Karen walked past the countless storage lockers in the basement. She was looking for her uncles, which was lot number 39. He had passed away a few weeks ago, and she was asked to help out with cleaning up his remaining belongings. Not that she wanted to; she was never really close to her uncle. He was a very quiet man up until his death, with an unknown source of income. But to make her mother happy, she agreed to sort out the storage locker a few towns over. The air was stale and cold, and not a soul was in the building. Karen sighed and turned another corner. She had been given a key in the mail along with a number, but no map on where to find the thing.
"Where the hell is it?" She thought, her hands clenching as she stomped from locker to locker. She had better things to do as a 26-year-old accountant fresh out of university with high distinctions. The numbers seemed to follow no reasonable pattern. It would go from 28 to 84, then to 83, then back up to 110. Karen had no choice but to scour every locker until she found 39, and sure enough, tucked away far away in the back corner, she found it.
She slipped the old key into the lock. Naturally, it didn't work at first and took a few enthusiastic jiggles before finally clicking and letting her open the fenced door. She stepped in, and as soon as she moved her hand, the door swung back and locked itself once more. This caused her to initially panic, but she realised she could easily reach through the bars and open the door back up. But the new concern was the light; it was nearly pitch black except for the rays of light through the steel mesh of the fence door.
Karen turned on her phone and rotated it around the cramped space. It couldn't have been any bigger than 3 by 2 metres. Inside were only a few items of noticeable description: an old bike caked in dust, some old paint buckets, and a large box covered in a thick grey sheet. She sighed, looking at the remnants of her uncle's past life. She was hoping there would be a motorcycle she could hide from her mother and sell for some quick cash. Or maybe jewellery. But alas, all she found was useless old equipment and a bike held together by rust. The box was all that remained to be inspected.
She pocketed her phone and adjusted her eyes to the dark as best she could before slowly pulling the sheet off the box. She turned her phone back on and tried her best to make out what it was. Despite how dusty everything was, it was very clean. A dark black marble box with smooth corners and what looked to be some sort of electronic panel on the front. There were four holes, two on the top and two on the front, on opposite sides of the panel. Below the panel were also a series of buttons and dials. Whatever this was, Karen had no idea what to make of it.
Karen inspected all sides of it and found an electrical cord. Thankfully, there was an outlet covered in dust, so she could plug it in and see just what she was dealing with.
"Perhaps it was some kind of portable clay oven? Or 3D printer? But that wouldn't explain what the holes are for. She thought to herself. She flicked the outlet switch, and the machine hummed to life. The panel lit up with the words:
"INITIALISING..."
"INITIALISING..."
"INITIALISING..."
"INITIALISING COMPLETE"
"ENTER SUBJECT"
The machine then suddenly unlocked, and the sound alone caused Karen to jump back. The lid of the box had opened up, and out poured a cloud of humid air. Using her phone to see past the fog, she was able to make out what was inside. The interior was lush, with pink cushions sown into the walls and a grove for someone to sit in. However, the size of the box didn't mean that someone could easily fit.
"Unless..." Karen thought to herself, looking at the holes in the box. "Someone stuck their hands and feet through these." An eerie silence filled the air, the low humming of the machine being the only thing to fill it.
"What the fuck kind of shit was he into?" Karen pondered, her face twisted up in disgust. She figured it was some kind of weird BDSM setup. She rolled her eyes, feeling like she had seen too much for today. Maybe she could sell it to some after-dark pawn shop? That is, if she could even move the thing. She went to turn it off until disaster struck.
Her heel had slipped on the sheet.
Losing her balance, she tried to grab onto the box behind her, but the lid was no longer there; it was wide open.
And just like that, she fell back. Her legs flew into the air above her own head as her ass hit the soft cushions of the box. Causing quite an audible thud.
And like a Venus flytrap, the lid closed tight.
And the tarp used to cover it had been kicked up into the air and fell squarely back down onto the box, obscuring it completely from view.
