Hi! Hello! Welcome to Spy School: Legends & Legacies! I really appreciate that you decided to click on this fic out of all the other fics on this site! I hope you enjoy your time here.

Updates may be a bit wonky but I promise to update on a semi-regular basis. Monthly or bi-monthly probably. So look out for that.

Another thing. At this point in time I've only read up to Revolution, so I hope you will accept any inconsistencies with any later books as simply an AU or something. This is my first Spy School fic so I hope you'll all be gracious as I figure out this fandom.

Thank you so much and please enjoy the story! :)

1. FAILURE

The most dangerous mission of my life began with yet another game of paintball.

Well, technically it began with a proper CIA meeting, but the paintball game proved to be thematically appropriate to the story, so I'm including it in my account.

Paintball, while a remarkably normal thing at spy school was definitely something that set us apart from most other schools. That was probably because most schools didn't offer self-preservation classes, while at spy school failing such a class would have earned you an expulsion and a stint in the Witness Protection Program.

This had been made clear within my first week of spy school, so I already knew this the easy way. Right now, I was trying to avoid learning that the hard way.

Unfortunately, I wasn't very good at that. At the moment, I was busy running from away from a hailstorm of blue paintballs. This proved to be quite challenging. Between the paintball gun and my gear, I was carrying a lot of extra weight around. Luckily, I was able to dive into a into a bush right on time to avoid being painted blue.

I heard the gunfire (or paint fire) splatter the shrubbery, then cease. I waited a few seconds, then sighed. Seemed like I was in the clear for now.

"Ben! There you are!" I jumped, startled by the sound of Zoe Zibbel's excitedly high-pitched voice. Zoe was a fellow student in my year at spy school and one of my closest friends. Despite being an extremely skilled spy though, she didn't seem to notice my startle reaction which was alright with me.

Good thing we found you, Ben!" Mike Brezenski, another one of my spy friends. "We just came up with a plan to capture the blue team's flag and we need your help to do it."

"You did? I mean, you do?" Looking to my friends I realized that there were more people than I first saw. Aside from Zoe and Mike, my friends Jawa and Chip had joined us as well. On the one hand, I was glad for that. Jawa and Chip were good spies, acting as the brains and brawns of our team respectively from time to time. They were best friends and though it was a little odd that two people so different could be so close they made sense in their own way and acted as a team.

On the other hand, knowing that all of my other friends had come up with a plan while I'd been busy cowering from our opponents made my feel stupid, useless and out of the loop. It was a good thing Erica wasn't here. Then I probably would've felt very stupid.

Erica Hale was one of the top students, no, the top student at spy school. This came as no surprise. As a descendant of Nathan Hale, she belonged to a long line of legendary spies, including her grandfather, Cyrus Hale and her mother Catherine Hale, who while not related to Nathan Hale by blood, had married into the family through Erica's father, Alexander Hale.

But Erica had been no where to be seen since the year started. We hadn't seen her when we all arrived at school, when we arrived at orientation, or during the leadup to the paintball game. It was possible that she'd just be running a little late (maybe she was on a mission with her family or something?) but it was still concerning nonetheless. Erica, being a top student, tried to miss as little school as possible.

And if she did have to miss school she would've informed her friends about it.

"Right?"

"Of course!" Chip shouted. "You're going to need to calculate some pretty hard math for us! Think you can do it?"

"Of course, I can," I said, with a nod. My math skills were uncanny. I could memorize any number, calculate measurements, convert measurements and tell the exact time something occurred without effort. If there was any way I would be able to help it'd be with that.

"Well good!" Zoe said, her green eyes lighting up. "Here! Come this way."

The five of us were all sitting up in the trees, looking down at the blue team's camp. Five "guards" were standing in a circle around a blue flag that flapped wildly in the fall wind. While there were a few specks of red paint in the area, most of it was covered in blue, suggesting that very little of our fellow teammates had survived their encounters there.

Despite my disappointment at not having contributed I really did wonder what plan my friends had come up with. Was it good enough to beat these clearly skilled agents in training?

"Here's the plan," Zoe said excitedly. "We're going to fetch the flag from above."

"From above!?" I echoed. "What are we going to drop someone on a rope hanging from the trees and hope that none of the blue team notice?"

