-14-
The Colonel in charge of the Ziggurat's primary operations center projected into in the Director's dim office. He was there to report good news.
“Before they shot it down, it captured some video. The feed from the Baccha Bay City parking enforcement drone was pretty bad, but we enhanced it.” The Colonel gestured to a still, eight-foot-square, two-dimensional image that hung in mid-air in front of them. He said, “The SunShade veil she's wearing blocks a lot, but in this image we compiled from multi-spectral sources, you can see her pretty clearly.” He pointed to a woman, seated in the passenger seat of a Z-class Lenz sedan. The cap, the SunShade, and the dark sunglasses she wore hid it surprisingly well, but at the left edge of the glasses there was a distinct, dark line leading away from her eye and into her hairline. It was the thin black strap that held an eye patch in place.
Delvaux recognized his Operator immediately, but said nothing.
The Colonel continued, “One of my lieutenants noted the same, unidentified woman, here.” The Colonel gestured with his own data-wand, and a second frame appeared, hanging in mid-air, next to the first, as he continued, “She appears in this image, captured from a Sherman Square tourist's mobile device, immediately following an unidentified man's... uh... explosive demise, and immediately preceding a bombing at the Winguard Hotel.”
Delvaux saw Bonnie in the image, carrying what appeared to be an unconscious child. The little figure's head was turned away from the camera, but Delvaux recognized him immediately as Alvin D. Ellis, the Buddha, and again he said nothing.
“There's more.” The Colonel waved his data-wand, and summoned a third close-up image of a woman in a head scarf and dark glasses leaning out a car window, and pointing a gun at the camera, “We're eighty-two percent sure that's Target WS596, a.k.a. Catherine Whitman of White Sunday. She fired an electrically charged projectile, downing the parking enforcement drone that captured these images.”
“Who is the driver?”
“That is one Casper Grey, 22 years old, residence unknown. Son of Patricia Alia Wu and Mather Jorge Grey, both deceased... Killed twenty years ago, along with an older brother, in a suspected White Sunday car bombing. The record states the parents were on a Goddie watch list and under class D surveillance due to their involvement in both religion and politics. Grey's profile suggests probable resentment for authority. No previous arrests, but as of twenty minutes ago, he is wanted by Baccha Bay City law enforcement for grand theft auto, reckless driving, evasion, and felonious property damage. We've already added him to the insurgent hotlist because of his new friends.”
“Yes, Colonel, he appears to be more than a simple car thief, but let's keep that one to ourselves for now. There's no need to overexcite local enforcement,” Delvaux said with a thin smirk. “In their enthusiasm, they might get underfoot, eh Colonel?”
The Colonel had been a policeman before he joined the Security Services, and he hid the umbrage he took at Delvaux's suggestion, saying only, “Yes, Sir.”
Delvaux stared at the image of the Z-class Lenz, stopped in the line of cars on Daisy Street, and he knew with certainty that under the car's shiny, racing-green roof, spattered with cleaning fluid and diluted blood, was the Buddha. “How old is this vervloekt image, Colonel?” Delvaux spent his teen years in Amsterdam. It was where he learned to swear, and he often swore in Dutch.
“Twenty-one minutes, Director Delvaux, Sir.” At hearing this, Delvaux glowered at the Colonel's full-size holographic projection, and the Colonel was glad he wasn't actually in the same room. Delvaux's expression made him think that he might have been slapped or at least poked in the chest with the data-wand.
Delvaux barked, “Then we've lost them again and this information is barely actionable.” The Colonel said nothing, allowing Delvaux to continue. “And the recurring camera malfunctions?” Delvaux pressed his palm to his forehead, and his eyes were closed while he waited for the Colonel's reply.
The Colonel was not looking forward to this part. He'd chosen to give the good news first, but it was time for the bad news. “Sir, we have no explanation for the widespread failures in the city's camera network. Insurgent groups have used jammers in the past to create dark patches in our field-of-view, but never anything city-wide like this. One of my men has found evidence of similar malfunctions in other, non-G.S.A. systems in the same area. Retail cameras, public transit cameras, and the like. They all seemed to be suffering from inexplicable malfunctions. MUNI 5-7 is working on the issue. The Condor UAV, keeping station at 55,000 feet, is still providing reliable coverage when tasked, and MUNI 5-7 is using it to scan the city for the vehicle from Daisy Street that was driven by Grey.”
“Do we have any idea where they are now?”
“No, Sir.”
“Thank you, Colonel. You are dismissed” The Colonel had been expecting more of an ass-chewing, but if Delvaux wanted to dismiss him instead, that was fine with him. In the Ops Center, the Colonel slapped a holo-scanner tracking module hanging on his belt, and his ghostly image disappeared from Delvaux's office.
Delvaux didn't know what Operator Bonnie Levi-Mei was playing at. She had the Buddha, he thought. They're together in Sherman Square in the tourist's image so why the hell isn't she bringing him in? Why isn't she bringing the Buddha to me as she was ordered? Delvaux briefly considered that he might have lost yet another Operator. The Buddha might have already turned Operator 388 against him. Was Bonnie Levi-Mei already a haan eter Goddie insurgent? This was more embarrassing than he could bear. At least, he thought, it should be easy to clean up.
“MUNI 5-7,”
“Yes, Director Delvaux,” the disembodied AI voice said from nowhere and everywhere.
“List Operator, excuse me... former Operator Bonnie Levi-Mei as a traitor. She has chosen to ally with the insurgents. Place her at the top of the Most Wanted Blacklist... Shoot On Sight.”