The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive

It was a Tuesday when I arrived at Camp Sareyiatril—referred to as Tsa’drill by those of us who had counseled here before. (“It’s a drill”—get it? Okay, so it was a summer camp, not clown school. So sue me.) The weather was what the locals called “crisp” and those of us from downstate called “still too fucking cold”; the snow had melted, true, but the shorts and t-shirts that the campers would be running around with three months hence would have earned us a nice case of pneumonia.

I was one of four returning counselors. Janice and I had worked together last summer at another camp, and Mary and Rose (Sisters—I think their mom just broke one name in half and spread it among them) had taught at another, but we’d seen each other last year at this time for counselor training. The other six girls were new. Our head counselor, Molly Albright, was in her late thirties, and had been running summer camps in the Appalachians (up and down the coast) for almost twenty years.

Me, I was just paying for college. I was under no delusions as to the fabulous job opportunities that awaited me and my degree in Scandinavian Studies, so I was inoculating myself against obnoxious teenagers now, the better to deal with them once I became a teacher. Actually, last year had been kind of fun, and I was looking forward to this spring break bonding exercise.

Which was mostly what this was about. There just wasn’t all that much to learn about running a summer camp that you didn’t learn by doing. Apprenticeship was the name of the game. But it was better to learn now whether you would like the people you’d be working with, so Catskill Camps Inc. paid for us counselors to all be trundled up here each year as a sort of shakeout meet-n-greet. Then we’d be assigned to our various summer camps.

Catskill Camps Inc. had been founded in the aughts (or is that the naughts? I’ve just taken to calling the current decade the naughties) by a friend of Andrew Carnegie, and some of us suspected that the same person was still running it. Our counselor uniforms had skirts that went below the knee. Though the actual camps themselves were no longer gender-segregated, our counselor camp this week was. Boys on that side of the lake, girls on this side. And never the twain shall meet.

Molly had picked up Janice, I, and a new counselor named Sheila down in Albany. In real life, Molly was an aerobics instructor, and looked it. Though we were all bundled up against the cold, in the car she had peeled down to her t-shirt, and her forearms had that solid, muscular look I remembered. I thought that any time in a gym was time away from the real world—I got my muscles from rock climbing.

Janice didn’t have muscles, or at least not so as you could tell. She was a bubbly blonde, thin, with light blue eyes she hid behind large glasses. We had made a good team—I was the counselor who got the kids to shut up, she was the one who they went to when they had problems.

Sheila was a dark-complected girl, short, with straight dark hair cut short above her neck. We spent the ride to the camp reminiscing, which I worried would leave Sheila out, but when we segued into popular music she joined in the conversation enthusiastically, and by the time we had reached Tsa’drill we were feeling pretty chummy.

The camp consisted of the usual series of cabins with bunk beds, but we counselors merited our own beds in rooms we shared with one other girl. For the weekend, we were all in the main building, the only one with heat.

The brief trip from the car to the building was enough to make me very thankful for that heat. The main building was basically a T, with the flat side overlooking the lake. The common room was, unsurprisingly, in the center of the T, and had both a tremendous picture window occupying almost the entire lakeside wall, and a huge circular fireplace in the center. I was pleased to see that the fire was already roaring.

The other girls, who were not in four-year colleges and had been able to come up earlier, were lounging around the common room. Janice and I were quickly embraced by Mary and Rose, and were introduced to all the new girls. They looked like we did last year, a bit nervous but ready to chorus “we’re happy to be here” at the drop of a hat. One of them, Elizabeth, had pink hair. The others were your standard grab bag of late teen East Coast girls. The Beach Boys can bite my ass.

After introductions, Molly took charge.

“Okay, ladies, I know that some of you have been here before, but let’s not forget that we are here this week to work, not to loiter. I need three of you, let’s see—Mary, Hannah, and Adrienne—to help me with dinner. The rest of you I want to come up with three questions each to ask other girls to get to know them. Do it as a group—I don’t want any of the questions to be the same. Before bed tonight, everyone in this room will have a good idea of who everyone else is. Any questions?”

The new girls looked rather aghast at having to dive right in to team building, but Rose winked at me, and I smiled back. Molly liked to set expectations right off the bat. It made it easier than trying to up the ante later.

Much later, with the fire down to embers, we straggled in groups down to our rooms in the girl’s wing. I accompanied Sheila and her roommate, Adrienne, down the north wing. We were all staying in the north wing save Molly, who had her own individual room in the south wing just on the other side of the common room.

Sheila was from Baltimore, it turned out, and was attending a community college there, aiming to become a CPA. Just like in the car, she had been reticent only a short while before jumping in and, well, bonding with the rest of the girls. I could already see that she would make a good counselor, and was hoping that she’d be on my team for some of the exercises this week.

Adrienne was a Jewish girl from Long Island, and much more reserved than Sheila. The two of them would probably make good roommates, once Adrienne felt more relaxed. The first day seemed to have overwhelmed her a bit, as it had several of the new girls.

As Sheila entered the room she shared with Adrienne, I pulled the curly-haired girl aside, and asked her how she was feeling after her first evening in training. She smiled, and indicated that she was a bit surprised at how quickly we were all supposed to become friends. I smiled, and reassured her with some pleasantries, pleased by her honesty.

Sheila called from inside the room:

“Hey, what’s this?”

Adrienne turned, and the two of us went into the room. Sitting on Sheila’s bed was a brown cardboard box, about the size of a toaster. Sheila looked at me, and I shrugged.

“Damfino. Open it and find out?”

“Is this some counselor thing?”

“Not as far as I know. Molly’s much more above-board than to place a secret box on someone’s bed. Is there a note?”

Sheila rolled the box around.

“Nope.”

“I have a Swiss army knife,” said Adrienne, producing the small object. Sheila took it, and quickly cut through the tape, keeping the box closed. She closed and handed back the knife, opened the box, and reached inside.

She pulled out an object shaped like a bell of some sort, with a quizzical expression.

“What is it?”

She turned it over in her hands a few times. It was shaped very much like a bell, save that it was flat on the bottom, and colored black there instead of the pearly white everywhere else. There was a switch on the handle.

“Is there a note, or anything?” I asked.

Sheila handed the object to Adrienne, and rummaged around in the box. It was filled with packing paper, which she pulled out, and when she upended the box, a small note fluttered out.

“’For Sheila’,” she read out loud. “That’s it. Just ‘For Sheila’.”

“I dunno, Sheila,” I said. “Looks like you have a secret admirer.”

“That’s not even funny, Maddy. I’m not here to play silly games.” She looked genuinely angry, and I quickly put up my hands.

“I’m sorry. Look, put it back in the box, and tomorrow we’ll talk to Molly about it. I didn’t mean to tease you. Maybe it’s from a friend of yours who knew you were coming up here?”

“I guess, but I can’t think of anyone who...”

“Woah!” said Adrienne. We turned to look at her, and she looked at us. “Check it out!”

The object was now emitting light from the bell-end. Green and blue swirlies danced on the floor.

“Ah, Adrienne, what did you do?”

“I turned it on! See, there’s a switch here. It’s like some sort of funky flashlight.”

