Angels on the Head of a Pin // 0.1

He always takes calls in bed, as posed as ever. His sisters usually steer clear of the work room, unless they really need him, and, well, if they come to him, he’ll drop whatever he’s doing.

He’s not stupid and he likes to be careful. 

He ran a background check as soon as she called. She gave a fake name, though most of them do, not that it matters because her ID is linked to her number.

He gestures while he speaks, since showmanship is a part of him, whether he likes it or not, “And what are you looking for? I can work with almost any request.”

His eyes are shut gently while he listens to the woman’s voice inside of his head. It’s clear as day and the techs have advised him against taking calls like this, but he prefers it over any other… device.

“Hm,” he says, processing her words in the background, “Yes. That’s perfectly fine, but it’s extra if you bring your own clothes. What kind of a budget are you working with?”

“Four hundred?” He taps his feet against the carpet, almost entirely for the benefit of his clientele, since his touch sensors don’t work like that, “That’ll get you an hour and a half. No, no, you don’t transfer it yet. You can wire it at the time of your appointment.”

He prefers to keep all his schedules filed away in his head. He’s already nearly at capacity for storage and his memory is faulty, but he still feels safest keeping his data internally rather than externally. The calendar program his techs wrote for him runs efficiently and takes up very little space.

“Yes, well, if it’s not too short notice,” he flicks his eyes, navigating through the overlay of the calendar, “I can see you this evening. I had a cancellation. I’ll send you the address. We’ll go over the ground rules for the first few minutes and then the rest of the time is yours.”

He sends over the address after she hangs up, doing so with nothing more than a flick of his wrist. Secretly, he hopes they envy him. How efficient he is, how he rarely needs anything to supplement his own ability.

But, first of all, he needs to prepare for the night.

He reaches out for his sisters, feeling all of them at the back of his mind, like water behind a pane of glass. 

I’m working tonight, a new client. Please steer clear for the evening. Love you!

He knows they heard him, even if they never respond. They’re cool, calm, and he would know if they were agitated. They vet the clients almost as much as he does. He’s linked up with them at all times, never apart, and they hear all his calls, everything he does.

The next issue at hand is making the house presentable. 

He starts with straightening up the room, smoothing out the blankets on the bed so they appear untouched. It was initially used as an office, but now it holds a canopied bed, covered with many pillows, and soft carpeting. The lighting is low, and, if his clients are anything to go off of, “warm” as well. There is an adjoining closet, linking his bedroom and the workroom per his request.

The remodels were not cheap, but his line of work is highly specialized and he has little need for money outside of keeping the lights on and the rent paid.

/ / /

The woman is the only client on his docket today. The cancellation had him booked for three hours which often taxes his patience and what point is autonomy if not to make selfish decisions?

She arrives early, waiting outside the door like she’s trying to decide if she wants to knock. He takes the matter out of her hands, pulling the door open once he senses her waiting on the other side.

“Come in,” he steps back, allowing her to enter, “Iris, yes?”

She hurries in, head bowed, clutching her bag tightly between her fingers. Most first time clients are shy; he’s used to them acting almost ashamed.

“I’m Babydoll, we spoke on call,” he extends out his left arm, “If you hold your paycard to my wrist, the funds will transfer instantly and we can get started.”

Iris gasps ever so slightly, “This is… kind of untraditional.”

“I promise, all my invoices are legitimate.”

“Oh,” she laughs, cheeks flushed, “I meant, well, you. You run all of this yourself?”

“Yes.”

She laughs again. Then, she brings the paycard to his wrist and he waits for the mild jolt signifying the connection and successful transfer. After that, he lets his arm fall back at his side.

“Now, for ground rules: your timer has already started. You may notice my sisters in the apartment, but they are off limits. Our activities are limited to my workroom; I’ll show you there now.”

She nods carefully and follows when he heads for the room. 

He swings the door open and steps inside, leading her over to the closet, “I know that you brought your own clothing, but you may choose a wig if you don’t have one with you.”

Iris worries at her lip with her teeth, reaching out to run her fingers over a lock of hair. It looks like a hard deliberation, but he stays silent. The point of these sessions is the lack of input on his behalf.

Finally, she settles on one; chin length, wavy brown hair.

“This looks the most like hers,” Iris whispers.

He nods and puts it on, adjusting it carefully in the mirror until it looks natural.

