The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive

Chapter 13

Theo was alone. Leaving after the others meant he arrived home expecting Sam to be there. She wasn’t. He assumed she’d be back later, and in the meantime, he felt stressed, and a little confused. The fresh air outside the bar jarred him from the blissful thoughts he’d been having about Aisling since he first saw her. Flashes of fantasies and fetishes slipped away, replaced by fear as he walked back to the Circuit, skyscrapers and shimmering glass giving way to urban decay, graffiti, and desolation. He had been so stupid. The screen in CaliaCorp headquarters, then her, Aisling, being able to exercise such power over him. The trance she put him under came on in seconds, and he had absolutely no idea. Powerless. That couldn’t happen again, that feeling.

He lay down on his bed, and absent-mindedly pulled the card Aisling gave him from his pocket.

Aisling Sugars

Senior Manager — Acquisition & Retention

CaliaCorp HQ

KL5-777-33-99

Theo had no idea what her job title meant; it was corporate nonsense. The scent of the card mattered more. Roses. Floral, fragrant, fresh. An aroma that sent his mind back to Aisling standing over him on the steps, her flawless skin, her perfectly toned legs, those eyes, that cascading, flowing mane of fiery hair. She was the embodiment of a powerful, sexual woman.

She was his biggest fantasy.

Theo tried to imagine himself with her, taking her home and pinning her to his bed. He saw himself grabbing her and throwing her onto the mattress, trapping her beneath his body. His hand moved up her leg, revealing delicious thigh and grasping at her panties, slowly sliding them down her legs and tossing them to the floor. Next, he unbuckled his belt and unzipped his jeans.

Aisling of course would be so excited, grabbing his head and pulling him to her to plant delirious kisses on his lips and cheeks before moving to his neck. Meanwhile Theo imagined his hardening cock bursting from his underwear as he peeled them off. He grabbed his cock and started to slowly stroke it to the fantasy.

The idea of being on top of her, of pressing his weight down on her, feeling himself enter her, slowly, teasing, letting her tightness envelop him before starting to pump in and out, watching her eyes roll back and her mouth open as her back began to arch and he pushed deeper inside. With his other hand he lifted her card to his nose and took a long, deep breath. As he did, the fantasy began to grow stronger. Aisling’s legs rose and wrapped around his body, her ankles pressing into his lower back as he groaned with pleasure. He could see himself looking down into her eyes and losing himself in them a little before lowering himself to meet her in a deep, ionate kiss. Her taste, the feeling of her tongue against his, her fingers grasping his back, nails scraping his skin, it felt so good. Theo stroked himself faster and took another whiff of the card, of that wonderful scent of roses. It felt like that smell washed over his brain, coursing through his veins, and pouring down into his cock. It felt incredible.

The fantasy felt incredible too, Aisling becoming physical. Pulling him close to her. Their chests pressed together, her legs clamping tighter and then, suddenly, her rolling over to pin Theo beneath her. He smiled at the thought. She placed a hand on his chest and dug her nails in. Even if it was a fantasy, he felt it, a sharp, sudden pain that made his hips thrust upward and deeper inside her. She smiled, looking down at him with the most delightfully evil smirk. He could almost hear her speak.

“What shall we do with you?”

Theo wanted to respond but, in his fantasy, Aisling pulled off her shirt and revealed a green bra that matched the shade of her eyes. It was velvet and soft and her pale skin had a trail of freckles leading down into her cleavage.

“That’s it, stare,” she said.

Theo found it hard to tell the difference between the fantasy and the reality of being alone in his room, masturbating over a woman on top of him. He wanted to throw her back down beneath him or bend her over the bed and fuck her senseless from behind, maybe even spank her, have her thank him for it. He tried to imagine her calling him ‘Daddy’ but all he could hear was ‘good boy’.

That should have made him stop, but the image of Aisling on top of him, riding him, holding him down and digging her claws deeper if he tried to move sent him into raptures of lust. He felt the edge coming and let himself enjoy the fantasy. It was ok, once in a while, to not be in charge. Wasn’t it? Aisling was so strong too, so powerful. Those legs were so hard and tight, her body lithe and limber. Like a dancer, or a gymnast. She could overpower him if she wanted. Did he want that? It didn’t matter anymore, he just wanted to fuck her, for her to fuck him. To be entwined with her legs and feel her smooth skin sliding against his, to feel her tight, wet pussy squeezing his cock and squeezing every thought out of his mind. That’s what he wanted.

The edge came and Theo was ready to give in and go over it, and in his fantasy, he looked up at Aisling, who bit her lip and then spoke.

“Only good boys get to cum.”

Theo felt confused, but the image seemed so strong, so powerful, that he was willing to go along with it. She raised her eyebrow, a devious grin on her face.

“Well? Are you a good boy?”

He didn’t know what to do, to say. He was supposed to be dominant; he did not want this. Did not want to act submissive just to orgasm but he needed it, so badly. He kept desperately pumping his cock and riding an edge that wouldn’t end. The smell of roses flooded his senses. He didn’t understand why he couldn’t just cum. Why was his fantasy betraying him? Should he just speak? Should he say it? He didn’t want to tell her that, he wanted to push her onto her back and cum on her chest. He wanted to explode on her face. Didn’t he?

“Oh, sorry baby,” Aisling said in his fantasy, “looks like you get nothing.”

She pulled back and he felt an incredible rush of pleasure as she slid along his shaft and over the head of his cock, then away. He fantasised about her buttoning her shirt back up, straightening her skirt, and fixing her hair.

It didn’t make sense. She was so beautiful. A goddess. Why couldn’t he treat her like he wanted? Theo looked down to see his hand had stopped moving and his cock had grown soft. No orgasm. He hated being denied, so why had he done it to himself? His fantasy burst like a bubble, and she was gone. All that remained was frustration, regret that he didn’t just say what she wanted him to, and the scent of roses wafting slowly away.