We looked at the colors on the floor. They were pretty, but swirled in some sort of dizzying pattern, and I looked away.

“It’s not bright enough to be a flashlight, Adrienne,” said Sheila.

“Well, maybe it’s a kaleidoscope.” Adrienne turned the bell-shaped end up, so that she was looking into it. Colors swirled on her face.

We watched her for a while, and a strange change came over her. Her face loosened, the tension draining out of it. Her shoulder relaxed. When her mouth started slowly pulling open, Sheila and I looked at each other.

“Ah, Adrienne? Could you turn it off?”

Adrienne just kept staring into the beam, eyes glassy and reflecting the patterns.

I walked over to her, and gently pushed the end down, so it was no longer shining on her face. Or rather, I tried to. I found that, as I pushed, her resistance grew, so that I was soon pushing with all my might.

“Adrienne! Snap out of it!”

I looked at her, and felt a shiver run through me as I realized that she was still staring, slack-jawed, into the beam. Her arm was rigid like an iron beam, and yet her mind was switched off entirely.

Sheila came the rescue, prying up Adrienne’s fingers so that I could reach the switch, and flip it off. The lights blinked out. We both stared at Adrienne. Slowly, her eyelids came down over her glassy eyes. Then she shuddered, scrunched her eyes, shook her head, and looked up at us.

“Woah. That was trippy.”

I took the object from her unresisting hand.

Sheila was looking at her roommate with a mixture of worry and curiosity. “Adrienne, what happened?”

“It, like, sucked me in. I could feel myself falling, floating, down into it. It was weird.”

“You just sat here like a zombie, but you wouldn’t let us take it away from you!”

“Really? Wow. I think you should maybe put that thing away.”

“No shit, Sherlock.” Sheila looked at me. “Maddy, is there like a lockup or something where you could put this?”

“Yeah, let’s put it back in the box, and I’ll go put it in the storage closet.”

“That sounds like a good idea. Are you okay, Adrienne?”

“I’m fine. A little weirded out, but I feel okay.”

After some nervous chit-chat, I took the box with the object in it, and bid the girls goodnight. As I stepped out the door, Sheila came over to me.

“Yes, Sheila?”

“Maddy, I’m worried.”

“Me, too. That was kind of scary.”

“More than that, Maddy. I mean—it was addressed to me.”

I didn’t have anything to say to that.

Sunday was a workout. We spent most of the day hiking—I had thought it too cold for hiking, but after about fifteen chilly minutes in the morning, I sweated the rest of the day. The human body is quite a little furnace when it gets going.

Sheila and Adrienne hadn’t brought up the subject of the box Sheila had received, but I mentioned it to Molly, and told her that I had put it in the storage closet. She promised to have a look at it, after of course I made her swear not to do so alone. Molly smiled, and said that she’d be sure I was there when she checked it out.

That evening I was on kitchen duty, with Pamela (one of the new girls) and Janice. We prepared pepper beef stew, Pamela’s face growing steadily darker as Janice and I swapped more and more indecent comments as we cut up the bell peppers. Pamela was a black girl from Philadelphia, whose skin was dark as mahogany and just about as polished. It was fun to make her blush—her cheeks got darker, and she stared more and more intently at the carrots she was chopping.

Dinner was the usual rowdy affair, and we had our first ghost story telling that evening—Molly chose Pamela to tell the story, and much to my surprise after our teasing her in the kitchen, she was an excellent story teller. And she knew her H.P. Lovecraft. We all retired to bed with visions of creepy crawlies that drove you screamingly insane just by looking at them. I was happy that I was in a room with Rose—having a single suddenly didn’t seem as appealing.

It was after midnight when I went to fetch myself a glass of water. I didn’t want to admit it, but the ghost story had managed to keep me up. As I returned, I noticed lights on in Sheila and Adrienne’s room.

I slowly slid open the door. The room was bathed in a diffuse blue and green glow. As I put my head in, I could see that the glow was coming from Sheila’s bed—the short-haired girl was sitting up in her bed, looking down at something on her covers. It was emitting the light, bathing Sheila in swirling colors.

It was that thing.

Sheila’s face was empty, blank, just like Adrienne’s had been. Her mouth hung open, and her eyes were glassy, unfocused. I wondered how long she had been staring at it, as I barged into the room.

Adrienne stepped in front of me, and I squeaked.

“Hi, Maddy.”

“A-Adrienne. What is that thing doing here? What’s going on?”

“It’s okay, Maddy. Sheila wanted to see it. That’s all.”

I tried to step around her.

“Well, it makes me nervous. Turn it off.”

Adrienne slid sideways, keeping me from Sheila’s bed.

“She’s enjoying it, Maddy. She doesn’t want it to be turned off.”

I looked at Adrienne, frightened by her deadpan tone. She was looking... through me. At me, but past me. I could feel my heart pounding. What the fuck was going on?

“Please, Adrienne, let me turn it off.” I pushed past her, expecting her to grab me, surprised when she did not. I walked up to Sheila’s bed, reaching for the device.

Up close, it was even more obvious that it was doing something, something bad, to Sheila. She would twitch, slightly, and her eyes were so wide it was eerie to look at them. She was bathed in the light, floating in it, and her glassy eyes reflected brightly the beam from the device. I could see it, swirling, changing, in Sheila’s eyes...

Shit. I closed my eyes quickly, and looked away. It had almost hypnotized me. Eyes still closed, I reached for the thing, found the switch, and flipped it off.

The room was pitch black. Holding the device, I stood up. The lights flicked on, causing me to squint. Adrienne stood next to the door, hand still poised under the light switch.

I looked at her as my vision returned. Slowly, she lowered her arm. I turned to look at Sheila.

Sheila was dazed, her eyes slowly returning to normal, her mouth closing. She looked drugged, sedated. I waved a hand slowly in front of her face, until her eyes began to track it.

“Sheila. It’s Maddy. Are you okay?”

Her eyes drifted from my hand, to my face.

“Sheila. Are you all right?”

“Maddy? I... I think so. I feel okay. Kind of dizzy.”

“Sheila, why did you do that?”

“Do, what?”

“Look at the device like that. It hypnotized you, like it hypnotized Adrienne.”

“Adrienne...” she looked across the room, and I turned to follow her gaze. Adrienne had returned to bed, and now sat there, watching us. I looked back at Sheila, and she was smiling at Adrienne. A conspiratorial smile.

“Sheila, what happened?”

“Ah, I wanted to see it again. So Adrienne brought it from the store room for me. It’s mine, isn’t it?” Her eyes were intent upon me.

I leaned in and spoke in a low voice, so Adrienne wouldn’t hear.

“Sheila, I thought you were scared of it.”

She just smiled, and looked at me in a... hungry sort of way.

“Oh no, Maddy. It’s wonderful. You shouldn’t be scared of it.”

I stood back from the bed. Both girls were smiling at me, now.

“Well, I’m going to hold on to it, tonight. Tomorrow we can talk to Molly about it.”

“Okay, Maddy.”

I walked out of the room. As I reached the door, Sheila spoke up again.

“If you want to try it, Maddy, go ahead. It’s really nice.”

