The Signal Ch. 04: Espionage

Tika gasped briefly as she spotted a weapon pointed straight at her and instinctively strafed out of the way, just before he opened fire in suppressed popping sounds. It was a silencer. Nearby equipment was damaged. She screeched again as she charged at him, dodging weapons fire.

It didn't take long before she roundhouse kicked the gun out from his grip, with it sliding beneath a desk out-of-reach.

Lykra quickly rolled away and then shot back up, confronting his aggressor. Then he recognized her. It was a stand-off, with the two birds locking onto each other

"You..." he spoke in the Nakanu tongue this time. "You are that Oummu'uka trophy wife who saw through my ruse. You will see nothing tonight! You best keep quiet if you don't want an incident."

"That's where you're wrong. Now!"

Suddenly a giant bolas-net with weighted balls at the points was cast over at Lykra. Two figures jumped out and attempted to pin him to the floor, catching him off-guard.

"[What?!]"

"Take that, you snake!" That was Gallo's voice.

Too late, Lykra was caught in a thick nylon net before Tika, Gallo and Tola all placed their feet onto his body, pressing firmly and threateningly.

"Rustle then up like them cows back home." That was Tola, crossing his arms smugly at the now-trapped spy.

"Curse you! Gah! After all I have done for you!" Lykra was not pleased with this, attempting to shake himself out to no avail. His arms and legs were all wrapped tightly to his body from the net, trapped like an animal.

"Good work, Tola!" Tika congratulated, "you earned yourself a bonus!"

"Oh you should've seen my ability to castrate them cattle."

Gallo shook his head at that little detail.

Gallo and Tola both lifted their feet off the immobilized Lykra, letting their weight off him. But Tika's foot is still on his. She has surprisingly strong legs for her kind.

"Now, we will have to make a long talk with you about all this," she said. "We'll take you to our office to settle this."

"You will learn nothing from me!"

"Oh you don't have to do anything." Tola said. "Remember, we have a mind reader."

"What?"

"And once that's done, off you go to the King."

"Besides," Gallo glared at Lykra. His gaze held a terrible indignation. "We're going to be relaying this straight to the President. I just can't believe you've been doing such slimy work right under our beaks!"

"Such is an example of how ignorant you Unohuan grease-drippers are," Lykra spat. "We will see how the feathers fall."

"Oh, you say that." Tola had a glint in his eye. "Well come on, let's throw down!" He proceeds to carry Lykra to the private office, secured by some extra rope at the back.

Once there, everyone was in the same chairs as during the interview several months prior, except Lykra was still bound. Tola took care to expose Lykra's head from the netting.

"Now we put this on your head," Gallo placed the helmet at his cranium, firmly strapping it on, fastening the strap as before, "which is connected to the speakers of the room."

Indeed, there were speakers around the room. They let off some standby feedback, confirming his claim.

"There is nothing you can hide," Tika said to Lykra. "Plus, it will help us test our new modifications."

"Curse you."

"So, after your performance we will now do an extensive interview. Now," she sat up at her stool and crossed her legs with her gaze fixed at Lykra. The interrogation has begun. "First question. What is your real name?"

Then the speakers played the thoughts out loud.

Oumutosk Gaggoshki, Oukashkan agent.

"So, it was a lie." Tika noted. "You're not Lykra; that was just a pseudonym."

"You will learn nothing from me!"

"We learned one thing already," Gallo said.

"Now, second question." Tika continued. "What is your real background?"

Eastern Oukashka, small town west of the capital. Curse it, breathing technique.

"Damn you and your invasion of the mind!" 'Lykra,' now Oumutosk, was livid. "You all are scum to use this tool as torture!"

"Look who's talking," Tola clicked his tongue disapprovingly. "Not like your own government ain't much better."

"Additionally," Tika added, "you took our honest work from us without our knowledge - without our permission! We don't appreciate that in our company! Now, third question. What is your real education?"

"I will not disclose that!" Oumutosk shouted again, but his mind could not resist so easily as the answer revealed itself.

Political Theory and Government.

"Government? What about that Cultural Studies thing?"

