Chapter 8 - Reyna
IT WAS AThursday and I’d had an especially rough time with my consultation work.
All I’d wanted the entire day was for time to pass so I could have my bath and head to bed so I could go to Aurora.
It had become a small crutch for me both mentally and socially.
I’d been barely leaving the apartment as it was and being invited to participate in the Alpha testing for the game provided me with even less reason to leave.
I’d eventually made it a habit of leaving the house once a week just to get the bare necessities - food, water, toiletries, and any other additional items I may need that I couldn’t order online.
I knew something I’d seen earlier that day had soft triggered me and had started to bother me, but I did my best to ignore it.
I didn’t even bother to eat dinner that night, opting instead to just have my bath and head to bed so I could escape.
I neglected putting on my usual nightwear, instead just going to bed nude and throwing my blankets over me after I secured the headband in its’ proper place.
The game had long progressed beyond the Alpha stage and Open Beta had just ended, giving way to live where a flurry of new players had come in so things in Aurora had started to become much busier.
Following the usual countdown, I closed my eyes and logged in, opening my virtual eyes and finding myself inside my wardrobe as usual which was and still is my preset login location.
After getting dressed in something fairly ordinary, I hopped around from room to room with no real purpose.
I was still dealing with the soft trigger even as I was asleep and it was coming through in my erratic decision-making in the game that night.
Having been to at least a dozen rooms, I ended up in the Slave X Auction room, a role playing establishment where players could put themselves up as sex slaves to the highest bidder.
It was all consensual and done for fun so there was no real issue with any sort of abuse.
Every one of the participants being auctioned enjoyed the fantasy of being owned or at least being submissive or “subs” to other players.
It was a popular option among the BDSM community in the game, some of whom I’d become familiar with given the kind of work I’d been doing in Aurora.
I took a seat in the second row of some plush red and black chairs that were adorned in similarly-colored buttons and brown leather.
The room itself was something resembling a modern playhouse or theater, complete with an upper balcony and several dozen chairs so others could watch the auctions take place.
The first few rows where I was seated were reserved for those interested in potentially purchasing a slave.
Having never done it before I had no idea how it all went down, but was interested in learning.
Each slave, most of whom were women, were held in a back room until their name was called.
At that time, they’d come out on stage and walk around, showing off their body and giving potential buyers a preview of who and what they’d be getting.
Some of the slaves would strip down and stand there completely nude which I never really liked.
I’d always felt and still do feel that part of exploring someone the first time was part of the fun of getting to know them so exposing themselves on stage before the purchase spoiled part of the fun.
As the event went on, more and more “slaves” were presented and purchased and I even bid on a few while having no intention on actually wanting to buy them.
Some of the women were up there for a time and no one would bid so I felt the need to kick start the bids so I’d call out a random acceptable amount, usually 1 to 5 thousand gold.
Already within this event, I had some slaves stand up there and it appeared people were too afraid to bid and things would get awkwardly quiet.
My bids did help to get things rolling though in at least two of the auctions.
In one of them, I’d ended up in a bidding war with 2 other buyers where we all ended up on the maximum bid of 50k gold.
When the maximum bid is reached, other potential buyers can chime in with a maximum bid if they choose.
Once the bids were closed, the maximum bidders engage in a roll off where a random number generator was used to produce a number between 1 and 100 and the highest rolls would then win the auction.
On the second to last auction, I lost with a miserable roll of 22 and the winner had managed an 86.
Only a single auction remained and I’d only looked over their profile for a moment before they were called out on stage.
She was a dark skinned woman, about 29, wearing white and yellow shorts with a white top.
Much of her accessories like her bracelets and earrings were also white as well as the nail polish on her fingers and toes.
The contrasting colors made her stand out and the mask she wore came off when her auction finally started.
She was made available to both men and women so I decided to bid on her.
My opening offer of one thousand was quickly eclipsed by another offer of 5 thousand and yet another of 10,000.
I looked up to the stage again and saw her up there looking around the room.
She was trying to see who the bidders were using our bidding paddles.
After a slight pause, I quickly raised my bid to 15 thousand.
I looked over to my right and spotted a relatively new player that had made a name for himself for all the wrong reasons.
Your Master, as he called himself, was one of those men that loved collecting women like trophies.
I’d gotten to know him when he approached me in another room when he’d first started after the game went live.
He wanted to “recruit” me into his stable of women and when I refused, he got angry.
He argued that I needed a pimp and that he’d help me make a lot of money.
Still, I refused.
I’d seen what some pimps did to their girls and I had made the decision long ago that I would remain solo, even if it cost me jobs which it didn’t seem to.
Even as more pimps rose in prominence the flow of clients I was seeing never decreased, but their mentions to me of bad experiences did.
Your Master or YM as I called him for short was very strict with his girls and he took a sizable cut of their earnings.
On more than one occasion, one of his girls approached me and asked about my rates which were, at the time, fairly high and asked how I managed to keep getting customers without a pimp while still asking for so much.
I explained to her that I focused on the quality of my encounters with my clients.
I never just got naked and had sex with them until they climaxed, but instead I spoke to them like human beings, made them comfortable, and showed them kindness and compassion.
I had quickly developed a sense for knowing which potentials would be too aggressive for my liking and I would turn them down.
Sometimes they’d get exceptionally angry with me which only justified my decision not to take them on as a client.
