by Cameron Hale
“Dayla Madlur?”
The pleasant voice emanated behind her from a towheaded young man whose wide blue eyes and soft features appeared not to have matured since childhood. Dressed in the perky coffeehouse uniform of tan trousers and green striped shirt, Dayla fought a sudden compulsion to rip off the cap rakishly perched on his head.
“Yes?”
“The manager will see you now about your special order. If you’ d like to follow me?”
She smiled fixedly, amazed at the sheer ingenuity of utilizing such an innocent courier. Quickly following the young man through a rear door into a corridor that led into yet another corridor, the chatter of patrons gradually faded away to welcome silence punctuated only by the rhythmic clicking of her stiletto heels and the lingering aroma of coffee. Arriving at the very last door, smooth metal and featureless like the others, the young man smiled, nodded and retreated without a word.
With quickening breath, she waited. After a moment, a slender panel opened beside the door. A miniature holo of a stern brunette materialized. She briefly appraised Dayla, and then glanced away as though checking something. “Please insert your identity card,” she said brusquely, indicating an illuminated slot that opened as she spoke.
Dayla retrieved a translucent, paper-thin card from her slim black clutch and inserted it into the awaiting receptacle. She endured the tedious routine each appointment while waiting for the government intranet to verify her membership.
Membership. She cringed at the word, a politically correct terminology to classify her as a registered addict currently under a federal rehabilitation program. Treatment centers, or clubs as they were politely known, existed in every major city in the world and were designed exclusively to localize and recondition social outcasts.
Though the subject was never openly discussed, everyone knew about the clubs and the activities transpiring behind stylishly anonymous doors. She briefly wondered about her family. Two years had passed since they had discovered the truth about her treatment, and subsequently disowned her. Her impassioned pleas had gone unheard, the social stigma more important to her parents than the sufferings of their own child. Dayla had expected at least some sympathy from her older brother. Their relationship had been solid, their conversations free. His indignation at her condition had been an unexpected blow, his rejection the most painful. Even now the wound was raw, her repeated attempts to contact him met with stony silence.
The card emerged from the slot. The brunette stared at her impassively. “You’re cleared for treatment eighteen. Your second medical review is due after treatment twenty. At that time, the board has the option to certify you as cured and release you from the program. Keep up the good work.”
Silently, the panel closed and vanished. A moment later, the door hissed open. She had barely stepped inside when it closed again, admitting her to absolute silence. Anxiously, she stared at the polished onyx emptiness of the room, its oval shape broken only by the tubular glass lift shaft in the center.
She shuddered when the lift quietly descended and opened. The thickly padded black leather chair inside rotated to face her in blatant invitation. As soon as she sat, the lift silently rose two floors and opened into a mist-enshrouded room scented vaguely of roses.
Good work? she thought with a rising sense of panic. If officials even guessed that the treatment designed to break her weakness was actually fueling it, the repercussions would be severe.
The mist slowly cleared. Surrounding mirrors infinitely reflected each other and the black draped glass and severe modern furnishings sparsely decorating the conditioning chamber. Around the elaborately canopied bed at the center, a variety of implements were neatly arranged.
She removed her jacket and draped it on the chair. Swallowing to ease the dryness in the throat, she came to accept that she would never pass the medical review. The standard mental probe required for program release would inevitably betray her sexual preference and condemn her to further treatment. Social reintegration embraced a variety of mental and behavioral problems deemed unacceptable, the technique traditionally involving aversion therapy.
Rising from the chair, she stepped toward the mirrored walls and faced herself in the mirror. Her petite yet sensuous build and dramatic features had never blended into the blandly homogenous idea of female attractiveness. Yet, her difference pleased her, despite the subtle pleas of her family to cosmetically alter her appearance. She had never adhered to the rigid social codes that stifled individuality and drained the very soul of creativity. With each passing generation, the dictates of appearance and behavior progressively narrowed until those, like her, found themselves branded as outcasts.
