Part 4 (2/2)
Then, as if suffering an attack of shyness, she swung back into her chair before the console. A few taps at the keys and she brought up onscreen the nearest spatial phenomenon: a glaring binary star.
”Look at that! Beautiful! A green star and an orange!”
64.Karmal Pak looked at the flaming yellow-white and its runty, ruddy companion sun, and broke up all over again.
Now that he knew her better she seemed more attractive and he was considering putting the moves on her -when the commbox winked and said ping.
The captain advised from his cabin that he had just taken a communication from their employer, ”the Admiral.” At last! Rendezvous in just under five hours! All crew were directed to clean up and dress up. He also asked Pak to come to his cabin.
Karmal left Najendra, thinking d.a.m.n, with a little sense of loss.
That feeling was not shared by s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p Lewuvul's mate. Her feelings were excitement and antic.i.p.ation only-and that had nothing to do with the steward.
Four hours later, her baggy pants were topped by a blousy-as-usual tunic, except that this one matched the pants: manganese blue. And she was wearing a belt, as if to prove that she had a waist. Clipped to it was a neat little black rectangular pouch.
”Very nice, Mate,” Captain Lortice said, rather striking himself in crisp and spotless whites. ”What's in the pouch?”
”A comb and a lip-glosser, Captain.”
”My G.o.d.”
Val.u.s.triana See was absolutely miserable and still on her knees. Once she had mouthed Manjanungo to o.r.g.a.s.m and swallowed the results in sobbing gulps, she expected that the awful cutting wires would be removed from her calves and swollen stomach. Far more importantly despite the pain of the constricting little bands, she expected that the plug would be removed from her a.n.u.s. The copious enema of too-warm soapy water had 65.been churning in her guts for forty-seven minutes and every one of the two thousand, eight hundred and twenty seconds had been an hour-long h.e.l.l.
She was wrong in her hopes and expectations. She was not yet to be granted relief, but must suffer more while demeaning herself still further.
In a cold voice, Manjanungo ordered her to crawl over and perform a similar service on the overly voluptuous Althis, one of the three persons he had taken off the crippled s.p.a.cer he had claimed as salvage. (Its captain, a pirate of small renown, had not agreed. Accordingly he was now locked in a dark small-hold, alone. He'd doubtless welcome the solitude, Manjanungo told him, after several months with two women in an uncontrollably drifting s.p.a.cer. Captain Vettering had not agreed with that, either.) Writhing as her insides grumbled and bubbled, seeming to send hot needles through her belly and all along her intestinal tract, Val.u.s.triana began carrying out Manjanungo's latest command. He watched, amused. After a while he signed to the stiffly waiting Intaglio, who nodded. He left the cabin. Just in case, he saw to it that the door was locked after him, on this latest of torments, inflicted on the TGO agent who had dared capture him. He paced smiling along the s.h.i.+p's tunnel to another cabin.
There, two of his girls had been long enough at the business of obeying him: they were wallowing in lesbian embrace with the third of the trio he had taken off with Vettering and Althis. Vettering had bragged of how she had been a TGW officer who had become positively insatiable during their months of helpless plowing through s.p.a.ce. He had kept her in skimpy briefs only. That became her, Manjanungo thought, but had ordered Lhari bathed and corseted at once. Now she 66.would service him as she had so often served Vettering; as Val.u.s.triana had just served Manjanungo. If she disagreed, she would be bent double, bound, and whipped. If she agreed, she would learn that she could not be successful with a man who had just climaxed. In that case of course she would have to be punished. .. .
6.
The two s.p.a.cecraft approached, communicated, adjusted thrust and aim, linked puters, matched velocity, communicated some more and approached still closer, and linked physically. Each fired a magnetized line to the other. They hung in s.p.a.ce, millions of stells' worth of handsome, ornate, and superbly equipped yachts. Captain and crew of Lewuvul would meet their employer on his boarding; s.h.i.+p's mate naturally had the con.
The pirate s.h.i.+eda styled himself ”admiral,” sometimes, though he hardly commanded a fleet. Najendra had heard Captain Lortice address Manjanungo as ”Admiral,” oncomm, and had heard no objection from the pirate who had indeed swiftly patched together a small fleet.
As ”the Admiral” prepared to come onboard Lewuvul, Najendra sat in the mate's chair at the con, watching SIPAc.u.m mind the s.h.i.+p. She wore a little smile, picturing them: Captain Lortiee, just inside the airlock, all scrubbed and groomed and handsomely attired in those snug whites; Serendip, Vermillion, and Vampy of Jarpi lined up in matched poses along with matching white blouses and burgundy tights; and Karmal Pak, in a satins.h.i.+ne white tunic and jet pants not quite so tight.
67.68.From the con-cabin she heard the excitement, and learned only later that it was a disappointment: everyone got ready only to have the Admiral first send over his man Javad. After him came one of the girls, and more excited sounds and tootle-wheets greeted the removal of her s.p.a.cesuit. And then the third s.p.a.cesuited figure was cycled through the airlock, and she heard less clamor.
A duly respectful silence, she thought, and soon heard his commanding voice with its Joser accent.
