White Knight

Brian O’Dell, a new agent in the Federal Bureau of Investigation, sat at his desk, staring at the report that he had just got done reading. The Soviet Union was invading the United State, but not as the public would believe with brute force, but instead by infiltrating the crime syndicate and starting operations in remote corners of the country. At the age of twenty-one, he was the youngest agent at the Bureau having completed everything required by the Academy with top marks. He had expected to be placed with the Dead Cases division, but because of his ability to blend in, he was assigned to a special task force dealing with crime.

“O’Dell, have you got a minute?”

Brian looked up and saw his sergeant standing at his desk, leaning slightly against the edge. Susan Fields looked at him from behind her horn-edged glasses, her dark auburn hair pulled back into a severe bun. Standing to his feet he placed the report back into the file that it had arrived in and pushed his chair under his desk.

“Yes ma’am.”

“Follow me then, the Captain wants to talk to you.”

Brian followed Susan to the war room, a conference room where agents met to discuss different cases and receive their assignments. When they walked through the door, several pictures of top Mafia leaders were pinned on a cork board with notes lined up underneath each picture. Taking a seat, he waited patiently for the Captain to speak.

“Good, everyone is here.” The Captain was Jacob Smith, an old SEAL who entered the FBI after being injured in Vietnam. His salt-and-pepper hair was close cropped to his head, the only inclination to his military background.

Several folders were passed out as the lights were dimmed slightly and an overhead projector turned on.

“As all of you know, the Russian mob is infiltrating our country, groups in North Carolina, Louisiana, Arizona, and New Mexico have already been established. Recent reports have been confirmed that a new group is starting up in Montana. The time is ripe for us to send an undercover agent within their circle and hopefully bring down these people once and for all.”

Several pictures flashed as the Captain continued outlining each of the leaders, and gave the general location of where each one was expected to be found.

“Reports state that these men,” a slide showed of three men, “are going to be heading to Montana to look for recruits to start a new center of operations. The men and women chosen to infiltrate will have to make themselves available to these men, and give a convincing enough story for them to be accepted into the group’s outer edges. The task is not to infiltrate fully, but instead to stay on the edge and get enough information for us to be able to set up traps to capture the lower criminals. We want to interrogate the lower edges, find out who they report to, capture those that are above them and move slowly through the ranks until we can catch the leaders.”

The lights brightened and the Captain turned to the group, his expression so severe that it seemed to be carved from stone.

“I don’t need to tell you people how important it is to NOT engage these criminals, no matter what they are doing they are not to be confronted. We need evidence against them, reasons for convicting them in OUR country instead of simply deporting them for them to find another way into the States.”

Another file was passed around, this one with the individual names of each agent written on the front tab, and Brian felt his heartbeat increasing with the knowledge that he was a part of the group who was briefed on this important topic. Only those who would have a hand in the investigation would have been invited to this meeting, and judging by the small group of people gathered, this was a VERY low-profile mission.

“The file in front of you details the background you have already been briefed on, as well as tells you the part you are to play in this game of cat-and-mouse. Dismissed agents.”

Brian, and the group of ten other agents, stood to their feet and walked out of the room. A few of the more outgoing members immediately opened their folders and began talking to each other about what was in their files. Brian chose to wait until he was at his desk instead.

“Hey, O’Dell, feel like hitting the bar tonight?”

Brian looked up and saw Lance walking towards him with an easy grin on his face. Smirking, Brian lifted the folder and shook his head. “Sorry Lance, can’t tonight. Got work.”

“You are always working too hard my friend, you need to take a break, get drunk, find a woman and get laid.”

Brian laughed and clapped Lance on the shoulder as the other man walked beside him. “When I find a woman who can handle my brand of lifestyle choices, then I’ll think about it. So far, I haven’t found the one.”

They continued to talk some more before parting ways. Brian went to his desk, noticing that the office was nearly empty now that it was close to five o’clock. The night crew would be coming in pretty soon and he knew he would have a small three minute window to review the information in the file. Sitting down, he quickly passed through the pages concerning the leaders and known members of the mob, going to what his part would be in this delicate game. His lips firmed as he read the pages before closing the file firmly and taking it with him as he walked out of the office and towards his small apartment.

“You filthy whore!”

The sound of skin hitting skin echoed in the barely furnished apartment. Three heads ducked behind the staircase as the female fell to the ground, her face already a mass of cuts and bruises, but her eyes determined as she stared up at the man towering over her.

He lifted his foot and aimed for her midsection, swinging his foot full force towards her body, the sickening thud of the connection caused her to gag and curl up defensively. An infant wailed from upstairs as the woman’s hair was pulled and she was dragged up to her feet.

“Go tend to the brat, slut.” She was slung towards the staircase, the thud of her body hitting the wall caused the neighbors to immediately starting hitting the wall and screaming at them to keep it down.

Shuffling up the stairs, she urged the three boys sitting on the staircase to crawl up with her, their heads down low so he wouldn’t see them. Once upstairs, she took the small infant in her arms and caressed the white-blonde hair from her face. Leaning down she bared a breast and placed the weeping nipple against the baby’s mouth.