Taught during training.

"So, now it makes sense. That was a half-truth!" She looked down at Oumutosk. "Mr. Gaggoshki, we saw you hijacking into our mainframe computers and illegally extracting our files through an external drive. Which leads to our final question, just to verify. Why did you come here?"

Infor- ret-!

Oumutosk was able to suppress the thought before it could come out fully.

"What's that now?" Tika interrogated further.

No answer. He was doing that breathing exercise.

Gallo put his finger on his beak in mock-thought, "I know a little something that will tickle that out." Then Gallo carefully grabs onto a feather on his arm and then plucks it out.

"Ow!" Why did I do that?

"Hmph! Feather tickling?" Oumutosk shook his head at this. "You must be joking with that old trick. Do your worst."

"Fair enough. Tola?" He gives the feather to him.

"Sure thing, boss."

Then Oumutosk kept stoic as Tola reached into his sides and began lightly stroking the feather tip against it.

At first, it did nothing.

But then...

"Mhmph... hmhm..."

Gallo was encouraged by what he was seeing. "It's working. Keep going."

"Yeah, you all crack up like nuts." Tola continued the tickling, switching to the other parts of his body. He would do this bit by bit.

He begins to swirl the feather through Oumutosk's exposed feet, each pried open for maximum coverage.

"Hmph... hmhm... heheh... oh no..."

"Hmm, might have to give this a boost. Hey Tika," Gallo asked, "have you seen our duster anywhere?"

"You know what? I just happen to keep one right here!" She grabs a table duster from the windowsill. It was made from fine, soft and bristly mammalian hairs.

Oumutosk looks on at the duster with dread, struggling and bucking underneath Tola's weight.

Tola was impressed. "Ahh, that's way more effective!"

Before long Oumutosk was bawling in laughter, his resolve faltering. Even Tika couldn't help but chuckle at what she was seeing; a hardened government agent subject to the most childish of tortures.

"Coochie-coochie, you better spill your secret otherwise I'll make you laugh so hard you may lose your voice." Tola spins the duster across his neck, then down his sides, and through his underarms.

"What? What? Ahahahah!"

Confident that Oumutosk was softened up, Tika makes one more attempt. "Now that we're in business, let me repeat that final question. Why have you come here?

Information retrieval! Information retrieval! Relayed to the King's Cabinet!

"A-ha! So you were stealing our information!"

"Alright Tola, that's enough for now."

Tola nodded and put the feather duster away from Oumutosk's body, setting it back on the table where it was. The interrogation is finished.

"Ahah! Aha! Aha! Oh... oh... oh no..." Oumutosk's formerly grinning expression gave way to a mortified dread.

"Oh no?" Gallo looked at him with both confusion and, despite his earlier anger, a hint of concern, "why's that?"

I am compromised. I will be punished for this! Gods save me! Oumutosk's thoughts still reverberate through the speakers.

"Actually," Gallo reasoned, "you revealing you're a spy will work in our favor."

Oumutosk was dismayed, saying out loud. "How?!"

"For one, we haven't revealed this recent discovery to our governments

nor does the kingdom know about what happened."

"What?" Oumutosk looked in outraged confusion. "Do you not work under their jurisdiction?"

"We do, but we haven't even submitted our recent findings to them,

which means both parties are none the wiser."

"Ahh, I understand now." Oumutosk seemed calmer now, "you are not to reveal the findings until your work is completely finished?"

"Exactly! We also know that recent tensions with the governments have not been as smooth lately, and that's why the aliens have sent us this recent information. Unless our two nations cooperate, I doubt we will be getting any further details."

"So," Tika added, "we intend to make a plan where everyone is happy - and that includes you (as much as I hate this bit of mild extorsion) being able to live with your dignity intact."

"You mean you expect me to continue working with you?" Oumutosk said. "I serve Oukashka, I swore an oath to serve their interests and theirs alone."

"Well, as far as your king knows," Gallo reasoned. "We still don't know you serve him."

"My mission as an undercover agent serves only a part of this." Oumutosk stops quiet, but his thoughts speak out through the speakers.

