Flic was painting her toenails. God, life in the colonies was so boring. There were no parties, at least not the kind she would want to be seen at. Bill wasn't even an officer, just a Private. None of the potential officers Daddy had found were suitable for her. Mind you, the officers' parties were probably boring as well. All the officers she'd met so far were much too serious and likely talked too much shop anyway. Like those tedious gatherings Daddy dragged her along to sometimes, when he wanted to show her off to his business friends. Maybe she could tell Denise to lick her pussy to provide some relief from the boredom? Looking down her slim body she could see that the pussy in question was, as usual, perfectly trimmed -- med-tubes did have their uses. Perhaps she could work out on her exercise bike for a bit? Her legs were her best feature, and having them done in a med-tube just didn't pass the time as well as real exercise.

The sound of her sponsor entering the pod interrupted her thoughts. "Flic," Bill called. "I'm back. We need to go out to see someone."

She sighed, it was such a pain being a concubine. Why did she have to score only 5.3 on her CAP test? Daddy had tried of course, but there was no way he could increase her score, or even get the Confederacy to ignore it and make her a sponsor anyway. Still, he had done the next best thing; he had set up a pre-pack for her. Bill, her sponsor, was compliant and Denise, his second concubine, was there to handle all the drudge work in their pod. Daddy was looking after both their families back on Earth, and she messaged him regularly to let him know how things were going. Bill and Denise both knew that a word from her would have repercussions for their families. That kept them both in line, despite her technically being Bill's concubine.

"Do we have to?" she replied, "I'm waiting for my nail varnish to dry." Why did Bill have to ask her to go out at such an inconvenient time?

"I'm sorry Flic, we have to go. Orders."

"Bloody orders," she called to him. "Always interfering with the important stuff." She closed her robe and came out of her room to see Bill. He'd been through the full Marine upgrade so he was two meters tall now. He hadn't changed his appearance much otherwise, still with the same mid-brown hair and permanently bemused look that he had when he was first introduced to her on Earth. At least he'd fixed his eyes so he didn't have to wear those geeky glasses any more. She was glad of that, the geek look most certainly did not suit the image she wanted him to project. He was in his full dress uniform; that was unusual. He looked worried as well, but that wasn't her problem. "Do I need to get into something formal if you're in your full uniform?" she asked.

"Flic, you need to wear one of those grey shifts. They want you dressed as a concubine." Bill looked nervous as he asked her.

"No I will not!" Flic shouted. "Those shifts are hideous. I wouldn't be seen dead in one. It was bad enough being forced to wear one on the voyage here. I'm never ever going to wear one again! Never! Do you hear me William Osbourne?"

Bill flinched. That was just the unfortunate reaction he had expected from her. "It's not me Flic, it's orders. You have to."

Flic launched into another angry tirade as she went back into her room to look for a formal suit to go with his dress uniform. How dare Bill try to tell her what to wear! He had no fashion sense whatsoever. She decided on a white blouse with a conservatively cut dark-green jacket and matching short skirt. There were a few silver details, but not so many as to appear vulgar. Flic would never want to look vulgar. Her legs were her best feature, so she wanted to show them off with the skirt and shoes she had picked. The blouse had a scoop neck, but not so low as to distract from her legs. Details like that were important.

As he was waiting for her to get changed, a voice came through Bill's internal AI link, «Private, this is Centurion Robertson. Give her one more warning about her clothes. If she ignores it then let her come dressed as she wants. I will deal with the problem.»

«Yes, sir,» Bill replied sub vocally. That worried him even more, the Centurion was obviously monitoring things personally. That meant trouble, for both himself and for Flic. Officers didn't involve themselves in trivialities. When Flic emerged in her green suit he tried once more, "You really should wear a shift Flic. They don't like concubines disobeying orders."

"I'm not wearing one of those fucking awful grey things for anyone!" she stormed. "End of argument! Let's go and see whoever it is who wants to see us." She couldn't believe that Bill was still pressing the point after she had already told him that she wouldn't wear one of those dowdy shapeless things. What did he take her for?

