The Weapon - Passion
By Diana the Valkyrie
All you need is love


There's nothing you can do that can't be done
Nothing you can sing that can't be sung
Nothing you can say but you can learn how to play the game
It's easy

Nothing you can make that can't be made
No one you can save that can't be saved
Nothing you can do but you can learn how to be you in time
It's easy

All you need is love
All you need is love
All you need is love, love
Love is all you need

By the time Wendy and George got back from Melbourne, I was one disgruntled
Duncan. There was absolutely no reason why they should have spent five days
there after arriving. Well, there was a reason, and the grin on George's face
said it all, but that wasn't a reason that I was happy with. It was obviously
George's fault, because he's supposed to command, Wendy's supposed to obey.
So, as soon as he wafted in through the door, I tore him off a strip.

"And where do you think you've been?" "To Paradise and back, Dunc old fruit,
eating the Lotus and having my brains fucked out by your wonderful Weapon."
"And this is what you were supposed to be doing?" "Hey, we went through a hard
time in Ramanmari, and I felt entitled to a bit of R&R." "OK, a day off I can
understand, but nearly a week?" "I'd taken two weeks off work, so where and
with who would I spend it, Southend? With Felicity?" "Humph," I grunted, "and
what about me? And what if some emergency had come up?" "You would have
phoned. Dunc, don't be such an old grumpyface."

Wendy had been watching the argy-bargy, head turning from side to side like a
Wimbledon umpire. Then she walked up to me and kissed me, one of those
full-body-contact kisses where most of the action is below the neck and above
the knee. "Did you miss me?" Well, damn it, of course I missed her! "Wendy, I
missed you, I needed you, like sage needs onion, like chips need salt, like
curry needs lhassi." "Don't be angry with George, love, it's all my fault,"
she said. "No it isn't, he's supposed to tell you what to do." "Has that ever
worked for you, Dunc?" "Well. Sometimes. Humph." Then she picked me up, and as
she flew towards the door, George yelled "Hey, how am I supposed to get home?"
"Car keys on the mantlepiece" I shouted back as we swooped through the door
and out, heading for the sky. As we headed up to get above the cloud layer, I
thought about George driving back through the rain to his cold lonely flat,
and I thought, serves him right.

"Oh, Duncan, I'm sorry I left you alone for so long, but George was so
exhausted and whacked out, he needed a good fluffing up, and, and, and it was
nice in Melbourne. They remembered me from last time I was there, and everyone
was so nice to us. I'll try to make it up to you now." We levelled off at
eight thousand feet, she wrapped her cape around us to keep out the cold,
stripped us both naked, and gave me a lengthy demonstration of exactly why I'd
missed her so much. I don't remember all the details, but I do remember
begging and pleading with her to stop several times, with the result that I
got several examples of her not obeying me. And I remember at several points
feeling that she had me surrounded three times, once with her vagina
surrounding my penis, once with her arms and legs around my body, and once
with her cape all around the two of us.

Eventually, she let me fall asleep in her arms, which is in some ways the best
part of it. Why? Partly because of the feeling of sexual exhaustion, and the
knowledge that there was no milk left in your bottle. Partly because of the
nearness of someone you love; the feel of her body against yours, her hair in
your face and her smell in your nose. And partly the tremendous feeling of
warmth, safety and security that you can get only with a lover like Wendy.

When I woke up the next morning, we were in my bed. I opened my eyes, and saw
Wendy looking down at me. She smiled, and said "Are you awake, Duncan?" I
slammed my eyes shut and said "no". She wasn't fooled. "Shower time," she said
brightly, and hauled me out of bed. I knew what was coming. "No, Wendy, I
absolutely forbid AAAAAAAAAGGGHHH!" I screamed as the cold water hit my naked
body, and fought to get loose. Which is pretty futile when it's Wendy that
you're fighting with. After a minute or so, she changed the water to warm,
soaped me up, rinsed me down, then pulled me out of the shower for a rub-down
with a hot towel. "There, you enjoyed that, didn't you." "Uh. Some of it." She
left me to get dressed while she did something nice with kippers. And over
breakfast, she dropped her bomb on me.

"I'm going to have a baby."

It is actually dangerous to be given news like that when you're eating a
kipper. Kippers have lots of little bones, and it's easy to get one stuck in
your throat, like I did. I spent the next five minutes coughing and drinking
milk before I finally decided that I would probably survive. "A what?"

Unexpected? When you've been shacked up with a woman for two years and she
suddenly announces that she's pregnant, that's "unexpected". When you've known
a woman for a few months and she makes the same announcement, then you can use
words like "astounded". But Wendy wasn't actually a woman, it had only been
weeks, and she didn't have the, uh, equipment, so the appropriate word was
"gobsmacked". "Uh, Wendy," I started, about to explain to her that this was
impossible, but then I remembered that my concept of impossible and hers was
considerably disjoint, "how?" "Well, I don't know. That's step two. Step one
is decide what you want, step two is work out how to get it. Oh, Duncan, it's
hard to explain." "Go on, try."

"I'm different from you," she said. I'll say. She isn't actually organic, she
just does a good imitation. Four black holes and a few fields of force, with
suitable stress-strain tensors to give the feel that she wants at each layer.
So the cape, for example, felt strong but silky because it had a high
stress-strain coefficient in the Z-vector, but very low coefficients in the X
and Y vectors. Whereas the skin felt soft and yielding because of the low
stress-strain coefficient in the Z-vector. And so on, I'm sure it's all pretty
obvious really. But, a baby?

"I mean, inside," she continued.

"Well, you can't get much more different than four black holes," I answered.

"No, I mean, uh, in the way I think, in the, oh hell, I don't know the words
for this. Instincts? No. Lower than that. Emotions, reactions. The stuff that
drives you even when you think you're in control. Duncan, I'm talking about
love here. It isn't the same for me as it is for you."

"Love is different? Surely love is a universal?"

"No, you're anthropomorphising here. You're thinking that everything works the
way you do and there's no other way it can work." "But you said you love me?"
"Yes, and I do, I do, but, look, you have to understand where love comes from,
what drives it, how it works" "Aren't you dissecting the rainbow here?" "Yes,
but understanding how a rainbow happens doesn't make it any the less glorious;
in fact, it increases your appreciation for it, because it adds a whole new
area to what you can already see." "OK, so how does love work?"

"The big question you should always ask about any animal characteristic is,
what evolutionary advantage does the animal get from it?" "We aren't animals."
"Oh Duncan, get off your pedestal, of course we are." Huh. Well, I suppose
technically I am. But she thinks she is too? I suppose that depends on your
definition of "animal". "So what's love got to do with it?"

"It's like this," she said. "Human babies are absolutely helpless for a very
long time, and have to be taken care of by their parents. It's the price you
paid for the big brain and high intelligence that are such a huge evolutionary
advantage that you pretty much wiped out any other large animals. And the
mother is very encumbered by the baby for a long time; the father is needed to
find food, to give protection; for survival. So, the human family has to be
bound closely together, man and woman. If that binding isn't strong enough,
the babies don't survive, so only where the binding is strong do the genes
propagate. And the purpose of sex is to reinforce that binding, most animals
don't do sex for fun, just for baby-making. Humans do it for the pleasure of
sex, even when there's no baby-making possible. And you call that binding
"love", and it isn't as strong as the mother/baby love, because the baby is
very soon dead without that love, but it's very strong." I grunted.

"Well, it isn't the same with us. We don't reproduce via sex. What happens, is
the four black holes are joined by a monopole, a single black hole, there's
still loads just floating around the universe, relics of the original big
bang. And then a sixth, seventh and eighth. You can help that process along by
going looking for them, or you might come across someone who's willing to give
you one they've already captured, but it's essentially a lonely process.
There's no sex-binding between two of us, and so we don't have the sexual
love-thing like you have it." "But you still have love?" "Yes. At the time of
fission, there's suddenly two individuals where before there was one who was,
er, pregnant I suppose is as good a word as any, and one of those two has all
the memories of the original individual, encoded as a set of quantum states in
an electromagnetic field. Call that the mother. And the mother then downloads,
er, teaches, a copy of the quantum states, except that obviously it can't be
an exact copy, because of quantum uncertainty, to the, uh, baby. And that's a
pretty painful process, and it takes a long time, several thousand years, and
all that time, the mother has to help the baby with how to do things, and
that's like, a billion tons you have following you around and getting into
trouble all the time. But if it isn't done, then the baby doesn't know how to
survive, what to eat, how to move, and it won't be able to function properly.
So the exact same evolutionary forces that create the baby-love-bond in
humans, also create a baby-love-bond in the Black Hole Folk. But you can see
it's a very different sort of love." "Yes, there's no quantum mechanics in our
sort of love." "Oh Duncan, you've missed the point totally. The point isn't
the mechanism, it doesn't matter if it's quantum mechanical or electrochemical
like it is for you. The point is that with you, there's the two types of love,
mother/baby and man/woman. With us, there's a single kind of love,
mother/baby. And for you personally, Duncan, since you cannot be a mother, the
only type of love you can know is the man/woman type. So when it comes to
love, we have two completely different models."

"OK, you've explained why I love you, sort of. My eyes and ears tell me you're
a woman, and the theoretical knowledge that you aren't doesn't impact on the
low-level thing inside me that does love-bonding. And you are a rattling good
fuck, and that certainly helps. But you haven't explained about you loving me.
If you don't have the man/woman thing, why do you, how do you, oh. Oh, I see.
Oh. The mother/baby thing." She nodded. "You see me as your baby?"

"No, not quite," she said, "I mean, you're weak and helpless ..." "Thanks!"
"Well, you are, want me to show you?" "No, all right, compared to you I am
..." "Right. So there's something deep inside me that wants to protect and,
well, nurture you. Look after you. Feed you, keep you warm, make you happy,
teach you things. Or, to sum it up in one word, love you." Well, I suppose I
shouldn't complain, she certainly didn't treat me like a baby. Well, not in
some ways, anyway. I munched on my toast and marmite, and said "So, about this
baby?" "Mmm?" "Well, is that, ah, what you're supposed to do? Within the
rules? I mean, are Weapons allowed to have babies?"

She looked thoughtful. "I think so. At least, I can if you say it's OK; you're
my Wielder, you command and I obey." "When you feel like it." She laughed.
"Come on, Duncan, when did I last disobey you?" "About ten minutes ago." "Oh,
that. Well. You know you enjoy it really. Anyway, all I need is the nod from
you." She got up and came round the table, dumped herself in my lap, and put
her arms round my neck. "So, can I? Huh? Please, Duncan?" With a billion tons
of Weapon in my lap, I struggled to get free, but she put her mouth over mine
and kissed me. "Mmmph, mmf." She let me breathe for a second. "Huh? Huh? Can
I?" "Wend...mmf, MMMMmmmph." I tried to throw her off my lap, but it was like
trying to shift a billion ton weight. Come to think of it, that's what she
was. Then she put her hands under my armpits and started tickling me, but at
least she was letting me breathe.

Sometimes it's difficult to tell the difference between torture and loveplay.
I mean, difficult for someone who is just watching. It's easy when you're the
victim; torture hurts a lot and you want it to stop, loveplay doesn't hurt and
you don't want it to stop. But anyone who might have been watching us for the
next ten minutes would have sworn that Wendy was torturing me, and anyone
hearing my muffled screams would have agreed. I knew differently, though, and
so did she. Another problem our putative watcher would have had, would have
been in following the action, unless they were able to stay with us as Wendy
zoomed out of the window with me and up to several thousand feet, where she
could unmuffle my mouth and let my unbridled screaming startle a few birds as
we passed them going up. The screaming might have misled this theoretical
onlooker too, unless they were familiar with the kinds of noises that a human
makes when in the grip of a powerful Weapon who has brought him to the edge of
climax and is now holding him on the edge and waiting for his begging for
release to die down to a whimper before unleashing the explosion of orgasm
that he's abandoned hope of. If you follow me. And then she put her warm arms
round me, wrapped us both in her silky cape, and rocked me to sleep, while
singing a lullaby to me. "I give him all my love, that's all I do. And if you
saw my love you'd love him too, I love him. He gives me everything, and
tenderly. The kiss my lover brings he brings to me. And I love him. A love
like ours could never die, as long as I have you near me. Bright are the stars
that shine, dark is the sky. I know this love of mine will never die. And I
love him."

I never did actually say whether she could have a baby. I think we both
assumed I said she could.

When I woke up again, it was very late morning, and we were in my bed again.
She must have noticed a change in my breathing, because she said "Oh, back
with us, Duncan? Need any help in waking up?" "No, no," I protested, "I'm
fine, look, wide awake." She laughed. "I don't need another cold shower,
Wendy." She laughed again, and evil sort of chuckle this time. "Please?" She
kissed me. "OK, you've talked me out of it. So, what shall we do today?"
"Let's check the newspaper first, see if there's any disasters or whatever
that you could help with."

So, we went downstairs, and she hovered over my shoulder while I paged through
the Telegraph. Royal scandal, political sex scandal, princess, unexpected and
climatologically impossible salt water flood wiping out the crops in Ramanmari
- Wendy giggled when I pointed that one out to her - cabinet minister caught
lying, financial scandal, strike, is this all that ever happens? "Nothing,
Wendy." "Oh. Well, suppose I go out and look for something?" "Won't work,
love, we're not interested in double parking and litter. But I have a question
for you." "Yes?" "Well, take last night. I fell asleep in your arms just above
the clouds, and I woke up in bed. Were you with me the whole time?"

"Oh. Uh. No, I wasn't."

"So, where were you," I asked, already knowing the answer.

"See, Duncan, you were fast asleep, I could see you weren't going to wake up
after getting the Wendy Special Knockout Treatment, and I thought, I bet
George is lonely, so I phoned him up, and he asked me round for a bit of a
kiss and cuddle, so I brought us back down, and tucked you into bed, and I
made sure I was back before you woke up, didn't I?" "And this morning?" "No, I
was with you the whole time." "Did you phone George?" "No, but I sent him an
email, he was at work." She can do that without a computer, she just induces
emf on the phone lines, it's like magic until you find out how she does it,
and then it's just rather simple engineering like wireless networking.
"Duncan, is this the Green-eyed Monster here, are you jealous?" "No, of course
not. Why would I be jealous?" "Hell, how would I know, I don't know, you think
I understand you humans? You're all, like weird. Well, I'm glad you're not
annoyed I spent some time with George." "Behind my back." "What do you mean,
behind your back?" "I mean, you didn't tell me, I had to guess." "I did too
tell you, I just told you." "But I had to ask" "Well, dammit, how am I
supposed to guess that you'd want to know. I mean it's not like you're jealous
or anything, is it!" "Yes I bloody am jealous" "But you just said you
weren't." "I lied, I'm jealous. Kiss and cuddle, is that all you two did?"
"Well, you know. One thing leads to another."

"Right, so while I'm asleep, you sneak out of the house and you're fucking
George's brains out." "It wasn't like that." "Oh? So how was it?" "You make it
sound so, so underhand, like it's some breach of trust." "And how am I
supposed to take it, in a mature sophisticated manner?" "Duncan, you know damn
well I was screwing George, we talked about it before I did it the first time,
you said I should, I didn't realise I had to ask your permission each time, do
I get individual bonk tokens, one-hour tickets or an overnight pass?" "Don't
you get sarcastic with me, young madam..." "Oh, it's madam, is it?" "If the
hat suits you, wear it." By now we were shouting at each other. "I didn't do
anything I'm ashamed of." "Oh, and what about your oath, love, protect and
obey?" "Which I do! Well, maybe I'm a bit light on the 'obey' but I do love
you, I do." "And that's a fine way you have of showing it, out screwing George
all the time." "It isn't all the time, and what do you think you and I were
doing just a couple of hours ago? Duncan, I love you, I really do." "Yes, and
you say exactly the same thing to him, don't you! It's often enough, when else
have you sneaked off to him, I know you did before you left for America last
week." And now she was crying, but I had the bit between my teeth, in full
flood, and wasn't stopping for anything. And there comes a point in this sort
of row when you've gone past communicating, gone past shouting, and you're
just trying to hurt each other. "Maybe you're just too immature", I said. "And
maybe you're too old," she said, finding my worst nightmare with unerring
accuracy. "And maybe you're not even human, just a bunch of incomprehensible
quantum mechanics," I said, going for the throat.

And then she was crying, and she dived for the mantlepiece, kicking over the
table on her way, she picked up the beautiful statue she'd made of her
carrying me while in flight, and threw it at me like a javelin, missing by
inches, and making a great gash in the plasterwork of the wall. Then she flew
out of the window, shattering the glass and curved up out of sight.

I sat there as my anger cooled, and I slowly realised with horror what I'd
just done.

At first, I was paralysed with shock. She just tried to kill me! Then I ran to
the window and yelled "Wendy!" but she wasn't anywhere in sight. Then I turned
and looked at the shambles the room was in. I sat down heavily in the
armchair, and looked at the broken table, the smashed crockery scattered all
over the floor, and at the statue. I went over and picked up the statue, it
was damaged, but not too badly, she obviously hadn't thrown it with all her
strength or it would have gone through the wall and probably through several
other houses in line with her throw. And now I come to think of it, she
wouldn't have missed what she was aiming at, which meant that she hadn't
actually intended it to hit me, which is just as well because a thing that
size and weight would definitely have killed me if it had hit me.

And by now I guessed she was halfway to the sun, heading for the centre where
she'd spend a long time crying her heart out. I felt like the worst kind of
heel, the sort that punches a woman on the face because he wants to hurt her.
And, of course, at some point in the relationship, if you keep doing that,
then she doesn't come back to you. And the thought that left a big empty
feeling inside of me, a hole big enough to lose an elephant in.

So then I thought, what on earth had gotten in to me? I'm not usually that
sort of rat. Well, it was obvious really. Green Eyed Monster, severe case of.
And, now that I was calming down, I realised that I had no real cause to be
jealous. Or rather, I did, but it was irrational. On the other hand, who said
emotions have to be rational? Of course they don't, that's why they're
emotions.

Wendy and I had different models for love, was the root of the problem, and I
think that's what she'd been trying to tell me. The model I was applying was
the man/woman model, in which it seems instinctive (and therefore probably
driven by evolutionary forces) that one man hooks up with one woman and vice
versa, like a pair of north and south magnetic poles forming a dipole. George,
in this model, was an interloper. Never mind that he'd saved my life, that was
something that my higher brain knew, but which cut no ice with my instincts.
But Wendy didn't have that model in her brain, the nearest thing she had was
the mother/baby model, which was what she was applying. And the mother/baby
model is very tolerant of multiple babies. So to Wendy's instincts, there was
nothing strange about her having a relationship with both me and George,
whereas to me it wasn't right (and presumably to George too).

