Bought

William stood looking at the woman who sat in front of him her head bowed, her hands knotted in her lap, knuckles white. Capable hands, hands that had successfully delivered thousands of Guide pups without mishap. She was good for Guides, that wasn't in doubt. Whether she was good for the Guide's Sentinels was another matter altogether. He had caught her red handed, still she didn't scent as cowed, or apologetic, she scented as defiant.



William sighed. This was exactly what he'd expected to discover when he'd finally found her out, a can of worms. No, more than a simple can of worms, a 55-gallon drum of worms. He rubbed his forehead; trying to discourage the headache he felt sneaking up on him from turning into a full-blown migraine. It was a lost cause, he reasoned, but he tried.



He himself had recommended the Doctor to countless numbers of Sentinels to care for their Guides both breeding and not. She was his own Guide's physician. And it had taken him this long to discover what she was doing. Now he needed to figure out what to do about it. He was afraid to ask himself if his own Guide or he himself had been subject to her wiles. He'd rather not know. He wouldn't change it if he could. His Guide...was his Guide, and he would never reject her, not even if he found his feeling for her had been manipulated.



On one hand it offended him, knowing that decisions regarding the degree of bonding with Guides was being taken out of the hands of the individual Sentinels. Many Sentinels chose not to, or almost never saw their Guides disrobed and unveiled. It limited the depth of the bond that developed; let the Sentinel control his response to the Guide. By tricking the Sentinels into the room during birth when emotions ran high, when Guides were completely unshielded, using her assistants in close, nearly intimate proximity to the Guides to trigger the Sentinels reflexive territorial responses, Dr. Miller was taking away choice for the Sentinels involved.



On the other hand, he disagreed with breeding farms and the impersonal way Guides were bred. He felt that multiple matings were unnecessarily distasteful, an affront to the Sentinels who bonded the Guides. He also believed such serial contacts, when in vitro fertilization was available and would allow Guides to live with Sentinels, not in breeding farms, such serial matings were a throwback to older, harsher times. Not civilized. Jim could keep Blair with him and not have to resort to a farm. A simple trip, maybe two, depending on Blair's fertility, to the Vet's and Blair would be impregnated without another male violating his body. Simple. Humane. Tolerable.



Even so, none of those arguments gave Dr. Miller the right to make the decisions she had for the Sentinels and their Guides. The Sentinels had to retain control because if they lost it...William found he couldn't finish the thought. What precisely would happen if Sentinels lost control? In a word, chaos. Pure and simple.



"Why?" William Ellison asked. "Why would you do this?" The Doctor clearly didn't see the same end result he did. If she did she couldn't do this. In times of chaos the weak, the fragile would be broken. It would be so much worse for all concerned. Sentinels would die, worse yet, Guides would die. Would be slaves, bartered, sold, stolen like stores of gold and silver, like territory. Bloodshed....



"A closely, deeply bonded Sentinel will protect his Guide. He will be incapable of the kind of mistreatment that most Sentinels subject their Guides to." Came the answer. Through clenched teeth if William's ears heard right.



"By taking the choice from the Sentinels?" William said, "you believe you are righting a wrong on behalf of the Guides?" No, she didn't see what he did. She had no idea of the risks.



"Yes, Senior Sentinel, I do." Dr. Miller answered firmly. William paced up and down the carpet in his audience room. His Guide was absent; his Companion was standing near the door, saying nothing. William could still smell him, his distress. Something was upsetting him. William wanted to go to him, comfort him. But he had business to attend to first. Reluctantly he put his Companion out of his mind for the necessary time.



"And what is your view on how things should be?" William asked; more out of curiosity than out of a real desire to hear a differing view. What was it that motivated this woman? How could she think she was helping, why didn't she see how much nearer to anarchy her methods might bring Sentinel society? The Sentinel laws were old, ancient, and obeyed because they were ancient and as much a part of every Sentinel as breathing. Sentinels obeyed the law. At least Sentinel Law.