Bill shrugged and led her out of the pod. She hadn't made a wise decision, but that was down to her. He had tried his best to dissuade her.

When the two of them arrived at the Civil Service reception area, the woman at the desk ignored Flic and just talked to Bill, "Private Osbourne. The Centurion will see you shortly. Please take a seat."

As they sat waiting, Flic glared at the receptionist, wondering what a Moslem woman in a headscarf was doing here. Hadn't the Confederacy left all the Moslems behind on Earth? Pulling her mind back to their current situation, she asked Bill, "Is a Centurion important?"

"Yes, Flic. He's the equivalent of a Major. You'll need to be very polite to him and do whatever he says. Best to stay quiet at first, until he starts talking to you. He'll probably want to speak to me first."

Flic started to get angry, but she managed to suppress it. Out in public she had to act more circumspectly. After all, she was supposedly the concubine with Bill as her sponsor. This Centurion, whoever he was, would expect her to play the obedient concubine. It wasn't something she enjoyed, but it was one of those annoying things she had to do now and then. A bit like attending Daddy's parties to smile at those fat, leering business partners of his. Bill was looking even more nervous than he had in the pod. Well, that wasn't her problem.

In his office Mark was refreshing himself from the file on the two he was about to see:

Sponsor: William Osbourne, Marine PFC, Age 16 CAP 6.5;

Concubine: Felicity Osbourne, formerly Barham, Age 18, CAP 5.3.

The AI had flagged him earlier, and he'd seen how far things had degenerated between the two of them inside the pod. When this case had first crossed his desk, he'd made some enquiries on Earth, and had got some interesting answers back. The sponsor would get a refresher course, and his concubine would get a sharp lesson. She would definitely need curing of her bad habits. He didn't expect that she would need recycling. She was obviously spoiled and over-indulged, but she wasn't stupid. She should be capable of learning what she needed to learn quickly enough to avoid the worst. Sitting up straighter in his chair, he told Shahana to send them in.

When they entered, Bill stood rigidly to attention in front of Mark's desk, saluting him. "Sir! Private Osbourne reporting, sir!"

Flic stood to one side, a couple of paces back. She posed herself to better show her legs and smiled at the Centurion; the nameplate on his desk said Mark Robertson. He was sitting there, looking very formal in his Civil Service uniform. Strangely, he had made himself look about forty with some grey in his hair and beard. Surely he could have had that fixed in a med-tube? This was obviously shaping up as a very formal meeting. Bill had been right to warn her to play her role as concubine. Irritating, but she could do it if she really had to.

Mark acknowledged Bill's salute. He asked, "Private, tell me what you were doing earlier this afternoon."

"Sir! I was being Court Martialed, sir!"

Flic gasped. What on earth was happening here? And why was she involved?

"On what charge Private?" Mark continued.

"Sir! Failure to control a concubine, sir!" Bill replied.

Flic immediately knew that this was big trouble for her. She changed to a more submissive pose and stopped smiling, that obviously wasn't appropriate any more in the current circumstances. How much worse was it going to get? Perhaps she should have put on one of those horrendous grey shifts after all? Bill had been more insistent about it than he usually was about things.

Mark carried on relentlessly, "And what was the verdict Private?"

"Sir! Guilty, sir!"

"And what part of your sentence was relevant to the Civil Service?"

"Sir! To transfer concubine Felicity Osbourne to the Civil Service for an indefinite period of obedience training, sir!"

Flic's heart sank. She was really in for it now. And it was probably all her own fault. Damn! Why couldn't she have been a sponsor? Why couldn't Daddy have fixed it like he fixed everything else for her? She just wasn't at all suited to being a concubine. She deserved far better.

"Thank you Private. Dismissed," Mark told him.

Bill saluted and marched out.

Flic stayed where she was. Having heard everything, she knew that for the moment she belonged to the Civil Service, not Bill. Oh God! The Civil Service. They couldn't put her in one of their brothels, could they?

