THE TWO COMPANIONS

(Using the characters and setting of the series “Firefly” and the movie “Serenity”)

We don’t make any money in Joss’s verse, we just play here.

PART I- Post BDM: in which Inara teaches a couple of novices the tricks of the trade. (Warning: interracial geek love)

Prologue: When the original colony ships had arrived, the society was largely egalitarian due to the long shipboard confinement. Huge sacrifices and death rates were involved in terra-forming and settling the raw worlds they found. Sacred prostitution by both males and females was seen as a public service and was actually done on a rotating basis among the whole population on some ships and in the early colonies.

The core worlds prospered, and the Companions rose in status. When their clientele gained wealth and status, the guild chose to bar from their membership all but the most highly trained Companions. They excluded the more common prostitutes who serviced working class patrons. The Companions also incorporated elements of geisha and Greek Companion standards and practices.

Settlements on the rim worlds witnessed rising neo-Puritanism and the consequential rise in discrimination against the common prostitutes in their midst. The Companions of the core worlds continued to rise in status while they in turn relegated the cult of Isis to ritualized ceremony with few actual believers.

Rim-world colonists largely came from the poor classes of the core worlds and looked back with nostalgia on the glamorous culture of the core worlds; especially the Companions.

The Companion Guild gained power and became a significant player among the power elite. People who manipulate lust, desire and considerable funds have to operate in the real world if for no other reason than self protection.

For self-protection, the guild had always maintained an elite group of covert agents drawn from within their own ranks who discreetly provided protection to the Companions. Of course, all Companions were trained in a variety of s