Chapter 41

Lucas looked over the papers after Skinny Guy left. Juno Colony, deep in the Indian Ocean—a sovereign settlement with no sympathies at all toward the UEO—that's what this was all about. Some people thought it was a myth or a joke. Political cartoons depicted busty dominatrices in leather corsets and thigh-high stiletto boots running the government, wielding riding crops over cowering males in loincloths. Before Skinny Guy, Lucas had always laughed at the whole notion, but now the joke didn't seem so funny. Rumor had it males didn't have any rights at all on Juno. They were slaves and chattel. They had even less protections than were afforded animals in most parts of the Western world. Signing the papers would make him the propertyof some woman named Mistress Gianna.

Well, Mistress Gianna could forget it. "Go to hell!" he screamed to the closed circuit camera as he ripped up the documents. The malodorous messenger had said he couldn't go to Juno until he signed. Good. He'd take his chances seaQuest could find him and rescue him. They could do that much more easily in open water. Juno Colony would never let seaQuest come near them, any more than the Amazonians would let a UEO plane fly over their airspace. He assumed he was in international waters in the meantime and started quoting Geneva Convention statutes and UEO resolutions to the camera, but it never answered back and Skinny Guy never returned to tell him to shut up or anything.

He had to pay a price for his defiance and it sickened him to live in that cramped space with the rank consequences, but some things were worth a price. He knew he was in trouble when he started to think how much more civilized Beauregard had been. His cell on If Island had been clean and warm, with a working toilet. He'd always had food and water, and he was never left in restraints for more than a couple of hours at a time. But he whipped your skin clean off your back, Lucas reminded himself. Then he sent Lonnie in with antiseptic to clean you up and comfort you, some other part of his mind argued back. Back and forth, his thirst-crazed mind would debate, both sides sounding equally virtuous.

He never left the dark closet with the dim light bulb. That meant he couldn't tell night from day, which would be expected if he was in a submarine. He liked to think he lasted three days before his thirst became overwhelming, but he didn't know for sure. Apparently, he hadn't left any kind of evidence for Ben and Katie to follow and he hadn't been let out of this stinking cage so he could try to send any kind of distress signal for seaQuest to find. He had tried so hard to get his hand through the shackle that he'd scraped it bloody, but he wasn't even close to getting free. Hopeless, that's what it was. So now it was down to whether he should sign away all his rights and become someone's property, or die of thirst in this wretched hellhole and become shark fodder.

Much as he hated the idea, it seemed the only logical course was to sign his rights away. Being someone's property was disgusting and shameful and against everything he believed in, but at least it kept him alive. Alive, he stood a chance at escaping someday. He probably wouldn't get help from seaQuest. Captain Bridger would absolutely hateit, but even if he found him, he couldn't very well torpedo the colony dome. He would demand they let him go, but his demands would fall on deaf ears. Dictators and unjust regimes had ignored human rights agencies and Western outcry for centuries. People died for their ideology, the color of their skin, or their gender all the time. How many boys were not lucky enough to be on the rickety old sub Cynthia Westphalen managed to get out of the Amazonian Confederation? How many died every day despite adamant demands they not be murdered just for being born male and poor?

Lucas wasn't ready to die of thirst, alone, in a fetid little closet, when he had another choice, however bleak. He looked up at the camera, scowling. "I'll sign your damned papers," he grunted.

In minutes, the door opened again and Skinny Guy appeared with a fresh copy of the document. "You still got the pen?"

Lucas sighed. "Yeah, but I bent it trying to leverage the shackle off."

"Everyone does. I'll get the mess outta here as soon as you sign." he said, nodding at the corner.

"If they'd unlock me, I'd do that. You shouldn't have to clean up after me."

"It's okay. That's my job. At least I don't have to haul your dead carcass to the airlock. I know you feel like my name, but you'll be okay. You'll probably get to be someone's rickshaw carrier or a valet or something real easy, if you're not too stubborn."

Lucas cringed. "What if I am stubborn?"

Skinny Guy shuddered and shook his head. "Dude, not a good idea. You can't win."

"Yeah, I kinda gathered that." Lucas drew a deep breath, maneuvered the bent pen around his thumb, and signed the papers. "There. It's done." He dropped the pen atop the documents and the thud seemed to echo in his mind like a death gong.

Lucas couldn't smell Skinny Guy's stench anymore, since the room itself reeked so badly, but he still felt sorry for him. The papers were rushed out and he brought a big glass of water when he returned just seconds later. It had to have been waiting just outside the door. He took care not to spill any and knelt to deliver it. Lucas grabbed it and gulped greedily. When it was drained and Lucas caught his breath, he said, "Thanks."

"Mistress Gianna will bring in your food after I clean up. You don't want all this crap in here while you eat anyway." He turned his back and crouched in the corner Lucas had improvised into a waste area.

"Do youever get to eat without the smell?" Lucas asked in a whisper.

The guy turned his face to give him a weary look and then shrugged. "What do you think?"

"I think you're a human being who deserves better than this."

"Shhh. Don't say stuff like that. I mean, you're nice to give a rip about me, dude, but I ain't worth the trouble."

"I don't know who's told you that, but don't believe it. If I ever get away from here, I'll come back for you."

Skinny Guy got a panicked look in his eye. They'd been whispering up to now, but he looked up at the camera and almost screamed: "I didn't start it!" Then he looked back at Lucas. "Don't talk about getting away, man. They punish you bad for that kinda talk."