OK, great analysis, Mycroft. Now what? And the answer, of course, was now
nothing. All I could do was sit tight and hope that she'd come back, I had no
way of contacting her. Well, there was something I could do. I held her statue
and cried.

. . .

Morning became afternoon. I didn't have any lunch, I didn't feel like eating.

Afternoon became late afternoon. All I could think of, was what an utter
arsehole I was.

The phone rang. I dived for it, hoping that it was ... but it wasn't. It was
George. "Hi Dunc. School's out! Would you and Wendy like to fly round this
evening, we can all go out for a hot curry." "Uh, George. Uh." "What?" "Uh. I
just. I've. Wendy and I. We." "What is it, Dunc, I can't understand you." I
swallowed, and tried to speak coherently. "I just had a blazing row with
Wendy, made her cry, and she isn't here right now." "Where is she?" "She, uh,
didn't say where she was going, she threw her statue at me and smashed through
a window. I'd say she's either on the far side of the moon, at the center of
the sun, or half way to Pluto by now." "Dunc! You idiot!" "I know." "You
lunatic" "George, you can't call me anything I haven't already called myself.
I'm sitting here cuddling her somewhat damaged statue wondering if I'll ever
see her again." "Of course you will. She'll have a good cry, then she'll be
back." "You think?" I asked, "George, I hurt her, hurt her badly, and I did it
on purpose." "You can't hurt her, she's damage-proof." "George, she's all too
easy to hurt, as you well know." "Oh. You mean that sort of hurt." "Yes."

"So what was it about." "Never mind." "Come on, Dunc, spit it out." "George,
the big rows are either about sex or money." "I'm guessing it wasn't about
money." "You guessed right." "Oh. So what do you plan to do?" "Yes, well,
that's kind of difficult. I can't contact her, all I can do it sit here and
cuddle her statue and hope she comes back soon." "Dunc, have you been crying?"
"Damn right I have, what to you think? I've been a complete arse, a bit of
self-pity doesn't add much to the tariff." "Are you on the booze?" "Not yet,
but I was planning to start about eightish if she isn't back by then." "From
what you've said, she won't be." "I know. Still, I've got a bottle of whiskey
here, and I plan to swallow most of it before staggering to bed." "I have a
better idea."

"Better idea, George? What's that?" "If Wendy comes back and finds you drunk
as a prime minister's son, and puking up your guts, that's not going to look
good on your report card." "If Wendy comes back." "She will. Look, Dunc, how
about I come round there, and take you out for a curry. And maybe a pint of
lager or two, not to get sloshed but just to help the curry go down, eh?" That
sounded like a better plan than mine, and it wasn't George's fault that she,
that Wendy, that they. Fucked. What man would say no when she offered?
Especially the second time, after you found out that her anatomy wasn't quite
what you expected, in some rather wonderful ways? "Good idea, son." "OK, I'll
be round right away."

He still had my car, so he was round in about ten minutes. "Snap out of it,
Dunc, it isn't the end of the world." "George, I hurt her, on purpose. On
purpose! If it isn't the end of the world then it's not far off." "Dunc,
she'll get over it, what was it all about, anyhow? Come on, let's go down the
Star of Punjab, a good brisk vindaloo will take your mind off it." I let him
hustle me out, hoping that he wouldn't ask me what it was all about again. But
he did, over poppadoms.

"It all started when she said she wanted a baby." "Yeah, I could see that
coming, you should have seen how she was mooning over this Ramanmari rugrat.
All gooey eyed, she was, and feeding it." "Feeding it? What do you mean? How?"
"She told me she just made a bit of lactose sugar in water, not ideal but
calories, and she breast-fed the ankle-biter. Anyway, that's not the point,
the point is, she was broody. Definitely baby-struck. All gooey and cooey,
talking to it, playing some game with her fingers and the kid. Typical woman!"

"She isn't a woman," I pointed out. "No," said George, "but she makes a pretty
good effort at emulating one, and broody is part of it, I guess." "Or maybe
that's her own instincts, there must be a drive to reproduce among the Black
Hole Folk, otherwise the race would die out." "Point," conceded George, "but
we don't know anything at all about them really, I mean, not how they think.
If thinking is what they do. Maybe they compute instead?" "No difference," I
said, starting in on an Onion Bhajee, "it's all just information processing,
what you do it with isn't as important as what you do to it. Question is, how
do we get her back?" "What do you mean 'we', Kimo Sabe?" I looked up from my
Onion Bhajee. "Huh?" "Dunc, you're the one pissed her off, you're the one has
to make it right." He was right, of course. "But how?" "Oh Dunc. You might be
brainy, but you're not very clever, are you?" "Actually, I feel about as
brainy as pond scum right now." "Flowers." "OK, I feel about as clever as a
flower." "No, I mean, you give her flowers, you give her flowers and you say
sorry and she kisses you and forgives you, and then, and then the key part
..." "She fucks my brains out?" "No, Dunc, you idiot, the key part is you
don't ever do it again."

Well, yes. Obviously. "And you tell her yes, she can have a baby." "George,
there's a couple of practical problems there." "Like what?" I counted them off
on my fingers. "No ovaries, no fallopian tubes, no womb ..." "Details,
details," said George, airily. "Oh, OK Mr Sexton Blake, then how do you
suggest getting round these minor details." "Haven't a clue," said George
cheerfully, "that's tactics, let Wendy handle tactics, you just concentrate on
strategy like you're supposed to."

So then they brought the vindaloos and the nan bread, the rice and the
Kingfisher lager, and we both dug in. "Ow," said George, "hot." "Not as hot as
where she is right now," I said, looking up, although since it was night time,
I suppose I should really have been looking down. "Yes," said George, "about
15 million degrees, I read." "She says it's nice and peaceful there." "I bet
you don't get people calling to sell double glazing." We both fell silent. I
was thinking about Wendy, I had a completely stupid mental picture of her
curled up there, sucking her thumb and crying. "Buck up, Dunc, she'll be fine"
Yeah.

Over khulfi, he asked me again. "So what was it about?" "I already told you,
George. Couples fight about sex and money, and she doesn't even know what
money is." "So it was about sex." "Yeah." "What about sex?" "Uh." "Surely you
don't have any complaints, if there's one thing she's really great it, it's
..." "No, not like that." "Well what?" He was obviously determined to drag it
out of me. I sighed. "It's you, George."

"Me?" George squeaked. A waiter glanced over at us.

"Yeah"

"What about me?" he asked.

"Look," I began. "It's like this," I tried. "Uh."

"Spit it out, Dunc."

"OK. I'm 47, you're half my age ... " "A bit more" "Not much more, point is,
I'm not some young stud any more." "She doesn't need a young stud, she'll milk
you dry whether you're young or old with that lemon squeezer of hers." "Yes,
well, anyway. So I find that in the middle of the night, she flies over to
your place to give you a seeing to, then back to me before I wake up, and I'm,
well, you know?" "No, I don't know, what are you?" "Jealous."

"You're what?" said George rather loudly, and the waiter came over to see if
we wanted something; I waved him off. "You must be crazy!" he continued. "You
go to sleep in her arms, you wake up in her arms, her body snuggled up to you,
her smell all around you. I'm lucky if I get a quick visit. Those few days in
Melbourne were like heaven for me, and you know what her main topic of
conversation was while we were there?" "No, what? Babies?" "She did coo over
every baby we met in the street, but no. Her main topic of conversation is
you, Dunc. All the time, she talks about you, what you like, what you think,
what she'd like to do with you, and you think you're jealous? Man, you don't
know what it's like. Has she ever so much as mentioned me to you?" "Er. No."

I looked at him. You never see it from the other guy's point of view, do you?
You're always so wrapped up in your own concerns, your own problems, you never
think what it's like to walk in his shoes. Even when she had sex with him,
she'd asked me first, and if I'd said "no" then that would have been no, and
he knew that. Urghh.

"George, look." And I explained to him about her theory of love, and how it
was actually quite different inside for her than it was for us. "She sees us
as her babies?" "No, George, you've missed the point. Point is, the "love"
mechanism for her is entirely derived from the mother/baby bond, whereas for
you and me, it's from the man/woman bond." "That's a bit clinical, isn't it?"
"Yes, that's what I told her, but she said, understanding how a rainbow
happens doesn't detract from the beauty, it makes you appreciate it all the
more."

I paid the bill, you can get an extremely good dinner at the Star of India for
two, for thirty pounds, and we went out to the car. The night sky was clear,
and I looked up. George did too. "I know what you're hoping to see," he said.
"Don't be silly, George, even if she were up there we wouldn't be able to see
her at night. No, I was looking at the stars, wondering what's going on up
there, wondering about this war, wondering where the Black Hole Folk hung out,
that sort of thing. It's different now, you look up and you know there's
people out there." "I wouldn't call a collection of black holes 'people'",
remarked George. "I would," I replied, "having met one of them."

On the way back, we called in at an all-night garage. George kindly refilled
my car with petrol, while I carefully chose a pot of chrysanthemums from the
wide selection of limp, dying and dried-up pots of chrysanthemums that they
had to offer. After all, it's the thought that counts, right? And where do you
get a really good floral tribute after midnight?

He drove me home. "Come in for coffee?" I invited. "Sure," he said, "but you
won't get me into bed with you." I laughed. Then I realised, that was the
first time I'd laughed since ... since. Since. Which stopped me laughing. I
put the kettle on, and went through the filter coffee ritual. I carried the
two mugs back into the living room, and found George looking at the statue. "I
hadn't seen this before, it's lovely." "Yes." "She made one for the Americans,
you know." I hadn't known that. "And for Lan Ho." "She did a few while we were
in Melbourne, she likes to make statues, and she likes to give them to
people." "She never made one for me," said George, sadly.

I got up and drew the curtains, to keep out the wind that was trying to
whistle in through the broken window. I turned to look at George. He really
was getting the short end of all this, wasn't he? I told him so. "Dunc, I'd
rather get the crumbs from this particular table than an entire banquet from
someone else." I nodded. "George, I want you to have that statue." He looked
down at it, and stroked her image. He shook his head. "Thanks, Dunc, but. You
know. It isn't the thing itself. It's who you get it from." I nodded, and took
the statue back from him, and put it back on the mantelpiece. "The damage
isn't too bad," he said, "I bet she can repair it when she gets back." "Yeah."

There was a long silence.

I sighed.

"Well," said George, "work tomorrow." "Yeah," I said. "Gotta go." "Yeah. Bye
George. I'll call you tomorrow." "Dunc, don't worry, she'll be back." "Yeah,
thanks." The fact that he said that, showed that he also had at least a
smidgeon of doubt.

George left, and I thought about whiskey, but he was right, if she did turn up
tonight, it would be best if I wasn't three sheets to the wind. So I made
myself another coffee instead, and when that was gone, I trudged up the stairs
and retired to my cold lonely bed.

...

I kind of hoped that when I woke up, she'd have her arms round me, like she
usually did. But I slept alone, and I woke alone. I thought briefly about
taking a cold shower like she forced me to have each morning, and then I
thought, no way, there's no enjoyment if she isn't there to rub me down
afterwards with a warm towel. So I just gave my teeth a bit of a scrub, and
trudged downstairs to see to something resembling breakfast. Then I moped
about the house for a few hours.

And then lunch. And then some more moping.

In the afternoon, George phoned. "She back yet?" "Nope." "Oh." There's was
lots more in the conversation, but that was the only important part. I watched
afternoon TV for a few minutes, thus refreshing my memory of why I don't watch
afternoon TV. I went outside to the garden and did a bit of digging, but as I
slowly worked my way along the vegetable bed, one spadeful at a time, I tried
not to think about how fast Wendy would do the same job.

Dusk arrived, but Wendy didn't. I went indoors and started pushing some
ingredients around to make some sort of supper. For one.

After supper, I switched on the TV again, hoping that the hypnotic trance
induced by a mind-numbing documentary about Mediterranean seaweed would
distract me from thinking about. About. Have you noticed that when you're
trying not to think about hippopotamuses, that's the only thing that occupies
your brain.

And I was sitting watching the TV when, suddenly, everything went dark.

I mean, like black. I couldn't see at all. Nothing wrong with my sense of
touch, though, and I could tell that the reason I couldn't see was that
someone had come up behind me and put their hands over my eyes. Another clue
was a female voice in front of me saying "Guess who!"

"Uh, Wendy?"

The hands left my eyes, but stayed on my cheeks. As a result, I could look
straight ahead, but not turn and see who was behind me. And when I looked in
front of me, I saw her. Wendy, one hand on her hip, the other by her side,
looking like water to a desert traveller, and saying "Nope. Try again."

I tried to turn my head to see who was behind me, but I couldn't. Then I
realised who it must be, if it wasn't Wendy, it must be George, process of
elimination, look out Holmes here comes McCrae. "George!" "Nope," said a
female voice behind me. Oh. My mind skidded on a surface that gave no traction
like a clown on a banana peel. "I give up", I said, "who is it?"

The hands let go of my face, and I was able to stand up and turn to see who
had been behind me. Uh. Duh. Uh.

Wendy.

Wendy behind me, Wendy in front of me. Two Wendies. One more than you'd
expect; should be one, is two. High quality thinking, here. The mind-skid
turned into a total tail-spin. "My brain hurts," I said. Both Wendies laughed.
The one in front of me stepped forward, moved herself into contact, and kissed
me. Yes, that was definitely Wendy. Then she spun me to face the other one,
who did exactly the same. Yes, that was definitely also Wendy. "My brain just
crashed," I said, "how are you doing this? Mirrors? Optical illusion?
Gravitational lens? Quantum uncertainty of position?" "No, silly," said one of
the Wendies. "There's two of us," said the other.

Ah. Why didn't I think of that. Such a simple explanation. My brain hurts,
hurts bad.

"But only one of us is Wendy," she continued, "I'm Wendy." "No, I'm Wendy,"
said the other one. "No, I'm Wendy," said the first. " ... and I'm Spartacus,"
I tried. Both Wendies laughed. I decided that if I sat down, that would
relieve the stress on my knees. And I also remembered something important I
had to do. "Look, Wendy, I'm really sorry about being such an arsehole
yesterday. And I got you some flowers." I picked up the rather pathetic pot of
chrysanthemums I'd gotten, and wondered who to give them to. I looked from
side to side, thinking, well, if they're both Wendy, it doesn't matter which
one. Then I thought, but then the other one will be upset that I didn't choose
her. And I wished it had been a bunch of flowers, so I could give half to
each, but you can't divide a pot. So I put it down on the table, and said
"this is for you" to the world in general.

"Aw, for me?" said one. "You shouldn't have," said the other. "Nohow," said
the one. "Contrariwise," said the other. "Uh, how come there's two of you?" I
asked. "I know what you're thinking about," said one; "but it isn't so,
nohow." "Contrariwise," continued the other Wendy, "if it was so, it might be;
and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn't, it ain't." They both nodded,
and chorused "Nohow". My brain hurt. They both folded their arms, waiting for
something. Waiting for me, I think. Waiting for me to get a clue.

I made a major effort. Two of them. How could that happen. Then I realised.
She'd already told me everything I needed to know to understand this, she must
have, otherwise she'd have told me the things she hadn't told me. Wait, don't
go there, it's recursive. They reproduce by adding more black holes until
there's eight, then they fission into two individuals. She'd found a black
hole in the sun, where there's one, there's probably others. And then there
was her startling announcement yesterday. I looked up. Looked at Wendy, then
looked at Wendy. No difference. Out of the strength, came forth sweetness.
"Congratulations, you had a baby!"

They both grinned, and suddenly I was surrounded by two Wendies. "I knew you'd
work it out, Duncan," said one. "Ditto," said the other. "So you're actually
identical?" I asked. They looked at each other. "I'm the mother," said the one
on my left. "I'm the daughter," said the other one. "Uh, could maybe I have
some way of telling you apart?" They looked across me at each other; I looked
from side to side, and suddenly the daughter was blonde. Apart from that, they
were still identical. And, at the risk of upsetting the blonde, I turned to
the mother, who I thought of as "my" Wendy, and gave her a long and very
grateful kiss. "I was a complete dipstick yesterday, Wendy, I'm really ashamed
of the way I behaved, and I'll try not to do it again." "I forgive you,
Duncan, I wasn't being too good either." "No, it was all my fault." "Mine
too." "Are you two going to bicker," said blonde-Wendy, "or just kiss and make
up?"

After a few minutes, I broke off kissing; I needed to breathe a bit, plus I'd
just remembered an obligation. "I've got to phone George," I said, "tell him
you're back." "Don't tell him about me just yet, but tell him to come round
tomorrow evening" said blonde-Wendy. So I told George "Wendy's back, I'm a bit
preoccupied right now, come round tomorrow evening, we'll talk then," which I
then immediately realised was going to leave him in an agony of wistfulness
and anticipation, but it was too late to do anything about it. "Feel like
flying?" asked brunette-Wendy, grinning suggestively. "Chocks away," I
replied.

Wendy wrapped her arms round me, then her cape, and we zoomed up a few
thousand feet, just above the cloud layer. "Oh Wendy," I said, "I do love it
when there's just the two of us and the rest of the world is like a million
miles away." "Three," said a voice behind me. Ah. "Uh, Wendy," I said, "are
you sure that it's, uh, appropriate that your, uh, young, uh, daughter,
should, uh. Um." I ran out of things to say. I lost count of the number of
taboos we were violating. Incest, underage sex, troilism, probably other
things if I could think about it. Bestiality? Unmarried sex? Unprotected sex?

On the other hand. She wasn't my daughter, so it wasn't really incest. And as
for underage sex, I recollected that brunette-Wendy was only a few weeks old,
and that age in this context wasn't really the same thing as with humans. And,
to put a seal on it, I don't think the human race has actually developed any
taboos concerned with having sex with black holes. I mean, it wasn't even
bestiality. Was it? So maybe I was just talking out of my arse here, something
I did more often than I would have liked. "Uh. Never mind." I said. "Duncan,
sometimes it isn't actually about you. You know?" said brunette-Wendy. "Oh. So
what is it about?" "Training," said brunette-Wendy, "this is Sex Education
101."

