Chapter 1: The Final Party

I stood with Jade watching the men in their suits and the other women in their evening gowns mill about the room. Once again I found myself cursing the decision I had made two years before to marry Radov Dragovic. If he was not pulling maids into closets for a quick screw, he was dragging me to these society events where I was expected to show up and display myself as a proper and loyal trophy wife.

If tonight was the opening of a new symphony concert or Broadway show I would not mind, but since the showing of Average Joes, Radi’s investment banking firm had been struggling to maintain clients. So this gala party in Las Vegas for top performing employees was our first journey out of Radi’s decaying mansion in months. The only thing making it bearable was passing though the receiving line and finding Jade holding onto the arm of one of the VPs.

Once the formalities had completed, I had hunted down my old friend to chat with as we watched the men all gather around the two bars in the place and the women filter off into several groups.

“Do they always do that?” Jade asked me as we watched several of the older women staring at another cluster of women with undisguised scorn.

I glanced over and then nodded. “Yes. The ringleader over there is Agatha Dawkins. She’s the graying lady on the right in the white gown and the pearl necklace. She’s married to the company president and has made it her life’s work to make the trophy wives of the younger partners miserable. Especially if they don’t dress or act elegantly enough.”

Jade coughed for a moment and gave me a look. I had my blond hair up in a neat bun to keep it out of the way and was wearing a flowing sky blue gown, which almost came down to my ankles. Only the long slit up the left leg of the gown and the three-inch heels I was wearing gave any indication that I was just as much a trophy wife as the girls being ridiculed by Agatha.

“Um...” Jade said starting to ask a question.

I sighed. “I actually don’t dress like this to keep Agatha off my back. I caught Radov over there tumbling a maid in one of the bedrooms almost a year ago. What he didn’t know was that two days before that I had overheard the maid talking about how she had just started treatments for the clap. Since then I have refused to touch him, and the gown is a way to insure he doesn’t look too closely at me.”

Jade nodded. “Remember Stormy? I ran into her at a diner about a month ago. She’s got HIV now. One of her johns forced her to have sex without a condom and gave it to her.”

“God,” I said with a sigh. “How many of us are left?” I thought back to the summer just over three years ago when I ran away from home and traveled to Los Angeles thinking to make my fortune in movies. I soon found myself nearly broke and working in a strip club called The Pink Poodle to make ends meet. There I had met Jade, Stormy and four other girls. I had formed friendships with each of them as we watched out for each other.

However, I did not stay a stripper for very long. One day Radov had come in and asked me to be his escort at some film premiere that evening. The end result of that date was I moved back to Saint Louis with him as his newly wedded wife and slowly lost track of my friends as they also left Los Angeles and sought their fortunes elsewhere.

Jade shrugged. “It’s just you and me now, Savannah, and you left the business when you met Radov. I’m still escorting for a living.”

I nodded and put a gentle hand on her shoulder, while trying to hide a smile. Only Jade and Radov remembered my stripper name, and from Jade it was a term of endearment. I decided to get her back and smiled. “Well, Mary, I told you before that I was willing to help you start over.”

Jade smacked me on the arm and giggled. She seemed about to say more when the door to the kitchen of opened and a number of white-coated men and women filed into the room lining up against the wall. I was trying to figure out what was happening, when the main doors to the room closed with a bang.

Jade and I turned to look and saw two huge men standing in front of the now closed doors. I remembered back to one day shortly after the football season started that a USC running back had brought the starting offensive line to the strip club as a motivational ploy. These two men looked every bit as tall as the linemen Jade and I encountered that day, only these men looked to be much more heavily muscled. I was trying to figure out what was happening when a gray field covered the doorway and one of the men shouted.

“Thank you everyone for the cooperation you gave in helping close off this room. Now, this is a Confederacy pick up, and if you haven’t heard the story of how this works by now, you can spend the next twenty minutes lying on the ground after we use a stinger on you. Corporal Whitman, call out the names of the volunteers please.”

“Sir!” another voice responded. “The following people are in the room and have volunteered, please step forward when you hear me call out your name!” The conversations in the room stopped and everyone looked around anxiously.

“Carlos De Gama!” I watched as one of the white-coated figures stepped forward. The man smiled as he looked over at one of the waitresses.

