Voyage Across the Stars (18 page)

Morales pointed—her hands were surprisingly delicate—toward a white stone building. It was also one-story, but it was more imposing than the others of the community. Beside the building was a cooling plant, breathing a plume of vapor into the humid air. “And maybe some variety for us, too. What do you say, mister?” She popped Levine in the ribs and gave him a simultaneous leer. Her expression seemed to rock the Captain as much as the physical contact.

Brandt, the third of the greeting team, was brunette like the leader, but smaller and with fox-sharp features. “We’ve summoned citizens who might want to participate in, ah, direct methods,” she said. Her voice was prim. Brandt kept her eyes focused so that they did not make contact with the eyes of any of the four men. “That isn’t by any means all the, ah, women on Erlette. In the time we’ve been alone, we’ve made certain adjustments, of course.”

Morales gave a coarse snicker and prodded Levine again.

Blushing but undeterred, the prim woman continued. “You and your crew will find an adequacy of entertainment, however. In exchange, we will expect cooperation with our efforts to increase the permanent gene pool.” She too pointed toward the sperm bank. is no risk, of course. But we are aware that some males import an emotional significance to what is only a mechanical act, the transfer of sperm.”

“Ah, Mayor,” Slade said. “Sirs—” That was wrong, wasn’t it, hell and blast this situation. “There’s still the problem of our navigators. Our lack of them. Is there any chance that you have qualified people that might be hired on a temp—”

Rodrigues touched Slade’s forearm to halt him. “Mister . . . ?”

“Slade,” the tanker said. “I’m—well, it’s complicated.”

“Mister Slade,” the woman resumed, “there’s a great deal about the future to be discussed. Right now, there are organizational details to be handled. This is—” she turned up her palms with a smile—“an embarrassment of riches for us, incredible riches. But I’ll call on you later this evening, if you don’t mind. We’ll be alone at my home, and we can work out a number of things.”

The prim brunette beside the Mayor made a moue.

The memory of Mayor Rodrigues’ smile lingered long after the trio of women had driven away.

“You know, Captain Slade,” said Snipes, the ship’s tall, bearded Administrative Officer, “I really respect you.”

Slade put down the laser pencil. He had just completed soldering the final lead to a post on the non-functioning commo unit. Slade’s palms were sweaty. It scared the bleeding cop out of him to work with electrical blasting caps. Even before they were inserted in the block of high explosive, they could shatter your hands or your eyes if something went wrong. And the one poor bastard Slade remembered, the fellow who had three caps in a front pocket of his trousers at the spaceport on Friesland . . . A maintenance crew had switched on a Transit generator for testing. The powerful field induced enough of a current in the leads to detonate the blasting caps.

The screen on the upper wall of the shop was fed by one of the external vision blocks. There was nothing in particular to see. Erlette’s port and capital were quiet except for light vehicular traffic in the dusk.

“The way you run these, these soldiers,” Snipes continued. He was a good-sized man, one of those who used the exercise machines more as a matter of religion than of muscle tone. “But without getting, well, hardened like most men in your position would be.”

“Now, do you have some luggage that’ll hold all this?” Slade asked. “A box might do if it had to, but I’d like something that looked like it was a change of clothing without anybody asked. And not military.”

The crewman glanced at the assembly, phony electronics and ten very real kilos of plastic explosive. “Well,” he said uncertainly, “there’s my own leave bag. I guess you could borrow it.”

“Might I?” said the tanker. “Fast?”

Snipes was back in less than a minute with the bag. It was a nice one, self-adjusting to hold its contents firmly but without crushing them. Slade began to pack it with care. First the gray, taped blocks of explosive, then the guts of the commo unit. All of them were connected by looped wires and the blasting caps buried in the mass of explosive.

“I can tell,” said Snipes, “that you understand women, too.” His mouth worked. “I swear, there was no decent woman ever born but my mother. Lord rest her soul.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” said Slade. He was arranging the leads with great care. “I was set to be married once. Turned out she married my brother Tom . . . but the way I was then, I wouldn’t say Marilee was indecent. Or even wrong.”

“But it made you look at yourself, didn’t it?” Snipes pressed. He reached out and touched the hand with which Slade was shifting the charge. “Made you realize there were things, that for you—for a real man like you—a woman couldn’t do as well as a man.”