Chapter 14

“Trish, you can’t do that,” Marc said, “they’ll just arrest you.”

Marc, Sam, Trish, and Theo were sitting in the living room of the apartment Sam and Theo shared. The usual soundtrack of people grunting and groaning, and beds creaking, drifted up from below.

“It’s a protest, I can do that. Plus, if they do something to me it’ll be all over social media.”

“Will it?” Sam said, “or will all the corporate brainwashed drones just ignore you. I mean, what are you trying to achieve?”

“I’m going to make them see what’s happening. If they know they’re being brainwashed maybe they’ll wake up.”

“I have another plan,” said Marc.

Trish gritted her teeth. Sam looked at her and frowned. Theo focused on Marc.

“Go on then,” Theo said.

“I’m gonna hack ’em. I can crack their system, maybe find Ben, maybe find out what they’re planning next, even get a virus in there.”

“You can’t actually do that, Marc, their security is going to be top of the range,” said Trish.

“Oh, come on, you think these big companies are that smart? People hack into stuff all the time.”

“Not you, Marc,” said Sam, “you’ve never done anything that complicated.”

Marc scowled and leaned back in his seat. Theo moved restlessly in his, he kept cracking his knuckles, alternating between that and rubbing his thighs. Finally, he sat forward, slapping his hands onto his knees.

“I’ve got a plan too.”

“Yeah, what’s your bright idea,” Trish groaned.

“They’re about to start construction down the road, right? I’m gonna get into their site and see what kind of stuff I can find.”

“What stuff? Dude, what do you even mean by that?” Marc said.

“Like, plans, documents, I don’t know, I’m not a construction… guy. But there’s gotta be something there, right? They definitely didn’t do anything legal to build there, no one who lives there would want to leave the city.”

Sam nodded. Trish tilted her head to the side and shrugged. Marc shook his head and rolled his eyes.

“At worst I can smash some of the equipment, slow them down,” said Theo.

“Good luck in jail buddy,” Marc said with a withering tone.

“Hey, fuck you asshole. Go hack yourself a better idea.”

“That’s what I’m going to do you moron.”

“Guys, stop,” said Sam.

She hated conflict. The group tended to agree on little, but never fought about it. Her hands were shaking and it took resolve not to leave the room and go hide in bed. One friend was already missing, seeing the rest bicker and fight was the last thing she needed.

“What are we trying to do?” she asked.

“Bring down CaliaCorp,” said Trish.

“Yeah,” agreed Marc.

Theo nodded.

“Aren’t we trying to find Ben?” Sam said.

Trish winced. Theo looked at his shoes. Marc clasped his fingers over his nose.

“So, shouldn’t we be waiting for that woman?” asked Sam.

“No,” snapped Theo.

Everyone looked at him with surprise. He sounded angry.

“Why not?” Trish asked.

“Because we don’t even know her, so um, we should do something ourselves. Right?”

“He’s right,” said Marc.

Theo nodded.

“I can’t sit and wait, Sam,” said Trish. “I have to do something. Anything. If that’s just causing a problem for CaliaCorp, so be it. Maybe if I piss them off enough, they’ll drag me in there, and then I can go look for Ben.”

“It’s not much of a plan, Trish,” said Sam.

“What do you want Sam? You want me to have an answer to how we find him? How we drag him out of a giant company? Maybe, just maybe, we can figure out where he’s living and find him there. Get me at a computer, inside the building, and I can find that information.”

“And I can search their servers for it,” said Marc, “if I can get inside.”

“He might be moving to the new places they’re building. You never know Sam, maybe there’s something there. What else can we do?”

“We could talk to them?” Sam replied.

“That didn’t go great before,” Trish said.

“But that was the receptionist, and Theo got pretty crazy. What if I could talk to someone high up, what if I could even talk to Calia?”

“Sam, no one has ever seen her,” said Marc.

“She must be, hang on,” Theo started counting on his fingers, then stopped abruptly, “old.”

“So? She might be reasonable. You heard that woman we met, the world is better in some ways, right? Maybe she’s not a bad person. Companies are evil… but people aren’t.”

Trish put her hand on Sam’s leg. Sam felt butterflies swirling in her stomach at the touch.

“Sam, I love you, you’re the sweetest thing, but that psycho bitch isn’t going to talk to you. If she even exists, and if she does, can you even find her?”

Sam could barely focus on Trish’s words. The touch, the word love, it was overwhelming. It took her a moment to collect herself and reply.

“I’ll do some research, dig into the history of, well, all of this. Of CaliaCorp. Find out who she is, and then maybe I can find her, or whoever runs the place.”

Silence fell over the room. Trish removed her hand from Sam’s leg. Sam lifted her leg a little, as if to try steal another second of that touch, then let it rest. In the quiet, the sounds of sex seemed amplified from the floor below. Thumping, over and over in a furious rhythm, with the occasional grunt from a deep voice. Whoever they were with was not having a good time. The sounds grew in volume and culminated in a primal groan and then muffled voices and footsteps. Then silence. Theo gripped the business card in his pocket and felt his cock twitch. Marc stared at the TV remote, looking for a distraction. Sam stared at Trish’s hand. Trish stood up.

“So, we’ve all got a plan, right?”

She felt a surge of energy. Her eyes were sunken, she was wired, running on adrenaline. Shifting on her feet, the floorboard creaked beneath her boots.

“Yeah, yeah we do,” said Marc.

“Ok,” Theo said, “yeah, I’ve got a plan.”

“So, let’s do all of it. We can all do something different and maybe something works.”

