BDSM Library - \"Planet of Men!\"

STILL MORE SYNOPSIS!

I had originally thought of beginning this series 'in media res', (as Horace recommends!) and allowing Readers to discover the odd practices of this strange society for themselves as the tale unfolds. On second thoughts, I concluded that this might be a little too much of an imposition, and this further synopsis is intended to give those Readers who have persisted so far a basic introduction to my imaginary world.

This is a planet much the same as Earth, but far older. Its mountains have been worn down, its great rivers wind and twist placidly across its continents on their way to the quiet oceans, and the temperature gradients across its latitudes are now too gentle to provide the energy for the storms of younger planets. Climactically quiescent, its temperatures varied from averages of eighty degrees on its Equator to forty at the poles, though its ice caps still return in the Winters.

Its species of flora and fauna, pitifully few and lacking in variety by the teeming standards of Earth, cover the normal range: marine life forms in the seas; trees, bushes and grasses, worms and insects, birds and animals on land, but in only a very few varieties of type. The sole large mammal on the planet is a two-legged creature whose possession of a ludicrously large brain and opposable thumbs has won it the chief place amongst its few would-be competitors. This creature terms itself Man or human beings, and its species Mankind or humanity. But it is only the males of this species who reserve for themselves this description, the far more numerous females they call Women,* and they are so different as to be almost a different life-form. They are bigger and stronger than the males, though with life-spans a mere fraction of theirs at about seven years as opposed to about eighty. There are other, more significant differences between the sexes. The brains of the females, although as large or larger than those of Men, are severely limited. Unlike human beings they cannot converse either by telepathy or simple speech, lacking the mental capacity to do so even if their primitive voice-boxes could cope. They have no opposable thumbs, nor, indeed, digits of any description on their blunt fore paws upon which they walk by preference, although they can and do stand upright upon their hind-legs at need.

*Or beasts, or animals. The word is the same in both their (single) spoken language and their mental one.

The men, or human beings, of this planet are uneasily aware that, despite their manifest superiority over these animals, they are essentially parasitic upon them, for they rely on them for a constant supply of new human beings i.e. male babies. But, for reasons they can only speculate about, the vast majority of births are those of foals, female animals. During the yearly birthing season they must search amongst the scattered herds of wild women which roam their continents for the precious male babies. The superficially easier method of breeding from domesticated women was long ago found not to work; no human being has ever been born to tamed women, and even the females born to them deteriorate physically over two generations. (Indeed, it is for this reason that periodic raids are made upon the herds to replace the stock of domestic animals.)

And now I must mention a subject the human beings of this planet found uncomfortable; that is, their essential part in the propagation of their species. No longer are they physically obliged to carry this out on each individual animal (fortunately a woman, once impregnated, continued to give birth for the few years of its breeding period; it would continously produce milk, too) as less inconvenient means had been discovered. But they must make sperm donations at regular periods, and all of them had experienced sexual intercourse with women as a youthful experiment, always with a young and reasonably attractive animal once she'd been cleaned up. And some of them continued this practice -- which was regarded as vaguely perverse -- long into middle age.

Human beings are equally dependent upon their animals for meat, for clothing which they make from their pelts and woven hair, and for their milk from which they manufacture plastics and pharmaceuticals along with many other useful things. On a planet so metal-poor as theirs, women are used as draught animals, to pull their carts and ploughs, to pump their water and to generate their electricity; in short, to perform all the tasks motors are employed to do on Earth.

This is not to say that the men of this planet are ignorant of such machines. On the contrary, they discovered their mechanical principles long ago and only the paucity of sufficient metals and the non-existence of any sort of industrial base prevent their widespread use. They do have personal, portable computers cum mobile message senders, but they are crudely constructed and somewhat unreliable; necessarily the case when each man must assemble and programme his own machine. They have ships, powered by the wind and by great paddle wheels turned by teams of women trudging around deep in the holds, and they have airships too, though they are few and rarely seen. They have a, more or less, efficient (by their own happy-go-lucky standards) land transport network for both goods and people, the former bring powered by great teams of the biggest and strongest animals and the latter by smaller teams of swifter animals (the so-called 'pacers'). Passenger travel operates on a rough and ready timetable, honoured more in the breach than the observance, and is the subject of universal complaint. But no-one ever does anything about it: this is, after all, a purely male society; ramshackle, slovenly and badly organised, relying on solving its problems at the very last moment by feats of brilliant improvisation rather than taking the obvious steps to resolve them by timely and obvious action. Their chief advantage over the human beings of Earth is their telepathic ability and their general mental powers. Together, enough of them can generate enough power to move objects physically over great distances, although the after-effects are physically and mentally debilitating. For the last few years they have been operating a series of mental probes deep into time and space. This they call the 'Dimension Gate'; it allows them to view creatures and events on other planets, and even to bring back small objects for further study. The whole operation takes but little power, and there are nearly always enough men sufficiently interested to volunteer their mental efforts on a regular basis.

Another invention as yet unknown on Earth was their mechanical servants whom they collectively called 'Androids'; robots of human shape, hand-assembled and programmed at home by each individual man and as cranky and dubiously efficient as their computers. It was to these whom they deputed the disagreeable task of artificially impregnated the women in the short period each year when the animals came onto heat. They helped in other ways too, cleaning their houses, looking after their animals and helping around their farms, but all in a somewhat slipshod fashion. But this was, after all, a solely male society in which what was near enough was good enough!

It was the Dimension Gate which provided the hero, 'Gershon', of my tale's official position in his society. In between farming his land and caring for his animals -- as nearly all men must -- he was second in seniority at the grandly entitled 'Faculty of XenoAnthropology' at the prestigeous 'Institute', the oldest Higher Education facility on the planet, rivalled only by the newer Eastern and Western Universities on the neighbouring continents. His Faculty was a newcomer, founded by Sisath, his older superior, who had argued for its essential existence for the study of intelligent life, if and when it was ever found, which some doubted. Despite the heated objections of the already existing Faculty of XenoBiology, who argued that their own remit adequately covered such an eventuality, Sisath, an elderly, irascible and energetic man, got his way, and Gershon, who had been one his students, had immediately been co-opted as second in command of the new and tiny Faculty. Alas! No such intelligence had yet been found on any of the twenty planets the Dimension Gate had scanned, but the new Faculty attracted its students none the less. The whole thing was, all agreed, jolly good fun; and Sisath gave good Dinners and was generous with the contents of his excellent cellar. And so matters proceeded on this planet where the ratio of the sexes had long been stabilised at one million widely scattered human beings to five hundred million women.

My tale opens with an account of the final days of one of Gershon's obligatory annual expeditions into the interior of the continent in search of bands of wild women. Each year they must be tracked down, the new foals collared, and the ones nearing puberty given their adult collars in exchange. This signalled that the women had been seen and inspected by a human being, and ensured that any early indications of disease were learnt of well in advance of its possible spread. Also, of course, it enabled those men unfortunate enough to have to undergo these tedious tours to compensate themselves with taking away with them any of the animals they thought might be useful, either for use on their farms or to barter for accommodation on their long return journeys.

I hope to develop this theme further, and would be most grateful for any comments or suggestions.

"PASTORAL CARE."

CHAPTER ONE

Gershon pulled back on the reins and halted his cart downwind of the little herd of wild women he'd been tracking for the last two days. Dismounting, he closed the blinkers over the eyes of the two women between the shafts and tied their reins to an iron-wood stake he thrust firmly into the thick turf of the steppe. Satisfied that the animals were secured, he took his bag and stick and walked away, his nostrils following the pungent woman-reek emanating from the nearby herd.

He found them two hundred yards away, in one of the innumerable folds on the otherwise featureless landscape, feeding on the patch of fodder plants usually to be found in such places. They had been there some days and would soon have to move on in search of more food; they would have to move for another reason, too, for Gershon could now smell the distinctive metallic odour of a band of termagants. These huge, semi-intelligent, carnivorous insects preyed exclusively on women, but then, Gershon thought, so did a great many creatures, from the flies who laid their eggs and hatched their larvae under the skin of their backs, up to the little carrion-eating rodents who devoured what the termagants left, through the huge insects themselves, to Men, who enslaved these creatures for their muscles and the products of their bodies; their meat, their pelts, their hair, and their milk. It had always been so, and always would.

Standing on the crest of the little rise beyond which was the shallow fold in the ground, Gerson looked down on the grazing beasts below. As was usual, the women had trampled and fouled as many of the plants as they'd eaten, though several of the weaker ones were grubbing about amongst the wreckage, their short muzzles probing the filthy churned-up soil for any broken fragments they could find. With a practised eye, Gershon estimated the herd's numbers at about fifty, along with some twenty foals feeding by their mother's sides. That would be about right, he thought; thirty or so of the women were of breeding age; all would have dropped their yearly foal over the last two or three months, and about ten of the foals would have died in their first month or so of life from one cause or another. The vast majority of those living were now old enough to take care of themselves, and most of them would breed at least once after their first and only impregnation; all of them dropping a foal yearly for their full breeding term of four years. There were, of course, no human babies amongst them, but he didn't expect any; such births were rare despite their vital necessity.

Since a human being had last visited the herd some six of the women had reached puberty and were ready for their adult collars. But first he would collar the youngest animals, and he walked slowly down the gentle slope towards the herd, his bag of collars in readiness in one hand and his stick in the other.

