Tracht had Alex dress him in a fancy suit instead of his usual uniform. He told Alex to get dressed too. “We’ll finish up a few things on the ship, and then we can go.”
“Go where?”
“Shopping,” Tracht said. “And, I think, a bit of grooming. I appreciate the longer hair on you, but it needs shaping.”
Whatever that meant. Alex had to admit his hair was getting longer than he normally wore it—buzzed short was a lot more convenient. He’d never seen the need to spend hours agonizing over his hair. He usually just got it done in whatever style Nick had. The more alike they looked, the easier it was to fool people that there was only one of them.
Just as they were wrapping up Tracht’s duties—he offloaded most of them on Espinosa, Alex noticed—Singh approached them.
“Captain!” She smiled broadly. “I have a present for you.”
Tracht’s eyebrows rose. “A present?”
“Well, maybe not as such. Charles got an invitation to a party at the Fotiou residence. Tomorrow evening. It promises to be quite the event.” She handed her tablet over to him, the invitation open on the screen. Name of host, date, time, and some vague reference to a special guest that everybody would probably love to see.
“Are you going?” Tracht asked her.
Singh nodded. “Charles thought it would be fun. We’ll take Nadia, of course. You should bring Alex, too.”
The back of Alex’s neck prickled. That sounded suspiciously like it would be anything but fun for him. “I’ll pass.”
Tracht and Singh both turned to look at him. Singh started giggling, and Tracht’s expression lost the languidness from the previous few hours.
“I suppose that decides it,” Tracht said, handing the tablet back to Singh. “Forward the details to me. I’ll admit to curiosity on the special guest too. Fotiou does throw good parties.”
Sh—shoot. For some reason Alex had thought that Tracht’s good mood would extend further than just a few hours. He’d saved Tracht’s life! That had to count for something, right?
He sulked while they made their way off the ship. Tracht gave no indication of caring, which pissed Alex off even more.
Finally, two blocks away from the ship, Alex whined, “Come on. You said you liked me! I don’t want to go to some stupid party with people like you and Singh.”
Tracht sighed very loudly and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Alex. I also clearly remember telling you that my affection for you came with a desire to see you continue to suffer. Now, behave, or the rest of tonight will go a lot less pleasantly for you.”
Whatever. Alex scowled and refused to talk anymore. Seemed like Tracht would use anything he said against him anyway.
The walk toward the shopping center was as pleasant as on any station. Artificial lights gave the semblance of an early afternoon, and people milled around. Alex noticed the bondservants a lot more now than he did the last time he’d been on Atalanta. Something about the collars stood out to him. He wondered if they were saddled with BS bondholders like Tracht, or if some bondholders were actually normal people.
This part of the station was pretty well-maintained too. When Alex and Nick had arrived, they’d needed the cheapest accommodations they could afford. Those tended to be on the lower levels, where light was kept dimmer and everything was closer to the central engine. Some people complained about the vibrations from the engine, but Alex had grown up with it, and he rarely noticed it unless pointed out.
The first place Tracht took him to was a salon. He got the haircut and a facial scrub and then, of course, Tracht insisted they wax him all over too.
“Every last inch,” Tracht insisted. “I don’t want any hair below his chin.
Those were a painful two hours. Alex ended up clutching Tracht’s hand and gritting his teeth through the pain, but at least it wasn’t an epilator. He didn’t like how the staff manhandled him into place so they could get at his crack, he felt stupidly raw, and fuck, even though he was mad at Tracht he was grateful enough when it was over that he didn’t try to evade the kiss.
“Mm. Much better,” Tracht proclaimed.
The next stop, confusingly, was a men’s suit store.
Even from the outside Alex could tell it was extremely high class; when he took a closer look at one of the suits on display, he couldn’t find a price tag anywhere. Nick would have been salivating just being inside this place.
Tracht greeted the store attendant with some level of familiarity. Knew his name and everything, so probably Tracht came to this place often enough.
“I need a suit for my companion here,” Tracht explained. “No need for anything tailored, I’m afraid I don’t have time for that, but your best fit that’s available now.”
That was how Alex got a suit that probably cost more than an entire year’s rent. Not just the suit, of course, a good dress shirt and socks and shoes and even underwear were all supplied. Between the suit and the new haircut, Alex ended up looking borderline respectable. Even the scar and the broken nose were more of a character feature now. Though the hickeys Tracht had left on his neck were still visible, as was the bondservant’s collar.
