Author: Windvein
Title: A New Beginning
Disclaimer: No copyright infringement intended upon La Femme Nikita or Men in Black. USA Network and Paramount Pictures retain full copyright to these pieces respectively and whoever else may own them, and I have quotes dispersed in the story from MIB the movie and LFM so in those instances not even the words are mine.
Continuity: Let us pretend the final season of LFN never happened, shall we? And MIIB hasn't happened.
Summary: What happens to Michael after he leaves Section?
Special note: I admit most of what I know about MIB came from the movie and from a few episodes of the cartoon series. I never read the comic, so forgive me if anything is out of whack. I tried to stay as true to this great premise as I could.
Feedback: Please, tell me what you think. If anybody likes it a lot, maybe I'll do more. This is my first official fanfic piece (as in first time posting anything anywhere). And boy am I nervous.
Michael sat in the shadow of a dumpster and ran his fingers through his grimy hair. He wasn't doing so well. He'd escaped Section One without the aid of the scrambler that Nikita had offered him, but he didn't know quite how that was possible. He'd fully expected a team to find him and cancel him within a couple of days after the abeyance mission, but that had been two weeks ago.
He'd stumbled out of the woods to a road and had hitched a ride on a truck. He didn't remember much of the ride. He'd been still reeling from Nikita's betrayal. 'I never loved you,' she'd said, and he'd known it was true. He'd been played by her for three years, maybe longer. Section and he had taught her too well.
Michael didn't know what to believe anymore. Everything had been thrown out of skew. He had been prepared to die, but instead, he was stuck in some sort of weird limbo. He had no one to call on for help. He was utterly alone. He'd slept on the street the past two weeks, going to a local shelter for food and warmth. He couldn't do much more than that. He couldn't take any sort of official transportation in fear of Section spotting him. He couldn't access his bank accounts without them noticing. He'd have to build some sort of new life from the ground up right where he was, and he wasn't sure if he could do that. Section and Nikita had been his life, now both were gone, and he had no fall-back life.
He sat against the chilly brick wall in the back alley and blew into his hands to warm them. He'd tried not to think too much during the past two weeks. He'd accepted the hobo hospitality of warm barrel fires and warmer bottles of cheap wine. No one asked him questions so he had to make up no lies.
He sat in the dark alley waiting. He didn't know for what, but something had to come his way. Either Section or Nikita had to come find him. They couldn't let it end like this with him alone in an alley. Even if it was just a bullet to the head by a green field op, it would be better than this total anonymity.
He looked up when he heard the sharp clicking of boot heels. A figure in black was coming toward him. For a moment, his hopeful eyes saw Nikita sauntering towards him, but his eyes quickly picked out the brown hair and that the slim figure, though female, was at least half a foot shorter than Nikita, but the figure was coming toward him. A field op he decided—Probably dispatched by Operations, who knew Michael wouldn't die complacently in a bomb explosion, no matter how turned around Section One had become. Operations probably wanted revenge for Madeline. They might not have loved each other, but they were a team, and Nikita had torn them apart like Madeline and Operations had never been able to tear Michael and her apart, but then Michael thought, the reason was Michael and she hadn't been a team, no matter what delusions Michael may have held.
As the figure continued to approach him, Michael reached under his sweatshirt for the glock that he had taken from a street thug several nights ago who had tried to hold him up. He hadn't killed him, only knocked him out and left the young man in a pile of garbage. Michael may not have had a will to live anymore, but he could not shake off the survival skills drilled into him from years in Section. The stranger strolled to a stop in front of Michael. She did not pull out a gun or remove her hands from the pockets of her coat. Michael reasoned she could have a gun aimed at him anyway in the folds of the material for a discrete kill. The figure stared down at Michael, and he looked up at her.
The light was dim in the alley. The sun was going down, and the long shadows of the buildings blanketed the ground. He looked up into the face, and saw she had on sunglasses anyway for the job. He had to smile at that. It wasn't a Section requirement, but many ops preferred to cover their eyes when in the field no matter the light outside. Suddenly he remembered a string of brightly colored sunglasses on a wire, clipped on by safety pins. Was that before or after the betrayal began?
"You look like shit, Michael," said the figure suddenly.
Michael looked up sharply at the unknown woman with the mention of his name. She was Section then, but he couldn't place her. Her voice was familiar, but only in the vaguest sense like something he may have once heard in the background of a group of people talking.
