by Amanda Milo
Pet Project: Unnatural Selection
By Amanda Milo
Copyright © 2020 Amanda Milo ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by an information and retrieval system without express written permission from the Author/Publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
DEDICATION
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
EPILOGUE
AUTHOR NOTE:
CARE FOR SOME TRIVIA BEHIND THE BOOK?
Cures for A Book Hangover
Books & Audiobooks by Amanda…
About the Author
DEDICATION
To R. We’ve been through the weirdest stuff together, but you know what? We made it through. I love you!
***This story is set in the Pet Project universe. Not to worry if you haven’t read that one! You can still enjoy this book entirely as a standalone. Want the link to the original Pet Project anyway? Here you go! =D https://amzn.to/2UAU3ff
CHAPTER 1
“Dog!” the male spits at me.
Dog. He’s never even seen a dog. Nobody has. Dogs were companion animals that the First Elders, before the First Elders died out, used to tell tales of. These long-ago animals were kept when our people lived as their own rulers on the planet Earth.
Now the word ‘dog’ is a derogatory term. One does not hurl it at another person, not unless they want to verbally slap them with a slur. Because it’s said that dogs were blindly loyal; creatures who would do whatever their master told them to do.
But here’s the thing. We (creatures formerly known as humans, but we now go by whatever name our owners’ peoples refer to our species as) have to do what our keepers tell us to do, or we’re not worth keeping.
And culled humans…
You don’t want to be a Cull.
Besides, why make life harder than it needs to be? If your keeper is good, why wouldn’t you be happy in their keeping? Why would you pay them back with unseemly behavior when it will only displease them and thereby make you miserable? So yes, there are those of us who loyally obey our masters. Some of us behave because it pleases us to please our masters.
My owner is an alien from a race we humans refer to as ‘Whistlers.’ Tall, much taller than us, they tower over us like the keepers they are. They have rigid, bony protrusions covering much of their skin, with some parts of their bodies fitting together with rock-like plating. My keeper has large, dark eyes that shine with intelligence, making his face (when viewed from his cheekbones and up) very sweet-looking.
The rest of a Whistler’s face though... I can see why some humans find them sort of unnerving. Where their mouth is, they have two flat lips that look normal right up until they swallow. When they do that, sometimes two little feelers pop out of either side of their lips, sweeping away any stray moisture. I’ve grown up with Whistlers all my life—yet still, on occasion when their feelers make an appearance, I get an instinctual urge to shudder. The impulse is so strong that, no matter how close I feel to my keeper, the sight of his feelers is sometimes enough to tighten all the muscles of my back.
The Whistlers seem very cerebral, always observing, always training and testing. We refer to them as Whistlers because that’s how the aliens communicate: by whistles. They whistle at us too, and I’m not talking just a note or two—they entirely communicate by almost… songs. Unfortunately, by contrast, us humans can only manage a small range of notes. Although we can largely understand them, we can’t converse with our keepers. It’s not possible for us to make the sheer number of sounds that they do in order to successfully chat. And if you’re one of the unlucky humans who for the life of them just can’t whistle period—then you’re as good as a mute companion to your keeper. You might as well be making animal grunts whenever you try to relay a need or concept to them. And, well… to an extent, that’s probably how most keepers think of our sounds as it is. They watch everything and they can understand a lot of our needs just by observing us, but communicating with them is nothing like two humans trying to converse. It will never be as easy as that.
But back to the human male who just spat the slur at me: I’m supposed to have sex with him.
We’ve been paired together for the sole purpose of procreating.
Except that he’s miserably mean, and even if he wanted to get near me at this point, I wouldn’t let him touch me. I guess the only good thing about our predicament is that he’s staying as far from me as he can, literally pressing his back to the bars of the cage wall opposite me.
Yes, we’re in a cage.
In the bitter cold season, our keeper houses us indoors, and I, as a female, am allowed to roam loose in his home. But in the lovely summer season, we’re housed in the garden, surrounded by trees and vegetable beds and water sculptures. It’s a beautiful place. It’s a very peaceful place.
Today is the exception because of this male with his wretched temperament.
“I’m not a dog,” I mutter to him tightly, deciding to pace my half of his pen.
When I get too close to the area where his sleeping den is, he bolts to his feet and strides aggressively to block the entrance. He’s completely naked, his cock swaying with his steps, and I notice that it's engorging, despite his earlier verbal rejection.
He’s clearly territorial, and I don’t want to make him mad. I don’t want inside his den; I was only trying to stretch my legs. I back up quickly and decide that my legs can get cramps. It’s not worth getting attacked over.
At that moment, my keeper emits a warbling trill at me in a pattern that means undress.
Gritting my teeth, I do as Keeper says… which makes the mean male scoff.
