The Farm’s Pigs, Part 1
The SUV came to a stop in front of a red-brick building.
The moment I opened the door and stepped out, a wave of damp heat hit me in the face.
And it was only morning. I couldn’t even begin to imagine how miserable the afternoon would be.
The American flag hanging from the central flagpole sagged in the still air.
All around, two- and three-story red-brick buildings sat scattered among the trees.
Not a single one looked newly built. Every building had the feel of something that had been standing there for at least several decades.
Bang. Bang-bang.
Gunfire rang out from somewhere far off.
Then came the endless cry of cicadas, and the crunch of combat boots on gravel.
As always, I took a quick scan of the surroundings first: the layout of the buildings, the flow of foot traffic, the locations of the exits.
So that was the sound I heard last night.
I turned at the sound of the trunk opening.
Sam lifted out my suitcase and set it on the ground before speaking.
“This is as far as I go. Someone from inside will show you around from here.”
He held out his hand.
“Good luck, Lee.”
I smiled faintly and shook his hand.
We’d only known each other for two days, but he already felt strangely familiar.
That was probably how he got by at the CIA.
“Thanks, Sam.”
“All right, then. See you around.”
I pulled my suitcase behind me and headed into the administration building.
First I gave my name at reception.
“Lee.”
After signing the form the staff member handed me, I turned in all my personal belongings.
My phone and wallet, my passport, even the suitcase and backpack I’d brought with me.
In exchange, they issued the items I’d need to live here.
A set of training clothes, running shoes, toiletries, a dorm key, and a Camp ID card.
The training clothes were a plain khaki. The size had apparently been prearranged, because they fit surprisingly well.
Oh. This feels like—
As I accepted the supplies, unpleasant memories drifted through my mind.
The army training center. Issue day. The first night there. Night watch duty...
I felt slightly dirtier just thinking about it.
“Your dorm is in Building B, and each trainee gets a private room. Lights out is at 10 p.m., wake-up at 5:30 a.m. Breakfast is from 6:00 to 6:30. You may not leave camp during training, and as a rule you are not to reveal your real name or place of origin to trainees from other classes.”
I listened and nodded.
I was already used to not using my real name. If anything, it was easier this way.
“This way.”
I followed the staff member outside and walked along a path between the trees.
After about five minutes, a two-story brick building came into view. That was Building B, the dormitory.
My room was roughly in the middle of the second-floor hallway.
Click.
I slid the key in and opened the door.
The room was about the size of a tiny studio apartment, crammed with a single bed, a wooden desk, and a wardrobe.
There was a small safe under the desk, and a window on the wall.
Swish—
I pulled the curtain aside.
As expected, there was nothing but dense forest outside.
I dumped my things down and looked around the room.
A Hong Kong one-room apartment, an Osaka business hotel, last night’s motel, and now this.
Feels like they keep getting smaller...
Still, it was only a place to sleep.
I changed into my training clothes and stepped back out into the hallway.
“Hey.”
Just then, I caught the eye of a white guy coming out of the room next door.
He was at least 185 centimeters tall, with broad shoulders, short brown hair, and a square jaw.
His confident expression gave him the exact look of a quarterback straight out of a movie.
He held out a hand first.
“You just got here, right? We’re not supposed to use our names here, so you can call me ‘Mo.’”
I shook his hand.
His grip was strong.
“I’m Lee.”
“Good, Lee. Nice to meet you.”
I had been planning to keep it at that, but he naturally fell into step beside me as we walked.
He didn’t feel like the type forcing conversation, and he didn’t seem awkward either.
He seemed like the sort of person who could get along with anyone he met.
“You just got here? This is the first time I’ve seen your face.”
“Something like that.”
We were chatting as we headed down the stairs when someone came up from the first floor.
He was a little shorter than I was, with a lean build. A man who looked Middle Eastern. Short curly hair, a neatly trimmed mustache.
One side of his shirt had come untucked from his pants.
He stopped when he saw us.
“Oh, you guys are in this class too?”
Mo gave a light nod.
“Mo. This is Lee.”
“Call me Nad.”
After the three of us exchanged brief introductions, Nad immediately sidled up to us and opened his mouth.
“Man, does the air-conditioning in your room actually work? Mine’s turned all the way down and it’s still disgustingly hot. That thing’s definitely broken, right?”
Apparently he’d built up quite a bit of frustration in the hour since arrival.
Mo chuckled at him, listening to the nonstop complaint-fest.
“Places like this are always like that.”
“Like this? Oh, so other places are like this too?”
“Usually, yeah.”
Mo shrugged.
And just like that, Nad grumbled his way along behind us.
Before I knew it, the three of us had naturally become a group.
When we reached the first floor, I could see other trainees here and there.
Most of them were well-built, with sharp eyes. Even the way they walked was similar.
People who’d spent a long time in the military always stood out, no matter where they were.
