Taste of Power

Taste of Power by: Krazytop ---

Part XXXII

I'm not sure exactly how cells became blobs, how blobs became animals, how animals became packs, and how human packs came to think they were special.

Come to think of it...I'm not sure when thinking took on this kind of...presumed primacy. As though everything people do is the product of carefully thought-out plans, or ought to be. How everything has to fit into some systematic, articulable book that guides us.

How so often when someone shreds up a book and writes their own, they make the same rigid mistakes of their predecessors.

How ideals came to parasitize off of people and their fighting.

Humans never stopped being tribal, drawing circles in the sand, defining insiders and outsiders. They conflated the rules with truths, and faith with righteousness. And inside that confusion, idealism set up roost.

Such is the paradox of the modern tribe.

Part of me strives to bring the ideals that live in me to fruition, to achieve some kind of symbiosis with them, to grow to change with them. You can't just shake off a thought like a pebble from your shoe. But idealism is all about setting yourself above things—apart from things. And in that sense, it is both clingy and lonely.

And I find myself in half a mind to cling tighter, and half a mind to escape.

"What's going through your head?" Chris asks, accelerating past the Smoothie Shack.

"I can't just forget about Zane," I say. "I can't just...pretend it never happened."

"So don't then," Chris says.

Zane.

Had it been him driving, the only thing going through my head would have been his throbbing cock.

Should I go back? Should I throw Chris from the car and go back to him? I've stopped Brett before. I could stop Brett again.

I could save him, pledge myself to him, and worship him till the day I die.

Why did he toy with me? Why didn't he just destroy me?

It might not have worked, if he tried to rush it. There was some risk no matter what, I suppose.

What a ridiculous fluke...a blasphemous test...

A tear rolls down my cheek.

I'm sitting in the car with my dream guy...or who I thought was my dream guy.

So is my life story just a romance recast for perverts, where I realize my actual dream guy is the one who shared the most with me? Or is the temptation to run back to Zane—the wistful echo a battle I've won?

Chris runs his hand through my hair, seeming to sense my ambivalence.

"It's okay, Travis. Whatever you are thinking. It's okay. God knows what you've been through."

I feel a wave of hatred rise like smoke through me; I have half a mind to total Chris's car.

But other than my heartbeat racing, I betray nothing.

Chris pulls into the driveway, kills the engine, and hops out, heading for the front door.

I follow him. "Not the basement?"

"I'm more in a bedroom kind of mood."

"Are we going to wrestle?"

"Not before you shower."

I follow him into the house, and when he gestures that the coast is clear, up the stairs. He throws a towel at me and points to the bathroom.

The water runs down, washing away smells, textures, and memories...

I remember when Mr. Andrews sent me out of class for telling him that superiority is modal. You either are or you aren't.

Some people see in black and white; others see in spectrums. But I mean...however he sees the world...he may as well express himself precisely, right?

I'm a coin. I'm the flip side of someone like Zane. A separate mode. I like it that way.

And yet...

The pill he gave me, meant to divide and conquer my mind, connected things instead.

People pretend to solve their conundrums by having different faces, looking past how the different versions of themselves play by different rules. Some people pretend they are consistent, while others pretend they have a system all sorted out. But the different faces are not satisfied with the white lies we tell them. They seep through the cracks; they intermingle in the back of our minds.

I have a work face and a home face and a school face and a sculptor face and a politics face and a sex face, and probably at least a half-dozen more partially-formed, jigsaw faces inside of me, conspiring for their chance to play the game.

The ones that feature prominently—those are the easiest to tear down.

But the ones that are itching for their chance—those are more slippery.

And that reservoir of faces—that's what Zane couldn't destroy, despite his best efforts.

He could strip away my intellect, he could tear down everything I embodied, but in the end, he couldn't solve my soul.

He came pretty damn close though, didn't he?

Chris waits for me, splayed out on the bed, shirtless, his pectorals rising and falling as he breathes.

I walk over, throwing the towel at him, striking him across the chest.

Chris tosses it on the floor, flashing an amused glance my way, gesturing toward my crotch. "Tell me what that's about."

"This?" I swing the cage jailing my dick. "Zane's last mark. A prison, to keep me chaste. I suppose we ought to get the key back from him some time."