I take off my dress and fold it carefully. I find a decent-sized jut of stone along the floor of the enclosure to set it on where it will stay free enough from sand and substrate.
Now I’m naked save for my collar. It isn’t a regular collar—not one of the light command collars like Tranq wears, or the thick, severe correction collar that Avox wears.
My collar is made of fine metal links, centered on my throat with a heavy ruby-colored jewel. There’s a ring at the back of it where a lead can be clipped, but there’s no mechanism to deliver punishments.
I could misbehave, but this collar in itself is a freedom and I don’t ever want to lose it. Plus, being corrected when I try so hard to be good would shame me.
When I face the mean male again, his eyes don’t stray from my face. In fact, he keeps his gaze very firmly planted on my face—and he scowls at me like it’s my fault I
’ve got no clothes on.
I glare at him. “You don’t have to be so angry. You’re not the one who has to be on the bottom, taking a penis.”
Eyes flashing, he curls his lip at me in response.
Firm whistles from our keeper are aimed at the male now. Clear be nice whistles. Whistles that this mean male ignores. He doesn’t even glance at our keeper, who stands behind a blind panel screen outside the pen. It gives us the illusion of privacy while lending protection in case a breeding does not go to plan.
Like this one, for example.
“You’re going to get in trouble,” I whisper to the male furiously. “Doesn’t that bother you? I would feel terrible if I ignored him.”
“Ha,” the male says. “Dog.”
“Is that the only word you know?” I ask, intensely disliking him.
He doesn’t answer. Thankfully, he doesn’t leap at me either. He doesn’t move at all, sitting with his back to his sleeping den’s doorway, his knees to his chest, his frame blocking the entrance so that I can’t get inside unless I want to try climbing over his rigid body.
I’ll stay outside, thank you.
Knowing already what I’ll see but having nothing but time, I take a look around his enclosure. It’s no different than I expected. I’ve sort of seen it from the outside; he’s being housed in a gazebo-like structure as elegant and stately as anything else in our gardens. There’s a sleeping box den with what looks like a comfortable pallet, and the substrate is a mix of soft sand, which warms nicely in the sun, and moss, which is easy on the hands and feet and knees.
I know this from experience. I’ve been down in a lot of moss.
Somewhere in here, there’s also a water drinking feature. I can hear it trickling prettily.
All in all, it’s a beautiful setup. A little smaller than my family-sized unit, but more spacious and better decorated than the average stud pen. It’s just as thoughtfully set up as any of the pens on the other side of the hedge.
That’s where my family is.
Soon, they’re going to be having a lunchtime treat. I’m certain that Keeper will still give me my portion of treats, even if I’m not bred today. After all, I did my best. I’m not the one who outright refused to make this easy and pleasant. I wonder if this ornery male will get special food. Keeper is very fair, but he also likes to be obeyed. Sometimes Avox has gone without treats as a punishment—and where food and Avox are concerned, withholding is a severe punishment.
When I make the mistake of glancing at this male’s food dish to see what he’s been given so far—he growls at me. He also barks, “Stay away from my food!”
“Now who is the dog?” I ask, feeling peevish. But the word tastes bad on my tongue. Heat stings my cheeks. It’s a terrible thing to say, and I’m glad my children are too far across the garden to hear me. At their age, they’re mimicking everything they hear. Which Keeper encourages. He’s desperately hoping to teach them how to whistle full sentences to him and he’s delighted whenever they succeed at copying any part of his phrases.
Thinking of my babies makes me want to check on them. I can’t, of course, not really. I suppose I could shout in their direction and hope I can hear them well enough to understand what they shout back. It’s not that we’re so terribly far apart; it’s that the garden is full of lots of lovely leafy things and sound is muted nicely, care of the endless foliage.
I might be able to return to my family tonight if this male initiates a polite mating.
I try to study him out of the corner of my eye. To say I’m curious about him is an understatement. He’s not like any male I’ve ever seen. He’s… an extreme Ornamental.
Ornamentals come from closed herds where the keeper practices close inbreeding. My parents explained that the closer and closer the relations, the more and more recessive genes get doubled up. Freckles, height (dwarf lines and giant lines are both wildly popular, for example), hair color, skin tone, everything from our facial structure to the coloration in our eyes—if there’s a variety to be had, someone is raising a herd of them somewhere. When mutations occur, if it’s desirable to the keeper, they’ll selectively breed for that specific trait.
