1. Shanti

"...el feel ep sim..." The sandalwood paste smeared Brahmin priest beseeched me, holding out his hands as if he cupped something between them. I backed away, "Uh, no thanks." Shrugged my shoulders in a gesture of none-comprehension and ran as fast as the crowd would carry me in the opposite direction. The streets stank of rancid cow piss, mixing with the odor of tightly packed bodies and the musty tang of incense. The brilliant hues of saris, the glittering mellow of gold, and the heaps of flower wreaths piled upon the roadside shrines all served to further deepen my sense of disorientation. Desperately I raised my arm and signaled for a cab, struggling not to be swallowed by the tide of people. When the floater lowered itself and I felt my hand reassuringly placed on the heated metal of its hull I sighed in relief. Calcutta, I thought remorsefully, Even after all this time, I still do not belong to you.

"Do you miss your home?" Shanti asked. He was stretched out on the padded mats in a purple sari edged with gold, his carefully curled black hair spilling over his shoulders, spilling over the edge of the mats to brush at the floor. Shanti had been castrated before he hit puberty, before the evils of testosterone could wreck his innocent beauty. He said that he had not wept when it was being done to him, instead he had felt relief at not having to take over his father's odious work. Now he flicked a gold bangled wrist expertly, bringing a ripe peach to his lush red lips. His thickly kohled eyes never left my face.

I tried to check my unease, "I told you not to break into my apartment anymore."

Shanti smiled wickedly, his real name had been Raji, or Reshi, or something of that sort. But he chose the name Shanti, because it was more girl, more fitting to him and his occupation. "Eunuchs go wherever they want to."

"I wish you wouldn't come here, especially when I'm not around. I had to call the locksmith three times last week, he's getting to be rather short with me."

"You should have given me your keys." He said, tossing the peach pit onto the floor.

"I wish you wouldn't do that." I said, scooping it up and delivering it to the garbage. "I wish you would go home."

"You are rude to me." Shanti pouted. His delicate nostril with its jeweled ring flared in warning. "There are not many who dares to risk the curse of someone like me."

"Curse me all you want." I said, trying to be indifferent. He was really quite impossible.

"Of course, you are not afraid of my curses." He bounced off the mat and came forward, locking his arms around my neck. "There is no reason for you to be afraid of anything, because you are a - what does the Englishmen call it? - A Synthetic. You will never be afraid, because you were not born from a mother and you do not inherit her frailties. No, you are not afraid, but you are lonely."

"I will cure your loneliness." He said. His long eyelashes fluttered sensuously, brushing softly against my forehead. "Do you miss your home, Neuro?"

I swallowed. He smelled faintly of rose petals, a small genetic enhancement given to him as a gift from one of his admirers. I could make no such offers, I thought guiltily, all I had was my last twenty, and I need that to buy another week of groceries.

"Don't..." I caught his hands as he began to unbutton my shirt, his hands were softer than clouds, rich and brown like milk and chocolate. "I... I can't afford you."

The slap took me by surprise. I stumbled back, holding my cheek. Shanti trembled with clenched fists. I winced at his glare, choosing instead to look at the floor. Finally he stopped shaking, opening his palms and raising them in placation. "Neuro... You can give me your ring, if you have nothing else."

I raised my head, he smiled painfully. The ring was worth nothing, a souvenir from my expedition to the exo systems. Some native ore, gray and unflattering. I had kept it on simply because I had forgotten to take it off. I slid it off my finger, pressing it into his hand. His fingers curled around mine, they have been dipped in henna. The electric heat of his skin making contact against mine shot fire into my veins. I gave him something every time, it would be wrong if I did not. He would still come, but it would mean... something different.

"Tell me about your home, Neuro?"

