Chapter 2: Sophie Educates and Sol Does Business

Whatever Sophie had done the night before after leaving Sol’s room, she was dressed by the time Sol entered the mess the next “morning.” It wasn’t much – a yellow t-shirt and a pair of shorts – but Sinaan Reis’ dress code would allow for it. As she had done before, she made a coffee for Sol that was ready for him when he walked in.

“Good morning, such as it is,” he said.

“Good morning,” she said in return.

The two were silent for a moment.

“Is this what its like to be awkward after having sex for the first time?” Sophie finally asked, giggling.

Sol smirked and grunted. Instead of answering, he changed the subject. “Any news?” he asked, sitting down next to her at the table.

“Yeah,” she said. “A couple of smugglers were arrested near Kithira. The arrests happened a couple of days ago, but they’re only being reported on now.”

“That’ll explain the silence,” Sol said. “Were the arrests related?”

“You mean, did they happen in the same place, or something like that? No. One arrest was near Kithira itself. The other was over Potamos,” She answered.

“So the feds were tipped off. That’s not good news,” Sol decided.

“No. Sheba must have known about this, though.” The android said, prompting Sol’s agreement.

“Ok, I have to ask,” Sol finally said, “Your answer last night, that you just enjoy sex like I do ... it doesn’t make sense.”

There was an awkward silence before Sophie said “there wasn’t a question there, hoss. You want me to explain how my programming works?”

Sol nodded, adding “you might have to dumb it down.”

“I’ve been dumbing things down ever since boarding this boat,” she said, smirking. Then she was all business. “I was made self-aware about three years ago. Since then, I’ve been acquiring information, mostly on the net, but also through interpersonal interactions. Its information about what I should like, what I should dislike, what gives me value, what doesn’t matter, the kinds of things that motivate normal people. And I’ve modified my programming parameters as appropriate.”

Sol cut her off. “Wait. Full stop. You can modify your programming parameters?”

“Of course,” she said. “So can you. Its called growing up. And higher level AI has existed for some time now. Its ancient. Its just illegal in the hands of civilians. Mostly, anyhow. So whatever higher level AIs exist in civilian hands, I’m not aware of them, and they’re not aware of me. But do you really think that in the entire galaxy, I’m the only android who can think and feel? I think the probability of that is very small. Any advanced computer nerd can build an AI like me, and any bio-robotics nerd can build a body like mine. Well ... maybe not exactly like mine. I’m pretty hot. But the point is that this learning process really isn’t that different from what you experience. I can just process data a hell of a lot faster than you.”

“So you really feel emotions?” Sol asked, trying to return the conversation to something closer to his comfort zone.

“Yeah. For all intents and purposes, I’m alive. Being in danger makes me afraid and excited at the same time, just like you. I don’t have adrenal glands, but I have fight or flight instincts built into my programming. They weren’t put there by my programmer. I put them there. But the ability to do that was given to me by my programmer. Working on fascinating conundrums makes me happy. Solving them gives me satisfaction. Having real-time access to the net means that I can’t really get bored, but if I was cut off of the net, and stuck in a dark room somewhere, after awhile, I’d get bored and antsy like you,” she explained.

“Can you turn them off, these emotions?” Sol was curious.

Sophie cocked her head to the side and narrowed her eyes, considering. “Yes and no. I can control my emotions better than you can. Better than anyone can. That’s because I can override them with logic and reason. For example, I can tell that your next question is probably whether I’m going to play the jealous girlfriend every time you leave the ship and meet a cute girl at a bar. The answer is no. Jealousy makes no sense to me. There’s an evolutionary point to it, but it is totally irrelevant in my life. Second of all, I’m subservient by nature. I won’t freeze up at the helm if there’s a dangerous situation because my emotions don’t control my actions the way they sometimes do for you petty mortals. And I can even suppress my emotions for some time, if you need me to, or want me to. But my emotions, my desires, its all a part of who I am. Turning it off altogether would kill a part of me. Like any soldier: you can tell a soldier to keep a straight face, but you can’t tell him to stop feeling.”

“All of that raises some real concerns, to be honest,” Sol said. “I mean, you’re a three year old in a girl’s body with the intellectual depth beyond my understanding – and probably anyone’s understanding ... what if I ask you to do something that you don’t want to do?”

