Roger Goes Bug Hunting
Archie's House
Michael
Roger drives the Rolls back to the garage, gets his own car back, and is back home late to collapse, but back up early to start doing bug sweeps. That’s likely his (and sone of Charley’s) whole weekend. Lunch on Monday may be a bit grumbly, but if this doesn’t justify his increasing skill with bugs, I don’t know what does.
Okay, the Ransoms are out in the early afternoon Saturday, so given they're closest to Roger's pad, they should be first on your list (unless Roger wants to do his own place first?)
Bill
Let’s do the place there’s a short window for getting in. Roger will have plenty of time to get his later.
Michael
All right, excellent. So the first roll I'm going to have Roger do is an Electronics Operation (Security) roll. Basically this roll reflects bringing in the electronic bug-sniffers to see if there are any weird transmissions happening anywhere in the house. I've been thinking about taking Extra Time for this roll and for the Search that's happening at the same time, and I'm guessing a baseline bug search of the Ransoms' house would consist of 20-30 minutes, and given you know they'll be gone a couple of hours, that feels like a +2 (x4 Extra Time). So first roll is Electronics Operation (Security)-15. Then I will roll the Search roll secretly at either a Search-14 (if the above roll fails) or a Search-18 (if the above roll succeeds).
Bill
>>>> SUCCESS by 1
Michael
An hour-long scan of the various rooms in the Ransoms' very sizable Pacific Heights house reveals no further cubbyholes with mysterious futuristic hard drives, no mundane bugs hidden by either SANDMAN, the Company, or the KGB, no wiretaps on either Archie's secure phone and Telex or the phone extensions in the kitchen, living room, Jane's bedroom, or master bedroom. Roger does get to see Charley's room, which by now offers very little of the decor that once marked it as Archie and Melanie's lost son's room.
(Up to you guys if Charley left anything in there of Charlie's.) When Roger checks the attic—who knows what kinds of wires could be in the ceiling fixtures on the second floor, after all—he sees Archie's "secret" puppet workshop (as seen in-game on the Fourth of July).
It seems fair of me to figure that the night Stoney was born, Archie left and forgot the empty bottle of 151; maybe it got kicked under the workbench and left there. The eyeless Count Shasta is hanging there near the worktable, his eyes having been purloined for Stoney. The entire gestalt of this attic—the high heat given it's daytime in summer, the gauzy light coming through the one cobwebbed porthole window, the half-finished puppets hanging everywhere with puppet parts poking out of storage drawers, along with the other family memories and random detritus that's usually found in an affluent white family's attic—all kind of give Roger the creeps. A haunted feeling. Spirit Empathy-13, please.
Bill
>>>> FAILURE by 2
Michael
Roger stares blankly at the eyeless Count for a good ten seconds or so, blanking out a little bit. It's just an empty shell, it's not got any spirit in it, Roger thinks. Voodoo dolls, he scoffs internally, knowing what popular culture has done to construct this inaccurate "Voodoo" trope out of whole cloth. Even in the heat of the attic a shiver goes down his spine. I must be going loco," Roger thinks to himself, rushing to descend the fold-out stairs and get out of here with his private security disguise and toolbox. It's just an empty shell, Roger thinks once more as he starts the white van to head over to Jocasta's and Viv's in Berkeley for a late-afternoon bug sweep. But it wasn't always, he realizes suddenly about halfway to the freeway.
Bill
>>>> SUCCESS by 2
Michael
whew!
Bill
But close. Boss man gonna have to explain; it’s gonna haunt Roger until he asks.
Michael
Fair.
So I was thinking the rest of the debugging: Viv and Jo Saturday afternoon/evening, Marshall early Sunday at the Mission and Mitch Sunday afternoon/evening. Lotta driving on Sunday.
Viv's House
Michael
So I would assume one of the team would have called ahead to alert Viv to the need for an urgent debugging of her house so on Saturday afternoon as Roger calls upon the Ballard-Abeille household, Roger notices their car out of their driveway as he pulls up in the white van with its fake contractor livery on it. Roger walks to the front door in his workman uniform and Viv answers.
"Hi, come on in," Viv says while the door is open, only speaking (marginally) more freely once he's inside and is unpacking the bug-sweeper. "Thanks for coming on such short notice," Viv says, writing down on a notepad in the kitchen, "Is there anything you need me to do to help?" and showing it to Roger. Looks like she's picking up the basics of tradecraft pretty easily, anyway, only three weeks into being a Sandman.
Same roll as before, Electronics Operation (Security)-15 and then I'll do the Search roll.