I smiled as best I could, and turned out the lights.

In the morning, I went to talk with Molly. I caught her in conversation with the pink-haired girl, Elizabeth.

“Look, Elizabeth, it’s not my decision. It’s Catskill Camps rules.”

“I’m just saying it’s stupid. I don’t see what my choice of accessories has to do with my ability to be a camp counselor.”

“Hi Molly, Elizabeth,” I broke in. “is this about the hair?”

“No,” said Elizabeth, “it’s about my nipple rings. Molly says I can’t even wear studs during the summer, and I don’t want to have to get my nipples pierced again.”

I had opened my mouth to respond, and found that nothing came out.

“Look, Elizabeth, I’m not going to be a hard-nose about it,” said Molly. “But some head counselors might. Just consider this an advance warning that the issue may come up again, and you might not like the resolution.”

“Okay, I’ll do that.”

Elizabeth smiled at me as she bounced away down the hall. Molly watched her go, and turned to me.

“Kids. So, Maddy, what’s up?”

“Ah, Elizabeth, I’ve got a problem. Someone sent Sheila this device,” and I produced the thing, “and it’s hypnotic. It hypnotized Adrienne and Sheila both, and the worse part is that they really seemed to like it.”

“Hypnotized?”

“Yeah, blank stares, the works. You turn it on, and colored lights and stuff come out of one end, and if you look at it you can’t look away.”

“Who sent it?”

“I don’t know.”

Molly took the device. For a second, I thought she was going to turn it on and look at it, but she just turned it around in her hands a few times.

“So, can I turn it on if I don’t look into it?”

“I think so.”

She did. Colored lights sprung into existence on the floor. They were much dimmer now, in the daylight. Molly looked at them, then flipped the device back off.

“Well, I dunno, Maddy. What the girls do on their own time isn’t really my business.”

“Molly, listen to me. Sheila told me, the first night, that she was scared of it. We had both seen what it did to Adrienne. Then, last night, Adrienne fetched it from the storage closet, and used it on Sheila. Now Sheila is all for it.” I put on my best imploring look. “Molly, I really don’t think we want anyone using it. It’s addictive.”

“Did the girls mind you taking it away?”

“No. They told me I should use it.”

Molly rubbed her chin. “Well, frankly, I don’t know what to think, but I don’t want anything disrupting camp. I’ll lock it up, until Sunday.”

“Thanks, Molly. I really appreciate it.”

“No worries, Maddy.”

At lunch, we were sitting around the common room having bowls of chili and big hunks of cornbread. The chili was Mary and Rose’s, and the cornbread was Diane’s. Diane was the youngest of the new girls, a freckly redhead from Boston. She was sharing a room with Janice.

Janice came over as I and Mary were talking about Antonio Banderas, and whether or not he would approve of how spicy hot the chili was. Mary, of course, felt that it was wimpy, but I had to keep wiping sweat off of my upper lip.

“What’s up, girlfriend?” I asked.

“Maddy, Diane’s been telling me about Sheila’s kaleidoscope.”

I chilled. “Her what?”

“Sheila and Adrienne have been talking about how Sheila’s mom sent her this electronic kaleidoscope, and how it can put you in a hypnotic trance. They say you were there with them. Is it true?”

“Ah, yeah, although we don’t know who sent it.”

“Where is it?”

“I had Molly lock it up until camp was over.”

“Why?” asked Mary.

They were my friends, so I decided not to dissemble. “I was scared of it. It just, just puts you into a trance, and when you wake up, you like it. It’s like brainwashing or something.”

Janice frowned. “Maddy, some of the other girls want to try it.”

“Who?”

“Elizabeth, for one. And Hannah, I think.”

“Shit. Janice, that thing really, truly scares me. Tell the girls that they shouldn’t want to mess around with it.”

“Well, I’ll try, but I can’t guarantee they’ll listen.”

Janice went back to where she was sitting with Diane. The rest of the chili felt cold in my stomach.

It was hard to go to sleep that night. Finally, I gave up, and rolled upright. Rose was asleep, her breathing low and even. Outside, the wind ruffled around the building, catching in the bushes below the window. I had to see if Sheila and Adrienne were up to anything.

Their room was dark. I opened the door, slowly peeking my head in. It took a moment for my eyes to adjust from the dim light in the hall to the near-blackness of the bedroom, but when I did, my heart sank.

The room was empty.

I flipped on the lights to be sure, and found both beds still neatly made. Not even dents in the pillows.

I turned off the lights, and walked to the office. No, I ran. The lockbox was behind the head counselor’s desk, in the office near the front entrance of the building, down the leg of the ‘T’. My bare feet slapped on the hardwood floor.

There were no lights on in the office. Using the dim illumination from the hallway, I opened the half-glass door, and slipped in. Carefully, I felt my way around the back of the desk, to the lockbox, mounted on the wall.

It was still locked.

I willed my heart to slow down. The device was still locked away. But where were Sheila and Adrienne? I slipped back out of the office, and made my way back to the counselor’s wing. Slowly, I paced down the hall.

Sure enough, one of the doors had a tiny finger of yellow light coming out from under it. Someone had put pillows in front of the door to block the light, but they hadn’t gotten it all. I listened at the door.

“...relaxed. Totally relaxed. Calm. Peaceful. Just keep gazing into my eyes, and relax. Yes. Good. So calm, so open...”

It was Sheila’s voice.

I fought down the urge to slam open the door. Once I was sure that my breathing would not betray me, I gripped the knob, and slowly turned.

Light spilled out over me, and I slid my head into the room. It was Elizabeth and Hannah’s room, and the first girls I saw were Hannah and Sheila, sitting on Hannah’s bed. Hannah was turned towards me, dressed in her pajamas. She was staring at Sheila, face blank, eyes staring dully ahead. Entranced.

I hadn’t really gotten to know Hannah—she was a pretty dark-haired girl from Baltimore. She had a large mouth and jaw, which on most girls would have looked out of place, but gave Hannah a sort of sultry, exotic look. Her mouth was just slightly open, as she started glassy-eyed at Sheila.

Sheila was facing away from me, wearing a flannel nightgown that was far too small for her. She was leaned up onto Hannah’s bed, her legs dangling off the side, and the bottom of the nightgown rode almost all the way up her thighs, exposing her legs entirely, giving me a glimpse of her ass.

“Yes, Hannah, relax. It feels so good to relax, to listen to my voice. You love listening to my voice, because it’s so soothing, so relaxing. It makes you feel so good...”

I slithered my head in farther, turning to face the other bed. Adrienne and Elizabeth were sitting on it, Indian-style, watching Sheila and Hannah. Elizabeth was smiling a crooked smile, raptly at attention. She was wearing a low-cut night gown, and with shock, I realized that one side of it had been pulled down to expose a nipple. The white cloth had been stretched down, and was now prevented from pulling back up by Elizabeth’s pierced nipple. It was tightened, hard, and bracketed by the silver spheres on either end of the bar which pushed through it.

