Stories Collide - A Stuart Gibbs Story

Chapter 3 - Confusion (UPDATED- NOW CYRUS IS COMING TOO!)

Perspective Switch: Benjamin Ripley

Several Days After Spy School At Sea 

Present Time On Earth

There was a flash of light.

Then everything returned to normal.

I was still in the mess hall at the CIA Academy of Espionage with my friends Jawa O'Shea, Mike Brezinski, Chip Schacter, Zoe Zibbell, and Nate Macky (who wasn't really my friend and had never been the brightest mind at school, but he was sitting with us anyhow). Everyone was now looking around suspiciously, wondering what was going on. Even Erica Hale at the far table, who usually knew everything about everything. In fact, everyone in the mess hall was extremely confused. There were a few moments of complete silence, with everyone glancing around frantically, and then the mess hall erupted into chaos.

"Attack!"

"I want my mommy!"

"What the heck was that?"

"Huh?"

"Ahhhhhh!"

"It's an evil organization!"

"Noooo!"

"What?"

"My lunch fell on the floor!"

"Ouch!"

With everyone chattering, it was hard to even think. I didn't know what had happened. No one else did either.

"What was that?" Asked Chip, pushing away his food. Cafeteria food at spy school was disgusting enough, but now everyone was much too distracted to eat anyhow.

"I don't know," I said.

"Maybe it was the northern lights!" Nate suggested enthusiastically. His suggestions never seemed to completely match what was realistic and what wasn't, so when he made a comment like this, I generally tuned him out.

"It could be a test," said Jawa. He was a good student at spy school, at the top of his class, athletic, and very smart.

"Maybe," said Zoe. She had been my first friend at spy school, friendly and kind, but things had gotten a bit off between us since I discovered she had a secret crush on me, and she had thought I was working for the bad guys on a previous mission. Though things were mostly fixed between us, she sometimes got jealous at the missions and things I got to do. "But what kind of test is flashing a blinding light and then doing absolutely nothing?"

"Maybe it was a test to see if we would panic," I suggested.

"But-" Mike didn't get to finish his sentence, because at that moment, an announcement came over the intercom.

"Benjamin Ripley, Erica Hale, Zoe Zibbell, Chip Schacter, Michael Brezinski, and Jawaharlal O'Shea, please report to the principal's office. 5th story Hale building. Thank you."

I looked over to Erica. She still had her nose in a book, as usual, but her ice-blue eyes flicked to our table. She got up, sighed, tucked her book into her satchel, and started walking to the principal's office.

We got up and followed her.

"Awww, why can't I come?" Nate whined. We ignored him.

Jogging to catch up with Erica, my heart raced, not just from the exertion. For one of the only times I've seen her, Erica didn't seem to know exactly what was going on. She still looked calm and serene as usual, her eyes focused ahead of her, but she seemed moderately confused.

I had a huge crush on her. She was the most beautiful, intelligent, and calm person I had ever met. I knew she liked me, but she had never seemed to want to start something until our last mission, when she had said she was thinking about going out with me. Shortly after, she kissed me, but I never got the chance to talk to her about it afterwards. Later, we had returned to school, where everyone was watching everyone and there were lots of people around, and Erica never wanted to be caught doing something remotely romantic. I hadn't really talked to her or seen her since. I had a feeling Erica wasn't going to say anything about it for a while, because I had found that as tough as she seemed, Erica got embarrassed easily. But I guessed part of that was due to not having many friends or people to share with, so she kept a lot of things secret. But she was an amazing spy, better than most real spies in the CIA. Erica always knew what was happening, even when most of the top brass at the CIA didn't. She was always ready. She was always calm, and I had barely ever seen her confused. Sure, she had been surprised (rarely), slightly perplexed, and embarrassed, (even more rare. I had been one of the few people ever to witness this, along with her showing affection towards me), but never utterly confused. She didn't seem like the kind of person to be daunted by anything. So when she was, it probably meant something not-so-good was going to happen.

I finally caught up with her.

"What's going on?" I asked her.

She hesitated for a moment. Then, she said quietly, "I'm honestly not completely sure, but probably that flash was just a slight malfunction in the lighting system, which is prehistoric, like most systems here."

I didn't doubt this for a second. My dormitory septic system had been waiting to be replaced since the school was built.

After a while of climbing up the twisting steps, we finally reached the principal's office, not that I was freaking out of my pants with excitement to see him.

The principal was easily the least intelligent person in the entire American Intelligence community. He was a liar and wore a toupee that seemed to get worse and worse as he got new ones from time to time. His hairpiece today looked as though a chinchilla had died of fear on his head. It seemed to be as hard as a petrified rodent, frozen with fear. And he had a huge grudge against me.

"Hello, students," he said, then grimaced as he noticed me, as if he had already forgotten that I was ordered to come to his office as well. Which probably wasn't far from the truth. The principal didn't exactly have the memory of an elephant.

"As I'm sure you are concerned, my Amazon order has been slightly delayed, but you are not to worry, I'm sure it will be here soon-"

He paused as an agent whispered something in his ear.

"Ah, as you can grasp, I have slightly mixed up all the important information in my head, which happens to everyone, all the time. So, according to scientific research, the amazing thing is that, while our world might not be capable of magic, it is amazing that-

"I'll explain this. It'll be faster," interrupted the agent. He let us across the room hastily to a computer.

"Something has happened. Something we need you to investigate. You are our best chance, though we are sending the rest of the team as well. Cyrus Hale, Catherine Hale from MI-6, as well as that fraud Alexander Hale. Though he has made much progress recently. That's why we are sending him. All of you, especially you Erica, and you, Ben, together, make a great team.

"It is something more powerful than evil organizations. Not even really a form of evil. Something strange seems to have happened. And the strange thing is that different... copies of the world have been running on a similar track for as long as humanity, and probably even before. Since the beginning of the world. But recently, those copies have sort of... mashed together. The different stories and things that happen there are now all in the same world. And all of these things together may be dangerous if you don't figure out how to work together. You are part of one story. The others, another. And still another. And another. We never thought our world was capable of magic until now. It is most likely some incredible form of science we have never heard about or seen before, but we are still not sure what to expect.

"Point is, we need to find these other people. Fast. Only you together can stop what's coming."

"Something way, way, out of our control."

Darn right he was about that.