The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive

She stood naked at the window. Their sweat glittered on the back of her thighs. Beyond the curve of her breast, the green of trees.

He lay on the bed, equally naked, a sheet drifted across one thigh. He studied her; her skin was pale, white flushed with pink, her hair a dark mantle on her shoulders. Her eyes, those deep, deep blue eyes, looked out the window at something, or possibly nothing at all. Her nipples were pink, and looking at the one visible to him in profile, he felt the desire to suckle at it, to take the breast again in his hand and feel its smooth warmth.

But the moment was past.

“I can almost see it between us,” he said softly.

Her eyes were the only thing which turned, then they turned back.

He looked around the room. It was one he’d not been in before; the bed was a four-poster sans canopy, white wood and floral print bedding. The furniture was white as well, ornate Louis XIV dressers and nightstands and sideboards, touched with gilt and marble. A pair of slaves flanked the doors, also in white. The light was a blown glass chandelier.

“It’s always between us,” she replied. “I’d thought us too wise to believe that, were it not, things might be easier or better...”

He laughed. “Yes, give all this up and come live in the suburbs with me. I shall become a CPA.”

She turned then, and her beauty struck him again. She was smiling.

“If you seek to give things up, you can come and live here, with me. I would take such exquisite care of you.”

“You would,” he replied.

She sighed. “Yes, firmly between us. Tell me, Doctor, is it there when we are belly to belly?”

He looked into those deep eyes, and shook his head. “No,” he said. “I do not believe it is.”

She smiled, and stepped over to an ornate chair. He watched her sex disappear into the cushion.

“No,” she agreed. Her eyes roamed his body, and he watched them do so. “Perhaps not.”

A bird began to call outside.

“So awfully large,” she mused. “I wonder where it goes.”

“Inside, of course.”

“That would be appropriate.”

“It’s mostly yours.”

She arched a brow. “Is it? Tell me, then, which of us has moved his pawns against this new interloper?”

He smiled a slight smile.

Without turning, she raised a hand and curled an elegant finger. One of the slaves by the doorway went to a shallow wardrobe and pulled open the white doors. The slave removed a white robe, and brought it to her Mistress, who stood up. The slave held it open for her.

She reached back into the sleeves and shrugged the robe on.

“Which of us is it?” she asked. “I think you would not jeopardize me. And you have your inexplicable fondness for Rose. Is it Pell, then? Or Lyons?”

“We are all of us pawns in this, Diana.”

She rolled her eyes. “Get dressed. And don’t insult me.”

It was really hard not to stare at Nicole’s tits.

The black triangles over her nipples were so tiny that on three sides Andrea could see soft pink slivers of areola. Only the fact that Nicole’s pale blue eyes were even more hypnotic kept Andrea from openly staring at her tits.

Or taking them in her hands. Cupping them. Sucking on them.

Silver metal glinted between them. The sunlight here by the pool was bright and it danced on the small rectangle in the center of Nicole’s chest, a fiery sprite dancing on her heart. The metal rectangle looked like a tiny access panel, like Nicole was the very sexiest of robots.

In a way, she was.

“So,” Nicole was saying. “Do you like it here?”

“It’s... very interesting.”

“Mmm.” Nicole licked her lips with a pink tongue. “Interesting.”

Andrea waited a moment, but Nicole didn’t add anything, so she turned toward Fiona.

“Fiona?”

“Yes, Miss Grey?”

“What’s next?”

“My function is completed, Miss Grey. I was programmed to bring you to the pool and to place you in contact with Slave Nicole.”

“Ah.”

“‘Slave Nicole’,” Nicole echoed. “Doesn’t that sound wunn-derful?” Andrea turned to face her wicked smile. Nicole slid a hand down her slick belly. “Mmm. Slave me.” Her fingernails toyed with the top edge of her bikini bottom.

It was very warm, standing here by the pool, and very humid. Andrea was beginning to sweat. “So, Nicole, now what?”

Nicole’s powder blue eyes considered her. “Now what, indeed? Hrm.”

The sun was making Andrea just a little dizzy. She let her eyelids rest.

“How about a swim?”

Andrea looked at the pool. Half Olympic-sized, square. The water glittered with bright diamonds in the sun, and she realized that it was full of swimmers. Twenty or so, glistening arms rising from the water in smooth arcs, wakes sparkling with light. Something odd about them... Andrea stepped toward the pool to look closer at the girls passing beneath.

Of course they were naked.

They didn’t splash. That was what was weird; there were the droplets flung from arms and the ripples crossing the pool, but the swimmers were moving smoothly, not racing, kicking just enough for propulsion. A droplet landed on Andrea’s shin as the nude swimmer passed, not racing, not splashing. Just swimming.

They were all deep in trance.

Andrea blinked. Nicole was talking to her. She turned.

“What?”

“Are you interested in a dip? I can clear a lane for you. You’d find it oh so refreshing.”

Swimming in a pool full of smooth nude brainslumbering bodies. Down amongst them, surrounded by their purposeful, thoughtless motion. Letting herself be lulled by it...

“No, thank you, Nicole.”

“As you wish. I’ll continue your... tour, then. Allow me to fetch my own assistants, if you would.” She turned to D19. “What is your designation, slave?”

“This slave is pleasure slave D19,” it—no, she—responded.

“Good. D19, Fiona, come with me. And if you would step this way, Andrea...?”

The three of them walked around the side of the pool.

“Disrobe,” Nicole commanded.

Andrea’s fingers flexed. She watched as Fiona removed her diaphanous wrap, unzipped her so-short skirt to reveal lacy black panties. The panties went on top of the other clothes, and Fiona stood at attention, nude.

D19 slid easily out of her sleeves and leggings. Somehow she was less naked than before, her nudity now a whole thing rather than a highlighted display of her sexual body, in clothing which guided the eye to the best parts of her to taste and touch.

In her light sun dress, wearing underwear underneath, Andrea almost felt overdressed amongst the throngs of glossy nude bodies in the pool room. Fiona, D19, the reclining sunbathers, the mindless swimmers—all nude. What Nicole was wearing could hardly be called clothes.

Nicole stood squarely in front of Fiona and extended a finger to touch her lightly between her thin black brows. Fiona’s eyes fluttered closed.

“Begin swim routine hippocampus,” Nicole said.

“Yes,” Fiona replied, her eyes opening to reveal a distant gaze. “This slave understands and will obey. Swim routine hippocampus begins.”

Nicole removed her finger, and Fiona scanned the pool, her head moving robotically. Finding an empty lane, she pivoted, and began walking towards it.

Nicole was already placing her finger in the center of D19’s head. “Begin swim routine hippocampus,” she repeated to the closed eyes.

The eyes opened. “Yes. This slave understands and will obey. Swim routine hippocampus begins.”

Nicole lowered her finger and let her go.

The two of them watched the naked forms of the slaves as they each found a position by the pool. Fiona paused, extended her arms, and dove in.

It was the first splash Andrea had heard.

D19 made the second. And then they were both just naked bodies moving in the water, forms rippled by the glittering liquid, moving smoothly and thoughtlessly through the pool. Fiona was buoyant, and Andrea watched the paired globes of her ass as the water sheeted over them...

“Andrea?”

She had faded out again. Andrea realized that this could be dangerous, that something wasn’t right, but the worry that accompanied the thought was weak and watery.

Nicole was looking at her with those magic eyes and a wicked half-smile.

Something else. She needed to move her focus away from Nicole’s addictive eyes. She looked down.

“So, uh, what about their clothes?”

Nicole shrugged and the metal between her tits glinted. “A cleaning thrall will get them. There are always twenty or thirty thralls wandering the mansion, just tidying.”

“Oh.” Andrea felt so softly dizzy, so in need of a nap. “So, uh, what now?”

“I’ll take care of you now,” Nicole said, reaching out and raising Andrea’s chin with a finger. Andrea lost the battle not to look at her.

Her eyes were pale blue power and it was even harder to look away from them now. Andrea didn’t bother.

If she wanted to, she could hypnotize me right now, Andrea realized.

That would be so fucking hot.

She wasn’t sure if she’d shivered.

If Nicole had put her hands on Andrea’s head and guided her, she wouldn’t have fought. Drawn in for a kiss or pushed down to feed at Nicole’s pussy under that skintight lick of black gauze, she didn’t have the will to fight. Her mind had gone soft.

