A Whole New World

A Whole New World

Ah, welcome. I see you’re becoming accustomed to your new body. All the travelers who come here seem to have that reaction. The male specimens on your world must be very poor, indeed to lead to such awe. Welcome to Braün. I trust your journey was a safe one. Please, come this way. Your contractor is waiting for your arrival. As per the document you signed, you will be serving here for a period of no less than two of your Earth years. That translates to seven-hundred-thirty-and-one-half days.

During your service, you will be required to act in whatever capacity your contractor desires of you, barring sexual service and favors. Depending on the aspects of what your service entails, certain alterations in thought processes and habits may occur. This is normal, and should be treated as such.

As your disclaimer form read, we at Braün are not to be held responsible in any way, shape, or form for any drops in IQ, loss of clothing, loss of memory, personality overwrite, or any other such incidents that may or may not occur. As a worker, you are to be given a temporary work visa and a certain amount of rights under your employer. Should you so decide, you may become a naturalized citizen of this world and integrate with any number of classes within the general populace. 

If there are any problems that should arise, you may contact the agency or other appropriate authorities to process your case.

Do you understand these rights and disclaimers as they have been read to you?

“Huh? Oh. Oh, yeah. I get it. Say, you guys wouldn’t happen to have a mirror handy, would you?”

*Sigh* Down the corridor, last door on the right. You can pose to your heart’s content while you’re being processed.

“Sweet!”

...

Initial Analysis:

Possibility of Naturalization: High.

Potential Class: Manual Laborer/Gym Rat (May prove useful for power generation.)

All right, that one’s done. Time for the next.

The Pendant of Somnambula

The Pendant of Somnambula is a curious artifact, and one of my favorites to give away to customers. Each one has to be fashioned from a stone that I’ve grown steeped in a magical solution to get just that right swirl. I also have a lovely garden one of my workers tends to water the stones with a similar solution as they develop in caves underground. Once the stone has developed to the size and potency I desire, it’s a simple matter to polish and cut it, then mount in a framework engraved with the runes necessary to bind the pendant to its host and channel its innate magic.

Once bound to a host, the pendant is able to support its carrier by subtly increasing charisma over time. The bearer will become more convincing and enticing to various individuals with whom he has regular contact. The longer they are near the stone as the buyer wears it, the more they will fall under his or her influence.

Of course, the stone also wishes to please its host. As such, its influence will also reach out to the very individual who wears it. Take this customer for example. He started off much smaller than this. He wanted something to help boost his confidence in the gym, so he could reach his goals in peace.

As you can see, the man has clearly reached and exceeded them. The pendant whispered to his mind and heart in his sleep to drive him with greater motivation. Over time, he developed relationships with various other muscle men in the gym. They serve beneath him now, and as you can see here, their constant interaction acted as reinforcement for the entire group to focus on building their muscles. He’s a personal trainer now, and does a fine job of it.

More often than not, my customers go into trance after taking pictures of themselves with their pendants. But don’t worry, there’s a failsafe to ensure no harm comes to them from it. And, of course, as part of the payment for the service my pendants provide, I am able to call upon the buyers when necessary for various jobs and purposes. Whether it be to act as muscle, an escort, a contact, or something else, they are only too eager to listen to my voice and follow my commands.

Don’t you look at me like that. I most certainly am not an abuser of that fact. The pendants may be bound to obey me, and thus their bearers as well, but I don’t treat them like slaves.

However, I will admit that as a writer, I do enjoy having the more muscular ones send me pictures with various poses in their progress for me to use in my stories. There’s something enticing about such images, wouldn’t you agree? Here, let me show you.

Now, now. It’s perfectly safe. Go on. He’s waiting for you. Don’t be rude.

A thick meaty hand supports you by gripping your arm as you stumble through the portal into the poorly illuminated locker room. Thin black strips stretch down to barely conceal the nipples on the man’s massive chest. A deep voice rolls smoothly from the bearded lips above that giant muscled torso as your eyes lock onto a pulsing golden stone that writhes like a galaxy in motion.

“Hey there, little guy. This gym’s for meatheads only. Let’s see what we can do to help you fit the part....”

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The Game

You’ve heard of video games and drinking games, but bro, you haven’t lived until you’ve played the lifting game. It’s so fucking addicting!

How’s it work? You’ve just gotta join the Gaming Gym, bro. Dumb bros keep saying muscleheads and nerds can’t get along. That’s bullshit. Got recommended to this place by one of my bros, and I’ve never turned back. They’ve got this sweet gaming room. Tabletop, cardgames, videogames, consoles. You name it, they’ve got it. There’s just one rule to get in. You’ve gotta spend at least a half hour doing fitness. Cardio, weights, doesn’t matter as long as you put in the work. And they have the best fucking save system! I don’t know how they do it, but there’s this reader they put in at all the game consoles. You just insert your membership card, and it’ll pull up your save files for whatever game you’re playing, no questions asked. I don’t know what kinda deal they had to pull with the manufacturers to pull it off, but bro, it’s sweet.

