Other Places 2: Road Blocks (24 page)

"Ah... The old coffee bar scam. Good one. Get Zack to put a little space in with a sofa and some chairs, that can be locked from the inside and we could use it for entertaining." She nodded as if he might have missed the reference. "Sex. This place isn't horrible that way, but it's way easier to get men to have sex with a hot woman, than for a good looking man to seduce the ladies. At least in the numbers that we need to do it. If we had two places we could go to here, it would really open things up."

Then, as if he weren't standing right there, they started planning it all out. The big expense, after the initial remodeling, which they didn't want to stint on, would be getting two of the larger spaces, side by side, which meant being on the lower level, between Candles and More and The Chasm. That would give them plenty of space for it and leave Zack a Node.

Glen waved at the space that they'd want, or at least in the right general direction.

"You won't even have to run it. We can do it and hire some other people from here. The Shifters had the right idea, you being tied up with the Mages made it seem like you were theirs. This way, if we diversify, we can have a lot of different groups involved. It might even get some of them to relax, about the whole Demon thing. I mean, it isn't like you're the only one here, is it?"

Zack didn't get his meaning, but the others had started to walk out, slowly, as if they were squirrels and he'd been scattering food, but they weren't really ready to believe it wasn't a trap yet.

"Won't that get in the way of your embassy duties here?"

Glen shrugged.

"Not really. We don't need many people here for that, and are over saturating our client base. If you let us set this up right, we can not only run both places, but probably reduce the overall tension level in the Mall by fifty percent." He smiled, which was a disarming thing and meant to be. "I'm making that last bit up, but..."

Zack nodded. He had the funds for it, he thought, and might have more coming in. He held out his hand to shake, and got one from both Glen and Kaitlyn, who seemed to want in on the whole thing.

"I'm headed to college next fall, but that's a ways away, and... really, I'm not getting a lot of action here. I might do better as a girl. Kyle still triggers too many maternal responses in the clientele here."

It was the kind of problem that he'd have never figured out on his own, but he just asked if they wanted to set it in motion. It might not work, but it sounded nicer than not having anything to do with his days, and he had people to see to and promises to keep still, so this would let him stay around.

No one in the food court would talk to him at all, being too wary, though Conrad did offer him some food, which he paid for out of pocket this time. The man took his money, but didn't make eye contact with him at all. After eating it, right out in the middle of the set of white metal and glass tables, he cleared the tray carefully and finished the rounds. The Trolleikein all acted like everyone else was tripping, and the women at Princess Pretty nails all figured that he'd come to ask out Charlie, the youngest one, who blushed the whole time.

So he did it. After all, even if she turned him down it was at least something for them to talk about, when he left. They all seemed
horribly
bored.

"So, what do you say? Everyone else seems to think it's a good idea? Dinner and a show? I have no clue what's playing, but I bet we could find something." This came out sounding so confident that he almost blushed, but the girl ate it up, doing first the blushing, then the agreeing part of things in rapid progression.

"Um, I'd like that. When?"

They agreed that the next weekend would be good. He set it for Friday, figuring that he could always change what they were doing if it was needed. Of course it meant that Darla would have to be all right with him taking off from practice, but he'd ask. Charlie was a little cutie and while not as alluring as some of the women he'd met lately, she was real. The fact was, for one reason or another, most of the people he knew weren't.

Not that they weren't good, but Lenore, for all she was nice and pretty, had to fake her way through every expression and emotional response. All the Vampires were like that really, except the very old ones and he just wasn't going to date Bey. The Alede were literally a trap to lure in victims for food. True, they didn't hurt them, but it was a part of them to not seem real at all. It was probably why Judy was a good actress. Like Lenore, it was part of her nature.

The Shifters were real, but half of them were a bit annoying, with their bigotry. Not
fake
about it, but that wasn't a huge improvement for them. Keeley and Darla...

Again, they were faking their way through everything, weren't they? And now he was too. That didn't mean he couldn't see the value in making a friend of Charlie.

That covered the first level, which meant that he'd turned around to work over to the stairs when Calley came out of her Embassy and waved at him.

"Zack! They're here!" She looked a little off however and Zack had a feeling of dread cut through his stomach about then. There were a dozen reasons why Calley might have been upset, it was true. Jahn could have told her she was fired, or her brother might have died in a freak flying accident. It was also possible that she'd overheard the book shop idea, but didn't like coffee, or reading.

It wasn't that, and he could see the warps in space that told him all about it. Shifters had come, but there were too many little ones for it all to be a coincidence. Taking a deep breath, he started walking that way, making himself feel peaceful this time, instead of just calm. On the good side, there was a chance right there to practice lying. He tried to make himself really believe the words before he got there, nearly two minutes later. It took enough of an energy draw that he was worried it would be too much for a moment, but he felt the new condition slip into place.

He moved into the place, past the circular racks of clothing and the faceless bald dummies wearing them and saw them all. Jahn Samson, along with three aides and his whole family. Including his three little children... and his wife.

She gave him a disgusted look as soon as he walked up, and he gave it his best shot.

"Mrs. Samson, how wonderful to see you. Looking so pretty too." She wasn't that great looking, but had taken pains to be presentable, and while a little twitchy, being a rabbit, the woman wasn't so much flighty as she was a mega-bitch.

Her nose actually wrinkled as the small man beside her held out his hand, preventing her from speaking yet.