Shanti took off my shirt and threw it carelessly on the floor just as he did with the peach pit. Eagerly he pushed me down on the mats, unzipping my pants and reaching his hand inside to clutch my balls. I gasped as he rubbed the pad of his thumb across the underside of my genitals. He lowered his head and I arched my back impatiently, thrusting my erection into his willing mouth. His throat was slick and warm and tight. I moaned, tangling my fingers in his thick hair as he deep throated me. He held me there for a second, then let my penis slide all the way out of his mouth. Grasping the base of my staff with both his hands, he began to work his tongue in a circular motion around the head. I was wet with his saliva, and the feeling of his hot tongue on my sensitive parts was almost too much to bear. He licked and licked, darting teasingly into my piss slit and making me shudder. "You're big for a little boy, Neuro." He murmured, suckling my balls and pulling on them gently with his teeth.

"I'm not so little!" I gasped as he pumped my shaft with his exquisitely long fingers, stroking and squeezing, spreading my precum around the swollen head. Most Sapiens presumed that I was just what I looked like, a sixteen year old boy with permanently disheveled hair. They've forgotten on purpose that our adulthood came at half their cycles, just like they've forgotten our supposed immortality. I must have been at least two hundred years older than Shanti, even though I appeared much younger than his miserable nineteen years. I had spent the first hundred plugged into the Collective Consciousness, and the second century floating in exo-space. Now, back on New Terra, I felt out of place for the first time in my extended life.

But perhaps... Perhaps I wasn't so out of place after all. Shanti's mouth was as familiar as the echoing comforts of the Collective. I held on to him desperately as he bobbed his head in my lap, spreading my legs apart with his shoulders so he could reach into the secret place between them. Synthetics are created with the reproductive equipment of both sexes. Inside the Collective, the distinction between male and female has long ceased to be relevant.

Shanti stayed away from my female part, it was as alien to him as the concept of sharing a thousand other minds. I felt his index and middle finger pushing into my anus unceremoniously, my body quivered and I shot out a muffled exclamation. He smirked. I could feel him smirking even with my dick in his mouth. "Fuck!" I bit back the pain, he had reached in far enough to massage my prostate and compensate for his intrusion. Shanti sucked harder, like a powerful little vacuum with a wonderfully caressing tongue. His long black hair covered my lap, tickling my naked thighs with their silky length. I mewled pathetically, he had began to purr in the back of his throat. The vibrations drove me crazy. I gritted my teeth and threw my head back, trying to hold on to the pleasure for just a moment longer, but he wouldn't let me. I felt my balls tighten in anticipation, the unbelievable pre-climatic feeling climbing from stomach to spine as he pressed harder and harder with his fingers.

"I'm gonna...!" My penis bucked wildly inside his mouth before I could finish, shooting stream after stream of sticky white cum down his throat. He swallowed enthusiastically, lapping at the head and squeezing my sacks to milk every last drop from me. Some of my semen had spilled from the corner of his mouth, dribbling down his chin in white rivulets. I wiped at them with my fingers, then pushed them back between his lips. He sucked them obediently, licking from the tip of each to my palm and the delicate underside of my wrist.

"Neuro." Shanti cooed into my ear. His fingers remained inside of me, making me feel strangely comforted yet vulnerable. "Neuro." He said again, his tongue darting out to lick at my lips. I opened my mouth and he kissed me, deep and hard. The smell and taste of my own seed lingering like a recurrent ghost. I bit down on his bottom lip, it was lush and sweet like the peach he just ate. "Neuro, tell me about your home."

"Home is beautiful." I said.

"Do you miss it?"

"Sometimes."

"It would be hard for anyone to be lonely there, wouldn't it?"

I stared at the ceiling, "With the Collective Consciousness we can temporarily share the sensation of multiples, but we do not loose our individuality or the sense of isolation and the distinction of one's self from others." I smiled thinly, "But yes, sometimes it's hard to think of yourself as a solitary creature in there."

"I would never be lonely," Shanti said, "In a place like that."