“Clothes really do make the man,” Tracht commented with a pat to Alex’s ass. “Yes. We’ll take all of this. And he’ll wear it out.”
Tracht paid for everything, had Alex’s old clothes shipped back to the ship, and then led them farther into the station.
They ended up in front of a high-end hotel. Tracht greeted the receptionist and walked past her to the elevators, hitting the button for the top floor.
As soon as the door opened Alex was greeted by some amazing scents. His eyes widened a bit as he realized they were at the hotel’s restaurant, high up enough that the windows were displaying outer space instead of artificial sky.
“What? Why?” Alex stumbled after Tracht.
The hostess smiled prettily at Tracht. “Captain Tracht! I saw your reservation pop up and was so glad to see you were in town again. How was your trip?”
“Fine, thank you. I am quite relieved to be back on Atalanta and able to partake of civilized meals.”
She giggled and led them to a table by the window. The view was fantastic: the wide expanse of space above and the glittering lights of the station on its night cycle below. The table had a table cloth and gleaming utensils on it, as well as cloth napkins and a small vase with flowers of some sort in it.
Alex felt really awkward as he sat down at the table. The suit he wore was a small comfort—nobody would know at first glance that he was extremely out of place—but even so he had the sense that he was being judged.
Tracht thanked the waitress and took the menus from her, completely unselfconscious. Well, if Tracht didn’t care, there was no reason for Alex to care. He sat up straighter and smiled at the hostess; she smiled back briefly but kept her words focused on Tracht.
When she was gone, Alex asked again, “Why are we here?”
“Because,” Tracht said with a laugh, “I truly expected you to choose the restaurant, Alex.”
Alex tensed in horror. “I chose wrong?”
“No. Simply not the choice I expected. I wanted to take you to out to dinner; I decided I would do it anyway. So, in a way, you made the best choice for yourself.”
The conversation was interrupted by the waitress coming by with water for their fancy glasses. “Have you had a chance to look at the menu, sir? Perhaps I can start you off with an appetizer?”
“We’ll have the calamari, and for our main dishes, the specials, please, and whatever wine you recommend paired with that.”
The waitress marked it all down and left, all before Alex had had a chance to voice a complaint.
“What if I didn’t want the special?” Alex complained. “And what’s cala-whatever?”
“You are, as ever, charming.” Tracht didn’t sound particularly mad though. “Calamari was, from what I understand, originally an Earth dish made from some sort of sea creature. It’s been adapted to be made with local sea life. Local being, of course, from Pylos.”
Tracht obviously expected Alex not to know where Pylos was. Alex looked out the window and tried to spot the planet, but the station must have been oriented away from it. “Is that where you grew up?”
“No. My family has always been on Cadmus. I say ‘always,’ but presumably my ancestors emigrated from somewhere. I did attend the merchant marine academy on Pylos. My first few jobs were contracted to the Argos Enterprise, shipping between Cadmus and Herakles station, until my sister married Vasilis and he set me up with Lysander Corp. A much more lucrative deal. That was also when I bought my ship.”
Normally Alex didn’t care about people’s histories—if he didn’t ask about theirs, they wouldn’t ask about his—but since Tracht already knew so much about his own, it seemed only fair. “Isn’t that cheating? Like, other people aren’t that lucky.”
Tracht snorted and sipped some water. “It is, indeed, nepotism at its finest. If Anna hadn’t married Vasilis, I would likely not have been able to afford my own ship for another decade.” He curled his lip in distaste. “I do hate working under other people’s orders.”
Alex could totally see that. “And now you just go back and forth between those two stations? Doesn’t it get really boring?”
“Well, Alex, that’s why I have you, isn’t it?”
The waitress came by with their appetizer and drinks before Alex could think of a good response. He was happy to have the wine to sip and realized that he hadn’t had anything alcoholic at all since the start of his trip. The last drink he’d had was the evening before he’d gone and signed up for the debt contract, just beers with Nick while they were planning his eventual escape.
He’d rather have a beer. The wine was kind of sour to Alex’s taste buds, and his nose reflexively scrunched up. If this was the expensive stuff, Alex would take the cheap drink instead. He quickly popped one of the ‘calamari’ in his mouth to drown out the wine flavor.
“Now that I’ve answered your questions,” Tracht said after a few apparently enjoyable sips of his wine, “I have a question for you.”
Alex looked at him warily. “Like what?”
“The scar on your face. I had originally considered offering you cosmetic surgery to smooth it over, but I’ve grown fond of it. How did you acquire it?”
