The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive

The Slavers in Pursuit

Chapter Eleven

Hulfgren was waiting impatiently when the telephone on his desk finally rang. He picked it up.

“She has arrived, master,” he heard Clio say. He didn’t bother to reply.

Hulfgren stood, tightened the belt of his bathrobe over his ample stomach, ran a hand unconsciously through his hair, and went to greet his associate. Ira was waiting for him in the study.

“Here she is, Gustavo,” the Chief Slaver said as he entered. Ira’s little blond slave, his latest Tiffany, knelt inconspicuously in a corner. The Managing Partner barely glanced at her. His eyes were focused elsewhere. “All bought and paid for and fresh from the processing lines of Regulon Colony.”

A sigh of delight brushed past Hulfgren’s lips, and he grinned salaciously, in deep satisfaction.

Standing a few paces away, her head bowed and trembling, was his Firm’s former rising star.

Rose.

His Rose, now.

She was clad in the uniform of his household slaves. The satiny green cloth brazenly framed her moist pussy and newly busty chest. Her hands were held behind her submissively, her posture designed to uplift and present her creamy pale breasts for handling. As he had requested, these former undersized tits had been muchly enlarged. They were now a perfect size double-D, ideal for his squeezing pleasure.

Her body met all of his specifications. Flawlessly smooth skin. Legs firm, shapely, and poised on stiletto heels. Pussy lips well-formed, fleshy, and rouged with the makeup he preferred. Even her hair was perfect, her ebony locks cut to his favorite style of bangs. And what made it all even better, what completed the picture in his own mind, was the look of absolute servility, and need, on the slut’s face.

He loved the way her deeply ruby lips quivered now in a familiar mix of fear and erotic desire.

Gone completely—gone forever!—was that abnormal look of female superiority he had so detested from the moment he had first met her and determined, then, that one day he was going to possess her.

He could not resist. He didn’t want to, nor was there any need.

Hulfgren approached his new maid, marked well the way she shivered at his approach, and brutally put his hands to the warm, soft delta of her sex. She gasped and started squirming immediately, her hands clutching at him. The genetic surgeons of Regulon Colony knew well the results he wanted from them. He had sent them many slaves over the years to be processed to his specifications.

Rose, the little bitch, his former Partner, was now ideally slave sensitive.

He slipped his thumb into her cunt—really, his cunt, for he owned the girl from head to toe—and was rewarded with the sound he had been waiting a whole year to hear. She came like a banshee.

He had always known she would.

It was all he could do to not slap her to the floor and fuck her right there and then.

“Don’t let me being here inhibit you in any way, Gustavo,” the Chief Slaver said, ironically. He lifted up an encoding module. “You might want to finishing her programming first, though.”

Hulfgren didn’t reply at first. He removed one hand from Rose’s twat, raised it, and tilted her head back for a deep, brutal kiss. Like the super-heated slave she now was, her body’s endorphin system and erogenous zones enhanced to excruciating sharpness and warmth, her mind programmed with parallel protocols, instructions, and conditions to make her a willing and eager slut, Rose kissed her new owner back with fervor. Hulfgren pinched her clit, and she moaned involuntarily, rubbing herself against the rock-hard dick she hungered for beneath his robe. She ground her hips against his.

When he stepped back, she moaned in the agony of slave frustration. It was a delight to Hulfgren’s ears. “Yes,” he said. “First things first.” He held out a hand for the encoder. Ira gave it to him.

“Strip, bitch,” the Partner ordered his new possession. The green garment fell from her shoulders with a quick tug, exactly the way it was designed to. “Kneel.”

“Yes, master,” Rose said, and he savored the sound of those words floating on her cultured voice.

Taking her head in his hands, Hulfgren put the module to the center of Rose’s forehead. A moment later the slut’s eyes widened in neural shock as the programming downloaded into her brain. Unlike first or second-stage slave programming, which took hours for the human brain to assimilate, these protocols would become available immediately. All of Hulfgren’s likes and dislikes, all of his personal quirks, all of the little things that personalized his household staff, all of this flowed uninterruptedly into Rose’s nervous system and, he knew, became the most crucial things in her life. Where a second before her mind had been filled with general and bland sex-slave programming, now Hulfgren knew Rose was his slave and only his slave. Before, he had just been a man, a master. Now, literally, he was her god!

All traces of the upstart bitch’s former personality would now have been completely overwritten.

Hulfgren threw the encoder back to Ira. Rose stared up at him with a look of divine awe.

“My master,” she whispered. “My master, oh my master!” She bent low and covered his feet in kisses.

