Spy Starter’s- Chapter One
“You sure you’ll be okay?” asked Mrs. Moscatt for the tenth time since their arrival at the campus of Agent and Spy United. Her daughter, Catherine, shot her an exasperated look. “Yes, Mom!” Catherine cried and darted up the trail to walk with her cousins. Catherine couldn’t bear to be asked that question again, secretly because she wasn’t sure she’d be okay. She didn’t like being away from home yet here she was spending an entire school year at a cut throat school for aspiring spies and secret agents. Catherine had no experience with any of that but it didn’t matter. The school had a reputation for turning nerdy bookworms into topnotch spies. All you had to do is get very good (no, excellent) grades and you were eligible for tuition. Catherine had been getting good grades all her life so it was no surprise that she was accepted. However, when the need for spies increased- when the USSR took over Mexico -, she had no intention of becoming a spy. It was only after her cousins made the decision to attend the academy that she followed suit, along with her younger brother Michael.
“Is that the main school building?” Catherine’s cousin, Joe, asked abruptly startling her from her thoughts. He was staring straight ahead at a building surrounded by a high, ugly fence with walls that glowed green. Catherine’s cousin Susanne shook her head. At seventeen she was the second oldest of the cousins.
“No. Joe, did you do any research? That’s the evacuation building- if the school gets attacked,’’. She said this last bit in a low whisper. They all stopped and stared and Catherine felt a shiver pass over her. She knew that becoming a spy would be dangerous- life- threatening, maybe. She glanced over at her cousin, Mary-Kate. Mary-Kate was only a few years older than her and she felt a special connection between them. She hadn’t expected Mary-Kate’s dreams to suddenly flit to spy hood. In fact, she was the last person Catherine would ever suspect of wanting to become one. But Mary-Kate was as mature as her (three) older siblings and being the youngest she loved to follow their leads and examples. Besides, she knew Mary-Kate would want to help their country in this time of trouble. Even if it did mean (Catherine took another glance at the foreboding evacuation building and shuddered) danger and destruction.
“Kids! Slow down!” cried Catherine’s Aunt Jeannette. She hurried to catch up with them as they neared the main gate. The gate’s gold shimmered in the sunlight. Flanking the gates were several burly men with security sensors. It was another reminder of the tight security measures that the school practiced. “Mom, they’re not going to hurt you,” Mary-Kate said, rolling her eyes with exasperation. But Catherine could understand her nervousness.
The last few adults lagged behind. They had been laughing and talking and cracking jokes but grew sober and silent as they neared the gate. Everyone knew what was coming and dreaded it. Catherine even wished there didn’t have to be a goodbye- the children would just walk through those gates and the parents go onto their cars. But of course it wouldn’t work like that. The group stopped just inside the forest trail where their goodbyes could be private and unrushed. Aunt Jeanette and Uncle Tommy and their kids (Edward, Susanne and Joe) embraced quickly but they left Mary-Kate (their second daughter) to hug last and tightest of all. It was hard, Catherine knew, for them to for them to give up four children and one just 13. Catherine felt a tug on her shoulder and looked into her mother’s eyes. They were wet with tears and made her want to break out wailing herself. But she couldn’t. Even Mary-Kate who sometimes got emotional hadn’t shed a tear. Besides if they were all falling apart what would the staff and other students think of their red eyes and runny nose? “Babies,” they would boom, “cannot become spies!” Or the other children would come up with some name for them. The puffy clan? The red nose nevers? Closing her eyes, Catherine burrowed herself in her mother’s jacket and hugged as if they would never let go. But they had to let go some time. Catherine felt herself begin to choke up as her mother pulled away and she quickly muffled her face into her dad’s coat. She could smell all the familiar scents of home in his coat, of cookies- “I’ll miss you. I’m so proud of you,” her father whispered, distracting her only for a second of her longing for home. That was how they parted. Catherine wondered if inside all her other cousins were aching for their home as well, when they’re parents had only just hugged them goodbye. Andrew was the only cousin who didn’t keep waving until the parents were out of sight. He had said goodbye to his parents at his house. But the rest of them did keep waving until the parents forms were only a speck in the distance and even then they didn’t stop. Even after they had disappeared from view they stood staring after them as if waiting for the parents to come running back. But they didn’t. It was only after Andrew suggested checking out the dorms that they pulled their eyes away from the parking lot and to the guards at the front gate. They had previously sent their luggage up to the school and only had to get themselves through security something that was not as easy as it seemed. Susanne stepped up first and began to speak to the guard. “Good morning. I’m Susanne Innace, a student that was accepted. It’s my first year.” She began to twiddle her thumbs nervously as they looked up her name.
