Empire Games Series, Book 1(53)
DR. SCRANTON: Are we talking about her National Academy session?
COL. SMITH: Yes. I had to pull strings just to ensure she scraped a pass. I didn’t—I say I didn’t—rig it; I just made sure she got some TLC. Extra coaching. Let’s be honest: she’s not a cop, much less an officer on the leadership inside track. She didn’t belong on that course; she was a fish out of water. It’s to her credit that she finished it at all, even with a bare pass. Putting a twenty-five-year-old introspective liberal female actor through a graduate-level course in policing and leadership populated by ex-Army county sheriffs and upwardly mobile municipality lieutenants was a big risk. But she, she survived. She nearly wiped out but it didn’t break her. Which makes me think she’s got what it takes to operate in an unsympathetic environment as well as having picked up the insight she needs for Evasion Planning. If we can earn her loyalty, we’re gold.
AGENT O’NEILL: That’s the hard part.
COL. SMITH: You know the old saying? “Set a thief to catch a thief?” We were trying a new angle. Train a spy in security policing to avoid getting caught by the adversary’s secret police.
DR. SCRANTON: Nevertheless, it seems to me that failure would have had a significant impact on her morale, not to mention making it harder to keep this little red wagon rolling along. Oversight wouldn’t like it.
COL. SMITH: I’d have pretexted her out of there in an hour if I thought she was going to crack.
AGENT GOMEZ: So now we have this introverted liberal hippie actress chick with diplomas in police leadership skills from the FBI, Espionage 101 training, and, and DRAGON’S TEETH capability? In what way does this get us closer to our objective?
COL. SMITH: We ran out of time. You’re on the distribution. You got the memo about BLACK RAIN.
AGENT GOMEZ: Yes, but I don’t see how—
COL. SMITH: She was set for another six months of Clandestine Ops School, then two years pushing a desk with Operational Analysis before deployment. Under constant scrutiny, of course, and we were going to take the time to weld some handles onto her to make her easier to move around—
DR. SCRANTON: What did you have in mind?
COL. SMITH: Boyfriend, girlfriend, whichever way she swings. Background says she dated boys in college but didn’t have anyone serious. Meanwhile there was a female BFF in high school, lots of tears when she moved away. So it’s not entirely clear which way she leans. But it doesn’t matter: if we can get her emotionally attached to someone, we have a handle. Or if we find something she’s afraid of, we have a handle. Or if she gets religion, same deal. Or if we get her to imprint on her colleagues—the Small Unit paradigm—that works too. She may be an introvert, but she’s not invulnerable: we just need to get her to open up.
AGENT GOMEZ: We can use her without a handle if push comes to shove, can’t we?
COL. SMITH: Yes, but it’s less reliable. Humans are social organisms. We want her to feel protective toward us as a society, before we send her out among them. Otherwise there’s the risk of Stockholm Syndrome.
DR. SCRANTON: We don’t need that. Termination Expedient is all very well as a policy, but not a sensible option for unique assets. Too much risk of making the wrong call.
AGENT O’NEILL: So you want her to fall in love, get religion, discover patriotism, discover team loyalty, or learn to fear us. Okay, so noted. But why has everything come so far forward?
DR. SCRANTON: Because of BLACK RAIN. We’ve lost three drones and detected fallout in that time line. People in high places are beginning to ask questions, and it falls to us to provide answers.
COL. SMITH: Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, but three times is enemy action.
DR. SCRANTON: Exactly.
END TRANSCRIPT
In the Valley of the Shadow of the Gate
CONNECTICUT, TIME LINE TWO, JULY 2020
They started Rita’s training three days, four MRIs, and one swearing-in after her last subarachnoid injections. The evening before, they began to cut back on the bad head meds. In the morning Rita, feeling a lot less mind-fuzzed and mildly irritable (if not stir-crazy), climbed out of bed and dressed in her own clothes before Marianne wheeled in her breakfast. “Well, we’re feeling better, are we? Great! Dr. Lane will be so pleased. I hear y’all have a visitor coming this morning…”
An hour later, stomach full and nerves buzzing with caffeine—it was the first mug of coffee she’d been allowed since the course of injections—she was in another windowless white room full of unidentifiable medical equipment, with a large display covering most of one wall. This one had markings taped out on the floor in various colors, like a basketball practice court that had accidentally shrunk. And she did indeed have a visitor, tapping his toes with Dr. Jenn. The Colonel smiled. “How are you feeling?” he asked.
“I feel fine,” she said noncommittally. She had a gut feeling that Colonel Smith wouldn’t appreciate her true feelings—a layer cake of resentment at being railroaded into this isolating situation, unease and disquiet at being treated as a medical guinea pig, and a glaze of boredom on top. He probably wanted something more positive: excitement, a sense of adventure, maybe a dose of unreflective salute-the-flag patriotism. “Is this the big day?”
“Yes, I certainly hope so!” Jenn interjected. “Yesterday’s bloods were looking good so—”