Cindy Psi: Spy In Training

All too quickly, Sunday rolled around. Cindy was due to leave that afternoon at 4pm. She lay in bed thinking back over the last few days. Tess had avoided her again at school on Friday, which hurt. Jacinta hadn’t, and had made a great show over how her mother had, in Jacinta’s eyes at least, humiliated her dad at Parents’ Night. Cindy had not risen to the bait this time at least, and Jacinta had soon tired of the taunting.

The meeting with the alleged ‘host family’ had been somewhat surreal – a charming couple who professed their excitement over having a ‘little visitor’ on Khoo and looked forward to showing her around. Her father had engaged with them on the PCD chat and asked a bunch of sensible questions – although Cindy remembered feeling at one point it was like he was going through the motions really. She got the sense that he trusted Cindy’s judgement and the pre-vetting he’d done and that this face to face chat was more of a formality than anything. That seemed a bit odd given that, at least as far as he was concerned, she was going to be living with these people for the next six months.

Cindy had thought on this one – not thought on it, mind, no mind reading or anything – she had decided not to do any more of that until she’d done some time on Adriá and learnt more about it – but she’d thought normally about it and had a theory that this was a kind of denial on her dad’s part. He was trying to downplay the scale of the trip by treating it like a more commonplace thing than it was. Fair enough, she had thought.

So that left Tess. Cindy hadn’t spoken to her, and she hated the thought of going off on this trip without clearing the air. The problem was, what was she going to say? Tess was too sharp and knew her too well to accept that there wasn’t more going on than Cindy was telling her, but Cindy couldn’t tell her what was really happening. It was tearing her apart, and she was at a loss what to do.

The heck with it – some things are more important, she finally resolved, and fired up her PCD.

CP: Tess?

There was a pause. It was 8:30 on a Sunday morning. She knew Tess would be awake, and was unlikely to be anywhere. So it was an intentional pause. Cindy’s heart sank a little.

TC: Hi.

CP: Look, can we meet up this morning just for a bit? I want to talk to you.

TC: So now you want to talk to me? A bit late for that don’t you think?

CP: Come on Tess, at least give me a chance to explain. Or try to at least.

TC: Why should I?

CP: Because I’m leaving today. For six months. And I hate the thought of going away while you and me are fighting.

TC: Alright. Meet me at the park at ten.

CP: I’ll be there :).

TC: Don’t smiley me. I’m still mad. But you asked for a chance so I’m giving you one. See you there.

And with that she disconnected. Still, Cindy thought, at least she had the chance.

Breakfast was a little strained. Her dad was desperately trying to make light of things but both of them felt the impending parting very strongly and it hung like a cloud over everything. Cindy mentioned she was going to meet Tess that morning to try and clear the air.

“Oh, that’s great,” said Mr P, genuinely relieved, “I’m glad you’re doing something about that. I’d hate to think of you going away for so long with that rift between you guys. I mean, try not to be too long because you need to finish packing and we’ve only got today together as well, but definitely the right thing to do.”

Cindy finished breakfast, cleared up, and headed off up to the park. Tess was there waiting for her.

“Hi,” Cindy said.

“Hi.”

“Ok, I’m sorry I didn’t speak to you about going away. I understand that you’re mad. But I just couldn’t.”

“Why not?” Tess sounded unconvinced.

“I just couldn’t. I can’t explain why.”

“See? There you go again! That’s not you Cindy, you don’t have these namby-pamby ‘I just felt like it’ kind of situations. You always know why you do what you do. That’s why we get on. Or used to.”

“I know, I know. But it’s not that I can’t explain, it’s that I can’t explain.”

A light dawned in Tess’s eyes. “What’s going on?” she asked, “are you in some kind of trouble?”

“No, no, nothing like that. All I can say is that I can’t tell you anything but there’s more to this than I can say and I would never do anything to hurt you and if I could have I would have spoken to you sooner but I couldn’t and I still can’t but I just don’t want you to hate me …” The words came spilling out all over themselves like a running tap. Cindy almost felt like crying. Almost.

Tess looked thoughtful. And as she thought, Cindy’s thoughts were interrupted.

Cindy? What are you doing?

Nothing.

You mustn’t tell her anything!

I won’t Dave, leave me alone. I know that …

“What are you doing? What’s going on? You’ve got that faraway look again.” Tess was angry, but curious.

“Sorry.”

