The grass in the lawn shook violently under the pressure of the powerful repulsor fields. The flycar gently laid on the ground. In a couple of seconds the engine went out and the skates' suspension unloaded all the weight of the vehicle on the lawn, bringing back the silence on a silent night. 

"We're here, ma'am. It's..." exclaimed, atonic, the cabbie, shifting towards the passenger area. 

Her client annoyingly raised her hand, continuing the conversation that took all her attention in the last twenty minutes. The cabbie snorted, waving the purple tuft of hair that caressed her cheek. She shifted around again and, exhausted, let her body sinking into the comfortable anatomical backrest. It always happened so, with her rich customers. She closed her eyes for a moment, losing herself in the murmur of the customer's indistinct words. 

Outside the flycar, the night and silence enveloped everything. The still grass covered sweet hills for whole acres, up to the limit of a forest of maples and alders. Perfectly shaped bushes, modelled as statues of women, heroines and classical goddesses flanked a gravel path of white and pink quartz, alternated with low garden lamps that lit up the path to the huge villa of the customer. From the ground you just could see the facade, but the cabbie had been able to see the entire estate from above: although there were much larger villas at Venus Hill, this was as imposing as a palace of the past times. The cabbie thought of her home: the modest suburb apartment, overlooking a tiny playground and Korean kitchen kiosk. Her entire flat complex was just one-fifth only of the main body of the mansion. 

The cabbie looked down on the monitor. By pressing a button on the hologram, the passenger area camera framed her passenger. She looked like it had come out of a painting, considering how sumptuously beautiful it was. Tall, blonde, with cerulean eyes shining of nobility in a face with pure white skin and without a single imperfection. Her dress was a single gold and emerald drape, shining with thousands of little gems sewn into the fabric, while jewels surrounding her chest, arms and legs. She looked young, but the cabbie wasn't able to speculate about her age: no one could. Thanks to genetic therapies, cell regeneration and every treatment that billions of credits could buy, the woman could be as fifty as one hundred years old. And yet she would show twenty-five years as long as the money would have lasted. Which probably meant forever. 
Choosing if and when to age or even die was the exclusive privilege of the richest women in the Solar System. 

"No, Liz." The woman said to the hologram projected in front of her mouth, attracting the attention of the cabbie." I want that diamond. It doesn't happen every day that a barrel size diamond comes out from an asteroid" 

The woman stood silent, letting the other person speak.  

"That's right. Owning it, but above all showing it off, is essential. Don't you think that donating it to science is a huge waste?"  

One more long break. 

"Exactly. The cuts that can be made from that gemstone will be much more enhanced on me than on a stupid laboratory table. And as the owner of that area of the Belt, and therefore of the diamond, I assure you that giving it to me will be much more profitable than using it for silly scientific research.  
Oh, honey... I'm serious. To begin with, the sum I offer you is more than generous. Plus a... Birdie... told me that most of your workers on Mars are led by a labor union that is currently quiescent, but equally annoying. An union that on more than one occasion has made silly insinuations about hypothetical inhuman living conditions. An union that, coincidentally, has its own buildings on one of my properties. As well as the hospital a few blocks from there... and five local schools, pubs, shops and a good part of the city's buildings." 

For those people it would be, of course, a misfortune to see the rent of those properties go dizzily up: being evicted, having to sleep somewhere under the Martian sky... Or, on the contrary, it would be a misfortune for you if those poor souls were relieved of the anguish of having to pay a rent or even receiving a donation. I bet this would give them more serenity to face other more important issues, such as... oh, I don't know... getting less exhausting working conditions or, the goddess doesn't want, a fair wage. Don't you think? Think about it, my dear. Carefully" 

The cabbie shifted off the monitor, disgusted. Even just hearing a conversation like that made her feel dirty. Inside. It wasn't the first time she felt so. Not even the hundredth. Every time she had to bring a filthy rich to Venus hill, she felt something: excerpts of conversations, words said and not said. And, in the following days, the news showed her the consequences of those words, last piece of a domino that fell out of the will of the richest and most powerful women of the Solar System. She gulped, feeling the umpteenth pin in her throat. Her work had annihilated her faith in humanity. 
But it was, at least, a very well paid job. And the need for money is a great sleeping pill for morality.  

