Chapter 8 — SEDUCTION

They let me out of my stinking cell the next morning. After I had cleaned and dressed, Scar talked to me again. "Have you had occasion to reconsider your position, Hubris?"

I certainly had, though not in the manner he supposed. I had, in my fashion, just spent six years as a Sunshine state senator and lost my bid to be governor. I now knew my life to age forty. I had learned political finesse. "Yes. I can see now that my position was in error," I said. "The flat tax would represent an improvement over the present system."

I could have been lying, but he was satisfied. Evidently he knew that I would not take a position I did not support, and indeed it was true: I now believed in the flat tax. I had seen the abuses of the present system of taxation and knew that the tax code needed to be drastically simplified and the nefarious loopholes eliminated. The flat tax would do that. I did not regard it as ideal, for it did tend to benefit the wealthy and penalize the poor, but it remained a fairer system.

"Actually, I have been reconsidering, too," Scar said.

That startled me. I looked at him inquiringly.

"What I am wondering now is whether any system of taxation can be fair," he said. It was as if he were a friend arguing a rhetorical case, figuring out his own position. "What, after all, is the definition of theft?"

"Theft? Taking something of value from a person or institution without his consent."

"So if I take money from you, without your consent, I am stealing it?"

"Yes," I agreed, uncertain where this was leading.

"If I point a weapon at you and require that you hand me money—"

"Yes, that's still a form of theft," I agreed. "Armed robbery."

"Even though I do it openly and you actually hand me the money?"

"Yes, because it's involuntary. I don't want to give you the money, but I'm afraid you'll hurt me if I don't."

"Suppose I don't actually point a weapon," he said. "Suppose I merely suggest that something unpleasant will happen to you if you do not pay?"

"Yes, that's still theft, if the threat is unequivocal."

"Such as confining you in a dark, noisome cell."

Again I was startled. "Yes."

He smiled. "I am not a hypocrite, Hubris. I have robbed you of your freedom, and I am coercing you to part with something you value. I am a thief. But I believe I am acting in a good cause."

"The ends do not justify the means!" I exclaimed.

"Don't they? Suppose I proved to you that the cause I serve is the worthiest possible cause and benefits the whole planet of Jupiter, while all it costs is the temporary inconvenience of one person. Doesn't that justify it?"

"I hardly believe that your cause can really—"

"But, for the sake of rhetoric assume this is true. Then is theft justified?"

I pondered and could not answer.

He smiled again. "Now back to the taxes. If I have a world of good works to perform with the money, does it justify my taking it from you in the form of involuntary taxes?"

"But that's not the same," I protested. "Taxes are a requirement of citizenship!"

"And if you don't pay them you may lose your citizenship—and become a refugee or a prisoner."

I had been a refugee and was now a prisoner. My family had rebelled against an unfair aspect of Callisto society, and it was evident that I had in some way crossed a powerful opponent later in my life. The parallel had power. "I don't know."

"Obviously I do believe that the ends justify the means," he said. "Actually it's a matter of proportion. I see the greatest good for the greatest number and am prepared to sacrifice the few for the benefit of the many. You may feel otherwise, and perhaps I would, too, in your situation. But the position is worthy of consideration."

"Perhaps if I knew what your cause is," I said.

"All in good time, Hubris. I am not trying to hurt you or humiliate you; all I want is your serious consideration of the points I raise. I did not punish you last night for differing with me but for refusing to hold a meaningful dialogue. Give me your serious attention, even in opposition, and your existence here will be comfortable enough."

"But you tortured me before ever inquiring about my attitude," I protested.

"That was necessary to demonstrate my power over you. To prove to you at the outset that I can and will do what I deem necessary to gain your attention. It is not enough merely to speak to you; I had to make you believe absolutely. Just as one learns by hard experience to treat electric current with respect, you learned about me. You do not need to grovel; just deal with me on my terms, as you would a natural force."

That concluded the session. I had to admit that, given the present situation, what he said made sense.

Other books awaited me in my cell, on the subjects of taxation and law enforcement. I read them; I had nothing else to do at the moment. Obviously I was being reeducated, but even with my extra memories of my political life on Jupiter, I couldn't grasp the thrust of it. Of course, a lot could have happened in the intervening five or ten years. I might not be in politics at all anymore.