Her mirror image faded as lurid crimson light enveloped the room. Turning to face the bed, a reclining, lissome, honey-eyed blonde smiled at her beneath a smooth curtain of flaxen hair. She was naked, her flawless, lusciously proportioned body completely devoid of hair. Spreading her thighs, her fingers lingered teasingly over the glistening lips of her bald, oiled cunt.
It’ s her again, Dayla thought, at once wanting to watch yet run from the room.
“Do you want it?” the woman asked. She lay back against a pile of silken cushions and slowly massaged her swollen clit with one finger while inserting the others deep inside her cunt. Her breath quickened, a flush staining her body. With the other hand she massaged her full breasts, teasing the rosy nipples until they became rigid. Slowly, she increased the pace until she cried out and shuddered, her hips thrusting into the bed.
Transfixed, the blood roaring in her ears, Dayla could only stare in stunned silence.
The woman paused to catch her breath before sitting up and watching Dayla with hard, appraising eyes. Sinuously slipping from the rumpled black satin sheets, she padded toward her and roughly grabbed Dayla’s red silk top. Yanking it up, she slid her hand beneath and squeezed the exposed bare breasts, pinching the nipples until Dayla cried out.
“I see,” she said noncommittally. “Now turn around and bend over.”
Mutely, Dayla complied. The woman yanked up her leather skirt and ran her hands along Dayla’s naked ass. Spreading the cheeks, she teased the drooling cunt with the tip of a fingernail and let it trail to her anus. It contracted at her touch.
“I bet you want it up your ass, don’ t you?” the woman whispered. “In fact, I bet you want it both ways.” She smartly slapped Dayla’ s cheeks until her hands left red imprints.
Dayla inadvertently gasped.
“I see we have work to do. Get on the bed.”
* * *
Sprawled blindfolded on the bed on her hands and knees, Dayla could not help but respond to the woman’ s fleeting caresses. Betrayed by her body, her cunt wet and aching, all she wanted to do was submit to the hands that brought her near to coming, and then quickly retreated. Another slap to the ass elicited a wave of illicit pleasure. Spreading herself wider, she arched her back and buried her face in the bed. It was too late to pretend now, too late to hide the fact that the treatment had been a complete failure.
Hands and tongue loitered once more, teasing, touching, arousing her to a fever pitch. With a feeling of glazed disassociation, she vaguely wondered where the pretended feelings of self-revulsion she was supposed to embrace had gone.
Something hard pressed against her engorged clit, something huge. Before she could take a breath, the woman impaled her with an oiled dildo so thick it almost tore her. Dayla cried out and bucked violently as the woman rhythmically thrust it.
“Do you want it? I said do you want it?”
At that moment, the woman slipped another heavily oiled dildo into Dayla’s anus.
Dayla’ s scream preceded her panted response. “Yes!”
“Yes, what?”
“Yes, I want it.”
“Want what?”
“I want you to fuck me.”
“Do you like it up your ass? That’s what you want, isn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“What el
se do you want? Tell me. Tell me now. Your board review comes up soon. None of my cases have ever failed and you’ re not going to be my first. Is that clear?”
Abruptly, she withdrew the dildos and tossed them onto the floor. She whipped off Dayla’s blindfold, grabbed her by the hair and yanked her onto her back. Straddling her breasts, she lowered herself until her cunt barely brushed her nipples.
“There’s always got to be one problem, patient,” she said, running a finger along Dayla’s lips. “But I’ m not going to let you defeat me. Sooner or later, everyone responds to the treatment. You’re no exception.”
Breathlessly, Dayla stared into the woman’s soulless eyes. “Why are you doing this? Why are you so afraid of me? All I want is to be left in peace.”
The woman sighed and lowered herself onto Dayla’s breasts. Dayla felt the hot wetness of the woman’s cunt sear her flesh and wanted desperately to reach out and clutch the soft mound of her ass.
“Because you’re different,” she said. “Because we’ve paid the price for such differences through social and environmental upheaval that lasted almost a century. Consider the relaxation of moral standards, the acceptance of almost any behavior under the guise of personal freedom. Do you think the mutation of the aids virus and other virulent, sexually transmitted scourges would have occurred had the dubious world governments of the time been more concerned with the cause of the problem rather than the cure?”
