’Neath Quicksilver’s Moon by Jaye Michael
Chapter Seven ― Baying at the Moon

¿Hasta cuándo, oh simples, amarán la simpleza, Y los burladores se deleitarán en hacer burla, Y los necios aborrecerán el conocimiento?

— Proverbios 1:22

How long, O simpletons, will you love being simple-minded, and you tricksters delight in trickery, and you fools hate the truth?

— Proverbs 1:22

Woe unto them who calls evil good, and good evil.

St. James Bible, Isaiah, 20.

“Jorge, have the dogs taken out for a run, por favor,” Mrs. Ortíz requested as she boarded the V-Lift with her husband. “They especially enjoy the north field. They like to play in the colonia del ardilla terrestres.”

“Sí, Madam Ortíz. I’ll see to it.”

Jorge turned to his second in command as soon as the boarding gate slid shut and said, “Pablo, see to it as soon as our visitors leave — I want no disruptions while they’re here, but don’t forget and don’t let them bring any dead squirrels back here, it will scare ‘la señorita.’ I need to meet with those fools from Espiar. Can you believe they want to run tests of our security? They’ve been unable to capture the Burlador gang for over a year now, yet they fear we may be unable to protect World Senator Ortíz and his family right here in the Senator’s own home.”

“Welcome, to our hacienda, Señor Webster. Jorge tells me you wish to review our security procedures and offer additional security advice, if needed.” Maria Ortíz-Berkowitz had no accent whatsoever, probably a result of her childhood in Switzerland. She met O’Neil at the main entrance to the hacienda, flanked by Captain Churco and one of his men. Long wavy black hair flowed down to the middle of her back but her bright red lips caught the eye first. She was strikingly beautiful. She extended a hand in greeting and smiled warmly, but her brown eyes were calculating and she appeared to be looking down at the Espiar agent, despite being slightly shorter. If Webster’s boss had not personally requested permission for this inspection, Jack knew it would never have occurred.

“Thank you, Señora Ortíz. I’m certain Captain Churco has done an excellent job developing and maintaining the security here.” Jack nodded to the Security Chief. “Director O’Neil asked us to review the security in light of the growing threat from “the Burlador, and some of the new capabilities the gang has shown in past attacks.” We will be quick and discrete, I promise, and we can probably learn something from your security officer as well. I have to say that I’ve been very impressed by what I’ve heard about your operation here.” ‘There!’ he thought to himself, ‘is that “PC‘ enough for you, O’Hare?’

It seemed to work, for La Señora Ortíz condescended to smile, so briefly that it was difficult to notice the twitch of her lips. “Very well, Señor Webster, I’m needed elsewhere. As I see you already know Captain Churco, I’ll leave you to your work.”

While clearly not the warmest of greetings, the room grew quickly colder after she left.

Captain Churco said, with icy formality, “Your presence is completely unnecessary, Agent Webster, and in fact introduces instabilities into our environment which actually decrease our overall security. This hacienda has been designed to withstand any kind of assault up to a tactical-scale nuclear attack. Our staffing does not change except as people retire or die and our procedures are designed after those used at World Security Headquarters.” Churco was a short, stocky man, but it was all muscle. The man could probably lift a small vehicle if necessary, and right this minute he looked like he really wanted to stuff just such a vehicle right up Jack’s...

He sighed and assumed an apologetic face. “Captain, my guess is that your security is better than that at World Security Headquarters. Unfortunately, I can also say that the security was better than that of World Security Headquarters at the home of World Senator Jackson, and both he and his son are now deceased.”

“I am aware of how one of his staff was somehow replaced by a lookalike, Agent. We have planned for that. No staff member is ever off the grounds of this hacienda alone, even my security staff. In fact, we do full DNA checks before they leave and before they are allowed beyond security when they return.”

