Spy School: Danger is my Middle Name

"Get good," -Sun Tzu, Art of War

---POV Switch to Agent Benjamin Ripley---

When I heard the news, I had to say, I wasn't very surprised.

It was about time the Croatoan made their move. Expecting that we could just beat them without any problems? That was like closing your room's door and expecting your brother/annoying friend not to know how to turn a knob and walk in (trust me, I have experience in people walking in on me).

According to the group chat, there were three men dressed in black traveling at blistering speed. They had ran from Dylan's location to Ivar's in less than ten minutes, then basically teleported over to me and Kylie's. Then they had managed to get rid of all their targeted units except Mike.

After I received the warning messages in the chat, I had bolted directly back to Jayden's location. As expected, he was bleeding on the ground, clutching his stomach in pain and gritting his teeth. I sprinted over to his area as fast as I could.

It only took one look at him to make me grimace. "Dude, I need to get you to the hospital as quick as possible. All that blood is making me naseous."

"Don't worry," he groaned, smiling weakly. "I have balls of steel. I'll manage until then."

"This isn't the time to be joking!" I shouted, dialing 911 and quickly giving the receptionist a rundown of the situation. I only took thirty seconds for the person to get off topic.

"You're joking," the guy at the other end had said after hearing my quick portfolio. "You're Benjamin Ripley?!"

"Yes," I hurried. "Can you send some people over to help us? I have a shot teenager over here."

"Oh, right!" he said in realization. "Christine, can you get two units to the mall? We've got a wounded teenager." Some muffled voices followed in the background.

"Anyway," the guy said again. "Can you tell me a bit about the Academy? I saw you on the news the other day- saving the president's life? That's amazing!"

"How do you even know about the Academy?!" I replied. "Isn't it supposed to be top secret?"

"You're a spy, aren't you?" the guy said. "You should by now that secrets don't stay secrets for long when there's another 7 billion people in the world. There's a lot of spies out there that you don't know about."

"Yeah, but there's a difference between a spy and a pervert. The perverts are the ones who go to immense measures to poke their nosy heads into information for no use. Spies are people who actually do their jobs for the greater good. Whoever's inspecting our lives isn't even close to being a spy," I ended, then hung up with a period.

Three hours later, here we were, at the hospital. All of our injured agents were under immediate care. After a period of recovery, we could visit them while they were inside their rooms, and I was the first to arrive.

I took the visits slowly. First, I walked into Dylan's room, wearing a face mask and making sure I didn't disturb his calm setting. Patting the seat next to his bed, I slowly settled down and tried not to wake him up.

"You don't have to act so silent," he suddenly said, scaring the heck out of me.

"Holy- Dylan, you could've told me you were awake for the whole time!" I practically yelled. It took me three seconds to regain my balance and adjusted the seat to it's original position. "Geez, I think you just enjoy seeing me like this."

He grinned deviously. "Why are you here anyway? Aren't you supposed to be asleep? You realize it's five AM, right?"

"I'm well aware," I muttered back. "But unlike Jawa over there at the hotel, I at least care about you guys. If you're dying, then I have to at least be by your side."

"You always act so cheesy," Dylan replied, coughing harshly. "It's best if yo-" he launched into another dozen of coughs, and I backed away. 

"Sorry," he groaned while clutching his chest. "It's just- the pain."

"Right. I'll give you some space," I calmly noted.

"Go check on Jayden for me," he said as loud as he could when I was exiting the room. "Tell him to send me some jokes. I need those to deal with the boredom."

I shut the door behind him, leaving his coughing to himself. I grabbed the doorknob for Jayden's room and shut the door behind me. 

"Wake up, perv," I said loudly, kicking the side of his bed.

Jayden groaned, turning around in his sheets and rubbing his eyelids. "Could you at least give me some sort of good greeting?"

I sighed and sat down in the chair next to him. Taking out my phone, I checked the group chat for any new notifications.

Jayden's snores suddenly rumbled back into the room. I pursed my lips and took a look at him. "For such an annoying kid, you fall asleep fast. Do you want to talk or not?"

"Pancakes..." Jayden mumbled between snores. "Soma-kun."

I gave him a confused look. "What was that?"

"Jellyfish..." he muttered again. "Immortal jellyfish. Hello, government official? How can I become an immortal jellyfish?"

I patted his head. "Jellyfish have no brains. You're already pretty close."

Jayden swung his body around, putting a strong arm around my neck and forcing me into chokehold. "What was that?" he hissed, increasing his strength onto my windpipe and making me cough and laugh at the same time.

"Just falling into the spirit of your joking mood," I gasped. "You've insulted me enough times for me to at least get back at you. Can you let me go now?"

"No," he seethed. "I'm going to repeat something: what was that?"

"I said," I choked. "Jellyfish have no brains. You're already pretty clo-ahhhhh."

Jayden released his grip from my throat. "The only reason I have no brains is because I've spent so long around you."

"It takes one to know one," I countered, then bolted out of the door before Jayden could strangle me to death.

Ah, communication between friends. You gotta love it.