“Sorry! Here you are trying to patch things up and you zone out even now. What aren’t you telling me?”

“I can’t say. Believe me, I’d love to, but I just can’t.”

No, you really can’t.

Look, just butt out Dave. Let me deal with this.

Fine, but when you get to Adriá, you and I are going to have a chat.

Tess was looking impatient. “Honestly, I can’t,” Cindy continued, “But there’s something going on that isn’t easy for me and I’d feel a lot better if I could go through it knowing I still had my best friend.”

Tess looked at her suspiciously. Cindy was tempted to try and look at what she was thinking, but only for a second. She wouldn’t do that to Tess.

“Ok.” Tess finally said. “I’ll buy it. There’s something going on and you can’t tell me what it is. So I want you to answer three questions.”

“Ok.”

“Are you in trouble? Or danger?”

She wouldn’t lie. “Trouble, no. Danger, possibly, but not immediately.”

Tess looked worried now alongside suspicious and still a little annoyed. “Are you sure of what you’re doing?”

Cindy sensed this was the key question for Tess. And in realising that, she realised the depth of Tess’s trust in her, and why she had felt so betrayed when she thought Cindy didn’t trust her that much back. Of course. “Yes, yes I am. Absolutely sure. And this is something I haven’t even told dad about Tess, I swear. And if I could tell you, I absolutely would. But I can’t.”

“Well that’s my third question, really; when the time comes that you can, will you tell me what the heck’s going on?”

“Yes! Yes, I absolutely will! I swear it!”

A slight pause as Tess considered. Then, resolved, the anger left her face. “Alright. I’m not mad then. But you look after yourself Cindy, and don’t do anything dumb. And as soon as you can tell me anything, you darn well tell me.”

Cindy had never felt so relieved. “Oh I will, I will. Trust me, I will.”

“Give me a hug then!” The two girls hugged each other, briefly but fiercely, and for a moment all was right with Cindy’s world.

“Can you come over for lunch? Dad won’t mind.”

“Sure, I’ll help you pack. For Khoo. It is Khoo you’re going to isn’t it?” Tess asked mischievously.

“Oi, less of that.” Cindy replied with a laugh. “Come on, let’s go back to mine.”

Later that day three people stood outside the interstellar gateway, looking silently at it. One of them had a suitcase.

Cindy broke the silence. “Well, I suppose I had better go in.”

“Yep. I guess you better,” said Tess. They turned to each other. “Look,” she continued, “you look after yourself, ok?”

“I will. You know me, always sensible.”

“Always on another planet, that’s for sure. But this time you actually will be, so just be careful. And have fun.”

The girls hugged, and then Tess walked away a little way to let Cindy say goodbye to her dad.

“Bye bye monkey. Tess is right – you be careful, and look after yourself. I’ll miss you.”

“I’ll miss you too daddy,” Cindy sniffed, and threw her arms around him for a big hug. After a while she broke off, saying “well, I hate long goodbyes. I’m going through now. Bye you two. Love you daddy.”

“Bye monkey. I love you too. Take care.” He smiled a sad-ish smile. Tess called out goodbye and waved. She was looking worried as well.

“I’ll be fine,” Cindy called back as she walked toward the door, “don’t worry about me. You look after yourselves. I’ll be in touch as soon as I can.”

With that, she went through the door without a further look back. She tapped her PCD on the console where the man stood checking access codes, and stepped into the transporter.

“Have you done this before?” The man asked.

“No.”

“Well, it’s very simple. You’ll feel a momentary disorientation, and then you’ll be in … Khoo, is it?”

Cindy thought how thorough the GCCSC were. “Yes, Khoo.”

“Alright. On three. One … two …”

“… Three.”

And she disappeared.

Everything went dark for a moment, and then there was an explosion of multi-coloured lights swirling in all directions around Cindy. Before she had time to register fully they resolved into a single, glowing plane. Within a millisecond the glow faded, leaving a wall. A grey wall. And a hazy shape in front of it. This too resolved quickly, and Cindy saw it was a man standing before her. He had grey hair and looked about ten or twenty years older than her dad (which would make him around fifty to sixty). He was very well-preserved though – Cindy could see that despite his age he was very fit. He was wearing a similar uniform to the one Cindy had seen in the vision of herself all that time ago (was it really only a few days?) with the crest over its pocket.

“Dave?” Cindy said.

He nodded, once. “Hello Cindy. Welcome to Adriá.”