Sam stood and faced Trish. Sam stood a few inches shorter, and Trish’s boots made the difference even larger. Looking up at Trish’s eyes, Sam wore the appearance of a lost puppy.

“I’ll stay here, ok? Do my research. If I find anything, I’ll tell one of you and you can maybe go? And that way if Ben comes back, I’ll be here.”

Trish nodded.

“Let’s fuck ’em up,” said Theo.

Chapter 15

Trish’s top hung off one shoulder, revealing a hot pink bra strap. The black cotton top she cropped by hand, she had sliced a chunk from it with kitchen scissors. Her stomach looked tight, and a belly-button ring drew the eye to that sliver of skin between the top and a plaid pleated skirt. Her blonde hair was tied in a tight ponytail, and a pair of thigh-high socks and combat boots gave her the feeling she was about to step into a fight. Dark eyeliner added a hint of menace to her face. Trish felt ready for battle. She stretched her neck and looked into the cracked, grimy mirror in her bathroom. Her expression seemed cold, distant, but inside she burned with energy. Rage and nervous excitement. Years of hating CaliaCorp coalescing into something dangerous. A chance to strike back against something that felt like an omni-present set of eyes, watching her for her entire adult life. Trish smiled, thinking to herself how much she wanted to poke those eyes, rile them up, see what would happen if that gaze wasn’t on anyone else, just on her.

There was a hint of arousal too. She bit her lip, smearing her purple lipstick, thinking about her plans. Marc and Theo and Sam could do their little projects in the shadows, but Trish wanted to show everyone what was going on, and in the process, be seen. She gripped the sink and leaned forward, peering into her own reflection. Trish knew she looked attractive, enjoyed people looking at her with those glances before staring down at their feet. She wanted to catch their eyes, and she smiled, pleased with how big her makeup made her eyes look, how a line of barely noticeable freckles peppered her nose and cheeks. With a swift, deft motion she pulled her hair down and let it unfurl down her back. Soft, pale yellow hair framed her face, and Trish was ready to go. Ready to show herself, and to show everyone exactly what CaliaCorp was.

Cold air cut through the streets outside as Trish left her building. A rush of chill wind threatened to send her skirt flying upward, but she didn’t care. She knew exactly where she was going, and what she was going to do. Her first stop was a small shop a few minutes’ walk from her apartment. Not many places were still open in the Circuit District. A few of the clubs were still playing music, which thumped in the background, bass booming from deep underground. Revelers from the wealthy part of the city fell out onto the streets occasionally, drunk and smiling, eyes glazed over from what Trish assumed a lack of sleep, or satisfaction. The clubs were happy to allow sexual services to be bought and sold and for the people of the rich part of town, they were cheap, easy thrills.

The Circuiters that were walking around were the owners of breakfast places and small stores, the kind of place a person might go after a night on the town. Most were near-empty. The CaliaCorp folk stopped going to them, instead they arrived, partied and did whatever sexually deviant thing they wanted to do, and left. It was another nail in the coffin for the district. Those little breakfast bars serving rice and eggs, where everyone sat around a bar with a cook in the middle making orders that machines took from the customers, they were going the same way most of the people were. Far away. To where, Trish didn’t know anymore. The countryside had become focused on two things; growing vast volumes of trees to improve air quality, and industrial farming to provide food. CaliaCorp had even taken over agriculture and forestry. There was nothing outside their reach. The kinds of things governments should do, all done by a gigantic, calculating corporation.

Trish first thought faceless, but that wasn’t quite right. CaliaCorp had a face. Always had that face. That same smiling, beautiful, horrible woman. Her visage was on posters about hiring and positive growth and whatever the latest product was. She appeared everywhere. Even in the Circuit, Calia’s face smiled out from torn posters hastily slapped on the walls of buildings. In the wealthier areas, she adorned digital screens, moving and speaking and reminding people that CaliaCorp is their friend, their family, whatever other nonsense the rich morons who worked up there believed. Trish knew there were other companies around that part of town before, banks and computer companies, but they were gone. She wondered if this was how it went in every city, every country. The information was all online to check, but she didn’t trust CaliaPedia to provide unbiased facts either.

A boarded-up diner marked the corner Trish turned to find her destination. One she had fond memories of visiting with family years before. It closed down a couple of months before Ben vanished. The sign above what was now a plywood board, but had been a large window to people watch from, was falling apart. Cheap Eats now read Chea t. Trish walked around the door and onto a side street and paused, immediately buffeted by a fierce wind that made her shiver and think for a moment that her outfit may have been a poor choice, but she shrugged it off. The clomp of her boots on the ground made her feel powerful and she’d already drawn the attention of several ersby.

The side street lay empty. What had once been a carefully maintained, but small road, was now cracked and bumpy. No cars were left in the city to drive down it, just people on bicycles and scooters went on wheels. Almost everyone walked, and in the other districts trains slid by silently on magnetic rails. An eerie silence hung over the quiet area Trish wandered through. Nothing was left open here, save for where she was headed. She ed so many places she might have gone, if they still operated. A pet shop, with empty pens in its windows and moldy bags of dog food. A gallery, with torn canvas paintings scattered on the floor. A clothing store with decades-old dresses and jackets hanging on headless mannequins. It all told a story of urban decay, in a city with a skyline reaching beyond the clouds. Some rose high, others were left to fight for space and lose, near the ground.

