Mr. Hartley (Alternate Places Book 1)

by P. S. Power

  Zack turned to Libby, her freckled face and slightly flattened nose inches from his own. Her grin proved itself to be infectious and they both laughed.

  “I think I have the picture now.” Libby snuggled in a little next to him. “They want me, for my well known flying insect control abilities! Now if you can just find a Were-Anteater, you'll be totally protected... Well, Nessa will have to come over to take care of the mice... but that could be her contribution to things, right? ”

  The front door opened and Valerie came in, holding a manila envelope in her left hand.

  “Okay, this looks cozy, mind if I join in?” Without waiting for an answer she settled in on the other side of Zack, also pressing up against him slightly, so that he found himself trapped.

  She opened the envelope and took out a small packet of papers and a pen. Then the alluring seductress... asked him to sign in several places, and signed and dated some other lines herself.

  “Merri! Come here for a moment please?” Val called out softly, only a small bit of seduction in her voice, though more poured out of her and into Zack sitting next to her.

  When she came in, carrying a plate with various tiny cakes on it, Valerie told her that they could make the renovations she wanted now, since they bought the house.

  “Our first home!” The tiny woman climbed over Val and sat on his lap. He found himself hugged and kissed on all sides suddenly. After about two minutes of this, Merri looked at Libby who just shrugged.

  “Hey, everyone else was doing it, I just didn't want to be left out.”

  Since the succubus had started to send out very strong signals and the gentle hugs had started to turn more serious, from all the women, Zack decided to calm things down a bit.

  A look at Val reminded her to reign in her power, and Libby pulled away when he asked for particulars about the purchase.

  “Well, it's not a wonderful area, but the price was reasonable. We made an offer and it was picked up, since the bank owned the property anyway, on paper, and the person buying it really didn't want to bother with it any more. We need to get a bigger place, but this will do for now. After all, most of the people living here don't actually sleep, which really saves room. Still, I for one would like a little more closet space.”

  The Bat girl laughed, then told them about how she had to share an apartment with Keeber, the bear from work.

  “No, Keeber isn't his real name, but when a bear asks you to please not call him Eustace, you do it. He's nice, but the place is tiny and gets rough if he changes. He's not tied to the moon though, neither am I, not like Brian and Nessa. So he can pick his time and go somewhere to change. Since my form is so small and can easily head out at night, I can live pretty much anywhere. Just another reason why Bats are so cool.” She grinned.

  Merri went to the kitchen and came back with another plate full of tiny cakes, which she passed around, to Zack first, then Val, and then Libby, even though this order didn't make sense to him.

  Libby saw his look and explained it to him.

  “It's because you were poisoned and they want to set my mind at ease. As the dominant here, the master of the house, you eat first, showing that the food is safe, then Val who's probably the second in command right now, since the others are out. Then me, being the guest, so that I have a choice as to what I want, then Merri, showing that they're all safe. Weres have a similar tradition. Not that I'm worried, you folks are my peeps. If I can't trust you then I'm in real trouble.”

  Merri picked up a small cake and ate it.

  Libby announced that she needed to get to work and took off around three in the afternoon. It had, he realized, been fun. The Bat girl had a lot of energy and life to her and always managed to be lively, even if the topic turned grim. That she didn't have the looks of Val, Hilda, or Merri, or even Claire, who managed stately cuteness rather than traditional good looks, actually won her some points with Zack. He knew that he liked her for her, not just some deep-seated instinct driving him to the prettiest one.

  He also noted that in any kind of normal situation Libby would be the only woman out of all the ones he knew that no one would look at him funny for walking next to on the street, wondering how rich he had to be to get her to be with him.

  Really, while the money came after his rare ability in their minds, in many ways this probably was a valid question. Would any of these women even know him in more than a passing fashion if not for that?

  Val thought for a second and pointed out a few flaws in his reasoning after he mentioned all of that.

  “First, I'm Alede. So, yes, I'd have eventually noticed you. Oh, true, it would have been for casual sex rather than something deeper, but this situation just let me get to know you. I mean, really, I haven't even gotten to second base with you yet. How rare is it for someone like me to hang around if no sex is being offered?” Leaning into him, she kissed his cheek softly.

  “Second, both Claire and Hilda took notice of you before anyone even knew you could walk a line at all. Granted Hilda probably doesn't think you're all that great looking, being incredibly short, scrawny, and hair free for her standard of male beauty. Claire though, she comes from a different time. You have clear skin and good teeth, a good job and no strong penchant to beat women, so you're about her perfect man. I'll grant you that I don't know about Lisa. I mean, she mainly likes women, but she liked you well enough to hire you...”

  For some reason this made him feel better, even though he didn't have any real hold on anyone, so it would be a moot point. Could he even claim to be dating any of them?

  Val thought about this for a moment.

  “Do you want to? I mean, at work people are getting jealous of me because of you. A relationship that isn't ruled by possession or jealousy? That's special. I know that the Vampire community around here has basically decided that you and Claire are together. That's the only reason you haven't been courted by other Vampires, you know. You're married to Merri... I mean, yes, it's a different land and different rules, but if you got married in Mexico, would you still be married here? Of course you would. Trust me, as a succubus you learn marriage and relationship rules.”

