UNDERCOVER: Mission Failed?

Chapter 4

I ended up finding one of Chris' friends and tagged him. That friend then tagged Ashley, Ashely tagged Chris' other friend, and that friend tagged me again. Long story short, I'm it again.

Turns out, the forest was larger than I expected it to be. I was wandering around, probably in circles, before I was able to catch a glimpse of somebody. As soon as I saw the person, I knew it was a boy. I chased after him as if my life depended on it. I just wanted to get this game over with.

The boy was actually pretty fast, so I ended up giving up on chasing after him. However, I didn't give up on the game. I slowly climbed up a tree and sat on one of the high branches. I looked down at the forest and immediately saw where four people were. I was a good forty meters off the ground and the view was gorgeous from up there.

Anyway, I saw Ashley, Julia, and two other boys from where I was sitting. Wait. Where's Chris?

"Great minds think alike, right sunshine?" I heard a voice not too far away from where I was. I snapped my head in the direction of the voice to see Chris sitting on a tree branch a couple feet away from me. How did I not notice him sitting there when I climbed up? How did he even climb up this high?

"How did you climb up here?" I asked him bewildered.

"I can do whatever you do." He said lazily. I mentally scoffed. Yeah right. He probably can't do half the things I can since I'm a secret agent for the FBI and he's not.

"Aren't you supposed to be running away from me right now since we're playing tag?" I asked him.

"You can't catch me." He said in a childish voice. I rolled my eyes.

I stood up on the branch I was on and started stepping towards Chris.

"Careful, sunshine. I wouldn't want you getting hurt." He said with an amused expression.

"I'm not going to get hurt." I said as I took another step towards him.

"You're going to fall any second now. Just give up. You're not going to be able to tag me." He said.

Without giving him a warning, I jumped off of my branch and landed on his branch perfectly. His eyes widened as he quickly stood up. He started jumping onto a few branches away from me, but I followed him.

"Careful, sunshine!" He yelled as he continued jumping away from me.

"Take care of yourself!" I yelled back as I started nearing him.

Without giving it another thought, I jumped on his back while Chris landed perfectly on a branch. Our position was pretty awkward since I was pretty much straddling him from the back, but I didn't care.

"Tag, no tag backs." I whispered in his ear. I got off of his back and gave him a cheeky smile.

"I didn't know you could do that." He said referring to me jumping on and off the branches.

"Well, there's a lot you didn't know about me." I mumbled.

"What was that, sunshine?" He asked curiously.

"Nothing. Anyway, I have to go with Julia and Ashley now. I'll see you at school." I said and started climbing down the tree without waiting for him to reply. 

I can't believe I'm being so careless with keeping my identity a secret. 

Once I found Ashley and Julia, we started walking home, but of course they couldn't hold back all of their questions.

"I saw you and Chris up in a tree." Julia said.

"Same! What were you two talking about?" Ashley asked while wiggling her eyebrows. I laughed lightly.

"We were just talking. Nothing more, nothing less." I said casually.

"You do know that Chris is the most popular senior at the school we're going to, right?" Ashley asked me. I looked at her oddly.

"How do you know that? We've only been attending that school for a day." Ashley gave me a sly look.

"I have my resources." She said and I just shook my head, laughing.

'"Where were you guys?" Jack asked us as soon as we walked through the house door.

"Out." I said simply. Jack frowned slightly at my vague response.

"What were you guys doing out though?" He asked.

"We just hung out with Chris and his friends." Ashley said.

"Chris!?" Caleb asked, suddenly coming into the room we were all in.

"Yeah, Chris. Why do you sound so mad because of that?" I asked him, confused.

"Chris gives me a bad vibe. I don't want you guys near him." Caleb ordered us. I scoffed.

"Since when can you tell me what to do?" I asked annoyed.

"I'm older!" He exclaimed.

"Only by three minutes !" I responded frustratedly. Caleb and I are twins, but even though he was born first, he tries to take that to his advantage all the time.

"Also, you should be more responsible! You could've gotten Ashley and Julia in trouble by hanging out with Chris!" Caleb exclaimed.

"He dragged me there to hang out with him and his friends! I didn't follow him!" I screamed at Caleb.

"Well, you should've at least informed Jack and I somehow. I can't believe you would even be messing around when the mission just started. You have to pay more attention to finding the illegal gang." Caleb lectured me.

"Shut up!" I yelled at him and stomped up the stairs, into my room.

Knock, Knock!

"GO AWAY, CALEB!" I screamed, not bothering to ask who was at the door.

"It's not Caleb." Jack said from the other side of the door.

"Oh. Well, come in." I said tiredly.

As soon as Jack came in, he sat next to me on my bed and hugged me. I hugged him back and breathed in the scent of his cologne.

"He doesn't even let me explain." I muttered.

"I know." He said comfortingly.

"Why can't he try to understand me?" I asked, more to myself.

"That's just how he is." Jack said.  

I broke the hug and looked at Jack.

"Do you want me to stay away from Chris?" I asked Jack.

"Where did you get that impression?" He asked me.

"I saw you back there in the other room. I saw how you frowned when you found out I hung out with Chris." I said. Jack sighed.

"I honestly don't know what to think." Jack said.

"Well, do you want me to stay away from him or not?" I asked impatiently. I don't know why I was acting so snappy towards Jack when he didn't do anything. Caleb just gets me wound up really fast these days.

"I have to agree with Caleb. I think that you should stay away from Chris, but my reason isn't because of getting bad vibes from him. Chris is just suspicious to me. However, if you want to hang out with him still, I won't get mad. If he makes you happy, then I won't stop you from hanging out with him." Jack said to me.

I gave him a bone crushing hug.

"Thank you so much for understanding." I said into his chest.

"No problem." He answered.

