Masked Effect

1.) Some Assembly Required

It looked like a normal summer day in the upscale neighborhood, at least as normal as could be these days. Gone were the lemonade stands and sounds of approaching ice cream trucks, but there were still the sounds of kids playing in the pool, parents struggling to light a grill, the occasional sound of a child being scolded. Only now instead of "Timmy, I told you to share!", the shouts were replaced with things like "Helen! If you take that mask off one more time, I swear—".

At the corner of this neighborhood was a very large house, complete with below ground swimming pool, spacious back yard protected by a large white fence, and an over sized garage that oddly had all the front facing windows tinted. Despite its normal surroundings, the going on inside the garage were about as far out there as they could be.

Nine people were inside, though only two of them seemed to be acting remotely normal. Sam was a tall blonde young man, a year away from graduating college. He stood over four people laying back in some lawn chairs, watching them and occasionally consulting a clipboard. His best friend Ben, shorter, more muscular from months of training for the wrestling team, (like that was gonna happen now), was looking over boxes on a table while a tall man with brown hair and a short redhead with a large bust and no top on stood behind him perfectly still.

"James, Pam, begin threading the wiring into the elastic bands of the blue masks."

"Yes, master," they said through their matching green masks as they swiftly got to work.

Ben had picked them up about a week prior while jogging and "convinced" them to alter their route. A few questions about their personal lives revealed they both worked from home and wouldn't be missed in the middle of the day, a perfect combination as Ben and Sam approached the mass production stage of their project and needed more hands. Now every day at exactly 3pm they would run by Sam's house, (with their new favorite masks on), and as soon as they got in range their brisk run abruptly turned into a steady, mechanical walk into the open garage where they would close the door behind them and wait for orders. Ben turned to his and Sam's bikini-clad assistant.

"Carly, have the pink masks been distributed?"

"You got it, Ben." Replied the beautiful blonde co-ed as she stood by and observed the four people laying in various states of undress on the chairs. After a few minutes all four faces were growing flush and warm as dazed smiles grew beneath their masks. A particularly busty woman at the end of the row began tracing her nails against her exposed thighs below the hem of her dress.

"Looks like it's starting to hit them now," Carly said excitedly. She bit her lip, knowing what was coming next, having experienced it herself on more than a dozen occasions. Sam walked up next to her and slid an arm around his girlfriends exposed midriff and absentmindedly stroked her. She purred into his ear and gave him a kiss.

Carly was a very pretty blonde, tall and athletic, a mainstay of their universities' soccer team since her freshman year. She and Sam had been dating for well over a year now, and she was very loving and supportive of Sam. So supportive that she technically was an equal partner in their mask venture, having paid a third of the startup funds herself.

Sam and Ben neglected to mention the true function of the masks to her at first, though, and she wasn't the only one...

* * *

Sam was a dual biology-tech major and Ben was a computer tech major with a minor in Psychology. Friends since elementary school, they had been through everything together; bullies, girls, classes, and now a global pandemic. When the virus broke out they had finished the spring semester from home, which presented more opportunities for casual fun, though with no parties to go to or sports to watch they quickly grew bored.

One drunken night over what was supposed to be spring break, Sam and Ben came up with an idea so ridiculous it would make a mad scientist laugh. After sobering up they looked at their drunken mock-ups and to their shock realized the plan wasn't actually impossible. They got to work, combining their free time with their talents and knowledge from their education, along with a few thousand dollars sunk into materials purchased online, they had somehow succeeded in making...

"Masks?" Sam's mom asked, stifling a laugh. "That's what you've spent the last two months locked in the garage over?"

"Technically we did it in just six weeks..." Ben mumbled under his breath, pouring himself a drink.

"Of course mom, it's a cash cow! What's the number one thing that's easy to make right now, in crazy high demand, and people go through quickly and will always need more of?" Sam asked, continuing his pitch.

"Well according to Courtney I hear it's called an "Onlyfans" account."

Ben spat out the water he'd been drinking from the table and began choking on his laughter. Debra, (Sam's mom), handed him a roll of paper towels as Ben coughed through an apology.

"Not a problem, Benji, we all make little messes from time to time," she said, winking at him. Ben grinned, blushing slightly.