The cattle, as was the way with women, took little notice of him, continuing to graze on all-fours and only lumbering to their hind legs in alarm if he came within less than six feet from them. They would stand and stare down at him with their dull, brown eyes, trying to decide if he was a threat to them or their offspring. Then a gentle prod with the pointed end of his stick would persuade even the largest of them to shift from his path. The mares with the youngest foals were the most nervous; in a typical defensive mechanism of their kind, they would stand protectively over their foals and freeze motionless, hoping that their hairless skins, striped and mottled brown, black and purple under their thick coating of dirt, would enable them to pass unnoticed by a predator.

But Gershon was well used to dealing with women. He would stroke their thick bodies gently, talking nonsense words to them, until they were calm, then allow them to sniff and nuzzle his hand. Then he would gently push them away and collar their perplexed foal. He would leave the mare to sniff its daughter's collar suspiciously for the few moments before all recollection of the event faded from her dull brain.

The last foal he collared was the youngest; a tiny creature of little more than a month old, no larger than a human baby of three years. Gershon sighed; so helpless at her age; too heavy for her mother to carry her to safety and too small and weak to run along beside her in flight when the nearing termagants struck. Her mother too was unlikely to survive; she was badly infested by parasites and she had an unhealed gash on her leg. It was scarcely worth collaring her tiny foal, but he did so anyway; the collar could always be recovered later.

Then it was the turn of the older beasts. They were a more difficult proposition, skittish and unpredictable. But they were impulsively inquisitive at their age, and he only had to pick up a a length of battered foliage from the mud and they would come to him on all-fours. Then, while they chewed on his gift, he would remove their first collars and put on their permanent, adult ones, oddly bulky around their still slender necks. Two of them were outstanding for their height and strength; they would make good pacers, fast and enduring between the shafts once they'd been broken to harness, and those he leashed, intending to take them with him and barter them on his long journey back for his food and lodging. As an after thought, he also leashed one of the bigger foals, at three months old as tall as a six year old human being. She he intended to cover the price of his stay at the first Inn he came to. It was nicely plump, and it would make good eating when she was slaughtered.

He left the herd, climbing the slope with the three women leashed behind him. After their normal brief resistance, more puzzled at not being able to wander wherever they wanted than anything else, they followed docilely enough; women were easy to tame. Even when they crested the rise and cought the scent of the termagants they came on trustingly, as if knowing as well as he did that their predators would not -- dare not! -- harm a human being, nor even approach him.

Once back at his cart, he tethered his three recent acquisitions to the wooden stake and lowered the rear ramp of his cart. Down it he wheeled a small, wire-mesh cage, its floor thickly carpeted with the pulped fodder plants stalled animals were fed upon. Taking up the little woman's leash, he took her over to the cage and ushered her gently inside. Then he detached her leash, shut and latched the door, and pushed the cage back up the sloping ramp. He secured the cage in position on the load-bed of the cart and closed up the tail-gate, leaving the little animal staring around her and butting her head tentatively against the bars of her prison, puzzled by her inability to pass their obstruction, before lowering her blunt snout into her bedding and beginning to graze, fouling herself as she did.. After leashing the two younger animals to the rear of the cart, he untethered the women between the shafts, flipped open their blinkers to the straight-ahead position, and took his seat behind them, carrying the precious metal stake in his hand. Laying it safely aside, he whipped his beasts into a slow walk, then into a fast trot.

About a hundred yards on his path, Gershon decided to return to the scene of his recent exertions to watch the impending attack by of the termagants upon the herd. Tugging hard on their bits, he urged his animals round in a big semi-circle and whipped them back in the direction they'd just come from.

He found himself just in time to observe the massacre, being able to see the predators take up their positions along the sides of the little vale where they hid amonst the scattered boulders. The wind was blowing from him towards them, and they paid him no attention. Then the carefully prepared trap was sprung.

The first termagant sauntered out into plain view at the head of the valley; its demeanour casual, almost insolent, as it walked slowly towards the grazing women on its six legs, its shiny black carapace gleaming ominously in the sunlight. The women nearest to it caught its scent and rose to their hind legs in sudden alarm, their foals huddling against their mothers' legs for protection. At the giant insect's inexorable approach, their fright spread to the rest of the herd. All the animals were standing now,and at a further pace from their Nemesis they broke and ran in panic. As they passed the line of hidden predators, the termagents sprang out at them in turn, each choosing its prey and leaping at her thighs. A quick slash with a razor-sharp mandible and the woman was hamstrung. She stumbled and fell; another leap and the deadly mandibles tore out her throat. Then came the feasting.

Gershon watched dispassionately as the little foal and her lame mother were dispatched in the same coldly efficient manner. The limping woman was carrying her foal; doubly handicapped she was easy prey. An insect crippled her, and her daughter fell from her arms. Pausing to rip out the foal's throat in passing, their hunter leapt upon its prostrate mother. Then the mare's own throat spurted blood; lying on the ground she kicked spasmodically and died even as her killer was tearing off the first portion of her flesh.

Despite the attack's suddenness, and despite the efficiency of their hunters, only fourteen corpses remained when the last of the fleeing women had vanished into the hazy distance. Eleven of them were of beasts too old or too young to keep pace with the younger and stronger women; two of the remainder were those of the little foal and its mother. The skirmish had not been completely one-sided; the fourteenth body was that of an attacker.Though it had killed its victim, her last, frantic, dying kick had sent its surprisingly light body somersaulting away to crack its carapace upon a rock. The green ichor the insects used for blood would not coagulate, and it had bled to death still tearing at the flesh of its dying prey. The casualties amongst the cattle were normal, as was their escaping further attacks from this band of predators. Twelve termagants; twelve victims: the foal's death was by the way. The insects were much slower than a running woman, nor did they have a woman's stamina; the only way they could succeed was by ambush, stealth and guile.

Gershon slapped down the reins on the shoulders of his pair of patient animals, laid his whip across their broad and muscular haunches, and drove off on the first stage of his long return journey.

CHAPTER TWO

Three hours later, and some twenty miles further on, Gershon brough the cart to a halt, reining in the panting, sweating women in a tiny fold in the steppe. This would have to do for his night's stop; there was a tiny patch of fodder plants, enough to suffice his animals for the period, already he was worried about his dwindling supply of crushed fodder plant now that he had five mouths to feed. Once off the steppe fodder for them would be hard to find, and he must reserve an ample portion of the dried food he'd brought with him for his draught animals. The two prospective pacers he hoped would pay for his board and lodging would have to manage on the milk they could suckle from the older and larger women; at least he would be spared the chore of milking those daily to relieve their straining udders. As for the tiny foal in her cage, she could subsist on her bedding. Progressively more soiled by her excrement as it would become, it would not diminish her appetite.

He unhitched the two tired women from between the shafts and put them on a long joint tether to the stake he firmly fixed in the ground a few feet from the fodder plants. He left their heavy harnesses on their sweating bodies; bad husbandry, but it would enable him to make an early start in the morning. The younger animals he tethered a little apart within reach of the older beasts; moments afterwards all four women were already kneeling facing each other, paired off, each of the younger ones eagerly suckling from the udders of her older counterpart. The foal he left where she was, perched in her cage on the cart. After erecting his tent upwind of the captive women, he cooked his dinner and ate it. Then he sat on his camp-stool by the fire and opened his last precious bottle of the best Institute whiskey.

Sitting under the stars, he mused on the day's events and those of the fortnight previous. Well, he thought comfortably, it was over now, at least until next year. He thought of the slaughter he'd witnessed. Suddenly, it struck him how ludicrously ineffective the termagants really were as predators. Their prey were larger, faster and stronger; a single kick from one of the women's powerful hind legs would send one of the light-weight insect spinning for yards. The women could easily escape their deadly intentions; at the first scent of their enemies they could flee far beyond their reach. In extremis, the women could face the insects boldly, forming a solid rank; such a wall of intimidating solid flesh might well send the predators scuttling off in search of easier prey. But then they were only women, dull, docile and submissive by nature. And that was as well, he thought wryly; were they not so easily tamed, his own smaller and weaker male kind would not have been able to exploit them so successfully. Pitching the end of his cigar into the embers of his camp-fire, he drained his tumbler and went to bed.

The next morning he rose before dawn, and by the time it was light enough he was whipping the panting women between the shafts into a fast trot across the steppe. They were young and fit, and he intended to drive them the maximum distance they could cover over such ground. By evening he hoped to be at the near end of the rough track which would take him to the Great Trunk Road which crossed the continent from East to West. There he could make better time.

The two powerful women between the shafts kept up their steady lope at an average of five miles an hour. Though Gershon was grudgingly obliged to halt for a few minutes every two hours or so to water them and to cram a handful of dried fodder between their jaws, they made excellent time, reaching the beginnings of the track which led off the steppe just as the sun was setting. Fifty miles, Gershon thought with satisfaction! Before the evening of the day after tomorrow he would reach the Inn of his friend Palshon, more than a hundred miles further. And then: human company at last!

His new camping place was bleak and barren; with no fodder plants. That night he fed the four women on the dried fodder he'd brought with him; he could expect to find no fresh food for them until the day after tomorrow. He would reserve the last of the fodder for the draught animals; the fillies he had brought from the steppe would have to subsist upon the milk they could suckle. The little foal would do well enough; her bedding, though now soiled and filthy, would feed her until their destination.

