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Updated Sunday 15 August, 2010 12:14 PM |
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SNAKE OIL
By Doctor What
Chapter Twenty-One
Monday morning. Time to pay for your
two days of debauchery, you hungover drones. ~
**
April 3, 2017
Drake had just turned the corner and was less than three blocks away from his house when he saw something that made him hit the brakes on the car.
To be more accurate – he saw someone.
Drake slowed the car down to a crawl and pulled into a stop behind a parked minivan.
And watched.
There were several skills that had been drilled into Drake’s psyche as of a result of his nearly three decades of service.
One was learning how to react to a possible threat.
The other was how to not react to a possible threat.
Immediately, Drake started analyzing the situation in front of him.
Only one man-- that he could see.
Not in uniform so unlikely he’s a cop.
He’s standing out in broad daylight in a residential area at three in the afternoon so he clearly doesn’t care if he’s seen by the neighbours.
So –if he’s here to beat me up or kill me, he’s either very confident or very incompetent.
Tall…kind of lanky…dirty brown hair ... rather young…looks like he’s college age…maybe just a few years older…
Wearing a really crummy looking trenchcoat that doesn’t seem to fit him very well…over a very nondescript black suit that looks like it came off a second hand coat rack...
Has that eager beaver look to his face…
And is that a handgun not so well concealed near his hip?
Drake put everything together and one answer immediately leapt to his mind.
Spook.
Drake let out a sigh.
God I hate spooks.
Especially the young ones.
Only one question that needs to be answered now.
FBI or CIA?
Letting out another sigh, Drake stepped out of his car and calmly walked towards his house.
The man idly glanced over in Drake’s direction and looked away—then did a double take.
Pulling himself together, he walked confidently towards Drake and came to a stop a few feet away from him.
Pulling out his ID, the man flashed his badge.
“FBI. Special Agent Ferguson. Patrick Michael Drake, I presume?”
Drake made a non-committal vaguely acknowledging grunt.
“Can I have a few moments of your time?”
“Am I in some kind of trouble?”
“I’ll rather that we discuss this matter in private, sir.”
Barely suppressing an urge to roll his eyes, Drake led Ferguson into his house.
“Mind if I drink?” asked Drake nonchalantly as he poured himself a glass of Bombay Sapphire.
“No—by all means, do so,” replied Ferguson.
Drake sat himself down on a leather chair and kicked his feet up onto the footrest.
“Would you like one as well?” he asked, sipping his drink.
“I’m on duty.”
“Sucks to be you, then,” replied Drake, taking another sip and smiling. “What can I do for you?”
“I’m here to ask you a few questions about our alien visitors.”
“Ask away, Secret Agent Man,” replied Drake, taking another sip.
Ferguson cocked an eyebrow at Drake and tilted his head to one side. “What do you think of them?”
Drake took another sip of his gin before replying.
“Pretty wild and crazy.”
“Is that all?”
Drake tilted his head to one side and seemed to ponder on this question for a full thirty seconds. Shaking his head, he took another sip.
“Yup. Wild and crazy seems to cover everything. What do you think of it, Special Agent Ferguson?”
Ferguson shook his head in annoyance, muttering something under his breath.
“Wild and crazy would be a good description. God—you should see all the loony stuff that’s going on just in my department! Reminds me of this absolutely insane internet discussion forum I used to hang out on when I was 15 or so...”
Ferguson shook his head again and pulled himself together.
“In any case, Mister Drake, I’m here to ask you if there’s anything more you would like to tell us?”
Drake raised a quizzical eyebrow.
“I’m not entirely sure I understand what you’re talking about.”
An outside viewer would have been very impressed at Drake’s apparent confusion. It would have been a performance worthy of half a dozen positive reviews from critics.
Ferguson licked his lips and shuffled his feet a bit but remained standing.
“As a matter of routine procedure, Homeland Security often does random checks of the coming and going of current and former members of the military, especially those individuals who are deemed to have certain...skill sets...and knowledge that may prove useful to certain domestic and foreign terrorist groups.”
“Really now?” said Drake, his face the very model of innocence.
“Yes indeed,” replied Ferguson.
“Well—thanks to our alien friends technology, we seem to have a lot less of them now, don’t we?” replied Drake.
Drake had privately thought to himself that, if nothing else, the Lytasians were good for that. Several spy satellites with enhanced Lytasian tech had been quickly (and quietly) launched shortly after the Lytasians had shown up. Drake, like nearly everyone else alive during the latter days of the Cold War, had heard all the stories of spy satellites that could read a newspaper from orbit. With the Lytasian enhancements, the satellites could now spot typos from orbit. A few weeks after Contact, a rather large assortment of ‘Number Two’s’ of various terrorist groups around the globe - why is it ALWAYS the number TWO that gets hit? thought Drake to himself - had found themselves suffering a series of unfortunate ‘accidents’.
