Surrendering to Her General

by Sadie Marks

  "Quiet, girl. You have to be examined before you're allowed up," he snapped impatiently.

  She sat down on the edge of the bed, trying to avoid touching the furs, and then she blinked, tilting her head. There was something different about the way he was speaking. The general, and this definitely was not him, had spoken slowly and in an oddly formal way that matched those Sadecs she'd seen on the news. There was always a faint accented burr to their speech, too, that was lacking now. "Your English is really good," she blurted.

  One eyebrow went up, and he made a chuffing sound of laughter. "No, girl, your Sadec is really good," he corrected her.

  "What?" She gave him a confused look, not understanding.

  He began to examine her in a quick, efficient way that made her think he had to be a doctor of some kind. As his hands roved over her body, touching her intimately but without any sexual heat, she squirmed and tried to avoid the thorough inspection. Her reflexes were slow from just having woken up and he had no problem getting around her despite her efforts. He barely seemed to notice as he explained, "We use translators on Earth. You have a ridiculous number of languages to learn, and most of us can't be bothered to go to the trouble, but if you're going to live with us, you need to speak the language, so it's included with the body. You should be grateful; our methods of teaching new skills can be exacting."

  Her struggles continued, and she went so far as to try to move back on the bed to avoid him.

  He sighed, "Stop that, girl, or do you need punishment already, to make you stay still?" He punctuated the last word by pushing his hand between her thighs, and her body reacted with an embarrassing rush of fluid.

  She wasn't sure if it was his touch or the threat, but whichever, it seemed to be what he was looking for and he nodded to himself and released her.

  "Body reactions on target, no modifications required," he said. "You can get up now, but you won't be permitted to leave this room until someone comes to get you." It was an unnecessary warning since she didn't even know how to open the door. Even though she watched as he left and tried to figure out how it worked, when she'd approached it, nothing happened.

  So, she reluctantly settled back on the bed to wait, but not before she shoved all the animal pelts off the other side so they fell out of sight. It was just too creepy to have them near her. She had no way of keeping track of time, but she knew it hadn't been very long before the door was opening again. Another Sadec, her third now, entered. Her attention drifted briefly to the human man that followed him but was quickly pulled back to the alien.

  At first, seeing them on the Sphere in news reports, she'd thought they all looked pretty much identical, like alien clones with the same skin tone, eyes, and hair, but now she was starting to be able to see the subtle differences in them. Even though they didn't have nearly the range of variety that humans came in, she could tell them apart when she looked closely.

  This one, another male, seemed younger and less experienced. He didn't have the confident dominant aura the general had, nor the rushed impatient 'in charge' attitude that the doctor had, but that didn't mean he wasn't aware of the power he held over her. His intense stare roved over her body as she sat on the bed, and she flushed with shame.

  "What's your name?" he asked

  She was slow to respond, probably because he was the first alien to ask her identity. She'd begun to think she'd just be 'girl' for the next five years. The intense stare turned into a frown when she didn't answer immediately, and she quickly gave him her name, "Kenzi—Kenzi Ellis."

  "Kenzi Kenzi Ellis," he repeated. "That's a long name for a slave."

  She didn't want things to descend into a comedy routine where she tried to explain it was only one Kenzi, or that Ellis was her surname, so she said, "Most people call me Kenzi. Instead." He seemed to like that better and nodded.

  "Kenzi, then. I'm Rohhul." He enunciated it carefully, emphasizing the double pronunciation of the h so she could repeat it. It took her a couple of tries before he nodded. He pointed to the quiet companion. "This is Dez."

  Her eyes flicked to the other human and then back to the Sadec. "I wasn't sure if I was supposed to call you Master or something," she admitted. "I haven't really been told much." It was a struggle not to squirm under his gaze; he had no shame when it came to enjoying the sight of her body. She pulled her legs up to her chest and wrapped her arms around them to hide as much of herself as she could.