“Tell the truth, Johnsie,” the tanker said, “it was more the Slammers that did that.” Slade folded over the top of the bag and watched it seal itself into the smallest six-sided prism that would hold its present contents. “In twenty years under Hammer, I met curst few women I’d trust to close my back in a firefight. For killing, I’ll take a man any day.”

He stood up. Snipes extended his arm to hold the fingers in contact, but the thought behind the Admin Officer’s eyes was changing. “And that’s fair, I guess,” Slade went on, “because for screwing, I don’t have a darned bit of use for men.” He smiled. “Most other duties, I’m pretty well neutral.”

“Well, why
are
you still on board, then?” Snipes demanded. “You could be out there, having a, having an
orgy
like the rest of them. Couldn’t you? Even Webb. ‘Come on Johnsie, it won’t hurt. They’ll be so
willing.
’
It just makes me. . . .” He trailed off with a grimace.

Slade was studying the view screen, partly to avoid looking at his companion’s face. “Well,” the tanker said, “I checked some of the old briefing cubes in the hold luggage you found for me. Didn’t like what I learned.” He shrugged. “Most everybody else had gone off already, like you say. There wasn’t any point in raising a fuss then. So I—” He smiled again, tense with pre-battle nerves. The apparatus was complete and he had nothing to occupy his mind but the future. “I called my date and told her I’d need a couple extra hours to clear up some business. Which was true.”

Slade wiped his hands very carefully with a solvent towel from the dispenser on the bulkhead. The skin of his hands prickled for a moment as it was cleaned. The skin of his neck and biceps continued to prickle for reasons unconnected with the towel. “She ought to be—yeah. I think that might be Delores right now.”

Slade shook himself to loosen his muscles. “Take care, trooper,” he said. He wore a cape against the chill and beneath the cape a civilian suit of brilliant silk from T’ien. The only military touch was a heavy belt on which a commo unit balanced the weight of a slung wallet.

On the screen, Delores got out of the same small bus she had arrived in earlier. This time she was alone in the vehicle. The tall woman began walking toward the vision block over the bridge hatch, growing on the screen. The garment she wore covered but did not hide her breasts, even in the screen’s blurred image.

“Hold the fort till I get back,” the tanker called over his shoulder. As his boots echoed down the corridor, Snipes heard him add, “Won’t say I’m not used to the work, but it’s a curst strange context.”

Mayor Rodrigues’ house was a low dome sunk a meter deep in the soil. The skylights, now shuttered, would not open without noise. There was no door except for the one which the woman now opened onto a flight of steps.

“Ah, you don’t have a, a roomate?” Slade asked huskily.

The tall brunette smiled. “Not tonight,” she said. “Not unless you want one.” Rodrigues stepped to the tanker. She swept his cape clear with her arms before she squeezed as much of her length against him as their position made possible. Slade shifted awkwardly at the woman’s weight and strength. He returned the hungry kiss and felt his groin return it also, despite his tension.

“Come, dearest,” Delores said. She broke away to lead Slade down the short flight of stairs. Her fingers felt warm and moist on his. “You don’t know how long I’ve wanted this.”

Slade paused to lock the door. A twist of the handle set bolts in both transom and threshold.

“Some things I don’t like disturbed,” he muttered, nervous and seemingly embarrassed. His luggage was in the bus outside. Slade had not wanted to call attention to the case by bringing it inside at once.

The room they stood in was the whole front half of the circular dwelling. There was a table and a variety of cushioned benches for seating. The floor was of rush mats, fresh and green-smelling. In the wall bisecting the interior were three doors. Two of them were ajar. Slade could see the corner of a low bed in the center room. The room to the left had a tiled interior, surely a bathroom though the fixtures were of unfamiliar style. The third door would lead to the kitchen, closed off for no reason other than its inappropriateness to the intended activity.

Probably.

Delores was in Slade’s arms again. His left hand flicked the brooch holding his cape. The fabric slithered away from his shoulders. The tanker’s belt gear pressed against the woman’s thrusting belly. She backed off, panting, and reached for the belt hook.

