The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive

The gate swung closed behind Patricia’s car. She had lost count of which gate it was—the eighth? ninth? The first, out on the desolate Nevada highway, had been chain-link. This last one was made of inch-thick steel bar, set in a concrete wall topped with electrified wires. In her rear view mirror, she watched the locking mechanisms slide into their tight embrace.

Ahead were a series of low buildings. Their roofs were uneven, with beams jutting out of them at strange angles. As she passed the obstacles in the barren courtyard, Patricia realized that it was all designed to prevent helicopter landings. The government was taking no chances with what was contained here.

The worms.

As she pulled her Cherokee into the roofed parking area, she saw a woman in a white lab coat emerge from a door, and wave at her. Then the woman gestured to her right. Patricia’s eyes followed the motion, to where she saw an empty parking spot. Sliding her car into it, she observed that her last name had already been stenciled onto the wall.

The woman in the lab coat arrived as Patricia was getting out.

“Hi, Dr. Sorenson? I’m Lacy Parker. Welcome to the facility.”

Patricia sized her up. Ms. Parker was obviously of mixed race, with dark wavy hair pulled up in a bun, skin the color of light coffee, and full lips. Inviting lips, one part of Patricia’s mind added, but she ignored it.

“Hello, Ms. Parker. It’s nice to meet you.”

“Please, call me Lacy. Here, let me help.” The other woman stepped forward to help Patricia remove her bags from the back seat. She was several inches shorter than Patricia, but had no trouble hefting the overpacked bags handed out to her.

“Thanks, Lacy. I’m Patricia. It’s quite a place you have here.”

The smaller woman smiled broadly. “It is, isn’t it? I understand even Fort Knox isn’t so well guarded. Of course, gold isn’t as aggressive as what we keep in here.”

The two women walked across the parking garage to the door Lacy had emerged from, each laden with two large duffels.

“The worms?”

“Yeah, the worms. Nasty little buggers.”

“Do we know where they came from yet?”

“Idaho,” deadpanned Lacy, as she opened the door.

“No, no, that was a joke. Actually, we haven’t learned much more than we knew immediately after discovering them. Here, let’s take these to the women’s dorm and then I’ll show you around.”

They walked down a short white hall, which Lacy opened to reveal a large sunlit area. The area between two of the large buildings had been glassed in and paved.

“So,” Lacy continued, “the building that you just parked in is pretty much a storage building. This one here is the main laboratory. It’s in the center, and this atrium basically runs around it in the shape of a U.”

As they walked, Patricia envied Lacy’s biceps, as she continued talking without any hesitation, while Patricia was beginning to breathe hard. Why did she have to pack so much stuff?

“As we round this corner, you will see the men’s facility. It’s got some more labs, and the men’s dorms. There are about thirty guys working here, and four men who had been infected and are under quarantine.”

They walked the length of the hallway, and Patricia saw several men working at a rack of computers through a window into the main building. One of them looked up, and waved. Then they rounded the next corner, and approached a much smaller building.

“And around this corner, we see the women’s facility. Home, sweet home.”

A woman in sweatpants and a white t-shirt emerged from one of the two doors in the women’s building. Seeing Lacy and Patricia approaching, she stepped back to hold open the door. Lacy nodded at her, but kept on with her monologue.

“Science being what it is, there are only five female scientists here currently. That’s counting you. However, if you feel like company, we’ve got seventeen formerly infected women in cages. They don’t say much, but I think the men like to sneak in and look at them all the same. Hi, Roberta.”

“Hi, Lacy. Eighteen.”

“Eighteen?”

“We just got another one. They caught her late, and held her up north for another two weeks. She just arrived, and we’ve got her in the observation cage.”

“Ah, okay.”

The woman in the t-shirt continued holding the door as Lacy entered. Patricia was struck by the significant shadows cast on the t-shirt by the woman’s breasts, then flushed as she realized she had been blatantly staring at her chest. The woman pretended not to notice.

“You must be Patricia Sorenson. I’m Major Roberta Velasquez. I’m the number two man here at the facility—if you need anything, come to me.”

“Hello, Major Velasquez. I’d salute, but...”

The olive-skinned woman smiled. “No worries. We’re all pretty informal here. Lacy will get you settled, introduce you to the girls. For some boneheaded reason, they’ve got us gender-segregated. You can meet Doctor Yang and the rest of the scientists in a few hours, after shift change.”

“Thanks, Major.”

“Roberta. I said informal.”

Patricia smiled. “Roberta.”

“Come on, Patricia,” said Lacy, standing inside the doorway. “My arms are getting tired.”

“And, for the piece de resistance, we have the women’s lab!”

Lacy swung open the large door at the end of the hall with a grand flourish, then held it for Patricia to enter.

It was the last room in the women’s building. After putting Patricia’s bags in her room, the two women had started at the north end of the building and worked their way room by room south. At the very north end was the large room containing the formerly infected women. They were being kept, four to a room, in a series of small cells whose walls did not abut any other walls, being totally contained within the large room. The women had seemed oblivious to Lacy and Patricia’s presence. To a woman, they had the swollen breasts and enhanced sexual characteristics that Patricia had heard about.

Patricia had wanted to examine them further, but Lacy had insisted that they move on, promising that it would be much easier to examine the new woman they had in the observation cage.

From the containment hangar, the building consisted of a number of rooms adjoining one central hall. They looked briefly into the storage rooms, then stopped in at the medical facility, where Patricia was introduced to Dr. Jessica London.

Dr. London was, in a word, elegant. In her mid-forties, she had tanned skin and hair pulled up in a way that Patricia had never figured out how to do properly. She sported rimless glasses that accentuated her dark eyes. Where Lacy looked like a scientist, Jessica looked every inch a doctor in precisely the same style of coat.

That was not the only difference, either. Jessica looked pained at Lacy’s gleeful intimation of the frequency of body cavity searches. She didn’t deny it, though.

Opposite the doctor’s office was the monitor room. Every room in the building was constantly monitored, day and night, from this room. Since all the worms were in the main lab building, these monitor feeds were currently only being recorded.

Past the corridor from the monitor room were the women’s rooms. They were small, functional affairs, without even a closet. Past them were the communal shower and a small gym. At the head of the hall was the women’s lab, and it was this room into which Lacy held the door open now.

Upon entering, Patricia observed that the main purpose of this lab was as a computer lab. One whole wall was banks of terminals, with chairs and a desk surface running the length of it. Some lab equipment such as centrifuges and other devices adorned another wall.

There were two women in the room. A slender woman with long red hair stood in the center of the room, observing a brunette, nude, seated in a cage. Both women looked over as Patricia walked in.

The redhead smiled, and came over to extend a pale hand.

“Hello, you must be Patricia. I’m Sally. Sally Pullworth. It’s nice to have another woman around.”

“Hi, Sally. And, uh, who’s this?”

“Oh, this is our latest guest, Dr. Melissa Quartz. She’s the last of the infected people from Idaho.”

Patricia walked over to the cage to look at the woman, who was returning her curious gaze.

“Hello? Dr. Quartz?”

Lacy spoke up from behind Patricia. “Don’t bother, hon. None of the infected folks have said word one since we got ‘em. The worms really do a job on your head, it seems.”

The two other women had come to the cage as well.

“It’s scary, isn’t it?” asked Sally. “I mean, she has a Ph.D. in psychology. She lived a perfectly happy, meaningful life for 32 years. And now, it’s all gone. She’s a zombie.”

Patricia looked at this woman in the cage. The remains of tan lines delineated her fair skin. Her breasts were full, heavy, and hung slightly to either side of her chest. Her face was smooth, with a look of calm intelligence, but her eyes were glassy. They made Patricia blink.

“So why’s she out here? Why not back with the other zombies?” asked Lacy.

“Well, Roberta wanted to run some blood tests on one of them, so when we got her just today, we had her put in here.” Sally ran a hand through her hair. “We’ve drawn the blood, so I suppose we can put her with the rest, now.”

Patricia was still looking at Melissa’s eyes. She waved a hand in front of the brunette’s gaze. “Hi, Melissa. Are you still in there? Somewhere? Won’t you talk to me?”

“She won’t say anything, Patricia.” observed Lacy.

“Says who?” said Melissa, in a soft contralto. “Hello, Patricia. What did you want to talk about?”

The three women stared at Melissa. Sally’s mouth hung open. The nude women looked at them, smiling.

The room was packed. Patricia was glad that she had stuck around, for Sally, who had gone to report this development to Roberta, had been unable to get back into the room. There had been hurried introductions between Patricia and some of the male scientists now filling the room, but it was evident that she was just a side issue to be dealt with later.

“So, er, Melissa, how do you feel?” asked Thomas Yang, chief scientist at the facility.

“I feel great, Tommy.” To underline the point, Melissa stretched, displaying her breasts to good effect.

“And, ah, how do you feel about the worms?”

“I love them. Look what they did to me.”

“But... aren’t you their slave?”

Melissa’s smile broadened a bit. “I suppose so. It’s so nice, though, to be so strong and... so sexy.”

“What would you do if we were to release you?”

“Oh, I don’t know. I think the first thing on my mind would be sex. In the long term, I guess I’d move somewhere and go back to practicing psychology.”

“You wouldn’t try to acquire more worms?”

“Well, sure, if some were available. But it certainly seems like you guys have gotten rid of them.” Melissa paused. “I don’t need them, you know, I just want them.”

