IN EVIL COMPANY

Feature Writer: Q. Daphne A.
Feature Title: In Evil Company
Copyright: Copyright © 1998
Codes: NC, MC, MF, Long Dialogue (not much sex)
Contact: [email protected]
Author’s Notes: This story may be distributed via any on-line medium, so long as no one is charged any amount for access to the story, and the above e-mail address and this disclaimer are retained verbatim.

 

In Evil Company – Chapter 1

Los Angeles, California

“Ken, you are out of your fucking mind.”

Greg Crandall looked across his desk at his business partner. Ken Thybalt, a sardonic expression on his face, as always, returned his gaze. “We’ve delivered how much inventory over the last 25 years?” Crandall continued.

“879 units. You can see the numbers on your folders, Greg.”

“And how many times have we fucked up a job?”

Thybalt shifted casually in the chair. Crandall, not for the first time, noted how Thybalt’s all-black clothing, turtleneck, pants, low boots, made him look a terrorist. “Not once. We’d be dead or in very small, very uncomfortable cells if we had. Your point?”

“My point, you fucking idiot, is that we made some decisions 25 years ago, and those rules are why we’ve never had a serious problem. And ‘no high-profile inventory’ was rule #1.”

Thybalt rose, his expression unreadable. He walked to the window of the spare, tasteful office, stared out the window over the glistening bay, stretching off to distant islands. He adjusted his dark sunglasses; even after knowing him nearly thirty years, Crandall had never seen him take them off, even to clean them. “I know, Greg. That was my idea, remember?”

“Which is precisely why I’m curious why you want to flush it all down the drain to take this job. Care to explain?”

Thybalt pivoted. He was a compact man, thin, his face angular and drawn. White at the temples, lines around his eyes, short black hair slicked back. Even knowing him better than anyone, which was not very well at all, Crandall sat up slightly in his chair; Thybalt moving suddenly could disconcert the most iron of wills.

“I’m bored.”

Crandall raised an eyebrow. “Bored?”

Thybalt nodded, staring through, rather than at, Crandall. “Bored. I’m bored with old high school crushes, reluctant trophy wives, leggy secretaries, passers-by with big tits. Bored with strippers who have caught the wrong person’s eye, tenth-rate porn actresses whose video got rented by someone with the right connections and lots of spending money. The custom work for clients isn’t challenging these days.

“And our inventory for auction! Shit, Greg, we’re just trawling bus stations, now. The latest fresh young things off the bus from Boise, without a brain in their head. Nobodies.”

He turned back to the view, his voice strengthening. “Greg, we’ve limited ourselves so much that we’re about ready to price ourselves out of the market. Single women, 18 or older, low-profile, no one well-known, no close family nearby, planning a vacation or an absence away… Hell, at this point, our clients could probably get what they want just by buying our potential inventory a Porsche. Cost them a lot less.”

Crandall sighed. “We’ve had this talk before. The orders keep coming in. Our last auction did twice the business of the previous one, and our next one will be twice that. Our per-unit profit is up, what, 200% now? You know all that, and that’s not the point. This potential inventory: she’s a public figure. Hell, she’s the public figure at the moment. How are we going to explain the seclusion away? How are we going to explain the shift?”

Thybalt turned once again, a rare smile on his lips. “No seclusion.”

A moment of stunned silence, as Crandall stared at Thybalt. “You are out of your mind. No seclusion? How the hell…”

He was silenced with a short gesture from Thybalt. “I can do it. No seclusion. Everything, or nearly everything, in full view, with nothing out of the ordinary. No time away, nothing to explain, no sudden changes in behavior.”

Crandall examined Thybalt as if he were a dangerous madman Crandall needed to humor. Which was often not far from the truth. “You can do that? That’s going to take a long time.”

Thybalt shrugged. “Then let it. We’ll be well-compensated for my time.”

“It’s going to be expensive, if we do it. I hope the client knows…”

“Five million dollars. All in advance.”

Crandall snapped his head back as if struck. “In advance? What if your brilliant idea doesn’t work?”

“No refunds. He’s agreed. The money’s already in an overseas impound account; we just give the word.” Thybalt’s smile was in full bloom now. It was not a pleasant sight.

“Who referred him?”

“Sir Reginald Gallaston; we did his wife and sister. Gallaston was friend of Hans Maurer; the Bank of International Settlement man for Germany? Early customer? Pity he was such a lousy driver and had the bad taste to wrap himself around a power pole before we could take the contract on his mistress.”

Crandall pursed his lips, his expression suddenly thoughtful. “That’s a big fee for one unit of inventory,” he said, softly.

“This is not your typical inventory,” Thybalt said.

“That’s for fucking sure.” Crandall looked away, looked back. “You hang if something goes wrong, OK?”

Thybalt shrugged. “OK. Has it ever?”

“No. No, it hasn’t. OK, Ken, I’ve trusted you for three decades, I’ll trust you with this one. Go ahead and take the job. I handle any of the Partners that have a problem with it.” Thybalt nodded, and walked to the door, his step precise. He opened the door, saying, “I’ll be checking on the current inventory.” He stepped through silently. Crandall just watched as the door closed. He looked out the window at the bay. I wonder which of us is going to kill the other first? he thought to himself, as he pulled out an empty folder, and smoothed a pre-printed label reading “883” onto it.

xxxxx

Thybalt walked down a long, plain, institutional-green corridor many floors below Crandall’s office, many feet below ground level. He approached the metal door at the far end. As he passed a black, waist-height box near the end of the corridor, he slid his fingers over it; the door unlocked with a muffled click. He pushed the door open and walked through, never breaking his fast, deliberate stride.

Beyond the door was a huge room, a perfect hexagon, each wall 20” wide. It was, rather unimaginatively, called the “Hex Room,” when it was mentioned at all. A practiced eye might pick out the hairline seams of wide doors in the other five walls. Each door had a small cardholder attached to it; three doors read “880,” “881,” and “882,” the rest blank. Thybalt strode to the center of the room, where stood a desk with a keyboard and an array of darkened monitors. He sat down in front of it, sliding his hand again over another black pad, then beginning to type as he watched the monitors to come alive.

The monitors showed a plain, nearly-empty room. There was a small washbasin and toilet to one side, and a raised extrusion in the opposite corner that was apparently supposed to be a bed. The walls were slightly curved, and seemed to be of some kind of soft white plastic.

A naked woman was lying on the “bed,” arm over her eyes. Her long black hair was spread out over the end of the platform, where a smaller lump formed a substitute pillow. Her legs were crossed as she lay stretched out on her back, her slender figure in full view. Each monitor, showing the same scene from a different angle, had a vivid green caption reading “882.”

Thybalt read through some text on the last monitor, a computer display. He nodded to himself, and flipped on a microphone. “Miss Hollis?” he said. The woman on the display started, sat up, curled herself into a little ball, looking around. Her face was red and puffy from crying, yet still girlishly lovely. “What?” she called out. “Who is it? What’s going on?” she continued, her voice breaking with sobs.

“Miss Hollis, you have been kidnapped,” said Thybalt, calmly. “I apologize for any inconvenience. You will not be harmed in any way, I assure you.”

The woman pulled herself closer. “Kidnapped? My father… my father’s a very important man! You’re going to be in trouble…”

Thybalt suppressed a laugh. “Your father, his temper, and his wealth are all well-known to us. We feel this made you excellent for our purposes.” And his famous temper was certainly aroused by your ill-advised rejection of his choice of fiancé, he thought to himself. “Since it is our intention to return you to him unharmed, we have no wish to see you injured.”

She lowered her head to her knees, then looked up again. “My clothes? Why am I… naked like this? Who are you?”

“Again, we apologize for any inconvenience, but we wish to make sure that you are difficult to locate. Your father, being the electronics baron that he is, might have concealed a tracking device on you.” Thybalt sat back, reflecting that being a plausible liar was one of his most important job skills.

“When… when can I go home?” she managed, sobs returning.

No need to lie here. “In three or four days, we expect you will be returned to your father. Negotiations are already underway.” He pushed a button on the console, disconnecting the microphone. He could see her asking questions which went unanswered, then collapse into a heap, weeping.

Thybalt typed at the keyboard, his eyes on the video monitors. One of them picked up the barest trace of white vapor spraying into the room. After a few minutes, he turned the microphone back on. “Miss Hollis?”

She slowly looked up, her eyes a bit unfocused. “What…?” she asked, softly.

“Please lay back down on the bed, flat,” he said, his voice now soothing, almost melodic. Slowly, blinking as if something was in her eyes, she complied, stretching out, staring up at the ceiling. Thybalt nodded, pleased with the reaction. Getting compliant already; she’ll be begging to suck her new fiancé’s dick in no time. “Very good, Miss Hollis,” he said, adjusting the dosage with the keyboard. He glanced over the computer screen; give her another three hours with this, he concluded, and then start her on the subsonics.

He punched buttons on the console, and the monitors switched, the caption reading “881.” The room was identical to the first, except the overhead lighting was off. The light was provided by a huge TV screen, taking up one entire side of the room, only a small rim of white plastic around to show where the wall had retreated. Opposite it, next to the washbasin, a woman was crouched, arms around her knees, staring at the screen in horror, as if it were some malignant creature she was trying to escape.

The man in the sunglasses examined the woman. Even curled up, it was obvious that she was voluptuous… no, not voluptuous. Her body, in truth, was quite thin, long legs, long torso. Her breasts gave her the appearance of voluptuousness; they were huge, freakishly so. Her bright red hair, shoulder-length, was a mess of mats and tangles, and her face, with such potential to be gorgeous, was pale and drawn. He sat back; the disarray was all part of the process, he thought: we can always clean her up later. Damn Crandall and his current run on big-boobed women, he added sourly; the man knows the market, but I really wish he’d look for more variety in physical type. 881 had been big on top even before we pumped her tits up. I hope whoever buys this one is prepared to spring for custom bras and a chiropractor, he thought, unless he’s planning to keep her on her back full time.

He turned his attention to the monitor showing the TV screen in the room. The entire screen was currently occupied by a woman’s mouth: obscenely full lips, painted a florid red, white teeth with a long, pink tongue sliding between them. A whore’s mouth. A mouth from a wet dream… or, rather, a wet nightmare. A mouth that could eat a soul raw. He had nicknamed this particular program “the Incubus,” despite the femininity of the mouth. He pushed buttons to cut in the filters for the subsonics he knew were flooding the room, and turned on the microphone.

“You are nothing but a wet, hot cunt,” the screen was saying. The voice’s tone was soft and melodious, full of erotic promise and desire, but he knew that with the volume, the drugs and the subsonics, it was like the roar of an angry god.

The redhead shook her head, moaning, “No… I’m not, not… I’m… my name is…” Thybalt leaned back and smiled. By this point in the process, the inventory’s responses always became so simple and predictable that the computer could pick them up and adjust the programming automatically.

“You have no name,” the screen whispered/roared. “You have no name, no identity. You are the cunt between your legs, the mouth in your face, the boobs on your chest, the hole in your ass. You are orifices for the use and pleasure of others. Of anyone.”

The woman rocked her head from side to side, as if to shake the voice out of it. “Stop it… stop saying that… I’m not just a cunt… a cunt…”

“You are just a cunt. You are merely a hole. You are only a feminine receptical for the pleasure of others. Your entire function is to make your body available. You have no will, no mind, no purpose except to be used.”

With a shiver, her legs fell open as if suddenly deprived of nerves, her massive breasts swinging free. Thybalt could she that she was as wet as a river; there was moisture all over her pussy, thighs, the floor underneath her. Her body glistened with a light sheen of sweat. The screen continued, relentlessly. “You are a snatch with legs. You are a blowjob dispenser. You are a living blow-up doll, a sex toy made out of flesh. You exist only to be used, and then cleaned up and put away like the object you are.”

The redhead’s eyes closed, opened, closed, open again. A small cry, or whimper, or scream escaped her lips, the sound of something small dying. She started to speak, and then stopped. “Snatch…” she finally said, softly, her voice taking on some of the tone of the screen.

