The G. M. Os. - 5. Chapter 5 - The Orphanage

Chapter 5
Ship Clock 262003
Li 72-893b
The Orphanage

Li stepped from the speeder that brought her from the bot juvenile detention facility where she stayed while doing her three months of community service. It was at an early childhood education center for children of working stepparents, so the work she had to do wasn’t that bad. Though, since she had to stay at the detention facility, the whole episode was not what one might call a good time. After she pulled her bag out of the speeder, the door quickly shut and the vehicle rose and flew away. She stood there watching it leave; then turned around and saw some sort of slightly rotund religious woman close to her.

“Hi, I’m Sister Euphoria,” she said with a chuckle. “Welcome to Saint Piddle of the Moors Orphanage and School. You must be Li.”

“Yes.”

“We expected you. You look tired. I suppose staying with the bots wasn’t much fun.”

“No, they wouldn’t let me meditate.”

“Ah, yes, we heard about that, too,” Sister Euphoria said with another chuckle. “We allow a different kind of meditation here, but that will come later, I’m sure. Let me take your bag and we’ll go see Mother Superior.”

“What’s her name?”

“Mother Superior.”

“I don’t understand.”

“You’re not meant to understand. You are here to live and learn. If you keep your interests to those two activities, today will be the only day you will see her.”

“I still don’t understand.”

“You will,” Sister Euphoria said as chuckled. She picked up Li’s bag and walked away.

Li hurried to keep up. This was certainly a strange place and she didn’t know if she was going to like it, but what choice did she have? She sighed and immediately saw she had fallen behind by a few meters. She hurried again, afraid she might lose the sister in this strange place. They went up two flights of stairs, which made Li wonder if there was an elevator. At the top, Sister Euphoria stopped at the first door and knocked. There was a muffled response.

“Come along little girl and meet your doom,” Sister Euphoria said with another chuckle.

Li was suddenly scared as the sister opened the door and stood aside so Li could walk in.

“Oh, our little heathen,” a much older woman with graying hair said. She sat on the other side of a large wooden desk and stared at Li with menacing eyes. “Sister Angelina? She doesn’t look as dangerous as the bots let on.”

“I don’t know Mother. One can never tell with those who have tried to contact one from the dark side. And, if we are to believe the report from the bots, this one was calling on the spirits for help. I believe I can turn her around to see the light. Yes, she will be my new project.”

“That sounds like you’ve done your homework, again, Sister Angelina,” Mother Superior said. “Sister Euphoria, you may go back to your duties.”

“Yes, Mother. Sister Angelina? Please try to be nice to this one.”

“Oh, I will be nice, I will be very nice,” Sister Angelina said with an evil chuckle.

Li felt her tummy turn to jelly. This seemed to be worse than living with bots. Yes, she was definitely scared of these women.

“You are Li?” Mother Superior asked.

“Yes, Ma’am.”

“You will call me Mother or Mother Superior, never, ever refer to me as ma’am. One strike of your rod, Sister Angelina.”

“Yes, Mother. Bend over and hold your ankles little girl.”

“What are you going to do?” Li asked, scared that something was going to happen that she wasn’t going to like.

“Bend over and grab your ankles, little girl.”

“Two strikes, Sister.”

“Yes, Mother.”

Li stood still and stared at the women. What were they going to do to her? Bots were never, ever like this. They never talked like these women were doing.

“Bend over!” Sister Angelina yelled.

“Three strikes, Sister!” Mother Superior yelled.

Li bent over and held her ankles. She wanted to watch between her legs, but she couldn’t quite see what was happening behind her. Then she saw Sister Angelina stand a bit away and on her left side. The first strike to her bottom immediately sent tears to Li’s eyes.

“Ow!” She cried. Then the next one caused her to start loudly crying. Then the third hit and Li couldn’t stop. She cried and cried.

“You little heathen, shut up!” Sister Angelina yelled and hit the girl again.

Li tried to stop, but the pain burned across her bottom. She hated this place and knew she would try to find some way out of here. Finally, not wanting to be hit again, she stopped loudly crying, but continued to weep. The pain was unbearable.

