Reuel’s face darkened. He seemed to think it over. “If they are very relaxed directly afterwards, then you have achieved the goal. If they are very tense afterwards, then the objective was not achieved.”
Chloe felt a lot better hearing that. “So, if they go to sleep …?”
He grinned. “They areveryrelaxed.”
Pleasure filled her for a handful of moments and vast relief. “But …. Never mind!” She got up. “Alright. I’m going to go to my room and study up. You can put a dance card up for me, too.”
“Uh … Chloe?”
She stopped and turned to look at him questioningly.
“I think we should decide, first, where would be the best place to supply the ship.”
“Oh! Shit! I forgot all about that. You’re right. Let’s go to the bridge and have a look at the star charts.”
The brawl on B deck outside of the mess hall that evening lasted until most of the deck was trashed and most of the men were too exhausted to walk away from it. Infuriated, Reuel tore the dance cards off the wall and met with Chloe again for a consultation.
“I feel we are getting close to a solution to the dilemma,” he said wryly.
Chloe was alarmed herself. She didn’t see how Reuel could be so calm about it. “They’ve trashed B deck!”
“Mmm,” Reuel agreed, surveying the damage himself the following morning. “I believe I should not have posted the dance cards outside of the mess hall. We will be eating on the floor until the tables and chairs can be repaired.”
“Ifthey can be repaired!” Chloe said in dismay. “They were old to start with. They haven’t been used since Pops bought the ship.”
“They will be repaired,” Reuel said grimly. “The entire deck will be repaired—and very quickly I am guessing once I announce that no sexual therapy will be issued until itisrepaired!”
Chloe frowned. “Any idea what touched it off?”
Reuel thought it over. “It may have been the impression that the order the name was listed was also the order of service.”
“Oh. Well we can solve that! Just tell them that once everyone has put their name on the cards, they can pick a number—or a day. We can set it up on the terminals—oraterminal they can access and have the computer randomly select. That way nobody has to feel like they were last choice or … well, there won’t be anything to fight about.”
Reuel considered it somewhat doubtfully. “I suppose that would be the best way to do it—random selection. I am not confident that it will eliminate the friction, but we will see.”
“Just tell them if they start a fight, they get moved down the list—or they get removed from the list and put in the brig.”
Reuel grimaced. “I do not think the brig is large enough to hold them all.”
* * * *
“I do not think that I particularly care for the fact that they have placed the sex act into effect,” Kane said thoughtfully. “I see the logic in it and there is certainly a lot to be said for the fact that we will get to fuck, but there is something about it that I simply do not like.”
“If you like anything about it,” Jared growled, “then you are happier than I!”
“You are not happy about it either?” Kane asked in surprise. “What part do you not like?”
Jared scowled at him. “Did I not just say that I did not like any part of it?”
Kane thought it over. “You did, but I was certain that you could not have meantanypart of it. You do not want to fuck?”
Jared threw his wrench down and stalked off. Kane stared at his back for a long moment. “You will not get to fuck if you do not help repair the damage!”
Jared halted, stood indecisively for several moments, and made an about face, stalking back and bending to pick up his wrench. Settling on the floor, he gave up on trying to tighten the bolt he had been twisting for a good five minutes and used the wrench on the seat of the chair instead, trying to pound it flat—or at least relatively flat.
“He does not like the list thing,” Sebastian offered when Jared paused to study the effect. “I do not know why you would ask when he has done nothing but growl over it ever since it was announced.”
Kane shrugged. “I did not hear him.”
