by Fox J Wilde
“...no,” she replied, hating the entire world.
“Lena?”
“Yes?”
“Start thinking, ok?”
“Alright.”
After Lena agreed with him, he tapped the top of his wrist as if checking to make sure a non-existent watch was still running. This had become a signal between the two that she had become quite aware of during her training. The signal vaguely meant, ‘This is an important thing you need to focus on’, or more generally, ‘spy stuff is currently afoot’.
“Now, let’s talk about what you’re wearing.”
“What’s wrong with what I’m wearing?” Lena asked, feeling insulted.
“Again, we’re not here to draw attention. I can see the top of your tits. And if I’ve noticed, everyone else has too. We are out on a date at a cafe, and you look like you want attention. Men will try to listen in to figure out lies to tell you after I have left.”
“Men don’t do things like that.”
“You’re not a man. Your opinion on us doesn’t count.”
“Well, you’re not a woman,” she replied indignantly.
“I’m your training officer. Your opinion on women doesn’t matter either.”
“Do any of my opinions matter?”
“Well…” he thought about this for a moment, before brushing a few fingers through his hair and smiling in an exaggerated fashion, “How do you like my hair?”
“It’s terrible,” Lena said, irritated.
“Well then,” he rolled his eyes, “your opinion doesn’t matter on that either, then. Dress so you won’t draw attention.”
The conversation continued in a more light-hearted fashion. This young Stasi officer wasn’t the meanest person she had ever met by a long shot. He was handsome, funny, and intelligent. Yet he had an air of boredom about him that most of the officers she met had, as if training her in the arcane realm of tailing and spying was more of an annoyance than a purpose-filled project. Honestly though, that’s probably exactly what this all was to them—an annoyance.
Still, the young officer seemed to enjoy their conversations somewhat. He bought her dinner and coffee, and would complement her music or hair. He called her nice things often, and seemed rather amiable about it; and even though they were ‘dating’, he would only kiss her on the cheek for appearances. Other than that, he was more like an annoying older brother that was much smarter than her, and knew it.
“Well, it looks like our time is just about up,” he said, as he fumbled for his keys. “I have another mission for you, and then you will be meeting with your Grandfather.”
Lena’s heart skipped; she had only seen him once after she was released from prison. She had honestly wondered if she was ever to see him again. The world had grown three sizes since she began her training with the Stasi, and it looked to be growing larger by the minute.
“What is it?” she asked eagerly.
“I want you to take this,” he said, handing her a small, nondescript black pen.
She fumbled it around in her fingers for a second before clicking the end of it.
“Don’t do that too much,” he chastised her. “It’s a camera. Each time you click the end, you take a picture through the nib, but first you need to twist the end to expose the lens”
“Alright,” Lena said, impressed.
“Do not…I repeat, do NOT try to write with it,” he spoke with an authoritative tone, “There’s only a small amount of ink inside the nib itself. The CIA and MI6 know about this model now. That’s why we don’t use it anymore. Don’t break it, either! There were only ten of these ever made, as they have to be made by hand, and they are really expensive. Obviously, do not let someone else use it, and for the love of God don’t lose it! That got a KGB agent killed—by the KGB, which happens an awful lot, by the way.” With a wry grin, he added, “Just…be natural.”
“What should I take pictures of?”
“That’s up to you. It takes 150 pictures, but I only want a few. Impress me, Lena! If you get it right and impress me, then I’ll give Grandfather my stamp of approval.”
With that, they both stood up, gathering their coats for the cold walk home. Her ‘date’ put his hands warmly over her arms and kissed her sweetly on the cheek. The kiss felt real, but she could tell that there was no pressure under his hands when he touched her. Strangely, she felt a little disappointment at the fakeness of the embrace.
“Until we meet again, my love,” he said genuinely enough, and clasped her hand warmly in his. It was a sort of romantic handshake, with both of the palms of their right hands touching, and his left hand placed over the back of her right. He looked longingly into her eyes, as if to convey how very much he wanted to meet with her again as soon as possible.
Strangely—perhaps pleasantly strange—he held the look, and began stroking the back of her hand. Suddenly, Lena realized that she was nearly beginning to enjoy this. He was handsome after all, and that stroking of her hand was stimulating in a sort of way. “Is this wrong?” she thought to herself, and she considered it for a moment. Her and a Stasi officer…that would be too much! No, best to avoid letting this evolve into something she would regret. Yet as the moment continued on, perhaps a little too long, his romantic gaze shifted slightly, and the rubbing on the back of her hand became rougher. Almost irritating.
“Take the piece of paper, dammit,” he whispered under his breath. Finally, Lena noticed the piece of paper he was trying to discreetly pass along, and that she wasn’t paying close enough attention to recognize it pressing against her palm.
“Oh!” she muttered under her breath as she took it as sneakily as possible.
“Dumbass,” he muttered under his breath playfully as he turned to walk away.