  Her hand touched his arm lightly, she didn't bother blocking all of her natural allure.

  “Now, Hilda, that's different. You went before a big chunk of her tribe's leaders and declared that, just because you were her friend, there was no debt for saving her brother. Even though you risked your own life to do it. Regardless of the fact that you didn't know him at all... They don't have dating, much less marriage. Friendship is as close as they come. Even for a friend to give back all that wealth, well, we don't have anything comparable, just assume that when you go there next that no one will hit on her without checking with you first.”

  The topic shifted a little, until she mentioned that Norris had contemplated taking a crack at him too. He would, she assured him, turn into a woman first – Nora – so that wouldn't be a problem, since Zack seemed to like women for sex. Being a prude like he was, and probably a little narrow minded.

  “He can turn into a woman?” He blurted a little loudly. Zack hadn't realized that the man was a shape shifter from his Shadow. He always just seemed to be himself inside.

  Her Shadow reacted to that one, I can change too, is that bad? Should I lie to you? What do I do?

  Zack fixed this by simply saying what he'd been thinking, that he'd missed shape changing abilities in Norris and in her, if she had them, on both levels so she'd know he meant it.

  “Oh, sure... I was 'Voite' for a whole summer once. Even for an Incubus it takes a bit more work to get laid than for a woman. I can't imagine how frustrating it must be for regular guys. Norris would probably have picked being a woman too, but we need the gender ratio for the store. Too many women on staff and the clientele will drop off, too many men and husbands start to get suspicious. At least enough of our clients have low self esteem that it isn't too hard for him to get a date there.”

  She pointed out how so
me Alede just passed back and forth at whim, while others picked one form and stuck with it all the time. Generally they didn't mention this to Humans though, because of homophobia. As far as the Alede were concerned, if you were a man at the moment, you were a man, and a woman a woman. Not that such things really mattered to the vast majority of them. When you harvested sexual energy to survive you learned not to quibble overly about exactly who it came from.

  Val ran back to work, hoping to get there before the evening festivities started. Hilda had plans, and it sounded like something she didn't want to miss.

  A nagging feeling that he should be doing something, instead of sitting around came over Zack. Qi-gong – energy work – occupied him for a while, then he decided he should practice some of his other tricks. Turning his focus inward he wrapped his soul, that inner most part that made him unique, inside of his Shadow, driving it into a tight black ball, that he then buried deep within himself. He tried to reach the deepest point possible, seeking to touch the void itself if he could.

  Nikki came out of Troy's room, where apparently Troy still slept, and walked past him without noticing his presence.

  He held it, seeing how long he could keep this kind of focus going.

  Claire came in, walked to the bedroom, then the kitchen, asking Merri where he'd gone.

  Merri came to the living room, wiping her hands on a cloth.

  “There he is, you must have missed him the first time somehow...” She finished wiping her hands and patted him on the shoulder.

  “Merri, there's nothing there. Quickly, check the house, there may be treachery here. Zack!”

  Relaxing his hold on his Shadow a bit, but not completely, he noticed that his energy circulation had stopped. He tried to start the pattern again, taking in part of the energy of reality as he had been taught, running it through his body out and around again, this time though, everything went black for just a moment.

  Then everything changed and he stood in his living room again. Claire actually jumped and almost hit him before she realized who stood there.

  “What... Are you all right?” Hugging him hard before releasing him.

  “Did you go somewhere or... hide yourself?”

  He explained the technique he'd been taught to help him hide from Demons by Big Shadow. How he'd inadvertently hidden from Keane, Nikki, and now her.

  “I could see you the whole time though... Claire asked where you were and I could see you normally...”

  They all thought about it for a while, Claire finally suggesting that the mechanism that allows Vampires to exist may be similar to the one that allows a Demon to take over a Human body and use it. Perhaps he could disrupt something in that kind of bond? They'd have to check it out, perhaps trying it on a mix of observers, to see if it really worked that way.

  “Not right now though. Hilda said she had a surprise for us. I think we're staying in however. She wants to wait until Troy leaves for work though.”

  Claire hugged him again and went to check on Nikki and Betty, who apparently were both in the basement.

  Hilda, arriving shortly after Troy had left, turned the lights off and turned the television on before saying anything.

  “Behold! We shall be regaled with the tale of Luke, a farm boy from long ago, who helped to destroy an evil and corrupt empire! Troy showed me how to run the machine and order the disks. We shall learn many lessons he said, from the adventures of Luke.”

  The Trolleinkein didn't have a solid concept of fiction, Zack discovered. They waited for Val and ate dinner with the lights out, watching all of the 'Tales of Luke', no one having the heart to tell her that the story had never happened. Given her reactions and what she said earlier, he didn't really know if Merri got the idea of fiction either.

  Both of their Shadow selves, the giant form of Hilda and the beautiful glowing one of Merri, kept commenting back and forth about how brave he must have been to face the powerful beings arrayed against him, when he so clearly had no real skill or talent for it.

