Hiding The Truth

Beginning The Mission

As the journalist and his party left the table and her group settled themselves alongside the Doctor and his lovely wife, Lydia caught Doug's eye.

"Who was that?" She whispered.

"That was the new Recruit you'll be training." He answered simply, without elaborating.

"She's so tacky!" Lydia exclaimed, careful to keep her voice down.

"I don't choose the Recruits, my dear. I just carry out my missions." His voice was flat, and Lydia recognized this was another conversation that was going nowhere. Her inability to control him, even while he courted her, drove her mad sometimes. She was sure all she had to do was figure out exactly which of his buttons to push to bring him into line. One of her greatest strengths as an Agent was getting her intelligence targets to do or say or divulge whatever the Organization ordered, and she wasn't for a minute above using the same tactics on the people around her. But Doug had been an Agent considerably longer than she, had had more time to hone his skills, and would be a harder nut to crack than the corporate drones and society divas she had been assigned to suss out so far. No matter, she thought. She'd figure him out eventually.

"Excuse me, y'all," announced Doctor Skye, "we have to make it an early night. Little ones and all that." He gestured at his sons.

"Aw, Pappa," the oldest whined.

"No complaining. Ice cream, and then home. We have Mass tomorrow and school on Monday, and I have to work." The Doctor's tone brooked no argument.

"Your father knows best, Leo." Mrs D'Angelo gathered the two younger boys and the family disappeared into the crowd.

Lydia was fuming. That tacky Lila woman in her scuffed shoes and brazen, bosom-bearing blouse, was not only overly familiar with Doug, she got an audience with one of Druid City's major rising star couples before Lydia? On what planet was that fair? Her whole mood was soured. She was supposed to be the one making friends with all the important people. She was the one who was supposed to know all the right people. She would not be usurped by some uppity trailer trash with bad taste and worse manners. The woman hadn't even shaken her hand! Or Andra's! That moment, that feeling of jealousy and anger and frustration, would color her whole relationship with Lila forevermore, both consciously and subconsciously, and send her spiraling ever deeper into her relentless pursuit of social and professional opportunities to better her circles and achieve ever greater heights. She demanded the best of herself constantly, and she was her own harshest critic beneath her inner and sometimes outer snob.

Finishing their supper, the three Agents and the easygoing teacher opted to skip the crushingly crowded ice cream social and take a guided tour of the Arsenal with some of the local townspeople instead. When the ladies excused themselves to the powder room, Lydia checked the mission notes she kept in her fashionable clutch.

"Stamps, bread, eggs, butter," she read from the few lines of objectives labeled "Do Not Forget." She designed all her reminders to appear as if she were keeping a shopping list. If she ever lost or had to leave her belongings somewhere, no one who found one would ever associate the little slips of paper with her line of work. Just another part of being an international super spy, she mentally joked.

Tonight's goals included finding a map of the Arsenal, an itemized copy of Launch Control's budget, collecting the names of the wives and girlfriends of various Arsenal workers, and working the crowd to establish rapport and make her presence as a member of the team assembled for the upcoming Launch Control mission known. She could handle this. She wouldn't let the incident at dinner distract her.

With Lydia now steady on Douglas Reever's arm and mentally focused on the task at hand, the group enjoyed the tour well enough. Lydia memorized the needed map from a print out  framed in a long, white evacuation corridor where it had been posted to direct Arsenal staff out of the building in the event of an emergency. She possessed the Talent of Memory, so reproducing it accurately back in her office would be no problem, whether she had to draw it once or ten times. The itemized budget was a bit trickier because she couldn't thoroughly search any offices with half of my
Progress City on the grounds, but she grabbed a file cheekily labeled "Dollars And Sense" from a purser's desk while the tour guide's back was turned and slipped it into a hidden sleeve in her skirt lining. She couldn't be completely sure she had the right documents, but she had a hunch it was important. It was stamped "EXECUTIVE PURSERS ONLY." Subtle. Real subtle. Some people were about as inventive as a wet piece of paper, she thought. The names she needed were the easiest to procure by a wide margin. The Arsenal Ladies' Auxiliary Club had littered the tour route with tables holding directory booklets containing the information Lydia desired, each with a neatly lettered sign reading "Please, take one!" She dropped two in her purse. One for her mission, and one for her personal use. It wasn't what you knew that mattered, after all. It was whom.