Verification Procedures

It seems that this week is something of a continuing story; funny how those creep up on you.

This week, Professor Thompkins has set another task for his new apprentice, Martha Hazard. This one is a simple one: basically, find out what some of Martha's colleagues are up to.

Unfortunately, Martha discovers that sometimes you find peculiar answers to the questions you ask when you go through your...

Verification Procedures - an In Council story by M. K. Dreysen

"So, you're headed out for your first audit. Remind me?"

Martha Hazard parsed the list of facts she'd found. "Urban Perspectives, Consultants. They offer services for the discerning developer."

"Uh-huh," her mentor replied. "And those services being..."

"Everything from Feng Shui through dowsing for water, depending on the property and the developer's needs."

Dwight Thompkins leaned back in his chair; Martha knew enough of the professor's habits to understand the look on his face as his "Scrolling through the memory banks" habit. "Let's see, Urban Perspectives, that's... Leona?"

"Leona Haversham, and Regina Russell. They've been in business for, about twenty years or so?"

"And?"

"Leona's the scryer, Regina is the layout expert. They've also recently added a junior partner, um, Gene Waters. Says here he's an expert in social dynamics."

Dwight smirked. "They're offering some protection against future events?"

Martha shrugged. "They're more careful than that. Not protection, just forewarning. And a list of insurers who'll underwrite based on the probabilities Waters generates."

Dwight chuckled at that. "Meaning, they've found a reason to keep an ongoing fee service."

"There's a certain utility there."

"Agreed. So what do you look for to make sure they haven't crossed the line?"

The line the professor indicated had only a little to do with whether Regina Russell followed Feng Shui as its more traditional practitioners would understand it, how or whether Leona Haversham found water every time she should have, or the accuracy of the predictions Gene Waters drew up.

What the professor, and the Council, were most especially concerned with was one simple thing. Were Urban Perspectives coloring within the lines of the expertise they did claim? "So far as I've been able to find, in their literature they're straight with their customers."

No promises outside of their domains, and most certainly no use of the big words: Enchantress. Sorceress. Mage. The difference between the education the principals of Urban Perspectives definitively possessed.

And the more rigorous certifications which the Council withheld unless the willworkers in question had gone through a similar apprenticeship to the one Martha had signed up for. "What they put in writing fits the bill."

"So how do you plan on verifying what they tell their customers in person? Away from those pesky little written conditions?"

****

Gene Waters lived on computers. Contrary to prior generations and their cards, runes, entrails (shudder), Gene much preferred numbers and simulations.

Especially combined with his special recipes. Therein lay the magic.

He'd built apps, of course. Databases. Special networks, server farms. Anything and everything to give his customers just that little bit of extra peace of mind. Gene Waters lived in a magical, electronic world.

And security was, of course, essential. Only. While you'd think, and you'd be right, that a worker of will and bits would be imminently sensitive to bots and spam and social hacks. That he'd notice minor variations. Little things.

A small electron's volt difference here. A microamp there. Only, in a digital world...

and Gene Waters was very much a digital child...

it's funny how an analog approach can slip by unnoticed. That which is unlooked for and all that.

****

Minor variations in electro-magnetic life would, on the other hand, have alerted Leona Haversham within microseconds. Leona lived a life very much free of electronic entanglements. She carried no phones, she surfed not the web. She maintained no online presence in the ultra modern world.

Not on her own, anyhow; she paid others for that. No, Leona lived comfortably within natural fibers, between hand-carved wood beams and panels of well-established provenance. She had chosen each board, each gardenia, all three of the boulders and each handful of gravel and seed that had grown to enrich her yard and garden.

Leona Haversham dwelled within a quiet, well ordered space. And what electricity she did allow there behaved itself according to her exacting specifications.

If only she had such control over the flock of wild doves she'd spent so many years admiring and cooing over in their generational dance through her neighborhood.

****

Regina Russell, as might be expected, lived between these extremes. Where Leona avoided the office and its incessant connections, Regina reveled in her phone and its constant view of what the world was up to.

Not, perhaps, to the extent to which Gene lived the online life. But certainly Regina let the online waves surf to her that which they would.

She lived as well an offline life. One devoted to museum dinners, concert series at the symphony, ballet in the winter. Those places where beautiful creations alternated with pregnant conversation.

Such a life has its charms; it's also difficult to track, if your target, like Regina, possesses both self-discipline and a security staff to mind the phone's updates.

But Regina did require a wardrobe for the life she lived.

And, having found a handful of designers with just her taste, Regina Russell had fallen into the habit of frequenting them regularly.

