Opened her eyes, after six hundred earth-standard years of sleep, to see her own reflection in the fogged glass of the hibernation chamber. She grunted, struggling with the straps and connections all about her body. Sitting up, she bumped her head on the pane, and grunted again. She pulled the latch on the side of the lid and heard the hiss as it opened.
My ears are working…she thought.
Endarial crossed the room, passing her husband’s hibernation chamber to find the sink. She filled a cup and drained it. The ice-cold water sent a shiver down her body. She stood straight and let her eyes focus, took a deep breath, and finally turned around to look at Markonal still resting in his chamber. She wandered closer to read the screen above his head. Three hours left.
“Something’s wrong with these hibernation chambers,” she said, mostly to check the functionality of her voice. She cleared her throat. “We should get a new pair. Use these as backup.” She peered closer. “We came out a month early. Now that’s just not right…”
And she started moving toward the living room/command center at the end of the hall. She grunted again, not knowing quite why she needed to be so stressed.
She sat on a couch and rested for a moment then pulled the nearest computer screen to her side, deciding not to link her mind with the systems this soon after coming out of stasis. Toast would be lonely after so many years, but pe would have to wait.
She opened the recent events log. We’re receiving a distress signal, she noticed, realizing her mind was still a little slow at processing information. She touched the screen to link to other bits of information and discovered a small craft, much like her own, was stranded with dwindling oxygen supplies, about twenty degrees off their course.
Okay, she thought, we can take care of that. I can eat something now; take a shower… all before Markonal even opens his eyes.
* * *
awoke and for what felt like a full minute, lay with his eyes closed, wondering what exactly was going on.
It’s early, he thought.
He groaned, finally forcing his eyes open, and lurched at the sight of the fogged glass, tugging painfully on several connections on the back of his head and neck. “Owe,” he said, barely hearing his own words.
Markonal pulled the latch to the lid with his right hand as he hastily unfastened connections with his left. He hopped out and staggered to the sink, filling the only cup and chugged. He turned immediately, to waddle with his back hunched toward Endarial’s sleeping chamber, to look up and find her door already open. Taking a deep breath, he forced his back straight, stretched for a moment, and groaned again.
He frowned at the timeline readout, taking special notice of the functionality of his facial muscles. “We’re early, damnit. What’s going on here?” He stopped to think for a moment and began walking toward the command center. Why am I so irritated right now? he thought.
“Hi honey,” came Endarial’s voice from the next room. He turned to see her in a living room, curled against a fern tree, under a blanket, reading from a handheld monitor. In one fluid motion, she rose to her feet and tossed the book on the grass, hopping forward to take Markonal in her arms.
“You’ve been awake for a while,” said Markonal just before she planted a kiss on his lips. “Why are we awake right now?”
He stared into her eyes and grinned, his grumpiness seeming to fade into nothing.
“We’re receiving a distress signal,” she told him, then kissed again. “Someone’s stranded about twenty degrees off our course. Are you ready to hook up and change course?”
“We’re stopping for him?” he asked.
Her eyes narrowed. “Of course we’re going to stop for him.”
Markonal shook his head. “Yes, of course we are.” She turned to walk toward the command center and Markonal took a moment to ask himself why he would consider passing the person by.
Following his wife, Markonal asked, “Are we going to need to go back into hibernation before we reach this person?”
“I’m not sure yet,” she replied. “Are you nervous about something?”
“Of course not,” he replied. “I’ve only been awake for four minutes and now we’re making complex conversation and decision making… stuff… It’s just that we’ve been traveling the galaxy for three thousand years now and never have we had a distress signal.”
She shrugged, and plopped herself down in the command chair.
“Can we wait a few minutes?” he asked.
“What for?”
“I just got out of stasis. My eyes haven’t focused. I still don’t know what’s going on.”
“Come on you big baby,” said Endarial. “You know who you are. You know who I am. You know who Toast is. That’s all you need to know. I’ll figure out the course and you just give your thumbs up. Here—“ she patted her thighs. “You can sit on my lap if you want.” She pulled a cord from the back of the chair and plugged it in the socket at the base of her skull.
Markonal sighed and sat atop Endarial, pulling a similar cord from a nearby interface to plug into his own head. He found himself even more disoriented in the computer systems, half his awareness lingering in his body and half wandering the intricate systems of their starship. Endarial guided him easily through the steps. She paused for moments to merge her consciousness with Toast’s to help calculate and understand the course and to select from the different course options. Markonal’s consciousness stood casually to one side.
Do you want to do a strip show after this? Endarial asked.
Yes, replied Markonal flatly, wondering whether their conversation was in real voices or electrical impulses through the computer system.
Give your okay, she said.
And Markonal’s consciousness gave his stamp of approval on the course redirection.
Done, she said, pulling Markonal’s consciousness from the matrix, and disconnecting her own cable. “It’s your turn to go first.”
“Huh?”
“Strip show. Get off me.”
“Can you give me a few minutes?” Markonal said, rising. He shook his head and rubbed his eyes. “I want a little time by myself to find my headspace.”
She nodded as he bent to kiss again. “Think about the song while you’re away. What song you gonna strip to?”
He shrugged. “I’ll think about it.” And he grinned widely.
“Brush your teeth too,” she said.
“Oh,” he said. “Does my breath stink? Is that what you’re telling me.”
“I’m just kidding.”
“No you’re not.” And he laughed. “I just got up. You can’t expect me to taste good yet.”
“Just go. I look forward to your show.”
* * *
Endarial
focused on the music and on her own movements. She danced for herself, knowing she must enjoy the experience if Markonal were to enjoy watching. She unbuttoned her pants as she swung away from her husband, hiding her movements, then let her clothing hang on her hips as she turned back. Opening her eyes momentarily, she met his, and saw the sparkle that for some reason never seemed to fade.
She reached for the cap on her head, but remembered the song, and covered her movement by simply adjusting the garment, tipping it down over her forehead, blocking the top of her vision.
“You can leave your hat on…” she sang along, under hear breath.
Don’t take the hat off, she thought, hoping she would not become too caught up in her own movements to remember.
She twirled, and let her pants drop naturally. She tripped as she stepped out, but recovered with another twirl, then a slide. Moving to the end of the bed, she stood against the bedpost for a moment, and Markonal began to rise.
“That was a beautiful show,” he said.
said to himself, “That is a beautiful show. Very beautiful show, indeed. You’re going to put on quite a good show for me too, aren’t you? Yes you are.”
And the voyeur cocked his head, gazing absently toward the screen. “You are beautiful, aren’t you?”
I wonder why, he thought. Is this just my imagination? It’s not like
you’ve never seen a beautiful woman before…It almost seems like the first time.
And Stivinie
laughed. “Oh, you are going to make a good show aren’t you Endarial? I can’t
wait for your arrival…”
replied, “Song’s not over,” turning away from her husband and continuing her dance. “I have one piece left.”
Markonal walked toward her and held out a hand, but she turned away at the last moment, teasing.
She met his eyes, as she fingered the elastic of her underpants, then turned away, raised her hands, adjusted her hat, momentarily touched her nipples, met his eyes again and grinned, poking her tongue out from between tight teeth.
And he jumped forward, took her hand and pulled her against his body.
“Hey,” she said.
“Hey.”
“You didn’t let me finish.”
“Sorry. I’ve been asleep for years, and I just want my arms around you. You probably had a beautifully dramatic and sexy finish, didn’t you?”
She smiled, then kissed him. “No, not really. I think I would have just put the hat on your head.”
“Well I can wear the hat now.”
“No,” she said, pulling it tighter around her brow. “You made me stop early. You have lost all hat privileges. You missed me taking off my underwear. Isn’t that the best part?”
“Yeah, I suppose… but I like a little mystery. The best part is…” and he kissed her again.
A moment later, they began moving, still tightly wrapped around each other, shuffling awkwardly toward the bed, as Endarial struggled out of her underpants. He fell atop her and they laughed, then rolled to the middle of the bed, Endarial coming out on top. She planted one more kiss then reached down and clutched his penis to insert it cleanly and smoothly.
