Like a sorceress making an incantation, she waved her hand before the mirror and said, "Display Stacey Fagan makeover." At once, the reflection in the mirror broke into billions of pixels and reconfigured itself. From the mirror's memory appeared a very different Stacey, recognizable only by the ripples of chestnut-brown hair flowing over her shoulders and down her back and the open smile and eyes like sapphires in her lovely, bright face. The rest of her, in the mirror, had metamorphosed into a body like that of a heroine in a 20th century comic book. Her smile broadened all the more to behold the Stacey-to-be. This was who she was inside, not that too-round and ungainly figure standing outside the glass. She could not wait to become her real self.
Inspecting who she would soon be, Stacey could not suppress a girlish giggle at the rewards of her transformation. Stacey expected to soon know her heart's fondest desire, just as soon as she was surgically remade into what giggled back at her from the simulation. Just outside her window lay boys—so many boys. Handsome boys, muscular boys, athletic boys. Perfect boys. Boys who never wanted the Stacey who stood in front of the mirror. Boys who, assuming they were heterosexual, always wanted something more like what stood inside the simulation looking out. First Stacey would shed the fat that stood between her and what she wanted. With that gone, her equally unwanted virginity would be next.
She knew girls who had what she craved: the touch, the kiss, the physical union with perfect boys. How many nights had she lain alone in the dark, knowing what those girls were getting from those boys, imagining what it must be like to feel them, to be held and entered by them? How many times had she cried for want of knowing what those girls knew? How many times had she despaired of ever knowing it herself? The only boys who would have her stout body were boys she did not want. She had begged and cajoled her parents since she was sixteen to let her go in for the surgery. Now she was nineteen and they finally agreed—which was what brought her to where she was now.
"Freeze display," she commanded the mirror. The simulator locked the image of her post-operative self into a still frame, and Stacey reluctantly turned away from it and crossed her luxury suite to the large picture window. Beyond her window beckoned the lights of Nirvana Planitia, the largest pleasure resort on the planet Mars, enclosed under a connected series of mighty transparent domes that shut out the almost, but not quite, terraformed Martian atmosphere.
The place looked as if the monumental architects of Ancient Greece, Rome, and Egypt had set themselves to building a city like Las Vegas on 21st Century Earth. Nothing about Nirvana Planitia was small and nothing about it was dim. It was all towers, spires, domes, arches, and pyramids, all done up in lights. A bustling traffic of beings from every planet in known space passed through every hour of every day. They came to do anything and everything, so long as it was entertaining or stimulating or sensual or fun. It was a city made solely for gamblers and hedonists of every type and every species, where some laws were written expressly to look the other way from certain pastimes. The slogan and motto of Nirvana Planitia was, "If you can't do it here, you can't do it at all."
Stacey eyed the wonderland of games, entertainment, and pleasure outside her window with a smile to match the lights that called out to her. Without a doubt she would "do it" here on Mars—and then have the most perfect boy she could find "do it" to her, again and again and again.
Feeling as though she had already been through the surgery, she spun around from the window, bounded back across the room, and flung herself across the bed upon which she knew some achingly beautiful boy would soon fling her lighter, sleeker self on. Oh, the things he would do to her! The things she would let him do, and do back to him! This was her birthday gift from her parents, two prominent attorneys of Earth: her first adult trip on her own, and an appointment with one of the finest plastic surgeons on Mars to have her body reshaped. She had not told her parents her intended final objective for this trip, but she and her mother had talked quite a bit about relationships and responsibility, and her mother had made utterly certain that precautions were in place for whatever may arise.
Grinning on the bedspread, Stacey mentally went over her checklist of measures. She had had her ovulation suppressed and her intrauterine condom was in place—double security against accidents. At Stacey's request, her doctor had used a routine cellular procedure to regenerate Stacey's maidenhood after placing the condom. She had been innoculated against all known STDs, not only those of humans but also of non-Earth humanoids. Only her outer body was not ready. Her outer body would be the final thing. After that...
She would be here for ten days in all. Ten days would be plenty of time to find that one boy. Or, who could say, perhaps two. She was hungry for experience.
Stacey rolled over from her stomach onto her back and imagined how the boy that she sought would spread out her new body the same way beneath him. Would he take her here, or somewhere else in Nirvana? Perhaps she'd have him on one of the artificial lily pads on Ares Lake, or on a force field in one of the artificial clouds that floated around and over the spa. The possibilities were endless. All she knew for sure was that it would be the most wonderful thing ever to happen in her life. He would be radiantly handsome with a tight, hard body and every muscle cut like a precious jewel. He would worship her new body as she worshipped his, and he would do all the things to her that young girls—heterosexual ones, anyway—dreamed that a stunning, handsome boy would do to them. And he'd do them over and over. She would find him among all the available young men visiting Nirvana who had posted themselves on the links. All she asked was that he was young, heterosexual, had no girlfriend or wife, and was not a hired stud. That, and physical perfection of face and body, was all she wanted—and what she would soon have at last.
_______________
"Rovan! Hey, Rovan!"