Well, it wasn't difficult to work out who was the trainer and who was the
trainee. And a couple of seconds after that, I grasped what my role in this
training session was - I was the equipment. One of the best ways to teach, is
for the teacher to explain and then show, and the student to listen and then
practice, perform the actions herself. So brunette-Wendy was explaining the
theoretical principles of sex with a man, and following it up with a
demonstration of the principles in action. And then blonde-Wendy did the
practical, to show that she'd grasped the principles. And grasped something
else, too. But after I'd been grasped a few times, I was all grasped out, and
I fell asleep in Wendy's arms while she was still explaining more stuff to
Wendy-blonde.

Next day, Wendy woke me up nice and early, and dragged me off for my morning
cold shower, which, although somewhat too brisk for my taste, soundly beat the
quick brush of the teeth that was all I'd done yesterday. But there was a
complication. My ritual screams of protest and attempts to drag my heels, were
interpreted by Wendy-blonde as a genuine attempt to fight brunette-Wendy off,
and she decided to pitch in on my side. So I found myself in the middle of a
catfight.

Both of them were throwing punches, pulling hair, scratching and clawing, and
since both of them were pretty much damage-proof, guess who was the main one
at risk? So I crawled out from between them, and cowered in a corner of the
room, hoping that I wouldn't catch any of the fallout. And then suddenly, I
guess they must have communicated, because they both turned on me, and with
one of them holding each of my arms, I was hustled into the shower and
drenched in ice water. GAAAhhhhh! After a couple of minutes, they took pity on
me and let me stagger out, and one of them gave me a brisk rub-down, while the
other one went to do breakfast.

When I got downstairs, and after I'd wrapped myself round a cup of coffee, two
eggs and quite a lot of toast-and-marmite, I said, "You know, I don't think I
can handle this." "What?" said brunette-Wendy. "Well, first of all, it's good
that you don't look the same, but you really can't have the same name." "Why
not?" "Because you can't. It's too confusing. Suppose I yell out WENDY, how
will you know which one I mean?" "Why would it matter?" Uh. Well. "Of course
it matters." "Why?" "Well, suppose George and I were both called Fred. You see
the confusion? I mean, sometimes it wouldn't matter which one answered, but
sometimes it would" "Oh. Well, OK. But I had the name first, she'll have to
get a new name," she said, pointing at blonde-Wendy, who looked back at me.
"Not fair," said blonde-Wendy, "she's already been using it, now it's my
turn." "I was first" "It's my turn"

I covered my eyes with my hands. Sometimes you forget just how different they
are, sometimes they remind you quite forcibly. Sometimes they act like
incomprehensible aliens, and sometimes they act like human two-year-olds in
kindergarden. Come to think of it, what is the difference between a toddler
and an alien? Well, whichever they were, I had to sort this one. I put on my
stern-father voice. "You," I said, pointing to the mother-Wendy, the brunette,
"are Wendy. And you, pointing to the blonde daughter-Wendy, "are Milly."
"Milly?" "Yes." "Couldn't I be Wanda?" "No, that's still too confusing."
"Winny?" "Milly. Now stop arguing, and eat your toast."

I found this with Wendy. Sometimes when I'm firm with her, she just does what
she's told, it's my "stern-father" voice. Other times, she just giggles and
does what she wants in spite of my telling her not to. Them's the breaks. It
seemed to work that way with Milly, too. "OK, Wendy, time for a few
explanations. What have we got here?" "Me. And Milly." Oh, it's kindergarden
time again. "You're her mother, she's your daughter. I guess she has all the
same characteristics and capabilities that you do?" Wendy nodded. "And she
knows everything you know?" "Ah, no. She's just got, like, the basic
training." "You mean, she's housebroken but she doesn't know which hand you
hold your spoon in?" "Well, she's a bit more than housebroken. But there's a
lot she doesn't know. We've been faking it quite a lot, with the link between
us." "You have a telepathic link?" "Come on, Dunc." I thought a bit.
"Telephone?" "Radio link," she said, "like 802.11, wireless ethernet. We even
use the standard frequency, so as not to mess up other things around us. But
that'll only work short range. Longer range, you're right, we'd have to drop
down to POTS, real slow."

Hmm. "Wendy?" "Mmm?" "You've created a whole new ball game here." "Mmm. That
was the whole idea. Milly teams up with George, I stay with you," she
explained, "that way we don't trigger the jealousy reflex you both have." I
looked at her. I hadn't thought of that, she was right. I'd been looking at
the problem as a given, the old triangle problem, which no-one has ever found
a good answer for. She cut through that and transformed the triangle into a
square dance. Brilliant. "Yes, I see that, but you've done something else,
too." "What?" "There's two Weapons on this planet now, you and Milly." "Well,
obviously." I suppose it was obvious. "But the implications are not obvious.
For example, you can seem to be in two places at once now, not a lot of people
can do that." She looked thoughtful. "Trouble is, we can't send Milly out to
do things, she's only got, uh, basic training. The first time she comes up
against something difficult, she won't know what to do." "But she'll have
George," I pointed out. "True." "And she can consult you, via whatever link
you have going." "True. But she can't stop to consult me about every little
thing. Sometimes you have to just react. And she won't know how."

"So she needs Advanced Training," I said. "Can we enrol her in an Advanced
Superheroine course," asked Wendy, "maybe the local college offers evening
classes." "I see you haven't lost your sarcasm abilities," I said, wondering
how on earth one does go about training a superheroine. "I can teach her about
flying," offered Wendy, "and sex." Sex and flying, my two favourite things,
especially when we did both at once. And then I came out with a doozy idea.
"Having seen you in action, Wendy, the big thing you do all the time, is
intimidation, things like "You know who I am" and the smashing the furniture
with a blow from your fist, that sort of stunt." "Yes, it's much preferable to
actually hurting people." "Well, how about you both go on a course on how to
win friends and intimidate people?" "There is such a course?" "Not usually.
But I know someone who would be rather good at doing one."

After breakfast, Milly helped me repair the window that Wendy had shattered,
while Wendy repaired the statue that she'd damaged. There's two tricky parts
to repairing a window; cutting the glass exactly to size, and holding it in
place while you tap in the tacks and putty round the frame. Yes, I could have
called in a glazier, but there's a lot of satisfaction in doing these jobs
yourself. I usually use a glasscutting wheel for trimming the pane, but with
Milly around, I just got her to run her fingernail down the glass and crack
off the excess.

I could not resist taking them both out for lunch, down to the Dog and Duck,
my local pub. I told Milly to keep her feet firmly on the ground, told Wendy
not to show off, at least not too much, and the three of us walked down the
road to the Dog, arm in arm. Hey, when you've got a trophy, you want to show
people, right? I had steak and kidney pie, Wendy had a ploughman's and Milly
asked me what she should have. So I told her, "Whenever you're in this sort of
situation, it's always a safe bet to say "Same as you" when you're asked."
"Same as you," said Milly. The other guys in the pub eyed us covertly and
enviously, and when I paid a quick visit to the khazi, I found that a couple
of them had made a move on the two girls. But before I could make an
appropriate suggestion to them (two words, second word "off"), Wendy had
handled it. She moved to the bar billiards table, picked up one of the
billiard balls, and crushed it in her hand. "Oops," she said, "that keeps
happening." The two guys fled, and Milly remarked, thoughtfully, "Yes, I see
what you mean about intimidation."

That evening, George came round - he still had my car. I met him at the front
door, and warned him that Wendy had a bit of a surprise for him; his response
was to look nervous, and ask what it was. "It wouldn't be a surprise if I told
you, would it?" I asked. He followed me into the dining room, but he stopped
as he passed through the door. I saw him look at Wendy, then at Milly, then
back at Wendy. I did the same. Little minx. She'd gone back to brunette, and
now they looked identical again. "Milly, don't confuse the poor boy, turn your
hair back to blonde," I said. She grinned, and did as I asked. Wendy did the
same, of course. Sigh. Kids, they're bloody kids. George continued to do his
impression of a tennis umpire, he even made some "Ba, but, b ... " sound
effects. "Wendy!" I said in my stern-father voice. Wendy changed back to
brunette, so now we could tell them apart.

"George, meet Milly." Milly floated over to George, and held out her hand.
George, brain still in neutral, looked down at her hand, wondering what he was
supposed to do with it. "Shake hands, George," I advised. He held out his
hand, gingerly. "Milly? Er. Who are you? You look like ..." and he looked at
Wendy, "but, er, um." Milly took his hand, and pulled him towards her,
violently. He fell forwards, she caught him, wrapped her cape round him and
about half a second later, the window I'd just carefully repaired needed
another pane of glass, and I was left alone with Wendy. "Mmm, she's a bit ...
aggressive, isn't she?" "Takes after her mum," said Wendy, fixing me in the
eye and stalking towards me. "Now, Wendy, we haven't had dinner yet ..." She
stopped about an inch from me, then moved two inches forward. "We can't eat
yet," she explained, "first of all the casserole isn't ready yet, and secondly
our guests are ... otherwise occupied." I looked up. "Are you in contact with
her?" "Yes, but now is not a good time to ask her any damnfool questions,
she's a bit busy right now." "How long will she be, do you think?" "I told her
an hour, then to get her Wielder back here." "Wielder?" "What did you think
this was, ballroom dancing?"

The plot was now revealed to me in all its glory. Wendy had found the perfect
solution to the George problem, one that left me without those unpleasant and
unjustified feelings of jealousy, and that removed the "second-hand,
second-rank" feelings that George had told me he had. I kissed her, hard.
"Sometimes, Wendy, I wonder why you think you need a Wielder." She kissed me
back, lifted me up, and as we floated through the already-shattered window, I
started to think about mechanisms for automatically opening a window as a
flying body came close to it, and the alternative possibility of a curtain of
warm blown air to keep the draughts out while still allowing the passage of
flying weapons. What we needed, was a kind of giant cat flap.

A couple of hours later, George and I sat down at the dining table, and Wendy
and Milly brought the casserole out, in a very ceremonial manner. "This is
Milly's first cooking effort," Wendy explained. I looked at George, it's at
times like this that I'm envious of the Wendy-Milly radio link, because I
wanted to send him the message "No matter what, smile and enjoy it." I guess
my look must have conveyed the message just fine, because he did exactly that,
and so did I. "Any suggestions for improvement?" asked Milly anxiously. "Um, a
little less salt," I suggested, on my third glass of water, "but otherwise
just fine." "Can I take him home with me?" asked Milly. "Of course you can,"
said Wendy, "that's the whole idea. I hadn't expected the fledgling to leave
the nest quite so quickly, but I guessed Wendy knew what she was talking
about, and they did have their radio link. "Tell George about your training
idea," she suggested to me. "Training?" said George.

"Ah. Well. Um." I hadn't expected George to be in on this one. "It's actually
an old friend of mine, I'm going to ask her to improve their intimidation
skills," I explained. "Wendy's pretty good already, you should have seen her
with the American Cabinet," George said. "Yes, I know, I've seen her in
action, but anyone can improve with good teaching, and it's clear that this is
going to be an important string in her bow. Milly is the main reason for
calling for training, though, to get her up to speed fast," I explained. "So
who's the teacher?" "Her real name is Sally Curzon, but she goes by the name
of Miss Hardlash." There was a silence, then George giggled. "Dunc, what have
you been up to?" I went red, and said "It's not what you think, I knew her at
school, she's just an old friend." "Hardlash?" said George. I ignored him.
"Dunc, what are you going to be teaching these sweet innocent girls?"
"Innocent?" I asked, "Innocent? They're as innocent as a cabinet minister with
an empty petty cash box. Wendy stopped being a virgin within 24 hours of
arrival, and Milly within an hour." "Milly's wasn't a virgin when we ... ?"
"Come on, George, don't come the raw prawn. They ganged up on me, what was I
supposed to do, fight them off? I couldn't even fight one of them off." "You
tried?" "Sure, it's a, well, Wendy and I, er, look here, it's none of your
business what we get up to. Anyway, you stand about as much chance of stopping
Milly from doing what she wants as you do of stopping the tide from coming
in." George grinned, beatifically. Milly put her hand up.

"Yes, Milly?" I asked. "Can we go now?" "Yes, Milly." There was a blur of
white and gold, and Milly and George shot out of the window. I got up and
pulled the curtains, then turned to face Wendy. "Time for ..." I didn't get to
finish the sentence, we were upstairs, on the bed. "Mmmm."

. . .

Next day, I phoned Sally. "Hello?" "Yes?" "Miss Hardlash?" "On your knees,
boy!" "Er, it's me, Duncan, Duncan MacCrae?" "Oh, hello Dunc, how's things?"
"A bit unusual, Sally, and I may have need of your professional services." "On
your knees, boy, and it's Miss Hardlash to you!" "Um, not, it's not quite like
that. Could we come round and explain?" "We?" "Me and, er, Wendy." "I don't do
..." "No, it isn't like that, either." She thought for a moment. "Can't you
explain now, on the phone?" "Sorry, no, I need to show you." She sighed. "All
right, if you must. This afternoon, at four o'clock sharp." "Fine, we'll be
there." "You better, or else," she said, menacingly. I think she just did that
sort of thing out of habit.

After lunch, we flew to Sally's house. On the outside, it was a fairly
ordinary detached house in Ruislip. The inside, however, was not at all
ordinary. She'd decorated five of the rooms to be used for professional
purposes. One was the rather obvious medieval dungeon with suggestive torture
apparatus hung on the walls. One was a classroom, one was a medical room, one
was a baby's nursery, and the fifth one contained a vaulting horse and a wide
selection of whips, canes and floggers. After she'd shown us round, Sally led
us to her tea parlour and did the usual ritual with tea and biscuits. "Where's
the baby?" said Wendy. Sally gave her a "when did you hatch out of the egg"
look, and I explained to Wendy, there isn't a baby, that's for, er, clients.

But I wasn't there to explain to Wendy, Sally would do that if she accepted
the job. "It's like this, Sally," I began. Then I turned to Wendy, and
motioned her upwards with my hand. She rose a couple of feet, and floated
there while Sally's jaw dropped a couple of feet. "I've heard about you!" "You
know who I am?" asked Wendy. "You're the one they call the Weapon, right?"
"Right, but my friends call me Wendy." "Wow," said Sally, "and you want a
job?" Wendy looked at me.

"No, Sally, the idea is that you teach her all about dominance." "Why?" "Uh,
so that she can dominate people." "Why? From what I've heard, she could punch
a man's head off, she doesn't need to play games." "Actually, she does. She
doesn't want to have to kill someone to make a point. She doesn't even want to
hurt anyone." "Ah. Yes, I can see that would lead to a bit of a problem. But
that isn't widely known, is it?" "No, we're trying to keep that a secret, as
much as possible. But you can see how she needs to learn your skills. Would
you teach her, and if you would, how much will I be paying you?" I wanted to
make it clear that I wasn't expecting something for nothing.

Sally thought for a moment. "Dunc, I'll do a trade. She comes here, three days
each week for two hours, and in that time I'll teach her dominance skills,
within three months she'll be so dominant you'll be licking her boots each
day." I looked at Wendy, she grinned at me. Gulp. "In exchange, I get her for
two more hours on the same day, in which she'll apply those skills to clients,
and we split the fee 50/50." That sounded good; I'd been wondering how we
could keep the wolf from the door now that I wasn't working any more; Wendy
didn't seem to have grasped the concept of money yet. "There's two of them,
Wendy here and Milly, same deal for both?" Sally nodded, and held out her hand
to shake on the deal. "OW!!" "Oh, sorry Dunc, I wasn't thinking, I do that,
like automatically." I was shaking my hand in the air and blowing on it, she'd
done something to the knuckles. Wendy moved over and sat next to Sally, turned
to her and said, quite softly, "If you ever hurt him again, I'll break both
your arms in two places, forearm and upper arm." And she patted Sally's arm,
gently.

Sally sat very still for several seconds. "Was that good?" asked Wendy, "did I
do it right?" Sally faced her. "Yes. Very good. Force escalation, credible
threat, corroborative detail, made very calmly. You, my girl, are going to be
good. Very very good." Wendy smiled. "Thank you." "I like her already," said
Sally. "No sex," I said. "Of course not," said Sally. "Domination isn't about
having sex, it's about not having sex. If they want sex, they go to a prostie.
This," she said proudly, "is a house of fear, pain and domination." Wendy
licked her lips and looked at me. I could see that I was going to be used for
practice.

We arranged for the days to be Monday, Wednesday and Friday, to apply over the
next three months. "Except when she's on a mission, of course." "Mission?"
"Like the fire in Melbourne" I explained, using the example that everyone had
heard of. "And she should be in disguise," said Sally, "that white-and-gold
outfit is a dead giveaway, you don't want the tabloids to find out that The
Weapon is also a part time dominatrix in a House of Pain." "Disguise is no
problem," said Wendy, "I guarantee you won't recognise me when I turn up."

When we got home, I suggested that we work on her costume for Miss Hardlash's
establishment. "I was thinking of black leather," said Wendy, "and a mask so
they can't see my face. And you know the way Wonder Woman has a golden lassoo
at her hip? I thought I could have a bullwhip, like Indiana Jones. And black
leather gloves" "Golly", I gollied, "wicked." "Short skirt, and stiletto
heels." "Unh." "I'll show you." And she changed her outermost field of force
from her white-and-gold, to black-and black. I could see where she'd gotten
the mask, it was Batman without the ears. I don't know where she'd gotten the
skirt, it didn't cover much, it must have been about eighteen inches above the
knee, Twiggy maybe. And the boots were a few inches above the knee too. "Would
you like my honest opinion, Wendy?" "Yes, let's hear it. You think I look
hilarious?" "Wendy, if I met you in a dark alley on a dark night, I'd wet
myself."

She laughed, and jingled the handcuffs that dangled from her waist. "And now
I'm going to get you!" she shouted, making a leap at me. I stepped to one
side, so she missed, crashed into the wall, bounced off and lunged for me
again. This time I couldn't move fast enough, she had me. Click, click, she
put the handcuffs on me. "I thought handcuffs were to keep my hands behind my
back?" "No way, I want them up the front so you can reach me," she said. Then
she scooped me up and threw me onto the floor. I was expecting a hard landing,
and tried to get ready for the pain of the impact, but she got under me on the
way down, so I landed on top of her, a soft landing. And that was how I found
out why she'd chosen a skirt rather than trousers or pants, and it was also
how I found out what she was wearing underneath the skirt. Or rather wasn't.

