The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive

Title: Instant-On

Part: 4

Keywords: MF mc Mm oral anal inc grow scat

Summary: A soccer mom is sucked into a world of uncontrollable desire and shameful degradation. Even if she manages to win some measure of freedom for herself and her family, will what remains be recognizable?

Optimization

By the end of the first month of school, we’d settled into a rhythm. It wasn’t anything like we’d lived before, and would have shocked the neighbors, but we did what we had to. Olivia had been accepted to several top-flight schools, but she ended up at the local community college. None of us were allowed to travel, and I didn’t think I could have survived without her, anyway. Maybe it was for the best; the friends she’d been closest to had moved away to school and weren’t around to ask awkward questions.

“Mom, I forgive you. Truly,” she told me the only time I tried to raise the subject. It was the first time she’d done anal, and her ass wasn’t as practiced as mine or Alex’s. None of us cared about things like that in the heat of the moment, but she’d flinched under my gentle touch as I applied cream to her inflamed orifice.

The men were the worst. Honestly, I think it was having two dogs. They were incredibly stoic, or more likely repressed, and never talked about any of it, even in their more lucid moments. There weren’t a lot of those at home, anyway.

“Honey, I’m home,” Jose called from the doorway. The greeting sounded tired and rote, and I knew any affection there wasn’t for me. By the end of the short walk to the kitchen, his eyes had already gone feral and he was sniffing the air. I was positive he wasn’t smelling the pot roast I’d worked on all afternoon.

“Dad!” Alex shouted, flying into the kitchen; apparently Olivia hadn’t been able to restrain him. He acted like a boy a decade his junior, running to give his father a welcoming hug. The passionate kiss wasn’t at all traditional.

I didn’t know if it was emotional regression, damage to his anus, or just a lack of concern, but Alex didn’t have very good hygiene any more. Unfortunately, the only thing that excited Jose more than the smell of his son’s shit was reaming the hole that produced it. They already were tenting their pants and my feeble plans for a family dinner crashed and burned.

“Not in the kitchen! Damnit, take it upstairs. Olivia!”

She appeared a moment later. “I’m sorry, Mom! I just turned my back for a second to put on my hose, and he got away from me.”

I smiled. “I understand. Don’t get a run in them! Here; just stir the gravy and I’ll deal with them.” I grabbed Alex and tugged him in the direction of his room; Jose followed as if attached by a string. A little push propelled my son through the door and I stood aside to avoid being trampled by my husband.

Olivia and I had done the work of clearing the room by ourselves, stripping it completely to the subfloor and installing easy-to-clean vinyl flooring. It contained nothing now except a mattress encased in plastic and a webcam. It was always active, and I knew perverts around the world were watching Jose force his hand between Alex’s legs while my son leaned forward to lick the tip of the organ protruding about my husband’s waistband. I’d have to put something in front of them later or they’d starve.

On returning to the kitchen, I paused to consider the picture it presented. Olivia had her tongue absentmindedly caught between her teeth while she stirred, and the only stitches of clothing she wore were her fancy hose and the garter belt holding them in place.

The same implants that looked preposterous on me were obscene on her, but I had to admit they seemed to drive men wild. For a quasi-modest girl, the proportions were a challenge; even with really stretchy fabric, Olivia’s tops either had to be really tight upstairs or absurdly loose around her midriff.

As of a week ago, we both sported what Olivia termed “blowfish lips” and I hadn’t made up my mind about them yet. Everyday Tanya thought they looked ridiculous, but slut Tanya had already noticed they got me a mouthful of cum faster than ever.

“Thanks, honey,” I told Olivia, relieving her of the wooden spoon. “I guess it’s just the two of us for dinner again tonight.”

“Sorry,” Olivia said apologetically, “it’s just you. I have bingo night at the LFOP.” They weren’t really called the Loyal Fraternal Order of Perverts, of course. She’d coined the name after the first night and it stuck. A bunch of dirty old men who should have been dead had figured out it was a lot more fun to play for a ride atop a sexy young girl than cash, especially if she was wildly enthusiastic and willing to do anything to help grandpa get his rocks off. Anyway, Olivia had been back there every week since she’d started.

