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With all his spare time lately, Luther had been thinking carefully about what type of hint he should give his brother. He could simply lie, of course, but that would no doubt kill any further attempts to barter. Worse, it might even make David refuse to speak with him again, and given that Luther would probably be stuck down here for quite some time, David’s traitorous company was one of the few things he actually looked forward to. Not that he could ever let David know this. It would only give the man an advantage.

So he had to tell David something, at least. And he knew what. “The hint, then. The extra precautions I took before the night of my undoing, as it were. I will only tell you that it has to do with money.”

“Ah.” David rubbed his beard. “I suppose that is a satisfactory clue.”

“Unless you give me something else, you will get nothing more from me,” said Luther.

“Okay,” said David. He stood and reached into his vest pocket. He pulled out a small remote. He hit one of the buttons.

The screen on Luther’s television turned to gray static.

Luther folded his arms. “Have you forgotten? You signed a written agreement, and one of the stipulations--”

“--Was to ensure that you be given certain numbered channels, yes. I read it quite thoroughly; I assure you. But if you look closely, you will see that I did give you those channels. For instance, channel six--” David flipped over to the specified channel, wherein the picture returned. “See? You requested this one in particular, and here it is.”

Luther stared at images of an animated sheep walking on two legs through a very boxy-looking city.

“Normally, channel six is merely a boring network with daily soap operas and nightly news programs,” said David. “Fortunately, I knew you would not be interested in any of that, so instead, I had a special receiver installed in your television, and now your channel six is twenty-four hours of cartoons.”