After several minutes on the floor, I found that it rather restricts what you
can do if you're in handcuffs. Well, I suppose that's the whole point. "Wendy,
could you get these things off me? Where's the key?" "Key?" she asked, "Sally
didn't say anything about a key, what's the key for?" "To get them off" "You
don't need a key to put them on." "But you do need a key to get them off,
where's the key, Wendy, don't tell me you forgot the key?" She nodded. "Looks
like you're locked up for ever, Duncan." "Come on Wendy, don't mess around."
"Why not?" she asked, messing around a bit more. "Ooo." "Mmm." "Mmmnn."

And that's how George found us when Milly flew in through my broken window,
with him in her arms.

I'll spare you the explanations. I mean, there was nothing to explain, really.
I don't know why George kept chuckling, or why Milly kept breaking out into
giggles. "You wait, my son, you just wait. Just you wait until Milly comes
home and decides to tie you to the bed, stuff a ball gag in your mouth and
practice her tickling on you." "You seem so knowledgable about these things,
Dunc," he said, and they both started laughing again.

Feh. Just you wait, my lad.

We went out for a Chinese meal that evening. I suppose I was lucky, Wendy
decided to get the handcuffs off me; using chopsticks while handcuffed didn't
appeal much to me. It turned out she didn't need a key, she just snapped the
chain. So now I had this nifty pair of bracelets. "Just like Wonder Woman,"
said George. I glared at him. Just you wait, my lad, till Milly gets into the
swing of this.

When we got back home, I asked Wendy if she'd get the bracelets off me. "How?"
she asked. "Er, can't you just break them?" "Not without a risk of breaking
your wrists, love." George, of course, was grinning like a Barbary ape. Feh!
Well, sometimes the old fashioned ways work best. I gripped the cuff in a
bench vice, and hacksawed through it. Then it was fairly easy to twist it with
a mole wrench, and get my wrist out. I'm not ambidextrous, and I didn't have
enough skill in my left hand to be able to do the right hand cuff, and I was
blowed if I'd ask George for help. So I asked Wendy. She took my hand in hers,
kissed the back, bit through the handcuff and swallowed the piece of metal.
"Showoff," I said, wondering why she hadn't done that in the first place on
the other cuff. At least it stopped George doing his laugh-like-a-drain bit.

"Well," I said, yawning and stretching theatrically. George took the hint.
"Come on, Milly, time we wasn't here."

. . .

Next day was Wendy's first day of domination training. She'd added a long
black leather cape to her ensemble, which I have to admit looked scary and
dramatic. In the morning, we checked the newspaper, just in case there was
something of interest to a Weapon in need of exercise. I didn't think there
was anything, but Wendy latched on to a piece about an orphanage in Ruthenia
that was closing down, and suggested that it might be worth investigating. I
couldn't really see how we could help in that sort of situation, but Wendy can
pull rabbits from hats, so I said we might go have a little recce after she'd
gotten back from Miss Hardlash.

She gave me her "sun is rising" smile, and shot out of the window. I spent the
next couple of hours surfing the web, munching my luncheon sandwich as I
surfed, wondering how much suffering I'd be put through as Wendy practiced her
domme skills on me, and looking for something that I could put on the window
frame that would keep the weather out, but allow flying bodies through. I had
in mind some sort of giant cat-flap. I found a hot air curtain that was
designed for doors, but I couldn't see why it wouldn't work on a window, so I
ordered one. They said it would arrive in a few days. I also got some
background on Ruthenia, there seemed to be a vicious civil war going on, but I
couldn't understand who was who or what they were fighting about.

When Wendy got back, she had Milly with her. "I wanted you to see her new
dominatrix outfit," said Wendy. Milly stood and posed for me. "You're a couple
of inches taller," I said. She was wearing a dark blue velvet catsuit, leaving
her arms and legs completely bare. The blonde of her hair contrasted nicely
with the blue velvet, and she had a gold belt round her waist. "Very nice,
Milly, but apart from the height, you don't look particularly dominant in
that." She smiled, and brought her arms up to her hair, piling it up on her
head. This had the effect of showing off her biceps. "Great Rao and Skietra,
Milly, where'd you get those?" She smiled. "Dominant enough for you?" "Ngh," I
gulped, "urghh" and looked at Wendy. "You too?" She shook her head. "I think
you're used to me the way I am, I don't plan to change." "Has George seen
this?" I asked Milly. "Not yet," she laughed. "Wow, I'd like to see his face
when he see this." "And this," said Milly, pointing one leg forward, and
revealing a massive thigh, with presumably another one where that came from. I
swallowed again. "How big is that thing?" I asked. "Big enough," said Milly.
"She can get a picture of him, if you like," said Wendy. "You have a camera,
Milly?" "She doesn't need one, Duncan, it's just photons and bytes."

Milly flew off to show George those immense biceps and massive thighs, and
Wendy turned to me, and said "Fancy a quick trip to Ruthenia?" I glanced at
the clock, it was only two in the afternoon. "Sure, will I need a toothbrush?"
"No, I was thinking, twenty minutes there, twenty back, a few hours poking
around and back in time for supper." "That's a thousand miles, you can't do
that in 20 minutes? That's an average speed of Mach six!" "I can do Mach six,
you're the one who can't take the stress. But I wasn't planning to go the
direct route. I was planning the up-and down route." "Suborbital? For such a
short hop?" "Sometimes the quickest route isn't the shortest. Come here,
lover." "You're in black-on-black, shouldn't you be wearing white-and-gold?"
"Oops. OK, how's that?"

She hugged me to her bosom, wrapped her cape round us, and I felt the familiar
three Gs of acceleration as she headed up for near earth orbit. Several
minutes later, the acceleration stopped, we had a couple of minutes in free
fall, then we headed back down again. It did seem like a long way round, but
it certainly beat the Great Circle route for speed. On the way, I asked her
about what she'd learned today. "It was mostly theory," she said, "there's a
thing called the Double Triangle of Domination. Today we covered the first
triangle; pain, fear and humiliation." "What's that about?" "Well, in essence,
I hurt you, that makes you fear me, I can then humiliate you. After I've done
it enough, you lose all self-respect, and you do whatever I tell you. I'll
show you this evening, my little one." "You'll hurt me?" I said, not
believing. "I'll tickle you," she said, "Sally said that you can get the same
effect with tickling, but you have to ignore the victim's pleas for mercy."
"Well, I guess you might turn me inside out that way, but you think that will
make me afraid of you?" "I hope not. But we can pretend, can't we?" "Mmm. And
what about this humiliation?" "Duncan, there's some things you're better off
not knowing. I do my first practical, day after tomorrow, that should be fun."
Fun. Terrorising and humiliating some poor bloke who thought he was in for a
little light spanking, maybe a swish of the cane, at worst.

We landed about 20 kilometers outside the capital city Hrvysklwr in the
district of Khzhykjsk, at a small country town called Grbzhynsky. What the
country of Ruthenia (or Rhyffnwyr as the indigenes call it) desperately needed
was industrial investment and more vowels. "Remember, Wendy, we're just here
to reconnoitre, not to take action." It's rarely a good idea to jump in and
fix a problem before you've found out what the problem actually is. Trouble
is, Wendy sees a nail and wants to use a hammer. As we walked towards the
orphanage, I raised a thought I'd had about hammers and nails. "Wendy, suppose
the Mazdas, or the Ahrimans, start an invasion. How do we enforce our
neutrality?" "Search me," she said, "I'm just the Weapon, you have to tell me
what to break." Oh, great. Like I would know. "Wendy, I think we'd better
start thinking about this, rather than wait till we see the whites of their
eyes." "They don't have ... oh, I see." "In particular, if you're still
suffering from this thing about killing people, we have to decide alternative
tactics. I doubt if tickling them will work." "Duncan, thoughts like that
confirm to me that I made a good choice of Wielder." Sarcasm, if her biggest
weapon is sarcasm then we're certainly in for a resounding defeat. Maybe she
could tell jokes that embarrass them so much they'd flee? Or maybe not.

We arrived at the orphanage. It was a large brick building, with bars on the
windows. "It looks like a prison," I said, and rang the bell. "BONG," said the
bell, "DONG BONG." The door opened a crack. "We'd like to talk to you," I said
to the crack. "Go away," said the crack in a deep male voice. "We're here to
help," I explained. The crack started to close, but Wendy put her hand into
it, and blocked the door from closing. "Please open the door," she said, "or I
will." Something heavy slammed against the door from the inside, trying to cut
Wendy's hand in half. "That's not nice," I said, "open the door, Wendy." Wendy
leaned against the door, and it sprang open, breaking the safety chain that
was supposed to stop that happening. There was a meaty thud as the guy trying
to close it was smashed against a wall, and I followed Wendy in. In this sort
of situation, I think it's best for the woman to go first, just in case
there's something nasty waiting just inside. At least, that's right when
you're talking about my indestructible little Wendy.

Nothing terrible happened.

Then the guy who'd been splattered against the wall started to fall; Wendy
caught him before he hurt himself hitting the floor, and looked at me. I
shrugged. She held him up, and said softly "You know who I am, don't you." He
nodded. "You want more pain, or are you going to be nice to me?" He nodded.
"More pain, can do," and she drew back a fist. "I have to be careful here,"
she said, conversationally, "because if I hit too hard, my fist goes straight
through your face, out the back of your head, and makes a nasty dent in the
wall." "Nice, nice," he said, "no more pain, please." Wendy continued to hold
him, her fist cocked, and turned to me. "What Sally recommends at this point,
is that I drop him on the floor, face up, and urinate on his head." Yeuch.
"What does that do?" I asked. "It makes him ... helpful. Of course, if he's
already helpful ... " "I'm helpful, I'm helpful, what do you want?" "Or I
could just hurt him some more. Break a few bones, couple of ribs, an arm or
two, then we could sit and listen to him whimper." "I'm helpful, I'm helpful,
I'm very very helpful." "I like hurting people," she continued in a calm,
conversational tone of voice, "it's like a kind of hobby with me. There's so
many different ways to inflict pain on the human body, and with a rubber ball
jammed in your mouth you won't even annoy me with your screaming."

There was an acrid smell as he lost control of his bladder. Wendy looked at
me, her nose wrinkled. "I think he might be ready to be helpful, Wendy." "You
speak English?" she asked. "Yes, everyone here does, it's the first language
you learn at school" "Well, let's start off with you taking me to see whoever
is in charge of this place. I really am here to help, you know." "That's me",
said the guy. Wendy lowered her fist. "Oh! Why didn't you say before. I'm The
Weapon, Defender of Humanity, nice to meet you." She held out a hand. He shook
it, and said "I'm Vlydfrl Dlstwymyr, call me Vlyd." He gave Wendy a nice
smile, she smiled back. After a few seconds, his smile turned to a grimace of
pain. "Oh, sorry," said Wendy, "sometimes I just don't know my own ... shall
we sit down and talk? I'll try not to hurt you any more."

We went into Vlyd's office, and sat on some very grotty-looking chairs. Well,
Vlyd sat and so did I, but Wendy stood, her feet a few inches from the floor.
Another one of her dominance ploys. "We read you had to close the orphange,
what's the problem," asked Wendy. Vlyd held out both his hands, palms up.
"Money," he said, simply. "Rent, heating, electricity, food, staff ... we
don't have the dough." "So what will happen to the children?" He shrugged. "I
don't know." "And you don't care," accused Wendy. "I care, I care," he said,
"but what can I do? Listen, there's twenty-three of them, some of them will be
OK, they're fourteen, fifteen, but some are just babies, and everything in
between." "You can't just throw them into the street,!" she said, frowning,
"that's inhuman!"

Vlyd put his hands over his face. "Listen, White Lady, Weapon, whatever you
are. The country is falling apart, they're spending money on guns, not bread,
and bullets, not butter. All the time, fighting, shooting, you don't even know
what side you're on. They kill us, we kill them, no-one cares about a few
orphans caught in the middle." "Who's us, who's them? Which group are in the
right on this?" asked Wendy. Vlyd put his hands on the desk. "There's two
groups, the Rhythyns and the Thrynyns. In 1023 AD ... " "That's a thousand
years ago!" said Wendy. Vald looked at her, and waited. Wendy nodded, "Go on."

"In 1023 AD, the Rhythyns attacked the Thrynyns and drove them out of the
country. Twenty years later, the Thrynyns, allied to the Holgars, invaded,
deposed King Ghrythryn, and threw the Rhythyns out, killing a great many of
them. In 1054, at the battle of Scythrni, ..." "Hang on," said Wendy, "how
much history is there? We don't have all day." "You want to understand the
situation here, you have to know the history." "And when I know the history,
I'll understand?" "No." "Then what's the point of knowing the history?" "No
point whatsoever. No bloody point whatsobloodyever. The history means whatever
you want it to mean, whatever serves your propaganda." And he put his hands
over his face again.

"Wait a minute," said Wendy. "So what are you, Rhythyn or Thrynyn?" He
interlaced his fingers, and rested his chin on them. "It doesn't. Fucking.
Matter." he said, "and I don't know what the children are, either. Look. I
haven't been paid for five months. I can't pay the rent on the flat that my
wife and kids live in, I can't feed my own children! I'll have to go get a job
somewhere, a job that actually pays me. We can't heat this building, the
electricity is out, they're screaming at us for the rent, which I can ignore,
but the one thing that I can't ignore is that a week from now we run out of
food for the kids, and what's your suggestion?" He started crying.

Wendy looked at me. "Duncan, what can we do?" I thought for a moment. "Wendy,
we only came her to find out what was up, now we've found out, what we do is
go back to England, and work out a plan. I don't know what the plan is just
yet, but we'll think of something." Wendy nodded, and went around the desk,
kneeling by Vlyd's side. "Vlyd," she said. His face was back in his hands,
hiding his tears, crying quietly to himself. She reached out to him, and
gently pulled his head to her breast. "Vlyd, don't cry." She put her arms
round him. He stopped crying quietly, and howled instead. She stroked his
head. "Vlyd, you know who I am. I'm telling you this now, I will fix this, I
will deal with this problem." He looked up at her face. "You will?" She kissed
his forehead, wiped away his tears and whispered "yes. I promise. Now, take me
to see the children."

"Um. Wendy. I don't think that's a good idea." She turned and looked at me.
"Whyever not? We came here to find out the situation, how can we leave without
seeing the kids?" I didn't have a good reason, I just had a bad feeling about
what might happen when she saw them. She can be a bit impulsive. "Stand up,
Vlyd, and show me where they are," she ordered. He mopped his face with a
grubby handkerchief, and stood up. "This way," he said.

He led us upstairs; the first floor was a big room that doubled as a dormitory
and day room. There were a couple of dozen children in there; some were
reading, some were playing with the younger ones, some were just sleeping. The
children saw Wendy, and stopped what they were doing. "Hello, I'm Magic
Wendy." She knelt down on the floor, her cape spread around, and beckoned them
to her. One small girl walked up to her and stood with her thumb in her mouth,
watching her. Wendy sat back on her heels, and said "And what's your name?"
"Davinia" "Hello, Davinia. Would you like to see some magic?" Davinia nodded.
Wendy beckoned her closer. "Why have you got a candy in your ear?" she asked.
Davinia looked puzzled. Wendy showed her an empty hand, then reached forward
to the girl's ear, and produced a candy. "Oh!" she said, "how did that get
there?" Several other children came forward to see this.

I hadn't known that Wendy was a conjurer. It was all very simple stuff, of
course, no sawing the lady in half. But these were children, you don't need to
perform sophisticated illusions. After a few minutes, they were sitting round
her, enthralled as she made things disappear, reappear, change colour, and all
the other things that you'd expect a party entertainer to do. For half an
hour, the children were transported from the daily misery of their lives into
a magical kingdom where anything was possible. Then one of the older children
put up her hand. "Yes?" asked Wendy. "Can you magic up a bottle of baby food?
It's for my sister Rosetta," said the girl, holding out a crying baby, "all
we've got for her is water, and she's hungry." The baby's arms and legs were
like matchsticks; I was shocked that such terrible malnutrition could be
happening in Europe. "Give her here," said Wendy, "I've got something better
than a bottle."

The baby latched on to her nipple eagerly, and was sucking hard. Wendy looked
round the room. "What about the other baby?" she asked. One of the girls
fetched the other baby, and explained "She hasn't got any brothers or
sisters." Wendy put the baby to her other breast, and said "Yes she has.
You're all her brothers and sisters. You must all help each other. Now gather
round, children, I'm going to tell you a story." I turned to Vlyd next to me,
and saw tears running down his cheeks as he watched the children laughing.

I tapped him on the shoulder, and said "Downstairs, back to your office." We
went down, and left Wendy with the kids. "Vlyd, old chap, I think your worries
are over." He shook his head. "I wish. I wish. She's very good with the
children, but that's not really going to help much. It's so wonderful to hear
them laughing, but what about tomorrow?" "Vlyd, I'll be honest with you, I
don't know what we're going to do. But she made you a promise, and you can
take it to the bank." "Mr Duncan, perhaps you haven't understood the problems.
It isn't just food..." I interrupted. "Vlyd, I understand more than you think.
And don't be fooled by the simple conjuring tricks that she's doing for the
children, that's nothing. She can do some really incredible things, she isn't
human, she has fantastic powers, and if she's determined to go in to bat for
you, then you're on the winning side. Just have a little faith in her. By the
way, why the prison bars?" "Prison bars?" "On the windows." "To stop the
children from falling out, of course. Otherwise, they'd lean out of the
windows and fall, you can't watch them all the time."

Half an hour later, Wendy came into the office, her arm cuddling two babies,
who were fast asleep. "Vlyd, we have to go now, but we'll be back tomorrow.
Meanwhile, I need your consent to take these two with me, so I can feed them
every few hours, that's what they need." He nodded, "Sure, that's two I won't
have to worry about." "Paperwork," I said. They both looked at me. "Vlyd,
write something down that gives us authority to look after these two for you.
Otherwise, if we get asked, we have nothing to show that it isn't a
kidnapping." He nodded, and put something on some headed notepaper. He handed
it to Wendy; she took it, and pulled him toward her, putting her free arm
round him and hugging him close to her body for a few seconds. "Vlyd, tell the
children, Magic Wendy will be back tomorrow." He nodded, he didn't look like
he was able to speak. Wendy let go of him, took my hand in hers and led me
outside. She blew a kiss to the children, who were watching from the windows,
and put her arm round my waist. I put my arms round her neck, and she took off
slowly into the sky, so that the children could see Magic Wendy as she flew.
After we'd risen several hundred feet, she brought her cape round to enclose
the two of us and the babies. Then she accelerated, but not to her usual three
gravities. "Slow trip, Duncan" she said, kissing one of the babies.

