A Symbolic Message

This was the place. Heavy wooden beams stuck down from the already-too-low ceiling. Thick shocks of steam wafted from the kitchen, smelling sweet and sour, and mixed with gritty clouds of tobacco smoke. Candles hung inside paper lamps, a fire hazard. To Mel, it looked like any other run-down noodle house in the nation, but this was most definitely the place.

"You, smart-man!"

Mel turned around.

A man stood there, short, extremely pale and with jet-black hair. "You were the one who was looking for someone?"

"Yes," said Mel guardedly. "Don't say that out loud."

The man opened his mouth, hesitated and seemed to forget what he was going to say. Then he perked up. "You went to universalty?"

"it's pronounced 'university.' But yes."

The pale man's eyes opened wide. He bounced on the balls of his feet. "Is it true? Do girls go there to pick their husbands?"

Mel realized he was leaning away from the man. Something about his manic, oblivious energy was vaguely repulsive. "Very much the opposite," Mel said coldly. "Education means economic independence. University is the way out."

"Out of what?"

"Of marriage."

"Why would you want a way out of marriage?"

Behind the pale man, a cloaked woman stopped and peered at the two men. With a smirk, she uncovered an empty glass ball from a pouch at her hip.

The pale man began to melt. His clothes twitched in the direction of the glass ball, then fell from him. His fingers and toes began to fade, and he fell backwards as if swept off his feet by a sudden wind. But he did not hit the floor. He shrank and flew and faded until, with a magical flash, he vanished from the outside world. Now he stood only three inches tall, confined inside the woman's glass orb.

The woman smiled down at her captive. "Time to go to the mill, sweetie. It's almost your shift."

As soon as he realized where he was, the pale man waved goodbye to Mel, grinning like an idiot. Then he sat down submissively as his wife tucked him into her pouch.

That had not been witchcraft. It had not been a cosmic anomaly, nor some kind of rupture in reality. That man was a hostage of his wife because he was not a man. He was a monster boy.

When he was younger, Mel had thought that monster boys were a relic of the past, a barbaric accessory to matriarchy that had died out with the medieval, authoritarian maternalism that had accompanied it. Now he knew the depressing truth: all over the world, men were still being turned into monster boys for the service of craven women. Sometimes the men were forced to drink the special nectar that began their transformation. Other times, they'd be forced to breathe the gasses that issued up from the ground in remote caves, or they would be exposed to the polar radiation storms that scrambled men's minds but left women's unharmed. The ways in which men could be turned into monster boys were terribly numerous.

And the outcomes were equally unpredictable. Sometimes their ears turned into cat's ears, and they became frisky, playful and capricious. Sometimes horns grew from their foreheads, and their skin turned as red as the blood beneath. Sometimes they grew tails that were as dexterous and sensitive as their hands. For some, like that unfortunate pale man, it was more surreal. Sometimes a halo of light would surround the monster boy's head, glowing differently to show what he was thinking. Sometimes a monster boy gained the ability to turn invisible or even—that most coveted ability of all—to shape-shift. Whatever the effect on his body, the monster boy invariably came out simple-minded, stupidly happy and unbreakably loyal to the first woman he laid eyes on. He would become the perfect servant, the perfect slave, the perfect collaborator in the oppressive system of matriarchy.

Mel had been lucky enough to grow up in a civilized country, where men were on equal footing with their sisters and wives. And he had assumed the rest of the world was just as enlightened. How naive of him! How ethnocentric! Now he knew better, and he had come to this impoverished corner of the world to stand up to injustice.

But he couldn't do it alone. Mel had come to this house to meet someone, and as he scanned the clientele of the noodle-house for the sixth time, he finally found her.

She was a working woman, probably less than forty, but already old. Burly arms hung from a broad frame with an incongruously flat belly. Her tough, factory-woven work shirt and pants were the kind one found everywhere in the world (such was the miracle of mass-production.) Only the greasy bandana over her head, inscribed with words in a brush-stroke alphabet Mel couldn't read, gave a hint of her cultural heritage. She tipped the soup bowl up to her mouth, downing the steaming broth and noodles with graceless speed.

She didn't look like much, but Mel had searched for almost a month to find a woman willing to do what she was willing to do. "May I sit?" he asked her.

The woman nodded. "So..." she leaned forward, planting her heavy elbows on the table, "you're the boy I got a tip about."

