The Girl With Pink Hair: Pt. 04

My apologies to anyone expecting to pick this up and get a quick fix. To understand what's going on you'll need to revisit earlier episodes.

As ever, any resemblance to persons living or dead is co-incidental. Constructive criticism is very welcome.

This episode is dedicated to Purplefizz for his kind words.

Recap

In "The Girl With Pink Hair: Pt 3" Elena is awarded her PhD and decides that she has had enough of academia for the moment, so she takes a job in hippy grocery store. She starts to cook for the clan at Somerset Street and gradually acquires a small network of friends. Elena and Jessica grow closer together and are introduced to each other's parents. They start to consider the longer term for their relationship.

These are the mundane events and are, by definition, quite ordinary. However, Elena's life is becoming stranger. She has come to the attention of the Folk and is challenged by another faction. One night she has a profoundly unsettling paranormal experience. Jess becomes uneasy at hints of external manipulation in their lives. Sylvie reveals that she knows something of Jess' true nature and purpose but seems benign.

In her role as covert intelligence asset (aka undercover sneak) Jess is assigned a target. Elena discreetly accompanies her to the meeting to watch from a distance. However, Elena is challenged by yet another undercover operative. It seems that she is now embroiled in a conflict she can't see and only barely understands.

***

I've got a girlfriend ...

The loft 17 ^th May

In the week after the encounter in the Bar Italia, nothing else extraordinary happened. When out and about, Elena gradually stopped scanning the crowds for intense looking men in long black coats. Jess reported the incident to Mariam but was advised to carry on as normal.

However, a few days later, a note was pushed through the door at Somerset Street. Shawna rolled her eyes as she handed it over. Jess regarded it with bemusement. Who used actual paper these days?

Back in the loft, she sat at the small table with Elena and prised open the envelope to extract the folded sheet of paper inside. She made an exclamation of surprise, "He wants to meet us!"

"Who?" Elena asked, cradling her coffee, and blowing gently on the surface.

"Alan Forrester. Mister 'welcome to the war!'" Jess mocked him by blowing her cheeks out and speaking in a wobbly voice.

Elena giggled. "It's a trap!" she exclaimed, channelling Admiral Ackbar.

Jess shrieked with laughter. "I thought you didn't like Star Wars!"

"Oh, it's just cowboys in space," Elena snorted, "And stormtroopers can't shoot for shit. It's the space travel that really gets to me. Have you any idea how much energy is involved?"

Sensing that her pet physicist was about to go off majorly, Jess hastily intervened. "It's just a film, love, just make believe."

"Might as well say people can fly," Elena grumbled, still not mollified.

Jess prudently decided not to mention Thor or Iron Man. Or Buzz Lightyear. She shook the paper. "Back to the point, he wants to explore the possibility of an alliance."

"But you're just a foot soldier! Why talk to you?"

"I don't know. And here's the weird thing, he wants you to be there too."

"Me!" Elena said in shock.

"The letter says 'us'"

They stared at each other.

"He said: 'welcome to the War' Now I suppose I'll find out what that means. Am I in danger?"

"Yes. No. I don't know. Neither of us are important enough to warrant executive action. Then again, neither of us are important enough for anyone to lose too much sleep if we were just to disappear. But that's not the way things work!"

Jess was agitated and Elena was sure she could feel the psychic roil muddying the air. She placed a hand on Jess's arm to steady her. "Let's meet him first. Find out what he wants, then worry. Tell your higher ups."

"Yes, you're right. Thank you." Jess hugged her gratefully.

***

The Backs 21 ^st May

They met at a spot on the tourist trail between the River Gate and the Commoners' Gate. It was still quite early in the season and there was a steady babble of foreign languages as visitors to the city took photos of everything, mostly themselves in front of picturesque views. However, the companies that bussed them in were keen to keep them to schedule so it was relatively easy to find somewhere to sit.

Alan Forrester appeared from out of the throng. He'd forsaken the duster in favour of a scuffed leather flying jacket, dark glasses, white tee shirt and black jeans. He looked very different, and Elena realised he was not much older than they were, early thirties maybe. In the light of day, the saturnine looks gave way to a slightly intense expression. He was actually quite cute she decided, before thinking that that was probably an asset in his line of work.

