Mercenary Read online

  “It is also the opinion of the Jupiter Navy that the best soldier is a satisfied one. We do not care to have stifled sexual urges generating mischief in the ranks, so we see that sex is not stifled. Sexual expression is normal and healthy, and the Navy wants normal and healthy personnel. But this cannot be verified by a computerized test, and psychiatric charting is cumbersome and, in my opinion, unreliable; a person like yourself could readily distort the results. It is necessary to see sexual expression in practice.

  “It is also true that some recruits are young, shy, inexperienced, or have some foolish notion of saving it for marriage or for a loved one. In reality, it is better to bring experience and competence to love or marriage, so that the relationship can be most positive where it counts most, without fumbling or accident or misunderstanding. So it is necessary to take care of this training at the outset. You are not in civilian life now, soldier; you are in the Navy, and your body is ours. Once you perform by the book in this house, you will comprehend the power the Navy has over you. Your sexual expression is no more private than your haircut or your pay. You will conform—or be compelled.”

  “Compelled?” I asked, alarmed at the increasingly firm tone.

  She smiled again, putting her hand on mine, softening the impact. “Was I lecturing? I apologize. Don’t be concerned, Private. It is true that we have drugs that will convert a mild-mannered man into a rutting billy goat, but that is pointless. It is the normal sexual bias and application we desire, not a drug-sponsored orgy. The Navy frowns on drug abuse. You will merely be prevented from undergoing further training until you meet our sexual requirement. You will remain on this ship until we are satisfied and issue you a certificate of completion. Most men meet it in a few days and have no further difficulty; some women take longer.”

  “Women really do have to—?”

  “Indeed they do, soldier! The Jupiter Navy is an Equal Opportunity Employer; no discrimination is tolerated. Males and females have identical requirements, allowing for anatomical distinctions. Obviously a woman cannot be overtly impotent, but she can be frigid, and rape is not the Navy way, either, despite scuttlebutt to the contrary. The woman must understand and acquiesce, voluntarily, and show some reasonable response. She must, in other words, be normal, and demonstrate that normalcy exactly as the men do. We believe this is fair; don’t you agree?”

  “Yes, sir,” I agreed, bemused.

  “Now, you said you believe there should be love or respect. Love is not permitted recruits, but respect is encouraged. I gather you had a relationship with a woman you loved?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And you lost her when you enlisted?”

  “No, sir. She’s dead.”

  “I understand. You feel you would sully her memory.”

  “Yes, sir.” She had scored directly, surprising me.

  “I do understand, Private. But what you wish is not an authorized luxury. Your heart may be your own, but as we say in the service, your ass is ours. You may feel what you feel for your loved one, but you must perform for the Navy. I believe your loved one would understand.”

  “Yes, sir, she would.” That was a gross understatement. Helse would have urged me to go along. She had understood sex as well as any woman living.

  “Are you ready to perform now, Private?”

  “Not with you, sir!”

  She laughed. “Of course not, though it is permissible in this special instance. Sometimes recruit girls feel easier about being initiated by male officers rather than enlisted men; it is a matter of breeding—no pun!—and perception. But for you, I mean, with June, whose office this is. You understand, she is required to make out a report; they all are. Attitude, technique, ejaculation—”

  A report! Was nothing sacred? That turned me off again. “I-” I hesitated. “She remains a—”

  “A prostitute?”

  “Yes, sir. She cares nothing for me. She just wants to get it over with, like an item on an assembly line. There is neither love nor respect in that. That is not the type of woman I—”

  “I understand, and I respect you for that attitude, Private. I really do! The Jupiter Navy does not require that you degrade yourself with a woman who is socially beneath you.”

  “Oh, I didn’t mean that, sir! I-” But as I spoke, I realized I did mean it, at least in part. I had no status in the Jupiter society, but June was little more than a mannequin.

  “You are intelligent and well educated,” she said. “I’m sure your tests show high facility in more than one language, broad information, extraordinary social perception, and an intelligence quotient in the upper percentiles. You are elite.”

  “No, I’m not, sir! I’m just a refugee.”

  “Well, refugee, we intend to do right by you, for you have a future in the Jupiter Navy. Would it help you to know that not all our women are sexually professional? Many are recruits, like yourself, who are assigned to this duty by roster.”

  “But if it’s not voluntary—”

  “That depends on how you interpret it, private. They do volunteer for the roster and are excused from KP or guard duty.”

  “Oh ,” I said. “Sir.” I saw how it was. I knew that many of the male recruits I knew would be glad to exchange their places on the KP roster for one like this. Evidently it was true for some women, too. But that sort of woman did not excite me, either.

