Chapter 1- New School Year
Summary: A mix of The Gallagher Girls book series and The 355. For Jane Browne Fowler, going to a new school was exciting. Of course her mother Mason "Mase" Browne has just retired and has taken a position at the school as one of the teachers. Two things that was different is that it's spy school and also no one ever bothered to tell Jane that her mother was a spy and that her dad, Nick Fowler, is still alive.
Summer vacation always did seem to go by fast for Jane Fowler. All too soon vacation was over and she and her mother was going back to school. This year her mother, Mason Browne was going with her as a new teacher at the Gallagher School in Roseville, Virginia. It was a school for gifted, exceptional children and only those who scored well on tests were allowed in. Jane had scored extremely well. She had gotten a letter from the headmistress, Rachel Morgan, asking if she would come to the school. Her mother and her friends all said the school was an honor to attend and that was when her mother had told her she was retiring from her job as a computer consultant and going to be a teacher at the school.
Jane didn't see her mother as much as she would have liked and her father had died before she was even born. Of course, Jane was thrilled that her mother's last assignment involved her going. They had spent the summer in Venice, Italy and Bucharest, Romania. Jane adored Venice and the canals. Romania was little too clogged, dark, and congested for her liking. Jane was more than relieved that her mother had insisted that she learn Romanian and she had been able to get around with the knowledge of the language.
Now back in America, Mase and Jane were pulling up to the school and Jane looked at the mansion. It probably would have been perfect if people were ghosts and they wanted something to haunt. "What do you think, Jane?" Mase asked her daughter as Jane looked, cocking her dark head quizzically.
"All right, I guess. There are no ghosts, mice, or spiders here, are there?" Jane asked.
"No. I went to school here. There are secret passages, but none of the above, sweetheart," her mother said.
"Do I really have to go here? I can go back to the school I was at," Jane said.
"No. You need the best of educations. Your father would have wanted you to go here," Mase said, driving with one hand and cupping Jane's face with the other. Jane then noticed a little man standing there with glasses. Jane remembered him being there when she took the tests at the end of her last school year.
"Harvey Mosckowitz! It has been a long time. How are you?" Mase asked.
"Very well, Mason. Nice to see you again, young lady," the man said.
"Nice to see you too, I think?" Jane said in the way of a question.
"She's not as vocal as you or Nick is she?" Mr. Mosckowitz asked dryly.
"No. She's too much like my mother's family," Mase said, gently teasing Jane. Actually, her mother had said that her father could talk when he wanted to and Jane was a lot like him. Like him, she just saved her words when it was necessary.
They followed Mr. Mosckowitz into the school and Jane looked around in amazement. It had been an old Civil War plantation and was right up Jane's history alley as she adored history. Over the summer when they were in Italy and Romania, Jane had dragged her mother to the historical sites that she had only read about in books. Sure beat going to the Alamo in Texas or Disneyland. Jane looked back at the inside of the mansion. A statue of a woman with a sword was in the middle of the hall.
"I wouldn't touch that if I were you, Miss Fowler," a voice said behind her.
Jane turned to see a man with a large nose that was obviously fake and a fake mole to his temple. "Hello, Smith," Mase said, shaking the man's hand.
"Jane, this is your Countries of the World, COW, professor," Mr. Mosckowitz said by way of introduction. Jane shook his hand.
"Nice to meet you," Jane said in a soft voice. She didn't like meeting new people as it felt as if her tongue tied up in knots. Also, why would a man need to wear a fake nose and mole? And shouldn't the class be World Geography? Jane knew a few older kids whose parents were work friends with her mother and a 14-year-old girl had said in high school a person took World Geography or World History in the Freshman year. Before she entered this school she was all prepared to take World History.
"Indeed. You act a lot like your old man," Professor Smith said.
"Thanks, I think," Jane said as Professor Smith turned to look at Mase.
"Mase, Rachel will see you and Jane now," Smith said as he and Mr. Mosckowitz took them down a hallway to a study with a paneled door.
He knocked on the door. "Come in," a feminine voice said and Smith opened the door. An attractive blonde woman was sitting at a desk and she stood with a smile.
"Hello, Rachel," Mase said.
"Hello, Mase. It's been a long time. How was Vienna, Venice, and Romania?" Rachel Morgan asked as she walked with the two of them to a couch. She held a file in her hands and Jane realized it was the file from her old school and the test results.
"The countries are still standing. Rachel, this is my daughter, Jane," Mase said.
"Yes. Jane Fowler. Top of her class in test scores and I understand you speak 5 languages?" Mrs. Morgan asked.
"Yes, Ma'am. Greek, Romanian, French, Spanish, and English," Jane said. This woman demanded respect and answers and not giving her either never crossed her mind.
"That is very impressive. It also says that you excelled in computers?" Rachel asked.
"Yes, Ma'am. I accidentally hacked into the school database. I'm not getting lethal injection for that, am I?" Jane asked nervously.
"No, you're not, Miss Fowler. What has your mother told you about this school?" Mrs. Morgan asked.
"Only that it's a school for gifted and exceptional girls. But there is more than that isn't there?" Jane asked.
"Yes. You would be right. You are like your mother. You don't miss anything," Mrs. Morgan said.
"So, what makes this school so different?" Jane asked.
"This school is training young girls to work for their country. When you graduate, if you decide to stay, you will work for the FBI, CIA, or the NSA," Mrs. Morgan said.
"So, this is spy school," Jane said, quirking a dark eyebrow.
"We don't really call it that here, but yes. The Gallagher girls go all the way back to the Civil War with Gillian Gallagher. She was a spy who saved Abraham Lincoln. We continue in her tradition," Mrs. Morgan said.
Jane looked at her mother. "Mom, you too?" Jane asked.
"Yes. That was how I met your dad. He went to a school that trained boys to work for the CIA, FBI, or NSA," Mase said, squeezing Jane's knee gently.
"So, Miss Fowler, if you decide to come here, we'll get started on your room assignments and uniform. But if you don't then your mother and me can give you something to make you sleep and when you wake up, you won't remember this place or this conversation," Mrs. Morgan said, holding a tiny silver pill box in front of her.
"I think I'll stay," Jane said. Mase and Rachel Morgan then gave wide smiles.
"Then, welcome, Jane to the Gallagher School," Mrs. Morgan said, those words changing Jane's life.