I Prefer the Mind Control Rewrite - Chapter 2
This is a rewrite of my I Prefer the Mind Control NaNo Novel. Here's hoping this version is more awesome!
previous chapter
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Xan, Jirrin and I sat around Xan’s dining room table, drinking the most fucking delicious coffee ever. Zimarans, they had good taste - at least the ones whose parents had mysterious government jobs did.
“Wow,” I breathed, not even sure why I said that.
“Wow what?” Jirrin asked as Xan took a sip of his coffee.
Good question. Pretty much everything wowed me, from the incredible sex to the almost-as-incredible furniture.
I said, “Just fucking everything. This whole apartment -- it’s fit for, like, space royalty.”
Xan spat out his mouthful of coffee, spraying it everywhere. “Wh-what?” he stammered.
I could ask the same fucking question. As far as I knew, I hadn’t said anything worthy of such a spectacular spit take. You’re hiding something from me, aren’t you, author? And you’re not gonna tell me, are you?
Jirrin started giggling. Yes, giggling. His violet eyes sparkled with fucking mirth, and I had no clue whatsoever what was so damn funny.
“He -- he doesn’t know. You -- you didn’t tell him, did you, X-Xan?” Jirrin could barely get the words out, he was laughing so much.
While it was harder to tell under Xan’s deeply tanned skin, I thought he was blushing.
I grumbled, “Would you people care to fucking explain the sudden outbreak of weird?”
“What did my friend tell you about what his dads did for a living?” Jirrin drawled.
“‘Lucrative government work,’ whatever that means,” I muttered.
Jirrin’s eyes still fucking sparkled. “That’s not technically a lie, but it’s not the whole story, not by far.”
I said, “What, are they like military contractors responsible for killing loads of people with their products or something?”
“That’s not-”
Xan interrupted Jirrin. “Let me explain. My -- my dads are, well, they’re kind of rather important. In the government. I don’t mean as contractors or anything like that. They’re, well, my dads are -- are kind of at the head of the Zimaran Interplanetary Kingdom. They’re -- the Kings.”
Wait, what?
“If your dads are the Zimaran Kings, that makes you...” I trailed off. This was just too fucking weird.
Jirrin grinned like the bewildering revelation was the most entertaining thing ever. “Xan is ‘space royalty’ as you called it. He’s a Prince of Zimara.”
“I -- what?” I stammered. My brain refused to wrap itself around this. Xan’s being a Prince I could handle in theory, but I had fucked him. “But we had sex! Is it even legal for you to have sex with a commoner like me?”
Xan muttered, “Our laws aren’t so antique that such things are illegal.”
“But I’m me,” I said.
He narrowed his eyes. “Dylan, my royal status has nothing to do with how much I like you, which is a lot. I don’t want to hear this ‘but I’m me’ nonsense, alright?”
Xan’s look almost made me flinch. I demanded, “Why didn’t you fucking tell me? It would seem if you wanted to fuck me, your chances of doing so would only go up if you let drop who you were.”
Jirrin took a sip of his coffee. “Our Prince would rather just pretend he’s normal.”
I was fucking flabbergasted. “Pretend you’re normal? With this fucking apartment?”
How could Xan possibly try and pretend he was normal when his residence looked like the inside of a luxury spaceship? What the fuck was he trying to hide from, exactly?
Xan muttered, “I’m not exactly good at pretending I’m normal, am I? Had -- had run-ins with the paparazzi in my previous city. They found out who I was quick enough. Wanted interviews and everything. I -- didn’t want to deal with it.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Don’t you kinda have to deal with that shit if you’re royalty, though?”
Wait, was I even allowed to curse in front of a legit space Prince? He had already seen me fucking naked, so I figured the occasional “shit” or “fuck” wouldn’t make Xan’s brain explode. I took a sip of my coffee, trying to get myself to process everything. It wasn’t working.
“Do you -- still want to see me?” Xan whispered.
Huh? I looked at him in confusion.
He said, “To sleep together again, I mean. Do you still want the mind control on?”
“Why wouldn’t I?” I asked.
“That’s a good question,” Jirrin muttered.
“Because of who I am,” Xan said.
I was lucky I hadn’t taken a sip of my coffee, because I would have spit it out like Xan had. “Xan, who you are doesn’t, like, detract from your impossible hotness. Seriously.”
