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to get out, to get anywhere but here.
It was still going to be damned tough. The only saving grace was that it
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should be easier with a loopy and tough evangelist than with a Navy cruiser
or, worst case of all, some of his old comrades. Friendships died awful easy
when you had the goods. A lot of his friends had died pitifully easy at his
hand for those very same goods, in this case a piece of information.
Follow me, you two, he said into the controller. Walk behind me but walk
where I walk and stop or turn when I turn.
He walked over to one of the lower cubicles, one on the end of the big row,
and they followed him dutifully, unable to do much else.
For the next hour, the Captain prepared them. He was used to giving orders to
subordinates to carry out, yet here he did not wish to relinquish the control
rod at all and thus he was an active overseer.
The quarters were more like those of an officer aboard a ship than a real
home, but the unit actually had running water and a small sit-down sort of
ship s shower installed. He had the male slave lather and wash her completely
off, and then she him, and, lastly, she also was commanded to do the Captain.
He was a bit more imaginative at that point than she d expected, and Eve
feared that this was where he was going to go into her. He didn t, but he did
force some oral acts that she found repugnant even as she did as ordered.
After, he fed both of them from a private stock that apparently came from far
on the eastern side of the continent, but which was very well preserved. They
were tubular fruit and a kind of thick gruel in a bowl eaten with a spoon, but
they appeared to be sufficiently nutritious, washed down with a blend of some
sort that was thick but filling and also quenched thirst. He clearly wanted
them well prepared for whatever he intended to do.
Eve felt totally alone, totally helpless and humiliated, and she knew that the
poor guy who shared her fate probably felt the same way, but, still, she had
to admit, she was very curious as to how this bastard thought kidnapping even
a hundred of the Arm would get the Doctor to move one millimeter. The Doctor
got mad, and sometimes he got even, but he just about never compromised.
That didn t necessarily cheer her up. It pretty much implied that she was
going to be stuck down here with these monsters permanently.
Please, sir! He s my only child! He did nothing to you or your people! He s
only a little boy!
The woman s agony was apparent in her face and her trembling and tears, but
Karl Woodward understood that the reason why the small group of all women had
been sent was because they would be the best way to tug at his conscience and
his heartstring. And, to an extent, they did just that he could understand
what they were going through.
Still, he knew that the children were not only in no danger, they were having
the best meal and playing with the most toys of any point in their lives, and
they were being carefully looked after. The older kids were being held apart
from the small ones, but in a theater-type setting with, again, toys
appropriate for their ages, holographic entertainment modules with content
suited to their age groups, and, hell, even an automated beauty and makeover
station from the makeup department. With the older ones all girls, this was a
very popular place.
They also had good meals, good tasting drinks, and ice cream and candy. Heck,
the kids were in a little heaven and probably mostly worried that it was all
going to end too soon.
These moms and grandmas, though, they didn t know that, and that was what kept
him firm, stern, and all business.
Stop all this wailing! he shouted to them in that Voice of the Almighty he
could call upon when preaching and teaching. Most of them stopped, or at least
wound down to sniffles.
Now, the first thing we re gonna do here is get some things straight, he
thundered. Over eighty of my people were kidnapped last night, kidnapped even
though they d done nothing but help you and your villages and shown you
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kindness and Christian charity. For all I know they may be dead, or tortured,
or worse. And some of it was with your doing. Village women, not these Pirates
of Belial!
Laughing village women at that! Want to see the recordings? Maybe I can match
faces to faces here. Didn t know our cameras saw in the dark, did you? I can
see it in your faces! So, I wondered, if they can take my young people and
laugh, then what can I take from them to shut off this laughter? And then it
struck me! I can take their children to replace the ones you ve taken!
There was more wailing and gnashing of teeth and sobbing; he almost felt like
he was in some kind of
Biblical scene. What he didn t hear was confession, contrition, or much else.
Now we can trade them back, or not. Your choice. And your problem. You have
no concept of how huge a ship I ve got up there. This is a mere lifeboat!
That wasn t true, but it was only a tenth of the complex.
He and Cromwell and the rest of the Elders had spent all of the night before
praying that they didn t blow this, that they did it right, that there would
be no loss of life and that they would foil Satan s attack. He had to trust
God after that, and play it out, have faith that his actions were God s
directions. Otherwise, he would have been living a lie.
Nevertheless, no matter how it turned out, Not my will, but thine, O Lord
.
Now, then, he continued. Let s stop all the games. You and this planet have
descended into the grip of
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