“So, why are you the only, er, victim, to talk to us?”

“Well, I don’t know. I suppose you’d have to ask the other people. Then again, I guess that’s tough to do if they aren’t talking to you.”

“Right. Well, um, Melissa, I’d like to formulate a list of questions, and have you answer them. Is that okay?”

“Sure thing. Whatever you want, Tommy.”

Dr. Yang turned to the crowd, which started to make noise as the assembled scientists began to talk amongst themselves.

“Okay, folks, out! This room is too small for all of you. I want everyone back to work. If you come up with questions to ask Ms. Quartz, email them to me, and I will compile the list. Oh, and I’d like to introduce everyone to Dr. Patricia Sorenson, our latest biologist. She comes to us from Southern California University, and is, obviously, among the top of her field.”

There was a general chorus of greeting.

“Okay, get back to work!”

As the scientists filed out, most of them continuing to gawk at the woman in the cage, Melissa spoke up again, in a low voice. Of course, the crowd immediately hushed, and her soft speech carried across the room.

“Tommy? I have a request. It’s kind of, well... indecent. My sex drive has been pretty well ramped up, and if you could see fit to provide me with some, er, equipment? Of course, if it were attached to someone that would be even better, but I don’t suppose any of these men are single. So I’ll settle for a nice Hitachi Magic Wand. Or an electric toothbrush. Anything.”

Dr. Yang had turned a bright pink. “I, I, I’ll see what I can do.” Noting that the exodus from the room had entirely ceased, he once again raised his voice.

“Out!!”

When Patricia had finished unpacking, Roberta and a group of men were in the lab talking with Melissa. Lacy and Sally were both in the gym, so Patricia took them up on their invitation to work out with them. Apparently the lack of other entertainment was what led to the general fitness of the scientists present.

An hour later, she was trying hard not to ogle either woman as the three of them showered. Lacy’s ass, in particular, kept drawing her treacherous eyes to its wet surface. She had just pulled them away again, when Lacy spun around.

“So, girls, what do you think of Melissa?”

Sally turned, and Patricia managed not to look at the pale red bush where her legs came together.

“She made me laugh,” commented Sally. “She’s so naughty.”

“Patricia?”

“Well, er, she was very forthright,” observed Patricia.

“She kicked ass. Did you see Yang blushing? I thought his head would explode.”

“Say, Sally, how did you get back into the room?” asked Patricia. “I saw Lacy elbow her way back in.”

“Oh, I just watched from the monitor room.”

“You know,” broke in Lacy, “if she were to have propositioned me like that, I would have taken her up on it. It’s not like she can infect you.”

Sally leaned towards Patricia and mock-whispered: “Lacy likes girls.”

Lacy grinned. “Actually, I believe my people’s motto is ‘Anything that moves’. Say, I know Sally isn’t interested, but how about you, Patricia? Do you swing that way?”

Patricia blushed. “Well, er...”

The smaller woman sighed dramatically. “Damn. Ah, well, can’t blame me for trying.”

Patricia, looking at Lacy’s full, wet, suckable lips (because she didn’t trust herself to look any lower) considered revealing that she was a lesbian, but couldn’t bring herself to do so in front of both of them. Patience, she thought. I just got here.

Sally stepped past them, and out of the shower. Taking up a towel, she said, “Well, if I were you, Lacy, I’d be careful that Roberta doesn’t hear that.”

“Good point, girl.” Lacy turned off her showerhead. “She’d have my ovaries if I did anything that was remotely risky, and inviting a sexually modified worm-drone to my bed, even one who talks a good game, might be considered risky.”

Patricia followed Lacy out of the showers, keeping her gaze fixed firmly above the shoulderblades.

The next week or so was an exciting one for Patricia. She was assigned to a team of biologists working under Stephen Parks, whom she knew from a conference she had attended at MIT. Doctor Parks was preeminent in the rather small and inclusive field of parasitology, and Patricia found him to be warm and personable.

It took only a few hours for her to tour the main laboratory building and the men’s facilities. The men were sleeping three to a room, but their building also contained the commissary, another gym, and the rec room where movies were shown. It also had internal monitoring facilities.

The main labs themselves were, unsurprisingly, immaculate, having been constructed only in the last month. The equipment was the very latest, and after years of working with what the SCU biology department had, Patricia was a little intimidated by all the gleaming new machines.

Her co-workers, however, were not intimidating in the least. She found them to be by and large the usual sort of reclusive but nice weirdoes that populated her field, and they were, above all, professional. This was the chance of a lifetime for a research scientist. As Eddy Huang, who, it seemed, was the resident joker, commented, “Everyone here can now put Xenobiologist on their business card with a straight face.”

Not that they had made much progress on the worms’ origins. Patricia had flinched when she saw her first actual worm, stretched out in a long plastic tube. The facility kept its specimens in single containers, in a cleanroom, and the tubes were unopenable save with a special unlocking device.

Word had not come down as to what would happen when they ran out of specimens, but they currently had thousands, and Patricia assumed if they wanted more they could just stick some in a cow.

The worm that Patricia saw was just the first she was to deal with that week. She quickly put aside her nervous distaste of the eighteen inch long segmented parasite when she was first given one, in its tube, to examine. She turned it over to examine the bulb along one side (the top? bottom?) from which the hairlike threads that bound into a victim’s nervous system emerged. This was a biological innovation of a type Patricia had never seen before, and she was eager to study it.

She had bent her face near the tube, and then shrieked and dropped it clattering to the floor when the worm violently thrust itself against the plastic towards her face. She felt her face flush as several of the scientists in the room chuckled, and was herself smiling embarrassedly by the time she had recovered the tube from under the desk where it had rolled.

By Friday afternoon, she was deeply absorbed in her work. A bit to her surprise, they had allowed her to work on whole specimens immediately. Of course, the worms that she was working with had been killed before being allowed out of the tubes. Live worms were only to be worked on in the clean rooms.

She lifted a worm out of the tray. It was surprisingly heavy. The design of the creature was quite simple, with horizontal bands like an earthworm, which could flare just slightly to offer traction in either direction. They were almost all muscle, with an incredibly complex and (at first glance) redundant nervous system. This particular worm had been taken from a cow.

Earlier that day, they had gone over tapes of animals being infected. Patricia had been startled at how... sensuous the process was. Very like mating.

Not that that was a surprise. Here you had Freud’s prototypical object longer than it was wide, and given its objective, using sexual behavior was the quickest way into a new host. Especially given that the preferred hosts were female.

Patricia wondered what it would be like, feeling it going in. She pictured herself, strapped to a lab table, a worm pushing its way into her mouth. Another pushing its way in... down there. Her, writhing in a mixture of terror and pleasure, as they entered, bearing sex, to steal her very self.

She realized she had been stroking the worm, and quickly looked around the lab. No one else in the room, thankfully. Patricia smiled. This one was dead, and all the rest safely locked away. Fantasies were fun to indulge in when you knew that you’d never have to suffer the consequences.

She lifted the worm again, feeling its smooth heft. There was a brief impulse to kiss the tapered tip, to take it for just a second into her mouth. To dare it, to feel that frisson of risk and the forbidden.

Then, Patricia stretched the worm out on her dissection table, and reached for a scalpel.

Patricia was walking back from dinner with Lacy and Roberta, and trying not to ogle Roberta’s breasts. Major Velasquez seemed to only wear tops that displayed her tits to best advantage. Pendulous, thought Patricia, that was the only way to describe them. So that’s what pendulous looks like.

They had just entered the women’s building, when Jessica came walking hurriedly around a corner and narrowly avoided walking into them.

“Roberta! I was just coming looking for you. I have something I need you to look at.”

“Oh? Where at?”

“Here, in the monitor room. Come on.”

The four of them walked into the monitor room. Screens displayed with great clarity an image from each of the rooms in the building. Most were empty. The women’s lab contained Sally, who was reading a copy of Maxim she had stolen from the bathroom in the men’s building, and Melissa. Melissa was sitting in her usual spot, cross-legged, doing nothing in particular. Her small box of ‘toys’ was in the cage with her.

After they had been delivered, the scientists had been somewhat shocked when she began to use them right there in front of them. Roberta had quickly requested that Melissa wait until she was alone in the room, or with someone who had said that it was fine if she masturbated. Melissa had immediately complied, though with some protestation.

Over the next few days, she had also recieved several other gifts from the male staff. Some books, a few pillows, and $10 necklace with a particularly sparkly glass “diamond” on it, which Melissa immediately took to wearing around her neck. Watching the host girl on the monitor, as Jessica sat down and the women gathered around her, Patricia could see her idly playing with it.

“Okay, watch this tape.” Jessica rewound a cassette already in the VCR. It showed the women’s lab, with a timestamp of 03:15. Melissa sat in her cage in an otherwise empty room.

The women watched the tape for a few moments. Nothing happened. Roberta asked, “Okay, so what are we supposed to see?”

Jessica replied in a worried tone. “This is last night’s tape. Look at Melissa’s cage. Don’t you see something missing?”

They looked back at the screen. Lacy spotted it immediately. “The box of dildos! It’s gone!”

“But they gave Melissa that box on Wednesday, and I don’t think it’s left her cage,” responded Patricia.

“Shit.” observed Roberta. “Someone has tampered with the monitors.”

“As far as I can tell,” said Jessica, sliding her glasses up the bridge of her nose, “this tape is an exact duplicate of Monday night’s. That’s what I had been determining when I went to find you.” She looked worredly at Roberta.

