True Master's Foolish Dreams

I smiled at the two, raising my Com I popped the code up on one of the screens behind me.

"It's a clever hack, very clever. It only set off four of the low-level intrusion & manipulation alarms in the simulation I ran. In isolation, each wasn't important enough to warrant a higher alert. You accounted for the aggregate checker, but you missed one of the checksum validators, well a few of them actually."

I leaned forwards, "It was a novel approach. Going after the emotional parts of the program and brain, I've thought of it before but never did quite figure it out. I could do general things but flipping emotions completely. It's brilliant!"

The woman curled her lip, "I'm glad you learned something." She spoke with the acerbic certainty that she was already dead, unafraid of anything now.

I pursed my lips, "I'm curious, what were you hoping to accomplish?"

"Your death." Rumbled the man.

I blinked, "That's it?"

"Freedom, from your rule, your technology." Said the woman, her voice level.

"A little better, still I have to admit I was hoping for something a little more original. What was your plan after you tore everything down?"

The two Saboteurs continued to glare back at me, not speaking.

I sighed, "If you're going to kill me for some pretty words, and you've made it this far I applaud you. Most idealists die in the gutter, saving one horrible person from another all over a simple pocketful of ration vouchers. The world has never been free, never will be free. Power is something the strong will seize, and most people are content to simply live. I am the latest in that line of fools who take power. Eventually, I'll grow complacent, lazy, and someone will replace me."

I smiled and stood up. "That's not going to be you though, and that day is a few thousand years in the future."

The woman's face soured. "So, that's how you justify it to yourself, that's what you say to help yourself sleep at night? That you are only the next in line?"

I raised my eyebrows, "I am a brutal dictator given to fits of, from my point of view, righteous anger. A monster by any civilized definition, but a monster satisfied to hold the match in its fingers and watch it burn down rather than drop it to the dry grass and set the field alight. I could be far worse, history has more than enough examples of those kinds of beasts already."

"Taking responsibility, as twisted as you are, does not absolve you." Growled the man, I could hear the strain in his voice as he spoke. He was no doubt attempting to brute force the Interface on his neck, exhausting himself.

I let a small chuckle fall from my lips at that. "I never pretended it did."

I closed my eyes and tapped at my Com, "Here I was hoping you would actually have an original thought. Fighting me, claiming I am evil, aiming to tear down the world, without a reason or plan, parroting words and ideals is just as cruel a fate I have inflicted on this desolate spit of sand we call Earth."

I opened my eyes and shrugged. "Ah well, at least I can test your program."

Kate's hand shot out and her fingers brushed across my own as she strained against the chains holding her. She was at their limits, the only one who was restrained by the metal around her ankles and wrists, and not the piece on the back of her neck.

"Marcus, don't. If you are going to kill them, kill them. If you're going to enslave them, enslave them and be done with it."

I moved my hands away from her touch, ignoring her words. She had always been weak, always been soft. No matter how often I ignored her though, she continued to offer her advice. I was the most powerful man in the world, and I was still beholden to the parameters Belial had written into me as foolish as they were. I couldn't hurt her, get rid of her, I didn't want to.

She was chained only to stop her from getting in the way. She was chained, and yet even so her words were enough to weigh down on me.

I had ignored her when I'd ordered the bombs to fall, I had ignored her when I used slaves to provide for the rest, I had ignored her when I'd built my Towers. Every time she made the request, it was like the first time I'd done what was best for the world and ignored her.

A stabbing pain in my chest, once again I was disappointing her.

I ignored it and continued speaking. "The program really is a beauty. It would be more cruel not to show them how much more if could have done with only a little more work. Show them the amount of damage they could have inflicted on Humanity, callously wielding the ability to twisting Love into Hate, Ecstasy into Despair."

"Marcus." She whispered the word. Unbidden my head turned just enough to see her. To see the disappointment in them. She still had compassion, mercy, and everything else that fomented rebellion in her heat. The world where Humanity had Free Will only because I allowed it, was something she hated.

