With a last glance up at the luminous, star-studded sky, he turned and re-entered the Sultana Suite where she awaited.

The suite's main room was aglow with a roseate light that was almost luminous. It was not eerie, even though it tinged the walls and every object hi shades of pink and red. The effect was sensuous. Jonuta moved through that s.e.x-hued room to the bedroom, where there was no direct light; the pink glow bled in from the sitting room.

He stepped through the doorway-and halted. The smile left his face. He was staring into the muzzle of a stopper.

"Do come in, Captain Cautious. So you are caught at last."

He recognized that sneering voice. He did not recognize the speaker. He knew the uniform. It was that of TransGalactic Watch. It clung to the curves and indentations of a more than attractive woman. Every seam and b.u.t.ton of the uniform seemed ready to burst with the ripeness of her. Nevelcro closures must have been hanging on as desperately as a kitten dangling from a limb.

Jonuta elevated bis hands.

"May I ask who my captor is?"

191.

"Indeed you may," the only just familiar voice said. "I am Brevet-major Shariella 118-99-793SR."

He showed her a restrained smile. "Shariella" was a name right out of a torn-bodice holodrama. He took that as a clue, since the sneering, slightly disguised voice was familiar. He wondered if the uniform and long curling ma.s.ses of black hair were real or holo-proj. In the sensual dimness of the pink light that seemed to warm the room while turning it into a sort of fantasyland, he could not be sure.

"And about to be full Condor-major, too, once you've brought me in, hmm? What is the charge, Brevet-major?"

"Never mind that s.h.i.t, Jonuta." She stepped back a pace, and aside. She gestured. "Precede me out the door."

Jonuta swallowed. The adrenaline burst triggered by the initial shock was dissipating. Now he went p.r.i.c.kly again. He was right, wasn't he? This is tonight's Change, isn't it?

He walked to the door, past her. He lowered a hand to the opener plate, pivoted, clamped the gun hand- the right-in his and thrust it straight up, and gave the uniformed woman a short, sharp, three-bent-fingers jab in the left breast.

She grunted. The stopper fell to the carpet. He used her upraised arm as if they were dancing. She had no choice but to move with it, turning her back to him. He didn't bother swinging his right arm around her. Instead he grasped her upper arm, set a knee against her prominent and taut-pantsed backside, and shoved, hard. He let go with both hands.

With a distressed sound, she was catapulted a meter or so forward to bring up against the side of the bed. She sprawled upon it. Just as she was turning over, Jonuta was upon her. She and the bed bounced.

His grab for her stiffly standing collar brought him only the feel of skin. He ran his hand down until the fingers slid into fabric, and he yanked. Cloth tore. He 192.

a.s.sumed it was something old. Cloth came off in his hand, but the uniform remained undamaged. She sputtered and tried to knee him and he jammed his own knee straight in between her legs. All the way. It impacted with a jolt that brought a throaty gasp from the brevet-major. He jiggled the knee while his hand clamped down on the bulge of a uniformed breast, hard. Again he felt no uniform. The unsupported warhead was indifferently covered with a silken fabric thin as epidermis.

"Stop resisting, b.i.t.c.h-major Shariella, or I'll twist this ma.s.s of meat right off your chest. t.i.tsy s.l.u.t, aren't you?"

"You . . . dog! Don't even think of raping me!"

"Of course not. Rape is a thoughtless act."

He'd had enough of the uniform he could see but not tear or remove, since it was a projection. A hand came at him but gave him plenty of time to notice and slap its wrist. Not hard, but she squeaked and the hand flopped. He pawed her. Silken fabric and skin. He found the projector at her waist, naturally, disguising itself as a TGW standard issue holster.

"No-wait . . ."

