"Alright dudes, our next word is… oor-shprah-khuh. Huh. That's a wallop of a pronunciation, if you ask me." She drooped her eyes passively, which seemed bigger underneath her thick glasses as she scratched her ponytail with a pencil. Dan couldn't help but think that the hair of her low ponytail resembled a mini-afro, and in the short period of their acquaintance, the new girl started to feel somewhat like home. Amy pondered on the pronunciation, resting her chin on a closed fist.
"May I have the language of origin, please?" she spoke, looking at the new girl with determined eyes. The girl squinted at the dictionary to get better focus.
"German, methinks."
"May I have the definition?" Dan spoke, breaking out of his trance. He previously wondered if he could make an awesome mustache out of the tiny ball of curls.
"Lemme see… a reconstructed, hypothetical parent language, as Proto-Germanic. What a definition," she spoke passively, hinging on a bit of sarcasm. She tucked a loose curl behind her ear, finally resting her head in the palm of her hand. Amy smoldered at the book in the girl's hand.
"Could you use it in a sentence?"
"He might have been speaking oor-shprah-khuh, for all that I understood. This word is starting to make my head hurt," the girl said, scratching her temple in mild confusion.
"Alright. Oor-shprah-khuh." Amy squinted a bit to gain focus. "U-R-S-P-R-A-C-H-E. Ursprache."
"Ding-ding-ding! We've got ourselves a champion!" She twirled her index finger a bit while imitating the sound of bells as she mimicked an announcer's voice. Slamming the dictionary shut, she meticulously put it at the side table. "You're as good as they say," she said with a smile.
"Well," Dan gloated. "We are the legendary Cahills."
"Dan!" Amy rebuked, nudging him in the ribs. "That's no way to act in front of a guest!"
"Naww. It's fine by me," the girl spoke with a swagger, slouching on the arm chair a bit. "Okay, okay… you're the best. You're the king. You're Mister Awesome, or whatever terms of endearment used to stroke your ego." Her voice was sarcastic, but it was in an air of joviality. Dan stuck his chin out at that proudly.
"You got that right."
"I'm sorry," Amy apologized, looking slightly embarrassed at Dan's actions. "He's really like that. I mean… you know how eleven-year-olds are. Immature."
"I heard that!" Dan interjected, still doing the macho man pose. The girl smiled casually.
"No big deal, dude. I'm cool with that," she said. "'Sides, I like being around kids like him. Kinda makes up for having no siblings, you get what I'm saying?"
"Not a kid!" Dan protested once more.
"Anyway," the girl continued. "Me? I'm at your service anyway. It's an honor working for the… what'd Dan say again?"
"The legendary Cahills," Dan gloated.
The girl smiled. "Yep. The legendary Cahills. It's good exposition to be in the front line, as Dad would say. Also, I work for very little," she continued, cozying herself on the velvet chair. "Just give me my classics and green tea. The magic words." At that cue, she got a bottle of green tea from the side table and chugged it down, trying to shoot the bottle into the waste basket after it was emptied. Although she missed, that didn't hamper her good spirits. "Alright, next word. Foresi."
Just then, a knock on the door interrupted their mini-Spelling Bee. The three kids then yelled for whoever it was to enter, and Nellie's face peeked in with her trademark happy-go-lucky expression. "Hey dudes! Old man Fiske wants you in the Dining Room for a moment—something important, he says. Anyway, he wants the two of you down immediately, so I guess you guys gotta make it snappy!"
Dan covered his left eye in an imitation of a pirate. "Arr! Methinks another adventure lies ahead!"
Amy sighed, pulling her brother by the wrist. "Let's go, first mate." And down the siblings went, rushing playfully through the mahogany staircase. The girl chuckled softly as she closed the dictionary, placing it gently on the parapet. "It's spelled P-H-O-R-E-S-Y, by the way," she said, as if the kids were still there. Nellie looked at her with a thoughtful smile.
"You know, they're great people to be around," the 20-year-old said, walking into the library with a casual smile. "It's amazing how you've got along with them so quickly. With what they've been through, it usually takes weeks before they could really get along with someone, especially someone their own age. I'm surprised you've managed to do that within a few hours."
The girl shrugged indifferently. "I've been with kids like Amy back home, at school. You just need to give the right encouragement."
"I'm also kinda mind-blown at how young you are," Nellie spoke. "I've had yet to hear of an agent that's fourteen years old."
