Andrew J. Offutt - Spaceways 04 - Santana Enslaved

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r. THE SLAVE MIDNIGHT POSTURED AND ADMIRED HERSELF WHILE HER MASTER AND HIS
FRIEND WATCHED. She had never been so loaded with twinkling jewelry nor
dreamed of herself in such breathtaking splendor. Surely Cleopatra would have
been envious of the slave Midnight, once Quindy of the spacer Satana Her
fellow slave Love-fire, the former Capt. Hellfire, was hardly less resplendent
in multicolor crystal, pendants. (Love-fire needed that extra color, in fact,
to hide the whip marks. Drugs were not enough.) Both had knelt well and
submissively, writhing and thrusting boldly while their masters grew steadily
more drunk. It was then the two men, each proud of his slave and pleased with
the other's, decided to flaunt their exotic possessions. Leaning on the
jewel-flashing girls, they went out into the night: two reeling masters of
Survival and their incredibly gaudy women. Cecil B. De Mille would have been
envious.... SPACEWAYS #1 OF ALIEN BONDAGE#2 CORUNDUM'S WOMAN #3 ESCAPE
FROM MACHO #4 SATANA ENSLAVED PLAYBOY PAPERBACKS SPACEWAYS #4: SATANA
ENSLAVED Copyright (c) 1982 by John Cleve Cover illustration copyright (c)
1982 by PEI Books, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be
reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form by an
electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording means or otherwise without
prior written permission of the publisher. The poem Scarlet Hills copyright
(c) 1982 by Ann Morris; used by permission of the author. Published
simultaneously in the United States and Canada by Playboy Paperbacks, New
York, New York. Printed in the United States of America. Library of Congress
Catalog Card Number: 81-85828. First edition. Books are available at quantity
discounts for promotional and industrial use. For further information, write
to Premium Sales, Playboy Paperbacks, 1633 Broadway, New York, New York
10019. ISBN: 0-867-21111-3 First printing July 1982. A: All planets are not
shown. B: Map is not to scale, because of the vast distances between stars.
SCARLET HILLS Alas, fair ones, my time has come. I must depart your lovely
home- Seek the bounds of this galaxy To find what lies
beyond. (chorus) Scarlet hills and amber skies, Gentlebeings with loving eyes;
All these 1 leave to search for a dream That will cure the wand'rer in me. You
say it must be glamorous For those who travel out through space. You know not
the dark, endless night Nor the solitude we face. (reprise chorus) I know not
of my journey's end Nor the time nor toll it will have me spend. But 1 must
see what I've never seen And know what I've never known. Scarlet hills and
amber skies, Gentlebeings with loving eyes; All these I leave to search for a
dream That will cure the wand'rer in me. -Ann Morris 1 The city sleeps
below. 1 sigh For there dwells one, all testify, To match the maddest of
dream's desire. -Thomas Hardy Barso swept his down-covered arm in a broad
gesture that sent beautiful ripples through his iridescent tunic, while taking
in all of the arcology that was his city. "And so we have lived here in our
city inside the mountain, for eight hundred ninety revolutions," he said,
declaiming proudly. "Snug as lichen tucked in sandstone, secure inside a world
gone cold when our sun died. Survivors!" "Oh it's marvelous, my love," Janja
told the short, downy Knorman. "And such a lovely, perfectly self-sufficient
citadel of a city!" "Isn't it! Hard and substantial, Janjis. But not hard for
its inhabitants, oh no. Toasty warm; well lighted! All our wastes contained
and endlessly reused for our common good!" Janja looked at him as if he were a
god who had created all this himself. It was almost a worshipful look, and
Borg Barso swelled even more his tunicked chest- which was already massive by
her standards, for the oxygen content of Survival's air was considerably less
than twenty percent. 9 10 "And you are happy here, Janjis, aren't you?" "Oh
yes, my love! Who could not be? We all are happy here, Borg Barso!" She gazed
on him with doting eyes, slavish eyes. "We are so glad. I am rather fond of
you, you know, you strange hairless creature!" Noting what pleasure the words
seemed to give her, he kindly fondled her breast. It was shockingly firm-and
of course she was not hairless. The hair of her head was almost white as the
snow Outside, and her eyebrows were rather thick. She was not, however, of
Knor, and she was not coated all over with light brown down. "You are really
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not a bad slave at all, Janjis, and you are definitely improving." "I'm
trying, beloved master." "And you are both decorative and will be such a
valuable addition to our gene-pool." He laughed. "If only we could get you
with child, that is!" Janja pouted and thrust out her bosom, a portion of
which was precariously contained in the two strips of ultra-soft cloth knotted
behind her neck. "Oh I know," she said. "But. . . Borg Barso . . . my love . .
