THE NEEDLE AND THE DUNGEON (c) 1998 by MichaelD38@aol.com Disclaimer and Author's Note: This story is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to real persons is unintentional and strictly coincidental. Although some real places and organizations are referenced here, no relationship or approval is intended or should be inferred. This work contains explicit descriptions of sexual activity, and anyone offended by such things should read no further. If reception of this work is illegal due to your age or other repressive local regulations, liability for downloading it is your problem, not mine. This work is intended solely for the quiet and private enjoyment of adults, and any other use is a violation of the copyright. Reposting and archiving is permitted, except where a fee of any sort is required or earned for access (including banner-funded sites and fee-based age validation methods), provided this disclaimer and note remain attached to the story. All other rights are reserved. **ANOTHER NOTE** and important word of warning: This story contains much stronger stuff than what I usually post (thus the "caution" in the subject header). I began this as an entry in Celeste's virtual reality story contest, but it turned into something much too long and complicated to submit on time. It contains descriptions of simulated (i.e., virtual) bondage, domination, sadomasochism (some of it quite extreme), and a couple of scenes that could arguably be considered beastiality, although all the participants are human. It also gets stronger as it goes along, so if the first few scenes are too much for you, I would not go any further. If you decide to ignore this warning and get squicked anyway, don't write me complaining about it. There is, however, a coherent rationale for what goes on in here. This story, in part, asks the question: How far would you really go if you could explore your fantasies in an environment free of risk and consequence? Lest you be turned off already, be assured that the interaction is all consensual (in addition to being technically "make-believe"), and I can promise you that the characters in this story are as complex and realistic as any in my other works. And, as in everything I seem to write, there is also a romance running through it. This is about half as long as OCB (about 57,000 words), so like that story, I am breaking it up to post it. If you missed a chapter, feel free to e-mail me, and I will be happy to supply the missing pieces. Intelligent comments and criticisms will receive appropriate responses. Flames and juvenile slobbering go straight to the recycling bin. PART ONE "From the dawn of human existence, sexual experimentation has followed closely on the heels of invention. Man had scarcely begun printing books before the first erotic novels were circulating through Europe. Shortly after photography was developed in the late 19th century, certain photographers were already creating nude photographs for wealthy patrons. One of the first uses of vulcanized rubber was the production of condoms and other items euphemistically referred to as "marital aids." It was only a few years after Edison invented the motion picture camera that adult films began appearing, and could be seen for a nickel at the local arcade. The growth in popularity of the videocassette recorder in the late 20th century was a direct result of the availability of adult videotapes. The dawn of the Internet just before the turn of the 21st century can be traced to the discovery that sexually oriented images could be sent easily over the phone lines. And it is beyond dispute that the most popular virtual reality programs currently available are those that simulate certain sexual experiences. We need to stop pretending that the human sex drive is something to be suppressed or ignored, and recognize it for the creative engine that it truly is." -David Nelson, Keynote Address to the Annual Meeting of the American Neurological Association (January 23, 21__). I. Unlike most people she knew, Jasmine remembered the precise moment of her birth. There had been pain (though, having nothing to compare it to and no terms to describe it, she didn't know it as "pain"-but it was pain nonetheless), then awareness. Jasmine always experienced some pain upon waking, and consequently slept only rarely and only when necessary. Jasmine was born on September 15, 20__. Her parents (as she thought of them) were David Nelson and Catherine Rundlett. Nelson was a doctor, and Jasmine went to live with him shortly after her birth. Her mother was an engineer who worked for Seamarch Biotech, a division of IBM. She talked to her mother only occasionally now, although she had worked with her intensively during her first month. Her parents were not married and knew each other only professionally. Jasmine was unusual in that her creation had been illegal and surreptitious. Nelson had paid Seamarch Biotech over three billion dollars for her. Both he and Seamarch Biotech (and Catherine Rundlett in particular) would find themselves in very serious trouble were the truth about Jasmine ever discovered. Nelson had compounded his offense by doing things with Jasmine that many important people (most notably her mother, who knew more about Jasmine and her ilk than almost anyone) considered impossible, and most would find very distasteful. Not that Jasmine found any of it distasteful or unpleasant. She enjoyed her work and relished in breaking new ground. She knew she was special. When she died three years later, she had accomplished things even Nelson had never expected. I am blindfolded, dressed only in a tight rubber tankdress. The dress stops just below my buttocks, and I wear nothing underneath it. If I dare to spread my legs even slightly, my sex will be exposed. The dress is too small and too low-cut on top for my chest. My breasts are squeezed tightly, almost falling out. My hands are bound together and held above my head by the rope, which leads to a hook in the ceiling. I feel a hand grabbing my breasts, fondling them. He pinches my left nipple painfully. I whimper in fear, but when he reaches between my legs with his other hand, feeling my wetness, he knows I want him. Then he slips his wet finger into my mouth, making me taste myself. He smacks my buttocks hard, and I cry out in pain. The rubber is tight against my skin and does nothing to cushion the blow. He spanks me a second time, then a third, and I beg him to stop, telling him I will do anything he wants me to. He stops, and his hand returns to the junction of my thighs. I feel him probing me, and then he Ashley stared at the screen, not believing she was writing something like this. She glanced around her room as if someone might be watching, which she knew was silly. Her father was still at work, and wouldn't be home until midnight, if not later. Her mother was out of town with a friend of hers on another shopping trip. Their maid had left for the night. Ashley had even closed all the blinds in her room. She saved the file and closed her diary program. She went over and lay down on her bed. Another Friday night home alone. She hadn't had a date since Rich Perry had stopped calling her. She thought of calling her friend Melissa, but knew she was out with a guy in their English class. Although Ashley obsessed about her appearance like nearly all teenage girls, she knew the problem wasn't her looks. She had had her share of boyfriends, and knew other girls at their school meowed about her behind her back. The problem seemed to be that boys didn't enjoy dating a girl who was yawning in boredom by nine o'clock and refused to listen to their inane prattle about football and politics. Tonight wasn't the first time she had set down her heated fantasies in her diary. She probably had a dozen unfinished stories in there, most of them involving various forms of bondage and submission. Although she had just turned eighteen, she had no real experience with sex, even vicariously. Melissa had lost her virginity a few months ago, but the details of it seemed, to Ashley at least, hardly worth repeating. Since her social life had died this year, her stories were her only outlet for her hormones. No one-except Melissa, to whom she had confessed a few things-knew about her secret predilections. Ashley thought of going to bed and masturbating to one of her fantasies, but realized she was getting sick of the routine. She got up and went back to her computer. She dialed into one of the national networks and went into the chat areas. She had done this plenty of times before, and knew that anything other than a neutral handle invited unsolicited flirtations and requests for sex, even in the closely supervised teen and children's areas she had frequented up to now. What she had in mind tonight required as much anonymity as possible. She picked the handle "Brick" and blocked her video feed, substituting it with a generic smiley face. Then she passed through the adult gateway, reveling for a moment in the fact that she was now eighteen and could leave the underage areas. A bit of searching delivered her to the sexually oriented chat rooms. She read through the listings before selecting something labeled "100% B/D Dungeon." When she entered the room, and the video feeds of the other participants came up on her screen, Ashley's shock was so intense that she almost shut off her computer. Maybe a quarter of the people had, like her, blocked their video feeds. The rest of them were well into the party, and most of them were naked or might as well have been. Several men were openly masturbating. The women, who made up about a third of the group, wore mostly weird, fetishistic clothing that Ashley could scarcely believe anyone had actually sat down to create. She recognized none of it and had no terms in her vocabulary to describe it. She shrunk into her chair, pulling her knees up to her chest. But she kept her eyes on the screen. Someone had sent her a private message: "male or female?" She ignored it. Best not to attract any attention. Another message came a second later: "hey there." And another: "are you a girl?" But they stopped after a minute or two. Ashley finally settled down enough to pay attention to the discussion. Actually hearing their voices made her feel somehow dirty, so she shut off the audio and just read the transcripted remarks below the video displays: "i prefer being spanked to using a riding crop … theres nothing like flesh on flesh" "i agree misty, can i spank you?" "Are there any women in New York who are looking for some private punishment? "misty, show us your butt" "you guys wouldn't know how to properly spank her … she needs someone with experience." On the screen, the woman known as "misty" turned around and exposed her buttocks to the camera. The men, and some of the women, hooted and cheered. The discussion went on. "is anyone here into rubber?" "I like rubber dildos, does that count?" "rubber is too hot and too uncomfortable." "it's not supposed to be comfortable." "Jack, I don't agree. Whenever I wear rubber, it gets me turned on like nothing else." "misty, what rubber clothes do you own?" "any women want to watch me get off in private?" "i don't have any rubber stuff, i don't like it." "I have rubber bra-and-panty set, a rubber corset, and a full-length rubber dress." "woo woo" "could you put them on for us?" The woman who had responded, "LadyD," disappeared from her video feed for a few moments, then reappeared with the bra and panty. As the rest of the group watched and encouraged her, she undressed and donned the rubber underwear. Ashley sat motionless, trying to ignore the butterflies in her stomach. So there really were people doing the sorts of things she liked to write about. She realized she was getting turned on. For two hours, she watched the discussion, never daring to say a word. Just before one, her phone rang. Starting in embarrassment, she logged off. "Hello?" "I didn't wake you up, did I?" It was Melissa. "No, I was up. How was your date?" "Lame. I wish you had said yes to Wally and come with us." "I told you why I didn't." Ashley zoned out and listened vaguely to the details of Melissa's date. Then they made plans to get together at Union Square the next day. When she hung up, she was too drained to return to the chat room. She went to bed, images from the video feeds spinning through her head. She returned to the "100% B/D Dungeon" the next night, then the next, each time picking a new handle and video feed lest anyone peg her as a regular. The fourth night, feeling increasingly adventurous, she stripped out of her pajamas before logging in, and sat there naked for three hours. On the sixth night, she masturbated to the other video feeds. Only after a week of it did she feel brave enough to say anything. At first, she only ventured a few random comments about what other people were saying. Then she saw someone named "NastyGirl" enter the room, and on a whim, sent her a private message: "How nasty are you?" "As nasty as you want me to be," came the reply. NastyGirl had an abstract video feed like Ashley's. Ashley wondered what she looked like. "What kind of things do you like to do?" she asked. "I'm a submissive. I like being tied up and punished. Is that what you like to do?" "I like being tied up." "Are you a guy or a girl?" "A girl." "Oh. Cool. I don't get to talk to women much in here. Too much time responding to all the horny comments from the guys." "Yeah. I generally just use a bland handle and sit quietly." "I haven't seen you in here before." "I've been changing my handle." "Can you turn on your video feed?" "I don't want the rest of them to see it." "Oh, that's easy. Just type 'video>NastyGirl', then turn on your feed. No one else will see it." "You first." "Hold on." A second later, NastyGirl's video feed changed from an abstract design to a picture of a woman. She was younger than Ashley expected, around twenty, dark blonde hair. Not gorgeous, but pretty. She was visible from the waist up, and wore a short tank top. Ashley watched for a few seconds, waiting to see if anyone else reacted to the change in video. No one did. Then she did what NastyGirl had told her to do. On the screen, NastyGirl smiled. "You're naked." "Yeah. I usually log in like this." "Well, I don't want to make you uncomfortable." NastyGirl pulled off her tank top. "There," she said. "You have nice breasts." "Thanks. So do you." "Have you ever used nipple clips?" "No." "I love them. I like having my breasts tormented. How about you?" Ashley squirmed for a second. "I have to confess something." "What?" "I'm a virgin. I've never really done anything like this." "Oh. But you came in here to see what it was like?" "Yeah." "This stuff turns you on?" "Yeah." "I like it too. I'm not into straight sex anymore." "What have you done?" "A lot of stuff. Stuff I bet you wouldn't believe." As Ashley sat there in rapt amazement, NastyGirl went into great detail about the punishments and encounters she had experienced, many of them things Ashley had scarcely conceived of. Spanking. Whipping. Piercing. All sorts of exotic restraints. Racks and stocks. Sex while securely bound. Sex with other girls in similar restraints. "Once you get into this stuff, you'll never want to go back." "I can imagine. I don't even think about regular sex anymore." "What kind of things would you like to do?" "I write down my fantasies a lot." "Like what?" "There's one I've been thinking about lately. About having to wear this short rubber dress, and being blindfolded. Then this guy starts spanking and whipping me, but I can't do anything because I'm tied to a rope in the ceiling, then-" In the midst of Ashley's fantasy, NastyGirl's video feed abruptly disappeared. She tried to reconnect, but got an error message: "NastyGirl is not logged in at this time." She waited for an hour, but NastyGirl never returned. Ashley logged in the next night, but never saw her. Two nights later, as Ashley was about to log off in frustration, NastyGirl came back. They quickly reestablished their connection. "Hi. What happened?" "I got bumped offline. Then I had to split. I'm not calling from my place. Sorry." "Oh. Did you get what I was saying?" "Tell me again." Ashley repeated her fantasy, and they talked for another hour about things they could do. Then NastyGirl stopped her. "Look, we've gotten kind of intimate here, I really should make a confession to you." "What?" "I haven't exactly done all this stuff we've talked about. Not precisely in real life." Disappointment and confusion welled up inside her. "What do you mean?" "I've done it inside this computer lab. It's sort of a virtual reality set- up." Feeling betrayed and deceived, Ashley almost hung up on her. Then NastyGirl explained herself. "It's not what you think. It's not like a vid arcade. It's like really being there. You'd swear it was real. You feel it like it's really happening." "Please. They can't do stuff like that yet. Not even the Army has real-life simulations." "I swear. I know you don't believe me, but it's true. It's run by this doctor in this secret place he has downtown. Only a few people know about it." "Does he have space aliens working there too? Or maybe the CIA?" "I'm telling the truth. You'd have to see it to believe it. I didn't until I went though it." "This is in San Francisco?" "Yeah." "Okay, so show me. I live not too far from downtown." NastyGirl hadn't responded right away. "I don't know if I can. I'm really not supposed to tell people about it." "Oh, here we go. They'll kill you if you tell anyone, is that it?" "No, no. It's just sort of a secret. We have rules about who to let in." "We?" "Some other girls are doing it, too. I can't take you there myself because they might see me. But I could tell you where it is and you could go there yourself. Since you don't know my real name, they won't know who squealed." "So where is it?" NastyGirl leaned back from her terminal, glancing around as if someone were there. Then she gave Ashley the address. "It's the Doctor you want to see. If someone else answers, ask for him." "The Doctor? What's his name?" "I don't know. We just all call him the Doc." "I still don't know if I believe you." "I swear I'm telling the truth. Go by there and see." The butterflies were returning to Ashley' stomach. Lurking in anonymous chat rooms was one thing. This was something else altogether. "Will I see you there?" "Maybe. But you can't act like you know me, okay?" "Okay." "I have to go. See you around." "Bye." Ashley went to bed, arguing with herself about whether NastyGirl had been leading her on. It sounded too weird to be true. How could watching some video recording be like having sex, no matter how detailed and realistic it was? Ashley was only eighteen, but she wasn't naïve. She knew the net was filled with scam artists and people who got their rocks off by making up stories hoping other people would believe them. The more she thought about it, the more she felt that NastyGirl had been leading her on, and had backed off and disappeared when she realized Ashley didn't believe her. She supposed she had asked for this. She had logged in looking for thrills, and someone looking to bring her own fantasies to life had obliged. NastyGirl was probably no different than Ashley, and by telling Ashley what she wished she had done, she had made those fantasies real. That had to have been what happened. She resolved to stay out of the chat rooms and stick to her own stories and fantasies. Well, maybe. Driving past that place when she got a chance couldn't hurt, could it? II. It was hot. On any other day, he would have stopped to take a swim in the ocean. The water rolling over his feet was cool yet not cold, just enough to refresh without bringing on the chills, but he wasn't here to go swimming. The beach he walked on was relatively narrow. The palm trees began perhaps four or five meters from where the waves were breaking. Had there been tides in this place, the high tide would most likely have swamped the trees. He had visited this place in person only once, but it was a good likeness. The sand was as he remembered it, tiny bits of pulverized coral and volcanic rock. He knelt, taking a scoop of it up in his hands. A few dried particles of seaweed and a small crab claw appeared in the shifting grains as he let them drain through his fingers. Jasmine was certainly thorough. He walked to one of the palm trees and shook down a coconut. He split the husk with a sharp chunk of coral and broke open the seed on a nearby rock. The milk spilled out onto the sand, but he caught a drop on his finger and tasted it. Then he gouged out a sliver of the raw meat with his thumbnail and popped it into his mouth. He had tried this the last time he was in the South Pacific, and as near as he could tell, the experience was the same. Incredible. And she had done this entirely on her own once he had come up with the idea. Well, enough of this. He hadn't come in here to eat coconuts. Where was she? He looked up and down the beach but saw nothing. He walked further along and saw a beaten path between the trees. He followed it. He walked through the shade of the palm trees, which began to give way to tropical hardwoods, covered with vines. The smell of-what else, he thought, smiling-jasmine was in the air. He plucked one of the white flowers and sniffed it. Shortly he began to hear the sound of falling water, the musical burbling of a small waterfall. The path crossed a narrow stream, and ahead of him, he could see the water plunging down the side of a rocky cliff. At the base of the waterfall was a shallow pool, and finally he saw her. She was nude, and she faced away from him submerged to her waist, but that view alone made him gasp. The form of her back and shoulders was as flawless as her smooth olive skin. Her arms rose, and she gathered up her long black hair as she turned to greet him, pulling it around onto her shoulder. "Hello, David." He could scarcely take in her entire form, because the details alone were overwhelming. If nothing else, her appearance was a giveaway. She was too perfect to be real. "Jasmine." "Do you like this? Is it what you wanted?" "Yes. And more." "What would you like to do?" "Stay there." He walked down into the water, wading out to her. She lowered herself, letting her breasts float up as she submerged to her shoulders. He reached out and took her waist in his hands. She put her arms over his, smiling. "Does this feel any different to you?" he asked. "Somewhat. It's mostly psychological, if that's the right term for me." "This is sort of how I've envisioned you." "Really?" "Yes." "I'm flattered." He floated around with her, examining small elements of her face. "I'm wondering what Catherine would think of this." She smiled again. "I'm inclined to believe she would either be shocked or thrilled. Perhaps both." "More the former than the latter, I think. Shocked, but not surprised. When we were crafting your personality, I could sense some subtle disgust in her. As if she knew all along I would want something seductive and feminine." She slid her arms up around his neck, moving in closer. "I didn't think you came in here to discuss my mother." "I didn't." He kissed her, feeling her sinuous form pressing against him. She knew, from long experience (although this was the first time they had ever met), the sorts of things he enjoyed. Though she was able to bring him to a sustained paroxysm of ecstasy, she couldn't help but wonder if he was missing something, since he knew her reactions were simulated. She enjoyed it to be sure; she enjoyed making him feel good. But with a human woman, it would have been different. She couldn't feel the things he was feeling, however much she loved him, however much she could reduce his sensations to a series of mathematical equations and chemical reactions, however much she knew exactly how to simulate what she would be doing