On the way back, I gave her a piece of my mind. "How the hell could you make a
promise that we'd fix this, we haven't got the faintest idea what we can do,
Wendy." "What it takes." "Huh?" "We'll do what it takes." "Because you
promised that guy? Wendy, you might at least ask me before you make rash
promises like that." "No, not for Vlyd, this isn't for Vlyd. This is for the
children, Duncan. For the children. The babies."

Sigh. There's no answer to that. She's right, of course.

The trip home took over an hour, but we were still back in time for dinner.
Wendy called ahead and by the time we got home, Milly and George were there,
and Milly was cooking something ethnic and East European "It's a traditional
Rhythyn dish," she said, "or maybe it's Thrynyn, it depends which recipe book
you read." Milly was wearing a black velvet catsuit, her blonde hair
contrasting beautifully against it, and a royal blue pinafore that looked
rather incongruous on her. "Are you sure about those arms," I asked, "they
look kind of, out of proportion?" Milly looked at George. "They're just fine,
Dunc, don't start putting her down." Milly smiled, flexed, and threw a pea at
me. I decided that I wouldn't retaliate, you can never win a food fight, so I
helped myself to some more thryxfth from the bowl. Yum.

While we were eating, Wendy and Milly took the babies upstairs to give them a
bath.

When they came back, George opened one of the packages of nappies that he'd
bought, to try to understand how they work. After a bit of trial and error, he
got both the babies nappied up, and bedded down in the baskets we'd got for
them. "Very good, George," I said, "you'll make a great mother." He made a
face at me.

Once we had the babies under control, Wendy explained to the others what we'd
found. "Vlyd's at the end of his tether, he can't feed the kids." "Why not,"
said Milly, "surely they still have food in that country?" Wendy looked at me.
"That's the bit I couldn't follow, actually. Duncan?" "Well, they've run out
of money. So they can't buy food." "But we saw shops with food in, why can't
they just eat some of that?" "Because they can't buy it." "There you go
again," said Wendy, "why not?"

Sometimes, you're talking to someone, and they suddenly seem to go insane, or
completely stop understanding what you're saying. When that happens, you know
that there's some fundamental assumption that they're making that is
completely different from the one you're making. It isn't always obvious what
that assumption might be, but until you find it and fix the difference, you
can't discuss that subject with that person. And that's what we had here.

Wendy didn't understand about money. Before you start laughing, you should
know that most people don't. That's why people wonder how come some parts of
the world have too much food, while others starve. And even within a country,
you can have some people with more than they need, and some starving children.
"Why can't the rich countries just feed the poor?" they ask, "why can't people
just share?" That sounds like a sensible question, unless you understand about
money (or rather, about economics). And this was the same question; why can't
the rich citizens of Ruthenia feed the poor ones? Or why can't the
international community pitch in and feed them? Well, the answer is actually
quite simple. There's no such thing as a "rich country". What there is, is
countries that include a lot of rich people (relative to the poor ones). And
unless those people are willing to give up part of what they have, it won't
work. Why? Because if the government tries to force them to give up part of
what they have, and they don't want to, then the government will be replaced
by one that does what the people actually want, because these countries tend
to be democracies. So, you have to persuade the actual people to give up part
of what they have. And that's the very very difficult thing. Ask any charity.

For a start, 99% of the people in a rich country, don't regard themselves as
rich. The fact that they have a thousand times as much as a poor person in a
poor country, doesn't make any impact. All they can see, is the other people
in the rich country they live in, and the fact that they have an old car, a
low quality house, and not much money left over to go on holiday in Cyprus,
means a lot more to them than a starving child a thousand miles away.

I went into lecturer mode. "First of all, children, I have to explain about
economics. When there isn't so much of something that everyone can have as
much as they want to take, there has to be some way to share it out, so that
everyone has less than they want. The way we do this, is called "money". You
have a certain amount of money, and you swap it for the things you want. You
can get more money, by selling things, or by selling your labour. You don't
have to spend it all, you can keep it and use it later. And money is just
something that everyone agrees is money. Like, a long time ago, people used
gold or silver. Now they use paper, but the idea's the same." "So why can't
the shops give the food to the kids?" "Because if they did, and they didn't
get money in exchange, then they can't buy more food for the shop, and they go
out of business, and the shopkeeper can't buy things for his family. So, that
would only work once. And you're left with the same problem."

"But why can't everyone just share?" asked Wendy. Good question. "Very good
question, Wendy, that debate's been going for a long time. The reason is this.
If everyone shares everything, then people do just as much as they need to, to
get by. But if you can tell people, the more you work, the more you'll get,
then they'll work more, and then there's more for everyone. The Capitalist
idea is that if you let some people have more than others by their own
efforts, then people will make more effort. The disadvantage of the Socialist
idea is that everyone has less. The disadvantage of the Capitalist idea is
that some people starve. The Socialist idea has the underlying assumption that
there's a fixed cake, and everyone has to share that."

"Never mind about cake," said Wendy, "the children have no bread."

"OK, then can't we give them money?" asked Milly. I looked at George. "You
tell her, George." "I have to pay my mortgage, or I don't have anywhere to
live," he said. "And electricity, and food, and evenings out down the Star of
India and the China Diner, and the car, which I still have to get fixed, and
and and. So where do we get the money to support two dozen kids?" explained
George. "It gets worse," I said. "How?" asked Wendy.

I counted on my fingers. "One," I said, "this isn't a once-off short term
problem, it's a long term problem, they don't just need money once, they need
it every month. Two, there's no way that this is the only orphanage affected,
they get their money from the government, and if one is having problems, then
so are all of them." Wendy interrupted, wide-eyed. "But that's, that's
terrible! How many children are we talking about here?" "I don't know, Wendy,
I really don't. I'd guess tens of thousands, but that's just a complete
wild-ass guess." She looked horrified. "That's, that's awful!" "It gets
worse." "How?" she asked. I sighed. "The real problem isn't money." "I thought
you said ... " "No. You see, there's a civil war on, the Rhythyns and the
Thrynyns, and if an orphanage has money, they'll just get robbed by one side
or the other, and you're back where you started."

Wendy sat and stared at me. "But those are their children!" "They don't see it
that way, Wendy. One side or the other, will think they're from the other
side, and therefore a target. Each side thinks their cause is just and good
and that robbery, in pursuit of their cause is good." "But what are their
causes?" "Like Vlyd said, Wendy. It doesn't. Fucking. Matter."

"Wendy?" said Milly. Wendy turned to look at her. "This is like the Mazdas and
the Ahrimans, isn't it? Two groups, fighting, no-one really knows why, they're
fighting today because they were fighting yesterday, and they drag as many
third parties into the fight as they can." Wow. Out of the mouths! "She's
right," I said, "it's exactly like that. Big-endians and Little-endians" "So
what's the real problem, if it isn't money?" asked Wendy. "The real problem is
this bloody civil war." "So how do we stop that?" asked Milly.

Naive. How do you put an end to war. People have been dreaming about that one
for thousands of years. The Congress of Vienna, the League of Nations, the
United Nations. The problem is, humanity actually seems to like having wars.
They're exciting, you get to go to interesting places with unpronouncable
names and kill people. The only time that a war ends, is when both sides want
it to stop. That's either because one side has so thoroughly beaten the other
that the other side sees no point in continuing, or else when both sides have
pounded each other to a draw. You can't just pull them apart, like a Saturday
night scuffle outside a pub. Hmm. On the other hand ... we did have a couple
of resources that most countries couldn't deploy in a peacekeeping force. If I
could only dream up a way to use them.

"There's four problems," I said. "First of all, we have to go back there
tomorrow with supplies, like food and stuff, because Wendy promised we would.
That's pretty easy, we just go down the supermarket, buy everything that looks
suitable, and Wendy flies it over there. But that's not any sort of long term
solution, that just gets them past the next few weeks." Wendy nodded. "If I
can leave the babies with you, Milly?" Milly nodded and grinned. "Then I can
go down there each day and deliver the groceries."

I looked at her. This has to be the most inefficient scheme I've ever heard.
We're going to fire a suborbital missile to travel a thousand miles in order
to deliver groceries? "How about a weekly delivery, Wendy? We have to deal
with the long term problem, can't spend too much time on the short term." She
looked disappointed. I was sure she just wanted to play with the children.

"The second problem," I continued, "is all the other orphanages that we know
must be there. The big problem there, is we don't have the slightest idea
where they are. The third problem is the ongoing supply of all of these, and
the fourth problem is that unless the civil war stops, it's all wasted anyway
because the combatants will just steal from the orphanages."

"So we have to stop the civil war," said Wendy, succinctly.

"Can't be done," said George. Wendy looked at him and then at me. "Is he
right?" she asked, anxiously. "Probably," I said. "But not definitely," she
pressed. "No," I admitted, not definitely. "Then we have to try," she said.
"Mmm." "Duncan, we have to try. Even if there's only a ghost of a chance, how
can we not at least try?"

"Come off it," said George, "people have been trying to stop wars for
centuries. How can us four do something that even the United Nations can't
do?" "Because we've got assets that they don't," I replied, looking pointedly
at Wendy, "it's just like breaking up a fight, but on a bigger scale." Wendy
looked at me, quizzically. "Sometimes, you're at the pub, and people have a
few beers too many, and one of your friends starts getting into a fight with
another one. So what you do, is you try to break up the fight; take away any
weapons they've got, and keep them apart until they cool off. And in the
morning, they're glad you did. Because neither of them really intended to have
a fight, they just got themselves locked into a situation that they couldn't
back down from." "But these aren't friends," pointed out George.

"Look," I continued, "I'm going to make a few assumptions here, and my
justification for making them is that unless they're true, we don't stand a
chance. Assumption number one, is that that they don't actually want to fight
any more. My guess is, most people are sick of it, it's just screwing up their
lives, killing their children, and they just want it to stop, but they can't
stop because." "Because why?" asked Wendy, "why can't they just stop?"
"There's a sort of momentum, Wendy. Tit for tat. A killing sparks a revenge
killing, and then that has to be avenged, and so on. They capture a town, so
we have to recapture it. Like Vlyd said, they fight today, mostly because they
fought yesterday. I want to try to treat this like a pub fight." "You think
that will work?" asked George. "No," I said, "but unless someone has a better
idea, or thinks we should just give up even though we have two Weapons that
no-one else can deploy?"

"So what's the detail of this plan," asked George. "I don't have any detail
yet," I replied, "But here's my strategic thinking. In order to support the
orphanages, there has to be a functioning government that can levy taxes which
will support such social services. The civil service will already have a
mechanism for distributing funds to the orphanages, and will know where they
are. Before a government can function, we have to stop the killing, but we
have to remember that our objective is for the Ruthenia to form a stable
government as part of the peace agreement. So, we have to get the main
contenders to sit down round a table and talk about a compromise that ends the
fighting."

"How?" asked George.

"Yeah," I replied, "I'll get back to you on that."

Milly flew George and baby Rosetta back to their place, so at last I got my
car back, and I suggested to Wendy that we get an early night, since tomorrow
would be busy. "I don't need to sleep," she pointed out. "But I do, Wendy, and
I sleep a lot better when you're with me." She grinned like the Cheshire Cat.
"Bed" she said. "Er, actually, I was hoping ..." "mmm?" " ... a couple of
thousand feet in the air?" She pulled me into her arms, and we exited via the
window. "What about the baby?" I asked. "I'll hear if she wakes up," said
Wendy.

I slept soundly that night. Wendy's an expert at putting me to sleep, and
after she'd administered the Wendy Special Knockout Fuck, she held me close
and rocked me to sleep in her arms.

Next morning, I awoke in bed. There were three of us. Me, Wendy and something
small and helpless being given her morning feed, together with lots of love.
When Wendy saw I was awake, she started singing to her, too. "You know, Wendy,
we'll have to find out her name." "She's Mattie, Mattie Hrwglyth. Aren't you,
Mattie? Yes, you are. Yes. You. Are. My Little Mattie. Goo! Goo goo!"

I went downstairs to get away from this saccharine scene of babyfied bliss.

After breakfast, I told Wendy that were were going shopping, to the
supermarket. "Bread," she said. "Milk." Actually, we filled up five trolleys,
and a lot of it was tinned. Twenty one children eat a lot, I'd think, and it's
probably better to have too much than too little. "How will you carry it," I
asked her. "In my cape," she replied, that multifunction Swiss-army-knife cape
of hers. "And what about me," I asked, thinking about a sub-orbital trip
without Wendy's cape around me. "Ah," she said, "yes. I'll have to leave you
behind, Duncan, and you can look after Mattie. I won't be long." And I was
left, in the middle of the supermarket car park, holding the baby. I was
hoping that she didn't wake up and want feeding, or (worse) changing.

I went home, basketed the baby, and started writing up my plan of action. It's
funny how, if you go to sleep with a problem, and get a good long zizz, you
can wake up with the solution pretty much complete in your head. But, for the
sake of being methodical, I wanted to write it down, so I could check it to
see if I'd forgotten anything major. I spent an hour staring at the plan,
rearranging bits, amplifying bits, pricing things up, and then I spent another
hour trying to work out what could go wrong. Eventually, I decided that there
were just so many things that could go wrong, and if something can go wrong,
then it will. I'd have to rely on Wendy and Milly being able to improvise as
necessary. But if it all worked, then we'd end the civil war, install a decent
government, rescue the orphanages, solve my financial problems (caused by
having expenditures and no income) and end the scourge of teenage acne. Well,
maybe not the last two. I left our own financial problems as an open issue,
but one that had to be dealt with fairly soon, before the wolf arrived at the
door. Teenage acne would have to be someone else's problem.

Wendy got back two hours after she'd left. "What kept you?" I asked, knowing
that she could have gotten there and back in 40 minutes. "I told them a story,
I told them the Saga of Scarpur." "What's that?" "Oh, it's just something that
happened a few billion years ago, part of the history of my people." How come
she never tells me these stories? "OK, fine. Now, listen up, Wendy. I have a
plan, and it's a doozie." I explained the outline of my idea to her. "And
you'll stay here, Duncan?" "Ah, no. Key part of the plan, I have to be with
you, you need a Wielder." "It could be dangerous, Duncan." "Not in the
slightest, Wendy, I'll have you with me at all times." She looked doubtful.
"I'd rather ..." "Wendy, if you can see a better way, say so. Otherwise, we go
with this." She shut up, but kept the stubborn look that meant I'd just lost
another argument. "And another thing," I continued. "You've never been shot
at, we have to get you some practice at that." "Why?" she asked, "all I have
to do is nothing." "Incorrect," I replied, "it's like everything else, you
don't know what might go wrong until you've tried it." "But we don't have a
gun," she pointed out.

Yes. True. And I couldn't see a way to legally acquire one in a hurry. I
didn't want a dinky little squirrel-gun, I wanted one of the heavy-duty
man-killers that the Ruthenians would be using. I'd thought of setting up a
catapult that gave the necessary kinetic energy to a lead pellet, but I
discarded that, on the same principle of "you don't know what might go wrong
until you've tried it". "Well, don't just stand there," I said. "You know
where you can get one, and this time, do not tell anyone any stories."

By the time she got back, George and Milly had arrived. And little Rosetta, of
course, carried in a sort of papoose-bag in front of Milly. "Does yours sleep
at night?" asked George. "Sure, doesn't yours?" "No," said George, succinctly.
"Oh?" "She keeps waking up and asking for something, Milly thinks she's got
wind, or she's hungry, or needs changing; I think she just likes being
cuddled. Dunc, I tell you, that baby's getting more of Milly than I am."
"Them's the breaks," I told George, "that's the way it often goes. Just be
grateful that you've got Milly at all, think of all the Milly-less
multitudes." He pulled a face. "How come I got the noisy brat and you got the
angel?" "I'm not sure I'd call Wendy an angel, more like a goddess, I think."
"I meant the baby," explained George. "I'm not a goddess," said Wendy, "are
you two going to bicker all evening, or are we going to try out this
goes-bang-stick?"

Since we had an illegal gun, we had to find somewhere quiet to try it out.
Plus, people might get the wrong idea if they saw us shooting at Wendy and
Milly. I didn't want to be on the wrong end of an attempted murder charge, so
we went to the King George V Reservoir, inhabited mostly by birds,
birdwatchers and yatchsmen. And they all go home at night, except the birds.
"You want to hold the babies?" I asked George. He shook his head vigorously; I
thought he needed to get with the program here, our Weapons were obviously mad
about babies, and life was going to be full of them from now on. Deal with it.
But since I was holding the babies, that meant George had to do the stuff with
the gun.

Wendy went first. "Age before beauty," said Milly. She stood in front of the
reservoir, about a hundred yards away, and George picked up the gun. "It's
heavy," he said, "how do you use it?" Ah. No manual. And none of us had ever
used a gun before. I bent close and shone my torch on it. "You point the end
with the hole at Wendy, and you put the wooden end up against your shoulder,
and you pull that little lever-thing there," I said, drawing on many years of
watching spaghetti westerns.

He did all that, and nothing happened. "Safety catch," I said, remembering
numerous episodes of Kojak. He found that and clicked it to the "unsafe"
position, then tried the trigger again. There was a hell of a bang, and George
fell over backwards. "You OK, Wendy?" "I heard the bang but I have no idea
where the bullet went." I thought about this. George was going to have trouble
hitting a barn at 100 yards, so I beckoned Wendy closer, until she was ten
yards away. Even then I wasn't sure that George would be able to score a hit,
so I shone my torch on her, so he'd get better aim.

Sure enough, his next go missed, but at least he didn't fall over again. "Ow,"
he said, "it keeps bashing me on the shoulder, it's got a kick like a horse."
"Persistence, George." On the fourth try, he got a hit, and we found out what
happens when a bullet hits a Weapon. George was thinking that the bullet would
bounce off, like Superman, but I was pretty sure that wouldn't happen, because
Wendy isn't hard like steel, she's soft like, well, like Wendy. So a lot of
the energy of the bullet was absorbed as it tore through her tunic and then
her skin and the stuff under it. I'm not sure how far in it penetrated, but
you could see the damage before she repaired it.

She said it hurt at first, which surprised me. I'd kind of assumed that since
she couldn't be damaged, except temporarily, then that meant she couldn't get
hurt. Then, on reflection, I realised why it hurt her. Of course she had to
have sensors to tell her about damage, just like we do, and those sensors
would raise an interrupt so that the priority message "Something just damaged
you" would get noticed. And that's what we call pain, so that's what she
called it. Of course, there's no way to compare how much it hurts, but then
you can't actually do that between two humans; we just assume that we all feel
the same amount of pain. But maybe we don't. Indeed, was there actually any
relationship between what George or I would call "pain" and what Wendy said
she felt? I didn't think there was any way of finding out. Well, you can get
too deep in philosophical questions like that; let's just assume that when
Wendy said "Ouch" she meant that it hurts.