. should we not be trying harder? I mean-is it a waste to spend so much of
your wonderful seed to add protein to my diet?" He whirled and his hand was
moving with the momentum of the turn. His face showed no sign of anger but she
chermed. what was coming and had time to cringe. She took the buffeting
open-handed blow on her half-covered right breast, and made a little
high-voiced sound in her throat. She sank, whimpering and servile, chastened,
to her knees. Her head was bowed. The narrow strip of pale blue cloth that
depended from the woven cord circling her hips lay in folds between her
thighs, and was beautiful. "That sounded critical, my big-mouthed slut. Such
words are not for you to voice, nor to fill your pretty head with. Stop
talking such intelligent-sounding stupidity, girl, and get that nice big mouth
to work in the 11 way it best functions, wrapped around your indulgent
master's digger!" Nodding, on her knees, leaking soft tears of contrition for
having offended her lordly master, Janja pushed her head up under his tunic
and began licking him to hardness. "Flourish, Barso," a voice said. "Flourish,
Gebb," Barso told the passerby, and held back his groan of pleasure so as not
to demean himself by showing that a lowly slave could get to him so
swiftly. "Ah, that's good, darling little Love-fire," Torgex said, with his
fingers entwined in his slave's hair. With her kneeling this way, she was
indeed little, rather than taller than he. "Ahhh, that's good, yes. Yours is a
good mouth for sucking a man, Shleefeemis, sweet darling Love-fire!-and you do
know how to use it, sweet slut. Keep it-uh!-up. That's right, now hands behind
your back and suck, suck hard, hard, sweet topaz-tressed slut. Ooooh. Yes, oh
yes, yes. We are having company this night, Love-fire. Tranek, and Gaid, and
Bromek. Important men! Once we have eaten and you and Misnais have cleared
away the utensils and you have changed into your very most tempting attire, I
shall make them the luckiest men in Survival! I shall let each of them
experience your sweet digger-loving sucking mouth!" She could not sigh with
her mouth so full. Glowing, palpitant and delighted that her lordly master was
so pleased with her, the slave Love-fire, who had been the pirate Hellfire,
fondled his darling testicles and did her very best to swallow his beloved
erection. Immediately she turned her thought to the activities he promised for
later, and his mandate for her "very most tempting attire." How pleased he
obviously was with her, to wish to share her with others, important men! She
decided that she would wear the floor-length skirt that began so low on her
hips, with the bangles; 12 the aquamarine skirt that was slit five times
all the way to the hip-strap. And just the faceted crystal tip-caps above, she
thought, linked by the dainty chain of crystal beads behind her back and
between the lobes of her chest. Planning, she felt his tremors. Quickly she
linked her fingers behind her back and knelt up almost straight the way he
liked her, while he began lunging in and out of her widely ovaled
mouth. Unfortunately, once her master's lordly guests were suitably drunk that
night, Borg Bromek denigrated her lack of breasts-"milkers," as Knormen liked
to call them-despite the handsomely decorative nip-rings with their dangling
ice-pearls. And he refused her mouth. He took her rearwardly instead,
unprepared and dry, and though she tried hard she could not help crying out at
the pain of friction. Bromek liked that. He enjoyed her little cries as he
buggered the over-tall, under-fleshed strangeling. After they had left her
master was displeased as she knew he would be. He slapped her and added
weights to the nip-rings. He was justified, of course, and she wept for him.
She had shamed him. She spent the night chained to the foot of his bed, not
quite able to lie down. Naturally next day she was very loving and devoted
indeed. Trafalgar Cuw smiled at this latest one, and sighed. She was lovely,
again. They all were. This must be the seventeenth or eighteenth eager young
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woman they had sent him. He wished he had kept a tally! He could not remember
all their names, all these pretty and so-eager lovelies with their soft sweet
eyes and their sweet soft down. They were short, almost uniformly so at 143 to
145 sems,* seven to ten centimeters-usually-shorter * Four feet nine or ten
inches, Old Style. 13 than their men. Their Knormen. Few males of Survival
were taller even than Janja, who was taller than any female here. Trafalgar
looked upon this one, and smiled. Life certainly was good, in the underground
city of Survival! So long as he didn't assert himself, or try. But of course
that did not occur to him. He went to her and she smiled, lowering her head
respectfully and provocatively, and slid liquidly down onto her knees. She
wore a loosely slung sling bandeau of light red or deep pink, and a strip of
iridescent cloth before and behind. The strips were slung from the extremely
thin, delicate circles of polished flint that circled her hips. From the ring
piercing the outer surface of her left upper arm swung an identical chip,
flashing now and again when the light caught it. A nice touch, he thought. The
floor-length "skirt" was weighted in front with polished quartz in green and
smoky pink, to keep it firmly against her mound. "What's your name,
dear?" "Dear" he spoke in his own language, Erts. They didn't know what it
meant, of course, but his tone made it sound rather nice. Besides, it didn't
matter. He was not Borg Trafalgar, not "my lord," but females of Survival
learned early not to question males. She spoke to the floor, her face framed
by tumbling hair about the color of redwood, naturally streaked with beige.
