Revenge of the Catspaw

by Helena Puumala

  “Sealand is a law-abiding, and well-policed town, so I don't think that you need to worry for your life here,” Agent Anna Edo said. “Space Station XER is another story, however. Why do you think that Marcues sent you on a trip there, anyway? I mean, outside of the stated task, which really doesn't need to be done.”

  The Flameworld Office of the Agency was well plugged into the informal, internal data network.

  “If I was feeling really cynical,” Coryn answered, “I'd say that it was to give The Organization a chance to get rid of me. The more likely explanation is that he just wanted me out of the way while he rearranges the Kordean branch of the Agency to his liking.”

  “But your Office there doesn't really come under his jurisdiction, since it's a part of the Diplomatic Corps,” Anna Edo objected. “He can't just turn it upside down for his own reasons.”

  Anna Edo certainly did know what was going on at the Agency Offices. She was apparently the type of an Agent with whom Coryn would have been pleased to collaborate. The type that did his or her homework, kept track of news, and of events which might prove to be important.

  “He's going to try, is my guess,” Coryn replied. And added with a grin: “He'll fail, though. The bureaucrats at the Diplomatic Corps don't much like him. And I did inform them of what was going on, as it was my duty to do, and even gave them a name of someone who I think would make a much more acceptable replacement for me than anyone that Marcues might try to appoint. Acceptable, that is, to the Kordean Witches, who are the highest Authority on the world.”

  **

  “Jillian,” Fiana called from the door of the inner office which had, until recently, been Coryn's domain. “Have you looked at the messages, yet?”

  It was the beginning of the work-night at the Liaison Office.

  “Haven't had a chance,” Jillian replied.

  She looked up from whatever she had been studying with Karan at the latter's desk. Paper documents, it looked like. Something to do with the City of Trahea officials, without doubt.

  “There's a cryptic one from Coryn. Read it when you get a moment, and then come and see me. It looks to me like he's telling us something; I'm not quite sure what.”

  When Jillian knocked on the inner office door, Fiana had already pulled down the information about the XYZ Imports from the Public Records. Jillian linked the tablet she was carrying with Fiana's console, and the two women studied the contents.

  Jillian was the one to react to the Forshie name.

  “You never trained or worked at the Agency Headquarters, Fiana, so you probably wouldn't know this,” she said. “But there's an Agent there by the name of Graeme Forshie. An annoying git, a rich man's spoiled son. He used to prey on the naive female trainees—probably still does. Thinks he's God's gift to women, plus believes that a male Agent should get to play with fast vehicles, and amazing gadgets, in between bouts of bedding various women.

  “He tried to seduce me when I was a trainee. I told him where to shove his slick exterior, and he was not happy with me. He and his hangers-on—there were those who actually looked up to the idiot—tried to make my life miserable, until Joe and I got together, when they suddenly made themselves scarce; I guess the very sight of the big boy from Paxic IV made them queasy!

  “A very attractive blond Agent from Coryn's training year fell for his line, and married him. She was a good Agent, if an idiot when it came to the opposite sex, and when the two of them worked as a team, Forshie actually managed to seem effective, instead of just a flashy fool. Then he made the mistake of not covering his tracks when it came to playing games with the naive trainees, and Lindy—that was the wife's name—blew things up sky high. I'll say that for her, she was not afraid of making a scene, and she did not blame the girl. Maybe by that time she had some idea of what she had married—in any case she came close to scratching his eyes out, and caused some serious pain to his manhood.

  “Because Graeme Forshie was one of Marcues' pets, she's still suffering for her audacity; Marcues gives her nothing but the most boring assignments around the Headquarters, with the pretext that she has anger issues.”

  “I have some memory of Coryn talking about Lindy—Cass, wasn't it? He was sweet on her during their training days, but she had a taste for sophisticated, tall, dark men. I gather he felt quite rejected by her,” commented Fiana.

  “That's funny,” Jillian said with a giggle. “Graeme Forshie may have thought he was a sophisticate, but, really, he was just a slick asshole. He didn't fool me for a second.”

