Centaurs (Parallel Worlds)

by Aaron Pery

  "Yes Sir, I do. It'll take me a week to get used to wearing my contraptions all over again but I assure you that I will even if my stumps bleed to death."

  "That's the spirit I expect to hear from a shit-kicking, tough Marine. So give me a call at this number, which is a bit complicated but it'll reach me, the moment you're ready to go to work for us. But you'll have to leave the jail you're in right now and rent yourself an apartment."

  "Leaving the rest home will be easy, but where should I live?"

  "What do you think, Adam?"

  "I think it'll be best if you move to Iowa City since we'll be working closely, if you don't mind."

  "I'd love to, Adam, I mean Major."

  "Oh, cut the shit out, boy. I'll look around and set up with a few nicely furnished apartments for you to choose from when you get into town. Oh, d'you have a drivers license?"

  "Yes, I kept renewing it so that's no problem. How about a car?"

  "I'll set you up with one so don't worry about that."

  "Then I better let you guys go." Marty said as she stood up. "And welcome to the fold, Stan."

  "Thank you Ma'am."

  It took Stanley a little over a week before he called Marty. "Sorry about the delay, General, but my stumps had gotten quite soft and needed a bit longer to be able to bear my weight after I'd neglected them for so long."

  "That's okay as long as everything's fine now."

  "It is, and I don't even need to use a cane. When would you like me to come over?"

  "Right now if you can. Oh, are you out of the damn jail?"

  "I definitely am. In fact, I used the extra time to fly over to Iowa City and got a real nice apartment at a reasonable price. Not that I need to scrimp or anything but I guess I'm thrifty by nature."

  "Same here. Okay, what you need to do is go to the warehouse that Adam runs on his property and tell him that Nella will transport you to the farmhouse from there. And pack enough stuff for at least a week."

  "No problem. I'll be there in exactly one hour from now."

  True to his word, Stan arrived at the side of the farm building exactly on time, and Marty was impressed by his upright stance when he reached her where she was sitting on the stairs having coffee. She shook his hand. "Welcome to Minos, Stan. And you do look chipper, no actually alive."

  "Exactly, General, which I haven't been for quite a while."

  "How about starting to call me Marty?"

  "It's gonna be hard but I'll try."

  "Good. Now throw the suitcase in the back of the jeep and I'll take you on a tour of the farm first, then we'll have lunch at the cafeteria, and from there we'll go to Heraklion to meet Nella, with whom you'll be working directly."

  "I like the plan, but where will I stay?"

  "I had an apartment set up for you that you'll use whenever you come over, which will no doubt be quite often as things get real busy around here."

  "Gosh, I like that."

  "So what did you think about our farm, Stan?" Marty asked when they had lunch.

  "I don't know if you're aware of it, but I grew up on a sizeable farm in upstate New York before being accepted to the Academy, so it was quite refreshing for me to see how well managed your farm is. Particularly after Adam told me that it used to be worked without any mechanization until quite recently."

  "I'm glad you feel this way. Did Adam relay to you everything that's happened here, historically and recently?"

  "Yes, and I almost threw up when he told me what was done to the original people who were brought here, and how the Gogians spliced their upper bodies onto the young people that they raised for that specific purpose."

  "Which they were in the midst of doing when we blew them all to hell. And as a result we're now in the nation-building business, which you're going to involve yourself heavily in helping accomplish."

  "I like the idea. But tell me, does anyone around here wear any clothes?"

  "Never when it's warm like today. We do cover our upper bodies, though, any time it gets cold but never over our lower bodies because our skins are thick and covered with a layer of fat underneath, and a coat of thick hair on top."

  "So everyone is mostly naked in one part or another of their bodies at all times?"

  "You mean particularly the females, don't you?"

  "Yes, which you must admit is somewhat disconcerting to someone like me. I mean seeing breasts and udders moving to and fro all the time."

  "Get's you excited, don't it? But the longer you're here the more used you'll get to it. Heck, I wouldn't be surprised at all if you ended up walking around in the buff before too long."

  "I can't picture myself doing that, particularly not with my weird looking legs."

  "Which no one will pay attention to after the first time they see you."

  "Maybe. Not that it's overly important to me right now, but we'd never got to discuss my salary, you know."

  "There wasn't much time for that so far, but let's resolve the issue right now. How much d'you get in disability from the government?"

  "Fifteen-hundred a month plus free medical expenses and the cost of living in that awful place."

  "Which isn't much to live on once you get on your own. Okay, let's set you up to start with triple the disability per month."

  "That'll be great because it means six grand a month, for which I thank you. How am I going to be paid, though?"

  "You got two choices. I can either have you get paid through Adam in US currency, or set you up as a Minoan government employee and pay you with our own dollars."

  "I sense a catch here."

  "There sure is since US money is worthless here because we don't use any paper money." Marty pulled a Minoan gold coin from her purse and handed it to Stan, who inspected it closely. "And you can't use this as a legal tender outside of Minos."