The major walked across the room, and slid open a panel. “Okay, mystery stranger, you may have known about the tapes. But were you smart enough to change the audio?”

Patricia looked at the screen showing Sally reading her magazine. She flipped a page, and giggled.

“The audio is recorded separately from the video?” she asked Roberta.

“Actually, it’s recorded both by the tape and by this audio system. I think this building was pre-fabbed for something, and they just added the video system on later. There, I have last night’s recording. Let’s just skim it back...”

The four women listened to the tape’s quiet hiss as it spun quickly backwards. Then, suddenly, there was definite noise, but garbled by speed.

“Let’s just start at the beginning, shall we?” observed Roberta, still holding down the rewind button.

The tape fell silent again, and Roberta released rewind and hit play.

There was a long moment of silence, and then what sounded like a door opening. Then Melissa’s voice.

“Hello. Who are you?”

A man’s voice replied, quietly, “I, er... call me John.”

“John,” repeated Melissa. “How appropriate. What can I do for you, John?”

“Um, I was hoping, that is, I’ve turned off the video recording.”

“And why did you do that, John?”

“Well, you, er, mentioned that you wanted sex, and I...”

“Ohhhhh. Sex.” came Melissa’s voice, drawn out and husky. “That sounds just lovely.” There was a pause. “Would you like to touch me, first? If you are in a hurry, I’ll just back up against the bars... like this, see?”

The man’s breathing became audible, and Melissa’s voice continued.

“Would you like to fondle my breasts? I know that men love them. I do, too. Here, pet them. Oooh, I can see you are ready for this. You know, not that I’m asking, but if you want to do this in the cage, I won’t hurt you.”

“No, er, that’s okay,” came the man’s voice.

“Okay, John. It’s up to you. I’ll do whatever you want.”

The recording stopped with a clunk. Patricia realized that Roberta had hit the stop button, and that she, Lacy, and Jessica had all been leaning in to hear the recording. They all leaned back, trying to look less interested, as Roberta addressed them.

“Well, girls, I think we have a serious security problem. I advise you all to go to your rooms, or the rec room. I’m going to summon some MPs, and Dr. Yang. I’ve already recognized the voice on that tape. Go on, now. Actually, Jessica, if you would stay here, please. Lacy, Patricia—Scoot.”

It was the next morning when Roberta assembled the women in the monitor room. Patricia yawned, and saw Lacy join in a second later. She was gratified that she had not been alone in her insomnia. For most of the night, there had been people wandering around the women’s building, many of them armed soldiers.

“Okay,” began Roberta, clad this morning in camo pants and her usual tight white t-shirt, “here’s what happened. One of the scientists, Juan Faludini, took Melissa up on her offer last night. He managed to copy Monday’s tape onto Thursday’s, but he didn’t know about the additional voice recording. Thanks to Jessica’s keen eye, we caught him, after just the one tryst.

He’s confessed, of course, and has been taken away. He hadn’t been infected or anything like that, but we don’t really want someone around who will tamper with the records for a little sex.

There will be some changes. Annoying ones, I’m afraid. The main one is that there will now need to be someone in the monitor room at all times, and an additional person watching Melissa. We’re keeping her in the women’s lab. Particularly annoying is the fact that the brass have decided that the people in the monitor room and the women’s lab should be us. The women.”

“Shit!” exclaimed Lacy. “That will really take time away from my research!”

“The way the boys at the top see it, they can’t trust all of the men to keep their hands off. Yes, it sucks horse ass. But, it’s not like you have to waste the time. Bring your equipment, and any non-restricted samples, and do your work here. We just need some people there to prevent this sort of thing recurring. You don’t have to actively watch for anything. Questions?”

“Um, what did Melissa say?”

“Well, that’s interesting. She wouldn’t say anything at all, until we dragged Mr. Faludini in, and forced him to tell her that it was okay. Once we had done that, she pretty much confirmed everything, quite happily. Anything else?”

There wasn’t, so Roberta posted the first week’s watch schedule, and the women went back to their rooms.

As she dressed for the lab, Patricia breathed a sigh of relief that she hadn’t let them know her own sexual orientation. Not that Melissa was attractive, well, physically she was, but mentally she scared the bejeezus out of Patricia. Now more than ever. Still, she was glad that she hadn’t wound up on the suspect short list. Always a good idea to keep one’s mouth shut, she reflected.

Patricia’s first shift on the monitors was Sunday night. She brought along some of the reports that Dr. Park had recommended, and after watching Sally and Melissa in the women’s lab for a few minutes, she started reading.

It was several hours later when she rubbed her eyes and realized that there was a conversation going on in the lab. Putting down the sheaves of paper, she leaned forward to pay attention.

Sally had swiveled around in her chair where she had been working on a computer terminal. She was laughing at something Melissa had just said.

“So, Sally, have you heard any good ones lately?”

“I’m sorry, Melissa, I don’t know any jokes. I’ll try to remember that one, though.”

“No matter. I don’t get bored, you know.”

Sally sighed. “Melissa, I wish you wouldn’t mention that.”

“Okay, Sally, whatever you like. I do get thirsty, though. Could you get me some water?”

Sally shot a glance up at the glass eye of the camera, directly at Patricia. “Sure, I guess. Hold on.” She left the room, and Patricia followed her as she walked down the hall to the refrigerator, and returned with a bottle of water.

Melissa hadn’t moved. As Sally passed her the bottle, she reached past it and stroked her hand down the back of Sally’s.

“Sally, do you... like women?”

Sally smiled. “Sure. Most of my best friends are women. Here, take your water.”

Melissa took the water bottle. “Thanks, Sally. But you know what I really meant.”

“I do at that.” Sally walked back to her seat. “But no, I don’t like women in that fashion.”

“A pity, that. You have such a beautiful face.”

“Okay, Melissa, knock it off. They took Juan away, you know.”

“Was that his name? A shame. We just fucked. It’s not like I could have infected him.”

“Well, regardless, your charms won’t work on me, I’m afraid.”

“Okay. Sorry, Sally. I’m just... you know.”

“I do. Okay, I’m going to get back to work.”

Sally returned her attention to the monitor, and after several minutes of nothing further transpiring, Patricia went back to her reading.

Patricia’s next night shift was on Monday, when her alarm woke her from sleep at three a.m. She rolled out of bed, swapped her nightshirt for some sweatpants and a baggy t-shirt, then padded in her slippers down to the women’s lab. Jessica was at her own door, rubbing her eyes under her glasses. As Patricia walked by, she righted them on her nose, and smiled a greeting. Then the doctor walked down the hall the other direction to the monitor room.

In the women’s lab, Lacy was seated at one of the computers, playing Starcraft. Patricia yawned and looked at Melissa, nude in her cage, idly stroking her pendant. Then she addressed Lacy.

“Sleep time, Lacy.”

“Okay,” came the reply from the back of Lacy’s head. “Let me just... crap. Well, I was getting pounded anyway.”

The brown-skinned woman rose from the chair, and smiled at Patricia. “I see you are dressing formally for these night shifts.”

“They can make me do ‘em, but they can’t make me like ‘em. Now, get to bed.”

“Yes, ma’am! Have a good time.”

“Yeah, thanks. Is solitaire installed on these things?”

“Should be. Good night, Patricia. You know, if you like, I could stay up a bit later... keep you company...”

“Good Night, Lacy.”

Lacy winked at Patricia, and very deliberately flounced from the room.

Patricia sat down at the terminal, and pulled up a solitaire game. She scratched her armpit.

“Excuse me, Patricia?”

Patricia swiveled the chair around to face Melissa. She darted a glance up at the camera in the corner.

“Yes?”

“Would you mind terribly if I were to sing to myself?”

“Well, I don’t think so. If it bugs me, I’ll let you know, or use some headphones.”

“Thanks a lot, Patricia.”

“No problem.”

She swiveled back around, and began playing. Behind her, Patricia began melodically humming. It was not terribly loud, and Patricia enjoyed listening to it for a while before forgetting about it. She played a few games of solitaire, and then began analyzing the results of a Van Veerven Spectrometry she had run a few days earlier.

Somehow, Patricia had gotten sick. Despite the fact that no one had come in or out of the facility for a week since Faludini had been taken away, she had gotten sick. She had realized that it was more than just allergies when, in the lab, she had sneezed hard enough to knock her slide off of the microscope and break it on the floor. Dr. Park attributed it to the weird hours she had been keeping recently, and ordered her out of the lab to bed.

She found Roberta in the gym, along with Sally. The Major was doing flat bench presses on the safety bar, while Sally was on a treadmill. Patricia waited for the dark-haired woman to finish her set. She ruminated that her own lack of interest in Roberta’s breasts, barely constrained in a sports bra, was a sure sign that she was under the weather.

Roberta finished with a grunt, and swung the bar into the locked position with a clang.

“Hi, Patricia. What can I do for you?”

“Hi, Roberta. I’m sick. I’m going to go to bed, if that’s alright.”

“Sure thing. Do you want me to take your monitoring shift for you tonight?”

“I hate to do this to you, but would you, please? I’ll make it up to you.”

Roberta laughed, stood up from the bench, and put her hand on Patricia’s shoulder. “Hell, that’s what friends are for. Go on, get better. If we all get sick, you’ll be in for some sleepless nights. In fact, before you hit the hay, have Jessica take a look at you just to be on the safe side.”

