“No.”
I believe him.
“This is so much bigger than all of us,” Oscar says, coming over to stand next to me. “I went to the Academy in Hong Kong. And sure, we figured there were other academies out there. Since I’ve graduated, I’ve run into assets from maybe a dozen or so places.” He gestures toward the computer screen. “But this? This is insane. They’re everywhere. What’re you getting yourselves into?”
“We don’t know,” I answer. “Something’s not right at the Academy—beyond the obvious—and we’re trying to figure out what it is. This isn’t just about these people following us.” I shoot Luke a meaningful glance. Instinct tells me that if the Academy really is as global as the files suggest, we’re going to need more help. “There’s more.”
“What’s she talking about?”
“All along, we’ve been told that we’re doing good,” Luke answers. “That we’re taking out dictators and criminals. Righting wrongs.” Oscar nods. “We think that’s all a lie. We think they’re using us as their own private army, that we’re little more than mercenaries to them. Someone knows something. We’re just trying to figure out who’s behind all of this.”
Oscar grimaces, silent for a moment. A long moment. “There’ve been rumors.”
“What rumors?”
Oscar exchanges a look with Luke. “Assets disappearing. That sort of thing.”
“Luke mentioned that.”
“Well, what Luke probably doesn’t know is that people have been tracking the disappearances.”
My pulse picks up. My gaze darts between Luke and Oscar. Luke’s silent, his attention focused on Oscar. His silence says it all; we definitely didn’t come here just for Oscar’s computer skills.
My eyes narrow. “You?” I turn on Luke. “You knew?”
“I suspected,” Luke admits. “There’ve been rumors for months. Quiet rumors, but still. Someone was allegedly keeping track of the assets. The computer skills involved in that kind of an op?” He nods at Oscar. “I figured it was you.”
“Why do you track them?” I ask.
He shrugs. “At first, it was just something to do. I like numbers, lists. A guy I worked with on an op in China disappeared one day, so I wrote his name down. That’s how it started. I created a secure Internet board, word got around, and soon people within the organization were adding more names—anonymously, of course.”
“Other assets?” I ask.
“Yes.”
“Are they all assassins?” Luke interjects.
“It’s a mix. Sometimes all I have is a name. Skill sets are harder to come by.”
That makes sense since our names are meaningless, really. They aren’t who we are. What we do is much more important.
“How many are there?” I ask.
Oscar turns back to the computer, punching in a few keys on the keyboard. Suddenly, a list of names pops up on the screen in front of us. I scan the list, counting roughly twenty in all. The names themselves aren’t particularly useful. Some are only partials—initials, first names, aliases. It’s not much to go on, but it’s something.
I want to know everything about these people—how they died, where they were—were they assassins like me?
“How did they die?” Luke asks, shifting slightly, his leg brushing mine.
“I don’t get cause of death, just names.”
“So we don’t even know if it was the Academy—or one of the academies,” I add, that long list coming to mind again. “It could have been anyone. They could have died on a mission. They could have caught pneumonia. You have no clue. All you have is a list of dead assets. We don’t even know what it means.”
“Have you heard of something called Ares?” Luke asks.
“No.” Oscar looks back at the computer, typing rapidly. “But I can do a search through all of the files on the flash drive to see if it’s mentioned anywhere.”
“How long will that take?” he asks.
“Not long. It’s all a matter of writing the proper code.”
I pull out my phone. Still no message from Grace. I want her with me now more than ever.
I turn back toward the screen, trying to fight the rising panic choking me like a noose. “What else is on the files? Besides the academy lists? Anything useful?”
“There’s so much data on this thing that it’s going to take me hours to go through. And even after all of that, I’m not sure I’m going to be able to retrieve everything. This is very sophisticated technology. They know what they’re doing. You guys can chill here while I do a search.”
Oscar’s attention returns to the computer. He hunches over the keyboard, his gaze glued to the screen. Luke settles in on the couch; a few minutes later, he’s asleep again. I can’t sit still. I pace, explore Oscar’s apartment, check my phone for texts from Grace about a hundred times. It’s like the claustrophobia again, although this time, instead of being trapped in a confined space, I’m trapped in my life. And this time there’s no rope to get me out.
Finally after a couple hours, the computer beeps.
“Did you find something?”
Oscar ignores me, his gaze focused on the code in front of him. For a moment, he doesn’t speak. “Looks like we got some hits on Ares.”
I nudge Luke. “Wake up.”
He’s bleary-eyed. “Did we find anything?”
I grin. “Yep.”
He rises from the couch, moving to stand next to Oscar. “What’d you find?”
“Three hits.” Three documents fill the split screens on the computer in front of us. The first looks like a memo. No names are used, only initials. Most of it appears to be in some sort of mixed code—one even a sophisticated cryptologist would have a hard time breaking. But there in the middle of the document is the word, “Ares.”
The next document is an email from the Director addressed to someone with the initials “E.R.”
I understand Ares is getting impatient. We’re doing everything we can.
