“Nobody on Akitha could figure out the motivation for what Cancer was doing,” Kandara said thoughtfully. “We all thought some kind of political fanatic was employing her to sabotage their industrial systems, but this…aliens scouting around the human race…I hate to say it, but this makes a kind of sense.”
“Who the fuck are they,” Alik snarled, “and how long have they been watching us?”
“Ask the Olyix,” Loi said. “They’re clearly complicit. Maybe it’s them.”
I let out a wearisome breath. “Not this again,” I said in exasperation.
Callum gave me a sharp stare. “They lied to Yuri about Horatio Seymore. They knew he’d been snatched,” he said. “They were involved. What more do you need?”
Which was an interesting outburst. Someone—some group—had to be pushing both Ainsley and the grade-one Utopials into believing the Olyix were chasing a hidden agenda, fueling the insecurities and paranoia of the old and powerful who inevitably see change as danger. And the only people with a reason to do that are the other aliens, trying to deflect attention from themselves. Aliens with influential agents in both Utopial and Universal ruling political classes.
“There was something odd about that,” I agreed. “Maybe they employ corporate intelligence gathering companies to keep a closer look on things than we realized. I don’t know. But face it, Ainsley Zangari’s exposed granddaughter calling him in a panic is going to be noticed by
“Yeah,” he agreed almost grudgingly. “That’s right.”
“So it’s not them,” I said.
“You seem very certain,” Kandara said.
I gave Yuri a quick glance. He nodded permission. It didn’t go unnoticed. “It goes like this,” I said. “Ainsley has been suspicious about the Olyix since before Horatio was snatched. He never quite believed their claim to be peaceful religious fanatics.”
“Now that has truly got to be the universe’s biggest oxymoron,” Alik mocked
“Whatever they are, they’re not actively hostile to humans,” I said.
“You can’t claim that,” Eldlund said. “There’s a lot of evidence piling up against them.”
“Circumstantial,” I replied. “Or maybe it’s disinformation. Look, after Horatio, Ainsley decided to find out what was really going on. So we’ve been mounting a discreet surveillance on the
“And?” Kandara prompted.
“They aren’t being entirely honest with us; they are keeping secrets about themselves. But there’s no conspiracy.”
“You can’t know that. Not for certain.”
“I do.”
“How?”
“Because five years back I took point on a covert mission that broke into the
FERITON KAYNE’S SPY MISSION
THE
I’d been living in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, for more than a year to physically inflate my cover story. Data-based legends are easy to install in solnet; these days you can basically be anyone you want to be, providing you have the money and expertise. Connexion Security had both in abundance. Even a G8Turing’s search would only turn up the cover history I’d been given. But if the Vatican or the Grand Ayatollah actually sent someone to Lancaster, they’d be able to verify what a great citizen I was and how my attendance at local Quaker meetings was top rate. Not that anyone in the office expected any cardinals or imams to physically turn up and run a deep check. But given where I was heading, office policy was to make that cover story as real as possible. So if some dark-ops agent did come checking in person, they’d swiftly get wearied talking to neighbors and colleagues and friends who would all tell them what a great (if moderately dull) guy I was, complete with the personal anecdotes I’d generated by actually living there.
Ainsley Zangari was very clear about getting the mission absolutely right. Funding for his Olyix Monitoring Office was already over three quarters of a billion wattdollars a year. A portion of that money was spent on G8Turings that scoured solnet for evidence of operatives like Cancer corroding and corrupting corporations and institutions, with emphasis on the defense sector. Deals like that were absurdly easy to set up anonymously through solnet. So whenever we did come across an op that had defense connotations, it was virtually impossible to backtrack.