She seemed distracted at first, and a brief pause ruled the room for a moment. "It's for my Dad," she said with a half-smile. Regarding Nellie's fallen expression, she continued immediately. "But not in the way the other Cahills did it, from what I've heard. I signed up for it to be with my Dad."
Nellie seemed surprised. "So you're a Lucian?"
The girl immediately gave her a look. "Lucian? Psh. Nope. Not a Lucian, not a Madrigal or any other of those Cahill branches. Ain't even a Cahill, nor a Vester, or whatever they call it. Just some girl born with… I guess you can say weird circumstances."
Nellie put her hands in her pockets. "Alrighty, then. Just be sure to take care of my homeys, you got that?"
She nodded, a tacit gesture. "Roger that. I'll even start patrolling the perimeter right this instant."
With folded hands Amy listened to her grand-uncle's words with prudence, while Dan was distractedly picking at some stubborn detritus packed within his left nostril. Amy had momentarily reprimanded him for the gesture, yet after some moments he started his conquest again in boredom. Fiske was wearing something colored—at last—yet his face was as grave as the day he had faced them for the first time.
"There has been a great deal of Vesper uprising in America, most especially in the areas of California, Texas, Wisconsin, Tennessee, and most recently, Connecticut." His voice was as solemn as a minister's. "Connecticut, as you may know, is one of Massachusetts' neighboring states. This is not the first attempt that the Vespers have tried to create a siege for the Cahill Family's heirs. In Korea, there has been an uprising in Janggok, near Seoul—in Italy, where two of your subordinates in the Clue Hunt Ian and Natalie Kabra have taken refuge, there has been an uprising in Messina, near Sicily—and as aforementioned, there has been an uprising in Wisconsin, near the Milwaukee area."
Amy felt her heart skip two beats. She gave Dan a tacit look, and at that moment she knew that they were thinking the same thing—Hamilton.
"But don't despair, children," Fiske reassured them. "We have collated your allies from the Clue Hunt and have arranged for them to take refuge in the Cahill Manor, where they can have sanctuary until the siege is over. You have been informed of the state-of-the-art facilities added, have you not?"
Amy nodded slowly, trying to keep level-headed throughout all this. "Yes. Dan and I have been informed."
"Dude, you look like you're constipated," Dan remarked off-handedly at Amy, which ruined the air of maturity she had tried to establish around her. In response, she shot him a sharp look coupled with a verbal reprimand. Fiske looked slightly uncomfortable at this, much due to his inexperience with these kinds of situations.
"Um, moving on," he said nervously. "I'm pretty sure that you have noticed new faces around the manor, and by now you must have been acquainted with them. These faces are part of a special task force dedicated to protect the Cahill Family at all costs. Perhaps you have familiarized yourself with these few?"
A projector screen dropped down from the ceiling, and upon turning on a grayscale picture of a middle-aged woman flashed on it. Dan gasped in surprise, half-gagging at the revelation.
"That's bull-faced Mrs. Buford!" he exclaimed, gagging as he did so. Upon seeing the image, Amy couldn't help but stifle a giggle as well. "Seventh Grade Algebra, nails-on-a-chalkboard voice, tough as steel and a mole to prove it… a bodyguard…oh my… oh my gosh… I can't… I can't stop laughiiiiiiiiinggg…." Dan continued, trailing off in a paroxysm of laughter. Amy covered her mouth in order to prevent herself from going into a fit as well.
Fiske dryly pushed a button on a remote control to change the picture. "Right. Continuing, I believe that you are familiar with this person?"
A picture of a man with an overgrown mustache flashed on the screen. Dan got excited all over again. "That's Guillermo, my man!" he interjected, pointing at the picture with pride. "Me and him get along real smooth, y'know what I mean? Awesome Spelling Bee jokes, funky accent—now him, I wouldn't mind having as a bodyguard."
"Isn't he the new school guard?" Amy inquired, and Fiske nodded in affirmation.
"Yes. This must give you a clue as to how the special task force will function. They will watch your every move disguised as ordinary people, and will serve as your chevaliers in times of emergency." Holding out the remote control again, he then continued to change the picture on the screen once again. About ten pictures followed afterwards, and Dan had a quirky comment for each one of them. Amy was overwhelmed by all of this, overwhelmed by the many people who would die for her sake. She immediately thought of Grace, and a wave of love and gratitude swelled within her so greatly that she thought that she might cry.