My mind struggled to wrap itself around Xan’s odd behavior. Did he have some sort of low self-esteem complex from being a Prince? As far as things that would contribute to low self-esteem went, that seemed unlikely. Still, Xan appeared to have something like that, but I’m no fucking psychologist. Would you care to offer me some insight as I assume he’s your character, too? No? Oh, fine then. Some help you are.
I looked right at Xan. “Believe me, I still want the mind control on.”
Jirrin murmured, “I probably should take mine off you. It was fun sharing you with Xan, but it’s better not to have two people in your brain for too long.”
He looked at me, and I felt a shift. Jirrin was no longer in my mind. Xan still was, causing me to breathe a sigh of relief. I had worried he would take the control off. That would have been seriously uncool.
Xan said, “As long as you’re sure, I still want you. A lot.” He reached for my hand and gave it a squeeze. “Why don’t you get your phone so I can put my number in it? I’ll get my phone, if you want mine.”
“Of course I want you number, Xan.”
I got up from the table and went to retrieve my phone. When I pulled it out of my backpack, I saw I had ten fucking text messages. Since when did I get popular? After checking them, I realized they were all from my roommate, Preston. Not wanting to hold Xan up, I didn’t bother checking the contents of the messages, but what the fuck? Why would Preston feel the sudden need to bombard my inbox?
When I returned to the table, Xan was already back, holding the fanciest fucking smartphone I had ever seen. Like his car, it was obviously a custom model, with a strange logo on it. Come to think of it, I had seen that strange rainbow logo on other things in the apartment.
“Your phone’s fucking fancy,” I muttered. “What’s the weird symbol on it?”
“It’s, um, the symbol of the Zimaran royal family,” he said.
“Neat, I see you guys do family crest shit, too. Here’s my commoner phone.” I punched a few buttons on my phone and handed it to Xan. “You can just add your number right here.”
He did the same for me. When I held his space phone, I couldn’t help looking the device over and admiring it. The thing was fancy.
Jirrin chuckled. “You might want to actually put your number in there.”
Right. Shaking my head to snap me out of my “ooh shiny” trance, I put my number into Xan’s phone and handed it back to him. He gave me back my phone, now with one swanky number added to it.
Looking at my phone, I finally realized it was fucking tomorrow. Well, today was always today, but I had spent the night at Xan’s place. Whoa.
“I spent the night,” I breathed.
“You’re a funny one, Dylan,” Jirrin said.
I muttered, “I should probably get going. My roommate’s already freaking out.”
Xan grabbed my wrist and pulled me over to him. He kissed me. My heart fucking skipped a beat. I closed my eyes, relaxing into the kiss. Damn, Xan really was good at that. He already made me want more, which wasn’t exactly convenient when I needed to, you know, leave.
“Someone doesn’t want his plaything to go home,” Jirrin drawled.
Eventually, I extracted myself from Xan. Very reluctantly.
After I got my stuff, Xan murmured, “I’ll take you home.”
Jirrin looked at us. “I wonder how your bodyguards feel about your human...friend.”
Wait, what?
“Bodyguards? I didn’t see any.”
Xan said, “They’re -- invisible, due to Zimaran tech.”
“Fucking invisible bodyguards? They -- they weren’t watching us, were they?” I stammered.
He shook his head. “Oh no, they stay outside the apartment door and patrol the building’s perimeter.”
That was a fucking relief. Being watched wouldn’t even be the problem; not being told I was being watched? That would cross a huge line.
* * *
Due to construction, you couldn’t actually get a car near my fucking dorm, so, when Xan drove me back, he had to stop at a parking lot at least five minutes from the building. After we got out of the car, he kissed me. I wrapped my arms around him. It made me very much not want Xan to go.
“Call me,” he said. “I had a great time.”
“Me too.”
“See you around, Dylan,” he murmured.
Xan got back in his car and drove off, leaving me standing there. I needed to head back to the dorm and pretend to fucking study for my French test on Monday. That thing was important, but it wasn’t anywhere near as hot as Xan. Him, I wanted to do. Homework? Not so fucking attractive.
When I arrived at my room and opened the door, Preston nearly fucking tackled me. He ran right up and got in my face. “Dylan, Dylan, Dylan! Oh my god, is it true? Is it truuuuuue?”
I stepped back as far as I could, considering he practically had me pressed against the door. “Is what true?”
“You,” he breathed.
“Unless I’m secretly part of some alien teenager’s virtual reality game, I’m as true as anything else,” I muttered.
He shook his head fast enough I thought he might give himself a fucking concussion. The words tumbled out of his mouth. “No, no that’s not what I mean.”
