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"Okay..." Visionary said, taking a deep breath. "You can handle this. You’ve faced the Yurt--in hell--inside a ship sinking in lava. You’ve faced the hordes of Armageddon. You’ve faced the Hooded Hood, and Loathsome Elder Beings, and Celestians, and even Lisa’s pregnancy mood swings. You can handle this..."
"Master...?" came a soft voice hesitantly through the bathroom door. "Please, master... are you well?"
"Or..." Visionary continued as his panic came crashing back down upon him. "You can try to flush yourself down what you’ve assumed is a toilet since you got here and find out if you’ve guessed correctly."
"Master..." the voice came again, on the edge of crying. "Are you displeased with us?"
Visionary drew a ragged breath and stood up. "Just... just a moment" he sighed. A quick glance at the mirrored wall of the bathroom confirmed his suspicions... He looked like hell. The 24-hour shifts to fix Aunt Sally had been grueling enough, but he doubted he could have slept anyway given the chance. Now he had doubts he could ever sleep again after his bed became the most intimidating thing he had ever seen. (Or rather, the 9 half-naked curvaceous green slave girls draped all over it took that top spot.) "Right... You can handle this" he said, gripping the door handle again. "And your shoulders probably won’t fit down the drain anyway."
The nine young women instantly ceased their nervous whispering to each other and dropped again in supplication to the floor as he stepped into the room.
"Please..." he implored them. "Don’t... don’t do that."
The stole nervous glances towards each other in confusion. "My gravest apologies, master... Please correct us. What is it we do wrong? Is our posture not to your liking?" asked the one who had first spoken to him, bowing even lower. "Instruct us, so that we may receive you in whatever position you desire."
He looked out at the sea of lush green flesh cowering before him and distinctly heard the siren call of the toilet’s hidden depths. "I, uh... don’t suppose you’re more afraid of me than I am of you?" he asked gamely.
"You are a great and powerful chieftain, commander of forces that lay waste to the mightiest races in the universe..." the girl whispered in awe, looking up at him with wide eyes containing dots of honest fear. "By your command entire cities live and die. It is only right that you be feared and respected by your chattel."
Visionary shuddered outwardly as she said this, and blinked back pain at the memory of the Z’Nox hostage plot. "That... was a mistake" he said sadly, realizing that they actually were physically afraid of him. He looked down at the young woman who was now regarding him with an expression of puzzlement and something more. "Look, please... everybody... stand up."
With the precision of a dance team, the crowd splayed across his bedroom gracefully came to their feet, keeping their eyes downcast. Unfortunately, they seemed to be incapable of any position of rest that did not show off their considerable physical assets to the fullest.
"Ah...May as well look at me" Visionary suggested, desperately seeking eye contact with anyone in order to keep his brain functioning. "I’m not going to get any prettier any time soon... especially not if Amy or Ms.Framlicker catches me going over my break time." They looked at each other with nervous sidelong glances, then lifted their gazes, although few would keep eye contact whenever his fell upon them. "Okay, let’s try it this way..." He held out his hand to the woman closest to him. "How do you do... I’m Visionary. And you are...?"
She looked at his hand fearfully, her eyes darting about trying to decide what it was she was supposed to do.
"I... um... I washed up... promise" he tried, figuring bathroom humor was universal. Her blank stare suggested that there was a reason he wasn’t considered a much of a ladies man.
"Our apologies, Master..." the one who had been addressing him before said. "It has been some time since anyone has cared to address us by name. Hers is Odoona, Master. In our native Caphean, it means ‘Lush, fertile land moist with dew’."
"Oh" Visionary gulped, trying not to be too aware of the very lovely and very exposed body matching the name. "Of course it does." Still, he was thankful for the initiative. Maybe he could still figure a way out of this before Ms. Framlicker found him and "reminded" him of the work they had to do... most likely with another spanner to the head. "Um... And you are?"
"Miiri, Master" she replied, nodding her head in respect. "It means..."
