Barking Up the Wrong Lead - A Gallagher Girls Story

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Fifteen

Summary of Surveillance

Operatives Morgan Goode, Alice Anderson, Blair Bateson, Faith Neal, William Kidd, and William Kasey (hereafter referred to as The Operatives).

After a possible lead from her MIA mother, Operative Goode gathers a team of her most trusted (and most trouble-prone) colleagues in order to preform what is probably the most important reconnaissance mission of her entire life.

Upon return to the Gallagher Academy and after the submission of a full report on The Phone Call has been handed in to MI6 intelligence, The Operatives endeavor to discover all they can about the Blackthorne Military Academy for Boys.  Operatives Goode, Anderson, Bateson, and Neal are stationed in the Gallagher Academy while operatives Kidd and Kasey are stationed in the heart of the op itself—Blackthorne.  The following is a record of the team’s findings.

Blackthorne was founded ten years ago near the town of Nokesville, Virginia by one Joseph Solomon.

No matter how many times they are asked, who does the asking, how the asking is done, or how many crème brûlée bribes are given, neither Joe Solomon or Rachel Morgan will answer any questions concerning Blackthorne  (but that doesn’t stop Grandpa Joe from taking the crème brûlée anyways).

The CIA has minimal influence on the inner workings of Blackthorne.  According to Operative Neal, Langley only ever intervenes to ensure that no illegal teachings occur.

Much like the Gallagher Academy, Blackthorne accepts students based on aptitude tests and an array of physical requirements (which, according to Operative Bateson, must include having “rock hard abs and arms the size of watermelons”).

Operatives Kidd and Kasey refuse to take part in any more covert activities that involve cramming into an unreasonably small space due to a rather traumatic flatulence incident two years prior involving a boy named Carl, an air vent, and liquid nitrogen.

It took Joe Solomon three years to gain approval to build Blackthorne and an additional two years to convince the CIA that he would be the appropriate headmaster.  The reasons remain unclear, but the CIA was reluctant about the school’s opening and even more reluctant about Joe Solomon.

Most of the records regarding Blackthorne are either unobtainable (in the traditional, non-national-threat sense of the word) or nonexistent.  Operative Bateson reminds everyone that nonexistent could also mean destroyed.  Operative Goode can’t figure out why those records would be destroyed.

Someone out there—or possibly many someones—does not want people to know about how Blackthorne came to be.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again—spies have boring jobs.  I’m telling you, most of it is recon and recon sucks.  The only time recon doesn’t suck is when you’re following an international terrorist with three mistresses, a direct link to each hub of the black market, a hang glider, and a poodle named Sal.  But even then it can still get pretty dry.  It is perhaps the only thing that’s black and white about a spy’s world.  Recon always sucks.

The case was no different on that cool afternoon, pacing around that old abandoned classroom.  It was starting to seem like we had done all the research we could on Blackthorne, which was terrifying because we didn’t actually have much information.

“That’s the last of it, Cap.”

Will handed me a packet that was as thick as my thumb.  It had a single, lonely staple in the corner that only barely kept the back pages connected to the rest of them.  On the cover, was a solitary word written out in spotty, typewriter print.  BLACKTHORNE.  “Swiped that right off your granddad’s desk, we did,” Bill told me proudly.