Chapter 8

	Frama kept waking up in the middle of the night, having bad dreams about being suspected of some crime that her dreams never specified.  She awoke some time in the morning, remembering the night before.  She used the arm laying under her boyfriend to pull herself just a little bit closer to him.  She just wanted to keep things as they were for a little while longer, pretend like things were the way they were before.
	"Morning Frama."
	Oh, he was already awake.
	"Morning."
	Somewhat disappointed she couldn't pretend anymore, she sat up.
	"So then we suddenly had everything shift on us when we ran across humanity."
	He looked surprised.
	"Things were pretty broken, and this was a surprise no one was expecting..."
	"Woah woah woah."
	He was waving his hands and squinting his eyes.
	"Frama, please, I just woke up.  It's too early in the morning for this insanity.  Can we please have breakfast first before we get back into this?"
	She practically jumped out of bed.  He grimaced, but it was already too late.  He had chosen his words poorly.
	"Of course!  What would you like?"
	One of the things you learned early on in a relationship with nemesian women, be careful about asking for anything.  They were always overeager to do things for their mate.  And they were ultra-sensitive about perceived criticism of how they did it.  One time he said he was thirsty, and she offered to get him something to drink.  He asked for water, and she had come back with a glass that was slightly over-filled.  He mentioned it to her, without thinking about it.  He didn't know it, but she carefully observed him the next time he filled up a glass with water.  Very carefully.  Later on she filled the same glass with water to as close as she could to where she had saw him fill it, and then measured it out.  He had noticed that she always seemed to fill glasses at about the same level after that, but didn't know what was happening until some time later.  She had offered to get him something to drink, but she seemed to be taking quite some time to fill a glass, so he decided to check on her.  He had no idea what to think when he saw her standing next to the sink filling the glass with a measurement tube that was marked by the milliliter.  He asked her what she was doing, and she said she was filling the glass "just the way he liked it".  He dumbly asked how that was, and she told him "467 milliliters, that is the right amount, isn't it?"  With a smile on her face, like 'aren't you proud of me?'
	"Cereal, just cereal.  I'm hungry, but not that hungry."
	He braced himself for the expected battery of questions.  Was he sure that's all he really wanted?  She would gladly make some other food for him as well, he didn't have to eat the whole thing, it was alright.  Instead she said it would be ready shortly, and rushed off to go get everything together.  He was somewhat relieved at that.  He felt he was finally getting the hang of wording things properly to prevent her from going overboard.  Of course, he did occasionally slip up and forget.  Had he said "Let's have breakfast together" instead, she wouldn't have rushed off to go make it, she would have stayed with him and then followed him to the kitchen.  He recognized what was happening.  Whenever a nemesian woman became concerned in a relationship, they always responded by turning up their normally obsessive attention to their mates to the point of overkill.  He had mentioned he was hungry, didn't word it in the proper way to keep her calm, and now he could hear her practically flying around the kitchen grabbing a bowl and spoon.  He pulled himself out of bed and put on the clothes he wore yesterday.  He thought he had better get in there before she decided to make more food anyways, just in case he might want to have a bite of something other than cereal.  She had done it before.
	Mentioning eating together was the key.  Realizing he had forgotten to do so, he called out.  "Hey Frama, let's eat together, alright?"  He heard her call back a cheerful "Alright!"  He inwardly sighed, another bullet dodged.  Failure to let a nemesian woman know you wanted specifically to share a meal meant you were going to find a meal ready to eat, while she was going to sit there and stare at you making sure you enjoy it completely.  Something wasn't one hundred percent perfect?  It was the glass of water all over again.  She would be obsessed with finding out what 'perfect' was, and making it that way next time.  And her guesses at what 'perfect' was could be pretty strange at times.  Actually, in general nemesians could be pretty strange.  The strangeness just tended to get amplified when they were in a relationship with a man.  It was something to do with the way they were wired mentally.