The sun was stabbing down cruelly on Calcutta. I squinted even though the inside of the cab was shielded from brightness by its color stained windows. The scenery outside was dry, a few floaters kept pace with the one I was in. Mostly tourists, I guessed, a few officials and diplomats, academics like myself, almost never a native. Calcutta hadn't changed much since the War. It had been one of the precious few preserved states on New Terra. It hadn't even been renamed, like most of the restored cultures. Calcutta, cut and dry. Calcutta, even when New Terra had lost its old name of Earth.

My reflection stared back at me in the window. I pressed a hand down on my unruly hair automatically. The heat had fried its fine Synthetic texture, making it crimp and coil, sticking up in every which direction. Some of it fell across my one eye, tickling my face. Annoyed, I brushed it away, knowing that it will fall back into place within seconds. I touched my cheekbones gingerly, they have become sharper since I first came. I had known before hand that the funding for the project had been cut, but still I came. I had thought that Calcutta had been calling for me. Calling for me to fall into her vivid and feverish embrace. Now I know that she was calling for me to stay away.

I shaded my eyes, they have already been bleached a paler shade of blue by the potent sun, just as my hair had been boiled to the lusterless color of bone. Only my skin had darkened, from corpse like parlor into a weak tan. The cab dropped into the landing zone, hovered for a moment over an unmoving bull that had obviously decided to take a nap right before the temple's entrance, and sat itself down gently by a freshly planted tree. I swiped the institute's i.x. card through the floater's pay slot and jumped out. If worse comes to worst, I thought, I could sleep in cabs, and charge it to the institute.

The Brahmin was reclined under the sapling. My stomach tightened as I caught sight of him. It was the same priest as the one that had approached me yesterday at the market, and the day before that he had followed me to the river, and the day before that he sat behind me at the picture show. I can't remember how long he has been stalking me. At first he lingered in the background, blending in with the plentiful scenery. Then as each day passed he edged closer and closer, until he began to speak. The first time he did it, I simply stared at him. He didn't speaking Hindi, but seemed to be chanting some kind of mantra like no mantra I've ever heard. And he had acted as if he wanted to give me something, though each time his cupped hands offered nothing that I could see. He must have belonged to some splintered cult of Vishnu, I thought, noting the vertical stripe of sandalwood paste on his forehead. A series of interesting sub-religions had emerged at the turn of the old Earth's destiny, and some had survived and even flourished after the War. Interested as I was intellectually in his origins, his close proximity to wherever I happened to be going was putting me out a little.

"Lum el feel ep sim di, ka'al ka ip sim." The weathered old man told me, smiling and holding out his palms. I began to back away, this has become an old habit. "Lum el feel ep sim di, ka'al ka ip sim!" He insisted, pressing something into my hands. I looked down, so he had something to give me after all - a blue lotus smaller than the width of my palm. Its petals were milky white at the base, gradually taking on the taint of blue as it reached its tip. The center was a rich brilliant golden, flecked with pink pollen. I've never seen anything quite like it, surely it did not exist in nature, and I wasn't aware that Calcutta was into gene-splicing their plant varieties.

Grinning broadly now that I have accepted his gift, the Brahmin pointed at the temple. When I didn't move he pointed at me, then the temple again. "I'm going there anyway." I said out loud, vexed at his behavior and wondering why a follower of Vishnu would point me towards a temple of Shiva.

Ducking into the shade of the temple, I turned and saw that my stalker was gone. Maybe I got rid of him for good, I thought, looking at the flower in my hand. At least he didn't mean any harm. I was lucky to get a blossom instead of some quick-wired explosives. Shrugging, I turned back to the temple.

It was less crowded than usual today; a few tourists, some housewives, the rudimentary smattering of priests, and couple of sexually frustrated husbands. I craned my neck to look around, Trevor has not arrived yet. He had worked in Calcutta longer than me, and had developed the habit of propitiating the local deities every morning. I had joined him in his little ritual shortly after I've arrived, learning quickly that spending the vibrant Calcutta after-dawn in that white walled prison of a research center was pure torture.