Dawn came grey and dreary; by mid-morning a fine rain was falling, driven from the South by the rising wind. The muddy condition of the rough track slowed the women down; the beast on the windward side kept trying to turn to her left to keep the wind from her flank and Gershon was obliged to keep pulling on her right-hand rein to keep her on course. But the rain stopped as the sun was setting, and Gershon was able to drive on far into the evening under the full moon.

That night Gershon sat with his whiskey over his tiny fire, watching his two fillies strain on their tethers, whimpering with hunger. Worried that they might dislodge the stake they were tied to, he rose and blindfolded them. He also blindfolded his draught animals; they, too, were hungry though he'd fed them almost all the remaining dried fodder, keeping only a couple of handfuls for tomorrow's journey.

By an hour after sunrise the next morning the sun was beating down on the steppe from a cloudless sky. Now Gershon cursed the heat as he whipped on his sweating beasts. But the ground was sloping gently ever downwards as they left the huge plateau of the steppe and the going improved dramatically. A cool refreshing breeze blew down from the steppe behind them and Gershon's beasts developed new energy and determination. So well and quickly did they pull that Gershon was able to drive into the stable yard at Palshon's on the stroke of six in the evening.

His host was absent, and the elderly and cranky android to whom he deputed the care of his animals told him that his Master was out with his heavy-haulage team, pulling a freight cart out of the notorious muddy section of the Trunk Road, something he was often called upon to do, and which was so profitable that it was darkly muttered that he had something to do with the astonishingly frequent flooding of this section of road.

Gershon pulled himself a huge mug of his host's beer, then went outside and spent a few minutes leaning on the fence of the field in which his four women had been put. His draught animals were grazing on their knees; the two fillies on all-fours as usual. When their arms had been amputated, they would soon learn to graze like their elders. Then he went into the animal shed where he looked at the little foal tethered in the sty in which she would spend the rest of her short life before being taken out and slaughtered. She was happy enough, her little snout buried in her trough, and she recognised his touch, for when he stroked her back she lifted her head to nuzzle his fingers affectionately.

The rumble of wheels, the creak of leather harnesses and the rattle of heavy chains from outside announced the arrival of Palshon and his team along with the rescued freight wagon and its exhausted women who had previously tried in vain to drag it though the mud. Its driver and his mate were cheerful individuals; in spite of the trouble and expense they had suffered at being bogged down, they were laughing and joking with their rescuer and exchanging insults with him in the normal everyday fashion while Palshon led his plodding team by leashes attached to the rings in the broad, flat noses of his leading pair of eight huge women, yoked together in twos, walking in single file with their heavy yokes linked by thick chains.

Gershon stared at the team with his usual admiration and envy. So many big and powerful beasts, none of them less than seven feet in height, thick-bodied, broad-hipped and broad-shouldered, with muscular, protruding haunches, were a rare sight. Moreover, that lucky scoundrel Palshon had bred from all of these great, hulking women successfully, and their enormous, sagging udders were bulging with milk. Like everyone else, he was certain that Palshon had acquired them by some underhand means; like everyone else he could not quite imagine how. Then he laughed ruefully. Palshon was something of a rascal, but he was a generous host and good company, and he made the best beer for two hundred miles around. For these qualities much might be forgiven.

The reins and halters of their various women were given to androids and the four men trooped into Palshon's rambling old house where they all immediately drew huge tankards of beer, The wagon driver and his colleague began a leisurely haggling with their rescuer on the price of his efforts, finally settling on a fee of two pairs of boots, ten feet of iron-wood chain and a crate of brandy. Gershon himself offered the foal as the price of a three night stay – for he meant to take a brief holiday – and Palshon raised his eyebrows in surprise.

“Thought you'd want to be back at the Institute at a time like this!” he told Gershon quizzically, and the other men nodded solemnly.

“What for?” Gershon enquired in puzzlement.

The three men stared at him in amazement, then Palshon snapped his fingers in realisation.

“Of course!” he exclaimed. “You've been out on the steppe. Knowing you, you never bothered to switch on your laptop! You must be the only man on the planet not to have heard the news.”

“What bloody news?” cried the exasperated Gershon.

Palshon took a long and deliberate drink from his tankard.

“There was a full planet-wide holocast,” he told Gershon in tones of wonder. “Pictures from the Dimension Gate. They've found life; intelligent life – and no-one knows what to make of it!”

Gershon stared at the others in stunned amazement. Of course he should be at the Institute at this time. No doubt his laptop already held increasingly impatient messages from his superior demanding his presence. Palshon broke the spell.

“I have a recording of the holocast,” he said. “You're welcome to watch it, and to download it afterwards. Who knows; you may even be able to make sense of it!” he added with a chuckle.

Palshon and the other two went on to sit on the sagging verandah while Palshon's androids prepared dinner and Gershon was left to clear the cluttered surface of his host's battered Holocube and watch his recording.

Having moved the litter of soiled plates, glasses, and empty beer bottles from the flat top of the machine, he sat down and thought a command at it. Nothing happened, and he sighed, rose, and gave the cube a smart kick. At this it burst into life with a swirl of colours appearing in the air above it. These resolved themselves into a list of what was recorded in its memory, and Gershon selected the latest. Immediately a three-dimensional tableau appeared in the air above the cube, half life-size, of two men talking. Gershon recognised them both at once. One was Morsith, the planet's sole and self-appointed news commentator; the other was Bronsith, head of Engineering at Western University and custodian of the Dimension Gate since its inception. Taking a huge swig of his beer, Gershon settled down to watch and listen.

Bronsith was talking, using audible speech, about the Earth-shaking significance of the pictures just received though the Gate; a brilliant technical achievement which, he succeeded in implying, could only have been brought to fruition under his own inspired leadership.

“Get on with it!” muttered Gershon, impatient to see the pictures.

Morsith seemed to have realised the danger of his guest boring his audience; with out more ado the first still hologram appeared above the holocube. Gershon froze the display, and examined the image carefully.

It was of a man, a quite ordinary-looking chap of about Gershon's own age, standing on a paved strip before a building of imposing size. Gershon marvelled at the man's image; except for his complicated and uncomfortable looking clothing he would have passed unnoticed on this planet. The merest hint of a companion was evident in the picture, and Gershon advanced the hologram to the next picture. But that turned out to be one of the rear view of the man as he walked away; Gershon swore loudly and advanced the image again.

This picture was of the departed man's companion, another man as Gershon took him for at first, but dressed with refreshing normalcy in the simple tunic and sandals of Gershon's world. Then he looked more closely before leaning back in his chair, his jaw dropping open in amazement. Bringing the image up to full life-size, he looked at it with fascination.

Despite its clothing, the figure was definitely feminine; of that there could be no doubt. The operator of the mental camera must have shared something of Gershon's stunned astonishment, for he zoomed the image up to the the woman's head and shoulders and Gershon gaped afresh. There was no collar around the woman's neck; she was unleashed and untethered!

Gershon sat stunned; the fact that the animal was clothed dwarfed by this new impossibility. A women, in public, free of any restraint! His thoughts whirled helplessly. How would anyone know who owned her? Who would be held responsible for her actions? How could the man have left her free to wander about wherever she listed?

The image changed to one of the lower half of the creature's body. The shape of its hips and thighs made its femininity yet more obvious. Its simple tunic, very like Gershon's own in design but far thinner and flimsier, ended, like his, just below mid-thigh. Its feet were clad in sandals like his too, but impossibly small and dainty. Gershon brought up a full-length image of the animal and studied its skin, so different from that of his own planet's animals in its non-mottled, virtually monochrome tanned pinkish white. Its hair was a startling pale gold in hue, and it had not been shorn by its owner for some time. It would make a fine cloth when it was spun, he thought. Its face was unusual too, as flat and expressive as that of a human being, without the short, blunt muzzle of a native woman. She would find it difficult to feed, Gershon thought; perhaps her owner had trained her to eat from his hand. That prompted him to zoom in on its bare left fore leg and follow it down from the shoulder to the paw at its end. By now he was prepared for anything, and the vision of the slender, delicate fingers and opposable thumb didn't shock him as much as it might have done.

The image faded and became a short video clip. The woman stood quite easily on her hind legs, showing no signs of dropping to all-fours as a native woman still possessing her fore legs would have done by now. She was quite young; past puberty but as yet unbred as her firm little udders and slim waist indicated, though incredibly small for her years, barely the height of a ten month old foal. Gershon estimated her age at thirteen months, the equivalent of twenty-two human years of development. The camera drew back, revealing the figure of another woman sitting on its haunches at her feet. Immediately the camera zoomed in on it.

If the upright woman was small, its companion was diminutive, and she was the most oddly shaped woman Gershon had ever seen. She stood on all-fours, on four short stubby legs, both those and her whole body covered in thick hair, even her face with its long sharp muzzle was obscured by fur. Genetic engineering, thought Gershon with awe. His own race had often debated the advantages of improving on the basic humanoid design of their animals, but nothing had ever come of it. The tiny woman DID wear a collar, and she was leashed too, at which Gershon heaved a sigh of relief. Impossibly, however, the end of the leash was held in the right fore paw of her companion, grasped lightly but firmly in those incredible fingers.

