Power to the People
By Marian Mendez
"Kick! Kick! Kick!" Dayna yelled, and the Hommicks, sweating and straining,
cringed.
Soolin, passing by with a head under her arm, paused to appreciate the
sight. The younger, less hairy, Hommicks looked quite nice in white tights
trimmed with marabou.
Dayna saw her troupe's attention waver, and she flicked her switch across
the nearest male backside. "You'll never make Radio City Rockettes!" she
shouted, and the shame-faced men increased their efforts to lift their feet
above their heads in unison, which resulted in one stumbling and taking down
the rest of the arm-linked group.
Soolin smiled and went on to her own trainees. She plunked the head down
on the table in the midst of the previously enslaved Seska. "Right." She
eyed the nervous women. "Now, which of you can show me how to do a French
braid?"
Pella timidly held up her hand.
Avon sipped at a glass of wine and nodded. "Very good, Cato. Now that
we have the Galacto-net hook-up working, download the essential files first."
"Yes, educational programs for our people."
Avon gave Cato a pitying look. "Recipes. We'll never earn our Cordon Bleu
with barbecued rodent."
"No, no, no," Tarrant said wearily, wiping off his mouth and applying
another layer of lip-balm. "That's not the way to kiss a woman. Gently
does it."
The abashed Hommick went back to looking at the diagrams Orac had provided.
"Next!" Tarrant said briskly.
Gunn-Sarr and Vila looked up at the monitor showing everyone hard at work,
laughed and went back to their 3-D naughts and crosses tournament.
Nina smiled fondly at the men and then returned her attention to her
plans for flooding the quarry and turning it into a community bath, with
hot and cold pools and soap and shampoo dispensers everywhere.
Orac and Slave blinked and rotated respectively, bored. "Honestly," Orac
said, "Did you have to tell them how to get along and spoil the fun?"
Slave wriggled for a moment, then said, "Sorry."