up on bumpy, rutted trails that a bus had no business being on. Two and half hours after leaving camp, we were chugging up a narrow track carved into the edge of a steep mountain with a precipitous ravine dropping away below us.
Our fellow students were so focused on our surroundings—and busily praying that we wouldn’t plummet to our deaths—that my friends finally felt it was safe to discuss what was really on their minds.
“Any idea what Woodchuck’s plan is?” Zoe whispered to me. “Once you get out into the wild and all?”
“Woodchuck says we’re just going to lay low,” I replied. “The deeper into the wilderness we are, the harder it’ll be for SPYDER to find us.”
“And you’re going total survivalist out there?” Chip asked.
“Apparently so,” I said grimly. I had spent a good hour in the mess hall that morning, stuffing myself full of waffles, bacon, and sausage, fearing that I’d soon be forced to subsist on insects. When I’d tried to bring a backpack full of supplies on the bus, Woodchuck had stopped me. “We need to move quickly and leave no trace. That means as few supplies as possible. No luxury items like matches or underwear.”
I’d never really thought of fire or underwear as luxury items; I’d considered them necessities. But I reluctantly left them behind. Except for the pair of underwear I had on, of course.
“So . . . the CIA’s whole strategy for you to deal with SPYDER is to run away?” Chip asked.
“No,” I said. “The Agency is trying to figure out what SPYDER is up to. But the twenty-four hours SPYDER gave me are almost up. So instead of forcing me to choose between working for the enemy and death, they’re removing me from the equation.” Even though I knew exactly what time it was, I nervously checked my watch to confirm it anyhow. It was almost exactly one day since I’d received the contract—and the ultimatum—from SPYDER.
“Why didn’t the Agency just let you accept their offer?” Zoe asked. “You could have worked as a double agent for us.”
“I’m not even a single agent yet,” I said. “I don’t think I’m quite ready to be a double agent.” I had thought about doing what Zoe suggested, but the mere thought of it was overwhelming and gave me a stomachache.
“Oh, I’m sure you could have handled it,” Zoe told me.
Warren glowered at this. “Does anyone have any idea where we are?” he asked grumpily, trying to change the subject.
I glanced out the window. If anything, the ravine seemed to have grown even steeper. “I’m guessing West Virginia,” I said.
“West Virginia?” Claire Hutchins called from a few rows up. “I thought that was all strip mines and inbred hillbillies.”
“You heard wrong,” Chip shot back. “As you can see, there’s plenty of wilderness here—and the locals are far less inbred than the royal family.”
Claire was suddenly on her feet with her fellow MI-6 students
behind her. “Mock the royals one more time and I’ll rip off your head and cram it down your neck.”
Chip leapt to his feet as well. “I’d like to see you try.”
“Hey!” Hank snapped. He charged down the aisle from the front of the bus, grabbed Chip by the shoulder, and slammed him into his seat. “You’re not going to survive three minutes out here if you can’t be a team player.”
“What are you yelling at me for?” Chip asked, then pointed at Claire. “She started it.”
“It doesn’t matter who started it,” Woodchuck announced. He stood in the aisle at the front of the bus, calmly peeling an apple with his bowie knife. “Hank is right. The first key to survival is teamwork. Suppose this road were to collapse right now and our bus were to plummet into the ravine. . . .”
“Is that a possibility?” Warren asked, terrified.
“Certainly,” Woodchuck said. “These roads are in terrible shape. Now imagine: The bus plunges into the river. The wreckage is hideous. The carnage is terrible. But a few of you manage to escape. What is the first thing you do?”
“Call nine-one-one and have the wilderness patrol come rescue us,” Jawa said.
Woodchuck frowned. “Er, let’s assume there’s no phones. They’ve all been lost in the disaster. Now, there’s only a few of you down there, stranded miles from civilization without any means of contact. What do you do to survive?”
“Eat the dead people!” Warren suggested, a bit too enthusiastically.
Everyone on the bus glared at him, disgusted.
“What?” he asked. “We’re going to need protein.”
“We start down the river,” Chip said. “That will lead us to civilization.”
“You don’t just head off into the wilderness!” Claire told him. “That’s dangerous.”
“Well what are we supposed to do?” Chip asked. “Just stay in the bottom of the ravine and starve to death?”
“We wouldn’t starve,” Warren said. “There’ll be plenty of fresh people. . . .”
“Dude,” Zoe said. “Drop the whole cannibal thing.”
“You don’t leave the site of an accident,” Claire told Chip. “When help comes, that’s where they’re going to look.”
“Who said help was coming?” Chip shot back.
“Staying at the site is standard procedure,” Claire said. “It’s straight out of the CIA rescue manual.”
“Well, what moron wrote that manual?” Chip demanded.
“I did,” Woodchuck said.
Chip grimaced. He turned around to face Woodchuck. “I didn’t mean you were a moron,” he tried to explain. “Just the manual . . .”
Woodchuck shrugged, unfazed. “It’s cool,” he said. “We’re all allowed a difference of opinion. You can think my manual’s wrong. It’s not, but you can think that it is. The point is, I’m not going to get angry at you. That gets us nowhere. It only wastes time and energy—and if this were a true survival situation, we would not have time or energy to waste. The first thing you do in a life-or-death situation is figure out how to work together.”
Jawa raised his hand. Woodchuck pointed to him and he asked, “Why is it safer to stay with the wreck than to head to civilization?”
“Because you don’t know what lies ahead,” Woodchuck replied. “Yes, a river will often lead to a town, but who knows how treacherous that route will be? Suppose you take the river downstream, only to encounter an impassable obstacle—a waterfall, for example—and there’s no way to get back upstream. Now you’re stuck. And when the search party comes looking for you—and a party will come—they’ll find the wreckage, but they won’t find you.”
