April 26, 2003
After her flyball game in France, she stopped at her London flat. She hadn't been there for a month and Henry told her she had a pile of mail waiting for her.
"Hey sis, it feels like forever since we haven't seen each other, yet you still live here, technically," said Erik.
"True, last time I stopped here for the night, you weren't there."
"Ah yes, we were playing in Asia. Are you still working in Scotland?"
"Not at the moment. This past month I've been working more in the United States, but I'm being sent to just about everywhere for consulting works lately."
"That explains why you've been getting a lot of mail from EBEE," said Henry.
"While I'm here, I should also collect my stash of uncashed checks."
"Speaking of the United States, we got a tip regarding Fart in the Sea, somewhere in Florida. You in?" said Gus.
"If I don't have to be across the planet when you're going there, count me in."
Coralis had a drink with them and took off toward Montreal. She arrived at her apartment late evening and Frank wasn't home yet. She poured herself a drink and went for a shower. He got back home as she walked out of the bathroom.
"Hey luv! Damn, I just missed shower time, uh?"
"Sorry hun, didn't know what time you'd be back."
After getting dressed, she grabbed the bag she carried from London.
"After the flyball game, I made a stop to London to pick up my mail and some other stuff," she said as she dropped a pile of unopened envelopes and uncashed checks on the coffee table in the living room.
Frank sat on the couch by the coffee table.
"Oh wow, that explains why you never received mail here," he said as he looked at what was on the table.
"With my list of enemies increasing, I'm going to keep it that way. As far as the EBEE and all of the governments I do consulting work for are concerned, Blue Thunder lives in the UK. They don't have my civil name and all my payments are filtered through the EBEE. I don't trust anyone there, so I want them to keep sending my checks to my London address."
Coralis walked to the liquor cabinet to grab a bottle of whiskey and a glass.
"Are you saying that all the unopened envelopes are from EBEE?"
"Yes, you can open them if you want to. Elemental people in general barter for just about everything, as you noticed, but not all of us can barter for a living and our currency isn't recognized by humans. When I do consulting work for human intelligence agencies, they send my payments to the EBEE. If they see a human check with my name on it, they send it to my London address."
"I was wondering about that. I never asked because I don't care about how much you earn, you know that. I didn't have to add you to my income tax declaration this year because we haven't lived together for a year yet, but next tax season, I'm will have to. Do you file taxes for our government or as far as they're concerned, you have 0 income here?"
She sat on the couch next to Frank, thinking about his question. A frown was visible on her face. Frank started to open some of the envelopes lying on the table.
"My banker does it for me. I know that my flyball income cannot be declared in human income tax papers, same goes for my regular EBEE income. The CMMA pays the EBEE for my services, so my income from them is added to my income from the EBEE. My consulting works are considered as freelancing, I was told, and are declared in my UK income tax declaration."
She grabbed the bottle of whiskey on the table and poured herself another drink.
"I'll have a drink too. Your banker? Do you mean your notary?"
She got up to grab a glass for Frank. She sat back on the couch and poured a drink for Frank.
"No, uh, our bankers also handle human financial paperwork, including income taxes. From what I was told by my banker, the interests coming from my inheritance investments need to be declared in the income tax declaration here, under my civil name. I wasn't 10 yet when I accessed my inheritance for the first time and I didn't know a single thing about economy. I was with my cousin. We kept a portion of it and invested the rest."
"Oh yeah, I remember you mentioning your inheritance money being mostly invested."
"It still is. When I became known as Blue Thunder, at 14, my banker recommended renewing the inheritance placements under my civil name, so that if I ever got under investigation by the revenue agency, I could use that as proof of income, and they wouldn't need to dig further. When a placement expires, I transfer a portion into a checking account and reinvest the rest."
"How much are we talking about? Just so I have an idea of which benefits I might lose when calculating family income. Although, if I'm to judge by how much money you just dropped on the table, fair to assume I'll lose them all."
She was about to refill her glass but paused what she was doing to look at him.
"Honestly, I don't know how any of this works. Every year in March, my banker hands me papers to sign and I never paid attention to numbers. He always gives me a copy of those papers. I have a safe at the bank and that's where I always put them. If you want to, I can ask my banker for a current statement of my investments stemming from my inheritance and I can also give you the copies of this year's income tax papers."
"Wait, you have more investments, other than those from your inheritance money?"
"Yeah, most of my flyball income is invested, but I told you before, if you need anything, let me know. If I could, I'd give you all of these checks for you to cash in, but I won't want any paper trail directly linking Blue Thunder to you, not under this war climate. However, I can transfer you anything that has been deposited and processed."
"I don't need to see your bank statements, but I am curious about how much you declared in your taxes, so, sure, if you can give me the copies of your declaration, I'd like that. I don't like asking you for money, but I might take you up to it to pay off my student loan before they charge me for interest."
"Do I also need to tell my banker about your income for next year's taxes?"
"Yeah, for family income calculation."
She chugged her drink.
"I see. Would it be easier if my banker also files yours?"
"Either that, or I file yours."
Her hologram vibrated on the table. She recognized Andrew's code so she pressed to answer it. Andrew's holographic image came out of it.
"You have to go to Dallas right now, I was told about a werewolf conflict that needs to be investigated and reports of demon summoning."
"Only me? Are you going to meet me there?"
"I need to go to Ireland with Leonan to investigate another demon summoning case. Check with Eva, or she might call you shortly, I think CMMA is also sending people there. Isn't it interesting that our elders consider me ready to take an apprentice, yet keep sending me on missions with my former mentor?"
"While sending your apprentice to chase demons with another apprentice. Yeah, that's hilarious," said Coralis as her mobile phone rang. "Eva is calling me, talk to you later."
"Demon summoning? In a city like Dallas?" said Frank.
"Seems so," said Coralis as she answered her phone. "Dallas?"
"Yes. High Fay Ellya is sending me and Sonylla. Before I ask Sonylla to pick me up, I wanted to check if you were also going there. She's in Winnipeg, I don't have any portals with me and she's never been to my place. Figured it might be easier to check with you first."
"Andrew just called me. I'm being sent there with no one else from the EBEE. I have a portal with me. I can open one for Sonylla and we'll pick you up before heading to Dallas?"
"Good plan. I'll let Sonylla know to wait for your portal."
"Glad you aren't going there alone if demons are involved," said Frank as Coralis walked to their entry closet.
"Me too. Honestly, if Eva hadn't been going, I probably would have contacted Veronica to see if she was up for some demon hunting. I don't know the werewolf packs around Dallas and I don't know why I'm sent to a werewolf conflict there, unless it's related to the demon summoning reports."
She opened a portal in the closet and Sonylla walked through. Coralis introduced her to Frank and went to grab her cloak and supplies she thought she might need.
Right as Coralis was opening the front door to leave with Sonylla, her hologram vibrated. It was a satellite call.
"MI6 calling, hold on," said Coralis, closing the door before answering. "I'm listening."
"We heard about demons being summoned in Dallas."