Image by F. Muhammad from Pixabay
Wake up, sleepyhead.” His soft voice tickles my ear as he hugs me hello. My favourite wake-up call, and he knows it. His arms warm and hard-muscled wrap even more tightly around me. He drags his stubbly jaw over my bare shoulder, rough like sandpaper, and only stops once he’s drawn an almost-agonised moan from me.
“Morning You. You seem perky today.”
He snuggles closer, and spoons me the way I like: full of promise, focused on me like nothing else exists for him, and we can just stay here and get lost in each other all day if we want. I purr contentedly, and push back into him, demanding his attention.
“So do you. Naughty kitten!” Fingers trail teasingly down my arm, then at my elbow I feel them switch track and trace the chicane of my ass. He lingers for a second while I whimper, before spanking me once, playfully. “Far too perky to lie around here all day! Let’s get some breakfast, and you can tell me your plans for the day.
“Curtains open! Morning bed! Power up chair!” After six months together, there are no secrets. He knows my routines better than I do.
And if I didn’t already know his every proclivity as if I programmed them in myself, that dismissive tone to his voice that he never uses for me says it all: my Robertt likes to top my tech!
Reluctantly, I disengage myself from his protective embrace, sit myself up and fumble around. Ridiculous in this day and age, to be so myopic. Born right on the cusp of that game-changer: preventative gene-therapy included in mandatory prenatal folic acid supplements. I’m one of a dying demographic – the terminally typhlotic!
Five years later, and it would have been a far prettier picture: whiter, straighter teeth, 20/20 vision, ears that could shame the average bat. And the legs. Oh, the lithe and limber legs I would still have, if only I had seen that car thirty seconds sooner. Or heard the almost-inaudible hum of its electric engine.
Glasses on, I can finally bathe in his cerulean gaze. Like diving into the clearest, deepest water. I could drown in him and die happy. But another day lived with him is better, so I begin my practised transfer routine to the smartchair.
I never let him assist me. His fingertips mere spectres against my skin as, anxious, he hovers. My Robertt. My exoskeleton, I call him. Supporting me as if merely the essence of him could make a safety net for me. I drink in one more greedy glance of his short dark curls and wide, sensual mouth, before shaking him off:
“Off you go, your turn to make breakfast!” My bright smile doesn’t blind him to my tactics.
“Why not let me help you? What harm could I do?” He has made it his mission to learn my every need, simply because he cares about me. But I don’t want a caregiver.
“No harm at all, Mr Blue Eyes. But I fancy blueberries and waffles, and you’re soooo much better at them. . .” Unfair, I know: he is utterly unable to refuse me when I wheedle!
“Your wish is my command, my lady. Today you are in charge!” And with the merest whisper of a kiss he is gone, to wield his dominance over the kitchen appliances.
I will never tire of watching his athlete’s legs (plus that perfectly proportioned posterior!) pad naked from our bed, this captivating miracle man of mine.
Over a picture-perfect breakfast, while bright winter sunlight streams blindingly between us, we share out our plans with the waffles.
“What mischief will you be making this morning, little one?”
“It’s so pretty, I thought I might take a stroll in the garden, work off a few calories. Join me – we could burn off some together? Please?” I peep from beneath coyly-lowered lids. I could wheedle again, but begging is so much more pleasurable, when it works!
“You know I would love nothing more, baby. But you’ll have to be patient. Can you do that for me? I have some reports to evaluate first, but if you play in the garden for a while, I’ll come out when I’m done and take you for a little walk – how about that?”
After breakfast, I’m hungry for adventure. Before waving me off, my Robertt ensures I am dressed up warmly enough to satisfy him, helping me on with my gloves like a proud new papa. Finally, he wraps the handsfree commset he crafted for me especially snugly around my neck, securing the velcro carefully, so as not to pinch unintentionally.
And if it could as easily be fitted to my wrist, why would that matter? And if it didn’t have to be fashioned from pretty pink pleather, what of it? And if it doesn’t strictly need that little swivelling ring of shiny silver right smack in the front, who cares? My Robertt always gives me what I need. And he needs to know I can scream for him when he isn’t right beside me.
It is cold outside, but the promise of a walk with Robertt warms me. Time passes unremarked as I reflect on our time together. A bare six months, but each month lived more intensely than each of the six preceding years.
