“I think I have an infestation and I could use an exterminator. Make sure you bring your mind reader to find the rats.
“Say, tomorrow morning, eight o’clock, my place.”
“I’ll be there,” Felix said.
There was no response to that, since the line had already gone dead.
How did he know about Kit?
“Rats? I hate rats. I had to deal with them a lot when dealing with targets who were in not nice places,” Andrea grumped unhappily.
Felix closed out his program and slept the desktop display.
“I think he means informants. People who work for the cops. Not actual rats,” he explained to the Beastgirl.
“Oh, that makes sense.” She poked at something on her screen and then bounced up and down twice. “There!”
She flipped her tablet around and showed it to him.
It was the background for her tablet. A picture of them smiling into the camera. One of those that had been taken earlier that day.
She tapped the desktop and it switched to the picture of her kissing him. She tapped the screen again and it was another photo of them together, but this time in the car.
Then it was a picture of a number of Andreas sleeping next to him in his bed. Though on him might have been more accurate. One was spread across his lower legs, another next to him had a leg thrown over his stomach and hips, and a third had wrapped herself up around an arm.
A fourth one was above him sleeping lengthwise across the pillows with an arm over his face.
Sleep hadn’t been as refreshing as it used to be. That change certainly lined up with after she’d weaseled that concession out of him.
Now he knew why.
“Andrea… how many pictures like this do you have?” Felix asked, looking over the top of the tablet.
She gave him a grin and leaned forward towards him. “A lot.”
“I… see. And you didn’t give these to anyone, did you?”
“No, no. Of course not.”
“Good.”
“Just Lily, Kit, and Miu.”
Felix felt his face screw up in a grimace at that.
“They’re all well taken,” Miu promised from behind him.
His intercom beeped once, then came to life.
“Mr. Campbell, I have a…” There was a pause as an Other questioned whoever it was for their name. “John Smith here to see you. He says he’s here from the Department of Slave Affairs.”
Thinking, Felix tilted his head down, staring at the ground. Reaching up, he thumbed the intercom button. “I’ll meet him in the Gold conference room. Please have Kit and Lily notified.”
Andrea Prime stood upright beside him and began tapping things into her tablet.
“I should be there in—” Felix paused as Andrea caught his eyes.
She held up one hand with all five fingers splayed. Closed her hand and did it again.
“Ten minutes,” Felix finished.
Andrea Prime nodded her head and turned back to her tablet.
“Consider it done, Mr. Campbell.” It had taken some serious work to get Andrea to be able, or at least willing, to call him Mr. Campbell when she used an Other to man the front desk.
In the end, it was Lily who had managed to get her to do it.
Now that he thought about it, those two were thick as thieves as of late.
“I have a couple Others preparing a suit for you. A squad of guard Others are setting up in Gold.
“Miu, I’ve taken the liberty of alerting your people of the situation.” Andrea looked up from her tablet, waiting for a response from either of them.
“Good work,” Felix and Miu said in unison.
Ten minutes later to the second, Felix sat himself down in the conference room named Gold.
Lily sat to his right, Kit on his left, Miu a half step behind him.
There was also an Other in each corner, armed with SMGs.
The poorly named John Smith walked into the room, took a look around, and then held up his hands.
He looked to be in his early thirties, brown hair, blue eyes, nondescript. Neither tall nor short, overweight or skinny.
One of the Others immediately moved in and frisked him roughly and thoroughly. She pulled out a handgun from a shoulder holster underneath Smith’s jacket. Opening the door, she handed the weapon to someone else and continued with her search.
“Wearing a wire, nothing else,” the Other reported, moving back to her corner.
“A little paranoid, Mr. Campbell?” Mr. Smith asked, dropping his hands to the side.
“I am indeed.
“You may want to turn off your electronics. Maybe put them on the table, even. I’d hate for all the electronics on your person to go dead. This building tends to eat electronics at times. My people constantly complain about it,” Felix said in a flat tone.
Mr. Smith looked up to the corners of the room, finding himself on two different cameras. “Uh-huh.”
Taking out what appeared to be a phone, with an attached cord that came up through his sleeve, Smith set it on the table. Then he pulled out a second device as well.
He deliberately showed both being powered off, then pushed them to the middle of the table.
“What can I do for you today, Mr. Smith?” Felix asked.
“As I said to your receptionist, I’m an agent for the newly formed Department of Slave Affairs.”
Pulling out an identification card, he flipped it open and held it out to Felix.
It read literally as he’d described.
Slave Affairs. John Smith. Investigator - Field Agent.
“I’m here as you’re a registered slave owner. Specifically, a major holder. We’re reaching out to those with a large interest in slaves to discuss changes we’ll be implementing.”
“I’m listening.”
“Glad to hear that, Mr. Campbell. Specifically, there is going to be a tax on all income generated by a slave equal to four percent of the value. This went live last month and this’ll be the first month that it’ll come due for payment.”
Lily was taking notes into a holographic projection from her tablet. Kit was staring through the man’s head.
The Others behind Mr. Smith had their weapons trained on the man’s back.
“Message received. Anything else?” Felix asked. He didn’t care, nor did he really want to deal with this right now.
Mr. Smith blinked at the casual acceptance and dismissal.
“Next year, the loophole caused by paying your own slaves will be eliminated,” said Smith.
“I understand. Anything else?” Felix repeated once more.
Mr. Smith smirked and then gestured at everyone around Felix. “Could we perhaps speak alone for two minutes? That’s all the time I need.”
Felix sighed and then nodded his head.
Lily had already spelled a shield around him. It would remain regardless of where she was. He was as safe as he could be already.
“Fine. Two minutes. Everyone, please clear the room. Make sure the recordings are paused.”
As one, they closed up their workstations, tablets, and messenger bags, packed up, and left.
The last one out the door was Miu, who he imagined was probably now standing on the other side of the door waiting.
“You’ve built quite a harem,” Mr. Smith said, smiling at Felix.
“What was it you wanted to discuss?”
Felix had other things he had to take care of today and his calendar was booked. After this, he was due to sit down and go over possible upgrades for the building.
“We both know there’s a multitude of loopholes right now with the slave system. Our beloved leader made it legal, but didn’t invest any time in its infrastructure. The system. Taxes. Anything, really.
“What’d be illegal elsewhere isn’t so at all here.”
Leaning forward, Felix spread his hands out in front of him. “And?”
“And I’d love to spend some time with your ladies. You let me stop by twice a month for an hour or so, and I’ll make sure those taxes you owe disappear. As if you’d paid them already.
“I’d prefer either of the two who were sitting next to you, but I could go feral on that dog girl,” Mr. Smith said.