Agent 024

ART OF DECEPTION

"By the way, I'm Tisha.", I said extending my arm.

"Abhishekh.", he said taking it.

"So what are you doing here, Abhishekh?"

"That's funny. I should be asking you that. I come here everyday, you on the other hand are new here.", he said taking out his books.

"You don't say.", I said amazed at the thought that I had found another crazy soul who sits under a tree and studies.

"So by the third year, you choose your specialization. I was sure I wanted to be in the research and analytic wing so here I am with my research.", he said waving his book.

"So you're the intelligent type?", I said studying him.

"And I take it you're the field type.", he returned.

I nodded.

"How come you're not training then. First years don't get off easy."

"Well, I ran the complete course after falling on my back and Doctor Kumar is keeping me off the field till today."

"Way to make an entry.", he laughed.

"In my defense, I did feel immensely proud for a minute or so before the pain settled in and well then there was regret."

"So where are you with the Morse code?", he asked.

"First ten characters done.", I said with pride.

"Hmm you'll get the hang of it soon, and a while later it'll be second language to you."

I nodded and set about writing down the next ten characters as Abhishekh opened his book.

I was already grateful that the English language had just 26 characters. 

About an hour later his alarm rang and he stumbled out of his exclusive world as the sound dragged him back to reality.

"Time to leave?", I asked as he started packing his bag.

"Yeah, got psychology class and boy you don't want to be late for that."

He slung his bag over his shoulder and said, "It was nice meeting you Tisha, I'll see you around."

"Good luck.", I smiled as he went off.

"Welcome to the art of deception.", Agent Abad said as we entered the auditorium.

"When you go undercover, your pretense is your only defense. The Academy sure as hell won't acknowledge you as its Agent, your country will not risk international embarrassment and fines by accepting you were there with government approval and sometimes you would be. Your strength and skill will be useless when you're heavily outnumbered. What I mean to say is that deception can save you or break you. Let your pretense fall for a second, and you're in deep mess."

"These guys sure know how to make a welcome speech.", Prakhar said.

"I'm used to it. We're going to scare the shit out of you is the way they greet here.", I chuckled.

"When are you going to be back in the field? I miss running laps together."

"Agent Kumar will let me off tomorrow hopefully.", I said.

"Glasses beard lenses attire hair color will only do you so much good. But when you assume the identity of a person, don't just fake it, live it. Become the person talk like him walk in his stride heck eat and drink what the man would, make your circle with people like him. Once you're living it, chances are you can't mess up and there's minimal danger of getting caught."

"But this class will not just be about learning how to deceive but also recognizing when one someone is using it to deceive you. It's a two way street, you use it as both offense and defense."

"On that note, I suggest each of you make three assumptions about me - my nationality my origin my culture my language, ethnicity, gender color anything you can think of."

"Think guys, what she said makes it clear that she is obviously using deception right now. So whatever she is showing herself to be, she is particularly not that.", Aviral said to the team.

"Okay, let's make a list.", I said pulling out my Academy phone and typing a new note.

"Okay gender - woman.", Aradhya commented.

"Judging by her accent and way of speaking, it's a South Indian accent - although I'm not sure which state.", Roger said.

"She's white and it's impossible to fake that with make-up so that's another thing we can be sure of.", I said and noted it down.

"Her name's Abad so she's Muslim too.", Aradhya said.

I looked at Irrfan who was the only one who hadn't said anything yet. He stood there smiling at us and I raised my eyebrow at him.

"Well I guess that about sums it up.", he shrugged.

"Okay guys call out your answers.", Agent Abad said.

"Religion - Islam."

"You're Indian but you have a bit of an accent so I'll say you've spent some time in Africa."

"You're a woman in your forties."

Different answers shot up from different teams.

Once we'd finished with this rapid fire round, Agent Abad called the hall to silence.

"Get me some cotton, a bowl of the cleansing liquid and preferably a comb.", she said to a volunteer and a minute later had everything arranged in front of her.

"First assumption - the kind that was so obvious that you didn't think again on it. My gender.", Agent Abad said as she pulled of her wig and jewelry.

"Agent Abad is a man!", Aviral gasped.

He removed his makeup with cotton and the liquid and suddenly all our assumptions stood defeated.

"And about my ethnicity-", he said in an authentic Rajasthani accent, "I've been in Europe a lot but no never in Africa." he completed with a European Spanish accent.

Agent Abad was a man in his late twenties, with brown skin and black hair and now that we noticed it a muscular well toned body.

"And this is exactly what I'll be teaching you in this class.", he said with a flourish.

"Ready to learn?", he asked.

"Hell yeah.", the class responded in unison.

"This is going to be fun.", I said as we took our place in a circle around her.

"An important part of deception is to speak in the correct accent. Now you will be learning many language including sign language in your language course. But I'll be teaching you how not to mess up when you land in an environment with no pre-existing knowledge of the language spoken there. The key to becoming one of them is to speak like them.", Agent Abad said walking to the edge of the class and setting the lesson into motion.