Junk Mail
Summary: Three girls. One joke. Four lives changed, forever. Three American teens are partnered with Alex when a silly prank results in their recruitment by the CIA. The mission's simple—or is it? Will this unorthodox team work together—or fall apart? Appearances by old faces like K-Unit, as well as OCs.
A/N: I KNOW, I KNOW, I should be working on Supernova. Don't worry—an update is coming real soon for that. And, by the way, there IS going to be AxOC in this story—it's a bit of an in-joke with my school friends. The article I mention is real, actually—it started the whole thing. I would just like to also say, yes, one of these characters is a self-insert of me, and the other two inserts of two of my friends who came up with this idea with me, but Alex will still play a major part in this story—it won't be dominated by the OCs, except for the first couple chapters, when we still need to get to know them. And, FYI—this takes place in the AR 'verse, so the books don't exist, because he's real (sigh).
Baka Chans, if you're reading this, which I doubt, except maybe for Madeleine—don't worry, you'll get your story, too. And Madeleine…look for yourself in Supernova soon. I might actually make you one of the…well, you'll see. Your name will be Tom, anyhoo.
And, uh, I just wanna clear this up. The FBI, much like MI5, is purely internal. The CIA, as well as MI6, deal with international threats. The CIA also, according to Alan Arkin and Alicia Silverstone, comes up with a lot of crap, but we'll ignore that in this story.
Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I ASKED for Alex Rider for my birthday, but no one gave him to me at my party –goes off into corner and cries- AH owns all, except for my OCs. Duh.
Chapter One
You've Got Mail
"Please tell me you are not serious, Kate," moaned Alyssa Taylor as she walked through the halls of Denstley Boarding School in Boston, Massachusetts, with her two best friends, Meghan Silverwood and Katrina Ashton. Kate had come up with another one of her crackpot pranks. However, the teenage girl was setting her sights not on a hated teacher or an annoying classmate—but rather further than that. How much farther?
"Oh, it's only the CIA," scoffed the student in question, and that sentence right there will tell you who she was planning on pranking. Let me guess—you're either rolling your eyes at her incredible stupidity or searching for some way to warn her that the intelligence services of the world are a lot meaner and more ruthless than they appear (I can think of one boy who knows that very well)."Like they're going to come to school and say, Hey, we've got an arrest warrant for these three girls, because they wrote us a prank letter. Pssh, like that'll happen. It's not like we're sending them anthrax letters, for God's sake! It's just a laugh. Lighten up."
"I don't think they'll arrest us—I just think it's stupid. It isn't likely that anyone who actually cares will read it—just some secretary running on autopilot," protested Meghan.
"I don't want them to actually consider us!" sighed Kate. "I just want to sit back and imagine the looks on their faces when they get the letter."
Are you confused? I would be. Let me explain. These three girls were at Denstley Boarding School in Boston, and they were best friends. Recently, one of them, Alyssa Taylor, had found an article on Yahoo! News about how the CIA was short-staffed, and how they were looking to employ people from minorities and those who had foreign language skills. Alyssa had shown it to the others, and Kate had gotten the idea to actually apply to the CIA—as a joke, of course. Meghan and Alyssa were adamantly against it, but Kate was working to persuade them…
"Ugh, Kate. You're insane." This comment came from Alyssa. Known as Aly to the majority of the world (except for their stuffy old health teacher), she was a pretty, loopy, Bulgarian-American brunette, with an excellent sense of fashion and a comprehensive knowledge of all things inner city. The latter came in handy on school trips and vacations—she knew all the good places to go in cities such as Manhattan, Paris, or even Bangkok, and had a good grasp of street fighting. She was, in addition, a good actress, and often put on one-man improv shows for her friends, such as The Purple Fruit (don't ask). "That is just so stupid."
