Chapter 2

Billy's Café is a busy place. And it's confusing too…lots of glass-pane walls and counter dividers. It is meant to give the place an open feeling, like some sort of cheery, fun-house labyrinth, but you can hurt yourself if you're not paying attention. I've seen more than one street comedian, busily blowing on his coffee while he walks out, ram himself into one of those glass partitions and splash hot brew all over his pink, tender face. And the food service equipment behind the counters, not to mention the robots that man them, is mostly white and silver with red trim. All in all, it is meant to be a bright, cheery place, like the way I imagine old 1950s burger joints used to be, from the pictures and videos I've seen.

But the glass partitions and red-trimmed condiment dispensers aren't what make Billy's so great. What makes Billy's so great is that there is a real live barista there. Yes, an actual person standing behind the counter, making your coffee right in front of you, like the old days. I guess that's why they went with the retro décor, although Billy himself doesn't strike me as strong in the nostalgia department. Still, it is a real treat to walk in to a café and see an actual person making and serving you coffee, instead of fetching it from a computer dispenser or taking it from a robot pretending to give you that "personal touch." And did I mention, Billy's is busy? A constant stream of people coming and going. There are a few booths and tables for the loiterers and travellers, not to mention the locals who hang out there, but it's mostly a buy-and-run shop. You see all kinds here. Which meant I fit right in.

I took my place at the end of the line, behind three other people, my hands stuffed casually in my pockets. As I stood there, waiting, contemplating, I realized that Geelan had taken all my money, and that when I walked by the computer cashier with my double-shot latté and it tapped my credit chip with a few microwaves to debit me for my purchase, my relaxed gait just may be interrupted by an offensive, shrill buzzing noise that alerts the proprietor, the customers, and the entire goddamn neighborhood that this guy in the black jacket passing by the cashier with a latté in his hand is actually penniless, and has now stooped to stealing coffee. (I'm not sure if there is a more uncomfortable stigma these days than not having any money. Perhaps murder, but it's a close call.)

Standing in line, my lips twitching reflexively, I then started to wonder if Billy is the kind of proprietor who opts to pay the police a premium to have his cashier wired to their network for "priority response." And that's when it dawned on me. The reason I came to Billy's was not for the delicate, light froth of a handmade latté that simply can't be replicated by a machine, nor was it the interesting décor or the amusing traffic. It was the cold, hard fact that maybe, just maybe, that nice barista up there would take pity on me and spot me a latté. Something a machine would never do. What is that old saying? I will gladly pay you Wednesday for a latté today? And hey, I've even exchanged pleasantries with Billy a couple times…surely he'll understand that a fellow falls into a spot of difficulty once in a while, and needs a toasty, velvety brew to help him think his way through it. Looking around me, I couldn't imagine that Billy had lived on Easy Street for his whole life.

I noticed my knee rocking nervously, and I willed it to stop. This is ridiculous, I told myself. You're just here to buy coffee. You're acting like a five year-old.

The line shuffled forward, and I moved along with it, focusing my attention on the larger problem at hand. What did I know about Geelan? I activated my heads-up display and a virtual, lightly opaque screen entered my field of vision. I opened a notepad, ready to take notes.

If I was going to find this rat and get my money back, it was up to me. The police would be of no help. I would be required to file papers of complaint, submit documentation and help them fill out reports, and probably be interviewed by three or four different case workers, all of whom, remarkably, would have absolutely none of the information available that I had given to the previous ones. I would have to repeat my embarrassing story – that I was conned out of my life savings by an alien – multiple times to young, untrained screeners who would assess the severity of my complaint with the advantage of their years of inexperience and ignorance, recommend a course of action for me that would cost the department nothing, and which would effectively gain me nothing and only give Geelan more time to burrow completely and forever out of sight. Even after I followed that ridiculous self-help regimen, then I would have to go back to the police, show that I had taken the remedial actions they suggested, and prove that the case had to be referred to an actual investigator, who might or might not be willing to commit any resources to it, and only after he determined that the cut of the returns he earned from its recovery would be worth the investment of his time and resources. (Of course, crime is prosecuted and punished, but after all, people are expected to look out for themselves, and if one is too stupid to keep his own money safe, one must pay the price of regaining it, if it can be regained at all.)

