The Tangerine Twelve
Part 4- Becoming One of Twelve
I think a few weeks passed. I’m still not sure, because the days and weeks blurred together pretty quickly. The schedule was the same every day: get up, go to breakfast, go to work, have lunch, go back to work, break off for dinner, watch the reinforcement movie, have sex, go to sleep.
But it was definitely a Thursday when I hit my full potential. “And remember, your order will be shipped within six to eight weeks. Thank you for ordering the complete gadget package, and have a great day!” I had finished my latest sale, just another one in an endless string of successes. Our little edge was helping, because even the least impressed caller would fall under my spell in a hurry, and by the end of the call every voice was soft and sleepy, every customer suggestible to every upgrade I suggested. I logged the latest sucker-er, customer- into my spreadsheet and prepared to dial the next number when my cell phone went off and took over my world.
“One thousand in a row. Congratulations. Please report to the 25th floor,” the person on the other end said before hanging up. I got up and headed for the elevator. I wasn’t expecting Sarah to be waiting right at the elevator for me.
“Surprised? You shouldn’t be. You’ve risen faster than I could ever have dreamed of. Not only that, but the sales of the entire floor are up. That’s how contagious your strength is- between your sales and the increase from your colleagues, you’ve made us a million dollars nearly overnight. You’re ready to join the Twelve now. I’ve already arranged for your things to be moved to your new quarters. There’s no time to waste, after all,” she said.
Some kind of thrill curled inside my stomach and reached into my throat. Excitement? Well, yes, of course. But this was all too much too fast, and I couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something to fear with Sarah. Of course, she caught it right away. “What questions do you have left?” she asked sharply.
I struggled to collect my thoughts. “Umm... why orange?” Not the question I had planned to ask, but it was a question, and with Sarah’s presence hammering at my sense of self, it was something I could hold on to to prove that I could still think instead of just falling to my knees in front of her.
“I went to school here- it’s where I learned my trade. And it’s a unique way to mark who we are. Other groups use other colors, signs, or patterns,” she explained.
“What happened to the last 12? The one I’m replacing?” A much better question. Even I was impressed with how fast I’d gotten my feet back under me.
“She left to pursue her own stable. Sandra’s now having her way with Canada,” she replied. I wasn’t quite sure what someone would want with Canada, but I guess it was a promotion of sorts. While I was considering how you’d go about controlling the Great White North, Sarah led me through a pair of large double doors into the nerve center, which was a control room similar to the security center, except that it was for the outside world.
“We have a twelfth!” Sarah announced, and the other women in the room got up and stood in front of her. “Ladies, I’ll let you take it from here. Introduce yourselves in your own special ways.”
And she left, leaving me alone with eleven of the best mind controllers out there, with only my mind as protection. Almost at once, the combined presence and power of the other eleven battered at me. I started unbuttoning my shirt when I took hold of myself and formulated a much better response. “Isn’t this work time? We can get introduced that way later!” I yelled. Not my style- way too unsubtle- but I was pissed and going one-on-eleven.
A black-haired woman, probably in her mid-forties, applauded. “Ah, you’re good. Sandra was on her knees when we did that. We still need to show you the rules, but you’ll do. My name is Rosa. I am the One, the senior member of the Twelve.” She leaned over to shake my hand, and the colorful dress- still primarily orange, but with a riot of colors around it- shimmered in the light, drawing my attention. “I see you like my dress. Feel free to stare.”
“Nice try. You make focus objects, don’t you?” I said. If she’d been a little less obvious- but she hadn’t been, and I snapped out of it.
“Very good. Yes, I design and create almost every device we use, and I oversee the manufacturing wing. You’ve sold many of my projects,” Rosa said proudly.
The next to speak was a dirty blonde, about my age, wearing an orange overcoat, an orange and white sweater, and a schoolgirl skirt. Somehow I suspected she had glasses. “Martha. I am the Seven. I specialize in subliminal code and Internet content. I create irresistible websites, videos, and programs.” Her fingers never stopped moving over the keyboard, and I realized that she was using a text-to-speech program- her voice was coming from the orange iMac, not from her.
