Pirates of the Caribbean: A Marketplace Tale, Part 2
Pirates of the Caribbean is fanfiction based on Laura Antoniou’s Marketplace series, a fictional world in which there is a large and secret market for consensual slaves who serve their owners under contract. Laura recently released “No Safewords,” a fan anthology of tales by different writers set in the Marketplace world.
This tale also takes a page from the real-world phenomenon of modern high seas piracy. Most people think that pirates are a thing of the past, but in fact, across the globe at least one boat a day is attacked by pirates looking to steal cargo, ransom the crew or owners, or steal the boat itself.
In Part 1, Bette, a former Army medic and foreign service officer turned freelance “fixer,” gets referred a new case by trainer Chris Parker: rescue three slaves who come under attack while sailing their owner’s boat from Nassau to Buenos Aires.
I fly to San Juan in the morning. The breeze that’s swishing through the palm fronds feels as soft as a baby blanket. I call Kelly on the phone.
“Hey,” I say. “I haven’t got my daily picture yet.”
“You will, Boss,” says Kelly. “I had a busy day with the contractors, and then with Dr. Wallace.”
The contractors were building a nursery into our home in Montreal, and Dr. Wallace was a Marketplace-friendly doctor who also happened to be board-certified in obstetrics. It was helpful to have a doctor who we could be completely “out” to about the true nature of our relationship.
You’ve never heard of the Marketplace, and that’s because of the work of thousands of people: thousands of people united in keeping a vast market for consensual human slaves a deep, dark secret from the rest of the world.
Sure, in this post-Fifty Shades world, you’ve heard of BDSM.
You’re also convinced that BDSM is one of two things: kinky fun with handcuffs in the bedroom, or a fantasy.
There is a third option, and that option is The Marketplace. It’s where people go when the kinky fun isn’t enough anymore — when their drive to serve — or to own — is big enough that they have to make the fantasy real.
I know, I know: “Hey lady, Lincoln done freed the slaves.” You’re right. And ‘slaves’ in the Marketplace have little to do with the historical institution of slavery: slaves enter the Marketplace of their own free will, typically on time-limited contracts that they negotiate with the help of a trainer. Nor are slaves chattel in the old-fashioned sense: although Kelly is my property as well as my wife, our child will be entirely free to shape his or her own destiny. Except if they want to get facial tattoos, because you know I will put a stop to that shit.
“I see. What does the good Dr. Wallace say?”
“Everything’s just dandy,” Kelly says. I can tell from the background noise that she’s pacing in front of the windows; the telltale squeaks from the old wooden floor of our loft give her away.
“I would like to know why the mother of our child is not sitting down with her feet up,” I ask.
“Bette, I’m pregnant, not an invalid,” Kelly replies.
“Excuse me?” I say. “Perhaps the hormones are affecting your memory, because you seem to have forgotten who’s in charge here.”
Kelly sighs dramatically. “Oh, all right,” she says. “I’m on the couch. Happy?”
“Are your feet up?” I ask.
Kelly clucks. “Yes, boss. I am barefoot, pregnant, and on the couch.”
“Perfect,” I say. “Read a book for a half an hour — and not any baby books! Some light reading. Then I want a complete report of your day via email. Including a picture.”
You’d think that being an owner of human property would insulate me from embarrassment over my own kinks, but there are some regions of my perversity that I’m still embarrassed by.
Okay, I’ll tell you a secret: I’m turned on by pregnancy.
Everything about it: the getting pregnant, the lush, advancing curve of a woman’s gravid belly…all of it.
Shit. Now I’m blushing. Fortunately, with my skin tone, no one can tell.
The good news is that being the top has its privileges: not only did I choose when and how Kelly became pregnant, I get to cater to my own fetishes by demanding a picture of her pregnant belly every single day, tracking its advance as our child gets ready to make its entrance into the world.
“Why can’t I read baby books?” Kelly asks.
“Because when you read baby books, you start Googling, and when you Google pregnancy facts, the Internet, in its boundless cruelty, shows you extreme and improbable things that scare you half to death, and then I have to wake up Dr. Wallace at three in the morning to reassure you that our child will not be born with a tail or three heads.”
“Oh,” Kelly says. “Right.”
“Read a nice mystery novel,” I say. “Or one of those lesbian romances Radclyffe writes, you like those.”
“Too many hot sex scenes,” Kelly replies.
“Oh, I see. Well, if you’re a very good girl, I might give you permission to have a playdate with Mr. Hitachi,” I say. Mr. Hitachi is an industrial strength vibrator that plugs into the wall and has two speeds: OH and OH MY GOD.
“Well, then I’ll have to be very good indeed, because the hormones are kicking my sex drive into overdrive,” Kelly says.
“Fuck, don’t tell me that,” I say. “You mean I’m missing out on sinking my hands, mouth and cock into and around every inch of my luscious, pregnant wife?”
“Yup,” Kelly says.
“You know, I’ve always thought you’ve had a little sadist in you,” I say.
“Ya think?” Kelly says.
“Oh, sure. Sass me from three thousand miles away,” I say.
“You know how to settle it when you get back,” Kelly says.
“I sure do,” I say. “Now get to goofing off, slave.”
“Yes, boss,” Kelly says.
“I love you,” I say.
“I love you too, Boss,” Kelly replies.
**************
When you fly to Puerto Rico, you generally fly into San Juan, but to get to the job, I have to get across the island to Batalla (pronounced Bah TIE yah). Stanton has arranged a private car and driver for me. I have no idea if the driver is Marketplace or not, so I just act as if he’s an ordinary limo driver for hire — which means I fall asleep in the back.
Puerto Rico is small — about the size of Connecticut. It’s a US Territory, which means that you can use US dollars here. Most Puerto Ricans speak excellent English, but I speak Spanish, and because of my coloring, most Puerto Ricans think I’m one of them.
That’s a big asset — blending in is a big deal in my profession.
But what is my profession? Well — let’s just say I fix things. I’m a former Army medic who went into the foreign service, and I still have diplomatic credentials that get me waved through Customs in almost every nation on earth.
Now, I’m a freelance “fixer.” When things go wrong and you can’t call the cops, you call me. You pay top dollar, but when I make things right, you’re happy to pay it.
Over the past couple of years, I’ve done a lot of freelance work for The Marketplace. The owners of consensual slaves can’t really be up front with police about their human property, and sometimes Owners lose their shit, and the Marketplace retains a commitment to human property — to ensuring their safety and well-being even if an owner can’t or won’t.
That’s where I come in.
“Mees? Mees? We’re here,” the driver says.
We’ve arrived in Battalla. It’s a town on the southern coast of Puerto Rico. Its name means “battle,” because it was raided so often by pirates in the 1800s that residents took it upon themselves to move the entire town ten miles back from the ocean to protect themselves from the constant raids.
Now, Battalla is a residence for retirees and tourists who know their stuff and want to get off the beaten path, and locals who mostly work fishing, surfing, and catering to tourists.
There’s just one thing: even though Batalla has moved back to the beach…the pirates are still here.
Lily Lloyd is the author of Discipline: Adding Rules and Discipline to Your Kinky Relationship, a book about making kinky relationships work.