The Centurion pointed silently to the spot where Bill had stood. She quickly moved there, standing still, waiting for him to speak. She thought back, wondering what she'd done to cause this. When she started thinking about it, there were rather more reasons than she expected. She had become careless, much too careless. The latest was last week. She'd been serving at a party Bill was throwing for some of his Marine buddies, when one of them had ordered her to get him a beer. She told him to get his own fucking beer and stormed off to her room. She'd had enough of being ogled all evening as the Marines had got drunker. Bill had persuaded her to go back and apologize with a blow-job. She did it because she realize that she'd gone too far that time. She blamed it on PMT, but the excuse and the blow-job obviously hadn't been enough. She'd become far too casual in the way she treated Bill and his buddies. Now she was going to suffer for it.

While she was thinking, Mark looked at her. Eighteen, blonde mid-length hair, blue eyes and perfectly turned out. From the pictures on her file she hadn't had much done in the med-tubes. Good legs, which her green skirt showed to advantage, and a relatively small bust. She probably thought a large bust would be vulgar and beneath her. After twenty seconds silence he began, "If your neighbor's dog bites you, what do you do about it?"

Flic wondered what his question was getting at, as it didn't seem relevant. She had to answer anyway, "You have it put down." Quickly she added, "Sir," at the end; the situation seemed to call for it.

"Correct. We do the same to concubines that bite sponsors," he said calmly.

This interview was not going at all well Flic realized. Was the Centurion going to kill her? Bill had said 'obedience training', surely that wasn't execution? Suddenly the Civil Service brothel began to look less unattractive.

"What if your neighbor's dog doesn't bite anyone, but just digs up your flowerbeds and shits on your lawn?" Mark asked.

Flic felt relief hearing that. He wasn't going to kill her, just punish her for not being a proper concubine. Undoubtedly it would be unpleasant, but almost anything was better than being recycled. The answer to his question was obvious, "You send it for obedience training, sir."

"So why are you being given obedience training?" he asked.

"Because I dug up people's flowerbeds and shat on their lawns, sir."

Mark had to work hard to suppress a grin at her response; she caught on quickly. She was probably intelligent enough to learn from her mistake, so he wouldn't have to recycle her. That was a relief -- recycling a concubine was always the very last resort.

"You shat on your own lawn as well," he told her. "Private Osbourne's record now has a black mark on it thanks to you. That will mean slower promotion for him, and I suspect that you would rather be concubine to a Corporal or to a Sergeant than to a Private?"

"Yes, sir. I can see that now." She did see it now, but she hadn't until the Centurion had pointed it out to her. She'd really messed things up by thinking just of herself, and not of the wider impact of her behavior. She resolved to act more carefully in future, if she got out of this in one piece.

Mark changed his line of attack, "I made some enquiries when Private Osbourne's case first came to my attention. Your father is a very influential man, used to getting his own way. I suspect that he let you have pretty much anything you wanted when you were younger, and arranged for inconvenient things like speeding tickets to disappear, didn't he."

"Yes, sir," she replied. He had that right. She'd never even bothered to count the number of tickets and such that Daddy had smoothed over for her.

"He even tried to get your CAP score increased," Mark pointed out.

"Yes, sir. I know he tried. He wasn't able to do it though." That had really annoyed Flic; it still did. Whenever she'd wanted anything, Daddy was usually able to organise it for her. Unfortunately he couldn't seem to get anywhere with the Confederacy. As he'd put it, there were no handles for him to get any leverage on them. They didn't owe him any favours, and he didn't have anything they needed.

Mark went on, "Indeed he couldn't. But he did come up with an interesting alternative. It seems to me that he set you up with a pre-pack. Private Osbourne's sister is at an expensive private school, with her fees paid by one of your father's charities. His father and brother, together with his second concubine's former husband, have sinecure jobs with one of your father's companies. Underworked and overpaid. All three of them have secretaries who are more qualified for fucking than for filing."

She hadn't known the exact details, but that sounded like something Daddy would have arranged. Flic was sure the Centurion was right, including the detail about the secretaries.

Mark continued, "I presume that the continuation of these arrangements depends on the contents of the messages you send to your father every few weeks?"