But it only hurt at first; she shut down the message once it had gotten
through, which is something one hears that some people can do, although I've
never known whether to believe that. And the repair was pretty fast.

I told George to put the gun on to semi-automatic, and fire a few bursts at
Wendy. "Ow," she said, "I didn't like that at all, not at all. Can we stop
now?" Her body looked badly sliced and damaged, and her clothes were a mess. I
nodded, and she came back to stand behind George, who changed the ammo clip.
"Your turn, Milly." Milly looked at me, like a dog who's been told "bath".
"I'll go again instead," said Wendy. I was a bit baffled by that, it didn't
make sense, the whole point was for Milly to see how it feels. Then I realised
- Milly was Wendy's daughter, and Wendy was offering to take her place so she
wouldn't get the pain of being shot. "No, Wendy, you stay here. Go on, Milly."

Milly went to stand in the target area. George raised the gun, sighted ...
then lowered it again. "Dunc," he said, "I ... I don't think I can do this."
Mutiny! "It hurts them, Dunc. I can't do it." I shook my head. "Sure it hurts,
but you know what they say, train hard, fight easy. She's going to experience
this sooner or later, and a fraught combat situation is not the best
introduction. Now pull yourself together, man, and do it." He raised the gun
again, Milly smiled nervously, and he put it down again." "No." "Give it
here," I said, passing the babies over to George.

George was right about the kick. And Milly screamed when the first bullet hit.
I changed to semi-automatic, took aim again, fired, but I didn't hit Milly.
Wendy had put herself between us, and the stream of bullets hit her, ripping
into her body and legs. When I realised what was happening, I lowered the gun,
but not before I'd done a lot of damage. I watched as Wendy repaired herself,
and told her to get out of the way. "No," she said. Mutiny? This was open
rebellion! Wendy walked towards me, and pulled the gun out of my hands. Then
she bent the barrel into a U shape. "No more, Duncan. That's enough." Milly
agreed, "I don't like guns, they sting."

Oh well. At least now they knew what to expect. "OK, OK. Dump that thing
somewhere where it isn't going to cause trouble, Wendy." "I'll get rid of it
next time we're in orbit."

Wendy spread her cape on the grass by the reservoir and we all sat on it; the
moon was low in the sky, and we could see a galaxy of stars. I leaned into
Wendy and pulled her toward me, nuzzling her ear. I stroked her shoulder, "I'm
sorry I hurt you with that gun, Wendy, it was so that you'd know what to
expect." "I know, love, I'm fine, don't worry about it."

George passed Mattie back to Wendy, who decided that now was a good time for a
feed, so Milly did the same with Rosetta. You know, you might not be able to
have sex with a woman while she's feeding a baby, but you sure as hell can
kiss her, and Wendy had at least one free hand. "Tomorrow, George, send Milly
round first thing; she and Wendy will be off to Ruthenia, to start the
process." George nodded. We all sat there, holding hands and kissing like
romantic teenagers, except that teenagers don't usually have a couple of
babies to look after. I wondered how long it would be before we could do this
again; it could be weeks before our efforts in Ruthenia bore fruit. If ever.
And then I suggested that the cold damp night air might not the the best thing
for small babies, and then we all flew home.

That night, I rather clutched at Wendy, because I knew I'd only see her
intermittently for a while. I know it's very selfish of me, but I want to be
with her all the time, and I really hated the idea of her spending a long time
fighting a stupid battle to stop a war for people we didn't even know. And I
told her that. "But Duncan." "Yes, I know, I know. It's for the children, I
know. I just can't help wishing that it wasn't necessary, you see?" Wendy
looked beyond me, into the distance, her thousand yard stare. "It's always
like this, Duncan. People lose track of what's important. But we'll remind
them." Then she focussed on me, and said, "But tonight, my Wielder, my own
baby, tonight is for you and me." And her body pressed against mine, and her
hair covered my face, and her smell filled my nose, and she loved me, fast and
slow, hard and soft, and thoroughly.

. . .

Milly arrived early the next day. I knew it was early, because I was still in
bed. I knew she'd arrived because I woke up surrounded; Wendy on one side and
Milly on the other, and there was a hand between my legs, and in my groggy
half-awake state, I didn't know whose it was. A few seconds later, I didn't
care whose it was. And then Wendy made the question irrelevant, with a
vigorous sexual assault. I had no retreat, because Milly behind me felt as
hard as oak; after a couple of minutes I was sweating profusely, and very
shortly after that, I screamed Wendy's name several times. She let me drift
down the far side of my orgasm for a few minutes, then she said "Milly - get
him up and awake." "Noooooo!!!" I shouted as she dragged me to the bathroom
rather more brutally than Wendy did, and hit me with a blast of icy water for
a lot longer than Wendy would have. After my screams turned to gasps, she let
me get out and rubbed me down with a hot towel. It's easy to get upset about a
thing like that, but it's very difficult to stay angry when someone does the
hot towel rub to you. When we got downstairs, Wendy came over to me and held
me, saying "Oh, Milly, I think you were a bit too rough with him." Yeah,
right. Milly was doing exactly what Wendy had told her to do, and I was
supposed to melt into Wendy as my brave rescuer from the nasty Milly. Yeah,
right. So I did. I know which side my toast is buttered, and if Wendy wanted
to play villain-and-rescuer games, I was up for it. "Oh, Wendy, Wendy, thank
you for rescuing me from that nasty old Milly ..."

While they were feeding the babies, I went over the forthcoming part of my
Grand Plan.

"It's pretty simple, really. Just fly a search pattern over the countryside,
and each time you see any item of military hardware, you break it. Try to make
sure that people see you when you're doing it, I want this all to be as public
as possible." "How do I break a tank," asked Wendy. "Oh. I assumed that
wouldn't be a problem, can't you just fly into it and smash it up?" "No," said
Wendy, "I can not! There might be people inside." "Ah. OK. Well, how about
putting a bend in the gun barrel? That won't hurt anyone, and it means the
tank is impotent until they replace the gun, which will be a major piece of
work. You can handle artillery the same way. Machine guns and the like, you
can just break."

"I do love breaking things," said Milly, stroking my arm. "Oh Wendy, Wendy,
help, rescue me from the evil Milly" I squealed. Wendy laughed and put her
free arm round me.

I got serious again. "Any locomotives you see, don't break them, because we'll
need them when the economy gets going. Just derail them, take them off the
track and put them down a couple of hundred yards away. You can leave the
rolling stock on the track." "What about trucks," asked Milly, "do they count
as military or civil?" "Dual purpose," I replied, "we want them disabled, but
not permanently." "How?" "Break off the steering wheel; you can do that pretty
fast, because you don't need to open the bonnet and search for something."
"Cars? Bicycles?" "Leave them." "Planes?" "Big passenger jets, leave them.
Small fighters and the like, break them." "What do we do about soldiers and
people with guns?" asked Wendy. "Get the guns and ammo from them, also any
other weapons they have. And then just dispose of it all. There's no need to
hurt the soldiers, unless you need to do something to convince them to give up
their rifles." "Oh," said Milly, "I think we'll be able to persuade them," and
she flexed her bare bicep impressively. "Wanna arm wrestle me, honey?" I
looked at Wendy. "How will you persuade them, Wendy?" "I'll explain to them
they either they drop their guns, or else I'll break them in their hands, and
if I break a few bones in the process, then that's a price I'm quite willing
to pay." I thought, faced with these two, anyone with sense would surrender.
Quickly.

"OK, Wendy, you cover Rhythyn territory, Milly will cover the
Thrynyn-controlled areas. Then both of you cover the grey no-mans-land in
between, especially the capital city Hrvysklwr, which is where a lot of the
shooting is going on right now. But leave that for last, otherwise you'll have
to do it twice."

"Is that it?" asked Wendy. "Er, yes." "Sir, yes sir! Can do!" shouted Wendy,
then she saluted and flew out the window, followed closely by Milly. "Er," I
said, too late, "don't you think you'd have twice as many free hands if you
left the babies behind?" Goddamit. Do I have to spell out every little detail?
And they take babies into a war zone? Have they no sense? Feh! I phoned George
to moan about it. "It's no good telling me," was his predictable reaction,
"but Dunc, you should think a bit here. Where is it you always say is the
safest place in the world?" Hmm. Maybe they are in a safe place, at that. I
imagine that Wendy can make part of her cape bulletproof if she wants to.

I spent the day ordering the air-curtain for the window, bigger than a cat
flap and highly insecure, except that my idea was to have it as well as the
window, and close the window when we weren't in residence. In the evening,
though, I got a nice surprise. I'd not long gotten into my cold lonely bed,
when I felt a presence beside me, and a pair of hands rummaging me.

Yum yum, I thought, turning round to face her. "Wendy!" "Mmm" "Urrrrr". I did
a bit of groping in return. "Where's the baby?" "I left her behind, she's OK"
I groped a bit more. "Wait, wait." "Yes?" she asked. I grabbed her biceps, and
felt the bulge, "You're not Wendy!" "Good guess, sweetheart, want to try for
the jackpot?" "Why aren't you Wendy?" "Huh, always the deep philosophical one,
aren't you." "No, I mean, why isn't Wendy here? Or why aren't you with
George?"

They'd decided that one of them should stay in Ruthenia, flying high, looking
after the babies, but ready to swoop down if they saw any military vehicles
trying to move by night. Wendy let Milly go first, but Milly had asked her if
she could spend the night with me, and Wendy, of course, had agreed. "But why,
Milly? You're George's Weapon." "That's true, of course" she said, "but Dunc
... you were my first. And a girl never forgets her first love." Only a cad
would have pointed out that Milly isn't a girl. And only a fool would argue
the toss when a warm willing woman is eagerly exploring your possibilities.

I stroked her heavily muscled torso, feeling the ridges and bumps, working my
way down to a pair of thighs that felt like oak trees. "You could crack a
coconut with these" I whispered. "Honey, I could crack a bowling ball." She
pulled me back up to face her, "but right now, I'm going to crack you!" I
wriggled and squirmed, but she had me locked between those mighty thighs, held
gently but immovably. She held both my wrists in one of her hands, and used
the other hand to stroke my body and tickle under my arms. She held me
helpless as I twisted and turned to evade her torture, she stretched me out
when I tried to curl up and muffled my screams with her kiss. When a woman
controls you as thoroughly as Milly did, then you can't control yourself
either, and I was gasping out an orgasm within minutes.

When it was all over, she released her grip, and pulled me close to her,
snuggling me into her breasts, letting me rest and recover. But I made the
mistake of licking and kissing her nipples, and she soon retaliated, gripping
me inside her and pulsing her vagina until I lost control a second time. Or,
to be more precise, I never did have control.

Then she lay under me, her big body spread out beneath me on her back, in a
submissive position. Not that I felt that I could dominate her, she was just
too big, too strong and far too sexy. I stroked her arms, carefully staying
away from anything at all sexual, and asked her, "Milly, why did you decide to
have such a big and muscular body?" "Three reasons, Dunc. One, it's a lot more
intimidating than looking like Wendy, and I need all the help I can get. Two,
George likes it. Three, you like it too. Don't you." I looked up into her
eyes. "Yes," I whispered, "I do rather." She smiled, and her arms tightened
around me in a bear hug. "Unff."

"Third time," she said, her hands creating chaos up and down my back. "Hmm,
Milly, could I ask you for something?" She pulled me up until my face was
level with hers. "Yes, love, what would you like." "Well, it's a fine night
for flying ..."

She laughed, and opened the window. Then she picked me up, and we zoomed up
into the sky. "Wendy and I love doing it in midair, there's such a feeling of
freedom."

It was a clear night sky, the stars sprinkled like salt on a black cloth, the
moon lighting the contours of Milly's body. At ten thousand feet, we hovered.
"Would you like to fly solo?" she asked. I laughed, "Milly, I'm not like you,
I can't fly." "Yes you can, you're just not as good at it as I am." "No, I
can't." "You can, I'll show you."

She showed me the posture, arms flung out and back, knees bent, and when I
adopted it, she threw me forward. I followed the same parabola that a falling
brick would travel; my arms and legs provided no lift, just a little drag. My
falling speed increased until I reached 120 mph, the terminal velocity of a
human being, the speed at which the force of air resistance just balances the
force of gravity. Terminal in another sense too; if I hit anything hard at
this speed, like the ground, I wouldn't bounce, I'd splatter.

"Enjoying it?" asked a voice by me ear. "Er. Maybe. A bit. This is like sky
diving. Except, uh, I don't have, you know. A parachute? Milly?" She swooped
below me, doing a half-roll so that she was facing up towards me, and letting
my body fall onto hers. I felt the acceleration forces as she slowed our fall,
and then brought me back up to ten thousand feet, where we hovered again.
"There. Your first solo! Did you enjoy it?"

I was still trying to get my wits back together. "Yes, it was exhilirating. I
suppose like bungee jumping?" "But safer," she said, "no elastic to break.
Want to do it again?" "Um." She took that as agreement, and I was hurled
forward again. This time, knowing what to expect, I was able to relax
slightly, and feel the wind in my face, and the drag on my arms. This time,
Milly flew along side me for nearly a minute before she scooped me up again to
soar into the night sky.

"Enough," I said, "it's not as nice as when you're holding me close to you."

She wrapped her cape around us both, and ran her hands down my body. "Wendy
sends her love," she said. "She does?" I asked, stupidly. "Yes. Like this,"
she replied, demonstrating what she meant.

That third time was the longest, and the best. Milly used my body like a
violin to make music, and the music she made was Ravel's Bolero, which is, of
course, not a bolero at all, but a fifteen minute musical crescendo, leading
to a fortissimo climax of chords. I lasted the full fifteen minutes, but only
because Milly made sure that I did. "Love you Milly," I said, just before I
faded to silence.

I woke up the next morning alone in bed. This has to be one of the big
drawbacks of a relationship with a Weapon, they tend to love you and leave
you. But I knew she had a lot to do, and I was happy that I'd been visited at
all.

Nothing else happened that day, I took advantage of the lull to do some
vigorous weeding in my vegetable patch.

The next day, the air curtain arrived, and I spent a few interesting hours
installing it. I suppose one could argue that an open window is an invitation
to be robbed, but first of all, glass isn't exactly good for resisting someone
who wants to break-and-enter, and secondly I planned to leave it open only
when there was a Weapon in residence, and if any wannabe burglar tangled with
Wendy or Milly, they'd give up the vocation permanently.

But I had a nice surprise that evening; Wendy managed to find time in her busy
schedule to cram me in for a romantic dinner date at the Star of India,
followed by a romantic walk in the park, at night, hand in hand. We stopped by
the river, and watched the water swirling by. "So how's it going in Ruthenia?"
I asked. "It's going well, Duncan. Today, we did a great joke on a bunch of
soldiers who were trying to kill each other." "A joke?" "Mmm. Milly tackled
one lot, and I dealt with the other. We took their guns and grenades and
stuff. You know, the old "Drop your guns or I'll make you eat them" sort of
thing. Then we made them take off their uniforms, so they couldn't tell each
other apart." "Yeah, funny." "No, hang on, I haven't finished. Then we went
round and ripped off their underwear." " ... " "Yes!" she said, "they stood
their with their hands trying to cover themselves up, and we just flew off,
giggling. I don't think those guys will be ready to fight for a while."
"Wendy, you're a riot. Just remember, you're not there to enjoy yourselves."
"I know, I know. Speaking of which, did you enjoy your visit from Milly."
"Mmmm." "And?" "We played 'Symphony orchestras'" I explained. "I think I know
how that goes, did she pluck your banjo?" "Yes, and she blew my horn." "So
have you recovered yet?" "No, and I probably never will." "I know a good
treatment for that condition." "And if the treatment doesn't work?" "Then
we'll do it again, until it does." "Mmm."

And it did. Eventually.

She flew south-east again in the morning, back to Ruthenia, and I spent the
day banging my head against one of our biggest problems. They thing is, you
don't get paid for saving the world, or even for rescuing kittens from trees.
But you still need to pay the rent, and the electricity, and and and. So
what's the answer, do I rent Wendy out as a flying bulldozer? Do people hire
flying bulldozers? Where do you advertise flying bulldozers? It was all very
well for Batman, he was a billionaire. Green Arrow likewise. Superman had his
reporter salary, and Diana presumably got the usual wages that a princess
gets. But how was I going to put bread on the table - the whole point of
leaving the boring old job was so that I could act as Wendy's Wielder, she
couldn't function properly without one.

I felt there had to be a way. Maybe we could sell some of the gold she
extracted from sea water? Or maybe she could make highly pure silicon, which
we could sell to chip manufacturers? Or maybe I was looking in the wrong
direction, we shouldn't be in the manufacturing business, maybe there's some
sort of service we could sell? My approach when facing this sort of problem is
to make lists, so I covered several sheets of paper with all the things that
Wendy might be able to do.

After an hour, I chucked away several useless pieces of paper, and started
again. Problem was, there were so many things she could do, I was looking at
this the wrong way round. What I needed, was things that she could do more
cheaply and effectively than existing methods, but they needed to be things
that I could actually explain, and therefore sell. Looked at that way round,
it didn't seem such a difficult problem, the answer was obvious. Wendy was a
heavy-duty flying crane. You want to put a ship in dry dock, but don't want to
pay the huge dry dock fees? Wendy will lift it to a position inland. You need
to haul some wide-gauge heavy machine from one end of the country to the
other? Wendy will fly it for you. You have a ship in New York and you want it
in Los Angeles? No need to go round Cape Horn, or even through the Panama
Canal - save the fuel costs, and a lot of time, we can transport your ship
cross-country.

I started to think about possible company names. Weight Lifters? Sky Hook? No,
all taken. Beautiful Crane? Then I thought of the song, "Pretty Flamingo".
Yes! A quick web search revealed that there wasn't a company with that name,
and I could register the domain name, prettyflamingo.co.uk, although I could
see no reason why we wouldn't operate internationally. Her hair could glow
like the sun and she could wear a tight crimson dress on company time, which
would be a useful distinction from her kitten-rescuing and world-saving
white-and-gold outfit. I started listing some likely scenarios, and thinking
about pricing. Marketing is always the key in this sort of thing; Wendy (or
rather, The Weapon, Defender of Humanity) was very well known already, it was
just a matter of making sure that people knew about the commercial side of the
operation. And, of course, the way to do that was a web site.