Dayla’s desire ebbed like a receding tide. Listening to the woman’s words, she remembered the tedious lectures parroted by her parents and other well-meaning friends and family members. Angrily, she sat up and pushed the woman off.
“And you think this society of robots we’ve become is better? History has two sides whether you like to admit it or not. It’s easy to make accusations, but the reality is that without compassion and tolerance, the pendulum always swings both ways. You’re not afraid of me so much as what I stand for, a threat to your dead, sterile society.”
The woman said nothing, merely watched her with an inscrutable expression. Only the narrowing of her eyes warned Dayla that she had crossed the line. Nonetheless, she felt no fear, no intimidation, only a clear resolve that it was time to end the charade. She would not be conditioned like a lab animal and if it meant leaving all she knew behind, so be it.
Sidling off the bed, the woman paused to cast Dayla a backward glance. “Report here tomorrow for your evaluation. We may need to make some adjustments with your treatment.”
You haven’ t heard a word I said, Dayla thought as the woman vanished through a concealed exit. And you never will. This is all nothing but a farce.
Rising quickly from the bed, she stepped into a fan shower concealed behind a nearby oriental shade to rinse herself of the woman’s stink. Directing the cool water at her cunt, she still felt the sting of her dual penetration. Yes, she had wanted it, had relished the feel of submitting her body, and as long as she was able to make that choice, she would relinquish it to no one.
* * *
Stepping from the lift with a sense of relief, she hurried toward the door. It opened silently at her approach, the image of the stern brunette already waiting in the panel outside. “Looks like there’s been an adjustment to your treatment,” she said impassively. “According to your therapist, you’ll need another six sessions, perhaps more. We’d better set up your next appointment.”
Dayla tried to act nonchalant. “Well, we’re both committed to success. Sometimes it just takes a bit longer than expected.”
The brunette nodded approvingly. “Cooperation and willingness are always important.”
“Tomorrow should be fine,” Dayla said. “Same time.”
“Very well, we’ll expect you then.”
Measuring her steps, she walked down the corridor until she reached the exit into the coffee house. Only when she stepped into the bustle of sound and movement did she exhale and promptly rushed out into the street, narrowly missing a nannypod decorated in the same yellow pattern worn by the ingratiatingly grinning parents.
* * *
The city’s glinting towers soared into the bronze evening sky. Searchlights scythed the night, bisecting an endless swarm of commuter hops. A faded wash of stars faintly glimmered in the distance, their brilliance stripped by the glare of the sprawling metropolis. From the solitude of a perimeter way station, Dayla restlessly paced, watching for the midnight taxi with furtive, darting glances. Commuter trains ran only during peak traffic periods, the automated stations deserted after hours. She half expected a patrolman’s hand to seize her shoulder and question her about her solitary presence, but concealed within the park-like strip flanking the waiting area, she remained unobserved.
A furtive noise caught her attention. Anxiously, she scanned the area, the dim landscape lighting creating a disconcerting mosaic of light and shadow. A cat scurried by with a limp object clamped in its jaws and quickly vanished into a bank of blooming shrubbery. She turned in time to meet the oncoming beams of the taxi.
Her heart fluttered as she watched the gullwing vehicle approach with scarcely a whine from its booster engines. The taxi pulled up to the station entrance, its silently rising doors resembling a bird of prey. She waited to make sure no one had followed before approaching.
“Is this the taxi for Dayla Madlur?” she asked, crouching to peer through the open window at the driver.
An unpleasant ferret face stared back at her from beneath a severe crop of iron gray hair. The man’ s pasty skin and pale, squinty eyes instantly labeled him a nightowl. Doubts plagued her. The driver could be a bootlegger, notorious for picking up customers and robbing them. She had to be sure this was her friend’s contact.
“Look, lady,” the driver mumbled, annoyed at her hesitation. “Let’s dispense with the bullshit. I’ve got half a dozen bookings waiting.”
