"Welcome home little one, I think its time we begin to get to know each other"

The words reverberated through her body, leaving shudders in their wake, she felt sick, so sick and she couldn't open her eyes, she just couldn't look at the monster standing in front of her, the monster that had snatched her from her life without any conscience or qualm on a fucking whim.
She focused on breathing, one in one out, but his presence sat on the edge of her mind cold and threatening and terrifying.

Without even realising it she was waiting for his next words, for his next action, for something for god's sake, she tried to listen to his breathing but she could barely hear it. Her nerves crawled under her skin with terror and anticipation.

He made her wait, her heart beat increased until she thought she was going to die from fear alone as he stood there and studied her for what seemed hours but in reality must only have been about ten minutes at the most and then she heard him move away and saw the light begin to leak into the darkness as he walked out and then she was plunged into the almost tangible blackness again as the door glided to a close behind him. What the fuck? He said…. what had he said again? "Time to get to know each other?" And then he just stood there not saying a bloody thing, bastard, using fucking mind games. She crouched there waiting for him to do something until her skin was crawling with the tension and still he kept quiet, the arsehole.

She knew they were mind games but as the silence swirled around her, she couldn't help it, she reacted to it, she suddenly drew in a deep gasping relieved breath. She couldn't control her poor body's reactions to the bastard's manipulation. Not yet, but she fucking would, oh yes she fucking would.

In the living room upstairs, Mrs Hudson was smiling with approval as she turned from the internal monitor showing the rooms of 221C and said to John, "I am so proud of him, he did so well resisting the urge to speak to her, just as I recommended, he really must stay strong and resist her whimpering. It will be better for her in the long run."
She gave her professional opinion. Then continued with a touch of worry
"That room isn't too cold for her is it John?"
John laughed at her with gentle amusement " Mrs Hudson, after all the lectures about the way to start with Pet training and here you are turning into a doting old sweetheart, no of course its not too cold for her, I have been monitoring her signs and movements. It will keep her awake and cold, she will be uncomfortable but it won't cause anything dangerous or life threatening for her, and I will be keeping an eye on her anyway"

Sherlock piped up from the doorway, "Do I really have to do this every hour on the hour Mrs Hudson?" he asked plaintively with that trademark pout on his fine lips which had John surveying him with hooded eyed appreciation. He wondered how long it would be before he could get Sherlock alone, naked and pouting in his bed.

Mrs Hudson was oblivious to John's expression; she merely levelled a stern look at Sherlock before he gave in and laughed at her. She shook her head with amused exasperation at him. Such a naughty tease that boy, she loved him to bits.

Mrs Hudson smiled reminiscently "Variations of temperature, sleeplessness and the silent treatment, all exceedingly good ways to begin training"

John allowed his expression to broadcast his lust at Sherlock behind Mrs Hudson's back until the curly haired sex god began to flush with delight, and then in his cool calm professional Doctors voice, which was a complete contradiction to the look on his face, asked him
"Has Mycroft sent over her medical history yet, I need to make sure she has all her jabs and is clean for you Love, don't want you catching anything nasty from the little one do we?" and he sent him a fond smile, enjoying the fact that Sherlock could not react to the messages John was sending his way because Mrs Hudson was still there.

Before Sherlock could answer, the sound system picked up the deep shuddering sobs from the Pets rooms. Sherlock swung round and stared at the monitor with concern. "Is she going to be doing that all the time?" he asked with some irritation. "Now Sherlock, stop fretting, it's a good sign and don't you dare go down there before you are supposed to, you'll spoil her."
Mrs Hudson patted his hand gently as she moved towards the bathroom to collect their laundry and head back downstairs for a well deserved nap. It had been very exciting and nostalgic when the little one had arrived, brought back some lovely memories but it had been very tiring and she wasn't getting any younger. She was very pleased with the way John and Sherlock were listening to her advice and after some initial misgivings she was coming round to the idea of a wild pet.
She would dig out some of her old equipment; she still had the first collar and leash she had used as a young girl. So many lovely memories they brought back.
Sherlock would appreciate it and it wasn't as if she had anyone else to leave them to when she was gone.

John smiled with secret satisfaction, excellent, Sherlock was intrigued. He and Mrs Hudson just had to curb his natural obsessive tendencies when it came to something he was interested in or the poor little pet would get no peace whatsoever.
He went to make a cup of tea, all in all it had proved to be a good couple of days and now he could concentrate on Sherlock and make sure he was happy with his gift.
He would pop in and check on the little one when she dozed.

