It actually took two whole pots of coffee and a mountain of pasta and Angie's home-made (two days ago) sauce to cover what Chris Farber had to relate.
Fresh out of the destroyed compound he'd gone straight to Jackie Bowdoin's office/warehouse, let himself in courtesy of a quick B&E, and waited. When Jackie got back Farber found his instincts paying off as Jackie caught him up on his post-Liberation business activities.
"Twenty years in the business, I figured there was nothing new, no new markets to tap. Except, you know, the stuff I don't want to get into."
Farber knew, all right. He and Tyler shared some laughs in the beginning, when they learned that Jackie refused to get into the violence and "alternative" things like S&M, and they wondered how he could afford the high end work they were doing. It was Angie who got the fuller story, when Jackie told her how much money he made distributing to vendors whose customers liked the old school movies and magazines - hence the name Old School Adult Entertainment. "The domestic market" he called it... home-viewing by husbands and wives, middle aged single men, retro-themed bachelor parties, and the like.
But the New World after liberation opened the door to a new market. "Turns out Visitors have their 'weaknesses' too. You know how some guys like the French maid thing, some guys like girl-on-girl. Our new friends are into Visitor-on-human. Doesn't matter if the human is female and the Visitor male, or vice-versa. They're not into violent stuff - that's not exotic for them anyway, is it? They also don't have any concept of gay stuff, it doesn't even register. But when the product producers found girls and guys willing to do the Visitor thing... jackpot. Of course the Visitors don't know that the 'aliens' in the movies and mags are humans in makeup, fantasy is everything y'know? When the customers get what they want, they don't ask questions."
As luck would have it (good or bad, depending on your perspective) the former city of Boston was the marketing hub for Jackie's new distribution gold mine. He hadn't had time to go into it when he saw Angie after the latest invasion and in those early hours was mostly interested in finding out what was left standing and who was left alive. But in the week since the attack two more important pieces of information had come to him: That the East Coast city renamed "Destiny" by the Visitors was now the center of science and technology - and quite possibly strategy - for the recent Visitor resurgence. It was likely that, since the Liberation, the surviving Visitors had developed an underground operation to transform the city to a sort of earth-bound mother ship that relayed its intelligence to ships beyond the reborn NASA's much-touted "refined aerospace security." As Farber related this information both Tyler and Donovan rolled their eyes.
"Color me stunned," Tyler quipped, "The government didn't get it right the first time."
The second piece of key information Jackie Bowdoin had provided was the somewhat surprising news that the Visitor attacks had been limited to the U.S.
"It's not like nobody else in the world will hear about it, I don't get it," Angie said.
Donovan, Tyler, and Farber didn't share her confusion.
"Watch for the news to say it was a rogue group of Visitor survivors," Donovan explained. "Oldest trick in the book to cover up a 'beta' operation."
Chris nodded in agreement. "Jackie's source guessed the same thing. He doesn't know for sure but he heard some buzz about the lizards trying out their new tech here, and then branching out. They got over the salt thing so for weaknesses we're back at zero, but the fact they're starting small means they haven't got it all figured out yet."
"Besides, Boston is the only city they totally flattened and rebuilt to their own specs," Angie observed. "Where better to plan a comeback."
Finally Fred spoke up. "So they're running the show from three thousand miles away, where does that leave us?"
"It leaves you kinda safe, for a start," suggested Angie. "If they're going to rely on the 'rogue' cover, that means they're not going to be gunning for rebels this early on, which explains why places like this palace are still getting electricity. I mean who's gonna question not getting bills?"
"Okay, but still," Fred said. "Our local intel gathering is limited to local stuff, how we gonna dig in on the other coast?"
Farber was smiling now.
"What?" Angie prompted. "C'mon Bear, now is not the time for mystery. Or should I say more mystery."
"Well our favorite low-key dirty picture man had what could be a real good idea. To send someone East supposedly on his payroll, to scout out setting up a local branch of his distribution operation." He was looking straight at Tyler. "We worked for Bowdoin, we know his operation here. And you're a man with 'flexible skills', and a reputation for siding with whoever looks like a winner."
