Chapter Three
“Do you have any idea why I asked for you?”
Andrew Espinoza looked across the desk at his new boss and grimaced at the question. First day on the job and already in front of the firing squad. It was a position he was familiar with, but uncomfortable being in. “No sir, I don’t know why you requested me,” he admitted. “I just assumed I was being rotated out, per the norm.”
“I need someone with brains in my outfit, agent,” Section Chief Zhu Gan said calmly, his eye staring intently into Andrew’s. “I hate mavericks – they usually end up having blown their cover within a week of their first assignment. I also hate braincases because they don’t have the common sense to know when they need to do something absolutely stupid to keep their cover. It takes a delicate balance to be a good intelligence officer, Espinoza. One that your last boss said you excelled at.”
“All I did was stay in cover while the DIB moved in, sir,” Andrew explained, thinking back. The chief snorted.
“You showed ingenuity while our agents brought down the entire cartel,” Gan brushed aside the modesty as he turned his datapad for the younger man to see. “You even kept your cover while sitting in a DIB prison and got more information from their top man. That’s one crime syndicate that’s never going to see the light of day again. You kept your cool, kept your wits and, most of all, kept your cover. That’s something that can’t be taught, and after I read this report, I requested you be transferred over to me.”
“Sir, I don’t quite know how to ask this...” Andrew trailed off. Seeing his boss nod, he continued. “I don’t even know what department this is.”
“This, my boy, is the Department That Does Not Exist.”
“Ah. I...see?”
Chief Gan laughed. “I get that a lot. Let me explain.”
“When the DIB was first formed, we were influenced by a lot of powerful people. The DIB, as you may or may not know, is forbidden by law to investigate anyone within the ranks of the nobility. It was part of the bargain Emperor David struck with the moneylenders. They financed his revolution, they received titles and rank. It worked out well for them, and for us, if you think about it.”
“But when we found evidence the Seiji clan was committing treason by selling military secrets to the Domai Republic, old Emperor Saul had to act. So he created Project Jericho. We don’t exist, aren’t on any known payrolls, and are officially off on fringe worlds gathering intel on whatever we deem fit. Mostly hunting for more alien tech from the jump gate builders or something. Think science missions for colonization and you get the point. Only that isn’t what we do at all. Really, we are working on Trono del Terra at the behest of the Emperor.”
“I always wondered how the Seiji were brought down,” Andrew said as he pursed his lips thoughtfully. “That’s how the Shaws grew into power, wasn’t it?”
“We had a hand in it.”
“I always thought the spaceship disappearing like that was a bit too convenient,” Andrew murmured, his eyes distant as his brain processed new information. “Of course, I always blamed it on the Shaws, since they stood to gain the most. Gaining peerage and what not.”
“Brains. I like brains,” Gan nodded. “I think you’ll do nicely here. I would have met you sooner, but transportation is stretched kind of thin right now, so I figured some time with your family would be a nice reward for a job well done. Especially after the loss of Agent Buckley. Such a tragic waste. He was a good man.”
“Yes he was,” Andrew nodded. “I know he wanted to go out while riding a stunning redhead, but I don’t think he envisioned being shot in the head by one during copulation. Though I think he might have laughed at the irony. Maybe.”
Gan shook his head. “I have a total of fifteen agents in my nonexistent department right now, and I desperately need more people. I believe you are a good enough agent to join us. Plus, I lost a man who was in deep cover recently. I have multiple openings, but only one person at this time who I think is good enough. So...”
“Murdered?” Andrew asked, his eyes wide. “Was your agent murdered?”
“What? Oh. No. Heart attack. He’d been under cover for almost seventy years. Old coot died in bed with his twenty-year-old wife. The poor, distraught woman.”
“Wow.”
“Kept his cover to his dying day, which meant he had to be a lecherous old man who had a taste for women young enough to be his granddaughter. Played it well, considering he was gay. Technically, we’re voluntary,” Gan continued. “I wouldn’t force anybody to do the job we do. In addition to being strictly voluntary, I’m very selective and picky. So, when Murray died, I got a list of potentials.”
“And I was on a list?”
“You could say that.”
“So, what am I going to do now?”
“Now? Depends on whether or not you take the assignment. If you do, you’re going to do your best to become a young man named Darius Hastings, tragically orphaned at a young age,” Gan stated, clucking his tongue as he leaned back in his chair. “Very tragic youth, by the way. Slightly chubbier than you, as well as darker skinned, so you’ll be using nanogel to change.
