All in Good Time

by Mackey Chandler

  “Makes sense to me,” Nick agreed. He didn’t say that his cousin was spreading the same rumor of Hawaiian interest and possible feelers in Texas as another agent of Tetsuo. The cousin, like Ihara, was a former USNA officer now in Texan service. Nick had been very careful not to invite anyone attached to Hawaii’s new Intelligence Agency tonight. A professional might have dug deeper with more perceptive questions. The idea was now loose in the wild. Perhaps it would find someone who would think it an advantage for their agency to move first and make it a reality. The action might fizzle out or it might return a huge benefit for little risk and with almost no expense except the cost of a dinner buffet.

  * * *

  Chen was on the com and oddly he had Jan the Head of Security for ISSII Station on the screen with him.

  “We have an odd situation here,” Chen started.

  April didn’t say anything. She really got tired of begging every male in her life to just cough up what they wanted to say without preamble.

  “There is a rather widespread reaction to your identifying our would-be-assassin with the TLA. In retrospect I should have advised you not to include that in your presentation since we didn’t know what it stands for,” Chen admitted.

  “We all screw up now and then,” April said, and shrugged to show her level of concern.

  “Jan here finds himself in a difficult position,” Chen said. “He asked me to speak for both of us to work a three-sided deal. The way in which I have an interest in that is he wishes to formally join forces with me doing investigations and security work. As a deal sweetener, he offers to explain what the TLA is.”

  “Do you know what the TLA is?” April asked Chen.

  “He wouldn’t tell me. He said if I knew you’d have it out of me.”

  “Investigations and security work,” April said, sarcastically. “You’d just choke to admit both of you have been spies forever wouldn’t you, Spook?”

  “Indeed, I feel my throat constricting at the idea of articulating that,” Chen admitted. “Anyway, the North American press, usually so accommodating, has been making all sorts of broad hints and double entendres about the acronym. They do love a good secret or fresh conspiracy theory. It’s been an embarrassment for a government that’s very hard to embarrass. Jan wishes not only to join forces with me but have it understood he may work with me on many of the requests you make of me. To make it clear, he wishes to come to Home permanently and asks to be under your protection.”

  “I’m not sure my protection is that big of a deal. Just declaring Home citizenship has to mean a lot more. You know most of your work for us is directed by Jeff. I’m trying to see why you didn’t put it to him directly. Do you want me to act on your behalf with him? Is this because you saved our butts at ISSII and expect me to feel obligated for that?” April demanded.

  “Yes, shamelessly,” Jan spoke up and agreed. “Look at what you are doing for Irwin Hall. Home citizenship should mean a lot more but I don’t see it is there yet. Home isn’t bombarding North America for Irwin. I need a sponsor and advocate who will go to war for me. I’m not sure Jeff fits the bill either.”

  “Just between us, I’ve been encouraging everyone to let me handle this. Once political principles are at stake I’m afraid poor Irwin will be lost in the noise. Jan, what kind of trouble are you in that you need that level of protection?” April asked.

  “I’ve been Head of Security for the International Station, well, forever. Having dual citizenship helped, and frankly, nobody else really wanted the job. It had all sorts of risks and very little in the way of rewards once your term was up and you went home. I stopped wanting to go home years ago, and never anticipated the political climate would change so. I’m not really in favor now in Germany or Switzerland. Indeed, if I go back it appears I’ll face all sorts of charges for past actions with little in the way of defense possible. I pretty much did all the things of which they accuse me. They used to be delighted I took care of matters, but both countries find themselves bullied by both China and the Russian Republic. Both are now interested in having control of the station to the detriment of the other instead of cooperating as in the past. To do that, they need to get their own man in place there. Both are keen to remove me and do it before my term expires. I’m not sure ISSII itself is going to survive the transition. There is serious talk about building a new international station with fewer nations represented and bigger more up to date facilities.”

  “Oh boy. I’m going to bring Jeff in on com and ask him to support it,” April said. “If he won’t buy it we’ll work something out. But it’ll be much easier if he’s in favor of it.”

  Jeff appeared working at a keyboard by his posture. He didn’t seem at all surprised to be confronted with a trio of callers.

  “Jan has his butt in a legal and political vise. He wants to immigrate here and wants to go to work with Chen. They both want that to include working for the three of us and he asks my personal protection. You in to do that?” April asked.

  “Of course, he’s a tremendous asset, and you owe him, so I do too. That’s very astute of him to seek your protection if his problems are of a scale to be addressed with thermonuclear devastation. My compliments and I’m sure Heather will sign on since both of us agree. Was there anything else?” Jeff inquired.

  “No, thank you, dear,” April said and disconnected. “With your permission, I’ll fill him in on the details later.”

  “Sure, I’m surprised you didn’t tell him right now,” Jan said.

  “I could tell he wanted to go back to whatever he was working on,” April said. “He agreed. All I could do by refusing to shut up was irritate him and kill the deal.”

  Chen just nodded. He had experience with Jeff.

  “So tell me what the TLA is,” April demanded.

  “It’s stupid, I’m sorry I didn’t tell you when you asked before.”

