Enslaved - Love in the Future

This is the conclusion to my novel Enslaved - Love In The Future. I can't express my gratitude for your support (and consistently high scores) on each chapter. I would greatly appreciate it if a few of you wonderful readers would make an effort to enter grades on parts 16, 17, 18 and 19. The scores are very high, but I need just a few more total votes to earn the "Hot" designation that attracts readers. It was my goal to write an actual piece of literature - a good story with a strong plot, believable characters, and lots of eroticism. Your scores and comments convince me that I succeeded. My thanks.

The Plan

Meena was drowsy when she found Nav. He'd shot her so full of sleeping aids that it took a lot of time to wear off. But it had done its job. She'd had the first good rest since Nav took to bed.

"Good morning, Master," she said. She'd found him in his office, which was a long walk from her bedroom. Meena's hair was a disorganized mess. She hadn't fixed her makeup. Her eyes weren't quite open. She looked absolutely lovely.

"Good morning, my love," Nav said. "You look wonderful."

"I look terrible," she said.

"Agree to disagree," Nav said.

He was listening to a recording of Meena playing a spritely tune originally performed by Benny Goodman. The wall in front of his desk displayed larger-than-life photographs of Meena on the day she competed in the fitness competition in Las Vegas. She looked fierce. The music and photos were inspiring.

"Have a seat, my love," Nav said. Meena particularly liked hearing Nav say the word "love." It made her feel secure. Nav knew he'd need to say that word a lot over the coming weeks. He needed to give her more orders - a lot more. He needed to stay active. And he needed to make love to her so she never worried their relationship was in trouble.

Mainly, he needed to lead her out of her crisis. He was her Master, and that was his job.

"I've been thinking about everything that has happened since people figured out that you are enslaved. You know as well as I do that this is a great big mess."

Meena didn't say anything. But she had a pained expression on her face that said more than enough. Her music and her Master were the only things she cared about. And Feva. She also loved Feva.

"I've been thinking, and you can stop worrying. We are going to fix this. I promise," he said.

"Yes, Master," she said. Meena didn't know what her Master was thinking, but he always told her the truth.

"The first thing you will do is write a certain kind of song. It's going to have to be funny."

...................................

One week later Meena released a free song and video to her fans. It immediately began playing on virtually all news channels. As always, Nav told her to "do her best" when he described what the song should be, and she'd produced a wonderful piece of music. It was energetic. Joyful. The melody was delicious and the chord changes were masterful. The video showed her having an obvious good time as she played the song. The musicians playing with her looked happy, too.

The lyrics described the way people were talking about her, and that she felt like she was being judged. Still, the mood was light and hopeful, and the verse ended with her telling her fans what she wanted them to hear.

You know I love you all

You know that I do

But do I look like a victim to you?

Nav entered the video. They'd made sure the media never saw them together, so showing his face was something new that attracted lots of attention. He was the guy who said the nicest things! He'd given her that magnificent jewelry! Who WAS this guy? Was he really some perverted old man with too much money and not enough heart?

In the video, Nav did a series of subservient little tasks for Meena. He fetched coffee. Painted her toenails. He pretended to be a dog and Meena pretended to be his trainer. She had him sit and roll over, then gave him a treat and patted his head.

The funniest part had them shopping for women's clothes. Meena looked over the merchandise as Nav followed along, weighted down by a large number of shopping bags.

She looked at two hats, one red and one blue. Meena looked back and forth, unable to pick one. She finally looked to Nav for advice. He looked at one, then the other, and finally pointed to the blue hat. She smiled and thanked him. Meena then put the blue hat back on the shelf and bought the red one, leaving Nav convinced that she'd only asked for his opinion so she could disagree with it.

The music kept returning to the idea that there was nothing wrong with the relationship she and Nav shared. Finally, at the end, Meena stopped joking around and looked straight into the camera.

