Hartan Expanding Ch. 04

The teacher looked around at us as she talked, describing this as very reasonable behavior.

"This young woman, she knew that proper procedure for dressing for an extended EVA meant putting on both a urine collection apparatus - for men, the urisheath, for women the uricup - and then a diaper undergarment in case of spills. Both of them knew, they'd heard the warnings about suit electronics and air filtration, etc., and had to pass tests on it. They definitely knew."

"One woman, she was neither permitted nor practiced in touching people enough to do the apparatus and diaper before that day. So, while her compatriot was stripping the victims and she was supposed to be re-dressing them, she could not bring herself to do so properly. Only some of the men in the group were prepared properly. She managed to do only some of the women correctly due to being rushed and nervous about the men, possibly because they were also attractive to her and this was disturbing, or she had a mistaken idea of how long the EVA would be."

We all were listening, and I think everyone knew where this was headed.

"So, they're all dressed up, these 2 women were handling a whole group that needed to be floated to a care center a long distance away. They got green lights for suit seals, tied the suits of the victims together, donned their own suits, and started out. By the time they got to their destination about a day later, of the 32 people they had rescued, 17 of them were dead. The woman's inaction due to shyness, or inability to confront her religious conditioning, led to these deaths, either from suit filter failure from frozen urine clogging the rebreather, urine short-circuiting a vital component, or hypothermia due to incompressible liquid urine in a part that required an air gap to work."

Looking around again at us, she made contact with the audience, scanning us to ensure we were following her.

"Now, you may know, modern env suits are getting better all the time. These suits were NOT modern. They were outdated, and thus moved to be 'emergency suits', placed in strategic locations just for such eventualities. ALL of these people would have lived, had their suits been properly configured. All 17 of them would have gotten the help they needed, and lived through the event with only minor lung damage. One addendum to this casualty count, though, is that the count is a little off -- 17 people didn't die that day. No. Eighteen people died. This young woman, so promising and capable, beautiful, well-educated and generally strong of character, took her own life later out of guilt and horror at what she'd done."

Looking around again, the teacher waited for us to digest this info.

She continued, somewhat forcefully, changing her voice to a startling SHOUT:

"WE, MY DEAR STUDENTS, ARE - NOT - FUCKING - GOING - TO - DO - THAT!"

The volume change made us sit up, and her finger stabbing the air at us drove the point home.

"WE have committed to only sending students offworld who are QUALIFIED! One of those qualifications is getting rid of silly prejudices, and preconceptions, and misconceptions, about other people's bodies being dirty, or ritualistically unclean. Or, reserved for a marriage partner, or... whatever STUPID SHIT that stops you from doing the NEEDFUL! NO - NO - NO - NO!! WE are smart! WE are capable humans, and we're not going to fucking let you kill people because you're fucking SHY!"

She definitely had our attention.

"You WILL have the need, should you go up, to touch, dress, undress, clean, bandage, intubate, catheterize, hell, maybe even jack off someone for medical reasons. You WILL do this competently and according to procedures. You WILL NOT use any, pardon my French, craptastic, addle-headed, brain-dead, FUCKWITTED, weak-ass excuse to avoid touching someone, if their life, or your life, is on the line! Because, PEOPLE, fellow HUMANS, we are not just keeping ourselves alive. We are keeping all our future children - at least thousands for each of you across the next 20 generations - of your babies, and your babies' babies - alive. We're keeping our Species alive. You WILL do the right things. I know you will. More than that, you will throw any of that stupid shit of not touching people away from your brains and replace it with a calm certainty. You will act objectively and with a clear head, forthrightly, and correctly. You WILL follow checklists exactly! Every single FUCKING time you do a checklist, you do it the Same Fucking Way, the exact Right Way! The day you skip a step, that's the day you kill yourself or others, possibly a lot of them. At the very least, YOU WILL KILL ALL YOUR FUTURE BABIES because it's hard to have kids WHEN YOU'RE FUCKING DEAD!"

She looked around at us, pointedly, eyes to eyes.

This was not a woman I wanted to disagree with. Ever.