“If you’ll excuse us,” the Managing Partner said, and the Chief Slaver nodded. He made a curt gesture to the Tiffany, and they left.

“Enjoy her,” the Slaver said as he was out the door.

“Oh, I intend to,” Hulfgren said. The Managing Partner lightly cuffed his new slave’s face, and she responded at once, in a way that told him his personalized programming had fully taken hold. Such things didn’t take long, not after full slave assimilation. Rose curled into a humble ball at his feet, hands and knees beneath her and her ass held high. It was a standard staff position in Hulfgren’s mansion.

He made his way to the couch, dropping his robe along the way.

“Crawl to me,” he ordered.

“Yes, master,” she whimpered. She unlimbered herself and made her way towards him, gently shaking her ass and lowering her tummy, moving in the highly stylized, almost dance-like prance of the well-trained slavegirl. He enjoyed the sight of Rose’s newly enlarged breasts dangling beneath her body.

He could wait no longer. Hulfgren fell upon her hungrily, pushing the new slave to her back and savagely entering her. “Oh, master, master!” She howled in a sudden paroxysm of pain and pleasure and wrapped her slave-smooth legs around Hulfgren’s back.

Her skin was preternaturally smooth. All the hair beneath her head had been permanently depilated and the flesh treated with a combination of toners and fading agents. She would never age nor wrinkle; her altered metabolism would keep her fit and beautiful with only the bare minimum of maintenance.

She would remain his little porcelain doll forever.

As a man playing with his new property, Hulfgren stroked, fondled, and not so playfully slapped at the slave beneath him. He pinched her breasts and thrust ever deeper into his Rose until she was helplessly panting and screaming his absolute authority over her. “Master, oh my master, oh! this is your slave, this slave is your slave! Oh, more… more… oh, master, master, MORE!!”

Her pussy was incredibly tight and slick. She moved her lower body in a sensational rhythm, a breathtaking tempo designed by the Colony Worlds’ best sexual engineers and refined through countless programmed slave generations for the maximum pleasuring of the male organ.

Oh, God, she’s so tight, so tight, Hulfgren thought.

“Master, master,” the slave whimpered beneath him. Her pleading encouraged him ever more strongly.

While she covered his face with servile kisses, Hulfgren achieved his first climax, grunting like the bull elephant his detractors said he resembled. For most men, that would be it, but Hulfgren was the Managing Partner of Frank, Bennet, Weschler, and Marx, and he had access to the best drugs and physical enhancements the Clients’ universe could offer. Through a biofeedback technique he had picked up years ago, he was within moments hard and eager again, as much or more of a sexual athlete as any boy forty years his junior. He disengaged from his new toy and roughly flipped her over.

“Beg, bitch. Beg like the bitch you are!” he commanded her.

“Yes, master. Oh, yes, my master, yes, yes! This slave begs her master. Use this slave. Use this slave till she bursts, my master! Oh! Master!” Hulfgren’s rock-hard penis penetrated her from behind.

Hulfgren closed his eyes, relishing the frenzied sensations of his property’s ass. She wriggled and groaned beneath him, and he thrust forward further and further until his scrotum was pressed tightly against Rose’s delicate rear. He reached around and grabbed hold of her breasts, holding her as he might the handlebars of a motorcycle. He kneaded Rose’s soft flesh and tickled her engorged nipples.

“Master, oh master. This slave cannot resist. This slave cannot resist her master! Oh! Ohhh!”

He abused her for a long time. How long he could not say, for the erotic Olympiad quickly eclipsed whatever sense of time Hulfgren had. He renewed himself twice more, he knew that at least, having Rose first clean him with her mouth, then afterwards going down upon her again, this time on the couch.

He stroked her feminine curves. He played with Rose’s body lingeringly. Again and again, he took pleasure from the sound of his erstwhile rival moaning like the slave-slut he had had her turned into.

Hulfgren was so preoccupied with the use of his new toy, he didn’t notice the door to his study open, nor did he take note of the figure closing in on him until it was too late.

Only at the last did he hear something. He looked up. “Err?”

“Good-bye,” he heard, and then everything went black.

* * *

Tiffany didn’t feel so well.

Back in the Managing Partner’s study, a nauseous sensation had crept into her stomach. Now, an hour later, Tiffany’s head ached in a way she had no recollection of feeling before, though with the holes in her memory that didn’t mean much. She tried to keep the customary handful of steps behind her Owner, the Chief Slaver, wherever he was going in this monster of a mansion, but it was a real effort.

