Mole Hunt

There was a mole. Moles are an unfortunate downside to the intelligence industry, even more so when dealing with international intelligence. The CIA was usually very good at figuring out when there was a mole and who it was. We had a whole team devoted to mole hunting. Our colleagues hated us, but recognized that we were a necessary evil. 

Apart from the intercolleague animosity, there were a few other downsides to being on the mole hunt team. Every person I worked with was suspicious of me, and I of them. If someone said something a little off color, a dozen eyes would watch their every move for at least a month. We weren’t just skeptical of our coworkers, we were suspicious of every one. I was still single. When I was younger, and had just joined the team, I was dating a woman while undergoing the intensive training the team required. Every so often she would say something seemingly inconsequential. She had told me she had gone to the mall with her sister that Saturday, but the day before she told me she had lunch with her childhood best friend on Saturday. When asked, she would brush away my words and say she had simply misremembered. After the third instance of this, I snooped on her phone while I slept over at her house. There was nothing. I discovered, via her texts, that she really was just bad at remembering when things happened. I still broke-up with her, because I realized that I knew too much to ever really trust another person again. I had no idea how some of my coworkers managed to get and stay married.

Instead, I got a cat. I named him Dmitri, after the Cold War spy. He was a rescue. When I saw him in the shelter his fluffy fur was completely shaved, except for his flat, grumpy face. He looked like a Medieval painting. Since he was shaved I could see all the scars he had from his life on the streets. His blue eyes looked like they had seen far too much. He was perfect.

And now he was my only connection. My family and friends had no idea what I did. They couldn’t. But Dmitri was a cat. I could tell him anything without risk of it getting out. And I’d investigated enough moles to know how easy it is for a human’s lips to loosen.

The first couple weeks I had him he would just hole up on top of the fridge or under the couch and watch me. Eventually he ventured out and would sit about ten feet away from me at all times. Now, from the moment I get home from work, he’s glued to me. 

He was my solace. He let me vent about how hard it was for me to dig into Jim’s daughter’s new boyfriend to check if he was a Chinese operative, or if there was anything nefarious about Jennet's sister’s vacation to Cuba. He never interrupted or judged, and, most importantly, he couldn’t leak the information.

And I needed him because we were in the middle of the biggest mole hunt since I’d joined the team. Information was being leaked to Russia at an alarming rate. Our own spies were reporting that Russian agents were learning about state secrets that they should have no access to under any circumstances. We had started giving everyone different information in order to try and weasel out who was leaking the information. 

I slammed the door shut extra hard the day we got information that Sean was the mole. While I wasn’t friends with anyone at work, Sean was always nice to me, despite what my job was. He would let me use his almond milk whenever my oat milk ran out. We were the only people in the office who were lactose intolerant, which fostered a sense of camaraderie between us. He would joke with me every time the coffee maker broke, which was far too frequently. And he was the one who suggested I go to Little Paw Rescue Cat Sanctuary and get myself a companion because I seemed so lonely.

Dmitri meowed, concerned, when I didn’t immediately pick him up and cover him with kisses.

“I'm sorry, buddy. Just give me a minute. I feel like shit today,” I said as I slinked over to the couch and collapsed on it.

Dmitri hopped up on my lap and started making biscuits on my stomach. 

“Do you remember when I told you about my coworker Sean?” I asked him.

He meowed like he always does when I ask a question. It really felt like he was having a conversation with me. 

“That’s right. He’s the reason we’re a family now. Well… now he might be going to prison for treason.”

Dmitri stopped kneading my stomach and curled up on it and stared at me with his eyes that were a bit too big for his face.

“It seems like he’s the one who was feeding Russia information. He’s been denying it though. And we can’t actually find any concrete evidence. All we have is that Russia got their hands on information that only he had. There really isn’t any other option.”

Dmitri smacked my face with his paw, which I chose to interpret as an encouraging pat.

“Thanks, buddy. I’ll be ok. I’m just a bit sad. Sean was probably the person in the office I was friendliest with. Now I'll just be alone. At least you’ll comfort me when I come home, right?”