Sam's mom Debra was an absolute knockout. Wavy blonde hair that just brushed her shoulders, a warm smile that always reached her bright green eyes, and a trim body adorned with a wonderfully full ass built by years of yoga and tennis, and a wonderfully full bust built by her plastic surgeon ex-husband.

Debra was a walking wet dream, and the cause of a lot of grief for Sam in school. Sam still had a scar behind his ear from the fight he got into with a couple guys he caught taking pictures of her his freshman year of high school when she picked him up early for an appointment one day, still wearing her yoga pants from her mid-morning session.

Ben's coughing fit over, Sam continued his pitch.

"Come on, mom, you know what I meant; masks! It's perfect! People are going to be stuck in these things for months, if not the next year. Ours are stylishly designed, they have solid filers on the front, and we even found a way to put in scents! We're gonna be rich, we just need more seed money to produce more of the prototype."

Debra looked at the box of masks in front of her thoughtful for a moment, then relented slightly.

"Alright, at least let me try it on first," she said, reaching for a blue one.

"No!" shouted Ben and Sam at the same time. Debra stared at them.

"Try the green one, the blue one's..." Sam began

"—We already wore today when we went for a morning run! I coughed a few times in mine, and no offense to your son, but I'm pretty sure he didn't brush his teeth before we left," Ben finished quickly. Debra laughed as Sam gave him a look and Ben shrugged as though to say "Shit, man, I don't know," to which Sam shook his head and gave him a small thumbs up.

"Alright, alright, fair enough boys, hand it over." Sam eagerly pulled a green mask out for her and she slipped it on.

"Alright, it is comfortable, and it does smell...hmm, is that bubblegum?"

"Yeah, it is, pretty great, right?" Sam said, slipping the blue mask on. Debra's brow furrowed.

"Sam, why are you putting yours back on?"

"I just wanted to show you the full effects, mom," and with that Sam turned a switch on the air filter of his mask. The effect was instant. Debra's eyes rapidly unfocused, her facial features relaxing. Her shoulders slumped slightly and her arms fell to her side as she stopped speaking and stared into nothingness.

"Holy hell, dude, it works!" Sam shouted, punching his fist through the air in victory. Ben gleefully reached into his pocket and pulled out a paper and a pencil.

"How do you feel, mom?"

"Like I'm...not really here..." Ben began writing notes.

"What are you thinking right now?"

"I'm...not," she responded, completely indifferent to her lack of independent thought.

"Sick..." Ben mumbled as he wrote more notes, "Ask her to do or say something she'd never do."

"Mom, why did you really leave dad?" It was a sore subject neither parent would give more than a vague answer about.

"After he and I had a threesome with one of his nurses he continued seeing her behind my back," Debra stated without emotion. Sam was stunned into silence, Ben pressed on.

"You're into women, Debra?"

"I'm not opposed, I'll bed anyone with a great tongue, and Nurse Fields could tie a sailor's knot with hers." This was met with another moment of silence.

"Your mom is awesome..." Ben said as he went back to scribbling.

"Shut up, Ben. That's enough, mom. You will give us all the seed money we need."

Debra nodded blankly.

"Hang on," Ben interjected, "I told you, man, these won't last when it's not on, we have to condition her overtime, at least until the god masks are working."

"Damn, I forgot. Alright, mom—You're happy we are so smart and inventive, aren't you?" She nodded.

"Good, you know it makes you feel good to watch us grow and thrive, it makes you feel good to trust us and believe in us. The mask project helps us do that. If that helps us grow and thrive, then what do you want to do to help us?"

"I want to give you all the money you need for the masks," she stated. Sam turned to Ben.

"Yeah, that should be good for now man. She'll do whatever we want while the mask is on and forget it all after, but we have to warp her actual feelings and thoughts over time with sessions like this. Getting her to commit to the money? I say three more days."

Sam nodded. Ben put his notes away as Sam flipped the switch again. Debra blink a few times and took a deep breath.

"So what are the full effects?"

Internally doing celebratory back flips, Ben answered, "Eventually we want to put Bluetooth in them, so when you wear a mask of our brand you can speak to someone else with it's partner." Taking off the mask, Debra smiled.

