Robert Silverberg: Thorns

“So pitiful. So much in need of help. What do you think of his gift?”

“We had a deal,” Lona said. “I took care of Minner, you got me some of my babies. I don’t want to talk about Melangio.”

“You broke up with Burris sooner than I had expected,” said Chalk. “I haven’t completed all the arrangements concerning your children.”

“You’re going to get them for me?”

“In a short while. But not quite yet. This is a difficult negotiation, even for me. Lona, will you oblige me while you’re waiting for the children? Help David, the way you helped Burris. Bring some light into his life. I’d like to see the two of you together. A warm, maternal person like you—”

“This is a trick, isn’t it?” she said suddenly. “You’ll play with me forever! One zombi after another for me to cuddle! Burris, Melangio, and then who knows what next? No. No. We made a deal. I want my babies. I want my babies.”

Sonic dampers were whirring to cut down the impact of her shouts. Chalk looked startled. Somehow he appeared both pleased and angered at once by this show of spirit. His body seemed to puff and expand until he weighed a million pounds.

“You cheated me,” she said, quieter now. “You never meant to give them back to me!”

She leaped. She would scrape gobbets of flesh from the fat face.

From the ceiling, instantly, descended a fine mesh of golden threads. Lona hit it, rebounded, surged forward again. She could not reach Chalk. He was shielded.

Nikolaides, d’Amore. They seized her arms. She lashed out with her weighted shoes.

“She’s overwrought,” said Chalk. “She needs calming.”

Something stung her left thigh. She sagged and was still.

He was growing weary of Titan. He had taken to the icy moon as to a drug after Lona’s departure. But now he was numb. Nothing Aoudad could say or do … or get for him … would keep him here any longer.

Elise lay naked beside him. High overhead, the Frozen Waterfall hung in motionless cascade. They had rented their own power-sled and had come out by themselves, to park at the glacier’s mouth and make love by the glimmer of Saturnlight on frozen ammonia.

“Are you sorry I came here to you, Minner?” she asked.

“Yes.” He could be blunt with her.

“Still miss her? You didn’t need her.”

“I hurt her. Needlessly.”

“And what did she do to you?”

“I don’t want to talk about her with you.” He sat up and put his hands on the controls of the sled. Elise sat up, too, pressing her flesh against him. In this strange light she looked whiter than ever. Did she have blood in that plump body? She was white as death. He started the sled, and it crawled slowly along the edge of the glacier, heading away from the dome. Pools of methane lay here and there. Burris said, “Would you object if I opened the roof of the sled, Elise?”

“We’d die.” She didn’t sound worried.

“You’d die. I’m not sure I would. How do I know this body can’t breathe methane?”

“It isn’t likely.” She stretched, voluptuously, languidly. “Where are you going?”

“Sight-seeing.”

“It might not be safe here. You might break through the ice.”

“Then we’d die. It would be restful, Elise.”

The sled hit a crunching tongue of new ice. It bounced slightly, and so did Elise. Idly Burris watched the quiver ripple its way all through her abundant flesh. She had been with him a week now. Aoudad had produced her. There was much to be said for her voluptuousness, little for her soul. Burris wondered if poor Prolisse had known what sort of wife he had taken.

She touched his skin. She was always touching him, as if reveling in the wrongness of his texture. “Love me again,” she said.

“Not now. Elise, what do you desire in me?”

“All of you.”

“There’s a universe full of men who can keep you happy in bed. What in particular do I have for you?”

“The Manipool changes.”

“You love me for the way I look?”

“I love you because you’re unusual.”

“What about blind men? One-eyed men? Hunchbacks? Men with no noses?”

“There aren’t any. Everyone gets a prosthetic now. Everyone’s perfect.”

“Except me.”

“Yes. Except you.” Her nails dug into his skin. “I can’t scratch you. I can’t make you sweat. I can’t even look at you without feeling a little queasy. That’s what I desire in you.”

“Queasiness?”

“You’re being silly.”

“You’re a masochist, Elise. You want to grovel. You pick the weirdest thing in the system and throw yourself at him and call it love, but it isn’t love, it isn’t even sex, it’s just self-torture. Right?”

She looked at him queerly.

“You like to be hurt,” he said. He put his hand over one of her breasts, spreading the fingers wide to encompass all the soft, warm bulk of it. Then he closed his hand. Elise winced. Her delicate nostrils flared and her eyes began to tear. But she said nothing as he squeezed. Her respiration grew more intense; it seemed to him that he could feel the thunder of her heart. She would absorb any quantity of this pain without a whimper, even if he tore the white globe of flesh from her body entirely. When he released her, there were six white imprints against the whiteness of her flesh. In a moment they began to turn red. She looked like a tigress about to spring. Above them, the Frozen Waterfall rushed downward in eternal stillness. Would it begin to flow? Would Saturn drop from the heavens and brush Titan with his whirling rings?

“I’m leaving for Earth tomorrow,” he told her.

She lay back. Her body was receptive. “Make love to me, Minner.”

“I’m going back alone. To look for Lona.”

“You don’t need her. Stop trying to annoy me.” She tugged at him. “Lie down beside me. I want to look at Saturn again while you have me.”

He ran his hand along the silkiness of her. Her eyes glittered. He whispered, “Let’s get out of the sled. Let’s run naked to that lake and swim in it.”

Methane clouds puffed about them. The temperature outside would make Antarctica in winter seem tropical. Would they die first from freezing, or from the poison in their lungs? They’d never reach the lake. He saw them sprawled on the snowy dune, white on white, rigid as marble. He’d last longer than she would, holding his breath as she toppled and fell, as she flopped about, flesh caressed by the hydrocarbon bath. But he wouldn’t last long.

“Yes!” she cried. “We’ll swim! And afterward we’ll make love beside the lake!”

She reached for the control that would lift the transparent roof of the sled. Burris admired the tension and play of her muscles as her arm stretched toward it, as her hand extended itself, as ligaments and tendons functioned beautifully under the smooth skin from wrist to ankle. One leg was folded up underneath her, the other nicely thrust forward to echo the line of her arm. Her breasts were drawn upward; her throat, which had a tendency toward loose flesh, was now taut. Altogether she was a handsome sight. She needed only to twist a lever and the roof would spring back, exposing them to the virulent atmosphere of Titan. Her slender fingers were on the lever. Burris ceased to contemplate her. He clamped his hand on her arm even as her muscles were tensing, pulled her away, hurled her back on the couch. She landed in a wanton way. As she sat up, he slapped her across the lips. Blood trickled to her chin and her eyes sparkled in pleasure. He hit her again, chopping blows that made the flesh of her leap about. She panted. She clutched at him. The odor of lust assailed his nostrils.

He hit her one more time. Then, realizing he was giving her only what she wanted, he moved away from her and tossed her her discarded breathing-suit.