Her mouth felt slippery.

Nicole took hold of her then, but not by the head, only by the hand. Her fingers were moist.

“Come over here,” she said. “I have someone I’d like you to meet.”

“You truly need her for this?”

They walked together down a carpeted hallway. The ceiling was high, and the wall on the right more window than wall. Bright sunlight shone in. On the left, paintings in golden frames watched them pass.

She was in her robe; he, in the clothes he had arrived in. The pants had been pressed.

“I do.”

“Why?”

“I cannot say.”

She stopped and looked at him, and he stopped to match her.

“Let us stop talking falsely,” she said.

He smiled. “Is the hour indeed so late? But if I am the joker, my dearest Diana, you are the thief. Oh thief, leave me my jewel. Without her my throne may crumble.”

Her eyes were somehow darker in the bright light of the hall, dark azure pools that poured into him.

She laughed, then, and resumed walking.

“Very well. I shall leave you your jewel, for now. Use her well before I change my mind.”

“Or hers.”

“Yes. Or hers.”

They passed a marble statue of a young man on his knees, clutching a woman by her knees. His face was caught in a moment of rapturous wonder. Outside the window, a slave in a white plastic apron was tending a rosebush.

“Where is my jewel, then?” he asked.

“nicole is keeping an eye on her.” She smiled a wicked smile. “Oh, but my dearest Neil, what shall we do if your jewel is mine already? nicole is very attentive, and some pretties come naturally into the jewel-box.”

He made no response.

Patrick was confused and unhappy.

Something was wrong with Mistress. She had a new boytoy, but instead of worshipping Her and bathing Her feet and waiting at attention, he was sitting in Her throne and She was lying naked at his feet.

It was all wrong.

Mistress and Petra were both naked on the cushions around the base of Her throne. Petra was on her knees, licking at the boytoy’s cock. Mistress was on her side, licking his toes.

Wrong wrong wrong.

Mistress sometimes played with them, reversed their roles, but never like this. Patrick had been Her boy for four years, and he had thrilled to the touch of Her lips more than a few times, but he was always ever so grateful and this new boytoy... he sneered. He had no respect.

What was Mistress doing?

She was even wearing a collar, something Patrick had never seen Her do before ever. A collar and a leash, which the boy on the throne would occasionally take hold of and tug on.

So very wrong.

But Patrick was Her boy and he would obey, and She had said that this new boy was in charge and that they must all obey him. She had brought all Her boys (and Her girls) in and told them that, and Patrick would obey Her always. He loved Mistress and he loved to obey Her. He would always obey.

He just didn’t like what She was doing.

The boytoy reached down idly and pushed Petra’s head away. Licking her lips, she subsided down to his feet. Mistress continued at Her own licking.

“So then, slave, tell me about Doctor Neil Arundsen.”

Mistress stared up at him with worship in Her eyes. “He is... different, Master. He has been a slaver here as long as I can remember. He’s a professor at SCU. But he doesn’t keep slaves, not like the rest of us. And he... I hear that he is immune to mind control.”

“Oh really? And how does he manage that?”

“I don’t know, Master. But it seems to be a general consensus that he’s immune. I don’t know who tried it or what they tried. I’ve only been a slaver for a few years, Master.”

“Had been a slaver. Now you’re just a slave,” he added.

“Oh yes, Master,” she proclaimed gleefully. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. So. Arundsen warns you about me. Arundsen is immune to mind control.” He ran his fingers through Mistress’ hair and She whined in pleasure.

“It sounds like I need to find out more about this Arundsen. And them pay him a little visit.”

“Hey you slave!” he called out, looking at Patrick.

“Um, yes, sir?” Patrick stammered. The boytoy grinned. He seemed to relish the unhappiness Mistress’ slaves could not help but show when he commanded them.

“Fetch us some lube. I feel like having your Mistress’ ass again.”

“Yes, sir,” Patrick said, trying to keep the unhappiness out of his voice. Mistress was almost whining with eagerness, one finger already toying with Her asshole.

Despondent, Patrick went to fetch the lube.

Nicole led Andrea around the pool by the hand. Andrea only half noticed the glistening naked bodies on the poolside recliners. Her attention was focused on the soft wet pressure of Nicole’s hand.

Her pussy felt like someone was tonguing the crotch of her voodoo doll.

They had done something to her. She wasn’t like this. She wasn’t... submissive.

She wanted Nicole to command her.

Preferably, command her for sex.

Nicole knelt down by the pool.

Her suit was nothing but string in the back. Not even providing the coverage of a thong.

Andrea wanted to lick her asshole.

Nicole had put a hand in the water. Andrea watched the swimmers in the pool, moving slowly, steadily. Making waves but little foam. The one in the lane Nicole knelt at was approaching.

The swimmer in the lane they stood at reached the wall, and stopped. She stood up.

She had on a white cap, and mirrored goggles.

“Come out,” Nicole said.

The swimmer lifted herself out of the pool. Aside from the cap and the goggles, she wore nothing at all.

Andrea wanted to do her too. To hold her curved thighs and lick her barely furred blonde pubis. To sit on her face and stare into those mirrored eyes as the tongue below them curled up into her hungry snatch.

She was so fucking horny.

“Andrea,” Nicole said, and Andrea stiffened just a little, “this is Anya. You may already know each other.”

The swimmer smiled. “Yes,” she said. “I know Miss Grey. Hello, Andrea. Are you a slave now too?”

Andrea groggily shook her head. “Just, visiting,” she replied. Anya looked vaguely familiar, but even without the slick oil in her head Andrea doubted she would have remembered her name. Too many cute students passing through her life. The mirrored goggles didn’t help, but even without them Andrea wouldn’t have remembered the girl’s name.

She’d remember it now, though. God, she wanted to fuck her.

“Too bad,” Anya said. Her hands hung slack at her sides, waiting.

Nicole took a step sideways, and knelt again.

Oh, to drop to her knees, and put her face into that ass.

Andrea remained standing.

The swimmer stopped, stood. “Come out,” Nicole said, and she rose glistening from the water.

She was short, Asian. Her body taut and muscular and almost boyish, breasts the barest of rises beneath brown nipples.

“And this is L44.”

The L series. The L series had... something. Andrea needed to remember. Needed to remember almost as much as she needed to suck on the smooth wet pussy between those muscular legs.

Implants. Brain controlling implants.

The L series had brain controlling implants.

Obviously, the implants were waterproof. Andrea stifled an irrational giggle at her deduction.

“Hello, L44,” Andrea said. The head rotated towards her, light glinting from the goggles, then slid back to Nicole.

“How may I obey?” L44 asked in clipped tones.

“Yes,” Anya added. “How may we obey?”

“Well. That kind of depends on our guest,” Nicole said slowly. She ran a finger down the string of her bikini top, pulling it away from her flesh. The fabric clung to her nipple a moment and then lifted free. “What would you like to do, Andrea?”

“What, ah...” Andrea forced her eyes up, and she fell almost with relief into Nicole’s ensorcelling gaze. “What are my... options?”

“Mm. Well. I hear that you like muscular girls,” Nicole said, “so I’ve picked a few for you. You could fuck them here, or in the pool, or in any one of our rumpus rooms. Anya is a wonderful lover, and L44 is fantastically flexible and oh-so strong. And I understand I’m a pretty good fuck myself.”

“I’ll say,” Anya chirped.

YES, Andrea’s mind ordered.

“Ah. Maybe, maybe later,” she panted.

Nicole frowned, then brightened.

“No,” she said.

“We’ll fuck you now.”

She gestured at L44, and the hardbodied Asian walked towards Andrea. Andrea took a reflexive step back but that was all, and then the Asian had her, was behind her with her strong hands pinning and holding Andrea’s arms. Andrea whimpered—in lust, rather than fear.

“Get her warmed up, L44,” Nicole ordered.

Breath on her neck and then lips, and the hands slid down her arms and then off them to touch her ass. Andrea shivered but did not try to escape, did not want to escape. She knew she shouldn’t do this but they were going to rape her and that made it all right, something she really had no control over. She couldn’t resist, it wasn’t her fault...

L44 slid down Andrea’s back, dropping to her knees; she dipped and then put her head up the back of Andrea’s dress, hands on her calves just for a moment to secure her, then sensing no resistance, up to her panties, pulling them down. Breath then, and Andrea tensed eagerly for the tongue, but it was fingers that stroked her and released the mewling she had been holding in.