  “And yet, look how handy it was as a bargaining chip. It’s Earth politics, so of course it’s stupid,” April snipped.

  “You realize they tend to identify themselves as liberal or conservative?”

  “Yes, but since both want to argue over who hates Spacers more that hasn’t meant much to me. Like the big confrontation, we might as well call it a civil war, between the Patriots and the Sons of Liberty. They mostly disagreed over whether to kill us when it was safer or right now no matter what the cost. It’s hard to see any real difference between them.”

  Jan nodded. “Well when they change administrations the hardcore factions in the appointed positions at the top generally get purged, but the bureaucracy is forever, and they never purge all the way to the bottom. As a matter of fact, they point to retaining people attached to the opposition as evidence they are bipartisan and open-minded. Those retained may not advance quite as well as those in favor but if they can hang on until their side gets a turn it will reverse for them.”

  “Is this actually going somewhere?” April asked.

  “Yes, the agent who tried to assassinate you was on the liberal side of the spectrum. That is the party in power now. But a few years ago he wasn’t. Back then he was biding his time, doing scut work and waiting until he would be favored again. He’d socialize with other agents of his political leanings and when they played poker or went out drinking they’d refer to themselves as the Token Liberal Agents, or sometimes as the Token Liberal Agency.”

  April stared at him. “That’s it? It was a snarky joking name they applied to themselves. Why would it trigger strong responses in his brain scan?”

  “Obviously it was a very long traumatic period for him out of favor. He internalized it strongly so he never let go of it. He deeply identified as TLA in his own mind,” Jan said.

  “If I called them up and told them we goofed and explained what happened nobody would believe me would they?” April asked.

  “Probably not. I admit I’ve joked about it before and once told Eddie if he didn’t know what the TLA was he didn’t need to know. This is the s
ort of thing that once it is out there never entirely goes away, because someone will always see it as a cover-up.”

  “So what do we do?” April asked him.

  “There’s not much you can do,” Jan said with a shrug. “Just not waste your own time thinking it is some deep black agency and let everybody else think as they please.”

  “People will lose their jobs and be accused of conspiracy and disloyalty over this,” April predicted.

  “Well that’s not all bad,” Jan pointed out. “It’s not like you spread fear and confusion among your friends by accident, is it? I’d have been hard-pressed to engineer such a lovely disinformation campaign on purpose.”

  April could only smile thinking about it. Jeff would really be amused by the story.

  Chapter 17

  “Well that was easy,” Chen said when April was off the screen. “I need to fill you in on everything I’m doing for this triad. It’s interesting that they individually give me assignments without necessarily discussing it with the others. On occasion, the others get wind of the same cases independently and mention them to me. All three obviously have alternate sources, but April more so than the other two. Besides tapping Home Security and reports from a couple of physical security companies, she has an extensive network of informants who feed her odds and ends. I weaseled out of her one day that she gets several hundred messages a day. She was suggesting how I could use the same kind of software to sort my own reports.”

  “She’d have to in order to have time for anything else,” Jan said.

  “I was impressed that she adapted a relatively simple social secretary program to sort the message with tiered keywords. She isn’t a programmer but she did very well. The volume is so high because she doesn’t make any requests for specific intelligence. People simply submit random tidbits they think of interest and she sends them payments without identifying which report is winning them the payment,” Chen said and smiled.

  “I’ve seen such a scheme,” Jan said, “but you usually have to drop random payments to both maintain interest and to cover up any pattern of what you found valuable,” Jan said.

  “I assume she does,” Chen said. “Jeffrey tends to make requests of me for technical information that one can find from public sources. A lot of them are pay sources and the challenge can be making sure you don’t broadcast his interest with your searches. Heather, on the other hand, makes far fewer requests but they tend to be off Earth and very specific to persons and a general, ‘Tell me everything you can get on them.’ sort of search.”

  “I have assets in Europe and North America,” Jan said. “You, I assume have mostly Asian contacts. I think our coverage will complement each other well. I assume you initiate some cases on your own? Have they ever tried to limit you from doing so?”

  “Far from it. When we established our relationship Jeffery offered a decent retainer and suggested it was to his financial benefit for me to have other sources of income.”

  “He doesn’t worry about conflicts of interest?” Jan asked.

  “That one would simply kill me if he found me in breach of trust,” Chen said.

  “I’ll keep that in mind,” Jan assured him. “I’ve had some dealings with them, you know.”

  “I also partner with someone else April uses occasionally,” Chen said. “Unlike us now, I’m not at all certain April knows how connected we are. I’ll have to ask him how closely he wishes to work with you. I presume nothing about him.”

  “The fellow who took her off Hawaii and came up later,” Jan said.

  “You must know his name then,” Chen said.

  “Call me superstitious, I’ve avoided saying it out loud,” Jan looked furtively at the corners of the room.

  Chen laughed, “Yes, it would be unnerving if the walls said, ‘What is it?’ back. April feels free to call on him for favors without payment,” Chen said. “I have good reason to think favors are paid the other way too. He regards her well enough to initiate small actions on her behalf of which April is kept innocent so she can’t be caught out being aware of them. I’ll ask if he wants to formally meet you.”

  “That would be a privilege,” Jan said.

