by Rene Fomby
“We can kiss PETSEC goodbye,” Tommy agrees ruefully. “And along with it pretty much the entire planetary feline population. All gone before we can even say meow.”
I’m trying to focus on the conversation in front of me, but I can’t help but be distracted by a laser beam shining just off to the left that’s currently in the business of dissecting a life-size mannequin of a large but otherwise nondescript dog, the beam now slicing through the space immediately north of the mannequin’s knees. Tommy’s sharp “ahem” brings me back to focus in on the meeting.
Q’ute is quietly laughing at the look that is clearly showing on my face. “Yes, that is one of our more interesting toys, although I’m not exactly sure how we would use it. We have a more portable version, though, that can be used in the field on much smaller animals. Splitting hares, you might say. Very effective at convincing some of your more recalcitrant individuals to spill the beans. One way or another.”
I shudder involuntarily at the image, although I have no idea what she means by “recalcitrunk.” Must have something to do with math. Division, now that I think about it. Or maybe trees.
Q’ute shows us to a table loaded down with various snacks. “I understand you both missed lunch today, and I wish I had more to offer, but it might be wise to keep up your strength while we still have a few minutes left to kill. And Nine, there’s a fresh litter box available through that little door over there, and a fire plug in the corner for you, Moose. Don’t want to have to deal with those things in the heat of the moment, you know.”
I don’t have to be told twice, and dive immediately into a large pile of milky bones before Tommy holds out a paw to stop me.
“Don’t overdo it, Moose. You don’t want to be slowed down in the middle of a critical undercover stakeout. Plus, we probably need to get you back home before dinnertime, so your humans don’t wind up calling out the police to hunt for you.”
“Right. Good call.” I decide to limit myself to just two milky bones for now. But I stash two more under my collar for later. Just in case.
Q’ute Branch, 4:15 p.m.
I
’ve just finished using the fire plug in the corner when the tech boys arrive with Strange’s laptop computer and a silver-colored ziplock bag.
Q’ute is standing with Tommy beside the snack table, talking quietly. The laptop and I arrive at the table almost simultaneously.
“Ah, good. Right on time.” Q’ute motions for Tommy to grab the computer but takes the baggie herself. “Getting into the computer was child’s play, but there was a ton of interesting stuff stored on the laptop and in her emails, so we’ll likely be up all night digging through all of it.” She opens the baggie and shakes out three small black squarish-looking thingies.
“Why three?” Tommy asks, taking the baggie as Q’ute dumps them back in.
“One of them has a small red mark on the bottom. That’s the special device you requested. Red for Russia, get it?”
Tommy nods yes, and Q’ute continues. “The other two are a standard full-sized SD card, plus a micro SD inserted into a full-size carrier. That way you have two different options on how to handle the switcheroo operation. And unless we get completely screwed and the Russians hand the Himalayan something truly unique and unexpected, like a blue or red card for instance, Strange will never know the difference. But black is a much better color for subterfuge, so I think we’re all in safe territory there.”
Tommy’s wearing some kind of belt pouch around his middle I hadn’t noticed before, camouflaged to blend into his fur, and he quickly stashes the little baggie into the pouch, zipping it up securely. The computer he’s got tucked under one arm.
“Okay, then,” he sighs. “Guess it’s now or never. Thanks for all your help, Q’ute. I can’t wait to hear what you find out about what other forms of mischief Strange has been up to recently.”
“Me neither.” Q’ute points to a side door. “You two better get going. I’ll have my people escort you out, so you don’t get lost. Or accidentally dismembered,” she snorts my way. “I take it you remember how to find our main entrance again, once you’ve completed the drop?”
“I do,” Tommy says. “But is there some kind of key—”
“The key is in your collar. It will automatically unlock the portal as you approach it. Just make sure you’re not being followed at the time.”
“Spycraft 101,” Tommy assures her as he hooks a claw over his shoulder toward the door. I get the message. Time for us to hook it.
Ecuadorian Consulate, 4:55 p.m.
O
ur brief meet-up with Julia Strange in the lobby went pretty smoothly. She seemed more than relieved to see her laptop still in Tommy’s possession, especially after he promised her he would return the computer if she did everything he demanded.
Our stakeout is behind a large potted plant in a dark back corner of the lobby. The Russians are a few minutes late arriving, but considering how hard it is to carry off a casual meet-and-greet between cats and dogs in the middle of a crowded human office building, that was probably to be expected. Plus, they no doubt had to invest quite some time casing the joint for unexpected visitors before ever entering the lobby. Visitors like us.
I’m not sure what I expected a Russian Wolfhound to look like, but this is certainly not it. They just look like a pair of shaggy greyhounds, with mostly whitish fur and several large brownish spots scattered all around for good measure.
“Don’t look much like wolves to me,” I mumble, mostly to myself.
“Shhh!” Tommy warns me with a hiss, and I shut my trap and burrow deeper into the foliage, still keeping one sharp eye on the Russians and another on the traitorous Julia Strange. An eyeball maneuver that isn’t all that easy to pull off, if I must say so myself.