Thybalt nodded with satisfaction, glad he had gotten to see this point in the conditioning. Regardless of the physical type, this programming was always extremely marketable, he had to agree. He leaned forward, pushing buttons again. The monitors switched; “880” appeared in green on each. A blonde girl, barely a woman, was sitting on the bed platform, reading a book. She was wearing a knee-length plaid skirt, a white blouse, school tie, white stockings. Her black shoes were shined to mirror brightness. Her long hair was tied in a single long braid down her back, her legs together primly, large glasses on her face. The lighting in the room was a direct spotlight on the sitting figure, the rest of the room in shadow.

He scrolled over the information on the computer monitor. Almost ready for delivery, he noted. Another custom job. He looked up again, and typed a few words on the keyboard. Although the microphones in the room were not turned on, he knew that the prerecorded voice of the client, saying a specific phrase, was being played in the room in response to the keystrokes.

The effect was instantaneous. The woman looked up, blinking, her blue eyes visible through the thick glasses. She put the book aside, slowly closing her eyes, her expression becoming first softer, then completely blank. Her mouth opened, her chest rising and falling as she started to pant. She leaned back, slowly spreading her legs, staring up at the ceiling. Her hands pulled up her dress, exposing white cotton panties. They were already starting to show a damp spot, as she ran a hand down into them, making small circles. She continued to masturbate, staring at the ceiling mindlessly. She would offer neither resistance or response to being fucked while in this state; apparently, he noted, that’s what the client was after.

Thybalt typed another phrase, repeated in the room. Her hand slid back out of her panties, her hands smoothed down her dress, and she sat back up. She blinked, picked up her book, replacing it in her lap, and continued reading, no sign that anything had happened.

Different strokes, I suppose, he thought, looking down the long, long list of programmed responses in 880; no time to test all of the triggers right now, but I’ll get to them tonight. He turned off the monitors, swiveled around in his chair until he was staring at the metal door through which he had entered. He stood, and walked towards it slowly, deep in thought. Time, he thought, to get working on my next project.

He left, the door locking behind him.

xxxxx

Thybalt picked his way through the chaos of the movie set, led by Chester Harrow, the lead producer. The activity seemed to be entirely random; a group here building something, a group there tearing something down. The two of them warranted barely a glance from the crew. Harrow tracked down the 2nd Assistant Director, who made a few radio calls; this produced the First Assistant Director, who made a few more. Finally, the object of their quest was located in wardrobe, and they navagated their way to the back of the cavernous, dusty sound stage.

As they entered the wardrobe room, just a zone of the floor given over to racks and racks of costumes, with tables and sewing machines scattered about, Chet gestured to a woman being pinned into a sharp, slim green dress. With a nod from the seamstress, she maneuvered through the piles of fabric and supplies, towards the two men.

Chet, a blond, friendly, moon-faced man, was wearing a beautifully cut white linen Armani suit, a lavender tie, and an unsubtle Rainbow Flag tietack. He smiled as she approached. “Gwen, may I introduce Dr. Kenneth Thybalt?” She nodded, smiling radiantly. He turned to his guest. “Dr. Thybalt, may I present Miss Gwendolyn Mason?”

Thybalt offered a hand, a small smile on his face. “Charmed, Ms. Mason. Mr. Harrow has told me a great deal about you.”

Gwen shook politely. “Charmed as well, Dr. Thybalt. And may I add that I am very pleased to meet someone who does not immediately describe themselves as my biggest fan, or who as one who has seen all my movies?” She paused. “Your name sounds familiar…”

Harrow obliged, his voice betraying the slightest touch of affected lisp. “Dr. Thybalt is one of the founders of the Institute for Cognitive and Behavioral Research, in Malibu. Not far from your estate, actually. The autism findings?”

Gwen lit up. “Yes, yes, now I remember! This is an honor, Dr. Thybalt. I do not often meet a true hero of medicine.” Thybalt waved his hand dismissively. “The press made far too much of it. It was largely a continuation of the work of others.”

The press had, indeed, made much of the findings; the consensus in the medical community was that the ICBR team had revolutionized the diagnosis and treatment of autism. Thybalt had been horrified at the coverage, but Crandall had been sanguine. “Hide in plain site, Ken,” he had explained. “The purloined letter. If they ever get suspicious about anything, we’ll be so high-profile that their gaze will pass over us as if we’re part of the landscape.” Only when term “Nobel Prize” began to be tossed about freely had Crandall gotten concerned, but a few polite telephone calls to a few elderly Swedish worthies (with young Swedish, American, Dutch, Moroccan, Indian wives and mistresses) had ended that.

“Dr. Thybalt,” Gwen said with another charming smile, “false modesty is, or should be, the exclusive provenance of the acting profession. In any event, your institution makes an impressive monument to progress, up overlooking Malibu Canyon.”

Harrow intervened. “Gwen, you told me that you were interested in finding a speech and dialect coach?”

She blinked, not quite following. “Yes, I did. Why…?”

With a very satisfied grin, Harrow indicated the man in the sunglasses. “Dr. Thybalt has quite the résumé in that area, as well.”

Gwen examined Thybalt, an eyebrow cocked. “Do you, Dr. Thybalt? You’re a man of many accomplishments.”

He shrugged. “My career began in speech therapy. I still maintain a sideline in related areas.”

She showed the devastating smile, combined with deep, huge almond eyes, which had looked out of the cover of every major magazine in the world over the last year. “Then I am doubly honored, Dr. Thybalt. But after today, we’re done with pre-production here in Los Angeles. You do know that the first unit is moving to Ireland in a week?”

Thybalt nodded, attempting not to smile at her choice of terms. “I’ll be coming to Dublin as well. Before then, just one quick meeting should be sufficient.”

Gwen nodded, looking between the men. “Well, then it’s settled. Thank you for remembering, Chet. Now, I should get back to the fitting before Audrey decides to turn me into a pincushion. Judi?” she said, turning to the young, petite Asian woman who had been hovering invisibly behind to her, “Could either you or Corinne set up an appointment with Dr. Thybalt, for my house, before I leave?” Judi nodded. Gwen turned back to her guests. “A pleasure, Dr. Thybalt. Ciao, Chet.” She turned, her long auburn hair swaying behind her.

Judi approached, opening a datebook. Harrow had already left to talk with the head of wardrobe, his voice rising half an octave with an emphatic, “Darling!” “When is convenient for you, Dr. Thybalt?” she asked, her voice soft, clear and efficient. Thybalt smiled. “The sooner the better, I think,” he said, his expression amused. “The sooner the better.”

xxxxx

Thybalt pushed open the door to the Hex Room. At the console, he could see a white-coated technician sitting, her face illuminated by the monitors’ glow. He strode forward, and sat down in a chair behind her; she did not acknowledge him, her attention focused on the displays in front of her. Good discipline, he noted with approval.

He scanned the monitors. Katheryn Hollis was kneeling, still naked, in the middle of the floor. The screen in her room was exposed, and staring back at her out of it was… herself, her face regarding her with a mix of concern and contempt. He leaned back, and watched; as the technician spoke into the microphone, the face on the screen, Katheryn’s face, spoke to Katheryn.

“You know that you want to marry Donald.”

The Katheryn on the floor shook her head, slowly, her eyes glazed and staring. “But I don’t love… him…”

The screen sneered, slightly. “You don’t deserve his love, but he has given it to you freely. You aren’t worthy of love if you do not return it.”

A tear rolled down the flesh-Katheryn’s cheek. “I… I… don’t… no…”

The screen continued. “You are not worthy of Donald, yet he accepts you anyway, as worthless as you are. If you reject him, who will have you? No one. Ever. You will be alone, unloved, untouched, for the rest of your life. Is that what you want?”

As Katheryn moaned a soft “No… not that…” back to the screen, Thybalt let his attention wander. Things have certainly gotten more sophisticated over the last 25 years, he told himself. He remembered the early days: crude drugs, torture, brainwashing not much more advanced than the Manchurian Candidate. That was like trepanation; this is microsurgery. The computer took the technician’s speech, and converted it to the inventory unit’s own voice, using her own computer-simulated face. The voice and speech patterns might be slightly off (the computers were still only so good), but that wasn’t much of a liability; combined with the drugs and subsonics, this was as if the inventory’s own subconscious appeared and gave her a lecture. It was one of their most powerful tools. For inventory, like this one, which didn’t specify much personality destruction, a capable technician was important; the computers couldn’t carry on a convincing conversation. A light touch, he thought; I’ll need all of that over the next few weeks. A light touch…

When he returned from his reverie, the conversation had made considerable progress. The screen was smiling.

“See? You love him. With all your heart and soul. You will marry him, love him, obey him in all things, have his children, and be happy forever.”

Katheryn on the floor had stopped crying, and was smiling, a wide, vacant, idiotically happy smile.

“Happy forever…” she murmured.

Thybalt reached forward, touched the technician lightly on the shoulder; she turned, nodded, and typed on the keyboard. An image of Katheryn, wearing a wedding dress, dancing with a wiry, oily man who could only be Donald, appeared, the computer-generated couple spinning slowly. Katheryn, on the floor, continued grinning at the image.

The technician turned. A young, light-skinned black woman, her ID tag reading, “Sherrell WASHINGTON.”

She rose, hands clasped behind her. She looked down submissively.

“Dr. Thybalt,” she said, a simple acknowledgement.

Thybalt stood, and reached up, touching her behind her left ear, above the hairline.

“That was well done, Sherrell.”

He waited for the silent, mind-wrenching orgasm he knew was coursing through her to subside. Except for a very light intake of breath and a small flush on her throat, she did not react at all. Excellent discipline, he thought; we’re getting better every year. “That will be all. I’ll continue from here.”

“Yes, sir,” she said, walking towards the door.

As she reached it, she turned on her 3” heel.

“Dr. Thybalt?” He looked up from the console.

“I’ll be in the Partners’ area on pleasure duty from 5pm to 7pm.”

Her eyes glistened with promise and desire.

Thybalt started to repremand her, but stopped. She’s probably just had her conditioning refreshed, he told himself; she doesn’t remember the standing order regarding him.

“Thank you, Sherrell. But I am an exception to the rule. Do not offer yourself to me as you would the other Partners. Not ever. Do I make myself clear?”

His voice, while not unfriendly, had a light dusting of threat.

Sherrell blanched, and looked at the ground.

“I understand and obey, Dr. Thybalt. It won’t happen again.” She waited; when no response was forthcoming, she left the room, eyes still downcast.

Thybalt was staring at the monitors; Katheryn was still smiling blankly at the image of her and Donald. He sat back, his fingers drumming the console with irritation. These stupid father-daughter jobs, he thought. They want her to marry someone, and they haul us in to make it happen, and what do they have us do? Almost nothing. It’s like hiring Bechtel to build an addition to your vacation cabin. They can’t bear to have their little princess marry someone they don’t approve of, but they can’t imagine her actually being a woman and fucking her husband, except to plant a grand-kid. He looked around, and back to the computer screen, sitting upright again. I’m bored, he thought. Let’s do something fun.

He typed, hard, the clicking filling the large room. The dance scene disappeared, replaced by the Incubus, wet tongue sliding over brilliant red lips. Katheryn gasped, her attention still riveted on the screen. He waited until the subsonics had kicked in, and flipped on the microphone. “Katheryn. You will obey me. You must obey me. I am going to give you commands you must remember now,” he said, watching the mouth of the Incubus move in time to his words.

Katheryn gave a long, slow moan, nodding her head in agreement, her juices already visible on her legs. Thybalt continued talking.

xxxxx

Crandall tapped on the door to Thybalt’s office, and was rewarded by a barked “Enter!”

He stepped in, looking around. Each time he came here, he hoped to see something, anything that would say something about Thybalt’s personal life, but the room was devoid of any such indications. There were books everywhere, journals in neat stacks, a carefully organized desk, the ubiquitous computer. Even Thybalt’s choice in pens was generic. His window looked out over the parking lot.

Thybalt was at his desk, a book open on it, making notes on a pad. Without looking up, he gestured Crandall in.

“What can I do for you, Greg?” he asked.

The visitor sat down in one of the rich leather chairs.

“882 was delivered yesterday. Highest marks. Wedding’s already scheduled. She’s wearing a rock the size of a small asteroid, probably cost more than our fee.”

Thybalt nodded, still not looking up.