He had already made his view clear on drugging the pet as a faster way to train her, he wasn't going to have it, no temptations like that in this house thank you very much and Mrs Hudson had agreed wholeheartedly. The whole bloody point of this exercise was for Sherlock to have his own pet, a pet that was totally focused on him as her Master, who would adore him and worship him and allow him relief from his frustrations. A pet who could be told anything and who wouldn't judge him only love him. A pet that wouldn't be able to exist without him, thus ensuring that he paid attention to her needs as well as his own.
Using drugs would taint the experience for him and that was not going to happen. John wanted Sherlock to enjoy every second of her training and then the rewards of a loving Pet. But it couldn't be easy for him or he would get bored and the project would be abandoned and then John would have to be responsible for her, or have her taken away and as he was too softhearted for the little one to be sent to a re-homing centre, because the private breeding centres would never take a wild pet into their care, so they were left to the tender mercies of the Government run facilities, and they barely had the funding to feed them, let alone find them a suitable new master or mistress. John just knew he would be the one left with her in his lap. Literally!

So John would not allow any short cuts in this process, Sherlock was in it for the long haul whether he knew it or not and whether he liked it or not.

As he waited for the kettle to boil, his thoughts swirled, and he mused sardonically that William Wilberforce would probably be spinning in his grave now if he could see how his little sop to public opinion, the creation of the Personal Pet scheme and the breeding centres had evolved over the centuries. Wilberforce had been desperate to get rid of the whole sale slavery that existed in the Island, he was a gang master's son and heir but his heart belonged to the new age of machines which would replace the intensive slave labour system. He had gained the backing of powerful men who saw the chance of profit and clever, clever lad that he was; he found a way to make the slavery system repugnant except for the use of Pets. He had dangled that carrot in front of the chattering masses and the populace had snapped their little jaws at it.

He had been so clever, John thought with amused cynicism, ordinary folk couldn't afford to have slaves, but the way he set up the Pet system then they had a chance, and it became a right instead of a privilege. So Wilberforce had got his way, abolished most of the old slavery laws, abolished the slavery system and turned those slaves left into cherished Pets, he had made a fortune with his machines and became lauded as the Father of the democratic pet process, which had gradually spread out across the rest of Europe replacing the slavery system and allowing fortunes to be made by the introduction of the marvellous mechanical age. The man had been a certifiable genuine fucking genius.

Anyone could be taken as a Pet on designated nights, and once they were, they spent an obligatory period at the breeding centres seeding the next generation of pets or bearing them and then returned to their Owners. Once they were taken they were no longer seen as free citizens, they were Pets. No pleading or begging for mercy was heeded, as everyone knew that if they assisted a runaway pet, then they would be selected instead.
Families knew better than to try to buck the system, but money always talked!
If they were well connected enough, sometimes they could make enough of a fuss that the process was quietly overturned as a "mistake" or if they had the funds but were not high enough on the social network to have those kind of connections they could normally "buy" the pet back, and then he or she would live quietly with relatives or be taken abroad where their status as Pet could be conveniently overlooked. That of course presumed that they wanted the "Pet" back. Some of the older established families saw it as a stain on the family name and would just conveniently forget about the one who had been caught in the process. They were wiped from the collective family consciousness as if they had never existed.

Sometimes families in need of funds would sell one of their own as a Pet. They were normally private transactions which for the last few years the courts had been trying to clamp down upon.
The breeding centres hated that kind of private business transaction as they did not get their cut, and there had been too many times when the private transaction had resulted in the Pet being seriously maimed or even killed.

There had been two notorious cases in the last decade which had swung public opinion against the use of private transactions.
A handsome and young cricket player had been sold as a Pet to ensure that a family business was not bought out and asset stripped by a multinational corporation making the local workforce redundant. He'd been popular, kind and handsome and had voluntarily agreed to the transaction because he had been loyal to the core and hated the thought of his home being destroyed and his friends parents losing their livelihoods.
He had ended up beaten to death and dumped on the village green in full view of the factory entrance, the day after his Master the CEO of the Multinational had closed the factory anyway. The lad had been heard vehemently protesting about the closure before his body had been found. The Pets death had been ignored as a minor civil matter, a mere irrelevance by the law courts and the CEO had faced justice for those actions which had been deemed to be illegal, he been fined heavily for breaking the contract regarding the closure of the factory.
But there had been flash mob protests organised by the lad's cricket playing friends, sparked by the death, and it had spread until they dared to protest at the Home of Cricket itself, The Oval, in front of the members of the establishment. It had been kept alive in the news much longer than the Government were comfortable with. Questions were asked in the House of Commons and the Prime Minister had begun to make soothing noises about ensuring the safeguarding of the poor little pets by legislating on private sales. She had set up a Royal Commission to look into the matter and quietly hoped the furore would fade into the background with the production of a well written fudged report from a very well paid academic.

