by John Ringo
Chapter Three
Back at her apartment, she carefully put the dull orange and somewhat battered seashell that Annie had proudly "found" for her on her bedside table next to a small potted cactus and went to shower off all the sticky salt and sand. She'd need another once she decided who she needed to be on vacation, but she'd worry about that after she was clean.
As she dropped the red bikini onto the bath mat she could hear the thunder and the first drops of rain beating against the small bathroom window.
A few minutes later, hair in a towel, wrapped in a big fluffy blue bathrobe, she emerged from the bathroom and thumbed open the bottom drawer of her dresser, this time pulling it all the way open and reaching in the back for a battered black shoe box. In here were her five specials, identities even the Bane Sidhe knew nothing about. At least, not as far as she knew. As Granpa had beaten into her head back during the Postie war, always have a go-to-hell plan. Hrms. These two are out, they need updating. I'd never pass for my thirties at close range without more cosmetic work than I can do. Okay. This one. Marilyn Grant from Toledo Urb. Good thing I picked her the night before. I'm gonna need a perm, and color that won't wash out the next time I shower. Oop. Hobbies include acoustic guitar, nineteen sixties folk music. There go the nails.
A few hours later she stood in the three-way mirror, wrinkling her nose slightly at the chemical smell that now pervaded her bedroom, and checked the changes. Warm brown eyes stared back at her, courtesy of good old-fashioned zero-prescription extended-wear contacts. Not-quite chestnut curls stopped around her shoulders. She hadn't had to take off much, with the curls to shrink the length up some. Her skin tone was not exactly tanned, just more medium than fair. Short nails on her left hand and slightly longer ones on the right were painted one of the rose shades more flattering to brunettes. The toenails were a different shade of rose. Both had small mistakes around the cuticles, both would be allowed to chip and be inexpertly repaired over the next few days.
She pulled out the picture IDs and looked at the face, comparing it to the mirror. Yep, I did this one with cheek pads. What a pain in the ass. At least you can actually wash a new perm now. Three cheers for modern cosmetics. But the stuff for major hair work still stinks. She looked at the rain battering away at her windows and shook her head, opening the door to the rest of the apartment and flipping on the ceiling fan. That and the bathroom fan venting to outside would help, some. Anyway, she'd slept in worse stinks often enough.
She looked over at the clock. Barely nine. What the hell, maybe there's an alternative. She wrinkled her nose and looked in the closet. Touristy, touristy . . . Blue Hawaiian shirt, white capris, white sandals, cheap tourist seashell jewelry. Perfect.
* * *
There was a really good seafood place a few blocks off Market—so good she had to consciously avoid going too often as too many people and setting a bad pattern. Not likely to have any cadets on a week night—definitely a bad week for cadets. Perfect place for tourists.
She pulled up Toledo Urb's local news for the past few weeks on her PDA and set it for audio while she dressed. As always, she'd avoid natives, but she was covered for anyone else.
When she got to the Bristol she went ahead and ordered a tropical shrimp salad and an extra large mango margarita at the bar, then sat nursing her drink and listening to a three-chord lounge lizard massacre Jimmy Buffett with one ear while eavesdropping on her fellow patrons with the other.
" . . . so I told Tom that if he couldn't get me some qualified help no way are we gonna make that October deadline. . . ."
" . . . sometimes I think maybe she's the one, but then I wonder . . ."
" . . . believe the prices here? Nothing costs this much in the Urb. . . . Yeah, I know, but how much more can it be, I mean, the ocean's right here. . . ."
" . . . finally final, and I know I'm supposed to feel better and free and everything, but all I feel is like a chump for never wondering why she never bitched when it was time for my boat to go out. . . ."
Bingo. She studied the guy talking to the bartender under her lashes. Fortyish, balding—but he cut it short and wore it with dignity—no comb-over or bad rug. A simple glitch ointment could have fixed it, but the fisherman apparently either couldn't afford it or wasn't that vain. Not fat. Well, a slight paunch, but without rejuv that was damned hard to fight. She looked at the shoulders and biceps from a lifetime of manual labor, and the weather-roughened skin, and decided she'd seen worse. She picked up her drink and moved over to the empty seat beside him, asking the bartender for a water and a slice of key lime pie.