Dmitri leapt off my lap and scuttled off to use the littler box. I took that as a “yes.”

I got off my couch to grab a beer and wallow for the rest of the evening. 

I woke up to Dmitri smacking my nose like it was the door spring that he loved so much.

“Ouch. Cut it out! I’ll get you your damn food,” I grumbled as I crawled out of bed. But Dmitri didn’t prance over to his bowl in anticipation like he usually did. He jumped up on my dresser and meowed loudly while swatting the drawer handles.

“Calm down, Dmitri. You want some wet food?” 

I tried to coax him into the kitchen, but he was insistent on his war with the dresser. I gave up going about our usual weekend morning routine and just got dressed. Apparently, that was what Dmitri wanted because as soon as I opened my underwear drawer he settled down and just watched me get dressed peacefully. When I was presentable, he jumped down and started walking to the kitchen. Thinking he was finally ready to eat I took a turn toward his dish, but he walked over to the door that leads to the backyard.

“Dmitri, food!” I called for him.

He turned back to look at me. He jumped up, turned the door handle, and slipped out the door.

My heart fell out my chest as I darted after him. Since when could Dmitri open the door? He had never gotten out before.

He was perched on the post of the gate that led out to my driveway.

“Dmitri, come here, buddy. Let’s go back inside.”

Instead he hopped down on the other side of the fence. I chased after him again. This pattern repeated many times. He would run somewhere out of reach, I would call to him, begging him to come to me, and he would run again. It went on for too long. I had slipped some sandals on when I left my back yard, but we walked too far for them to have done much to protect my feet from all the walking. We had reached the city proper by this point. I lost sight of Dmitri a couple times. But then I would hear him meow and manage to find him again. Something was tickling my suspicions. He was very obviously leading me somewhere. The longer we walked the more my panic faded and my curiosity grew. 

Eventually, we ended up in a back alley full of dumpsters. The smell made it quite obvious we were walking amidst the trash from a bunch of restaurants. I wondered if Dmitri was taking me to a restaurant that had been feeding him while I was at work. Maybe he wanted to share food with me, like when he would leave piles of kibble on my pillow.

We reached a dead end. Dmitri was waiting by the last dumpster in the alley. When I got close he hissed at me. I paused. Dmitri had never hissed at me, even when I first got him and he seemed allergic to being in my line of sight. I tried to take another step toward him. He hissed again. I stayed put for a while. We held eye contact with each other. When Dmitri seemed satisfied that I wasn’t going to move, he turned toward the dumpster. He placed his paw in a small indent at the bottom. There was a whirring noise and then a panel of the dumpster opened up and a small computer popped out. 

My jaw hit the floor, but Dmitri was paying me no mind. He stood on top of the keyboard, which I could make out was the Cyrillic alphabet, and held his face right in front of a small camera that was on the top of the monitor. A green light scanned his pupil, and he sat back down in front of the computer. The monitor came to life and a message in Russian popped up that read: Welcome Agent #3792. Are you alone? 

Dmitri hit a key on the keyboard.

The screen blinked and a new message popped up.

Solo status confirmed. Do you want to make a report?

Dmitri hit another key.

A text box appeared on the screen.

Using a single paw, Dmitri typed out a message.

Target has yet to mention a mole hunt.

He hit another key and the text box disappeared and replaced with the message:

Do you wish to submit this report?

Another key pressed.

Is there anything else you wish to do?

A different key pressed.

Shutting down now.

Then the computer retreated back into its dumpster hiding place. Dmitri strolled over to me and started rubbing himself on my legs. He wanted me to pick him up. But I was still in shock. 

My cat, my pet cat, was a Russian spy.

Or, I suppose, my pet cat was a Russian defector.

I gave in and picked him up. He dug his claws into my shirt so I couldn't put him back down.

“You know Dmitri, moles aren’t feline.”

Dmitri mewed softly in my ear.

“Well, I suppose they are now. How am I supposed to tell my boss about this?”

Dmitri started to purr loudly in my arms.

“You’re right. Let’s just go home. That’s a problem for Monday.”