Ask Me Something, by ameretrifle
Oct. 5th, 2008 12:27 am![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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sga_flashficSo I look at the most recent challenge and I'm all like, "Hey, I've got some half-finished stuff that actually fits into that. Sweet."
Title: Ask Me Something
Author: ameretrifle
Rating: PG
Summary: AU. Presumably. Whenever Meredith Rodney McKay began to believe that the CIA was fundamentally, utterly, incurably useless, he remembered the day they recruited him.
Spoilers: Not that I'm aware of.
Notes: Yep, kidfic. Well, maybe they had some weird ideas about espionage in that decade. ;)
-
Whenever Meredith Rodney McKay began to believe that the CIA was fundamentally, utterly, incurably useless, he remembered the day they recruited him.
They took him from the middle of the science fair-- five minutes before the announcement of the winners, presumably because dragging him off of the stage would have been too melodramatic, even for them-- walking him right past at least five kids and three of his teachers, none of whom said a word. The teachers didn't even look particularly alarmed. They knew he'd pick up, consciously or subconsciously, on the lesson-- don't trust in the adults. Nobody's coming to rescue you.
All the more effective because he'd been more than half on his way to adopting that as an axiom already. Whoever ran the project must've read a lot of Orson Scott Card.
They'd bundled him unceremoniously into the backseat of a gray car, windows tinted, a metal panel firmly seperating him from the front seat. They didn't put anyone in the back with him. They probably knew that'd just give him something to rail at, an outlet for his insecurities, a tangible object of blame. He still railed, and screamed, and cursed them in every way he'd ever heard and far more-- but it didn't help nearly as much when nobody heard.
To his dying day he will be firmly of the opinion that he could've got the car door open if only he'd had the right tools. As it is, he was about five minutes from getting the thing open with only a paperclip when the car pulled to a stop.
He backed toward the center of the car when he heard the engine switch off, glancing furiously between both doors, waiting for the attack to come. What the hell he thought he'd do he'd never be sure; he had half-formed notions of launching himself at them which didn't survive after the panel behind him opened and the frighteningly muscled man pulled him into the front seat.
He'll never know quite why he didn't scream; he thinks maybe he was too terrified. One of the things he took away from that day (other than the several years of clandestine work and the lifelong connection to the American government) was, don't stay quiet: that can't help. Always, always, make sure everyone around you knows exactly what's going on. He's pretty sure that policy's saved him from covert citrus poisoning at least seven times.
So then they were bundling him into a spacious, modern office building, and the second agent actually stopped to chat with the receptionist while Mr. Muscle hustled him through corridor after corridor, which grew steadily sparer and bleaker as they went. And then, of course, he was tossed into a room with a worn black table and a rickety folding chair, and two fluroescent lights that wouldn't stop blinking and left the room distressingly dim.
He sat on the chair, staring at the two-way mirror on the opposite wall, trying to examine the details of the room though it, even though he knew it was pointless-- how the hell could he escape from a building stuffed full of CIA agents? He could maybe get through the door, with enough time, but he wasn't going to get the time and he didn't have anywhere to run to if he did.
So he stared at the mirror, utterly terrified, and his brain (because it's always been wired this way) spun a thousand different scenarios, each worse than the last. All the ways things could get worse: he didn't see any way it could get better.
Now, that, he decided later, was the hallmark of genius: the subtlety of it. Someone less perceptive would've sent in a bad cop to terrorize him. It took someone damn clever to realize that job had already been done for them, by the most brilliant and dedicated person possible. It took someone damn clever to know that giving him a concrete reason to fear and hate them would only come back to bite them in the end.
So when someone came in, it was a round-faced middle-aged woman who secured her hair in its bun with pencils. Even though Rodney had been trying his best to be clever, to see past the tricks he knew they'd play, he couldn't see this... librarian as any sort of threat.
Which was unforgivably stupid of him.
"I hate the lights in this place," she said, unfolding a chair. "I think they think it's psychology. I know it always puts me on edge, so that makes sense; but what the hell they think they're playing at with the chairs, I've no idea. It's so... stereotypical, you know?"
An honest question, like she was talking to a fellow rational human being. That was an intoxicating enough priviledge for any child, but for Rodney...
"Yes, it does rather seem like a badly researched movie set," he answered, unconsciously straightening, wanting, of course, to prove himself worthy of being considered an equal. "Very unoriginal."
"Which means, I suppose, that I'm supposed to either terrify you into submission or try to play on your patriotism or something." She rolled her eyes. "Of course, given the fact that Canada is still a different country, that's hardly a feasible plan."