The unfortunate side effect of that is those same men would often find their ways to YM’s girls where they were allowed to treat them roughly.
YM didn’t care as long as he got his money.
The bid had suddenly hit 40 thousand gold when I looked away from YM and he was the high bidder.
Without thinking I raised my paddle and offered 43 thousand.
I looked back up to her and saw that she was looking right at me, having seen me raise my paddle.
We locked eyes for a moment before I looked back over to YM to see him grinning from ear to ear.
I knew what he was thinking.
He didn’t even want the final auction because he was looking for someone to add to his stable.
Instead, he wanted to deny me what I was wanting at the time.
I didn’t even know why I wanted it back then.
All I knew was I wanted her with me and not him.
45 thousand was the next bid from YM which he also felt compelled to shout out as if trying to intimidate me.
Looking back up to the dark-skinned beauty in white, I offered the maximum bid of 50 thousand gold which drew a loud cheer from the crowd.
I looked back over to YM and he chuckled, quickly matching my 50 thousand gold offer.
One other bidder from the back of the room whom I paid no attention to also offered the maximum bid and after a few moments to check for additional max bids, the auction ended with me, YM, and a random guy that I did not know being forced to roll for the opportunity to “own”
this “slave,”
at least for a short time. The first to roll was the man from the back and his result was 12 which all but assured he would not win. YM and I locked eyes once more and he laughed at me as he rolled a 70 - not unbeatable, but a damn good roll. I looked away from him and back up to the mostly nude woman on the stage and again we locked eyes. Without looking away from her, I entered my roll and let the random number generator decide her fate - 72. I had won.
I looked back over to YM to see the grin on his face disappear and be replaced with a scowl. He’d never forgiven me for turning him down and he wanted me to pay for denying him something he desired. He never really wanted her. All he wanted was for me to fail so he could take her from me, but I had denied that pleasure to a man that was very used to getting what he wanted. In a huff, YM stood up and stormed out of the bidder’s pit, two of his girls trailing behind him.
I looked back over to the stage and stood up to eye my prize, Reyna, who was already making her way down to me. I quickly sat back down in my chair and waited for her to walk between the rows. The MC announced that the days’ auctions were over and thanked everyone for coming, letting us all know they would be back the following week for more role play fun.
Once she’d made her way over to my chair, Reyna knelt down in front of me as most slaves did for their new “masters.”
In that moment, what had been a soft trigger I’d experienced in my real life had suddenly found its’ way back into my consciousness and began to fester. I could feel it in my soul and although I hid it from her in that moment, I knew I wouldn’t be able to hide it for very long.
“Stand up,”
I said to Reyna in a calm yet stern voice. “I don’t want you kneeling in front of me like that anymore, you understand?”
“Yes Mistress,”
she said back to me, doing as she was told as most slaves did.
“Your clothes,”
I said to her. “Where are they? Did you leave them on stage?”
She nodded. “Let’s go get them. I don’t want you walking around nude for all to see. That’s unseemly.”
I asked one of the stage assistants to help me gather Reyna’s clothes so she could dress. I helped her with her shoes, kneeling down in front of her to help her slide them on which took her by surprise. As I did, I noticed a small, lightly-colored tattoo on her ankle - a butterfly. Just then the owner of the room announced that they would be closing up in a couple of minutes and that we should find another place to be, lest we be kicked back to our login locations. Taking Reyna’s hand, I slide my wrist over hers and requested to pair with her which she immediately accepted as a proper slave should, at least in the state of role play we were in at the time.
“We should.…”
I stopped short. I was beginning to feel that trigger effecting me more. I could tell it was starting to eat at me, but I couldn’t lose myself in front of all those people. “We need to….”
“Mistress,”
Reyna said, realizing I was becoming distressed. “We can go to your place. Maybe that would be best?”
After a few seconds, I nodded my head to her and brought up my HUD so we could teleport over to my apartment which, at the time, was more of a luxury suite that I used for virtually all of my clients. It was nice, premium, and comfortable so most people felt welcome there.
“Yes,”
I said. “Of course. We’ll…we’ll go now.”
Taking her hand as had become my customary way of guiding my clients to my suite, I tapped on the teleport option in my HUD and we were there in an instant. The interior of my suite quickly came into view. I found myself dropping Reyna’s hand and walking into the next room.
“Sit down,”
I said to Reyna, directing her to one of the two couches I had in my living room which I kept fairly dark. In front of the primary couch was a large television which I used to watch shows and concerts with some of my clients when they asked for such things. On the walls were various pieces of modern art, all purchased with the money I’d earned as an escort. In the center of the room was a glass coffee table, topped with a few standard coffee table books filled with pictures of classic cars, fashion, and sports.
“Yes Mistress,”
Reyna said as she quickly moved to the sofa and sat down. I arrived in the next room over which doubled as my dining room and kitchen. While I didn’t have a stove, I did have a refrigerator where I kept plenty of cold drinks and some small snacks in case a client wanted to have something like strawberries or other fresh fruits. I took a bottle of water from the fridge and cracked it open with my fingers, closing the door with my foot. I walked back over to the living room and handed it to Reyna as that unsettling feeling in my chest grew larger.
“Here,”
I said to her as I gave her the water. “Long day; figure you’d want something to drink.”
She looked up to me somewhat shocked that I was being as thoughtful with her as I was.
“Thank you,”
she said. “You’re so kind to me, Mistress.”
After a short pause, I waved my hand to her.