  Those dark, bottomless eyes followed the movement, and then, without a word, he turned and strode towards the door, which opened as if by magic. The portal retracted after him, and she was left with the man from her own planet. He'd been quiet while the Sadec was in the room, but now he spoke in a low reassuring tone, "No one is told much before they arrive. This is your orientation, I guess. I'm just going to explain a few things, answer your questions, and then I'll give you a bit of training before I escort you to a waiting room," he said in a slow, southern drawl.

  "Are we still on Earth then?" she asked, flustered.

  "Naw, we left yesterday while you were still asleep. We're a long way off now," he said, shrugging.

  "Sorry, I-I guess I wasn't expecting to see another human so soon. They warned me that there weren't many processed yet. I'm supposed to be one of the first," she murmured, but it was confusing because he didn't look new. He looked like he was confident in his place and a little bit bored about having to show the new girl around. She wanted to ask him if he was a Pain Receiver, like her, or if he was on the ship for another reason, but she was too flustered to form the question.

  He gave her an amused look that she didn't understand. "Well, there are a couple of us human types on board. The Sadecs tend to have less patience and don't like a lot of questions so preparing you is my job. You should get all the questions out now," he added.

  Less patience, yeah, that would describe it. "Um, well, I am wondering how I'm speaking their language," she said after a brief hesitation. "He—the doctor? He said it was included with the body, but…" She hadn't had a chance to ask the doctor many questions, but now she was curious.

  He nodded like that was exactly what he thought she'd ask first. "They call them clinicians here, but yes. When they transferred your consciousness to the new body, they added in the Sadec language as part of the procedure. Implanting languages is easy for them, and translators are never perfect. This way, there won't be any misunderstandings," he explained.

  "Oh." It made sense; if they could move over all her memories, then adding a few had to be easy enough. There were so many other things she wanted to know that the questions got jammed up in her head and she just sat there in silence.

  "Anything else?" he asked pointedly.

  "I don't—I don't know how I'm supposed to behave," she said. It wasn't a question, but she hoped he could form an answer anyway.

  "That's why I'm here, sweetie. The most important thing for you to do is obey, immediately. If you hesitate, you'll just make it worse. They will look for any excuse to punish you, but if you obey, they may be satisfied with lighter things that you might enjoy. Each warrior will have their own rules, so there's no point in giving you a whole list. Just do what you're told, or…" He made that gesture again before continuing. "…don't. There are few things that you could do to actually anger them, but they will see disobedience as begging for harsher treatment and will jump at the chance."

  "That's…" She stopped and frowned as she puzzled through that. It was nothing like she thought it would be. She'd expected all kind of strict rules and protocols. She thought she'd be told to keep her eyes down and call everyone by a title—this wasn't like the stories or vids at all. "…not what I expected, I guess. I can just disobey if I want to?" she asked, trying to clarify something that seemed so odd.

  He laughed. "Kenzi, many of them will prefer it if you do. If you fight and struggle, they'll enjoy it more. They are honoring the constructs of our culture to a certain extent. Many of them spent time in the clubs, so they h
ave an idea that if a submissive is out of line, it's because she needs severe punishment. You're not precisely a slave here, at least not in the way you expected." He looked thoughtful, as if trying to figure out how to explain it to her.

  After a second, he came over and took a seat on the bed next to her. She flushed and moved over when her bare skin brushed again his. He, at least, had some clothing, but he was dressed similarly to the Sadecs, and his upper body was bare. He didn't bother to hide a smile as she moved. "You'll get over that body shyness pretty quick. I did. It took a few months, but I got there."

  "Months? Have you been here months already?" Her head jerked around, eyes widening in surprise as they met his.

  "Actually, a bit longer than that," he said, nodding with a hint of evasion. "Anyway, we should—"

  She interrupted, "B-but the centers haven't even been open that long! They said only a few had finished before me, and—" The rapid gush of words trickled to a stop as her brows furrowed. Something wasn't adding up.

