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A dog collar. Bright yellow, unmistakably chosen to match his raincoat. Delicately etched onto a hanging metal tag in the middle are the words 'If lost, please return to Eva Stratt'. Grace turns it over in his hands and tries to quell down the nausea pooling in his stomach as the room starts to laugh. He thought he'd managed to convince them he was telling the truth when he said he wasn't sleeping with Stratt, but clearly, the rumors have persisted.
They're in the midst of a holiday gift exchange. Grace hadn't wanted to participate, he could think of a million things better to do than sit through an awkward exchanging of gifts no one really wants and drink lukewarm beer with his coworkers for a few hours, but he'd been cajoled into it. Good for crew morale, they'd said. Stratt won't do it, but you're the next best thing, they'd said. We really would love to have you there, they'd said.
Grace doesn't want to overplay his importance, but he thinks the astronauts might have had this gift in mind when they asked to organize this.
Without needing clarification, most of the crew had settled on gifting each other liquor or some sort of gag gift. Grace had given his giftee, one of the doctors on Lamai's team, a sturdy coffee mug with her name painted on the side. He'd felt silly for not realizing the general vibe of the event when he'd first handed it over. He feels downright foolish now as he turns over the collar he's been gifted.
"Because you are Stratt's little lapdog," Ilyukhina explains needlessly.
"Yeah, no, I get it," Grace assures her.
"You can wear for weird sex thing." She corrects herself a moment later, "Or not weird. You are like puppy. Very normal sex thing."
"I've been to Folsom, you don't have to explain pups to me," Grace mumbles.
"You what?!" Ilyukhina grins. "I knew I should have gotten full hood!"
"Not like that!" Grace says, though he knows it's too late.
Grace tries to explain that he'd really only gone as designated driver for a friend who had, in turn, babysat him when he tried acid for the first and last time. His undergrad years had been a little wild, but definitely not like that. He'd kept his gaze firmly on his sneakers all event long.
None of that matters, of course. They'd already made up their minds about him and Stratt and unfortunately, he'd gone and given them juicier fodder than they could have ever imagined. The conversation has moved along anyway, on to the next gift. Grace might still be mortified, but the joke is old news. Half of the people here probably won't remember by morning. If the memory isn't lost to hangovers, it'll take second place to the constant stress of trying to save the world. Grace wishes it were as easy for him to brush things off. He wishes things didn't sit endlessly in his gut, ugly and festering.
He knows he's brooding. Sitting quietly in a corner of the bar space as the last of the gifts are handed over and the mood shifts to singing and dancing and kissing and drinking. Like they're co-eds in a frat party and not leading experts in their field. Grace knows he's acting like a child, but the silent tantrums are better than the anger he used to have, always quick to lash out and burn every bridge in sight.
He could go back to his room, of course, just slip quietly out the party and hope no one notices. But his room is so small and dark and he knows he'll just be up all night long running through endless calculations. He'd rather sit here, even if it is to brood and even if he is still scrawling numbers down on a napkin.
Ilyukhina approaches with a gift bag in hand. "You are still upset?"
"I was never, I mean, I'm not, I'm fine," Grace says. He doesn't look her way as he says it. The numbers he's running are important. Obviously.
Ilyukhina looks unconvinced. She holds the bag out toward him. "Collar was only joke. I have real gift here."
"Oh." Grace slips his glasses on to get a better look. It sits heavy in his lap when she hands it over. "You didn't have to get me another gift. It's okay. This was just a silly thing to boost morale and, by the sounds of it, morale was boosted."
"Your morale need boosting, too. Open, open!" she demands. Even as she says it, she's reaching to pull out the contents of the bag herself. Inside are five half liter bottles of liquid, each in colors so bright, Grace is worried they might be some form of poison. Grinning, Ilyukhina explains, "Skittles vodka! Don't worry, I use cheap American vodka for this."
Grace opens one to take a cautious sniff and sure enough, it smells like ripping open one of his favorite bags of candy. With a whole lot of rubbing alcohol on the side. He can't help but laugh. "Ilyukhina, this is nuts. I don't think I could drink all of this in a year."
"Weak," she scoffs. Ilyukhina waves the bartender down for a pair of shot glasses and pours out two shots of distressingly green vodka. "We drink together. Make you strong. We start now."
"Don't we all have work in the morning?"
