Chapter 11

Snart had seen quite a bit in his life, but somehow even the last several months he had spent as a Legend had not prepared him for what he was dealing with now.

Everything that Mulder and Scully had told him about the Smoking Man in their interactions had always been that while they knew he was capable of murder and had doubtless killed many people in his life, they had always thought he had done so cautiously and with restraint. Their experience with them was that of a tactician, someone who was thinking several moves ahead with every action that was taken, and who had long since realized that acting on impulse was a luxury that the greater purpose could not afford.

Nothing that Snart or the other legends had seen of the Smoking Man in the past three trips had done anything to change their opinion of Mulder and Scully's appraisal. This was a man who plotted and planned, who was willing to give orders to kill but would only do so if it was absolutely necessary. In their most recent trip to 1973 Stein and Jefferson had the impression of a man who didn't make decisions lightly and who believed those who stepped out of line were problems to be dealt with – or eliminated – at a future point.

Snart and Rory had raised the question among themselves whether when – not if - they encountered the Smoking Man in 1952 that he would be radically different when he was in his 20s. Neither had truly thought it a legitimate possibility. The one thing that they had assumed the more that they had personally experienced the history of the Syndicate was that these men had fundamentally never changed at any point along the timeline. This had been true when Mick had gotten his first glimpse of them in what would be the final days of their existence and Stein had seen very little difference between their stoic attitude in 1999 and when the Project had effectively taken its modern shape in 1973. Furthermore based on what Mulder had heard about his father – albeit secondhand – even in the early days of the project Bill had been a waffler, someone who only did the right thing when there was no chance of it being connected to him and only under extreme duress. It was logical to assume that the Smoking Man would be little different.

But if that were the case, a roughly 27 year old C.G.B. Spender – Bill Mulder was that old in 1952 and the two men were about the same age – would have been holding the gun at Snart and waiting for his superiors to arrive. He would not clearly be itching to kill Snart, practically daring him to make the kind of move that Snart had seen so many rookie cops make in all of his experience. The Smoking Man had always asked every question possible, gotten all the facts and information, and then got someone else to do the shooting. The 1952 version clearly wasn't interesting in finding out what Snart knew or even who he was: he thought that he was dealing with a threat and that threat needed to be eliminated immediately.

For the first time Snart realized something he had never considered before. Perhaps the Smoking Man had risen to his position of leadership after decades of methods of dealing with previous threats had ended up with exposure that the Syndicate in its early form couldn't easily cover up. Maybe the reason Mulder had been kept alive for as long as he had was because there had been more primitive versions of him over the decades – journalists, law enforcement, maybe even aspiring politicians – and they had been eliminated in methods that had drawn the wrong kind of attention. Maybe the Smoking Man and his colleagues had spent their early years following the orders of elders and had decided to try and do things differently when they were in charge.

Of course that meant that Leonard Snart was going to be a victim of that kind of leadership which he had no intention of letting happen. He had escaped far more deadly situations in his lifetime then this version of the Smoking Man had ever yet had a chance to deal with. And more importantly, this version had no idea which methods worked yet.

All of this went through Snart's mind in a few seconds. Then the Not-Yet-Smoking Man put the gun to his forehead.

"Is there an answer to that question that gets me out of here alive?"

There was the briefest of pauses. "What were you doing in the FBI this afternoon?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Snart said boldly. "Of course, if you're so sure I was there, then we don't need to go any further. I assume the bullet going through my head will make a noise that people will hear and a mess that will be hard to clean-up, but that's your problem to solve, not mine."

"You've got a set of brass ones for a man in your position."

"I'm not the one in a position. This is still America, and I think people still speak unkindly when their citizens are shot in the street." Snart paused. "What's the cover story going to be? You came to serve a warrant on a Communist agitator, I pulled a gun so you shot me in self-defense."

Spender didn't move the gun but he didn't pull the trigger either. That was progress.

"I don't know what position you have or what agency you actually work for but I do know that you've likely been given instructions to find out why these individuals were where they say they were before you kill them." Snart said. "And while I am curious to know what brought you to our little establishment at this time of night, you don't have any evidence that I am who you say I am. By the way, do you even know my name or is that a technicality?"

"Whatever it is, it's not your real name."

"Well, I have one. I'm not sure you do." Snart said. "And since that's irrelevant to why we're here, let's return to my original question. Is there any answer I can give that allows me to escape alive?"

