Habeas corpus did not apply to imperial provinces.
"It was a waste of a year of my life," Hamilton said. "Those people weren't rebels; they were poseurs, Marxist idiots caught up in the drivel of a century ago." Hamilton stopped speaking as one of the "rebels"—a lovely, tall, dark-blond girl named Hélène—stopped to glare at him, resisting the shove of the escorting officer. She looked terribly disappointed and terribly hurt. They'd been bedmates for the last six months and she had never suspected he was working for the other side. Hamilton looked ashamed.
Ah, she was such a sweetheart. Maybe if . . .
Caruthers noticed. "What is it with you and tall blondes, anyway? Oh, never mind.
"John, we've been tolerant before and we suffered for it, badly. This is what 'zero tolerance' means."
Hamilton sighed as the police pushed the girl onward. "Can we get her some . . . consideration? 'Services to the Empire,' if nothing else?"
"I'll see what I can do," Caruthers said. "You cared for that one?"
"As much as I can care anymore, I suppose. She was very sweet and she's very young. I'd rather not have to think that I sent her to a freezing labor camp in Nunavut."
"All right," Caruthers agreed. "We owe you one and getting her sent to a re-education camp in Puerto Rico probably about covers that. Besides, she's young enough that re-education just might take."
"Thank you." Hamilton breathed a small sigh of relief. "What's next?"
"You can't operate here anymore," Caruthers said. "While this group may have been ineffectual, there are others that are considerably more capable." He paused to think for a bit before continuing, "School again, I think, language school."
"Fuck!"
"Trust me; you'll like the reason why, once it's explained."
Castle Noisvastei, Province of Baya, 21 Sha'ban, 1536 AH (17 June, 2112)
Her head moved rhythmically, the object of her attentions pulsing in her mouth. A crucifix swung back and forth in time with her bobbing head, hanging from a chain about her neck. "The men like the idea of fucking Christian women," Ling had explained once, when she'd given Petra the cross. "It asserts their superiority. It's also good for tips."
Petra was a full-fledged houri now; Ling had taught her well and patiently. She no longer knew how many men she had serviced since coming to the castle. It was over a thousand, certainly, even subtracting for repeat customers. She actually tried not to remember the numbers, or the acts. Though, of course, if she wanted to keep repeat customers, she did have to remember preferences. It was a difficult game of mental gymnastics.
For the first few months, Ling had been content merely to have Petra sit or kneel nearby and watch her perform. Well, not quite content; the almond-eyed girl had also taken Petra to her own bed and shown her how to enjoy a woman and how to please one.
"It's how we keep our sanity," Ling had explained.
After that first few months of observation, Ling had had Petra begin to take part, whenever she had a cooperative and suitable man in her quarters. Under Ling's patient coaching, Petra had learned the use of her lips and tongue, Ling's words explaining and encouraging,
Ling's hand firmly but gently guiding Petra's head, Ling scolding at first until Petra learned to accept whatever gift the customer might deposit in her mouth or on her face or lips. Only once had Ling beaten her, and that was because Petra had rudely thrown up after such a "gift."
Before her thirteenth birthday, Petra was a past master in the use of her mouth.
From there, Ling had moved on to more advanced courses. Always she was careful though, selecting, for example, very small men to open and stretch Petra's anus until she could handle larger. One day, Petra had balked, complaining, "It hurts and I hate the pain."
Thereupon Ling had taken Petra down to a lower level of quarters. There, blank faced women sat staring at walls. Others sucked frantically on men. Still others rode customers with seeming wanton abandon. Those last two categories were as blank-faced as the first.
"These are women who complained," Ling explained. "Women who complained once too often."
"What happened to them?" a horrified Petra had asked.
Ling had unconsciously rubbed the crown of her own head, above the hairline. "Oh . . . they were sent to doctors and little things were implanted in their brains. Some other things, parts of their brains, were removed. All their fucking and sucking is controlled by a computer brought from China that sits in the lowest levels of the castle. So far as I know, they feel nothing. So far as I know, they aren't even there. Maybe if the computer didn't make them eat they'd starve to death. But what if they are still there?