"God that looks sweet," the fisherman looked at her margarita and shuddered slightly, "and you're having pie with it?"
"Yeah, I've got a bit of a sweet tooth." She grinned at him.
"Well, if you'll excuse me saying so, it doesn't show." He glanced briefly at her body but politely looked back away.
She grimaced as the guy with a guitar—calling him a musician would have been too generous—fumbled a chord change, then saw the fisherman wincing, too, and laughed.
"So since it's obviously not the music, what brings a pretty young girl in here drinking with old farts like us?" He gestured around the bar with a hand. "Your boyfriend work here?"
"Did you ever have an evening where you just didn't want to be alone?" Cally smiled gently at him.
"What, you mean like tonight?" He snorted, taking a long drink of his beer and staring off into nowhere. "All the time, lately." He drained his drink and gestured to the bartender for a refill. "You don't sound like you're from around here, either. Aw, excuse me," he waved her off. "I'm just being nosy."
"Nah, it's all right." She offered her hand. "I'm Marilyn, and you're right, I'm not from here. I'm on vacation, from Toledo." She took a sip of her margarita and looked away. "This trip was supposed to be with my fiancé, well, ex-fiancé, uh . . . it just didn't work out, I came anyway, and now I'm wondering if I should have."
"You wanna paint the town red to show you ain't hurt, but then you ain't in the mood for partyin'." He fumbled for the bills to pay for his arriving drink. "Guess there's a lot of that goin' around tonight."
"You too?" She took a bite of the pie, watching him.
"Yeah, I just went through a divorce."
"Bad?"
"It could've been if I'd made it. I could have taken it into court and made sure she got nothin'." He took another drink. "Her good luck. When I walked in and, well, saw what I saw, I was so disgusted all I wanted was out as fast as I could get."
"That's lousy. I don't know what I would have done if there had been another girl. I just finally got tired of us fighting all the time. He was one of those people who could find something wrong with everything."
"Sounds like you had a lucky escape."
"Yeah, well, you too. And I came out here planning to party all week, and, I guess it's stupid, I just . . ." She trailed off and went back to her pie. She had obviously picked someone whose prime interest was getting good and drunk. Not a good pick. I should have known better.
When the bartender cut him off, later, she was a good enough sport to put him in a cab home before driving back to her own apartment to sleep in the hair fumes.
* * *
Chicago, Tuesday, May 14
The receptionist was a hell of a looker. Not much in the tits, but her face just took your breath away. Besides, tits were easy enough to fix. Damn.
John Earl Bill Stuart, Johnny to friends and enemies alike, paced the outer office pretending a polite interest in the snooty art stuff scattered around the place. If any of it was real, it must have cost a mint. Most of it was probably those reproduction things meant for show. And he'd bet it worked with some people. He'd been more impressed with the view. This Terra Trade Holdings had the whole next-to-top floor, at least, of the old Sears Tower. They'd renamed it, but it was still—or again, depending on how you looked at it—the tallest building on Earth. He didn't know who had the top floor, but it sure wasn't
open to the tourists any more and he figured the second to top floor view was closer than almost anybody got these days. Damned aliens, but there you were, and they were really no different from the old corporations, who had really taken it in the teeth when the aliens showed up, now were they? Just different people on top.
Johnny would have liked to have brought his camera and snapped a few pictures for Mary Lynn while he was up here, but that wouldn't have been classy, and he knew you had to be classy at meetings like this. Pictures would have been nice, just to show her he'd really been here, but it couldn't be helped.
"The Tir will see you now," the girl said, just like one of the girls on the evening news. No Yankee accent like you heard a lot here in Chicago. No accent at all. Classy.
