The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive

Once upon a time, not so terribly long ago, and not all that far away, there lived a beautiful princess.

-Was she tall, with red hair?—

What?

-The princess. Was she tall, with red hair?—

No. She did have red hair, violently red hair as a matter of fact, and freckles, but she was short, and she had to exercise constantly, or she started packing on the pounds. She also had an explosive temper that she struggled mightily to keep under control, and she had absolutely no patience with idiots. But, as I said, even with the freckles, she was beautiful, nonetheless.

-That’s good.—

Yes. Anyway. To get on with the story. The princess was born, and she grew up. Did I mention she was very smart as well? She was, and because of this, unlike her two sisters, she refused right from the start to do all the things that were expected of well-brought-up princess of that land and time. She loved her parents, and they loved her, but still, she bit and she scratched and she clawed, and in the end, while her sisters married local princes of stolid and unimpeachable repute and shut off their brains, she left her home and went off, clear over on the east side of the state, in fact, to study at the feet of wise men in a citadel of learning, far out among the fields of corn and soybeans. And because she was smart and driven and refused to take any crap from anyone, she did well in her studies, learning all about the plants and the rocks and the growing things of the world. She did very well in fact, and in due time, she officially became a wise woman herself, and was given a position at the citadel, with an office of her own and a lackey or two to cater to her whims, and even tenure. She was happy enough, I think, although she still lost her temper sometimes, and she still had to exercise if she even looked at a cheesecake. (And she loved to do more than just look at cheesecake.)

Anyhoo. The earth made a few more trips around the sun, and one day it was decided that she and some of her colleagues from the citadel would venture out into the wide world, traveling far into the...uh...great woods of the north, in order that some of the secrets of those woods could be unearthed and the world’s collection of knowledge might thus be increased, for the benefit of all. Or at least for the benefit of those trying to maintain tenure. And so an expedition was organized, and they set forth, fording the mighty rivers and crossing the wide plains, until finally the woods loomed up before them. Reports had come to their ears that the woods could be dark and confusing and even dangerous, so they hired a prominent local guide to help lead them to the various things that they sought.

-Ah.—

Yes. He was a mighty huntsman. Tall and skinny with pitch-black hair, he walked the woods without fear, and he played the fiddle reasonably well when he sat beside the campfire at night. Unlike the princess, he almost never lost his temper, but when he did, the mountains crumbled, the sky shook and the grizzly bears all ran for cover.

-And the princess? The wise woman?—

She fell in love with him, of course, and he with her, as is so often the case in this sort of story. Before very long, he proposed to her and she accepted and (to the great relief of the princess’s parents, who had never given up hoping) they were married. With only a little regret, she left the citadel for good, and went to live with him in his manorhouse deep in the woods, on the edge of a wide blue lake, the same place where his father and grandfather had lived.

-And they lived happily ever after?—

Well...no. But only because no one ever really lives happily ever after. There are always bills to pay and fights about furniture and illnesses late in the night. But they lived, and they lived together, and they were happy for the most part. The princess learned to hunt and shoot and gut fish, and the guide learned a lot more about the world of ideas outside the woods. The years continued to pass, and, again, as is usually the case, they began to have children.

-Tall, with red hair?—

Some of them were tall, and some were short. Some were skinny, some not so skinny. All but one of them had red hair, of one shade or another.

And they were all girls.

-All girls? The woodsman really must have been tough, if he survived all alone in a house with...how many girls?—

Seven in the end, counting his wife. But you shouldn’t feel too sorry for him, since the last of his daughters was very different than all the rest. She had hair as black as his, and, it was universally agreed by impartial observers, she was some sort of reward for his perseverance, and more than made up for his not having any sons.

—Is she the woman on your wall?—

Huh?

—In your bedroom. With the spear. And the moose.—

Oh. Yeah. Yeah, that’s Gwen. You might say she inspired me.

-She hunts with a spear? Isn’t that going a little far?—

Poetic license. Look, do you all want to hear the rest of this story or not?

