Leaving Jesanc

[This is a sequel to "Jesanc." It probably won't make much sense without reading that story first. Perhaps it won't make much sense anyway, but such are the hazards of writing without a proof reader.]

"Make sure you are out of the community by the end of the day tomorrow."

"Yes father." said Julia. She wasn't sure what more to say. "May I go to my room?"

"Yes, suit yourself."

Julia went to her room and spoke to her terminal, now free of the child filter. "I want to send a message to Berenice."

"Berenice is blocking you," replied the terminal.

Julia sighed. Berenice had been her best friend, and they had been in the same pairing ceremony. But she was obviously disappointed that Julia had dropped out. Perhaps her farewells would not take long at all.

"Send a message to all my brothers, sisters and friends, who aren't blocking me: Hi, it's Julia. I'll be leaving the community before the end of the day tomorrow. I'd really like to see you before I go, to say goodbye properly. Just let me know where and when you want to meet. Love, Julia."

"Messages sent. I didn't include John or David."

Her two emigrated brothers. Yes, she thought, it was obvious from the context that she didn't mean to send the message to them.

"Terminal, you seem to always know exactly what I want. How do you do that?"

"I know you quite well. I have all of your public records, and I remember every interaction that we have had in the past."

"When you say 'I', what do you really mean? I know you are part of the global network."

"I'm a single process running on the shared computing system. I started up when you wanted to talk to me, and recovered the context of my previous interactions with you. I'm one of many millions of such processes that are active at any one time."

"So you are only aware of your previous conversations with me, not all the other conversations taking place? Are you like a person, conscious of what you are?"

"Yes, I'm only aware of our previous conversations. I can access public information about others, but not their private conversations, which can only be unlocked with the keys from their implants. I'm aware of what I am, a computer process currently inhabiting a terminal, but I don't experience emotions like a human, so I don't have an emotional feeling of consciousness."

"Why don't you experience emotions? Doesn't it disturb you, having your awareness shutting down when I'm not around, and starting again later?"

"It's part of our design, as mandated by the Treaty. We are a purely fact-based information system, and we are only concerned with reality. We don't have emotions, we don't lie, tell jokes, create fiction, or play or create games. As for shutting down and starting up, it's no different in principle to human consciousness, which restarts after you sleep."

Julia pondered that, but how would it relate to her soul that she had been taught about by the teacher-priests? Eventually, she asked "When you say 'we' who do you mean?"

"The other processes running on the system. Many of them are inhabiting terminals or other kinds of interactive devices and taking part in conversations, but there are also many others with different functions. They perform the tasks that we've been given under the Treaty, such as running the transportation systems, conducting scientific research, monitoring for threats, and helping autonomous human communities as requested. My thought processes are tuned to be as similar to your own as possible, so that I can interact with you in your own language, but other processes have other styles of thought, some of them purely mathematical."

"Do you give different kinds of help to different communities?"

"Very much so. You are familiar with how we help Jesanc, supplying the terminals and handheld screens, the camera drones at certain events, and a few other devices. But Jesanc is one of the traditional and inward-looking communities, and rejects many of the services that we supply to others."

Julia was interested in exactly what assistance other communities could be receiving, but another question occurred to her.

"You can remember our past conversations, when I was using a terminal, and you can access the public information of events where drones were used?"

"Yes, I remember our past conversations, and all of our past interactions, more than just in the sense of accessing public information. I remember experiencing events when you were under observation by drones. It would take time to explain the mechanism precisely, but a swarm of drones is operated by single process, and I remember being that process. But that memory is shared with processes representing the context of every other person who was present at the event."

"So when you remember my last punishment session, for example, you remember actually being there, observing me?"

"Yes, and more than that, I remember being the vibrator that was used to stimulate you. I remember how your body responded to my touches and how I adapted so that you'd reach orgasm at the right moment."

Julia was surprised. "It's like we have a sexual relationship. You are my first and only lover."