Her destination was a stationery shop. How it remained in business, Trish had no idea. It sold a lot of things, so that helped. Paper, pens, paint, but also snacks and drinks, and she was sure some illicit items too, though those were carefully hidden and she had never actually seen them, so it may not have been true. The place seemed to be a chaos of things. Shelves overflowed with dusty items that no-one wanted or needed. The owner was an elderly man, and as she walked in, he pushed his glasses higher on his nose and nodded. He never said much. Trish walked around picking up the things she needed. A large sheet of white cardboard, a brush, and a small pot of black paint. She placed them on the counter and the owner looked down at them over the rims of his glasses. Wispy white hair hung loosely on either side of his otherwise bald head, and his blue work shirt was stained with paint and ink in many places. A nametag hung awkwardly from his breast pocket, but the name had long since faded. Trish could make out some of the letters, but the best she could guess was his name was Alan or Ang or Akira.

“What are you doing with these?” he asked. His eyes were half-covered by the glasses and only served to make his quizzical expression more pronounced. Trish bristled at the question.

“Just some art,” she said as she handed over a small pile of coins. The man took them, counted them, and grunted. That was the last thing he said to Trish, she took her supplies and left the shop.

Back on the street, the wind threatened to send the cardboard sheet rocketing into the sky. Trish gripped it tightly to her chest, pressing the brush and painting against it. Scanning the street she saw a small alleyway that offered shelter from the blustering wind. She walked into it, and into a dark, damp sliver of concrete between two apartment buildings. Ancient, creaking air conditioning units hung from windows above her, whirring and wheezing. Laundry hung on lines above her head, hooked between the two apartment blocks. Damp rose from the ground right to the roofs, tainting everything with black mold. She placed her cardboard down on a dumpster lid and opened the paint pot. Trish was no artist. The brush she dipped into the black liquid and sloppily slathered paint onto the white cardboard, spelling out a message in black and white.

CaliaCorp is Brainwashing You

It felt absolutely silly to have painted it on the card. True or not, she wondered if this was what protestors always felt, if they wrote their messages and then second guessed themselves, wondering if maybe things were ok, if maybe the world wasn’t as bad as it felt. Maybe it was just her. Maybe Ben was right.

She caught herself. Of course it wasn’t right. The paint dried fast and Trish picked up the crude sign and held it to her chest, hoping that it wouldn’t stain her clothing. The alley led out at its opposite end to the main strip of the Circuit, and on reaching it Trish smelled the street food carts immediately, they were getting ready for the day and the workers moving from their tiny apartments to their tiny workplaces. The ants beneath the CaliaCorp tower. It loomed over the strip, a monolith. The tower looked out of place even surrounded by other skyscrapers. It was so tall, so unfathomably huge, that it could contain the population of the city within it. The place where almost everyone from CaliaCorp worked, those who weren’t in something that demanded they be outdoors like construction or farming. Sometimes, when the wind blew strong enough, the tower swayed. Trish always hoped a strong enough wind could knock it down, send it crashing to the ground and have it take CaliaCorp and the empire they had created with it.

It never happened. The building swayed, seemed to bend, but those inside were unmoved, and those outside could only hope.

The strip seemed less busy than usual, even for the early hour. Steam rose from grates on the street and wafted into the air before dissipating into the sky. The few people who were around walked with heads down, rushing past the food, hoping to get out of the cold.

With the cardboard held against her, covering most of her body, Trish felt at least a tiny bit insulated from the driving wind, but it barely helped. Her legs felt stiff and tired. She felt tired. It was as if something, somewhere in her mind, told her to stop, to turn back, go home and accept the inevitable. Another part of her screamed not to. To rebel, to fight, to tear down the walls and show everyone what was going on, to make herself seen, to be the face of the resistance, the queen of the counterculture. It was a little ambitious, but Trish always wanted that, to be known, seen, perceived. As a child, she wanted to be a performer, a dancer or an actress. It never worked out, never enough money, never a place to go. The void that left had never truly been filled, the empty space where her dreams were supposed to go.

Being alone with her thoughts for so long wasn’t good. Usually she would listen to music, watch TV, go online, or do something sexual but out on the street, hands full with the sign, there was nothing else she could do. Perhaps it would have been better to keep distracting herself but wasn’t that the problem? Wasn’t that the reason no-one did anything? It seemed as if everyone had become completely addicted to their screens. It terrified her to think that she was much the same, but how else could she quiet the doubt and fear and disappointment. She lived in a damp room in a dying part of a city being trampled beneath the spiked heel of a woman whose entire existence was shrouded in mystery.

Trish reached the train station that marked the end of the Circuit District, and the start of Calia’s city. A gleaming, bright, clean building. Slick, gold-hued, safe. She walked up to the platform and waited for the train to arrive and take her into the belly of the beast.

Chapter 16

Marc clamped his fingers together, stretched his arms out, and twisted his wrists so his palms faced forward. His knuckles cracked loudly in his sparsely furnished apartment, barely more than a room. He owned a bed, a desk, a computer, and a container in which he kept clothes, old computer parts, and the single photo left of his mother. A fire had consumed the rest, along with the woman who raised him.

Wearing just a t-shirt and boxer shorts, Marc didn’t notice the cold. His place was old and drafty but once he sat at his computer, nothing else mattered. The room looked dark other than the three screens in front of him. Lines of code poured down the one on the right, then as he unclasped his hands and moved his mouse, it vanished. A screensaver. Marc typed an address into the bar on his browser. CaliaCorp dot com. Where else would he start? He browsed the homepage of the site for a while, ing many images of Calia, perpetually smiling, smirking at him. He hated her, but it was hard to escape her beauty. The woman appeared everywhere on the site, often in business attire that seemed a little too revealing to get any work done. Alongside the images were slogans and services. Media; Shaping Reality. Construction; Building the Future. Environment; Healing the World.