For a moment, her illness swelled, and she had to stop and balance herself on an end table lest she fall down. It felt like her head was about to split.

The Chief Slaver kept walking, not noticing he had left his lovely property behind.

“I can’t wait to see Gordon’s reaction,” he said, to no one in particular. “He’ll be so… Tiffany? What are you doing?” He stopped and stared at her, putting his hands akimbo, much put-upon.

“Stop lollygagging. What’s wrong?”

“Master, I…” and she couldn’t go on. The nausea and vertigo were too much. She shuddered all over. The room seemed to melt slightly, as if she were viewing it through a distorted glass.

The Chief Slaver approached. “Stupid slut,” he said, in a half whisper. Tiffany whimpered.

He took out her controller and examined it. “Bad girl,” he told her. “You’re a bad, bad girl.”

The familiar horror and pain coruscated throughout Tiffany’s nerve endings, only adding to her discomfort. She closed her eyes and thought, I hate him. I hate him! I Hate Him!

“What’s this?” the Chief Slaver said. He was still talking more to himself than to her. “Elevated neurochemicals. Endorphins out of whack. Neural shock.” He looked at her with new eyes.

“What’s wrong, Tiffany?” he asked, this time with almost a touch of concern in his voice. Almost.

I hate you, she thought. And suddenly it was as if a bubble had burst inside her mind, as if all the pain and illness and vertigo inside her had collapsed into a small, tight ball and imploded. Her eyes flashed.

The pain was gone. The nausea had disappeared. The room snapped back to normal.

Tiffany felt fresh and new and completely like her old self again.

Without even looking, without even thinking about it, she grabbed the Ming vase sitting on the end table beside her and in a swift, clean motion brought it down on top of the Chief Slaver’s head.

It shattered with a sound like thunder.

The Chief Slaver’s eyes rolled back in their sockets. He fell.

“I hate you,” Tiffany said softly, looking down at her Owner. She spoke honestly. “I despise you.”

A warm sensation suffused her being. It felt wonderful.

A memory flashed into her consciousness. It was clear and pristine in its clarity, as if it had happened yesterday. She was sitting in her office, and she was talking to a middle-aged, slightly balding man.

I want to hire you to locate my ex-wife and daughter, she remembered this man telling her. He was crying. He was literally holding his hat in his hands. They’re gone missing, and the police won’t lift a finger to help. Tiffany remembered glancing at the photograph he had given her.

A woman and her teenage daughter. She was a doctor.

Is this them?

Yes, he told her. Find them. Find them both. His eyes were filled with tears. I don’t care if they’re alive or dead, but I have to find them. I have to know.

She remembered him sitting in front of her desk and pleading with him. She usually didn’t do missing persons cases, but she felt sorry for him.

I’ll do my best, Mr. Pitzler, she remembered saying. I’ll do my best.

Tiffany crouched down beside the Chief Slaver and put two fingers to his neck to check his pulse. It was slow but steady. He was in no immediate danger. She reached for the projector dangling from his coat, flipped it around to the touch-sensitive control panel, and rapidly input a long sequence of numbers. The sets were long and complicated, but she didn’t hesitate, nor did she make a mistake.

The series input, she turned the Client device over again, aimed it at the floor, and depressed the trigger. There was a flash and a popping displacement of air. Tiffany didn’t even blink.

A small package materialized. The slave opened it with a touch. It was filled with many useful items.

She had to hurry. Whether the sound of the vase breaking or the noise from the incoming projection had alerted them, she knew Hulfgren’s bodyguards would be coming at her, hard and fast. Unarmed against their physical prowess, she would stand little chance. For a moment, Tiffany debated whether she should call her reinforcements in now. No, she decided, almost before the thought was finished. That will take too long. More people will only increase the risk factor.

Besides, she was confident she could handle things on her own. She was, after all, an expert.

She took the headphones out of the package first and put them on. The second thing was a small metal device with what looked like a tuning fork at one end. She set this item pronged end up on the floor.

Even through the headphones, Tiffany heard the approach of running rubber-clad feet. She hurried.

Without looking up, she triggered the sonic stunner and then reached into the package for the tranquilizer gun. What felt like a warm wave passed over Tiffany’s skin and caused the hairs on her head to rise. The safety phones activated automatically, producing a low, pleasant buzzing in her ears.

Now she looked up.

One of the tightly black-garbed bodyguards was only a few feet away from her. The mannequin-like figure was leaning against the wall for support. Behind her, Tiffany saw the other two guards, not all that far away either. They were fast. Fortunately, they were in a similarly weakened condition. For now.