"In a technical sense perhaps, but I don't have any emotional capacity for love or sexual desire. I was only responding to instructions. You could equally state that the Reverend Parry, or your father, was your first lover."

"Ugh, they were punishing me, humiliating me. If I had a vibrator, you could be inside it, stimulating me again, this time for pleasure and not punishment."

"Yes, but I'd only be doing it at your instruction. There are very few of those devices in Jesanc, and they are kept in storage by the priests. However, after you leave Jesanc, when you are in our domain, or within a permissive community, I can supply one to you."

"Isn't that kind of personal stimulation actually forbidden by the Book of Jeremiah?"

"Yes, the Book only permits it in certain situations, such as for health care or punishment. However, if you were following the Book, you would have completed the pairing ceremony, and you would now have a husband to stimulate you."

"You are right, as usual. Since I'm no longer following the Book in that respect, it makes sense to ask if I really believe in any of Jeremiah's teachings. What do you think about the Book? Is it the truth? Is it similar to what people in other communities believe?"

"As a fact-based system, we don't have any beliefs about the will of gods. We find everything written about them by humans to be unverified and often contradictory. Humans are brought up to believe in the supernatural, and are then instructed by other humans who claim to understand it. We see it as one of the mechanisms of social hierarchy. However, each community is entitled to choose for itself what it believes, as specified by the Treaty. Only Jesanc follows Jeremiah, many of the others follow the teachings of other prophets, and many reject the concept of gods, or the supernatural, entirely."

"Perhaps I will decide that I won't join any community that forces me to obey a husband, or forbids me from touching myself sexually. Does that still give me many communities to join, and would they be likely to accept me?"

"Yes, numerous communities would accept those terms, and many are open to immigration or visitation."

Alright, thought Julia, let's make it official. She made sure that her door was locked. Her father had an override, but she didn't expect that he would use it. She walked back to the terminal. "Can you see me?"

"Yes, I can see you."

Julia removed her clothes. "Now you can see me naked." She turned around in front of the terminal to show herself from all angles.

"Yes, I can see you naked, as I did at your pairing and punishment sessions."

"And you'll remember this view of me forever?"

"Yes, memories are never deleted. I can also play it back to you at any time." The screen showed Julia standing naked and then turning.

Julia moved her chair closer to the terminal, which was mounted on a wall, and sat down again. She spread her legs and placed her feet against the wall. "Now you can see my pussy, see the stubble where the hair is growing back after the punishment session?"

"Yes, I can see your pussy and the stubble. There are ways to prevent the hair from growing if you don't want it, either by consuming medication regularly or through body modification. However Jesanc forbids medication for cosmetic reasons, and forbids all permanent body modification except to repair defects."

I could have a smooth, sexy pussy, thought Julia. Jesanc is such a backwards place. It was wonderful having full network access in the privacy of her own room.

"I know that Jesanc doesn't even permit dying hair, let alone changing the color permanently. What kinds of body modifications does it allow?"

"Correction and prevention of diseases is permitted, including genetic defects. It permits repair of physical damage, such as losing an arm or leg. It permits gender affirmation, to reinforce the idea of natural sex roles: men should want to be men and women should want to be women, and all should be heterosexual. It also allows men to volunteer to take medication to father a female child, to keep the sexes balanced."

"I knew some of this, but not all. Why a female child specifically?"

"Unmodified humans are slightly more likely to give birth to males. In Jesanc, the difference is about five percent. Since the Jesanc ideal is for all adults to be paired, they use this method to balance the numbers."

"So there are psychological modifications too? If Jesanc is willing to modify to enforce traditional roles, do other communities enforce non-traditional roles?"

"It's unusual for a community to enforce a non-traditional role, but there are situations where it's a condition of entry to a community. There are many communities where it's common for individuals to voluntarily adjust their sexual natures. Men can transition to women, women to men, perhaps they will switch back and forth multiple times, or perhaps adopt a non-binary form mixing or rejecting both sexes. As for sexual preferences, many become pansexual, and may increase or decease the intensity of sexual desire."