Trying her hardest to look natural, she gathered herself and walked out of the small café. She walked slowly through the door, and then paced around the corner. Once she was sure she could do so unburdened by the prospect of prying eyes, she glanced down at the piece of paper. It was folded in half, so she unfolded it as casually as she could. On it, the words, “Metropol Interhostel—9pm—tomorrow—Dress fancy!” were written. Suddenly, Lena had a bit of an idea what her new super-secret spy-pen would be used for. Excited and pensive all the same, she walked towards the exit to leave.
Lena was already tired as she started out of the cafe. It had been a long day, and she knew tomorrow would be as well. Her life since leaving the prison had become quite active—her Grandfather had seen to that. After being allowed a few blessed nights of sleep back in her own bed, her new job as the lead singer of Nicht Zustimmen had begun. Typically, when starting a new band, a lone musician pools his or her resources and tries to get the word out to all the known musicians for interest. Then auditions start and if it’s a good fit, viola! …you have a band.
However, this new band had already been waiting for her after the three days of rest. She had a guitarist, a keyboardist (a keyboardist! Of all things!), a drummer and…no bassist (Grandfather had stressed that the keyboardist would be enough). All of them looked perfect, and all were perfectly willing to play the parts given to them. And the parts were given to them—by Lena, apparently. By the time Lena met her new band-mates, several songs had already been written, lyrics to boot, with all the parts fleshed out, which made for easy learning. They had been practicing twice a week for a while now, and, in spite of the fact that the practice sessions were mostly spent arguing (as bands do), trading gross and terrible stories, and chain-smoking cigarettes, Lena thought they actually sounded pretty good. The road ahead was also clearly paved with booked gigs, so there was nearly no work involved. At least as far as music was concerned.
The music itself was masterfully written. The inclusion of a keyboard had added a dynamic that wasn’t all too common in punk music—even in East German punk, which was well known for having a plethora of influ
ences. The only band that even remotely compared was perhaps Feeling B, but this was something else entirely. While Feeling B’s music was weird and extremely fast, Lena’s band bordered on simply angry dance music. Her Grandfather felt that this would play well in the West “with all the New Wave, British, hippy nonsense flooding the streets like diarrhea.” Lena had to admit that she was pretty excited to see how audiences would respond.
On top of having a completely new sound (again, thanks to the keyboards) the quality of the sound overall had been vastly improved. Grandfather had seen to that with state-of-the-art amplifiers, guitars, and other equipment that had probably come from the West. These had been provided courtesy of the band’s brand-new label, Little John. Bearing the name derived from the main cohort of the legendary Robin Hood, Little John was one of the first independent labels in Eastern Germany—very, very underground and secretive in its doings and dealings. It dwelt within the back rooms of Nadja’s Sehr Sauber; a nondescript dry-cleaning facility on yet another corner of Berlin that seemed to escape any attention from the Secret Police. As if by sheer serendipity, the label had managed to not only acquire printing and distribution equipment, as well as an entire recording studio that was reasonably modern, but had avoided any and all detection to speak of. It was as if the Stasi had turned a blind eye to it completely.
Lena knew different, of course; Little John was not independent at all. It was a licensed subsidiary of Amiga, the State’s one and only entity for artists, both musical and otherwise. Amiga had gone to great lengths to ensure that Little John maintained the appearance of a haven for miscreant youth. Yet every crack and crevasse inside the building was bugged. None of her band-mates, nor any of the other bands on the label were wise to that, of course.
Surprisingly, there were many benefits to this. Grandfather had informed her that the bugs only existed to garner ‘talking points.’ In other words, spying on the bands to find out what they were interested in, so that they could be more easily controlled by the producers, managers, and agents—all Stasi plants of course. This helped to encourage band members to crash at Little John, on the many comfy couches that seemed to proliferate any time there was a need.
While Lena’s band-mates practically lived in the studios—having their ‘secret’ discussions about things the Stasi and Politburo ‘didn’t’ hear—they were also provided two very important things that even a lot of regular bands didn’t get. Firstly, a license from the State to perform music (previously unheard of in the GDR for punk bands), and secondly, the all-holy provisional Passport which allowed them to play on the other side of the Wall. Her band-mates didn’t ask too many questions about how she had been able to procure such powerful items. It was becoming more common for punk victims of Stasi internment to be granted these things once the black cells helped them to ‘see the light’.
While her fledgling band still had yet to play a big, well-promoted show, she had been assured by Grandfather that, once her training was at a certain point, she would be sent over the Wall.
“You have to understand that it’s very different for you,” he had said to her. “Most punks get locked up for a time, then get sent on their merry way to inform for the Stasi while being rewarded with trips across the Wall to play. You don’t work for the Stasi; you are just being trained by them. Your job isn’t to rat on your friends. It’s to do intelligence work for the State. My reward to you for working for me is the instant success your band will achieve. But you having a band and your trips across the Wall aren’t part of that reward—that’s part of your work. So, you won’t go anywhere until you have your training down.”
For this reason and more, Lena had worked her rear off to become as skilled at surveillance, trailing, eavesdropping, informing and general spying as best as she possibly could. But she also had her band to tend to, and after a few months of practicing without doing one notable show, they were starting to get restless. Sure, they had played a few underground bangers outside the city limits that were attended by twenty or so faithful punkers, but that was about it. This served only to stoke the fire and she knew that she would have to routinely meet with her band to encourage them on the path to righteousness. Thankfully, this was something that the regularly-provided Stasi transcripts of the bugged conversations in Little John helped with immensely.