”A very good job indeed, Lortice! A beautiful craft, and I do know and appreciate how long yer've all waited. Well, you've doubtless heard from ONS about Starqueen. What you did not I am sure hear is that it was a joint Manjanungo/Ramesh Jageshwar venture! And now I have another s.h.i.+p, partially in tow. This one we just . . . found. Contained a bedraggled and beaten outlaw named Vettering and his woman, Althis, and their . . . pet. Even more bedraggled, and not a st.i.tch on her. Former TGW officer, can yer imagine? Now devoted to Captain Vettering, poor stupid thing. Name's Lhari . . . something.* The s.h.i.+p is ours, taken as salvage. Wants a bit of working and refitting, is all. As to the others . . . we'll see, won't we! This bit of fluff, Lortice, it pleases me to call Amethyst. Named for the color I chose for her hair, yes. A well-trained girl. Very nearly eighteen, aren't you Amethyst, hmmm? You will please this man Captain Lortice, Amethyst! It occurred to me that yer've waited long and doubtless celibately, Gap-tain Lortice, and so Amethyst is for your cabin. She will do precisely what she is told, and do it well. If she does more or less, she expects to be punished just as she ex- * Suffragan Captain Lhari Haddad's fate was decided in s.p.a.cEWAYS #12, Star Slaver, the story of Vettering and Althis.
69.pects to remain in the snug embrace of that lovely satin corset. Do not disappoint her, Lortice. Beautiful s.h.i.+p, beautiful! Well then, who's oncon?”
”First Mate Najendra 7240ltRE, Admiral.”
”Ah, a Res.h.i.+, hmm? Well, well, let's see this lovely craft's con then, and then I shall want to ... interview your most n.o.ble guest. She is in good health?”
His voice was moving toward the con; so was Lor-tice's: ”Better than good health, Admiral.”
”Ah-huh. Goodi And keeping all crew save Mate Najendra lean and a bit tired, hmmm?” Manjanungo laughed, and Najendra heard the falseness of it. Playing the admiral, this ruthless and born-wealthy man of 28.
She sat on a con until she heard them entering behind her, and looked around and nodded, then turned back to make an obvious check of her console. Only then did she rise and turn to face them. Her face was open, showing none of the excitement she felt; only the friendliness of a competent s.h.i.+p's officer. She saw the flicker of the self-consciously weirdly clad young man's eyes when he caught sight of her attractiveness.
The captain said, ”Admiral Manjanungo: s.h.i.+p's mate Najendra.”
She met Manjanungo's eyes briefly before lowering her head in an obvious above-the-shoulders bow. ”Admiral.”
”Mate, I am impressed. A handsome con, sparkling and first-rate in every regard,” the black-taffeta'd man said, as if he really were a reviewing admiral. ”I am impressed, too, with the fact that even my entry did not prevent your making a double-checking final scan of the console before turning from it. I am most pleased. You could do well with me, Najendra.”
She didn't bother to correct him. ”Thank you, Admiral.”
70.He glanced about with proprietary pleasure. ”Ah, beautiful, beautiful.” He did not quite rub his hands together. ”A good s.h.i.+p, Mate?”
”An absolutely superb s.h.i.+p, Admiral.”
”Excellent, excellent. Ah-do call up a picture of Starwolf.
She nodded, turned to give that order to SIPAc.u.m, without mentioning the obvious: the picture would not be much, with the other s.h.i.+p so close. The . . . flags.h.i.+p of the admiral.
It wasn't. The blue-and-white yacht beside Lewuvul was of a different make, obviously a bit larger and a sort of rounded rectangular shape. Manjanungo beamed at what he saw of it anyhow.
”Well!” he said, obviously much enjoying himself and quite full of himself. ”We shall celebrate our mutual successes. First, however, I would interview the Most n.o.ble Lady Seerava. Is she in your cabin, Lor-tice?”
Seemingly proud rather than at all affronted at being addressed by name instead of t.i.tle before his crew, Lor-tice said, ”In her own cabin, Admiral. I fear that we have . . . discommoded the Most n.o.ble Lady to the extent of removing those objects she might rashly have tried to employ as weapons-and we reversed the lock.”
Manjanungo smiled, nodded, and Najendra watched the bob of his bow-tied pigtail. Queue, rather.
”Good! I am glad you have not had to discommode her to any greater extent. She is, after all, my kin by marriage. Hers. Hmmm. Captain, why do we not ask you to take the con while I go to interview the Most n.o.ble Lady? The presence of another woman might make her feel less uncomfortable. Less . . . distracted,” he said, letting them see that he wanted to smile 71.satirically but was resisting the impulse. ”Mate Najen-dra, I am also impressed that I miscalled your name and you did not correct me. The complete professional, I should say, hmmm? Would you accompany me to interview the lady, please?”
She glanced at her captain before saying ”Of course, Admiral,” to let him know how professional and what a superb subordinate she was. ”Oh, Admiral, Captain ... we did not apprise the Lady Seerava of the Admiral's arrival. She may be in ... deshabille. Should I go first, sirs?”
”Well, well,” Manjanungo said with a wave of a gleaming blue-black arm-a gesture that made the odd fabric rustle susurrantly-”I am after all her cousin, and she is after all much older. Let us a.s.sume that there can be no impropriety, and should be no embarra.s.sment. Will you lead the way, please. Oh, Captain; the lock.. .?”
Lortice looked pleased. ”It now responds to the spoken word 'Starqueen,' Admiral, in any voice.”
This time Manjanungo's laughter was genuine. He swung to the door and gestured in manner lordly.
”s.h.i.+p's Mate?”
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