Needless to say, that doesn't stop her. Grace lets himself be bullied into taking the shot. Then another. And another. Obviously, they have to try all five flavors. Then a few more drinks after that, just for good measure. It's not a wise choice. Grace has experiments to check on in the morning, reports to edit, meetings with Stratt to attend. But other than holding firm on his unpopular academic research, Grace has always been susceptible to peer pressure.
Besides, people tend to like him better when he's drunk. He doesn't fidget as much, things like overhead lights and loud noises don't bother him like they typically do, his brain slows enough to hold a conversation without jumping to half a dozen topics in two seconds. It makes him normal enough to tolerate. The temptation of it is both why Grace had gone mostly sober after his academic disaster and why it's so easy to go along with Ilyukhina's goading.
He doesn't even flinch when, at the end of the night, she pulls him into a hug.
"You are fun, Grace!" she exclaims, ruffling his hair as though he's not over half a foot taller than her. "We should spend more time together outside training. Before I go off to die."
There's enough alcohol buzzing under his skin that Grace just laughs. "I dunno how my liver would feel about that."
"Weak," she remarks again, giving him a pat in the general area of his liver - closer to his kidney, but Grace doesn't bother to correct her - and saunters off to her quarters.
It's deeply unfair how cool and collected she looks as she does. They could probably throw her on a spaceship right now and she'd do great. Grace, meanwhile, is grasping onto walls as he makes his way through the ship. He's not exactly stumbling, but his feet have seen steadier days.
He's holding onto Ilyukhina's gift bag, lighter now that they've broken into the vodka. The collar is in there too, raincoat yellow and taunting him from where it peeks out. He could have left it on the table somewhere. Maybe shoved it in the trash to never think of it again. He doesn't know why he put it away.
Just like Grace doesn't know why his feet have led him to Stratt's office. It's late, well past midnight. He should go to his room and sleep this off for the few hours before his alarm rings. If he needs to be out, he should go out to the flight deck and let the fresh air sober him up. He definitely should not be standing outside of Eva Stratt's door.
The light is on. He's not surprised. Everyone knows she works impossible hours. Grace can't think of a single time he's needed her and she's been unavailable. Typically, middle of the night visits like this are because he's made a late discovery or woken up with some groundbreaking revelation. Even during the day, he doesn't come to Stratt's office unless he has some impressive update to inform her about. Sort of like a dog bringing a shiny stick to its owner, he supposes.
He regrets the thought as soon as it creeps in.
Grace lets himself in before he can change his mind. He doesn't knock. Stratt told him a long time ago he doesn't need to. He doesn't know if she affords anyone else that privilege. He doesn't want to know.
Stratt is sat by her desktop, almost certainly working her way through the eternal backlog of emails. Questions, requests, suggestions, complaints. Everything goes through her. Grace took a look at her inbox once and was too scared to ever do it again. All the more reason he should just leave her be right now.
Unfortunately, he's already here. Stratt looks his way. Her eyes stray briefly to the bag in his hand before coming back to him. She's frowning, though that's not uncommon for her. Grace taps into the alcohol in his system and actually holds her gaze for once, keeps semi-steady eye contact. See? Normal.
"Dr. Grace." Stratt stares right through him. She takes all of him in, the eye contact, the bag gripped in his hand, the way he sways even as he stands there. Grace can't imagine it's difficult for her to connect the dots. "You're drunk."
"No, 'm not. Mildly tipsy." Grace knows it's not convincing. Especially not when he stumbles as he goes to sit.
"I have my doubts about that." She purses her lips and gives him one last distasteful look before going back to her work. "I think it's best you go to your cabin and rest. We have a meeting with NASA at 9am sharp and I don't think they'll take kindly to being postponed because our lead scientist doesn't know how to pace himself."
Grace waves her away. "I'll be fine by then."
"Wonderful. I hope you can find your way back to your room by yourself? Or do I need to procure you an escort?" she asks.
Grace hesitates. Sitting across her desk like this, he's reminded of meetings in the principal's office. He hadn't been sent to the principal's office much as a kid, but he'd accompanied his students there fairly regularly. He has more sympathy for them now given how it's impossible to not crumble under Stratt's gaze.