Snart could see the wheels turning. The obvious move was to lie and say that if he answered the questions he would walk away unharmed. The problem was, of course, that Spender had started this conversation with a gun to his head and whatever credibility he had was pretty much starting at zero.

Alternatively he could bring him to whoever his superiors were – Snart was sure at this stage Spender wasn't very high in the food chain – and argue he could negotiate with them. Snart didn't think 'good cop, bad cop" had been invented yet but he figured that was the next try. Under other circumstances and with other people, it might even work.

There were two problems with that. First, Snart had been in enough normal interrogation rooms to know the kind of tricks cops used on suspects to get them to confess. Second, the police were bound by certain codes and Snart knew far too well these men had none. He had no intention of ending up in a room with no windows with any of these men and certainly not this one.

"I don't think you understand the severity of your position," Spender said solemnly.

"You've got a gun to my head. Not the first and it won't be the last, but I understand my position perfectly." And then Snart had an idea. "Tell you what. I'm more than willing to explain why you're here and what you think this about. But not to you. Or your superiors for that matter."

"All right then," Spender said. "Who will you talk to?"

The answer wiped the smug expression of his face.

"I'll talk to William Mulder."

10: 05 pm

Mick had never been as smart as his partner when it came to planning: he had always been the brawn and left the brains to Leonard.

But everyone he'd ever dealt with – and that included Team Flash and for a while many of his fellow Legends - had underestimated his blunt manner and crude speech as if he was dumb.

It was true he didn't have the intellect of anyone at Star Labs or Palmer or Stein but there was something to be said for street smarts. He could read threats of every person who was in a room as quick as Snart and measure how much of an effort it would take for him to deal with them.

So when five men in trenches burst in with guns out within ten seconds he had a pretty clear idea based on their posture and they were holding their weapons how dangerous each one of them would be if he were to attack them. He could also tell within another five seconds which one of them was the weak link, both physically and psychologically.

Mick had never been as good as Snart at manipulating people because of his nature: he didn't have the patience for it the way his colleague did. That didn't mean he wasn't capable of it, albeit in a far cruder manner than Snart. However, his ability to read the threat level could also tell him when the best thing he could was to shut up and do nothing. This went against his basic instinct – he knew this was his biggest weakness even without having to be told – but when he needed to he could exercise restraint. The problem was he could never do it as long as most of his colleagues and the problem was he had less ability to know when the breaking point was then Snart did.

It might have been more logical for Snart to stay behind and for him to draw fire. The problem was that Snart had been the point of contact with Bahnsen and the one people were more likely to remember. If he had been the one to stay, he likely would have been killed by one of these itchy trigger fingers – probably the one closest to him – when he did anything that looked threatening. And in 1952, that had a far wider range than it did in the present. (Or was it the future – Mick still had a difficult time trying to figure out which it was.) The fact that Snart had done most of the talking with Bahnsen meant that she was more likely to be remembered that he was. His staying was going to buy his friend time.

The two of them had gone through variations of this several times in their careers, and both had played the role that Mick was about to. There was a basic script for this kind of thing that they had and Mick was going to use it. Some might question it would work in the 1950s as it did in the 21st century but Mick was pretty sure that cops were cops no matter when they existed.

"I don't know who you work for but you guys are terrible at your jobs," Mick said slowly. "My grandmother could have made you guys and she's been blind for ten years."

"Shut up!" The one closest to him. Right call.

"Seriously if you guys are the best and brightest, then it's no wonder the Reds are everyone in this country," Mick didn't move. "You don't recognize a fellow G-Man when you see one?"

There was a long pause as this registered. "Show us your ID." The tallest one said.

"Sure. How about you show me yours?" Mick remained calm. "Let me guess. You all left them in your other suits."

This was a slight bluff but not much of one: based on every Mulder had told him and their own experience both he and Snart were betting none of them were going to be carrying official ID on them. Mick wasn't sure the phrase 'plausible deniability' had been coined yet but he figured its variation was just as in style in 1952 as in any era. In certain things the left hand didn't want to know what the right hand was doing and that meant making sure if things went wrong, there was no connection.

Sure enough not one of the men made even an effort to reach for ID. "That's what I thought. Let me guess. Your superior – your real one, not the one who's in charge of this little raid – called you and told you had to come out here and grab me. You didn't ask any questions, you just piled into your cars, drove out her in the middle of the night and were told to grab whoever was in this room. Just out of curiosity, did they even give you a name or more than a general description?"