The Tir's corner office was a criminal waste. Heavy drapes covered both walls of floor-to-ceiling windows, darkening the room to dim shadows as well as shutting out the view. It was a little like the guy who takes the last piece of chicken in the basket, not because he wants it but so you can't have it. It was pretty much of a piece with his employers' typical way of doing business.
He had never actually seen a Darhel before. Usually he had reported through Worth, but had had an emergency contact number to use when his immediate superior had dropped off the map sometime between Thursday and Monday of last week.
"We received your message." The voice was just beautiful. Hypnotic. Almost like music. He could have listened to it all day long, but Johnny hadn't gotten where he was without learning to recognize a slick talker when he heard one. He blinked in the dim light as his eyes adjusted, making out the cloaked figure behind the very large desk. It looked like a bit of a muzzle, like a coyote, or maybe a fox, protruded from the hood. He caught a small glimpse of sharply pointed teeth that didn't quite fit right with the plate of vegetable looking stuff that sat to one side on the desk. Scattered small bits of green on the desk surface gave the impression that the alien was not a particularly neat eater.
"Yes, Your Tir. And I got your summons. What can I do for you?"
"We have come to the reluctant conclusion that our junior colleague, the human Worth, has met with a misfortune. This leaves us with an opening in a certain position. A position we feel someone with your talents may be able to fill."
"You mean you need someone to coordinate your hits?"
"We need someone to provide services managing awkward problems." The Tir's voice was tense, and now sounded more angry than melodic.
"Awkward problems like annoying people that need to be killed and gotten out of your way?"
"That . . . that of course would be entirely up to you," the alien squeaked. Fuckin' coward.
"Right. I'd need a raise for that. It's riskier than what I've been doing."
"If . . . if you . . . no, if someone were to periodically submit a request for reimbursement for reasonable expenses somehow incurred in something that is in our interests, reimbursement would . . . would be ordered." The alien was breathing deeply and shakily, as if even saying the words bothered him. These damned Elves were all cowards. That was why they had to hire real men to do their dirty work. Johnny wasn't above getting a little of his own back on the aliens by rubbing their noses in it a little.
"So when I have some sumbitch killed for you, you want me to tell you how much I paid the guy, then you pay me plus my cut. Say, fifteen percent on top."
"We . . ." It squeaked to a stop, shaking, and was silent a moment before trying again. "We believe you should . . . should use your best judgment, and are willing to pay you a seven percent overage on all service associated expenses."
"Ten."
"As you say," it gasped, taking a silent moment to get its breathing under control.
"Then you've got a deal. You tell me who's in your way, I send somebody to wax 'em, I get my percentage. Works for me."
"This . . . this conversation never took place," it choked.
"Okay, Your Tir. Johnny Stuart's your man."
"Wait." He choked, taking a few moments to breathe deeply. After several long seconds he looked back up and fixed Johnny in the eye. His voice had resumed its melodious character and was almost caressing as he spoke.
"The trouble with humans, Mr. Stuart, is that they are incredibly poor at maintaining the proper decorum around their betters." He addressed his AID, "AID, display Martin Simpson hologram, download full file to Mr. Stuart's AID." He looked back up and very deliberately made fixed eye contact again. "Mr. Simpson is a perfect example of that lack of decorum, and it is unacceptable. You may demonstrate your understanding of our arrangement by handling the problem. You may go, now."
"Yes sir, Your Tir." He walked out the door, restraining the urge to whistle. Damned alien cowards. But he made a good living out of them. You wanted to make a bundle, you had to work for the men, or whatever, on top.
His AID, which was admittedly a damned nifty gadget, was disguised as a regular PDA, and seemed to think there was something funny about aping the behavior of one of the lesser devices. He had barely gotten out of the building and down the block towards the valet deck when it started alternately beeping and vibrating at him.
"What?" he asked the thing, irritably. Machines shouldn't have a damn sense of humor.
"The Tir instructs you to find out what happened to the human Worth."
"Gotcha. Now cut that out!" After giving his ticket to the attendant, he propped himself against a pole and waited for them to bring his car around. A promotion and a raise. Not a bad day. Not bad at all. He hadn't much liked Worth before. He liked him a lot better now.
