Spy Ski School (27 page)

My phone buzzed in my pocket. I pulled it out. Now that we had reception, all my text messages had arrived at once. To my surprise, most of them were from Jessica Shang. I scrolled through them quickly, hoping one might say something important, like “Heard my dad tried to have you killed. Sorry. I'm so angry at him, I'm going to tell you what his evil plans are. . . .” Instead, they were all a bit more normal:

Furious at my father for grounding me today. What a massive jerk!

And:

Looks awesome out there. Can't believe I'm stuck inside.

As I got further along, they got a bit testier, as Jessica grew upset that I wasn't texting back.

Where R U?

Thought we were friends.

R U still freaked out because of my father?

It seemed that I really ought to write back to her, though I wasn't exactly sure what the proper response should be. Plus, I was having trouble focusing on it. I continued to have the nagging sense that I was missing something in the restaurant. It felt as though my observational skills were kicking in, only not quite well enough. Like I'd seen the important object—whatever it was—but hadn't fully grasped it at the time. I looked around again, more slowly this time, doing my best to take everything in, to not let a single item escape my grasp.

“So,” Mike said. “What happens now?”

“Well,” Zoe said, “I guess Cyrus and Alexander will come get us. That's Erica's grandfather and father. They're both CIA too. And then, um . . . I'm not sure. Figuring out what the bad guys are up to is usually Ben's job.”

“Really?” Mike turned to me, intrigued. “You're that good?”

“I'm okay,” I said.

“He's way better than okay!” Zoe corrected. “Ben's the best! Every time he's faced the bad guys, he's figured out their plans.”

Mike's eyes widened. “Every time?” he repeated. “How many missions have you gone on?”

“Not that many,” I said humbly, still trying to focus on the room.

“This is his
fourth
,” Zoe told Mike. “Which is huge, given that he's only been at spy school a year. A lot of kids never get to go on a single mission the whole time they're there. But Ben has uncovered moles and saved the president. . . .”

“The president of the United States?” Mike asked, amazed.

“Aw, that's nothing,” Zoe told him proudly. “Last fall Ben saved all of New York City from getting blown up!”

Mike stared at me, stunned.

“Zoe's exaggerating,” I told him. “I didn't save the
whole
city.”

“Well, he saved a lot of it,” Zoe stressed. “He's exceptionally good at thwarting the plans of bad guys. So now I guess we just need to give him some time to think things over so he can figure out what the Shangs are up to and then we can go thwart
their
plans too.”

“Wow,” Mike said. “And this whole time, everyone thought you were just going to a nerd academy.”

“That's the problem with being a spy.” I sighed. “Everything's supposed to be a secret. Even when you save the world, everyone back home still thinks you're a dork.”

I had imagined this event plenty of times: the moment when Mike finally learned my big secret and realized I was much cooler than he thought. But now that it was here, it wasn't quite as wonderful as I'd hoped. Because at the moment, the past didn't matter at all. What mattered was the present, and despite Zoe's belief in me, I had no idea what Leo Shang was up to. Even after three days on the case, I was drawing a giant blank—and time was running out. If I didn't figure out what Operation Golden Fist was soon, I'd have failed. And failure in spy school was far more than just a bad grade on your permanent record. It meant chaos, destruction, and a lot of other terrible things. . . .

Across the room, one of the snowmobilers shifted in her seat, revealing a metal sign nailed to the wall behind her. It was old and rusted, dented a hundred times over.
PROPERTY OF CLIMAX MOLYBDENUM MINING
, it read.
GUARDS ON PREMISES. NO TRESPASSING
.

I sat up, suddenly forgetting all about food or anything else.

The waitress stopped at our table, bearing glasses of water for all of us.

“Is the Climax Mine somewhere near here?” I asked.

“Sure is!” she said. “It's just a few miles up the road. Half the town works there.” She plunked the glasses down and headed back to the kitchen.

“What's all this about the Climax Mine?” Zoe asked.

“Look,” I said, pointing across the room.

“Oh!” Warren cooed. “Another jackalope! How do you think those things get in their burrows with those big horns?”

“Not the jackalope,” I said. “The sign! Jessica Shang misheard her father. He wasn't saying he was going to see ‘Molly Denham.' He was going to see ‘
molybdenum
.' ”

“I'll be danged,” Woodchuck said. “I can't believe the Climax Mine is
here
.”

“You've heard of it?” I asked.

“Sure. I wrote a paper on it back when I was in spy school, for my history of espionage class. I knew the mine was in the Rockies, I just didn't realize we were practically on top of it.”

“Whoa,” Mike said. “Slow down. What is this molly-whatever stuff?”

“Molybdenum,” I corrected. “It's one of the elements.”

“Its primary industrial use is to make steel much stronger,” Woodchuck explained. “It's extremely important for making weapons, especially large-scale ones. The Germans first figured that out back during World War One. They
were building these massive cannons that could fire one-ton shells for more than ten miles, but the cannons were tearing apart from their own explosions. Then the German scientists realized adding molybdenum to the steel would prevent that from happening—but there was only one place on earth known to have large deposits of it: the Climax Mine. So the Germans sent a covert team out here and essentially stole it from the owner. Then they starting mining molybdenum and shipped all of it to Germany.”

“The Germans captured an entire mine
inside
Colorado?” Mike asked. “And then used it to make weapons they fought us with? And we let them do it?”

“Yes,” Woodchuck replied. “In fact, the United States didn't even notice the mine was in German hands for three years. It was a major intelligence failure. Of course, there wasn't a CIA back then—or much of any organized spy network, really. Climax was one of the reasons the government realized they
needed
an intelligence agency. Once we found out what was going on, we took the mine back from the Germans, and it's stayed in American hands ever since. To this day, there's been only one other major deposit of molybdenum found in the entire world.”

