Vip

Thursday

Yumi Etsuko grew up in the suburbs, but she was more of a city person. She was twenty-five years old, wore her long black hair in layered bangs and owned only three pairs of shoes. She liked banana ice cream, punk music and played the bass. Her singing was better than she would probably admit to herself. She liked to cook, but only in company. She'd never liked Asian food, and she didn't know if that was going against stereotype or not.

She first met April in History 1 at the university. Yumi studied to be an English teacher, but the course requirements demanded that she attended. April had made fun of the professor's glasses and they had both almost been thrown out because they were giggling way too hard at that joke. From then on, the both of them had been close friends, helping each other study and spending afternoons, evenings and nights together, almost always accompanied by April's younger sister, Tess.

Yumi was on her best way to becoming Mrs. Etsuko, and her internship at the local high school had started one month ago. She was still feeling like an impostor when she stood at the "wrong" end of the classroom, but she slowly but surely got the hang of handling a room fool of bored and rebellious teenagers. Luckily, she only had to teach twice a week.

On this particular Thursday, she came home from school pretty exhausted. It wasn't all that easy to make a teenager feel passionate about pretty much anything, much less Ernest Hemingway. What made matters worse was that she hadn't really slept at all well that night. Also, she was starving.

She dropped her bag under the coat hanger, opened the freezer, stared into it for a minute and finally produced a frozen pizza. She read the instructions: "Preheat oven to 340 degrees. Bake for 12 minutes."

The doorbell rang.

God dammit! I've had enough bother for one day.

"I'm coming!"

She put the pizza box on the counter and went for the door. Out in the hallway, there stood her friends April and Tess.

Shouldn't they be studying?

thought Yumi. They were dressed pretty weirdly, too.

"Hey, It's you two, I didn't expect you. Come in!"

"Yumi Etsuko?" asked April.

"Uh... yeah, that's me, silly."

"Override code theta phi 1-A."

* * *

There was an awkward pause.

"What did you say?" asked Yumi, surprised "And what's with the dresses and the hair?"

April and Tess looked at each other. They both had their hair bound back tightly with ponytails at the backs of their heads.

They said nothing.

"Are you going to come in or what? Or do you want to stand there all day being weird as hell?"

Both of them paused, then Tess smiled awkwardly. "Yes, Yumi. We will come in. Sorry."

Yumi let them walk past her into the living room. They looked really strange in those black dresses. They were really nice dresses, but what the hell? Yumi went after them and hurriedly picked up the blanket and extra cushions from the couch.

"Just a minute, let me get that. Sorry. Slept on the couch last night. Weird noises in my bedroom keeping me up. I already called the landlord." Tess and April patiently waited until she had removed the last of the improvised bedclothes and wordlessly sat down. "So.. well, yeah! Do you want something to eat? I was just about to make something for myself, but now you're here, I could—"

"No thanks, Yumi. We are not hungry" said Tess.

"Alright. Some drinks, maybe?" Yumi was getting seriously weirded out.

Should I say something? What's wrong with them?

"We would like some water, please. Yumi, might we please have some? Also, I would like to use the restroom."

"Sure. You know where it is. I'll fetch you some water." Tess stood up and left the room wordlessly.

What the fuck?!

Yumi went to the kitchen and filled two glasses with tap water. When she returned to the living room, Tess was also back and Yumi's laptop stood on the coffee table. Yumi started to feel irritated.

"Err, Tess? Were you in my bedroom? Could you please ask before you just take my stuff?" Tess didn't respond. "Tess?"

April got up.

"Seriously, what's wrong with you two? What's with the dresses? Would anyone of you mind letting me in on what the fuck's going on?"

"The dresses are for tomorrow evening Yumi", said April as she came closer. Tess was still working on the laptop.

"Do you like them, Yumi?" she asked.

"I guess they're pretty nice. Not my style though. And not yours as well, I would've thought." April came closer still. Yumi began to feel uncomfortable. She took a step back.

"Err, yeah, um.. I got you some water."

"Thank you, Yumi. That was very nice of you." There was an uncanny lack of emotion in April's voice. This wasn't normal. Yumi began to feel really uneasy.

She raised her voice, and what came out sounded unsteady: "Is this a joke? Seriously, what's wrong with you?!"

"Program ready. Subdue," said Tess.