"Seems like something you shouldn't put off."

"I dunno. You might be missing the idea," I say, shrugging. I snuggle in next to him, tugging on his biceps, and after a moment, he wraps his arms around me.

"I should at least text Calvin...Make sure he gets the key."

I lie in place, closing my eyes as Chris's fingers play across the surface of his phone. Eventually, he lets it drop, running his hand through my hair for a minute while I breathe.

"I don't expect you to wash away the memories of Zane in just one shower," he says softly, his words warm on my ear. He nibbles around my earring and flicks the cage. "Especially with all these marks he's left."

"Well—that's good," I say.

Darkness is falling. The singing of the cicadas and frogs from the forest carries in through the window.

"Hiro thought I was turning into..." I shake my head, swallowing back what felt like a stone in my throat. "Zane kept trying to drive the gulf between us deeper, and still, in some ways, I became like him."

"This earring is a yin-yang, right?" Chris asks. "And one of his tattoos—has the same design in the form of a half-sun, half-moon."

I nod into his arm.

Chris nuzzles me from behind. "From what I remember of the yin-yang, it's a tale of opposites. Opposites that have the soul of one another at their core. That's the nature of dualism. Democrats and republicans. Opposite parties, opposing beliefs. But the mechanisms, the political machines, the generalizations, the demonization, the manipulation—is all in the same vein. By being opposites, they share a battle, they share a context, they share some rules, even if they try to break them. They hate each other even when they are each other. Especially when they are each other. They may not be equal all of the time, but they are tethered to one another all of the time. Men and women. Mind and body. Chastity and lust."

"When did you get so wise?"

Chris's eyes twinkle. "Take your best guess."

"Did...did Hiro tell you what he meant by all those random names? One of them said Li Jen. Some random general or something..."

"It's not a name. It's just two words. Two ideas."

"By all means, infect me with them."

"Li is a kind of etiquette, the way life is, you know—ritualized--on a daily basis, made sacred, even if we don't realize it. And Jen is the good within people, the potential that can be brought to its completion. Hiro was hoping you would see that you aren't just a collection of things that happen to you. That you aren't just a passive work of art—some sculpture—but that YOU can do a bit of the sculpting."

"I dunno. I'm not sure I believe that."

"Wasn't that the first thing you asked me, the first time we were alone together here? Didn't you ask—if you could sculpt me?"

"And I did, didn't I?" I say, twisting to face Chris. "You were so vanilla, a few months ago. But also—a bit cold. Sexy as fuck, but cold."

"And what? You think you changed me?"

"You weren't perfect. But my conception of you was perfect. I believed in what you could be," I say, tracing the hairs along Chris's chest. "And with my unfaltering love, I actualized it."

"Unfaltering? Don't make me laugh."

The sound of the cicadas seems to rise.

It's hard to find room in my heart for the kind of love Chris and Zane demand. Backbreaking. I sure as fuck want to. I want to be utterly devoted. But how can I be, when they pit me against the other, and thus pit me against myself?

It's hard to love wholly with Chris and Zane in your life. I'd like to see you try.

"Well..." I say softly. "Love will falter, from time to time. It's going to feel like things aren't just bending towards...Jen...of their own volition. Like everything is just too difficult. And I guess it's times like that...you just have to recover enough to put your weight on it. Lean in--and sculpt it into place."

"So...can I put my weight on you then?" Chris says, rolling me onto my back and looming over me.

"Not so fast," I say. "I didn't resign for Zane, so I sure as hell am not going to resign for you."

"So then go ahead and beat me," Chris says.

We grapple and roll around; I get the feeling Chris isn't giving it his all.

I sense an opening and wiggle my finger into Chris's armpit.

He lets out a chortle.

"Are you ticklish?"

"No—"

I do it again, and Chris writhes in place. I swivel on top of him, flattening him on his stomach.

I stare into his eyes, which shimmer up at me, golden-brown, with a bit of softness in them today. "Has it been three seconds?" I ask.

"No."

"I think it has."

"No it hasn't," Chris says, gripping me by the shoulders and rolling on top of me.

"I think I beat you," I whisper.

"Pretty sure you got it backwards."

Chris kisses me.

