Chapter 6
Johar and I walk hand in hand through the quarter.
I am only too aware that our hands are touching every second that we spend together. My heart beats like crazy, but it might also be because there are so many people crowding the streets. There is one advantage of Johar staying so close to my side. Nobody dares to bump into me, and nobody dares to give me more than a cursory look. In the dusk, the metal on Johar’s face flashes and reflects the rising planet, whose blue light transforms everything into an unreal, dreamy scenery. It has gotten significantly cooler, and when I start to shiver, Johar stops in front of a display of a clothing store. After hesitating for a second, Johar goes in, and I follow him. While I look around for something warm that would look somewhat good with my colorful rags, he chats with the store owner. They laugh and joke like old acquaintances. A sharp-eyed crow is sitting on the counter, never taking its eyes off of me. The store owner and the crow lift and lower their heads in sync. Another one of those animal companions. With a soul animal like that, you are never really alone, I think and am surprised at my thoughts. I have always been more comfortable being alone than in the company of others. Why am I suddenly thinking about loneliness? I shake my head to chase away the tears that are coming into my eyes, and randomly reach for a soft, black leather jacket. Matching, skin-tight leather pants are hanging on the same hanger. I grab both things and, being slow on purpose, I saunter back over to the two men and the crow, who considers my selection with approving nod. I reach out my hand, wanting to pet its shiny feathers. As soon as my fingers reach out, the bird snaps its impressive beak at me and squawks shrilly. Johar reaches for my hand to see if the feathered little devil has injured me. When he sees that I am uninjured, he lets go of me, and my hand falls down like a lifeless object. I feel strangely alone.
“I guess you’re on Betania for the first time, huh?” the store owner mumbles, and smooths the bird’s ruffled feathers with loving strokes.
“My girlfriend wanted a change of scenery,” Johar confirms. “She didn’t know that she shouldn’t touch your animals. She is from Earth.”
The man nods, as if this explains everything. He looks at me, noticeably less friendly than earlier. “You lock your animals in cages there, don’t you?” He makes his opinion of my home planet clear by spitting on the floor. Well, it is his store, and I am not the one who will have to mop the floor, but it still isn’t very polite. At the last minute, I remember my role, and hide behind Johar’s broad back. The cyborg pays, hands me the jacket and takes his leave with a crude good-bye that makes me blush.
“Better?” he asks and fixes the collar on the jacket.
“Much better, thanks,” I say and mean it. This unexpected courtesy from him puts me in a tender mood, and this time, I take his hand. “What is our destination?”
“An establishment called Red Moon,” he answers and I get a bad feeling about this. His eyes flash in amusement as he interprets my appalled expression correctly. He is taking me to a bordello with him! And I can’t even blame him, because, after all, I am the one who insisted on accompanying him at all times.
“Hhhm,” I mumble. “Is there anything I should avoid doing there? I don’t want to make another dumb mistake like just now.”
“The only important thing there, is that we not get separated, so stay right next to me, no matter what happens. You might see things you don’t like, or someone might mistake you for an employee of the house. If that happens, I will be there to help clear up any confusion.” For once, his voice doesn’t sound authoritarian and all-knowing, but relaxed, instead.
I slow down, because in the distance, I see a lighted sign that can only be for the bordello. Pulsing red moons that look suspiciously like ample breasts. This is so tasteless that it temporarily distracts me from my anxiety. I have only been in such an establishment once, but that one was on the military practice grounds where I received my training. All of the women had to mimic unscrupulous spies, and I remember that I was especially clumsy in trying to poison my target. It didn’t matter that the poison was merely a harmless substance that induced vomiting. In the end, my partner slipped it to me, instead, by switching the glasses.
“Who are we looking for?”
“A man by the name of Hazathel Suk,” he tells me. “Apparently, he knows someone who landed with Cassie Burnett and who might be able to tell us where she took off to.”
“Have you found out anything about the circumstances of her disappearance?” I ask. “It seems strange that she would just leave, even though she is expecting a child of the king or ruler of this planet.”
With an even tone he reports what he has learned. He really was busy this afternoon, while I was bathing and writing the report. Zeyliv, the leader of the escaped humans, is no longer among the living. There had been some kind of commotion at a slave market, and he died under unexplained circumstances. His wife, also one of the first settlers, has seized power and rules the planet with an iron fist. “Cassie and her companion, the Qua’Hathri warrior, were able to flee during the chaos,” he adds.
