The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive

Carol stepped into the low round room and looked up at the glowing blue pods.

She was tempted to slash at them with the knife, but that was just her anger. It would serve no purpose other than to possibly alert whatever these things were, and to coat Carol in more blue ichor.

A bath was what she needed. A long, warm, soak in a claw-footed tub. With Katy.

She sighed. They had Katy. Katy, and now Tasya, and probably Ginger and Milly and Carin and Maria. And Carol had dropped her machete and was armed only with a knife. It was a good knife, and she knew how to use it, but it was still only a knife.

She looked around the room. Three exits, one which led back the way she had come. It made a certain amount of sense, going back. The things might have cleared out, and she could get out and find the others. They should be on the ropes by now, with the radio.

But... Kiko and Surbitsar both had crawled around down here and come out again. And neither of them had been as... aggressive as Carol was. Maybe she would find something.

Someone.

Carol braced her shoulders and took the left-hand exit.

Kiko crept through the bushes.

The creatures were out in the bushes as well. She had encountered two of them already, scrambling away from them as they turned to... to point at her. But she had either lost them, they had not pursued, or they were following her stealthily.

That last was not worth thinking about; it served only to scare herself. If they grabbed her, they grabbed her. She would do what she could to prevent it.

Yet she could not help but think of Carol. Naked in the drizzle, staring blankly, with that thing on her back. Intoning “all must obey.” Her sex and her head gripped by those blue arms.

What sort of creatures were these?

The camp was just ahead. The others must return to the camp. If they escaped. Kiko pictured Wen disappearing under the pile of blue flesh. There had been nothing she could do.

Was there even now?

Wen had the radio.

The rain continued, a warm mist. Watching it drift down in long grey streamers from the top of the sinkhole would have been wondrous in any other circumstance. Kiko crouched low and peered around a water-soaked bush.

The camp was full of creatures.

A half-dozen, perhaps, perhaps more. Standing around on three legs, their free arms raised into the air.

There was movement in the bushes and for a moment Kiko’s hope rose as she saw a human figure. Then it turned around.

It was Milly.

She was as naked as Ginger had been, with soft blue flesh gripping her tightly around the ribs, pressing down on her straight black hair, cupping between her legs. Her body was slick with rain, and she left wet footprints as she walked around the semi-cave. Somehow, she still had on her shoes.

She was picking things up.

As Kiko watched, Milly finished rolling up a bedroll—Tasya’s—and squatted down to tie it to a backpack. Then she picked up the backpack and walked to a nearby creature. She ran her fingertips down the creature’s midsection.

It bent one leg and leaned back, raising its extended arm in the air.

Milly put the backpack on it. The free arm curled around the backpack.

Kiko stared as the creature resumed its tripod stance and walked off, wearing Tasya’s pack.

Milly began to gather up Katy’s belongings.

Something moved behind Kiko and she froze, turning slowly.

It was a creature! No, several creatures. They were just behind her, coming through the bushes; they were only a few feet away, but they had stopped moving. They raised their arms. Kiko prepared to run.

“kiko. come out.”

Milly.

She should run. She really should run. But if she kept running as an option—if she didn’t get trapped—she might be able to find out more.

Slowly, Kiko stood up.

Milly was staring at her, nude, hands at her sides. Gripped from behind by that thing. Her face was blank, expressionless.

“kiko. give up, kiko. come here. submit.”

“No, Milly,” Kiko said, whipping her head around to check that none of the creatures were sneaking up on her. The ones in the camp with Milly were motionless, save for the weaving of their arms in the air.

“give up, kiko. you must submit. you must obey.” Milly’s dark eyes were wide open and glittering. Her lips were wet.

“Perhaps instead, Milly, you could take that thing off your back. Then we can talk.”

“my minder will remain on me. you must have a minder. you must submit. you must obey.”

Kiko began circling around counterclockwise, passing through the bushes at the very edge of the camp. “What it is, Milly? What are they? What’s happened to you?”

Milly slowly turned, following Kiko’s movement through the wet growth. “i am becoming a slave. you must become a slave. you must submit.”

“’Becoming’ is what you say? So you are not a slave yet?”

“i am becoming. the minder is transforming me. you must accept a minder, kiko. come here. submit.”

“Maybe if you tell me more about what I would be getting into,” Kiko said. “Exactly what are these things?”

“submit and discover,” Milly replied. “nothing better has or will ever happen to you.”

Kiko stopped; she had come near the cliff wall. Her suspicion that some of the creatures had been trying to sneak up on her was still tingling, but there was nowhere left to go but into camp—not bloody likely—or back away.

“Why are you picking up our things, Milly?” she asked.

“none may leave. all must obey. these items may be put into the service of my masters. enough stalling, kiko. come here.”