“You’re getting down to business,” said Markonal.
“Actually, I’m
about ready for sleep,” she replied, closing her eyes and resting her head on
his shoulder. “Goodnight.” And she began to make a half-snore. After a moment,
she snuggled closer, and thought, I
really could sleep like this…
And they rested for a time.
“I wonder how long we could stay like this,” Markonal said softly into her ear.
“I could lay like this all night, I think,” she replied.
“One entity… I wonder if anyone has ever set a record… Maybe we could try to make it until we need to stop for the stranded traveler.”
“We’re two weeks away, honey,” said Endarial.
“Ah, yes… do you suppose we should hibernate again before meeting?”
“Hard to say,” she replied. “We need to check out our oxygen supplies. Maybe check out our travelers’ supplies.”
“Who is this person?”
She shrugged. “He didn’t say in his message.”
“It’s a single male?”
She nodded. “That’s all I know.”
“Why didn’t he say anything more? Did he say what he needs from us?”
“Probably a ride to the nearest habited planet.”
“Strange that he didn’t say anything more.”
“Maybe he’s got other problems to deal with right now,” she told him.
“Hmmm…” he nodded. They rested for another few minutes, one inside the other.
“Hey,” said Markonal. “Can I wear the hat when we have sex?”
“No,” she replied, pulling it tighter. “I already told you: you lost all hat privileges when you made me quit my show early… besides, we’re already having sex.”
“Are we?”
“Wouldn’t you consider this sex?”
“We’re not moving.”
“Why should that matter?”
“I don’t know.”
She lay against his shoulder and he ran his hands through her hair.
“Where do you want to go after this?”
“Huh?” said Markonal. “What do you mean?”
“We’re stopping for the traveler. We could go anywhere at that point.”
“You don’t want to continue with our original plan?… where were we going?”
“You don’t even remember? Why are we going if you don’t remember?”
“Never been there before.”
She sighed.
“You want to do something else?”
“I don’t know,” she replied. “We never seem to have a real reason to go anywhere.”
“Refill oxygen supplies.”
“But that’s about it,” she countered.
“Are you tired of roaming? Already?”
“I like roaming with you… and Toast… but I feel like I’m going to need an ultimate goal someday. I can’t just wander aimlessly for my whole life without feeling a little sense of emptiness. My entire family died three thousand years ago. I don’t even know who their descendants are. I never will.”
“Are you regretting your decision?”
“No, no, no. Of course not. This is what I’ve always wanted… I’m sorry, I shouldn’t be talking about this right now.”
“You can’t see the ultimate purpose…” Markonal replied. “I can understand that… It needed to come out at some point… we should try to find a purpose… a long term goal… perhaps the accumulation of wealth… we could focus on acquiring physical possessions through trading… perhaps we should search for a permanent residence, trade in Toast for a mansion on a hill somewhere… maybe we could travel with the intent of educating ourselves.”
“Study the different societies…” said Endarial. “Maybe learn something about where the human race is headed. Maybe we could use our education to help people somehow. We get to watch the human race expand and advance over many millennia. We’re in a very unique situation. We could be using ourselves to help figure out the direction of the human race…”
“That sounds like a good idea… we should ask others when we reach our destination… maybe we’ll start seeing cracks in society that no one else can see because they’re all caught in the same century.”
“…in the meantime I should just have sex with you and forget about it… right?”
“Yup… do you want to start soon?”
“Whenever you’re ready.”
But their lower bodies remained motionless as they stared into each other’s eyes.
“One of us should take the initiative and start moving,” said Markonal.
“How about on the count of three…”
“Okay… wait… okay…”
“One… two… three…”
“Oh yes, here we go… here we go.”
______ ______ ______
took a deep breath, watching an interface monitor as the craft named Toast came into view, it’s braking thrusters glowing brightly at the front.
This is what it’s all about, he thought.
He double-checked the five lengths of twine in his pocket and the knife, and he waited, knee bouncing happily.
Finally, the computer informed him of a communication.
“Put it on.”
And Markonal’s ugly mug came on screen. Stivinie smiled.
“Hi. My name’s Markonal,” said the target.
“Nice to meet you,” Stivinie replied. “I’m Stivinie.”
“Is there a problem?”
“Well it’s rather complicated…” explained Stivinie. “People are starving all over the galaxy and communications rings are breaking down… but… Could I board your vessel and talk in person?”
“What? What are you talking about? You want to come over here? Is that necessary?” Markonal looked back at his wife. “He wants to come over…”
He looked back toward Stivinie. “What seems to be the problem? Maybe we can help you from here, without using up thruster power.”
“No… I need to ask a bit of a favor from you… I’d like to talk in person. My ship has enough thruster power to dock. Just give me the okay and I’ll be over in a minute.”
“Right.” Markonal shrugged and looked over his shoulder again for confirmation. “Come on over…”
It took ten minutes to maneuver the two crafts together. Stivinie heard the loud clank as the hatches touched, a moment after the computer sent the message to his brain. His chair quivered slightly. The ships clamped and the air mixed.
Stivinie jumped up, pulling the connection from the back of his cranium and bolted to the table near the hatchway.
“Oh yes, here we go…” he thought, picking up an auto-syringe containing his favorite concoction of steroids, adrenaline, and cocaine. He barely felt the prick as the instrument found his vein, clamped itself to his skin and began injecting.
A moment before its completion, Stivinie flipped the switch to the hatch, and heard the hiss as the air pressure forced the door open.
The syringe finished its task, unclamped and dropped back to the table. Stivinie stepped into the opening and waited for Toast’s hatch to rise.
commented, “I think he’s here.”
“Sounds like,” replied Endarial, not looking up from her book.
“I’ll go meet him.”
Endarial finished the page, put her finger on the button to mark her spot, then scrolled down to see how much text was left before the end of the section. Oh, she thought. Only a thousand words till the end of act 2. And she continued reading.
And just as she finished the section, Markonal entered the room, followed by the man she’d seen on the monitor an hour earlier.
She put her book down and began to stand.
“Honey, this is Stivinie—“ Markonal waved his hand at the man behind him, without turning to look.
Endarial felt her eyes widen as she noticed a small knife clutched in Stivinie’s right hand. His knuckles were already white.
“Uh—“ she cut off her husband’s statement, but did not manage to complete her own as the hand whipped from the stranger’s side to Markonal’s neck, then back again in a seemingly instantaneous movement.
She looked at her husband, and he stared back with a blank yet terrified face. A moment later the blood began to pour, draining onto his chest and soaking into his shirt. His head tilted back slightly, exposing the gash, and he slumped to the ground.
“Pleased to meet you,” Stivinie said.
And she screamed, then dove for her hand held monitor, and flung it at the man’s head.
He stepped to the side and the computer smashed against the back wall.
“Let me try that again. My name’s Stivinie. I’m happy to meet you.”
“What are you doing?” She backed off, keeping her eyes on the stranger. “What do you want?”
“Take off your clothes.”
She heard her throat make an involuntary whine. After glancing at her husband for just a moment, noticing the pool of blood growing rapidly, she brought her gaze back to Stivinie to find herself unable to focus.
“Why are you doing this?” she asked.
“For the thrill. Now take off your clothing, or I’m liable to injure you as I rip them from your body.”
“Markonal!” she shouted, not knowing why.
“He’s dead,” Stivinie told her.
“He’s
still moving.” And she started crying fully. I need to move, now…before I lose all control…need to do
something…might still be time…
“That will be over soon. Take off your clothes.”
“No,” she choked. “I don’t want to.”
“Excuse me? No… see… in this situation, I get to tell you what to do. Have those tears already blinded you to the fact that I have a knife in my right hand?”
“You’ll kill me either way,” Endarial replied, glancing about the room, trying to focus on anything that might be of help.
“Whatever gave you that idea?”
“Because I’m not stupid.” And she sprinted suddenly toward her nightstand, ripping its clamps from the floor, and charged the stranger, turning the legs of the table outward, and thrusting at the last moment.