The Taxi agency she worked for served a huge territory, but recently had specialized in the transport of VIPs. People who could afford golden transport, preferred to adapt to an anonymous taxi to escape the varied crowd of journalists, photographers, questors and annoyances. All women who besieged their lives at the entrance or exit of events, parties, dances and social occasions. It was an easy job, after all. Sometimes it happened to have to lose someone on her flycab's tail, but most of the time she only had to load a woman from the back of a swanky building and take her at home. Nothing more than she did with any other customers. The difference, if anything, was in the compensation. 
Those were not customers who questioned the price of a race some credit too high. On the contrary: they were women who had no idea how much life cost at levels below their own. 
Many cabbies raised the price of the race. When they paid, they increased the price by one hundred, two hundred, three hundred percent. And no VIP customer had ever complained. All of them had placed their hands on the reader and paid. She too had done it: her customers didn't even look at the taximeter with the real cost of the race. They paid with the naturalness of someone who has never spent a single minute of her life worrying about how much she spend. 
The cabbie thought it was a good karma for those who had the power to ruin so many lives with a single phone call. A right karma that entered to green her bank account, always too empty. 

The client lifted a hand to her ear and the hologram vanished into a cloud of colored sparks. She brought her hand to her feet, to pick up from the bottom of the taxi the very expensive high heels that she had been slipped out for the trip. 

"I can't say it has been a pleasure, Miss" 

The cabbie didn't answer. 

"Was it really necessary to stay bottled up in all that traffic? That's a FLYcab, isn't it? She could get out of the flow and fly straight to here" 

The cabbie suffocated her instinct to reply her. Getting out of the air traffic flow was a serious breach of the traffic code. It was worthy of an immediate withdrawal of flying licence. And the police officers weren't soft with the sanctions on Island One. But it would have been useless to explain it to who had probably never driven in her life. 

"I'm sorry, Ma'am." 
"Also" the woman interrupted" I advise you to take better care of the hygiene of the vehicle, nauseating, by the way, and buy yourself a better beast to entertain your customers" 

The woman gave a little kick with her foot and under the driver's seat echoed a little thud, then another, as a bounce. While the lady was wearing her high heels again, the figure of a tiny male dazed from the kick staggered out from under the seat, until it placed its hands on the foot's side of the cabbie. The tiny fell to the ground curling up against the driver's shoe, who gave a gentle flick to the little body, more to comfort it than to make sure it was okay. 

"It's five hundred credits, madam" exclaimed the cabbie 
"Ah! For the service you've offered me, miss, four hundred credits is more than enough. And forget the tip" 

The cabbie got off the flycar and opened the passenger's door. The woman picked up the pouchette and placed her hand on the small sphere next to the seat to pay for the ride. The sphere lit green up and the cabbie offered an hand to get her out of the aircraft. The woman walked elegantly along the gravel path of her house, making every step crackle. She muttering something about the disrespectful and slacker youth, while the cabbie stretched out a hand at the bottom of the taxi. She gently grabbed the tiny male and, taking care not to move it too brusquely, puts it in the cage tied to the passenger seat next to hers.  
She sat down at the cloche, reset the taximeter from 35 credits again to zero and a few seconds later the flycab flew away brushing against the tops of the trees. 

The cabbie breathed out, as if she had held her breath until then. In the seat next to her, the tiny pet ran around its cage, troubled, until it had entered the green plastic house inside, to wrap itself in the tissue that was its bed. 

"It has been an hard evening, hasn't it, Pip?" 

