Vile Machinations

by P. S. Power

  The largest space was the sitting room. A living space with several sofas, large chairs and a flat screen television which took up a nicely large area along the wall to the left.

  Connor hadn't really watched much television before. Etain had allowed it on occasion as part of their training. Mainly so that the boys would know what that kind of thing was. He’d also been taught, rather firmly that the devices were mainly used as a subtle form of mind control. There was, given that, little to no use in spending time with the things, given that factor.

  His screen time had mainly been about computers. Ones that had very limited data streams on them compared to the web, or so the rumors at school had told him. The school computers had linked to some very nice libraries, as well as research documentation. They hadn't had any real porn at all, and most of his classmates had mentioned missing things like television programs or social media when they were at school. Both of those were things that he didn't really have experience with at all.

  In the bedroom was a closet. Inside of that, interestingly enough, was clothing. Most of it didn't look at all like he was used to. It was mainly simple seeming tan slacks, and plain, light blue, button up shirts. At the bottom was a shoe rack with both soft looking brown loafers and running shoes. There were, off to the side, also some sweats, for exercising in. Several sets of those, which was probably about right. He was used to using them once, then putting them in to be washed.

  There was also a dresser that held some t-shirts, underwear and socks for him to wear. Grabbing a set of those, he went to the bathroom, used one of the razors there to shave the nearly four days of growth off his face, a new toothbrush to handle his teeth and then showered the stink of several days off of himself. That took some real scrubbing to make happen.

  After he dressed, Connor wandered out into the main space and contemplated finding some food. There was a kitchen there and he'd been warned that there wouldn't be servants, in particular. When he checked there was a fridge filled with food, canned and frozen goods as well as some fresh fruits in a large bowl on the counter. The cupboards had cans and boxes as well. The fruit was real, so he started with that. Most of the rest of the food required some kind of preparation. That was, he feared, going to require a new skill set.

  He could roast meat, over a fire. Opening cans and jars was a trick that he’d been shown in survival training, if not often. That gave him a starting point, but he was, sadly, lacking anything like a fire pit in his room. There was a stove and he wasn't a total idiot, so he had a heat source, potentially. On the back of the boxes and containers of food there were hints as to what to do. Such as boiling water or temperatures to set the oven at.

  Not how to do those things, but it should be safe enough to play around with, if he were careful.

  First though, he contented himself by eating several apples and a nice pear that had to be washed off his hands and face when he was done. There was a trash can with a lid for the leavings, which worked for him well enough.

  Not being hungry at the moment, he didn’t have to try and make anything more to eat. Leaving him with a large open space around him and not much to do at all. There was a clock on the wall, which claimed that it was nine-seventeen in the evening. The red numbers glowed at him, stating the time rather definitively. It wasn’t refined, compared to the rest of the room. That was nice enough, compared to what he’d had at Etain. In the castle his room had been nicer, of course.

  The place wasn’t a hole under a garage with a piss bucket in it, so he wasn’t going to whine on that score. It was, compared to that, a palace.

  Before he could think about going to bed, or sitting in one of the soft chairs, a knock came at his door. That just had to be answered, since there was no way to see through the thing, that he could tell. No peephole or view screen was available for him to utilize for safety. Not that he'd ever heard of the last one being a thing. It simply made sense to him. You could put up a camera and then see who was about to come and attack you. If no one had invented that yet, it was an idea to work on.

  So he opened the door, blind, getting ready to fight.

  Standing back, nearly across the hall, was a familiar face. A rather nerdy one, with glasses on. Doc Short.

  Connor grinned at her. Probably stupidly. It was real though, since she was, of the new people he'd met, probably his favorite. Walker was okay, but it was clear the man wasn't that interested in being more than his security guard and maybe exercise buddy. Doctor Nerd Girl was, as much as he had one outside of school, his friend. A thing that even he knew wasn’t real and probably meant he was being needy and silly about it all. The truth was that the woman had kind of mentioned being willing to have sex with him, even if it wouldn’t be exciting or memorable for her. That meant she was extra cool, in his book.

  So he lit up and let himself seem like an idiot.

  "Hey! I didn’t know you'd be here. I heard that my Father was, but that's all." That and his Father’s people, whoever those were. Obviously Doctor Short was in that grouping.

  She waved him back, so they wouldn’t touch at the door.

  "I notice that you aren't making everyone freeze at a huge distance anymore? That's good. I was worried you might be stuck that way. Not that you'd be here if you were still doing that. You seem normal? Any new symptoms?"

  Connor blinked and moved back, the girl, who was in a black skirt, white blouse and a black vest over it, moved in, quickly, shutting the door behind her. Almost furtively, which made little to no sense.

  Then she waved him all the way back into the room. Still, she was only about ten feet from him. So inside what he thought of as the honesty zone.

  Her face was cheerful, but she waited for him to answer her questions.

  "Well, I doubt that I'm normal at all. As for my abilities... Those seem about the same. Why? I noticed that the effects from the other day came after I had that shot. Is that related, do you think?"

  That got a head shake.