“Guisippe Zamboni!” Another chef stepped forward; this time he started walking directly towards the large figures. The one speaking continued to scan the room as the other reached into a bag and pulled out some device I had never seen before.

“Christopher Will!” This time I recognized the name and looked around. I saw Chris step out from a group of the firm’s partners. He was smiling and quickly walked over to the non-speaking marine, who whispered something to him.

“Who is he?” Jade asked me quietly.

“He’s a mathematical wizard who works out of the Saint Louis office for Radi. The only reason I’m here is because Chris was good enough to make even my stupid husband look good. The company invited only the top three managing directors, and Chris did such a great job trading that his efforts made the Saint Louis office the top in the company this year, so Radi got an invite, despite doing nothing at work. I stopped visiting his office because he spent all his time and energy chasing his secretary around the office, and she’s nearly forty. But Radi convinced her that he had the CAP to volunteer. I knew better though,” I whispered back. Jade giggled at my comment and we watched two more people join the small group around the marines. The one speaking seemed to be about done and then spoke one more time.

“One more, Tanya Dragovic!”

I reached under the slit in my dress to pull out the small wallet I had slipped under a garter before I had left the hotel room for the party. “It’s Walker!” I called back. “My ex-husband can keep his family name on Earth!”

“Savannah!” Jade screamed in my ear. I pulled my CAP card from the sleeve in the wallet where I had hidden it for nearly three years and turned it so she could see the six point eight score on it.

Jade hugged me with joy and I whispered in her ear as Radov started walking over towards me. “I hope this means you are coming along as my companion and lover.”

Jade gasped just as my husband reached us and raised a hand to slap me. “You’re my wife and you are taking me with you! And what were you doing hiding your score from me?” he growled.

I looked down on my husband. He liked to think of himself as a big man, as he stood about five foot ten, but at six foot two and wearing three-inch heels I towered over him. He stood there glaring up at me silently until I shrugged. “You didn’t know my score because I never was going to take you with me. Now unless you want to embarrass yourself further why don’t you return to your friends and commiserate at how terrible it is that your company is losing another of your math geniuses to a pickup.”

Radov’s hand swung forward, but before it could reach my face a loud chirp broke through the background noise in the room and my ex-husband dropped to the ground. I looked up to see the corporal who had announced the names walking forward and holding some pistol like device. He smiled when he reached me and pulled a small box from one of his pockets. “I’m guessing you didn’t want him to slap you,” he said as he held the box out to me. “Now this is a CAP card reader, it can see the sub-scores that were compiled to obtain the score everyone sees. You are Tanya ... Walker and have a six point eight, correct?”

I nodded. “I was Tanya Walker when I tested. I wasn’t aware your system kept track of name changes so I was a bit surprised to hear you call for Tanya Dragovic. But I only took the last name because Radi demanded it, and since he’s not coming, I can go back to my maiden name.”

The marine laughed and looked back towards his partner. The other five volunteers had obviously received some instruction because they were shouting to the gathered crowd and I could see a few women moving to remove their evening gowns. I had to giggle when I noticed that Agatha had already thrown her gown at her husband and was giving one of the two chefs a blowjob. The woman was nearing fifty, but she loved to tell everyone that she still bled monthly and obviously she was hoping to escape the Sa’arm.

Just then an argument broke out among the men as Agatha’s husband tried to rush the volunteer receiving the blowjob only to be held back by one of the company vice-presidents. This attracted the attention of the marine and Jade grabbed my head to hiss in my ear. “Did you mean it?”

I gently pushed her hands away and turned to look at her. “Mean what?” I was smiling as I said it and Jade surprised me by grabbing my head and pulling me in for a long kiss.

As she released me from the kiss, Jade glared at me for a moment and then giggled. “I should have remembered your habit of answering questions like that with a question. Was your offer for me to go with you real?”

I laughed. “Well, I do hope you have your card because without that my offer can’t be real, but don’t you remember the promises we all made back at the Poodle? We promised to always look out for each other. I can’t do that if you are on Earth and I’m off in space fighting the Sa’arm.”

Jade blushed. “But ... I’ve never been intimate with a woman. The closest I came was a couple of makeout sessions Stormy and I did for a couple of johns over a year ago.”