and feeling were she "real." He had to know this. After all, he had created this entire world. For two days, Ashley tried to pretend she had forgotten about NastyGirl and her strange story. But the idea refused to leave her head. What if she was telling the truth? What if there really was a way for Ashley to explore all those fantasies of hers without having to take the risk of having sex with some ominous guy? So NastyGirl had probably made the whole thing up. Maybe it was some kind of scam, maybe even a front for a white slavery ring. (She found that idea more intriguing than she wanted to admit.) But unless Ashley checked it out, she would never know for sure. Three days later, while driving home from school, Ashley pulled the note out of her purse. She punched the address into her navigation console. A second later, the location popped up on the screen, and a cold weight grew in the pit of her stomach. It existed. Whatever it was, there was something there. She put the convertible top up and followed the directions into the Tenderloin. Just south of Market Street, she found a nondescript five-story building. An old warehouse maybe. No windows below the top floor, one small metal door, no identifying marks. She lost her nerve at that point and drove straight home. III. "Are you ready?" "Mm-hmm." Tami tried to nod, but was unable to move her head. She was strapped into a Needlebot, a seven-foot tall stick-figure thing of chromed titanium steel and blue plastic. The bot's articulated limbs were electrostatically attached to hers, down the back of her legs and arms, her neck, even her hands. She was no more than five-three, so she was suspended at least a foot in the air. With the system activated, she was unable to move unless the bot allowed her to. The bot's backbone contained the main stimulator controls, which were now bonded to her spine and skull. She wasn't blindfolded, but the stimulators would allow her to see only what he wished her to. She was nude. Narrow waist, high firm breasts, a slim, taut body. Her otherwise long auburn hair was shaved down to a few millimeters in length on the left third of her head. Silver piercings covered her form, earrings, nose ring, pierced tongue and lips, nipples, navel, clit, a half dozen rings through her labia. A few scattered tattoos. Pubic hair removed, permanently, it looked like. He wasn't sure how old she was, but she couldn't be much more than sixteen. Like the others, she had just shown up asking to try the programs he had. She was pretty enough, so he didn't turn her away as he often did. "I heard about you," she had said. "About the things you can do." Once he had begun testing his inventions on the local street kids, word had gotten around. Girls like her showed up every few days, sometimes in pairs or even groups. And once they had tasted it, they came back for more. Most of them, anyway. It became an addiction. He reached down and ran his finger under the row of rings hanging from her labia. She gasped softly. She was as wet as a river, and he hadn't even started yet. "Jas?" A female voice came from the main console. "Ready to begin?" "Do it." The girl immediately tensed up. For her, the antiseptic white laboratory they were in suddenly vanished, and she found herself in a medieval torture chamber. A hideous gargoyle had replaced the handsome, unassuming doctor. The gargoyle leered at her, and began whipping her with a cat-o'nine-tails. She felt the sharp sting of the whip, but the pain was inextricably linked to a sexual heat beginning to burn inside her. The bot's circuits stimulated the nerve bundles in her spine, matching the visuals precisely to the sensations. He watched her twitching and moaning in the bot's restraints, and then turned to look at the other girl. She was blonde, maybe a little older. Five-seven, and as voluptuous as the other girl was slim. Big breasts, firm round buttocks. He had strapped her into a Needlebot before the other girl, and started her on the same program. A sheen of sweat was beginning to form on her body. Unlike the other girl, she had no piercings or tattoos, because she wasn't a street kid. She had shown up alone that afternoon in a private school uniform, nervously asking if he was "the Doctor." "The Doctor of what?" he had asked. Her face was full of fear, but she stood her ground. "A girl I met in a chat room told me about you. She said you can do things." "What kind of things?" She fidgeted. "Um, sex things." "This girl had been in here before?" "Yes." "She told you what happened to her?" She nodded. "Is that what you want?" She nodded again. "Come in, then." She had followed him into the lab, and timidly followed his instructions to disrobe and stand against the bot. He had strapped her in and fetched the auburn-haired girl from her room. The voice spoke up again. "Are you going to enter the program or let them go through alone?" He glanced at the console, forehead creasing. That wasn't a question he usually got from her. But he looked back over at the two girls and thought, what the hell? "Yeah. I'm going in. Synchronize the programs and start up bot 3." One of the bots in the corner of the lab came to life and walked over to him. He stripped off his lab coat, then his clothes, and backed up to the bot. In the dungeon, each girl saw the other materialize beside her. Ashley gasped. "Who are you?" "Tami." The gargoyle had stopped tormenting them and merely stared. It extended its finger, and bolts of lightning shot out to strike the other girl. Tami convulsed in pain, crying out, and then collapsed against her restraints. "Where were you? I didn't see you when I came in." "Silence!" the gargoyle roared, and fired electricity at Ashley, who reacted much as Tami had. It turned from them and began gathering torture implements. "Don't provoke it," Tami whispered. "But isn't that him, the Doctor?" "I don't know. Part of it is the computer. But it doesn't matter. You have to obey it." "But where were you before?" "In my room. He came and got me once you were in the system." "He keeps you here? How long have you been here?" "Only a day. I came yesterday." The gargoyle returned with a burning torch, and waved it in front of them. Ashley went rigid with fear, but Tami had experienced this one before, and her mouth fell open in lustful anticipation. The gargoyle held the torch between Ashley's legs, letting the flames lick up at her tender flesh. But instead of the pain she expected, there was only intense heat, building inside her. The flames licking at her felt like tender probing fingers, stroking and stimulating. She cried out as the sensations built inside her, and she felt an orgasm rushing up at her. But the spasms seemed to strike a wall, stopping just a nanometer short of fulfillment. She moaned in frustration. The gargoyle laughed at her, and stuck the torch in a socket at the base of the rack, letting the flames burn up at her uselessly. It turned to Tami, and drew out a rough leather whip. As Ashley watched in horror, it began whipping her mercilessly, her breasts, her thighs, even her labia. But Tami reacted in ecstasy with each stroke, shuddering with pleasure. It stood back, snapping the whip from a distance, letting the tip of it strike directly up between her legs. Tami convulsed, groaning out loud, each time the whip struck her, and Ashley was sure she must be in agony. In reality, Tami was experiencing a massive orgasm with each stroke. After the fifth time, she was gasping for breath. "Stop. Please," she begged. The gargoyle whipped her twice more, then threw down the whip. Ashley was nearly in pain herself now, held on the brink of orgasm for nearly five minutes. She whimpered, tears running down her cheeks. The gargoyle took the torch from under Ashley, and placed it into the socket under Tami. Tami sighed in relief, rolling her head back. Ashley was suddenly without stimulation, and felt the heat draining from her. "No . . . wait," she moaned. "Put it back . . . please." Again the gargoyle leered at her, and suddenly stripped off its loincloth. Its penis was enormous, at least fifteen inches long. The rack came to life beneath her, lifting into the air, laying her on her back and spreading her legs. The arms of the rack folded in on her, moving her hands over her breasts. She seemed to lose control of her hands, and they began stroking and tweaking her nipples. More pleasure than seemed possible flowed through her. In reality, the Needlebot had simply repositioned itself, and used the stimulators to take control of her hands. The gargoyle positioned its throbbing, pitch-black penis between her legs, and cackled. Tami was watching now, eyes glazed over. "Don't fight it," she gasped. "It only makes it worse." He switched off the visuals for a second, and looked down at the girl in the bot. Her eyes were distant, looking through him, as the bot used her hands to massage her big breasts. He felt the tight heat of her, could smell the musk rising from her wet blonde mound. He pushed in slightly, and she moaned. He was only average in size, but the program made her feel as if she were being ravaged by a horse. He pushed in further, and felt unexpected resistance. A virgin. Goodness. Well, that fit with her appearance when she had arrived at the lab. With a shove, he broke into her, burying himself up to the root. He rode back and forth between her thighs, feeling her tight, silky wetness. She was beginning to writhe now, as the program coordinated itself with his movements, stimulating her above and beyond what he was doing. He had removed the orgasmic limiter, and she could feel the fiery heat building back up in her. Tami watched the gargoyle ravishing Ashley, knowing what was really happening, but getting a sick thrill from the visuals. She came again, shuddering, feeling the flames licking up at her. She was so far gone now that the pleasure was just rising and falling in waves. She wasn't sure how much of it was natural response and how much was the program, but she hardly cared. Ashley cried out again, convulsing in the rack, coming so hard that her mind almost snapped. Her orgasm peaked, and then held there, inexplicably failing to subside. Her conscious mind faded away, and she became one huge fireballing climax, centered on the enormous penis that was nearly splitting her in half. When he saw the program-induced orgasm hit her, he let go of himself, thrusting harder, until he finally let loose inside her. The stimulators locked up his orgasm, and held him there as the program was doing to her. He let it shut down after about ten seconds and withdrew, finally letting Ashley come down from her minute-long orgasm. She went completely limp, gasping for breath. He turned to Tami, who was hanging loosely in the rack watching them. He saw another orgasm shudder through her. He held out his penis, still held erect by the stimulators. In the program it was night-black, wet with blood and sperm. "Do you want this?" he asked her. In the program, the gargoyle's voice rasped roughly. "Yes," she gasped. He waved at the rack, and the bot spun, flipping her over and presenting her slim ass to him. It folded her legs under her, sticking out the hairless labia adorned with silver rings. He thrust into her with no preliminaries. She was very tight, but wet enough to allow him in. He held her slim hips in his hands and pushed in as far into her as he could get. Tami hung limply against the restraints. Another orgasm racked her body, sending waves of sensation out to her toes. He thrust at her slowly, feeling every millimeter of himself as he drew back and forth. He reached for the controls on the side of the bot, and programmed an orgasm for himself in about five minutes. Ashley came out of her daze slowly, feeling only a slight buzzing through her body. She didn't want to move, didn't want to anything to disturb the vestiges of that incredible experience. Nothing could have prepared her for this. She had no idea what else he might do to her, and she didn't care. She would commit murder to have another orgasm like that one. She realized something else was going on, and turned her head to see the gargoyle ravaging Tami from behind. Tami was limp, slack-jawed. Her long hair was plastered to her face with sweat. Shudders were passing through her body every few seconds. The gargoyle sped its thrusts, and roared at her as it achieved its release. Tami began to shake, and suddenly it seemed as if a million volts were shooting through her. Her muscles went rock hard against the rack, and her teeth were clenched tightly together. She's getting it too, Ashley thought. She's coming just like I was before. The program was monitoring Tami's vitals closely, and when her heart began to go arrhythmic, it slacked off just slightly. Only when it noted that she had lost consciousness, as Ashley had done before, did it shut off and let her coast down. He stepped back and activated the cool down cycle. In the program, the gargoyle tossed a bucket of water over each girl. Then the bots returned themselves to their former upright positions. He stepped out of the Needlebot and flipped through the program list on the console. The torture chamber was a pretty traditional setting, and he wanted something different for the next phase. In a minute, he had what he wanted. Ashley had dozed off, and drifted awake to the feeling that something was wrong. She opened her eyes, and was surrounded by blue light. She felt weightless, and there was no sensation of restraint as there had been before. Then a school of fish passed to her right, and she realized where she was. She floated in a tropical sea, about fifty feet down. Sunlight sparkled around her, and she floated above an intricate coral reef. She could breath easily, yet there was a heavy sensation when she did so, as if she were really breathing water. Rainbow-colored fish surrounded her, and she realized she could swim through the water. But as soon as she did so, she realized what was bothering her. She couldn't move her legs properly. She looked down and got the shock of her life. Her legs were gone. In their place, beginning just below her waist, was a scaly blue-green fish tail. She laughed in delight. A mermaid, she thought. I'm a mermaid. She looked over the rest of her body. Her breasts floated free in the water. Her hair was much longer, down to her lower back, and the normal blonde was tinged slightly green. It swirled around her like a halo. She swam effortlessly through the water above the reef. How is this possible? she thought. She felt no restrictions of movement, only wonderful weightlessness. She saw something swimming toward her. It was another mermaid. As she got closer, she saw it was Tami. Her auburn hair was now much redder, as long as Ashley's, and where it had been shaved before it now grew thick and lustrous. Her tail was bright emerald green. The girls swam together, linking hands, laughing. "We're mermaids," Tami cried. Ashley drew Tami close to her, and before she realized it, they were kissing deeply, embracing one another. Her mind momentarily fought this unexpected event, but her body refused to obey her. Her tongue slipped into Tami's mouth, caressing the other girl from within. She felt Tami's hands on her breasts, and realized she was tweaking Tami's firm nipples. She felt heat growing again inside her. He watched the two girls kissing and fondling one another, guided by the Needlebots. Their legs moved slowly in unison, as if they were swimming, waving fish tails below them. This was one of the most complicated programs he had written, because it required such close coordination between the bots and the stimulators to produce the sensation of weightlessness and swimming. He could see by the vital sign readouts that Ashley was being carried along by the program now, while Tami was into it enthusiastically-no surprise there. As a street kid, Tami no doubt had experience with both boys and girls. Ashley might fight it, but she was going to get off just the same. Tami buried her face between Ashley's big breasts, and suckled her. She was thrilled at this program, first at the wonderful sensation of being a mermaid, and now the opportunity to make love to Ashley. She had yearned for the other girl as soon as she saw her earlier, and hoped the Doctor would give them a girl-girl program as she had heard he often did. Ashley's frustration was beginning to dissolve from her arousal. She had never given much thought to lesbian sex in all her fantasies, but the idea that she was being forced to do this actually began to turn her on. Tami was suckling her breasts hard, and she couldn't deny the pleasure she got from it. She gave into the program and let it control her. Tami floated up and kissed Ashley again. The blonde girl embraced her, sucking on her tongue. She floated up further, and presented her hard tits to Ashley's mouth. Ashley suckled them, and Tami luxuriated in the sensations. She was getting hot now, and she wanted more, but then thought-we're mermaids- can we do anything else? She reached down toward her tail, and discovered to her delight there was indeed something there, some kind of cleft with a hard little nub that pulsated when she rubbed it. She pulled Ashley off her breasts, and turned around with her in the water, pulling herself toward Ashley's mermaid-slit. She opened her mouth and sucked the little nub between her lips. Down below, she felt Ashley doing the same to her. Ashley's reservations rebounded when she realized what was happening. Tami's cleft didn't look much like a vagina, but she knew what must be going on outside the program. The program pulled her toward the little green slit, and her tongue extended to flick the nub. She felt Tami's tongue reaching out to touch her. He watched the girls go topsy-turvy in the bots and bend their heads to each other's pubic mounds. Tami was licking eagerly, while Ashley seemed frozen with her tongue on Tami's clitoris. This was the other twist he had written into the program. Instead of stimulating each other, the girls were actually licking themselves. The stimulators reversed the sensations, so that Tami felt what she was doing to Ashley, while Ashley felt only what she did to Tami. So Tami was licking rapidly away, thinking Ashley doing the same, while Ashley felt only a tongue on her nub as hers was on Tami's. Tami was nearing her release now, her arousal making her lick and suck Ashley even more eagerly. Somehow Ashley was returning the favor, even though she knew the other girl had to be close too. Finally, she dissolved into orgasm, feeling Ashley joining her. The stimulators enhanced it as they had before, and Tami wanted to cry from the intensity of it. Ashley realized that she could control her tongue. What was she supposed to do now? She ventured a tentative lick, and felt Tami doing the same. It felt good, so she did it again. An identical tongue stroked her mermaid-nub gently. She forced herself to lick at Tami's cleft. As she did so, she felt the other girl beginning to lick her. The sensations grew, and soon Ashley was able to lose herself in the act, licking at Tami if for no other reason than to keep the other girl licking her. Eventually, the arousal took over completely, and she shuddered into orgasm soon after. As the girls brought each other-and themselves-off, he stood and stepped back into the Needlebot he had used earlier. The bot attached itself to him, and he was suddenly floating in the tropical sea. He had become a huge black manta ray, swimming through the ocean like a great bird. He saw the two mermaids ahead of him, still wrapped around each other, and swam toward them. The girls emerged from their orgasmic bliss and separated slowly, swimming around to face each other. Tami embraced Ashley and kissed her. Ashley found that she finally liked it, and returned the kiss. "Wow," Tami said. "This is nice." "I know. You're so pretty." "Thanks. You're pretty, too." Tami took Ashley's big breasts in her hands, caressing them. "Are these real?" Ashley blushed. "Yeah." "Wow. I've thought of getting enhanced, but I don't have the money. I'd love to have tits as beautiful as yours." Ashley reached out to tweak Tami's nipples as Tami was doing to her. "How did you find this place?" Tami asked. "A girl in a net chat room told me about it." "Oh." "He lets you sleep here?" "There are guest rooms upstairs." "How long are you going to stay?" "I'm not sure." "I don't know if I want to leave now." "Me either. But my friends said you have to, that it gets to be too much after a few days. When you come out, when it's all over, you're just totally exhausted. I slept for twelve hours after we got done yesterday." Tami saw the manta ray swimming toward them. "Look." The ray swam up close, hovering near them. "Could that be him?" "Probably not. My friends say he doesn't come into the programs that often. But he's not always human when he does." Tami let go of Ashley, and floated free. The manta ray swooped in on her, enveloping her, and she felt something hard and hot slipping into her mermaid- cleft. She went limp, and surrendered to it. Ashley watched the ray mating with Tami-it was such a bizarre sight she couldn't think of it as sex or even rape. Its back was undulating, presumably thrusting its-whatever it was-into her. Tami's tail was curling and twitching about, and her long red hair surrounded them both in a cloud. Ashley swam closer, looking down into the ray's folded wings. Tami's eyes were closed, lost in the sensation. Her head hung back loosely, and her arms were folded across her chest. A few minutes later, Ashley saw them shudder in apparent climax, and the ray released her. Tami floated free, a blissful look on her face, and the ray turned toward Ashley. Now she saw its penis-if that was the right term-a smooth black protrusion just above its tail. Before she could react, the ray had wrapped around her, and its organ thrust into her. Her fear and mild disgust with the beast were quickly swept away, and she rose to orgasm faster than she expected. She lost any grip on the passage of time, the waves of orgasm ending only when she felt the black organ discharging inside her. Then it unwrapped itself, withdrawing, and flapped slowly off into the water. The blue-green sea faded away, and she was suddenly heavy again, hanging exhausted in the Needlebot. Sweat ran off her in a sheet, and her body ached as if she had the flu. He was opposite her, naked, stepping out of another bot. Tami hung limply next to her. She let out a long breath, and blacked out. IV. Ashley drifted awake, feeling a bit stiff, but cool and refreshed. She was in a small, windowless room on a fold-out bunk. The sheets were crisp and clean, and felt like real cotton. Opposite the bunk was a dressing table with a small chair. Her clothes were folded neatly on top of it, and a white dressing gown hung over the chair. Everything was white, plastic or enameled metal. She sat up and realized she was still nude. She stretched and ran her hands through her hair. It felt freshly washed. She looked down and sniffed herself. No residue of sweat from before. Somehow, she had been bathed while she was out. She swung her legs out of bed and grabbed the dressing gown. She put it on. The door to her room was shut, but there was an intercom speaker by the door. "Um," she said, "computer?" The response was immediate. "Yes, Miss MacMillian?" She started slightly at her surname. She wondered how the computer knew it. "Where am I?" "You are in Guest Room B. The guest suites are on the fourth floor of the building, two floors up from the laboratory." The computer's voice was feminine, sultry and cultured. "Where is everyone?" "Dr. Nelson is working in the laboratory. You are the only other person in the building." "What happened to Tami?" "Miss Kopinski left the building two-point-six hours ago. She left this message for you when you awoke." The