Death by Chocolate

by Michelle L. Levigne

  "You rock," Guber muttered, as the two of them stepped out in the suite of offices reserved for Kevyn's family in the administration dimension.

  "It's fun the first dozen times you do it, then it gets kind of..." Kevyn dropped down into the big chocolate brown recliner that was an exact match to his favorite chair at home and grinned. "Can't lie to you. It never gets boring."

  "I'm starting to see that. Guess we were wrong all those decades, huh? Hiding you from your folks and avoiding school and all that."

  "Hmm. Maybe. But when you figure I never would have met Sophie if I hadn't been playing hooky for so long..." He shuddered. The last glimmer of playfulness faded. "Guber, I'm sorry. I honestly thought that legislation was a slam dunk. I'll get to work, following up. Restraining orders have a whole lot more punch here than in the Human dimensions, but they still can only do so much to get those radicals off your backside."

  "Nah. Don't worry about it. At least, not while we're working on Epsi's problem. If we're working with the investigators, that'll protect me, right?" He didn't wait for Kevyn to think and nod. "I'll just activate the dozen-odd escape and distraction spells I've put together since the last time I had to run away to avoid the throne. If they're running at full speed before I actually need them, ain't no way those loonies can track me when I hit the launch pad."

  "Uh huh." Kevyn studied him for a few seconds, with enough intensity to make Guber fidget, and then snap his fingers to teleport in his favorite recliner for serious thinking. "I have access to a whole lot of serious information. I know that whenever some group shows up wanting to restore the hereditary throne, on their heels is another group. Just as extreme, but instead of being annoying, harassing you with rhetoric about civic duty and other idiot rhetoric... well... restraining orders won't make an impression on them."

  "The Erasers? Yeah, I've heard of them." He shuddered more violently than his friend had only a few moments ago. The problem, he reflected, was that his shudder was for real, whereas Kevyn had been acting silly. "Why waste time convincing people that hereditary royalty needs to be nullified? Just save your breath and wipe out the entire gene pool."

  Funny, but Guber didn't want to snap his heels together, activate every self-defense spell at his disposal, and get it out of there.

  He wanted to stay.

  He wanted to see Epsi again.

  And that was the weirdest thing that had happened to him in a long time.

  After all, he was a charter member of the Single, Serene and Smokin' Men's Club. It was one of their core principles that as soon as a member felt any sort of attraction to someone of the female persuasion, they put as much distance, physical, dimensional or otherwise, between them and said object of attraction.

  Guber had made up that rule.

  Of course, he had made the rule before the French Revolution, when it was dangerous in a lot of different ways to hang around with those hot French chicks. Or any other hot chicks in a lot of different dimensions. That was the funny--funny weird, not funny ha-ha--thing about political and social unrest. It spread to multiple dimensions.

  In the centuries since then, Guber had grown a little smarter, worked out a lot of wildness, had a lot of fun, and realized that the female side of fandom and science fiction writing came up with a lot more fun than the male side. Girls were cool.

  Maybe girls didn't have cooties.

  Even if they did, he was willing to bet Epsi didn't have any.

  "Well, I figure, hanging tight with you is probably the safest place to be, if the Erasers or anybody who thinks like this is on the hunt. I'm in." He snapped his fingers, bringing his electronic tablet to him, to start putting together the next phase of his research.

  "What I should do is a PR campaign, once Epsi's problem gets cleared up," Kevyn mused as he brought in a stack of paperwork four inches thick to land on his lap. "We need to show both sides of the problem that nearly everybody with purple blood wants nothing at all to do with politics."

  "Except for creeps like Theodosius." He sighed. "And that's exactly what the Erasers are trying to prevent."

  "Too bad we can't do genetic screening for the creeps."

