Hair Suite

by Piers Anthony

  “If you don't get paid in Caesar's coin, then I will pay you in pleasure, and you will be satisfied.” She sent belief, for it was true. But she intended to see that he got money rather than sex.

  She gave him the address and settled in close beside him, so that he could reach his arm around her shoulders and take hold of her right breast. She kissed his right ear. They had a deal.

  It was a long drive, in fact overnight, but the cabby was more than satisfied. Gena drew on another power of the hair to feed power from her flesh to his hand, and into his body, so that he had endurance and wakefulness to keep driving almost indefinitely. Meanwhile her bare breast continued to send delight to him, so that he was satisfied with that much and no more. It was a kind of balancing act to keep him at the right level, so that he neither lost interest nor became overcome with lust, but she zeroed in on the right dosage.

  While they drove, she rehearsed the ploy that Burn had described in her proposed seduction contest. Take the man's hand, Sanford's hand, put it on a breast, then stroke it on down to the buttocks and finally to the vulva. Put his finger into the vagina. Clench on it. Kiss him lingeringly. Keep going until he could no longer resist and had to complete the act. He'd better complete it, because by that stage she would be desperately turned on herself. This seemed to be a quality of hair and chip: they enhanced the host's health, and the host's libido. Sex was a natural part of the new state, and a woman could time her climax to match the man's.

  In the morning they arrived at Idola's house. Only Sanford remained there, his wife having decamped; she read it in his grieving mind. She formed her hair into a routine but attractive outfit and went to the door. He gazed at her, rumpled from lack of sleep. “Gena!”

  “Please, I have prevailed on the cabby to drive me here on a promise of payment. Can you take care of it? You and I have a serious discussion coming up.” She sent his mind reassurance: she was serious.

  Sanford went to pay the cabby, while Gena made herself at home, being long familiar with this residence. When he returned, she guided him to the kitchen table and handed him a glass of wine. “Merrill returned,” she said, prompting him.

  “We always knew it could happen,” he said. “Clyte was upfront about that. But I never thought it really would.” He was close to tears; she read that too in his mind. And the details: “Merrill won a million dollar lottery, and came for her,” Gena said, “just as he had promised a decade ago, and she could not resist, though she hated hurting you. And suddenly you are alone, and you don't know how you'll carry on, or take care of Idola.”

  “You may have to take your daughter back,” he said, not questioning the source of her information. “I know you could take care of her, now; you have a high class job. But I don't want to lose Idola too. I love her!”

  “As do I,” Gena agreed. “As does Clyte.” She took his hand and squeezed it gently before letting it go. “There may be a solution. Suppose you found another woman?”

  “I could never love another woman as I love Clyte.”

  “Are you sure of that?”

  He gazed at her, perplexed. “What are you saying?”

  “Could you love me?”

  He stared. “Gena, we have never had that kind of relationship!” But there was a tinge of doubt in his mind; she read it there.

  “Times are changing,” she said. “The two of us together could take care of Idola. We both love her, and she loves us. We could make a marriage of convenience that she would accept.”

  Slowly he nodded. “We could. It makes amazing sense. Love does not have to be part of it.”

  “But it could become part of it. Suppose I seduce you, to see whether that kind of association is feasible? If it is, love could follow naturally, in its own time.”

  “But Gina, I love Clyte! Such a marriage would be a mere shell.”

  “As your association with Clyte was a shell on her part?”

  “No! She was a good wife!” He put his head in his hands as it sank in. “Oh, God...”

  Because he truly loved Clyte, he had gambled and lost. “You need to find an alternative, practically and emotionally,” Gena said. “I am that alternative.”

  He shook his head. “Gena, you're a fine woman, and you mean well; I know that and respect it. But you could not seduce me, let alone win my love. It's hopeless.”

  “Shall we put that to the test? Let me try to seduce you. If I succeed, it will indicate that there is a potential relationship for us. If not, then I will leave you alone hereafter.”