The woman hunched down before him to be eye level. Michael looked directly into her opaque sunglasses and saw two dim reflections of himself in them. His hair was dirty and matted, and his jaw scruffy with new growth. His clothes, found in the refuse, were an old sweatshirt and jeans, both gray and splotched.
"Well, do you want to get out of here?" asked the woman a touch impatiently.
"Do I know you?" Michael asked with his quiet, hoarse voice. The woman smiled and stood up.
"You did once," she said and held out her hand.
Michael reached for it and allowed her to pull him to his feet. He expected any moment for the soft exit whoosh of a bullet from a silencer but none came. His hand still clutched the glock.
When he was standing, the woman dropped his hand and began walking away. Michael followed, resigned to his fate. He knew where they were headed: Back to Section and the White Room. He regretted it wouldn't be Madeline interrogating him, but maybe Operations would do it personally instead of inflicting him with someone else. The unknown woman stopped beside a luxury town car and got in. This surprised him. He'd expected one of the transport vans. Michael got into the passenger seat. When he was safely in, she started the car and pulled out into the street. She didn't say a word to Michael even when she pulled over again. Michael looked at their destination. It was an Italian restaurant. The woman got out, and Michael followed her.
"You look like you need a good meal, and we need to talk before we go any further," the woman explained before going into the establishment.
Michael didn't understand any of this. Could Adrian have set this up some how? But she was tucked away in a rest home with total amnesia. She couldn't have recovered or have been faking it. Red Cell? But they were crippled by Section's last strike against them. They couldn't care what happened to him. They knew he'd never work for them after his betrayal of their profiler. They'd join forces with Section again to find and destroy him before taking him in.
The restaurant's hostess greeted the woman as if she knew her and didn't cast but an interested glance at Michael. She ushered them to a table in the far back corner. She didn't ask them what they would drink or eat but vanished into the kitchen.
The woman took off her sunglasses once she was seated, and Michael got his first look at her eyes. He was struck by how much they looked like Nikita's. They were the bright shocking blue he'd fallen in love with, but they were in another face. It was at once comforting and startling.
The woman took a sip of her water and looked over the rim at Michael. "I'm here to offer you another chance," she said over the glass.
"I can't go back to Section. My time there is done," Michael stated.
"Good, I wasn't offering you a chance back there."
Michael sat silent waiting for her to continue.
"I'm not with Section or Oversight or any of the organizations affiliated with them. I'm with another group."
"Red Cell?" he asked. Maybe they would recruit him after all. He had valuable information on Section, and he was one of the best.
The woman shook her head again with a slight smile. "You've never heard of my organization. Section has never heard of it. No one outside my organization knows of it." Michael raised an eyebrow at this high claim. She must be with a lesser known terrorist group.
The woman shook her head as if reading his thoughts. "We are above Section and Oversight. George and his people wish they had the power we did, if they ever knew of it." Michael automatically discredited this statement. The conversation was beginning to bore him. The woman was speaking nonsense.
The hostess came back with two steaming plates of calzones. She placed one before each of them and stood back. She smiled graciously at them and with a happy smile, said, "On the house."
The woman nodded her head and cut into her calzone. "This looks delicious, Maria. Tell Waldo he has outdone himself again."
"Anything for you, miss" the woman gushed and went away.
Michael picked up his utensils experimentally. He was already going over the list of poisons that could be in the meal and trying to weigh whether he would eat the meal anyway. It smelled tempting. He looked around the restaurant at the other patrons. They all seemed like plants. Something was off about all of them, even happy Maria, but he couldn't place his finger on why he knew they weren't innocents. The woman was eating her meal. Michael shrugged off his doubts and ate as well. After the woman took a sip of water, she spoke again.
"You know, I was once Section."
Michael looked up at her from his food. He knew she'd seemed vaguely familiar, but even with this confirmation, he couldn't place her.
"You won't remember me, even though I was brought in at the same time as you, and we trained together, but it's good to see you again, Michael."
Michael looked at the woman harder and tried to place her. He could remember perfectly everyone he trained with in the early years. She was not among them.
"When did you leave?" he asked.
"Shortly before Simone was captured. I am sorry about that. Simone was special. I wish I could've done something, but I was already well beyond the walls of Section."
Michael's gaze turned to stone, and he stopped eating at the mention of his lost wife. This woman would dare to say she knew Simone? A dull fire began in his belly.
"Stop it," he said.
The woman looked at him quizzically.
"Stop trying to form a connection to me of things you don't know directly. Don't speak of Simone. Don't speak of Section or anything. Just state your offer."
