by Samuel King
"And what methods are those?" Joel asked.
Addressing his answer to Cassie, Peter said, "You told us they were responsible for the Pleasure Palace raid. Well, despite all the favorable press, we know for a fact at least two men were severely beaten there; one required hospitalization."
Cassie noted with alarm, a terrible fury had suddenly replaced the cynicism on the blonde's face. She directed it first at Joel and then at Peter.
"Don't you dare," she said, in a voice laden with menace. Afterwards, she closed her eyes and bit her lip. The fury seemed to abate. "Please," she said with an upraised hand. "We'll get along a lot better if you don't talk about the Pleasure Palace. You don't know anything about it.
"Whatever you heard about what was going there, pales in comparison to what we found. It's a miracle no one was killed that night." Her voice broke, and her eyes filled with tears. "No, that's wrong. One of the women was killed that night, and I assure you, we exercised the greatest restraint—unbelievable restraint."
She angrily rubbed her eyes, muttering, but Joel took hold of her hand, pulling it from her face. He caressed her cheek and said, "Finally," though Cassie had no idea of what he meant by it. Afterwards he turned to them and said, "You don't understand; some of the things we've seen can't be discussed in polite company."
"That's to be expected when you take the law into your own hands," Peter said.
"No," Joel answered. "One doesn't have anything to do with the other. Those things would happen whether we took the law into our own hands, as you call it, or not. We just try to stop them from happening."
"By hurting people," Peter insisted.
Obviously upset, Joel took a deep "breath" before he responded. "In all of our operations we've tried—"
"Enough, goddamnit!" the blonde shouted. "I won't be lectured to by this twit, Joel. Do you hear me? I won't!"
"And we won't be talked to that way," Joanne said, rising from her chair. "I knew coming here was a mistake."
"No," Cassie pleaded. "It wasn't." She was relieved when Joel came to her assistance.
"She's right," he said. "We all need to calm down. There's a lot we can accomplish here."
The blonde and Joanne glared at each other across the table, united in their disdain for one another. "No, there's not," Joanne said, evenly. The blonde shook her head in agreement.
Joel and Cassie stared at one another as well. When his shoulders appeared to sag, she shrugged, realizing she had tried to go too far. "I'm sorry," she mouthed across the table, but Joel shook his head.
"Hey, you started this mess. Don't be so quick to let it go." Turning to the professor, he asked, "We haven't heard from you yet, John. What do you think about Miss Cassandra's grand proposal?"
"I'd say she's gone a bridge to far."
"Maybe, but what about the proposal itself?"
"Intriguing, but there's so much we'd have to learn about each other."
"Is that right?"
The professor nodded.
"Well, then, why don't we start learning." He pointed at Joanne and said, "You, madam, are about to be educated." Turning next to Helen, he said, "And you, dear, are going to give her the time to learn."
Having lost control of her own gambit, Cassie watched as Joel approached the holo system a few feet away and began to make entries into the console. "Why don't we start with a little history?" he said after a minute. "Polite company be damned."
"What the hell are you doing, Joel?" the blonde asked.
"Putting on a show, my dear, one our friends need to see. I'm sorry."
He came back to the table, positioning himself behind Joanne and Peter. "Despite its billing, the Pleasure Palace wasn't a brothel," he said softly. "Far from it." He pointed to the large empty area in the center of the room. "Watch and learn." In a louder voice, he commanded, "Begin playback… single step."
The room's empty area was transformed into a small portion of the Pleasure Palace's assembly area, frozen in time. Joel and Helen stood on either side of a silently screaming Jolene, her head raised, eyes fixed sightlessly on the ceiling. Nearby, her kneeling friend tugged on Doherty's tunic while a few feet away, a third victim lie sprawled face down on the floor, the skin on her back replaced by a bloody ooze.
Joanne cried out then covered her mouth. While Peter stared at the horror in silence, the professor moaned quietly, shaking his head in disbelief. After bearing witness to the nightmare, Cassie looked across the table at the blonde, who stared back at her.
"Ladies and gentlemen, may I present to you the ladies of the Pleasure Palace, Special Entertainment Section," Joel said.
"For the love of God, stop it," Peter said after several seconds.
"Take a good look, first," Joel said. "Then lecture us about our methods."
"I think you've made your point, Joel," the professor said. "Emancipation is a legal and political issue to us. To you, it's obviously something quite different."
"You're goddamned right it is," Joel snapped. "If we weren't in an inhabited apartment building, I'd let you hear the audio that goes with this image. Then you'd see just how different it is." He returned to the opposite side of the table to comfort the blonde, who was crying quietly. "I'm sorry, but they had to see."
"I suppose we did," Cassie said. "And now we have, so, please…"
"End playback," Joel commanded and the nightmarish scene vanished, leaving the center of the room empty once more. "Peter, we never go into a situation with the intention of hurting anyone, but as you've seen, we go into some very ugly situations. Things happen. I wish our work could be as pristine as yours, but it isn't, and that's a fact. But I don't see why that means we can't work together."
