by Stuart Gibbs
I walked on a bit more, trying to fathom this. “So . . . When the CIA says they’re trying to protect me from SPYDER, they don’t even know who that is?”
“No. So far, Murray Hill is the only SPYDER agent ever to have been captured—and you’re the only person he spoke to. The CIA put its top interrogators on him. He didn’t say a word.”
“That’s not quite true,” Alexander said.
“Okay, technically he said a word,” Erica admitted. “He said plenty, in fact. He told the interrogators all sorts of things about SPYDER. But they all turned out to be lies. Unfortunately, the CIA didn’t realize that until it was too late. Murray had agents off on wild-goose chases all over the world. The CIA had blown millions of dollars and who knows how many hours of manpower before they realized they’d been scammed.”
“So where does that leave us?” I asked.
“I’m not sure,” Erica said. “In theory, this ought to be a bonanza for the CIA. They know SPYDER is active, so you’d think they’d be sending every man they have out here to engage them and try to capture at least one enemy agent. But SPYDER has already given the CIA one black eye today, so maybe the Agency is holding back and trying to figure out what to do next before they get embarrassed again.”
“Then we might be on our own out here?” I asked.
“For the time being,” Erica said. “Although it’s likely that the CIA doesn’t know we’re out here. They probably think we’re either captured or dead. We need to make contact as soon as possible. Which is why we’re heading there.”
We emerged from the trees to find the old fire tower atop a small rise close by. It was a small room perched four stories up atop a steel framework, just high enough to see over the surrounding trees. It looked as though it hadn’t been used in years. Most of the paint had flaked away and the steel was coated with rust.
“The forest service used to post men up here to keep an eye out for fires,” Erica explained, “but they can do that with satellites now. They’ve probably forgotten this place even exists. Let’s just hope they didn’t bother to clean it out before they decommissioned it.” She hurried up the small rise toward the tower.
“Wait,” Alexander said. He seemed almost embarrassed to speak up to his daughter now. “If you know about this place, what’s to say that SPYDER doesn’t as well? They might be waiting up there to ambush us right now.”
Erica didn’t even slow for a second. “There’s over a dozen of these old things out here. I doubt even SPYDER would go through the trouble to set up ambushes in them all.”
“But suppose they did . . . ,” Alexander began.
“That’s a risk I’m willing to take,” Erica said. “We need to establish contact with the CIA.”
“Perhaps not,” Alexander said. “They’ve activated Klondike.”
Erica stopped at the bottom of the fire tower stairs. It was one of the very rare occasions when I’d ever seen her express surprise. “When?”
“A few days ago.”
“Why didn’t anyone tell me?”
“Because you’re a teenager,” Alexander said. “Only agents with top security clearance were supposed to know.”
Erica frowned angrily. Then she started up the stairs anyhow.
I stayed on the ground. “What’s Klondike?” I asked.
“A very bad idea,” Erica replied.
I looked to Alexander for more, but he didn’t offer it. “Erica!” he yelled. “Please come back down here!”
Erica ignored him, continuing upward. The stairs ended underneath the small room. There was a trapdoor above, which was padlocked shut, but the hasp was rusted and it only took Erica two karate kicks to break it. The trapdoor dropped open and, despite her father’s continued protests, Erica climbed up into the small room. A second later, she called down, “You can stop worrying! There’s no one here!”
Alexander and I climbed the stairs quickly.
The crow’s nest at the top of the tower was fifteen feet square with windows on all sides, affording views for twenty miles in every direction. It hadn’t been cleaned out. Everything had simply been left behind when it was abandoned. But though no humans had been there in years, plenty of other things had. Two of the windowpanes had fallen out, allowing access to any forest creature that could squeeze through the gap. The rafters were filled with birds’ nests, and most of the logbooks had been eaten by rodents. The floor was covered with years’ worth of animal dung. A quick assessment of it indicated that everything from bats to bobcats had used the lookout tower as a toilet.