This is an easy out. She's asking him to go back to his room and sleep this off. If he gets up now, he knows she'll never mention this again. It'll be one of her strange kindnesses. It'll be all but wiped from her memory if Grace only gets up and leaves now. Instead, he reaches into the gift bag and pulls out the collar. He puts it on her desk, pushes it closer so she can read the engraving.
"I, uh, I got this at the gift exchange today," he explains.
Stratt picks it up, looks it over, doesn't react at all before putting it back down. "Hmm. I see the rumors are still going strong."
"Yeah. Definitely are. Getting crazier by the day. Obviously." Grace gestures at the collar in her hands.
"Does it make you uncomfortable?" Stratt asks.
"Doesn't it-doesn't it make you uncomfortable?" Grace shifts awkwardly in his seat.
She sets the collar down on her desk. "I find I don't have it in me to care what the crew has to say. I have bigger things to concern myself with."
"Oh." Grace swallows around the lump that's formed in his throat. Maybe it's nausea. Why is he here again?
"I need you at your best, Dr. Grace," Stratt says. "If you're distressed over ship gossip, I will take appropriate action to curtail it."
"No. Gosh no." Grace shakes his head so violently it sends the room spinning. "I'm not going to be the snitch that gets recess taken away from the whole class."
"You are my head scientist, Dr. Grace. The world's leading expert on astrophage. If you're not at your best, the world is not at its best. That's more important than schoolchildren on the playground," she insists.
Grace squirms at the praise. Is it warm in this office? Is Stratt's office warmer than the rest of the ship, maybe? "No, yeah, I get it. I, uh, I guess I sort of stumbled my way into being important around here. I get that. I think, I, um, should go to bed. Early morning, right?"
"Rest well, Dr. Grace," she says, turning back to her computer. "Drink water."
Grace nods and stumbles out the way he came. The vodka comes with him. The collar does not. She'll probably throw it away. Maybe she'll toss it overboard while everyone is asleep. Grace convinces himself he doesn't care and pulls the covers over his head when he goes to bed that night, as though it might quiet the commotion in his head.
***
Like always, life goes on as normal. Grace has often found that the events that send him into endless spirals and self-doubt will be little more than a blip in everyone else's radar. Here on Stratt's Vat, particularly, there's no time to worry about interpersonal drama. The world is ending. Who cares what went on at their last party?
Grace wishes he could shake things off so easily. He wishes he wasn't so sensitive. He could have probably avoided many catastrophes in life if he didn't always take things to heart. That's not him, though, and it never has been. Probably never will be.
The gift exchange plays over and over in his head. How it felt to pull the collar out of the box, how people had latched onto the old and tired joke that he was sleeping with Stratt, how the laughter had reminded him of being in primary school classrooms and wondering why everyone got such a kick out of all his quirks.
Grace's work takes a hit from this whole thing. His numbers come slower, his reports are scattered, he can't bring himself to focus. One afternoon, when he paces endlessly in an attempt to reign his mind in, he nearly walks right off the side of the ship. It's only one of the sailors acting as security personnel yanking him back by the back of his labcoat that saves him from becoming a man overboard.
He's not surprised when he's summoned to Stratt's office shortly after. Grace's stomach is in knots as he drags himself to her office. He's equally unsure why he's so nervous as to why he's been so upset about this whole situation. If he could put words to these things, he'd probably do a better job at life in general. He only sort of wants to throw up when he knocks once on Stratt's door and lets himself in.
When he sees the collar sat on her desk, he definitely very much wants to throw up.
Grace keeps his eyes firmly locked away from it as he takes a seat. He can't bring himself to look at Stratt, either, so mostly, he ends up gazing down at his sneakers. For the millionth time, he wonders how his life became this. He should be in a classroom, far away from astrophage and suicide missions and yellow dog collars.
"Glad to see you still on the boat, Dr. Grace," Stratt remarks dryly.
"It's fine. I can swim," Grace mumbles.
"How lovely. We'll send your work after you on a life preserver. Is that the plan?" She's not quite scowling, but the displeasure is obvious on her face. Grace might even call it disgust. "When you fall behind, Dr. Grace, the entire project falls behind. Do you understand the ramifications of that?"
"Yes. Yeah. Yeah, I understand. I'm sorry. I'm having an off week, that's all," Grace insists. "I'll be back to it. Right after this! Back to normal. Promise."