  * * *

  Diana called Nick the next morning.

  “Hello neighbor, my gardener just gathered a bunch of garlic from across the wall and is going to take it to market. If you want some come on over. I’ll feed you breakfast too.”

  “If I bring a bottle of cheap champagne would you make Mimosas?”

  “I haven’t seen a cheap bottle of champagne in decades, but I have orange juice whatever you want to bring. I’m down to vodka or rum right now.”

  “Nothing so crude, I’m on the way with the bubbly,” Nick promised.

  The phone Nick left on the kitchen counter. If he needed to talk to Diana privately it had a short-range encrypted chat app on it but he didn’t want anyone keeping track of when or how often he went between the homes. Turning it off completely just told any trackers something definitely was happening worth hiding. Revolutionary safety habits die hard.

  Diana’s Newfoundland, Ele-‘ele, was at the stone fence by the time he got there, knowing what his voice on the phone meant and escorting him to the kitchen door.

  “I saw all the cars last night,” Diana said. “A bunch of gas guzzlers too. I thought about taking their drivers refreshments but decided I’d just scare them.”

  “Really? I didn’t know any of them made their drivers wait. I’d have given them a comfortable place to wait and something to drink if they’d brought them to the house.”

  “Just two, the rest drove themselves like members of the proletariat. As if the workers could ever afford a Brazilian Fiat,” Diana said. She was setting the table while she talked.

  “One must keep up appearances,” Nick said in a clipped voice.

  “So this wasn’t friend friends but work friends,” Diana said. “I hope you aren’t unhappy and starting the counter revolution already.”

  “I guess I have never said, but I’m pretty happy with how things have turned out so far. We didn’t have to fight the North Americans, we’ve avoided massacring any ethnic groups, and the government isn’t hiring every nephew and cousin to live off the rest of the population. I even got a job out of the deal at a low enough salary that nobody wants to kill me for the position. I’m working hard to see nobody does anything stupid like banning the importation of food or declaring shorts are illegal.”

  “That was pretty stupid of the North Americans in a tropic climate,” Diana said.

  “The Arabs do the same in worse heat,” Nick said shrugging. “We had a discussion last night about banning real fur on the islands. It got quite heated. Fortunately for Ele-‘ele, I was able to talk them out of it.”

  “In other words, don’t ask what the agenda was. I know – it’s for my own protection. It’s a good thing I don’t run veracity software on you,” Diana said, loosening the wires on the Champagne. “You know, April accused us of importing revolution to New Las Vegas. I hope there’s no truth to that.”

  “It’s us now, is it? I swear we have no plans that way. In truth, we hope to have better relations with other nations. I don’t hold much hope for joy with North America in the short term. It usually takes them a decade or two to get over being enemies, but Texas seems a good candidate for improved trade. Once you have their money committed closer relations naturally follow,” Nick said allowing her a general idea of the issues.

  Diana frowned. “Just remember, that’s how Hawaii was taken over in the first place. They sent in the Marines to protect commercial interests.”

  “A point one of my guests brought up last night. He didn’t want to see improved relations based on hosting foreign bases. I thoroughly agree with him,” Nick said.

  “I think I got the truth out of you there,” Diana said working the cork loose carefully.

  “You can run software on that if you want. I have nothing to hide.”

  “I have thi
rty years on you, Bunkie, and my wetware says that is the biggest lie you will tell today. You have tons of secrets to hide and I’m just as happy not to be burdened with most of them,” Diana assured him.

  * * *

  Heather tried to get herself in the right frame of mind to call Timmy Holbrook. The man wasn’t like most of her subjects. She corrected her own thought… He wasn’t like any of her other subjects. There might be a few near-matches among Earth’s billions but she was pretty sure he was unique among her population. Jeff was about as close as you could find but even Jeff wasn’t the sort of mind to create new ideas. Jeff was better at looking over the things other people created, seeing relationships others hadn’t, and integrating them in new ways.

  Dr. Holbrook didn’t mind being called Timmy. Most grown men were happy to leave the diminutive form behind at some point. Holbrook embraced it with no self-consciousness. He was also different to speak with because he didn’t seem to have any of the concern others showed speaking with their absolute sovereign. He wasn’t furiously trying to recall if he’d done anything to displease her or reduce his funding when her face appeared on his screen.

  Holbrook was North America and Armstrong’s loss and her gain. When the other lunar colony was in political turmoil a few years ago, she’d snatched Holbrook and several others away before they got deported to Earth. It had been a stretch to set them up with facilities to continue their work. She’d had to cooperate with Marseille to do so and they still shared facilities and benefits with the French outpost, but it had been worth it.

  Holbrook and his assistants had continued to crank out novel technologies and improve on the ones they already created. Heather really didn’t speak with him very often. She didn’t need to. Unlike some workers, the scientists got up in the morning eager to start work. It had been a huge boost to their productivity when Heather offered them a free gene mod to reduce the need for sleep by about half.

  “Dakota, please hold my calls or handle them if that’s possible,” Heather requested. “I’m going to be tied up with Dr. Holbrook a little this morning. I don’t need any distractions while trying to deal with somebody that much smarter than me.”