"Shileele, Har Falgo." Always such soft liquid names, so feminine! Last night
it was Laleemis. And . . . Shulalee the night before, wasn't it, or had that
been Llullais? Lord lord, who could remember all their liquid f eminine
names? What a life! Each day he was interviewed two or three times while
secretaries worked away taking down every word, and he was walked about
through Survival the wondrously self-contained and self-sufficient, and each
night he soared with a new maiden. If he was more than pleased and remembered
a name to ask for again, he had but to say so. Back she would come on 14
another night. Pleased to be remembered and honored by his request, and even
more anxious to please. It was almost boring, his trying nightly to do his bit
for their needy gene-pool. Almost. Jisheemis wasn't, he mused with a smile as
he gazed down at Shileele. Damn, not another eager damned virgin! Tomorrow I
mean "next period" I'll ask for Jisheemis again. Lord lord, the enthusiasm of
that girl! Wearing loose silky black bra to enhance its breasts and skintight
trunks that showed off its penis and testicle, Cinnabar sat on the dais and
talked to itself. The dais, decorated with carefully halved geodes, was in a
front corner of the large banquet room. It was tiresome, this constant talking
to itself while all these sawed-off Knorman farts and their sawed-off busty
slaves dined and guzzled booze. But they loved it, the masters and their
women, and it was this or be punished-tortured, perhaps killed. Yes, Cinnabar
of Jarpi had been threatened with that. ("What good are you to us, weird
alien? You look almost human except for your height and ranginess and your
lack of bodily fur and your ugly cold-sun coloring. You are an alien! You
cannot breed with us. All those pretty milkers and a nice little cave between
those long shanks of yours, too. But-a digger and a single geode as well! But
useless, useless to us. You are not of us, not even like those others who
arrived with you. You cannot breed with us. No matter how great our need to
expand our gene-pool for the good of the commonweal, we want no such chromatic
chromosomes as yours!") So they consider me just not worth a fuck, Cinnabar
reflected, literally! But how the sawed-off idiots do love for me to talk for
their entertainment at their pre-orgy dinner parties. And keep talking!
15 That was the function of Cinnabar the Jarp in won-drously self-sufficient
Survival of Knor. They made no effort to ascertain what might be in its brain,
under that hair that was so very, so emphatically red. No, Cinnabar must talk.
Just talk, in the language of Jarpi, and without its translation
helmet. Cinnabar, who had been Raunchy of Jarpi off spacer Satana and who had
never thought it would miss its translahelm, kept talking. For the masters of
Survival. And the mastered. They were Survivors, the descendants of survivors
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who had taken refuge within a mountain on this Cold Hell of a planet they
called Knor. They worked to keep Surviving. They had Survived for almost a
thousand years-Knor. They claimed to like the monotony of their height and
their features and the almost uniform color of their hair and eyes, and yet
they talked a great deal of their desire and need to expand their gene-pool.
The need showed. They were the descendants of few, and not all those had been
capable of breeding, the unscientific assholes, Cinnabar added mentally. Death
lurked outside, in the keening wind beyond Survival's walls of natural stone.
Within were two castes: men and slaves. They weren't worth a damn at music and
writing fiction was forbidden, unless some of those males-for-males treatises
on the proper training and use and punishment of slaves were embellished. Art
was something they proudly claimed to have no tune for, other than their
working with precious and semi-precious stones; the making of jewelry. With
them that was an art indeed, even the mentally sneering Cinnabar had to admit.
No such beautiful and delicate, ornate jewelry must exist anywhere else along
the spaceways. They did not dance. Singing was unmanly, in Survival. Whistling
was too; too sybaritic for the males, who considered it a frivolity for their
womenfolk. Not worthy. Puckering the lips among the women was for
digger-sucking. 16 Yet they appreciated music, and the advent of Cinnabar
gave them an excuse. They need make no music; they need only listen. And so
they let Cinnabar live. (Exactly one senator had expressed a desire to have
the Jarp for a slave. The man was surely forty sems- four decimeters-shorter.
But the "orange thing" had a penis as well as a vagina, and that senator was
sneered at and muttered about. His motives had been much in question, and he
suffered loss of face. Now he never never so much as looked in the direction
of the orange thing from Outside.) Cinnabar became the property of the
commonweal. They let it live. They kept it around solely to talk during their
dinner parties, which always ended in too much drinking-among the men-and
usually in orgies. (No Survivor may drink before night, the law said, and
maintained further that no man could be held responsible for his sexual
appetites and actions while drunk. That way they freed themselves of their
exaggerated pride and machismo and enormous regard for keeping face-in a
tight, controlled pressure-chamber of a society that could afford neither
expansion nor violence. And alcohol was cheaper than cheap, and available to
all ... males.) Cinnabar talked in its own language, its translator taken from
it, and they considered that whistling art. Entertainment. Cinnabar gamed no
esteem from it; it was just something the orange thing did. Seasoned
spacefarer Cinnabar had become the dinner music of Survival. "Hey ladee lah
you're an ugly little bastard, ole Borg Gorso-o," Cinnabar whistled, "you
sawed-off fart-knocker. I'll bet your slicer-I-mean-digger is a nailfile
pitted like an asteroid and too small to satisfy a yearling grat! Now it's
true that I would enjoy the pointy warheads-I-mean-milkers of that whorish
little digger-mouther of yours tra-la-loo; to shove my goodole orange
digger-I-mean-slker up her till it clogs her stupid throat from the
insi-i-hi-hide. Ah bugger, bugger 17 you all and all-all, my charming 'hosts'!
