Chapter Twenty-three
Tommy surprised Mandy and Lola when they sat down to have whatever was responsible for the aroma wafting out of an 'open front' bar. He left the table and walked over to two men at the bar.
"I'm not Shadill, but I like them. Shadill marriages aren't the only group marriages and people in group marriages aren't the only ones who don't like taking their wedding rings off when they work. Gen, many people get caught between embarrassment at being in the company of someone spouting bigotry and the socially accepted courtesy of sitting with a person who bought them a drink. It's a well-planned technique. Tender, I wish a complaint form. Your employers need to give their support to your obvious desire to tell this paid hate-monger to leave and not come back. He's disgusting, one of thousands and people are beginning to notice it's the highest budget advertising campaign in the sector. It's been going on about fifty years and the budget has gone up every year. It's a real growth industry and it's been making people very nervous because they can't figure out how the multi-billion credit investment is supposed to pay off. Then someone said the words 'divide and conquer.' You're finished. You all are. You may be too stupid to ask who you're working for. Most of us aren't."
"Leave, Captain Fomeerty. Don't come back on my shift. I have a customer complaint. I would like, but don't need, my employer's support to refuse someone service on my shift. Thank you. You just made sense of how five like him can afford to travel in nice accommodations often. They all pass through here on their way to and from cruise ships at least twice a year."
"You're welcome. The official word is the imperium doesn't think the empire is the actual target, but the fleet would respond to a call for help before the treaty was signed, if someone yelled they wanted to be part of it. It's believed people like him are supposed to cause a government somewhere in the sector to 'bow to public demand' and pass a law that infringes on rights guaranteed under Imperial Law, as stated in the sector treaty, most probably those of homosexuals. They're the main target of the hate campaign. The imperium would be forced to 'interfere'. Even those who thought the infringement was wrong would be angry. The fleet is always exactly the size needed to watch over every sector and it's always present in all of them. Reduce the number of sectors, reduce the size of the fleet, gobble up worlds while people on independent planets yell they want to be sectors again, and are reminded the fleet is never larger than required to protect the empire and it takes awhile to build ships and train crews."
"Divide and conquer. Who?"
"Good question, gen, and I'm sure good people are working on it, but none of this is 'military intelligence.' It's being passed as official word is spread the word. People are nervous and need to see the security people are on the job. The imperium wants us all to know why the fleet is going to stop being invisible. Time for a friendly wave hello and a bit more obvious quick look around in passing. The bigots don't know who's paying the bills. Big crime doesn't know who's providing some nice plans for expansion of the drug trade in several sectors. Finding out who obviously isn't considered of primary importance. The people are under threat. Defense first."
"Where did you hear this?"
"Heard most of it in a bar the last time the girls decided we were going shopping for a half-day. Heard some of it in the same here. Worked real hard figuring out what was official and what personal speculation. You got everything I'm sure is official. It was a lot more than I expected too. Three orders of whatever smells wonderful and three of what you consider your most tasty fruit juice."
Mandy sealed and checked a shopping bag at the shuttle dock. They didn't handle luggage. The merchants provided the service for shoppers. It was a rather full bag. It held the contents of six ship bags, two purchases and the recording Geery had tossed her when she 'stuck her head in the door' of the testing center. Lola was carrying one with six empty ship bags and one purchase. She'd check it when she'd found at least one more thing she wanted. The check was for large items or two or more purchases. Tommy had said. Shel had bought sealable shopping bags. Mandy saw him coming out of a fabric shop.
"Looking over retail prices?"
"Yes, and what they stock. Tommy was right. You can almost see the relief in the air."
"I've heard 'I knew there was something going on,' more than once. Opinion seems to be about fifty years is a bit long for the imperium to catch on, but telling people what it thinks is the reason is a step in the right direction."
"The empire is a very separate entity in their minds, but so is the planetary government. In Empire Sector, people would ask why the emperor hadn't done something sooner. Here they ask why the empire hasn't. I rather wish I could ask Tori and Barri if they think it's a problem."
"There are Tal and Li."
"Yes, and I'm tired of playing we're not together. Let's... I think that person is following them."
"So do I, but it doesn't make me nervous. I think we're looking at someone trying to figure out how to ask if she's the one he really wants to talk to."
"Since I don't feel like growling, I think I agree, but let's get a bit closer anyway."
The two just lengthened their strides a bit. They were close enough to hear when the young man asked if Li was the one who'd set the record. She thoroughly surprised them when she answered.
"Yes, but that's not what you want to talk about. The person you want to talk to is behind you."
"Tell Shelter why you're scared. He'll find a way to help. Come on, Mandy."
"Yes, Tal. See you later, Shelter."
"Let's walk. What's wrong?"
"I've been... spying for someone for two years. I think I've been working for the enemy."
"Probably, but you didn't know there was one, so you couldn't have known you were. Who did you think you were working for?"
"A world outside the empire. I wasn't gathering information on the government or the military, just people. How many and who came from outside the sector and what they were doing here. I thought someone was hunting real information instead of official counts, maybe to see if there was enough real trade going with the rest of the empire to make Silvern a good candidate for middleman. I made a lot of assumptions. My family needed the money. I work for a trade association. I tell people I gather information on where from and what traded. I just don't tell them how many files I open and how far I send what I find."
"Let's go back to your family needed money. I have a family too. I wouldn't have done what you did, but I understand the motivation. Why?"