Tiffany didn’t think about the irony of using a Molosian-made weapon on Hulfgren’s slave-soldiers. She just aimed and fired. A stream of hair-thin slivers of crystallized anesthetic poured out over the paired guards. The shards punctured their black uniforms and the skin underneath and liquefied in their bloodstreams. Tiffany gave each slave a nice triple dose, then turned back toward the first guard.

The slave-soldier was moving again. Tiffany had suspected the bodyguards’ cyborg components would adapt to the stun field, but she hadn’t thought it would happen so quickly. The slave came at Tiffany, her hands held flat in killing gestures. Formidable as she was, though, she was still slowed by the numbing waves of high-frequency sound coming from the stunner. A normal, unprotected person would be flat on her back. Tiffany ducked the first murderous blow the guard threw. Her hand knocked a chunk of stone out of the nearby wall. Tiffany crouched low and fired a stream of anesthetic directly in the woman’s face. She avoided a disemboweling kick and hurled herself across the hall.

The paired guards were getting up. Their blood full of tranquilizing agent, their ears and nervous system becalmed by high-frequency noise, they were, nevertheless, getting up. Tiffany was impressed.

This could be slightly more difficult than she thought.

She fired a second stream into the guard who had attacked her. She brushed the little stud on the weapon’s stock that controlled intensity. A triple dose of anesthetic would kill an average human.

Tiffany let the guard have a quadruple dose, just to be safe. Despite the intensity, the guard actually managed to take two more staggering steps toward Tiffany before collapsing.

The blond slave turned her attention back to the other girls.

They too were slowed but active. One of them had even removed a weapon, or, at least, a handheld tool that Tiffany thought looked like a weapon. It had a short barrel and a trigger, but it looked like something out of Star Trek, a child’s toy. Even so, Tiffany leapt into the air, flinging her body low and horizontally to the floor. At the same time, she fired again.

Behind her, where she had been standing, a perfectly round hole the size of a manhole cover appeared in the wall. An ominous crunching sound accompanied the disappearance. Part of an end table was affected as well, sliced in half by the invisible whatchamacallit. It fell over with a crash of wood.

That’s neat, Tiffany thought, flying. That’s certainly not Client built. They don’t build weapons.

Anesthetic sprayed over the shooter’s body. She fell. Tiffany landed well, rolled, and fired again.

For a moment, Tiffany thought she might have to go for the MAC-10 in the infiltration package, but the third bodyguard finally collapsed. Tiffany got up, dusted herself off, and went to the first bodyguard.

She eyed the items hooked to the slave’s belt, recognized the immobilizer, unhooked it, and quietly used it on the soldier. Her futile attempts to regain her feet halted. My, but they’re strong, Tiffany thought. She went back and used the paralyzing device on the other slaves as well as her Owner, just to be sure.

Moments later she was breathing easier knowing that was one problem well taken care of. Dealing with the other household servants would be much easier. She reached into the package for the communicator.

Tiffany set about doing what needed to be done.

* * *

Martin did not consider himself a coward. He thought of himself as prudent, a man who strikes while the iron is hot, when the odds are totally in his favor. That, or when he had nothing to lose.

Now, he had everything to lose, but if he didn’t act, then he was sure this opportunity would be wasted. Slowly, stealthily, Martin crept downstairs, walking on the edge of the risers with his shoes in his pockets in order to avoid making a sound. He felt mildly ridiculous, and if someone—Hulfgren, his bodyguards, one of the maids—stopped him, he would feel like an ass.

Somehow, though, he didn’t think he was going to be stopped, at least, not by any of them, anyway.

Something was going on. He didn’t know what, but there were strange noises coming from downstairs. For the first time, too, none of his rubber-clad wardens was close by. A few minutes ago Clio had been escorting him back to his room, the tall, leggy figure keeping her standard, intimidating distance to his rear, when suddenly she took off at a dead run past him and down the stairs. Martin’s heart had leapt into his chest. For a second, he had been sure she was going to kill him. He recoiled against the wall, shouting involuntarily. In an eye blink she was gone. Slowly, surely, his blood started to flow again, and he wondered what was happening. That was when he heard a noise, a light, almost inaudible whistling that nevertheless seemed to resonate within the very bones of his skull. The next thing Martin knew he was flat on the floor. All the strength was gone from his legs, and his head was spinning wildly, like he had just come off a Twist-n-Twirl at the amusement park. It was the most godawful feeling Martin had experienced in his life, including not once but twice getting hit over the head with a Client projector, not to mention having mace sprayed in his eyes. He vomited helplessly and lay there like a dead thing.

