Her deep-blue eyes had a cold clearness that seemed to mask a longing desire, her curly blond hair tumbled down past her shoulders to just barely cover the full swell of her breasts. She stood before him naked and inviting.
" Ahh, my child, do you understand what I'm saying?"
She nodded and smiled.
"My name is Dr. Croce. Ahh, well now, you see, being of the medical profession my training requires that I must inquire into your obvious state of excellent health. Do you understand me?"
She nodded again.
"Good, my ahh… dear." He moved forward and touched her lightly on the shoulder. "Would you mind if I perhaps examined you a little more closely?… "
"Richard, you pig!" Ellen pushed forward to stand be tween the girl and the medico.
" Ahh, yes, I've heard of that word, 'pig'." The voice was cold and chilling. Ian turned and found himself look ing into a set of cold dark eyes. He stepped back as half a dozen women floated out from a side corridor. They were dressed like their comrade, but the business ends of six antique pistols were enough to convince him that he shouldn't ask questions about their choices in fashion.
"You see, sisters," the cold-voiced woman said, "it's as we've learned. His first thought was that of exploita tion."
"I can explain…" To those unfamiliar with him, Rich ard's voice sounded solemn and professional, but Ian could detect the fear in it.
"Ah, now the pig will explain. That's always the case."
"You were right, Diana," the blond woman replied, " the trap was almost too simple."
"Say, Ian, what the hell is going on over there?"
"Secure the airlock against entry, Stasz!" Ian shouted, but before he could say another word the cold-eyed woman held a small box against his neck. A numbing shock knocked him over. He was still conscious, but incapable of moving.
"Thank you, sister, I've been waiting for this liberation ever since I was assigned to these men. Please let me knock the other one down."
Ian recognized the last speaker as Ellen! Well, of all the gratitude, he thought sadly as two women hauled him away. At least, he thought philosophically, I'm still conscious and capable of enjoying the view.
"How long do you think it's been?" Ian asked.
"Don't know-a day, maybe a day and a half," Richard replied wearily. "Their time measurement is radically different from ours, so it's hard to tell."
"I wish they'd give my clothes back." Ian felt ridiculous sitting naked in a bare cubicle alongside the equally overweight and equally naked doctor.
Richard started to chuckle.
"Damn it, I don't see anything funny! What the hell are you laughing at?"
"I never thought the two of us would be paraded before ten thousand naked women and extolled as examples of manhood. Think of it, Ian, ten thousand women seeing a man for the first time, and it had to be us. Imagine what fantasies they'll have about us afterward."
"Fantasies my bare ass," Ian grumbled as a key clicked in the door. It was time for another examination session.
"Sisters, our two specimens here are evidence of just how degenerate the male of the species truly is. Thank our grandsisters for liberating us from that." Diana pointed with contempt at Ian and Richard. Murmurs of agreement arose from the several hundred women gathered in the lecture hall to attend what Diana said would be an "in teractive examination of the subspecies male."
As Diana gazed at him in contempt, Richard tried a weak smile. Ian scanned the audience and found to his amazement that after several days of seeing naked female flesh in every form and shape, the initial excitement was wearing thin. Oh, to be sure, an occasional woman caught his eye, but given his current situation, tied and spreadeagled on an examination table, he felt it best not to let his gaze linger on any particular attraction.
But he did notice Ellen and Shelley sitting in the front row and made eye contact with both of them. Taking a closer look at Ellen, he almost started to laugh as she positioned her body in a desperate attempt to cover all areas of interest. But Shelley was another story. She sat back in what could only be considered an attempt at dis play and regarded him with a cool look of playful invitation. In desperation he quickly looked away. Good lord, that woman was torturing him!
"Sisters," Diana said, interrupting his thoughts, "we've had our opportunity to examine these creatures both physically and mentally. Now, in yet another demonstration of our liberated society, I think it is only correct that we allow them to show their own masculine weaknesses by giving them the opportunity to question us in turn.
"Go ahead, ask us anything," Diana said with scorn, "anything at all,"
Ian and Richard were silent.
"Are you afraid, too?"
"Understand I am a doctor," Richard said, attempting to sound authoritative, " so this is only a question out of my professional curiosity."
"Go on, Doctor," Diana hissed. "We already saw a display of your professional interest in Sister Carrie." She nodded toward the willowy blonde from their first en counter.
"All right then. As I understand it, you are a feminist group that holds all men in contempt."
"Correct, and in fact the only logical thing any normal woman would do."
"Second, in the thousand years since you've left Earth you've used only X-chromosome sperm to create more women."
"As is only proper, you see, Doctor. With our huge bank of edited sperm we've eliminated the need for men and for that-how shall I say? — function you once pro vided."
"I see." Richard was trying to look professional, and Ian almost found himself laughing at the naked doctor trying to stare down his disdainful audience.
"Then what do you do for, ah, recreation?"
"Do you mean sexual gratification, Doctor?"
"Yes. I mean, after all, ladies, without any men around…" And his voice trailed off.
Angry mutterings could be heard in the crowd.
"Why doctor, I'll satisfy your disgusting prurient in terest, which we realize all men naturally harbor. Doctor, we simply find our necessary gratification in each other."
"Good lord, I've died and gone to heaven," Richard muttered.
"What was that?"
"Nothing, nothing at all.
"Now, I'm a healthy man, not past my prime," Richard said in reply. "Don't you think some of you ladies-say you, Carrie, or even you, Diana-aren't you curious just to see what it might be like with a man?"
The audience chamber exploded in outraged shouts of disgust. A torrent of abuse showered down on the two, so that for some minutes Ian feared that they were about to be lynched by a thoroughly incensed mob.
"Keep your damn mouth shut," Ian hissed, "or so help me…"
"So help you, what?"
"I don't know, but so help me something."
Suddenly Ellen was up and pointing at Richard. "That's what I've had to put up with," she shouted. "It's still that way back on Earth! Thank you, oh, thank you for saving me." She started to cry, and Carrie hurried to embrace her.
"Traitor!" Richard shouted. "You didn't act exploited when you were trying to get into Stasz's pants."
Outraged howls roared over the crowd as, sobbing hys terically, Ellen was escorted from the room by Carrie.
"Just shut up, Richard," Ian begged, "otherwise I'll strangle you the first chance I get."
"See, sisters, see the natural aggressiveness coming out, even between two so-called friends."
The two prisoners fell silent, and eventually the out raged women calmed down.
"You, Lacklin," Diana asked, " do you have any ques tions?"
In spite of his sense of absurdity, Ian couldn't help but approach the situation as an historian. He felt that he might even have been participating in a historical first- the first interview by a historian in deep space while naked in front of three hundred naked women.