She didn't want him to kill the holo. All right. "I'm going to punch you and knock you half-senseless," he said, and aimed a blow at her chin that didn't quite land. She went limp while he kneed himself back off the bed with a lurch. He pounced to the doorway connecting the rooms and closed the door. End roseate light. The room was almost dark; the wan glow of a Franjese moon and several distant suns-all larger than points, here close to galaxy center-crept in through the window.

He clamped an ankle and pulled her off the bed. The impact was not silent and neither was Kenowa.

"Hush, Shariella," he bade her, jerking the ankle high while he opened his pants. "Your a.s.s is definitely padded enough to protect you from the floor, Trans-Galactic Witch! It's a wonder you didn't bounce!"

- 193.

"Oh! Dog!"

"You said that." He kicked away his shoes and his pants. He was not amazed that his p.e.n.i.s had both thickened and lengthened. His woman knew, her man. And she knew herself. She was one of the few who were fortunate enough to realize their s.e.xual fantasies-without danger or consequence. Otherwise all of this would be horrible, both inhuman and subhuman. "Your vocabulary seems limited, Brev-s.l.u.t. Sheltered life?"

"Blackguard! Varlet! CIA! Spittle of an unclean Crusader!"

"Better," he said, recognizing a few old-fashioned terms straight from her 'dramas. "But . . . sticks and stones, TGW b.i.t.c.h. Going to take me in, were you! Hmp-here, let's get you . . . turned ... over!" He did that, with her on the suite's rich carpeting.

After that he made loud whistling-rushing noises with his belt, while he used his left hand to land awkward slaps on the upturned b.u.t.tocks of his "captive." She squealed, kicked, pleaded, pretended to be hurt, and began promising to Do Anything, ANY-thing.

"Glad to hear it," he said into the almost-darkness. "Maybe I won't kill you, then. For awhile. You are the s.e.xiest TGWatcher I ever saw."

"Ohhh nooo," she said, in a tiny voice. His hand wasn't slapping the mound he could see now. He was rubbing it, lovingly, with a circular motion.

"You mean you'd rather be killed than meet a Fate Worse than Death?" He reached around to palpate her breast.

"No-I mean . . . fiend! How can you be so cruel? How can you be so-so . . . male?!"

"Must be in the genes. Now you have only to turn over, get up onto your knees, and get your tongue and lips to work on me." He paused one beat before adding, "Wh.o.r.e." (Kenowa liked the word. Had not Vardis Fisher written that a woman would rather be 194.

called a wh.o.r.e than a fat-a.s.s, and been confirmed by his wife?) "I'm not! Y-"

"You will be before you leave here."

"No! I won't touch your nasty slicer with my mouth, you-owww!"

So she had decided she hadn't received quite enough on the upturned a.s.s, eh? Well, he'd give her some more. Kenowa well knew the neural connection between the b.u.t.tocks and the genitals, male or female . . . aside from the psychological reasons for her enjoyment.

"Oww! I'll do it, oh! I'll do it, monsterowww!"

"Sorry," he said. "That's only nine. I decided that you need twenty. With the buckle end of my belt, of course."

He rushed the buckle through the air and struck the bed while his off hand slapped her tensing cheek. She squirmed and affected agony.

"Theba's mercy-you'll bruise my poor, uh, me!"

"Bruise! Hmp! I'll draw blood, wench! We Crusaders know how to treat you s.e.xy b.i.t.c.hy Saracen s.l.u.ts!"

And he gave her the other ten slaps, medium hard, meanwhile making a lot of noise with the belt. He was not, after all, either a conquering Crusader of old or a Gorean-Jonuta liked women.

Then she licked and sucked while her eminently malleable, manipulable warheads were manipulated and palpated with much much attention to their erected tips. And eventually the poor groaning moaning (and thoroughly interiorly wet) TGW brevet-major was sprawled on the unyielding floor, however thickly carpeted, being cruelly raped. It was marvelous. The sound of flesh slapping flesh rose in the room as he rocked in her cradle, and the odor of s.e.xuality rose around them like a curling mist.