"Oh, you're no fun," sighed Kate. Katrina Ashton was a sarcastic, half-Indian bookworm with a sharp tongue that could wrap itself around almost any language. She was a fantastic liar, and could deliver hilarious lines completely deadpan. She was strong, too—she loved sports, and was currently a brown belt in karate, as well as on Denstley's swim team. She was also messy and disorganized—her school binder was full of unattached, loose papers. She also, as you have probably gathered by now, was fun-loving and resident prankster. "It's just a letter. Sheesh. I didn't know you two had absolutely no sense of humor."
"We do." Meghan Silverwood rolled her eyes. Meghan was half-Indian, just like Kate, and very smart—she'd done Algebra in elementary school. She loved to read, and was, in addition, a great tactician and strategist—as demonstrated in their Humanities class, where they took part in various simulations, the most recent one being the American Civil War. The group Meghan led had won, of course. She loved academics as well as sports, and was a member of the swim team along with Kate. She was random, hyper like Aly, and funny. Although, just then, Kate didn't think she was, at all. "We just don't want to applyto the CIA, even as a joke. It is stupid. Honestly, Kate…you need hobbies."
"I have plenty, and they just so happen to include pranking. And you know I'm just gonna keep bugging you until you agree to help me write the letter. C'mon, please." Kate then brought out the last weapon in her arsenal—puppy-dog eyes. She gazed pitifully up at her two friends. "Please."
Aly was the first to bend. She sighed. "Okay, fine."
Neha took longer. She weighed her decision carefully—on one hand, there was Kate's eternal gratefulness, as well as an activity that would make some laughs. On the other, the activity in question was pointless. But still..."All right, Kate. But I better not regret this."
Kate smiled evilly as they came to their next class. "You won't. Oh, you won't."
***
Two hours of frustration, Google, anger, laughter, and spellcheck had paid off. At five in the afternoon—a time when the girls should have been doing their homework, incidentally—Kate was sitting at her laptop, flanked by her two friends, the letter inscribed in glorious pixels on her screen. It read as follows:
To whom it may concern (Kate had insisted on putting that in, claiming it sounded "professional" and they didn't know who to address it to anyway),
We have heard you are recruiting as of late. We believe that we are prime candidates for any spots in Covert Operations you may have advertised. (The formal tone was again all Kate's doing.) We are young and fit, as well as possessed of, collectively, a comprehensive grasp of English, as is apparent, Spanish (Meghan and Kate were in Spanish 4), French (Aly was in French 4), Hindi (Meghan had a good grasp of it, and Kate wasn't bad), and Bulgarian (which was Aly's native tongue). According to an article we read recently, we are under the impression that about 13% of your employees speak a language other than English. The aforementioned languages we can speak will obviously prove an advantage in the field—the two of us who speak Spanish both look Spanish, too. The same goes for Hindi, and for the one person who speaks Bulgarian.
Perhaps we should stop referring to ourselves as a collective entity. We are sure you wish to examine our skills—and drawbacks—on an individual basis. Therefore, we shall give you an overview of who we are, what we can do, and why we would prove so advantageous to an illustrious intelligence service such as the one you represent.
One of us is Katrina, or Kate, Ashton. She is smart (as are all of us). Her school career, as you may note, is largely composed of time in accelerated schools—having completed equivalent Algebra, Geometry, Biology, Chemistry, and Physics courses, as well as three classes in the Humanities, upon her graduation from eighth grade (at the age of thirteen). She holds a brown belt in karate, and is soon to graduate to brown stripe—which is, as we are sure you know, only one level away from a first-grade black belt. She is a good actress—which will, of course, be useful in any undercover operations. She can speak Spanish to a substantial extent, and has a rudimentary grasp of Hindi and Marathi. She is enterprising and quick-thinking, and, we believe, an excellent addition to your staff.
The next is Meghan Silverwood. She is highly intelligent—definitely the smartest of us. Her school career is similar to Miss Ashton's, but she completed an Algebra II/Trigonometry course at the end of her middle school career. Miss Silverwood is a brilliant tactician and strategist—one of the best in her class; she can think her way out of almost any tight spot, and fight her way too—she was recently awarded a blue belt in Tae Kwan Do, top in her class. She is the other Spanish speaker, and has a comprehensive knowledge of Hindi. She is resourceful, loyal, and thinks outside the box, and, as with Miss Ashton, she will surely be advantageous to your organization.