I started to design the web site. Something pretty simple, I thought, but with
lots of pictures of Wendy, showing what she could do, and how much cheaper it
was to hire us to do it than to spend money on the alternatives. I thought
about pricing, and made a few phone calls to find out the cost of hiring a dry
dock for a week, the fuel cost of various shipping routes. For example - the
export of lamb from New Zealand to Europe; long trip, refrigeration needed all
the way. The alternative would be Wendy lifting the ship and transporting it
around the world in whatever, I guessed 24 hours, need to do the calculation
there, but that would save a huge sum in fuel, salaries, refrigeration cost,
the ship could do dozens more trips in the same time, and what I needed to do
was work out a pricing that would halve the cost that the ship-owner was
currently shelling out, and since our costs were, like, zilch, that would be
our income!

That evening, it was Milly's turn to visit. She announced her arrival with a
crash of broken glass; I rushed into the dining room to see her standing amid
the shattered ruins of the window. "Wendy told me you fitted a cat flap!" she
exclaimed. "Yes, I did. On the other window." "Oh. Oops. Sorry." Damn, I'll
get these girls housetrained if it breaks me. "Anyhow, Milly, it's great to
see you again." "You too, Dunc," and she walked to me and gave me a killer
hug. Not literally, I hasten to add, but it was the sort of hug that makes you
think you just died and went to heaven. "Wendy said you took her to the Star
yesterday?" With a hint like that, I obviously had to take her somewhere nice.
"How about the China Diner," I suggested. "Corking," she said, "I'll wear
something nice," and she raced upstairs.

I stood there, a bit baffled. She had no clothes here, Wendy didn't have much
either, and I didn't think Milly would look good in one of my old suits. Plus,
it wouldn't have fitted, by about a mile. But when she came downstairs wearing
something silky and glittery, I realised that she'd faked it. "How's this,"
she asked. "Great," I said, "let's go." "No, wait," and she went upstairs
again. She came back down looking off-the-shoulder and sophisticated. "What
about this?" she asked. "You look gorgeous.". "Hmm, maybe ..." and she
vanished again.

I got a book and sat down. I know this game, it's called "Dressing Barbie".
You can see it in little girls, when they dress their dolls in various
outfits, an activity that seems pointless to boys, but then a lot of what boys
do seems pretty pointless to girls. But they don't actually grow out of it,
and in the full grown adult female it takes the form of "How do I look in
this?" Men don't change their pointless activities either, you see grown men
playing "who can piss the furthest" all the time, or at least something very
like it.

I got the whole works. "Does my bum look big in this?" "Do you think this is
too blue?" "This really wants a different hairdo, don't you think?" and the
classic "I've got nothing to wear", which in her case, of course, was
literally true, since each outfit was just another field of force.

Eventually, she decided on a little black dress, classic in form, and *much*
too short. I estimated that it ended about eighteen inches from the knee,
maybe twenty, she'd have to be very careful sitting down, and getting into or
out of a car was a no-no. Fortunately, the China Diner is within walking
distance. Or if you're wearing a skirt as tight as that, hobbling distance.
And the heels were a mistake, too. A girl who is six-two, should not wear six
inch heels. For a start, doorways are only six foot six, and when she banged
her head on the door lintel as we left the house, I saw I had another repair
job to do.

As we walked down the street, I thought of pretending that she wasn't with me.
But that's really hard to do when someone's holding your hand in hers, and
after she looped her arm round my waist, it became impossible. So I sighed,
and leaned in towards her, and decided, what can't be cured, must be endured.
Or, to put it another way, when you know you're being fucked, you might as
well relax and enjoy it. So I thought, the hell with anyone who sees us and
makes a snide remark, the key fact is that I'll be in bed with her later, and
you won't.

At the China Diner, I ordered the Special Feast A, with chopsticks. I suppose
it's a bit ostentatious to eat with chopsticks, but I think it's all part of
the fun. Milly, of course, tried to copy me, which was an unmitigated
disaster, because unless you've had a bit of practice, it gets very messy. I
tried not to laugh as the noodles slithered off her chopsticks, as she tried
to pick up rice, and when eventually an attempt to pick up an egg roll led to
the food flying across the restaurant. Eventually, I couldn't take any more,
and I signalled the waiter to bring a knife and fork for her. But it was too
late for the little black dress, which was now a little technicolour dress.
When I pointed that out to her, she looked down, said "Oh," and the dress sort
of flickered. All the food stains vanished, and the dress was now a deep royal
blue. "I think I prefer that colour anyway, Milly". The waiters kept coming
round to look, wondering how she'd changed the colour.

We got back home fairly early. When we got in, she kicked off her shoes, which
brought her down to not far above my level, and pulled me towards her. We
stood there in a hug for a minute or so, then I turned my face up to hers for
a kiss. Her tongue invaded my mouth, her legs surrounded and gently crushed my
waist, and her hand invaded my genitals. She had me in a state of sexual
frenzy within a very short time, and I wasn't sure exactly how it happened,
but I found myself on the bed, underneath her, my mind filled with the need
for sex to the exclusion of any other thought. She knew of my need, and she
knew how to deal with it. "Wendy says hi," she whispered into my ear as she
fucked me, and I realised that they had a continuous comms link running
between them, and I guessed that part of what I was getting here, was Wendy
teaching Milly how to turn a man into an sweaty, exhausted, mess without
actually rendering him unconscious. Which of course she could, but then you
miss the post-coital cuddling.

I won't say that's the best part of it. But anyone who thinks that the actual
orgasm is the only point of making love, is missing out on a lot. Afterwards,
when you're relaxed and drowsy, it's so good to just gently touch things, and
to be touched, and to whisper things to each other that don't actually make
much sense and which you wouldn't say in the cold light of day. And I felt
that Wendy was there too, which made it even better. Then she said "Say
goodnight, Gracie", so I said "Goodnight, Wendy, goodnight, Milly" and floated
off to the land of nod with Milly's arms and legs around me.

I was woken in the morning by a loud crash. I rushed downstairs to see what
had happened. Then I calculated the odds. If you have three windows, one
configured as a cat flap and the other two made of glass, what's the
probability that Milly will choose the wrong one, twice? One third, of course.
Maybe I should paint a big X in whitewash over the glass when I replace it.
The glass shop, of course, was happy to sell me two replacement panes. "Are
you replacing all your windows?" asked the shopkeeper. "No, it's breakages."
"Ah, kids," he nodded. "Yes," I agreed, "it's the youngsters. But I think
they've learned now." He nodded. "Catch them and give them a good spanking,
right?" I thought about putting Milly over my knee for a spanking, and
wondered for a moment what would happen if I tried. She'd probably let me do
it, too. On the other hand, did I want to teach her about spanking? Probably
not. On the other hand ... On the other hand, Miss Hardlash had quite likely
already taught her everything a domme needs to know about spanking. "What?
What? Oh, I was woolgathering a bit, here," as I adjusted my trousers, "let me
pay you for the glass."

That evening, it was Wendy's turn to visit. She came in through the cat flap,
which meant that my whitewashed X's worked, and she had some good news. "I
think we've smashed up pretty much everything that does bang in the country.
Quite a few of the larger knives, too. None of the railways work, because the
locomotives have been transported into the middle of forests. All the tanks
and artillery need replacement gun barrels, and a lot of soldiers are running
around in their underwear. And there's a lot of non-operational trucks, too. I
think we're ready for the next step. What's the next step, Duncan?" Trouble
is, I knew what I wanted next, I just couldn't quite see how to get there. But
I do know how to delegate. "We need to get the people in charge of each side
of the civil war to sit down round a table. But I don't know who they are, or
how to make that happen." "Oh, that's tactics, Duncan, leave that to me and
Milly, we'll arrange it." She does make things simple sometimes. "We're eating
with George and Milly tonight," she continued, "Milly's over there now." "And
where would you like me to take you tonight?" "Nowhere. Tonight, we're taking
you boys out. We're having a picnic."

I blinked. "Uh. In the park?" A midnight picnic, I thought. Unusual, but
romantic. "No, silly. Duncan, grab some wine and stuff, Milly's bringing the
food." I put the necessary drinking stuff in a bag, and Wendy put her arm
round my waist, and I got to use my cat flap personally. We soared up into the
sky, way above the clouds, heading for George's place, but along the way, we
met up with another flying couple. "Oh, hi." "Here we are," announced Wendy,
redundantly, because wherever you are is here. I explained that to her, and
she said, "No, silly. Here we are where we're here for where we're
picnicking." After I sorted out the atrocious grammar, I realised that she
meant we were about to picnic two miles above the ground. "Uh, usually one
sits on the grass. Dejeuner sur l'herbe, you know? There's nothing to sit on."
"There is now," said Wendy, spreading out her cape, "sit on that."

It's a peculiar feeling, sitting on a silky cape with nothing between you and
a death-plummet except that and two miles of thin air. Still, if Wendy thought
it was safe, then it was. And, I thought, moreover, if I do fall then she'll
catch me. There was enough moonlight to make it romantic, although not enough
to really see what you were eating. Milly had brought a picnic basket with
french bread and cheese, pickles and pate, ham and goujons of plaice, cold
chicken and Jacobs Cream Crackers, and I don't know what else. I didn't need
to see, I could smell. Yum yum!

"Wendy, it's a bit ... cold. Brrr." She pulled me close, and kept an arm round
me. I snuggled as close as I could get, and the cold night air was replaced by
a delicious feeling of warmth.

While we were eating, I explained about "Pretty Flamingo" to the others.
George liked the idea. "I could really run up the flagpole with that," he
said. George is in marketing, he speaks like that when he's excited. "Like
this?" asked Milly. She changed into a crimson creation; a tight sleeveless
bodice, and a fully ruffled skirt. Her blonde hair glowed and danced in the
pale moonlight, and she looked like she could light up the sky. I stared at
her until Wendy stuffed a gherkin into my open mouth.

I passed the wine over to George; as the younger man, it was his duty to open
and pour. "Corkscrew?" he said. "Damn," I said. "Anyone got a Swiss Army
Knife?" asked George. "Uh." Milly looked exasperated. "Give it here," she
said, and bit off the neck of the bottle. George and I stared at each other,
horrified. I'm not sure what was going through his mind, but I suspect it was
the same as the thought I had - I couldn't help thinking of something else
she'd had in her mouth, of a similar size and shape, and what bad news it
would have been if she'd bitten that off. Sure, I know she wouldn't do a thing
like that. But thoughts like these spring unwanted into the old noggin, you
know what I mean?

By the time we'd eaten, George and I were slightly tipsy, and although I knew
academically that there was no way the girls could get drunk, they were
certainly going a decent imitation of amorously inebriated females with
wandering hands. But before we could do anything about it, George produced his
coup de grace from the picnic basket. A tin of pineapple.

Have you ever noticed how, alone among the fruits, tinned pineapple is so much
nicer than the fresh variety? For a start, fresh pineapple is deuced difficult
to eat, what with the armour-plated exterior. Also, it has a tendency to be
woody, whereas tinned never is. And finally, there's the juice. Fresh
pineapple doesn't have juice; tinned always does. And I suspect they add sugar
to it, too.

It was a large tin, a generous tin, a king sized tin. A tin suitable for four,
even eight hungry people. We looked at the picture of pineapple on the label,
we thought about the juice. We salivated; I may have even drooled a little.
"Did you bring a can opener?" asked George.

Yeah, right. I hadn't even brought a corkscrew. "Hey, you brought the can, you
should have brought a can opener," I told him. "Huh." We gazed at the can, and
thought about the contents. "Maybe I can use an empty wine bottle," said
George. He held the can between his knees, and brought the neck of the bottle
down onto the top of the can. It made a small but encouraging dent. "Try the
side," I suggested, remembering that the metal is thinner there. He turned the
can sideways, holding the flat parts between his knees, and rammed the empty
bottle down on the can's side. The resulting dent was a lot larger. "Let me
try," I said. I held the neck of the bottle, and brought the bottle down like
a hammer on the side of the can. I tried turning the can a bit, and hammering
at it that way. I bashed and hammered until it was almost square, but I didn't
get it open. "Give it here," said George, and he had a go, a frenzied attack
on the can which left it looking like it had been folded in half. "No, George,
that isn't working, you aren't getting enough leverage. Maybe if you hold it,
and I batter it ..."

George held the can, gripped tightly between his knees, one hand supporting it
underneath. He held one of the bottles against the topside of the can, neck
pressed to the can, bottom up; the idea was that it would act as a chisel. I
held the other bottle like a hammer, swung it behind me and with an overarm
action like a cricketer at the Oval, I brought it down as hard as I could to
strike the top of the bottle that George was holding, in order to drive the
neck of that bottle into the can, punching a neat circular hole that we'd be
able to enlarge. It was a good plan. I know that, because I'd thought of it
myself. It should have worked.

It was Milly who saved George's life that night.

The bottle, which in my wine-soaked inaccuracy had been heading straight for
George's skull, was intercepted by her forearm. It shattered into a thousand
shards, and there was a silence. "Now what?" said George. "George," I said,
"This was not meant to be. To some people pineapple is given, to some it is
taken away. There will be other days, other pineapples. But not this one, not
to us, not today. Urp." I burped.

Wendy took the can from me and opened it by running her fingernail round the
rim, she poured the chunks into paper cups for us.

After the picnic, Milly took George home, but Wendy and I stayed where we
were. It was nice and peaceful up there, and with Wendy's cape wrapped round
us both, it was cosy and warm. We lay in each others arms, looking up at the
moon and stars. "I'll have to take you up there one day," she said. I think
she meant the moon. It's four years to the nearest star, although, come to
think of it, if Wendy can get up to relativistic speeds, it wouldn't be four
years of our time. No, I'm almost sure she meant the moon.

"Tomorrow, Wendy, I want you and Milly to organise this meeting. I want to
wrap this Ruthenia business up soon, I don't like all these nights with you
away." "But Milly ..." "Isn't you," I explained, "she's nice, of course, and I
know you have a comms link running all the time, and if I were George I'd be
delighted that she was there, and, well, I am delighted, she's a delighting
sort of a girl, but she isn't you. Now shut up and show me why I like having
you around."

I woke up the next morning in my bed, but Wendy was still with me. I kept very
still, hoping that she wouldn't realise I was awake. Laying there with my head
on her chest, I could feel something that felt like a heartbeat, but I
couldn't detect any breathing. I tried to stay motionless, but she must have
spotted some change in my breathing, because I felt her start to breathe. The
reason she hadn't been breathing was to avoid waking me up, so I could sleep
on top of her without being disturbed. Oh well, I thought, and I opened my
eyes. "Good morning, Duncan! It's seven o'clock and it's a lovely day!"
"Urghhh," I replied, not really being a morning sort of person. "And I have to
jet down to Ruthenia, to get things moving." "Unhhh. Bye, Wendy." "But I won't
just leave you lazing about in bed ... " Oh no. "Rise and shine" "Please Wendy
..."

I swear this is nothing to do with bodily hygene, it's just her way of
establishing dominance. She yanked me out of bed, tossed me over one shoulder,
and pushed me into the shower. On full. Cold. "NOOOOO!!!!" I screamed, as the
frigid liquid hit my warm skin, turning my blood to ice and my morning
erection to a shrivelled nubbin. She held me there for a minute, soaped me
down, rinsed me off, and rubbed me down with a hot towel, which at least
stopped my teeth from chattering. "Duncan, you're acting like you're cold,"
she remarked. "Gah," I replied. "I'll warm you up, love. Personally." Ah,
that's more like it.

Hand in hand, we went back to the bedroom. This time, I was underneath, and
she was on top. The loss of the morning erection was soon compensated for, and
very soon, a large powerful Weapon was pounding me into the mattress. She had
both of my wrists in one hand, her legs controlled mine, and the other hand
was free to wreak damage up and down my helpless body. It was a devastating
combination of sex and tickling, and I have no notion where she gets these
ideas from. "Miss Hardlash," she explained, "she said that if you get a man
completely helpless, then you can do a whole lot more with him." "But Wendy,
you always make me feel helpless." "Yes. Good, hmmm?" "Mmm."

She wore me down, and burned me up. She lifted me to heaven, and brought me
crashing back to earth. She bamboozled my brain and dazzled my dick until I
didn't know what day it was, or where my towel was. I fell asleep again after
she'd drained me dry, nestled in her powerful arms, and when I woke up again,
she'd gone.

I went downstairs to do some more work on Pretty Flamingo. I got the domain
name registered, started the process of registering the company, printed up
some business cards, made a list of pictures that I wanted to illustrate our
services, then got down to some serious number-crunching on pricing. By the
evening, I had the plan for the web site, an initial list of prices (100,000
ton ship from Amsterdam to Rio, that sort of thing). I'd drafted up a contract
that people would have to agree to, in which one key factor was that I had to
allow leeway in timing. If we were supposed to move a ship and some emergency
cropped up and Wendy was needed to deal with it, I didn't want to get sued
just because Wendy was going to save a thousand human lives instead of
transporting some goods. And if the ship broke while Wendy lifted it in the
cradle, we had to be covered. And I had to specify payment within 30 days. And
other stuff like that. You might think that a lawyer is needed to draft a
contract, but actually there's no way that a lawyer would be able to suggest
what was needed for such an unusual service offer. Sure, I'd get it translated
into incomprehensible legalese by a legal eagle, but the basic ideas had to
come from me.

That evening, Milly flew in, and this time, she used the cat-flap! She had
some great news. "We've persuaded them to sit round a table." "Great," I
enthused, "how did you manage that?" "Piece of cake," she replied, "we each
visited one of the headquarters, and told them that since they can't fight
now, they might as well talk. And if they didn't, then we'd just leave them to
hit each other with sticks and stones. Which would then move up to knives and
swords, and they'd be back to a gun war within a year. So, if they actually
did have any interest in ending the killing, now would be a good time." "And
they agreed? Just like that?" "Well, no. Not straight off. Some of them liked
the idea, some didn't. We had to do a bit of ... persuading. Intimidating, you
know? Like Miss Hardlash showed us." I knew that skill would come in handy.