I glanced at the schedule we kept posted on the side of the refrigerator now. “How could I have forgotten that?” I wondered. At least she’d be home early. My next appointment was an 8 AM with Mr. Burns the next day. That wasn’t his name either, but Olivia had explained the reference and I had to admit it fit—except, perhaps, for the age. “Well, I’ll just keep it warm until you get home. You’d better hurry up—don’t want to be late!”

Olivia nodded energetically and tip-toed out of the kitchen, trying to be gentle on the soles of her stockings. I knew neither of us wanted to think about what happened following any of the infractions we’d made in the past.

She was down again in plenty of time, all made up and dressed to kill. Olivia had said—I thought in jest—that she thought the LFOP had a dead pool for the first person to pass away coitus interruptus. A year ago, I would have sent her back to her room to put on a top under the vest, find a skirt at least two inches longer, replace the stripper heels with anything else, and put on some underwear, for God’s sake! A lot had changed. “You look scrumptious, as always. I wish I were still your age.”

“Oh, Mom.” Olivia rolled her eyes. She walked over and we hugged lightly; I took care not to smudge her makeup. Looking serious, she pulled the locket she wore on a fine chain around her neck over her head and handed it to me.

It was the symbol of our deal with the devil, but repetition had dulled any awkwardness or self-consciousness. I matter-of-factly held it between my legs and released a short squirt of urine, hitting it dead-on and saturating the bit of foam inside, before handing it back to Olivia.

With it, and the right perfume from Mr. Burns’ supply, she’d be the raging slut I knew too well from my own experience. Without it, literally nothing on earth could arouse her and anything she’d experience would be pure rape. Olivia hung the chain back around her neck; it was a tiny measure of self-control not even I was granted.

Normally, Olivia knew what she was getting into and raised the locket whenever she recognized the perfume to which she’d been keyed. But, if she wished, she could refuse to sniff it, retain her wits, and perhaps escape from a bad situation. It was a two-edged sword.

She’d refused exactly twice that I knew of. Once, upon review, Mr. Burns had agreed with her assessment. The other time, I’d been forced, while totally in control of my faculties, to watch Olivia be triple-teamed by three of the most unsavory vermin I’d ever met, until she begged me to piss on her. Then I’d been forced to watch her insatiable desire for the same degradation that had left her crying a few minutes earlier.

“Be safe,” I told Olivia, which was a really stupid thing to say, but made her smile for a moment. Then she was gone. I wondered idly if Mr. Burns stayed away from younger children because they couldn’t drive themselves to their assignations, but realized I really had no idea how many of the people around me might secretly share my twisted circumstances.

I sighed and divided the pot roast into four servings. Two I set aside under plastic wrap, and the other two I carried up to Alex’s room. I’d thought more than once it would be easier, and just as acceptable, to use dog food, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. “Dinnertime,” I announced brightly as I walked into the room.

They weren’t fucking, which was a blessing, but I couldn’t always tell how “with it” they really were. Tonight, the answer appeared to be “not very.” Alex set his plate aside without interrupting his masturbation session, while Jose, equally erect, placed his carefully beneath Alex’s bobbing ass. A mingled stream of semen and liquefied shit trailed from his distended hole onto the food. I turned away before I saw any more, but I could hear Jose slurping and chewing behind me.

After retreating to the family room, I turned on the music loud enough to drown out any noise from the bedrooms and picked up one of Jose’s old Popular Science magazines. I’d used to read romance novels, but they left me flat now. Nothing that didn’t smell of cologne excited me.

It was a little later than I’d expected when Olivia returned home, and she went straight to the bathroom without saying a word. That wasn’t unusual —it still took a lot out of us, emotionally—but I grew concerned when she didn’t reappear.

I went looking for her, and found her curled up on the floor of the shower, under the spray, crying. “Olivia, baby, what’s the matter?” I asked, climbing in to sit and hold her. My skirt and shirt had seen a lot worse than warm water.

