Templum Veneris

by Jeremy L. Jones

  Viekko pushed him down the street and turned back to the door. Cronus whipped around. “Hey! What are you supposed to do after?”

  Viekko didn’t turn around. “Think of it like landin’ a shuttle without the training. Just focus on the approach and be damn happy if anything at all happens after that.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  After the assassination attempt, Diana Adriana disappeared from public view for several months. When she returned, it was to issue the following proclamation:

  “The natural beauty and vast resources of Brazil, the talent and labor of its people, and the wealth of its culture have been, up to this point, stolen and sold to the highest bidder. The proceeds of which benefit a select few in far-away places. That changes today. The international corporations are no longer welcome here. The people and the resources of Brazil will no longer be exploited by the rest of the world.”

  -From The Fall: The Decline and Failure of 21st Century Civilization by Martin Raffe

  Althea returned to the Sala and snuck inside. The drinking hall was silent except for the clatter of oculto cleaning up the remains of food and drink and the snores of a few Cytherean warriors sleeping off the excess on the floor.

  She crept through the wreckage, making sure not to step on anything still sleeping, and found her way back to her room, where she sat down hard on the edge of the bed. When they first showed her inside, the queen’s assistants had closed the curtains and lit a small fire in a square pit in the center. It was now burned all the way down to glowing coals and a few small flames.

  Althea laid on her side and watched the fire smoldering in the pit. She was exhausted, but sleep felt like an impossibility. For one, the sun was still out, and light streamed around the curtain and through a hole in the ceiling where the smoke escaped. It was dim, but it was enough. The mattress felt like someone made it by killing a sheep that had lived a terribly unpleasant life, skinned it, and shoved it full of sticks. On top of all that, some sociopath had taken the time to decorate every wall with a mural depicting the most savage acts of brutality imaginable. The whole thing was a running motif involving shirtless men, severed heads and the color red. The way the firelight flickered in the dim light gave the art an uneasy sense of movement as if the painting may come to life at any moment and Althea would find herself sleeping in the middle of a pitched battle.

  She sighed, focusing on the flicker of firelight over the soft red glow of the coals and let her mind wander.

  She could still hear the terror in the pregnant woman’s voice, could see the fear in her face; something terrible was happening, and Althea knew it.

  She lay back on the bed. Maybe she was overreacting. After all, it was a civilization and a culture that they knew little to nothing about. That was why they were there after all; to study and document the way people outside the hegemonic terrestrial cultures might organize and rule themselves. They might do some things that were morally questionable to her but, like Viekko said, maybe it was what they needed to survive out here.

  Viekko’s words echoed in her head again. “We could always ask your brother what people are willing to do to survive.”

  Feeling her anger rise again, she sat up and ran her hands through her dark red hair. There was no need to bring her brother into this. It was a cheap shot.

  Not that Viekko was wrong.

  Althea flopped back on the bed, breathing hard and fighting back tears. Not that she was afraid of someone seeing her cry in this place, but she’d shed enough tears for her brother.

  Yes, Viekko was right. Her brother would approve of anything when it came to survival. After all, it was Ethan Fallon that taught her to steal in the first place.

  She could almost feel the chill in the air during the autumn evening that she and her brother sat by the side of some God-forsaken road waiting for a ride. She was fourteen, Ethan was seventeen. It had been a week since either of them had a decent meal. Their faces were caked in dirt. Their clothes were rags. They could both look down and count the ribs showing through their skin. And Ethan spent the last of their money on makeup.

  “Do this,” said Ethan, puckering his lips.

  “You look like a bloody monkey when you do that,” said Althea.

  “Just do it,” Ethan repeated, pulling a tube of bright red lipstick from his pocket.

  Althea did as she was told, and Ethan leaned forward to apply the lipstick. “Don’t worry about looking too good, these geezers aren’t into ‘good’. They want desperate; that’s what they prey on. They feed on desperation. So you don’t want to look good. But you want to look as if you tried to look good. Now do this.”

  Ethan smacked his lips together like a carp pulled out of water. Althea did, although she had the distinct feeling that her brother’s makeup skills would be better suited for the circus than her present purposes.

  Ethan put the lipstick away and retrieved a small eyeshadow the other pocket of his worn green jacket.

  “If you get two male dogs in a room,” Ethan continued, applying the eyeshadow, “sometimes the bigger one will mount the smaller one and start humping. I mean really go at it. That’s what this is. It’s not a sexual thing, not really, it’s about dominance. Not love. It’s ownership. That’s what the geezers want. One more bloody thing to own.”

  Ethan sat back. “Just to be clear,” he added, “you don’t actually need to sleep with the bastard.”

  This was less of a relief than it sounded at the time, which was kind of a feat.