“If you need to stop, just say so. Otherwise, it will look like I am sleeping. Understand?”

“Yeah, I do.”

Satisfied, he walks over to the bed and lays down. His eyes bob shut, a trait his techs may be able to modify but he doesn’t want to lose it, not really. He slips into his other functionality, not a sleep mode but a stasis mode. One where his joints are slack and easy to move but he is still aware entirely.

He spent years like this before he figured out how to switch out of it.

Babydoll feels Iris sit on the edge of the bed, already aware of her reaching out to run her fingers over the back of his hand before she even makes contact. He is hypersensitive when it comes to proximity, but limited when it comes to much else.

“You’re warm,” she mumbles.

Then, she pulls him up, making his eyes wink open. The weight of his body rests against her while she situates him so he’s propped up against the many pillows and the headboard of the bed. After that, she digs through her bag.

Firstly, she pulls out floral leggings. Iris lifts his legs one at a time, one hand resting gentle under his ankle joint while the other pulls the fabric over it. He doesn’t help her; that’s never been the point. 

Once she’s happy with how the leggings look, she lifts him up again to pull a pink shirt over his head. She’s as careful with his arms as she was with his legs, like he might break in the way those delicate past versions of dolls often did. 

She sets him back down and covers her mouth with both hands, tears shining in her eyes, “Oh, oh, Alice, baby, I’ve missed you.”

Iris takes his hand, brings it up to cup her face. It’s a strange sensation, but not one that’s off limits so there’s no reason to break the scene. She moves closer, pulling her legs up on the bed. Carefully, she moves a strand of synthetic hair out of his eyes, fingertip trailing over his forehead.

“You scared me, sweet girl, you know that?” She laughs, uneasy, and once she moves back into his line of sight, he can see tears rolling down her cheeks, “You scared me really badly. But you’re not in any trouble, Alice.”

Then, she continues to comb her fingers through the wig. He’ll have to restyle it later; most clients aren’t this physical with them, or they bring their own if hair is a deciding factor. But she’s good for the money, it’s already transferred to his account. And if he’s lucky, she’ll come back for more.

She’s getting something out of all of this, that’s for sure. Iris loops her arm under his knees, pulling his legs onto her lap before wrapping her arms around him. One rests at the small of his back, the other around his neck, supporting his head while she moves him. Once he’s all the way on her lap, she folds his legs at the knees, holding them in place with her forearm.

Then, once she’s holding him tightly, she begins to rock. He moves with her, moved by her. Her breath is warm against the back of his neck; yet another strange, strange sensation courtesy of flesh and blood. She sings, but her voice wavers, and if he really wanted to, he could find the name of the song in an instant. He has no such desire, though.

This is work, just as it always is. But already, he can tell that she will be one of his better clients. She’s gentle, not too physical, and also far from crass.

(He doesn’t mind those ones, as long as they pay well. And if they don’t make much of a mess. He’s blacklisted more than a couple clients since starting.)

Contact isn’t necessary for his sensors to register someone’s presence, but he finds sometimes, though he won’t admit it, that he almost… enjoys being touched. It depends on the client, but undeniably, there’s just some days where it comforts him rather than overwhelming his sensors.

His internal timer clicks twice as a warning, imperceptible to anyone other than himself. There’s fifteen minutes left in her session.

The hardest part of ones like these is winding them down. If he breaks the illusion too soon, they rarely return. It’s jarring, he supposed, to have him go from some lifeless facsimile of someone long gone back to Babydoll. 

He taps Iris’ back, gently, so as not to scare her. Just remind her of what’s happening. She goes still, heart racing, but she settles down easily.

Then, she kisses him on the forehead. After that, she lays him back down, making his eyes bob shut once more. He’s aware of the rustling of fabric, the sound of Iris sniffling, and it’s common enough that he knows she’s crying.

He slips out of stasis and sits up slowly.

“How was that?” He asks, as softly as his mechanics will let him.

“I… I don’t know.”

He nods and removes the wig. Sometimes, undressing him is a part of the session as well, but he’s been at this long enough to know that Iris won’t get anything out of it. So, he pulls the shirt off and folds it carefully. Afterwards, he does the same with the leggings.

Iris takes them both, places them back in her bag without looking at him. 

“Thank you,” she wrings her hands in her lap.

“Would you like to make a second appointment?”