"Yes, controller," replied April mechanically and lunged forward.

Yumi didn't have time to react. April got hold of her wrists and twisted them behind her back in an arm lock. The glasses dropped from her hands and spilled on the carpet with a dull noise.

"What the fuck, April?! Let—"

April pressed her palm against Yumi's mouth.

"Wht th fnck rmm ynn dnnn?! Lt mmm gnnn! Hlllmp!"

Meanwhile, Tess had gotten up from the couch and positioned herself right in front of Yumi. She had turned up the laptop speakers, and now harsh white noise filled the room. Yumi jerked from left to right, trying to break free of April's hold, but she wasn't strong enough. She kicked out and hit Tess's shins.

Tess twitched a little. That was it. She looked straight through Yumi.

"Sit her down", she said.

Yumi felt herself being dragged to the floor along with April as the both sat on the carpet. She was cushioned on the bulge of April's skirt behind her. Tess walked back to the coffee table and pivoted the laptop so that it faced Yumi. It showed the desktop. It was a picture of the three of them on the university campus. In the photo, they were smiling, standing closely next to each other, arms reaching out behind their backs in mutual embrace.

Something flickered on the screen, but it was gone instantly.

Yumi tried to break free of the hold again, but she was feeling exhausted. She tried to process what was happening to her, the craziness of the situation just now simmering through. Here she was, on her wet living room carpet. Arms behind her back, held there by her best friend. And her best friend's sister was standing idly by, watching. well, she wasn't even watching, she was just sort of staring straight ahead. It felt really hard to—

There was that flicker again! What had they done to her laptop? And that noise! It seemed to get louder. Yumi couldn't concentrate. She struggled against April, but she couldn't see how it would work this time.

What had happened to her friends? They had been fine when they had partied on Monday night. And they had wanted to go to The Enclave tomorrow. And now they turned up like this, dressed like some late 19th-century bohemians, acting like fucking pod-people. It didn't make sense.

The screen flickered again. There definitely had been text there. Yumi could have sworn she could make out a word. The noise filled her ears.

What was happening here? What were they doing to her? Would they let her go, what was their plan?

Again. She could definitely make out some words.

That noise. Make it go away.

She felt really tired now, and her limbs were heavy like lead, so she just stared at the screen. She wanted to find out what the words said. She watched the screen more closely. This calmed her down. She would just wait and see what happened next, find out what the words said. Maybe things would make more sense then. Just watch the screen, and listen to the noise. It would all make sense...

One minute later, April took her palm away from Yumi's mouth. Yumi didn't say anything. She stared at the screen, her eyes wide. Her mouth hung slightly open and her head bobbed a little when April let go of her wrists. April got up and stood next to her sister.

Yumi hadn't bolted, she didn't try to run. She was sitting on her living room floor with her legs spread out in front of her and her arms hanging limply to the carpet from her slack shoulders as the white noise hissed loudly from the speakers. No one in the room moved. April and Tess just stood, and Yumi just sat there wide-eyed, and watched.

She just watched.

* * *

Yumi woke up in total darkness with a start. She quickly got up from where she had lain, immediately stumbled and fell down. She landed on a soft surface, and indeed all the floor beneath her seemed to be padded with a smooth and elastic plastic.

She was very afraid. Where the hell was she? She breathed heavily, trying to find some point of reference in the darkness. She found none, it was pitch black.

She was nude. Someone had undressed her and taken away her clothes. She sat up and hugged her knees, shivering with adrenaline and fright.

It was deadly silent, apart from her heavy breathing, and even that sounded muted. When she held her breath, she could hear the blood pumping in her ears. Yumi sat like this for quite some time, then she slowly got up. Blindly, with her arms stretched out before her into the darkness, she stumbled around. She hit a wall after a few small steps. It was padded, like the floor. She pressed against it, and it made a little squeaking sound as the smooth material rubbed against her skin.

As she followed the wall, she found something. It was hard and slightly cool, and perfectly smooth. She guessed that it was a door, but there was no handle, no keyhole.

The rest of the darkness was just rectangular padded walls, floor and silence.

Yumi started to scream for help. She screamed until her throat was hoarse. Then she cried, rolled up in a small ball on the soft floor.

Hours passed. Or maybe minutes. She may have fallen asleep. The silence began to drone in her ears.

"Sorry I couldn't talk to you sooner. I've been quite occupied with party business."