"Sorry," he whispered. Then Lucas looked up at the camera. "He's telling the truth. I started it. He didn't do anything."

"Admirable," a woman's oily voice said from behind the open door. "But I'm certainly not going to deface a prime specimen like you if there's a Shit Boy I can beat instead."

Lucas's blood boiled. He wanted to let loose with a scathing rant against this she-devil, but he didn't like the implication of her threat. It sounded like Skinny Guy would be punished for his misdeeds, which included mouthing off. He held his tongue and wished she would walk in so he could knock her off her feet and pull her into a choke hold.

"You're smart," her silky-yet-menacing voice continued. "I know this. I also know you have friends back in Hawaii and on seaQuest. Your parents are divorced, but you don't live with them, and haven't for several years. They don't keep tabs on you, but your Navy friends do. You will be allowed to make a recording to say goodbye. You may not mention my name or imply you were coerced. No one will be able to get you out of Juno, so the most thoughtful thing you could do for your friends is to tell them you chose this life and will be happy here. Most men your age do come in voluntarily and stay quite willingly. If you attempt to use this privilege to call for help, I will destroy the recording and you simply vanish into thin air. They get no closure and I will beat Shit Boy for your arrogance. You will never get a second chance. Understand?"

Lucas had about a hundred snide comebacks he desperately wanted to spit out, but not if the poor starved guy who already got stuck with too much dirty work would have to pay for it. He bit his lip until he tasted blood and managed to hiss "Yes," through gritted teeth.

"Good." Lucas heard her hard shoes click down the hall in retreat.

When she was gone and Skinny Guy had resumed his diligent cleaning of the corner, Lucas ventured to speak again. "Sorry I got you in trouble. Look, don't answer me if I ask the wrong thing, but what did she mean, 'most men come in voluntarily and stay willingly'?"

"Submissives, dude. The BDSM crowd. Lots of the women want the kind of guys who are into that. They come to Juno because they want to. Of course, no one gets to leave if they change their mind, unless—"

"Shut your useless mouth if you want to eat this week," the feminine voice warned from somewhere far off.

Skinny Guy stopped talking abruptly. He took another trip out of the room, carrying a wad of crumpled newspaper. He left the bundle on the other side of the door and came back with some disinfectant. He poured it out and a thick scent of pine took over the small room. He slopped it around with a rag, leaving generous amounts of residue, for which Lucas's nose was grateful. Skinny Guy stood. "Anything else you need me to clean before I go?"

"No. Thanks and I'm sorry." Lucas extended his hand.

Skinny Guy looked at his hand like he didn't understand. Then he caught on and looked at his own hand, shaking his head. "You don't wanna touch me, dude. You're gonna eat."

"My hands are already dirty. What's the difference?"

They shook hands and Lucas felt him tremble with emotion. He wondered how long it had been since anyone said a kind word to this poor sap. Skinny Guy exited the room, but he left the door ajar. Lucas might have felt a rush of excitement, but his wrist was still chained to the wall and he had no energy to run even if it wasn't. He heard the clicking footsteps of his female adversary and some squeaky wheels. A small cart with a plate of food rolled into the tiny space between the wall and the mattress, pushed by a hand in a shiny red glove.

Before Lucas could see any more of her, he saw a long metallic rod with five prongs. If it had been a giant scepter, it was missing a softball-sized gem. "Do you know what this is?" the menacing female voice asked.

"Yeah, I know. Stun rod."

"Then you should also know we don't buy the kind that are strictly… safe." The rod moved to hover over a potato that sat on the cart. Without touching the potato, lightning sparked out of the five prongs, and joined into a single thick bolt which shot into the vegetable. She let the bolt sizzle and crackle for two seconds and then moved the rod away. The potato was now a lump of charred carbon, smoking on the plate. "Add a little butter. It'll be fine," she said smoothly. "And don't force me to use it on you. You're worth more without your hair singed."

Lucas didn't speak, but he got the picture. Try anything and I'm toast. Literally.

"Clean yourself up, put on the clothes, and eat. Do as you're told and you get to make your recording in fifteen minutes."

She shut the door without him seeing more than the long red glove and that lightning rod. The cart had a tub full of soapy water with a washcloth in it. Not as good as a shower, but better than nothing, he mused resignedly. He stripped off his clothes and did the sponge bath thing in his underwear, feeling very self-conscious with the camera in the ceiling. The clothes he was supposed to wear were the most degrading things he'd ever seen and he had half a mind to refuse to put them on, but he had decided he really wanted to make the recording.

Captain Bridger didn't need to have another young man he cared about just disappear on him so it could eat away at him day by day. No. Lucas couldn't allow that. He would kowtow to this bitch's demands as much as necessary to get some kind of explanation sent, for the captain's sake, not his own. He might leave a very subtle clue or two, but not anything that would risk her destroying it. Even if his friends believed the lie he was being forced to tell, at least they'd have closure.

He applied his mind to what to say and how to say it so this red-gloved demoness would let him give this one last gift. Tears welled up in his eyes thinking how much he would miss his friends and seaQuest. He was probably doomed to manual labor or perhaps he'd be forced into some kind of sick sex slavery, but it certainly wasn't going to be science and computers and designing awesome new submarines. No, Juno Colony was a deathtrap, a roach motel for men. Guys went in, but they never came out.