No one moved; none of their expressions changed. But Mick had been doing this long enough to know he'd unsettled at least two of the men here, maybe three. They still were all sure about the righteousness of their cause but they were beginning to wonder if they should have at least asked one question before they started on this trip. Some of them were no doubt wondering if this was a training exercise and if so, were they passing or failing?

"You know I really would have thought the last war would have given you some ideas as to what the wrong way to behave is." Mick shook his head. "Did you guys hear some of the excuses they made at Nuremberg or does the color red frighten you so much that you have memory loss?"

"Who are you to tell us our jobs?" Twitchy.

"Shut up!" The tall one warned.

"Jobs? You mean you get paid for this?" Mick rolled his eyes. "I knew standards were relaxed after V-J Day for recruitment but I didn't think they'd lowered the bar this much."

"Who are you working for?" the tall one demanded.

"Now we all know I'm not authorized to tell you that any more than you're authorized to tell me who you are," Mick was taking a lecturing tone that Stein would have approved of. "Besides we know that no matter what I said you wouldn't believe it even if it was the gospel truth."

They were all nervous now. Mick hadn't so much as moved a millimeter since he started talking and anyone of them could have executed him in a minute. But now all of them were unsure as to what to do next. Any move they were going to make seemed to be almost certainly the wrong one and they were all terrified if they went along with their orders, they would all be told they had failed – and likely face a worst end than a tongue lashing.

"Well, are we going to get on with it or not?" he continued.

Now they were all clearly nervous.

"What are the orders? Haul me into one of your nearest holding offices and beat me to a pulp? Rubber hoses? Cat O' Nine Tails? Forty whacks with a wet noodle?"

They were clearly baffled.

"Were you supposed to shoot me in the car on the way back to wherever you were taking me and dump me in the Potomac? Stage a hanging in this room?" An idea struck him. "Did they even give any of you the same set of instructions as to what to do with me?"

All of them remained stone-faced – except for the one with a gray fedora. He blinked. Just once. It would have been completely unnoticeable to most observers. To Mick, who'd long been equipped to recognize these things, it was a tell.

"Just so you know, one of you was told something else." Mick said calmly. "And that has nothing to do with me but the rest of you."

The man shifted slightly. Bingo.

Twitchy reacted first. "What's he talking about?"

"Shut up. It's a Commie trick."

"Is it?" Mick said calmly. "See one of you has been given a very different set of orders then the rest of you. He hasn't said so. He's told you he had the same set of orders as the rest of you and that's half-true."

"Keep your mouth shut." The man in the grey hat said.

"Now I could be wrong about the details – those are always the part that are trickiest – but the basics remain the same," Mick said. "He was told that there was a threat to the nation's security here, the same thing you were all told."

"Shut up."

"He was told to come here, haul me off and neutralize that threat. You were all given the same orders, I'm sure."

"Don't say another word."

"The difference is, he was given one more order. Simpler. Just three words."

The man stuck his gun in his forehead.

Mick smiled. "'No loose ends'.

Mick knew what was going to come next and he was prepared for it. The man hit him with his gun hard enough to knock a lesser man out. Mick had taken harder blows before so he was prepared.

The man in the grey hat wasn't.

When the shots rang out, Mick knew who they come from and where they were aimed.

He opened his eyes – and was somehow not shocked.

He tsked-tsked for nearly five seconds. "I never understood how someone couldn't hit the broad side of a barn until now." He got to his feet. "Five shots at near point blank range and you hit him twice – in the shoulder, no less." He walked over to him. "Well, at least you managed to ruin his hat."

The hat was in fact pretty much in rags. The man who wore it was groaning in pain.

"Oh, walk it off," Mick said. "I've had insect bites more painful then what you've got. This is the best and the brightest Uncle Sam has recruited the fight the Red Menace? I am deeply ashamed. Though I guess I should be grateful that you made him drop this."

He picked up the gun. "Snub nose pistols. Well, if the enemy attacks with crossbows America will be safe from an invading force."

The man in the hat cringed. "Oh relax, Captain America. But now that I have your weapon, can we talk? Like grownups?"

"I'll die before I talk." It would have sounded bold coming from Mick.

"And if I were interested in what you had to say that might be an interesting offer. But we both know that beyond your orders, you don't have any power." Mick said. "I've never been accused of being the sharpest knife in the drawer, but next to you guys I'm Einstein. Hell, he could probably put up a better fight then any of you boys."

"Now look I think we've established that you guys are low, low down on the totem pole in every possible respect. And we also know you guys don't have much of a lifespan if you stay with your current employer. So here's what's going to happen. I'm going to be the bigger man" Mick smirked "which I am, physically and oddly enough mentally and give you guys a running start."

