Teylon: Deciding to act alone

They had another social gathering, and Teylon's bank balance took another hit. For once, nothing out of the ordinary happened. Teylon was glad to see that they were actually beginning to interact with each other as if they were good friends, and not as if they were a bunch of awkward asocial teenagers ready to self-destruct at the slightest provocation. It was a good start, was Teylon's opinion. Still a long way to go, however.

A day after that, a Friday, Teylon set off on his first fishing expedition. Fishing for information to do with his task. He left his apartment at 4:30pm. Made his way down to the sub terrain maglev station, and disappeared into the men's toilets. Ten minutes later a man came out, one that did not look all that much like Teylon, although he was of the same general height and build.

OK, hunch over a bit, widen my walking stance a little, yep, those kids might recognise me, but a casual passerby wouldn't.

I wish this wig wasn't so hot and itchy, but. If I start sweating, the makeup will run.

He made his way back to the tower that contained his own apartment, but this time he took a different set of elevators. The doors slid open at the sixtieth floor, a floor that contained offices for various companies. Since he was now wearing a non-descript business suit, he was just one of the office workers getting ready to go home for the evening.

There he is!

A courier, doing the end of day delivery service. The courier got to the entrance of Verdant City Sanitation Services, and waved his left wrist near to the door opener. Just as Teylon also arrived, as if by coincidence. Teylon courteously waved the delivery person ahead, and followed smartly behind him. Depending on the security level, the door's sensors could pick up a stranger's mobile and make a complaint if they were not registered. But, the band around Teylon's wrist was a fake; his real mobile was securely enclosed in a Faraday cage, sitting in his inside coat pocket. So as far as the door was concerned, only one person had gone through.

Security slack, as expected.

No way could Teylon just casually waltz into a high security area, like a bank or police station. To do that required much more preparation. No, what Teylon wanted to do this time was to gather as much incidental information as possible, in the hope that somewhere amongst it there will be something of use. So he had selected a low security target.

This is where I have to be nimble.

The receptionist looked up from packing her handbag.

Good, she is already thinking about going home. Now casually glance at the parcels the courier is carrying...

The top one had a label clearly visible: To Larksen.

"Oh, I'm seeing Larksen, how about I take that one?"

The courier handed it over and plopped the other two on the desk. The receptionist accepted them and Teylon was already walking through the door behind the desk. She gave a quizzical look at his back, and then went back to the more important job of packing her handbag.

Looking as if he owned the place, he strolled down the corridor, checking out the doors on either side. There were a few people around, emerging from one door and disappearing through another. There were snippets of conversations from open doors as he passed.

Store room, toilets, lunchroom, a row of offices, ah, one without a name label. Maybe it is unoccupied?

He slowed down his pace, and picked a time when no one was visible.

The door closed behind him. No one was present, and the office did look unused. He placed the parcel on the desk, then rummaged through the mostly empty desk drawers until he found a manila folder. With this folder open in front of him, he sat at the desk, pen in hand, as if he was just another worker settling in for some overtime.

Just in case someone barged in unexpectedly.

He waited. He had lots of practice at waiting in potentially dangerous situations. He also had lots of practice in being calm and collected in such situations.

At 7:00pm the noises of people moving around outside had long gone. He turned off the office lights. At 9:00pm, he finally started moving himself.

As expected, most of the doors are not locked.

He moved from office to office, using a torch to see. They all had computer systems - which he left scrupulously alone. Computers meant passwords. And he did not have any passwords, yet. Instead, he was searching for USB memory sticks. Passive, inert, only coming to life if plugged into a computer. Or into his general-purpose USB memory copier. He did not have a clue as to what might be on the sticks he found, maybe pictures of kittens, maybe the plans to the doomsday bomb. Whatever, he would sort them out later. In the process, he put the parcel on the desk of Larksen's room.

Might as well help them out.

He found the storage room, and did a quick circuit.

Doesn't appear to be anything here - wait, what was that?

When he had looked at a cupboard at the very back of the room, he had the briefest flicker of that sun-baked landscape back in Australia.

Is this a little hint from Esmeralda?

He opened the cupboard and gave it a thorough check. Eventually he ended up on his hands and knees, sticking his head into the bottom most shelf.

Damn, can't see anything out of the ordinary - wait, is that it?

That was a USB memory stick, which was lying in a gap between the base of the shelf and the back wall.

Wonder how long that's been there?

He grabbed it and put it into his pocket. Finally he did a quick check of the lunch room, but as expected didn't find anything -

There was a click as the front door opened, and the sound of two voices.