-Carry on. The rest of the daughters? Did they live happily ever after as well?—

Some did. Others...Well, let’s start with the easy ones. Carmen and Herb own a long-haul rig, and endlessly travel the highways together. Brigit followed in her mother’s footsteps, and she and Simon are currently down in Argentina, digging up dinosaur fossils. Or digging something up, anyway. Denise became a author, moderately famous in certain circles, and married Albert, who is in insurance. The rest of the family tried not to hold that too much against him, since he was pretty nice guy otherwise. They have two kids, Bobby and Kathy, the only grandchildren. So far.

-That leaves...two daughters. Are they ones who didn’t live happily ever after?—

Yes. Well, the verdict is still out on one of them. Fiona, on the other hand...

(sigh)

Fiona worked in an office all day, filing papers. Before. Now she is in prison. She shot a man.

-On purpose?—

Yes. Well...it’s always been hard to say with Fiona, when it comes to reasons and motives. Right from the beginning. She was the oldest of the daughters, by five years, and she never...She never bothered to spend much time explaining herself, and the shooting was no exception. She admitted she did it. Said he attacked her, that it was self-defense. Pretty much wouldn’t elaborate, even on the stand at the trial. The shootee was her... I guess he was her boyfriend at the time, a man named Lewis Randich. He was a librarian. I only met him once or twice. He seemed nice enough, but... Anyway. The jury didn’t believe her, and she’s now in the Polktown Women’s Correctional Facility. Life sentence, but maybe in another twenty years or so they’ll let her out. She’s been a model prisoner, I hear. I’ve gone to see her...once or twice...but she doesn’t exactly encourage visitors.

You know, talking about all this, I just realized something. Apart from all the crap we’re dealing with here...if I could have Suzanna go...read...just one person in the world it would be Fiona. I’d really like to know, just once in my life, what was really going on behind that mask of hers. The woman’s a goddamn sphinx. And I was her sister. Am her sister. I slept in the same goddamn room with her every night for three years.

-Yes. And I’m sorry.—

-But that still leaves the last daughter.—

Yeah. Well. Then there was Erika, who was not the last daughter, but actually the second-oldest after Fiona. Erika never shot anyone, but there’s no point in mincing words. I...She wasn’t a nice person, really. She grew up tall and skinny, like her father but also awkward and clumsy, and she fully inherited her mother’s brains and temper. Oh, don’t get me wrong, Dad’s no dummy, so all the girls were smart, even Carmen when she could be bothered to make half a fucking effort, but Erika was the one who got the full dose. Well, OK. Brigit, too. Brigit, however, only got the brains, and picked up her temperament from her father. Calm and sensible and methodical. That’s why she makes such a good scientist now, I guess. Erika carried around not a chip on her shoulder, but a whole damned log. If you had strapped Erika down at the time, and slid bamboo slivers deep under her fingernails, she would have eventually, grudgingly, admitted that she loved her parents and her sisters, but nevertheless she wanted out. Out of the manorhouse, out of the tiny village where the daughters spent twelve long years going to school, out of the Woods altogether. It all got a little better in high school, when she finally filled out...relatively speaking...and her body got its wires untangled. She even played basketball, and was pretty damn good at it, if I do say so myself. She might have even been able to snag an athletic scholarship, but didn’t need it. She got a full academic scholarship at...well, a citadel of learning that was most definitely not surrounded by corn and soybeans, and about as far as you could get from the Woods without leaving the continent. And the times had changed enough that she didn’t need to fight for it nearly as hard, the way her mother had. She picked up and left, taking only her faithful old armchair with her. Breezed through her courses, graduated near the top of her class, and immediately went to work conquering the concrete jungle, the great jungle, all without a backwards glance.

-Up the ziggurat, licky-spit.—

Yeah. Exactly. And in just a few short years, Erika was flying high. Literally; she got tapped to go on an important overseas junket with some of the top brass at Ziggurat, Inc. And then....

