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Totter, Too, Part 2



Mom also had a surprise for Totter. She pulled out a small blue case and held it out.

"What is that, Mildred?" he asked.

"It's a pocket game of Battleship," she said. "I'm not sure what all it does. I told the young woman at the store that I needed it to work for one or two players, the sound has to have an on/off, and it couldn't hurt if illiteracy wasn't a problem"

Totter looked over at Tammy. "It means you can practice playing even if I'm busy." He looked a little worried about that. By now Tammy had a pretty good idea what he was worried about.

She reached out to touch his hand where it held the bars. "It does not mean we won't play our nightly games, Totter." He relaxed. "It just means you can play it in the carrier when I'm at work and I can't play with you."

Mom nodded, both at her reassurance and how well she'd read the sylph. "You move this dot around the board until you find the place you want to shoot."

"Great!" Totter said. He stared at the game as she put it down.

"Totter?"

"Yes, Mildred?"

"It would be impolite to pay more attention to the game than to the people you're dining with."

Tammy's mom had always been a stickler for polite behavior in public. It was nice to see that her metaphorical grandchild wasn't getting off any easier than Tammy or her father had.

"Oh. Yes, ma'am." He sagged, looking pitiful for a moment. But after that, he stood up straight and looked the giantess right in the eye. "So, Mildred. Um... Anything else about to fall off or lose sensation?"

He looked around with confusion as the two women broke out in laughter.

After the meal, Tammy shouldered the carrier and gestured for her mom to go down the aisle first. Mildred paused to tap a finger on the 'Won't Make Him Dance' button.

"Oh. I moved that to the strap so I wouldn't lose it," Tammy explained.

"I would never," Mildred said frostily, "ever ask you to force Totter-"

"Oh, she knows," Totter called up from the carrier. "That's only for idiots." Both women's eyebrows rose.

"What a nice compliment!" Mildred said. She blew a kiss down at the little face in the window.

Then she gave her daughter a peck and walked to the door.

On the sidewalk, she took Tammy gently by the elbow. "By an amazing coincidence, there's a vet's office just down the road from here."

"A coincidence," Tammy said flatly. "Is there an opening in their schedule?"

"There was. But someone took the four o'clock appointment."

"Four?" Tammy looked at her watch. "What am I going to do until-? Oh. I suppose there's a Registry office near the vet's?"

"No," Mom said. "It's in the completely opposite direction. About a block down that street." She gestured and Tammy raised the carrier up so she could look inside. "Be good, little Totter. Everything will be okay."

"Okay," he said, more than a little fear in his voice. She smiled and he returned it. A shaky one, but it was a smile.

Tammy kept the carrier high as she walked towards the Sylph Registry. "Totter? We're going to make me your official owner. That way no one can take you from me."

"Goody!"

"Yes, it is good. Now...have you thought about what official name you want? It doesn't have to be Tiny Totter. In fact, I'd rather we didn't use that name. It might make it easy for those bastlords to find us. That wouldn't be fun"

"No," he agreed.

"What would you like?" She saw the office. There was a bench on the sidewalk about two doors down. She set there and held the cage up to her face.

He was looking thoughtful. "Can I be...Battleship?" he asked.

"Sounds like a racehorse," she said with a shake of her head. "And I'm not going to tell Carrier to get into his carrier. One mistake in punctuation and you'll have this transport up your butt."

She shook the carrier as she spoke. Totter giggled. She found that she was starting to really treasure his laughs. Each one seemed to push them both further away from the day she found him, from the condition he was in.

"Oh, let's see. Cruiser has possibilities. Submarine? No. No periscope jokes for someone who always looks up my skirt. If I call you Destroyer, people will think you gnaw on the furniture.

"If you were a girl, Peg would work. But you're not. If you had red hair, Red would work. But you're blonde. White? No, if you fell in the 'whites only' laundry cart, you'd get washed and folded, and there'd be nothing I could do about it."

She stared off into the horizon for a long moment, muttering. "Carboard, no. Box? Boxy? Nah. You sank my... Sink? Sinker? No, people would think your nickname was Stinker."

"Cruiser?" he asked.

"Cruiser," she nodded. "It seems to be the only choice." They went inside.

A few people were looking at the blister packs of sylph clothing and a few other goods. More walked along the shelves of pimped out hamster cages.

If there's been one of a nautical design, she might have considered it. But this year, they leaned towards cars and trucks.

The registrar's desk was in the back. There was a small waiting area, all the seats empty. The clerk looked up expectantly.

"Hi. I need to register my sylph, please."

"Certainly!" He uncovered the weighing and marking equipment. "Not much call for this stuff these days. Let's see if I can remember how to use it." He laughed at his little joke. Tammy laughed. It was cheap and it might help the guy be nice to Tot- Cruiser.

He pulled out a form and they whisked through the questions. Many were 'Don't Know.' Date of birth, city of birth, were the parents registered.

