She looked at him, full at him—that too-wide face with its toothless mouth and high cheeks, the pinpoint eyes, the receding forehead and protruding chin. Her gaze traveled down his body—enormous chest, but sunken and incurving . . . and narrow hips . . . pipestem legs . . . He was . . . he was not just he, she saw, but both sexes. And now she understood the grunting. He was fucking himself . . . herself! Little muscles at the crotch moved the . . .

Rachel whirled away, her mind searching wildly for something, anything to say.

“Why are you crying?” Her voice was too high.

“Ohhh, I always cry. It doesn’t mean anything.”

Bulbous-head lurched another step toward her and the circle moved with him.

“Entertainment time,” Jessup said and pushed her roughly toward Bulbous-head.

She felt hands clutching her, turning her, and, presently, her memory left her . . . but for a long time she felt that she heard screams and she wondered if they might be her screams.

Chapter 31

Chapter 31

Absolute dependence is the hallmark of religion. It posits the supplicant and the one who dispenses gifts. The supplicant employs ritual and prayer in the attempt to influence (control) the dispenser of gifts. The kinship between this relationship and the days of absolute monarchs cannot be overlooked. This dependence on supplication gives to the keeper of those two essentials—the ritual paraphernalia and the purity of prayerful forms (that is, to the Chaplain)—a power akin to that of the gift dispenser.

—“Training the Chaplain/Psychiatrist,” Moonbase Documents (from Shiprecords)

RAJA THOMAS strode along a Colony passage with Waela TaoLini at his side. They both wore insulated yellow singlesuits with collar attachments for breather-helmets. It was first-light of Rega outside, but in here was the soft gold of dayside illumination that any Colonist could remember from shipside.

The food of this diurn’s first meal sat heavily in his stomach and he wondered at that. They were adding some odd filler to the food. What was happening to the shipside agraria? Could it be possible, as Oakes’ people hinted, that Ship was cutting down on hydroponics output?

Waela was oddly silent as she matched his pace. He glanced at her and found her studying him. Their eyes flicked past a confrontation too brief to call recognition, but an orange glow suffused her neck and face.

Waela stared straight ahead. They were bound for the test-launch apron to inspect the new submersible gondola and its carrier. It would be tried first in the enclosed and insulated tank at the hangar before being risked in Pandora’s unpredictable ocean.

Why can’t I just say no? she wondered. She did not have to get at the poet in the way Thomas ordered. There were other ways. It occurred to her then to ask herself about the society of Thomas’ origins. What was his conditioning that he thinks sex is the best way to lower the psyche’s guards?