"Sounds wonderful, I love how inventive you boys are. Let me think about it, ok? You guys can't be the only people with an idea to cash in on masks, but I'll hear you out more tomorrow, sound good?"

The boys smiled.

"Sounds good!"

* * *

They'd spent the next three days getting Debra firmly onboard with the idea and she committed to the project happily. Once online classes ended in Mid-May Sam's girlfriend began joining them regularly in the home and they told her the same thing they told Debra. Always one to be supportive, Carly offered to help put in money for funds herself and was eager to get her own mask. Sam obliged, then spent the next 14 hours barely leaving his bedroom with a totally docile and pliant Carly.

Months of work had led them to have perfected two of the masks, (green and blue), with the black and pink ones undergoing their final trials today.

There was a knock on the door that connected the garage to the house and Debra walked through the door, beaming at the scene before her. Any other mother would be horrified to walk in on what was essentially a brainwashing lab and seeing her son exposed to people in various states or mindlessness and undress, but Debra had been condition nearly every day for months and now accepted anything that happened in the garage as perfectly normal.

"Hey, guys, looks like it's go well in here!" Debra exclaimed proudly, eyes going from the mindless joggers working away to the people in their chairs dreamily shifting and squirming in their seats. She addressed a young woman in the fist chair.

"Courtney, dear, will you be joining Luisa and I for a yoga session later?"

"Sorry, Ms. King...I'm gonna be a little...busy later," the lovely Asian girl softly responded. Debra nodded.

"Of course, dear, thanks again so much for helping the boys out so much this summer!" Courtney smiled and gave a weak thumbs up.

"Well, if that's all, I'm going to go get some sun before my class today, return Luisa in one piece, ok?" Debra said, pointing to the dark, busty woman on the end of the row who had now pulled her dress down so she could start playing with her nipples. She turned to leave.

"Actually, Debra, Sam had a question to ask," Ben interrupted. Sam gave no indication of, then Carly kicked him.

"Oh, right! Hey mom, I was thinking, what better way to give off the sense that we're killing it in the market than to be seen driving around campus in the Jag?"

Somehow, as Debra stood in a room with multiple people dazedly rubbing themselves, two people people working like mindless drone, and her son's girlfriend parading around in the smallest bikini imaginable, this request was what struck her as ridiculous. She over-dramatically threw her head back in laughter.

"Oh, Sam, there is NO WAY in hell I'm letting you putter around campus with my baby 100 miles away. Boy, I hope you were joking or I might have to check you for a fever!" She even slapped her knee.

Ben and Sam shared a look.

"Do it."

"Do what?" Debra asked, smile still plastered to her face.

Sam picked up one of two black masks in the room, put it on and flipped the switch twice, staring at his mother. The effect was instant as he spoke.

"You will give me the Jag."

Debra's face went from gleeful mirth to devoid of all emotion in the blink of an eye. She stood to perfect attention, arms lifeless at her side, eyes fixed with a thousand yard stare.

"I will give you the Jag."

"You will trade cars with me for the school year."

"I will trade cars with you for the school year."

Sam turned his knob one more time and Debra blinked a few times.

"What were you saying mom? Are you sure I can't use the car?"

"What? Of course you can! Just trade with me so I still have something when you're gone," and with that she walked past the small group of moaning people too horny to pay attention to the scene before them and handed Sam the keys.

"Thanks mom," said Sam. Debra smiled and patted his head.

"No problem, dear," She said casually, as though he had asked for something as simple as an extra $20 for gas. She closed the door behind her as she left.

Ben and Sam air high-fived as Carly fist pumped.

"We are going to look so fucking good driving that around campus, baby," Carly said.

"Man, it was so worth the wait using her as the control subject for the black masks; approved?" Sam said.

"Approved!" responded Ben, as he made a big check mark on his clipboard, happily looking down on the results of their months of work.

They found that the masks had their own advantages and downfalls. The green masks allowed someone wearing a blue mask control via a chip hidden in the filter that turned anyone wearing it into an obedient drone via a skin connection with a wire in the masks elastic bands. The commands only worked while someone was actually wearing the mask and the commands would be forgotten and ignored as soon as the active control was relinquished, but they had found that repeated conditioning while wearing the mask led to more permanent changes and learned behaviors. This was how Carly had gone from somewhat frigged, conservative, and certainly unadventurous in the bedroom back in May to the bubbly, openly bisexual, borderline-nympho hanging on Sam's arm today.