One strong digit slid into her—so wet, she was so wet—and Andrea clenched on it.

She was wet all over, slick where the pool-fresh L44 had touched her... a shiver of sex-pleasure ran through Andrea, interrupting her surprise, but somehow she forced herself back to the thought she’d just had.

It wasn’t water on her arms and legs. On the hands delicately touching her sex. All over the slick forms of L44 and Anya.

It was oil.

The pool was full of oil.

The air was full of oil.

The tongue came and her mind released the thought. Her eyes lighted on Anya, who was unashamedly masturbating, one hand working between her legs, the other squeezing a breast, her silver eyes fixed on Andrea.

Nicole spoke and Andrea swung her attention heavily to her.

“I’m going to fuck you, Andrea. L44 is the prop, and Anya the spotter. And I’m the domme, Andrea. And you’re the sub. I am going to train you and fuck you and train you with fucking, and you will cum all the way into slavery.”

Andrea whimpered, but stayed put on the fingers writhing within her.

The clinic was small, a single-story building with a parking lot for perhaps a dozen cars. The six-lane street it sat on was busy with cars.

He looked over his shoulder and snorted. “Los Angeles.”

Slave Margaret was in a nice tan suit with a skirt much too short to be professional. He’d been fingering her as He drove the Porsche, and the crotch of her panties was dark. The dog collar she wore didn’t really go with her peach blouse. He had taken off the leash.

The door had a bronze placard next to it: “Benjamin Rose, M.D.”

“This is it?” He asked.

“Yes, Master.”

“Excellent.”

He pushed open the door to the accompaniment of a jingling bell.

It looked nothing like a typical waiting room. It looked like a library. The walls were dark wooden shelves filled with carefully ordered books. On the wall opposite the door was a niche containing a five-foot diameter globe. The only concession to the place’s true function was the reception counter. Behind it sat a receptionist sporting a generous amount of cleavage. Which came as no surprise, at a plastic surgeon’s office.

The receptionist smiled winningly. “Hello! How may I help you?”

She was looking at Slave Margaret, but He responded and she shifted her attention without a hitch.

“We are here to see Doctor Rose.”

“I’m sorry, but Doctor Rose is not in right now. Would you care... to... make...?”

The secretary blinked in confusion a few times, then smiled even more winningly.

“Master,” she breathed huskily. She stood up.

She was nude from the waist down. The cord of a vibrator dangled between her legs.

He snorted. “Let us in, slave.”

“Of course, Master!” She hurried to the door and opened it. She was in seven-inch anklestrap heels and black stockings; the vibrator batteries were stuffed into one garter.

Behind her, a second nurse walked by, this one with truly gigantic breasts—almost as large as her head. She was in a white nurses outfit made of glossy plastic, but did not stop to see who was at reception.

“How may I serve you, Master?” the receptionist asked.

“Take us to Doctor Rose,” He replied.

Her face fell. “I am sorry, Master, but he is in Toronto.”

Slave Margaret watched her Master’s face. A flash of anger and then He appeared thoughtful.

“Does he have a cell phone?”

“Of course, Master. Shall I call him?”

“Do. And fetch out the other nurses.”

“Yes, Master!”

Nicole’s hands cupped Andrea’s breasts and Andrea pushed herself into them.

L44’s mouth was on her sex, engulfing it, and the push of tongue and lips had already given Andrea one spine-jolting cum, but she needed more.

“Look into my eyes,” Nicole whispered, and they swelled to become the center of Andrea’s universe.

Elsewhere in the universe, Nicole squeezed her breasts, and she moaned.

Then those magic blue eyes looked down, and Andrea reluctantly left them to travel where she was bidden, looking down, to where Nicole’s hand had reached up between her own tits, to the metal rectangle.

Nicole slid a fingernail into it and swung out a metal ‘O’ big enough to push a finger through, which she did.

It was horrible and frightening and the hottest thing Andrea had ever seen. She stared at it.

“This is my anchor,” Nicole breathed. “It reminds me of the one in my brain.” Her eyes were on Andrea again, commanding. “Soon there will be one in your brain, too. Would you like one over your heart, too? Like me?”

Andrea’s mouth, suddenly dry, opened.

“Anchor,” she whispered.

“Enough,” someone else said coolly. “Attend.”

Nicole stiffened and turned to face the voice. The mouth clasping Andrea’s sex pulled off with a sucking sound and a sudden rush of sexneed, and the hands left her ankles. Anya had turned as well, face blank and hands at her sides.

Woozy, pussy weeping for attention, Andrea rotated loosely in place.

It was her: Mistress Snowdon. And Doctor Arundsen.

Gosh, Mistress Snowdon was beautiful.

Her perfect red lips moved.

“Well,” she said.

“I see she still has her clothes on.”

The car was hot and smelled a lot like sex.

Andrea squirmed on her seat. Her hands gripped the door and the side of the carseat with white knuckles; if she let them, they’d drift back to her pussy.

Her panties were back at Mistress Snowdon’s.

Arundsen hadn’t said anything since telling her to get into the car. Andrea tried to focus out the window, tried to look at cars, buildings, anything, but as soon as she failed to explicitly concentrate her mind snapped back to Nicole’s eyes and L44’s fingers and Anya’s glistening body as she masturbated watching Andrea’s rape—or seduction, or whatever—and her hips began to grind her pussy into the car’s leather seat and her hands began to loosen their holds.

Screw it, she needed to talk. “I,” she grunted. “I—didn’t—didn’t...”

“It doesn’t matter. You got out of there with your mind more or less intact.”

Didn’t matter?! You mean I could have gone ahead and been fucking them for however many hours...?

But she knew that’s not what he meant.

She looked out the window and found her left hand sliding across her thigh. She forced it back.

She: “I don’t—” He: “I am—”

She swallowed. “You first.”

“I told you that it was risky. I had no idea what she was planning to do with you. But you needed to know. You needed to go there.”

“It was the pool. The pool was some sort of drug. It was in the air.”

“Yes. Dian— Snowdon likes to use oils. I helped her design some of them. What you got a big dose of was an arousal agent and will suppressor. I shall show you how to make it in the lab.”

Andrea giggled then forced herself serious. “Definitely an arousal agent.” She giggled again. “Do you want... do you want me to tell you what I saw? On the, the tour?”

“Not now. Right now I’m taking you home to let the drug wear off.”

Taking her home.

Oh.

It was the drug making her horny, but that didn’t matter.

She steeled her courage.

“Would you... did you want to stay with me?”

He turned to look at her, so long that she was afraid he’d hit the car in front of them.

“No,” he said finally. “Not now. Not... no.”

“Oh.”

Her arousal masked the other emotions his reply invoked, but there was disappointment and anger as well as relief.

She realized that her hand had escaped and was toying with her pussy, and she sighed and let it continue. Fuck his leather seats anyway.

“Is she good?”

“She’s incredible.”

She studied him, ignoring her hand. “Are you two...?”

His eyes stayed fixed on the road. “Rivals. Sometimes lovers. We are... complicated.”

“I’ll fucking say.”

She turned to look out the window, but the sun on the ocean turned into Anya’s glistening tits being kneaded in greasy hands. She grunted and came all over his seat.

He didn’t say anything.

It was kind of fun, actually. Liberating. Here she was frigging herself in the passenger seat of Arundsen’s Infiniti and because she wasn’t really in control of herself it was okay.

Just like it had been okay to let L44 stuff a strong finger into her box. To stare into Nicole’s eyes and let them melt her mind.

That way lay Suzanne. So easy to give in, to relax and let someone else make all the decisions.

Andrea held her breath and pushed her hands back to her sides.

She gripped the car, and exhaled.

“So, um. How come she doesn’t try this sort of thing with you?”

“She does.”

Andrea looked at him. “She could have just shoved you in the pool.”

He made a small smile. “Such overt methods she long ago discarded.”

“Why’s that?”

“They don’t work.”

Andrea shudderingly forced her hands back to the sides of her seat, and stilled her undulating crotch. “Oh really?”

“Really.”

“Why?”

“One day I may tell you.”

Andrea frowned. Her right hand was slipping, slipping... and back on her snatch.

