Descending Road - PROFESSIONAL QUERIES by Dana W. Paxson

PROFESSIONAL QUERIES

1562 4D

Standing in the T-chamber, Progarnes placed a drop of antorphigen on the unconscious man’s neck, beside the drops of the other pharmas he had placed. So delicate these things had to be. The brutality of beatings, rapes, shocks, falls, strangulations: this was not his way. Pain forcible and visible never achieved its promise, and presented high risk of death of the client. Why exert such effort, having to clean up so much of one’s own mess, when a good practitioner could get high-quality results with no exertion at all?

He shook his head. Arlen still didn’t understand this principle very well, as witness the damage he’d done to Tariall before he saw a better way; but he was head and shoulders above those pigs he used as corpos. Having the client alive and in pain worked far better than giving it a chance to resist, be brave, and die. No art in that, except from the point of view of the client’s associates, if they ever found out. Progarnes always made sure they didn’t; keeping them wondering stressed them in useful ways.

For the key to good torture was information. A spoken word could be the poison that fed despair, that eroded resistance, that created the deepest myasthenia and hopelessness; and at the same time it was the magic elixir that resurrected strength and hope and fortitude for the next cycle, when it could magically turn to poison again.

It was odd, though. What did Arlen want with tissue samples? Progarnes had drawn the blood, taken nasal scrapings, collected saliva and the other fluids, biopsied some soft tissues here and there. He’d even run several scans. The labs would show anything unusual; Progarnes didn’t care about any of that, unless it affected the client’s receptivity. He went to work.

Story List	SURPRISE ME	Author Page
USER SURVEY	PUZZLE ME	MAKE ELM MARK

HOVER Lucida Bright BARE	HOVER Lucida Bright FULL	HOVER Palatino Linotype BARE
HOVER Palatino Linotype FULL	HOVER Times New Roman BARE	HOVER Times New Roman FULL
PAD Arial BARE	PAD Arial FULL	PAD Lucida Bright BARE
PAD Lucida Bright FULL	PAD Times New Roman BARE	PAD Times New Roman FULL


	PROFESSIONAL QUERIES 1562 4D Standing in the T-chamber, Progarnes placed a drop of antorphigen on the unconscious man’s neck, beside the drops of the other pharmas he had placed. So delicate these things had to be. The brutality of beatings, rapes, shocks, falls, strangulations: this was not his way. Pain forcible and visible never achieved its promise, and presented high risk of death of the client. Why exert such effort, having to clean up so much of one’s own mess, when a good practitioner could get high-quality results with no exertion at all? He shook his head. Arlen still didn’t understand this principle very well, as witness the damage he’d done to Tariall before he saw a better way; but he was head and shoulders above those pigs he used as corpos. Having the client alive and in pain worked far better than giving it a chance to resist, be brave, and die. No art in that, except from the point of view of the client’s associates, if they ever found out. Progarnes always made sure they didn’t; keeping them wondering stressed them in useful ways. For the key to good torture was information. A spoken word could be the poison that fed despair, that eroded resistance, that created the deepest myasthenia and hopelessness; and at the same time it was the magic elixir that resurrected strength and hope and fortitude for the next cycle, when it could magically turn to poison again. It was odd, though. What did Arlen want with tissue samples? Progarnes had drawn the blood, taken nasal scrapings, collected saliva and the other fluids, biopsied some soft tissues here and there. He’d even run several scans. The labs would show anything unusual; Progarnes didn’t care about any of that, unless it affected the client’s receptivity. He went to work.