Bill
>>>> SUCCESS by 6
Michael
Viv lets Roger into all the rooms of the house; it's a comfortable living space, very Northern California: the kitchen full of wicker baskets overflowing with fruits and vegetables, a sizable cookbook shelf in there. Both the kids' bedrooms are still decked out in their decor, even though Viv's daughter Carolyn is at college (Tommy, her son, is a rising senior in high school just like Jane Ransom). Tommy's room is the more lived-in, of course: his posters and décor run to the mainstream; a lot of straight-ahead rock band stuff: Zeppelin, Floyd. He's got a good amount of medals and trophies from track and field and a couple of family pictures on his desk. In the basement/garage are Charles's model trains and electronics workshop, and the last room Viv lets Roger into is Viv's sanctum sanctorum, her writing room. It's a loft area, absolutely covered in lush growing plants. A somewhat battered 1950s-era typewriter in a cool mint blue sits on a preternaturally neat work desk. Stacks of typing paper sit on a rack beneath the desk, and a couple of very modest bookshelves with a odd array of books — old hardcover books from the early part of the century on natural sciences, an array of contemporary science fiction, scholarly journals on sociology and psychology — sit close at hand to the work desk. A couple of boxes of advance copies of Viv's new book sit on a love seat in the office; Roger pops open the flap of one of them during his searches and sees the weird cover art: a blue-purple blob enveloping a landscape on an alien world.
The entire trip through the house the bug-sweeper hasn't gone off once. All Roger's manual searching has revealed no taps, no bugs, no wires. As Roger takes the headphones off, Viv looks at him. "Are we... okay to talk now?"
Bill
“As best I can tell. I mean, technologically; I can’t do shit about remote viewing or spying spirits.” Roger shrugs and smiles conspiratorially. “And I’m also more than okay to want to talk. How you holding up? I’ll always feel a little responsible for you being in this. I mean, there was fate and all that, and you chose. But I asked, so … How are you?”
Michael
Genevieve clears the boxes so Roger can sit down on the loveseat. She takes her chair from her work desk and sits down across from him. "I'll be honest with you, Roger. It's been a difficult week. Saying goodbye to my clients at MRI, some of whom I've been working with for years and years... well, they're all doing better than they were when I first started working with them of course... but, their traumas and stories... they stick with you, you know? You get to know them better than your own family in some cases."
Viv stares pointedly at the boxes with the new Kinarchy book. "And the book tour, I haven't even really brought that up with Archie and Marshall yet, but I'd still like to be able to travel this coming month. Maybe I can be of some use to you all while I'm on the road, stay in touch remotely, keep my eyes open among the attendees for... the kind of thing we saw happen at the con?"
"So what's all this bug sweeping about? At the barbecue Archie said the Project would keep my family safe... is this just pro forma? Or is something going on?" It seems clear to Roger from her body language that Viv suspects from the urgency that something is going on; this is probably just her way of hoping Roger will open up about it.
Bill
“Well, yeah, something is going on. Something is always going on. And it’s always something big, scary, and partially out of our control.” Roger shrugs. “But we will keep you safe— us safe— to the best of our ability. This here, well, it’s not great to bring this stuff into the home front, but maybe with these scans we keep it out.”
Michael
"'Something is always going on.'" Viv repeats this and smiles. "Boy is it ever." She chuckles. "You looked a little shaken when I met you at the door, are you doing all right?"
Bill
Roger shrugs again. “It helps to do something, take a little action. Check in with friends. This sweep job is good for that. So yeah, right now? I’m doing okay. You know, Mrs. High Priestess, I’ll tell you something, maybe only you get. I was worried letting more folks in my head would make it feel smaller. But instead, it’s like… it’s bigger.” Roger pauses. Then he catches himself, and chuckles. “So, the opposite of having my head shrunk.”
Michael
Genevieve chuckles again despite herself. "I definitely understand what you mean about keeping busy being the thing that keeps the dark clouds away. Sometimes just day-in, day-out, putting in the work is truly the only tonic that helps."
"But your head getting bigger... as much of an honor as it must be to usher the spirits into your body, it has to be taxing too. And the fear of the universe getting bigger... yes. I can also relate to that. Intensely." Viv looks a little uncertain, but then puts on her usual mien of calm and acceptance. "What is the fear for you, Roger? How does it manifest?"
Bill
“Heh, you can’t help yourself, huh? Gotta be the doc, gotta help. Well, doc, it’s not a mystery. Losing myself, losing control, not getting my body back, and finding out ‘I’ have done something unforgivable. That fear is always there. Yeah, there’s fear of these creatures, of Evil, too. But being the monster, that’s fear I think you’re probing for.” Roger crosses himself.
“Reminds me to go to confession.”
Michael
Genevieve allows for a respectful pause. "That must be a terrific burden to bear, Roger. And it's clear you've obviously given it much thought, much worry, much concern." Viv leans back a bit and ponders this.