Reflexively, Alex reached up to cover the scar. “Got it on, uh, Winnipeg station. Nick scammed a couple of thousand credits out of some dude, and then he figured us out and came after us. Nothing I couldn’t take, except he had a knife and nearly got me a lot worse than this. We quickly got off station after that.”
“And it never occurred to you to stop?” Tracht shook his head. “No, perhaps I should ask: it never occurred to your brother to stop, despite the very real damage to your body. Am I right that your nose happened in a similar manner?”
Alex ate another one of the calamari—some rubbery deep fried thing that was actually really good—and nodded. “Here, actually. Last one of our stops before Cadmus.” From Cadmus, on to Cassiopeia, and from there to any ship that would hop to another system.
The calamari went quickly, and as soon as they were done with it, the waitress came around with their main dishes. Some kind of fatty sea creature from Pylos covered in a white sauce that exploded with flavor on Alex’s tongue. “Ss good,” Alex said after nominal chewing.
“I don’t know why I thought you’d have manners,” Tracht commented. He ate more slowly. “If we weren’t at such a fine establishment, I’d tell you to get on your knees, because eating from my fingers would surely be more civilized than what you’re doing.”
“Whatever. You wanted to bring me,” Alex said, and for good measure he opened wide to show off the half-chewed food.
“The first and last time, it seems.” Tracht pointedly rolled his eyes. “I’ll remind you that I am perfectly capable of punishing you for your transgressions once we are back on the ship. I still have some ginger, and we haven’t even played with the whip or the crop.”
Alex swallowed quickly. “That’s not funny,” he said, careful not to open his mouth too wide.
“Your manners certainly aren’t, but your reaction amuses me fairly well.”
Dinner wasn’t as fun anymore. Alex ate while shooting occasional glares at Tracht, but naturally Tracht just smirked back at him. At least the food was good. He tried to copy Tracht’s mannerisms, cutting his meal into smaller pieces and chewing slowly. Tracht didn’t even seem to care that Alex wasn’t talking at all.
Dessert followed soon after, a froofy coffee for Tracht and a fluffy cake thing that Tracht insisted on spoon-feeding Alex. Alex could have sworn everybody in the restaurant was staring at him, and he could feel himself blushing with each bite. On the other hand, he wasn’t going to turn down an expensive dessert even in the face of humiliation.
“I do think your tears are my favorite,” Tracht murmured, “but shame looks good on you too.”
“For like, five minutes I thought you weren’t a dick,” Alex countered.
Tracht laughed, and instead of feeding Alex the next spoonful he ate it himself. And he took the rest of the dessert for himself too. “Surely you must know better by now. And I’ll remind you how I feel about foul language when we’re back on board.”
“No! That doesn’t count! It wasn’t real cussing!” Alex tried to reach for the dessert, but Tracht swatted his hand away with the spoon.
“You had your chance.” Tracht made a show of savoring the last bite. “Out of consideration for your service today, I’ll let it slide. But today is it, Alex. Everything is back to normal tomorrow.”
Great. He’d kind of been hoping that Tracht would just be nicer all the time. “Can’t we come to an arrangement of some sort?” he needled.
“We have an arrangement. You provide any services I require, I have total control over your body, and in exchange, I pay off your ridiculous debt.” Tracht leaned forward a bit and rubbed his thumb against Alex’s mouth. On instinct, Alex’s lips parted, and he stuck his tongue out to lick a few traces of sweetness from Tracht’s thumb.
Tracht smiled and withdrew his hand. “Lovely. How did you enjoy the meal?”
Alex thought about it while the waitress came by to take Tracht’s card.
“Food was good but not enough. The wine was gross. I didn’t like getting spoon fed. And you made everything weird later. You’re always telling me to be nice, but you’re not that nice to me.”
“Surely allowing you an orgasm and bringing you to a high-end restaurant all in the same day constitutes as nice?” Tracht’s voice was laced with amusement.
“Maybe.” Alex did like most of what had happened that day. Full-body waxing aside, up until Tracht got mean again it had been a pretty good day for him.
The waitress came back with Tracht’s card, which was their cue to get going. Tracht insisted putting his hand on the small of Alex’s back, making it perfectly clear to everybody watching exactly what their relationship to each other was.
It was such a minor thing in comparison to everything else Tracht put him through that it barely registered. Alex remembered how it had bothered him those first few days on the ship. His old self should have appreciated that Tracht touching him casually was actually a good sign.