Then the bigger woman began to move off along the smooth pavement, the smaller one trotting at her side. Their path was bordered by a tall hedge on one side, and by a strip of tilled soil, gay with flowers and colourful shrubs, on the other. After a few yards, the smaller woman pulled back on her leash and stopped. The bigger one turned and looked down at her, then led her onto a patch of bare soil where the little beast squatted, obviously to relieve itself. Its companion stood by, looking both bored and faintly embarrassed, if a woman was capable of such complicated emotions. Gershon was half prepared to see it lift the hem of its tunic and squat by the side of its sister animal, but it showed no signs of doing so. Probably its owner had made certain it opened its bowels and emptied its bladder before he let it out, he thought. And then the clip ended and a hologram of Morsith and Bronsith exchanging platitudes re-appeared.

Impatiently Gershon re-started the recording to see the images once more. This time he downloaded them into his laptop. He watched them on his computer's monitor over and over again, his stupefaction undiminished with each viewing. Finally a shouted invitation from his host for him to join them for dinner on the verandah broke into his consciousness. He closed down his laptop and went outside.

Over their simple and substantial meal, Gershon tried to parry the questions of his companions. He was flattered by their evident belief in his professional knowledge, but, in reality, he was obliged to admit to himself that he was no wiser than these laymen. He had many times tried to envisage other intelligences; with his colleagues he had argued about their possible physical appearances and had even built crude models of what he'd imagined they would look like, but this .. this absolute physical resemblance to his own people was downright uncanny. And the odd behaviour of the alien woman – it was impossible for an animal to behave as he had seen her do; it was as though she possessed some rudimentary intelligence. In the end Gershon had no alternative but to ascribe the beast's conduct to her owner's rigorous training even as he privately doubted the possibility of such long and intense instruction over the short period of her life time to date. And with that they had to be content.

After dinner Gershon excused himself from the inevitable drinking bout to play back over and over again his recording of the images he'd seen earlier. He meant to be thoroughly familiar with the happening when he answered Sisath's frantic massages at last.

Satisfied with the extent of his grasp on the subject, he opened his message file. Sure enough, twenty-two messages awaited him from his superior. He read them cursorily; as he'd thought they amounted to an impassioned plea for him to return to the Institute. He thought up an image of the time of day. Ideal, he thought; Sisath would have dined by now and would be in his large and untidy Study finding what peace he could in a bottle of his own fearsome home-made Brandy. He thought a quick command at his laptop, and a real-time hologram of Sisath appeared in miniature before his eyes.

Sisath looked up, startled, a mixture of relief and his usual irascibility on his broad face. Immediately he burst into a torrent of questions, the gist of them being enquiries as to where Gershon was and how long it would take him to return. Informed of his whereabouts by his junior, Sisath looked thoughtful. Then he spoke decisively. Gershon must, he told him, leave first thing the next morning for the near Public Post Inn. There he would find reserved for him a light, single seater cart and two first-class pacers ready harnessed. He would drive down the main Trunk Road as fast as possible, changing pacers every four hours. In this way, with good weather and luck, he could cover as much as a hundred and twenty miles a day, arriving at the Institute in the early evening in four days' time. Ignoring Gershon's groans of anguish, the older man broke the connection.

Gershon joined the others and indulged himself in their sympathy; a journey of nearly five hundred miles in the next four days was no joke. Then, along with the rest, he got thoroughly drunk.

CHAPTER THREE

Gershon, his head throbbing painfully, left at dawn the next day with only his few personal effects in his cart. His young fillies he'd been obliged to leave in Palshon's care; his host had agreed to look after them until they were sent for providing that Gershon asked for nothing in return. It went against the grain, but Gershon was forced to agree; he well knew that, while waiting for the women to be collected, Palshon would break them to harness and get as much work from them as he could. Gershon consoled himself with the cheering reflection that the Institute would pick up the bill for his journey, and drove on.

Sisath's arrangements had been as good as his word; twenty miles down the road Gershon drove his cart into the big yard of the nearest Post Inn, and, ten minutes later, drove out again in control of a light single-seater drawn by two eager pacers in the prime of their strength.

Before midday he took a brief meal while his exhausted women were exchanged for fresh ones; four hours later he ate another, and in the early evening he stopped for the night at the next Post Inn, a good hundred and thirty miles on.

Ten hours passed in eating, drinking and sleeping, and Gershon was on the road again.

The weather continued to favour his progress, and by morning on the fourth day he was able to relax his breakneck pace, confident in the certainty that he would arrive at the appointed time. With no more than fifteen miles to go he took an expensive and leisurely lunch at one of his favourite Inns, making sure to sign a promissory note on behalf of his Faculty. What the Bursar of his College would say when he received the bills for Gershon's journey he shuddered to think, but then, he told himself virtuously, he had incurred them legitimately under orders from above.

It was thus that he was able to arrive at the Institute in plenty of time to make himself comfortable in his rooms, dine in the Hall of his College, and meet Sisath afterwards in the latter's Study.

Over a tumbler of Sisath's fearsome Brandy (no less than a month old, as its maker proudly assured him) Gershon learned the full reason behind his superior's frantic desire for his return. The truth was that Sisath had the greatest respect for his junior's incisive and devious mind, and he deeply feared the prospect of the rival Faculty of Xeno Biology, a branch of the enormous Faculty of Biology, taking charge of the whole project. Having argued for years for the setting up of the independent Faculty of Xeno Anthropology (with himself as its Head) he writhed at the thought of its 'raison d'etre' being snatched from it at the very moment of triumph.

Gershon, as horrified at this dismal prospect as his senior, readily agreed to use his best efforts to avoid this end, and, politely refusing more of his host's deadly brew, went off to the nearest student drinking hole for inspiration.

Despite the long journey he'd recently completed, Gershon rose early the next morning, his mind grappling with schemes to prevent his Faculty's rivals stealing the rightful prize of his own. In the Refectory, he broke his fast on a chunk of bread and a mug of milk still warm from the udders of the woman who had provided it. To that he added a healthy slug of the Institute's own whiskey, and, in a more cheerful frame of mind, collected a thick woman-skin cloak from his rooms and went out into the rainy morning.

Crossing the big yard bordered by animal sheds, he had to step aside sharply to avoid a spray of water from the hose wielded by an android employed in washing out the pen used by the last group of women to be milked. Gershon swore at the stupid machine; already another group of women, hobbled and shuffling slowly across the yard, brought from the field where they'd spent the night grazing, were being herded towards the pen to await milking. He altered course to pass upwind of the shambling beasts, exchanging greetings with the bored undergraduate trudging behind them, a long stick in his hand.

Gershon smiled, recalling the tasks he been deputed with when he'd been a lowly student. Still, he thought, these things were necessary; as for himself, he'd actually quite liked feeding the very young women destined to be slaughtered for their tender meat; he'd enjoyed leaning on the walls of their sties and scratching their plump little backs while they ate. He breathed deeply of the warm, damp air and hurried off to the stables, there to harness the staid and elderly pacer which was all he was offered and go for a ride in the rain to aid his thoughts.

The aging woman, though much slower than in her prime, was still powerful even so close to the end of her useful life. By the registration number tattooed on her left thigh she was more than six years old, a second generation animal bred and foaled here in the Institute's stables. Certainly she had dropped her own last foal and she would produce no more milk, and even now her hair was being left to grow extra long for her final shearing. She would be worked until she died the quick, undramatic death of a draught animal; one day soon she would be found cold and stiff in her pen, or she would fall dead between the shafts where she'd spent her life. But she'd be good enough for today, and for several months to come. Gershon laid his lash across one muscular buttock and the beast in front of him responded obediently with a quickening of her pace.

He drove on, enjoying the warm rain swirling about him. Considerately, he had set out into the teeth of the wind so that, on the return journey, the woman between the shafts would have the benefit of it at her back.

A field of roots was on his left, and he reined in his woman to examine their growth with approval. These were an alternative food source for women, more nutritive than their usual diet. Whipping his woman into a slow walk, he drove along, examining the fence for signs of dilapidation; it wouldn't do for a roving band of strayed animals to gain access and grub up the roots. He'd been told there was such a group of women in the area; when there was time they would be hunted down and captured. Then he took it into his mind to drive on to the Inn eight miles on, there to enjoy a leisurely lunch.

The woman between the shafts trotted along easily, with Gershon looking to either side at the various fields of fodder plants and roots, of wheat and the smaller, more delicate roots devoted to human consumption, automatically checking the fences as he rode. Then the cultivated ground gave way to the untilled scrub land which covered so much of his sparsely populated planet. The track stretched into the distance, and he whipped up his beast into a fast trot, suddenly anxious to get out of the rain and the wind.

A mile along the track he drove off to the left, for it was his intention to take a short cut direct across open country. A mile further Gershon had a stroke of good fortune. Passing a small copse, he glanced into it and was startled to see a woman kneeling and grazing on the few fodder plants amongst the trees. Reining in his panting beast, Gershon brought the cart to a halt and descended. Tethering his woman to the branch of a tree, he took a rope halter and walked across to where the other animal grazed, indifferent to his arrival.

