Date: Fri, 30 Mar 2007 22:52:54 +0100 (BST)
From: Nexis Pas <nexispas@yahoo.co.uk>
Subject: Dreamwork

Dreamwork: A Story for J
Nexis Pas
c 2007 by the author

His stories are the scattered shards of a mirror, glass
knives reflecting the fragmented face of the viewer,
undulating images caught in rippling water, shadows moving
beneath the ice, overheard conversations between two
characters who meet and then part. Relationships begin but
do not last. The tale ends without a resolution, and the
characters wander off into their own lives. A sense of loss
is pervasive. He is ruthless with himself and demanding on
his readers. Violence, a dominant man, a narrator who wants
to be controlled and hurt appear over and over. When I
discovered Zed's works, I read them through many times in a
frenzy of longing, longing because they do not sate, they do
not satisfy. Too much is left blank. There is no ending,
only an ellipsis.

I once saw a photograph of two chairs in a park. From the
position of the chairs, one felt immediately that two people
had recently been sitting in them and talking. Zed's
writings are like that--absences and metonymies, images
condensed and displaced, inviting the reader to supply the
missing elements and complete the story. Two empty chairs on
the meticulously mown lawn of his prose inviting the reader
to the dreamwork.

When I had finished reading all the stories I could find, I
knew that reading alone would not be enough. I had to
possess Zed. I had found a new objet d'art to add to my
collection. I emailed a note of appreciation to the nom de
plume address given with his postings. He replied. We began
an exchange of thoughts on writing and reading, on dominance
and submission. There were hints of his life in his stories;
his emails revealed other facts in passing. It took the
clever researchers I use in my work only a few hours to
identify the `real' person behind the pseudonym Zed used.
They compiled a complete dossier on Zed. I did not read it.
I did not want to know the `real' person.

I employ other, less ethical operatives. Their supervisor
read the researchers' file, as well as Zed's stories, and
devised the plan for Zed's abduction. Again, I did not want
to know the details. The results mattered, not the means. I
know only that the abduction was based on themes in Zed's
works. Zed accompanied his new lover, his kidnapper,
willingly and flew to London with him. There he was drugged
and brought to me.

When I first saw Zed, he lay, still drugged but now naked,
on a bed. His nipples were pierced, and a tattoo disfigured
his left shoulder and upper arm. When I had him turned over,
I found that the tattoo continued down his back. I left
orders for the piercings and the tattoos to be removed. I
did not want evidence of others' temporary possession of
him, I did not want evidence of his ownership of his body.
When he came to me, his body would be totally naked; all his
hair would be removed and his flesh scrubbed clean.

I did not see Zed again for a month. In the interim, I
consoled myself by rereading his stories and anticipating
the pleasures of owning him. The doctor's reports on the
laser surgery were promising. The tattoo removal was as
successful as can be expected. When the guards brought him
into my office, he was chained and muzzled. Often when an
addition to my collection is brought into my presence for
the first time, he demands answers to his questions. Who are
you? Why are you doing this to me? Tedious questions and
threats and pleas. You won't get away with this. Please,
please let me go. Few understand the futility of struggle.
Most give in after a little training, but there have been
occasions when it became apparent that I had misjudged the
candidate. That here was a person who would not become an
object. Unfortunately we have to put some of them down.

Zed, however, understood the situation immediately. The
shackles hobbled his movements, but he knelt and then bowed
his head to the floor. I stood up and walked around him,
inspecting my property. `Help him to his feet.' The guards
lifted Zed by his arms until he was standing again. I
touched his body for the first time. Smooth and cool beneath
my fingertips. Zed kept his face turned down and his eyes
closed. He did not speak but he smiled.

`You make a gift of yourself?'

Zed nodded his head in acquiescence. I raised his chin in my
hand and kissed him on the lips for the first time. `You may
look at me.'

He opened his eyes and took me in. Not a stare of defiance,
but a look of recognition. I was the master now, he was my
slave.

`Release him. Take off the chains and muzzle.'