Damn, some late night workers.

The lunchroom had a kitchenette/store room attached. He went through the door, almost but not quite closing the door behind him. He listened as they came in to the lunchroom.

Oh shit, why aren't they going to their offices?

"You got away without much trouble?" said the man.

"Yeah, my husband was out like a light. And you?"

"My wife was so busy with her long distance bridge game that she barely looked up from the computer screen as I said I had some overtime to do."

Wait a minute! Are they actually going to...?

"I got the picnic blanket, let's grab some cushions and go to my office." said the lady.

"Hey, what about we do it on the floor here? Where everybody has lunch."

Giggle. "Isn't that kind of kinky?"

"Aw, come on! The only ones to know will be us." said the man.

And me! And, what's more, you should be ashamed of yourselves for being so dishonest with your partners!

There were various rustling sounds, then

"Oh, you have new bruises." said the man.

"It's nothing. He never hits very hard."

"Hitting you at all is wrong! You need to do something about it!"

"But, you know how things are; they're very awkward, what with the family situation and all..."

A sigh from the man.

And a purely internal sigh from Teylon:

OK, OK, so maybe there are valid reasons for this. It's not as if I can really lecture you about honesty, anyway.

Teylon had a lot of practice in being patient. But this was stretching his patience to the limit. Cringing in embarrassment, he could do nothing but wait silently. He silently and carefully prowled around the kitchenette, all four square metres of it. He tested the curtains at the end, apparently this room, like the lunchroom, had external windows.

Hello, this is an openable window. Why on Mars would you have an opening window sixty stories up - ah, of course, this is Mars after all. They must be catering to the occasional levitating esper. Let's see, there's magnetically levitating espers like Maggie, full gravitational control espers like Leroy, and, also, don't some espers who can produce shields have the ability to move their shields around?

He paid attention to the sounds coming from the lunchroom, then wished he hadn't.

Keep distracting myself!

He carefully moved the curtains away from the window, and saw that there were hand grips and foot rests on the outside of the window.

Presumably to allow the levitator to stabilise themselves getting in or out of the window.

He had the nasty thought: what if the couple decide to come into the kitchenette?

Well, I could just blackmail them -

No!

He had never stooped to threatening people, not even the not so innocent ones. And now that he knew he had an Angel of Death watching his every move, he was not going to start.

So he very carefully and silently opened the window. The exterior rungs went down from the window for a couple of metres; he could step outside, climb down out of sight, and wait until they left. He always had a very good head for heights, so it should not be too much of a problem.

Finally, after an eternity, he could hear two very relaxed people getting up and sorting themselves out.

"While we're here, let's have a coffee!" said the lady.

"OK, you put away the cushions and I'll get them."

Shit, this is getting farcical. Perhaps I could just apologise and run past them and out? Or maybe even just make a runner without apologising?

Nyah, too embarrassing. I'll just wait outside for a little.

So he stepped out of the window, firmly gripped the rungs, and climbed down until his head was a metre below the windowsill. He discovered that that was as far as the rungs went. At about this point in time he made a rather unsettling discovery.

He was afraid of heights. Badly afraid.

What? But I've never been worried about heights before - Oh, I get it. Falling from the observational platform when I saved the boy must have triggered something. This is really bad.

The light went on. He pressed his head to the wall. Sweating, heart pounding, stomach cramping from fear, he waited. He could hear both of their voices coming from the open window.

"Two white coffees, no sugar, coming up!" said the lady.

"Hey, I feel a breeze, that's funny, the window is open!" said the man.

"So it is. It should be closed, we don't want any random flyer to come in and burglarise the place, do we?"

Clunk.

Wait! Oh -

He could not think of a swear word bad enough for the situation. With a look of horror on his face, he climbed back up so that he could see into the kitchenette. But they had already moved out and turned off the light.

Wait! Wait! Aren't you going to come back to clean your cups! Show some responsibility!

He loosened one hand from a rung and banged on the window. But it was solid, double paned, capable of holding in the air of the tower if the dome ever had a blow out. Those inside could not even hear it if they were in the room. And they must have been very irresponsible; they must have just left their cups on the table. Since they never returned.

Teylon realised that it was cold up here. A quarter of a kilometre above the dome floor. Hands gripping the rung in front of his face, and his feet firmly planted on another rung below, he carefully looked down.

Mostly black, but dotted with streetlights and lights from windows of buildings. Each light lit up a patch of ground; he could even see a few people walking around.

He could also feel his heart racing. His arms and legs were beginning to tremble.