It was like a gunfight, for a moment, Milly staring at Kiko staring back at Milly. No one moved.

Then Kiko ran away.

Carol stared into the room and was impressed despite herself. It was vast, as large as a basketball arena, almost a perfect trapezoid in shape. She stood in a small door that opened in the center of the wide wall. The opposite, shorter wall was covered floor to high ceiling in carvings, band atop band of figures, like a roman triumphal column. In the center of the room there was a statue on a pedestal, the legs and torso of a woman.

There were also a bunch of the giant blue eggs. And the ceiling was covered in glowing blue, with long tentacles reaching down twenty or thirty feet in places. The room was alive with the starfish-like creatures, walking around on three arms, long arm up in the air. What they were doing was impossible to guess.

“Well,” Carol observed to the darkness. “Now what.”

The darkness moved.

They were behind her. A lot of them. Close.

Things were moving towards her, several of them, not glowing in the slightest. Once again they had gone dark and snuck up on her. Carol snarled, mostly at herself. She had her knife up, but she was in a terrible spot; if more than a few of the creatures had snuck up on her...

The lead starfish shuffled past.

Carol held her knife out, guard position. But the creatures ignored her. And there were many of them, too many, twenty or thirty that swayed by her on their three legs, close enough to touch.

Once in the room, they began to glow.

Hadn’t they seen her? They didn’t have eyes... but that had not kept them from finding her—or Tasya—earlier. What the fuck? They were ignoring her now?

Well, back or forward. Those were the choices.

Carol stepped into the room.

Nothing happened. No tentacles swung her way, no creatures rushed her.

There were two other exits, equidistant on either side of her. Whatever strange fortune was keeping the things from noticing her, Carol was not going to push it. She headed for the left opening.

She realized that her hands were glowing.

And her arms, and legs. Carol froze, holding her limbs out, staring at them. And her tits, and her stomach, and shoulders...

She had almost forgotten that she was drenched in their blood; it had stopped glowing shortly after it had dried. There was something in this room, then, something that re-activated it.

Carol turned around, slowly. There was a creature right behind her, tentacle up, weaving it slowly back and forth.

Her fist tightened on the knife.

It just stood there. Like it was sniffing.

Then it turned and wandered away.

Carol turned around. She was disguised—disguised in the creatures’ blood.

Carol smiled grimly.

Now she just had to find Katy.

“Did you see what happened to Kiko?”

Beshaarir shook her head. Surbitsar stared at her, then slumped. She didn’t understand the other woman, never had. Everyone expected them to bond because they were from the subcontinent. But Beshaarir made less sense to Surbitsar than even Tasya had.

Still, it was good not to be alone. She could ask Beshaarir what she wanted to do, but then Beshaarir might snap at her because of course she didn’t know either. So no point in asking.

Two of them. And the sinkhole filled with those things. And Professor Maitland.

What could possibly have happened?

The thing had changed her. Brainwashed her, like in a cheap movie. But how? What was the mechanism? Nothing could have evolved to do that.

There were wasps. They could slide a proboscis into the brain of a cockroach and steer it like a toy car. But Professor Maitland was a human woman, with the most complex brain on the planet. If something had ever evolved that could control that... it would have taken over the planet long ago.

Or been eradicated.

The ruins. An ancient civilization. Had they all been slaves? Had they been destroyed?

By whom?

How?

“How long should we stay here?” Beshaarir asked suddenly.

They were crouched on a ledge—a dry ledge—at the eastern end of the sinkhole. It was under a large overhang, which had collapsed recently enough that the rock scree around them was not overgrown with plants. Nor was it shot through with holes. If any of the creatures—or any of the other women—came near, they would not be able to sneak up.

“Wen had the radio,” Surbitsar replied. “We should try to get it.”

“Can we ascend the ropes alone?”

“One of us can belay the other. I will do it. You can climb the ropes, with the radio. We have to call for help.”

“If Professor Maitland is still there?”

“Then we will deal with that when we must.” Surbitsar laughed without humor. “Probably we will run away again.”

“Surbitsar...”

“Yes?”

Beshaarir gave her a level look. “Surbitsar, we’re not friends. But I... I wanted to say, I admire you. You are dealing with this horror in... in an admirable way. And however this turns out, you have my respect.”

Surbitsar stared back, then nodded. “Thank you. I... appreciate your words. And I, too, am impressed by how you have fought. You are brave and intelligent, Beshaarir.”

“I’m not, but thank you anyway.” Beshaarir leapt down from the ledge and steadied herself on the scree. She held up the ruined flashlight and gave it a few squeezes.

“Shall we go find the radio?”

She really should have left the room and found her way back outside. Or, searched for Katy.

