Fortitude (Scattered Stars: Conviction Book 4) by Glynn Stewart

Author:Glynn Stewart [Stewart, Glynn]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Faolan's Pen Publishing
Published: 2021-08-02T16:00:00+00:00

The two officers lived up to Kira’s middling expectations, talking to the hosts to arrange to check the bags and then putting the petty officers up at a different table—and making it clear that they were paying for the petties’ meal.

Of course, that meant that they casually ignored the growing line of other customers behind them. Civilians, even merchants and tourists, clearly didn’t register on the same priority as their crew.

Once the NRC group had headed in to their tables, Kira stepped up the hosts and palmed a fifty-crest physical credit chip onto their podium. That was as much as the meal was likely to cost, which made it more than the hosts were going to see in tips.

“Can you sit me within hearing range of that pair of fancy uniforms?” she asked.

“Of course, Em!” one of the hosts replied cheerfully as the chip disappeared. “Right this way.”

If the other host didn’t trust her compatriot to give her part of the bribe, they didn’t have time to argue before Bertoli stepped up to the podium behind Kira—and repeated the same trick.

It wasn’t as subtle as Kira would like, but there weren’t many options for making sure they were within eavesdropping distance of their marks. The only people they were really drawing attention from was from the restaurant staff they were bribing—who almost certainly did not care.

As the second host moved away with Bertoli in tow, a holographic artificial stupid appeared behind the podium and greeted the next guests. This was a higher-end restaurant—hence having human staff at all—but they could only afford so many human hosts.

Kira’s guide led her to a table just on the other side of a three-quarter wall from the two officers. As she took her seat, she realized there was a privacy field along the wall. She’d have difficulty hearing through it, but this was as good as she was going to get.

Then the privacy field dropped—just between her table and the one with the two NRC officers. Her host gave her a wink.

“I hope the table is to your satisfaction,” he said. “The table interface will have the menu and can take your order. There’s a call command if you have any questions; it will bring a stupid who can summon one of us if it can’t answer.”

“Thank you,” Kira told him.

He vanished and Kira brought up the menu—but her focus was on the other side of the wall.

“It’s a mess,” one of the two men was saying. “Jorge is saying that his promotion board was grilling him on his volunteering for the Liberals. He thinks he’s stuck at Commander forever.”

“He’s actively spending his free time working for the opposition, Egemen,” his companion pointed out. “With all the rumors flying these days, they have to make sure no one is thinking about backing a coup.”

“Still, aren’t we supposed to keep our politics to ourselves?” Egemen asked. “I mean, I voted SPP, not saying otherwise—Jeong’s fantastic—but it doesn’t feel like I should have to tell the promotion board that, you know?”

That was…bad.

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