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Something Broken (Part II)

“That was quick.”

Mari fixes Graham with a questioning stare. They’re sitting on the train on the way back. A lady chatters on her phone in the row directly behind them, yammering something about toilet paper and plastic ducks.

Graham leans back into his seat casually, glancing sideways at her. “Hm?”

“Don’t hmm. There’s something up about that Masato fellow, or the guy he works for. You’re not telling me this and you’re not telling me why.” Mari states this as fact, accusingly.

It’s not entirely unfounded. Where Graham was more than willing to introduce him to Ariko and Haruka, people who were arguably a little more dangerous (or a little more mentally unstable), this meeting had just been weird. Masato himself was charming enough - a little too polite, but still - and there wasn’t anything much curious about him at all.

After those two sentences of introduction, Graham had briefly talked to Masato for a while more, but it was mainly about business, receipts and future shipments of “stuff”. There were some polite references to Mari, but Graham never revealed anything to him, and Masato had not pressed matters.

Graham doesn’t answer, but something about him changes. Mari is suddenly shot with a thought that she might have gone too far.

They sit in silence for the rest of the ride home.

When they reach the train station, Graham says “Follow me.” Mari is about to protest a little, but Graham’s tone of voice makes it clear that it wasn’t meant to be a question.

***

“That was unplanned.”

His voice is quiet. Mari doesn’t say anything.

“The trip to visit Masato was unplanned. And at the last possible minute, I get entrusted with a Masato job.” He spits out the last two words as if they were ice cubes.

“What’s wrong with him?” Mari questions.

They’re back in Graham’s old apartment. He’s flung his rucksack into the corner, and is bustling around noisily in the pantry. There’s a clatter as a plate or something meets the ground a little too enthusiastically.

"He’s a mage, too. I’ve been hiding you well, I think,” comments Graham, “but somehow he’s managed to find out somehow. Masato never shows up unless something big’s happening. Masato’s an Auditor.”

There’s that old saying: three people can keep a secret if two of them are dead. The lesser people there are, the easier it is to control them. The Syndicate was so big that no one mortal could reasonably hope to control every single individual. People cut corners. Leaders could be corrupt. Lower-level heads might simply be idiots. How do you make sure everyone toes the line and behaves?

The Syndicate’s answer to this was elegant: send in the Auditors.

The Auditors were a feared group talked about in whispered conversations, if at all. They were supposed to be loyal to whoever (or whatever) was at the head of the Syndicate, and they prowled the individual branches of the organisation to look for deadwood.

Auditors appeared when there were suspicions. They didn’t really need to do anything; they had enough reputation that the rumour of an Auditor visit was enough to scare most people into submission.

But Auditors had an uncanny knack of showing up when people least expected them. They came in all shapes and sizes: ranging from graceful ladies with dangerously silky voices to bad-tempered obese men with horrible combovers no one dared to laugh at.