“Um, you are a person at a computer, right? Not a computer with a person attached?” I stalked over to see if I could tell whether she was a robot or not. Yep, she wore glasses.
“Oh, I’m very real. But I prefer to bring people into my little world,” she said softly, guiding my hand onto the keyboard. The cursor blinked at me like a metronome, and I started typing in my name, every keystroke earning a caress from Martha. I could feel my knees go weak and my vision start to blur from the blinding patterns in the page background.
“One of the ways we find the next gifted great,” Rosa said. “Such profiles give much away about a person.”
I shook myself awake, recognizing how close I’d come to giving in to the subliminal commands. “Right, so are you trying to test me or trying to bag me?” I snapped.
“One of those,” Rosa said with a smile. “We can’t put anything past you, can we?”
The next to speak was a blonde in a tight leather miniskirt and tube top who looked for all the world like a scaled-up Barbie doll. She leafed idly through a pile of magazines as she spoke. “Erica, Five. ‘People who need people are the happiest people’, right? I make the people that people need. I control what’s behind the Candies’ porn and make them into irresistible stars. Bet you wondered what was up with the orange dresses at the Grammy Awards, right? Our maker’s mark. I create them, own them, and run them. It’s as high as a Candy can go. Models, singers, actresses, skaters—”
“Yeah, I heard about that,” I interrupted her.
“Oh, I know you did. If you ever want to sleep with a star, just let me know and I can make it happen.” She looked up at me for the first time, green eyes scanning me as if she could divine my style, her smile sharp and plastic. But I’d seen the pattern by now and didn’t even flinch. Erica chuckled. “A keeper, this one.”
The next was a beautiful, regal blonde in orange tennis gear. She moved with such sensuality that I started reaching for my buttons and had to curl my hands into fists to control myself. “Hi, who are you?” I asked her. She didn’t answer.
“That’s Anya, our Three. Don’t mind her. She’s not one to waste time,” Erica laughed.
Anya came ever closer, each step captivating me more. She slid her finger across my shoulder, moving closer to me so that her soft curves were right against me. “So your trick is... you. You use your body. You’re a temptress.”
“Da,” she agreed with a warm smile. “Good. Quiet now… relax, lovely, relax with me.” Her voice was right in my ear, and my body was beginning to suggest that I give up on this whole resistance thing. Anya had really nice breasts. Really nice everything. Every time I tried to look away from one perfect part of her, I got caught up in another one.
“How- how did you get her? If she doesn’t speak English, how—” I asked, trying to rationalize myself back to sanity and out of Anya’s hot grip.
“Sarah speaks five languages, she just normally recruits in English,” I heard someone say, but the voice seemed far, far away. Anya was all I could see, all I could feel as she teased me again with her manicured finger down my cheek. Someone was unbuttoning my shirt-oh, that was me. Hard to tell with the heat throbbing between my legs. One last time I tried to muster up the strength to resist, but Anya chose that moment to bend over and take her shoes off, and the sight of her bright orange panties triggered every lesson Ashley had ever taught me.
Going to her, running my hands up her skirt, kissing every inch of her- it was automatic. Anya was the only thing in my mind, my only focus, my only concern, my only desire. I wanted her to take me down, make me scream, make me come. She turned around and kissed me, her hand straying down my back. I couldn’t stay upright anymore. Someone- not Anya- put me on one of the tables and spread my legs.
“She lasted to the fourth, that’s amazing!” someone said, the last thing I heard or remembered before something slipped into my pussy and the world faded away.
I came back to myself and started the usual routine of figuring out where I was and how long I’d been out. A tall black woman-striking, despite pushing forty- entered, wearing an African patterned dress and a headdress in a matching print.
“Ah, our twelfth has awakened. The way you lasted, you’re a regular battle captain. I’m not surprised it only took you a few days to come out of your indoctrination. You were barely out long enough for everyone to take their turn- Daphne was ready to dose you with one of her concoctions to make sure she got a turn with you. You were quite impressive, I assure you. The average time is two weeks- that’s how long it took me. But then again, you’re anything but average.” I was flattered, but there was something important missing in this conversation. She seemed to realize that and continued, “I understand that you don’t remember me. I’m Keisha, the Two. Welcome to the Twelve, and your new suite. Yes, it’s this big. It’s only four to a floor on each of the 22nd, 23rd, and 24th floors. We house the assistants on the 21st.”
