Maria: ::texts:: "Sure. I'm in my quarters, unless you want me to come to you"
Anyil: ::texts:: "Whichever works for you, ma'am."
Maria: ::texts:: "Come to my place then, I have brownies and I might even be convinced to share"::they were fresh out of the oven, it would have hurt to go elsewhere and leave them to cool::
Anyil: ::smiles a bit, texts:: "I'll be sure to bring my best persuasion, ma'am." ::throws on uniform pants but a more relaxed top - neither definitively SHIELD - and walks up quickly. Knocks.::
Maria: ::opens the door, a slightly guilty look on her face and a half-eaten brownie in her hand. Her willpower hadn't been able to hold out, and she was already eating a brownie...:: Come on in.
Anyil: ::smiles a bit, but her eyes are solemn,:: Thanks for having me up here.
Maria: No problem. ::proffers a tray of brownies:: have one?
Anyil: ::chuckles and takes one:: I'll never turn down fresh brownies. You really ought to offer information about how to resist brownie-offering torture.
Maria: But then how would I interrogate anyone?
Anyil: ::smiles, again, but it fades quickly:: Perhaps. I'm sure you'd find a way.
Maria: ::notes the frown:: What's up?
Anyil: ::runs a hand through her hair, and sits down:: What the Hell am I, ma'am? Here, to SHIELD, or whatever?
Maria: ::taken slightly aback by the severity of the question:: You're an agent, Anyil. You're there to gather information when we need it, keep the peace on this ship, or elsewhere should it be required, and generally make sure we don't implode before we can stop the bad guys.
Anyil: ::sighs:: Perhaps I should clarify. What the Hell am I, here? Am I a grunt? a pawn? I can be that, I suppose. ::smiles bitterly:: I'm quite used to being that.
Maria: ::ah:: We're all pawns, Agent. All of us. I don't know if it's God playing dice with his creations, the Council playing with us, or just Fate being a fickle bitch, but we're all of use, or of potential use.
Anyil: ::sharpens:: The council, or someone else, Agent? If I am to be a pawn, then, give me a gun and someone to shoot, for a pawn does not think. If I am to think, here, I am no fit pawn. ::deathly quiet:: I was a pawn in Afghanistan, Agent, along with all my troop.
Maria: The pawns win the game, Agent, or have you not played chess?
I was in Iraq, and I secured Camp Rhino. Don't play that card. Not with me.
Anyil: ::chuckled with more than a hint of bitterness:: Chess is not war, Agent. And I came to you because you were there, because you were military - I do not play the card to belittle. I play it to explain. ::pause:: We were all of us pawns, together, the grunts, the enlisted bastards, whatever you'd like to call us. We didn't know the plans, and we knew we didn't, and accepted it. Those of us who even thought of it, that is. But here, here - am I a pawn? And if so who are my fellows, that I can quietly join ranks with, and be traded for the best advantage when the time comes? ::pained voice but fiery eyes:: For pawns are not trusted, Agent. Not with vital details and not with strategy.
Maria: Think of it this way: There are details you will be told, and there will be things you will not be told. Everyone is more than a true pawn, and less than a rook. You're all knights. The avengers are the rooks and bishops. Fury... Well. He's both the king and the queen. I'm not exactly sure what I am.
Anyil: ::closes her eyes and tries not to cry, to let out all the pain and anger:: That's the problem, see, Agent - *Major* - I was never supposed to think. I was supposed to live and die as a grunt. ::chuckles bitterly:: I joined to die quietly and serve while I lived. You know as well as I the life expectancy of infantry down there. You know a grunt is supposed to trust their orders and execute them. And when I nearly died, I came here because I had a chance to be something more than a mere grunt - to join an organization where I could think. Could trust and be trusted in turn. And here I am, higher than pawn and lower than important. My best friend up here dies and doesn't and I'd never know the difference, because the lies we are fed. How can you trust a chain of command that lies to you, ma'am? ::runs a hand through her hair; a few tears start leaking out but she ruthlessly suppresses them::
Maria: ::ah, the same questions shes been asking herself since the Tesseract Incident:: Damned if I know, Agent. I believe in the cause, even if I don't approve the methods. I get my orders, and I follow them. I have faith that they are just, even if the means are questionable.
Anyil: ::opens her eyes, and speaks quietly:: And how do you get to that place? And how if the orders become unconscionable? ::closes her eyes, in pain, and opens them:: I got some unredacted material on the Tesseract incident, to get me to join up. I know about the nuke, ma'am. I can't have such faith in those above me without shutting off all thought again.
Maria: I believed in Fury, not the Council. The council was wrong, and they couldn't see what we saw, they didn't understand what was happening. Fury is a two-faced, manipulative, Machiavellian bastard, but he sees the bigger picture, and will do whatever it takes to make sure the world survives. Do you read Asimov?
Anyil: :shook her head:: No, ma'am.
Maria: Have you heard of the Three Laws of Robotics?
Anyil: ::frowns a bit:: Heard of in conversation, but never really figured out what they were.