The first thing he did on reaching her side was to clip the halter to her collar. She obligingly raised her head for him then returned to her feeding. With the woman secure at his feet, Gershon examined her back for parasite infections. Those he found were not far advanced, and would yield easily to treatment. He saw from the tattoo on her thigh that she was registered in the neighbouring province, some three hundred miles away. It wasn't unusual for strayed women to wander long distances, but it was very unusual for them to be found in such good condition. She wore no bridle, nor the ankle-cuffs of a broken hobble, and he wondered for a moment how she'd come to stray, for she couldn't possibly have been put out in a field to graze unrestrained. He estimated her age at about twenty-four months; she had been bred once, for she was lactating. Then he noticed her flaccid udders; she had been milked today, suckled by one or more of the little band of stray women she'd been living with. Of them there was no sign, but little piles of fresh dung announced their recent habitation in the copse. Well, he thought, they had gone now; no doubt his prize had remained to feed upon the last few plants.

The woman finished demolishing the plant and began to shuffle on her knees towards its neighbour. Gershon gently checked her with the halter, turned, and walked slowly away. Behind him the woman came obediently to her feet and followed him docilely. He tied her halter to a ring at the back of the cart, untethered his own woman, and took his seat behind her. When he drove off once more, the newly-found woman trotted behind.

Once at the Inn, he dismounted and threw the reins to one of the Landlord's android, bidding it take his woman to shelter, dry it off, and feed and water it. His capture he led off across the stable yard and tethered to the fence in the rain. Then he went in search of his host.

He found Rapsith in his office, brooding over his ledgers. The Landlord was a gaunt and worried looking individual, as well he might be, for the majority of his customers were the students and staff on the nearby Institute, and they tended to pay for their beer, food and lodgings in the traditional way, with their labour. He brightened up as Gershon appeared in the doorway and asked him eagerly if he'd come to settle his account, and if so, whether with goods or with iron. But Gershon merely smiled enigmatically and summoned his host outside.

Together they stared at the woman tethered to the fence. Rapsith began to examine it, opening the beast's blunt muzzle to look at her teeth and palpating the big muscles of its back, buttocks and thighs. Finally he lifted her feet to inspect the tough, leathery soles; she was still shod, and Rapsith's face brightened.

Turning to Gershon, he began the long process of haggling. Gershon's demand for five hundred hours credit was greeted with ironical laughter, as was his own counter suggestion of two hundred. Finally they settled, as they'd known they would, on the compromise of three hundred and fifty, and went into the Inn to seal their bargain over a drink. Both were eminently satisfied; Gershon at wiping out his debt and being in credit for a change, and his host because, to his certain knowledge, he could barter on his new possession at a handsome profit. The woman herself, forgotten by them both in their good humour, stood tethered in the mud and rain, waiting patiently to be led away.

The news of Gershon's find was announced to the Common Room over a long and bibulous lunch. All agreed that the band of roving women were close, and all decided to help hunt them down. But not today; another day would be better, when it wasn't raining.

Gershon was pleased with himself as he drove back in the twilight. He had, or so he thought, solved the problem Sisath had presented him with. He'd realised that the chances of the Dimension Gate bringing back any more pictures from the alien planet were slim. The apparatus was notoriously cranky and unreliable; there was every chance that the Engineers would never be able to focus the machine on the same spot again; this had often happened in the past to the point where it had come to be expected. In short, he had solved the problem by calculating that the problem would never actually arise – a classic human manoeuvre.

Back at the Institute he drove his woman into the stable yard and relinquished her reins to an attendant android. Then he sought out the nearest bar for a well-earned drink before dining in the Hall of his College.

After dinner Gershon visited one of his usual drinking haunts. There, just about to order up his third pint of beer, he was disturbed by a frantic thought from his superior. Contrary to Gershon's hopes and expectations, not only had the Gate been successfully re-opened and the alien planet re-found, but Bronsith was reported to have made a long video clip of what the virtual camera had seen. It was at that moment being fully prepared, and would be transmitted to interested parties in an hour's time.

At that hour, Sisath told him, he, Gershon would report to him, Sisath, in the latter's Study, there to watch the clip in the company of his colleagues.

Gershon swore. But he downed his third pint just the same, and an hour later was sitting in Sisath's Study with the others as Sisath fussed about with his holocube. The display cleared and steadied, and the watchers, each clutching a tumbler of their host's deadly Brandy, settled down to watch.

CHAPTER FOUR

In Bronsith's part of the world it was mid-afternoon, and the man himself looked offensively fresh and dapper as he told his audience that the clip was ready for transmission, along with a commentary by none other than himself.

This announcement was greeted with groans. Sisath, however, was disturbed in a different manner: he damned Bronsith's impudence; the fellow was an Engineer, not a Social Scientist. He was unqualified to comment, Sisath added angrily. But then the clip began.

The scene was very similar to the one before, with the two women of such disparate sizes walking together along a narrow stone path. The smaller one, clad only in her long fur, trotted along on its four short legs; the larger animal, dressed as before in sandals and a simple tunic of a colour close to that of its pelt, walked on its hind legs, the little woman's leash held in one of its fore paws. Then it became clear that the scene was not, after all, identical with that where the original clip had ended. The lawns and flowerbeds on either sides of the path were very much smaller from what the camera had previously shown them, and the path ended abruptly at a gaily-painted door.

The two women halted perforce, and the larger one, fumbling with its unengaged fore paw among the recesses of its skimpy tunic, withdrew a small shiny object which it inserted into a metal disc in the door's surface. The door swung open, and the two animals passed through it. Then the camera showed only the blank wood blotting out any view of what lay beyond.

While his technicians sweated to get the virtual camera past the door, Bronsith explained that, in his view, the building which the animals had entered was the residence of their owner. Sisath had barely time to snort in derision and mutter the words "Bloody idiot!" before the clip began again.

The two women were in a room whose exact purpose, in the short interval in which the camera scanned it, left then only with an over-riding impression of whiteness, cleanliness, and the presence of several mysterious machines, highly polished and gleaming.

The big woman stooped over the smaller one and removed its leash with astonishing dexterity. It straightened up, hung the leash upon a hook on the back of one of the room's two doors, then kicked off its sandals. It took up a collar, the exact match of the one around the neck of the smaller woman, and, to gasps of surprise from the watchers, calmly buckled it around its throat. Then it performed a complicated little wriggle with its upper body and its tunic dropped from its slender shoulders and fell around its feet. It kicked the garment aside, then stood upon its toes (appendages whose existence the watching men had not expected it to possess) and stretched its fore legs high above its head, at the same time wriggling its neck inside its collar as if reassuring itself of the latter's presence.

Janet closed the door on the hot afternoon with a feeling of relief. Once in the kitchen, as usual the first thing she did after freeing Trish and hanging up her leash was to slip off her sandals, put on her collar, and undulate gently out of her simple dress, enjoying the softness of its fabric as it passed slowly over her hips and thighs. Clad only in her, totally unnecessary, brassiere and her skimpy panties, she rose on her toes and stretched her arms as high above her head as she could. She held the pose, wriggling her neck luxuriously in the collar she'd made Mark buy for her along with Trish's and of identical pattern. Coming down from her toes, she deftly unhooked and removed her brassiere and pulled down her panties, discarding both, along with her dress, into the laundry basket in the corner of the kitchen. Then she stood on the tips of her toes and stretched upwards again, enjoying the slight caress of the air on her bare skin.

Tomorrow, she thought, she'd take Mark's little dog for a walk wearing only a dress and no underwear; and the next time it would be with her own collar around her neck. She gave a little giggle at her daring. In the event, of course, she expected that no-one would see fit to comment although many might smile at her, women and men alike. One day, perhaps, she might clip a leash to her collar and go out in public with it dangling invitingly outside her dress between her firm little breasts. At the thought she giggled afresh, and flushed as a queer little feeling made itself felt deep in her groin. Then Trish, impatient for attention and water, gave a little bark of frustration and Janet went to attend to her.

The watching men relaxed, unconsciously soothed by the familiar spectacle of a woman in her normal condition; collared and naked. But they continued to marvel at the dexterity of those impossible fingers and the depth of training that enabled her to do the things she was doing and they pondered silently on the purpose of the tiny scraps of semi-transparent material she'd worn under her outer garment. They watched as she filled a large transparent jug with water and poured some of it into a brightly-coloured bowl which she set down on the floor. Then she stood watching as the little woman drank.

Impossible as it was, to her watchers she seemed to be pondering something. Her delicate features flushed as they had before; with a series of decisive movements she picked up a large, shallow bowl, filled with water and set it upon the floor near that of the smaller animal. Then she dropped to all-fours, lowered her head into the bowl, and began to drink.

Janet watched Trish wistfully. How much she'd enjoy it if Mark could be got to treat her exactly as he did his dog! Why not? She flushed again, then on the spur of the moment she filled a soup bowl with water and put it down on the tiled floor. Then she got down to hands and knees and drank noisily. Finished, she determined to remain on all -fours until Mark returned. That was it; she would lock on her mitts after she'd showered, then greet him at the door alongside his 'other' little dog.

She looked around, attracted by the faint clicking of Trish's claws on the tiles. The dog trotted over to her litter tray where she squatted for a few moments before rising and going through the open door into the lounge. Still on all-fours, Janet walked over to the tray and inspected the little damp patch in the grey, crumbly litter. She giggled and flushed bright red at the same time as the outrageous notion came into her mind. Then she herself squatted over the litter tray and added her own contribution to that of the dog.

