Room 10-214. Written in gold atop mahogany, inset with polished fig wood carvings. Real gold, you assume, as Fervidora beckons you closer.

She takes you by the wrist. It’s a guiding grab, gentle, conscious of your cautious nature. She presses a key in your palm. An iron antique. The cheapest thing you’ve seen since disembarking.

Ø fires off disappointment. You struggle against the ancient lock, unable to maneuver the key’s teeth correctly. Your wrists strain against the tumblers, hurting as the mechanism is forced open with both hands. The ass smiles through the silence, doing her own internal accounting of how best to empty your pockets for the evening.

Your mare scoffs in lieu of a thank-you, blowing past you into the suite.

Your accommodations are fitting for two pirates. Ones hunted, claim the files on you both, hiding, like the painted cherubs adorning the walls, sneaking between oily green cypresses. Ones loaded, judging by the gold leaf moldings jumping off the plaster.

Two rooms. A bedroom out of sight and the entryway. An iron chandelier drops from the drawing room’s coffered ceiling, hanging between dual fauteuil armchairs. These fruitwood bergère are angled towards the floor-to-ceiling porte-fenêtre windows, preemptively open, allowing in a breeze of hazelnut scents from a bakery below the balcony, already preparing tomorrow’s stock. You assume tomorrow you’ll smell lavender, too.

“Facing the sunrise, Monsieur LeFlore,” Fervidora gloats. She waves into the hallway, beckoning unseen others. “Just as you requested.”

In her search for the bedroom, your mare nearly throws the interior doors off their antique hinges. Brocaded pure-silk, yellows and golds, cascade from atop the canopy bed. It’s elm wood framing. Newly finished with a rich patina’s shine, carved with peacocks and lilies, shooting into the air opposite a griotte fireplace. One that’s false, supplied with instantaneous holographic displays. It can oscillate with temperature, mimicking an actual log. Useless in the Department’s perpetually temperate climate.

The mattress itself is a Lamanon. The same brand equipped on the Mr. Memory. Your bed.

Another facsimile. A few generations ahead of your hand-me-down fixture. The N-12 Deluxe. You remember an advertisement for it. Two hours ago, lasers shining across Ø’s face as you bickered, lingering in orbit. Whether it was a subliminal suggestion or data gathering, you do not know.

Unlike yours, the mattress works without failure. Its sensors are more adept at assessing your subconscious needs, enhanced by the file on you that grows with every step that echoes against the hardwood flooring, judging and re-judging weight and gait. For example, it recognizes that the weight atop the largest pillow is yet another liter and a half of bubbly, one that Ø has already uncorked and begun to guzzle, aching to cover her nervousness.

Before you can ask whether this bottle is complimentary as well, you’re accosted from behind. A gloved hand at your spine, two silken paws at your shoulders. Fervidora gesticulates wildly, casting shadows from the super-heated lamps within the chandelier, directing a cavalcade of tailors that pour through the doorway.

There’s nine in total, including Fervidora’s assistant, who, having discarded the hatboxes of explosives, carries bolts of fabrics under each arm. The tailors are dressed down. Puresilk dress pants and shirts, suspenders at most for the men. Mustached, five of the seven. And the women, older than the rest, one bespectacled, one smiling.

“Monsieur LeFlore, if I may introduce Corrine Bernard, Baronne de la Rue Maury,” Fervidora interjects, pulling frowning one. She has a gap in her teeth, and is the stoutest of the legion. “Corrine, Monsieur LeFlore, his partner Madame LeFlore. Privateers on behalf of the Republic of Barataria.”

“Beautiful country,” the woman remarks. You wonder about her opinions on fictional factions like your so-called Republic. She’s more concerned with your wrists after the complimentary kissing gesture of introduction. “Just a few more measurements. Double-checking what Fervidora has already given me.”

“Along with your instructions sent in advance with your booking information,” she follows up. She moves out of the way, towards Ø, to collect the bottle as another workman’s table is slid through. The sewing machine atop is plasma-powered, able to sever an arm at the shoulder if improperly wrangled. Yet Fervidora’s attendant whistles while he works, red cap bouncing with each shove of the cart, ash collecting in the mobile contraption’s path.

Corrine’s measuring tape expertly coils and uncoils. As if she were attacking, grappling you into submission. It ensnares your shoulders, thighs, her assistant mirroring her movement at your legs, almost tripping you twice. Your hands instinctively grab the tape while it constricts your neck, the feeling too similar to that of a garrote.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“Please, Monsieur LeFlore, try to relax,” the tailor kindly berates. You assume the impoliteness is a signal. She’s a professional, even at your expense.

“It should only take a few minutes,” Fervidora assures. She reaches for Ø. Her attempts to relieve her, only momentarily, of the three-fourths filled bottle in her furred palm are waved away. She’s set upon by the tailors now. Two tanned sets of hands track down her pelt while one in a mustache kick starts the infernal sewing machine. They maneuver with the mare, measuring wingspan in between swigs, careful to avoid any rogue elbows from her tense frame, never standing behind her too long.

