“What do you mean?”
“Octavius, and most of the other pilots, usually confiscate ammo when they can get away with it, then sell it back to us at a premium. A little business they run on the side. As to your current problem, we’ll get to work on finding some sort of employment for you. In the meantime, you can borrow what you need to keep afloat from the group. We keep interest rates reasonable among ourselves, but it would be a bad idea to get carried away. Only borrow what you really need.”
The discussion turned toward general problems and complaints. As an immigrant community, we faced a number of problems. Ar was the most cosmopolitan city on Gor, but was nonetheless quite provincial. Our accents, which marked us as outsiders, and our lack of marketable skills in this economy meant that making a living was more of an adventure than any of us really appreciated. It was apparent from listening that the group was headed toward building it’s own economy.
The meeting was being held in English, a fact which I appreciated. My Gorean was still a bit shaky. “Are these meetings always in English, or are you just doing it for my benefit?”
“We always do it in English,” Lysol said. “We want to maintain fluency; also, it’s more secure.” Bardol gave Lysol a look that suggested security had just been breached.
They loaned me enough money to get me through the week until the next meeting. I thanked them and left. They said that in the meantime they’d beat the bushes for some kind of job for me. I was confused as to the exact nature of this support group. I had expected a social gathering where everyone would commiserate about how mean and nasty the world was treating them. This was run more like a business meeting. The members seemed prosperous--well dressed and confident, albeit cliquish to the point of paranoia. I went back each week for several weeks. Each week they would probe a little deeper into my past and present activities, then loan me some more money and tell me they were still looking for a job for me. The overall atmosphere reminded me vaguely of the Teamsters--paternal rather than fraternal and benevolent as long as you were part of the group and didn’t break the rules. I wasn’t entirely sure what the rules were, so I tried not to make any waves. They were obviously checking me out, getting to know me and evaluating.
Finally, on my fifth visit, I was told they had something for me. Prego, the current bartender at the club, was being promoted and the position was available if I wanted it. I accepted and moved out of my rundown insula and into the club. My duties were less than onerous. In the morning, I’d get the slave girls up, feed them, then set them at their tasks. They did all the work except make the drinks. I took pride in doing that myself. That was one of the differences between us and the average paga tavern. We had real drinks. Most paga taverns served paga (something like a strong ale) or various wines, but nothing stronger. The Goreans seemed to have discovered fermentation, but not distillation. We had a couple of stills out back where we made bourbon and a pretty good brandy from the local kalana wine. The club was generating some income by supplying these to other taverns around Ar and there were plans to enlarge the distillery.
I hung out at the club all day. I wore a white apron over my tunic and when things were slow I would wipe the bar down and philosophize to whomever would listen. As the days went by and I got to know the various members better, I began to get a picture of what was going on. The club had it’s fingers in a number of pies, and liquor sales was one of the more legitimate ones.
Apparently, the Goreans had also neglected to invent organized crime and the club was hard at work repairing this lack (organized crime being defined as crime carried out on a businesslike basis by organizations other than governments). I still wasn’t sure what all the club was into, but it appeared to be prospering. I realized that my job was a way for me to start at the bottom and work my way up. In the meantime, I was where everybody could keep an eye on me. I didn’t mind. I knew that cohesion was extremely important to make it all work and it would take time for everyone to know me well enough to feel secure about me.
I set about reorganizing the staff and their routines. The slave girls were required to line up in front of the bar and stand at attention when they had no other duties. When a member came in, the girl assigned to the area in which he sat would leave the bar and attend to him unless he was known to have a favorite girl. The minute he left, she would clean his table, wash the glasses and dishes, and return to the line. When the number of occupied tables exceeded the number of girls, they were required to circulate constantly in their assigned areas. If a girl’s area should be empty, she was to help at the most populous adjacent area. This seems like a small change, but service had previously been random, with some girls overloaded at peak periods while others had little to do. The members commented to me on the improvement in service.
At closing, I would lock all the girls who weren’t occupied in their quarters. There were rooms available for members who wanted to spend the night with a girl (the girls weren’t allowed out of the club), but this was uncommon, since most members had their own slaves. Like all Gorean taverns, there was no extra charge for the girls. They came with the price of a drink. Most commonly, members would stop by of an afternoon for a beer and a blow job.
The slave quarters consisted of several large well appointed rooms in the basement. They were accessible through one heavy door which I locked behind them every night. They were equipped with sleeping rooms, toilet facilities, their own kitchen and a stock of food, and whatever else we felt they might need. Unlike the Goreans, whom we considered to be a bunch of wackos, we made no effort to impress the girls with their servitude every waking moment. The tables were not equipped with slave rings (in fact, there were none in the club--we didn’t feel the need of them) and the girls were encouraged to address the members by name. We preferred that to the generic and impersonal ‘master’ the Goreans were so adamant about. Despite all this, there was no question as to their status. They were slaves. We didn’t put a lot of effort into impressing them with this fact. They would either get it or they wouldn’t. If they didn’t, they were punished or disposed of.
One afternoon, after I’d been on the job about a month, a couple of Goreans wandered in. I could tell from their red tunics they were warriors (‘rarius’ in Gorean--also translated as ‘asshole’). Trouble was guaranteed. The girls, as per policy, ignored non-members. The intruders began shouting for service, but were still ignored. A girl waiting on a nearby table passed, ignoring their demands. Being ignored by a slave was too much. Enraged, one stood, grabbed her and drew his sword. It was obvious he was going to kill her. I had a cocked crossbow behind the bar. Even if there had been time to pull it out, set it against my shoulder, aim, and fire, there was a distinct possibility of hitting the girl. I’d never practiced much with that weapon. I whipped out my .45.
Shooting a gun indoors is not recommended. My ears rang for hours. The slug took the warrior in the side of the head and he pitched backwards, a chunk of his skull missing. His cohort, who by now was also standing with sword drawn, dropped his weapon and started backing toward the door, waving his arms as if to ward off evil spirits.
“Not another step, fart orifice.
” This was about as close as I could come to “Freeze, asshole!” in Gorean. He halted as I trained the gun on him. I shot him right between the eyes. There were to be no witnesses.
I am a man of only one talent. I have no skill at literature or science or diplomacy. I often do not understand the ramblings of learned men. What I am is a marksman. I have often thought it would be more honorable to be an excellent baker or potter or such, but I am what I am: the best shot on planet Gor. I had been kind to the second warrior. I could easily have shot his balls off--one at a time.
I had a mess on my hands. Use of firearms is frowned on by the club. We didn’t want the Goreans or the priest kings to know we had them. Had I been more experienced in the ways of Goreans, I would have known what was coming and had the crossbow ready. The girl that the warrior had grabbed was hysterical. She was a Gorean and had no experience of guns. I assigned a couple of the Earth girls to take her in hand and calm her down. I got two of the members to help me and we stripped the bodies and carried them out. The other slaves were assigned to clean up the blood and bits of skull. I wanted the place spotless by the time I came back in. We fed the warriors’ remains to the sleen, meanwhile throwing their clothing and other combustible accouterments into the furnace which heated the stills. I wrapped their swords and non-combustible possessions in a parcel with a couple of stones and dispatched a member to drop them in the river. Then we retrieved the remains unconsumed by sleen and buried them in the lime pit. The warriors were gone without a trace, just like Jimmy Hoffa.