“Stand up, heathen,” Mother Superior said.

Li tried to stand, but the burn worsened as her muscles changed position under her injured skin. Not wanting to be hit again, Li took in a deep breath, straightened up, and unconsciously winced from the pain.

“Now, get on your knees, rest your bottom on your ankles, bow your head, thank Sister Angelina,” Mother Superior said.

Somehow Li got down and knelt before her tormentor, bowed her head, and said in almost a whisper, “Thank you, Sister Angelina.”

“Girl, you have a heathen name, but we will keep the sound of it for your sake,” Mother Superior said. “From now on you will spell your name L-e-e. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Mother Superior.”

“That’s my new little girl,” Sister Angelina said. “Now stand up, pick up your bag, and follow me. I will take you to your quarters.”

They went down the stairs out the building and across the courtyard to another building. This time they climbed up four floors and Lee saw that the stairs went up further. She wondered if she’d ever get the chance to go up there. They went down a hall to a door with the number sixteen on it. Directly across the hall there was a door with number eighteen on it. Even numbers, Lee thought. The odds must be down the other hall. She noticed Sister Angelina take a strip of plastic out of her pocket and slip it into a slotted nameplate on the door. Her name, spelled L-e-e was on the strip. This was to be her room. The name above hers was Willamina. Lee sighed and followed Sister Angelina into the room.

“That will be your bed,” Sister Angelina said, pointing at bed on the right. “You may put your clothes in that dresser. You will be issued uniforms tomorrow. We know you came from a farm, so being in coveralls until then is okay. You may keep those for the times when you are not in school. Many of the girls here wear coveralls on their own time. Willy will be excused from classes tomorrow to help settle you in.”

“Willy?” Lee asked.

“Willamina is too harsh for a sweet girl. I am your guidance counselor, your mentor, your leader, and I will dole out the punishment when you err. Are you good at meditating?”

“Yes, though, I was wrong to practice it. I took a religious book for a set of practical instructions. I believed in an impossibility.”

“Here, take this paper, this will be your first verse. Memorize it, and you may meditate upon it. Try to understand the words. They have great meaning for the Sisters of the Immaculate Contraception.”

“Immaculate Contraception? I thought Sister Euphoria said this was Saint Piddle something orphanage and school.”

“Saint Piddle of the Moors, yes, that’s right, but our order is the Sisters of the Immaculate Contraception. We follow the Book of the New Apocrypha. It is close to the original Bible, but has more meaning to our current situation. You will come to understand that in time. Now, read your verse for me.”

Lee looked at the words, but they held little meaning for her. She knew she had to read it though, so she started, “The Teacher stood upon the rock and spoke to the assembly, ‘I say unto you, in your time you will look to the stars, this you will do for me forever.’”

“Do you understand the words?”

“Yes, I think I can see their meaning. I am used to being in the lotus position when I meditate. Is that okay, here.”

“However you meditate is of no importance, meditating is. You said you were good at it. That will help you more than anything here at Saint Piddles. Do you have any idea of what vocation you would like to follow in the future?”

“My parents raised fruit, grain, and vegetables. I would like to raise flowers and shrubs, maybe roses, if I could.”

“That is a commendable profession and we will help you to attain it. In fact, Sister Euphoria maintains our gardens and flower beds. I’m sure she will be happy to help you, but there are many classes you will have to take before you can pursue your goal. I will talk to you about that tomorrow.”

The door opened and a young girl with light colored hair and skin, about Lee’s age, walked into the room. She stopped and looked at Sister Angelina, who said, “Willy, this is your new roommate, Lee. You are excused to help her tomorrow settling in, getting her uniforms, and showing her where my office is. I hope the two of you can become good friends.”

“Great, hi, Lee.”

“Hi,” Lee said. For some reason, she couldn’t stop staring at the light colored hair and skin.

“I’ll see you two tomorrow, then,” Sister Angelina said. She left the room and Willy sat down next to Lee.

