Talk about a clusterfuck of massive proportions, Claire thought to herself as stood near Agent Bryant and listened to him chew out the GADEM agents and associates in front of them; although her outward expression was that of near-bored indifference, inside she was absolutely fuming as she continued her thoughts. My interrogators and I spent over two months cultivating and building up enough information for these raids and they go out and fuck it up like they were virgins on their wedding night, the motherfuckers! she mentally fumed. It wasn't idle thoughts either: her and her team of GADEM interrogators, all CIA and Special Operations veterans with experience in both intelligence and the euphemistically called dark art of "wet work" (i.e. state-sanctioned murders and assassinations) had taken the beta and gamma-level mutants field agents had captured, interrogated them carefully and meticulously over a period of two months, sent the information over to the Operations side....only to watch their hard-clawed work go right down the drain... "Asset transport to the alpha compound Destroyed and 15 high profile mutants escaped. 6 failed Raids Across the Board. Mystery abductions around a circus that was ordered disbanded 6 days ago."

Before she could continue fuming inside, she heard Agent Bryant tell the assembled agents in front of them that they were to either start coughing up actionable intel on mutants or they'd be on desk duty until their bones rotted away to dust....and I thought I had a way with words, Claire mused, her fury and anger slowly abating away as one of the assembled - a cocky Brit by the sounds of it, she thought - spoke about a major lead. Claire whistled softly to herself; it was very rare in her mind for GADEM to target an X-Man member directly because of their public status and notoriety, so for someone to have any info on one of them in the open was a rare gem to find.

"You've all gotten to comfortable. You all have one week to track down a alpha mutant or higher and bring them in or your out on your asses. Got it!!?" Agent Bryant said, finishing up his thoughts to the assembled agents; before he could add anything else, Claire stepped forward and chimed in her thoughts on the situation. "That's a good tip....Walker, right?" Claire asked, continuing on before he could reply. "You already know Agent Bryant; let me introduce myself," Claire began, taking off her slick black leather jacket and setting it down over a nearby chair; dressed in a long-sleeve black blouse, tight leather skirt and black heels, she looked every bit as much as her sobriquet of "the Lady in Black" described her. "My name's Claire Franklin, one of GADEM's lead interrogators. Those raids you agents fucked up earlier....the info for those raids came from my team of interrogators and I, so if you think he's pissed off," pausing to point at Agent Bryant, "so am I."

For a few moments the only sounds inside the hall were the sound of her heels as she paced a few steps. "Eight weeks of hard work down the drain...eight motherfucking weeks, ladies and gentlemen! Now, you may think interrogative work is easy; after all, all we interrogators do is beat and cajole information out of captured mutants, but it is much more than that. To be a good interrogator, you've got to think like the prey we're after, you've got to think fast and speak on the fly and above all, you've got to make sure when they haul their carcasses out of the interrogation rooms, you've got information you can send up the line. That's what my team and I do, so fuck you for fucking up out there in the field. The leads weren't weak, you were!" pausing as she pointed at one agent, who all but shivered back in his seat.

Seeing him visibly flinch, Claire quipped, "Oh, did I make you flinch? Maybe you should work a desk; after all, you seem too soft for field work," continuing on before the field agent could reply back to her. "Now where was I....oh, I remember: you have your orders from Agent Bryant. You've got one week to go out and bring me and my interrogators an alpha mutant or we'll be interrogating you instead!"

Looking over at Agent Bryant, Claire added, "Agent Bryant?" Technically, she was subordinate to him (they both had the same rank, but she had a later date of entry into GADEM than he did) but after the fuckups of the past week or so, she was damned if she was going to remain silent over it...