195: The Forever Virgins

ENTRY 195: The Forever Virgins

The transition into space was anything but a smooth colonization designed to keep the multitude of Earth cultures intact, and many took to desperate measures to sustain their traditional practices. Whether those cultures were worth saving is another debate entirely, and one still being played out. Old arguments about whether one culture has the right to level moral judgments on another, or the cost to transhumanity should certain practices be allowed (or forced) to die out. But while different parties argue, some people still cling to the old ways…and someone, some specific individual, always pays the price.

Many cultures hold special consideration for virgins. They occupy a certain place in society, and are the subject of considerable status and desire; some assign superstitious benefits to sexual congress with a virgin, or hold virginity as a sexually desirable trait in a potential partner. Whatever the case, the demand for virgins among those seeking to preserve that part of their culture exceeded the supply—so a compromise was made, and a new flesh trade was created.

The Forever Virgins are specially-augmented neotenic morphs, designated as professional virgins to accommodate the needs of the culture-groups they serve. They are willing volunteers in their positions, though some may argue that they have agreed to these positions without consent. Depending on the culture involved, a virgin may occupy specific duties, have their virginity ritually “tested,” or be called upon to be sexually initiated according to the group’s customs. In some instances, this has led to Forever Virgins being ceremonially “sold” to “husbands” or “clients,” most notably in the Mizuage Project on Luna.

COG	COO	INT	REF	SAV	SOM	WIL	MOX
15	13	15	10	10	8	13	-
INIT	SPD	LUC	TT	IR	DUR	WT	DR
5	1	26	5	52	30	6	45

Morph: Neotenic

Skills: Academics: Anthropology (their culture) 55, Animal Handling 50, Art: Dancing 46, Art: Singing 46, Interests: Art History (their culture) 55, Interests: Child Development 36, Kinesics: 65, Language: Native (their culture) 85, Language: ASL 60, Networking: Scientists (Anthropologists) 45, Perception 40, Persuasion 45, Profession: Virgin 55, Protocol (their culture) 65, Unarmed Combat 30

Implants:** Basic Biomods, Basic Mesh Inserts, Cortical Stack, Medichines*, Sex Switch

Traits: Edited Memories, Social Stigma (Neotenic)

* Modified version; the Forever Virgins “heal” normal sexual trauma, including restoring hymens and undoing the effects of circumcision or genital mutilation. The healing process triggers an automatic ego-pruning procedure in the cortical stack, removing from the ego the memories of the traumatic event.

** A minority of Forever Virgins are actually pods, with the Cyberbrain and Puppet Sock implants, designed to allow infomorphs to take part in coming-of-age ceremonies and the like.

Using the Forever Virgins

Sexual norms and unusual cultures are not fit for every game; before bringing the Forever Virgins into play at your table, please make sure that your players are mature enough to handle the concept…and be willing to abandon it if it looks like it’s going to be a serious fight-starter. That being said, here are recommendations for using the Forever Virgins.

The most obvious choice for Forever Virgins is just to present them unaltered as part of the background of an adventure—maybe a sect of brinkers trying to maintain their pre-Fall culture and “needing” virgins for certain tasks, maybe an anthropological project to sustain a certain cultural practice for further study. In this case, the PCs are exposed to the practice, allowed to ask questions, come to their own conclusions, and decide and debate how they feel about that…and maybe what to do about it. It is very easy for the Forever Virgin practice to resemble child prostitution or worse, even if the entire concept is carefully explained, and the PCs may well feel inclined to “rescue” the virgins. Whether this works or not is up to the gamemaster; remember there are no right answers and have fun.

The other alternative is to have an ex-Forever Virgin—a character who was a participant in that lifestyle, but escaped or was broken out of it. Such a character probably still struggles with issues related to their morph’s unique traits and their former social role, and may have the Real World Naïveté trait. A strong reason for Forever Virgins to “break” from their social role is if their memory programming fails for some reason, leaving them to remember repeated sexual initiations or genital mutilations. The mental stress alone from such memories can cause the character to develop any number of mental derangements and social hang-ups…or the character may be met several years later, having overcome that trauma and emerged as a self-assured, self-empowered character; a good NPC contact for deep insight into mental trauma or their “home” pocket-culture.