“Who’s your contact?”
He gestured impatiently. “Lucie Quintero. Okay? If you’ re still not convinced then run the damned scan and let’s go. The only bootlegger you’ re going to find is the one lurking in your head.”
She fumbled for the wafer thin telvid in her clutch and accessed a security channel. Within moments, the driver’s ID scrolled down the miniature screen. Satisfied, she scrambled into the plush chamois interior of the back seat.
“Seventy credits up front,” the driver said, his eyes squinting into the rearview mirror. Dayla swallowed her protest and pressed her thumb against the debit pad located in the armrest console. Silently the gullwings closed, the sleek car a mile down the road before she realized they were moving.
The journey passed in silence through the deserted woodlands surrounding the city. Dayla watched the retreating towers through the tinted window, the jagged skyline as consistent and orderly as every detail of the place that only pretended to be her home. Drained and weary, she leaned back against the plush seat and shut her eyes. Though the gentle motion of the car relaxed her, sleep was impossible as her mind continuously churned. Even at high speed, it would take at least an hour to reach Lucie’s rural retreat. Though she knew she had taken a risk by calling her friend from the city, there was no way she could stay on the chance that she would be picked up after the incident at the club. At Lucie’s, sanctuary awaited, a sanctuary for mind and body far from paranoia of the city.
A cough from the driver distracted her. “It’ll be another seventy credits at drop off.”
She sat up. “What the hell? What kind of scam is this? I thought the price had been agreed in advance.”
“And you were damned lucky I owed Lucie Quintero a favor,” he retorted. “You think I’m in this game for recreational purposes? Nobody makes a decent living from running straight fares. I make it my business to know my cargo and right now, I’m having second thoughts about you.”
“Would you mind telling me what you’ re talking about?”
The man’ s eyes glinted in the mirror. “You’re a club member, a rehab. Had one jump a fare a few month
s ago. Only time I ever got duped. My pick up, so the Feds were over me like flies. Yeah, I’m a midnight taxi, and I’ll take just about any fare, but you rehabs are too risky. Money’s not worth it.”
“How did you discover this information? As you undoubtedly know, ID checks don’t register rehabs.”
“There’s no such thing as trust in this world, lady. Maybe you ought to be more careful the next time you make phone calls to friends.”
“What the hell are you talking about? I can’t believe Lucie would…”
An alarm trilled from the softly illuminated dashboard. The driver stared at the blipping tracker scope and angrily shook his head. “Shit!” he cried, slamming a button with his thumb. “I knew it! Fed patrol ship two miles ahead of us. Let’s hope we’re not in for a social call.”
He abruptly careened off the road into a dense copse of trees and shut down, the motion so abrupt she felt momentarily nauseous. She watched him pull a tiny, pulsing instrument from a concealed compartment and place it on the dashboard. “Sensor deflector. Cost me a fucking fortune, but it’s the only way I can stay in business.”
Seconds later, the ominous, staccato rhythm of the patrol ship filled the air. Dayla watched anxiously through the canopy of trees as the craft hovered above the road and swept the immediate area with a strobing red beam. At one stage the patrol ship approached within yards of where the car was concealed, hesitated and returned to the road. Only when it finally flew north toward the city did she dare to breathe.
“Close one,” the driver muttered. “Too damned close. Those newfangled security sensors combine body heat with brainwave detection. Bastards can pick up an ant a mile away.” He turned and stared at her. “Better pay me those seventy credits now.”
* * *
The driver waited fifteen minutes before returning to the road. Dayla’s fingers clutched the armrest as he ignited the thrusters and sent the car rocketing at one hundred sixty miles per hour. The pitch-black countryside sped past in a blur with only the occasional smudge of light from isolated residences. Free from the city glare, stars shone brilliantly in the moonless sky, the constellations reaching like vast jigsaw pieces. At length, the terrain transformed into dense forests and undulating hills. The driver slowed and followed an unmarked gravel turnoff that sloped gently into a secluded valley.