The woman sighed and rubbed her eyes. "I knew this was going to be hard, but I forget. You don't remember me at all."
"You seem vaguely familiar," Michael conceded.
"Maybe, but that doesn't matter. Now does. You have nothing waiting out there and nothing is waiting for you. I can offer you a purpose again with a cause you can believe in, unlike Section. My people don't double deal with each other. We don't have dark designs among us. Believe me; my organization is light years better than Section."
"Then why didn't you try to recruit me before?" he asked.
The woman looked down sadly. "Because we can't extract someone from Section. We're not that powerful. You would be missed if you were still active there. Section had to believe you were dead before we could make any move on you and now they do. We'll take care that they never remember you, and you will never have to worry about going back there again."
"Like they did with you?" Michael asked a touch cynically. He didn't believe a word she said. Nikita had tried to do what she offered, so had he, but Section had still reeled them back in, but then Nikita had never really left Section, or had she already left before she did leave by working for Oversight and George? Thinking about this always gave him a headache, and Michael didn't like headaches.
The woman looked around the restaurant and stood up. "I need to show you something. This is not something that can be told, and I wouldn't want to do it here."
Michael got up as well and followed her out of the restaurant. Maria watched them go, and Michael heard her call, "Good luck." He wasn't sure if it was for him or the woman.
They went back into the alleys. The woman walked down them purposely. She was taking him somewhere. They walked down street after street. Some of the hobos watched the two of them curiously while a few retreated back into the shadows at sight of the woman. They came to an old wooden back door to some old brick building. The woman knocked on the door with a series of distinct taps. A slot window slid open and a pair of muddy eyes looked out. When they saw her, the pair of eyes widened, and Michael heard the unseen man say, "Shit!" and the slot slammed closed.
"Come on Ricky, open up!" the woman called irritably, banging on the door. The door didn't budge. The woman snorted.
She stuck out her hand. "Give me your gun," she demanded.
Michael looked at her coolly, not reacting to the fact she knew he was armed. The woman rolled her eyes and shook her hand. "Come on Michael, give me the damn glock now. I need it to shoot out the lock."
"Why not use yours?" he asked back.
"Because I don't want to vaporize the door, just bust it down. Now give me your gun," she said. Michael handed her his gun, deciding she or one of the men on the other side of the door would unarm him when they went inside. The woman took the gun, pointed it at the lock, and fired three times. The shoots rang out loudly in the alley with faint echoes chasing after them. The homeless quickly scrambled to leave. The woman put her shoulder to the door and shoved it open. Michael could hear frantic movement inside with a lot of swearing. The woman handed Michael back the gun and reaching into her coat and stormed in.
"All right girls, this is a raid!" she shouted. Women began streaming out of the rooms off the hallway running past Michael and the woman. They were all dressed in lingerie and had on make-up and high heels. The woman had taken him to a brothel. The woman didn't stop any of the ladies running past her but kept going straight back. She had a phone up to her ear and was speaking into it. Michael could hear her say something about back-up. At the end of the hall, she raised her foot and kicked down a door. Michael followed her into an office. One of the prostitutes was inside sitting on the office desk. She let out a shriek and jumped off the desk.
"Get out of here," the woman ordered the girl. The girl dashed out. The man sitting behind the desk stood up nervously with his hands raised.
"Agent T, so nice to see you again. What brings you to my humble establishment?"
"We've busted you three times in six months Harry, and I've enjoyed it every time you sleaze ball."
"Got a soft spot for me, agent?" the man asked with a flash of his yellow teeth.
Michael wasn't sure what to make of the situation. The first thing that sprang to mind was FBI, but surely, the woman couldn't be a fed. The Bureau didn't know anything of Section. CIA? Interpol? None of these rang true either.
"Harry, the only soft spot I have for you is in my trigger finger, now sit down and shut up." The woman's tone was too serious to be a bravado threat. Michael stood where he was to observe.
The proprietor sat back down and watched the woman nervously. She stalked over to him and took up position behind him. "Harry, I'd like you to meet Michael. He's a possible recruit. I'm giving him a taste of what is in store for him. Want to help?"
Harry tilted his head back and looked up at the woman standing over him and licked his lips. "This isn't going to hurt is it?" he asked.
The woman smiled and leaned in close. "Only if you make any sudden moves."
"Come on Agent T, I promise to shape up," he begged.
