Sofia came out of the bathroom, wearing nothing but a towel. She had put her hair up for taking her shower and now she let it down.
“Are you curious?” She asked. Rodney was still naked, but lying under the covers. Her apartment was not in the central tower, but a studio in a low group of buildings to the west. Her collection of rooms, as befitting her station was actually quite large, and she had a spectacular view of an old growth forest, but Rodney only had eyes for her lithe form. It was easy for him to imagine what was under the towel. After all, they had spent an hour gathering what on Cross Roads was considered obligatory carnal knowledge.
“More surprised,” He said. “I did not think people in your position would be allowed to have a baby.”
“Oh, I’m going to be pregnant,” Sofia plopped down next to him. If she hadn’t been wearing a uniform when they first met, Rodney would have considered her to be a ballerina, or a tennis player. She gave him a peck on the forehead. “However, I do have an obligation to donate to the cause. Our genes will help contribute to the population.”
“Is that what what you call it here?” Rodney folded his arms across his bare chest. “A contribution?”
“Call it what you like, but we have a job to do.”
Rodney cocked his head to one said then said, “Well, I guess I can adapt to do your way of business.”
She punched him lightly on the shoulder. “I will have you know that you sir, were in very high demand. No nanites. Kapoor almost demanded that we conscript you on the spot. You should have heard her. I thought she might have even put her name in, except that she hates men.”
“The head of the population program hates men?”
“Well, you can’t blame her. They make a lot of extra work for her.”
Rodney frowned. “How do you figure?”
“Well, fertilizing eggs with sperm has become spectacularly efficient, but you still need a living womb from a healthy mother to birth a healthy human. And then you have to rear them. And it turns out, if we want both sexes to be raised we need both parents to be involved in the process. The challenge is that it is a process. And while we can select for women who work collectively to breed more humans, the men become… territorial, possessive. The trouble Kapoor faces is that the more compliant the men become the less they contribute and they don’t do very well raising the children. It’s a very tricky balance. You can’t imagine how much pressure she’s under. She can’t get ride of the men but she struggles to get the balance right as well.
“Don’t look at me like I’m sexist.”
“But you are,” Rodney said pointing out the obvious.
“No I’m not. Benjamin Franklin said something similar almost four hundred years ago. When men have work to do, when they have a purpose they are happy and productive. But when you give them nothing to do, they are quarrelsome and cause trouble. The problem where is that we quite literally do not need the men to do anything. We have systems, and androids, and the Wards are very well organized. But we either seem to get stuck with limp fish who barely contribute, or we get renegades who try to do stupid things like run off with their women and children.”
“What!?”
“Rod, you do understand what we are trying to do here right? Dr. Kapoor, in fact this entire installation has been tasked with doubling our population. Do you have any idea what it takes to intentionally, purposefully grow one billion new humans? And a billion is not even enough. We are swimming in a universe of unlimited resources yet to take advantage of those resources we need people, billions more humans.”
Rodney shrugged, “So why me?”. He looked in her eyes. She gave him a long slow kiss then shrugged herself. “I like men, and it does get lonely, being at the top. It can be extremely stressful. If it is not the internal politics, or the other species, there is always some small fire here. And the truth is I don’t just like any man. I want a strong man. You are a strong man. There are too many limp fish here for my tastes. Perhaps that is not fair and I am only human. I want what I can’t have.”
“It seems to me you got my best,”. Rodney countered.
“Tell me, are you afraid of me?”
“Afraid of you? No, why would I be?”
“There, that is what I’m talking about. I cannot own you. My position, my authority, it means nothing to you now.”
“Well, that’s not completely true,” Rodney said, “I like you’re uniform. It makes your butt look nice.” He tried to pull back the covers to get out of bed, but Sofia pushed him back down. Her towel was gone - Rodney couldn’t believe he hadn’t seen her remove it. He gave a whistle. “I’ll tell you what, you look pretty damn good for your age General Lindberger.”
She gave him a long kiss. They did not talk for the next 45 minutes.
When they were dressed, Sofia said, “I need to know what your intentions are there though. Pima locked you up to flex her muscle. Kapoor agreed to it because she thought she had captured some fresh seed, and to a certain degree she did, but she is very angry with your - what is he anyway? Mr. Rashad is not listed as a member of your crew, just a passenger?”
“He’s a business partner at the moment,” Rodney tried to be as truthful as he could without being completely sure himself. “We’re both looking for the same lost ship and we decided to pool our resources. So we’re working together for this one contract.”
“I checked your background and it does come up that you are working an insurance investigation, looking for a missing pleasure yacht?”
Rodney nodded. God bless Tracy for getting the paper work correctly.
“How did that send you the Nexus?”
“I needed a favor. The actual location of the ship has been encrypted. My sponsor offered to unlock the location if I completed a small job for him first.”
“And that is why you are here?” Sofia finished getting dressed.
“See, I told you that uniform makes your ass look good.”
“Stop it,” She said firmly. “Play time is over. Now what is this favor you are supposed to do?”
Rodney decided to go for honesty and possibly even push it and ask for help. “Truth is I’m not completely sure. I’m supposed to get a song, a song from Govvu.”
Sofia looked up and held his gaze. “That is a very odd request.”
“Do you know what he could be talking about?”
“Well, the Govvu are very protective of their intellectual property, especially their music. They won’t let any one record it, but they will gladly teach anyone to play.”
