by Palladian
Casey gazed at Lex for a moment, as if considering what Clara had said. “No,” Casey eventually answered, “She moved too fast for me to catch her with something like that. I didn’t even do it on purpose. Relax, would you?”
Lex now had a moment to look at Casey as she stepped the rest of the way up to the door. She held a man in the air by the back of his shirt, and as Lex watched, Casey put him out the door, landing him on his feet but roughly enough that he stumbled. He turned and looked at her as if he wanted to yell, or at least say something sarcastic, but Casey gave the man a hard stare and he just shouldered his tools and left instead.
Probably one of the reasons he had done so was Casey’s stature. Lex estimated the woman to be around seven feet tall with the physical build and obvious strength of a bodybuilder. It hadn't escaped Lex that Casey had carried the man to the door with little effort, as if she’d been holding a newspaper, not even breathing heavily. The next thing that Lex noticed, after getting over some of her surprise about the incident with the workman, was that Casey was dressed in workout gear—bike shorts with a long t-shirt and a pair of sneakers. Her blonde hair was back in a simple braid that ran halfway down her back, and her dark blue eyes appeared frank and direct.
Casey sighed as she looked back at Lex. “Look, I really am sorry. I had no idea you were down there because we don’t get many visitors here. Anyway, Clara,” Casey said, turning back to the other woman, “this is actually all my fault. Be sure to blame it on me when you talk to Sauer.” Rolling her eyes, Casey added, “It’s not like you wouldn’t anyway.” She began to turn to go back inside, but then glanced back at Lex. “Oh, and good luck, I guess.”
Lex was unsure of what to make of that last comment and so just replied, “Uh, thanks.” Stepping around the paint as well as she could, she made her way to the front door.
“There’s a first aid kit in the kitchen,” Casey’s disembodied voice said from somewhere inside. Clara glared in the general direction it had come from and then turned to Lex.
“Let’s get you cleaned up a bit before we go in to Mr. Sauer,” she said.
Lex nodded and followed her in and to the left, the door automatically creaking shut behind them along its track. Turning her head to briefly scan her surroundings, Lex noted an open area to the right with couches and tables, just past two sets of staircases. It had wide picture windows with a view past some tired-looking docking to the water, then of the river beyond and the tall buildings across it, probably Crystal City, she thought. Not exactly a downtown vista, but very nice compared to what Lex had expected after the neighborhood she’d traveled through to get here.
Everything smelled faintly of cinnamon and coffee, Lex noted as they moved through the kitchen door. Looking over Clara’s shoulder, Lex saw large stainless steel appliances and an island in the middle with stools pulled up around it. She stepped up to the big sink, took some soap from a nearby pump bottle, and drew some water to wash her cut, working the wound a little to push the grit out. While she dried the abrasion, Lex watched Clara poke through a white metal cabinet attached to the wall, eventually handing over a gauze pad, some bandages, and some disinfectant packets. “Is this what you need?” Clara asked.
Lex nodded, reached for the articles, and quickly patched her hand up. “Thanks for your help, Ms. Pingham,” she replied, throwing the trash into a large wastebasket near the door. She wished there was something she could do about her shoes and skirt, but sighed as she realized that there was no help for them now. “I think I’m ready.”
“Good. Mr. Sauer doesn’t like to be kept waiting. Please come this way.”
Clara led Lex out of the kitchen and then back towards the open room she’d spotted earlier. Before entering the room, however, they turned and went up a set of stairs to the left. At the top Lex saw a corridor with doors on either side and noted that the window at the end of the hall showed a blank wall at the bottom and part of a cloudless, intensely sunny sky at the top. Mentally thanking whoever invented air conditioning, Lex turned left to follow Clara and trailed her through the last door on the right.
“Mr. Sauer,” Clara said as she went into the room, “I apologize for the delay. There was an incident at the front door, and Ms. McKilliam was slightly injured. We had to stop by the first aid kit on the way up.”