Shit! Shit! Shit!

I have never screwed up as much as this!

But wait! I have my mobile.

He turned face to his wrist, before realising that it was a fake.

He was beginning to hyperventilate.

Think! The mobile is in my pocket in its Faraday cage.

With great reluctance, he loosened one hand, reached into his coat, and it out. Only, how to get the cage off, using only one hand? With great difficultly. He fumbled and almost dropped them, before making a convulsive grasp for the mobile. The cage itself disappeared into the darkness below.

I hope I don't have a heart attack at this rate.

Next problem, getting it onto his wrist. Since the only way he knew to operate it was by simple finger twitch commands. And only on his left hand. Which was currently holding the rung in a death grip.

He swapped hands over, and finally got the band onto his wrist.

Whom do I call? The police...

Yeah, sure, he could well imagine the questions...

"Well, that was a close call, Mr Teylon. Say, how come you were clinging to the outside of the building in the first place?"

That's preferable to falling. Except that he probably won't be able to do anything more about his task, and so Esmeralda will call him in anyway. Oh, bloody hell.

He took a deep breath, and called Maggie.

After she gets me to safety, I'm going to pay for this, I can just tell.

"Ah, Maggie," his voice was trembling with strain, "Ah, can you come out immediately, like right now? I'm hanging on some rungs on the outside of the north tower, facing south, sixty floors up, and, ah, I'm not sure I can last much longer. And on your way here, could you send on a call to Leroy, also. Only, please, hurry!"

"What the hell? - OK, I'm on my way."

A click as she hung up.

Maggie lives closer, but she can't fly straight here, she has to hug the ground and fly along any steel tracks or hand rails she can find. Leroy lives further out, but can fly straight in. If one of them doesn't get to me soon, I'm going to be reporting to a very unimpressed Angel of Death.

The wind whistled past him, chilling him down. He lost feelings to his feet, and his hands were not far behind. He tried to shift his position around to reduce the strain on his arms and back, but he was already as close as he could get to the wall.

It got colder. He could no longer feel his hands. He watched in horrid fascination as his fingers slowly unfolded themselves from the rung, one finger at a time. He was leaning further and further back, with his arms straightening out. Finally, his hands released their hold and he was falling backwards, slowly rotating so that he was facing straight up the tower -

Thump

Something thwacked him across his back and he was no longer falling.

"Teylon, you really are heavy, you know." said Maggie, struggling to hold him in her arms.

To relieve the weight she was about to change positions, when somebody else swept in from the sky and held Teylon on the other side.

"Hey, that's much better!" said Maggie.

"No problems!" said Leroy.

They drifted straight down, Leroy making sure to always fly as close as possible to the building so as to allow the maximum grip for Maggie's magnetic fields.

Teylon started to thaw out almost immediately. He relaxed and sagged into their arms, and did not say a word all the way down to ground.

After gently settled onto the grass at the base of the tower, Teylon sat down heavily, grasping the grass as if he was afraid that he would start floating back up again. Leroy and Maggie separated and sat either side of him. Leroy was wearing a well-insulated single piece flight suit. He unzipped the front of it, showing he was still wearing his pyjamas under it, and flapped his arms around a bit.

"Hey, it got warm as soon as I reached you. You must be heating us all up slightly with your ability?""

"Yeah, that's right. Just as well, as Teylon was freezing cold to the touch when I caught him," said Maggie, "It's a really useful technique, means I don't have to wear a flight suit like you do when I go flying."

Maggie was wearing thin flannel pyjamas and a thin dressing gown, and gave no signs of being cold.

They watched as Teylon slowly recovered his composure. Leroy patted him on the back.

"Feeling OK, now?"

"Ah, ah, yes, I think."

Not to be out done, Maggie copied Leroy and also patted him on the back.

"T-Thanks Maggie. And Leroy."

By now, the two teenagers had had a good look at Teylon.

"You into costume playing?" said Maggie.

"Yeah, I was wondering why your hair is a different colour and, you're actually wearing makeup?" said Leroy.

"Well, I wanted to change my appearance..."

Teylon yanked off the wig with some satisfaction. It had been seriously irritating him for some time - right up to the point in time when he had become seriously distracted by other matters.

"I'm sure there is a really great story here..." said Maggie.

Yeah, isn't there. Gotta wiggle out of this one.

A groan from Teylon, "Can I tell you at some other time? Right now I want to get back to my apartment and have a rest."

Two teenagers looked at each other.