“He-he-he died,” she sobbed into my shoulder. “Mr. Grelton, he just died! I screamed at him and hit him because I wanted his dick and he wasn’t staying hard. They had to pull me off his body. My God, what if I killed him?”

“Oh, Olivia,” I gasped, appalled, “I’m sure that wasn’t it. He was old, right? I think the exertion must have done it; you couldn’t have changed anything.” I considered a moment before adding, “At least he died happy.”

A choking laugh interrupted her sobs. “You’re terrible!” Olivia told me, and hiccupped.

I encouraged her to stand up. “C’mon, let’s get you out of here.” I turned off the water and wrapped her in Jose’s terry robe before pulling on my own over my wet clothing.

We shared a quiet dinner and a glass of wine. Yeah, Olivia was still underage, but if she was old enough for the rest of it, she was old enough for a little alcohol.

“I just don’t know,” she finally told me. “I’m not sure I can go on like this. How do you do it?”

My heart clenched at her words. “It’s no great virtue. Maybe I’m just more of a slut than I let on.” I felt my eyes get watery, too. “But don’t give up, Olivia; you’re smarter than I am. We’ll figure a way out of this.”

We put away the dishes and went up to the bedroom. Olivia usually slept with me now; it was strictly platonic, no matter what an observer might have thought, but neither of us wanted to sleep alone. Jose slept—if he ever did—with Alex.

She and I spooned our naked bodies together and held each other close. I tried again to think of some way out of the trap I’d led us into, but once again managed to lose myself in sleep before an answer appeared.

The two of us had the morning routine down pat. About half an hour before the bus was due, we entered the unspeakable filth of Alex’s room. The sight, and the smell, still made me want to heave, but I hadn’t done that since the first week. Olivia flipped on our jury-rigged exhaust fan, and then we dragged our charges apart and out of the room.

It probably wouldn’t have been possible any other time, but by dawn they were so smeared with each other’s secretions and dazed from another sleepless night that their mutual attraction was at a low point. Olivia pushed Alex down the hall into their bathroom, while I tugged on Jose’s arm until I maneuvered him into the shower in the master bath.

As always, the start of the process was a struggle, but as the gunk flushed down the drain, a degree of sanity returned to their eyes. Olivia would get Alex dressed, push a hot pocket for breakfast and his book bag into his hands, and get him physically out of the house in time to board the bus. A knock on our bedroom door let me know it was safe to allow Jose out of the bathroom. Once, I’d messed up and let him out before Alex had left, and he’d had to use a sick day.

He dressed slowly, never looking at me, and left for work. Olivia and I traded supportive glances and finally were free to look after ourselves. Normally I’d decontaminate Alex’s room after Olivia left for her first class, but today that would have to wait.

I’d allowed extra time in case there were traffic problems, but apparently the idiots were driving somewhere else and I made it to Mr. Burns’ office way early. I didn’t see any reason to just sit around in the car, so I went in and rode up in the elevator with a number of well-dressed men who couldn’t stop glancing at my jugs. If I’d been wearing fuck-me pumps instead of Sketchers, I bet I could have gotten some action—not that I wanted any.

None of them got off on my floor, and for once I saw the receptionist’s station was unoccupied. Well, it wasn’t like I didn’t know where his office was. I let myself in, and realized I’d found the receptionist.

Burns was sprawled on the little loveseat that sat to one side of the seating area in front of the desk, and the girl knelt on the floor between his legs. Of course, I assumed she was blowing him, but it didn’t appear anything was happening and I started second-guessing myself. He gestured quietly for me to take a seat, and I did.

From that angle, I could see she really did have his cock in her mouth, but it wasn’t like any blowjob I’d ever seen. Everything was incredibly slow, like a walk in the park on a really muggy summer day. She worked her mouth languorously down the length of his organ, but then she withdrew again and begin licking it. I kept waiting for him to hump her face and get it over with, but it never happened.