  * * * *

  Theodosius wouldn't lower himself to actually come chase Epsi down, but he did send one of his flunkies to listen when she reported to her friends about her meeting with Kevyn and Guber. She had settled down with some of them to dissect the conference in further detail by the time the flunky came back, with a summons to report directly to Theodosius. She considered for a moment just ignoring the poor, worn-out looking fellow. Knowing Theodosius, he had intimidated the flunky into volunteering to accompany him to the holding dimension. Or he had attacked the poor fellow to the point that the flunky's ear tips were wilting, convincing him that he deserved all his troubles, and only Theodosius could protect him from dire punishment--if he kept the former Administrator King in a good mood.

  "Sorry, but you can tell my very distant cousin that not only do I want to maintain my distance, I'm not repeating myself for his benefit," Epsi said, after tossing aside a half dozen other, more astringent responses. "He keeps forgetting he isn't the king anymore, and he doesn't have any right or authority to give orders." The flunky went so white all the color bleached out of his ebony hair and his navy-and-peach cashmere sweater. Pity for him prompted her to say, "Tell you what, though. I'll ask my advocate to take you on."

  "Would you?" The flunky nearly wept. His knees buckled and the color returned to his hair. His clothes looked only marginally better; a washed-out shadow of the original colors and pattern. He looked over his shoulder in the direction of Theodosius's cubicle. "Who's going to tell--"

  "Let him find out for himself." Rosamundiana giggled and her eyes sparkled wickedly.

  How Theodosius found out and how long it took, Epsi had no idea, but somewhere along the way her distant cousin had learned how to make requests to the monitors for information, including notifications when others had visitors. When Kevyn and Guber returned for another meeting, Theodosius darted out of his cubicle and snatched at Epsi's sleeve as she stood up, in preparation for being transported to the visitation area.

  "I demand representation by my dear cousin's advocate," Theodosius said, using his plummy, I'm just so jolly and beloved, everyone has to give me what I want, tone of voice.

  "Such a request can only be granted by the advocate in question. Epsibellah, do you grant permission for this suspect to accompany you to your meeting with your advocate?" the monitor voice asked.

  "If my advocate says no, does he get sent back immediately? He can't stay and harass us until he gets his way?" Epsi immediately snapped.

  "Of course. Your advocate is not required to take any clients he does not wish to handle."

  "Okay. He can come. Hands off, Theo." She twisted her arm free of Theodosius's grip and checked her sleeve, positive there would be oil stains from his fingers. After all, she had only brought six changes of clothes. She wanted them to last as long as possible, and she didn't know how long she would be held in the holding dimension.

  Kevyn and Guber both stood up when Epsi walked through the portal. Their welcoming smiles fell off their faces when Theodosius stomped through. He nudged her aside and snatched at the only chair on his side of the table.

  "Hey, dude, show some respect for the lady," Guber said, before Theodosius could open his mouth and begin what promised to be a harangue, based on the sour look on his pudgy face.

  "What lady?" Theodosius said, looking around the room. His gaze landed on Epsi, who took her place at the end of the table, standing closer to Kevyn and Guber than to him. It was evident from his sneer that he was about to say something derogatory about her, but he glanced at Kevyn and his expression froze. His flushed complexion paled, and he swallowed hard.

  Epsi looked at Kevyn. He had definitely graduated from his final steps of training, because only full advocates were able to manifest the official Thundercloud of Disapproval, guaranteed to intimidate the
most obnoxious, arrogant, self-righteous, malicious pests to ever stand before the Fae High Court. It wasn't directed at her, but the flames in his eyes and the sub-zero temperatures radiating from Kevyn's frown made Epsi tremble for a few seconds.

  "Could we have a new, clean chair for the lady?" Guber said, when Theodosius cleared his throat in obvious preparation to begin his demands.

  The chair appeared immediately. Guber hurried to move the chair to the end of the table, positioned so Epsi was definitely seated with him and Kevyn, and leaving the other side of the table all for Theodosius. He held it for Epsi, then pushed it in for her after she sat down.

  "Yes, well. I'm sure you know what I want," Theodosius began, to be cut off by Kevyn's sharp upward flick of his hand.

