Security Risk

Participants:

cat_icon.gif doyle_icon.gif ygraine_icon.gif

Scene Title Security Risk
Synopsis Two people who were each themselves locked up by national authorities raise urgent concerns about one of the Ferryfolk.
Date July 27 2010

Gun Hill - supervisor's apartment


So it's been a busy weekend at Gun Hill, at least for Doyle, who's been getting everything in order to move the kids back to the Lighthouse later in the day. As he waits for his appointment to arrive, he's nervously bustling about his apartment packing his trunk and making sure he hasn't left anything behind.

By and large he's probably driving Ygraine crazy with his restless, nervous pacing and re-checking of things.

"Okay, the kids should all be packed by now, but I'll have to double check - Colette offered to help out, so we'll have other people…"

09:00, straight up. A female shape stops at the doorway and applies knuckles to the barrier three times to draw attention. Maybe it's open, maybe not. Cat then waits for the result, holding a copy of the Sunday Times in hand. She can finish reading it when she gets back to the Village and lunches at the Cellar.

Accustomed to the organised, controlled bustle of competitors and trainers, Ygraine does indeed seem to find Doyle's restless energy rather distracting. For her part, she's lounged in a chair, one eye on her phone as she checks through options for routes to the relevant waterfront.

"The people-carrier's ready, and I'll help shift luggage. Yes, the windows are tinted. Yes, it's got suitable seat-belts. Yes -" She stops as the knock arrives, rising to her feet and striding over to peep through the spyhole. "She's here", she warns Doyle, before swinging the door open and standing back, the hand holding the phone grandly waving Cat inside.

"Please, come in and enjoy the air conditioning."

"Catherine. Hey." Eric finally stops his nervous, restless pacing and looks up to her as she's waved inside, a half-smile spasmically ticking up at the corner of his lips and fading over and again before the door's closed behind her. Then he turns, stepping over to double-check the long-empty drawers again.

"…I expelled Magnes and Elaine the other day," he tells her, not stopping for foreplay this morning, "The crazy little— he's a massive security risk. Even just being here he's putting everyone in danger, and plans on worse. And I think he might be insane. Convinced he's being persecuted and that Rebel is spying on him personally."

This, from Eric Doyle.

"Thanks," the brunette offers in reply as she steps through. Cat seems about to say more when Eric speaks, reporting his decision regarding occupants, but cuts herself off to rethink words. "I saw he's been on YouTube again," she murmurs, "it was a recent topic of discussion. Did he say why he believes himself persecuted and personally monitored by Rebel?"

She closes the door after herself, turning then to the apartment's interior. "Good morning, folks, by the way."

Ygraine moves to reclaim her seat, expression rueful. "Hi", she says quietly, offering Cat a finger-wave in response to the wishes for the morning - but she looks to Doyle. "That particular bit of the Magneverse, I've not been personally exposed to", she warns the fat man, offering him an apologetic look after entirely failing to provide any help with the very first question asked.

"I'm afraid not," Doyle admits, turning back towards Cat after slamming the drawer closed, hands spreading slightly as he exhales a humorless little chuckle, half-grinning, "Do you know what his plan is? His plan - get this, his whole plan is to hold a series of dramatic public battles, purposefully getting filmed and recorded, culminating in him triumphantly handing this guy over to the police."

That smile fades entirely as he leans forward a bit, "And his back up plan? He'll call the Company to take care of the guy. Claims that he used to be 'with' them."

"The only issue I'd have with a stalker being given to the police is due process," Cat remarks, "I don't trust such authorities to behave legally all the time. And the Company… that's not far removed from simply handing someone to the Institute for labratting. Public battles," she goes on to opine, "are what happens when one is attacked and has to defend in public. Not what one wisely sets out to do."

A chair is looked for, silence ruling briefly as she seeks. "Where do things now stand with the stalker?"

Ygraine winces at Doyle's words, shooting him a somewhat worried look, before refocusing upon Cat. "Still out there, so far as I know. A while back, Sable stabbed him, and drew blood - but in return he broke her arm and got away. And… for some reason, they decided to leave the knife at that scene, even though 911 had already been called with the report of a violent crime."

