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Bird of Paradise
By Brantley Thompson Elkinswith Velvet Belle Tree
I: Ben
"You had a Velorian at your birthday party, and nobody even
noticed 
?""Well, there was a lot going on in Llanview just then. Carlo Hesslerwas making a lot of headlines -- they were trying to get the goods onhim.""Carlo who?""Local crime lord. And then there was Todd Manning, returning fromthe dead to discover that his true love Blair had seduced Pat Thornhart,and kidnapping their daughter Starr in revenge and--""What are you talking about?""Our local
opera bouffe
. Llanview was a pretty jumping place,everybody thought. Made the worst stuff in Philly look like asnoozefest. Anyway, that's why nobody noticed."She still looked confused, so I tried to further explain the ins andouts of the bizarre denizens of the seemingly average Pennsylvaniacommunity where I was born and raised.
 
"Why are you telling me this?" she finally asked. "Why do you thinkI have the slightest interest in it?"I knew it was time to quit. Homeworlders might be fascinated bythe trivia of Terra, but Nikki wasn’t a Homeworlder. Besides, I’d alreadyturned her off once, talking about my early experiences on Atlantea –not the sort of thing to bring up to a woman whose sister had fled theRites.But this time I thought I'd found the right approach to my quarry."Nikki, the thing is,
I
didn't give a shit about these people any morethan you do. I don’t know what happened to them after I left, and Idon't want to. I wanted to get out of Llanview in the worst way. Iwanted to get to Velor in an even worster way. I'd had two years tothink about it, remember?""I'm trying to forget. Can you get to the point?""I'm getting there. You’re like me, before I left Llanview and cameto Velor. Only for you, Velor might as well
be
Llanview. You're bored outof your gourd, you have nothing to do with yourself -- nothing that'sallowed to you by your station. And the things you
do
want to do are…forbidden."I realized too late that I'd hit a raw nerve -- one I wasn't supposedto know about."
What 
things? Did Mother tell you that? Did she send you to mindme again? She doesn't trust Sara, is that it? Or is this sort of scam?Like, you’re going to enhance me? Make me a P1?"I saw through the sarcasm. She must have thought I was a prettypoor excuse for a supremis, even an M-class supremis like herself. Shewas just being testy. And paranoid. She had a right to on both counts,so I just ignored her bitter words."Hear me out. You might be surprised.""You're just desperate to get laid. Big surprise." 
 
II: Nikki
I'd known he was a freak from Day One, when we'd been stuck withhim as Minder. I just hadn't wanted to know the whys and wherefores.Back then, back there, when I was totally wasting myself.Wasting myself on him, among other things. Sneaking into hisroom at night, trying to play head games while giving him head.Somehow, he always managed to kick me out of bed when he woke upto find his dick in my mouth. That pissed me off. I was a true Vel. I wassupposed to be irresistible.And where did he get off, anyway? With that chubby build and thetufts of yellow hair in all the wrong places besides his head, and theterrible freckles, and the pale green eyes – he was damned lucky a Velwould pay any attention to him. And he couldn’t make it with the frails,any more than James could – not make it for real, I mean.I still thought Ben was a freak. But then, I was kind of a freakmyself -- a mere M with P-1 cravings. God, how could I have told Alisaabout that? Had she gone and told Mom? Alisa the bitch, who'd fuckedup everything for the family when she'd fled the Rites. Who'd brokenup the family…..Sara was the only one left now. Mom had somehow gotten a newdiplomatic posting way the hell out on Bering's World. James wasfighting in that stupid war on Reigel 5, defending what he called thefamily honor -- lucky he hadn't been taken out by that rogue Protectorwho'd sided with the Enemy -- the people the newsnets said were theenemy, although the Aryans (Why did they have to call themselves
that 
?) seemed to think they were Skietra's gift to the planet.Ben Shaffer was right about one thing: I was bored silly. Sara hadme working as a glorified gofer for NFN. She couldn't understand, but itwas worse than boring; it drove me up the wall. They were working on a new version of the Lillith saga, all about
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