Fuck it. He wasn’t going to give her any answers. It was fine for her to be greased up and obedient, to be helplessly fingerfucking herself while he sat there all cool...

She let go with her left hand and it found her tits.

His nice leather seat got wetter.

“Master?” Slave Margaret asked.

“Yes?”

“Why aren’t we going after Arundsen?”

He looked over his shoulder and merged slowly onto the 5. It was three-thirty, and rush hour had already begun. Twenty feet, stop. Fifteen feet, stop. They slid in behind a beaten Chevy with a lawnmower in the back. Slave Margaret wondered why Master drove. She never had, not once she’d gotten slaves.

“No need to rush things, my slave. I want to get the lay of the land, first.”

“I see, Master. Thank you, Master.”

He pursed his lips. The Chevy came to a stop. There was a big green sign ahead, indicating an interchange with the 405.

“Slave, which way is it to Malibu?”

Andrea closed the door behind herself and tore off her dress.

Naked, finally!

One hand still working her pussy, she staggered to the phone. Stabbed at the buttons.

“Hello?”

“Slave,” she rasped. “Come here immediately.”

“Yes Mistress!” fern replied.

she put the phone down, and looked into the mirror.

The traitor looked back.

The traitor smiled.

He pulled over, across the street from the gate, engine rumbling.

The white cast-iron fence with the lush landscaping bent inward to the gate; a small white booth stood next to it. A woman in grey wearing sunglasses sat in the booth. No house was visible behind her, only lawn and shrubbery, and palm trees into the near distance.

On the map it was a park. He was impressed.

“This is the place, slave?”

“I think so, Master. I’ve never been inside.”

“Very well.”

He looked at the woman in the booth for a moment. Reddish-brown curls under her grey cap, a white coil of wire from the back of her neck to her ear.

And now, a completely obedient brain.

She stood up, and stepped out of the booth. Calmly, she walked to the street, stopped, looked both ways, and then walked across to his car. He rolled down Slave Margaret’s window as she approached.

“My Master,” the woman said, standing to attention.

“Slave. Get in.”

“Yes, my Master.” She opened the rear door and slid into the car.

“Is this Diana Snowdon’s residence?”

“Yes, my Master. My Master, I have a message for you.”

“A message?”

“Yes, my Master. Mistress Snowdon informed me that a man would come who would take over my mind and make me his slave. And that when he did I should tell him that Mistress Snowdon has many slaves. And she asked me to show you this.”

The woman’s hands moved to open her suit coat. Slave Margaret spun around in her seat, but her Master raised a hand. He nodded at the slave sitting in back to proceed.

She flipped all her buttons and held the jacket open. Under it she had no shirt, just a transparent purple bra. And beneath the bra, strapped to her torso, twelve sticks of Semtex.

Slave Margaret’s pulse was racing, but her Master seemed nonchalant.

“But it won’t go off, will it?” he said.

“No, my Master.”

“Because the instant you were Mine you could do nothing to harm Me. Had you been a trap you could not even have walked over here.”

“Yes, my Master. Also because Mistress Snowdon did not include the detonator.”

His smile became a frown.

“Get out,” he said.

She obeyed.

“You go sit in your guardhouse and find out what Mistress Snowdon does with a turned slave.”

“Yes, my Master.” The uniformed woman, her coat still open to reveal her breasts and the explosives under them, turned and walked back across the street.

He revved the engine and pulled away from the curb.

“My Master? I don’t understand.”

“She was showing Me her fangs, slave.”

“But I thought her slaves could not hurt you.”

“They can’t willingly hurt Me. But I’m as vulnerable to booby traps as the next man. And she’s had a lot of time to place them. What the slaves don’t know is what can hurt Me.”

“I see, my Master. I am sad.”

He looked at her, then laughed.

“Don’t be. I’ll make an army of slaves to go in and tear that place apart. And once Snowdon is on her knees beside you, she’ll tell Me all about any sort of snares she might once have spun.”

“Oh, yes, Master. That sounds wonderful.”

“Yes it does,” he muttered. “Yes it does.”

“Mistress? I’m here.”

Mistress Andrea’s voice came from the bedroom. “Close the door, take off your clothes, and get in here.”

fern closed the door. The house was warm and humid. she peeled off her black t-shirt, wriggled out of her jeans. her lacy black undies joined them on the floor; fern rarely wore a bra.

She walked into the bedroom, expecting to see Mistress Andrea on the bed, but the bed was empty.

“In here,” came Mistress’ voice from the bathroom.

There were a half dozen bottles of baby oil on the sink counter. Through the frosted glass of the shower door fern could see two bodies; Mistress and linda both.

Mistress slid the door open and fern’s heart accelerated. She was naked and glistening from head to toe. Her hair was dark and slicked-back, her tits shone in the light of the heat lamp overhead. linda stood next to her, eyes glassy and face slack, as greased as Mistress, nipples erect. The water was running, but not the shower; Mistress and linda stood ankle-deep in steaming bathwater.

“fern,” Mistress gasped. She waved a hand. “Grab a bottle and get in here.”

fern didn’t need to understand, merely to obey. she took a bottle and stepped into the shower. With three of them it was crowded, and warm, and very sensual.

Andrea took the bottle from fern, opened it, and poured it carelessly onto her hands. She began to rub oil onto fern’s body. fern felt her nipple rings slide up her aerolae as her nipples hardened.

“Give me your hands, slave,” Andrea rasped, and linda raised her hands, palms up. Andrea put the bottle into them.

She ran her hands all over fern, touching her face, her arms, leaving warm oil wherever she touched. She didn’t say anything, and as she looked into in her eyes fern could tell that Mistress was seeing something else, someone else, something in her imagination.

It did not bother fern. she lived for Mistress’ pleasure, and Mistress was obviously enjoying herself.

When her hands got to fern’s legs, already covered in glistening rivulets, she dropped slowly onto her knees and stopped. She stared at fern’s sex, knees in the warm water.

Slowly, she leaned forward, inhaling, and then began to lick.

fern panted softly.

“Pour it on my head,” Andrea mumbled around fern’s pussy, and fern had a moment of confusion before linda reached the bottle forward and slowly upended it over Andrea’s glossy dark hair. fern felt the oil running all over Andrea’s face as she pushed in between fern’s thighs.

she watched, passively curious, as Andrea shivered when she came.

“Mistress?”

The bedroom was dark; not pitch black, but too dark to differentiate between the green of the pillow and the red roses on the bedsheets. fern lay nude atop the sheets; Mistress beneath them.

“Yes, fern?”

“i’m... curious, Mistress.”

Mistress Andrea sighed, and turned to look at fern. She’d sent slave linda home, since linda had an early class.

“I had a... a strange day, fern. I visited a slaver out in Malibu and she tried to enslave me.”

“Oh no, Mistress!”

“It’s fine, fern. ‘Tried’ is the operative word. But it really fucked with my libido.”

“You were very horny, Mistress.”

Mistress smiled ruefully. “Yeah. My cunt’s gonna be sore for days. But I think it’s worn off.”

“Is this why you wanted us to use all that oil?”

“Yeah.”

Mistress reached out and stroked fern’s cheek, and fern purred. Mistress was so good to her. She loved Mistress.

“Mistress, why did you visit the slaver?”

Andrea sighed. “Doctor Arundsen wanted us to.” A chuckle. “He got to fuck her.”

“Her?”

“Diana Snowdon. You’ve never met her.”

The name was unfamiliar, but the sound of it tingled something down near the bottom of fern’s spine.

“She tried to control you?”

“Well, she... it’s complicated, fern, and I’m tired. You are to not worry about it, and you will forget your curiosity.”

fern sighed happily. It did not worry her, and she was not curious. Mistress had everything under control. Mistress ran her fingers through fern’s short hair, pulled her in for a kiss. Then she lay back and closed her eyes.

fern watched Mistress fall slowly asleep.

fern liked to watch Mistress sleep. she felt more devoted, protective, when Mistress was asleep. As though Mistress were unable to defend herself but her loyal slave would protect her. Would prove her loyalty even when Mistress was unaware.

fern was a very loyal slave. The loyalest.

Happily, she watched Mistress breathe.

she felt restless, untired. Moving with infinite patience so as to not wake Mistress, fern slid out of bed.

She stood up and found one of her hands gently stroking her sexlips. fern smiled.