-Yes?—

I remember the moment, probably will remember it all my life. I was in bed. It was late at night. I woke up, I was suddenly wide awake, and I was staring at the ceiling of the hotel room I was staying in. This all happened on the banks of the Elbe river, in Hamburg. The one in Germany? I got up, and went out on the balcony. I could see the full moon floating over the river and the city. Not a cloud in the sky. It was quite beautiful, actually. I stood there for a long time, freezing my damn ass off, and I realized...I realized I was unhappy. Bitterly, desperately unhappy. In that moment, everything turned to ashes, and I didn’t care anymore. Didn’t care about any of it. The money, the power, getting to the top of the ziggurat. So. I finally went back to bed and stared at the ceiling some more. For the rest of the night, really. At least it was warmer. Somehow, I dragged myself through the rest of the trip, which was otherwise a smashing success. Came home and immediately handed in my resignation to the Top Brass. Burned all my bridges, sold most of my toys, and walked away.

-What did you do then?—

Wandered for a long time. Went all the way around the world in the end. Back to Europe. Africa. Thailand. Saw lots of things, learned lots of things, some good, some bad. It was all far more educational than college ever was. Maybe the best and most important thing that I learned, much to my surprise, was that I was pretty good artist. Like I think I told you before, maybe not great, but good. And I actually enjoyed doing it. So when my hoarded stacks of gold started to run out, I washed up here, back home in the good ol’ US of A. This seemed like seemed like a nice place between the mountains and the sea. A good compromise between my two lives, so I stayed. Got myself a small house, and an old gray van from Honest Sam’s, that place over on Guin Street. Got the armchair out of storage. Started making a new name for myself. Pretty much patched things up with most of my family. Or maybe built something new with them. There hadn’t been much left to patch, and Fiona was still a sphinx in a cage. But anyway, I was happy.

-And then you met me.—

No. No, actually. Then I met Theodore.

There was a faceless silver-colored mannequin standing a small platform just inside the entrance to the uniform shop. It was dressed in an ugly black, white and orange outfit with a matching baseball cap, and as a result the figure looked like a some sort of stupid giant two-legged bee. Holli stopped and stared at it, but after a single glance Kristen marched on to the counter which was crammed into one corner of the shop and confronted the pimply stack of boredom which was lounging behind it. She finally managed to yank the man’s attention away from the fascination that was his navel just long enough to learn what she wanted. Throughout this torturous procedure, she somehow resisted the terrible cold impulse to pick up the credit-card scanner from the counter and methodically brain the clod into a coma with it. In his drooling, apathetic ignorance he was helping keep that bastard alive...

The targeted uniforms were hanging from a long metal rack which was also shoved up against one of the walls, under a large sign promoting the very hospital deal that Kristen had mentioned to Holli before.

Speaking of which...

Kristen turned in irritation and saw that Holli was still lingering near the doors, staring at the bee outfit as if hypnotized by it.

Hypnotized...

Something squirmed pleasantly down between Kristen’s legs. She pushed the feeling aside. If all went well tonight, there would be plenty of time for that later.

Plenty of time...

She managed to attract Holli’s attention, and the bigger woman finally came shuffling over, much in the manner of a reluctant dog being pulled along on a leash. Kristen stood with folded arms and spoke once Holli was in range.

“Now then. I was careful to take note when we left the hospital. Some of them were wearing, you know, ‘civilian clothing’, but others had these on.” She pulled a garment from the rack, a one-piece tan-colored overall. Without the change in color and sleeves added, it wasn’t much different than the grubby outfit that Holli was already wearing. Holli transferred her glazed attention to the garment.

Kristen read Holli’s blank expression, and glanced at the clerk. He had of course already retreated back in that far-distant mental landscape where bored retail clerks spend so much of their time. Nevertheless, she spoke more softly.