Gradually, I began to appreciate her artistry. It was true that nothing happened quickly, but her tongue was always in motion and never doing the same thing for longer than about a minute. There was never a time her lips or tongue weren’t caressing either his hard shaft or the sack hanging below it. Her hands remained neatly in her lap the entire time, and she wasn’t playing with herself, either.

Precisely at the time the clock in the corner began chiming the top of the hour, she opened her mouth wide and Mr. Burns began spurting into it. One jet went wide, arcing across her nose and the corner of one eye, but she remained perfectly still. Only after he nodded did she close her mouth and I saw her throat work.

A perfectly manicured finger removed the errant jism from her face and was cleaned in turn by her obviously talented tongue. “Thank you, sir.”

“That will be all, Lauren,” Mr. Burns absently replied while tucking himself away.

She rose gracefully to her feet and swayed out of the office. I watched her go, trim in her professional attire, and caught her looking at me with a smugly superior attitude. Lauren might have been the one leaving with a bellyful of cum, but I was the one who felt like a cheap slut.

Hell, I looked like one, with my obviously artificial bust and lips; Lauren looked like she was smaller than I’d been even before. She had to have trouble typing with those nails, while mine were short and uneven from scrabbling at stranger’s zippers and mopping up my son’s shit.

“Good morning, Tanya,” Burns greeted me as he rose and walked behind his desk. “I appreciate your punctuality.”

I snorted, letting some of my bitterness show.

He frowned slightly in return. “I thought it was time we discussed your future with our organization.”

“Future, me? That seems pretty obvious, even to a dumb bimbo. What do I have, five years before I’m fucked out and discarded? I’m never going to be like Lauren, especially now.” I hefted my tits for emphasis. “Why don’t you just go get more like her?” I nearly bit my tongue, ashamed I’d suggest even in jest subjecting more innocent victims to his cruel whims.

“Don’t be catty. Humor me for a moment and listen.” He leaned forward and studied me intently; I couldn’t help but focus on him in return. “Your surmise is roughly correct, in the general sense.”

“We are a large enterprise, with a diversified client base and a correspondingly large portfolio of product offerings. You were selected as a typical MILF candidate.” I looked blank, and he explained it. “Mother I’d Love to Fuck. An attractive soccer mom, old enough to appeal to several demographics and young enough to retain substantial sex appeal and have reasonable shelf life.”

“You are, frankly, not the type of woman men dream about having romantic relationships with or take pleasure in breaking or degrading. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that such men doubtless exist, but they are unlikely to pay the sums we demand for such fantasies. No, Tanya, men who dream about MILFs expect to fuck them. If the mother in question is wildly uninhibited and uncontrollably aroused by their prowess, is that not just part of the fantasy? Your induction and conditioning was planned accordingly.”

Listening to him dissect me so analytically was like undergoing surgery without anesthesia.

“In the normal course of affairs, you would be subjected to increasingly intrusive alterations to bolster your attractiveness to additional audiences when your youth begins to fade. Your implants are a common first step. Perhaps you will not be shocked to learn that more radical fetishists focus more on the alterations than the starting point.”

“At some point, either your mind or your body will give out, and you will become useless for our purposes. Our actuaries estimate that will occur between 3 and 7 years from now for women in your position.”

I closed my eyes, uncertain whether I wanted to cry, or scream, or do both. “You dragged me down here to tell me you’re going to squeeze me like a tube of toothpaste and throw me away when you’re done?” A hysterical laugh burst out of me. “You should tell your fucking actuaries that my life expectancy is about as long as it’s going to take me to overdose or jump off a bridge somewhere!”

“And leave your family to fend for themselves?” he asked, piercing me to the quick. “Listen, Tanya; I said, ‘in the normal course of affairs.’ I am increasingly convinced you are not a normal acquisition.”

“Sure,” I sneered, unswayed. “I’m just a college dropout who stayed home to raise kids and then decided to become a trashy slut—what do I have that she doesn’t?” I nodded my head angrily at the door.

“Do not confuse appearance with potential. If Lauren does not look like you, it is because she is intended to suit a different audience. That does not, on its face, make her either more or less than you.” He pushed the call button on his desk.

