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Cellulose & Steel	By : Not-Taylor Category: Misc Books > FemmeSlash Views: 1028 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I don't own HDG or its characters and I don't make money from this work.

Chapter List
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It’s probably not Verda’s fault there’s nothing to do. She probably couldn’t have gotten permission to let her “floret” watch television unattended. Showing a cartoon to a floret probably merits disciplinary action. Violence is really bad and stuff, even if it’s just pixels! Do Affini screens have pixels? That’s a really good question that the videos aren’t going to answer!
Could it ask for another walk? Probably not. Its legs are still a bit tired. Even if it hadn’t gone back to space, it probably would still be needing time to adjust to gravity again.
It sprawls on its stomach facing the head of the bed. Ow! It does not sprawl on its stomach because that isn’t a good idea. It flips itself over the long edge to end oriented normally and on its side. That’s sort of better. The room is feeling especially cramped now. It reminds itself that small spaces haven’t bothered it before and that there’s nothing to worry about. It wishes its warden would depart.
It slips on the headphones again in order not to give its captor the satisfaction of an opening to call it a good little floret. A Guide for Wards and Florets: Part… 5. That’s the right one. It’s the next one, anyway. It doesn’t know about “right.”
The presenter is a blonde girl in a nurse’s uniform, or a Halloween costume version at least. It cringes at how much of a stereotype she is. There’s no way that isn’t intentional. She’s even chewing gum. Who does that? Who does that while speaking to people? The shrill voice is just too much.
“Hai gais, this is a really important video, where we talk about something really important (she crosses her legs). That’s your health. Oh, right (she laughs and chomps on her gum). My name is Alex duLac, and I’m the third floret of Zena duLac, eighth bloom. So the most important thing about your health is taking care of it. Your owner’s going to know how to do that. They’re really smart (she smiles happily). They mostly just use xenodrugs because those work really well. I haven’t gotten sick and I’ve been a floret for years now. Really, it’s been entire years and my asthma’s gone… They can do that.
“Mostly xenodrugs make you feel good, but they’re still drugs. They still do medical things, like helping you heal faster if you get hurt. So mostly the way you take care of yourself is telling your owner what’s wrong so they can fix it. If they can’t, you get to go to the vet’s office. They’re always so nice. The vet likes to pet me (she pauses to remember what being petted is like), and I always get a carmel there! So if you tell the vet and your owner what’s wrong, it’ll be fine.”
The video cuts out abruptly as the floret starts to stare into space. The viewer wonders why the affini has a Terran surname that isn’t mythological. Did she pick it up from a book? It thinks about Terrans it used to know who did that. It now knows what sort of a person Zena is. It wonders further whether the purpose of the borderline useless video was to let somebody’s floret do a cosplay.
The next video’s floret has cybernetics covering most of the upper right of his face. The eye looks natural, but it’s hard to be sure. Since that looks like Terran work, it wonders why the Affini didn’t just use their superior technology to do better. They should be able to achieve things far in excess of Terran work, right? Or do they just do their xenodrugs and medicate florets into apathy? The man on screen still looks like a soldier under all the xenodrugs. It wonders whether he was part of Terra’s ground defence. Either way, he seems thoroughly content now. Traitor.
“Good day. I’m Arthur Chrysanthemum, first floret of Erdala Chrysanthemum, Second Bloom. Today I’m going to talk to you about staying safe. Just because you’re somebody’s pet doesn’t mean bad things can’t happen and that you can’t get yourself into trouble. As safe as the Affini’ve made life for us, being careful is important too. I burned myself while cooking the other day. It hurt a lot! Things like that happen all the time, so pay attention to yourselves.
“One of the big things is when xenodrugs make you cuddly and you’re left alone with other florets. Then you have to be careful that- (somebody to the side of the camera interrupts him and he makes a face), so, um, stay safe. Another one is to look where you’re going. I have a friend who works with metal to make little art things for his mistress, and he nearly walked into her because he wasn’t looking where he was going. And that’s not good. Stay safe.”
It wonders just what he meant by “alone with other florets.” That doesn’t really matter since it’s not a floret and thus can’t interact with other florets by definition.
“Hello again. This is Arthur Chrysanthemum, first floret of Erdala Chrysanthemum, back to talk more about how to stay safe as a floret. I’m not sure why this was broken into two parts, but I trust the decision of my Mistress and the editors of the Guide.
“What we need to cover now is actually the most important part of staying safe as a floret: obeying your owner. Because your owner cares a great deal for your health and wellbeing, She’s sure to want what’s best for you. The affini are very smart. Mistress showed me some of the calculations for an engineering project she’s working on last week and I didn’t understand any of it. I don’t even understand the level of math going on there. Because they’re so smart, they tend to know better than we do. That’s why we get to be their pets.
