Unicorn Point

“Within the last month?”

“Well, no, actually, I’ve been busy with my exercise schedule. But—”

“And no one has approached you,” he concluded. “Now we know why. I was foolish to—I mean, I just got carried away, and—“ Deerie was completely flustered, and Agape could not get through to her at all. The charge was surely a lie, that Handy would conveniently discover in three hours, but meanwhile he had the planet’s best excuse to avoid contact. Deerie her self was all too much afraid it was true; Citizens did that sort of thing when they chose. They did not like to share their sex objects with serfs. Tan had come up with a masterpiece of dissemblance that gave him the complete advantage for the moment.

Agape knew that she had lost her opportunity to win this fall; it would take more than three hours to get her actress settled down. She let Deerie disengage and seek solitude; there was nothing else to be done.

Except to prepare for the final session. Tan’s actor would come calling, and this time he would not be limited to words.  He would be allowed to coerce or even rape her, and certainly Tan would encourage that. Tan’s vengeance was in the mak ing; Agape could have avoided it only by winning this second fall. She had failed, and now the score was even, and there would be hell to pay.

She decided that her best chance was to hide so that he couldn’t find her. Since she couldn’t leave the Commons without defaulting, she would have to hide by concealing her identity. It would also be better if she were in a crowd; he would be less likely to try rape among people. For one thing, she could scream, and other men would surely come to her rescue. Sex was all right, and could even become a deliberate show, but rape was considered a form of violence by most women and some men. In addition, she could fight. She could put a defensive strategy into Deerie’s mind, so that Deerie would understand what to do when the time came.  By the time of the third period. Agape was well prepared.  She had caused Deerie to take some dirt from a flower pot and go to a toilet stall, where she rubbed the dirt into her hair and face and torso. Thus she became darker and wilder, looking quite different in the mirror. Her hairstyle was changed too, now being plaited and plastered. It had taken some urging to get the woman to do this, but the persistent thought that Handy had turned angry and intended to humiliate her did the job.

Then Deerie went quietly to a darkened show chamber where a dull holo was being played. She sat on the floor in back and watched as if mesmerized. With luck, she would never be found, and both of them would be spared a horrible ordeal. She was there before the second period ended, so that when the onus changed and Tan/Handy started looking, there would be nothing to see.

But moments after the third period commenced, a shape loomed in the entrance to the chamber. It was Handy—and he seemed to know exactly where he was going and what he was looking for. He must have been watching her all along, anticipating this ploy of hers!

He paused long enough to let his eyes adjust to the gloom.  Then he made his way toward her. Should she scream? But he might be searching all the chambers this way, trying to make her identify herself by reacting; she had better keep quiet and hope he passed on by. If he did, then she was on her way to winning.

He did not. His face was contorted; Agape could not guess what thoughts Tan had put into Handy’s mind, but it was evident that they had driven the man beyond reason.  “I will scream!” Agape cried.

Deerie opened her mouth—but Handy’s hand clapped down on it, stifling her.

“I will bite!” Agape said. But already the man was pulling the woman over, coming down on her, crushing her; she was too disoriented to pay further attention to Agape’s thoughts.

But one thing Agape had put into her mind before paid off: Deerie’s knee came up, aiming for the man’s groin. The blow would have been devastating if ft had connected, a definite game winner. But it only struck his outer thigh; he had been on guard against it. Trust a man to know how to rape better than a woman knew how to defend against it! Handy pressed Deerie down flat on her back on the floor, his hand still stifling her, one of his knees wedged between her legs so that she could not clamp her legs together. Her effort to knee him had only put her leg out of position, giving him this opening.  “I will strike him with my free hands!” Agape cried des perately. “I will poke out his eyes! I will hurt him until he stops!” But Deerie was beyond that; terrified, she was retreating into an emotional shell, becoming passive. In fact, she was close to losing consciousness.

“A message for you!” Handy gasped, evidently coached by persistent if meaningless (to him) thoughts. “I owe you this, alien mare!”

“Fight him! Fight him!” Agape cried. “Roll, struggle, bite/resist!”