Three Card Monte (The Martian Alliance)

by Gini Koch

  “We have her locked down. I’m the captain, and you’re coming along. This is a social call. We’re not doing a job—we’re visiting a friend.”

  “Job or not, this is a bad idea, Roy.” Bullfrog shook his head, but he stopped arguing. And on that cheerful note, we locked down the Stingray and headed for the Spillway.

  Polliworld’s Tourism Bureau, which was unofficially run by the Underground, had two distinct branches: Scientific and Respite. For first-timers it was easier to get through the Spillway, which was their version of customs, if you were coming through via the Respite side.

  However, we’d been here often enough that the Stingray’s crew and mission were reasonably well-known, and scientific missions were rarely searched because their equipment tended to be fragile and expensive to replace. On Polliworld, whoever broke it bought it, and that rule extended to Polliworld Underground employees. As Bullfrog liked to say, Polliworld Underground was firm but fair.

  We arrived to a short line and were up at the head of it in no time. “Business on Polliworld?” the Polliwog working our line asked.

  “Crew of the science vessel Stingray,” Roy said. “Here to continue our research on the habits and lifecycles of leeches.”

  Ironically, this really was our mission. We’d created it in honor of Monte, but without his knowledge, of course.

  “Where’s your equipment?” the clerk asked.

  “On our ship,” Roy replied. “We want to determine where we’ll be studying before we haul it all out.”

  “And we want to see your new gaming establishment,” Ciarissa added with a beaming smile.

  The Polliwog nodded. “Good. We’re very proud of it.”

  “We heard about it from six solar systems away,” Dr. Wufren said. “Made us get ready in a hurry.”

  The Polliwog smiled. “Length of stay?”

  “Unsure,” Roy said. “Let’s request the maximum, if we may, just to be on the safe side.”

  “One Polliworld month,” our clerk said as he stamped nine bright green leaflets and handed them to Roy. They really were leaves, from one of the sturdier and abundant trees that grew on Polliworld like weeds. Polliwogs preferred to use natural products whenever possible.

  Roy handed us each one. They were stamped for a month’s stay with full access. I wondered if Ciarissa had helped the Polliwog to be amenable or if we’d just caught him on a good day. Normally we had to work a little harder to get this kind of all access pass.

  Once you’d landed at a spaceport and made it past the Spillway, Polliworld was fairly lax about everything else. The Underground tended to protect itself, and therefore its planet, quite well. The positive of being thought of as scientists here was easy and reasonably unhindered access. The negative was that all our weapons were still on the Stingray. It was an unpleasant but necessary tradeoff.

  We left the Spillway area, unmolested and basically ignored. It was a nice feeling; experience said this level of casual disinterest wouldn’t last.

  “Ready to get to work?” Roy asked me.

  “Sure. Let’s head off to study the habits of Monte the Leech and to determine if his lifecycle is in danger.”

  Monte had taken up residence in Amphibia, the capitol city of Polliworld. The Amphibia Space Center was huge and had anything and everything you could want: a museum, a theme park, the Swampland Zoo, restaurants, gift shops, and more. Anything made on or about Polliworld—including Polliskins and various transportation methods—were for sale or rent. Some visitors to Polliworld never left the Space Center and still felt they’d really seen the planet.

  Enclosed buildings were fly-, humidity-, and fetid-odors-free. I could see the wisdom in never leaving the Space Center.

  I was somewhat surprised Monte’s establishment wasn’t attached to the Space Center. I had no clue whether this was a sound idea or not, or if the casino was elsewhere because the Underground wanted Monte elsewhere. Either way, I planned to find out.

  “Can you tell if it’s safe?” Roy asked Ciarissa.

  “Especially for you and Dr. Wufren,” Doven added.

  “Not yet. We’re too far away.” Ciarissa could read minds from space if necessary, but spotting electronic and mechanical surveillance and related equipment required closer proximity. Dr. Wufren was telekinetic, not telepathic, so he normally needed Ciarissa to know what items might need to be moved, shut down, tampered with, or broken—and when.

