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They told him they'd come to rescue him, but he doesn't get what he's being rescued from. He can only remember living with his master; he has no memories of before. They said he was better off not remembering. His Master said they'd helped reprogram his mind to get rid of the past memories, take out the bad. He trusted his master, even though he sometimes hurt Tommy, even when he hadn't done anything to deserve a punishment. But now, men have come and they say they are freeing slaves. Tommy didn't know he was a slave.
His master owned him, but that was just the way things were; it was all he'd ever known. He can't remember a life before his master and he doesn't understand what he's meant to do now that no one owns him. The people who came, take him to a house with other slaves. They say he's there to be deprogrammed and even though he doesn't want to believe his master, the man who owned him was a bad man. The man who brought him here has kind eyes and he finds himself believing him. No one hurts him in the first week, no one comes into his room at night to demand he perform any sex act. He talks with a woman each day, a specialist in deprogramming who says she can help him. The kind man, Adam, says that it will bring back his memories of before he was a slave, before he was owned, when he was free.
There’s a mirror in his room. He hadn't had one when he'd lived with master and he finds looking in it fascinating. When he was owned, his master modified him anyway he wanted, with ink and metal, but Tommy's never seen it all before. So weeks after his rescue, he finds himself in front of his mirror, completely naked, looking at a body that nobody owns anymore. He owns him, it's his body; Adam said so and Tommy trusts Adam. He's not sure about some of the people here, but after a week, he could tell Adam really cared about him getting better. He knows Adam is attracted to the way he looks, but he doesn't try to touch Tommy or make use of him. He's not like master, who said Tommy was his to do with as he wanted. Adam says he has choices, says people own things, they shouldn't own people.
Tommy's starting to get that he was a slave; master owned him and used him. He needs deprogramming so he can remember who he was before he was a slave. He knows he didn't always look like this. Both of his nipples are pierced, a fine chain connecting them and leading down to a metal bar in his belly button and then a chain from that to a piercing in his cock. Adam says he can have them removed and he thinks he might, at least the chains and the one on his belly. He kind of likes the others and all the metal in his earlobe. He can't remember not having them and they don't hurt. The chain catches though and causes pain, now he owns his body. He can decide to get rid of it. Adam has explained that the tattoos on his arms and hands mark him as a slave and that they are a lot harder to get rid of than the piercings, but Adam gave his gloves, got him long shirts, so he can cover them if he wants. He's been warned that some people react badly to free slaves, so it's better if he doesn't show the piercings on his body till they've been changed to something a non-slave would wear and the tattoos always.
He knows his body has been modified, marked up to show he was owned and by who, but other than the slave markings, he doesn't know what is him. He has no memories of what he looked like before he was owned. Was his hair always black? Did he always wear it short, did he always work out to stay tone? He's done everything his master ever asked to keep his body the way the man who owned him wanted it. He can't believe some days that he didn't know he was a slave, when he had no say in any part of his life, including how his body looks.
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The deprogramming starts to work; he's learning to not think the way a slave would. He's not owned, he doesn't have to ask permission to do everything. He's started sitting in the garden with Adam at night. Adam tells the world stories about the world, his life, what it's like for free men who are not owned. Adam has a family in the city, parents and a younger brother, and one day when Adam's talking about them, a memory comes back to Tommy; he had parents and an older sister. When he tells Adam, he promises to help Tommy find them. He'd been afraid of getting his memories back as part of being deprogrammed, because when he was a slave, his master had said his past was terrible, but in the memory of his family, he was happy, he knows he was happy. But he's starting to see his master lied, just as he said Tommy's body was his, something he owned and could use and modify at his own will. That was a lie and everything he ever said was a lie. Tommy wasn't always a slave; he was born free and he was loved once.
Adam comes with him when he decides he wants to do some body modification of his own. He feels safe with Adam, happy in a way he never had been as a slave. The first thing he does is dye his hair blonde, because he has a memory of being blonde. It feels like he's taking a piece of himself back, no longer owned. He can do what he likes to his body and Adam says he suits being blonde; the compliment makes him blush. He'd never felt like that when master owned him. He'd liked the way Tommy looked, but he thought he owned Tommy, so it was more like the way someone would like a possession.
He changes his piercings next, has the ones he doesn't want removed and the chains, changes some of the others to things he likes and Adam holds his hand when it hurts and he likes it when Adam touches him. He never rejected his master’s touch, but he never liked it either, but he feels alive when Adam touches him. He has Adam to help him modify his body and his therapist to help get his mind back to the way it was before he was his master’s salve. He can't thank his rescuers enough and he can't believe he ever thought they weren't saving him.
He doesn't have all his memories back when Adam finds his family, but Tommy remembers enough to know that he loved them very much. Adam takes him to see them, his Mom and sister cry and his Dad's eyes look wet like he's trying not to. They all hug him and he can feel how they love him and for the first time, he starts to feel like Tommy the man, instead of Tommy the slave. His memories come back quicker after that, now he has a link to who he was before he was a slave, before his body was modified almost beyond recognition. He stops working out and rediscovers a love for junk food. He sits up late eating ice cream with Adam and when he was a slave, he wasn't allowed simple pleasures like that. When he was owned, he wasn't even allowed to decide when he went to sleep, he was punished if he couldn't sleep when he was told to.
Some nights he doesn't go to bed till the suns coming up, just because he can, because he's a free man, not a slave. No one owns him, no one can tell him when to do things that only affect him. With the help of the deprogramming specialist, he slowly but surely starts to leave behind the mindset of a slave. He owns himself and he can share his time and his heart with who he wants. He loves his family, he thinks maybe he loves Adam too. Tommy's not going to tell him yet though, not till he has all of his memories back, not till he's free of his past. He wants to undo more of the body modification the man who called himself Tommy's master did to his body. He's doing well, but he needs to learn to be Tommy again before he can be with Adam. He has a feeling that Adam will wait for him, no matter how long it takes.
The End.