The man Lex spotted turning towards them was much older than Clara or herself and had the look of someone used to getting what he wanted and for whom cost was never an issue. He sat in a sleek, motorized wheelchair and wore a suit that probably cost more than Lex had ever earned in a year. She smelled good cologne and could tell that the cut of his grey-silver hair had probably been done by someone whose phone number she couldn’t even afford. Lex swallowed, her ripped skirt and paint-spattered shoes looming so large in her imagination it seemed they had their own neon signs. Even if it hadn’t been ripped, her suit, a simple design in black linen with a fitted, short-sleeved jacket and a knee-length skirt suddenly seemed pathetically cheap in comparison. She forced a smile on her face as she thought, Oh well, I’ve probably lost the chance at this job! The idea made her feel a bit less anxious, however, and she sensed her shoulders dropping a fraction as she stood taller and moved forward to meet her interviewer.
Clara introduced them as they crossed to the side of the conference table where he sat and Lex leaned forward to shake hands with the man. Momentarily surprised by the strength of his grip, she increased her own fractionally and then they both pulled away. As Lex stepped back, she took a better look at the room she’d walked into and found it the nicest she’d seen in the building so far, furnished with a large, polished, black conference table surrounded with comfortable-looking leather chairs.
“Clara, what was the incident you just referred to?” Sauer asked. “I didn’t think the neighborhood was that bad.”
Clara’s lips thinned a little before she answered. “Casey seemed to be in some sort of argument with one of the workmen on the roof, and during their…discussion, a five-gallon bucket of paint was pushed off the roof, nearly onto Ms. McKilliam.”
Mr. Sauer looked at Lex with a raised eyebrow. “Really? I’d like to see what happened. Could you bring it up on the monitor, Clara?”
Clara pushed a button Lex hadn’t noticed, which flipped a screen up on the table in front of Sauer, then typed a few things into the keyboard in front of it. Finally, Clara swiveled the screen so that all three of them could watch it. Lex saw herself waiting at the front door and then watched her face turn upwards. Her expression changed, and then it looked as if the camera had suddenly moved away from her. After that, Lex stumbled a little and caught herself from falling with her left hand.
Oddly, Lex heard Sauer chuckle, almost as if to himself. “Could we see that again, Clara, from the side?”
After Clara typed a bit more on the keyboard, Lex and the others watched as the scene replayed itself from a different angle. She darted sidelong glances at her companions’ faces and watched as they stared in surprise, blinking and seeming unable to track exactly what had happened. Lex finally looked squarely over to see Sauer nodding to himself, a look of satisfaction on his face. She tried not to let her own expression show how bizarre she found the situation, however, because for the life of her, Lex couldn’t figure out why they’d care.
“Ms. McKilliam, please have a seat,” he said, and Lex chose a nearby chair at the conference table. As she slid into the chair, she found it difficult to stop herself from petting the buttery-soft leather on the armrests, but tried hard to focus on the interview instead. Clara sat opposite them and opened a laptop that she’d pulled out of a nearby bag. Sauer then went on in a thoughtful way, “You’re Bill McKilliam’s daughter, aren’t you? Do you know I knew your dad?”
Lex could feel her throat constrict and her stomach clench, but responded quickly. “Mr. Sauer, please feel free to call me Lex.” She paused a moment, trying to think of something else to say. “I don’t remember your name from when I was a child. Are
you someone he met in the service?”
Mentally cursing her father, Lex wondered if she would ever get out from under the man’s shadow. After being out of his house for almost a decade now, she still felt like she couldn’t escape him.
“Well done, Lex,” Sauer complimented her. “Yes, your father and I met up in the service. We weren’t close pals or anything, but we did work together on several occasions. He seemed a very reliable man.”
“Yes, I’m sure. He always spoke highly of his military service.” Where they taught the rat bastard to torture people. I’m sure he was very good at his job, even then, Lex thought.
“Did you train under your father in martial arts?”