Cruiser was starting to get agitated. The clerk noticed. "Don't worry, little fellow! You're about twenty, I'd guess? No one's sylphed for about 25 years. Most of these details don't matter in your case."

He gestured at the examination pad and Tammy placed Cruiser on it. The clerk waved the scanner over the sylph.

"No chip," he said. Fingers brushed Cruiser's ears, wrists and nose. "No tags. Strip." The jumpsuit came off. He made a quick examination for ownership tattoos. "No tatt-" He paused and shot a look up at Tammy.

She saw his thumb was resting on Cruiser's wire collar. She'd forgotten all about that.

"They closed down a bloodsport ring last week? I was in the building after the shootout. And...I found Cruiser." It wasn't the full truth, but it wasn't a lie. She pulled out her wallet for her company badge.

Cruiser was looking up at her with more than a little fear. Naked in the man's hand wasn't a new experience for him. But he clearly thought this was going to keep him from going home with Tammy.

"I keep meaning to cut it off of him, but he's afraid that-"

"That he'll become a toy," the clerk spat. Tammy was surprised to notice that it wasn't Tot- Cruiser that was shaking. It was the man's hands. Both of them vibrated with insufficiently suppressed anger.

"I," he said slowly, "am going to cut off this. Damned. Wire. If you. Don't mind."

"I don't mind!" Tammy said quickly. "And I'm sure that Cruiser doesn't, either!"

"NO!" the sylph shouted, desperate to go along. A pair of diagonal cutters appeared, making quick work of the collar.

The man went through the rest of the details rather brusquely. Cruiser stood and took it, afraid to say boo to anything.

Tammy wanted to ask about identification, but she was afraid to interrupt. When the clerk snapped, "Chip, tag or tatto?" she started to form her question about pain.

Cruiser just stood up straight and said, "Yes, SIR!"

"What? Which one?"

"Whichever one gets me home with Tammy, sir!" The tension went out of the man in one big breath. He showed a small smile.

"Sorry, Cruiser. Miss. It's just... Well, I hate those rings. And it does look like this little guy has truly escaped them. Good for you. Good for you both."

"Thanks," Tammy said softly.

"Okay," he said, returning to his jovial mood. "Chips are the most effective, tattoos are the least painful, tags are the fastest to verify without a trip to a facility with a scanner."

"I think I want effective," Tammy said/asked. "I don't ever want to even think about loosing you, Cruiser."

"The chip then," Cruiser said with a nod. The clerk got out the gun. The sylph's hands made fists and he braced himself for agony.

When Tammy stepped out onto the sidewalk again, she was holding the cage up to her shoulder. Cruiser stood in the window, running a finger across the new scar in his armpit.

"I'm so PROUD of you, Cruiser!" Tammy said. "You were so brave!"

"That's the most painful?" he muttered. "It's not even throbbing..."

-----

The ink was hardly dry on the registration as she handed it over to the receptionist. Tammy kind of expected that it looked suspiciously quick, but no one there even blinked.

"Always good to have a new patient," the nurse said as she led them into the back. There she weighed and measured him.

Where the results were different from the Registry's numbers, Cruiser politely pointed them out. The nurse smiled, nodded and recorded Cruiser's numbers instead.

The vet clicked her tongue a time or two as she examined Cruiser. He stood even more still than he had for the registrar. Clearly, the bloodsports 'doctors' didn't hand out lollipops.

Here, though, the whole staff of the office were the least judgmental people Tammy had ever met. They seemed quite professional, but they'd let Tammy or Cruiser interrupt at any time.

If patient or owner felt a need to touch the other, for reassurance or whatever, they'd pause and wait patiently until they were done.

Mostly they got by with a fingertip to the back or a hand against fingernail.

When the vet wanted to give Cruiser a broad spectrum vaccination, though, she just went ahead and handed the sylph to Tammy.

"I need to prepare a shot. While I get it ready, tell him that it'll hurt less than implanting the chip did."

"Okay," Tammy agreed. "Are you up to that, Cruiser?"

"I think so," he said. He quivered a bit in her grip.

"So we'll get a shot," she said, sketching out the schedule. "Then we'll finish the examination, then we'll settle up. After that, we leave. I think you've been brave enough, we can get ice cream on the way home."

"I've heard about ice cream," he said.

"Have you heard about fudge?" the nurse asked.

"No...." he said slowly.

"Oh, you have to make sure she teaches you about fudge," the vet said, walking back into the room.

"Fudge?" the sylph asked his owner.

"Oh, I suppose we can fudge." She held him tight, fearing that he'd cut himself by flinching during the shot. But the vet used an air injector. There was a loud PHUT and it was over. Then he flinched, but too late.

"And that's it," the vet said. She tousled Cruiser's hair and complimented his cooperation.