She had complete Freedom, save for the iron around her wrists. Something no one else enjoyed, and it was not enough for her.

Jerking my head and thoughts away from my first Slave, I raised my Com and pressed the button.

The program activated and both Saboteurs twitched. An affectation I liked to add to the programs, something external to signal the code had taken hold within the very depths of another's mind.

The woman moved first, her hand twitching towards the man next to her. Almost as if she were going to take his hand.

The man jerked away from her hesitant touch. His face twisted up as if he'd bitten into a sour lemon, the scars across his skin stretched to turn his visage into something truly ugly.

His hand curled in on itself, and with the experience born of someone who had been fighting for years turned and set his feet. The woman's eyes widened, and her own features began to twist into one of loathing. Her own hasty attack was already moving for his gut, which landed and instant later. Not set, and a third less in mass than him, the man didn't even react.

He smiled as his own fist connected, replicating her attack his punch hit her gut.

The female Saboteur grunted as the air was forced from her lungs. She doubled up in pain, and the man's next attack hit her in the face. The sound of crunching cartilage accompanied her groan of pain as she collapsed to the floor.

The other things I had chained to the back wall were yelling now, even as the man knelt his legs straddling the woman, he began viciously beating her, both of his fists already covered in blood. The woman screamed in pain, horror, anger.

Only Kate and I were silent watching.

Fists pounded; blood began to pool beneath the two. Her cries already replaced by the all too familiar wheezing of a creature that barely had the ability to. The man driven by the program she had more than likely written, and I'd modified, continued to savagely beat her spurred on by a hatred that was a dark reflection of how much he had cared for her.

I tapped my Com reversing the program.

The man shuddered, and his clenched fists froze.

A low keen grew in his throat, and I leaned forwards interested. As much as I was attempting to put on a disinterested aura his reaction would be fascinating.

Real emotion enhanced by the program she'd created. That had always been an issue with the Interfaces, creating true emotion from nothing. It could manipulate feelings already present, twist them or encourage them to bloom, but wholesale fabrication was impossible. For as much as I understood the Human brain, some things were still beyond understanding.

The man let out a howl of anguish, slowly he moved his hands underneath her head, waving fingers through her blood-soaked hair. His touch was as gentle as it could be, leaning down he let out another pained yell and hugged her to him.

Beside me Kate let out a disgruntled harrumph. "You've made your point. Let them die."

"I am the one who gives orders, not you." I growled.

"What purpose does this serve, beyond your own twisted amusement? They are beaten, end this and move on. Feelings should have no bearing on your actions, what purpose does this serve?"

Her words echoed the ones I'd said to her when I moved out of the shadows of The Company. To save the world.

Sniffing I tossed my Com back towards Kate and reclined in the uncomfortable chair. I heard the rattling of chains as she moved, taking steps back so she could snatch the device from the air.

The man was crying now, tears streaming down his face to fall onto what remained of the woman's.

"You've lost your way Master." Whispered Kate. Out of the corner of my eye I watched her raise the Com, she tapped at it for only a moment sending a command to the Interface in the Man's head.

The male Saboteur slowly collapsed as his heart stopped. Still cradling the woman, he died with her in his arms.

"This is the only way." I growled.

The room was silent, the whine of the computers fading into nothing. The clanking of the slave's chains disappeared into the void.

"This is the only way." Kates voice was whispered directly into my ears, and my eyes snapped back open.

She stood beside the two corpses, both of which were staring in my direction. The faces which had been so indistinct were now immediately recognizable. The one that stared back at me from every mirror, and the one that dominated my more pleasant dreams.

More pleasant than this.

Kate raised her hand, the Com held up like the weapon it was.

She was not crying, there was regret on her face, but her eyes were hard. She was uncompromising, she would not tolerate me slipping. She would end me if I fell from the knife's edge, she was my slave, and yet also my master.

