Relevant Experience

Participants:

deckard4_icon.gif ryans2_icon.gif

Scene Title Relevant Experience
Synopsis Deckard is baffled to find that he has some when Ryans introduces him to the details of his first assignment.
Date May 15, 2010

Fort Hero: Conference Room


In the depth of Fort Hero, Benjamin Ryans sits in the conference room his team uses for their briefings. He's waiting patiently for someone to join him. Since he doesn't officially have an a real office, this room would have to do. So he sits patiently, leaning back in his chair, his jackets draped over the back, leaving him in a pale blue dress shirt, tan slacks. His shoulder holster bunching up the fabric of his shirt.

A phone call the day before from the upper brass caught the Senior Agent off guard. They were getting a new team member.

Fingers tap lightly on the table in front of him, where a file folder lays along with, Ryans ever present fedora. Blue eyes watch the door silently watching, his features as always give away nothing of his thoughts.

Deckard is on time.

His punctuality would probably seem remarkable to anyone who's never employed him before. Tall, wiry and irreparably worn around the fringes, like a gun left out in the weather for a few months. Presumably it'll still fire once it's cleaned. It's just kind of discolored and has some corrosion eating black at the metal.

He opens the door to let himself in without knocking after spending a moment peering awkwardly in through the wood from without, chilly eyes an unnaturally frigid shade of blue and dark suit in decent order. He's gaunt around his narrow face, grizzled grey and brown stubble already dusting back in around the previously neat sheer of his goatee. "…Am I in the right room?"

Foot sliding off his knee, Ryans unfolds his tall frame from the chair when the door opens. "Agent Flint Deckard" He in that quiet rumbling tone, stepping around the table, eyes tighten at the corners as he studies the newcomer. "Your in the right room." He assure a hand motioning to the variety of chairs. "Please, have a seat and we'll get you up to speed."

A hand is offered then to the younger man — even though the men look the same age. Ryans' lips offer only a ghost of a smile, his head inclining a little. "I am Senior Agent Benjamin Ryans, I am lead on the Alton Case and heading the experimental Investigation Team that you have been assigned too." It had been news to him that he's been shoulder with that position, but it explained why everyone kept looking at him to decision.

Agent Flint Deckard locks up and bristles like a spooked coyote when Ryans pushes to his feet. Skittish either at the way the title falls alien on the jut of his ears or at unexpected movement when he'd been in the process of squinting sideways at the sprawling space of the conference room. Maybe the first one he's been in. Like.

Ever.

In any case, an oddly flat look later, he recovers himself enough to grasp Ryans' offered hand with his own so that he can resume staring at the rest of the room — and especially the nearest chair so that he can drag it out for himself and sink into it.

There is the slightest tick of brows going upward, as the older agent watches Deckard's reactions. Interesting. Though there is relief in the fact this was an older agent, no baby face there. Steps are taken back, before he turns to pick up the file. "The case you've been assigned too, is becoming a tricky one."

Moving slowly, so as not to spook the new guy again, the file is set on the table and pushes it across to the grizzled looking agent. "It started as me going to the Corinthian as a personal favor to Mr Linderman. A simple pick up of a cheater, one James Alton."

Sidestepping back to his chair, Ryans settles back into it, hands folding across his stomach. Launching into the tall tale of Jimmy Alton and Benjamin Ryans, his voice drones on softly, but it still carries well in the room."While picking him up, we were assaulted by gunmen. Who were presumably just after Alton." His head tilts down, gaze on the table. "These men knew who I was and… that I have two daughter.

"Not sure if they told you about me, Deckard, but I am in actuality fifty-seven years old. I have been a Company agent for almost thirty years." The man sitting there doesn't even look close to that age, his current appearance he would mean he was an agent at seven. His mouth pulls to one side in a hint of a smirk. "One of my recent cases, a man suicided by giving his life to me… literally."

Leaning forward, arms on the table, Ryans adds, "The reason I'm telling you this, is that… it was recent and it is not widely known. There is a chance I am also a target for these men."

A man of few words even when he isn't sitting in a chair worth more than he knows himself to own and in a Conference Room (for conferencing,) Deckard is content to listen in reasonably rapt silence while Ryans speaks. His attention has a tendency to swivel from one point to the next from table end to end and even the ceiling, focus swiveled back to the younger (elder) gent with a telescopic kind of falcon focus every once and a while to show that he's listening.

He looks older than his information says he should be by nearly a decade with no explanation, leaving one to assume that he too was assailed by some secret form of biological manipulator. Or that he is (or was) a raging alcoholic. In this business really the odds are pretty fifty-fifty.

In any case, he outwardly notes no discrepancy past a skeptical glance up around Ryans' middle, irises bleaching pale for half a second before they find their color again. "Where are you from?"

Ready to plow on about the case, since that was what they were there for, Ryans is completely thrown off by the question. Brows lift at the simple question, eyes narrowing for the briefest moment, before he states simply in return. "I am not sure what that has too do with anything… " His head tilts ever so slightly, as he considers the other. Not exactly anything that has been asked of him before. "I've lived a couple of places.

"May I ask why you want to know?" The question is fired back, hands folding to rest on the slick surface of the table, Ryans doesn't seem to be giving that information easily.

There's a politely quiet, papery flip when Deckard turns the file folder carefully open, eyes on Ryans all the while. He doesn't blink enough, expression inscrutible and motivation in pestering potentially even moreso.

"You talk funny," is the eventual answer, bleakly honest under a hitch of his brows on their way to a knit so that he can read. He probably needs glasses.