Woodchuck finished peeling his apple, then sliced off a hunk and jammed it in his mouth. “Survival is like a chess game,” he told us. “You can’t think only one step ahead. You have to think several steps ahead. You have to examine all the scenarios: If you go down the river, what’s the chance of someone getting injured? If they get injured, how do you help them? Once you analyze everything, you choose the course with the least risk. In nearly a hundred percent of cases, staying at the crash site is the least risky option.”
“Told you,” Claire said under her breath.
Chip sat back down, frowning. He muttered something to me, but I didn’t hear it.
I was too busy looking at the bus driver.
I hadn’t paid much attention to the man when I’d gotten on. I’d been distracted by Woodchuck confiscating my extra underwear. And throughout the drive, the man had been facing out the front of the bus, away from me. I’d only been able to see the back of his head, and that was from a distance, as I was toward the rear of the bus. But while Woodchuck had been speaking, I’d been looking forward. There was a mirror at the front of the bus, as on most buses, designed so that the driver could look back at all of us. The mirror thus allowed me to see the driver’s eyes—and I’d noticed they kept flicking toward me.
The driver was watching me.
I didn’t get scared, however. Not quite yet. There was something familiar about the eyes, as though I’d seen them before.
I kept my gaze fixed on the mirror.
The eyes flicked up again, locking with mine.
They were ice blue. I only knew one man with eyes that color: Alexander Hale.
He’d disguised himself. In truth, he’d done a pretty good job: He’d put on a wig, affixed a fake mustache, and maybe even added a bit of latex around his jowls to make himself look pudgier. But still, if I’d been paying better attention—which I should have been doing, given my situation—I would have noticed it was him.
Alexander returned his gaze to the road ahead and steered us around a hairpin turn. A large trestle bridge that looked at least a century old came into view. It spanned the steep gorge only a few hundred yards ahead.
“Oh no,” Zoe said. “Tell me we’re not going over that.”
“No need to worry,” Woodchuck said. “It’s perfectly safe.”
I scurried up the aisle to the front of the bus, slipping past Woodchuck to get to the driver’s seat.
“Alexander?” I asked.
“No,” Alexander said with a wink. “My name is Enrico Palaterri.”
“What are you doing here?”
“Getting you to your destination safely.” Alexander was playing up his role for the benefit of Woodchuck and anyone else within earshot. He was trying to do an Italian accent, although he actually sounded Irish. “My mission is to ensure the safety of all academy students.”
“But you’re not supposed to be protecting me anymore!” I hissed. “Woodchuck’s been assigned to do that now. You’re supposed to be figuring out what SPYDER’s up to and neutralizing them.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m only here to drive the bus,” Alexander said, then lowered his voice to whisper back, “I made an executive decision. Woodchuck might be a great survivalist, but he’s not a great spy. If SPYDER comes after you, you’re going to need someone with my skills to protect you.”
“The whole idea was for you to stop them before they came after me,” I said.
“Benjamin, relax,” Alexander said. “You’re in good hands here. SPYDER isn’t going to be any trouble at all.”
At which point, SPYDER attacked.
EVACUATION
Shenandoah River Gorge
June 14
1130 hours
The first explosion detonated in the road directly in front of our bus. There was a blinding flash of light and then a concussion of air that shattered the windshield and knocked me flat. The bus was thrown sideways like a Matchbox car and slammed into the rock face. Dust and debris ballooned through the gap in the window, coating me, Alexander, and everyone in the first three rows.
Someone screamed in terror next to me. I thought it was one of the girls in my class, but when I sat up and wiped the dust from my eyes, I found it was Nate Mackey.
He was on the floor in the fetal position, white as a sheet. “We’re go
ing to die!” he screamed. “We’re going to die!”
I looked to Woodchuck for help. Unfortunately, he was slumped in his seat, unconscious. Perhaps he’d been clocked in the head by a piece of flying debris. Or maybe he’d simply fainted in fear. Whatever the case, he wasn’t going to be any help.
A second explosion went off in the road behind the bus. Out the back window, I saw part of the road crumble and plummet into the gorge, cutting off our escape route.
Nate screamed again. “I don’t want to die!” he wailed. “I’m too young!”
The students on the bus were reacting in a dozen different ways, ranging from abject terror to cool aplomb. Warren was at the terrified end of the spectrum, hiding under his seat. Zoe was somewhere in the middle, trying to be calm, but obviously frightened. Most of the others handled themselves with dignity, mixed with a bit of confusion. Chip and Jawa were popping out the emergency windows, trying to evacuate the bus. Hank had thrown himself on top of Claire to protect her, although Claire wasn’t too pleased by his chivalry. “Get off me, you twit!” she snapped. “I’m not some helpless damsel in distress!”
Suddenly, a voice amplified by a bullhorn rang out from above, loud enough to drown out everyone else. “Benjamin Ripley, your twenty-four hours is officially up. Kindly surrender yourself—or we will blow you and everyone else to smithereens.”
The bus immediately fell silent. Every pair of eyes focused on me.
Zoe shook her head, not wanting me to give myself up. Chip and Jawa seemed torn, unsure what I should do. Claire, meanwhile, gave me a heated stare. “What are you still doing here?” she demanded. “Get off the bloody bus!”
I nodded and headed for the front door. There didn’t seem to be anything else to do. “Okay!” I yelled. “Hold your fire! I’m coming out!”
As I passed the driver’s seat, however, Alexander suddenly seized my arm. “Follow me,” he whispered. “The moment you step off this bus, we make a run for it.”
I froze on the bus steps. “But if I do that, what’s to stop SPYDER from blowing up my friends?”