Little Big Man

LITTLE BIG MAN – a serial novel by Travis Creel

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CHAPTER SIXTEEN: PORT OF CALL

Previously: After three long days of exhausting sex produced losers of Round Two, Round Three was conducted quickly, in the form of a Spanking Contest. Tops were judged by the ferocity of their swats, Bottoms by their ability to muffle their verbal reaction. All were relieved to learn that the next three days would be sex-free, except for those who had lost the competition or committed infractions.

Alex and Matti both managed to escape demotion and remain Tops. Florida, whose lack of cooperation has frequently gotten him into trouble, had been slated for gelding after Round Two, but was saved by the results of the Spanking Contest. His salvation came at the expense of Utah, who had been tricked by Alex and Matti into becoming their victim in Round One on Monday night.

On Wednesday Matti had noticed, from the position of the sun, that the ship seemed not to be heading northeast toward the Mediterranean as expected, but to the southeast, which led Alex to wonder, "Where were we going?"

ALEX: SATURDAY, JUNE 11 – ATLANTIC OCEAN AND . . . SOMEWHERE

The next three days should have been a respite. They were a respite from sex, true enough. That sounds like a strange thing for a healthy young man to say, but my cock was worn out after all the activity it had had in the last three days. My spirit was worn out as well. I needed some time to take stock of things. I needed this break in the action to replenish my soul.

My soul was not replenished.

Round Two – and its unanticipated sequel, the Spanking Contest – had been incredibly stressful, keeping us on tenterhooks about our status as Tops. Since Monday night, thirty-six of us had been raped. Matti and I were fortunate to be among the remaining sixteen.

But today there was nothing planned – no competitions, no sex, just sailing. And apparently the same for tomorrow and most of Monday. What bliss.

The day did start out rather blissfully, and I was determined to make the day as relaxing as possible, and just chill with Matti and other friends I had met in the last week.

At breakfast, Rhody sat with us, but Del and Noisy were having a private conversation at another table. They were both good friends with Puerto Rico and D.C. and were struggling with their loss of status.

I was glad that the Bottoms were not around. What could I say to D.C. or Nebraska? "Hey, you look great shaved. Good luck with your impending gang-rape"? I don't think so.

And I was particularly glad that the Eunuchs were not around. Especially Utah.

It was Saturday. Last Saturday at this time I was still in Wisconsin, en route to the airport.

• Do you realize that only a week ago we all thought we were competing for a quarter of a million dollars and taking a trip around the world?

• (Rhody) Well, we are taking a trip around the world. Or at least to Russia.

• (Matti) Maybe.

• (Rhody) But I guess we have to be grateful for something. We've still got our balls.

• (Matti) In terms of being grateful, that has got to be the lowest bar to meet in the history of the world. "We've still got our balls."

• (Rhody) Well, it's true. We do. And I AM grateful for that, when there are others who've lost them. And all three of us are still Tops. What are the chances of that?

• (groaning) You're asking the wrong person – he'll calculate it.

• (Rhody) You're kidding.

• (Matti) Give me a moment. Let's see it's four thirteenths times . . . five seventeenths times seven twenty-fifths – that's a hundred forty over – hold on – (pause) – about two and a half percent. One chance in forty. Approximately.

• Finnish Calculation Wizard.

• (Rhody) That's amazing.

• If he's telling the truth. Finns lie.

I was waiting for Matti to contribute his signature line about it being `horizontally', but I guess that was a joke he wanted to keep between us. I was glad about that, as I didn't want Rhody to get the wrong idea about my relationship with Matti. Especially since I was beginning to wonder if Rhody had a bit of a crush on me himself. He wanted to come back to Matti's room with us, but I told him I needed some alone time.

We discovered that our rooms had been reassigned yet again, to accommodate the fact that there were now only 16 Tops. A sign on the door to our corridor said, "Tops only. Bottoms residing on this floor must enter on opposite end."

When we entered the corridor, we found a floor-to-ceiling barrier two-thirds of the way down. Obviously, there weren't enough cabins on Deck 2 for all 36 Bottoms and Eunuchs, so they had to house some of them on Deck 3. And they wanted to keep us physically separate.

We found our new rooms – I was back on the starboard side of the ship. After I saw Rhody enter his cabin, I slipped over to the one marked Minnesota and knocked.

• I thought you needed some alone time.

