“No,” I say, sucking in a deep breath of air. “I mean, why is it your treat?”
He shrugs. “Because I’m fucking rich. And I don’t care how many credits Mighty Minions scams me out of, it’s not going to matter. Just a little blip in the bank account and nothing more.”
“Oh,” I say, trying to imagine what that feels like, and find I can’t. Not even when I was back in Cygnian System did I have access to unlimited credits to buy anything I wanted. And I was one of the lucky ones. One of the girls who had an actual family, and a home, and didn’t live in the harems with dozens of sisters.
“You can stay here all weekend too,” he says. “If you want. It’s paid for. Might as well enjoy it.”
“Really?”
“Sure. Why not?”
Why not? I wonder.
He’s not what I expected, that’s for sure.
Flicka buzzes in my ear. “Don’t fall for it. He’s dangerous, Delphi.”
I swat her away and she flits off to go exploring.
“Where did you really get that dragonbee bot?” Jimmy asks.
“I told you, she’s been with me since I was a little girl.”
“What kind of parent gives a child a dangerous bot like that?”
“How do you know they’re dangerous?”
“I’m sort of a bot expert.” He refills his drink, takes a sip of whiskey, and then uses his glass to point to the wall panel where the maidbot appeared and disappeared a few moments ago. “That’s an UltraClean 9000 series. A very high-end bot with near-sentient processing power.”
“Get out of here.” I laugh. “Near-sentient? Please. It’s a vacuum.”
“No,” Jimmy says, shaking his head. “That thing could beat you at any game of chance you could imagine.”
“A maidbot?” I scoff.
He nods. “They’re actually pretty creative too. I once knew a maidbot who painted Centurian portraits as a hobby.”
I shake my head and scoff again.
“I swear. She still does. She’s got a gallery on Harem Station. I haven’t seen her in a while, but she was one of the first bots I ever liberated.”
“What the hell are you talking about? Liberate bots? That’s not what you do.”
He raises that eyebrow again.
Oops. I shouldn’t know what he does. “I mean,” I say, correcting myself, “you look like… I don’t know. A bounty hunter, or something.”
“No.” He laughs. He’s got a nice laugh. And a nice smile too. In fact, Jimmy of Harem Station isn’t anything like I imagined. “That’s my brother, Serpint. He’s the bounty hunter in the family. I’m in charge of bot liberation.”
“That word,” I say. “It makes no sense to me. I mean, liberation? I don’t get it. You what? Buy them and take them back to… did you say Harem Station?”
“Sometimes we buy them. Most times we just steal them. You can’t own people, you know.”
“Yeah.” I laugh. “But you can own bots.”
“Not if they’re people.”
“They’re not people.”
“They are people.”
“OK,” I say. “Whatever you say. Thank you for the shopping offer, but I’m fine. In fact, maybe I should just find another place to stay?”
And you know what the funny thing is? When I say this to him, I mean it. He’s weird. This whole bots-are-people-too thing, also weird. And his brother, Serpint? One of the most awful men in the entire galaxy. They not only steal bots, they steal us. Me. People like me. And they take us to that rogue station, and trap us in their special princess harem, and use us for sex. Just like everyone else. They are not liberators. They are hunters.
I’m sure I could find a way to sneak back on Queenie. There has to be a way. In fact, I’m sure she’d even help me. Subvert some security system or something. I just can’t stay here with him. He’s creeping me out.
“Well,” Jimmy says. “You could try.”
“Try what?”
“To leave.”
“What?”
“Come on.” He laughs. “How stupid do I look, Delphi? Or should I say, Princess Delphi? You’re a Cygnian.”
“You’re crazy.”
“‘Oh, I have a little dragonbee bot my parents gave me when I was a child.’ You know, that was your first giveaway. But the second one was your attitude about the maidbot. Only true assholes or Cygnians feel that way about bots these days. Which is really kind of sad because you seem to actually like your little bot friend.”
Flicka buzzes in front of him, preparing to sting while I turn, leg in the air, ready to deliver a flying leap kick to the side of Jimmy’s face. But Jimmy taps his wristband and Flicka drops to the floor like dead weight and then his forearm comes up, blocking my kick, knocking me down, and before I even realize what’s happened, he’s got me pinned to the floor.
“Get off me.”
“No. Your little bot friend tried to sting me. And if you’d have landed that kick I could’ve lost a tooth. So no. I’m gonna stay right here on top of you while you explain just what the fuck you’re doing and why you’re lying to me.”