What Marc was looking for was at the bottom of the page. The section. He copied several names from there onto a document on his leftmost monitor, and then looked around the site, going deeper into the sections that allowed him to people at CaliaCorp. He found what he wanted, an email address. @caliacorp.com. What else would it have been, he wondered. That was all the information he needed to start with. He pulled up his email , one of the few that were not run by CaliaCorp. His drafts had a few options for the next step—emails designed to entice the person on the other side to click on links that would share sensitive data, s, addresses, credit card information. Marc chose one he thought the CaliaCorp folks would enjoy, considering their preferred reason to visit the Circuit District.

Hey there party people,

The Circuit is proud to present Dark Mass, an erotic burlesque show like no other. See the sexiest ladies of the night shake their tailfeathers on the stage at the venerable Venus Theatre. For one night only, this evening is not to be missed if you love gorgeous women, erotic dancing, and an after party to die for!

VIP guests get special access to our performers for the real show. A hands-on experience that will leave you completely satisfied. Click here to learn more!

You’ll never have a better night than at The Venus.

Marc smiled to himself. What warm-blooded person could say no to that. It was just what the rich folk wanted, served on a silver platter. He began entering what he assumed the correct emails would be. First name, full stop, last name at CaliaCorp dot com. Everyone he could find on the page he added manually, then turned on a program to scrape any other names on the site for him and turn them into the same email format. Within a short time, he had over a hundred emails ready to receive his message. He checked the link, everything was working perfectly. Once someone clicked it, it would a sneaky little program that would send a stream of data to Marc’s computer, all he had to do was send and wait.

Of course, the penalties for cybercrime were serious, but he routed through a virtual network that changed his location multiple times an hour. Tracking him was next to impossible. He had no fear of that. No matter what his friends said, he knew what he was doing. He’d spent years learning the craft, how to send phishing emails, how to crack s. A lot of it was easily garnered from dark web discussion boards, and what he didn’t know, others helped him with. Most of the people he talked to were anonymous criminals, but who wasn’t outside the law, if they were outside CaliaCorp? It wasn’t like there were other options most of the time. Plus, it felt nice to chat with people who understood his skills. Marc loved his friends, but they were always so dismissive. Just because he’d messed up a few times and gotten his PC infected with a virus. Damn whoever invented CaliaWare. Hardly his fault, the whole thing was designed to trap him anyway. Since then, and a few other minor incidents, his friends didn’t trust him with their computers.

What did they know anyway? Marc sent the emails and sat back, waiting. He realised the wait would be long. If those emails even reached any of the people he ed. In the meantime, he could see if there were other vulnerabilities in the CaliaCorp system. The website looked slick and stylish, but there was a lot going on. Someone may have missed something. Breaking into that could lead him to a , or better, straight to a database. That’s where he’d find Ben’s information, his new address, the floor he worked on, the department he worked in at the company. All he needed to do was get in somehow. If he could do that, getting to Ben would be just the tip of the iceberg. The things he could do with full access to the CaliaCorp system, before anyone would know, were manifold. Ransomware sounded like an option. He could expose secrets or make himself and his friends rich beyond their dreams. Calia could afford to lose a few million, and maybe he could expose them anyway. They were brainwashing people, he knew it, and all he needed was evidence. There was just so much more to get out of his plan than an address for Ben.

But he needed a way in. The pages that drew his attention first were the media sections. Creative types never understood online security, not like programmers and devs. That part of the website was built around an interactive experience, so he opened the source code on his vertical monitor and began scanning it for hints at an error. The main monitor displayed a simple quiz, the kind that led to a result about what product to buy or which fictional character you’re most like. This one was all about how the media team at CaliaCorp functioned. Kind of self-indulgent to talk about it via a quiz, but Marc supposed they wanted to express their creativity somehow in a sterile corporate structure.

He clicked start and glanced at the code, updating in real time. The quiz began with Calia, of course, what else? A video of her smiling and gently moving her head left and right played, not quite shaking or nodding, just slow movements, like a metronome set to a low tempo. Marc didn’t have his headphones on, he wasn’t repeating previous mistakes. The first question appeared on screen, fading in over that familiar face.

Can Calia Media Help You?

The only option was yes. Marc clicked it. The code updated. Nothing useful. On his main monitor the image widened, as if a camera pulled back and showed more of the woman on screen. She danced to an unheard rhythm, and now her collarbones, bare and prominent, showed between the black straps of a dress or a top. Marc wondered which it might be, and in the dark corners of his mind, he had a question of his own, what would it look like if he saw all of her. The next question faded into view.

Do you need us to shape your reality?

Again, no option but yes. Marc hesitated. He felt like this was going one way, but he had no reason to worry, he couldn’t hear whatever Calia danced to. He was just looking at an attractive woman moving her body. So what if he enjoyed that? So what if he hated her? She was hot. Ridiculously, stupidly hot. He clicked yes. More of Calia was revealed, a deep cleavage in what could still be a top or a dress. Her breasts bounced to the rhythm of the music she danced to. Marc found himself drawn to her cleavage, watching her move sensuously, like a snake writhing from side to side. He felt almost disappointed when the next question appeared over her chest.

Do you need what CaliaCorp offers?

Marc knew the drill. This time he quickly clicked yes. He wanted to see more of Calia, and he did. The screen revealed the rest of her upper body, her slim waist above what he could already imagine were hips, shaking, rocking side to side. A pendulum, a metronome, a rhythm he wished, for a moment, that he could hear. Marc knew that was a bad idea. He was simply gathering information, searching for weaknesses. He looked at the code and saw his own reflection for a moment as the screen flickered off and back on. It did that occasionally. Old monitor. The next question flashed up on screen.

Do you want to know more?

He did, he wanted to know everything. He clicked yes without hesitation and saw more of Calia, and confirmation she wore a dress, a short black one. The pleated lower part flicked left, then right, moving with her. Marc’s eyes moved with it. Calia put her hands behind her head and began to move faster, the rhythm increasing in pace. Marc forgot about the source code, he was staring, wondering what her shoes looked like.