"Actually, we're both agog with curiosity right now. I vote we wait here for the others to arrive, and then all go to your apartment. After all, you said it was about time we visited each other's homes anyway, didn't you?" said Maggie.

"Well, actually I was hoping to go somewhere where there's a cat - sorry, did you say wait for the others to arrive? What others?"

"These others!" said Leroy.

Three more teenagers walked up. Sarsaparilla, Adalace and Erasyl.

Maggie looked smug, "When I rang up Leroy, I asked him to ring the others."

"Oh" said Teylon.

This is too much! There's no way I'm going to reveal to this mob the full extent of my debacle! You have to be kidding! Give me some time and I can come up with a plausible sounding story that doesn't make me look too stupid.

Teylon might still be shocked and out of kilter from his near death experience, but he was an accomplished con man after all. He concocted a plausible initial excuse and was about to open his mouth when

Teylon’s Soul Reading of: himself, again

Courtesy of Esmeralda, he had an image of her sitting on that park bench in that far away Australian heat wave.

Teylon:

Shit. Looks like they will be laughing at me, after all.

"OK, OK, let's all go up to my apartment. And," sarcasm dripping from his words, "I suppose you want me to order in some food also, while we're at it?"

"Ooh, yes please!" said Sarsaparilla.

When it came to food, Sarsaparilla was happy to ignore any negativity.

Forty minutes later, Teylon was ensconced in his favourite arm chair. The teenagers were sitting on his sofa, and drawn up kitchen chairs. They were also having a great time. Adalace and Sarsaparilla were giggling, Maggie looked highly amused, while Leroy and Erasyl where laughing their heads off. Teylon flopped back in his armchair and looked at the ceiling. At least that way he did not have to look at them.

"I hope you realise that the only reason I'm telling you all of this is that Esmeralda compelled me to?"

"My compliments to your Angel of Death!" said Maggie, who by now was also starting to laugh.

"Say, why didn't you just blackmail the couple into being silent, then disappear out the door without further fuss?" said Sarsaparilla.

"Cause I was too embarrassed. And I've never blackmailed anyone in my life. Although I suppose I could have threatened to do so, since they wouldn't have known that I wouldn't do anything further."

"That's nice. He risked his life so as to save them from any embarrassment!" said Leroy, "Does that make him a true hero?"

How long is this torture going to last?

"It's sort of noble in its own way, isn't it?" said Maggie.

Much to Teylon's relief, the take away food arrived at this point in time. The teenagers temporarily gave up on making fun of Teylon and devoted their attention to devouring the food.

"Hey, didn't you lot have tea tonight?" said Teylon.

"Sure, sure, but that was hours ago!" said Adalace.

Erasyl began to giggle again.

"Say, why didn't you just ask to join the couple?"

I really hope I wasn't as bad as that when I was a teenage boy.

"Eww, that's gross! As if some random woman would want an old man gate crashing their tryst!" said Maggie.

Now, wait on Maggie, surely I'm not that bad?

"Actually it's worse than that, remember Erasyl goes both ways!" said Leroy.

All three girls scrunched up their faces in revulsion.

"That's even more gross, now I have to scrub my brain clean with some bleach to remove the images!" said Sarsaparilla.

"Yeah, quit the gross comments, Erasyl!" said Maggie.

"Oh, lighten up, don't be so uptight. It's not as if I'm making a pass at anyone!"

"Are you now calling me uptight, you little creep!"

Where the hell did all this come from?

This got Erasyl really upset, "I hate being called a creep! If this goes on I'll leave! At least I won't have to put up with your selfish behaviour anymore."

By now, they were both leaning towards each other, angry faces glaring at each other. A couple of Teylon's knives and forks lifted off the table and began hovering around.

"Enough!" yelled Adalace, "Stop this fighting now!"

A tense silence, broken by the sound of pieces of cutlery falling to the table.

"Ah, yes, everyone, you have all just had a fine meal, on my coin by the way, so let's just sit back and mellow out, shall we?"

Everyone sat back and tried to do an imitation of that mellowing out thing.

"Erasyl, I suggest that in future you don't say anything at all that is the slightest bit risqué. It's just too risky." said Teylon.

"Yeah, fine, fine, I won't." said Erasyl, looking extremely disgruntled.

"Geez, why is he so obsessed with sex, anyway?" said Maggie.

"You are actually asking a teenage boy that question?" said Leroy.

"Bet you he's a virgin." said Maggie.

Oh crap, does Maggie want to start Mars War Number One?