"All throughout human history the ecstatic, the shaman, the channeler, the tribe's wise one, has had to bear that burden. Yours is a role that is, in many ways, unenviable. But think about the trust the gods, the loa, the spirits must have in you, to allow themselves to experience our world through you! I know on a certain level you didn't choose any of these partners, but if fate, or if their omniscience, led them to you: well, they must respect your strength and courage and power as a vessel."
"Of course you're not just a vessel: you're a man, a man with his own thoughts and feelings and moral code. That duality... it's tricky to square! It's been that special burden of the mystic for hundreds of human generations. But if anything, experience and wisdom and age will temper that fear you have. Your being selected, that itself indicates—to me, anyway—that you are worthy, that you are brave, and that you are strong enough to assert your self when it matters. That's what I saw at the St. Francis, anyway. A man who knew right from wrong and had to do things, desperate things, to keep the innocent safe."
"Besides, who's to say you won't meet a loa one day that addresses these very worries. One that helps temper that fear of... doing the unforgivable."
Bill
Roger suddenly laughs, and then realizes he may need to explain himself. “Oh, I met that ‘loa’ long ago, before any of the others. He trusts me, I try to trust him, and when I do, I’m not afraid of being unforgivable. I’m not sure how that squares up with how your shamans and mystics do it, but that’s how I do it.” He smiles again, and kinda sing-songs: “‘How do you do that voodoo that you do so well?’ Heh. But I gotta say, it also helps a guy a lot to be reminded by flesh and blood folks that he’s worthy. ‘Specially when a lot of them are doing the exact opposite. So… thank you.”
“But one bone to pick with you, doc, about what you said. We’re all the same level of worthy. The houngan is beloved, yes, in one way, but everyone else, they’re just as beloved. They just need to listen better.”
Michael
Viv smiles. "You're right, that wasn't very... egalitarian of me, to propose there's some kind of... hidden mystic elite. History's shown us that down that road a lot of bad stuff lies." Viv visibly shivers; Roger can sense the same kind of unease in Viv's manner that she showed when talking about the world getting bigger. "A world where everyone listens that closely to the gods and spirits, now that's a world I would work towards."
Viv then says, "Are you familiar with the concept of the 'higher self'? Many religions and mystical systems include such a concept... an oversoul of which the earthly person is but a reflection. The Hindu ātman, glimpsed then seen then finally understood through self-knowledge, meditation, peaceful co-existence, ahimsa. When you hurt others, you hurt your highest self; when you learn about and co-exist with the world around you with greater harmony, you gain deeper insight into that higher self. It's not ego, it's something far more all-pervasive. I write about it in my books as 'the monad,' but that's honestly a very Western, very constricting concept. But then back when I wrote the first Kinarchy book I was still trying to reach those kind of scifi readers." A tight-lipped smile.
"Anyway, your talking about the vastness of everything out there after having been crowded in your own head got me thinking for some reason about how in all our interactions, if we go through this world with that sense of awareness and receptivity and gentleness, how much more vast—and sometimes scary and unfathomable!—it can make our perceptions. Enlightenment isn't always bliss! Sometimes it can be frightening, and not necessarily because we're not ready or worthy. It's because our higher self isn't glimpsed all at once; it's meant to be slowly revealed to us over a lifetime... heck, over multiple lifetimes." Roger can tell Viv is thinking of Charley now. "Holding the prospect of both highest existence and non-existence in our heads at the same time, well, that's the paradox that holds the key to not wilting in the face of such immensity."
"I had an experience like this last weekend. Probably best to save that story for another time, but remind me to tell you about it soon. Maybe at work sometime this week."
Bill
Roger nods, “I think I get you. You listen, you ain’t gonna always hear nice things, and sometimes it’s easier to avoid the trash talking for your own peace. So yeah, it does take longer. If you wanna talk more later, let’s do that. Although, I gotta say, your phrases like existing and not existing at the same time — sounds more like what Mitch says sometimes. I’m not sure I can talk it as well. But I’m ready to listen — I did say that’s what I do.”
Michael
Genevieve laughs. "I've been meaning to sit down with that elusive customer. I haven't really talked to him since the con and there's a lot I've been pondering that I think he would have a unique perspective on. More chatting. It sounds like I have a lot of catching up to do on Monday!"
Bill
“Yeah, see you then. Gotta motor over to the next ‘exterminator’ gig at Jo’s. Adios”
Michael
"Say hi to her for me! And Roger... thanks. Thanks for trusting me with... all that." Genevieve shows Roger to the front door and out.
