"A song!" a drunken froly roared. "A song for the love of kloval and ale!"

     No one knew the words, but everyone sang along.

     Skip counted, maybe, four dozen "people" still with him, some as tall as saplings, others as small as calves. Every color of the rainbow and beyond.

     "This might be a good time to slip out," Claudia said. "While everyone's focused on something besides you."

     "Yeah, and where are we going? You said something about some sort of mission."

     "Don't mention that. Forget everything I said about that."

     "Can we have a conversation about who gives the orders around here?"

     "Sure. I give the orders. Glad we had this talk." 

     "You're going to have to be a little more open that that. Like, okay, you've got the 'brain', but I've got the body, and I want to feel I have the freedom to..."

     The security bots all seemed to come to attention at once.

     Four flew right to Skip.

     "We have a problem with your cred account," one of them said.

​     "Party's over," Skip muttered. 

​     "Should have left when we had the chance," Claudia muttered back.

CONTINUE