Tyler laughed out loud. "Oh, and Farber here he only sticks with the righteous. Okay, I get the picture. I'm 'Old School's' advance man on the East Coast. If we're gonna do this whole rebellion thing again, it'd be nice to stay clean and well dressed for a change."
"And you won't need a cover," added Donovan.
Angie had been listening quietly, but no more. "Hold on a minute, don't I have something to say here?"
"You stay back here and run things with your pet geek, while Chris wrangles the Wild Boys with Fred and Gooder." Tyler spoke as if it were a done deal.
Her face and voice hardened. "Guess again." Since they got married she and Tyler shared an unspoken vow: no more separations, professional or otherwise. This sounded like a repeat of his operation in Mexico during the first rebellion, two months of absence never knowing if he'd be back, or was alive or... anything. She couldn't live with a repeat of that but was not about to get into it now. "If you have no cover you'll need to explain why you're flying solo. It's not as if the lizards never heard of me."
"No offense, sis," Farber interjected, "but you're not exactly a household name outside of L.A."
Well that made sense. After the war Angie, Tyler, and Chris had avoided the very public and publicized celebrations and endless awards and honors showered on key rebellion figures in each region of the U.S. The Fixer and his sidekick, of course, were already well known by the Visitors, not to mention the underground world of black ops and international government agencies.
Angie tried a different tack. "You'll need someone to play a tech consultant. Not to mention someone who knows how to play in their infrastructure."
Donovan didn't like the sound of it. "You really think they won't care your last job was breaking security designs?" he wanted to know.
Angie smirked. "I'm not that famous, remember?" She glanced at her husband before turning to Fred to explain, "Tyler will be the front man, and I'll be the helpful spouse and consultant." Now she risked a direct look at Tyler. "Bet you can live with that." She turned to Fred. "Don't worry, Steve is more than able to handle your tech stuff." She added hastily, "Don't tell him I said that."
Tyler was eyeing Angie, not sure how to read her. "You sure you don't want to think this over?" he asked. Going back to her old stomping grounds would raise more ghosts than he could count.
"It's the easiest operation I've ever had," she told him. "I'll be who I am... the Fixer's wife, and a geek consultant. And if anyone does remember who I am, it's easy enough to play a mercenary's convert. Tired of down and dirty fighting and running and risking my life, and happy to play on the winning side. Which they will love believing is them." She rose from the table, indicating she was done with the discussion. "I'll leave you to suss out the next step while I fill Steve in on what needs to get done to finish the systems here." She saw their questioning looks. "'Destiny', guys. Who am I to question it?"
As she left Tyler told the others, "Gimme a minute," and followed Angie out of the kitchen, catching up to her halfway to the office.
"Angel, wait." He caught her hand to turn her around. "This isn't gonna be like Mexico. I'm going to have a plan."
But she was over the Mexico flashback already and smiled at him, reading him like a book.
"Fuck Mexico. You're thinking of Boston, of me going back."
He only looked a little caught out. "From psycho to psychic, what a talented broad I married." He looked harder into her eyes. "You sure about this?"
"Why should you be the only one who gets to be clean and well dressed?" When his expression didn't change she pulled him down for a kiss. "Relax. New war, new Angie, remember? Look, I gotta spend some time with Steve-o figuring out where things go forward here, tech-wise. No sense not taking advantage of the Wild Boy Network while we're gone, and vice versa. Somewhere to send our intel so we won't have to keep it ourselves... one less thing to worry about."
Tyler shook his head, impressed. "If I don't watch it you're gonna outrun me."
"Hah, eat my dust," she laughed over her shoulder as she walked away.
"Wiseass. When we wrap up I'm gonna de-brief with Farber." Meaning some drinking and catching up.
She waved him off without looking back. "I won't wait up."
She really hoped Chris might be able to help him process Reno's death, and quiet that echo behind his eyes she couldn't seem to reach.