The last of us is Alyssa, or Aly, Taylor. Again, she is well known among her peers for her intelligence. She knows the cities well—she is a frequent traveler, and is also skilled in several forms of street fighting, because, after all, big cities are not completely the safe and happy places they used to be, and you, as the CIA, know that better than anyone. She is quick to react and, again, a good actress. She has completed the same classes as Miss Ashton. She is fluent in Bulgarian and also speaks a good amount of French. She will certainly become an asset to the CIA during her prospective career there.
That is not quite all the information about us, however.
We are all fifteen years of age.
Before you toss this letter in the trash, please hear us out. We really might be a help, rather than a hindrance, to your agency. There are several points to support this statement.
One, as stated before, we are fifteen. No one is going to suspect a fifteen-year-old. They'll be looking for thirty-somethings dressed in black and traveling alone. But a group of teenage friends? It's got to be a school trip, or something along those lines. Two agents traveling with one or two of us? Who would get suspicious of a family? No one. But two agents traveling together, jumping at every noise, wearing suits and sunglasses? They would be the ones the bad guys would be keeping an eye out for.
Besides, it's not like we are less skilled than your agents. We have martial arts and language skills that are probably beyond those of most of your operatives—and you can always look up our grades and test scores if you want a measure of our intelligence.
What we are trying to say here is that we will make good agents. You should employ us for the reasons we have outlined for you in this letter.
Sincerely,
Katrina Ashton, Alyssa Taylor, and Meghan Silverwood
Meghan nodded appreciatively, but she still looked a little skeptical. "It seems like we're actually serious about it."
Kate rolled her eyes. "Well, we're not. Even if we were, it's not like they would consider us, anyway."
Alyssa leaned over and pressed the print button. The girls pulled the letter out of their dorm printer, stuffed it into an envelope, and handed it to one of their teachers, asking it be mailed the next morning.
And that was the end of it.
Or so they thought.
***
THREE DAYS LATER
Robert Shaw was a very careful man. He was precise, he was cautious, and he never made a mistake. Of course, those qualities were very useful in his line of work.
You see, he was the head of the CIA Covert Actions, and a mistake from him could literally mean the end of the world. You could almost say Robert Shaw, and the others like him, controlled the fate of the world—guarding it against terrorism and even worse things. He certainly controlled the safety of the American people.
Robert Shaw, however, unlike most of his colleagues, was fond of change.
Change meant new technologies that would save even more lives. Change meant a new environment, one that was harder for the evils of the world to survive in. Change meant new agents that could fix a problem that much faster.
That last one was incredibly relevant to the paper that was sitting on his desk.
It was an application letter from Boston.
Now, that in itself wasn't unusual at all. He received hundreds of applications every week, from all corners of the globe, especially since the CIA had started their new advertising program. No, applications were not abnormal at all.
Except for this one.
It came from three teenagers. Most obviously a prank.
But Robert Shaw was actually taking it seriously.
Why? Because the teenage girls who had sent the letter had outlined some good points. And the girls themselves had better language and fighting skills than half his agents. They could be trained, after all. He knew that MI6, over in Britain, had done something similar, and that the results had been incredible—his own second-in-command, Joe Byrne, had employed that teen spy for two missions, and consequently, two major disasters had been aborted. Was it worth a try?
Was it?
Robert Shaw called in his personal secretary. Her name was Abigail Williams, and she was enormously helpful. She could rattle off figures and statistics about a vast amount of subjects, and was nearly always correct. She never forgot a piece of information, and, but for her condition, she would have made a fantastic agent. But for a car accident ten years ago that had left her in a wheelchair, he'd have had an amazing spy. But no matter. It was a thing of the past. Robert Shaw spoke four words he'd said so often before, and yet this time they would carry such different implications.