The black masks emitted a tone that, when paired with their voices, paused the conscious mind and allowed their voices to be hyper focused directly into their subconscious, giving them total control. When focused it could reach two or three people standing close together and shut them down entirely. When set to "range" it could reach everyone in a room, but the commands didn't last nearly as long. The suggestions made in "focus" states, however absolute in the moment, began fading after about two weeks though, needing to be reinforced fully within at least three weeks, or they'd fade entirely. The "range" suggestions lasted not even half that long.

They'd tested the black "god" masks at various times over the past month, but using Debra, (who they made sure never to use the black mask on in order to have a control subject who hadn't been exposed to it yet as a final test), was the final stage.

"Now we won't always need multiple masks on us at the same time," Sam said proudly.

"Now we can use the black masks on your mom too..." Ben mumbled to himself.

"I didn't catch that" Sam said.

"I said now we can focus on the pink masks fully."

The pink masks were the wildcard. Dosed with an extraordinarily mild sedative and powerful agent that stimulated the pleasure centers of the brain and body, wearing the mask was essentially like taking a continuous aphrodisiac with the inhibition diminishing effect of a few shots of vodka. While the black and green masks could cause arousal and increase sexual intensity, they just weren't quite as powerful as the active chemicals in Euphoria. Additionally The pink masks didn't require control via another mask. Those were the masks they were primarily studying today now that the black mask passed the test on Debra. It was the same pink masks that were cover the faces of their four "volunteers" laying in their chairs in various states of arousal.

On the four law chairs sat a couple from across the street named Andy and Liz, a beautiful young Asian woman named Courtney, and an athletic Latina named Luisa. Andy and Liz were a slightly overweight cheery couple in the neighborhood who were now thoroughly convinced they arrived at the King's every day for lunch at 3pm sharp. The reality was they spent all that time at the heart of various experiments, then released back home believing they had a lovely time, and usually too horny to care to remember any more.

Courtney was the daughter of an old friend of Sam's mom that had moved back to Japan just after Christmas. Courtney, halfway through her junior year at the time, stayed behind for the school year, then was stranded in the US after the quarantines began in a hotel near campus. Debra had graciously offered to have her stay with them when the school year ended, and she had spent the summer tanning and swimming with Debra, playing video games with Sam and Ben, watching re-runs of Bachelor in Paradise with Carly, (while Ben and Sam complained about it while pretending not to like it), and unknowingly testing out their first mask prototypes.

Courtney had already been similarly conditioned like Carly and Debra; she was fully accepting of anything strange going on in the house and happy and willing to test out the masks whenever asked. She was testing the smaller dose today of Euphoria, the name Carly had come up for the drug after first experiencing it. Laying back in her chair, short, toned legs crossed at her ankles on display via her skirt, she was now playing on her phone, eyes somewhat glassy, humming to herself and occasionally rearranging her legs and squirming.

"How we doing Courtney?" Sam asked, staring down her blouse. Courtney didn't mind, on the contrary she shifted in her seat, sitting up a little and leaned forward, deepening her cleavage.

"Nothing to complain about, Sam, I feel great. Not as good as yesterday—yesterday my clit was practically vibrating—but I still feel sooooo warm and yummy, maybe I could show you just how warm?" Courtney pulled her skirt up revealing a thin pair of white panties, practically see-through now with how wet she was.

"Sorry, you're gonna have to take care of that yourself, which you can because luckily you're all set to go, we have everything we need from this dose."

Courtney took her mask off and stood up, flashing a 1000 watt smile.

"Thank god, it feels like I've been here HOURS! If any of you need me I'll be in my room going through another pack of AA batteries."

Sam watched her ass peaking out from under her skirt as she trotted off to her room and turned his attention to Andy and Liz.

"How are you two this afternoon?"

Liz pulled her face away from her husband's neck and looked up, appearing dazed and blissfully unaware of her surroundings as her husband continued groping her.