General Purpose Conference Room #6, Australian Parliament House, Canberra
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Anna walked into the Conference Room to find the three people she expected already there. With her was one of the people from her Technical Group and their equivalent from the Parliament House team. The pair of them swept the room for any electronic devices, then left.
“Right, this briefing is to the executive of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Law Enforcement and is code worded material, I will need you to each sign acceptance forms. You may not disclose anything said here, without either my approval or the approval of the majority of the full Committee. Does anyone not agree to these conditions before I start?”
Ferdi Pasquie, representative of the Liberal Coalition, Janette Xi, an Independent and Marty Miller, representative from the Labor party, agreed.
Once the paperwork was completed, Anna collected it and began.
“Firstly, we have one or more ‘black op’ groups with the AFP. When such groups are created, they require the unanimous agreement of the Committee at that time, although the information that they exist is only shared with each new Chairman of the Committee from that point on. Chairman, can I get you to confirm this, please?”
Ferdi looked up in the air for a moment, blinking a couple of times. “Oh, yeah. I remember that. Yes, I was informed when I took over as Chair.”
“The group in question is called the AFP Paranormal Group and is tasked with investigating all credible, and I suppose some not-credible, paranormal reports. Most of these are successfully debunked.”
Marty Miller said, “What’s this cost us?”
Anna mentally compared this reaction to the normal one she gets. It’s not about ‘does the paranormal exist’, but what does it cost us. Politicians. “Basically, about two million dollars a year. Sometimes capital expenditure adds a bit to it, but generally about two million.”
Janette Xi said, “And the second thing?”
“We are still working our way through this, but at this stage we’re confident that there are actual people able to change into an animal form. The initial analysis identified a mid-range threat which we are working to properly define. This is the threat overall, not from ‘shifters’ or ‘weres’ in Australia, who seem to be fine, but from the potential risks with terrorism and espionage. If there are shifters here, then there could be shifters ‘there’ and our security processes would probably not be able to handle a threat from an animal vector, among other concerns.”
Both Ferdi and Marty spoke at once. The reaction was pretty much what Anna expected - overreaction and political butt covering. Except for Janette. She was being far too calm about this.
After ten minutes, Janette interrupted the conversation. “Gentlemen, you’ve been arguing in circles for the last five minutes. Do either of you want to take lead on this?”
The discussion went on for another ten minutes before Janette asked, “Anna, from your viewpoint, is this informational, or we’re actually expected to do some work, and if so, how much and how urgently?”
“I suspect, the overall project will generate a lot of work. This is simply the first step, as per our procedures.” Anna tapped on the small pile of folders in front of her, then continued, “We’ve completed our responsibility by informing this committee. Now it is the committee’s job to pass this information on to the appropriate person or persons for any further action. The urgency is around the public exposure of this information, either now or at some future time. There is the probability of public unrest if this information is handled incorrectly.”
Ferdi spoke up, “Just to make sure, this is all real and we’re talking about a bunch of werewolves?”
“Yes, it is all real. No, not were-wolves. It seems that shifters can be any animal native or endemic to a region, plus extinct species and, apparently, including mythical creatures.”
Marty said, “Mythical?”
“I’ve seen photos of a bunyip and apparently there is at least one Rainbow Serpent knocking around somewhere.”
Anna had set up her laptop and ran a medley of clips of various shifters.
Janette looked at Marty and Ferdi and said, “I think you broke them.”
Anna snorted. “I’m going to guess we’re going to have a little chat sometime in the next couple of days? You are taking this far to calmly to not be at least partly aware.”
Jeanette nodded and then said, “Maybe.”
Some ten minutes later, Marty and Ferdi had recovered enough to hold an intelligent conversation again.
Janette said, “Do either of you want to argue that this completely falls within the purview of the Committee?”
After another 15 minutes of discussion, the three of them came to a consensus.
Janette said, “So, who needs to be in the initial briefing? Us, plus who?”
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Marty said, “The AFP.”
Anna replied, “Nup. No. ‘Aint gonna happen. We’ve done our bit, so other than any future tasks assigned to us by the Attorney General, this briefing ends out involvement. I am willing, however, to offer some logistical support for the initial meeting. So, we will organise this next briefing and handle the security clearance paperwork, but one of you will need to run the actual meeting. Lastly, if required I can ask some volunteer shifters to display an actual shift.”
After more spirited discussions, it was decided that the committee would exercise its authority to brief a core of people, then drop the whole wriggling mess onto that group.
With a sigh, Janette said, “Heaven forbids that we actually do some real work, so ‘let’s form another committee’. Anna, at this point does anyone else in the government know?”
Anna replied, “Apparently, Prime Ministers Menzies through Holt knew. Unless there’s been a sort of secret handshake between PMs as they hand over the keys to the Lodge, that should be it. Our initial information is that there are currently no shifters in Federal politics, but there are shifters in Federal Employment and State politics. There are also…unsubstantiated rumours that there are ‘other’ types of supernaturals, some of whom may be in Federal politics.”
Janette nodded. “So, Anna, from your understanding of the issues, what are the minimum items that should be addressed?”
“The issues that we have identified so far, please remember that this is from the AFP’s viewpoint only, would be: do we go public; identify and rectify any legislation that would advantage, disadvantage or are now ineffective as to shifters; retirement age, as shifters live some 2 to 3 times longer than non-shifters; Medicare; taxation; anti-discrimination; education; defence; and policing.
