Manny's POV
Damn… who has wifey in their crosshair today? I am glad that she is okay though. Goodness knows that everyone would suffer if she were hurt even minutely.
Not only with Ranger, but all of us at Rangeman would turn back to how it was before wifey came into our lives. Dark, militarily rigid, and all on edge… We dealt with those when we were in the service, and some of us were still under contract, we don't need to go even deeper into darkness than where we already were. Although… if I were honest, we weren't really much of a family until after wifey stepped through Rangeman. Sure, we answered to Ranger and the core team and followed orders to keep us sharp so we would be ready to be "in the wind" at the drop of a hat.
Outside of those hours? We kept to ourselves so we can deal with our nightmares and demons on our own secluded room, not wanting to appear weak or mentally inept in case others reported us to the military handlers and we would be forced to talk to those phychologists and risk terminating our contract and barring us from missions.
We may not be on active duty per se… but we still want to do good and make sure that our families have a safe place to live. Never needing to look over their shoulders for hostiles or enemies… No, those are our crosses to carry, so they do not have to.
Those who go into the military, they are changed fundamentaly from the getgo. The training of every military personnel is rigid and designed for you to basically be able to adapt to any weather and psychological terrain at least on a basic level. Despite the amount of people joining the military, only 40% of those ever get deployed overseas. Of those 40%, max 20% ever gets involved in combat. **A/N: Do not quote me on this, this is just hearsay**
Then you have those who go further and specializes. Be it the Special Forces, Seals, Delta Force or Rangers, or any other specifically trained military personnel. That is where the majority of Rangeman comes in. We are trained more specifically to be adaptable, to lead and be led. Trained in strategic ambushes and understand the underlying reasons for a strategic strike. We sometimes go in before any other team mobilizes to get a preliminary look or we go in to neutralize a target. We sometimes go in and rescue hostages or a target and interrogate to get intel. We calculate risks and see the options we have to complete our tasks with the least amount of casualties on our side.
All of our training is honed and kept fresh by being with Rangeman between contract and "in the wind" calls. Our adaptability knowledge is always tested when we are in contact with wifey. She bounty hunts for the low bonds, but let me tell you… those are the most crafty and tricky bonds you can think of when compared to the higher bonds. Higher bonds, we know and understand because those usually shoot and dash… Hers… not so much.
Unfortunately, she is not fond of her gun or exercise, so she never really had training in all the years she has been doing this. It is a miracle to say the least that she is still alive and with us. Thankfully, she has her Merry Men (that is us) and Ranger who looks after her and keeps track of all the police dispatch calls. That does not even include all the trackers that are dropped on her cars, person, or purse. With the amount of times that her cars get blown up and usually with her purse along with it, it is VITAL to have multiple trackers on her. Every time two of the at least 3 or more goes offline, we have a serious problem. Everytime one of them goes off, we notify the core team and send a team to the last known location of the tracker and give a call to wifey to make sure she was okay. I cannot tell you how many cars she has been lent to by Ranger.
Back to work… Tank told me to find the full background on this new detective in town. I am searching the preliminaries of a Detective Marcos Romano, let's see what we find… Hmm… Pretty bare bones if you ask me… that is really weird. How did he make detective barely a year in? In the NYPD? Impossible. That is heavily populated with gang and the underworld alike, so that would require more training and knowhow in uniform before they cut you loose on your own with a partner. Vice and Homicide are always backed up and slow to get things moving, what with the political red tapes, power play and delicate handling of both sides of the law.
Romano entered as a beat cop and then not a year later he bumps up to detective of Vice AND Homicide? Nope. That is not possible, even if he were the best cop in the country, you would need to be in uniform minimum three years and then specialize and shadow and apprentice before you even HOPE of being a detective of any branch. Vice is easier to get into, but homicide takes the most time and shadowing.
Lets look at where he has lived. He lived in Fort Meade, Maryland after his time in the Navy. Since Fort Meade is home to majority of the branches of the military and many other subdivisions of the branches, he most likely has done some intelligence work. With our searches here typically requiring civilian background checks, I have no way to go in depth on his service records more than just knowing he served and got out five years ago and started working in one of those sub-agencies.
Single with no children that shows as dependents or child support. Makes sense, lots of Rangeman are single and keep it that way. Not that we don't WANT to be in a relationship, but we tend to push them away because we have our own demons to live with and do not want to accidentally hurt whoever was in bed with us. As long as we have that and are under contract where we go in the wind at the drop of a hat, relationships are quite difficult to maintain. Especially if they never served, they most likely would not be able to deal with us just disappearing one day with no notice to them…
Unfortunately, I think that is the main reason why Ranger has not officially claimed wifey… too many demons and enemies alike. His is worse than majority of us, he gets called to be in the wind the most because he is the BEST at what he does. Be it neutralizing targets, gathering or interrogating for intel, or hostage retrievals.
More often than not, each mission he loses a bit of his human side to build his Ranger armor… just as we lost a bit of our human side to complete a mission. Many of us have the human side misplaced and have to scramble to find it to try and piece it back to our souls. Lots of times, when we find it, some pieces have been chipped… leaving us with cracked versions of what we left the states with… Thus the nightmares and decompressing time after missions. We go to some place quiet and calm, and insert ourselves little by little back into civilian lives. Typically it takes two weeks average to fully immerse back to civilian life, but ever since wifey came into the picture? It could be as little as a week. Main reason? No judgment or fear from her by seeing us silent and not talking. She does not push us to talk about any topic, whether it be where we have been or why the bad mood. She offers us her Boston Creames or cake that she so treasures… trying to make us feel better. You know you are special to her when she offers you those.
Anyways, I note down the discrepancies of the police time and the fact that he has lived at Fort Meade, Maryland, which houses the majority of the military branches and sub-agencies. Also the fact that he served in the Navy and got out five years ago, and could not search further into his time in the service or what he did for the sub-agencies. That would require some military clearance that our search does not provide or allow.
Then I go about my day.