"Now. Today, and for the next several days, there will be classroom exercises, here, and in the outer vestibule, floorspace being limited. In those exercises, you WILL DISROBE EACH OTHER. This is NOT a sexual exercise. There is no sex in it. There are just... body parts! These body parts will be clothed, and you will unclothe them. They will then be naked, and you will put the clothes on them again. You will do it calmly and efficiently. You will NOT apologize to each other for doing it! You will NOT be shy, or afraid, or reticent, or disgusted, or any other emotion of compromise. You are not compromising. You are saving someone's life. You will NOT be DAINTY. You will not be overly polite! You will be assertive and in-charge. You will follow the directions, and you will not stop to gawk at the boobs or penises or vulvas or anuses - ASSHOLES - maybe with poop on or near them because accidents happen - YOU WILL SEE THEM. You will TOUCH them. You can look at them if you like, but that is not the job. Half of humanity has breasts and vulvas. The other half have penises and testes. These are normal body parts. Almost every human being has these things, so get used to them!"

Her level of seriousness was a bit over the top, but it was easy to see why.

"You are saving someone's life -- right now, in this BUILDING -- because there is, 'No separating the practice of the procedure from the procedure itself.'"

She let that hang there, then repeated it clearly and separated each word.

"If you do an action up there, you're only able to do that action because you've practiced it here. Each practice of an action is part of a whole chain. SO, this action now? This is the action that saves a life, because later, when you meet the life you're saving, it's part of the same chain."

We all nodded, that made sense, and it occurred to me that the mood in the room had changed entirely from trepidation or social anxiety about possible nudity to a far more clear-eyed determination.

She continued, "Remember, there is no room for DAINTY here! The right action is a take-charge action. You are people of action. You are smart. You are capable people, and I expect the best out of each and every one of you. If you don't know what you're doing, that's fine, you're learning, ask for help! Not used to looking at erections? Fine, Look at It a second or five, pick it up and move it if you gotta, it's not gonna break. It might SPURT at you, but it ain't gonna break."

There was a tiny bit of laughter - I expected more, but we were all pretty serious.

"Pulling down underwear over an erection? Lift it out first, it's gonna snag. Tugging up a urine cup against a vulva, not sure how tight to make the straps? ASK. Try it too tight, see what it looks like - it'll cut off circulation, you'll see the skin compressed. ASK. Ask so you KNOW, NOW. No embarrassment, just Clear Action! Once you have that ideal in mind, Do IT AGAIN. Do it over and over until you can do it forthrightly and confidently, and not get distracted by the entirely human body parts you're interacting with. Ask for suggestions from your partners when you're done and you will learn things. Attempting those suggestions or not, keep trying until you've got it down, right, guaranteed. LME applies here."

"Got it? Good! Now, Everyone, we're going to start with dressing and undressing people. If you're going to put on someone's env suit, you need to get used to putting on their shirt or pants or whatever."

She turned around and raise her hands to motion us all. "EVERYONE. NOW. Stand up. Get to an open space, far from your handle or handlers, random direction."

We stood up and started moving, and she kept talking as we did.

"This is to be on people you don't know, or you don't lose the hesitancy. By your student number, you're odds and evens. Evens, you're the victims. Odds, take off the shirt of the victim. Victim, do not help, You're Dead Weight. You are passive. To start with, do this standing up. Do not rip clothing. Once the shirt is off, fold the shirt. Then, unfold the shirt, and put it back on them, correctly, tucking it in appropriately per uniform regulations. GO. Again, Evens are victims."

We all stood up and moved around randomly, then did the exercise.

I was an 'odd'. It was an entirely different thing to take someone else's shirt off versus my own. The shirts were the same, men's and women's, just different sizes, they were all white button-down oxford-cloth poly-cotton shirts. The tie had to come off first, obviously. The girl I was working on wasn't that buxom, but as I undid her shirt, I realized I was probably brushing up against her boobs with my knuckles, unbuttoning it. I did like the teacher said and was not dainty.

The girl was interested in how I was doing it, watching me but saying nothing. I was still a little concerned I might be offending her (despite the teacher's words, I know), but it soon became a mechanical exercise to get the shirt and sleeves unbuttoned and off. She stood in front of me in her bra, and seemed satisfied with the way I did it. I put it back on her and buttoned it up, unbuttoning her pants to be able to stuff the shirt into them. The tie was a hassle since I had to stand behind her to tie it.