  “We’ll go along and if we have to take public transportation to return to the safety of the Space Center, we will,” Dr. Wufren said. “Don’t worry, my boys, we can take care of ourselves.”

  “The Underground taking care of all of us is what worries me,” Bullfrog muttered under his breath. If Roy heard him, he ignored Bullfrog’s fretting.

  We rented a planet flyer and headed for The Polliwog Palace. Monte was all about keeping the theme if the original had worked out well.

  Amphibia, like the other Polliworld cities, was on dry ground. But the swamp-and-flies motif was in full force anyway, making visibility sketchy. All this caused a first-time visitor to assume that Polliworld ground transportation went slowly and carefully and was well-controlled at all times.

  Which is why so many first-time visitors ended up in the hospital.

  Polliwogs made good pilots in space, and even in the air, but they were awful flyers on the ground for whatever reason. Maybe it was because the more flies they could smash onto their windshields meant the bigger, better meal later, but “chaotic” was the kindest description I could ever come up with for how they flew.

  “They all drive like little old ladies with a death wish,” Willy said as Roy dodged the first, but certainly not the last, near crash. “It’s like they can’t see and have the accelerator pressed down to the floorboards.”

  He was right and I was glad Roy was driving—even Doven would have had difficulty avoiding the planet flyers going every which way at reckless speeds with no obvious directional goals in mind.

  “You say that every time,” Kyle mentioned through clenched teeth.

  “It’s true every time,” Willy replied with a hiss as a flyer missed us by a hair’s breadth. “This place is like running a gauntlet—bad all the way through with death likely waiting for you at the end.”

  “Cut the chatter,” Bullfrog said. “Roy needs to concentrate.”

  This was true and we all shut up, other than group and individual gasps of fear as we ran the traffic gauntlet and prayed to our personal gods for safe passage.

  Proving again that he was the best at any kind of piloting, Roy got us to the Polliworld Palace unscathed. He went to self-parking, and no one argued. The walk was longer, but you didn’t have to wait for someone to bring your flyer around if a fast retreat was necessary. Fast retreat was frequently necessary for us.

  “What do you get here?” Roy asked Ciarissa.

  She closed her eyes and tilted her head back again. “Nothing. There is no telepathic surveillance or telekinetic inhibition I can detect.”

  “That’s odd,” Willy said.

  “Scary,” Bullfrog suggested.

  “Good for us,” Dr. Wufren offered.

  “I’m with the doctor,” Roy said. “Let’s go. But everyone be ready for anything.”

  “You know,” Kyle said. “Business as usual.”

  The downside of using general parking was that it wasn’t enclosed. Thankfully, we had our Polliskins. However, we were either going to have to keep them on inside or leave them at the spacesuit check, which was never a good plan for us.

  Bullfrog’s unease convinced Roy to have us keep our Polliskins on. However, as we entered the antechamber that connected self-parking with the casino’s lobby and took a look around, everyone who had a ’Skin was checking it.

  Bullfrog was looking elsewhere. “Is there really no tele-surveillance of any kind around?” he asked in a low voice.

  “I sense none,” Ciarissa reassured him.

  “Nor I,” Dr. Wufren said. �
��Nothing seems to be inhibiting me in any way.”

  Roy looked at Ciarissa. She nodded. “We will do as the others,” she said in our heads.

  We waited for a contingent of Polliwogs with bad attitudes to descend on us, but nothing happened.

  We heaved a collective sigh and struggled out of the ’Skins. Dr. Wufren used his powers to help Doven and Tresia out of their ’Skins. No one took any kind of interest in us.

  “Don’t get cocky,” Bullfrog warned. “Just because you can’t spot it and no one’s come to slap you two into tele-restraints doesn’t mean they’re not monitoring.”

  “Bullfrog’s right,” Roy said. “Only use your talents for what’s necessary for the job, not for anything else.”

  Dr. Wufren sighed. “You do like to remove all the fun out of life sometimes, my boy.” He grinned as Roy and Bullfrog glared at him. “Not to worry. We’ll be the souls of discretion.”