“Body cavity search?” asked Patricia, wryly.

Roberta laughed again. “Only if you ask nicely. Okay, let me get back to the irons.”

Patricia smiled, wanly, and turned to walk out, as Roberta resumed exercising. “Hi, Sally,” she said, as she passed the redhead on the treadmill. Sally appeared not to have noticed.

“Sally?”

“Hm? Oh, Hi, Patricia,” said Sally. Patricia smiled and walked past, but as she left the room, she put her hand on the doorframe and stopped to look back in.

Sally was staring at Roberta. It was a stare that, for a moment, Patricia thought was lust. Then she smiled. It couldn’t be, she thought, my fevered imagination is getting the best of me. Time for some sleep.

Sally was still staring as Patricia let the door close.

Melissa smiled, and stopped singing. She began to speak in a low voice.

“You were so very tired, weren’t you? And now you are asleep. Yes, sleeeeep. Relax, and sleep. Are you very relaxed?”

“Yesss.”

“Good. Now, though you are still asleep, still relaxed, I’d like you to slowly stand up. Can you do that?”

“Yesss.”

“Oh, very good, my love. Of course, that beautiful girl in the monitor room... yes, you... will remain in deep, peaceful sleep. Deep, deep sleep, only awakening when someone enters the room.

“Now, my love, come to me. Slowly, slowly. You are ever so relaxed. My, what a good hypnotic subject you are. Yes, walk over here, slowly. You are warm, and comfortable, and oh so relaxed.

Oh, wonderful, my love. Now, ever so slowly, open your eyes. You are still in a deep, deep sleep. So relaxed. Yes, open then slowly, slowly. Good. Here, my love, what is this, that I have for you?”

“Your... breast...”

“Yes, it is for you. Come, closer. You are so warm, so safe. Here, look at it. Isn’t it beautiful? So much like your mother’s. So safe, so warm. Come, closer. Yes, closer. Touch it. See? So warm.

Look, it is excited by your touch. It needs you. You need it. It appeals to you, to touch it. To kiss it. It will make you feel so good. Come, kiss it. Put your lips around it. Feel it with your tongue.

Good. Wonderful, my love. You are so happy, so relaxed. Isn’t it warm, in your mouth? You love to taste it. Suck on it. It has something wonderful for you. Yes, suck. Drink from it. Drink, my love.

Yes. Keep sucking. You feel so relaxed, so good. So open. Nothing can harm you. You are safe, calm. Warm. Doesn’t it taste good? It is doing wonderful things to you. Making you feel good.

Now, my dear, you are becoming full. It was so delicious, but you are sated now. You can stop, and just enjoy the feel of my nipple in your mouth. Yes. Calm, relaxed. I love you. You are my love. I am going to tell you some things. True things.

You will believe in these things. They are the most true things you will ever hear. Thinking them will make you feel good. Any thoughts that conflict with these things are wrong, and you will cast them out. Are you ready to hear the true things, my love?”

“Mmeeehhhfff.”

“Listen then, my love. The first true thing is: You love me. You will do anything for me. I am your reason for living....”

The rest did Patricia a world of good, and the next day she was fully recovered. She spent the day working with Dr. Yang on the live specimens, then went to bed early enough to be fairly awake for her three a.m. shift in the monitor room.

She and Jessica nodded at each other as they passed in the hallway. The doctor seemed unusually tired, and Patricia hoped that she was not coming down with the cold. Jessica stopped at the restrooms, before she went into the lab to spell Sally.

Patricia opened the monitor room door to find Lacy asleep in the chair. Her head was tilted back, and her mouth was slightly open. It looked remarkably uncomfortable. There was a soft noise coming from the speakers in the women’s lab. It sounded like Melissa was having a rather one-sided conversation with Sally. Patricia supposed that Sally was just being too polite to tell Melissa to shut up. She looked at Lacy’s pretty, sleeping face, and sighed.

“Lacy? Time to wake up.”

“Huh? Wha?” Lacy sat bolt upright, her finger stabbing for a button on the monitor panel in front of her. The conversation in the lab stopped.

“Oh, shit. Was I asleep?”

“Yup. Which is fine, but do it somewhere else. Like your bedroom.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Lacy rose from the chair, and held her hand to her mouth as she yawned. “All yours, ma’am.”

“Why, thank you,” countered Patricia, as she sat down. On the monitor, Jessica entered the lab, greeted Sally, and poured herself a cup of coffee.

“Good night,” said Lacy, flouncing out. Patricia rolled her eyes.

“Good night.”

Patricia turned to the console. The monitors showed the various rooms. Roberta was asleep in her room. Lacy and Sally were talking in the hall. In the women’s lab, Jessica was opening a mystery novel.

Patricia frowned, and looked for the button Lacy had lunged forward to press. It was the intercom button to the women’s lab. Patricia looked around the room, feeling silly, and pressed it.

There was a small click as the intercom connected. Jessica looked up from her book. Patricia realized that she didn’t have anything to say, and released the button, sheepishly. Jessica’s head remained cocked, then with a shrug she returned to her book.

Patricia took out the report she had been working on, and began to annotate it in red pen. The damn network printer was in the men’s building, but she kind of liked the hands-on feel of working in pen anyway. In the lab, Melissa began to sing.

In a perverse sort of way, Patricia had begun to enjoy the days after she had a night shift. Sleeping in until late morning really left her refreshed, and her afternoons seemed significantly more productive.

Today she was back in the main lab. Acting on a hunch, she had requested some flatworm cell analysis papers, and had been gratified to discover some definite similarities between the tiny scavengers and these much larger alien parasites.

Flatworms had long been a particular topic for biological research, for it was a fact that if a flatworm was taught the way through a simple maze, and then turned into soup and fed to a second flatworm, the second flatworm would be able to correctly navigate the maze the first time. Every time. Somehow the knowledge had been transmitted by the consumption of the first flatworm.

Patricia had done some undergraduate research on the creatures, and while analyzing some slides of the parasites, she had been struck by some structural similarities to flatworms. Now that she had the information, she knew she was on to something.

So it took a moment to register that Dr. Park was speaking to her.

“Er, yes, Dr. Park?”

“Please, Patricia, call me Steve. I was saying, we’ve had a serious security problem, and are clearing the lab. Please report back to Roberta.”

“Oh, shit.” Patricia began gathering her notes.

“Leave them, Patricia. Go now. They are going to sterilize this building in fifteen minutes. Your notes should be safe enough, though.”

The women had gathered in the monitor room again. Patricia was last to arrive. Roberta looked worried.

“Girls, we’ve had another problem. This morning, Dr. Yang decided to use several specimens from the rear of the specimen room. He discovered that they were missing.” Sally gasped.

“Yeah. In total, eight worms are unaccounted for. We have people going over the access logs and the security tapes now. The lab will be closed until further notice, though we anticipate that we can go back in tomorrow.” Roberta rubbed her eyes, and continued.

“And, it’s time for your favorite activity and mine. Full body cavity searches. Fuck, I feel like I’m in the Beavis and Butthead movie.”

Jessica spoke up. “Well, let’s take this one at a time. Roberta, you’re first. I’ll send you out after my next victim. Doctor Thomas should be over in half an hour to give me mine.”

The doctor and Roberta walked out, and crossed to the medical office. As she followed Jessica in, Roberta turned to address the women in the monitor room.

“Don’t say you weren’t warned! All part of serving your country!” Roberta winked, and let the door shut behind her.

The ‘cleanup’ of the lab had destroyed a number of Patricia’s best slides, and she spent two days cutting more before finding ones to match them. Nor were the missing worms discovered, though all of the scientists came out with a clean bill of health. Teams of three scientists, all men, were assigned to begin scouring the grounds, methodically searching for the escaped parasites.

When Patricia came back to the women’s building after a late supper (she had taken to making a sandwich in the mess hall earlier in the evening, and taking it to the lab in a zip-lock bag), she wasn’t in the best mood.

After ten minutes in a warm, shower, though, her outlook was beginning to brighten. It brightened a bit further as Lacy came in and began to disrobe.

Naked, Lacy was even more striking. Her sandalwood brown skin contrasted with her glossy dark brown hair, both on her head and crouched under her smooth stomach. Although short, she had a curvaceous body, with full breasts whose upper slopes supported smooth oblong aeraolae, full hips, and a smooth stomach which protruded just a touch, enticingly.

“You know, Patricia, you are free to look all you like, if you don’t mind me staring back.”

Patricia felt her face flush, and dropped her eyes.

Lacy stepped into the shower. “You know, you are usually pretty discreet. I think you must be tired.”

“I, er, yeah.”

“Well, I find it flattering, you scoping me out. Of course, I suspected that you were interested from the first day.”

“You did?”

“Yeah. Remember ‘Anything That Moves’? I was really rather hoping you might be interested. You are very attractive.”

“Uh, thanks.”

“Are you gay, or bi?”

“Gay.”

“Okay. Well, I won’t tell if you don’t want me to. Besides, I think I might be spoken for these days.”

“Spoken for?”

Lacy smiled, and began to soap up her arms. Then she continued: “Yeah. It’s kind of strange, really. Sally propositioned me last night.”

“Sally did? But I thought...”

“Yeah,” said Lacy, turning her front to the water, “So did I. But, well, I’ve been trying to get into her pants for a month, and now she’s holding them open for me herself.”

Patricia stepped out from under the water, and looked into Lacy’s eyes. “Lacy, that’s weird.”

