The doctor had finished working on Lavim, and assured Alqadi that he would be asleep for the next couple of hours, and he might as well join us in the cafe for a bit.
We ordered some food, and watched a performance from a dancer with a snake in a basket. Tahir was entranced, and asked the waiter if he could buy a drink for the dancer. Sayah took the opportunity to steal his snacks.
We were interrupted by a call from the doctor, however. Well before he should have been waking up, he had awoken, injected himself with enough stimulants to kill most people, caused a lot of property damage and run off. We went to investigate. The doctor wanted us to pay for the damage he had done. Karim reiterated that we were not financially responsible for him.
We investigated the scene, finding out what drugs he'd taken and watching him behave strangely on the security cameras footage, cutting something out of his forehead before running away. He had also been shouting as he went - the old name for the Judge that we'd seen before, and which according to the doctor was banned from being spoken in Djachroum under pain of having your tongue cut out.
Alqadi had a quiet word with Tahir, and then lead the way to follow Lavim away from the doctor and into the heart of Djachroum.
We found ourselves in the souk, and were almost delayed by encountering vendors offering some lovely soft furnishings, but assured them we would come back for tapestries and cushions later on. Where would Lavim go? Given his behaviour in the surgery it seemed likely he might be looking for more drugs. We tried a pharmacy, but no luck. Lila suggested we visit the arena. This was more promising. Sasaya's Arena played host to fights between lizard cats, which were being injected with stimulants to make them more aggressive before each fight.
The place was crowded. Alqadi ploughed his way through the crowds while the rest of us followed in his wake, occasionally purchasing items from the local vendors when they got in the way. Finally Alqadi and Tahir made it as far as Sasaya while the rest of the group went round to the trainers' entrance.
Lavim had been there, and recently. We made chase, but as he bounded his way up walkways and bridges in a way that seemed almost superhuman, none of us could catch up. Lila came closest, but not even the blessing of the Gambler was enough, and he slipped away.
Gurgeh asked Tahir if we could get a pet lizard cat for the ship, but he insisted we had other things to do.
Back on the trail we followed him across Djachroum, realising that he was heading into the machine hall, home of the station's life support system. The idea of him causing damage down there was pretty horrific. Purple guards blocked the entrance to the tunnel, but with some fast talk we managed to get ourselves allowed in for an hour.
We descended the tunnel until we reached a point where gravity was minimal and large floating rocks lay between us and the other side. Tahir was immediately keen to jump across and show off his zero-g skills, but fortunately was made to tie a hyper rope to himself before he went. After bouncing between rocks for a bit he was pulled back in. Should he try again?
Then someone approached. A man in a flowing purple kaftan, who floated effortly across the gap despite being blindfolded. After we expressed our admiration for his smooth moves, he offered his help in exchange for a song.
Sayah offered, having been practicing, but between the odd circumstances and the rest of the crew insisting on being the backing track in the absence of her oud, the song of love and betrayal she performed didn't go down particularly well.
He was still willing to talk, however, and asked if we had any food. Karim had a bottle of beer left over from our cargo run, plus some snacks he'd purchased at the arena, and the beer was enough to get the strange man on our side. Our search could continue.
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