Chapter 231: Checking Out Without Paying Room Service

The zoo was about to pay me for three days of doing fuck all, but Old Mate kept calling it theft while he arranged the transfer. I considered it an appearance fee, especially since I had appeared every morning without asking for a dressing room or a bowl of expensive fruit.

[System: The transfer’s queued with a seventy-two-hour hold, mate; don’t start ordering gold toilets when you haven’t even got an arse that needs one.]

I was thinking about a better heating rock, but now you’ve made the toilet sound like a challenge.

The money remained in the zoo’s accounts while the payment waited, which meant I needed something else to entertain me. Three days of warm food and no work had been lovely, but another night in the same enclosure sounded painfully boring.

I closed the office computer and slipped into the corridor, where a keeper was checking a door latch. He looked up as six feet of red smoke snake drifted towards him, then reached for his radio with the care of a man trying not to upset tomorrow’s newspaper.

"I’ve enjoyed my stay, and the heated rock deserves a pay rise, but somebody needs to explain sauce to whoever handles the food," I told him.

His hand stopped halfway to the radio, and he stared at me as though I’d just asked him to carry my luggage.

"You can talk, so why have you spent three days letting us treat you like an animal?" His voice rose at the end, which felt unfair when I’d been such an easy guest.

"I was on holiday, and explaining myself sounded dangerously close to work. Please thank the intern who brought the takeaway, because that was the best service I’ve had all week."

I left before he could find a form for the situation. His radio crackled behind me, followed by a tired voice asking whether the snake had really complained about the menu. Nobody chased me, which made this the first hotel I’d left without checking for hidden charges.

Outside, the air smelled of traffic and fried onions. I spread my fins and climbed between the buildings, enjoying the bright signs and the feeling that nobody knew where I was supposed to be.

That lasted until a woman on a flying scooter demanded three hundred dollars and a photograph of my arse.

"You’ll have to explain which service you’re offering before I agree to either of those things," I called across to her. Blue lights flashed along the scooter while she pointed towards a platform beside the road.

"I mean your rear identification marker, which you aren’t displaying, and the fine for entering a commercial lane without clearance. Follow me before somebody mistakes you for loose cargo."

[System: You’ve been out ten minutes and already found a woman charging to look at your back end; your old life really was a waste, wasn’t it?]

You could help me find the right lane instead of reviewing my dating history. I followed the scooter onto the platform and settled beside a painted landing mark, where the officer parked close enough to block an easy departure.

Her badge read ROOK, and dark feathers framed her temples. She asked for my flight permit while a taxi passed behind us, carrying a furious minotaur and what had probably been a wedding cake before I crossed its path.

"I’ve only recently grown the equipment, so the paperwork hasn’t caught up with the exciting changes in my life,"

I explained. I spread my fins to support the point, but she seemed strangely unmoved by their quality.

"The taxi driver says you crossed directly in front of him, and his passenger is wearing most of the wedding. You’ll need an assessment before using these lanes again, regardless of how recently you acquired your fins."

Coloured lights divided the traffic routes above us. I’d assumed they were there to make the city look expensive, but apparently they also stopped people dying in ways that delayed other people’s dinner.

[System: Ask for the ground route, champ, because you can argue with the bird or spend the night as a minotaur’s novelty cake topper.]

"Could you give me a route that doesn’t end with somebody scraping me off a bus? I’ve got a meeting, and I’d rather arrive without needing a shovel."

She entered my name and district, then frowned at the screen when I said Twawi.

The subsurface address wouldn’t connect with the surface register. I nearly offered my father’s name, but Rook said a business record would work, so I called Lyra instead. She answered with the casino’s accounts open behind her and asked whether I’d already lost the horse-racing money.

"I’ve had a small disagreement with the sky, and the officer needs proof that I live somewhere people can send bills," I said on the phone to Cherry.

"Did you try biting a cloud again, or are you saving that for after dinner?" Cherry asked.

Rook made a suspicious coughing noise while Lyra sent the casino’s business record and told me to keep the debt receipt.

The address cleared, and Rook booked my assessment for the following afternoon. I paid the fine while Old Mate made a cash-register noise inside my head, then followed the ground route towards the horse girl track with my pride costing slightly less than my bank balance.

Rook also sent a diagram of the permitted routes, which Old Mate offered to explain using pictures large enough for my attention span. You can start by finding a route that passes somewhere selling proper dinner, since you seem so keen to help.

The gates stood beneath floodlights, and every armed raccoon inside was watching horse women race around the track on human feet. A doorman checked my name and guided me towards the office, where the head raccoon sat with a small photograph tucked behind his gun.

Before I could introduce myself, the crowd started shouting at the same time an alarm sounded beside the track. Decker lifted one finger, keeping his eyes on the runners while somebody outside yelled that number seven was going down.