Lex sighed internally. Just about everyone who heard her last name wanted to know about that because of the stupid radio commercials. Anyone who'd lived in the DC area for even a short amount of time had heard the man’s voice on the radio, talking up his string of martial arts studios. She’d considered changing her name, but it had seemed like too much trouble. Instead, Lex avoided listening to the radio.
“Yes, I trained under him from the time I was 2 until I turned 16. During that time, I earned black belts in tae kwon do and hapkido, and a brown belt in judo.” Which I paid for in bruises, a few broken bones, and a number of scars, Lex thought, her stomach now churning. Which is why I only wear tights and never stockings. Which is why I feel so uncomfortable in these short sleeves and try not to turn my right arm so the hand is up and you can see my compound fracture scar.
“Why only your brown belt in judo?” Sauer asked, looking at her curiously.
“That was the highest I could go, since I was under 16 at the time.”
“May I ask why you stopped training when you were 16?”
Lex was ready with her stock, semi-truthful answer to the intrusive question that she’d heard too many times. “High school studies just got too busy, so I thought it was more important to focus on them.”
Her mind was screaming the real answer, that everything had gotten much worse until finally her father had told her to leave the house or he would kill her. The highlights of her move to a friend’s parent’s spare room, working a fast food job and cleaning the house she stayed at for rent, and somehow graduating high school under these circumstances flashed quickly through her mind. “Mr. Sauer, do you mind if I ask how this is related to the interview? I have some copies of my résumé, in case we need to reference them–”
Lex had started to open her portfolio and take some résumés out to hand to Clara and Sauer, but Sauer put a hand up.
“No need; we received all the information we needed to know from the government application you filed.” Sauer pressed a button on the keyboard in front of him, and Lex saw a document appear on the screen with her picture on the top right-hand side. “I see here that you graduated last year from Northern Virginia Community College, cum laude. What did your major in?”
“Science. Mostly biology and chemistry courses. I’m interested in eventually finishing my four-year degree in biochemistry, so I focused on what was available in that field. As you probably saw in my application, I’ve done some consulting work with the National Institutes of Health, and I’d like to continue working in that field and that direction.”
“Very…interesting.” Sauer replied distractedly, frowning about something in Lex’s last statement. Lex almost shook her head but stopped herself. Even when she’d begun college she’d never been eligible for grants for school because she’d been too afraid to approach her father and ask him to sign paperwork to emancipate her as a minor when she left home. As a result, she’d only ever been able to take loans out for college, since the powers that be considered her parents’ income as well as her own until a few years back, but by then they told her she made too much money to be given a grant. Lex had never felt comfortable enough to borrow money to go to school, however, fearing she could never pay it back. She’d been able to afford to attend college part time during the last five years, since she’d been making decent money doing consulting, and had been able to finish her two-year degree last year, but most employers in the area frowned on her lack of a four-year education. She mentally sighed, assuming that was the source of Sauer’s displeasure.
“I don’t know if it’s included on my government application, but NIH ranked our team very highly on the last project I worked on for them. I’d be glad to give you contact information for some of my former managers so that you could talk to them for references.”
Sauer looked up at her. “If you like, please give that to Clara before you leave; I can have her call them and ask about your character. Because, really, I’m not interested in your previous work experience, since it’s not applicable to this job.”
Lex looked at him directly for a moment and then dropped her eyes, trying not to stare in confusion. “Mr. Sauer, I was told that you couldn’t explain to me the exact nature of the position over the phone, but I’ll need to know more about it in order to make any kind of decision. I would be glad to sign a non-disclosure agreement if it would mean you could tell me more about the job.”
Sauer chuckled softly, again. “Clara, an agreement for Lex, please. Lex,” Sauer said, turning back to her, “this isn’t just a job.”