“She’s apologizing. The person she’s writing is clearly higher up than she is. The whole tone of this is deferential. Whoever the Director is in this organization, she’s not at the highest level.” Excitement fills my voice. Finally. It’s not much, but at least it’s something. “If there are academies all over the world, then there has to be one centralized organization keeping everything tied together. Ares has to be it.”
“Makes sense,” Luke says.
The third document is even more cryptic; it looks like a list of sorts, more initials, the word Ares, and not much else.
“Do you recognize the code?” I ask Oscar.
“No. It’s a cipher, maybe. But I don’t think it’s the kind of thing I can break on my own.”
“The Academy trains cryptographers,” I interject.
“So now you want to involve even more people in this?” Luke asks.
“I don’t know.” I gaze pointedly at Oscar. “I didn’t exactly want to involve him. That was your idea.”
“Did you have a better idea?” Luke asks, his tone frustrated. “By all means, I’d be happy to hear it. I never said I had all the answers. But it’s not like a lot of other ideas presented themselves.”
I gesture toward the screens in front of us. “Can you break it?” I ask Oscar.
“I don’t know. Maybe. With a lot of time, at least. Parts of it? Probably. All of it? Doubtful.”
“Do you know anyone who could help?”
Oscar’s silent for a moment. “Look, this isn’t exactly something I want to get in the middle of.”
My gaze drifts to the computer screen behind us. “Aren’t you already involved? How long have you been tracking assets? What do you think will happen if they find out about it?”
It’s not a threat exactly, but it has teeth; after all, they taught me to hit where it hurts.
Oscar sighs. “You do realize we’re probably going to get ourselves killed for this.”
“Probably,” Luke agrees, not taking his e
yes off of me.
“And you think it’s worth it?”
“What’s the alternative?” I ask. “That we wait for them to kill us?” My voice builds, matching the anger and frustration filling me. “We don’t matter to them; we’re a means to an end. We’re completely disposable. Don’t you want to fight back?”
I can’t explain it—it’s like all the years of obedience are choking me now. I’m sick of following their rules, sick of my life being defined by their needs, their orders. I’m tired of spending my life worrying about Grace, about whether they’ll make her a killer like me. I’m sick of the weight of the lives I’ve taken and the lies I live dragging me down. I played by the rules because I thought it was the best thing for my sister, but what if I’ve just handed her over to the devil without even realizing it?
Luke jumps in, his gaze on Oscar. “She’s right. You know she is. What you’re doing now—these names that you’re tracking, these assets—if they find out, you’re dead. You’ve already broken the rules. It doesn’t matter anymore.
“Haven’t they taken enough from you?” Luke asks. “Don’t you want a chance to take something from them? To hit them where it hurts?”
A look flashes in Oscar’s eyes—a look I immediately recognize. I’m all too familiar with the kind of loss you can’t ever forget—first my parents and then the two years when I lived with the memory of what I’d done to Luke.
“Who was it?” I ask.
“My best friend.”
“I’m sorry.” I hate what they’ve taken from all of us. Hate that I’ve spent my life serving an organization and a purpose that was built on an elaborate lie. “If you could go back, if you had a chance to save your friend, wouldn’t you?” I need to make him understand. “I don’t want this fight any more than you do, but I have a sister and I’m all she has. I have to keep her safe.”
I wait, the room so silent you could hear a pin drop. I don’t blame him for his reluctance; I felt the same way. But the further we get into this the uglier it seems, and the more I begin to doubt that we can live this life. We need Oscar. He can get in places that we can’t. His computer skills alone change everything. And if he helps us, Luke will have no need for my sister.
Oscar nods. “Fine. Let’s do this.”
Relief floods me. “Thank you. Where do we start?”
Luke points at the screen. “With Ares.”
“Okay so there’s this organization controlling all of the academies,” Oscar says, leaning over his desk. “And you guys think Ares is the one sending down the assignments.”
“Yes. When Luke heard about Ares, it sounded like they were the ones running the show. Beyond that, we don’t have a ton to go on.”
“X is right,” Luke answers. “Without full access to the Director’s computer files, it’s tough to know exactly what—or who—we’re dealing with. But Ares seems like the best place to start.”
Oscar nods. “Agreed. If you want to get to the bottom of everything, you have to go through Ares. If you go after the Academy, it won’t be enough. You need to strike at the heart of the operation. You need to go after the one calling the shots.”
This was daunting enough when I thought we were just dealing with the Academy. Taking down a multinational organization? Infinitely more difficult. We need to dismantle Ares piece by piece.
“We don’t know where they are or who they are,” I interject. “We don’t even know if they’re the ones following us. Ares is just a name Luke heard, a word we’ve seen on your computer a few times. We don’t know what it means.
“How can we fight against something that may or may not exist? The Academy is real. The Director is a living, breathing person. We already know she’s behind some of this, if not most of it. Why not go after her? She can lead us to Ares.”
“It’s not enough,” Oscar argues. “If you just go after the Academy and the Director, you’re going to get us killed.”
“Yeah, but how can we possibly take down an organization that large? We would need an army. A big one.”
