The Curse of the Middle

I bet you didn't figure you'd see this story updated in your feed ever.

“Well, I have a master’s degree in nursing from Canterlot University and have been working here for the last forteen years.” ██ must have caught her eye, for he appended. “If you are referring to the padding on my resume, I mostly do contractual work for the Foundation on an as needed basis. I take care care of families and foal medical problems when not working in the clinic, so I am required to know detailed genealogical histories that might run in families or help newborns. As a result, I specialize in biological and reproductive anomalies when my handler comes calling.”

For some reason she was expecting him to be a savant type double agent that blended in plain sight, a deadly serious agent behind a false veneer of modesty. “I admit I misjudged you a little. My experience so far has been—”

“Overwhelming?”

“More or less.”

He gave her a friendly and hearty laugh. “Not surprising. I had my own trouble swallowing that pill, no pun intended.”

“I think I’m doing okay so far. So, you only work here?”

He shook his head. “Oh, no no no no no. Canterlot is still my, for lack of a better word, seat of power, but I am called away when the need presents itself. I watch over Canterlot and ensure that nothing dangerous or hazardous spreads. It’s noble work, but I’m called away when a Mobile Task Force or a particularly difficult case requires my aid. I’ve been working with the Foundation for eight years, primarily as an advisor to Mobile Task Force Mu-7, otherwise known as the ‘Nursemaids’. I’ve assisted in the capture of no less than eighteen skips, and have even gone on missions as a field medic.”

Wow. ████████ had thought the Foundation had just ███████ ███ ██ the most convenient ███████ and ██████ █████ █████ ██ ███, but ██████ turned out to be one of their veteran agents. His lax attitude had turned out to be surprisingly deceptive.

“That’s amazing...”

Smiling at her praise, he continued, “I’m just a contractor now. I don’t do field work anymore, and I don’t go on armed raids at all. Well, there was one where I was forced to, but that was due to some extraordinary circumstances. And no,” he said upon seeing her preparing to interject,” I can’t say why. I’m not cleared to say it, and you’re not cleared to hear it.”

“Hear no evil, speak no evil, see no evil.”

“Exactly.”

Hold on. Contractor?

“Wait. You’re not with the Foundation?” she asked, confused.

██████ kicked his chair out and rolled across the floor. He was a flighty one, if not quite as much as Pinkie was. Why would the Foundation hire someone with such whimsy on the mind? Then again, there was no telling how much of it was a show just for her if he had done as much as he said.

“Not in any official capacity. The Foundation can be anywhere, but it can’t be everywhere. The MTFs are its hand, the O5 its heart, the researchers its brain. We, the embedded agents, are its eyes and ears. Should we notice anything unusual, we report it to our handlers so the proper response can be measured and taken. The Foundation combs through reports and high profile incidents to see if people are made of stern stuff in order to work at one of the black sites. The more common response is to hire us and leave us in our current position in order to have tabs on the pulse of current affairs. For instance, I work at one of the largest and most well-funded hospitals in the world. I can monitor case files, diagnostics, and infection reports throughout the city without having to cut through a sea of red tape. It’s my job to look for not aggressive anomalies or oddities. I am looking for medical anomalies, things that change us.”

I really want to finish this story. I even have █████ ███ █ ██████. It involves spiders.

God bless redaction.

I talked about it in the last author's notes of Site 16. In short, there was a problem with my original script and I couldn't fix it. I think I know a way around it now, but it comes at the price of possibility being boring. No one likes reading boring stuff. You see my dilemma.

The beginning and end are perfect for me. It's the middle I am having trouble scripting. Keeping with the same method I was writing chapters, I have enough content for about three chapters, giving me roughly five thousand words or so. I'd guess another five chapters at the end totally somewhere around seven thousand words. There'd be another three documents at minimum, and I can't guess at the length of those, although one of them is finished at just shy of an even thousand.

I have requested the gimp's help too much over the past few months, so it wouldn't be right to ask him. Even gimps have lives outside the house. That's the trouble I am currently having. I'd like to finally finish this one; it's been too long.

Cheers.