Authors: Paula Bradley
It was time to complete “Operation: Maximum Magician.”
Winters knew the sight of the media trucks would have the desired effect. However, he wasn’t prepared for how easy she made it. Mariah was adamant about relocating to some place with more privacy, less people—a place where she would not feel so exposed. It spoke to her “cabin fever,” this new house and location.
The house was on Mastenhege Heights, considerably more modern than the one in which she currently resided. It was near the top of a hill, high enough to look out at the Santa Cruz Mountains on a clear day. The backyard was not landscaped. The wildflowers—Indian paintbrush, manzanita, gold poppy—growing in and among large rocks could just as easily be behind a cabin tucked away in the hills instead of a tract home in suburbia.
Ninety feet from the house, the yard yielded to the remaining segment of the hill. There were no houses beyond this point. The hill was dotted with chaparral, milkweed, and boulders of varying sizes. Englemann oak trees lined the top of the rise, hiding a road used only by the utility companies, further adding to the sense of living in the wilderness.
She liked the new house, smiling at the bright cheery kitchen and the wall of windows in the living room that afforded her a decent view of the backyard, the south side of San José and the mountains.
When she begged to turn the house into a kaleidoscope of color, he resisted for a little while. But it was a game, both of them knowing he would capitulate.
He never let on that he actually enjoyed her attempts at “wiping that perpetually sour expression off your handsome face.” She was not coy and manipulative like most of the women he knew. Her straight-forwardness and uncontrived playfulness was refreshing, maybe even a little stimulating.
Intellectually
stimulating, he amended quickly. It was unsettling, her knowing him well enough to judge how far she could push him. He briefly wondered if she was reading his mind, but shrugged off the notion instantly: if she was, she would have exposed him for what he was—a CIA agent illegally conducting business in the United States, masquerading as an FBI agent.
He sighed. Gabriel Winters wouldn’t let his imagination dwell on what she would do if she found out who he really was and that he was responsible for the death of her best friend, Frannie Manzetti
If there was one thing that constantly annoyed Mariah like a persistent flea darting in front of her eyes, it was the inexorable presence of Agent Gabriel Winters. She was not happy when he decided to move into the safe house one week after she did, commandeering the small bedroom on the ground floor for his private office.
She felt his calculating eyes assessing her. His presence haunted her even when he was not on the premises. Like a phantom, she never knew when he would materialize; nevertheless, since she had his scent, she was never taken by surprise.
One evening Mariah entertained her guards with
The Puppets from Pluto Theater.
The show began with the wedding night of Polly Applebottom and Monsieur Pierre Pareknife. The groom stripped the “clothing” off his new bride while seducing her in a bad Pepé Le Pew French accent. The agents laughed in appreciation as the apple spun in the air, its skin coiling gracefully toward the floor while the white-handled peeler spun in the opposite direction.
Unknowingly, they were witness to the mastering of a new skill: Mariah made two unrelated objects performing different tasks at the same time.
But Winters knew. He was sure nothing she did escaped him now. The surveillance equipment brought all her little tricks into sharp focus.
The infrared cameras with large zoom lenses (monitored by the FBI) were positioned outside. They were weatherproof, able to brighten the night with a seventy degree field of vision and a range of at least one thousand feet. Installed next to the floodlights at the four corners of the house, they were also at the front near the porch lights and in the back in the shrubs under the windows. Since the auto-iris lenses automatically adjusted for light level, they were perfectly functional during the daylight hours as well. Mariah complained of the lights shining in her bedroom window, hoping they would be shut off: Winters countered by covering the windows with blackout curtains.
The CIA’s hidden equipment, however, was even more sophisticated. Their fixed focus lens cameras were hidden in places like picture frames and mirrors. The images they captured were sharply defined whether a few inches or several yards away.
It was the visible light zoom lens cameras with pan and tilt that provided the most flexibility. These little gems were installed in the smoke detectors, one in the upstairs hallway, one in the bedroom, and one in the back door entry to cover any stray movements missed by the cameras in the living room and kitchen.
These highly sophisticated cameras, also equipped with auto-iris lenses, were additionally installed in the burglar alarm system’s motion detectors. The zoom, combined with the three hundred thousand pixels, supplied clear color pictures through the tiny 3.6 mm pinhole lens. Unlike civilian surveillance equipment, all these babies came equipped with microphone pickup integrated into the radio frequency transmitter. Every word, every whisper, was heard with crystal clarity.