  "We heard. And I'm not dropping my representation of Epsi to take you on," Kevyn said.

  "I'm not asking you to drop her. Just put her case aside until you tend to mine." Theodosius's oily smile made Epsi want to pull out her compact and touch up her makeup to get rid of the shine that was probably coating her from head to toe.

  "Why?"

  "Why? Why--because--well, I'm the Administrator King, of course."

  "Former." Kevyn sounded bored.

  Epsi wondered if he had taken a class in advocate training to learn how to do that, too.

  "Very well, former. But only because it was simpler to terminate my term than to investigate--"

  "The investigation is going on at this very moment. Advocates and clerks from every level of the judiciary are working on the allegations and counterclaims." Kevyn sat back in the chair and crossed his arms. "What made you think the allegations had been dropped?"

  "That doesn't matter right now. The fact of the matter is, I'm far too important to simply allow me to sit in there, cooling my heels, until someone gets around to investigating my innocence."

  "The term is 'determining innocence or guilt.' Which means that until that determination is made, you could be guilty, so you cannot be allowed to roam freely in any of the realms hospitable to Fae life. But because you could also be innocent, you are not incarcerated with total deprivation of magical means to effect your comfort." Kevyn glanced at Epsi. "Do you want me to handle his case?"

  "Not even if he was holding a knife at my throat, or blackmailing me with all the lies he used to tell to get his way at family get-togethers, back when we were children." Epsi knew that was far too long of an answer, but she had longed for decades to get a little back at Theodosius. He'd had an incredible talent, as a boy, for getting to the adults first after some sort of fracas among the children, and spilling so many half-truths and quarter-truths that it was impossible to refute anything of his accusations.

  She had decided long ago that Theodosius's philosophy was that if he couldn't have fun, nobody was allowed to have fun. And if he was going to get punished, everyone would get punished. And inevitably, the adults did punish everyone, just because it would take too much time and effort and magic to untangle the truth from Theodosius's twisted version of unreality.

  "Epsi, dearest cousin, how can you say that to me?" Theodosius's eyes welled up with tears, and his fat bottom lip quivered.

  "Ummm, because it's the truth? Because I despise you? Because if there was such a thing as divorcing your relatives, I would? Hello, monitors? My advocate will not be representing the former Administrator King. Could you--"

  "Whoa. Cosmic," Guber said, staring at the temporary black hole that collapsed in on itself, where Theodosius used to be.

  "That's what I call service," Kevyn said. All the dark sternness and cold immediately vanished from his expression. "Hello, monitors?"

  "How may we be of service to you, Advocate?" the disembodied voice responded.

  "You are recording all this, aren't you? What I'm telling my client will be of use to the investigation. The Supreme Advocates and the Ministry of Investigation already have our report and our theory of carob poisoning and the steps we're taking to find evidence. It would save time if this was recorded and sent to everyone involved, so we don't have to repeat ourselves a couple dozen times along the way."

  "Recording. Please be notified that several administrative levels have requested immediate access to anything you clear for distribution to the investigation team. You might be interrupted by questions, if anyone joins the conference in real-time."

  "That's fine with me. How about you, Epsi?"

  "Uh, sure. Let's get it over with." Epsi checked her clothes. They weren't her best, and she hadn't anticipated being put on a couple dozen report globes, streaming to as many dimensions, when she got dressed that morning.

  "You look great," Guber whispered.

  If she could have leaned across the table and kissed him and gotten away with it, Epsi would have. Guber might be a total Human-phile geek, but he was alert and sensitive enough to know when a girl was feeling entirely too self-conscious, and to know exactly what to say to make her feel better.

  Could she hope that maybe he was expressing his opinion, too? Or was that asking for too much, considering her circumstances?