“That might explain why he wanted me to also bring back the method of playing it. If I can’t record it for him, I’ll probably need a way to reproduce it.”
“I’m afraid I don’t know very much about Govvu culture,”. Sofia said. “That is all I know. But their music festivals are very popular in the MetroPlex. I believe they have one tomorrow night. If you hurry, you should be able to make it. That will give you your best chance to find what you are looking for.”
“So are we free to go?”
“Yes, but I have to let you know that while the Governor was flexing her muscle, locking you up, do not undestimate Dr. Kapoor. I’m not joking that she doesn’t like you. For much the same reason I am attracted to you, she is repulsed. She finds you to be an opportunity, and a threat - both at once. So be careful. Do not give her reason to detain you, or your contributions will not be nearly so pleasant as the time we have spent together.”
“Understood.”
“Have you been to the Southern Metroplis before?”
Rodney shook his head. “There are no transfer portals here on the surface. They are banned. And your ship will be held in customs until you return. In short, every species must use the planetary transportation system.”
“Oh,” Rodney said, suddenly realizing that no trunning afoul of Dr. Kapoor might not be as easy as he thought. “No ships?”
“None. It is part of keeping the peace on a shared world.”
“Then, can you give me any tips?”
Sofie then sat down and did something Rodney hadn’t seen in years. She pulled out a pen and paper and scribbled something on the paper. “Here, this is an address of someone I am close to down there. It may be a place you can stay in SoutherMet. You need to understand the Metroplis is under galactic union law, not human, not earth. Galactic. So if you break the rules there, you’re on your own. You will also find a vibrant human colony down there. That’s another reason Kapoor and Pima will not be happy to see you go. So you need to leave quickly, before they know what you are up to.”
“A second human colony?”
“Officially, we consider them part of our outpost, however, they consider themselves refugees. Kapoor thinks they are traitors, abandoning the mission to populate the stars. Governor Terrakul believes they are snubbing her authority. You see, there is very little we can do to them in the city without creating more problems in the Union. We don’t want the other worlds to think we sent criminals to the city. So we coexist in an an unhappy truce. You’re heading immediately there will not make things simpler.”
She folded the paper in half then handed it to Rodney, pausing for a moment, “You can read that right?” He opened and looked at it. She had written it in cursive. He nodded. “My grandmother taught me when I was young. She thought I would be an artist.”
Sofia was a tall women, but she still had to stand on her tip toes to kiss him on the nose. Rodney bent his head and kissed her on the mouth. “Time for one more contribution?”
She smiled a roguish smile, but shook her head. “I do like you Mr. Morris, but duty calls. And you are not the type man who would be waiting in my bed for me when I get home.”
“I could be…”
“No you couldn’t.”
Rodney agreed. “No I couldn’t.”
“No go, you do not have much time. You must gather your compatriots and leave before my influence is overruled.”
Rodney saluted the general and was surprised to see two soldiers waiting for him right outside the generals door. “We will escort you back to your quarters,” the Corporal who addressed him had the name badget, “Yasketh”.
“Please lead the way,” Rodney motioned and they turned sharply on their heels and guided him back to his quarters.
When Rodney arrived back at his apartment, he found Anil sitting there eating breakfast, which reminded Rodney of how hungry he was. Sofia had not even bought him dinner. The night spent together had been fun, but focused and intense. She was a soldier through and through.
“How was your evening?” Anil asked.
“Business. Colony Business.”
“Where’s Tony?”
“He hasn’t come back yet.”
Rodney checked his watch. The three of them had stayed on ship time, which fortunately synced with the planetary day night cycles well enough. It was still early, so he set about making himself some breakfast. “They have eggs on this world?”
“They have everything,” Anil said, “Plus some things that are hard to come by on Earth.”
A little while later, just as Rodney was about to sit down to eat, the apartment door opened and a very tired looking Tony Capasella staggered in.
“Wow, buddy, you look like you were rode hard and put away wet.”
Tony nodded and collapsed on the couch.
“Fun night?”. Anil asked.
“Well, it started out fun, but then they wouldn’t let me go.”
“You look drained,” Rodney said around a mouth full of eggs.
“I’ll say. They kept giving me this drink, some kind of stimulant. Chai and her friends were… voracious. but now, fuck, I’m really sore.” Tony rolled on his side and curled up. “I’ve never been sore like this before. My stomach and my back hurt.”
“That happens when you get old,” Rodney said. “Look, I know you’re gassed, but you need to get yourself cleaned up. Well do. General Lindberg has given us clearance to head to the Southern Metropolis, but we need to get out of here before Dr. Kapoor, or Governer Teerakul overrule her. It’s a truimverant, but that doesn’t mean they all see eye to eye.”
“Can’t I just take a shower on the ship?” Tony asked.
“We can’t take the ship. And they don’t have transfer stations on the planets surface. That’s one of the terms of being here. So we have to take local transport, the sky train. So hurry up take a shower, grab you stuff and lets get out of here.”
Anil stood up and went to his room and moment later returned with a backpack. “I’m ready,” He announced.
“How are you ready already?”
“I saw this coming,” Anil explained. “Let’s just say I was the only one thinking with my big head. Besides, I’ve been to the colony before. General Lindberg is right. Governor Teekul and Dr. Kapoor are not to be trusted.”