But... but now that Carol knew she was not going to be molested, her curiosity got the better of her. She was in this tremendous room, with that statue and that wall, and she wanted to see more. It would only take a few minutes. She had her knife.

Still half-anticipating a soft-but-firm sudden embrace from the dangling tentacles, Carol walked out to the middle of the room. She walked past a dozen creatures, a score of the waist-height eggs. Nothing seemed to notice her.

Everything was blue. Everything, including Carol, glowed.

The statue was on a pedestal and the pedestal had a frieze. On the statue itself, a woman’s torso three times human size stood with legs akimbo. It had no arms or head, and up close Carol could see that this was either a decision by the artist or they had been neatly sawn off, for the stumps were smooth-ended.

The body of the statue, which was probably pure white but like everything else at the moment was an electric blue, was incredibly detailed. Carol circled around to see the front. The woman was in a strange hunker-down and her sex was exposed and slightly open. Carol had never seen a statue with a pussy, much less a lifelike one, and particularly never one so... lewd. As though the statue woman were thrusting herself down onto... well, something, while trying to remain standing.

In front of the statue there was a clear path to the adorned wall; no pods, no creatures—and, in fact, the floor had two long parallel ruts, perhaps a foot deep and smooth, that ran from the pedestal to the wall, a distance of some hundred feet.

Carol turned to look at the frieze. The women on it had heads and arms, and no tentacles, but they were all kneeling and leaning back. Detail was harder to make out than on the statue; things had moved past the pedestal and smoothed it, or the rock was softer, or something.

There was a clutch of pods, three medium and one almost as high as Carol’s navel, up against the pedestal. Carol felt a sudden urge to touch the stone.

The urge worried her but not enough to resist. She reached down with her empty hand.

It was smooth, and cool.

Motion caught carol’s eye, motion across the room and behind the statue. She looked up.

Tasya was walking into the room.

The ropes had been pulled up.

Bish stared up the cliff face. The yellow lines were still there, but they no longer reached the ground. Instead, they had been pulled into a hole in the rock thirty feet up.

Nor was there any sign of the radio, or of Wen, or Kiko.

Or, for that matter, Ginger. Or the creatures.

She looked at Surbitsar, who was scanning the ground. “Do you think that the things did that?” Bish asked, pointing up. “Or did Ginger get up there somehow?”

“I could not say. Either is possible—the entire area is evidently connected through the cave system.”

“If Ginger did it, then we ought to be able to get to the ropes from the caves.”

Surbitsar looked up. “I agree. Climbing up to them from here does not seem feasible, at least for me. Katy or Carol, perhaps.”

“Yeah.” They looked at each other. “We go to the camp?”

“Yes.”

The pair re-entered the bushes. The rain had ceased but everything, including Bish and Surbitsar, was soaking wet. At least in this part of Papua the rain was not cold. Bish reached up to run a hand across her hair and force some water out.

Movement.

They froze. Slowly, Bish lowered herself down. Surbitsar was ahead of her, crouching behind a huge grass-like bush.

Several of the creatures went by, coming from the camp and headed towards the southern wall and the caves. They were fortunately moving on a perpendicular line to the womens’ path, and the creatures were at least fifteen feet away.

Bish needed to sneeze.

Then Milly walked by.

Bish pinched her nose hard enough to hurt.

She was like Ginger, completely naked—except for shoes—and had one of those creatures on her back, its body pressed into hers. It held on tightly around her ribs, curved blue arms beneath her small breasts. One of the tentacles was atop her head, one between her legs.

Milly walked, head high and back erect, carrying a duffel in either hand. She too did not notice Bish and Surbitsar where they hid. In a moment she would be out of sight.

What was she doing? Taking their supplies?

Milly stopped.

Bish felt herself tense, and waited for Milly to turn and face them. Suddenly she felt tingles running down her back—were the creatures circling around? Had they gotten behind them?

But Milly did not turn to face them. Instead, she shifted in place, spreading her legs. She let the duffle bags fall to the ground.

The tentacle clapped between her legs began to unpeel.

The tip rolled off first, and slowly the entire arm uncurled, pulling away; standing as she was sideways to them, Milly’s leg blocked Bish’s view of her sex.

A small part of Bish chided herself for wholly inappropriate voyeuristic desires. And was blown away as the tentacle pulled back past Milly’s leg and there was a huge blue dildo at the end of it.

It was blue and contoured, and seemed to grow out of the inner surface of the tentacle. A long streamer of glisten ran from it back up between Milly’s legs, then snapped and fell away.

Sweet Mercy, she was walking around with that stuffed in her?

The tentacle curled back further until it was in an arc the reverse of that it had before when cupped between Milly’s legs. It looked like a tail.

Milly squatted down, and began to pee.

