Quick query and story

[maculategiraffe]

Happy new year, everyone!

So I just got my picture for picfor1000, and I'm-- a moron, because I'm actually not sure what it's of. Can anyone help? I'm supposed to write a thousand-word story about it and right now I got nothin'. (I couldn't just get handcuffs or needles. Oh no, I have to get a... spacecraft? Very large teapot with a very small spout? Help?)

Sixth and lastly, the following scene was requested by skylerbird and seconded by aerialsprite in the comments over here).






I can't take this any more, Holden thought as he watched Jer, naked and sprawled on his bed, looking relaxed and eager, both at once. Except for the eyes. The eyes were watchful, and as they read Holden's face, grew anxious, then unhappy, defeated.

What disturbed him so much about the sight of Jer's studied languor? All slaves played these tricks. Holden and Alix taught them. Yves had quite a repertoire, and certainly knew how to display himself to best advantage naked; that had never depressed Holden, or made him lose all desire for the posed body on the bed. But Yves' bedroom tricks were irresistible because he took the same happy, unselfconscious joy in them as he did in everything else he learned-- Hey! Look what I can do! Jer's had nothing to do with joy.

He sat down and examined Jer, who looked up at him, his eyes bleak, and said tonelessly, "I'm sorry."

Holden touched his shoulder briefly, lightly, without sensuality. He'd never thought this transition would be easy, but somehow he hadn't envisioned this particular problem. Or at least he'd thought it would get better as everything else did-- as Jer achieved truce with Yves and Bran, smiled and talked more often, began acting more like himself. But it hadn't.

Jer didn't appear to want sex, or at least not sex with Holden, who found himself in the odd position of envying Yves and Bran on this point. But Jer couldn't stand it, either, when Holden didn't try to fuck him, couldn't stop working with a mechanical, lustless desperation to seduce his master, to make Holden want him even when he obviously didn't want Holden, or not in that way. When they did fuck, the act felt so many times removed from any real desire that Holden would have found it comical if it hadn't been so horrible.

"Master?" Jer still sounded as if he were talking to someone else when he used the honorific. Argounov, Holden guessed.

"What is it, baby?" The endearment came unthinkingly to his lips. Jer used to call him that, and he picked it up, said it back. Such a different ring from Pavel's dearest, he'd been able to say it without a qualm.

"I'm sorry," Jer said again. "I can't seem to-- please you."

"Jer," said Holden quietly. "You don't have to have sex with me if you don't want to."

"Yeah, I know," said Jer, closing his eyes. "I'm not exactly the most appetizing thing on your plate."

"You know it's not that, baby. You're gorgeous. It's just--"

"I'm not stupid, Holden," said Jer softly. "I know I'm making you sick with-- the way I am. And I'm sorry. But I wish you'd-- let me pay you back, somehow. And this is the only way I know any more."

"Pay me back? What kind of talk is that?" Holden shook his head. "You're not a whore."

"Yes I am," said Jer flatly. "That's exactly what I am. That's exactly what I've spent twenty-six years learning to be. I don't know why you won't just... fucking use me."

Holden lay down next to the rigid body, not quite touching.

"Jer," he said after a moment. "You don't sound like you. When you talk like that. And I-- I guess this is my problem. I miss you."

"Yeah," said Jer grimly. "I miss me too. Shit luck all around."

Holden sighed and pulled Jer into his arms. "So... what? Who are you now, if you're not you?"

"I told you," said Jer, his body suddenly, artificially pliant against Holden's. "I'm a whore." He kissed Holden's neck, lingeringly. "And I'm good at it. I know I'm not pretty any more and I know you get more hot teenage ass than you know what to do with-- but I'm a fucking expert. I know I can please you. If you just let me. If you just stop-- wanting me to be--"

"Stop that," said Holden sharply when Jer kissed his neck again. "Be still."

Jer stopped and was still, holding himself tensely motionless in Holden's arms. Holden stroked his back.

