Chapter 38

Vera:

Poor Ollie! He knew I was different when I walked through the door that morning! Uneasiness and guilt were written all over his face -- and guilt was similarly there in Britney's -- but I wasn't upset that they enjoyed one another while I was gone -- look how much I'd enjoyed myself! I had to wonder how jealous Ollie would be...

The revelation had come in the middle of the night, while the Major was draped atop me, snoring softly. He was a simple man, really -- hard, a forged weapon. You pointed him at things and he dealt with them, as directly as possible. He'd said something about how his current concubines were a distraction -- and I knew that he probably replaced his, regularly, from somewhere, when he became too irritated with them. He was totally matter-of-fact with me, from the moment he took charge of me that night -- and yet, he was my champion! I was there to do a job -- and he had every confidence in me. I wasn't 'that fat sow of a slut, Vera, ' to the Major -- I was a woman he had already fucked once and pronounced satisfactory and that he would fuck again. Orally, his cock had been a challenge -- and I'd risen to it -- and he'd been forthrightly pleased with the result.

But a big part of it was his approach when he championed me to Tillotson. Whether I was fat or not wasn't at issue with him; it was his contention that Tillotson had an unhealthy fetish for the very thin. The Major contended that Tillotson didn't mess with real women -- he had a thing for artificially constructed creatures with very little meat draped over their skeleton and outsized balloons on their chests. The subtext of all this -- which only soaked in slowly -- was that porky Vera was a REAL woman ... Tillotson would bitch about my looks, and the Major retorted that I was more eager to please than one of his skinny bitches and offered better performance ... It was all there, in the automobile comment: "The difference, here, Tillotson, is sort of like the difference between a sports car and a luxury sedan. The first moves impressively, but the suspension is tight and jarring and it isn't too comfortable. The latter offers a comfortable ride and ... options..."

Then I PROVED it by making Tillotson ADMIT that I was good -- and the Major started talking about Judith and Tillotson started LISTENING ... And in the meantime, I did it all, rimming assholes, deep-throating cocks, taking it up the ass ... and realizing I'd missed it ... and when we took a break, the Major was pleasant and relaxed and offhandedly complimentary ... Yeah, I was a slut -- but it was what I was there for, and I was doing a fine job; what else could I ask for? And when the Major teased Tillotson into pumping his cock into me, I made DAMNED sure we both enjoyed it -- and the Major helped, and got a kick out of doing it...

And when the Major wanted his, later, he didn't begrudge me mine and we had a wonderful time and I knew that I'd need to do it all again -- regularly. The Major was ALMOST right. I wasn't a luxury car -- I was a truck! Actually, I was an SUV -- I was the Cadillac Escalade, the Lincoln Navigator of sluts! My big fat jugs and my porky ass and my thick hips were there so I could take hard fucking from big, hard men and come back for more. I was tough to damage and capable of taking a beating, but luxurious -- all of my holes knew cock and how to make it comfortable. I could climb a curb without damaging my bodywork, or do rutted dirt roads -- just wash me off, afterwards. The only problem here -- the one Ollie was going to have to deal with -- was the word 'men' -- plural -- not 'man' ... Slut Vera was there for men to play with -- and just one probably wouldn't be able to get her into four-wheel drive...

This is what I knew when I walked back in that door. Ollie had wanted me loosened up and put back on track -- and he had gotten his wish -- but things had gone farther than was going to be comfortable for either of us. Jack had said something Friday night to Judith -- "There will probably be a period of 'Oh, God! I'm a slut!' and things will get rough until you move on to 'Thank God I'm a slut!' which is where you need to be." For me, the 'Oh, God -- I'm a slut!' period had started in high school and gone on for almost twenty-five years while I repressed everything and was therefore unable to move on and learn to live with myself -- but overnight, I'd finally moved on to 'Thank God I'm a slut!'

The problem was Ollie. I owed Ollie more than I could ever repay from all that time when he was giving one hundred percent and I was giving back maybe thirty. So now I was probably going to have to make do with thirty percent of what I wanted -- because that would be what Ollie could give me, working at capacity. It was pretty ironic, when you think about it...