"Do you know what will happen if we get caught?"

"They take away your secret decoder rings," Mick deadpanned. "Considering that the boy wonder was planning to take you out at the end of this little mission and you spectacularly failed at doing the same thing given the opportunity I think the government was not going to thank you for your services any time soon. Your chances of escape may be slim right now, but if you stay they're none. I'm going to give you until the count of five to get out of here. One -"

They were all starting to run before he even made it to two.

"You know I've had a hard time understand why the government would knuckle under to alien threats; then I see this and it makes perfect sense." Mick's attention had been fixed on the door but he had never forgotten the man on the ground. He stood on the man's foot.

"Hold on a second, that offer did not apply to you." Mick knelt. "What's your name? No you'd lie anyway, so I'm just gonna call you John."

"Go fuck yourself."

"Finally, a little spirit." Mick said. "Now we both know you're not even close to the brains behind this outfit. But I also know that when this was over with there was someone you were going to report to. Let me guess. You were going to a pay phone; call a number you'd been given and say something like: 'It's handled'' Then you would hang up and drive away until called upon again. Am I right?"

'John' didn't answer but it was clear from the way he looked at him that Mick was on the right track.

"Now I have no doubt you've memorized it because you're smart enough not to write anything down. But you're also smart enough to know that they didn't send you here without making sure this place wasn't already under surveillance. And because they don't want any connections, they drove off when you guys arrived."

'John' was unable to hide his astonishment, though he said nothing.

"They're going to be back here in a while, ten minutes, maybe fifteen. And when they find the job isn't done, they will eliminate loose ends of which you're now one."

"Is there a point to this?" John snapped.

"I think we both know what I'm getting at. The question is, are you going to take the same opportunity I just gave them?"

10:11 PM

Snart had been willing to bet that if the Smoking Man was behind this operation, William Mulder wasn't going to be that far behind. How else could that explain the relationship between the Spenders and the Mulders for more than forty years?

Spender seemed a little floored by this and Snart had expected some kind of violent response. Instead Spender had grabbed Snart by the scruff of his neck and hauled him for nearly five minutes before stopping outside what looked to be a 1950 Oldsmobile.

He hammered on the passenger side window.

Not surprisingly twenty six year old William Mulder seemed as timid as he would be nearly two decades later. "Why did you bring him here?"

"Little pissant said he'd only talk to you," Spender said.

William Mulder blanched. "How does he even know who I am?"

"I don't know," Spender paused. "But they're going to need to know before we finish things here."

"You didn't seem that interested when you had that gun to my head," Snart said cheerfully.

The timidity disappeared. "Charles. What is he talking about?"

For the first time in a long time someone on the Legends saw something very close to embarrassment on the Smoking Man's face. "He wasn't being cooperative."

"And you thought a bullet in his brain might loosen his tongue. We both know that's not how the human body works." There was something almost chiding in Bill's tone.

Snart had assumed that Smoking Man and Bill Mulder had been equals in the Syndicate at one point, with Smoking Man a little higher up in the pecking order. Was it possible that at this juncture Bill Mulder was actually a little higher up in the chain of command? It would explain why there was something close to deference in 'Charles' appearance now.

"I overreacted," he admitted.

Bill sighed. "We're not given the luxury of overreacting. We've seen what happens to our colleagues who do. We were sent here to gather intelligence before handling the problem."

Snart knew what the euphemism meant.

Bill opened the lock of the door.

"You really expect me to get in there?" Snart demanded.

"You don't have a lot of options right now," Bill Mulder pointed out.

"Neither do you. Like you said, you were sent here to gather intelligence. I'm not dumb enough to know that the Senate was going to call a hearing in order to get it."

"You really think you're in a position to dictate terms?"

"I can either make this very difficult or very easy. Easy is you get out of the car and we talk like civilized people." Snart said. "Hard is anything else."

"We could just kill you right now."

"You're probably going to kill me anyway." Snart had been in this exact position a few days and forty years ago. "This way, you don't have to do as much paperwork when we're finished."

There was a pause. Spender looked at his watch. "He's scheduled to call in ten minutes. I suppose we can give him that long."

Snart kept his expression blank. He knew that this information was supposed to leave him both mystified and terrified. He knew that he had to hide this fact – and hope his friend had done his job right.

In any case Bill Mulder got out of the car.