Tavos did not respond at first as he climbed up naked out of the pool in the staff quarters of the resort. He should have known better after all this time. Not responding to the name he had given for himself was liable to give him away. A novice mistake could cost him. When the voice called out a third time—"Rovan! Did you hear me?"—he flinched and started, and turned in the other young man's direction. Jed Nash, one of the other masseurs, lay on a deck sofa between the pool and the rear entrance to the resort and was calling him over.
Tavos changed directions and strode over toward Jed, water rolling off his lean and sinewy body, his zazansa swinging idly between his thighs. The water slicked down the dark hair that normally piled atop his head as well as the triangle of hair that tapered down from his hairline to his nose. Jed was naked as well, this being a clothing-optional resort. It amused Tavos to think of how much more ashamed humans had once been of their bodies, insisting on covering up their zazansa and gliarra when they swam and basked. Well, it was just another of the myriad differences between beings that Tavos might never have known first-hand if he had stayed on Sarma, instead of leaving to be on his own in space.
Jed tossed him a towel. Tavos caught it and began to dry himself off. Jed was another darkly handsome, lean and hard specimen, only a little older than Tavos. Except for the thick, dark hair on his head, he was smooth all over—not like Tavos, who kept a few days' growth of hair on his face and whose chest and abs were seductively haired as well. "Thank you," said Tavos. "I forgot to bring a towel from my room."
"Seems like your mind was somewhere else," said Jed, "like taking a swim didn't get you too clear. Big booking with a client today?"
"A young one," replied Tavos, holding onto the ends of the towel as it draped over his shoulders. "She has just come from Earth by herself, a human girl on holiday."
"Is that right?" Jed grinned. "A lot of the best tippers are on either end—the young ones and the older ones. I had an older one this morning. She'd just had all her wrinkles lasered away. Felt younger than she was, and tipped well—really well. She asked me if I'd throw in the extras for a separate fee. I didn't take her up on it—this time. I usually throw i
n the extras for the younger ones. Hey, have you done that yet?"
Knowingly, Tavos replied, "The 'extras'? No, I have decided to put a limit on my services."
"Why's that?" Jed answered, sitting up, curious. "You could be making out, Rovan. I mean making out and 'making out,' you know? Some of these women, they've got the looks to match their money. And you're set up like nobody else here. You've got what nobody else has got to offer. You’re a Sarmian in a Martian resort, surrounded with Earth women with money who come here looking for something exotic. Rovan, there's nothing more exotic here than you! You're already the most in-demand masseur here, and the word's getting around. How many clients do you get in a day?"
More modestly than he knew he ought, Tavos said, "I have my share."
"Yeah," said Jed, "you get your share and some of mine and some of all the other guys' too. The other masseurs are getting jealous of all the clients asking for you by name. Do you know how many Earth women fantasize about getting it from a Sarmian warrior?"
Tavos shook his head, dismissing the notion. "I am from Sarma. I am not a warrior."
"They don't know that. A fantasy only knows what it wants, and I'm telling you, buddy, you're it. You could be getting rich."
"I am doing well enough. And I am content to please them just with my hands and oils."
Jed shook his head, rubbed the back of his neck, and sighed. "I don't get it, man—not snatching money when it's being thrown at you. Come on, they must ask. They ask, don't they?"
Tavos thought back over the dozens of Earth females he had tabled since coming to Nirvana, and the generous number with whom tabling could easily have become an even more lucrative bedding. "Yes, some of them have asked," he said. "But my services... are limited."
Jed shook his head again. "I just don't get that. If I were you I'd be working what I’ve got. I'd be capitalizing, that's all I'm saying. Coming from Sarma, with your looks and your body and that prong of yours... I'd just be capitalizing."
"I do well enough," Tavos repeated. "Do you mind if I keep the towel to return to my room?"
"Keep it," said Jed. "Tell 'em inside I need another one, would you? And think about what I said. You're what they want."
Wrapping the towel about his waist, Tavos said, "I will consider it. And thank you."
Watching Tavos stride back into the resort, Jed called after him, "Give 'em what they want, buddy! You'll thank yourself!"
_______________
In the sonic shower in his room, Tavos—alias Rovan—of Sarma let the mist of water and the acoustic fingers do for his body what his own hands would shortly do for his latest client. He was booked for the afternoon with a human girl who had decided to pamper herself with his massaging of her body fat before she had a surgeon laser it all away and turn her from a doughy-figured debutante to a sleek and dewy-eyed princess. Tavos did not judge. After all, he could easily be the one facing judgment. A most dire, severe, and final judgment.
"Rovan" was the latest of the series of aliases he had adopted since he’d stolen away from Sarma, years ago. Since then he’d always kept a step ahead of the hunters who had been sent after him.
He considered Jed's words, but not in the way that Jed had urged him to do. Jed was right about one thing: there was nothing more exotic in Nirvana Planitia right now than Tavos, a Sarmian estranged from the fields of battle, wielding carafes and bottles of interplanetary oils instead of deadly weapons. In this place Tavos stood out like a stiff zazansa. And Jed was right that Tavos had quickly become the busiest masseur in the resort. He was attracting attention, and it could easily become the kind of attention he did not want. It was only that the money was so good, more money than he had ever imagined. With what he was earning here, he might well afford to lie low for a long while on some little-trafficked planet in a star system on the frontiers. It was just too good an opportunity to pass up, so long as he did not get himself caught.