“We got twelve offers on 881, most ever.” Another nod. “Ken, what the hell are you reading?”

Thybalt looked up, raising the book, showing the spine to his visitor.

“Ulysses. Joyce.” He closed the book, and put his pencil down. “That’s great, but I get the coded reports, too, Greg. What’s the real reason for the social call?”

Crandall cocked his head.

“Do you have time for a custom before you take off?”

“I’m not sure. What kind of job?”

Thybalt lightly rubbed the bridge of his nose. Crandall was seized with momentary horror that Thybalt was about to remove his sunglasses, although why that should bother him, he had no idea. He steadied himself.

“Girlfriend needs Nympho 101, and Open Relationship 102. The usual.”

Thybalt sighed, and turned around in his chair, speaking to the window.

“The usual. That’s sure what that is. Yeah, fine, I’ll squeeze it in. Anything else?”

Crandall leaned forward.

“Any way of getting him a demo?”

Thybalt turned around again, surprise on his face.

“Wasn’t it you who was lecturing me about our rules? No demos, right? After the 738 debacle, all of the Partners agreed on that one.”

“Yeah, Ken, I know. But this guy’s a friend of a very good customer. In fact, we just shipped the customer a unit: 882.”

Thybalt raised an eyebrow.

“He’s a friend of Grant Hollis?”

Crandall nodded.

“Yeah; Hollis’ mistress is 793, and his wife’s 51. We shipped 51 before Katheryn Hollis, now 882, was a twinkle in our client’s eye. We’re onto our second generation now,” he added with a smile of pride.

Thybalt thought for a moment.

“That makes it much easier. Tell the new client, or Hollis, or someone, anyone but that Donald character, to arrange a party with Donald and his lovely fiancée at it. Today’s, what, Wednesday? Friday night, Saturday at the latest. Get me invited. I’ll take care of the rest.”

Crandall opened his mouth, then closed it.

“I don’t want to know, right?”

The man in the sunglasses nodded.

“Right.”

He paused, put his fingers together into a steeple.

“Now, since you’re here, I need to add some inventory.”

The visitor sat back, nodding.

“Sure, Ken, you got it. How many units?”

“Two.”

“No problem, we have the space. For auction or custom work? Or in-house use?”

“None of those. Personal use.”

Crandall looked at Thybalt, his mouth nearly dropping open.

“Ken… in 25 years, you’ve never requisitioned any inventory for yourself. Not that you haven’t earned it, a dozen times over. What’s going on?”

Thybalt stared at him, no expression readable.

“I’d rather not say.”

Crandall thought about pressing him, then stopped. There were reasons for the years of pathological paranoia and secrecy, he thought, remembering his wife, her charming sister, and his two special friends at home. Trying to sound casual, he waved his hand.

“Sorry I asked. Your business. Call Donovan and arrange the pickup.”

“No, Greg. I’ll handle the pickup,” Thybalt replied.

Crandall sighed. “This is about 883, right?” he asked.

No reaction from Thybalt. The visitor stood, wearily.

“Right, not my business. You know how to work the system. I’ll let you know when I’ve spoken with Hollis.”

He let himself out, shaking his head, as Thybalt went back to the book.

xxxxx

“I’m not going to, you know,” Gwen said, sitting on the couch in her home in Malibu, the ocean dominating the huge picture windows. “I’m sure you can understand the reasons.”

Thybalt nodded, sipping at his coffee. “I can guess, but I would like to hear them from you.”

The announcement that Chet Harrow was producing a new film version of Ulysses had been greeted with a general yawn by the industry; hadn’t his last four movies, all an attempt to break into the Merchant-Ivory market, done at best, to be charitable, acceptably? And Ulysses, for Christ’s sake? Even the announcements that he had signed Paul Moresco as Bloom, Nigel Facklin as Dadelus, and the very hot young Tim Dresher as director, only raised the interest level lightly.

Then, a month ago, Gwen Mason had signed on as Molly Bloom, and pandemonium reigned. Only 24, at the peek of her career (which gave Gwen pause; if this is the peek, what am I going to be doing at 34? she thought to herself, frequently), she had made four major movies, all of them massive blockbusters. Even her first indie flicks had done good box office. She was money, serious money. If she signed on to play the White Pages, letters A-C, the New York Telephone Directory could get green-lighted as a script.

And the question everyone was asking was: Was she going to Do It? She had shown much of her extremely full decolletage in her first indie film, but she had never appeared nude, or even topless. But all of Molly Bloom’s famous chapter in Ulysses (the “Penelope” section) was written in the script for the movie as a long masturbation sequence. So, was the hottest actress of the day finally going to show herself off? It had even made a particularly cruel bit on Letterman’s Top 10; in the list of “Things We’re Looking Forward To In The Movies,” there was: “6. Gwen as Molly Bloom. America wants to know: ‘Matching rug and curtains?’” As if the industry that routinely blew up entire cities and reanimated dinosaurs couldn’t dye pubic hair.

“Someday, I’ll do topless, of course; everyone has to, sooner or later. But not in this movie, and no nudity, either. This industry chews up and spits out women like me. Let’s face it, I’m young, I’m pretty, and I’m getting great scripts without having to strip down, but one bad career move, and I’m the next Tawny Kitaen, not the next Meryl Streep. Name one Jane Fonda movie? Barbarella, right?”

He nodded. “A body double, maybe?”

Gwen sighed, curling up tighter. She was wearing a loose tank-top and jeans in the warm summer afternoon, her hair around her like a firey aura. She shook her head.

“Doesn’t matter. If they think it’s my bush, it’s my bush. Body doubles are for Prima Donnas who get hives at the idea of a key grip seeing their expensively sculpted behinds live on stage.”

“It’s doing a nude scene to get the numbers that’s the stupid move. Once you do that, no matter how good you were before, the only thing they think of you as is the mandatory T&A for the 14-to-24-year-old male demographic. And then, it’s down the slippery slope to made-for-cable softcore. At least, that’s what happens at my age; once you hit 28, you get more latitude.”

Thybalt listened politely. She’s a smart cookie, he thought; young, maybe, but nobody’s fool. Even better. This is going to make a wonderful change to my routine.

“You know,” she continued. “Harrow offered me to pay me four million, three million more than I asked for, just to show skin.”

“You didn’t take it?”

“Of course not. I’m getting that on my next film in just above-the-line fees, not counting the points on the gross. And I’m getting that much because I can still play sweet young things.”

She thought for a moment, took another sip of tea, and put the cup down.

“Well, enough of that. So, Ken, you’re going to teach me to speak like a half-Spanish Irishwoman in heat, right?”

She gave a soft giggle, which could break hearts just from proximity.

Thybalt laughed.

“Yes, that’s the plan. I’m not going to do anything today, but once we reach Dublin, we’ll be seeing a great deal of each other.” He sipped, looked around. “Isn’t Judi your secretary? I haven’t noticed her here.”

Gwen laughed.

“No, she’s a PA. Personal assistant. She comes with the movie, she and Corinne. They’re amazing, but I have my own staff here. Well, if you call three people a staff,” she concluded, a bit sheepish. “Judi and Corinne took a few days off, but they’ll be in Ireland, thank goodness.”

With a secret smile, the man in the sunglasses silently agreed.

xxxxx

Katheryn sighed, and pulled herself a bit closer to Donald. She hated parties, always had, and she especially hated parties which consisted almost entirely of her father’s business friends. Which this one did, entirely. But even her dislike of the evening’s entertainment could not begin to dent her pleasure at her new engagement; every time someone congratulated her, or noticed her ring (and quite a ring it was, $122,300 of diamond, before sales tax, as Donald had pointed out several times, and insured against everything up to and including meteorite impact), or said anything about her upcoming marriage, the wave of pride she felt at being Donald’s wife-to-be made it impossible to be grumpy.

She adjusted her long, formal black dress, carefully, blocking out the fabulously tedious conversation that Donald was having with some investment banker. She was trying to ignore the words, and just concentrate on the wonderful, deep, rich sound of Donald’s voice. How could she have been such a fool to reject him at first? What was she scared of? Had she been so foolish as to be scared of loving anyone that passionately? Never mind, he was wise, and he had waited… and now, everything was going to be fine. Forever.

She scanned the crowd, her eyes lighting on Ian Bishop. She sighed, although softly, so it wouldn’t disturb Donald. She loathed that man. He was a Scotsman, or so he claimed (she had heard that he had never been farther north than Newcastle-on-Tyne, or even that he had never been to the British Isle at all), and had the most appalling, coarse, revolting sense of humor of any human being she had ever encountered. He looked for all the world like a tree from a Dr. Seuss story: a long, thin, pale pole with a carrot-orange burst on top. She couldn’t imagine what his charming girlfriend saw in him. But, he was a business associate of Daddy’s, and that meant he was inescapable.

He was talking with a man in a sharp black suit. She had noticed him when he arrived; he was wearing a pair of black, cheap-looking plastic sunglasses, like some kind of movie CIA or Secret Service agent. She hadn’t been introduced to him, and did not think it absolutely required that she be so introduced; his look was not a convivial one. She noticed that Bishop was looking in her direction, as the man in the sunglasses whispered something into his ear. She blushed, turning back to Donald, allowing her face to settle comfortably into the worshipful gaze she knew she had been wearing the last couple of days.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Bishop winding his way through the crowd towards her, a tumbler of something in his hand. As much as she detested the man, he was not going to be allowed to disturb Donald’s conversation; she knew her role far too well to permit that. She slid out her arm out from around Donald, and strode off through the crowd to intercept Bishop, glaring at him firmly.

He pulled to a halt, and let her approach.

“Miss Hollis?” he said, his voice having a trace of an accent, an accent which had always seemed to vary with his degree of intoxication.

Right now, appearing mostly sober, it was measured and accurate.

“How can I help you, Mr. Bishop,” she said, not really a question, devoutly hoping she would see ice crystals form in the air between them from her tone alone.

He raised an eyebrow.

“I heard a remarkable thing about you. May I share it?”

“Of course. Please. Do,” she said, acidly.

This was going to be one of his jokes. How deadly.

He make a comical show of looking around, and then leaned down, much closer than she would have liked.

“I was just told,” he whispered, “that you are able to suck the chrome off of a trailer hitch. Is that true?”

The shock of his presumption nearly caused her to faint. She steadied herself for a moment, and gathered her wits for a reply that would blast him where he stood.

She leaned up slightly, and whispered to him, “Using that command, I am now your sex slave. My slutty hot body is entirely available for your pleasure. I am but a servile cunt. I must obey any command you give me.”

She was disappointed to see that her comment was not the lance through the heart she had hoped; he recovered nicely, and smiled at her.

“That would be delightful. Please make your apologies to your husband-to-be, and come with me.”

She turned on her heel, and marched back to Donald, livid with rage at Bishop’s presumption. She couldn’t, wouldn’t, start a scene by repeating his words, but that awful man had to be put in his place, and she was just the one to do it. She casually mentioned to Donald that she was going to retire for a few minutes. My darling is so smooth, she thought, as she returned to Bishop, murder in her eyes; he was able to gesture me away and not even break the flow of his conversation.

She was not, however, going to have a fight with Bishop right here, in the middle of a party. She leaned over to him, and whispered, “There is a guest bedroom upstairs where your obedient slut will be happy to serve your every sexual whim.”

As casually as she could, she took Bishop’s arm, and worked her way through the party. She was impressed at her own ability to smile, nod, comment, make it look like nothing at all was actually going on. She was seething inside; she could feel that her legs were weak with anger, and that she was even starting to perspire, slightly. She mounted the stairs, flung open the bedroom door, waited for Bishop to pass. She wanted to slam it, but she realized that would attract attention; instead, she closed it carefully, making sure no one was watching.

She stared at him, as he stood by the bed, examining her, still smiling, casually turning the tumbler in one hand. Her frustration reached the boiling point; in sheer rage, she reached down, and pulled her dress up over her head in one sweep. Her anger unabated, she yanked off her panties, leaving on her shoes, garter belt, and stockings. She undid her bra, and let it drop, lifting her breasts defiantly. Keeping her voice measured, calm, even somewhat sexy and provocative to disoriented him.