Lauren appeared a moment later. “Yes, sir?”

“Come here.” When she was standing in front of the desk, he added, “Now, face Tanya. Masturbate.”

I thought her expression slipped, ever so slightly, for a fraction of a second before she lifted her black skirt and slid one of those carefully shaped and polished nails beneath her black satin panties.

Mr. Burns asked, in a conversational tone, “Why are you doing this?”

“Because you told me to.” He shifted in his chair. “Because I have to do everything you tell me.”

“Really? And why is that?”

Lauren’s eyes dropped. “Because you might not give me your cum. I’m addicted to it.”

“So if I told you to reach orgasm in less than a minute, you’d do it? I am telling you, by the way.”

A look of panic crossed Lauren’s face, and a second finger joined the first underneath her panties. She turned her head aside.

“Keep looking at Tanya.”

Her eyes locked on mine, and she didn’t look superior any longer. She looked frightened, and then humiliated, and finally ashamed as her body jerked on her fingers and she bit her lip to stifle a gasp.

“Thank you, Lauren; that will be all for now.”

She straightened her skirt with shaky fingers and exited the office with a semblance of her normal assurance.

“It’s nothing personal,” Mr. Burns clarified. “A mouthful of love from any man who chews these special breath mints is enough to hold off the withdrawal pains for another day.” He nonchalantly popped one, as if to demonstrate.

“How do you know she wasn’t faking it?” I blurted out, unable to resist asking.

“I don’t,” he answered simply. “But if she was—and I’m not saying that’s the case, mind you—she’d have to be confident that I couldn’t tell the difference.” He shrugged. “Either way, it’s good enough; remember, this business is all about appearances, not reality.”

Mr. Burns focused on me again. “That brings me back to my point. Having seen this little demonstration, what do you suppose is the difference between Lauren and yourself?”

Not as much as I’d believed, it was clear, but I was tired of being lectured. “I don’t know; a $1000 wardrobe and a good manicure?”

“Very good.” He laughed lightly in a way that let me know he was humoring me. “The difference is that Lauren recruited both of her sisters— triplets, by the way—while you managed to muster enough willpower and creativity to place your daughter at least partially outside our control. We frankly expected your husband and son to be fixtures in a brothel months ago; you have somehow managed to maintain a semblance of a normal household.”

He rocked back in his chair. “This is not a business that tolerates the ill-prepared or incompetent. While you do not have the experience to comprehend this, please accept my assertion that you have been both unusually troublesome and unusually intriguing.”

I couldn’t decide whether to be horrified by his callous assessment, pleased at the apparent compliment, or disgusted with myself for having any positive reaction to the man. “Which means what to me, exactly?”

Mr. Burns sighed. “People are a dime a dozen. Not literally, but there are so many opportunities—far more than we could ever hope to manage— that no face or figure, no matter how compelling, is truly indispensible or irreplaceable. Meat is a commodity. Minds, on the other hand, are a far more precious resource.”

He studied me intently for a moment longer. “I believe there is a spot for you on our management team.”

It took a moment for the words to sink in, and another moment for me to master the towering fury that erupted within me sufficiently to stand up and walk towards the door without trying to kill him with my bare hands.

Listen!” The slap of his hand against the desk punctuated the order and was enough to freeze me for a moment. “You can decide to be ordinary, and walk through that door. We’ll do the usual things at the usual time. Jose and Alex will be dead within a year, from disease, mistreatment, or just a lack of interest in anything except sex. You’ll have your half decade, more or less, before you’re too used-up for all but the most extreme deviants. The ones who won’t care what you look like, as long as they can watch you orgasm while they kill you.”

“Then there’s Olivia. She’s young, and resilient, and might have decades ahead of her. Except you won’t be there to help her, or provide those little shots of piss that make life bearable, will you? Nothing will ever arouse her after you’re gone. Most men won’t be interested in a girl that isn’t hot for them. She’ll be left for the rapists and sadists, the ones who just want to hear her scream. I wonder how long she’ll last then?”