"Oh, Leanne," he asked the AID, "by the way, what does 'decorum' mean?"
"Decorum: politeness, the observance of proper protocol or etiquette," it said.
"Okaaay. So what did this Marvin Smith do to piss the Tir off so badly?"
"Martin Simpson. Employee of Terra Trade Holdings. I think the offense was telling a Darhel joke in a staff meeting." The AID's voice was unusually dispassionate.
"Jesus H. Christ! What the hell was the joke?"
"How many Darhel does it take to change a light bulb?" The voice playing from the AID was a young male, pure Chicago, "Twenty-one. One to change the bulb, and twenty to curl up and die in the corner at the cost."
"Okay," he chuckled, "what else did he do?"
"Nothing. Well, he did take home a pen from the office once."
"I'm supposed to kill a guy for making a bad joke?" He paled briefly. Poor bastard. Still, better him than me or mine. Shit. Lord, remind me not to needle Darhel.
"That would be an interpretation consistent with the Tir's request."
"Yeah. Okay. He's the boss. Thanks, Leanne." And I hope you report that polite answer to your real boss soon, you spying bucket of bolts.
* * *
Charleston, Tuesday, May 14
Cally spent Tuesday morning shopping for the extras she'd need in her pack and case. While most seafood going inland was canned or frozen at the big Greer's processing plant, monopoly pricing made it barely affordable for a small fleet of vans carrying live delicacies like fresh crab, scallops, and oysters to make a reliable profit selling to restaurants for the wealthy, well-connected, or families enjoying the occasional special occasion. While technically a violation of the National Emergency Food Supplies Act, the trade survived and even thrived largely because federal inspectors liked fresh seafood as well as anyone. Their share didn't really add more overhead than the old prewar health inspections had, anyway. It was a perfect way to travel anonymously.
She could take the bus, but the middle seat in a live crab van was not only more discreet but would be cheaper, especially for someone who was young, pretty, and friendly. Not that money was a problem, it just made a good excuse for preferring a fishy van over the bus.
The bright, new beach T-shirts and some garish souvenirs fit the picture of an inland coed who'd spent too much on vacation.
After lunch she found a pay phone and dialed the number Shari had provided.
"Hi, Granpa."
"You're a bit late," he reproached. "Trouble finding a phone?"
"I'm late?" she choked. "Yeah, five minutes, not three hours and forty-five minutes."
"Um . . . yeah." He cleared his throat and was silent for a few seconds. "We had no idea the damned Elves had that kind of jammer deployed with any of their human people. I know he was modest about it in the debrief, but the algorithm our largest friend put together on the fly to filter out the false images was nothing short of genius—until then, you could have been anywhere in the city as far as we knew. You would have found us before we found you. If it's any consolation, you improvised brilliantly."
"It's a living. What did you want to talk to me about? And why a telephone, of all things?"
"People do still use them, you know," he said wryly. "It's still the most popular means of talking over a distance."
"And insecure as hell. Quit dancing, Granpa, what's up?" She added suspiciously, "This doesn't have anything to do with Wendy and Shari cornering me for purposes of matchmaking, does it?"
"Well, not ex. . . ." He stopped and started again, "I don't think there's anything wrong with wanting to see some great-grandkids before I die."
"Talk to Michelle."
"You know damn well why I can't." He sighed. "I just don't know what the problem is. For awhile I thought if I just waited . . . and you seem to like kids well enough. Honey, I just don't have a whole lot of wait left."
"Well, I'm sorry," she sounded a hair more indignant than sorry, "but I just haven't found the right man. What I do have is a job, an important one that not just anybody could do, and I'm damned good at it!"
"You can't let a job take the place of a life!" She could hear him take a deep breath and sigh, "It's eating you up, and it's not good for you. There are plenty of fine men out there, and plenty of places other than bars to meet them."
"Now wait just one fucking minute, I may look twenty, but I'm . . ."