	He sat down with her, and they ate while she occasionally tried to subtly ask if he wanted more to eat.  He made sure to repeat that he was fine, and that the bowl of cereal was "great."  He knew this was just the way she always was, but couldn't shake the feeling she was trying to distract him from what he was asking about last night.  They finished eating, and she grabbed the dishes to take back to the kitchen.  When she came back, he decided to get started.
	"Frama?"
	"Yes?" she said, sitting back down at the table.  She knew he wanted to continue, but wanted to prolong this little bit of pretend normalcy for as long as possible.
	"Before we continue, I had a few questions about what you told me last night."
	She felt her good mood vanish, it had been nice while it lasted.
	"First off, there's one thing you talked about that doesn't make any sense to me.  I've only been here for a few years, but even before we started sleeping together I noticed the way your species treats men.  I really don't know of any other way to describe it than obsessively overprotective."
	She didn't try to argue against that.  To humans, they did seem outright paranoid about protecting men.  He didn't mean it to be insulting, he was just looking at it from a human's eyes.  Or maybe he did mean it like that, she couldn't tell right now.
	"So, how did the breeding farms even happen?  I just can't picture your species going along with that, it doesn't make sense.  How did it go on for so long?"
	She thought about it for a few seconds, trying to figure out the best way to explain it to him, to get him to understand.
	"They weren't horrible at the start."
	"Hon, they were forced into the farms and coerced into..."
	"No, they weren't forced into the farms."
	"You mean the men went along with this shit willingly?"
	"When the farms were first proposed, it sounded like a good idea to both sexes.  The women were going to have more frequent breeding chances, and the men were going to be protected by the military and have the best in medical care."
	She could tell he didn't understand.
	"Our males, they're...afraid."
	"Yeah, you told me last night, and why."
	"No, I mean before that.  In general, as a rule, our males are afraid."
	"Afraid of what?"
	"Us, wild animals, natural disasters, the universe, take your pick."
	He still didn't understand.  Was this one of those things humans just couldn't understand?
	"They are smaller than us, weaker, more prone to illness and infection, they don't live as long.  Any woman looking to attract a man makes sure her weapons training is current, because being able to show a male you can protect him has always increased the odds.  They fear everything.  They even feared us, before we gave them a good reason to do so.  The traditional way of attracting a mate was to convince him he had nothing to fear from you, that you could take good care of him, and protect him from anything that made him afraid.  It's one of the biggest determining factors in if a man is interested in mating with you.  Attractiveness helps, being interesting helps, but being able to care and protect for your mate is what attracted them the most."
	"So when they all heard about the government's plan to have a special reserved area for them, where they would be protected by the might of the military, it was a very attractive offer to them.  The best in health care, all needs and wants taken care of, and they wouldn't have to go outside if they didn't want to."
	"They don't like the outdoors?"
	"There's far more dangers outside than inside your own home."
	He nodded, he guessed that was one way to look at it.  If you were paranoid.
	"The government opened the farms with the approval of the majority of the population, and 85 percent of the men signed up for them the first day."
	"They signed up?"
	"It was entirely voluntary at first.  Just an offer, if they were interested.  By the end of the second month, every male in the empire had joined a farm by choice.  They were happy there, before the changes started happening."
	"Happy to be locked up and drugged?"
	"They weren't locked up or drugged at the start.  They were free to come and go as they wanted, they were supplied intoxicants if they wished but they didn't have drugs forced on them.  They always reported being happy with their situation in the beginning.  Then they started being forced to breed when they were unwilling, and threatened if they told anyone they were unhappy."
	"And being afraid of everything, they were easy to control by threatening them, right?"
	"Not them, the other men they lived with.  They were told if they complained to anyone, all males in that farm would only get just enough food to not die for a week.  Nemesian men bond very easily with other nemesian men.  Before the farms, on the rare encounter one man had with another, they would quickly become friends.  Another big reason the farms seemed to attractive to them was they would have lots of time to spend with other men, to make new friends.  So the idea of doing something that would hurt their new friends...they always reported being happy, right up until the end."
