Life in the Loop: Life #36 – Canadian military, round one
Disclaimer: see the first chapter.
12-1
Angelika Finch walked over to colonel Hall's office and knocked on the door. "Enter…" the man said absent-mindedly, before seeing as to who it actually was and caught himself. "Ms. Finch? Your presence is no longer required, thank you for coming, what are you doing here, did you get turned around?"
"Yes, apparently," Angelika Finch nodded, "either I misunderstood your man's instructions, or he confused them himself…" she shook her head, getting her act together, and went in. "So what about Lt. Leeds? Why is he in trouble?"
"That is none of your concern-"
"Actually, it sort of is – I got him and the Project Magnet involved in this," Angelika sat down, "so maybe I can get him out, or whatever the proper term is. Well?"
"I don't think that you can," colonel shook his head. "We here are having a bit of a situation, what with Mr. Cross and everything, and the lieutenant got caught in the crossfire, and-"
"Say no more – you're not angry with him, but at Evan," Angelika nodded thoughtfully. "Well, colonel, here's the thing – I don't Evan is the one you should be angry at either."
"Oh?" And now Angelika really had the man's attention. "Then at whom?"
"This is where it gets trickier," Angelica sighed. "You need to talk to him again – not a pleasant task, I know it – and ask him just who's been feeding him his lines and strategy."
"Why don't you think that he has come up on his own?" Contrary to Angelika's expectations, colonel Hall was not dismissive, but attention. "Mr. Cross isn't the easiest man to talk to, or to deal with, but he is a genius."
"This isn't about genius, it's about Brooke," Angelika shook her head. "After she died, because of Evan's stupidity and hubris-"
"That's an odd thing to say about your friend-"
"I wasn't his friend, I was Brooke's friend, and then only some," Angelika admitted, reluctantly, with a lot of old bitterness coming to the surface. "We had each other's numbers, but we were drifting apart even back then, we weren't as close as we were when we were little girls, and Brooke's relationship and marriage to Evan Cross was a part of it. Then she died because of Evan, Evan started Cross Photonics, he needed someone to lead their financial division, I needed a job, he hired me, the end of the prequel. You know the ending, since you're in it and all," Angelika made a wide, sweeping gesture around herself.
"If your friend died because of Mr. Cross, why did you decide to work for him?"
"I didn't know that back then," Angelika was on the defensive now, "plus until recently, until all the deaths began, it was different." She trailed away, looking at nothing in the distance. "Evan isn't a bad man," she spoke suddenly, startling Hall. "But he is stubborn, he is obstinate, and when it came to Brooke, he was obsessed, in a disturbing way, breathing fire and bile and hating all the dinosaurs. I don't know the person, whether they were even a man or a woman, who changed Evan's mind and fed him the new party line, but they're the extraordinary leader who you are looking for, not Evan."
"Seems to have done all right by Cross Photonics and you."
There was a pause. "Corporal," colonel Hall gave corporal Merryweather – who had been standing in the doorway all this time, listening in, apparently – a look. "It's so good for you to be punctual at least, since you're obviously so very bad at managing Leeds and everything else."
"Sorry sir," the corporal found something really fascinating on the floor or on the tips of her military shoes, "it's my fault. I do not know how he did it-"
"Been there, done that. You underestimated him," Angelika replied with a warmth that sounded… actually genuine, and that made it worth. "Yes, certainly, on most level's he's the oaf that he looks like, but regardless, he's just as competent as the next man, and a leader at that."
Hall snorted disdainfully. "Kenneth Leeds is a lot of things, and none of them good, but a leader? What brought that on?"
"He helped to clean up Cross Photonics' dinosaur messes, and that wasn't easy, considering that Evan isn't a leader at all," Angelika matched the good colonel's voice tone for tone. "He's what we civilians call a maverick, not a leader. He is a genius when it comes to technology, no argument here, but people? Not so much."
"Is that why are you leaving him?" Hall asked, with a shrewd look on his face.
