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each and every time.”
    “You’re telling us this beforehand why?”
    “I believe in truth in advertising. Last, if you’re really talking a job, you’ll talk about it with me and my business manager.”
    “Business manager?”
    I gave him a slow, wide smile. “Yeah. In the trades, they call him Janz the Butcher.” I prayed Randolph would keep his mouth shut and his expression neutral.
    They exchanged glances. “You know Janz?” The man who’d had his hand on me sounded a lot less sure of himself.
    “Very well. He hates rudeness, so, who the hell are you?”
    “Beber Zoltan. I’m the head of the Bureau on Herion.” This settled it. All the names on Herion were bizarre.
    I nodded. “I’m sure he’ll be impressed. I don’t want to talk business here—we just had an interview with Herion Military and I have to assume they’ll be keeping an eye on us for a while.”
    “Where then?” Zoltan asked.
    “The Crazy Bear.”
    “That’s a nightclub.”
    “Right. Still a popular, noisy and crowded nightclub?”
    “Yeah.” Zoltan shook his head. “Got your point. What time?”
    “Tomorrow night, call it oh-twenty-hours.” They ran on military time on Herion, and had an Earth-like rotation around their sun. It was interesting, how much influence Earth had had on the galaxy. I was from Zyzzx, but I could trace my family lines back to Earth. Great-Aunt Clara had been particularly proud of our heritage. Me, I just had to give it to the folks from Old Earth—they’d spread throughout the galaxy and left their mark on every single planet.
    “Fine. No tricks,” Zoltan added.
    “Not from our side. We’ll be expecting them from yours.”
    He laughed. “I think I like you, Outland.”
    “Well, guess we’ll see if this is the start of a beautiful friendship
or if you try to betray and kill me and my crew later.”
    Zoltan smiled as he and his group turned to leave. “Liking and business don’t always go together.”
    “Yeah. Like I said, been there, done that, got the carbon markings.”
    He nodded as he walked away. “See you tomorrow night.” Randolph and I exchanged the “we’re dead” look. “I can’t believe you have us involved with Janz the Butcher.” Randolph sounded like he was wavering between crying or killing himself.
    “Or that I know him very well and am going to contact him. I know. You say this every time.” I sighed. “Let’s get back to the others. I need to make an interstellar call.”

CHAPTER 12
    W e found the other three where we’d left them. I was immensely relieved. “Time to go up to our room, sweep it for bugs, check for potential snipers, bombs and similar, then figure out what the hell’s going on.”
    The Governor hailed the waitresses. They came trotting over. I considered again. Yes, only worth it if I had both of them at the same time. “Young ladies, can we please close out our tab?” The Governor gave them both his patented “charming old geezer” smile. They giggled at him. The Governor never failed to impress. It never failed to amaze and astound me.
    One of them handed him a bill which he handed to me. “My retainer,” he said to them. They giggled again.
    I paid, working not to mutter nasty things about the Governor under my breath, and then we headed off to our rooms. We were on the highest floor and the word “palatial” leapt to mind. We had four bedrooms, two bathrooms large enough to house the Ismaliz Boys Choir, and a sunken living room area. The furnishings were all top of the line and so sleek they gave Slinkie a run for her money.
    “How much is this going to cost us? All our internal organs? The Sixty-Nine ? All of the above?”
    “Same cost as the cheap fleabags you normally stick us in,” the
Governor replied. “Things are quite bad for Herion.”
    Slinkie, Randolph and Audrey performed a variety of scans. I had to admit that Audrey was useful. She found some bugs no one else had. Once we had everything cleaned out and