He plonked himself down and rested his elbows on the back of the bench, staring out over the field. There was silence for a few moment before he turned to Elena and said, "You look different without a heavy glass in your hand, Doctor Kowalski."

She regarded him amusedly. "Is that a way of saying 'no hard feelings?'"

He chuckled and Elena found herself in the odd position of rather liking him.

Jess gave him a look. "No hitting on the opposition's girlfriend!"

He put his hands up. "Just a little professional flirting, Miss Calamar."

Now it was Elena's turn to laugh, and the mood lightened considerably. "I hope you'll not be using any underhand techniques to try and influence me, Mr Forrester."

He looked at Jess and grimaced. "Not a chance with her around. And now that you're in the know, not much chance otherwise either."

Elena took Jess's hand and kissed it.

He sighed. "Some spies have all the luck."

There was silence for a minute or two while they sat looking over the field between them and the river. On the far side, the colleges glowed golden in the sunshine and the cattle in the meadow pursued their mission objective single-mindedly. The wind gusted and lifted the detritus beside their feet.

"I represent Centrist interests," he said abruptly, tugging the edges of his jacket a little tighter around his chest. "In this matter I think we find common cause so it would be a lot less disruptive to work together."

Elena blinked. If he was a Centrist, then what was Jess? She consoled herself that labels meant nothing, the Committee of Public Safety was one of the most feared instruments of the French Revolution.

"Maybe," Jess said. "What's your interest in Mr Plantagenet?"

Elena wrinkled her nose. Who? However, this was the spies' party.

"We would prefer that he be less strident in the campaign," he replied.

A couple of swans, white plumage radiant in the sunshine, edged up the bank of the ditch separating them from the field. Beady black eyes inspected the trio before moving on with aristocratic disdain.

There was more silence as Jess and Alan each tried to work out what to say to advance their agenda.

"It's unusual for you to be in the field, isn't it?" Elena said and felt them turn to her in surprise.

Forrester raised his eyebrows. "It seems I've developed a bad habit of under-estimating you, Doctor Kowalski."

She looked at him. "Call me Elena. What do you really look like?" Jess gave a sharp intake of breath while he chuckled amusedly. "No underhand stuff, now. I can go and get a heavy glass."

He laughed out loud then looked at her intently, and for a moment there was a shimmering impression of hair so deep blue in colour it was like the iridescence of a magpie's wing. His eyes blurred to a deep violet and then back to brown.

"Whoa, good looking!" she murmured.

"Elena!" Jess said, shocked.

"I'd recruit you myself if you weren't already entangled," he said, chuckling and shaking his head. He regarded them afresh, then frowned slightly, and put his head on one side. "You ... you really are entangled, the Twain as I live and breathe. Are you sure you have no Talent, Elena?"

"She's as mundane as they come," Jess said, taking Elena's hand and standing up. "I'll pass your message on. How can we get in touch with you?"

"How about we don't pretend it's still the Dark Ages and exchange numbers and text one another."

"Huh?" Elena quizzed.

"The Orpheans." Jess answered, shaking her head and Elena mentally added another to her list of the groups that worked in the shadows.

Jess took her hand. "Come on you, before he lures you to the Dark Side!"

"I hope we meet again, Elena," he said as she turned to go.

She favoured him with a sideways glance and inclined her head. He smiled and she felt a little heat inside. Suppressing it quickly, she turned away and accompanied Jess into the college through the River Gate.

***

Later, as Elena slept, the Centrist's words came back to Jess, and she thought of the moment at the ball where she could have sworn Elena was projecting.

Then there was what he had sensed about their coupling, how very complete it was and how it had been since almost they first met. Something hovered just out of Jess's reach, something profound, but in reaching for it, it faded away until she was grasping smoke.

***

The loft 24 ^th May

Elena thought about Alan's eyes quite a lot. They had a quality like Jess' but not like Jess' parents and relatives. Their eyes were just like mundanes, and Jess had assured her that no-one had 'glammed up' for their visit. Was there something special about Alan Forrester? And Jess?

"Both you and Alan-"

"Oh, it's Alan now, is it?"