“If you honestly think what I might offer is worse than that, then please keep walking.” He paused for emphasis. “On the other hand, I hope you will choose to use that brain in your head and come back here to listen to my offer. You can always choose to stupidly end your lives afterwards.”

I rested my head against the door and wanted to cry. “Why can’t you just let us go?” I asked, voice breaking.

“That’s hardly good business,” he said, a hint of humor grating on my last nerve. “I grant you are unacquainted with the costs of preparing and maintaining somebody such as yourself, but I think you might find them surprisingly high. I am confident it requires no particular imagination to understand the risks of exposure. I am sure you will find it callous, but it makes much better sense to use up our resources rather than leave them... flitting about to be picked up by others.”

“I hate you,” I grated out as I plopped myself back into my chair.

He had the grace to look discomfited. “That is understandable. It is not a defense, but I ask you to consider that my personal feelings do not always align with my professional responsibilities.”

“Yeah, yeah,” I irritatedly waved away the insulting disclaimer. “Get on with it, already. Start with how you think you could trust me if I were stupid enough to agree to whatever you want me to do.”

“Enlightened self-interest,” began Mr. Burns, pausing to make sure he had my attention. “It is clear you care deeply for your family, and obviously it is unnecessary to point out at any greater length what could happen to them if you made us unhappy. I would prefer not to dwell on that possibility; fear of punishment may command obedience, but it does not inspire.”

I reluctantly nodded in agreement.

“We are willing to make—concessions—for good service,” he continued, sounding as if the word was being torn from his throat. “More to the point, I have mentioned this is an enterprise. Our industry is highly competitive, and some of our competitors are less principled than we are.”

His admission surprised a laugh out of me. “Worse than this?” I asked, skeptically.

“Considerably,” he answered without elaborating.

I didn’t know if he was letting my imagination paint a darker picture than the situation warranted, or if I wasn’t as scared as I should be; I decided I wasn’t ready to find out just then. “I still don’t understand what you think I can do for you,” I prompted, trying to get back onto the original subject.

“One or more of our competitors—we believe just one—has resorted to theft in an effort to boost their market presence and profit at our expense.”

“I guess you can’t just call the police,” I smirked, but he surprised me by grinning back.

“Actually, we can, within certain limits.” He produced a small cardboard box, opened it, and shook out a tiny perfume sampler; it looked just like the one I’d been given to use with Olivia. I tensed as he pressed the tiny pump, but the mist it produced was an unfamiliar scent. “We’re just another cosmetics distribution company, as far as the authorities are concerned. Their investigations have been fruitless; in part, that is because they rely on the stolen merchandise turning up on the grey market or swap meets, and ours never does.”

“What is particularly disturbing to us is that these shipments are fundamentally worthless unless the thief happens to know the identity of the person that goes with each specific lot. This information is quite closely held, as you might imagine, but it has become clear the guilty party does, in fact, possess some of it.”

I struggled with the thought of some creep with fewer scruples than Mr. Burns holding a box of “my” cologne, and repressed a shudder.

“While this information must unavoidably be known at the tip of the distribution network—how else would we get the right product to each of your dates?—the pattern of losses suggests we are looking at a more highly-placed turncoat. We have no leads, and fear of an insider deters open discussion of the problem.”

“Maybe you have a blackmailer,” I suggested, becoming engaged despite my earlier inclinations. “You know what Lauren or I would do for a little fix; what if the same thing happened to you or one of your boardroom buddies?”

“Impossible,” he asserted with the air of sublime superiority that irritated me every time I heard it. “You recall from our earlier discussions that an individual can be imprinted exactly once, and that the result is permanent? Each executive candidate is imprinted with a totally random one-off sample to guard against precisely such an attack.”

“Oh come on,” I laughed at him. “You think an organization that engages in slavery, torture, and murder is above lying? I’d bet you everything I own there’s a box like that with your name on it sitting in a vault somewhere.”

Mr. Burns looked suddenly discomfited. “There’s a certain logic to what you say, but it couldn’t be done,” he admitted slowly, before perking up again. “However, that is precisely the viewpoint and manner of thinking that makes you valuable, Tanya.”