Dr. Miller leaned forward. "Guides are human. They have all the feeling that you or I have. Can you imagine a life where you were forbidden to talk, forbidden to volunteer your feelings. A life where you were used as a sexual convenience by men who never cared enough to look you in the eye when they took you? Who might never touch any part of your body but your genitals? All of the touch, of the caring you ever experience coming only through sex? Men who chose to breed you, send you to breeding farms and subject you to repeated matings with stimulant crazed "studs", other Guides or Mundanes who you didn't know, weren't permitted to talk to, and who you would never see again after you were impregnated? And can you imagine what it would feel like to lose child after child, have them taken and turned over to Guide Houses to be raised into servitude? I know that is wrong." Her eyes lifted and burned into his.



Oh, yes, she was right, while at the same time so very wrong.



"And you are seeking to change that." William said, gently once he'd seen her belief and how sincere, how sure she was of her position. He knew she was wrong. But he also knew it was not possible to convince her of it. "How?"



"Your son will not give up his Guide now. Last week, before he went through the birthing with Blair, he could have. Now he can't. Blair and Blair's children will stay with your son. Blair will be able to raise his own children, be able to know them. They will nurse from his breast. Not be raised by caretakers, not be brainwashed into being good little Guides. They will know their mother, he will talk to them, teach them, bond with them as all mothers do, are allowed to, all but Guide mothers. They won't be given up and sent elsewhere to be fed some synthetic blend of feeding formula that is laden with a preponderance of female Guide hormones in the hopes of making them fertile and breedable. They will develop normally, probably look exactly like Blair. Do you know how rare it is now to see a male dominant Guide like Blair? With most of the secondary sex characteristics of other males?"



"No. I don't believe I understand exactly what your point is." Ellison narrowed his eyes. His instincts were screaming at him, this was actually important. Even as it made his skin crawl to think of. Blair hadn't been hairy; he'd seen a smooth face, a beautiful face when he was undraped, and huge lovely blue eyes. But he also knew why there had not been hair, he had known it, and not thought of it, there had been the minute signs of permanent hair removal he had ignored. He shuddered. Had Blair once been hairy enough to shave? Had he had chest hair? That seemed wrong. Incredibly wrong to William Ellison as he contemplated the possibility of having a Guide as hirsute as himself. At having a Guide who's male genitalia might be more than a small, soft penis and testicles, dominated by the far more appealing, seductive vulva and female apparatus. Guides should be androgynous or feminine, not masculine. And they shouldn't be capable of anything more than the soft, half-erections that the female dominated Guides on occasion displayed. William couldn't imagine what to do if he was faced with a Guide with a true, full erection. He wiped at his mouth.



The Doctor was still talking, rambling, and in desperation William fought to listen. To expel the unwelcome pictures in his mind. He caught up in mid lecture....



"It isn't widely known, the government, the Sentinel National Authority in particular, ordered the results of a study done in the 1960's kept under wraps. The scientist," Dr. Miller's face was pale, she swallowed convulsively, battling for control. "The scientist was my father, Dr. Barrent Miller. He disappeared one day when he was coming home from work. We never saw him, never heard from him again. I remember hearing him and my mother discussing his findings before he disappeared. My mother was a Guide and a Mundane." Her eyes fixed on William's grey ones. Daring him to comment.



"That is not possible." William declared. He straightened his shoulders. Maybe his Companion should leave the room; he didn't want him tainted with these kinds of thoughts....



"Yes it is. My mother carried the genes to function as a Guide, she was my father's Guide, my father was a pure Sentinel, and I am a Sentinel with Guide genes." Her direct gaze dared him to refute this fact. She was sure of her facts. He could see it. Scent it. She was not lying. But she did not smell like a Guide. Yet, she believed in the truth of what she was saying. When he could find nothing immediately pertinent to say, she went on. "It is a lie that Sentinels and Guides can't breed together. Guides are so rarely fertile, and so often sent to breeding farms, with multiple studs put to them who was to know when one of the Sentinels was actually the father and not one of the many others? How else do you explain that every once in a while a Guide births a Sentinel?"