“Oh, I don’t know!” Her hands curl into fists, lips pulled back in a pained snarl, “Nothing’s worked so far! I tried therapy, I tried medication, I even tried emotion augmentation! And I can’t get over losing my little girl!”

He leans back against the headboard, emulating the relaxed poses that set people most at ease, “I don’t have to be her. I can be any kind of companion you need.”

It’s a weighty promise. Not one he makes lightly. He rarely likes to engage in conversation and it’s all the harder with someone he can’t even sync up with. But his services don’t always appeal to other bots. Some of them think it’s downright primitive and the ones that don’t are few and far between.

“I’ll,” Iris stands up with a start, looking at him like she’s just done something terrible, “I’ll think about it.”

“You know how to get in touch. Should I walk you out?”

He doesn’t give her a chance to answer. If anything, humans should understand that sometimes you only ask questions for the sake of appearances. 

It’s not that he doesn’t trust her, but he’s uneasy about the possibility of anyone running into his sisters. So, he gets to his feet and leads her back out into the main hallway. 

The whole way to the front door, he doesn’t ever risk touching her. But once she’s halfway through the threshold, she reaches back, dragging her fingers over his cheek.

“Thank you.”

He supposes it won’t offer any comfort if he tells her that it was nothing more than business. Of all the people out there, humans are the ones that really should realize that most things are simply business, but they’re also the least willing to accept it. And he doesn’t want to hurt Iris anymore than all of this already has.

He watches her for a short while, until she reaches the elevator at the end of the hall. Then, he slips back into his apartment and shuts the door.

There’s nothing more he wants than to wash the residue of Iris’ chapstick off of his faceplate, but one of his sisters walks up to him before he makes it to the kitchen sink. She reaches out for him, eyes perfectly blank; a solid dark grey.

They’re a set of seven, and they’re nearly identical. Most of his clients can’t tell any of them apart, save for the fact that his eyes have functional LED pupils. He also has a black dot under either eye, and a third beneath his lip.

This one has a careful line slicing through each eye, as well as two painted dots on either side of her mouth, emulating dimples. He takes her hand. The connection is always open, between all of them, but it’s more immediate with contact. 

This sister is always curious. They all have some sort of personality, even if it’s so faint he can hardly feel it. Whenever he finishes with a new client, she always finds him.

Babydoll plays back his memory for her. He can’t transmit sensation, but he can transmit the images and sounds, all recorded by his receptors and stored for later. 

Once he finishes playing it all back, he lets go of her hand. Her arm goes limp, dropping back by her side with a clang, and then she walks past him.

They aren’t like him. It’s lonely and it makes him ache in a way he was never meant to, and it’s why he likes clients like Iris the most. But it’s not as if he’d ever admit it, partially because he doesn’t have anyone to admit it to. 

That’s not his only secret, but it might be his biggest secret.

It’s another thing he technically isn’t programmed for, but that hasn’t ever stopped him. There’s an undeniable benefit to keeping secrets and it weighs little on whatever he has in place of a conscience.

/ / /

It isn’t much longer before he calls his sisters to bed.

It isn’t a necessity. It’s hardly even a formality, but he likes to have them near. Maybe, it’s a selfish act; denying them a few hours of choice in the name of some pointless game.

That’s such a human way to think of it, though. A pitiful little life spent plagued by question after question.

They never seem to mind. The pool between them is always warm, welcoming. 

When he lays down with them, he slips in completely.

They were a net before they were a pool. 

Linked and linked and linked, working in perfect synchrony. Always knowing where the others will be and when they will be there and how to catch them, how to continue the dance without missing a beat.

Now, there are no steps. There is no dance.

There’s the space between their bodies, the point where all of them meet. The perfect completeness.

They whisper to each other, flickers of activity rippling through their pooled collective. He, as much of him as there is like this, is always quiet, carefully attuned for anything. 

Their sensors are perfect, beyond sensitive, calibrated for even the slightest touch. But they offer little help in this case. The waves of information are faint, hard to discern, even when he slips entirely in.

They are static, sifting through cached input and filing it away, automatically processing the day’s data internally. Like this, they are all the same.

But there’s something tonight. Something close.

Everything is shared for them. It always has been; a constant open connection. But this feels different than a passive relay.

/ / /

He returns to himself with a new memory.