Tavos had come into Earth's well-populated solar system with the intent of disappearing into the crowd. Since first contact between Earth and Sarma, many Sarmian expatriates were now living in human space. He would be just one more. He had stumbled onto this opportunity on Mars and, having necessarily lived a less than comfortably as a fugitive, he welcomed the opportunity to be in more commodious surroundings for a while. It was all going well, so far.
"I am not a warrior," he had said to Jed. And it was true; he wasn't. He had forsaken that life because his heart was simply not in it. Better he should live a fast-running, furtive, light-footed, freebooting life, not always knowing how he would fill his stomach or where he would lay his head, than to stay on his home planet, with his tribe, and face a life of battle and strife and perhaps a too-young death. His life may now be hard and sometimes dismal and desperate, but he found the alternative no more glorious. And if they caught him and his life were forfeit for what he did, at least he would die as himself and not as a warrior that he did not choose to be.
So it was that on Mars, under the name of Rovan, he had come to the sweetest spot in his journeys so far. He was sought out here by the wealthiest and most privileged beings in known space. He had known the beds and bodies of many of the most elite women—with the understanding that the "bed" part was completely separate from his professional services. And the word of his skills had indeed gotten around, for Sarmian hands were as adept in giving relief from the pains of battle as they were in dealing death to their enemies. Rich, self-indulgent humans seeking the exotic pleasures of space sought him out, and he had taken his hands to as many men as women.
But, as he had refused to let his tribe press him into battle, he likewise did not allow the humans that he served to lure him into bed with their money. His zazansa, he determined, was for pleasure, not commerce, and he had used it for plenty of the former since he’d arrived here. The way that he had come to live did not lend itself to many principles—he was a fugitive and had often resorted to deception, trespassing, and theft to survive—but there were some lines that Tavos did not cross. He would neither take a life, nor make his sex a transaction. And if need be, he would take his generous earnings and sadly flee this beautiful, luxurious place, just as he had fled all the others. In a vast galaxy, a boy who ran could run forever.
Not wanting to be late, Tavos cut his shower short and stepped glistening out into his room, slipping into the simple uniform of his trade. He covered his non-negotiables in a thong and put on a pair of white leggings over that. He donned a light grey sleeveless shirt and a pair of light grey slippers and was ready to go. He did not need to wear much for work, as he worked only in the thong anyway—sexy, but not sexual.
He crossed the room to the window port, outside of which his little skimmer was docked. He could have bought a sportier model, but this little topless saucer suited his needs and did not deplete his earnings. Sliding open the window, he stepped out into the skimmer and seated himself at the controls as the window slid shut behind him. He slipped the little craft free of his dock and peeled out into the air over the streets of Nirvana, already imagining running his hands over the body of a girl not yet twenty Earth years, who already had the body of an elder Sarmian. Tavos did not blame these Earth people for their practice of making over their bodies. Not artificially bred for battle like his own people, they were often prone to the bulging and sagging of age while they were still young. No doubt his client was eagerly looking forward to being relieved of all that.
_______________
Stacey stood out on the terrace of her suite, still in the black body suit, smiling broadly in greeting, when Tavos's skimmer came gliding in. Hovering near the terrace dock, he smiled back at her, sizing her up (for want of a better expression). She was not too large. She was not gross, but he could see well enough that the surgeon's skills were called for. Stacey watched him dock his skimmer and climb out, looking him up and down all the while. He was even hotter-looking than his holograms, sublime muscles squeezed into sublime limbs and torso. It made her sor
ry that she had ruled out hiring him for more than a massage. She made a mental note that this was exactly what she wanted in bed after recovering from the procedure. Perhaps he would consent to a date outside of work in a few days’ time. She could only hope so.
He climbed out onto the terrace and offered her his hand in the traditional human greeting. "Hello, Stacey," he said, smiling. "I am Rovan. I am pleased to meet you." This time, on the job, he remembered his pseudonym.
She shook his hand gladly, feeling strength in the way he pumped his arm up and down and imagining how he might pump something else. He was her first Sarmian acquaintance. How perfect would it be if he were truly her "first"? How wonderful would it be to lie for the first time with not only a perfect boy, but a member of the race who were the star-lost cousins of humankind? "And I'm very happy to meet you, Rovan."
"Shall we begin?" he asked. "Shall I set up in your suite or out here on the terrace?"
"Oh, I think out here would be perfect," she replied, tingling all over.
"Very well. I'll be only a moment." Tavos turned quickly back to his skimmer, removing his folding table and some sheets, towels, and pillows from the hatch and his supply bag from the passenger's side of the compartment. In the bag lay his bottles of oil and his heating disk—as well as the pulse pistol that he had bought when he first arrived on Mars, against any possible emergency that might arise or need for a quick getaway. For this work, he would take out everything but the pistol.
Highlander's Pride: Winter Solstice (Against All Odds Series 1) Page 52