Still, the two things we needed were in working condition.
The first was the water supply. There was a cistern on the roof to catch rainwater, which ran down a pipe into a small tap with a water filter attached. None of us had had anything to drink in hours and were parched dry. We each guzzled about a gallon.
There was also a ham radio. It was ancient and it looked ready to disintegrate, but when Erica turned the crank on the side it came to life. Erica quickly set the dials to the CIA’s frequency. Alexander grabbed the receiver before she could.
“Mayday,” he said. “This is Agent 2364, codename Big Dog, calling for emergency backup . . .”
“Hello, Agent Hale!” The voice that answered was electronically garbled, so we couldn’t even tell if it belonged to a man or a woman. “We’ve been hoping to hear from you!”
Alexander sighed with relief. “It’s good to hear your voice as well,” he said.
“What’s your location?” the voice asked.
Alexander started to answer, but Erica snatched the receiver from him before he could. Her face was etched with concern. “What’s your security clearance code?” she asked.
There was a pause, and then the voice at the other end laughed. “Ah. This must be the famous Erica Hale. I knew we couldn’t trick you with so simple a ruse.”
“Wait,” Alexander said. “You’re not the CIA?”
“No,” the voice replied cheerfully. “I’m with SPYDER. Is Ben Ripley there with you too?”
“No,” Erica lied. “We were separated from Ben in the river. We think he got washed farther downstream.”
“Well, you’d better track him down,” the SPYDER agent replied. “We need you to bring him to us.”
“And why would I want to do that?” Erica asked.
“Because we’ve captured a few of his friends,” the agent said. “And we’ll kill them if you don’t.”
NEGOTIATION
Shenandoah Wilderness Fire Tower 14
June 14
1430 hours
A disturbed silence settled over the room. Alexander and I were too shocked to say anything. Erica, however, seemed lost in thought, as if she were quickly trying to figure out what her next move should be.
“Are you still there?” the voice asked. There was a taunting quality to it, as though the speaker was having a great time. It reminded me of Murray Hill, and I wondered if it could possibly be him. “Hello? Erica? Hello?”
The words jolted Erica back to action. There was now a look of confidence in her eye, which I hoped meant she had a plan. “I’m here,” she said. “But I’m wondering if you’re telling me the truth.”
“You think I’m lying about the hostages?” the voice asked.
“You guys aren’t exactly known for your honesty,” Erica replied.
“Touché,” said the SPYDER agent. “How’s this for proof?”
There was some scuffling as the handset was passed to someone else. “Erica? Is that you?” a voice asked.
Zoe.
She sounded so frightened, I wanted to shout out to her, to tell her everything was going to be all right. But, of course, revealing myself would have ruined whatever Erica’s plan was.
“Yes, it’s me,” Erica replied. “How are they treating you?”
“All right, I guess,” Zoe said. “They haven’t tortured us or anything.”
“Who else is there with you?” Erica asked.
&n
bsp; “Warren, Jawa, Chip, Claire, and Hank.”
“Are they all right?”
“Yes. Well, Warren’s been crying a lot, but other than that, I guess we’re okay.”
“What about everyone else who was on the bus?”
“I don’t know,” Zoe said. “I guess they’re all still back in the wilderness. SPYDER only took us.”
Erica took her thumb off the radio switch so she could speak to us in private. “Makes sense,” she said. “No need to trouble yourself with forty hostages when six will do. The others ought to be okay. Woodchuck can get them to safety.”
“Assuming he’s not in league with SPYDER,” I said.
Erica nodded, conceding that might be the case. Then she got back on the radio. “Zoe, how many SPYDER agents are there?”
“I don’t know. They have us blindfolded. Although I’ve recognized at least four different voices . . .”