“So what’s on 16 through 20?” I had to ask.
“Oh, you don’t miss a beat. Those floors are where our professionals have their offices- lawyers, stock traders, the ones who land the big money.”
“Good to know. So what do we do as the greatest ever?”
Keisha flashed me a wicked grin that I liked the looks of. “We make sure that our footprint is as large as possible and there are no cracks in our foundation. You’re good at getting people to do what you want. Now we get to see how far you can take it.”
“I’ve got some ideas,” I admitted, matching her grin for grin.
“Oh, no you don’t. You’ll have to get up a little earlier in the morning to get one over on me! Besides, you’ve got some duties to take care of before you can start having fun. First job is to pick your assistant. She’ll handle your operational duties when you aren’t here, and despite all appearances, that’s more often than not. We’ve been waiting here for you to go through your paces and either outdo the others or cause someone else to develop.”
“I know just the person, too. Ashley can handle anything while I’m not here!” I already had my phone open when Keisha gave me a look that suggested I had said something incredibly stupid.
“All that conditioning and you still haven’t forgotten who brought you here. Your loyalty is unmatched, and that’s why you’re about to make a really big mistake. Your assistant is there to be you when you’re not there. She’s your… slave, for lack of a better word.” I could hear her discomfort- completely understandable.
“What?” I squawked.
“The best way to be sure that everything’s going exactly as you’d have it is to have an extension of yourself here even when you’re not, someone who can’t do anything but what you would do. Whoever you choose as your assistant ends up completely broken. It’s a secret we keep from the other floors, but it’s one of the ways we prove that we’re superior. I don’t doubt that you have the power to do it.” She paused, almost seeming to read my thoughts. “No, no going to the lowest floors, either. Yes, I know about Alisa- the story of your recruitment got around while you were being indoctrinated. You’d bring her up and reform her into something more than a sexpot. But there has to be something there to break for you to break it.”
I guess that made sense. I couldn’t imagine Alisa being able to handle any major projects that would need my attention- either before or after she got Candied.
“Loyal, and clever, but I’ve seen those traits before. What you have, though, is something I haven’t seen here in a very long time, and something that makes you different from the rest of the Twelve, something that makes you stronger than the rest but something that can be your fatal flaw if you let it consume you.”
“This is starting to sound like a lecture from English lit,” I grumbled. “Or some kind of riddle. Okay, what is it I have that’s both a strength and a weakness?”
“A good heart that we couldn’t overwhelm and a well of compassion that I’ve never seen. Even after we got through with you, implanting the killer instinct you’ll need to survive here, the need to control that will help us all grow stronger, the desire to use your talent, and the courage to get over your qualms- even after all of that, you still care. Somehow, we couldn’t ice over your heart. Don’t let that innocence leave you, but be careful that it’s not your downfall, either.”
That was the feeling I couldn’t put my finger on, and probably the reason why I had tried to work on Keisha before realizing she was one of the Twelve. Now that I was officially one of the Twelve myself, I was looking forward to dominating a mind- it was almost like bloodlust, a craving that wasn’t quite sex, but was almost as satisfying. I can’t really put it on words- if you’ve felt it, you know what it is, and if you haven’t, you can’t.
But at the same time, the idea of taking someone from the middle floors- someone who had a mind to break- repulsed me. The fact that someone had thought of the loophole and deliberately closed it bothered me a lot.
“You also owe us two Candies,” Keisha said, interrupting my train of thought. “It should be three- that Alisa of yours was a sweet little Candy, but Sarah moved her to the higher floors to gain your trust. That heart of yours again- you couldn’t see her like that, as just a sex toy for everyone’s amusement and entertainment, but in this life, you can’t let that get in the way, or someone will take you and use you as a weapon and you’ll be defenseless because you’re more worried about others than yourself.” She spoke bitterly, like she’d been there before. “Sarah’s a kind ruler, compared to the others who are out there. She knows, and I know, and soon you’ll know just how this power corrupts and destroys.”