Luke grimaces. “She’s right. Organizing something that big would take a lot of time. Way more than we have. How would we even start something like that? There’s a reason we don’t have any connections. They don’t want us to.”
“How many assets do you have access to?” I ask Oscar. “You said you’ve been connecting with assets online, tracking deaths. What if we reached out to them?”
His gaze is speculative. “It could work. It would take some time, though; Luke’s right about that. And I’m not sure how many people will be willing to talk. But it’s worth a shot.”
“If they were willing to break some rules, then they may be willing to go further,” I suggest.
“Wait. Be quiet for a second—” Luke interrupts. We’re both silent, our attention shifting to him. Luke moves away from me, walking to stand in front of the desk. He points at the computer screen—the first list of academy locations. “Look at the list.”
I follow his gaze. “What?”
“What don’t you see?”
I walk next to Luke, staring down at the screen in front of us. It’s a fairly large list, but nothing seems strange about it. It’s just a list of cities.
“I don’t know.”
“What do they have in common?”
We’re trained to look at patterns from an early age. Trained to analyze them. They’re all major cities—London, Tokyo, Rome…something’s missing.
“New York isn’t listed.”
Luke grins. “Exactly.”
Oscar stands next to me, scanning the screen. “You’re right. It would make sense that they wouldn’t need an academy in the same city as the headquarters. They would already have access to as many assets as they would need from the main organization alone. The academies seem to run as satellites for the main organization. I bet they’re training and launching points for Ares.”
My eyes narrow. “So you think Ares is headquartered in New York City?”
Luke nods. “Makes sense.”
“If it is located in New York, then it has to be in a highly secure building,” Oscar says. “It would probably be somewhere in plain sight, with access to an impressive communications network. It would have to be a location with highly established infrastructure—likely an office building.”
“That’s a needle in a haystack,” Luke comments.
“Maybe. Maybe not.” I turn to Oscar. “If you started a search of the sorts of things the organization would need—camera feeds, security, that sort of thing—then maybe you could come up with a list of possibilities? Plus you have to think they’re using a lot of technology to keep the organization running. And I doubt they’re working normal business hours. What if you started tracking high amounts of electricity usage at abnormal hours?”
A slow smile spreads across Oscar’s face. “I could do that. Satellite imagery will help. Most likely the easiest way to find the building is going to be the one that’s the hardest to crack. It’s not going to be easy and it’s going to take some time, but it could work. In the meantime, I can go through the rest of these files.”
“Can you hack into the necessary systems, power companies, etc.?”
He grins at me. “I can hack anything.”
I stare at the list again, searching for patterns. “What if they’re not in the city?” I counter. Maybe I’m wrong about Ares’s operational structure. Maybe they prefer the anonymity of being somewhere remote. But all the other academy locations are major urban areas—transportation and telecommunications hubs.
Luke shakes his head. “They have to be. Think about it—an operation as big as we believe they are? A city makes the most sense. Assets could come and go and you wouldn’t ever even notice. They would be hiding in plain sight; it’s a smart move. And when no one thinks they exist, it’s even easier to hide.”
He has a point.
“How long do you think it will take?” I ask Oscar.
“It could take weeks
, months. It’ll depend on what I find. Right now we don’t have much to go on. And Luke’s right, it sort of is a needle in a haystack.”
We don’t have weeks or months. We barely have days. But I’m not sure what else we can do at this point. “Does this mean you’re helping us?”
“I guess it does. What will you do next?”
“I have to go back to London.” I need to know my sister is safe.
Oscar pulls out a piece of paper and a pen, scribbling something down. “You may want to make a stop in North Africa first.”
“Why?”
“There’s a guy in Tunisia. A weapons guy. Used to be an asset—an assassin.”
Luke and I exchange puzzled looks. He says what we’re both thinking. “Bullshit. No one used to be an assassin unless they’re dead.”
Ours is not a career path that lends itself to retirement.
“Hey man, I’m just the messenger. He’s rogue, but he’s good. Really good. He may have a desire to take down the Academy and this Ares organization. And he could know something.”
“Why would he help us?” I ask.
“Because they killed his girlfriend.”
Chapter Eighteen
We walk back to our hotel in silence.
I’m not sure what to think anymore. I want to run, to take my sister and hide her away, but after seeing that list, I’m not sure there’s anywhere in the world we can go. If Ares is as connected as we suspect, we’ll never be safe.
“You didn’t expect it to be as bad as it is,” Luke comments.
“Did you?”
“No. I didn’t.”
“The sheer size of this organization—Ares—there’s no way the two of us can do anything to take them down. Not on our own. Even Oscar isn’t enough. And I can’t involve Grace. She’s too young.”
“I know.”
“How much do you think we can count on Oscar?” I lengthen my stride, struggling to keep up with Luke. His energy manifests itself physically—he walks faster, his body language impatient. He looks like he’s gearing up for battle.
“I have no clue. I would say I trust him as much as I trust anybody in this business. Although, I’m not sure I’m all that good at reading people anymore.”
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