William stared at her. He'd heard those rumors too. Ravings of possessive Sentinels, out of control, not willing to admit to reality, to the fact someone other than themselves had fathered a pup on their Guides. He'd not believed the far-fetched tales. Now this woman was telling him they were...true? And what else was she saying? Because, damn his objectivity, but he believed her. Instantly. She wasn't lying to him.



Sentinels and Guides could breed together. What did that make Guides? Human? He fisted his trembling hands. By the Gods. It could not be.



"Male dominant Guides are just one casualty of the current breeding program. They don't smell like the female dominant Guides, so we don't instantly identify them as Guides when we meet them in the world. We are used to the way the highly bred and hormone treated Guides scent. The unnatural use of hormone treatments, and selective breeding is damaging the Guides and reducing their fertility, their health in general. They are becoming weaker as a species. More homogeneous, rather than heterogeneous. As the collective gene pool shrinks, they are less fertile, more the same, and more fragile. Their mental capacity is less, and they are not provided an enriched environment on top of that. Most are hardly more mature than an average ten year old. Blair is an example of what they can be like, if allowed to develop and mate naturally, like you or I or any mundane human is allowed. Anyone not a Guide." She was leaning forward, her hand splayed on the slim thighs. Passionate. Sure of her views. And still talking. Showing no signs of stopping.



"Blair is not naturally submissive. It was, I believe, beaten into him. He is highly intelligent; he has done ground-breaking research on Sentinels. Research so innovative and intuitive that it is talked about and quoted at every medical conference I've gone to in the last five years. He is brilliant, and yet, the current law forbids him from more research. When he was discovered, Sentinels stripped him of his degrees and the titles he earned, and told him he had one function and one function only. To be a Guide. Nothing else mattered. None of the good he'd done, or would do in the future mattered. Only that he submit himself to whichever Sentinel bought him and filed ownership over him. He must serve in whatever capacity he is told to. And this is wrong. I can't tell you how wrong if you don't see it already for yourself."



"You say my son's Guide is this Blair you are speaking of? That he is unique?"



"That is my point. How can we know if he is unique? There may be thousands of Guides like him, if only we let them live a normal life. Let them live out their dreams and aspirations. Let them grow up with parents who love and support them. Rather than be farmed out to Houses, trained to obey and never question what they are told. To be sold to whomever bids highest, and forced to serve until they are sent elsewhere or resold."



"Sentinels cannot live without Guides." William countered, carefully. "If you think to give Guides complete autonomy over their own choices, where would Sentinels be? It would be chaos. Take my word for it Doctor. I have lived through a dozen Sentinel riots when access to Guides has been restricted, or rumors of shortages got around. As long as a Sentinel can hope that if he has earned the money he can purchase a Guide of his own, or visit a brothel if he can't afford his own, peace and law abiding is guaranteed. Any move to reduce Sentinel's access to Guides will result in similar riots."



"Actually, by acknowledging the Guides as human and granting them rights that any other living human on the planet can expect will increase rather than decrease the pool. There are many Guides in hiding, like Blair." Dr. Miller's eyes shone. William's narrowed.



"Are you saying there are Wild Guides in abundance?" That would be very important. With so many Sentinels doing without their own Guides...it would go far to alleviate the stress placed on younger, less affluent Sentinels if a new pool of Guides could be found and tapped. But...



Again William had a flash of hairy Wild Guides, Guides who would shave as he did, become erect as he did, who would perhaps want to penetrate their Sentinels reciprocally. He felt the gorge rise in his belly. "I can't accept that. I don't believe..."



He couldn't go on. He felt his face freeze. But....Blair didn't sicken him. He wanted to touch him, couldn't resist touching him, through the veils, the robes, or when he could, skin to skin. And the pups, Blair's pups...William handled them as often as his duties permitted him to visit his son's loft. Those pups were beautiful...infants.



And Guides. He felt the connection every time he cradled them. Their soft, baby scented skin against his palms, against his lips as he kissed their cheeks. They were utterly perfect. But they couldn't be...what the Doctor said. Human? Could they?