And Stivinie stepped to the side and pushed the table safely away. He laughed.
She ran another half dozen steps, then flipped the table in the air to grab it by two legs. She turned around and charged again, swinging toward his side.
He caught the head of the table cleanly with his left hand and gripped it. “Just what are you trying to prove?” he asked.
They stared into each other’s eyes for a moment, the tears no longer flowing from Endarial’s, though more were not far behind. “I’m going to kill you,” she said.
“By playing tug of war with me? I could rip this right out of both your hands right now without even using my right hand.”
And she pulled harder.
His face seemed to show strain as she attempted to pull. He groaned, as though he could barely keep grip.
She stopped.
“You don’t believe me?”
And in an instant, the table was out of her hands and flying across the room to shatter against the far wall. “See.” Stivinie grinned. “I have the power here. Now remove your clothing. I think I deserve a strip show.”
She ran again, this time in a mad flee toward the hall, but after three steps, felt something cold on her arm, and found herself spinning around Stivinie. He threw her arm and she tumbled to the ground, rolling to find herself next to her husband.
Her vision blurred again, and as she placed her hand on the ground to lift herself, she felt the puddle of blood, now larger than she had expected.
Pulling herself to her knees she focused for an instant on Markonal’s hand, noticing an ever-so-subtle twitch. She took his hand in her own.
“Awe,” Stivinie said, cocking his head in a look of pity. They stared at each other for a long moment.
“Okay, times up,” Stivinie said, stepping forward. “I’m going to count to three and if you’re not well on your way to naked, I’m going to hold you down and tear your clothes off with my fingernails and teeth. Okay… one… two…”
And she kicked, pushing off with her hands and extending her leg suddenly to connect with his shin. In the next moment she was to her feet and sprinting from the room.
Stivinie
said “Owe,” absently, not actually feeling the pain, surprised that the woman had actually managed to land an attack, and move out of his reach.
He stepped, and for a moment straddled the husband, allowing himself to enter the other’s consciousness, feeling that beautiful yet terrifying space that a person must traverse as pe fades into nothingness.
Stivinie took a deep breath and sprinted after his target. “I’m gonna get’cha!” he shouted after her as he watched her round a corner at the end of the hall.
The door at the end began to close and Stivinie began to sprint.
The hall was longer than expected and the door came close to latching, but at the last moment Stivinie reached out a hand and caught it—a risky maneuver, but one that paid off this time as the safety mechanisms would not allow his hand to be crushed.
Pushing the hatch open again, he saw that she had already gone from the room.
Two doors.
He took a guess and headed for the closest, slamming his hand hard against the control button.
The door slid open painfully slow, and Stivinie stepped unexpectedly into the galley.
He took a moment to orient himself and out of the corner of his eye, saw quick movement.
Endarial stepped from behind the closest counter to swing a small long-handled pot in a wide but rapid and powerful arc to her right.
He felt his eyes widen and his hands went instinctively up. The left missed, but the pot connected hard with his right hand, blocking what would have been a clean blow to the face.
Surprised to feel the stinging pain despite the drugs running through his system, he brought his right hand down to be comforted by the softness of his outer thighs.
His left hand, however, did not waste time in snatching the end of the pot from the air and holding tight.
She screamed and looked into his eyes, pulling wildly at the handle with both hands. He saw the sweat glistening across her brow and dripping to her cheeks to mix with the tears; he saw terror in her eyes, though not hopelessness (not yet, anyway), and all he could think were the simple words, She is beautiful.
He tugged again on the pot, but she held, screaming that beautiful scream of complete frustration.
And without thinking, he pushed on the pot, catching her off balance, the handle connecting momentarily with her face. With help now from his right hand, he wrenched the pot away and tossed it on the floor. In the same fluid motion, Stivinie snatched a length of cord from his pocket and pounced on her, first wrapping his arms about her body as she screamed and wriggled frantically.
Her fists began flying, connecting with his shoulders, sides, back, even the top of his head, but made no difference. He snatched her wrists from the air, twisted them behind her back, and pushed her against the counter top, immobilizing her as he bound her hands together.
She screamed now, louder than before.
Stivinie closed his eyes momentarily and sighed inwardly as her piercing cries overwhelmed his consciousness like a pleasure drug shot straight into his vein.
Her legs began kicking backward and Stivinie was forced to dance in order to avoid being hit in the shins again. “Stop it,” he said.
But she did not.
“Stop it or I’m going to be forced to hurt you.”
She kicked again and again, finally connecting lightly with his knee.
“Damnit,” he said, and took her by the back of the neck. He squeezed and her neck crinked back. She stopped kicking as he pulled her away from the counter and pushed down on her shoulders to force his victim to her knees.
And her cries changed tone, from frantic and frustrated, to helpless and defeated.
He kept a hand on the back of her neck, holding her in place and looked at her face, hoping to see that look of panic and terror behind a screen of tears. He saw these things in her face, but also noticed blood dripping from her nose, and a small gash on her cheek, which overshadowed the things he hoped for.
“Oh, my god,” he said. “Did I give you those cuts? Did I make your nose bleed?”
She answered with a sob.
“I must have done it… of course! When we were fighting over the pot… I popped you in the face with the handle… I’m sorry Endarial. It was never my intention to beat you up. I’d patch you up right now but I’m afraid you’ll try to run away again. Get up. Let’s go to the bedroom and I’ll stitch up your cuts… I’m sorry about that Endarial… Really sorry… you sort of put up a hard fight. I’d say it was your own fault but I’ve done this enough times I should know how to deal with fighters without bashing their faces in… I’m really sorry Endarial, really really sorry.”
“Why are you doing this to me?” she blubbered, though did not move as he had ordered.
“For the thrill of the hunt,” he replied. “And for the sex.”
She groaned.
“I’ve got you now,” he told her. “You’re mine now. All mine and no one else’s. Come on, let’s go to the bedroom.” And he hauled her to her feet.
opened her eyes again, like coming out of a dream, to take in her situation: tied tightly to her own king sized bed on her own ship, one limb to each bedpost. Though she remembered clearly the trip from the galley, she asked herself how she’d come to find herself in this situation.
Because I gave up hope, she thought.
…I gave up hope in fighting him… And she remembered promising herself she would try somehow to communicate with this madman. Anger seemed useless and fighting had proven useless.
And she remembered the cut on her face, now dripping blood into her eye, forcing them closed once again.
Don’t black out here, she told herself. Calm yourself… focus… focus… what do I say
to him? I need to know him if I must defeat him… I’ve got to ask him about
himself… direct the questions toward him… questions, always questions… don’t
argue about anything… accept what he says and ask another question. Above all
else, keep him talking.
And she choked, momentarily, as she thought of the task ahead of her and the concentration it would require. “Oh, God,” she said.
“Yes,” Stivinie replied. “I’m coming… oh, you’ve got a bleeder there.” A moment later she felt a cold cloth on her face, patting softly about the wound, soaking the various bodily fluids.
She twitched, but forced herself to hold steady. He poked and prodded for another few moments with the towel. “Looks like you’ll need a couple stitches. Do you want me to do it myself? I can, you know.”
“No, please,” she choked. “Did you bring the medic plate? Can you use that?”
“No problem.” And a moment later she felt the mask fitting, then clenching to her face. Her head bounced with the pressure as Stivinie adjusted the settings on the front. “Do you want any painkillers?” he asked.
And
she paused to think. Painkillers…
something strong would relax me… would it shut me up or would it make me more
interesting to him… so that he doesn’t want to kill me.
But I need to keep on
my toes.
“No,” she answered finally.
For a minute, she felt nothing at all, then a tickling, and a comfortable pressure, as the spider-sized robots sanitized the area while clamping the wound shut and eventually began stringing the stitching.
“I’m sorry again,” Stivinie started, “about that cut. I understand a girl’s got to put up a fight, and I really should have my technique down to the point where I don’t need to hurt anybody.” He walked to the end of the room as he spoke and into an adjacent lavatory. Endarial heard the water running over the low hum of the medic plate.
