Today has had a bit of a rainy-day feel. The ship has been jumping around a lot, resupplying former Terran colonies with the materials their new Affini management needed to make them properly habitable. Of course, with every stop, a flood of new florets and seedlings washed aboard, some of them not yet entirely tame. You smile and think about the "rebel infiltrator" who snuck aboard when stopping at Centhia a couple of weeks ago - she's now transitioned and wears a cat bell on her little bioluminescent collar, just to make sure she can never get lost in the shadows again. So for the sake of these feral Terrans, as well as of course the trivial (to an Affini) rigours of microgravity and hyperspace travel, florets have been encouraged to stay inside.

 

You are cuddled up on the sofa next to your Mistress, nuzzling her massive plant shoulder with your forehead as she works on her tablet. Sometimes it's nice to have some time just being together doing your own thing, so you're also playing around on your much smaller, much pinker tablet. 

"I'm working on a floret-suitable version of Mozart's Cosi fan Tutte," she explains, rewarding your affectionate nuzzles with some headpats from a stray vine or two. "Do you mind if I get your feedback on it from time to time?"

Once the little happy stars of headpat-induced bliss fade from your vision, you grumble out an articulate "Mrrrr?"

"It's an ancient opera that's got some nasty misogyny in it as is, but I think has a lot of potential as a story, and the music is wonderful."

"Oh … okay …" you respond vaguely, waiting for a clear question or command.

Your Mistress bristles, literally. "... I'll let you watch your programme in the meantime, then I'll ask you to comment on my plans once I have everything worked out. I just need a Terran sensitivity reader."

You giggle. "I'm not much of a reader, thanks to you, Mistress." You blush, thinking about how that came to be the case, your brain sparking with a hot, acid ecstasy.

She simply turns to fix you with a big, gentle smile. "Cute." She turns back to her pad and you turn back to yours, vibrating with quiet need.

 

***

 

You're watching a fun little documentary series you found on Floretube. Improving your mind is your tiny act of rebellion against a Mistress who enjoys you most blank and giggly, and this is the only way to do it that doesn't make your smooth little brain hurt.

 

Two virtually identical florets dressed identically, one with short purple hair and the other with long purple hair, and both holding hands, are standing in front of a grand old Terran skyscraper, smothered in vines.

"Hello! I'm Derek!" said the long haired one.

"Hello! I'm Erica!" said the short haired one.

"And welcome to:-"

"WOW, THAT'S COOL!"

"Wow, That's Cool, a show about interesting places -"

"- and cool people!"

"And not forgetting -"

"- all the other awesome things in -"

"- this SUPER COOL UNIVERSE!"

They both grinned in perfect synchronicity, before spinning round and pointing enthusiastically at the building behind them, never once letting go of each other's hands.

 

"So today our Affini has-"

"- brought us to -"

"- the Terran Hypnosis Research Centre on Mars!"

"Here a dedicated group of Affini experts -"

"- figure out how our little brains work -"

"- and how to change them -"

"- to make us all better!"

"Let's go inside!" Derek and Erica chant together, skipping inside before the camera cuts.

 

Now the two pinnates are in an office, with a snack bowl and giant sippy cups of water in front of them, facing (well, in a matter of speaking) a huge, faceless eldritch maze of thick, black, slimy vines that exudes a fine occluding mist over itself. "Hello little cuties," it intones sepulchrally. "I am Marsh Bogland, 388th Bloom, and I am one of the team here at the THRC."

"So like …" Derek begins, eating a handful of tiny pretzels,

"... what do you do here?" Erica concludes, taking a big sip of water.

"Well," begins the ancient eldritch horror, taking out from within its fog a pair of crochet needles and starting to knit something pink with a distracting click-clack. "Most Terrans have probably experienced Affini hypnosis at this point - whether because your owner has used it to break your adorable little spirit, or whether you've simply fallen into a light trance staring into an Affini fellow passenger's eyes on the tram."

Derek stims excitedly, flapping his arms. "Ooh! Our Affini uses hypnosis to gradually swap our consciousnesses between our bodies!"