The woman shook her head. "Sorry Harry, you're going to help, willing or not. Now Michael, one of the reasons no one on the outside knows of my organization is because of the advanced technology we have available to us." The woman drew out a small metal devise that looked like a lighter. Harry's greasy sweat began to drip off his face as his breathing quickened. She flipped a switch on the devise, and blue glowing blade appeared. "Another reason the outside world doesn't know of us is because of the individuals we deal with are not part of the major population but are special immigrants you might say. It is our job to keep an eye on these immigrants." The woman lowered the glowing blue blade to Harry's cheek. "Remember what I said about sudden movements, Harry?" the woman asked the man.
Harry sat still, his eyes wide. He didn't move a muscle. A small smirk crept onto the woman's face as she touched the blade to the man's face. Michael watched impassively as she cut. He'd seen worse done to others, had worse done to him, and had done worse to others.
The woman carefully cut around Harry's face in a large circle till she reached where she began. Harry didn't scream or even wince, and the cut didn't bleed. When she finished, the woman switched off the device and pocketed it again. Harry sat still. He didn't reach up to touch his mutilated face but kept his eyes raised to the woman. She leaned over Harry and delicately put her fingers on the edges of the cut.
"Now stay very still, Harry, so I won't rip this." She picked up the edge of the skin and began to pull it up. Michael watched on with interest now. Harry's face came away with sticky tendrils trailing from it. Underneath the mask was something that Michael mind couldn't accept. Harry's face was purple with hard bits of scale freckling his cheeks. His lips were hard and pointed like the snub beak of an octopus. His pupils were slitted like a cat's and were startling neon green that had a faint phosphorescent glow. Harry stretched his jaw letting Michael get a view of the inside of his mouth. The inside had a tongue that was a lighter purple with what looked like tiny teeth embedded in it.
"Getting an eye full, guy?" Harry asked Michael. Michael opened his mouth unsure of what he was going to say when men in black suits came into the room.
"Hey T, what's up?" asked a tall African-American man. He had on shades like the ones the woman had worn earlier. The man looked down at Harry and cracked a smile. "Harry, how's my favorite intergalactic pimp?" Harry looked at the man sourly. The man looked around and noticed Michael.
"Who is he?" he asked, indicating Michael.
"A possible recruit. J, if you wouldn't mind finishing this, I'll get him out of here." Agent J nodded and Agent T led Michael out.
Aliens, Michael thought. He tested the word out in his brain. Before it hadn't meant anything to him, it was a word without value. He'd known incredible things were possible. Section 4 had been investigating those possibilities, but extraterrestrial life had not been one of them.
When they were outside, Michael spoke, "Who are you people?"
The woman smiled and took his elbow to steer him back down the alley. A large black van with a water and power logo on it was parked outside the building now with men in black suits stepping out of it. They gathered up the homeless and the prostitutes in the alley. As Michael and the woman walked away, a bright flash of light erupted behind them.
"We call ourselves the Men in Black or MIB for short. We didn't originate the name, it came from some UFOlogists, and we decided to use it. We do not exist in the major scope of things. We answer to no government agency. We are self-sufficient and very good at what we do. We keep the peace, as simple as that. We monitor the aliens on earth and make sure they don't cause trouble while they're here. We're sort of interstellar cops to put it bluntly.
"Anyone who joins the MIB must forget about their prior life because we will make it disappear. In your case, all files pertaining to you at Section and elsewhere will be erased. Everyone known to you will be contacted and neuralized. That means we will make them forget that they ever knew you. It doesn't hurt and has no adverse side-effects, and it's actually a major aspect of what we do. Even your grave erected when you entered Section will be taken away, and your birth certificate erased. You will no longer exist on anyone's radar. We can give you a whole new life. I'm not promising happiness, but ironically, I can promise you the stars."
Michael stopped and turned to Agent T. "Why chose me?"
The agent looked down at her hands and shrugged. "I remember you, Michael. You were one of the major reasons I was able to survive at Section as long as I did. I heard on the grapevine what happened to you, and it made me want to help in anyway I could. I wanted to offer you a second chance. You're not obligated to take it, but I wanted you to know that your life doesn't have to end, that there was something better for you, waiting."
"And if I don't take your offer? I know too much already," Michael said.
The woman shook her head. "You don't remember me because that is what we wanted. We can make you forget all of this just as easily."
"Do I have to answer now?" Michael asked.
"No, you can have twenty-four hours. If you decide to join us, come here. If you decide not to, we'll find you." The woman offered him a white business card. It had MIB embossed on it with an address scribbled on the back. Michael pocketed it.