Flic made a quick decision that it was best to tell the truth here. She knew AIs could act as lie detectors, and undoubtedly there was one checking on her right now. The Centurion seemed to have worked it all out anyway, so she wouldn't be telling him anything he didn't know already. "Yes, you're right. As long as I tell Daddy I'm OK, he'll keep looking after Bill and Denise's families... Sir." She almost forgot the 'sir' that time. The depth and detail of his research worried her.

"One thing does puzzle me," Mark asked. "Why did your father pick Private Osbourne? I'd have thought that he would rather have chosen someone who was officer material."

"He tried to, sir, but none of the potential officers would go along with the arrangement. Bill was the best of the ones who agreed."

Mark could understand that. She was obviously a spoiled rich girl who would have deterred a lot of possible sponsors. Far too high maintenance, especially with the amount of control she would have under the deal her father was trying to set up. "How did your father set up the extraction?" he enquired.

"He wasn't able to, sir. He was trying to arrange for us all to go together as a pre-pack, but that was taking a long time to set up. While we were waiting, the three of us spent a lot of time together in coffee bars and restaurants. One day we got lucky."

Mark felt relief at hearing that, and the AI had confirmed that she was telling the truth. There would have been big problems to investigate if her father had been able to influence the location of a random pickup.

Pausing, he let her stew for a bit. "I'm not going to interrupt that arrangement at the moment." Flic sighed with relief. "Many of the parties involved are on Earth and so are none of my business. I am only interested in the three of you that are here on Waller. You three {EM}are{/EM} my business."

"Yes, sir. Thank you, sir." Flic emphasized the sirs. Maybe she could salvage something from this disaster after all.

"And you are the one among the three who is causing me problems. I'm sure you're intelligent enough to realize that you can't go on the way you have been."

"Oh yes, sir, I realize that, sir. I'll be better in future."

"Good. Then strip naked, you're improperly dressed," he ordered abruptly.

Flic realize that she didn't have a choice here. She had messed up and was being punished for it. Daddy punished his people when they made mistakes and this Centurion Robertson was doing the same. In some ways he even reminded her of Daddy; his automatic assumption of obedience to his orders gave him the same air of authority. Even his apparent age and his hair, with some grey deliberately left in, enhanced the image of authority. Perhaps that was why he kept it that way? She started unbuttoning her jacket.

Once she was naked, Mark ordered her to dump all her clothes in the recycler. When she was back standing on her spot, he got up from behind his desk and walked slowly round her, looking at her from all sides. Very attractive. "Bend over the front of my desk with your feet apart and grasp the far side with both hands," he ordered.

Flic could tell what was coming. It would be the brothel, though hopefully she would only have to entertain one client. She prayed he wouldn't want to use her arse. She'd never ever let anyone bugger her, certainly not Bill. She felt a sense of relief as Mark's fingers probed her pussy. His fingers were greasy so at least he was using some lubrication; just as well because she wasn't aroused at all. She was thankful to him for thinking of that. She only allowed Bill to fuck her occasionally, when she wanted a man. Most of the time Denise took care of him. Fucking Bill was Denise's job, not hers. She felt Mark's fingers withdraw and the blunt head of his cock began pushing slowly into her passage.

As he penetrated her, Mark could tell she wasn't ready for this. He could feel that her channel was dry each time he went deeper. He had to pull back frequently to spread the lube further into her.

Sometimes it wasn't enough just to talk, or to shout, at a concubine. She needed something physical to emphasize just how badly she had failed. He preferred fucking women to beating them, so he chose to fuck Flic. On one level he enjoyed it, but at another level it showed him something about himself that he didn't really want to see. Back on Earth this would have been rape, and Mark didn't see himself as a rapist. Here in the Diaspora it wasn't legally rape, of course, but that was only a minor consolation to him as he contemplated his feelings about himself, and what he was doing to this woman.

Once her pussy was fully lubricated he let some of his anger bleed out as he slammed himself into her. If she hadn't been so stupid by not behaving properly in public, then none of this need have happened. What went on in private inside their pod was between her and her sponsor. In public it became his business, and he wanted to make sure she realize that.