Jocasta's Pad
Leonard
Roger probably has to spend about ten minutes sitting in his car in front of the park across from Jocasta's house before she comes tearing down Masonic Avenue at far too high a speed. She slides into the short driveway and emerges, half in and half out of an overshirt and with a towel still wrapped around her waist. Tossing her sun hat back in the Javelin, she swings open the garage doors — a curious old model that opens sideways, like barn doors, instead of overhead — and pulls in. Clumsily gathering her bag, hat, and sketchbook out of the car, she opens a side door to the house that's inside the garage and tosses everything inside haphazardly. She pokes her head back out and exaggeratedly mouths "SORRY" to Roger across the street. After about a minute of pointlessly fussing with something inside, she waves her arms to beckon him over.
Bill
"So, this is your place, huh? Much happier to have you give me the tour, instead of, well, letting myself in."
Leonard
Jo laughs. "Yeah, sorry, man," she says sheepishly. "I was, uh, up here," she explains, pointing at her head, "And I lost track of time. Rude."
The two of them enter via the garage — where her car is crowded by camping and other outdoor gear — and she gestures around at the various rooms. Her house is a small bungalow, longer than it is wide, of the kind that was popular about fifty years ago. It's a two-story in an Arts & Crafts style, cozy and with a spacious back yard (which is overgrown with lush grass and contains only a beat-up grill and and old deck chair). The inside is...well, it's not a disaster. It's generally clean, in the sense that there's not trash everywhere or rats and roaches having a field day. But it's also the house of someone who lives alone and doesn't really think about anyone being around. Books are left wherever Jocasta stopped reading them, nothing is neat, and most of all, there are dirty clothes everywhere: she clearly prefers buying new outfits to doing laundry. There's also drug paraphernalia all over the place — a couple of bongs, a shisha, small baggies of weed and mushrooms, bottles of wine — and the fact that it's all out in the open probably gives her a tinge of guilt for the white privilege of not having to hide it. The kitchen and bathroom are unexpectedly clean, but the bedroom is a bit of a wreck: an overwhelming scent of nag champa and cannabis smoke, discarded outfits and bedclothes everywhere, overflowing ashtrays, and a closet stuffed with new clothes, some still in the store packages. There's also a few well-tended to pistols and rifles, and stacks of books and notebooks; Roger can probably spy a drawer in a tallboy with nothing but gloves. The place that seems the most chaotic is the upstairs bedroom: Jocasta uses it as an office, and while the desk is merely messy (a proper office chair in front of a desk covered in half-opened books, magazines, newspapers, research articles, and more notebooks), the walls are covered in photos, printouts, and Jocasta's own sketches. There aren't any pins or strings connecting them, but the sheer mass of them, and the hint of a pattern impenetrable to outsiders, would make Roger worry if he saw it at a stranger's house.
"Sorry about, well, the state of my life," she laughs. "And that you got stuck doing this all weekend." She peeks back into the kitchen. "Hey, are you hungry? I could probably make us some dinner. I can still cook when I want to...I used to be a housewife once, you know."
Bill
"Really? Oh, yeah, I guess I knew that. Well, OK. Let's see what you can make. I am gonna be a while, and aiy, don't take this the wrong way, but I just gotta help you clean some of this. Ma maman, you know she was a cleaner, right? She couldn't stand this kind of thing, and well, I gotta look for the bugs, and some of them could be under these." Roger points to a lampshade with a light summer dress laid over it. "Sound's probably muffled, but worth the check."
Leonard
Jo's face reddens slightly as she rattles around in the kitchen putting together the basics of a spinach lasagna. "Geez, Roger, I really am sorry. I know it's a sight in here. My old DI would have torn me a new one," she says quietly. "Hell, me from ten years ago would have done." Pouring two glasses of a French Bordeaux, she adds, "The security situation isn't the best. I always assume that I'll be around if anyone tries to come in, and if I'm not, well, things are just things. Bad opsec," she says, shaking her head.
Bill
"Hey, I'm not the brass to ride yo' ass. Just wanna help. Maman would want everything hung and folded, probably pressed. Me, I'm good if we just shove it in a duffle or two. Grunt like me, I know you gotta have at least three army surplus duffles in here. Enough to clear the floor, maybe take to a laundry lady." Roger pauses for a second trying not to think of the Vietnamese ladies he dumped duffles on doing laundry around the fire bases.
"And think about this: if I've gotten this passive receiver detector gadget wrong, Charley's gonna have to come over to do a second sweep. I mean, that was Marshall's order, however I'm interpreting it — that she come. I'm glad she's having fun with the family instead, but you never know, she might be swinging by here some day soon."
Leonard
After sliding the lasagna into the oven, Jocasta brings Roger a glass of the Bordeaux and starts flitting around the living room, grabbing weeks-old outfits and tossing them into a big pile. She mutters something about having an army bag or two out in the garage, but if Roger were to bet, he'd put a full paycheck on all these clothes still being here in a week's time, just in a heap instead of scattered around.
