Madison sat out on her balcony, taking in the night air. She stared down at the telephone on the table next to her. The cautious part of her was telling her to call her father and confirm the man's story, or call that cop that Emma had been flirting with, what was his name⦠Valentine. But the other part of her brain told her that if he was who he seemed, he would disappear if she didn't do as he asked. She'd seen the type before, intelligence operatives and military officers flitted around her father like flies. Either they were old war buddies or they wanted RobCo to help with one of their projects. And this guy certainly seemed to check all the boxes.
Finally, she made her decision. She got up and went to her bedroom. Donning a pair of jeans, a sweatshirt, and a set of tennis shoes. She also picked up one more thing from her bedside table, the ten millimeter pistol that her father had taught her to use and given her, she loaded the pistol, made sure the safety was on, and tucked it into her sweatshirt's pouch.
Then she went to the phone, Emma was out for the evening with another one of her dates, so she didn't have to worry about her. She dialed the number on the card, it rang four times before someone answered.
"Williams and White, How may I direct your call?" A woman's voice came from the receiver, a young woman by the sound of it.
Madison cleared her throat, no going back now, "I'm calling for Christopher Payne."
There was a pause before the woman spoke again. "A car will stop in front of your building in five minutes, if you wish to continue, you will take the stairs down to the ground floor, you will be waiting out front when the car arrives. When it does, you will get in and tell the driver to take you to Lexington and Main." The line went dead immediately after she stopped speaking.
If she took the stairs at full speed, it would take her three minutes to get to the ground floor. She sprinted out of her apartment, grabbing her bomber jacket on her way out. She hit the stairwell and took the steps two at a time. When she hit the lobby, she forced herself to slow down and walk normally. She checked her watch, two minutes left. The doorman tipped his hat as she brushed past him.
The car pulled up at the exact moment the woman said, a black Corvega V8. She opened the rear passenger door and got in. The man was dressed in a suit and a black chauffeur hat. "Where to Ma'am?"
Madison was surprised by the calmness in her voice, "Lexington and Main."
The chauffeur's eyebrows arched, "Well, they're getting younger every year"
Madison was about to ask what he meant, but thought better of it. He'd either lie or say nothing. The ride passed in silence as the man drove them through the city. The windows were tinted, so she couldn't tell where they were going. She timed it with her watch, it took about forty minutes before the car came to a stop. Not long enough to get outside of the city, but still a decent distance. Unless, of course, they had driven around in circles for half an hour and they were just ten minutes away.
"We're here kid, good luck to you." He tipped his hat to Madison as she got out. The second she closed the door, he sped away. She was standing in front of a skyscraper. Williams and White was emblazoned in gilt letters across the sign in front of the building. Seeing no other obvious option, she walked inside. The inside was as you'd expect it to be for a profitable law firm, all black and white marble with a receptionist's desk in the middle.
An attractive young woman approached, "You must be Madison, it's a pleasure to meet you. I'm Patricia, if you'll just follow me, I'll take you to Mister Payne."
It was the same voice that she'd heard on the phone, "What is it with you people and the third most common names?"
The woman looked back at her for a moment, "I beg your pardon?"
"Payne used the name Robert William when I met him, third most common names in America. Patricia is the third most common female name in America." Madison thought she might be overplaying her hand, but what the hell, showing that she could see through bullshit had gotten her here, why stop now?
"Christopher told me that you were a smart one, here we are." They stopped in front of an elevator and Patricia pressed the call button.
"So what is your real name?" They stepped into the elevator. Patricia, because she didn't know what else to call her, pressed the first floor button, then the ninth floor button, then the fourth floor button, and finally the seventh floor button. The doors closed and the elevator began to descend.
"Let's hold off on proper introductions until after your meeting. Now, please stop asking me questions and I won't ask questions about that ten millimeter pistol that you have tucked in the pocket of your sweatshirt." Madison's expression must have betrayed more surprise than she thought because Patricia actually giggled. The rest of the ride passed in silence. There wasn't a floor counter in the elevator, but she could feel they were going down and considering how long it was taking, they were going pretty far down.
When the doors opened, she was taken aback. The huge room before her was a flurry of constant movement, the main source of light came from the screens that lined the walls, showing maps and timetables, one screen showed the DEFCON status. Dozens of desks held terminals and phones. Men and women darted around the room, some wearing office wear, others dressed in military uniforms. The vast majority of them were armed. She picked out snippets of conversation.
"Blackbird is go, I repeat, Operation Blackbird is a go."
"Top Hat just reported in, Beijing is code three."
"Someone get me the Burma reports, I need-"
"Someone tell the Birmingham to pull back, Ahab just left port and he has thirteen shiny new harpoons."
"We need an exfiltration team for the Kiev network, the bridge agent-"
"Quite a sight isn't it?" Patricia smiled at Madison's expression
"Uh huh." Madison could only nod, that was an understatement.
"It never gets old, come on, Christopher will want to see you right away." Patricia grabbed her by the arm and guided her down a set of stairs, past a holographic war table that was surrounded by men in military dress uniforms, through a bullpen style set of desks, then down another set of stairs to a long hallway of offices. The frosted glass obscured the inside of the offices, but she could tell a few of them were currently occupied by the silhouettes inside.
