Waiting A While
My mother was always a very supportive person. She believed herself to be a liberal parent single mother, letting her children decide for themselves what they wanted and didn't want to do. If I didn't clean my room, then it just stayed like that until I had things evolving under my bed. I came home drunk; she just quietly shook her head and then `insisted' I go to church the next morning. I prayed long and hard that morning in church. That God would just strike me down right then and there, because the whole `death by hangover' deal just wasn't working.
I said I wanted to take a year off after high school to travel around Europe, she said it was coming out of my college money.
I brought home my girlfriend from college; she kept a straight face and offered her a drink. Well, at least she kept all her opinions in French.
I'll never forget the only fight we ever had. I took her out to lunch, this nice little restaurant that offered authentic Indian food. I waited till about halfway through the meal to tell her, knowing that she wasn't going to take this well. I expected tears, I expected her to be upset, but I never expected the cold, emotionless look that came into her eyes. "Tu vas pas joindre la CIA. " She said. "I lost your father to those people, I will not lose you, too, Michel."
Should I give up the CIA? Should I just finish off law school and live my safe little life in Albany with a safe little wife and a safe little family?
I can't say that it was some huge fight that is ongoing to this day. But there is a small rift there; a rift that I know never is going to be fixed.
I joined the CIA for so many reasons, not just to honor my father. That was a big reason, but it wasn't it. It was cliché, but I wanted to save the world. I wanted to jump out of planes into burning buildings to save the president, disable a nuclear bomb, and then help rescue a kitten from a tree.
I went into training ready to learn how to do all those things. Instead, I learned how to make sure the people who do that don't get their asses killed. It was a rude adjustment in my whole master plan to accept that I wasn't going to be saving the world, one kitten at a time. But I was going to be helping someone else do that, one fax at a time.
I never really regretted it, per se, but I was...we'll say disillusioned. I hadn't asked to get the best scores on the written test. I hadn't asked to be better at strategy then at hand to hand. But I had to accept what I got or get out.
Recently, I had started questioning exactly what I was doing. Wondering what would have happened if I would have finished off law school. Wondering what I would be like if I'd met Sydney under different circumstances. I didn't really like it. I wasn't happy what I was doing; sitting on the sidelines while someone else did all the work. What exactly did I do? I was supposed to pat Sydney on the back, tell her 'good job', and then file the paperwork. Except, scratch the whole patting on the back, because that would go past the whole agent/handler protocol, and then I'd have Hadacki down my throat again. Not that he's going to live through the night the way Weiss is talking anyway.
Today, I got to live the life I always wanted to. I got to use what I learned in my months of training. I got to strap on my weapon, knowing that I was probably going to have to use it.
I killed a man.
I probably should have been horrified by that, probably should have felt guilty. He was some guy just trying to make some quick money. He probably didn't even know what they were doing inside. Instead, there is something that is a little to close to pride for my comfort.
If Barnett wants to analyze something, maybe she should stay out of my personal life and get into that little personality defect.
I think the oddest thing of all was how Sydney and I just fell into step together. We didn't plan it that way, though if we'd had the time we might have attempted too. I really don't think that kind of synchronization can be duplicated though.
It could just be bragging, but I know that without me, Syd wouldn't have had a chance in hell of getting out of that building alive, not less saving all the rest of the agents.
Pretty damn good for a desk agent, if I do say so myself.
So I might get demoted. Oh well. So I might lose my job. That's okay; I still have a college education to fall back on. And what good company doesn't want a guy who knows what C4 charges look like? So I might never see Sydney again.
Okay, that I might have a problem with that. But they wont do that. Because, they have learned not to piss off Michael Vaughn.
Okay, they'll probably let me stay on as Syd's handler because they know just as well as I do that Hadacki is a conceited jackass.
It doesn't really matter though. Syd'll keep on kicking ass and taking names across the world while I make sure she doesn't get shot, or tortured, or god forbid, hit on by some playboy, drug dealing, asshole surrounded by jealous crack whores.
At least now I can say I'm a desk jockey by choice, not by force. Yeah, I've still got it. But don't ask me to do it again, my shoulders are killing me.
