What to do about Katrina, Ep. I, Act I, sc. 8-9
A mistake is only a mistake until it is corrected
If you have just joined us, you are very welcome! Although if you wish to avoid any potentially spoilery stuff, or confusion arising from arriving late at the cinema, you can begin at the beginning. My intro is here, and the first instalment is here. If you missed the last one, here’s the previously link.
As a brief recap, Tom fulfilled his orders and took Katrina out to lunch (and was firmly of the opinion there’s a double meaning there), with watchers in attendance, and has now dutifully returned her to the Embassy. As you would expect, he is somewhat eager to discharge himself from any further Katrina duty. Sorry, but no such luck, boyo.
Katrina did correct her mistake when they arrived back at the Embassy. She apologised to the security men.
“I’m sorry for scaring you. Truth is,” she lied, “of course I don’t know Jet Li shit. I just needed to convince you I did so you wouldn’t hurt me.”
The senior of the two laughed, with a little relief. “Well, you had me convinced.”
His junior colleague still looked a little anxious. “I would’ve shot you, you know, if he hadn’t stopped me.”
“Just as well he did, then. It would’ve been messy.”
“Katrina is a talented actress, apparently,” Tom explained, raising an eyebrow.
Katrina loved the fact that she had an unwitting accomplice. Concealing that inner smile was effortless.
“Ah. Now that I can believe.”
Perfect.
And so Tom led Katrina back into the room where they first met.
“While you go and report back to your boss, Tom, could I borrow one of your smartphones? Just so I can look up stuff on your whatever-you-call-it-pedia.”
“Wikipedia.”
She rolled her eyes. “Wikipedia. Keeping myself fascinated by the differences in this world is the best way to distract from me from the stress of this situation. I need to keep myself occupied. I hope that makes sense?”
Tom smiled. That was another awkward spy question avoided. “We can definitely let you have a phone, sure.”
“Protocols, again, eh?”
“Yep.”
Katrina knew perfectly well that was bollocks.
Tom got up to leave.
Katrina remembered something else. “Tom?”
He turned around.
“I couldn’t help noticing you looked distinctly uncomfortable when I suggested those injections are bioweapons. Does this mean you’ve had one?”
Tom took a breath, then answered softly. “Yes.”
“Did you have any ill-effects?”
He shook his head.
“Have you had any since?”
“None whatsoever.”
“Hmm.” She looked at the floor and thought about it for a moment. “Did the Service arrange these injections for you, or did you just go to your regular doctor?”
He hesitated.
“I don’t think that’s a classified secret, Tom. Did your employer arrange the injections? Perhaps I’ll put it that way.”
“Yes. The MoD.”
“And are you aware of any of your colleagues having any adverse reactions?”
He shook his head again. “What are you suggesting?”
“I think you were given a placebo. You and all your colleagues. It would make a lot of sense.”
Tom’s mouth was a little open in surprise. And, it has to be said, not a little relief. She was so convincing she really had gotten him worried.
“Well, Tom,” she smiled warmly, “I think that means you’re in the clear. Hopefully that makes you feel a little better.”
It did, as it happens. He returned the smile. “I’ll be right back. Don’t go anywhere.”
She leaned back comfortably in her chair whilst she watched him leave, took a deep breath, and closed her eyes again.
“Any other mistakes I need to correct?”
The Goddess didn’t need to answer that one.
“A million?! Bloody cheek! I thought you said she’s a socialist?!”
“She’s a very contradictory kind of girl.”
“She’s taking the piss is what she’s doing. Well, I’m sure we can haggle her down a bit. We have all the cards, don’t we? If she’s desperate. Which she clearly is.”
“I suppose. But she does understand about property rights. So she’ll need some kind of signed legal document before we take a sample.”
“Hmm. Well, I don’t know anything about that kind of stuff. I’ll look into it.”
Tom was a little desperate to ask. “Is it true that a lot of business consultants used to work for the Service?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Katrina mentioned it. She wants us to ‘recommend’ someone.”
Peter burst out laughing. But then narrowed his eyes suspiciously.
“She’s right, then?”
“Yes, as it happens. Business consultants don’t just advise about boring business stuff, whatever that is. They can do all sorts of nefarious activities, for the right price of course. And the client, naturally, retains plausible deniability. Spying on competitors, headhunting, hacking, that kind of thing. That requires a certain skillset, wouldn’t you say? Obviously, they need to maintain a reputation for client confidentiality. And all that comes at a price, as you can imagine.”
Tom laughed. He never knew. “They really don’t tell the likes of me much at all, do they?”
“Nope. Get used to it.” Peter grinned.
“Meaning her million-pound offer can’t be too far off the mark, then?”
That wiped the grin off his face. He frowned and decided to dismiss the issue.
“So anyway, how was she? Mentally, I mean?”
Tom frowned too. “She’s clearly distressed. She has emotional outbursts. But then she does an annoying passive-aggressive thing and calms down quickly enough and apologises. She said that even if she’s not from a parallel world -”
“Which she isn’t.”
“Even if she isn’t, her brain thinks she is, so she’s just completely stressed. She says she just needs to feel secure.”
Peter sighed. “Well, I suppose that makes sense.”
“She has this idea that her Goddess sent her here.”
“Oh for fuck’s sake! Right. Get Malcolm over here. Tell him it’s urgent. In the meantime, take her to the hotel and I’ll get the watchers to make sure she doesn’t run away. Then we’ll examine those personal details and find out who she really is. She seems to know far too much about intelligence matters. And as for choosing Russian names for her imaginary husband and children… I’d say that alone justifies taking this seriously.”
“Once I’ve done that, Peter, may I be excused from Katrina duty?”
“Absolutely not.”
Tom continued to frown. This was without doubt not only the weirdest day of his life so far, it was quickly becoming the most tiresome. And he had an uneasy feeling it wasn’t going away anytime soon…
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