• That's what I told Rhody. I needed some alone time with you.

• You don't look happy about it.

• Utah is probably being castrated as we speak.

• If they castrated Utah, it would end the Mormon problem.

• (annoyed silence)

• What? It's a joke, Cheesehead. Okay, I shouldn't say there's a Mormon problem, it's not politically correct, and many Mormons are nice people but –

• We're not talking about Mormons. We're talking about Utah. The person, not the state. The dude who no longer has balls. And if we hadn't done what we did the other night –

• This again? Shit. He was weak, Wisconsin. Utah was weak. If we hadn't nailed him, someone else would have. How many times do I have to use the phrase `zero-sum game'?

• Well, here's a sum that's not zero: do you know how many guys I've screwed this week?

• I didn't count. Surprise – a number I don't keep track of, Finnish Calculation Wizard that I am. Because I'm not torturing myself with guilt. Because I'm not responsible for this. And neither are you. The Russians are. The maroons are. Everyone who works for them is – because they made choices. We didn't.

• We made choices. We chose to –

• Stop! Just fucking stop! Look, the lion kills the gazelle not because the lion is evil but because if it doesn't eat, it will die. It's a matter of self-preservation. And so it was with us – self-preservation. Don't you ever getting tired of blaming yourself for everything that happens in this world?

• . . .

• You do that, Wisconsin. You feel guilty about all sorts of things that are not under your control. You say `if only I had done this and not that, then this terrible thing wouldn't have happened'. But you didn't do the terrible thing. And you are not responsible for the chain of causation in this world.

• But what if . . .

• . . .

• . . .

• But what if what, Cheesehead?

• . . .

• What's going on?

• What if . . . ?

• . . .

• . . .

• Hey, it's okay. You're holding in something, tell me.

• . . . What if I did do a terrible thing? I don't mean Utah or Alabama or all the fucking. I mean – besides this.

• Besides this?

• Before. At home. In Wisconsin.

• You think you did something terrible in Wisconsin.

• I did do something terrible.

• That I don't know about.

• That you don't know about.

• . . . Let me get a tissue. . . . Here, dry your eyes. . . . Okay. I'm here for you. Talk to me.

• . . . It's hard to talk about.

• But you want to. You want to tell me or you wouldn't have brought it up, whatever it is. Maybe it's not as terrible as you think.

• It is.

• It can't be as terrible as you think.

• I killed my brother.

• . . . (softly) What?

• Matti, I killed my brother. My twin brother Adam.

• Jesus, that's . . .

• Terrible.

• . . . Okay, I'll admit I wasn't expecting you to say that.

• I didn't mean to. I mean, I didn't shoot him or push him off a cliff or anything. But I was responsible. I was driving drunk and I hit him and it killed him. And I never told the cops and my Dad never told the cops and I killed him and I was responsible and I covered it up. I got away with it, Matti. I should have gone to jail. And now I AM in jail. Just a different kind of jail.

• And you feel this is all karma. God's vengeance on you.

• I won't speak for God, but yes. I'm being punished for what I did. I deserve this. Only I deserve to be one of the ones getting fucked.

• Maybe the fact that you're NOT getting fucked is karma, too. Maybe this is saying you're not such a bad person, you deserve to be on top. Sorry, didn't mean that as a pun, but maybe it's appropriate anyway.

• You said Utah was weak? I'm weak, Matti. I don't want to be fucked. I keep doing whatever I can to keep myself as a Top, but I don't feel like I deserve to be a Top.

• Get this into your head. You are a good person. You may have done a bad thing – I'm not going to judge you on that, I wasn't there, I don't know all the circumstances. But good people can do bad things and still be good people. It's called being human. I pride myself on being a pretty good judge of character. I can tell what your character is, just as I can tell that Utah is an asshole, and while I don't wish castration on my worst enemy, if it has to be someone, I would rather it be Utah than you. Because you are a better person.

• But –

• No buts. Now stop thinking about yourself for a moment and think about your friend Minnesota. Do you want to watch your friend Minnesota get gang-raped?

• No, of course not, why would I – ?

• Your friend Minnesota wants to be around you. One of the few things that keeps him sane is the pleasure of your company. Do you want to deprive him of that?