That’s why there are albino herds, odd-eye herds, herds with extra fingers on their hands, blue-skinned herds, werewolf herds, and so on. Of the last two mutations, the blue-skin is caused by a blood disorder, so they tend not to live as long as a regular human. But oh, how some keepers adore them for their interesting color. The werewolfism isn’t really werewolf hybrids. We know they don’t exist, it’s just that telling stories, including horror stories, is a time-honored tradition among human herds, and fables about these furry creatures are well known. When a mutation in humans produced babies born with thick black hair completely covering their faces, ears, throat, neck, shoulders, back and chest—werewolf babies were what some humans called them. The line faces some problems; some werewolf gene-carrying mothers have been known to reject their babies if they’re bred to a werewolf male, because it always produces a werewolf ‘pup,’ with full furring. It’s better to breed a furred woman to either a furred male or a male carrying the gene because, when a fully furred pup is birthed to her, that mother accepts the features of her offspring as normal.
And keepers love their werewolf-people. But then, keepers are wild to create all sorts of new variations of us.
I turn enough that I can get a clearer peek at the male I’m locked in with. This is supposed to be the father of my next baby. He’s what some elders would have called ‘grotesque.’ Younger generations of us humans are more accepting—we have to be. With so many of us designed, it’s nothing to us to see specially bred individuals.
This male’s grey-green eyes are set under impossibly hooded brows. Triangular ridges swath the area above his eyes, creating wedge-like cranial overhangs. His forehead and his nose bridge form a convex swell. His nose bridge is thick and domed, in such a way that his construction appears artful, like he was created with heavy artistic license, sculpted not with a thought to the normal laws of nature but of a fanciful sort of whimsy. His jaw is wide and square like a box. The overall effect of his face… It looks… unnatural.
His limbs are long, and I noted when he was rushing for me that he’s quite tall, impressively so, and he has muscle wired onto every part of his body. He’s striking and unusual and there’s a strange sort of beauty to his form. He looks created, like a living sculpture if keepers could play with clay and turn it into a living being.
And in a way… I suppose they did.
I’ve heard very few good things about the extreme Ornamentals, but I’m not put off by his appearance. If he hadn’t been rude to me, I wouldn’t have turned him away.
Although, it isn’t really as if I have much choice. I’m here to be bred, and he’s here to cover me.
I try to imagine what a child with him would look like. Every baby I’ve ever seen is beautiful. Of course, my own three are my favorite, and while none of them look like an Ornamental of this male’s type, I imagine I’d be just as in love with a fourth baby, should I have one (no matter how mean the man), no matter what line of selective-breds he descends from.
Since Keeper hasn’t unlocked the door and led me out, I try to make conversation since I’m stuck in here. “Have you sired children before?”
A crown of dark brown hair cropped short was my focal point while he kept his glare at a point near his feet. At my question, his head whips up and his gaze latches on mine, searing me where I dare to stand. “I’ve been studded out since the day I was old enough to ejaculate viable semen. Do you want to know how many children I’ve cursed to being born a freak?”
I don’t know what to say to that. “Sorry...”
His glower on me has the power to make me wince.
He doesn’t release me from his glare, so I avert my gaze and resume the tiny amount of pacing I’m allowed. But eventually, this gets so tedious, I think I’d rather brave the angry man I’m locked in a pen with than
do absolutely nothing in the face of this miserable tension that sits thick in the cage between us.
I drop until I’m sitting down, my legs folded under me.
The male’s eyes lock on my breasts as they bounce with the movement—but it’s like he catches himself and it makes him angrier. His nostrils flare and a muscle jumps in his jaw.
Uncomfortable with nudity for the first time in a very long time, I fold my arms over my chest and clear my throat. “I have three babies. Ava, Quinn, and Molly. Four summertimes, three summertimes, and two summertimes of age, respectively.”
“Good for you,” he utters caustically.
“I’m Theresa.”
He says nothing. But he’s finally turned his glare away, pointing it at a spot beyond me now. Which I appreciate. I’d swear my lungs operate better when he’s not aiming his killing look in my direction.
“We call this the Garden Sanctuary herd.” When he still doesn’t acknowledge what I’ve shared, I decide there’s no harm in saying more. “An elder taught me—taught all of the children born at my birthplace facility—basic science, math, letters. I’ve never fully grasped the ability to write, but I can read some letters. I haven’t seen anyone write anything since I left my birthplace. It’s not a skill I need, but it’s one that I hope to pass down to my children when they get old enough to learn.” I catch my bottom lip between my teeth, shoring up the courage for the question that could get my head bitten off. “What’s your name?”
My breath catches when angry eyes full of fire lock on mine. “What’s the point of getting to know me?”
I frown. “If things were going according to Keeper’s plan, we’d be pretty well acquainted right now. Your name is a small thing compared to…” My eyes try to drop to his lap, but I manage to raise my gaze right back up to his.
He sneers. “Don’t waste your time making a connection. I won’t be here any longer than it takes for my cum to plug your cunt. They’ll whip me until I cover you, then they’ll shuttle me off to the next farm with open bitches. They’ll never stop using me. Don’t you know that? I’m ‘special.’ They will use me and use me until the day they can’t possibly use me anymore.”