Human Pet
Chapter 7
Molly watched through the datalink as Zerok approached the building. Jessica lay next to her. They had had to use the sleeping chip on her to get her to let go of Zerok’s leg.
They were parked several miles away, far enough to be clear of the blast, and how Molly hoped it wouldn’t come to that. All in all Zerok was a good pet owner whom Jessica would badly miss. Also, well situations that brought two people close together tended to make them appreciate one another.
“Oh admit it Molly, you made your feelings known on the beach.” she said to herself.
Okay so yeah, she liked him now. Perhaps it was the parts of Jessica’s personality in her that hadn’t been altered. She had been searching through the copy of Jessica’s personality inside her head, and removing inorganics from the equation, Zerok was a guy that Jessica would have liked. Perhaps that’s why the real Jessica liked him. He usually had a solid plan, or could come up with one quickly. He cared about Jessica when no one else did. He had set out on this journey, and now risked blowing himself up, when others wouldn’t have bothered. They had learned so much, so much that would have remained buried had it not been for his persistence.
The world needed people like him.
Zerok entered the building through the same door he had used previously. It had been secured with a padlock and chain. Surprisingly nobody was there to greet him. He went to the computer that he visited before, booted it up, and started decrypting files.
The bunker had been abandoned for 18 years. It had been a research center set up by humans for creating “super soldiers”, people brainwashed and given combat skills and memories. They were also developing ways to digitize a human personality for possible uploading into captured inorganics.
There was more data, and data encrypted with a different encryption pattern. However Zerok became aware of people watching him from the shadows.
“I know you’re there. Show yourselves.”
Several humans with weapons pointed at him emerged from the darkness, along with an inorganic whom Zerok recognized.
“I knew it. Why else would you be here? Undercover agent huh?”
“Very good Zerok, Combat unit #1157829. I would ask why you’re snooping around our network, but I’m sure the answer has to do with Ms. Simms. Am I correct?”
“Yes.”
“We have several high powered plasma rifles pointed at you. You’re coming with us. Try to resist and—”
“Oh shut up! I have a 1 kiloton nuclear bomb strapped to me, and it’s got a sensitive hair trigger. You assholes shoot me and you’ll all be incinerated!”
Quiet murmuring among the humans. They weren’t sure if he was bluffing or not. There were a lot more glances at that bulge under his shirt. The inorganic squinted, scanning the device under his shirt.
“You came prepared. Very well. Would you like the tour? Perhaps when you see what we’re doing here, you’ll understand. By the way, we haven’t been properly introduced. You can call me James.”
The building itself was a normal office building on the surface, but below was another bunker, much newer and much larger then the one out in the desert. In various rooms, Zerok could see women performing sexual acts on men, and occasionally other women. Each of the slave girls had a DBC port implanted in the back of their heads.
“As a pet owner, I’m sure you see what we’re getting at. We’re training these people to be pets. I have lobbying groups around the country, pressuring the people in charge to revisit the pet laws. Legal intelligent pets will fetch a high premium.”
Zerok recognized one of the women who was currently performing oral sex on a young man. It was the cashier from the shop. The chip in her DBC port blinked red, each blink signaling a burst of pleasure in her mind. It was the same type of sexual reward chip he had for Jessica, though probably modified.
“It’s a pretty symbiotic setup. We give the humans sex slaves and no nonsense opposite sex companionship, as well as a nice city to live in. In return they let us turn some of them into pets.”
“And what about the soldiers and sleeper inorganics? How do those fit into your scheme?”
James faced Zerok, looking genuinely puzzled.
“Clarify.”
Zerok smiled. “You don’t know about the other bunker.”
“So tell me.”
“Find out for yourself. Search the network here for data encrypted with the following key: 7-1-1-7-B-8-3-Q-1-9-2-Z-7-7-5.”
One of the humans raised his gun to fire, but another stopped him and muttered something about the nuke strapped to Zerok’s body. They both started to run. James quickly turned to face them.
“You leave this party now and you’ll be hunted down. If you want a ticket out of here alive, be good little boys. Drop the guns and sit down.”
After decrypting the files and scanning through them, James went over to the two humans who had tried to run.
“There are other files with different encryption codes. I want the codes.”
They sat there stony faced.
“You’re running out of chances to leave this room alive. You can tell us the codes, or we can kill you and begin cracking the encryption ourselves.”
“4213GT6Q192800D. It’s the master code. It’ll open up everything.” one of them replied.
James input it, and several terabytes of information that had been disguised as empty space was revealed. There was a whole other level below this bunker, the access hidden in a janitors closet.