• Well, no, but –

• Then what I'm hearing you say is you want me to stay a Top and you want me to still have you around to be with. Which means that you have to stay a Top, too. Because, in case you haven't noticed, they're not letting Tops and Bottoms intermingle socially. So don't feel guilty about being a Top, think of it as keeping me happy.

• (Small pause.) I guess when you look at it that way –

• Good. That's settled. No more guilt, you're doing charity work by staying a Top. Your contribution to the Finnish Relief Society. Now what do you say we get out of here?

• And do what?

• Go for a swim.

• Fine. Can we take Rhode Island?

• Afraid to skinny-dip alone with me?

• Safety in numbers.

• At least you smiled when you said that. Let's go, Cheesehead.

We had a good swim, the pool being unoccupied except for us. Rhody experienced his first purely recreational swim without benefit of swimming trunks, and quite enjoyed it. After lunch, we found space on some lounge chairs in the sun deck. Saturday was a stunningly gorgeous day, warm and sunny with just a light breeze, and I had to admit that sunbathing, like swimming, was more enjoyable in the nude than in swimming trunks.

It was a popular place. Most of the Tops were there. They were keeping the Bottoms out of sight.

We passed a pleasant couple of hours there with Rhody, Del, and Noisy, chatting about baseball, politics, video games, and other topics having absolutely nothing to do with the Little Big Man contest.

Noisy spotted it first.

• Hey, guys. Is that land?

We all got up from our lounge chairs. It was, in fact, land.

Land. After several days' travel, we had spotted the first bit of horizon that wasn't sea.

• (Del) Holy shit, it is. Looks pretty flat, though. Shouldn't we be seeing the rock of Gibraltar? I mean, this has got to be Spain, right?

• (Rhody) Gibraltar is miles inward. You have to sail past a good bit of Spain before you get there. This would be the coast of Portugal, or Morocco, maybe.

• (Matti) Wrong. You're assuming we're going through the Mediterranean to get to Russia.

• (Rhody) Well, I doubt we'd go all the way up north by Sweden and Norway. Logical way is through the Mediterranean, then through the Bosporus into the Black Sea – and Russia.

[AUTHOR'S NOTE: In this version of the world, the war in Ukraine does not exist - how I wish that were the case in reality. Going through the Black Sea would not be a reasonable route in the real world. The vast majority of this story was drafted prior to the unanticipated invasion of Ukraine.]

• (Matti) Logical, but unobservant.

• (Del) Thank you, Mr. Spock.

• (Matti) We haven't been going toward Europe. If you've been watching the sun, we've been going south of east, not north of east. This is Africa, and not Morocco either – well south of there. We're not going to Russia, at least not by sea.

• Minnesota's right. He noticed that a few days ago. The sun's in the wrong place for heading toward Europe. Unless of course, he got it wrong.

• (Matti) Finns are rarely wrong.

• He's Finnish, in case you couldn't guess.

• (Del) So, Mister Rarely-Wrong, tell us what country this is.

• (Matti) No idea. I'm not THAT good. Cameroon, maybe, or Angola. I think it's got to be south of all those West African countries like Nigeria and Senegal.

• Gabon. Possibly Gabon.

• (Del) I've never even heard of Gabon.

• (in snarky mode): I guess they didn't ask a lot of geography questions in your state contest.

• (Del) You're just showing off.

• Indeed I am.

• (Rhody) I'll say Equatorial Guinea.

• I'll lay you fifty-to-one odds it's not. Do you know how small Equatorial Guinea is?

• (Matti) I do. It's one thousand four hundred and eighty-one point six square miles.

• (Everyone else) ?!

• (Matti) Okay, I made that up. But I know it's small. So it's probably not Equatorial Guinea.

• (Rhody) I stand by my answer. You'll have to prove to me it's NOT Equatorial Guinea.

• Gabon.

• (Matti) Cameroon.

• (Noisy): Congo.

• There's two Congos. Which one?

• (Noisy) Whichever one has a coast.

• (Del) I'm holding out for Spain.

At which point our conversation was interrupted by an announcement:

• All contestants return to their cabins immediately. You have two minutes starting now.

From which it became evident that we were going to make a port of call at Cameroon, or Angola, or Gabon, or a Congo, or Equatorial Guinea – or wherever we were. Probably not Spain.