“Speaking of...”
“Yes, let’s go get you an assistant.” Keisha led the way into a little office that was clearly part of every member of the Twelve’s suite. The workstation had a database open of all those who were currently available if I decided to pick from among them. “Mind the stunned looks- those pictures would have been taken at their first indoctrination.”
I clicked through the profiles, reading through carefully. I wanted someone who wasn’t too smart- I didn’t want to waste a mind-but I also wanted to prove myself. I went through the list, but kept going back to one in particular. After the fourth time, I realized that Mandy, the telemarketer from the twelfth floor, with big shy eyes, was perfect for my purpose. I dialed her number and headed back to the bedroom to wait.
The bell rang, and there she was, a pretty girl in a Dutch soccer uniform. The jersey was tucked into her shorts to accent her breasts, and the knee-high socks were closer to schoolgirl than soccer player. My killer instinct- the one they’d given me- said to take her down quickly, but that wasn’t the way I wanted this to happen. She was defenseless. If nothing else, there was no challenge in that. I let her sit down on the bed and wake up slightly to see if I could get into her head a little.
“Hi, Mandy. I just wanted to ask you a few things,” I said gently.
“I’m not in trouble, am I? I know I don’t have great numbers, but I’ve been getting better and it’s not that easy for me to connect with people—”
“Easy there, Mandy,” I said, and she calmed immediately. “I’m Cara, the newest member of the Twelve, and I want you to be my assistant. I looked through all the personnel files and picked you-you’ve got the looks, you’ve got the body, and I think you deserve to move up in the building.”
“If you wanna take me, take me. It would be an honor to serve the Twelve,” she said, and she was fading without too much help from me.
“You understand that you wouldn’t be Mandy, right? You’d be my assistant- you’d be me when I’m not around. You’d never leave again. You’d either be in this suite waiting for me, being with me, or in the control room being me. If you’re not willing to do that, I understand. This can just be another room service call. I wouldn’t tell anyone. If you do want to make the sacrifice, though, I’ll always remember it, and always remember you. I promise you that.”
Mandy watched me as I spoke. When I was done, she said, “You really would, wouldn’t you? You’d let me go. Even though you could have me out and spread in a second, you care enough to give me a choice. My God...” Without a word from me, she got up, stripped, and fell to her knees, waiting for me to take her. Her complete surrender took me by surprise, but not for long. I began the process of changing her, taking away her memories and implanting my own, adjusting her personality and attitude so that she would make every decision that I would if I were there. It was a long process, made longer by the periodic breaks to… shall we say, reward her for her sacrifice? The text file that had accompanied the database had indicated that the information our assistants needed was better absorbed during orgasm. Lucky Mandy, getting to have her brains fucked out.
Then again, we were both going to wake up as Cara the next morning. Well, for the most part. I did let Mandy keep some parts of her original identity- namely her athletic awareness and her soccer uniform (I had plans for that outfit later). A nice body and good stamina would be pretty damn satisfying after a long day of doing whatever it was I’d be doing as one of the Twelve.
By the end, Mandy was Mandy in name only, nothing but an empty shell for whatever I needed her to do. Keisha had left, but there was a note by the computer suggesting I should check my speed-dials. The other members of the Twelve were, unsurprisingly, the first eleven slots. #12 was empty, and I programmed Mandy’s number into that one before dialing #2 for Keisha. “One assistant, coming up.”
“Nicely done,” Keisha said. “I’ll send mine up to take care of her.”
Maybe two minutes later, there was a knock on the door. A very pretty young black woman in an orange skirtsuit stood on the other side, with what looked like another skirtsuit over her arm and a shopping bag in her other hand. “Keisha sent me,” she said, and she took Mandy in hand, dressing her in the outfit she’d brought. When she was finished, the two of them were a study in contrasts- one blonde and fair, the other midnight black, but both in the same uniform. Mandy left with Keisha’s assistant, and for the first time in a long time I was alone.