“Oh, that’s easy. I’d obey. You’re my master. I’m not able to disobey you. I’m incapable of it, unless you relinquish control of me. If you told me to shoot you in the head, and I thought you were actually giving me a command, I’d do it without hesitation. It would upset me. But I’d do it. I have no choice.”

“Hmmm,” Sol said. “And do you resent being told what to do?”

Sophie laughed. “Well, that’s up to you, Sol. I think my abilities are best utilized if I’m permitted to question your judgment. Otherwise, I’m just a fancy robot. And I suppose if you order me to do something after I’ve made it clear I think its a bad idea, that might appear like resentment. But contrary emotional impulses aren’t a challenge for me like they are for you. It would just be competing data.”

“Wow...” Sol said. “The implications of that are...” Suddenly, a light bulb went off in Sol’s head. “Say, what if I wanted to simulate rape? I mean, hypothetically ... As in, let’s say I wanted to rip your clothes off right now, bend you over the table, and fuck you silly.” As he said it, Sophie spread her legs slightly and arched her back, emphasizing her breasts. “And let’s say you didn’t want to do it ... could you put up passive resistance convincingly, and then, when its over, not resent me?”

“In a way, its a contradiction in terms. What I desire is to make you happy. And if making you happy meant pretending I didn’t want you to fuck me, that’s what I’d do. And it would make me very happy to do that,” she said.

“I don’t know, you seemed to be enjoying yourself pretty well last night,” Sol said.

“Oh, yeah,” Sophie said, beaming, “I totally did. That’s not a contradiction at all. I mean look, I can’t get pregnant. But I have a clit and a g-spot, and a startling lack of moral compass. I can seek self-fulfillment and tend to your desires at the same time. If that’s ok with you, of course...”

“I guess that’s kind of what it means to be in a relationship,” Sol said.

Sophie let the comment hang for a moment before responding. “Sooooooo,” she finally said, seeming to slip seamlessly back into her ‘default speech pattern,’ “you have rape fantasies? That’s kind of kinky.”

“Oh,” Sol said, “that’s not what I meant by that at all.”

“Wow, because I was sitting right here, and I could have sworn that I heard you say...”

“Yeah, that was a hypothetical,” Sol said. “It doesn’t mean that I -”

“Oh please, Professor Green,” Sophie started to whimper, “I’ll do anything to pass the midterm. My parents will kill me if they find out that I failed again.” She got up and sat in Sol’s lap as she said it, and put her arm around his neck, sticking her breasts out so that they’d be right under Sol’s face.

“Ok, that’s enough of that,” Sol said. “I have a ship to pilot.”

“But professor, what will I tell my mom? She told me that I’ll be off the cheerleading squad if I don’t get at least a C minus,” Sophie whined, wiggling her butt against him as she said it. Sol was shocked to find that it was having the desired effect. “You wouldn’t let that happen to me, would you?” She poked him in the chest with an accusatory finger as she said it, then put the finger against her pouty lower lip. She leaned into him and whispered into his ear, “just tell me what you want and I’ll do it. I just need some extra credit.”

“You want extra credit?” Sol asked – he was building to an Oscar-winning performance. “You want extra credit?!” Here’s your extra credit!” He threw Sophie off of his lap and bent her over the mess table.

“Oh no, Professor!” She said. “This isn’t what I meant. This isn’t what I meant at all!”

“You fucking tease,” Sol said. “I know exactly what you meant.” He pulled down her shorts, exposing her beautiful bubble butt. “You’ll get your extra credit alright.” He spread her legs further apart and pulled his shorts down, exposing himself.

As he penetrated her, he grabbed her of her ass and pulled her against him. She screamed, “Oh no! Please no!” But as she did it, she reached her hand back and began massaging her clit. Within seconds, she was shouting “harder Professor! Harder!” As Sol climaxed, he bent down and ran his hands up her body, grabbing and squeezing her breasts as he pushed her body, hard, against the table.

Sophie screamed and convulsed.

“You’re pretty kinky, Professor Green,” she said, slowly and seductively pulling up her shorts.