Lacy sighed. “Yeah. I guess she’s really just looking for comfort. Last night, after we made love, she just held me for the longest time. It was sweet, but...”

“Look, Lacy, I know I’ve only been here a few weeks, but Sally is het. She is. It’s not, I don’t know, normal for her to just change and jump into bed with a woman, even one as sexy as you.”

“Yeah, well, what should I have done? Said no?”

“No, I... don’t know. It’s just strange. And anything strange is a bit scary, these days.”

Lacy took Patricia’s hands. “Look, Patricia, it’s okay. It’s me. I’ll take care of her. I don’t think that there’s anything wrong with it.”

They looked at each other without speaking a moment, the water splashing on the tiles suddenly loud. Then Patricia nodded. “Okay, Lacy. Have you told Roberta?”

“No. Why should I?”

“Because she’s in charge here, and it’s the sort of thing she may need to know. Come on, woman, think.” Patricia sighed. “Look, Lacy, I of all people don’t mind if you shack up with Sally. But it’s just a bit odd, and I think Roberta should know. Will you tell her? I won’t say anything, either way.”

The shorter woman looked relieved. “Okay, Patricia, I will. If she asks.”

“Good. Something odd is going on, and we have to keep each other aware of things.”

“Yeah. Still, it’s hard to be terribly upset by a beautiful woman agreeing to sleep with you.”

Patricia smiled, and headed for her towel. “I can understand. But let’s both try and keep our equilibrium.”

“Check.”

Patricia was on first shift, that night. After dressing in her SCU sweats, she stood hesitantly in the doorway to her room. What Lacy had told her was worrisome, but Patricia didn’t know what to make of it. Sally wasn’t harboring the missing parasites, or Jessica would have found them. But what else could explain the sudden change? She decided not to wait for Lacy to consult with Roberta, but to find the major herself.

As she knocked on the major’s door, though, Jessica came in from the courtyard outside. The doctor looked tired, her eyes tinged with red behind her glasses. She noticed Patricia at Roberta’s door.

“Roberta’s not in, Patricia. She’s over in the men’s building, in a videoconference.”

“Oh.” Patricia dropped her hand. “You look tired, Jessica.”

“I am tired. I’ve been assisting Dr. Thomas with the physical exams. Frankly, I’m so sick of intestines that I could live my whole life without examining another.” She chuckled. “I’m going to try to get as much sleep as humanly possible between now and my shift in the lab tonight. Speaking of which...”

“Yeah, it’s my turn, but I wanted to talk to Roberta first.”

“About what?”

Patricia hesitated. “Just some general concerns I’ve been having. I catch myself feeling paranoid.”

Jessica took off her glasses, and held them, looking at Patricia with red eyes. “I understand your concern. But I think that we’re all just running on too little sleep and too much worry. As I understand it, Roberta plans to have our charge in there transferred somewhere else in the next few days, and then we can all get back to sleeping properly.” She replaced her glasses. “Speaking of which, I’ll spell you at three.”

“Right. I guess I can talk to Roberta later.”

The women bid each other good night, and Patricia went into the women’s lab.

The room was quiet save for the hum of the computers. Hesitantly, Patricia looked at Melissa. The brunette was seated in her usual spot, currently looking off into space. For some reason, Melissa was making Patricia increasingly nervous. Maybe it was just resentment. If she had just been sessile like the other captives, none of these late shifts and frayed nerves might have been necessary.

But no, it was more than that, thought Patricia as she fetched some coffee from the coffee maker next to the door. Melissa... was up to something. Patricia could sense it. Despite being naked, and caged, Melissa was somehow playing with them. And Patricia was afraid of Melissa’s goals. She looked up at the glass eye of the camera, behind which sat Sally, keeping watch over her. She took a sip of the coffee as she sat down.

“Patricia?”

Patricia’s blood chilled. She swung around, to find Melissa’s gaze upon her.

“Yes, Melissa?”

“Are you okay? I am getting bad vibes from you. Are you worried about something?”

“Er, no, Melissa, everything is okay. I’m just tired.”

“Ah. Maybe some more coffee would help. I notice you don’t drink as much as the other girls.”

A moment passed, as Patricia sipped her coffee. Melissa looked at her, then spoke up again.

“You know, I don’t know why you are keeping these late nights. If you had asked me not to have sex with anyone, I could have restrained myself.”

“Well, it’s just a precaution.”

“Mmm. After all, you were so kind as to provide me with these toys. Thank you.”

“Er, you’re welcome.”

“Did you bring any toys? It must be hard, being out here without your lover. Do you have a lover, Patricia?”

“That’s not really any of your business.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.” Melissa gave a good impression of contrition. “I didn’t mean to pry.” She was quiet for a moment, eyes downcast, but just as Patricia was about to turn back to the computer, Melissa’s gaze flicked up, catching her.

“But it must be hard, going without. I couldn’t do it. It just feels so good, to come. It’s hard to go for any length of time without using these.” She gestured at her box. Her pendant swung, sparkling. “Did you bring yours? Would you like to use mine?”

Patricia realized, fuzzily, that the last statement had been a question, and still hung in the air. “Er, no thanks. I’m okay.”

“You can if you like. If you’re shy, I’ll go first.” Melissa’s gaze smoldered. “Or, I can help you. I know, Patricia. You don’t like boys. You like girls. You like me.”

Patricia felt like she was caught in a web. Melissa’s dark eyes burrowed into her. Her mouth slipped open, hung open.

“Come to me, Patricia. Kiss me. Make love to me.”

Patricia was lost in her eyes. Yes. She wanted to do what Melissa told her to. To obey. To make love to her. Patricia was suddenly aware of her own intense arousal. She licked her lips. Melissa was so beautiful, with her wonderful skin and her alien-touched breasts. The smooth, hairless mons guiding one to that gorgeous pussy. Patricia had to taste it.

Unthinking, she put down the coffee cup just a bit too hard, and a drop splashed out onto her hand. The hot coffee startled her, and Patricia realized that she had been about to stand up, to walk over to the cage. She took a big swallow of the coffee, to clear her head, and mustered up her will.

“Melissa. Do not speak to me. Do you understand? I don’t like what you are doing, I am NOT attracted to you, and I don’t want you to talk to me for a while.” Patricia felt dizzy with the effort.

Melissa withdrew, penitent once more. “I’m sorry, Patricia. I’m so sorry. I only wanted—”

“NO. Be quiet, please. Just... be quiet.”

Patricia stared at Melissa for a moment. After she was satisfied that the caged woman planned to remain silent, she turned back to the computer, and opened up a solitaire game. She took another swig of her coffee. They must have been making it pretty weak, Patricia thought. It was hardly doing anything to keep her awake at all.

She woke to a hand on her shoulder.

“Patricia? Wake up. It’s my shift.”

Guiltily blinking, Patricia sat up, and turned to look up at Jessica. The dark haired doctor looked much better, and startlingly informal in plaid flannel pajamas, with a coffee cup in her hand. Patricia realized she had never seen the doctor with her hair down before.

“Thanks, Jessica. Sorry I fell asleep.”

“No worries. Anything happen?”

Patricia looked at Melissa, but the former host sat quietly, then looked up at Patricia repentantly.

“No, nothing of note.”

“Well, hit the hay. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

At breakfast the following day, Lacy and Patricia attempted small talk, but began to lapse more and more into uncomfortable silences. Lacy obviously felt guilty for enjoying Sally’s new attentions, but steadfastly refused to bring the subject up. It was a relief when they finished their meals and split up to head to their various laboratories.

Patricia managed to lose herself in her work that day, but in the evening, as she was eating her sandwich in the lab, Roberta came in to see her.

“Patricia, I’d like to talk to you.”

Patricia swallowed her bite of cheese sandwich. “And I, you. Has Lacy talked to you?”

“She was reluctant to, but I saw what was going on and confronted her. Patricia, I don’t like to beat around the bush, so let me get straight to the point. Melissa is an hypnotist. She’s got a doctorate in psychology, and has apparently been monkeying with people’s minds.”

“Oh, shit.”

“Yeah, well. Apparently, only Sally has been really affected. I think, if we keep her away from Melissa, that she’ll revert back to the way she was more or less naturally. Not even the best hypnotist in the world could have much effect on unwilling subjects, in this amount of time. The real issue is, has Melissa managed to get anyone to do something regarding the worms?”

Patricia just looked at Roberta, who then continued:

“Frankly, I doubt it, but it’s not the kind of thing where I am willing to take chances. I have a real, professional hypnotherapist on her way, a Dr. Hart, who will be able to find out exactly what Melissa’s been up to. She should get here at the end of this week.

“Until then, we are going to do several things. Sally is not to be in the room with Melissa. Those of us on night watch will need to be extra careful, and if the person in the monitor room sees the person in the lab sleeping, they will wake them up. The sound feed to the monitor room will be turned off, although it will still be recorded.

“And I want you to help Dr. London and I go over the tapes for the last few weeks. Jessica has already started examining them, since she does not have a job in the main lab, but there are weeks to cover. So, when you are on monitor room duty, you are to be also scanning the tapes for anything unusual.”

Patricia sighed. “Roberta, can we get rid of her? Melissa, I mean. She is causing so much trouble.”

Roberta grinned. “Not only can we, we are going to. I have a solitary confinement cell in a separate building already being prepped. Melissa will be out of our hair this Friday, so once we get clean bills of mental health from Dr. Hart, we won’t have any more worries.”

