Asher had things he liked!
It was a novelty and oh, how fun! Asher had always had preferences for things like dramatic music, knew all kinds of ranges for sex club house music.
That had been the extent of his personality for... well, since Asher'd damned himself with a few sins one fateful night. But it turned out that wasn't necessarily all of it.
Jezebel showed him different things, and there were preferences there, and he wasn't even bored. Asher liked stories, had always enjoyed those, and it turned out that things like shows and movies weren't always boring.
He just needed a friend to see them with him so he could talk.
And, of course, it made him want her all the more. Every passing date, every evening in a book store where she would ask him questions with those thoughtful eyes, every curious new thing she wanted to show him, became something near pain.
Even after she healed, she didn't come to him for that final punishment to get her card, and he didn't bring it up.
It felt like something to be left for them, like an event neither of them wanted to start so it wouldn't have to be over. The effect was that she didn't end up with a card for a long time.
But that's not to say that she didn't end up at Sulfur's.
Asher got the call one night about a week later. Jezebel had healed wonderfully, and she would have minimal scarring.
So it was more than a fair time frame. In fact, he should have already given her that last punishment... "Hello, Clarice."
Jezebel laughed in his ear, but it was an anxious laugh. Her curiosities seemed to have been satisfied with him for the time being, but her emotions were still...
Asher thought they were wonderful, but he was sure to her they must have been torturous and exhausting. Her anxiety would shoot sky high at the slightest provocation.
Her fear response was immediate when she heard a noise out of the ordinary in her apartment. Her tears came easily but were soothed just as easily.
Her anger was a fun thing, although he'd never tell her that. It burned to life and then died within 30 minutes at most.
What was more fascinating was the fact that she totally forgot what any of those emotions felt like once she was no longer feeling them.
Jezebel couldn't remember the feeling of anger when she didn't have it. It intrigued him because he thought that was why empathy was so difficult for her sometimes.
But all those things also meant she wore her heart on her sleeve. Her little return laugh on the phone had a world of rainbow suggestion in it. Nervousness, excitement, anticipation, some fear. "H-hello, Master."
Asher leaned back at his desk chair. Expanding the clubs was fun, but there was a world of numbers and random shit that came with renovating to open.
Asher had learned the most sporadic bits of useless information from subcontractors alone. But with his little playmate, he worked more efficiently than ever these days.
Asher was an android of a person, a machine, and he was staring at a spreadsheet of successful accounting when she called, enjoying the fact that she affected him in these ways, stroking a hand over his still caged cock.
"How can I help you?"
Jezebel hesitated, and he waited it out patiently. Asher had learned that sometimes she just needed a minute. "Are you only interested in me as a slave?"
Asher sat forward. "Only? You don't know what comes with the interest of someone as a slave, Pet, if you have to ask that. If I'm interested in you as a slave, it means I'm interested in everything about you, more than anyone ever could be."
"I don't... know what that means."
Huh. That question actually took some of his patience from him. "Ask for what you want, Pet."
"Okay. Um. Okay. Okay, would you play with me or... not play, really. Mess around or something, I don't know. At Sulfur's, maybe? But, like, not in a sexual way, I mean."
Jezebel was also not very eloquent when emotions started taking their hold. Asher loved it. "Well, that clears things up. Why don't you come to Sulfur's, and we'll see what we can do to satisfy a kinda, sorta, not-really-playing in a not sexual way."
Her laugh was shy and breathless in his ear. "I'm sorry. Thank you."
"It's my pleasure, Pet." And it was, actually. Asher considered her words, thinking of what he knew about submissives, the deep world submissives. There were those who were like the Pet he had first met, ones who chased their kinky desires for fun.
But then there were ones who lived in submission. It was their state of being, their kind of therapy. And those kinds would get antsy if they went too long without a feeling of subspace. And it had to be subspace, specifically.
Not sex, but the mentality of pleasing someone. It was like they would be all over the place, and that magical mindset was an anchor to recenter them.
And it was easy to see why.
A submissive personality craved to feel approval, craved to see someone else pleased with them, so it made perfect sense.
Asher thought he might know what Pet needed. Jezebel showed up at his back door in perfect time for him to do it, too.
The dungeon monitors could handle opening Sulfur's, but once it started to get busy, he preferred to be more hands-on and personal. That gave him plenty of time to get Pet set up.
Asher hugged her when he saw her, and she gave him a shy, nervous smile. "Good afternoon."
"Good afternoon," she answered back softly. "I'm really sorry. I don't know what I want. I'm really confused."
Asher touched her nose. "Well, fortunately for you, I've built my life on fetishes and needs of all kinds. I feel good enough to take an educated guess. Come on, Pet."
Jezebel followed after him, and this time, he took her to his bedroom.
She blinked. "Is this your dungeon?"
***