When I got back to our quarters, I went to Ollie and hugged him -- and he asked, very carefully, "How was your night?"

I said, "Fine, Master. I think I accomplished everything you wanted me to." I know that wasn't what he expected at all, but it was the truth...

Soon after, we were distracted by Jack's little video object lesson -- which was rough, to say the least! Then the AI had us head for the passenger mess that Oliver's colleagues attended for breakfast. We met Jack's concubines on the way, which was nice, as it kept us from being the only ones nude -- but I was already learning not to worry about it. We were nearly settled in with food when Ollie's boss Dave and his Brinkman people started wandering in. We ended up demonstrating how to get breakfast from the replicators -- something recently learned from Tara.

Dave and Ollie talked and Dave settled in with us. In a few minutes, Jack came through the door, followed by the Major and Decurion Tillotson -- and things got embarrassing. The Major was effusive with his praise -- and very descriptive; I was thoroughly unmasked! Any thought I might have had about hiding my capacity for large amounts of sex from Ollie was totally dashed! The Major went so far as to say, "It's so unusual to find a woman who actually enjoys sex in quantity, rather than just enduring it. I'm going to have to raise my standards!" I could do nothing but stand my ground and return Ollie's gaze...

After breakfast, Jack took his girls and advised Ollie to join the Brinkman Foundation group. I think Ollie was momentarily miffed -- but Jack had things to do and couldn't babysit us all the time. Besides, Ollie got a good bit of adulation for his part in the group's extraction, which didn't hurt his ego any.

We were split up, though, for the briefings; most of it I'd heard from Jack already, so there were few surprises -- but the other concubines in the group tended to be regularly shocked! I found that I was actually a help to some of them, just by being there; someone would make an exclamation like "Surely you're kidding!" and everyone would look at me -- and I would smile and shake my head ... Britney helped with this, even though she hadn't seen it all; she was still properly undressed and able to sit and look serene and shake her head.

At one point, I got up and said, "Ladies, some of you at least have been doing this job -- poorly, maybe, like I was, but you've been doing it. You were married to your man and you love him and you played bedroom games with him and you had his children -- and you're raising them. That hasn't changed. You're not equal partners any more, though -- that HAS changed. But that isn't new -- we were just crawling out from under that rock, and in some places on Earth they STILL hadn't -- the old ways held that you never HAVE been equal! You can do this -- it's been done before. There will be other women -- and the best thing you can do about that is treat them as sisters and act as though your hubby has taken an additional wife. Everybody knows that raising kids takes your attention away from your man; he may need it but they need it more, and there are only so many hours in the day and you only have so much energy. Well, now you have HELP! Lean on each other! Share the load! Save that much more energy so you can give your man that attention he's going to demand from you -- and when you can't, smile when she steps forward and provides THAT for you! I know you've heard the ugly truth, here -- you've been demoted. But your man is no more used to the idea of being the evil slave master than you are to being a slave, and what he wants in his household is peace and harmony! What they are trying to emphasize here is that you have NO RIGHT to drive wedges between your man and the other women he selects based on your previous position -- but in many ways, the easiest way to handle this is to let them step up, rather than stepping down."

I knew I was on the right track when the AI delivering the lecture said, "This may provide an easier psychological adjustment."

There was a question and answer period with a concubine who had been in the job for a while -- and I don't know whether it helped or hurt things. I think she was settled in her role -- but many of those present seemed to think she was broken. The harsh realities were old hat to her; she confirmed many of the downside issues -- but her attitude said they were irrelevant, something I got, but I don't think a lot of the others did. You could be killed for a major infraction -- so you just avoided major infractions. It was a lot like going to jail in our old life -- how many people worry about that all the time? You avoid the problem in the first place by not doing things that will get you arrested, that's all ... I could tell, though, that several didn't get it. At one point she got irritated with someone over rape... "Honey, there is no such thing -- well, only in a few special circumstances. If your sponsor is off somewhere and a male concubine or another sponsor who hasn't got his permission won't take no for an answer, that's rape, because they don't have the right. If your sponsor wants something and you don't feel like giving it up it's NOT rape, no matter WHAT he does, because in that case YOU don't have the right to say no! If he busts you in the mouth a couple of times to get you to hold still while he sticks his dick up your ass, it's YOUR fault, because YOU didn't have your head on straight! You don't GET headaches -- or if you do, you go to Medical and get something for them. Fucking your sponsor is your JOB! There would have been a lot fewer divorces on Earth if married women had managed to remember that rather than pretending the old man had to get permission every time he wanted a little!"