"We're not in-- wait, what do you mean, 'still'?"
She grinned. "It's a joke. and no, we're not in Canada. I'm afraid you're in the custody of the CIA."
"The CIA? Why?!"
"Oh, come on. You're seriously expecting me to believe that someone can be simultaneously capable of building a working model of a nuclear bomb on a twenty-dollar budget-- utilizing a truly astonishing amount of aluminum foil, by the way-- and incapable of realizing that sort of thing might set of a few alarm bells?"
He flushed, because he really hadn't given much thought to it. It had just been-- a project, a way of making the science fair bearable, when usually he'd just sucked it up and done an idiotic experiment from one of the books in the library like everyone else. They didn't really want you to discover something new; they wanted you to learn, and somehow thought you'd learn it better by doing even though any idiot could read what the results would be on the next page. He didn't understand the damn system at all. It had just been his project, his escape, a goal to work for, a new way of teaching himself, like he had been for years.
"Maybe in my own country," he defended, weakly. "But the CIA?"
She nodded, acknowledging the point. "We happen to be looking for people like you, at the moment."
"People like me?"
"People who... I'm not going to lie to you; it'd be pointless. Brilliant people without resources. It's how we get a lot of our personnel, because anyone who's rich enough to pursue their own interests, or connected enough to find resources elsewhere, generally don't want to assume any of the risks involved with being a government employee. Which you can guess for yourself. Low pay, being taken hostage, being the target of a terrorist attack, being the perpetrator of a terrorist attack-- there are dangers."
He just stared at her, because no one had ever spoken to him so candidly, and because she couldn't possibly be saying what he was beginning to think she was saying.
"So we look for people who need what we can give them. You need teachers who will actually teach you things, instead of trying to help you interact with all the other children in the class who are three or four years older than you after all the grades you've been skipped, and would probably hate you even if you weren't. You need something real to learn, something real to do, funding and help on the way to become the brilliant scientist you should-- we need you to-- become. You'll need access to equipment. You'll need funding to get into schools. You don't have any of that now."
Actually, he'd been putting a lot of thought recently into how he was going to get into college, because there was no way in hell his family would be able to pay even for gas money, at this rate. "So... are you offering me something?"
She folded her hands. "A paying job. Talented instructors who will teach you all you want about anything you want to know. Access to scientific equipment. A guaranteed full-ride scholarship to the North American college of your choice. That's all the way through your first doctorate, by the way, with an option for negotiating more. The opportunity to do something worthwhile with that brain of yours; to apply your genius to real-world situations, and create real change."
"In return for?"
"At least three years of service. Missions will probably be rare, but may include infiltration of enemy organizations, espionage, sabotage--"
"You're asking me to be a spy?!"
"We call them 'covert operatives'. You'd also spend a lot of time learning, working on project development, and advising the military on technical capabilities of new and unusual weaponry."
"Me? I'm allergic to at least ten things and I practically fall into a coma if I don't eat every four hours!"
"We think you'll grow out of that. Oh, but thanks for reminding me." She drew a granola bar from her pocket and handed it to him.
"Grow out of it?"
"The hypoglycemia thing, at least. To some degree or other. The allergies you're probably stuck with. And it's four things you're allergic to, by the way. If you lump all the citrus into one category." She slid a piece of paper across the table. "Read it, if you want. There are details, about the salary and such."
His eyes lit on the figure and he sucked in a breath. He'd had to learn a lot about finances, recently; and this was... very generous. He could save up for college expenses, an apartment, all of that. Jeannie could go to that boarding school whose brochure she'd been daydreaming over for months. "So how would this work? What would you tell my father?"
"We'd say you were going to boarding school, just like your sister. If you send him a letter every couple months, he might bother to read it. I really don't think he'll get very concerned about it."
Which was indisputable. "And I would really be?"
"Working with other people like you. We'd take care of your living arrangements. You'd be out of the country quite often, I'm afraid, but of course we'd arrange all of that as well."
"But-- seriously, what are you asking me to do? You're not asking me to infiltrate the KGB or work on the next Manhattan project or poison foriegn leaders--"
"Oh, no, no. The KGB would spot you in a second. We're not that reckless. And we aren't going to ask you to go around shooting people, either. And if you work on any weapons, they will be decidedly more conventional than the atomic bomb. In terms of scale, at any rate. What you'd be infiltrating are scientific projects-- many of which would be used for mass destruction. Things that only a scientist would be able to understand, much less sabotage or destroy. They'll be very low-risk missions. We wouldn't risk an asset such as you unnecessarily-- especially one so young. It tends to provoke... questions."