Yumi let out a surprised little squeal.

"I apologize. I didn't mean to startle you." There was a cheerful female voice with her in the darkness, but it was impossible to point out where it came from.

"Who are you?", Yumi asked in a frightened and croaky voice.

"I'm Beatrice. How are you?"

"What?"

"I asked you how you're feeling," came the voice.

"Please let me out!" Yumi cried.

"If you answer my question, maybe. Now, how are you feeling?" The woman sounded perky, almost chipper, like someone talking to a young child.

Yumi sobbed. "I'm afraid. I want to go home!"

"Well I admit I haven't been the best of hosts. I really am terribly sorry. Why don't we lighten the mood a little?" With that, the darkness faded away as from somewhere, light slowly started to fill the room. The room itself was brilliant white, with the rubbery material mutedly reflecting the light in small patches. Yumi looked around. She couldn't see the source of the voice or really anything except for the smooth white padding and the large metal door.

"Please let me out! I want to go home!"

"You're repeating yourself, that's bad style. I'll have to detract some points for that. Now let me teach you something. Override code epsilon theta 3."

To Yumi's absolute horror, she found herself getting up from the floor and standing erect in the middle of the room, with her arms by her side. She hadn't meant to do any of this and she couldn't do anything about it. She tried to move her arm. She couldn't. She tried to scream. She couldn't. Her immobile eyes stared straight ahead at the door. She would be shivering with fear, but she couldn't do that either.

"Neat trick, isn't it? Did you ever try recording lessons and playing them while you sleep during studying? We tried to teach you that trick in almost the same way, but you've been... slacking." The woman giggled.

What the hell is happening to me?! Who the hell is this woman?! What does she want from me?! This can't be real! No, this can't be real!

"So when our two mutual friends came by to visit, they had to do a little... tutoring. Release code epsilon theta 1"

Yumi stumbled forward. She could move again. She ran towards the door and tried to pry it open. "What is this? Where am I? What have you done to me?! Let me go!" The door didn't give a millimeter.

"I can assure you this isn't the right approach to your problem. But I've always been an advocate for liberal education. Kindly stand back and I'll let you out. Under one condition, however. You stay and let me teach you one more thing. I promise that no harm will come to you and in one hour you will be free to go. Sound good?"

Yumi's hands trembled. Her head was spinning. This was crazy. Things like that didn't happen to people in real life. This was like a movie or a book. This was science fiction, fantasy. Lovecraft-level insanity.

"What if I don't want to?" her voice was still hoarse and shaky.

"Then I'll make you." There was still an out-of-place sympathetic kindness to the woman's voice. Yumi hesitated, then took a step back. There was a beat of silence. Then the door swung open towards her.

"Hurry up now, class starts in 5 minutes! Down the corridor and the last door on the right."

Yumi hesitated a moment, then stepped out and followed the long, deserted corridor. The last door stood open and Yumi entered. She found herself in a large enclosed space with some crazy-looking contraption in the center of it. But what caught her eye was something different. There were three other people in the room with her, seemingly waiting for her arrival. Two of them were April and Tess. They wore black, but not the dresses they had worn when they had...

abducted

... her. They were dressed in a miniskirt with their legs naked and bare feet. They each wore a corset putting their cleavage on very public display. Around their necks were leather collars. They didn't acknowledge Yumi's presence in any way.

The other person was a woman dressed in a red dress, with wavy blonde hair. She smiled at Yumi. "Good Afternoon," she said cheerfully.

Yumi instinctively took a step back from her. "You're the woman from my cell!"

"How rude of you! I have told you my name, you know. It's Beatrice. And I might add that not terribly many people get to call me that."

"What do you want from me,

Beatrice

?" demanded Yumi, finding some courage. She put as much spite in the name as she could. "And what have you done to April and Tess?!"

"Oh, them. That's easy to explain."

"What have you done to them?!" demanded Yumi.

"I have erased their memories and personalities and made them into my mindless slaves," she said matter-of-factly.

Yumi was dumbstruck.

"...WHAT?!"

"It's quite ingenious. I use electromagnetic radiation and sensory stimulation to relink synapses in the prefrontal cortex." But Yumi wasn't even listening anymore.

"Oh my God! This isn't real! Tess! April! Do something! This is a lie!"