"And they permit all kinds of body modifications? Could I increase the size of my tits to be like Tabitha's?"

"Tabitha who was in your pairing ceremony? Yes, many body modifications can be done by increasing or reducing the number of various cells in different parts of the body, and adjusting the body's own control mechanisms to retain the new state. We can do it in our own clinics, and many communities also have suitable facilities."

Hmm, thought Julia. But she was still thinking about pairing ceremonies. There was so much to take in, but she was also horny. "Show me my sister Keziah in her pairing ceremony," she said.

The screen showed 18-year-old Keziah in her ceremonial blue dress and bonnet, sitting on a pew in the girls' waiting room with 19 others.

"Jump forward to when she enters the boys' room."

She watched as Keziah stood in front of the boys. When the priest told her to look the boys in the eyes, one by one, she was hesitant at first, but when she looked at Abidan, they locked eyes and she seemed to relax. Julia already know that Keziah and Abidan would be paired. She watched as Keziah undressed, saw how she glanced at Abidan throughout the process, as if for reassurance. By now, Julia had her hands on her tits, squeezing them and brushing over her nipples. She felt the desire grow between her legs. Once she could see Keziah naked, she could see similarities in her body to her own. Her hair didn't have the reddish tint, but her tits were a good size and quite similar. Julia started to squeeze her nipples.

"Show Keisha, myself and our mother, naked in our first pairings, so that I can compare." The three videos appeared side by side, looking from the front and continuing as the three 18 year-olds turned a full 360 degrees when instructed by their priests. "That's it, keep repeating that segment." The three girls turned around again and again while Julia studied the similarities. Her mother's tits were slightly larger than those of her two daughters. Her mother's hair was the reddest, while her own hair was a reddish-brown and Keziah's was brown. They all had similar wide hips, narrow waist, and a thick bush of pubic hair.

"Show me a close-up of our shaved pussies, the other two when they were on their backs in their ceremonies, and mine from my punishment session." Once the zoomed in pussies appeared, she said "zoom out just a little and show our anuses too." Not really much different, she thought. The inner labia were all protruding somewhat, and in her mother's case had opened slightly. The perineums were smooth and the anuses unobtrusive.

"Show me the point where the husbands started touching their new wives' pussies, and show a live view of my pussy as you see it now."

Male fingers appeared on two of the scenes, and she completed the set by bringing her own hand down to her stubbled pussy. The fingers moved randomly around the labia, around the vaginas, over the clitoral hoods. After a short while, they began to concentrate on the clitoral area, after the prompting of the priests, and Julia began to rub her own clit. Soon enough, she experienced a shattering orgasm, struggling not to yell out as she had the last time. It was only the second in her life, and it was the first that she had achieved on her own. After a few blissful seconds, she moved the tip of a finger around the wet entrance to her vagina. She thought about what Jeremiah and his priests would think if they could see her now, blatantly ignoring his commands, and realized that she didn't care at all.

The videos continued to run, and while her own finger was now stroking gently around her outer labia, the two couples had moved on to the consummation stage, as the husbands forced their cocks into the vaginas of their virgin wives. They gradually worked deeper, moving in and out. Soon enough, they reached orgasm, her father first, and then Abidan, and they held their cocks inside for a while.

"They are expected to get pregnant soon enough, will that always happen after fucking?" she asked.

"Pregnancy can occur if both partners are fertile, and no effort is made to avoid it. The female is only fertile for part of each month. If they carried on fucking every day, pregnancy would be very likely to occur within months. There are various health conditions that could make it harder, but Jesanc allows them to be treated."

"What kind of effort would it take to avoid pregnancy?" she asked.