When he lets up, he brushes the hair out of my eyes.

"You don't have to be too soft with me, you know," I say. "I'm way past that."

"Then maybe you can come back from the ledge a bit?"

"You can't take back what you did, Chris."

"What did I do?"

"Threw me away. Let Zane fuck my mind."

Chris sucks on my neck, before whispering in my ear. "I'm crossing my fingers you are strong enough to put it behind you."

"Look in my eyes," I say, keeping my voice even.

Chris looks my way slowly, and I look back.

"I'm a faggot, Chris." He stares at me, so I barrel on. "I didn't see myself that way before. I was depressed and vulnerable and naive, with my heart set on you. You weren't the man I dreamed you'd be. And in my fragile state, Zane swept in and broke me. And I didn't even mind. You sent me to Zane. So it was you—who made me a faggot."

"Stop saying that."

"No, Chris. It's you who needs to START saying it. You sure as hell have made me feel it. You think you are being nice to me, by not saying it? Please."

"Travis..."

"Shed the denial. Look into my eyes, and let it be KNOWN."

"Aren't you afraid I'll sound more like Zane than like me?"

"It's okay to take a leaf out of someone else's book sometimes. That's how you come out on top."

"Travis..."

"Do it!"

We stare into each other's eyes, reading what's written there.

Then, at long last, Chris grips my hair, glaring down. "You're a faggot."

"Was that so hard?" I ask, my voice cracking. "Now, if I could just get you to do that with your cock inside me, I'll be set..."

"I'm sorry..." Chris says.

I roll back on top of him, sliding my crack along his cock.

"Sorry for what? It's the old Travis who'd be upset about what happened. People don't like changing, because it requires a bit of them to die. But once that part is dead...who cares?"

"God, you are so fucked up."

"I certainly hope so."

Chris slaps my face; I moan; he slaps my face again.

Then he grabs me by the ears and pushes me down till my face is inches from his junk.

"Go ahead, then, coin." Chris growls. "Put your money where your mouth is."

"You want me to be your cocksucker?"

"You provocative little shit," Chris says, the tone of his voice rolling as his mouth curls into a smile.

I lick his balls, one after the other, before stealing a glance into his eyes.

His mouth hangs half-open; he peers down on me with an expression of indifferent superiority.

I drag my tongue up the shaft of his cock, savoring every contour, every ensnaring flavor and smell as it hits me. The head of his cock spellbinds me, and I pause, cross-eyed, inches away.

I clamp my mouth around it, sucking hard.

Goblins run around in my mind, knocking down everything they touch, cackling.

A look of concern sweeps Chris's face; my eyes flutter; his cock slips out of my mouth.

Towers fall; dams burst; water, water, everywhere.

I'm drowning; I'm drowning in sweat and piss and ass; I'm drowning; I CAN'T BREATHE. Everything is black.

"Are you okay?" Chris asks.

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"Well, for starters—the last two times I asked you that question, you didn't answer."

"What did I do?"

"You've been rolling around, gasping for air and laughing. I think you just had a panic attack. Anything...you forgot to tell me, Travis?"

I stare at the ceiling. "I don't think I can suck your cock."

"Why the hell not?"

"Zane...trained me...not to suck cock without his permission. I associate it with choking, drowning. And I'm..scared. NOT like a normal fear. Like a worst fear."

For a moment, there's nothing but breathing.

"Okay," Chris says.

"Okay?"

"Well—not like REALLY okay. I mean—you are a cocksucker who can't suck cock. What the hell does that make you?"

"Useless?"

"You still have your mind, Travis."

"But like—useless in bed?"

"We'll see about that," Chris growls, flipping me onto my stomach.

"You did this to me, you know."

"SHUT THE FUCK UP."

"Are you still sorry, Chris?" I ask, jutting my ass toward him. "Are you really sorry?"

I feel Chris's breath on my ear. "You really are a fucking faggot."

"Yes sir."

He grips my ass cheeks and spreads them apart. This time, I feel his breath on my hole.

I let out a little whimper.

Chris prods my hole with his tongue.

"Shit," I whisper.

Chris sculpts my ass in his palms, spreading them so he can delve his tongue inside me.

I squirm around on the bed.

