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RECRUITMENT Ripley Residence 2107 Mockingbird Road Vienna, Virginia January 16 1530 hours “Hello, Ben,” said the man in my living room. “My name is Alexander Hale. I work for the CIA.” And just like that, my life became interesting. It hadn’t been, up till then. Not by a long shot. That day had been a prime example: day 4,583, seven months into the twelfth year of my mundane existence. I had dragged myself out of bed, eaten breakfast, gone to middle school, been bored in class, stared at girls I was too embarrassed to approach, had lunch, slogged through gym, fallen asleep in math, been harassed by Dirk the Jerk, taken the bus home . . . And found a man in a tuxedo sitting on the couch. I didn’t doubt he was a spy for a second. Alexander Hale looked exactly like I’d always imagined a spy would. A tiny bit older, perhaps—he seemed about fifty—but still suave and debonair. He had a small scar on his chin—from a bullet, I guessed, or maybe something more exotic, like a crossbow. There was something very James Bond about him; I could imagine he’d been in a car chase on the way over and taken out the bad guys without breaking a sweat. My parents weren’t home. They never were when I got back from school. Alexander had obviously “let himself in.” The photo album from our family vacation to Virginia Beach sat open on the
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