“Then what do you mean?”
Preston babbled, “I mean -- I mean, you. One of my contacts spotted you. Or maybe it wasn’t you. And maybe it wasn’t him. And maybe it was...”
A little translation help, here? No? You’re the most unhelpful author, like, ever.
I grabbed his shoulders, desperately hoping to calm him down enough to make some fucking sense. If I didn’t know better, I would say he shivered at my touch, but it was Preston.
“Preston, man, you need to calm the fuck down, okay?” I hissed.
My “grab him” method failed. Preston bounced up and down even when I tried to hold him. “Calm? Calm? How can I be calm? I need confirmation!”
I let him go and grumbled, “Then you need to fucking tell me what I’m supposed to confirm.”
“You and him,” he breathed.
Did he mean? “Who is this ‘him’ you keep talking about?”
“Xan!” he cried. “The Xan. Prince of the Zimaran Interplanetary Kingdom.”
My heart fucking stopped.
“Wh-what?”
Preston’s eyes got huge. “It was you and him, wasn’t it?”
There wasn’t any point in lying. “Yeah, that was me. Who saw me? What and where and how?”
He said, “I can’t reveal that. Let’s just say my contact sent me a pic labeled ‘I think Prince Xan’s gonna fuck that short guy,’ and that was it.”
Wait, short guy? Fine, I was only five foot six, which is short for a man. And no short jokes, okay? That shit is stupid and cheesy. You won’t mock me for my height? We’re good then, but you’re still the most unhelpful author ever.
Preston asked, “So -- what exactly is your, um, relationship with Prince Xan?”
None of your business? I knew Preston wouldn’t be so easily dissuaded from trying to find out what was going on, and I would rather he heard it from me.
My cheeks got kind of hot. I said, “Relationship? I don’t know. We -- slept together, and he’s still got the mind control on me, whatever that means.”
“You what? He still what? What?” Preston breathed.
“Yeah, he still has the mind control on me, and we slept together. But Zimarans are supposed to practically use sex to say hello so I don’t know what any of it even means, okay?” I muttered.
Shut up, brain. If I were going to be fucking honest with myself, I did kind of hope it meant something. How ridiculous was that?
Very ridiculous, but a guy could hope, right?
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written for writerverse Challenge #14 - Weekly Quick Fic #5
next chapter
previous chapter
---------
Xan, Jirrin and I sat around Xan’s dining room table, drinking the most fucking delicious coffee ever. Zimarans, they had good taste - at least the ones whose parents had mysterious government jobs did.
“Wow,” I breathed, not even sure why I said that.
“Wow what?” Jirrin asked as Xan took a sip of his coffee.
Good question. Pretty much everything wowed me, from the incredible sex to the almost-as-incredible furniture.
I said, “Just fucking everything. This whole apartment -- it’s fit for, like, space royalty.”
Xan spat out his mouthful of coffee, spraying it everywhere. “Wh-what?” he stammered.
I could ask the same fucking question. As far as I knew, I hadn’t said anything worthy of such a spectacular spit take. You’re hiding something from me, aren’t you, author? And you’re not gonna tell me, are you?
Jirrin started giggling. Yes, giggling. His violet eyes sparkled with fucking mirth, and I had no clue whatsoever what was so damn funny.
“He -- he doesn’t know. You -- you didn’t tell him, did you, X-Xan?” Jirrin could barely get the words out, he was laughing so much.
While it was harder to tell under Xan’s deeply tanned skin, I thought he was blushing.
I grumbled, “Would you people care to fucking explain the sudden outbreak of weird?”
“What did my friend tell you about what his dads did for a living?” Jirrin drawled.
“‘Lucrative government work,’ whatever that means,” I muttered.
Jirrin’s eyes still fucking sparkled. “That’s not technically a lie, but it’s not the whole story, not by far.”
I said, “What, are they like military contractors responsible for killing loads of people with their products or something?”
“That’s not-”
Xan interrupted Jirrin. “Let me explain. My -- my dads are, well, they’re kind of rather important. In the government. I don’t mean as contractors or anything like that. They’re, well, my dads are -- are kind of at the head of the Zimaran Interplanetary Kingdom. They’re -- the Kings.”
Wait, what?
“If your dads are the Zimaran Kings, that makes you...” I trailed off. This was just too fucking weird.
Jirrin grinned like the bewildering revelation was the most entertaining thing ever. “Xan is ‘space royalty’ as you called it. He’s a Prince of Zimara.”