Stivinie returned to her side just as the tiny robots were climbing into their storage cells above either cheek. Their eyes met momentarily through the faceplate and he waited as the mask unclamped itself.
Endarial noticed an out of place calmness come over her now. For a moment, she felt content as Stivinie lifted the plate from her face, now patched up, no longer gashed, no longer bleeding, no longer ugly and uncomfortable, no longer something to think about. She looked at him again, and he looked back, head cocked, eyes drooping and sad. “How are you doing?” he asked.
“Well…” she replied slowly and carefully, clinging to her calmness.
“Do you need anything? A glass of water, perhaps?”
“Could you let me go?” she replied.
“No,” he replied simply.
And her calmness began to slip away again.
“Does your stomach hurt?” he asked.
“No,” she replied.
“Do you have a headache?”
“No,” she choked.
“Do you want anything at all from me?”
“Please tell me what you intend to do with me.”
“I’m going to have sex with you and then I’m going to kill you… actually I’m going to do both at the same time… right at the climax point, to be more specific.”
And Endarial lost her calm, allowing the frustration to overcome her logic and consciousness, finding herself crying openly.
Damnit, she thought, you can’t save yourself this way. You want to get out of this, quit
blubbering and talk to him. You can communicate with anyone, remember?
But the thought of the focus and patience necessary to communicate with this person overwhelmed her. She tried to speak but found she could not. The frustration needed a vent.
Stivinie draped an arm across her midsection and climbed onto the bed to lie next to her. “It’s okay,” he told her. “This is the way it has to be. You’ll find much pleasure in the afterlife, I promise you, and I’ll do it so quick you won’t even know it happened.”
And Endarial cleared her mind long enough to ask, “Why are you doing this to me?”
“It’s what’s right.”
And she stared at him. “What kind of an answer is that?” she asked, her tears drying slightly, then returning a moment later.
“It’s the only one I can give you. I’m sorry Endarial. This is just the way God wants it.” And he stared into her eyes, cocking his head again, rubbing her stomach gently with his arm.
“I don’t understand…” she replied. “Because I don’t believe in God.”
“It’s a shame,” he replied. “It could have helped you in your lifetime. But don’t worry. It won’t affect the outcome of your afterlife.”
“I don’t understand why it’s necessary for you to do this to me.”
“I don’t want to get into detailed explanations because it doesn’t really matter.”
“If it doesn’t matter, then don’t fucking do it!” she cried.
“Shhhh,” he said, putting a finger lightly over her mouth. “It is you who do not understand, but that does not matter. You don’t need to understand it. Just sit back and let it happen. Death is just another part of life, Endarial. It’s all a great cycle.” He wiped a tear from her cheek and she let herself stare deep into his eyes.
He likes to be comforting… she realized.
“I will donate your spacecraft to charity once it’s all over, so that you’ll know all this is for the best. That’s one of the main reasons I do—“
“You enjoy seeing me in pain—“
“No!” he cut her off. “I’m simply doing—“
“Then why are you dragging it out like this? If it’s necessary for you to kill me, why must you rape me first?”
“Well, it’s sort of my reward, you know, for doing the dirty work.”
“Hmm…” she replied, not knowing how to respond. She shook
her head then caught herself. Don’t let
him see your contempt. He knows you’re scared. He wants you to be scared. But
don’t let him see your hatred. Make him think you’re considering forgiving him…
“I must say I’ve never met anyone quite like you, Stivinie,” she said.
He smiled. “Thank you. I find you to be quite a unique person yourself.”
He stared for a moment longer as Endarial realized her eyes were now reasonably dry, and her energy slowly returning.
“May I kiss you?” he asked.
“Excuse me?” she laughed. “You’re going to take everything away from me…” without a rational explanation, she thought, “…but you won’t kiss me without permission?”
“I wouldn’t disrespect you like that.”
And she felt herself hit suddenly with a wave of frustration, expecting it to topple her defenses yet again. But instead, it was gone as quickly as it came and left Endarial with her own calm, uncaring blankness allowing her to focus again.
She knew she needed to say yes to his request to get on his good side and attempt some form of communication, and to break down his barriers.
This is a human
being, she told herself. This is a
human being. He is part of your consciousness.
“I don’t mind,” she told him.
He leaned forward, bringing his face toward hers, but did not head for her lips. Instead, he kissed her first on the forehead, then on her undamaged right cheek. He pulled back. “Everything’s going to be okay,” he said.
You are delusional, she internally accused.
He hovered over her, smiling, clearly wishing to kiss her more.
I have to do this, she thought.
“Would you like to kiss me on the mouth?” she asked. “Only if you want to.”
He grinned suddenly and she noticed him start to tremble subtly. “I’d love to,” he said, but hung above her for several more minutes before finally lowering himself to give a quick peck on her lips. He pulled away several centimeters.
I have to.
And she closed the gap, pressing their lips together. His eyes widened in a look of shock and his facial features seemed to stiffen, but a moment later he relaxed and kissed her back. His tongue darted cautiously in and out, as though confused, as though he’d never kissed a girl before.
And here we are, she
thought. You’re kissing a madman who’s
going to slit your throat… but if you can make him think you want him… maybe
you can trick him into thinking you’ll ride off into the sunset together…
But strangely, I’m not
in misery here. Kissing a madman seems much like kissing anyone else…
physically anyway. She sighed internally of frustration. You need to make yourself enjoy it,
Endarial. If you want to convince him that you want him, you must find a way to
convince yourself to enjoy this for real.
Forget about the
whole dying part. Forget about your murdered husband.
And they kissed for a time. She closed her eyes. He seemed uncomfortable at first but took control after a moment.
After a time they pulled away and Endarial opened her eyes to see his. They gleamed, matching his uncontrolled smile. His pupils were large, blocking most of the color from his eyes. “Thank you,” he stammered.
“Did you like that?” she asked.
“Yes,” he replied quickly. “I’ve never—“ and he stopped.
“You’ve never been kissed like that before? Do you see what it can be like when both parties agree?”
He shook his head.
“You liked it because it was consensual.”
“No.” He shook his head again.
“Sex can be like that too.” She stared confidently, and for the first time, felt as though she had the upper hand in the conversation. “When was the last time you had consensual sex, Stivinie?”
“I’ve—“ and he stopped himself. “Don’t talk to me about this. What’s going to happen will happen.”
“How long have you been a rapist?”
“A long time.”
“How long have you been killing people?”
He shook his head and stood. “Don’t talk to me about this, Endarial. It’s only liable to upset you.”
“But I want to get to know you,” she said.
He looked dumbfounded.
“If you feel it’s necessary to do this to me, please at least help me understand why.” She stared for a moment. “How many times have you done this?”
“Fourteen,” he said.
“Holy shit.”
“Yeah.” He chuckled. “I’m a pro.”
“Ever left anyone alive?”
“Never.”
“Why not? Does nobody else have the right to live?”
“I wouldn’t want anyone putting out a warning about me for future travelers. I plan to be doing this till I’m old and gray.”
And she felt her focus waning. What use was it to communicate with a madman? She stared into another world and felt herself begin to cry again.
“Would you like to see a strip show?” asked Stivinie. “I’ll do a better show than Markonal did.”
And she realized that he’d been watching her, tapping into the ship’s computer systems. But at this point, it made no difference.
“Yeah,” she said. “Let’s see the strip show.”
He jumped up and clapped his hands, then ran to a computer terminal to select music.
The song started a moment later with a popping drumbeat, leading into something twangier. Stivinie flapped his arms and stepped side to side with the beat, moving more dramatically with each step. “Can’t seem to face up to the facts…” he sang along, but slowed as though he could not remember the words. “Don’t touch me; I’m a real live wire,” he chimed back in.
And as the chorus began, Endarial found herself laughing through her tears.
“Psycho killer,” sang Stivinie, twirling dramatically now, then moving into a more outlandish dance. “Fa fa fa fa fa fa fa fa fa! You’d better run run run run run run run away!”