“Yes, I noticed the equipment as I was being checked in. I was pleased to note that you required a DNA sample from me and I’m quite certain that you compared it with the sample on file at Espiar headquarters. While World Senator Jackson was not so thorough, the staff member duplicated was a long-time staff member, well known, and quite convincing in her interactions with the other staff. Additionally, and this has not been available in the general security releases covering the incident, we checked afterwards and the DNA match to those traces of the intruder left behind at the scene was 99.999%. As you know, that’s as close to a perfect match as we can come at this time. In fact, if we didn’t have independent evidence of the staff member having been imprisoned in her own home at the time of the assault, she would now be in prison for having perpetrated both murders, since we can ‘prove’ beyond the shadow of a doubt that she was present at the scene of the crime, and that through computer-simulated reconstruction of her movements before the explosion, ‘she,’ and only she, or an impossible facsimile, could have committed the crime. Unfortunately for us, but fortunately for her, she can also prove that she was somewhere else at exactly the same time. Our local prosecutor saw the injustice of accusing her after her ordeal — and it was an ordeal — she’d had neither food nor water for several days by the time the local authorities bothered to respond to the anonymous tip, so she didn’t look at all like the facsimile who actually planted the bomb. Then too, charging her would have set an impossible precedent if the case were brought to trial, since the likely outcome would be to overturn every DNA-based conviction since the technology was invented, and thereafter render the tests utterly useless in any evidentiary proceeding for the foreseeable future. Captain Churco, these criminals have access to technology so far advanced that it looks to our experts like magic.”

He blinked, a little slow on the uptake, then blustered, “That just negates one small component of our overall security system. I still see no reason to worry.”

‘Empty-headed buffoon!’, he thought, then smoothly said, “You are quite correct, Sir. I too doubt that there is any reason to worry. Look, Captain, your reputation precedes you. I know you are obsessively thorough and I know you are loyal beyond question. So why don’t you let my people do their job? You might find that we discover one or two small things that will enhance your security even more. We might see something in your operation here that we can use, giving you full credit of course, to help make all the other World Senators safer. You’ll be happy. Our bosses will be happy. I’ll get to go home and leave you alone. How about it?”

It took a moment, but a smile slowly spread across Churco’s face. “I like you, Agent Webster. Let’s get this over with.”

“It’s been two weeks and there’s been nothing, Boss.” Jack was angry, frustrated, and feeling stupid, not necessarily in that order. “ Captain Churco is chomping at the bit for us to get out of his hair and I don’t blame him. His security procedures are tight. There is absolutely no way I can see for any unauthorized person to get in or out of this hacienda. In fact, I doubt that anything much larger than a fly could get past his security as it stands. Just this afternoon, I saw a damned butterfly set off an alarm when it flew into the shade of one of the tunnel entrances.”

Tom O’Neil listened to the audio on his vid screen while slowly working his way through the piles of paper in his in-box. When Jack Webster was done, he looked up.

“I’ve heard you whining for almost ten minutes now. Let me just say that the only evidence of Burlador-like activity in the past two weeks has been a routine screening of a salesman named Bud Williams, whose business took him into a secured area two days ago. He reported having hired a call girl and having a wonderful evening on his way through Vegas, but the brain screen picked up traces of memory erasure.”

“I assume it wasn’t one of the usual wipe and swipe scams.”

“That was exactly what we assumed at first. There were about five thousand creds missing from his account, but the casino insisted he had gambled them away.”

“Let me guess, several ‘reliable witnesses’ confirm that he was gambling.”

“Of course, but in this case, one was the Chief of Police and another was the head of a rather large religious charity.”

“In other words, really reliable as opposed to the usual scum. So, you think this could be the Burlador making a pit stop on the way to Ortíz’s hacienda.”

“Well, I’m still not certain I buy your theory about a creature that can change its shape to become other people, but I will point out that the Las Vegas Historical District is almost in a straight line between The Illinois urbopolis and the Mexicali Historical District, and there’s one other thing: Mr. Williams, who has something of a reputation as randy horn dog on the road, professes a new dedication to the sanctity of his marriage, and says that his ‘wonderful’ experience with the hotel hooker showed him how fantastic marriage could be, if only he worked at it more. As hookers go, she certainly had a piss-poor approach to customer loyalty.”

“So how do I tell Churco we’re staying, possibly indefinitely?”

“You don’t. You just spent the last ten minutes telling me how good the security is there. Is they anything you could do or would do differently?”

“No, not really. It’s just…”

“It’s just that you want to catch the Burlador and rub it in everyone’s face, including mine.”

“Absolutely. Can’t hide anything from you, Boss,” Webster’s usual smirk was back on his face.

“Can the wise ass comments and bring your team home. We’re just spinning our wheels down there; Ortíz is on his own.”

“Yes, Boss. Right away, Boss.”

“¿Pablo? ¿Está listo? It's that time again. Saquen a los perros a passear. Saquen a los dos.”

“Sí, Capitán.”