And you, dear bandy-legged Borg Gamax the macho idiot with all your esteem and
respect! You couldn't satisfy that limp-eyed combustion chamber of yours who
keeps throwing me hot-eyed lickety looks tra-la, if you continued as Director
of Recycling for a thousand years rickety-tickety-tin! She probably has a
stash or a cave or tunnel, as you macho fatheads so delicately term vaginas,
that is all sere and desiccating from acute lack of use. And nipples doubtless
limp and black as raisins from your constant pinchings! Of course tra-la
Garnax you ugly fuzzy son of a Sekhari gamel I wouldn't kick that big-eyed
fat-bottomed mighty mammaried hust out of bed tra-la. Not till I'd made her
soho-hore O-soarr so high she'd bang her fluffy head on the lid of your
oversize cave of a 'city' and forever after prefer a limp thumb-size dildo-oho
to you-hooo. Hey nonny la-le-lo! O-ohh . . . this is an anile world of
hyper-macho assholes and I'd like to bugger it bugger it my dearest darling
masters and all you little under-attired small-brained weak-mouthed
tired-tongued cave-tunnel-1-lls! But I in my wisdom know you futhermuckers
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have done something real-1-lly nasty to Janja's and Hellfire's (Love-fire oh
boy-oh hoho tralelo!) and Quindy's and Trafalgar's heads not to mention their
nice warm smooth bodies you creeps use and use and I'll bet my
one-better-than-two-of-yours ball it's that soupy sweet-alcoholic stuff you
make so-o-o-ho-ho sure I drink every morning and night hey nonny NO-O! If only
la-la you knew! It doesn't affect a big sturdy plasteel-consti-tutioned
bisexual hermaphroditic native of Jarpi, garden spot of the cosmo-ho-hose! Ah
but one of these day-ay-ays, you anile mange-crotched
furred-like-a-beagle's-head double-stupid sawed-ofE little fart-knockers and
knart-fockers, I'll find a way to get one of them out of your heavy-handed
clutches. Then-n-n we'll cut off all your furry li'l slicers you call
'diggers' and give them to all those fawning furry pitiful fitipul Slavies you
mighty 18 Sons of Survivors call females! And toodle-wheet, you-" And
Cinnabar talked on, whistled on, and on, dinner music, a one-creature chamber
orchestra, sweet background music for the downy diners of Survival. "Oh I'm so
glad that poor ugly orange thing came to us," Borgis Garnax-Meeshais told her
noble lord. "Its sweet music is such an asset to our gatherings!" "It's just
whistling," her husbandly master and masterly husband told her, slapping the
bare weirdly down-less and gleamingly, intriguingly black bottom of their
host's new servant to speed her and her jug of punch on her way along the long
table's periphery. "That's the way the poor inferior homely creature talks, in
what passes for its native 'language.' Or so Falgo says, the hulking weirdo."
He was looking sidewise after the slave, thinking rather wistfully of how
fortunate Boskar was to have gained that most exotic of women. "Well, I do
think it's lovely music, my sweet lord and master," Meeshais was saying, as if
Garnax were listening. "What pleasant stories it must be telling in its own
tongue!" "Stories? That's highly doubtful, dear Borgis," Gedd said from
Meeshais's other side. "It can't really be language, after all. Just its form
of communication with its own weird kind." Her husband glanced across her at
Gedd. "Only a stupid alien, called a Jarp," Garnax told him. "With an
excavator no bigger than your finger, poor thing!" Both men laughed and
continued the nightly ritual of sluicing down their throats with Survival's
greatest asset, its marvelously absolutely free alcohol. The triple-earringed
woman between them kept her pleasant submissive smile in place. But I wonder
if it knows what to do with its digger, Meeshais thought, and wondered too
what Garnax would do to her if he knew about such a thought in the mind of his
dutiful and ever-decorative wife. 19 A little frisson ran over her and she
shot the Jarp another look, well aware that her husband's gaze was directed at
their host Boskar's new acquisition. Like polished onyx she was, with a
marvelous contrast of hair the color of the best citrine. (The Jarp was
commonweal property, given its assignments by Social Director Brond, based on
the earliest request. Or so Brond said. Idly Meeshais wondered how the poor
thing must feel, not only unable to communicate but without a specific master
to guide its life. Maybe Brond acted as master to it.) (On the other hand, the
fascinated Meeshais thought, tracing her finger over the unending silver-wire
ara-besquery of her bracelet, the Jarp could not be said to be a woman, even
though it possessed breasts and- they said-a vagina. It also, after all,
visibly-she stole another glance-possessed a penis and scrotum. Could it be
part master, part slave? (What an utterly fascinating creature! And what
beautiful music. Its soul must be beautiful, Meeshais thought.) Her lordly
master, meanwhile, was watching the new slave. Now she was pouring for Senator
Gaid. The latter was not-quite-idly fondling the slave's large, obscenely
hairless pubes. The lips were all bulgily swollen around either side of the
tight strap that ran down between them and up between her buttocks. Boskar had
cleverly chosen a thin strap of white that provided eye-catching contrast with
her unbelievable, estimable and yet slicky-looking skin. The strap was
securely attached to her corset, fore and aft, and it was taut. From the strap
a pair of nice little bells dangled to tinkle between her shining black
thighs. The sound was muted, thin and pleasant. Another such dainty bell
tinged softly from the crystalline ring that pierced her right areola, just at
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the base of the nipple. It was a nice touch, that gold-flecked transparent ,
20 ring carved from a single piece of rutilated quartz. It had been sanded
and polished to the smoothness of metal. Stone-working was superb in Survival,
