Mina Cortez: From Bouquets to Bullets

by Jeffrey Cook

  Mina mirrored the slight grin at the last part, finally relaxing back in her chair a little.

  “Your grandfather was pretty famous in certain circles,” Deborah said. “Tommy Escalante started out as a delivery boy. Organized crime figures still have flowers at the funerals and weddings. He got very good at just not drawing much attention. For a while, there was a lot of hope that his daughter would go into the real family business ... well, from a lot of people other than your grandfather. He was pretty happy the day she ended up a florist for real.”

  Mina remembered her grandfather from her youth as a man old before his time, moving around on a cane with difficulty. What happened to his legs was attributed to a car accident, but not the one in which Carmen Escalante, now Cortez, had lost her mother. She recalled her earliest days at the flower shop, before her parents took over fully. They'd been doing a lot of the work for some time anyway. Her increasingly immobile grandfather's real contribution by then was the web of contacts he'd built up. He knew everyone, remembered everyone, had a kind word and a few questions as to health of family or the latest gossip for everyone who came into the shop. As soon as the shop closed, he was much quieter. Closed and private even with family, often citing exhaustion and wanting to just go home to rest, but he'd always be there first the next morning. And now she was hearing him like he was some secret soldier.

  “After he got hurt in the line of duty,” the Deputy Mayor continued, confirming Mina's most recent suspicion, “he turned the shop into a safehouse. Agents would disappear there for as long as needed, and leave in empty delivery trucks bound for anywhere needed the next time inventory was dropped off. And then there was his registry. There is an amazing amount of history and a whole web of connections between people for the last fifty years in the computers at your shop. It’s all in addresses and flower inventories ... but it's still history. You'd be surprised how many cases he got started just with noting who was a whole lot more elaborate with their daughter's wedding or their mother's funeral or their grandson's Chipping Day party than their income would suggest. When your grandfather died, an awful lot of agents were very relieved that he had such a network of friends, so they could safely show up to pay respects. For obvious reasons, most agents don't tend to end up with a lot of close friends.”

  Mina took all this in, making a mental note to herself to start checking out everything about her grandfather as soon as possible.

  “Your grandmother knew,” Miss Lasko answered Mina's next question before it was asked. “She was like me. Not part of the organization, but a friend. She worked as a secretary at City Hall for years, keeping track of the political process from near the ground floor.”

  Mina swallowed. “His accident wasn't an accident. What about hers? She died when my mom was a kid ...”

  Chapter Eight

  Deborah Lasko sighed slightly. “No one was sure. His cover might have been blown. After that, the shop—in all its functions—and protecting your mother became his only real passions. He poured everything he had into the AIA, and most of the agents old enough to have been there during his tenure were trained under his watch. Most of those have either retired, died, or moved to other cities—thankfully, mostly the latter. Seattle had something of a reputation of excellence among the organization, with how many cases it solved involving Pacific Rim trade and local smuggling through the ports. Everyone wanted agents trained here, rather than recruiting their own.” The Deputy Mayor's pride in this fact was not concealed at all.

  “And the transfers weren't replaced?” Mina ventured a guess. “You said that the organization was shrinking.”

  Miss Lasko shrugged. “Changing with the times. The world has moved on. International tensions aren't remotely what they once were. Working together for mutual survival and fighting through growing pains led to something akin to actual cooperation. This century has seen no wars between major nations, just terrorists and isolated violent regimes, neither of which can take advantage of seas of refugees and emergency transfers anymore. Sure, there's always going to be mistrust between uncomfortable bedfellows, but the odds of China and the United States ending up at each other’s throats is remote—the current arrangements are too profitable. As the enemies in the world shrink, so too have the forces that the alliance puts out to fight them, and just as importantly, so too does the budget. There are days that fanatical accountants in the halls of power are our worst enemies.”

  The extremely well-informed civil servant smiled, leaning forward at the desk. “Which is the reason all of you have people like me. You're going to have enough trouble just holding down a full-time job and dealing with your parents, dealing with customers, and dealing with the heavy responsibilities of being part of the invisible line that guards us and our allies. I've already arranged for a new apartment for you through suitable channels. You'll be introduced to your first case tomorrow.”

  “What is—?”

  “I'm afraid I can't give you any details now ... the Director will handle that. Meanwhile, I'm going to give you as many tools as I can to do your job to the best of your ability with as few roadblocks as possible. In the near future we're going to have to keep contact between us discreet, until such time as you're more involved with the Parks & Rec projects, but if you seriously need something, please don't hesitate to contact me, all right?”

  “Thank you, Ma'am, I will. I think I should get back to my family though. They'll be worried.”

  Odd as the afternoon had started, Deborah Lasko and her security detail, the Director, her grandfather, her own chip, her future—a lot of things were starting to make sense. Mina couldn't wait to tell Miko ... that she was a florist. Mina deflated a little, but managed to maintain her smile. Despite feeling just a little less like a proper Mouseketeer, she had to admit, this was a lot more excited than she'd expected to feel at this point after her chipping.