“How many swats did you get?” Willy asked.

“Is that when you get it with that shiny rod?”

“Yes, we call them swats. Did they give you one or two?”

“Four, I didn’t bend over in time and then I couldn’t stop crying.”

“Well, now you know how it is here. Never wish to be called to Mother Superior’s office because you’ll get swats there. Sister Angelina doles them out, too, when our teachers tell her we’ve misbehaved, but she usually only gives out one or two. She’s not like Mother Superior. She actually can be nice. It’s just when we have to get swats that she’s mean. Oh, well, those are nice coveralls. Are you from a farm?”

“Yes, my parents raised lots of things.”

“Come on, I’ll show you around to the other girls on our end of the floor. Never, ever, go to the other end. The girls down there are younger than us and we’ll get in trouble with Sister Angelina if she finds out.”

“Whatever for?”

“I don’t really know,” Willy said with a frown.

“Can I ask why you have light colored hair?”

“I was born this way. After I grew up a little the bots told me they considered killing me to stop the mutation, since everybody else on the ship has darker brown skin and black hair, like you. I had an operation where they fixed it so I can never give eggs to the birthing centers. Come on, we can talk about this stuff later.”

“Okay,” Lee said and followed her roommate out of their room and across to the first room on their afternoon journey to meet more girls whose names Lee wouldn’t remember for days.

********

Lee settled in the life at the school rather easily. Yes, she did run afoul of Sister Angelina on occasion, but it was never more than two swats. After a while, it simply got to be almost easy to go in the office, bend over, and get whacked on the bottom. Once, both she and Willy had a double showing. They were becoming close friends.

Willy found Lee to be somewhat unexpected. She had grown up in a city, so had no comprehension of what it might be like to live on a farm. At first she was perplexed the way Lee would strip down to nothing and then go into their bathroom for a shower. Then dried off and came back just as naked. She asked her once, but Lee said that was how she was raised. It took Willy quite a number of months until she too took to the practice, though she was still embarrassed when Lee would look at her, as if she was deformed in some way, which with her mutation, she was.

Finally the last day of the year came and Lee found out that meant the High Holidays of the Blessed Birth. Sister Angelina gave her a new verse to memorize and meditate on: “Tapping the rock wall of the mountain, the Teacher brought forth living water for the congregation, and said unto them, ‘Drink this and be fruitful,’ and they drank, and in the course of time babies came forth and the congregation rejoiced.”

Initially, Lee remembered the rock wall of the mountain where the rock crystal was taken, but quickly put that out of her mind and began to meditate upon the words. This one was difficult because people didn’t actually drink any water to have babies or that was what she thought. She knew adults were called to birthing centers to donate eggs and sperm, but there was nothing that she’d heard about that said they had to drink something first. Though, there was the fact that all babies were born within a few days of the High Holidays; which meant that in around sixty chronological years the orphanage would receive young girls around the physical age of five whose twin brothers died as a result of the birthing process and their stepparents relinquished custodial rights to the bots. Then, like her, girls came when their twin died in an accident, a childhood disease, or all of their family died for some reason, like hers.

For the children at the orphanage, the High Holidays meant hours on end in church listening to Mother Superior recite from the Book of the New Life, one of the books of the New Apocrypha; and each of the older children came to the altar and recited the verses assign by their guidance sisters. When Lee recited hers, she paused at each comma, taking it as a rest stop, and raising her voice slightly when she recited the words of the Teacher. Mother Superior thanked her for reciting it correctly, which simply meant that Lee was given more verses to memorize for special Diosday celebrations.

The second year brought new changes in Lee’s experience at the orphanage. As if in answer to prayers, she finally was granted permission to work in the garden with Sister Euphoria, but, as often happens with good tidings, Lee started out trimming the boxwood hedges in perfect rectilinear shapes along the borders of the stone walks, rose and flower beds. Then, close to the end of the year, she was allowed to moved up to taking care of the various shrubs, first to deadhead spent flowers and then the following year learning how to carefully select and prune small stems that were growing awry to the overall shape of the shrub. Once again, Mother Superior and Sister Angelina praised her for doing well in school, learning and memorizing new verses, and learning how to maintain Saint Piddle of the Moors’ gardens.