"Send them an acceptance."
***
TWO DAYS LATER
It was break that March morning, and Kate, Meghan, and Aly were lounging around in the common room. Meghan was reading a thick book, Kate was finishing up her science homework, and Aly was immersed in the movie that was playing on the lone, wall-mounted TV. There were other students around them, chattering loudly, the overall noise creating a pleasant hubbub that the friends loved so much. It felt like home.
They couldn't have known that they would never hear that noise again after that day.
Ms. Pierce, a math teacher, came through a door and walked up to the three friends. She smiled. "I've got a reply to that letter you sent out the other day, kids."
Kate raised her eyebrows. She thought it highly unlikely the CIA would have bothered itself to respond to their prank letter. It must be something else—maybe a letter from her grandfather. That must be it. Never mind that her grandfather lived in India, and the stamps were definitely American. She took the letter, and waited till Ms. Pierce was gone. Then she looked at the return address.
The letter had come from Langley, Virginia—the headquarters of the American intelligence agency. Kate gasped. "Oh, my God. It's from the CIA."
"What?" Aly and Meghan leaned over, their distractions forgotten.
Kate opened it carefully. She took the letter out, and began to read it to her friends.
Dear Misses Ashton, Taylor, and Silverton:
We have received your application. We believe that you will indeed become assets to the Central Intelligence Agency, should you make it through training. We deemed your letter satisfactory, and are pleased to invite you to Washington, D.C., for an interview with one of our recruiters, as well as a briefing for your training. Enclosed are the tickets required. Thank you very much for your application. We hope you decide to take on a career with us. We can assure you, it will be rewarding.
Sincerely,
Robert Shaw, Head of CIA Covert Operations.
"Oh, my God," repeated Kate, as she shook out three round-trip tickets from Boston to Washington. "They're serious. These are first class."
"Oh, my God," echoed Aly. Then her face hardened. "Kate, what have you gotten us into? This is all your fault! We sent a prank letter to the CIA, and now they're trying to recruit us? I can't believe you! We'll have to go all the way to Washington and tell them we don't want to be freaking agents! Jeez! Look what you've done!" She wasn't speaking loudly, but with a force that made Kate lean back cautiously. "I always wanted to be a spy—but the real thing? We can't do that!"
"Aly, calm down," said Kate soothingly, recovering. "It's not going to be that hard to tell them, 'Hey, that letter was a prank. We weren't being serious. Sorry.' Stop freaking out. How was I supposed to know this was going to happen, anyway?"
Meghan grinned, trying to lighten the mood. "It really seems like we didn't think this through, but who would have known they would have taken us seriously? It's just a misunderstanding, and we can tell them that on"—she consulted the tickets—"March 13th."
"That's a school day," sighed Aly, still somewhat disgruntled, although her friends had eased her anger for the most part. "And the day of our math midterm."
"We can just say—um—what can we say?" Kate wondered out loud.
"That smiley faces are taking over the world that day, and we're going to go help them," said Neha, deadpan.
Aly and Kate were silent for a moment, before Kate spoke. "I'm just gonna disregard that completely," she grinned.
"How about we say that we have a sports competition?" suggested Aly. "Tennis, or karate, or something."
"Meghan doesn't do tennis, and neither of you do karate," pointed out Kate reasonably. "We could just come up with individual reasons—the fact that we're all in Washington on the same day can just be a coincidence."
"That works," nodded Neha. "Kate can have a tennis competition, along with Aly, and I can—I can be attending the National Writing Festival."
"Sounds good." Kate stood up, ready to lie to her teachers so she could go meet with one of the most respected intelligence agencies in the world. Her friends rose with her. "Let's go."
So, what'd you think? Don't worry—Alex will be coming in soon. Real soon. Like, next chapter soon. And, again, he's gonna play a major part in this story—Blunt, Mrs. Jones, K-Unit, Scorpia, and even Smithers will make appearances, as well. So hang on for my next update in about a week!
3, Sienna