  "Kenzi, um, I'm not sure how to tell you this, but some of us have been here since long before the Sadecs made the offer. A few of us were here before Welcoming Day, actually. I was, and I've met at least one other." One hand went up to rub the back of his neck, and there was a sweet, distant look on his face, like he was remembering something happy.

  "They lied to us?" she whispered. She forgot about the nudity and turned on the bed to face him directly. All the doubts and fears that had been submerged by how right it had felt to be commanded by the general resurfaced. If they'd still been on Earth, maybe she would have run for it. But it was too late to run, far too late. She had consented to this, and now she was trapped for the duration.

  4

  He hesitated and then sighed, obviously deciding it would be faster just to tell her what she wanted to know. He began to fill her in on the information they didn't have back on Earth. That the Sadecs had been visiting for a long time wasn't a shock to her. After the big reveal, a couple years back, the Sentient Council had explained that there had long been a thriving, but secret, tourist trade as other cultures had visited to learn about humans. They'd been a little bit vague on the details and made it sound like a beneficial thing, so no one really questioned it—they were still adjusting to the shock of finding out that thousands of other sentient races had been eagerly waiting to meet them.

  The one thing they'd been very clear on, though, was the details of the experiment and the quarantine. Humans had been assured that those crazy alien abduction stories really had been only stories. In front of the whole world, they'd explained the need for scientists to control every factor. Prior to the first rocket off world, there'd been no interference, and after that, everything had been controlled; that's what they'd been assured. But here was a slave who'd been taken long before the reveal, and she wasn't sure how to process that.

  "To be honest, I really don't think anyone knows how long they've been visiting. Longer than people back home would guess, though. The party line is that they discovered the BDSM scene during the adjustment period, but I doubt it. They don't talk about it much because they were there before they were supposed to be—but you must have noticed the coincidence of the word sadist being so close to Sadec? I asked once, and my Master laughed and said, 'There are no coincidences.' So, I'm thinking they go way back," he said, shrugging.

  She frowned, but yes, of course, the similarity in words had been noticed. It was the root of many jokes about them back on Earth, but she hadn't thought it actually meant anything. "Y-you seem okay with being kidnapped, um, Dez, right?" she asked, clarifying his name.

  "Dez's just a pet name that doesn't translate to English very well because it's more of a concept in their culture and we just don't have words for it. My real name is Thomas, but I'm used to Dez now, and yeah, I'm the happiest I've ever been. I wasn't exactly kidnapped, though. I fell hard for this Master I met in a club, and then he said he had to leave town and he asked if I wanted to come with him—so, I said yes. It wasn't until we left the planet that I found out he wasn't human and we weren't just leaving the city. It was an adjustment, but I've never regretted it," he explained with a look of serene contentment on his face.

  "So, still a volunteer, just— before it was technically allowed?" she asked, sounding a little relieved. That wasn't so bad, then.

  "Um, a lot of Sadecs took their favorite submissives from Earth at the end of their visits, sort of like a souvenir I think, so most of us agreed to it. Well, at least we agreed to be with them. I don't think anyone was ever told the whole truth until they got into space, just to make sure the secret was kept. The Sadecs don't like rules, but they also don't like dealing with the council, so they try to be sneaky about breaking them," he explained.

  There was so much she hadn't known. She wondered now, if the Earth hadn't agreed to allow submissives to volunteer, would the Sadecs have just taken them? Probably, but then she thought of the way his voice had rolled over her, leaving her dripping with passion, and she doubted many people said no to them. "They don't like rules, but we have to follow theirs?" She snorted, rolling her eyes.

  He laughed and then got to his feet and began to pace around the room. He seemed filled with energy, and her gaze followed him. "We should get started, or they'll be impatient and we'll both get punished," he said as his eyes flicked to the invisible door nervously.