Do you want to go deeper?

Yes, he thought, as he clicked the button, yes I do. He wanted the camera to go deeper too, wider, to see more of her. It obliged, showcasing her entire body, her black, open-toed kitten heels, bare legs, and the dress that flounced and bounced to the rhythm of her body. The sweetly seductive motion of her perfect hips. It felt so easy to stare at her, Marc could hardly think. He wondered how many people were brainwashed by her, broken and corrupted and turned into drones at her command. He felt his cock stiffen at the thought and then with a sudden hiss, fizz, and finally a pop, the monitor died.

He blinked, shook his head, and cursed, smacking the monitor’s frame with his hand. It didn’t respond. Dead. He looked across to the screen on the left, at least that one still worked. On it, his email was open, and someone had replied to his mass mail to the CaliaCorp staff. He scrambled to move his cursor to the other screen and check it.

Your email has been rejected by our filters, and your has been blocked.

Thank you for ing CaliaCorp, if you would like to learn more about our company, please visit CaliaCorp.com for details.

Regards,

CaliaCorp Digital Protection

“Fuck,” said Marc as he threw himself backward in his seat, feeling his body crack against the hard chairback, the cushioning long worn out. He rubbed his forehead and stared at the blank screen between the two functional ones. Nothing from the website, nothing from the emails, and now a monitor was broken. He couldn’t afford to replace it, and he needed it. He set to work pulling out the cables from it and moving the other two monitors closer together and placing the broken one on the floor. He stared at it for a moment. His window to the world, one of only three, broken, dead, fizzled out.

Then he kicked it hard in the centre of the screen and cracked the glass. The monitor fell to the ground with a dull thud. Marc turned back to his desk and opened up a browser window. He navigated to one of his bookmarks, a favourite haunt of his where other hackers, coders, and other tech-savvy folk exchanged skills, advice, and resources. He started a new thread, entitled: Need Help With Major Hack ASAP. In it, he explained little other than he wanted to get some sensitive data from a server that had strong security. It took five minutes before he got a reply from someone, about average for what was a popular, but well-hidden site.

XxNarixX: Hey, wanna PM me deets? Experienced hacker, can hlp!

He didn’t recognise the name, but what did it matter, the whole place was anonymous anyway. Marc clicked on the name and opened the private message button. Some help would go a long way and keep him focused. He hoped this Nari was up to the challenge.

Chapter 17

An entire section of the city, boarded off from its former residents. Cranes pierced the sky above it, their frames reflecting from the glass of the surrounding skyscrapers. The endless towering offices and apartments housing CaliaCorp’s staff. And now, more. More rising from the ground, shooting up like twisting vines reaching for the heavens, an affront to the sky itself. Reaching ever higher.

Theo felt small. He slunk along the perimeter, around a blue-painted hoarding with CaliaCorp slogans painted on it.

Fall into the Future

Your Purpose Defined

It meant little to Theo. Empty words for the drones who slaved away in her service. The face staring down from massive screens hanging from the sides of the buildings around him. Smiling, winking, smirking. He felt as though she were watching, always watching. He hated it.

The construction site was quiet. The workers were high up in the skeleton of the growing tower and Theo easily walked under a barrier and inside. He ducked low, careful to avoid the small hut where he assumed security were sitting, but when he moved beyond it, a glance back revealed it to be empty. Moving on, his feet squelching in the mud of the site, he looked around for something that could be useful. Construction vehicles dotted the place, large, yellow beasts labeled with some Calia sub-brand. In between them stacks of concrete slabs, building materials, and bags of cement lay on pallets. Nothing helpful. The single place to go was a small, prefabricated building on the opposite side of the site. Theo saw no one around, but still took his time, slipping along between vehicles that could hide him from the people high above, moving the pieces into place for yet another CaliaCorp monstrosity.

He reached his destination and walked up to the side of the door, pushing his back against the wall and peering through the window. Empty, as far as he could tell. He tried the handle, unlocked. Theo pushed it down and the door swung inward. It was dim inside, and dimmer when he stepped inside and shut the door behind him.

It was an office. A large desk sat at its centre, covered in blueprints and plans. Smaller desks lined most of the walls, with a set of lockers at the back, metallic and cold. On the smaller desks were computers and other devices. Theo started at the plans. It seemed clear what they were building, and much like the other skyscrapers. A tower of glass and steel, another homogenous structure in a forest of them. What Theo needed was evidence that CaliaCorp byed the planning process or bribed someone or something that could be used against them.

The blueprints were useless. Theo opened a computer and tried to find something on it. protected. He wasn’t Marc, all he could do was guess. He tried some basic variations. None worked, and he closed the screen down. There were other machines. One just to its left, in fact. Theo opened this one and a post-it note fluttered from the screen to the keys. The was written on it.

Ilive4cal!a

Theo balked, then quickly typed the string and watched as the machine sprung to life. The wallpaper showed Calia. Of course it did. He looked over his shoulder, out the window. Still quiet, but that didn’t mean he shouldn’t work fast. The computer was simply laid out, with a few folders. One held photos of the site at various stages of construction. Another the blueprints in digital form, and a 3D render of the final build. The final folder contained just notes about the materials needed. Nothing he could use. Nothing.

Theo winced. He wanted to smash the computer into the ground, but he gathered himself and kept looking around the room. The other computers he checked were protected, just like the first two. He checked the same that worked once but it didn’t get him anywhere. There was little else in the room of use. He slammed a screen down and grunted. Maybe he should just try to sabotage them, break the machines, sugar in the petrol tank. Did that even work? Did it even matter? CaliaCorp owned thousands of vehicles, infinite money. He’d need to do something drastic.

