Steven Harper - Trickster

"You saw nothing to your liking tonight?" he asked solicitously as he presented Gretchen a bill for the champagne.

Gretchen settled the check, trying to look as if she paid half a day's stipend for a single drink all the time. "Nothing grabbed me. Lady Kellyn says you're getting two new souls soon?"

"Yes, madam. They will have finished their training by the day after tomorrow. I'll be sending out a notice to everyone on our Honor Roll once they're available."

"Really?" Gretchen put her hand on the pudgy man's podium. When she removed it, a hundred-freemark coin glittered in the soft light beside a small address chip. "I hope I'm on that Roll."

The pudgy maitre d' swept the chip and the coin into his pocket. "Of course, madam. You will be among the first to hear."

"I'd like to be the very first, even if it's only by a few minutes."

"That can certainly be arranged, madam."

Gretchen thanked the man and swept out into the false night.

"A hundred freemarks?" Kendi spluttered. "Gretchen! We have a big budget, but isn't that extravagant for a simple bribe?"

"It didn't even include the champagne," Gretchen added with a winsome smile. "Do you want to hear what I got or not?"

Kendi took a deep breath and closed his eyes to get himself under control. It was only money, and the Children had never stinted when it came to buying, begging, or stealing Silent into freedom. It was just the way Gretchen went about it, so smug and irritating.

They were in Ben and Kendi's quarters, with its half-messy living room. The faint smell of old coffee hung on the air. Behind Kendi on Ben's desk sat holographic displays of the plain corridor leading to the Collection's part of SA station. Ben and Lucia had managed to get close enough to the Collection entrance to release a pair of tiny spider cameras that had crawled up to the ceiling and planted themselves. One of them had wandered too close and shorted out, the victim of some sort of jamming device, but the other had hung back and was transmitting a clear image. At the moment, the display showed nothing but an empty corridor that ended in a door fitted with an hand-level scanner for checking prints. Dozens of people passed through that door every day, presenting an identification holo and submitting to a quick print scan before being admitted. Kendi burned to know what was on the other side of that door, but had to be content with having his team shadow the various department heads to learn more about them.

"All right," he said at last. "What did you learn?"

"The maitre d', or whoever he is, takes bribes. I didn't try it with Lady Kellyn. I didn't think it would work."

"Right, right. What else?"

"Jeung has a thing for sex with non-humans-we knew that from our other research-and he does get bored fast. Whenever they get someone new, Jeung's on her faster than a spacer on… well, you know."

Kendi tapped his fingers on the arms of the desk chair, a habit he had picked up from Ara. "Anything else?"

"You betcha. I gave the maitre d' guy a mail drop and bribed him to let me be the very first to know when a new soul is ready to start working. He said there'll be two more coming up by the day after tomorrow. I'll bet a year of your stipend-"

Kendi snorted as he usually did when Gretchen made this remark.

"— that Jeung will be there and he'll be heavily occupied for quite some time."

"In other words, we'll have a time and place of his next assignation," Kendi said. "Along with a built-in distraction."

"Astute," Gretchen said. "No wonder you were promoted to Father."

Kendi ignored this comment and thought for a long moment, then rose. "We'll have to put a twenty-four hour monitor on that mail drop. And be ready to spend the evening with a hooker. I need to go find Ben."

" The message came in, troops," Kendi said. " Go! "

Gretchen acknowledged the transmission, left a few SA company chits on the restaurant table, and hurried out the front door. The lights and sounds of FunSec swirled around her in a cacophony she had come to hate over the last day and half. Ignoring all of it as best she could, she picked her way across the street to Lady Kellyn's establishment and let the attendant get the door for her.

Because Silent Acquisitions had been originally started by humans and the station originally built with humans in mind, SA Station kept a twenty-four hour clock and work schedule. However, Silent Acquisitions itself was open twenty-four hours a "day," meaning FunSec establishments could expect customers at any time as people got off work at all hours. Lady Kellyn's was therefore busy, despite the fact that it was barely six-thirty in the evening.

Another fact Gretchen had learned in the last day and a half was that Lady Kellyn did not accept reservations from anyone but preferred-read, regular and wealthy — customers. On the surface it was an attempt to seem gentile and old-fashioned, but Gretchen suspected that too many people had called for reservations and then broken them, either because the customers chickened out or they didn't bother to inform the brothel of a change in plans. People who had to go through the trouble of making reservations in person, Gretchen imagined, rarely broke them.

Gretchen approached the maitre d', still pudgy in his tuxedo. "I just happened to be in the neighborhood when I got the news," she said breathlessly. "You have two new souls?"

"Indeed, madam." The maitre d' tapped his podium and brought up a screen. "Would you like to spend time with either of them? They begin seeing customers at seven o'clock."

"Who are they and what are they like?" she asked.

A small hologram of a greenish, cone-shaped creature with a multitude of segmented arms appeared next to an image of something that looked like a giant throw pillow with zebra stripes.

"Tour-rif-na," the maitre d' said, indicating the cone creature, "is from the planet Pell-de-ra. Her multiple arms and fingers are especially adept at giving pleasure in many forms and she secretes several specially scented oils for this purpose. Zem-" the maitre d' indicated the pillow "-is a very relaxing partner from Rivva. The fur is actually made of mobile cilia which can either massage or excite."

Behind Gretchen, Ben and Lucia came through the door, hand in hand. Lucia wore white gloves to cover her scars. Gretchen ignored them to concentrate on the holograms. She started to point to one of the images, then apparently changed her mind.

"Is… has Ken Jeung made a reservation for this evening?" she asked, setting a coin on the podium. "I don't mean to pry, but I work for him and it would be… embarrassing for me if I ran into him here. I'd prefer to arrange things so that he doesn't see me."

The coin vanished. "He hasn't called yet, madam, but I'm expecting him to do so any moment. The Honor Roll notifications went out only two minutes ago. You asked to be first."

"And I do appreciate it," Gretchen said. "He should be out of work any moment, now, and I'm sure he'll come straight here, so if I take an hour with Zem-" she pointed to the pillow "-I should be out of sight. Unless-oh, wait-are their rooms close together? Where we might run into each other?"

The maitre d' began to look a little annoyed, so Gretchen put another coin on the podium. "Their rooms are right across the hall from each other, madam. But don't worry-each room is equipped with a spyhole so you can check the corridor to see if it's empty before you leave."

"Thank you so much," Gretchen said.

"I've logged you in to spend an hour with Zem in the Palace room beginning at seven o'clock. Go to the top of the stairs, turn right, and go all the way to the end of the corridor. Zem herself will not be spending time down here-she isn't as mobile as our other souls-but she will be ready for you. Meanwhile, you can enjoy the bar and buffet." The maitre d's podium chimed for his attention and he tapped it. "Greetings, Lady Kellyn's. Ah, hello, Dr. Jeung. So good to hear from you. Yes, we do have a reservation open."