A round plastic bladderbed filled the center of the floor. On it lay a naked woman with blood-streaked thighs. She was very still, but she breathed.
«Your first job,» said Cleet, and indicated the woman with a languid gesture. «Hose her down, and get her into the med-unit down on the cargo deck.» Cleet turned a sharp glance on Bemer, and the beautiful mask shifted, displayed a stern expression. «Keep your prong in your pants, hermit. Or rather, under your robe. Yes, yes, I know of your religious prohibitions, which I trust you still cling to; but heed me–certain of my facilities I don’t care to share with the help.»
«I haven’t touched a woman in 30 years,» Bemer said.
«That’s exactly what causes me concern,» said Cleet. He smiled crookedly and left.
Bemer stood for a silent moment, confused, wondering how the world had changed so much, so quickly.
He looked down at the woman. She was pale, with tarnished- silver hair, cut short. Her body was smoothly muscled, her breasts heavy, her hips rather narrow. Bruises bloomed under her skin. She smelled of blood and sweat.
One arm was bent beneath her body awkwardly. He bent down, rolled her enough to free the arm. He saw a glint of metal at the back of her neck–the oval mating surface of a personaskein implant. «A beaster,» Bemer said, repelled.
He glanced around the deck. In a bulkhead locker, he found a hose, stowed on a reel. A bucket held a soft-bristled brush and a soap dispenser.
Warm water sprayed forth when he pressed a button. He scrubbed away the worst of the grime that encrusted her, as gently as he could. When he was finished, he turned the hose on the rest of the chamber. He touched another button and warm air sighed from the hose.
She was soon dry. He lifted her, and she lay motionless against his chest. Her skin had a lovely silky texture, which he tried not to notice.
He stepped into the stairfield, and was carried down to the cargo hold. In one comer a large med-unit waited.
He laid her down on the med-unit’s tray. An odd emotion touched him briefly. He frowned. Would he have preferred to prolong that warm contact? «Let’s not kid ourself, Brother Berner,» he muttered. He slid the tray into the diagnostic chamber.
He stood by the med-unit’s port, watching as limpet sensors crawled over her body, assessing the damage. The med-unit’s readout panel flickered briefly with amber warning lights, but quickly cooled into steady yellow-green. Bemer smiled.
«You should be pleased,» Cleet said.
Berner jumped and turned to find Cleet at his shoulder.
Cleet leaned forward, looked into the port. «Yes, you should be pleased. We must hope, you and I, that she remains healthy. If I should use her a bit too harshly and she should die–then I might have to appropriate your stringy flesh. Though it would be a sorry exchange. The med-unit is good enough to implant the skein interface... and make any other changes I might require. Well. At least you have good bones.» Cleet winked grotesquely, his mask sparkling. He reached out, touched Berner’s cheek. Bemer edged back.
Cleet transferred his attention to the woman. «She’s a pretty little thing, my Candypop. Isn’t she?» he said. «An alley clone. Her cellmother was a beauty queen on some backwater agworld. Think of it–a million farmers would have laid down their manure forks to court her–and she’s my very own somatoy....» Cleet sighed. He appeared to take no pleasure from this observation.
He turned to Bemer. «Come. I’ll show you your place.»
Bemer hung back. «I’d prefer my cave, if it would please you.»
Cleet’s mask became an inhuman and incomprehensible surface. He jerked his arm and the nerveburn appeared in his trembling hand.
Bemer hung his head. «As you wish,» he said in a thin voice. He tried to conceal his rage, but not his fear.
Cleet’s mask rippled, regained a semblance of humanity. The nerveburn disappeared. «Wise,» he said.
Cleet took him to a cubicle. «You’ll wait here until I call,» said Cleet, and left. The door swung shut with a click.
Berner pushed at the latch, was unsur prised to find it locked. He looked about. A canvas pipe berth hung on one wall; in the comer were a sink and toilet. A dark vid- screen over the door completed the furnishings. Light came from an overhead panel; after a minute it dimmed to a faint red glow. Berner lay on the berth and waited for sleep.
A long time later he felt an urge to perform his devotions. Evidently morning had arrived.
The light panel grew brighter. Strange, he thought. In yesterday’s dawn he had gone up to the shrine and worshipped, as he had for ten thousand mornings. He had loosened the dust around the posole vines, had gathered the ripest pods. That routine should have continued until he lay down for the last time.
He had imagined his old passions to be thoroughly quenched in the emptiness of his world, his fascination with the flesh lost to the slow abrasion of unchanging days and nights.
He thought of the woman and wondered if he had been a great fool.
Hours passed. Finally the vidscreen lit, and Cleet’s gold and silver face looked down at Berner. «Awake?»
«Yes,» Berner said, sitting up on his berth. «May I return to my cave? I’m a little hungry. I could have breakfast there, or fetch back a stock of posole, if you preferred.» He hated the subservience in his voice, but he was still terrified of the nerveburn.
Cleet smiled, an oddly empty expression. «You will never return to your cave, hermit.» He shook his head, slowly. «But you may take your breakfast in the refectory; I’ve finished. When you’re done, come up to the astrogation deck. We’ll have a discussion.» The screen blanked and the door sighed open.
Berner found the refectory, a long cabin that followed the curve of the starboat’s hull. A narrow strip of tinted armorglass ran along the outside wall. Berner looked through the glass. The posole vines drooped gracefully in the gathering heat, and the black mouth of the cave seemed a lost haven, unbearably sweet in memory. Berner was taken by regret so strong his eyes watered. Eventually he turned away.
At the far end was a counter, cluttered with dirty dishes. Berner sat at the counter. Shutters slid back to reveal the terminal of an autochef. He ordered something called proolie, which turned out to be cooked grain, sprinkled with a bitter yellow spice.
When he finished, he stacked the dishes in the sanitizer. He went to the stairfield and floated upward until he reached the astrogation deck, which identified itself with a flashing prompter.
Cleet stood before a hemisphere of smoky armorglass, looking out over the badlands, a pensive expression smoothing his mask. «Ah, hermit,» he said, turning toward Berner. «Can you make civilized conversation?»
Berner stood awkwardly, hands knotted together. «I don’t remember,» he said finally. «It’s been a long time.»
Cleet laughed. «You are at least honest and unassuming, two useful virtues in a person of your station–though such attributes would seem grotesque in a person of my station. Wouldn’t you say?» Berner could think of no safe reply.
«Never mind,» Cleet said. «I won’t expect too much of you. So. Tell me how you came to be here. Be brief, be accurate, be entertaining.» Cleet’s mask now showed no emotion at all. «Sit down,» he ordered, pointing at a bench that ran along the hull, beneath a bank of storage slots.
Berner sat. His mind was empty of words. Cleet watched him expectantly, eyes fluidly alive in the cold metal of the mask. Finally, Berner spoke. «I came here 30 years ago....» Immediately, Cleet interrupted. «Think of it! Thirty years of nothing. But tell me of your life before you came here. Remember, you must amuse me.»