The next day, I was sitting in my usual spot at the navigation panels and tweaking the engine’s thrust vectors. Zero mass fields are awesome, and require very little power to actually generate with the right crystalline structures in the field generation rods attached to the hull of the ship. The only downside is that the technology hasn’t been perfected. If it were, Jump gates would be useless. With a push from a baby a ship with a perfect zero mass field could fly across the galaxy and back within the same time it took for anyone reading this to finish that last sentence.
Efficiency of a super-light speed engine is something that still keeps new star ships being built. The latest ships are coming out with engines that can push the power efficiency curves up higher than they went before. What I mean when I say that is after you put so much thrust behind a ship with a current zero mass field, there is a point where the amount of speed you get out of the amount of force starts going off into stupidly exponential amounts of numbers in regards to the force used and minutely tiny numbers in the amount of speed gained.
This ship could reach ninety nine point ninety nine percent of light speed. It couldn’t actually get to light speed. The latest ships could get to three times light speed. That was about the maximum obtainable speed while still maintaining efficiency of the engine and fuel in acceptable ranges. The latest military grade could hit four times, but the government wasn’t publishing the amount of fuel being expended and current corporate capabilities were right about on par with military spec.
When you start playing with Quantum physics crossing over to Newtonian physics, lines begin to blur in what we are able to accomplish. Sound, magnetic, and gravity based shields kept those pesky little bitty asteroids from ripping through ships like a hot knife through butter also. Zero mass fields aren’t that different from shielding. Almost the same structure, but with slightly varied wavelengths and frequencies. It was those nice little training guides in the survival manual that explained how to cultivate Gravitilectric crystalline structures. Start screwing with gravity fields and you start opening up all sorts of possibilities.
Most ships also have Einstein-Bose condensate panels on them. Those are much more environmentally friendly then turning on a zero mass field in the middle of a parking lot. One would wonder why we even use thrust based drives if we had the EBcon panels. One should not be surprised that gravity only works as a propellant when it has something to repel against. It is an attraction force, and like magnets, works best when there is something nearby that has force that it can repel.
So, enough of the physics lesson kids. Just trying to sort of explain that I was seeing if I could play around with the fields and the thrusters to wrangle out a little bit more speed from this old clunker. It wasn’t really working, but it was keeping my mind off of being bored.
“Hey John.” Marissa greeted, sitting down in the seat next to me.
I immediately froze in mid-tweak. “Uh, hi.” Yes, I am a master of the English language aren’t I?
“Relax, I’m not here to rape you again.” Marissa laughed at her own joke. “Well, unless you wanted me to that is.”
For the record, I didn’t laugh. Nor did I come back with any witty comments about not being able to rape the willing. I sorta just sat there and nodded a couple times, then thought better of it and shook my head. Yes, I have mastered the art of body language as well.
“Okay, so what are you doing? Figured I would stop by and peek over your shoulder for a bit.” Marissa said, leaning in and looking at the displays currently up on the screens. You can say this was awkward. I was telling myself that right now.
“Speak!” She yelled. I jumped.
“Um, uh, just playing with thrust vectors and field variance.” I explained.
“Sounds hot, tell me about it.” Marissa looked at me with this very interested expression. People, never do that to a geek. It seriously arouses them. You don’t even need to understand what they are talking about, just keep looking interested and you have a new pet puppy. So I did what any self-respecting geek would do and blushed while stammering.
“Alright, that tears it. John, it was really nice having sex and you were wonderful. Problem is that you are doing exactly what I thought you would do afterward and act all uncomfortable. Would you just relax? It was only sex, no big deal.” Marissa explained, leaning back in the chair.
“No big deal? Really, Marissa, no big deal?” I asked, shaking my head in frustration and feeling anger rise up inside me. “The part about you taking my virginity must mean absolutely nothing to you.” I admit it, I was hurt.
“John, you know the problem with geeks?” She asked, looking at her nails.
“No, but I’m sure someone like you is going to explain it in detail to me.” I shook my head and went back to looking at the nav panels.
“You put too much thought into things. I mean really, why should sex be all that important? It’s something we do for pleasure and to breed. Nothing really huge about it.” Marissa smiled. “John, listen to what I’m telling you. It isn’t important. So stop being all emotional about it and go back to being my friend please.”
“Marissa, my whole semi-adult life has been spent mostly thinking about my first time. The first woman that even showed any interest in me waylaid me and threw me into a slave pen. The second, walks up to me after we made love and acts like it was just any other day and is telling me to stop thinking it was something special. So yeah, not really up on the concept of being happy go lucky right now thank you.” I nearly growled because this conversation was getting me so angry.
“I’m doing you a favor John. Really, I am. You know what my first time was like?” She asked me. I cringed, figuring that it was going to be that she was molested at twelve or something.
“It was amazing John. The guy it was with was such a sweetheart. It hurt like hell the first time but he was really gentle with me. Also he bought me flowers and took me to dinner and stuff. Really romantic. I was eighteen, John. It was all great and gravy until he got seriously hooked on pills and gambling. He got in deep to some really nasty people and they took me as payment for his debts.” Marissa grimaced, looked down, then brought her eyes back up to mine before continuing. “That first time didn’t do me any favors. The reason is because it didn’t allow me to learn that sex isn’t something important. It made it feel so great and wonderful. Then reality hit me like a thousand tons of brick in the face.