Endarial watched for about half of Stivinie’s routine, until he had stripped to his underwear, then she closed her eyes and leaned back, sighing heavily as the half-forgotten fear came rushing back. She felt her legs begin to tremble, as she realized she needed to figure out how she could break through to this man’s reasoning.
Brainstorm… what
does he want? What is he trying to satisfy by this?
Oh, shit, she thought.
I wish I’d studied psychology… stayed home and studied psychology… never married…
But Endarial found herself unable to focus, and instead drifted into a confused and frustrated sobbing, though underneath she held firm to her promise that she would use everything she’d ever learned about communicating with other human beings to attempt to save her life.
Don’t attempt… she
thought, just do.
But on the surface she imagined herself becoming a bubbly sobbing mess, but after a few moments realized the tears were not coming in liquid form.
Endarial then allowed the misery of the situation to overcome her senses and she let herself go. For several minutes she allowed herself to truly comprehend the insanity of the situation while her emotions interpreted the ideas in their own manner, allowing her to lose touch with reality for a short while and collapse into a perspective of blind pain, hatred, and fear.
But as the song ended and she sensed Stivinie coming near again, she heard her inner voice of clear reason, screaming out to bring her entire consciousness back to full alert. She opened her eyes and stared at him, as though in a daze. The pain seemed to slip away and Stivinie’s consciousness seemed to enter hers swiftly, as though this were a mental game of cat and mouse. She stared him down, focusing everything on the game.
He looked away. But as he turned back, Endarial cast her gaze downward to stare at his penis, wondering for a moment if this man suffered from inadequacy problems as a result of its size, but after looking for several moments, realized she had no means to tell. Markonal had always told her he had a large penis—though she could never be sure that wasn’t partly his imagination—and Stivinie’s was not comically small compared to his, but still…
Damnit, she thought. Should have joined a nudist colony sometime in my life so I could know
how big they’re supposed to be so I could know if this is a factor in this mans
insanity.
“Do you like it?” Stivinie asked.
“Huh?” she said.
“You’re staring at my crotch. What are you thinking about?”
“I’m thinking about what might be going on in your head right now,” she replied. “What’s going on in there right now that is making you want to do this to me? I thought you might have a small penis but it looks perfectly normal to me.”
Stivinie laughed loudly. “Ah, no. It’s no behemoth but it gets me by.”
“My husband’s penis is larger than yours,” she told him and immediately could not understand why, but realized quickly she had not offended him. “I’m glad too. Getting raped is supposed to hurt like hell. Did you know that, Stivinie? This has never happened to me before, you know.”
“It was bigger,” Stivinie told her. “There aren’t any parts of your husband’s anatomy that will do you any good.”
Stivinie pulled out his knife and flipped it once in his hand, but Endarial pressed on. “Yes,” she said. “Thank you so much for reminding me of that, Stivinie. I really appreciate that.”
More questions
she thought. Keep using his name as often
as you can, but ask more questions… damnit, Endarial…
don’t piss him off!
“I’m sorry,” Stivinie replied. “You’re right. I should be trying to make this as easy on you as possible.”
“Okay,” she said. “Will you tell me then, why you’re doing this? What is it that you’re accomplishing? What are you satisfying? What emotion is driving you to do this? Were you abused as a child?”
Stivinie laughed and sighed. “Aww… it’s no use trying to understand all of this. I’m just a psycho killer, Endarial, and I’m sorry.” He cocked his head and gave that now- familiar look of utter pity. “Why are your legs shaking?”
“Because I’m scared.” She laughed through her tears that seemed suddenly to be giving another burst of liquid. “You act like you’ve never done this before.”
“I’m sorry—“
“If you’re so sorry, why don’t you let me go?”
“I can’t do that?”
“Why not?”
“I must say, though, Endarial, and I’m being totally honest here, you’ve handled this whole experience better than anyone I’ve ever done this with, male or female.”
She stared at his knife for a moment and swallowed hard. “Are you going to slit my throat and rape my corpse, now, Stivinie? Is that your plan?”
“No, no, no… I already told you what I intend to do. I’m not going to kill you right now.” But as he spoke, he brought the knife suddenly toward her throat, but did not make contact with the flesh. He took hold of her shirt with his left hand and began cutting away her clothing. “Could you do me a favor?” he asked. “Could you just call it sex, rather than rape. I’m not under any delusions here, I know that’s what it is, but it just sounds better to my ears and it’ll probably be easier for you if you think of it as normal sex.”
“Whatever you want,” she replied.
He finished cutting away her shirt and started on her pants. She forced her legs to remain still so she wouldn’t risk getting cut. She returned to her daze as she watched him cut through her second pant leg from ankle to waist then pull them out from under her and throw them on the ground. Another two cuts to her shirt sleeves and he pulled that out as well. Her bra and underpants came off swiftly with two quick cuts each.
And Endarial lay naked, though not feeling more hopeless
than before. Power is in the mind, not in
the clothing, she reminded herself. You
can communicate with anyone. You can communicate with anyone.
“You are so beautiful,” Stivinie said, staring at her body, systematically moving his gaze from head to toe.
“Thank you,” she said, twanging her voice with artificial excitement, as though to show that she actually cared about his compliment.
“Did your husband not tell you that enough, Endarial? Because I think you deserve to know.”
She murmured, not wishing to tell him the truth, that Markonal had reminded her earlier that day.
Stivinie walked toward his clothing, now strewn about after his strip show, then shuffled through his pants to pull out a small tube of some kind of cream. As he walked closer he squeezed some of the goop into his hands. Endarial noticed the label.
“You brought lubricant,” she said. “That’s thinking ahead.”
“I don’t understand how people can have sex without it,” Stivinie said.
“Well, I can explain,” she replied. “See, when you get a woman in the mood the natural way, we’re capable of creating natural lubricant. It’s like when you salivate when you know you’re going to get food—“
“I understand how it works.”
But she pressed on. “Being tied to a bed without consent and having your husband murdered is—how shall I say this?—a bit of a turnoff. While we can call this regular sex, me, you, and my pussy all know the truth.”
“Shut up,” he said, but then laughed and began rubbing the cream on his penis. “You’ve got a hell of a sense of humor considering the situation you’re in. Most of my victims can only blubber and cry and plead. Usually the deepest conversations I can have with someone in your situation is when they start screaming ‘why?’ over and over and over again. I thank you, Endarial.”
Endarial’s stomach clinched as he climbed onto the bed and situated himself over her. He set his knife on the bed, off to her left side. He squeezed more lubricant into his hand and began rubbing her between the legs. Her fear, nervousness, and drive to focus on this communication game, all seemed to condense in her throat into a tortured groan, though she managed to tweak the sound just enough so that someone might think it to be a groan of pleasure.
She squeaked as he entered her and settled his body on top of hers.
Oh, God, she
thought. This is it. Make a last ditch
effort…pick your best idea and go with it… death is the only way he can get
off…
“You don’t waste any time, do you?” she asked. “No foreplay or anything?”
He began moving his hips rhythmically.
“Wait,” she said. She felt him inside of her, as she experienced his sexual energy, but did not seem to care. Being raped seemed like nothing to her now, like little more than a fall in the grass and a scraped arm. What mattered now—all that mattered—was playing the game, breaking his communication barriers and convincing him not to end her life.
“Wait. Don’t you want to talk first?”
Stivinie’s movements slowed. “Talk about what?”
“Well…” she started. “My husband and I liked to lie just like this and talk, before having sex. Sometimes we’d talk for hours before we’d finally start humping.” And she continued with one of the most painful statements she’d ever had to force from her lips: “You can sort of take Markonal’s place now, Stivinie.”
“You just want to lay like this and talk?” he asked. “With me? What do you want to talk about?”
“I want to get to know you. I’ll bet I can make you come without killing me. I need to get to know you a little better first, though.”
“What?” he said, cocking his head backward, “Do you think I’m not capable of--?”