Both of them became quaking, sighing moaning prisoners of carnal pa.s.sion. The relentless pounding of 195.

his sinewy body raised libidinous joy to an extravagant peak of arousal and need.

"Take ... this ... deep . . . TGW . . . wh.o.r.e!" "Oh yes," she breathed, and was inwardly sprayed. A bit later, before she began to rub herself while he pressured her nipples, Kenowa turned off the stern TGW holoproj and removed the belt whose holster contained the toes-to-neck projector. The long, long curly wig she retained. Both of them liked it, as both of them had far more than liked Kenowa's latest Change scenario.

14.

DESTRUCTN OF OUR SHIP OFF MURPH INTOL-ERABL. JONUTA MUST BE PUNISHD. READ: RUINED. INITIATE FULL COMPUTR SRCH & SCAN OF HIS AFFAIRS, ACCESS ALL AVL. DATA + ANCILLARY E.G. POSSIBLE INFOR-.

MATN. OPERATION CLAMP TO BE INITIATED IMMEDIATELY. END.

Message received & amplification requested. What command to personnel & ships re: Jonuta?

ZERO COMMAND TO SHIPS & PERS. RE: J. DO NOT REPT ZERO ATTEMPT TO ATTACK, KILL, OR ATTEMPT TO ARREST. NO CONTACT. PREFER HE ZERO KNOWLEDGE OF OUR MOVING. OPERATION CLAMP IS TO CLAMP.

& CRUSH, ECONOMICALLY & SPIRITUALLY. CONFIRM. END.

Confirmed. OPERATION CLAMP initiated this date.

Top Secret Exchange: TGO 196 197.

It began when they flew out over Haj Seablood's mansion, far from Velynda. It was not there. It no longer existed. There was plenty of rubble, slag, and the horrific shapes of tortured structural materials. There was no mansion.

There had been an explosion, Jonuta saw with stricken eyes. The ensuing fire had burned hot and without attention. Some power failure must have prevented the automatic fire-control systemry from doing its work. Perhaps it had been destroyed in the explosion, which would surely never be explained. There was nothing left. Only that saddest of sights, rubble and char and impossibly ugly, surreal twistings of a few unconsumed materials.

Haj Seablood was burned out. He did not land the handsome little yellow and blue craft, its gay colors now garish, obscene in the presence of disaster and bideousness. He did not land because he did not want to. He could not. He was grieving.

"I loved that place," Jonuta said softly, in a dull voice, and he said nothing else.

His jaw was tight against words and grief, all the way back to Velynda. Kenowa shared bis anguish and his silence. All there was to say were the ridiculous cliches people said at such times, and she would not mouthe such things to Jonuta. They would talk later.

He did not even consider arson or a bomb, until the second blow crashed down.

There was nothing in Haj Seablood's account.

It was then that he had the first new feeling, deep in the pit of his stomach, that was beyond grief. A plot . . . ? But no, it had to be some sort of mistake. As Seablood, he knew the president of the Franji State Bank & Transfer, and he could d.a.m.ned well accost her. He did.

There was no mistake. Computer storage and no less than two human employees provided the information and the doc.u.ments. Without formality, Haj Seablood had quietly withdrawn every stell, to the stell, simply 198.

by using his I.D. to effect a transfer to an account at Vanguard, a planetary money market.

"1 did no such thing, Fara."

The eyes of Farathis Littel, president, Franji State B & T, were anguished.

"I believe you, Haj. But-you see the copies. It was all done in an orderly and even casual manner. I did not even know about it until later. The account was not formally closed, you see. Just emptied."

"Looted," said the man in her office: Haj Seablood, suddenly unwealthy.

She heaved a sigh. "Looted. Brilliantly and-well. When I discovered the heavy transfer, I checked. When I found it was your account, I tried to contact you. You were offplanet. There is a message out at the house."

"There is no house, Fara. It's ... rubble. Burned out. After an explosion."