“Why do these damn dogs insist on heading for the ravines?” Pablo muttered to himself as he tried to keep the two huge Russian Wolfhounds in sight while fighting to control the off-road vehicle as it bounced from one gully to another. Pablo and Juan were just at the edge of the free fire zone and the flat plain dropped off into a maze of gullies big enough to hide an army. If it were not so far from the hacienda, more than a mile, and if the walls of the hacienda were not adobe-covered durasteel, he would have worried about snipers since it was an easy six to ten foot drop into some of the deeper arroyos.

Pablo’s curses were momentarily silenced by a yelp from one of the dogs; then the yelp turned into what sounded like an ongoing dogfight with snarling growls and barking interspersed with yelps of pain. “If those damned dogs have gotten into a fight with a coyote again, I’m going to see if I can have them neutered.” Continuing a steady stream of curses, he sped up; for once glad of the seatbelt and shoulder strap. Juan cursed too, but his were interspersed with pleas for Pablo to slow down.

Nearly ten minutes later, clearing an especially sharp corner, Pablo slammed on the brakes. Maximilian was lying on his side, panting heavily. Julietta was about ten feet away, sniffing at her mate but not approaching him. Pablo quickly grabbed his rifle and made sure a live cartridge was in the chamber. There was still a ten-cred bounty on coyotes and Pablo was never averse to a little extra money. Juan also had his rifle out, but he scrambled toward the top of the ravine to check for intruders while Pablo slowly approached the downed dog.

“No me veo sangre. Whatever’s wrong with Max, he’s not bleeding.”

“Good. No intruders that I can see. Let’s get him into the vehicle and get him back to the hacienda pronto.”

The dog limply let the two men move him into the vehicle. Juan called to Juliette to join them, but she refused, instead hanging back as if searching for something. Cursing, Pablo used one of the command words and she stopped what she was doing. She still would not get into the vehicle, even with the command word, instead running beside it as they headed back to the hacienda.

Webster and his team were just about to board the train out of Mexicali when they got the word. World Senator Jamie Ortíz was seriously wounded and on his was via air transport to the nearest hospital. One of his dogs had attacked him.

Grabbing what they could and hoping the rest would be set aside when it got to Nogales, the team jumped off the train as it jerked into motion. Half an hour later, they were back at the hacienda and hitting a brick wall.

“Captain, there is no time for turf wars. I want to interrogate everyone in the hacienda immediately. This is the closest we’ve ever come to the Burlador and I won’t let him escape again.”

“What are you talking about? This is no assassination. This was an attack by a sick dog. You want to interrogate anyone, interrogate the dog and leave me be. I need to lock this site down and get a handle on the security at the hospital. I sent my best man, but I want to get there and review the situation myself.

“All right, I will. Dayton, find a recorder and join me in the yard. I saw the dog caged up there on the way in.

When she got to the yard, Sandra stopped in her tracks. Her boss was seated in one of two wooden chairs that had been brought out from the dining room. He was about five feet from the caged wolfhound, just staring at it. Clearing her throat, to let Webster know she was there, she did nothing but stand there, watching. The man just continued to stare at the dog. She was just about to give up and ask him what the heck was going on when he turned to her.

“Good, you found a recorder. Turn it on and sit beside me. I want you to personally witness what I’m doing in addition to the recording.”

Still totally in the dark, Sandra complied, sitting in the remaining chair and setting up the recorder on its built-in stand by the side of her chair after turning it on.

“Hello,” Jack spoke to the dog. “We haven’t met before, but I’m Agent Jack Webster and you’re not what you seem, are you?”

The wolfhound seemed to tilt its head as if thinking. Then it carefully moved its head from side to side. Sandra was impressed. She had seen well-trained dogs before; one had even been able to growl out what sounded like several phrases, but never one that seemed to answer questions with an eloquent motion of the head.

“Good. I’m assuming that was a ‘no.’ If I was correct in that assumption, please nod your head up and down.

Once again, the dog moved his head; this time up and down.

“Okay, so now we have a method of communication. Nodding up and down will mean ‘yes’ and wagging side to side will mean ‘no.’”

The dog did nothing, but Sandra almost got the impression that the animal was getting impatient.

“So, let’s start with what we know. You are the Burlador.”

The dog wagged its head from side to side.

“Please. Isn’t it a bit late in the game to be lying?”

The dog’s head moved from side to side and it added a deep growl.

“You’re not the Burlador? Then, what are you, an alien from outer space?”

Copyright © 1993, 2010, 2011 by Jeffrey M. Mahr

All rights reserved.

DEDICATION:

To my loving wife, Betty. She completes me.