"Oh, hell, Charley," she says. "I'm sure you'll do an amazing job, and it's not just because I'd be mortified if that kid sees how I live." She tries to laugh it off, but Roger can probably sense a nervousness — maybe even a little fleck of fear — as she remembers a conversation she had with Archie, not too long ago.
Bill
Roger starts creating those very heaps for archeologists to find. But as he has a bit of wine and his bug scanning necessarily slows down, he misreads Jo's nervousness. And then he too starts to show some signs of nervousness. The flimsier the article of clothing he's moving, the more obvious it is. He starts to fill silences, extra awkwardly, because until the sweep's done, he can't really talk about work. Well, not about the important stuff that just happened at work. So he lets out some real winners like "So, what do you think of Archie's office? Those puppets, right?"
Michael
(Oh yeah, you can give me another Electronics Operation (Security)-15 roll. )
Bill
>>>> SUCCESS by 0
Michael
Wow, Roger is distracted. He has to hit the passive measures receiver/detector on the side a couple of times to make it work properly, but he's pretty sure after doing a full sweep of Jo's place that they're clean. Fairly sure.
Leonard
Jo doesn't have to use Empathy to figure out that Roger's feeling a bit heated. She plays it off lightly, shoving the more, uh, delicate items into a pile next to the fireplace. "Oh, man, those puppets. You want to know a secret? Something I've never told Archie?" she asks, conspiratorially. "I drank Teem all through college because of his puppets. That little football player puppet, remember? I used to see those commercials all the time, a lifetime ago." She laughs.
Bill
Roger laughs too, but more keeping up appearances than joining in. Then he confesses: “To be honest, no, I missed a lot of those commercials. But man, I don’t like to think about the fights I had with my mother about those cereals. Kids are terrible when frustrated. I did get to have those— mon grand père, he’d get them for us. I did find out later that it caused a fight between them, but only briefly, and then it was allowed.”
“I can’t bring myself to tell Archie, because who needs to find out they were so good at their job, they made little kids cry? Made those kids make their mothers cry?”
Leonard
Now Jocasta's laugh is louder and more genuine. "What a weird reality we live in, Roger," she says, putting on a beat-up oven mitt and pulling the lasagna out of the stove. "We both work for a guy who sold us breakfast cereal when we were kids, helping him fight monsters."
"And now we're going on a camping trip with Diane Keaton's celebrity psychiatrist."
Bill
“Say what you will about Archie, he’s trying to get you to like things. Marshall wants you to like him. Yeah, it’s a crazy mixed-up world, for sure. Better than the alternative. And, well, still maybe getting better. Or. I don’t know. Maybe Mitch is right, and we should be making it better, pushing more. I’m not sure exactly how a camping trip will do that, but I’m willing to set up tents and dig latrines so it happens. More likely Mitch will get it right than this new Schlesinger guy.”
Roger again pauses, trying to shake memories of latrines out of his head.
Leonard
As they eat and sip wine, Jocasta, confident that they aren't being listened to — or perhaps beyond caring if they are — loosely relates the morning's acid vision to Roger. "I won't say I'm optimistic, Roger," she concludes. "I've seen too much to claim that perspective. But I don't think either one of their visions of the future — not the Red Kings, and not whatever element of SANDMAN that creep Puharić represents — is based in a real understanding of our situation. They're both so...fatalistic. The enemy wants slaves who think they're free, and these...technocrats, whatever you want to call them, they want free people who are basically slaves. They both ignore the reality that someone, somehow beat the Red Kings once, and has kept them out of our history since them. They both ignore how people — people they've both spent all their time treating like wind-up birds — keep surprising them. There was something in us, something beyond prediction, something unexpected, something that wanted to hope — long before either of them started working their craft. And we need to start directing our efforts towards that part of people." She drains the last of her glass of Bordeaux and sighs. "That's where I am, anyway."
Bill
“Powerful shit. Sounds to me like you got it. I tell you what: it’d better be a Spirit of hope rising, or we’re gonna get a Spirit of wrath. Well, if we can go find a spirit on that mountain… well then, I got more to do than dig latrines!”
Leonard
Jocasta smiles. “I never knew anyone with the spiritual gifts you have — I mean, full stop, but especially who deals with it with as much…levelness as you do, Roger. You’re pretty remarkable,” Jocasta says coolly. “And here we are, digging latrines and sleeping in cars. Weird reality.”
Bill
“Yeah, about that.” Roger takes a large bite of lasagne to ready himself. “The level-headedness.” He takes a sip of wine. “So, this new loa. The Agent. Ain’t no plainer way to say it: he wants you. Well, to have you.” Another large bite of lasagne and some studied chewing.