“I -- what?” I stammered. My brain refused to wrap itself around this. Xan’s being a Prince I could handle in theory, but I had fucked him. “But we had sex! Is it even legal for you to have sex with a commoner like me?”
Xan muttered, “Our laws aren’t so antique that such things are illegal.”
“But I’m me,” I said.
He narrowed his eyes. “Dylan, my royal status has nothing to do with how much I like you, which is a lot. I don’t want to hear this ‘but I’m me’ nonsense, alright?”
Xan’s look almost made me flinch. I demanded, “Why didn’t you fucking tell me? It would seem if you wanted to fuck me, your chances of doing so would only go up if you let drop who you were.”
Jirrin took a sip of his coffee. “Our Prince would rather just pretend he’s normal.”
I was fucking flabbergasted. “Pretend you’re normal? With this fucking apartment?”
How could Xan possibly try and pretend he was normal when his residence looked like the inside of a luxury spaceship? What the fuck was he trying to hide from, exactly?
Xan muttered, “I’m not exactly good at pretending I’m normal, am I? Had -- had run-ins with the paparazzi in my previous city. They found out who I was quick enough. Wanted interviews and everything. I -- didn’t want to deal with it.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Don’t you kinda have to deal with that shit if you’re royalty, though?”
Wait, was I even allowed to curse in front of a legit space Prince? He had already seen me fucking naked, so I figured the occasional “shit” or “fuck” wouldn’t make Xan’s brain explode. I took a sip of my coffee, trying to get myself to process everything. It wasn’t working.
“Do you -- still want to see me?” Xan whispered.
Huh? I looked at him in confusion.
He said, “To sleep together again, I mean. Do you still want the mind control on?”
“Why wouldn’t I?” I asked.
“That’s a good question,” Jirrin muttered.
“Because of who I am,” Xan said.
I was lucky I hadn’t taken a sip of my coffee, because I would have spit it out like Xan had. “Xan, who you are doesn’t, like, detract from your impossible hotness. Seriously.”
My mind struggled to wrap itself around Xan’s odd behavior. Did he have some sort of low self-esteem complex from being a Prince? As far as things that would contribute to low self-esteem went, that seemed unlikely. Still, Xan appeared to have something like that, but I’m no fucking psychologist. Would you care to offer me some insight as I assume he’s your character, too? No? Oh, fine then. Some help you are.
I looked right at Xan. “Believe me, I still want the mind control on.”
Jirrin murmured, “I probably should take mine off you. It was fun sharing you with Xan, but it’s better not to have two people in your brain for too long.”
He looked at me, and I felt a shift. Jirrin was no longer in my mind. Xan still was, causing me to breathe a sigh of relief. I had worried he would take the control off. That would have been seriously uncool.
Xan said, “As long as you’re sure, I still want you. A lot.” He reached for my hand and gave it a squeeze. “Why don’t you get your phone so I can put my number in it? I’ll get my phone, if you want mine.”
“Of course I want you number, Xan.”
I got up from the table and went to retrieve my phone. When I pulled it out of my backpack, I saw I had ten fucking text messages. Since when did I get popular? After checking them, I realized they were all from my roommate, Preston. Not wanting to hold Xan up, I didn’t bother checking the contents of the messages, but what the fuck? Why would Preston feel the sudden need to bombard my inbox?
When I returned to the table, Xan was already back, holding the fanciest fucking smartphone I had ever seen. Like his car, it was obviously a custom model, with a strange logo on it. Come to think of it, I had seen that strange rainbow logo on other things in the apartment.
“Your phone’s fucking fancy,” I muttered. “What’s the weird symbol on it?”
“It’s, um, the symbol of the Zimaran royal family,” he said.
“Neat, I see you guys do family crest shit, too. Here’s my commoner phone.” I punched a few buttons on my phone and handed it to Xan. “You can just add your number right here.”
He did the same for me. When I held his space phone, I couldn’t help looking the device over and admiring it. The thing was fancy.
Jirrin chuckled. “You might want to actually put your number in there.”
Right. Shaking my head to snap me out of my “ooh shiny” trance, I put my number into Xan’s phone and handed it back to him. He gave me back my phone, now with one swanky number added to it.
Looking at my phone, I finally realized it was fucking tomorrow. Well, today was always today, but I had spent the night at Xan’s place. Whoa.
“I spent the night,” I breathed.
“You’re a funny one, Dylan,” Jirrin said.