Looking up, I saw that Adrienne was looking at me, wearing her own naughty smile. Observing that she had caught my eye, she slowly raised a finger to her lips, demanding my silence. Sliding her hand from where it sat on Elizabeth’s, she softly dropped off the bed to the floor. Elizabeth didn’t look away from where Sheila sat, hypnotizing Hannah.

“So good to relax, to submit... it feels good to submit... give up any resistance... no resistance... makes you feel good to submit... give in... so good, Hannah, so good... it feels... sexual...”

I don’t know why I didn’t break in, shaking Hannah awake. At the time, I rationalized to myself that they knew what they were doing, that it was just the kind of no-harm-done fun that teenage girls at camp have. I must have told myself that. But, even then, I knew the real reason I didn’t intervene.

I was excited.

Adrienne softly swept across the floor to where I stood.

“Hello, Maddy. Shhh. Don’t disturb Sheila and Hannah. It’s a bad idea to bring someone out of trance suddenly.”

I knew it was a lie, but I believed it. I wanted to.

“Adrienne, you shouldn’t be doing this.”

“Doing what? We’re just having a little fun. Hannah wanted to see what it was like, to be hypnotized. Why don’t you come in and watch?”

I looked back to the two on the bed.

“so good, Hannah... you are open, submissive, and it feels so good... it makes you feel warm, excited... horny... obeying makes you horny, Hannah... submitting, being hypnotized, makes you horny... you are horny now... and it feels good... nothing has ever felt so warm, so good... you are relaxed, and open, and totally obedient, and aroused...”

I had to stop it. I was a senior counselor, for God’s sake.

“Maddy, it’s really a lot of fun. Look at Hannah’s face. See how much she is enjoying herself?” Adrienne leaned over to whisper in my ear. “And look between her legs...”

Of course, I couldn’t stop myself. Hannah had on light blue pajamas, with matching pants and shirt. Light, powder blue... except between her legs. Where they were slowly becoming dark.

“so aroused, Hannah... so submissive... so open.... so horny...”

I realized that I could either give in, and sit down and wait in a state of increasing arousal for Sheila to hypnotize me, or I could break it up. And I couldn’t wait.

“Okay, Adrienne, get Sheila and get back to your room. It’s past curfew.”

My heart was pounding again. What if they refused? I looked at Adrienne, expecting an angry rebuttal.

She smiled sweetly at me.

“Okay, Maddy. I won’t say I’m not disappointed.”

Adrienne walked to Sheila, and whispered in her ear. Sheila never stopped speaking to Hannah, but her voice dropped, and she reached out, and gently pushed Hannah back down onto the bed. When Hannah was entirely horizontal, Sheila slithered to the floor.

The two walked towards me, impassive. Sheila’s dark blue eyes were larger, somehow. It’s hard to describe. Filled with power. I felt like I could fall into them, be pulled under.

Adrienne walked past into the hallway, but Sheila stopped, turned to me.

“Don’t fight us, Maddy. Be one of us. It’s like nothing you’ve ever felt.”

Then they were gone, walking down the hall to their room.

Hannah lay on her bed, eyes closed, unmoving. Elizabeth was watching me. When she caught my eye, she picked her right hand up off her thigh, to push her nightgown back up over her breast. However, she did so by first cupping her breast with the hand, pushing the areola entirely clear of the gown, raising her breast as if in offering, then sliding her hand wiith the fabric up and over it. There was a look in her eyes of invitation.

I fled.

No, I didn’t get any sleep. I huddled in my bed, listening to Rose, and the creatures in the forest, and tried not to panic. I was afraid of them getting me, tapping into the arousal that spiked through me and using it to make me one of them. I rolled around my bed, my panic at being made a slave wrestling with my lust at seeing Sheila take Hannah. And I could still see Elizabeth’s short, bright pink hair, and the wanton look she gave me.

I mastered my fear. Again, I went out into the hall. I had to be sure that Sheila and Adrienne were safely ensconced in their room. Quietly, I slipped down the corridor, to their door.

There was a low moan from inside. Then another. It was Sheila, and she was....

“Mmm... Aiiiidrie-ennnnne....”

Under the soft mewling of Sheila’s pleasure, I could hear the wet work of her roommate.

Only a very small part of me wanted to join them.

I snuck further down the hall, to Elizabeth and Hannah’s room. Looking at the bottom of the door, I could tell that the lights were out. A small, warm relief filled my stomach. To be sure, I listened at the door.

It was soft, but unmistakably Elizabeth’s voice.

“obedience is pleasure... you will obey, Hannah... you exist to obey... you love to obey... it feels so good to obey... feel your wet cunny, Hannah... yes... push in your finger... you exist to obey... slide it in, Hannah... tell me how much you love to obey...”

As Hannah began her soft chant of devotion, I stepped away from the door. What could I do?

All the other rooms were quiet.

The morning was normal. At breakfast, the girls were their usual rowdy selves, and somehow I started thinking that I was the weird one for my behavior. Rose asked if I was feeling okay, but I just couldn’t stop looking over at the table where Sheila, Adrienne, Elizabeth and Hannah were talking and laughing. None of them looked over at me.

We spent the morning doing emergency medial training. All counselors had to be CPR certified as well as licensed life guards, and Molly also had us practice all sorts of other medical drills. There was even a written quiz.

After lunch, it was back into the woods for a nature walk. Each first year girl was assigned an older girl who would show her where the birds nested, the meadows the deer liked, and that sort of stuff.

I was paired with Sheila.

Oh yeah, I was scared, but what was I going to do? Besides, it wasn’t like she had the device. And I knew enough about hypnosis to know that you can’t be hypnotized against your well.

Not that that explained the device.

However, Sheila acted entirely, well, normal, as she and I trundled around the woods. I showed her the woodpecker tree, and the stream where the otters played, and the nest of the horned owl, and all the other myriad things which ten percent of the campers would find really cool and the rest would immediately forget.

I’d find myself in happy conversation with her about pine trees, or badminton, or ‘Cast Away’, and then at the next lull I’d picture her eating out Adrienne and get all weirded again. Sheila seemed to be having a fine time.

We ran into some of the other girls occasionally (the camp didn’t have that many acres), but for the most part it was just the two of us and the great outdoors. The last place on the tour as I was giving it was a place I called the copse—a long time ago, some white fir had died after putting seedlings all around it, and now there was a ring of tall white fir around a small green meadow, slightly rising in the middle.

The birds were singing as I announced: “Last stop—the Copse.”

“Pretty,” marveled Sheila, as she craned her neck to look at the trees.

Tired of hiking, I sat down in the grass on top of the hillock. Sheila joined me.

“Well, Maddy, we really should talk about it.”

My stomach sank, but I just looked at her.

“I want to apologize for scaring you. We were just having fun, and I didn’t think that you’d take it all so seriously.”

“Sheila, how could I not? That, that thing scares me.”

She ran a hand through her dark hair. “Yeah, but it’s locked up now, isn’t it?” She turned to look at me. “Please, Maddy, relax. We really are just having a little fun. Can we just go back to the way we were? Friends?”

I wanted to ask if she and Adrienne were just being “friendly” last night, but that would mean admitting I had been spying on them. I sighed. “I’ll try, Sheila. I do like you, but the whole hypnosis thing really unnerves me.”