I returned her blush with one of my own. “I must admit I have had a female lover for the last year. One of the maids Radov employed was a very enthusiastic lover of women, and her favorite hobby was flirting with me. After I caught Radi fucking the one maid, I decided to see if her flirting was just in fun or if she really found me attractive. Let’s just say I discovered that her advances were very sincere.”

Jade giggled. “Oh, I can just guess how much you blushed the first time she kissed you; back at the club you always hesitated to accept anyone’s advances. So how does it compare to sex with a man? Which is better?”

I sighed and looked down at my ex-husband’s body as it lay there still recovering from the effects of the stinger. “Her lips and toys touched me and pleased me more than any man’s touches have. I know that women in the Confederacy will be expected to get pregnant, but if I have a choice I prefer women now,” I whispered.

Jade gasped. “But you were...”

I nodded. “I told you all that I was the senior class punchboard at my high school. Sex was always just a game to me, that’s why it was so easy to accept Radov’s proposal, even when I knew he wouldn’t stay true. It got me noticed, and I even was offered a few modeling jobs because of it.”

Jade giggled. “Yeah, Miss Hawaiian Tropic Saint Louis and an appearance in Maxim for being the wife of one of the few remaining hedge traders in the nation.”

I looked at my old friend. “You knew?”

Jade blushed and looked down. To my surprise she nodded slightly. “I masturbated to them,” she whispered. “I’ve grown sick of the touch of men. When I heard your company was having this gala, I begged my escort agency to guarantee that I’d be one of the girls assigned once calls came to them for the bachelors. I wanted to see you. I didn’t know that you weren’t sure about being invited though.”

I felt my right eyebrow rise. “Just to see me?” I asked.

Jade blushed deeper red. “I wanted...” she stopped and fidgeted while looking the floor.

A huge laugh burst forth from my chest and I threw my arms around Jade. “Well, you have me, now we do need to select another before we can leave.”

Jade returned my embrace and I felt tears fall from her eyes to hit my shoulder. “What if I don’t want any men either? What do we do then?” she asked.

I looked up to find the marine corporal standing nearby and quietly watching the orgy being run by the male volunteers. One of the tricks I learned as Radov’s escort at so many parties was how to remember names and I confidently called out to him. “Corporal Whitman, can I ask you a question?”

The man walked over to Jade and I and smiled as he saw Jade take my hand. “How can I help you?” he asked. “You really should get closer to the fun. It’s the only way to find who might be willing to follow orders once you are in space.”

“Actually, I wanted to know about the rules on who I can select. I’ve heard that concubines are expected to get pregnant, but...” I temporized.

The Corporal glanced over at Jade who was looking at the floor and laughed. “You don’t want a man in your pod all the time. Well, I have good news and bad news for you.”

“Oh?” I said as Jade gave my hand a squeeze.

The man nodded. “You can select any concubines you wish. If you want to take two girls you can. That is the good news. However, the bad news is that you are correct that female concubines are expected to get pregnant. There is no set schedule, but most sponsors get all of their female concubines pregnant with their first child during the week after pickup. Since most households spend a month together in a pod, it tends to happen that way.”

I took a deep breath and then let it out slowly. I turned to look at Jade. “What do you say Jade? Shall we select another woman and then look for a few volunteers to solve the pregnancy issue? I agree with you, I don’t think a man is what we want.”

Jade nodded. “I just hope we don’t have to keep inviting men all the time just to get pregnant. I enjoy sex, hell I have to or I wouldn’t have spent two years as an escort. But, I want to fall asleep in your arms every night.”

The Corporal laughed. “Well, I have one more piece of news for you then. The Confederacy’s medical technology pretty much guarantees that you can control when you get pregnant. When you arrive, you’ll go through a medical screening, where the AI looks for any diseases or medical conditions. Just about every woman who goes through that screening gets pregnant the next time she has sex unless their sponsor requests temporary sterility for the woman. Just make sure you ask the AI to spike their fertility and you’ll only need to share them with one man.”

Jade blushed and looked at the corporal. “Um ... can I ask if your organ has the same heroic proportions as the rest of you?”

To my surprise the man started laughing. “Oh, that is cheeky.” He glanced at me and winked. “Just a little warning, watch the tongue on your concubine, lots of Confederacy marines are just a touch sensitive about some things, and angering them isn’t a good idea. However, I’ll have you know that while I’m not petite, I did not take the enhancements necessary to claim that horses have less between their legs.”