She commanded not my thoughts, my body, actions or emotions. All she held in her grasp was my very soul. Raising the Com like a sword she slashed it through the void. The sensation of falling hit me, and once more I tumbled from a dream that was all too real...

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Marcus Roland

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Running my hands through Kate's hair, I watched through the windows as the sun rose over the city.

It was a visage smeared by smog, the testament to Human progress on this small part of the world. In spite of it the sunrise was still a beautiful. Nature had endured and recovered from far worse blights than man.

Sleep was something I had never been able to indulge in for any length of time. As late as Kate kept me up, or as tired as I might have been, waking before the sun was not an uncommon occurrence.

Waking when it was still dark and I wasn't sure if the dreams were real or not, I only had to pull her close to differentiate reality from what could be. Moving my hands through her hair, across her skin, taking in her scent and the wonderful way she was tangled into the blankets every night, stealing them away from me leaving my feet cold.

She was my anchor in the world. For all the evil I was committed to, all the blood I was prepared to spill, the souls I was determined to bend to my own, it was for her I would do it.

I was programmed to hold onto her as my anchor. Compelled by a madman, a rapist of the very soul, I would burn the world for her. Knowing why I would do these things; did not change how I would act. I was a puppet that could see the strings, but not cut them.

Kate stirred in my arms, breaking me from the dark ponderings.

"You really should sleep Master." She muttered, speaking into my shoulder.

I shifted moving so I was sitting up against the headboard. Her head beside me on the bed, I continued to run my hands through her hair I couldn't help but smile down at her groggy eyes. Half awake, covered in small bites and bruises from our night, she was Aphrodite made flesh.

"More nightmares."

Kate slowly rolled, opening her eyes and blinking a few times in the morning light she let her concern show.

"Do you want to talk about them?"

She'd asked every time I could remember having them, and like every other time I was going to give her the same answer.

"No."

Kate nodded, and disentangling herself from the bedsheets sat up beside me. Bathed in the light of the day, she was the closest thing to perfect that I could imagine. Leaning up against me, she gave me a chaste kiss on my check.

I sighed and slowly pulled away from her. I wanted to do nothing more than stay in the bed with her, order in food enough to keep us going, and forget everything else.

Standing up I strode away from her and looked out at the city, the world beyond it. A year ago, I'd not even been alive, my body had been nothing but another brain-dead patient in a medical ward. Ten months ago, I'd been living in a dingy apartment, close to drinking myself to death for lack of anything better to do.

Now I had control of one branch of The Company. I had the resources to start tracking down the other branches. What would I have in another six months?

Taking in a breath I smiled, "Today, I save the World."

Kate snorted.

I blushed and turned back to Kate who looked to be on the verge of losing control. I chuckled, "Today, I save the World."

Kate lost it and started laughing into the pillow. They were pedantic words, devoid of so much meaning and purpose. Touted out by every half-wit politician, every hero of the age, and the dictators who murdered millions.

They were the words of a foolish dreamer, who'd never learned to stop believing in such childish ideas.

+++

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What the Hell, you're alive?

That I am, and surprisingly enough I've been working on this return for about three months (Not to date this post, but USA is under Covid-19 Quarantine). I've been writing under a few other names in different genre's in the past few years but this story, for being as much porn as it is this has always been in the back of my mind.

It was my first original story of significant length, and god is it horrible. I've been trying to go back through and edit the original but man, is writers shame a hilarious thing. The fact that this is porn is likely the reason it's been rated so highly here, the audience is far more forgiving.

I am doing a re-write of the original now, one that will be toning down the porn to focus on plot(!!??) for perhaps something that can be self-published for some amount of money. I'm not a full-time author, but that's to goal at this point. Got a long way to go, still get one drink a month out of the royalties, yay!

I'm not promising quick updates or the like for this, but more looking at this as a soft reboot of things going forwards for Marcus, Kate, and Belial.

Timelines have things going out +60 years or so. Which is a bit much for a porn story, but ah well. It ain't going to be a Harem trope I'll tell you that much...