and the working of various non-precious forms of quartz was a hobby Garnax
shared with Boskar. Thus Garnax knew that the slim circle had been opened with
meticulous care, to make an aperture only a couple of millimeters wide. Next,
either tip of that niche had been sharpened, into a needly prong. With a lot
of tugging and prying and forcing-and tears from the girl, of course-the ring
could be forced into a good-size pinch of skin, which bulged before it. A
little extra pressure applied just so, and the prongs sank in. Soon the ring
was rooted. The hard stone, harmless to flesh, was there for good. And it was
a nicely handsome decoration that twinkled and flashed and also tended to keep
the nipple attractively fat. Their host's wife had led the girl in by a leash
attached to that ring, and handed the leash's end to Boskar. He and the slave
had then demonstrated her obedience and truly beautiful submissiveness. Proud
Boskar! Fortunate Boskar! The whispered word was that this slave received no
daily libation. But that was just whispers and hard to believe as well. Garnax
did not believe it. How could this one be so like the women of Survival in
that regard, and so different from her fellows, the other captives? Why would
she willingly accept a woman's proper place, when the other strangelings with
her did not? It made a good story. Garnax watched her while his wife cast
glances at their entertainment from time to time, and Garnax felt lust, and
envy of Boskar. And Cinnabar . . . talked. 2 The qualifications for
self-government in society are not innate. They are the reward of habit and
long training. -Thomas Jefferson "But damn it all, sir," Tobodex almost
shouted. "No matter how we come at him with our queries and compare our
transcriptions of his replies, the alien Falgo says the same-that the most
noble Senator Torgex's slave was captain of their craft! That her name was
indeed Hellfire, not Love-fire or anything like. That the noble lord Boskar's
slave was her second in command!" His voice rang back from the carven stone
walls of the chamber of the Thirty-two, and he stared about at them from
Knoresely deep-set eyes of soft hazel. "Falgo says that he was not, ever,
captain of any such craft-he is or was merely a spy among them. She is the one
whose knowledge we should be seeking with these daily interviews,
Senators!" Borg Senator Gaid rose stormily to his feet. He was the tallest
among them at 164 centimeters-a meter point six-four-and invariably wore
uncommonly long robes even out of this august chamber to emphasize that
height. Now he was scandalized and wore his righteously offended look like a
crown of superiority. 21 22 "Query a woman, Senators? Ask and record the
opinions and 'wisdom' of a female, of whatever species, and one not fit for
reproduction at that? I protest even the intimation in this hall, my fellows
of the Thirty-two! What could we possibly learn from a woman?- The most noble
and distinguished Senator Torgex's slave?" Those last words were well chosen;
several men chuckled. Senator Torgex was among them, and he continued to smile
smugly. "Far be it from me to tell," he said mildly, and more of the
Thirty-two laughed, all in their gold-ocher robes and sapphire-set
headbands. True, Torgex was inclined to exaggerate, to brag. But Gaid had
enjoyed Torgex's brassy-haired alien exotic. He too had stated without
equivocation that she was extraordinarily good with that almost lipless mouth
of hers. As for Gaid-he was well known to be a milker-lover. What he meant by
"not equipped for reproduction" was that Love-fire was not equipped to nurse
children. Which was ridiculous; who knew what lactation might do to her chest,
or for it? Still-Tobodex was speaking plain heresy! "But-good my fellow
senators! They are different from us," Tobodex expostulated, in frustration
that was read as unworthy desperation for his failing appeal. What a stand to
take, for one who called himself not only a senator, a Descendant, but a
Knorman! "What can it hurt to try? It does not diminish us as men- she is not
of our people and therefore reflects not at all upon us. One or two interviews
with our distinguished compatriot Torgex's new slave, that is all I urge. An
application of the scientific attitude, my noble lords of the Thirty-two. She
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might be of value to us!" The words were greeted with a staring silence. Into
it Torgex said, "She is of value to me," in an austere voice just loud enough
to to be heard in that chamber of wonderful acoustics, and this time even more
senators laughed knowingly. 23 Torgex, meanwhile, resolved to increase
Love-fire's daily libation. He would double the sleek-skinned slut's dosage,
by All-father and the Inner Fires! "But hardly of value for her head above the
mouth, eh Senator?" someone called from among the aides, and that time nearly
everyone laughed, senators and their aides alike. They were the best
thirty-two of Survival's controlled population of precisely six eights of
thousands. They had to be the best; each was after all a Descendant of the
original Survivors' Directorate of four hands of men. Those first thirty-two
had enabled the chosen few to continue living while Knor effectively died,
Outside. Now for nearly nine Knorese centuries they had lived and lived well
here within the planet, heated by the planet's own unquenched Inner Fires and
guided by the Thirty-two. Tobodex was talked down and voted down and shunned
later. He was a Descendant and could not be replaced, but he could be made to
feel distance, to let him know he had lost face. He could be squeezed. As a
matter of fact his younger brother was an eminently sensible man just past his
youth. Doubtless he had a better head and more respect for the Thirty-two and
all that was Survivalish. Violence was forbidden and all but unknown in