“Still don’t understand? Don’t you see? People notice doctors. People even notice nurses. But janitors...nobody notices janitors. I was one, for a couple of semesters back in college, when I really needed the cash. I learned all kinds of things, snooping around. You wouldn’t believe what people leave in lying around in unlocked desk drawers.” For a moment, she had a powerful flash of memory; on one occasion, what some bastard had left in an unlocked drawer had proven to be a rat-trap. She had gotten him back, though-

She pushed the thought away. “Fortunately, I moved on to better things in the end.” She held the overall against Holli, and tilted her head, getting a rough measurement. Too small. She jammed it back and moved on to the next largest size. “You put on that uniform, pick up that bucket and mop, and suddenly you turn invisible. Janitors go everywhere, see everything...I’m surprised they haven’t already taken over the world.” For a sudden moment, another trickle of...something unpleasant...ran down her spine. A sad voice, whispering something. She shrugged it off irritably. “And, there’s an added bonus. He has to....” Another glance at the clerk, another drop in tone, almost hissing through her teeth. “Be taken care of, no matter what, but there’s no point...yet...in risking your being asked to perform some medical procedure. No point yet in hurting anyone else unnecessarily.”

Holli said nothing and gave Kristen a look like a sheep.

The hot wet thing pulled again between Kristen’s legs, stronger than before. She looked at her watch, considered. After they ate, they had to go someplace to get Holli dressed anyway.

Or maybe they could just combine the two.

They really should kill a couple of hours first...

She smiled, and examined the uniform she now clutched. It appeared to be about right. Good enough for her purposes, anyway. She carefully folded it up and pushed it into Holli’s hands. Then she noticed a bunch of matching baseball caps, piled up in a sloppy stack nearby. She grabbed the top one and added it to the pile.

“You do have a valid credit card?”

“Yes, Kristen.”

“Fine. Give me all your cash. Hurry up.” Holli didn’t have a purse like a normal person; she fished a pocketbook out of, yes, another pocket in her overalls, and extracted a small crumpled wad of bills. Kristen took it and flipped through it. “Fine. Go pay for that, and meet me back at the truck. And I think I saw a pile of those plastic ID card holders on the counter. Get one of those, too. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Kristen.”

“Good. Go.” Kristen turned Holli’s unresisting body and pushed it in the direction of the counter. Not waiting to watch the transaction, Kristen strode back out of the shop, onto the concrete of the sidewalk. Remembering her own words, she realized now that she had almost forgotten a couple of very important items, and, yes, there was another shop just a couple of doors down.... She supposed, as she went towards the proper entrance, that she should send Holli to do this as well, but at least she wouldn’t leave any paper trail....

She did some fishing of her own in her purse and examined the resulting catch. Combined with what she’d taken from Holli, it looked like it would be enough...

Tom clutched tighter at the plate he was holding in one hand, somehow forced his voice to stay casual.

“Theodore?”

Erika nodded, not looking at him, or at anything else in the room, for that matter. Nina and Suzanna stood quietly to one side, watching all of this with silent intensity.

Erika finally resumed her history.

“Theodore. Where to begin with Theodore.” She scrubbed absently at her face with her hand. “He was...still is a carpenter. Well. I imagine he still is, anyway. He might be dead, for all I know. We don’t exactly keep in touch. He was a carpenter. A good one. Physically, he reminded me of my father. Sort of. If Dad put in some serious time on the weights in a gym. And downed a few steroids. Tall. Well-built. Lots of dark wavy hair. Blue eyes. A chin with a cleft in it.”

“I already despise him with every fiber of my being.”

Erika nodded absently, her gaze still in the past.

“We met at this stupid crafts show, you know, ‘meet the local artistes’, that sort of thing, we were both trying to sell our wares. He did really fancy woodworking, high-quality stuff, not just hammering house-frames together. Although he did that, too, to pay the bills. We hit it off, started going out, the usual thing.” She paused for a long moment, evidently remembering something new. “I had had boyfriends, you know. Something I didn’t mention before, right? I lost my virginity well before I went to college.” She flashed a wistful smile. “Did it for the first time with a guy from my high school named Jim Thompkins. In the back of his car. Well, his parents’ car, actually, but it was a pretty nice set of wheels, for a pair of thirty-year-old fogies. Out by the town gravel pit. How’s that for stereotypes?”

“How was it?”