"No," said Chip. "We're going to come down swinging from the trees like Tarzan and steal the flag that way."

"Oh." I said, thinking that was significantly worse sounding. But mostly because it sounded scary. In actuality I did think it'd be a more affective plan than just dropping down from a rope.

"Don't worry, Ben," Jawa assured me when he saw my face turn white. "You won't be doing any swinging yourself. Like we said, we just need you to do calculations."

From there, the group explained their plan to me. First, Mike and Chip would come to them with a diversion, pulling their attention away from the bright, warm colored treetops. Then, when they were distracted, Mike would give the signal (a fist in the air) and Jawa and Zoe would swing down from the trees. While Jawa would shoot at the guards, Zoe would catch the flag. Then both would swing up to a tree on the other side, where they'd be safe from our opponents and able to declare themselves the official winners of the paintball game.

"I've got a length of rope in my bag," said Mike. "Your job, Ben is to calculate how long the rope should be, where we should tie them, How long after the diversion Zoe and Jawa should swing, how much force they should you and when Zoe should make a grab for the flag."

I nodded. That sounded like a lot of calculations, but I figured it'd be easy enough. I was good at math. Remarkably good. It was my thing.

Or at least I thought it was.

Within minutes I had determined, to the best of my ability, the best way to carry out our plan. While Mike and Chip had scurried down the tree to prepare the diversion, Jawa and Zoe and I went upwards. There, we cut the rope in two long pieces and tied it near the top of the tree. I chose this place because it would've allowed my friends to get low enough to the enemies while also giving them a branch on the other side where they could have easily landed.

It seemed like the prefect place.

"We're in position!" Mike said, a few minutes later. He was speaking from a walkie-talkie of course. We'd all been given one just for the paintball fight even though we'd never used one in the field and probably never would. All my secret spy communication had been done via earpieces.

"So are we!" Shouted Zoe, and she turned to me. "Now, it's up to you, Ben. Just tell us when to go."

"Okay!" I said, my voice full of determination. Turning my face to the guards on the blue team, I saw that they were still on high alert, pointing their guns all around the clearing. That's when I noticed it. Two of our fellow red team members were attempting to creep up on them. One on each side. I could already tell they were going to lose. It was two to five for one thing and their plan wasn't all that good. They'd be taken out within seconds once the blue team guards found them and pelted them with paint.

Despite the fact that this meant that our team would have less active players, I was happy with this development, because it provided the right circumstances for us to take the win.

Down below, the two red team agents charged towards the blue team. As expected, they were blasted with pain almost immediately. In fact, the force was so strong for one of the agents that he fell down. By this time Jawa and Zoe had their eye on what was happening too and they cringed as they watched.

"Boy, those two did not think that plan through," Jawa stated. Perhaps it was a bit of a smug thing to say but it was also a true thing to say.

As the blue team was mocking the red team for their show of stupidity, I leaned into the walkie talkie. "Go." I whispered.

Mike and Chip went. Dashing out of the trees and into the clearing, pelting the enemies with red paint. A second after they emerged, I shouted to Jawa and Zoe, "Now!" They were just as diligent as their other teammates, shooting off before I had finished saying the word. In that moment I was proud of myself. It seemed as if everything was going according to plan.

But then something terrible happened.

On their way down, Mike, who had been shooting at the blue team while running backwards had lost his footing and tripped over a rock. This caused him to accidentally aim his gun at Jawa who he hit, spot on.

This would've been bad enough on its own, as friendly fire still counted as an out in spy school paint ball. But what made it worse was that it started a chain reaction. Jawa didn't let go of the rope as he fell but apparently he was so strong that he was able to bring the admittedly, rather flimsy branch they swung off down with him. He, Zoe and I all fell to the ground.

One our way down Zoe ended up crashing into Mike, while I fell on top of Chip. Within seconds we had all gone form a group of smug spies to a pathetic pile of bodies groaning on the ground.

In no time at all we were covered in blue paint.

"Ha! You red team really are pathetic!" Shouted the leader of the blue team. "We'll see you losers later after we've won!" They all burst into laughter.

Meanwhile, us blue team were all covered in bruises and all kinds of angry at each other.

"What the heck, Mike!" I shouted. "What made you think it was a good idea to walk backwards with a gun!?"