Bottom line, the cops were out. Geelan was on the run. Every day that passed, he got further and further away from any kind of prosecution, and my credits spiraled further into the vacuum of digital never-neverland. I had to move quickly, and I had to catch the bastard myself. The only problem was, how was I going to finance my investigation? If I had to travel somewhere, or bunk up somewhere, how would I pay for it? This was a thorny problem. If I was ever prosecuted for what I did to Geelan when I caught up with him, the court would easily prove that I had the motive; they would be hard-pressed to show opportunity.

The guy in front of me took his coffee from the lovely barista and moved over to the condiments counter to dress it. I closed my HUD for the moment, stepped forward, and gazed intently into this beauty's eyes. I flashed my most captivating smile. "Hi, Lana. How are you?"

"Great! What can I get for you?" She said it with utter vacancy. Was I just one more customer to move along? Hadn't my previous visits meant something? Did she not even recognize me? I couldn't believe it…I had been here three or four times! How could she have forgotten our intimate, over-the-counter pillow-talk so easily? I needed that coffee, and my lifesaver seemed to be looking right through me. My situation was turning graver by the minute, and I wasn't even out of the coffee shop yet.

I picked my pride (and desperation) up off the floor, and soldiered on with another fetching grin. "Double-shot latté. And an extra cup please, so it's not too hot on my hands."

"Sure!" She said perkily to no one in particular, and she started slamming ladles, squeezing dispenser handles, and shooting relentless jets of foam into the kind of punished pitcher you can only feel sorry for.

I leaned toward her conspiratorially. Maybe even a bit romantically. Whatever it took. "You know, Lana, I've got a…bit of a problem I was hoping you could help me out with."

Her eyes lifted slowly up at me, while her robotic hands continued flinging dangerous implements around. Suddenly she stopped all movement, like a marionette with its strings cut, and she released a pent-up sigh. "You wanted skim."

"No, no! No, I uh, no, that's not it at all. Please." My hand waved encouragingly to her.

She gave herself the most indiscernible nod – just a quick personal sanity check, it appeared – and began putting the finishing touches on the drink she had already started.

I continued. "You see, well, you know, I've been in here a few times, I don't know if you remember me, and I've chatted with Billy – Great guy! I've been meaning to ask if you like working for him. Anyway, there's been this…mix-up with my bank, I'm on my way to sort it out now, some kind of credit transfer snafu, or whatever they call it. And well, this is silly, I know, but I was just worried that your cashier machine might think I'm…you know, that I don't have the money to buy this…" I laughed and plowed on, "this ridiculous latte. It's crazy, isn't it? Um, do you think there'll be a problem? I mean, with your machine? I can refer you to my bank, they'll explain the problem to you."

She licked her lips, considering the strange, blubbering animal before her. I flipped my concerned gaze back into my most winsome smile, and waited.

"Are you a Citizen?" she asked.

That threw me. I didn’t know what my citizenship had to do with coffee, but I wasn't going to be caught off guard this early in the game. "Well, yes, of course I am."

"Well, what are you worried about then?" she retorted with – I must say – poorly concealed disgust. "They just passed the Horace L. Ridman Dignity Act." She paused again at my blank stare. "You know, a mandated minimum credit extension to all Citizens?"

"I'm not…I've been offworld for quite a while," I explained meekly.

She set my scalding double-paper cup on the countertop between us. "You should read the news," she chided. "All Citizens are now guaranteed a daily fifty-credit ration, no matter what happens to them." Her eyebrows went up a notch. "Bank snafus notwithstanding."

"Oh."

She gave me an instructive gaze, like a teacher trying for the last time to get through to a thick-headed kid. "You can buy yourself coffee every day for the rest of your life. Courtesy of the taxpayers."

"Oh!"

"Good luck with your bank," she added. Then she pasted back on her practiced smile for the customer behind me. "Hi, what can I get for you?" she said happily to no one in particular, and I headed down the line to pay for my coffee with my free government money, wondering why a human barista's greeting should be so mechanical and routine like a robot's…maybe the robot baristas were better imitators of humans than I had been giving them credit for. But I was getting off track.

A daily fifty-credit ration for all Citizens, huh? So they had finally pegged the lifetime value of a nonproductive member of society. Jeez, just a measly fifty credits a day. But who was I to complain? It wasn't enough to finance a bounty hunt, for sure, but free coffee was a damn good start.