We returned to our cabins. The drapes had been drawn closed; access to them had been blocked by dozens of strips of thick tape stretched across them. The tape would have to be removed in order to even get a glimpse outside. On the monitor was a stern warning: DO NOT ATTEMPT TO OPEN OR EVEN PEAK THROUGH THE DRAPES. GUARDS OUTSIDE ARE WATCHING THE WINDOWS FOR ANY MOVEMENT WHATSOEVER. THE PUNISHMENT FOR VIOLATIONS WILL BE MORE SEVERE THAN ANYTHING YOU HAVE WITNESSED ON THIS VOYAGE.

The reason for that was obvious. If we were going into port, they could scarcely have any of their naked prisoners waving wildly out the window seeking rescue. As tempting as it was to try to pry open a square inch to peer though, the last sentence convinced me not to. I had witnessed gang-bangs, throat-fucking, full-throttle paddling, and testicles in jars, and I was not going anywhere near those curtains.

The ship slowed to a stop a few minutes later and I felt a bump as we pulled against the dock. I was curious as hell as to where we were and what we were doing here.

A second message appeared on the monitor, a kinder one. YOU ARE FREE TO MOVE ABOUT WITHIN YOUR CORRIDOR. I pressed my palm against the security pad and the door obediently opened, but of course the corridor was closed off. Beyond it was an open area where a leap over the railing might actually result in a survivable escape. I made a beeline for Matti's room.

• So now what, Minnesota?

• Your guess is as good as mine, Wisconsin.

• Possibly better. This can't be the terminus – there's a contest Monday night. So why did they stop?

• Probably just getting supplies. Fuel. Groceries. There's like a hundred people on this ship – that's a lot of food. That's my guess, but what do I know.

• The question is – are they taking us to Russia or not? And if so, why did we go this way?

• The answer to the first question is a definite maybe. Depends on what you mean by `us'.

• Us. The guys on this ship. You know, Little Big Man contestants – you've heard of that, right?

• Sarcasm does not become you, Wisconsin. I think SOME guys are going to Russia but not everybody. I think they're going to lose some of us along the way.

• If that were true, wouldn't they have just thrown guys overboard already?

• Not lose that way. Sell.

• The return of the Arab Slavers theory. But this isn't Arabia.

• Not unless we've gone all the way around the Cape of Good Hope, which we haven't. But we might be on our way there. This might be the coast of Namibia or maybe Angola.

• Or Gabon. Don't forget Gabon.

• In any case, if we were going to Arabia, this would be one way to get there.

• Then they lied to us about Russia.

• Not necessarily. If you've noticed, everything they've said they've followed up on. They haven't really lied to us.

• Oh, so we're really getting that $25,000 prize and a free trip around the world.

• Er, except for that. Since we found out what was really going on, I meant. But these guys are Russian, it makes sense they would take at least some of us to Russia.

• But how would we – whoever `we' is – get to Russia?

• That, my Cheesehead friend, is a good question.

At 6:30, we heard a beep and a message appeared on Matti's monitor: WISCONSIN, RETURN TO YOUR CABIN.

• They do have cameras in here.

• I don't think so.

• Then how do they know I'm not in my cabin?

• Oh, I don't know – that mysterious headband that's the only thing they allow you to wear perhaps?

• Oh, that.

• Remember on Monday they told us that before we could start the Sex Period they'd have to wait until we were all in position. They know where we are even when it is dark. That's the only reason for these headbands. It's not for identification. By now even all the maroons know who we are. They've got some sort of chip in there.

• And maybe it's recording every word we say.

• Now you're being paranoid. You'd better go.

I went back to my room, expecting some kind of imminent message, but all that happened was that a maroon – Jesús – appeared a few minutes later with dinner. Congregating in the Dining Hall was obviously not an option while we were in port. After Jesús left, however, I found the palm pad unresponsive; I was confined to quarters. And settled in for what promised to be a long night alone.

I entertained myself as best I could and went to bed about eleven, sleeping on the side of the bed furthest from the window, not wishing to even accidentally brush against the drapes. I lay there for a few minutes listening for any kind of sound from outside, any kind of hint as to what lay beyond this ship, as if knowing that would help in some way.

I heard a sound, all right, but not from outside the ship. From outside my room. Then from inside my room.

Latronius.

• Well, well, well, what have we here? One naked little boy, expecting to spend the night alone.

• What are you doing here, Latronius?

• You promised to be nice to me.

• That was when you had the power to cheat me out of my points in the competition.

• Do you think the competition is over?

