The platypus absently stacked a block on top of another block. He was beginning to lose interest in the toys; he much preferred the television. He understand what it was and what it did now. He understood a lot of things. Sometimes, the television tried to teach him things that he already knew, and that was getting as dull as the toys, but at the moment it was showing an action movie. The platypus liked action movies. They were exciting. They made him happy.
He didn't think he'd seen this one before. It was good.
He heard human footsteps behind him. He didn't care until suddenly, he was lifted into the air. The platypus struggled, chattering. It wasn't time to go back to his cage. The movie wasn't even over. He'd seen other animals get picked up during the day, and most of the time they didn't return.
"Calm down, you can watch it later," the human told him. She was tall and wore purple.
She carried him into another room that smelt funny.
"I'm Dr Gatti," said the human. "I'm going to run some tests to determine whether you're ready for training."
The platypus nodded to show that he understood, though he didn't, really. Training? Training for what? What sort of training?
The first test was what Dr Gatti called a vision test. She make him look at some human writing on the wall. The writing got smaller the further down the wall it was, until it was too small to see. The platypus worried that he was going to have to read it, which he couldn't do at all, but it turned out that all he had to do was look at the letters, and then point them out on a piece of paper.
She then asked him a set of yes or no questions. Some were easy, some were hard, some he didn't understand. He did the best he could.
The tests went on. There was a hearing test, a spatial reasoning test, whatever that was, and then she told him to lie down. She squeezed his front leg
really hard for a while, then stabbed it with a needle to get his blood. The platypus didn't know why she needed his blood, but he let her take it.
Then he had to run on a treadmill. He liked that. He didn't get to run very often. Most of the time he had to walk, or he'd bump into something.
While he ran, Dr Gatti said "You know, you are very lucky to be alive."
The platypus didn't know what that meant. All he could remember was being in his cage at night and the playpen during the day. Neither seemed to be particularly life-threatening.
"You weren't even a day old when Fra- when Major Monogram found you unconscious on the sidewalk."
He didn't remember ever being on a sidewalk. He also didn't remember being a day old, but he guessed he'd have to have hatched at some point.
"There was a dead platypus nearby. It... It was probably your mother. I'm sorry."
The platypus tried to feel sad about that, but he couldn't. It didn't feel real. His life was there, not on some sidewalk he couldn't remember.
.
After the tests, the platypus had to wait in a small room with a television in the wall. The platypus wondered what it was for. Was it another test? Was he
going to have to remember what it said? He couldn't think of any other reason for there to be a television there.
It was showing a boring educational program about colours, but the platypus still tried his best to concentrate on what was happening.
After a while, Dr Gatti returned. She didn't say anything about the TV. She just said "Good news. You can begin your training now."
The platypus thought she sounded a bit sarcastic.
Dr Gatti picked him up and took him to another corridor. "This is your room," she told him, putting him down in front of a small, platypus-sized door.
The platypus looked at her, then went inside. The room was bigger than his cage, big enough for him to rear up on his hind legs, though it wasn't quite high enough for a human. There was nothing in the room but a small desk and a sleeping basket. He curled up in the basket to test its softness, and soon went to sleep.
.
He was woken up by a knocking sound. Confused, he stood up, then remembered where he was. He glanced at the door. It was opaque, but he was pretty sure it wasn't locked like his cage door had been. He kind of missed his cage, but he didn't miss the lock.
He opened the door. There was a human standing there, clutching a clipboard. He looked like late at night.
"Are you the new recruit?" said the human.
Recruit. The platypus liked the sound of that. He nodded.
"Okay, follow me," said the human.
The platypus left the room and followed the human down the corridor.
The human looked back at him. "Hey... You're the baby platypus from the night I broke in... I mean, volunteered, aren't you?"
The platypus looked at him blankly. The human did look familiar, but he didn't know where he'd seen him before.
"Wow, you've grown," said the human. "You were just this long back then!"
He held his hands close together.
"This is so cool," continued the human. "It's my first day too! My guidance counsellor always said I was best suited to espionage or working with animals."
The platypus didn't really understand, but the human seemed to be looking for some sort of acknowledgement, so he nodded his head.
The human stopped abruptly at a door. "Well, here we are," he said. "See you round!"
He walked away, and the the platypus nudged the door open. He was glad to see that it didn't have a doorknob. They were hard to open.
There was another vaguely familiar looking human inside. This one wore green. He was sitting in a chair. There was a smaller chair in front of him. "Ah, there you are," he said. "Take a seat." He indicated the smaller chair.