“If you don’t, then you walk out of this office and get shipped off to some distant planet with a new ID and we let you sit for months while you wait for another slot like this one to open. No expensive toys to play with, no unlimited amounts of nanogel to change your identity with, nothing exciting, nothing worth much except for some more paper pushing. Very boring, I’m afraid.”
Andrew whistled and considered his options. He really did not want to be exiled to the fringe systems, especially after having finally been offered a job where he could do something very important. Plus, he wasn’t certain his ego could take being sent out to the middle of nowhere a second time.
He thought about the toys and perks of being a deep cover operative. The latest technologies, support unlike anything he had ever dreamed of, and it would make his resume look amazing. And the toys, he considered. Nanogel was hideously expensive. It allowed someone to change their facial structure with nannites. It also changed the ectodermic layers of the skin to match whatever the wearer desired, allowing for fat deposits, skin tone alterations, and even changing hair follicles. It did nothing for DNA, however, and he wondered for a moment just how deep his cover would be.
“I’m in,” Andrew said after a moment of thought. “All those wonderful toys...”
“I also want you to study up on Parliament,” Gan continued. “I have a bunch of files for you to look over. Something tells me you’re going to be very busy for the next three weeks.”
“What happens after that?”
“After that, you get to infiltrate the most powerful nobility in the Dominion of Man.” Then he added as an afterthought. “And, hopefully, stay alive.”
* * *
“Again,” the woman demanded.
Andrew grimaced and recited the line, “Perhaps the chance encounter was meant to be.”
“No, damn it. You have to soften your ‘R’,” his instructor said as she leaned back in her chair. “If you have a hard ‘R’, you give up any pretense of being from the Apaloosa region. Think of it as a lisp, but like ‘ahr’ instead of ‘R’.”
Andrew rubbed his temple, frustrated. While looking like Darius Hastings, bastard son of minor nobility, was simple enough, sounding like him was proving to be a much more difficult task. He was beginning to understand why the DIB had always tasked him to the fringe planets.
While the overall language in the Dominion was standardized, the fringe planets had developed a harsher-sounding mixture of words to use when dealing with the Boers and other cultures. This, in turn, led to a minor split in the pronunciation of words, creating different phrases and accents. One of which was easily defeating Andrew.
“Remember this,” his instructor said as she pushed a datapad before him. “Your current accent, according to the analyzer we’ve written, says you’re from a small village on Corus named Hedged Bet. You do not sound like a minor noble, even a bastard one. No nobility would be caught dead in Hedged Bet. If we have this, what makes you think that anyone with half a brain won’t try to use something similar to test you. You need to outsmart them. You need to convince them. Most importantly, you need to convince yourself.”
“I know, I know,” Andrew mumbled. “I’m sorry.”
“Again.”
“Perhaps the chance encounter...”
* * *
“There’s a trick to thinking of yourself,” the man said as he paced the room. Andrew watched him with rapt attention. “You think of yourself as ‘Andrew’, correct?”
“Yeah.”
“Yes,” the trainer corrected. “But Andrew is dead. You are Darius.”
“I am Darius.”
“What would Darius think of this?”
Andrew paused, thinking. What would the bastard child of a minor noble think of everything he was doing?
“He’d think it was deceitful and dishonorable,” Andrew answered, his voice cautious, his new accent stronger, more pronounced. His body language changed. “A waste of money and time.”
“Good, good. What else?”
“He’d think he shouldn’t have to listen to someone of lower birth than he, especially not having to listen to you trying to teach him,” Andrew continued, warming to the topic. “He’d–”
“You mean, ‘I’,” the instructor reminded him.
“–I’d think this is wasting my time. I know who I am, and I don’t need some pathetic fringe-worlder telling me otherwise. I am the son of nobility, damn it. My family was key to the Dominion.”
“Perfect,” the trainer nodded. “That contempt for the weaker classes, that barely-veiled disgust, wrapped in a thin veneer of politeness? That is Darius Hastings. That is the bastard.”
Andrew nodded and tapped more into his datapad as the lecture continued.