  * * * *

  Her family, and Miko, had indeed been worried, but they'd been reassured, then put her to bed after her surgical procedure and its minor complications. Mina had barely been able to sleep. A whole new world had suddenly opened up, and she found herself immediately thrust into the middle of it. Worse, she apparently already had a case, and no one was telling her anything. She thought a couple of times about going back to see Director Richter sooner, but her chip and her general fear of the Director told her that was a bad idea. Exhaustion caught up with her enough to get a couple hours of sleep, leaving her bleary-eyed and sleepwalking through the start of her day.

  With school behind her, she was up with her parents and off to the shop in the van. Even as tired as she was, the chip practically walked her through the first routines of the day. As long as she didn't fight it, everything went smoothly. Flowers were picked and arranged and put on display, inventory was moved from the back gardening area to the shop refrigeration units, and everything was watered and fertilized in order. By the time the shop actually opened to customers, and the phones were turned on for the day, Mina was waking up, but she barely remembered the morning.

  She ran into the first moments of trouble with her weekend work habits. Her shortcuts didn't match the chip's programmed procedures for handling flowers and setting displays. Vague hints of that aluminum taste were followed by burning in her sinuses. Most of the time it was momentary, but she gained a definite feel for when she and her chip weren't in perfect alignment. School had given her a few cases of people with similar sensitivity, especially very early in the process, but not many. A few times she also had to slow down, or was told by her parents to slow down. Outpatient procedure or not, she was still supposed to take it mostly easy, especially after her alleged “complications.”

  Even so, as soon as the first calls came in for deliveries, Mina couldn't help but launch herself towards the phone. Much as she was aware that the shop was going to be most of her day-to-day life, she couldn't wait to actually begin figuring out precisely how all of this spycraft happened. Her parents were left a little con
fused by her sudden enthusiasm for the work, but let her take the van out for her first deliveries, to celebrate her first official day on the job full-time, and perhaps they thought she'd strain herself a little less.

  If that was what they thought, they were to be disappointed. She ended up making a delivery to the clinic she was told about and was directed downstairs. There, Agent Park was waiting for her. The basement itself had a few high-tech workout machines, as well as an old school treadmill with some sort of suspension device set up over it. Most of the weights were set up over some type of raised plates, partly set into the floors.

  “This is where your transformation into a superhuman begins,” Agent Park offered as soon as she laid eyes on the set up, with a wave of his hand. “We're going to take it easy on you today and tomorrow while you adapt to your chip. You shouldn't be jarring it too much ‘til everything heals entirely. Still, we can get you used to the routine. I'll be here to supervise, at least for now.”

  He moved her to one of the raised plates, tapping a button. The ground under her feet started to vibrate, causing her to almost lose her balance a couple times before she found her equilibrium. Then he guided her through stretches while still on the plate. “Everything here is designed to create the most efficient workout possible. You have two types of muscles: slow-twitch and fast-twitch. The first get used for endurance; the second get used for sprinting and bursts of activity. We're building up both at the same time, but especially the fast-twitch.”

  Mina listened while going through the warm-ups, trying to keep her balance. “So working on these muscles will get my body closer to catching up with my chip's processing speed for physical information?”

  “Oh, good. You remember more from that briefing than just 'Director Richter isn't easily interrupted.' That's the goal, yes. You hear stories about how when professional athletes are really on their games, everything slows down for them. When you get adrenaline going, your chip lets you see the world like that full-time. Because we were all on Inquisitor chips, that test-fight would have seemed normal to you, but I suspect it didn't last near as long as you think it did. We'll outdo that.”

  Mina grinned at mention of the test fight. “Yes, but I hit ... I think that was you, and disarmed agent Hall,” she answered.

  “Well, yes,” he agreed, his own cheerful expression not fading. “That was the idea. When you're a little further from your surgery, we'll try some sparring matches and show you what it looks like when we're not walking you through it.”

  Mina's grin faded. “I'll be looking forward to it,” she answered as any elation from her small victory faded.

  From the stretches, she moved onto weights. Squat press, military press, bench, each time on one of the platforms, stressing muscles each time, especially in her calves and thighs that the weightlifting itself didn't bring into play.

  “You're going to notice drastic jumps in your weightlifting maximums, your muscle endurance, and especially your reaction times within a fairly short period. The training regimen you've been under already did wonders for you, or you wouldn't have been a candidate. Now, we're moving you to the type of training you'd be under if you were going into professional sports, except your chip is a lot more complex than any athlete's.”

  As she lifted weights, Agent Park started telling her stories of his own years as a spy. Despite the fact that, as a personal trainer, he was a sadist, Mina found herself liking the man. He'd seen a lot of cases come and go. Some of the stories weren't even about his Inquisition cases, but just his work as a policeman, then as a detective on the force.