She doesn't look convinced. She ignores everything he's said and continues, "People die, Dr. Grace. With every delay of this project, every week our astronauts are here and not finding solutions in Tau Ceti, people will die. That is the stakes here. This is not a schoolyard full of gossip and hurt feelings. It's an attempt to save the world. And here you are, wandering about like a stray dog."
Grace winces. Of all things she could say. Was it an unfortunate choice of words or does she know how that dang collar has been bouncing around his head? Maybe she's developed the ability to read minds and she's seen how he's been reliving that poorly thought out trip to Folsom, how he'd tried to keep his eyes on the ground, but they'd wandered to men in collars and leashes, roaming the festival grounds without a care in the world. Had it been jealousy or judgment that weighed him down that day? He's never been more unsure.
Stratt pushes her chair back. She makes no move to stand. She beckons him closer. Grace stares and hesitates. He swallows. She tuts disapprovingly.
"Dr. Grace. Come here." When he braves a look at her, she's staring him down. He remains firmly in his seat, arms crossed petulantly over his chest, but she's unbothered. "Ryland. I said come here."
Grace’s neck snaps up at hearing his name. He hesitates only a moment before standing and shuffling over. Stratt doesn’t use his given name often. It never fails to make him comply without question when she does.
He stops just out of arm’s reach. She stares, displeased, until he steps closer. As soon as he has, she grabs onto his sleeve and tugs him down to his knees. He goes down without a fight. He knows this will take whatever nebulous thing exists between them to a place he’ll never be able to fully grasp. More importantly, a place they’ll never return from.
“You’re of no use to this project if you’re wandering about scatterbrained,” she says.
It’s not fair how calm she sounds. She might as well be commenting on the weather. Shame pools in Grace’s stomach. He knows she’s right. This isn’t some undergrad research paper he’s failing to meet expectations on. It’s the end of the world. He had begged to be a part of this mission and run away from his kids, the only thing that mattered to him, without so much as a goodbye. He can’t let it fall apart around him over nonsense.
Grace opens his mouth, intending to apologize and swear he'll do better, but Stratt silences him with a shake of her head.
"Quiet, Dr. Grace. You'll speak when told," she instructs.
His mouth snaps shut. Grace sits back on his heels, quiet as can be despite the racket his heart is making. He wouldn't be surprised if Stratt can hear his pulse. It only races faster as he watches her reach for the collar. He can't pinpoint if it's excitement or shame, maybe even just his fight or flight response encouraging him to hightail it out of here. All Grace knows for certain is that every atom of his being is locked in on Stratt right now and he'd rather go overboard than disappoint her. He forces himself to hold still as she winds the collar around him.
She buckles it, tightly enough that the clasp might leave behind a mark. The thought should bother him, leave him feeling scared or disgusted. If he had any shred of sense left in him, he might claw it off and run to the next flight off this boat. Instead, he settles into it. The leather, warm and sturdy around him, is grounding. His breaths come easier. His pulse begins to steady as soon as his collar is in place.
(He doesn't know when he started thinking of it as his. He adds that to the long list of things he doesn't want to know.)
His glasses are askew, as they often are. Stratt takes a moment to affix them properly on his face. She pats his cheek and says, "There you are. When you're not bursting at the seams with anxious brags and silly puns, you can be quite pretty."
Grace has a moment of uncomfortable clarity, keenly aware that he's single, conventionally attractive, and on his knees in front of his equally single, equally conventionally attractive boss. Just because it does nothing for Grace doesn't mean he's unaware of how this would seem from the outside looking in. He's been accused of leading people on one too many times to want to experience it again.
He intends to slam the brakes on this, to clarify that despite what this is, he has no interest in making their alleged sexual relationship a reality, nor does he want to hold hands and watch the sunset or whatever it is couples get up to. He'll let her down gently, of course, make it clear he's the problem and she's probably perfectly lovely to anyone else. No need to make this weird thing weirder by hurting her feelings. He wants to reassure her that he can be normal about this tomorrow, pretend the whole thing never happened, and stay on the project without interruption.
Instead of any of that, all that escapes him is a soft whine.
Stratt allows herself to look amused. "Yes. You are much prettier when you're quiet." And then, because she always seems to know what's going on in his mind, she adds, "This changes nothing between us. My only interest is for my lead scientist to function at optimal capacity. I expect nothing in return from you. In fact, I don't want it. Do you understand? You may speak."