Then there was a pamphlet about sylph nutrition and exercise, and they were on the street.

Later, after dinner and the game, Cruiser looked rather thoughtful as she carried him over to the cage.

"I think..." he started to say. He went quiet, so Tammy sat on the sofa and waited. One finger rubbed his back gently.

"I think I know what money means, now," he finally said.

"Do tell," she encouraged.

"I... Okay, that wire collar was very important to me. It... It was my status. It was what kept some of the Lords from...hurting me."

"I know," she said softly.

"But I thought that the guy in the office was going to... Stop you from taking me. Because of the same wire."

"For a second there? I was, too." He didn't look surprised. He just nodded.

"But in that moment, I didn't just want to not have a wire. I mean, I didn't think about how... You know, how you think about fights that you lost? How you think what you should have done?

"Or you think it would have been better to just not put your leg out where he was going to bite it? You know?"

"Not exactly," she admitted. "But I have had things run through my mind from time to time. Regrets. Rethinking. Reevaluation."

"Yeah. Well, I was not thinking that I should have let you take the wire when you found it.

"I was thinking that I'd be willing to give up the wire, to PAY the wire, and everything that went with it, if that's what it took to be yours."

He took a deep breath. "Is that kinda what money does?"

"Oh, gosh, Cruiser," she whispered. "That's more like prayer." She held him to her cheek and tried not to cry.

"Oh," was all he said.

--------

That night, there were no screams. Tammy hoped it meant he was healing. She also tried not to think it was a bad sign when he had nightmares the next night.

For the next few weeks, he had nightmares more often than not, but they had started tapering off.

She wasn't sure what was letting him sleep through the nights, so she kept everything up. The games, the wrestling and keeping him beside her almost all the time.

One night, the wrestling session changed.

He'd gotten around her fingers and stood on her wrist. She couldn't figure out how to get to him without cheating. He grinned and pulled back on her finger.

It actually popped. The sound surprised her. It scared the hell out of Cruiser.

He staggered back, falling over her watch. She froze, wagging the finger back and forth. "Don't worry," she said. "No pain. It sounded much worse than it is."

"Okay," he said after a moment. He stayed sitting on the top of her forearm. His eyes were on the finger, but his hands were rubbing her sleeve.

"What is it, Cruiser?" she finally asked.

"It's just...weird."

"What is?"

"Being...on you, but not held by you. You know?"

"No," she admitted. Then she thought about it. She felt his hands through her sleeve. His thighs flexed where he sat, which did and didn't feel the same as when she cupped her hands under him. "Well, maybe."

They sat there for a moment. "Cruiser?" she asked. "Do you want to explore?"

"What?"

"Just...walk around. I'll lay still. You can, I dunno, walk down my back or jump over my shoulders or..."

"Can I touch your hair?" he asked suddenly.

"Sure." She moved her unoccupied hand to grab a throw pillow off the sofa and lay her head down on it. She tracked him by touch as he crawled up her arm.

It was weird. His little hands almost felt like the paws of a mouse. But his knees were unlike anything she'd ever felt.

He moved a bit faster after the elbow. Either he was trusting her more or the path was wider. Then he was stroking the hair on her head. She felt him part the hair in handfuls, touching her scalp gently.

She'd seen a movie with something like this. Teri Hatcher with a sylphed detective. He'd 'explored' her body. But there, the lighting, the background music, and the dialogue had suggested a sexual context.

Suggested it so well that Senator Thirdman had managed to get it blocked everywhere except California, Pennsylvania and every city in the nation named Springfield.

It wasn't that they were all progressive with respect to sexual relations across gaps in scale. The Senator had made a comment on TV about the kind of city that would produce a family like The Simpsons. He'd alienated every Springfieldian alive and was still paying for that.

But size paranoid politicians aside, this didn't feel the same as that scene had. She wasn't trying to seduce her sylph, he didn't seem to be interested in erogenous zones.

They were just trusting each other. He pulled on her hair but not enough to hurt. She breathed slow and steady and tried to telegraph any other movement.

Eventually he stepped out of the waves of her hair. He wandered over her shoulder blades, then down across her ribs and spine.

He stopped in the small of her back. She worked out where he was standing and where he must be looking.

She lifted her head off the pillow. "One word about the size of my ass and you sleep in a mayonnaise jar!"

"Nothing!" he protested. "I wasn't going to say nothing!"

"Then what are you waiting for?" she growled.

"Remember that moon walk on the TV show the other day?"

"Yes?"

"I was just wondering if I'd get in trouble for asking to bounce on these.... "

"Any other man," she muttered. "Any other man on the planet, I'd roll over and crush him." She grumbled out loud, but her inner self pumped a fist in the air. He was confident enough to tease her!

He giggled and ran up to her shoulder. She felt him press against her cheek and raised a hand to hold him there.





Totter, Too, Part 1
Totter, Too, Part 3

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