“Where?” I asked, although I was pretty sure I could guess the answer.

“China,” Woodchuck replied.

“I'm
betting there's a good chance Leo Shang controls it,” I said. “Anyone have a working phone?”

“Already on it.” Mike had his phone out and was Googling the answer. “I don't see anything about the owner, but it's called Huangshan. . . .”

“Huangshan!” Zoe exclaimed. “I saw Jawa type that name, like, ten dozen times while he was eavesdropping on Shang's business calls last night!”

“Do you know what Shang was saying about it?” I asked.

“No. That was Jawa's bug to deal with,” Zoe explained. “But Shang was certainly talking about Huangshan a lot.”

The waitress came over with a plate piled high with bacon and sausage. “Eggs are coming, kids. But I figured you wanted this fast.”

She set it on the table, and we all dove in, spearing meat on our forks and wolfing it down. Everyone except Warren, who groused, “Where's the pickles?”

It was pretty much the best thing I'd ever tasted.

“One thing,” Mike said, through a mouth stuffed with sausage. “So Shang owns another molybdenum mine. What's the big deal with him looking at this one? That isn't a crime, is it?”

“No,” I admitted. “But Erica heard him say he was plotting something for today. And he's definitely been secretive,
acting like he's going heli-skiing when he's not, renting the entire hotel and hiding something in his room. . . .” I trailed off, a horrible thought occurring to me.

“What's wrong?” Zoe asked.

“I think I know what Operation Golden Fist is.” I snapped to my feet and pulled my jacket back on.

“Where are you going?” Woodchuck asked me. “We've still got eggs coming!”

“I need to talk to Erica right away.” I grabbed a handful of bacon, rebuckled my ski boots—doing my best to ignore the resurgence of pain—and headed through the restaurant. “Cyrus needs to hear about this!” I raced out the door into the parking lot and found Erica nearby.

Unfortunately, she was unconscious. She was sprawled on her side in the snow not too far from the horse.

I ran to her side to check on her. To my relief, she was still breathing.

It occurred to me a little too late that I'd just dropped my guard in a very big way.

“Get your hands up, Ben,” someone said from behind me. “And don't try anything funny. I've got a gun.”

I knew the voice. I did exactly as ordered, turning around to face my nemesis:

Murray Hill.

Minturn, Colorado

December 30

1330 hours

Murray wasn't much older than
me, but he had been a dangerous covert agent for SPYDER. The last time I'd seen him, he was running for his life as a missile was about to blow up a good bit of New Jersey. Despite there being hundreds of CIA agents around, he'd escaped and disappeared without a trace. He hadn't changed much since then; he was still as slovenly as ever. His hair was unkempt, his posture was terrible, and the thick parka he wore was splotchy with food stains. He was flashing the same cocky smile he always did when he had me at the business end of a gun and spoke
with his same lackadaisical attitude, like he was having a great time. “Hey, Ben. It's good to see you.”

Since he'd caught me by surprise, it took me a few moments to manage to say anything. I had a thousand questions all vying to be asked at once. “Where did . . . ? How . . . ? When . . . ? What are you doing here?”

“I'm competing in the halfpipe at the X Games,” Murray said sarcastically. “What do you
think
I'm doing here? I'm working for the bad guy.”

“You mean SPYDER is working with Shang?”

“SPYDER?” Murray laughed. “Those jerks don't know anything about this. That whole organization is a mess since you blew their headquarters up.”

“So you're not working for them anymore?”

“Those dirt bags left me at the scene of the crime to be their patsy while they all fled the country! That was completely uncool. I'm not about to work for people who don't respect me. I'm a freelance evil agent now.”

“There are freelance evil agents?” I asked, unable to hide my surprise.

“Oh, yeah. Tons of them. SPYDER was unusual. There's not a whole lot of organizations out there dedicated to causing chaos and mayhem full-time. A guy like Leo Shang pulls off maybe one or two evil schemes a year, if that. In fact, sometimes he's gone years without doing
anything
evil. So there's
no point in him having a bunch of guys like me on the payroll twenty-four seven. Instead, he hires us all for a scheme, we come in, we get the job done, and then we move on.”

“Like Dane Brammage?”

“Yeah, that slab of meat is a freelance too. It's way better than working for SPYDER. The pay's higher, the accommodations have been top-notch, and I don't have to worry about anyone setting me up as a patsy and blowing me up. The only problem with this plan has been the weather. I am freaking freezing!” Murray shivered and rubbed himself with the arm he wasn't using to hold a gun on me. “Ski people are crazy, coming someplace this cold on vacation. What do they have against the beach?”

I glanced toward the restaurant door, hoping someone else from the gang would be heading outside soon. Murray's major weakness was that he loved to talk. I figured if I could keep him on his favorite subject—himself—I could stall long enough for someone to come to my rescue. “So, have you been here with Shang this whole time?”

“In Vail? No. Believe me, if I'd been here, there's no way you would have gotten anywhere as close to Jessica as you did. I was in China, handling some really important stuff this morning. I got in on the ground floor on this one. In fact, a lot of this whole thing was my idea. So I fly in to help
put the final pieces of this plan into action and hear Leo's having a cow because some kid's charmed his way in with Jessica. Well, the alarm bells go off for me. I ask if there's a picture of the kid, and he shows me, and I'm like, ‘Holy guacamole, that's no normal kid. That's Ben Ripley!' ”