“Enya.”

I rub my eyes and look around, my room lit by every single light in the house being on at once. I have to cover my eyes partially with my hand so I don’t go blind, but the affini seems to catch on and turns off most of the lights, except for one kitchen light. It’s all one room. Even my washroom doesn’t have walls. Once I’m able to get my bearings, the alien speaks again. All of the groceries aren’t in her hands any more, and she’s staring at my multiple cool Anarcho-communist flags all over my wall! She’s frowning. It’s a big one.

“You did the thing.”

She doesn’t answer me about her mind control eyes, only says my name again with that disappointed look. I don’t understand what she’s talking about until she starts taking down my flags and rolling them up!

“Hey! Hey! Don’t touch my things!”

I freeze. That came out as a scream. I screamed at the authoritarian plant lady who led me around for a few hours like a lost dog. My breathing gets erratic, but as she puts a hand over my head the stress melts away – Her music playing over me drowns out the hum of the electricity from my walls. I remember being mad, but the emotion is just out of reach.

“Enya, these are feralist symbols. You can not keep them.”

Amaryllis finishes taking down the flags, while I listen to her music and close my eyes. Affini are unfair, evil and want to repress me. No arguments come to me, all I can do is sit on my bed as she leaves a vine loosely wrapped around me and goes to the kitchen, keeping the good sounds in me.

***

I come back up to the smell of pizza. It takes a bit of struggling for me to get out of my weighted blankets, I somehow got wrapped up like a burrito in 30 pounds of wrapping. Amaryllis is still in my home, her laughter says that she noticed me struggling. That pretty dress is still on me, I take a pinch of it and rub it between my fingers before my lucidity finally notices – My mess is gone!

“A-Amary, why did you do my work?? That’s supposed to be my responsibility!!”

I shouted her name again. Everything inside of me locks up and I look back to the floor. I’m not supposed to be like this. I’m supposed to be in control of myself. I’m supposed to be -

“That’s okay, sweety. You don’t have to worry about anything, I can take care of it all. Come get your pizza, it’s cooled.”

Those four golden eyes pierce through my spiral, it only takes her a couple steps to get to my bed. Suddenly there’s a pizza on a plate on my lap. One of her fingers get my attention, and she taps it on the pizza. It’s covered in those really yummy meat circles, I think it’s chicken or something, two colours of cheeses melted over each other, and a thick looking sauce.

Amaryllis is already taking a slice for herself, but my skill in eating outclasses the affini! I stuff myself on two of those delicious slices, the crust has cheese in it too!! The plant lady makes a horrified gasp and stops me from taking a third small slice, I distracted her from eating. Wait, do plants even eat? What was she doing with the -

“Enya, Darling. Please slow down, you’ll make yourself sick. Take a few minutes before you have another slice, okay sweetheart?”

The pizza isn’t on my lap any more and I’m left with an inappropriate amount of guilt. The authoritarian plant lady was guilt tripping me! Authoritarians aren’t worth feeling guilty over, so I do the healthy thing and push those feelings deep down!

Her hand is back on my head, almost able to wrap it entirely around and pull it off – Aaaa, intrusive thought begone! She’s only rubbing my head, and it feels way too relaxing and -

***

Something distracted me, I’m trapped in my blankets again, and my giant alien invader is sitting at the foot of my bed. The pizza is gone! Luckily I’m full, but a giant face next to me is giving me a very big frown. There’s a sigh coming from her before she says my name again.

“Enya, we’re going to talk about your independence. You haven’t been taking any of your prescriptions except for the Class G’s, you’ve been spreading feralist sentiment on the overnet, you have eaten one three days worth of groceries over two weeks, and any time I look at you, you go under.”

The plant lady says all in one single breath, if plants needed to breath anyway, don’t they breath sunlight or somethi-

“Enya. Focus, please.”

All I can do in my bed is roll, so I roll the opposite direction of her and loudly groan.

“Most of your alphabet drugs are just supposed to make me more ‘functional’ for the Compact! None of them are about making me feel better! Why should I take them?”

Amaryllis’ body rustles while she speaks, exuding patience.

“The Class-C’s are there to help you avoid getting pulled into affini biorythyms, because you’re adorably susceptible to them, sweetheart. The Class-S’ are for your light and noise sensitivity. There’s nothing wrong with you, ‘functionality’ is an Accord myth. You only have some adorable differences that any affini would find endearing.”

I chew on my lip while she explains and a vine strokes me through my blanket. I’m not supposed to agree with her, but she hasn’t said anything wrong yet.. The thought of those biorhythms acting as a lure for me shouldn't be stupid hot, neither should going down any time one of those evil invaders speak. Some sort of grumpy growl comes from me, but it’s only rewarded with more gentle pettings. I’m an Anarchist, I’m not supposed to like these stupid hot imperialist invaders.

“We’ve left you alone too long, and things got this bad. I promise you that I won’t let that happen again, Enya.”

Something inside of me stirs as she says that, like my entire being is supposed to agree and beg for her to do whatever she says she needs to do. This is that plant-rhythm thing happening again.. I take a deep breath and wiggle around in my bed, rolling over to look her right in the shoulder.

“N-No. I’m not letting you take my freedom.. You can’t reprogram me, I broke capitalism’s programming on my own!”

Guilt almost drowns me as I try to stand up for myself while wrapped up in a blanket, Amaryllis says something but this time it doesn’t pierce my shield. My breathing picks up speed and the thoughts of everything that could go wrong pour over me like rain. She’s going to domesticate me. She’s going to make me a slave. I’m going to be tame, I’m going to -

Something cool touches my neck, feeling like getting three of those super-HRT injections at once but instead of feeling more girl, the fear fades and drifts away. I feel dizzy, and the plant lady picking me up and holding me to her chest is fucking with my thoughts more. But it doesn’t feel wrong. The weight of every moral I’ve picked up over my thirty years alive aren’t there to tell me this is wrong. I only close my eyes and smile, feeling her noise take me away.

***