That evening I visited Dorian Gray again, knowing it was expected of me. The irony was that though I knew this was part of the larger trap my captors had laid for me, and that I had to seem to fall into it, I felt its power nonetheless. Knowledge is not necessarily a perfect defense. I was alone so much of the time that any human contact was valuable, even the interview with Scar. Dorian also happened to be a woman, which made the appeal that much stranger, and she was a lovely one. Yes, I remembered Megan, and loved her and longed for her, but she was far away, while Dorian was here. I know this seems fickle, a confirmation of the evil women are apt to believe of men, that men love only what is in reach, isn't scratching and biting, and is fair and fully formed, and that men have no lasting commitment beyond sexual gratification. Like many myths, this one has some substance; men are indeed sexual creatures and feel the attraction of nearby women in the manner a body in space feels that of a proximate planet. I was sexually vulnerable now; a part of me wanted to fall into the trap. Thus my pretense was apt to become real. Forgive me, Megan! I prayed in silence again, but I had no assurance that she would.

Dorian did not make it easy. Rather, she made it too easy. She embraced me and kissed me the moment I arrived. "Oh, Hope," she breathed. "I missed you. When you didn't come last night, I thought..."

A further irony: she meant it. She was an actress playing a part, yet she did care. The best actors do care. Perhaps she used the ancient Stanislavski method, trying truly to experience her role, but it seemed like more than that. With her, too, the role was to a certain extent becoming reality. Yet she had to know her true face, too, as I knew mine.

"I did what I said I would," I said. "I talked back. So I got dumped back in the smell-cell for a night. I don't think I'll do that again."

"I was afraid they'd do worse to you," she said.

"I won't talk back to them soon again," I said ruefully. "I had forgotten how bad that cell is." Which was, of course, a lie of sorts, for the benefit of the recorders. Scar must never suspect that I wanted to visit that cell from time to time, so as to catch up on my recent history. The truth was, I had hardly been aware of the smell; I had in effect been transported to Jupiter.

"I did tell you not to do it," she reminded me, as she held me tight. "Oh, Hope, if anything had happened to you..." Why was she so eager to get so close, so fast? I enjoyed the feel of her flesh, but I distrusted this. Was there a time limit on my treatment, so that the seduction had to be accomplished early? That could work to my advantage. So I demurred. "I mustn't take advantage of you," I said gallantly.

She realized that she was moving too fast and eased off. "Come, sit and talk. It's been so lonely."

That suited me. My talent was tuning in on her, adapting to the dark. I was used to visual contact, as perhaps my captors knew, but now I was tuning in on her touch.

We sat together in her hammock and talked. The hammock tended to wedge my left hip and her right hip together, and our corresponding shoulders. That suited her because she wanted to seduce me, and in the darkness touch was her main asset. It suited me, too, because I wanted to read her with my talent, and touch was my main asset, too. And it suited us both because we had to keep our heads close together, to whisper, so that we would not be overheard, theoretically. Actually, modern auditory pickup devices are so sensitive that they can monitor a heartbeat from a quarter mile's distance, so that was illusion; if our captors were listening, as they surely were, they were hearing everything. If they were not listening, it was because they trusted Dorian to inform them of anything significant. But human reflexes die hard; we whispered.

I told her what little more I remembered of my experience in the Jupiter Navy, taking advanced training, winning an accelerated promotion to private first class—the enlisted men having army-style rank, while the officers had Navy-style rank, in the merger of the old separate services—and rooming with lovely Juana, who was also Hispanic.

"I'm Hispanic," Dorian reminded me in Spanish.

"And lovely," I agreed. "I have never seen you, but I know I would be smitten by your beauty in an instant."

"Thank you," she said. Women like to be reminded that they are beautiful.

"But I don't understand why you should have any interest in an older man like me."

"There is no other man," she said. This was of course true on the surface, and untrue beneath, and I read both reactions in her. But there was another current of reaction that cut across these like a solar wind. I was looking for some weakness in her, some human aspect I might exploit, and suddenly I had a hint of where to look.

