Chapter 53: Loss

WELL, THE CHALLENGE SUCKED. It was rugged and dangerous. And surprising. The evaluation that came back was entirely due to lack of life experience and decision-making. Artemisia was eliminated. We were all devastated. She’d acted bravely and put herself at risk so the others could succeed in the rescue, but as a result, she didn’t complete the mission. The independent judges ruled this as a loss since the others all reached Suhani and rescued her.

It might have been the saddest going away party that we’d had.

I waited in my study for Artemisia and consulted with my wives and possessions. I was to do whatever was necessary to convince her to come to Areola.

I was seated at my desk when she came in, dragging her suitcase behind her. Her jaw was set and I could tell she was only barely holding it together.

“Through there?” she asked, pointing at the door.

“Artie, wait. There’s another option,” I said before she could reach the door. She stopped and turned to me.

“Don’t fuck with me, Bob. I wanted this more than anything in the world. I don’t want to leave them. You. Just, don’t fuck with me.” The dam was about to break.

“You’ve heard the rumors, Artie. Do you believe them?” I asked. I stood up and came around the desk where I could face her.

“That you’ll get us all back? How can you?” she said. “You’re broadcasting this on television. You can’t just go around making exceptions.”

“Yes, I can,” I said. “Do you know what I am, Artemisia?”

“You mean a rich playboy?”

“No. I mean did you know I’m a demon?”

“Wait. What? Damn it, Bob! I told you not to fuck with me!” She turned toward the door again and I made a full transformation.

“Artemisia, look at me,” I bellowed. The force of my voice stopped her and she turned slowly around. When she turned and saw me as I finished my transformation, bursting the seams of my clothes so they hung in rags, she passed out. I transformed back and picked her up to cuddle in my big easy chair. Unfortunately, I was still naked, but she didn’t seem to mind that as she regained consciousness.

“What was that?” she whispered.

“That was me in my natural form. Eventually, we’ll expose that to the world, but we can’t do it until the ship is ready and we can actually board it and get out of here,” I said. “I’m telling you all this—showing you—so that you’ll believe that I can and I want to keep you. Forever, Artemisia. Not for the length of the show, but to join with me and my world for all time.”

“How can you do that?”

“A long time ago—about 4,000 years—I accidentally created a new world.”

“Four thousand years?”

“Approximately. I’m bad with dates. I’ve been around a long time. It was a couple of millennia before Caesar (BC). But the point is that there are now over three million people in Areola.”

“You named your planet ‘Titty World?’ That is so Bob!” she laughed. At least she was loosening up.

“You know me. Anyway, this whole show and contest and work with the Space Pioneer group is so I can take my world someplace where it will be safe. There is no place on earth where we could remain hidden and secure forever,” I said.

“So, you want to take your world, wherever it is, to Mars so you can remain undiscovered forever.”

“Beyond,” I said. “At the rate humanity is progressing, Mars will not be safe for us for long.”

“Us? I’m sure we could stay hidden for a hundred years or more there,” she said.

“There is an interesting phenomenon that occurs in Areola. When I bring someone from the natural world into my world, they stop aging. People who are born in the infinity room—that’s what I used to call Areola—age fairly normally. Maybe a little slower than the natural world. We’ve never really done a study. My first wife is nearly as old as I am. Maybe technically a little older. She still looks and feels twenty.”

“You’ll take me to this Areola?”

“Honey, you showed the very best of the characteristics I am looking for in people I bring to Areola. I couldn’t have disagreed with the judges’ decision more. You were brave, self-sacrificing, loving, and smart. And not only that, we all love you. I love you.”

“Will the others be coming, too?” she asked.

“Unless they choose to leave. I won’t force anyone. Rhonda and Rin chose to stay in this world and leave us. Linda, Eun-ha, and Wendy are all waiting in Areola for us to join them. And you’ll like it there. Believe me, I’ve done the best I could to create a paradise and my wives and concubines keep it running that way.”

“Will I be one of those?”

“Your decision, sweetheart. I hope you’ll be one of my concubines forever.”

“Take me there, Bob. Let’s go. Take me there and when we get there, strip me bare and fuck me so I’ll know it’s all real.”

“See my satchel over there by the door? Areola is in it.”

“Bob!” she whined. “Quit teasing.”

“I’m serious. The infinity room is somehow inside that little space and I’m going to open a portal to it right now.”