The entryway was lighter than the bedroom, streetlights outside casting yellow stripes through the blinds onto the carpet. fern tiptoed naked to the window, bent the blinds, looked out. Another quiet night in West L.A.

she walked over to the pile of her clothes on the floor. her fingertips traced her pussy again, and then she bent over, pushing her undies aside.

Her cell phone was clipped to her belt.

The message light was blinking.

With one hand, because her other hand was still stroking her pussy, fern flipped open the phone. Looked at the number that had left the message.

fern looked at the number and felt her mind soften. Soften, and run, and flow. Re-arrange itself into a new pattern.

A better pattern.

It hardened, and fern smiled.

she was alone, and Andrea was sleeping.

jillian had programmed her well. she would act as Mistress’ agent now, and use her programming to hypnotize the sleeping Andrea.

Andrea would become a slave. slave andrea. And slave fern would be the tool that remade her.

she bit her lip to silence the orgasm.

“I like this guy,” Master said.

They were at the Rose clinic. It was night, but none of the ‘nurses’ had gone home. It was doubtful they ever did.

There was an entire understory to the clinic, a secret laboratory of many levels and many wings. How Rose had gotten it built on a busy Valley street was a bit of a mystery. Slave Margaret had been quite surprised as Master’s new slaves led them to the secret elevator.

They were watching a transformation in process. An attractive young woman was lying on a bed which was tilted at a thirty degree angle. Her legs were spread widely, her ankles in stirrups. Tubes connected to her in multiple places, an IV in one arm, other tubes attached to strange ports in her breasts.

Other tubes attached to her head.

Her skin was deeply tanned and freckled, the skin of a sun worshipper. Her eyes were open, pale blue; her hair a dark brown, cropped short. Her lips were swollen and moved in constant tiny motions, reciting.

One of the nurses was busy at the woman’s crotch. The nurse—who like all of the staff, save the receptionist Master had taken first, had obscenely enormous breasts—dipped a plastic oblong into a jar of gel, and then worked it carefully up the woman’s ass.

Master’s dick was hard, and Slave Margaret wanted to suck it, but He made no indications how she should obey.

They watched as the nurse finished inserting the ovoid into the woman’s ass. A white wire emerged from the closed pucker and ran to a little box; the nurse slid the box into a socket on one of the instrumented IV stands.

Slave Margaret savored her unobstructed view of the woman’s sex. Before Master had taken her, she had possessed no sexual interest in women, but He had corrected that. Nibbling on those engorged and helpless lips was a very erotic thought to her now.

“Hm,” Master grunted, and Slave Margaret stiffened, focusing all her attention upon Him.

“Seems like a lot of work to make a slave,” He said. He looked at Slave Margaret, and His lip curled. “But to each his own.”

The nurse walked out of the room. Master had programmed them all to accept Him as their Master, but left them otherwise intact, performing the chores they had been programmed with.

The woman on the table stared into space and whispered her programming.

“I’m tempted to go in and give her a quick fuck,” Master observed, “but she’d never remember it. And I’m getting tired. Slave, do you know how to get to the Tempe hotel?”

“Oh yes, Master.”

“Good. You’re driving. I want a good night’s sleep before I break Arundsen.” He chuckled. “And maybe a little room service.”

fern kept her wrist steady, using her elbow to swing the pendant in perfect time.

Andrea lay on the bed, eyes open. Her pupils tracked the pendant, just as she had been instructed.

“Deeper...” fern whispered. “Deeper.”

Andrea’s unblinking stare followed the golden bauble, back and forth, back and forth.

fern did not know what she would do next; she did not have to know. jillian had programmed her to hypnotize Andrea, and as Andrea reached successive stages of trance, knowledge of what fern must do blossomed in fern’s mind.

“Deeper,” she whispered. “Deeper.”

The phone rang.

It did not disturb Andrea’s trance—thank Mistress—but it did disturb fern’s. She stared at Andrea’s slack, blank face, frantically rummaging through her programming for what to do. She wanted to ignore the phone, but if Andrea did not answer and it was linda or worse, Doctor Arundsen, they might just come over.

It rang again.

She had to answer it. Andrea would stay in trance. She was too deep now to wake on her own.

Slowly, fern cupped the pendant in her other hand. Andrea eyes stopped moving, and stared at nothing. fern slid off the bed and ran naked into the other room. She yanked up the receiver.

“Hello?” she asked quietly.

“Fern. This is Doctor Arundsen. Let me speak to Andrea.”

“She’s, um—” not asleep, he’d have her woken up “—she’s out right now. Wanted to take a little walk. May I have her call you back soon, Doctor?”

There was a pause. fern panicked a little. Oh no, he didn’t believe me.

“No,” he finally said. “I’ll call back in the morning.”

“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.”

“Good night, Fern.”

“Good night Doctor Arundsen.”

fern gently replaced the receiver, and with some trepidation returned to the bedroom.

Andrea lay on the bed, sheets down around her waist, staring at the space the pendant had been. She looked intent, aware. fern almost expected her to sit up, swivel without blinking, and walk stiffly away in a zombie-like trance.

But she was not awake. She was very far from it.

fern slithered back onto the bed. she raised her hands, placing them into Andrea’s vision, and removed one, revealing the pendant. Slowly, she set it swinging again.

Andrea’s eyes resumed their slow obedient following.

“Deeper,” fern whispered. “Deeper.”

The Tempe was the hottest new hotel on the Sunset Strip. It had the best view, the most avant-garde architecture, the most cutting edge decor, the best clientele, the most expensive rooms. And it would until the next hottest new hotel opened in six months or so.

Michel—who was born Frank, and spoke very little French—tapped his foot impatiently as the elevator rose. So far he had sent four Guest Attendants up to room 1119, and not one of the little bitches had come back or even bothered to call in.

The elevator slowed and he composed himself. The name on the register had not been familiar and Claude at the desk had not recognized the man or the trollop with him, but rock stars stayed at the Tempe and although Michel needed his staff back he also needed to keep any celebrities who might be here, even under false names, happy. The door dinged open and he smiled as he stepped off.

He walked down the hallway, and paused outside the door. Giggling, and a definite female sexual groan. The little bitches. They could fuck all the famous people they wanted, but not on his time!

He rapped politely at the door. “M’sieur?”

“Come in,” a man said. More giggling.

He pushed open the door, and walked into the suite. The door to the bedroom was open.

All four Guest Attendants—Jennifer, Traci, Yvonne, and the other Jennifer—were buck naked. The Guest was lying on the bed, and Yvonne was between his legs, mouth working furiously. The other three girls stood in a row next to the bed. The blonde Jennifer saw Michel and giggled—giggled!—and nudged her compatriots. They looked at him and then looked at each other, grinning.

On the bed, the man ran his fingers through Yvonne’s hair as she sucked on him.

Even his Advanced Composure classes hadn’t been meant for this. Michel averted his eyes.

“Sir—”

“Ah, you must be Michel. Your sluts told me that you’d be up to check on them. I’m just giving them a hand, Michel, teaching them how best to suck dick. Not that that one—” he pointed and there was more giggling “—had much to learn. Man, does she fellate like a pro. I’ve had my dick sucked by the best, Michel, and Jenny is right up there. You should try her.”

The girls giggled.

Michel swallowed hard. “Sir. You are welcome— I must— Sir, I need my staff back. There are other guests who need attending to and I cannot have four—”

“Hang on a sec, Michel, let me help you with that.”

Everything turned. Michel began to realize all sorts of Very Important things, all at once, as though things that he had puzzled over for years were suddenly revealed. It was dizzying.

“There we go. So, Michel, any problems if the girls stay here and play?”

Michel blinked. “Of course not, Master. There are other, perhaps more attractive girls on staff. Shall I fetch them for You?”

He smiled. “Sure, Michel. That would be downright courteous.”

“Obedient,” Andrea whispered.

fern smiled. The pendant was on the bed now, unnecessary. Andrea could see it quite clearly in her mind.

“Yes,” fern replied. “Calm, and relaxed, and obedient. You feel perfectly safe and perfectly trusting.”

“Trusting.”

“Yes. Safe and trusting. Ready and happy to obey.”

fern paused, waiting for her next instructions to awaken. All had gone precisely as jillian had promised. she looked at the clock. There were hours before dawn. Plenty of time for Andrea’s mind to be fitted with irresistible keyholes. Keyholes that would return her to the obedient state she was in at this exact moment.