"You're familiar with hypothetical scenarios? Let me spin you one," Snart said. "Let's say this afternoon, two gentlemen entered a government building and asked to see an individual of no consequence. Let's say further these individuals – who you have only a vague description of and no photographic record of - went into the recesses of this organization and had a conversation with said individual. Let's say that these individuals asked for information on some other individuals."

"You're not telling us anything," Spender said dismissively.

"I'd argue I'm speaking your language perfectly," Snart sighed. "Let's get slightly less generic. Those individuals are currently assigned to the State Department, though they don't have a listing in Foggy Bottom. At the moment they have a connection with the House Unamerican Activities Committee. But so what? So do a lot of people in Washington. The difference is no one else is supposed to know that."

"You're not exactly giving us a reason to keep you alive," Bill Mulder said.

"Yes, what's another dead Communist agitator, more or less?" Snart said casually.

Neither man's face gave anything away. Maybe it hadn't happened yet.

"Now for obvious reasons people shouldn't be able to walk into a government office and ask for sensitive information and as we all know, sensitive information is basically the only kind there is these days," Snart said slowly. "These days people are being sentenced to die for far less. In the normal order of things, the Bureau or some other agency would merely swoop in and grab the individuals involved and be done with it. No one would even blink." Snart paused. "The problem is that the individuals who were asked for in these files hold a position that is very important to national security. A position so important to it that no one can even know it exists. Therefore the traditional channels of government – frequently useful to them – cannot find out about this. Because if they did, they might wonder whether their own place in the totem pole. What's that old saying: 'who will guard the guards?'"

Both of these men must have been very early in their loyalty to the project; Snart could see that he had gotten to them. To be sure, the tells were minor – a twitch of one's vocal cords, a tic of the eyebrows – but for these men in particular they might as well have been covered in flop sweat.

"Using unofficial channels and methods that the Director wishes he had access to, these same men determine who the individuals who have infiltrated their sanctuary in search of information that shouldn't exist but does," Snart said. "They are powerful enough to order men to go on missions without asking questions and battle-hardened enough to turn them into cannon fodder when it's over with. But they are also not secure enough in their place in the firmament to know that they can just stay behind and wait until its done. They must wait and get the answers they require personally. Which leads us, inevitably, here."

"So you admit you were in the building." Bill Mulder said.

"I have, in fact, done no such thing. Not that I expect to ever see the inside of a courtroom but all I have done is speak in hypotheticals. Unless, of course, you have something you want to add that might illuminate the proceedings?" Snart asked.

After a long enough silence. "Really? You won't even say if I'm getting warmer or colder?" Snart shook his head. "And on the rare occasion I would have actually preferred the former."

"You've basically told us everything we need to know," Spender said.

"If you wish to infer that from our discussion, I suppose you could." Snart said almost cheerfully. "Anyway we both know this was just stalling. You've been waiting for that phone to ring."

He pointed to the phone booth roughly fifty feet away.

"If you're trying to unnerve us you're failing," Bill Mulder said. "I told you someone was going to call."

"Yes you did." Snart said serenely. "Difference is, I actually know who's going to be on the other end of the line. Here's a hint: it's not going to be who you think it is."

There was just the slightest of non-verbal exchanges between Bill Mulder and Spender that very few would have picked up on. Snart had long since become an expert in this so he knew enough to know that it meant they were surprised but not nervous yet.

Then the phone rang.

"I'm guessing that call means I'm a dead man," Snart said. "Well, no sense avoiding the inevitable. Pick up the phone and get confirmation."

Another ring passed in which another non-verbal communication came. This one was clearer. Boy this guy's an idiot.

Bill Mulder walked to the phone and picked it up.

"The party you are trying to reach is no longer available," Mick said.

This time Bill couldn't hide his shock.

"Nothing to say? Hardly surprising. I know you have questions. Let me reassure you. I have no intention of answering any of yours. But here's what you need to know. The men you sent here know exactly what you had planned for them. If it's any consolation, they were the wrong men for the job anyway."

Bill found his tongue. "Who is this?"

"I made it very clear I'm not going to answer any of your questions. So listen. Your little operation is officially a bust. Which leaves you, the way I see it, with two choices. One: you report to your superiors how you went over their head to sanction an operation without approval that has officially failed. Or two: you put my friend on the line right now and hope that I'm more merciful then they are."

For what might have been the first – but as Snart knew far from the last time – Bill Mulder looked genuinely unsettled. His colleague sensed this and had a different reaction.

"I can end this right now," he said.

"We might have bigger things to worry about if we do," William Mulder said. "Keep the gun on him."

