“Fun,” Daria snorted. “I want… I want to be told I’m bad.”
“And as long as that’s in the bedroom, metaphorically, that’s all fine and good,” Mike replied. “Daria, look at me.”
He waited until the girl looked up and met his eyes.
“You’re a good girl, a fine woman,” Mike said, holding her eyes with his. “You just have the need to be told otherwise. Do you want to be spanked? To be abused?”
“Yes,” she admitted, still looking him in the eye.
“But you don’t want that to be your life, right?” Mike said. “Tied up and hit, carefully, and told you’re a bad girl in bed, sure. But not hit in the face because supper’s late.”
“No,” Daria said, shocked. “I mean, yes, the first but not the second.”
“You’re a sexual sub,” Mike said, shrugging and leaning back. “My favorite kind of girl. But the point is, at the end of the play you go back to being your own person. Owning yourself. Loving yourself and knowing that you are not a bad person. If you can’t do that, you’re never going to be the person you can be.”
“But now I feel as if I really need it,” Daria practically wailed. “I want it all the time—”
“Item twenty something on the post-rape checklist,” Mike said. “Nymphomania. The female in the situation shifts to desiring sex. If it’s going to happen, anyway, they might as well learn to enjoy it. A lot. And do it. A lot. Even when they aren’t forced to.”
“You’re saying I’m sick?” Daria asked carefully. “Nymphomania is being sick.”
“Not really,” Mike replied, shrugging. “You’re just having a standard reaction to your form of trauma. Sorry if it makes you feel less special. Not sorry if it makes you feel less bad. Because you’re not. You’re a fine young lady. You’ve just been through a traumatic experience and you’re reacting to it in fairly well recognized ways.”
“So what do I do about it?” Daria asked, sitting up.
“That’s where my knowledge sort of breaks down,” Mike admitted. “The thing about rape, especially when it happens to a person with little or no experience of sex, is that it changes the wiring for what is positive and negative sexual experiences. You can’t really know what your sexual interests, your needs, are. Look, my ex-wife did some rape counselling. Most of the stuff I know comes from her and girlfriends who have been abused. I’m not an expert. Okay?”
“Okay,” Daria said, carefully. “But you’re as close as I can get right now.”
“Right,” Mike admitted. “Especially since you’re still, effectively, a prisoner. Even if I went out and found a counselor, he or she would be sucked into the same void. So I’ll just tell you what I know. The thing about rape is that it sort of changes the wiring. There was a boy that my wife counselled. He’d been homosexually raped when he was thirteen or so. And he’d been homosexually oriented ever since. So he was in his mid-twenties or so and all of a sudden he starts getting interested in girls. He’s not sure what’s happening, so he goes back into counselling. Turned out, he wasn’t really homosexual at all. His orientation was as a result of the rape, period. So right now, it would be hard to tell what your real orientation is.”
“So what do I do?” Daria asked. “What do I do about the… the nightmares? About the feelings?”
“Well, one thing is you talk about them,” Mike said. “This is a good start. And if you’re fixated on certain kinds of sex, try them. You’re not a virgin anymore. If you want to have sex, have sex. Over time, your real orientation will probably, I dunno, realign? Talk to some of the other girls about the feelings they have, the nightmares they’re having. Talking about it hurts when you do it, but it will help.”
“I’ll tell you one nightmare,” Daria said. “It’s that this is all an elaborate joke to break us down again. That we’re going to go right back into being whores. That’s not even a nightmare; it’s something I worry about all the time.”
Mike opened his mouth to reply and then paused.
“You know, there’s an aspect of this I hadn’t considered,” he admitted. “If we bungle one of the upcoming ops, you might just end up that way. Back in slavery, that is. Hell, the Keldara women would. Although I think the rest of the militia would turn up pretty quick with Nielson leading them. I probably ought to figure out a way to get you all back to Georgia. You’d be safer there. Not safe, exactly, but safer.”
“To be part of your harem?” Daria asked bitterly.
“Like I said, I’m not sure what to do with you,” Mike replied.
“Can I just go home?” the girl asked softly.
“Not until the op is over,” Mike said. “You understand why.”
“Understand, yes,” Daria said. “Happy about, no.”
“Not much I can do about your happiness,” Mike replied with a shrug.
“You can do one thing,” Daria said.
“And that is?”
“I need…” She paused and looked at the floor. “I want…”
“You know that this is probably just your reaction to what you went through, right?” Mike asked.
“Yes,” she admitted. “That doesn’t relieve the need.”
Mike cocked his head to the side and really looked at her for a moment.
“Daria?”
“Yes?” she asked, looking up.
“Take your clothes off.”
“What?” the girl asked.
“I’m going to relieve both our needs,” Mike replied, standing up and walking over to her. “I’m not sure if it’s a good idea, but it’s the best one I can come up with right now. The bedroom door is, metaphorically and really, shut. You can choose to not play the game if you wish.”
“I choose…” Daria said then paused. “I think I choose to play.”
“Fine,” Mike said, walking over to one of the other chairs and sitting down. “Then stand up and take off all of your clothes.”
The girl looked at him for a moment and then stood up and started to slowly undress. She started off looking at him but when she started to slip her dress off she had to look away.
When she started to sit down and remove her shoes, Mike waved at her to stop.
“Keep the shoes on,” Mike said gruffly. “I like high heels. Here is the deal. You’ve been an actual sex-slave. Some of the play is based around that sort of situation. Are you going to be able to take that?”
“Yes,” Daria said, softly, still looking at the floor. “As long as I’m sure it’s play.”
“Are you?” Mike asked.
“Yes,” Daria admitted. “I trust you. I don’t know why I do, but I do.”
“It might have something to do with my rescuing you from durance vile,” Mike told the naked girl. “Or my winning smile. But we’re going to have to establish the parameters. That is, we’re going to have to find out what I can and cannot do. And you’re going to have to know how to end the play. Are you listening?”
“Yes,” Daria replied. “Can I put my clothes back on?”
“Not unless you want the play to end,” Mike said. “Do you?”
“Not yet,” Daria admitted. “I am very confused. I want to do this, but I am frightened. I was stripped like this to be sold to Ahmed Pasha. It was very humiliating. This is very humiliating. But…”
“You like it,” Mike said.
“Yes.”
“Go over to the bed and get a pillow,” Mike ordered. “Put it on the floor and kneel on it. There,” he added, pointing to a spot a few feet away from his chair. “Keep your head down when you are kneeling. You will only look at me when I order you to do so. The response to that is ‘Yes, master.’ ”
“Yes…” Daria said, pausing with a catch in her voice. “Yes, master.”