  “I can see you are sincere, and I do want to help you,” she said earnestly. I found I believed her. “I can offer you one other option, though a more difficult one.”

  “Sir?”

  “As I mentioned, more female recruits have initial problems than do the males. They have been raised more restrictively, especially in your culture, and never expected to become refugees or to be obliged to join the Navy. Many understand intellectually but are unable to accept it emotionally. We have the drugs and experienced male operators, but—” She shrugged.

  I caught on. “Me—and one of those?”

  She looked me in my eye. Her iris was purple, and I realized she wore tinted contact lenses. “Hope, she is intelligent and bilingual, like you, no woman of the streets. You would be doing her a favor, believe me.”

  Her use of my name startled me; I had not realized that she knew it. But, of course, she had done her homework before coming here, at least to that extent. She was a competent officer.

  “Uh—” I began doubtfully.

  “A refugee does not really have the option of dismissal from the service, as you know. I hesitate to conjecture what would become of her, if ...”

  How well I understood! Perhaps some women considered sex to be a fate worse than death, but most refugees who returned to their home planets would find literal death, and the females would find sex, too, in the form of rape. They had to make good in the Navy. This officer had really maneuvered me; I could not refuse what she asked, as well she knew.

  “I’ll try, sir,” I said.

  She smiled warmly. “You will have an hour. I regret that we cannot grant you more time, but our facilities are already overworked. You will be under observation, you understand; we must be assured of performance. But that will not be intrusive. We do have some slight discretion. Here, I will convey you to Juana’s chamber.” She rose gracefully.

  “Uh, sir, my clothes—”

  “Yes, take them with you, by all means.”

  She waited a moment, gracious even in this detail, while I gathered up fatigues and boots in an armful that I carried as low as possible before me. Then I followed her out the door and down the hall. We passed into another section of the ship and entered a new chamber.

  “Good luck,” the officer said, and closed the door behind me as she left.

  I stood there, my bundle of clothes held protectively before me. There on the bunk was a naked girl. She was hunched over, her black hair covering her face and part of her bosom. At least they didn’t shave the women’s heads; that would have been a horror! As the officer had said, certain allowances were
made.

  “Juana?” I asked. I could see she was Hispanic; it was not just her skin, as dark as mine, but the shape of her head and the way she held herself, even in this cruel situation.

  She did not answer. I did not know her personally, but I knew her culture and her horror. I also knew that she knew what had to be. To her, it was much the same as rape.

  And I was to be the rapist.

  I turned to go, unable to continue with this. At least the regular prostitutes could not be hurt.

  But then I remembered the alternative—for both of us—and turned again. I set down my clothing and sat beside her on the bed.

  I saw her stiffen and hunch away from me, but she did not actually move on the bed. I began to use my power, to fathom her individual nature. I can judge a person quickly and accurately when I try. I would not call my talent telepathy—I have very little belief in the supernatural—but rather a semiconscious perception of human reaction, of body language, of tension in the voice; I suppose I am a living lie detector, though it is more than that. I relate to people more perceptively than others do. Now I related to Juana. She was frightened but not completely; it was not the blind terror of the unknown but rather an unwillingness to yield gracefully to degradation, and a horror of the inevitable. It is said that the familiar loses its horror; that is not necessarily the case.

  “My name is Hope,” I said. “Hope Hubris, from Awful. This is my first time here. I—I was impotent, so they put me with you.”

  She lifted her head, losing her horror of me. She brushed back her hair. Her face was pretty—or would have been, had she not been crying, making her eyes puffy and her chin mushy. Her irises were dark brown and glazed with moisture. “You’re not—one of them?”

  “Not a prostitute, or gigolo, or whatever it is called,” I said. “I—sex with a stranger, just like that, like polishing boots or brass— I can’t do that. So they put the difficult cases together, figuring maybe we’ll understand each other and work it out.”

  “I’m sixteen,” she said.

  Helse had been sixteen! It struck me suddenly, unexpectedly. I forgot where I was and what I was supposed to be doing. Helse, sixteen, and I, fifteen. She had shown me sex and love, in that order, and changed my life, and I never wanted any woman but her, ever, and she was dead. Because of me.

  “What’s the matter with you?” Juana asked.

  I wiped my face, suddenly wet with tears. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I can’t do this.”

  “You know you have to,” she said.

  “Maybe with a—”

  “All I said was that I was sixteen. I didn’t mean it was statutory rape! I just meant I’m young, and it’s hard for me. So you would understand.”