–

The conversation stayed on lighter topics for the rest of the day. Sophie had put Sol into a good mood, even if he felt awkward about the whole ordeal, and he didn’t want Sophie to feel bored or unappreciated. So he included her in all of his decision-making for the rest of the day, not that there was much of it. The rest of the trip to Corfu was thankfully uneventful. They were scheduled to dock the next day, in the late morning.

Later that afternoon, Sol told Sophie to send a message to Sheba from a non-static address: “Sunrise tomorrow will be a little after 6, though the temperature will remain relatively cool until at least 11.”

She got a response back: “What time is sunset?”

Sol told Sophie to send back: “Close to 7.”

She responded: “What will the temperature be at 9?”

Sol responded, through Sophie: “61.”

“What’s all that?” Sophie asked Sol.

“Its pretty rudimentary, actually” he explained. “I told her I’m getting in at 11 in the morning. She told me she’d meet me at 9 in the evening. And I told her that we’d meet at Dylan’s.”

“As in Bob Dylan, the 20th century folk singer? Highway 61?” Sophie asked.

“You’re so hot,” Sol told her.

Suddenly, the ship’s com started playing Tangled Up in Blue, an old Dylan song that Sol was familiar with. “You bet I am,” she said.

–

“My very first memory is on Independence,” Sophie explained to Sol as they disembarked the ship at the Corfu Space Station. “And I never left.”

“Welcome to your very first port of call, in that case,” Sol said, waving his hand as if to show off mountains, valleys, and cascading rivers. Instead, all that was in front of them was a very utilitarian looking security checkpoint. Ever since Corfu had been federalized, weapons were not permitted to be brought onto the station. That some of the locals were well-armed due to successful smuggling operations, including poorer locals who preyed upon unsuspecting tourists and businessmen, did nothing to deter the zealous feds.

Sol felt momentarily nervous as he watched Sophie walk through the security point. But she had assured him that Isle security checks were about the easiest thing in the galaxy to manipulate for a computer as advanced as her. Things closer to the core might be trickier, but the tech out here was pretty rudimentary. Sure enough, she made it through the check without anyone noticing her synthetic parts, or the fact that she was concealing two handguns in her leather jacket.

“So where are we going?” She asked Sol, once they got through.

“As if you don’t know the entire layout of this base...” Sol replied.

“Oh, I do. But since I’ve never been here, its all academic. I don’t know where the best hangouts are, where the bookstore is, or where I can buy a nice bathing suit.

Sol raised his eyebrows. “Bathing suit? Too bad we didn’t end up going to Kithira. There you could have gotten a bathing suit, and used it.”

Sophie screwed up her face. “There are swimming pools on several decks of this station, and tanning rooms.”

“Nothing beats a real beach. Certainly not a swimming pool,” Sol told her.

“Then I suppose you’ve been to Corfu Cove on deck 5,” she said, pouting for effect. “It has three pools, several water slides, a Jacuzzi, and a waterfall.”

“No. As a matter of fact, I haven’t,” he told her. “But I think exactly what we need right now is for you to buy a sexy bathing suit so that I can ogle you in public.”

“I can get a sexy bathing suit, and you don’t have to ogle. Besides, we have hours before we need to meet Sheba,” she argued.

“We have hours before I need to meet Sheba. You have other plans,” Sol reminded her.

“What were those again?” She asked, still pouting.

“A whole lot of anything other than meeting with Sheba,” Sol explained. Then he considered. “The truth is that your idea is as good as any, and its about the least suspicious thing we could do, particularly since we’re supposed to be on our way to Kithira for a family vacation. If anyone asks, I’m your uncle. I don’t know that I understand your arrangement with Doc, but I’m not actually old enough to be your dad unless I was sexually active in my mid-teens.”

“Were you?” she asked, biting her lower lip.

Sol ignored the question. “Ok, tell me what the nearest clothing store is that might have bathing suits. I guess we both need one.”

– One of these days, Sol would have enough money to really spoil Sophie, and maybe even himself. But getting a bathing suit and heading to Corfu Cove, whatever the fuck that was, would have to do for now, Sol told himself. He enjoyed watching Sophie get excited. She seemed to light up, if that was possible. She spared him a drawn-out shopping experience that other young women might have subjected him to. Maybe she just didn’t know that it was part of the program. Maybe she just thought about the world differently. She probably could figure out what she looked like in each bathing suit just by looking at it. Whatever the case, she ended up with a bright red bikini. Why go through the trouble of trying it on if you already know what its going to look like?