The lifting game? Oh. Oh, yeah! Huhuh. Sorry ’bout that, bro. Kinda nerded out for a second there. I can be kind of a dumbass like that, sometimes. The lifting game’s got its own space aside from the rest of the gaming room. There are stations all over one of the walls, and it still has lines. The name says it all. It’s a game about lifting stuff.

Hey, don’t knock it till you try it! It’s harder than it sounds. You know VR, right? S’kinda like that. The more points you earn in the game, the higher your rank gets in the gym, and the more benefits you can earn, like VIP access to some of the games, special training programs, free health drinks from the bar once a month (or even once a week, if you’re really good), that sort of thing. It takes some getting used to at first, but bro, once you get into it, you won’t want to stop.

Don’t believe me? I used to weigh 130 when I started here. Now look at me. I’ve more than doubled that weight. I fucking love to lift, bro. And it’s all thanks to that game.

What’s my rank now? Bro, can’t you tell? I’m an NPC!

Well, of course we’re gonna have gaming references for ranks! It’s the Gaming Gym, bro, where you come to game and gain!

Come on. Let me give you the tour. Nah, bro. It’s no trouble. After all, I’m the welcoming NPC.

Gotta give those tutorials, m’I right, lil’bro?

Get Bricked

You didn’t believe him when he first approached you in the gym. You thought he’d misspoken. Most of the guy in the gym did, actually, and Marcus was the biggest of the bunch.

“Let me help you,” he’d said. “Work with me, and by the time I’m done with you, you’ll really be bricked.”

“Uh, don’t you mean ripped?” you’d asked.

Marcus just smiled as he motioned to the weight bench.

It came in little stages. A few reps here, a bit of cardio there. And all the while, Marcus would babble on about his work routine, his diets, the focus it required, the diligence, the ability to be absolutely unyielding in every respect. It got kinda repetitive, so you just sort of grunted and filtered it out as you worked.

For a time, things were pretty cool. Your grades were up, your concentration was better than it had ever been before. You’d learned how to filter out things you didn’t want to listen to or focus on, thanks to all that practice with Marcus in the first place. And it goes without saying that your body was toning nicely. Things were pretty great.

Then he suggested you spend more time in the gym.

And before you knew it, you’d already grunted and nodded along like you always do. His grin was massive, and the workout that day particularly vicious. Your arms felt like they wanted to fall off. You were so tired that night, you didn’t even want to so much as think about your homework.

So you didn’t.

It was the first time you deliberately chose not to work on an assignment you knew was going to be due the next day. It wouldn’t be the last.

The workouts were killers, but you couldn’t help but smile weakly at Marcus when you’d managed to push through another plateau. The guy was just so enthusiastic and charismatic. He’d flex whenever he got really excited. You couldn’t help but wonder if the muscle was part of it all in the first place. Could it really be that simple to gain such confidence?

...

It had been so embarrassing the first time he caught you posing in the locker room mirrors. But then he just chuckled and popped a little flex of his own.

“Like this, bro,” he’d said. You spent the next half hour practicing poses in the mirror. The way the light reflected off his skin, the ripple of the raw muscle beneath the flesh, the way the veins accented the primary locations. It was almost a form of poetry.

You practiced those poses every day from then on at home in your closet mirror.

Then came the party. Marcus insisted you attend at his place for a premier football game, just a close gathering, some of the guys hanging out. You were flattered, but you hardly felt prepared for that sort of thing. Sports had never really been your forte. But Marcus insisted. Time and place.

It was inevitable for you to follow.

You’re still not exactly sure what happened that night. Things are sort of hazy. You arrived on time, but none of the other guys from the gym were there yet. Marcus just chuckled and said they’d be along soon. Then he wrapped his huge arm around your shoulders and led you to the huge leather couch in front of a gigantic flat screen TV.

One minute you were watching the screen. The next, you were standing at the door with your iphone in hand and the rest of the gym goers smacking you on the back.

“I want you to listen to those tunes, bro,” Marcus said seriously. “No skimping out. Every day for your warmups, every night when you sleep. Got it?”

You nodded numbly. And for some odd reason, you chose to run home that night, rather than calling a cab.

It got a lot easier to understand the guys at the gym after that. It didn’t take all that much, really. You just had to do a little research on football and some of the other sports they liked. If you didn’t know about something, you’d ask one of them, and they’d be able to explain it in perfect detail. You were shocked. The guys weren’t dumb. They just specialized. Tony was football, Mikey weights, Alphy diet and nutrition. They became your gurus, all while Marcus continued to push your limits with his routines.

You nearly threw it all away when you got your report card at the end of the year, though. C in almost every course. That wasn’t like you. How were you supposed to get into college like this? It hurt to go and tell the news to Marcus, but you knew you had to.

Then came that hazy period again. You’re not sure what was said. All you knew was you needed to keep going. The gym made you happy now, surprisingly enough. And the guys, well ... you’d become sort of like a unit. You couldn’t picture doing anything without them around anymore.

You got yourself a tutor, and he helped you to pass. You didn’t like that your GPA had dropped so much, but it was better than before.

