Chapter 57: Season Two

“HERE’S THE CONCEPT, BOB. Listen, you’re going to love it,” Doug said.

My friend and producer had finally come to reside in Areola with his girlfriend, our camerawoman Avril, at the end of the last mini-series. We’d traded bodies when we wrapped up the shooting for the season and he went to Japan while I went to a remote island I first encountered soon after the first millennium AC. Peninnah had acquired a nice little estate for us there and it had been pretty easy to change identities and fly with Virginia from Los Angeles. Virginia had met me at the mansion after the last day of shooting with my Thunderbird and we simply drove away. When it was safe, we drove it into the satchel and put it away. Easy.

But the final episode was getting ready to air and we had to start thinking about a second season since our rocket wasn’t ready to fly. Fine. Go ahead and make sure it’s safe. We can wait.

“Tell me.”

“Season Two: The Harem Hunter. We’re still under the umbrella of To Boldly Go, but the season has its own focus. By now, people know you haven’t really eliminated anyone. There’s no surprise to the show. So there needs to be a new twist. In this series, we follow Bob as he goes hunting for new members of the harem.”

“I don’t know, Doug. It seems like following my normal daily life will be strange. And what about all the women who wouldn’t get chosen. How do we get releases? It seems so complicated.”

“Stop whining, Bob. You’re going to get fresh willing pussy on every show. Look at this.” He hefted a banker’s box full of papers onto the table. “This is signed consent forms from over a thousand beautiful women, along with their pictures, history, addresses, and social media accounts. By the end of the first episode, we began receiving ‘applications’ for next season. I had the staff vet them and get releases from them signed in advance. These are the only ones that followed through on their applications. Get that Bob? These 1,257 signed consent and release forms are the only ones who passed our initial review and signed on. That’s out of over 15,000 inquiries! You are a hot property and thousands of women out there want a piece of it.”

“You mean... 15,000 women responded to the show and asked to become a part of it?”

“Um ... not only women. About two percent were men. It’s up to you, but I thought that would add an element of intrigue to an episode or two. Even if you don’t have sex with them, it wouldn’t hurt to have a couple more men in your harem. I mean, that’s a lot of pussy for just half a dozen guys to keep satisfied while you’re busy elsewhere.”

He was right. Over the years, I’d brought hundreds of men into the infinity room, in various capacities. Not the least of those capacities was satisfying the women who outnumbered them nearly a hundred to one. Half a dozen of the men had attached themselves to my harem and lived among my concubines. I counted Doug and the young physicist Paul among them. They could probably use a little help. I sure could.

“So, basically what you are saying is that I stalk these women and when I find one I want, I jump out and say, ‘Hi! I’m Bob, the Harem Hunter. Want to go to my world and fuck me for the rest of your life?’ And then we see if I get killed by her response.”

“Don’t worry. We’ll have backup for you. But it doesn’t need to be that much of a blunt statement. We’ll arrange an accidental meeting. She has a flat tire and this hunk of a guy—you—pulls over to help her. They talk and you invite her out. You romance her and get a real feel for her as to whether you want to make her part of the harem. Then, at a time of your choice, you reveal our hidden cameras and tell her you are the harem hunter and would like her to join your expedition. It will be great.”

“There are 1,257 applications. How do we decide who gets to be stalked?”

“Bob, this is part of the beauty of the program. You just took eleven beautiful women to Areola from the first season. They should become your review committee. Along with your wives, of course. We can shoot a ton of footage just of the selection process for the applications. That’s something we missed in the first season. We had a general cattle call for women and even then we had to go out and find referrals. This will take the place of the auditions. We can cut in the commentary from the first crew about the women during each episode as they analyze her looks, personality, sex drive, and likelihood of getting along with the others.”

“Wow! Okay. I haven’t heard any better suggestions. Liz?” I turned to my fifth possession who also acted as the manager of our little production.

“I think it will work, Bob. And it sounds like something the girls will have fun with. Let me work with them to get them in the mood. But first, you’ll have to make the announcement that the ship isn’t ready. You’ve kept that to yourself so far.”

“You’re right. I’d better go have a meeting with the crew.”

It wasn’t the first time I had to take bad news to my family and others about a delay. I’d had to explain that I would be staying in Egypt for a while because my ship had been burned along with the Library at Alexandria. Everyone was sad that my ship had been burned, but no one was particularly upset that we’d be staying in Egypt. Whether we were there for a day, a year, or a century, didn’t really make any difference in the infinity room. Don’t ask me how or why, but the only sign the residents had of time passing was if they happened to go into the natural world with me. At that time, they would become aware that there was a more modern ship, a different mode of dress, and a different language. But none of that really affected them.

This time, however, several of us had been involved in the mini-series production and were marking time until we could blast off from earth for our great escape. The contestants on the last mini-series had lived in the expectation that when the last episode aired, we would actually be boarding the ship.

That night, we watched the dramatic conclusion to the show when the girls all rebelled against the eliminations and demanded that I take all of them. Then I revealed a portal to my ‘other palace’ in a hidden location. It ended with each of the girls giving their toast to the future and going through the gateway.