Well, this is the CIA training facility. They said most of the trainees had military backgrounds.
I was recalling what Sam had told me when a man who looked like an instructor shouted from the end of the corridor.
“Form up in the auditorium in fifteen minutes for orientation.”
At that, Mo and Nad exchanged a look and started moving.
The training schedule at Camp Peary had begun.
***
At 5:30 a.m., the alarm went off.
I passed through the still-dark hallway and stepped outside, where a clinging heat welcomed me.
Even before sunrise, my T-shirt was already sticking to my back.
It’s insanely humid, damn it.
The smell of mosquito repellent hit me from the back of my neck.
This was day four of it. The scent had already started to feel like my own body odor.
5:45 a.m.
Our class had assembled in front of the trail course leading into the forest.
After a short stretch, the instructor gave the signal to start. Total distance: five miles.
We took off along the pine-needle-covered path.
Towering trees stretched skyward on both sides, passing by in a blur.
Tap-tap. Tap-tap.
The overall pace was pretty fast.
It was fast enough to leave an average person breathless after only a short run.
You could tell just by the way they ran. Most of them had been doing this kind of jog for a long time.
“Huff... huff...”
I deliberately kept my breathing as steady as I could while running.
My legs were getting heavier, and my breath was climbing up to my throat.
Still, the good thing was that using my inner energy made running a bit easier.
Not constantly, just in bursts—but that was enough.
“Hahh... Khaahh...”
Heavy breathing came from behind me. Nad.
At this rate he’d be dropped to the very back of the pack in no time. He’d already been doing that for days.
For the record, Mo was running right beside me.
He didn’t even look especially winded, wearing a fairly relaxed expression.
“Lee, I’ve been noticing this since the other day—you’re getting better and better at running.”
Mo tossed the words at me with a strange look.
Actually, on the first day, I hadn’t used my inner energy at all. I’d just run myself into the ground.
After getting completely crushed by this insane pace, I’d started using it.
“I’ve always been decent at running.”
“Where?”
That was a loaded question.
Was he asking where I was from, or whether I’d trained professionally?
Maybe both.
“Just on my own.”
Mo gave a small nod and didn’t ask further.
Instead, after a beat, he added, “I used to run like this every day in the Marines. Actually, it was a little harder than this.”
He hadn’t even been asked, but he brought it up himself.
For all his size, he seemed like a pretty considerate guy.
He’s a good one.
By the time the five miles were over, Nad had finally managed to catch up from behind.
He was bent over with both hands on his knees, gasping for air.
Mo handed him some water and said, “Hey, you still breathing?”
“...I’m breathing, damn it. This is seriously too much. What the hell am I supposed to do? People like me?”
“Oh, this isn’t even stretch-level warm-up yet.”
“Fuck. What did you say?”
Nad’s face twisted. He looked genuinely devastated.
I drank some water beside them and smirked.
What a ridiculous combination.
A super-influencer quarterback who got along with everyone, and a loud Middle Eastern nerd.
And me? I supposed I was just some mysterious ninja type who threw needles around.
Even to me, the combination was hilarious.
***
The outdoor firing range.
The first weapons training since entering camp was being held.
Beyond the earthen berms, a dense forest spread out.
It was tucked away in a remote spot five minutes by car from the dorms.
After a short briefing, we moved onto the firing lanes.
A pistol had been laid out on each table. A Glock 19.
The standard 9mm sidearm, and one of the most commonly used pistols at the CIA.
Click.
It was lighter than I expected, probably because of the plastic-like material.
It was small enough to fit in my palm, and once I attached the magazine it became a little heavier.
It felt oddly natural in my hand.
The instructor walked me through the basics from the side.
Two-handed grip, stance, how to focus on the front sight, how to pull the trigger.
After practicing the position a few times exactly as instructed, live fire began.
With the earplugs in place, every sound was dulled.
The target was a fixed silhouette at seven yards.
“Hoo...”
For the first shot, I simply fired.
I wanted to feel the pistol exactly as it was.
Bang!
The recoil ran through my wrist and shook my whole arm. It was much stronger than I’d expected.
I checked the target. The bullet mark barely clipped the edge of the paper.
It was almost a complete miss.
...Yeah, this is definitely different from a rifle.
At this rate, I felt like I’d do better throwing a coin.
It just wasn’t hitting the way I expected.
Bang! Bang!
The second and third shots were the same.
They made holes in the target, but all of them were scattered along the edges.
“Wait.”
The instructor, who’d been watching from the side, came over.
He looked at my grip, then adjusted the position of my index finger.
“Don’t squeeze the trigger. If you tense up, the muzzle drifts sideways. Hook the first joint of your index finger lightly over it, then pull slowly. When you feel it get stiff, give it one more smooth push.”
He corrected my hold as well.
The feedback was that my left hand wasn’t clamping down hard enough, letting the recoil push the gun off line. That was why the shot group was drifting to the right.