  "I understand that, but this one's worth a bunch just for the gold it contains."

  "Right. About five-hundred in US dollars, but you can't exchange it for dollars in the US because the feds frown on gold trading on the open market. So you see, there's not much you can do with it any place else."

  "I see. Is that why you came up with the perpetual motion engine, to earn big money in order to buy all the modern conveniences for Minos? Then I'm confused as to why you're doing it if, as Adam told me, you got tons and tons of gold that's sitting in your bank vault."

  "First, Stan, we didn't come up with the new engine in order to make money to buy goodies. The reason for it was because we're patriotic, loyal Americans and wanted to cure our country's economic dependence on foreign oil and raise the United States back to the level we were at right after World War II."

  "Now I understand the essence of Adam's public interview and his declaration that most of the profits from the engine will go to support our veterans."

  "That's right, which should amount to about fifty percent of all revenues. But we also needed foreign, that is American, currency for urgent Minoan purposes rather than for luxury items or consumer goods. Which we at first thought might come in through selling our gold cache to this Indian smuggler at a very good price. But this morning just before you got here, Adam called to tell me that last night the guy was caught at the Pakistani-Indian border and was killed and his gold was appropriated. It was unfortunate because we'd lost our middleman but truth be told, we were uncomfortable about dealing with such a person or anyone like him, so we decided not to get involved again."

  "I can understand that. But why do you need any money if, like I'd been told, you produce plenty of basic goods and services for everyone in Minos?"

  "The reason, Stan, is that we're in quite a spot right now because we anticipate serious problems to hit us in the near future, stemming from the fact that we might be hit by a population explosion that we have no idea how serious it might be. Or what effect it'll have on us."

  "How come you don't know?"

  "Because we have no idea what number of offsprings our females will bear once they conceive.
I know it sounds a bit crazy but no one here was ever born as a result of natural conception because we were controlled chemically by the the Gogians. Oh, I'm sure some such births did occur but the bastards used to butcher the parents and their offsprings of what they called 'wild-ones' so there's no records of it anywhere. Nor do we know the exact gestation period we'll be going through."

  "Sons o' bitches. So you may bear children from one to six once you start producing offsprings?"

  "That's right, which even a brood of four might put a tremendous strain on our resources because it'll quadruple our population much too quickly. That's why we need to accumulate a large cache of staples, which is where you come in, to do procurement from food to clothing, to modern medical supplies."

  "Okay, now I understand. About the gestation period, it must be longer that six months since none of you seem to be pregnant, and most of your females seem to be older than one year."

  "Very good logic, Stan, had we been of equine genus. But we're not, and everyone here reaches physical and sexual maturity in less than a year. As to why no one's pregnant, it's because all females have been taking an anti-ovulation pill during this time because we were afraid of the consequences of too many of us getting pregnant before we were ready for it. It's been a voluntary measure, but by now people are starting to have second thoughts about it because they see wealth and success all around them."

  "So what's going to happen next?"

  "It already has. Last week a delegation of women appeared before the cabinet and demanded that the ban on pregnancies be lifted, which we had no choice but to accept or have a rebellion on our hands. We estimate that maybe half our women had already stopped taking the follow-up pills and are waiting with baited breath to see the results."

  "Why are they so anxious to bear children, Marty?"

  "Because it's a desire inherent in the emotional makeup of our females to do so. We are after all centaurs who, according to legend, were ruled by their sexual desires, and bearing children is chief among them."

  "You, too?"

  "Mentally, the idea of being pregnant sends shivers along my long spine, but emotionally I'm no different than any other female on Minos. So after discussing it with my husband and President Thompson, I decided to take the plunge and didn't take the pill. As, I'm quite sure, did half of our females of child bearing age."

  "Then, the way I see it, what you'll need urgently here is a physician who can monitor yours and all the other women's pregnancies, who'll also train a bunch of you as birthing nurses."

  Marty considered it for a moment before responding. "You're right because that was one of the subjects that I'd discussed with Nikki. But what kind of doctor or even a vet can we get who'll agree to treat a bunch of pregnant centaurs? But in either case it will have to be someone who won't faint when he sees us."

  "You found me, didn't you?"

  Marty smiled. "We sure did, so maybe I need to talk to Adam about it and see if he can come up with someone suitable for the job."

  "I bet you he will, Ma'am."

  "Ready to go to town?" Marty asked a moment later.

  Stan smiled. "I am, but I wonder if you'd let me drive."

  "My driving scare you?"

  "To death, I'll admit. But I guess I have no choice in the matter, do I?"

  "That's right, my boy, so steel yourself for the next part of the adventure."

  When they reached Heraklion, Marty drove around the city from end to end and pointed everything out to him. She parked the car next to the palace, then took him to the barracks where Paula had set up the government administrative offices once the building was sectioned off into offices and cubicles. Then, after introducing him to Paula and Nella, she hugged him warmly and left Stan in their charge.