The Briton sighs. "So… he can be hurt, doesn't necessarily kill when seriously provoked, and can run away when it's wise to do so. And in return, the cops now have a bloody blade with Sable's fingerprints on it… though I don't think they have those on file, and it's at least possible they've not bothered processing it."

Shaking her head, Ygraine sighs again. "Sorry: the stalker… I've no definite information on where he is now - but he's apparently a criminal with outstanding warrants in place, with an eye for the parts of the city the authorities avoid. Unfortunately, "a somewhat violent misogynist who doesn't like the police" isn't the most distinctive of people to look for - not even with the possible added identifier of a healing knife wound."

"You see, the issue I have with the stalker being hung over to the police," Doyle points out darkly, "Is that he'll be questioned, and his questioning will lead back here, and anyone here who has a warrant or isn't registered is, in a word, fucked. They'd take the kids, too — fortunately we were already moving them."

He shakes his head to the latter question, gesturing back towards Ygraine as she fills Cat in.

"This also is true," Cat acknowledges in reply to Doyle as she mulls over Ygraine's information. "Meanwhile the stalker is out there and will come back if he believes Elaine is still living here. That's a danger for her, and anyone near her. But it's also the man's weakness, it can be used against him. I wonder if Quinn can use her light manipulation to make it seem she's out in the open and lure him to a nice quiet place of our choosing."

Ygraine frowns pensively. "Her skills are nowhere near Colette's", she cautions. "Perhaps in the right light, a silhouette he'd recognise? Or perhaps she can project from an image? I've been doing some work with her - but we're really on the basics. Things like smooth changes of shade, and producing two different colours at once. Full-scale illusions, I suspect are out of her reach at the moment."

"This also is true," Cat acknowledges in reply to Doyle as she mulls over Ygraine's information. "Meanwhile the stalker is out there and will come back if he believes Elaine is still living here. That's a danger for her, and anyone near her. But it's also the man's weakness, it can be used against him. I wonder if Quinn can use her light manipulation to make it seem she's out in the open and lure him to a nice quiet place of our choosing."

Ygraine frowns pensively. "Her skills are nowhere near Colette's", she cautions. "Perhaps in the right light, a silhouette he'd recognise? Or perhaps she can project from an image? I've been doing some work with her - but we're really on the basics. Things like smooth changes of shade, and producing two different colours at once. Full-scale illusions, I suspect are out of her reach at the moment."

"If you can get me in visual range of him," Doyle shrugs one thick shoulder, stating rather bleakly, "He's dead, and stops being a problem. Multiple criminal counts, they won't question a suicide, happens all the time."

"Might be nothing has to be done to find or lure him at all," Cat muses, "he believes Elaine lives here and will try to watch for her. Quite possibly all that needs to be done is watch for him. I won't counsel murder, but if a life comes to an end while defending others, such things happen. It's been well enough demonstrated he'll face opposition to his behavior, and if he elects to continue…" She trails off.

Ygraine winces slightly, though the frown she turns towards Doyle is worriedly pensive rather than disapproving or hostile. "He protected Elaine for years in the scuzzier parts of the city. He's almost certainly got some sort of connections, and we've no idea who he might have told. If he 'disappears' or dies after he goes looking for Elaine, anyone he mentioned her to will know where to start looking if they're at all curious. I think we need him to change his mind about pursuing her any more, or this problem might not go away when he does."

Shrugging slowly, Ygraine bites her lip for a moment. "Perhaps if we could be subtle about it, you could be the key. Have him write himself a note explaining how he really needs to go away and not pursue Elaine any more, unless he wants to become of greater interest to certain people. If he can't see a source, but feels himself helpless while he writes out a warning… he should get the hint. Or I'd hope so."

"Maybe if they'd told us about it before starting their little… whatever," Doyle replies to Ygraine with a slightly irritable note to his voice, "I'd care more about what happened to her. My concern is for the safety of the people here in the safehouse, and the Ferry as a whole. Which - speaking of - "

A wry look to Cat, "Quinn's pretty much figured shit out, I think, someone should talk to her soon, if she passed vetting."