He pulls his face out of my ass with a little sucking noise. "Stop moving, bitch."

I freeze.

He prods his tongue inside me again, and I moan, trying to stifle the shiver running through me.

"Relax. Just relax."

But my ass won't cooperate. It keeps flexing, seemingly of its own volition, compressing Chris's face. My tunnel constricts around Chris's tongue, pumping it.

Chris surfaces again. "Jesus, Travis." He rolls his palms up my back, hovering next to my ear. "So you can't suck me off. Okay if we try Plan B?"

"We can go all the way to Plan Z if that floats your boat."

He parts my ass cheeks with his cock, waiting with the crown flush up against my hole.

I push back, opening enough to take the head of his cock up my ass with a little gulp.

He leans in, using his weight to dig through the tension, slowly sliding more and more of himself inside. As he does, my jaw drops further and further till my mouth hangs wide open.

"You okay?" Chris asks.

"Yeah," I croak.

"Your body can handle it?"

"Yeah."

"And your fucked up mind?"

"Keep going—and we'll find out."

Chris pulls out slightly, then packs his cock back in, his crotch grinding against my ass, his abdominals tightening against my back.

"Still okay?" Chris whispers, sucking on my ear.

Rapid breathing chases me--like fire--till I'm gasping.

"Travis? TRAVIS?"

"I—I'm okay. I swear."

"Thank God," Chris whispers, running his hand through my hair.

My ragged breathing accelerates again, my eyes swivel in place.

"I should pull out—" Chris says, worry etching his voice.

"DON'T PULL OUT," I growl. "Don't."

"I'm gonna pull out...."

"NO! Goddam it, Chris. FUCK. ME."

"Are you sure?"

"Do I sound like I'm some kind of doubting Thomas? I want you to fucking destroy me, Chris. Fuck me like you wrestle me. Like you mean it. Break me down."

He pulls out part way—he knows I can handle it, right? Then--he thrusts his cock in, slowly stretching the tunnel of my ass. Again, my jaw drops.

"You aren't blameless in this, Travis. You aren't some kind of innocent victim. I know what you did to Brett."

"Yeah?" I say, my voice going high and cracking. "What did Brett say?"

"That you were spineless. That you obeyed out of fear and habit--without even thinking. That you couldn't be bothered to even try."

"Not true. I showed backbone. Brett just didn't like what side I chose." I scrunch my face, tightening my ass around Chris's cock. "He would have been fine if it was his cock I worshipped. These moral appeals—aren't they often just selfish appeals, masquerading..."

Chris humps me harder, forcing the words back.

Masquerading as rules so others will follow along?

A code understood by the wise as power play, and `understood' by the foolish as something...deep?

I never get the words out.

"How do I know—you'll stay loyal?" he growls.

"How does anyone in a position of power know their dominion will stay loyal? Stay worthy, I guess? And trust me."

"And if I can't trust you?"

"Then control me."

"And how should I do that?"

"However the fuck you want."

Chris reaches under, gripping my balls, before tracing his hand up the bar of the cage around my cock. "Maybe I should leave this on a bit longer, after all."

"It hurts, Chris. My dick hurts. It's stretching against the cage. It means to stretch further. But it can't. It's not a cock, like your cock. It doesn't work like a man's genitals...anymore."

"It never really did, Travis."

"No?"

"You complain about our society an awful lot, Travis. And it deserves its share of the blame for our fucked up world. But admit it, coin. There isn't a society in history that would think of you as a man. You were a child when I met you, Travis. Tell me—what's your coming of age story? In your dream world—how would you prove yourself?"

"Prove I'm a man? When I've just spent the last few months coming to understand that's wrong?"

"Prove you are something, Travis. Prove you are something, and not nothing after all. Prove you are a fully-fledged cundango, if you want. Ritualize it—so it's real."

I try to catch up with my breathing, and Chris shows an ounce of mercy, waiting in place with his cock full inside me, a smirk etched across his face.

"Leave this cage on me," I say at last. "For the rest of the school year."

"Are you sure?"

"We you don't quite know how I'll evolve," I say. "But maybe, just maybe—that just means you'll have to be ready for something new."

"Nothing from you would surprise me anymore."

"Does it gross you out? That I live so far outside of people's expectations?"