I can never tell you all I feel for my man

Or how he feels about me

I've always had these feelings no one can understand

How much I love being his property

I'm proud to be his possession

I love that he owns me

But what you don't understand

Is a big part of the plan

Is that he's my possession, too

That was what happened Monday.

Nothing happened Tuesday. Nav wanted the new song and video to dominate the discussion for a full news cycle. The next development happened on Wednesday.

Charlie Frederik announced the creation of the Louis Armstrong Foundation. Created by Meena and Nav to help talented young people interested in jazz, the foundation would do everything from buying instruments and subsidizing school music instruction to providing mentors, rehearsal space, performance venues, recording opportunities, and anything else needed to help foster a new generation of jazz artists. Every cent of Meena's income would go to the foundation, with Nav matching her contribution.

"It's named after Louis Armstrong because he is such a powerful example of the transformative power of jazz," Frederik said. "Armstrong was the illegitimate son of a prostitute. He grew up in one of the worst orphanages in America. But then he discovered jazz. It moved him to produce music so joyous and powerful that he re-made jazz in his own image, and we remember him today as the most important musician America ever produced." It was easy to get Charlie to speak passionately. Just ask him about Louis Armstrong, then brace yourself

At first, the media treated this as a touchy-feely story about a well-intentioned effort to help kids. But soon sharp observers realized Nav had destroyed the most powerful criticism against him. He was accused of exploiting Meena's talent to enrich himself. When they announced that all Meena's income would go to charity - and that Nav would match her donations - the exploitation argument imploded. When people bought one of Meena's records or tickets, they were literally draining money from Nav's bank account. For anyone who hated oligarchs, it was a win-win. People who understood math pointed out that this wouldn't have a significant effect on Nav's total wealth, but since almost no one understands math, that fact was never seriously examined.

That's what happened Wednesday. The news channels aired passionate interviews with Charlie, who was appointed director of the new foundation. They found a lot of talented kids who heard Meena's music and wanted to make some of their own, and viewers heard from school officials who were anxious to get some foundation money to support their own music programs.

The big ka-boom happened Friday.

Meena agreed to do her first live interview ever. It was on the program hosted by Uma Emerson, the celebrity slave known for her advocacy of better understanding of enslavement.

It attracted the biggest audience in the history of broadcasting. The show had everything. A beautiful star. A divisive controversy. One of the finest musicians on all three worlds. Sex - lots and lots of (possibly perverted) sex. Money. Power. How could anyone watch anything else?

"Thanks for coming on today, Meena," Emerson said. "I'm sure you've gotten a lot of requests for interviews, and I appreciate you being with us today."

"You're welcome, Uma. Nav is a big fan of yours. He watches your program all the time."

"I understand he's had some health problems," Emerson said. "How's he doing?"

"Much better. The doctors still don't know why he got sick, so they don't know why he got better. But the tests show that the problems seem to be clearing up. We are both just glad that he's doing so well."

"I'm sure you know that we've got a lot of questions we want to ask." Emerson held up a thick stack of index cards.

"I'm happy to talk as long as you want, but I can tell you right now that there's one little fact that you're going to want to hear about first.

"I am no longer a slave."

Silence. Emerson was a very quick, witty host, but Meena had shocked her into speechlessness.

Meena filled the silence. "Yesterday Nav and I signed emancipation papers. He no longer owns me.

"We realize that a lot of people have some concerns. We don't share those concerns, but we respect these opinions, so we decided it would be helpful if we dissolved the enslavement contract that upsets so many people."

"But this can't possibly change your relationship," Emerson said. "You two are bonded. There's no way to end that."

"Of course not. Our relationship will remain exactly the same. I am his and he is mine. But he has no legal ownership rights anymore. My status has changed to something else."

For the second time, Emerson did not know what to say, so Meena said it for her. "I am now his fiance." She held up her left hand, displaying an engagement ring with an enormous diamond. "Meena, what a beautiful ring!" Emerson said.