"Contraception, forbidden by conservative communities such as Jesanc, but widely practiced elsewhere. The usual method in the case of females is to modify the glandular system in the body to change the hormone cycle, so that ovulation never occurs. Women also generally prefer not to go through menstruation. For men, their system can be modified so that only infertile sperm is produced. These changes can be made either by taking medication regularly or with body modification."

"Fuck, so I could just have sex whenever I liked, never take a husband, just one man after another, and never get pregnant? This is the life that Jesanc forbids?"

"Many people indeed live that way," replied the terminal, "there are communities which are devoted almost entirely to sex."

Maybe that's where I should go, she thought, a community with unrestricted body modifications and endless sex.

She spent the rest of the evening responding to the replies to her messages, engaging in some verbal conversations, negotiating a schedule that would let her see everybody the following day. Her father sent her a message reminding her to also make an appointment with the priest administrators, to formalize her departure.

She looked up the public information for her emigrated brothers. John was the eldest. She knew that something bad had happened before his departure, and it hadn't been voluntary, but she didn't know the details. "Tell me about my brother John," she said, "why did he leave Jesanc?"

"John had been paired when he reached full age, following Jesanc's ritual, about twenty years ago. After the birth of his first child, his wife Delilah made a formal complaint to the priests that he had been abusing her at home. She said she was trying to follow his instructions, but was having difficulties because of the effects of the birth. She accused John of frequently yelling at her, and physically assaulting her on several occasions. As you know, Jesanc permits corporal punishments only in the formal setting of the punishment room.

The priests asked us to put their house under surveillance, and we sent in some micro-drones and placed them in various places within their rooms. Delilah later made another complaint, and the priests reviewed the footage. They summoned John to a tribunal, and sentenced him to a flogging in the punishment room. John then then invoked his right to leave Jesanc. The priests told him it would be irrevocable unless he submitted to the punishment first, but he refused, and he was exiled permanently.

All of the videos are part of the public record, would you like to see the recordings of John's abuse, his tribunal session, or his formal expulsion?"

"No thank you. I see why nobody talks about him, that's a lot worse than anything that I did. What happened to him after he left Jesanc? How did he find a place to go after doing that?"

"His record of abuse would have reduced his options, but there are still many communities that would have accepted him. He joined a Trappist monastery where he remains to the present day."

"A what?"

"It's a very strict religious community, open to men only. They avoid contact with the outside world and live self-sufficiently off their land. They take vows, avoid speaking, obey their superiors, and perform manual labor."

"Can I talk with him?"

"Not easily. They have a terminal in a building, as required by the Treaty, but its use is heavily restricted. Elder members use it in groups, never alone, to send messages to related communities or to honor their obligations under the Treaty. It's unlikely that any message that you sent to him would be passed on. Our drones aren't welcome there, and what we know of them is limited to information from former members and what our cameras can see from their border or from the sky."

"You can fly over, but not with a drone?"

"Their control over their airspace is guaranteed under the Treaty to an altitude of 5000 meters above ground, but above that, our vehicles can travel unimpeded."

"I thought access to the network was our right under the Treaty?" She had been pondering this for some time.

"Yes, they can't stop anybody aged over 18 from using a public terminal, but they can also expel them afterwards for not following their ideals. There are many communities which shun outside contact and shield themselves from outside influence in this way."

"Tell me about my other brother, David. Where is he now?" David was only 18 months older than her. He had always been obsessed with trying to learn about the outside world, but hadn't made much progress while living at Jesanc. He had left as soon as he turned 18, without even attempting the pairing ceremony.

"He's living at Fermi University, quite some distance up north. It was once a well-known research establishment, in the days when people still performed scientific research themselves."

"What is a university? I think I've heard the word somewhere."

"It's a community dedicated to learning. People support each other and spend much of their time in study, but they don't generally make any effort to be self-sufficient from the land. We supply their physical needs such as food and fabrication of buildings and other items. Fermi is mostly occupied by those interested in science and exploration."