"I was... We were both Shadill. It hurt both our families when we left, but they loved us and wanted us to be happy and that meant together. We couldn't find jobs that paid more than enough to stay out of subsidized housing, then I got a fairly good one and we moved to an apartment big enough for us and a baby. Our twin girls were four days old when I was informed the company was closing the office on Silvern in ten days, but they'd help look for jobs for four of us. They gave me three referrals. I wasn't what two were looking for at all, but the trade association wanted someone to do exactly what I had been doing and paid good. I took the job. It was a quarter-year before I was handed a bunch of file codes and told I'd get a raise if I did what was asked and be looking for a job that day if I didn't."
"Not a bad method of recruitment. Find some under-employed young people, run branch offices you want to lose enough credit that closing them seems reasonable in about a year, use them to train them, send them where you really want them, and just when they begin to feel secure, hit them with 'Do the real job or apply for subsidy, so your children don't starve, and pack to move out of the nice home you made for them.' You were who they wanted. The rest were just window dressing. Did you report my family?"
"No, you were... ordinary."
"And worked hard at it. Want to switch sides?"
"Not if it puts my family in more danger than just stopping working for the enemy. Now that I know I was."
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"Now that you know there is one. Connect Tommy."
"Yes?"
"Skillfully manipulated, good at finding who came from elsewhere for what, remorseful, worried about family when he walks off the job, but walking. More worry is unacceptable."
"He knows who you are. You have a 'lucky charm on the bridge and an angel in engineering.' You're going to sit in a very plush lounge and he's going to tell you all about the trade association he works for. He's paying. It's not his usual job, but he's the only one in the right place to make a pitch for his employer. If he didn't, it would be odd. He files routine and boring once and stops. He got a better job. His new employer knows why he left his old one and he doesn't know anything, but that he should have asked a lot more questions. They won't bother him or his family. I have an understanding employer to find. Out."
"So, what's the nicest place in the place where you can buy me a couple very nice ales? Need to call your wife and tell her you'll be late?"
"Uh... The Glass Wall and I already did. He didn't even ask my name."
"He doesn't need it, yet."
Tommy took a deep breath and walked into the station security office. He asked to see the highest person currently on the station, immediately. The young woman told him they'd borrow her boss's office to talk.
"I'm here. I say go where. That makes me as senior as we've got on station right now."
"Is this room secure?"
"Yes."
"Can you do a secure scramble and lock on comm?"
"Yes."
"I'm the emperor's spy. I've been a spy since I was two. I just didn't tell anyone until I was nine and had a lot of proof I needed to hand someone. I married into his family when I was eighteen. You're going to help me protect the family of the young man, who thought he was just collecting a bit more information about people than was quite legal. They had been working quite awhile to make sure he had no doubt saying no would hurt his family. He needs a job. He's good. He's sorry. He's always worked hard. He's telling everything he knows and it will come down to he should have asked more questions. The employer will know it and that's all he knows."
"Candor. It can't be anyone else. He's just plain nice. So's his wife. They have adorable twin girls."
"They're very, very good. They probably spent several years and a lot of credit on the recruitment. I'm who he's been watching for. He quit because he found out why, before he found out I'm here. He wanted to talk to someone, to confess. He didn't expect help."
"No, he wouldn't. One name, we all know what it means, divorced Shadill. The bigots were busy. It's twice something wrong with them. They were 'failures' as Shadill and we all know they make sure Shadill have all the advantages. They didn't want them because they were parasites on the rest of the marriage, or so promiscuous they couldn't keep a vow of fidelity."
"We have about an hour to find him a job that will support his family and he can be proud of."
"An hour. Comm connect Daddy. Scramble and lock on. Check."
"Scramble and lock. What's wrong?"
"We've got an hour to find a job for Candor. I have the emperor's personal spy in Shemir's office. I didn't ask for identification. He doesn't need it. Candor just found out who he worked for and stopped working, but he doesn't know anything but he should have asked more questions. The spy says an employer who knows that is the help protecting his family he didn't expect to get."
"Damn. Not up there. Doesn't he live in Waterside?"
"Let me check. Yes."
"I may have an idea. Let me look it over to see if I'm right. I doubt he wants to stay there while I do. I'm sure he'll tell you how to contact him. Out."
"Daddy is?"
"My daddy, mayor of Silverlight City."
"Fairy dust in the air. I'm sure of it. Let's see how close the ship is. Call the Nightband."
"Comm connect Nightband, Kirsy. Once I have it. I'm scrambling."
"Nightband."
"Silvern Docking Security. Scramble and lock."
"Scramble check. Lock established."
"Hello, Anverd. Contact the fleet. A few for a few hours R and R every place they get close enough. Wave hello as they go by those they don't. Visible presence starting immediately. We just cracked apart a nasty plan with a multi-billion budget by telling everything 'the empire' knows and adding what we learned today. They need to see 'the empire' is here."
"The empire?"
"Yes, very much. It's an entity that lives over there and collects money so nobles can have big parties, a piece of a fifty-year campaign of bigotry against homosexuals and the Shadill. In as little as five years, a planet could pass a law infringing on the rights of 'those people you don't want close to your kids.' The imperium would be 'interfering' and on the wrong side of protecting the children. We're getting everything the local spy knows, because he just found out he was working for the 'enemy' and hunted someone to tell he'd quit. Of course he picked one of us. Oh. Li broke the previous time record by about forty minutes. Shel got best ever score. We all finished more than six hours under. They gave Tal the wrong test. He's a captain. Out."