Bish looked away. She scanned the bushes behind them, but saw no sign of any creatures sneaking up. She looked at Surbitsar, whose attention was riveted on Milly.

Bish looked back. A creature emerged from the bushes in the direction of the camp and passed right by the crouching Milly, moving in the direction of the caves.

Slowly, Milly stood up.

The tentacle curled forward again, bending up between Milly’s legs.

Milly reached down and guided it back in.

It was terrifying—but it was hot. Bish stared as Milly reached between her own legs, one hand in front and one from behind, and seated the thing inside her. Her mouth had opened and she made a soft mewling noise.

Her hands came away. The flat part of the tentacle, where Bish could see it on Milly’s mons, rippled once, then held fast against her.

Milly’s hands drifted to her sides. Back erect, she crouched down, picked up the duffle bags, then walked into the bushes.

What in the hell?

Carol stood crouched down next to the statue. At the back of the room—or maybe the front; in any case, the wide end with the three doorways—Tasya was walking past the center entrance.

She was stark naked.

One of the things was on her back, like a backpack or the proverbial monkey. It was gripping her with all four arms, two around her ribs and the other two atop her head and between her legs.

She didn’t seem to notice; she walked not stiffly, exactly, but erect, back straight and head high. Her expression was blank and mindless. She was carrying one of the big blue pods, her hands supporting it from underneath, like one would carry a potted plant or a delicate vase.

What had they done to her?

Then Katy walked in.

She came out of the center doorway, the one Carol had come from and the one Tasya was walking past. She was naked as well, the nipples on her breasts tight stubs, the tattoo... Carol could see the tattoo, a fingers-width away from the flattened tentacle end where the thing on her back reached around and pressed up between her legs.

Her eyes were wide, her face wearing a small, vacant smile. She stopped, turned slowly on a heel, and fell in behind Tasya.

They were heading for the third doorway.

Carol did not have time to be happy that they were alive, confused at what had happened to them, or baffled by this entire situation. They were there and she needed to rescue them.

She began to move low, crouching, crossing the floor on crab legs, but that wasn’t fast enough and the room was too large; even with their somnambulant pace she was going to lose them out that other doorway.

So, fuck it. Carol stood up and strode.

She wove around the pods on the floor, past a gathering of hanging tentacles, sped up a little as she recalculated their relative speeds. Nothing snatched at her; the blue blood still kept her safe.

There was a joke in that, but no time for it.

Tasya reached the far doorway and walked into it, but just as Katy got there so did Carol. Carol reached out and grabbed her shoulder.

Katy stopped, then slowly turned.

She looked at Carol blankly. Then she opened her mouth to speak.

“carol. you must obey.”

Around her, the creatures came alive.

Bish kept seeing that... thing, that had been in Milly’s sex. Wet, blue... so big. How it flexed, and moved.

How Milly had groaned as she shoved it back inside.

The camp was empty. Cleared out. She and Surbitsar stood and slowly looked around, feeling utterly helpless. There were no bedrolls, no food, no equipment—no sign that they had ever been there. Milly, with the help of those creatures, had cleared the area out entirely.

Surbitsar sat down on a rock.

“We can,” she said slowly. “We can try to reach the ropes. Or, we can try to get our supplies back. From the caves.”

Or we can give up and let them take us, Bish added, but did not say it aloud.

“We should try to get our supplies,” came a voice from the bushes, and they both jumped.

Kiko stepped into view. “Milly was here, with a lot of the things. They took all of our gear.”

“We saw her,” Surbitsar said. “Leaving.”

Bish stared at Kiko; she wanted to hug her, just for being alive and free. What had she been thinking, giving up?

“Have you seen Wen?” Kiko asked.

“No.”

“Ah.”

There was a moment’s quiet.

“I think we should go into the caves,” Kiko finally said. “That is my vote. I am willing to try for the ropes if you both feel that we should, but... I think we should try to get our supplies back. And if possible, rescue our friends.”

“Do you think we can?” Bish asked.

“I have no idea. But we have not tried.”

That was true enough.

“We have only your machete,” Surbitsar said, “and the flashlight that Bish is carrying. I dropped my weapon at the ropes, and it is no longer there.”

“Then I will go in front,” Kiko replied. Her dark eyes were unreadable, inscrutable.

Bish was struck with the sudden observation that it was fortunate that the possessed wore no clothes.

Surbitsar wished once again that she had not dropped the machete.

Their possessed colleagues were certainly tidy. The camp, the base of the ropeline, the entrance to the cave; all had been entirely cleaned up. Even the broken casing of Beshaarir’s flashlight—there were no pieces left at all.

This left Surbitsar the options of carrying a rock, a stick, or nothing at all, to defend herself from the limitless numbers of creatures they were once again intending to encounter.

