Matthew Silver and the Monster Hunters, Book One: The Darkest Waters

Chapter Three

SilverCHAPTER THREE

The Virginia Sector (my CCU base) was completely underground somewhere outside of Richmond, Virginia. All CCU bases are located in manmade underground caverns, miles below the surface.

The only times we were allowed to leave was for assignments, missions, or field trips. The latter was the least common. On a trip to some symposium, some kid (not from our Sector) had bought a whole bunch of firecrackers and had thrown them into street crowds, yelling Grenade! Get Down! as they went off.

I thought it was pretty funny, but the Administrators didn’t. It had caused a pretty big mess, and all of the Sectors’Administrators had to put their foot down on field trips to avoid further conflict with the government. We already made them nervous enough, so the last thing we needed was a terrorism charge on one of the recruits.

Once you became a Senior Agent, the 2nd highest rank a Hunter could achieve, you could go wherever you wanted to and live wherever you wanted to. No more being cooped up in an underground city. The highest rank, I wasn’t too interested in. That was being an Administrator, and between a desk job and fieldwork, there was no contest.

It was my life’s dream to become a Senior Agent. It took a lot of hard training and completed missions before you could be seen as qualified, but I was pretty well on my way. Plus, I was in the Virginia Sector.

Only the best of the best lived and trained in the Virginia Sector. Four years ago, if you had told me I’d end up as one of the best and brightest at Virginia, I would’ve thrown you into an insane asylum right then and there. Not that I didn’t consider myself skilled, but I didn’t see myself nearly that skilled. Honestly, I still feel out of place sometimes. I don’t feel dangerous or deadly at all. I just feel like…well, me.

I left the campus hospital and started to walk over to the campus dormitories to check in on things. The Virginia Sector was set up in a grid-like pattern. Two main streets crossed through the entire campus in an X, and the southeastern street continued past the campus grounds to the border and eventually the exit/entrance. Many other side streets, alleys, and sidewalks crisscrossed throughout the grid. There weren’t any cars in the Sector. The streets were merely for walking along to get from place to place, but they had to be wide enough for the occasional moving truck, construction vehicle, or tank. Buildings were evenly placed all over the grid, making it feel like a small town.

You might think it’d be cramped around the underground campus, but it never really felt that closed in. I was usually so busy that I never noticed it. The campus had an entire artificial biosphere. There was an artificial sun and sky, grass and trees grew everywhere, and the Botanical Gardens were filled with flora of all sorts. For the most part, it was just like being on a very large college campus, complete with buildings, dorms, shops, a cafeteria, offices, and of course, the students and teachers.

I had seen the above world a whole lot more than some of the other recruits. Most of the recruits had already been off campus at least once, but we all shared a sense of wonder and awe at the vastness and openness of the above world.

During a recruit’s initiation ceremony, where the recruits graduate from the Academy, he or she is paired with another recruit of the opposite gender. During those six years of Academy training, the instructors gather a complete analysis of your character and abilities. They use this information to find the perfect match for a partner for you.

All partnerships are boy-girl, and they make sure that the two partners are fit to be a perfect team, capable of working with each other in the toughest of situations. Apparently, a team of opposite sexes provides better decision-making skills and more diversity in talents. It also makes us argue a whole lot more, if you ask me.