The altar was overflowing with offerings of multicolored flower wreaths from the morning ritual. The statue of the Nataraja was draped and smothered in their fragrant petals. It was a new and unusual piece, created by a group of Aghoris after the last faint flickers of the War. The molded bronze with intricately pressed details depicted the Great Lord Shiva dancing the Tandava, the dance of destruction. His multitude of arms flared angrily around him, drawing a circle of fire, and his feet crushed the backside of a giant tortoise base. The expression on Shiva's face was serene, unmoved by his devastation of the material world. I shuddered, a draft had began to wound its way through the temple.

I remembered my lotus. Opening my hand, I saw that several of its fragile petals have already been crushed beyond repair by my fingers. I had been clenching it more tightly than I had thought. Gingerly I sat it down on the altar.

"There." I said to no one in particular, bowing a feeble homage to the Destroyer.

"Hey!" Trevor said. I started, nearly falling out of my chair. He winked mischievously, dropping a few tons of antiquated books beside my terminal. "Sleeping on the job again, huh? Rough night?"

I blushed, and pretended to shift my attention to the manuscript at the top of the stack. The curly black Sanskrit squiggles swam before my eyes. I just couldn't seem to concentrate today. My mind lingered on the Brahmin and the lotus.

"Well, you better not let anybody else catch you at it." Trevor rambled on, "Veya's here today."

"Veya's here?" I cried out in dismay, pushing the book away from me at once. "But I thought he was in Varnasi."

"He was, but not anymore. He's back to arrange the reception for Deus Mercury."

"Deus Mercury!" I exclaimed.

"Yes, Deus Mercury." Somebody said, it wasn't Trevor. We both whirled around at once, and there he was, our much-despised supervisor.

Veya was a third generation soldier module: young, arrogant, and over-sexed. A recent graduate from the Academy with top scores, inscrutable records, and endless recognition. It must have been a quark or a form of keen punishment dealt out by some highly placed enemies that he ended up heading the research institute here in Calcutta. He stood smirking at us, elated at having caught his insubordinate and unappreciative underlings doing something they shouldn't be doing. Which I wasn't even sure was what we were doing. But that didn't matter to Veya.

"We are very honored to be receiving the Deus." Veya said. Rather haughtily, I thought. Deus did not usually grace the doorsteps of academia unless something dastardly has prompted them to do so. Especially hyper-personalities like Mercury, whose main preoccupation since the War was to wander aimlessly from Edge to Edge, finding blood sport where there was none. I didn't hear mention that he had returned to New Terra. "Will I be assured that you will both be on your best behavior?" Veya berated, as if our behavior was ever below standard.

"Yessir!" Trevor saluted, and marched humbly back to his work. I tried to become engrossed once more in the manuscript, as it suddenly appeared to be very intriguing.

Veya did not leave my desk. "Step in to my office, Neuro." He said. I winced. Trevor gave me a sympathetic look of knowing. Slowly I got up, noting from the corner of my eye Veya's ever so sly of a smile. I saw as I was passing the mirrored hall my clenched fists, and tried to unclench them. Veya was behind me, his dark blue eyes glued to my back. Looking at his reflection, I was instantly reminded of how much I detested him, his acceptably vogue clothes, his impeccable gait, his flawless features, his well-toned body, and his neatly spiked hair. Neatly spiked! I ground my teeth together.

He closed the door behind us as we entered his office. I felt myself tense up anew, any more tension and I would have shot off like a tightly wound spring. The glass window of his office, which took up the space of an entire wall, overlooked the early noon bazaar. I tried to preoccupy myself with its vivacious theatrics, but Veya had no intention of letting me blank out in his presence.

"Neuro." He murmured so close to my ear I nearly jumped out of my skin. "Did you miss me?"

