As he bid the Merovingian adieu he thought a bit more deeply about the ennui his liege must have to deal with.  He calculated his age somewhere between 400-500 years, taking into account the previous One Cycles that Neo finally broke.  He knew if he had to live that long he'd be swinging from the rafters.  Thirtysomething was already starting to freak him out.

As he left the Kowloon building he ran across a known Zionite.  The Zionite gave chase.  Villemar thought about teaching him a lesson, but he had bigger fish to fry.  He hyperjumped away.  So ridiculously impulsive, these Zionites, he thought.

He hit the hardline and ported to Chelsea.  He liked Chelsea, usually nice and calm, a place to get away from the maddening crowd.  He maneuvered toward the center of the district, hoping to run into some Bookwyrms who could lead him to Teacher.

As he was making his way along he spotted Entropi and a couple of Merovingian operatives he knew running down a side alley.  They were probably chasing Anome's thugs or something.  He waved to Entropi but he doubted she or the others saw him, so determined were they with the task at hand, whatever that was.

Always the gregarious politician, he always tried to maintain good relations with all the org Liaison Officers.  He would always invite them to his faction's parties and exchange pleasantries.  He had run missions with Entropi, but didn't know Baelroth that well.  On the surface he seemed a bit aloof, but nowhere near the insufferable Flood.  He had minimal exchages with LOCross, finding him to be very aloof but in a much more machinelike manner.  He had had his conflicts with Alsos, finding him to be a bit of a punk who occasionally fed Zionites nonsense; but kept his distaste under his hat.  Dissimmulato was a bit of a punk too.  He hated zealots, but Dissimmulato was not as much of a troublemaker as Maskque.  Oddly enough, he had very good relations with Keterina, the EPN liaison, finding one night at a Succubus party that they liked the same kind of music.

His musings were interrupted as he spotted a Bookwyrm.  He was intrigued with these exiles. Were they truly brains and beauty or was it just a big joke designed to fool other exile gangs into underestimating their toughness?  He knew he was advanced enough in power and skill that he no longer needed to fear on-the-spot attacks from them.

He approached one in a group.

"Bonjour."

She was apprehensive, clutching, ironically enough, a couple of books.

"What?"

"Good day to you, ma'am.  My name is Villemar.  I work for the Merovingian.  I need to speak with Teacher. Can you direct me to her?"

Her face blanched.

"I don't know what you're talking about," she abruptly exclaimed, as she turned away and left.

He approached a few others.  All gave him more or less the same reaction.

He wandered around, surveying the area.  Some clown named Stiletto approached him offering him a special weapon if he would kill a bunch of Bookwyrms.

"Pass."

He also found a Merovingian Collector in front of a large library.  He would deal with him later when he felt like collecting rare bits of code.  He wondered why he had never seen this enormous building before.  He tried to enter in through the front door, but it was locked.  It perplexed him.   He circled the building and all entrances were sealed.  It annoyed him. "Think, Villemar," he mused.

He decided to go across the street and check out Club Messiah.  He thought it a mediocre club at best.  His memory flickered when he recalled that Hypatia lurked here often.  He made it a point to avoid her as he walked to the bar and ordered a Sicilian Kiss.  He tried to recall his old merc missions for Hypatia.  She seemed covetous of certain books and her missions were based around those.  Makes sense.  Bookwyrm gone batty.

Ages and ages ago, back when he was barely out of the pod, he recalled reading something Tyndall wrote; a debriefing about one Exile called The Librarian, whose Library included many a rare volume of arcane lore.  Why was it shut?

He prowled the entire damned district for hours on end with no sign of Teacher.  Tons of various Bookwyrms but no apparent leader.  It was uncharacteristic, the other Exile gang leaders usually lurked around with their followers.

"Enough of this shite."  He found a lone, uncharacteristicly male Bookwyrm and snuck up behind him, smashing a bottle over his head.  The Bookwyrm groaned and he collapsed to the ground.   A crappy owl bookmark fell out of his pocket.  He grabbed him by his lapel and threw him against the wall, holding the bookmark at his throat.

"Alright Jerky, make with the info.  Teacher.  Where is she.  Let me know or you die." 

(to be continued)