Janet felt the urine drying on the skin high up between her thighs as she padded on all-fours into the lounge and from there into the bathroom where she finally got to her feet, took off her collar, and went into the shower cubicle.

As the scene progressed, the men looking on from another planet relaxed even more.

The sight of a woman on all-fours, drinking from a bowl reassured them – even if she had managed, impossibly, to fill the bowl herself. The purpose of the litter tray was obvious to them; once more they marvelled at the depth and thoroughness of the training these two women had received. They watched the bigger woman walk into another, larger room (on all-fours, as was perfectly normal) and cross its soft floor covering into yet a further room, this one smaller, tiled and clean in the same fashion as the one which the two women had been found in. They barely had time to recognise the large white porcelain object on the floor in one corner when the woman rose to her hind legs. Her fore paws went to her throat and she calmly took off her collar. Then she stepped into a large glass cabinet from which there soon came the sound of falling water; and it was hot water too, for the outline of her pink body was soon veiled in steam.

The effect on the watchers of the alien animal's latter actions was devastating. Sisath spluttered brandy all over his desk, while Morshon, a junior colleague who affected a pipe, bit through its stem, scattering shreds of burning weed all over Sisath's disreputable old carpet. As for Gershon, like the rest he gaped openly. Then everyone began to to project thoughts at once, and Sisath was obliged to order all present to conduct their observations in audible speech. His own voice was the first to be heard.

"It took off its collar!" he said dazedly.

"And it's washing itself all over!" someone said in tones of wonder.

"In warm rain... in that glass box ...somehow!" marvelled a third person.

"What a bloody good idea that contraption is!" Gershon added admiringly.

"Good idea be damned!" spluttered their superior, not yet fully recovered from his coughing fit. "Now what the hell's the bloody thing doing?" he asked angrily, waving his sadly depleted glass in the direction of the hologram.

Janet emerged from the shower and dried herself with one of the huge Egyptian cotton towels she'd made Mark buy. She buckled her collar around her neck, then, her skin glowing and her hair fluffed out in a golden halo, came out into the living room. From a drawer she took out a pair of slim flesh-coloured leather mitts. Locking the one around her left wrist with her right hand, she locked the right-hand mitt on her wrist by pressing it between her knees. She dropped to all-fours and padded over to the long sofa where Trish lay asleep on a cushion. About to jump up to join her, Janet decided instead to lie down down on the carpet and wait for Mark's return. She lay down on the floor, curled herself up into the best approximation of a sleeping dog she could manage, and closed her eyes.

Sisath's little group watched the animal's actions with mixed feelings. That her owner had trained her to immobilise those dexterous fingers came as no surprise, nor that she so easily reverted to a woman's default position on all-fours. But that he was confident enough in their training to the extent that he could safely allow his two animals the freedom to roam unrestrained throughout his surprisingly neat living quarters passed their comprehension. Nothing appeared to be happening, and Bronsith came into view to explain that nothing would for another hour except for a short tour of the other room his technicians had managed to get the camera to visit. The hologram reappeared, this time showing a different scene.

This room, smaller than the others, was so obviously the room where the man slept that it presented little interest beyond the bed, easily large enough to accommodate two human beings, and a large free-standing closet filled with his odd-looking and over-complicated clothes. There was also a small table-like affair in one corner with a large mirror fixed to it. Its surface was littered with various mysterious oddments, and a chair was positioned in front of it. A small round padded object lay on the carpeted floor at the foot of the bed, probably, as someone suggested, for his smaller animal to sleep on. Of sleeping accommodation for the larger beast there was no sign; very likely she was penned out of doors at night.

The camera was returned to the big room where the two women lay asleep and panned around idly, examining the sparse furniture. Apart from the large couch there were two other smaller identical seats. There was a table too, with four chairs arranged around it. Pride of place seemed to be given to a large glass-fronted box which stood in a corner. In a manner typical of engineers, the man controlling the camera sent it prying all around this apparatus, which, by the wires leading from it into the wall, was apparently some sort of electrical gadget. But its purpose remained unknown, and, while waiting for the clip to show more action, they began to discuss the bigger animal's oddities of behaviour and the causes of its occasional strange changes in expression, particularly the occasional flushing of its uncannily human-like face. No-one had a clue, but all agreed that she presented an attractive picture at these times. But then, she was a very attractive young animal to begin with.

One of the students had a brainwave. At his suggestion they went back to the scene where the woman opened the door from the outside. They looked at her, frozen in the door frame in the act of entering, and estimated the distance between the top of her head and the bottom of the frame above her. Assuming, for the sake of convenience, that the frame was the normal six feet, six inches (the actual units were unimportant) the creature's head was a good sixteen inches lower. For the sake of the argument, given that they themselves were more or less the same height as the alien man, she would be about five feet, two inches tall; the height of a pre-pubertal woman of their own planet. All agreed that, for whatever reason her owner possessed her, it was not for a woman's normal use as a draught animal.

Bronsith's voice broke in. The clip was about to show the next scene, he announced. It was to be the entry to his house of the human being, and, fortunately, the camera had been in the white-tiled outer room to record it.

Mark unlocked the outside door and walked into his kitchen, anticipating meeting Janet again. He knew she was here already, for she had rung him from the Railway Station on her arrival announcing her intention of going to his house (to which he'd given her keys) and taking Trish for a walk while she awaited his return from work. They should be back by now, he thought eagerly.

As if responding to his thoughts,Trish, on hearing the first scratchings of his key in the door lock, leapt down from the sofa and scurried into the kitchen to greet him rapturously – and hard on her heels came Janet, naked and on all-fours!

Mark's face beamed with delight at this welcome, Janet's eccentric contribution especially. He'd come to enjoy her role playing, he thought, remembering fondly her pretty flushed face as she shyly and hesitantly explained her desires to him just after one of their early meetings and the tremulous hope in her face when she looked at him for his reaction. He remembered too how her face had lit up at his expression of mild astonishment without trace of either laughter or disgust. The sex was never better than after these episodes, they'd discovered! As to her motives for this behaviour, he had no idea and had never asked. But he suspected that she enjoyed the feeling of helplessness she associated with domestic animals, and which she, in part, achieved by wearing her lockable mitts. Well, he had some little presents for her which would drastically increase that feeling, and he grinned to himself at the thought of her reaction when he produced them.

By now Janet had adopted the posture of a dog begging and he smiled down into her sparkling eyes, seeing her blush prettily under his gaze. Breaking the spell momentarily by asking her if she'd like some cold beer and getting a silent nod in response, he opened the 'fridge and took from it two tinswhich he carried into the living room, Janet and Trish at his heels. He sat down on the sofa, Trish immediately jumping up and lying at his side while Janet sat at his feet 'doggy-fashion' looking up at him eagerly. Mark smiled down at her. He opened both tins and sipped the froth from his while he waited for the one he intended for Janet to lose its gaseous head. Then he offered it to her and she came to her knees and took it awkwardly between her artificial 'paws'.))

Sisath's little group watched in wonder and admiration at the larger animal's dexterity. True, her fore paws were far smaller than those of a normal woman, but that she could grasp the concept of actually holding something between them was itself remarkable; as remarkable as the way she drank from the tin, neatly and without spilling a drop from the tiny mouth in the little flat face. When she'd finished, tilting back the tin to drain the last drops, her owner took it from her and placed it along with his own on the small table beside him.

Janet dropped back to sit comfortably with her legs folded beneath her and her buttocks resting on her heels. She belched, and grinned up at Mark mischievously.

He grinned back.

"Got some presents for you," he said casually; "and one for Trish, too!"

From his pocket he withdrew a a small paper bag, and from it he took out a shiny brass disc with a 'split-ring' through the tiny hole in its outer rim. He showed it to her; plainly engraved with the name 'Trish' on one side and his telephone number on the reverse, then gently raised his dog's head and clipped the split-ring and its disc to her collar.

"Guess what?" he continued playfully. "I've got one for you, too!"

"Oh, Mark!" squeaked Janet, beside herself with excitement, lifting her chin in invitation.

"And it has your name on it, too; just like Trish's. The name I've chosen for you, I mean! But you won't know what that is until I use it to call you!"

Mark bent and attached Janet's name disc to her collar, smiling as she scampered off on all-fours to admire her reflection in the glass screen of the television set, knowing that she wouldn't be able to read the name engraved on her disc without getting so close that the shape of the glass distorted it beyond recognition.

Janet scrambled back to him and nuzzled his hand, thanking him profusely.

Mark smiled down at her, delighted by her own evident happiness.

"I did say 'presents' in the plural!" he reminded her with a chuckle. "You'll find out what the others are by and by. Sit, girl!" he added, laughing tenderly.

Eyes sparkling with anticipation, Janet sat bolt upright before him.

“Stay!” he told her, chuckling.

Janet sat obediently, beside herself with anticipation. She heard Mark's soft footsteps on the carpet, them the sharper sounds of his shoes on the tiles of the kitchen. He returned, and she felt his fingers at her neck and heard a faint click and a grunt as her boyfriend reached down and placed the loop at he end of Trish's leash under the raised foot of the heavy sofa.