"Thank you. It belonged to Nav's grandmother. She had a particularly lovely collection of diamond jewelry she got from Nav's grandfather. Nav has been giving me her jewelry for a few years now. This is the last piece. I think it's lovely, but it is so big I have to take it off to play piano."

"It's big, I'll give you that," Emerson said.

"It's big for a reason. Some of you know that Nav's grandmother was a passionate campaigner for reform of the global diamond industry. Nav's grandfather recognized how corrupt and greedy it was, and he recruited her to join the cause. And be his wife. She wore these gems everywhere as a way to call for change.

"I think it's nice that her jewelry can symbolize something new. I've dedicated my life to reviving music that has been silenced for much too long. I recruited Nav to help me, just as Nav's grandfather recruited his wife. In our very first conversation, Nav and I talked about my interest in jazz. We hadn't been speaking for more than five minutes before he promised to do everything he could to help me. I think his grandparents would be very proud of him. Everyone who enjoys listening to jazz can thank Nav for figuring out how to wake it from hibernation."

The interview continued for a while, with Emerson eventually asking questions she'd prepared about the many ways the public failed to grasp the nature of enslavement. "Uma, we appreciate the effort you've devoted to promoting understanding. That's why the only interview we're doing is here on your show. But we have to recognize that this is a subject outside the experience of most people. It's like trying to explain a rainbow to Helen Keller.

"We can sit here and say that bonding is the most intimate and durable relationship possible between two people. I can explain that we are not capable of hurting each other. I can go on, and on, and on, and I can only get so far. I've reached the point where I think the most revealing thing I can say is that it's pretty odd that anyone feels sorry for me. Who has more love than me? Who has a more dedicated and devoted man than me? For God's sake, who has a better collection of jewelry than me!? I mean, beside the queen of England.

"I have joyful music I can share with the world. Nobody is more privileged than me. Nobody. I am the last person in the world anyone should feel sorry for.

"Do I look like a victim to you?"

...........................................

Coda

For the next several weeks, the media digested the menu of ideas Nav served to them. He and Meena remained silent. This forced the public to focus on what they'd already said without getting distracted by anything new.

There were headlines when Charlie negotiated a contract to construct music rooms in public schools. The rooms would include the same kind of recording capabilities and VR instructors Meena had at home. Charlie identified individual young people who'd released unusually good amateur recordings, and he arranged for them to get producers, record contracts and performance bookings. He said that sales of Meena's music were higher than ever, guaranteeing that the Louis Armstrong Foundation would have the resources to help many young musicians for many years to come.

It did not take long for the public to stop seeing Nav and Meena as suspicious characters. Suddenly, they were heroic crusaders, who happened to be the stars of the most passionate public romance since Romeo and Juliet. Drones flew over their house, trying to get photos of the loving couple. Nav knew he would have to arrange for them to appear in public so the paparazzi could do their job. He didn't want to see what they'd do if they got too desperate.

A completely unexpected development happened when millions of couples entered into voluntary enslavement contracts. There was no possibility contracts like that could be enforced, but it was nice if it made people feel better about their relationships.

Meena suggested that Nav come on stage sometime and perform a duet of

You Say The Nicest Things.

They rehearsed it once. She didn't suggest that again.

Meena remembered exactly what he'd said in their first conversation:

"Meena, if things work out, and I become your Master, I promise I will do everything I can to make your dream become real."

Neither one of them could have known what her dream would demand.

Nav took a long time to completely recover. The doctors remained baffled. Brain scans done before and after his recovery proved that something big had happened inside his head, but there was no record of it ever happening to anyone before. It was obvious that the threat to Meena somehow shocked his brain back to normal function.

He felt good enough to savor the notion that he and Meena had done something that lived up to the legacy of his grandparents. It was hard to remember that he bought Meena because he worried he'd lived too long. He'd needed a reason to live again. She was the best purchase he ever made.

He was no longer her Master, but she never stopped calling him that.