WHEN HE WOKE the second time he knew she would be there, beside him in the bed. He turned and looked at her, all shame, all horror purged from him, only love and a vague desire remaining. For a moment he was still, silent, watching her, a faint smile on his face. Then, as he watched, there was movement at the mouth of her sex. A dark and slender shape seemed to press up between the soft, pale lips of flesh. Slowly it emerged, stretching a thumbnail's length and more into the air, its blind snout moving purposively, as if sniffing the air. Axel stared at it, fascinated and horrified. It was alive—a living thing. He gave a small cry of shock and surprise and the thing vanished, as though it had never been, burrowing back down into the soft, moist folds of flesh.
His cry woke her. She sat up abruptly, her eyes as blue as a northern sea, heavy with sleep. "Axel. . . what is it?"
She focused on his face and seemed to come awake suddenly, seeing the horror there.
"Gods, what is it?" She got up and moved toward him, but he backed away, fending her off with his hands. She stopped still, her body tensed, and lowered her head a fraction, staring at him. "Tell me what it is, Axel. Please. Was it a bad dream?"
He pointed at her. "Something ..."
It was all he could say, but it seemed she understood. She sat back on the bed, folding her hands in her lap. "Ah ... I see."
She let out a deep breath. "What you saw"— she shrugged and looked up at him, strangely vulnerable—"we all have them." Her look was as much as to say, Surely you knew about this? Surely you've heard?
"I"— he swallowed—"I don't understand."
She stared at him a moment longer, then reached down into the folds of her sex and began to coax something gently from within. Axel watched, wide eyed, as she lifted the thing with her fingers and placed it gently in the palm of her right hand, extendiag it toward him so that he could see it clearly.
"Look. It's all right. It won't hurt you. It's perfectly harmless."
It was an insect of some kind. Or so it first appeared. A dark, slender, wormlike shape half the length of a finger. It was smooth and perfectly black. Unsegmented. Unmarked. It seemed blind; devoid, in fact, of all sensory equipment. And yet it had reacted swiftly to his cry.
"What is it?" he asked, coming closer, unable to conceal a shudder.
"As I said, we all have them. All of the girls, that is. They keep us clean, you see. OenSyn developed thenu They live off bacteria—special kinds of bacteria. AIDS, herpes, venereal diseases of all kinds."
He wrinkled up his nose. "Gods," he said. "And it's been there all the time. While we were . . . ?"
"AH the time. But it never gets in the way. It lives in a special sac in my womb. It only comes out when it senses I'm asleep or perfectly relaxed. It's a parasite, you see. A benevolent one." She smiled and petted the thing in her hand, then gently put it back.
There was a knock on the door. Axel looked about him.
"Here," said the girl, handing him a robe, but taking nothing for herself.
He wrapped the er-silk pau about him, then turned to face the door. "Come in!"
It was Mu Chua. "I heard a noise," she said. "Is everything all right?"
"Yes. Yes, it's fine." He glanced at the girl, who sat there on the bed, looking away from him, then turned back to face Mu Chua. "It was nothing. Really. Nothing at all."
Mu Chua met his eyes and held them just a moment longer than was natural, making him wonder what she was thinking as she looked at him; reawakening, for the briefest moment, his fears of being taped and betrayed. But then she smiled—a warm, candid smile that held no subterfuge. "Good," she said. "Then dress and come through. I've prepared a breakfast for you."
Her smile warmed him, cleared away the shadows in his head. "Thank you, Mother Chua. You run a good house. A very good house."
THE PIT was a riot of noise and activity, its tiered benches packed to overflowing. On all sides men yelled and waved their arms frantically, placing bets, dark, faceless figures in the dim red light, while down below, in the intense white light of the combat circle, the two men crouched on their haunches, in the wa shih stance, facing each other silently.
Axel Haavikko, sitting on the front bench between Fest and Ebert, narrowed his eyes, studying the two combatants. They seemed an ill-matched pair; one Hung Mao, the other Han; one a giant, the other so compact and yet so perfectly formed he looked as though he had been made in a GenSyn vat. But there was a stillness, an undisguised sense of authority, about the smaller man that impressed at once. He seemed immovable, as if grown about a central point of calm.
"The Han's name is Hwa. I'm told he's champion here," said Fest, leaning forward and speaking into his ear. "Seventeen bouts, he's had. Two more and it'll be a record."
Axel turned and yelled back at Fest. "And the other?"
Fest shrugged and indicated the small Han sitting next to him. He leaned forward again, raising his voice. "My friend here says that no one knows much about him. He's a local boy, name of Karr, but he hasn't fought before. He's something of a mystery. But worth a bet, maybe. You'll get good odds."
Axel turned to look at the other combatant. Crouched, Karr was taller than most men. Seven ch'i, perhaps. Maybe more. Standing, he had been close to twice the size of Hwa; broad at the shoulder and heavily muscled, his oiled skin shining slickly in the brilliant whiteness. Such men were usually slow. They depended on sheer strength to win through. Yet Axel remembered how the crowd had gone quiet when the giant entered the arena and realized that Karr was something unusual, even by their standards.
For a moment he studied the tattoos on Karr's chest and arms. On each arm a pair of dragons—one green, one red, their long bodies thick and muscular—coiled about each other sinuously. Their heads were turned inward, face to face, wide, sharp-toothed mouths snarling, huge golden eyes flashing. On his chest a great bird spread its wings, its powerful, regal head thrown back defiantly, its cruel beak open in a cry of triumph, a terror-stricken horse held fast in each of its steel-like talons.
Axel looked away, feeling suddenly quite awkward. His silks, his braided hair, his necklaces of silver and jade. Such refinements were an impertinence down here. There was no place for such subtleties. Here everything was bared.
It was warm in the Pit and unbearably stuffy, yet he shivered, thinking of what was to come.
"Look at him!" yelled Ebert, leaning close to join their conversation. "Meat! That's what he is! A huge sack of meat! It's a foregone conclusion, Haavikko! I'd not waste a single yuan on him! It'll be over in seconds!"
"You think so, Ebert?"
Ebert nodded exaggeratedly. "See our man here." He indicated Hwa. "I'm told he's a perfectionist. An artist. He practices eight hours a day, sometimes doing nothing but repeating one single movement." Ebert laughed and his gray eyes gleamed red in the dull light. "Such training pays off. They say he's so fast you daren't even blink while he's fighting!"
Axel shrugged. Maybe it was so. Certainly there was something different, something obsessive about the man that was quite chilling. His eyes, for instance, never moved. They stared ahead, as if in trance, boring into his opponent's face, unblinking, merciless in their focus. Whereas the other . . .
Even as he looked he saw Karr turn his head and look directly at him.
It was a fierce, insolent gaze, almost primitive in its intensity, and yet not wholly unintelligent. There was something about the man. Something he had seen at once. Perhaps it was the casual, almost arrogant way he had looked about the tiers on entering, or the brief, almost dismissive bow he had greeted his opponent with. Whatever, it was enough to make Axel feel uneasy with Ebert's brusque dismissal of the man. On balance, however, he had to agree with Ebert; the small man looked like an adept—a perfect fighting machine. Height, weight, and breadth were no concern to him. His strength was of another kind.