  Ethan put the eyeshadow back in his pocket and pulled out a clear plastic tube with some kind of white powder inside.

  “When you get to his house, offer to pour him a drink. They like that sort of thing. Shows that you know your place. And that place is somewhere between his pet and the person who makes his food. When you pour his drink, crack the top of this and drop the lot in.”

  Althea took the tube and held it up to the light. There were maybe a few grams of colorless crystals that looked like table salt.

  “It will dissolve instantly. He won’t even get halfway through the drink before he feels the effects. Once that happens, he'll be on the floor in seconds.”

  Althea shook the tube. “What if he doesn’t want a drink? Or wants to do… you know… before?”

  “Just… well, deal with that if it happens. Put on a bit of charm. Or ask for a drink for yourself and tell him you can’t go through with it without a nip. Then offer him one, so you’re not drinking alone. That’s a good one, it feeds the desperation.”

  If it was desperation they wanted, Althea had it. She had it all. The dress she wore was something her brother dug out of a trash heap. It might have been pretty once or expensive at the very least. It was from a material that changed colors depending on the angle one looked at it, and it used to be decked out in crystal sequins from top to bottom. Most of those were gone now, though a few still hung on. Without them, though, it looked like she was wearing an oil spill.

  It also had no pockets. Althea shoved the small tube into the top of her dress.

  Just then, they heard the distant whine of an electric motor making its way up the road. Althea swallowed hard and stood up. Ethan followed. Nobody in their village could afford the few remaining motor vehicles. That privilege was reserved for a select class. A class that could afford to maintain a lifestyle comparable to those that lived before the Fall. They fixed up old wrecks with imported parts. Every one of which could feed Althea’s village for a month.

  “We’ll be nearby,” said Ethan, patting her on the shoulder as they watched the clouds of dust. “Me and the other lads. We won’t let you out of our sight.”

  That was strangely reassuring, even though Althea knew it was an outright lie. They didn’t have the means to keep up with an old-fashioned motor vehicle. They would be able to track it, but only because nobody used them anymore. Tire tracks stood out these days.

  “You’ll be a hero, Althea. You pull this off, the whole village eats for a week.�
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  The vehicle got closer. Althea’s anxiety increased with the crack of gravel and dirt under tires and she had to clench her fists to keep them from shaking. This whole thing wasn’t just an idea cooked up by the young people of the village anymore. It was real. Althea was really out shivering in the autumn evening, painted like a whore, and in a dress that made her look like another bit of garbage this society threw away. The thought made her stomach turn and, for a moment, she felt like she might be sick right on the road.

  “Are you sure this is… I mean. This is okay, right? I’m not doing anything wrong, right?” she asked without looking her brother in the eye.

  Ethan smiled. Ethan had a smile so warm it made a fire seem like a needless redundancy. Ethan had a smile you could curl up next to.

  “It’s survival. You’re only doing what you need to survive. I have to go now. But I won’t be far. Okay?”

  The vehicle was close. They could see it cresting the hill on the horizon.

  “I love you, Althea,” said Ethan. “I won’t let anything happen to you.”

  With that, Ethan was gone. Althea didn’t look at him or watch him leave. She focused on the black, sporty car closing in. It kicked up a cloud of dust from the remains of the street so that it looked like a missile flying down the road at her. She had seen similar ones before. They came by fairly regularly, took what they wanted and left.

  Tonight, it was coming for her.

  The car pulled up beside her and stopped. The window came down and revealed a fat man dressed in a suit that could never have been bought anywhere in Britannia. He had a mustache that suggested that, somewhere, a walrus was missing its whiskers.

  “Why, hello there, young lady. What is a pretty little thing like you doing out in this cold?”

  Althea swallowed hard and forced a smile. She tried to form that same smile Ethan had. The kind of smile you could curl up next to.

  “Just waiting,” she said, wrapping her arms around her small frame. “Waiting for a gentleman like yourself to pass by.”

  “Is that right?” said the man. “And what would you be waiting for, exactly?”

  “Just a touch of kindness. It’s in short supply these days. I’d give anything I had to find a bit.”

  She ran her hand up her chest and felt the vial of white powder.

  “Anything, huh?” said the man, watching her hand.

  “Anything at all.”

  Of course, he opened the passenger door.

  And from that moment, she played her part. She giggled and fawned on his every word. She moaned when he ran his hands over her thigh. And, yes, she made him a drink.

  Althea and her brother cleaned out several houses that way over the next few years. Enough to feed her village. Enough for her and Ethan to have a proper home. Enough for her to leave that trash heap village and go to medical school.

  She wiped away some tears as she rolled on her side on that lumpy, hard mattress in a palace on Venus. Viekko was right. Ethan would have approved of this. The kids fighting to prove themselves able-bodied warriors would have made sense to him, as would the subjugation of those who were deemed unworthy.