Survival, whose confines could not countenance it. Still, there were some who
thought all would be better off if Tobodex should happen to fall into the
Flamepit. What had they to lose, the idiot had dared demand, and in this very
chamber of polished redstone! What to lose! Why, their whole society! The few
who had fought and striven and Survived Sundeath-so it was called, though the
sun lived as little more than a glowing cinder-they knew! They knew what the
position of the stronger sex must be in an eternal struggle for survival of
looming racial death. And they knew what must be the position also 24 of
the weaker sex! Tobodex was challenging not just the Thirty-two, but
manhood-Knormanhood. Not just Knormanhood, but the social order of Survival
and thus all Knor. For Survival was all there was of life on Knor. Naturally
the slave Love-fire did not know why she was hair-bound on her toes and
belly-whipped before being left for two full hours that evening, or why her
master was so rough in his callous use of her. Still, she later received an
unprecedented second mug of delicious lipith, and she knew that she was seen
to, and wanted despite her lacks, and that sustained her. She lived for Torgex
who was important, and he had taken time and trouble to discipline and use
her. That sustained the slave called Shleefemis: Love-fire, who knew after all
that she need not know the reason for discipline. There was more than one
anomaly in Survival, Cinnabar reflected. It was alone in its cubicle, provided
with sweetened water to restore its throat for tonight's gig. There was
nothing to do and nothing to see. Cinnabar pondered Knor, Knormen, and
Survival. Cinnabar knew that their science was advanced in some areas and
sadly lacking in others-biology/ eugenics, for instance-but there seemed more
wrong with their story of Survival than "mere" scientific ignorance. Was it
merely a legend? Was it a deliberate lie? Was the truth lost in the past, or
known to some here; locked up somewhere in their unwieldy records system that
had nothing to do with silicon chips? Was it possible that they had come here
from somewhere else altogether-their ancestors, that is-as spacefarers?-- and
been trapped, and taken shelter here? Or was it possible that their tale of
the founding of Survival actually covered centuries and centuries? Perhaps
their sun had not cooled, consuming its hydrogen and then going on to burn its
helium in a cooler fire; perhaps there had been some mighty occurrence.
Something from outside this sun-system? Something from within it,
perhaps-perhaps their own technological efforts, in their distant past? (That
seemed to make some sense, the Jarp thought. That would account for their
desire to forget it, cover it up, if they had upset their own sun or their
planet's position. And it would account for their dread of change and of
science, progress. Perhaps they suffered from a massive racial
guilt?) Something, Cinnabar thought. As to their story: Knormen had lived on
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their planet for thousands and thousands of years-they said. (Even that was
wrong, Cinnabar was sure. It was millions, if they were native to this world.
But even if it could speak fluent Survivalish, the Jarp was not about to try
to tell these macho swell-heads anything.) They had progressed from hunters to
farmer societies to civilization. Industry had awakened and then
industrialization, and the civilization had risen. Knormen found leisure at
last. Like the dwellers on other worlds circling other stars, they deepened
their studies of the sciences. They learned enough-they said-to suspect the
horror that was coming, with regard to their sun. Naturally most refused to
believe it. Predictably, the governments on Knor argued and diddled and
dad-died, while heat raged over their world. Amid all the squeal and jabber, a
wealthy few began preparing for disaster. They talked and planned for what
they came to call Sundeath, though that was not quite an accurate description.
Those men expanded their number to take in scientists, and then a few
engineers. Eventually they included a few of the most trustworthy of
laborers. The sun-Survivors said-faded from its new brightness back to
yellow-orange and then orange, consuming its finite supply of hydrogen.
Meanwhile, an elite expanded the caverns of this mountain in a triumph of
Knorese engineering. Meanwhile, supposed leaders and 26 savants still
pondered and argued their predicament, and the actions they should take.
Sixteen "solution" projects were commenced, in sixteen different directions.
"If a scientific heresy is ignored or denounced by the general public," Asimov
had stated, "there is a chance it may be right. If a scientific heresy is
emotionally supported by the general public, it is almost certainly
wrong." The projects under way were wrong, in one way or another. The argued
thesis was right. Knor was about to become mighty cold. It happened. Life on
Knor was doomed, far from a surly red sun, despite the outcries and prayers
and "efforts" of those who had spent too long doubting, and then wrangling
over what they must do. The temperature declined steadily, on Knor. The poles
grew and spread their ice-caps like conquering armies in quest of territory. A
few survived. Those who had begun preparing so long before, while others
gabbled. No matter who the males, or why, or their ages. Some were old by
then, and some were older than that. All of them were men, Knormen, who had
the wherewithal and the foresight; those who could. They reached hard-nosed
decisions. Those became one decision, since unity was essential. Surely there
must have been some powerful dictator of magnetic persuasive abilities even
over these "elite," Cinnabar thought. At any rate, in acceding to the
Decision, some abandoned their wives. Some even ordered kidnappings. They knew
that the "victims" were in truth the Chosen, the most fortunate women on Knor.