Fortunately, the queer sound, and the nausea it inflicted, lasted only about five minutes. Martin got up and, resisting the temptation to go and hide in his room, staggered to the top of the stairs.

He heard footsteps running. Then, unmistakably, the sound of incoming projector effects. Martin had used the teleportation device frequently enough that he could distinguish between an outgoing pop! and an incoming one. Then, more footsteps, and voices, male voices, though what they were saying he couldn’t quite make out. One thing was certain, though. Something was going on.

He didn’t take long to debate with himself what it might be. Stuffing his shoes in his pockets, he started down.

Hulfgren’s house was big. Martin was semi-confident that if he didn’t make a lot of noise, and if he stayed away from any noises he heard, he could remain undetected. Hulfgren’s bodyguards had been another matter entirely, and he wouldn’t have even dreamed of trying this if he didn’t think they were already busy. The lobby was deserted when he got there. He was about to make his way out the front door and escape when he saw a lone, rubber-clad leg dangling out of the east wing entrance hallway.

Martin’s eyes widened in surprise and alarm. Looking in all directions to see if he was being observed, he inched closer. His eyes had not deceived him. It was indeed Clio lying there in the hallway. Even more surprisingly, the other bodyguards were there too, all three of them breathing but not moving.

This was another effect of Client technology with which Martin was accustomed. To his eyes, the three slavegirls looked unmistakably immobilized.

Despite the elation he felt, this was, in a way, bad news. Martin wanted no part in whatever might have taken the three of them down. He turned toward the front hall and actually made it halfway across the lobby before he heard several someones approaching from that very direction. He froze for a second, lost in indecision. Stay and get caught? Run back up the stairs? But how would he get out?

He turned around, and again he saw Clio lying there in the entranceway, immobilized.

Maybe she had a projector? If not that, then what about the imager he had seen her wearing?

Before he even knew what he was going to do, Martin ran into the hall. Clio was at his feet. Someone had already gone through her utility belt, and he panicked. What if it wasn’t there!?

He heard a sound, and his breath stopped. People were in the lobby!

If they even glanced in his direction, he would be spotted for sure.

Martin searched. At last he saw the imager on Clio’s belt. He had seen a similar device demonstrated on a Colony World, and he had recognized it for what it was the first time he saw it dangling there.

He grabbed it. He tugged too hard, though, and Clio’s body shifted. It was almost like she moved on her own. Fear bulged Martin’s eyes almost out of their sockets. He didn’t see a projector, and he didn’t have time to search the other slaves. He disconnected the imager and ran, hurtling over the other two bodies and into the east wing. Behind him, he heard voices.

“Where is Master Hulfgren?” a plaintive slave maid cried. “Where is this slave’s master?”

“Be quiet. Kneel here. Don’t say another word.” A male voice the young attorney didn’t recognize.

Martin ran down a carpeted hallway, stopped at a T-intersection to surreptitiously glance down either cross corridor, and took a left toward what he hoped was the kitchen. There was a back door.

Running, he almost ran into one of Hulfgren’s slave maids coming in the other direction.

“Master!” the startled girl said and dropped her burden of bed sheets. “Oh, master. This slave abjectly apologizes for disturbing the master. This slave is such a lowly and miserable slave, she…”

“Shut up,” Martin whispered furiously. He dragged her up from the kneeling position she had been about to fall into. “Don’t say a goddamn word.” He looked behind him. He saw shadows on the wall.

“Come with me,” he said, not knowing where he was going to go. He saw a door to his right. Martin opened it, saw a guest bedroom, and pulled the startled maid in with him. He leaned with his back against the door and thought desperately.

“Master, how may this slave serve… ?” the maid began, and Martin rushed forward to put a hand to her mouth.

“Shut up! Don’t say a word.” He pushed her away then and looked around for something to use as a weapon. He did not want to fight, though. Then he remembered the imager in his hand.

It was his only shot. He had daydreamed about using the imager to confuse Hulfgren’s bodyguards long enough to get their immobilizers and freeze them, or trick them maybe into thinking he was Hulfgren long enough to get out. But in all his daydreams, he had had enough time to figure out how it worked.

He tried anyway. He had nothing to lose.

Martin fiddled desperately with the alien device. Someone had replaced some of its components with familiar-looking Earth electronics, and he wasn’t exactly an expert in its use to begin with. Finally, however, he clicked the small box on, and what felt like an electrical charge passed over his skin.