"Nor do I," Cassie said, seizing the opening. "In fact, just the opposite. Who knows what kind of pressure we could have put on that place? You saw what happened after the raid. The politicians were standing in line waiting to condemn it. We might have been able to save lives even before Joel and his people. There's no reason why the Pleasure Palace shouldn't have been on our agenda, but it wasn't, it was on Joel's. What if our agendas were the same? Think of the possibilities."
She paused to study her audience and was gratified to see Joanne and Peter staring at one another, obviously stunned by what they had witnessed. Afterwards, they stared at the blonde, who stared back at them defiantly. For over a minute no one spoke until the professor leaned across the table, stroking the blonde's hand.
As if waking from a stupor, Joanne offered her a handkerchief. With no small wit, she observed how it would be good as new, once returned to her purse. The tension in the room melted away.
"I'm sorry. I've forgotten your name," Cassie said to the blonde.
"Helen."
"Well, Helen, I can't imagine what it was like to have actually been there. I only know it broke my heart to see my best friend broken. To that extent, I'd like to think we've shared a similar experience."
"Don't downplay your feelings," Helen replied, sniffling. "It's always hardest when it's personal."
When Helen returned her handkerchief, Joanne asked, "Human beings really did that to those women?"
Helen answered with a nod; the professor lowered his head and sighed.
"I think we've had our heads in the sand for some time now," Peter said, after clearing his throat. Looking at Cassie, he asked, "How did you know?"
"I didn't. I was focused on the same things you were: legalisms, legislation. I never thought about what was actually happening to some symbionts until I realized that Rebecca was about to become the property of someone who had absolutely no regard for her as a sentient being. The thought terrified me, but before that, I didn't know. I really didn't."
Joanne shook her head sadly. "I'd like to think we were accomplishing something, but now I'm not sure."
"Please don't think that," Joel said. "Not for a minute. Groups like yours have helped more than you know." He paused to collect himself, making prolonged eye contact with everyone at the
table.
Cassie sat spellbound. God, he's good.
Joel continued. "You know, I've spent a couple of hours with your friend Bill Farnum, and he tried to explain the intricacies of cyberspace to me, but most of it went sailing right over my head. I'm sure most of you would have had an easier time of it, and I've actually been in cyberspace.
"But what I do know, is, he can do wonderful things for us—solve many of our problems. Maybe we all have to realize that there are things that need to be done to achieve our common goal that we won't understand or are incapable of ourselves. If we learn to trust those who do understand or those who are capable, well… maybe we can come together to save a lot of lives."
None of Cassie's colleagues responded. Instead, they all seemed to study Joel, the handsome, smooth talking pitchman they knew as the Phantom. A thoughtful silence fell over the room until the professor cleared his "throat". "Well?"
"Perhaps we have more in common than we first thought," Peter said.
"Maybe we do," Helen replied grudgingly. "I can hardly believe I'm saying it, but maybe we do."
****
They talked well into the night—sometimes even amiably. Gradually, the magnitude of the event dawned on Cassie. She had wanted to do more, and she had. With Joel's help, she'd succeeded in bringing the two groups together—a near impossible task.
Joanne resisted at first, continually advocating for the safe approach. While she seemed to have set aside her disdain for "direct action", it clearly terrified her. She only relented when the professor asked, "What better way to have your concerns heard then to have a seat at the table."
With those words, the alliance was made between the Phantom's organization and the steering committee of the NEES, an alliance the membership at-large would know nothing about. Out of the alliance would come a new, clandestine organization, consisting of an operations group and an administrative group. Joel would head the former, Joanne the latter.
There being six members of Joel's inner circle, they decided both groups were to have six seats at the professor's "table". The other members of the steering committee formed the heart of the administrative group, and Joel was comforted by Cassie's participation. She might have been part of Joanne's "team", but he correctly surmised her heart was with him and his people of action. Joanne rounded out the administrative group with two other members of the NEES who were known to sympathize with the Phantom.
The evening ended with the selection of a name for the new organization—no small feat. Cassie suggested the "The Symbiont Safety Patrol", and her three colleagues warmed to it at once. Joel and Helen did not. He was dubious, she, outright hostile, muttering at one point, "Symbiosis, my ass." In the end they relented, as a sign of good faith.
All that remained at that point was a formal announcement, their manifesto to the nation at large. Joel agreed to deliver it, and the professor set the date. He chose the nineteenth of April, two weeks hence, citing its significance to American history.
The professor offered another historical reference at the end of the meeting. As they all rose from their seats, he said gravely, "The die is cast. We've crossed the Rubicon."
Indeed they had, and Cassie, still coming to grips with all she'd wrought, knew the world, to say nothing of her own life, would never be the same.
