Arena spent the rest of the day working through computer tutorials on more specific protocols and basic history of the CIA. Lorna brought her sandwiches, apples, and bottles of water. At the end of the day, Nate came to get her. “You’re in luck. You get to learn combat from me. Firearms, basic martial arts, how to protect yourself--that sort of thing.”
He lead her to an open room decorated like a dojo, with tatami mats and a few weapons racks. She took off her shoes automatically before stepping on the tatami. He did the same. “You probably read in your tutorials about code names. Most people choose their codename, but sometimes they are assigned. Code names shouldn’t have any logical identifier in them, such as based on looks. We use them on missions to talk to one another, but so it’s not always clear who is talking to whom unless you are part of the group. Mine is ‘Atticus’. I am a little bit of a Roman literature buff. George decided to assign you the codename ‘Cyclone’. Bertha’s is ‘Goldilocks’.” That was definitely contradictory. Nate went on, “Unfortunately, you are going to get the short course on training, because as far as we know, you’re the only person in the CIA who can ride the hoverboards without getting tossed instantly. We’re going to have to grill you on how you learned to control it later.”
“Can I ask a few questions first?” Arena sunk to the floor. The whole day was starting to wear on her, too much unsorted information in too little time.
Nate seated himself in one swift movement. “I’m sorry. I’m sure this is all a bit overwhelming. Sure, go ahead. I’ll answer what I can.”
“What do you do in the group? And why do they call it ‘The Misfits’?”
“I was a regular field agent, and I didn’t follow orders on a particular mission. This is actually my ‘punishment’.” Arena was puzzled. “You’ll find that’s not really a big secret around here, nor is it a liability. They all seem to have ended up here the same way.” He folded his hands, leaning toward her. “The Misfits is what pretty much everybody calls this unit, although the technical name is the Special Technology Advanced Tactical Unit Service, or STATUS. Mostly, we recover technology that’s been stolen from the government, or in the case of the hoverboards, developed by some college students, and stolen by another agency. As you might have noticed, most of the people in the group are a bit unusual. Despite the name, they are usually pretty effective, even if most of the CIA wouldn’t like to admit it. I’m honestly not where sure where the Misfits name came about, whether internally or from people in the CIA. They seem pretty proud of it, though.”
Nate seemed exactly the type of person the CIA would want. She wondered what he did to earn a spot in the Misfits. “What is everyone else’s codenames?”
“Lorna is Deadeye. Harriet is Lester. Who knows why she picked that? George is Silo. Anita doesn’t use one, as she usually isn’t in comms on missions. Mostly they call her Homebase. I don’t think I’ve ever heard her speak on comms when she is. She mostly types stuff on our handhelds.” Nate shifted in his seat. “And Sterling is Catalyst.”
“Sterling?” she asked.
“He didn’t introduce himself? I dunno what he said to you earlier, but don’t take it personally. You get used to him. He’s the analyst for the group. Amazing researcher. I dunno how he finds stuff out sometimes. He doesn’t normally come on missions, but he usually runs the comms.”
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
“What about the guys in black suits? Where are they? Aren’t they part of the group? They don’t really look like misfits.” All the questions and answers made Arena even more confused.
Nate startled her by laughing. “You mean the Decoys.” He tried to stifle the laughter at Arena’s expression. “The Decoys are somewhat equivalent to our hired help, I guess. We run the operations, and they provide backup if we need it, and sometimes we use them to fool the opposition into thinking that’s who they should be chasing, hence their name.” He chuckled and ran a hand through his spiky blond hair. “Sort of like the big dumb guy in all the spy movies. They’re combat trained, but not all are real good at knowing what to do next. Mostly, we make them run around like mad.”
That certainly seemed what they were doing while chasing the hoverboard. Arena realized Lorna must have been running the operation, and the Decoys were doing most of the work for her.
“Sometimes we all work together, but more often one or two of us will run an op with a group of Decoys. It depends on how big the operation is and how much we think we can get away with at the time.”
“So you guys have all sorts of cool gadgets?”
“Not as many as you might think, except what Sterling or Anita design. The CIA takes the rest, and we never see them again.”
Arena had a lot more questions, but her body was starting to go to sleep without her brain. Nate seemed to recognize this. “Hey, let’s just call it a night, tonight. I’ll take you to your room and you can get some sleep. We have a few weeks of training to get through and you can ask me questions any time you want.”
He led her down a narrow hall with doors on each side. “Some people live here, others don’t. It’s up to you after you go through official training, which for you probably won’t be until this summer. I live here, but I didn’t have a steady place to live before I came here. Lorna lives here. I think she just likes it too much to leave. Anita doesn’t, but she stays here when something is crucial. And Sterling lives here.”
Suddenly Arena realized spring break would be over in a few days. “What about school? I have a paper due Monday! I need to get through the year. I can’t fail now!”
“Sterling’s taken care of that. You’re on a special leave to study weather patterns in the Arctic. I know, a bit trite, right? Professors seem to like trite though. You’ll have a thesis due on that in June, so not all fun and games. Sterling got you out of the rest for full credit. Let’s just say we have some connections at UCLA.” Taking her wrist, he placed her hand on the panel. A small light on it turned green, and he pushed open the door. “They plan to let you finish your senior year through extension, thesis, and intensive classes. Depends on how long you stay in training. You have to have a college degree to be a full agent, but there have been rare exceptions.”
He stopped at a room marked with her name and grabbed her wrist. She let him place her hand on the panel by the door. He gestured into the room, which resembled a decent hotel room, with a bed, desk, table, big-screen TV, and small bathroom in neutral colors. “Good beds. Cable is limited. Lots of news. They don’t want us spending too much time watching TV, I guess. Dunno why, since we can watch nearly everything else on our netbooks. You can feed the netbook screen into the tv if you want. There should be an icon on the desktop for that. I left some books for you to start reading, mostly on covert espionage. Whether you like it or not, we’ve got to work fast, so you will have to do ‘homework’.”
Arena nodded. She didn’t really expect anything less. “Thank you. I will have them read as fast as possible. Good night?”
“Good night. Meet in the common area at 7:30am if you want to eat. There’s a little dining room off that,” he said, and he pulled the door shut.
Arena took a long shower, something she had missed in the past two days, and found her own clothing in the dresser. She read half a chapter of one of the books before falling fast asleep.