Marsh exudes a distant animal chitter. "That's right, young one, we use that hypnosis for all kinds of clever things! And for that reason, we need to understand better how it works, so we can make sure your plastic little brains are entirely in our control … when they need to be, that is."

Derek nods excitedly, while Erica sits there, slack-jawed, hyperfixated on Marsh's knitting. A bead of drool falls from the corner of her mouth. Marsh hums with pleasure (presumably, since a feeling of pleasure is simply deposited in your brain as the Affini hums). "Oh dear, you two might be rather more susceptible than I thought. How delightful it is to get a visit from two wonderful diminutive 'journalists' like you," it chanted, pronouncing the inverted commas as it pets both of the florets with long, relatively dry vines that left only a little thick, primordial black goop in the florets' mussed hair. "So yes, here at the THRC we have two principal branches of research into … honing and systematising what we know about hypnotising humans. The first is historical research into traditional human hypnosis techniques before the arrival of the compact."

Derek looked fascinated shuffling forward to the edge of his seat and gorging on corn chips. So did Erica, albeit in a different sense, eyes staring blankly ahead as an inky vine daubed Marsh's thick muddy mucus onto her cheek. Derek raised his hand to ask a question. "Oooh, ooh, were native Terran hypnosis techniques any good?"

An amused rustle came from Marsh. "There was a kernel of truth in there, but knowledge about hypnosis was never systematically collected, and there were far too many charlatans in the field for any real breakthroughs. However, we have found that using some of the forms, patterns and rituals of Terran hypnosis create a strong placebo effect, that is, people understand they are being hypnotised, and that makes them fall into trance more easily."

Derek put a finger to his chin, deep in thought. "So there was some real hypnotism before the Affini, but nobody really understood it properly? And there were lots of fakers confusing everyone?"

"That's right, little one," Marsh said, pulling from an unseen part of its boggy cloud a small colourful wrapped sweet and depositing one in each of Derek and Erica's laps. "Now the second branch of what the THRC does is more experimental, both modelling what happens in normal Affini/floret interactions, and also pushing the boundaries of what was previously considered possible."

Marsh's vines twitch and then cascade in a terrifying grab for Derek and Erica, binding every limb tight and pulling them up into the fog. "I will introduce you to some of our lovely test subjects soon! But first, cuddles."

 

The screen fades to black. "Intermission~" reads a caption, rendered in a cutesy purple font.

 

***

 

It's cuddle break time! You know what that means. You pull on one of your Mistress's stray vines - a few are always positioned around you, for your protection and comfort - and she rumbles softly.

"Yes, little one?"

"Cuddle break," you demand

She smiles and lifts you onto her lap, broadening and softening it so it feels even softer and more supportive than the Affini sofa.

"You did well, dear one. I needed to take a break anyway. Can I tell you about what I've been doing?"

You nod and cuddle close to her core, listening more to its addictive, gentle rhythm than her words. You aren't paid to think any more, after all.

"So the original opera is about two women who are dating two men. A grumpy old man tells the men that women are naturally unfaithful because they are too easily charmed, so the brothers, making a wager on their lovers' loyalty, pretend to be drafted into the army and leave. Then they put on disguises and try to seduce each other's lovers. There are all kinds of hijinks, including the brothers pretending to be revived from their fatal lovesickness by a Mesmeric therapist who is actually a maidservant in disguise. After more hijinks, and the couples getting closer and closer, the brothers reveal the trick and all is forgiven and forgotten. A play with no apparent moral, except that women are silly, I suppose."

"I'm silly, Miss," you add, helpfully.

She chuckles. "Yes, I made you so, didn't I? Perhaps … yes. This opera is salvageable. Instead of 'All Women Are the Same', why don't I translate the title as 'All Florets Are Adorably Silly'?"

You giggle and nod happily. "I would certainly want to watch something with that title, Miss!"