"Yes, I am the man you got a tip about."

"Sure." She dropped her voice. "You know it was a big risk, putting it out there that you wanted to help bring down the monster-boy traders. If the wrong people heard you say that, you'd be gone in a moment, and I never knew you."

He swallowed; she was probably right. "Well... we are fortunate they didn't."

"My name's Nuan... listen, if you're serious about this, we need to talk in secret. Come to my apartment and I'll hear you out." She stood up.

'Finally!' thought Mel, as he followed her out into the street.

This country was the fifth largest in the world, encircling almost 1.5 million square kilometers within its borders. There was plenty of space to build in, yet for some reason, its cities were crushingly dense. Market stalls grew like weeds wherever there was room, and pack mules, horses and oxen labored through the crowd, piled high with packs of who-knew-what, somehow not stepping on any toes. Not that Mel could sense, at least.

Two men barreled down the street, panickedly carrying a third man on a stretcher. A casualty of a workshop accident, no doubt, on his way to a physician. A monster boy leapt out of their way, and the three water buckets piled in his arms teetered dangerously. He walked on, swaying drunkenly, mumbling "sorry, mistress," every time he spilled any. A young lady, much too well-dressed to walk unguarded in this part of town, snatched the hem of her qipao away from the bumbling male, shooting him a haughty look. When she turned away from him, Mel caught a glimpse of her intent, intelligent face.

He felt a pang of attraction, which he immediately fought down. He looked at his feet, hating himself. Sexual attraction to women was nothing more than a tool they used to assert dominance over the oppressed gender, and here he was, partaking in it of his own free will. "I'll be glad when I can spend time with other men again."

"Hm?" Nuan looked over her shoulder at him.

"It's nothing." He cringed. "Well, no it isn't. The women here, they're using their bodies to their advantage. Modern accoutrements like clothing and makeup improve their attractiveness. It unnaturally enhances their power to dominate men, even without corrupting them into monster boys."

"Power to dominate men? What dunce told you that? Women don't dress to attract men. They dress up to look good, simple as that."

Mel's eyebrows furrowed. "That 'dunce,'" he said icily, "was my first-year men's studies teacher. He's the man who opened my eyes to the oppression my brothers face around the world. He's the one who taught me that the world needs my message." He capped that off with a challenging look.

"He put you to this whole 'hero' thing, did he? Maybe he's not so bad."

'Did she just agree with me?' Mel thought. "Yes... yes, he was a great man."

There was a pause.

"We're here." Nuan ducked into an old wood-plank door.

Through the door and up a thin staircase, Mel followed her into a room where old pots lined a shelf, a wooden smoking pipe hung on the wall and a few dirty food bowls sat on a table with chopsticks leaning lazily out of them. A square window, only two feet on each side, let in a tiny stream of sunlight.

Mel bit down on the words, 'This is it?'

"It's not much," said Nuan, "but the landlady's boys keep the thieves away, and that's what you really want." She leaned against an empty patch of wall, the only one in the apartment. "So, you want to infiltrate the local slave boy ring? Expose them from the inside. And you don't even plan to make money off this, do you?"

"Not one cent. I'm not a mercenary. It's unjust that men have a subordinate role in society simply because they're more vulnerable to mental corruption."

"Are you some kind of reformer? The tip said this was a one-time thing. Said you were going home after this one bust."

"I am."

"So you want to wreck one slaving operation and then leave?"

"Yes. When we do this, it will send a symbolic message that treating men as property has consequences."

"A symbolic message, huh? You think all the gangsters and pimps and kidnappers will just change their minds?'

Mel furrowed his eyebrows. "I am prepared to make it worth your while."

"Ah..." Nuan leaned back and smiled. "So that's the way you're playing." She stared at him for a long, silent, uncomfortable moment. She grew a devious smile. "You know what, boy? Life is short. I'll help you out, and in the spirit of things, I won't ask for money. I want you. No cash, no connection, no services." She grinned. "Well, actually, lots of service."

"I know what you mean," he hissed.

"Oh, don't be so cold! Don't tell me you've never pulled a favor like that for a girl."

"Never," he lied.

"Is that so?" She stood up. "Well, if we're serious about sabotaging the local slaver operation, I've got some preparing to do. People to talk to, things to buy, questions to ask and... well, you get the idea." She pointed a strong finger at him. While I'm gone, stick around here and don't steal anything. If you do, the landlady will spank you, then I will."