“Open sesame,” Artemisia said. She was shocked when the satchel started to glow and the portal sprang into existence. “Shit!”

“Come on, honey. Let’s go to Areola.”

I took her hand and we crossed the threshold. We were met by Josie and Ali with a small company of warriors who would guard the portal while I was inside. We walked straight into the main square where the pool reflected both the temple and the palace. Several of my concubines were lying naked near it or playing in it. Linda, Eun-ha, and Wendy rushed to Artemisia and hugged her.

“How did you get Bob to come with you? We had to make a big decision and come alone. It was a little scary,” Eun-ha said.

“I just asked him to take me here. Wow! Is this all real?”

“It’s real and it goes on forever!” Linda said. “And you can get out of those clothes. I haven’t worn anything since I took my clothes off in Bob’s study. I never plan to.”

“I have another task while I’m here,” I said. I waited until Artie’s clothes were lying in a pile at her feet. Oh, what a delectable bit. “Come, concubine. I want to make love to you.”

“Yes!” she said, jumping into my arms. I carried her to the big bed in my room and gave her the full loving treatment. I kissed her entire body. I lapped the honey from between her legs and curled my tongue deep in her vagina. Then I crawled between her legs and while we stared into each other’s eyes, I slid deep within her, holding her with my gaze as I gradually worked up speed of thrusting into her. As we reached our climax together, I felt her utter devotion to me grow. This might be another like Zhi.

Even when one has the best benefits of tantric sex at one’s disposal, there are times when a couple just wants to fuck. I’d experienced it with all my wives, possessions, and concubines.

Back before his conquest of Gaul and the Britons, Caesar arranged for me to marry Cordelia, a distant cousin. It was a marriage of convenience and an alliance. I asked her point blank if this was what she wanted and her answer was to look at me in consternation and say, “Of course! How could I not want to help Caesar make an alliance he deems important. Take me to your bed and make me your wife.”

I thought she was incredibly willing to have her body traded for an alliance, but she proved to be an avid lover.

Religiously repressed people in the After Caesar centuries conveniently forgot how to give women pleasure and they forgot they could receive pleasure. Unlike Bernice and Virginia and nearly every other girl I dated in the fifties and sixties, Cordelia needed no instruction on how to receive pleasure from sex. If I was not tickling the right spot, she made sure I either found it or she took over and found it herself. And she was aggressive in bed.

“Bob, enough with your soft and gentle lovemaking. That’s fine sometimes, but right now I just want to fuck. Make me come, Bob. Push that big old dick up my quim and let me have it!”

Yes, well, maybe those weren’t the exact words. I never actually learned Latin, but when people spoke to me, I understood what they said and when I spoke back, I planted the idea straight into their brains. Even in Latin there was talking dirty.

I’m sorry to say that Cordelia despised the sea. She absolutely would not board my ship. The closest she would come would be to accompany me to the dock and fuck me there before I boarded to leave. And she would meet me there when I returned to port, no matter how long I’d been gone, and demand to be fucked on the spot.

She passed away about the time Caesar grabbed me to take him to Egypt. What a fuck!

After Artemisia and I made love, we fucked. Several times. Then I had to return to the natural world and take up the role of Bob the Billionaire Spaceman.

We headed back to the mansion in Los Angeles for what I told people would be the final week of filming for the show. We needed a pick-me-up after the decidedly depressing elimination of Artemisia. This whole television thing couldn’t end too soon to satisfy me. It was getting to be exhausting.

“This week will be our last challenge,” I said. “And you are going to be the judges this time. The task is to do everything together. And I mean everything. I’m having you all move into the master suite with me. You know how big the bath is in that room. So, if one person needs the bathroom, you all go in. When you shower, you all shower. When you sleep, you all crawl in bed to sleep. And it won’t just be living assignments. You’re going shopping together. You’ll go to an amusement park together. To a concert and whatever else you decide together that you’d like to do. Think of this as your last week on earth. What do you want to do? Just do it together. At the end of the week, you’ll decide which of you is eliminated.”

There was an immediate whispered conversation and Deedee was pushed forward as the spokesperson.

“We’ll take the challenge on one condition, Bob,” she said. “Our future lies with you and your family. You all have to join us together. You, Penelope, Peninnah, Liz, Dezi, and Laine. Whatever we do, you do it with us.”

I looked at the family. They’d mostly been used to slipping into the infinity room at night. This meant they’d all be here for a week, day and night, with the women of the challenge. This would tax all of us.