`But, Sir, he could be dangerous.'

`No, he will be obedient. Zed will be obedient.' The name
came to me without thought. Thus was Zed christened. The
eyes of my new slave acknowledged his new designation. I
turned my back while the guards freed Zed from the physical
restraints. I knew that the mental bindings were all that I
needed. Without looking around, I told the guards to leave
when I thought that enough time had passed for them to
finish. They protested again at the danger, but I silenced
them and sent them away. I remained as I was until I heard
the door close. I wanted to see only Zed when I turned to
face him.

He was regarding me frankly and openly. I motioned him to
step closer. `Please do not move or respond. Become an
object for me. I wish to examine you.' He lifted his arms
away from his sides and spread his legs apart. I touched all
of Zed. At times my hand whispered over the surfaces of the
body, barely touching it as my palm glided over the skin. At
times I pressed my fingertips deep into the hard muscles and
smelled the faint scent of the vetiver soap used to clean my
properties before they are admitted to my presence. I licked
and tasted for the first time. I bit deep into the buttocks,
leaving my teeth marks. All for the first time. Zed was a
virgin again.

For me, it was a new experience also. In a sense, I dared to
hope that I came to Zed as a virgin. We met as equals. Our
prior histories had been erased, we were beginning a new
story. He gave himself to me, and I accepted that gift.
There would be no barriers, ownership on one side, obedience
on the other. It was our bargain, our contract.

Much later, I led him to my bedroom. Those outside our
world, and even many within it, do not understand how
intimate pain can be. Here, too, Zed was a new experience.
Even with many of my long-time properties, bindings are
necessary. They want to submit and experience the pain, but
their bodies flee it. The willing mind in weak flesh, as the
old saying has it. Zed, however, gave himself to the pain.
We sat beside each other on the bed, and I put my arm around
his shoulders. I held Zed as I played with his nipples,
stroking them at first, rolling them between my thumb and
forefinger and then pinching them lightly. Zed's former
identity had written often about nipples, and I had chosen
the nipples for my introduction to the pleasures of Zed. He
let his head relax onto my shoulder. Anyone seeing us would
have-correctly--identified us as lovers. Zed's cock stirred
and then became hard as he accepted the pleasures of the
flesh.

When I opened the drawer and lifted out the clamps by their
chain, Zed moaned. It was the first sound he had made since
entering my office hours earlier. `May I?' It was necessary
to have his agreement here, at the beginning. I would not
ask again. I would never need to ask again.

Zed smiled and sat up straight. He pushed out his chest to
present the nipples to me. `Please.' We kissed, delaying the
first moment of pain. It was too precious an occasion to
hurry. I put my hand on the back of his neck. Beneath my
fingertips, I could feel the blood pulsing in the carotid
artery. `Please,' he whispered again. I put the first clamp
in his hand and then closed my own hand over his. I lifted
our joined hands and fingers toward his nipple and then
pressed the clamp open. Together we closed it around the
nipple. As the teeth bit into that tiny bit of flesh, Zed's
body stiffened. `Please, accept this gift from me,' I
begged. He lifted his face to look into mine and smiled
again.

Later still, I entered him for the first time, uniting us
for the first time, one body, one flesh, cleaving unto each
other.

Months have passed. I have no need of anyone else now except
Zed. He comes to me unshackled except for the bonds he
closes around himself. His room is next to mine. I ordered
that he be given a computer and connected to the internet.
He set up the computer himself and created his own
passwords. They are known only to him. He is free to
communicate with others, to write new stories, to send them
to others. He writes occasionally. Perhaps he communicates
with others, perhaps others read the story of our
relationship. I do not know. He would show me what he has
written if I were to ask, but I do not. When he is ready,
when he thinks I am ready, he will give the new stories to
me to read. Zed must be free to be a slave. It is his
submission, freely given, that makes him a slave. If I were
to force him to do anything, then he would become a mere
possession, simply another object in my collection.

I play the role he is writing for me.