He could believe that. He did believe that. "Three years?"
"Oh, they'll do their best to keep you in as long as they can, but I think someone like you won't stay a day longer than you want to."
It was flattery, but it didn't seem like flattery, and Rodney had always been terribly weak against flattery. Not to mention, it really was all also true. He'd spend years trying to root out the tiny, subtle lies.
"Take your time thinking about it," she said, and put a pen on the table. "If you don't agree-- well, they'll probably interrogate you for a while, but you'll be sent home safe and sound soon enough. But I hope you will agree, because there are dangerous people out there. There are terrible, terrible things. And I do believe you could help stop them."
She folded her hands in her lap, waiting, as Rodney stared at the pen.
Offer him everything he wanted, for himself, his family, and the world. Acknowledge all the risks and minimize them at the same time. Make most of the fear come from his imagination, so he'd think all the fear was in his head. Make it noble and necessary, exciting and intriguing, a wide new world of everything he wanted-- everything he needed-- everything he was slowly going crazy without.
The world on a platter, if you work for us.
It was a masterwork. It was perfect. It was probably all that guileless woman's idea, to lie without lying, seduce without seducing, and he still couldn't hate her for it at all. Because it was, all, true.
He took the pen, frowned one last time at the contract, and signed his name at the bottom.
Her face lit up. "Good," she said, "good. Thank you so much."
And he was in.
-
Title: Ask Me Something
Author: ameretrifle
Rating: PG
Summary: AU. Presumably. Whenever Meredith Rodney McKay began to believe that the CIA was fundamentally, utterly, incurably useless, he remembered the day they recruited him.
Spoilers: Not that I'm aware of.
Notes: Yep, kidfic. Well, maybe they had some weird ideas about espionage in that decade. ;)
-
Whenever Meredith Rodney McKay began to believe that the CIA was fundamentally, utterly, incurably useless, he remembered the day they recruited him.
They took him from the middle of the science fair-- five minutes before the announcement of the winners, presumably because dragging him off of the stage would have been too melodramatic, even for them-- walking him right past at least five kids and three of his teachers, none of whom said a word. The teachers didn't even look particularly alarmed. They knew he'd pick up, consciously or subconsciously, on the lesson-- don't trust in the adults. Nobody's coming to rescue you.
All the more effective because he'd been more than half on his way to adopting that as an axiom already. Whoever ran the project must've read a lot of Orson Scott Card.
They'd bundled him unceremoniously into the backseat of a gray car, windows tinted, a metal panel firmly seperating him from the front seat. They didn't put anyone in the back with him. They probably knew that'd just give him something to rail at, an outlet for his insecurities, a tangible object of blame. He still railed, and screamed, and cursed them in every way he'd ever heard and far more-- but it didn't help nearly as much when nobody heard.
To his dying day he will be firmly of the opinion that he could've got the car door open if only he'd had the right tools. As it is, he was about five minutes from getting the thing open with only a paperclip when the car pulled to a stop.
He backed toward the center of the car when he heard the engine switch off, glancing furiously between both doors, waiting for the attack to come. What the hell he thought he'd do he'd never be sure; he had half-formed notions of launching himself at them which didn't survive after the panel behind him opened and the frighteningly muscled man pulled him into the front seat.
He'll never know quite why he didn't scream; he thinks maybe he was too terrified. One of the things he took away from that day (other than the several years of clandestine work and the lifelong connection to the American government) was, don't stay quiet: that can't help. Always, always, make sure everyone around you knows exactly what's going on. He's pretty sure that policy's saved him from covert citrus poisoning at least seven times.
So then they were bundling him into a spacious, modern office building, and the second agent actually stopped to chat with the receptionist while Mr. Muscle hustled him through corridor after corridor, which grew steadily sparer and bleaker as they went. And then, of course, he was tossed into a room with a worn black table and a rickety folding chair, and two fluroescent lights that wouldn't stop blinking and left the room distressingly dim.
He sat on the chair, staring at the two-way mirror on the opposite wall, trying to examine the details of the room though it, even though he knew it was pointless-- how the hell could he escape from a building stuffed full of CIA agents? He could maybe get through the door, with enough time, but he wasn't going to get the time and he didn't have anywhere to run to if he did.
So he stared at the mirror, utterly terrified, and his brain (because it's always been wired this way) spun a thousand different scenarios, each worse than the last. All the ways things could get worse: he didn't see any way it could get better.