“You’ve probably never met the right woman. You’ve always resorted to tying them to beds and cutting their throats—am I right? If you find the right woman, she could turn you on every night and live to do it again. And every time you do it, it gets better, because you get to know each other along the way.” And another statement that seemed to tear at her soul: “I think I could be that woman, if you give me a chance.”
He laughed. “You want to be my sex slave?”
“I just want to show what it could be like, Stivinie.”
His eyes brightened dramatically, though only for a moment. He scowled. “You’re only saying that because you don’t want me to kill you. I’m sorry, Endarial, this is how it must be.”
She did not reply. Instead, they stared into each other’s eyes, and Endarial began to feel the waves of hopelessness crushing her senses once more. And for another quick moment, let all her emotions go.
Then she returned.
“What was your childhood like, Stivinie?” she asked. “How long ago did you leave your family?”
“I left my family when I was twelve, twenty years ago, my
time; about four thousand earth-standard years.”
“That’s funny,” she said. “I
left my family when I was twelve, though that was only six years ago; about
thirty-five hundred earth-standard years.”
“What made you leave them?”
“I got sick of it all,” started Endarial. “My parents had so much ambition in my name but no direction. They seemed to feel they were the ones to decide my ultimate future. It may have worked, though they never knew what they wanted me to be. One year a nurse, the next an archeologist. And rigorous education drives me mad, so I just got up and left. They were nuts anyway.”
They fell silent a moment.
“Do you think I’m a bad person for leaving just like that, saying, ‘hey, mom, pop, I’m leaving for space. I’ll see you never. I’ll come back but it won’t be till thousands of years after you’re dead.’ I said all that—maybe not in those exact words—to my own parents. What do you think about that?”
“I’m not here to judge you.”
“What about you?” she asked. “Why did you leave home at the ripe old age of twelve?”
“Actually, I didn’t leave anyone behind. My dad killed himself when I was twelve and I didn’t know what I was going to do with myself so I sweet talked these little old ladies, one of them the grandma of one of my dad’s best buddies. They were rich… well, rich by my standards at the time. They owned a spaceship for no reason other than vacationing, something, by the way, which had always infuriated me, so I talked them into taking me to another star system, seeing as now I had no family that would miss me. One thing led to another… I convinced them to let me log my consciousness into the computer, they taught me a little about navigation, course corrections and such. They were quite impressed with my drive to learn… then one night I figured I’d learned enough and I cut their throats while they were sleeping. I’ve been roaming ever since.”
Endarial cringed and shivered, but found herself unable to move a centimeter with the ropes tied tight to her wrists and ankles and Stivinie’s dead weight on top as well as inside of her. She saw herself for a moment at the bottom of an ocean, several kilometers and uncountable tons of water pressing against her on all sides. Her stomach knotted from the pressure, and her thighs unexpectedly clenched, squeezing his, so that she could feel every curve of his mid-body against her own.
Stivinie gasped quickly. “Ah…” he said. He paused. “Does that bother you that I killed a couple of old ladies?”
“Yeah,” she replied. “It bothers me a little more that you intend to kill me, though. I don’t think it’s very nice for you to be killing anyone, but to be honest I don’t really care what you did to some people several thousand years ago. I’m glad you told me. I’m interested for the sake of getting to know you, I mean. I’ve never killed anyone myself.”
“Ever thought about it?”
“Of course I’ve thought about it. Everyone thinks about killing at some point. I’ve found that communication is a far better approach.”
“You don’t know what you’re missing.”
“You’re right. But you don’t know what it’s like to be down here, Stivinie. I don’t know what I’m missing, but you don’t know what you’re putting me through.”
“You look like you’re handling it fairly well.”
She stared into his eyes. “But inside I’m falling apart. I don’t want to die. Have you ever been tied down and told you were to be murdered?”
“Well…”
“You have! Do unto other’s what has been done to you, right?”
“I don’t want to talk about this—“
And as though catching a sudden gust of a spiritual wind from an open door, she felt her confidence unrepentantly soar. “You have absolutely no intention of killing me, do you?” As she stared into his eyes she noticed, if only for a moment, fear. And in the same moment decided, this is the moment of truth, and that she could no longer handle having this man’s penis inside of her.
She began moving her hips.
“Hmm…” he started. “I thought you wanted to lie here and talk… you know, delay the inevitable.”
“But
I want you to fuck me,” she said, the words burning her throat. Let’s get this over with, she silently
translated. “Besides, I know now you have no intention of killing me.” A shot
in the dark of course, but at this moment, somehow, she felt her confidence
powerful enough to meld with his consciousness, and convince him to just run
with it. “You’re going to make me your sex slave.” And she laughed. “That
actually doesn’t sound all that bad now.” Because
I can wait until the right moment and drop a fire extinguisher on your head.
And Stivinie’s face flushed red as she continued to move against his thighs. “I can’t think while you’re moving like that—“
“Good,” she said. “See, you don’t need murder to get off.”
Nothing matters anymore, Endarial told
herself. Nothing matters anymore. Nothing
matters anymore. Nothing matters anymore.
And she began kissing him again. His eyes seemed to roll back in his head before his eyes closed. She sensed him shiver slightly, then pull away.
“But I don’t want to kill you yet,” he told her.
“You decided not to kill me, remember?”
“Sorry, Endarial. The decision is out of my hands.”
“Shut up and fuck me.” And she began kissing him again. He did not pull back this time, but instead, began moving in rhythm, kissing deeper. Endarial’s confidence in her lifesaving strategy seemed to wane slightly over the next few moments, but nothing mattered anymore.
Reach down, Endarial. Find that self-abusive
spot, that place where the sense of loss can carry you on an experience like
psychedelics at a symphony, where pain is pleasure and rape is ecstasy and
death is divine.
Find this moment, she
told herself, as their bodies moved steadily harder and harder against each
other. Experience this moment, because
nothing else matters anymore. Make it good for him… and keep faith…
There is good inside
all humans—
And closing her eyes, she seemed to simply drop her consciousness off the edge of the boat, and entered a world of sex.
She saw Markonal atop her, and sensed his skin, far warmer and comfortable than her experiences from just a moment ago. He’d tied her to the bed for fun, and everything she’d recently experienced was nothing more than role-playing, all of her raging emotions the result of a well designed, very intense, game.
She gripped the ropes tied to her wrists, and allowed herself to pull painfully on the ankle restraints in order to squeeze her legs tighter against her partner. She began to moan, unable to tell whether or not her gesture was false, and unable to remember whether or not it was supposed to be.
Losing herself in the rhythm, she felt suddenly ill, though the sensation quickly left as her consciousness drifted further into the darkness. Up and down. Harder and harder each time. She imagined him cracking her pelvis with each thrust, but felt very little real pain. They kissed intermittently, finding it more and more difficult with the increasing movement.
He began calling out, mostly unintelligible, single syllables, though called her name more than once. She let her own voice follow his in intensity, though she had no idea the type of things she called out, if she were in fact creating anything intelligible.
But over the next few minutes, her partner’s voice became overwhelming, as though his booming grunts and “Oh”s would soon cause something to burst.
As she noticed an absence on her left side, she realized he was coming to his climax, and her consciousness seemed to pound itself immediately into her brain.
She opened her eyes and looked to the left, saw the blade sitting on the edge of the bed, toward which Stivinie’s hand steadily crept.
She focused for a moment on her pelvis, somehow doubling the force of her thrusting, while keeping her eye pinned on the knife.
Shifting her gaze quickly, she looked at Stivinie’s face, bright red, beaded sweat, eyes clenched tightly shut, and returned to stare at the knife.
His hand patted the bed, searching.
She watched as his hand patted back and forth for a moment, their thrusting still becoming more and more dramatic, before his pinky finger came to rest on the tip of the blade.
And Endarial let loose.
Every muscle clenched. She screamed and turned, her face shooting toward his. Their mouths connected, but instead of kissing, she formed her teeth around his lips and pressed, screaming with all the force she could find. Forming a seal, she blasted screaming breath into his lungs, startling, and forcing him backward.