	"They didn't actually throw entire farms onto starvation diets, they would just keep whatever men they were punishing together isolated from the rest.  Too many overly thin men would have aroused suspicion.  Those involved in running the farms put a great deal of effort in hiding what was going on from everyone.  That one man who broke down and was crying, who inadvertently alerted someone of what was happening, he was crying because he knew if he didn't fulfill the encounter as he was ordered to, he was going to prolong the starvation the whole farm had been suffering for the prior three days.  Or that he thought they had been suffering.  It's why he wouldn't let her leave until they had finished."
	He sat in silence for a little while, before finally speaking.
	"You said the one who started it was executed.  What happened to everyone else who was involved?"
	"If it could be proven in the slightest that someone was involved in the coverup, or had testimony against them, they were also executed.  The majority were reported to the authorities by their own friends and family."
	He seemed surprised at this.
	"Really?"
	He wasn't understanding.  She wondered for the millionth time in the past 24 hours if she could get him to understand.  In human society, with their damned nearly perfect 1:1 gender ratio, a woman harming a man wasn't considered that big of a deal.  They were shaped by their environment as much as nemesians were, was it possible to understand another viewpoint well enough to understand the small differences?
	"What happened, what they did, was beyond abhorrent.  Monstrous doesn't describe it properly.  To harm a male like that goes so against our fundamental instincts, each and every one of them had to be a sociopath or psychopath to some degree."
	"So you're saying that for a species that has legalized bloodsports, these women were particularly insane?"
	He regretted it shortly after saying it, the hurt look on her face said it all.  The worst part was, he knew she wouldn't say it hurt her.  He wasn't trying to hurt her, he just never could deal with the bloodsports.
	"I didn't mean it like that."
	"It's alright, I know the rule-less sports bother you."
	She was doing it again, playing down the times he had accidentally insulted her or said something hurtful.  It was something to do with the way they were wired, it seemed she couldn't hold a grudge against him.  Even for a second.  Which made him feel like he was always abusive towards her when he accidentally put his foot in his mouth.  The way nemesian women looked didn't help.  They were generally smaller than human men, incredibly cute, and their sad-puppy-eyes look was incredibly heartbreaking.  Making a nemesian woman sad made you feel like you just drop kicked a puppy into it's owner's 8 year old face.  If it wasn't for the fact that he had to know what as going on, he would have stopped asking questions.  He would have wanted to comfort her and tell her how much he loves her to make the sad look go away.  But until he got to the bottom of what was going on, he wasn't even sure if they had a future together.  He had moved to a nemesian owned world shortly after getting out of high school, looking to escape painful memories of prior relationships where he had been lied to.  Finding she had lied to him had hurt deeply.  He had to know why.
	"One last thing I still don't quite get.  It's been hundreds of years since then, and I'm willing to bet they are all aware of your society's reaction to the entire mess, so why are the men still afraid?  Everyone involved is long dead, do they really believe it's likely to happen again?"
	Her response was almost immediate.
	"No.  They don't think it's likely to happen again.  The fact it happened is the problem.  Like I said earlier, they were always somewhat afraid of us.  The first step to initiating a relationship of any sort was to get them to understand you wouldn't ever harm them, not even accidentally.  The way our men think, getting in a relationship with a woman was about finding someone who would protect you from the OTHER women.  Not that rape or assault was common or widespread, it's just how they viewed things.  Kidnappings used to be a possibility, but they were never in any danger, only those trying to keep ownership of them.  The way they view things, that was the agreement.  They were somewhat afraid of us, but would gladly become mates as long as we were willing and ready to defend them.  They viewed it as an exchange of sorts."
	"Then we women proposed a plan for them that sounded really good to them.  And then it turned into absolute misery for them.  Nothing even similar to that had ever happened before.  Before they feared us a little, now they feared trusting us.  And that trust that we wouldn't hurt them was the only thing that made their idea of exchange a viable concept for them.  It broke the idea of the exchange for them.  Since then, less than two percent of men on average enter into long term relationships with women.  A small percentage have a few women they enjoy the company of but won't enter into a relationship with, most just do their agreed on breeding, and some avoid contact with women outright.  They used to be afraid, but they felt they could trust us.  Now they are just afraid."