  After all, he was willing to leave his little sister standing in a skimpy, torn dress shivering in the cold waiting to be picked up by some unspeakable predator, like a hunk of bait on a rope.

  Well, Althea wouldn’t. Not anymore.

  If she could go back in time, she would have rescued that little girl. She would have shown her that there were other options. Maybe Ethan wasn’t smart enough or driven enough to find them, but they were surely there. Prostituting his own little sister couldn't have been the only thing left open to him and, if Althea could go there now, she would show him that.

  That thought calmed her and filled her with a sense of peace as she drifted off to sleep. She couldn’t do anything for that little girl anymore. But she could do something here. She just had to find out what it was.

  ****

  Isra was in an identical adjacent room, blissfully sleeping off the honey wine from the night before. It was a deep, dreamless slumber that wasn’t even interrupted by a man quietly getting out of bed, putting on clothes and slipping out the door. She barely broke her rhythmic snoring when the man came back into the room with a metal serving tray and a kettle.

  It was the kind of sleep that was impenetrable right up until it wasn’t. There was the sharp sound of metal sliding on metal as the man drew back the curtain. The grating sound, combined with the intense light, dragged her kicking and screaming into consciousness.

  Isra was awake and in pain. And… naked, it turned out. And, there was someone else in the room. She sat bolt upright in a moment of panic. Then, in a secondary moment of panic, she tugged the covers over her body.

  It took her a moment to remember the man standing by the window. He had dark hair and a belted tunic over a well-muscled body. “Bom dai!” he said, smiling.

  There was far too much enthusiasm in his voice, especially as the details of the impending hangover began to set in, and the memories from last night started to take form. There was the party in the Sala, the Rainha asked her to pick a man, she did and then… well… she made a good choice

  But while she was enjoying herself, apparently her hangover had been preparing a full assault. She covered her eyes and groaned into her hands.

  The man walked across the room to the bedside table, where he set the serving platter with the kettle. He picked it up, speaking Cytherean. “I brought you fornocha.”

  “You brought what?” she asked, in the same language. Isra kept her eyes covered; it helped keep the pain just below excruciating.

  There was a slosh of liquid accompanied by a sharp herbal scent like mint mixed with pine and… she’d have to say cat urine. The man held a cup of it out for her, which only made the unpleasant smell more intense.

  “Fornocha,” the man repeated. “It brings alertness, strength and virility. Try it.”

  Isra squinted at the steaming cup of bluish-green liquid the man held out for her. Now that it was right under her nose, the feline quality of the drink seemed more potent. Still, she took the cup, sipped the hot drink and immediately launched into a mild coughing fit. She liked her tea strong, but this made her strongest cup seem like she waved a tea bag over a hot cup of water. To call it bitter would be like biting into a ghost pepper and saying that it was a little spicy.

  Still, it helped ease her headache, and she already felt a little more awake. She took another drink.

  “Rainha Isabel wanted me to give you a message.” The man pulled a red cloak over his tunic. “She requests that you meet her on the overlook. There are servants outside who will take you there when you are ready.”

  “Excellent.” Isra tried to keep the sarcasm out of her voice.

  She held the cup tight in both hands and took another sip. The hangover subsided, but fear, shame and general self-loathing rushed in to take its place. How could she have been so dumb, so careless? Getting drunk was bad enough. It was perhaps a minor lapse of judgment under the circumstances. But going to bed with one of the native people?

  A rush of anxiety turned her stomach as she realized that she was on a planet full of overly-aggressive men armed and begging for a fight. The Rainha notwithstanding, women tended to fall into a broad category labeled ‘property’ in such societies. Best case scenario, she could escape an interplanetary incident without ending up married to someone. That is if she wasn’t already.

  The man finished getting dressed and bowed to Isra. “Thank you very much for last night,” he said. “There was much pleasure.”

  Isra forced a smile. “Yes, there was.”

  There really was. That part was absolutely true.

  He walked to the door and flashed a charming, boyish smile. “I hope to see you again. Enjoy your time with us.”

  And that was it. The soldier bowed one more time, turned and walked out the door.

  Well, that was easy.

 
Isra sat back on the pillows and sipped the fornocha. A strange feeling of calm washed over her. It was nice. Stupid, dangerous, entirely outside the mission protocol for the Human Reconnection Project and grounds for dismissal as the project leader, she quickly chastised herself… but nice.

  She finished the drink and went to the bedside table to pour another cup. She found that the aroma was still awful, but the taste wasn’t so bad once she got used to it. The evening wasn’t completely her fault, though. Hell, it was all practically at the Rainha’s request. One might even say it was diplomatic. There was probably some clause in the Mission Charter that covered it. If not, it would be an excellent time to add one.