In the fourth year, Lee’s life changed drastically, puberty came on a bit too early. Unfortunately, life for young women on Hercules III was much different from the first years of the ship. Not knowing what to do about the changes that were occurring, Lee went for help.

“Something’s wrong with me, Sister Angelina,” Lee said. She wanted not to sound serious, but something important was happening to her.

“And, what is that, Lee?”

“Willy said my breasts look strange, like they’re getting bigger; I looked in the mirror and I think so, too,” Lee said, well they were, but she felt uncomfortable telling Sister.

“Ah, yes, it sounds like you’re starting early.”

“Starting what?”

“Puberty.”

“What’s that?”

“It means you’re starting to become a young woman. We will have to notify the bots. You’ll need an operation.”

“Whatever for?” Lee asked, suddenly scared of the pain to come.

“To temper the process. They will adjust your hormone output to slowdown the process. They never did it that way in the old days, but everything changed when they started altering the human birth process. I’ll let you know when the operation will occur. Don’t worry; the operation is performed by humans, though you will have to start taking medicine, too. I’ll talk to Mother Superior, she needs to know. Stopping it now might be soon enough to allow you to stay with Willy, otherwise you might have to move upstairs with the middle twelve-year-olds.”

“But, they’re old.”

“Lee, rules.”

“Yes, Sister.”

On the following Moonday, a bot speeder came for Lee and flew her to a medical facility in the city. First they had her take off her clothes and started to give her a physical examination. When the doctor got down to her genitals, he stopped and told the nurse to schedule Lee for a chromosome and genome scan. He told her to dress and they took her to a ward full of children.

The following morning, a bot came for Lee with a wheelchair. It pushed her to a laboratory where they drew a lot of blood from her arm and then she was taken back up to the ward.

A week later on Botsday, the doctor escorted Lee back to the orphanage in a bot piloted speeder. When they got out it stayed on its feet to wait for the doctor to come back. She led the way up to Mother Superior’s office; Sister Angelina was there, too.

“Hello, I am Doctor Henrik 87. I’m afraid Lee has a little problem, well, maybe a big problem, depending on how you look at it.”

“And, what is that, doctor?” Sister Angelina asked.

“She has a chromosomal and genetic mutation that rarely occurs in today’s human births.”

“Is this inherited or something that happened in the prenatal process?” Mother Superior asked.

“We can’t be certain because it occurs so rarely and due to the bot way of mixing eggs and sperm, that may cause the occurrence of this condition. What it means is she needs to go on hormonal treatments right now. A prescription has been written and will be delivered in the next few days. From now on, her puberty will stop until she’s closer the normal age; from then on she will appear to go through puberty almost normally, but as she doesn’t have a vagina or the internal structures she will not menstruate or be able to participate in the birthing process. Her breasts will be smaller than the small range of normal girls, but that can be corrected surgically when she is older. We will need to see her at the clinic every six months until she reaches her physical age of sixteen, when we will determine what surgical needs she may have. We can give her a vagina surgically, if she wants one in anticipation of heterosexual relationships, but that will, of course, be her choice. I’m not a sexologist and it may be helpful if she sees one to determine where she lies on the sexual landscape. We have several on staff, including several women who are able to counsel young girls on their individual feelings. Things have changed legally, so the stigma of identifying oneself as a, uh, homosexual is not as pronounced as it once was; nor, do the bots kill female homosexuals anymore.”

“If I understand what you’re saying Doctor Henrik is that Lee is not a normal human,” Mother Superior said.

“Oh, no, she is female; it’s just that her ovaries won’t produce eggs for birthing. The pill she will be taking will help her through the normal process of puberty, but it will slow it down, at first. You were correct in sending her to the clinic as she is starting too early, but that is one of the signs of her condition. As I said, it is very rare, less than one in a million births, but there is literature supporting her future treatments. If you have any other questions, please feel free to message me on the module.”

