«I see. Are you molting?»

«What?»

«I notice you are losing your outer integument in spots.»

«Oh, that. I got a bad sunburn from exposure to starlight. It's not important.»

TWo heads stared at each other for an eyeblink. A shrug? The puppeteer said, «We have deposited the residue of your pay with the Bank of We Made It. One Sigmund Ausfaller, human, has frozen the account until your taxes are computed.»

«Figures.»

«If you will talk to reporters now, explaining what happened to the Institute ship, we will pay you ten thousand stars. We will pay cash so that you may use it immediately. It is urgent. There have been rumors.»

«Bring 'em in.» As an afterthought I added, «I can also tell them that your world is moonless. That should be good for a footnote somewhere.»

«I do not understand.» But two long necks had drawn back, and the puppeteer was watching me like a pair of pythons.

«You'd know what a tide was if you had a moon. You couldn't avoid it.»

«Would you be interested in —»

«A million stars? I'd be fascinated. I'll even sign a contract if it states what we're hiding. How do you like being blackmailed for a change?»

GHOST: TWO

I tried to script the story myself, of course. There was a computer program that would do it as an interview. I made lots of notes … too many notes, because any time I tried to write text for myself, I blocked.

So I advertised for a ghost.

Ander Smittarasheed answered.

His type was familiar enough. He was a gaudy flatlander athlete, too aware of the limps and lames around him, very aware that any woman was his for the asking. It all showed in his words and body language.

Maybe I wouldn't even have hired him, but he just pushed into the situation without giving me a chance to react. Before my caution caught up, I was telling him everything … nearly everything. He turned it into a one-act play between me and the interview program, all in one afternoon. We spent two days polishing before we filmed it. The recording sold instantly to the nets.