Summary: A new job doesn't mean a better one. Jeffrey, Diana, Kersh. Written for the Harem Jeffrey Spender challenge.

TITLE: Not in the Brochure
AUTHOR: Maidenjedi
RATING: PG
ARCHIVE: List archives, otherwise please ask.
KEYWORDS: Jeffrey, Diana, Kersh
SPOILERS: The End
DISCLAIMER: Not mine, thank you very much.
SUMMARY: A new job doesn't mean a better one.

***

For the 500 Word Jeffrey challenge at the Harem.

Author's Notes at the end.


*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*X*


"What makes you so sure you're qualified for this
job, anyway? You think growing up with a lunatic
mom and an absentee father made you some tough guy?
Jeff, you could have gone into law. No guns.
No fighting."

He took his razor and swiped it across the last
shaving cream-covered inch on his face. Rinsed
the razor in the sink, looked into his own eyes
in the mirror.

"Because law wasn't enough. Arguing in front of
a judge isn't my style. I want to catch the
bad guys. I want absolute justice."

In a Jack Nicholson voice, "I want the truth."

With that, Jeffrey Spender dried his face and left
the bathroom to get dressed. Black suit, white
shirt, red tie, black shoes.

"You could have been a cop, Jeff. It would have
been enough."

He put on his clothes.

The uniform of an F.B.I. agent.

----------------

He walked into Assistant Director Kersh's office
with his jaw squared and his shoulders back.
He was surprised to see another agent there.

Shining dark brown hair and glittering dark eyes,
her left arm bound in a cast.

"Agent Jeffrey Spender, I believe you've met Agent
Diana Fowley."

They shook hands. "Yes, while we were both working
the Praise case." Jeff's eyes lingered on her cast.
She'd been shot, he recalled.

They sat down and watched Kersh.

"I want to know that I can trust you both."

"Yes sir," they said, almost in unison.

"Orders have come down that new agents be assigned to
the x-files division. You two have been selected."

Jeff stiffened, his cool exterior chipped by the heat
he felt inside. Agent Mulder's X-files?

"Mulder and Scully have been reassigned. The office
has just been renovated. Here are your keys. From
here on out, you are assigned to Assistant Director
Skinner. I suggest you report to him directly
following this meeting. That is all, agents."

*That* was an interview? Jeff stood up, shook
Kersh's hand. Agent Fowley did the same. They
walked out together, Fowley with a grim look on
her face.

In the elevator, Jeff pushed the basement button.

"Agent Fowley?"

"Diana. When we're alone, anyway."

"Diana, did you request this assignment?"

"No. I was assigned, same as you were." She looked
at him, took in his face full of questions.

"Jeffrey, isn't it?"

"Yes."

"We do the jobs they tell us to do. We don't ask
questions. We don't ask for better things. They
tell us to go to the basement, we do it. Understand?"

He frowned, nodded. She wasn't unkind, just direct.

Diana seemed to know her way around, and grabbed
files that she told Jeff to read.

Later that day, exasperated, Jeff mentioned that none
of the cases were ever solved, just given weak
explanations.

"This is not what I joined the Bureau for."

Diana gave him a pitying look. "What for then?
Absolute
justice?" She shook her head.

He stared at her.

Sadly, "You couldn't handle the truth, Jeffrey."

He set his jaw. Oh yeah?

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A/N: Shameless quoting of "A Few Good Men". But it
fit! I had to do it!

For Kristen, because there wasn't enough Jeff
in the first one. Every girl should be so lucky to
have a stalker like her ;-)

Feedback and criticism to texgoddess@yahoo.com



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"And that while the things that actually happened to you would invariably disappoint, the things that never happened to you would never dim, never fade. They'd always be engraved on your heart with sort of a sweet sadness to them." - Wilder, DC
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http://users.pdsys.org/~maidenjedi