Since he would not have liked my answer I thought it best to say nothing. Which was hard, I had an awful time trying to bite back my tongue, especially when he was already pushing his hands under my shirt and caressing the flat of my stomach.

"Oh Neuro, why are you always so difficult? I've never seen an ice queen frozen so rigidly as you are. It wouldn't kill you to relax a little and enjoy the moment."

"Some would consider this sexual harassment." I replied coldly. "Not an enjoyable experience."

"Ha!" He exclaimed against my neck, his hands freely exploring the dip of my navel. "Thank goodness they did away with that stickler. What an utterly insipid rule! Neanderthal, I must say. Anyway, I don't see why you find me so disagreeable. I can think of numerous individuals who would delight in my favors."

"Then maybe you should harass them instead of me." I said, trying unsuccessfully to brush his hands off of my body. I didn't try very hard, I must admit. Displeasing and inevitably being fired by Veya would result in very poor consequences for me, especially when my personal finances were at an all time low. But I always threw in the rudimentary struggles, just so he would not get the wrong idea.

"I don't want to harass anyone else but you." Veya leered. He was pressing unbecomingly into my backside, rubbing his heat against me as his hands traced my package through my jeans.

"Why me?" I pleaded, "I'm just some boring information module with no specialized traits, undeserving of your attention!"

"Maybe you're right." Veya mused, "But I find you strangely attractive, especially in your antiquated costume." I think he meant my buttons, as he was busily unbuttoning them. "I know you've hated me the first time you saw me, Neuro. Was it because I out ranked you? Or was it because they put some brutish military type in charge of you faint hearted smart asses and that didn't seem fair? The expression on your pitiful face every time you look at me makes my blood boil, but that just makes me want to fuck you more than anything else. Nothing turns me on more than seeing you on your knees sucking my cock and begging to keep your job. What can be more pleasurable then having some one who hates you ground helplessly under your heel?" He laughed a little at this.

"No!" I gasped as he pulled my shirt off of my shoulders. His rough fingers passed over my chest, pausing to tease at my nipples. He pinched and pulled, rubbed them hard enough to hurt. Bending his head down, he took one into his mouth. I felt his tongue linger tenaciously over my areola, dousing it with saliva. He suckled gently at first, then clamped down hard with his teeth. I barely managed to stifle a scream before he bit the other one as well. I thrashed wildly in his grasp. Veya smiled and held me tighter. Soldier modules were amazingly strong, though their deceptively light frames did well to hide it. He had the lean, hard muscles of a seasoned bully. Streamlined to cling closely to his bones.

"Shut up, Neuro." He said, pushing me down until I was bent over his desk. "I'm going to fuck your sorry little ass and make you like it. Life must be empty for you without me here to stick it in and fill it up." Tugging my already loosened tie from my neck, he bent my arms behind my back and tied my wrists together. Then he pulled my pants and underwear down to my knees, exposing my buttocks. I cried out at the first stinging swat of his palm. "Have you been bad while I was away, little boy?"

Little boy indeed! I thought angrily, I was his senior by leaps and bounds. I couldn't help it if my genetic package determined that even at full maturity I still looked years younger than a warrior pup! Another smack, I lurched forward with it, banging my balls painfully into the desk. He stopped to feel his red and burning handprints on my bottom, cupping the plump lobes of my ass in his hands and rubbing them lewdly.

"I think you want to be spanked, Neuro. You bad thing!" He chided, reaching forward to stroke my semi-hard penis. I bit my lips and refused to give him the satisfaction of hearing me moan. With one hand wrapped around my dick, his other hand continued to slap my rear end. It was humiliating, to say the least. I couldn't help but cry out towards the end, as the persistent blows really began to hurt on my tender rump. "Shut up and take it like a good boy." Veya said, and when I wouldn't he pulled off my undies and stuffed them into my mouth. "Mmrf! Mmph!" I could only say as he continued to spank me.

