Last Year's Model

[tortolis]

Here's the start of a new series. The title isn't relevant until later on. I may do a few more installments with these characters and then return to Chris and Boot. - tortolis


Last Year's Model

When Harry Weiner’s daughter Amber came down from her room and stopped in the doorway of the breakfast room, he couldn’t tell if she was just squinting or at him or really angry. “Good morning, Princess, I’ve been waiting for you” he said. “Happy birthday.”

Harry loved it here. It was hard not to be cheerful in this cozy space, with its bright morning light and its trellised, lemony-yellow walls. But his daughter could find a way, especially lately. She was pretty enough and her friends certainly seemed to like her, but she was also bored. And with thirty now a year behind her, she was seeing no one in particular and living at home while the giant economy-sized bathroom in her loft was being renovated into two full baths with steam and waterfall showers.

“Thank you, Daddy,” she said.

He put down the paper, stood up and kissed her on the top of her head. “I got you something,” he said. “I really think you’re going to like it.”

As if. For thirty years he’d been getting her the wrong thing, usually a thousand-dollar bill that she threw back in his face. When it came to gifts, Harry was a slow learner. But lately, at least he’d been trying harder. He knew she’d had a thing for strong men since her first time at the circus, and last year he hired her a biologically enhanced bodyguard who was incredibly strong, ten times as strong as the average guy. Scott. And it was fun to see what Scotty could do, but something was missing: he didn’t look special unless he took his clothes off — ripped, but on the thin side. The whole point, Harry pointed out, was for these guys to look normal, not to stand out in a crowd and call attention to themselves. Just plain wrong, countered Amber. Superman shouldn’t look like Christopher Reeve. He should look like Schwarzenegger, only bigger. If Hercules doesn’t look the part, where’s the intimidation factor? Which got Harry to thinking…if his researchers could develop a guy who was that much larger and more muscular than his original cohort of development subjects, wouldn’t the guy also be way stronger?

Harry had bought the lab after a military contractor lost interest, not because of problems with the science but because the commercial potential just wasn’t there; search-and-rescue, maybe, but combat, no. Warfare was changing. Subjects were expensive to develop and maintain, and the docs said that bigger ones might be subject to more biomedical risks. But Harry became intrigued, then fascinated. He hired a new research director. He expanded the lab and the project scope, extending it to wasting diseases, catch-up growth for premature infants and tissue regeneration. He got into fund-raising as president of a foundation to fund it all, and the philanthropy raised his social standing. Most of all, he got Stan, the first successful second-round development subject, who had more than twice as much muscle as Scott and had to be seen to be believed. And now, Stan was in the house. For Amber’s birthday.

Harry flipped open his phone and speed-dialed number three. “Stan, come on into the breakfast room, would you? It’s right through the kitchen.” Suddenly there was suspense in the air, and though he was wearing trainers and trod lightly, they could hear him coming: unassuming, beautiful, larger than life. “Every inch for you, Kitten,” said Harry. “Thirty five hours a week.” He was wearing a white tee-shirt stretched tight across his chest, which was broad as a prairie, and though it was blousy underneath, the sleeves had been torn out to reveal his huge arms — burnished, adamantine, more like carved stone than flesh.

“Oh. My. God.” Amber rose as if pulled up by a puppeteer’s strings and stood facing this man, if that’s what he was, trying to take him all in.

“Remember that tee-shirt, Kitten?” asked Harry.

“Sure, Li’l Abner, right? Love it,” she said. “Double love what’s in it. Love-love it.” Stan’s tee, which said “ZEKE” on the chest, was copied from a musical production.

“I ordered a dozen of them,” said Harry, “so why don’t you go ahead and unwrap your present?”

Amber stood there gaping.

“Here, I’ll start you off,” said Stan. As he raised his arms to grip his collar, Amber saw both his biceps swell, fighting for space with his forearms. It was an upright rowing motion, she knew. She stepped forward and caught the slightest whiff of him and felt a rush better than coke. He pulled, and the crew neck gave way like wet paper, starting a vee. “Go on,” he said. “Keep going.”

She reached up and ripped hard, tearing down through an ‘E,’ exposing pecs that jutted wide and flat, with a sharp divide. She knew all the parts, but never saw them like this: abs angular and machined, like tiles. Even his delts seemed squared-off rather than round, almost robotic, and next to them his shirt still hung off the absurdly wide shoulders. The severe taper of his torso seemed just as improbable. She couldn’t see his waist and his shoulders at the same time right now, standing so close, with her head at pec level, but she couldn’t imagine them matching up. She’d check that out later. Now she placed a palm gingerly on his pec and pushed: unyielding. Inhuman. Fabulous. “Oh, Daddy, he’s just what I’ve always wanted,” she said. She ran over to Harry gave him her best little-girl hug. “Thank you, thank you, thank you!” Then she looked back at Stan for the full view, with his shirt hanging in rags. He was just an impossible specimen, cut to ribbons, barn-wide at the shoulders yet narrow-hipped. But he was tall, so his vee didn’t look cartoon-y.

“So, what are you going to do with him?” asked Harry.

“All sorts of things,” said Amber. “We’re going to get into all sorts of trouble.” She was imagining him with his epic chest in full view and a stethoscope around his neck, or perhaps a spike collar. Or tennis shorts. She’d have to get those jeans off and get a look at his legs; they looked incredible so far.

“Nothing illegal, Kitten.”

“Illegal, no. Immoral, maybe.” And so the three of them sat down to Amber’s birthday breakfast, eggs Benedict with lots and lots of everything, and with the doting Harry introducing her to this mountain of a man who he knew could take care of her if anyone could.

[arpeejay]

I never get something like this for MY birthday, dammit!

xoxo

Richard

[mlbjock]

I'll 2nd that!

Nice take on this particular genre, man. I'm eager to see more.

Originally Posted by arpeejay

I never get something like this for MY birthday, dammit!

xoxo

Richard

[62strap]

MORE! What a terrific story!

[philat99]

Thanks for the great birthday story. I'm interested in where you're going to take it!
Mike

[worshipper]

I like the start. Lots of hints such as, he can take care of her, etc. Let's see how he impresses her with his power, might & manliness. Thanks for the story

[skumbum]

Fun stuff. Good writing!

[tortolis]

Thanks for the nice feedback. It gave me the push I needed to find time for another installment.

[Faust2001]

What a lucky girl! I can't wait to see what she does with him!

[Mass Driver]

Ok I have to admit it.
We dropped the ball.
We were reading a great story and we didn't send you the praise you deserved.
I'm reading this for a third time (the first when it was first posted)
and I'm thinking, "Where are all the other stories."
We the readers must have screwed up and forgot to feed the golden goose.
Ya don't get the golden eggs if ya starve the goose.
And a very handsome goose at that.
I saw the comment on Last years Model-2 and freaked out when I saw the difference between the year it was posted and the year of thwe last comment.
I just hope you are still looking at these posts and get this one.
There should have been a hell of a lot more comments for your writing.
Please do...
Keep Writing

MD
aka
redroger11
aka
dymondbolt