Sending An Emotionally Compromised Agent on a Mission

So I'm working on a spy story that involves the protagonist being sent on an undercover mission in order to contact someone. The thing is, my protagonist has just lost a family member and is still grieving. Their superior knows about this and even tries to comfort them. So, I'm asking if it would be realistic for an agency to send someone on an assignment, knowing that they were still grieving from a recent loss.

Probably not, since an agency wouldn't want to send someone in such an emotional state for fear of them making mistakes that could compromise them.

It depends on a large number of factors. Most employers grant bereavement leave, after which it is generally assumed that the employee will return to work even if they're still sad. If there are doubts about their fitness for work, then a medical evaluation might be required before they can resume their job, especially if it's a high-risk or high-security position. This would apply especially for spy agencies and the like, who must always be aware of the risk of their agents being compromised or doing something improper.

Much depends on how visibly distraught the character is. "My mum died yesterday and I'm in a corner weeping like a baby"... obviously no sane agency would send such a person on a mission. "My grampa died two weeks ago, I went to the funeral, and I'm sad but I'm ready to work again"... this probably wouldn't raise any flags unless they display obviously aberrant behavior. Between these are a wide range of possible situations. "My 5-year old daughter was just murdered by the bad guys that I'm being sent to infiltrate"... yeah, no.

Scenarios like these can be used to demonstrate whether the agency employing these characters is competent and/or sympathetic. An incompetent agency will have no psychologists on staff and send obviously unstable agents on critical missions as a matter of course. An unsympathetic agency won't give a damn how anyone feels as long as they follow orders. Either or both can serve as foreshadowing of the agency being revealed as or becoming an antagonist later in the story. Either way, you'll want to justify how it's lasted so long in the business while displaying such a cavalier attitude towards morale.

There's also the classic scenario wherein a particular character is The Only One for a particular mission, possibly because they alone have the trust of a vital contact, or they have a crucial piece of information that they can't share, or everyone else who could go is compromised, or the organization has a tiny pool of active agents, etc. Between letting them grieve and letting the world blow up, someone has to make a hard choice. It's cliched as all hell but seems to get trotted out often enough regardless.

Even if the agency is competent, you can always have the agent decide to go rogue and do the mission on their own. That's also a grotesquely overused cliche, but it's your story.

edited 21st Jun '18 9:28:09 AM by Fighteer