Trash Is What Trash Does
Tam wiped his forehead with his arm, looking across the garbage piles lying in the ditches between the rows of ramshackle huts that lined the streets of the internment camp. He placed his chin on top of his arms, which were crossed overtop the handle of his shovel, and with a sigh, surveyed his surroundings. Two similarly-clothed workers further down the alleyway were picking up trash and tossing it into almost-full carts. His cart was still half-empty.
Back to work, I suppose. He sighed again and bent over, continuing to shovel his trash pile into his cart. The sodbent he sensed earlier would have to wait. Right now would not be a good play time—he could not be caught doing something so degenerate. Focus on the job. No point losing your life over something so basic. Sex would have to wait, even though his loins told him otherwise. He curled the shovel a little to the left, deftly lifting a layer of garbage off the ground and into the cart.
The garbage stank. Tam’s sense of smell was nearly as powerful as his sense of sodbent-searching. Balancing his shovel against one arm, he reached into his satchel with the other and pulled out a small, round container. The oil was used to dampen out the smell. He applied a generous amount to his large concave nostrils and wrinkled his nose. It stung a bit—sometimes, to the point that his brown skin would lighten at the edge of his nose.
Majoris poked its light through the clouds above. As they cleared some more, Minoris added its weaker, reddish light to the mix. The binary stars never really competed much for his attention but when he felt the light streaming down, his mood changed somewhat. He paused again. Tam noticed his willpower start to waver and began searching anew for the man who had appeared in his mind earlier. He looked up and to the left. But he wasn’t really looking at anything; he was searching beyond his sight. He must be somewhere nearby; I can sense his thoughts and can see that his sodbent is strong. It was the same sodbent as before! The man’s actual desire was to be pushed over a bench and be penetrated from behind—anonymously, so as to not attract the police. Goddesses, if anyone were ever to discover this degenerate event, the police would haul both of us to prison. Death penalty, obviously. Was it worth it?
A stirring in Tam’s trousers distracted him from his worry about being discovered. He tossed his hesitation aside as instinct took over. Garbage can wait. There is always more to pick up. Tam looked up and down the row of huts and saw no supervisor in sight. He dropped his shovel mindlessly and it clattered noisily against a random piece of metal. He walked to his cart and reached for his clothes satchel, from which he pulled a bar of soap, a towel, and a change of clothing. Feeling a little nervous but rather aroused, Tam headed for the public baths to clean up. One can’t have sodbent with dirty hands or smelly privates! It was almost the end of his shift anyway; no one would notice his absence. He walked down the alley, turned the corner onto the dusty main street, and approached the baths.
Thankfully, they were mostly empty. As he entered the main door for males, which was open, he saw three collectors like himself casually pouring water over themselves and lathering themselves with soap. Tam understood the constant battle against the grime and horrid stench that enveloped each worker. The goal was to be almost free from the smell of trash when done.
Tam gathered two buckets of lukewarm water from the dispensing troughs by the door and approached an empty basin two down from the three men who were bathing. There was a silence that was only broken by the sound of water being poured by one of the men or an occasional cough. He stripped off his satchel and then his uniform, which he tossed on the floor, then untied his braided hair. Tam clambered into the basin and reached for the first bucket. He raised it over his head and allowed some of the water to trickle off it. The water streamed across his broad shoulders, down the front of his chest, through the clumps of coarse curly chest hairs.
Tam picked up the soap and began applying it to his arms. Reaching downward, he lathered up his genitals, then reached around to clean his ass and down his legs. He then stood up and applied the soap to his long, black hair, which trailed down over his shoulders. With his body fully lathered up, he reached for the first bucket and poured the remaining water over his head, allowing it to rinse the soap away down the drain of the basin. He watched the soap circle the drain, around and around, until it disappeared to Goddesses know where. Life seemed to go down the drain the same way sometimes. He sighed, picked up the second bucket, and completed the job at hand as the rest of the soap drained away.
Suddenly, a sodbent image spun into his head. The thought took shape and he rotated it to see it from several sides to best understand what the man’s intentions were. He wanted to receive sodbent! The signs were unmistakable. One of three men was definitely sodbent. The man must also have known that Tam was there.
Tam searched the minds of the two men closest to him. The one beside him, in the basin two spaces over, was empty. He was not sodbent. The one next to him, though, was the one. Tam felt a rush of adrenaline. The man knew that Tam desired sodbent, too. Tam gave him a quick glance and he flashed his interest—not only in his mind, but in a very discreet, physical look.
[There is a cleaning closet at the row’s end. No one goes there during the day. I will meet you there,] the man projected as he toweled his pale skin and rubbed his genitals and backside with a sense of urgency. He then stepped out of his basin. He moved toward the closet, casting a quick look at Tam as he went.
Tam sniffled as he dried himself off and began to step out of his basin when, suddenly, noises came from the entrance of the bathhouse. He started, feeling the hair on his arms stand up and a knot develop in his stomach as he turned and looked through the humid, misty air. Two police in red tunics and yellow sashes appeared and began approaching Tam, who started and then stopped himself from foolishly fleeing. He urgently tried to access their minds to see what their intentions were. One thought popped into his mind, spinning furiously with intent: A degenerate is here. Arrest him!
Tam swallowed nervously as he closed his eyes, praying. He began to pull on his clean pale blue tunic and brown sash. Surely, just thinking about sodbent couldn’t get him caught. He gathered his things and waited for the inevitable as he heard the men approach from behind him. Tam’s knees felt weak, and he shivered despite the warm temperature of the room.
The men pushed into him, almost knocking Tam into the basin, as they carried on. He wasn’t the target! It was the man who had sent the message. The police continued down the aisle to the cleaning room and opened the door.
Tam didn’t wait to hear or see what transpired. His dirty uniform and socks would have to stay near the basin where he had forgotten them. He dashed out the door and headed back to his waiting cart, uncharacteristically out of breath. Adrenalin pumped in his veins and his flight response was almost impossible to ignore. He had escaped a situation that was becoming all too common in the mining communities and internment camps on Zemitis. In fact, it now felt more like a prison than Corustloth did. The world had become a dangerous place for men like Tam.
He felt perspiration dripping down his armpits and the middle of his back. His escape was a close one. He would have to be careful, or he would end up in a Senate prison, like the man being dragged out of the bathhouse at that very moment probably would. Worse, he could be shipped to Corustloth, the dreaded prison world. Was it all worth it for a few moments of sexual pleasure with another man?
Tam let out a breath to try to calm his nerves. With a bit of resolve, he decided to proceed to the processing plant on the other side of the internment camp. Once his cart was delivered, he would receive his meagre pay and be free to go home. Mother would be waiting by the door, tapping her foot and rolling her eyes.