The FBI monitored the infrared surveillance equipment installed next to the floodlights. While they scanned the outside of the house with their equipment set up in the family room, the CIA tapped into their signal to make sure the amateurs didn’t miss anything. But the Feds knew nothing of the cameras inside the house. These signals were transmitted to remote receivers located in a dirty green and brown-colored RV, parked behind a knoll on the shoulder of the utility service road, up the hill behind the house, a quarter of a mile away. The knoll hid the lower third of the van; the remainder was hidden by chaparral and trees.
The camouflaged RV was loaded with an array of video and audio monitors, complete with joystick controls that allowed the pan and tilt cameras to be manipulated for optimum viewing. It also provided creature comforts; toilet, shower, microwave oven, and a miniature fridge/freezer unit.
The CIA could see, hear, and record any activity or sound that occurred inside or outside the house. They could monitor any RF signal made by cordless phones, cellular phones, or hand held transceivers. They could listen to every outgoing and incoming telephone call via their line taps.
Every one of Mariah’s achievements was analyzed, dissected, plotted on a graph, fed into a newly developed computer program to predict future developments, and discussed at great lengths by all those involved regarding her usability in the Central Intelligence Agency’s worldwide covert activities.
There was a shroud of secrecy thrown over “Operation: Maximum Magician.” Only a select handful of people knew of it. Even the Director of the CIA was given general information and non-exact details. The less he knew, the better, both for him and the agency. Knowing her every move did not make Winters less tense. In fact, his stress level caused him to develop neck pains.
She continued to refine and expand her talents. He was pleased, but he instinctively knew he was not getting the complete picture. It was what he imagined that made him goosey. Gabriel Winters never let himself forget she had physically manipulated that child molester in Canada. He also held personal reservations about her innocence in the death of Everett Hinckley in New Mexico.
Siddhartha placed the root, the
solam tebrosm
, he had developed in the hollow then covered it evenly with treated soil. Kneeling on the hard-packed ground, he was able to ignore the muted roar of the hot
sharuq
blowing steadily from the south, his body protected by his SRIG, a sapphire blue, skin-forming, Self-Regulating Insulated Garment.
He had approached the Elvilivians, natives of this planet, with an offer to develop a food product that would grow in their inhospitable clime. Hardly more than fine sand and pebbles, the soil on Elvilive could not sustain its population, forcing the inhabitants to barter for necessities with industrial products of limited value. Siddhartha hoped his tedious laboratory experiments conducted on this hybrid would provide negotiating leverage.
They were a hostile, paranoid race. Before their eyes, he had appeared in a nearly blinding flash of light from a hole in the endless black sky. They were sure it was a demon that hissed as the hole closed behind it.
They knew not of hyperspatial transport points. They knew only that the demon hovered above the ground and, as the light receded, floated down.
Five of the Elvilivians advanced and took a predatory stance, their three arms bending inward, their clubbed hands flexed. As they attacked, Siddhartha glided easily away. He was a diminutive man with deep golden skin, hair as black as the eternal night, and eyes of ebony which radiated peace and serenity. His stride was fluid, graceful, and bespoke of strength and agility.
Before they could recover, he was behind them; how they wound up face down on the ground was still a mystery to the aggressors and those who witnessed the swift and precise maneuvers of the alien. Gaining their respect, he would come to be called
Oolatorh
—friend.
The root was shielded from the incessantly swirling dust as long as he held it. But it was now planted and exposed to the variations and severities of this unreceptive environment. The final test must be conducted under conditions native to Elvilive: Siddhartha would kneel here until he was certain the tuber was firmly anchored.
“Another root, if you please,” he said, distractedly.
With a soft
whirrrr
,
the LZ-Ssn that hovered exactly fourteen inches from Siddhartha rotated on its axis. Its central core with two glowing green illumines—its “eyes”—on coiled metal stalks remained stationary as receptacle number eight now faced him. The hatch opened silently and the tray slid out, dispensing, as requested, one
solam tebrosm
wrapped protectively in a soft silicone cloth. When Siddhartha removed it, the tray slid back and the hatch shut.
