Spy Bait (short story)

Spy Bait
Main character(s):	Twenty One
Featuring:	S
Main enemy:	SOFRAM
Main setting:	Space Station E9, 2040s
Key crew
Publisher:	City Magazines
Editor:	Alan Fennell
Release details
Printed in:	TV Century 21 Annual 1966
Release date:	1966
21 stories
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Spy Bait was a 21 short story printed in TV Century 21 that contained elements from the Doctor Who universe.

Notably, its narrative concerned a plot by SOFRAM to cripple the Universal Secret Service and destroy most of Unity City, a location first introduced in The Daleks comic story Duel of the Daleks. It also heavily mentioned the DWU character of World President Nikita Bandranaik, who main character Agent Twenty One had been assigned to protect.

Summary

to be added

Characters

• Agent Twenty One
• S
• Ann
• Fleen
• Amardan
• Robot Twenty One
• Cypher clerk
• Guard
• Controller of Space Station E9
• Immigration official
• Policeman

Worldbuilding

• The passengers arriving at Earth Space Station E9 from Universal Spaceways flight ME 971 from Mars are asked to proceed to immigration.
• Twenty One lists his nationality as Terra-Martian and his profession as a toy salesman for Century 21 Toys Inc.
• In his short-lived impersonation of a member of the police, Amardan quickly flashes a Venusian Public Library ticket at Twenty One but he notices Amardan's lack of proper credentials.
• Twenty One asks one of the Space Port Police to radio a string of numbers to the headquarters of the Unity City Secret Service and ask them to feed them into the code-breaker computer.
• The glass-roofed observatory lounge is the most popular part of Space Station E9 and always crowded with people waiting for connections to other planets or the rocket ferry to Earth.
• Twenty One merrily tells his captors his double could never get past the front door of the security conference because the X-ray check would pick him out instantly and his voice is like a fingerprint in that it cannot be copied exactly, only to be told his double is actually a walking neutron bomb planned to detonate after failing the first test.
• S has a Service Ray Gun which he stores in his desk drawer, and his own rocket ship.
• The controller of Space Station E9 uses a breakdown in radar control as an excuse to delay all incoming and outgoing flights for two hours while S searches for Twenty One.
• Twenty One has an odour card kept in Universal Secret Service files. One of the deadly toys from his sample case, a bloodhound dog, is able to track him down upon analysing it.

Story notes

• Unusually, the name of the criminal organisation SOFRAM is styled as "Sofram" in this story. The name had previously been established as an acronym, standing for "Solar Organisation For Revenge And Murder".

Continuity

• It is not often that Twenty One is given the task of guarding the World President, but Nikita Bandranaik planned to go on a tour of the planets and the security arrangements proved to be a headache. Twenty One had already saved Bandranaik's life by this time and would do so again. (COMIC: Andromeda Or Die, Deadly Fly)