You hardly pay attention to the teachers now, though. It’s all just so ... boring for you. You’d pass the time by doing mini-flexes and running through some of the games you’d caught the other night in your head.

You still remember the first time you chuckled. It had been so easy. It just sort of burst out of you like a belch. You flexed. You chuckled. You flexed. You chuckled. You flexed....

Most of your games moldered in the dust now. Madden, EA Games, sports, those all were used well enough. After all, you had to have something to play with your bros from time to time.

Then they finally invited you here, to this place. The rough stone blocks behind you were a light dull gray. Daylight streamed over it, highlighting the muscles that now stood out from your sleeveless shirt.

The response was automatic. You raised your arms and flexed. You admired the light as it played across the flesh, casting it shadows that flowed over the curves and bends like a work of art.

You smirked.

You sneered.

You were a muscle god, and you liked it that way.

School? Screw it.

D&D? Bro, you were living that dream. No need to play a barbarian with these guns.

Your future? ... Why think about it? Your future was here with your bros.

Class? ... Class made your head hurt. Whatever. If you pass, that’s all that mattered. You couldn’t get banned from the gym. S’where you and the bros hung out.

You stare into Marcus’ face as he grins triumphantly at you.

“So, how does it feel to be bricked?”

The words flow out of you as easily as if you’d been cursing your whole life. “Huhuh. Fucking sweet, bro.”

And it was. The gym is your life now. The gym and your bros. And you wouldn’t have it any other way.

Pledge

He didn’t remember what happened last night. He didn’t remember how he got there. All he knew was his head was killing him, and his whole body ached. He groaned.

“Bro, what the hell happened last night?” He blinked in surprise. Had his voice always been so deep? He felt the warmth of sunbaked stone beneath his arm and turned his head as he stretched one of his arms up to his head and felt the fabric of his snapback. He didn’t remember putting it on.

A big house stood in the distance. Someone was standing on the porch. His sleeveless muscle tee clung to his gigantic pectorals, and his square jaw accented the broad shoulders and clenching abdominals of his torso. A few seconds later, his chiseled features blocked out the sun as he peered down at the prone figure.

“You seriously fall asleep out here, lil’bro?”

The man on the grass blinked blearily. His bicep tingled as he stared up at the behemoth looming over him. “I, uh ... I guess?” He furrowed his brow. “I ... don’t really remember, bro.”

“Big.”

“Huh?”

“It’s Big Bro. You’re my lil’bro, and I’m your Big Bro.” He lowered a hand. “Got it?”

“Uh ...” He seized the hand. “I ... guess.” He was on his feet in seconds. “Thanks, uh ... Big Bro....” He shuddered, then groaned as his eyes rolled back in his head. Wave upon wave of pleasure plowed over his body. “Uhhh.. Huhuhuhuh....”

“That’s right, Lil’bro.” The big man twisted the cap around so the bill sloped down Lil’bro’s neck and exposed his face. He sneered as he watched the man’s legs swell in the boxer shorts he was wearing. The fabric creaked as a distinct swelling began in the crotch, and a full beard grew in on the man’s face as the hairs thickened on his swelling pectorals, then spread down in a treasure trail through the shallow trench that was the beginnings of a defined six pack. “Just enjoy the ride. Let it happen.” He rubbed the man’s growing bicep and grinned. “Damn, you are gonna be huge. Think I’ll call you Swole. How’s that sound, Lil’bro?” he asked as he curled an arm around the man’s shoulders and led him closer to the house.

“Swole....” he parroted as his swelling feet smacked against the stones leading up to the porch.

“Just a big, dumb, swole bro, Lil’bro.”

“Yuh....”

The big man grinned as he pulled his hand aside to reveal a large 86 on Swole’s bicep. He flexed his own bicep to show off the giant 01 that had been inked there and watched in satisfaction as the light left the half-naked man’s eyes. “Yeah, you’re gonna fit right in, Pledge.”

“Whatever you say, Big Bro....”

The frat president sneered as the front door creaked open to reveal row upon row of muscle men posed in identical double bicep flex to salute their president, each sporting a large number on their left bicep. “Damn straight. Now go join the line.”

Anxiety

The guilt you feel for a wrong you never knew.

The fear of hurting another to push them away.

The worry that you will never be what the world expects.

The constant constriction in your chest that squeezes like a vice.

It is a master of infiltration and disguise.

Its target, peace. Its calling card, perception.

Its compatriots: fear and doubt.

Its occasional ally: pride.

Spawned by: love, hate, lust,

MISUNDERSTANDING.

And there are times where it cannot be removed, cannot be destroyed. You cannot simply shoot it. One may mask it, but that disguise often makes it stronger.

One may seek to control it. But control does not come easily, and can be an expensive venture.

So what is the antidote? Is there an antidote?

Not always.

But there are things that help:

Openness.

Patience.

Empathy.

Love unfeigned.

Gentleness.

Kindness.

Hope.

These things are there, and they will come.

But only if you SPEAK.

Only if you ACT.

So.

Will you be the hostage,

or will you try again?

For me, I will ACT.

For me, I will try.

For me, I will do.

And we will see what will be.

Together.