The receiver was suddenly yanked away from her. The garbled voice got back on again. “Okay, that’s enough of that. You heard the girl. So you know I’m telling the truth. Now here’s how things are going to play out: At the intersection of Virginia state roads 522 and 37, there is a farm with a large red barn. We will be at that barn with your friends in exactly six hours. If you are not there with Ben Ripley at that time, we will kill the first hostage. . . .”
“Whoa,” Erica said. “Six hours? Let’s be reasonable here.”
“I’m trying to,” the voice said.
“Six hours isn’t anywhere close to reasonable,” Erica argued. “First of all, I don’t know where Ben is. He could have washed halfway to Washington, DC, for all I know.”
There was a map table on one side of the crow’s nest. Back in the day, the lookout posted at the tower would have used it to pinpoint fires. It had one drawer, which turned out to be full of chewed-up maps and ancient rodent pellets. I started searching through the maps quickly, trying to find one of Virginia that hadn’t been eaten.
“Don’t jerk me around,” the SPYDER agent said. “Ben’s standing right beside you, isn’t he?”
“He’s not,” Erica said. “But even if he were, I’m nowhere near civilization, thanks to you. I have no food, no water, and no method of transportation except for my own two feet. It’s a miracle I even found this radio. Now, I’d be happy to radio the CIA to have someone come pick me up, but I’m guessing you don’t want that.”
There was a pause at the other end. When the voice got back on, it sounded considerably less taunting than it had before. “You’re right. We don’t. In fact, if you contact the CIA—or any other law enforcement agency . . .”
“You’ll kill a hostage,” Erica finished dryly. “I know the drill. Now, I’ll concede to that, but without any help, I’ve got a lot of work cut out for me. Six hours just isn’t going to fly. I’m going to need six days.”
“Six days?” the voice asked. “Unacceptable. We’ll give you eighteen hours.”
“Oh, come on,” Erica said. “Where do you think I am, the Ritz? I’m in the wilderness here. It’s not like there’s a herd of deer with a rental car agency nearby. I’ll need at least a day and a half to track down Ben and another twenty-four hours to get back to civilization.”
“Hold on,” the agent said. Then he was gone, although I thought I could hear him discussing options with someone else in the background.
I found a map of Virginia that was still in decent shape and spread it out on the table. Alexander and I quickly scanned it, trying to find the location the SPYDER agent had mentioned. Alexander found it first. He triumphantly thumped his finger down at the junction of state roads 522 and 37. It was just north of a town called Winchester, which looked to be a good hundred miles away from us.
The agent got back on the radio. “The best I can do is two days.”
“That’s ridiculous,” Erica said. “I need three.”
“You have two and that’s our final offer. And only you, your father, and Ben better show up. Contact anyone else—the CIA, the FBI, the army, the police—and we’ll know.”
“Two days from this very moment?” Erica asked.
“Yes,” said the voice. “Let’s say two thirty in the afternoon on June sixteenth.”
“Do I have any leeway at all? I don’t want you whacking my friends because I’m five minutes late.”
The voice sighed. “Okay. Two thirty, give or take fifteen minutes. How’s that?”
“Still pretty lousy,” Erica said flatly, “seeing as once we swap Ben for the others, you’re going to kill him, aren’t you?”
The SPYDER agent hedged a moment before answering. Erica seemed to have caught him off guard with such a direct question. “Well . . . er . . . That’s really up to Ben. He’s still welcome to accept the very generous offer we made him. To be honest, though, we’re getting a little tired of waiting for him to make up his mind.”
“Could you accept me in his stead?” Erica asked. “I’m a much better spy than he is. Frankly, that kid has the fighting skills of a guinea pig.”
Alexander looked at Erica, unable to hide his shock at what she was saying. Erica shook her head, letting him know she wasn’t actually serious about this.
“True,” the SPYDER agent replied. “And I must say, that’s a very tempting offer. But the fact is, Ben has some very special abilities you don’t. Abilities that he might not even be aware he has.”
“Like what?” Erica asked.