They would survive . . . Survive. And so to their impregnable, geothermally
heated and lighted haven they took only young females. They were men, and they
chose as men. They chose the best-looking, very most attractive potential
breeders for a handsome continuing race. Sure of themselves as the elite,
demonstrably the only smart men on Knor, the 27 men assumed that they would
supply the intelligence genes for their offspring. Knormen would
survive! Those original Survivors were men of wealth and power, even of
genius, in a few cases. Their attractiveness or its lack did not matter, for
they were men of wealth and power. That power was many times magnified; only
they had haven within a planet that was freezing, dying. The females were
chosen-the Chosen. Their survival was assured. So was their status. On par
with a carpet, Cinnabar mused, but that was going too far. The uniformly
beauteous females of Survival were more aptly compared with pets. Handsome
pets, and well trained and well disciplined in a carefully controlled "city"
inside the planet. An ark of survival; an arcology. Marquis de Sade, who was
far from the monster he had been considered, far less monster than the mass
murderer Napoleon who had him shut up in an asylum for political reasons
(meaning fear) . . . Donation Alphonse Francois de Sade would have been
delighted with Survival. Perhaps he'd have wanted even more women, rather than
the original Survivors' decision to include three per male. Never mind the
emotional response akin to a knee tapped with a rubber hammer. Was that not
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the male way? It was what they did. Now close onto a thousand years-ess had
passed; almost nine hundred years-Knor. Expansion space was nil and so
breeding was controlled, in the arcology called Survival. The number of males
was controlled to preserve the status quo and a society that was almost free
of violence. Never mind how it was controlled, with a greedy zeal akin to the
limiting of entrants to medical schools, elsewhere. Males were held to thirty
percent of the population of Survival, where size and available space was very
finite indeed. And females were held in ... their place. In Survival. 28
They lived here-existed here. Survivors, on or rather in a planet whose
surface was a frozen enemy to them. Now all semblance of their cities was
buried under decameters, perhaps kilometers of ice and snow. The wood brought
in 890 Knorese years ago had long since responded to a combined
saline-algae-silicon treatment and become as one with the stone of their
cavern world. Those plants, lichen and fungi that grew and could be cultivated
in such an environment, fed the Survivors well. Naturally that science and art
progressed. Their minimal energy needs were more than met geothermally. Water
was simple, because it was simple to.pipe a controlled measure of heat upward
and pipe down water from the ice it melted. The things these Knormen could and
did make of stone, from agate and flint and sandstone to granite, were
ingenious and astonishing, and often consummately beautiful. Once food supply
was stabilized at a guarantee beyond the merely adequate, they explored other
uses for those materials their circumscribed world provided. Now their ability
to create fabrics had leaped beyond that of other races that were technically
far more advanced. Despite the fact that they used almost no machinery, there
was no lack of leisure time in Survival. A realization of the danger of
leisure in such a straitened society led to a banning of anything approaching
industrialization. People had to be kept busy if they were to be kept out of
trouble. Survivors did their mining by hand. Individuals made their own
clothing and prepared their own food and cut their own stones, to stay busy.
Those stones were wrested from within the mountain primitively, solely by hand
and hand-held tools. Jewelry was their art. Other arts did not flourish, at
all. "We are here for all time," the Survivors said. Cinnabar could understand
that meant they dared not progress much further. Yet Cinnabar heard them make
references to having 29 been Outside. Through the airlocked tunnels, onto
the frozen surface of Knor. And the Jarp heard no references to the creatures
it knew were out there. Squat, stumpy-legged bipeds covered with long hair.
Creatures almost perfectly adapted to Knor, with their low profiles and thick
dark fur shaggy on their thick bodies. Such creatures had captured the crew of
spacer Satana. Yet there was no sign of them, no mention of them in Survival,
where the crew of Satana awoke. As slaves. Slaves, Cinnabar mused cheerlessly.
Captain Hell-fire, First Mate Quindy, Janja, short as these sawed-off
masterly-bastardly Knormen, and Trafalgar Cuw. Slaves. Cinnabar was a slave,
too, but in a different way. For one thing, it was not a sexual object-under
what it suspected was the excuse or Knorese wishful thinking about their
damned genetic pool. The sawed-off furbag fur-asses aren't about to impregnate
three women of another species, even if Janja and Quindy and Hellfire hadn't
been implanted with an anti-conception emitter! A grat or a Sekhari
rock-lizard would do as much for the gene-pool these rectums yammer about! The
Jarp's position here, however, was entirely different in another way. Since
the alternative was likely death, Cinnabar was a slave by ... call it choice.