He sat bolt upright. "How long will I have to wait?"

"Give me until tomorrow morning. If I can find everyone in a hurry, it'll only be half a day, and we can try the infiltration tonight."

Before he knew it, Nuan was off. Mel sank into his chair and sighed away all of his frustration and uncertainty, leaving only peaceful resolve behind. Finally, a plan was in motion! A day of idleness was a small price to pay for a chance to send those human traffickers a message.

* * *

Nuan came back in only seven hours. She had left as a work-worn city woman, and she came back a savage street thug.

It was a simple change for such a dramatic effect. She had only traded in her woolen shirt for thick leather and added a sheathed pocket knife at her hip. On her mannish physique, the little tool became fearsome. "If we're sneaking into the slaver's den," she said, "I have to look the part."

Mel shot to his feet. "I'm ready!"

"Cool your heels, boy. Before we're ready, there's one more thing, and I need you for it."

"Whatever it is, I'm ready."

"That's a man. Come with me."

Earlier, Mel had only explored the newer, heavy-industry parts of the city. Now Nuan took him into the overpopulated, underfunded old city center that development had left behind. Mel had never seen such density. Huts were built on top of other huts, or excavated beneath them. There were no plain walls; windows, staircases, catwalks and doorways pocked everything. He smelled smoke—of tobacco and things much worse—and heard drinking songs. Somewhere underground, in the tangle of trenches and tunnels dug into the hill, women were cheering on some game.

"Are you sure you won't rethink the whole one-time-only clause?" asked Nuan, out of nowhere. "You know these slavers are small-time, but if this works, we can go after the bigger players. Make some real change."

"I stand by what I said before. One time only."

"I'm surprised. Busting traffickers is the perfect line of work for a fiery boy like you. All fire and sparks, that's what you are." She chortled. "'Sparky'. That'd be a good stripper name for you."

"Must you?"

"Don't tell me you've never thought about it. You've got a cute body, do you know that? If you got into the business, you'd be all set for twenty, thirty years."

Mel had indeed thought of it. As degrading as sex work would be, as antithetical to male liberation, he still could not help imagining it. Some boyish recess of his mind, hungry for female attention and bereft of self-respect, longed to bare his flesh for the pleasure of female gaze, to trade in his individuality for their approval. "I suppose I would be good at it."

"Good thing, because that's what I need you for."

"What?"

"No, not stripping. You can keep your clothes on. You're just my Zallin gift. You know what that is?"

'It's a corruption,' he wanted to say. 'It's a twisting of reciprocity into a tool of female domination.' Instead, he said, "Zallin is a local custom wherein a female guest offers her husband's sexual services as a gift to her hostess."

"Yes, but a Zallin guy's cock is off limits. The lady we're visiting, she won't make you do anything too intense. Just kiss her and massage her and tell her she's pretty, that kind of thing. Her favorite is usually something called the Blossom Trail, it's where you start off with a kiss on the lips and then-"

"I know what a Blossom Trail is."

Nuan's hard face twisted into a question mark. "How come you know that?"

Mel flushed. "Research."

"Mm. Anyway, when I say, 'Sparky, you know what to do,' that's your cue to start."

"Is this absolutely necessary?"

"If you want a favor, then don't show up without a Zallin gift. That's how it's been forever, so you'd best get used to it." She stepped up to a door and gave it three firm knocks, ending the conversation.

The door eased open a crack, then a man swung it open. Except it wasn't a man. It was taller than any real man, his long neck peaking seven feet off the ground before craning sharply downward. His intent face peered at Mel over an impossibly strong chin. His skin was red—not copper-tone, like the native minorities of South Tawantinsuyu, but a fierce crimson—and scales encrusted the outsides of his arms and legs. Smaller scales accented his cheekbones and temples, almost as if he were wearing a helmet, except that his bright orange mane ran freely back down his neck.

'A dragon boy!' Mel had doubted they were even real.

The dragon boy's head turned on his flexible neck. "Greetings," he rumbled, in a voice too big even for his voluminous chest. "My mistress expects you." With a slow, graceful step back, he motioned the two in.

Nuan stepped in as if the dragon boy were just another monster boy. Mel could not coax himself to be so nonchalant. When the dragon boy stared at him, he froze. "C-can I help you?" he strained out.