My thoughts are racing around in my head. “No wonder she wanted to get off Betania. I can’t imagine that the new queen would be very excited about her husband’s fling. It is possible that she, the queen, can’t have children, and instigated the uprising because of it.”
“It would be a mistake to jump to conclusions before having all of the facts.” His tone is dry and slightly amused. It really is strange that he, of all people, who is only half-human, has such a repertoire of expressions. I wonder if my father made a mistake back then. Cyborgs are supposed to be easily recognizable as machine beings, and therefore have only very limited expressions. Their ability to express emotion is strictly limited, not in the least because they don’t have any. This cyborg is definitely not a normal specimen. He is old, he is emotional and he could even pass, if he went to the trouble of hiding his metal, for a pure human.
“Will we find this Hazathel Suk at the whore house? What is he doing there?” I bite my tongue, but it is too late. What would a man possibly be doing in a bordello?
“He works there, as a bouncer,” Johar responds, overlooking my embarrassment.
“Do you want to pretend to be a client who misbehaves, so you can meet him?” I ask, half-joking. I suspect that Johar loves crazy plans like that one. But he shakes his head and gives me a broad smile.
“I thought about it,” he admits. “But once we have been thrown out, it would be hard to get back in. And how can you talk to a man who is grabbing you by the scruff of the neck and depositing you in the street? We will have to improvise.”
I could …,” I start, but he looks at me with a furrowed brow and closes his eyes in a strange desperation.
“Mara,” he says my name emphatically. I have goose bumps all over, just from him saying that one small word. “This is the kind of house where every wish, no matter how strange, is fulfilled. People like Hazathel have seen everything, and will see through an unworldly person like you in under two seconds. He is dangerous. Don’t forget that. His animal is a scorpion.”
The color drains from my face. I can practically feel the blood draining away. Despite our comfortable pace, we are now so close to the Red Moon, that I don’t say anything else, but hold on to Johar tightly. The entrance is deceivingly simple, if you compare it to the lighted sign, which is anything but discreet. Johar gives me a last warning look, puts his arm around my waist, and rings the doorbell. Not even two seconds later, a young woman is standing in the doorway. She has a small ball of yarn with her, out of which two black button eyes are looking at me. I assume that this is a tiny dog, because the dog jumps up and down at the cyborg’s leg, panting a hello. Johar does not acknowledge the dog, but asks to be admitted, instead.
“What about your company? Does she want to wait, or is she looking for a little distraction, as well? Maybe a brief interlude à trois?” Before we are even inside, she is listing other possibilities, of which one is as astounding as the next. When we leave the plush decorated entranceway, and go into a kind of living room, she falls silent. With a gesture that looks like a circus director’s, she points to at least twenty beings, in various stages of undress. I notice two men, among the female beings, who are humanoid and who are both looking me up and down. I hide behind Johar, who is walking by the women slowly, and finally nods at a red-headed one.
“What can I do for you, sweetie?” she breathes with a raw voice that sounds like it should come from a woman with a much ampler chest. She is wearing a bikini made of shiny gold fabric, leaving nothing to any visitor’s imagination. Every dark blue vein that supplies her body with blood, is visible underneath her alabaster-white skin. The only color, other than her flaming red hair is her bright green eyes and her red lips, with which she gives him a routine smile. She seems creepy to me, but I don’t dare let go of Johar, so I follow him, instead. Before we go upstairs, so Sherri can have fun with Johar, he pulls out his money pouch and puts a few coins in the hand of the woman who met us at the door. I see her eyes light up happily, and then suspiciously, as she counts the coins.
“No damage to the merchandise,” she says and squints her eyes warily. Johar laughs and it sounds utterly convincing.
“Don’t worry,” he replies and pulls the red-head to himself. “I just want to be spoiled for a little bit, while the little one here watches.”
I realize that I am the little one, and breathe in sharply, appalled. But Johar isn’t finished yet. “She is still pretty shy, if you know what I mean.” He winks at the bordello owner. “I want Sherri to show her a few things.” I pinch him in the ribs, well, I try to, but my fingers just run down his skin. “Also, I am aware that not many of my kind come to your establishment, and that it might take some extra effort.”
The hardened whore mother actually pats him on the cheek! It seems almost comforting, and I can’t stop gaping. “We are not on Earth here, boy,” she states the obvious. “Your origin doesn’t count here. Just your money. He who pays, is treated well. He who pays more, is treated better.” Her dog-like creature wags his tiny tail in agreement. “And anyway, my Booby likes you, and that is enough for me to trust you.” Booby must be her little ball of fur, because when she says his name, he barks happily and wags his tail so hard that his whole body jerks. My goodness, where have we landed? There is no trace of Hazathel Suk.