  Fiana grinned at her.

  “Which explains why Coryn has been so inordinately pleased that he was able to snag you for his staff,” she said. “He's always saying that not much gets by your observant eye.”

  “It's not easy to fool me, true,” Jillian answered thoughtfully. “Though I'm not saying that it can't be done. I've pulled my share of boners, for sure.”

  “We've all done that,” Fiana said. “Human beings learn through screw-ups, let's face it. No mistakes, nothing figured out.

  “But, I wonder if there is any way we can dig a little deeper into this XYZ Imports business? Maybe there's some crazy connection that means something, and has present-day implications?”

  “Maybe, if we set some of the staff to mine the Public Records,” Jillian said. “Have them look up anything and everything that has any connection to the company, or to its owners, the Forshie Family. There's probably a lot of noise there, but there may also be the odd factoid which may lead us somewhere.”

  “Yes, I think we'll do that,” Fiana agreed. “Get Karan to work on it. She's got a methodical mind. Pity we don't have Coryn's friend from RES, Kev whatever-his-last-name was, available. He's a genius when it comes to babying information out of the Public Records.”

  “We've got Nance, Fiana. She's showing an amazing affinity for data banks, which is amusing, considering how much Texi dislikes working with computers. Yes, between Karan and Nance, if there's something to be discovered there, we'll find it.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Space Station XER was as drab as the reports claimed. How, Coryn wondered, had Sarah survived the three or four months that she had spent there, before getting the chance to leave aboard an Explorer ship?

  Coryn booked a hostel room for the Station night, after disembarking from the small liner which had ferried him, and a handful of other travellers, from the Flameworld Port in Sealand. As far as he knew, Matty Harmiss' connection to the Agency was not common knowledge on XER; that meant that he had to contact the young man surreptitiously. Roland Harmiss had been in touch with his son, and was supposed to have informed him of Coryn's imminent arrival. The Hostel was a good place to meet, since Matty's cover identity included the activity of providing passers-through with luxuries that they could not obtain from anyone else on the Station.

  The Travellers' Hostel was not a hotel, but more like a dormitory. Coryn was assigned a sleeping room by one of the two women behind the reception desk; she walked to it with him, pointing out the amenities while doing so. There were communal washrooms with shower and laundry facilities, a large kitchen (its size surprised Coryn who had listened to Sarah's complaints about the cooking facilities in her XER “shoebox”), and two comfortable lounges, one of which was furnished with a vid-feed screen—definitely a luxury in this austere corner of the galaxy. Coryn wondered whether it could pick up standard Confederation fare from the Flameworld, or was it good only for carry-discs, and local feed. Local feed, he assumed, would be peppered with exhortations for the servants of the God Ammha to obey his commands, and details of the punishments that awaited those who refused to do so.

  His personal space proved to be a small cubicle halfway down a long hallway. The size of the common amenities began to make sense to Coryn as he and his guide strolled the hall. The Hostel was meant to accommodate a lot of people; there were probably times when it did, although this did not appear to be one of them. The common areas were almost empty, and they met no
-one in the hall.

  **

  The bedside com in Coryn's cubicle beeped loudly. Tired from trip, he had lain down on the bed, and had fallen asleep. For a moment he was completely disoriented, and tried to figure out why the tone of the Official Residence emergency com had changed. And wondered what sort of an emergency was awaiting for him?

  It took him only seconds to snap to reality, however, and he realized that the Hostel's front desk had to be calling him—it could not possibly be anyone else under the circumstances. He reached to activate it.

  “Mr. Leigh, there's a young man here asking for you,” the female voice said. “The name's Matty Harmiss, and he says that he recognized your name from the arrivals list, and wonders if you are the person that he thinks you are. He suggests going to the Central Caf for a meal, and some conversation.”

  “Sure, why not?” Coryn replied while stretching his body to wake it up. “I'll be there shortly; just have to throw some cold water on my face first. Can you keep him there until I come?”