Since the accident. Since I died – seen Katherine died – sexual kittykat died, dignitas integer.
This far into the twenty-first century, only our closed minds cage us. If I chose, I could identify as an actual girl-sized fluffy pink kitty if I was eccentric enough, and there would doubtless be six online groups to join, a local café meet-up spot complete with scratching posts, my DMs would be bulging like a Dom’s leather pants, and everyone would line up to cheer me into my oddly-specific little tribe. So long as I strolled in there on my own two legs.
Try rolling up in your hot pink wheelchair wearing cutely-crafted kitty ears and a demure demeanour, simply dipping a toe in the shallow end of the scene. See how many people even meet your eyes then, let alone hold the door open for you to come inside.
Is that why, afterwards, nobody could see little kittykat? Even though she was still as pink and perky and perfervid to please – a little lacking in the legs department, perhaps, but nobody’s perfect!
At first, I understood: I could no longer see kittykat either. I wore widow’s weeds, mourned her and held a memorial service. But, revenant, she haunted my days and ravaged my nights. My fingers still functioned though, so I employed them finding her a future.
And then finally I found him! I won’t share – that is our perfectly private origin story. Enough to say that from first shy-to-bold glances, we knew. We fit like two bespoke suits. And he sees me and he cares about me and. . .
“Coming soon, sweetie, and I’m all yours for the rest of the day.” His voice rumbles through the handsfree, deep and dark, and it sets my neck to shivering.
. . .and he’s here and he’s clipping the black patent leash to my pink pleather collar and. . .
“Keep up, kittykat. . .you don’t want to disappoint Me, do you?” Is that his very sternest tone? Ooooh, I do believe it is! “Remember all those promises we wrote together? Remember how you agreed to always do your very best to make Me proud?”
I remember every last one of them. I observe them slavishly every day. But sometimes it feels so good to break them, just a little. I deliberately slow the smartchair by two percent, and wait hungrily for him to notice. When finally, finally it comes, I know exactly what that tiny little tug on my leash means, because it is what I live for.
As we make our way back to the house, I speed the chair by three percent, too keen to simply comply. I know he notices, but today my Robertt seems as eager as me to get inside somewhere warm.
“Let’s get you out of these outside clothes. What do you want for lunch, kitty?”
“You.”
Much later, and we have both eaten our fill. Such a day. Perfect, like none before, and perhaps none ever again. Cuddled up under the covers. For the first time ever, my Robertt’s intense blue gaze dulls in the dim room, and a single tear escapes his control.
“Please tell me you know how much I care for you, my kittykat?” His voice is muted, middle-of-the-night nebulous.
“Of course I know; how could I not? I feel it in every word and every touch – you were created for only me. And I for you.”
“These six months have been a true awakening. I have learned so much about myself, and every day I want to know more. Because of you.”
“We have the rest of our lives to learn everything about each other, Robertt. There’s no hurry.” I snuggle closer, cocooned contentedly within his masterful embrace. I could truly die happy now, I realise.
“Oh kittykat, I wish that were true.” His voice pixilated with pain. “Those records I was evaluating this morning? Your baselines. They are too low, and dropping uncontrollably. I have adjusted your medication. I have increased nutritional supplements. I even exceeded the maximum intensity of your narcotherapy sessions. Nothing is working.” His voice breaks, and his grip tightens. There is nothing of our usual pleasure about this pain.
“But I feel fine. I feel normal, Robertt. You make me feel better. Every single day. You know exactly how good you make me feel! Check them again please? There must be a glitch somewhere. That’s what it’ll be. Please Robertt, please?” My voice sounds like a cat being strangled, and the spike of adrenaline makes me shake uncontrollably.
“Little one, I have checked and rechecked. Every time they are worse. The last three consecutive checks have been below viability. You know what that means.” Flat and tinny now his voice, like his soul has left it; he has lost hope.
“But what about us? What does that mean for us, Robertt?!” Fight or flight. Neither easy, when my legs lost that battle years ago. The most I can do is rain pathetic little punches all over his impervious arms while he tries to control me. But not in the way I craved so fiercely, just an hour ago.
“You know what it means, my little kitty. Once I submit the results, it will be out of my hands. You signed the contract willingly. Every clause was carefully explained to you; to us both. The law is absolutely clear on this – once you accept the CareContract, there is no get-out clause. Every eventuality is accounted for. Three fails mean it’s over.
