The Year's Best Science Fiction 11

“Go on.”

He was firm and I obeyed. It had a touch like skin and was warm. It might have been part of someone’s fat stomach. I pushed my finger in, and the thing squeezed the finger gently with muscular contractions.

“It’s yours,” he announced.

I nearly fainted with horror. It strikes everyone that way until they realize how simple, harmless and useful free living tissue can be, and its many healing purposes. It embarrassed me to guess where the “consex” was to be located on my body, and my intuition was uncertain with equally embarrassing ignorance. But one only has to wear a consex a short while to realize how utterly natural it is, and how delightfully pleasant when in active use. It is a boon to lone explorers, astronauts, occupants of remote weather and defense stations, and so on.

“Don’t worry,” said the specialist as I drew back in disgust. “It’s no more horrible than the way you came into the world, or the parts each of your parents played in starting the process. In fact, it’s cleaner, more foolproof, and efficient, and far more satisfying than a woman. Thank heaven, without them we’d be overrun.”

I feared to do anything. He said,

“I’ll show you how it works. Don’t take it off for at least a week, not for any reason. See me at once if there is any discomfort. Later on, you may remove it for athletics, though you can do most things with it on—swimming, for instance. In the toilet it rolls up easily enough. But don’t disturb the suction or play around. It clings well if you leave it alone, and it’s very comfortable.”

He took me into a private cubicle, where I undressed and lay under a soft blanket. Then he brought the thing in on his hand and pulled the blanket back.

I held my breath. It was the worst moment of my life for fear, though not for pain.

“I’ve stimulated it a bit,” he said. “It’ll take over for you this time, but every time after that it’s up to you to make the first move, or nothing will happen. It’s very responsive. Now you must lie here half an hour until I let you go.”

He let it rest between my thighs, and it covered all those parts you never see on pictures of nudes except those in classical religious paintings. It was comfortable. It felt pleasant. This first time when the sexiatrist goes out and leaves one alone with one’s body and one’s consex and one’s private thoughts is the crucial one.

It was only pleasant sensation; I had not been given any warning. So I tolerated it. But at the same time I was disgusted at the smallness of sophisticated adult behavior. Hell, I thought, they take a lot for granted. But my curiosity overcame my dignity, and I did not rebel.

It was hardly over when I heard a conversation which startled me.

“Do you have a letter from your parents?” the sexiatrist was asking someone.

“No.”

“But you still refuse to have an appliance fitted?”

“Yes.”

“Well, I agree it is not compulsory. But you’ll have to give a very good reason for refusing. And without a letter from a doctor or parent or guardian we may not accept your reasons.”

“I’m a conscientious objector.”

“On what grounds? Do you realize what you’re letting yourself in for by refusing to wear a consex?”

“I don’t believe all the claims made for it,” he said, but feebly.

“You don’t even know them,” said the sexiatrist, condescendingly. “I’m quite sure of that. But surely you want to know what it’s all about first? Surely the subject fascinates you so that you are interested enough to desire the experience for a while?”

“No, sir. In principle.”

“In principle! What do you know about it? Tell me. What do you know about so vast a subject?”

“I don’t believe in the principles the welfare authorities base it on.”

“You don’t believe in them! You don’t believe them despite the fact that the government authorizes me to fit every boy and girl with an appropriate consex as soon as he or she reaches puberty. Every boy and girl in this population of over eighty million wears one—”

“Not every boy and girl.”

“All but one or two in a million, and those are mostly for health or mixed-sex reasons. They are approved by the R. M. A. and every major health, legal and educational authority in the country. Virtually all religious denominations have welcomed them. But you refuse.”

“Welcomed, sir? I don’t believe any of them.”

“I see. You don’t believe that this country is heavily overpopulated? You don’t believe that before consexes came out the years of adolescence were years of miserable misfits trying to adjust to a half-baked situation? And that boys slept promiscuously in spurious natural sexual relations, that girls had illegitimate babies sometimes from the earliest years it is possible to conceive, and that mere children contracted serious venereal diseases from these methods.

“You think you can do without all this. And what sort of substitute will you have? Tearing about on a rocket-scooter or getting drunk! Raping a woman or just stealing her handbag! And if and when you grow up . . .

“Did you know that there are ten million bachelors and the same number of spinsters in this country who have never been married nor had a so-called love affair but are sexually wholly satisfied and consummated? Did you?”

“It may have been in the papers, sir.”

“Tell me.” He spoke kindly and coaxingly for a moment. “Is it because you’ve picked up some little bad habit? It’s very common, nothing to be ashamed of. This thing will help you.”

“No, sir.”

“Come on now, man of principles. Square with me. Haven’t you? Are you sure you’ve never committed . . . well, self-abuse?”

“What, sir? I—I haven’t done anything wrong.”

“Come off it, lad. No one has ever never done anything wrong.”

“But I haven’t, sir.”

“Do your parents approve of your attitude?”

“I think so, sir.”

“You think so? That’s not good enough. Now come on. Be a good chap and let us fit you a consex. It’s much nicer than natural sex or any of that. You don’t want to be the odd man out, do you?”

“No, sir—”

“Good. All right, then. Nurse, he’s accepted after all. Get it out, will you.”

“No, I haven’t, sir. No!”

“I am an authority on this, lad. You mean to say you still haven’t accepted that the government knows what is best for the nation after all I’ve told you?”

“I haven’t, sir, no. It’s not the government—”

“You haven’t? But I thought just now you said you had.”

“I didn’t want to be the odd man out; but I can’t wear one of these.”

“Then you will be the odd man out, won’t you? What d’you mean, you can’t? Come into the laboratory and let me show you.”

There was silence then for nearly half an hour. Now I know what one of those laboratories looks like, I can imagine the sexiatrist taking him round, telling him to peer into a microscope and see tiny microbes swiveling about in plasma, showing him charts of the amino acids, the blood-types, the cell-types, the skin-types, etcetera, pulling out samples for quick-fire experiments, and showing him a few easily digested examples of living tissues artificially made for various purposes. Then the door opened and in they came.

“Well, what did you think of it?”

“Very interesting, sir.”

“Impressive, wasn’t it? Wasn’t it!”

“Yes, sir.”

“Now what do you say? It’s up to you. You have some idea how it works now, and you’re not afraid any longer, I hope.”

“No, sir.”

“You’ll consider it.”

“I am considering it, sir.”