I'd tied ties before for the little ones, when they were starting second grade and had to start wearing them, but I just put it on myself to tie it since tying it backwards on someone else was too odd.

Maybe that would be something I'd practice later. I wasn't sure if it was going to be tested on.

Once I finished, I became the victim and she took off my tie and shirt and put them back on me again. It was a little harder for her since she was quite a bit shorter than I was, but I guessed learning that difference was part of the exercise.

The teacher noted that some people were done, and she called out to us. "OK, ATTENTION, people! Attention! Right. After you each have done it once, your next task is to take off their shirt and bra. If you are paired with a male and they have an undershirt, take that off. Get down to SKIN. Make sure when you put it back on, it's right side out and front-side-front. Make it happen, people. Get the ties right. If you can't tie a tie on another person, save that as practice you do walking somewhere, or on a friend, or at home, later. GO. Bras off, folded. Oh, yes, and people? When you go to put the bra back on, pay attention to getting it configured correctly for comfort. A breast that's pinched, over time in an unconscious person, could chafe, create a wound, get infected, and kill them. Ask your victim how to do it right, pay attention, and try again if it's not obvious. GO."

We did the actions again, and when I got my victim's shirt off, I worked on her bra. There were several standard issue bras types I'd seen - pull-over jog-bra, front-clasp, and rear-hooks. My victim's bra was a pullover that was fairly simple to remove. Once I got it off, I turned it right side out again and tried to put it back on. The problem was figuring out how to get her arms through it without her helping, but eventually she told me what to do and I got it down.

I examined her breasts in the bra to see if they were pinched, and it didn't look like it. I asked her if they were, and what that would look like if they were pinched.

She moved her boob around to make it happen and how a pinch looked, too, which was interesting. I asked and she said with her breasts being on the smaller side, she didn't have the problem often, mostly on the outside near her underarms with the lower strap.

As a guy - things I didn't know!!! I actually found it to be really, really cool.

About the time she got my shirt off, the bell sounded, so I thanked her and did up my own buttons again.

Walking away from the church after class, I realized I never asked my 'victim' what her name was. I had just seen and touched the bare breasts of a girl I didn't know the name of. Sure, it was innocent, but I realized my life was very different after age 18 versus before it, in oh, so many ways.

My next class was biochem. We had been building up skills to make aspirin -- acetylsalicylic acid, and it was finally time to put it all together. The process had a lot of steps but we ran through them quickly since we'd done the sub-steps several times before.

Checking my purity at the end, I got a big ego boost because it melted at exactly 135 degrees, one of the checks for purity. The second check, running a tiny sample through the mass-spec at the back of the room, showed our purity was pretty good there, too.

I liked biochem, and my lab partners were competent, but I worried that I didn't know what use biochem was going to be when we were just living on a rock in space with blankets, space heaters, and a greenhouse lit by LED's.

Maybe that was the use - the greenhouse - making things grow better or creating aspirin out of raw materials because the factory for that was back on Earth burned by Hartan death-beams and the remains ground up into sand and smoke.

Aspirin could save lives, it wasn't just for comfort. Fevers happened, and it was an easy fix. Still, I really hoped no one ever depended on my ability to create it for actual medical use.

Swim class, happily, was next. I'd gotten off 4 times in the past 24 hours, so maybe, I hoped, I wouldn't sprout an erection so fast.

It was not to be. Almost as soon as I got in the water, the girls around me, we all were just standing there. I wasn't fully erect, sure, but I definitely had half-staff, mostly due to the fact that we were in the shallow end and standing up, the water was about navel-deep, so everyone's breasts all around me just stared at me. It was hard not to look. I turned to Joanne, standing next to me, and said, quietly, "Hey, Joanne?"

"Yeah?"

"I don't want to... I'm trying not to be rude. But, I have a question?"

She turned sort of to face me, but she could tell I was a little embarrassed. She looked down my front and focused on my dick. Looking down at that instead of looking me in the eyes, she said, "Yes?"

"You're staring at me."