  The woman said that she would do that, and Coryn thanked her, threw his clothes back on, and made a quick stop in the communal washroom, on his way.

  “Mr. Coryn Leigh?” the young man seated on a wooden bench near the front desk, asked him.

  Coryn stared. He did not have to feign surprise. It had been more than two standard years since he had last seen Matty, and in the meantime the lad had grown into an adult. He was taller than Coryn remembered, and broader at the shoulders. He looked a lot like his father, Roland, but with his mother, Elli's hair and eyes. However, the humorous twinkle in his eyes was his very own, and it Coryn well remembered.

  “Ah. You're Matty Harmiss?” Coryn said, conjuring up a grin. “You wanted to go to Central Caf to eat—and to discuss possible business transactions, maybe?”

  Sarah had told him about the Central Caf, the only public eating place on XER. During Sarah's stint as a ship mechanic in XER Maintenance she and Matty had whiled away many hours there. It was not noted for comfort or good food, but it was a place where it was possible to have a private conversation without any worry about being overheard by Ammha's spies. As such, it was an important business venue for Matty, whose personal living quarters no doubt resembled the “shoebox” which Sarah had described as the one she had lived in. The “shoeboxes” were not attached to lounges, or a kitchen, the way Coryn's hostel cubicle was.

  The common areas of the Hostel, however, Coryn did not find tempting when it came to important private conversations, even if he had arrived during a quiet season. He was cynical enough to suspect them of being equipped with surveillance capabilities—Ammha's Authorities no doubt took an unhealthy interest in the private lives of travellers, along with those of the faithful. Plus, the women manning the front desk seemed, frankly, quite curious about the Hostellers. They might have been spies for the Space Station Authorities—although it was possible that they were simply taking an interest in a good-looking male traveller.

  Matty grinned back at Coryn.

  “Yeah, let's have a chat while we eat,” he said. “There haven't been too many travellers coming through here, lately, so I'm pleased to make the acquaintance of those that do. You were the only obvious one on today's transport from Flameworld; the rest were all XER residents back from rest and recreation.”

  They walked by the reception desk and Matty smiled at the two staff there; it was a “thank you” gesture, Coryn deduced. Probably the Hostel staff kept Matty informed of any, and all, interesting travellers who came through.

  “Ah,” Coryn responded to Matty's comment. “That's why my fellow travellers seemed to be in a drab mood. They were returning to the workaday world.”

  He had, in fact, scrutinized every one of the dozen, or so, passengers on the small transport. If the Neotsarians were going to make trouble for him during space travel, and the thought that he might disappear into some pseudo-omega-space, like Peter and Cameron Mackenzie had, years ago, had crossed his mind, doing so during a smallish craft flight made more sense than trying something on a mega-transport. However, if all his fellow passengers had been locals, he really had had nothing to worry about. He, along with other Agency personnel, suspected the Neotsarians and the XER Authorities of having a working relationship between them; thus it would not have done for The Organization Hounds to sacrifice locals in their pursuit of an enemy.

  Matty laughed.

  “A drab mood is about right!” he said. “Although, if I want to transport what passes for contraband here, but is freely available in Sealand, I usually ask the most dull-looking of the local travellers to be my abettor. The Customs workers let him, or her, walk right through; no checks, nothing! Me, I never get off that easy!”

  “They went through my bag pretty thoroughly,” Coryn agreed. “I wasn't quite sure what they were looking for. I knew better than to try to bring even a bottle of wine with me. I'll manage without, until I'm back on Flameworld. Then I'll celebrate on some lovely bar patio!”

  They had reached the Central Caf, and Matty secured them a table for two. Sarah had told Coryn that when she had been on XER the Central Caf had always been a very busy place, but it was not that, now. The duo walked by a number of bigger, empty tables, before coming to the small one which the electronic maitre d' had assigned to them.

  “Is this the slow season for travelling, in this neck of the woods?” Coryn asked Matty as they settled down to peruse the menu which flashed onto a table top screen.

