Then, from the incision, a figure emerged.

Was it Zyro? Lois’ paralysis only allowed her to raise her sight an inch. In a moment, though, a shadow wobbled into view.

It must be someone crippled, she thought. The shadow hobbled, like a limping man, and with it came an irregular ticking. A limping man? she wondered. What kind of dream was this?

A tingling spread like sparks, describing the intricacies of her ribs, her spine, even her skull. What’s more, her state of arousal crested to waves of hot, knifelike flashes through breast and loin. Her sex visibly thumped.

Before the dark light, the limping man bumbled forward. The sharp ticking drew close, and at last Lois was able to glimpse her new and mysterious suitor…

For shit’s sake! she thought.

One look and she’d had enough of this nightmare. The limping man was no man at all, but a preposterous parody. It appeared more insectoid than anything, a broad humped shell encircled by tiny clicking legs. It stood upright, however, on a pair of stout, jointed appendages with points. If it bore any semblance to humanity at all, that humanity was fanfare. This was no dream lover. It was a bug.

But it was a big bug, big as a man. Lois wondered what could be more disgusting than a man sized cockroach. It seemed to have a face, or facsimile thereof. Clusters of blinking ocelli gazed at her, above a beaked enclosure that could only be a mouth. Something akin to a tongue lolled within the aperture, to lick plated lips. The thing reminded Lois of the Kafka story, where a man named Gregor turned into a big beetle. Zyro had deftly described the piece as an “axiological allegory symbolizing the transmogrification of modern man within the continuum of corporate bureaucracies bent on the total alienation of individuality.” As far as Lois was concerned, it was nothing more than a story about a silly man named Gregor who turned into a bug. But who cared what the story meant? This was supposed to be a sex dream, not some Kafkaesque joke. Nevertheless, here was Gregor, hobbling to meet her.

And again the question came: What could be more disgusting than a man sized cockroach?

Answer: A man sized cockroach with a penis.

For shit’s sake! Lois thought again. I’m about to get fucked by a bug!

Gregor’s works bloomed, a steadily distending, meaty pink mound betwixt its walking joints. She could almost hear herself say: Hey, Gregor, is that twenty five pounds of hamburger in your pants or are you just happy to see me? Well, Gregor was happy indeed. The mound swelled forward, showing a puckered hole. Eventually something popped out and slapped to the floor—a slack pink tube with a fleshy nozzle. It drooped like loose hose.

Gregor crawled daintily over her, as if great care were utmost on its mind. But did this thing even have a mind? Vivificated breaths whistled through multiple spiracles along its shell, and she could see horny passion in its compound eyes. Dollops of green goo dropped from its irised mandibles onto her bare belly. Lois was revolted, yet her physical excitement, somehow, refused to wane. Gregor lay fully atop her now. The nozzled glans snuffled fanatically, and at last the pink cannula found her sex. Lois’ orgasms unwound in spastic quakes. The cannula throbbed, passing jets of warm bug-sperm into her cervical canal as Gregor muttered sweet insectoid nothings into her ear.

“For shit’s sake!” Lois was finally able to exclaim.

Gregor’s armored face inched up to hers. The mandibles opened to fullness, revealing soft lips and tongue, and more than a modest portion of the opaque green saliva, which dribbled liberally into Lois Hartley’s aghast mouth.

««—»»

In this business you were one of two things. You were either legit, or you were dirty. And if you were legit, you were also something else:

You were poor.

Czanek was dirty.

It wasn’t Czanek’s dirt; it was other people’s. He did not feel bad about uncovering the evil of others; he was just a cog in an inevitable machine. Bug planting was a good gig; he could pull in twenty large a year from bugs alone. Industrial espionage paid well too, and sabotage paid even better. Czanek had once taken ten grand for stealing a composite formula from a textile factory and fifteen more for burning the records room and production facilities. By the time they cleaned up the mess, the other company, Czanek’s client, had already patented the stolen formula and was in full production. These were examples of what the trade called “surreptitious entry” or “black bag.” It involved invading privacy, violating personal rights, and, of course, breaking the fuck out of the law. If you were good at black bag, you made lots of money. If you were bad, you lost your license and went to jail. Though Czanek was small time, he was good at black bag, perhaps very good. Its diversity challenged him, and it brought in the cash. Dean Saltenstall, for instance, paid five hundred dollars per hour for a job. Good work reaped good money.

Tonight, though, Czanek was working for free.

Saltenstall was his best client, period. But if the dean ever found out that one of his bugs was transmitting to someone else’s, Czanek would lose his professional credibility in less time than it took to wipe his ass. He may have been the best dirty P.I. in the state, but he wasn’t the only one. Other dicks would kill for a client like Saltenstall. Some literally.

He walked up to the third floor of the sciences center. He wore maintenance overalls and had a phony card identifying him as Peter Hertz, a campus a/c technician. The building was empty at this hour, and the security guard wouldn’t be making his rounds for another forty five minutes. Czanek used a 2mm tension wrench on Besser’s office lock, applying nominal downward pressure with his pinky. Each lock had its own feel; too much pressure seized up the pins, and too little wouldn’t hold them flush. Czanek stroked the pins twice with his #2 rake, and the cylinder opened. He was in the office and had the door locked behind him in four seconds.

He let his eyes adjust, then turned on a red filtered penlight. His gloved hands snooped a bit first, an unavoidable professional impulse. He memorized the exact position of everything on the desk and in the drawers. The bottom drawer, however, was locked.

It was an old Filex disc tumbler with an 18mm keyway. He used a wider tension wrench and a “doubleball.” The slide bar slipped open immediately.

What he saw first made little sense—a list of typed names: L. ERBLING, S. ERBLING, L. HARTLEY, I. PACKER, E. WHITECHAPEL. L. Hartley’s name had a line through it.

Beneath this lay a stack of folders stamped with the Exham seal. Medical files, Czanek noted. The top five matched the five names on the list. All the files belonged to female students. But next was another stack of files, males. A Qwik Note on the top folder read: Choose one holotype for Supremate. And the next line, in red: Wade St. John.

Holotype? Czanek thought. Supremate? And who’s Wade St. John?

At the back of the drawer was a gun.

Czanek was stumped. The piece was some offbeat .25 auto. It smelled of cordite. He wrote down the serial number and put it back.

He didn’t like any of this. Why would Besser have a gun? Czanek didn’t know what to make of the notes and lists, but the gun was something else—guns were of his world. Could Winnifred and Besser really be planning to kill the dean for his insurance?

At the back of the drawer he spotted another Qwik Note. Four notations in florid writing, like a woman’s:

1) Pick holotype. Wade seems best.

2) 2nd vassal in case Tom wears out. Jervis Phillips?

3) Have Tom bury Penelope and Sladder.

Czanek should’ve been alarmed, extremely alarmed. One note mentioned Jervis Phillips, Czanek’s own client.

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