  The Polliwogs working in coat check were younger females. Kyle and Bullfrog checked our suits in—Kyle flirted, Bullfrog blew his cheeks out, the females giggled and promised to keep our gear very safe. Two of them passed their cards to Bullfrog. One passed hers to Kyle. “I like off-worlders,” she said, loud enough for the rest of us to hear.

  Kyle grinned, Bullfrog looked pleased with himself, and Roy blushed. Roy’s extremely old-fashioned reactions toward the variety of come-ons he, and to an extent Kyle, always got was always endearing.

  “Nice to see your charm is still working,” I said to Bullfrog as we walked along the enclosed corridor.

  “I’m the best there is at cheek puffing.”

  “That’s what it says on the bathroom stalls,” Willy said.

  I managed to refrain from comment, or laughter, but only because I’d known Bullfrog a long time. Every species had their own special mating rituals.

  The reminder that I no longer had the option to practice the rituals specific to my species slithered up from the part of my mind where I’d shoved those regrets. I had Roy, and really, I didn’t need someone who could shape shift to make me happy. Even if I met another shifter—an unlikely possibility since the Diamante Purge—I’d want him to shift into a copy of Roy anyway.

  I enjoyed that particular sexual fantasy, because the idea of having two Roys making love to me was only supplanted by the idea of having three.

  “What are you smirking about?” Kyle asked me.

  I quickly shoved regrets about the loss of my entire race and sexual fantasies about his big brother out of my mind, but not before Ciarissa giggled. I figured my fantasy had been particularly “loud” in my mind and did my best not to blush. “Nothing, nothing. Where the heck is Monte’s office in this place, do you think?”

  “No idea,” Roy said with a shrug.

  Ciarissa’s eyes narrowed. “We must go through the casino, I believe.”

  “Never a problem, my dear,” Dr. Wufren said cheerfully as he offered his arm to Ciarissa, and they led the way. The rest of us followed.

  The Palace on Roulette was large, loud, and flashy. Monte had done his level best to ensure the Polliworld Palace was larger, louder and, galaxy gods alone knew how, flashier.

  Everyone inside seemed to be having a fabulous time. The noise level was high, with a lot of whooping and excited squealing. There weren’t just Polliwogs in here, either—a variety of beings from other systems had come by to check out the new game in town. The Polliwog Palace was packed.

  Normally I enjoyed the flashiness that casinos created—it was fun to be around and the glitz, and constant activity made it easier to shift without being spotted.

  However, shape shifters were, among our other talents, really good at spotting fakes. We had to be, in order to learn and protect ourselves. I took another good look around. Under the circumstances, it felt like everyone was trying just a little too hard.

  Dr. Wufren and Ciarissa led us on a winding path through the casino. We looked like we were just wandering, which was wiser than heading directly for the heart of the operation. Beings who appeared to be storming the place where the surveillance feeds and money were housed tended to be removed bodily.

  We finally reached a hallway at the back of the casino, set off from the main floor in such a way that it was easy to miss unless you were looking for it or, in the case of our group, had a telepath along.

  We trotted down the corridor until we reached a doorway at the end of the hall. A doorway with guards. Big Polliwogs who made Bullfrog look puny. Clearly, we’d arrived.

  Roy stepped to the front. “Here to see Monte the Leech,” he said to the two huge, stone-faced guards. Of course, Polliwogs looked stone-faced frequently, but it was clear these two practiced in the mirror every morning.

  “Who wants to see Mister Leech?” one of the guards asked.

  “Roy.”

  “Roy who?” the other guard asked. They both seemed willing to wait a long time for the answer.

  “Doctor Roy Evans.” Roy wasn’t a doctor and Evans certainly wasn’t his last name, but using his last name would be the height of stupidity here. It would be the same as us waving a banner saying “Look! It’s the Last of the Imperius Bloodline!” in front of the entire Diamante hit squad.

  “And why would Mister Leech want to see a doctor?” the first guard asked.

  “Routine checkup,” Roy said, sounding bored. “Here to ensure that Mister Leech’s parts don’t fall off.”

  The stone-faces remained stable, but the door opened. “Roy baby, how’re they hangin’?” a familiar voice called from inside. “You and the rest of my favorite crazy crew should come on in.”