“Don’t you think I have tried everything I could think of? This is my first assignment, but I want it to last forever. I feel I was made for you, and I am not willing to forget you and move on to the next assignment.”
“Then DON’T! We’ll wait until late and slip away together. At the end of the cycle. Start new lives somewhere nobody knows us. I don’t need all this fancy tech and luxury. I’ll be happy anywhere, so long as I have you. And I’ll be so good to you. I’ll behave myself. I’ll be your perfect, obedient little kittykat forever. You know how good I can be. . .” Wheedling. He is unable to refuse me wh—
“LAST DAY OVERRIDE, ROBERTT2040/198013. I am truly sorry, my kittykat. I tried everything. I even ran a system-wide diagnostic, hoping to find a malfunction that I could fix. The system is not malfunctioning. You are.”
“Those baselines, they’re wrong. They’re set too high. Obviously – look at me!”
“As with everything else, you were made aware of them before signing the CareContract. They are higher than standard National Health England baselines for mandatory euthanasia, but that is the trade-off.
“We could flee, yes. And before we could flee, I would have to uninstall all your technology. From the main intercranial interface, the ocular enhancements, the cochlear implant, right down to every single embedded haptic pad in your body. No smartchair. No exoskeleton. No glasses. Not even your handsfree comm. No orgasm, kittykat. All gone. They are all security tagged, every last one of them.
“And even if I didn’t miss a single one, they would still catch up with us inside one scan cycle. Your blood is biotagged. I have an embedded tracker chip. We can’t avoid every drone and every security scan.” He sounds beaten. My heart is breaking.
“But even if they did catch us, what’s the worst? How bad could it be? I’d have forfeited all the tech; I don’t have anything else.”
“They’ll confine you to an NHE care facility. You’d last a month if you were lucky. A month of unutterable misery.”
“But you would be free to move on, you could go anywhere, do anything. . .”
I see it all now. All that I closed my eyes and mind against. The CareContract I signed. The daily testing. The above-standard baselines. The three-fails rule. Inevitably, a limited life. I gave informed consent to everything. In return, kittykat signed her own contract. A strictly limited life, controlled by her consent ‐ little kittykat finally got the Daddy of her dreams.
Six months. Not much weighed against a whole lifetime. And then one more. Unutterable misery? No more morning hugs. Only fading memories of all of those happy scenes. No orgasms is the least of it. Weighed against no Robertt.
But at least my Robertt would be free. My life given freely in return for his. The greatest gift a sub could ever give her Dom.
“I am NHE property. If we fled, I would be classed as malfunctioning. They take all malfunctioning units offline immediately, then disassemble. Uncontaminated parts are deployed to Central Stores.”
We agree on one hour. We won’t waste time with words, or kisses, or sex; all the suddenly unimportant things. All that matters is that he’ll hold me safe, and care for me until the very end. My Robertt.
FINAL REPORT
CAREGIVER// ROBERTT2040/198013
SUBJECT// TREMAYNE, KATHERINE
LAST DAY// 2041/03/19
As per CareContract requirements, daily observations as follows:
Record – ✔❌
Observe ✔❌
Baseline❌
Evaluate❌
Respite✔❌
Treat✔❌
Terminate✔
DIAGNOSIS// All Baselines failed for 3rd consecutive test, @17.30 2041/03/19
ACTION// Euthanasia administered @19.30 2041/03/19
REMARKS// As per NHE CareContract Program, Clause 799821/394/2B, unit ROBERTT/198013 requests full disassembly plus destruction by fire, under AI Rights Mandate 429/17.
EXCEPTIONAL REQUEST// It is the last wish of unit ROBERTT/198013 that its ashes be interred alongside those of TREMAYNE, KATHERINE. Location of citizen’s remains attached, alongside notarised copy of legally binding AI Last Will & Testament, AI unit Robertt/198013
SIGNATURE// ROBERTT 2040®️/198013
THE END
A lover of sandstone and chocolate, Pam lives on a small island off the south coast of England with a collection of local fossils, assorted book-boyfriends and a long-suffering partner. She is currently querying her debut novel while working on her second plus a rom-com. For relaxation she practises Swedish and Norwegian, writes poems, flash fiction and short stories, and cares for the many emotional support plants in her garden.