“Awful. Well, no.” She shook her head, as if at a pestering fly. “I mean, looking back now with corrective hindsight...it was awful. But at the time.. you know how teenagers are, I assume. We thought we’d...”

“Invented fire and discovered the wheel all at once?”

“Yeah. Yeah, that pretty much nails it. But, you know, even now, I say ‘awful’, but it could have been far worse. At least he tried. Wore a condom. Was gentle. And if he bragged about it to his friends later, he was discreet about it.” She blew out a small breath. “I’ll always have a soft spot for ol’ Jim. He deserved better than me, or better than the me of the time. He joined the Navy in the end. Kinda ironic, considering how terrified of water he was as a kid. Married a girl he met in the service, I think. Last I heard, he was out on some battleship in the Pacific somewhere.” A vague wave of a hand in a generally western direction. “Anyway. He was the first, and there were others. In college, then while I was in the concrete jungle. And, again, as I think I mentioned to you before, some of them were real pros. But...I didn’t love any of them. Never even came close.” She finally looked at Tom, and her eyes were raw. “I was fond of Jim, and all, but Theodore McManus was the first man I ever really loved.”

“And he broke your heart.”

“I...I don’t know. Yes, but...somehow that’s not the right phrase. Even now, I’m not sure how it happened. Everything seemed to be going well, and then it all fell apart all at once. It was so sudden, and it swallowed everything. Like some horrific train wreck. But again...it could have been worse. At least I learned what I learned before...the knives didn’t go all the way in.”

“Did he cheat on you?”

“No. Well, not that I know of, but I’d still say no. It...I had some medical problems.” For some reason she shot a glance at Suzanna as she said this, but blonde woman appeared oblivious. “They seem to be all cleared up now. But he didn’t handle it well. Theodore could bench-press a ton and hammer all day long, but when it came right down to the crunch, I learned that the man was weak. And I couldn’t trust him to watch my back. If it had been him that had gotten the book, instead of you...Ugh.” She shuddered. “Anyway. The single solitary good thing about train wrecks, as opposed to all the other horrible ways in which relationships can end, is that they are over pretty fast, and all you can do, all you have to do, is pick up the pieces and move on. And so I did. At least, to some extent. I met other guys. I went out on a few dates.” She managed another smile, this time almost humorous. “Somehow, I never seem to have much trouble meeting men. But there was nothing serious. And I still sleep in the bed that Theodore made for us.”

“And now do we finally get to me?”

“Yeah. And then you finally showed up. I came out of my house one morning, and there you were, standing on Nina’s porch. Maybe now I can finally drag that damn bed out in the backyard and take an axe to it.” She looked at him directly. “But anyway. Now that I’ve messily spilled my guts out all over the floor, how about you? Do we have time for one more story? Suzanna told me what she knows, but...who was Elise?”

“Elise.” As he had when the subject of Sparky had come up, Tom looked at Suzanna. “I’ve mentioned Elise to you?”

“On three occasions, sir. The first was three years, five months and two days ago, when we were talking about college romances. You said—”

“Yes, all right. Thank you.” Tom cut her off tiredly and looked back at Erika. “Yeah. Elise Cammell. That was her name.” He turned his own gaze inward, watched Elise bounce cheerfully across the Quad at Western, with the sunlight shining golden in her hair...“I don’t know what to say about Elise. I think...the best I’ve ever been able to come up with is, the woman just had a thing for birds with broken wings. Or maybe she liked playing nurse, or something. I was sick or broken or something...and she helped. I’m grateful to her...I guess she’s the closest thing I’ve had to a love of my life, but when we broke up, just before graduation...it was actually almost a relief. For both of us, I think. No train wreck for us, just one of those long petering outs. Bad, I suppose, but there are worse ways for relationships to end. Maybe it was part of her whole nursing technique. I dunno. Anyway. I lost touch with her. No idea what happened to her after she finished school. And like you, Erika, there have been...one or two others since then, but nothing serious. No great heartbreaks, no great triumphs. Well...except maybe for Suzanna.”