Now, that, he decided later, was the hallmark of genius: the subtlety of it. Someone less perceptive would've sent in a bad cop to terrorize him. It took someone damn clever to realize that job had already been done for them, by the most brilliant and dedicated person possible. It took someone damn clever to know that giving him a concrete reason to fear and hate them would only come back to bite them in the end.
So when someone came in, it was a round-faced middle-aged woman who secured her hair in its bun with pencils. Even though Rodney had been trying his best to be clever, to see past the tricks he knew they'd play, he couldn't see this... librarian as any sort of threat.
Which was unforgivably stupid of him.
"I hate the lights in this place," she said, unfolding a chair. "I think they think it's psychology. I know it always puts me on edge, so that makes sense; but what the hell they think they're playing at with the chairs, I've no idea. It's so... stereotypical, you know?"
An honest question, like she was talking to a fellow rational human being. That was an intoxicating enough priviledge for any child, but for Rodney...
"Yes, it does rather seem like a badly researched movie set," he answered, unconsciously straightening, wanting, of course, to prove himself worthy of being considered an equal. "Very unoriginal."
"Which means, I suppose, that I'm supposed to either terrify you into submission or try to play on your patriotism or something." She rolled her eyes. "Of course, given the fact that Canada is still a different country, that's hardly a feasible plan."
"We're not in-- wait, what do you mean, 'still'?"
She grinned. "It's a joke. and no, we're not in Canada. I'm afraid you're in the custody of the CIA."
"The CIA? Why?!"
"Oh, come on. You're seriously expecting me to believe that someone can be simultaneously capable of building a working model of a nuclear bomb on a twenty-dollar budget-- utilizing a truly astonishing amount of aluminum foil, by the way-- and incapable of realizing that sort of thing might set of a few alarm bells?"
He flushed, because he really hadn't given much thought to it. It had just been-- a project, a way of making the science fair bearable, when usually he'd just sucked it up and done an idiotic experiment from one of the books in the library like everyone else. They didn't really want you to discover something new; they wanted you to learn, and somehow thought you'd learn it better by doing even though any idiot could read what the results would be on the next page. He didn't understand the damn system at all. It had just been his project, his escape, a goal to work for, a new way of teaching himself, like he had been for years.
"Maybe in my own country," he defended, weakly. "But the CIA?"
She nodded, acknowledging the point. "We happen to be looking for people like you, at the moment."
"People like me?"
"People who... I'm not going to lie to you; it'd be pointless. Brilliant people without resources. It's how we get a lot of our personnel, because anyone who's rich enough to pursue their own interests, or connected enough to find resources elsewhere, generally don't want to assume any of the risks involved with being a government employee. Which you can guess for yourself. Low pay, being taken hostage, being the target of a terrorist attack, being the perpetrator of a terrorist attack-- there are dangers."
He just stared at her, because no one had ever spoken to him so candidly, and because she couldn't possibly be saying what he was beginning to think she was saying.
"So we look for people who need what we can give them. You need teachers who will actually teach you things, instead of trying to help you interact with all the other children in the class who are three or four years older than you after all the grades you've been skipped, and would probably hate you even if you weren't. You need something real to learn, something real to do, funding and help on the way to become the brilliant scientist you should-- we need you to-- become. You'll need access to equipment. You'll need funding to get into schools. You don't have any of that now."
Actually, he'd been putting a lot of thought recently into how he was going to get into college, because there was no way in hell his family would be able to pay even for gas money, at this rate. "So... are you offering me something?"
She folded her hands. "A paying job. Talented instructors who will teach you all you want about anything you want to know. Access to scientific equipment. A guaranteed full-ride scholarship to the North American college of your choice. That's all the way through your first doctorate, by the way, with an option for negotiating more. The opportunity to do something worthwhile with that brain of yours; to apply your genius to real-world situations, and create real change."
"In return for?"
"At least three years of service. Missions will probably be rare, but may include infiltration of enemy organizations, espionage, sabotage--"
"You're asking me to be a spy?!"
"We call them 'covert operatives'. You'd also spend a lot of time learning, working on project development, and advising the military on technical capabilities of new and unusual weaponry."
"Me? I'm allergic to at least ten things and I practically fall into a coma if I don't eat every four hours!"
"We think you'll grow out of that. Oh, but thanks for reminding me." She drew a granola bar from her pocket and handed it to him.
"Grow out of it?"
"The hypoglycemia thing, at least. To some degree or other. The allergies you're probably stuck with. And it's four things you're allergic to, by the way. If you lump all the citrus into one category." She slid a piece of paper across the table. "Read it, if you want. There are details, about the salary and such."