Pip raised its head. From inside the little plastic house it could only see the side and the leg of its owner, but it still made a verse that seemed sad and disconsolate to the cabbie. 

"Yes, I know. She wasn't a kind lady. But now my shift is almost over. One more hour and we'll go home. And we'll drop ourselves to bed, all right?" 

The Tiny made a more cheerful verse, as if it had understood the owner. The cabbie smiled. 
It was good for her to talk to her little pet during the long hours of the night shift. It kept her awake and alert and when she spoke to it, the stress collected in the traffic just slipped away. It didn't matter that it was an animal and that it didn't really understand or speak: it was therapeutic. Sometimes she would engage in whole discussions with Pip, when she was alone and no one could take her for a fool. The tiny guy carefully listened to her, emitting those shrill verses that she found so adorable. 
And then there was that gaze.  
Alive, curious: years before she had a parrot with which she spoke, exactly as she did with Pip, but it had never shown that slight shadow of intelligence that made the little male seem more... alive. Perhaps, she thought, being a species more akin to the human one made the difference. Or maybe it was just pareidolia and she saw intelligence where there was none just because Pip looked like - approximately - a woman. 

The cabbie flew over Venus Hill, full of huge and precious villas, and headed to the city park on the other side, where her special place awaited her. Fronds and winding paths ran under the flycab, free to fly without traffic that could disturb it. In a couple of minutes, the forest left way to a big terrace surrounded by the wood. A small parking area was flanked by a night kiosk and picnic tables. A banister with small coin-operated binoculars placed at regular intervals overlooked perhaps the most beautiful view of the entire Island One: the largest space station that mankind had ever produced, the jewel of the Earth and home to the government of the United Solar System. 

It was an immense cylinder, whose inner surface had been shaped to resemble as much as possible to the Earth's surface. Venus Hill, the highest relief dominated the centre of the station and forests, rivers and lakes framed the silhouette of the Grand Capital. An expanse of light and shadow, sunk into the night, covered the interior of the station. It bent along the station's walls to rejoin, upside down, on the barrel vault. The woman loved that place. The hill was high enough to soften the force of gravity and, looking up, one of the largest lakes revealed its transparent bottom and the space with all the stars outside. It was a magical sight, which had the power to fulfill her heart. 

The cabbie smiled, breathing in the fresh air of the night again. She opened the door and took Pip's cage, untied it from the seat belt that held it. Pip, inside its plastic house, didn't move. It curl itself up even tighter into the soft fabric of the handkerchief. 
Pip didn't particularly like to be transported with the cage and when it heard the wide swings of it, it did everything to hide. 

"Have patience, Pip" she whispered "Mommy must see if that bad woman has hurt you" 

Taking care not to shake the cage too much, the cabbie went to sit at one of the empty tables. It was late and only a couple of young hover-riders occupied one of the tables near the balustrade. 
Leaning the cage on the table, the cabbie opened the door, putting her hand inside. She could very easily have grabbed the plastic house, moved it and grabbed the tiny male directly, but it wasn't her intention. The woman had a good relationship with her pet and wanted it to go out.  

"Come on, sweetie... get out. Come to mommy." 

Pip put its head out of the hole in the little house, looking at her with those almost completely black eyes. Then it walked carefully towards her open hand and sat on, throwing itself on its side and rolling over her palm. When the woman bent her thumb, Pip hugged it as it was being pulled out of the cage. The woman caressed the tiny cute head, whispering meaningless but sweet words. It was not strictly necessary for them to have any: tinies understood the tone of voice, not the words. 
The cabbie looked closely at her little pet in the light of the lamp, not far away. Even in the twilight, a large bruise on Pip's arm was spreading under the soft skin, and another one less noticeable on its side, right above the hip. With the forefinger's tip she touched its bruised arm and Pip squealed it back. 