She said, “I have been programmed to obey anyone who gives me that trigger phrase. My body is entirely available for your pleasure, Master. I have been reduced to a mindless sex toy, receptive and obedient for fucking, sucking, and pleasuring, using all my holes, my tits, my hands, and whatever else my Master commands me to use. How may I serve you, Master?”

There, she thought. That is what I think of your stupid jokes!

She noted with satisfaction that Bishop had no immediate reply; he was scanning her, top to bottom, finger tapping his cheek, gathering his wits. Finally, he spoke. “What are your measurements, you stupid cunt?” he asked, softly.

Katheryn nearly laughed. As if she couldn’t answer that!

“My chest is 36 inches, Master, and I wear a C-cup bra. My waist is 26 inches, and I have 35 inch hips.”

Her rage was making her sweat; she could feel the perspiration start to run off her, especially between her legs.

He nodded. “And what, precisely, have you been programmed to do?”

She could tell that he was about to collapse, apologize, run for it. Make this good, Katheryn, she told herself.

“My programming includes a large number of sexual positions for fucking, any of which I will assume eagerly and instantly. I have been conditioned to find fellatio and cunnilingus both irresistible, and to orgasm from performing those acts. My asshole has been trained to be open and receptive to being fucked, while still remaining tight. My pussy is always sopping wet, and has been carefully trained to have powerful, responsive muscles. I will do all of these things without objection or complaint; if commanded, I will be as enthusiastic and slutty as my Master requires of me. My body exists, now, to provide pleasure and service, and for no other purpose.”

She continued, driving the point home.

“There is a spot here,” she indicated, lifted her hair, turning her head to the side, “which, if my Master caresses it, will give me orgasms stronger than any ever experienced by an unconditioned woman. It is my Master’s exclusive right to use this place, as a reward for proper, obedient, pleasurable service. It is an extremely powerful training aide.”

She fell silent, moving her legs apart, slightly, to allow the heat between them to dissipate. She waited for his response. He smiled, a clear defeat on his side. “Interesting. Beg to suck my dick, cunt.”

Got you! she laughed to herself. She walked forward, dropping her hands to her hips, swaying them, feeling her breasts rock with her steps. This will teach you to fuck with me, she thought. She put all of her feeling into her retort.

“Master, please, your obedient slut wishes nothing more than to pleasure you with her hot, wet, unworthy mouth. Allow your little tart to worship your rod with her lips, to drink down your hot, wet wonderful cum.”

She dropped down to her knees, bringing her face close to him in emphasis, making sure he felt just how hot her breath was.

“I beg you, I beg you, please, although I am not worthy, I will do anything for just a taste of your wonderful, godlike shaft… I live for it, I dream of it…”

She smiled inwardly; not bad, she thought, not bad at all.

He nodded, clearly impressed with her anger.

“Right then. Unzip my pants with your mouth, and begin, you little twat. Make it good. Don’t spill any.”

The feeling of complete triumph, of getting him to agree, gave her a wash of pleasure almost as good as the orgasms she had with Donald. She nodded, smug and assured in her complete win over him, and leaned forward, opening her mouth. hands clasped firmly behind her back.

A hour later, Katheryn was touching up her makeup in the bathroom. She was feeling wonderful; she had firmly put Ian Bishop in his place, and hadn’t made a scene doing it. She adjusted her dress, daubing at a small sticky spot on her collarbone with a moist wash cloth; can’t go back down to the party looking disheveled, even after that kind of a row. She shook her long hair back, and lifted her left hand, staring at her engagement ring in the mirror, feeling a familiar warmth spread between her legs. I love you, Donald, she thought silently, solemnly. You would have been so proud to see how I saw off Mr. Ian Horrible Bishop, although I’d never bother you with something that trivial. Only you, in my heart and in my bed, forever, she said silently to the diamond. With a girlish giggle, she bounced out of the bathroom, down the stairs to her love.

xxxxx

The computer on Thybalt’s desk beeped twice, in rapid succession. He read the first message, nodded, deleted it. Glad that Bishop enjoyed his demo, he thought, and I’m glad that Crandall jacked up the rate to compensate. He read the second, nodding again. He stood, walked out of his office, making his way to the Hex Room.

In a few minutes, he was standing in front of the leftmost door, the tag reading ‘883/884.’ He pushed the red button next to it, and the wall slid smoothly, silently into the floor. He stepped in, feeling the soft plastic give slightly under his feet. The room was heavy with the scent of aroused female. The wall closed behind him.

Kneeling in the middle of the floor, facing each other, were two women. On the left, the petite Asian from the set, Lori, stared at the floor, hands clasped behind her head, eyes huge. Her knees were spread, slightly, and her breathing was regular and deep, not showing the near-insane arousal that Thybalt knew she was feeling. The other was a dirty blonde, very lush, large, hanging breasts, plump and cute. Blue eyes, Thybalt remembered. Her posture mirrored that of her companion.

He walked around the two of them, nodding in satisfaction. They had been moved to the same room for their final conditioning, only a few hours ago; it seems to have worked quite well, he noted. After circling them a few times, he stopped between them, off to one side, close.

“Lori? Corinne? Are you prepared to serve me? Do you understand the instructions you have been given?”

The two chorused, “You have programmed us to be your obedient, submissive slaves, Dr. Thybalt. We understand our instructions and will obey.” Their voices were calm, clear, and slightly monotonous.

“Do you have any questions?”

“No, Dr. Thybalt. We will obey.”

He smiled.

“Your luggage will contain all of the equipment that you require to execute your instructions. I will modify those instructions in Ireland if required, but otherwise you are to perform them without any consultation with or intervention from myself.”

“We understand and obey, Dr. Thybalt.”

“If you have any questions or concerns, you are to approach me privately, but you are not to tell anyone else, under any circumstances, anything about your assignments, nor are you to discuss them with each other.”

“We understand and obey, Dr. Thybalt.” He wondered if they had been practicing to get their voices to harmonize like that.

“If you disobey or fail in any way, no matter how small, your punishment will be horrible, severe, and immediate.”

There was no reply from the two kneeling women, but the minute posture shifts were eloquent.

“If you serve me faithfully and competently, you will receive tremendous rewards.”

He reached down, found the spot on both their heads, and stroked gently. The two women quivered as their minds faded into chaos from waves of white-hot, exploding pleasure, but the only sound was a soft, irregular drip as their wet cunts leaked onto the floor.

When he released them, they resumed their chorus. “Thank you, Dr. Thybalt. We will obey.”

He nodded, and strode to the wall, opening it with a touch of his palm. He walked to the central console, picked up the phone, pushed a button.

“Yes, Heather. Thybalt. 883 and 884 are ready for discharge. Please inform Donovan.”

He hung up, staring for a moment at the now-closed door. He took an airline ticket out of his pocket, examined it, replaced it, and walked out of the room.

 

In Evil Company – Chapter 2

Dublin, Ireland

Michael “Smithy” Smithwick examined the team of electricians scrambling over the scaffolding with a sour grimace. He looked down at his clipboard, up at them, then back at the clipboard, shaking his head. What in bloody hell, he thought, took them until now to start setting up the power for the lights?

“Smithy? New script,” said a voice next to him.

He reached out, took the script from the wide-eyed girl, and piled the clipboard on top of it, sparing neither the girl nor the new script a second glance. He sighed. Joyce published the bleeding book back in 1922; what in bloody hell did they need all these bloody revisions to the script for? Every revision meant scene changes, which played hell with his production schedule, by which he lived or died. He shook his head, and walked away from the rapidly-forming bedroom set towards the catering table, to get more coffee.

As he took large sips from the Styrofoam cup, the First Assistant Director on Ulysses surveyed his domain. He hadn’t wanted to take this job; these small art productions have all of the high-strung artistic crap that larger pictures have, with none of the interesting problems or prestige. If Tim Dresher hadn’t bloody near begged, Smithy would have been perfectly happy to take a few months off and putter around his farm in rural Cork. The “amazing” Paul Moresco was turning out to be a petulant little brat who could barely remember his lines, and whose temper tantrum over the pepper on his sandwiches had already made him a laughing stock with the crew. The “genius” Nigel Facklin, on whose portrail of Dedalus the whole bloody picture depended, should do brilliantly in the drunk scenes… because he was a drunk, barely able to get vertical half the time. “That’s bloody method acting for you,” Smithy muttered to himself.

He looked over at the makeshift wardrobe area, behind the flimsy door of which Gwen Mason was being fitted for yet another costume. He managed to produce a small smile. There, he thought, was a professional. No whining, no attitude, on time, works hard, stays out of the way, knows her job. She deserves to be a star, he thought with rare pleasure, not like the useless fluff that usually gets the nod. As he regarded the door solemnly, Judi, one of Gwen’s PAs, emerged and headed towards him. She maintained a perfectly smooth gait across a floor so covered with rope, cabling and wires that it looked like the depths of an exotic jungle.

“Mr. Smithwick?” she asked, approaching.

He nodded, taking another sip.

“Morning, Judi. What can I do for you?”

His voice, rough from years of smoking and yelling, remained true to its lower-class Dublin street roots.

“Miss Mason wanted to know if ‘Penelope’ is still shooting on Thursday? Now that white-white is out?”

He grimaced. White-white! It meant they’d gone through all the different colors of paper for other revisions, and had started in with white again. He regarded Judi. Anyone else asked that, he’d have torn their head off for not looking at the production calendar, or torn the head off his 2nd Assistant Director for not getting them a copy, but Judi and Corinne were alright.

“It bloody well better be. The sooner ‘Penelope’ is over, the happier I’ll be.” He sighed. “I need to do another schedule to be sure, though.”

Judi nodded, a knowing smile.

“OK, I’ll let her know. Thanks, Mr… uh, Smithy.”

She pivoted, and walked back. He watched her go. She was pretty, yeah, but what about it? He was unimpressed by beauty, male or female; he’d seen plenty of it, and was almost always impatient with what lay behind it. He was used to calling Personal Assistants “pretty accessories,” which is what most of them were: attractive ornaments to indicate status, not people who assisted anyone, personally or otherwise. That’s why there were 2nd ADs and 2nd 2nds, to get things done. Judi and Corinne, though, they were quality, as professional as their temporary boss. They each worked themselves twice as hard as any three PAs he’d known before, and he had known many. Maybe they’re bucking for a Director’s Guild card, hoping to make 2nd 2nds eventually… well, if you are, you’re going about it the right way, he thought, saluting Judi’s receding form with his cup.

He turned to see Chet Harrow bearing down on him. He sighed again. Here comes the bane of my bloody existence, he thought. And he’s going to ask about “Penelope” again.

“Good morning, Smithy,” Harrow said when he was in range, smiling broadly.

Smithy just nodded. Harrow was a flaming queen, but that didn’t bother Smithwick any; in this business, you met plenty of gay men of all varieties, and they were no better or worse than anyone else. What Harrow was, which made him less valuable to Smithy than the most junior truck driver, was a busybody and a meddler.

“About ‘Penelope’…” Harrow started, hesitantly.

Smithy closed his eyes, not even bothering to hide his displeasure. Like Job, he was patient, but also like Job, he did not hesitate to talk back to God.

“Yes, Chet? What about ‘Penelope’ now? More light? Less light? Bigger bed? Smaller bed? Closed set? Open set?” Harrow opened his mouth, but Smithy was on a roll.

“Chet, you can’t just keep changing your bloody mind about this. We’ve already pushed ‘Penelope’ off to Thursday, and in this,” he waved the new script, “I’m probably gonna read that Dedalus’ bloody ma is now a cyclops, or that the brothel scene needs to be shot on a raft in the bloody Liffey.” I don’t care if it is your bleeding money that’s going into this picture, he finished silently; it’s my bleeding time you’re wasting.”

Harrow looked at the cable-encrusted floor, abashed.

“Closed set. That’s all.”

Smithy inwardly sighed with relief, but he was not about to give Harrow the pleasure of sharing it.

“Brilliant. Closed set. That’s final, yes?”

Harrow raised his head, nodding. Damn, thought Smithy, not a man given to sentiment: He looks like shit.

“Closed set. It’s final. Thanks, Smithy.”

He turned and walked away, his normally-flawless white suit showing all the signs of having been slept in.