“Please to dispense the soil now.” Siddhartha cradled the root in his hands, not taking his eyes from it.
“As you wish, Siddhartha,” intoned the LZ-Ssn in a proper British accent.
He smiled. Ton Re’Sateron’s fine touch was evident in the reprogramming of this unit that now addressed him by name. Indulging the botanist who wished for a more life-like companion to accompany him during his experiments, Sateron had added several new features. One was a second green illumine, the “eye” that served no other purpose than to balance the “face.” The other was an auditory core stocked with colloquialisms Sateron had discovered by studying broadcast signals picked up from the orbiters monitoring Earth.
Rotating once again, the LZ-Ssn stopped when the soil receptacle was in the proper position. The hatch opened, the tray slid out, and a small bucket of uncontaminated Elvilive soil was dispensed.
“Oh ... please to pardon me,” Siddhartha muttered, “I need first the clippers.”
“Coming right up.”
The tray slid back into the receptacle, the hatch closed, and the LZ-Ssn spun again;
whirrrr
, open, slide—and there were four clippers with different length blades.
Siddhartha picked the smallest. Leaning slightly forward, he pushed the clippers through a permeable barrier into a beaker of sterile solution close by his knee. With a pinging
zzzzzzt,
the LZ-Ssn hastily backed up in order to maintain the programmed fourteen-inch distance from the human. As Siddhartha straightened, the LZ-Ssn drifted back to its original position.
“
Now
the soil,” he said, absorbed in trimming tiny filaments from the base of the light brown root. The tranquil expression, which rarely left his face, was altered by intense concentration.
“At your service.”
Whirrrr
, open, slide ... soil.
Siddhartha’s brow furrowed uncharacteristically as he wet his lips with his tongue. Pausing to glance left then right, he murmured, “My, my ... where did I leave the trowel?”
With an “I will find it,” the soil instantly disappeared inside its receptacle and the LZ-Ssn’s flexible neck uncoiled to a height of ten inches. Beginning a circumferential scan, one green “eye” turned red and began to blink, reverting to a solid-state condition when it homed in on the discarded instrument. The LZ-Ssn flowed forward, stopping when it was directly over the tool. Lowering an articulated arm from its central core, it delicately lifted the trowel with a replicate thumb and first finger. It was halfway back when Siddhartha cried, “Drat, I forgot the yellow marking sticks!”
Practically skidding to a stop, the LZ-Ssn once more extended its neck coil, found the marking sticks some ten feet from its present location and hurried to the new coordinates. Gathering up the sticks with a second arm, it headed back to the human, once more positioning itself at the appropriate distance
“I will take the trowel, thank you,” Siddhartha said absentmindedly, his attention still centered on the
solam tebrosm
. The articulated arm that held the trowel bent at the elbow, bringing the instrument close to the human’s left hand.
“Happy to comply.”
Siddhartha ignored the proffered tool and stared at the root. “Hmm ... I believe I must mist again before I plant,” he murmured. “And please to give me the digger before the soil so that I may make the hole larger. Oh my, I have dropped the clippers!” So saying, Siddhartha retrieved the fallen clippers, leaning forward at the same time to reach the beaker of sterile solution.
Whirring as it rotated, the LZ-Ssn began to open the receptacle that housed the mister while simultaneously skittering backward to maintain its proper distance as both articulated arms swiveled rapidly to prevent injury to the human.
Shuddering slightly, all trays disappeared, the hatches closed, the elbows straightened, and the retrieval arms retracted into the central core.
“Siddhartha, your instructions are unacceptable. I cannot process multiple directives and imprecise commands while concurrently preserving your safety. I will maintain present stasis until I receive a singular intention.”
Properly chastised, Siddhartha was about to apologize when the portable MERs communicator on his wrist began to pulse. Frowning at the interruption, he brought the device to eye level, quickly scanning the display.
Excitement smoothed his creased brow. The root was carefully placed back in its cloth and covered with the loose ends. Rising stiffly, he brushed dirt off his SRIG that covered his entire body including his head, but not his face. With a “Please to remain here until I return” to the LZ-Ssn, Siddhartha touched the HOME button on his transport belt. Bathed in the blue-white glow of the HST, he disappeared.