Homesick

Ian paced the room impatiently as Obiiilion continued to eat without any regard for table manners.

“Your food is so tasteless,” she commented.

“Then stop eating it,” he grumbled. “You’ve gone through a week’s rations already.”

She smiled at him, tossing a square of pork into her mouth. He turned away in disgust.

“Don’t you enjoy eating?”

“Of course, but what you’re doing is a bit extreme, don’t you think?”

“Why?” she asked, still chewing loudly.

“Well, look at you! You ought to be more concerned about your health if nothing else! Why, imagine the risk of heart attack alone!”

“I’ve had six heart attacks. Each time one failed I had it replaced. Now I have two hearts at once to help me go on. Our Builders can do wondrous things!”

Ian could hear her swallow loudly, almost grunting. Then he stopped pacing and faced her in amazement. “You mean to say you’ve had a second heart put in just so you can continue to indulge yourself like this?”

“Why not? It’s what I want.”

“But you can barely walk!”

“My Brethren attend me. I don’t need to walk at home. And here on this ship I could be even more comfortable!”

“Well, don’t get too comfortable,” Ian mumbled.

“You just don’t understand us,” she said, fingering another tin.

“You’re right, I don’t. And I don’t want to. You’re unspeakable barbarians. You dirty everything you touch just like you’ve dirtied poor Anderson there.”

“We are Masters,” she said with an odd kind of pride. “And you could join us. We don’t have to be enemies. We could be friends!” She stared at him, almost breaking her pace with the ration tin. “That’s really why we came to visit you. We want to make an alliance.”

Ian scowled. “Yes, I heard Darm feeding that line to the Captain. Well it won’t work!”

“Surely you’ve wanted things, haven’t you?”

“Of course! And, when I do, I work for them! If I’m not willing to work for them I don’t deserve them!”

“But what if you didn’t have to?”

“Well, I hope to God I’d never turn out like you lot! Shameful, it is.”

“There’s no shame on our world. We don’t need it anymore. And, no matter what you may think of us, our Brethren love us.” She smiled at Scott. “4702, do you love me?”

Scott perked up. “Oh, yes, Mistress!”

“How much?”

At first Scott was simply unable to find words.

“You would die for me, wouldn’t you?”

“Oh, yes!”

“And do you find me attractive as I am?”

Again, his delay in responding was only because the appropriate superlatives were simply not in his vocabulary. “You’re beautiful!” was all he could manage. But his face immediately strained, as if he knew his words were foolishly inadequate. He faced her on his knees with the worshipful glow of a kid with a crush on his teacher.

“Would you like to pleasure me sexually?”

His mouth dropped open in a sort of religious awe. “You?” he said, barely looking up into her eyes.

Obiiilion rotated to face him and began to fumble with her clothes, exposing one leg before Ian was driven to act.

“Stop that!”

“Come along, 4702,” she encouraged, her voice growing heavy with lust and anticipation. “Worship me!”

Scott approached her, still with the hesitancy of unworthiness, but his intensions were clear and Ian did not want to imagine what they were.

“Certainly not!” Ian shouted, raising the gun. “That’s it, I’ll not have it!”

At this, Scott’s mood rapidly changed. He positioned himself in front of the weapon to shield Obiiilion, dancing from side to side like an athlete protecting a goal.

“Oh, now you’ve ruined it,” she said, her mouth puckering into a pout. “Surely you could have let him have his moment. He’d die for the opportunity, you know.”

“His mind’s in a bad way, and that’s thanks to your butchery! Are there no depths you won’t sink to?”

“Never mind, 4702,” she said with exaggerated disappointment. “Perhaps later, when we’re back home.”

Ian lowered the gun and Scott seemed to deflate. He folded back into his kneeling position, but angled himself to keep track of Ian’s movements.

“But why think of it as sinking to depths?” Obiiilion asked. “You people are so self-righteous! Many on our planet felt the same way before our order was established. Now we know better! You live such short lives and indulge so few of your pleasures. Haven’t you ever wanted to truly reach the limits of pleasure?” Her face took on a seductive grin. “Haven’t you wanted to truly explore its full potential? Some on your Earth have done this. Your Henry VIII, for example. He lived in your homeland, did he not? England, you call it.”

Ian sighed, disturbed by her references to Earth. “You’re very well informed.”

“But Henry VIII had enemies and the masses didn’t like him. He had to waste vast amounts of his wealth to protect himself from those who were supposedly pledged to serve him. He had to live in fear!” She shook her head, feeling obvious pity for the tyrant. “But we don’t have this problem. Our peasants serve us truly and would protect us with their lives! If I needed another heart tomorrow, any one of them would give up theirs without hesitation. They’d fight for the opportunity. It would be an honor for them.”

Ian snorted. “Disgusting! And I suppose the poor sod who gave up his back for your jacket was honored, too!”

“In fact he was,” she said, taking a bite of fish stick. “That’s the beauty of our system.”

Ian leaned close to her and sneered. “Well, let me tell you something! My granddad spent some time with people who did things like that! But they only made lampshades out of . . . people.”

“You mean the Nazis?”

“Yes, you swine, the Nazis!” he shouted, getting Scott’s attention again. “The most disgusting regime our planet ever knew! But, if I had to choose which one of you was worse, you lot would get the biscuit!”

“But a part of you must envy us,” she said, pausing to study him. “I know you don’t like me, but that’s not my concern. Every one of us chooses our own pleasures. For Master Daaarrm there are other diversions. Sex is his first pleasure. He also enjoys the fun of the hunt and to challenge himself with your knowledge. What would be your fantasy?”

He glared at her. “Just at the moment, I don’t think you’d like to know my fantasies.”

“Violence?” She shrugged. “That’s a diversion for some of us.”

“Then why hasn’t one of them killed you?”

“Why would they? There are few of us and we all have whatever we want.” Her smile broadened. “It’s much easier to take out such impulses on the Brethren or to channel them to more constructive uses. Some hunt as Daaarrm does. He helps keep up our numbers of the Brethren.”

Ian had been pacing, but he stopped again at her words, regarding her with genuine surprise. “You mean to say there are still human beings down there you haven’t destroyed yet?”

She nodded. “There will always be some we haven’t fulfilled,” she corrected him. “But they’re without direction. They lead useless lives outside our society, and they’re far from happy. But the Builders track them and we rescue them. Daaarrm enjoys that! It was he who rescued 4702, you know! Do you remember that?” she asked Scott with a playful smile. “They’re always much happier after that.”

Ian’s chin began to tremble and he silently counted to ten.