She looks at me, defiance in her eyes. She probably thinks she looks tough, but she only looks disobedient, cute, and a tiny bit stupid.
Her unruly eyes make me want to fuck her. I think about taking her in the center of this room, leaving her dripping in my hot seed.
"I hate you," she sneers.
"Right now, you might hate me," I say. "Give it a few weeks. You'll learn to love me more than your daddy."
She wets her panties. Absolutely soaks them, and the excess wetness floods the bucket below her. She steps away from the bucket, yanking her collar from my hands. "Fuck. Off," she says, scowling.
I don't want to do what I'm about to do. I don’t want to, but she must learn. Away from the Earth Federation bases, women must submit to survive.
I force her to the ground and kneel alongside her. I place her cheek near the urine bucket and dip my finger inside. "Didn't your mother teach you how to potty?"
She nods and cries like a pathetic baby. I pull her back onto her feet and make sure she's looking at me. I lower my tone and try to explain.
"I don't want to hurt you," I say. "It's about teaching you right from wrong. You can't get better if you keep acting up."
Tears ruin her pretty face. "I know right from wrong. You’re the bad guy here. Not me."
I shake my head and lead her back to the bed. There's so much she doesn't know about her people. I’m only being careful.
The Earth Federation exterminated everyone I loved. My family. My brother.
Maybe she doesn't know. Maybe she justifies it. It happened before her time. Still, it is a brand she defends as her own.
If she realized the truth, she would understand who I am. Maybe she'd have some empathy, but the knowledge could also break her.
We are all victims of our reality, but our reality sometimes distorts, becoming a nightmare. Sometimes, we have no control over what we see and experience.
The events that made me who I am broke me. I'm never getting those moments back again.
I only have her.
I set aside the past and occupy myself with cleaning her room. In silence, I make things right by tidying her world as best I can. When I'm done, I blow out the candles.
Simple as that.
No matter how much she screams and bucks. No matter how hard she tries to claim an upper-hand. She can't distort the truth any longer.
She's not leaving me. She's mine. Forever.
Two weeks later...
Anna is handling her treatment well.
She has stopped fighting me and accepted that the drugs are healing, not hurting her. I am not her torturer. I am the only one on this planet that wants to see her get better.
To celebrate, I've decided that it’s time to let her upstairs. It's the first time she has been out of the hole, and I'm hoping she stays obedient.
I push her inside and sit her at the dinner table. The interior of my shack is a wreck. It's full of old tech I've modified over the years.
Loose wires, microchips, and various tools lay in piles on the floor. Every so often, a piece of machinery lights up or makes an odd noise. It's not great a place to drag a mate to, but these are special circumstances.
I twist a silver key into the gold locket that clamps through her collar. Three clicks to get the collar off. "You don't need to wear this anymore," I say. "You're healing faster than expected. You’ve been a good girl."
Her tone has changed. The way she looks at me has, as well. She doesn’t exactly trust me, but she doesn’t fight me much anymore. She’s… playful.
She looks at it and bites the inside of her lip. "I was beginning to like wearing it."