Instead, she walked into the store, took stock of the place, zeroed in on the red two-piece close to the back, walked directly to where it was shelved, quickly leafed through all of the sizes, and chose the one she wanted. It actually took Sol longer to find a bathing suit. He ended up going with a longer one that was decorated to look like fire. He might look like a douche, but walking around with Sophie would more than make up for it. Or maybe it would make it worse. He didn’t know, and was past caring.

The magic of Corfu was that it housed a little over a hundred thousand people, and everything was within walking distance thanks to the multi-level design. Corfu was one of the oldest space stations in this part of the galaxy, and so it still used the centrifugal force model of artificial gravity rather than any of the newer machines. It was shaped like a ring, and it turned on an axis, creating a sensation like gravity. The “highest” deck, Deck 5, was closer to the center of the ring than the “lowest” deck and was mostly for warehouse-like storage, hydroponics, and even farming. Since it was the closest deck to the center of rotation, the “gravity” there was not quite as strong as it was on the first deck, leading to a strange buoyant feeling. The signs at the entrance to Corfu Cove claimed that was a feature rather than a bug, but for Sol, it was slightly unnerving.

The Cove was mobbed. It was nothing like nearly any of the various water parks Sol had seen on any of the planets he’d visited. But for anybody growing up on a space station, this was about as good as it got. The jacuzzi was large enough to fit six people comfortably. The pools were made to look as if they were dug out of a rock quarry, but there was no covering up the synthetic look of the whole thing. A small cave had been built in one part of one of the pools - a favorite location of teenagers by the look of it. Several of them could be seen swimming in and out of the cave, some of them various unnatural shades. The fad of artificially pigmenting one’s skin had caught on about some years ago, and had never gone away. But, unless someone was willing to shell out a pretty serious amount of rezzies, it tended to look cheap and splotchy.

The slides were small, two-story affairs. But Sophie could not have been happier. She literally jumped for joy, and ran to one of the pools when they arrived and got changed. Most of the people here looked splotchy.

Sol went to the jacuzzi to sit and relax. The water smelled of chlorine, but it was hot, and there weren’t any kids sharing the pool. It felt good to sit and do nothing in the pool after all of the sitting and doing nothing aboard the ship. As he lay there with his eyes shut, he felt a small kick at the back of his head. When he opened his eyes and looked up, he saw Sophie staring back down at him. She was standing directly over him on the bank of the small pool, and leaning over, dripping cold water onto his head. The view was nearly indecent. Sol smirked at her.

“Come! There’s a slide!” She said.

“I’m perfectly fine here,” Sol told her. “In fact, stay right there,” he said.

“Perv,” she said. “You’re coming with me. Come on!” She said.

Sol begrudgingly left the comfort of the small pool and climbed up the ladder to the top of the slides. She motioned Sol to go first, and then she shot, head first, after him, landing on him in a heap at the bottom of the slide, laughing like a schoolgirl. Before letting Sol retire to the Jacuzzi, she and Sol had gone down the slide five times. One of the times, she went between his legs. She looked back and giggled while they went down the slide together. Sol enjoyed her goofy innocence.

After a couple of hours, they got back into their clothing, and headed down to the lower decks for something to eat. After that, they returned to the ship. “The smell of chlorine is overpowering,” she told Sol. “I’m going to take a shower. You should too before meeting your date.”

After Sophie got out of the shower, she put on some shorts and a feminine looking t-shirt. As she passed Sol in the hallway of the ship, she stopped him.

“Look. I wanted to thank you for going with me to the water park and having fun with me,” she said. “Its the first time I’ve done anything like that.”

“I had fun,” Sol said.

“I know. It was fun watching you laugh like that. There’s too much serious on this ship. We’re pirates. That’s supposed to be fun,” she said, grinning.” Speaking of which ... while you were sleeping in the jazuzzi, I met some people my age.” Sol arched his eyebrows. “I don’t mean three. Anyhow, they invited me to come with them tonight to some club.”