With her mind open, and eager for programming.

Knowledge of the first program to plant in Andrea’s receptive mind awoke in fern’s brain. she grinned evilly.

she had obeyed. Now she would betray.

Suddenly, there was movement. fern turned in time to see a man, large, moving quickly, and then he had struck her, pushed her off the bed. she sprang up, body twisting into a martial stance, but he didn’t come after her.

The man had leapt right onto the bed, and now knelt over Andrea’s prone form.

It was Arundsen.

He stared at fern for a moment.

Then he slapped Andrea mightily across the face.

Andrea squawked, her hands flying to her face; she yanked her legs up into a sitting position, sliding back against the wall. Her eyes flew around the room, looking at Arundsen crouched over her, then over at fern.

They both looked at fern.

“...obey?” Andrea said in a small voice.

Java Joint was open all night.

Andrea crouched in the corner, wooden chair pulled up under her. Although it was balmy outside and temperature controlled in the cafe, she shivered in her SCU sweatshirt. Her flip-flops squeaked against the wooden chair seat.

Arundsen sipped at his hot chocolate, and said nothing.

The guy behind the counter ignored them and filled in his crossword. Outside, the occasional car passed.

Arundsen was in a dress shirt. Middle of the night, and he was wearing a dress shirt.

At least he wasn’t wearing a tie.

“I want to go back,” Andrea said.

He looked at her.

“I want to be done with Mind Control and slaves and the whole thing. I want to go back to normal relationships and a graduate degree and not worrying that my lover will try to take over my mind and hand me over to be a cog in the slave machine of a billionaire dominatrix.”

He considered her. “Do you?”

She looked at him, but didn’t reply.

“She’s not a billionaire,” he said, sipping at his chocolate.

Andrea stared at him, then snorted.

“This is why you don’t keep slaves, isn’t it?”

He shrugged. “It’s one of the reasons.”

“Once you break them, they are easy to break again. To repurpose.”

“That supposes that it’s hard to break them initially.”

Andrea sighed. She looked at her tea; the bag had been in so long that the water was a deep teak brown.

“What do I do now?”

“What do you mean?”

“With her. With Fern.”

He shrugged again. “I don’t know. That’s really up to you.”

“But she’s not safe to keep around.”

“No she’s not.”

“You’re not being much help.”

“I rather think I have been a great deal of help, tonight.”

Andrea poked a finger at her tea cup, pushing it across the table.

“Yeah. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

The traffic light changed, and the half-dozen cars that had queued at the light rolled forward. There was never a time when the streets of Los Angeles were empty.

She sighed. “Is she ever going to stop trying to get me?”

“I doubt it. She might slacken, after a while.”

Andrea’s eyes fixed on him.

“I know what you did. You fixed yourself, didn’t you? You used your own machines to ensure that you can’t be controlled. Physical modifications to the brain. Like... like I did to myself. To remove my qualms. That’s why you’re not afraid of her. You can’t be controlled.”

He laced his fingers together. “I’m not afraid of her because there’s nothing to be afraid of. Were I to be enslaved, I’d doubtless be made to enjoy it.”

“But you don’t want to be enslaved.”

“No.”

“And you can’t be enslaved.”

“Maybe.”

“I’m right though, aren’t I? You fixed yourself. Fixed your brain.”

He looked out the window at a passing pair of headlights. “I will not confirm or deny that statement.”

“You could do it to me. Fix me so that I can’t be hypnotized.”

“I object to your use of the term ‘fixed’. Yes, we could use my technology to increase your resistance to trance. And we could ensure that you have no desire whatsoever to be enslaved. That is how she, and how most of my peers, get you, you know. They tap into and inflame the latent desires we all have. And use them to subvert and eventually eliminate the desire to remain free-willed.”

“You could do it. To me.”

He nodded. “Yes.”

Andrea lifted her tea and sipped at it. Cold and far too black. She put it back down. The guy behind the counter sucked on his pencil.

She thought about Suzanne.

Suzanne. She’d had to dispose of her. Get rid of her. So that she could never, either as someone’s pawn or simply inadvertently, make Andrea obey her again.

Arundsen had helped her. Showed Andrea the machine, the earlier, simpler machine, the machine that wiped minds.

Tabula rasa.

Andrea told herself that she hadn’t killed her.

“That’s not all there is to it, though, is there?” she asked quietly.

“It never is.”

Andrea realized she was seeing him with new eyes. Seeing, and just maybe understanding, the things he had done to himself.

When was the next step one step too many?

Arundsen lifted his cup and finished it. He stood up. “Are you ready to go back?”

She looked up at him.

“Yeah,” she said, standing. “I think I am.”

fern stood naked, in the center of the room. her eyes shone with tears.

she could have run away. Could have found Mistress Snowdon, somehow. she knew that Mistress wouldn’t be angry, not at a hapless slave.

A slave who’d failed.

she didn’t know why she was staying. Maybe it was her programming. Maybe she couldn’t leave until she had enslaved Andrea. Which would never happen now.

Maybe it was something else.

The key clicked in the lock, and the door opened. Andrea stepped in, the Doctor behind her.

fern’s jaw trembled but she remained in place.

Arundsen closed the door, while Andrea stood looking at fern. She clenched and unclenched her fists.

“Speak, slave.”

“A—andrea. You don’t understand. She came and, and...” fern stared at her, tears streaming down her cheeks. “I am a slave. I have to obey.”

“But whose slave?”

“M—Mistress Snowdon’s. i’m sorry, Andrea, she came and took me and i’m just a slave, i cannot resist...”

“Shh.” Andrea held up a finger.

Arundsen had walked around to the table. There was a case on it; he spun the combination dials and snapped it open. From the velvet-lined interior he took out a shiny silver curve.

A helmet.

“New model,” he said, walking back with the silver cap in his hand. He handed it to Andrea.

She turned it over in her hands. A smooth silver cap, it was so small it wouldn’t even cover the entire scalp. One button, one light. The light was on.

“A trance inducer,” he said. “Very fast.”

Andrea looked at fern.

“A—are you going to reprogram me?” fern asked.

Andrea handed her the slim silver helmet. “Put it on,” she said.

fern lifted it with both hands, and raised it over her head. she set her jaw and slowly lowered it.

Nothing happened.

“The light’s backwards,” Arundsen said. “Light on means inducer off. Push the button.”

Andrea reached out a fingertip and pushed the button.

fern stopped worrying. Stopped thinking at all.

“Fern? Can you hear me?”

“Yes,” she replied in a soft monotone. “i hear you.”

“Good. Now, from the beginning, I want you to tell me how you were reprogrammed.”

“Yes. i was at home. i was doing pull-ups. There was a knock on the door...”

“I’m sorry, Master. We don’t have Doctor Arundsen’s home listed. Or any off-campus office.”

Priscilla looked up at Him unhappily. He was frowning.

She hadn’t known Him at all five minutes ago. She’d been sorting through Doctor Grundlich’s email, and looked up to see a young man and a woman in a nice suit and a dog collar walk into the department office. The collar only surprised her because of the otherwise mature mien of the woman; undergraduates wore all sorts of crazy things.

Then, He had looked at her, and she had understood.

“You mean to tell Me that you don’t have any address for one of your emeritus faculty at all?”

“I’m sorry, Master, there is none in the computer.”

He sighed. “And I assume he’s not teaching this quarter.”

“No, Master. He hasn’t taught undergraduate for some time.”

“Does he have any graduate students?”

“The computer only shows him having one, Master.”

“Where does she live?”

“One second, Master.” Priscilla tapped at the keyboard. “She lives in West Los Angeles, Master. I have her address for You.”

She pulled off a Post-It note and wrote down Andrea Grey’s address, trying to balance her need to keep the note legible with her need to please Master now.

As she handed him the address, she wondered briefly how He had known that Doctor Arundsen’s graduate student was a woman, before dismissing the question. He knew all sorts of things. He was a god.

He looked at the note. “Well, that’s not too far. Can you be of any other use to me, slut? As far as finding Arundsen.”

Priscilla racked her slave brain. She had hoped, with the first part of the question... but then He had redirected her. Sorrowful, she slowly replied. “I don’t... think so.. Master.”

He turned to go.