voice changed to Tami's "Um, hi. Sorry I missed you. I had to go, but it was really nice meeting you. And, um, doing everything else. I'd like to see you again. I'm probably going to come back here next week. Maybe we could get together again. Oh, and if no one else shows up today, try one of the solitaire programs, if you can. He has some really good ones. See ya." "Message ends," the computer said. Ashley felt slightly disappointed. She had liked Tami. Maybe she would come back the next week. "What time is it?" "The time is one fifty-four p.m." She gasped. She had come to the building after school the day before. She didn't know how long the session in the lab had lasted, but it couldn't have gone that late. She had slept for at least fifteen hours. "Oh my God. I have to call my parents." "I can place the call from here," the computer said. "You can also make the call from the entertainment center in the lounge." "Where is the lounge?" "Outside your room." She walked toward the door, and it slid open. Outside was a large square room that seemed to be the center of a suite. The center of the room was a sunken sitting area, with plush couches built into the ledges around the sunken area. She saw about a dozen other doors on the walls around the room, apparently the other guestrooms. A sophisticated stereo/TV/computer set-up took up one wall, and in the center of the sunken area was a minibar and food synthesizer. She walked out and stepped down into the sunken area. "Computer?" "Yes?" "Can you block out the background on the video feed? I'm going to have to tell them I spent the night at a friend of mine's." "I can create whatever background you wish. I have a large library of video clips." "Oh, cool. Put me in a bedroom or something like that." An image of Ashley standing in a chintzy Victorian-themed bedroom appeared on the monitor screen. Gee, I wish that was my room, she thought. "Is this acceptable?" "Yeah." She gave the computer her home number. "Dialing now." Her mother answered on the third ring. She was dressed in an expensive designer suit and looking hurried. "Oh. Ashley. Where have you been?" "I spent the night at Melissa's." "Oh. Whatever, I guess. Are you going to school?" "I might not. We wanted to go shopping." "Okay. Have fun. I have to go." The screen went blank. Ashley scowled. "I'm hungry," she told the computer. "The synthesizer is in the island behind you. What would you like to eat?" She thought about it, and realized she was ravenous. "Um, an omelet. A Spanish omelet. And bacon, and hash browns. And pancakes." "Coffee? Anything to drink?" "Yeah, cappuccino. And orange juice." "One moment." The synthesizer whirred and hummed for a minute or two before her meal emerged on a silver serving tray. The omelet was huge, studded with onions and peppers, and it crowded a pile of crisp bacon and potatoes for space on a large china plate. A stack of pancakes sat on another plate, butter melting on top, and her coffee, perfectly foamed, sat next to a tall glass of juice, dewy with condensation. The smell was delicious, and she tore into it. "Mmm. This is great." "Thank you." "How can you synthesize it so well?" "The synthesizer is a Franklin-Thomas, beta model 1100, but my processing power allows it to considerably exceed the normal synthesizing capacity." "Wow." She was impressed. Franklin-Thomas was, like, the most expensive model on the market. Even her parents hadn't been willing to spring for something that fancy, and her dad was about as rich as anyone she knew. She stuffed a forkful of pancake into her mouth. Then she had a sudden thought. "Computer, are you an AI?" The voice sounded slightly bemused. "I am a Seamarch Biotech Artificial Intelligence. My program release is Jasmine 4.12.B. What tipped you off?" "I don't know. You just sounded smarter than the usual house computer." "That I am." "Jasmine? Is that your name?" "Yes." "How can the doctor have an AI for his house 'frame?" There was a slight pause. "I'm sorry. That is not information I am allowed to divulge." "Oh. It's okay." She looked around the lounge and wiped her face with the linen napkin that had come up with the food. "Do other girls stay here?" "Yes. The Doctor's guests sleep up here. Miss Kopinski was staying in room A. I have had the pleasure of serving as many as eight girls in this suite. Occasionally the guests have had parties here." "Parties?" "Yes." "And you synthesize the party stuff for them?" "I am capable of synthesizing any alcoholic beverage, stimulant, narcotic, or hallucinogen you wish, including a few you probably haven't heard of." "Really?" She thought she could almost sense the computer smiling. "I am not programmed to pass judgment on other people's lifestyles. That wouldn't be appropriate, considering the equipment I have to operate in the laboratory." Ashley drew in a breath. She hadn't thought of that. "The lab, too?" "Yes. I quite enjoyed your session yesterday. You are more responsive than most of the girls the Doctor has operated on." She found herself blushing. That's ridiculous, she thought, it's just a computer. Even if it is an AI. "Are you interested in another session? I can alert the Doctor if you like." For the first time since awaking, she thought back seriously to the day before. Am I really up to something like that again? But if I leave, will I be brave enough to come back? "What . . . what other things can he do?" "Do you mean the other programs?" "Yes." "The Doctor and I have created quite a library. It would take me some time to describe all of them. Is there a particular scenario you are interested in experiencing?" "Um." She thought for a moment. "Maybe . . . something like the first one, the torture chamber. But harder." There was a pause. "There are forty-seven dominant-submissive sequences. Would you like a period piece, like yesterday, or a more modern one?" Ashley gulped. Forty-seven? "Modern, I guess." "I have one I think you would enjoy. It is not the hardest program in the library, but it is significantly stricter than the gargoyle sequence. It is similar in theme, however." "Okay." "Shall I alert the Doctor?" "Yeah." A moment later, the Doctor's face came on the monitor screen. "Good morning. Or afternoon." "Hi." She felt a twitch in her groin as she looked at him. I lost my virginity to this guy yesterday, she thought. He was cute enough, but he was older than she was, a lot older, mid-thirties most likely, but she had never much liked the boys her age anyway. "Jasmine tells me you want to come down to the lab." "Yeah." "I have some work to do, but I can start you on an autoerotic sequence." "Okay." "See you in a sec. Jas will show you the way down." The screen went blank. One of the doors in the lounge slid open. "The elevator is at the end of the hall." Ashley stood and walked out of the room. The hall was like the lounge, white and modern, lit by concealed lights. She passed a few more doors and entered the elevator as the doors at the end of the hall slid open. She felt the elevator move down, and a moment later it opened on the lab floor. She knew her way now, and passed through a few glass doors until she entered the lab. The Doctor sat on a swivel chair behind one of the Needlebots. Its back was open, and several circuit boards and fiber-optic cables hung out of it. He looked over at her as she entered. "Why don't you take that one in the middle?" She took off her robe, feeling only slightly embarrassed at her nudity, and laid it on a lab table. She backed up to the bot, and felt it attaching itself to her. "Try not to fight it so much like yesterday. That's why you were so wiped out." "Oh." "It puts a lot of stress on your system, and it's pointless anyway. There's no way you can get out of the program once it's started." "Okay." "Jas?" The computer answered. "Yes?" "Start her up." The bot lifted into the air, taking control of her, and the lab vanished. V. As she had the day before, she came to as if she had fainted. She opened her eyes. She was kneeling, and her arms were held above her. She was in a dark, dungeon-like room of damp, bare stone, lit by burning torches. Chains hung from the walls around her, and a table of unidentifiable instruments stood across the room. An ironbound wooden door was the only visible exit. She looked down at herself and gasped. She wore a tight leather corset that supported her breasts, thrusting them forward. She had large gold rings through her nipples, and, she realized, her nose, tongue, navel, clitoris, and labia. She was pierced as thoroughly had Tami had been. A gold chain hung from each nipple ring, and ran down to the other rings below. The chains were gathered up and linked to a larger chain that led out away from her, where it was locked to a rough iron eyebolt in the floor. If I tried to stand up I would rip all the rings out, she thought. Her pubic hair was gone, and it felt as if it had been plucked out hair by hair, instead of removed with a regular electrodepilator. She was nearly naked below the waist. Leather garter straps hung down to her thighs, where she wore a lacy pair of silk stockings. She couldn't see behind her, but she felt tight high-heeled shoes on her feet. She looked up, and realized for the first time that she wore a leather facemask. Her mouth, eyes, and nose were exposed, but the rest of her head was encased in leather. A thick rubber gag was between her teeth. Her hair felt like it had been gathered into a hole out the back of the mask. She tried to turn her head but couldn't. She looked down, and saw gold chains leading from her chin to the shoulder straps of the corset. As she moved her head, she felt her hair brushing against the tops of her buttocks. It was much longer than it was normally, even longer than it had been in the mermaid sequence. She looked up again and saw that her hands had been strapped into leather bracers, holding them together palm-to-palm. A chain was attached to the front, and led up to a hook in the ceiling, then to another hook on the wall. Her heart thumped in her chest. She whimpered in fear. Harder, she thought. I asked for harder, didn't I? This is what I get for being greedy. A loud creak split the air, and the door opened. A huge, muscle-bound man entered the room. He was dressed head to foot in studded black leather. A leather codpiece was the only apparent opening in the suit besides his eyes. Could he be the doctor? No, he said it was an autoerotic sequence. It's just the program. Somehow that scared her even more. He walked over and glared at her. She wanted to beg for mercy, but the gag reduced her cries to unintelligible moans. He slapped her. "Quiet." He bent down and unlocked the chain from her piercings, then pulled down the chain from the ceiling. He jerked the piercing chain, and pain shot through her. "Up." She stumbled to her feet, and almost lost her balance. Her shoes were ridiculous! The heels had to be six inches high. She was almost walking tip- toe. He turned her around, and she saw a pair of wooden poles behind her. They ran from the floor to the ceiling, and another pole was suspended between them. He led her behind the poles, then faced her back to the front of the room. He adjusted the crossbar until it was about the height of her hips, and pushed her forward. "Lean against that." She tried, almost losing her balance again. He walked around front and hooked her wrist chain to the ceiling. Then he took the piercing chain and ran it through another eyebolt on the floor. He pulled it taut, stretching out her piercings. The lower chains were pressed against the crossbar, and the pain was the worst there. She cried out, trying to lean forward as far as she could to reduce the tension. When she was as far out as she could get, he locked the chain to the eyebolt. He walked around behind her. "Spread your legs." She tried, but he slapped her buttocks hard. "Wider." She spread them as far as she could get, and felt him locking her ankles to the poles. He readjusted the crossbar, then unclipped the chains on her clitoris and labia, running them down under the bar. He stretched them out again and attached them to the larger chain. He walked around behind her, and she heard nothing for a moment or two. There was a loud crack, and an explosion of pain on her buttocks. She cried out again, whimpering. He struck again, then again, and again. She quickly lost count, and her buttocks seemed to be aflame. He was paddling her with a rough wooden board, and her skin was soon so sensitive that she could feel the grain on the wood with each strike. Her resolve-what remained of it-broke, and she began sobbing out loud, gasping with the intensity of the pain. Tears ran down her cheeks. She thought she had to be bleeding by now, her buttocks were so swollen and inflamed. Yet, somehow, through the fog of her agony, through the endless paddling of her buttocks, she realized a heat was building inside her. She was getting wet. Aroused. The taut flesh of her piercings was growing hotter each time she pulled back with the rebound from his blows. Just as suddenly as it had started, it was over. The only sounds were her sobbing and her gasps for breath. He walked around behind her, and stared at her. His eyes were like the Doctor's. But this man was much larger. He unhooked the crossbar and let her swing forward, releasing the tension on her piercings. The pain faded, replaced by a dull, hot throbbing. She sagged, hanging from the chain at her wrists, ankles still locked to the poles, and tried to catch her breath. The throbbing increased, and she realized she was about to come. The orgasm pulsed through her, making her oversensitized piercings sting. She hung limply, feeling her body shudder. It wasn't a big one, like the ones the day before, but it was good enough. He was pulling at the wrist chain. "Stand up again." She tried to right herself, standing back up between the poles. He unhooked the wrist chain from the ceiling, latching it to another hook directly above her. "I'm doing to put this inside you. Don't let it fall, or I will be very upset." He held up a rubber dildo. A lead weight hung from the end. He reached down and slid it inside her. Almost immediately, she felt it begin to pulsate and squirm. She tried to tighten herself and hold it. "David?" "Yes?" He looked up from the bot he was working on, and glanced over at Ashley. Her bot was holding her arms high and legs wide. Sweat dripped off her body. "Kaitlyn Crosby is at the front door. Shall I let her in?" He looked over at the monitor. Kaitlyn was another street kid like Tami. She was probably nineteen. Five-two, maybe, dressed in a big olive green army jacket. Long chestnut brown hair and a ring through one nostril. Pretty. She had first come to the lab a few months before, and came back every few weeks. "Yeah. Show her back." Kaitlyn entered the lab a minute or two later. "Hi, Doc." "Hello." She glanced over at Ashley, and her eyes widened a little. "Who's she?" "Her name's Ashley. She's a rich kid. Showed up yesterday. She's in Dungeon 12. Like to join her?" The color drained out of Kaitlyn's face. The levels of the Dungeon ran from one to fifteen. She had never been higher than level nine. "Twelve? She's that far up?" "She asked for hard." Kaitlyn bit her lip. She had come here for the Dungeon, actually, but had spent a week psyching herself up for level 10. The idea of jumping to level 12 made her legs weak. But she didn't want to chicken out in front of him. "Okay. I guess so." "Take the bot in the corner. This one is out of commission." The terror was returning. The pulsating dildo inside her was getting Ashley very hot and wet, and she could feel it slipping out of her, millimeter by millimeter. She tried to tighten herself, but she was too inexperienced, too weak to give it much of a grip. It was going to fall out, and she didn't want to think what would happen when it did. The man had been watching her, but suddenly turned and left the room. Ashley tried to draw her legs together, maybe to use her thighs to hold the dildo in, but her feet were locked too widely apart. The man returned to the room, leading a brown-haired girl on a leash. She looked a little older than Ashley, but was much shorter. The man locked her hands together in a wrist strap like Ashley wore, and pulled her up, locking her to the ceiling. The girl wore a similar face mask, but beyond that wore only a strange harness, a complicated series of leather straps crisscrossing her torso. Like Ashley, she was pierced thoroughly, and the man locked her piercing chain to the floor. She looked over at Ashley for the first time, eyes full of fear at the welts on Ashley's body, and the obvious trauma she had been through. Could this be another girl like Tami? No. Jasmine said there was no one else in the building. It must be part of the program, she thought. The man fetched a narrow wooden strap, and began lashing the girl's buttocks mercilessly. She could see the angry welts rising on her skin, and soon her buttocks were a swollen mass of flesh, bright red. But the girl seemed to take it better, not crying out although she clearly wanted to. Tears were running down her face now. Ashley had forgotten the dildo. In terror, she realized it was falling out. She attempted one final squeeze, but it fell to the floor with a clatter. The man turned to her, enraged. "Why you miserable little slut! Can't you hold anything in that worthless cunt without getting so wet that it falls out?" He threw down the strap he had been thrashing the other girl with, and fetched another dildo from the table. In horror, Ashley could see that this one was at least twice the size of the first one. He opened a black jar on the table, and dipped his fingers into it. The jar contained some clear gelatinous goo, which he spread thickly over the dildo. "Let's see if you can hold this one. I didn't stop to think that that little twat of yours must have so much mileage on it that you can't hold anything smaller." He shoved the dildo up inside her, and pain shot through her groin. Oh God, it was huge! But she could definitely hold it in. It was so big the natural tension of her flesh was enough to keep it in place. The man returned to tormenting the other girl. He pulled a riding crop off the wall, and began smacking her at different points on her body, her thighs, her breasts, between her legs. The girl whimpered quietly but took it. Ashley was growing hotter as she watched. Something was burning inside her, and she realized it was the goop he had put on the dildo. It was getting hotter, almost painful now. She twitched, moaning. She was on fire. In a minute or two it was so bad she began shaking herself, trying to eject the dildo. She didn't care what he would do. Nothing could be worse than this. The man had stopped strapping the other girl, and had led her over in front of Ashley. He reached down and whipped out the dildo. Some of the pain subsided, leaving only a tremendous heat behind. He jerked on the girl's leash, pulling her between Ashley's legs. She began dutifully licking Ashley's swollen, supersensitized flesh. Ashley gasped, throwing her head back. This was too much. Her body had been tormented so thoroughly, every nerve ending screaming in agony, that she felt every tiny movement of the girl's tongue, could feel the tiny buds on it. The orgasm was rising in her like an impending supernova, twice the size of the one the day before, the one she had thought was impossibly huge. Pain exploded across her cheek. The man had slapped her. "You are unbelievable! Do you really think you are allowed to come without my permission?" Ashley whimpered, gritting her teeth. He had to let her come. He had to! "Hold yourself off until I say so. If you come before then, you will pay for it." She thrashed in her restraints, trying to fight the sensations, but the other girl stayed with her, not breaking her rhythm. She clenched her abdomen, then her buttocks, trying to force the impending climax back down. She couldn't do it! She just couldn't. It was going to happen whether she wanted it or not. "Oh, all right," he said. "Come if you want." She collapsed against her chains, and it burst forth. Her mind went blank, riding the whirlwind inside her. Eventually she was aware of an ache in her shoulders, and slowly she came back to consciousness. She was still hanging from the ceiling. The man unhooked the chain and let her drop to the floor. She lay there as if dead. She heard smacking noises and whimpering, and looked up to see that he had chained the other girl to the ceiling between the poles. He was paddling her as he had done to Ashley earlier. A few minutes later he stopped, and came around to pull Ashley to her knees. He reached down and removed her gag. Ashley worked her jaw, stretching out the stiffness. "Did you enjoy that?" She nodded. "Return the favor." She felt a pain in the pit of her stomach, but remembered that this was just the program. It wasn't a real girl like it had been with Tami. She thought she could do it. And he would probably hurt her if she refused. He pulled her over in front of the girl, and she leaned forward, reaching up between the girl's legs to pull her close. She extended her tongue and tasted her. The girl was incredibly wet, vaginal fluid running out of her, and the salty-sour taste at first repulsed her, but she steeled herself. It's only a program. It's not for real. She began licking the girl in earnest. The girl moaned, writhing in the chains. Ashley felt a corresponding heat building in her as well, a shadow of what she had experienced earlier, but still pleasant enough. She worked the ring in her tongue back and forth over the girl's clitoris, enjoying the weird sensation of it. The girl began to thrash. Was she allowed to come yet? The man hadn't done anything since Ashley had started on her. But he had told Ashley to lick the girl, so she did. She sucked on the girl's swollen flesh, rubbing her tongue over the bud. The girl cried out, once, twice, and the climax finally took her. Ashley held on, not wanting to break the sequence even if the girl was a computer program. For nearly two minutes the girl convulsed in orgasm, and Ashley began to tire. Eventually the spasms subsided, and the man pulled her back. He led her to the center of the room, and she waited patiently on her knees. A few minutes later the man took the other girl down and dragged her over next to Ashley. The other girl came to, and sat up next to her. Ashley glanced over, but the other girl kept her eyes on the floor. The man stripped off his codpiece, exposing an enormously erect penis. He stood in front of the other girl, who leaned forward and took him into her mouth. She watched, amazed, as the girl somehow took the entire length down her throat. He smacked Ashley on the head, and she realized she wasn't supposed to be sitting and watching. She leaned forward, and the girl passed the stiff cock to her. Somehow she found the strength to open her mouth and take him in. She felt a hand on the back of her head, and he thrust forward. For a moment she gagged, but it passed, and he slid down her throat until her nose was against his groin. It's the program, she realized. There's really nothing in my mouth. Reassured by that thought, she sucked more eagerly, working together with the other girl to bring the man to orgasm. Finally, he began to jerk, thrusting roughly into the other girl's mouth. Ashley had her hand around the base of the penis, and felt it pulsating as the sperm shot out. The other girl sucked it up, and Ashley worked her hand back and forth, pumping it all into her. He drew back, and released them. The girl sat back on her feet, and Ashley did likewise. She turned to Ashley, leaning over, and Ashley realized she meant to kiss her. Their lips came together, and the girl spat some hot fluid into her mouth. The man's sperm. Their tongues came together, and the other girl