"Line Walker. Thank you for coming here and doing this for us. I understand that the Vampires are making the arrangements to pay for this?" He looked slightly worried, even after Zack nodded.

That wasn't really true either, but he was on a roll, it seemed.

"That's right. They really don't want this to blow up into something negative. More negative, I mean. No one can claim the events in New Mexico were good. I didn't realize that we'd have this many, I have a porter coming. A Trolleinkein. She'll need to touch you for this to work." He felt stronger now, but hadn't tested it and didn't really want to start something with the tiny, rather angry seeming woman in front of him. Even the other Shifters were acting like they didn't want her there. Zack understood why, as soon as she opened her mouth.

"A Troll? At least they aren't as low born as Humans. I had to wash them for weeks to get the stink out of my children the last time this...
man
, touched them. An emergency, so it had to be done, but the sloppy service, requiring us to fly home, after what we went through-" She kept going, but Zack realized he had a true super-power that he'd never noticed before at all. He was able to block her out
completely
, and still hear everyone else. That meant he had a nice conversation with an increasingly uneasy Jahn and his aides, which occasionally included his oldest child, who was very polite and courteous. All the kids were. They had some bags, but had packed for a week, not a year and a half. It would make a difference.

His job or not, the Dragon-Shifter, if that's what he was, went and got Hilde for them, and Calley walked in front of Catherine, as if guarding her physically from Zack's notorious rage. For his part, even though he could see the tiny woman's mouth move, he was very pleased with the results he was getting. In the back room he went through and waved at the telepath there, who signaled for him to stop and touched his arm. The man thought at him and it was very clear at least.

'We could use those Interpreters?'

That was a thing that Zack had forgotten all about. He nodded, planning to go and get them after the Shifter leader and his people were in. He explained it all, including his lapse, but not why. The man nodded calmly and stood back, letting him get to the job at hand.

Mrs. Samson was a pain, it seemed, but other than listening to everyone apologize about it, including two of her children, Zack didn't have to hear it. It was nice.

Then he spent hours getting those translators in, the bird people being willing, but the Fox Shifters not so much so. In order to get them to be happy with it, he had to promise to take their leader along, which he had no problem with. The woman was old and didn't say much to him, and as soon as she stopped stabbing him, which meant twisting the knife from her hand and healing, he had her in place in the Ettarian lands. He hadn't been ready for it, but the healing was much faster now that he had more energy. It reminded him to go and get his big box of food from his house, which was still on the table. He had donuts too, but kind of felt like a chicken sandwich instead.

Plus, now he needed to go and change.

Calley looked at him and winced, but it was Catherine, the bitchy Ambassador, who was a cat-woman of some kind, who commented on it.

"Trouble?" It wasn't rude at least and she looked almost worried about it.

"A bit. The Reynard leader took exception and stabbed me about ten times. I healed, but need a new shirt." He was going to leave it at that, knowing that it was that thing were
everyone
tried to kill the baby Demons, but the Ambassador acted like it was some vast problem.

"Do they live?"

He could have played dumb and ask who she meant, but the idea was that he might have killed The
Reynard
, wholesale, for that kind of thing. There weren't that many of them after all and turning into a fox, while a real ability, wasn't exactly enough to protect them from, say, a hunting rifle.

"Everyone is fine. I just took the knife away and got her into place. If they do it again, I'll have to do more however. That's their free pass, because I hate killing old women in the morning. You might want to pass the word around?"

She acted as if he were being mean to her, personally, but Calley came up and moved between them again, which was a little strange. He really wasn't going to harm the woman after all, and she hadn't exactly been slapping him down, or even yelling.

"Let's get you a shirt, to replace that one? Something in light blue would look nice on you. Over here?" She goaded him away, but seemed shocked when he paid for the shirt. They hadn't stabbed him after all and while it might feel good to make the woman that stabbed him replace it, that would just lead to wasted time for him.

Taking his bag, which had the bloody shirt in it, he used their Node to go directly home. He needed to scrub up. He picked his own bedroom to appear, in case there were workmen around, but that wasn't a big problem that day, since Troy was sleeping and Judy was on the sofa, finishing the book she was reading. When she saw him there was a large smile on her face, but she didn't hop up to hug him or anything. Instead she marked her book and sat up.

It was still the old sofa, which she patted gently, indicating that he might want to sit.

"Long time no see. I hear they're keeping you busy at the Mall?" Her voice was calm and held a slight edge of playfulness, instead of that sexiness the other Alede always had with him. Even Glen had, which was a bit odd. They couldn't really help it, except for her. That meant she was probably
way
older than he'd originally thought, wasn't she?

"Not so bad today. I just need to go back and make sure Bey gets into the meeting in a bit. I needed to get some food first." He looked at the kitchen and then sighed. "I guess I got fired from work. For being a Demon? You have heard about that right?" It was possible that no one had told her after all.

She nodded.

"I
have
heard something. Considering it's all over the alternative news sources, at least
ours
, it was kind of hard to miss. How do you feel about it?"

"You know... I haven't really thought about that yet. I don't get a choice, so... Does it matter how I
feel
?"

After a bit, her eyes glued to his closely, she shook her head.

"No, not really. When there's nothing you can do about things, you just have to make it work. Speaking of which, let me make you something to eat. I noticed that the food supplies have both increased and gotten better? How about this, you can tell me about what's going on and I'll cook. Deal?" She grinned as if she were being cute.

Zack shook his head.

"Nope."

Judy laughed, but went to make the food anyway.