It seemed like an eternity before it was over, thirty solid whacks on my poor behind. My ass felt like it was on fire. My penis trembled with a painful erection between his fingers. He kissed my burning bottom ardently, distributing his saliva generously on each throbbing cheek. Straightening up, he thrust a knee between my thighs and forced me to spread my legs. I felt his hands prying open my crack, revealing my pink puckered hole. "Mrrgh!" I protested, but his spit-coated finger was already sliding into me. I jerked violently, trying to squirm away from him. Veya pressed down on the small of my back, holding me in place as he finger fucked me. I groaned into my gag as he stretched out my anus, adding more fingers as he went along. Finally satisfied that I was loose enough, he removed his hand and unzipped his trousers.

Veya walked around the desk to stand in front of me, his long thick penis nearly poking me in the eye. Synthetic soldiers always had impressive equipment, since their testosterone level were higher than most. I looked at it warily as he stroked it to maximum attention. Removing my underpants from my mouth, he said. "Lick it, get it nice and wet right up to the hilt if you don't want me to dry fuck you."

Reluctantly I did what he said, taking his circumcised cock head into my mouth and working my tongue over it. Veya groaned loudly, grabbed me by the hair and shoved more of his huge pecker down my throat. My mouth was stuffed full of rock hard penis, my cheeks bulged and my jaw ached with the effort. He fucked my face for a good while, getting his staff nice and wet with my spittle. Then he got behind me, kicked apart my legs and lubed my asshole with his precum. I choked back a scream as he penetrated me, his fat knob stretching me so wide I thought I was going to split in half. "Oh god, Veya, stop! Stop it! You're hurting me!"

"Stop fighting it so much, then." He panted, cramming inch after inch of his monster cock into me. "Aaargh! Your little boy cunt is so damned tight! Take it! Take my cock! I'm gonna fuck you so hard you won't be able to sit down for weeks!" He shoved himself forcefully into me, all nine inches of pulsing meat pushed so deep inside my anus it nearly went into my stomach. His heavy-laden balls pressed tightly against my buttocks, his hands coaxed at my shamefully erect penis.

"Veya!" I whimpered as he began to pull out and slam back into me. "Uh! Uh! Veya! No! Uh! It's so big! I can't...! Veya! Oh god..." I swayed, knees buckling, to the rhythm of him pounding my defenseless ass. He jacked me mercilessly. The sensations of his hands on my cock and balls combined with the pressure on my prostate made me float perpetually between the brink of pain and ecstasy. As his pace grew more frenzied, it didn't take long for me to ejaculate. I squealed pathetically, spraying his desk top with ample loads of my cream. He crushed my balls in his hands, shaking the last few precious drops from my dick.

"Neuro, you slut." He said bemusedly. I panted, exerted from the exercise. But he wasn't finished with me yet. Veya plowed my asshole in renewed frenzy, building up considerable friction as he thrust in and out and in again, harder and faster with each jab. I grunted wordlessly, lost in animal lust from the concentration of his pheromones and the feelings inside my anus. He came with a shudder. Spasm wrecked his penis as he shot at least a gallon of sperm into me, filling my insides with his thick steaming semen. Veya stayed inside me for a long while, trapping his cum inside me. As he withdrew, finally, his juices and mine began to trickle down my thigh. It felt so empty without his huge thing inside of me, I almost asked for him to put it back in. Almost.

Veya untied my hands and wiped us both off with some tissues. "Are you angry at me?" He asked, straightening my tie.

"What good will that do me?" I sighed, rubbing my bottom. It hurt, but it was nothing I haven't dealt with before.

Veya pulled me to his chest, murmuring. "Drop by my place later and I'll give you a nice hot steamed bath that'll make you feel all better. And we can have some more... Fun, afterwards."

"Don't be ridiculous." I said quickly, "I hate you, remember?"

"How can I forget?" He smiled.