"Let's go..." She warned "Don't be a whiner. Let me check" 

The bone didn't look broken. It was just a bad bruise. The woman breathed a sigh of relief. When she had seen the woman's leg kicking away Pip, she had feared for the worst. She took a tube of gel from the waist belt and squeezed a small drop of it over its injured arm. Keeping Pip still, who had started to flail when it felt the cold of the medicine, she spread the lotion with the tip of her pinkie and second by second the bruise cleared up. Less than thirty minutes and the nanites would have done their job, making the bruises vanish completely. 
Glad that the pain was passing, Pip stood up on its knees, holding her big thumb in a tender hug, licking it's owner's skin in appreciation. 
Some seconds after, it raised its head, smelling the air and threw itself from the palm straight into the long sleeve of its mistress' long sleeved shirt, which felt the little naked body climbing on her own arm. 
The woman laughed, because of the tickling and the game of her little animal and placing her finger in front of the moving bump of fabric, enjoying to block its way. 

"Hi, Kelly" exclaimed a voice behind her.  

The cabbie shifted around: a middle-aged, tall, black and wavy haired woman stood behind her, with a greasy apron at her waist, a towel on her shoulder, a smile on her face, a plate with a warm sandwich in one hand and a can of cheap martian beer in the other. 

"Hello, Janice. I don't even have to order anymore, huh?" 
"You've been coming to my kiosk for over two years and I've never heard you order anything other than the usual cold martian ale and a sandwich with lettuce, sausage and ham. Tell me I was wrong and I'll offer you the next twenty drinks" 

Kelly laughed. 

"No, you did well. Pass here: today the shift was so heavy" 
"Let me guess... Rich girls, mommy's daughters and spoiled to the bone, stoned of onocaine that had sex in your taxi" 
"Cold..." 

The woman sat down. She put the beer and the sandwich in front of the cabbie, took the cloth off her shoulder and dropped it on the table and crossed her arms on the table, taking a minute's break from work. 

"Then... selfish yuppie, back from a business dinner that vomited in the..." 
"Cold again. Level up." 
"Rich bitch?" 
"Rich bitch." 

Kelly grabbed the sandwich with one hand and bit it, hungrily, savoring the first hot meal for hours. 

"And Pip? Where is it? Didn't you bring it tonight?" 

With the mouth too full to talk, the woman simply touched the bump on her shoulder that, as a small wave, moved under the fabric of her sleeve. With the thumb, she gave a few taps, forcing the little male to go up again and immediately Pip came out of the shoulder of its owner, observing the other woman with its black eyes alive and curious. It completely came out of Kelly's shirt and went down her arm to Janice's open hand, which immediately closed the fingers on it. 

"Don't squeeze it too tightly. The last customer hurt it a little" 

"Oh, you poor thing!" 

The woman opened the fingers slightly, releasing the little male who, at all upset, sniffed the hand smelling of food, then began to lick her thumb. Moved, Janice stroked the tiny head with the tip of her forefinger. Pip really liked that little cuddle and threw itself on its back to ask for more. Janice laughed and agreed to it, stroking her finger on its belly. Pip's body was soft and incredibly smooth, like silk. It wasn't particularly muscular, like the expensive quality males, but it had a nice young, agile and well nourished body.  
Janice lowered her finger further and lingered on the small bulge that all the little males had in the middle of legs. Immediately Pip mourned. it raised the tiny legs, wrapped them around the woman's index finger and began to lick her thumb, happy. Janine once again smiled at the little animal she was holding in her hands. 

"You know..." she said "I've had... and used... so many little males in my life. Even now, my wife and I are still buying some for... well, you know. But Pip has something special" 
"Yes, it's true" replied Kelly, swallowing a sip of beer. She took Pip from Janine's hands and carried it on her shoulder, where it curled up near the woman's jugular, rubbing its head and licking her skin. Used to the tickling that little tongue caused, Kelly didn't bother and went back to focusing on the sandwich. 

