ASK MICHAEL ABOUT MADELINE
by Marie
 
        Michael  had been confused and unhappy ever since he had awakened in the white room and been presented with the ultimatum of  work for the Section or die.  He had reluctantly agreed because he simply wanted to live.  He still raged at the injustice of his so-called sentence.  True people died in the bombing, and the reality of what he was, a murderer, plagued him night and day.  As a student activist, he had told himself he was on the side of  true justice for the downtrodden, but instead he was a murderer.  Several people had died because of his direct actions, and Michael was not sure that he could ever forget the faces or the families of those he killed, who stood to judge him in court.  It was no wonder that they found him guilty.  He condemned himself as well.

        He trained with Jurgen, who tested his body, but it was Madeline who tested his mind and soul.  She was tearing him apart  in order to make new man, a perfect operative for Section One.  Piece by piece she rearranged his psyche, as if it were merely a puzzle for her amusement.  When she tired of that exercise, she played with his emotions.  One day she would be seductive, teaching him manipulations to use with women.   She would use her hands to touch him and talk about love-making techniques.  She would  discuss what would be effective and what would not until he would be so aroused that he could barely stay in her presence.  The next day she would be cold and reserved and humiliate him beyond belief,  if he so much as came near her or tried to initiate a conversation.  He hated her and he loved her.

        The tests that Jurgen used to push and punish his body were simple.  Physically he excelled in hand-to-hand combat.  His hand-eye coordination soon made him a marksman beyond compare.  His intelligence proved to be his greatest strength, assimilating computers, languages, and geopolitical issues with ease.  He hated Jurgen, but had no conflict about it.  No one really liked his trainer anyway.  It just wasn’t done.  Michael could never imagine that if he survived his two years probation and training that he and Jurgen would ever go out for beers together.  Jurgen pushed him unmercifully, but it was a relief to be with Jurgen.  It was hell to be with Madeline.  He tried to become the perfect operative for her, but he always failed her tests, and she let him know.

        She continually complained about his body language and his expressive eyes and face.  She said he must learn to control all these things, if he were to be an acceptable agent for Section One.  He mustn’t talk with his hands, a common French failing, but one that must be eliminated, she said.  She taught him to fold his hands in front to keep from moving them about.  If he showed too much facial emotion, she would slap him, then stroke his cheek gently and apologize.  Her caresses hurt him more than her strikes.   And yet when in character, he must act like a normal human being.  He must laugh, gesticulate, and use facial muscles that were becoming atrophied from lack of use, or risk her majestic ire.  He began to feel as if he were split in two.  Two parts of him residing within one body, each hiding and fearing the other.
 

*************
 
        Madeline remembered the first time she had seen Michael.  Jurgen had brought him in and introduced him to the others as his new material.  Madeline was already familiar with his profile.  Student activist in France, genius IQ, convicted of murder in a campus bombing, twenty years old, and his photographs did not do him justice.  Photographs could not show the way he walked and held his body.  Photographs could not show how he had every female in sight turning their heads when he came into their view.  He had a presence and a sensuality that appealed to them all.  He was a true male beauty, not a handsome pretty boy.  His animality was evident in his wild gray eyes that turned green when he was upset.  He had curly wavy hair that most women would immediately want to caress with their hands.  His facial features were unique--a generous nose but with a long jaw to balance it, and tender sensual lips that affected Madeline as well as any female in Section.

        That was the reason Madeline chose him.  Operations had pointed out that his other superior qualities would make him and excellent cold operative.  Operations had no doubt that he would survive his probation, if his compassion and emotions could be crushed.  He was still suffering from the usual situational depression with afflicted most of the new material.  It was a phase, but he didn’t seem to be moving through it as fast as was the norm.  He needed encouragement, and she would give it to him.

        At twenty-eight Madeline had no problems with re-educating a twenty year old.  He would eventually be a great asset to Section One.  Operations wanted him as his personal, unemotional machine, and she would give Michael to him on a silver platter if need be.  That was her job, and she could do it.
 

*************

        Michael remembered the first time Madeline allowed him to make love to her.  Michael’s natural enthusiasm for the act, as well as the prior informative discussions with Madeline, had made it a wonderful experience for Michael, until Madeline followed with a critique assisted by video tapes of their coupling.  Michael would have rather been beaten, but instead Madeline expected him to sit there and offer suggestions as to how he could make  the next time better for both partners.  Michael vowed to himself at that moment that he would never make love for the cameras again.

        He had avoided her for the next two days, but then she had summoned him to her office.  He had gone there with apprehension and foreboding as his main  emotions.  Humiliation was not his favorite way to pass the time.  He managed to have sexual relations with two different women since he had been with Madeline, and they had done much to restore his usual confidence in himself.

        He walked into her office and was greeted by a smiling Madeline.  She indicated that she was pleased that he was testing his techniques on new partners.  He had cringed as she had said this.  He made another vow, never again would he have relations or a relationship with another operative from Section.  There was no privacy.  He would have privacy or he would have nothing.
 

************

        Operations was pleased with Madeline’s progress with Michael, therefore Madeline was pleased.  She has successfully taken an immature and emotional young man and fabricated him into a unemotional killing machine for Section One.  The big picture was the important one, and Michael, had just been made a full operative.  He no longer followed her with his big gray eyes.  He had control over his body language and his facial expressions.  Although a brief thought of the original Michael saddened a remote part of her psyche, she knew that they would all be more secure with the new Michael she had created.

        She felt that he really deserved a reward.  She picked up the phone and called Operations.  “What do you think of transferring Simone back from Hong Kong, and teaming her with Michael? Simone is a first rate operative and very focused.  I think they would be an excellent team,”  she suggested, knowing the Operations usually went along with her personnel decisions.

         “By all means,” he said.  “Give Michael to Simone.”

fini
 

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