***

I didn't bother with waiting for everybody to get up the next morning. I simply ate some cereal, grabbed my bag, and left for school. I left Ashley a sticky note in her room, saying that I went to school already. Ashley is usually the first to always wake up, so she can just tell the others that I already left.

Once I arrived at school, my presence was immediately acknowledged by the few kids who were already there. I arrived at school really early so that I can try and find information about the illegal gang that my mission is about. The problem is, where do I start?

Ring, ring!

I took out my phone and looked at the caller ID. It read "Kirk." Why is he calling me at this time?

"What is it, Kirk?" I asked him once I picked up the phone.

"I have some information about the illegal gang." He said, going straight to the point.

"Okay, one moment." I said as I walked into an empty classroom.

I didn't want anybody to be eavesdropping on my conversation. That could totally blow my cover and I don't need that happening. 

"Okay, you can tell me now." I said once I closed the classroom door.

"Remember all of this information because I'm only saying it once." Kirk said. I nodded, but quickly answered him when I realized he can't see me since we're on the phone.

"Okay." I said.

"The illegal gang consists of five male members. The leader is twenty while the youngest is seventeen. They all live together, but their address is unknown. None of the members have a job, but one of the members attend your school. The identity of the person who attends your school is mostly unknown, but I do know that he's a senior just like you." Kirk said slowly and carefully. I took a mental note about everything.

"Is that all?" I asked.

"One last thing." Kirk said.

"What is that?" I asked him slowly. I heard Kirk pause for a moment before saying two words that have never confused me more in my life.

"Don't die." He said simply and hung up.

Why does he keep on telling me to not die? It's like he really thinks I'm going to die. Doesn't he have more faith in me? I haven't even gotten a scratch on half of my missions, yet they're all successes.

I put my phone away and started walking in the school hallway. I examined the students one by one without them knowing. None of them seemed like a potential murderer, yet the gang member could be any of them. 

"Sunshine?" I heard somebody say my name from behind me. I turned around and saw Chris.

"What is it Chris?" I asked him unamused. I really had to focus on the mission since I've been messing around lately. 

"Why are you literally checking out almost every guy in the hallway?" He asked me on the verge of laughing. I gave him a confused look, but immediately felt myself blush when I realized that it may have looked like I was checking guys out when I examined them.

Wait. How did he know I was looking at the guys? Nobody should've been able to tell because I discreetly did it. Even my teammates can't tell when I examine people. 

If Chris was able to tell, could that mean that he was one of the gang members!? After all, he was able to jump from branch to branch just like me yesterday when we were playing tag. Caleb even said that Chris gives him a bad vibe. Jack said that Chris is suspicious. 

My eyes widened as I looked at Chris. Have I been hanging out with a murderer!?

"Sunshine, what's wrong?" He asked me when he saw my face. His face was now filled with worry.

"Nothing. I have to go." I said without looking at him. Chris got a grip of my wrist though and he pulled me back.

"No, tell me. What's wrong? Did I do something wrong?" He asked me.

"I don't even know anymore." I mumbled as I got out of his grip.

Maybe, I should take Caleb and Jack's advice to not hang out with Chris anymore.

***

"Are you okay, Skylar?" Julia asked me as soon as I saw her. 

"I'm fine." I said.

"Don’t lie. Your face looks so pale." She said worriedly.

"Don't worry about me. What happened to your wrist though?" I asked her, now looking at her wrapped wrist.

"Lexi must've hurt me yesterday when she grabbed my wrists. This one really hurt, so I just wrapped it up a bit." Julia rambled.

"Well, I hope it heals soon." I said. 

My other team members soon walked into the classroom we were in. We all had Spanish first on Tuesday. I don't even know why I'm taking this class since I'm already fluent in this language.

One thing you probably don't know about me is that I'm actually fluent in six languages. I can speak English, Spanish, French, Chinese, German, and Italian. 

"Guys come over here." I said waving my teammates over to where Julia and I are sitting.

"What's up?" Jack asked as soon as they were all near me.

I looked around the room and saw that it was still empty. I then looked back at my teammates seriously.

"Kirk told me information about the gang." I whispered.

"What is it?" Ashley asked.

"There are five male members and their ages rank from seventeen to twenty. They live together, but there's no information about where their house is. They don't have a job, but one of them goes to this school and he's a senior like us." I informed them shortly.

"A senior?" Caleb asked, surprised.

"Yes and I think I might know who." I admitted. Caleb looked at me and I could tell that he immediately knew I was talking about Chris.

"Sorry about yesterday." Caleb said to me.

"No, I'm really sorry. You were right." I said as I got up and hugged him.

How could I have doubted my own brother in the first place? 

***

During Spanish class, I had a hard time with paying attention to what the teacher was saying. I just had a gut feeling that someone in the class I was currently in, was the murderer. Call me paranoid if you want, but my gut feelings are never wrong.

I looked around the room and saw only half of the class since some students had a field trip. That's good though because that lessens my options of seeing who the gang member is. I memorised the guys who were in this class.

There's Jack and Caleb who I already know are definitely not in the gang. There was one boy sleeping, one boy staring out the window, three boys talking while ignoring the lesson, two guys actually paying attention to the lesson, and then there's Chris in the back of the room. Chris was staring blankly at the board like he was in deep thought. 

I looked back at the board with all the Spanish words on it and kept on thinking about the guys in my class. Who could the killer be? I can't just confront one of them and ask if they're part of a gang.

Chris seemed to be really in thought though. Maybe he's thinking about who to murder next. Ugh, now I'm really being paranoid. Chris probably isn't the gang member. The gang member would try to keep themselves quiet in order to not draw attention to themselves, right?

I put my head on my desk and mentally groaned. This mission is seriously giving me a headache.