Maria: Rule one, that overrides all other Laws: A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm. This is the rule the field agents and low-level agents operate at.
Anyil: ::nods, still frowning a bit::
Maria: Rule Two: A robot must obey the orders given to it by human beings, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law. This is following orders, also something all agents must do. Nuking manhattan violated rule two.
Rule Three: A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Laws. I will lay down my life for any of my agents or anyone on the ground, if I can. Or rather if I have to to save them.
But there is a zeroth law, that overrides ALL of these, that everyone forgets about because it was a later addition.
Rule Zero: A robot may not harm humanity, or, by inaction, allow humanity to come to harm. THIS is the law Fury follows. I follow the first.
It's his job to care more about the population as an evolutionary whole than it is to worry about one individual person. It is MY job to worry about everything else.
Anyil: ::looks her in the eye:: So, we follow some laws of morality, as best we may - and we do harm people in the course of our work, but so others will not be harmed. And orders are part of that, and at some level we do just have to accept that. Even when the methods are questionable or worse. That's what you're saying.
Maria: Exactly. It isn't fair. It never will be. But it is Just.
Anyil: ::looks away, eyes almost dead:: Fairness is a fantasy children can afford. No one else.
::lowly:: And some not even.
Maria: ::just as soft:: Don't I know it.
Anyil: ::more loudly:: So. I know then where I stand. Or should. ::rises and looks her in the eye:: A killer that others won't be. A shield for innocence, and the rest can go to merry Hell. ::eyes are pained, voice is even:: Someone has to be shielded from this, after all, or better we all were dead.
Maria: It's our job to stand for those who cannot stand for themselves. It means we take the hits, because that's what a shield does.
Anyil: ::humorless smile:: It's good to be home, I suppose. ::moves to the window:: What's the life expectancy for this job, hmm?
Maria: ::Sighs:: Averages tend to lie. Before the Tesseract Incident it was fifteen years, a second career.
Now? It's more like five.
Anyil: ::nods, murmurs very very quietly:: Good. ::turns back:: My Ama always told me - Jainkoaren eskuetan izan ezik bakea ez da, there is no peace save in the Hands of God. I was too young to understand.
Maria: ::nods:: She was wise.
Anyil: ::very quietly:: She knew pain. ::smile, but hollow eyes:: I think what we call wisdom is often only the lessons pain teaches us.
Maria: Or only recognized as wisdom by those similarly scarred
Anyil: ::laughs without humor:: I suppose.
I've likely taken enough of your evening... Maria. I thank you.
Maria: I'm sorry I couldn't give you any peace, Anyil.
Anyil: ::smiles with some humor:: You're not God. Though I am, in some ways, in your hands.
Anyil: ::moved by an impulse she didn't quite understand, and lays her hand on Maria's shoulder; speaks gently:: You're still not God. You can't save us our suffering, Maria. And trying will make you hurt the worse.
Maria: ::doesn't like being touched, not really, but feels slightly better for it:: I care too much. Everyone sees me as cold, distant, but it is mostly because it hurts too much otherwise.
Anyil: ::lowers hand:: I know. Maria, zuk ezagutzen baino hobea zara. :: shakes head gently::
Maria: ::she rose and walked to the door with Anyil, wondering if she should learn Basque as well, since she had a leg up on Welsh already::
Anyil: ::pauses at the door, sighs, and nods:: Thank you, Maria. I appreciate the talk. I'll... have to think some things over. ::smiled with dark humor:: Don't suppose there's a standard form for agents reconsidering being a part of SHIELD?
Maria: There is, yes. It's simply a resignation packet. You do understand that if you went that route we would still watch you? Due to how you came to our attention in the first place, we would have to.
Anyil: :: nods:: I don't think I've reached the point of resigning, Maria. I don't know that I ever will. I didn't even know one could....
Maria: ::shrugs:: we are not a prison. Even Agent Wilson could quit if he wished. But we pay him well enough that he tends to not think about it
Anyil: ::eyes grow dark:: well, for me things might have been different. ::tight smile::
::shakes her head:: circumstances of being a guinea pig and all that. Sort of was a prisoner, for two months in there.
Maria: ::nods:: True. I won't bother denying it. There were reasons. You know as well as I what they were.
Anyil: :: nods:: Acquisition of powers and all that, I am well aware. Doesn't mean it doesn't color things, sometimes.
Anyil: ::shook her head and sighs:: And none of it on you, alright, Maria? I should go. Depression can be infectious.
Maria: I've already had it, like Chicken Pox. Or something flippant like that. Whatever. Here ::dashes back for the brownie tray:: Take one for the road. Nothing better than warm brownies for injuries of the soul.
Anyil: ::chuckles a bit:: I seem to have a chronic case. Thanks for the brownie; I'll have to share some cookies with you, sometime. ::nods wearily, and leaves.::
Maria: ::closes the door after her and eats another brownie herself. There's a reason she made herself a who pan of brownies and was going to eat them all, alone in her room::
