Once Sam had eaten his fill and drank himself silly he found himself feeling tolerably more human. He still ached all over but at least he wasn't dying of thirst or starving any longer. His eyes turned back towards Lyria, who was looking at him expectantly. Obviously she wanted to hear about the whole shadowrunning thing. Sam took a deep breath, his lungs having recovered nicely from his suffocation before going into the whole story.

"Right. So I am- was part of a shadowrunning group. You probably heard about the break in on the facility so I'll spare you the numbers and stuff you probably don't care about. We were contracted to get data on Formula 27 and deliver it to our employer." He started.

"Who employed you?" Lyria cut in.

Sam gave her a frank look. "I don't fucking know. Your security forces knew that so they tossed me into that place rather than interrogate me. Razor, he might have known but your guys gunned him down so that info died with him. Can I continue?"

"Please."

"Right. So our employer gave us a little device to help us bypass the building security systems and cut the electricity. Unfortunately something went wrong and the power came back more rapidly than expected."

Lyria smirked. "We have several backup systems on those levels. They can run on independent power sources. Requires manual startup but it does the trick."

"I see. Well, whatever the case was my team ended up dead and I got thrown down into the test chambers. A lab assistant prodded at me and I almost got suffocated beneath a tube of your lipstick, pretty much sums up how it is being tiny. I didn't know who you were. Though I can tell you I was half expecting another gun in my face when we met up again." He said, nervously chuckling at the end.

Lyria said nothing and instead regarded him with a searching look. It was basically the truth for the most part. He'd omitted his freshness to the group and opted to forgo talking in detail about the death of his team. That sore was still a bit too raw to open up again. People died but those had been his people. The elf seemed to be weighing his honesty and Sam felt naked, well more naked, under that gaze.

"Alright. I believe you."

Sam felt a wave of relief wash over him. "Thanks, Lyria."

"I said I believe you. Doesn't mean I am willing to look past the fact you tried to steal from my employers. That could have ruined me." Lyria said, her eyes narrowing dangerously.

"I didn't know-."

"No, I bet you didn't. You fucking runners are all the same. You don't give a shit about ruining people as long as you get paid." The elf said, her free hand clenching into a fist.

Sam felt anger rise in his own chest. "What the hell do you know about it!? You ever tried living on the streets? You've got a nice corporate job but the rest of us? We've got to survive. Yeah, people get hurt in the process but that's what has to happen sometimes. Don't play the upstanding citizen card, elf, not after what I saw in that lab."

The two glared at each other and Sam felt a thrill of fear cross his heart. He didn't back down even though he realized Lyria was the one with the real power here. She was no saint just like he wasn't. They had blood on their hands and the woman was not wiggling out of that. Not when he'd seen her send five metas to some sick area of her facility to be dissected without a quaver in her voice. He wasn't innocent here but neither was she.

After a long moment she let out a breath and a chuckle. "You look just like you did at that club. Your taste for danger will be your end one day, Sammy."

"Maybe. So what now?" The man asked, the fire dying down as he faced uncertainty.

The elven woman seemed to ponder this as she put the cap back on the water bottle and set it aside. In the end she shrugged slightly. Sam frowned at that and at the hand offered on the counter. Slowly he helped himself on and adopted a kneeling position as Lyria moved through her large home. Looked like a penthouse apartment from his limited view. The elf sat down and kicked off her heels, lounging back in a comfy looking chair and holding up her hand so they were eyelevel.

"Good question. Technically I've disposed of you. So as far as my employers are concerned you're dead. Strangely I don't want to kill you." Lyria said.

"So where does that leave us? I suppose my leaving is out of the question." Sam inquired.

"Sure, you could go. You'd get squished like a bug or eaten by an actual one probably but no skin of my back. Growing you back is out. Survival of the shrinking is low enough; we haven't even started working on the reversal." She informed with a chuckle.

"I'm thinking I could use a little pet. It does get so lonely up here. Besides... I know how you liked serving me that night." Lyria offered.

Sam blinked at that rather brazen offer. She had laid out why it was a stupid idea for him to strike out alone. Logically she was correct. He's probably last all of two seconds on his own. On the other hand being her... pet didn't sound particularly appealing either. He'd played along well enough that night out of curiosity, arousal, and the rush but being made servile seemed emasculating. Death was on one hand and on the other was a life of bondage to a woman as her little plaything. Hard to decide which was preferable when laid out like that.

"You mean slave." He said bluntly.

"If you prefer. You'd get food, water, comfort and in return you'd be mine. Worse fates out there." Lyria said, shrugging.

Sam frowned. The only other choice was pretty much certain death. He was one for danger and taking risks but risks were on either side. One had stupid risks and the other had risks he knew and could accept. Lyria clearly had a mean streak, she obviously loved power, he could bet a good amount that holding him like this got her juices flowing. Being her... pet was not exactly as safe as she made it sound he suspected. Sam didn't want to die. However he also didn't want to lose himself. That was just death of a different kind.

In the end though, staring at the exquisitely shaped face looming before him he felt that rush. That adrenaline started pumping through his veins and he remembered how very intense she had been that night ago. The rush was like a bad addition and Lyria was positively toxic, no two ways about it. The offer she made was simply become her toy or die. The latter was finite but the former held such... possibilities. The danger there was real. His odds were better. He also felt confident enough he could match her will. He wouldn't lose himself. Not to her, not to anyone.

"Fine. I'll do it. I'll live under your roof, Lyria. But I'm no one's pet or slave and I'll never be one." Sam said with all the fire in his gut.

The elf laughed at that, her eyes gleaming with mischief and with that dangerous light from that night when she'd held a gun to his head. "Please, don't insult me. By the time I'm done with you, Sammy, you'll be my own little domesticated human." The elf said.

"Regardless. Today must have been so rough on you, my little human. You need rest otherwise I won't be able to mold you." Lyria said, giggling as she reached down and lifted up one of her heels.

Sam couldn't react before he found himself dropped into the blue heel, rolling down the arch and towards the toe section. He could smell the mixture of her fruity scented shampoo and sweat, the cocktail overwhelming his nose. Lyria giggled as she put the heel back on the ground, bounding away out of his view. The human shook his head and sat up, staring up at the hill of the rest of the heel. The toe section was closed and snug enough where he could easily sleep in it. The arch would be a bit of a climb and the heel section was likely the best place to get a vantage point.

The smell of Lyria was heavy in this place though at the moment it was far more comfortable than the other places he'd been sleeping. Was this her way of rattling him then? Making him take residence in one of her heels, surrounded by her intoxicating scent? Sam smirked; it would take more than that to rattle his cage. The elf was not going to break him. He'd thrive in Lyria's shadow like he did in the other points in his life. He was no person's toy or pet or slave and he wasn't going to start being one.

Sam laid back in the shade of the toe of Lyria's heel, the plush material beneath him not as soft as the elf's skin but it felt divine. He crawled and tucked himself in the nook as deeply as possibly while still managing to be comfortable. The elf was right. He felt utterly terrible and like one big sore spot. The residual body heat Lyria's foot had left was incubated in the toe section though he did wish he had something to cover himself with. Not perfect but even in these imperfect conditions Sam found himself drifting off to sleep. Not unconsciousness but finally a real sleep.