Cassandra Kresnov 5: Operation Shield (28 page)

“Callay's pretty. But I'm back now, and I'd like to join the CSA.”

Just like that. Rather than sitting at home and playing piano, or wandering the tourist circuit—also on Anita and Pushpa's money. Disassociated, disconnected, disinterested, no one had yet figured Poole out. He just didn't seem to care that much.

Sandy looked at Ari. Ari scratched his jaw. “Any particular reason?” he asked.

Poole made a face, looking down at Amirah. “Oh, you know. Something to do.”

“If that's your answer to psych questions,” said Sandy, “you'll fail.”

Poole smiled. “Well, I'll just have to come up with something better, yeah?” This time Ari looked at Sandy. Sandy rolled her eyes. Poole looked at Danya and Sunita. “One of yours, Rhi?” Rhian nodded. “Can I hold her?”

“Of course.”

Danya got up to transfer the sleeping infant very carefully. Sunita looked so much smaller in Poole's arms than in Rhian's or Danya's. The little girl snuggled and slept on.

“Hello, there,” Poole murmured. “Hello, little thing. So when do you go and pay the unofficial League embassy a visit?”

“No idea what you mean,” said Sandy.

“Sure you don't. Can I come?”

“Can you come where?”

Poole looked at her for a long moment. Sandy gave nothing away. She was the only one qualified to discuss or deny what he was asking. Poole sighed. “Join the CSA?” he suggested.

Sandy nodded. “I can tell you all kinds of things once you join.”

“I'll want to fast-track it to the FSA. Like Amirah.”

A smile escaped Sandy's control, but she shut it down fast. “Sure. Just make sure you pass CSA prelim psych tests first.”

“Piece of cake.”

“Why FSA Poole?” asked Danya. “Why not just CSA?”

“Kids interest me,” said Poole, looking down at little Sunita in his arms. “Music interests me. Turns out nature and wildlife interest me too, within reason. And killing people from the League interests me considerably. That's
mostly a Feddie job.” Sunita stirred again. “And you, little bumpkin,” he told her, “aren't gonna know nothing about it.”

Professor Gao Dan did not expect to find Sandy waiting in her office. She did a fast double-take and recovered herself commendably well.

“Commander Kresnov! I don't believe we've met in person. I wasn't told you were coming.”

“There's a reason for that,” said Sandy, sitting in the chair beside the professor's desk. The desk sat before a wide window overlooking the grassy grounds of Rao University, one of Tanusha's five most prestigious. Professor Dan was head of League Studies in the InterSystem Relations Department, and had been for three years since she'd arrived from the League. “Please, take a seat.”

“Actually I'm expecting a guest. I've a meeting here with the Ambassador to Jade, and…”

“That meeting will not be taking place,” Sandy said calmly. “I'm here instead.”

“Oh,” said Dan. Evidently doing fast calculations in her head. She'd had ambassadorial postings herself, back in League, and the procedures were not so different in the Federation. “Well, in that case, can I offer you some refreshment?”

“No, thank you. Please, a seat.”

Dan put her briefcase on her desk and sat. A plain woman, dark suit, straight hair, no makeup. Every inch the unremarkable professor of what had once been known as International Relations, until interstellar travel had made planetary systems, not nations, the primary decisive actor on the stage of human affairs.

Sandy had selected dark pants, boots, and a black leather jacket. Suits did not really work on her, but she'd wanted something that said “authority.” Black leather somehow worked where shoulder pads did not. For such a formal effect, her still-too-short hair now played the part, neatly combed, a striking blonde contrast to the black.

“Professor Dan,” she said, “we have a situation. Your friends in the League's Internal Security Organisation have gone and done something completely unacceptable, launching two attacks within this city, causing the deaths of nine CSA personnel and one Callayan citizen.”

“Well,” said Dan, taking a breath to prepare herself for argument, “if you would present me with the evidence of your accusation, I could take it to the relevant officials and see if I can get a formal response for you…”

“We have League GIs in custody,” Sandy interrupted. “Captured alive. I wasn't making an accusation, I was stating a fact.”

Dan shifted uncomfortably. “If that is your position.”