The sun shone down into my little glen, and with the firs providing shelter from the chill wind, I found myself unbuttoning my jacket. Sheila lay back into the grass, and I sat next to her. We sat in stillness for a while.

Sheila plucked a stalk of grass, and began to chew on one end. I watched the other end bob above her head.

“So,” she said, “you heard Adrienne and me last night.”

I blushed, but said nothing.

“Why didn’t you tell us to knock it off?”

“Not my business, I guess.”

“Does it bother you?”

“Fooling around is against the rules.”

Sheila turned and smiled at me. “But we’re both girls, Maddy. Do the rules say anything about that?”

I sighed. “Sheila, I thought you weren’t going to harass me any more.”

She flopped back down. “But this isn’t about that. This is something totally different.”

I didn’t think so at all, but I held my tongue. Seeing that I wasn’t going to say anything more, she continued in a lower voice.

“You know, Maddy, we were both really hoping that you would come in and join us.”

I stood up. “We’d better be getting back.”

She looked up at me from the grass, then slowly rose.

“Are you sure you’re not interested? It’s ever so much fun.”

I turned to leave, assuming that she’d follow me. Or not, I didn’t really care one way or the other.

“I don’t swing that way,” I replied.

Sure enough, she followed. “But have you ever tried it? I mean, it’s not like it has to be love. It’s just... fun.”

“It sure is,” came a voice from ahead of us. Elizabeth swung around from behind one of the fir trees. “I assume you two are talking about girlsex.”

I stopped, and felt Sheila stop immediately behind me. Her presence was palpable on my skin.

“Elizabeth. What are you doing here?” I asked, my voice a higher pitch than usual.

“Oh, Janice and I got done early, and you two were dawdling, so I came out to fetch you.” She walked up to me, looked up at me from under her eyebrows. “To be honest, I was hoping to catch you two at something.”

“I, I’m not interested, Elizabeth.”

“That’s a real shame, Maddy, because you’re very beautiful.”

Standing between them, with Sheila behind me, was too much—I lurched out to the side, and turned around.

They were standing there, looking at me.

“I’m going back,” I announced rather needlessly, and headed back to the lodge.

When I had gone some ways into the trees, and they didn’t seem to be following, I looked behind me.

They were still standing where I had left them, watching me, but now they their arms around each other’s backs. As I looked at them, Elizabeth turned from me, and pressed close to Sheila, nuzzling under her jaw. Sheila looked down at her, and Elizabeth raised her head for a kiss.

I left the two of them snogging in the grove.

“I’m really scared, Maddy.”

“It’s okay, Janice, they can’t get you unless you let them. Molly locked the device up in the storage cabinet, and they can’t hypnotize you if you don’t want them to.”

We were in our pajamas in the common room; the rest of the girls had gone to bed. Janice told me how Elizabeth had come on to her, talking about how much fun it was to be hypnotized, and making passes at her. I told her about what had happened last night.

“But Maddy, you said you were scared of them.”

“I still am, Janice, but they can’t get us if we don’t agree to it.”

“Are you sure?”

I sighed. “No, but I’m pretty sure. I mean, look who’s involved. Both Elizabeth and Hannah were into it already, you said so yourself.”

“Yeah,” she said doubtfully.

“And Sheila and Adrienne both had the kaleidoscope used on them, and it’s locked up.”

“I suppose.”

“How does Diane feel about it?”

“Oh, she’s worried too.”

“Then you don’t have anything to worry about, Janice. Go to bed, put something against the door, and you’ll be fine.”

I should have followed my own advice.

I smelled her before I could see her. It was the smell of clean skin, the warm and inviting smell I associated with the touch of a loved one.

Opening my eyes, I saw in front of me a vision of female loveliness, a woman with smooth skin and unselfconscious nudity. She was above me, somehow, though it was unclear where we were. The sky was the same soft, cloudy blue as the earth, but it was balmy and somehow comforting. I wasn’t really curious. She took all of my attention.

I moved to her—I’m not sure how—and found that she was, indeed, above me, for as I touched her my fingers fell upon her ankles. It felt good to touch her, right, and slowly I ran my hands across the tops of her feet, around her ankles and calves. I petted her, stroked her, and she was smooth and soft and smelled the way a woman should smell.

I climbed her, tracing my fingertips across her knees, rubbing up her thighs to where her hips pushed out, firmly but subtly pronouncing her womanliness. ‘Femininity’ seems such a dainty word, but she was far from dainty. She was pure and wholly female, strong and welcoming.

I caressed her hips, and climbed still higher, my hands smoothing over her hipbones, sliding behind to her ass. I was conscious, now, of her sexuality, and found myself gazing upwards, slowly, out of reverence, to see that most private of places, her altar, that cradle of pleasure that was reserved for the select few. My hands outstretched, above my head, clutching her from behind, I looked up.

I had never seen one before. That was how I felt, at that moment. Equipped with one my whole life, and yet all my experience was nothing. My eyes filled with tears of gratitude for what she was sharing with me.

She was perfect. Smooth, as her legs had been (I thought nothing of it), her delicate folds were the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. I had not realized. And then I felt something new.

Lust. For as she was perfect, her sex was perfect, and it demanded fulfillment of its purpose. I crawled towards it, my mouth open, slavering. My whole body was a single flame, and this need, this new need, was everything I was. Her purity made it right, and her perfection commanded my obedience. She wanted me. I could see it in the delicate curves that were presented for my face, in the way her legs opened, then, drawing me in. And I wanted nothing more than her.

I shivered, as my lips touched a woman’s sex for the first time. I was afraid that I would fail to please her, to please my Goddess, who had given me her own perfect self, and I almost wept in fear at my ignorance. Oh, the fear of being cast out! But I breathed in the smell of her, and I opened my clenched eyes, staring at her so perfect skin, so close to my face, cradled between her legs, and I extended my tongue, and licked her.

And again, and I drew in close, and took her lips into my mouth, sucking lightly, and working her with my tongue. And I felt pleasure myself, pleasure that she conveyed to me as an echo of her own. And I kissed her, and licked her, and used my lips and tongue as though I had always known what to do.

And we were in bliss together for a long time, she and I, and as she drew near that moment, approaching an orgasm which I knew she would reflect to me as well, and that mere fraction of her orgasm would be the most pleasurable thing I would ever, could ever experience, she looked at me. And though it was terribly presumptuous, I knew that I could look up at her.

My mouth to her pussy, sucking, tonguing, I looked up at her face, the face of this Goddess, and it was my own.

It was my face.

And the body of the Goddess was my body.

And the soft, beloved folds in my mouth were my own.

And I came, and came, and came....

I came so hard it woke me. I cannot say what noises I made, but my body arched and thrashed beyond my control for some time, and as I came down I discovered that there was a green and blue light playing on me. I realized that my eyes were open, had been open. And that the light was a bright circle, no, a tube, and I was looking down it. I reached out to the tube. The lights from it were flowing towards me, into me, through me.

Then it flicked off.

That confused me. I batted the air, for a moment. It had just flicked off, like a flashlight-

Oh, shit.

