Part 4 (1/2)

Someone from Jolober's staff would poke his head into the conference room shortly to ask if the meeting was over and if the commandant wanted nonemergency calls routed through again.

The meeting was certainly over... but Horace Jolober had an emergency of his own. He swallowed, keyed his implant, and said brusquely, ”I'm out of action till I tell you different. Unless it's another Cla.s.s A flap.”

The kid at the commo desk stuttered a ”Yessir” that was a syllable longer than Jolober wanted to hear. Vicki straightened, wearing a bright smile beneath the tear streaks, but the big human gathered her to his chest again and brought up the power of his fans.

Together, like a man carrying a moderate-sized woman, the couple slid around the conference table to the door of the private suite. The chair's drive units were overbuilt because men are overbuilt, capable of putting out huge bursts of hysterical strength.

Drive fans and power packs don't have hormones, so Jolober had specified-and paid for-components that would handle double the hundred kilos of his own ma.s.s, the hundred kilos left after the tribarrel had chewed him. The only problem with carrying Vicki to bed was one of balance, and the Doll remained still in his arms.

Perfectly still, as she was perfect in all the things she did.

”I'm not trying to get rid of you, darling,” Jolober said as be grounded his chair.

”It's all right,” Vicki whispered. ”I'll go now if you like. It's all right.”

She placed her fingertips on Jolober's shoulders and lifted herself by those fulcrums off his lap and onto the bed, her toes curled beneath her b.u.t.tocks. A human gymnast could have done as well-but no better.

”What I want, want,” Jolober said forcefully as he lifted himself out of the saddle, using the chair's handgrips, ”is to do my job. And when I've done it, I'll buy you from Red Ike for whatever price he chooses to ask.”

He swung himself to the bed. His arms had always been long-and strong. Now he knew that he must look like a gorilla when he got on or off his chair... and when the third woman he was with after the amputation giggled at him, he began to consider suicide as an alterative to s.e.x.

Then he took the job on Placida and met Vicki.

Her tears had dried, so both of them could pretend they hadn't poured out moments before. She smiled shyly and touched the high collar of her dress, drawing her fingertip down a centimeter and opening the garment by that amount.

Vicki wasn't Jolober's ideal of beauty-wasn't what he'd thought thought his ideal was, at any rate. Big blondes, he would have said. A woman as tall as he was, with hair the color of bleached straw hanging to the middle of her back. his ideal was, at any rate. Big blondes, he would have said. A woman as tall as he was, with hair the color of bleached straw hanging to the middle of her back.

Vicki scarcely came up to the top of Jolober's breastbone when he was standing-at standing height in his chair-and her hair was a black fluff that was as short as a soldier would cut it to fit comfortably under a helmet. She looked buxom, but her b.r.e.a.s.t.s were fairly flat against her broad, powerfully muscled chest.

Jolober put his index finger against hers on the collar and slid down the touch-sensitive strip that opened the fabric. Vicki's body was without blemish or pubic hair. She was so firm that nothing sagged or flattened when her dress and the supports of memory plastic woven into it dropped away.

She shrugged her arms out of the straps and let the garment spill as a pool of sparkling shadow on the counterpane as she reached toward her lover.

Jolober, lying on his side, touched the collar of his uniform jacket.

”No need,” Vicki said blocking his hand with one of hers and opening his trouser fly with the other. ”Come,” she added, rolling onto her back and drawing him toward her.

”But the-” Jolober murmured in surprise, leaning forward in obedience to her touch and demand. The metallic braid and medals on his stiff-fronted tunic had sharp corners to prod the Doll beneath him whether he wished or not.

”Come,” she repeated. ”This time.”

Horace Jolober wasn't introspective enough to understand why his mistress wanted the rough punishment of his uniform. He simply obeyed.

Vicki toyed with his garments after they had finished and lay on the bed, their arms crossing. She had a trick of folding back her lower legs so that they vanished whenever she sat or reclined in the port commandant's presence.

Her fingers tweaked the back of Jolober's waistband and emerged with the hidden knife, the only weapon he carried.

”I'm at your mercy,” he said, smiling. He mimed as much of a hands-up posture as he could with his right elbow supporting his torso on the mattress. ”Have your way with me.”

In Vicki's hand, the knife was a harmless cylinder of plastic-a weapon only to the extent mat the b.u.t.t of the short tube could harden a punch. The knife was of memory plastic whose normal state was a harmless block. No one who took it away from Jolober in a struggle would find it of any use as a weapon.