A wave of relief overcame Patricia. “Oh, thank you. That’s great.”

“Yeah, I think so too. The bitch scares me.”

Tuesday night late shift, Patricia had spelled Sally in the monitor booth, and was going over the tapes. She would occasionally look over at the monitor to where Lacy sat in the lab, playing a solitaire mah jongg game. It had been a while since any of them had used the late shifts to do work.

She was watching Sally from early last week. The redhead had come into the lab for her shift, and apparently fallen asleep almost immediately. Sure enough, the audio was full of suggestions to Sally that she was interested in women, that she loved the look of women, that she wanted to have sex with women. Patricia found herself mildly aroused, and had quickly shut off the sound.

She yawned, and almost missed it. Sally had been drinking from a coffee cup, and there was a sudden burst of motion over the cup. As Patricia watched, Sally’s sleeping hand reached out, and she took a long drink of coffee.

Patricia hit the stop button, and rewound. Then she put the tape into super slow play. Melissa was in her cage, cupping her breasts. That was odd, but as she tended to play with herself at any hour of the day or night, it wasn’t surprising in and of itself.

And then it happened. From Melissa’s right breast, cupped by her hand, something arced through the air, and landed perfectly in the coffee cup. Horrified, Patricia sat through the slow seconds as Sally’s hand reached out, gripped the handle, and brought the cup to her lips.

Patricia rewound again. There it was. It was... milk. Definitely liquid, as it squirted ballistically through the air. Again, Patricia watched as Sally drank it. Over a week ago.

Patricia looked down at her own coffee mug, resting on the console table. Chills ran down her spine. She looked at the rack of monitor tapes, saw the one from last night. The night she had been propositioned, had fallen asleep. Had been drinking coffee.

She almost shrieked when the door opened behind her. It was Jessica, in her plaid pajamas, blinking owlishly behind her glasses. “Patricia? I was just going to the bathroom, and thought I’d see how you were doing.”

“I... Oh, shit, Jessica, look at this.”

She showed Jessica the tape, playing it through slowly.

Jessica was silent for a long moment. Then she said, quietly, “Well, I think it’s safe to say that we have all drunk it. I’ll go get Roberta, and we’ll get Melissa to give us some samples. I should be able to analyze them in a few hours.

“Patricia, I want you to be calm. At worst, it will turn out to be a soporific. We aren’t infected. You know that the worms don’t work that way. They have probably altered Melissa’s body chemistry to produce some sort of mind-enfeebling drug. I want you to calm down, and tell Lacy that Roberta and I will be in in a second. Okay?”

“Okay, Jessica.”

“You are alright? I can go get Roberta?”

Patricia smiled weakly. “I’m alright. Go ahead.”

The nurse swept from the room, and Patricia hit the button to transmit into the room. Lacy was facing away from the camera, at the mah jongg game.

“Lacy?”

On the screen, Lacy turned over another tile.

“Lacy! Hey! It’s Patricia.”

Lacy’s head bobbed down, then back up. Then she turned around to face the camera, her mouth moving. Patricia flipped on the sound. “—at’s up?”

“Roberta and Jessica are coming in to have a chat with Melissa, Lacy. Just wanted to give you a heads up.”

“Why? What’s happened?”

“They’ll tell you in a second.”

“Er, okay. Thanks.”

Patricia let go of the transmit button. She sighed heavily. A tranquilizer, that’s all it was. It had to be.

She was in the lab the following afternoon when the phone rang. Dr. Park answered it, and informed Patricia that it was for her.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Patricia. It’s Jessica. I just wanted to tell you that I’ve run a full battery of tests on, er, Melissa’s milk, and it is exactly what I anticipated. It’s a mild soporific, and probably makes the imbiber more open to suggestion.”

“That’s it?”

“That’s it. Sadly, that’s the good news. The bad news is, more worms have gone missing. I just heard from Roberta. She was livid. They are probably going to shut the lab down again, and I have to,” Jessica sighed dramatically, “search you all again.”

Fuck, thought Patricia. “Okay. Thanks, Jessica. The good news part was particularly good, at least. And thanks for the heads up. I’ll shut things down here.” Patricia hung up the lab phone.

“You will, will you?” asked Dr. Park. “And why is that?”

A soldier walked into the lab. “Dr. Park, Dr. Sorenson? The lab is being cleared. Apparently, more specimens have gone missing.” The shaven headed young man walked out again.

Steve looked at her, with a wry smile. “You’ve got good sources. Well, let’s shut down.”

Sally, and Patricia stood around in the corridor outside of Dr. London’s office. Lacy was inside, getting her search done.

“Patricia,” Sally said bashfully, “they told me about what Melissa had done to me. That she hypnotized me.”

“Oh,” replied Patricia. She didn’t really know how to respond to that.

“I, er, just wanted you to know. That I knew, that is.” Sally looked pained. “I didn’t want you to be afraid of me.”

Patricia smiled. “It’s okay, Sally. She did it to all of us. I still trust you.”

Sally smiled back. “Thanks, Patricia. That means a lot. To know that you can be, changed, without knowing. It’s pretty scary.”

“Yeah. Well, Melissa will be leaving soon, and Dr. Hart is coming to sort us out.”

“That’s good. Though, you know, I want to be sure that none of us do anything for the worms, of course, but... I kind of like liking girls. I don’t know how I’ll feel, once that’s gone.”

“Well, I don’t know if that’s how it works. What Melissa probably did was to make you open to finding out if you like girls, and to suppress your liking for boys. I don’t think you will ever regret, er, doing what you’ve done. With Lacy.” Patricia blushed.

“That’s good. I wouldn’t want to regret that, even if I do... go back to normal.”

“Well—”

Lacy stepped out of the exam room, with an exaggerated bowlegged gait. “Well,” she announced, “that was fun! Thanks, doc!”

Jessica appeared behind her. “Okay, that’s all of you. Would someone please fetch Roberta from her room?”

“I’m here,” Roberta announced, striding down the hall. “I’d just like to tell you all that this may be our last cavity search together. Due to the security problems with the worms, the brass is considering completely removing access to live specimens, until we can get the situation under control. They will almost certainly base their decision on my recommendation, and I am damn well going to recommend that they do.”

“But,” interjected Lacy, “can we still get cavity searches if we want to?”

Patricia snorted, and soon all the women in the corridor, even Roberta, were laughing.

Jessica spoke up from inside the office. “If you are all finished, ladies, I’d like to get this over with. Roberta?”

“Coming, doctor. Don’t you lot have something else to do?” The three women, still giggling, left down the hallway.

Roberta lay back on the table. “Okay, doc, let’s get this over with.”

Jessica pulled on a pair of rubber gloves, and began filling a syringe.

“Er, what’s that for?”

“It’s a solution that will highlight your tissues under a MACT scan. This way, I won’t have to spend as long prying around inside, looking for worms. Not that you are getting out of the exam, but this should make it shorter. The girls didn’t mind.”

“Ah...”

“Come on, Roberta, afraid of a little needle?”

Roberta sighed, and stuck out her arm. “Whatever.”

The needle stung, and Roberta rubbed the little puncture after Jessica had daubed it with alcohol. Then she lay back on the table, as Jessica rummaged in drawers. The doctor’s hair was pulled up in its customary tight but artistic style, and her glasses flashed in the light as she handled various instruments. She began speaking.

“You know, it’s a good thing we are getting rid of Melissa. Do you know the kind of damage a good hypnotist could do, if she managed to plant suggestions into people’s minds? It’s lucky for us that she wasted her time trying to turn Sally into a lesbian. I mean, imagine if she had gotten to you, instead? This building, and to a large extent this whole facility, runs because of you. If she had somehow managed to turn you, well, we’d all be in trouble.” Jessica had stopped rummaging, and withdrawn a black leather doctor’s bag, which she set on the metal instrument table next to Roberta.

“Of course, there’s no way that she could do that without me finding out. I mean, she might be able to mess with your head, but none of us could get infected without me finding out right quick. Hell, not even me—Dr. Thomas and I check each other every time. On the other hand, I wouldn’t have to be infected to do Melissa’s bidding. And I could easily vouch for you.”

Roberta’s eyes widened as Jessica reached into her bag, and pulled out a large worm. It slowly twisted in her grip.

“Don’t bother trying, Roberta. You can’t even squeak. That business about the tissue highlighting was malarky. There is no such thing as a MACT scan—I just gave you a nice large helping of large animal tranquilizer.”

Jessica lifted the worm, and considered it. “Do you know, it’s actually difficult to resist opening my mouth and allowing this master into my body right now? But Mistress Melissa would not like that. And I live to do as she instructs me to.”

Jessica lowered the worm to place it on Roberta’s legs, which lay on the table, closed. It immediately began stretching towards her crotch. A shiver ran down Roberta’s prone form.

“Of course, it should only be a little while before I can get my wish, and become hostform. Just like you. Melissa was crafty, you see. She knew that she had to get me on her side. And she did. Oh, did she. I can still taste her. I exist to obey her.”

Jessica unbuckled her pants, let them drop to the floor, and stepped out of them. Her hand found its way quickly into her panties.

The worm had followed the crevasse of Roberta’s legs upward, and reached what it had been seeking. The tiniest whine escaped Roberta’s lips as it pushed its way into her vagina. Jessica’s glasses flashed.