• . . . I think THAT competition is over.

• That ROUND of the competition is over, Wisconsin. Monday night there is another round. Four more Tops are destined to bite the dust. And perhaps I have influence over which ones.

• If you did, I think you would rig it so that I lose.

• (smile) If you did lose, I'd have access to your ass. And believe me, boy, your sweet ass deserves my big fat cock.

• So I have no incentive to be nice to you.

• Oh, yes you do. I know what the rules are for Monday night's game. If you take a shower with me, I just might tell you what they are. And then you could plan a strategy.

• And would planning a strategy help?

• The game will depend upon your decisions, let me say that.

• What decisions?

• Get out of bed. We're going to take a shower.

• And if I refuse?

• I'm eight inches taller than you, weigh a hundred pounds more and it's muscle, not fat. I don't think you can refuse.

• Just take a shower?

• (smile) Get out of bed, boy.

I couldn't believe what was happening. I wondered if anyone knew that Latronius was in my quarters. He had no headband pinging away his location. Were his visits authorized? I'd heard of no other case of nocturnal maroon visitation. Of course, I had told no one except Matti so if it had happened to others, maybe they'd also been quiet about it.

I followed him into the bathroom, where he quickly stripped out of his maroon uniform. His cock was tumescent but not fully erect. He put his arms on my shoulders and then ran them smoothly over my bare chest and I felt it before I saw it. He was hard now, hard as a rock.

• Feel it, boy?

I nodded.

• Into the shower.

I obeyed. What else could I do? He followed me in, and turned on the water, positioning the shower head so that it fell equally on each of us. While the shower was comfortably large for a single person, there was not a lot of spare room. At least, I thought, not enough room for me to bend over and have him `inspect' my ass.

• Soap me up, bitch. Yourself too. We're going to get slippery.

I stuck my hand under the soap dispenser and filled it with the liquid soap. And then I applied it to his massive chest. I returned for more and applied it to his arms. I was delaying the inevitable, which didn't please him.

Now that we were wet enough for the soap to stick, he turned the water off. He grabbed some soap himself, closed his fist and held it in front of my face.

• Faster, bitch, or this soap is going in your mouth.

I got the point, and applied another layer to his thighs and calves. At the same time, he began rubbing soap over my back and the top of my head.

At his direction, I covered his back and ass with soap; while I was doing so, he was slathering me with soap until my entire body felt like it was covered in an oily film.

• Okay, now the parts you've been avoiding. And be thorough.

I worked my soapy hands into his groin and thoroughly washed his thick, curly pubes, his groin, and his balls. I left his enormous shaft for last, knowing I would have to touch it, but I succeeded in my mission of soaping him up. And he succeeded in his. Now we were both as slippery as anyone could wish.

The odd part was that I liked feeling slippery. And his hands over my slippery skin actually produced a pleasant sensation. Which was starting to result in something embarrassing. Particularly when his hands touched my inside of my thighs. I felt a lift in my cock.

Okay, not to panic. Simply a physical reaction. It's an erogenous zone, anything touching me in that area would result in that reaction. It has nothing to do with Latronius. And certainly nothing to do with Latronius being male.

Right?

My visitor turned the water back on full steam and let the water course off of our bodies. The shower was coming to an end. I thought.

• I don't want you to get soap in your mouth. Because now you're going to kiss my cock.

• No, I'm not!

A fist in my gut was the big maroon's answer to that. It was followed by sharp pressure on my shoulders, pushing me down to my knees. There was barely room for me to kneel in that shower, but I could. What there wasn't was much room between my face and Latronius' member.

• Kiss it!

What choice did I have? His stiff cock was practically poking my nose. I puckered my lips and touched them briefly to his cockhead.

• That's not a kiss. You're going to leave your mouth there for five full seconds.

I pressed my lips against his bulbous dong and left them there, trying to ignore the implications of what I was doing, and trying to ignore the stirring in my balls.

And totally unable to ignore it when he took the opportunity to slip the tip of his cock between my teeth.

I was surprised to find it nearly tasteless. It smelled nice and clean, as a just-washed body would, but I expected more of a salty taste, I guess. But not as unpleasant as I was expecting. Of course, only the tip of his cock had penetrated my lips. I knew he wouldn't go further. He couldn't go further. It was against the rules.