"I had to sit on a couple of guys faces, and there's a couple of buildings
that got, er, demolished. And there were a few changes in the command
structure." "You mean you killed the officers who wouldn't attend the peace
talks?" "Certainly not, Dunc, what do you take me for? I just ripped their
clothes off, and explained to them that one of my hobbies was collecting men's
genitals, pickled in alcohol and formaldehyde and they decided to resign their
commissions. It was mostly the older ones that were a problem, they've been
hating for so long, they just can't imagine anything else. The younger ones,
though, they have wives, families, they want a decent place to live, a decent
job, and no-one shooting at them. And there were plenty of keen younger
officers ready and willing to take the place of the oldies."

"So when's this peace conference?" "Tomorrow afternoon, Dunc. So, I can give
you a good rogering tonight, then tomorrow morning you can put on your best
suit and tie, and I'll take you there in time for the meeting. Now, tell me
more about Pretty Flamingo, I'm really looking forward to that. Breaking stuff
gets a bit tedious after a while. Will we be flying all over the world?"

So I told her about some of the calculations I'd done. "If you curve your
force field under a ship, then you can lift it without breaking its back, like
a big baby basket with a handle on top. Then, you lift it up a couple of
hundred feet, they batten down the hatches, and you can pull it alone at a
couple of hundred miles per hour, you can do that, right?" "Sure," said Milly,
getting back into her Pretty Flamingo crimson. She stood up and twirled for
me. "How do I look? Do you think I should wear gloves with this?" "So, for
example, you could make the Amsterdam-New York run in 24 hours, and it usually
takes them six weeks. They save on fuel, on mariners wages, and on ship
utilisation. Instead of the voyage costing half a million dollars, we charge
them a hundred grand, and they save four hundred, a big win for the shipping
line. And we don't really have any costs, so that hundred grand goes straight
to our bottom line, you see?" "Mmm. Do you think I should wear knee high boots
with this, or just ballet slippers?" "Then there's short cuts. You have a ship
in the East Coast of the US, and you want to transport stuff to San Francisco.
But it's a few months if you go round the Horn, several week even if you go
via Panama. But we can fly the ship overland, just three thousand miles, get
there twelve hours later!" "Could I wear the same gold belt that Wendy wears
when she's The Weapon?" "You aren't listening, are you, Milly?" "Sure I am.
Overland. Can I carry a passenger, too?" "Passenger?" "It'll get kind of
lonely and boring, Dunc, flying a ship for 24 hours. I was thinking, it would
be nice if someone was with me on the journey."

I've really got to stop thinking about them as flying cranes and start
thinking of them as people. "Well, yes. Of course, Milly. You could take
George with you, and on the overwater flights you could let the ship down into
the sea now and then so that he can use the facilities there. Hot food, you
know? And suchlike." "Mmm. I do love a bit of suchlike. And maybe sometimes I
could take you?" "Uh, yes. Unless I'm with Wendy." I planned to be with Wendy
rather a lot. "Oh, Dunc. Stop thinking about Wendy all the time. I'm here and
she isn't," and she dumped herself on my lap and started snogging me. And
snogging turned into serious snogging, which became heavy petting. And we all
know what that leads to.

* * *

Next day, I packed a bag with clean socks and stuff, and got ready for my trip
to Ruthenia. Because it was a somewhat formal occasion, I wore my interview
suit and a sober tie, the one with the gold W embossed on it, just to show
off. And then I caught (or to be more exact, was caught by) the morning flight
to Ruthenia, courtesy of Pretty Flamingo Passenger Services. Some of the big
advantages of Pretty Flamingo are: you don't have to hassle into Heathrow,
there's no passport nonsense, and the inflight entertainment is superb. I
reminded Milly to change back to the white-and-gold before we landed, I wanted
her and Wendy to provide a unified and very daunting sight.

After we landed, I told her to join Wendy, while I got myself straightened
out, brushed my hair, pulled my trousers back on, that sort of thing. Then I
went to the big room where the peace conference was about to start.

Wendy and Milly were standing, side by side at the head of the table. Milly
held the two babies, Wendy stood with her hands on her hips, a great black
cloud of hair contrasting with her white tunic and cape, and a serious look on
her face. "Gentlemen," she said, "you have all expressed a desire to put an
end to this horrible war. Now make it so."

She stood, waiting. Her feet were several inches from the ground, a small
reminder of the tremendous power that she could exert if necessary. There was
a long silence; I think they expected her to tell them what to do. She waited
patiently; I could see from the flicker of Milly's eyes that they were
communicating via their radio network. I tried to imagine what they would be
discussing. Swapping curry recipes? Baby stories? Sex tips? Tactical military
data?

General Nyvski cleared his throat, glanced at Wendy, and said. "We should have
an agenda," he said. Wendy didn't move. Colonel Arpkhan spoke up, "First, we
should talk about the Final Solution, then we can agree how to implement it."
I shuddered at the expression he used, but Wendy still didn't move or speak.
Nyvski moved to the map on the wall, and pointed to a river. "The river
Khnorry is the obvious boundary between us, we could agree on that, perhaps?"
"No," said Arpkhan, "that leaves Hrvysklwr in your territory, we need to
divide the capital in two." Nyvski nodded, "Perhaps an island of territory
here ..."

"No." Both the men looked at Wendy. "No," she said. They waited for an
explanation, but Wendy stared back like a basilisk. So I thought I should
explain. "What she means is, that's just going to lead to more conflict in
future. One country, she wants you to be one country. A Union, a Federation, a
single political unit. One." She nodded, and folded her arms, and waited
again.

"But how can we ....?" "They are savages ..." "Death before dishonour," said
one of the men around the table. Wendy nodded to Milly, who walked round the
table until she stood behind him. Everyone fell silent, as Wendy spoke, very
quietly, to the man who had demanded death. "She has two babies held in her
left arm. They are life, the future, the hope of the nation." Milly put her
right hand on the man's neck. "She has your neck in her right hand. That is
death, the past, the despair of the nation. So, Mr Death-before-dishonour. Do
you choose life? Or death? Because you can have either of these, very easily."
I say Milly's hand clench slightly, making it hard for him to breathe. He
coughed, choked. "Life or death?" asked Wendy. "Life," he gasped. Milly let go
of his neck, and moved back to stand by Wendy. "Good choice. Gentlemen, please
continue."

There was a silence as each man contemplated the drama he'd just witnessed.
Milly started pacing slowly around the table, passing behind each man in turn.
I could see their eyes nervously following her as she prowled like a big
lioness, carrying her cubs.

"One nation," said Nyvski, "but who is to rule?" They looked at Wendy. She
said nothing. Milly was silent, too. One of the babies started to make a
mewing noise, but Milly let her suck a finger, and she was soon silent again.
Arpkhan sighed. "We cannot have a ruler that is one of us or one of them.
Please, Defender of Humanity, give us a leader. Or be our leader." Several of
the men around the table nodded, they would accept a strong woman leader, a
leader with the power to force them to do what she wanted. Wendy said nothing.
"You must," said Nyvski, "we cannot agree on one of us or one of them."

"No," said Wendy.

"Then what?" asked Nyvski, "with no ruler, we cannot unite, and we are
condemned to fight on. Please, O Defender of Humanity, rule us."

"No," said Wendy. There was another long silence.

Arpkhan spoke. "The Romans, they elected two consuls each year, but the main
power was in the senate. Maybe we could do something like that?" Everyone
looked at Wendy to see if she approved; she stared back at them. "Consular
elections every four years?" asked Nyvski, "with one consul to be Rhythyn and
the other Thrynyn" "And how do we decide the constituencies for the senators?"
"Easy - we don't have constituencies, we use proportional representation, so
parties get a number of seats that is proportional to the popular vote."
People around the table nodded and agreed, this sounded like a workable
compromise system. I wondered about the idea of having two presidents, but
hey, it seemed to work just fine for the old Romans. Wendy looked at me as
they talked excitedly about the details, and her tongue appeared between her
lips for a second, then she pursed her lips slightly, and twitched an eyelid.
Nothing as crude as a lewd wink, but easily sufficient to convey what she was
thinking. Who needs a wireless lan link? I adjusted my trousers
surreptitiously.

It looked like the delegates were actually hammering out a constitution; once
they'd gotten started, it turned out that they were full of ideas. "Maybe we
can join the European Union", said one "Yes, and that means a stable currency,
and the stable political situation will mean industrial investment." I smiled
as I imagined an emergency airlift of vowels, but I could see a shared dream
taking shape around this plain wooden table.

War isn't just killing. It's also unemployment, scarcity, hunger and misery.
Even people who see glory in battle, find it difficult to see glory in lice
and dysentry. These men were sick of war, and now that they had an
alternative, they were going to grasp it with both hands. They were choosing
life and hope.

And then one of them stood up, and shouted "NO!" Everyone turned to look at
him. "This is treason, you are betraying the dead of centuries past, did they
die for nothing?" "Yes," said Wendy, quietly, "they died for nothing." "NO!"
he screamed, "it would be better to die than to live under the yoke of the
ancient enemy." "That can be arranged," said Wendy, and Milly started to walk
towards him. He pulled out a mobile phone, and dialled a number. "Detonate,"
he said.

Wendy and Milly glanced at each other, Milly tossed the babies into the air,
and crashed straight through one of the walls, zooming up into the sky. Wendy
leaped up, scooped the babies into her arms, then flew straight at me. She
smashed into me, toppling my chair backwards. I lay face-up on the floor, the
babies on my chest, Wendy covering all three of us and holding me still, her
cape spread out around and over us all.

Then I felt the ground heave and shake. There were screams, then everything
fell silent. Wendy held us down for a while longer, then she stood up, and
hurled herself furiously at the man with the mobile phone. "You piece of
shit," she screamed, "you murderer, you coward, you ..." If looks could kill,
he would by now have been charcoal. Her face was inches from his as she hissed
"You'll pay for this, you snake." He looked terrified, as well he might, and a
wet patch appeared on his trousers. She spat into his face, and he fell,
unconscious, or dead. She stood over him. "You shit," she said, in utter
contempt. She turned to the other men, beginning to get back on their feet.
"Charge this piece of garbage with murder. Murder of one, and attempted murder
of two million. He just tried to set off a nuclear bomb in the middle of this
city."

She came over to me, took the babies back into her arms, and helped me stand
up. "I'll be back," she told the frightened delegates, "and when I return, you
*will* have a single state and a functioning government. Or you will each
explain to me why you failed. Each of you. Will explain. To me." She put her
arm round me, and the four of us left through the hole that Milly had made,
and zoomed up into the sky.

"Wendy? What happened?" "Later, Duncan." "No, tell me now, what's going on?"
"Duncan. Shut. Up." I shut up. I'd never heard her like this, and I didn't
like it. This wasn't the warm affectionate Wendy, this was some cold, angry
stranger. This is what it felt like to be intimidated by her, and I didn't
like it. I was pretty sure she wasn't angry with me, but what was she so upset
about?

She wrapped her cape round us, and we flew in silence. I looked up at her
face, but it looked like stone; hard and expressionless. I looked down at the
babies, one of them was stirring, and Wendy was soothing her with her other
hand. I had a lot of questions, and no answers, and I'd just been told to shut
up in a tone of voice that left no scope for argument. I sighed, and kissed
her neck, just below her ear. Maybe there was one thing I could say, despite
her command. "I love you." She hugged me closer.

The journey home took two hours, I guess she hadn't gone suborbital in order
to protect the babies against the acceleration. When we got home, she said
"Don't call George", and set about dealing with the babies; feeding and
changing them, and putting them in their baskets, while I boiled some rice and
heated up a can of instant curry for myself. When she had the girls fed,
cleaned and stowed away, and I'd eaten, I faced her across the table, and
said, "Well?"

She shook her head. "Wendy?" She sighed, and bowed her head, her hair falling
like a curtain around her face. Then she came over to where I was sitting, and
knelt by my chair. She put her arms round me, pulled my head down to her
breasts, and whispered "It's Milly." "What?" "She's dead."

I wasn't sure that I'd heard right. "Dead?" Milly?" "Yes." "How? But. I mean,
I thought, I thought that nothing could, I thought. But. How?"

Wendy was crying now. She'd held herself in check for the last few hours,
doing the things that needed to be done, but now it was bubbling out. "She's
dead, he killed her, that shit, she's dead, dead, Milly, oh Milly, my baby, my
Milly." She clutched at me and I held her as she sobbed incoherently. "I
should tell George", I said. "No, no, not yet, wait a bit, Duncan, not yet.
Not on the phone, I should tell him, I should be there when he's told." I
nodded, she was right. This isn't the sort of thing you can do on the phone.
"But how, Wendy, what could kill someone like Milly?" Someone like Wendy, I
thought. Someone like Wendy. Someone just like Wendy. Dead. An ice cold fear
gripped my stomach.

Gradually, in between sobs and tears, she explained it to me. Dialling that
number had detonated a nuclear bomb. As soon as the fission was initiated,
Wendy and Milly had known what was happening, and Milly went to deal with it.
"You could stop a nuclear bomb from exploding?" "No, it was too late to
prevent it, the chain reaction had already started. She went to contain it."
But by the time she got there, it had already progressed to the point where it
wasn't a matter of just wrapping her cape round it.

"The thermonuclear explosion had already happened, you see. All she could do,
was to try to stop the fireball from expanding, stop the explosion from
destroying the entire city and suburbs, two million people. Two million! You
can only do that by inserting a major black hole at the center of the
reaction, nothing can escape a black hole, nothing at all, it's an absolute."
I stared at Wendy. In my mind's eye I could see the four charged spinning
black holes that were the essence of her, and I suddenly understood what Milly
had done. "She entered the fireball, it's not as hot as the center of the sun,
we can handle that. And then she coalesced her four black holes into one. The
mass of that, plus the binding energy, plus the kinetic energy, plus all the
matter inside the Event Horizon, combined into one single black hole that
contained the energy of the device." "But Milly, what happened to Milly?" "She
sacrificed herself, so that others could live."

There was a long silence. I watched the tears streaming down Wendy's cheeks,
and dabbed at them with a tissue. "Her last word was 'Rosetta'"

The baby. It's always for the babies, the children. Any species that survives,
protects its children, makes any sacrifice for them. If they don't, then the
species doesn't survive. "She also asked me to look after you, Duncan, and
George." "She knew ..." "Of course she knew. She knew exactly what she was
doing. Oh, Duncan, why am I so, so..." "Unhappy?" "Proud. I'm so proud of her,
she was so brave, my daughter, my Milly, but I wish, I wish ..."

"Is there nothing we can do? Some rescue or something?" "No, Duncan,
everything inside the event horizon is inaccessible to the universe outside.
No information can leave the inside." "But, but there's still a black hole,
that's her, isn't it? Couldn't you go and get it?" "I could, but that wouldn't
be Milly. My brave daughter."

For a moment, I wondered why Milly had sacrificed herself and not Wendy. Then
I realised, they would have exchanged a discussion on this as soon as they
realised the situation, and somehow they'd decided between them which of them
would die and which would survive. And I thought, there's no way I'm going to
make Wendy relive the agony that they must have both been through to make that
decision.

So I put my arms round her, and said "Oh Wendy. Wendy. I love you. But I loved
her too." She looked back at me, "My daughter. My brave daughter. She loved
you too, you know. You were one of her babies." "No, I mean, not just as a
baby, I mean, I mean ..." "Shush, Duncan, I know, I know. I know what you did
that night, I watch over you all the time, you know. I told her to do it, she
wanted to so much. And I'm glad you both got to, got to, before she, she. So
brave."

Now I was crying too. Crying for a lost love, for a potential that had gone,
for a life that should have lasted for millions of years, which had only
lasted for days. For the evil done by humanity, and for the babies who would
never know their mother. For the end of innocence, because now Wendy knew
death, and when you know death, you lose your own immortality. I cried for
what might have been and now never could be. And all we'd been aiming to do,
was help an orphanage stay open.

"Do we bury her? Or what?" "There's nothing to bury. Just a black hole,
hurtling out in space, establishing its own orbit around the sun." I thought
about this. She was full of life and happiness, now she was alone and cold in
the dark vacuum of space, and not even anything to mourn. I went to the
kitchen cupboard, and got a candle, put it on the table and lit it. "What's
that for?" asked Wendy. "It's for Milly, love. You light a candle in honour of
the dead, it's an old custom. The candle flame symbolises the life, and you
think about the one who is gone, but she isn't completely gone, because she's
still in our memory. Even when the candle burns out. The candle always burns
out." Wendy came over to kneel next to me, and pulled me into her arms. "I'll
stay with you tonight, Duncan, I'll tell George tomorrow." "I'll tell George,
I understand how he'll feel." "No, Duncan, I'll tell him. Because then I can
comfort him, and I can do that a lot better than you can. You know?" I nodded.
George's loss was much greater than mine. I still had Wendy. And I didn't
fight too hard on this, telling George was going to be a very difficult job.

Next day, she flew out to tell George the terrible news. By the time George
got back from work, she was inside waiting for him. I wasn't there, but she
gave me a telephone feed of what was happening, so I heard the whole thing. As
soon as he came in, she said "George, come here." She wrapped her arms and
legs round him, the way she does, and held his head to her breast. "George,
I'm so sorry." "What?" "Milly won't be coming back, she's dead. She died to
save two million people's lives." "No!" "George, she was so brave, she didn't
hesitate for a moment. She had no qualms, she sacrificed her life for those
people." "But why, why?" Wendy explained what had happened. "But they didn't
deserve this, why her, why Milly? Why not one of them?" "George, George.
Shush, shhh, George. She did what was right. There was no other choice." "So
where's her, her body, I mean, is there?" "No, George, there's nothing. Duncan
lit a candle last night, let's do the same thing." Wendy had brought a big
votive candle for George to light; she had to hold his hand as he did it
because he was shaking so much. "Now we can sit here and remember her as she
was." George was crying now. "She was your daughter, Wendy." "My brave
daughter." "I loved her" "We all did." "She was looking so good in that Pretty
Flamingo dress, she was looking forward to doing that, I'd have gone with her
on some of the trips." "Yes, George, you would. Now I'll have to do all the
Flamingo trips, but you can come with me sometimes." "Can I?" "Of course you
can." "It's not the same, you know." "I know." "Oh oh oh." "Shhh. Come to
Wendy. There there." And she sang softly to him, and when I heard that, I hung
up, went to bed, and cried myself to sleep thinking about Milly.

Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away
Now it look as though they're here to stay
Oh, I believe in yesterday

Suddenly, I'm not half the man I used to be
There's a shadow hanging over me
oh, yesterday came suddenly

Why she had to go I don't know, she wouldn't say
I said something wrong, now I long for yesterday

Yesterday, love was such an easy game to play
Now I need a place to hide away
oh, I believe in yesterday