“Thank you, Doctor Henrik for taking the time to bring Lee back to us,” Sister Angelina said. “When she first came here I said that she was going to be a project and now I see that I was right. Yes, we will take good care of Lee until she becomes a woman and wants to go out to find her place on the ship.”

“Lee, escort the doctor back to his speeder and come back up here,” Mother Superior said.

“Yes, Mother.”

When Lee returned she had a slight dread that something bad might happen, but both Mother Superior and Sister Angelina were very kind to her, almost too kind. They talked about her current situation and whether she was having feelings toward Willy, but Lee totally denied that.

“Is that what being a homosexual is, having feelings toward someone of your own sex?”

“Yes, but do not worry yourself, Lee,” Mother Superior said. “We do not discourage nor do we encourage girls to become more than best friends, but do not take that as we will allow an outward expression of those feelings on campus. What happens in your room is your business, not ours, as long as the other party is amiable to the other’s feelings. We do realize that sometimes, as has happened here before, at establishments such as ours some girls may start to have those kinds of feelings.”

“I don’t understand.”

“You’re a little too young to understand these things, Lee,” Sister Angelina said. “If you have more questions in the future, please feel free to come to my office to talk about them. As Mother said, as girls approach adulthood, now with the change in the aging process, sometimes, um, feelings between two girls become more than either one or both of them are willing to face, but do not fear us if you or Willy have or express those feelings. Both of you are free to come and discuss them with me.”

“Yes, Sister. Thank you Mother Superior. And, Sister Angelina, thank you for being so nice about this. I was afraid I was going to be in trouble, again.”

“Lee, you are a very special girl here at the orphanage,” Mother Superior said. “You learn the verses we give you and now you’re able to interpret them correctly, which I’m sure the other girls appreciate. Sister Euphoria says you’ve become very helpful in the gardens and you’re doing acceptably well in school; and, now you have a problem that we want help you with. That is all we want.”

“Thank you, Mother.”

Later that night as the girls were getting ready for bed, Willy finally brought up the subject of Lee’s visit to the hospital. “We saw you get out of the speeder with that man and go into the convent. Was he your doctor?”

“Yes, we went to see Mother Superior and Sister Angelina. He explained what’s wrong with me and how they were going to help me through puberty.”

“What’s that?”

“It’s when you start becoming a woman. I started too early.”

“Oh, I’ve heard of that from some of the older girls, but they never said what it was. So, is that all that’s wrong with you? Is starting early something bad?”

“Yes, I have a condition that makes me unable to participate in birthing; I can’t give eggs to the bots to make new babies,” Lee said with a sad look. “The doctor said I might need to see a sexologist, too.”

“Who’s that?”

“It’s a person who helps you determine where you, uh, are on, what the doctor called the sexual landscape.”

“What’s that?”

“It’s when a woman has feelings toward a man or another woman. Mother and Sister said if we had those feelings we should talk to Sister. I don’t have those feelings toward you.”

“Eww! I don’t either. That sounds icky.”

“Yeah,” Lee said. She looked at Willy and had the strangest feeling; it was almost like they were more than best friends, but that was silly, they weren’t even through puberty yet.

********

Around the twenty-third iteration of age twelve, Willy suddenly started growing breasts, too. Both girls looked at them with wonder as they seemed different from Lee’s, bigger. After a couple of years hair started growing in places they never imagined seeing hair, but then Lee remembered back on the farm when she saw Mother and the hair she had under her arms, down over her genitals, and on her arms and legs.

Lee was starting to have those feelings, again. She and Willy were very close as best friends, but they seemed to be coming closer in their feelings toward each other. Willy had suddenly gotten into the habit of coming out of the shower and sitting next to Lee on her bed before putting her pajamas on. They just talked, that was all that was happening, but Lee felt something different was going on and she did not discourage Willy from coming over to her bed. Unfortunately, Lee did not have the courage to bring up the subject fearing Willy would say something derogatory and ask to be moved to another room. Then the other girls would stop talking to her or sitting at her table in the dining hall. She would be an outcast and no one would want to be in her room.