Kiko pulled her head back from the hole between the entrance chamber and the first, tall room. “I do not see anything. I am going in.” She handed the machete to Beshaarir, who stood behind her, and climbed up into the hole.

Her flashlight came on; Surbitsar watched as the circle of yellow visibility played around the room. “It is clear,” Kiko said, and reached down for the machete. Beshaarir handed it up, waited for Kiko to back up, then climbed into the hole herself.

Surbitsar followed.

The tall room looked the same, water-worn, natural, but with the three tunnels leading away whose flat surfaces bespoke their unnatural origins. The western tunnel ran up, unexplored. The southern, up to the room where the group first encountered the tentacles and from which Surbitsar had run into the maze. And the eastern, which ran down, the tunnel that Kiko and Surbitsar had fled out of, leaving Carol and Tasya to their fate.

“Which way?” Kiko asked.

Beshaarir held her hand palms up, not venturing a suggestion.

“Down,” Surbitsar said. If they were entering the lion’s den, there was no sense trying to avoid the lions.

Kiko turned the flashlight on the eastern tunnel. They descended.

The broken room, the rectangle sundered by the crack from which the creatures had erupted to seize Tasya, was empty, but the floor was slick with fluid. Carol had fought a mighty battle here; but ultimately, a losing one. Surbitsar wondered how the three of them thought they stood a chance, where Carol and Tasya—armed with guns!—had failed. But she said nothing.

“Where are the bits?” Beshaarir asked.

“What do you mean?”

“The floor is covered in blood, but where are the bits? The severed arms?”

Kiko moved the flashlight’s beam around, but there was no flesh to be seen.

“Let us continue,” she said, and vaulted across the gap in the floor.

The tunnel descended further and they reached the entrance to the water tunnel, the round hole through which Surbitsar had crawled. Still there was no sign of the creatures.

“Where are they?” Beshaarir demanded.

“Down, or into the tunnel?” Kiko asked.

“Down,” Surbitsar said, and realized why she said so only as she did. She wanted to find the bottom. Something, some almost subliminal guess, told her that if there were answers, were a heart to this place, it would be at the very bottom.

“I have been that way,” Kiko said. “There is a large room with a statue. But there was no sign there of our compatriots.”

“Were there exits?”

“There were.”

“Then let’s go that way.”

They moved onward, and down. Ahead of them, blue light began to show.

“Say, if we keep going down, shouldn’t we hit water?” Beshaarir asked.

“Possibly but we are overall at a fairly high elevation,” Kiko said, “and—”

The darkness around them burst into motion. Something dropped onto Surbitsar and she screamed, joining Beshaarir who was also screaming. The flashlight fell to the floor and rolled, and suddenly the only visibility was struggling silhouettes.

“Go down,” Kiko shouted, “we must reach some light.”

“They’ve got me,” Beshaarir replied. “Oh, they’ve got me!”

They had Surbitsar as well, strong arms enfolding her wrists, curling around her legs. She bucked and stumbled, dropping to the floor. A tentacle curled around her face, and she could not pull her hands up to pull it away.

She bit it, but it did not move. With all her strength she pushed down on the floor, tried to stand, and rose a few inches—which was enough to dislodge the arm from her eyes and nose. She sucked in a tremendous breath of air.

There were wet chopping noises, so Kiko must still be loose. But Surbitsar was being moved, now, dragged away, and her loudest cry was only a muffled hum.

They had her.

Bish’s right arm was held by one of the creatures, and she had stumbled and spun around it, tripping over another one, falling to the ground. More of them kept trying to seize her legs and she kicked at them, pumping her legs out and back, striking at them. She still had the broken flashlight but her hand was enfolded in tentacles and she couldn’t use it...

She could hear Kiko fighting them, hacking, and could hear Kiko’s flashlight clatter away down the tunnel. Surbitsar had gone silent, which could only mean that they had grabbed her, too.

Then something blue and glowing and big dropped from the ceiling, almost on top of Bish. She jerked away from it, and then realized, stunned, that it was Carol.

Carol slashed at the creature holding Bish’s arm, severing the tentacle with one blow, then turned and lashed out at the ones crowding Bish’s feet.

Bish stared up at her; Carol was a blur of turquoise motion. A blue drop of sweat landed on Bish’s cheek.

“Get up,” Carol hissed.

Bish batted down her astonishment and vaulted to her feet. Carol thrust a pointing finger towards the ceiling. “Up there,” she said. “There’s a tunnel, go!”

Bish could barely make out a darker patch of black above her; she hopped up and her hand found an edge. Gripping it with both hands, she pulled herself up, and into a pitch black space.