Slade caught her fingers with one hand. “Just a second, darling,” he muttered. His free hand tucked down the indigenous lace of her blouse so that he could kiss one broad, dark nipple. “Just a second,” he repeated as he straightened. He walked quickly to the right-hand door. One hand reached into his slung wallet.

“The bathroom’s the other way,” Delores said. She did not sound concerned, only out of breath. She was reaching behind her for the blouse fasteners.

Slade opened the door, onto the empty kitchen as he had expected. “Oh, to hell with that anyway,” he said as he strode back to the woman. It was not particularly necessary that his movements make sense; only that they be seen as non-threatening to a woman in the Mayor’s present circumstances. “Here,” the tanker said as Dolores nuzzled his throat, “let me help with the blouse.”

She turned willingly. As willingly, she extended her hands behind her. She gave a throaty chuckle as Slade guided the hands to his groin, and she did not first realize when the tanker taped her wrists that the program had changed abruptly.

“Dearest?” the woman said in puzzlement as she turned back to Slade. “If you like this, we can, of course . . . anything. But I hoped first . . . ?”

“Here, love,” Slade said. He lifted the tall woman onto a bench. She still did not object, though she was frowning. “Just for a moment,” he added as he taped her ankle to one leg of the bench. It was solid wood, fifteen or twenty kilos; heavy enough to keep Rodrigues from jumping quickly to a hidden weapon or communications device.

The tanker was breathing hard. His body had told no more lies than his victim’s body had. “Via.” he said. “Via.” He drew the pistol from his wallet and held the small weapon loose in his hand. “Don’t pull against that,” Slade went on with a nod toward the obvious strain of the woman against her wrists behind her. “It’s freight tape. You can cut it, and alcohol’ll release the adhesive clean. But you couldn’t pull it apart with tractors. The loops are tight enough that it won’t help you to tear your skin loose.”

“But
why?”
Delores said. She did not struggle for the moment, but her body was tensed for a last hysterical burst before expected death convulsed her. “Donald, almost anything. . . . If not me, then
somebody
on Erlette will—want whatever you want. Willingly.”

Slade sat down on another bench, facing his captive. “I was on Sphakteria,” he said. “Were you?”

Rodrigues shook her head without comprehension of either the words or what was happening to her. Her blouse hung free of one of the breasts it had not hidden very well to begin with.

“I was, the Slammers were,” the tanker went on. “Both sides pretty well financed. We got a book from Central on a dozen or so merc units operating against us.”

Delores’ eyes began to widen. She tensed still further.

“You won’t be hurt,” Slade said sharply. In his calmer voice of moments before, he continued, “But you’re right, there was a company of scouting specialists from Erlette. All women and ready to prove they had more balls than any man they were going to run into.” Slade shrugged. “The background, though. . . . All the men on Erlette had died, not a few years before from a sex-linked plague, but thirty-odd years back even then. And they’d been killed by the women.”

“Don, none of that’s true!” the Mayor gasped. “At least, I mean about the men here on—”

“Can it,
honey,” Slade said. “I’m not going to hurt you, you hear?” He glared at the woman until she subsided. “It was true ten, twelve years ago when I heard it, and it’s true now. Word was, no men were allowed to live on Erlette since that—incident. There was a sperm bank and normal reproduction to keep up the population at a viable level. . . . but male offspring got deep-sixed at birth.”

The tanker shrugged again. “That’s your business,” he said. “I don’t interfere. But I didn’t much like the notion that the same thing happened to visiting spacers—after they’d contributed to the gene pool directly and through the sperm bank.”

“Donald,” the Mayor whispered, “that’s all the most vicious lies. You and your men aren’t in any danger, I
swear
it.”

Slade nodded. “Then there won’t be any trouble,” he said. “All I want is for all the—all
my
men—to be sent back to the ship unharmed. And we’ll leave. Anybody in the Sperm Bank tonight?”

Delores’ face hardened. “Why?”

“Because it’s solider than this place,” Slade said, “and because I figure it’s too important—” The glint in the woman’s eyes agreed with his assumption even before he finished stating it. “—for any of your, ah, friends to try and be heroes around it. They might risk you, but if somebody puts a batch of holes through that place, your whole society goes down the tubes. Right?”