Did he really just say that? The scruffy man across from him gets stared at for a long moment, his expression unreadable at first, but then Ryans actually look amused. "Well…" A rough chuckles escapes the old man, a deep sound. His head shakes a little, his eyes dropping to the table briefly. "..interesting to know. "

It takes him a moment to get his head back on track, eyes lifting again to watch Deckard flip through the file. "Back to the case… There was suspicion that a technopathic entity name Rebel. I was able to get into contact with him. While how reliable his intel is… I have no idea, but it is all in that file." Minus the fact the thing living in the internet, tried to make a deal with him… Ryans is still pondering that option.

"The men that attached me and Alton, were ex military and were once associated with Stillwater Securities, which sold to the government." Ryans continues to watch the new agent, brows furrowed slightly, seemly trying to figure out this odd man. "These men want Alton cause he is a Pre-cognitive. Though his ability only goes a few minutes into the future. Not exactly, overly useful, unless you are a gambling man, much like Mr Alton is."

Deckard's brows meter out into an uneven tilt that says not that interesting despite his memory's shortage of real life James Bond characters to cross reference. Back to the case.

"Or a criminal. Or a soldier. Or a cop. Politician, surgeon, phone psychic, professional boxer. Bomb technician. Terrorist." Flint's voice is raspier and more nasal, thumb scuffed up to itch at his brow whilst he trails off to keep reading. Two more turned pages later, he continues with: "I can pull the serial numbers off the handguns, if you have them. Filing to remove legible evidence is a purely aesthetic reassurance; the stamping process distorts the numbering into the metal layered under the surface."

"Can you?" There is nothing sarcastic or disbelieving in that question, a little surprise really. "Useful skill. What type of work space would you need for that?" Ryans asks, pulling out his blackberry. "I'm sure Agent Lee can spare some lab space for it."

Having been a bit stumped on how to proceed beyond a few minor things, this could help them find more purchase on things. "We have guns from the Corinthian and my daughter's attempted kidnapping. With hope, one of them can give us some sort of lead to who is pulling the string."

"The… suspect list for this is fairly long.”

"A notepad and a pencil." Still reading, voice and expression mild with distraction that curtails deeper explanation, Flint falls silent again for a while. Too long, probably, the hard angles and planes of his axe-hewn face rested flatly into his upturned right hand.

"The metal is more dense where it's compressed. I can see it. Or you can bring it out with a chemical wash. Just. It might take longer."

Okay, that has Ryans curious, he shifts slightly in his chair leaning forward. "Your ability." He doesn't word it like he's asking. "X-ray vision?" His lip tilts up at the mention of it. The thoughts more along the line of remembering his childhood and the comics with the ads for X-ray vision glasses. How many kids had fallen for that ad?

"Alright." His gaze drops to his blackberry, brows creasing… his thumb hovers over the keyboard. There is a heavy sigh out of his nose, a glance goes to Deckard. "Never been much for texting." He explains blandly. "Calling takes less effort." Unless you get an automated system. Course for most people, it's having a wall between them and the people on the other end. The cellphone is set on the table gently. "I'll make a call to let them know you are being given clearance to take a look at those weapons."

"Get the numbers to Agent Ayers, see if you guys can come up with owners…" The elder Agent trails off thoughtfully.

More silence. Flint looks like he's thinking, which probably means that he is. He's distracted anyway, even from the file — eery glare turned off sideways again. Beyond the table, beyond the conference room, beyond Fort Hero. "Yeah." X-ray vision. Not flight or super strength or heat rays.

Definitely not healing.

The corner of his mouth tilts up too. Less in good humor than resignation while his fingers tap tap tap long over crisp white paper. Up until he swings the file shut and sits back away from file, hands and table alike, tie traced absently away from its skew towards his lapel after him. "That it?"

"Pretty much… Everything we have to date is in that file." Ryans doesn't sound particularly happy, but… it's not exactly the easiest case. "Anything else you see that might spark something, let me know. I can use all the help I can get on this one." This case is personal for the teams head agent, he's got family to protect.

"So.. get those numbers, get them to Ayers… see where it takes you, let me know what you find." Ryans lifts a hand to rub at tired eyes.

The hand drops and Ryans studies Deckard again. "Before you head out… Is there any other useful skills I should know about?" Brows tilt up with curiosity, arms settling on the armrests of the chair. "They told me about your ability and that your a good shot. That is about it."

Already scraped back in his chair and pushed stiffly up onto his feet, Deckard hesitates in the process of dragging the closed file after himself. Suddenly he's strange again. Off balance and wary, rangy construction closed under a suit that could probably stand a little tailoring to narrow it through the middle and penetrating stare indirect.

"I dunno," is inevitable. Unfortunately it's also slightly dishonest and there's a subtle flinch that rankles at his nose and brow a beat later. "I'm good with crime. And finding things." Thennn the file goes up while he waits, presumably to see if his answer is sufficient.

Eyes narrow warily at the younger of the two of them. There is more the Senior Agent could ask, but now is not the time, plus the skittishness of Deckard keeps him from grilling the agent just yet. "I imagine with an ability like yours it would…"

Hands reach out to draw another folder close to him, which he flips open, while Deckard is free to go, the Senior Agent has other things that he needs to do. "If you run into a kid… blonde… looks about ten — twelve, beware he'll talk your ear off and is iffy about listening to his elders, but he's one of us." Displeasure coloring his voice, since to him it's just a kid.

With that, the investigations team's leader, turns his attention to the file in front of him, giving Deckard a change to flee, should he wish it.

Arguably not all that high up on the mental age ladder himself, Flint's nod is placating at best. After that and a hesitant drag of one foot backwards, he turns to go in earnest, managing to discern dismissal from silence after a thirty-second tangle with assumption that feels like it lasts an hour.

The door opens, the door closes and he stands for a moment frowning to himself just outside. Then he's gone.


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