She looked down at the leash trailing across the carpet on its way from her collar to its anchoring point and moved her upper body experimentally to feel the thin leather brush against her breasts. Tied up like a dog! she thought, closing her eyes in bliss. Behind her, the door into the kitchen closed.

The men in Sisath's study watched transfixed as the alien man entered the white room and closed the door on his pets. They saw him open the door to the outside and bring in a long, flat parcel. The covering was removed to reveal a wire mesh cage, folded flat, and the man erected it in a corner of the bare white room. At a little more than the length of the larger animal's body on all-fours and a little higher and wider than her hips and shoulders, its purpose was obvious. They visibly relaxed and watched to see what would happen next.

Janet opened her eyes on Mark's return. Blinking, dazzled by the light, she saw him lift the foot of the sofa and take up the loop at the end of Trish's – of Janet's! – leash. She felt its tug at her collar and rose obediently to all-fours. Mark led her into the kitchen room and allowed her to look at what he'd put there for her.

Janet stared at the mesh cage eagerly, noting the thick, comfortable looking pad on its floor. She looked up at her boy friend, a look of wonder and delight on her face.

Mark smiled down at her. Stooping, he gently inserted the leather ball of a gag between her parted lips and secured it with its strap. He slid back the bolt on the cage door and ushered her gently inside. Releasing his hold on her leash, he closed and bolted the door on her. Then he walked off through the living room into his bedroom to re-emerge after a few moments, naked for his shower.

Ten minutes later, clothed in fresh garments, the alien man passed through the door into the outside world, shooing his dog back into the kitchen as he closed the door, ignoring his caged girl friend.

“That's more like it!” exclaimed Sisath in satisfaction, opening a fresh bottle of his lethal brandy. "Though I don't think the design of that muzzle's very efficient."

Everyone present silently agreed with him both about the oddly inefficient muzzle and the cage; it was far more comforting to see this strangely capable young woman safely caged and out of action. As for the smaller, hairier woman, she ran back to lie upon the long padded chair in the other room and went to sleep. The camera zoomed in on the bigger animal, now lying on the floor of her cage, her eyes closed.

Janet lay with her eyes shut, thrilled beyond measure by the knowledge that she caged as helplessly as any animal. She had no idea where Mark had gone to on this Friday evening, nor how long he'd be. But she hoped he wouldn't be away too long; she was hungry, and sooner or later she would want to empty her bladder of the beer she'd drunk previously.

The watching men stirred impatiently, waiting for something to happen in the hologram before them. It vanished, only to reappear immediately to the accompaniment of Bronsith's announcement that an hour had passed and the alien man was about to return.

Mark closed the door behind him a little awkwardly because of the parcels he held under his arm and the heavy shopping bag he held. Trish ran out into the kitchen to welcome him and he patted her absently as he took the big, shallow plastic tray from its wrappings. Placing it on the floor in the corner, he took the bag of cat litter from the shopping bag which held it and emptied it into the tray. The big, shallow plastic dog bowl, the largest the pet shop had in stock, he placed on the floor next to Trish's much smaller bowl and poured water into it. Removing the pizza he'd brought back, he put it in the microwave to heat.

Jane had been standing on the floor of her cage, watching in anticipation, and when her boyfriend opened the cage door she darted past his legs and scampered to the tray and the bowl the kitchen to investigate, her leash trailing between her knees.

In Sisath's untidy study, the assembly watched in silence as the little woman began to lap the water in the the big new bowl, the larger one joining it after a brief interlude, the little leather ball in her mouth apparently not preventing her from sucking up the liquid with her lips. The alien man, meanwhile, had crossed to the polished metal machine into which he'd put the thick flattened disc he'd taken from a thick, garishly coloured, paper box.

He removed the plate which bore the disc he'd inserted into the machine, now apparently steaming hot, and took up a knife to cut it into pie-wedge slices. After taking a tin of liquid from yet another white machine, the same one he'd taken drinks for himself and his bigger pet before, and took both the steaming plate of food and the tin into the larger room where he sat down upon the long chair.

Both his pets had followed him, and both sat at his feet in uncannily similar and expectant attitudes despite their very different anatomies. But the man, after briefly considering his pets for a moment, rose to his feet. Picking up the trailing end of the bigger woman's leash, he led her back into the white room, the other, tiny woman following in response to a curt command. There he put them both into the wire mesh cage and left them there, closing the intervening door upon them.

Back in the larger room, he sat down on the long seat, the sliced disc on a plate on a small table at his side, and picked up a little plastic box which he waved in the vague direction of the big, glass-fronted contraption standing by an opposite wall. The glass box burst into instant colour, and the Engineer controlling the camera, as Engineers will, instantly zoomed in on it.

Sisath and his group groaned in disgust, being far more interested in the reactions of the two animals to this phenomena, but the Engineer continued to scan the crude two dimensional display on the glass front of the box which showed a serious looking alien mouthing some gibberish or other until the sitting alien, with a movement of his forefinger, killed the picture.

By now the alien had demolished rather more than half of the slices of the disc, and he sat for a little while unmoving. Then he stood, picked up the plate, and took it into the white room.

“He's going to feed the leftover food to his pets,” prophesied Sisath, and he proved to be correct, for the alien man, after breaking up the remaining pieces of the food-disc with his fingers, tipped the fragments from the plate into another large, shallow bowl which he placed on the floor

Janet realised at once why she and Trish has been caged; it was to prevent them pestering Mark for food while he ate. She lay down, the little dog in her arms, and waited patiently for him to return.

Mark placed the bowl of broken, lukewarm pizza on the kitchen floor. Opening the cage door, he allowed his eager little dog to bound past him and begin to eat, but he seized the end of his girl friend's leash as she tried to follow. Shortening his grip on the leather, he held her at his feet.

He glanced down at his girl friend's bowed head, and an idea grew in his mind. He grinned to himself; would her desire for authentic treatment really bring her take up his offer? Or would she convey to him her intention to end the session?

Trish finished eating, looked up at her Master in absurd self-congratulation, then loped off on her short legs into the living room where she leapt up on to the sofa and lay down to sleep off this burst of energy. Mark tugged his girl friend's leash and led her the few steps to the bowl in which lay the remains of the food left by the dog. Bending over her, he removed her gag.

“Good girl, Shandy!” he told her, using the name he'd given her for the first time. “Take it!”

He watched with interest, wondering if she'd go so far as to eat the broken scraps Trish had left.

The little spot of heat high up between Janet's thighs glowed as she looked down into the bowl and heard her new name. This, she thought dizzily, was one of the best moments of her life! Without hesitation she went down on her elbows with one mitted hand on either side of the bowl and lowered her head into it. Seconds later, Mark heard the sounds of her noisy eating.

He waited patiently until she raised her head and made to move off. Checking her with her leash, he looked down into the bowl, now completely empty. He patted her gently on the head.

“Good girl, Shandy!” he told her, in exactly the same tones he would have used to his dog. About to lead her back into the living room and tether her to the sofa as before, he heard the musical warble of his mobile phone from his jacket, hanging over the bedroom door knob where he'd left it. Uttering an impatient exclamation, he rammed the leather gag into his girl friend's mouth and shut her in her cage before hurrying from the kitchen, closing the door behind him.

Janet, dazed by his abrupt departure, stared at the closed door between her and the living room. Then, with nothing better to do, she lay down, wondering as she did so when Mark would come back. She hoped it would be soon; though her hunger and thirst were now satisfied, she was becoming more and more uneasily aware of the pressure in her bladder.

They watched the alien sitting on his long, softly padded chair, alternatively talking and listening to a little plastic gadget he held to his ear and mouth, the little woman lying at his side with her head on his lap. He threw the gadget aside and sat for few moments seemingly reflecting on something. Then he picked up a coloured booklet of some kind and opened it. After a few moments he tossed it aside with an air of boredom, then rose abruptly and went to a small cabinet from which, after a few seconds of hesitation, he took a thin disc, impossibly shiny on one side and garishly printed on the other, which he inserted into a slot in his big, glass-fronted box. Returning to his seat, he picked up the tiny plastic thing and pointed it at the screen. At once the besotted Technician controlling the camera zoomed in on the display.

The watching men groaned, but made the best of it and settled down to watch.

The story being related on the glass screen was an impressive display of alien technology, with space ships zooming hither and yon, deploying weapons against each other to spectacular effect. The alien, on the rare occasions when the Engineer controlling the camera showed his reactions, showed a certain boredom, and the watchers formed the sobering impression that space travel was a perfectly ordinary thing to these people. They glanced at each other in alarm, knowing that their planet could never match this technological achievement.

The hologram vanished, and Bronsith's face appeared. After informing his audience that nothing happened for a hour or so, the hologram reappeared at that point.

The alien rose, stretched, and walked over to his glass box to retrieve the shiny disc. His smaller pet was fast asleep on the chair, but the larger woman, when the Engineer controlling the camera condescended to zoom in on her, was on all-fours, her head turned to the door to the larger room in eager anticipation.

But, if she'd expected her owner to appear, she was disappointed, for he returned to his seat and picked up the little glass from which he'd drinking during the interlude. He filled it with a pale yellowish liquid from the bottle he'd produced from somewhere and sipped it appreciatively while his unseen watchers speculated on the nature of his drink.