"If you're so good at being a whore," he said finally, "you must be used to indulging strange whims. Indulge mine for a minute. See, I had a friend-- well, a lover-- when I was a kid. His name was Jer. And you look like him. So if I can't have him, I guess you're the next best thing."

"Whatever gets you off," said Jer softly, "master."

"Glad you feel that way." Holden ran a hand down Jer's spine. "You sound like him too, sometimes. Jer was really funny-- in a deadpan kind of way. When I met him, I hadn't thought I'd ever laugh again. Someone I trusted had just betrayed me, I'd lost my home, and I thought my life was over. But Jer could always crack me up."

Jer lay still under Holden's stroking hands. Was it Holden's imagination, or had he relaxed a little?

"And that's not all he did for me," he went on. "I had terrible nightmares back then, and he used to hold me like I'm holding you now, when I woke up at night. We slept in a room with four other slaves, and most of them hated me because I was such a stuck-up little prick. I'd wake up screaming and he'd clamp his hand over my mouth-- like this-- so I wouldn't wake the others and make them angry."

He leaned forward, his hand over Jer's mouth. "He'd put his mouth against my ear-- like this-- and say, shut up, shut up, it's okay. He held me so tight." He pulled his hand off Jer's mouth, cupping his chin. "I was so scared, I was so-- confused-- and I was nothing but trouble for him, but he took care of me. There was a girl there, another slave, Candys, and she told me, I've never seen him stick his neck out before, for anyone or anything, but he sticks it out for you every damn day. She said, what is it about you? And I said I didn't know. I still don't know. But I know he loved me."

Jer shivered suddenly, but said nothing.

"About a year after Jer and I first met," Holden said, "I was talking to a girl named Alix-- crying on her lap, actually, but that's another long story- and she could see I was barely holding it together, and she asked me why I hadn't ever tried to run away, or physically attacked the master-- why I wasn't dead, basically. And I said, "Because of Jer." And she said 'Ah. Right.'"

Jer shifted, and he was smiling now, a small smile, but a real one. "Bullshit. You're making that up."

"Ask her."

"I will. How much longer do I have to listen to this? You're giving me the creeps."

"But this is what I want." Holden caressed Jer's hair. "Don't you want to please me? Like a good whore?"

Jer's lips thinned. "Fuck you."

"Funny." Holden traced a finger down Jer's cheek. "You look like Jer, but you sound like me. I used to say that to my master-- and get whipped good and hard for it." He heard Jer draw in his breath, and continued carefully, "I remember the first time our master-- Jer's and mine-- whipped me. It hurt like hell, but even more, it was so humiliating. I was tied up because I wouldn't stop struggling beforehand, but afterwards when he untied me and left I just-- dropped to the floor. I had my hands over my face, I was shaking, I couldn't-- imagine-- what had just happened to me."

Jer swallowed as Holden went on steadily, "But Jer found me, and he put his arms around me and kissed my hands where they were over my face, and he helped me up, and he got me to his bed and he held me, for hours, and he made everyone else fuck off and leave me alone, and after a while, he even made me laugh again. Isn't that something?"

Jer was so rigid now that he was almost trembling, and Holden fell silent, hoping he hadn't just made matters even worse with all his babbling.

"What would he do now?" Jer asked after a long pause, very quietly. "Your-- friend. If he were here."

"I don't know," Holden admitted, his voice calm despite the jolt of adrenaline the unexpected surrender had sent through him. "He'd probably have changed a lot, after all this time. And I don't know that he'd love me any more. He might hate me. For falling face-first into all this luck, while he got left behind. But I hope he'd let me take care of him, after all he'd been through. The way he took care of me. Without worrying about things like... paying me back."

Jer pulled out of his arms, using all his strength, and rolled over with his back to Holden.

Holden hesitated. "Baby? Are you--?"

"You fucking asshole," said Jer, his voice ragged.