  "Maybe, but probably not. My guess is that something triggered it in you. Stress is the most likely cause, but it could be something else. Even the hypoxia you suffered in the cleaning process could be what did it. We'd just been talking about me being your great-great-grandmother, as well, which isn't true, of course. We aren't related like that. Still, that could have been it. That or just the excitement of leaving. Still, you aren't doing it now, so it’s probably related to the idea of just seeing a new place. I need to run some tests." She shrugged then, and wrinkled her nose at him, cutely.

  Then took her black velvet vest off, rather matter of factly.

  "Here, I'll strip and you can do me from behind. I can't get pregnant, so that's no worry." She shook her head. "I'd claim I was lying now, to stress you, but it isn't true. I’m probably the one woman you’ll ever meet that you don’t need to wrap up the goodies first, before having fun. No diseases, thanks to the shot we both had, and no babies, even if I wanted to catch you as a husband. So, get your clothing off." She kept removing items of clothing, as he stood back, wondering what was really going on. After a moment, he thought he had it.

  "Wait, so... you want to see if sex triggers a response in me? An increase in field strength? Only, you can't lie right now." He was certain of that.

  She shrugged.

  "Exactly. So, you'll have to remind me later if that happened. So far so good. Here, check out my goodies. Does that get you going?"

  She stripped naked, and stood there in front of him. Seeming unashamed of her nudity. She either shaved her whole body or didn't grow hair in particular. That meant everything on her thin, rather pale form showed. Then, almost playfully, she turned around, knelt on the floor, then got on all fours.

  Over her shoulder, her long hair pulled to the left side, she nodded at him.

  "Go ahead. No anal this time? I'm not used to it anymore, so that will probably hurt, even if I don't remember it happening. I sit too much during my work day for that to be comfortable later."

&
nbsp; Connor felt slightly torn. For about ten seconds, then he took his own clothing off and moved toward her. After all, the woman was offering and he really was interested in trying things out with a woman. That made it all right, he thought. She kept speaking, though very softly, until he touched her, his hand on her behind, gently. Then, like everyone did, she stopped moving and zombied out.

  Part of him wanted something more alive than that and felt a bit guilty, abusing her when she couldn't consent properly. The rest of him really wanted the release and frankly, she was much cuter with her clothing off than she had been before while clothed. Plus, she really had basically ordered him to do it, which was, he had to consider, sweet of her. The only rule seemed to be not doing her up the behind. That time. That was fine with him, of course. Not that he didn’t want to use all of her. It was all new though for him, so going in normally first was fine enough.

  He explored her body, doing a good job of it, since it was unique to him, feeling her small breast, then running a finger up inside of her.

  She was moist there, already. Slick with some form of lubricant. Probably not a natural one, given that they hadn't done anything to cause that to happen. Even he knew that women needed foreplay to start things going for them. It had been in his school lessons, more than once. A thing which he couldn't really do at all. Rather, he could go through the motions, but had to think that women weren’t going to respond to him properly that way, no matter how much he pet or cuddled them first.

  Still, he did stroke her body for a while, going through what he thought were the correct motions for her. Trying to make things interesting and pleasant for her, even if it didn't matter in the end. Then, slowly, he entered her from behind. It was a bit awkward, and felt like he was simply using her. Which he was.

  "Um, push back a bit." That got some action at least, and she grunted as she did it.

  Apparently, that part was honest enough. It was also exciting, since she was responding more than he would have thought possible.

  "Does this hurt or anything?"

  Her voice was soft, but she did speak.

  "It feels good. Nice."

  They kept at it for a while. Not too long, since it felt incredible for him. He finished inside of her, then felt bad about that. Right until he moved back, and she recovered after fifteen seconds or so, turning around to look at him again.

  "Are you ready?" Her face was innocent enough that he shook his head.

  "We're done already. You told me that I was the best you ever had, just so you know." That wasn't true. She'd kept saying it was good though. Nice. That could have been worse, he decided.

  She seemed to agree, going in to the bathroom, to dress and probably wash up, since he'd left something of a mess inside of her. As she did, she called back to him.

  "We have some things to talk about. I'll be out in a few minutes. Don't run off on me yet."

  Then she vanished into the other room, leaving him there. Naked still.

  Chapter six

  It took ten long, dread filled minutes for Doctor Short to come back out of the bathroom. The shower had run, though her dark brown hair wasn't damp. The long locks were perfectly straight and seemed clean and tidy, if not decorative.

  Connor had taken the time to dress, and get a drink of water. There was a filtered system on the refrigerator, which didn't taste bad or as if it had anything chemical in it. That would make it an excellent portal to poison people, given he had to either drink that, or what came from the tap. Just slipping something into both of those would be enough to get rid of him. Everyone else that was currently in the underground bunker as well.

  In general, you couldn't functionally poison a water supply, for say a large town or city. The dilution rates were so high and water flows so uneven that it simply wouldn't work. The same problem existed for chemical weapons in the air. Which meant that slipping a self-replicating bio-agent or nano particulate system in would work best.