"So we'll have the two women in the original plot replaced with two florets, perhaps one male and one non-binary floret to ensure no stench of misogyny remains. The men are replaced by Affini, again one female and one ungendered. The two Affini will boast of their florets' loyalty to them and them alone, and then to test it, will pretend to go and volunteer at the domestication front. They'll then disguise themselves as petsitters from the neighbouring hab ring. Hijinks will ensue, without the threats of suicide or any of that distressing material. Why that was in there in the first place is beyond me." She puffs out a snort of cinnamon-smelling air. "Anyway, the big double wedding will be replaced by the two Affini conjoining and becoming a big polycule."

A thought drips through your head like treacle through molasses. "Miss … these sound like quite big changes. Won't the music be, like, not ruined but … made less … effective?"

She rubs your hair until the thoughts dribble out. "That's certainly a fear, but I would like to think of this as in the spirit of pastiche opera, which goes back to Mozart's own day and beyond. Popular opera tunes were written into new plots, to help freshen up old material without having to compose new music."

You nod, knowing your Mistress is infallible. "You're so cool, Miss," you gasp, immersing yourself for a moment in the music of her core. Is there the ghost of an Alberti bass in there? Impossible …

Mistress lifts you out of her lap and you gain a little more lucidity. "Time for you to get back to your programme, little one," she says, a feeling of regret washing over you that you recognise as coming from her. "As much as I could cuddle you all day, I would like to get this finished first."

You sigh, lean your back against her pulsating body, and press play on the video once more.

 

***

 

"Special Message," reads an energetic green caption. A laid-back looking girl with short hair, plaid shirt and a cute septum ring comes on the screen, in a close up view. "So, uh, this is like a missed connection, I guess," she says, chuckling and running her fingers through her hair. "I'm Melissa Short, she/her, human independent. No particular trauma, no desire for domestication. Happy to just be myself, you know?" 

She gives a big, husky laugh to disguise the nervousness betrayed by the slight tremble in her fingers. "So, uh, I was getting groceries, and this gorgeous plant woman, like, sat across from me on the train. She was, like … four, five metres tall? She had big stompy boots on made out of plants, lots of black flowers everywhere, super SUPER goth, like, wow, and these, like, long black claws?"

She blushes considerably at the memory, and fiddles with a button on her plaid shirt. "So I would, er, like to meet her again. Badly. So if you know who she is, please can you, um, ask her to get in touch by overnet? Thanks."

She gives a weak thumbs-up and the picture fades, replaced by Derek and Erica, who have clearly been washed up after their encounter with Marsh, their dilated pupils the only sign of being played with.

 

***

 

Derek and Erica are in a sunlit courtyard, orange Martian light dappled through large beech and elm trees. They are interviewing a short Affini who has on his leash on all fours, well, a cowgirl. There's no other way to describe her. She has horns, a vaguely bovine face, a thick brown leather collar with a cowbell, and then something which certainly draws your eyes: two massive, bouncing, nude tits. They are impressive, and you can see spots of watery milk drip from them onto the ground. A cow tail and implants that turn her hands and feet into useless hooves completes the look.

Derek and Erica give her long white hair some light petting before asking her Affini: "So, what are you here for?"

The Affini looks a little sad, his pretty colourful meadow flowers drooping. "I have a disability, you see. My biorhythm isn't strong enough for hypnotising Terrans, and I don't have eyes either. So the THRC helps me achieve my floret's dream for herself," he explains.

The cowgirl looks up, moos, and clears her throat, before speaking in the most cut-glass, aristocratic Martian accent you've ever heard. "You see, I am a dairy cow. My purpose in life is to get milked, and my joy in life is to be a fun companion for my herd and my Owner."

Her Affini nods encouragingly, massaging her bare arse comfortingly.

"So the THRC is helping remove all the silly people things from my head, so I can be a better cow for Owner."

Erica asks her Affini a question, over the cow's head. "So like, what kinds of things are too people for her?"

The Affini answers for her, giving her a scritch behind the ear that elicits a happy little moo. "Things like human language beyond simple commands, the idea of wearing clothes, human dignity … I have given her special dispensation to speak today, but normally she is just a little moo-er. Food, affection and milk is all she needs to know. Poor thing had strained her brain so hard doing her postgraduate studies in economics. Wholly obselete now, so I… persuaded her to move into a new field, as it were."