After he came inside her he made her kneel down and clean him up. She couldn't deep throat him, though Mark suspected that would change in the near future. She hadn't come herself of course, but that wasn't the point of the exercise. This was about power, not sex.

When she had finished sucking him clean, Mark silently pointed her to her spot. He didn't let her clean herself, so she had to suffer with his cum dripping down her thighs.

Mark sat back behind his desk. "Why did I strip you and fuck you?"

"You stripped me because I wasn't properly dressed. You fucked me to punish me, sir."

"Would it surprise you to know that you aren't being punished?"

"Yes, it would, sir," Flic replied, astonished.

Mark explained, "Private Osbourne was punished with a reprimand on his record. You aren't being punished, you're being trained."

"I see, sir."

"I don't think that you do, not really. You were told to wear a concubine shift, but you didn't. You have to learn to do whatever your sponsor tells you to do. If you had been correctly dressed, then I wouldn't have stripped you and I wouldn't have fucked you. Your actions have consequences. You need to learn from the consequences so you correct your actions." Mark paused to let that sink in. "You are assigned for an indefinite period of obedience training. That means I will keep you in training until either you have learned your lesson or I decide that you aren't worth any further effort and recycle you. Do you know what 'recycle' means?"

"Yes, sir. It means you will execute me."

Mark nodded, "You might not believe me, but I would prefer it if it didn't come to that. The colony needs as many live concubines as possible to bear children, so we can out-breed the Sa'arm. I hope you are intelligent enough to avoid being recycled. You have certainly been stupid, but not yet stupid enough to deserve that." He paused, waiting for a response from her.

"Yes, sir. I've learned my lesson. I'll be good from now on." Flic knew that her life depended on her not messing up again. She would have to change if she wanted to survive.

Mark continued, "I'll put you in training for an initial period of three weeks. At the end of that time I'll check how you're doing, and decide if you need any further training or not. My patience is not inexhaustible, so you will not be able to extend the training forever." He looked his question at her.

"No, sir. I'll do my best to learn everything in three weeks, sir."

"Make sure that you do. I've assigned you to Sergeant Matsushita's pod for your training. He won't actually be training you of course, his time is far too valuable to waste on you. His head concubine Makiko will train you. She has helped us before with training recalcitrant concubines, and she hasn't failed yet. You will have to obey her just as if she was your sponsor. Do you understand?"

"Yes, sir. I'm to obey Makiko, as if she was a sponsor."

"See that you do. The Sergeant wants his pod just so, and Makiko is very zealous in keeping it exactly the way he wants. She doesn't like slipshod work."

"Yes, sir. I understand, sir." Flic thought it sounded as if this Makiko would be a very hard taskmistress. She did not expect to enjoy her next three weeks.

Mark used the AI to tell Shahana to come in from the reception desk. When she arrived he told her, "Shahana, please escort this concubine to one of the holding cells. Sergeant Matsushita's concubine will be along to collect her later."

"Yes sir," Shahana replied. Turning to the naked Flic, she told her to follow and walked out; Flic followed meekly.

The alarm buzzer sounded and Flic leapt out of bed in her dimly lit cubicle. There was no time to waste. She had things to do before the Sergeant needed her to attend to him at breakfast. She didn't even think of being late. Such thoughts were dangerous.

A very brief shower; no time for more. Clean her teeth. The AI had turned up the lighting to let her see better. An enema -- the Sergeant expected her to be clean in case he wanted to use her back there. The enema made her guts hurt, but she would keep it in for the required time before releasing. Early on she had made the mistake of avoiding some of the discomfort by releasing too early. Makiko had made {EM}very{/EM} sure that she didn't repeat the error.

She didn't know what time in the morning it was. She didn't need to know. Her day ran by the Sergeant's time. He might be rousting his trainees at 04:00 or perhaps he was letting them sleep in until 06:00. He would be perfectly ready for them, whatever the time, and she had to be perfectly ready for him. Whenever he wanted his breakfast she would be there, fully prepared for whatever he wanted from her that day.