“Now, it was an act quite similar to this one that led to the League Embassy being shut down on this world,” Sandy continued, “and the League losing all official use of diplomatic privileges and contacts with the Federation capital. Federal Security and our elected masters in the Grand Council find it quite disconcerting that this behaviour should continue, despite the Federation's previously clear assertion that we would not tolerate any more acts of this kind.”

“I understand your position,” said Dan.

“Well, I wonder if you really do.” Sandy shifted forward to the edge of her seat, forearms on knees. “You see, Federal Security's position on these matters has become quite tough, as has the CSA's. Callay keeps getting attacked, you see, and just demanding that it stop does not appear to work. So lately, you may be aware, we've been arranging for some of the perpetrators of these attacks to…well, to disappear.” She kept her gaze quite calm and level. “Not just the actual agents, but the organisers behind them. People who wear comfortable suits and work in nice offices.”

She looked around at the Professor's office. Dan was sweating, eyes darting. There was a reason Sandy had been sent to perform this task. She did not particularly enjoy it; she had no quarrel with the professor personally. But then, conflicts between planetary systems, as Dan taught well to her students every day, had little to do with personal feelings.

“I've been aware of several reports, yes,” Dan admitted. “Commander Kresnov, please be assured that I have absolutely no contact with the ISO on operational matters, or on most other matters. It's not like I'm running a…a fully-fledged embassy here…”

“Oh, I know that,” Sandy cut her off. “But like I said, I'm not sure that you do understand our position. Our position is that the ISO are clearly not deterred by our previous threats. Now, there are several broad strands of thought as to how to deal with this, in the FSA. Some say that we should retaliate directly against known League operatives here in Tanusha. People
like yourself.” Dan swallowed. “We know you had nothing to do with it personally, but the ISO organisers themselves are quite proficient at remaining unseen, especially in light of our new measures, and the people who actually organised
these
attacks are doubtless many light-years away in the League. We can hope that by retaliating against people like you, that it may at least upset League government enough that they crack down on the ISO themselves; after all they were quite upset with the ISO last time too, most of them hadn't expected to lose their embassy here so suddenly to ISO activities they hadn't directly authorised.

“But then others make the case that action against just
any
League operatives would be pointless, partly because we here in the Federation pride ourselves on killing the
right
people, not just any people, and partly because after the retaliatory expulsion of
our
embassy in the League, we too have been relying upon unofficial Federation figures in the League to act as our unofficial embassy staff, to maintain contacts between Federation and League. Anything we do to you would just be done in turn to our people in the League, and that would be criminal negligence on our part toward our own people.”

Dan nodded nervously. “Not an unreasonable assumption, I'm sad to say.”

“So here's what I've been sent to tell you today,” said Sandy. “Firstly, be aware that all our local security apparatus are now extremely suspicious. Of course you're aware that we constantly track who you and your colleagues are meeting with. Best that you scale back the scope and sensitivity of your meetings. You're all on very thin ice, and if we suspect even the hint of threat in planning or purpose, we may act suddenly and unexpectedly against any of you. As a new mother myself, I can personally guarantee the safety of your families—should any of our people touch your families, I'll deal with them myself. Our people know that, and they're not that dumb. But everyone else is now on warning. Am I understood?”

Professor Dan nodded shortly. “Very well understood.”

“Secondly, please convey this circumstance, and our displeasure with it, to your League masters. Tell them to rein in the ISO before they upset our politicians so much that someone decides to restart the war. Those are the words of Director Ibrahim of the FSA, not mine.”

Another nod. “I'll tell them.”

“And thirdly, please convey to everyone that these aggressive League
actions shall not go unanswered. We in the security agencies are not in the business of table thumping and accusing others of risking wars by their actions—that's what politicians are for. We understand the difference between a covert action and an act of war. But because we understand that difference, we can promise that the League will now be answered in kind. You attacked us twice, and so you have two attacks coming to you.”

Professor Dan blinked at her. “Attacks?”