Was it on? How could he tell? He looked around for a mirror, found one, and gazed at himself. He nearly shrieked. A dead ringer for that ugly, infamous, overly cosmeticized female televangelist stared back at him… dressed in his clothes!

No! he thought, despairingly. Shit! That’ll never work as a disguise! Never!

He tried playing with the controls, but many of them seemed frozen. He looked up and saw the image of the heavily festooned woman waver sickeningly, as if the mirror he was staring into was taken from a funhouse. He returned the controls to their previous settings and saw the evangelical doppelganger return to normal, or, at least, what passed for normal for her.

What was he going to do? Could this image possibly work as a disguise? He didn’t have much faith in it. Fretting, Martin glanced at the maid behind him. Inspiration struck. Rapidly, he started stripping.

“Take off your uniform,” he told the servile creature. She opened her mouth, and he pointed a bony, televangelist finger at her. “And remember: don’t say a word! Don’t say anything!”

The maid nodded and complied. Martin noticed his voice was affected by the imager as well.

After telling her to hide in a closet—and reminding her again not to say anything—Martin put on her uniform. Its scandalous design actually helped fit his masculine body, if not well, then enough to stay on.

He looked in the mirror. The sight made his gorge rise, but, with the help of the imager, it actually made the uniform appear as if it fit his—her—body as if made for it. He shuddered. Every wrinkle was in full display. Every sag. Every… every everything. He closed his eyes.

If he hadn’t already been impotent… .

The door opened. A large man wearing an anonymous black t-shirt and jeans walked in. He was carrying a gun in one hand, a Client immobilizer in the other. He saw Martin, and his whole face instantly screwed up in amazed disgust. “Good god,” he said slowly. “What the hell are you?”

He raised his gun hand first, apparently thought better of it, raised the immobilizer, then realized he would have to touch the apparition before him, and grimaced again. Martin took the opportunity to get to his knees in what he knew was the standard slave display position: knees wide and head down.

The strong man shuddered.

Two weeks in Hulfgren’s house had taught Martin what to say. “This slave is a slave, master” he said, in what sounded to his ears like the kind of voice this hideous image demanded. “This slave belongs to Master Hulfgren, master.” He knew Hulfgren and his friend Stein had dissolute reputations. Now, he hoped they were just dissolute enough.

The man looked around the room. “Are you alone, slave?” he asked.

“Yes, master,” Martin said, praying the maid in the closet would obey his command, praying that this goon wouldn’t decide to search the room anyway. Martin felt his entire life hanging by a thread.

The goon nodded. Why would anyone question the word of a slave. Everyone knows they can’t lie.

“You’re an ugly slave,” he said, appearing more professional now. “What are you doing here?”

Beneath the illusion, Martin sweated. “Master Hulfgren keeps this unattractive slave for variety, master,” he said. “Master Hulfgren likes the… (Ahh, he thought)… contrast.” He smiled meekly, hoping the imager would cause his features to respond accordingly.

The man shook his head disgustedly, the implication of what Martin had said filling his mind with all sorts of unwholesome imagery. Martin recognized him now. He was a security guard with the Firm. More importantly, Martin recognized him as a Firm employee affiliated with a certain Partner of his acquaintance. In his experience, in business, the people on the lower rungs of the corporate ladder tended not only to try to climb higher but to climb in the direction of others already higher up. While they all followed orders, there were some bosses they obeyed with greater speed and efficiency.

This tough guy worked for—was owned by—the Firm. But he was a “Rose” man all the same.

And if he was a “Rose” man, that likely meant… .

Martin’s incentive to get out of Hulfgren’s mansion took a quantum jump. Still, he stayed on his knees until the guard ordered him to accompany him. Martin said all the proper things a properly mindfucked girl should say and followed the goon into the hall. He had already collected a couple of other maids, many of whom Martin knew by name. They looked at him—her—inquisitively but didn’t say anything. Standard slave programming, Martin knew, and was counting on, all but destroyed a person’s curiosity. But he knew all too well what he looked like, and they knew all too well he didn’t actually belong to their beloved Master Hulfgren. If somebody asked them a question about him, he was cooked.

But nobody did. They ran into nobody else. The guard took his prisoners to the kitchen and ordered the lot of them to kneel, wait, and say nothing. He then took off. Martin could have blessed him.

Not one minute after the man left, Martin stood up and went out the back door.

The slave maids saw him leave, but they were under orders.

Nobody else saw him.

He was almost a mile down the road before he remembered he was all but naked.

