To find a Queen

1

She walked into Quantico, her oxfords quietly squeaking on the tiled floor while she made her way to her newly assigned classroom, Shoulders stiff with tension.

Glancing at the half crumpled map she clutched in her hand firmly, she absentmindedly pushed her glasses back up her nose. She was lost, and hopelessly so; she chewed her lip unsure of where to go. Focusing on the map, She found it wasn't very far away from her position in the building at all... just down the next hall and it was the first classroom on the right;  Room 109.

She found the illusive room and retrieved its keys from her back pocket. Shoving them into the door knob, she struggled to unlock the ancient thing, but with a forceful little jiggle the door opened.  She entered the quiet auditorium of a classroom, It's seats stacked like risers, going up and up and up as she took in the whole of the room.

Being in one of the oldest buildings at Quantico has it's perks, the classroom lacked very little and included a warmth only felt from oak floors. Dust motes swished as She moved through the musted room acquainting herself with the stale , rather likable, area. She admittedly was surprised by the lack of sterility the room held and it's  flooring, which looked scuffed from years of use. She carefully set her briefcase on the barren desk and hopped atop of it, Taking in the quiet stillness that seemed to echo through the room. There was a knock; she glanced from the corner of her eye to find someone reading a newly printed name plate:

Dr. Athena O. King.

Criminal Psychology, Forensic Anthropology  

She looked up to find a scruffed man peering into the class through the glass window of the door; She got up to answer it, still reluctant to introduce herself to anyone as the foreigner. Awkwardly, she opened the class door again with some heave. The man held himself like his bones were made of wire, stiff and hard to move as he walked with a straight back to greet her, not making eye contact until the last minute when he offered his hand.  He reminded her of a stray dog, the look in his eye was ever cautious when he did look up, like he had been kicked one too many times but was still forcing himself to interact with others. He looked...rugged, and even stranger than before when he smiled his crazed smile. 

"  Will Graham." His voice cut through the quiet like a knife

" Olivia King." She said grasping his hand firmly, observing how his shoulders stiffened for a moment and then relaxed, like he wasn't ready to receive the offered hand shake.

Introvert with social anxiety; Will Graham smelt like dogs, sweat, and fresh river water. He was rain and thunder and stormy seas. 

" You work here as well?" She spoke quickly, covering up the awkward silence, a lady was always polite and charming.

" Yeah, I teach class here and consult."

Merlin sounded in her ear like a whisper, she had forgotten the feed was live. "You need to be careful of him Guinevere." He warned, the brogue of his voice rough, she could almost see the raised eyebrows sliding up towards the crown of his head. She bit down on the urge to respond to him and demand just " why ever must I be careful ???? " in a snarky tone.

" Oh, you do? Well...I've just been sent over from MI5 to teach some of your up and come-ers. "  She said, reciting her cover from memory. 

Will looked intrigued, her spine tingled in a sense of not-right.

"From England?" He gave a polite smile and stuck his retracted hand into the pocket of his very worn slacks.

"Surprising I know, I'm from the South but as they say "Shit happens". Olivia worked to make the smile she gave Will as genuine as possible, but there was something about him that threw her off.

"Well then Olivia, it's going to be a ...pleasure to work with you." Will smirked.

"I'm sure it will be Mr. Graham." 

Silently he nodded at her in departure, closing the ancient door behind him with a cracking "thud."

She breathed out for a moment before barking "Merlin what the hell !" into the audio feed.

" Mr.Graham has anti-NMDA encephalitis, which causes a form of ...autism." Merlin pulled up the information through the feed of her glasses. 

"Gets into the minds of the killers?" She mumbled, going to her briefcase, she opened it to reveal a standard issue laptop. 

"Yes." 

"And that's a threat to me how? I'm not exactly a cereal killer Merls."

Merlin huffed like the answer to her question was so obvious.

"He'll try to psychoanalyze you, and you need to be two steps ahead of him when he does. He can blow your cover, William Graham is your wild card." The scotsman hummed in her ear, bringing up this and that on the FBI profiler. His file appeared on the  screen in front of her and she focused on it intently. 

"So basically the game plan here is to keep my friends close and my enemies closer?"

"Precisely, and if need be, the NLP strategy."

Olivia rolled her eyes and glared at the computer screen. "You want me to fuck him?"

"If you're not getting anywhere with him, yes." Merlin confirmed to her.

Oh that was the last straw of her patience indeed. It was one thing to be sent out here with the American branch on the trail of a cereal killer who mutilated his victims for aesthetic reasons but now she had to seduce the mark as a last resort because her agent skills weren't on par with everyone else's "How fucking......fucking stale of you.." she said hotly, not thinking of anything better to say in the heat of the moment.

"If I fail at getting the information in a non-biblical sense, I can always fuck him!? Screw you Aaron, that's so bloody sexist of you. My abilities are fine without having to seduce the mark."

"Oi! Tha's not it at all, it's not a doubt of your abilities......" Merlin sighed then spoke in a calmer manner, seeming to realize where he miss-stepped in the minefield of her emotions.

"Firstly, You're on a mission, so stay to the bloody code names please, Guinevere. Second,i recognize it's been a bit harder on you than most because of your..... connection to Arthur, but that doesn't excuse you from your duty as a leader to this organization. Need I remind you that the world went tits up a few months back, and now there's a serial killer who's gotten a hold of an agent. So suck it up, put on you grown-up pants and get your job done." Merlin, ever blunt when he needed to be, was unfortunately correct. Lamorak had been abducted, and it was her job as queen to get him back or god damn her. Olivia sighed, scrunching her eyebrows together over her glasses.

"Alright." She breathed out and it was all tension. Her mission wasn't going to be easy, and with someone like Will Graham on her tail, it just got one million times harder. But a Kingsman agent is a Kingsman agent and she was their bloody queen. Merlin was right, it was time to grow up and find Lamorak.