All thought faded as more and more of the glop spread over the figure’s skin. When finally the entire body was—like Pluummuluum’s—vivid and humming, the bonder’s fingers, suckers and tentacle tips slipped and slid in the cracks and crevices of the figure’s genitals and anus until the glop was oozing inside, past cervix and sphincter, high up into the body, spreading pleasure everywhere it went, out and out and out from the orgasm now pulsing and rippling in waves of sensation away from its epicenter.
Abruptly, as happens in dreams, the watching Azia was looking at a world on the viewscreen of the Emma G., a world surrounded by official Federation starships, freighters, and cruisers. Before getting even the first glimpse of the world, she discovered that she knew the world was one that had been resisting trade with the Federation, a world inhabited by sentient creatures barely visible to the naked eye, creatures who had built eerily strange, almost ethereal structures on the archipelagos dotting the great ocean covering the world. Trading corporations wanted some of those structures for research and even to sell as art objects, and wanted, also, the valuable minerals in its ocean. The Corollians had been trading with these creatures for centuries. They claimed any Federation presence on the world would destroy the species and were determined to interdict it. Pluummuluum’s particular task was to acquire a highly controlled virus designed to eat the ceramic metals all human spacecraft were made of.
On screen, the view of the world was magnified until an entire island became visible. Azia’s breath caught in her throat; against a deep green scintillating ocean glittered delicate rose, purple, and gray spires and spirals, about which fluttered and swooped and soared creatures with wings variously green, red, and orange, VR-like in the intense brilliance of their colors. The view zoomed out—this time revealing an enormous tan monolith that towered menacingly over the island. A threedy image of the familiar gold Federation logo hovered above its roof, sickening in its nonchalance, outrageous in its matter-of-factness.
Azia woke in tears. She knew she was being emotional, she knew she was being irrational, but she woke determined to do all she could to fight the Federation. She felt Pluummuluum’s hand on her face, clammy, chill, and slippery, brushing away her tears. It had told her a story that she couldn’t verify, but she believed it in her body, in her soul. She had no community now, it was true. But helping save another one from being destroyed by the same enemy that had destroyed hers would go some way to making her feel less alone in the universe.
17.
Loaded with Federation troops and security officers and heavily monitored, the station orbiting the Federation world called Rosario spooked Azia as soon as she set foot on it. Pluummuluum had warned her to take care with every word she spoke, no matter her location. Her awareness of having ventured into the lion’s den to work the final deal made her nerves jumpy, her mouth dry, her palms perpetually sweaty. This station’s light seemed harsh and cold, a virtual glare of intimidation and suspicion determined to eradicate individual thought and private feeling.
Pluummuluum had not taken quarters because they would not be making a layover beyond the minimum required for refueling and maintenance. The trading party they were meeting, all officials from Rosario, awaited their arrival. Everything had been arranged long before, contingent on Pluummuluum’s securing the items the Rosarians so desperately needed and could not afford. While most negotiations were slightly more than a formality, these were meant simply as cover, for thwarting the Federation.
Azia took a big chill in the corridor outside the negotiation space when Gerson Culley and a companion—no doubt another agent—openly confronted them. “Azia,” she said, “I’d like a word with you.”
Azia’s shivering tensed and shook every muscle in her body. Her mouth went so dry she had trouble making her tongue form words. “I have duties right now,” she said. “I—I, maybe, if my bonder permits it, after we’ve finished inside?” She glanced sidelong at Pluummuluum, hoping she appeared anxious for its approval rather than for securing its protection.
It laid a hand on her shoulder in a touch that sent spirals of sensation down her back and into her belly.
“I think you need my help, Azia,” Gerson Culley said.
In spite of her bonder’s touch, Azia felt sick. Gerson Culley could take her away from Pluummuluum and put her in hell. Gerson Culley’s eyes, ignoring Pluummuluum, staring icily into Azia’s, said that she knew it.
A contingent of humans accompanied by a pair of uniformed station police rapidly approached. It was unusual for two trading parties to acknowledge one another outside the formal space, but the contingent paused before going to the door to its side of the space, and one of the men said, “Trader Pluummuluum?”
Pluummuluum bowed, and Azia said, “Yes, sir.”
The man bowed, too. “I assume there is no problem here?” He glanced pointedly at the agents.
Azia carefully avoided Gerson Culley’s gaze. “We are ready to enter, sir.”
Each party entered by the door assigned it. Before they took their places, Azia whispered into her bonder’s ear, “When we leave here, please don’t let them separate us. Please!”
To her surprise, it pressed its comforter into her palm. Bowing to the other party and then kneeling beside Pluummuluum, she felt not only calm, but bursting with warmth and confidence. She would do her part, and it would take care of her. The Federation could do nothing to separate them. If they wanted to question her, they would have to do so in its presence.
Of course, they might do something lowdown hke planting contraband on her body, as they had planted it on the Emma G. She knew that. But she wouldn’t let fear of their doing so stop her.
The Rosarian delegation was made up of two men and a woman, sharply corporate looking, and members of the world’s governing council. The negotiations were bogus. Pluummuluum had been acquiring lyric crystals precisely because they were among the items the Rosarians wanted in exchange for the cermetophage. But in order to play along with Pluummuluum’s usual protocol, the Rosarians negotiated the exchange of two lyric crystals for all the germ stocks the Corollians had collected. Azia concentrated on the “feather” in her palm, hoping it would keep her mind blank and her face straight. She assumed the agents would be recording not only their speech, but their physiological responses; she needed hers to be routine and unremarkable, to lull the agents into thinking that this station—though it was the one she had been specially vaccinated for—was not the site of the end trade.
“The germ stocks specified are satisfactory,” the head of the Rosarian delegation said. “The physical exchange can be arranged to take place within the hour.”