Star Emperor

After their argument, Andrew went to the fitness module to vent his frustrations on the punching bag.

His anger was burning out slowly as he landed hit after hit on the bag and cursed under his breath.

He should have never signed that contract in the first place, but it was a spur of the moment and he wanted to do something for her.

Now he knew that the only things he got in return were nagging, nitpicking, and accusations.

-No Problem, lesson learned, now she's where she belongs and it's gonna stay that way.

He said to himself while punching the bag.

Lanarine on the other hand was lying in her bed, unable to sleep and the chip at this setting could not force her to do so.

Luckily for her, the human didn't set it up any higher or she would become a mindless doll again.

Right now she was cursing her stupidity and stubbornness.

-Way to go idiot, now you are back to being a slave over a minor detail that you could have easily overlooked.

She chastised herself.

-What am I going to do now?

She asked herself a moment later but had no answer.

Not that she was in a position to do anything other than follow his orders right now and it was unlikely that he would release her again.

What she was worried the most about was that he would take out his frustration on her, not that she was not the source of most of his frustrations.

-Whatever happens, it's out of my control now.

She finally admitted right before she finally was able to fall asleep.

The next morning she arrived at the command center and as usual it was empty, however, this time Andrew was not exercising but sleeping.

Thanks to their quarrel he could not fall asleep for a long time after he finally stopped tormenting the punching bag.

Not minding it she got to work.

Andrew arrived three hours later.

-What did you find so far?

He asked, without the usual warmth in his voice.

-Yup, he's still angry at me.

She thought to herself and proceeded to give him the report.

-Continue with the work.

He said after hearing her out and proceeded to look at the reports from the scout drones.

The drones managed to scout quite a bit of the area around the station but they found nothing so far.

Not waiting wot Lanarine to finish the scans he added some more asteroids to the drone target list and got up from the console.

-If there is something requiring my attention contact me.

He said to Lan and left the command center before she could even answer.

Not wasting any time he went straight to the education module and started his lessons.

It was a different experience than he had from school, but without rowdy classmates and the beauty sitting next to him, he was able to focus on the materials before him and started to learn.

Before he knew it, a few hours flew by so he decided to check what was going on in the command center.

-Lan, give me a rapport on your progress and the scout drones.

He said into his communicator.

-Yes….

I scanned eleven asteroids of which three contain the materials needed for the merchant and six others contain materials required for drone production.

Came the answer.

-The scout drones are currently scanning the space around 20,000 kilometers from the station and so far have reported no findings.

She reported.

-Good, continue with your work, and notify me if there is something that requires my attention.

Andrew said to the device.

- Yes….

It was amusing to him how much she fought to simply stop herself from calling him master.

-That's her problem, not mine.

He said quietly and returned to his studies.

Lan was not happy with the way Andrew was treating her now but she could only blame herself for it.

She sighed and returned to work as ordered, that way the chip didn't force her to do so and she had some control over her movements.

Now she regretted ever opening her mouth about the drones.

Just the day before she was free and could do what she wanted and Andrew treated her way better and today she was a slave again and treated like she was a tool and nothing more.

During the parts of her work that required her to wait for the scanner readouts, she wondered if it would always be like that or if he would someday forgive her and give her another chance.

She hoped that he wouldn't hold a grudge for too long as after tasting the freedom again it was extremely hard for her to get used to being a slave once more.

The rest of the day went by without any incidents.

In the evening Andrew walked into the command center after he finished his classes.

He managed to get through much more material in a single day than he did in school in three days and learned a lot from it.

-Send me your reports and go get some rest.

He said to Lanarine before sitting in the command chair which was surprising as he preferred to use the consoles one by one instead of doing everything from the command chair.

Seeing the change, Latrine was afraid that her stupid outburst might have affected him more than she thought, but at the moment she was unable to do anything about it.

She sent him the reports and left as ordered.

The moment she went back to her beginning module she felt the control of the chip relax a bit allowing her to do whatever she thought was necessary for resting.

Which in her case meant a shower followed by a meal and lying down in her bed.

While she was busy with that, Andrew read through her reports and also all the drone reports.

The reports that made him the happiest were the ones stating that all the drones he ordered were now operational and 60% of his storage modules were already full of materials. 

-If I keep this up, I will be able to start research in the morning.

He thought happily.

Finally, he would be able to move ahead with his plans.