“The best part of being a floret, for me, is not having to worry about things, because Mistress takes care of it all. She knows where I should go and do, and She’s always watching over me, when she can at least. I’m grateful to Her for saving me from myself. The part of that that you should remember is that your owner knows what’s right for you.
“The way to ensure that everything goes smoothly and that you don’t mess up is to simply follow your owner’s directions. It’s really easy. Some of you are probably going to have problems at first. That’s because other humans aren’t smart enough to give you the kind of security that an affini could. Once you let go, it’s so much easier to just obey them.
“As our owners, it is the right of affini to discipline us as well. That doesn’t happen very much, especially when we obey, but it isn’t an idle threat. It’s for our own good and to ensure we stay happy and safe at all times.
“My Mistress treats me very well. When I do as I’m told, She gives me treats and scratches behind my ears. She always finds a way to demonstrate how She appreciates when I’m good. Back when I hadn’t been implanted yet, I turned in another floret who was running away (expression drains from his face and he stares at the camera for a bit before suddenly waking up and smiling). She was implanted the next day and thanked me for helping her stop fighting. Mistress rewarded me with a belly rub and took me to the park twice in one day.
“Putting that in perspective, our owners’ love isn’t conditional. It’s there even when we misbehave and they have to punish us. Just because that happens doesn’t mean they hate us. They’re doing it for our own good so we can be the best we can be, for Them.”
A belly rub and a trip to the park? Now that’s an interesting story. Did he get a biscuit too? The Free Terran scowls at the weeds’ perversion. It doesn’t even want to fight them over this. It just feels sad.
One more? It may as well. There’s nothing better going on here. It can’t even throw spitballs at Verda. It clicks on the next video in the list. There are two florets this time, about the same age. They look like trans men. Even though they’re sitting, one is way taller than the other. They’re wearing matching floret clothing. Going by the speech patterns, trans guys for sure, and gay.
“Hi everyone! I’m James Klus, first floret of Arine Klus, seventh bloom. I’m Meriwether Klus, second floret of Arine Klus, seventh bloom. We’re going to be talking with you about making friends, because only talking to your owner gets lonely. The topic is important to us because that’s how we met, and why Meriwether agreed to become Mistress’s floret too.
“I was independent when James and I met. We became close, and eventually I met his mistress. We took a liking to each other, and now here we all are. That’s a story for another day, of course. You won’t always end up living with your friends (they both laugh a little), but for sure it’s not impossible.
“There are lots of places to make friends. The Affini are doing their best to make our lives safe, so nearly anywhere you go will be full of friendly people. We live close to a bowling alley, but maybe you could find a park or a gym, or somewhere else to go and see who’s out there. There are libraries too. Don’t interrupt people reading, but they do fun stuff there, like…
“Like face painting! And wasn’t there a flier about a poetry club?
“Yeah! That sounds like fun, for people who like writing poems. So there are a lot of places you can go and things you can do to meet people, if your owner allows you out by yourself. If they do, don’t be afraid to go up to people who don’t look too involved in something. They might be looking for friends too, and then you’d both miss out if you didn’t.
“True. And you might not meet anyone you gel with that way, but that’s life. You can ask your Mistress or Master to see if you can play with some of their friends’ florets. That way all of you can socialize at the same time. It’s a great way to find people you otherwise never would’ve thought to talk to. Plus it can help getting over social anxiety, which is one of the problems our mistress helped me with a lot.
“Meriweather’s being really brave to come here and talk in front of so many people. He’s really improved (the other floret touches his arm). Affini really like having their florets meet. There are whole group days and stuff where you can go meet tons of new people, and if you’re ever overwhelmed you can just go back to your owner and cuddle for a bit. They have cotton candy and popcorn. We went to one with hundreds of florets… and that was kind of a lot for me too. Mistress was good about helping us feel comfortable there, though!
“But you have to make sure to be clear about what’s too much. That’s way better than going past your limits. There’s nothing wrong with liking time between the two of you, as long as you don’t mentally wall yourself in. Go make friends! They’re one of the best parts of life. Thanks for listening (they say that at the same time and wave)!”
The Terran who isn’t a floret feels a little unsettled by that. What’s with them? There wasn’t anything objectionable in the video, but something still feels wrong about it. There’s something… sinister. The sinister sitting and writing poems together, clearly. It wonders what villainy the Affini are perpetrating. Suddenly it remembers. That sounds like advertising campaigns for communist third world hellholes from before its time. “That has to be it. Maybe not, but I still don’t like it,” it thinks.