My mother was always a very supportive person. She believed herself to be a liberal parent single mother, letting her children decide for themselves what they wanted and didn't want to do. If I didn't clean my room, then it just stayed like that until I had things evolving under my bed. I came home drunk; she just quietly shook her head and then `insisted' I go to church the next morning. I prayed long and hard that morning in church. That God would just strike me down right then and there, because the whole `death by hangover' deal just wasn't working.
I said I wanted to take a year off after high school to travel around Europe, she said it was coming out of my college money.
I brought home my girlfriend from college; she kept a straight face and offered her a drink. Well, at least she kept all her opinions in French.
I'll never forget the only fight we ever had. I took her out to lunch, this nice little restaurant that offered authentic Indian food. I waited till about halfway through the meal to tell her, knowing that she wasn't going to take this well. I expected tears, I expected her to be upset, but I never expected the cold, emotionless look that came into her eyes. "Tu vas pas joindre la CIA. " She said. "I lost your father to those people, I will not lose you, too, Michel."
Should I give up the CIA? Should I just finish off law school and live my safe little life in Albany with a safe little wife and a safe little family?
I can't say that it was some huge fight that is ongoing to this day. But there is a small rift there; a rift that I know never is going to be fixed.
I joined the CIA for so many reasons, not just to honor my father. That was a big reason, but it wasn't it. It was cliché, but I wanted to save the world. I wanted to jump out of planes into burning buildings to save the president, disable a nuclear bomb, and then help rescue a kitten from a tree.
I went into training ready to learn how to do all those things. Instead, I learned how to make sure the people who do that don't get their asses killed. It was a rude adjustment in my whole master plan to accept that I wasn't going to be saving the world, one kitten at a time. But I was going to be helping someone else do that, one fax at a time.
I never really regretted it, per se, but I was...we'll say disillusioned. I hadn't asked to get the best scores on the written test. I hadn't asked to be better at strategy then at hand to hand. But I had to accept what I got or get out.
Recently, I had started questioning exactly what I was doing. Wondering what would have happened if I would have finished off law school. Wondering what I would be like if I'd met Sydney under different circumstances. I didn't really like it. I wasn't happy what I was doing; sitting on the sidelines while someone else did all the work. What exactly did I do? I was supposed to pat Sydney on the back, tell her 'good job', and then file the paperwork. Except, scratch the whole patting on the back, because that would go past the whole agent/handler protocol, and then I'd have Hadacki down my throat again. Not that he's going to live through the night the way Weiss is talking anyway.
Today, I got to live the life I always wanted to. I got to use what I learned in my months of training. I got to strap on my weapon, knowing that I was probably going to have to use it.
I killed a man.
I probably should have been horrified by that, probably should have felt guilty. He was some guy just trying to make some quick money. He probably didn't even know what they were doing inside. Instead, there is something that is a little to close to pride for my comfort.
If Barnett wants to analyze something, maybe she should stay out of my personal life and get into that little personality defect.
I think the oddest thing of all was how Sydney and I just fell into step together. We didn't plan it that way, though if we'd had the time we might have attempted too. I really don't think that kind of synchronization can be duplicated though.
It could just be bragging, but I know that without me, Syd wouldn't have had a chance in hell of getting out of that building alive, not less saving all the rest of the agents.
Pretty damn good for a desk agent, if I do say so myself.
So I might get demoted. Oh well. So I might lose my job. That's okay; I still have a college education to fall back on. And what good company doesn't want a guy who knows what C4 charges look like? So I might never see Sydney again.
Okay, that I might have a problem with that. But they wont do that. Because, they have learned not to piss off Michael Vaughn.
Okay, they'll probably let me stay on as Syd's handler because they know just as well as I do that Hadacki is a conceited jackass.
It doesn't really matter though. Syd'll keep on kicking ass and taking names across the world while I make sure she doesn't get shot, or tortured, or god forbid, hit on by some playboy, drug dealing, asshole surrounded by jealous crack whores.
At least now I can say I'm a desk jockey by choice, not by force. Yeah, I've still got it. But don't ask me to do it again, my shoulders are killing me.