Derek seems preoccupied with staring at the cow's enormous udders, so Erica asks the next question too. "Do they, like, use spirals and shit on her?"

Her Affini shakes his head. "She won't remember the conditioning. We put her in a comfortable stall with a powerful, but non-personal biorhythm signature playing. That, plus strong Class-H and -S, along with video and audio triggers in a headset, and physical reinforcement too -" at this his cow blushes - "do the job nicely."

Erica giggles, turning to the floret. "So, give us a good moo and tell us about where we can find you!"

"Ahem," the cow says, incongruously. "Mooooooo, I suppose. As for where we can be found, you can come by our little shop on Mars, postcode BB1378C4F, for homemade ice cream, soft cheeses, yogurts and, of course, the chance to milk me. Please milk me," she begs, giving the audience a doe-eyed stare. "I'm Milky_maid on the ship chat, when I'm allowed to speak."

 

Derek and Erica trot, a little clumsily, across the courtyard to a different Affini, all red and gold, with a little floret tucked in their arms. "What's this little cutie's story?" Derek asks them. The floret is asleep, his tiny frail arms wrapped around a big squirrel plushie, nestled comfortably.

"My little one is currently resting after a session, but I'll wake him up soon. He had some very interesting desires which have been quite the puzzle to achieve."

"Oh?" Derek seems fascinated with the little man, flushing slightly. Erica is distractedly playing with one of the Affini's long red vines.

"He showed several signs of being pluribus, and wanted to be pluribus, but the impact of the cruel 'therapy' he had as a child stopped him from realising his other selves. So we're using hypnosis to help develop his distinct identities and also, as a … happy byproduct … being able to indulge several of his kinks at once."

Derek blushes. "O-oh?!" he stammers. Such articulacy from a former Pulitzer Prize winner.

The Affini merely grins in a predatory way (while offhandedly giving Erica more vines to play with) and injects their floret with a counteragent for his Class-Z.

The floret yawns, raises his skinny fists to heaven, and blinks his eyes open. His blue eyeshadow makes his ice-blue eyes really pop. "Oh! Nice to see you again, roomie," he says sleepily to his Affini. "This is the interview you told me about, right?" He turns to Derek and Erica. "Hello! Derek and Erica, right? I love your programme! I'm not a floret myself, but if I were, I would really appreciate the time you take to unpack complex issues!"

Erica stops playing and looks up in shock. "Wait, he's not a floret?"

The Affini laughs. "Oh no, he absolutely is. This is one of the things this personality of his wants: to be clueless and oblivious about his own submission until I shatter the illusion for him and he sees how far he's fallen. Look!"

The floret simply batted his long eyelashes. "Um, did you say something? Sorry! I space out sometimes, which is why my roommate helps me out sometimes. They're a real pal."

Derek and Erica flash little playful smiles at the camera and start speaking in tandem, their minds focused. "So I suppose -"

"Let me guess -"

"- your roommate helps you with -"

"- bathing and cooking and -"

"- sometimes eating and brushing your teeth?"

The floret nods and smiles vacantly. "That's right! How did you know?" 

The pair of floret journalists' smiles grow wider, toothier. "They're, um, very common difficulties -"

"- for such independent sophonts like you."

"What a helpful roommate -"

"- this Affini is. I'm sure -"

"- they have no ulterior motives -"

"- and definitely don't think of you -"

"- as their cute, obedient -"

"- and utterly entranced floret."

He scoffed and chuckled, setting the many bangles on his wrists jangling. "Me, a floret? Absurd …" He nestled into his Affini's vines, visibly soothed by their biorhythm. "Just because we kiss and cuddle sometimes and they like to play the top in the bedroom sometimes …"

His Affini pulls out a datapad and presses a button, and his whole aspect changes. His posture straightens, muscles tense, eyes appearing more alert, if unfocused. "So he's very fun to play with like that, but we're also building this other personality."

"Other personality!" the floret parroted, biting a stim vine his Affini lowered in front of him.

"He's more birdlike - playful, food-motivated, and unable to restrain his adorable penchant for echolalia."

"Echoecholalia!"