"Evan isn't the only one who's missing Brooke," by contrast, Angelika's voice was tightly clipped and controlled. "He isn't the only one who had past wounds ripped open down on the memory lane recently. Only whereas he has done a complete turnaround and took to it like a pig to slop, some of us weren't so lucky and actually care about Cross Photonics, whereas Evan doesn't." She took a deep breath and continued. "Oh, he cares about people and the greater good and consequences and so on – it's just that he's so bad at doing something that he shouldn't be doing in the first place, but he soldiers bravely on, and the corpses just keep on piling, and his regrets make it all better – or is it Ms. Dylan? I forget." Angelika's eyes blazed with an internal evil light, like a pair of feverish suns. "Leeds isn't perfect, and Major Douglas is another story, but darn it, at least they're trying to minimize the civilian casualties – Evan and Dylan cannot even do that, and it's on the conscience of Cross Photonics, thank you very much. Evan and I made Cross Photonics a nation-wide name, and now Evan is throwing it all away, because he is a free spirit! He is living his dream of the year and everything else is falling apart. You want Cross Photonics to function?" she looked Hall straight in the eye.
"No," Hall exhaled, "I don't. I need the technology, and while Cross Photonics' continued existence could be helpful, I know that it can go either way-"
"No, it won't," Angelika pinched her nose. "You're thinking in logical, linear terms. Evan does not. He will get from point A to point B eventually, but not before covering half of the alphabet first, and that will be out of order too. I do not know how you plan to control him, but it will backfire eventually, because Evan is that man. What he really cares about, he cares about, and but what does not, he does not. Dylan Weir seems to be the same manner as well. You really should make your peace with Leeds and let him manage them – none of them will be happy about it, but at least bodies will stop hitting the streets and making the news." She got onto her feet and off her chair. "Well, that's that, now if you excuse me, I'm going to go home and hit the proverbial sauce."
"Aren't you going to call your new bosses at Song-?" Merryweather asked despite her better intentions.
"Corporal," Angelika smiled warmly. The other woman immediately recognized a threat and fell silent, trying to dig through the wall with her backside. "Do I sound, or look, like someone who should be working with money any time soon?" Angelika pressed on. "I know that I'm preaching to an audience who works on a federal budget, but let me assure you, that in the private civilian sector, big money is serious business," she finished her latest statement in an almost hissing voice, and left, sounding much more angry than when she'd come into colonel Hall's office.
"Um," the other woman looked at her superior. Sadly, colonel Hall was less than sympathetic and quite a bit scary himself.
12-2
"Angelika! Ms. Finch! Ange!" Lieutenant Leeds' voice reached the woman in question as just as she was finally ready to leave. Looking cross, the woman swirled around on her heeled shoes, (leaving scratches in the floor, incidentally), and faced the man in question.
"Lieutenant," the woman's voice was not entirely welcoming or inviting. "You're out of your bondage already. How nice for you!"
"Yes, well, your intervention helped," Leeds replied brightly, "so, uh, thank you?"
"Don't," Angelika wrinkled her nose, "I got you into this mess of Evan's, it might be better than jail time, but not by much. Plus from what I understood, Evan and you have problems of your own?"
"I wouldn't call them problems-"
"Yes, and I can call nougat whatever I want, but it is still going to be nougat, it is still going to remain nougat, and so on, and so on," Angelika cut her interlocutor off. "Lieutenant, I don't know the specifics about the whatever that has happened between you, Evan, and your superiors, but I am quite confident that Evan did his best to make it worse. The man might be an engineering genius, a technical prodigy, and what else have you, but when it comes to people skills, he a pig's ear. Even you are better than he is, as I've told your boss," Angelika made a vague gesture with her hand.
"Thank you," Leeds turned red, "it wasn't necessary-"
"Maybe, maybe not, but it still needed to be told," Angelika shook her head. "Who's the woman?"
"Her name is corporal Merryweather, and uh, and um," Leeds turned red. "There's a faulty communication here, I'm certain-"
"Me too," Angelika smiled kindly, causing Leeds to trail away. "Lately we all are suffering from some bad communications, aren't we? I hope that after today the things will begin to improve." She looked over Leeds' shoulder. "And speaking of your friend and faulty communications… you can begin now," she smiled widely, maybe even – overly widely. "Lieutenant, I'll see you around."
She turned around and left.
"Well, I'll be," Colonel Hall, who just happened to be near the showdown, cough, said brightly. "A woman who can see through your bullshit."
"Sir," Leeds twitched. "With all due respect-"
"Stuff it," colonel Hall shot the younger man a look. "This is one angry hurt woman, and I doubt that she will be going to the Sueng group anytime soon. She's in too dark a place right now, and I wouldn't want to be the man to pull her out of there-"
Leeds whirled around and stalked off – Hall managed to get one over him this time. However, he had also failed to notice corporal Merryweather, leaving after the lieutenant on metaphorical cat feet…
End of life 36