"Oh, Haj!" Her commiseration was genuine. Bank presidents were human, especially with social contacts. Especially with big depositors. That would have to change, if he was ruined. But right now she was able to share some portion of his anguish. Right now he remained human. Haj Seablood couldn't be wiped out.

His stomach was churning. There were things he wanted to do. Calls he wanted to make. Fear was rising.

"It ... it was insured?"

"You know where it was, Farathis." Of course. She had been there. Socially. "The house was paid for, and way out there insurance was twice the cost of taxes. I spent more thousands and thousands putting in warning systems and cybernetic decombusters and fire-suppressants. Two systems, separate. Obviously they failed. No, I didn't have insurance. It's a total loss. And it's impossible." He stabbed a finger at the printouts on her desk. "As impossible as this."

"Let-let me call Theb Arortis over at Vanguard. Do you know him?"

199.

"No." And he added bitterly, "I wish I did. Looks as if I'd better wish I'd had my account with Vanguard all along. It won't be there, Fara."

"Oh,-Haj," she said, trying to combine commiseration with a tone of accusation, and she made the call.

He was right. The account with Vanguard had been of brief duration. No one at Vanguard had met Haj Seablood. He had opened a smallish account by phone, sans visual. He had transferred in the huge amount from FSB&T. And he had called and had it sent to him, by voucher. That was that. The account was inactive. It was also empty, and would be automatically closed at the next auditing period, unless there was activity.

There would be no activity. Jonuta was sure of that. And what was he to do? Call the policers? Sure. Someone had cleaned out Haj Seablood, and they would investigate, and offplanet the message would go, and . . . how long until Haj Seablood's real ident.i.ty was known?

"No, Farathis," he told her, while her hand lay on the bank's direct comm line to the police. "I have resources."

"Haj, you've been robbed! Someone . . . you've got to ... what will you let me do for you?"

He rose, shaking his head. "Nothing, Fara. Thank you. I have resources."

She rose also, a woman of about fifty, apparent-age about twenty-six, figure carefully slim yet imposing. "Haj-"

"Get back to work, Fara, dammit! I am hurting and there is nothing you can do-but I've got to!" And he left her.

He could not get to a public comm fast enough. Nearly everything on Franji was government owned, which explained high taxation and inefficiency. Financial inst.i.tutions, though heavily regulated and constantly snooped upon, remained publicly owned, which on Franji was called "privately owned," since the 200.

euphemism for government ownership was "publicly owned." Using the Eri Haddad I.D. and no visual, he called Velyndabank, for direct access to the account of Eri Haddad: his account.

The message came onscreen and it was a big knuck-ly fist slamming into his stomach.

ACCOUNT UNDER INVESTIGATION.. PLEASE APPEAR PERSONALLY TO VERIFY I.D.

They've got me. Someone knows about Seablood and Haddad, too. I've been burned out and looted. Maybe it's Franjese confiscation. I doubt it. This was too efficient for government work. They'd still be talking about it, planning and arguing about just how to go about robbing me-to "confiscate'' my property. Or they'd have botched some aspect of it so that the b.u.mbling governmental hand would be obvious. It isn't. All this has been handled smoothly-hideously smoothly. It's not even possible, not using an I.D. and going through the bank's computers and safeguards to get my Seablood account! No. Someone else. Who? Someone knows about Eri Haddad. A dead man, with an active account on Franji. Do they know whose retina print his is, too? Probably.

This time his sinking feeling was almost physical illness, because he was coming onto the only possible answer. Corundum? Ridiculous. No individual has this kind of resources and ability. No, the answer was obvious, and it sent fear crawling slimily even into Captain Cautious. It had to be TGO. TransGalactic Order. TGO: The Gray Organization. Preserving "order" through any means. Doing good by doing evil. Justifying the means by the end achieved.

Nor would an outlaw be making protests or trying to fight!