"I know your mission, Melchior Atamaugh," the dragon boy rumbled. "You have a good heart. But through your eyes, I see a man who tells himself falsehoods."

"How could you possibly know who I am?"

He smiled. "I see with more than eyes, boy. Do not think monster boys are always less." He pressed a thin, strong finger into Mel's belly. "And never forget that you are only one man." He withdrew, moving like he weighed nothing at all.

Mel stayed frozen.

"Your mistress is waiting," added the dragon.

Sheepish, Mel ducked his head and followed Nuan into a drab wooden kitchen. Nuan sat across the wooden table from another woman, slender and swathed in only a simple dress and apron.

The woman glanced at Mel, gave a hint of a smile, then returned her eyes to Nuan. "Why now?" she asked. "You're not one to take risks."

Nuan sighed. "As you get older, you start to realize there's no such thing as safe, not really. So you might as well try some risky things. This foreign boy wants to do it and needs help, so he asked me, so now I'm asking you. That reminds me... Sparky? You know what to do."

Both women turned to look at him, and Mel suddenly remembered what he was expected to do. In the streets it had seemed scandalous, but here in a medieval wooden hut, it seemed somehow natural to follow such a medieval custom. He approached the table, eased himself to his knees and crawled underneath.

The woman Nuan spoke to wore a leisurely robe that exposed most of her legs. To Mel's relief, she had washed her feet; she smelled only of soap.

Mel thought of the Blossom Trail. Now that he was already under the table, it was a little late to kiss the hostess on the mouth and work his way down, but he could still do a truncated version. He leaned in, careful not to put weight on her, and kissed her inner thigh. He paused, waiting for some kind of feedback.

"So," said the hostess, "Nuan, you want to make some justice of your own? Who do you have a grudge against?"

Mel kept kissing, licking his lips so they'd stay wet, but not too wet, and gently placing one kiss every six inches down the woman's right leg.

"We're going after the kidnapping gang, the one run by Guan-yin."

"You mean Sweetwater? The one who took over the cave?" Her leg tensed under Mel's lips. "Why are you after her? She's making it. She's the one person who looks like she's rising in the world." She sighed. Her leg shifted a little, and Mel could feel her muscles loosen. "Everyone else these days is only breaking down and growing old."

"She may be making good, but it's the way she's doing it I don't like. Making money by turning men into sluts? It's not right."

"Come on, Nuan, you know that's what they are anyway. The gas only helps to bring it out."

Mel stopped and made a concerted effort not register his offense. Then with a supreme effort of will, he stooped to her feet and ran his tongue up her ankle.

"Not all men are the same," said Nuan. "When a man doesn't use his judgment and a girl takes advantage of him, well, that's his fault for being stupid. Fair is fair. The smart ones hold the leash, and the dumb ones lick their boots. That's how it goes."

As Nuan said this, the hostess lifted her foot, and her toes toyed with Mel's lips. As soon as he parted them, she intruded on his mouth, and he could either reject her or suck on his toes like a proper Zallin gift. He chose to suck.

"But," Nuan went on, "this whole monster-boy-trafficking thing? This isn't right. If you're a man and you're pretty, there's nothing you can do. The smart ones, the dumb ones, they all get captured. They don't stand a chance."

The hostess chuckled darkly. "You want life to be fair? Nuan, if life was fair, we'd have to shut down every monster boy brothel in this city."

"I wish we could. Don't get me wrong—I love a good servicing as much as the next woman, but those brothels cross a line. Men should have a chance of something better."

"Why? What's it to you?"

"Do you have kids?"

Mel stopped sucking. 'What kind of a question is that?' Before anyone could notice him, he resumed his ministrations.

"No kids yet," was the reply.

"I do," said Nuan. "Two daughters, and they work for the sign-maker just on the far side of Donkey Lane. And I also got a son. And knowing what kind of threat he's up against, how many people want to use him as sex toy, like he's not even alive... it just makes my skin crawl. He's married to a girl who's got the connections to keep him safe, and it's a good thing, because if he wasn't, I don't know what I'd do."

There was a pause. The hostess clenched her toes in Mel's mouth, and it wasn't out of pleasure. "I'm only one woman, Nuan. What do you expect me to do against Guan-yin?"

Mel detected the shift in tone. Now she was making excuses.