It had been almost one and a half weeks since I agreed to do this mission, and let me tell you, It was slowly turning into the worst mission ever. I had seen at least two strange things happen and reported them to the agency, but they were still as lost as I was. We still had no idea who the other spies were and we had no idea how we were going to be able to capture the other spies before they got Julia. This mission was at a dead end, and there was no reversing it.
It was currently Wednesday and we were still clueless. I had been going through the classes without really paying attention the whole first half of the day. My thoughts were to lost in figuring out the identities of the spies and how to stop them. The spies had to be a teacher or staff. It would be incredibly implausible for them to have a spy that looked young enough to be a student. As far as we knew, I was the only under eighteen spy in the world. The problem was figuring out which teachers and staff were new and giving them background checks.
The best choice we had right now was a janitor called Mr. Pickett. He had a shady background and he used to be a navy S.E.A.L.. Most people who switch sides used to or still work government or military jobs. He also had an affiliation with the gang that we originally suspected of the kidnappings. We know believe that some higher power is paying the gang to help them with the kidnappings - I mean - how else could they pull off at least three high profile kidnappings and get away with it?
The bell rang to release us out to lunch, which was a giant relieve. I made my way to the lunch room with Julia and her friends, not really paying attention to what they were saying. By time we reached the table that we sat at everyday I had finally started to listen to them ramble on about the latest gossip.
". . . And then they ran from us. Can you believe it? They actually ran from us!" Lauren exclaimed in an unhappy tone.
"Oh, don't worry, Lauren, I'm sure that you'll be able to convince someone else to help you out with your Fall dance princess campaign." Max comforts her.
"My campaign is going quite well, I'm sure that I have at least half the grade voting for me now." Julia brags. I know that she was running for the princess of the dance only because her mother and her 'friends' had convinced her to do so.
The Fall dance happened every year at this school, normally around the beginning of the year. This year it was on this Friday. If you were a senior you could run for Queen or King, Juniors for Princess and Prince, and so on. There were currently four girls running for princess in the Junior class: Julia, Lauren, some girl named Bella, and I. I was only running because the rest of the popular group had convinced me that sense I had a good chance of winning that I should at least enter and try. I didn't try and campaign though, as long as I was entered my 'friends' didn't bother me about it.
"Ashley and I are definitely going to be there." Julia says.
"We are going to be where?" Of course, I wasn't supposed to know about the dance yet. It was tradition for the school students to only start campaigning and telling people about the dance a couple days before it happened. That way, people would be more excited about it or something. It honestly made no sense to me.
"At the fall dance on Friday. It's going to be masquerade themed this year! They always have it like in the beginning of the school year for some reason. But it's going to be so much fun! You need to listen more Ashley, you've been zoning out way too much lately." Julia tells me.
Of course this school had to have a school dance right in the middle of the mission. The school dance would be the perfect time to kidnap Julia or I: it was crowded, lights flashing everywhere, and everyone had masks on. It wouldn't be too hard to lose track of who was who. Most of the masks would only cover up half of their faces anyway.
"Oh yeah, we'll totally be there." I agreed.
"Great! We'll see you guys there!" Lauren says.
"Now we have to go out and buy dresses, don't we?" I ask Julia.
Julia gives me a sly look, "Not necessarily. We have all the perfect dresses here. Before I left I bought two dresses for the fall dance, and you seem to be my size anyway. We can just use those because I'm am way too tired to go out and shop again."
"Thank god! I do not want to spend another afternoon trying on a hundred dresses trying to find one that doesn't look as sluty as the others." I sigh. Julia laughs at me and almost falls to the floor.
"We get along so much better now, don't we." She suddenly says.
"Yeah I guess we do."
"Ever since I told you who I really was as a person, I've felt more like connected to you, you know? I feel like our friendship is stronger. And it's not like you're keeping any life altering secrets from me, right?" she continues.
God, now I feel really bad about never telling her the real reason I was here. I should've told her that I was here to protect her, but who would believe that a secret government organization existed whose whole purpose was to go on undercover mission around the world and wasn't below hiring an underage teenage girl? Wait. That is kinda believable. The government has way more secrets that they've never told the public that are way more worse than the UIA existing. Anyway, the UIA has strict orders to never reveal ourselves while on missions.
"Actually, there is something that I've been keeping from you, it's-" I start to attempt to tell her why I was actually here, but something was happening in the middle of the cafeteria.
Right in the middle of the cafeteria was one of the Janitors, Mr. Pickett, was holding his neck as he fell to the floor. He started foaming at the mouth and kids started to panic. The students rushed out to the walls while some of the teachers and the nurse rushed to the janitor to try and help him.
Me and Julia give each other looks of panic matching the rest of the students and rush out to try and help the teachers and staff that were trying to help Mr. Pickett.
Right in front of the table next to us is a wheezing and convulsing Mr. Pickett. I knew that the nurse was heading for Mr. Pickett now, but it would be too late. I headed down to where he was and tried to help him.
"Oh my god! Somebody do something!" A panicked freshman yelled out.
"What happened?" Julia asks no one.
I went down and tried to stabilize the Janitor, if he kept jerking around like that he could break his neck or worse. I reached down to him when he all of a sudden stopped moving. I checked his pulse and was shocked. There was no pulse. This man had just died n my arms. The nurse came up to us and I just shook my head at her. She understood and ordered the security guards to round up all the students and take them away from the cafeteria.
Me and Julia still stood with the teachers and staff by the time that the students were all cleared out. For some reason they let us stay. I bent down while the teachers were telling the already late paramedics where to go. I looked where the Janitor had been holding his neck and I saw a tiny needle. I pick it out and put it in a plastic bag before the teachers could notice.
Later that day when all the students had been gathered in the auditorium the teachers told us the news that had spread across the school like wildfire, Mr. Pickett had died. They told us that it was a seizure, but I knew better. They almost canceled the fall dance, but the school physiatrist told the principle that it would be a good distraction from the tragedy.
When I was finally able to get back to the dorm I sent the agency a picture of the needle and the description of its affects on the janitor. As I waited for the results I sat on my bed and went through what just happened. Mr. Pickett, our number one suspect, had just been murdered. I bet my money on it being a hit form the gangs employers. They were insulted that we thought that the spy was the janitor. They didn't like anyone else taking the credit for what they had done, it was sick.
Our number one suspect had just been murdered because the opposition was angry and jealous. Now we were down a suspect and had a better profile on the kidnappers. They had unknowingly led us closer to them.