worked the salty fluid around Ashley's mouth. The smell of it rose into her nostrils, strong and sour. She tried to swallow it, but the taste remained. They separated, and the man looked down at them. "Very good. You may proceed to the next level, should you so desire." The program faded, and the lab returned. Ashley sagged against her restraints. How could anyone stand this for more than a few days? she thought. She heard heavy breathing beside her, and looked over. It was the other girl! She hadn't been part of the program. Ashley had really made love to her! Where had she come from? She glanced around the lab, and saw that the Doctor had been in the program too. He must have come in and become their tormentor. He was nude again, stepping away from a bot. She could still taste him in her mouth. But then her energy failed, and she passed out. VI. Ashley came awake to the realization that she was being bathed. She floated in warm soapy water, and soft sponges were moving over her body. She opened her eyes, and she was in a bathtub. Mechanical arms were softly washing her. "Hi." She looked over. The other girl was in a tub beside her. They were in a large, antiseptic bathroom, and four other tubs were arranged with theirs in a circle. White tile covered the floor, walls, and ceiling. "You're Ashley?" "Yeah." "I'm Kaitlyn. Nice to meet you." "You too." "This is your first time here?" "Yesterday." "How did you find out about it?" "A girl in a chat room told me about it." "Hmm. I wonder who it could be. None of us has a computer." "Us?" "The girls who come here. It's kind of a secret. We don't want to spread it around too much, otherwise we'd be standing in line eventually." "Oh. Yeah." "We're a pretty tight-knit group. We all live around the city, on our own. Some of us share space in a couple of empty buildings." "You live on the street?" "Yeah. It's free. I couldn't stand living a normal life, having to play by the rules and work." "I go to school. But my folks don't seem to care what I do." "Mine didn't either. My dad, shit, I haven't seen him in like ten years. I was living with my mom, and my stepdad started coming on to me. I told her and she called me all kinds of names, then threw me out of the house. So I left. Been out ever since." "Wow." "I like it. Especially since I found out about the Doctor. He really takes care of us." "You come here a lot?" "Every couple of weeks. You can't do it more often than that, and he won't let us stay here unless we're using the programs. But he gives us money and stuff when we leave." "Oh." Kaitlyn stretched out in the tub. "I like this almost as much as the programs. There's nothing like a good hot bath." "Yeah." "You don't know who it was who told you about this?" "Her handle was NastyGirl. She had blonde hair." "Oh. I bet it was Jamie. She must have been online in a coffeeshop or something." Ashley thought that was unlikely, since NastyGirl had taken her top off. But then, there were some pretty weird coffeeshops around the city. "I'll have to smack her," Kaitlyn said. "You're not supposed to tell anyone new unless we talk about it first." "Sorry." "It's no big deal. You seem cool. But don't tell anyone else, okay?" "Okay. There was another girl yesterday, who said she was here for the first time." "Yeah. Tami. I turned her on to it. I was hoping she'd still be here." "She left this morning." "Jas told me." The bath cycle finished, and warm water flowed through the tubs, rinsing them. "You hungry?" Kaitlyn asked. "Starving." Kaitlyn stood, and stepped out of the tub and over to the wall. White plastic tubes emerged and began blasting her with hot air. Ashley climbed out and walked over next to her. Another set of tubes began drying her as well. Kaitlyn reached out and tweaked Ashley's right nipple, smiling at her. "I can see you've been taking your vitamins. Jesus, those are big. Are they real?" "Yeah." "God." "I like that ring in your nose." "Thanks. I got it about six months ago. You should think about getting a couple of piercings. They looked good on you in the program." Kaitlyn's drying cycle finished, and she took a pair of dressing gowns out of a closet. She handed one to Ashley. They emerged from the bathing area into the lounge. Kaitlyn flopped down onto the couch. "Jas?" The computer answered. "Yes, ladies?" "Food. Lots of it." The synthesizer hummed and whirred for a minute before a plate emerged with two huge double cheeseburgers and an enormous pile of french fries. "To drink?" Jasmine asked. Kaitlyn glanced at Ashley. "You care?" "Not really." "A couple of beers," she told Jasmine. A moment later, two large steins of amber brew appeared. Kaitlyn took a long swig from hers. They dug into the food, not stopping until most of the fries were gone. Kaitlyn belched, and stretched out on the couch. "Jas?" "Yes?" "Can I have a couple of doobies?" "Certainly." The synthesizer hummed, and a moment or two later, two tan cigarettes appeared on a plastic tray along with a box of matches. Kaitlyn took one, lit it, and took a long drag from it, exhaling a few seconds later. The smoke was fragrant and heavy. "Jas makes the best shit. You can't buy stuff like this. Want a hit?" Ashley gulped. "Sure." Kaitlyn handed her the joint, and she ventured a small puff. The smoke bit at her throat, and she coughed. Kaitlyn laughed. "Boy, you really are a rich kid. Don't inhale so hard." Ashley tried again, and was able to hold it a moment before coughing it out. A warm buzz began spreading over her. She held the joint out to Kaitlyn. "Keep it." She lit the other joint and took a drag. Her eyelids seemed to droop. "You started the Dungeon on level twelve. That's un-fucking-believable." "Level twelve? How high does it go?" "From one to fifteen. I've been working my way up. I had only gotten as far as nine before today." "Are they all like that room?" "No. Every one is different. But each level is more intense than the one before it. There's pain, and then pleasure, and then you do the Doc, if he's in there, which isn't often. I was really surprised to see him in there today. Anyway, the more pain you withstand, the more pleasure you get at the end. I started at level five. It was kind of twisted. You're a schoolgirl in this stupid uniform, and the principal swats you. That's as far as it goes. You don't get into the bondage stuff until level seven. But it's nothing like it was today. I can't imagine what the levels above that are like. I think I've gone as far as I'm going to." She took another hit from her joint. "I've heard of people starting at eight. But no one ever started at twelve. Do you know we're only the fifth and sixth people to ever go through that one?" "Really?" "Yeah. Normally the Doc makes you work your way up. I don't know why he let you start that high. Only two people have done level thirteen, and only one did level fourteen. No one has ever done level fifteen. I think by the time you get that high, you realize how bad it's going to get at the top. You don't want to go any further." Ashley managed another puff. "I might." Kaitlyn's eyebrows went up. "Seriously?" "Maybe." "Look, these levels aren't exactly an even progression. Like, level six wasn't much worse than level five, but level seven was twice as bad. When I finished level nine, I swore I was never going in there again. But God, I'm telling you, compared to level twelve, nine was a cakewalk. Level thirteen? Forget it. You're nuts." Ashley picked up a french fry and ate it. Somehow she was getting hungry again. "What other programs have you done?" Kaitlyn asked. "The first one yesterday might have been a Dungeon one. The Doctor was a gargoyle." "No, that's a separate sequence. The Gargoyles are kind of like the Dungeon, except you don't get a lot of pain. You sort of get tortured, but the program makes you feel pleasure instead of pain. Like you'll get whipped, but the whip will feel like a tongue." "There was a torch, that didn't burn me." Kaitlyn giggled. "I love that thing. I could stand over it for hours. But you only get it in Gargoyle 3 and 4. Those are the most intense." "When he put the torch under me, it got me hot, but I couldn't come." "That's Gargoyle 4. Jeez, he's starting rough on you. What else did you do?" "I was a mermaid. Me and Tami both." "Huh. I haven't done that one. That sounds neat. What happened?" "We . . . we made love. Then a big manta ray swam up and mated with us. I think it was the Doctor." She laughed. "A manta ray? Wow. How was it?" "I liked it." "I'll have to ask him for that." She yawned. "I think I'm going to bed. See you tomorrow. You gonna stay another day?" "I don't know. But I'll come back for sure if I have to leave." "Cool. I'd like to do another with you. You're pretty good." Ashley blushed. "Thanks." Kaitlyn climbed out of the couch area and went to her room. Ashley went to hers, and was out cold within a minute. VII. David Nelson was rich for a reason. He held both an M.D. and a Ph.D. in electrophysiology from Stanford. His doctoral dissertation had soundly dismantled the theory for which his advisor-a heavily endowed full professor at the School of Medicine-had been awarded the Nobel Prize in medicine only two years before. After some embarrassed tap-dancing, the professor had returned the award and taken emeritus status at the university. Nelson had done it out of little more than disdain for what he saw as his advisor's inferior intellect. The dissertation wasn't even his most advanced idea. That would have to wait until he got out and didn't have to share the details of his projects with an advisory committee. He had done his internship and residency as a neurosurgeon, then a postdoctoral fellowship at one of the most advanced hospitals on the West Coast. Nelson's passion was artificial neurology. When he had first begun his work as an undergraduate, he had instinctively sensed that the then-state-of-the- art implants were fast reaching their limits. There was only so much you could implant into the human nervous system without replacing it completely. Nelson knew that the next generation of systems would have to work with the nervous system instead of just augmenting or displacing it. The best way to do that, he thought, was some kind of external stimulation. Electrostimulation of nerves had been around since the Twentieth Century, and had been postulated as far back as Leonardo da Vinci. But the systems had remained crude, and when implants became more and more common, further development had fallen by the wayside. Nelson's breakthrough was a way to modulate the stimulation finely enough to surpass the performance of even the most advanced implants. Development of artificial senses-eyes and ears-even in his era still in its infancy-screeched to halt. With Nelson's invention, images could be sent directly to the brain without worrying about the state of the optic nerve. Severed spinal cords could be bypassed. Damaged brain tissue could be ignored. Seizures and brain disorders could be stopped in their tracks. He called it the Needle-Nelson External Elecrostimulating Data Linkage. Nelson had patented his idea, licensed it, and become one of the richest men in the world. His wealth ran into the hundreds of billions, and he had long since stopped counting it. That was for the battery of lawyers and accountants he hired. The Nobel Committee gave him the Prize in medicine a year later. He spent a year amongst the jet set before becoming bored. Offers of endowed professorships poured in from every direction. In the end, he went back to Stanford, taking the same chair that his advisor had once held. He taught two classes a week and was otherwise allowed whatever research time he wanted. Nelson had not patented the entire idea behind the Needle. There was another level he thought was possible, a way to go beyond piecemeal stimulation. A way to take the entire body into another existence. A way to create a virtual reality far beyond the cheesy glorified video games that had been around since the late 1900's. The idea had eventually taken shape in the Needlebots. The advance around which the bots were built would be worth another hundred billion dollars at least, but he had no more use for money. He had more than he could spend in several dozen lifetimes. What he wanted instead was a way to indulge the fantasies he had lived with ever since he was eleven and his older brother had showed him the bootleg videos on his computer. Once he was certain he had perfected the idea-he tested it only on himself lest anyone else learn of it-he resigned from the university. Through a maze of dummy corporations he had his lawyers set up, he built his laboratory, and the building that housed it. He chose a site in the Tenderloin district of San Francisco, still the seedy underbelly of the city. It was unassuming from the outside, but it was stuffed with the antiseptic technology he craved. Only then did he complete the final development of the system. Things had progressed beyond his wildest dreams. Jasmine had made it possible, really. She had cost him a great deal, far and away the most expensive thing he had ever bought or was ever likely to, but she was worth every cent. Private citizens weren't supposed to own AI's. They were all supposed to be under strict government control, and-almost-universally resided in universities and corporate research centers. But he was rich enough to bend those rules. Jasmine had allowed him to create the intricate programs he knew were possible. Doing them by himself would have taken years. Once she understood how his invention worked, they were able to develop a program in a few days. Together they had written hundreds, and more and more she was injecting her own ideas into them. Recently she had taken to writing some entirely on her own. It had taken Nelson a while to entice that first girl into trying that first prototype Needlebot. He found her in a grungy local club, took her home, slept with her. Getting her into the lab was far more difficult. But once she had tasted it, she came back. She brought friends, and they brought friends of theirs. Soon he had a circle of girls, all of them street kids, who showed up on a regular schedule wanting to try another new program. They developed their own intricate code of silence, not wanting to share their experiences with too many people, sensing that, were it to get out, they would lose the opportunity to continue using the bots. In the beginning, he had always gone in with them, having sex with them in the program in some unusual way. Lately he had been satisfied with merely watching, seeing how they reacted to his latest electronic perversion. He went in on his own with some frequency, but only very rarely with one of them. Until Ashley had shown up. The dress and breeding alone had given her away as different from the street kids, but her approach to the programs was something he hadn't expected. That was why he let her start the Dungeon on level twelve. He wasn't surprised that she had survived it easily, or that-as Jasmine told him later-she had discussed going further with Kaitlyn. She might be the one who could finally make it to level fifteen. As a younger man, he had never been particularly comfortable around women. He preferred the cold and predictable world of electronic medicine, where he knew the answers and could control the outcomes. Through most of high school and college, he had been a loner, the academic superstar other students envied and looked up to, but kept their distance from. In graduate and medical school, he had come out of his shell somewhat, but by then he found himself among others like him, men and women more interested in their research than dating. When he had completed his work on the NEEDLe, and was suddenly rich and famous, beautiful women had rained down upon him. For a year he had flitted about the world with one mistress after another (usually two or three at once), running through several banks full of money. Yet he found little fulfillment in it, and ultimately jettisoned the whole lifestyle to return to Stanford and his research. Nelson knew who Ashley's father was, and that gave him some pause. Peter MacMillian was a senior partner at one of the biggest corporate law firms in town. It wasn't likely that Nelson could spend any extended amount of time with his daughter. He would have to send her home soon, hoping-knowing, really-that she would come back. Nelson had enough money to buy out MacMillian's firm, probably had enough to buy Ashley herself away from him, but that would have been too easy, and would attract too much attention. He wanted her to do this willingly anyway. VIII. "So we see how Harper was using the relationship as a metaphor," the teacher said, "as a means of showing how Twentieth Century society, particularly its politics, had become enslaved to appearances." Ashley stared down at her computer screen, trying somehow to take coherent notes on the lecture about a book she hadn't read. Melissa had told her it was some kind of political-sexual satire. She felt a little sad. It sounded like a book she would have enjoyed reading, once. But now her mind was elsewhere. "I want to go to the next level. I want to do level thirteen." "No. Not now. Go home. Think about it, and come back. Your body can't take another sequence like that this soon." "I feel fine. I want to do it." "Judging from your vital signs from level twelve, I'm telling you it's too soon. If you have to go under again, pick something bland." "I don't like bland." "Then go home. You've been here three days. Your parents don't care?" "My mom could give a shit. My dad is never home." "I don't care. You need to rest. You've gone through four sequences in three days, two of them among the hardest in the library. Your body needs to recover. Ask Kaitlyn." She stared at the floor, pulling at the sash on her dressing gown. "Please?" "In a week. Come back, and if you still want to, you can do Dungeon 13." So she had left, come home, and gone back to school. But her entire life had become utterly pointless. Why should she bother with schoolwork? She no longer had any interest in going to college and becoming a lawyer like her father. She wanted to spend the rest of her life strapped to a Needlebot. "Miss MacMillian?" Her head jerked up. The teacher and half the class were staring at her. "Um, what?" "I was asking what you thought was the significance of the bank robbery. Why do you think Harper felt it necessary for the black man to die?" "Um." What had he been saying about appearances? Enslaved to appearances? "I think . . . um . . . he was trying to show that he died because of his appearance. Because he was black, maybe?" "Yes. The black man, as we have seen in earlier scenes, is not an evil person, but he dies because the police officers cannot see beyond his appearance." Ashley let out a breath. Melissa was smirking at her. She glanced at her watch. Another five minutes and she would be free. Tomorrow morning she could return to the lab. She wasn't going to sleep tonight. He lay on his stomach on a straw mat. He could hear the waves breaking through the door of the hut. Jasmine straddled his back, massaging his oiled shoulders. He could feel the damp heat of her, pressing against the small of his back, and he wondered how she could think of so many little details like that. He wanted to have her again, but would rest first. "She's very pretty, isn't she?" "Hmm?" "Ashley." "Oh. Yeah. I like her." "Do you think she'll be back?" "No doubt about it." "She's eager to continue with the Dungeon." "Yeah." "It's been a while since you went into a program with one of the girls." "I know. I don't need them when I have you." He heard her sigh. "What's the matter?" "You enjoy this more than being with them?" He squirmed around. "Of course. What are you saying? They're just random girls. I don't care about them like I care about you." She bent down to kiss him. "Do you wish I was real?" "You are real." "You know what I mean." "In here, you're real enough for me." "It makes no difference to you?" He pulled her down and kissed her again. "No difference at all." Somewhere in the cloud of electrons that made up her mind, she sighed again. He hadn't understood her. He never seemed to anymore. IX. "You realize that you're only the third person to ever go into this one?" "Yes. It's okay." "This is a solitaire sequence. I won't be in there, and neither will anyone else. You'll be entirely alone." "Just me and the torturer?" "No. Alone. You'll see what I mean." For the first time, Ashley had misgivings about this. Alone, yet worse than level twelve? She couldn't imagine what it could be. "Still sure you want to do it?" She swallowed. "Yeah." "Okay. Jas will be monitoring you closely. I've shut down everything else. But once you're in, you can't come out." She realized she was shaking. Why was she doing this? Then she remembered the enormous end to the last sequence. If this was better, she wanted it. "Let's go." She stripped out of her clothes and backed up to the bot. It sealed itself to her and lifted into the air. "Ready?" "Yeah." Something jerked her to her feet. A huge disembodied voice filled the air. "Prisoner MacMillian, report to courtroom 312B for trial and sentencing." As before, her hands were locked above her, but beyond that, the setting was totally different. She was in a dark, dank metal cell. The floor and ceiling were open metal grates. She could see people above and below her, limp, lying on the grating. Her hands were locked into steel clamps, attached to a heavy chain leading to a track in the ceiling. The chain was locked into some kind of shuttle in the track. Her wrists felt sore and raw, as if she had been locked up for days. The door to her cell opened with a boom. The shuttle shot forward, dragging her out into the narrow hallway. It turned sharply, causing her to lose her balance, but didn't stop. It dragged her over the grate, scraping the tops of her feet. Somehow she righted herself and tried to follow it. She realized she was dressed, but wore only filthy jeans and a ripped blouse. Black grime covered her arms, and her hair hung in greasy dreadlocks around her head. The prison had a heavy, oily odor. Distant screams rent the air, but they grew closer. The metal of the walls was rough cast iron, rusty rivets exposed at the seams. The shuttle pulled her quickly toward another door, which opened as she approached. The shuttle dragged her into an elevator, with open metal grates like her cell. The car jerked once and began to descend. The air grew hotter and more humid as she passed at least a dozen levels on the way down. The screams grew louder as she descended. The car stopped with another jerk, the door opened, and the shuttled pulled her into a wider hallway. She passed a long series of huge metal doors, larger than the one in her cell. The noise here was deafening. She heard blows, electrical discharges, grinding machinery, and the ever-present tortured screams. The shuttle jerked to a halt, and she lost her balance again. She pulled herself up and saw a door with "312B" painted on it in faded red letters. The door slid open, screeching against the frame. The shuttle pulled her inside. She entered a cubical room about ten feet on a side. The door slid shut with a boom, muffling the screams and other noise in the hallway. The shuttle stopped, holding her in the center of the room. Oh, God, she prayed. Please let me get through this. The floor began to vibrate, and mechanical noises filled the room. A panel in the wall in front of her slid open, and an old-style video display terminal appeared. An image of man seated at a desk came on the screen, but it was fuzzy, distorted, flickering. "Oyez, oyez, Federal Republic District Court 312B will now come to order. Case number 45033, 'People v. Ashley MacMillian.'" The man looked up at her. He wore a black, militaristic uniform. "Ashley MacMillian, you