Only when squeezed after being cued by the pore pattern of Horace Jolober's right hand would it- The plastic cylinder shrank in Vicki's hand, sprouting a double-edged 15cm blade.

”Via!” swore Jolober. Reflex betrayed him into thinking that he had legs. He jerked upright and started to topple off the bed because the weight of his calves and feet wasn't there to balance the motion.

Vicki caught him with both arms and drew him to her. The blade collapsed into the handle when she dropped it, so that it bounced as a harmless cylinder on the counterpane between them.

”My love, I'm sorry, sorry,” the Doll blurted fearfully. ”I didn't mean-”

”No, no,” Jolober said, settled now on his thighs and b.u.t.tocks so that he could hug Vicki fiercely. His eyes peered secretively over her shoulders, searching for the knife that had startled him so badly. ”I was surprised that it... How did did you get the blade to open, dearest? It's fine, it's nothing you did wrong, but I didn't expect that, is all.” you get the blade to open, dearest? It's fine, it's nothing you did wrong, but I didn't expect that, is all.”

They swung apart The mattress was a firm one, but still a bad surface for this kind of conversation. The bedclothes rumpled beneath Jolober's heavy body and almost concealed the knife in a fold of cloth. He found it, raised it with his fingertips, and handed it to Vicki. ”Please do that again,” he said calmly. ”Extend the blade.”

Sweat was evaporating from the base of Jolober's spine, where the impermeable knife usually covered the skin.

Vicki took the weapon. She was so doubtful that her face showed no expression at all. Her fingers, short but perfectly formed, gripped the baton as if it were a knife hilt- and it became one. The blade formed with avalanche swiftness, darkly translucent and patterned with veins of stress. The plastic would not take a wire edge, but it could carve a roast or, with Jolober's strength behind it, ram twenty millimeters deep into hardwood.

”Like this?” Vicki said softly. ”Just squeeze it and... ?”

Jolober put his hand over the Doll's and lifted the knife away between thumb and forefinger. When she loosed the hilt, the knife collapsed again into a short baton.

He squeezed-extended the blade-released it again- and slipped the knife back into its concealed sheath.

”You see, darling,” Jolober said, ”the plastic's been keyed to my my body. n.o.body else should be able to get the blade to form.” body. n.o.body else should be able to get the blade to form.”

”I'd never use it against you,” Vicki said. Her face was calm, and there was no defensiveness in her simple response.

Jolober smiled. ”Of course, dearest; but there was a manufacturing flaw or you wouldn't be able to do that.”

Vicki leaned over and kissed the port commandant's lips, then bent liquidly and kissed him again. ”I told you,” she said as she straightened with a grin, ”I'm a part of you.”

”And believe me,” said Jolober, rolling onto his back to cinch up his short-legged trousers. ”You're not a part of me I intend to lose.”

He rocked upright and gripped the handles of his chair.

Vicki slipped off the bed and braced the little vehicle with a hand on the saddle and the edge of one foot on the skirt. The help wasn't necessary-the chair's weight anch.o.r.ed it satisfactorily, so long as Jolober mounted swiftly and smoothly. But it was was helpful, and it was the sort of personal attention that was as important as s.e.x in convincing Horace Jolober that someone really cared'- helpful, and it was the sort of personal attention that was as important as s.e.x in convincing Horace Jolober that someone really cared'-could care-for him. care-for him.

”You'll do your duty, though,” Vicki said. ”And I wouldn't want you not to.”

Jolober laughed as he settled himself and switched on his fans. He felt enormous relief now that he had proved beyond doubt-he was sure of that-how much he loved Vicki. He'd calmed her down, and that meant he was calm again, too.

”Sure I'll do my job,” he said as he smiled at the Doll. ”That doesn't mean you and me me'll have a problem. Wait and see.”

Vicki smiled also, but she shook her head in what Jolober thought was amused resignation. Her hairless body was too perfect to be flesh, and the skin's red pigment gave the Doll the look of a statue in blus.h.i.+ng marble.

”Via, but you're lovely,” Jolober murmured as the realization struck him anew.

”Come back soon,” she said easily.

”Soon as I can,” the commandant agreed as he lifted his chair and turned toward the door. ”But like you say, I've got a job to do.”