“Hush Abby, mommy’s here now. Eat your food and go back to sleep.”

“Mommy…” the little tow-headed boy spoke up. The eldest of the four, Mark was only about five years old, but because of their lives being as it was, he was much older in appearance. He waited for his mother to sit down with his sister while the other two boys quietly went into the bathroom to wet a rag and fill a small cup of water for her.

“Yes son?”

“He needs to die. He shouldn’t hurt you like that.”

Georgia Moore looked sharply up at her son, frowning severely at the child. “No one NEEDS to die son, but he does deserve what is coming to him.”

The other two boys, Lucas and Hunter, came into the room at that point. Their eyes were wide as Mark took the rag from Lucas and walked towards his mother, wiping her cheek gently as Abby nursed loudly. “Mommy, what are we going to do?”

Georgia reached up and stopped her son’s nervous habit of caring for her when her husband grew angry. “We’re not going to do anything that hasn’t been set into motion long before any of this life had even begun son.” She took the rag from his hand and smiled weakly, her lips already swelling on one side and her eye closing completely as the dark bruise took place against her skin. “Go to bed, you have school tomorrow morning and the bus comes early.”

Mark nodded sadly, gathering his brothers to his side and taking the water with them so that he wouldn’t get angry about her having the drink. The rag was safe because it could be explained as a way of wiping the baby’s face after she finished eating, but the cup was sure to send him into a furious rage.

That night, the sound of the headboard hitting the wall rhythmically was the only sound that was heard coming from the room. The boys slept fitfully, their dreams haunted with visions of their mother falling to the ground and their father beating the hell out of her.

The next day was beautiful, but no one in the small family noticed it as they woke and went about their daily activities. He went to work, kissing his wife harshly to remind her to not say anything about what happened the night before, before heading outside. Mark got dressed and gathered his school supplies in his book bag as the loud sound of his father’s F-310 truck engine roared to life.

Georgia stood in the kitchen, mixing the oatmeal that simmered on the stove with a small pad of butter and a little milk as the door came crashing open. He stormed into the house, straight into the kitchen where she turned around and looked at him. The pot of hot oatmeal sat on the stove and she watched him glare at her.

“I’m disconnecting the phone so you can’t call your LOVER,” he sneered, stalking towards her the entire time.

“I don’t have a lover, and you know this. You are with me every moment of every day, and you have cameras watching me so that you can keep an eye on me while you are at work. You know that the GPS chip in the car works and if I do leave the house you know exactly where I am. The chip in my cell phone lets you track me as I walk around. There is not a moment in time that you don’t know where I am and who is around me; especially since you can watch me from the street cameras that is close by the only store I go to shop at.”

He grabbed her throat, squeezing it tightly as he forced her head up towards the ceiling. “Just remember bitch, every cop on the force knows how much of a whore you are, and they know how much trouble I have keeping you faithful, you aren’t safe anywhere if you try to cheat on me again. I’ll drag your filthy ass to court and take these kids away from you if you do ANYthing that looks even remotely suspicious.”

Squeezing her throat once more, he snarled as he saw her eye begin to bulge and her mouth gaped open and shut. “Feed the brat,” he growled as he threw her into the counter, ruffling Mark’s hair as her back made a loud CRACK! against the edge of the counter. Closing the door once more, Georgia panted rasping breaths until she heard the truck pull away.

“Hurry, we must hurry. He’ll be back after your bus leaves and we have only ten minutes until it gets here.”

Mark looked confused as he followed his mother out of the kitchen, his gaze looking longingly at the hot oatmeal sitting on the stove. “Where are we going mommy?”

Georgia turned and smiled softly, kneeling down towards her son, “We are going to McDonalds for breakfast, and your teacher sent a note saying that today was a free day so you don’t have to go to school. So hurry up slow poke!”

Mark continued to look confused, though his little boy’s heart picked up at the prospect of going to his favorite restaurant. He helped his brothers get dressed and ready to go while his mother threw clothes into trash bags and diapers into Abby’s diaper bag. Wipes followed and several toys were added and everything was dragged downstairs to the car. After getting his brothers inside the car and helping them fasten their latches, Mark watched the car carefully as his mother went back inside the house and came out with Abby in her carrier seat.

After Georgia latched the baby into the back seat, she reached under the car and started feeling around; a series of beeping sounds could be heard until the rending of metal against metal reverberated loudly in the night air. Mark cringed and quickly jumped into the front seat, buckling his booster seat securely as his mother climbed into the car as well. Turning the switch, he heard her muttering under her breath, “Cutting it close, so close, gotta make it, gotta get gone” as she looked hastily at the clock and the driveway.

The familiar yellow bus started slowing down as it reached the cul-de-sac where the small community was positioned. Georgia didn’t even look as she gunned the engine and shot out in front of the bus, ducking under her seat and reaching for a dark bag that was between the seats. Mark looked wide-eyed at the stringy thing his mother removed from the bag, and then watched as she navigated the car with her knee, using her hands to hastily tie up her hair and pull what looked like someone else’s hair over her head.