Neither of them moved. They both kept staring straight ahead, with no sign of even having noticed Yumi yelling at them. They just stood there with their arms by their sides, like statues standing guard.

"And you'll do this to me as well?"

"That's the plan." Beatrice smiled.

For a moment, Yumi stood there with a million thoughts coursing through her head. This was real. Frighteningly real. This was no prank and those were not her friends anymore. She couldn't quite grasp the enormity of that realization, yet. It was just words in her head. She knew it was true, but she couldn't really process it. One thing was obvious, though.

She turned and ran.

"Override code epsilon theta 5."

Her body came to a halt.

No. No. No!

"You're an unruly little troublemaker, aren't you? I promise you, the lessons you'll learn here are for life. Right now you might not want to be here, but at the end of the day you'll be glad you attended." Yumi could hear Beatrice walking towards her behind her back. She couldn't turn, but she heard the click-click of Beatrice's high heels on the marble floor. She circled Yumi, letting her hand brush down her naked body, slowly and deliberately stroking with her gloved fingers across Yumi's ass and her breasts. All the while eying every curve and crease and fold and all her most private places. "And I can tell that you'll be an excellent student once we've unleashed... well... unveiled your full potential." Yumi felt vulnerable and violated, but she feared the worst was yet to come. "Turn around!" commanded Beatrice.

Yumi felt herself turning, and she saw April and Tess, standing a couple of yards away. They still hadn't reacted at all to what had happened, their faces were perfectly expressionless. Beatrice spoke. "This subject is to be enslaved. slave89, to the console. slave90, strap her into the preparator. She will comply."

The slaves snapped to attention. "i obey, Mistress!" they said in unison. Tess walked to the other side of the room and April came towards Yumi. Beatrice meanwhile had sat down on a small couch that stood near the wall, facing the giant machine Yumi now took a closer look at. It was really big. Her entire apartment wouldn't have been able to hold it. It looked very scienc-y with lots of bare wirework and odds and ends sticking out unaesthetically.

April took her hand and walked towards the machine. Yumi's body followed unresistingly, while in her mind, she was running for the door with every step. She witnessed herself stepping into the machine, and April put her wrists and ankles into shackles. As this was done, she walked some steps away. "Subject prepared for enslavement" she said. Tess pushed a button on the console. Yumi was lifted off the ground by her wrists and her limbs were being spread outward in all directions. It didn't hurt, but she felt extremely vulnerable and exposed, with her breasts and sex on full display in the air.

Beatrice sat leisurely on her couch: "You know, Yumi. I have a small confession to make and I'll be honest with you: I quite enjoy this part. And I like to mix things up every now and then. April here for example-" she made a sweeping gesture toward the woman silently standing near Yumi "I took quite liking to her. So I gave her and Tess the chance to walk free. And they..." she paused. "they beat me. I asked them for a reason to let them go. And they gave me one. But Tess made a remark that hurt my feelings quite a bit, so I enslaved both of them anyway. So I might have let them fail intentionally, and that's bad form for any teacher."

Yumi wouldn't have known what to say even if she had the ability to do so.

"The reason I'm telling you this is this:... actually, let me show you something. slaves 89 and 90, heel!" Beatrice got up towards Yumi, who was still hanging spread-eagled and unable to move or speak. April and Tess positioned themselves at her flanks.

"slave90. do you know this woman?"

April turned her head and looked up towards Yumi, as if she had just noticed that she was there. Yumi saw her face. Her expression was blank, her eyes empty. Yumi suddenly remembered that one time when they had eaten together in the cantina. April had laughed at some joke and milk had shot out of her nose. Her face had changed through seven different expressions in four seconds.

"Yumi Etsuko, age twenty-five, prisoner. To be enslaved," said the woman with cool detachment. Yumi's insides turned to stone. Now it had sunk in. What they had done to them. This was not April anymore. April had gone away and she would never talk to her again.

"slave89. Pleasure slave90."

"i obey," said the slave, and kissed slave90 full on the mouth. Her hand reached under slave90's skirt, stroking her, and Yumi could see that they weren't wearing anything beneath their miniskirts. Her kisses got more involved, she licked across slave90's face, covering it in saliva, her hand feverishly working beneath the folds of the skirt. slave90 began to moan softly. Yumi was forced to watch. Beatrice stood behind them and observed with a satisfied smile.