"--crying? Oh, Jer. Gods. I--"

Jer put his hands up to his ears. "Would you just fucking leave me alone?"

"Okay," said Holden cautiously. "Jer-- it's okay."

"Yeah, sure, it's okay." Jer's voice was muffled now, his face half buried in the pillow, but the rage in it was crystal clear. "Sure it's okay for you. You married Alix, you had a kid, you own your own goddamn business, you prick. You're right. I do hate you. Okay? I fucking hate you."

"That's okay," said Holden soothingly, and Jer let out an ugly bark of laughter. "Really. Lots of people hate their masters. It could be worse. You could still love me."

Jer rolled back over, glaring at him, and practically smacking the tears out of his own eyes with a gesture that looked painful. "Thor fucking thunder-fist, Holden, does being free automatically make you a complete moron? Of course I still love you, you twit."

"Oh," said Holden, and Jer's eyes narrowed.

"Quit grinning like an idiot," he said. "And quit trying to tell me it's okay. I'm not a little kid. I'm not Bran."

"But it is okay," Holden insisted, reaching for Jer's hand; Jer didn't clasp back, but he didn't pull away, either. "Listen. New rule. You listening?"

"Yes, master," Jer gritted, and Holden smiled a little; that had sounded like it was addressed to him.

"No more trying to seduce me," he said, "or guilting me into sex by whining about how unattractive you are. If you want to fuck, you can ask nicely. And if you don't want to fuck, we don't fuck. We've both got other options. You seem to be getting along fine with Yves and Bran."

Jer shook his head. "They're getting along with me, you mean. They're both fucking impossible to piss off. I snipe at Yves and he just grins like I'm such a card. And Bran gets those big worried eyes like he only hopes I'll tell him what he did wrong so he can atone. Like bitchslapping a kitten."

"Must be hell for you, all that rage and no one to fight with," said Holden. "But I'm the one you're mad at, Jer. Why don't you take it out on me? We've got plenty of private time, I've made sure of that, and now instead of having all this awful sex, we can-- I don't know, whatever you want. You can hit me, and yell at me to fuck off and die." He lifted Jer's hand to his lips, then knocked it gently, knuckles first, against his own cheek. "Work through it."

"Yeah, great. No problem. I'll be the bitter, resentful slave who abuses you as therapy. That should work out really well for me when I'm competing for your attention with Sweetness and Light, the Sunshine Boys."

"You don't need to--- hee. I mean you don't need to--"

"It's not that funny," said Jer acerbically as Holden struggled to control a sudden fit of laughter.

"Compete with them. You don't have to. I love you. Yes it is. Can I tell Yves you called them that?"

Jer lifted his eyes to the ceiling as if imploring the heavens to bear witness to his trials, and Holden laughed out loud at the sheer familiarity of the expression and of being the one it was aimed at. Finally, reluctantly, Jer cracked a small smile back at him.

"You're crazy," he said. "Can I really tell you to fuck off and die without getting put out on the street?"

"Get one thing straight," said Holden, giving Jer's hand a hard squeeze. "I am never putting you out on the street. If you try to kill me in my sleep I might have to chain you up at night, but I won't put you out. You're stuck with me-- unless you successfully kill me, and then Alix will probably marry you instead. She always liked you. And yes, you may scream anything you want at me, as long as you only do it in private."

"In that case," said Jer, "I'd like to point out that Alix should have married me in the first place instead of you. I would have been way less trouble, and I'm much better at licking cunt."

"Not any more, I bet," said Holden, grinning. "She's got me pretty well trained."

Jer laughed, and Holden laughed back, relishing the sound of Jer's genuine amusement. "I just bet she does. She never had much time for incompetence."

"Incompetence?"

"Sorry. I should have said... bungling."

"Hey! Come over here and say that."

"Wait, I can't until I ask nicely. Worshipful master, your humble slave begs permission to approach--"

"I said, come here."