Chrono Inquisitor (Gods Be Damned) Read Online Free PDF

waiting to serve me whenever I beckoned further.
    In watching the waiter depart I caught sight of a man sitting at the counter eyeing me as well. The man was in dark brown coveralls with three green bands around each of his upper arms. As soon as I locked eyes with the guy, he turned his head back to his plate.
    ‹“Kali, what position does his uniform indicate?”›
    ‹The man is wearing the uniform of a sanitation laborer.›
    I guess he literally drew the shit end of the stick, didn’t he, I thought. Let him look.
    ‹I feel it prudent to remind you how you came to sit where you are. You need to perform an audit, otherwise I will have to report you for breaking section 84 of the Inquisitors Jurisdiction.›
    All right then. Since the man seemed to be so nosey.
    ‹ “Kali, lock onto that guy’s Chrono and begin monitoring.”›
    ‹Audit initiated.›
    That little technicality taken care of, I turned my attention to the cup of coffee. It was filled to the brim so I carefully lifted it to just under my nose and took a deep inhalation of the tantalizing aroma.
    Except it was n’t tantalizing. Something was off.
    There was nothing I loved more than the smell of a good cup of coffee, and this wasn’t what I had expected.
    I took a sip and shook my head. It was coffee, but that wasn’t all it was.
    It was mixed with that roasted root shit often passed off as coffee. Sometimes a place would mix the two to keep costs down. Apparently that’s what the management of Francine’s was doing.
    With a very unsatisfied look I beckoned my waiter to attend me.
    “What the hell is this?” I said as he approached the table.
    “It’s our house blend. It’s what you ordered.”
    “I certainly didn’t. I ordered a coffee. A pure coffee.”
    There was a moment of silence from the man while I assumed he was checking the order.
    “My sincerest apologies, sir. It would seem you did indeed order a coffee. Unfortunately, we are currently out. There is an apparent glitch in the system and it defaulted to the house blend since it contains coffee.”
    Just my damn luck.
    I sighed. “And how do you intend to correct this gross error?”
    For half a second he looked like he had no intention of doing so, but then he said, “It’s possible one of our sister diners has some in stock. If you’re willing to wait a little while longer I’m sure I can find you some.”
    I was impressed. I actually hadn’t expected him to do anything. I contemplated sending him to my pad to retrieve some of my stock, but decided against it. Let him scrabble trying to please me. Let him work for his tip.
    It was a good thing I could afford to feed my addictions.
    Speaking of addictions, as far as the mytes and Kali allowed me to have any, I reached into the vault, compartment 22, and extracted my flask. I took another sip of the mongrel coffee so I could add some enhancer. I did so, stirred it with a spoon, and took a sip.
    It was tolerable.
    I took a moment and let the warmth of the drink irradiate from within, enveloping my body.
    Now the day could begin.
    I sat back up and looked over the list again. I deleted the Rex Jester advertisement. I settled on learning a little bit more on how the powers-that-be were fucking with my head even more. I opened the Huginn & Muninn article.
    The screen became a chaotic mess of ads promoting the best prices for the presale of H&M, simulated demonstrations of its capabilities, various videos of interviews with the creators – most of whom I’d met and knew to a certain degree , as well as a slew of many other things. It only took a blink of an eye before Kali had the screen filtered and organized. I didn’t even have to ask.
    I sat in silence reading and sipping my doctored coffee. Right as I was taking my last sip, the waiter, whose name I’d failed to acquire, arrived with a new cup and informed me he’d found some pure coffee and that it was on its way. I thanked him and kept reading.
    Finishing the report, I