  She sat back and listened as Kevyn paced around the table, speaking to the invisible audience. He gave a barebones history of the case, the implications linking to her, how he had become involved in the case, and what Will and Phill had told him about her reaction to carob, and how that whole theory came into being. Then he turned the education portion of the testimony over to Guber, who explained his device and the tests. He described the carob or carob-mixed-with-chocolate samples that had been tested already and set up as standards for judging and calibrating the sensitivity of the device he had put together.

  Epsi found it amusing that every couple of sentences, Kevyn interrupted with a layman's interpretation, as well as putting it into advocate-speak, for those who had a hard time understanding plain talk after decades of wrangling with the finer points and hairsplitting of language.

  "What we propose, honored committee members," Kevyn said, after Guber finally sat down, "is to start with the easiest cases first. We will test all chocolate that came from Human sources. Every person who gifted the late queen on the occasion of her coronation was required to report where it came from. All gifts originating in the Human realms will be tested first, on the theory that this is the most likely source for the quantities of carob that poisoned the late queen.

  "At the same time that we are testing the chocolate, we request that the Ministry of Health as well as the Ministry of Culinary Protection set up their own testing program in conjunction, to determine just how sensitive Fae are to carob, to identify the different reactions that are possible, and try to determine if different bloodlines react differently.

  "It might be beneficial if emergency medical procedures are set up to automatically kick in as soon as symptoms are noticed in the future. With the increasing traffic into the Human realms over the last few decades, especially for the sake of obtaining chocolate, the chances of innocent Fae unknowingly obtaining adulterated chocolate and poisoning themselves without realizing it, could be increasing."

  He nodded toward Epsi. "My client started the line of thought that led to this suggestion, and I request that she be given credit for what could result in life-saving measures for other Fae in the future."

  Epsi blushed so furiously, she could feel the sparks whizzing past her cheeks. To avoid looking into the reception globes that transmitted the proceeding in the meeting room in all six dimensions, she looked at Guber. He mouthed "teacher's pet," which set off a fit of giggles in her that were hard to control. At least she stopped blushing.

  Kevyn covered over most of her reaction by continuing his recommendations for the testing. The late queen's bloodline needed to be tested first, to determine if it was a specific susceptibility that made her swell up and die, or a combination of factors.

  Epsi couldn't believe how long the report and testimony and questioning by the investigation committee took. When she was sent back to the holding dimension and her cub
icle, she was exhausted. The lights had dimmed in the living areas, meaning it was technically nighttime there.

  She found several of her friends camped in front of the doorway to her cubicle, and the protective coded doorway buzzing and hissing and arcing, shooting off sparks sporadically.

  "What happened?" She nearly forgot to keep her voice down.

  "Theodosius decided to have a temper tantrum in your cubicle. Or at least try to have one in there. Whatever your advocate said, it really set him off," Lucentio said with a grin. "We're pretty sure he worked off most of his temper just trying to slam through the door. He finally got sent to the medical dimension after he knocked himself unconscious for the third time."

  "Ouch." Epsi grinned, and bit her tongue to keep from asking if anyone had recorded the battle between enraged Fae bully and security-spelled door.

  It took her a few minutes to repair the twisting and damage done to her spell before she could open the door. She washed up and changed her clothes, and came back out to the common area. She wasn't surprised to see that twice as many people now waited to hear what had happened.

  It surprised her to learn that more than three-quarters of her friends had gone to the Human realms to obtain chocolate novelties for Mellisande's coronation gifts. Epsi realized that her news gave them all hope. Everyone who had Human-made chocolate could claim innocence in the matter, if they could prove they had no idea that carob even existed before the whole incident.

  * * * *

  "Let the madness begin," Guber muttered, taking a step back from the cobbled-together monstrosity that was part magic, part wishful thinking, part Human technology. It also incorporated a few borrowed pieces from other dimensions that weren't officially in an Intellectual Property trade agreement with the Fae. He nodded to Kevyn and his five cousins who were officially monitoring the entire operation for six different oversight ministries. Each one snapped their fingers in perfect synchronization, igniting the spells that broke the seals on the portion of the testing procedure that was directly under their authority.