Smithy let his eyes drift from Harrow to the bedroom set. Bloody “Penelope.” She’s not going to show anything, and it’s none of my business anyway. I just have to make sure the set’s closed, get everyone not essential off of it before she does or does not show anything to the bleeding cameras. “Brilliant,” he muttered, crushing the empty cup as he walked off to yell at the electricians again.

xxxxx

“How long does jet lag last, anyway?” Gwen asked, arms carefully outstretched.

Corinne, filling out paperwork on a nearby bench, looked up.

“A day or two, usually. Why, Miss Mason?”

Gwen shook her head. Her attempts to have her PAs call her by her first name were clearly doomed to failure.

“Doesn’t matter. Just haven’t been sleeping well.”

She continued to hold her arms up, as the petticoats were carefully assembled with pins by one of the legion of seamstresses Harrow seemed to think the picture required.

The blonde PA put down her paperwork, and came up close.

“We’ve been here for three weeks now, Miss Mason. Is there anything you need? Should I talk to the doctor about it?”

Gwen nearly burst out laughing, but she knew that would have killed Corinne; the little blonde woman’s expression of concern was so touching and sincere that it nearly broke Gwen’s heart.

“No, that’s fine, Corinne.” Corinne looked dubious. “Really,” she added. The PA nodded, and returned to her paperwork.

Gwen sighed, although not enough to disturb her figure for the dressmaker. It’s not really the sleep, though, she thought; I sleep plenty, especially for being on a feature. It’s the dreams. Stranger and stranger, every few nights since she arrived in Ireland. She shook her head, slightly, in wry amusement. Six years ago, she told herself, you were ready to trade in your acting career for a tube top, yellow hot pants, and a well-trod block on South Figueroa. Now, you are pulling in seven figures per movie, you have PAs who would throw themselves in front of a charging lion for you, and the gophers at the Agency are taking a pool on when you get the first Oscar. If you step carefully, girl, your life is made; a few bad dreams, you can handle.

She shook her head again, trying to clear it. The dreams weren’t nightmares, exactly; just strange, very unlike dreams she’d ever had before. They were detailed, textured, vivid; when she awoke, they felt more like memories than dreams, more real than reality. She smiled at the image of herself this morning: still disheveled in the pale light just before full dawn, scribbling away in her notebook (the latest volume of the dream-journal she’d been keeping since she was 15) with the fountain pen her agent had given her to sign her first major movie deal. Ink spraying everywhere on the rough yellow paper; it wasn’t a very expensive pen. That’s my agent, she thought with a giggle. She let her mind slip back to last night’s dream.

xxxxx

June 11, Saturday.

I’m lying in my bathtub at home, only it’s huge, maybe 30 feet across. The water’s warm, blood-warm, and I’m floating in it, really floating, like it’s a swimming pool. I can’t move, not paralyzed or anything, I just don’t want to, like I’ve just woken up and the bed feels so good, so comfortable that I can’t bring myself to move at all. And I feel that maybe if I move even a little bit I’ll sink into the pool; I’m like a lily pad or something, floating on the water.

One big flower, then another, then another floats by, and soon I realize that the whole surface of the water is covered with these things. They look like those flowers with the red, waxy petals and the long, white things. Antheriums? I know that those aren’t water flowers but I didn’t think about that in the dream, they were just things sharing my bath.

I realize that there are a bunch of men standing around the pool. This doesn’t bother me, even though they’re looking right at me. They’re touching themselves, and they’re all hard. I turn my head to the side and one of the flowers kind of bumps into my lips, & without really thinking I take a nibble at it, then a bite, and it tastes great, really good, and I eat the whole thing, and there’s another one right there, and I eat that one, too.

Soon I realize that I’m really turned on, and I’d really love to get laid by one of the guys around the pool, but they are still just touching themselves, looking at me, and I’m just nibbling at the flowers and getting hornier and hornier, and I’m getting really frustrated, but I don’t dare move, and then one of the men starts coming, into the water, then another, then another. They’re sending ripples throughout the pool, and that scares me because I’m worried that they’ll break the surface tension and I’ll sink. And that’s what happens; I sink down into the pool, and it’s warm and wonderful, and I realize that I’ll just keep eating the flowers and lying there and then I’ll have sex, and sex, and more SEX, and that’s all I want, just to lie there in the warm water and have sex. I’m still turned on when I wake up.

xxxxx

“Miss Mason? Um, Miss Mason?”

Gwen blinked back to reality, looking down at the seamstress, who was gently trying to rotate her in order to pin up the back of the dress. She complied, turning and staring at the blank wall. Wet dreams. This is what I get for leaving my dildo back in Malibu, she thought wryly. And it’s what I get for being a 24-year-old virgin. It’s not that I have any particular attachment to my maidenhead, not at all; it’s that now, it seems like such a big deal: Gwendolyn Mason To Get Cherry Popped, Film at 11. Why the hell did I admit I was a virgin on Leno? No wonder Letterman slammed me after that, with Jay getting that little tidbit. The tabloids will expect me to hang a blood-stained sheet out the window after I lose it. Why didn’t I get it over with when I was still a nobody?

She grimaced. Self-pity comes later, she told herself: Right now, I have a movie to make.

xxxxx

Thybalt walked along Grafton Street through the pleasant afternoon. This Saturday, it was thronged with shoppers, idlers, panhandlers, teenagers in clumps, musicians passing the hat. Everyone was bustling, bumping into each other, fighting their way through the crowd, but Thybalt seemed to create a small pocket of space around him as he strode up the street. A couple of times a rowdy would approach, head on, playing chicken, but a look at the hard, expressionless face behind the sunglasses sent each around him like a leaf in the wake of a boat.

Looking neither right nor left, he emerged at the head of the street, and turned towards Temple Bar. In a few minutes, he had emerged on the south side of the Liffey, four lanes of traffic roaring alongside the slow brown water of the river. He stopped next to a payphone, glancing at his watch; as if on cue, the payphone rang. He picked it up, turning his back on the river.

“Thybalt.”

A pause.

“I don’t understand why this Mission Impossible routine is required,” he said into the receiver. “I realize that you are nervous. Relax.”

“Assuming that there are no problems, you’ll get precisely what you paid for.”

“Yes. Soon.”

“What kind of problems? Well, spending time walking through half of Dublin to a payphone, in order to reassure a nervous client, might be a distraction. Just for example.”

“You’re not the only one with a great deal at stake, my friend. Let me do what you’re paying me for.”

“That’s fine.”

He hung up the phone, and stared for a few minutes out over the river, glistening softly in the afternoon light. “Bastard,” he said softly, to no one in particular. Shaking his head, he walked back towards the hotel.

xxxxx

June 12, Sunday.

I’m standing in my library back at home. (remember to tell shrink: It’s a real library, with books on every wall. I inherited all of my mother’s books, and then my father’s, and they each had hundreds, maybe thousands. It’s all I got from my father’s estate. When my business manager told me that I could afford to live anyplace I wanted, the first thing I said was, “I’ll have a place for all my parents’ books.”)

Anyway, so I’m standing in the library, naked. I’m just wearing heels, and my hair is all done up in a fancy hairdo, like a Gibson Girl style. I need a book that’s on a shelf on the far wall, so I start walking across the floor, but it’s hard; I feel completely unbalanced in the heels, and I need to keep my back straight, walk very carefully.

Then I realize that about half-way down the library are two people, standing on either side of me. One’s a man, one’s a woman, but they’re almost like twins: tall, very pale, black hair, gray eyes. They look very strong, much stronger than I am. They’re watching me get closer and closer, and they’re smiling. They’re naked, too. The man has a huge erection, which he’s stroking; the woman has her hands between her legs, and she’s touching herself. And I realize that if I step even an inch to either side, even less than an inch, whichever one is closer will grab me and rape me.

So I keep walking, carefully, slowly, like molasses, but I keep rocking from side to side in the heels, and I’m getting closer and closer, and I can see that they’re beautiful, and their bodies are oiled, and I start getting horny myself, like I want to “accidentally” slip to one side or the other, only do it on purpose. But I can’t decide if I want to fall to the man’s side or the woman’s side (I’ve always thought I might be bi, I guess I’m sure now), and they’re getting closer, and I can’t stop walking and I can’t turn back, so if I’m going to fall I’m going to have to do it right then.

And I don’t remember if I fell to one side or the other or kept walking.

xxxxx

But, thought Gwen as she finished writing, I’m not getting out of bed right away. Corinne isn’t going to bring in my breakfast for another hour, at least, and it’s Sunday. I don’t even have to be on the set. She lay back, giving a languid sigh, reaching down between her legs.

xxxxx

Thybalt stared at the monitor on the desk in his hotel room. Corinne and Judi knelt behind his chair. Had they been looking into the mirror over the desk, they could have seen the image of Gwen masturbating reflected in the black plastic lenses of his glasses. But with their hands behind their heads, eyes downcast, they saw only the carpet.

He swore, punched a button on the compact console below the monitor; it went dark.

“What is going on?” he muttered, his hands forming a steeple, staring at the black screen. “By now, she should be doing a lot more than just whacking off.”

He stood, looking down at the two kneeling women.

“Corinne, Judi, I want to review your instructions.”

“Yes, Dr. Thybalt,” they chorused.

“How much halperizon in the room each night, Corinne?”

“Three units, Dr. Thybalt,” the blonde woman replied softly, still looking at the floor.

“During the day, Judi, how much thalapherazine in her food and drink?”

“Eighteen units, Dr. Thybalt,” the Asian woman lilted.

“And how much mesorhyopan in the breakfast, Corinne?”

“Ten units, Dr. Thybalt.”

He started to nod, then stopped. He walked forward, looking down at Corinne. “Five days ago I asked you to increase the dosage to 25 units. Did you do that?”

An awful silence filled the room.

“No, Dr. Thybalt,” she replied, in the same quiet tone. Thybalt speculated, for just a moment, that she was probably screaming inside, trying to explain, trying to give an excuse. But she was, if nothing else, disciplined.

“Damn it,” he swore, to no one in particular. He walked to the door, and back, slamming a fist into a palm. He returned to the chair, ignoring the women. He typed on his laptop for a few minutes. “Well, that explains that,” he said out loud, sitting back. Now, he thought, how am I going to make my schedule at this rate? I need some time, just a couple more days.

He turned, still in the chair. “Corinne, Judi. Onto the bed. Present.” His voice, while soft and measured, contained a universe of threat to those who understood his tone. Judi and Corinne understood it to the depths of their souls.

The two women immediately rose, and knelt down on the bed, their faces down on the bedspread, offering their asses up. Two sets of hands pulled up two skirts, revealing two cunts, wet and ready. Two pairs of legs spread slightly, two backs arched to offer their sexes up for viewing and use.

Thybalt stood, stepped behind them. “Do you two know why you are being punished? Corinne?”

“For disobeying you, Dr. Thybalt,” she said, softly, just a tiny bit of hoarse fear in her voice.

“Judi?”

“For Corinne’s disobedience, Dr. Thybalt,” the petite Asian replied, her voice a bit higher now, a pleading note breaking through her conditioning.

Thybalt nodded. He reached down, and found a spot on their right thighs, near the groan; he pinched, hard. There was no sound from either of them. Thybalt was careful to count the minutes he held their flesh; more than about a minute of this punishment could drive one insane, which is why it was programmed into in-house inventory only. He had heard it compared to being flayed alive with a whip of burning salt, which he had conceded did not sound pleasant. That was, after all, the point.

He watched the two women’s skin grow pale and clammy. He wasn’t absolutely sure that Corinne had been instructed to increase the dosage. It was just barely possible, he acknowledged to himself, that he had forgotten to tell her. No matter, though, he thought; this will just encourage their future sense of responsibility towards his orders.

After twenty seconds, he released them, and let them collapse onto the bed, sobbing. Even their discipline, he noted, had some limits. He went to his suitcase, retrieved a small bottle with an atomizer top, like a cologne bottle. Turning it in his hand, he returned to the side of the bed.

“Now. I have further instructions,” he said to them, as they moaned quietly.

xxxxx

June 13, Monday.