Leonard
Jocasta puts down her fork and lights a cigarette, letting the cool burn seep down her throat. “Roger, you know me pretty well. Maybe better than anyone else in URIEL, I don’t know. But well enough that you know that all the men I have cared about have…gone away. One way or another, they left me. It’s been hard.” She swallows a mouth full of smoke and tickles the top of her mouth with her tongue, that old trick her mother taught her to stop yourself from crying. “So ever since then, I’ve had my fun on my terms, and those terms are that we each get what we want, but that’s the end. I don’t want them to stay around enough for me to start caring.” She smiles, and there’s a little desire behind that smile, but it’s also very tired. “That could be a great time if it was someone else, someone like you but not you. It might even be a blast with the world’s greatest secret agent. But it can’t be with you. It can’t. Because I can’t lose you. I know you and he aren’t the same. But it’s close enough.” She doesn’t say I’m sorry, and she doesn’t know why she should; but there’s an apology on her face, in her body language, in the smoke curling around her lips. I’m sorry.
Bill
“You didn’t need to say anything. I just wanted to warn you. I don’t want you to see this, me, as anything but me… your friend. I’m sorry. I’m sorry for the work you’re gonna have to do some day holding him off. I know you will, but I just want you to know I’m sorry for the work.”
Leonard
“No sorry necessary, Roger. It’s the job. I wish it wasn’t.” She crushes out her cigarette. “I’ll deal with Mr. Double Zero when the time comes. In the meantime…we work. You got any other houses to debug? I’ll be in the stacks all day tomorrow but I’ll keep you company on the rest of your runs tonight.”
Bill
Having seen Roger’s “can’t we just get to work” routine many times, Jo can see a bit of a crack in the façade as he starts it up. “Nice to offer, but next up is the Mission, so no way I’m going out that far tonight. I could use the help — the place is huge. But if you can’t, that’s cool. Reminds me to call Archie to see if I’m taking Charley out there.” Roger lights a cigarette of his own. “So no rush getting anywhere else for work. You got some of that tiramisu stuff? If not, let’s find a place for a sweet.”
Leonard
“I gotta go down to the Mission soon enough, can’t do it tomorrow,” she says. “And tiramisu is beyond me. But the liquor store on the corner has It’s It, my treat.” She kicks another pile of clothes out of the way and grabs her keys. “Hey,” she adds. “Do you like comic books?”
Bill
“I did. You’ll laugh. I loved cowboy comics. But comics were over when I kept seeing baby grunts show up reading them.”
Leonard
“Yeah, the baby grunts is why I’m interested. I’ll tell you about it later.” She heads for the door. “Westerns, huh? Lemme buy you an ice cream, Two Gun Kid.”
The Mission
Bill
Roger gets up very early Sunday, little the worse for wear from a nightcap taken with his chocolate ice cream sandwich. He’s feeling really good, in fact, for the morning, and for having gotten some fears cleared out of the recesses. The driving scenery across the Golden Gate just adds to it. He stops in for the 8:00am mass at Mission San Rafael Arcángel, off the 101. He sits in the back, he doesn’t take the wine, and he makes sure to have a talky parishioner right in front of him as he leaves, so he can slip by the priest as he goes out the front. He does his usual, large, to-be-expensed, plate offering. Then he gets back on the road.
Michael
Bill, give me that sweet sweet Electronics Operation (Security)-15 roll one more time if you please.
Bill
>>>> SUCCESS by 5
Michael
At reception, Sunshine greets Roger cheerily and offers him a choice of coffee, tea, orange juice, and other morning refreshments—breakfast, if he wants it—before he gets to work on the scanning. Classrooms and "backstage" areas have been pre-cleared by security so Roger can do his work undisturbed. The reception area and its phones are clean, as are all the public areas Marshall spends a lot of time in. Marshall's residence, as well, is clear of bugs and wiretaps.
When Roger gets to Marshall's main office on the Mission grounds, the passive measures detector goes wild for the first time all weekend. Roger zones in closely on where the signal is coming from and very quickly finds himself focused on Marshall's desk. On the underside of the antique work desk is a disguised wooden compartment, about twice the thickness of a deck of cards, made from the same type of wood as the desk. As Roger checks it he's unconsciously reminded of the computer storage unit that was hidden in the lintel of the front door of the Ransoms' home, but no, this one isn't nearly as cunningly designed, but it's still been made by someone with intimate knowledge of Marshall's desk to have been made of (mahogany, whatever rich wood Marshall's desk is made out of). Roger doesn't touch the compartment, but he does take a moment and plays a hunch and scans the desk phone. A weaker signal, and this time Roger does carefully and gingerly take apart the desk phone and sees there is a bug in it, with a very low-range, low-power radio transmitter. Roger would guess the compartment on the desk contains a booster with power source. The Mission is huge, and if there is someone listening out there, it'd need a good amount of power to transmit the signal across the Mission's vast surface area to the listening post. There are a lot of vineyard-covered hills around here that could hold a nice spot for said listening post. Roger doesn't remove the phone bug yet of course, but he does get a good look at its design and spends a lot of time racking his brains for memories of the wiretap spec training SANDMAN gave him. Electronics Operation (Surveillance) with Extra Time, at skill rating 16.
