All throughout history there has been many different versions of spies. They haven’t all been called a spy, but they all do the same thing. They discover information, take down enemies, hack into other countries servers, etc.. But now, they run everything. Nobody knew it until they started taking over. It started with the government buildings. Everything went fast from there. It all happened so quickly. There takeover wasn’t like most. Instead of acting with force they attacked with brains. The best spies and scientists from all over the country teamed up and planned everything. There were a few people who found out what they were doing and tried to stop them, but they were quickly annihilated. So here we are now, a brand new amazing planet, with only peace and prosperity.
This is the announcement we here everyday before school starts. I am Sandra, a student in London. I want to believe that the world is a good and prosperous place but I really don’t believe it. My whole life has been the same thing day after day for my whole life. Of course we aren’t like those terrible places you here about in the stories where they have no freedom and can’t do anything fun. We can choose who we want to marry, boy or girl, and we get to choose our jobs and where we live, there is just something missing. I just can’t figure out what it is. We have been like this for almost three centuries now, and no one has had a problem with it. I wish that I could travel back in time and see what we're missing, unfortunately only one person can do that
That one person is Her. Her is an idea that was made when our nation was first founded. Every fifty years all girls from the ages of 10-30 put there name in the drawing. The drawing determines who the next Her.
Her has all of the power. She can see both the past and the future and can also travel to both. The reason that Her is always a girl is because of an ancient myth. The myth says that the first group of spies to start the takeover were girls from all over the word. Those girls made the decision that girls should always be in power.  This a complete opposite of what has happened in the history textbooks. In the past it has always been patriarchal.
I know that I will never be picked but I still dream about getting picked all the time. I am fourteen so this is my fourth year applying. My older brother always says that it’s unfair that we can be the ruler and he can’t. Whenever he says this I tell him “Men ruled for millenia, now it’s our turn.”. It doesn’t hold him for very long, but at least it stops his complaining for a little while.
Three weeks Later
Today is the picking! About two weeks ago the last Her passed away. We were lucky that it happened right before the picking. If it had been after the picking then we would have had to wait until the next picking to get a ruler. That almost happened once around 150 years ago and the world went into chaos. I am so excited! I swear I won’t be able to wait until the ceremony this afternoon. My mom says that i’m silly for thinking like this, but I just can’t help it.
Mom just said it’s time to go! I am so excited! Me and my friend Maggie have been talking about this for weeks now. Neither of us really know what we would do if we were picked, what we do know is that it would be very exciting.
They’re starting now! I can’t hear what is being said because there is so much noise. When I was little we used to stay home and watch on the T.V. because there wasn’t anyone who was in the ceremony. However, now that my name is in the bowl all of us go every year. The pickers are always either Him or a congress member. Him is the vice president to Her. The reason the vice president is always a guy is because the first Her wanted the vice president to be her husband. Ever since, all of the Her’s and Him’s have been married. If the new Her is not married then there is another picking to find the new Him. Even if the new Him and Her are mortal enemies, they are required by law to marry each other. 
Holy crap. This is so much different than I ever thought it would be. When they first called my name I couldn’t hear them. It wasn’t until the third or fourth time when people started to stare at me that I realized what was happening. Now i’m inside the Capitol waiting for the picking for the new him to be over.
Everyone just came in and they said that the new him is from America and he should be here in about 15 minutes. This is all happening way too fast. I just realized that I am going to be getting married to a person that I have never met. This is just like those old arranged marriages that we learned about in history class. I’m not ready to get married. I’m only fourteen! No one gets married at fourteen! This is crazy! A maid just came in to take me to my room and I am freaking out. I just want to see my family and get out of here. I don’t think I can do this.
“Ma’am, I know this is a lot to take in right now but you need to come with me” said the maid
“Umm, yeah, O.K., will I be abled to see my family again?” I asked
The maid looked at me like I was crazy and then said “Of course! What kind of people would we be if we didn’t let someone see their own family?”
“Yeah, ha-ha, that would be crazy” I said.
This is crazy and nothing like what me and Maggie thought it would be like. We always thought that it would be so much fun and that we could immediately meet up with each other after the picking and we would go through everything together. I don’t know if I can do any of this without her.
He is here. We were just put into a room together to get to know each other. All were doing is just sitting here in silence and trying to not look at each other. Eventually the previous Him came in and said that we had to say something to each other because we’ll be spending every waking moment with each other and we might as well say something to each other now. He also said that we were going to be sharing a room and a bed. That really got our attention.
“WHAT???” we both screamed at the same time
“Nobody told you that? Oh,well then, I guess you know now.You will be sharing a house down the street. It will be a big one with lots of bedrooms for all of your future kids. Harry will mainly be a stay at home dad while you work” he said
His name is Harry, good to know.