****

Given the requirements, where their mundane brethren might have been audited within a few hours or, at most, days, Martha Hazard spent months listening to her various devices. Weeks sifting through data.

And a few days working up her nerve to talk to the boss.

"Ok, hit me. It's gotta be the new kid, right?"

"He's careful, Professor. He always lets the client know that his projections are subject to change, and that they're limited by the information he can gather. He goes over the risks exhaustively, and I've never heard him claim to be anything other than a specialized analyst of trends."

Dwight pursed his lips at that. "Huh. Leona's slipping, then?"

"Not even a little. She'd rather go without the business than promise them something she can't deliver."

Martha's professor sighed, then turned his swivel chair around so that he could look over downtown while his student gave him the bad news. "What's Regina done, then?"

"She's calling herself the Queen of Midnight."

****

Martha's surveillance had the added benefit of mapping out when Dwight Thompkins could drop in on Regina unannounced. No concerts, no games.

Just Regina Russell sitting in her office by herself on a rare night alone.

Frowning at the knock, and the unwanted presence looming beyond the door. "Councillor."

"Regina."

Dwight waited for Regina to step back, reluctantly, and allow him to find a seat. "Comfortable."

"We like to make our clients feel at home. Otherwise they wouldn't feel we were giving them value for the money. I take it you've audited us?"

Dwight Thompkins had met Regina and her partners only a few times over the years. If he remembered correctly, all of these meetings had been at Council, with Leona or Regina having questions related to their endeavors. He didn't know Regina's personality, not really.

Jumping immediately to the point of his call didn't exactly bode well. Or at least, Dwight mused, it meant Regina understood that she'd pushed the limits. "Midnight Queen, Regina? I'm fairly certain that's a title outside of your reach."

Regina slammed herself into her chair. "And that's an entire field of endeavor that's outside of your precious Council's purview."

"Expertise. But not purview. You well know how these things work."

"And I know you have no knowledge basis to accuse me of anything," Regina retorted. "You wouldn't even know where to begin. You've bought into their, their precious worldview, you've given up our ancestors' incredible birthright just so that you can sit there and..."

Dwight leaned forward while Regina wound herself up. Then interrupted. "And Mother Sorrow? Would you say these things to her? Or the Laughing Man? Would you call yourself the Midnight Queen when you stood in his court?"

Regina Russell sat across from the councillor who'd measured her, and come armed with such knowledge. Her lips mouthed but no words came. And no more words came. And then, "You wouldn't."

"We all live within the rules, Regina. Sorrow and Laughter may not sit Council, but we welcome them as siblings. And we provide them both the same justice which we provide the rest of our extended family."

"Justice." Regina spat the word. "How is this justice?"

"You'd prefer the Laughing Man weigh your claim?"

****

Dwight Thompkins opened the passenger door to Martha's little van, and sank into place. "She took it well."

Martha raised a skeptical eyebrow from the driver's seat.

From the back, an older woman's laughter came. "Damned straight she took it."

Martha looked at the mirror, and the lady's face framed there beneath a crown bun of snow-white hair. "Mother, do you think..."

"She'll behave. For long enough, that child's closer to retirement than she wants to admit. Look at Leona."

Dwight shook his head. "I'm worried at how much she loves the limelight."

Mother Sorrow chuckled again. "That's how she got into this mess. Started believing her own bullshit." Mother reached her cane, a gnarled sassafras taproot, and tapped the driver's seat. "Let's go back to my hotel room, young miss. I'm missing my stories."

****

At the hotel, a small very exclusive place just a short trip from the west side's equally small and exclusive private airport, Dwight stepped out to assist Mother Sorrow down from the minivan. "Thank you, ma'am."

"Of course. You've given me enough help, young pup, I owe you a time or two."

Dwight let Mother Sorrow hold his arm until the hotel's attendant arrived to take over. "You take care on your travels, Mother. And send me the bill this time, please?"

Sorrow chuckled, then turned before Dwight could get away. "When's the last time you saw your mother, son?"

Dwight Thompkins, professor and councillor, gulped. "I talked to her yesterday..."

"No, son. When's the last time you came home?" And, when she read Dwight's face. "Uh-huh. Make time, Dwight. She doesn't have much of that left."

Dwight climbed back into the van, and Martha and professor watched Mother Sorrow, hand gripping the young lad who aided her rather possessively, tap herself and her cane through the golden electric light of the hotel entrance.

"I guess that means you're taking a month or two off this summer."

"I guess it does," Dwight rumbled. "I'll need to put together a list for you to think over while I'm gone."