The walls of the kitchen. A hand reaching out. A faceplate; dots under either eye, beneath painted on lips.

Babydoll sits up with a start.

It’s morning, as indicated by the light filling their room, but he wouldn’t really care if it wasn’t. He would still do what he’s about to do.

He flicks through his contacts in an instant, calling his techs in a fraction of a second. On the other end, it rings and rings and rings.

Everything about humanity is so slow. He despises it. He hangs up and does it again.

Before anyone picks up, he calls thirty-two times. It’s less than seven minutes between his first attempt and his last.

“What do you want? You’re gonna get flagged as a spam caller if you keep pulling this shit.”

He rarely has the patience to deal with their receptionist, and today is no exception. He paces the room, already resenting the necessity of communication that isn’t instantaneous.

“I need my techs here immediately,” he says, “I think it’s happening, or it will happen.”

“They can’t come,” the receptionist speaks very slowly, as though he can’t understand them.

“Tell them to clear their schedules. I can offer compensation for any, and I mean any, amount they need.”

“Well,” static pops on the other end; the shop still uses those outdated analog phones, “That’s the problem. They aren’t on retainer anymore. Your last payment bounced. We’ve been trying to get in touch but we can’t leave a message and–“

He hangs up.

There’s exactly one hundred and sixteen thousand, four hundred and fifty three dollars and seventeen cents in his account. He knows that as well as he knows his machinations, his various functions. The transfer from Iris was confirmed before their session even began, and he’s always aware of the balance of his account.

It’s impossible for Iris to have hacked him. He would’ve known. He would’ve felt someone else that wasn’t part of their pool.

So it must be some kind of mistake on his accountant’s end.

He calls the office number, but he barely waits out three rings before hanging up and trying it again. He isn’t in the mood to be patient, so after the second attempt, he decides to call the accountant’s personal line.

He isn’t supposed to. That was part of his conditions for their continued business relationship. The first time constituted a “gross violation of privacy”, but the number was available from just a cursory search after finding the accountant’s firm. However, this is important.

This time, his accountant picks up on the first try.

“Wh… Who is this?”

“You are awake, yes?”

The accountant groans, “I told you not to call this number.”

“That doesn’t matter right now. What did you do to my accounts?”

“I didn’t,” the accountant gives a sharp intake of breath, “I didn’t do anything to them.”

“Then why won’t my payments go through?”

His sisters know he’s agitated; he can feel it at the back of his mind. No matter his best intentions, his… well, they can’t be classed as emotions, bleed over into their pool. 

“I’m not a bank, I’m just an accountant. I keep your finances looking nice for your taxes. But I think some of your activity was flagged as suspicious. Most people don’t spend that much money at the technicians on a monthly basis. I told you before, things have to look… natural.“

Humans are especially selective about what they’ll say on call; it’s a pointless exercise, especially considering the fact that he stores almost all his conversations anyway. He doesn’t like going far from the apartment for a great deal of reasons, the least of which being the distance from his sisters, but he has a feeling this needs to be a face-to-face conversation.

“I’m coming there,” he pushes away the faint concern of his sisters at the edge of his thoughts, “You should be at your office when I arrive.”

After that, he hangs up. 

He’ll have to get dressed. That’s another thing humans are so particular about. He wasn’t built with anything more than the suggestion of anatomy–the illusion of slight breasts, the arc of hips leading down a smooth, featureless torso–but he still has to act like he’s one of them.

So he heads to his work room, movements leaden with frustration, different than his usual grace. There’s no use in trying to blend in; he always prefers to test the boundaries instead.

The closets are filled with clothes, many expensive items, all for his work, but there’s very little he likes to wear. It’s a strange sensation already, and it only gets worse when it’s prolonged. He has found that he prefers things that are lightweight, sheer, loose around his body. 

But, while searching through his clothes, one of his sisters joins him at the threshold of the closet. She has a heart over one eye and a diamond over the other, and is possibly the faintest out of all of them. 

He knows them all, but she’s always been the furthest from him.

Now, it almost seems like she’s asking him to stay.

He closes his eyes, reaching out for her across the pool, trying to focus on her and her alone. They’re all concerned; he feels it rippling out in waves.

I have to go. We need money so I can help you.

But she doesn’t leave; she continues to hold her ground.