  They moved to the treadmill eventually. Expecting to end up jogging or something for an extended time like some of the warm ups she was used to, she was surprised when he helped her into a vest attached to a suspension harness. “If you fall, the machine will catch you. Because you will fall,” he told her. “You're right-handed. Stand, facing me, to the side,” he instructed, as he turned the treadmill on. He kept increasing the speed of the machine as she shuffled laterally. He helped coach her through proper movement, improving her speed, then dialed the machine up ‘til she could no longer keep up.

  “Twelve miles per hour ... now ...” he turned the machine off and turned her around, then started the process again. She didn't get up to nearly the same speed before losing her balance.

  “Just like you have a dominant hand, you have a dominant leg. You can currently pivot or push off, or maintain balance much better going one direction than the other. We can't have that, so we're going to train that out of you.”

  A short break followed for water, finally, before they did one more set of exercises on the treadmill. This time, he dialed up the suspension to help hold her more upright and took some of her weight off her feet. “Currently, your legs will only move you so fast. We're going to train the fast twitch muscles to fire faster, partly by making you run in these conditions faster than you currently could if you weren't suspended, at half weight. When those muscles are trained, eventually, your speed will improve and then we'll turn the treadmill up higher.” Indeed, he got her up to twenty three miles an hour on the treadmill before she was having to rely entirely on the harness.

  Finally, Agent Park called it for the day. He brought her a couple of fruit-and-nut granola bars from the storage unit, along with more water. It was a while before she was feeling up to walking again, but eventually she had to get back.

  “You'll have a couple hours at the shop, pending any actual deliveries, then the Director will be calling. Good luck,” Agent Park offered, genuinely, on her way out.

  At that moment, it wasn't that Mina wasn't looking forward to her introductions to spycraft still—more that all she really wanted was to go home and sleep for about ten hours after this first introduction to her new spy routine. She was especially not looking forward to waking up tomorrow morning, as sore as she already was.

  * * * *

  Mina received the next set of instructions piecemeal. She got a call for a delivery. As soon as she reached the light rail station, she got a direct comm that her chip picked up as a secure priority message. Instead of her original destination, she was to take the light rail north into the University District. She followed the instructions her chip gave her to interface with her comm, hacking into the system in order to broadcast false coordinates, so if her parents checked in on her, it would tell them she was on her way to the original destination.

  As soon as she got off the light rail in the mostly deserted University District, she was given an updated set of directions. She passed the various establishments set up to cater to the academics and archivists still employed with the University of Washington system. Most of the buildings had been converted from larger establishments as recently as fifty years past, when the University was still hosting students, whether because people had opted out of chipping due to health quirks, or further assessments were necessary at a higher level to match the most complex chips to candidates.

  With leaps in data storage, and increased ability to update chips, the purposes of the Universities had shifted. Now, the quiet grounds were for people like Dr. Kimura, who were advanced enough in a subject, or in multidisciplinary studies to not simply take their chip and do a job perfectly, but to innovate in their fields. Miko's father ran the second largest pre-Decimation archives on the West coast and published regularly in scholarly journals on topics of life in the 20th and 21st centuries. Plenty of people with the right chip could tell you about the history of car manufacturing in the United States. It took geniuses like Kenichi Kimura to restore 114 year old cars found buried in pre-quake ruins. Mina wasn't quite sure if Dr. Kimura's being able to sing all the top hits of 1983 was quite as useful, but she definitely appreciated Miko having Vlad.

  As she passed several open spaces, Mina could imagine them filled with people her age. Now, everything was tailored to people like Dr. Kimura; locations had names that were references to things that flew over Mina's head. All of the buildings of the
University itself were similarly tailored to their fields. Looking in windows as she walked revealed rooms structured very similarly to her school classrooms, but now full of books, machinery, historical artifacts, models of star systems or early humans, and various other things she couldn't identify. There were a few people about, but no one took much notice of her.

  Mina continued to follow directions which updated themselves every time she thought she might be nearing her destination, before finally heading into one of the buildings near the center of the university. The chipped instructions led to an elevator. Once within, there were a few moments of confusion before Mina rolled with going through rote actions, guided by her chip. She opened the emergency panel, disengaged two wires which were mounted loosely, then touched the tips together. The elevator hummed into motion. The lights showed her going into the basement. Motion continued well past that point, with the elevator doors finally opening some distance beneath the ground. Her instructions updated, leading her down a hallway. Rounding a corner, she almost ran into the Director.

  “Miss Cortez,” Director Richter said without prelude. “This is Seattle's central chip programming center. There are only four like it in the United States. Aside from your own, and that of a few of the nation's highest officials, the people who work here have some of the highest security clearances available. This is where your own chip was developed. This is also where Scott Szach worked before his disappearance.”

  Chapter Nine

  The statement took Mina aback. Common sense and her chip quickly informed her that it was highly irregular to put an agent on a case involving someone they were close to. Much as Scott had been on her mind, she hadn't remotely made a connection, partly because this was against proper procedure, partly because she simply hadn't considered that this was the sort of thing the AIA would handle. Of course, now that she was here, it made sense that they would, but not that she'd be called in on it.