He went further. He pushed a couple of more inches in until I started to gag and jerked my head away. Which gave me the chance to voice my objections aloud.

• You're not allowed to do that. You can't have sex with me, I'm a Top, it's against the rules.

• The rules say I can't make you suck my cock. Well, you weren't sucking, were you. I just put it in your mouth. The rules say nothing about your kissing my cock. Or your licking my cock. Or your sucking on my balls. So suck on my balls, bitch.

He thrust his hips forward and presented his ample scrotum. His hands were firmly on either side of my head and he maneuvered it so that my mouth was next to his ballsac. I resigned myself and opened up and took first one of his nuts, and then the other, into my oral cavity.

Latronius moaned in pleasure.

• Oh, yes, baby, that feels good. Move that tongue around them.

I washed his balls with my tongue; his testicles were so massive that a single one of them nearly made me gag. After a few minutes of this, to his steadfast encouragement, he pulled out and grabbed my hand.

"Beat it," he ordered. A vision passed through my head of Matti greeting such an instruction with a song, evoking his inner Michael Jackson. But my hands on his cock was better than my mouth on his cock – although my own cock was approving of both processes.

His stiff joint was at least eight inches long, maybe more, and far from thin. I wrapped my left hand around the base of the shaft and began stroking it with my right, the water cascading around us making this a far more sensual experience than I could have ever imagined. There was no escaping it: I was rock hard.

Residual effect from his stimulating my erogenous zones earlier, I told myself. Nothing to do with attraction.

I stroked him harder and harder and he began to rock slowly back in forth in pleasure. From time to time, he would murmur things like "Oh, yeah, bitch, keep that up." I noticed his breathing suddenly increase sharply – I knew what that meant, and closed my eyes lest his explosion catch me squarely in the face (and I prayed he wouldn't poke his prodigious member into my mouth when he shot), but a second later I felt him sharply smack my hand away from his cock.

I looked at him.

• The rules state that I can't ejaculate in you or on you. That's why the word "tantra" was created.

I breathed a sigh of relief as he took the time to relax. After about a minute, his cock started to lose rigidity, and he nodded.

• Again, baby. Take me to the edge.

I started to beat him off again. It didn't take that long this time for him to smack me away as he approached climax.

He made me repeat the exercise three more times before he ended the shower.

We dried off and he walked me back to my bed.

• Now, I need to see your pretty little hole, boy. I can't fuck it, I can't even stick more than the tip of my finger into it, but I'm not leaving this room without getting a nice close-up view of your pussy. On the bed, on all fours, and spread it wide.

I pulled myself up to the bed, knelt, and bent over until my head was against the mattress. He tugged my legs further apart and then ran his hands over my buttocks repeatedly before letting his fingers dart into the cleft. He teased my hole time and time again, occasionally dipping the tip of a finger past the anus – but not beyond the first knuckle. My hole tingled at his touch, and a part of me wanted him to probe inside – but just a part of me.

He spent a good ten minutes exploring my anus before giving me a half-dozen swats on my buttcheeks – hard enough to sting, but not hard enough to raise any color. There would be no evidence of his visit on my body – or, thankfully, in it. When he was finished, he said:

• Good times, baby, good times. Maybe soon I'll be dipping something bigger than a fingertip into your cunt.

He started to leave, but I had one more thing to say.

• Your part of the bargain. You said if I were nice to you, you'd tell me the rules for the game Monday night.

He pressed his palm to the palm pad and the door opened for him. He put himself in the doorway so that it couldn't close and looked back at me, with a smile.

• Actually, I said I just MIGHT tell you the rules for Monday night's game. I've decided not to.

It took me a long while to get to sleep.

ALEX: SUNDAY, JUNE 12, AFTERNOON – SOMEWHERE ON THE AFRICAN COAST

The palm pad didn't respond to my touch until mid-afternoon. Breakfast and lunch had both been delivered by maroons. But about 2:00 there was a knock on the door. A maroon wouldn't knock.

The ship still seemed to be in port, but perhaps at least they were letting us out within our corridor. I tested the palm pad and this time it responded – admitting Matti.

He plopped himself down on the bed, in a supine position. He scooched himself over toward the window and patted the mattress beside him.

• Come join me in my favorite Finnish pastime.

• Which is?

• Lying, of course.

• (together) Horizontally.

• Wisconsin. Stop walking around and come over here.

• . . .