Anyway, one of the Russians is hanging back near the lobby exit, keeping a sharp lookout, while the other one slides smoothly along the bar toward the spot where Strange is standing all alone. They brush past each other very quickly, and then suddenly the Russian is staring back at Strange with concern and confusion spreading across his long face. They exchange a few brief growls, then the Russian seems to have made some kind of decision as he shakes his head once or twice and heads back toward the exit. The whole operation took less than fifteen seconds start to finish, and none of the humans standing around seemed to pay a lick of attention to everything that was happening right at their feet, so to speak.
As soon as the door swung shut on the two Russians and we’re in the clear, Tommy is up and across the lobby in a flash, leaving me to saunter more casually across the room, trying to look for all the world like I own the place. Humans will usually defer to a well-bred canine like me if they think I might just belong there. Or, to be exact, belong to someone who belongs there.
By the time I reach them, Tommy is already in the process of handing over the laptop. “Ah-ah-ah,” he suddenly tells her, pulling the computer back sharply and handing it to me instead. “First I get to eyeball what they gave you.”
Reluctantly, she sticks out a paw, and in the middle of it is one of those little black computer thingies. Tommy snaps it up it instantly and holds it up to the light, shaking his head for a moment before handing it back, then motioning for me to fork over the laptop.
“Satisfied?” Strange asks him with a snarl.
“You just keep that fat nose of yours out of our business from now on, okay, little darlin’?” Tommy snarls back. “No more funny business, or I promise you, our next visit won’t be so friendly.”
She takes a long hard look at her computer, then slides her eyes back at Tommy, anger and distrust written all over her face. “How do I know you haven’t done something—”
“You don’t. But, truth be told, you don’t have any secrets left that we really care about. Just remember what I said, no more funny business. I don’t want to make another house call. The second one seldom works out all that well for my patient.”
Grabbing the computer, she turns in a huff and struts off, the laptop clutched under one fore leg and the little black thingie shoved safely underneath her collar. Tommy motions for us to beat a quick retreat outside before the humans finally begin to take notice.
Once outside, though, I turn on him in a huff myself, wanting some quick answers to what I just saw. “That’s it? You just give back her the laptop and that black thingie she got from the Russians, simple as that? What about the pee-mails? What about finding out where the Russians are hiding out? We’re running out of valuable time, here, Tommy!”
Tommy manages to somehow both smile at me and purse his lips in the process. “Like I said, Moose, you got a lot to learn about being a spy.” He motions for me to follow him into a dark hidden-away corner near the Dunkin’ Donuts shop before continuing.
“First, Moose, we already dumped the contents of that laptop, so by the time this evening is over we’ll have the down and dirty on every single thing she’s up to. We’ll know, but since she had her laptop locked down with 128-bit encryption, she doesn’t know we know, she thinks all of her secrets are still safe. That’s a pretty powerful weapon, in and of itself.”
I gotta agree with him on that, now that I think about it, but I’m not quite ready to give up the fight just yet. “Okay, then, how about that black computer thingie? I’m pretty sure it’s some secret technology the Russians have come up with to stash away all of the stolen pee-mails, and now that she has all of it in her dirty little paws—”
Tommy is rubbing the back of his head with one paw. “Moose, that little black thingie you think might be secret Russian technology is called an SD card. SD stands for Secure Digital, and it’s a standard format for a memory card, a way of storing computer data in a very small package. You can buy SD cards pretty much anywhere in the world, right off the shelf.”
Okay, he’s got me there. But I’m still not giving up that easy. “But, but, you just gave it right back to her. And I’m absolutely convinced it’s got all of our secret pee-mails on it. So now she can broadcast them out to the entire world. And that means we’re doomed!”
“And that is exactly what we’re hoping she’ll do. You see, Moose, if you were paying careful attention back at the lab, you’d have noticed that Q’ute handed me some SD cards that looked exactly like the one the Russians gave her, the one with all our pee-mails on it. When I took the Russian SD card from her and pretended to take a long hard look at it, I secretly switched the Russian card for an almost identical card from Q’ute. A card that was loaded to the gills with fake pee-mails that make Fat Tony and the entire PETSEC organization seem like a bunch of bear cub scouts, totally sweet and innocent. If she does decide to release them—which we’re betting she’ll do without even looking at them, trusting that the Russians have handed her something very juicy and damning to our side—that will only make us all look like perfect little angels. And if the Russians ever try to release the real pee-mails later on, Strange’s version will give us cover to insist that the Russian version is all fake news.”
Tommy’s right, maybe I really am way too stupid to be a secret agent, after all. He and Q’ute are operating at a level way above my kibble grade. But— “Okay, I get it, pretty clever really, but there’s still that thing about the Russian base of operations. How can we possibly track them down now? We have no idea even which way they turned when they left the consulate building.”
Tommy has that weird smile/pursed lips thing going on again. “You’re right, Moose. Maybe I should have hidden out inside the lobby and watched the swap take place while you sat out here and tailed the Russians to their secret lair. And that might have worked, assuming two of Russia’s best-trained and most ruthless operatives could somehow be tracked by a lap dog Yorkie from the suburbs without them turning on him in some dark alley and gutting him like a fish before he could even get out a single bark. But what Q’ute and I decided on, instead, was for Strange to hand them an SD card of her own, one that holds very little in the way of data but does hold a microminiature transmitter. A transmitter that they are now carrying straight back to their secret lair and a certain evil mastermind named Vladimir Kitin. So, what do you think now about our little Plan B option?”