Lex took the paper Clara offered her from across the table and scanned it. It was one page, with a logo at the top that read “MSI” from top to bottom, entwined in what looked like a strand of DNA. The beginning language was pretty standard, but as she got near the end of the document, a sentence stood out to her suddenly as if it had been highlighted. She looked up at Sauer with disbelief. “What is this passage about, that if I reveal any specifics of our conversation today to unauthorized personnel that I could be killed, at the agency’s discretion? Are you serious?”
Sauer chuckled again. Lex was getting tired of the sound.
“Really, Lex, it’s just there for effect,” he said, but his eyes hardened a bit as he looked at her again. “Since I know you have no intention of letting anyone know what we talk about today, however, why don’t you just sign the paper so we can get on with the interview?”
Lex thought about it for a moment, weighing her gut feeling to run against her months of joblessness, and then signed the agreement. Really, he’s right, Lex thought. No one will ever believe me even if I do talk about it. Anyone would think she was joking about the content of the agreement, at the very least. Wondering for a moment if this was how Central Intelligence Agency or National Security Agency candidates felt, she handed the paper back to Clara, who filed it quickly away.
“Good,” purred Sauer. “Now, let me tell you more about our organization. We are based around a team concept. Casey, for example, would be one of your team members, were you to be chosen. We recruit individuals with exceptional talents and train them so they’re able to excel further. We also do special team training so that all of us are able to work more effectively as a unit. Our team then uses this training to back up and provide extraordinary help to law enforcement, the National Guard—really, any agency that requires assistance and could use our unique skills.”
Chosen, not hired. Lex had noted the odd word selection. She thought a moment about what she’d heard, but it didn’t really match up with any positions she’d taken before, and the whole setup had started to make her feel nervous. “That sounds very interesting, Mr. Sauer, but I’m still uncertain how I’d fit into what you described,” Lex said tentatively.
“Really?” He arched a silver-grey eyebrow at her. “You don’t see how you could fit in with us, with almost a decade and a half of various types of martial arts training?”
Now she was beginning to understand, but didn’t like it. “Mr. Sauer, although I’ve tried to keep practicing over the time I left organized training, as an adult I don’t have as much time to train as I did when I was a kid. I still do my forms when I can and hit the heavy bag and lift weights, but I am not as practiced with my martial arts as I was then. I can’t say I’d
consider it something I would put on my résumé.”
“I know!” Sauer exclaimed. “That’s why no one else has approached you about this before, I’d assume. I was lucky I recognized your name and figured out you were Bill’s little girl.”
Lex felt her scalp starting to sweat. She could taste an odd, metallic flavor as she clenched her teeth. Her hands felt cold, and she could almost swear she heard her father’s voice in the distance: “Harder, Alex, you piece of crap! Can’t you fucking do anything right?”
“Mr. Sauer, what sorts of things does the team do, or assist with?” Lex finally settled on asking as her mind reeled about wildly, not sure at all what these people were trying to get her into.
“Well, we can help with natural disasters, for example, since we have some members with greater strength or speed than the average person. Sometimes we assist with large incidents in cities where the National Guard might normally be called in; we can help get things back to normal. Sometimes we can help law enforcement capture criminals that have unique talents or abilities. That sort of thing.”
Lex nodded, trying to appear thoughtful, figuring that looked better than confused. “So, what do you see as my potential role in the team?”
“Well, as I’ve already been able to see, you’re fast and flexible. Judging how far you were able to jump, I bet you’re a lot stronger than you look, too. We’d be able to give you further martial arts training with some of the finest teachers to capitalize on what you already know, allowing you to become the martial arts expert on the team. How does that sound to you?”
“It all sounds very interesting, but I’d have to think it over, Mr. Sauer, since it’s so far from anything I’ve done professionally before.”
What the hell have I stumbled into? she thought. Lex was wondering how long the rest of the interview would last because she now felt that leaving as soon as possible would probably be the best thing to do. It was all just too unbelievably weird.
“Well, I’m convinced. I think you would be a good addition to the team, but you still have to meet with the other girls,” Sauer concluded.