The second case happened eighteen months later, after the recent election which had seen the Opposition come to into power. An older woman in her mid thirties, a successful lawyer plucked out of her life because she had been sold by her step mother on the death of her wealthy father in order to access her fortune. The feminist movement were outraged; the newspapers and the news channels had a field day scaremongering. If it could happen to a professional middle class wealthy woman, it could happen to anyone. Who was safe?
This time the sale was overturned, only after a couple of months of legal wrangling and court cases by the ex lawyers employers and colleagues, who had begun to feel vulnerable, not something they were comfortable with. So she had pretty much begun her training but she was a strong-willed and stubborn woman and when she was released in an unheard of but theoretically legally possible manoeuvre, she was "emancipated" and the Government used it as a public relations coup, her happy ending story used to bolster the Pet laws amidst the self congratulations and political posturing whilst the greedy step mother had been imprisoned, as at forty five she was classed as too old for Pet Service, though in theory there was no upper limit to the Pet service programme, it was rare for anyone over the age of thirty to be taken.
Most Citizens heaved a sigh of relief once they hit thirty so it was a bit shock to the system when the Lawyer had been taken. Of course she had become even wealthier with the sale of the rights to the film of her life, the ghost written autobiographies and the talk show appearances of the emancipated pet. "The one that got away" was now a minor celebrity with her own agony aunt talk show on one of the satellite channels.

Those two cases had changed the law to disallow private family sales without a licence issued through the Local Authority's registrar's office, which had to be applied for at least three working days in advance or there were severe financial penalties. The Government were pleased with the changes and had recommended them to Her Majesty the Queen for approval. Of course they had been passed and hailed as a progressive way forward for the future.
Sometimes the courts would sentence the younger and prettier defendants to the Pet process, instead of Jail. There were legal age limits, at the breeding centres; children only became pets at the age of sixteen. Sometimes the Wild Hunt disregarded those rules especially if the little one looked old enough and they thought they could get away with it.

But once a Pet was in the system, no-one thought of them as a free human being again. The only exception to the rule had been the lawyer.

John wondered what has made him think of his old history lessons, as he wandered back into the living room and gave Sherlock his cup of tea. The monitor was on but Sherlock was engrossed in his laptop. John noticed that the little one had fallen silent, she must be tired out, poor little darling. There he was being all stern with Sherlock about the proper training when that's all he wanted to do was go and scoop her up and bring her up to 221b where she would feel safe again, tucked up in her little pet bed with a soft blanket, he thought with a fond smile.
Thank goodness she wasn't his; he would make a complete idiot of himself and spoil the little thing. Damn it, he was such a soft-hearted fool sometimes, he though ruefully.

He took a deep and satisfying sip of his tea, and the nearly spat it right out again, as he heard the hoarse, cold voice of the little trainee pet speak through the monitoring device.
Sherlock's head jerked back as if he had been slapped as he heard her words and his eyes widened with a myriad of emotions ranging through disbelief, outrage, insult, and then finally fascinated glee, as he swung away from the desk to look again at the monitor which only showed the infra red image from the dark room. She had relaxed back against the tile wall, her knees up to her chest, no doubt to keep her warm, but her head was no longer slumped down, her back was straight and her shoulders thrust back, so her voice was not muffled but perfectly clear.

"How utterly predictable" Icy distain dripped from that soft husky voice "Is this really the best you can do, isolation in darkness, no heat, lack of clothes, too cold to allow me to sleep properly in these uncomfortable surroundings, no doubt regular irregularly timed silent visits designed to frighten me. Did you follow it faithfully from chapter one in your dog-eared copy of 'Pet Training for Dummies'".
They heard the rueful mocking laughter in her voice as she continued.
"You morons, did you see the state of my flat, I live in isolation, I don't have a family, I don't have any close friends and I work the night shift in the morgue to pay for my studies. I can't afford to heat the flat properly so am always cold and more often than not I have to use candles because I can't afford the electricity. Oh and the irregular silent visits? I have a fucking lecherous peeping tom of a landlord who tries to catch me unaware for a quick grope."
She drew a breath and continued, her anger overriding her fear and common sense, she needed to rage at someone and she just knew there would be monitoring equipment in this room. Even if they couldn't hear her, she would feel better saying it. She was on a roll now and she wasn't going to stop.

"What's next? Some putrid little sex act for one of you or calling you master so that I am rewarded with something to eat. Did I mention this is totally unoriginal and pedestrian you pathetic pair of perverts"

She snorted her disgust and then that dismissive sarcastic voice went silent. The shock of her words finally breaking through her rage, Instead her internal voice was screaming at her as if she had gone insane. She had gone insane, she must have. Why the fuck would she challenge them on something like this? As if she was urging them to put their thinking caps on and do worse things to her. If she had kept quiet, she could have predicted their next moves and maybe used them to her advantage, now, now for the love of God she had thrown down the gauntlet to that pair of psychopaths.
God help her, what the hell had she just done?

AN:

A belated happy new year to you all. Sorry for the delay, lots of things going on including moving premises and been too shattered to do anything. Also to be honest Molly wouldn't speak to me until the last couple of days and Sherlock and John were freaking me out a bit. Damn this is getting dark.

Hope you enjoy. Thank you for your reviews and the requests for a bit more world building. Hope this works. Let me know what you think, I love it when you review

Disclaimers:

They belong to who they belong to, this is just playing ... no infringement intended.