“Did she look like me? Elise?”

“Hmm? No. More like Suzanna. Only even more blonde. A little more...ethereal.” Tom looked at Suzanna. “Actually...now, you resemble her more than ever, now that I think about it. One of those little ironies, I guess.”

“Yes, sir.”

At this point Nina interjected, looking and sounding strained.

“Sir. Please. I’m very sorry, but we really need to talk.”

When The Master had informed Nina and Suzanna that he wouldn’t be having sex with them anymore, Nina’s reaction had been oddly split. There was pain and despair of course, the wheels and the gears in her head all screaming and shooting giant red sparks as they ground against each other in agony.

But at the same time....

It was almost, in some horrible way, a relief. If she didn’t have to think any more about making herself sexually pleasing to the Master, that was one less thing to worry about.

One less thing to get in the way of protecting him.

And it also somehow made it easier, if still far from easy, to finally speak up and interrupt.

The Master studied her, and to her relief nodded.

“You’re right. Enough stories. Enough ancient history, at least. Back to current events.” He turned to look at what Suzanna was holding. Nina kept her own eyes averted. “I see you finished the painting already. And that everyone found out about it.”

“Yes.” Erika. “Suzanna figured out what I was doing. And with her help, it went much faster than I expected.”

“Suzanna? How did she help?”

“I mixed paint, sir. And made sandwiches.”

“Oh. Well, now we need to find out if it works. No. Wait.” The Master massaged his forehead, and Nina had to stifle an impulse to go do it for him. “Of course it works. You used it on the nurses, didn’t you?”

“Yes, sir. We didn’t mean to at first, but we didn’t have any choice.”

“Oh?”

His implied disapproval raked burning sparks across the Machinery, but she somehow found the strength to press on.

“I decided to test it. Just test it, show it to someone new . See if worked on someone who...wasn’t previously involved.”

“I see. So you used Nurse Price?”

“No, sir. We showed it to a blonde woman upstairs. It worked on her, but it also...it triggered something in us. This horrible compulsion to use it...” As she spoke, the Machinery began to make that noise again. Ka-chunk Ka-chunk.. Things seemed to go far away. “To find a woman...and enslave her. For the Mast—”

“Snap out of it, Nina. You too, Suzanna.”

Click.

“Yes, sir. I’m sorry, sir.”

“So the compulsion is still there.”

“Yes, sir. It would probably be best if...” The Machinery offered up a possibility. “I think, sir, you can solve the problem.”

“How so?”

It was Suzanna who replied, having obviously reached the same conclusion.

“By giving us an order not to use it, sir.”

“That’s all?”

“I believe so, sir.”

“Very well, then.” The Master sharpened his voice, and the Machinery trembled. “Suzanna, Nina. Listen very carefully. I am giving both of you a direct order. You are not to use the painting on anyone. Not unless it is a matter of absolute life and death. Do you understand?”

Clunk.

“I understand, sir.”

“I understand, sir.”

A pause.

“Did that help?”

Nina cautiously probed the Machinery, sent out little scuttling scouts, then picked up the thread again.

“Oh, yes, sir. That helped very much. Thank you, sir.”

“So this compulsion is gone?”

She probed deeper, sent more scouts....

-kachunk?—

“Um...No, sir. Not completely. But it’s not chewing at me like it was before. It would still be best if you didn’t leave the painting in our care. Unless it is an emergency.”

“Sir, there’s a monster after us.”

Suzanna interjected this comment, and Nina blinked at the sudden change in topic.

“A monster?” Both Erika and the Master were confused, and he looked around the room, as if expecting something to come leaping out of a cupboard, or from behind the curtain that concealed the elderly man in the other half of the room. “What? What now? Something with fangs and tentacles?”

Nina stepped forward.

“There was a man in the waiting room with us. He was wearing a white coat. When Suzanna saw him, she read his texture—”

“Read his what?”

Erika spoke up.

“It’s how she sees people now, evidently. She tried to explain it to me, after we were at ClickAway. The cybercafe. Some sort of set of subliminal clues she can pick up off people.”

