Project 26 (part one)

Chapter 1

"Ava Walker. But around here I'm just Agent 4."

I really didn't feel like talking to his guy, he makes me suspicious. Anyone nice makes me suspicious.

"So what training grounds are you from?"

"These grounds actually."

"Ah, so you have an advantage to the rest of us, I guess."

"Not really."

"How so?"

"I grew up here, yes, but I've only trained over near the main building. I've never been on these fields. They're forbidden to anyone in the undertraining levels."

He nodded and didn't say anything.

Thank goodness.

I watched Quinn start her hand to hand combat, laughing out loud whenever she got hit, then remembered I was supposed to be acting nice until the judges left. Curse George and his stupid plans. Speaking of George...

I reached up to my earpiece and clicked on the tiny button.

"Where the heck are you George? You're missing Quinn getting beat up by the combat men."

"I told you not to make fun of her while you're on field. And I'm almost there, my transportation just got delayed. I'm coming up on your right."

I looked over my shoulder and sure enough there was George coming up in his large black hover car. I turned away from the boy and ran over to my mentor.

"Bye, Agent 4." I turned to see the boy wink at me, then walk back over to wait on the bleachers for his turn in front of the judges. I shook my head and turned back to George.

"You did good out there, Agent 4." His short, grey hair moved slightly in the wind, and his bright blue eyes studied me over like a father. He towered over me by a good one and a half feet (I'm a shorty. Somewhere around 5'2) and was naturally taller than any other man around. He was always lean and ready for action, being a retired agent himself.

"You already said that." I waved at my earpiece.

"It's true enough, isn't it?" he studied the field and frowned," Who's the kid you were talking to?"

I turned and saw him gesturing towards Agent 12.

"He said his name's Brett Smith."

George sucked in is breathe and let it out slowly," Just be careful, Agent 4. We're trying to get you to the Hold. The only thing preventing us from doing that is the other agents who want in. Kids like him."

The Hold is the Government. And I'm an agent in training. So it's obvious I want to become a Government agent. Unfortunately, only ten agents get picked every year. And you can be sure I'm not going through another year of torture here at the training fields. I've spent my whole life here-that's long enough thank you very much.

"So what do you need me to do? How can I outshine everyone if they're better than me?" the thought that someone is better than me at anything is hard to swallow; I was raised to think I could do anything. But it's easily a plausible statement when you look around. The kid with the hat over there is a computer genius. The girl with the dark clothes knows how to defeat anything. The girl with blond hair makes bombs in less than twenty seconds; a world record. We're all amazing I guess.

"Get to know them. If you know what they're weakness is, you can use that. And use your own strengths to make yourself better. I'm not saying become best friends with them or anything, just get to know them. And no enemies, Ava." He caught my eyes meaningfully," You know I already hate that rivalry between you and Quinn. It's bad. Say you two got on the same squad? You'd have to work together even though you hate each other. Make yourself allies. Not enemies."