"B--but," the woman involved stammered, "What about abuse?"

"Honey, there is 'abuse' and 'abuse.' If your sponsor shows a pattern of beating the shit out of you for the fun of it, that's abuse -- and the AI's see all and you can file a complaint if you like -- and it will get seriously looked at. If the Civil Service pool is a better place for you, maybe they'll take you away from him. If he slaps the shit out of you because he tells you he wants something and you don't provide it, though, that's an attitude adjustment -- not abuse." She cocked her head and looked at the woman. "You'll straighten out real quick, I think -- your head's just full of mush. It won't take more than a couple upside the head for you to stop parroting stupid shit and get down to business."

I found myself amused.

Somebody else asked, "Can we come back to the part about permission?"

The concubine cocked her head and grinned. "You're property, Honey -- just like a lawnmower. If your sponsor wants to lend you to the neighbor -- or a Marine Recon unit returning from a deployment -- you grin and bear it, because they have permission to do whatever he agrees to. If that's just cleaning the neighbor's pod because his concubine is in the hospital, that's easy street -- but if fucking is on the authorized activities list, you'd better make happy noises! On the other hand, if the neighbor tries to borrow you without permission, you have the right to fight and argue and when Daddy gets home, he's gonna call the cops, because it's stealing. Male concubines in the household need permission to fuck you -- your sponsor may want him concentrating on something else -- but in a lot of cases, they have blanket permission, because who's gonna keep the cobwebs out if your sponsor is out on a six month cruise? Male concubines OUTSIDE the household had BETTER have permission -- because if they don't and you complain, it's likely they'll end up dead!"

Someone asked, "What if the guy is physically repulsive?"

The concubine scratched her head. "Huh! THAT's a new one! Let's take that a piece at a time. Sponsors get upgrades, just like you will. Old guys get some years peeled off and ugly guys get to make adjustments. They get muscles -- and bigger dicks, too, some of them. I can't see why you would present yourself to a sponsor who makes you sick to look at him, even if you could find one. If your sponsor wants to lend you out to the guy next door and he squicks you, then you need to ask yourself -- or him -- why he's doing it -- have you been fucking up? Does he just owe the guy? Or is he trying to break you of some bad habit? Maybe your problem is a race thing? In any case, the answer seems to be 'you grin and bear it'. You give him what he wants and try not to puke. If you DO puke, apologize..."

Ollie came and got us after a couple of hours and took us to Medical -- which was HUGE, but they were handling thousands ... There was really nothing to do but hop in the tube...

When I came out, though, everyone else was out already, standing there. Ollie had this odd look on his face -- he either wasn't happy or he was trying to be happy and having a hard time of it. "What's wrong, Master?"

Ollie eyed the medic. "I assume that there is some kind of manumission..."

The medic looked back and nodded. "Yes, Doctor. Actually, she's been fitted with the standard implants. Once we discovered this..."

"Master?"

"You can revert to Oliver, Dear -- or whatever you like, it seems," Ollie said, somewhat sadly. "I'm not sure what this means yet, but the initial piece is clear -- you are no longer my concubine."

"WHAT?" The world rocked.

"I had you tested again while you were in the tube, at the request of the medic," Ollie said. "Your scans just didn't match the profile on your CAP card very well. It seems that the last few days have been, um, beneficially traumatic ... Your CAP score has increased to six point six."

A voice inside my head declaimed, <Welcome to sponsorship, Vera Hopkins.> I recognized it as that of an AI!