The platypus stared at him, then at the seat. Gingerly, he sat down. He wasn't exactly sure what to do with his tail. No matter he held it, it was still uncomfortable.
"Welcome to your orientation," said the human. "I'm Major Monogram, and I'll be your boss if you complete your training. That's right, I asked for you specially! You're a real survivor, do you know that?"
That name sounded familiar... Of course it did, Dr Gatti had mentioned it earlier.
The human started to chuckle. "And breaking out your cage last month... What a great stunt!"
The platypus was beginning to wonder if all these humans had got him confused with someone else. He never had any idea what they were talking about. Besides, he couldn't break out of his cage. It had a padlock on it.
Major Monogram stopped laughing and cleared his throat a couple of times. "Uh, anyway, do you know what this facility does?"
The platypus thought. Obviously they took care of him, fed him and gave him somewhere to sleep. And they showed him movies. Was that what the human was talking about? Was he supposed to know what they did?
Fortunately, Major Monogram answered for him. "We train secret agents and sent them out into the field to protect the Tri-State Area, and the world!"
That sounded good. All the platypus's favourite movies had secret agents in them. He wondered if he'd get a chance to meet any of the agents in this facility.
"Do you want to be a secret agent?" asked Major Monogram.
The platypus nodded enthusiastically. Not that that was likely. He doubted that platypuses made good agents.
Strangely, Major Monogram looked a bit surprised. "You... You do? Great! Welcome to the agency!"
What?
The platypus sat in a stupor while the human explained what he'd be doing. He would be trained in many things, including various fighting techniques, vehicle manoeuvring, opera, and intellectual pursuits like reading and writing. Once he was able to stand on his hind legs like a human, he would be eligible for the more advanced classes that required human posture.
When he finished enough classes, he'd take a test to prove his skills. If he did well, he'd be a proper secret agent, with his own hat and lair.
The platypus was having trouble processing this. Him, a secret agent? He barely knew what was going on at the best of times. But if this Major Monogram human believed it was possible, then it was possible. He seemed to know what he was talking about.
.
After his orientation, Major Monogram gave him a map and told him he was free to go wherever he wanted until his first class. He'd know when it started because there'd be a loud noise.
The platypus walked alone through the corridor, staring around in awe. A tiger, a tapir, and a red panda pushed past him, and the platypus scuttled out of the way. They were huge.
For a long time, he just wandered, trying to familiarise himself with the layout of this place. He found the door to his room. There were other doors of different sizes nearby, which all seemed to lead into other animals' rooms. He quickly learned not to enter those without knocking. He also found some sort of dining room, and maybe a... bathroom? He wasn't certain.
The most interesting place was a large room, full of animals doing things he couldn't comprehend. At one end, there was a television. There were soft things like couches and cushions around it. Some animals were sitting or lying on them.
What really caught his attention was the big window on one side. It looked out into a blue room that contained something the platypus recognised immediately as a swimming pool.
He waddled over to it and pressed his bill against the glass. Whenever he saw a body of water on television, he'd spend the whole time it was on screen trying to figure out how to get in, only to remember that it wasn't real. He'd longed for the water as far back as he could remember.
There was the door. He nudged it open, rushed through, and stopped at the water's edge. It had a very strong, and not very pleasant smell, but it was clearlywater. After a moment's hesitation, the platypus took a breath, sealed his eyes, ears and nostrils, and jumped in.
He didn't know what to do for a second. He was blind, deaf, and unable to smell. His electrorecption was working better than ever, though. Normally it wasn't very useful, but the pool seemed to be teeming with electrical sources. That was strange. He hadn't noticed them when he'd jumped in.
He swum around for a while, feeling like he'd been born there. Finally, he had to breathe, so he paddled his front legs, broke the surface, and opened his eyes, ears, and nostrils.
Now he could see where the electricity was coming from. It was coming from the other animals in the pool. That was weird. He knew that living things gave off electricity, but he normally couldn't sense it unless it was very, very close. He wondered why it worked so much better in water.
Putting it out of his mind for now, the platypus dove down again. As he swam, all the techniques, like how to hold his breath, or paddle with his front feet, or steer with his back feet and tail, came to him like something he'd only forgotten. But he kept his first class in the back of his mind. How was he going to hear the loud sound if he was underwater with his ears closed?
He shouldn't have worried. The sound happened during a dive, and though he couldn't hear it, it made the water around him vibrate. The platypus jumped out of the pool, and headed off to class.