The SPYDER agent laughed. “Nice try, Hale. But I’m not that easy. Now go find Ben. We’ll see you in two days.”
With that, the radio went dead.
Erica looked at me curiously. “I don’t suppose you’ve figured out what these incredibly amazing special abilities you have are yet?”
“No,” I admitted, feeling as though I was letting her down. I racked my brain, trying to think of any incredible thing I’d ever done. Yes, I could do somewhat complicated multiplication and division in my head, but as Erica had pointed out, anyone with a calculator could get the same answers. As far as I knew, I couldn’t instinctively crack codes or hack computers or disarm ninjas. “What I don’t understand is, how could SPYDER know I have this ability when I don’t even know I have it?”
“Murray Hill,” Alexander said. “He was obviously studying you closely while he was working as a mole.”
Erica looked at her father, intrigued.
He flashed her a proud smile. “See? Your old man might not be as big a fool as you think.”
“Even a watch that’s broken is right twice a day,” Erica said, and Alexander’s spirits immediately deflated again.
Erica snatched the map off the table and hurried out the trapdoor. “Come on,” she said. “We need to get moving.”
Alexander and I hustled down the steps behind her. “How hard is it going to be for us to make it to the hostage swap in two days?” I asked.
“Oh, not hard at all,” Erica said. “It’s not really that far. I was just bluffing. We could easily be there in a day if we had to.”
“Then why did you ask for two?” Alexander asked.
“Because we’re not going there right away,” Erica said, in the tone that one might have used to explain things to a two-year-old. “We have one other place to visit before that.”
“And that’s why we’re in such a hurry?” I asked.
“No,” Erica said. “Right now, we’re evacuating the fire tower before SPYDER attacks it.”
Alexander gave a gasp of surprise and picked up his pace. “You think that’s possible?”
“Anything’s possible with SPYDER.” Erica reached the ground first and led the way toward the safety of the forest. “Getting a pinpoint location on a ham radio isn’t as easy as doing it for a cell phone, but it can be done. Or at least, they could figure there weren’t many ham radios in the vicinity and deduce that we’re at one of them.”
“But they knew we were going to use a radio, didn’t they?” I said. “They intercepted our call to the CIA the moment we m
ade it.”
“I don’t think they knew that we’d use a radio for sure,” Erica explained. “I think that, as usual, SPYDER was simply prepared for any eventuality. They must have been monitoring every method of communication. I’ll bet that if we’d used a cell phone to call, they would have intercepted that, too. Or a pay phone. Or an e-mail.”
“How long do you think we have until they get here?” Alexander asked.
“That depends on what they’re sending after us,” Erica replied. “If it’s an assault team, it might be half an hour. If it’s a helicopter, it might be a minute or two. . . .”
There was a sudden roar in the distance. Through the trees, I spotted something racing across the sky toward us, a trail of black smoke in its wake. It covered the miles between us in seconds.
“Though it appears they have a missile,” Erica said. “We should run.”
She took off like a shot. Alexander and I followed.
The missile screamed over our heads, slammed into the crow’s nest, and exploded.
The concussion of the blast threw us forward, nearly knocking us off our feet. A surge of oven-hot air braised my backside. Flaming debris rained down. Chunks of twisted, red-hot metal slammed into the ground around us.
A dead tree buckled by the blast splintered with a lightning crack as we ran past.
“Look out!” I yelled.
We all dove for cover as the tree toppled. The trunk crashed to Earth right where I’d been a second before.
And then, it was all over. Or at least, the big pyrotechnics were. All the large debris had landed, although thousands of flaming bits of paper still fluttered down from the sky. The lookout tower was now just four decapitated support beams, charred black and warped, looking like a really bad piece of modern art. Although my ears were still ringing from the blast, the aftermath was surprisingly quiet.
Erica and Alexander emerged from around the fallen tree, unharmed—although Alexander had dived into a bush and was spitting out leaves.