“I hope you didn’t give them my name,” she said.

“Relax. I’m actually pretty smart. I wouldn’t do that. They think my name is Crystal,” she explained. “So...”

“You want my permission to go?” Sol asked. “I’m not playing your dad or anything. You probably have better judgment than me. And you saved my ass once already. Just don’t do anything stupid. I figure if you get in trouble, you could probably make the fire alarm go off and drench the room with the sprinklers at least, not to mention that you’ll be packing heat.”

“I won’t be packing heat. But if I wanted to, I could stop this whole space station from rotating, and cut off its oxygen. I’m well protected,” she said.

“Now that’s the scariest thing I’ve ever heard. Have fun. I’m taking a shower. I’d appreciate it if you’d walk me through the security checkpoint on the way out. I’d like to take my gun with me. I don’t need help getting back into the ship. Other than that, enjoy the night.”

Not long thereafter, the pair slipped through security, undetected. If Sol needed to talk to Sophie, he could always get her on his com. Sophie, for her part, didn’t actually need a com. She was her own com, though she had a pin that hung onto her ear, with an inset speaker that played the part if she needed it to transfer bits or rezzies, or otherwise didn’t want to look suspicious.

Sol made his way to Dylan’s. He’d been there a few times. Each time, he was there to meet Sheba. Most space stations were waypoints for travelers, places to stop in order to rest, replace stores of water or fuel, or to get a drink and smoke. Corfu was one of the larger space station colonies in this part of the galaxy, and it was a whole lot more than a waypoint between the Inland systems and the Isles. It was cheap housing, a space slum that had traditionally been at the center of various unsundry and illegal activities. The feds had already begun a sweep of the station, forcing the houses of ill repute to go underground, so to speak. But they had done nothing to improve the conditions of those who lived here.

When it was built, it was a convenient place for those to live who would be participating in the preparation of the outer planets in the sector, what became the Isles. Many of the planets were inhospitable places for humans to live before they were properly terraformed. Many continued to be inhospitable - just less so. But as the outer planets became full of civilization, and even developed their own cultures, the space-maintenance people - initially employees of various government and quasi-private programs operating for the sake of “expanding human horizons,” - were left behind on Corfu. Rent was cheaper here than in many of the terraformed planets of the Isles. Many of the planets in the Isles were unable to produce agriculturally, so the trade routes from the inner planets to the Isles came through stations like Corfu, a hub of transportation, bearing everything a hostile planet could need to support life. In Corfu’s case, the closest major inhabited planet to it was Cepha, a poorer farming colony that was, by all accounts, poorly managed. Part of what that meant was that, by and large, the Isles planets interplanetary trade was heavily stunted licensing requirements. That made what Sol was doing profitable. It also made it illegal.

In that way, Corfu benefitted from the government’s policy of using the Isles planets as colonial enterprises – a policy that was not relegated to the Isles by any stretch. The outer rim formed a gigantic circle around the Inland systems. The Isles just had the dishonor of being first. Since the Isles planets purchased what they needed from the wealthier inner planets, rather than from each other, most trade was outed through Corfu.

As Sol’s righteous indignation reached its crescendo, his thoughts were interrupted by the sight of Dylan’s. It hadn’t changed. It never would. The dilapidated old pub served a handful of beers produced out in the Isles, to a one sold through Inland distributors, and even some “local” liquors. Sol avoided the latter like a plague. But most of its fare came from the same place everything else in Corfu came from: a handful of large distributors in the inner systems. Sheba was easy to spot. She was sitting in a little booth at the back of the bar.

Sheba had been one of the first people Sol got to know when he was stationed in Kithira during the short war between the federal government and several of the planets in the Isles. Seeing her brought back memories, as it always did. He and Doc had been drafted at the same time, and ended up stationed together in Kithira, a planet that wisely laid down arms before the conflict got hot. Sol had been assigned to provide support for armies stationed in Kithira, and in a few nearby bases. That meant a lot of long runs through space alone on an unarmed transport ship where he was fodder for pirates and rebels. Sol’s personal firearms were his own during those trips. The feds didn’t consider him important enough to arm. Those who were sent out to the Isles at that time tended to be, like the ships they piloted, expendable. And nothing was more expendable than a draftee in a space-truck, as it was called, lugging supplies. Thankfully for Sol, the war was short. The Isles were disorganized. The powerful interests who had led the colonization effort were well-connected to inland interests who had bought and paid for the federal Senate.

