Mercury - Part 7

Part 7 – Retelling

INTERVIEW 001 – 13/07/2028 (PART 1)

(Two figures sit across from each other at a table. The first is a man in about his thirties wearing a business suit, the other is a mouse recom of about nine years of age.)
BIO-TECH INTERVIEWER: "Jupiter. Nice to finally see you again."
JUPITER: "With all due respect, Mr. Arthurs, you can go suck a pile of-"
BI: "There's no reason to be rude, Jupiter."
J: "There's no reason for me to be here, Arthurs."
BI: "Three years back... we want to know the details of your escape. Do you know where the others are now?"
J: "My other playmates? Dead, I suppose, or something like it."
BI: "Are you lying to me? Neptune? Saturn?"
J: "I'm telling you that I don't know. It's just not a friendly world out there when you've escaped."
BI: "Are you glad to be back in the 01 Bio-Tech facilities?"
J: "I would rather be dead than being here."
BI: "But you said..."
J: "That it's not a friendly world? No. It's not. Recoms aren't common out there right now, and everyone's mistrustful of us, even though we're children. But this place is worse. We were already at your mercy, you made us do things... and Neptune, oh my god, poor Neptune. I'm sure the only reason he...
BI: "It. Not he. You're androgynes."
J: "Shut up, I'm talking... that he didn't just kill himself while you were punishing him for worrying about Mercury, knowing that she would die... He loved her, you know that? Even I, with deficient empathy scores, was able to see it."
BI: (Skeptically) "Like me and Mrs. Arthurs? And don't talk to me like that."
J: "No. Not like that. I think your relationship is a physical thing. Uranus had told me that you aren't properly compatible with her. No, Neptune loved Mercury in a different way... and if you don't want me to talk to you like that, well, there's really no helping it. I hate you so much."
BI: "You'll receive punishment if you continue talking like that. You never used to have such attitude, Jupiter. Whatever happened out there after you left, it didn't affect you positively."
J: "As bad as it is, being caught was the worst thing that could have happened to me. I would have rather died on the street than have been picked up by the hospital... traced..."
BI: "It couldn't have been helped. You were very sick, Jupiter. I'm just glad you could have been recovered. You were always one of our most valuable subjects. Now, please, tell me... what happened. How you got out?"
J: "How your whole organization got outsmarted by a group of children? Fine. Play the video for EXPERIMENT207."

***

"So what did you find?" said Samara, who was already back at the hotel room we were sharing. We wanted to look like honeymooners for the purpose of the trip, since some of the Amundsen hotels are a pretty popular spot for that kind of thing. It was apparent that Sam was here for awhile, though, given that everything seemed to be arranged in parallel and perpendicular lines to the wall.

"Blueprints. Or at least, I've got a guy who'll get us the blueprints to the building. How about you? What did you do?"

"Card keys with security clearance for two specific nine to five employees, designs for their uniforms," said Sam with a shrug. "I also picked up some lemon candy." I eyed the small bag. After the Apocolypse War that wrecked Old Earth and extinguished almost all its native species, there weren't very many options left for growing lemon trees, since that wasn't one of the priority items to bring on the colonization missions. Most of that kind of candy was artificially flavoured, given how expensive it is to produce the juice. Samara's bag, though, looked like one of the genuine ones. Expensive tastes.

"Any chance that you'll tell me how you got all that?" I asked Sam with a raised brow.

"There was a vendor down the-"

"Not the candy. The other stuff." I interrupted, provoking Samara to just look at me with some degree of ire.

Sam just stared at me for a few moments and said, "Fine, just don't interrupt me. After we parted ways, I ran down the street to meet up with my contact, but ran into this guy in a Designer Genes outfit. I said to him, 'hey, why are you wearing that', and he says to me, 'because i'm testing it out, i'm the designer for these suits'. Well, that's a good opportunity, so I ask him about giving me the designs, and he's interested. He thinks I'll critique them. The keycards, would you believe that I found them on the ground, next to two very distracted employees?"

I shook my head. "I like story-time as much as the next guy, Tammy, just tone down your story next time and make it believable."

"When uncovered, believable lies have so much worse for consequences, but the unbelievable ones are all in good fun," said Sam, with a small chuckle. "Check my report on the mission notes."

Ah, I recalled, it was unlikely that this partner would be verbally forthcoming. But maybe, like Mercury, Samara was better able to express the truth through writing. As I glanced over the mission notes, I came across a story much more likely to be true, though written with generic language so that neither one of us could be traced.

I parted with One. I passed through the labyrinthine tunnels of Amundsen, lower into the undercity, to a haven of things that the locals would prefer not to show off to tourists. My destination, however, seemed to thrive on tourist activity: a brothel in an area of town that I will not specify. (Ask Two to lead you there if you are One and you need to go there. If you are Three, the area should be irrelevant to you, but if it is not, ask Two to lead you there.)

Previous contact, hereupon being referred to as Madame Beta, was from Two's previous mission, a search and rescue operation that occurred 15 months ago. More details will be given upon request directly from Two, in written form to be destroyed immediately after reading. Madame Beta was very accommodating, offering to provide me with the keycards and uniform designs of two of her problematic clients, employees of the Company. Research says that they both begin their next shift in 63 hours, this should be enough time for One to get his piece completed.

I nodded my head slowly. I never liked reading this kind of writing, but I knew that I was One, Samara was Two and Errol Olne was Three, so the meaning of it all was pretty clear (in reports that go up to Thirty-Nine, it becomes really difficult to follow. Which I guess is the whole point). The Company was just our target company, Designer Genes.

"By the way, check that out," said Samara, gesturing towards a little device on the wall. Most people would have missed it. I had done a check of the room earlier, when we first arrived on planet, and found no surveillance devices in this particular hotel room. So the tiny camera and microphone that I was looking at must have been something new. It seemed as though it was already attached to Samara's PDA, which was now attached firmly to the wall.

"Well, look at that. What'd you do to it?" It was a pretty standard piece of spy equipment for this planet, but there was no way that it was there when we first arrived. Which means someone installed it after our arrival.

"Yeah, we should probably put a show on it later. I've just been looping some pretty boring shots and sounds so far, so that it wouldn't get suspicious," said Sam, shrugging indifferently, "But they'll catch on if that goes on too long."

I nodded a couple of times and looked at the screen of the PDA, which just showed where in the loop the video being displayed. The video Sam chose was quite easily looped, and involved actions that didn't keep us on camera for very long, and there weren't any conversations. It was clear that we'd have to put on some kind of display to avoid suspicion, but also that we would need to watch our backs. We have already aroused some kind of suspicions, likely from Martian corporations, and we were already being monitored by the police. "Alright, well, let's put this room back exactly the way it is in the video. We've got a show to do."