“Toledo,” they chimed.
“Right. Your PDA or AID calls Toledo, disappear and lie low for at least two days before returning to base or dropping the Bane Sidhe a cube, your best judgment which. We’re all seasoned operatives. If your best judgment says ‘abort’ somewhere along the line, call it. There’s no points for heroism in this business. Jay, it’s way out of line from her profile, but if Makepeace comes running up to the gate right at boarding and never sits down, just call Toledo. A switch that’s not clean would be worse than an abort, especially with this mission. All right. Let’s split up and move.” He grimaced at the muffin in his hand and paused by the door, apparently debating whether to toss it uneaten. He took another bite of it and walked out the door.
“What’s the matter, Granpa? Don’t you like corn? We have it so seldom,” she said, grinning.
“I can eat cornbread for every meal if I have to, you hellion. Even if the yankees do insist on putting sugar in it.”
Cally’s dummy suitcase was a good match for the persona. Her ID said she was Irene Grzybowski. Irene was the kind of woman nobody would look at twice in a crowded area like an airport: maybe forty to fifty, dumpy figure, eyes on the ground most of the time, polite but not friendly to security. And nobody did. Nobody looked at her as she heaved the battered cloth suitcase, made out of fabric that looked like a college student’s sofa, onto the counter. Nobody looked at her as she walked through security with the all-plastic syringe of tranquilizer taped into the reinforced elastic under band of her sports bra, which did a good job of helping her look fat and lumpy rather than well-endowed. Nobody looked at her as she walked to gate S-six and went into the ladies’ room across from the departure lounge, taking up a natural-looking position in the second stall from the end. She had beaten Granpa and Tommy in getting here. She had not looked for Jay. It would have been bad tradecraft.
She took her PDA out of her purse and flipped it open, setting it on the top of the tissue dispenser. The buckley’s voice access was, of course, off. Should the abort code come in while the screen was off, the PDA was set to vibrate. She hoped it wouldn’t be necessary.
She looked at the clock icon on the screen. Six-fifty-three. She had made good time. After sending Tommy her arrival message, getting the syringe out and ready, and brushing her hair, there was really nothing to do but hurry up and wait. The trick on this type of setup was to keep her attention focused on the PDA screen without her mind and eyes wandering off and without falling into a daze staring at the screen. Cally’s solution was to split the screen, with the small custom icons labeled “in motion” and “video” on the top half and an old logic game based on hunting for hidden mines on the bottom half.
At six-fifty-eight, the message icon on the control bar blinked at her. Tommy and Granpa were in place.
The blinking of the video icon caught her eye at seven-oh-five. She set it to play on the lower screen and had just caught her first glimpse of the target when the in-motion icon started blinking at her. Okay, time enough to watch the movie after I take the target. If she’s moving on her own, she needs to be here. Best to take her on her way out of the stall.
She breathed evenly as the door opened, all senses hyper-alert. Something was wrong. The tread was too heavy on the floor, and not a woman’s shoe. She tensed.
“Cally?” a voice whispered.
That could be Tommy. Or not. “Um… this restroom is occupied.”
“She bought a donut and went back to sit down. Reset and wait for him to send it again,” he said.
“Got it.” The voice was definitely Tommy. She heard him leave again as she tapped options on the screen, working quickly to reset everything so she’d know when the target left her seat again. It didn’t matter what the mission was, there was always something. Although I hope to God this is not another mission day from hell. Good grief, under the damn bed!
She watched the video, taking note of the target’s seat location and that she had a laptop computer with her. It made sense, since the assignment was clerical. Real screens were still the best option for minimizing eye-strain from all-day use.
As she waited, she could periodically hear apologetic male voices as Tommy and Granpa redirected a female traveler to the next nearest restroom. At seven-fourteen the in-motion icon blinked again.
She shut off and pocketed the PDA, palmed the syringe, and stood. As the door opened, she flushed just for verisimilitude and opened the stall door, going to the sink as the target came in the door looking down at her silks and swearing softly.
By the time Cally reached the sink, the other woman had grabbed a handful of paper towels and was rubbing at the large wet blotch. She didn’t even look up as the assassin slipped behind her and clapped a hand over her mouth, finding the right spot for a neck injection with the ease of long practice. Makepeace didn’t have time to struggle much before the strong drugs hit her system and she went limp, breathing smoothly and evenly as Cally lowered her to the floor.
You’re lucky. I get to let you live. She went to the door and opened it a crack, motioning Tommy inside with the cart. Granpa nodded shortly to her before turning to look back outward, watching for threats. As Tommy came through, she was back out of direct sight of the door, over by the sinks and already unfastening the top of the target’s gray silks.
“I’ll get her, you get out of those.” Tommy waved her away from the unconscious woman.
She quickly stripped to her panties, leaving the clothes neatly on the floor in the order they’d need for the other woman. She shrugged into the woman’s thankfully well-designed bra and the silks, finding enough in the woman’s purse to do a passable copy of her makeup, pinning the silver-blond hair in a knot at the base of her neck. Thank God she doesn’t wear nail polish. Having to match the shade on the go would have been annoying.
Socks and women’s low-quarters, which were thankfully not quite regulation — having added support insoles — and she was almost ready to go. The buckley on her PDA and the on-board storage had been sanitized by the best the night before and given a surface makeover to the make and model of the other woman’s. As far as it was concerned, she already was Captain Sinda Makepeace. The cube in the reader slot had the only sensitive information. She handed her PDA and Makepeace’s to Tommy and took over finishing dressing the target while he convinced the other PDA to surrender its files to hers. He opened a bottle of “cleaning fluid” and dropped the cube in, handing her back her PDA.
“Now remember, to access the transmitter, you need to go to your photopak icon, open it, select help, then transmitting a photo. The application will let you transmit anything on your PDA or in the cube slot,” he said.
She helped him clean up the scene quickly, getting the now nameless woman squared away under the trash. She had to work carefully to avoid further mussing the uniform. The wet patch would look bad enough until it dried. And it felt clammy. Ick. It probably won’t even be dry by the time we get up to the ship. I’m definitely going to need to stop in my quarters and change before I do anything else.
“See you on Titan.” She gripped his hand quickly and was gone.