Until it learned more, and made some sort of plan, and found opportunity to
introduce a bit of nice violence to Survival. Lots of it, preferably! The Jarp
knew that its companions were slaves, but not by choice. Whatever had been
done to or was being used daily on the others-the libation of that lipith
stuff?-to keep them such accepting slaves ... it was not effective on the
Jarp. Its constitution was different, its metabolism was different. It was
humanoid, not human; not a Galactic. The others were changed. They were
different individuals altogether. They seemed to accept the base 30
situation and philosophy of the Knormen. They believed. Somehow they had
become part of the systemry of Survival; somehow they were part of
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Survival. Even Hellfire was as Survivalish as any of these cream-color,
whiskery, thick-mopped, small-chinned, four-digited, sawed-off Knormen with
their wide- and deep-set eyes and their blunt, down-turned little noses with
the tiny nostrils. And their covering of fine, extremely short down. Males and
females alike, Knormen seemed oddly cool," as if their natural body
temperature was considerably lower than Galaetics' or Jarps'. It was
Cinnabar's theory that this was because the hair was fine, and quite short,
but dense and clinging enough to hold the Survivors' natural heat inside,
close to their skins. That's why 1 stay chilly most of the time, Cinnabar
thought with bitterness. These dummies don't have the sense to realize I need
more warmth than they do. Of course with their arrogance, they probably just
don't give a vug. Why worry about the comfort of the "orange thing?" We'd all
be sick as Reshi priests if we weren't immune to more things than have been
discovered! Meanwhile, Cinnabar pretended to be as slavish as the others. To
stay alive, it pretended. It wasn't easy. Cinnabar wanted very much to
introduce violence to Survival. Were they so stupid? Or was it plain lying?
The Jarp saw holes in the story of what they called the "death" of their sun,
and the founding of this mammoth cavern town-called-city. Holes big enough to
take a spaceship through. Was the real story lost in time, or deliberately
suppressed? Are they so stupid as to think that a star cools within a jew
years-and that cats can impregnate dogs? Cinnabar understood their talk,
because they had taught it to, along with the other captives. In the Jarp's
case they seemed to have forgotten, because there was no way it could reply in
their language. They might 31 have learned its tongue; they didn't care to
try. Arrogance was a natural personality trait of Knormen. Cinnabar's
translation helmet was of no value. It was ingeniously and specifically
devised to translate the whistling burbling tweeting tootling language of
Jarpi into Galactic language, Erts. The Knormen were not interested in
learning that, either. Knormen were the Chosen! The eminently superior.
Survivors! The best- masters. What could they possibly learn from others, to
any profit? Their mental set was strange. They could not be considered logical
beings. None seemed to consider the study of another language, even of an
obviously alien creature such as the Jarp, as a practical use of their
dangerous leisure time. Much less as an application of a science they could
afford. Cinnabar listened, and reflected. And Cinnabar bided its time. And
whistled for its daily bread. 3 / think all pirates are short a few jets
somewhere- if they weren't they wouldn't be pirates. -LaVerne Thorndyke,
Galactic Patrol The nuttiest, dopiest, wooziest planet in the galaxy -we would
draw something like that to set down on for repairs, wouldn't we? -L.
Thorndyke The brass-haired woman called Hellfire had acquired spaceship Satana
as a result of biology, pheromones/ the sexual imperative, and the former
captain's stupidity. She warned him when he took her on as crew. She had been
certain to let him know that she was lesbian, exclusively. Furthermore and in
addition, she didn't really like men. He looked at the long, lean, rather
mean-looking young woman and nodded. He needed her as crew, and so he accepted
her terms; it wasn't as if they were mandates, or that he was interested in
her. He agreed. And they went into space. After four or so months between
worlds, all that time combined with biology and pheromones and his own
stupidity. He not only made a pass, he pushed it. So she killed him. 32
33 She had little choice, then. She decided to flee. The parsec abyss was vast
beyond imagining; other ships had vanished along the spaceways. Several other
crew were ready to join her. One resisted. That one did not survive. Without
much choice and with a natural inclination besides, Hellfire turned pirate.
Her first raid was successful, and she was in business. The ship was hers, and
she renamed it Satana. An independent mer-chanter. To a degree, she
nourished. Quindy, disgraced former military space officer, dyed a refulgent
black by choice, had joined her some time later. Her advent was a stroke of
luck for Captain Hellfire, pirate. Quindy was academy trained. Quindy was also
the competent one, the stabilizer Hellfire needed. Quindy was just not a
leader and had no desire to try. Hellfire found her to be an odd mix.
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摘要：

r.THESLAVEMIDNIGHTPOSTUREDANDADMIREDHERSELFWHILEHERMASTERANDHISFRIENDWATCHED.Shehadneverbeensoloadedwithtwinklingjewelrynordreamedofherselfinsuchbreathtakingsplendor.SurelyCleopatrawouldhavebeenenviousoftheslaveMidnight,onceQuindyofthespacerSatanaHerfellowslaveLove-fire,theformerCapt.Hellfire,washar...

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