Cally's War

Bobby Mitchell was good at surveillance, and his skills had only improved since leaving law enforcement. A throwback to a touch of Sioux on his daddy’s side and a hint of Mex on his momma’s, he was a small, slightly nervous man with dark hair, dark eyes, skin that tanned easily, and a talent for blending in with his surroundings, whether people or environmental.

Bobby maintained his tan very carefully, having noticed early on how disinclined people were to notice a swarthy, average to short man engaged in manual labor.

Today, he was sweeping a sidewalk across from a park. Bobby’s natural vision hadn’t been all that good, but the damned aliens had some doctors that weren’t too shabby. As he progressed along the sidewalk, he was from twenty to eighty yards from the park bench that allegedly was the enemy dead drop, yet he could clearly make out the features of anyone on or approaching the bench.

He could have used electronics, of course. And he did have them, as a backup. Still, after seeing just a few of the things his damned alien bosses could do with recorded data, Bobby was a firm believer in the personal touch. He’d never been one to assume the enemy was incompetent or stupid.

Besides, the mission here was purely confirmation of a tip in advance of a raid.

He was halfway down the sidewalk sweeping, the second time, when the very average black man with conservative scalp patterns, dressed in a dirty sky blue windbreaker and jeans, sat down on the bench. The face was a dead ringer for one of the four in the tip file, and he admired the smoothness of the man brushing a hand under the edge of the bench under cover of tossing crumbs to the pigeons. You had to admire the artistry. He didn’t even see him read it, and only knew it was probably a note on flashpaper from the slight excess flare as the man lit a cigarette, standing and strolling casually back the way he had come.

Tip confirmed, mission accomplished. Bobby continued his sweeping all around the square, palming his back-up cameras as he passed them.

The Fleet Strike puke who picked up their cameras from within the park itself half an hour later was clumsy, wearing civilian clothes that were too carefully sloppy and too new and overacting his casualness, although his sleight of hand was acceptable. Still, it was obvious Fleet Strike hadn’t faced a serious threat from an opposing intelligence force in a long time.

Too bad he couldn’t count on all their people being that inexperienced. It was probably overkill, but he’d still plan the raid as if they were going to be competent competitors for the prizes.

After cleaning up the last camera, he disappeared down an alley to his ten-year-old gray sedan, throwing the broom in his back seat. His AID looked like a cheap discount-store brand PDA. He took a moment to call his cousin, “Hey, Johnny. Yeah, it’s me. We’re on for beer and pizza Tuesday. My place.”

Tip confirmed, raid on schedule, set the wheels in motion. And may we all get nice bonuses out of this.

As he got off the bus, Levon Martin took out the baggy where he’d saved a bit of bread from his sandwich. He tore the bread into crumbs as he walked from the stop to the park.

It was a beautiful day but a trifle windy. His clothes had the well worn look of the comfortable clothes that a man might wear for a walk on his day off. The air today smelled fresh and green, and he couldn’t help but be cheered a bit by the profusion of dandelions that pushed up between the cracks of the crumbling sidewalks, giving way suddenly to solid concrete and well-tended flower boxes as he turned onto the square.

In the park in the middle of the square, he found a spot on the left end of the bench that was mostly clear of pigeon droppings and sat, playing out the crumbs to the fat, iridescent birds as they waddled and pecked at the bits of bread and sometimes at each other.

Somewhere in the middle he managed to palm the flash paper sticky-note stuck to the bottom of the bench. Under cover of crumbling a bit more bread, he tore off the corner of the paper that held a few tiny dots of film that would yield up their data later, under magnification. The rest of the note simply said, “Plus one hour for Joe.”

He kept it palmed while he finished feeding the birds and disposed of it before he left by the simple expedient of burning it as he lit a cigarette, covered by the flare of his lighter. The baggy with the data dots went into his pocket. Wonder what in the hell Barry has going on that necessitates pushing back the mid-cycle meeting? Not that it matters.

There were various people in the square or on the walkways this Sunday afternoon, but none of them stood out. There was nothing to distinguish the sidewalk sweeper from any of a couple of dozen other people going about their business in plain sight.

Martin walked back out to his bus stop, arriving five minutes before the next scheduled pickup at that stop. After a short wait, he boarded his bus and was gone.