• It's a double bed. Plenty of room.

• I know.

• Okay, that's a start. Now lie down. . . . Yes, like that.

• You'll stay on your side of the bed.

• Are you worried I'll get a hard-on?

• Just don't . . . get closer than you are now.

• Okay. I won't move. But I will do this.

• Jesus, Matti, what are you doing?

• My name's Minnesota, and I'm putting my hand where it wants to be.

• I don't want it there.

• Evidently.

• Stop acting like you're trying to seduce me.

• I'm not acting. I am trying to seduce you.

• I don't want to be seduced, Matti.

• Minnesota, and why not?

• Why not? Because I'm not gay. Look, we're friends, okay? I'm very fond of you – as a person.

• I think we both know it's more than that. Wisconsin, I love you.

• I love you, too, as a –

• Brother?

• I was going to say `friend'.

• In case you forgot, we kissed the other day.

• You kissed me.

• You kissed back, my friend. And you got hard.

• I was confused. A momentary lapse.

• And as I recall, you told me you actually liked it when you were fucking.

• Yes, that's the horrible thing I discovered over the last few days. I like fucking dudes. Doesn't make me gay.

• Beg to differ. I think that's the very definition of gay.

• I liked the sensation of my cock up someone's ass, all right? It grips it, it makes it feel good. But it's just an ass. An ass doesn't have a gender, I mean, women's asses are the same as men's, aren't they? I could have been fucking a woman's ass, there just weren't any women available. Like straight guys in prison – they fuck ass because that's the only thing they can fuck. It doesn't mean I'm gay, it just means I like anal.

• That's why we're here, Wisconsin. We ARE gay – or at least bisexual. We just didn't realize it before.

• If I were gay I'd want to suck their cocks and get fucked by them.

• No, if you were a BOTTOM you'd want to suck their cocks and get fucked by them. You're a top. Hey, they should make a song about that. (singing) You're a top! You're the Eiffel Tower.

• Jesus, is everything a joke to you?

• I make jokes when I'm serious. Haven't you noticed that before? That's why I'm always joking with you – because I'm serious about you.

• I don't want to have this conversation, Matti.

• Minnesota.

• Jesus Fucking Christ! Will you stop worrying about the name thing? You're the one who keeps telling me they're not bugging these rooms; we'd be in trouble already if they were.

• Got it. Not bugging rooms. But apparently I'm bugging you. Not buggering, mind you, just bugging. . . Sorry, another joke. Inappropriate. You're angry with me.

• Not angry, exactly. Just . . .

• I went too fast.

• You went too FAR.

• Weren't you willing to have sex with me on Monday night? You were willing to let me fuck you.

• To save us both from castration? Yeah. It was self-preservation, Matti. Remember that speech you gave me yesterday? The lion and the gazelle? Only in this case the lion just fucks the gazelle and they both go home with their balls still attached. But I didn't want us to have sex. I was relieved as hell when you came up with that scheme to double-cross Utah.

• Okay, I hear you. I'm sorry if I'm being a little too . . . aggressive. I think I'm in love with you, Alex Sorenson – look, I said your whole name, see? But I'll pull it back a notch.

• Thank you. I'm confused, Matti. I don't want to be gay, I don't think I am, but this week has been really . . . really confusing. And last night . . .

• Last night what?

• I was visited again.

• Latronius?

• Latronius.

• And?

• He made me beat him off. He didn't cum, just made me take it to the edge. Tantra. And he made me kiss his cock and suck his balls.

• And you found this less horrible than you thought you would.

• Something like that.

• Look, this experience has made me realize that there's a lot of gay in me. I'm ready to accept that, and ready to recognize that the gay part is a lot stronger than I ever would have dreamed.

• That's you. That's not me.

• That's just the point I was going to make. That's me, that's where I am. And part of the gay in me wants to make out with you – and I don't mean we need to fuck, I mean kissing and cuddling and fondling and being next to your naked body. But if you don't want that –

• I don't.

• Then I'll respect that. I'm sorry, Alex.

• Oh, Matti, you don't have to apologize. I'm the one who should apologize. I just . . . this whole thing is just so fucking COMPLEX.

• You said a mouthful, Cheesehead. A mouthful.

Which only made me think about what my mouth had been full of last night.

[COMING UP NEXT: CHAPTER SEVENTEEN - HEADING SOUTH]