Georgia operated on auto-pilot as she removed the large-framed glasses from the console, and arraigned the wig to look naturally on her head. She knew that she had only five minutes after the bus stopped to get as far as possible. She had hair dye in bags in the trunk of the car, and after disconnecting the GPS chip in the car, she ran a long handled magnet under the frame and rewired the computer system in the car. By the time he found this car, it would be in a state that was opposite of the direction she was running.

After she crossed state lines, she stopped at the closest McDonalds and bought breakfast for her children. They were complaining of starving by the time she felt they could leave the car behind. After eating, and feeding Abby, they went to a used car lot and traded their new car in for a better car. She used the papers she had for covering their trails to get the car, showing that she was Celeste De’LaFonte. After the salesman confirmed that she had insurance and her credit score was high enough to qualify for buying from their lot, he took the receipt of sales from Georgia Moore to Celeste De’LaFonte and bought the car from her.

‘Celeste’ and her four children loaded up into their new/used car and transferred their belongings to the trunk of the five-passenger sedan and drove off the lot.

“Agent O’Dell, so glad you could make it on time. The boys and girls down in the Food and Drug Administration just approved this new drug for human usage. Of course only two agencies are approved for the administration of this drug, but it applies to operatives in your situation.”

The young lab tech smiled assuringly as Brian signed the paperwork needed for the administration of the new drug out in the market. He didn’t even bother reading the effects of the drug as she began her speech on what to expect and what the drug did.

“As you know, you will not only need to have a cover story for your assignment, but there can be no mistakes as at any moment you may be required to do something that goes against your training. That is what these drugs will enable. They are made from a highly synthetic compound which affects your long term memory aspects of your brain. They freeze the memories in your cerebral cortex, allowing us to implant new ones. In essence, this drug allows you to become someone else.”

“So it’s sorta like hypnosis, only with drugs instead of a swinging pocket watch right?”

The woman laughed as she laid him gently down onto the hospital bed, securing his arms and legs with straps and tying down his waist and head. “Sorta like that, yes. After the administration of the drug, we have about two minutes to begin the reprogramming aspect of your cover story program. There we will show you videos, brief glimpses of recordings, to give you early memories as well as memories of a childhood of another. These are done as if they are being seen by you, and combined with the drugs you will believe they are your life memories.”

Brian took a deep breath and shifted his body to a more comfortable position on the cold bed. “And will I be able to be brought out of this hypnosis?”

The woman stood by his side and nodded. “Yes, a deprogram code has been chosen for you ‘Georgia has been secured’ must be said twice in order to allow you to have your own memories. Your mind will record everything that happens, even after we administer the drug and reprogramming videos, but the events will be recorded so that you will think you are dreaming at times until after you are deactivated.”

Brian gritted his teeth and nodded his head as the tech then moved to the top of the bed. “Let’s do this then.”

The man woke up from under the cardboard box he had flattened for his blanket. His hair was in his face and he snarled as it tickled his nose. The body sleeping next to him shifted and the sound of scratching could be heard as well as the grumble of another stomach.

“I know sis. I’m hungry too. Let’s see what is in the dumpsters tonight. Maybe we’ll find something that won’t make us sick.”

The two people pushed off the cardboard and rose up from the ground. Wind rushed around them, eating through the threads of their clothing. Shivering the man walked up to a local bar and went inside while the female went to the back to scrounge in the dumpster. He walked up to the bar and ordered a beer, using the last amount of money he had managed to work for at the shipyard last week to make the purchase.

“You look rough lad.”

The voice was soft, the Irish lift barely pronounced. Turning the man looked at the rough face of the dark-haired man. “Living on the streets is rough living.”

“If you be living on the streets, then hows is it you got money to pay for that beer?”

“You ask a lot of questions.”

“And I be expecting answers if’n you be wantin’ to stay in this bar.”

Sighing the young man took a swig of his beer, feeling the cold liquid slid down to his stomach, filling the aching holes in that organ. “I had a job, was fired after only working two days.”

“What happened?”

“I beat the man who tried to make a move on my sister.” The man’s black eyes stared coldly at the vibrant green of the other man’s eyes.

Suddenly the man gaffed his laughter as he clapped the younger man on the shoulder. “What’s your name son? I may have a job for you.”

“My name is Gregory Wells, and what kind of job is it that will hire me?”

The two men talked for several hours into the night, the other man; whose name was Marcus Leary, told Greg about the job that was looking for young men who are not shy about protecting themselves or others, who had loyalty that allowed them to do whatever necessary to protect others. The young woman, Lilly, crept in with anger in her eyes. Seeing her brother drinking more than just the one beer required to distract the bartender and cook, she stalked into the room and hit him with her knuckles against the back of the head. She was soon included in the conversation as he went nowhere without her, and the siblings slipped out as dawn approached to their new home.

Operatives O’Dell and Myers have been accepted as lower level members. Myers is not active as she is only acting the part of the little sister, but O’Dell is now what is termed a “mover”. Further information will be added as each progresses in their assignments.