Ordinarily I would be right in his face about that snarky little Yorkie reference, but right about now I don’t feel like I could take on a wounded butterfly. Much less a master spy who really does deserve the whole Double-O status. Licensed to kill, and right now my own ego is ready to be buried alive. If it had any life left, that is. Weakly, I manage to get in one last word on the subject. And even that’s just a surrender. “Okay. That makes sense, I guess. Good idea. So, what do we do next?”
“We do nothing, Moose. I’ve still got a long night ahead of me, working with the lab rats to locate the Russian HQ and draw up a plan for putting a stop to whatever nefarious plans they’ve put in place for screwing up the election.”
“So, okay, where does that leave me?” I ask in a tellingly squeaky voice.
“I think you’ve done enough—” He hesitates for a moment, and I can almost hear the word he’s decided to leave out. Damage. “—for one day. Like I said before, you had best head home before your humans panic and get the police, the firefighters and half of the armed forces out on the streets hunting you down. Get some dinner and a good night’s rest. If you still feel up to it, meet me at the lab early tomorrow morning. Your collar will let you in.”
Oh. That reminds me. When they swapped out my collar for this funny little blue thingie, will it still work my doggie door? And what if my humans notice the switch? I can’t exactly show up scratching on the back door begging to be let in, they’ll notice it in a heartbeat. So I have a lot to worry about as I turn and start trotting my way back home, my head hung low. I’ve got a lot to think about, for sure.
Home, 5:45 p.m.
I
got lucky with the trains, and also lucky with the collar. Q’ute must’ve had them stick something in it to trigger my doggie door because it worked without a hitch, and my humans already had my food bowl laid out on the floor waiting for me.
My head is still buzzing from all the events of the day, and no matter how hard I try, I can’t seem to think of anything I really added to the effort, except maybe distracting Julia Strange while Tommy took off with her laptop. He really had the whole thing under control, start to finish. Maybe tomorrow I’ll just be better off staying home and leaving all the spy work to the pros.
A sharp bark from outside, somewhere out back, stirs me from my troubled thoughts, and I trot slowly toward the back door to check it out. Once I’m down the steps I glance off to my left and see immediately I was right—the bark was from Bella, the Corgi who lives next door. My girlfriend. Or, more realistically, just my girl friend. Of all the dogs in the entire universe, she has the least delusions about my particular role in this world. She’s got my complete measure. And it isn’t very long.
“Moose!” She’s sitting at the fence, and I notice right away that her ears are drooping, and her tail is lying flat. “Where have you been? I’ve been sitting here barking for hours!”
That’s not exactly new news. Even more so than most Corgis, Bella has a real yapper on her. A nonstop yapper. I think she might even bark in her sleep.
“Hey, Bella. Sorry, I got called downtown. An emergency down at PETSEC.” I decide to not dive into any of the details. Bella has told me in no uncertain terms my hero days are long behind me. And, after today, I’m beginning to think she’s completely right on that score. Besides, she’s wearing a real hangdog look I’ve never seen on her before, so I sure don’t want to add to her troubles. I decide to change the subject. “What’s going on, B? You seem sad. Is everything okay? How did the doctor visit go?”
I can see her big brown eyes starting to fill up with fat tears, spilling over and trickling down her muzzle, something I’ve never seen her do before. And somehow it seems to be catching. “No, M
oose,” she blurts out in a leaden voice. “Everything is not okay. Everything is really bad, as a matter of fact. Really, really bad.”
The tears are already falling in a steady stream as I shove my nose through the chain link fence for a gentle bump. “Did someone get hurt?” I seem to recall her human mistress acting a little off recently, and sounds coming from inside of Bella’s house like the ones I make when I eat too fast and toss it all back up. Which isn’t all that bad, really, once you get through all the retching. It’s like getting two meals for the price of one.
But I suddenly realize Bella’s been talking all the while I’ve been thinking. Which is my usual go-to move, given she rattles on pretty much nonstop, but right now I think she might actually have something important to say.
“—so it seems my humans are getting a little baby human pretty soon, a human puppy, and I heard them talking about maybe giving me away—”
“Giving you away!” I can’t believe what I just heard! Bella’s humans? Talking about engaging in canine trafficking? That can’t be true! That’s just so—inhuman! “But Bella, surely you must have misunderstood them. I mean, the way humans garble all their words and such, it’s pretty much impossible to really follow along when they—”
“No, Moose, I know what I heard. They’re serious about it. It seems they’ve been worried for a long time about all my barking—”
“They can’t restrict your First Amendment rights! There’s nothing wrong with your barking, you just have a lot more to say than most dogs. We’ll sue!”
“Yeah, well, good luck with that.” Bella glances back toward her house. “But, the problem is, my mistress thinks the noises I make will wind up disturbing the new puppy when it comes. She says it’s already disturbing her, and the puppy isn’t even here yet. And—and my master agrees.”
