Spy School Oneshot Collection

Alexander Radicalizes the Kitchen

Alexander accidentally blows up his kitchen. Based on something Erica mentions in the Washington Monument in the first book.

It had been a rather boring day at work for Alexander, filled with the misery of paperwork. He got in the car to leave CIA headquarters and turned on the radio.

The drive home was quick, barely slowed by the pre-rush hour traffic. Alexander wasn't the greatest driver, but this drive was safely uneventful. Alexander pulled into his garage and reached to shut off the radio. There was a subtle click, but the radio remained on, the talk host still droning on about the stock market.

Confused, Alexander hit the button again. Now there was a more distinct click. And then there was a loud boom as several chunks of siding thwacked against the windshield. Panicked, Alexander ducked for cover in the footwell.

When he peered back up, Alexander couldn't see much through the cracked windshield. There were several charred bananas smushed into the glass.

Throughout all of this, the radio remained on, causing Alexander to have the sudden realization that he had been the cause of the explosion. He hadn't hit the button to turn off the radio. He had hit the button to launch missiles out of the front of his car. Upon this realization, Alexander sheepishly opened the car door to find Catherine staring bullets at him.

Catherine had, upon hearing the explosion, grabbed Trixie, who had been in the middle of a nap, and run outside with Erica right behind her. As soon as she saw Alexander's car parked in the still-open garage, she realized what had happened.

"Alexander!" she yelled as he exited the car. "What on earth were you doing?"

"I didn't do it!"

"Then who did? The kitchen didn't blow itself up!"

"I swear it wasn't me. It was those radicals I was telling you about! From Sweden!"

"That doesn't make any sense," Catherine said. "There aren't any Swedish radicals just going around blowing up kitchens."

"Yes, there are," Alexander insisted. "In fact, on my last mission-"

"Your last mission was in Canada!"

"Which is right next to Sweden," Alexander said with a startling amount of certainty.

"No! Canada is nowhere near Sweden. Do you work for the Central Idiot Agency?"

"Of course not. In fact, let's go look at a map."

"Alexander! We can get to your failures in geography later. You could have killed someone!"

"Well I didn't kill anyone."

"This time. This time you didn't kill anyone. But what about next time?"

"There won't be a next time," Alexander said. "I can't blow the kitchen up again."

"Next time it'll just be something else. You'll leave poisons lying around or tase one of us again."

"Listen, I'm really sorry about that. I won't do it again. I promise."

"Oh, I know you won't do it again. We're done. This has gone on for far too long already."

"But-" Alexander started.

Catherine cut him off with a look and turned around to go back into the house.

"What's going on?" Erica asked, following her mother into the house.

"We're just going to go back inside. You and Trixie need to stay away from the kitchen. Your father and I will deal with this mess he's created."