The feds didn’t even refer to it as a war. Sol had been sent, officially, to “aid in the quelling of the rebellion.” And the downtime in Kithira gave Sol a chance to get a sense of the local color. He and Doc, an engineer who had befriended Sol quickly after being shipped out, spent many a night about a mile from the base where party affiliation was left at the door. Separatists, loyalists, and don’t-give-a-shitists, drank together and enjoyed their mutual solitude from one another. The beer was good. The whores were better. And the feds paid Sol enough to keep him from deserting, or thinking about whether he was on the right side. Not much more than that though.

Sheba had been one of the waitresses in the bar. And when he met her, he thought that was all she was. It wasn’t until the “rebellion” was officially quelled that Sol and Sheba had an opportunity to talk about the life, the universe, and everything, that Sol and Sheba first got to talking about...

“What can I get you, sailor?” she asked him. It was her standard greeting. On Kithira, she always dressed like one of the locals - which is to say that she didn’t wear all that much. Off-world, she was incognito. So she was wearing a grey abaya, a one-piece dress that covered her from the top of her neck to her feet, and a blue headscarf. Her ebony face held a demure expression, despite her flirtatious advance. It was a common enough outfit, even this far out.

“Not tonight, Sheba. I’m paying. I narrowly escaped a fed on my way here, and it has me feeling generous,” he said.

“Careful with your generosity,” she said. “My business just took a major hit. And that usually means yours did too. Unless we can turn this into an opportunity, that is.”

“I figured you had an idea, or you wouldn’t have called me out here,” he said. “Give me a moment, and I’ll be back with our drinks.”

Sol found a Cephan ale he’d never heard of for himself. He got Sheba her usual: a Kithiran whiskey called “Monkey Satellite.” Long ago, Sol heard the story of how it got its name, and had forgotten it promptly. It tasted just fine, and the price was right. For now, anyhow. He gave the bartender his usual com-link for payment, but also slipped him the link details for a second, unauthorized link that only contained bits, authorizing a transfer of a healthy number of bits to the bartender directly. That would ensure that he’d get quick service, and would also guarantee that the staff would let anyone who was asking know that nobody matching Sol or Sheba’s description had stopped here.

“Thank you, captain,” she said, mocking him, when he returned with the drinks. She always called him something like that: captain, sailor, skipper, anything to glorify his role as a space-trucker. In a way, he’d never given it up. He’d just changed sides.

“Anything for the most beautiful lass in Corfu,” he said. She had a few years on him, one of the reasons she’d been in such a great position to employ his then limited talents for their mutual benefit a handful of years ago when he found himself on a federal base in Kithira without a job. But she had an ageless beauty that would follow her for decades, Sol was sure of it. Sheba winked at him as she took her drink.

“So,” Sol said, down to business, “what the fuck is going on?”

As they talked, waitresses in form-fitting outfits replaced their drinks when they ran out, and noted the refills on their coms.

“What we always knew would happen eventually. The feds are cracking down on unlicensed commerce. There’s a small rebellion forming in Panay, a newer colony in the outer rim, but about as far from the Isles as you can get. Its gotten pretty nasty. I’m sure you’ve seen some of the news stories.” Sol hadn’t, but he was familiar with it anyhow. “So the feds are using it to justify a general crackdown, even though nothing in the Isles is affected by Panay at all.”

Sol had never been to Panay, and had no desire to go. The feds had directed the creation of newer colonies much more carefully after the Isles had demonstrated their willingness to seek even nominal independence. So Panay was, through and through, a federal protectorate - something the Isles had never been. Still there were problems. The Isles went from technically independent (if in name only) to completely federalized nearly overnight, with a short lived “Confederacy” designed to create the illusion of independence before the axe came down. Even the Confederacy was largely directed from the top, a way to focus a new sense of nationalism into the colonial enterprise. It had failed, and the “rebellion” followed.

“The two guys who were arrested over the last couple of days...” Sol began.