But over their own cries, somehow, from the back of her mind, she heard the clank of the knife as it hit the floor.
With both hands he forced her head back.
“Sorry,” she said, panting. “Got… carried… away… don’t stop…. Please don’t stop… don’t stop…”
“I need the—“ and she saw him try to reach in the direction of the knife, though the floor was too far to reach without dismounting.
“I can make you come,” she said. “I promise… just keep going… don’t stop… don’t stop… I promise I’ll make this work for you.”
And once again, she allowed her consciousness to become lost.
brain seemed to be pleasantly expanding as he stared down at Endarial, who stared blankly and silently toward the ceiling.
Wow, he said to himself, feeling a sense of release never before experienced. So completely alien to feel the after effects of ejaculation, while still looking at a living female, while still having someone to talk to.
He heard a choking sob, as though she were trying desperately to conceal her frustration.
She cares of nothing but killing you, he
told himself, admiring her naked, vulnerable, beauty. She hates you. Don’t let her fool you. You have to do what you have to
do.
He turned away from her. “I’m going to go to the galley,” he said, then remembered the knife and walked to the side of the bed to retrieve it. I’ll be back in a little while. “Do you need anything?”
“Will you please let me go?” she asked.
“No, I’m sorry,” he replied. “I still need to do this. I can kill you now or I can wait until I’m ready again and have sex and do the whole thing over again. Either way I’ll do it so quick you won’t feel a thing. Which would you prefer? Now or later? You’ve already given me my reward so it’s up to you.”
“Let’s wait.” And she seemed to slip down, into the bed, as her face drooped. “Why can’t you just let me go?” And she started crying. “You can drop me off at the next planet. You can keep the ship. You can keep everything. I don’t care… I made it good for you… please don’t kill me…”
“Don’t beg. You’ve been fighting so hard this whole time, and you’ve handled this experience like no one I’ve ever met. Don’t break down now.”
“I’m sorry,” she sniffed, and fell silent, staring blankly and hopelessly at the ceiling.
And
Stivinie stared at her, losing concept of time. He seemed to want something
more from her, somehow. She’s handling
everything perfectly, he thought. This
is how I’ve always said they should act. Just let it go. The cursing and the
spitting and the crying, screaming, and begging, they just don’t work. She
seems to understand that.
And he stared harder.
She understands communication.
But with these
realizations, his mood only darkened, an emptiness moving in steadily, as
though the emotional ups and downs of a normal victim gave him a purpose.
I don’t know how to comfort this girl.
And he shook his head and finally turned away to head toward the galley. It doesn’t matter. I’m not the cause of her suffering, he told himself. “Do you want anything?” he asked.
“Water, please,” She replied.
He headed silently from the room and moved swiftly down the hall and into the kitchen. He replaced the long handled pot on its empty peg, and headed toward the vacuum cabinet to stare through the large window into all of the preserved food.
“Meat,” he said, looking at the selections. “Meat here, meat there. Who do these people think they are?” He shook his head and sighed, then searched for something normal to eat, finally seeing a reasonable assortment of fruits, vegetables, breads and pastries, though nothing that compared to the array of meats.
He put together a sandwich, selecting the ingredients using push-buttons located to the side of the display, but found himself at an impasse, realizing they had no form of vegetable protein. I don’t want to eat a dead animal, he thought, staring again at the meat. But his sandwich still needed something more.
He finally shrugged and decided it didn’t need to be perfect, placed his array of vegetables and lettuce onto a thick slice of bread and slapped the other one on top. He took a cup, filled it with water, then stopped to grab one for himself, then headed back toward the bedroom.
As he walked, he thought again of Endarial, suddenly seeing her, in his mind, lurking behind the next corner with a computer terminal to crack over his head… or a knife… or a table leg…
He’d never had a woman escape her restraints, though he realized he rarely left them alone for this period of time, and if there ever were a woman to find a way to slip out, it would probably be Endarial. As he reached the end of the hall he moved cautiously, peering in either direction before stepping into the bedroom.
Endarial lay in the same position, though instead of staring blankly at the ceiling, she focused intently at her right wrist, which now wriggled and turned, fingers picking awkwardly at the knot. Stivinie set the sandwich and water on a desk near the door.
She noticed him, stopped moving and turned her head to stare at him.
“Making any progress?”
She grunted an angry reply.
He took a closer look. “Well…” he started. “Jeeze, you’re not doing too bad. Glad I got back when I did. I’m just gonna need to re-tie that.”
After tying the loose restraint, he brought her water and carefully tilted it to her lips as she strained her head up. She sipped greedily for a moment, then stopped, spilling, a stream running between her breasts.
“Want any more?” he asked, stabilizing the glass, raising it high over her body.
“Can I get more later?”
“Of course.”
“Then no.” Her head slumped back to the bed.
“Do you want your pillow adjusted?”
“Yes, please.” She lifted her head for him. “For a serial murderer you seem to be a nice guy,” she said dryly.
He stared into her cold expression for a moment. “You don’t need to play polite. I know you hate me.”
“I don’t understand why you’re doing this to me.”
“It’s just the order of things, Endarial.”
“It’s what God wants?”
Stivinie bowed his head. “Yes. That is what I believe.”
“So you talk to God and He tells you to do these things to me, to everyone else?”
“It’s not that simple. I’m just—“
“Addicted?” she cut him off.
“I don’t want to talk about this.”
She paused. “Am I going to make you mad if I keep pressing you on this issue?”
“I might not answer your questions… but no. You won’t offend me. I want you to be honest with me, Endarial.”
“Then you’re not afraid to debate with me?”
“No.”
“Then why won’t you tell me about your reasons?”
“You’re already closed to the concept of God?”
“Why would you jump to that assumption?”
“Be honest with me.” Stivinie cocked his head.
She frowned. “Yeah, I’m pretty fucking closed to the idea. Give me a break, Stivinie, there’s no such thing as God. Speak to me on a level I can understand.”
And his heart sank, like a schooner filling with liquid pity.
“I’m sorry. I should be trying to figure this out. Tell me, when did you first learn of God?”
“It’s not all about God,” he replied defensively.
“So it is about the sex, then. The rape—you wanted me to be honest—the slitting of the throat at the moment of truth. If it’s not about God, then is it because you can’t come without blood? You can’t ejaculate unless you’re slitting the person’s throat at the same time; am I correct?”
His face felt hot. “I don’t want to talk about this.”
“Can you masturbate?”
“I’m going to eat my sandwich now.”
“But I made you come, Stivinie, right.”
“Yes.”
“So what the fuck? Why are you doing this? If I can do it once I can do it again.”
“You’re misleading. You’d take the first opportunity to bash in my skull and take off.”
Her eyebrows rose momentarily. “What I should have said is, ‘if you can do it once, you can do it again.’ I know a planet nearby with some of the best prostitutes in the galaxy—“
“Have you ever visited these prostitutes?”
“No, but you should.”
His attention perked. “Are they organized? Do you think they’d let me kill one?”
“No. But I’m sure they’d help you with your little problem. I’d be willing to pay for the sessions, of course. You could check them out, find the one that fits you best. Tell her what’s going on. Ask her to get creative. There’s got to be something else besides murder that can get you off, Stivinie. These girls know how to figure these things out.”
“Don’t jump to conclusions about me.” He turned. “I’m going to go in the other room now and cut off your husband’s head for a souvenir.”
He picked up the sandwich and his glass of water and headed for the next room. As he passed the door, he heard her resolve breaking again, the sobbing bursting forth violently through whatever defenses she may have had in place.
And from the recesses of his subconscious a dagger stuck in his back: Why am I doing this? came the voice.
But he forced
himself onward. It’s just the way things
are. This is what I do. This is who I’m meant to be.
And he blanked his mind, took an awkward bite of the sandwich as he walked, and thought of nothing but his short list of tasks.
He headed first for his own ship, retrieved his laser scalpel, then returned to Markonal’s body. He sat on the floor, staring at the corpse as he ate his sandwich, then downed the last of his water.