God help him, he barks. Only once, soft and uncertain, but he does it without meaning to. He expects her to laugh when she hears it, quickly followed by being kicked out of her office, but she only nods. She beckons him even closer and he crawls on all four. Any humiliation he might have felt disappears when she rests a firm hand on his head, fingers tangled in his hair.
He whines again, louder than before. Grace knows he sounds pathetically needy, as needy as he must look leaning into Stratt's touch. He presses his head into her hand, rubbing up against it like an overeager puppy. That's what he's been reduced to here at Eva Stratt's feet. Nothing more than an anxious pup.
"Calm," Stratt chides. She puts more force into her touch, forcing him to sit still and stop his wriggling under her. She's not heartless, though. She pets his hair down, gives him firm scratches along the back of his head like he'd been seeking. Grace lets out a shaking, shuddering breath. The tension in his body, years of it, starts to sap out of him. "You've neglected yourself for a long time, haven't you, Grace?"
It gets easier to just let himself give into it. There's still a knot of shame deep in his chest, but it gets smaller with every passing moment. Quieter and easier to ignore. Grace doesn't even second guess himself before letting out a quiet whimper of agreement. He's good at ignoring his needs and discomforts and simply keeping his head down to stay on track. Very good at it. That doesn't make it any more enjoyable.
Grace leans back on his heels again to get more comfortable, though he keeps his body leaning forward with his hands on the floor in front of him. If he'd settled like this after being asked to sit, he would have probably gotten a treat for being so good. Grace shudders at the thought. Life is much easier to stomach when all he needs to do to be good is sit and bark and preen.
He hasn't been asked any closer, nor does he think he's capable of asking even if he wanted to, but Grace leans in to close the distance between them and rests his chin on Stratt's knee. He looks up at her as he does, all his usual discomfort around eye contact momentarily forgotten. Above all else, Grace wants to be good. He wants Stratt to coo and marvel at him and he wants to soak it all in.
Stratt is briefly startled at Grace's head on her lap, he can see, but she relaxes her features before that can rot and grow an ugly anxiety inside him. Her hand moves down from his hair and scratches gently under his chin. Her thumb brushes against the collar, just above where the tag hangs. Grace's mouth falls open ever so slightly. He thinks he might be panting.
"Imagine if the crew could see you now," she says. "I probably wouldn't get so many complaints that you don't play well with others if they saw you like this."
The thought of anyone else seeing him in this state, half dazed and stupid, brings the shame back to the surface again, but Grace doesn't mind it as much this time. Stratt is there to hold him through it. It's not as scary from down here. Nothing is. Not his embarrassment, his insecurities, his crippling fear of failing at this like he'd failed at everything else. All of that feels distant from here at Stratt's feet.
She keeps petting him, running her hands through his hair, along his throat, down his back. Some of the touches are light brushes, others are firm and strong. All of it has Grace whining and squirming into it. He can't imagine she's getting much enjoyment out of this, but it's difficult to care when his brain feels like it's floated away and left nothing but a content little pup in its place.
Stratt brushes a thumb against the bags under his eyes. "When's the last time you slept?"
Grace considers the question for a moment. Thoughts are hard, numbers even harder, but he can piece together that he'd never gotten out of bed this morning and he's not so sure about yesterday. Words still escape him, but the meek little bark he lets out is answer enough.
"You'll stay here no less than two hours," she decides. "I'd prefer if you slept. I'll accept it if you merely rest. I won't have you endangering the project any further because you're sleep deprived."
Under normal circumstances, Grace would point out that she sleeps even less than him and probably doesn't want to throw stones in a glass house. Right now, though, he doesn't care. He can admit he's tired. Exhausted, actually. Being tired has been a given since this whole project began. This is a step beyond that new normal. He feels it in every part of himself.
Relaxed and floating as he is now, it's easy to let the sleepiness overtake him. He shifts ever closer, settling up against her legs in the nook under her desk. His head stays leaned against her knee. It's a tight fit and he's sure he'll end up sore later, but he finds it comforting at this moment. His world has shrunk down to nothing but himself and Stratt, his only concern to be a good pup for her. It's infinitely easier than the weight he's been carrying as of late.