Below her, Carol had found Kiko, and was giving her the same instruction. Kiko held the machete up—it was not glowing, Bish noticed—and Bish took it, then Kiko scrambled up into the space.

Carol followed. “Move,” she said. “That way.”

“Surbitsar!” Bish objected. “She’s still down there!”

“She’s not. They took her, and they’re all riled up now so I can’t get to her. Now, crawl.”

Bish hesitated—she wanted to object but Carol was so forceful-

“Look, either we will get her back or we won’t but we can’t face them now or they will overrun us all. Now move!”

Bish crawled, the machete clinking softly against the rock floor of the tunnel. Carol’s soft glow did not serve to illuminate the tunnel ahead, so Bish was moving forward blindly, feeling with the machete then following on hands and knees.

Shortly, however, the blue glow began to show from ahead of them. An opening in the floor of the tunnel was full of the eerie radiance. Bish stopped just before reaching it.

“Hang on, let me past,” Carol said, and squeezed past Kiko and Bish. She crawled up to the opening and looked down. Then she thrust her legs out, lowered herself into the opening, and dropped.

Bish looked down; Carol had landed on what looked like a large blue ottoman, a fat cylinder with a dimple in the middle. She stood up and beckoned at Bish to come down.

Bish handed the machete to Kiko, whose eyes glittered blue in the light. Then she hung her body down into the opening, and dropped.

The pod-thing was soft like a waterbed, and cushioned her fall. Bish stood up; ten feet above, Kiko was already hanging herself down.

Bish looked around. They stood in the center of a large, low-ceilinged room... no, not low-ceilinged, just so wide as to appear so. It was full of blue pods and streamers, of multitudinous shapes and sizes. Some of them seemed to pulse, some of them moved as though in a faint breeze (although there was no breeze). Some were the size of a man and almost transparent. Carol, Kiko, and Bish stood at a high point in the room; the alien forest sloped gently away from them in all directions.

What concerned Bish the most were the tentacles. “Carol,” she asked, seeing no exits, only tight horizons of blue, “how are we going to get out of here?”

Carol took the machete from Kiko, walked a few steps down hill, and slashed viciously at a large pod. It spurted blue fluid.

“Cover yourselves in that,” she said, pointing at the glowing blue spurting from the damaged ovoid. “They don’t recognize you as an intruder if you are covered in their blood.”

Bish hesitated but Kiko walked forward immediately, stepping into the diminishing spray and letting it spatter all over her. Carol hacked at some tentacles, and some more pods, and a fronded cylinder that must have been eight feet tall. She hewed it down, then picked up the severed top and tossed it to Bish.

“Go on,” she said. “If we’re going to rescue anyone, you have to glow from head to toe.”

Kiko was almost covered; she thrust the top of her head into one of the wounded pods, and withdrew it soaking in blue. Carol had already begun to descend through the alien foliage.

Bish walked down into the injured forest, rubbing the severed flesh on her skin.

Surbitsar was held by a wall of flesh.

It was composed of the small pods, hundreds of them, and her elbows and legs below the knee were held tightly by something within the wall. Her arms were bent at her sides, hands free, but each elbow was gripped by something behind her and she couldn’t bring her arms forward so much as a centimeter.

She was also completely naked.

The room she was in was small, and squared off, and the walls—at least the three not holding her—were covered in bas-relief figures, rows of them. They reminded Surbitsar of some of the Khajuraho temples with their intricate carvings of human figures, not least because here too the figures were nude.

Opposite Surbitsar’s wall was a rectangular doorway; beyond it, Surbitsar could see creatures passing. The blue glow from the wall lit the room and spilled out the doorway, but there was more light from some other source outside.

Katy appeared in the doorway.

She was naked, of course, one of the starfish riding her. Its blue arms held tightly beneath her handful-size breasts. She was smiling vacantly, gripped also on her head and between her legs.

“surbitsar,” she said. “sister. welcome.”

Surbitsar pulled but of course she was held fast. “Katy. Let me out of here.”

“you will be free once you are a slave,” Katy said. She walked into the room.

There was no thought in her blue eyes, just a glossy passivity. Katy no longer made decisions, she merely carried them out.

Wen entered the room behind her.

Her smile was not as obvious but her eyes were just as clear of thought. “hello surbitsar,” she said. “we all must obey.”

Surbitsar realized that she ought to have been terrified. Watching Wen enter the room, nude and in the grip of one of those things, was such a clear harbinger of her own impending fate that she should have lapsed into screaming panic. She was greatly surprised and mildly proud that she hadn’t. In a time of crisis, she could still act.

Now they just had to slip up.

Tasya filed in next, and she was carrying a pod, a big one, a third as large as herself. The muscles of her arm stood in sharp relief as she brought it into the center of the room. Ovoid like the rest, this one had a ring of small tentacles at the top, like a sea anemone. Tasya smiled vacantly as she set it down on the floor between Surbitsar’s legs.