Removing the head from the body took a mere five seconds and one quick swipe with the laser scalpel, scorching the neck to stop the blood. He carried the head by the hair, through the airlocks and back to his own ship, to find his room of vacuum cabinets and add to his collection. He stood for a long moment, admiring the wall of blank faces, each displayed in its own airlocked box.
But his attention quickly perked as he remembered he had been gone a long time. He returned to the ship called Toast, then sat down at the nearest computer terminal and plugged his brain into the network. He oriented himself quickly, having entered a new ship’s system fifteen times now, then brought up an image of Endarial.
She lay, still in the same position, though her head now focused intently on her left wrist.
“I can see you,” Stivinie told her through the speakers in her room. “Quit trying to untie that.”
But she ignored him. Her breathing became more dramatic.
Stivinie adjusted the camera, and zoomed, then focused on her left hand.
“Oh shit!” He stood, then ripped the plug from the back of his head and sprinted toward the door, slamming his hand onto the opening mechanism.
“Open, open, open,” he said, then slipped past as the door began to slide. He ran for a minute, brushing corners as he entered and exited rooms, finally to come to Endarial’s bedroom.
As he entered, he saw Endarial’s first restraint pulling free. Stivinie rushed forward as her arm came out to head toward her other hand. He caught her wrist and with both hands held her back.
She screamed; not pained, but angry. She bared her teeth as she wriggled her hand. And Stivinie screamed for a moment as her fingernails dug into his flesh, but then recomposed himself and ignoring the pain, pulled her arm back into position and wrapped the twine tightly to hold her wrist as he fetched a spare string from the floor to retie her a more permanent restraint.
She screamed for another thirty seconds, snapping her teeth, and tugging randomly, obviously painfully, on all four of her bindings.
“I should start using chains,” he said. “I swear, Endarial—“ and he laughed. “—I’ve never met anyone as persistent as you.”
And she calmed, composed herself, stared into his eyes, and said, “Do you have any idea how frustrating this is?” And they both laughed.
* * *
observed cautiously as Stivinie’s consciousness slipped into the computer systems and immediately began exploring, though what he did not know was that his mind traveled only through the most superficial of pathways. The real intellect of the computer hid perself from his detection, spying from a distance.
Stivinie didn’t seem to have a clue. To him this was nothing more than a standard, static computer system with traditional coding, and not the advanced artificial intelligence that called perself Toast, now brainstorming on ways to alter Stivinie’s consciousness in an attempt to save per owner’s life.
Toast found perself at a temporary impasse, however, as two sets of programming seemed to contradict each other. While technically Toast was not allowed to infiltrate the mind of a human without permission, one of per prime directives involved protecting the lives of per passengers. Due to this contradiction Toast was not obligated to do anything, and if pe had followed his standard, computer based programming, that is what pe would have done.
But for the first time in Toast’s seven thousand years of existence, he found the biological, emotional half of his consciousness coming at odds with the computerized, complex and logical half.
For a hundredth of a second, a war raged, out of Stivinie’s sight. Generally, in this type of disagreement, the computer wins, though the biological mass (consisting of a pile of genetically altered brain cells grown in ten liters of human fluids deep inside the ship’s hull), in times of great stress could produce amazing feats, and this time came out victorious.
For another hundredth of a second, the computer systems shut down and Toast was left with nothing but his raw consciousness and blind emotion, free from the confines of the safety and human-interest programming.
Toast focused on Stivinie’s room, maintaining the lights and air filters as normal. In the rest of the ship however, the lights went black and life support shut down.
The systems flowed into Stivinie’s mind, encompassing it as a part of the ship, just before the computer programming regained its traditional control.
“What are you doing to my computer system?” Endarial shouted from the bed in the room adjacent to Stivinie’s.
And Toast replied: “I request permission, Endarial, not to deliver your question to Stivinie. I caused the lights to go out, not him. It is a side effect from what I am trying to do and he does not know what I am doing.”
“What are you trying to do?”
“Infiltrate the mind of Stivinie to find information that you can use against him.”
Endarial smiled, beaming that recognizable look of extreme shock and sudden happiness. “If you can break into his mind, why can’t you just kill him? Did he give you permission to go in there?”
“Murder is beyond my capabilities,” replied Toast. “I can overcome some of my programming but not all.”
“So tell me about Stivinie. What do I need to know? How do I convince him to stop this and let me go?”
As they spoke, Toast explored the recesses of Stivinie’s mind, finding corner after corner of random, confused, often very intense emotion. Toast recognized the pattern of growing emotion, building, climaxing, then a release. This man liked to deal with his problems and emotions all at once, instead of slowly, over time, as most humans learn to do. His brain seemed to be at war, just as Toast’s was a moment earlier.
As Toast explored the layers of beliefs and “truth” in Stivinie’s consciousness, pe found an uneven distribution. The lies all seemed to be directed inward, buried beyond recognition with excuses, feelings, exceptions.
And Toast realized that this mans excuses were so buried, and being completely inexperienced at mind infiltration, pe had little chance of convincing Stivinie not to kill Endarial.
“He won’t lie to you directly,” Toast told Endarial. “But he will lie to himself and then pass it on to you.”
There was so much more, however, that Toast was discovering, multitudes of factoids about Stivinie’s life and beliefs. All together, they could have been useful to Endarial, but the verbal human language, of course, did not allow for communication of such complex and detailed thoughts in such a short amount of time.
So Toast ignored Endarial, concentrating on inserting thoughts into Stivinie’s head. “You shouldn’t kill people just for fun,” was the basic jist of per message, though now pe didn’t have a clue how to communicate it. Almost all humans believe there is something wrong with murder, though almost none bother to express in actual words, why it is wrong.
And Toast realized that the only reason pe cared was because the integrated computer programming told per to care.
Murder is wrong.
That’s a simple fact, Thought Toast. But why? Why is it wrong? How can I explain
it to someone else if no one has ever explained it to me?
Toast searched his communication histories, going over every conversation for the last seven thousand years, but still could not find a single logical argument to demonstrate murder being wrong.
Murder hurts others, Toast found perself communicating, subtly, to the back of Stivinie’s mind, though secretly found the argument
ridiculous. How can a dead person be hurt
by something that happened in life? And history has shown that many people
enjoy watching others be murdered.
And he asked, How would you feel in Endarial’s position? A frustratingly indirect argument, though one of the few that Toast could think of.
Within a minute Stivinie found the information he was looking for and began exiting the computer systems.
Toast caught him before leaving, having one piece of information that per programming required per to communicate.
A small fleet of ships is headed in your
direction, en route to another system.
Have you contacted them? Stivinie asked.
No.
Well don’t.
Did Endarial call
them?
No.
So it’s just a
coincidence that they’re heading toward us right now?
Yes.
Have they sent any
communications?
No. They don’t appear to speak your
language, nor do they possess translation software.
When will they be here? Stivinie asked.
And Toast allowed Stivinie’s moral programming to momentarily override per own. And pe used his own tricks against him.
Less than thirty days. Toast replied, not mentioning that it would actually be less than six hours.
A moment later Stivinie unplugged himself from the system. He got up and moved back toward Endarial and Markonal’s bedroom.
And Toast watched the unfolding scene from behind the cold plexiglass eye in the ceiling, thinking nothing but cold calculations, analyzing facial expressions, choice of words, pitch of voice, et-cetera. New and strange events were always good for figuring out the various human patterns. Nothing tests a human’s character like sudden, intense, stress, and Toast had never witnessed either a rape or a murder.
The sexual act played out very similar to the first time, though Endarial was far quieter, and Stivinie a little slower. He placed the knife on the edge of the bed again in a similar spot. Toast had imagined Stivinie to be more careful this time but after running a check, determined the knife sat a full four centimeters closer to the edge. Endarial looked at it momentarily and gave a snort-laugh of the type she gives when she disapproves of something but is slightly amused and is afraid to speak out.
Stivinie climbed over Endarial and rested atop her, inserting his penis in her vagina as humans do du