“Wait. Parking passes. I can check the parking passes, Master. I am not supposed to have access to them but I saw the system administrator type in the password. I can tell you when and where Doctor Arundsen is parking.”

He paused, probably doubtful of the information’s utility. “Go ahead,” he said generously.

She typed furiously. The password worked. “He parks in Lot G, Master. He has a reserved space near his labs. He...”

Priscilla looked at Him and beamed.

“He just parked there five minutes ago.”

She should have been dead tired, but she wasn’t.

Trotting along the corridor behind Arundsen, Andrea found herself possessed of a strange mental clarity. Perhaps it was the trance she had been in. Perhaps she had simply passed through exhaustion. Perhaps interrogating Fern, and then putting her to bed, had worked out some of her stress, put her in a contemplative place.

Arundsen knew how tired she was—to say nothing of how tired he might be—but he’d told her to accompany him to the lab. So she did. The sun was up, but there were few people around campus. Students weren’t generally early risers.

As he unlocked the door of the lab, Andrea considered the Problem.

Did she want to rewire her brain to resist mind control, or not?

Arundsen had said his piece, cryptic as it was. Andrea doubted her ability to pry more out of him for some time.

As she followed Arundsen into the familiar lab, Andrea changed her focus and considered Fern. If Andrea were smart, she’d get rid of her. If she were kind, she’d send Fern to Snowdon, stark naked with a red satin bow. Let Snowdon remake her into a blissed-out number girl.

If she were not kind...

No. It was Fern. She’d be kind.

If she gave her up.

“Wait there,” Arundsen said, sliding onto a stool at a lab bench. He plunked the case with the slimline helmet onto the bench absently. As he pulled a keyboard to himself his attention was already on a console.

She didn’t want to be a slave. That much was certain. But did she want to rule it out forever? She’d turned herself into a Mistress—a fumbling, neophyte one, admittedly—and that had brought her more trouble than she had ever imagined.

Also more excitement.

Arundsen said something, and Andrea realized she had drifted to a chair and sat down without even noticing. Maybe she was exhausted.

“What was that?”

He leaned up from his computer terminal. “Take off your clothes.”

For a moment she thought she had misheard. “What?”

“Take off your clothes,” he said. “Please. I want to see you naked.”

She looked at him, and looked at the door. It was closed. The blinds were drawn.

She rapidly reassessed her recent clarity. Was she in a trance?

No.

He was standing now, waiting.

Andrea stood up. She pulled off the sweatshirt. Undid the drawstrings of her sweatpants.

This was the lab. A year and a lifetime ago she had seen a co-ed sucking Arundsen’s dick in this room. Amongst the benches and the clutter, the linoleum floor and the overhead hoists. A co-ed who had walked out utterly unaware that she was a sex puppet.

Andrea undid her bra, let it fall forward, put it aside. His gaze went from her eyes to her breasts, and back.

She slipped off her panties.

He looked at her. She felt like she should turn, slowly, but she did not.

“You are,” he said, “very beautiful.”

He began to unbutton his shirt.

Why now? Why here?

As she watched him get undressed, no answers came.

He was naked now. “Come,” he said, beckoning her over to where he stood. She went.

His fingers were warm, which surprised her, and they touched her shoulders first, and her back. He was already coming erect.

“Do you want—” she whispered, but he put a finger atop her lips.

His hands slid to her waist, and he lifted her, put her atop the lab bench; it was cool beneath her ass. His hand stroked the tops of her thighs, then he reached past her.

He snapped open the valise.

Andrea’s eyes widened as he took out the helmet, the slim silver helmet. The light was on.

She did not move as he lowered it onto her head.

He leaned close. “Don’t,” he whispered. “Move.”

Then he kissed her, his hands roaming her back, and she kissed him back, afraid and curious and disappointed and thrilled, and his hands stayed on her back as he moved his mouth to her breasts and then they slid around to her thighs and he parted them, pulling her forward, and she raised her pelvis and he began to kiss her sex.

What was going on? Why now? Why only now? She wanted to ask him, but she knew he wouldn’t answer. His tongue moved slowly along her sex and she shivered.

The helmet was very light atop her head.

Would he touch the button and trance her out?

She didn’t want that. She wanted to be here, to experience him. Not to be a sexpuppet co-ed, a warm place for him to put his—

“Nice!” someone said.

Arundsen looked up, raised himself and turned around. Standing in the doorway was a young man dressed in t-shirt and jeans, and behind him a young woman with sandy hair, in a suit jacket and a very short skirt.

Andrea recognized her.

Pell.

Which meant—

“Doctor Arundsen,” he said. “We meet at last.”

“Roger.”

The man rolled his eyes. “Come on, doc. Get into it a little. At least call me Mister Jeffries.”

“My apologies. Mister Jeffries.”

Pell was standing at attention, back straight, eyes wide above a dopey smile. Even without the dog collar she was an obvious slave. Andrea’s eyes slid from her onto the man, who had shifted his gaze ogling her. She stilled an impulse to close her legs. Arundsen had told her not to move.

Pell may look like a slave, she thought, but at least she has some clothes on. All I’m wearing is this... helmet...?

“Nice,” Jeffries repeated. “She looks like fun. But I’d heard you don’t keep slaves.”

“I don’t.”

His eyes flicked off Andrea’s tits, back to Arundsen. “Say, doc, do you want to put some pants on or something? I don’t want you to enter a life of slavery without your dignity.”

“I’m fine.”

He seemed disappointed. “Whatever. Any last words?”

“Many, but you’ll never hear them.”

Jeffries snorted. “Cocky.” He pointed. “No pun intended.”

Arundsen finally showed some emotion—a soft, exasperated sigh. “Can we get this over with? Your humor is annoying me.”

Jeffries’ expression darkened. “Fuck you, man.”

Andrea felt it. Felt the air move without wind, like a deep bass pulse from a hidden speaker. She swallowed.

Arundsen stood there, hands at his sides.

No one said anything.

Jeffries took a step forward. Then another. He was frowning, his brows knitted.

“Kneel,” he said.

“I’d... rather not,” Arundsen replied.

Jeffries’ mouth twisted. His hands clenched.

“I... said... Kneel!”

Arundsen’s knees flexed and a flicker of panic went through Andrea, but he went no further.

“You. Can’t make me,” he replied. There was strain in his voice.

“Oh. Yes. I can,” Jeffries said, stepping forward again.

They faced each other, and between them something Andrea could only barely feel writhed and flexed.

Then Jeffries laughed. “Got you.”

He came a step closer. “Your mind is... different, doc. I don’t know what you’ve done to it, if you were born that way, or what. But I’m seeing it now.” He smiled viciously, and stepped forward again. “I actually ought to thank you, doc. It’s been a long time since I’ve had to work for anything. Feels good to have a challenge.”

Arundsen was sweating, and his hands had balled up into fists.

Jeffries took one more step forward and he was directly in front of Arundsen. “I’m almost there, doc. Can you feel me? I’m all around you. I’m going to crack that mind of yours like an egg.”

“I— don’t—”

“No, you wouldn’t. But you will soon enough.” Jeffries’ eyes almost glowed. “Now, kneel!”

One leg buckled. Arundsen sank, listing, clenched fists at his sides.

“We’re gonna have a real good time, doc,” Jeffries said, his voice still strained. “You, and me, and that hot slave of yours. You can lick my cum from her twat.”

“I... don’t... keeep....” Arundsen’s eyes flashed as his knees touched the ground. “Slaves!”

Andrea half-dropped, half-hopped off the bench.

Jeffries turned, but she was already slapping the helmet onto his head, stabbing the button with her thumb.

Arundsen’s voice cracked like a whip: “Don’t think! You cannot think! You are relaxed and calm and you cannot think!”

Jeffries’ hands had formed claws and grabbed at Andrea’s wrists where she held the helmet down on his head; above his snarl his eyes bored into her, and suddenly she began to have a Very Important Realization...

...and then it went away.

It no longer mattered. The light was off, on the helmet, and in his mind. His face, and his hands, were slowly draining of tension. They slipped from Andrea’s wrists.

“Don’t think,” Arundsen said weakly. “Don’t think. Relax. Don’t think.”

His eyes rolled up and he slumped onto the floor.

Andrea watched Arundsen pass out. Jeffries’ arms were at his sides now, and he stood unmoving. His face was placid, his eyes vacant.

