Chapter 5

"THE WRONG PEOPLE!?! WHAT DO YOU MEAN?"

"Please, Lone Ranger! There is no need to shout! What I mean is that none of the 3 people you snatched is the supreme leader of the Reglaz. You managed to capture 3 of his wives who happened to have been chosen to spend the night with him."

"THREE OF HIS WIVES? Oh, sorry. How many wives does he have?"

"Just a minute ... They don't know. They had just arrived at the palace and had no opportunity to meet any of the others."

"Oh, well, forget that for now. How did we happen to miss the supreme leader?"

"He had just gotten out of bed to visit the bathroom to relieve his bladder when you attacked. The wives assume that he hid in the bathroom until you left. The supreme leader is somewhat elderly and often needs to visit the bathroom in the middle of the night. These new wives had been warned of this and were told not to make an issue of it. It seems that he is somewhat sensitive on the subject."

"OK, what do we do now? Please, ask the wives if we can ransom them to get the supreme leader to negotiate."

"They say that is very unlikely. The supreme leader goes through 3 new wives per night. He only uses them once and discards them. I don't know for sure, but I suspect that he is often impotent, but doesn't want the word to get out. I would not be surprised if he had any of those wives he could not penetrate killed so that they could not leak his secret. Of course, I have no proof of this, but it fits the psychological profile of a 'supreme leader.'"

"Please ask the wives their opinion of your conjecture. That information might be useful."

"OK, one minute, please ... All three wives fainted when I asked them about it. To me, that is a pretty good indication that I am correct in my assumption ... Wait, one of them is waking up ... She says that he was unsuccessful in penetrating any of the three last night, so she would guess that all three of the females are on some sort of death list."

"Please ask them how they were chosen to be his wives. That information might be useful."

"They were chosen in some sort of space-wide lottery. All virgins above a certain age are required to participate. The prize is a night with the supreme leader and a life of perpetual luxury after that. There are even more rewards if they should become pregnant. She said that they were 3 of the 'lucky' winners from her planet. She said that 90 virgins are selected at one time from a particular planet and shipped to to Reglazia to await the call to service. The lottery rotates among the planets, so the supreme leader never runs out of prospects."

"That gives me an idea. Papoose, what do you project would happen if we made public your projections of the result of the lottery and the fate of the females?"

"I would need some time to work out the projections. Please wait ... I have a tentative projection. My estimate of the situation is that there would be widespread discord among the families of the people whose daughters were lost to the clutches of the lottery. There could even be open rebellion. That could be the lever we need to extract concessions from the supreme leader. I think that you have an excellent idea!"

"Please discuss the projection with the three females and get their opinions. It might be worthwhile to raid the compound where the survivors are kept."

"OK, this could take a while. The three females are still quite upset. I'll get back to you when I have something to report."

"Thank you. Call me whenever you have any conclusions."

All of the other members of the team had heard the conversation between Zeke and Papoose, so they were up to date on the situation. Xylo agreed that this discovery could be the straw to break the back of the Reglaz empire. He was sure that, if nothing else, a great propaganda coup could be made from what they already knew. Interviews with survivors of a night with the supreme leader should be even more useful. Xylo said, "Tonto, can you scan the compound where the used females are kept? Furthermore, can you get us some data on any resulting children?"

"I'll see what I can do. Please give me a few minutes ... Ah, there they are. People, this is a wonderful stroke of luck for us! There are no restrictions on my access to the used females. Should I try to pick up one or two?"

There was an immediate chorus of voices urging Tonto to snatch a couple of the females for questioning. Tonto transported 2 of the females to one of the larger compartments and begin questioning them. Tonto talked to them for nearly 2 hours before reporting back to the group. "The situation is worse for these females than we could have imagined. They are held in virtual slavery in a brothel for the employees of the palace. At one time, anyone who became pregnant by an employee was simply killed, but there have been so few replacements lately that the child is murdered at birth and the female is returned to service. The promised life of luxury is a hoax. The females have no way to contact the outside world, so there is no way to get their story out. These two females would love to be able to exact revenge on the supreme leader and his government! Furthermore, they are sure that all of the other females in the brothel would be overjoyed to help us."

"How many are there, Tonto. Do we have enough room to transport them all to Silver? I don't like the idea of taking some of them, but not all. This could cause trouble for those left behind."

"Yes, we could squeeze them all in, though it would be crowded."

"OK, in that case, transport them all on board as soon as possible. That should give our friends down below something to worry about. A few sleepless nights wouldn't hurt them."

"I'll have them all aboard in about 20 seconds. Please stand by."

"Lone Ranger, they are now all aboard. Urlitz, the most senior of the females would like to speak to you. I will relay the conversation and translate, since you have no common language."

"Thank you, Tonto. Please go ahead at your convenience."

"Hello, Lone Ranger, sir. We are very grateful that you have rescued us from a miserable life. We would all like an opportunity to take revenge on those beasts who have so mistreated us. We will help you in anyway that we can. Just tell us what we can do for you."

"Hello, Urlitz. Welcome to the Silver. We are glad to have you aboard. I'm not sure, yet, just what you can do to help, but I know that we can work something out. In the meantime, ask Tonto if you need anything."

"Thank you, Lone Ranger, sir. Can we see you? We would like to know what our benefactor looks like."

"Sure, I don't mind. But are you certain that you can stand the shock of seeing a being so different from you? I don't want to frighten you, and you may consider me to be too ugly for you to look at."

"Oh, I'm not worried about that. We've seen some pretty ugly things in our time. I'll work out with Tonto a schedule that will be convenient for you. Until then, thank you, again, and goodbye for now."

Zeke consulted with Xylo and the others about what to do to exploit the windfall offered by the Raglez female sex slaves. Xylo counseled a mighty blast in the media about the fate of the lottery "winners" through interviews with the escaped slaves. He said that the propaganda should also include advice about not answering the call if a female was picked as a "winner." Tonto said that he would be able to break in on any radio or TV broadcast with taped interviews; all they needed were the interviews.

They decided that Tonto would generate a hologram of a Raglez male to conduct the interviews. Each female would be interviewed alone, after that they could decide whether or not they wanted group interviews. Since there would be plenty of opportunity to edit the tapes, they would not script the interviews, but let them free wheel to see where that led. If necessary, they could always fall back on scripts.