The lower level was set up almost exactly like the old bunker. Micro nuclear reactor for its power source making this bunker independent of the building’s main power source. Laboratory room, computer room. All the equipment was intact and had seen recent use.
“So they’ve been brainwashing people behind my back? Implanting separate personalities. Pet by day, raging soldier by night.”
James turned to face the two humans.
“How very clever. And you went a step further. You developed technology to copy those altered personalities and put them in captured inorganics. You’ve been building an army right under my nose.”
“This is our planet. You took it from us. One day we’ll get it back. This isn’t the only facility. We have hundreds more!“ one of them replied.
Both James and Zerok saw that he was lying.
“This is your only facility. You’ve built it in secret for almost 20 years. At some point James came along with his deal, and you guys figured out a way to incorporate your plans into his without him knowing. Does that sound about right?”
Neither of the humans answered.
“Okay fine. We both know the answer to that one anyway. Now, what about Jessica Simms? What happened to her?”
“Test subject directory, file 0055. It’ll tell you everything.”
Zerok accessed the file and saw that it was a combination of text and video. He began to decode the video.
Jessica was their first test subject in almost 20 years. The program had been mothballed after the bunker was shut down to hide it from the satellites. The critical data and machinery had been removed and the bunker quickly sealed. Then they covertly built another bunker in what was then just a small desert town. The whole town was in on it, but progress was very slow. They were starved for technology and resources.
Then as serendipity would have it, James came into the picture five years ago. They agreed to his proposal, and from almost day 1 they diverted resources towards their project. The diversions were small, and attributed to human wastefulness by James and his inorganic partners. Three years later, the humans had their bunker lab up and running, right under the sex slave bunker.
Jessica had been what they called a sex pet. She had been implanted with a DBC port by inorganics working for James. The video file showed that they had apparently done the procedure without anesthetic. Jessica’s screams and cries could clearly be heard. The next surgery to follow was the removal of her uterus, as was done on normal female human pets. After she recovered from those procedures, they began training her to sexually please other humans. At some point the humans decided to use her as their test subject. They said she went missing, kept her prisoner in the secret bunker, and kept her drugged for four months while they figured out a way to copy and digitize her personality.
Unknown to them, her half brother was in their employ. He found out they were going to brainwash her, and sabotaged the computers. Unfortunately the memory wipe had already happened, and his rather crude method of sabotage resulted in the brain damage that Dr. Jenners had discovered.
He caused a distraction by programming the micro nuclear reactor to malfunction, causing massive power fluctuations. Then he escaped with Jessica in the chaos that ensued.
He traveled across the continent with her and along the way must have realized that while he hadn’t quite made her a vegetable, she no longer recognized him and couldn’t even speak. His plan had apparently been to pass off Jessica as a normal pet to keep her safe until he could figure out a way to reverse the brain damage. Then he’d come back and track her down.
He hadn’t known he was being followed. While they never found Jessica, they found him and shot him.
All was not lost. They still had the digitized copy of Jessica’s personality. They quickly altered it, inserting memories from dead soldiers. A few months later they captured an inorganic unit, wiped her old personality, deleted her public records and implanted two versions of Jessica’s personality codenamed Jekyll and Hyde. They set her up in the city where Jessica was hiding. They had configured her to secretly scan for Jessica without her being aware of it.
Back in the van, Molly looked down at the sleeping Jessica. She would have cried, had she the ability to.
The plan was for a data link via satellite. However that had failed. They couldn’t set it up without the inorganics finding it, so they relied on couriers who secretly downloaded data from Molly during each of her weekly recharge cycles. It was all very clever. They were going to start a war with a Trojan army of human pets and inorganic sleeper units. They were going to take back Earth from the “evil machines”.
“They were using you James. They were going to use you as long as they could. Happily they went along with your plan. Sex slaves just being an added bonus. You supplied the technology, and they outmaneuvered you.”
“Well we have a problem. If this gets exposed I go down for my part in this, and you go down for bringing a nuclear weapon into an organic city.”
“You’re probably right. We’re about to find out, as I’ve just contacted my military friends. No going back.”
“Do you think you’re gonna dance your way out of this because you have military connections? Bringing a nuke into an organic governed city is a Level 2 treaty violation!”
“And implanting DBC ports in normal humans, making them into sex pets, not to mention your assistance unknowing or otherwise, in the biggest human war project this century? I’ll take my chances.”
James lunged at him. Zerok sidestepped him and brought his hand down hard. The impact broke James’ neck. He fell to the floor.