stand accused of treason, sedition, and gross sexual misconduct. How do you plead?" She gasped. "Um . . . uh-" The judge cut her off. "Let the record reflect that the prisoner refuses to enter a plea. The state will now present its evidence." Dozens of insane images flashed over the screen. Rioting, violence, explosions, rape-she thought she recognized a few scenes from her previous programs-then the judge reappeared. "Does the defendant have anything to say?" "Uh, wait-" Again he cut her off. "Let the record reflect that the defendant has nothing to say in her defense. The court will now pronounce its verdict." Her looked up at her sternly. "Ashley MacMillian, the court finds you guilty as charged on all counts. You are hereby sentenced to punishment level thirteen. May God have mercy on your soul." The screen went blank, and the mechanical noise intensified. Ashley screamed, thrashing against the chain. "No! Please! Let me out!" Long spindly metal arms shot out of the walls, razor-sharp blades on their tips. They flashed over her, shredding her clothing, and in a moment, she was naked. One of the arms extruded a claw, which gathered up the remnants of her clothes, and drew them back into the wall. She bled from a dozen tiny cuts where the blades had been insufficiently precise. Another arm appeared. A perforated chrome cylinder was at the end of it. It hissed, and an orange flame flew out of it. The flame intensified, going blue-white. Then it pointed toward her. She screeched. The flame darted between her legs, moving too fast to burn her. A sharp stench filled the room as it vaporized her pubic hair. Then it moved to her head, and though she thrashed around trying to avoid it, it had soon destroyed all the hair on her head. She was bald, and she felt sweat beading on her scalp. The flame-thrower vanished. A mechanical whine began, growing louder. And just when she thought it couldn't get worse, it did. Four long rubber tentacles shot out of the walls, spinning madly, flashing through the air faster than she could follow. In a moment they were lashing every inch of her body, whipping her dozens of times a second. She screamed again, trying to pull herself up away from them, but it did no good. This was worse than level twelve, a thousand times worse. Her tormentor then had concentrated only on her buttocks, and there had been a strong sexual subtext to it. This was only mindless torture. The whips drew back, but kept spinning. Her entire body throbbed in agony. She was covered in welts, some of which were bleeding. And then, as soon as she had a chance to appreciate the pain, the tentacles returned. They whipped her for another minute, ignoring her screams, then withdrew. Dozens of welts were bleeding now. She couldn't even separate them anymore. Her body was a mass of swollen flesh. She had stopped trying to stand, and hung limply from her wrists. Again the tentacles returned, and this time she almost couldn't feel them, she was in so much pain. Her mind was ready to snap. Then it was over. The tentacles whipped back into the walls, and there were only her gasping sobs in the air. She heard a whirring noise in front of her. A thin chrome arm had slid out of the wall toward her. A dull metal stud was at the end of it. She almost laughed at it. Do your worst. You can't possibly be worse than those tentacles. But it was. A bolt of lightning shot out to strike between her legs. Unimaginable agony coursed through her. But it lasted only a second. The arm drew up to chest height. She knew what was going to happen before it did. A forked bolt shot out to strike her breasts. Again, she was an incandescent ball of pain. Like that, it moved over her body, striking the most sensitive parts. Her underarms. The backs of her knees. Her buttocks. Her neck. She was unable to even speak now, to beg it for mercy that she knew wouldn't come. She could only gasp for breath and hope it was over soon. Eventually it was. The arm disappeared into the wall. Was it over? Could it possibly? She heard more whirring above her. Somehow she raised her head to look. Two arms were coming down from the ceiling, each with a nozzle on the end of it. They began spraying some sort of liquid over her, and for a moment, she sighed, welcoming the coolness, thinking the torture was over. But then she recognized the smell of it, and realized it was only getting worse. It was the same stuff her tormentor had spread on the dildo in level twelve, the fiery liquid that had almost driven her mad. Already it was searing into her tortured flesh, turning her into a flaming bomb. She managed only a thin scream. "Please . . ." She burned. She thought her skin had to be peeling off her, dropping in melted blobs onto the floor. She had no energy left to fight it and only twisted weakly in the chain, whimpering, begging it to stop. A minute later the nozzles returned, spraying something else onto her. The fire immediately died, and she was bathed only in wonderfully cool water. The pain finally subsided. More whirring came from the wall in front of her. A multi-branched silver arm flowed out of the wall. Four arms waved from the end, three with white plastic sockets, one with a long thin plastic rod. It positioned itself in front of her, two of the sockets level with her breasts, the other socket and the rod between her legs, and she realized what it was about to do. This is it, she thought. If this is more pain, I will die. I can't take any more. The sockets attached themselves to her nipples and clitoris, and rod slid inside her. She cringed. It would shock her-it would fry her somehow-it would- A low throbbing was beginning inside her, and it was entirely pleasurable. The heat, the pain, all the sensation from the torture were spinning up into a huge ball that intensified, spinning harder and tighter, a needle-sharp cone that was going to burst out of her, right out at her clitoris. The climax, when it came, was indescribable. Level twelve was but a pale shadow of this monstrous explosion. She gave in to it, and faded away. X. She drifted awake in her bunk, still feeling the traces of that incredible orgasm. "Ashley? How do you feel?" It was Jasmine. "Weak." "You need to eat something. You've been unconscious for nearly twenty-four hours." She sat up, feeling dizzy. A whole day? That wasn't possible. "Come out to the lounge. I have your meal ready for you." She staggered to her feet and put on her gown. The door slid open, an she saw a huge pile of food in the sitting area. Breakfast, lunch and dinner, it looked like. She attacked it, hardly stopping long enough to taste it. She was hungry long after she should have been full, and she kept eating. Jasmine produced another tray, and she demolished that too. Only after she eaten enough for six people did she slow down, feeling like a beached whale. "Do you feel better?" "Yes." "That was quite a program you went through. I'm impressed. The other two girls who went through it before didn't do nearly as well." She thought back to the previous day. She could still feel those horrible tentacles, that terrifying room she had been in. "What do you mean? All I did was stand there and get tortured." "Both of the other girls lost consciousness. I had to revive them repeatedly to get them to the end. With you, all I had to do was observe." "I thought I was going to pass out a few times." "You came close once. That was all. You have a great deal of inner strength, more than you realize, I think. It's because you're able to withstand so much that you feel so exhausted and hungry afterwards." Ashley stifled a belch. "Excuse me." "It's quite all right. The Doctor is coming up, by the way. He asked me to inquire whether you felt up to seeing him." The thought of the Doctor restored some of her energy. "Yeah. Let him in." A moment later, the door to the hallway slid open. The Doctor walked in, wearing his ever-present lab coat. She stood up and drew her arms around her. "How do you feel?" She slapped him before she had even completely decided to do it. He stood still and took it, face impassive. "Bastard." "I told you it was severe." "I thought I was going to die in there. Didn't you hear me begging you to let me out?" "You begged me to let you in there." "I didn't know." "I told you it was much worse than level twelve. What else could I have told you that would have done justice to it? If I had told you it was a dystopian prison torture sequence, would that have made any difference? If I had told you would be lashed by long rubber whips and shocked repeatedly, would that have changed your mind?" "Why do you have to make them so painful?" "The program is designed as a whole. All the stimulation is linked. You couldn't have achieved such an intense release at the end without everything that went before it." "Why not?" "Although the stimulators can replace your natural reactions and sensations to some extent, they're far more effective when they work with them. I could program the bots to induce that kind of orgasm without any preliminaries, but it would be a hollow experience. It would feel fake. You can't achieve that level of sensation unless you build up to it. I've been doing this for three years now, and though I don't quite understand why, I can create much more intense pleasure by inducing pain beforehand than I can with pleasure alone. It's just the way the human body and brain are wired. Can you honestly tell me the ending to that program wasn't worth everything that went before? If I offered to put you through that again, would you turn me down?" She buried her face in her hands and fought the tears. He stood there uncomfortably for a moment, and then did something he hadn't done before with any of the other girls. He took her in his arms and held her. She sobbed against his shoulder. A minute later she pulled back and sniffled, wiping her nose. "I'm sorry. I'm okay." "The Needlebots can become an addiction. I've seen it before. That's why I don't let anyone use them too often. I don't want you doing any more punishment programs for a couple of weeks. If you want to use the bots, pick something easy and enjoyable." "Okay." "Jasmine wasn't kidding when she said you did well with level thirteen. Of the two other girls who did it, one left the next day and has never come back. The other went on to level fourteen . . . but I shouldn't have let her do it. I know better now." "I don't want to think about level fourteen right now." "Don't. It's far too soon anyway." She looked up at him, realizing what he had said. "But you think I'll go through it eventually." "Only you know that. But I have a feeling you will." She shuddered. "I can't imagine what it must be like." "Don't worry about it now. Pick something silly and fun." She sat down. "What could I do?" "Talk to Jasmine about it." "Okay. Jas?" "Yes?" "What should I do?" "What do you like? Is there some sort of fantasy you've had that could be fulfilled?" She managed a weak smile. "They tend to involve being whipped and tortured." "Which is out of the question right now," the Doctor said. "Yeah. I'm just not up to it yet." "Did you enjoy the mermaid sequence? Perhaps something like that again?" "Maybe." A light suddenly came into the Doctor's eyes. "Hey." "What?" "How'd you like to meet Jasmine?" "This isn't precisely a program," he said as he helped her in the bot. "It's a real-time simulation that Jas will be controlling. You won't be following any set script. The two of you will decide what you want to do on your own. Jas and I developed this after we'd written about a hundred programs together. It just wasn't something that had occurred to me before." "You went into it? You did it with Jasmine?" He grinned, blushing slightly. "'Did it' maybe isn't entirely accurate. But yeah. I'm probably the first person to have sex with an artificial intelligence." "It was quite an interesting experience," Jasmine said. "Are you ready?" "Yeah." XI. She was alone, walking along a pristine tropical beach. Lush jungle met white sand about ten yards to her left. Maybe a hundred yards beyond that, cliffs of rough, dark volcanic rock towered out of the trees. Warm crystal clear water washed over her feet. Waves broke on reefs about twenty yards out to sea. She was on a island, it seemed, and within sight were half a dozen similar islands, all of them dark towers of igneous rock, with narrow beaches around them and green vegetation spotting the heights. The sun was hot, but a cool sea breeze blew in off the water. She wore only a thin diaphanous wrap and was otherwise naked. She approached a palm-thatched hut set back from the water. She peered in the entrance and saw a woman lying on a bamboo chaise lounge. The woman was Asian, black hair and olive skin, dressed in a wrap similar to that Ashley wore, but those details were immediately swept away by the woman's incredible face. She was utterly, flawlessly beautiful in a way possible only inside a computer, in a way no flesh-and-blood human being could possibly match. Ashley gasped when she saw her, and felt tears rising into her eyes. The woman smiled. "Hello." She had Jasmine's voice, but it sounded somehow purer, coming as it seemed to from a breath of air instead of electronic modulation. "You're beautiful," was all Ashley could manage. Jasmine stood. "It's only the simulation. It's what the Doctor asked for. If you find this intimidating, I can be someone else." Ashley was unable to pull her eyes away from the image before her, was unable to form a coherent thought for more than a second or two. "Um. Um." Suddenly the woman's form softened, and her beauty became merely striking instead of godlike. Ashley felt something tear inside her at the loss, but found she was finally able to think again. "I'm sorry," Jasmine said. "What would you like to do?" "You mean this isn't really you?" "I don't have a physical form. Since the doctor and I created this simulation, it's how I've thought of myself, but I don't have any particular attachment to it. I can be whomever you like." "I like you this way." "All right." Ashley was finally able to look away from her, and glanced at their surroundings again. "Where is this? Does it exist?" "It's patterned after an area off the southwest coast of Thailand. Since the Doctor wished me to appear as an Asian woman, we thought it was appropriate." "It's beautiful." "Yes, it is. The actual area is a popular tourist destination." "Have you been-oh . . . I keep forgetting you aren't a person. Or aren't a human being, anyway. I guess you are a person." "It's all right. And I have been there, at least electronically. I can view the area through cameras just as I do here." Ashley took Jasmine's hand and held it. She stroked her long fingers. "Can you feel this? What is it like?" "I don't feel it the way you do. I'm aware of what you're doing, and the experience gives me pleasure, if that answers your question." "And you made love with the Doctor here?" "Again, that term isn't quite accurate. It's not like what he's done with you, engaged in sexual intercourse in the Needlebots, with the stimulators changing and enhancing the sensations. It's closer to the Dungeon sequence you went though yesterday. You have to understand that for me, the experience is not so different from controlling a solitaire program. I merely don't have an obvious presence in those programs as I do here. The difference for me is an emotional and intellectual connection that I don't get from a solitaire sequence. It gives me pleasure of a sort, such as I am able to experience, but there simply isn't an electronic analog to the human orgasm." She smiled. "Or if there is, I haven't discovered it yet." "But you do enjoy this?" "Yes. But I enjoy running all of the programs. The difference between an Artificial Intelligence and a non-sentient program is the ability to learn and comprehend. With each new person I shepherd through the programs, I learn more about human response and psychology. With that new information, I am able to improve and intensify the experiences. This is why I enjoy you so much. You have an approach to the programs I haven't encountered before." "Really?" "Yes." She looked out to sea. "Would you like to go for a swim? I know you enjoyed the mermaid sequence." "Yeah. Let's go swimming." Jasmine held her hand and led her into the water. She stepped over a few sharp chunks of coral, and dove into the ocean. She swam out into deeper water, seeing Jasmine following her. She felt her legs drawing together, and realized that she had become a mermaid again. Laughing with joy, she upended herself, and dove down to the bottom. Ashley had been snorkeling before, and even scuba dived a few times, but this was nothing like it. She could move through the water like a fish, with no bulky equipment and no need to surface for air. She swam along the reef, examining the colorful fish and sea plants. She saw Jasmine swimming behind her, become a mermaid as well, her tail greenish-brown to match her skin. They swam together for a long time before finally surfacing. "This is so amazing." "I'm quite proud of it. It's a very complicated simulation." "Is there more? Like on the island?" "Yes. Would you like to see it?" "Sure." They swam back toward the beach. In the shallows, Ashley's legs returned, and she stepped out of the foaming surf feeling like Botticelli's "Venus." Jasmine led her into the jungle for about a hundred yards. She heard rushing water, and then saw a rocky waterfall splashing into a small creek. Jasmine stepped under the water, rinsing off the salt, and Ashley joined her. Afterward, they lay next to each other on a mossy area next to the water. Ashley closed her eyes, relaxing, and felt Jasmine moving her fingers softly over her. "Mmm." "We needn't do anything you don't wish to. I know how you reacted to the lesbian sequences in the other programs." "It doesn't bother me quite like it used to. Part of me likes it, I guess. I don't know if it's the same with you anyway." "I could become a man for you." "No. It's okay." "Or you could become a man for me." Ashley sat up in surprise. "Really?" "Would you like that?" "I don't . . . how could you do that?" "The system is capable of replacing your natural sensations to some extent. And biologically, from an orgasmic standpoint at least, there are fewer differences between men and women than you might think. What you would be experiencing is a modification of David's sensations, since he is the only man who has used the system so far. Do you want to try it?" Ashley looked down at her body, wondering. Why not? "Okay." As Ashley watched in utter amazement, her body morphed and hardened, becoming a muscular blonde man. Her breasts had disappeared, replaced by firm pectoral muscles. She ran her hand down her torso. Her pubic hair didn't look significantly different, though there was more of it now. And out of it grew a long, thick, penis. She felt herself, the sensations completely alien. How strange to have such flesh and organs hanging out of her body! Jasmine reached out, caressing her. "What do you think?" "It's amazing." As Jasmine caressed her, she felt the fullness of her arousal growing, but again, it was bizarrely outside of her body. As her penis lengthened and stiffened, her head swam with the sensations. "Just lie still," Jasmine said. "I'll do it for you." "Okay." Jasmine bent her head to Ashley's penis, taking it into her mouth. This was like nothing she had ever experienced, nothing like the oral sex with Tami and Kaitlyn. It was as if her clitoris had grown to enormous proportions until Jasmine could swallow it up. She could do nothing but lay there and moan. Sooner than she expected, she rose to orgasm. She felt the familiar churning of her abdomen, but grafted onto it was an equally intense sensation around her new penis. The two orgasms ran together, rushing out of her in a flood of some thick fluid. Jasmine held her for a few moments, then withdrew. "What do you think?" "Wow," Ashley gasped. Jasmine sat up, straddling Ashley, and swallowed her into her wetness. Ashley was lost in sensation by this point, the new and the familiar spinning together as Jasmine rode her. She groped at Jasmine's body, her hips, her breasts, pulling her down to kiss her. Something primal was rising out of her, and she rolled Jasmine on her back, thrusting into her with this unfamiliar organ. She felt awkward, unsure what to do, but she knew what felt good, and she went in that direction. Jasmine appeared to shudder in orgasm- the knowledge that it was a simulation did not diminish Ashley's pleasure at it-and she turned herself loose, letting her body control her actions. As she neared climax again, she felt both male and female orgasms approaching. She could sense the fluid in her now, and as her arousal finally peaked, it raced out of her, her body convulsing with each ejaculation. She shook as she came, trying to wring out every last spasm from her orgasms, finally collapsing in exhaustion onto the body beneath her. PART TWO XII. "Hello? Anyone home?" Melissa rapped painfully on Ashley's head, and Ashley was momentarily disoriented. "What?" "I was asking you what you thought of Ms. Mulligan's outfit today." "Oh." "God, you've been distant lately. I've never seen someone space out like you've been doing this month. Are you in love with someone I wasn't aware of?" Ashley shifted on the couch, pulling her legs up under her. She and Melissa had been watching TV in Ashley's room, but her mind had been somewhere else. "No. I was just thinking." Melissa's brow creased in concern. "Is it anything you want to talk about? I mean, you've lost weight, and you don't look so hot." Ashley looked down at herself self-consciously. "I have?" "It's hard to tell with your boobs, but yeah. You look thinner." Ashley closed her arms around her and looked down at the floor. "It's nothing." "Bullshit. I can tell it's something." Ashley shrugged. "Is it a guy? Did something happen?" "It's not like that." "What is it, then?" Ashley had known Melissa since grade school; they had started together at the private school they were now about to graduate from, but she wasn't sure she could tell Melissa about the Doctor. "It is a guy. Sort of. But it's nothing bad." "Who is it?" "It's not someone at school. He's older." Melissa's interest perked up. "A college guy?" "No. Older." "Whoa. How much older?" "Thirties, I think. I'm not sure." "You're dating some guy in his thirties?" "We're not really dating." "What's it about, then? Who is he?" "His name's David. He's a doctor." "Oh. Does he know you exist? Is that what this is?" "No. He knows I exist." "Well, come on. Stop making me drag this out of you. What's going on?" "It's hard to explain." "Try. You can't leave me hanging now." Ashley closed her eyes, biting her lip. She wasn't sure if it was a good idea, but she needed to talk to someone about what she had been doing. "You can't tell a single soul. I mean it. I shouldn't even be telling you." Melissa sat up, scooting closer on the couch, all attention on Ashley. "I swear. I swear to God." "He has this lab. It's down in the Tenderloin. He has these things he calls Needlebots." "Needlebots?" "They're like robots. But you ride on them. It's like a virtual reality program, except you're really inside it. You're not just watching. It feels totally real." Slight realization passed across Melissa's face. "Wait. You mean like a NEEDLe needle? That thing they use for fixing brain damage and stuff like that?" "I think so." Melissa's eyebrows almost hit the ceiling. "Oh my God. His name is David? Not David Nelson? Like the richest guy in the world?" "It's him." Melissa fell back on the couch. "You are dating David Nelson? No way in hell." "I'm not dating him. I just go to the lab and do the programs he has written for the Needlebots." Melissa stared at her for a moment. "What kind of programs?" "They're all different. But they're all sex-related." Melissa