The Affini lowered him down to Derek. "Give him some headpats."

Derek stroked his short, fluffy hair with a look of gay awe. "He's so soft …"

The floret blinks slowly and makes little animal chitters.

"So as you can imagine," the Affini continues, picking Erica up and depositing her within petting range of their adorable birdlike floret, "this kind of deprogramming, personality construction and selective memory editing takes some rather advanced hypnosis. I'm no slouch, but the THRC has helped me a great deal. I've made some great friends, too!" They exchange a friendly vine with the cowgirl's owner.

 

The screen fades as Derek and Erica go all in on cuddling and petting the adorable floret. Another cuddle break.

 

***

 

You inform your Mistress that it's cuddle break time, and she looks up from her own datapad. "Goodness! Already?" she asks. "I've only had time to translate the first act. What do you think of this?"

You shake your head. "Miss, cuddles first please. Work can come later."

She grins. "Okay my demanding floret … how about we cuddle up while you watch the rest of your little video? I've reached a natural stopping point."

"It's only been ten minutes, Miss."

"But I am an Affini! Didn't I tell you, when I took your smarts away, that I have plenty of smarts for the both of us?"

You blush. "B-but … Miss …"

"My powers when I hyperfocus are nearly unlimited. At least, compared to you, or even old you when you were still a corporate high flyer."

You bury yourself in her vines, flustered. "L-let's watch, Miss."

 

***

 

The 'Special Message' lady returns, clearing her throat. She is breathing a little oddly. "So, uhhh, thanks everyone who put me in touch with Miss Nepenthe. She was, uhhhh, interested to hear from me. She asked me to read you this note:

" 'Thanks to all you cuties who pushed dear little Ocyrhoe to me. Thanks also to all of you no-good poaching Affini who wanted to steal my prize! Don't worry, I am going to utterly break this one's independent spirit and turn her into an utterly useless, slutty, subby toy who will have to whine and beg to so much as blow her nose. She'll be totally humiliated, entirely mine, and wholly dependent on me. And at that point I have decided I want her to be in as many porn videos as she can be. She will be appearing as a femme, bimbo toy I am generously loaning to the viewing public.' "

The Terran shuffled around a little, and then looked back at the camera, entirely clear-eyed and calm. "So yeah, sounds pretty cool to me, right? Pretty much what I wanted, although I hope she makes me extra slutty." She chuckles and runs her hand through her short brown hair. "Guess I'll see you on the other side? So if you see me in a video soon, I guess I know your taste in porn, lol!"

 

***

 

Derek and Erica are back on screen, in the outermost vines of Marsh. "Welcome back -"

"- everyone!"

Marsh's vines shudder and rustle like an unseen creature moving through undergrowth. "These two little ones have been having fun forgetting themselves, haven't you? Can you tell me what your names are?"

"I'm Derek!" pipes up Erica, cheerily.

"I'm Erica," says Derek, a look of mild confusion on his face.

Realisation dawns on both of their faces, and they start to grin and turn to each other, both excitedly flapping hands. "Oh! We're swapping -"

"- bodies again!"

"That's right," Marsh rumbles. "Your Affini said I could begin the process for her, as long as I stuck to the basics. So for all of you at home, you can imagine that orchestrating a body swap for non-digitised florets is quite an exercise: we have to synchronise their brain architecture, and then pass one's experiences to the other piece by piece while gradually removing their own experiences. Derek and Erica can only manage it because they're so well synchronised and easy to hypnotise!"

It scritches under their chins with two soft, spongy vines, and Derek and Erica let out perfectly synchronised moans and chuckles.

"This is the kind of little joy we at the THRC hope to provide all our favourite little sophonts. Dericka, do you want to do your outro?"

In perfect sync, the two florets turn to the camera and recite: "Thank you to everyone at the Terran Hypnosis Research Centre for your help, especially Marsh Bog, 388th Bloom! The Centre is always keen to toy with new sophonts, so if you fancy being a test subject, do come along to Mars DE1567A1 and ask any friendly Affini for directions! 'Independent' sophonts -" here they mimed the inverted commas, Derek doing the left and Erica doing the right - "are particularly welcome! And if you'd like a taste of Affini hypnosis at home, simply search for #BrainWash or #BreakMe on your chat app, or simply ask your hab to 'play the pretty spirals'. Once again, that's 'play the pretty spirals'."

