"So, Meri … tell me all about him!" Alaema cooed from her resting place atop the back of the couch.

"For the last time, sister, later!" Mericlou snapped, returning her concentration to her microcomputer.

Most humans considered Alaema to be perfectly gorgeous for an android: a sensuous, raven-haired beauty, with a physique that was both lithe and voluptuous: the typical build of any Setru model. As Mericlou observed from the day that she brought her new sister to their home from the brothel, every twist of her flaring hips, coquettish flick of her ebony waves of hair, and serpentine movement of her body exuded some form of flagrant sexuality. Even her uniquely human-like voice, possessing a unique modification to filter out the electronic resonance, was just the right tone to please a man. But even with those dubiously positive traits, her voracious sexual appetite was something that the entire household had agreed that they could do without.

In the early days, her overzealous wiles led to more than a few embarrassing situations with potential clients, until Skori had figured out a way to control it with home-built memory buffer units. Unfortunately, they burned out quickly from the massive amount of data they had to filter from her memory core's pleasure center, and the expense of materials required to make the units caused a cash sink for much of the money from the family's business.

"I'm trying to tally the accounts from last month," Mericlou said. The dataspike at her wrist helped the information to flow faster than the jack in her neck, but accounting was still a very boring and painstaking process, fraught with checks and double-checks of the incoming data. And Alaema's incessant begging for the details of her time with Aldrec was not conducive to her concentration.

"Please, sister?" Alaema keened, idly playing with Mericlou's green ringlets. "You know how much I do love hearing about handsome elf lords!"

"Sister, if Meri needs silence now, then you should give her some space," Sedriil said, appearing through the archway at the opposite end of the den. He sat down at the far corner beside a haphazard pile of spare parts. A full head taller than Mericlou and a head and a half more than Alaema, his hair, as white as his skin, was straight, combed back, and tied into a short braid at the end. "She works her circuits short to help support us, you know."

Though marginally aware of the beginning verbal engagement between her siblings, Mericlou was silently thankful that it momentarily diverted Alaema's attention.




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