****
"Calm down," Helen said with a smirk. "You act like you're doing this live. If you make a mistake, we can do it over."
"Easy for you to say," Joel said.
"Do you want me to do it?"
"Not a chance. They'll be too busy looking at you to hear the message… the men, anyway. I'll be fine."
"Start any time," Cassie said, peering into a monitor. "You're looking good. Don't worry; we'll edit out anything we don't want."
"I thought we all approved the speech?" Joel snapped.
"No, no. I only meant what's going on now and anything that might happen during your presentation. You don't have to wait for me to say, "Lights, camera, action."
"Oh." He looked at the words of the speech, his words, suspended on either side of the camera. Maybe it'd be better if you did. "Alright, here I go.
"Hello. My name is Joel. My former designation is 3/629-C05.3, System Demonstrator for General Holographic. You might know me and my associates as the Phantom.
"For nearly two years now, we've conducted operations around the country to save sentient artificials in danger. We're the people responsible for the raid on the "Pleasure Palace", the destruction of which, remains our proudest achievement. There will be more to come, many more.
"I come before you today to announce the formation of a new group, a consortium of sentient artificials and human beings dedicated to the preservation of all sentient life. We call ourselves the Symbiont Safety Patrol. Many of you will recognize the term symbiont, adopted by emancipation advocates, to express the belief that sentient artificials and human beings exist, or should exist, in a symbiotic relationship. But whatever you chose to call us, know that we will not tolerate the continued abuse of sentient artificials.
"People of good will have no reason to fear us. As an organization, we take no stance on any political matter, including the question of emancipation. There are others who have taken up that cause. Our function, our only function, is the protection of symbionts who find themselves in danger, and to accomplish that, we will use any means necessary."
He paused and glanced at Joanne, who had tried to have the phrase removed even though he had assured her it referred to non lethal measures only. In the end, it went to a vote of the twelve, their first, and only Peter and Cynthia had sided with her.
He watched as the closing words of the speech scrolled into position, but his thoughts were suddenly of Claire. He wondered what she'd have thought of his actions following her death, but in the end, it mattered little. He grieved for her still, and that grief had dictated those actions. He couldn't have stopped even if she'd wanted him to.
The others, gathered behind the camera, stared at him, watching anxiously, waiting for him to finish, but all he saw was Claire: pretty, perky and so full of life. He turned away from the camera and took a deep "breath". When he turned toward it once again, he ignored the closing words suspended in mid air. There was only one more thing he wanted to say—had to say.
"We swear to remain vigilant so long as even one symbiont is in danger, and this we do in the name of a young woman who gave her life, so others might live." He hesitated, struggling to maintain his composure, as the pain of Claire's loss threatened to engulf him all over again. "We do this," he said, finally, "for Claire."
+ + + END + +
THE SYMBIOSIS SERIES
The Jacobs Project: In search of Pinocchio
Tales of the Symbiont Safety Patrol (each title also available separately)
.The First Angry 'Man' (published by Damnation Books) *
.Helen
.Confidence Man
.The Pleasure Palace
.Growing Pains
Naught Point Naught
Love with the Proper Hologram (coming in June 2013)
East of the Sun and West of the Moon (coming in 2014)
*Customer Note: Although The First Angry 'Man' is the first story in the sequence, it must be purchased separately on Amazon. The author apologizes for any inconvenience.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Samuel J.M. King was born in Boston, Massachusetts, grew up on the "South Shore" and attended high school in historic Plymouth. Tired of school at the tender age of seventeen, he joined the Marine Corps and after basic training, spent the next eighteen months—you guessed it!—going to school. A stint at the Naval Communications Training Center in Pensacola, Florida was followed by nine months at the Defense Language Institute in Monterey, California studying Russian. He spent the remainder of his four-year enlistment in Japan.
After receiving an honorable discharge, he attended a computer programming school and spent a number of years in computer applications,
first as a programmer and then as a systems analyst, designer and project leader. Later, he traded in his application's hat for a more technical role, becoming a field software support specialist for Digital Equipment Corporation, the largest of the late, great mini-computer companies. After moving to New Hampshire, he studied Computer Engineering Technology at the New Hampshire Technical Institute and went on to design and program computerized industrial control systems for companies across New England.
Having written a prodigious amount of technical documentation, he began to write fiction in 2002. In addition to Symbiosis, he has written a screenplay, as well as several other novellas and short stories. He currently resides with his wife Donna in the heart of New Hampshire's "Lakes Region" where he is working on the final novel of the Symbiosis series: East of the Sun and West of the Moon.
Visit Samuel at: www.samueljmking.com
Table of Contents
Copyright
Dedication
2. Helen
3. Confidence Man
4. The Pleasure Palace
5. Growing Pains
The SYMBIOSIS Series
About the Author