"Surely you have known other men," I said, holding her hand in mine lightly, so as to pick up any quiver of tension passing through the fingers.

"No," she said, but her fingers gave her the lie.

"Now I have been candid with you," I chided her. "I told you of Juana. Won't you tell me of your first love?"

"You didn't love Juana," she retorted accurately, but again that tension rippled through her hand. Oh, yes, she had loved.

"Perhaps not," I agreed. "My true love was Helse. But she died...." This time it was my own hand the tremor shook. "And life continued for me. Juana was a good and lovely girl, and what I felt for her was as close to love as I was capable of feeling. I think—I can't quite remember—that there were others, but she was the first in the Navy, and I will always treasure the memory."

"I—I suppose there could have been, in the period of wash," she said. "Maybe in due course I'll remember."

She was lying. She remembered now. This was her point of vulnerability. I regretted having to do it, but I knew I had to. I had to get hold of her vulnerability and turn it to my advantage.

But not openly. If the captors knew what I was doing, they would remove Dorian and mem-wash me back to coordinate zero. I had to do it covertly, and this was a challenge.

Fortunately the scratches in the hell-cell had given me the clue. I needed an open code as a starting base, and a closed one for the real action. Our overt conversation and gradual seduction would serve for the first, and our physical contact could be adapted for the second.

I took her hand more firmly. "I want to understand you, Dorian Gray," I said. "Maybe if I had understood Helse better, I could have prevented her death. I never want to make the mistake of incomprehension again. I am desperately lonely in my cell, and I do not know when or why I may be tortured or killed, and I would cleave to you in a moment, if I felt I knew you well enough so that you would not dissipate in my arms like mist. You must be real to me; I must know you." As I emphasized the word I squeezed her hand, not hard enough to show on whatever nightlight scanner was watching us but enough so that Dorian was definitely aware of it.

She was moved; I felt the tremor pass through the whole of her body. "You're not just a—a body, are you?" she asked. "You value the mind, the—"

"The essence," I agreed, squeezing her hand again. "But do I know your essence, Dorian?" This time I squeezed twice: two quick pulses.

She was startled. Obviously I didn't really know her, and in the common code of one for yes and two for no, I had answered my question.

She fumbled for words, realizing that something special was going on. "I—what can I tell you, that—"

"Only the truth, Dorian," I said, squeezing once.

Which I knew she could not do. "Why don't we just lie down and relax, Hope," she suggested after a moment. "Here, close, in the hammock, and I'll try to tell you anything you want to know."

The seduction ploy again. She hoped to use her body to distract me from this odd approach. She certainly had the body to do it.

"All right," I agreed. That surprised her; she hadn't expected me to capitulate so readily.

We worked our way around and managed to get into the hammock together, face to face, my arms around her body and hers around mine. The hammock pressed us close, and her thigh, belly, and breast were warm against my body.

My right arm was the upper one. I slid my hand down along her back to her left buttock and cupped it familiarly through her skirt. "What is your name?" I asked.

"Why, Dorian Gray," she said with a shake of amusement.

I squeezed her buttock twice.

She tensed, realizing that I was denying her answer, rather than being familiar in the physical sense. I suspect it might be a shock to any beautiful woman to discover that a man is more interested in her mind than her body, for whatever reason. "Does my name really matter?"

"Yes," I said, and squeezed her firm flesh twice.

Again she tensed, but this time only in the buttock. The feel of that was interesting. "What are you up to, Hope?"

"I think I'm seducing you," I said, and squeezed once.

"Well, two can play at that game." She moved her left hand to my right buttock and squeezed.

I smiled. "Oh? Then try this." I moved my hand, finding the band in her prison skirt, and slid my fingers inside. I found the silk-smooth surface of her panties. "No one can see what I do." And I squeezed once.

She laughed again, playing the strange game. She undid my trousers and reached inside. The flesh she found was not that of the buttock. She took hold and squeezed. "What do you think of that?"