"And why weren't you conscious of the quality of the branch!" Mike shouted back. "Jawa was able to take that thing down!"

"It's his fault for not letting go!" I accused. "If he didn't it wouldn't have caused so much trouble!"

"Hey!" Jawa shouted. "It wasn't my idea to swing like Tarzan! That was Zoe's! I wanted to grab it with a hook or something!"

"Well, you didn't say as much while we were brainstorming!" Zoe shouted.

From there we devolved into a nasty argument, accusing, and pointing fingers at each other. It was only interrupted when we heard the sound of a horn blast through the campus grounds.

"The red team's flag has been captured!" Shouted the voice of the principal. "The blue team wins! Everyone come back to school for some celebratory hot chocolate!"

Not too far from us, we heard the blue team guards whoop with joy. Already, they were talking about their hot chocolate. Normally, the five of us would have been happy about hot chocolate as well, but we were too salty about what had just transpired. Our team was silent and sullen as we walked back to the main school.

Once we got there, we were surrounded by students milling about as they enjoyed their hot chocolate. Even our fellow teammates from the red team didn't seem too upset by how things had turned out. This was probably because everyone who had remained in the game to the end had earned nice B's, which anyone would be happy to get. Even me, as it was easily among the best grades I'd gotten at spy school.

That's why it seemed strange at first glance that we were unhappy.

Then I caught the principal walking up to us and our unhappiness was once again justified. No one was happy when encountering the principal of our school. Probably because he was an incompetent quack.

"Benjamin! Zoe! Jawa, Chip and Mike! How are you all this afternoon?"

"Fine," I lied.

"Just fine!?" He asked in an overly cheerful voice. "I think it was great! In fact, it was one of the best games of paintball I'd ever witnessed!"

"I'm glad," Chip deadpanned.

It was clear that, while the principal was making an attempt to be pleasant, he couldn't hide his nervousness. He was constantly fidgeting with his hands and his eyes were darting every which way. Clearly something was up.

Jawa, privy to this as well, got straight to business. "What's going on, principal? Do you need us for something?"

"As a matter of fact, I do," The principal announced. "Someone from the CIA is here. To see all of you."

The five of us all looked to each other. If the CIA was here that meant something serious was going on. My anger quickly dissipated. A thought suddenly occurred to me, but I felt it too terrible to voice.

Zoe didn't though.

"Does this have something to do with Erica? And the Hales? Are they in trouble?"

"You'll find out when we get to my office," The principal said. "Just come with me." He had probably intended to sound reassuring but looking into his eyes, we could see that he'd realized that we'd known what this was all about. Immediately, my fear for Erica spiked.

What on Earth had she gotten herself into?

The six of us continued into spy school, not even stopping for hot chocolate, which I was pretty sure I wouldn't've been able to keep down anyway. Since everyone else was outside for the paintball fight, the halls were empty, so our footsteps were exceptionally loud. Loud enough to cover our whispering from the principal who was incompetent enough to not pay attention to the students walking right behind him.

"So, we're all aware this is about Erica, right?" Mike asked us.

"Yeah," Jawa agreed. "Erica and all the rest of the Hales."

"You think something went wrong during their mission?" Chip asked us.

"How do you know they all went on a mission?" Zoe questioned.

"Well, I don't exactly know," Chip confessed. "I'm just making an educated guess."

"Here we are!" The principal shouted. WE had arrived at the remains of his office. Despite the fact that my attack on his workspace had happened a year ago (This was actually the anniversary, so yay!) it still hadn't been properly repaired. Upon walking through it, I discovered that it was still a mess of exposed wooden beams, wires, and concrete.

All of this would've been eye catching if it hadn't been for the people who were already in the room. The first was a short squat woman with oaken hued skin and dark hair tied up in a tight bun. She was wearing a sour expression, as if she'd just bitten into a lemon.

The second was a man we all recognized. His icy blue eyes and dark hair were hard to miss. Especially in the spy world.

Alexander Hale looked at all of us in surprise as we entered the room. The rest of the Hales were nowhere to be found.

So yeah, that's the chapter! Hope you enjoyed! Sorry there wasn't that much Hale action, this was more of an introductory chapter. Still, I hope you'll stick around for chapter 2. We'll see more of the premise then.

Thank you for reading! Have a wonderful day!