When I entered the class a week later, they sat in silence. Over the sessions, they had gained perspective on what I was willing to teach them. They welcomed me into their classroom and actively participated in conversations I initiated. I never uttered a word. They spoke in length about planning escapes before starting a mission. They were supposed to learn from their mistakes, but I didn't want them to cost them their lives.
That day, I had a different plan.
They waited patiently for me to scribble something, but that was not part of the plan.
"Today, I will be giving you situations, and you will be telling me how you will escape from it." Gasps filled the room.
"You speak?" I heard someone say. I pressed my lips together in irritation and gave them a fierce look. They quieted down and then waited for me to proceed.
"Adam," I called the boy in the front row. He was good with knives but was even better with computers. He couldn't shoot a target to save his life.
His head jerked up and he stood up, nervous.
"Sit down," I ordered, kindly. I didn't feel like punishing them that day. "You are asked to carry out a robbery in a high-security building. The diamonds are in your hands, and you find yourself on the rooftop, surrounded by guards. What do you do?" He stares at me for a moment and then starts panicking. "Sit down and think about it," I tell him. He is probably the smartest in the class, which is why I let him go first. I was hoping that he would come up with an interesting answer for me.
There was nothing like a little challenge in the classroom.
"John… You have been asked to infiltrate a terrorist group who is planning to bomb the major metropolitan cities in India at one go. Let us imagine for a moment that you were successful and you got the job of planting the bomb inside the Victoria Memorial in Kolkata. You know that you will be safe if you leave the location within 3 minutes of planting the bomb. You have two options. Plant the bomb and somehow run out of the premises, or not plant the bomb at all and die at the hands of the terrorists." His eyes told me that he already had an answer for me. I knew what his choice would be.
"I would plant the bomb and run, of course." He said it so simply.
"How fast do you run?" I asked him critically.
"Fast enough," he said smugly.
"Well, John. The premise of the Victoria Memorial is well over 60 acres of land."
"I would just have to run as far away as I can to avoid the blast."
"Lets just imagine for a moment that you do run away from the spot, the police would mark you as a suspicious candidate immediately. Damn, I'll let that go, as well. You somehow manage to go unnoticed… Did you know that there are over thousands of people trying to get inside the memorial every day? It is a chore even trying to walk fast because of all the people, and running? Think twice." He eyed me suspiciously.
"So, what do you propose? I die in there?" I shake my head. "You want me to not plant the bomb, then? I die anyways." I shrug. "You are painting an impossible image here. Tell me… what would you have done? Would you have been a moral citizen and died before planting the bomb?" he retorted, thinking that he had trapped me.
"I would find an alternate option. If I refuse to do it myself, they would kill me and ask someone else do it. So, everyone dies. I can't run… so I don't run."
"What do you do then?" Adam asked, baffled.
"I take the bomb to the safest spot possible and then try to deactivate it. The gardens itself is sixty acres. The number of people in the garden is lower than those surrounding the building. Even if the bomb goes off, fewer people die."
"And you don't think about yourself?"
"I think about myself and try to defuse the bomb." It is as simple as that. It is just that selfish.
"Then what happens to morality? You die anyway!" John argues.
"And you have no other option than to take it on. When you are there, sorting through the options… something will pop out at you. If it doesn't, you die. You can't possibly figure out the circumstances when you are not in them. If you try, you give yourself away and die anyway. Your hard work serves no purpose. So you wait, gauge the atmosphere and form your plans according to what happens around you."
I was surprised that they argued further.
"Adam, have you thought through your situation?" He shook his head with a small smile on his lips. "If it were up to me, I would just crash their security system before trying to steal anything." I smiled, feeling a bit smug that my faith in him was not misplaced. The others retorted, saying that it wasn't related to the options given.
Adam held his ground.
"That is exactly the point!" he exclaimed, passion pouring out of him. "It is not about the choices you have, but how you mould them and dodge them to get what you want!" The others still refused to believe him.
"So, is this lesson about how we should expect the unexpected?" I heard an enraged girl, who I called Molly because that is what the others called her.
"I'm saying that you shouldn't expect anything. When you have a job, you plan on how to do it, and you use whatever they throw at you to make you stronger and reach your goals."
"This is bullshit," said another sixteen-year-old. Their disrespect was welcoming, though. It made me want to think that they could stand their ground and fight for what they thought was best. Decision making was something that came with practice, and they seemed to be having a good time learning how to debate it out and make their decisions.
"Why would we trust someone, who hides herself behind long sleeved clothes and chopped off hair? You're creating this look, which is supposed to make you seem hard and shit, but if you know so much then why aren't you on the field practicing what you preach, huh?"
"John…" I heard someone whisper, their voice strained. Silence prevailed inside the classroom.
"Stand up," I ordered. He stood up.
"Open your shirt." He hesitated. "Open it!" His hands trembled as he unbuttoned the shirt. He hung his head as he waited for me to tell him what to do next.
The others looked on in horror as I called him to stand beside me.
"I was asked to show you what it means to be a true agent."