He pushed the box aside and leaned forward intently. “Find us the leak, or a lead, or anything. Use the eyes of an outsider to see what we have overlooked or failed to consider. Succeed, and you will earn considerably more than just my gratitude; my word on it.”

The funny thing was, I could tell he meant it. I didn’t like him and didn’t understand him, but for all that, I almost trusted him to hold up his end of the bargain. It still didn’t make sense to me, however. “I’m flattered, but how do you think I will be in a position to learn anything?”

“There are several factors,” he said, looking more relaxed now that I’d pretty much signaled I was going to take his offer. “First, you and Olivia are among the people affected by the most recent lost shipment.”

My face must have turned grey as I thought of Olivia exposed at school, out in the open and unaware of her danger.

“Don’t panic,” he told me, uselessly. “Some people aren’t compromised for months after a loss, and some have gone years without anything happening. Nobody has ever gone missing sooner than two months. The important point is that both of you are in the subset of employees who may be of interest to the perpetrators.”

“The next important point is that your stubborn willfulness and Olivia’s, um, less than perfect imprinting are not known outside this office.”

Men were all the same. “Didn’t want to look bad on your next performance review?”

He didn’t deny it. “Area managers are given broad discretion in how they run their territories. I intend to push the limits of that policy.”

“So your grand plan is to let me get picked up, hope I can resist whatever happened to your other bimbos, figure out who kidnapped me, and then somehow escape to fill you in on the details, while you just sit here and give Lauren her cumshots?”

A pained look crossed his face. “In crude concept, I suppose so.”

I crossed my arms, somewhat awkwardly because I still wasn’t used to the size of my new breasts, and glared at him. “You’d have to guarantee the safety of my family before I’d do something that stupid.”

The pained expression intensified, and I knew I was about to hear some of the fine print. “I’m afraid Olivia would need to be with you.” He held up both hands to forestall my explosion. “That’s both for her benefit and mine.”

“I’m listening,” I angrily told him.

“You wouldn’t have had any reason to know this, but you’re both addicts, too. If you aren’t exposed to your trigger compound for longer than about a month, you—just die. It isn’t flashy or painful, and there aren’t any withdrawal symptoms. It’s meant to prevent incriminating strays from wandering away. If you left her behind and couldn’t return in that time, you’d be coming home to a gravestone.”

“You bastard! You told me she could live for decades!” I was so angry I was shaking.

“I told you what was necessary to get you to the bargaining table!” he retorted, showing some anger too. “Now, I’m telling you the truth.”

“Really?! Why are you still alive, then, if you’ve been imprinted too? Shouldn’t you be dead already?”

“It doesn’t work like that unless you’ve been exposed a second time, which I’ve explained is impossible,” he said, and suddenly went still.

“What?” I asked, still irritated.

“Nothing,” Mr. Burns assured me with a distracted air. “I was just reminded of a colleague who passed away unexpectedly about a year ago.” He gave himself a brief shake and focused on me again. “There’s still a risk, but I believe it’s reduced if the two of you are together.”

“What if we got split up?” Suddenly I was more focused on the danger to Olivia than ever before. “My God, what if they kidnapped her now?!”

“Calm down,” he said, which was perhaps the stupidest thing to come out of his mouth so far. “That is the other reason for my plan.”

I waited impatiently for him to get to the point.

“I’ve told you that soccer moms and cute coeds aren’t exactly in short supply. We could wait months, or for all eternity, for you to be picked up. Worse, certainly from your perspective, is the prospect they might snatch one of you but not the other.”

At least he acknowledged the risk, even if he made it sound like a minor inconvenience. “So?”

“As you can see, we are not without cosmetic resources. Normally, neither of you would be a candidate for the sort of work I envision, but this is a special case. With the right enhancements, your trade value—and the likelihood of being stolen—will increase astronomically, and you’ll be virtually guaranteed of being kept together. Like all expensive and rare collectibles, a pair is worth far more than two alone.”