"You were coated in piss when we got here, Travis. I've seen you suck dirt off of my feet. How could you not gross me out?"

I push my ass up, clenching his cock.

"I love you, Chris. You get that?"

"Even when I think you are fucking disgusting?"

"Especially when you think I'm fucking disgusting."

"Well...in that case...you may as well know...you are the most disgusting thing I've seen in my whole life."

He tilts my head to the side, and I can see that he is smiling, and not in a mean way. Then, he leans in, and plants his lips on mine. I suck on them softly as he rides me.

He cradles my head in his palm, flexing, before pulling me away. "But also...beautiful."

"Don't go soft on me," I say, shoving my ass up and grinding it into Chris's balls. "I survived everything Zane threw at me; so you sure as hell don't have to be too careful."

"To be fair—you've never seen me completely let loose."

"I'm not sure anyone has."

"Want to?"

"What the hell do you think, Chris?"

Chris nibbles my lip, then moves back to my neck, humping me a bit faster. He lingers next to my ear. "You still want me to call you a faggot?"

"I need it, sir."

"You are a fucking faggot," he says, growling, thrusting his cock in defiantly, one, two, three times.

"Yes sir."

"But you are my fucking faggot. And I'm going to take care of you this time. I don't want you to feel bad anymore."

"Yes sir."

The temptation to jack my dick flits across my mind, and perhaps, if only to see if he'll punish me, I reach down for it. I know just where it will be--its sweet spot, hard and big in my palm. But instead I only feel phantom space. For a confounded moment, I wonder if it's gone...

My dick strains against the cage.

I can't jack it. A frustrated howl rolls through me; I move my hands to my ass, rubbing my cheeks, spreading them, and focusing on my true sex organ.

Till the school year ends. That is my vow.

Chris wraps his arms around me. "Why me?" he asks, chewing on my ear and finding his rhythm. He batters his body against mine, his cock exploring novel places inside me. "Why me?"

"Because—it was always you, Chris. How could I not—give you a chance? You're helping me become a faggot. Why can't I help you become a man?"

"Why not Zane?" Chris asks, shelling out a particularly painful thrust.

"Because he lost," I whisper, clenching my ass again.

"You made him lose. Why make him lose?" Chris hastens his thrusts, his abdominals slapping against my back; sticky sweat runs down.

It's hard to get the words out as Chris hammers my ass, again, again, and again.

"Because—sometimes--I fight back."

He bites my ear. "Not anymore."

Zane made me. He MADE ME. It's amazing how much I felt the need to defend my actions. There was still a voice inside me, screaming that I'd fucked up.

I won't fight anymore...I won't...I won't...

Chris bends my head at an odd angle and guides my face into his armpit, shutting down the words running through my mind, and any chance of voicing them.

I slowly lap at the bristly hairs, my eyes glazing over as I absorb the essence there. He infiltrates my mind, shuffling the links around.

Chris pounds my desperate, clenching faggot cunt, flexing to his limits.

"I look forward to being your Master, Travis. It looks like there's a bit more sculpting I'll have to do, after all."

He pads his palm on my ass cheeks, spreading them wider, so that he can thrust all the way inside me.

I nearly black out.

He lets go of his inhibitions; his body cracks against mine like a wrecking ball. He ratchets up the intensity; when he reaches the peak, his motions ghost Zane's; the contagious sense of losing all sensations; of going into a numb darkness swamps me...

But Chris pulls me back. He doesn't hesitate to wrap his arms around me. To hold me, the moment I need to be held. To swaddle me—to keep me from being lost in the blackness of space.

With three more powerful thrusts, Chris buries himself all the way inside me.

"Oh, fucking hell," I murmur, my voice muffled by Chris's armpit.

My caged dick leaks a continuous stream of cum onto Chris's bed. Without being touched—without even being able to get hard—I paint his sheets.

I wrench my face free, stealing a glance into Chris's shimmering eyes.

His expression alone makes my ass clamps down tight around his cock.

He growls, his face alight with the knowledge that he overpowered me so thoroughly, lost himself in his own pleasure; and paradoxically, got me off as a result.

I can only imagine that kind of power.

Chris erupts inside me, my ass pumping out every last drop.

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