I tightened my left hand and took the pistol up again.
This time it felt properly locked in my grip.
“Hoo...”
I set my finger on the trigger and let the tension out of my body.
Then, slowly drawing up my inner energy, I observed myself with sharpened senses.
The thudding of my heart, and the muzzle trembling in time with it.
The wind passing through the outdoor range, and the target paper fixed beyond it.
Everything was suddenly crisp and clear.
I held my breath for a moment and eased the trigger back.
Just as I felt the trigger finger grow stiff—
Bang.
My arm barely moved.
When I looked at the target, the shot wasn’t in the center, but it was clearly inside the inner ring.
Got it.
The next shot drifted about three centimeters to the left.
Too much tension in my left hand. I corrected it and fired again, and this time it went straight into the center.
With every shot, I felt like I was reading the pistol itself.
At what angle the recoil jumped, how much the muzzle rose the instant after firing.
Each time I emptied a magazine, the impacts tightened further toward the center.
“Hmm...”
The instructor came up behind me once more.
This time he said nothing. He only looked at my target with a strange expression.
By the time training ended that day, I was shooting far more accurately than the lane beside me.
“...You said this was your first time shooting, didn’t you?”
“It is.”
Nad stared at my target, then at his own, and shot me a glare.
“First time and you’re shooting better than me? That’s fucking unfair.”
“Congratulations. You’re last in marksmanship too.”
Mo gave Nad a tap on the shoulder as he walked by.
For the record, the lane next to mine was Nad’s.
***
That evening.
All the trainees’ duties were over, but unfortunately mine weren’t.
That was because a separate one-on-one training session arranged by the CIA was waiting for me.
I changed clothes and left the dorm, and through the open doorway I caught Nad’s eye.
He was lying on his bed and muttering with a beaten expression.
“You’re not even tired? What a damn schedule, man.”
I gave a small shrug and headed downstairs.
Of course I wasn’t enjoying it. I was just doing what had to be done.
The north side of the campus.
There was a separate building set apart from the main facilities.
That was where I’d been told I’d be training separately with the SAC instructor starting today.
Man, seriously, it’s training from morning till night except for sleep.
Honestly, without my inner energy, there was no way I’d have survived this schedule.
When I opened the door and stepped inside, a wide mat-covered space greeted me.
There were a few punching bags and weight machines. And in the middle of it all stood a man.
My first impression was simple: big.
He had to be at least 190 centimeters tall, and he looked heavy as well.
He was bigger and denser than even Mo, who I’d already thought was pretty large.
Broad shoulders, a thick neck, short-cropped blond hair.
A long old scar ran from beneath his left jaw to behind his ear.
Black tactical pants, a tight plain T-shirt. A Glock in a gun belt, and sunglasses pushed up on top of his head.
“Hm.”
I slowly studied his build and the way he stood.
His weight was spread evenly over both feet, and there was no tension in his shoulders.
And that frame of his wasn’t the kind you got from stupidly piling on muscle at a gym.
He’s pretty...
Hong Kong, and Marek, flashed through my mind.
If Marek had been a finely honed blade, this guy was a brutally made axe.
Much rougher, heavier, and more merciless.
“Tch.”
He opened his mouth.
Predictably, there was no friendly greeting or introduction.
“Fuck. Now I’ve been reduced to fucking babysitting duty too.”
His face was laced with obvious irritation.
In that low, husky voice of his, he said to me, “Sorry if you were expecting some nice lecture, but I don’t do that. I’ll teach you what I know, and if you can’t keep up, that’s that. I’ll report that you’re just useless and be done with it. I don’t want to waste my time.”
He flipped through the papers in his hand and muttered, “All right, then. I hear you’ve never handled firearms at all, but you’re pretty damn good at close-quarters combat... hmm.”
His eyes swept up and down over me.
“Doesn’t really look like it to me.”
He didn’t give me a chance to answer.
He just kept tossing out whatever he felt like saying.
“Anyway, let’s see what you can do. First class today is hand-to-hand.”
He clicked his tongue once and climbed onto the mat.
Then he curled a finger at me.
“Come on, kid. You didn’t come here by sucking Hoffmann off, did you? If that’s your specialty, I might be able to point you somewhere else.”
Unlike his words, his eyes were cold.
I could tell he’d been provoking me on purpose since the moment I walked in.
It felt like some kind of test.
“Hah...”
Honestly, I wasn’t feeling much from that level of provocation.
I’d heard far worse in my previous life.
But if this was a test, there was no reason not to play along.
“There’s one thing I’m curious about.”
I tossed the words out casually and followed with a question.
“If the instructor becomes unable to teach, is a replacement possible?”
His eyes seemed to ask what I was talking about.
I rolled up the sleeves of my training clothes and answered.
“I think we’re going to need a replacement right away.”