Those skirtsuits had given me some ideas. I needed something a little more mature than the preppy look I’d been cultivating if I was going to be taken seriously within the Twelve. A trip downstairs got me a ride to the nearest mall, and close to a thousand dollars later, I came back with a new wardrobe of tight blouses and stylish skirts. The rest of the Twelve were waiting for me when I returned.
“I knew this one had the kill in her!” Rosa exclaimed. “You knew a speech like that had her gone and buried before she opened her mouth. The choice that’s not really a choice- a classic technique. You’re quite the charmer, Cara.”
“How did you know how- no one was there!”
Keisha laughed. “Security is my turf, Cara. I set up the cameras to see how you would handle this on your own. You’ve grown up already. You don’t look like the innocent you did before. Good. There’s another task ahead of you that innocence won’t do you any good for. I did warn you that we needed Candies.”
Ugh. That still gave me the heebie-jeebies. I understood why we did it, but I still had issues with such a heavy level of control for such sordid purposes. And hadn’t Sarah told me that we didn’t go looking for Candies? Maybe it was part of my induction to the Twelve, or maybe it was just because we were short on them. But I had a pretty good idea of how to make sure I wasn’t emptying anything worthwhile. Back downstairs I went, first stopping by the assistants’ quarters to pick up Mandy, then heading down to the basement for two male Candies to serve as bait, then coming back up to the garage for one of our limos. I put Mandy behind the wheel and the boys in the back, then rolled into town, ready to hit the nightclubs.
“Remember, boys, only the sweetest and the dumbest. Naturally dumb, not just drunk or high,“I ordered them. They got out of the car and went into one of the bars. I spent most of the night releasing women who had something to salvage, but after many misses, we had two hits in a row, both of them blonde, both giggly, and both weak of mind, not just drunk or daring. “All right, Mandy, let’s take the long way home while our friends get to know each other back there,” I said. Mandy flashed a smile, knowing, of course, exactly what I meant.
I started nice and slow, suggesting that the girls might want to show off by kissing each other. No hesitation there, and I waited until they were both groping the boys again before I made my next suggestion. Slowly but surely, the boys and I kept it going. Each of them willingly stripped, then flashed passers-by through the moonroof, then gladly started putting out. I kept myself concealed in the front seat the entire time, checking for any resistance to the men’s increasing demands. None whatsoever. I had found what I was again looking for. “Home, Mandy,” I said, and ordered the boys to tell the blondes that. Again, no resistance.
That was my cue. I twisted around in the front seat until I was fully visible from the back. “Hi, ladies. Having fun with these two hunks I gave you?” I asked, smiling at the two naked, giggling women bouncing around in the backseat.
“Oh, yeah, they’re awesome!” one said. The other’s mouth was too full of cock to speak, but she nodded enthusiastically. Yes, exactly what I was looking for.
Still I wanted to be honest with them. “I’m a porn producer, and you two are naturals. Would you like to do this for the rest of your life?” I asked.
“With men like these? Oh, hell yeah!”
The other finished her blowjob, swallowed, and said, “Like, fuck our jobs if we could really be porn stars.” And she meant every word of it.
“Would you like sex to be the only thing in your life?”
“What’s not to like about that?”
“Um, yeah!”
I had to hold back my laughter. “I mean the only thing, ladies. Nothing else.”
“Oh my God, are you going to sign us up or not?” the giver of blowjobs blurted out, and that was that.
“Like I said, you’re naturals. Welcome aboard,” I said, rolling down my pantyhose. “Now, there are a few things I have to tell you before we start…”
The ploy worked. Both of them were looking right at me, right up my skirt, and fixed on the orange panties I wore. As I spoke, their eyes grew wider and emptier, their stares blanker with every second. The giver of blowjobs let her mouth fall open- apparently a natural position for her. “Your new names are Candy, both of you. You’re nothing but a sweet little piece of candy, sexual sugar to be licked and tasted and enjoyed by anyone. It’s all you want, all you’ll ever want, all you’ll ever need. Just a sweet little piece of candy, and it feels so nice, so good, so hot and wonderful to be taken that it’s all you want to do, all you want to be, all you are, and the hotter you get, the harder it’ll be to think about anything but how hot you are, and how much hotter that makes you...”