“Tasya,” Surbitsar pleaded, as the possessed Russian took a backwards step, “Tasya, help me get out of here.”

“i am helping you,” Tasya said in the same pre-recorded tone of voice as the others, flavored by her Russian accent. “you will obey. all must obey.”

“slaves are necessary to bring the masters,” Katy said. She and Wen both stepped forward so that, with Tasya, they surrounded the pod with Surbitsar hanging on the fourth side. “now we awaken the possessor.” They stood, side by side, glazed eyes fixed on Surbitsar.

The three of them suddenly shuddered, hands fluttering at their thighs. Fully panicked or not, Surbitsar realized that she was panting, her heart racing. Her eyes flicked from one nude form to another as the three of them, all close enough to touch her, shivered, and their eyes rolled up in their heads.

Wet noises came from below. Unable to look away, Surbitsar watched as the tentacle between Wen’s legs unpeeled, pointed tip coming away from her cropped black hair, revealing the glossywet lips, and then slowly pulling out the thick tube that it had grown inside her.

Wen’s hands flapped at her thighs, her eyes straining into her head, and then the shaft plopped out with a wet smack and Wen grunted. The tentacle continued its slow curl backwards, and then Katy came with small high-pitched noises, and Tasya moaned.

Their tentacles continued curling until they were reversed, short curved tails sprouting from each backside.

Eyes slowly slid down and returned to their glassy focus. Surbitsar stared as each of them tilted her head to look down at the pod between them.

Katy reached for it, took hold of one of the anemone-like fronds. She widened her stance a little, shuffled forward, and fed it into her glistening sex.

Surbitsar felt paralyzed now, helpless, as Wen and Tasya followed suit, each taking one of the pods’ tapered arms and impaling herself on it. Although soft, the tentacles were meaty and their pussies well-lubricated, and soon each of the three chosen limbs was engulfed to the root, and Katy and Wen and Tasya touched at the thighs.

Surbitsar tried hard not to think of her own exposed, slightly splayed sexlips, only a foot or so from multiple unoccupied tentacles that decorated the top of the pod.

Those tentacles began to move.

They started to wave, softly. The three women were making soft noises and the top of the egg was... opening. With a wet sound it came open like a mouth. Wen and Katy and Tasya were sliding their thighs against each other as they bounced, slowly, pressing their crotches into the flesh of the giant egg, and it was coming open.

Surbitsar could do no other than to look.

It was light inside, a brighter light than the blue that filled the room, and it... pulsed. Brighter, then dimmer, then brighter, but increasing, and the egg was opening wider and so were Surbitsar’s eyes, her mouth falling open unconsciously. Her eyes widened and she stared down into the light, and began to spread her legs without knowing it...

Three glowing blue women crept along a tunnel.

It was an artery of some sort; the starfish (that’s what Carol called them) came by on a regular basis. The women moved faster, but stopped from time to time, so starfish passed them both approaching and from behind. Many of them were carrying things, ovoids and spheres and stranger objects. Some of the starfish were glowing; most were not. All were blue, probably.

Bish’s vision had, in the absence of any light other than the soft blue glow she now emitted, gone monochromatic. Everything was blue. It was like watching a black and white film through colored plastic. A black and white monster film.

Just as Carol had said, the blue blood on their skin and clothes seemed to make them invisible to the starfish. The creatures never bumped into them, stopping or turning at the last moment to avoid colliding wtih them, but otherwise seemed to ignore the three women completely.

Was it scent? It couldn’t be sight, the things had no eyes...

“Where are we going?” Kiko asked quietly.

“To find our friends,” Carol replied. “I encountered Tasya and Katy in a big room down this way.”

“Katy?” Bish blurted. “Was she...”

“Yes,” Carol replied curtly. “And I should warn you, they can still see you and they will warn the starfish. I had to fight my way out of that room.”

“Katy turned you in?” asked Kiko.

Carol didn’t reply.

The busy corridor came to an intersection with another corridor, forming a ‘T’. Some of the starfish turned to the right and disappeared, others emerged and walked away down the passage.

Carol, in front, looked down the adjoining corridor. She stiffened.

“Quick,” she hissed, spinning in place and looking frantically around. “There,” she pointed, indicating a dark alcove. “Get in there.”

Kiko and Bish obeyed, kept from questions by Carol’s manner. The alcove turned out to be the entrance to a small, empty room, dark, bean-shaped with a concave floor.

Bish crouched at the entrance and watched Carol, who had flattened herself against the wall next to the passageway. Bish had a sudden realization—one of the other women must be approaching. Only they could recognize the intruders. And Carol was...