“John, I learned the hard way that if I kept seeing sex as something important pretty soon I was going to be seriously screwed up because of it. I would get stuck in this adolescent mentality that I was being tortured by being forced to have sex with people that were just using me. Also, those rapist bastards got their rocks off by how much it hurt me. They indulged in the pain in my eyes, John.” Marissa gripped her hands in front of her so tightly her knuckles were white while staring at the floor.
“What I’m trying to say is that if you keep seeing sex as something so hugely important, people can use it not only to hurt you but also to control you. They will manipulate you with it, hurt you with it, and yes John, even torture you with it. Some just because they can. That’s reality John. No, not everyone in this world is like that but enough of them are that it’s stupid not to allow yourself the opportunity to defend against it. Anyway, I will talk to you later John. Think about what I’m trying to say.”
With that said, she left me alone to contemplate the conversation. For the next day I tooled around on the really small library for books about the psychology behind relationships and allowed my mind to wander. When she showed back up first thing the next morning in nothing but a bra and panties I didn’t have the same reaction as I did before.
“That’s odd.” I said when she showed up.
“What?”
“Just, after spending yesterday thinking about what you said I started to understand what you were saying to me. Som
e people spend their entire lives obsessed with sex and don’t really get over it until they are incapable of having it anymore.” I commented.
“Seems like someone did some homework.” Marissa stated, smiling.
“It’s amazing, I didn’t even realize that a lot of what you were saying was true in so many ways.” I commented, shaking my head. “Although your delivery was a little harsh, I can understand what you were trying to say.”
“Not trying to hurt you John, trying to help.” She leaned over and kissed me on the cheek. “John, I’ve been doing this job for a really long time. I know what I can do, and I am very good at it.”
“Why don’t people see that, though? That they let it control them I mean.” I asked, confused.
“When something feels good, your brain goes to great lengths to give you all sorts of reasons to keep doing it. The smarter the person, the easier it is to get them hooked on stuff. I told you, you over think things. But luckily, you ran into a whore that doesn’t mind sharing a trade secret every once in a while.” Marissa smiled and winked at me.
“You actually like your job?” I asked.
“Of course. I make a lot of money John, and I don’t have to do much work. I’m kind of lazy too because I don’t put all that much work into it. When I was basically a slave, they kept feeding me drugs to get me heavily addicted and keep me there. When Ray, that was my first real pimp, bought me, he cleaned me up. I spent six months with one of the top rehabilitation specialists there is. Thank god too, because I would probably be strung out in some gutter somewhere if not dead.” Marissa told me.
“Ray is a really smart business man. He runs three brothels that are the highest grossing cat houses in the entire world. All the girls in them wouldn’t think of working anywhere else. The reason is because Ray takes care of them. He has this policy that he takes about sixty percent of the cut. But what he explains is that the extra money that you pay him more than the other places is put into investment accounts that his finance people control.
“I met one of the retirees. She’s loaded. This woman makes the people that are running this operation look like nickel and dime thugs with the kind of money that she can throw around at her whim. Really smart business man, John. I’m telling you.” Marissa sat shaking her head at the memories.
“Why’d you change jobs then?” I asked her.
“I got tired of sales. It really doesn’t fit my personality at all. You have to be a salesperson to work as a prostitute in a cat house. If you don’t, you don’t make much money.”
“Okay, you took a job where you didn’t have to convince the customer to sleep with you. Makes sense I guess.” I shook my head.
“More than that. I took a job where it isn’t work to convince someone to have sex with me. Also, I don’t have to work very hard because you guys aren’t getting any out here. I don’t want people falling head over heels so I can actually just chill and let it happen. Told you, I’m lazy.” Marissa and I both laughed about that. “Don’t get me wrong, I like making money. That’s why I never cashed out when I left Ray’s operation. He keeps it for me. He takes a higher percentage from the interest than he does from the girls that are making money for him but I still make a profit. Did I mention he has his own credit union? Like I said, really smart business man.”
“With me, was it laid back for you?” I asked her, my curiosity is absolutely insatiable.
“Oh no, John. I worked so hard with you.” Marissa whispered in my ear breathily. Then she laughed and I couldn’t help but join her.
“I’ll take that as a no.” I commented.
“If looked at from the standpoint of someone that has a lot of experience and skill in the area of sex to draw on, no John, I truly sucked in bed when I was with you. I did it on purpose too. If I would have been too good, it wouldn’t have gotten across the point I was trying to make. It would have hurt you really bad too and that was something I had no intention of doing.” Marissa kissed me on the cheek again, then left.
I stood up and stretched, releasing the small amount of pent up energy that I had built up while she sat there. Fortunately for me it wasn’t anywhere near as extreme as it had been on the day she basically took what she wanted from me. In truth, I appreciated what she did for me. After thinking about it and reading a few books, I realized that I had a seriously unhealthy childish fascination with sex just like she told me I did.
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