Bureaucratic Fussing

“You ran.” She eyed the white tile across to the other side of the room as she talked. “Why?”

“He was bundled up in a fuzzy bath towel, still dripping into it as he glared up at her. “You know. Fuck it, you know why I ran.” His teeth showed, a snarl pushing past his lips. She didn't seem to notice.

“Please state for the record why you ran, Mr. Williams.” Down flicked her eyes to the clipboard, pen poised above a blank white response-box. “This is crucial to the debriefing process.”

He turned his face away, off to a white wall before he answered. “Damn you all. You know it was because of the fire. It was your fire and it messed up the whole operation. I lost a friend in there.”

Her pen moved quickly, jotting down at most half of his words. “May I remind you, Mr. Williams, that Associates do not have friends while serving?”

“No you bloody well can't.” The wall played out a sequence of mental images for him. A toy rabbit there, a red pool soaking into the snow, a thin streak of smoke floating up above the treeline.

She waited calmly.

Breaking back out of it he stared at her light blue eyes. “You lab-types don't know the field, and you'd better not stick your nose in again.”

A sideways glance at his face, redder than it had been when they had started, thicker looking too as if the blood had inflated his thin face like a balloon. “The information section of the Agency is tasked with monitoring and effecting positive change in the missions performed by the field section, along with the task of debriefing the returning Associates.”

Breathe in, breathe out. “You had no cause to light him up.”

More quick jots then a pause. “You refer to Associate Ward, Mr. Williams?”

“No.” His gaze had drifted down to the tabletop, his hands grasping at intangibles. “He was dead, gone. You did what you had to.”

“There were no other Associates assigned to that sector, and no other incendiary surges authorized.” She flipped up some of the stack of papers on the clipboard before setting it on the table in front of him. “Which incident of the incendiary surge protocol are you referring to?

It was a list of the past month, each of the five entries exhaustively detailed. Time, place, context, Variables. The code names of all the supervising personnel. Aftereffects from public witnesses. “It's not listed.”

“Impossible.” She didn't blink.

He noticed. “No, improbable or uncanny. I saw it with my own eyes. Agent Wisconson was sitting drinking tea before he just flamed up.”

She retrieved her clipboard and began writing again. “Elaborate, please, Mr. Williams.”

“We were at a catch point. Subtle op., casual gear and a clean toolkit. I had a knife, fit in well with the local custom. Wisconson had a concealed knife in his boot, but regular issue so it would have stood out on his belt too much. Locals don't get a hold of vibro-knives much and live through flaunting 'em, ';east not ones who would go to that bar. I say this because even if we were caught with what we had, we were traceless. Wisconson was not in any danger of capture, alive or dead, and then he bursts into flame just like that.” Some page flipping, more writing. “Not easy to keep cool and play it off as a fluke after that. They a'int stupid so they figured the pair was there, I was there, and so the close down the bar and barricade it shut. Target wasn't there yet. Room sweep starts, and I'm clean, like I say, so I make it through. Lose the knife though.” His eyes drift off to the side, living the day in cinema on the white-tile wall.

She coughs, softly. “Mr. Williams”

“What?”

“Associate Wisconson is currently stationed in the tropical branch on sick leave. Files came in last week.” She turned the clipboard and pointed at the signature and fingerprint stamp. “After the clning incident and the teleporter catastrophe, such happening should not exist currently.”

“Well, I saw him there, and I talked to him. It was him through and through. Scanners checked him out.” He was frowning, forehead furrowing to match. “There is no possible time-frame he could have gotten through?”

Tapping the paper with the pen she bit her lip. “The request for leave came in after your reported date of death.”

“You checked with medical and the other experimental solutions groups about this?”

She was back to staring at the white wall past his head. “As is part of procedure.”

“Damn.” He spit the word, short, punctual, and wet.

“Perhaps we are getting off topic.” A neck twitch that resisted the urge to glance at him.

“Right, can't have an incomplete story,” he rolled his eyes, “Now can we? So I was disarmed and in a tight spot. They could find me out if they deep-probed the room, and it was getting near to that. Just saw another guy get flamed, so that was on my mind. I was lookin' mighty spooked, and they musta noticed. Big guy, leader of 'em, large and burly and bald comes up and he starts glaring at me. Tells me to open up so he can get a probe down in my gullet. A'ight gonna happen, so I make a break for it. Cover's blown by then, no time to get back under their noses and make it back in time to intercept the target. I could take these guys out easy, but not fast enough to stop any alarm. I run.”

“Concluding with your pickup in the tundra three days later, where you were cooking a reindeer for food?” There was some judgment in that line, and he could swear he saw a glance.

“Yes.”

“No more details to add?”

“Nothing that's not in my writeup already.”

“Thank you or the time.” She knew it was obligatory, he knew it was, and they both knew the other did too.

He still felt compelled. “You're welcome.”

She smiled, dry and deep. “We will be in touch, Mr. Williams. You have banked vacation leave, we suggest you take it.”