“Oh, Roberta, I am so horny. It is so fucking hot to watch the masters take you. Mmmm,” moaned Jessica, but softly, as she stroked herself. “Ohhhh. Yes, Melissa, Mistress, they are fucking her. I obey. Ohhh.”

The worms tail end flicked as it passed between Roberta’s lower lips.

Jessica smiled. “Did you enjoy that, Roberta? I did. I will. But, such a strong-willed fleshiform as yourself would not submit to just one master. Happily, I have stolen enough.”

Jessica pushed Roberta’s legs apart, revealing her pussy under its glossy black hair. Then, taking the bag, she upended it over the table between Roberta’s legs.

A dozen worms fell out. Immediately, they began heading towards Roberta’s inviting openings. Roberta whimpered again, and another shiver ran across her limp flesh.

“Oh, Roberta. Don’t worry. You’re going to love all this in just a few hours. Just love it.”

The worms pushed their way in.

The main lab was open the following day, and Patricia spent all day working with Steve on a joint report. They had come to some interesting conclusions regarding the worms’ biology from Patricia’s flatworm hunch, and felt that, given a few more weeks, they might be able to unlock the secret of the worms’ bonding with host bodies’ nervous systems.

Patricia felt better than she had in weeks. Tonight she was off-shift, and she just had to deal with tomorrow night before Melissa was safely taken away to the new holding facility. She glided through dinner, opting to eat with her colleagues in the mess hall, and then had a great workout.

She read through the report in bed once more, and then turned off the lights. Sleep came easily.

And fled as easily. Suddenly, she found herself awake. Her room was dark, and still, but something was out of place. Slowly, as she lifted her head from the pillow, she became aware of a dark shape. Someone was in the room with her.

“Patricia?”

It was Lacy.

“Lacy? What are you doing? Turn on the lights.”

Patricia winced as Lacy did so, and lay in her bed, blinking as her vision cleared.

Lacy was in a nightgown of thin silk. It draped from her curves in a terribly appealing way, and her dark skin was quite visible beneath it. Patricia thought momentarily that she had come to seduce her, but then realized that Lacy was crying.

“Lacy? What’s the matter?”

“Oh, Patricia. I’m scared. I needed to talk to someone, but I’m ashamed of being scared.”

Patricia slid around, and placed her feet on the floor. “It’s okay, Lacy. Come sit here. It’s okay. There’s nothing to be ashamed about. What is it?”

Lacy sat on the bed next to her. Despite herself, Patricia felt a thrill of arousal.

“Sally. She came to me tonight, and was more into it than ever. She started licking me, and... and after she had been so worried about what Melissa had done to her. And I, I’m just so scared about what Melissa has done to me. I mean, I was in that room with her for weeks. I fell asleep in there. I... drank her milk. Sure, I feel fine, but what has she done to me? What if I’m the one who broke in and stole those worms?”

Patricia slid her arm around Lacy’s shoulder. “Lacy, you can’t worry about it. Jessica said that we are all fine, that Sally was just particularly susceptible to hypnosis. It doesn’t work like that. Do you feel like stealing some worms? Taking them home?”

“No...”

“Then you shouldn’t be worried. Besides, Melissa is gone, day after tomorrow. And then Dr. Hart will be here, to check us all out. Besides, the worms are all under lockdown, now. No one can get to them. It’s okay, Lacy, really. You have a right to be scared, but everything will be all right.”

Lacy sniffled, and leaned against Patricia. “I... okay. Thanks, Patricia. I sent Sally back to her room. We were both on first watch, tonight. I made sure that I didn’t fall asleep.”

“What time is it?”

“It’s almost four. Jessica and Roberta are on watch.”

“Ah. Well, you can stay here, if you like. If you still are worried.”

Lacy smiled thinly, and sat up. “No, that’s okay. Thanks, Patricia. You’re a real nice girl.” She wiped her nose with a forearm. “I’ll be okay.”

Patricia watched as Lacy rose, and left her bedroom. Maybe, if things settled down... Nah. Well, maybe.

In the morning, Patricia arrived in the lab to a note saying that Steve was sick, and that she should go ahead and work without him. So she ran some more modeling that morning, and began some sequence mapping. At about eleven, she realized that she had left the report in her room, and rather than print out another copy, she decided to head back to the women’s building to fetch it.

Roberta was in the gym, working out, the door open. Patricia smiled and waved, and Roberta made eye contact, but did not smile back. Disturbed, Patricia fetched the report, and stopped at the gym door on her way back out. Roberta was doing squats, thrusting out her ass and crouching, then rising to a standing position. Her olive skin shone with sweat.

“Hey, Roberta, how’s it going?”

Roberta stood with a grunt, racked the weight, and looked at Patricia. Her brow wrinkled, and she paused before replying:

“Hi, Patricia. Everything is fine.”

“Er, good. Getting a good workout?”

“Sure am.”

“Say, I told Lacy that Melissa would be leaving tomorrow. Is that still true?”

“Oh, uh, yeah. Yup, she’s out of the lab tomorrow.”

“Great. Well, I, uh, guess I’ll let you get back to it.” Roberta watched her as she turned from the door.

As she stepped back into the hall, Patricia thought she heard a sound, coming from the women’s lab. She listened, and again heard what sounded like a soft cry. Opening her mouth to ask Roberta to accompany her, Patricia shot a look back into the gym. Roberta was fiddling with the weight stack again.

She thought better of disturbing Roberta, and walked down to the women’s lab, worrying. That train of thought was quickly lost, however, when she opened the door, and was confronted by the smell of... sex!

A glance told her all she needed to know. The hatch on top of Melissa’s cage was open, and inside, Sally and the brunette host were engaged in a passionate sixty-nine. As Patricia watched, Sally, on top, lifted her head from Melissa’s cunt to mewl in soft pleasure. Her mouth and chin glistened with wetness.

Patricia raced back down the hall. “Roberta! Roberta!” She skidded into the gym, where Roberta was again in the midst of a deep squat.

“Roberta! Sally’s in the cage, with Melissa. They’re having sex.”

Roberta stood, tossed the weight bar into the rack with a clang, and strode to Patricia.

“They are? Shit. Okay, I’ll call security. Let’s go break it up.”

Roberta punched a few keys on the pad adorning the wall next to the door, and led the way back to the women’s lab. Inside, the redhead and the brunette were still at it. Patricia watched from just inside the door as Roberta stormed over to the cage.

“Sally!” yelled Roberta. “Get the fuck out of there!”

The redhead looked up at Roberta. “But...”

“Get. The Fuck. Out.”

Sally shuddered as Melissa, on her back and gripping Sally’s thighs, continued her ministrations. Roberta shifted her attention.

“Melissa. Knock it off. Right now.”

Patricia couldn’t see Melissa’s face, but she could tell from Sally’s reaction that she had stopped.

“Sally, stand up, and get out of the cage.”

Trembling, Sally gripped a bar, and pulled herself to a standing position. She looked at the major pleadingly.

“Roberta. It’s so good.”

“I don’t give a fuck, sweetheart. Get out of there.”

As Sally began to clamber out, Roberta turned to Patricia. “Patricia, get a cell in the holding hangar ready for lovergirl, here. Come on, Sally. You really fucked up now.”

The guards came barreling in, as Patricia left down the hall to prep a cell.

In contrast to the previous night, Patricia found it almost impossible to sleep on Thursday. Sally had begged not to be put into the cell, but Roberta had been adamant. “And as for you,” she had said to Melissa, “tomorrow this is all over.”

Lacy’s visit came back to Patricia, now, and she lay awake, worrying. Had she been too quick with her reassurances? The morning, and Dr. Hart, could not come quickly enough.

She had somehow just slipped into unconsciousness, when her alarm clock went off. She slid her feet into her slippers, and padded out into the hallway.

At the far end, Jessica had come out of her room, and was talking to Lacy, who was leaving the women’s lab. Patricia opened the monitor room door to find Roberta already standing on the other side.

“Hi, Patricia. I’m off to bed.”

“Hi, Roberta,” Patricia said, yawning. “See you in the morning.”

The major passed by into the hallway, and Patricia sat at the monitor room desk. She checked all the monitors, watched Jessica fire up a game of Solitaire, and leaned back and stretched.

She flipped the monitor to Sally’s little cell in the hangar. The poor girl had been provided with bedding, and seemed comfortably asleep. Patricia chuckled. She envied Sally that, at least.

It was just after three. Patricia considered a game, then brought up the report. Maybe she could get some indexing done.

She woke up again suddenly, sweating. A quick glance at the clock told her that she had slept for an hour, but it was still some time until daybreak. Her mouth was dry.

She checked the monitors. Jessica was still in the lab, apparently reading a book. Sally was still asleep in her cage. Lacy’s room was dark, but the sound of regular breathing emanated from it. And Roberta...

Was walking down the hallway. Patricia frowned. Roberta was dressed in only a night-shirt, which her breasts caused to drape out in front of her. She was barefoot.

At first, Patricia thought she was going to the bathroom, but Roberta had already passed the bathroom. It quickly became clear that she was heading to the hangar.

Patricia flipped on the audio feed from the hangar. Roberta’s bare feet clapped softly on the cement floor. She walked through the room, passing the cells of the docile hosts, and stopped in front of Sally’s cell. There she began to open the door.

This awakened Sally. “Ro- Roberta? What’s going on? What time is it?”

The dark-haired major pulled the cage door open, and stepped inside.

“Roberta? Am I being released?”

Roberta pulled the cage door closed behind her. “No, Sally. Not exactly.”

