Operation Holiday Cheer - A Spy School Story

Chapter 4: Simulation Debriefing

CIA Academy of Espionage

Washington, DC

The War Zone's "Morgue"

December 17th, 2015

1546 hours

Ben POV

As we walked to the morgue, everyone on the Red Team gave me high fives, fist bumps, and claps on the back.

"Nice work, Ben!"

"Doggone good strategy, dude!"

"That was amazing!"

"You're one a heck of a leader!"

I blushed from the praise. "Thanks guys, but y'all are the real heroes. You executed the plan," I said loudly.

Several people facepalmed simultaneously. "Just accept the praise! Stop being so humble!" they shouted in annoyance.

Feeling a little scared, I nodded furiously. I hung back, waiting on three teammates in particular.

"Ben! That was brilliant!" Zoe exclaimed, giving me a hug.

I hugged her back. "Thanks, Zo! You were great too!" I released her from the hug to do the secret handshake with Mike.

"Dang, bro! That was freakin' spectacular, eh?" he said in a Scottish accent, almost word-for-word quoting a spy film save for a cuss that he replaced with "freakin'." What was that movie called again?

Ah, nevermind. Back to the story!

"Oh yeah. You did great, man!" I said. I then stopped to look at Erica. We stared at each other for a few seconds, when Zoe got an idea.

"Mike, come on! Let's get some hot chocolate before it runs out!" she says with a mischievous grin.

Mike frowned. "Thanks Zoe, but—"

"Mike, come on!" she said, still smiling but having a tinge of annoyance in her voice. She grabbed his hand and pulled him away.

Mike blushed from the contact, but obediently followed Zoe. I took note, knowing it would be perfect blackmail material.

I looked at Erica, and neither of us spoke until I decided to break the silence.

"So... did you have fun?" I asked nervously.

She thought for a moment before nodding slightly. "I'll admit, it wasn't too bad. They weren't too dumb," she said.

I smiled. "I'm glad you came and enjoyed it."

She didn't respond, but she smiled back.

"RIPLEY! HALE! GET OVER HERE NOW!" shouted one of our instructors.

Erica nodded. "C'mon, Ripley. Let's debrief," she said, patting my shoulder as she strode past me.

Third Person POV

What Erica didn't see was that while Ben had a tinge of red on his face from the contact, he also had an expression that disappeared as soon as it came. Not embarrassment, or even happiness from being touched by his crush, but... fear?

Ben POV

I shook myself out of my thoughts and went into debrief.

Inside, everyone was waiting, including our two Conducting Warfare instructors, Professors Alex Mason and Frank Woods.  While they shared this class along with Firearms Handling, Woods taught the Physical Training class himself, while Mason taught Counter-Interrogation.