Fiske then pushed the button again, and the two were surprised at that last picture.
"Do you recognize her?"
"It's the girl who played Spelling Bee with us!" Dan exclaimed, jumping up and down in excitement. "A bodyguard! A bodyguard! I can't believe it!"
"I thought she was a guest at first," Amy spoke, relaying her surprise to Fiske. "And when she told us about working for us, I didn't think… I didn't think that…"
"She'd work as a bodyguard?" Fiske finished, leaving Amy to nod dumbly in affirmation. He gave her a quick smile. "It's normal to be surprised. Perhaps if I elaborated on the nature of her recruitment more, the situation might seem less confusing. When we chose Belinda Buford as a monitor…"
"You mean Belinda Trunchbull Buford. Yech," Dan wisecracked, which was hushed when Amy nudged him in the ribs.
"… it was out of her being qualified enough to handle the worst and best-case scenarios when it came to protecting Dan, as well as others who would be joining him. Agent J, as she is—"
"Wait a minute," Dan interrupted. "What do you mean by others?"
"I will explain all that later," Fiske spoke briefly as he glanced at Dan. "But, moving on… as Agent Buford had proven to be the best candidate for Dan's safety, Agent J has proven to be the best candidate for yours and some others. We have arranged for her to be in all your classes as of Monday, under the guise of a new student you are to befriend. Is that okay with you?"
Amy nodded, trying to keep level-headed once more. She knew what was at stake here. "Okay, okay… so Agent J will be in all my classes, and… wait, is her name really just 'J', or is it spelled J-A-Y?"
Fiske's face stiffened a bit, signaling that they were speaking of a very sensitive topic. "Neither. You see, the non-revelation of her name is due to some negotiations with her father. He initially attested against her wishes of entering, yet after some compromises thrown from both sides, she was finally able to join the task force with that one small pact. We needed to make that compromise since she was the safest choice out of all the candidates—the others had more than one Cahill or Vesper connection found in their background."
"Alright, alright… so we know about this 'special task force' hullabaloo and stuff," Dan whined. "So can you answer my question now, please? What's all this about the other—"
Just then, the sound of propellers greeted their ears. Nellie rushed into the room without permission, a twinge of concern present on her face. "Sorry to interrupt your super-duper important meeting and all that," she said quickly. "But McIntyre's radioed me a status report. We've got seven casualties in those helicopters, and once those babies land we need to rush them to the Infirmary, PRONTO!"
The three Cahills sprung to their feet in alarm. Fiske's face turned grave at those words. "Who are the injured, Miss Gomez?"
Her eyes seemed to sink into their sockets in concern. "The entire Holt Family, sir; as well as Broderick and Jonah Wizard."
The Cahill siblings just stared at her dumbly, too stunned to think of their next move. Fiske grunted in frustration and pulled a black coat from its hanger, putting it on as quickly. "Miss Gomez, Amy, Dan—let's move. We've got seven injured people to rush to the ER—just injured, Miss Gomez? That's all?"
Nellie's face fell, and the worst of Dan and Amy's suspicions had been affirmed—Nellie had been hiding an extra detail. "I… I'm afraid not, sir," she spoke morosely. Her eyes seemed to sink in even more. "One of them, the youngest—Reagan—I'm afraid she's dying."
The sound of the propellers beat rhythmically, systematically—like a drum of mourning, like a fragile heartbeat trying to keep stable, a heart trying to keep alive. No longer did those propellers symbolize the advent of war or the advancement in technology; no longer did it stand for the hollowness of moving vessels nor shells without souls. The steady beating became a symbolism of fate, of circumstance—of the fine balance of the thirteen lives they carried, almost tipping towards the edge.
Author's Note: NO CLASSES TOMORROW. OOOOOOOOH YEAAAAAAAAAAAAH. XD (And that is why I have made the next chapter. Ahh. I should get more breaks more often. XD) Aside from that uber-special announcement, perhaps I can clarify a few things. For all those concerned about Agent J's probably descent into Mary Sueism, don't worry. Although she'll be in the story, she'll just play a minor role. (I like to think of her as a "plot device") For the most part, she might not even be in most of the chapters... and if she does, just for a brief moment. Sorry about worrying you guys with that conversation between her and Nellie!
Comments and constructive crit is strictly advised! Don't go easy on me! XD