They came to a stop in front of the door at the end of the hall. Patricia pressed a button on the intercom next to the door, "Christopher, Miss Victory has arrived."
There was an audible click and the door swung open revealing a small anteroom, Patricia motioned for her to step inside. After she did, the door immediately slammed shut behind her, the audible click telling her that the locks had reengaged.
"Well, that's encouraging." Madison put her hands in the pocket of her sweatshirt, getting a firm grip on her pistol.
She stepped through the anteroom toward the office door. The anteroom was fairly basic, wood paneling, two couches and coffee tables, but the walls were more interesting. There were spaces in the wood paneling that just slightly stood out. Madison would bet her trust fund that those panels would slide open and expose turrets at the press of a button. The door in front of her opened and out stepped a man in a white suit and tie with glasses and a thick mustache.
"Out of my way you twonk." The man shoved past her, Madison glared at his back as he left. When she turned back, Christopher Payne was standing in the door, clad in the same black suit that he'd been wearing at the coffee shop.
"Madison, I'm glad you came. Sorry about Desmond, he's the best Her Majesty has to offer, but he's a bit of a jackass. Please come in." He motioned for her to step into his office. The inside of the office was little different from her father's, minus the family photos and the million dollar view of New York. A large desk, a high end terminal, souvenirs from around the world spread around the room, a lot of military memorabilia mixing in with the souvenirs.
"Can I get you a drink? I have your favorite, Nuka Cola Victory. Or, if you want something more adult, I have a decent Bordeaux, and Desmond is a jackass, but he brings the best scotch in the world." Payne walked over to the wet bar in his office.
"A Nuka Cola Victory would be fine." Madison took a seat in one of the chairs in front of the desk. "Now, please explain to me exactly what all of this is?"
Payne opened a bottle of Victory and handed it to her, "Well, that depends on who you ask. On what little official paperwork there is, and when I say little I mean in terms of government bureaucracy, so it's still a mountain, we are described as a specialized task group for the dissemination and coordination of various forms of intelligence from military and civilian agencies in order to secure and further the interests of the United States of America."
Madison took a long drink of the Nuka Cola. "So what is it actually?"
Payne poured himself a glass of scotch. "For once a government description is halfway accurate. We have access to the whole of the American intelligence apparatus. DIA, CIA, FBI, BADFTL, IRS, Secret Service, military intelligence divisions in every branch of the armed forces, even state and local police departments, we have access to it all. We do coordinate intel between agencies, but the description neglects mentioning the operations aspect of what we do."
"So, where do I fit in?" Madison felt like she had a good idea, but you could never be sure when it came to intelligence. Or at least, that's what her father used to tell her.
Payne sat down behind his desk, taking a long drink of his scotch. "I know a lot about you Madison, a lot more than just your favorite soda. I know that your father taught you how to use and maintain that ten millimeter in your sweatshirt, among various other firearms. I know he trained you in hand to hand combat to a black belt level. I know that the camping trips he took you on were closer to Green Beret survival training. I know that you're fluent in six languages, passable in three."
Madison leveled a get-to-the-point stare at him, did everyone know she was carrying a gun? "Are you going to list everything on my college resume? I won my third grade spelling bee too, while we're on the topic."
He grinned, "I know, and your fourth grade spelling bee, and the fifth, and the sixth, and so on. I know you completely reinvented yourself when you moved from New York and again when you moved from Vegas, changing your look and personality from an athlete in New York, to a party girl in Vegas, to a more bookish and scholarly shrinking violet here. You pretend to be shy, but you're not. To put it in the most basic set of terms, you have the potential to be one of the finest agents this agency has ever seen."
She downed the rest of her Victory. That was what she thought this was about. It was the only reason that they would have chained her along like this. "I have no espionage training."
Payne arched an eyebrow, "Yes, you do. As I said, your father fairly well took care of that for us, and you certainly seem to have a natural affinity for adapting to legends. I'm not going to force you into this Madison, you don't need an excuse. All you have to do is say no and you'll be taken back to your apartment as if nothing ever happened."
Once again, her mind went to war. The cautious part of her brain told her to say no, she was a college student, she was going to be a lawyer, why would she want to throw away all of that away. "I'm not willing to drop out of college."
"We wouldn't expect or want you to. You're position as a college student provides a built in cover for all sorts of assignments."
She searched her mind, but she couldn't find any other reason not to do this. The cautions part of her was still telling her to say no, but the other part of her kept asking the same question, why not? And right now, she couldn't find an answer to that question. "Alright, I guess I'm in. But I think I'll take that scotch now."
Payne laughed, "Certainly, then Patricia can brief you on your first assignment." He extended his hand over the desk to shake her hand.
"Madison, let me be the first to welcome you to The Activity."
Okay, now the story can really begin. I'm really kind of just playing around with this, trying to decide how I want to play this.
I'm updating this in the eight minutes I have before my Leadership development class, I mention this to let you know that school has returned so I will probably be updating less frequently.
As always, tell me what you think.
R&R people, later.