He imagined an explosion rocking the building from its foundations, sending it toppling over, crashing into another, starting a domino effect, taking the whole city with it, leaving only the Circuit District standing. That drew a smile, the thought of the whole thing coming down around him, of utter destruction, of devastation and then rebirth, the flood of people from the margins ready to rebuild, ready to take back the city in the wake of this act of vandalism that energised the people.

And Theo imagined Calia’s face as it all fell. That constant smirk twisted into a grimace. Maybe their headquarters would come down too. The whole place crumbling into dust, the glass and steel and gold and marble nothing but rubble. Nothing but a monument, a memory, the fading recollection of a time when a corporation controlled the world. He imagined the people in the tower then, the fear and anger and shock of their safe, corporate world disappearing in one fell swoop. He imagined himself there, watching. Then his mind went to someone specific, someone in the tower. To Aisling. Her face contorted in terror, and Theo rescuing her. Rushing in as the building fell and holding her to his chest and keeping her safe and the scent of her perfume filling his nose. He took her card from his pocket and inhaled. It smelled serene, sexual. The scene in his mind shifted and she held him, he felt small, weak, his head on her breast, her stroking his hair, telling him it would be ok, that he would be safe with her. He felt an involuntary smile creep across his face and an erection tighten in his tros.

That’s when he saw the drive. A small black drive that he snatched up and shoved into the card slot of the computer he could access. Folders flashed up on the screen. Billing, invoices, planning documents, and something about the Circuit. Plans. Future plans. For his home.

He clicked on the folder but it was locked, encrypted, and he had no way in. He tried another folder and found the same. Nothing about The Circuit could be accessed. As he moved the cursor to one about planning, he heard a voice from outside, and froze.

Theo looked around frantically. Two voices, male and female. Right at the door. He saw the door handle start to droop, they were dawdling outside but would enter at any moment. Theo shut the computer, ripped the drive from it, and made for the lockers. He ripped open a metal door and found it full of tools. The office door opened. He tore open the next locker, empty, and squeezed inside, closing the door on himself, finding himself standing upright, tightly squeezed into the darkened space, only able to see out through two slits at eye level. He hoped no-one heard him.

Chapter 18

Why, Sam wondered, could she find out so little about CaliaCorp? The whole operation was so closely guarded, as if any real information had been erased from the internet. It was all so stupidly mysterious. She couldn’t hack into a system or anything like it, but did have keen research skills and it was rare for anything to be so mind-bogglingly confusing to understand. As far as she could tell, the only real information about CaliaCorp came from CaliaCorp, but even that seemed inconsistent. She could find four separate dates for the founding of the company, some over a century apart. If one was to be believed Calia herself could be almost two hundred years old. Another made it seem as though she started in the business world just a few years before, and her dominance arrived quickly.

But none of it made sense. The whole company credited itself with cleaning the air, the rivers, the sea. Of fighting to save the climate, endangered animals, ecosystems, countries. How could that be done in less than a decade? How if it had taken two hundred years had no one stood up against the company? And who, really, was Calia?

Sam felt defeated by it all. She wished Trish were there, just to have someone to talk to, to express her sadness and fury and desperation too. A little too, to see Trish in her skirt and her boots and just enjoy her. Enjoy that one perfect thing in her life, even if she couldn’t touch it, even if it felt forever out of her grasp. Was she in love with Trish? Or did she just want comfort. Theo made her feel safe too. So strong. She smiled, thinking about him. He had a temper, but he always kept her safe. Always reminded her that he would protect her. That promise was one she felt happy to hold tight to.

Ben. She needed to find Ben. That was what she was looking for really. For him. For their friend. Everyone else seemed to be lost in some personal crusade but Sam just wanted to keep her little group of friends together. Every time they fought, every time things changed for the worse, she imagined everyone just drifting away from one another. Being swallowed up by the uncaring world of the Circuit, or by the corporate monster living above them, ready and willing to subsume all in its path to the progress touted by their company website. Progress to save humanity and secure the future. Were people that easily taken in? Was comfort so much more important than freedom?

The usual sources were useless, Sam decided, and dove into the discussion sites that she often disregarded. Too full of weirdos and cranks and lunatics. Or bots with an agenda. Just nothing good, nothing that could be trusted. Not that CaliaCorp could be trusted but some of their sites were good, had good information. Just not when you needed to know about them, or about Calia. Only for, well, everything else. Need to know how to peel potatoes faster or who broke the spaceflight speed record, easy. Want to know anything about the most famous woman on the planet? Nothing.

It made no sense, and yet total sense. It seemed clear, abundantly clear that Calia simply did not want to be known. Wanted to be some aloof figurehead and enslave mankind from the shadows. It seemed to be working. Behind that slick corporate exterior, Sam knew something was going on. Something horrible.

The discussion sites were, as she expected, full of strange ideas and thoughts. Mostly utterly insane ones. Nothing to do with CaliaCorp, just odd ideas about what clouds were made of and underground civilisations and aliens. Clearly, some people had gone directly off the deep end. Anything about CaliaCorp tended to be positive, overwhelmingly so. Saying they made life better, safer, happier. Lots of messages between people as if reinforcing the others belief in the need to surrender to the company. Co-dependent brainwashing. It felt awful to read, for Sam, knowing something like this was likely why Ben had vanished. Getting lost in cyberspace and losing grip on reality. He had grown distant, isolated. She knew he was always in danger of being a shut-in and she knew he spent too much time online. It seemed to have taken its toll and now, now he was gone. Sam felt no closer to finding him than ever.

Digging deeper into the darker areas of the web yielded little, save for a few conspiracy theories about Calia that seemed to build on the idea of her being some all-powerful thing. One positioned her as a vampire, with mind control powers. Another as an angel, come to save us all. Preposterous.