“OK. Fine. I guess. So. The guy in the white coat? A doctor?”

“No.” Suzanna. “He was not a doctor. He was sent here to...I don’t know why he was sent. I can’t read minds. But he was sent here because of us. To follow us. Maybe kill us. I don’t know. He’s done terrible things.”

Nina felt her hand reaching again for her gun, and also felt little urge to stop it.

The Master raised his eyebrows.

“But you just said you can’t read minds.”

“No, sir. No one can read minds, that I am aware of. I can just...read textures. It’s not the right word, there is right word. But I saw it. It was stamped all over him.” She shuddered. “Something terrible happened, and he made it worse. And now he gets sent out to do awful things. He doesn’t enjoy doing them. He just does them. Like a machine.”

The Master considered all of this, then looked at the door.

“What does he look like? Physically?”

Suzanna instantly straightened up and began to recite.

“The Monster is a white male, approximately 40 years old. He stands an inch or two above six feet tall. He weighs approximately 200 pounds, and is quite muscular. He has light blue eyes and thinning brown hair, cut very short. His face is craggy, with a wide nose that appears to have been broken on at least one occasion. He has a noticable scar across the back of his right hand. When we saw him, he was wearing a white coat, dark gray slacks, shiny black shoes, and a pair of brown-framed glasses.”

“You’re saying he’s the one who cut my brake line?”

“No, sir. While he would be quite capable of doing such a thing, and is the most likely suspect at the present time, I have no evidence that he actually did so.”

“What did he do? When he was in the waiting room with you?”

Nina spoke.

“He just sat down and read a magazine, sir. He never said anything. After Suzanna came back with some food, saw him, and ran off with the painting, and I followed, we didn’t see him again. That was when we decided to test the painting.”

He shifted his focus to Erika.

“Did you see this guy?”

She scratched her forehead.

“Uh...yeah. I guess I did. But he was just sitting there. Reading a magazine, like Nina just said. I didn’t pay any attention to him. I did notice the white jacket.”

Back to Nina.

“So he could be anywhere right now.”

“Yes, sir.”

They all looked at the door.

The Monster failed to come bursting through it, wielding an enormous axe, but like before, back at Harrison, seeing the Master lying dead in a pool of blood, for a moment that scene imprinted itself across Nina’s mind with searing vitality.

She considered, then marched to the bed, found the controls that lay near the Master’s hand and pushed the ‘Summon Nurse’ button.

“Nina? What are you doing?” The Master eyed her cautiously.

She squared her shoulders. “I am taking care of security, sir. That is my job.” She looked at the curtain again. “And we should not discuss anything else of importance until I’m done. In my opinion, sir.”

“I see. OK.” The Master considered, then leaned back. “Carry on, then. But after that, we definitely have some other things to discuss.”

As she had been told, Holli paid for the uniform and the hat and the tag holder. There was a scary moment while scribbling her signature on the charge slip where she couldn’t remember her own last name. The world was suddenly filled with scary moments.

-When I’m with her, I don’t even have a fucking last name anymore. Or some fucking thing.—

She looked at the back of the store. There was a door going off, with a sign on it that said EMPLOYEES ONLY. There was probably a fire door back there, a place where the fucking delivery trucks unloaded, something. She could stomp the weed behind the counter, and be out of here, running away...

The thought came and went. She grabbed the handles of the shitty plastic bag the weed had stuffed her purchases and receipt into, and she left the store by the front door, pushing hard on the swinging glass, half-hoping it would break.

Her truck was right where she had left it, and it was empty.

Another thought, sneaking up on her like that fucking mugger that had tried to jump her a few months back in the alley behind Drakken’s. Tried being the word; she’d sent the little bastard home with his tail between his fucking legs. The memory of that moment gave her an extra burst of strength, enough to get her across the sidewalk.

She yanked open the driver’s door, dropped the bag into the already-crowded slit that was the vehicle’s “backseat”, slid into place. Closed the door and fastened her seatbelt.