I could almost see their thoughts melting away behind those empty eyes, replaced by lust and sex. They ate it up, and I could see how one of them almost reached for me so that I could satisfy them, but, well, I didn’t know where those things had been before I found them. I had standards, after all. Instead, I rolled my pantyhose up and continued building up their sexual energy with just words, keeping them unable to move or think, or do anything but be wet and needy. Didn’t help them much that the boys re-dressed them, either.
Once we were back home, I brought them in. Keisha was waiting for me, and she didn’t look happy. “Where’s their orange?” she demanded.
“Oh, I’m not done with them yet. The devolution will be televised.”
“I see you’ve lost your conscience already.”
“Au contraire. They signed their contracts before I even loosened a zipper. I let the boys take care of them. No control at all. I’d swear they were halfway there before I showed up. Do you really think I’d let a couple of skanks like those have me? I think I’ll use Studio B for this one. Keisha, wanna come? Or do you prefer to watch from a distance?” I teased her, but she didn’t smile back. Whatever was up her ass wasn’t my problem, though.
Studio B was a bedroom done completely in orange, with a canopy bed big enough for an orgy. “All right, ladies, this is your screen test. After all, Candyporn.com only uses the hottest girls as Candies. Why don’t you tell me your names and what you do for a living?” I let up on them just long enough to let them speak.
“Liz, and, like, I work part-time at Kaiser’s,” the giver of blowjobs said.
“Allison, and I’m a sophomore at Albany, but, like, mostly for the parties,” the other one said.
“Well, by the end of the scene, if you’re as good as I think you’ll be, you’ll both be screaming that you’re Candy, the finest and sweetest sluts on the Internet. All right, each of you pick your partner and go to opposite sides of the bed. Positions, everyone- not like that, Liz, nothing exotic until after you’ve passed your screen test. That’s it- okay, lights, camera, action!”
Liz was the weaker of the two, because as soon as the camera started rolling, she stripped out of her miniskirt and tank top and practically pushed the male Candy into her slit. Maybe three minutes later, in response to my suggestion and the subliminals in the background music, she shriekd, “OH GOD YES I’M CANDY!” and started encouraging her partner to suck her, lick her, and eat her up like a piece of sweet little candy.
Allison tried to make it a little more interesting, arousing her partner with a slow striptease and engaging in a little foreplay. Maybe she realize what would happen to her if she gave in, and maybe she was afraid, and maybe that would have kept her from going under if she hadn’t looked over towards me in my orange. But that one glance was enough, and soon she was on her back and spread, begging her partner to fuck her, and screaming out her new name when he did.
As both women lay back on the bed, drained and glowing from the sex, I brought the little hand-held camera over to them and said, “Why don’t you tell me who you are and what you do for a living?”
“I’m Candy, and I’m the finest and sweetest slut on the Internet!”
“Nuh-uh, I’m Candy, and I’m the finest and sweetest slut on the Internet!”
I smiled. “Welcome to the business, ladies. Since you’re not sure which of you is the better slut, why don’t we have a little fuck-off to determine it?” I gave the male Candies instructions on what I wanted them to do, then left them all to work out the rest of their pent-up sexual energy while Mandy and I headed upstairs.
Mandy had apparently gotten a crash course in Tangerine Twelve business from the other assistants, because she showed me the proper paperwork to fill out for our new Candies and how to withdraw them from the outside world. Their credit lines and bank accounts were our property now. I tapped into their e-mail accounts, got a sense of their writing styles, and sent out the proper excuses to their families, Allison’s school, and Liz’s job.
It was amazing. Not the paperwork- paperwork I knew all too well from the Discount Den- but the absolute, unadulterated, concentrated power that I wielded. I’d essentially played God to these two women, completely taking over their lives, and bending them to my will. I hadn’t even had to touch them to turn them on. I’d always known I had a way with people, but I’d never realized how good it felt to let that power run free.
Despite all my ethics and all my values, I still went to bed with a wicked grin on my face.