“So, get to it,” she tells us. She takes my hand and squeezes it. “It is good that you don’t have the same dumb prejudices that other humans have,” she praises me. “And if you are afraid of getting pregnant, stop by and see me after. I can give you something that will prevent conception, so you can just focus on your lust. You seem very tense, my little one.”
“Thank you,” I blurt out and force myself to smile. “Maybe that’s exactly what I need.” Should Johar not have a chance with Sherri, maybe I can pump her for information, I think, before I notice the double meaning of my words, so I clamp my mouth shut, before I say something dumb.
With a deep breath that feels like the last one of my life, I follow Johar and Sherri up the steps.
An hour later, I am lying next to Sherri and Johar on the bed. How has it come to this?
Somehow, Sherri managed to get me to relax with her chatter. I had thought I was going to have to watch the two of them, and had prepared myself for an hour of awkwardness. But Johar figured out a way to maintain his disguise without going to extremes with Sherri, or me, or even Sherri and me. He is lying naked on the bed and Sherri’s fingers are showing me with definite expertise, how and where to touch a man to arouse him.
I would rather stand there like an idiot, who has no idea about sex, than roll in the sheets with them. This situation is strange enough, as it is. Sherri obviously enjoys teaching me the ways of her profession, and she really knows a man’s body in and out. Johar reacts to her deft fingers with increasing (and visible) arousal. She leaves nothing untouched, instead of concentrating only on the obvious. Gently, but determinedly, she guides my fingers, which suddenly feel like clumsy foreign bodies. When my fingertips graze over Johar’s skin, feeling his soft, but also rough, manly skin, I can feel myself getting wet. Sherri tells me to kneel between Johar’s legs. She releases my bra with one hand and frees my breasts. Without wanting to, I compare her ample bosom with my smaller one, but she just smiles and tells me that she always wished she had smaller breasts. Her friendliness only slightly reduces my embarrassment, and when she shows me how to rub Johar’s hard cock back and forth between my breasts, so he doesn’t come inside me and get me pregnant, I even enjoy it.
I look at him from my kneeling position and see Johar’s stretched out body from an unusual perspective. His muscular chest is rising and falling faster than usual and his lips are parted slightly. He looks so vulnerable, and so human, that, for a long time, I forget what he really is. I allow my thoughts to wander, and concentrate on, what Sherri thinks, is my job. She points out to me how perfectly Johar’s manhood is formed. He is bulging and hard, but straight and regular with just the slightest bend. The length and width seem above average to me, and when I gather my courage and ask Sherri about it, she laughs softly. “Oh, yes,” she answers my question. “Your friend is very well equipped, but not so big that he would hurt you.” A dark cloud appears on her face but leaves again. “Another thing that will bring much pleasure to you,” she distracts quickly, “is his self-control.” She points to the small drop at the tip of Johar’s penis. “When you see that drop of lust, then you know that he will come soon. Your man has been holding back for so long now, that I wouldn’t believe it, if I weren’t seeing it with my own eyes.” She grins mischievously, like a cat who has found a bowl of cream. “He will give you as much pleasure as you are giving him, if you will let him”
I lean wordlessly between Johar’s legs and do something I would have never thought possible. I take him in my mouth. This is as much of a surprise to him, as it is to me, because he stiffens up for a moment. His manhood seems to grow even more in my mouth, but I could be mistaken. I hear a long, tortured intake of breath and know that I need to stop, or he is going to empty himself into my mouth. I pull away from him and look at him. At this moment, anything is possible between the two of us. I can see in his eyes that he wants nothing more than to throw me on my back and take me. He scoots back a little and sits up, breathing heavily. He reaches between my legs and rubs my dripping wet crack with his finger. Equal rights for all, I think, and register nothing but the devastating lust rushing through my veins, which I can barely control. I want nothing more than to touch him and see the arousal on his face, so I reach for him again, so I can pull him to me – but in vain. He evades me quickly and my hand misses.
Johar rolls from the bed and grabs his things. If I didn’t know better, I would say he was fleeing. His considerable erection makes it hard for him to get dressed, and I turn my head, so I don’t burst into laughter. It isn’t the absurdity of the situation that makes me want to laugh, but rather the strange feeling in my chest. It takes me a few minutes of analyzing it to figure out what it is, and then I understand why it feels so strange: it is happiness. I have crossed my self-imposed limits and tasted freedom, as I brought pleasure to the cyborg.
And that scares me more than anything.