The “real” me came rushing back like a freight train. I was in my room; Rose’s bed was a dark shape across the room; she was not in it. There were figures at the foot of my bed, though, and one of them was holding something.

One of the figures flipped on the lights. It was Hannah. She was smiling, like a girl who had been caught being naughty by a friend.

I blinked in the suddenly bright room. Sure enough, Sheila was leaning on my bed, aiming the device squarely at my face. With her was Adrienne, and Elizabeth. They all shared the same cat-who-ate-the-canary grin.

As though removed, I felt myself try to get scared, but fail. I felt way too good to be scared. I knew that I should be scared, but somehow I just couldn’t do it. There was too much pleasure filling me to admit any fear.

Sheila put the device down on the foot of the bed, and crawled on. She slithered over the sheet, now soaked in my sweat (and my...), and pulled herself right up against me. She rubbed against me like a cat, her breast pushing into mine, then around my shoulder, her legs trailing, until she was wrapped around me, her upper body behind me, her stomach wrapped around my side, her legs lying next to mine on the bed.

God, I felt good.

Sheila ran a hand softly down my cheek, and placed her head on my shoulder.

“So now you know, Maddy. And doesn’t that make you feel better?”

Oh, yes. I felt fucking wonderful.

And yet—there was some part of me that didn’t want to feel wonderful. That was extremely unhappy with this development.

I focused in on that part, as Sheila continued.

“Welcome to Her service, Maddy.” She licked my ear, and I shuddered. Pure pleasure.

“She’s going to arrive tomorrow, Maddy, (lick), and we have to be ready. All the girls have to be prepared. And you’re going to help us with that, aren’t you?”

She ran her hand down under my shirt, and pulled on a nipple. I whimpered uncontrollably, and almost came again.

“Oh yes,” she said, whispering now, “I think you’ll find that you do ‘swing that way’, now.” I felt her looking up, and found myself following her gaze.

Elizabeth was at the foot of the bed, in her same white nightgown. As I looked at her, she ran her tongue over her upper lip. Her eyes were powerful, staring at me, and I found that I couldn’t look away. She reached one hand up, and flipped one of the straps of her nightgown off of her shoulder. Sheila’s breath was in my ear. Elizabeth slid her arm up, out of the strap, her eyes never leaving mine, mine powerless to leave hers.

There was... power, in Elizabeth’s gaze. I could feel it—and it wasn’t just her lust, or my lust, it was something else. Something I had felt before but never recognized. It was almost palpable against my skin. She was willing herself onto me.

She flipped the other strap off, slid the other arm out, and let the nightgown drop to the floor. My eyes fell to her breasts. Each pink nipple sported a silver ring. But what was more was how much they excited me, now. I knew then that I had been changed; I’d never felt lust at the sight of breasts before. But these—I wanted to touch them, to stroke them. Wanted to very badly.

Sheila’s hand, in my pajama shirt, was doing just that. I had settled into the heavy breathing of excitement, and each smooth pass of Sheila’s hand stoked the fire inside me. She was sucking on my ear, now, as I lifted my gaze to stare into Elizabeth’s eyes as she put her hands on the foot of the bed, and crawled up onto it, towards me.

A stray thought hit me—“Well, now I get to find out what pussy tastes like.” Because I was going to. I wanted to. And that little part of me that knew that this was wrong, this was not what I really wanted, had given up fighting the sex battle. It was marshalling its meager resources for something else, and given me over to my new lusts entirely.

Sheila had begun to whisper dirty things in my ear. (“She’s coming to fuck you, Maddy. To taste your sweet pussy. Your slit. She wants to lick it, Maddy. To lick your cunt until you come all over her. And then you can lick hers. Suck on it. Taste it, kiss it, fuck her pussy with your tongue.")

Elizabeth slid across me, now, her face inches from mine, and I stared into her eyes as she came closer, closer. I felt her power, the power of her will, wrap me in its folds. And then she kissed me.

I kissed her back, achingly, and felt her tongue dart out to taste my lips, then push inside my mouth. Sheila shifted position, sitting up and straddling my back, and I could feel both of her hands cupping my breasts as Elizabeth frenched me. And I frenched her back, tasting the inside of her mouth, running my tongue over hers.

I could feel her pulling down my pajama bottoms, and I shimmied to help her do so. Sheila had unbuttoned my top entirely, and Elizabeth slid her face down to my breasts, sucking on one, then the other. I arched my back, and whined.

She kissed her way down my stomach, and I watched her pink hair recede as she slithered down to my most private area. I felt her chin glide across my pubic hair, and then she blew on me.

Sheila held me as I bucked. Elizabeth’s breath became warm as she opened her mouth and drew near, and then her tongue was on me, stroking, licking, and then her mouth engulfed me, and I was lost again.

Some time later, I lay nude in Elizabeth’s embrace. I realized that my face was still wet from my vigorous pussy-eating, and I rolled it on a dry corner of the sheet. Sheila had indeed tasted different from Elizabeth; and Adrienne different still.

The first sign I had that my old self might be returning was when Rose came into the room. I wasn’t bothered that she was seeing me naked, obviously having made love to Elizabeth. I worried that she had been gotten, like I had, and that worry made me think that maybe I wasn’t as gone as I feared.

Rose was crying.

“Oh, Maddy, they got you. Oh God, I’m scared.”

She walked into the room hesitantly, but the woman who walked in behind her showed no such hesitancy.

“There’s nothing to be afraid of, Rose. Look how happy Maddy is, now.”

It was Molly.

Rose must have gone to Molly when the girls came to get me. It’s what I would have done.

And Molly had brought her back.

Molly put her hand on Rose’s shoulder, and guided her to her own bed. Behind her, Sheila walked into the room, with the kaleidoscope. Seeing her, Rose let out a sob.

“Shhh,” Molly comforted her. “It doesn’t hurt.”

Rose looked at Molly pleadingly, and I almost leapt off of the bed to come to her aid. Didn’t they see she didn’t want this? And I knew then, that I was no zombie, because if Rose didn’t want to be hypnotized, then she shouldn’t be, and that was a thought that no zombie was going to have.

But what could I do?

Sheila hadn’t wasted any time, and was already pointing the kaleidoscope at Rose.

“Please,” Rose said, “don’t.”

A moment passed. Then Sheila smiled, and put the kaleidoscope down onto the bed. “Okay, Rose, I won’t.”

I was as surprised as Rose was. Looking at Molly, I could see that she wasn’t expecting this either.

“But tell me, Rose,” Sheila said, sliding up the bed towards her, “tell me—what do you see in my eyes?”

“In your eyes?” squeaked Rose.

“Yes, Rose. Look into my eyes. Deep into them. Yes, just look in my eyes and tell me what you see.”

“I... I don’t...”

“Relax, Rose. I’m not going to use the kaleidoscope on you. But you have to tell me, what’s here, deep in my eyes. You can’t see it if you are all tense. Relax, and look inside. That’s it. Relax. You’re safe now. Just look into my eyes, deep down into my eyes...”