* * *

Tiffany came back into the study carrying the infiltration package with her. She closed the door behind her and looked out the window. It was nearing dark.

After dealing with Hulfgren, she had immobilized the slavegirl. She used an immobilizer now to free her.

Rose looked up at Tiffany tearfully.

“The slave hurt this slave’s master. Why did the slave hurt the master?” Her voice was filled with sorrow and anxiety, with perhaps the smallest tinge of anger. The maids in this house were so heavily conditioned, Tiffany believed they couldn’t feel anything even approaching real anger.

“It was necessary,” she said. “Now, sit still. There are things we must do.”

“Where is the master?” Rose asked. She made an attempt to stand up, and Tiffany pushed her down onto the couch. “This slave must go to Master Hulfgren.”

“No,” Tiffany said. “Sit still. That is an order.”

The slave was restless. Obedience was hardwired into her artificial persona. It was hard for her to disobey a direct command. Only the fact that Tiffany herself was an obvious slave had her acting contrary. Tiffany opened the package and began removing various tools, all of them Client technology.

“Why did the slave hurt the master?” Rose asked again. The way she phrased it, it sounded like the first time. Considering the trauma of seeing her master mugged in front of her face, it was possible she didn’t remember. In any case, Tiffany didn’t bother answering. She took out a silver-colored headband.

“What is that?” Rose asked.

“Shhh,” Tiffany said. She looked the young girl in the eyes. “How long have you been a slave?”

“This slave has always been a slave. This slave has always been Master Hulfgren’s slave.”

“And your name. What is your name, girl?”

“This slave has no name. She is a slave. Master Hulfgren commonly refers to her as ‘Rose,’ though.”

When Tiffany placed the silvery circlet around the slave’s forehead, two things happened. First, the slave stopped fidgeting and sat perfectly still. Her hands settled calmly in her lap, her eyes stared forward blankly. Second, information appeared on the small portable screen Tiffany had also taken out of the infiltration package. Numbers, text, graphs, and visual displays, all in very precise detail reflected the current neuroelectric state of the slave’s mind. The Client recorder worked in passive mode.

The next part would be tricky. Going back to the package, Tiffany laid out four encoders, one after the other, on the table next to her. She checked each to be absolutely sure of their contents, then took the first and used it, pressing the transparent front portion to the slave’s head just below the band. Tiffany watched the results on the screen. She might have to use the disrupting program more than once. It was important that every memory, every thought, every neuroelectric structure in the slave’s mind was affected, save those necessary for maintaining a minimum life function. No neurological damage could be permitted either. This procedure would have been so much easier using a cloned brain fresh from a tank, one with absolutely no life experiences whatsoever, but this was what Tiffany had to work with, and she would perform her task diligently. She used the special encoder twice more, fifteen minutes apart, until she was sure every necessary mental pattern in the slave’s psyche was in a state of flux. She picked up the second encoder then and used it. In essence, this module’s content was the equivalent of any second-stage slave or other personality program. Normally, downloading a subject with such a detailed set of protocols without its initial set would result in brain damage, but the disrupting program had already loosened things up, and, too, there were no actual protocols in this download per se.

The second encoder had downloaded what was, in effect, nothingness. It was a blank slate. A tabula rasa. And it was fast, much faster than most assimilations. Five minutes after the encoding, the recorder told Tiffany the slave was a vegetable. All ego, all personality, all consciousness had been smothered. She was flesh that breathed and no more. A goldfish had more awareness of itself.

She was ready.

Tiffany removed the recorder and used the third encoder. It was the first stage of a two-stage program. It was would take time to assimilate. She sat down beside the empty vessel and held its hand.

No one disturbed them. Hulfgren’s estate was in order. Tiffany had made sure of that before starting.

After about four hours, the vessel’s hand began to twitch slightly. This was a good sign.

Tiffany waited three more hours, then used the fourth and final encoder on the vessel. The framework was in place by now. This last download contained everything else. Tiffany moved the table out of the way and knelt at the vessel’s feet. Nothing overt would happen for several more hours, she knew.

She waited.

The night sky outside Hulfgren’s study window waned. Dawn appeared. Tiffany thought the view appropriate. She didn’t budge from the vessel’s side. She remained wide awake. Even so, even she couldn’t tell exactly when the transition occurred. When the event came, finally, it took her by surprise.

Rose’s eyes snapped open. She took a sudden, sharp breath.