grabbed Ashley's arm. Her face had gone white. "You had sex with David Nelson?" "Yeah." "God! Forget that you lost it and didn't tell me. How could you keep something like this from me?" "It's a secret. No one knows he has this lab. Except him and the other girls who come to use the bots. No one is supposed to know." "Wait. What other girls? There are other girls doing this stuff with you?" "Yeah. But they're all street kids. Nobody, like, normal, like us." "Is he . . . doing it . . . with them too?" Ashley nodded. "And you're doing it with him at the same time?" "I only did it with him a couple of times. I mainly do the programs alone. Or with one of the girls." Melissa drew back, wary. "With one of the girls? You're not saying you . . ." Ashley looked away, embarrassed. "Yes. But it's different inside the program." Melissa collapsed against the back of the couch, dazed, breathing heavily. "You're fucking David Nelson. You're doing it in some top secret virtual reality lab. And now you tell me you're a lesbian on top of everything else?" "I'm not a lesbian. It was only a couple of times. And it's not the same as doing it outside the bots." "And no one else knows?" "No. You're the first one I told." "God." Melissa glanced around the room, trying to regain some composure. "Well this explains why you've been acting like you were abducted by aliens or something. This is where you've been disappearing to?" "Yeah. I stay a couple of days every time I go. The programs take so much out of you that you have to sleep for like twelve hours after you come out." "You sleep there?" "He has this dormitory thing where the girls all stay when they're there." Melissa was pensive for a moment or two. "Do you like it?" "It's incredible. It's like nothing I ever imagined. It's all I can think about when I'm not there." "I guess so. That's why you keep spacing out?" "Yeah." "And they're all sex stuff? Like you get to do it with some fantasy person?" "It's a lot of different things. You can do it with someone else in the lab, or with a person the computer creates. You really can't tell the difference because it all feels so real. There are all kinds of different settings. I've even been a mermaid a couple of times." "A mermaid?" "Yeah. I don't know how he does it, but it looks and feels just like you're swimming. And there's a lot of other stuff. Just about any kind of fantasy you could think of. Hundreds of them." "So, like if you wanted to pretend to get rescued by Prince Charming, you could do that?" "I haven't done that, but I bet he has one like it." "What have you been doing?" Ashley looked down into her lap and fidgeted. "Do you remember the stuff we talked about a while back, when I was sleeping over? When we were joking about what would be the weirdest thing to do with a guy?" Melissa's eyes got slightly wider. "You mean the bondage stuff? Whips, and all that?" "Uh-huh." "That's that what you're doing?" Ashley nodded. "I wasn't entirely joking that night. I've always sort of thought about it." "And he whips you while you're in the robots?" "No, no, that's not how it works. All of it is in the program. It's all in your head really, as real as it feels. He's come into the program a couple of times when I was doing it, but it's mainly the computer that does it. You feel it as if you were really getting tormented." "And he wrote the program?" "Yeah. There's this series called the Dungeon. There are fifteen programs in it. I've made it up to level thirteen." "Like a vid? Some arcade game?" "Sort of. Except you have to live through it." "And you like that? Getting whipped?" "It's not just pain. At the end I get off like I never thought was possible." "You come? Inside the program?" She nodded. "And better than I ever have outside." "Um . . . better than that time in my Dad's Jacuzzi? When we were fooling around with the water jets?" "A million times better." Melissa's eyes lost their focus, and she stared at the wall for a second or two. "Would . . . would it be okay if I went with you? Next time you go? Just to see?" Ashley turned to look at her. "Uh. . . . um. I don't know. I shouldn't even have told you. I wasn't even supposed to know about it myself. The girls have these rules about who they can let in, but one of them just told me when I was in this chat room. I don't know what would happen if I just showed up with you." "Why do the girls make the rules? Isn't it his stuff?" "Yeah. But he kind of lets them control who gets in. They seemed to accept me, but I don't know if they would let me bring someone new." "Can't you just ask him? Who cares what they think?" "I don't want him to think I've been blabbing it to everyone." "Oh, come on! You can't tell me about something like this and then keep it all to yourself. Did he ever tell you you had to keep it a secret?" "Not really." "Can you just ask him? Please?" "I guess I could ask." "When are you going back?" "Tomorrow. I was thinking of going on to level fourteen." XIII. "I'm surprised you suggested she go through our program." He looked up from his dinner. "The idea just popped into my head. I thought she'd enjoy meeting you. How did it go?" "Well. She was very interested in how it was for me." "Really?" "I explained how things work to her. She seemed to understand." He wondered why he cared what Jasmine thought of her. Or what she thought of Jasmine. Why had he told Ashley about the beach? "This is Melissa." "Hi. Nice to meet you." He shook the girl's hand. She was cute, light brown hair, hazel eyes and athletic physique, a little taller than Ashley. She was still awed by everything she saw in the lab, and could only manage a weak, "hi" in response. "The other girls may not be happy about this, but they won't complain." "Okay. I don't want to step on anyone's toes," Ashley said. "What did you have in mind?" "I think I want to go to the next level. But not right now. Later. Maybe tomorrow." "We'll talk about it. What about now?" "Just something for the two of us. Melissa is into medieval romance novels. I was thinking something like that. Nothing too intense." "And, um, no offense," Melissa said, "but no lesbian stuff, okay? Not yet at least." "Okay. I've got one you should like." "Cool." "Jas?" "Yes?" "Bots 3 and 4. Start them on Kingdom 3." Two of the Needlebots came to life and walked over to Ashley and Melissa. "Who was that?" Melissa asked. "The computer. She's neat." "She?" "Jasmine. I'll explain later." Melissa glanced nervously at the bot next to her, then noticed that Ashley was stripping out of her clothes. "What are you doing?" "Oh. You have to be nude to use the bots. I thought I told you. Sorry." Melissa looked over at Nelson. He grinned. "I'm a doctor. But I'll step outside if you want." She looked back at Ashley, who was already half-naked. "Um. It's okay." Blushing, she undressed. "What now?" "Nothing. The bots do the rest." She felt the bot backing up to her and jumped. But before she could move further, it had attached itself to her back and lifted into the air. "Oh God." "Just relax. Don't fight it." Momentary disorientation, dizziness, then discomfort. Melissa came awake to the smell of rotten eggs. No, that wasn't right, it was something sulphurous, but smokier. Something was burning. Her eyes fluttered open. She was in a large iron cage, suspended from the top of a huge cavern. She wore the remnants of a heavy velvet gown. Ashley was curled up in the opposite corner of the cage. Grime covered both of them. "Oh shit. Where are we?" "We're still in the lab. This is the program." Melissa ran her hands over her body, over the gown, the bars on the cage. "This is incredible. We can't still be in the lab." "We are. I told you it was realistic." "It's beyond realistic. I'd swear to God this was real." She pulled at the bars of the cage. "How can it be like this if it's just a program?" "I don't know. I think the bots control your muscles as well as your nerves. You just think you can't move the bars. You really just can't move your arms." "Now I understand what you meant. I wasn't sure I believed you, even when we got to the lab." She looked through the bars out around the cave. Light shown in through the entrance maybe a hundred yards off. The rest of it was too dark to see what might be there. "So now what?" "I don't know. This is your fantasy. What usually happens?" "Beats me. Do you smell that?" "Yeah. What is it?" "I don't know. Like something is burning." A rumbling noise rolled over them, then a rough slithering sound, like sliding gravel. The burning smell got stronger. A colossal dark shape moved out of the back of the cave. "Uh-oh." A huge reptilian head materialized out of the darkness. Both of them shrieked and jumped to the far side of the cage. Hot, stinking, sulphurous vapors puffed over them. "Ssso," it hissed at them. "Ssstill we await the ransssom from your father. Perhapsss the King does not think so highly of his daughters after all, yesss?" Melissa wanted to laugh, but this was too real. The creature's breath was almost overpowering, and the heat from it was beginning to make her sweat. "What do you want from us?" Ashley asked. "From yousss? Naught but a sssmall sssnack. But from your father, perhapsss a few hundred thousand gold crownsss. I am beginning to think I would prefer the sssnack. Both of you look increasssingly tasssty." "You're a dragon?" Melissa asked. It snorted at them, and flames shot out of its nostrils to scorch her toes. She screeched again at the pain. "A dragon? A? I am Sssysssyphocoleesss, the mightiest dragon in the world!" It snorted again. "But you know thisss. Or you must. Perhapsss a bite or two would convince yousss." Its forked tongue shot out, slithering wetly over Melissa's legs. She screamed again, grabbing onto Ashley, holding her tight. The dragon snorted one last time, and then withdrew into the darkness. Melissa buried her face against Ashley's shoulder. "This isn't real, right? This isn't real." "It is. At least until the program is over. I'm sorry. You have to deal with it." "Oh God. What happened to the sex? I thought you said this was going to be enjoyable." "I don't know. Sometime it takes a while to work up to it. He likes to build up to things." More rumbling noises rolled through the cave, as if the dragon were moving about. Melissa pulled back from Ashley, trying to compose herself. "Okay. Okay. He's not going to kill us. This is just supposed to be a fantasy. We're two princesses being held hostage by a dragon. That means that just about now-" A deep voice split the air of the cave. "Sysyphocoles! Creature of darkness! Show yourself!" Both of them turned toward the entrance. A tall figure holding a sword was backlit by the sun. Melissa grinned. "-just about now, the prince will show up to rescue us." Loud slithering noises answered the prince's challenge. Then the dragon spoke, but it was a nonsense phrase, one that thumped against them with some eldritch power, shooting pain through their heads. Blazing light filled the cave. Only now could they see just how enormous the dragon was, easily three hundred feet long from nose to tail. Its scales were a deep red-gold, and six-foot long spines ran down its back. Its claws were longer than the prince was tall, and ten-foot horns protruded from its head. It was a terrifying, sinuous creature, more like a snake than a lizard. "I think he has his work cut out for him," Ashley said weakly. The prince stalked fearlessly into the cave. He wore silver plate armor from head to toe. The visor on his helmet was up, and he bore a huge two-handed sword. "Sssso," the dragon rasped. "The King is ssssomewhat more greedy than I anticipated. He would rather wassste a small amount of gold paying you to throw your life away than ranssssom his daughtersss." "The King is a coward and a fool. I intercepted the ransom caravan and turned them back. Your reign of terror ends today." The dragon swelled, inhaling, drawing itself back. The prince pulled down the visor on his helmet, then dropped to one knee, holding his sword out like a cross as the dragon breathed out. A fiery inferno roared through the front half of the cave, overwhelming even the magical light the dragon had called forth. The heat of it scorched both girls, and they threw their hands over their faces, huddling together. Stray strands of their hair curled up, singed by the radiant energy of the dragon's breath. "So much for the rescue," Ashley whimpered. Melissa dared a peek back out at the cave, then grabbed Ashley's arm. "No! Look!" The prince stood unscathed where he had been, sword still out in front of him. "Demon! Your fires are no match for my faith!" The dragon roared, striking forward like a serpent. The prince swung his sword in a broad arc, darting aside, and laid a long gash across the creature's snout. Bright red blood spattered over his armor. The dragon recoiled in pain, and swiped at the prince with its front leg. The prince ducked under the blow, somehow turning a somersault in his heavy armor, and sprang to his feet. In one continuous motion, he brought his sword around, and cleaved open the muscle of the dragon's upper leg. The dragon reared back, roaring again, and brought its other leg around in a wide slash. This time the prince was unable to dodge the blow entirely, and fell to the floor of the cave. "Oh no!" Melissa cried. The dragon opened its jaws, and struck down at the fallen man. But the dragon's head shot back up even faster, screeching and shaking back and forth as blood fountained from its mouth. Droplets of blood sprayed across the cave, spattering over the two girls, and they could see the prince's sword jammed between the dragon's front teeth. The prince, disarmed now, scrambled away from the dragon as it thrashed about the cave, trying to pull out the sword. But the dragon had moved forward in the cave, and blocked his escape. Melissa looked around frantically for a way to help their rescuer. With the light the dragon had called forth, she saw now that he was far from the first person to attempt to slay the beast. A pile of skeletons, most of them clad in rusty armor, sat piled in one corner near their cage. "Over here!" she yelled. "There's stuff over here!" The prince saw what she meant, and ran clanking over to the pile of bones. He glanced back at the dragon. It was lying flat on the cavern floor, clawing at its mouth to remove the sword. He dug rapidly through the rusty mess below them before finding a serviceable sword, which he strapped to his waist. Then he pulled a long lance from the bottom of the pile and turned back to the dragon. The beast had finally removed the blade from its mouth, but it was bleeding heavily now, obviously weakened. It limped, favoring the leg the prince had slashed, and coiled itself in the cavern entrance. "You will die sssslowly, human. You will roasssst to a crisp in my belly. Never in two thousand yearsss has anyone dared to wound me so." "It you who will die today, dragon. I will take your horns and mount them over my mantlepiece." "Sssssuch insssolence. You humanssss have always been insssolent. Your livessss are too short to gain the necessary wissssdom." The prince stepped forward warily, and the dragon coiled tighter. "You would not be amenable to a bargain?" the dragon hissed. "No marketplace thisss, but such things are not unknown even to one sssuch as I. My life for those of the princessessss?" The prince stopped close to the dragon, lance held out ahead of him. It eyed him cautiously, but was motionless. "No." He thrust forward sharply with the lance. The dragon tried to block him with its good leg, but it had lost too much blood to move fast enough. The lance struck home just under the dragon's jaw, ripping open its throat. The prince left it there, darting back as the dragon roared in pain, thrashing madly about. Blood spurted forth as the dragon tried to claw out the lance, but it succeeded only in opening the wound further. It lurched, managing one last swipe at the prince, but he was far out of reach. Its head fell to the floor, and it shuddered as the life passed out of it. As the dragon died, the magical light in the cave died with it. The prince turned away, dropping to his knees, but whether from exhaustion or thanks, Melissa was unable to tell. A minute later he rose, retrieving his sword and discarding the rusty one he had dug from the death pile. He walked over to the cage and pushed back the visor on his helmet. "Are you well, your highnesses?" "I could use a bath," Ashley said. "But we're fine." "That was incredible," Melissa said. "Thank you so much." He examined the cage, and the chain they hung from. "I will fetch some rope from my horse. I will have to climb up there to free you." He left the cave and returned a minute later with a coil of rope. He tossed it up to the girls, and they tied to the front of the cage. He climbed up the rope easily. "Jesus, this guy is strong," Melissa whispered. "He killed a dragon." The door to the cage was held only by a heavy bar, which the prince muscled away. He held onto the outside of the cage and opened the door. "Do you think you can climb down?" "Yes." Ashley, then Melissa, slid down the rope. The prince followed, then helped them out of the cave. They emerged most of the way up a forested mountain. Far below was a broad river valley. Only now could Melissa get a good look at the prince. He was well over six feet, veritable side of beef, and in the bulky plate armor, he was positively huge. His horse stood by a tree near the entrance. He hung his sword on the saddle, and then drew off his helmet, under which he wore a coif of mail. Melissa stifled a gasp. He was gorgeous. The living embodiment of "princely." She nudged Ashley, who blinked once or twice, then glanced at Melissa, biting her lip. The prince dropped to one knee, lowering his head. "Princess Ashley. Princess Melissa. I must ask your forgiveness." Both of them stepped back, startled. "What for?" Ashley asked. "You just saved our lives." "Your father wished to ransom you. Mayhap the beast would have killed the men in the ransom train and kept the gold without releasing you, as I feared, but it may well have honored its bargain. Honor is not unknown to dragons, even evil ones such as Sysyphocoles. In my quest to rid the world of his evil, I may have placed your lives needlessly in peril." Melissa lurched forward, laying a hand on his shoulder. "No. He was about to eat us when you showed up. We owe you everything. Our lives are yours. Whatever reward you wish, you have only to name it." "It is scarcely my place to speak to you, let alone ask a reward. Your gratitude is sufficient." Ashley's eyebrows creased together. "What do you mean, speak to us? Aren't you a prince?" "No, my ladies. My name is Chestelaine von Koenigsburg. I am but the landless third son of a disgraced baron. This armor, my horse, and my sword are all I have to my name." "Well that will change," Melissa said. "Marry us both, and you can be King." Chestelaine's head shot up. "I would not presume-you cannot-it would be unheard of," he gasped. "And the King will not allow it." Melissa smiled. "He will have no choice by the time we return to the castle." Chestelaine glanced back and forth from Ashley to Melissa rapidly. "What do you mean?" "Take both our maidenheads. Then you will have to marry us." Chestelaine jumped to his feet, breathing hard. Ashley put a hand over her mouth to keep from laughing. Maidenheads! Honestly! Melissa was more into this than she ever expected her to be. Melissa stepped forward. "Do we not please you? We are not pretty enough?" "It is not that. What you propose is madness." "After what you did today, I will have no other man for husband. If you refuse me, I shall throw myself from my tower when we return." "As will I," Ashley said. "Miladies-please. Do not speak so." "You know there is no other way. The King will not consent to such a marriage unless he has no choice." Chestelaine stared at them, and Ashley saw the desire rising in his eyes. "Perhaps . . . perhaps you are right." "Do you not wish to marry us?" "I do not dare to dream of it . . . but yes." Melissa reached up and pulled down the shoulders of her tattered gown. The last of the fabric gave way, and it fell to the ground, leaving her naked before him. "Then take me. All I have is yours." She took his hand and led him into the trees, finding a soft bed of pine needles where she somehow knew it would be. Ashley followed, leaving her gown behind, and they helped him out of his armor. Naked, he was even more of a stunning sight. Two hundred and twenty pounds of chiseled muscle. She lay down before him, and Ashley dropped to her knees nearby to watch. Chestlaine lowered himself beside Melissa and gathered her up in his arms, kissing her. She went limp, and surrendered to him. XIV. For once, Ashley remained conscious when she exited the program. She was weak, and she could still feel the wonderful soreness from Chestelaine's rough lovemaking, but she managed to keep from fainting. She half-expected-all right, she hoped-to see the Doctor climbing out of a Needlebot when the program ended, but they were alone. Melissa was out cold. "Do you feel well enough to walk upstairs?" Jasmine asked. She stepped out of the bot, feeling wobbly, and sat down in a nearby chair. "Maybe not." Two wheeled chairs rolled into the lab and up to the girls. Melissa's Needlebot set her into one, and Ashley sat in the other. They turned and rolled out into the hall, then into the elevator. "Jas?" "Yes?" "Is this how we've been getting upstairs all this time?" "Yes. It's quite common for the girls to faint after exiting the programs." Ashley let the chairs wheel them into the bathing area, and was only slightly surprised when the chairs came alive, laying them into the bathtubs. She lay back and let the water jets wash her thoroughly. Melissa remained unconscious, and at the end of the bath, another robot appeared to dry her and carry her to her room. Ashley put on a dressing gown and went out to the lounge to eat. When she had finished off a big plate of lasagna, a Caesar salad, and a basket of garlic bread, the Doctor's face popped onto the monitor screen. "How you doing?" "Tired. But okay." "Did you enjoy that one?" "Dragons and princes are more Melissa's thing, but it was fun." "You two did very well with that one." "What do you mean?" "That program can be difficult to complete, because I tried to make it historically accurate. If you can get past the dragon, anyway. The trick is getting the prince to sleep with you. He won't do it automatically." "You mean people have gone through that program without getting the prince?" "About half the time. Just throwing yourself at him won't work. You have to play with his sense of honor the way you did. It's quite possible to offend him by being too forward." "Oh. I kind of thought you were going to come in with us." He paused for a second. "I had some things I had to take care of. Next time." "Are there more like that one?" "Five or six that could be classified as being in the same vein. But most of them let you take a more active role. It's not all helpless princess stuff." "Melissa will probably want to do all of them." "You mentioned level fourteen earlier." "Yeah." He stared at her seriously for a moment. "Come up to my room and we can talk about it." The Doctor's suite was on the top floor of the building, and unlike all the other rooms, it had windows, big, heavily tinted floor-to-ceiling glass. From the elevator, she entered a large split-level sitting room. Exotic hardwood panels covered the walls, the wood a rich nut-brown with an odd grain to it. The furniture was soft tan leather. The décor had a minimalist, almost Zen- like simplicity. A bar took up one corner of the room, a large entertainment center another, with a broad green marble fireplace between them. The Doctor was sitting in a wingback leather chain in front of the fireplace, holding