Charles Stross - The Clan Corporate

"Oh." Mike was silent for a moment. "I was expecting an enquiry, you know?"

"There's been a board of enquiry." Smith leaned forward. "We don't have time to piss around, Mike. We had a video take on you when Source Greensleeves offed Pete and took you hostage, it turned up yesterday. Left hand didn't know what the right hand was doing, excessive compartmentalization in our

security architecture, et cetera. Nobody's blaming you for what happened; if anyone gets blamed it's going to be me for sending you guys in in the first place. But. We're moving too fast to play the blame game right now-"

Mike gestured at the table on the other side of the bed: "Pete's funeral is tomorrow. I was planning on being there."

Smith looked worried. "Shit, our schedule puts you on a ranch in Maryland-wait, hang on, it's not like that. I'll get you to the funeral, even if I have to bend a few rules. But I really do need you back on duty."

Mike stared at him. "Spill it."

Smith stared right back. "Spill what?"

"It." Mike crossed his arms. "This setup stinks. Whatever happened to your professional assets? I thought you guys majored in infiltrating hostile territory. You're the military, you go to exotic places and meet interesting people and kill them. I'm just a cop. Why do you need me so badly?"

"Hold onto that thought." Smith paused for a moment. "Look, I think you habitually overestimate what we can do. We're very good at blowing shit up, that's true. And NSA can tap every phone call on the planet, break almost any code," he added, with a trace of pride. "But… we're not good at human intelligence anymore. Not since the end of the Cold War, when most of the old HUMINT programs were shut down. You don't get promoted in Langley by learning Pashtun and going to freeze your butt off in a cave in central Asia for six years, among people who'll torture you to death in an eyeblink if they figure out who you are. The best and the brightest go into administration or electronic intelligence; the people who volunteer for spying missions and get through the training are often, bluntly speaking, nutjobs. A couple of years ago we had to fire the CIA station chief in Bonn, did you know that? One of our top guys in Germany. He'd been invoicing for a ring of informers but it turned out he was a member of an evangelical church, and what he was really doing was bankrolling a church mission. Anyway, you've got a three-month lead on anyone we could train up to do the job, and whatever your own opinion of your abilities, you are not bad. You've done police undercover work and stakeouts and run informers-that's about ninety percent of the skill set of a field agent. So rather than pulling one of our few competent field agents out of whatever very important job they're already doing, and trying to teach them hochsprache, we figured we'd take you and give you the additional ten percent of the skill set that you'll need."

A long pause. "Bullshit. What else?"

"What do you mean?"

"You know damn well I'm unreliable. I'm not acculturated, I still think like a cop, even if you're right and the job overlap is significant. I'm unreliable from a departmental point of view: I've got the wrong instincts. And this isn't a Hollywood movie where delicate operations get handed to maverick outsiders. So. What aren't you telling me?"

Smith shrugged. "I told them you'd see through it," he said, glancing at the door. Then he reached into his vest pocket and pulled out a photograph. "When did you last see this woman?"

"Who-oh. Her. What's she got to do with this?" Mike's mouth went dry.

Smith glared at him, clearly irritated. "Now you're the one who's playing games. You've been through the clearance process, we know what color underpants you wear, we interviewed your ex-wife, we grabbed your home phone records." He waved the photograph. "Confession is good for the soul, Mike. Level with me and I'll level with you. How well do you know this woman?"

Shit. Should have guessed they'd figure it out. "There's not much to tell." Mike struggled to drag his scattered thoughts back together. "I met her a few years ago. She's a journalist, she was doing a story about drug testing for the glossy she worked for. It worked out really well at first. Did a couple of dates, began to get serious." How much do they want to know? It was still a sore point for him. "Yes, we did sleep together."

"Mike. Mike." Smith shook his head. "That's not what this is about, not really, we're not the East German Stasi."

"Well, what did you want to know?" Mike glared at him. "She's a journalist, Colonel. She wasn't faking it. I picked her up at the office a couple of times. I didn't have a fucking clue she was anything else! Let me remind you that I didn't know the Clan existed, back then. None of us did. I don't think she did, either."

"I'm not-I wasn't-" For a moment Smith looked embarrassed. "Carry on. Tell me in your own words."

"It didn't work out," Mike said slowly. "We were talking about taking a vacation together. Maybe even moving in. But then something spooked her. We had a couple of rows-she's a liberal, we got bickering over some stupid shit. And then-" He shook his head. "It didn't work out."

"How long have you known she was involved with the Clan?" asked Smith.

Mike shook his head. "Not known. Wasn't sure." But Pete was, he realized. And what Matthias said- "Listen, it's over between us. Two, three years ago. I didn't put two and two together about the woman who Source Greensleeves kept ranting about until he waved it in my face, and even then-how many journalists called Miriam are there?"

Smith put the photograph away. Then he nodded at Mike. "How would you characterize your relationship with her?" he asked.

"Turbulent. And over." Mike reached over to the bedside stand and picked up a glass of water. "If you're thinking what I think you're thinking, it won't work."

"And maybe I'm not thinking what you think I'm thinking." Smith suddenly grinned. "Honey traps were an old Stasi trick, and they didn't work consistently-in this situation, the collateral damage from blowback if it goes wrong is too high. But can you confirm that you do-did-know Miriam Beckstein, journalist, last employed by The Industry Weatherman?"

Mike nodded.

"Well, there's your explanation! Now do you see why you're needed?"

Mike nodded warily. "What do you want me to do?"

"Well, like Dr. James told you two weeks ago, we want you to set up a spy ring in Niejwein. That hasn't changed. What has changed is that we now have a list of starting points for you. It's a very short list, and she's right at the top of it. If we're right-if she's a recent recruit, dragged in by her long-lost family-she may be a potential asset. As long as she's inside the Clan, that is: she's not a lot of use to us over here, except as another mule."

Mike shivered momentarily, visualizing a collar bomb around a throat he'd buried his face in. "When?" he asked.

"We know roughly where the royal palace is, in Niejwein: it overlaps with Queens. Niejwein isn't a big city, it won't be hard for you to get there with the right disguise and cover story. Which, by the way, is that you're a Clan member from the west coast. It won't stand up to scrutiny, but from what we know about Niejwein it won't come in for much unless you try and play it for real. They're pretty primitive over there. And we've got an extra edge I haven't mentioned. We captured a courier last week."

"You did?" Mike sat up.

"And his dispatches." Smith frowned at Mike. "You don't need to know the details. Anyway, it seems your girlfriend is going up in the world. She's due to be the guest of honor at a royal reception in two weeks time, and the document taken from the courier includes what appears to be an invitation to a country cousin." Smith looked smug for a moment. "One of the things the Clan are good at is postal security-which works against them at times like this. As long as they don't know we've got couriers working for us, you're in the clear."