  Nodding, she kept her eyes on him, wondering what was about to happen. She didn't have to wait long. "There are a few rules you can't break, not unless you want to be in big trouble, and I mean trouble you won't enjoy even a little," he said in a serious tone of warning.

  He held up one finger. "Don't go anywhere on the ship that's marked as forbidden. You'll see the signs in red on any sections that aren't allowed. It's mostly for safety reasons; if you get caught in one of those places…" He shook his head. "Just don't risk it."

  "Safety. I get it. We're on a space ship so there's dangerous stuff; seems fair," she agreed. She didn't question the mostly part; with everything going on, she had enough to take in.

  "Right, it's just common sense. Next," A second finger went up. "You can fight them all you want, but hurting another human is forbidden. Not only will you be punished, but you'll be punished by everyone who has a claim on the other slave, and they won't be nice about it. I told you that we're not slaves, really, not like you'd expect. They treat us like—" Here, he paused, frowning as he tried to think of how to describe it. "We're like pampered pets, companions and children, all at once. They are fiercely protective of a Pain Receiver they feel a connection with, and because there are so few of us here, we are usually shared among at least a few Sadecs."

  Her eyes widened, and she licked her bottom lip nervously. "Shared? But I thought we'd be auctioned off to one owner?" Was anything she was told accurate? Though, when she thought about it, the problem had mostly been a lack of information and she'd filled in the details on her own. It wasn't so much that she'd been lied to; they'd just let her believe what she wanted to believe. Either way, it was a shock, and there was more coming.

  There was sympathy in his hazel eyes as he shook his head. "You'll be assigned a price, and you'll have an owner, but they'll share you with others. They've been waiting for more volunteers to pass through—for ship's morale. There's been too much jealousy of those who brought slaves back with them, and it's not good for the ship. It wasn't so bad before, but since the offer was made, the waiting has gotten them all hyped up to try a Pain Receiver and, like I said, they aren't very patient."

  Her mouth dropped, and she just sat there staring at him for a long moment as she tried to remember how to talk. "H-how many will be s-sharing me?" She was barely aware of how squeaky and high-pitched her voice had gone.

  "That depends on your owner's rank, mostly. The higher the rank, the fewer can make him share. Rank hath its privilege and all that." He frowned, thinking about something. "Or her. Whatever preference you put down on the forms is probably what you'll
get."

  She'd put down male, and hearing that she'd probably get that was something of a relief. She was bisexual, but when it came to being dominated, all of her fantasies had always been about men. She didn't think she'd mind playing with a female Top; she just didn't want to be owned by one. "Him. I put down male," she said.

  "Right, well, I'd say your chances would be good at getting a high-ranking owner because the cost is high, except they're weird about money. It doesn't seem to connect much with rank here. It's all earned on bravery and honor, so it could be anyone, really." He shrugged. "Anyway, there's not much else to worry about now. We don't go back to their home planet much, but if we do, be sure to ask about the rules then. There are a lot, and we don't have time to go over them now," he said briskly.

  "Okay, what's next, then?" She tilted her head questioningly.

  "You know the basic submissive positions?" he asked. Again, his eyes flicked to where the door was. He seemed to be getting more nervous, and she had a feeling this was taking longer than it was supposed to.

  "Not really. I know about kneeling, but I never submitted back home," she admitted. Her cheeks started to flush with embarrassment.

  "Figures, when we're running late. Get over here; I'm going to give you the fast course," he said, crooking a finger and motioning her impatiently.

  She hesitated. Sitting down offered her some modesty, and she was reluctant to give it up.

  He sighed, looking exasperated. "Look, I'd love to be your Earth buddy and all, but if you don't hurry, I'm going to get punished and lose a reward I was hoping to earn, and that will not put me in a good mood. So, get your cute butt off the bed now, or I'll spank you, myself, and then tell them you've been a bad girl," he said.

  There was a snap in his voice that made her take notice, and she straightened and slid off the bed quickly. She gave him a wary look as she wondered if he was actually allowed to spank her.