  He laughed bitterly. “Lotsa luck.”

  “But first I need you to know that I am no longer an ordinary woman.”

  “You were never an ordinary woman. I'm not questioning your merit.”

  “This is beyond that. I am becoming a, well, a super woman. Like Quiti, only more so. I will be able to fly, to read your mind, and more. Could you live with that?”

  “Would I have a choice?”

  “I'm not sure. Certainly I don't want to force you.”

  He considered. “If you won my love, I believe I could accept you whatever way you are. Idola loves Quiti, because she resembles Tillo in the hair, and I like her too. If you had hair like that, I'd notice. But this is academic.”

  “Perhaps.” She extended her hand. “Give me your hand.”

  *

  Gena woke. She was lying on Quiti's bed in the embassy, with Burn in attendance. “Oh, my,” she breathed. “It was a dream.”

  “It must have been some dream,” Burn said, bringing food. “You slept an hour after Quiti woke. Wrapped in your new hair.”

  “It was more than a dream,” Gena said, reconsidering. “This was reality.”

  “Honey, you're not making much sense. You've been sleeping here throughout.”

  Gena puzzled it out further. “It was—a dream of the past, present, and future. It's real, or could be real.”

  Quiti appeared. “My hair is your hair. We have a special connection. I believe you. But that's a problem.”

  Burn looked at her. “It looks from here like a problem of sanity. The dream is either real or it isn't, or maybe parts of it are real.”

  “The problem,” Quiti said seriously, “is that we don't believe in divination or accurately foreseeing the future. The future is malleable; it constantly changes. Therefore it can be foreseen only in the vaguest sense. But your vision is not the least vague.”

  “Not the least,” Gena agreed as she wolfed down the food without even noticing what kind it was. She was ravenous.

  “I hate to say this, but I think you should test it. Because the implications go beyond anything we anticipated. If you can actually dream the future...”

  “I can,” Gena said with certainty. “I think.”

  “How can you test it?” Burn asked. “Why is that a problem? You don't want to disprove it?”

  “The immediate problem is that she'll have to go overnight without eating any more than she can cram in right now. Because eating's not in the dream.”

  “I'm famished,” Gena said. “But this is more important. I'll do it.” She jammed the rest of the food into her face and walked to the door.

  “I will track you,” Quiti said. “But I can't talk with you, even mind to mind, lest that change it. You understand.”

  “I understand,” Gena said over her shoulder. Her belly was full for the moment, but she would soon be hungry again. Discipline, she thought. She needed to suppress the coming hunger. She could endure for a while without eating.

  The scene was familiar, because she knew this area, but also because she had recently seen it in the dream. Traffic was passing. Her mind reached out to sense the minds of drivers. There was a cab, but not the right one. There was another. And there came the third one, the right one. She flagged it down.

  She knew the script. “I do not have money at the moment...”

  Soon she was nestled beside him, his hand on her breast. The dream was playing out true.

  In the morning
they arrived exactly as projected. Sanford paid the cabby, and the car departed.

  They had the Dialogue. “Give me your hand.”

  Sanford gave her his hand. She took it and stroked her bare breast under the hair. He looked at her, surprised. What had he expected?

  She got up and walked around the table to him, carrying his hand. She stood beside him as he sat, and stroked herself with it. She inhaled, making him feel the expansion. She knew he had an erection; how could he not? She felt his rising passion in his mind, and played it like a violin, giving him more of whatever detail turned him on most. She made him cup her bare buttock and slide around and under. She poked his finger in as she bent down to kiss him. “Are you ready for the bed?” she inquired. “Or must I tease you a while longer?”

  “God, Gena! You are overpowering me.”

  They finished on the bed as he plumbed her ferociously. She summoned her own orgasm to match his, passionately kissing him all the while.

  Finally, sated, he lay on the bed beside her. “God...”

  “Have I made my point?”