I muttered, “I should probably get going. My roommate’s already freaking out.”
Xan grabbed my wrist and pulled me over to him. He kissed me. My heart fucking skipped a beat. I closed my eyes, relaxing into the kiss. Damn, Xan really was good at that. He already made me want more, which wasn’t exactly convenient when I needed to, you know, leave.
“Someone doesn’t want his plaything to go home,” Jirrin drawled.
Eventually, I extracted myself from Xan. Very reluctantly.
After I got my stuff, Xan murmured, “I’ll take you home.”
Jirrin looked at us. “I wonder how your bodyguards feel about your human...friend.”
Wait, what?
“Bodyguards? I didn’t see any.”
Xan said, “They’re -- invisible, due to Zimaran tech.”
“Fucking invisible bodyguards? They -- they weren’t watching us, were they?” I stammered.
He shook his head. “Oh no, they stay outside the apartment door and patrol the building’s perimeter.”
That was a fucking relief. Being watched wouldn’t even be the problem; not being told I was being watched? That would cross a huge line.
* * *
Due to construction, you couldn’t actually get a car near my fucking dorm, so, when Xan drove me back, he had to stop at a parking lot at least five minutes from the building. After we got out of the car, he kissed me. I wrapped my arms around him. It made me very much not want Xan to go.
“Call me,” he said. “I had a great time.”
“Me too.”
“See you around, Dylan,” he murmured.
Xan got back in his car and drove off, leaving me standing there. I needed to head back to the dorm and pretend to fucking study for my French test on Monday. That thing was important, but it wasn’t anywhere near as hot as Xan. Him, I wanted to do. Homework? Not so fucking attractive.
When I arrived at my room and opened the door, Preston nearly fucking tackled me. He ran right up and got in my face. “Dylan, Dylan, Dylan! Oh my god, is it true? Is it truuuuuue?”
I stepped back as far as I could, considering he practically had me pressed against the door. “Is what true?”
“You,” he breathed.
“Unless I’m secretly part of some alien teenager’s virtual reality game, I’m as true as anything else,” I muttered.
He shook his head fast enough I thought he might give himself a fucking concussion. The words tumbled out of his mouth. “No, no that’s not what I mean.”
“Then what do you mean?”
Preston babbled, “I mean -- I mean, you. One of my contacts spotted you. Or maybe it wasn’t you. And maybe it wasn’t him. And maybe it was...”
A little translation help, here? No? You’re the most unhelpful author, like, ever.
I grabbed his shoulders, desperately hoping to calm him down enough to make some fucking sense. If I didn’t know better, I would say he shivered at my touch, but it was Preston.
“Preston, man, you need to calm the fuck down, okay?” I hissed.
My “grab him” method failed. Preston bounced up and down even when I tried to hold him. “Calm? Calm? How can I be calm? I need confirmation!”
I let him go and grumbled, “Then you need to fucking tell me what I’m supposed to confirm.”
“You and him,” he breathed.
Did he mean? “Who is this ‘him’ you keep talking about?”
“Xan!” he cried. “The Xan. Prince of the Zimaran Interplanetary Kingdom.”
My heart fucking stopped.
“Wh-what?”
Preston’s eyes got huge. “It was you and him, wasn’t it?”
There wasn’t any point in lying. “Yeah, that was me. Who saw me? What and where and how?”
He said, “I can’t reveal that. Let’s just say my contact sent me a pic labeled ‘I think Prince Xan’s gonna fuck that short guy,’ and that was it.”
Wait, short guy? Fine, I was only five foot six, which is short for a man. And no short jokes, okay? That shit is stupid and cheesy. You won’t mock me for my height? We’re good then, but you’re still the most unhelpful author ever.
Preston asked, “So -- what exactly is your, um, relationship with Prince Xan?”
None of your business? I knew Preston wouldn’t be so easily dissuaded from trying to find out what was going on, and I would rather he heard it from me.
My cheeks got kind of hot. I said, “Relationship? I don’t know. We -- slept together, and he’s still got the mind control on me, whatever that means.”
“You what? He still what? What?” Preston breathed.
“Yeah, he still has the mind control on me, and we slept together. But Zimarans are supposed to practically use sex to say hello so I don’t know what any of it even means, okay?” I muttered.
Shut up, brain. If I were going to be fucking honest with myself, I did kind of hope it meant something. How ridiculous was that?
Very ridiculous, but a guy could hope, right?
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written for writerverse Challenge #14 - Weekly Quick Fic #5
next chapter