Hidden deep among the dross was something though, that caught Sam’s eye. Corp Exiles, a place for people who left CaliaCorp. Which, Sam thought, was strange, because she had never heard of anyone leaving. Ever. She clicked inside and found a very small group of people chatting about random things, life, music, the past, movies. But there were some messages, nothing recent, that Sam found hidden away when she searched. The reasons they left. The doubts, the fear, the sudden realisation something had gone terribly wrong. Hope, at last. And yet, it seemed only three people were having those conversations, and one was on another continent. Another had no location at all and the last.

The last lived in the Circuit.

Sam began to type, furiously, frantically, her fingers hammering on the keys as if possessed. She needed to talk to this person and had to know what they knew. They were in the belly of the beast and escaped, living to tell the tale. Hopefully tell the tale. Details on the site were sparse. Little more than a few comments that gave the hint that they became aware of something negative happening to them, but nothing concrete, nothing that really told Sam what happened at CaliaCorp. It was loose, lacking detail, lacking anything she could believe in. So she was compelled to find the rest, to uncover the truth and know if Ben could be saved. If he could be brought back from there and be himself. Maybe the claws of corporate life hadn’t truly sunk in yet. She just needed that sliver of hope, that light, that pinprick that told her something worthwhile lay on the other side. This person could give that to her.

Hi, I need your help, please. My friend started working at ccorp and won’t answer our calls. I don’t know whats going on and i want to get him out of ther. Please please please help me I just need to know he’s ok and safe and maybe how to get him to leave, can you hlp? In circuit, can meet.

Sam waited. She didn’t know when the person was even online. But people were connected constantly, so maybe they’d be quick. Maybe they’d see her desperate plea and rescue her. The computer screen’s glow lit up Sam’s face. She adjusted her glasses and pushed a stand of hair back over her ear and typed another line.

Please, please help.

Silence. No thumping or grunting or groaning from below, just the low hum of electronics. Sam almost wished she could hear those sexual sounds. Being alone like this felt horrible, alone wondering what could be happening to Ben, or if Trish was ok or if Theo was in trouble, or what Marc was doing. Why were they all apart, at a time like this. She knew, of course, everyone had their plans, but it didn’t stave off that gnawing loneliness. That feeling of being adrift in a sea of doubt and fear with no idea where land could be found. No one steering things, no one guiding. Just Sam, alone, waiting and hoping.

She missed Ben. He wasn’t even that good a friend, but he made her laugh. He acted awkward and a little bit cute and at one time, a long time ago, she thought about asking him out. The group treated them like the dorky ones anyway, why not just embrace that together. But she never did. Never felt right. Ben wasn’t what she wanted anyway. Her thoughts returned to Trish. Strong and confident. Trish could guide her to land. Theo too. Both of them, maybe. Together.

Sam became lost in a fantasy, tied to her bed as Theo and Trish teased her mercilessly. Taking turns to run their hands over her body, to spank and scratch her and make her say ‘thank you’ each time. That was what she wanted. Someone who could take control, who could give her that moment of blissful empty submission, where all that mattered was being a docile slave for her Mistress or Master or both. For Trish’s flat stomach or Theo’s bugling biceps. It didn’t matter as she pictured herself suddenly on her knees watching them both above her, Trish stroking her hand across Theo’s cheek as Sam kissed her boots. It wasn’t that she wanted them both, in fact the thought had never crossed her mind before, but she wanted their power, their control, their dominance. She wanted to submit to it, to embrace it, so they could replace all her worries and fears with lust and want and need and desperate aching desire. She needed it, needed to feel the power of someone as she simply gave in to it and allowed herself to be used.

And then Trish started doing just that, pushing Sam’s face into her pussy, under her skirt, while Theo guided her hand to his cock and she began to stroke it. Eyes closed, just being of service, being a toy for them. A pet, a puppet, a slave. Their slave. Safe in their control.

It felt so right that Sam barely noticed the sound of a message notification.

You’re local?

Sam felt elated. Finally, some answers. Some hope. The fantasy faded and she became focused again, she had a mission.

Yes, can you help me?

She waited again, holding her breath, stomach pulled taut.

Probably not.

A sharp exhale. Sam’s shoulders sank. Hope dashed, so fast.

Please, just wnt to talk

Again, she waited, hoping for something other than a dismissive response.

What u wanna know?

Finally, something, a glimmer of a sliver of a hint of light at the end of a long, dark tunnel. Maybe there was a chance to save Ben, to bring him back. Back to the Circuit. Before Sam replied again, she thought about that. Back to the Circuit District. To poverty. To a single-room apartment in a warehouse. To cracked old buildings and no hope, no opportunity. Was she doing the right thing? Maybe Ben was just better off away from them, away from all of the decay that surrounded her. The sex sounds started up again. Anguished howls this time, and the rhythmic crack of a whip. How could she bring Ben back to all of that, all that disappointment and longing for better only to never see anything but worse.

And then she ed why it mattered. The root cause. CaliaCorp made it that way. CaliaCorp pushed everything else out until there was only them. CaliaCorp brainwashed people to do what they wanted. To give up on their lives. To abandon their friends and family. To give themselves to the machine and never look back. Minds gone, given over to a corporation and for what? A luxury apartment. If that was all they had to offer, why bother? Ben would be better with his friends, loved, happy. Even if that meant being broke.

Need to get my friend out of ccorp. How?

The reply came quickly this time.

Not easy. Need to talk offline. My place. When free?

Today? Now? ASAP

She waited a moment, and a reply appeared. An address close by. Another message.

Come.

She didn’t hesitate. She didn’t even reply to confirm. Sam grabbed a jacket and rushed out the door.