  Claire sat next to him, holding his hand, cold fingers locked between his.

  Her Shadow whispered to him as they sat watching the films.

  I love you.

  Chapter twenty-four

  Zack got up and went to work the next morning. While he expected some suggestions that he rest more, his argument that showing weakness may invite further attack, at least possibly, actually won over everyone but Val. She didn't argue much, just kissed him meaningfully, packing in a near full dose of her personal appeal, and suggested more seductively than he'd ever seen anyone do anything that they stay in, instead.

  It took all of his ability to ignore his body's reaction and break away from her embrace. His biology didn't want to listen to his head, so he headed out quickly. The others followed him, since it was easier than driving, and he ushered them through the shortcut.

  Lisa had canceled all travel for the day, on account of nearly dead, her Shadow let him know, and looked positively shocked when he walked in.

  “Well, it's not my day off, after all.” He reminded her, giving her a warm smile to help reassure her. Taking a few moments to soothe her on the Shadow level got her to smile back at him.

  She made some calls and by ten people started coming in. Most of them wanted to go to Lesser Shia and be picked up later in the day. Lisa had come up with a kind of package deal for that destination. A round trip for fifteen thousand gold. They had people from around the world booking passage, even if it meant traveling around the globe to get to Underwood first, then waiting in local hotels until a position opened up.

  “It's the place everyone wants to go sometime, if they can. It's legendary.”

  Zack thought for a bit, then shrugged. "You know, I could work from other Nodes easily enough. If a group of people got together, all going to the same place, I could just go to someplace nearer them and take them there. Then people could stay longer, and not have to do as much travel. Call it a group of ten at once, and we could lower the price to five thousand gold or whatever?" It made sense to him at any rate. True they could probably charge more for it, but what kind of a deal was that? After all, he was pretty certain that they'd bought his house for less than five thousand gold. Stopping to think about that and doing some basic math he nearly blanched. That was... over a quarter billion dollars. Yes, there were exchange rates involved, but he hadn't realized that before really.

  Luckily Lisa distracted him.

  “I'd go, if I could.” Lisa looked wistfully past him, at her friend the wall. “I've dreamed of it since I was little. Finding new things that no one here has ever seen, haggling with people that we don't even have descriptions of. You hire translators when you go, they're said to be the best anywhere.”

  Zack shrugged and told her that she had passage, and wouldn't even have to spend any money on it, obviously. After considering it for a bit he told her she probably should go and check things out, find some hotels or whatever they offered there, maybe make some contacts so that people that wanted to stay could find their way around easily.

  “Maybe if you go with some friends? I don't know if any of the others would want to go or not, but asking them wouldn't hurt. If we keep the schedule light and the phones off, then it should be fine. It will be a bit though, I need to get my feet under me again.”

  Her worried look told him a lot, and her Shadow wondered if she should send him home to rest.

  “By the way, so far at least, while I can't claim the poison had no effect, the big problems seem physical. Tremors in my hands, and I feel a bit heavy. Honestly, I feel best when I'm in the void, as strange as that may sound. I promise, if I get too tired or stressed, I'll let you know. What I meant about getting my feet under me is that I don't think I can do your job yet. That will take a bit to figure out.” Shadow Zack tried hard to project this idea to her.

  She smiled.

  The rest of the day went smoothly, the tempo slower than before, giving him about sixty trips in all. He foun
d that he honestly did feel better in those brief moments when he sat in the void. Hilda brought in a tray of snacks for him at ten and then brought lunch at almost noon exactly. This turned out to be a large box of fried things and a giant chocolate milkshake from the burger place, in a cup larger than he'd ever seen one come in before. It went unfinished, his stomach just couldn't take it all in, though it tasted delicious.

  At five feeling a little bored even with all the people he was meeting, Zack went to see Claire, who seemed worried, but didn't say why. Her Shadow politely mentioned Forest, the Vampire that had tried to kill Vaun and almost got Zack in the bargain. Apparently he'd been doing something in their area. Though no one knew exactly what yet. Rumors had begun to surface with her name involved which made the Vampire Ambassador worry a little.

  He kissed her on the cheek.

  “Be careful. That guy's mind doesn't seem to work right. So be ready for the unexpected from him. I mean, not too unexpected, he won't attack with pies, or mimes, but you know what I mean.”

  Claire nodded at him, so seriously he thought she might be joking for a moment.

  "I will. You as well. When one thing goes wrong, many others often follow." It sounded strange. Flat, but also wise, which didn't fit her look at the moment.

  At the food court, Merri couldn't come out, since she'd found herself running the Italian Place by herself. Not that she wasn't up to the task, but it seemed that Glen was promoting her, a little. Even though he thought of her like a child still, he was giving her real responsibility. She just beamed with it and worked in the back of the other kitchen, popping out every few minutes to see if anyone waited for her creations.

  Some of the others had been called away, suddenly. Luckily she'd worked that area before and knew all the right recipes. She told him that she couldn't get away until late though. Val had offered her a ride in her automobile, she informed him, so that he wouldn't have to come back for her.