  “Every season is the slow season for travelling to XER, these days,” Matty said with a shrug. “There's not much here to come for. Not that there ever was, but when I first got here, that did not seem to be an issue. People would stop by on their way elsewhere, just to gawk at the absurdity of it all—you know, the religious lunacy, the women being treated like second class citizens.”

  “The gawkers have given up, have they?”

  Matty shrugged.

  “I guess. I think that the word has got around that the Authorities have become—shall we say—overly friendly with people dropping by from The Organization sector of the Galaxy. We're now frightening, rather than a curious anomaly. So travellers now head off in some other direction, when they leave the Flameworld.

  “It's a pity, as far as I'm concerned. The tourists enjoyed buying contraband whisky, or some mild hallucinogens, from me. Made them feel deliciously wicked at a very low cost.”

  Coryn grinned at him.

  “Forbidden fruit has the sweetest flavour,” he said.

  Matty grinned back.

  “Even if it's the same fruit which was freely available at the last stop,” he commented.

  “What about the visitors from the other sector of the Galaxy, shall we say?” Coryn asked. “Don't they enjoy forbidden fruit?”

  “Probably,” Matty replied. “But they go to Flameworld for it, or any other Confederation stop outside of this one. To them, this place is just like home, and they make their visits short and businesslike.

  “But, Coryn, tell me,” he added, lowering his voice even though the tables around them were empty. “How's Sarah these days? According to my parents, she and you have become an item, shall we call it? And she, I hear, has proved to be a powerful Witch.”

  “She's fine,” Coryn answered, his face breaking into a grin. “And she is remarkably talented. And a wonderful person! I'm counting on the Witch Circle of the Twelve to keep her safe while I'm away from Kordea.”

  “She was a great friend to hang out with, when she was here,” Matty said. “Though I gather that I inadvertently sent her into danger.”

  “She made it through.” Coryn shuddered as he spoke. “She rather draws trouble to herself. Loving her can be a wild ride sometimes—but then, I would never have met her if it hadn't been for one of those rides.”

  For a while they traded Sarah stories. That was pleasant, but it was not what had brought Coryn to XER. Soon enough they got down to the details involving Agency matters, and Coryn tried to expla
in Marcues' “make-work” project, and his own reasons for having accepted it.

  “It was absurd of Marcues to send you here,” Matty objected. “I have a secure connection to my Dad at the Headquarters. To activate it all I need to do is punch in a code on one of the public coms. As far as anyone has been able to tell, it has never been breached, yet. Apparently it's a clever piece of work by a brainy programming and engineering nerd.

  “Wait a second—maybe that's it. Maybe someone wants to know what I know, and you're here as a plant. You get a little disc of my info; someone then steals it from you. They crack the safeties written into the disc, and then they'll know just how much we know about the stuff happening in, and around, this place.”

  “Your scenario would definitely implicate Marcues, since he's the one who sent me here,” Coryn objected.

  “Not necessarily,” Matty argued. “Dad says that he can be pretty foolish when it comes to some things and people. Not because he's a crook, but because he's incompetent at handling the complexity of the internal affairs of the Agency. Besides which, he's petty. Someone could be using those qualities to get him to do stupid things.”

  “That would mean an influential mole close to him, maybe inside the Agency itself. Not that the possibility shocks me, and I'm sure that others have thought of it before me.”

  Coryn thought for a moment.

  “If we assume that your scenario is the likely one, and it may well be, Matty, the way to thwart it is to, simply, make sure that I carry nothing for them to steal,” he said. “We'll make no disc; you'll keep on reporting via the route which you have successfully used in the past. I'll hang around here a few days and talk to people, poke my nose into this and that, looking like I'm doing an investigation. That's to divert suspicion away from you, as anything other than a source of a few bottles of wine, which maybe the women working at the Transient Hostel will share with me. There must be some corner of a lounge, or the kitchen, which is not under constant surveillance!”