Larger than either The Slipper or The Shinai. A 70,000 ton pleasure palace glittering in space, decked out to the megs. No cost spared. No opulence or extravagance too great.
Who could guess how many worlds had been sucked dry and how many generations of Corps wage slaves had given their all so that she could indulge herself and all of her lackeys and sycophants in such decadence?
Waves of food, drink, entertainment, and every pleasure lay wide open and available for the guests on board.
Each room a grand palace ballroom. Each hallway and corridor a priceless art gallery. Furnishings and decorations taken from untold worlds and cultures. Diversions, games, shows, delights, and debaucheries.
Levels filled with whores, and sex slaves from a hundred races and the several known genders, more than a match for any imagined taste or the indulgence of any vice, fantasy, or perversion
Arena levels with blood sports and gladiator death matches, where warriors and dangerous beasts and monsters pitted themselves against one another for sport, gambling and sheer delight.
Naero, Jan, and some of her friends entered the lair of the beast beside Aunt Sleak, with Captain Zalvano and their Spacer retinue right behind. They stepped into a Casino just beyond the opulent landing bay, about threescore in all.
She noted the row upon row of viewscreens, brazenly offering all of their enjoyments and much more, directing guests to where they could all be found on what deck or level.
“Triax Gigacorp, the worst of the worst.” Jan noted. “This Triax princess sure has megacredits to spare.” Even he sounded stunned and amazed.
Naero frowned. “Yeah, despite trillions on the Triaxian wageslave worlds wallowing in poverty and despair.”
“They refer to them as ‘useless eaters,’ sib. No one cares what happens to them.”
“Jan, the cost of any small section of this yacht–even one of their bathrooms–would be more than enough to purchase a fine trade ship, the modest likes of which you and I might never see now. We could work our entire lives and never save enough. Remember that tonight.”
Even Saemar, voluptuous in a tight, hot pink dress, was amazed. “Look at what they’re doing on that screen. Even I’ve never done anything like that.” She sighed and nudged Naero. “Too bad we’re on duty, huh sweetie? Chaela’s gonna miss a good time tonight.”
Naero endured a twinge of pain. She still felt responsible for Chae’s injuries. Her friend’s absence left another gaping, emotional hole.
But Naero tried not to look at many of the screens after she got the gist of what was going on in them. Somehow it was worse than porn, flaunted so brazenly for everyone to watch and join in if they wanted to.
Liveried servants waited to escort them to the zero-G play rooms, beach rooms, winter mountain ski slopes, underwater rooms, several convenient costume shops, and vomitoriums for the hordes of enormous, feasting gluttons and their grav implants.
Finally they arrived at the primary reception hall. Everything around them dazzled and sparkled, like a spectacular Algedian casino palace.
Naero glanced at Aunt Sleak and then at herself, suddenly feeling somewhat self-conscious and out of place. Even with her concealed weapons, without her flight togs she felt half-naked, and it wasn’t just because of her slinky dress.
None of her friends or Clan could see the insane eye in her forehead but to her it was still there. Naero had checked, filled with horror every time it stared back at her.
She strategically kept a thick wave of her raven hair partially covering her forehead and her left eye.
She reminded herself that she agreed to go along with this public display.
The Akoran nightsheen gown she wore shimmered with the ambient light from bluish-black to blackish-red. She caught herself in a mirror and struggled not to blush. The top was cut much lower than anything she thought she’d ever be allowed to wear. Her ivory breasts were ample but not overly large; at least they were firm and natural.
Unlike the various pairs of wobbling grav-implants all around her that seemed to float and bob freakishly with lives of their own.