Large groups of people milling about and interacting sound horrible. It wonders why anyone would choose to be in such a place. Do the affini promote that for themselves? It sounds like a recipe for torturing people with social anxiety or autism or just about anything.
“Hello and welcome back! I’m Meriwether Klus, second floret of Arine Klus. I’m James Klus, first floret of Arine Klus, seventh bloom. Now we’ll be talking about what it’s like to have the same owner and go over a few tips on doing that smoothly. We’ve been together under our mistress for almost a year now, so even if things are a little rocky at the start, they really can go well.
“When more than one floret has a particular Mistress or Master, they’re said to be connivents-”
That’s enough of that. It’s happy to know where that word came from that’s been used occasionally, but it really doesn’t care about sharing an owner. That reminds it of some things it’d really rather not remember for the time being. And those two are making its head hurt with how happy the sound. It’s disgusting.
Fine, just one more. Hopefully this one will be a little interesting. Again, two florets. It recognizes the one on the left from when the Accord tried to make a meme to boost support for the Defence War, and failed miserably because they were out of touch old people. Nobody cared. Maybe that’s why so few were willing to stay and fight…
The left floret is a woman who’s starting to approach middle age, with short purple hair just longer than a buzz cut and an eagle tattooed on her jaw. She looks unhappy. Unlike the other actors, she’s wearing a color inverted Terran uniform, which is what she wore in the “meme.” She’s a lot less muscular now so it just looks weird and unsettling. Getting old isn’t really her fault, obviously, but… why, weeds? This might be worse than the original operation.
The second floret is wearing a mask and gloves. This should be an especially clever idea of the xenodrugged former people who wrote these videos. The mask quickly comes off to reveal something not quite human. The nose is too flat, the eyes are too far apart, and the purple hair doesn’t appear to be dyed. Looking a little longer, the skin has a weird coloring in it. The voice turns out to have a spooky resonance too.
“Greetings, new floret. Welcome to the large and prestigious Affini family. My name is Fols Kos, first floret of Aasin Kos, sixth. I have been a floret for more than fifty Earth years.”
“Hi from me, too. My name is Brenda Kos, and I’m proud to be Aasin Kos’s second floret. Fols and I agreed to make this video because we have a special perspective on its topic, the wonderful diversity of the Affini Compact.”
And because your picture was in half the ships in the Navy with a caption of “Terra for Terrans, the vacuum for the rest” with an affini drawn clawing at the outside of an airlock, or won’t we be mentioning that today? What were they thinking…
“I had no idea there were so many xenos out there. They come in all different shapes and sizes, and some look more alien than others. The Compact contains hundreds of species already, and more are joining every decade. Like us, they go through a lot of difficulty trying to assimilate and learn to fit into Affini society. Many have an easier time than we do, but some have more difficulty. Going over every species would be a pointless exercise, so I’ll refrain from doing so. Just know that everyone you meet is under a treaty of domestication not unlike humanity’s.
“Because of that, not every floret you meet will be from Earth. It’s not unlikely most will be, given our location and given how recent our domestication was, but that’s certainly not the case through the whole Compact. Everywhere you go there will be new xenos to meet and make friends with.”
No, we won’t be talking about the picture. Got it.
“For those who aren’t human, the shock may be even greater than yours. Many species’ first contact is the Affini, and that’s a terrifying experience if you’ve grown up expecting space to be a scary place. It stops being so scary when we accept our owners, but that doesn’t always come instantly.
“That’s why it’s important to be nice to everyone you meet. Even if you don’t end up sharing an owner, it’s important to get along since you’ll be sharing a world or a ship. That’s why so much of the Compact’s infrastructure is oddly proportioned. Even if most is designed around humans, the Affini themselves are large and differently shaped enough to warrant changes. Between day lengths, size, limb count… there’s a ton that goes into it. The Affini manage to make it all work, which is why we love them so much.
“Past prejudices may be difficult to shake off, but it’s really important! Life is so much better when you’re nice to people. Even though you’ve been taught to see other races as lesser, they’re people, just like us. Delaying the acceptance of that fact is just plain pointless.”
Brenda hugs her fellow floret and the video ends. Shameful. Everyone around the pilot is so weak. It’s almost ashamed to be Terran. It can never be ashamed of that, but it’s coming close. Another? No, it can’t handle that. It doesn’t want to contemplate just how many of its kind betrayed their nature and their heritage… and for what? A belly rub? Even dogs don’t betray for rubs, even if they’ll readily accept them from whoever gives them. Thoroughly sick of weed nonsense, it flops onto its back and tries to relax.
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Cellulose & Steel