“Single? Double?” The Baronne asks. She’s a centimeter from your face, breath smelling of espresso, “Monsieur?”

“What?”

“Single or double? Your suit?”

“Single, as the instructions said, Baronne,” Fervidora speaks on your behalf.

“The instructions were contradictory, were they not? One sent in advance, the other sent from orbit. Two requests, two sets of measurements…”

“Yes, and I assume you’ve made preparations for any combination?” Fervidora implies.

“Of course,” the seamstress replies, never making eye contact with the ass, the two associates in opposite rooms, looking past one another, professionals to the fullest. “Merely confirming, as always.”

“Which I’m sure Monsieur LeFlore appreciates.”

“Of course I do,” you bluff, nearly swallowing your tongue. “What was the question again?”

“Single or double?”

“Double.”

“Pockets?” She shoots before pointing to her second, fingers firing bowman signals as instructions for her subordinates.

“Yes.”

“Monsieur LeFlore, I ask the type.”

“Two of them,” you choke, “parallel. Able to be filled.”

“Monsieur,” Fervidora implores, “would you like me to speak on your behalf? I know you must be so tired from your journey, and I would never want you to overexert yourself now that you’ve finally reached your destination…”

Ø scoffs, swatches of fabrics floating around her oblong head, obscuring the perfect opaque view of the bottle’s empty bottom. Her lips click, an obvious sign that her patience is wearing thin. The squad of tailors freeze in midair, thimbles frozen on seams, machines humming with super-heated plasma, waiting with bated breath for coup d’envoi, the Baronne no doubt eager to complete her work as diligently as possible.

“Sure,” you concede before the ass runs you over.

“Single. Patch pockets. Herringbone purelinen, finto-corozo buttons.”

“It’s summer, isn’t it?” The Baronne muses. “Cuffs?”

“Neo-Edwardian.”

“Azure shirt?”

“Of course.”

“Exactly as the first order requested?”

“Yes, with updated measurements,” the ass finishes before tapping a silent associate, “and Lamberto, as quickly as possible. We’ve had so many delays already, just disastrous.”

As Fervidora corners your mare, discussing strategy and color theory with the local royalty, you’re captivated by the industrious display. The reliable chk-chk-chk of the sewing machines produce golden sparks. Violently, the stitches per minute careen exponentially, cooking the room, leaving sub-atomic discharge on the hand-painted walls in the form of shadows. A steady rotation of tungsten cams rocks the nearby vases, disturbing the coral peonies, vibrating their brittle forms against the antique flooring.

Pins bisect your joints, nearly stabbing you at the shoulders and hips, down your newly exposed legs, keeping fabric in place. The room is sulfuric, only momentarily, with the machines’ exertions. From between the Baronne’s maw burst bouquets of ball-point needles. She plucks them between her gapped, ill-fitted original teeth. They’re artisan-hammered for her atelier, the studio one of three beneath the Punta del Muso’s commanding shadow. They cut her lip on exit, and with the speed at which she pricks the textiles in place, it’s the furthest thing from your mind.

But as a needle brushes against a sealed gash in Ø’s bare thigh, hugged by pure-silk, you’re once more aware of the presence of the attendants, the number of which continuously oscillates between eight and fifteen.

Fervidora is the conductor. Porters ferry your luggage, the first of its kind you’ve ever seen. Black-brown satchels filled with undergarments, chests with flak jackets. A smattering of miscellaneous gear, clearly stolen, now in your possession. You assume you are simply the natural destination for some up-the-chain laundering of goods. Between the bulletproof vests are the tailors’ products, perfectly hemmed, growing in number.

“Monsieur LeFlore?” Fervidora breaks your concentration, gripping your vision from the open balcony, where fireworks careen across the sky, shot from a clutch of yachts on the horizon.

“Hmm?”

“I asked if you would still like to be brought to the bar once my colleagues are finished.”

You’re nearly alone. The industrial machines are gone. The suite returned to its near-pristine condition. Only the Baronne remains, plucking the final few needles from your jacket. It’s snug, like everything else in your new wardrobe. ‘Your’ unpacked luggage is already stowed, your unpacking and organizing complete. The mare is away, hidden in the bedroom, you feel, searching the room for concealed luxuries.

The tailor meets your eyes with a frown, pulling the linen taut in all directions. She’s happy with her work, you assume, as she lingers, removing her tungsten thimble, tracing your jacket’s tail with a furrowed brow.

“I’d suggest it,” she mumbles. The Baronne pauses, stowing the rest of her toolbox, content to hop to the next client.

“Why?”

What follows is a deliberate move. You’re sure of it, Ø feels. The mare rolls her eyes and prods under the bed, more concerned with her quest for vice, searching

Her answer is too confident. Succinct, organized. Like a message spoken through an intermediary. You’re reminded of the mechanical sawing of Zelmire’s printers, the showgirl’s vibrating banana skirt, the curt digi-grams with no return addresses. Why else would you be on a planet like Fontvieille? You’re obviously here for a job, as always.

The Baronne shrugs her shoulders, hands before her, pausing before her exit.

“Who wouldn’t want a drink, after all you’ve been through?”