"That kind of statement is exactly why you're going to pay us our asking price," said Simon, pulling out a notebook and flipping it to a page marked with a neon orange sticky note.
"One, because you don't realise that the Ratking can and will discorporate into individual rats if it thinks that will give it a better chance of survival, for example when it falls off a mountainside and needs to be small and agile rather than large and imposing."
He reached for the invoice and turned it around so that it once again faced the Mayor, tapping the first line on the page.
"Two, for failing to realise that breaking an unsteady truce with a hive-mind composed of vermin would result in swift and immediate retribution from every crawling thing in the immediate vicinity."
He tapped the second indented line.
"And third, for living up to your name by trying to chisel us out of a previously agreed fee, again."
He tapped the third line, the one with the largest price tag, then slid the open notebook over the gleaming wood to rest beside it.
Chisel glanced at the rough hand-drawn grid with it's scrawled annotations and laughed.
"Shitty customer bingo," he said. "I believe I sense Mister Teller's hand at work."
"You should be proud," Simon told him, straight-faced. "He made you the central square."
The Mayor looked closer.
"Delightful," he said, and almost seemed to mean it.
He pushed the notebook back towards Simon, then turned to a small sideboard on which a crystal decanter stood alongside three matching tumblers. The crisp lines of his navy-blue suit jacket blocked Simon's view as he fiddled with something on it, before turning back with a glass in one hand and a personalised seal in the other.
He pressed the stamp into the paper, which immediately began to blacken and char as a red liquid that was almost certainly not ink spread out from beneath the edges of the seal, filling the room with the smell of burning and the faint sound of remembered screams.
"Drop that with my secretary on your way out," he told Simon. "He'll see to it that you're paid in full."
He took a sip from the glass.
"Aren't you going to offer me one?" asked Simon, gesturing at the uncorked bottle.
Chisel raised an eyebrow.
"You would almost certainly think I was trying to poison you," he said.
"I would," Simon nodded. "I just wanted to see if you'd push it."
Chisel shook his head.
"Mister Holmes," he said. "It remains one of my greatest regrets that you've chosen not to avail yourself of the employment opportunities offered by my office. We could do great things."
Simon stood, taking the stained and still-screaming sheet of paper by a single untouched corner.
"I could do great things for you, you mean," he said. "And in return, you'd take the credit and then, one day, my face."
"It's a trustworthy face," the Mayor agreed, pleasantly.
Ongoing Verse: Holmes Brothers( Read more... )Ongoing Verse: The Powers That Be( Read more... )Ongoing Verse: Microwave( Read more... )![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
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