Steven Campbell - Suck My Cosmos

“How can I get anything? It’s moving too fast.”

“A gentleman should not pour his own drinks.”

“He’s right, you know,” Malla added.

I turned back to correct her and when I did, she opened her coat and let it fall to the floor.

She was naked.

“Whoa,” I said astutely.

“Should I withdraw for the night, sir?”

Cliston was holding a drink in my face, which I quickly took.

“Yeah. I think so.”

“As you say. Good evening. Good night, miss.”

“Good night, Cliston,” Malla said casually, as she walked closer to me.

That coat hid a lot. I would never have thought she was so athletic. She had prominent abdominal muscles and seemed like a gymnast about to pounce. When she walked she crossed one leg in front of the other and rocked her hips back and forth. That must have taken years of practice and it hit me below the belt.

Everywhere I looked, I saw a new muscle group. Anatomy classes could use her as a specimen. No wonder she wore that fur coat, she had no fat on her and must be freezing.

I had met a lot of fit women in my day and I think Malla could even give Garm a run for her money—though Garm was a trained assassin. Presumably Malla had nothing better to do as a formerly kept woman than exercise all day.

I drank my drink.

“You need to be more relaxed around your servants,” Malla said, smiling. “I’m relaxed around you.”

She was right in front of me and I was not relaxed.

“You know, Malla, now that your husband is dead—murdered—and they’re looking for the killer, and you hired me, maybe we shouldn’t see as much of each other. Or at all. I wouldn’t want anyone to get the wrong idea.”

She dabbed her finger at my chest.

“Why? No one cares.”

“I’m pretty sure the City Council cares,” I said, trying to drink more from my empty glass.

“They care least of all. They used to be one Councilman out of five, having 20% of the System under their control. Now they are one Councilman out of four. We all gained from my husband’s death. They gained power and I’m wealthy and free to do what I want.”

She was right up against me now.

“But they’ll just elect another Councilman,” I said hastily.

“Will they?” She giggled at my naiveté.

She was far shorter than me and had to stand on her tiptoes to kiss the underside of my jaw.

When my body was remade younger, everything was remade. I had the same glands and hormones and drives and urges as the younger me. But my brain was still old. So I was always in the terrible predicament of having the desires of a younger man, but the wisdom of an older one.

I liked to think my wisdom won more often than my lusts. No man could survive on Belvaille with passion alone. Not a poor and ugly man like me, anyway.

“I just got out of prison,” I said to her, weakly. Meaning, I didn’t want to go right back in for bedding the murderer of a City Councilman. Or worse, get framed for the murder.

“Then I should think you would like the attention,” she grinned mischievously.

On this one occasion my wisdom was nowhere to be found.

I did not consider myself a great lover. In fact, epic poems had been composed about how bad at intercourse I was.

I knew my strengths and I knew my weaknesses. I prided myself on that.

When I spent the night with Malla, it was clear something was wrong based on my prowess in the bedroom. Throwing around cars, sprinting across the city screaming, that was nothing compared to my acrobatics and stamina in bed that night. I started to believe that Malla had been sorely regretful about seducing me.

In the morning it was clear. Tamshius’ soup!

His five hundred step soup. No soup could be that complicated to create and end up with something that horrible tasting.

That was a drug!

Was that his legacy to me? To become a wealthy peddler of a fantastic new substance that turned you into a lunatic and expert in the carnal arts?

It seemed like a lousy product on the surface. But if I knew people, and I did, if there was a drug that made you better at sex but had a side effect of causing your face to burst into flames, you could make a fortune selling fire extinguishers.

Besides, I wouldn’t mind being a drug lord. Anything was better than my current situation as servant extraordinaire. I didn’t even understand who was paying me for what. Was I still working for Malla? What did she even want? I couldn’t exactly find out if her dead husband was cheating on her.

I could ask Malla but, like a proper lady, she left before dawn. Cliston had let her out.

I sat there eating my breakfast the next day.

“Cliston, can you decipher who I’m working for? All these contracts are too arcane for me. Aristocrats don’t make anything simple.”

He cleared off the last bit of food and added an exquisite little pastry that was too small for me to even taste.

“It is not for me to say, sir.”

“But if it was. I’m letting you. Or asking your opinion.”

“I believe you have one contract with the City Council where you report to Maris-To. You have one contract with Lady Malla—”

“Lady?” I asked. “Is that something new?”

“Just a title I’m trying out,” he said rather confusingly. “That contract appears to be open-ended. The one with the City Council will end when you provide definitive evidence for the bombing attack. And you have a contract to an undisclosed person that nevertheless pays fairly well.”

“Which is best?” I asked.

“It depends on your definition, sir. Do you wish to classify by remuneration or ease or prestige?”

“Money, Cliston. It’s what makes the galaxy spin.”

“The City Council contract is superb. It varies on what expenses you incur, but I would suspect it is approximately four times larger than the other two combined.”

Wow.

“So am I the ‘servant’ of all those people?” I asked distastefully.

“In a way. It’s not a bad thing, sir.”

“And this Servant-Master stuff. Is that a law or something?”

“Master-Servant confidentiality. No, it’s not a law. Just an understanding among the upper classes.”

“What? So I could get in trouble if I tried to use it?”

“No one would break it.”

I shook my head at that. I’d break it if it meant saving my neck.

“Did the City Council make it up?” I asked.

“I’m a bit embarrassed to say that I did, sir.”

“You? When?”

I looked around at this point, as if I expected to see a pile of legal documents in the kitchen.

“Oh, some years ago. It was an addendum to my Household Standards Manual.”

I poked at my food a bit.

“Cliston. You could get a real job, right? Like with an important house on the station.”

“Lady Malla asked me this morning if I wanted to come work for her,” he said.

“What did you say?” I asked, alarmed.

“I told her it showed very low breeding to try and acquire another person’s servant. Especially after spending the night.”

“Damn, Cliston, I have to work with her. Or arrest her.”

“She knew better, sir.”

“Why do you work here?” I said, turning to face him. “Honestly. I don’t pay you much—I think. This place isn’t all that magnificent, despite all the great work you’ve done. I’m not a rich family who owns a planet.”

“Sir, it is not wealth or family connections that make a noble home.”

“Sure seems like it,” I said.

“No, sir. It is character.”

“You saying I have character?”

“Just a bit too much, sir.”

I didn’t know if Tamshius’ super soup was really a narcotic and I didn’t feel like testing it on myself again. I figured there was a limit to how many times even Malla could get me out of jail.