Bill
Did Marshall put this up to test me?
>>>> SUCCESS by 9
Michael
Roger is 95% sure from the model, design, and installation and from his own COINTELPRO experience in LA; this bug is FBI-grade.
Bill
Roger definitely puts all the pieces back, so he can consult with Marshall on whether he wants to cut it off, try to draw them out, or use it for misinformation. Roger will try to plan to see if he can install a cut off switch. What would be perfect would be a rheostat, something that dials down the booster with an analog dial so it can appear to be interference.
Given this isn’t troposphere-high tech, his sense of urgency for telling Marshall isn’t enough to stop the tour. He’ll just put an “out of order” sign on the headset until he can debrief with the guru.
Michael
Yeah, this stuff is definitely not bleeding edge, TL 7+1 type stuff. But the installation was performed quite well.
Bill
Roger will still take sight lines from the windows, even though the booster means it’s more likely radio not light. They still might want to confirm lights on, somebody there.
Michael
(This is where Charley's Cartography would have come in handy. Still could, honestly. I'm sure Marshall has detailed maps of the areas surrounding the Mission. All we'd need to do is bring her the maps, the coordinates, the specs on the booster, etc. and we could see what she could puzzle out for most likely spots for a listening post.)
Roger definitely puts all the pieces back, so he can consult with Marshall on whether he wants to cut it off, try to draw them out, or use it for misinformation. Roger will try to plan to see if he can install a cut off switch. What would be perfect would be a rheostat, something that dials down the booster with an analog dial so it can appear to be interference.
And the interference plan is GREAT, we just need to pick up some equipment back at Livermore.
Again, this could be a situation where Charley comes out with Roger/Marshall depending on what we plan to do with this bug.
Bill
So Roger continues his sweep, everywhere Sunshine will take him. He also keeps an eye open for placed he’d put a listening station, blind, or other surveillance post. So he does a thorough job. Then he asks for Sunshine to get him time with Dr. Redgrave, and he sits down to wait.
Michael
The rest of the Marshall-habitated zones of the Mission come up clean, and Roger would bet that the listening post is somewhere in the ring of hills along the northern edge of the Mission property; best sight-lines, best elevation, clearest signal (no buildings, fewer trees and structures), but that's a ring of a few miles which goes a couple of miles deep into the Sonoma County hills. Needle in a haystack stuff without some mapping and real shoe-leather tracking.
Brant
Marshall's fit.
"Sergeant Martin, always a pleasure."
Bill
“Doctor, thanks for your time. Let’s speak in private; I’ll keep it quick.”
Brant
Marshall will lead them to somewhere private.
Bill
Once behind doors, Roger just goes right in: “You’re the first one I’ve found anything for. But nothing extra ordinary. On your phone, with a booster hidden in the desk— feels like G man tech, nothing special. Hoover hated hippies; could be one of his old flatheads.”
“Assuming this wasn’t just a test, what do you want to do? Cut it, reel them in, or just keep it open for misinformation?”
Brant
Marshall seems genuinely surprised. “Well, certainly wasn’t a test.” He rubs his beard for a second, thinking. “Might be the feds … though more likely it’s this cop, a detective. Has it out for me. His name’s Atwood.” Another short pause. “Can you trace it? Figure out where it is transmitting to?”
Bill
“I have one or two ideas. Range isn’t that big— likely on property or near it. To spot exactly, I might need Charley’s help, if she’s ever let out if the house again. Maybe Mitch. Do you want to catch them on your property? A trap would take a few of us.”
“Could be a would-be blackmailer. I mean, people think that’s what you do; they’d want some of those secrets, or leverage on you to get them. They don’t know you don’t need anything to make folks do as you ask.” Roger keeps a very straight face for that last bit.
Brant
“I’d like to know who they are … or at least where they are, before making any moves. Enlist the girl, see what she can do, and let me know what you find. Don’t engage unless absolutely necessary. Once I know what I’m dealing with — if it’s who I suspect it is — I’ll ‘deal’ with it myself.” He smiles. “Sorry to inconvenience you on a Sunday. Where are you off to next?”
He says “sorry to inconvenience you” in a way that suggests he is not at all sorry.