She brushed her hair while waiting. Finally the AI signaled that she'd held the enema for long enough and she let it go. Relief. A quick but thorough wipe, flush and then lube for her two holes. The Sergeant never bothered to warm her up if he wanted more than a blow-job, so she had to be ready for him everywhere. Anything less would be punished by Makiko. Even if he didn't want to fuck her or bugger her, he would almost certainly want deep-throat. It was rare that he didn't use at least one of her holes in the morning.

No clothes to bother with of course, not even one of those hideous grey shifts. Quickly tidy the room. Make the bed. Just a sheet over the mattress, but it had to be made. Neatly. Very neatly. Makiko would inspect it later, and if she wasn't satisfied.... A glance in the mirror and Flic was off to start her day's work.

Mark re-read the file on the Felicity Osbourne case. The file now held a report on her from Makiko Matsushita. Felicity was obviously a quick study, and had a reasonably good report; a rare thing from Makiko. There was also a note from medical, where they had resized Felicity's anus and reduced her gag reflex. Makiko was very thorough where the Sergeant's pleasures were concerned. Mark smiled to himself and put the file away. He told the AI to send Felicity in.

When Flic entered, wearing a grey shift, Mark was standing in front of his desk. "Blowjob," he ordered abruptly. She immediately went to her knees in front of him, extracted his cock and began to suck. She had learned to deep throat since she was last in his office. Makiko had obviously made sure that Flic had pleased the Sergeant in many ways, including that one.

Once she had finished licking him clean and putting his cock back, Mark sat behind his desk. Flic stood on her spot in front of him, without Mark having to tell her. He looked at her for a few seconds. "You have responded well to retraining so I have decided to return you to Private Osbourne."

Flic quietly sighed with relief, "Thank you, sir." Her time subject to Makiko was over! She wanted to dance with joy but managed to keep still. She didn't want to mess things up now.

Mark continued. "Your father is a Mr. Barham, isn't he."

"Yes, sir."

"That's an old English name?"

"Yes, sir," Flic confirmed. "Daddy says that it goes back to before the Domesday Book."

"You need to think of your situation as one of those nineteenth century Barham Ladies of the Manor," Mark told her. "In public they were perfectly respectable hostesses, conforming to all the accepted social norms and deferring to their husbands. In private they may have been fucking their way through the stable-boys, but in public their behaviour was irreproachable. You needed retraining because your public behavior was not acceptable. It didn't meet our standards here in the Diaspora. Do you understand?"

"Yes, sir. I understand. I was taking far too many liberties before. Thanks to Makiko, I now have a far better understanding of what's expected of me, sir."

"I hope so. I don't think you're stupid, and I don't think you want to find out what we would do to you if we have this problem with you again."

"No, sir. I'll be good, sir." Flic wasn't sure whether another three weeks with Makiko, or three weeks in the brothel would be worse. Surely they couldn't have anyone stricter than Makiko, could they?

"To extend my nineteenth century metaphor," Mark continued, "those Ladies of the Manor did charitable works as part of their role. You are doing less than five percent of the community service hours that Private Osbourne's family owes. You need to increase that percentage, it is noticeable outside the pod."

"Yes, sir. I'll do more of that, sir." Until now Flic had made Denise do almost all of that stuff. Obviously that would have to end. Still, at least it would get her out of the pod and give her something to do to pass the time.

"Before I call Private Osbourne in, I'll remind you that he was also sent on a retraining course. He got a short refresher on how to handle concubines. I expect you to help him put what he learned on that course into practice."

"Yes, sir. I'll do that, sir." Anything not to repeat the last three weeks, Flic thought. There was no way that Bill, even a retrained Bill, could ever be as bad as Makiko. And as for the Sergeant himself....

"That means you're going to have to take more of a second place inside his pod," Mark told her. "Remember that it's {EM}his{/EM} pod, not your pod. I think part of your problem was that you had too much control inside his pod, and you let it spread over to your behavior outside. It would be better if you brought the two more into line. Since you absolutely must behave like a concubine outside, that means that you're going to have to behave more like a concubine inside his pod. Keeping the two closer together should make it easier for you to behave properly in public."