“As to urgency, it’s not urgent, except that now it’s known, there’s a potential for a lot of things to go wrong. Basically, every person who ends up knowing this adds to the likelihood the information will escape before we are ready. Before that happens, at least a bipartisan position needs to be agreed on, otherwise there could be public safety issues.”
“Marty shook himself and said, “I think the PM, Deputy PM, Attorney-General and the Minister for Defence.”
Ferdi countered with, “Leader of the Opposition, Deputy Leader of the Opposition, Shadow Attorney-General and the Shadow Minister for Defence.”
Janette said, “So, four each. “I’ll go for another Independent, one from a minor party and two members of the Greens. Anna, do you feel comfortable if we add the head of the Australian Defence Force and someone from the Office of National Intelligence?”
“No, but I understand why we must. But I will insist that proper rules are followed, so each of those must sign a release and only attendance in person is allowed. This information cannot be transferred electronically and can only be stored on hardened, local servers. Hand-written notes must be secured. Each person will be given an opportunity before they sign to either declare their acceptance or to nominate someone to attend on their behalf. I’m sure each department will create their own projects to start looking at the issues, but we need to start by figuring out what our policies will be.”
Janette said, “That’s reasonable. You two agree?”
Having taken the lead, Janette seemed to have taken the fight out of them. They were happy to let Janette take the risks while standing by to grab any glory they could.
Janette said, “As per our Standing Rules, I propose the formation of a Special Access Group, under the auspices of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Law Enforcement to coordinate the response to the code-worded information before us. Do I have a second?”
Fredi said, “Seconded.”
“OK, those for? Against? I declare that the motion has been passed unanimously. As per standing rule number 23, the initial membership shall be made up to 18 members, a list of positions will be attached. Quorum will be 9 people. Three non-voting, advisory positions will be assigned, one to each of the AFP, ADF and ONI. This SAG will be subject to review every 6 months and currently has no budget of its own. Initial expenses will be met out of the ‘Discretionary Funds’ pool of the committee. Anything else?”
After a pause, where no-one spoke, Anna said, “FYI, we expect that the initial work will involve the Senate and House of Reps, Attorney-General’s Department, Defence – plus Office of National Intelligence, Employment and Workplace Relations, Health, Home Affairs and Foreign Affairs.
“I’d then expect work to flow out from there to a stack of other departments. This is going to fundamentally change things across the board. Also, there are rumbles that there are other supernaturals out there that may come out of the woodwork, depending on how things go with this group. I’d expect that the list of departments that will get involved will extend to at least, the Australian Human Rights Commission, Australian Bureau of Statistics, Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, National Parks, Fair Work and Safe Work, Education and the Commonwealth Ombudsman. Oh, and Sports Integrity Commission.”
Janette said, “Sport’s Integrity?”
“Apparently all shifters are stronger and faster than most people. They want Australia to support the idea of a separate paranormal Olympics, plus I’d expect a lot of sports to have to set up a different paranormal league, but that’s way down the line.”
Janette snorted. She stopped herself from saying, ‘Shifters.”
After a pause, Anna said, “OK. So, I will visit each of you after this to get your official list of four people, plus a spare in case there are any issues with your candidates. AFP will deal with the revelations to the candidates. Please remember that you cannot talk about any of this, except to each other and only in person. On that note, signals have now put the likelihood that our internal communications are currently compromised up to 38 percent as of last night. They are working on a solution, but it will be at least six months away, as it will require hardware. Once I’ve got agreement from everyone, we’ll reconvene, and I will take you through the evidence and the decisions that have already been made and those we need to make. Marty, I will start with you, so I will see you in about thirty minutes.”
Marty nodded.
Janette said, “Anna, can I speak with you for a moment?”
“Sure.” Anna waited for the other two to leave and then said, “Let me guess, you’re a Shifter?”
“No. What have you found out about the Councils yet?”
Anna fixed her sight onto Janette and said, “That there is an Australian Council of Shifters, which may or may not be part of a group of Councils. If others did happen to exist, they would be informed of the situation and, if any did happen to exist and wanted to do anything, they would contact us.”
“Well, can I ask who your contact is for the Australian Council of Shifters?”
“Initially, it was Sam Smirn. I’m waiting for confirmation if it will continue to be him moving forward.”
Janette started laughing. Looked at Anna and then just started laughing louder.
Anna said, “Care to share the joke?”
“Sam’s been trying to avoid politics for the last thirty years or so. Now he’s been landed into the middle of it all.”
“Willing to tell me what council you are with?”
“Council? What Council? Let me talk with a few people and then we can see where we’ll go. I’m sure it will be…magical.”
Anna had worked with Janette enough to understand what she wasn’t saying. She quietly banged her head against the table a few times.
“Does that help?”
“No, but when I stop it feels soooo good.”
Janette laughed, then Anna stood up and left.
Janette stood up and walked out into one of the gardens that surrounded Parliament House. She discreetly cast a glamour and a privacy spell and pinged the Dean of the Australian Council of Magical Practitioners, ACoMP. She felt a knock against her mental shields and accepted the call.
“Janette, what can I do you for?”
“Charming as always, Bruce. Just a quick heads up, as we’ve got nightmare scenario number four just opening up. Looks like AFP has detected something a bit shifty. It looks like things are going to get a bit official. Talk later.”