Mark sipped his whiskey, one hand tousling the thick fur on his dog's head. He looked at his watch: only nine-thirty. He sat for a few minutes wondering whether to finish the bottle or to go to the White Lion for a drink before bed. Deciding on the latter, he drained his glass and stood. Recollecting that Trish's leash was now attached to Janet's collar, he took her old, frayed leash from a drawer in his bedroom and clipped it to his excited pet's collar. Then he led her from the room and into the kitchen en route to the outside world.

His girl friend, he noticed as he hurried across the room, was standing on all-fours, her gagged mouth uttering strangled little noises as if asking him for something. Mistakenly imagining that she wished to end the session, he smiled at her in passing and went outside, switching off the kitchen lights as he went. It would do her good, he thought, to experience a typical period in a dog's life, of being ignored by her owner!

The hologram flickered and Bronsith's countenance appeared in its place. The camera was incapable of a view more than fifty or so yards from the alien's house, he said, and there was little of interest to observe inside with the bigger woman penned up in her cage. The camera had been left trained on the paved track outside the front door in wait for the alien man's return from wherever he'd gone with the smaller woman, and the next clip was timed after an interval of ninety minutes. Bronsith's face vanished in its turn and the hologram began again, this time with a view of the outside world.

It was dark, that they saw at once, but it was not the pitch darkness of their own nights. On the contrary, the scene was brightly lit by garish orange lamps mounted on the top of slender stone poles lining the wide, impossibly smooth road. But they had little time to make any comment on this prodigal use of valuable electricity before the figure of the alien man hove into view, the little woman held in his arms. They watched as he inserted a tiny metal implement into the metal disc at one side of the door, then the camera switched to the interior of the white room and they watched the door open from that side.

Mark belched comfortably as he unlocked his front door. Entering the kitchen, he placed the drowsy Trish on the tiled floor and walked over to the sink to fill the kettle. Only when it was switched on did he turn his attention to his girl friend.

Janet was feeling near agony at the pressure in her bladder. On her boy friend's appearance at last, she pressed her body up against the mesh of her cage and whined piteously to be let out.

Mark gazed down at her muzzily. What on Earth was the matter with her? Then, when he heard the rustle of the litter in Trish's tray as the dog relieved herself, his brow cleared. So that was what she wanted, he thought with a smile. Opening the door of her cage, he picked up the end of her leash and led her out.

Once free of the cage, Janet tugged hard at her leash, pulling her laughing boy friend behind her to her litter tray. There she squatted hurriedly, and a bare second passed before they all heard the splash of her urine into the absorbent stuff beneath her. Then, suddenly, at the thought that she was relieving herself at the end of a leash exactly as Trish had done earlier, she blushed a deep crimson all the way from her hair line to the tops of her breasts.

The watchers craned forward in their eagerness to examine this interesting phenomenon, uttering exclamations of astonishment and hastily ensuring that they were down loading the scene for future study

Janet felt her boy friend's hand pat her on the head. “Good girl, Shandy!” she heard him say.

Finished, she sighed with contentment. Then she felt a tug on her collar and came obediently to all-fours ready to follow Mark to their bedroom. But, almost before she realised it, she was being ushered back into her cage and the door was closing behind her. She just had time to turn to see Mark and Trish leave the kitchen when the lights went off again. She stared after them in consternation before lying down again on the padded floor of her cage, padding which seemed to grow harder with the passage of each hour.

Mark used the lavatory, then went into his bedroom where Trish was already curled up on her little bed. Undressing, and leaving his discarded clothing on the floor, he climbed naked into his bed and pulled the covers over him. Turning on his side, he closed his eyes. This would teach Janet a much-needed lesson, he thought comfortably. He drifted off to sleep, knowing that the beer he'd drunk would cause his bladder to wake him after about five hours or so. Then he would let her out and bring her to bed for the usual purpose. After that, he would see!

They watched as the alien ushered his pet back into her cage. After bolting the door, he left for his bedroom, on the way depressing a small switch on the wall which obviously controlled the central lights. There he undressed, leaving his garments in an untidy heap on the floor in a hearteningly normal human fashion, and got into his enormous bed. Raising a hand from beneath his thin covering, he pulled a cord and the light in that room went off too.

The camera, after wandering about aimlessly for a few moments, focussed on the cage in the darkened room. Behind the mesh, the larger woman stood on all-fours staring at the half-open door into the larger room beyond which her owner lay in bed, an odd expression on her peculiarly mobile face. Then they saw her lie down, and the hologram stopped. Bronsith appeared again, beaming triumphantly, and told his audience that a further clip would be ready for showing tomorrow. Then the whole display went dark, and the men gathered in Sisath's study burst into a babble of talk and argument, expressed both in thoughts and in speech.

Janet lay on the soft bedding, the little tingle between her legs screaming for relief. But, as she realised with a delicious shock, she was even unable to masturbate successfully. The way her boy friend had treated her made her writhe in frustration; she expected their normal sexual interlude, but to be shut up in a cage to await his pleasure brought almost unbearable sexual longing.

Mark turned over under the covers and grinned into the darkness, imagining his girl friend's helpless frustration. He closed his eyes, intending to wake later and bring her to his bed.

The gathering in Sisath's study broke up vowing to meet tomorrow to consider the implications of what they'd seen, several men, including their host, announcing their intention of getting thoroughly drunk first. But Gershon wandered out into the dark Quad and up the worn stone steps into the Senior Common Room, deserted at this hour. There he drew himself a large tankard of beer from the barrel in the corner and at down to think.

After an interval, he placed his laptop on the table by his side and brought up a stationary hologram of the alien woman in the act of stretching.

He stared at the image for some time, then set it slowly rotating, scrutinising it carefully.

She was definitely a woman who'd just become a young adult, about thirteen or fourteen months old by the standards of his world. Though he examined every inch of her skin, he could see no tattoo, no indication of who owned her. And if she could remove her collar at will, he thought, how on Earth did the aliens recognise their property? Were their women held in common?

He increased the size of the image, concentrating on the paw of her right fore leg, and gazed at the long, slender, impossible fingers with awe. Recalling the things he'd seen her achieve, things no woman should be able to do, he was filled with astonishment at the depth and degree of training she'd evidently undergone. He wondered for a moment whether there existed any pictures of other alien women in close up; if any, they would repay study.

Sighing, he shut down the hologram and closed his laptop. He drained his beer, left the Common Room, and crossed the Quad to his Staircase and his rooms.

At far off Western University the sun had just set. In the Engineering Department the youngest and most junior Technician sat yawning before the screen showing the raw feed from the virtual camera. He spent some minutes toying with the controls, sending the camera here and there about the darkened house of the alien man, focussing on the mysterious machines in the white room. Bored, he turned the camera on the bigger woman's cage, or as much as of it as he could see in the darkness.

The animal was restless, it seemed, turning over and over as if to get comfortable and now and then getting to all-fours and turning around in its cramped cage. He was trying fiddling with the controls, trying to improve the image, when he was was startled by the sudden blaze of light as the alien man entered the room.

By now Janet was heartily sick of the cage. The padding beneath her felt rock hard, and, because she'd spent so much time dozing during the evening, she now found it impossible to sleep. She thought with longing of her boy friend's soft bed, the bed she'd been expecting to be taken to. Rolling over onto her stomach, she considered Mark's actions. She could clearly see what he was up to; he wanted her to break out of her self-imposed role and plead with him to be let out. Until then he would treat her, as far as possible, just as he would a 'real' dog.

Busy in trying to get comfortable, she failed to hear her boy friend's stealthy, bare-foot passage from his bedroom to the kitchen. The lights in the ceiling came on without warning, startling and dazzling her.

Screwing up her eyes against the glare, Janet didn't see the cage door open, but she was aware of Mark's hand groping for the end of the leash and she felt his sharp tug on her collar.

Janet came out on to the hard tiles of the kitchen floor under her boy friend's urging. For a single instant the thought of standing upright flashed into her mind. But that would mean she'd accepted the ending of her present role; dismissing the notion out of hand, she padded meekly from the room at Mark's side.

Still stubbornly on all-fours, she climbed on to Mark's bed and felt his hand on her collar as he lay down beside her and pulled the duvet, still warm from the heat of his body, over them both. Janet lay down by his side, her whole body tingling deliciously with anticipation.

The young Technician stared at the screen in growing disbelief. “Wow!” he thought in excitement. A perversion he'd never even dreamed of was taking place under his very eyes. Hastily, he switched on his personal laptop and recorded the shocking scenes. His friends would thrill to this!

He watched to the very end, looking on in a daze as the alien man, after allowing a brief interval to elapse following the frenzied activity in his bed, led the woman from the room and put her back in her cage, pausing only to let her relieve herself in her tray and then to wipe her perfunctorily between the thighs with a piece of absorbent paper he took from a roll. Before the lights went out in the white room, the camera lingered on the young caged animal, still panting a little from her recent exertions.

In the darkness of her cage, Janet lay unsleeping, her eyes staring sightlessly through the mesh. The aching sensation between her thighs, temporarily sated by the attentions of her boy friend, flared up afresh as she recalled how he'd treated her. To be taken from the cage he kept her in, to be led on a leash to his bed for him to slake his desires upon her body, then to be led back and shut up until he wanted her again; all this filled Janet with such a delicious mixture of humiliation and longing that she groaned aloud in ecstasy, and a long hour passed before sleep found her at last.

\"Planet of Men!\"

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