"No effect," I said, squeezing her buttock twice. Indeed it was a lie, for in her grasp my flesh was rapidly changing. I knew she was an agent of my captors, serving their purpose, but she was indeed a luscious item of the flesh. That was what made this so difficult emotionally: I had to keep my inner feelings apart from my outer ones, while causing her inner and outer emotions to merge. That might not be easy to do.

She hesitated. She had expected the hand signals to stop once real progress toward a sexual act was made. "What do you want?"

"I want you," I said with a single squeeze.

"Well, just let me take off my clothes."

I squeezed twice.

"I don't understand!" Her confusion was understandable, for she held in her hand the proof that I desired her body.

I found her face and kissed her lips—and squeezed her silken buttock twice again.

Yet again she tensed, which caused me some discomfort because of the position of her hand. She started to protest, but I stifled it with the continuing kiss. Then I repeated, "I want you." One squeeze.

She lay still, analyzing, trying to figure out what I was getting at. She squeezed my hard anatomy once, as if it were a question, and I squeezed her soft bun twice in negation. She laughed silently. "You are very firm. You want... more than my body?"

"Yes." And my squeeze agreed.

"You want my love as well?"

"Yes." But I did not squeeze.

She hesitated. Then, "You can have it." But then she squeezed my flesh painfully hard, twice.

It was my turn to tense and pause, for different reasons. I was in physical discomfort and mental turmoil. Overtly she was offering me everything; why should she deny it privately? (I really did not intend that pun.) It was her assignment to seduce me and win my love; surely she would have better success if she convinced me she loved me. She was acting against her own best interest.

Or—she was telling me the truth for the first time. That this really was only an assignment and that her secret heart was not in it. In that case I was making genuine progress.

"I'll settle for what you offer," I said with one squeeze.

She squeezed once in response, more gently.

We had established communication. We talked, and while she denied it verbally, by the squeeze route I learned that she had not been mem-washed. I had already known that, of course, but now she confessed it. She was indeed on assignment to seduce me. Why? Because my captors knew I was married and they wanted me to be sexually compromised, emotionally, too, if it could be done. Why was she cooperating? That was a longer story, harder to gather because the key words could not be spoken. To maintain the pretense of sexual seduction, we had to get undressed and proceed toward the physical culmination, but our true attention was elsewhere.

In the course of our secret dialogue the pretense became reality, and we did complete the act. I felt guilty, even as my fluid pumped into her body, because of my memory of Megan, but I knew it was necessary. I felt worse because it turned out to be so thoroughly pleasant; Dorian was good at her trade and almost made me believe that she liked doing this.

I wanted to know more about her, but I had been too long away from my cell and had to return. "My fate is in your hands," I told her openly. "If you report what I have done here, they will wash everything away."

"I'm guilty, too," she replied. But she knew what I meant: I had told her that I knew she was an agent, which was supposed to be a secret from me. She had admitted it, which was a forbidden action for her. She could turn me in, but that would implicate her, too. I was gambling that she would keep my faith and report merely that she had succeeded in seducing me, which the spy pickup would confirm.

We parted, but I was restless the remainder of the night. I realized that she might have played along in order to win my secret confidence, the better to betray me more thoroughly in the end. She could report on this matter without penalty to herself. She would have done her job and shown my captors an aspect of my capabilities they had not suspected. Still, I did not think she would; her secret responses had been true. My talent suggested that I had reached her on a personal level and compromised her mission to that extent.

If nothing happened in the next day I was probably right. My captors would have no reason to continue in their present program once they knew that I was not being truly compromised.

The day passed routinely, with further discussion/indoctrination. My captors did know I was sneaking out of my cell at night but evidently believed that their agent had the situation in hand.

Night came again, and I had not been punished. My gamble seemed to have paid off.

I returned to Dorian Gray, and we proceeded to fondle each other again, leaving our clothing on so that it was more complicated and therefore slower. Also, the clothing concealed the squeezings on bare buttocks, so that we could communicate more freely. I discovered that it was more stimulating to touch and be touched inside clothing than it was naked; perhaps it was the suggestion of illicit discovery that enhanced the effect. It got to the point where the game overtook me, and I almost raped her in my urgency to complete the position before spewing on the clothing. She found that very funny; it was a special victory for her, though the entangled clothing had to have been uncomfortable for her.