Butt on the seat, fingers around the wheel.

She looked around. No one in sight. The sidewalk thought came back again, stronger than before. She could just drive away. It would be easy. Key in the ignition. Drive away and leave that-

Leave Kristen behind.

If she did that, she’s just have to go after him on her own. And Kristen would...

Miss Moresen would...

The whole world slowly went cold and dark.

Holli sat quietly and waited, looking at nothing, thinking about almost nothing, her hands still gripping the wheel.

After forever, Miss Moresen came back, coming up the stripmall’s sidewalk, carrying in one hand something long and skinny, and in the other another of those bags. The only difference from Holli’s were the blue words printed on the side: PRENTISS KITCHEN SUPPLIES.

Miss Moresen smiled widely as she got in the cab. Like Holli, she stuffed the bag and the long thing...a new broom, still wrapped in plastic...away out of sight behind the seat. She didn’t speak until after she had set her purse to one side and fastened her own seatbelt.

“All done?”

“Yes, Miss Moresen.” Holli stared straight ahead at the various sale signs in the window of the uniform store, not daring to look at the other woman.

“Miss...Yes. That is appropriate, isn’t it, now?” A long pause. “You know...I understand some things better now. It’s not just him...I see now.”

This seemed to be demanding a reply, so Holli forced the words out.

“I don’t understand, Miss Moresen.”

-You understand all too well, bitch.—

There was a chill in her head, flat and dead but existing nonetheless. She had heard a voice often enough over the years, relentless poking away at the back of her mind as she made her way through life. But now....

The voice was no longer her father’s, but instead Miss Moresen’s.

Miss Moresen went on, with forced casualness.

“I sleep around a lot. I suppose you know that. That everyone knows it.” A pause, and Holli heard the sound of Miss Moresen slowly tapping her fingernails against her passenger window. Holli bit off the need to scream, thinking about those nails.... “No. I used to sleep around a lot. Because now.... Now I see what I was looking for with all those men. They were all wrong somehow, and it simply never occured to me what the problem was. I was looking for you. You. Right there under my nose all the time.”

“I don’t—”

“Be quiet. Big and strong and not terribly bright, but not a man, either. It’s all so perfect.”

Holli struggled to speak. Her mouth wouldn’t open.

-Run. Run away. Go back to hospital, kill him and then run very far away and hide-

Her body gave a violent twitch, which Miss Moresen evidently saw, and laughed at.

“Thinking about leaving, or something? That won’t do at all. Don’t move, Holli. Stay absolutely still.”

Her body locked in place.

Kristen laughed, and stroked Holli’s side.

Like petting a damn dog.

-A dog. A bitch. Maybe Miss Moresen will get me a collar to wear...—

Holli’s cunt began to moan.

“Yesss. That’s it. So very perfect. To repeat what I said a short time ago...I was first. I used it on you. Even if...hmm. You know, I just realized.... I don’t even remember what ‘it’ was anymore. How odd. Anyway. That puts me in charge of our relationship. But not just beyond our...present circumstance...It puts me permanently in charge. After we kill him.... No. After you kill him, we must give credit where credit is due, now, mustn’t we? Assuming you don’t go to prison or get shot by a security guard or something...that fact won’t change anything between us. Will it, Holli?”

Holli struggled to open her mouth, but instead she stayed absolutely still.

Miss Moresen laughed again.

“You may speak. When I ask you a question.”

“Killing him won’t change anything between us. Miss Moresen.”

This time Miss Moresen patted her on the head, and Holli’s body trembled all over, teetering uselessly on the brink of orgasm. So that was something else she couldn’t do without permission. Why not? It was moving, wasn’t it?

And that had been forbidden.

Finally Hollibitch was able to calm down, but it was a flat thin calm, shaped like the things you see floating in the air above highway asphalt on hot sunny days.

Miss Moresen leaned back in her seat, and stretched.

“Now then. We’ve got a couple of hours to kill. So. First, let’s go get something to eat. I’m just starved. And after that...we’ll see...”

Hollibitch’s cunt screamed.