“Well, what do you think of the show?” I asked.

“It was so much fun! Will blasting off into space be as much fun?” Deedee asked.

“That’s a good question, and it brings me to some matters that I need to discuss with you all. At the end of that episode, after everyone else was in Areola, Doug gave me some bad news. The construction of our ride is woefully behind schedule. It could be a year or more before we can actually board,” I said.

“Oh, bummer,” Julie said. “We’ll just have to stay here in Areola and lie in the sun for a year or so. I can handle that.”

That was the most serious expression of disappointment that the girls had.

“When you think about it, our intent was just to blast off and send some expression of excitement and farewell, then all come into the satchel to live here anyway. It’s like the schedule was just moved up a year or so and we’ve already reached our destination,” Karla said. “I don’t see a problem.”

“Good, good,” I said as I looked over to my wives. They were giggling. “Well, you can all become productive citizens of Areola, but I have to go back out into the cold cruel world and produce another season of the show, but with a new twist since we kind of shot our wad on the first season. I can’t exactly convince a new crop of contestants that they are going to be eliminated.”

“Aw. I’ll help,” Eun-ha said. “It would be fun to be on the other side of the cameras for a while.”

“Yeah, me, too!” they all chorused. This was going better than I expected.

“Okay. I’ve got a job for you and the family,” I said. “It would really be a big help.” I put the banker’s box in front of them. “There are 1,257 contestant resumes, photos, and release forms in this box. We need to consider which would be the most likely to make a good addition to our world and our crew so we can set up the season. I want them organized in groups of three that I will judge for one slot. That means you shouldn’t put all three of your favorites in one contest. Two would be eliminated. On the other hand, you might put someone very low on the list in a competition to make sure your favorite gets chosen. But I won’t know what your ranking is. I’ll assume that these three are all acceptable to you. It’s always possible I’ll choose someone other than your favorite.”

“What would cause you to do that?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Suppose her pussy tastes like honey and I get addicted.”

“More likely her pussy will taste like red wine if you’re going to get addicted,” Wendy giggled. The rest laughed and they started talking about how to go about making the choices and rankings. I excused myself.

Doug set some rules for their discussion. All the resumes had been assigned numbers and the group was admonished not to use any names, since the cameras would be running and we’d be taping segments of the discussion when I actually made contact. This was going to be interesting.

The wives and possessions joined the discussion and occasionally Zhi or a priestess would join in. The priestesses were pleased that we weren’t leaving yet. They wanted me to identify more kidnappers they could rid the world of. I thought that was a reasonable request.

Doug handled the publicity for season two, announcing that in the fall I would be hunting for new members for my harem from the 15,000 applications we had received so far. He was very blunt about what the contest would be and that not everyone I met with would even know they’d been taped for television. He invited those who had sent releases to contact us to withdraw if they no longer wanted to be considered.

I didn’t expect the result. We received another 15,000 applications. Doug’s staff took care of vetting the applications and determining if she should or shouldn’t be considered. Rejection letters went out to 10,000. The other 5,000 were sent a detailed rules book, release form, consent form, and asked to provide detailed information and a photograph. I’d been surprised from the first batch how many of the applications came back with full nudes attached.

Perhaps the first line screeners had become better at their jobs and perhaps there were just a different class of women who applied after having seen the entire first season broadcast. The result was nearly 2,000 more completed applications. They were put on hold until the girls had finished their first pass on the original apps. Then they started in again.

Back when I was with Hubilai Khaan—remember that? Around a thousand or twelve hundred years AC—I got to know the adventurer Marco Polo fairly well. In addition to the seven arts and general Christian and Greek philosophy, Marco brought a tale from Europe that I found intriguing and a little inspiring. I cannot verify its veracity, but this, to the best of my recollection, is the way he told the story.

“There are many who tell the tale of the Great Khaan Chinggis defeating the Christian monarch called Prester John. This was about six years before the Great Khaan’s death.”

I nodded. I had already departed from the camps of Chinggis before he went to war over an insult from the King of Persia. Or the king of a part of Persia. Or a general who claimed to represent a King of Persia. The only thing most of the reports agreed upon was that his name was John.

“Well, I listened to many people in the course of my journey from Italy to Xanadu. We were on the road for three years and within our company, we counted a few Nestorian Christians from India. Their tale was very different than that told in the North. They hold that the name Prester John was usurped from its rightful bearer, who was one of the grandchildren of the Magi who visited Christ’s birth in Bethlehem. That same Prester John is variously said to have been St. John the Apostle who was evacuated from the island of Patmos and went to visit the Apostle St. Thomas Didymus.”

“You’re saying that two of Issa’s disciples made their way to India to join Issa?” I asked. Marco was confused until I told him that in India Jesus was known as Issa or Yuz Asaf which means Son of Joseph. Marco was surprised that I possessed this knowledge and I encouraged him to continue his tale.

“Strangely, that would fit. Now this is not scriptural, but there is common belief that St. John, who became known as Prester John, was set to rule a secret Christian kingdom in the East and that he will one day emerge from that location to announce the second coming of our Lord, in the same fashion that John the Baptizer announced his first coming,” Marco said.