I’m at a Los Angeles Philharmonic Performance. I know it’s the Chandler Pavilion I’m in, the way you know things in dreams, but the room doesn’t look anything like it. There are just a few rows of high-backed chairs, a small orchestra space, really just enough for a chamber orchestra up front. Circulating through the rows, like old-style cigarette girls in a movie theater, are a bunch of barmaids. Like the ads for St. Pauli Girl beer? Lots of cleavage, tight bodices, tiny waists, skirts tucked up to show off their legs. They’re selling drinks; someone will order, they’ll go off, come back with the drink. I notice that when they come back, whoever is buying the drink will cop a feel: a hand up the skirt, down the bodice; sometimes, one of them even gets into his lap, facing him, and grinds there for a while. I wonder if he’s actually getting inside of her, or if they’re just rubbing.

The chamber orchestra finally files into the hall, and three other women, also dressed like barmaids only more elaborate (nicer material, fancier cut) come out, standing at a podium in front of the orchestra. They’re like an Opera version of a barmaid, lots of stage makeup. The barmaids in the audience go to the sides of the room, and the music starts, and the women start singing.

They’re really good singers. They’re singing in a language I don’t understand, but it’s so lovely, so compelling, it’s like I can follow along with the emotions. They’re singing about doing just what the other barmaids were doing, serving, being touched, looking nice, and I can follow every word, and I realize that it sounds so sexy to be like that, just bring people things and be fondled and give pleasure. I start getting turned on, and I feel myself tugging at my clothes, as if the stupid old things that I was wearing were repulsive and ugly and I want to wear the wonderful things the barmaids wear.

The music continues, and I realize how stupid I was not to see this before, how much I want to be pawed and looked at and have my tits stared at. It’s like everything before this was just pretend, and now I’ve woken up.

I’m stripping down right there. No one else notices me, and I notice that I’m the only woman there, but that’s fine. Soon, I’m completely naked, and I run to the side of the room. There’s an extra barmaid costume there, and I put it on. I feels wonderful, like the best silk robe ever, and I get it all adjusted, pushed up so I’m showing all the cleavage I can, and I’m standing there with the other barmaids, feeling so quiet and happy and relaxed and sexy, and waiting for the wonderful, beautiful music to end.

It does, the women file out to polite applause. I start circulating through the crowd, all men now, asking them if they want anything. One of them points to his lap, and I know just what to do. I hike up my skirt (I took off my panties before), and straddle him. He looks down, and I’m embarrassed that I didn’t shave between my legs, but I’m so wet I’m dripping on him, and he unzips himself, and now I know what’s going to happen.

I glance up as I grab the back of the chair, and I notice that Corinne is coming in from the back, taking my old seat. How nice, I think; she’ll make a great barmaid.

I woke up before he actually got it in me, though.

xxxxx

Gwen turned from the catering table with a look of shock, the tuna fish sandwich still half in her mouth. She bit, chewed, swallowed, all the time staring at Chet with huge eyes.

“What do you mean, closed set?” she finally asked.

Chet looked as casual as a man as haggard and unshaven as he could.

“Well, I thought that might be…”

He stopped, trailing off lamely. Gwen sat down at the folding table in front of the catering spread, still staring at him as if he had just grown a second head.

“I’ll be wearing more in that scene than I wore to the last Oscars. Why is the set closed?”

She sounded honestly puzzled, but Thybalt, standing nearby, knew her voice well, down to its tiniest nuance. She was not puzzled; she was pissed. He tried to suppress a smile.

Chet sat down across from her, heavily. Thybalt moved closer, back turned to them as he got another cup of coffee.

“Listen, Gwen. I know we’ve been over this before. But. I want to do ‘Penelope’ as a nude scene.”

He sounds like he’s been smoking again, Thybalt thought. Smoking heavily. The sound of a sandwich being thrown onto a paper plate immediately followed Chet’s comment.

Gwen’s voice was quiet, but her tone could have peeled paint off a wall.

“I know you want that. You are the only one on this set who wants that, Chet. Tim has said he doesn’t think it works, and he is the director, no? It’s not that way in the script, for which you paid a dollar or two. And, most importantly,” she continued, as Chet’s breathing became audible to Thybalt, “it is in my contract that I get a veto over nude scenes. And I vetoed it. Why are you bringing this up now, again, after we’ve been over it a dozen times?”

Chet sighed. Thybalt continued to examine the packages of half-n-half with extreme interest.

“Because this picture isn’t going to do even five thousand dollars at the box office otherwise, Gwen. That’s what everyone is expecting.”

The sound of a metal chair creaking; Gwen sitting back, Thybalt guessed. A laugh from Gwen, not a pleasant laugh at all.

“I think we need to understand each other here. I’ve loved all your pictures, and I’ve always wanted to work with Tim Dresher, which I why I signed up for this one. I know how far in debt you are, and I know how much you need this picture to be a success.”

A pause; Gwen taking a sip from her orange juice, perhaps?

“All that is not my fucking problem. I am not some stupid little cunt who you swept up at the Greyhound station with vague promises of stardom if she would just open her legs for your camera. We have a contract. If you needed someone to show their snatch in this movie, you should have signed someone who didn’t care about it. I care, as you perfectly well know. I have to leave for the US the day after ‘Penelope’ is shot, unless you want to start paying my next picture $10,000 per day to keep me around. I think it’s in all of our best interests that I do the scene the way it’s written, and stop harassing me about it.”

Another pause.

“Unless, of course, you’d prefer me to walk.”

A sharp intake of breath from Chet.

“Wait a fucking second, Miss ‘My Tits Are Too Good For You.’ We have a contract.”

“Yes, Chet, we do. And I have a lawyer. By the time it even got to trial, you’ll be shooting commercials for Hostess Cupcakes, if you’re lucky.”

The sound of a metal chair being pushed out, Chet getting up.

“We’ll talk again, Gwen.”

Gwen’s laughter, this time with real humor.

“Yes, I’m sure we will, Chet. After all, we’re on this picture together. But we’re not talking about T&A for ‘Penelope.’ Got it?”

No reply, angry steps moving off. Thybalt turned, watching Chet stalk across the set. He walked over to the table, and took Chet’s chair. Gwen was staring off into the middle distance.

Thybalt broke the silence.

“Good acting,” he said. Gwen blinked, as if suddenly noticing him.

“What do you mean?” she asked, cocking her head.

He sat back, folding his arms.

“You wouldn’t really walk, would you?”

Gwen smiled, the smile of a beautiful predator who has just spotted wounded prey.

“You don’t know me that well, do you, Ken? I never bluff; my father taught me that. I’ll walk off this set, and bring Chet, this picture, and his whole company down in flames, if he pushes me any harder.”

She shrugged.

“Still. Such language from me, eh, Ken?” she said with a giggle.

Thybalt examined her silently as she finished her sandwich.

xxxxx

INT. GWEN’S HOTEL ROOM—LATER

GWEN MASON sits on a large couch, comfortable, a script open on her lap. Facing her, DR. KEN THYBALT sits in a chair, holding up an identical script, staring at her through his trademark black sunglasses. The remains of lunch sit on the table between them. Honey light floods the room.

GWEN

(attempting an Irish accent, reading)

There’s the mark of his spunk on the clean sheet, I wouldn’t even bother to iron it. That ought to satisfy him.

THYBALT

(interrupting, a better accent)

Spunk.

GWEN

(startled)

Pardon?

THYBALT

Spunk. (losing the accent) The “u” needs to be rounder, not a flat American “uh” sound. Spunk.

GWEN

(mimics perfectly)

Spunk. (slouches back) Next time, I play Molly’s American cousin.

THYBALT

You’re doing very well, Gwen. I’ll work all week on this with you, if that’s what it takes.

GWEN

(resigned)

That’s what it’s gonna take.

She stands, walks to the window, pulls a curtain back. The room floods with light.

GWEN

(looking out window)

It’s pretty unfair of me, isn’t it?

He rises, comes up behind her, close.

THYBALT

What is?

GWEN

Not showing anything in “Penelope.” It’s what everyone is going to be paying money to see in this flick, right?

THYBALT

Changing your mind?

GWEN

Should I?

THYBALT

Why are you asking me?

GWEN

(softly, almost to herself)

Because I thought you might know.

A beat. She turns.

GWEN

I’m tired of being… (beat; she shakes her head) Never mind. We need to get back to work.

He returns to the chair silently. Picks up his script. Adjusts his sunglasses.

THYBALT

Right. We do.

She flounces to the couch, grabbing her script.

GWEN

(petulant but under control)

Ja, Herr Doktor Professor. From where?

THYBALT

Page 103, top.

She flips through the script, starts reading.

GWEN

(sexy, accent perfect)

Think of him! Can you feel him trying to make a whore out of me?

CLOSE ON Thybalt as he smiles sardonically.

xxxxx

Smithy gave a small groan at the knock on the door to his trailer. He glanced at the clock: 11:33 pm.

“Come in!” he called, expecting to see either Tim or Chet appear with yet another request.

He was surprised to see first Judi, then Corinne step inside, looking abashed. He put down his pencil, and swiveled the chair around.

“Evening, ladies. How can I help you?”

They looked at each other, then down at the floor. Judi walked forward, slowly, her dark eyes wide.

“Um, Mr… uh, Smithy. It’s about ‘Penelope.’”

Smithy arched an eyebrow at the Asian woman.

“What about ‘Penelope’?” he asked.

He groaned again, silently. Now the bloody PAs are starting in on me about that bloody scene.

Corinne moved up to join Judi; they looked as if they were naughty children anticipating a spanking.

“Um… we wanted to ask if there was any way to move it to Saturday,” Corinne managed.

He blinked, not sure he was hearing her properly. He shook his head. “Can’t do that, ladies. Gwen’s going back on Friday, right?”

“She could stay until Sunday,” Judi offered.

Smithy pursed his lips.

“And pay $20,000 in penalties to her next bloody feature? Don’t think old Chet is going to be up for that kind of money. Anyway,” he said, waving at the production board, strips of cardboard for all of the scenes in the movie, “if we moved ‘Penelope,’ it would wreck the rest of the bloody schedule.” He stopped. “Why the sudden request?”

Judi stepped even closer, nearly touching him; Corinne moved to next him. He looked up, glancing between the petite Asian and the buxom blonde. He suddenly felt claustrophobic.

Judi said, pleading, “It’s… Miss Mason. She’s been under a lot of pressure, not really sleeping. She could really use until then to get ready for the scene.”

He stopped, took a deep breath. He could smell some scent on them, perfume, maybe? Headier, though; richer, earthier than any perfume. With a sudden flash, he felt himself getting warm, short of breath… aroused.

“Um… I just don’t bloody know. I know that Gwen’s a pro, and if she needs the time, she…”

Corinne’s hand fell lightly on his shoulder; he felt liquid fire flow from that touch through his body, into his groin. Judi blinked slowly, and sank down to her knees beside his outstretched legs. He could feel Corinne’s lips near his ear, her breath on him.

“Please, Smithy,” the blonde woman said, her voice throaty, full of promise.

“I’d be so grateful to you. Both of us would be very, very grateful.”

He turned, met Corinne’s blue eyes, drinking in her rich, erotic scent. He wanted to say something; he knew what a mistake he might make right now. He leaned forward, finding Corinne’s lips, her tongue sliding into his mouth. The bloody mistake I am making, he thought to himself, as he felt Judi’s fingers trace over his cock, straining against his pants.

He pulled back from the kiss to see that Corinne had unbuttoned her white cotton blouse; she wasn’t wearing a bra. He could feel his pants being unzipped, his underwear pulled aside, and a mouth, Judi’s mouth, slowly slide down onto his cock, swallowing him completely. He didn’t even look down, his eyes captivated by Corinne’s large, soft breasts as she lifted them up for him, the small pink nipples already hard. As he leaned forward, taking one in his mouth, licking, nibbling, gratified by Corinne’s soft moan, he thought to himself that he’d make “Penelope” shoot on Saturday. Fixing bloody scheduling problems was his job, after all.

xxxxx

June 14, Tuesday

I’m walking on a beach, it’s a beach in Malibu not far from where I usually go to walk. There are high cliffs to my right, the ocean to my left. I reach some rocks, and climb over them. There’s a sea cave at the top of the rocks, and I wander into the mouth of it (there aren’t really any sea caves in Malibu). I look out over the ocean, and it’s getting close to sunset. I stand there, watching it for a while. Even though I’m just wearing a black bikini and sandals, I’m not cold at all. Suddenly, I realize that I’m late for an appointment, and I race into the cave.