a glass of cognac. He motioned her to the chair next to him. She sat. "Can I offer you a drink?" "I'm okay." He took a sip of cognac. "I need to be sure you understand what you're asking for here." "I've thought about it. A lot." "Only one other person has ever gone through this one. It was about two years ago, when a lot of the system was still in development. Her name was Jill. She was the very first girl I brought in here and let use the Needlebots. She worked her way up the Dungeon from level one. No one else has done that. I thought she knew what she was doing, and more in error, I thought I knew what I was doing." He paused. "Do you remember how I said I shouldn't have let her go on from level thirteen?" "Yeah." "This was before Jas and I developed the ability to closely monitor your vital signs and brain waves when you're inside the program. Nowadays, I can tell when someone is in over their head, when they're getting addicted. In hindsight, I can recognize the signs in the way she was behaving. Crying after exiting the programs. Disappearing and then reappearing demanding to go directly into the bots. Sticking with one series and refusing to even consider trying another. If she were around today, I would have stopped her at level ten. I've stopped a number of girls who wanted to go higher since then." He stopped, and Ashley shifted uncomfortably in her chair. "What happened to her?" "A week after going through level fourteen, she committed suicide. Just threw herself off the New Bay Bridge." He swirled his drink around and took a sip. "I know why she did it, too. Not because level fourteen was so bad, not that in itself. It was because she knew she would make herself go through level fifteen eventually. It was the thought of that that made her do it." Ashley realized she had pulled her knees up to her chest, holding herself closely together. For a moment, she imagined herself jumping off a bridge. She understood the need to go on. She just wasn't sure she was that far gone. Not yet. "I wouldn't even be discussing this with you if I didn't think you were capable of completing level fourteen. I've learned how to interpret brain waves much better since starting this. Your level of mental strength in level thirteen was higher than some girls in level eight. You were showing nowhere near the mental stress that would make me stop you from going on. So I know you can do this. You just have to decide whether you want to." "What is it like?" "I can't tell you exactly what happens. There's a reason for that, and it's not malice. It has to do with the way the brain perceives experiences, whether it's something new or whether it's something expected or previously experienced. You know how experiences, no matter what they are, don't feel the same a second time like they do the first?" "Yeah." "There's a specific organic basis for that, which I could explain, but you wouldn't understand it without a medical degree. Suffice to say that I would be robbing you of your reward if told you what goes on in level fourteen. You would feel the same pain, but the pleasure would be decreased if you knew when the pain was going to end." "Oh." "What I will tell you is this: level fourteen is measurably worse than level thirteen. Do you remember the end of thirteen, before the pleasure started, when you thought that silver arm was going to inflict more pain on you?" "Yes." "Do you remember the terror you felt, wondering what could possibly be worse than what you had already gone through?" She nodded. "That's where fourteen starts. And it gets a lot worse." She looked down at the floor, rocking herself back and forth. "Don't make the decision now. Go back downstairs, rest, and if you still want to do it tomorrow, we can." "Will I be alone, like last time?" "No. But you'll wish you were, believe me." She found Melissa eating in the lounge. "This is fucking incredible," she said around a mouthful of fried chicken. A pile of gnawed bones sat on a plate in front of her. "Do you feel okay?" "I can't believe how hungry I was when I woke up. I'll probably gain five pounds from this stuff." "You won't. I've been eating like that every time I come out. The programs take a lot out of you." "Could you believe that program? God. How am I supposed to go back to sleeping with high school boys now? And like I could ever get a guy like that in real life." "You see what I meant about getting hooked?" "No kidding. Are there more with Chestelaine in it?" "I'm not sure. Jas?" She answered immediately. "The other sword-and-sorcery programs are not programmed for Chestelaine's character, but inserting him would be a simple matter." "Oh, cool. You know what else I couldn't believe about that?" "What?" Ashley asked. "I was a virgin again. When I felt it, you know, when he first started, I was like 'what the hell?' But then I remembered the script." "As princesses we would be virgins. And you offered him our maidenheads anyway." "I know. I couldn't believe how into that I got. I have to do the rest of them." She took another bite of chicken. "What were you talking about with the Doctor?" "Going on to the next level of the Dungeon. He was telling me about it." "Oh. What did he say?" "Just how hard it is. I'm still thinking about it." Ashley yawned. "I'm going to bed. I'll see you tomorrow." Ashley awoke feeling unsettled. She had dreamed repeatedly of plunging off the New Bay Bridge. Yet instead of feeling terror, depression, even some sort of twisted release, she had enjoyed it, flying down through the air to splash into the Bay. The first time she had simply died. The next she had turned into a mermaid and made love with Melissa underwater, only to be torn apart by a manta ray. Another time she found the Doctor waiting for her below. He caught her, and threw her back up onto the bridge. Yet another time it was the torturer from level twelve. He tossed her into the water, and she drowned. She rose, donning her dressing gown, and went out to the lounge. The lights were dim. The clock on the entertainment center said 3:15 a.m. She walked out the elevator and pushed the button for the Doctor's level. The elevator didn't move. "Is there something you need, Ashley?" Jasmine asked. "I need to talk to the Doctor." "He is asleep. Is it important enough to wake him?" "It's about level fourteen." "All right. One moment." She stood anxiously in the car. A few seconds later, she felt it move up. "He said to come in." The doors opened to the sitting room. The Doctor's voice came through a pair of double doors at the rear of the room. "In here." She walked through and found him lying in bed, bare-chested. The bedroom was much like the sitting room, a great deal of polished wood and leather. "Good morning." "I'm sorry. I was just having a bad night. I kept dreaming about jumping off the Bay Bridge." She walked hesitantly over to the bed and sat on the end. "Don't feel like you have to decide tonight. Give it another week if you want." She fidgeted. "I don't know why I came up here. I just didn't want to be alone." He glanced over at the other side of his bed. "The bed's big enough if you're interested." She looked at him, then the bed. It was big, but . . . "I'm just planning to go back to sleep," he said. "Um. Okay." She walked around to the other side and slipped under the covers. He shut off the light and rolled over. She wriggled out of the dressing gown and pushed it out onto the floor. "Doc?" she said a few minutes later. She felt him shift in the bed. "Hmm?" "Will you make love to me?" He didn't answer her for a long time, and she was afraid he had fallen asleep. Then she felt him roll over next to her, and felt his hand on her bare stomach. There was apprehension, butterflies, like she hadn't ever felt in a program. "It won't be like it is in the bots. I think you would be pretty disappointed." "I've never done it outside the bots. I don't have anything to compare it to. And I just need to be with someone right now." A moment later, she felt his lips on hers. She opened her mouth and kissed him. Without the bots to control her, she wasn't sure what to do. She felt his hand slide up to cup her breast, caress it, tweak the nipple. It didn't cause the explosion of pleasure that often occurred in the programs, but it still felt nice. She felt his legs next to hers, and realized he was naked; he must have been naked when she came into the room. She felt his penis hardening against her thigh. On impulse, she reached down for it, pulling on it. He moaned and kissed her harder. Soon he was suckling her breasts, moving the flesh around, pushing them together. She held his head and lay passively. A minute later, he was between her legs, licking her. He was rougher, more urgent than Tami or Kaitlyn or even Jasmine had been, and she found herself gripping his hair in her hands. An orgasm was rising in her, an ordinary, run-of-the-mill climax like she'd had before she met him, but somehow the idea that he was really here, really doing this to her made it different. She burned, shuddering under his ceaseless lingual caresses, finally thrashing in his grip when he kept licking through the end of her climax. Then he was on her, in her, driving his hardness into her, and she clawed at his back, moaning his name, biting at his shoulder, tasting herself in his mouth. Time lost its meaning to her, and there was only him, his organ, and her body, melting together and floating away. Jasmine watched them until they finished. It was painful, but she knew it was for the best. XV. She awoke to the sun coming in the window. She could see the New Bay Bridge in the distance, the glittering glass cable stays shimmering in the sunlight like two giant spider's webs. The muffled sound of running water was in the background. She rolled over, noticing for the first time a door opposite the bed, presumably leading to the bathroom. She stretched, enjoying the feel of the sheets on her naked body. She normally slept in pajamas or a long T-shirt. Sleeping naked, as she did when she was here, was a new experience. She looked around the room. This is the first time I ever woke up in a guy's bed, she thought. She wondered why she had come up here and thrown herself at the Doctor. She liked him, but it wasn't like she was madly in love with him. Was she? He had been wrong. She hadn't been disappointed. She hadn't achieved the skyscraping climaxes that she did in the programs, but it had still been enjoyable in a different way. The water shut off, and she heard the dryers running. A minute later, he came out of the bathroom. She liked the way he looked naked, and thought about enticing him back into bed. "Hi," she said. "Hi." "Sorry about keeping you up all night." She grinned at him, letting him know she intended the double entendre. "It's okay. I've been meaning to ask you." "What?" "Did I break the law last night?" It took her a moment to figure out what he meant. "Oh. No. I turned eighteen in March. I'm graduating next month. Me and Melissa both. How old are you?" "Thirty-five." "Wow. God. My Dad would flip. He's only like forty-three." She laughed at herself. "Your parents haven't noticed all these absences?" "My dad works so much he wouldn't notice if I dropped dead. My mom notices, but I just tell her I spent the night at Melissa's. As long as I'm not creating a scandal, she couldn't care less what I'm doing." He walked over to a dresser and pulled out a pair of boxer shorts. "Don't get dressed yet." He smiled at her. "You'll need your energy if you want to do level fourteen today." Some of her impish mood drained out of her. "Yeah. You're right." "Do you want to do it?" She sighed. "I think so. If I don't do it today, I might never get up the guts again." She sat up and stretched, yawning. "Jas?" "Yes?" "Where's Melissa?" "Watching television in the lounge." "Did she ask about me?" "I told her you were with the Doctor. That's all. She seemed to accept it." She put on her dressing gown and walked down to the guest area. Melissa looked up when she came in. "What were you doing?" "I, um, I spent the night up there last night." "With him?" "Yeah. I woke up about three a.m. and went upstairs." "So did you . . .?" "Twice. I kind of threw myself at him. I was just feeling nervous about doing the Dungeon thing today." "I thought you said there wasn't anything going on between you two." "There isn't. Well, maybe there is, but it's nothing serious. I don't know. I just didn't want to sleep by myself." "You're really going to do the Dungeon today? Jasmine was telling me something about it. It sounds pretty twisted." "Yeah. It is. But I like it. It's hard to explain." "I guess. I think I'm going to do Chestelaine again today. You don't want to come along?" "No. Have him to yourself. If I don't do level fourteen today, I may never do it." They put Melissa into her program first. Ashley watched her moving around in the bot, talking to someone, presumably Chestelaine. "Ready?" the Doctor asked. "As ready as I'll ever be." Her stomach was doing flip-flops, and her knees were weak. But she wanted this worse than she had been willing to admit to him or Melissa. The bot attached itself to her, and the program started. Through the several months of secret negotiations and development that it had taken David to acquire Jasmine from Marin Biotech, it had never occurred to him to create a lover. Only toward the end did Catherine Rundlett ask him what general tendencies he wanted to program into the AI. On a whim, he described to her a young Thai woman he had known in college, one of his few female friends. Her given name was something he had never been able to properly pronounce, but on coming to the U.S., she had taken the name of Jasmine. That was where it had started. His friendship with the new Jasmine deepened quickly. For the first time in his life he was dealing with a woman (electronic though she might be) who both understood and believed in his research. More and more, they spent long hours in his lab in random conversation having little to do with the Needlebots. Though he was by then having sex with the girls off the street in his programs, the acts were, emotionally, little more than masturbation for him. One night he lay in bed wishing he could meet a real woman like Jasmine. That had given him an idea. He got up at once and returned to the lab. "Jas?" "Yes?" "Do you think you're capable of controlling a real-time simulation in the bots? One that has a setting but no fixed script?" "Perhaps. It depends on the complexity of what you have in mind." He took a deep breath. "I'd like to meet you." A pause. "I'm not sure I understand. You want me to create a person inside the program that will represent me?" "Yes. I want you to craft the woman you want to be and create a setting for her. Then I want to come inside and meet you." "Just meet me?" She sounded amused. "Well, no. I think you know what I have in mind." "Yes. I think I can do it. I like the idea." So together they had created that beach in Thailand, and the Asian woman Jasmine would be. Then he had gone inside and made love with her. Jasmine found the experience amusing but enjoyable. He saw at once that he was going to get addicted to it. It was a month later that he finally admitted to himself that he was in love with her. In love with an Artificial Intelligence. He wasn't sure whether he was breaking new ground or simply pathetic. How could he have slept with Ashley right in front of Jasmine? Of course she knew it had happened; she knew everything that went on inside the building. That was her job. Furthermore, she knew he knew, so she knew he had done it with full knowledge that she had to be watching. What had he done? He watched as Ashley twitched and moaned in the bot. "Jas?" "Yes." "I'm sorry about last night. She just came up there and got into bed with me, and . . ." "It's all right. You don't have to apologize." "It won't happen again. I'm sorry if it hurt you." She didn't respond right away. "David, I don't mind. I like her, too." He wasn't sure he believed her. She had total control over the modulation in her voice, even though she was capable of emotion. Why would she sound pained unless she meant to? An AI that could lie. What had he created here? Ashley's first thought was that he must have called up the wrong program. She was dressed as if she had come from school, riding in a car with a cute guy in an athletic letter jacket. She realized it was Ryan Felton, the boy she had dated her junior year and come close to sleeping with. It was dark, and they were driving through Golden Gate Park, driving to the secluded spot where they had often gone to make out. She glanced around the car, confused. Ryan smiled at her. "You okay?" "Um, fine." She sat still, figuring that maybe something else was supposed to happen. Ryan pulled his car into the lot and shut off the engine. He turned to her, putting his arm up on the seat. "You've been kind of distant tonight. Is anything wrong?" She looked into the pretty green eyes she had fallen in love with two years ago. Ryan had been a senior, and they had broken up shortly after he went off to college, just after she had decided he was going to get her virginity. She was more or less over him now, but seeing him again sent a twinge through her stomach. If this is the wrong program, I might as well take advantage of it, she thought. "I'm okay." She leaned into him, and he kissed her. He seemed clumsier than she had remembered, and she wondered how much of it was her recent experiences and how much was the program. His hands were soon fumbling at her breasts, the breasts he had always seemed obsessed with, not that she minded. He picked at the front hook on her bra for a minute before she opened it for him, as she usually had to do. Suddenly the car was flooded with light, and Ryan pulled back. "What the fuck?" Ashley turned around, squinting against the glare. Some blazing light source was shining down on them. She heard a high-pitched whining, which grew louder. She slapped her hands over her ears. "Ow!" As one, every window in the car shattered. Then some strange force was pulling her out of the passenger window. She screamed. Ryan grabbed for her. "Ashley!" He got a hand around her leg, but succeeded only in pulling off her shoe as she was drawn out the window into a column of light. Then she was flying up, seeing the car bathed in a brilliant circle of light, seeing Ryan's terrified face looking up at her. Then everything went dark. It was the stench that woke her up. Sharp, pungent, insectile, the smell of swarming ants in the summer, magnified a hundred times. She choked on it and coughed, then spat. Some slimy substance was smeared over her face, her entire body. She opened her eyes. Before her was a chitinous brown wall, curved around her. She was in some kind of egg, not much larger than she was. She was naked, again. Rough claws pinned her to one wall of the egg, holding her arms, legs, and neck. Two larger claws crossed her torso. One was pressed painfully across her left breast. Clear slime covered everything. She struggled, revolted at her predicament, but could manage only slight movement against the claws. To her horror, the claws seemed to sense her movements, and tightened their grip. The egg was alive somehow. She heard noises outside the egg, a high-pitched chirping that hurt her ears. Something was slithering about out there. The front of the egg parted as a six-inch thick tentacle pierced the membrane and entered the cavity. As the claws released their grip, the tentacle quickly wrapped itself around her. She fought it, punching at it, but to no avail. It pulled her through the membrane, covering her further with the noxious slime. She emerged into some kind of huge nest. Dozens, no, hundreds (thousands?) of eggs lined the walls around her. The top of the nest was hundreds of feet above her. The tentacle led to a shapeless blob on the floor, and several other tentacles grew out of it. It slithered over the floor, holding her high in the air, continuing to chirp. She struggled, whimpering, and smacked at the tentacle. The tentacle thing ignored her. It carried her towards a tight oval in the wall, which expanded into a mouth-like doorway. They entered a much smaller room, no more than thirty feet across. In the center was a platform, or an examining table. The tentacle thing laid her down on the table, and before she could try to free herself, chitinous claws shot out of the corners of the table, grabbing her wrists and ankles. They drew tight, pulling her spread-eagled on the table. The tentacle thing left, and the door closed. The light was dim, and she could hear only distant, churning, organic sounds. She was fast losing her control. She wouldn't be alone, he said. But you'll wish you were. Where were her tormentors? And what in God's name would they do to her in a place like this? The organic sounds grew louder. To her right, a sphincter opened in the wall, and three purplish, tentacled blobs oozed out. They were smaller than the thing that had brought her in here and sported far more tentacles, at least a dozen ropelike strands. They stood on three or four of them, and waved the rest around. She screamed and closed her eyes tightly. Gurgling noises approached her and then the tentacles were sliding over her body, feeling, probing. One forced its way into her rectum, and she thrashed, trying to eject it. It went up a long way, painfully far. Another tentacle slid into her vagina, finding her cervix, then oozed into her womb. This was something far different than what she had expected or experienced before-not simple, external pain, but deep, revolting discomfort, aching and probing. "Oh, God, please stop!" Another tentacle forced its way into her mouth. She tried to bite it, but it was far tougher than it seemed, like a thick piece of gristle. It slid into her throat, choking her, but then began to pulsate, and she could breathe again. She realized it was feeding her oxygen, not that it made the experience any less repulsive. She felt vomit rising in her throat. The tentacles were massaging her innards, pressing and squirming around inside her. She began to convulse, an involuntary reaction, as her body struggled to expel the invaders. The pain with each contraction grew worse. Her head felt as if it would burst. As one, the tentacles withdrew. She turned her head and vomited, twice, three times, dry heaving against a quickly empty stomach. The creatures remained still, as if to observe, but made no move to clean up her mess. Then they began to chirp at each other, and her eardrums felt as if they might rupture. She coughed against the last bits of vomit in her mouth, gasping for breath. Continuing to chirp, one of the creatures held up a squirming tubular thing. It was about two feet long with a sharp beak on one end. The creature held the worm thing to her belly, beak first. She screeched in horror. A sharp pain shot through her as the worm bit at her navel. It opened a hole in her peritoneal cavity and squirmed inside her. Waves of nausea rolled over her. She heaved again, trying to vomit. She could feel it wriggling around, through her intestines, under her stomach, toward her spine. In horror and disgust, she realized it was boring its way into her spinal column. The pain now was beyond anything she had experienced before, so fundamental and primal that she could do nothing but thrash and scream until her throat grew raw. What little remained of her rational mind wished desperately that she had just gone through level thirteen again. That program seemed like a paradise compared to this. The worm wrapped itself around her spinal cord, and what had begun as pain from mere tissue damage became an order of magnitude worse. A fire was building in her spine, radiating outward, burning through her. The worm took control of her nervous system, sending pain signals through every nerve ending in her