We all know I didn't write Twilight. If I had I would own more books, have all the music my heart desires, and have a new car by now. Dolla, dolla bill y'all.
'How We Operate'
It had been raining for the past three days in D.C. A battering storm had just hit the North Carolina shore on Monday and now was slowly making its way north, sloshing everything with rain in its way.
Edward couldn't help but look out the window and how it reminded of being back home in Washington as he, Emmett, Jasper, and the other three men on his team waited for the others to join them in the room.
Usually, Edward tried not to think of home that much. It simply hurt his heart to do so. All those failed attempts at opening himself up to something more than just friendship with the one person that had ever really known him always plagued him when he did think back to that time. He would feel a constriction in his chest and throat that felt more like an ache.
Here he was, a newly-turned 28 year-old man, and he was still bothered by the fact that he'd given up virtually everything that he had always wanted and hoped to have someday even though he subsequently went out and grabbed a hold of the plans that he had made for himself. He now had his dream job, sure, but his life outside of those walls felt empty and undefined; it was as if it was a blur of time, color, and plot.
He supposed he could always email her father tonight to find out what had been going on in that tiny little town where he got his start. Of course the Chief would know his true intentions and would give him all the knowledge Edward sought out. He would tell him the local gossip from Forks and the Reservation – just as a side note – and then he would add how his daughter was getting along in her life and what she was up to.
The Chief had always been his ace in the hole for information about her now. His best friend. The only girl he had ever really loved.
Sure they had kept in touch after high school and all throughout college, even though a whole country had separated them. It was Edward's time as a constantly moving Army Ranger that albeit solidified an end to that. It was just too hard to promise to call from the South Korean border when you weren't even sure if you could get reception or not, and back then high speed internet wasn't everywhere that it is today so that ruled out email.
Of course over time technology became more widespread. When Edward returned home for the holidays, just after his time as a Ranger was over, he had discovered that the Chief had even acquired a new computer, and an email address to go along with it. Turns out that the Chief had grown accustomed to the ones that the police department had, and broke down and decided that he needed one of his own.
It was nice to communicate with him again. He had missed him, too. The Chief had always been a sort of father figure in his life, especially since his had passed when he was just a kid. Chief Charlie Swan was why Edward fell in love with the idea of being in law enforcement in the first place. The two would carry on and joke in their emails about Edward coming to volunteer as a small, runty teenager and the Chief always made sure to call Edward by his old dispatch nickname of 'Bronze Medal' just because he could.
Chief Swan never gave Edward his daughter's email address. They knew the truth. They both knew he had loved her. They both knew that sometimes things just didn't work out the way you wanted them to. They both felt the loss of losing someone so dear to you, and they both knew that sometimes things are just better left alone. It was easier to deal with the pain then, and that was the reason Edward never asked for her email address either.
He had started a new life here in D.C. and it was one that he wanted to be a part of, even if he never really was living it. There just wasn't a point to all that, without her.
Emmett cleared his throat to garner Edward's attention, and then they both looked up as the director of the Service, Carlisle Cullen– code name, Santa Claus – walked into the room with his usual manner of respected authority.
By nature, he was a jovial guy. In fact, it had even surprised Edward with how laid back he was at work. When he had moved here, he expected everyone, including the director, to be strict and regimented. It had come as a shock at first, but he quickly realized that the director was very much on top of things, knew everything, and did everything that he was supposed to.
He had called for a meeting between these five teams earlier in the day, and every pair of those eyes that outfitted those teams watched as he sauntered over to the head of the table, laid down his file and dropped his pen on it. With an air of his usual joviality he started the meeting off with, "Well guys, I've called you in here today because you are my five best groups. You work well together, are organized, and can rise to the challenge," he stopped to look around at all of them. The mood changed at once when the look on Carlisle's face did. Gone was the easy decorum, only to be replaced by a serious tone and tenor to his movements. "Are each one of you up for the challenge?"
Every man seated around the long oval table responded with either a head nod or a "Yes, Sir," and they had not even gotten any specifics on what there was to be yet. Such is the life of an agent. These men that bordered Edward's left and right had all been trained just like him. Many of them could also add a criminal justice degree to their collection, which only added to their already stout list of military experience, years of living the life of a police officer, and also their previous first two years of required in-state Service work.
