"You can't have that!"
"Have what?"
"That huge account with all that TIME!"
"Why not?"
"YOU ARE FEMALE!"
"Yes, well, you're no longer my husband, I'm free now. You have to leave."
"NOT without what I'm owed!"
"Ok, say hello to security for me." -- Lessons
He had once sent her to fetch a meal. The written order in one hand and the Pfennings to pay for it in the other. She had left him with a head full of lies about the Galactics and learned, very quickly, that everything she knew was wrong.
She had been learning at light speed ever since.
Alyssa had arrived at the restaurant lathered in nervous sweat. Thus rendering the food order illegible. When she broke down crying, her life changed. For the better.
Security and Counsellors told her that she was safe now. Forensic experts extracted meaning from the ink-smudged paper. She was told she had choices, and that she no longer had to live in fear. She was no longer a thing. She could be someone.
Alyssa sent him his food by swift courier, for completionist's sake. She never looked back. And yet he had found her in spite of all her efforts to stop him. She had removed his tracker chips, changed her name, changed her face, built a fiscal empire far greater than anything he could have hoped for. She had even begun a charity to buy 'wives' from his home polity and set them free.
"You got fat," she said. "I used to have nightmares about you starving to death without me to get food for you. You never needed me at all, did you?"
He must have heard, I still love you, in there somewhere. Wishful listening in combination with wilful ignorance was one hell of a hallucinogen. "I knew you still wanted to serve. I'm willing to take you back. No more nightmares. I can even fix those wrinkles and grey hairs right up. Make you young again. Make you worthy again."
Flakk you too, she thought. "Who said I wanted to go back?"
"Babe," he said. "Love. Darling. Sweetheart... You know what you're doing is illegal, right? You know you don't have a head for figures. You can't be a real businessman... you're not a man."
"And yet I have done more and gone farther than you ever thought I could. I don't need you, and you never needed me. As for legality... I'm a Galactic Citizen now. I'm one of those corrupt forces you used to warn me about."
He stared, trying to process words that did not fit together in his world. "What?" he managed after a great deal of blinking.
"I'm not stupid, I'm not expendable, and I'm not going back with you." Alyssa quietly checked. Security were on their way. He would be suffering hefty fines for breaching the DNI order. He may even have to spend some months in therapy. It would do him some good. "Hit the road, hit the skids, hit the bricks, take a hike, take off, take a long walk out of a short airlock, make like a tree and leaf... You. Are. Dumped!"
Ah good. Security had sent the intimidating goons. They loomed with intent as they grasped each of his arms.
Alyssa would treasure his tiny frightened 'hyerk' noise on long, cold nights alone. Not that she had too many of those, any more. She'd still request a clip of it to share with her polycule. They would all find it hilarious.
"You owe me!" He shrieked, kicking and struggling all the way. "I gave you everything! Alimony! Alimony!"
"I will give you everything you gave me," she cooed.
Which was a food order and insufficient cash to pay for it.
[Image (c) Can Stock Photo / jemastock]
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