The two florets turn to look at each other, kiss deeply, and then retreat into Marsh's fog, where there are some questionable moans.

 

***

 

Immediately the video shows a trailer for the big new blockbuster everyone's been talking about on the ship chat! It's the biggest collaboration yet between Terran and Affini filmmakers, and for some reason you can't really fathom, people are much more excited about it than, say, season four of Violet's Garden. There's a disclaimer first saying that the trailer is suitable for florets of distressing media tolerance level 6 and above. You're generally okay with tolerance level 7 or 8, so you press the 'OK' button.

 

Low bass strings hum ominously.

"In a world where sickness can make you bankrupt …" begins a gravelly-voiced narrator.

There are art-house sepia cinematic shots of moody hospital corridors, crying people emptying out their handbags, etc.

 

"... three time-travelling Affini face their ultimate challenge." Three Affini plop down from a ceiling vent into a corporate office. One has all brown, barky vines, covered in forget-me-nots and blue cornflowers, and a smiling face as they handle a few Class-Z grenades. "Let's go and show these cuties who's boss. We are. We're the bosses. Insofar as their rudimentary social structure mirrors ours."

Behind them is a pink, unusually humanoid Affini, with a digital display for a face, doing martial art poses as she follows. "Hya! Kya! I don't know why the Terrans do this, but it looks stylish! Cuddles incoming, little ones!"

The third is a shambling mess of dark greens and browns, who plops down and slides around with the elegance of a seal on dry land, his branches tangling everywhere. He sighs. "So typical … this building's safety measures are so lax, it'll need … drastic renovation."

The music swells, enervating synth strings and brass buzzing out heroic motifs.

There are a few action scenes cut in, humans being thrown clear of explosions by Pink, and Blue charging in to domesticate a battalion of riot police in a swirl of needles and vines. However, there are also cathartic displays of hypercompetence in fields which might impress an Affini more: Brown slamming down a huge stack of papers in front of a group of besuited executives; Pink cuddling five crying Terrans all at once.

The music cuts off at a sudden fermata, mid-phrase.

Brown is speaking to Pink and Blue: "Five hundred million Terrans to domesticate … have we bitten off more than we can chew?"

Pink: "Chew? I don't have a mouth …"

Blue reassures them both. "Of course we can do it. We're Affini."

A brass stab. The screen fades to black.

"Coming this half-cycle," drawls the narrator, as the title appears on screen: "American Healthcare: 2077."

 

***

 

Your Mistress looks like she has just woken from a fever dream, her antenna roused and flowers wilting. "What … what is that art form? Is it … a Terran tradition?"

"Yes, Miss," you confirm. "It's something called a 'trailer', a little short film to tell you what's coming. Like an overture in your opera."

"I grasped that much, little one, but … the story being advertised … it seems so unlike the traditions of human tragedy and comedy I have read about."

"It's like, a summer blockbuster, Miss! Big explosions, fun action scenes, slick dialogue, those kinds of things. Often quite light and silly."

Your Mistress shudders as she looks up previous blockbuster films on her datapad. "So in this genre of film, death is treated as something light and meaningless … violence is celebrated … agh!"

Her rhythms are all askew for a moment.

"What's wrong, Miss?" you ask, pulling yourself closer into her core.

"It's just so much to take in. It's the same struggle I've been having with Cosi fan tutte. Why do humans consistently give their creative best to things which are harmful, bigoted and violent? It's such a struggle to enjoy your people's art without ruminating on the darkness that lies under its surface.

You hold Miss closer. "I used to feel that way a lot too, Miss, but now I don't need to worry. The Affini have come and that darkness is gone forever. My smooth little brain is happy with that."

She holds you, wordlessly, giving you many kisses to the forehead as she gives you a perfect cocktail of drugs to make you a comforting plaything for her, mewling and lost in adoration.

 

***