Elena gave her partner the severe look. Jess caught her bottom lip in her teeth and widened her eyes. Elena took a deep breath. "As I was saying, both of you have hair and eye colours that are not mundane. Your relatives could all pass for Sapiens without needing a glamour. People might remark on your hair but, as I've noticed, girls with statement hair colours just aren't that unusual. But him? He'd stand out in any crowd."

"The very Talented do tend to peacock. Guess it missed a trick with me, I'm very ordinary."

Elena blew her a kiss. "Not to me. And don't fish for compliments."

"But him, he's very good. I've read up on him, he's one of their best."

"So why is one of their best mucking around with us low lives?"

"Maybe because he thinks we might be useful?"

"That makes me think of Stalin's 'useful idiots.' Are we Alan's useful idiots?" Elena frowned.

"You're not an idiot, love, you just lack ... information."

"I guess. Now if you want to know about the homogeneity of the Universe at intermediate scales, I'm your girl, but I'm in the dark on witchy politics."

Jess blew her cheeks out. "My handler has authorised me to tell you a few things."

"Your handler!" said Elena with glee.

"I'm a spy, and spies have handlers, and I don't know why I'm blushing, this is what I was recruited to do for the Adventists."

Elena smiled in satisfaction. "Centrists, Orpheans, Adventists, check. Who else?"

"The other player is The Elect, although they're much smaller and more secretive. They're also a bunch of nutters. We really don't want to be involved with them."

"Let me guess, they're the Magnetos of the Folk."

Jess looked at her sideways. "You absorb everything, don't you? Yes, there are cliques in The Elect who think we ought to be nudging disaffected geneticists to create plagues to cull Sapiens."

Elena shivered. "There are always nutters." She straightened. "Is this why Alan's involved? Fanatics plotting something terrible?"

"Could be, but we've no intelligence on that. And my target is a low-level government minister in Housing. Unless he's planning to short the cement in the mortar, I don't think it can be anything to do with him."

"So why was Alan there that evening? And your guy was a no show. I wonder, did you put off someone he was interested in?"

***

... who's better than that

The Leahy Building

Two members of Alan's faction met in college rooms.

Professor Matthews leaned back in her chair and regarded her visitor with undisguised glee. "There has been a great disturbance in The Force!"

Judy Pendlesham gritted her teeth. "I swear, if you are taking the piss, I can arrange for life to become a great deal less comfortable."

The old academic stared back at her with chilly disapproval. "You always were fond of throwing your weight around, Judy. Don't make idle threats."

They looked at one another for several charged moments, then the other shook her head. "Get on with it, then."

Professor Matthews took off her spectacles and polished them absently, "I never expected it to happen under my nose."

"What to happen? Speak sense!" Judy said impatiently.

"I understand that you've been keeping an eye on Jessica Calamar and her new girlfriend."

"Yes, they spiked a little while ago and they keep doing it. Their future is opaque. My team is investigating. How did you know that?"

Professor Matthews chuckled, "I have my sources."

Judy looked sour; she was supposed to be in charge of operations. The team was leaking and there would be hell to pay when she found out who it was.

"Elena Kowalski might be a Slànaighear."

Judy looked open mouthed at the old academic. "Are you sure?"

"Would I joke about such a matter?"

"She's a mundane!"

"Possibly latent. We don't know, but the intelligence leans in that direction."

Judy shivered. "That story is fifteen hundred years old! Something we use to frighten children!"

"Nevertheless, this is the hand we appear to have been dealt."

"Then that's a fucking disaster! She's entangled with that gutter trash Jessica Calamar. The Calamars are Adventist stalwarts."

"You're missing the point. You were a terrible student, always rushing to conclusions, usually the wrong ones."

Judy's mouth twisted. She had often locked horns with the academic when she was a student, and now they were doing it again. "Enlighten me, then, Professor. What is the point?"

"If Elena Kowalski is an instantiation of the Slànaighear, then she won't have a faction. Adventists, Orpheans, The Elect will represent everything she is fated to extinguish. We risk ending up with another Battle of Badon."

"Badon?"

"The final battle between Arthur and Mordred. The main reason the Folk have been under the radar for the last one and a half millennia. Only this time it won't be for some hill outside Bath."

The younger woman's hand rose to her mouth as the implications dawned on her.

