(A/N: I'M BAAAAACK! :D Cue happy dancing music. *dances around like an idiot* uhh... Yeaah. About that. *cough* WELL. I'm back. My NaNo novel was an epic fail. Okay. Here's chapter one.)

Okay, let's see a show of hands: who here has tried one of those cool ninja rolls?

Guilty as charged. But see, I'm excused, because I had a whole class on it this semester. Not even joking. Here, I'll stick my schedule in this thing. I'll warn you, though. I've kind of written on it. So ignore the stuff that doesn't look too professional.

NAME: Valerie Goode
ID: ****6821
1…HISTORY OF ESPIONAGE ADVANCED (ew much? History first thing?)
2…ENCRYPTION AND ITS USES (like hiding stuff?)
3…THE ART OF NINJA ROLLS (oooooh.)
4…LUNCH (aww, not "The study of the effect eating after rolling around for an hour can have on a girl?")
5…CHEMISTRY 2 ADVANCED (not again..)
6…SIGN LANGUAGE 2 ADVANCED (because I already knew every other language available. -.-)
7…INDEPENDENT STUDY (basically, nap time.)

So my year wasn't too bad. I had no real hard classes. Even the advanced classes weren't that bad. I pretty much had to teach myself anything I wanted to know. This wasn't that bad, considering the size of Timmons' library. It was the ONE good thing about the place.

"One more week, one more week…" I muttered as I made my way down the crowded hall. Finals week at Timmons Academy was extremely boring, but maybe it was just me. Honestly, they hadn't taught me anything I didn't know already. While I was here teaching myself, my friends at Gallagher Academy were protecting one of their own.

I was so mad I couldn't be there to help them. My roommates saw a totally different side of me when I managed to hack into the official report of the "incident". It wasn't pretty, I'll tell you that. Not only that, but when I learned that Zach might be involved, I seriously contemplated running away (getting out of the school was a piece of cake) and murdering him myself. Luckily for him, one of my roommates managed to hack into a British designer store and used the "friends and family" discount, so we all went shopping crazy.

I was lucky enough to have a roommate who may or may not have an addiction to hacking and creating computer programs. Everyone called her Squirt, and apparently it was with love, because she didn't mind, and actually wrote it in place of her name on school assignments. Anywho, she made a facial recognition program similar to those already existing, except hers was extremely more advanced. I don't know how that's possible, because I couldn't tell the difference, and I'm what you would call a computer nerd. I ran all the pictures from my first day at Blackthorne through it, and came up with some surprising matches. I learned that a couple kids I had met there were related (ah, that's how hers was more advanced…), but I also learned that Zach's profile matched that of someone who was involved in the whole Macey thing. It was somewhere on a train. I didn't really get the full story, because the bell rang and I had to go to class, but it made me curious. Once Macey was safe though, I stopped worrying about it as much. I couldn't do anything about it, so I took the advice from my friends and didn't stress.

I had tried to stay in touch with Zach, but he didn't exactly make it easy. I mean, once I figured out that he wasn't at Blackthorne, I figured I would have been able to talk to him. Makes sense, right? Lousy jammers at TA, and no jammers where he was (wherever that was…) should equal easy communication. Apparently not, because not once did he call me. Or text, email, Facebook, or IM me. I had been used to not talking to my twin for long periods of time before last year, but after seeing him every day for a semester, I kinda missed him. Not that I'd ever admit that. He was as annoying as heck without the notion that he made a lasting "brotherly" impression on me. Puh-lease. That would only make things worse.

About three weeks into my semester at Timmons, I got an encrypted email from an address I didn't know. Anyone else would have marked it as spam and deleted it, fearing it would give them a virus. Me? I took Squirt's best virus protection, added a couple of my own tweaks to it, and started decrypting the email. Two and a half hours later, I got a coupon for extra credit for my Encryption class and a compressed file. I still didn't know who had sent the email, but after tracing the address for thirty minutes (whoever had sent it had bounced it off of like eighty countries, like they would do with a phone call), I got a name.

Ms. Morgan.

Excited, I unzipped the file and five minutes later, my roommates walked in to see me staring open mouthed at the screen. Laina, the girl that had become one of my best friends in those three weeks, came over and play slapped my cheeks, to "wake me up". I let out a high pitched squeal, which earned me a few weird looks. The files turned out to be zillions of lessons – worksheets, notes, lectures, power points, quizzes, tests, and even the finals – for all the classes I would have taken at Gallagher. There was one line of text included: If you got this, you deserve it. You'll catch up before you get back, I'm sure.

My roommates didn't understand the significance of this, but I sure did. I knew that it took Macey a TON of hard work to get up to the same level as Cammie and the rest of the kids in our grade, and since I had come in a year later, I had just as much work (not more, because I was taking advanced classes at my old school, which helped some. And I discovered I had a thing for languages. So that helped too). This information would allow me to test out of those classes, so I could start basically at the same place everyone else was in most subjects.

The year passed, and I kept up with my TA classes, and caught up with my Gallagher work. Now, finals week was here, and my move back to the States was confirmed. I started packing up everything, so I could send it out as soon as possible (we had one day after finals to get our stuff together before we were released). Right before lunch we all had a free hour – no finals, no classes, no food being served. Everyone either used it to study or sleep. Since it was Monday, we had the rest of our finals in front of us, so most people were studying. We all got called to the Great Hall for a "special announcement". The last time we'd had one, we were told that our Ancient History teacher (who I didn't know…) was being recognized for saving the life of a Russian dignitary. Except he wasn't being given the award under the name we knew, because apparently if anyone besides us knew it, he would have to leave our school. It was an extremely awkward assembly. My roommates and I were debating what it would be this time when Mr. Tarson came on stage.

"We have some very special guests this last week, so I'd appreciate it if you all gave them a warm welcome." The headmaster paused, and everyone sat waiting for him to continue. It was dead quiet when a loud "AAAAHHHHH!!!" came from across the room. I spun around. A scream that loud could only mean one thing.

Cammie and Bex were here.

(A/N: So. What did you think? Y'all are smart people, let's not repeat the whole "I need five reviews before I post the next chapter" think. Okay? Okay. You review, I post. If I can. I'll be out for Christmas, because I'M GOING TO ENGLAND!! *squeeee* Anywho. Questions? Comments? Happy dances? Threats? Review. If you have an account, I'll reply. If not, I can't, so sorry. Til later, cp.)