I could see it. No, that wasn’t the right word. Feel it, sort of, but from across the room. Power. Sheila was pushing on Rose with her will, and I could feel the strength of it. Elizabeth had it, a little, when she came for my sex. But this was different—it was purer. Sheila was pushing on Rose’s will in a more total sort of way, not to push Rose into doing something, but to subjugate her, to take her over. To control her.

And it was working. Rose was staring into Sheila’s eyes, her face losing its tension, her whole posture slackening.

“Yes, Rose, relax. Just keep looking into my eyes. Just look deep, deep into my eyes, and relax. Float down into my eyes.”

“Yes. Your eyes.”

“Yes, Rose. You are calm, relaxed. You trust me. Just sink into my eyes, and listen to me, and obey. You are so calm, so relaxed. And you want to obey me, Rose. It feels good to obey. It’s relaxing, and calm. Yes, obey. That’s what you want.”

Rose shuddered, then, and did something unexpected. She looked at me.

“Maddy...” she said, in a pleading whisper.

It struck like lightning. She wanted me to save her. Needed me to. I opened my mouth to say something, faltered.

“Look into my eyes, Rose!” demanded Sheila. I felt her power flare, swell, and Rose was helpless against it, her mind like a twig on the sea. Her head rotated back around, and she stared back into Sheila’s eyes. Unblinking.

I could do something. I should do something.

“You will only look into my eyes, Rose. Look into them, and forget. Forget your fear, forget Maddy, forget Rose. Look into my eyes, Rose, and slip away.”

What could I do? As I watched, Rose slipped back under the surface.

“You want to obey, Rose. You want to. You need to. It feels so good to obey. Here, I have something for you. Just keep looking into my eyes, and being relaxed, and I’ll put in into your hands. Good girl. It makes you happy to obey. You want to obey. Good girls obey.”

“Good girls... obey,” Rose replied, in a soft voice. She was totally wrapped in Sheila’s power, smothered in it.

“Now, hold it like this... yes, good girl. Now put your thumb here. Good. You love to obey. You feel so good. Now, Rose, it’s time for you to flip the switch. Push your thumb up, and turn it on, and stare into the lights.”

The kaleidoscope clicked on.

Rose was smiling, now, happy, and eagerly accompanied Sheila down the hall to get her sister. Jesus. I suppose I should be thankful that I wasn’t asked to help Rose adapt to her new sexuality, but I guess I was just a special case. Rose’s conversion was just taken as a given.

Poor Mary. Fuck. Her own sister was coming to show her her own new truth, to wipe away the parts of her mind that didn’t suit and install the new bits that were desired. New bits like a lust that would probably have the two of them wind up in an incestual 69. New bits just like mine.

Elizabeth had drifted off to sleep, but I doubted that I was going to get any. One of the disadvantages of still having some free will, I guess. I went out into the hallway.

Molly was standing there. Molly, who I trusted, who told me she had locked up the kaleidoscope. And who had just brought Rose back in to be enslaved.

She walked over to me, smiling.

“Welcome, Maddy. I was worried that you were going to cause us some problems.”

What to say. “I suppose I might have, at that.”

She ran a hand down my cheek, and part of me wanted to slap it. Another part wanted to suck on her fingers.

“You see, Maddy, I put the box in Sheila’s room. My Owner instructed me to. Your Owner, too.”

“My Owner?”

“Yes, Maddy.” Molly smiled, “You saw her in your dream. The same dream we all had. You looked up at your Goddess—and there She was. She’s real, you know. She’s coming here tomorrow. And we’ll all be ready for Her.”

I didn’t reply. Part of me sang.

I was rather at a loss for what to do. I couldn’t stop Molly and Sheila (and all their eager helpers), and I didn’t really want to watch. Partly because it bothered me, and partly because it aroused me. Which bothered me.

So I went to the kitchen and made a sandwich, and tried not to think about the impending arrival of the architect of all this. Could I call the police? I didn’t know what to tell them. Some sort of mind controller had taken over the Camp, and was coming to collect us? Oh, and she (or was it She?) had turned me into a lesbian? Yeah, that would get them right up here.

I could call my parents. Demand that they come get me. Yeah, all the way from Yonkers. Sure, that was even better than the police idea.

And I didn’t know if I could do it. I was terribly afraid that I’d try, and then my arm would hang up the phone and I’d go report my bad behavior to Sheila. That would be more than I could deal with. So, when the morning came, I guess I’d just see what happened.

She was here. All of the girls had been preparing all morning, getting showered and making themselves up, cleaning the building. Molly had turned the heat up to enable them to run around in their underwear. I suppose it would have been eerie to see all the pretty, almost-nude girls moving quietly and efficiently about tasks they had complained about only a few days before, but of course I wasn’t surprised.

Occasionally, Sheila would take one of the girls aside into her room for a quick ‘update’ session. The blue and green lights of the device would spill out into the hall (for Molly had had the doors all taken off), and Sheila’s melodic voice would softly tighten the mold around her subject’s mind.

The last girl to get some ‘updated’ before She arrived was Janice. I had been in my room, avoiding the activity, but when Molly announced that She had arrived, I couldn’t help from coming out to the common room, where the girls were gathering. As I approached Sheila and Adrienne’s room, the lights flicked off, and Janice stepped out into the hall.

She rotated her head to face me, and her blank, bespectacled face drew up into a smile. Her pale blue eyes were distant, unthinking.

“Maddy.”

“Hi, Janice.”

Sheila emerged from the doorway, and slid a hand possessively onto Janice’s shoulder. Where Janice was in a matching white lace bra and panty set, Sheila had opted for satin green, and it both offset her tan skin and gave her a more dominant look than the other girls.

“Janice, Maddy, it’s time for us to await Her in the common room,” said Sheila.

“Yes, Sheila. I obey,” replied Janice. Sheila slid a hand around Janice’s waist, and the two of them turned to join the rest of the girls in the overheated main lounge.

As they turned to go, my heart, which I thought had been overwhelmed and burned out by now, once again pained me at the thought of Janice’s being turned into an obedient doll like the rest of them. She had trusted in me to help keep her safe, and I had failed. They hadn’t needed the kaleidoscope to get her at all. Just Sheila. And the price for my failure was her freedom.

I must have said something, for Janice stopped, to look at me. Sheila gave her a strange look, but pulled away and kept walking. Janice came up to me, held my hand.

“She’s here!” came a loud voice down the corridor. I looked up. Janice, still smiling vacantly, dropped her hand, turned from me, and walked quickly down the hall to meet her owner.

I wasn’t going to hide. I followed her.

The girls had lined up in the common room. Molly stood at one end, and the line ran in descending height to Sheila at the other end. Funny—Sheila was so powerful that I had completely forgotten she was shorter than I was.

They were all in underwear, bras and panties, and the room was almost uncomfortably warm. They all had matching expressions, emotionless, unafraid, watching the entrance door for their Owner expectantly. I flashed on poor Mary, helpless as her own sister took her mind. Now she was in burgundy Victoria’s Secret, standing next to her sister and not thinking of anything.

I was the odd girl out, and I remained in the hall, leaning on the doorsill, watching. It wasn’t like there was anything I could do, but the hall behind me gave my lizard brain a place it thought it could run, could get away to. I was dressed. None of the other girls seemed to care.