  Hopefully there was an alarm for things like that somewhere in the complex. Which meant he only had to worry about his Father and the people with him deciding to do that kind of thing to him, specifically, not outsiders. Which was patently ridiculous to even consider, he knew. Given his location, they could simply shoot him. No one would report it to the police, at a guess. It was what he would have done, if he had a troublesome person with no real-world use to get rid of.

  Hopefully being young and well enough educated would give him a leg up that way, as far as seeming useful enough to bother keeping around. Even if working with him was going to be a big enough hassle that he honestly could see just dumping him on a road side or even killing him to get rid of.

  The doctor didn't hold back much, moving close to him even if she was smart enough not to move all the way in to try and touch him. That wasn't happening. Not in a way she could remember at least. It would, in the end, keep him from having a real relationship with anyone, he had to figure. Even if he was feeling pretty warmly toward Bertie at the moment. If her goal had been winning him over, she’d managed to do a lot toward that end, already.

  She wouldn't be feeling the same way, it was clear. There was no reason for her to. Honestly, there never would be, on a physical level.

  As soon as she sat on the sofa, the woman, seeming more than young enough for him to go around with publically without raising any eyebrows, gave him a serious look.

  "We need to get you up to speed on things around here, before you make a mistake. First, you're going to be offered entry into the Order. Your father confirmed that for me and frankly, we’d pretty much have to do that, given your abilities. Worse, we'll have to have complete faith and trust in you, and can't actually test you that way. Well, we can, by putting you in a very advanced lie detector. We'll do that as well. Normally you'd be given opportunities to betray us, our own agents doing the offering. If you failed and did it, you'd die automatically. That isn’t going to work with you, since anyone trying would just tell you about it first." She seemed serious and was sitting no more than seven feet from him. His mind wanted to turn back to sex, but he managed not to be that distracted.

  Even if he had just been with a woman for the first time.

  "Okay. So, I really don't get a choice here? I'd rather not have to rape and eat the corpse of a baby or anything, if that can be avoided. I don’t even know any Presidents to share with me." Connor had heard of that kind of thing from some of his friends at school. It always seemed disgusting. That part also meant that it wasn’t just a Leland thing, of course.

  Connor wondered if the man was still alive or not. His guess was no, though anything as possible. The man was a monster, but it was clear that a lot of the kids at school had done similar things and really weren’t.

  Then, the idea was that if they hadn't done it when told, they or their family would have been put to death. With no choice and often drugged to the gills, they'd done what they were told. Not all of them and not all the time, but at least half a dozen of the boys had mentioned things like that happening on their breaks. All inside the last six months, too. Meaning it couldn't be that rare. There were only about two hundred students at Etain, after all.

  The young looking doctor across from him nodded.

  "I hear that one. I can try to put a word in that way, to see if we can forestall that. The trick is that we all have to show complete obedience to the rules of the Order. If we can show that you aren't lying... That would probably work well enough. The problem there is that I don't run those tests and probably can't rig it for you. Not if it's done here, inside the next few days. If we get a few weeks, we could manage that. Which... It means you need to agree and believe what you're told about us. You can do that, can't you?" She said it like Connor might just have a problem with their aims and goals. Whatever those were.

  So he nodded.

  "Possibly. Am I allowed to know what my new goals and all that are first, or do I have to guess? That would make it harder, I think."

  Glasses g
linting in the overhead light, his new friend gave a single nod.

  "Your Father gets to inform you of that. Again, you need to simply accept. You can ask questions, to make sure you understand, but doubting... He will have you put to death, if he can't do it himself. At least if you aren’t all in with us. That's normally how it's done, actually. Parents have to kill their own children if they fail to join when the time comes. It's a bit early for you, having been away at school like you were. Indoctrination is normally done over a few years, not weeks."

  She shook her head and leaned back, sneering a lot more than he'd ever seen her do before.

  "Not that you weren't screwed up enough for us to work with. I looked at the records that were kept on you there... At Etain. That place designed everything around you in a way that broke your mind. They forced you to simulate killing in realistic conditions, over and over again, from a young age. You were conditioned to follow orders. For that matter, you were conditioned to be gay. Bi-sexual, at the very least. It's why they punished you for masturbation in an all boys school. Then didn't punish people for doing things with each other. Well, some of them. Not you, though. Only the naturally gay ones were punished for that. Most of them will probably off themselves inside the next few years. That you haven’t yet is interesting. You’re clearly depressed enough."

  Connor, feeling a bit miserable about his life, tried to smile and not show it in his voice.

  "I suppose that will mean that I can pick my rape victims from an unlimited pool, then? My powers... Well, you know, better than anyone else in the world, don't you? It's got to be hard to be emotionally close to anyone if you can't touch them."

  That got a gentle wave. A dismissal, really.

  "That really is a point. On the good side, you won't be emotionally scarring people when you do it, if you don't explain yourself first. Just make sure not to get anyone pregnant or harm them so much they go to the hospital over it. Other than that, well, there have been studies. If a person can't recall a trauma, they don't suffer from it. Really, you should just fuck whoever you want and not worry about it. If it’s a problem for you, ask if they want to first. That’s the best you can do, so it has to be enough. Morality doesn’t work if it’s impossible, after all."