One day at lunchtime, Lee couldn’t take it any longer and went to see Sister Angelina. She explained what was happening and Sister just listened, not offering any explanation or advice. Lee continued by saying she felt of Willy as more than a best friend like Mother Superior had explained to her back that day the doctor brought her back from the clinic. She was afraid that Willy was beginning to have those kinds of feelings, too. She didn’t understand where all of this was leading and hoped Sister would be willing to talk to Willy. To her horror, Sister messaged the sister who was the dining hall supervisor and told her to send Willy up to her office.

“Oh, hi, Lee, what are you doing here?” Willy asked when she walked into the office.

“Willy please sit down; that chair next to Lee is okay,” Sister said.

“Okay, but what is this all about, have I done something wrong?”

“No, Willy, you haven’t. Lee here has a little problem and I was hoping you could be of help.”

“Oh, sure, Lee what’s going on?”

“Willy, Lee told me that when you come out of the shower at night, that you come to her bed and talk, before putting your pajamas on. Lee is a little uncomfortable with that, not to say she wants you to stop, she’s just concerned and wanted my help in the matter.”

“Oh, that,” Willy said. She stared at Sister and then looked at Lee. “I, well, I kind of like doing that. Lee, I didn’t know it was upsetting you.”

“No, I’m not upset,” Lee whispered. “I don’t mind that you come over and sit beside me. I’m just scared of what it might mean. You know?”

“Oh, that, I only thought you might like it. Like I said, I don’t want to upset you.”

“I’m not upset,” Lee whispered. “I, well, you see, Willy, I like it when you do that. I was afraid you’d be upset if I said that.”

“Oh, yeah, I see what you mean. It’s that sexual landscape thing you told me about that day you came back from the clinic. Sister? Is it okay if Lee and I have feelings toward each other? I don’t want to get in trouble. I like Lee a lot and now I know she likes me that way, too. What do we do about it, Sister?”

“Willy, Lee, first of all you’re still little girls who are going through puberty. Your hormones are running rampant through your bodies and you are growing into young women. The feelings you are having now may only be temporary and you may want to marry a man sometime in the future or, maybe, those feelings won’t change. I want both of you to be calm about this. Continue doing what you’re doing, if both of you want to. If these feelings grow into love, then accept God’s blessing, be assured you will always be welcome at Saint Piddle of the Moors. The only thing I ask of you is that if your love grows, to limit any expression of that love to your room so as not to upset the other girls here. Will you do that for me?”

“Yes, Sister,” Willy whispered.

“Yes, Sister, Lee whispered.

“Good, now I’m going to arrange counseling for the both of you at the clinic with one of their sexual therapists. This is something beyond the scope of my training and I prefer it be handled by a professional. I don’t want to scare either of you; this is a natural way of growing up. Now, I want both of you to go to your room and talk. Work this out between yourselves. Both of you are very special girls and I want the best for you. As I’ve always said, if you have a problem, come to see me so I can help. Does that sound reasonable?”

“Yes, Sister,” Willy said.

“Yes, Sister,” Lee said.

Back in their room, both girls stood looking at their beds. “Where do we sit?” Willy asked.

“If you want, my bed is okay; we usually talk there anyway.”

“But, I’m usually naked.”

“No, that’s for when you come out of the shower; I don’t want to do that, now.”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right. Lee, can I kiss you?”

“No, not now.”

“Are you afraid of something?”

“Yes,” Lee whispered. She went over and sat on her bed. Willy came over and sat next to her, close. Lee shivered.

“What’s wrong, Lee?”

“I don’t know.”

“Can I kiss you, now?”

“No, not now, maybe later,” Lee whispered.

“Can I hold you?” Willy asked. Lee didn’t respond, so Willy moved up next to Lee and put her arm across Lee’s shoulders. “Girlfriend?”

“Girlfriend.”