Fortunately, Erasyl took this one fairly calmly, "Of course I am. Just like everyone else here. Right? Apart from Teylon, of course."

He looked around, and no one contradicted him.

An uneasy silence. The others noticed that Sarsaparilla and Adalace seemed to be the ones most embarrassed by this; they had turned their heads away from each other and were going red in the face.

"Say, wait a moment. You like men, so why don't you go to one of those gay single bars for men, and try out your lines there? I mean, I'm sure the clientele would love it!" said Maggie.

Now it was Erasyl's turn to blush. Beetroot red. The others were impressed.

"Well, now, I, you see, I did try that once. As soon as I was old enough. But, ah, well, I got scared and ran away the first time one of those men talked to me. I did some serious thinking and decided that what I really wanted was a long-term relationship. Of something like that. You know, one based on things like,"

By now Erasyl was squirming in shame.

"Like, say, love and respect and..."

His voice dwindled away into mumbles.

Maggie looked at him in astonishment.

"You mean, the only thing you know how to do is make crude passes, but what you want is a long term relationship?"

"That's so funny! So pathetic!"

She thumped him on the back a few times.

"Well, then, what you need to do is learn how to do friendships first. And then you learn how to extend a friendship in to a relationship. So stick with us, baby! There is not the slightest hope of a relationship for you here, but you will learn all about friendships!" said Maggie, thumping his back a few more times for emphasis.

Maggie the virgin, never had a boyfriend, offering relationship advice to another virgin.

Although, it's not bad advice.

The tension having dropped, they were all silent for a while.

"Actually, getting back to the main topic, what shall we do about Teylon's intelligence gathering attempt?" said Sarsaparilla.

Damn, I was hoping they had completely forgotten about that.

"For a start, I think the word 'pathetic' aptly describes the idea of Teylon doing any processing of the data he might have found on the USB thumb sticks. I mean, he has the services of me, the best programmer on Mars!" said Adalace.

Over confident much, young lady?

On the other hand, she does appear to be good...

"Hey, I'm not entirely dumb when it comes to computers, you know! And I went and brought myself a little laptop to examine the files."

Teylon went to his bookcase, and picked up a laptop which he showed the group.

"Oh yeah, let's have a look at it." said Adalace.

She deftly removed the laptop from his hands, turned it on and typed a few commands onto its keyboard. Thereafter she controlled it with her own wristbands. After a bit of rapid finger twitching, she said:

"Ha, not a particularly powerful one, and woefully lacking in the appropriate software."

She smirked.

"And, you do realise that you need to disconnect the laptop from the web, otherwise some authorities somewhere might be able to detect the files as you down load them?"

"Ah, well, - of course I know that!"

Nobody believed him. Teylon, knowing this full well, hurriedly continued.

"But, but, the same thing will happen to you when you download the files to your big computer!"

Another smirk. It appeared that Adalace was enjoying herself tonight.

"Not at all. I shall use your disconnected computer to download the files from your USB drive, then encrypt them with my own password and from there on they are mine only. No one will be able to track what I do with them on my big computer!"

She held out her hand, and Teylon had no choice but to give over his USB drive, plus the USB stick he had found.

"Well, that is pretty clear, Adalace does the computing." said Maggie.

"And, what is also pretty clear is that Teylon went burglarizing on the sixtieth floor, and did not arrange backup with us, two levitators who could have waited outside, just in case something happened. Which did in fact happen." said Leroy.

"In fact, why didn't you just ask us to fly you to that window?" said Maggie, "I could have used my magnetic ability to open the window lock, and you could have been gently deposited in the kitchenette by Leroy without any of this messing around with disguises and manipulating people."

"And I or Maggie could have been on lookout at the receptionist for any visitors while you were searching the offices." added Leroy.

The other teenagers nodded their heads in total agreement.

"But, you do realise all of this is totally illegal, don't you? I don't want to be responsible for getting you lot into trouble!"

A moment's silence.

"Well, yes, but, on the other hand, there is this Angel of Death business." said Sarsaparilla.

"Which kind of makes things different." said Adalace.

"After all, according to you Esmeralda has basically brought us together for the express purpose of fixing this evilness at the heart of Mars society. And, well, that sounds important." said Leroy.

"And also it sounds like an adventure." said Erasyl.

"Although remember, adventures can be dangerous. Heroes do not always survive." said Leroy.

"That's just it, I don't want to be the one bringing you in to danger." said Teylon.

"But, Esmeralda has selected us, so perhaps you are meant to bring us in to danger." said Maggie.