His eyes lit on the figure and he sucked in a breath. He'd had to learn a lot about finances, recently; and this was... very generous. He could save up for college expenses, an apartment, all of that. Jeannie could go to that boarding school whose brochure she'd been daydreaming over for months. "So how would this work? What would you tell my father?"
"We'd say you were going to boarding school, just like your sister. If you send him a letter every couple months, he might bother to read it. I really don't think he'll get very concerned about it."
Which was indisputable. "And I would really be?"
"Working with other people like you. We'd take care of your living arrangements. You'd be out of the country quite often, I'm afraid, but of course we'd arrange all of that as well."
"But-- seriously, what are you asking me to do? You're not asking me to infiltrate the KGB or work on the next Manhattan project or poison foriegn leaders--"
"Oh, no, no. The KGB would spot you in a second. We're not that reckless. And we aren't going to ask you to go around shooting people, either. And if you work on any weapons, they will be decidedly more conventional than the atomic bomb. In terms of scale, at any rate. What you'd be infiltrating are scientific projects-- many of which would be used for mass destruction. Things that only a scientist would be able to understand, much less sabotage or destroy. They'll be very low-risk missions. We wouldn't risk an asset such as you unnecessarily-- especially one so young. It tends to provoke... questions."
He could believe that. He did believe that. "Three years?"
"Oh, they'll do their best to keep you in as long as they can, but I think someone like you won't stay a day longer than you want to."
It was flattery, but it didn't seem like flattery, and Rodney had always been terribly weak against flattery. Not to mention, it really was all also true. He'd spend years trying to root out the tiny, subtle lies.
"Take your time thinking about it," she said, and put a pen on the table. "If you don't agree-- well, they'll probably interrogate you for a while, but you'll be sent home safe and sound soon enough. But I hope you will agree, because there are dangerous people out there. There are terrible, terrible things. And I do believe you could help stop them."
She folded her hands in her lap, waiting, as Rodney stared at the pen.
Offer him everything he wanted, for himself, his family, and the world. Acknowledge all the risks and minimize them at the same time. Make most of the fear come from his imagination, so he'd think all the fear was in his head. Make it noble and necessary, exciting and intriguing, a wide new world of everything he wanted-- everything he needed-- everything he was slowly going crazy without.
The world on a platter, if you work for us.
It was a masterwork. It was perfect. It was probably all that guileless woman's idea, to lie without lying, seduce without seducing, and he still couldn't hate her for it at all. Because it was, all, true.
He took the pen, frowned one last time at the contract, and signed his name at the bottom.
Her face lit up. "Good," she said, "good. Thank you so much."
And he was in.
-
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2008-10-05 04:19 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-10-06 04:39 am (UTC)Ask Me Something by ameretrifle
Date: 2008-10-05 05:24 pm (UTC)Thanks for writing.
Re: Ask Me Something by ameretrifle
Date: 2008-10-06 04:40 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-10-05 05:48 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-10-05 07:27 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-10-06 04:48 am (UTC)There's also a possible offshoot where Rodney and Zelenka were like Cold War buddies back in the Day. Incidentally. ;)
Thanks for reviewing!
(no subject)
Date: 2008-10-05 07:01 pm (UTC)Fun and, just, so Rodney....
(no subject)
Date: 2008-10-06 04:55 am (UTC)Glad you liked it. Thanks for commenting!
(no subject)
Date: 2008-10-05 07:18 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-10-06 04:56 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-10-05 09:31 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-10-06 05:00 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-10-07 09:40 am (UTC)Thank you so much for writing this and sharing it with us.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-10-09 09:36 am (UTC)And I notice you've friended me now. That's a hell of a compliment. thank you so much! I'm glad you enjoyed it! :)
(no subject)
Date: 2008-10-08 12:57 am (UTC)It stands alone, but I don't suppose you'd write more?
(no subject)
Date: 2008-10-09 09:40 am (UTC)I'm definitely considering writing more. If I do, it'll probably show up right here eventually. Thank you for asking!
(no subject)
Date: 2008-10-11 04:50 am (UTC)DragonLady
(no subject)
Date: 2008-10-11 05:16 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-12-28 12:20 pm (UTC)Hi there. Found this by following links and tags and god only knows what. (Okay, so I'm a Luddite... )
This? is quite wonderful. Did you end up writing more?
*applauds*
(no subject)
Date: 2009-05-08 04:57 am (UTC)