I hate to admi- gah! Cursed helmet!

Gallo saw this, realizing that the hands-on part of the interrogation is done. "Tola. Care to take off that helmet? We're just about done with it now."

Tola nodded and unstrapped the helmet, taking it off of the spy's head. Oumutosk sighed in relief, then said nothing more for a moment.

"I understand now."

Tika listened attentively to him. "What's that?"

He started to look heavy-hearted from this. He was about to make a confession. "I will tell you this only because my king will not know of this. You are right in that the relations between our two nations have been eroded. The extraterrestrials will not have sent the blueprints they did had they not wished us to remedy this. But I am afraid a simple gadget will not do it; the king and his cabinet are making efforts to skirt the peace treaty from the years before and ensure that Oukashka reigns supreme by the end of this tech race."

"What?!" Both Gallo and Tika shouted at once, shocked.

"Yes," he admitted. "But it is clear now. These aliens only wish for all the world to come together, and not for one nation to dominate the rest."

"Then why would he send agents like you to steal others' progress?" Tika asked.

"Because... because..." His head slumped down heavy in shame from what he was about to give away. "We are... we are falling behind."

Everyone in the room save Oumutosk exchanged glances with one another as they put it all together. It is a bit surprising a technological juggernaut like Oukashka would be faltering like this.

"Do not misunderstand me, we have still made great strides in technology thanks to the extraterrestrials and our best science teams. Yet compared to your own people, according to our intelligence, we are lagging behind. Hence, why I am here."

"Then let's speed up their progress a bit?" Gallo bargained. "Grant them access to some technology but nothing that they can use as a weapon.

"Hmm?" Tika turned to Gallo. "What are you thinking, Gallo?"

"I know what I'm doing," he turned to Oumutosk again to ask. "What has your kingdom managed to uncover currently?"

He answered, "through our own efforts we have uncovered our own piece of a translator device. We saw that that the translator program uses an elaborate mathematical algorithm to analyze grammar and sentence structure, as well as an automatic learning capability to allow comprehension across even the most distantly-related language families. Also, we have discovered that the extraterrestrials somehow possess a far deeper knowledge of our brain structure than we could have ever known, as they have laid out plans for neural networks related to not only language and speech, but also motor skills related to body language. With this information, we can combine this data with your findings to fully complete the project! "And good news, it may not even necessitate a helmet, only as a possible method."

"Right," Gallo was skeptical, but not of the information provided. "But I doubt your organization will just happily it over for free. So, here's my plan. We're going to untie you, then lead you over to my computer so that I can fix it after the mess you made. Then you're going to upload some files. Not all of them, the relevant ones only. Only then will you send it to your organization."

This left Oumutosk puzzled. "You... you are willing to let us leak this information to our government? Your government will not be happy with this."

"They don't need to know," Gallo assured. "Remember, this is a world project. The issue is you taking information without our consent, and right now we are giving you that consent. Besides, this is for world peace - we can't sabotage it with an international incident. You studied International Relations, didn't you? You should know this. Think about it."

Oumutosk was silent as he thought it over. He sighed through his nose. "Very well. I will hand you some tago juice in return for reasoning with me. It is only fair that I return the favor and as an apology for what has happened."

"Thank you, but a fair warning." He looks over to Tola, who wiggled the duster and feather in front of Oumutosk's face. "On top of that he can neuter cattle, though I would never condemn my worst enemies to such a fate."

"Oh, it is not unusual in the farm town that my family and I grew up in. My father was a butcher."

After Oumutosk is freed of his bonds he gives Gallo and Tika a respectful head-nod.

"We are looking forward with working with you again." He raised a hand once again, this time to Oumutosk instead of that persona named Lykra.

"As with you, comrade." He salutes before leaving the room, before pausing just as he was about to exit the door.

"Oi, Gallo."

"Hmm?" He turns around behind him to listen.

"You have a fine woman. Treat her well and she will reward you well."

He continues and leaves the exit, before wincing and groaning from the neck pain Tika gave him from that kick. Medical bills will have to be covered for this one.