“Do you have any idea what kind of car itis? A 1959 Mercedes Benz 300 SL Gullwing Coupe!” Ace whistled. “Ifsomeone stole it from me, I’d be hot to get it back no matter thecost.”
“But Division doesn’t send us on operationsto benefit one person.”
“Ours is not to reason why,” Halluis cut in.“We don’t question our mission orders. But rest assured, wewouldn’t take on a client just for money. The car must be veryimportant, or Division wouldn’t have invested all the resources,man-power, and money into tracking it down that they have, don’tyou think?”
I nodded. Everything I’d seen Division 57 dohad huge impact.
“I’m sure you’re right,” Ace said. “I mighteven get out from behind the computer to touch that beauty when wefind it, but only for a second.”
I considered the two men in the van with me.Before I’d joined them, Halluis and Ace had been a two-manteam—Halluis as jack-of-all-trades, doing most of the actualintelligence gathering, and Ace as tech genius extraordinaire. Heliked to call himself “glorified tech support,” but it was Ace whohad found the only solid lead thus far. He’d written a computeralgorithm that had analyzed the locations of the car thefts and hadidentified the academy as the center of the theft activity. The twoof them had been trying to gather intel from the school and learnanything that would help track down the illusive car. But so far,no luck.
That’s when they’d brought me on board.
At nineteen, I was one of the youngest spieson Division 57’s payroll, making me a perfect candidate to goundercover in the school and learn things that surveillance feedsand computer algorithms could not. It was Friday, so we had onemore day of monitoring the feeds, learning as much as possible. OnMonday, I was going in, joining the ranks of future engineers asAmber Smith, transfer student.
Only a few knew it, but my uniquephotographic memory had taken me through spy school and my othertrainings in under a year. I had a natural knack for it. I onlywished it hadn’t taken witnessing a murder when I was sixteen toput me on this path. I never wanted another terrorist or madman tohurt so many people. I loved being one of the good guys.
Ace shook his shaggy blond hair, whichdespite being streaked with gray had a boyish quality to it—maybebecause it always seemed to be in his face. “I could really go fora hot dog right now. What’s the point of being in New York if wecan’t take part in all the beauty of the city?”
Halluis just rolled his eyes. “YouAmericans. I can’t believe you call that food.”
“Hey, I’m Canadian. French Canadian,”Ace protested. The two of them started to argue about what exactlyit meant to be French, and I tuned them out, turning my attentionback to the audio feed.
What Halluis had said was true—we’d placedaudio feeds as carefully as possible, using Ace’s algorithm tolocate likely students to monitor, but so far all we’d caught wasthe typical teenage conversations about school, bands, TV shows,and of course the opposite sex.
The one I was listening in on now, in fact,was a fine specimen of banal adolescent conversation.
“…come on, man, it’s gonna be tight. We’reputting it on the big screen, four players, blowing up zombies allnight long.” That was Nick Harris, one of the kids we’d tagged as apossible suspect. I sighed. Sounded like he’d be playing videogames all night—no car theft activity there.
I was about to change the feed and focus onone of our other targets when I heard the response.
“Sorry—it sounds like a lot of fun, but I’mbusy tonight. Got a hot date with a German model.”
My scalp twitched, and my hand tingled; Iwaited another second before switching the feed.
“Aw, what? Jericho—there’s no way you’regoing out with a model. I call BS.”
“Believe what you want. Doesn’t bother me.I’m just telling you I’m busy.”
“Right, right. Still, man, you’re seriouslygonna ditch us for some chick? I can’t believe you’d do that toyour boys.”
“Ha! I’d leave you in the dust for this oneany day. She’s more than worth it. Older, high class, you know.Usually spends her nights with a rich doctor, but she’s seen mycharm now. She’s as good as mine. And the payoff is gonna be sogood.”
Nick made the expected response of combineddisbelief and awe, but I was too distracted by the storm inside meto pay much attention to his words. In my head, it was if alarmbells were going off. My senses were on high alert, and everythinginside me screamed that something was going on here. It may haveseemed like a totally normal conversation, typical teenage boybravado and brag, but I knew—I just knew—there was more toit than that.
“Quiet, quiet,” I hissed at Ace and Halluis,who were still arguing. “Pull up everything you’ve got on a kidnamed Jericho.”
“Jericho Roman?” Halluis asked, turning backto his keyboard. “No, it’s a dead end. We looked into that kid.Total straight arrow. Class president, good student, trèspopulaire, all that.”
I shook my head. “I think something’s upwith him.” I pulled my heavy headphones down and stared at the infosheet Halluis pulled up on his monitor. This Jericho kid certainlyseemed clean—from a well-off family, good grades, everythingHalluis had said. Yet, I still felt this intense pull, telling meto pay attention. Something occurred to me. “You did look into him,though. That means Ace’s algorithm tagged him.”
Ace shrugged. “It’s not perfect, you know.The algorithm tags potential suspects, it doesn’t handcuff theculprits. There’s still some work actual agents have to do. Weruled him out.”
I nodded slowly, but something still feltoff. I sighed, massaging my neck. The giant headphones had reallyput a strain on my muscles.
Ace chuckled. “Don’t worry, Christy, I’mworking on some things that should make your life easier,” hesaid.
I smiled distractedly. There was somethingJericho had said…
“Hey, Ace—didn’t you also make a list ofpossible targeted cars?”
“Yeah, it was just a variation on the samealgorithm I designed to—”
I cut him off before he could get too woundup in techy-talk. “Will you pull that up for me?”
A look passed between my two team members,then Ace shrugged