“Slow down for a second who says that were going to have kids just yesterday neither of us knew each other and we were living completely separate lives, and now you expect us to have kids?!?! Thats crazy!” yelled harry as he jumped out of his seat “No offense to you or anything but I don’t know you and don’t really want to marry you”
“None taken, I feel the same way. And besides, shouldn’t it be our decision if we want to get married and spend the rest of our lives together?” I responded
“Normally yes, but under these circumstances no. After awhile me and my late wife started to like each other and we hated each other at first so i’m sure that once you spend a little time together you will see that this is the right choice” he said
“We’ll give you two weeks, but if we don’t like each other by then then you are out of luck” said harry
“Deal. But if you don’t like each other by then, then you at least have to act like you do until the next picking where you will officially resign” he said
“Fine” I said as I stood up. I could tell that Harry didn’t like this deal, but we didn’t have a choice, I knew that if we didn’t agree to this then our lives would be living hell forever.
Me and Harry talked the whole way back to our new house. When we got there our families and Maggie were in the living room waiting nervously. When me and Harry walked in they all looked at us like we had completely changed. Which I guess we kinda had, I wish they could still look at us like we were their kids and not aliens from another planet. After we finished talking to our families we headed upstairs to get clean clothes on and to see the rest of our new house. It is giant. We decided to let our mother’s deal with the wedding planning, because neither of us have done it before and we really don’t feel like we would be capable of doing it. I can’t believe we're already thinking about our wedding. This is still setting in for me. I can’t imagine how it is for Harry. Oh god, Harry, what is he thinking about all of this, this is al an even bigger change for him than it was for me. At least I get to stay in London because it’s the capitol, but he had to move here from America, leaving everyone behind. I wonder if he had a girlfriend back there.
“I didn’t have a girlfriend back in America” said Harry
“What?”
“I could tell you were thinking that. You make a face just like this” he mimicked
“I do not”
“Do to”
“Do not, you don’t know what youre talking about”
“Sure I do”
It was then that we realized we were standing right next to each other and Harry started to back away. All of a sudden I kissed him. He looked so shocked. I was just starting to apologize when he kissed me back. I had never felt anything like it. He was the first person that I had ever kissed. It got really awkward after that so he went in to the bathroom and changed and then I did the same.
“Since we have two weeks we might as well have some fun with it” said Harry as we walked around the house.
“What are you talking about?”
“Have you ever heard about the time travel machine that only me and you can operate?”
“Of course, I’ve dreamed about using it since I was a little girl”
“Well then, why don’t we?” he said as we walked up to a metal door with a keypad and a scanner next to it
“Are you serious? Can we do this?”
“I don’t see why not it is our now remember?’
“O.K. let's do it, you pick the first place because it was your idea in the first place
“Let’s go to Washington D.C. 300 years ago when it was still the capital of the united states.”
“Let’s do it”
We both put our hands on the scanner and the Harry punched in the year 2018 into the keypad. He opened the door and we walked in together. It was incredible. All of a sudden we were in front of these giant white stone buildings. Harry said that they were the Smithsonian Museum’s and the red one that was shaped like a castle was the Smithsonian castle. He said that even though there weren’t any royalty who lived in it like in the fairytayle’s it was still called a castle because it was shaped like one. Everyone was holding this ancient version of a phone. They all had to actually hold the phone because they didn’t float in front of them and you could actually see their earbuds instead of them being little disks that fit perfectly into your ears so they aren’t noise canceling. And all of their cars were on the ground instead of the air. After we finished walking all around D.C. Harry said that it was my turn to pick where we went. I said that we should go to London and meet the original Her because her term started at the beginning of 2019 so she won’t completely freak out when she meets us because she knows that the time machine is actually a real thing and not just something in the movies.
We both got out our bracelets which we put on right before we walked through those doors and punched in: Department of Espionage, London 2018. The bracelets are like a portable time machine. When we opened our eyes we wee in the middle of people staring at us in astonishment. It took me a second to realize why they were staring at us like that, it was because they had never seen someone do that and they were scared. We explained everything to them and the asked to see Melissa Iversting, who at the time was the head of this corporation. I knew that at the time that were in the middle of a war between the spies so she would be very busy, but I never realized exactly how busy she would be. I really hope that I won’t ever have to be that busy.
After we talked to her for a while there was one thing that I noticed about her and it was that she is super bitchy. She talks bad about everyone, it doesn’t matter if they are good or bad she doesn’t care. She does whatever she wants. The person she was the worst to was her assistant Ruby. At the time I did recognize the name but I never knew what I remember her from. It wasn’t until later that Harry told me that she was the second Her. I laughed for almost ten minutes at the irony of that. I never realized how terrible Melissa was. As we were leaving I punched Melissa in the face, high fived Ruby, and ran out the door with Harry running after me laughing his head off.
When we got back I asked one of the maids to get me a history textbook to see if our adventure was in it. Sadly it wasn’t so now it’s just me and Harry’s little secret.
“I think this might actually work out” said Harry as we walked back to our room
“Let’s give it a year”
“What?”
“Let’s date for a year and then see where we are then. I’m afraid that if we get married now, in six months well regret it so let’s just try it out for a year and then see out where we are there.”
“O.K. I don’t think he will like it though, but that also makes it perfect”
When we told him (his name is actually Jeremy, who knew?) he really didn’t look happy but he knew it was better than nothing so he went with it. When we told our families we could tell that they were kinda disappointed because they were looking forward to planning a wedding but they were also happy because we weren’t jumping into anything.