Weightless Ecstasy Ch. 02

She pressed a finger on her right temple. A green dot glowed inside her upper right eyelid, indicating that intrusions of semen and E. coli had been eradicated. "I won't reserve an ERV session with a partner for another nine days," she said.

Ian nodded.

"You, of course, may set your own schedule." Wati turned off the water and shed her 'suit.

Another nod.

She glided over and embraced him. "I really enjoy what we do, Ian. And, yes, I need it, and you. And I understand, now, how deeply this affects you. You were right to share that with me."

She floated her body far enough to kiss him. She prolonged it. He returned it.

"Every shift," she said, "you save me from the death out there. And I save you. And everyone on this ship saves everyone. I think you and I ought to step back for a while, but after that time, I hope you'll still save me in here."

"Yes, I want to, Captain."

She angled her head, and raised an eyebrow.

"I will, Wati."

She nodded. "I'm honored to have your respect," she said. "I'm gratified to have your partnership, on shift and, especially, off. I'm happy to have your desire. I can even be content to have your hero-worship. But, Ian, this is a long voyage. Please, for everyone's sake, give your love to someone else."

***

The next day—which, for her, meant after her next sleep—the Captain awaited a conference linkage to Earth. To her left was Bogdan Stivic, representative of the ship's personnel who were selected by the International Space Exploration Commission. Stivic was a mineralogist, and would do essentially all of his scientific work on Mars. This left him plenty of free time during the voyage for bureaucratic tasks which he clearly disliked.

"Have you spoken with Dr. Gudmunson?" asked Wati.

"I have," said Bogdan, looking straight ahead at a wall that was not yet showing imagery from Earth, or anywhere else.

"Will she join us?"

Bogdan made eye contact. "She said that if someone requests her presence during the conference, she will consider it."

A large black rectangle showed on the wall, with streams of bright green numerals. Wati didn't try to read all of these data, intended for one artificial intelligence to recognize another, but she did learn the signal's point of origin. The coordinates indicated X-PAN headquarters in Austin, Texas, USA.

"We're not yet sending audio or video," said the Captain. "You and I may speak freely while we watch and listen."

"Good," said Bogdan, sounding displeased. He always does, Wati reminded herself.

"We'll want to respond as soon as they're done," she went on. "The six-minute gap is bad enough without adding more dead time."

"I'll take notes," said Bogdan impatiently, tapping the touchpad on his armrest.

She nodded, and said no more. At least the seated position seemed comfortable for him. Stivic had spent nearly all his life Earthbound. A chairdesk secured to the bulkhead, with straps to hold him in place, allowed him to focus on things other than drifting about the room. Wati also used a chairdesk, but partly from deference to the Earthbound, who could be distracted by people floating freely at odd angles.

The screen resolved to show an office that Wati recognized. Jessamyn Hillaird, Chair and Chief Executive Officer of X-PAN, sat in a surrounding workshell, facing to the left. "Just a moment," she said. "If I have to wait to hear anything from you, I'll get some real work done."

Wati, accustomed to her employer's attitude, maintained the relaxed smile of her resting face. She saw enough of Bogdan to see his scowl deepen further.

"All paused," said Hillaird. She was shown from the waist up, dressed in a dark tunic that was surely tech-enabled. Her shimmering golden hair was styled in a pageboy, in an era when the original meaning of that term was largely unknown. She pivoted her seat to face the screen that linked her with XPML1. "If your suggestion of a work stoppage was supposed to make me laugh, it failed. External Relations wants me to take it seriously, but I won't do that either. I'll just give you a few things to think about."

Bogdan touched his throat and said, "Please join us."

"Are you sending her what we're seeing?" asked Wati.

"Yes."

Hillaird continued, "First, I think it's pathetic and creepy that people want a peep show into my Mars craft, but the pledge numbers from drooling users are real. The income won't pay for everything, but it will let ISEC's backers cut their costs. So far, nobody has a better idea, and the fact that this can work has the governments already trying to spend the savings they don't have yet.

"I personally think your wild sex is overrated. I bought half an hour of free-fall in a suborbital to try it, and dragged my lover along. It's a bit of a thrill, floating in mid-air with my pussy out. But even with the tutorial on maintaining partner contact, we couldn't cum. He was nauseous, and I got a vertigo headache. The point is, though, almost nobody on Earth can afford that, so they'll never know there are problems. All they'll see are healthy people, accustomed to zero gravity, fucking without the silliness of the trampolines they use on Luna."

Dagmar Gudmunson pulled herself through a hatch. Wati fingered a control to anchor another chairdesk to face the screen.