  “You can seduce me,” he admitted. “I thought I was immune. I was wrong. I thought I would never love another woman the way I love Clyte. Now I am in doubt. I think I always loved you, Gena, but suppressed it out of loyalty to my wife.” He rolled over so he could look at her. “And you, Gena—do you have feelings for me, or is this all an act?”

  “Maybe similar. I always wanted what was best for Idola, and you are the perfect father for her. I was attracted to you but did not want to interfere with your marriage. But now it is easy to love you. I don't at this moment, but all I need to do is relax and I will coast there soon enough.”

  “What of Clyte? I still do love her, though you have shown me how readily you can change that.”

  “Continue loving her. She's been a good wife and mother, and I want her to remain in my daughter's life. Our daughter's life. But now she will become that loving auntie, and I will be the loving mother. We're switching places. Only a detail of the family has changed.”

  “Some detail!”

  “It just seems the right thing to do in a difficult situation.”

  “This involves Idola most of all. We need to know how she feels about it.”

  “I will summon her,” Gena said, knowing that she had telepathic rapport with her daughter. “Get dressed while I focus.”

  Soon they were back in the kitchen. Idola appeared, her three dimensional image vibrant. “Wow!” she exclaimed. “I can't do anything like this myself. Tillo's connecting my mind and doing it for me. Astral travel! It's weird but fun, even for the few minutes we can do it.”

  “Gena is considering marrying me, to continue the family for you,” Sanford said. “We won't exclude Clyte. But how do you feel about it, Idola?”

  “Marry her, dad! It's perfect!” She crossed to him, gave him a phantom kiss, and faded out.

  “That seems to be our verdict,” Gena said. Her stomach rumbled. “Now what do you have in the house to eat?”

  Cha

  pter 6

  WormWeb

  Quiti woke and climbed out of bed, leaving Roque asleep. A week had passed, and her hair had largely recovered, as returning to normal was faster and easier than growing from scratch. She could do most things almost as well as before, and the following days would complete the restoration. Meanwhile, there were urgent things to do. They had to find out how to deal with the Pod!

  First she checked on Gena. She was naked on the pot while still gulping down liquid food, but she looked better. Her hair, too, was filling out, trailing down her back to stay out of the way. The chip was surely taking hold too. So far there had been no adverse effects of the Hair/Chip combination, a great relief to all of them.

  Burn arrived with more food. “Hi, Quiti! You're looking flush too.”

  Quiti flashed her hair, making it sparkle. “Thank you.” Gena didn't talk, being too busy eating.

  “Damn I like that hair!” Burn said. “We Chip Monks have to use clothing.” Though at the moment she too was naked, possibly to make Gena feel at ease.

  “Any progress on the wormholes?”

  “Levi's been coaching Speedo and Desiree, and they're connecting, but so far haven't found anything useful. Those holes go every which way. Receiving a message from the Chip sphere is one thing, but exploring it for ourselves is something else.”

  “But that is the way to go,” Gena said, pausing in her chewing. “I dreamed it.”

  “And you proved your dreams are true,” Quiti said. “Congratulations on your engagement! Still, it seems we need something more.”

  “There's more,” Gena said. “Speedo and Desiree are both Chips, and new ones at that. We need Hairs doing it too.”

  “But we Hairs can't find the wormholes,” Quiti protested.

  “My dream says you can, if you work with a Chip. In my last dream I started to get into a hole, but there was danger and I backed off. I don't have all my powers yet. But you and Levi are solid in your spheres. I saw you sitting on his lap and doing it.”

  “Doing what?” Quiti asked, smiling.

  “Getting into a hole,” Gena said, smiling back. “That is, you had close physical contact with him so you constantly could read his mind, and that took you into the wormhole with him. Only for you it wasn't haphazard; you could see where you were going.”

  “You dreamed us getting there?”

  “Yes, or starting to. You both completely tuned out our world, which was why you needed to be sure your physical contact didn't end, and got into the wormhole labyrinth. I dreamed the others tried it too, one Hair and one Chip, like Roque and Burn, but you worked it best.”