Meanwhile I learned the essence of her situation. Dorian, a beautiful young woman just coming out of her teens, had found employment with a Jupiter government office, but instead of routine office work, she had found herself on assignment to seduce a diplomat from Ganymede. She was offered such a bonus for success that she couldn't refuse. So she had done it. The man had been easy to seduce; she had simply moved in with him and served as his sexual plaything. Heedless of consequences, she soon found herself pregnant. She thought that would end the affair, but it didn't; the man was pleased to have his virility demonstrated and kept her with him through the birth of the baby. There was no question of marriage; he wasn't interested, and neither was she. They were a satisfied, unofficial family.

Then, abruptly, he was gone—with the baby. Whether he had somehow learned of her assignment to spy on him or simply had his own assignment changed, she didn't know. He had said nothing to her, perhaps because she would never have given up her infant son. The loss devastated her, but Ganymede was the last place she could go, as she was a refugee from it. She appealed to her employer, who promised to recover her baby for her if she would undertake another assignment. So she had, knowing nothing about it—and here she was.

Why had she confided all this to me? If I betrayed her she would surely never recover her baby. She hadn't had to tell me; I could tell when she was lying, but I couldn't make her tell me anything she really wanted to hide. She was cooperating—too well.

"Why?" I asked her, by squeezing that word in an unrelated sentence. "Why... tell... me?" Such questioning was slow, but we were used to that. We had already made sex, rushed and awkward as it had turned out, and were theoretically relaxing in the aftermath, still glued together in the hammock. We no longer had to use our hands directly for signaling; we could use any part of the body to nudge.

"I... know... of... you," she answered. And then she made her pitch, coming so swiftly into my camp that even with my talent I was suspicious of her motive. And she asked me: If she helped me, would I help her recover her son?

I needed her help, but I wasn't sure how I could ever help her in that way. But I agreed that if it ever did become possible, I would do what I could to restore her son to her.

It was time for me to read another key word and see what memory it evoked. That, added to the information I had from Dorian, could complete the background I needed to deal with my situation. But I wasn't sure how to get back to my old cell. I had balked at the indoctrination once, had been punished, and had "learned my lesson"; it would not be in character for me to balk again. I was sure my captors were planning something for me, and I had to act before that happened—but how?

If I didn't misbehave how could I get to that cell? Could Dorian help? But she wasn't supposed to know me personally; theoretically she was just a prisoner in another cell whose eye I could see in the opposite window, no more. She did know me—rather intimately—and the captors knew it. But none of us could admit that to the others. There seemed to be no avenue there.

Could I sneak in? No, I had checked out the bulkheads at the end of the passage, and they were tight. I could not pass them. It was a foolish notion, anyway. I had to be sent there.

I wrestled with it but saw no better device than another balk on the indoctrination program. I didn't want to do that; it would ruin my credibility with Dorian. But what choice did I have? I had to have the next key term.

I procrastinated, unable to make the decision. And abruptly I was returned to that cell, no reason stated. It was exactly where I wanted to be, but I distrusted the mechanism. Why had they so conveniently put me there? Did they know what I was up to? I had not mentioned the code terms to Dorian Gray; as far as I knew I had not in any way betrayed that most vital secret.

I had to assume that they did not know, that this was no elaborate trap. In any event I needed that key term, as I did not have enough information without it. If they were watching me, so be it; better to risk giving away my secret than to lose the game by default.

I felt in the muck for the symbols, translating each tediously as I got it. I was up to ALL in the open key: ABANDON HOPE, ALL YE WHO ENTER HERE. A was the fifteenth spot, and the symbol in that location was . That translated, appropriately, to the number 7. Seven characters from the letter A was the letter G. The next symbol, , was 27, and that far beyond L counted off to A. Then , 3, readily converting to N. was 36, or after a horrendous mental count from the space following ALL, Y. And , 26, going from Y to M. And , 1, translating to itself, E. , 15, from the space following E, becoming D. , 20, from the W in WHO, E. And , 20 again, this time from H, counting off to the space. My word was finished.

GANYMEDE.