"Do we know where this stalker lives?" Cat asks quietly. "You're going back to the Lighthouse and have the children to tend there. Toby can pick it up if he continues to come around this place." And the unsaid part, she knows someone who can simply 'persuade' him to let it go. "Do we know the man's name?"

Moments later, she addresses the other topic. "Quinn has, and I will."

"Elaine was wholly legit. Registered, holding a proper job, unaware of the existence of the Ferry. Unless Magnes had her be very careful, tracking her to this address wouldn't be hard", Ygraine cautions Doyle. "I admit that I'd personally like to see her protected, since I think that she's… trapped as the teenager whose parents died in the Bomb, in many ways. Hence her habit of depending upon violent young men who tell her they'll protect her from a frightening world. But I also think that resolving this problem as peacably as possible is the best bet for the Ferry avoiding further trouble."

A slight pause, and she turns her thoughtful frown upon Cat. "Not… that I'd swear to. If I can get Elaine to talk to me, I can probably find out what name he at least went by while she was with him. I'll pass that on as soon as I can, if I manage to find it out. As for Quinn… she knows virtually everything, in part because of all this. Though she was apparently aware of Magnes tooling up to go on some highly dangerous "mission" before this kicked off, so… she's been aware of some sort of secret activities around here for a while. Now, she's a bit suspicious as to quite why she was invited to move into the building in the first place."

"Mhm." A sound of agreement from Doyle, although he doesn't seem to like it, his head shaking a little bit, "Well. Once I'm gone, I suppose it's not my problem anyway… wait, a highly dangerous mission aside from this stuff?" He looks at Ygraine, bemused, then back to Cat, "Do I even want to ask what the Ferry's been using him for?"

"It sounds like Magnes has some private agenda to follow," Cat replies, "given he claims to be persecuted and monitored by Rebel. I might go around and ask him about all that. Maybe talk with Elaine too. We do have the YouTube footage, meanwhile, Wireless could be able to search the stalker out, apply a name and address to the face."

Ygraine nods worriedly. "He might have assigned himself the 'mission', but I know that it was something Elaine was worried about him doing, and that he refused to tell her any details about…. I'll try to get hold of Elaine - I'm trying to help her pursue some academic aspirations, so I think that she trusts me - and see if she's willing to share anything on him, to help with sorting out a solution as quickly as possible."

Doyle's hand rubs against his forhead, and he sighs, "Alright. Well, sounds like you've got that, then, and everyone… knows everything they should, uh… anything else?"

"I think we're good," Cat comments. Her head tilts. "What's Elaine registered as? She's not Tier 1 or 2. And, on the topic of registration… Ygraine, are you registered?"

"She's a zero, I believe", Ygraine says. "She has a… remarkable facility with linguistics. Since it works with written material as well as the spoken word, I suspect she might be an instinctive code-breaker, of sorts - though I've not pointed that out to here. And we're not sure. She's in touch with some academics here, via my father - he holds a Chair in Linguistics at Edinburgh - with a view to sorting out a scholarship…."

A quirked smile, then Ygraine shakes her head. "And no, I'm not registered. The wording as it presently stands talks about "citizens", and I'm not one. But I suspect that loophole will be closed in short order. As you know, at least some Feds were shown my photo, given my name, and told I was Evolved… but I've not had any overt follow-up to that since early last year. I only came back, once people over here were sure I wouldn't get any hassle from it… and I kept my first few visits brief, to test the waters."

"Tier 3." Eric's fingers wriggle in the air as he admits tiredly, "Which is… going to be an issue, eventually. Anyway. I should go take care've the kids and make sure they're all ready to go…"

Eric's tier is known, it doesn't spark a reaction in Cat. What does, though, is Ygraine's commentary. She shows a trace of scowl, something darkening in her eyes for a moment. Damn you, Sarisa Kershner. No commentary is given on the reason for her question, that being a story for another time. Soon attention is shifted back to Elaine as she rises and moves toward the door.

"Fascinating. I thought something was up, when we met I had a Dutch/English dictionary…" The door opens. "See you both soon enough," is offered.

Finding herself once again somewhat perplexed by one of Cat's responses, Ygraine briefly looks confused… but rises to her feet, nodding to both the others. "Thanks for coming. I'll see what I can do about getting more information. But for now - let's get those kids underway, Eric."


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