"It is over," Recruit Cal said in a dead voice, pale and trembling. He blinked in disbelief, pinched himself hard to make sure he was not in some horrible nightmare, and finally let the dreadful truth assert itself in his uncomprehending mind.

Alas, his coffeemaker was no more.

It had just let out its last struggling breath, then had fallen silent. The valiant machine that had relentlessly supplied Cal with its elixir of life for as long as he had been here would give him happiness and comfort no more. It was an old coffeemaker, to be sure, and the young Recruit had never expected it to live forever, but its tragic passing at the moment he needed it most was more than what he could bear. But even as he mourned his old companion, silvery tears gliding down his cheeks, Cal already thought about finding a replacement. It was disrespectful for the deceased, but also necessary — for what is a man without coffee? For the greater good of the Protectors of the Plot Continuum, he had to find a new coffeemaker.

"You can surely understand," sobbed Cal, addressing his lifeless sidekick. "Don't worry, I shall never forget you for as long as I live."

Someone passed in the corridor just outside Cal's office, and the young Recruit immediately put on his usual mask of grim stoicism. He was supposed to act professionally, and a professional does not weep. No, tears would not solve his problem. He should immediately look for a new assistant to replace the one who had just left this sad, joyless world for a better place.

It took him quite a while to find the Department of Sufficiently Advanced Technology in the inextricable maze of the Headquarters. Slaloming between the white-coated technicians testing their revolutionary inventions or reading thick books of physics, Cal went directly to a Token Black Man, who looked like he had a significant rank.

"Excuse me, mister Token," Cal said in a businesslike tone, "but I need a coffeemaker quickly."

The man raised an eyebrow, either because of how Cal had called him or because of the Recruit's strange request (or, maybe, a bit of both).
"Uh, you can probably find one in the storage room over there," he said, pointing. "It's where we put what we want to get rid of at our next yard sale. It's a bit of a mess, but you can take whatever you want. It's not like there's anything valuable in there."

"Thank you."

As it turned out, saying that the storage room was a bit of a mess was a massive understatement. Under a thick layer of dust and cobwebs, an incredible number of appliances, tools and strange gadgets occupied almost every square inch of the floor. Cal picked his way carefully, looking everywhere in the dimly-lit room for a coffeemaker.

Then he tripped on someone.

Gasping, he looked down at the face staring up at him. No, not someone: something. To be more precise, an android in the shape of a little girl with tangled black hair and large, innocent hazel eyes. She (it?) was badly damaged, with many multicolored wires laid bare, but her contact with Cal's foot had woken her up. With an eerie little smile, she started singing the digits of Pi on the tune of the Soviet national anthem. The young Recruit stared at her with astonishment. Then, forgetting all about his coffeemaker, he examined the girl. She was apparently very sophisticated, and without the wires she would look perfectly human. But she was broken, that much was plain. Cal suddenly forgot his initial purpose here, fascinated by the android. He did find a coffeemaker somewhere and absent-mindedly put it under his arm, but when he quit the storage room with the android in his hands, only her deserved his full attention.

By the time he reached his response center, the robotic girl was now making a lecture on the many useful applications of string theory to winemaking. Cal put her on the floor and rummaged in his closet to find his toolbox. He was not much of an engineer, but he intended to repair her no matter what. Pouring himself a cup of coffee (the new coffeemaker was even better than the previous one), he opened up the android with his knife and got to work. Here in the Headquarters, time knew nothing of logic or regularity, so the young Recruit used cups of coffee as an approximate unit. From one to three cups, the robot girl translated one of Barack Obama's speeches into pirate speak ("Arrrr, matey, aye we can!"). From about three to six cups, she composed an opera version of The Matrix. At seven cups, she predicted the next big San Andreas earthquake for October 2014, along with a rough estimation of damage and casualties. From eight to ten, she recounted every single move of the six chess games that opposed Garry Kasparov to the computer Deep Blue in 1997. Cal thankfully found a way to shut her down just as she was starting to graphically describe every sexual position known to man, and from then on he was able to work in silence.

Around fourteen cups of coffee and a half, Cal was extremely tired, but he felt he had done a decent job. All wires had been reconnected and several missing parts had been replaced. He only hoped his tampering had not turned the android into a blood-thirsty megalomaniac bent on world domination.

Of course, there was only one way to find out, and it was to flick the switch — which he did.



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Okay, this was part one of the introduction of my second agent.

I will post part two when I have found a name for her. Feel free to make suggestions.