"You're a good boy, Grace. A very good boy," Stratt mumbles, petting his hair down as he falls asleep. Her voice wavers more than it had before. Perhaps even her relentless confidence has its limits. "Sleep well, pup."
Grace lets his eyes close and it's only a few seconds before he's drifted off to sleep. In his cabin, he would have likely tossed and turned for hours. He'd have doom scrolled on the spotty Wi-Fi for a while. Maybe he'd have just decided to try again later and gone back to his lab. None of that even crosses his mind here.
He's not Dr. Ryland Grace, academic burnout extraordinaire and accidental expert on astrophage. No one is counting on him to save the world. He's just Grace. Just a dumb pup with nothing to worry about but getting his head scratched.
He dreams of eating sour Skittles by the beach and fog creeping in on his San Francisco skyline and the Giants winning the World Series. There's no astrophage or dying suns, no project reports to write up or deadlines to meet. Only his collar around his neck and Stratt on the other end of his leash.
Grace wakes up feeling boneless. Relaxed in a way he hasn't in years. He keeps his eyes closed a while longer and nuzzles further into his pillow, trying to chase the feeling for just a few more minutes. At least until he hears typing above him and remembers he's not laying on a pillow. He's not laying at all.
He jerks back suddenly. He bonks his head on the edge of Stratt's desk, succeeding only in sending himself tumbling right back towards her. Against her leg once more, lucid this time, he sees the puddle of drool that's collected on the floor below him. Some of it has dried on her pant leg. Going overboard has never looked so enticing.
Grace clutches onto the back of his head as he scrambles backward. That's going to leave a bump, he's sure. He tries to rub the pain away and only ends up brushing his fingers against the edge of the collar. That sends him into another panic, though he blessedly avoids hurting himself in this one. He only swallows and shakes and avoids Stratt's eyes.
Not that it's difficult to imagine how she's looking at him. Cool and calm and collected as always. Probably with one judgmental brow arched and a tight frown on her face. Grace braves a glance to confirm that yes, that's exactly what she looks like.
"Are you finished, Dr. Grace?"
"Um. Yes?" He pauses, clears his throat, and tries again. "Yes."
Clearly, she doesn't believe him. Still, she asks, "Did you sleep well?"
Grace considers it. He did, actually. He can't deny he did. His back and neck are sore from the awkward angle he'd slept at, but his mind no longer feels like a live wire, ready to combust at any moment. When he takes a breath, it fills his lungs. Thinking about his projects fills him with new ideas and not just a cloud of dread. Even the baseline anxiety that tends to hum under everything he does has quieted, other than the one obvious situation before them.
He nods. "I did, actually. Um, thanks. Sorry about, y'know, everything."
"I don't need an apology from you, Dr. Grace.” Stratt leans back in her chair as she looks him over. Her eyes linger over the collar still buckled firmly around his neck. "You feel better? Your mind is calmed?"
Grace nods again. He can't bring himself to respond out loud. That would be too close to admitting that he'd enjoyed what they did. He knows she can see right through him. She probably can tell there's already a part of him wondering if they'll ever do anything like that again. But saying it out loud is further than Grace can go right now.
When she beckons him closer, though, he comes crawling just like before. His hands are trembling, all the pent up energy of stopping himself from flapping and rocking, but he holds his head steady as Stratt undoes the clasp on his collar and slides it off him. Grace whines as the pressure fades. Neither of them mentions it.
"Take a few more hours to yourself before returning to your work. Eat, shower, rest. That's an order," she says.
"I'm fine," he insists. "I'm good to go back. No stupid mistakes. No walking off the side of the ship. I promise."
"Grace."
He shrinks away from her gaze, suddenly very aware that he's still kneeling in front of her. "I'll rest."
"Good boy."
She pats his head one last time before giving him a push up and turning back to her work. Grace knows when he's been dismissed. He shuffles back to the door, feeling both lighter than when he'd walked in and inexplicably confused. His head is clearer, his body is relaxed, he knows he'll get back to work with all the focus he'd been lacking. But this? He has a feeling he'll be thinking about this for a long, long time.
Grace hesitates at the door. What is there even to say in a situation like this? He settles for another weak, "Thank you."
"Of course, Dr. Grace." She doesn't even look away from her computer screen as she replies. "I need my lead scientist at his best. You know where to find me should you ever need me again."
Grace wanders away with weak legs and the phantom pressure of a collar around his neck.