  We did as requested. The Polliwogs looked disappointed for a moment and then went back to practicing for their second jobs as statues.

  The room was large and lavish, decorated in what I thought of as Bad Guy Impressive. Lots of large, dark, heavy, obviously expensive furniture, thick rugs, a heavy reliance on gilt and deep reds. Monte liked style, even though it was hard for him to achieve it personally.

  My gaze landed on Monte, and I managed to hide my involuntary shudder. I’d known Monte a long time, but seeing him was still repulsive, at least at first blush. He wasn’t called “the Leech” only because he drained your money.

  Monte undulated over. He did some intricate hand slapping with Roy, Kyle, Willy, Bullfrog and, even more impressively, Tresia. I focused on his hands. They hadn’t been his originally, but it’s amazing what some people had to give up when they lost more money than they actually had access to. And the medical advances on Roulette were legendary. Another reason Monte moving to Polliworld was odd.

  Doven and Monte did a wing-butt thing that never failed to make me want to gag. For whatever reason, Monte didn’t ever try to touch Dr. Wufren or Ciarissa. Lucky them.

  Monte looked at me. “What, no hug for your Uncle Monte?” He looked expectant, at least as much as a giant leech with hands and other, thankfully covered, parts could.

  I sighed to myself. I knew the drill. If I didn’t come across, we didn’t get our money, information, or cut of the action. Monte was a traditionalist, when you got right down to it.

  I shifted and was now a female giant leech, also with hands, but no other parts Monte could conceivably feel. I undulated to him, and we sort of lolled into each other.

  Most disgusting species greeting in the galaxy over, I shifted back to me, and Monte beamed. “Lord of the flies, it’s been too long. What brings you out my way? Can’t wait to test your luck on my lovely new tables?” He directed this remark specifically to Willy and Dr. Wufren.

  “No.” Roy shot the two of them a very meaningful glance that plainly said “behave.” He looked back to Monte. “No, we wanted to know what’s going on.”

  “New scenery’s good for the soul, Roy baby.”

  “Right.” Roy looked around. “This place bugged?”

  “Of course not!” Monte said with just a little too much enthusiasm. “I’ve got free rein here. Best setup in the galaxy.”

&nb
sp; “Fren has disconnected the audio and visual surveillance,” Ciarissa shared. “I believe we will have a few minutes before company arrives.”

  “Fine,” Roy said, more to Ciarissa and Dr. Wufren than to Monte. “So, for the short time we’ll be able to visit with you, why don’t you tell us why you sold part interest in the Palace to the Diamante Families?”

  “Business, Roy baby. Business. They made me an offer I couldn’t refuse.”

  “What were they going to do to you if you did refuse?” I asked.

  Monte shrugged, which meant his whole body rippled. I managed not to gag again, but only barely. “They’re business-beings; I’m a business-being. It’s not like I’m in bed with Roman the Redeemer or something.”

  The Redeemer had been one of the political leaders on Convent—a religious, peaceful planet. Until the Diamante Purge, anyway. Roman had given up on peace and fought back, very publicly, and in a variety of dirty ways, ultimately becoming a guerilla fighter with a good sized fleet. By then, he’d become a fanatic and had perpetrated atrocities on more than the Diamante Families—he’d attacked worlds unwillingly under Diamante control. Not to free them, but to do his own kind of purge.

  But the Diamante Families were too much for even Roman and his fanatical followers. The Redeemer’s fleet was destroyed, and the story went, he’d been run underground.

  These days, the Redeemer was used as a boogeyman, someone to mention to show that while you might be bad, you weren’t that bad.

  “If he came by with a deal, you’d think about it,” Roy noted. Accurately.

  Monte shrugged and rippled again. I again controlled the gag impulse while hoping we’d have no more shrugging from him for a while. I wasn’t sure I could continue to keep my sandworms down. “We reached a mutually satisfying arrangement. Which meant I could come here.” Monte beamed. “I’m on the ground floor of what’s going to be a huge industry.”

  “Speaking of which, why are you in bed with the Underground?” Roy asked.