Lights Out

Unprecedented (Cashton/Cake/Lashton/ot3)

To say Ashton was sick of it would be an understatement. He was Director-General of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation. He was essentially the head of Australia's answer to the CIA or FBI, and he had more security clearance than anyone else in the country. Every time there was a new prime minister, he had to go explain Australia's security in (what he considered) quite dumbed down language. It seemed there was a new prime minister every 45 seconds, and Ashton had had enough.

Invitation: Meet with new prime minister in one hour

Ashton groaned as the email invitation appeared on his computer, begrudgingly accepting it. The fact this guy seemed so young he wouldn't be able to spell the word intelligence filled Ashton with very little confidence. That being said, the old people who couldn't tell an iPhone from an iPad were not any better.

Ashton continued to keep the country in one piece because, let's face it, that was what he was doing and all the politicians were largely irrelevant, before picking up an iced long black coffee on the way to his meeting. The last puppet was in power for less than nine months and that thought alone gave him a headache.

"Ashton Irwin, Director-General of ASIO." Ashton strides into the office of newly sworn in Prime Minister Luke Hemmings, and introduces himself amongst the moving chaos.
"Luke Hemmings. This is my assistant Michael Clifford and my Uh-" Calum intertwines their fingers,"husband, Calum."
"He doesn't have security clearance to be here." Ashton says immediately, seemingly unfazed by the husband part.
"Well-"
"What my husband is trying to say," Calum cuts Luke off, "Mr Irwin, with all due respect, is that I'm his husband and so anything you tell one of us you can tell both us."

Ashton rolls his eyes so hard it's nearly painful as he takes an obnoxiously loud slurp of his iced coffee.
"What Mr Hemmings, and for that matter all his staff and close friends and family, need to understand is that I am responsible for this nation's security and nothing will stand in the way of that. I don't think you understand the importance of what I do because if you did, you'd understand that there will now be a lot of things your husband will not legally be allowed to disclose to you. I have the highest security clearance in the country, and that means one very important thing, I decide who else does and does not have security clearance. You, husband hot stuff, do not have the security clearance. For the sake of this country please get out of this office and let me brief your husband whom you love so dearly." Calum clenches his fists, giving Luke a big and obnoxious kiss before storming out of the office wanting to do nothing but slap the smug smirk of Ashton's face.

*****unspecified time jump of some months, above was sort of a prologue*****

"Luke, we have a crisis," Michael screeches, barrelling into Luke's hotel room at 6am. Luke was currently on an official trip to Cairns to help the smooth roll out of a huge renewable energy infrastructure plan across North Queensland. Michael was the only person Luke could tolerate being woken up by for official work matters, and he still didn't want to be woken up before 6am unless it was a life or death situation.
"What time is it?" Luke groans.
"6:01, I waited. Even though I got woken up at two in the morning for this," Michael gripes.
"Well at least it's not life or death."
"I managed to go back to sleep for two and a half hours, thanks for asking," he rolls his eyes, "now do you want the bad news or the worse news first?"

"Start with the bad news. It's too early," Luke decides as he gets out of bed and heads for the bathroom.
"You're going to need to find a new director-general of ASIO."
"Ashton? How is that my job? Don't they have a board or something? Also why?"
"Okay yes you personally won't need to decide, maybe have an opinion on a few candidates once it's narrowed down, but you'll definitely have to announce it," Michael replies.
"Are you sure? Doesn't it seem counterintuitive to publicly announce who the person in charge of our top security agency is?" Luke says disbelievingly.
"That leads to your second question, the worse news. You need to publicly announce a new director-general because the current director-general slept with your husband."
"He did what?" Luke chokes.