  “I’m sixteen, too,” I said in Spanish, under my breath.

  Juana’s eyes widened. “You lied to get in?” she asked in the same language.

  “No. I don’t believe in lying. But someone did—and the magistrate didn’t believe me. But that’s not why—why what you said bothered me. She was sixteen.”

  “You have loved?”

  “Forever.”

  “But she is gone?”

  “Dead. And I want no other, ever.”

  “You made the trip to Jupiter?”

  “Yes.”

  “Me, too.” She was more comfortable in Spanish, speaking with greater confidence.

  “Your folks?” I asked.

  She nodded heavily. “Yours?”

  “Yes. All dead, except my sisters.”

  “Raped?”

  “Yes. One.”

  “Me, too.”

  “The Navy doesn’t understand about rape,” I said.

  “They practice it!” she said savagely. Then she smiled, and her beauty began to manifest. “Figuratively.”

  “True.”

  “I’m glad it’s you, Hope. I’m Juana Moreno, from the Second Platoon. We had better get it over with.”

  “But if you were raped—”

  “I think it will not hurt so much, with you.”

  I realized that she had accepted it, but I had not. “It should not hurt at all! And I—Helse—”

  “Helse? That is not a Hispanic name.”

  “Neither is mine. But she was Hispanic, like me. Like you. But more experienced. She showed me—”

  “Show me how she showed you. For it not to hurt.”

  “No. That memory is sacred.”

  “Look, Hope. I was raped by Saxon pirates. I’m afraid. I know it will hurt terribly, and I’ll scream, but if I can’t make it in the Navy, I have no life left. So I’ll bite my tongue. You understand. I want it to be you.”

  I sighed. She was correct, for both of us. We had to do it, and I could be potent with her. “She—I was afraid. I had seen my sister raped—I didn’t move. Helse did it all, the first time.”

  Juana shook her head. “I couldn’t do that. You must do it.”

  “I don’t want to hurt anybody that way!”

  “It will hurt less with you. And it’s so important. They are watching, and time is passing.”

  “They are watching,” I agreed.

  “Yes.”

  I glanced down. “You can see I’m not ready.”

  “Yes. You really don’t want to. That makes it easier for me.”

  I shrugged. “I’ll try.” I raised my right hand. “May I touch you?”

  She shrank back. “No!”

  Then she laughed falteringly. “Sorry, Hope. Ask me again.”

  I got up and paced the floor, no longer bothered by my nakedness. “This—like a surgical operation—I can’t do it.”

  “Yes.”

  My eye caught something on the wall. “A light switch!” I exclaimed.

  Juana looked up, smiling with gratification.

  I touched the switch, and there was blessed darkness. First, the language gave us some illusion of privacy of speech, and now the cessation of light gave us privacy of appearance. I felt much better, and knew that Juana did, too.

  I returned carefully to the bed, finding it with my foot, and sat down. I heard her breathing beside me.

  “Juana, take my hand,” I said.

  There was a brushing of arms, and then her hand found mine and squeezed it nervously. She was shivering and not with cold. It was warm here, and she was well fleshed. I knew she would cooperate, but would not initiate anything; it wasn’t her way, and she had not been jesting about being afraid.

  “May I kiss you?” I asked.

  “Yes,” she whispered, almost imperceptibly faint.

  I drew her in toward me by the hand and quested for her face with my own. I found it and met her lips, and kissed her briefly.

  Then she tore her hand away from mine but not to retreat. It was not passion, either, but the desperate need for comfort. She flung her arms about my shoulders and pulled me in close, so that we both almost fell over. “Hold me! Hold me!”

  I held her. She was excruciatingly female against me, and now I reacted. Her hair caressed my shoulder, and her body was warm though her hands were cold. I felt guilty on two counts: for having to take advantage of a frightened woman; and for being aroused by someone other than Helse.

  “May I pretend you are someone else?” I asked.

  “No!”

  Surprised, I chuckled ruefully. “That was unkind of me. I did not mean to insult you.”

  “You did not insult me, Hope. I know you loved her. But I wish you would try to love me, just for this hour. I have no one, and I need someone.”

  Helse was dead, I reminded myself yet again. I was not really being unfaithful to her. She would have urged me to do this. She would never have permitted the dead to hurt the living. “I’ll try.”

  We lay on the bed and kissed again. I was on my right side, she on her left, and it was somewhat awkward. I proceeded very slowly and paused when she stiffened, trying not to hurt her, but somehow it had to be forced. In retrospect I realize that the position was wrong, but then I thought it was my
inadequacy.