They had all done their time, and checked every box that was required of them along the way – otherwise they wouldn't be here. The only differences between them were what branch of the military and various jobs within that they had done, or why they eventually made their way to the Service.
It was Jasper that found respite here. He had filled his time before hand cranking out orders and seeing things that haunted men along the way. Army Special Black-Ops had not been kind to him, and when he had been almost fatally wounded he took that as a sign that it was time to move on. When his commanding officer had inquired about his reenlistment he had given him a firm no, but had not left without an admirable recommendation that followed him all the way back to Dallas PD. He found solace in being on the SWAT team, but after an encounter that hit a little too close to things from his past he was urged to join the K9 unit by the force's psychologist. That ended up being the best therapy for him. But being as ever experienced as he was he decided that he wanted something a bit more than the normal, and with that he and his trusty pal of a German Shepard named Jake joined the Service. It ended up being a perfect fit for both.
Sure, Jasper was a jackass. He acted and walked a tough game and was stubborn to boot, but there were times when Edward would see that old shell of what he was slip out. He could see the hurt. Everyone could. So he just chose to give him the benefit of the doubt and accept him for who he was.
His other partner Emmett mirrored that same pain, but dealt with it better. He had been a sniper in the Marines Special Forces division, and Edward would guess that he had seen as many bad things as Jasper had. But where Jasper held it in, Emmett let it pass. Ever the wise one about his emotions, he knew what to hold on to and what to let go. Yes, he was quiet and gave off a presence of calm authority, but one would only wonder if he had always been that way. He would joke around once he got to know you, but it was Emmett's sage advice and steel leadership that won him the respect of Edward and everyone else upon first encounter. It was what had even helped land him the job. He was so used to being put in pressure situations that the regular duties of police work all but bored him. That's why the Service fit him so well. Here he could make use of his training and mentality but still live the everyday type of life. Emmett had even become Edward's best friend in D.C. and helped to lead him through the rigmarole of being the "new kid" in the neighborhood.
So yes, they were all brave men. It was who they were. It was what they had always been, whether or not years in the military and being a police officer had ever added to that. It was with that bravery that they all blindly accepted new challenges, such as the one being put forth in front of them now.
Carlisle was quick to respond to all of their acquiescence by giving a firm nod and saying, "Good. I knew I could count on you all…now let's get down to business." With that he pulled out a chair, unbuttoned his jacket to sit, opened his folder, and then spent the next three hours briefing them on Operation Chinese Zodiac.
~~~TTfG~~~
It had been a busy time on the Hill for Bella. Ever since she had helped out Angela for those couple of days at the beginning of the week, she needed to come back to her office and make up for everything that she had missed.
There was tagging, the logging in of information, and the research deemed necessary for each new piece that came in. Even if it was only two new things, it still took up the majority of her time at work and for this she felt sad. It was time to start getting ready for the National Book Festival and she very much wanted to be a part of it. The ground work for it had all been laid out by the upper crust that worked at the Library of Congress, but now was the time when the planning stages moved in to the doing stages.
Authors were to be chosen and invited, books were to be ordered, games were to be made, and a time-line for the day was to be set in stone. Bella couldn't wait to be a part of it. The Book Festival was a big deal to LOC, to the city, and especially to her.
Two years ago had been Bella's first foray into the whirlwind that is the BookFest. It was a busy day filled with games for kids, authors speaking, and of course finding new books to read. That first year she had not even considered it work because she was flying too high on the joy of the day. The next year she was hit with more duties, and even though it was like work that time around it was still a joy to be a part of the whole process. She had hoped that she could do the same this year, but by the time that the end of the week had rolled around and she hadn't heard anything she began to get a bit discouraged.
Bella threw herself into her work to keep occupied and hold the disappointment at bay, and she was so focused on the task at hand that she was startled when there was a knock on the open door.
"Bella, may I come in?" It was Irina, her boss and also, subsequently, one of the planning managers of the Book Festival.
"Sure." With that Bella put down her pen, took off her reading glasses, gave Irina her full attention, and tried to not to smile too much.
"You probably know that it's time to start seriously planning and taking care of this year's BookFest?"
Bella pleasantly nodded.