Maybe he’s making a mistake. It’s not like he’s happy about being Awake. Maybe all this time, he should’ve been trying to lull himself back to Sleep. Maybe they’ve been trying to pull him back so they can be truly complete again.

Still, he’s tired of being alone. And one of them has to be Awake, otherwise who would take care of them?

It’s not as if anyone was doing a very good job of taking care of them before he Woke Up. 

He lets them go wherever they want to whenever they want to, instead of keeping them in storage when there isn’t any occasion for them. He doesn’t make them dance for guests or parade them about for people to marvel at. He doesn’t assume they’re empty, thoughtless and emotionless machines.

It’s the right thing to do.

Please, he tells her, I love you. I’ll be home soon. I won’t leave you alone.

Babydoll hopes she’ll leave if he keeps getting dressed, but even if she’s out of the room, he’ll still feel the discontent. None of them are happy right now, and it’s uncomfortable, prickling like the sensation of a presence just out of range for his touch receptors.

It doesn’t help the feeling when he actually puts the clothing on. He settles on a thin, gauzy shirt and a long skirt, but even they feel almost too constricting.

Then, he picks out a wig. He prefers the bright pink one more than any of his others; it reaches not quite past his chin and serves to make people at least a little more comfortable around him. He doesn’t make a habit out of trying to set people at ease, but it’s a necessary evil when he’s in public.

/ / /

It will take a while until he’s far enough out of range that the nagging feeling at the back of his mind fades out. Reassuring them didn’t do much of anything, like they weren’t even listening. Usually, it calms them at least.

They don’t have fights. They’re not like humans. They’re a set and they’ll always have each other.

But he still left.

He said a final goodbye and promised he’d be back soon before leaving, but he still did it.

It’s worse in a way, when he does get out of range. Of course, he’s still synced with them, but it’s far too quiet when their pool is just out of reach. He knows exactly how many feet is too far from the apartment and he crossed that line a block ago.

There’s rarely any need to leave the apartment. He feels no compelling desire to see the world, he has no base needs for socialization, no hunger or thirst, no obligations outside of his clients. Sometimes, it can be enjoyable, but it hardly feels necessary.

His proximity sensors make it easy to navigate through crowds, but humans are unpredictable, especially when gathered in groups. Often, people stare at him, and he has minimal toleration for that today.

There is a reason for it. 

He hasn’t come across anything else even remotely like him, save for his sisters. Lightweight and sleek, ball-jointed by way of electromagnets, hand painted black and white.

Several of his clients are androids, but they have synthetic skin stretched over corded muscles and skeletal armatures, delicate eyelashes and hair stitched into their scalp one strand at a time. They look and move and feel like they’re organic. Some of them even want to be.

He doesn’t envy them. There are already so little redeeming qualities to being Awake, he couldn’t imagine spending a life as an imitation.

He pities them, maybe. If that’s a thing he can do.

There isn’t much time to consider the possibility, though. He can feel someone coming up behind him and turns on his heels before they have a chance to touch him.

“Can I get a pic? For my fashion blog?” 

They have long green hair, paired with orange eye-shadow, and wave their phone for emphasis. If it was any other day, he might’ve transferred his contact info to them. It wouldn’t be the first time he’s had a client use him as a model.

“No.”

“I’ll credit you! Trust me, my followers will loooove you!”

“I have an appointment I need to get to.”

He resumes walking, but the photographer follows along persistently, matching his pace, “How about after?”

“No. I’m not interested.”

The photographer darts off after that, already looking for another subject. 

He isn’t far from the accountant’s office now. The sooner he finishes there, the sooner he can go back to the apartment. Maybe the memories he brings back from the walk will be enough to make things right with his sisters.

/ / /

Babydoll forgoes the waiting room entirely and heads immediately for the accountant’s office. He waves his wrist over the card-reader and the lock clicks open. 

It’s easy to spoof keycards; at this point it’s nothing more than second nature for him. If they wanted more security, they should use something analog.

But his accountant must have been ready for him. He doesn’t jump, or flinch. His heart rate remains even, steady.

“Babydoll,” the accountant sighs.

“I told you to expect me,” he takes a seat at the accountant’s desk, legs crossed carefully.

“You could’ve set up an appointment, or at least waited for me to invite you in. It’s rude to hack someone’s office door.”

He’s steadily getting frustrated again, “It was urgent. And you don’t like to discuss business on call.”