Sandy nodded. “Two attacks. They will be planned at the highest level and will strike somewhere in League space that you least expect. Be reminded that we have assets now that we did not have just a few years ago. We will strike security-related targets only, which is better than you've done in killing an innocent lawyer just now. And we expect that you shall repay us the same courtesy once we're done of not declaring these attacks to be acts of war, as we've restrained ourselves with you. Should there be more attacks on our territory and our people in the meantime, our replies shall increase accordingly.”

“I see,” said the Professor. “When should I say these attacks are due?”

“Any time,” said Sandy. “Also, please inform your masters that we are currently debating whether or not political figures should be considered a part of League security infrastructure.”

Professor Dan shook her head. “I'm sorry, are you saying that you're considering assassinating League politicians?”

“No,” said Sandy. “The political establishment is large. Security targets are not necessarily elected, in fact, the most significant ones usually are not. Will you tell them?”

Ibrahim took off his shoes and walked barefoot in the sand. His job took him to strange places, and beautiful places, but rarely places as beautiful as this. He stood on a long, curling beach, white sands receding down to the cool water, where aqua blue turned to deep ocean green. Above the beach, the land was thick with palms and other trees. The bay ended just nearby at a headland, a rocky outcrop upon which nested various birds and batwings. Beyond the headland, another long beach. And it was all nearly deserted, save for the recent descent of a hypersonic VTOL onto a small clearing in the trees behind the headland.

His entourage this trip was small—two pilots, Ambassador Ballan and one trusted member of his staff, Agent Ruben, and Commander Rice. And her husband Phillippe. Curious choice that was. The two pilots were both GIs, highly trusted and valued members of the Federal Security Agency for several years now. The indigenous synthetics had to be represented by someone, and of their two seniors, Captain Chu was too busy, and Commander Kresnov had been given the choice and had declined to come.

“Better not tell the rest of the galaxy about the Callayan relocation program,” Agent Ruben suggested, sunglasses on, looking around. “They'll all sign up.”

Ibrahim smiled. Ruben looked as out of place as he did, in his city suit, shoes in hand. Only Ibrahim was perhaps a little more comfortable shoeless, and the sand reminded him of hot pavings at the mosque. That same sensation of needing to hurry, yet that given the surroundings, one should take one's time.

“I do hope they like it,” he admitted. “You have no idea the difficulties obtaining environmental clearance for a secret facility.”

“Right,” said Ruben, frowning. “How do those pointy-headed little bureaucrats approve environmental clearance for something they're not allowed to see or know the purpose of?”

“I'm afraid that shall have to remain a great mystery.”

“You didn't get a clearance did you? You just built it.” Ibrahim only
smiled. “We've got to be a hundred kilometers from the nearest settlement. Who's gonna know?”

“Someone, eventually,” said Ibrahim. “It's only temporary, to buy us some time. And there's the question of orbital surveillance and lone adventurers touring these islands. If it buys us six months we'll be happy.” Though of course, orbital surveillance could be altered, if one were the FSA. And lone adventurers spotted in advance and diverted.

Commander Rice's presence was not entirely formal, though it was certainly of use to have the FSA combat arm represented. More than that, she was here on doctor's orders and had been told to stay on a few days and relax. But Vanessa Rice being Vanessa Rice, she was already in her swimsuit and now swam out upon the reef in the mid-shallows with snorkel and fins. Her husband was with her, a necessity if she were to be gone for more than twelve hours, and now swam with her, duck-diving for a closer look at the reef below. He'd been involved in the major security incident four months ago that had led to the closure of the League Embassy and had acquired a security clearance by necessity from that incident plus his relationship to Commander Rice. The psychs said he was little risk so long as he and she were together. Hopefully the relationship would last.

“So how is Chandi?” he asked Ruben. He'd been working on the flight down and hadn't really had time to talk to his old friend. He'd recruited Ruben a little over ten years ago now, when Ruben was a young kid making trouble and getting rich in the Tanushan underground. Such young kids needed choices, Ibrahim had been certain, and were far from lost to notions of civic virtue. With guidance, they could become civic assets. It was a policy he'd continued until his final day as CSA Director—one that his successor was now, word had it, contemplating to change.

