Not long after that, Dwayne and I were driving down a street in a small Virginia town. It was an industrial area, and there was a factory at the end of the street.

Dwayne stopped up the block from the factory. “Well, kid, this is it: your first assignment. And boy, is it a doozy. It should have gone to someone a lot more experienced, but you’re the only agent we have who fits the profile. You did read the file on your cover story, right?”

“Memorized it,” I said. I was proud of my memory, it had helped me ace many high school tests.

“Good. Now in that factory yonder, there’s a team of metallurgists working, though they don’t know it, for Aegis. We think they should be working for us instead, but Aegis handles the security so an automech can’t go within a block of it right now. But we’ve found a weak spot: that kid there walking up the sidewalk.”

I glanced at him. Kind of skinny, brown hair, glasses. “That’s Phil Morton,” Dwayne continued. “Intern. And the psych profile says you’re just his type.”