Disregard. Time for some self-directed espionage.

You already have your task. You need only commit to it.

Negative. Gäng want spy.

REACTIONARY PESSIMISM. THE PEOPLE'S SPY IS INDOMINABLE.

The ciphertext. You have the pieces, you just need to put them together.

Something about the strange red disc nags at the edge of your consciousness. Perhaps the room contains other leads as well.

That numberless phone line may be worth investigating. Perhaps the room contains other leads as well.

The room remains to be searched. There may be leads to follow up on.

Even as your controller is speaking, your mind is settling back into familiar grooves. The old mechanisms slide and click into position.

A.k.a. 'The Freezer'. The Opera's labyrinthine archival complex. Where the old, useless, and discredited are consigned until they're dismissed or die of despair.

REACTIONARY MISADVENTURE.

Auto-erotic obliteration.

Tsunami of self-love.

Five years, three months, ten days. That's how long it's been since her voice was in your ear.

The exquisite work of the 'magic box', one of the proudest achievements of the Opera's Technical Services Office.

This has to be Reno's pied-a-terre. He's one of the only people in Portofiro who could afford this kind of luxury.

Barely audible: a mechanical hum.

A camera!

Such majestic buildings always have multiple points of access -- better look around.

Maybe it's worth taking another look at the cleaners' tuk-tuk.

One door closes, another opens -- there must be another way in.

Something whirs inside the black sphere. A camera points at you.

The camera whirrs.

Both of those things can't be true.

'No' is not an answer.

A list you're meant to be on.

There's a delicate balance to be maintained here.

HAS HE NOT CONSIDERED THE INTERNATIONAL SHAME THIS COULD BRING?

He's on the oüts. Not part of the in-crowd. What a löser, to not be told what everyone else already knows.

His voice cracks. The intercom pops.

This has to be Reno's pied-a-terre. He's one of the only people in Portofiro who can afford such material luxuries.

This must be Reno's place, the dolphin indicates as much.

Proper posh.

Sterile, discreet, professional. This is who you call in when you're paranoid that 'regular help' might molest the contents of your apartment.

When the things you're cleaning up after are especially sensitive in nature.

A whiff of fried shrimp layered under a pervasive antiseptic odour.

El Dolor de Viudas. Extremely popular at pelota matches and the main cause of Portofiro's looming epidemic of atherosclerosis.

No one abandons shrimp like that for long.

El signo del Vega. Angel of ancestors and bringer of the new year.

This tuk-tuk has recently suffered a rear-end collision.

That padlock is under sustained physical pressure. Its collapse is not far.

The cleaner's face obscured from clients who'd rather not have to acknowledge the humanity of their janitorial staff.

Fig. 1452: a linocut of an early diving suit, so primitive that the explorer had to be sewn into it before he went under — and cut free after surfacing.

The call of the meat cannot be denied.

It vaguely resembles a giant sausage, an organ stuffed with flesh, processed and squeezed into shape.

Look, his hair's a bigger catastrophe than usual -- he just stuck his head out of the window.

Why didn't everyone do that, then? This may well have been high-level psychogenic stagecraft.

The tram wires crackle above you, as if charged with new energy.

His luminous yellow visor is stained with bloody fingerprints.

Nothing to do with M.I.H.O. If it came to it, he would've taken ten more bullets on his way to you.

Checks