"Yes, ah..." Visionary cut in quickly. "I’m sure it has a very lovely meaning, and it’s a very lovely name, but I’m thinking my nerves might not be able to handle it right now." He looked at her pleadingly. "And do you think you could not call me "Master"?"
She blinked in confusion. "I...do not believe so, Master"
Visionary sighed. At least she was honest. "Well, maybe we can work on that. Now then... let’s talk through why you can’t stay here..."
"We will go wherever you want us to, Mas..."
"I don’t want you to go anywhere..." Visionary countered. "Well, I mean, I do, but..." He paused and tried to straighten things out in his head. "What I mean is, I’m not going to give you orders."
Miiri looked at him uncertainly, while a ripple of unease swept the rest of them. "We are then to... anticipate your wishes, Master? We can do our best..."
"That’s not... I don’t mean..." He clenched his teeth in frustration, before realizing it sent the girls closest to him cowering back. "I’m not a slave master! You don’t have to do as I say! Why is this such a scary concept for you?"
They remained silent, obviously looking to Miiri to handle this frightening and baffling conversation for them. For her part, she looked taken aback, as if a new idea was forming for her. "You... have no experience with slaves?" she asked, as if this were unheard of.
"Yes! Well, no... I mean, there was Valeria, but she wasn’t mine, she was Exile’s.... Or rather, she wasn’t anybody’s... that’s the whole point. Don’t you understand?" Visionary looked at her and from her expression guessed it seemed as if he were raving like a lunatic.
"I... do not." Miiri admitted. "But to answer your question, Master, a slave is expected to do her master’s bidding or be corrected. Some masters are kind, and respect the customs of the sacred bonding between master and slave. Such would instruct us carefully, so that we may please them properly, not wishing to have to correct us." Her face clouded and her eyes were no longer focused on anything in the room. "The Lovetoad was... less so. Corrections for mistakes before him could be... elaborate. And the rules to be followed to avoid correction tended to change without notice."
He froze as the implications of what she was saying sunk in, imagining what these young women had endured since being removed from their homeworld. His own fears seemed petty and small by comparison. "Look, I’m not... I’m just trying to..." He sighed and decided to try another tactic. "If it will make you feel safer to be clear about my intentions, I’ll be as clear as I possibly can: I’m not the Lovetoad... I would not correct you that way... I wouldn’t correct you at all. More to the point, you don’t have to worry about what I wish you to do. You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do yourselves. I won’t make you. It’s your right to decide things for yourself."
There was silence while they chewed this over. It didn’t last. "But a master must decide our fates! Without one, we are shamed!" Odoona protested as the wailing of her fellows began again in earnest.
Visionary put his head in his hands and contemplated another trip to the bathroom.
"Do you mean what you said?" a voice asked, cutting through the hysterics of the others.
He lifted his head to find Miiri looking at him intently, an odd expression on her face. "What?" he asked, as the others quieted down.
"Do you mean the things you said?" Miiri repeated softly. "That you would not make us do anything we did not want to do? One such as you is not obligated to make or keep promises to those like us... But... do you mean them?"
He nearly kissed her feet at this spark of hope, but realized that would likely confuse matters even more. Instead, thankful, he met her searching gaze as sincerely as he could. "Yes... of course... I mean every bit of it. I give you my word."
She looked at him carefully for a while, then nodded as if some unspoken decision was made. "So then you would not send us away if we did not wish to leave you?" she concluded, in a mixture of shrewdness and hope. "You would not make us ownerless if we did not wish it so?"
As his life flashed before his eyes, Visionary was quite surprised when it continued past this moment of accepted slave ownership all the way up until the Shoggoth ate him. "It... seems like I did say that, doesn’t it?"
Next: Another little scene that doesn't quite add up into a story by itself, all in an effort to take advantage of some opportunities before they totally slip by. Because, hey... why talk about this stuff out of continuity without working it in somewhere?
