Cleo Hart: Intelligence by Default

Cell

I pushed some sweetcorn from one side of my plastic plate to the other. The warm food, which was slid under a flap in my door, looked surprisingly well made, but my appetite was withered with nerves and apprehension, and part of me thought it might be spiked with something. There was no clock in my cell, but the darkening and lightening of the sky outside meant I had been locked up for at least three days. I chewed at my lip, staring obsessively out of the tiny window which looked out onto the corridor. A guard had been walking past every once in a while, and expertly ignoring me when I slammed against the door. Shuffling round to lie on the bed, I decided to try to sleep, although the glare of floodlights from outside kept me from getting any proper rest.

When the door clunked open, I had been dreaming about living in a small home in a small town, with a cat and an office job. I sat up hastily, sobered from the peace of my dream by my dark surroundings, and brushed down my clothes, trying to see who had walked in.

"Mary." Lewis greeted me, as the lights flicked on. He wore black combat uniform, and seemed full of energy, like he had just got back from a power nap or a coffee, either way, the sight of him awake and alert was confusing to my stinging, tired eyes.

I grunted apathetically, glaring at him and ignoring the thumping of my heart in my chest. I could just about see two other men stood around the corner from my cell door, waiting for any trouble, although I doubt Lewis would need the assistance, the last time I tried to go up against him I lasted about a second. He leant against the wall and opened his file. His brow creasing with half-concentration as he read. I stared behind him, trying to think of an exit plan, but all of them ended in me more bruised and the same amount of trapped. I sighed and hugged my knees.

"Our agency has been," he looked up, "Observing you from a distance, for quite some time. It seems as if you have potential for a career with us." 

Observing me from a distance? I thought about walking around town or home from friends' houses, trying to imagine dark figures hiding around corners and analysing my every move. The thought made my skin crawl.

"Funny kind of interview you've got going." I grumbled dryly, rolling my eyes at the smirk on his face. 

"Yeah well," He grit his teeth," it's not a very generic job that we're offering." He took half of the papers that he was holding and held them out to me. I eyed them, not wanting to seem like I was engaging him, but took the papers anyway; three days of nothing to do had left me desperate for any kind of stimulation.

"To cut a long story short, we are a private company often employed by the government. We offer services in espionage." 

My heart thundered in my chest and my hands became sticky on the paper. The thought of working with these people terrified me, I just wanted to get away as fast as possible. I looked down to the floor and tried to make myself even smaller.

"How much do you know about me?" My voice was jittery and weak. I chewed my cheek and could no longer resist letting my leg shake slightly.

He turned to the first page of his file, before exhaling and abruptly closing it.

"Everything."

I gulped and put the papers to one side, allowing my head to fall into my palms. I didn't doubt for a second that he was telling the truth, but he listed off information just in case I thought he was bluffing.

"17 years old, brought up in the outskirts of London, been moved around multiple care homes and kicked out of most, since the murder of your parents six years ago."

I looked up at him with horror.

He smiled half-heartedly. "And this is just the broad stuff, I was trying not to freak you out, but we also know your old best friend Hannah, where she lives, and why you had that argument in year eight. We know you went to see the same film eight times in the cinema two years ago, each time with a different friend, and the same obsessively excited look on your face."