"Yes, sir. I can see that, sir." Flic could understand his point. She'd become careless because she was so used to ordering Bill around inside the pod, that she had sometimes forgotten herself when there were visitors or when they were out.

Mark had Flic stand back in a corner and called Private Osbourne in. After the usual saluting and sir'ing Mark got down to business. "We have retrained your concubine, Private, and you have had a refresher. I expect you both to do better from now on. Next time will be a second offence, so it will not be as easy for either of you. Do you understand, Private?"

"Sir. Yes, sir!" Bill replied.

Mark continued, "There is a fair amount of leeway about what goes on inside a pod between sponsor and concubines. I once had an interesting discussion with an AI, about why a concubine was wearing leather thigh-boots and whipping her naked sponsor. It isn't easy explaining sadomasochism and safe words to a glorified computer. However that leeway stops completely when there is another sponsor visiting your pod, or when you are out in public. That dominatrix I mentioned was a model concubine everywhere except in their private dungeon." Mark paused, smiling slightly at the memory. "I've already told your concubine and I'll tell you as well. You need to bring public and private behavior more into line. That means a change to private behavior, since there is no flexibility allowed for public behavior."

"Sir! Yes, sir!" Bill said. Despite him trying to hide it, his worry about how this would impact the arrangement with Flic's father showed on his face.

Seeing Bill's worried look, Mark decided to address the probable cause. "I am aware that there is a special arrangement between Mr. Barham and your family back on Earth. However that does not absolve you from doing your duty."

"Sir! No it does not, sir!" Bill acknowledged Mark's point.

"I have decided not to interfere in that arrangement for now. You might want to bear in mind that it is the only card she has to play. Once she's played it, then you hold all the other fifty-one cards. I'm sure she's intelligent enough to realize that you could have her assigned to the Civil Service brothel the day after she sends that message to her father.

Flic kept her eyes downcast. She wished that the Centurion hadn't pointed that out to Bill. She wasn't sure if Bill had worked it out for himself already, but he certainly knew now.

Mark used his AI interface to silently tell Bill, «Private, I have told the AI to blind copy you in on every message she sends to Earth.»

Just as silently Bill replied, «Sir! Thank you, sir!» He realize that this was something he should have done before. As sponsor he had the right. He was grateful that the Centurion hadn't pointed out his mistake in front of Flic.

Mark quickly ended the meeting and sent them both away. Silently Flic followed Bill back to his pod. She had to remember to think of it as 'his' pod and not as her pod.

When they were alone in his pod, Bill turned to Flic. "We don't want to go through that again, do we?"

"Oh God no," she replied with a shudder, "absolutely not. It was horrible."

"It wasn't exactly pleasant for me either," Bill said. "So, we're going to have to change things around here. In the pod I mean."

"Yes Bill. It was too easy for me to forget and get out of line. You need to be harder on me," Flic admitted.

"What about ..." Bill was all too aware that she and her father still had their arrangement.

"I can always tell Daddy that I am doing well. Like the Centurion said, I only have the one card to play, and I really don't want to end up in the brothel. Makiko and the Sergeant were bad enough."

"You had Makiko? Sergeant Matsushita's Makiko?" Bill asked.

"Yes."

"She has a fearsome reputation." Bill had heard his Marine buddies talking about her when discussing concubines. Her strictness was legendary.

"She deserves all of it, and more," Flic replied with a shudder.

Bill thought for a while as Flic waited quietly; something she had learned to do in the last three weeks. The earlier Flic would have been too impatient to wait.

Bill proposed his idea. "When the Centurion was talking about that dominatrix concubine, he mentioned using a safe word. Perhaps we need something like that? I can use it when I see you getting too far out of line. Like when I told you to wear a shift for that first interview with the Centurion. Would that work?"

"It would certainly help some," Flic said. It seemed to her that it would be a good way to distinguish between casual requests and formal orders. It would also let Bill stop her if she started ordering him around, as she had been used to doing. "I probably need something like that to remind me. What word should we use?"

"How about 'Makiko'?" Bill suggested.

Flic flinched at the memory. "That would work."