	"Well, I'm sure the negative reinforcement training of showing the younger ones videos of the farms doesn't help any."
	"What?  No, it's not like that.  They don't force the videos on the younger ones.  They teach them about the farms, but they show the videos when the younger men refuse to believe that such a thing happened.  They fear us, but their instinct is to trust us.  I remember seeing an interview with a male writer once, he said no nemesian male ever believes it until they see the videos for themselves.  'Women wouldn't do that, they are too protective!', they would argue.  We believe that instinct to trust us is why they let mothers keep males until puberty, instead of taking them away at birth.  They could do that if they wanted to, but they don't."
	"So the only way the men would ever trust the women again is if they all managed to forget about the farms, and it was wiped from history?"
	She nodded.
	"Pretty much, and it will most likely never happen."
	It was starting to make some sense to him, in that bizarre way nemesians thought.  He had always wondered about the elusive nemesian men, and why he only rarely saw them in public or in the news.  It was still confusing, and he didn't ever think he would fully understand it, but he somewhat understood it.
	"Alright, I think I get it now.  I'm still not entirely clear on what this ancient history has to do with this pheromone scam thing."
	"It's not a scam, it's a strategy of sorts."
	"To convince the humans the cute and friendly deergirls are also easily controlled with sex?  That's not a scam?"
	"A scam is done to benefit yourself, a strategy can benefit both parties."
	He felt she was trying to take them off-course.  She could be good at that when she didn't want to talk about something.
	"Back to the topic at hand, I'm having a hard time with this.  I honestly think if you wanted to come up with a lie you would have come up with something more believable, but I'm still having problems believing that your entire species is engaged in this bizarre act.  Do all nemesian women know all the details like you, how does this work?"
	She suddenly looked a bit worried.
	"No, very few people outside of the government know all the details.  I wasn't supposed to know either.  I found out something didn't match the official story, made some inquiries, and attracted the governments attention.  Most people just know what they are taught, and what the government tells them.  They go along with the act because they don't want criminal charges against them, or because they support the goal."
	"And what is the goal?"
	"To forge our species together close enough so that no matter what problems may arise, the alliance will never break."
	He thought about it for a little bit.
	"By lying to us to convince us you're easily controlled by sex?  How the fuck does that even work?"
	"It's worked well so far."
	At least she looked ashamed to say it.  He was going to get back to that later, but he wanted her to complete her explanation first.  And it was getting harder to believe.
	"Frama, do you have any proof of any of this?"
	She tensed up.
	"You have to promise to keep this a secret."
	"I already said I would."
	"No, I mean I want you to never speak about what I'm about to show you to anyone, including me.  I want you to pretend you never saw it, alright?"
	"Why?"
	"Because I lied to the government.  I told them I figured out the truth while doing some research.  Something I saw didn't add up.  They don't know I have this."
	"Why did you lie?"
	"Because I didn't want them to take it away.  It's a family heirloom."
	He wasn't sure what to make of that.
	"Alright, I promise.  I'll never say a word about it."
	She still looked worried, but she nodded, and got out of her chair to walk to the living room.  He followed behind her, wondering what she was going to do.  She moved a chair away from where it sat, and pulled the rug under it aside.  She pushed her fingers into the floor, which caused a small panel to move aside, revealing a small cavity.  He expected to see a safe hidden like that, instead there was just a small box.  She pulled it out and looked at him.
	"Remember what we were talking about in class?  The first encounter?"
	He nodded that he did.
	"It wasn't entirely truthful about what happened.  That's just the official story.  I know this because of my grandmothers notebook.  She used it to keep track of different bits of info she needed, sketched out plans for potential travel routes and other things.  It's such a common and nondescript item for a miner to have, no one would ever give it a second glance."
	She opened the box, pulling out a small notebook.
	"After accepting the government's bribe to not contradict their story, she wrote what really happened as best as she knew it in her notebook.  She knew they weren't likely to look in one of her notebooks, so she could pass the truth on."
	"What do you mean, what happened?"
	She held the small notebook out to him, still crouched on the floor.
	"My grandmothers name was Muli.  She was the first nemesian to make contact."