"Is that your question?"

"Can I stare at you?"

"What do you think people are doing around here?" She was half-whispering. "That's all anyone is doing. We're trying to not be obvious about it, but, we're all naked. Just because it's the 3rd day of being naked, doesn't mean it isn't interesting."

"Would people think it was rude if I stared at their boobs?"

"Aren't you doing that anyway?"

"Sort of. I glance, then look away, and hope they don't notice."

"Yeah. About half the guys are doing that, and about half the girls. The other half -- we're openly staring, if you noticed."

"Kinda. I'm not sure what to do."

"Do whatever. No one can stop you. The point of this thing is to get used to being around naked people, so it's probably better if you look and get it out of your system."

I looked around me more. I was kind of freed-up by the permission, so turned to face her, and stared at her boobs. I sank down in the water, and kind of floated over to where she was standing. I looked up and said, "I'm looking at you now."

She looked down at me, her arms crossed under her boobs, supporting them, but kind of with a minorly exasperated look on her face. "Yeah? Well, you're underwater. I can't look at you."

"You want to look at my chest?"

"No."

"The water's too deep..."

"I know."

I said, grinning and floating, "I'm getting a big 'it's not fair' vibe coming from you right now. I think I know why."

She looked me in the eyes, and raised her eyebrows, "I have rather straightforward frustrations."

The teacher had been getting a bag, it looked like coins. She spoke up. "Attention. You've done the basic rescue now. We need to get used to diving and grabbing now."

There was a sexualized, "Who-Whooo!" from some girl at the other end of the pool, and a lot of laughter.

The teacher smiled, "No, not that kind of grabbing, that's done between consenting people and is a different game." Laughter cut through the crowd, and she continued, "No, this is dive-and-grab for coins. We'll go by teams of 2. The exercise is actually more complicated than just getting the coins. You have to get the coins while tied together. Over there..." She pointed at the wall where there were a bunch of elastic bands, "Get out, get 2 of those bands, and stand together. Go."

We got out. My woodie was only half-staff now. Joanne and I got out and walked over, and each of us got a thick elastic stretchy-band, about a meter long.

"Right. Now, the goal is you're going to be tied together at the chest. It can be front-back or back-back or front-front, but not side-side! You're going to get in the water, swim down, and get some coins from the bottom. This will be very slow to start with as you figure out how to do it. You MUST pay attention to your partner! They have to breathe, too, and you're only as good as your shortest breath. I would suggest agreeing on hand signals, like this..."

She made what she explained for standard hand signals for up, down, left, right, emergency, stop, faster, okay, confusion. Scuba, she said, translated to spacesuits, they'd adopted the same hand signals since astronauts practiced in pools, and there had to be gestures if radios were out and you couldn't touch helmets.

"Come up to the pool edge when you're ready. When you get in, watch out, it's really awkward. And, don't let your heads bang together! Seriously! It hurts! Safety first! The back person, put your arm between your face and the back of the other person's head, it will definitely bang otherwise."

The room erupted in conversations. I turned to Joanna. "So, how do we do this?"

She shrugged, "I think back-back would be horribly awkward."

"No doubt!"

"So... front back?"

"Who's in back?"

I thought a second, and said, "Uh, I'm taller. If you're in back, your toes will kick me a lot."

She smiled at me, tilting her head, "You just want to rub your dick on me."

I laughed, "Or hide it."

She laughed back at me and said, one eyebrow raised with a half-smile, "You're not hiding that thing in me."

We both laughed, and I said, "Okay, if you want, I'll be in front, whatever." I didn't care that much.

"No, you're taller, you go in back." She turned her back to me and backed up.

I took the rubber cord and wrapped it around us under her breasts, pulling us together tightly as I stretched it and snapped the latch shut. Other people around us were doing the same thing, so we were in good company.

We did the same with the second cord. One was around our mid-ribcage, and the other slightly below it, above the hips. We walked toward the pool, and watched how people were getting in. Some jumped together, but then had trouble swimming.

The teacher said, "Jump near the side, hold on to the side, and move towards the shallow end."

While we were waiting, I whispered in Joanna's ear, "Your skin is really soft. I like it."