Well—getting decapitated could – theoretically – be considered a freak shaving accident, I suppose... thought Drake.
“Yes, yes...” replied Ferguson, a bit testily. “That’s true but—you know – the price of freedom is eternal vigilance and all that stuff...”
“And have I done anything that warrants this extraordinary attention?” asked Drake innocently, putting on a performance that would have earned him a handful of ‘brilliant effectiveness’ accolades from the critics. “I’m fairly certain that I have not done anything the least bit suspicious or questionable,” he finished, going for the Emmy.
Ferguson leaned back a bit and hrumphed.
“You seem to have been doing an awful lot of traveling lately, Mister Drake.”
“I was under the impression that’s legal last time I checked - although I admit I didn’t see today’s headline so I may be wrong.”
Ferguson let out a snort of derision this time.
“Very amusing, Mister Drake. It’s the nature of your trips that we in the Bureau find intriguing – an awful lot of traveling all over the globe in a relatively short period of time. Meeting certain individuals who are also...er...under scrutiny by us or our allies. Spending a lot of extra time with members of your old unit. That sort of thing.”
“And this warrants a visit from the FBI? My, oh my--you spooks don’t seem to have anything to do these days, do you?”
“I really would like an explanation, Mister Drake. A man of your experience and knowledge and background gallivanting around the world and having meetings with people of …er…questionable affiliations?”
Drake leaned back a bit in his chair and took a -- very slow – drink on his gin.
“What’s to explain?” he replied eventually. “I’m officially in semi-retirement, as your file on me no doubt confirms. I’ve always enjoyed traveling when I was in the service and am now doing it as a private citizen instead as a soldier. And in my thirty years service to this country – or to put it another way – since you were but a gleam in your mom’s eyes, I have had the opportunity to serve with a wide variety of individuals in a wide variety of countries. A man approaching middle age isn’t allowed to have a bit of fun and hook up with some old friends anymore?” Drake finished off his statement with a deliberately long and slow sip of his gin.
“Nevertheless…it does seem a bit…suspicious,” replied Ferguson, leaving the statement hanging in the air.
Drake squinted his eyes. His outside facial expression was still relatively neutral.
Inside however – Drake was trying very hard not to grin.
“Special Agent Ferguson – if I’m under suspicion than why are you here telling me this?”
That seemed to rattle Ferguson.
“That is because you’re not under suspicion, Mister Drake,” he said. There was a long pregnant pause. “At least—not any more.”
“Oh?”
“I brought my suspicions to my supervisor. Twenty-four hours later, I was informed by a Captain James Weaver in the Navy, a Major Douglas Wise at the Pentagon and a Colonel James Ward of the Marines -- to name just three individuals – that my suspicions were quote extremely unfounded unquote, with the added commentary that I should occupy myself with something of a more substantive nature rather than –“ Ferguson paused to make quote marks with his fingers in the air - “‘waste precious Bureau resources’ on wild goose chases.”
It was obvious from his demeanor that Ferguson had an entirely different opinion on what constituted ‘wild goose chases’.
Drake just smiled.
“What can I say, Special Agent Ferguson. People like me.”
Ferguson hrumphed again.
“So—“ continued Drake, “Am I to understand that this is not an official visit from the Bureau but merely a rather nice and friendly social call instead?”
“You can consider this to be whatever you want, Mister Drake. I have no idea what you’re up to –or even if you’re up to something at all – but sooner or later you’re going to mess up and you won’t have any of your friends to help you.”
Ferguson turned and walked towards the door and opened it and started to walk out.
He suddenly paused just as he was stepping out and then turned around and faced Drake.
“And when you do—I’m going to be there.”
Having delivered his exit line, Ferguson walked out the door, slamming it shut behind him.
Drake sat in his chair, slowly finishing off the remnants of the gin in his glass.
With a grunt, he got up and walked towards his desk, a smile on his lips.
Hrumph! Two months before some spook got wind of this little resistance movement of his.
Damn—they’ve actually improved a lot since my day…I thought for sure that I would have had a whole THREE months to work with…
Drake sat down at his desk –eliciting another grunt this time as well – and pulled out a black notebook out of a desk drawer.
He began to leaf through it.
Taking out a pen, he slowly started crossing off various names in the book.
After a few minutes, he put the notebook back down.
There were a lot of names crossed out in the book now.
So—that’s it. Every favour, every marker, every piece of dirt I’ve got - all of it now used up.
No more guardian angels.
And a lot less sources of info too.
But at least I’m good for a while.
Nodding his head once again, Drake put the notebook back into the drawer.
He sat there for a very long moment, deep in thought.
Finally making a decision, he pulled out a cellphone and dialed a number.
“Hello?” said a sleepy voice.
“Jason?”
“Sir?” said the voice, now no longer sleepy and with a definite eager tone to it.
“Time to go to phase two.”
“Yes sir!”
~~
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