This is precisely what she was up to tonight after her meeting with Patrick, her young Stasi agent. So, after a few blocks of walking, and a few perfunctory checks to make sure she wasn’t being followed (not like it really mattered), she snuck in to the ramshackle little dry-cleaners and headed towards the back rooms. Excited to switch gears and let her hair down a bit, she clicked her new assassin-pen a few times, then reminded herself to stop doing that.
“Look who the hell it is?” Jakob shouted, as Lena walked into the back rooms of the recording studio, “It’s the boss bitch herself! Where the hell you been? We been waiting here for fucking ages!”
Jakob, her guitarist, stood roughly six feet tall. He had shaved his head almost entirely, leaving a singular strip on the top for a hairline-mohawk. He was more often than not shirtless, displaying filthy-sick (and sickly-acquired) tattoos from his collarbones down, and he swore worse than any person Lena had ever met. He even swore worse than the punks from Leipzig—the scene he hailed from. Despite his punk appearance and crusty demeanor, however, once he stepped out into the streets his relatively conservative outerwear and hat disguised him completely.
“Yeah, and we’ve run out of alcohol!” a lovely, young, and darkly-dressed woman complained.
Vivika, the keyboardist, would have otherwise been a sterling beauty if she wasn’t covered in facial piercings (as well as a few others Lena didn’t have to guess about) and thick noir makeup. She chose to wear a hodge-podge of hand-made and hand-spiked leather, head to foot, looking reminiscent of a porn actress in a Western fetish film. She swore almost as bad as Jakob, but once her boyfriend’s massive overcoat went on for her return home—and a few select piercings disappeared—she was the very picture of decency. Her ‘boyfriend’ never seemed to appear, however, as she claimed her girlfriend wouldn’t like that very much.
“No,” a very strange-looking person twirling a drumstick said, “Jakob has run us out of alcohol! Vivika and I didn’t drink any of it.”
Vortecx was the drummer who also hailed from the Leipzig punk scene, and he was a strange one, indeed. A huge fan of British and American noise rock, and an avid student of the SCUM Manifesto smuggled in from the West, Vortecx had taken to adopting a take on…err, gender…that Lena couldn’t quite figure out. He looked more-or-less like the man he was, but dressed and groomed in a fashion that made it quite difficult to tell otherwise—not that it really mattered, as a low hat concealed most of the finer points when Vortecx walked out into the night. He claimed to not care about discovery much, but his actions proved otherwise. He wasn’t stupid; he was just a little queer.
“Well what the fuck was I supposed to do?” Jakob spat at him.
“Sit calmly and try not to annoy everyone with…this,” Vivika pointed her hand at Jakob and made a circular motion, implying the entirety of the shirtless man.
“I know, I know,” Lena began, “We’re all restless. But Jakob, if you just drank a little less, then…”
“The fuck are you talkin’ to? What the hell am I supposed to do, if not drink?!”
“Oh, can it, ass-wipe!” she shouted back, “We’ve been trying to record an album for a month now, and the only reason we’re still doing it is because you can’t get your parts down!”
“Why you pointing your fuckin’ finger at me? You don’t even know your own damn lyrics!” “I’m sorry that I can’t always be here to babysit you, idiot,” Lena retorted, “but if you weren’t so busy trying to get Vivika to sit on your lap, maybe some shit would get done around here!”
“Aw, fuck you!” he replied, avoiding Vivika’s gaze which was e
ven more irritated than normal.
“And put your pants back on, you idiot!” Vivika joined in as Jakob’s pants sagged lower and lower by the minute, exposing his bright pink underwear (what could be called underwear, anyway), “Holy hell, Jakob, you look like an anorexic snowman wearing a banana hammock!”
“Hey now, all the fuckin’ girls want a piece o’ this!” With that, Jakob grabbed his crotch through that godawful pink thong he wore—for no good reason whatsoever—and began shaking his manhood, much to the chagrin of the room. All in all, he really was too proud of it.
“Jakob, I swear…!” Vortecx yelled, swatted him hard in his groin with a rolled-up newspaper, causing Jakob to fall dramatically to the floor while clutching his beloved man-parts.
“Fuck you, you strange fucking shit!” Jakob shrieked. “Fuck your weird hair, fuck your weird clothing, fuck your...”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. There’s more where that came from if you don’t pull your pants back up.”
“Alright, alright! Fuck! The hell is your problem, you confused, scary idiot?”
“Hey Jakob,” Lena interrupted, lifting the pack of beer to full visibility, “guess what I brought for after your clothes are back on?”
“Beer!” the three others shouted at the same time.
As the three of them dug into her small cache of bubbly goodness, she had to smile to herself. Oh sure, these goons were insufferable idiots, but they were her insufferable idiots. For all the problems they caused her, they were still her children and she loved them all the same—even Jakob. And yet, as the three of them began fighting again, she had to marvel at how perfect they all were. They were almost too-perfect caricatures of themselves. They were exactly the image that Grandfather felt the West would take to.