  “If I sat naked on Roque's lap,” Burn said, “the only hole he'd be into would be mine.”

  “Exactly,” Gena agreed. “You're both hopelessly hot for each other.” She smiled again. “It's a good thing you have tolerant significant others. Levi and Quiti have more discipline. So they're the ones for this, until I can stop eating and pooping long enough to do it myself.”

  “Did you dream how much time we have?” Quiti asked.

  “About a week.”

  “But the Chip Sphere thought a month,” Burn protested.

  Gena shrugged. “They could be right. But I doubt it. We're the ones on the scene, and that Pod is coming right for this planet. It won't arrive for a month, but that will be too late for us; we have to deal with it in a week, or it won't matter.”

  “Point made,” Burn said grimly. “Best time to handle a train wreck is hours before it happens.”

  “If I understand correctly,” Quiti said, “I need to get together with Levi today so we can start feeling our way and get somewhere within the week.”

  “Yes. If my dream is right.”

  Quiti focused on her telepathically. She was amazed by the growing complexity and competence of her friend's mind. Those internal hair/chip interactions were potent. “I'm pretty sure it's right. Then I had better leave you in Burn's hands, and Speedo and Desiree in Roque's hands, and Idola in Tillo's hands, and focus entirely on Levi.” She glanced at Burn, in case she objected.

  “Do it,” Burn said. “Whatever it takes. Our world is on the line.”

  Quiti went to Levi's bedroom, where he was taking a shower. “We have business,” she said, pulling the curtain aside.

  “By all means. Step in here with me. I thought you'd never ask.”

  “Wormhole business. Gena's dream says that you and I are the ones to try to use the wormholes to find the answer to the problem of the Pod. Within a week.”

  “Damn. I mean that in the most serious way, about both your body and the fate of the world. I'm not sure which I regret more.”

  “Eat and get ready for what may be a prolonged session. Don't dress. You will sit in a competent chair and I will sit on your lap. I will read your mind as you orient on a wormhole. We will continue from there.”

  “Yes.” He stepped out of the shower and dried off wh
ile she fetched food for them both. Then they used his toilet in turns. Then he sat in an enclosing chair, and she settled comfortably onto his lap. The point of this position was to maximize their physical contact, so that his body became pervious to her awareness, and the interference of the Chip he wore was minimized.

  “Damn,” he said again as she reached into his mind. He was mourning the position they were in that was being erotically wasted, but he was completely serious about the effort they were about to make. He was a good man.

  Levi tuned in on the wormholes, invoking his awareness of the conflux (not exactly confluence) of gravity and magnetic forces, both of which completely permeated space/time. They were all around, not merely within feet or inches, but everywhere; the fundamental fabric of space was riddled with flaws, like the cracks in a fractured stone. Levi and Quiti themselves were similarly riddled, but their living bodies had healed over the fractures. The great majority were too small to use, but the larger ones were erratically feasible.

  She focused telepathically, and discovered that she could orient on the cracks in much the way she could on living minds. Maybe her telepathy was related, being the complement of his gravity/magnetism awareness. Maybe the very substance of space was in its own fashion a living thing. Regardless, working closely with him, she was tuning in on the wormholes. This was a new and wonderful thing.

  She explored the holes. Some were dead ends. Some were loops, going nowhere. Some were dangerous, like tunnels leading down into a snake pit. But a few were reasonably safe and leading somewhere. Those were the ones to follow, cautiously.

  “Got it,” he said. It was actually a thought, but it was easier to hear it in the familiar manner.

  “That one,” she said, mentally indicating one hole of the many.

  “Going in,” he said, thrusting. It was indeed somewhat like sex as they wedged into the tight hole, though the penetration was mental rather than physical. Their bodies were not moving, only their minds. It was more like sex when their linked consciousness forged through the conduit like hot fluid under pressure, finally jetting into the terminus of the wormhole.