Page 14 of Soros
“That’s confidential,” I informed her in a grumpy tone.
“I’m an agent. You can trust me,” Tania said with a facial expression that told me she felt humiliated by my doubt in her ability to keep secret information.
“It’s one of the humans I worked with when I was last here. At that time, he was the President of the United States.”
Tania’s mouth dropped open. “You’re kidding.”
“We’re here to deal with a threat and he’s more than willing to help.”
“But how do you even communicate with him?” Tania’s eyes widened. “Wait, are you saying that he’s alien and knows telepathy?”
“Of course not. The leader at base four is serving as a translator right now,” I explained reluctantly.
“You mean that you talk to the base leader through telepathy, and he calls the former president on his phone?”
“Maybe that’s how it’s done. I’m not sure how the base leader communicates with the human, but he’s passing on instructions right now.”
Lios chipped in. “We’re being directed to a landing site on a private property outside the city. A helicopter will be there to pick us up and take us downtown. We’re meeting a group of our contact persons to update them on the situation.” Leaning over Nerix, Lios asked Star, “Are you okay?”
“Yes.” Her answer was timid, and it was clear to see that she was nervous as Lios continued to update our group.
“It’s already late and we’re sleeping in New York tonight. Tania, while we’re meeting with our contacts, you’re getting Star situated at the accommodation we’ve been given.”
“Where are we staying?” Tania asked.
“They gave us the offer of being hosted privately or at a hotel. I chose hotel because private hosting tends to involve socializing, which is time consuming.”
“Maybe I should stay with the women,” Nerix suggested.
Lios rejected that idea. “Earth isn’t Markatoria and Tania knows how to handle herself and take care of Star.”
“It’s still an unknown planet to the rest of us and in case something happens they shouldn’t be left unprotected.”
“We’ll be fine,” Tania assured Nerix dismissively and it made me suspect that they weren’t doing great as a couple.
Once we reached New York and separated into two black town cars, Nerix didn’t look happy. As the women drove off, he muttered to Lios, “That wasn’t a good call. If anything happens to them it’s on you.”
Arching his eyebrows, Lios warned telepathically, “Don’t go there, Nerix. They aren’t children and Tania is a competent and resourceful agent on Earth. You always get overprotective and suffocate women. And there’s no need to be verbal now that it’s just us three.”
Narrowing his eyes, Nerix responded in the same way. “I wish I had been more overprotective with Ziba and Keindra. Maybe then they would still be alive.”
It was as if the temperature dropped, and so I changed the subject before the confrontation between Nerix and Lios escalated further.
“Can we focus on Ko’roz for a moment? I’ve looked through everything I could find on him and there are some important character traits that might help us in our search.”
Lios seemed relieved for my bringing us back on track. He was quick to ask, “What are those traits?”
“Ko’roz is flamboyant and likes an audience that he can impress with his abundant lifestyle. On Markatoria he would exhibit his wealth in the most vulgar way and that’s why I argued that he’ll be drawn towards larger cities. His thought is that he can hide better among a large population of people. That might be true, but this Malbreean has gotten away with a lot of shit his entire life. He’s not used to his actions having negative consequences, because he’s been rich in a corrupt society where he could pay officials off. I predict that he’ll quickly succumb to his need to show off. Right now, he might be careful while he settles in, but my guess is that he thinks he’s safe on Earth because he’s convinced that coming here was an unpredictable move from his side.”
“It was,”Lios said.“I would have never thought of Earth and I’m still skeptical that he’s here.”
“He’s here,”I said although I couldn’t be sure.“Ko’roz’s biggest weakness is that he considers himself to be much smarter than everyone else. My colleagues on Tandaquon are backtracking his moves while he was there. If we can figure out where he stayed and who he worked with to change his identity, then we can get answers to where he might have gone on Earth.”
We kept talking about Ko’roz until the car stopped in front of a townhouse. I had been to a place similar to this while I worked on Earth. That place had been in London, and it had been the home of the British Prime Minister. This place had a staircase leading up to a shiny black door, which was opened as we approached.
Once inside, we met with two stern-looking men and one woman. Lios, Nerix, and I sat at one end of the table and the humans sat at the other.
The woman addressed us first. She was old with a hard expression in her small eyes, which sat close above her beaky nose. “We are members of the US Congress and serving on the committee for alien contact. It’s a secret committee that requires the highest level of security clearance. We are all handpicked for the great responsibility. There are currently five of us, but given the short notice, only we three were able to attend tonight.”