"Bogdan, you're too easy to offend," said Dagmar, strapping in. "Ms. Hillaird knows that."

"She refuses to respect us," said Bogdan.

"Or anyone else," said Dagmar. "Correct, Captain?"

Wati's smile grew. "I reserve comment on my employer," she said.

"Let the record show," Hillaird had gone on, "There are rumors that X-PAN will finance and build an ERV in Earth orbit, and fill it with porno pros, because nothing in the junkyard up there has a space big enough for humans to have sex that's fully visible and not cramped. The rumors may have been started by the self-appointed morality police. My highly principled response is that X-PAN will devote its resources to projects that derive real value for humanity and our shareholders. The rumors conflate that this ERV would be expanded into a tourist resort. The thing is, even if the yelling about Sodom and Gomorrah despoiling the heavens weren't happening, nothing like that could exist for two years, and the space program money crunch exists now.

"Anyway, here's what I have for you. There's gear on the ship that can convert the bodies in your sex videos to look like people who don't exist. We can send A.I.-faked faces, skin tones, hair, ink, piercings, and whatever, for everybody you have. Your movements and insertions would be what you do to each other, but you wouldn't be recognized doing it. Does that satisfy your notions of privacy and respect? Answer quick, I don't want this to take all day. Over." Hillaird then rotated to face left, and made gestures in the workshell to reactivate what she had declared to be more important.

"We're still offline," said Wati. "What do you think?"

Bogdan looked surprised. "This...may be worth considering. On Earth, they already know that there is sex here. If the people in the ERV cannot be recognized, there is no further erosion of privacy."

Dagmar was about to say something, but Wati cut her off. "We have been sent a sample," she said, nodding at the screen.

A nude female gymnast was shown performing an energetic floor exercise routine, in Earth gravity, displaying a wide variety of motion ranges. A bright green line moved across the screen, and when it passed the gymnast, her face, hair, and skin color changed enough to look like an entirely different, yet real, person.

"Look there," said Bogdan, pointing. "Her hair was short, but now it is a ponytail, and it moves just as her head does. I would think that this person is real."

Wati almost felt sorry for him. She said, "Dr. Gudmunson, can I trust you to be respectful of Professor Stivic?"

"I will try," said the tall, shapely blonde who appeared at least ten years younger than her true age. "Bogdan, I admire you for keeping your focus on your work, and dismissing the personality cult that has been imposed upon us all. But at a time like this, awareness of the cult is important."

"How do you mean?" he asked, confused.

Dagmar indicated the screen, which showed the routine and transformation in a loop. "Her face and skin are different, but the structure of her body is the same. A video of two or more people in, ah, close quarters would have to maintain their body structures, as they interact. If our body structures are not changed in the videos, then people on Earth who follow the personality cult will still know who we are, because there are only 27 of us here...and some on Earth will alter the videos, to restore our faces, and so forth."

Wati judged that this was as good a way as any to break the news to Bogdan, a shy widower who might never have used the ERV for anything other than exercise. She watched him look away, again becoming glum.

"So this answer is no answer at all," he muttered.

"Let's work out our reply to Ms. Hillaird," said Wati.

They did, and then they transmitted, with the Captain reading their statement.

As they awaited Hillaird's response, Bogdan asked, "Are we being too obstructive?"

Dagmar's smile was light as she said, "Anyone may keep a private life private."

Wati knew that Dagmar had dealt with this sort of thing her entire adult life. Seen in almost all cultures as beautiful in face and form, even well past the age of forty, Dagmar Gudmunson had taken very few of the offers from the world outside of science to promote and popularize her work. This did not stop her from becoming the person most desired by the majority of the Mars-mission personality cult.

"For a life to be truly private," said Wati, "it must not be shared with anyone else." She recalled Ian's statement about what Earth could learn about the Captain. That was all part of role play, of course, she thought. Nothing more. Surely.

When the response arrived, Wati saw that Hillaird was not merely continuing her irascible pose, but intensifying it. "Despite your terror of losers playing with your images, that offer will stay on the table. In addition, X-PAN has the option of cutting the cost of your mission by reducing the juice in the laser blasts we so generously send you. As your Captain can inform you, these blasts support the amenities on the ship that aren't strictly necessary. The ERV could be closed indefinitely, and the saved money would go to your colleagues who whine about being stuck on Earth. You have seven days to give me a reason not to do this. Over and out!" The screen went dark, and then was again a blank bulkhead

This left all three in silence, until Wati, still smiling, said, "Obviously, we stand adjourned."

(To be continued)