* * *
“Walk like you’re floating!” the shrill tone of the elderly woman blasted his ears. Andrew hissed and tried to walk lighter. A sharp smack! to the back of his leg, the instructor’s riding crop gripped firmly in her claw-like hand. “This is not some schlop walking to get his dinner. Back straight, arms swing at a measured distance. You must carry yourself as though you haven’t worked laboriously on a farm. The worst injury you’ve ever received is a paper cut. Now act like it! I can tell you’re an off-worlder just by the way you walk. Float, damn it! Don’t march. Float!”
“I am floating!” Andrew snapped, his patience growing thin.
“Bullshit!” the old woman fired back. “If you were floating, I–” thwack! “–wouldn’t–” thwack! “-have to–” thwack! “–continue to–” thwack! “–correct you!”
Thwack! Thwack!
“Jesus Christ!” Andrew howled.
“You better pray, child, because if you can’t convince me, you’ll never convince someone born and bred into privilege. Now, float, or so help me I’ll start using the electric prodder!”
* * *
“Now, you’ve already been trained on how to do a bug-drop,” the petite woman said, smiling mischievously at him. “That’s kindergarten stuff. Anybody can bump into someone and make a drop. I’m going to show you how to build one using duct tape, wire, a battery and a processor chip. Welcome to Grad School, MacGuyver.”
“What?” Andrew asked, confused. The woman shook her head.
“Kids these days...”
“I’m older than you are,” he countered. “And I know tech already. Hell, I built a microprocessor in elementary.”
“Then explain to me why rerouting a security system when breaking into a noble’s house is a bad thing.”
“Uh, it’s not,” he told her, astounded. “You bypass the security system, nothing goes off when you’re inside. Piece of cake.”
“Except the history is still recorded, including when an external system bypasses the main router. It won’t trigger an alarm, but it will alert the authorities a bypass has been made when – not if – they look for it,” she told him. “Money breeds paranoia, and these people have both in spades. I bet their chief of security checks for something like this on an hourly basis. Now tell me, Mister Moneybags, how does Darius break into a house and plant the bug?”
“He...doesn’t,” Andrew paused for a moment before smiling. “He doesn’t need to. He just needs to get inside, and an invite is much more likely.”
“And easier,” the techie nodded. “The tough part is using what’s available on hand to build what you need. A microprocessor is easy to smuggle in, but why risk detection or suspicion by bringing in other items as well? Find what’s on hand, use it, and then leave when the party or meeting is over. Use your surroundings and adapt, not vice versa. Ingenuity is just the first step to having the proper mindset of a covert intelligence officer...”
* * *
“So, what’s it like?” Gan asked, three weeks later.
Andrew shrugged. “I feel as though I’m not me. I’m Darius Hastings. I know I’m Darius. Somewhere deep inside, though, is Andrew Espinoza.”
“Good,” Gan nodded. “What do you think of your assignment?”
“It’s...different,” Andrew said. “I’m nervous though.”
“What about?”
“What if someone more qualified than me applies for the job?” he asked. “I mean, my father took care of my mother after I was born, but when they both died...”
“He recognized you right before he died,” Gan smiled. “I’m glad you’re thinking like Darius, though. The interview process is a formality, really. The McCarroll’s have been looking at your family for a long time, ever since word got out last year the Hastings had but one bastard son remaining. No political clout, but still a valuable asset to have financially. It’s all about prestige to them.”
“So what happened to the real Darius?” Andrew asked, curious. Gan chuckled.
“Died as an infant,” Gan replied. “His mother, for tax purposes, kept saying he was alive. When she died we saw a potential opportunity and scrubbed the info. Nobody’s seen the boy since birth, so it’s hard to discount him. Hastings claimed him, possibly to help out the mother financially without pissing off his former wife, before he died last year. Plus, time changes everyone. Now you have a passing resemblance to the Hastings clan.”
“What about Dame Hastings?” Andrew wondered, his mind on the grand matriarch, the only surviving Hastings.
“Incapacitated. She’s not a political force, and since she’s but a minor noble, nobody’s worried about who the successor is – which is you, by the way. Better hope she doesn’t die before your mission is over.”
“I feel somewhat bad, misleading her so,” Andrew said, unconsciously slipping into the role of Darius. He rubbed his face with his hand, missing Gan’s subtle smile.
“She’d go along with it, if she were able,” Gan reassured him once more. “She was loyal to the Dominion first, which is more than I can say for the house you’re about to infiltrate.”
“I hope I can do this,” Andrew whispered to himself.
“As do I,” said Gan.
* * * * *