***
"Hello!! HELLO!!!!" Screamed Karen. It was nearly pitch black. She had dropped her phone and was stuck in this box with her knees up to her chest. She had been in there for nearly twenty minutes. Trying to rock herself out of the box, kick the box open, and look for any sort of panel. But it was useless. She was, in every way, trapped. She couldn't even hear the outside world; it was almost like the interior was vacuum-sealed. Karen looked up, and through the dim light the box provided, she could see the two holes leading to the outside of the box.
"Of course! Maybe I could reach the panel on the front of the box and push something on it to open it back up? Or maybe yank the cord out of the wall?" Unfortunately for Karen, the holes in the front of the box were out of reach, and she wasn't able to rotate her body. All she could do was barely scrape the holes with her fingers. She sighed and decided she might as well try sticking her hands up outside of the box. Maybe then someone at least might see her?
She summoned up her strength and slowly pushed her right and left hands through the holes. They were hard to break through, considering the box was almost sealed off to the outside world. But sure enough, she broke through the seal and, for a brief moment, was able to hear the humming of the box again and the buzzing of the fluorescent lights. She had just gotten her wrists past the holes when, suddenly, the machine roared to life.
The rings on the lid lit up a bright neon pink and clasped around her wrists tighter than ever before. In a moment of panic, she tried to pull away, but she was now even more stuck than before.
"No!... No no no no NO!" Karen protested. Tears welled in the corners of her eyes as she kicked and screamed in rage. Her hands tensed up into fists and released over and over again as she used every bit of energy she had to try and escape. But it was futile.
She must have sat there for at least 5 minutes in silence before pondering what to do next.
"It has my hands... and it won't let go. And there's room for my feet at the front..."
"Maybe... maybe if I just put my feet through, it will do whatever it has to do... and it will let me leave."
Her mind started racing with what it might do to her. But she sharply inhaled and suppressed her thoughts. This was survival. And in survival, actions are more important than pondering what might be for hours on end. Karen decided to surrender herself to fate. She pushed her feet slowly through the holes, her heels awkwardly breaking through the seal, until finally her ankles poked through. And like it did with her hands, the machine sprang to life and clasped down hard around her feet, locking them in place.
Karen's heart began to race, the machine was getting louder, and just what it was planning was still a mystery. When suddenly a small panel flipped open from one corner of the box and a red laser scanned her body. It must have done this for a few seconds before it stopped. Karen couldn't see it, but on the front panel, it now read:
"SUBJECT SECURED..."
"SCANNING..."
"...ERROR X04!"
"PROPHIBITIED ARTICLES!"
"REMOVING ARTICLES..."
Karen's head darted around the box once more, and this time a new panel had opened up. But this time there were two long steel rods. One with what looked to be a surgical knife on the end and a hook on the other. Karen didn't even scream; her blood went cold as the arms mechanically went towards her and lowered to her waist. Then, with surgical precision, the hands hooked themselves into her leggings and cleanly sliced them off.
"HEY, GET THE FUCK OFF OF ME!" Karen screamed; the arms didn't even flinch as they made their way up to her dress, the hook lifting and the knife cutting away at the fabric.
It seemed to know exactly how to remove clothing with the smallest of cuts. In under a minute, she was down to just her bra and underwear, in her panic, she had also kicked off both of her heels. The hook spun around her back and unhooked her bra, and it fell to the bottom of the box, along with the rest of the clothes. While the knife made cuts on both sides of her underwear and quickly yanked them off, exposing her privates.
Karen was now completely naked.
"GET ME THE FUCK OUT OF THIS THING!" Karen screamed. Her voice now wasn't one of a strong, confident woman, but one laced with fear.
Her chest heaved up and down; despite the panic coursing through her veins, she was still comfortable, and the warm humidity in the box meant she wasn't cold. The hands folded away her cut-up clothing and took it with them to some unknown storage panel. Once again, Karen was left alone. The panel outside once again lit up.