“But... what?” The redhead did a double take. “Roberta, you’re not wearing any underwear.”

“Sally, why did you do it? Why did you go into that cell and fuck Melissa? You knew what would happen.”

“I... I just couldn’t resist. I needed to. I had to. She was so, so sexy, so hot. And I needed to fuck her.”

“Was it worth it?”

Sally had started to breathe faster. “It was. I’d do it again. She tasted so good. And the things she did to me, with her tongue, they... mmmm. So good.”

“You know that you didn’t used to like to fuck girls.”

“I don’t care. I love them, now. They are so beautiful. Their eyes, their skin. Their breasts.”

“Like these?”

Patricia goggled as Roberta reached under her arms, and pulled off her nightshirt. The woman’s endowment was, if anything, highlighted by her nudity. She dropped the shirt to the side, and stood, muscular, smooth, naked.

“Roberta?”

“Don’t you like them, Sally? They are bigger than Melissa’s, you know. And Melissa’s have been augmented by the worms.”

“Roberta, I don’t know if this is okay.”

“Don’t you want to touch them?” Roberta stepped closer to Sally. “To... kiss them? Suck on them? I want you to.”

Sally was obviously conflicted, torn between her lust and her unease. Roberta stepped closer still, until only an inch separated them.

“Make love to me,” hissed Roberta. “Fuck me. I’m yours.”

Sally still hesitated, but Roberta now dove in, pressing her lips to Sally’s, pushing her body up against the younger girl’s. That was all it took, and Sally started to reciprocate, eagerly.

Roberta reached down to Sally’s pajama bottoms, gripping them at the crotch, and pulled down. They broke their lip-lock, and smiled at each other lasciviously as Roberta yanked off the pajama bottoms.

Then Roberta darted her face down between Sally’s legs. Sally gasped, her mouth drawing back in an O, as Roberta began to lick her.

“Oh, Roberta, I, I, Oh!”

Patricia watched, transfixed, as Roberta sucked on Sally’s pussy. She knew she should do something, do anything, but she couldn’t bear to take her eyes away.

After several minutes, Roberta pulled her head up. “You are nice and wet now, Sally.”

“Ohhh, Roberta.”

Roberta slithered up Sally’s body, placing her legs inside Sally’s own. She licked up Sally’s neck, over her chin, and inserted her tongue into Sally’s mouth. Her hands drew up Sally’s sides, to take her wrists, and raise them above her head, pinning her. Roberta broke the kiss.

“Are you ready, Sally?”

“Ready?”

Patricia was as confused as Sally. Then she saw the movement at Roberta’s crotch. Roberta’s labia were distending, pushing open. And from within her....

A worm. The creature was pushing its head out of Roberta’s pussy, an inch, then another. It was as thick as all of Patricia’s fingers put together.

“Roberta, what’s going on? OH!”

The worm had hooked its head around, and found Sally’s soaking opening. It pushed in its head, hooking the two women together at the crotch.

“Sally, it’s time for you to become one of us. Make love to me, Sally. Fuck me. You will love being hostform. Just relax, and enjoy this.”

Patricia was paralyzed. This was terribly, desperately wrong. She had to find an alarm, to rouse the others, but she was unable to bring herself out of her petrified inaction.

“Oh, God,” said Sally, as the worm muscled its way into her. She could not fight against Roberta, even if she tried. Her arms were pinned above her, and Roberta lay heavily on top of her.

“Oh...” Besides, it felt so good. She was being fucked by Roberta. Beautiful Roberta. And the worm felt so good, entering her...

“Oh... Yessss....” Sally gave in. This was her destiny. Roberta would fuck her, and then she would become like Roberta. She craned her neck forward, and was rewarded by a deep kiss, as the first worm’s tail fell out of Roberta’s cunt, onto her thigh. It contracted, then pushed another several inches forward into Sally. The second was already worming its head out, dilating Roberta once again.

Patricia wrenched her head away, and found herself looking at the monitor to the women’s lab. Jessica was still there, but she had stood up, and was disrobing. The plaid flannel pajamas dropped to the ground. Patricia, struggling for understanding, received another shock as she looked around the room.

The cage was open, and Melissa had gotten out of it. She was walking, now, slowly towards Jessica.

As Melissa reached Jessica, Jessica dropped to her knees. Melissa stopped in front of her, and began to run her left hand through Jessica’s hair. Petting her.

Then, Melissa’s fingers curled, and she gripped the top of Jessica’s head. Stepping forward a half pace, she guided Jessica’s face to her crotch. Jessica obediently allowed herself to be pulled in, extending her tongue. Melissa let her head drift back, and smiled.

Melissa’s gaze slowly drifted towards the camera, and Patricia. Patricia felt pinned, like a butterfly, as Melissa’s eyes found hers. Melissa’s placid smile widened, slightly, as she stared into the camera, directly at Patricia. She said something.

“—eady for this, are you?”

Patricia looked at her hand. It had flipped on the sound.

Then Melissa’s voice came through again.

“Oh, Patricia, you worry too much. I promise that, once you accept my gift, you’ll be a lot happier. Won’t she, Jessica?”

Melissa looked down, used her guiding hand to pull Jessica’s face back out from between her legs. The doctor’s glasses were smeared with sweat, and other fluids. After a moment, her tongue ceased its questing.

“Jessica, tell Patricia how happy she’s going to be.”

“Oh, Patricia, don’t fight it. Don’t fight us. Your new life will be so much better,” intoned Jessica, her eyes never lifting from Melissa’s navel.

“Good girl.” Melissa guided Jessica’s face back down under her belly, and Jessica eagerly began to work on Melissa’s slit once more.

“In case you are wondering, Patricia, I never really got you. It’s kind of ironic. You, the only real lesbian of the bunch. I suppose that those years in the closet strengthened your resolve.”

Melissa sighed happily, and ground her crotch into Jessica’s face. “That’s good, Jessica. Patricia, you can turn off the sound, now. I believe you have a visitor.”

There was a soft rapping at the monitor room door. Patricia looked at the monitors. Melissa had sat down, and Jessica was now crouched on all fours, servicing her. Roberta and Sally were still in Sally’s cell, Sally now sucking on Roberta’s pussy. The redhead’s formerly thin stomach was visibly distended.

That left only...

The door opened, admitting Lacy. She was nude, silhouetted in the light from the corridor. Even now, some part of Patricia’s brain that was not petrified in fear warmed in lust at the curvy shadow.

“Lacy....”

“Shhhh.” Lacy stepped into the room, letting the door swing closed behind her. In the light, she was more beautiful than Patricia remembered. Her skin was a smooth, warm brown. Her wavy hair was in its usual ponytail, cast now over one shoulder. Her full, ripe lips reflected the light. Her eyes were wide open, chocolate brown; filled with concern, and tenderness, and purpose.

Lacy stepped forward to stand in front of Patricia. Slowly, gingerly, she reached down her arms to take Patricia’s. A violent shiver shook her as Lacy’s warm hands encircled her wrists.

Lacy ran her hands up Patricia’s arms, to her shoulders. She gently brushed one hand over Patricia’s forehead, back along her hair. Then, leaning on Patricia’s shoulders, she slowly swung one leg up, over Patricia’s leg. Then the other, leaving her sitting in Patricia’s lap, facing her.

Patricia stared into Lacy’s eyes. There was nothing to say. Lacy leaned forward, gently, and Patricia shut her eyes. She felt the full press of Lacy’s mouth on hers.

Then she felt Lacy’s hands, sliding down her front, lingering on her breasts, and moving down, down. She shivered again, still held by Lacy’s kiss, as Lacy pulled open the front of her sweatpants.

She felt the air move around her exposed pussy. Lacy used one hand to hold open the sweatpants, and slid forward until she was pressed against Patricia. Her tongue darted over Patricia’s lips, slid in to dance with Patricia’s tongue. Behind her back, she swapped the hands holding open the sweatpants, her own pussy inches above Patricia’s, now inside the pulled-open fabric.

Patricia felt movement in Lacy’s stomach. She could feel the push of the first parasite, sliding out of Lacy. Patricia’s own pubic hair crinkled back, as the worm dangled slowly lower along it. She shuddered, for the last time, as Lacy coaxed her tongue into her own mouth, to suck on.

Patricia didn’t open her eyes as it entered her, concentrating instead on Lacy’s warm mouth. She didn’t picture Lacy’s pussy lips, bulging wetly as they disgorged the heavy pink worm. She didn’t shiver, running her tongue around the Lacy’s, as the worm stuffed its head into her slit, began to push inside. She didn’t think of Lacy’s fears, the night before, that she had soothed away, as the master slithered into place in its warm new home, and the second one began its entry.

Lacy broke their kiss, and licked the salty tears from her cheeks.

The red Nissan rumbled to a halt in the parking slot marked ‘visitor’. The woman who stepped out into the hot Nevada air of the garage cursed, suddenly, as several papers slipped from a file she had pulled from the passenger seat.

Patricia knelt to pick them from the garage floor.

“Here, I’ve got them.”

“Thanks. So, this is the facility, eh?”

“It sure is. Welcome to our humble abode, Dr. Hart. We’re all really glad you are here. Really glad. It’s been a hectic couple of weeks, but hopefully that will all be resolved, now.”

“Well, I’ll do what I can to help.”

Patricia smiled. “Oh, I’ve no doubt you’ll be incredibly useful. Incredibly useful, indeed.”