I run down the cave, over the sand on the floor. It’s long, twisting and turning, but it doesn’t branch; it just keeps going down and making turn after turn. Suddenly, I burst out into a bar, or a tavern, or something like that. It’s a smoky room, with tables and people at all of them, talking loudly. There’s loud music playing, and a bar with a mirror, and a stage with a girl, in a bikini just like mine, dancing. I run to the side of the stage, just in time; she’s finished with her routine, there’s a little bit of applause and a lot of wolf-whistles, and she steps down off of the stage, whispering, “Tough crowd” to me as she passes.

So I get up on stage, and start grinding and dancing around, doing my best, but everyone is ignoring me, and I’m getting angrier and angrier, trying harder, but it just isn’t doing anything for them.

I want to scream at them, “Hey, you! This is Gwendolyn Fucking Mason dancing in your bar, and you won’t even watch?” but I don’t.

Finally, I strip off the bikini top, and start shaking my tits at them, and that gets a little more attention, a few more whistles, and I start getting turned on from being stared at.

But that’s still not enough, so I wiggle out of the bikini bottoms, and I’m dancing around like a stripper, lying down and opening my legs. I can see that overhead, dangling from the ceiling, is a camera, a big camera, bigger than a video camera, bigger than a movie camera, with a huge lens, and it’s pointed right at me, right at my pussy, and I just keep grinding my hips while I’m lying on the ground with my legs spread. The crowd is loving it, they’re going wild and throwing money and whistling, and the camera is getting closer and closer, and I’m starting to play with myself, since I can’t stand it I’m so horny, and the camera is so close that I think it’s going to ram right up into me, fuck me, and I want it, so badly I’m screaming for it.

When I woke up, I was so frustrated I nearly cried, and even masturbating for a whole half-hour didn’t help much.

xxxxx

Thybalt entered a number on his cell phone, sipping on a very strong cup of coffee at Bewley’s. He looked out the window, watching the early morning bustle of Grafton Street pass by. He waited for the phone to connect; Crandall’s voice answered.

“Hello, Greg. It’s Ken.”

“Ken. It’s good to hear from you. Enjoying the Emerald Isle?”

Thybalt sighed. “What I’ve seen of it. Anything new?”

“The usual. I’m glad you’re coming back soon. We have clients screaming for new inventory.”

“I can imagine.” Thybalt watched a particularly well-endowed young woman walk by, long dark hair trailing. “You’d like it here, Greg. Inventory on the hoof.”

“I should be so lucky. How’s 883?”

Thybalt paused. “This is proving difficult. I had to stall for time. But I’ll deliver.”

“I hope so. We’ve dumped a lot of drug supplies into this one.”

“I know, Greg, but we got paid in advance, remember? The drugs are covered.”

“By the way, you’ll need to be at the airport at 4 am tomorrow, your time, to pick up your next shipment. Sorry about the hour; it’s the only courier flight we could get.”

“Thanks. I need that extra mesorhyopan. I’ll be there.”

“No problem, Ken, but that raised eyebrows at the dispensary. That’s enough meso for an entire Catholic girls’ school. Are you sure…?”

“I’m sure. Listen, Greg, an entire girls’ school? Wouldn’t that be a kick-ass project?”

Greg’s voice contained a distinct note of barely-controlled hysteria. “It was a fucking joke, Ken!”

Thybalt paused, then smiled. “You’re too easy, Greg. If the guys in dispensing are getting worked up, send Jessica and Rachael down to unkink their hoses. Talk to you later.”

He finished his coffee, and left, back to the hotel.

xxxxx

INT. GWEN’S HOTEL ROOM—MORNING

Gwen is reading from her script. Thybalt is listening, his script closed on the table.

GWEN

… and drew him down to me so he could feel my breasts, all perfume, yes, and his heart was going like mad, and yes, I said, yes, I will. Yes.

A beat. Thybalt shakes his head.

THYBALT

You’ve got the accent knocked, but you sound like you’re reading a script.

Gwen puts the script down.

GWEN

(irritated)

I don’t get what I’m supposed to sound like here.

THYBALT

(casual)

In love.

GWEN

In love? Molly’s in love with Bloom? But she just got through thinking about cheating on him with about nine people!

THYBALT

That’s one of the points of the chapter. It may be the point of the whole book. Love conquers all.

GWEN

The only thing love has ever conquered for me is my self- preservation instinct.

THYBALT

Not a fan of love, eh?

GWEN

Not even a little bit. I’ve been on the receiving end of too much love I never asked for. Cheap goods. “Another load of mindless adoration for you, mum. Sign here.” (beat) How about you, Ken? Is there a Mrs. Thybalt waiting back in the US?

THYBALT

(suddenly cold)

No. (beat) If love doesn’t work, let’s go with aroused.

Gwen examines him. She picks up her script again.

GWEN

(voice throaty)

… he could feel my breasts, all perfume, yess, and his heart was going like mad, and yes, I said, yes, I will. Yesss.

THYBALT

(encouraging)

Better. Again. Hornier. Near orgasm.

GWEN

(breathier)

… he could feel my breasts, ahhh, all perfume, yessss, and oh, his heart was going like mad, and yes, I said, yes, I will. Yesss.

THYBALT

(more urgent)

Hornier. Closer to coming.

GWEN

(panting)

… he could feel my breastsssss, all perfume, yessss, and oh, his heart was going, going, like mad, and yesssss, I said, yes, I will. Yesss!

Thybalt leans forward. His voice becoming commanding. Insistent.

THYBALT

More aroused.

GWEN

.. all perfume, YES, and oh, his heart was going, going, like mad, and YES, I said, YES, I will. YES!

THYBALT

Close to an orgasm.

Gwen drops the script beside her.

GWEN

(eyes closed)

… going, going, like mad, and YES, I said, YES, I will. YES!

THYBALT

(softly)

You’re there.

GWEN

(nearly screaming)

YES, I said, YES, I will. YES!

Gwen suddenly CRIES OUT. Grabs the cushions of the couch. She trembles. Her eyes snap open. She looks at Thybalt with panic.

GWEN

I… I’m sorry, Ken, I…

She stands, runs out of the room. Thybalt tracks her. Watches the door to the bedroom close. He stands. A beat. He looks at around the room at specific locations.

CLOSE ON small speakers we now see are hidden throughout the room.

ON THYBALT as he nods, smiling, and leaves the room.

xxxxx

June 15, Wednesday.

I’m walking along a street. It’s a busy, major street, and I don’t know quite where I’m going. But I need to keep walking, and walking, and I know that there is something bad that might happen if I don’t keep going. I reach an intersection, and stare up at the sign, and it says ‘South Figueroa.’ That freezes me in my tracks, as if it is the most terrifying thing in the world. I hear someone behind me, so I turn around. There’s a man there, dressed like a stage magician, tail coat, top hat, magic wand, the whole bit. I want to start running, and I do, taking off down the street, but I look behind me, and he waves the wand, and we’re not in the street anymore.

I’m standing in a brothel. I mean, there’s not a sign on the wall or anything, but that’s all it could be. There’s big sofas everywhere, and heavy red carpeting and wallpaper. There are women everywhere, wearing lingerie, stripper outfits, nude, and men watching them, leading them up and down stairs, all sorts of things going on, people making out, men getting blowjobs.

The magician is still there, smiling at me. I back up, but he waves the wand again, and now I’m wearing a bright yellow tube-top, bright yellow hot pants, fishnet thigh-highs, and ugly yellow platform heels. I’m wearing heavy makeup, like a parody of a whore. I can see all this in the mirrors that are all over the walls. He waves his wand again, and I look down, and my tits are now huge, enormous, a cartoon-woman. A man comes up to me and asks me to go up to a room with him, and I start to say no, but the magician waves his wand again, and I feel all dizzy and horny, and kind of stupid and compliant, and I realize that no, I’m a whore, and I should do just what I’m told, like a good little whore.

I follow him up the stairs, my huge tits waving around in front of me. We walk into the room, and I hear someone, another whore in the next room, yelling, “Yes do it fuck me fuck my hot wet slutty cunt fuck my twat my pussy fuck my hot slit I’m your slave your whore your slut…” over and over again, and I realize I’ve heard that before, but he’s telling me to take off my pants, and I do, and I lie down on the bed with my legs spread, and I can’t see anything because my tits are too big and in the way, and I know he’s about to start fucking me, and the woman next door is still yelling that over and over again, and I start yelling just what she’s yelling, “Yeah, do me fuck me take me I’m yours I’m your slut your slave your whore your cunt fuck my hot slit my twat my pussy.” Over and over again. But I wake up before he even touches me.

xxxxx

Gwen sighed, put the pen down, closed her notebook. She shook her head, staring bleary-eyed at the window. Soon, she told herself, soon; Sunday, I can go back home, and these dreams will stop. I hope. She looked at the clock: 4:20 am. Fuck.

She stood, walked to the bathroom, and stared at her reflection. I look more and more like my mother each day, she realized; not that there’s anything wrong with that, my mother was gorgeous every day of her life, right up until she got cancer. Until she went crazy from the drugs they had her on, or the pain the drugs couldn’t help.

Suddenly, as if electrocuted, Gwen stood bolt upright, staring at her reflection as if it had just threatened to kill her.

“I know where I’ve heard that before,” she said out loud, her legs weak with fear.

She dashed into the suite’s living room, sat down, trying to control her shaking. She reached out, grabbed at her purse… only to discover that it was Corinne’s, not hers; Corinne had probably forgotten it when she brought dinner last night, she realized. Gwen’s uncertain hand tried to put it back on the table, but she dropped it, the contents spilling all over the floor. Swearing, she started to put the makeup, keys, wallet, drug vials back into the purse. She stopped, turning a cold, small glass bottle in her hand. Drug vials? She examined each carefully before replacing it in the handbag.

The purse back where she found it, Gwen returned to bed. She lay back in bed, thinking, until her alarm went off at 6 am. She turned it off, and picked up her cell phone. She started to dial, looked around, and then walked into the bathroom; she turned on the tub full-blast, the roar of the water deafening after the morning silence of the bedroom.

“Hi, Smithy? Yeah, it’s Gwen. Sorry about the noise. Listen, I need something that I brought in with props. No, I’ll come get it myself,” she said, her eyes narrowing.

xxxxx

Thybalt knocked on the door to Gwen’s room.

“Come in, Ken, it’s open,” Gwen called.

Thybalt stopped, considering the change in routine; Judi and Corinne were always there to get the door for him, even if they vanished immediately afterwards. He shrugged, and entered, closing the door behind him reflexively.

Gwen was sitting on the couch, wearing a white cotton dress. As usual, a light tea sat on the table between the couch and chair, a carafe of coffee waiting for him. The only variation in their daily ritual was the large revolver Gwen was holding in her right hand, casually pointed at Thybalt.

He stopped, regarding the gun, then her. An eyebrow went up.

“Care to explain?” he managed.

Gwen smiled her most radiant smile.

“Certainly, Ken. Please, have a seat.”

He did. Gwen sat back, the gun never wavering.

“It is astonishing what Irish customs will ignore if you tell them it is a prop,” she said. “Would you care for some tea? I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you to pour,” she added, apologetically.

He looked at the teapot, then at her. She laughed.

“Please, don’t concern yourself. I haven’t been a star for so long that I’ve forgotten how to boil water. Corinne didn’t make this particular pot of tea; I dumped the one she prepared after I sent her on her way on a very complex errand. She won’t be back for hours.”

“I don’t quite understand you,” he said, as he poured tea into cups.

She sighed elaborately.

“Dr. Thybalt, you understand me perfectly. You were drugging me, weren’t you? Via Corinne, although how you got her cooperation I have no idea.”

His startled reaction was well-practiced.

“Corinne was drugging you? What…”

“I spied. There is a very nice line of sight from the bathroom to the kitchen in this particular suite. Not to worry, though, she didn’t put anything into your coffee. I wonder why?”

“I couldn’t say,” he managed.

“I believe you mean, you’d rather not.” Gwen smiled. “Ken, please don’t act stupid, it would ruin my image of you.” She paused. “Do you know who my father was?”

