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clear and focus.
    “He’s coming around. Good. I worried you’d hit him too hard, Lawrence,” a dark and slippery voice says. “Can you hear me, Campion? I told you, you wouldn’t like me knowing who you are! You’ve risen through the ranks a bit since we last spoke, haven’t you? Full ambassador! That’s impressive. How is your head?”
    Wentworth.
    “Fuck you,” BC says.
    “Is that any way to start our conversation? Any way for a diplomat to talk to the UTZ representative to this ceremony today? What, are you having another one of those headaches, padre?” Wentworth jokes. BC rubs the back of his head as he answers. “Funny. You clubbed me. Is that any way to open a dialogue with the Vatican Ambassador?”
    “Touché,” Wentworth concedes, “Perhaps not. But certain precautions need to be taken when that Vatican Ambassador is also an assassin! It would have been easier if we could have at least chatted at the reception,” Wentworth assures him. “Yet you avoided me. You have been avoiding me.”
    “I didn’t feel like making small talk with a murderer,” BC says as he tries to sit up on the couch.
    “Murderer? Who? Fiza? She’s not dead, just... gainfully employed. Making herself useful, you could say. She’s still on my station. She’s not dead.”
    “That’s not what I hear,” BC says.
    “Oh, yes. That. You probably heard about the report. That’s what we do with some of our more, uh, indentured , servants on the station. She’s just officially dead, not actually dead. Makes the paperwork so much easier.It’s just a formality, terms of her employment,” Wentworth says dismissively.
    “Convenient for when you really do kill her, then. If I can believe you,” BC says. “I know you, Wentworth… I know your type. You’re the type of man who can tell another man anything he wants to hear, in order to get that other man to do as you ask. You’ll tell me she’s not dead, whether she is or not, if it makes me open up to whatever it is you’ve dragged me here for.” BC looks around the room,
    “Wherever ‘here’ is.”
    “You’re still on the Moon,” Wentworth says. “We haven’t gone anywhere. I need information from you, cooperation. I don’t need you ,” he says with emphasis, “I need you for what you know , and who you represent. I am doing this in an official UTZ capacity, and so I officially apologize for your clubbing....”
    “And kidnapping,” BC interjects.
    “You are not tied down, Campion. You can leave now, if you like,” Wentworth says with a gesture towards the door.
    After that thwack, I don’t know if I can stand up without getting dizzy... maybe not yet. Wonder if I got a concussion from that love tap?
    “But,” Wentworth continues, “Before you go, a question. Why have we lost all touch with the Vatican?”
    “Maybe because you go around clubbing their agents,” BC mumbles. He rubs the back of his head.
    “What do you mean, ‘lost all touch’? I’ve seen the Pope on the news and stuff.”
    “Yes, and that’s all we’ve seen or heard from this new Pope. We worked closely with Pope Peter, as you know. This new man doesn’t do us the courtesy of returning our messages,” Wentworth says with some indignation.
    “How rude,” BC mocks him.
    “Why won’t he get in touch with us?” Wentworth says, losing patience.
    “He won’t get in touch with anybody!” BC says, matching Wentworth’s tone.
    “What?”
    “I haven’t heard anything myself, not since he named me ambassador and told me to rebuild the mission up here. It’s been a whole lot of nothing since January.”
    “Nothing? I find that hard to believe. You’re the ambassador; there must be reports, communiqués...”
    Wentworth is shaking his head.
    “Nope. Afraid not. Oh, I send reports back there, don’t get me wrong. I report to them every week. But them to me? Not so much.” BC’s tone is tinged with sarcasm.
    “But what about...” Wentworth looks around, then walks