FIVE

I dodged one of Melissa’s punches and responded with a flurry of hurricane kicks. It was just the two of us fighting in the Japanese style dojo. The only sounds were the light touch of our feet on the mat and our fists in the air. Besides missions, training in martial arts was my favorite part of being a spy. The rest of my training was tolerable–languages, acting, disarming detonators and all the rest of it, but nothing beat fighting.

Today though, I was still sore from wedging myself down the air shaft the night before and I felt every movement more than usual.

“Seriously, Melissa, is fighting with your hair down a superpower?”

This was the one aspect of fighting that I had not yet mastered. I just hoped that my hair was securely up whenever I needed to defend myself or, if not, god help me if I didn’t have a ponytail holder handy.

“Would it make it easier to lose to me if you thought that I had superpowers?” Melissa grinned.

“I’m not going to lose.” I dodged one of Melissa’s famous sweeps. “It’s just that you may on occasion have won a match or two. And you did it with your hair down. You must have a secret.”

“If your hair bothers you so much you can always cut it off.”

“Real funny Melissa.” My hair might not have been anything to write home about, being pretty much light brown and as uninteresting as possible, but I was not about to part with it.

“Losing every now and then is good for you. I’m afraid that beating Expert and Elite level spies as often as you do is going to give you a big head.”

“It’s too late for that.” I gave Melissa a spinning round kick to the head that sent her down. I had been taking martial arts lessons since I was tiny and I had been good right from the beginning. With two older brothers, I had to be. Soon my skills exceeded the limit of the nearby community center and by the time the U.E. noticed me, I was way ahead of the game when it came to fighting.

Melissa sprawled on the ground, laughing. “OK maybe you have reason to have a big head. Just make sure that you fight this well in the field.”

I put my hand out to help Melissa up. Being a good fighter in the field was essential as a spy at the U.E., because they were stingy with the lethal weaponry, but not with the dangerous assignments. Not that I had gotten that many dangerous assignments. Yet.

Tonight sounded like a particularly wimpy mission. This whole “from a distance” business seemed pretty lame to me. They probably sent us on this mission because Jaisen didn’t have any fighting skills.

Melissa and I again took our sparring stances.

“Why didn’t anyone tell me that we were getting a new recruit that I could possibly be stuck with?” I dodged Melissa’s arm.

“Now would be a good time for a lecture on your attention to detail, don’t you think? If you had been paying attention at the monthly team meeting you would know that Jaisen Bax was coming to join our branch of the U.E. You have the ability to pay attention and pick up on details. When we gave you the Espionage Exam after you had been flagged, among other things you showed an accelerated ability to pay attention to detail. You just choose not to utilize this ability.”

I pushed Melissa away with a front kick, “I try to pay attention. I just have a lot to think about.”

“Try thinking about what’s in front of you some time, you just might discover something interesting.” Melissa feinted a punch and then hit me with her left. I went down. Melissa smiled. “We’re even.”

I pulled myself into a sitting position. “Couldn’t you put a good word in for me with Commander Eckle–tell him how unnecessary this whole partner thing is?”

She shook her head. “He wanted to take you off missions for a while. I’m the one who fought for you to get a partner so you could stay in the field. It was a compromise.”

I sighed.

Melissa put her hand out to me. “Why don’t you go do some weights? Clear your head a little before you head home. Try to get a nap in after dinner.”

Taking out my frustration at getting stuck with a rookie partner on the weight bench sounded like a great idea, but no sooner did I have my back down with a weight in each hand then the face of my fellow Novice Spy Cora loomed above me, one evil brow arched. She was practically popping out of her regulation work out leotard in every direction and her hair was in a perfectly tousled brunette knot on top of her head.

“So I hear you are, like, hooked up with Jaisen,” she said.

“I would like to remind you, Cora, that it is unwise to talk while lifting weights. I might strain something and hurt myself.”

“I also heard that you are going on a make out lookout with him tonight.”

Weren’t secret spy missions supposed to be secret?

“It’s funny, but I still hear your voice.”

“I wouldn’t mind going on a make out mission with that guy.” She chuckled. Evilly.

“Go away Cora.”

“So sad that the really great missions are wasted on someone who has no appreciation for them.” Cora sighed and flounced away. Cora was a few years older than me, but rarely got to go on missions. She usually ended up on the cleanup crew–the team that came in when the dreaded emergency button was pushed. Her special skill seemed to be creating a distraction.

I gave up on the weights and decided to call it a day. Maybe a nice bath after dinner would sooth my aching muscles. Not that it sounded like I would be moving around a whole lot on a boring old sit-down-and-watch type of mission.