The professor looked at Judy steadily, over her half-moons. "So, if the story is to be told, you ought to be trying to work out whether Miss Calamar is occupying one of the other roles. And, if the story is to be told then there needs to be a third."

Judy stared at the eminence gris. Which was worse? Jessica Calamar as the mythical warrior, the Queen's Sword, or the terrifying spymaster, the Queen's Shadow. There had to be another actor waiting in the wings and they had no clue as to who that might be.

"One more thing," Professor Matthews said.

"Tell me this can't get any worse!"

"This will of course attract the attention of the Americans."

Judy blanched. The Yanks had a deserved reputation for shooting first and asking questions later. The last time they had deployed a SWAT team into the UK, their target had been a nasty little cell of the more extreme Elect and privately Judy thought that the American solution was better than the endless dithering in the conclaves of the Assembly and the Council. It had been a terrible mess and an awful lot of fast footwork had been needed to cover their traces. This time though, she was the point officer and she shifted uneasily in her seat.

"Quite," said the Professor, as if reading her thoughts. "You've got a lot to be getting on with, Judy. Don't let me detain you," and she turned back to her papers.

Judy glared at her and rose from her chair, then turned to retrieve her coat from the pegs by the door. Halfway through putting her arms into the sleeves she paused as an idea came to her.

The professor's head came up and Judy could feel the other woman's curiosity as an ice green shard. It gave her no small measure of satisfaction to leave the professor's silent question unanswered.

***

As she hurried back to her car, her mind raced. Alan Forrester had already made contact with Elena Kowalski and Jessica Calamar. The possibility that they might have an early opportunity to intervene and steer events in their favour was within grasp. He'd have to be told to pay more attention to Elena but kept in the dark about anything but the most general auguries ...

***

The Thai Kitchen 26 ^th May

A couple of days after that, in a good restaurant in the heart of London, a well-dressed woman with aristocratic bearing sipped an artisanal light ale as she waited for her lunch date. The fashion for all things artisanal amused her, as had the trend for 'organic' food before it. Being a chemist by training, the notion of food being composed of compounds with no carbon atoms was frankly absurd.

A couple of American men were adjacent to her at the counter, loudly and tediously boosting each other like salesmen post a couple of stiff ones. She reached out and gently dialled down their bullishness.

Beyond them a young woman was seated a little way away on a bar stool and the older woman appreciated the way the check pattern of her trousers followed the curves of her anatomy like gradient lines on a map. Her thoughts turned to memories of the times she and her wife had invited other women to their bed. She frowned. It had been a while and she knew that Nancy worried over her workload.

A little later she was joined by another woman also in high end but more conservative clothes. "Sorry I'm late, traffic's dreadful!" her lunch date apologised, shaking her umbrella gently before stowing it. Her companion was magnanimous. "I've only had the one beer, honest!"

They sat at the long counter in front of the window to the street and exchanged small talk until the food arrived. Outside, people hurried past, heads down, umbrellas ineffectual in the intense squally showers.

The late arrival plumped for green chicken, which was fiery but worth it. Silky meat and crisp vegetables atop unctuous coconut milk, spiked through with lime and pungent lemongrass. Not strictly authentic perhaps, but it definitely hit the spot. She had a sip of nam manao and discreetly mopped her brow.

"I don't know how anyone eats that stuff," her companion laughed, as she tucked into her Pad Thai.

"I imagine it started out as a bragging contest for the young men."

"You're probably right. Talking of young men, what do you think of ours?"

"Oh my dear, I hardly know what to think about anything anymore! It's like we've spooked a herd of elephants."

She stabbed her empty fork at the window for punctuation.

"He's got a good reputation, smart, thinks on his feet. The problem is that now we're asking good Premiership players to play for their country. Even fans of the running, jumping, kicking thing will acknowledge that not everyone cuts it, and it's nearly impossible to work out who will and who won't in advance. I don't mind the odds, but the size of the pot frightens me."

"And the mundane? How on earth did she get roped into this? Is she relevant?"

The other shook her head. "This is what we were hoping for! Some randomness, so we wouldn't tread the same territory as we have since time immemorial. I have no idea what role she has to play in this, and it is of a very personal concern to me, as you are well aware!" This last was uttered with considerable heat and the other reached out to soothe balm upon the troubled waters.