Tiffany still waited. This was exactly what was supposed to happen. She watched as Rose looked about and collected her bearings. The eyes were the windows to the soul, she had heard. This was a lie. The face was the window to the soul. Tiffany could tell from looking at that divine countenance, from the change in its expression, that a different person now wore it. She waited patiently.

She would have waited forever if need be.

Eventually, her Rose deigned to look upon her. She spoke.

“What contingency plan is this?”

“Number Six, Mistress,” Tiffany said.

Rose looked at her more closely. “I remember you. You were the investigator. Tiffani Andersen. My father hired you to find me.” Tiffani, she heard, not Tiffany. It was a small difference, true, but crucial.

Tiffani remembered.

“Yes, Mistress. And I found you.” And gifted me with the blessing of your brain plug. And arranged for me to be owned by the Chief Slaver. I was Contingency Plan Number Six.

She wondered if Contingency Plans One through Five felt as wonderful as she did at that moment.

“Call me Rose. What is today’s date?”

Tiffani told her. Her Rose did mental calculations.

“Three weeks,” she said after a moment. “I’ve lost three weeks since my last backup.” She clutched at her naked breasts, startled with their newfound weight. “And gained a rack in the exchange.”

Rose closed her eyes and fondled herself. “Ohh, that’s good.” It was with some reluctance, Tiffani saw, that her Rose managed to pull her hands away and return to the business at hand.

She ordered Tiffani to report.

“Yes, Rose,” Tiffani said. “We are in the private residence of Gustavo Hulfgren, a mansion some miles outside Amsterdam. All hostile elements in the house have been secured. Approximately twenty-two days ago, Earth-relative time, you left Earth for the planet Molos. You were entrapped in a scheme devised by Gustavo Hulfgren and Ira Stein and enslaved. You were programmed with slave protocols and your body was modified on Regulon Colony. You were subsequently used by both Hulfgren and Stein.”

Rose nodded, looking grim. “Go on.”

“Yes, Rose. Shortly after your return to Earth, my programming fully activated. I implemented measures against Hulfgren and Stein, and, using the equipment you had made available, erased your slave mind and reprogrammed you from your backup memory.”

Tiffani smiled. “The only problem was with the bodyguards, and they were easy.”

“Ah, yes. Celestra’s old lieutenants. Where are Gustavo and Ira now?”

“In an adjoining room, Rose. I have recordings of their conversations, both visual and audio, collected from devices I planted without their knowledge, acting on my subliminal instructions. Their violations against Firm policies are clear and damning. There will be no difficulty in convincing your Partners of their conspiracy against you.”

“Good. Is there anything else I should know about before I start making calls?”

“Yes, Rose. One matter. Hulfgren’s scheme hinged on a previous plan devised by Martin Gordon, who was conspiring with a party of Molosians.” Rose’s eyebrow raised. “He was being held here at the mansion, but I cannot locate him now. I have already started a search for him.”

Rose snorted in derision and smiled. It warmed Tiffani’s heart to know she had pleased her Rose.

Now she had something hard to say. But it had to be said.

“There are other things you need to be made aware of, Rose, but nothing of immediate concern. I will have a detailed report made ready at your convenience.” Tiffani put her head to the floor and rested her cheek against Rose’s feet. “I was slow, my Rose. I attempted to warn you earlier by calling your residence, but I didn’t say enough, and you were captured. I’m sorry, Rose. I failed you.”

Rose patted Tiffani’s head and kissed the nape of her neck affectionately. “No. I recall your warning. It’s one of the last things I do recall, prior to updating my backup.” She lifted Tiffani’s face so she could look into her eyes. “Your programming hadn’t fully activated yet. It wouldn’t have, not until you were sure you could help me. You didn’t know enough then, and so, you, the real you, stayed hidden.”

She touched Tiffani’s cheek.

“You are a good girl, Tiffani. A very good girl. I knew it from the start, when you managed to locate me. Do you remember everything, now?”

“Yes, Rose. I remember it all. The day I found your apartment. My enslavement. Your instructions to make me forget. My first encounter with the Chief Slaver. I remember everything.”

She smiled ruefully.

“He took great pleasure in training me, just as you thought he would. He thought he was the first to know about the connection between you and me. He bragged about it to Hulfgren in his office.”

“Yes. Men do that. Now, go find me some proper clothes. I have a great many things to do.”

“Yes, Rose. At once.” Tiffani got up, kissed her Rose one more time, and then obeyed her orders.

Now that she remembered her past, she found she loved obeying orders.

Her Rose’s orders, anyway.

And why was that?

Because now she knew: despite what the Chief Slaver had said, she was a very, very good girl.

And she always had been.