"Very special" repeated Janine, observing the little creature on the customer's shoulder "it seems almost a shame to force it to serve the passengers" 
"It's a service a lot of customers have come to expect, you know. And I know that it may seem false: you know how many people say the same thing about their little males... But Pip really likes to lick people. It's a real cuddly guy." 
"Yes, of course..." 
"I'm not kidding. It did it the first time. One night, I had just bought it, I was so tired that I didn't realize that I had left the cage open. It jumped out and after a couple of minutes it found the passenger's feet. I almost had to make an emergency landing when that girl screamed. But it, with that adorable little face, began to lap her toes up. She let it do it... and now it's a regular service. Since then all my colleagues have been running to buy a little male to offer the same service. But almost none of those little males do it voluntarily: my colleagues pass the little male to the passengers, they use it and it ends there. Pip is the only one who comes out of the cage alone and starts looking for customers. And he hasn't even been trained to do it." 
"But aren't you worried that someone might..." 
"Steal it?" 
"Or hurt it too much. After all, it's just a tiny male" 

Kelly stiffened her back hearing that "just a tiny male", but she got the point. The little males weren't particularly popular animals for company. They were food. They were entertainment. They were objects. 
Hell, Kelly thought. She had bought Pip in a pet store, among the little males to give alive to pythons and reptiles, sold as much as a kilo! Many customers appreciated its attention, its cuddles. But perhaps only respect for the property prevented them from really hurt her pet. One too many act of arrogance and for Pip it would have been the last race. 

"You're right," she replied, "but if I get to the end of the month, it's also thanks to Pip. I really don't want to move back to Earth. Maybe I just need to choose my customers better. Maybe I have to lock it up in a cage when I load the most dangerous ones for it. I don't know..." 


Janine stretched out her arm and caressed the tiny little head of the little man, who replied with a delightful verse and swept away the crumbs that the fingers had left on its head. Again, the Pip's tongue slipped out, but this time it licked its own fingers, full of infinitesimal remains of the crumbs tt had removed from its own hair. 

"Well, Kelly, honey, whatever you choose, take care of it. It's not a tiny to use and throw away, this" 

Said that, the woman stood up, said goodbye and came back to the kiosk, where one of the two motorcyclists was waiting for other two beers. 

Kelly sighed and finished her sandwich and the beer without a word, pondering about what Janice toldher. Without Pip to offer that special service, the passenger's liking would have dropped down, as would the races and the money. With the increase in rent, in the cost of energy, the IV of the apartment that was to be replaced - at her own expense, since the landlady stubbornly didn't want to put her hand in her wallet - couldn't afford a drop in salary. And just now that she came back to be single after a long period of cohabitation. 
That wasn't a good time. Too many expenses, too few paying customers. She couldn't give up her little bonus. But it wasn't even right to let Pip would take unnecessary risks. Kelly decided that she would be more careful to choose the customers who could enjoy the attention of her pet. For a while. Just... for some time. As long as she thought of something better for it. 

Suddenly Kelly's communicator vibrated. The woman raised her wrist and the address of the next customer appeared on the holographic screen. The last one, hoped the woman, of that night's shift. It was one of the villas on Venus Hill. Not far from the park where she was. 
The cabbie sighed, grabbing little Pip by its shoulder. 


"Are you ready, honey? One more customer and then we go home" 

Pip smiled and blinked its little black eyes. 

"I'll take it for a yes" 

Kelly put it in the cage, passed the hand over the metal ball on the table to pay and returned to her flycab.  
Just before closing the door, the woman's gaze fell on the two motorcyclists sitting at the kiosk table. Half drunk of beer, they laughed loudly as they tormented two small wild males who, in search of food, had gotten too close. One of the two girls enjoyed to tear the tiny limbs off and the other had lowered the zip of the suit and enjoyed lowering and pulling the little male out from her panties. 
Without saying a word, Kelly looked away. She tied Pip's cage to the seat and, this time, checked that the door was tightly closed. Then she started the engine and flew away, to the next passenger.