Snart didn't bother showing that he wasn't afraid now as he walked to the phone. "I was expected you to call five minutes ago, my friend."

"I'm not used to these rotating dials. I got the number wrong twice," Mick joked. "I'm guessing you have them right where you want them."

"One of them has a gun pointing at me and both of them are scared shitless," Snart said. "So yes. Did you hurt any of them?"

"No they did fine on their own with that one. I don't think they got the trigger man part down yet, by the way."

"Well, what do you expect from the best and the brightest?" Snart joked. "Anyway, where are you calling from?"

"Pay phone about six blocks from where we were. No one's come by in three minutes, but our luck's been too good already tonight."

"Good point," Snart said. "All right, I'll finish up here and I'll meet you at the rendezvous point."

"Remember. No visible scars." Mick hung up.

Snart turned around. "Put that pop gun away before you hurt yourself," he told Spender.

"Before he does, give us one reason why," Bill Mulder said.

"Because you sent out five men for this job that you trusted and none of them are coming back." Snart said calmly. "The two of you are going to have to work really hard to cover up this fact with your superiors and at a minimum, that's going to take the rest of the night. Now I'm pretty sure you'll get away with it but it's going to take time you don't have."

This clearly reached Spender. He put his gun back. "You really think we can just let you go?"

"Who would you be letting go?" Snart asked. "You know the names that were given at the Bureau were false ones, same as the ones at the boarding house you gentleman just tried to raid. You don't know who they worked for, either an agency or this country. The only thing you know for sure is that they asked for information about you." Snart said. "For all you know, this was just a drill and you've overreacted to it spectacularly."

Snart could read the expressions on both faces very clearly this time. There was doubt.

"I have no intention of confirming or denying anything. Because as far as me and my colleague are concerned, nothing happened tonight. We didn't see anybody and we didn't talk to anybody. There's a mess to clean up but I'm guessing the two of you are experienced at that. The last thing you want is for people to get ideas."

It was clear from this that both of these men had heard these kinds of speeches before - maybe even had given a few at this point.

"So here's what's going to happen. I'm going to leave and you're not going to follow me or try to figure anything out about the last day. You're not going to report this to anybody, not at State, not at the Bureau, no one." Snart said. "And there will be no repercussions to anyone down the food chain who might have interacted with us. Far as you're concerned they were your people who came down there and they didn't do anything wrong."

"You're trying to dictate—"

"You have my word," Bill Mulder cut his colleague off.

"I don't think your word is worth that much," Snart said. "But that doesn't matter. Our people will be checking in from time to time to be sure. You won't see them, but they'll be there."

Now there was genuine alarm crossing both men's faces. "Are you with -"

Snart held up his hand. "You don't get to ask that question. You should be lucky we let things go this far. Now I think it's time you flew back home. After all, we wouldn't want people to talk."

Had they met a decade later Snart was certain that Spender would have fired anyway and Bill would have let him, damn the consequences. But this was early enough in their careers with the project that both of them were much further down the chain of command then they wanted to be.

"If it's any consolation I have full confidence in your abilities to clean up after yourselves," Snart said as they got in the car. "Nothing else, of course, but that you two are able to handle."

Snart waited until the car was out of sight before he touched his earpiece. "I think we should leave now," he said calmly.

"I agree. We'll pick you up at the rendezvous point" Sara Lance said.

"You're not afraid of us being spotted by the wrong people?" Snart said.

Sara snickered. "What's the worst that could happen? For these guys, lights in the sky would basically be the best thing that they could think."

AUTHOR'S NOTE

And here I take by far my greatest dramatic license with Bill Mulder and the Smoking Man. In my defense we know nothing about the Smoking Man prior to 1973 besides his own words so I think I'm in good shape. Seeing him as the more hotheaded of the partnership might seem a bit extreme but he was young once.

What little we know about Bill Mulder in the early days of the conspiracy comes from Travelers and it shows him as a man who is always equivocating. I'm considering alternatives based on a line of dialogue from Anasazi: "Your father was never opposed to the project. In fact, he authorized it." Was it a lie? We never did know when the pecking order shifted and maybe in the early days.

I liked making Mick smarter than he usually seems.

And I wanted to have Snart do as much double talk as he possibly could. Did he influence so much of what Spender would say later on? Hard to say, considering a lot of this dialogue was being used by Roy Cohn and Hoover in Travelers.

Another interim chapter next and then we go back to the beginning. We're coming into the final third of this particular story.

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