“You know, he's handling the pressures very well,” said Ruben in that familiar, offhanded drawl of his. “I mean, for a while there it was looking like he was losing control of the left side here, just above the ear?” He gestured to that part of his hair. “But then he attacked it aggressively with conditioner and some truly impressive comb work, and it's settled down nicely since.”

Ibrahim smiled broadly. There were those who'd never warmed to Ruben's humour, often he tugged the prophet's beard quite hard. But Ibrahim had always enjoyed it, even when, second-hand, he'd heard it aimed at himself.
“And is there a symmetry between Chandi's hairstyles and his management techniques?”

Ruben sighed. “I wish. Maybe I'm just biased. It was better with you.”

“I hear he makes fast decisions.”

“
Oh
, yeah,” Ruben agreed drily. “He's an administrative chainsaw. Doesn't like too much deliberation.”

“He was quite recently a field agent. An excellent one. He was always outspoken against too much delay and deliberation.”

“A man of action.”

Ibrahim nodded. “Quite so.”

“It's not causing too much trouble now,” said Ruben. “But it will. It's probability theory again, you flip a coin a hundred times, the odds say most likely you'll get a pretty even spread of heads and tails, within 55-45. Anything more than sixty-forty is statistically unlikely. But a guy like Chandi comes in with fixed opinions and won't deliberate, and he's tough and he won't let go once he's latched onto something. A man of action won't just wait for feedback from his policies, he'll double down every chance.”

“He'll flip a head every time,” Ibrahim surmised.

“Exactly. And so you get a probability spread like 80-20, or 90-10, and the balance is gone. And that's how institutions get themselves into trouble.”

“On some matters, firmness works,” Ibrahim disagreed. “What distinguishes human institutions from random nature is that we
make
things happen. A doctor in a hospital does not leave patient survival to random chance, he stacks the odds. That's the thing that has freed human civilisation from the tyranny of natural randomness.”

“Sure, when the question is ‘would you rather granny lived or died?’ that's easy,” Ruben replied. “But the stuff we deal with is never that simple.”

Ibrahim glanced at the younger man. “If you're unhappy in the CSA, I'm certain a place could be found for you in the FSA.”

Ruben sighed. “Well, that's…that's nice, seriously. But you know me, I'm a Tanushan, my skills are best where they are, and civil security just isn't the FSA's field.”

“Your work in Anjula was superb. Commendation worthy, if we were allowed to admit what you were doing.”

“And I was
so
glad to come home,” said Ruben. “No offence, but if you
want to recruit me to do more jobs like Anjula, I pass. Tanusha's my city, it's where I belong.”

“We'll see,” said Ibrahim, gazing across the cool green ocean. “We'll see just where the FSA's capabilities and interests expand. This current institutional overlap may have interesting consequences.”

Ruben looked suspicious. “You're planning something.”

“Not planning. Anticipating.”

“There's a difference?”

“Yes,” said Ibrahim. “I anticipate rain but cannot plan for it. Rain will do what it does.”

“Speaking of anticipating, sir, have you seen these crazy sociologist predictives Chandi's authorised?”

Ibrahim nodded. “I have.”

“Excuse my language, but this stuff is all fucked up.”

“I'm aware of your objections.”

Ruben gazed at him. “You read my reports? My CSA reports?”

“I still keep tabs on the organisation. On matters concerning.”

Ruben exhaled in relief. “Thank God! You don't like it either.”

“Not liking it, and finding it within one's authority to act against it, are two different things. My jurisdiction is the Federation; Callayan local matters are out of my hands.”

“You don't think some bright spark in Psych will start pushing to take the program Federal? Sir, this is some of the scariest stuff I've seen in all my time above ground. They've got it figured so they're convinced uplinks are causing dangerous sociological phenomena everywhere, and they're only looking for evidence that proves it because we're a security organisation, not an objective think tank, and results that aren't dangerous don't interest us. So surprise surprise, that's what they find—it's a structurally self-proving theory.”

“They may yet be proven right, there are turning out to be far greater sociological implications of all uplink technology than we had previously figured.”

“But they don't
know
! They're interpreting data without the tools to analyse what they're seeing, so
every
phenomena may be perceived as dangerous. And once you get into that mindset, every phenomena can become any excuse to crack down, to lock up, hell, maybe to knock off anyone who's acting
funny…because like Chandi always tells me, we're a security organisation, Ari, it's what we
do
.” With great sarcasm.