"Be seeing you," the woman said and walked off. Michael turned and began walking in the opposite direction.
Section could be erased away. He could have a new start. It was all very chilling. Everyone who had ever known him could be made to forget him. Nikita, Operations, Walter, Birkoff – no Jason. What they had done to Seymour's twin had always unnerved Michael because it was so complete how they had succeeded in resurrecting Seymour in Jason. But all of them would forget him. He almost liked the idea of Nikita forgetting him, and then maybe the pain of what happened would be erased too. The others he had never been very close to, Jason barely knew him, Operations he didn't care about, once maybe, but not anymore. For Walter, he felt a slight twinge of remorse because the old man was so decent that Michael didn't want to deceive him, but Walter was gone from Section, he might relish having one less memory of the place. But what about Daniel? Would he be made to forget his father? And Jeanette, she deserved memories of her husband, and Michael realized selfishly that he didn't want the happy times they'd had together to be erased as well. He didn't want his family, no matter if it had been a Section mission, to be erased. He wanted someone to remember him fondly.
And could he really start over? Could he come out from under Section's shadow? Everyday after he'd escaped the explosion and had left Nikita, he'd thought about the place. He'd waited for Section to come for him. Section was all he knew, it was home. He pulled out the card Agent T had given them. Could the MIB become home? Agent T had said they were better than Section, but could that be true? They would take more than his life. They would take his past and his identity. He would be reduced to a letter like them. Agent M. At least Section had allowed him to keep his name, but what else was there? He didn't want to continue living on the streets like a common bum. He was more than that. He'd been trained to be one of the best covert anti-terrorist operatives in the world. He didn't deserve to die in a gutter.
Michael continued to walk all night and ponder the business card. When the sun rose, he looked up and found himself at the address on the card. It was gray with no identification on the outside. When he went inside, his very thoughts were drowned out by the whirling of large fans. The solitary security guard pointed toward the elevator. He stepped inside and pushed the single button. He was carried down into the building, and when he stepped out, Agent T was waiting for him.
"Come with me," she said.
"No," Michael said stepping out of the elevator. "I want one thing. I have a son and a wife. They think I'm dead, but I don't want them to be made to forget me."
Agent T frowned. From her pocket came a loud beeping, she fished out the communicator and listened to it without speaking. The communication was short, and she put the devise back in her pocket. "We will leave your family alone, but you may not contact them in anyway. Do you understand?"
"It was the same in Section," Michael commented.
"Yes, but we won't hold them over your head. Now we need to get you outfitted. Follow me. You will only wear MIB approved attire. As Zed says, 'This will be the last suit you will ever need.'" Agent T led him into a locker room and showed him which locker was his. She excused herself so he could shower and change. Michael supposed that she went to begin the erasure of his old life while he began his new one here. After his shower, he found that the suit and shoes fit him perfectly. It felt good to be wearing black again, though the traditional suit was not his usual attire. He put on the glasses and realized that they were implanted with advanced technology. As he pressed the joint between lens and eye band, the view switched to infrared and other spectrums that he did not know how to identify. He pocketed the glasses and went to find Agent T. She was waiting just outside the locker room for him with an older man who had a beard and a paunch.
"Michael, allow me to introduce you to Zed. He is the commander of MIB. You obey his orders first and any others second."
"Welcome aboard, M," Zed said, shaking his hand. Michael tried to identify any similarity in this man to Operations, but could not see any. Zed seemed human. "T give him the tour and meet me in my office later," he said.
Agent T led Michael into the main room of MIB headquarters. "This is the hub." Michael had to stop to absorb what greeted him. Aliens in every shape and color milled around with humans in black suits. None of them seemed to think anything strange. Michael felt a small tug on his sleeve. He looked down to see a hairless, antennaed form with murky eyes standing at his feet.
"Hey, do you have a light?" it asked, waving a cigarette at him.
"No," Michael responded.
"Figures," said the small being. "Hey T, you got one?" Agent T turned and looked down at the six legged thing and shook her head.
Michael watched the alien curse and walk away on its small legs. What he was getting into finally began to hit him. He had entered a whole new realm, and he would have to learn how to exist again. The MIB may not have left him much of his old life, but they were offering him a new one, and it looked more interesting and brighter than what he'd had before.
"That was a worm. They reside here with us like benign parasites. They usually stick to the coffee room, though. Come on, I show you the labs," said Agent T, and the man once known as Michael, now Agent M, followed. He didn't realize that he was smiling.
The End