Miss efficient was leaving the bathroom, pale.  With the distressed look etched on her face. She started walking towards the meeting rooms at a fierce efficient pace, but not quite so fierce or efficient.  She didn't walk smoothly, all sharp corners and angles.  So It was trivial when we passed through the I rooms for me to just walk up beshide her, put my hand behind her back and send her into one of the spare rooms...  

By the time she even started to protest, I'd closed and punched a 12 digit code into the pad the door.  She started "What are you doing? I have a meeting to go to!". 

"It can wait", I said.  "But it's critical we aren't behind the eight-ball on this, the first 48 hours are critical - you know that!".  To which I motioned to the chair.  She stood for a while, internally fighting her urge to flee, and knowing I could stop her before she started, which would just make her look stupid and weaker, so she went for the verbal route..  I had purposely worn a tie today, as much as i despised them, and started undoing it... "This is very improper, who the hell do you think you are, doing this, your even more fucked up than the analysts said you are...  you can't just grab people and throw them in an interrogation room and have your way with them...  Your way too big for your britches mister."  Oh so 'That' was what the analysts thought, or at least she thought.  A repulsive thought, but I could understand why she would think it.  Taking off the tie had been a little too effective...   

 I stood there and had a gulp of coffee, ready to see how good her training was, or more to the point, her inate ability.  She moved as I lifted the mug, with a decent open handed strike to the bottom of the cup.  Interesting, I thought - she was surprisingly graceful and fast.  "So that's what zack saw in training, I thought".  

 It didn't work of course, and I could I stopped her in a second, but she needed this.  So I deflected and brought the cup down, shattering the cup, but avoiding me... and squeezed a pressure point that would be severely painful, debilitating, if I really squeezed, but I didn't go that far, that wasn't the point.

She was really in the zone now, responding with a nasty chop with her left hand to my neck.  I wanted to know how hard, so I moved just a little, letting it fall on my shoulder.  It WAS hard, not enough to end-me, but in training it would be chastized severely.  We don't want rooks with disabilities for later field work.

 So I did the worst thing you could do in a situation like this, if it had been real, and grabbed both her arms, blocking the instant groin smash she attempted with her knee, and knee rake with her outstep, and dodging the repeated violent attempts to try and smash the bridge of my nose with her forehead.

Pushing her back against the wall.  She stopped quickly, appearing outwardly calm, her breath control wasn't good, but that was to be expected...  She then tried to savagely bite my ear, at which point I needed to make a point without hurting her.  So I spun her into the center of the room towards the table, not at the table...  we didn't need broken bones, I just needed some space and time for what came next.

I bent down and started pickup my my shattered mug pieces as she spun around, and she starkly realized the disproportionate aggression of what she was planning next.  I actually wasn't sure what that'd be, but was now confident it would be nasty, and I might really have to risk slightly hurting her to stop her.  This was the real test.

She barely stopped herself.  Shaking and breathing hard, as I watched her and slowly picked up each little piece of the cup.  She had a fighting chance of making it I thought.  She was coming down, feeling the adrenaline and visibly breathing better now.

 "I got this mug in '88, I said to her as I picked up the shattered pieces".  Her strikes and claws, none of which were futile and would have worked quite well if I'd let her really dig them in had left my shirt torn, so she could see my scars as she calmed down.  She'd seen them before when I'd been sparing, but never up close.

 She stared at them as she slowly calmed, the post addrenaline crash calming her to a point lower than she'd been for days I suspected.  "Saint Petersburg", I said to her stare.  When Moscow was on the call earlier, the man who spoke dragged me from the flames.  I got to repay him in '91.    

She was probably six years old and running a very efficient lemonade selling operation from the sidewalk back then I thought.

I sat.  She was feeling the crash more now, doubtless tired too, but didn't want to.  "Look, I really do have a meeting to be at, I have notes I need to take".    'It's my meeting, and I let them know we'd start in an hour, right now what you need to do is sit, or stand if your more comfortable.'.  She sat.

A neutral topic, that's what was next before we got into the hairy stuff.  'When did you last spar?'.  She looked at me half worried I was chastizing her for the answer she'd given, or her prior actions.  She knew I could see who was sparring.  "A week, I just have so much to do, so much is needed".  'Who's asking you for those things that are needed?' I asked.  "The organization needs them R&D have some interesting new ideas, people need to know them".  'You need to spar every other day', I said. 

"I can't find anyone to spar with, they are nice enough when sparing but they hold back too much and I end up feeling like I'm being too aggressive".  'Who have you asked?', I said.  "Nobody, I hang around in the training room doing personal exercises until I see someone come in".  I'd seen her doing that, late at night, working out in a calm efficient manner, so I already knew that. 

"Why didn't you ask me?".  'She looked at me, slightly shocked, 'I assumed you were too busy, but you never act busy, and you were operations, and I was analysis'.  This was my own fault partly.  I'd seen her, I could have asked her.   I made a mental note to send a memorandom for an open-sparring program cross division.  

A look of self-doubt, failure flashed onto her face, immediately replaced by her "composed look".  Her turn now.  'Why are you so casual?'  - She'd never seen me on an Op before, where I was anything but casual, so that was a fair question.  "Would me being less casual make it any easier to deal with what you just saw and heard?".  'No, no it wouldn't make any difference at all'.

"Eleven PM tonight, we will spar, don't tell me you can't because I know you work till then regularly". 

'I'm fucked up, aren't I?   I just don't know if I'm right for this, I was bored in analytics but didn't expect this.'  "We all are fucked up, and you are fucked up in mostly the right ways.  After what you saw, you didn't need to be forcibly sedated for 72 hours, and told it was a psychological test operation that your response was absolutely normal anything else was abnormal, and had been promoted to Section 6, given a service achievement award, more pay, better hours and we'd prefer you didn't discuss the test because we still needed to screen others who might not responsd as well as they just had". 

The shocked look again.  'That happens?'.  "One in three, today was worse, Moscow lost 2 today and Britain 3, you haven't seen Zagsby or Moore since the meeting this morning have you?" 

'They cracked?' she said.  "I frowned at her, and said 'I don't consider it a sign of personal weakness.  They are decent people, they just couldn't take it.  As it is, we will do everything we can for them, but they will still have night-terrors and don't be surprised if you find out they became alcoholics, or drug addicts in a years time, detained in a mental facility for the forseeable future until a more effective treatment is found'.

'We have a meeting now in 5 minutes', I need to change my shirt.  I got up and stood beside the door waiting.  She came to the door, and looked at me, slightly differently now.  'She looked at me expectantly - It's unlocked I just turned off the recording devices.

Before she opened it, I put my hand against it and said 'I've never forced myself on a woman before.  Do you honestly think the screening wouldn't catch something like that?, and furthermore, consider how easily you could kill with your training'   If however you see anything of that nature by anyone inside or outside this program I expect you to immediately end-it with all means necessary'.  Her face flushed, and I gave her a moment.  What you may have heard is entirely wrong, it's always consensual.  Unless you are drugged or unconscious that won't happen to you.  It has never happened in all the years of the project operating.  A few goons tried it once.  They all ceased to live within seconds effected by their intended target.   

She opened the door and we walked out.  Menendez was walking past us.  He acted completely normal but slowed his pace so I'd catch up, we were walking the opposite way from Elizabeth back toward my office.  I carried my tie with me, wrapping a cut in my hand she had gouged - superficial but still bleeeding'.  "She's a keeper" I said.