Bill
“Mitch is next. I think my next move after would be to come back here and give you some kind of control switch on the device; something that lets you dial it down if you need privacy again. But I’ll consult Mitch, too, while I’m there.”
Roger assumes he’s been dismissed. “Happy to serve, sir. See you in the funny papers.”
Brant
Marshall nods and heads off to his afternoon meditation workshop.
Bill
Roger goes around the back and has a “moving on my schedule” cigarette. He takes a good look at the grounds, for the beauty this time. Then he lets out a deep breath, snubs out his cigarette, and heads back to the road.
Michael
On to Edenvale, I guess.
Mitch's Place
Jeff
All right. So, Mitch's house is a rental in the Edenvale neighborhood of San Jose, located among a bunch of little houses on little lots, roughly a five-minute walk from an elementary school. It looks pretty much exactly like all the houses around it. The closest thing to a distinguishing feature is the lack of grass on the lot; it's mostly gravel, with a little bit here and there which somebody probably mows in under five minutes while doing a different yard. Two bedrooms, one bathroom, maybe a thousand square feet. Mitch's brown VW Bug is parked in the driveway.
Bill
Roger isn’t sure how much cover Mitch cares about, but since he has to lug equipment around, he’s got the van and his overalls anyway. So he’ll come to the door with a clipboard and ring the bell.
Jeff
Mitch comes to the door fairly promptly, wearing an unobtrusive bells-and-mock-turtleneck combo in earth tones. "Roger, hey, man! Come in, yeah. You're here for the thing, right? I got a thing I want to ask you about, don't let me forget. Can I get you a beer?" He might not be entirely sober.
The front room is dominated by the dyad of a big couch with a paisley slipcase and a television set on a stand, blocking off the nonfunctional fireplace. Though Mitch has cleaned up dirty laundry, dishes, and other detritus in advance of Roger's arrival, it's apparent that he sleeps on the couch most nights. A half-dozen posters are taped to the walls, nothing exciting: the kind of album promotional material that piles up at radio stations. Blackout curtains and table lamps. When Roger checks the rest of the house, he finds the usual: bedroom, kitchen, bathroom, cramped utility room (water heater, etc) connecting to the garage where the washer and dryer live. Most of the larger pieces of furniture have the air of conveying with the rental (the couch, the kitchen table). The kitchen has a bunch of spider plants and other hardy houseplants, and a door out to the back patio which has some lawn furniture that came with the rental and Mitch has almost certainly never used. Every room except the utility room (and the living room) has a small black-and-white television set in it, with antenna deliberately positioned.
Bill
At this point, this is normal Mitch for Roger, so Roger takes it in stride. "So this is your crash space, uh? Cool. I'm here, officially ordered, to sweep for bugs — not that you can't do that for yourself probably better than me. But I'm also here to see you man, and your digs. Hold on, gotta get some equipment out in the van."
Roger ferries in some surveillance equipment and that weird gadget of Charley's.
Michael
Okay, once more with the Electronics Operation (Security)-15 roll.
Bill
>>>> SUCCESS by 7
Michael
Scanning Mitch's pad takes much less time than the Mission and the good news is: no bugs, no taps, no hidden surveillance of any kind.
Bill
Good to know (as far as we can) SRI doesn't bug its subjects as a matter of course; I guess Marshall would have found out if they did. Still, one more way they seem less overtly evil. Roger's main comment on the digs is just: "Man, I would have thought you'd have a sweet hi-fi, being musically inclined as you are. You should get one: chicks dig live music, but you can't have your arms only around the guitar."
Jeff
"Yeah, maybe. I guess. I never really thought about it, you know? What all is involved."
Bill
"Well, I mean, maybe a brother could help you out. Or a sister: Charley's into all this stuff too. You gotta get the albums yourself, though. Surely you got some vinyl around?"
Jeff
"Oh, sure. Sure." Mitch looks distracted for a second, then gestures towards the bedroom. "There should be something in there."
Mitch's hi-fi is in his bedroom. Taped to the wall over it is a copy of the current KPFA broadcast schedule, and more of the album posters. Mandrill's self-titled LP is on the turntable, more LPs are filed in four milk crates lined up along the wall, and the windowsills are ersatz bookshelves with a bunch of paperbacks. The bedroom has blackout curtains like the living room.
"Sorry, man."
Bill
Roger frowns for a second, a little confused, like the poor boy in him can’t grok this lifestyle, like there must be something wrong. But then remembered shame reminds that same boy he would never shame anyone for how they live. So Roger puts back up the light smile, and he tries to pick back up the thread, lightly. “Well, that’s something. Hey, amigo, you got anything you played on? Like, if your lady friend were to ask? Maybe we could hit some record stores in the Haight sometime.”