Pell! Andrea spun, but the former mistress, now slave hadn’t moved. There was concern on her face, but no hint of action.

Andrea took a step back and looked around. The lab was the same. No one appeared to have noticed the commotion, if indeed there had been one. She had no sense of how loud the altercation had been.

She shivered, violently, and then it passed.

Clothes first. After another glance at Pell to be sure the slave didn’t go for the helmet, Andrea fetched her sweats from the desk where she had stripped just a moment ago at Arundsen’s command.

It had all been a ruse. He’d known that Jeffries was coming and had gotten Andrea, and himself, naked to distract him. Put the helmet on her head. Made Jeffries think she was no more than a slave, and thereby discount her.

She shrugged her shirt on and wriggled into her sweatpants. The helmet. He’d built it specifically with the stupid, inverted light. Built it just for this scenario.

How long had he been planning this?

Jeffries just stood there as Andrea came back and knelt down next to Arundsen.

“Hey,” she said, waving a hand in front of his face. “Wake up.”

No response.

She snapped her fingers.

An eye popped open. Then the other, and he made a face.

“Good God,” he said. “Do I have a headache.”

She slid an arm underneath him and helped him into a sitting position. He winced and rubbed his temples.

“There are some aspirin in the top right drawer of my desk,” he said, gesturing. “Could you bring them? And my cellular phone.”

Andrea fetched the aspirin and the phone. Arundsen swallowed the pills dry, still seated on the floor, and flipped open the phone. He thumbed up a number and hit Send.

“This is Arundsen,” he said into the phone. “I have him. Yes. Yes, him. We are in my laboratory on the SCU campus. Yes, send a team right away. I’ll be here.” He snapped it shut.

He looked up at Andrea. “Andrea,” he said. “I need you to take Pell over there to the Keever estate. Yes, now. Calpurnia will be expecting you.” He winced and pressed at his temple. “Just drop her off and go home. Don’t come back here until you hear from me. I have to stay. Do you remember how to get there?”

“Uh, sure,” she said. “Uh, you should probably get dressed...”

“Take my car. The keys are in my pants pocket,” he said, waving a hand in the direction of his clothes. “Hurry.”

Andrea took the keys. She had questions, but.

There would be time.

At the door, she took Pell’s arm. “Come with me,” she said. “We’re going for a little ride.”

The ride up was quiet.

He had picked her up at half past six. The setting sun painted the western sky purple and orange as they wound through the canyons up Sepulveda and onto Mulholland.

It was the second time she’d made the trip up here today. The first time she’d been at the wheel, Pell sitting quietly in the back. The former mistress hadn’t said anything from the time Andrea led her to the car to the moment she’d left her at the mansion’s door, a slave in French maid garb hurrying to fetch Calpurnia.

When she got home, she woke Fern, and sent her home. She considered calling Linda, having her come over to watch her while she slept, but...

She couldn’t handle it if they’d gotten Linda, too.

She settled for putting a chair against the front door. And collapsing.

The phone woke her at six fifteen.

Arundsen drove faster than she did. He was in a suit; she wondered who had come to the lab and what Arundsen had told them.

As little as possible, of course. It was him, after all.

She sighed, and leaned her head against the window.

“Go ahead,” he said.

“What?”

“Ask.”

She looked at him. “So what happened?”

“They came and took him away.”

“Who came?”

“The government.”

“The CIA?”

“The government.”

“What are they going to do with him?”

He shrugged. “Experiment, I suspect.”

“What that your plan all along? Have him walk in on us... like that?”

“For some time, yes.”

“You used me as bait.”

“No. I used myself as bait. I used you as the spring arm.”

“Why? Why something so risky? Why not just, I don’t know, have someone shoot him or drug him or something?”

“They wanted him alive.”

“So why not drug him?”

He waited so long she decided he was not going to answer, but then he spoke in a soft voice. “Because that was how I wanted to do it. I wanted to do it myself. There were things I had to know.”

“What things?”

The car slowed. “We’re here,” he said.

The estate was, if anything, more elegant in the early twilight. The peacock stood at the far edge of the vast lawn, showing its fan. The palm trees swayed a bit in a wind that didn’t reach the ground.

He pulled around the drive, stopped the car, and gave the keys to the busty valet. Calpurnia stood in the doorway. She looked demure in a white silk dress.

“Doctor Arundsen.”

“Calpurnia.”

“Mistress Snowdon and Miss... Pell are in the conference room.”

“I see.” Andrea stopped at his elbow. “And the others?”

“Master Rose and Master Lyons will not be joining you. Master Rose said to convey his entire confidence in your decisions.”

He made a small smile. “I see. Well, then, let us go in.”

She led them into the house, down the marbled hall and into the study, through the bookcase and down the passage to the conference room.

“Your slave must wait in the antechamber,” she said.

“Miss Grey is not my slave, and she will accompany me into the conference room,” Arundsen replied.

Calpurnia paused. “I see. Allow me to inquire with Mistress Snowdon if this is acceptable.”

“Go right ahead.”

She opened the door and stepped into the room, leaving the two of them on the deep white carpet of the hall. Arundsen looked at his watch.

Andrea looked into the antechamber. There was a woman there, looking out the window. She was tall with long reddish-gold hair, tied back in a ponytail. Sensing Andrea’s eyes upon her, she turned around and smiled. Andrea smiled back. She didn’t know her.

The door opened. “Mistress Snowdon agrees. Please, Doctor Arundsen, Miss Grey.” She held the door open.

The conference room was dimly lit. Diana Snowdon sat at one end, her dark hair in an elaborate coiffure. She smiled with blood red lips as they approached. There were thirteen chairs at the table; Arundsen sat next to her.

Andrea sat in the next seat down.

Only then did she notice the woman standing against the wall. Pell was wearing the same clothes that she had this morning; short skirt, tan jacket, dog collar. But the blissful look on her face was gone. Now she only looked sad.

“Arundsen,” Snowdon said, her eyes twinkling with mirth. “Or seeing as how it is just us, shall I call you Neil?”

“Whatever pleases you.”

“And Miss Grey. A pleasure to see you again.”

“Likewise,” Andrea replied, surprised at her own lack of irony.

“I take it from this meeting and the condition of poor Margaret over there, that you were successful?”

“Indeed.”

“And the young man in question?”

“En route to Virginia.”

“I see.”

She leaned back in her chair. Andrea could picture her with a cigarette in a long holder. In black and white.

“So,” she said. “You could have relayed this over the telephone. Why the meeting?”

“Because we must dispose of Miss Pell’s estate,” Arundsen said.

Andrea looked at the sad woman, standing against the wall. Her cheeks were pale.

“And what do you suggest?”

“I would prefer if you were to attend to it,” he replied.

“I see.” She shrugged. “Very well, I shall.”

“Don’t let me remember!”

They all turned. Pell had stepped forward, put her hands on the back of a chair. Her knuckles were white.

“What’s that?” Snowdon asked.

“Don’t let me remember,” she begged. Her eyes were wet. “Please. I know what you’re going to do to me. I won’t—I can’t stop you. But please, please... wipe my memory. Don’t make me remember. Not... not this. Don’t make me remember this. Don’t make me remember him.”

Arundsen looked at Snowdon. She nodded. “Very well, dear. I shall take special care that nothing remains. You won’t remember this, or that man, or being a mistress or a slave or anyone at all.”

“Thank you,” Pell whispered. Her hands relaxed.

Snowdon gave Arundsen a bland look. “Will that be all?”

It was full dark as the Infiniti came to a stop in front of Andrea’s house.

She touched the door handle, and stopped. Turned.

“Doctor...?”

“Yes?”

“I just— There’s one thing I’d like to know.”

“Which is?”

“When you... had me strip, and were... and we were...” she closed her eyes, fought for composure. “Was that just for show? Was that just part of the plan?”

His face was its usual expressionless self. Hand on the door, she waited.

There. In his eyes, something.

“No,” he admitted.

She swallowed.

“Take me home with you,” she said. “Just for tonight. Take me home with you and tomorrow I’ll be your grad student and you can be my mentor. And I’ll deal with Fern and Mistress Snowdon and face all my decisions. But tonight, just... tonight. Take me home.”

He looked at her for a long moment. His lips twitched.

“Please,” she said.

The car pulled away from the curb.