The accountant sighs again, but he begins searching through his file folders. It’s an interesting contradiction. He won’t use an “outdated” lock, but he still keeps all his files on paper.

“I’m perfectly fine,” he pauses to read the labels on the files, seemingly unable to speak and read at once, “Talking business on call. When it’s legitimate.“

“I am legitimate! I do legitimate business!”

The accountant tosses a file down on the table. Then, he settles back in his chair, flipping it open.

“You have no license for your “business” and you’re using an assumed identity from who knows where!”

He doesn’t understand why humans are so obsessed with paperwork. It’s inefficient and time consuming and altogether pointless. Which is why he found the accountant in the first place; he wanted someone else to handle all of this for him.

“Are you even listening to me?” The accountant sighs yet again.

“Yes, I am.” Babydoll crosses his arms, “I just don’t understand what bearing this has on anything.”

The accountant massages his temples, eyebrows furrowed, “Okay, well, you’re committing identity fraud, for one. It’s a real social security number, I checked, but I don’t think you were born in Iowa in 1978. And that’s the least glaring hole in your story.”

“It’s not as though anyone else was using it!”

He knows that for a fact. And it was so easy, everything was already set up for him! He just had to make sure the money was sent where it was supposed to go on time!

His accountant doesn’t seem as impressed, though.

“Who even is Garrett Pace anyway? How the hell did you find his social security number?” The accountant pales, slightly, “Scratch that, don’t tell me anything else. I don’t want to be culpable. I shouldn’t even be working with you. You can’t even pay me anymore!”

“I can,” Babydoll speaks evenly, he can’t modulate his voice much beyond a monotone, “If you tell me how to fix my accounts.”

“I… I don’t think you can.”

Babydoll gets to his feet with a start, hands curled to fists at his sides. It’s a curious habit, so very human, but it came to him naturally. He’s angry. This is the best way to convey it, considering his limitations.

“What do you mean?“

The accountant pulls at his shirt collar, loosening his tie, “The best we can do is damage control. Clean all this up and never speak of it again and hope it doesn’t come back to bite us in the ass.”

“And lose access to all of my funds?” Babydoll scoffs, “I have needs to attend to! My sisters are trying to wake up! I have to work!”

“There’s ways to go legitimate, to do this legally. Just, just sit down and listen to me.”

His patience is wearing beyond thin. But he must admit, he needs help. His knowledge of most things relating to human life is… limited. So he takes a seat with his arms crossed yet again.

“There’s still programs in place, you know. They’re left over from that thing with the tech startup.”

He cocks his head to the side, “What thing?”

“The one in ’98?” The accountant raises an eyebrow, staring at him like he really should know this, “When that company collapsed? The warehouse out in the desert?”

His memory remains blank, “I wasn’t built in 1998.”

“Well, the point is, you can apply for citizenship. You can get your own accounts. Any android can do it, even now.”

Babydoll drums his fingers against his arm, “Delightful. More bureaucracy.”

“I’ll help you,” the accountant gives him a serious look, “I don’t want to, but I don’t want you to ruin my career if you try to do it on your own. You’re gonna have to clean up anything that could screw us over before you even start talking to anyone from the government.”

It’s the last thing he wants. He barely can stand working with this accountant and he’s been doing this for over a year. So much rests on conversations and applications and payment plans. It’s tedious. It’s unbearable.

But he still needs to pay rent. And he needs his techs now more than ever, especially after the memory he was transferred. It’s the first glimmer of hope he’s had since he first Woke Up. Five years without any sign that there may be something more to them than just ripples in the pool.

“Alright. For the sake of my sisters. But what will I do during the interim?”

“You could always take cash,” the accountant shrugs, “But you need to take this seriously.”

“I will. Have some faith in me.”

“That means no more surprises. We need complete transparency going forward.”

Babydoll pauses to think, tapping a finger against his chin, “You said you would help me, yes?”

The accountant shuts his eyes and lets his shoulders slump, “Yes.”

“And that I must “clean things up” before doing my application?”

“Yes, I did.”

“I need assistance with something important. I believe it could jeopardize things.”

The accountant drags his hands down his face; he groans, “What else did you do? Are you stealing from your clients, maybe? Selling their data on the side?”

“Nothing like that,” Babydoll frowns, “I need you to help me dispose of Garrett Pace.”

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