I liked the idea of knowing I’d be with Olivia, although I didn’t like the way Mr. Burns discussed me like I was some anonymous object. “These aren’t going to get any larger, are they?” I asked, looking down at my chest.

He laughed. “So worried about being an ugly duckling, yet afraid to dream of being a swan? Any boob with a scalpel and a few bags of silicone can give a woman udders. That won’t impress the sort of people we need to attract. Tanya, I’ll make you a firebird!”

“And Olivia, too?” I pressed him.

“Her, too,” he agreed, and then qualified his statement. “I won’t do this if she isn’t a willing participant. You should also be aware that, since you don’t have her advantage, I’ll want you to undergo some psychological training to help you control your impulses. It’s rather painful.”

“I’ll think about it,” I told him. All I could think about was the threat of Olivia being stolen away alone, no matter what Mr. Burns said about it. As far as I was concerned, it was already a done deal—no matter what it cost me.

We didn’t get home to the new condo until after the new year. The change had been necessary to avoid alarming the neighbors, and it also provided better accommodations for the staff I’d insisted on to care for Jose and Alex while Olivia and I were in the hospital. My daughter was now a college dropout like her mother, and we resembled each other more than ever.

I shivered inside my jacket and squinted in the sunlight that seemed too bright, even through the dark sunglasses. It was nice to be outdoors again, even briefly, but nicer to be inside and warm. Mr. Burns had kept his word and our breasts and lips were still the same size, but he’d been right when he said my imagination was totally inadequate to the task at hand.

“Mom? Olivia?” asked Alex uncertainly, looking at us while we removed our jackets. He was home-schooled now, by one of Lauren’s sisters—I couldn’t remember if she was Megan or Jasmine. “Is it really you?”

Well he might ask. Those 5 or 10 extra pounds that had always bothered me were gone now, along with a few more and my lowest pair of ribs. The resulting wasp waists Olivia and I sported emphasized our bust and hips, and guaranteed we’d never wear clothing that wasn’t tailor-made for us. Alex wasn’t looking there, however; he was transfixed by our hair.

It had only grown out about a hand length, and still had the same soft wave as before, but it was a light pastel blue never found in nature. That was our natural color now, courtesy of some specialized retroviruses, and matched our lashes and eyebrows. I was a traditionalist and had a little blue powder-puff above my mound, but Olivia had elected to go permanently bare. I’d forgotten what they’d told us, but I wouldn’t have to shave my legs ever again.

The scars there already were so fine they were difficult to find. I sometimes still felt aches where they’d broken my legs and lengthened them, giving me an extra two inches of height. I felt bad for Olivia; she’d had twice as many breaks to work around the areas where her bones hadn’t finished growing, but she was younger and healed faster.

Mr. Burns’ artistic consultant—for people, if you could believe it— had wanted to reshape our feet and hamstrings too, but I’d drawn the line. If we got into a bad situation, I wanted to be able to run—not prance around in impractical heels like a helpless victim in a slasher movie.

“It’s us, Honey,” I told him, and watched him gape as I removed the sunglasses. The vivid violet of each iris was artificial, courtesy of permanently implanted lenses, but unforgettably striking. With our exaggerated lines and coloring, we looked like refugees from a cartoon. I wasn’t going to go into the less-visible changes. “Give Mom a hug, okay?”

He clung to me like a barnacle, and I buried my face in his miraculously clean hair.

“What about me?” asked Olivia, obviously feeling left out. I saw Alex’s reflection in the mirror stick out his tongue at her, and felt him jump as she returned the sentiment. Olivia didn’t think and carelessly extended her tongue a full four inches beyond her lips. She blushed slightly as she realized what she’d done, but I just extended an arm and silently pulled her into our communal embrace.

Dinner felt like heaven, even though it was just pork chops out of the freezer and some au gratin potatoes out of a box. We were a family again, for the first time in too long. If you ignored our hair and didn’t notice the high-tech filters tucked discreetly into Jose’s nostrils, we were almost normal.

I didn’t know how long we had, but I was determined to make the most of every moment.