I could feel Her before I saw Her. Behind the door into the room there came a prickle of power, like a change in the air pressure, and I felt it pushing against my skin. The line of girls straightened, as one.

An Asian woman, dressed as a chauffeur, opened the door—I was probably the only one in the room who saw her. Because the woman the chauffeur was holding the door for was Her.

Not ‘her’, but ‘Her’. She walked into the room and it felt like a boulder had fallen into a mill pond. Her power washed over me, pushed through me. I swayed in the doorway. The girls seemed unaffected, other than to stand more tautly in their line.

She was dressed in riding clothes; black boots with a mirror shine, tan jodhpurs, a red felt jacket. Her black hair was pulled up in an intricate design on top of her head. I could feel her, as she moved across the room.

It was Molly that she went to first. Nearly nude, strong, muscular; Molly was trembling as She drew near.

“Molly. My dear. You’ve done well, Molly.”

“Thank You, my Owner. Thank You.”

“Let me inspect your catch, my pet.” Turning from Molly, She began to walk down the line. Diane, Janice’s redheaded roommate. Pamela, the pretty black girl from Philly. Hannah, whose mouth She ran a finger across, and into. Mary and Rose, obviously sisters, dressed in matching lingerie. Elizabeth, whose short pink hair merited Her petting. Janice. Poor Janice. Adrienne, first to look into the device and fall under its spell. And then, Sheila. She stopped at the end of the line, at Sheila.

“Ah, Sheila. I can see your power, you know. I knew that you would take to hypnosis like a kitten takes to yarn. It was my handwriting on that box, my pet. Did you like being my little catspaw, my sixth columnist?

“Oh, yes, Mistress.”

“I’ll keep you, I think. You have potential, as a tool.”

“Oh thank You, Mistress.”

“Now then, my pets. The woman at the door is my servant. She will take you out to a transport vehicle. Molly, I have them until Sunday, was it?”

“Yes, my Owner. They are expected to leave here on Sunday.”

“Fine. You will all now follow my servant out to the transport vehicle. I have much more... complete facilities awaiting you elsewhere.”

She hadn’t looked at me until then, and somewhere in my mind I had allowed myself to think that maybe she didn’t notice me. Stupid. She took her hand off of Sheila’s head, and looked directly at me.

“Go, my pets. I have something very interesting to deal with, here.”

She walked towards me, the line of girls behind her filing out quickly. I felt like a mouse, unable to move as the hawk dropped towards it. For some reason, I wondered how long it took to do her hair up like that.

As she drew close, I could feel her power around me, pushing at me. Sheila’s abilities at their most intense were just distant echoes of the flowing power coming from this woman. She could tell the President to moon Congress, and all he would ask was “for how long?”

She stopped a few feet away, and looked me over, from my feet to my head. Her expression was impenetrable, until one corner of her mouth crooked up in a smile.

“So,” she breathed, “Maddy, is it?”

“Madeleine.”

I don’t know where I came up with the courage to correct her, but it seemed that she was amused by my temerity. She laughed, softly, with a sound reminiscent of water moving over pebbles.

“Madeleine. You’ve been quite a surprise, Madeleine. The last thing I would have expected to find is someone like you.”

“Um—like me?”

She ignored my question, and began to walk around me, slowly. I didn’t turn to face her.

“You can feel me, can’t you, Madeleine. I saw you shake when I came in.” Her boots clicked behind me, as she drew her heels together, and turned around. “Do you know, Madeleine, that I can count the number of people I know who can feel me like that?”

She was in front of me again, looking into my eyes. “I can feel you, Madeleine.”

Her eyes were like chips of onyx, but alive, so alive. They pulled at me, but did not draw me in.

“Well, Madeleine? Nothing to say?”

“Why did you do it? Why are you here?”

She laughed again. “Not the question I anticipated.” She threw open her hands. “But I’ll answer it nonetheless. Why, for fun, Madeleine. For fun. Why do people go hunting, fishing? It’s fun. I just cast out my line, and in it comes with all the pretty girls.” She darted an eyebrow up. “And I like pretty girls, Madeleine.”

“What are you going to do with them—with us?” It was like someone else was talking for me. By rights, I should have been petrified into immobility.

“Catch and release, my dear. Sheila, she is of some interest. And Molly, of course, is mine. But as for the rest of your friends, why, I’ll just put some radio tracking devices in their ears and let them go.”

“And... me?”

“Well, now, that is a very good question.” She put a knuckle to her lips. “I could, of course, do the same to you. You can feel how useless it would be to fight me, can’t you?”

“Yes.” The answer was compelled. I hadn’t planned to say anything.

“But, like I said, you’re rather a rare thing. You’re a controller, my dear. Just like me. With some work, you could be me. Tell me, who is your mother?”

“I don’t know,” I heard myself respond. “I’m adopted.”

“Ah! There it is. You see, my dear, we tend to keep very good track of each other. But you, somehow, you slipped out of the net.” She leaned her face close to mine, her breath warm on my ear. “And that makes you valuable.”

Leaning away, she resumed her small pacing.

“I’m not going to just let you go, Madeleine. You are too interesting, and too useful. Of course, the intelligent thing to do would be to turn you into Sheila. Erase the bits I don’t want, and install the thoughts I do want.” She looked at me. “And I’m very intelligent.”

“But,” she resumed her pacing, “I’m also easily bored. And there’s no surprises in your dancing to my tune. Finding you here, in a routine pleasure hunt, has been the most fascinating thing I’ve encountered all year.”

“Tell me,” she said, facing me and stepping close, “about Rose.” Her eyes glittered.

I hesitated, expecting to find myself speaking again, surprised when I did not. I ran my tongue across my teeth.

“I, she wanted me to protect her. From Sheila.”

“Yes, she could tell what you were, and sought your help. And did you help her?”

“No. I... no.”

“Why not, Madeleine?”

I wanted to say something about how I didn’t know how, how I was afraid, but that was a lie. If I had wanted to, I would have tried.

My voice was a whisper. “I wanted her to be taken.”

She smiled. “Because...?”

“Because it excited me.” My cheeks were burning, my head bowed.

“Ah, Madeleine.” She ran a hand across my cheek. “Such a difficult admission. And does it still?”

“It does.”

“To take the minds of your fellows, to erase their cares and make them yours? It’s terribly immoral, Madeleine. Mind control. And you say it excites you?”

I could barely hear myself. “Yes.”

“Good.”

I looked up at her.

“Madeleine, I’m going to make you an offer. Come with me. Let me teach you how to use what is yours. How to bend others into your slaves.” She extended her hand to me.

I knew what the cost would be. She wanted me to become like her. And what would happen, when I could bend the minds of others? My friends, when they annoyed me. My parents. Who wouldn’t become my toy? Somehow, I knew that to accept her offer was to ever after look down dispassionately at the world, seeing others as toys and tools and lesser beings. If I took her offer, I could never again have normal friends, family, relationships. I would be above them. She was asking me to be alone.

But the box had already been opened, hadn’t it.

Her hand, nails long and lacquered, was open in front of me.

God help me, I took it.