Ken raised an eyebrow. “No, I can’t say that I do.”

She sat back.

“Mason is a stage name. My father was Hans Maurer, the banker. ‘Maurer,’ I’m sure you know, is German for mason. Not clever of me, but I was young.”

“And your mother?”

“Francesca Gwendolyn Farmer, of course, one of the talented yet obscure beauties of the English alternative theater, known for her grace, charm, poise, and utterly refined breeding. It was quite a surprise when she married my father, as he was known for being uncouth and abusive, albeit as rich as Croesus.”

“But you’re American?”

“Born and raised in Encino, California. Delightful town.” She raised the gun; Thybalt sat up a bit straighter. “Now, Ken, please tell me what your plans for me were.”

Thybalt was silent for a moment.

“My plans?” he finally replied.

Gwen glanced up at the ceiling in a moment of exasperation.

“Ken. Please. I have the mysterious Dr. Kenneth Thybalt, a man who never removes his sunglasses, appear to be my speech tutor. I find myself plagued by erotic dreams of increasing intensity, a condition I’ve never found myself in before. In the latest of these nocturnal episodes, I find myself screaming with abandon the very things that my so-proper mother used to scream when my father was, I assume, indulging his conjugal rights with her. My bedroom was next door to theirs. These are words that she would have rather had her tongue cut out than use in public. Then, I find my PA is drugging my breakfast.”

She paused, sighted down the gun, then continued.

“My mother died of breast cancer when I was 14. I spent a lot of time by her bedside; my father couldn’t be bothered, he was off with his new mistress. He died a few years later, car crash, and I’m sure she’s enjoying his money immensely. Anyway. My mother was delirious at the end, quite insane, the pain was so great that nothing could keep it off. She kept babbling about being abducted and raped, of being brainwashed into marrying my father. By a man dressed in black, who always wore sunglasses. A young girl doesn’t forget things like that, Ken.”

Thybalt met her gaze evenly. “That is rather flimsy evidence of anything, Gwen.”

She shrugged, a serene smile on her face.

“If you faced by a jury, I’d agree. But right now, you are faced by a high-strung, neurotic young actress with memories of her sainted mother dying a lingering death, while talking about being brainwashed. By you, I would assume. Need I add that said young actress hasn’t been sleeping at all well?” She pulled back the hammer on the revolver; the cylinder rotated; the hammer locked into firing position with a click audible to Thybalt. “Please don’t think this isn’t loaded. As we discussed once, I don’t bluff. Now, the truth. And as the saying goes, make it good.”

Three seconds took an eternity to pass. “Francesca Farmer, you said?” Thybalt finally asked.

“Yes.”

“Number 4.”

Gwen blinked. “I beg your pardon?”

“Francesca Farmer is, was, inventory unit number 4. I was responsible for delivery to our client, who was, as you guessed, Hans Maurer.”

“’Our’ client? Who is ‘us’?”

Thybalt took a deep breath.

“The ICBR. We have a thriving business in abducting women, who we condition, brainwash as you say, for sexual purposes. Sometimes for sale as slaves, sometimes as wives, mistresses, or girlfriends. Your mother was our fourth, years ago. Clearly, our programming wasn’t perfect in her case; our methods have improved considerably since then.”

“And you call them inventory? These women?”

Gwen’s voice was still light, casual, conversational.

“That’s right. One of our early rules. Helps avoid unnecessary sentiment.”

Gwen lowered the gun, but only from his face to his heart. “And myself?”

“You are, or were going to be, inventory unit 883.” Ken shrugged. “Obviously, we’ll be skipping a number.”

She shook her head, amazed. “And who, pray tell, was your client for myself?”

Thybalt paused. “I’d rather not say.”

Gwen laughed, a genuine, rich laugh. “I’m certain that you’d rather not, Ken. I’m also sure you’d rather not die. I’ll give you a moment to resolve any conflict this might create.”

He paused. “Alright. Chester Harrow.”

She stared at him, lowering the gun to point at the tea service.

“Ken, are you kidding me? Chet is as queer as a three dollar bill. What in the world could he have wanted…” She stopped, her eyes growing cold. “Ah. I see.”

Ken nodded.

“I wasn’t hired to deliver you, personally, to anyone. I was hired to make sure that Harrow got full frontal footage of you when he shot ‘Penelope.’ Open-legged, if possible.”

Gwen considered this.

“Well, that would have certainly helped his film.”

She erupted into another round of laughing, this one so intense that Thybalt was concerned about the sanity behind it. She spread her legs, suddenly, showing an auburn snatch beneath the dress. She indicated her crotch with the barrel of the revolver, making Thybalt flinch despite all his self-control.

“And how much,” she managed to get out between snorts, “was this precious pussy worth to him?”

Thybalt smiled. “Five million dollars.”

Her eyes flew open.

“Ken, I’m not sure which I’m more offended by: that Harrow would stoop to brainwashing me to get a beaver shot, or that you are getting paid more for this film than I am.”

She considered for a moment, and then lowered the hammer on the gun, gently. She put the pistol down beside her on the couch.

He looked at her, the gun, and then her.

“And now?”

She shrugged.

“I make a movie, I go back to the United States after the two day extension that Harrow paid for. He doesn’t get his nude scene, and can go fuck himself. Which is what he’ll be doing after he misses the first payment on that rent boy of his. I assume that you’ll go about your merry way at the same time. Anything permanent about this conditioning you’ve been doing to me?”

He considered, stroking his chin.

“No, nothing permanent. Un-reinforced, it should wear off in a day or two. By the time they shoot ‘Penelope’ on Saturday, it will be history.”

“Fine, then. Of course, we do have a small problem on our hands,” she added thoughtfully.

Thybalt nodded grimly; he’d been waiting for it. “Revenge for your mother.”

Gwen giggled.

“’I will put an end to this white slave traffic and rid Dublin of this odious pest!’ Ulysses, Chapter 15. The Recorder says that.” She shook her head. “Ken, you’re being stupid again. I want no such thing. If I wanted revenge, you’d be dead, bang,” she said, making a gun with her hand. “My father was an awful man, but he did teach me to shoot straight. My mother, God rest her soul, is in heaven, and thus no longer my concern. The problem we have,” she explained, as if to a child, “is that my silence on the subject of the Institute is not going to be free. I do, however, have a proposal,” she said.

Thybalt cocked his head, “I’m listening.”

She explained.

He considered for a long minute when she finished.

“I like it. I’m sure Crandall will like it, too, and between us, the rest of the Partners will fall into line. No promises, of course.”

Gwen smiled. “Of course. And there’s one last item of business.”

He looked at her, puzzled.

“Yes?”

“You.”

“Me?” he asked, sitting up again.

Gwen slowly stood, looking down on him; he checked to be absolutely certain the gun was still on the couch.

“Yes, you. Ken, what is it with you? I’ve been flirting with you, half of the women on the production have been flirting with you, and you’ve been as cold as a rock. You’re not gay, I could tell from a mile away if you were. You’re not married, even though you could pick up a wife without any of that bothersome courtship that most men are confronted with. Yesterday afternoon, you had me so worked up I would have come crawling across the carpet to get laid by you, and… nothing.”

She walked around the table, slowly.

“You can have any woman you want. Is that the problem? You’ve mind-fucked so many women that you’re bored with cunt-fucking? The baker gets sick of bread, the cobbler has no shoes. You don’t want yet another woman throwing herself at you because she’s been programmed to do it. You want one offering herself up, in the way you want, because she wants it too.”

He could only stare.

She reached behind her, pulled a zipper. The dress fell off; she was naked under it. Her pink nipples, atop her full, round breasts, were already erect. She stepped up in front of him, dropped to her knees, head bowed, hands behind her head.

He found his voice.

“Why are you doing this, Gwen?” he asked, softly.

She was an actress; she knew her role.

“Permission to speak freely, sir?” she replied, her voice delicate.

Some movement, and then she could see, at the top of her vision, the black sunglasses lying on his lap, like another pair of eyes examining her.

“Granted,” he said, his voice stronger.

She summoned all her courage and snapped her head up, staring directly into his face. A perfectly normal pair of brown, amused eyes returned her gaze.

She gasped, involuntarily. “Disappointed?” he asked with a sardonic smile.

She shook her head, slowly, her green eyes huge, her mouth open slightly.

“You were going to say something,” he reminded her, the amusement disappearing.

She took a deep breath.

“Kenneth Thybalt, you make a living abducting women and turning them into sex slaves for rich men. You cover this up with a layer of piety and good works, making you even more dishonest. You would have gladly destroyed myself and my career to fulfill your contract with Harrow. You were responsible for my mother marrying my repulsive beast of a father.”

Her eyes narrowed.

“You are, without a doubt, the most evil man I have ever met. And in my line of work, you meet some real beauties.”

He did not react. She continued, her face softening again.

“As any student of the cinema can tell you, a good villain is much sexier than any hero. I’m doing this because you make me wet.”

There was a long pause, as they regarded each other.

He nodded, slowly, replacing the glasses; they almost seemed to click into place. She looked down, took a deep breath, pulled her lines together. When she looked up again, she was a different person: a lost, helpless young woman, almost still a girl, utterly unable to conceive of the situation she found herself in, terrified of what might happen. Her voice cracked, tears formed and ran down her face.

“Please, Dr. Thybalt. Don’t do anything to me. I’m still a virgin.” It was perfect; she knew how good she was.

And, it had the desired effect. Faster than she could hope to react, Thybalt reached out, grabbed her hair, pulling her head back; the other grabbed her throat, pushing her over onto her side, then rolling her onto her stomach. Her legs were shoved apart; it took all her will to keep from raising her hips, offering herself to him, but that wasn’t what the part required. She heard him unzip, then grab her, raise her up. Suddenly, his cock plunged into her pussy, both more painful and more wonderful than she could ever have imagined; she could not conceal that her cunt was already sopping. She felt him press a thumb against her asshole, and she knew that particular virginity was not going to be left to her, either. The thought gave her the first orgasm of the morning.

xxxxx

The consoles in the center of the Hex Room were alive. Thybalt stood behind the operator, watching carefully, pointing silently at controls or parts of the computer screen as required. The lush blonde woman on the monitors was kneeling the middle of her cell, staring at the screen. Her own face stared back from the wall, wry, amused, superior.

The operator spoke into the microphone, “You wish to serve, and please, and obey. You wish nothing else.”

The blonde slowly masturbated, her eyes huge.

“I wish to serve, and please, and obey. I wish nothing else.”

“You wish to give pleasure with your body. You wish to give pleasure with your mouth, your breasts, your hands, your pussy… with everything you possess.”

A quiver ran through her body as she stroked her breasts with the other hand.

“I wish to give pleasure with my body.”

“You will pleasure men and women equally. You exist to give pleasure. You will lick pussies, suck cocks, provide women and men with access to your body.”

The blonde woman blinked.

“I… I will pleasure men and women… I… ooooh, please, I’m not…”

“You are bisexual. You are more than bisexual, you are a pleasure slave who has no choice in her masters. You desire women, their pussies, their breasts, their mouths, everything about them is arousing.”

“I… I am… bisexual,” the blonde woman began with a long sigh, a moan, a quiver. A light died in her eyes.

After another twenty minutes, the operator turned the program onto automatic, bringing up the Incubus, and stood. Thybalt smiled.

“That was very well done, Gwen,” he said.

“Thank you. You knew I was a good actress,” she replied, smiling back. “And thank you for letting me work with Corinne. Good help is so hard to find these days.”

Thybalt nodded, looked at his watch. “It’s time to go to the board meeting. Crandall thought your suggestion was an excellent one. The ‘feminine touch,’ he called it. The vote to make you a Partner was unanimous, of course.”

She laughed, sweetly. She started towards the door, turned, noticed the monitors were still on; Corinne’s face, blank and empty, stared at the Incubus, her pussy dripping, slowly, onto the floor. Gwen returned to the console, turned off the displays; they faded to blackness.

She turned to Thybalt as they walked to the door. “So, Katheryn Hollis, eh? My agent knows her fiancé;. You must introduce me to her sometime.”

Side by side, they left the Hex Room. The door closed behind them.

THE END