"But, but, ah, wait, do you all believe that what I say about my Angel of Death is all true?"

The teenagers looked at each other.

"Well, I guess we all sort of accept it for the time being." said Maggie.

Teylon dug his fingers into his hair in frustration.

"But I've never had any help in my entire career! And now I'm expected to rely on a bunch of teenagers?"

"What's wrong with teenagers?" said Erasyl.

Oh my God. Using examples purely from my experiences with you lot, the answer to that question will take two straight hours to give!

"Never mind."

"And also, maybe Esmeralda wants you to have partners this time," said Sarsaparilla.

"Why would she want that for?" said Teylon.

Sarsaparilla shrugged her shoulders.

"Right. Is it agreed that in future, Teylon takes no action without our input?" said Maggie.

The teenagers all agreed.

You're not going to ask for my opinion?

Apparently not.

Teylon did his best to change the topic of conversation.

"Say, Leroy, that looks like a fancy flight costume you're wearing."

"Yeah it is."

Leroy looked embarrassed.

"I made it when I was at the height of my hero complex. Not only can it keep me warm, but I was..."

He squirmed uncomfortably.

"I was kind of fixated on saving someone from falling. Which I have now managed to do twice! Even if one of them I had help. Anyway, I figured that if someone fell from the full height of our dome, about three kilometres, they would be cold. So -"

He pulled some tabs at his sides, and out came two pieces of cloth, one from each side.

"These aren't wings, they're meant to go around a person I'm hugging and carrying. They have velcro and stick together, so the person is basically lying on me, with these forming an almost complete cover over him. Or her. With me on one side and these flaps on the other, the person should soon be cosy and warm. It gets extremely cold up there, you know."

"Course now I'm slightly more realistic, and realise that the chances that I would ever be in the right spot at the right time to catch someone falling from the very top of the dome is pretty low..."

Since, in fact, Leroy had saved Teylon, twice, no one was going to ridicule him. He packed the flaps back into their storage pockets.

All the teenagers, feeling pleased with their progress and being full from the food, said their goodbyes and got ready to leave.

"Say, Maggie, would you like me to accompany you as you fly home? After all, you're only dressed in your pyjamas and a dressing gown." said Leroy, always trying to be a gentleman.

"Huh? I'm Maggie the Magneto! Anybody who tries to messes around with me is going to regret it!"

"Oh, sorry, forget I said that."

They all left.

Teylon flopped back on his bed, totally drained and exhausted, both physically and emotionally.

Oh my God. Surely I don't deserve all of this?

He dropped off to a long and deep sleep.

----------------------------------------

Deep underground

"So, what do you make of this latest - development?" said the Lenny.

"More like debacle." said Prakash.

"Yeah, if he has anything to do with those strange deaths, then he must have sophisticated sources of intelligence, not to mention some strange abilities. And then he tries this really basic attempt at gathering data." said Arnold.

"Well, give him some credit. If he hadn't been forced out of that window, we would never have known." said Terrence.

"What a laugh, fancy coming to such a fate because some couple decided to commit adultery in the office!" said Teresa, giggling.

"Yeah. It's a pity we don't have security cameras inside every building." said Arnold.

"Humph! You all know that such total surveillance can't be hidden, and that people will complain. And anyway, at least we do have constant audio surveillance via the mobiles." said Lenny.

"Yeah, it's amazing, everybody knows about it, everybody has the option of buying Faraday cages and using them if they want to, but almost nobody does. Even that adulterous couple didn't bother masking their own mobiles!" said Teresa.

"Certainly makes it easy for us. After all, Teylon's mob doesn't bother doing that, also." said Arnold.

"If we can get back to the topic?" said Lenny.

"Ah, right. Now, if Adalace takes precautions with her analysis of those files, then there really is no way we can see what she is doing." said Terrence.

"But we have our own very good programmers, too." said Prakash.

"Yeah, but Adalace is in a league of her own. As well as allowing her to control the temperature of things, her ability must be powering her programming skills also." said Terrence.

"Which is why we had Adalace as a subject of our programmes in the first place." said Lenny.

"It's would be a big shame if we lose Adalace. She could be very valuable to us, you must all agree." said Teresa.

"Yes. We will have to keep track of what happens with her." said Lenny, "And, as for the others, and Teylon?"

There was further discussion.

"Say, I suppose it is nothing more than coincidence that he picked the city's Sanitation Department office to burglarise?" said Teresa.

A moment’s reflection.

"Nyah, just a coincidence." said the Lenny.

They made some tentative plans, then moved on to the next item on the agenda.