  Chapter 29

  Once home, she called Adam and related to him her conversation with Stan. "So you see, we've arrived at a point in time where we'll need some serious help in managing not only our population but it's health as well."

  "I understand, and from what you just told me it looks like you need a very unique physician to take on these issues--one with extensive knowledge of human medicine who's also deeply involved in veterinary research, particularly in the equine field."

  "Quite so, but such a person if he exists, must also have an open mind to be able to accept who we are and that parallel dimensions are a reality rather than a fictional tale."

  "Like myself and Stan? That's a real tall order so I better start searching for such a person."

  "Thanks, Adam."

  "How's Stan doing, though?"

  "I'd left him with Paula and Nella about an hour ago and they all seemed to take to one another instantly."

  "No ugly looks from anyone like I got on my first visit?"

  "None, not after Nikki wrote the article in our weekly paper right after you'd come over that time, explaining to all who had never seen a human before that not all bipeds are Gogians."

  "I'm glad he did, which must've helped Stan be accepted by the natives."

  "You bet it did. Anyway, get back to me as soon as you find anything."

  "Will do, General."

  Three days later, while having breakfast on the balcony, Marty and Nick were surprised when Stan sped up the hill toward their house. He literally burst in as Nick opened the door for him, looking extremely agitated as he rushed to see Marty whose smile vanished the moment she saw his face.

  "Before you say anything, Stan, please sit down and have a cup of coffee to calm yourself from whatever apparently ails you."

  "But I ...."

  "But nothing, Stan. Just do as I tell you and we'll talk in a moment." Offering Stan a cigarette, which he took, she lit it up for him and waited until he seemed to gather himself.

  "I'm sorry I barged in on you like this, Marty, but I did something terrible last night."

  "What did you do? Kill someone?" Nick asked, then regretted it. "Oops, sorry for my sarcasm. Please be so kind and explain your problem, which you apparently came over to tell us about."

  Stan gave him a thankful look and smiled. "I appreciate your setting me back into a rational attitude, Nikki."

  "Okay, so what was it that you did which is so terrible?"

  "I spent last night with Paula. I mean in her bed, which is inexcusable."

  "Why? Did you force yourself on her?"

  "No, of course not. But I betrayed everyone's trust by doing it and worse, I'd had sex with my boss."

  "So it was consensual? I'm glad to hear that because I like both of you very much, Stan. So let's talk about your distress as a result of having sex with a very pretty woman who apparently cares for you very much or else she would have kicked your skinny ass all to hell with one of her powerful hind legs. And it just occurred to me that the feeling was mutual or else you wouldn't have had sex with someone who looks like Paula."

  "That's true, and also the fact that I'd been literally smitten with her from the moment we shook hands."

  "But not with Nella?"

  "Nella? Gosh, no." A smile suddenly crossed his face. "Nella's a wonderful girl and extremely bright but she looks like a Belgian horse size-wise, and isn't overly pretty in her human visage."

  "I'd noticed that. In other words, you would've never asked her to be your date to the prom but, in a way, Paula was a perfect choice?"

  Stan gave him a stunned look. "Put that way, absolutely. Paula's beautiful and petite, with an outlook on life that's closer to mine than anyone I'd ever met."

  "But you're disturbed because she's half horse and half human while you're fully so?"

  "Well, that's part of it."

  "You're being an asshole, Stan," Marty burst out. "Because while Paula's got four legs you only got two halves. So who's the more weird looking between you two?"

  "Oh, my God. I am, of course."

  "That's right, Stan. But it seems like Paula doesn't look at you as an apparition despite being peg legged, nor should you see her as such just because she's go
t body parts like no girl you'd ever met had. My only question is whether you like her more than just being a one night stand."

  "I do, very much so."

  "Then get the fuck out of here and go back to work, and give the girl a big hug and a kiss when you get in the office so she won't think that you have any second thoughts about making love to her."

  "You mean behave like we were lovers in public?"

  "Why shouldn't you when everyone else does it whenever they feel like it? And I'd like to suggest that you take your clothes off because you stick out like a sore thumb running around here fully dressed."

  "Despite my strange looking metal legs?"

  "Maybe because of them, so everyone will see what you really look like."

  Stan looked at them for a moment, then ran out of the house as fast as he had come in, which made Marty and Nick burst into laughter.

  "Ah, falling in love is a marvelous thing, isn't it, Nikki?"

  "It sure is. But what's going to happen to these young mismatched people?"

  "Apparently they're not overly incompatible, you know--not mentally for sure, and it seems not physically either if they were able to have sex. I guess we'll have to keep a close watch on them and see how their relationship develops."

  "Yeah. Should be fascinating to see how a centaur and a human create a life together."

  Two weeks later, Adam called Marty and suggested they need to meet in person as soon as possible. "Sure. How about you coming over later today?"

  "I was hoping you'll have the time."

  "Then use the tunnel from your warehouse in an hour, and by then I'll have its exit in my living room so we can all have a lunch of hamburgers and fries on the balcony."