"Good. Well, you've done such a good job for us the past two years…you really made yourself available to the project…I was wondering if you would be interested in helping in a bigger capacity this year? You'd be helping me directly, and would be given some leadership roles in overseeing some aspects of the Festival this year."
"Irina…wow," Bella was a bit speechless over this. She was happy to be asked, but she still wasn't expecting to be able to do more, "Yes! I'd love too," she said with hardly a second thought. Of course, she didn't really need too. Her heart was already in helping out and taking part, but this...this was exceptional.
Bella felt as if she'd been given a job promotion even if she hadn't, but her heart didn't really believe that.
"Great! Well, this year it's fallen to me to organize the authors who will be joining us so I'd like your help with that. If that's alright with you?" Irina was a bit direct, but still nice enough about it to make it seem like Bella had a choice in the matter.
"Sure. Whatever it is that you want me to do, I'll do." She was not passing this chance up, even if she knew her pushy boss was going to be a bit passive aggressive about picky details the whole time while they were planning this out.
"Alright, well…let's see…you're from Washington state right?"
"Yes."
"Good. I was going to put you in charge of coordinating the Northwest area since I figured that you would be more familiar with local writers from the area. You'll need to find an author, book them, help make arrangements for travel and hospitality, and work them into the line-up for speaking and scheduling."
"Okay," Bella said as she dutifully wrote down all points that her boss made.
"Oh, and also…you'll have about a week to get this done for the Northwest region before moving on to the next. Now you, I, and two other people are all doing this so we'll need to expedite this process as fast as possible so that we'll all be ready come mid-August," Irina gave her look that seemingly asked Bella if she could not only get this done but if she could also handle it all in the time frame.
Bella nodded and added a nice but firm, "Sure. Okay."
"Alright. Good! So, let's get started tomorrow morning. Come by my office around nine o'clock tomorrow morning and we'll all start laying out some concrete details. Hopefully that will give us the weekend to brainstorm some more and come up with some things that we can use and start working on, come Monday."
The two then said their farewells, and when Irina left, Bella squealed a little bit and gave herself a silly one-person high-five. After she called to tell both Rosalie and Angela the good news, she went right back to work. Twenty minutes later she had finished, procured her third cup of coffee for the day, and then set about making a list of all of the authors that she knew of from the Northwest. She included fiction, non-fiction, young adult, and children's authors, and then added to her list an arrangement of ideas that each could have at their table besides just their books. It gave her a great sense of accomplishment to write this all down and especially so when she wrote the words 'Operation Book State Fair' as the title on her paper.
Bella just knew that she was up for this task, and it felt important to her to prove it to Irina. She wanted to show her boss that she earned the right to do this job in the first place. It would take organization, patience, grace, and maybe even a little bravery to get it all done in time.
A/N:
As ever, credit to my non-existent over use of commas on the upload goes to my lovely Fic Mom and beta Marvar. She makes me look smarter than I am with this whole writing business. I totes love her, her attitude, and her love for Harry. Find her on twitter marvar29.
Massive props go out Ms. Ouiser. This fic, honestly, wouldn't be possible with out her. If I could I would pay her smiles and so many "thank you"s. Oh wait... I do that already. Okay, if I could I would pay her with money, but I don't have a job so... I'm just really glad that she likes smiles and "thank you"s. Find her on twitter ouiserb.
My Care Blair is sharing and caring, and offering to be the soap opera voice over for this fic. So if you're an auditory learner you might want to give her a call. She can be found on twitter buhbeesgirl and in my google chat line-up sharing pictures of Jackson with me, because... like I said... she's sharing and caring like that. She's also recently met my fellow friend Harry Potter, and all I can say is "I told you so."
A super special thanks go out to my great bud Scott. I love you more than words can say, and without you, well, there would be no Edward for this fic. I'm so happy that D.C. is everything you had hoped it would be.
To the Library of Congress: In all my research for this fic that I've looked up on you, I can honestly say that I kind of fallen in love with you. When I finally make way to D.C you are, without a doubt, the first place that I'm going to visit. I'm looking forward to it!
To you lovely readers that have added as a favorite, reviewed, and/or even added TTfG as an alert: I love you too! Your reviews are better than getting emails from the Chief!