Chapter 7

Thirty days after her bar was nearly destroyed Bea stood watching the clock on the far wall. Her new waitress was released from her apprenticeship daily at seven, it had become habit for Bea to watch for Kat, five minutes after the hour she came to the back and put on her apron. Bea had tried giving her a uniform at first but that asshole Brown seemed to delight in sending the girl to work in a different body each time. How he had access to that many corpses was one of many things that irked her. She was pretty sure that he wasn't killing them or having them killed but still, he was one creepy wizard or whatever he was.

"Hey Bea, its me", Kat breezed through.

"What the hell Kat? Japanese with a pink bob cut? How is he doing this? And when are you going to be you, again? Not that I remember what you look like by now."

"It took awhile to patch it up, I find out tomorrow if it worked or not. Everything but the rat damage was easy to fix. Something about the rodents makes it damn hard to repair."

"You're pretty calm about this, aren't you even a little creeped out being inside someone else? Much less a different one all the time?"

"Well sure I was at first, Bea, but I think that was Mr. Brown's point. I needed to get over my squeamishness about the dead. Besides I've had time to get used to the idea it might not work. You have admit I look cute." Kat said the last with a little pout looking through her lashes at the bar owner.

This was a far different girl than the sullen depressed one the day after the fight. Bea had to remind herself that Katherine had never been normal, even in life she had been raised as the only boarding student at a Catholic girls school. Her Uncle enforced rules from treaties so old the signing races weren't always in existence still. Now here she was helping in a non-human bar to pay back damages. This kid was so far away from normal the space telescope wouldn't be able to spot normal for her.

"Uh Bea, you still here? You kinda spaced out for a minute there,"

"Oh yeah, and you get to work! Clean up till there is someone here to serve," Bea said this while snapping the towel she was holding at the girl.

It wasn't long before the regulars started to come into the bar. There were more of them now then there had been a month ago. It was something of a contest for them to bet each other what the waitress would look like on a given night. Tall or short, thin or fat, blonde or brunette the bets changed all the time. The only constant being that she was always a girl. She confided to Bea late one night after closing that Brown had forced her to try a boy, but she had been so uncoordinated inside of it that he had called it off after only an hour. The more competitive patrons tried to get the inside scoop from Bea, but she was just as surprised as them.

The night passed swiftly like so many did now, one drink order then another and suddenly it was last call. Kat hanging in there bravely even with waking up at 5am to go to the lab. It didn't hurt that as more people crowded the bar she fed on every bump or casual touch, when they were busy she was the perpetual motion waitress endlessly wading through the tables. It surprised her that none of the rats had been back since then. They could be counted most times to avenge slightest wrong, much less the death of one of their people. Yet there was still an uneasy truce that someone or something had brought about. Bea suspected that George had done it, but she didn't know. Neither of them had seen him since the day after the fight when he made the arrangements for Kat to sleep in the back of the bar till she worked her debt off and finished classes with Brown.

A few minutes later Bea became aware of how deep in thought she had been when hands of magic gripped her shoulders and started to work the tensions out. Just a touch by Kat felt like the best massage but combine that with an actual attempt to work the muscles and it became an in describable feeling. How she didn't turn around and tackle the girl to the floor Bea wasn't sure. It was pure Eros like each finger sent a shockwave to ricochet to all her erogenous zones. Probably the real possibility of Kat's Uncle hunting Bea down is the only thing that kept her from jumping the girl when she did things like this.