I sat in a molded plastic chair next to a vending machine. I was hungry, having skipped breakfast to make sure I had time to find where I was supposed to go, but the vending machine ate my dollar bill without relinquishing my chosen candy bar. The metal spiral turned, but the bar clung tenaciously to its position, refusing to fall. The next customer would probably get two for his money, but I was out of cash. I thought about shaking the machine, but I thought that might not give the right impression to my potential employers.
I slouched in the chair, watching a flat-screen television mounted on the wall that was set on endless loop. It showed a two-minute video extolling the virtues of the NSA. It was called Information Is Power, and it featured clips of high-tension battle scenes and a deep male voiceover saying things like “Intelligence saves lives on the battlefield,” and “We protect our nation’s borders through global cryptologic dominance.” The first time, I thought it was awesome. By the fifth time, I had it memorized. By the tenth, I had fallen asleep.
I woke up at 9:05 with a stale taste in my mouth and sense of panic, which only intensified when I realized my name was being called. The lobby, which had been empty, was now full of candidates. I thanked the receptionist who was calling my name and rushed down the hallway she indicated. My interview letter said I would be interviewed in room thirty-two by a Ms. Shaunessy Brennan. I pictured a red-haired Irish woman, her fiery locks tied back and a merry twinkle in her eye. When I peeked into the room, however, a young black woman sat there with her arms crossed, wearing a scowl. “Um, hello?” I said.
“Neil Johns?”
I halted. “Yes.”
“You’re late.”
“Oh. My paper said a Ms. Brennan.”
“That’s me.”
“Right. Sorry, I just thought…”
“You didn’t think there were any black women in Ireland?” Her voice was steel, and I now realized there was a bit of an Irish flavor to her vowels.
“Apologies,” I said.
She stood to shake my hand. She was young and fit, dressed in black slacks and a loose green blouse, with long hair twisted into tight braids and pulled back in a silver clasp. Her handshake was businesslike and cold.
I sat down and tried a smile. “Shaunessy, that’s a lovely name.”
Her look impaled me to the chair.
After that, it only got worse. She asked me nothing about the WWII-era ciphers I’d invented in my spare time, nor did she quiz me on famous cryptologists of history, which I would have knocked out of the park. There’s a certain kind of person I can impress with charm and a winning smile, but Shaunessy Brennan was not one of them. Her baleful gaze didn’t falter, no matter how many witticisms I attempted, and soon I stopped trying. I sensed that my dream of following in my father’s footsteps was about to die.
Her accent was beautiful, light and musical, and soon I found myself listening to the sound of her voice instead of what she was saying.
“Mr. Johns?”
“Yes, I’m sorry. I was thinking.”
“You do realize,” she said, “that you applied to the Computer Science division of Signals Intelligence? We do large-scale computing. Practically everyone in this division has advanced degrees in Computer Science. You don’t seem to have any formal computing education at all.”
“I’m pretty good at math.”
“With three failed attempts at a degree to show for it.”
I shrugged. “Signals Intelligence seemed like my best shot. I don’t know anything about network security, and I haven’t really studied any foreign languages.”
She frowned. “Your resume says you know Portuguese.”
“Well, yeah. I kind of grew up in Brazil, so Portuguese is easy. I know a little Spanish, too. And I can get by in Tupi-Guarani.”
“But you don’t know any foreign languages,” she said, deadpan.
“I wasn’t counting those because I learned them as a kid. I haven’t learned any recently, as an adult.” She raised an eyebrow. “Which, granted, hasn’t been very long,” I pushed on, rambling now. “I mean, I don’t know any of the really important languages, like Arabic or Russian or Chinese. I’m guessing you don’t get much signals traffic in Tupi-Guarani.”
Her face was impassive. “Let’s talk about your school record.”
I would have rather not, but it didn’t seem helpful to say so.
“It says here that over the course of three years, you managed to be expelled from MIT, Princeton, and Carnegie Mellon.” She looked at me over the top of my resume. “An impressive feat, I suppose, but not in a good way.”
“I was young then,” I said. “It was a long time ago.”
She squinted at me. “How old are you now?”
“Twenty-one.”
She riffled through the papers in front of her. “You started at MIT when you were sixteen,” she said. “You were expelled a year later. Admitted to Princeton at seventeen, and expelled a year after that. Carnegie Mellon at eighteen, and that time you lasted only two months.”
Her eyebrows asked the question.
“That last one wasn’t my fault,” I said. “I thought the university president was embezzling funds. I did a probability analysis, based on the donation profile of similar schools, the number of attending students and the published scholarship numbers, and the report of available capital I happened to see on his secretary’s desk. But nobody was going to believe me without evidence. I had to break into his office to prove it.”
“I take it you were mistaken.”
I shrugged. “Sort of. The embezzler was actually the provost.”
She regarded me with an unreadable expression. “Do you have a problem with authority?”
I felt the blood rushing to my face. I was getting tired of her raised eyebrows and barely veiled disdain. How much did a degree and a neat resume really prepare someone for a job? The Alan Turings and Claude Shannons of the world had been eccentric, inventive, forceful people. Rule breakers. The people at Bletchley Park and Room 40 didn’t stop to check boxes; they got the job done no matter what the cost. This NSA seemed more interested in writing procedures and creating flashy videos than in saving the world. “I might not be a cookie-cutter candidate,” I said. “But I’m more than qualified. I belong in the NSA.”
She drummed her fingernails on the desk for a moment, thinking. Then she pushed her papers into a stack and rapped them on the tabletop to square the edge. It was a dismissal. “I’m sorry,” she said. “You’re obviously a pretty smart guy. But we don’t hire candidates without at least a bachelor’s degree.”
“I know that’s your policy. I was hoping that you’d make an exception.”
She sighed. I guessed that interviewing candidates wasn’t her usual job, and she was anxious to get back to whatever it was. “And why is that?” she said.
I squared my shoulders. “Because I care. Because I know that every war, every battle, every skirmish over trade rights and clear waterways is won and lost by intelligence. When I attack a problem, I don’t quit until I solve it. Nobody in this building will work as hard at this as I will.”
“It takes more than just ambition. You need to finish your education.”
“I’m a quick study. Anything I don’t know, I’ll learn on the job.”
“You’re too young.”
“If you don’t mind me asking,” I said, “how old are you?” It was a cheeky question, and I thought it might get me thrown out of the room, but it actually evoked the first hint of a smile. “I’m twenty-four,” she said. “Unlike you, however, I actually graduated, with a degree in Computer Science from the University of Maryland. I’ve been working here for three years.”
“And they have you interviewing unlikely candidates?”