Ibrahim nodded slowly, thinking. It was nothing he hadn't thought himself at length. But there were alternatives to consider. To
deliberate
, that thing that Chandrasekar hated to do, though perhaps not quite as much as Ruben accused. And, the fact that he simply didn't have the influence within the CSA that he once had.

“I will consider options,” he said. “And observe outcomes.”

“You could declare this network psych profiling a Federal security risk and shut it down.”

“I could. But that would have consequences too, some of them possibly worse. All we can do is watch and be ready. But know that if you have vital information and find all other doors shut, mine will always be open.” He shifted his sunglasses down his long nose for a meaningful stare at Ruben. Quietly, he meant. Ruben nodded with evident relief.

“Yes. Good.” He ran hands through short, wavy hair. “Thank you, sir.” Only Ruben, Ibrahim mused, would express such relief at being asked to spy on his own organisation against a vital secret program. But then, Ruben had loyalty to principles, more even than institutions, places, or people. Ibrahim had nurtured Ruben as long as he had, and put up with all of his irregularities, because he felt that loyalty to principles, in this work, was the single most important thing there was.

If only he could tell Ruben what he one day hoped the younger man might become. But he knew that if Ruben saw a destiny being planned for him by others, he'd run from it as fast as he could.

The flyers arrived with little warning, two big military models, CSA registered. They roared overhead and circled, aiming back to the hypersonic jet in the clearing amidst the trees. Ibrahim and Ruben walked back, a slow trudge through soft white sand.

When they arrived, both flyers were down and the blowing sand already clearing, engines winding down and cargo doors open at the back. Ambassador Ballan, his aide, and the two GI-pilots were already waiting, as new arrivals walked from the flyers in old military jumpsuits or greens with the duffle bags and backpacks that were probably all they owned in the world. With weapons and other military equipment banned, they weren't left with much.

The first of them reached Ballan's group before Ibrahim and Ruben arrived. With any other arrivals, that breach of protocol might have alarmed Ibrahim, but with these he didn't think it mattered. And it gave him longer to look them over, as Ballan talked and the rest of the arrivals assembled behind. An equal mix of men and women, no great variation in stature, an equal racial spread and collage of skin colours. All apparently young and attractive, with athletic builds and erect postures. They might have been a team of athletes on their way to a sporting competition.

He arrived, and Ballan turned to introduce him. “Director Ibrahim, these are Kiet and Rishi. Kiet, Rishi, this is Director Shan Ibrahim of the Federal Security Agency. And Agent Ariel Ruben, an investigator with the Callayan Security Agency.”

They shook hands with both. Kiet was East Asian–featured, with a sour twist to his mouth. He'd shot himself, Ibrahim had read in Cassandra's report, after leading the failed assault to free the remaining corporate GIs on Droze. Rishi looked South Asian, attractive like all combat GIs, wide cheekbones, short hair. She was Chancelry, high designation but young, had led the revolt that freed the Chancelry GIs. Kiet was a lower but still high designation, and much older, a former League soldier abandoned by the League withdrawal that preceded the crash. That experience meant he ought to be the smarter, like Rhian Chu had become smart, “only” a 39 series but now surpassing most young mid-40s. But Cassandra mistrusted Kiet's judgement, with apparent good reason.

“You're Kresnov's friend,” said Rishi to Ruben. “You were in orbit; you came to help.”

Ruben nodded. “But actually, we're both Cassandra's friends.” With a nod at Ibrahim. “It's just that he's a
Director
, you see, of some big organisation whose name I forget, and he has to pretend to be impartial to everyone.”

Rishi looked a little puzzled but saw them both smiling, and began to smile herself. As though slowly working through the joke. Young GIs were like that.

“And where is Cassandra?” asked Kiet. He spoke as though he had a mouth full of cotton wool, but clear enough.

“She's busy,” said Ibrahim. “We thought that a personal greeting by the Director of the Federation's primary security agency, and by the President of the Grand Council's Intelligence Committee should be sufficient.”