Bish scuttled across the hall and pressed herself into the wall next to Carol.

“Go back,” Carol hissed at her.

“No,” Bish whispered. “I have something that stuns them. Let me do it.”

Carol gave her a stare, then shrugged. She shot another look down the corridor, then slid around Bish to hug the wall behind her.

Bish waited. She heard nothing, only the faint scuffing of the starfishes’ arms on the rock. If this didn’t work, there were maybe ten of the things around, although it was of course impossible to see very far down the corridors. She took out the broken flashlight, squeezing, squeezing...

Ginger stepped out from the passage.

Bish slid out behind her and pressed the flashlight to the creature riding on her back.

A soft grunt like she had been punched came from Ginger’s mouth, and she froze. She was carrying a blue pod, the size of a large vase, and it slid from her hands and dropped to the floor, where it rolled up against her feet. Her hands fell to rest at her thighs.

Bish grabbed her, and began to pull her towards the room. She realized that she had not looked down the corridor for more of the possessed, that right now Katy or Milly or Carin could be a few feet away, instructing the starfish to grab her.

But none did, and Carol took hold of Ginger’s other side and the two of them carried her, heels dragging on the floor, into the small room.

They laid her on the floor. Her head twitched to the right a few times, then a sort of focus came into her wide, blissful eyes.

“carol,” she said, her mouth open to continue.

Carol reached under her neck with the knife and cut right through the tentacle that reached up atop Ginger’s head.

Ginger arched, making a gargling sound, then went limp. Her eyes rolled up in her head.

She didn’t move.

Kiko and Bish stared at Carol. “Let’s get this thing off of her,” Carol said, and pulled at the severed arm atop Ginger’s skull.

It didn’t budge.

Carol pulled at it, then sat down on the floor above Ginger’s head, took both hands, and leaned back. Ginger slid towards her.

Frowning, Carol put her feet on Ginger’s shoulders and pulled again.

For a moment, nothing happened. Then the tentacle came free with a wet sucking sound.

Carol stared at the thing in her hand. The bottom side of the tentacle, right where it had lain across the crown of Ginger’s head, was a mass of glowing blue fronds.

Bish turned away. She squeezed the rock wall. It had grown into Ginger’s head.

“There’s... no blood,” Carol said softly.

Bish steeled herself and turned back around. Carol had slid forward and had Ginger’s head on her lap, and was running fingers through Ginger’s lush hair. “And the skin... it’s closed up,” she said, looking up at Kiko and Bish.

Kiko stepped forward to look at Ginger’s head. Ginger’s eyes were still open, showing whites with only a sliver of iris at the top, and she was still breathing even though her body was utterly limp. There was the tiniest pucker of flesh on the very top of her head, surrounded by masses of flattened red hair.

Kiko gingerly touched the top of Ginger’s head. “It’s like... an orifice,” she said. “That thing...”

Ginger moaned.

Carol snarled, and suddenly, savagely, cut through the arms gripping Ginger’s ribs. She rolled Ginger onto her side, crouching next to her, and flung the arms across the small room. Then she tugged the body of the starfish down, and pulled...

“Carol, it’s inside her there too...”

The tentacle between her legs came out with a wet sucking noise different from the one that had been on Ginger’s head. Carol tossed it across the room.

Ginger moaned again, louder, and suddenly sat up.

Everyone stared at her as her eyes fluttered, and closed. She inhaled noisily.

Her eyes opened again they were staring straight ahead; but then she seemed to come awake, and looked around the room.

“Carol? Bish. Kiko. What’s... I was... obey....” Ginger shook her head. She looked down at the dismembered remains of the starfish that had ridden her.

“My masters...” she breathed.

There was a long moment of silence.

Ginger didn’t move. She sat looking down at the dismembered starfish, legs akimbo, hands on the floor.

Bish looked at Carol. “What are we going to do with her?”

“She’s coming with us.”

“But... that thing. It had... grown into her brain.”

Carol frowned. “And I pulled it out.”

“Carol,” Kiko said, “it has grown an orifice in her head.”

“So what?” Carol snarled. “Why are we here? To find the fucking radio you couldn’t keep a hold of? We’re here to rescue our friends, and... and don’t you start writing them off before they can even talk!”

Bish held up her hands. “Carol, calm down. That’s why we’re here. We’re not leaving anyone. But, what are we going to do with her now? I mean, can she even walk?”

Ginger was still staring at the dismembered creature that had been riding her. It lay on the floor in separate bits, leaking glowing blue fluid onto the ground.

“We don’t have any clothes for her,” Kiko observed.

“Ginger?” Bish asked gently. “Hey, Ginger? Professor Maitland?”

Slowly, Ginger looked up at her. “What?”