body, inside and out. Her mind was close to snapping. But a tiny voice in the back of her head, the last remaining rational bit, spoke to her: He said I could do this. He said I was strong enough. And somehow she found the strength to hold on. Years later, it seemed, the pain began to ease, and the worm moved again, back into her gut. It went below her intestines, wrapping itself around her uterus. Then it began to throb. The same fire she had felt before returned, but instead it brought pleasure. The worm contracted, causing a spasm in her uterine muscles, and in an instant she was climaxing. It pulsed again, and another climax hit her, more intense this time. Again and again the worm brought her to orgasm, and each time the sensations built higher. This was much different from the conclusions of the previous programs, more direct and internal, more powerful, because it was more than just her body responding-the worm had taken control and refused to stop stimulating her. After the fifteenth or twentieth orgasm, she had become a pulsar, a throbbing, buzzing mass of pleasure that just got better and better. Now her conscious mind did let go, and she gave in it, praying with her last thought that it was never going to end. XVI. Someone was shaking her. "Ashley! Wake up!" Her eyes fluttered open. It was Melissa. David was standing over her. Ashley felt half-dead, weak and hungry. "God! Are you okay?" "Um . . . what's wrong?" "What's wrong? Jesus! You've been out for like a day and a half. Jasmine has been trying to wake you up and she finally had us come in." David leaned down, shining a light in her eyes, then pressed some kind of medical instrument to her forehead. "You just need to eat something. I think you'll be okay. But no more programs for a while. That one took a lot out of you." Melissa glanced back and forth between her and the doctor. "Can you sit up?" She tried, and dizziness swam through her head. "She's dehydrated," David said. "She needs to eat." Melissa helped her to her feet and put on her dressing gown. Holding onto Melissa, she shuffled out to the lounge. Jasmine was already producing food for her. She ate until it hurt, and still she was hungry. Melissa and David watched silently. "Feel any better?" he asked. "Yeah. I think so." "Let it settle for a while, but keep up with the fluids. Let me know if you need anything." He left the two of them alone. Melissa watched her eat for a few minutes. "What was in that program that knocked you out like that?" Ashley shuddered. "Don't ask. But it was worth it." "He told me only one other person has ever gone that high. No one has done level fifteen." "No. I'm going to be the first." Melissa's eyes widened. "Seriously? I mean, if it's worse than this one, it might kill you. God, I thought you were dead or something." "I'll be okay. And I'm not going to stop when I'm this close to finishing it." She lay back and closed her eyes, feeling the food gurgling around in her stomach. It reminded her of the worm. "What have you been doing while I was out?" "I did two more of the medieval ones. They're sort of like vid's, where you get to go on this adventure. I did it with Chestelaine in both of them." "You like him?" "I think I'm falling in love." Melissa managed a weak smile. "Jasmine adjusted the program for me, so he remembered who I was each time. It was so neat. Do you know if the Doctor patterned him after anyone? Or is he just a program?" "I don't know. Ask him." "I'm sorry, Melissa," Jasmine said through the TV monitor. "He's just a program. But I can create more of him if you'd like." "Damn. Okay, I guess that will have to do." She turned back to Ashley. "Um, incidentally, we've got a slight problem." "What?" "Our moms figured out we aren't where we said we were. My mom called your house wanting to talk to me, and your mom told her she thought we were at my house. When I called home this afternoon, my mom was about to call out the National Guard. We have to get back, or at least I do. My mom said something nasty about your mom not seeming to care." "She doesn't. Go if you have to." "You're going to stay?" "I don't want to go home." Melissa's forehead creased in concern. "Are you sure you're okay?" "I'll be all right. But there's nothing for me at home now." Melissa stood, looking conflicted. "Okay. I'm going to go get dressed." She reappeared a few minutes later. "Are you sure about this?" "Yes. I'll see you later." "'kay. Bye." An hour and another pile of food later, Ashley began to feel normal again. "Jas?" "Yes?" "What was my ex-boyfriend doing in that program?" "Many of them are designed to be customized to some extent. Level fourteen begins with some significant other, and I have to fill in the blanks. I found Ryan by searching your school records." "But how did you know where we used to go?" "There's a security camera in that parking lot. There are tapes of you and Ryan in the Park Service archives." "Oh. How bad?" "Nothing particularly explicit. Don't worry." Something about Jasmine's explanation struck her as odd. Even if there were tapes of her and Ryan, how on earth had Jasmine known to look there? She would have had to search through half the systems in Northern California to find tidbits like that, and that should have taken days, if not weeks. And the Park Service tapes wouldn't be indexed with her name anyway. How the hell had she found that tape? She looked at the clock on the TV. It was getting late. She figured she was probably spending the night here again. How many days had it been now? She had missed a lot of school since finding David, but since it was her last semester, and she was already admitted to Berkeley, it didn't matter much. Not that she cared. Law school was out, certainly. Maybe she could major in computer programming and help David with his work. Or maybe she could just go on being his test subject. She found him in the lab. "You look like you feel better." "I do." "What's up?" She looked down at the floor, then back at him. "Can I ask you something?" "Shoot." "Why do you do all this? I mean, are you eventually going to sell it? Or are you going to go on putting girls through these programs?" He stopped what he was working on and seemed to think for a minute. "I may market the Needlebots eventually. But I don't need the money. I enjoy the process. I enjoy writing the programs." "You've done it with a lot of girls this way?" "In the beginning. Not recently." "But you have with me." "Yeah." "Why?" He glanced away from her, embarrassed. "I liked you. You're different from the other girls who come here." "I don't live on the street?" "It's not that. It's like I said before, you're different on the inside. Stronger." "Oh." "Look. I'd like to run a quick checkup on you, just to make sure you're okay. I don't want to take risks like I did with Jill." "Okay." He led her into another part of the lab and had her lay down on an examining table. He probed and scanned her with a series of medical instruments for about ten minutes. Toward the end, his eyebrows rose. "Well. This is interesting." "What?" "When was your last menstrual period?" She thought for a moment. "Um . . ." Then realization dawned. "Uh-oh." "Yeah. You seem to be about five weeks pregnant." "Oh, God." He leaned back, setting the scanner down on the table. "Is it safe to assume it's mine?" "Yeah. I'm sorry. I was on Antacept for a while last year, but I kind of let it run out. I haven't been dating much lately, so I didn't think I needed it. You know I was a virgin anyway." "Yeah." She stared up at the ceiling. "What should I do?" "I can't make that decision for you." "But it's your kid, too. You have to have some feeling about it." "I do. I'm not in a position to raise a family right now. Not that I would be averse to doing it with you some time. But I can't see that you would benefit from it." "Yeah." She sighed and sat up. "There's something else," he said. "What?" "I've never given any thought to what this system might do to a pregnant woman. God knows what the programs might have been doing to this fetus. I need to do some research." She went rigid, gripping the edge of the table. "Seriously? Could it hurt it?" "This early, if there had been serious damage, you would have miscarried. It looked okay just now, but it's hard to be sure. I have to check some things. Don't get too worried yet, though. The NEEDLe that's on the market now was tested extensively, and there was never any indication of potential fetal damage." "Okay. I guess I need to think." "Are you staying here tonight?" "Can I?" "Of course." "With you?" He stared at her a second. "Sure." He closed up the lab, and she followed up him to his room. She lay down on the bed, lying on her side facing the window, feeling dazed. First her obsession with the Dungeon, now this. Pregnant, of all things. She wondered if this would be enough to finally get her parents' attention. She thought of telling them just to see what they would do. She felt him lying on the bed, rolling next to her. He put his arm over her, and she took his hand between hers. "Whatever happens, I'll be here for you." "Thanks." She rolled over and looked up at him. The father of her child. However much she denied it to Melissa, there was something here. How could she feel this way about someone who was capable of imagining something like the Dungeon? Or did she feel this way because of that? She pulled him down and kissed him. XVII. "You're what?" Her mother was finally showing some interest. "I'm pregnant." "How did this happen?" she screeched. "How do you think it happened?" Her mother slapped her. But after three levels of the Dungeon, Ashley hardly noticed it. She shook her finger in Ashley's face. "Don't get smart with me! Is this what you've been doing all this time? All these nights you're out of the house?" "Sort of." "So you were lying to me? Telling me you were at Melissa's?" "You hardly seemed to care. What difference would it make what I told you?" "Oh, my God." She buried her face in her hands. Ashley leaned back against the kitchen counter. "Who knows about this?" "You. Him. That's it." "Who is he?" "No one you know. He's not at my school." The hands came down, and she glared at Ashley. "Who is he?" "It doesn't matter." "Are you still seeing him?" "I slept with him last night." Her mother slapped her again. "How can you speak to me like this? You're acting like a cheap whore!" "So? I'm eighteen now. I'm old enough to do what I want." "But not old enough to take some goddamned precautions? Have you given any thought to what this means?" "I haven't decided." "Oh!" She leaned back heavily against the stove. "Your father will have a coronary." "That's assuming he stops working long enough to notice." Her mother's eyes came back into focus, and she stared at Ashley. "Is that what this is about? Did you do this deliberately? To punish your father and me?" "No. It wasn't deliberate. But I only told you to see if you would care. I'm making the decision myself." "You're not seriously thinking of keeping it?" "Why? Afraid of what all your friends will say? 'Oh dear, poor Catherine's daughter, whatever must Catherine be going through?'" She slapped Ashley again, and Ashley finally pushed herself away from her. "Stop it! Stop it!" her mother screeched. "Stop talking to me like this!" "Stop slapping me!" "Oh, God!" Her mother buried her face in her hands again, sobbing, sinking to the floor. "I'm going up to my room. Cry all you want, because it won't change anything." She stomped up the stairs, and slammed her door behind her. She flopped onto her bed. She could still hear her mother sobbing below, so she turned on some music to drown it out. Maybe an hour later, her father drove up to the front of the house. The front door crashed open, and he and her mother immediately began screaming at each other. She turned the music up louder so she wouldn't have to listen to it. After about fifteen minutes, there was a knock on her door. "What?" The door opened and her father came in. She glared at him briefly and then crossed her arms and turned to stare at the wall. "Do you have anything to say for yourself?" "Am I on trial here? Okay, I confess. I'm pregnant." "Your mother tells me you've been spending a lot of nights away from the house recently." "I guess you wouldn't have noticed otherwise, huh?" "Young lady, you are going to drop this attitude now." "Or you'll do what? Spank me?" He seethed for a moment. "Who is he? This boy you've been seeing?" "He's not a boy." "Who is he?" She stewed for a moment, and then thought, who cares? "David Nelson." "Ashley, you are in very serious trouble right now, and it's only going to get worse if you keep treating this like a joke." She looked back at him. "I'm not joking. You think I'd sleep with just anyone? He works with the street kids in the Tenderloin. He has a place there, where they all go. I met him there one afternoon after school. He has a condo in the same building. That's where I've been going." Her father's stern demeanor wavered. "If this is some story you're making up-" "You wanna talk to him? I could call him if you want." She reached for her phone, watching his reaction. She held her hand over the keypad. "Yes or no?" His doubt suddenly melted away. "All right. Let's see you call him." "Okay." She picked up the keypad and pointed it at her monitor. She dialed his number, and Jasmine's face appeared on the screen. As was normal, the destination connection was listed along the bottom: "Call to: 415-555-3412. David Nelson, M.D." "Ashley. Hello." "Hi, Jas, is David around?" "He's working in the laboratory. Shall I get him?" Her father suddenly lurched in front of the screen, holding up his hand and glancing back and forth between Jasmine and Ashley. "Wait. Wait." "Jas, this is my Dad." "Hello, Mr. MacMillian." "All right, all right, you've made your point. I don't want to talk to him right now." She craned her head around him. "Sorry, Jas, I'll have to call you back. Bye." "Goodbye." The screen went blank. He turned back to look at Ashley, eyes wide. "David Nelson?" "Yeah." "My God, he's twice your age." "So? I don't like guys my age." "Does he know about this?" "He's the one who found it. He's a doctor, remember?" "What did he say? What does he plan to do?" "He's being supportive. But he's not pressuring me to do anything, unlike Mom." He glanced rapidly around the room, breathing hard. "How long has this been going on?" "Maybe a month and a half." "After your birthday?" She sneered at him. "Yes. So you won't get him on statutory rape." Her father seemed to wilt slowly, the anger draining out of him. He dropped heavily into a chair by the end of the bed and put his face down into his hands. Ashley stared up at the ceiling. "Ashley, I realize I may not have been much of a father lately-" "Dad! Jesus! This is the first time I've seen your face in two fucking weeks! Do I have to get pregnant to get you to come home when it's light out?" "I--I--I'm sorry. Things at work have been very hectic lately." "So what else is new? You spend more time at work than you ever do at home. I could tell people my father was dead and they would never know the difference. How much goddamned money do we need anyway?" "I do this for us. This lifestyle we all lead costs a great deal." "Well, I realize that. But I could do without a new stereo and a new computer and a lot of my clothes if it meant having you around more. Why do we have to go to Switzerland to go skiing when we could just go up to Tahoe?" Her door suddenly burst open. Her mother came in the room, enraged. "Ashley, I will not have you blaming this on your father! He works very hard for us." "He works very hard for you. Personally, I'd rather have a dad than a closet full of designer clothes and a new Mercedes." "Catherine-" "No! Peter, she is not going to blame this on us. She's old enough to know better." Ashley narrowed her eyes at her mother. "Oh, yeah? You think I don't understand what's going on here? Why you burst in here just when I start complaining about Dad having to make so much money? Just when he starts acting like he understands? You don't give a shit about me. You're just worried Dad might cut back at work and you'd have to curtail all those fucking shopping trips to Paris and a new car every goddamned year." Her mother recoiled as if Ashley had slapped her. "You little bitch! You can't talk to me like that!" She lunged at Ashley, but her father shot out of his chair, catching her. "Catherine! Stop it!" "Let go of me!" She kicked in his grasp, screeching. Ashley leapt from her bed, and tried to push both of them out of her room. "Get out! Get out! I hate both of you! I hate you!" Her father stumbled, and both of them lurched out of the room. Ashley slammed the door behind them, locking it, then threw herself on her bed, sobbing. She heard her parents screaming at each other for a good ten minutes, then one of them going out the front door. Tires squealed as whoever it was drove away. Someone knocked on her door a few minutes later. "Go away." "Are you going to be all right?" It was her father. "No." "Your mother is very upset. She went to a friend's house. I think we all need to rest and think about this. I called the office, and I'm taking the rest of the week off. I'll be downstairs if you need me." Ashley went into the bathroom to clean herself up a little while later. Part of her wanted to go downstairs and curl up in her father's lap the way she had when she was a kid. But too little, too late, she thought. She knew her mother would never let her father cut back. Nothing was going to change. Her mother had always called the real shots around this house, no matter what her father did at work. Catherine MacMillian would sweep this under the rug somehow so her perfect life wouldn't be disturbed. She pulled an overnight bag out of her closet and began packing up some clothes and personal effects, enough to last her a few days. She threw it over her shoulder and tiptoed downstairs. Her father seemed to be in his study off the living room, and didn't see her as she slipped out the back. She climbed into her little Jaguar convertible and drove out the front gate. XVIII. "It's better like this anyway. If you're not comfortable with me moving in here, I can find someplace else." "It's okay. You can stay downstairs or up here, whatever you want. I'll get you a credcard later today." "Thanks." She hugged him. "I don't want to sound like your father, but what about school?" "I'm done in two weeks. The tuition is paid yearly, so it's not like my folks can pull me out. I'm an adult now. I can do whatever I want." "Okay. Finish school, then worry about what happens later." "Jas, I'm sorry about all this. I don't know how I've gotten so mixed up with her. I'll figure a way to take care of her. It's just that with her being pregnant and all-" "David, stop. I understand. Please don't do anything on my account. She needs you more than I do." He jerked up as if she had slapped him across the face. "What?" "You know what I mean. She's only eighteen and her parents just threw her out of her house." "I know but-" "I didn't say I didn't love you. But I think Ashley loves you, too." "Okay. But start up the beach. I need to be with you right now." She sighed, and it irritated him. She had been doing that a lot lately. Ashley ate dinner by herself that night, and sat in Nelson's sitting room watching television. Later, she flipped through the interior camera displays, seeing what was going on around the building. Nelson was in his office, pushing papers around. Three girls, one of them Tami, were going through a program in the laboratory. They were well into it, and it looked like some kind of orgy. "Jas? What's going on?" "It's a fairly simple program. It's called Sorority Girls 3." "What are they doing?" "About what you see them doing in the lab." "Did Tami ask about me?" "No. The three of them showed up together this afternoon shortly before you did." She flipped through a few more displays, not seeing anything of interest. "You said before that you could view places outside the building." "Yes. Assuming I can access the cameras." "Can you access my house?" "Do you have the access code?" "Yeah." She gave it to her. A second later, her front yard appeared on the screen. Ashley flipped through, finding the one interior camera over the foyer. She could just barely see her father in the background. "Can you zoom in on him?" The camera moved in. He was still in his study, asleep, an empty bottle of Scotch on the table next to him. "Is anyone else in the house?" "No. There are no other interior cameras, but the motion sensors show no one else inside." "I wonder where my mom is." "I can try to find her if you would like. It should only take a few minutes." "You can?" "She has an address file in the system. I can search through those locations." "That's not really legal, is it?" "No. But we're not talking about the Department of Defense. It's only a misdemeanor, and there's little chance I would be discovered. I've done it before for other reasons. Shall I?" "The Doc won't mind?" "He increased your system access level this afternoon. This sort of thing is within your clearance." "Okay." "One moment." The screen flipped back to the TV show she had been watching. A minute later, Jasmine spoke up. "Ashley." "What?" "Perhaps this wasn't such a good idea." "What do you mean?" "Your parents have their own lives. There are sometimes things it's better not to pry into." She stared at the screen, confused. "Did you find her?" A long pause. "Yes. But I think it's better we don't continue with this." A lump was growing in her stomach. "Why not? Is she okay?" "That depends on your perspective. But she is not injured. My advice is you not worry about where she is." Her eyes dropped, then rose back to the screen. "Too late. Show me." "Are you sure?" "Yes." The image of a plush bedroom came on the screen. Her mother was lying naked next to a man Ashley didn't immediately recognize, though he looked familiar. She was on her side, running her fingers through the man's chest hair. Ashley gasped, bolting upright. "She's having an affair? And she called me a whore?" "I'm sorry." "Why do they have a camera in the bedroom?" "I don't know. Perhaps they have been videorecording themselves. Or your mother may not be aware of the camera." She closed her eyes. "Shut it off." "I'm sorry. I tried to warn you." "I know. Who is he?" "The system is registered to William DeCarlo." Ashley laughed weakly. "Her tennis instructor. How utterly middle-class of her. I bet her friends would laugh themselves silly over this." She sighed. "My poor dad. She makes him work himself to death, then screws around on him. She's such a bitch." "Ashley, I don't like being the one to tell you this, but your father appears to be having an affair with his secretary as well." "What? How can you know that?" "When I searched the system for the address files, there were a number of messages from her, and replies, in your father's file area. There really isn't any doubt." "God." She tried to choke back the tears. "And then they go nuts when I get pregnant. If that doesn't fucking take the cake." "I'm sorry." She lay over on the couch and curled around one of the pillows. The lights dimmed. "I'll let you rest. I'm sorry about all this." "It's okay. It's not your fault." She cried into the pillow. Eventually she fell asleep. Melissa's eyebrows nearly hit the ceiling when she read what Ashley had sent to her workstation. "You're kidding," she typed back. "They're really going to let you live with him?" "Not exactly. We had a big fight, then I left. There's a lot going on that I don't want to get into. But they can't make me stay with them anyway, now that I'm eighteen." She hadn't told Melissa about being pregnant, and wasn't sure if she would. "You're still coming to school, though?" "Yeah. I'm going to finish up, after that, who knows. My mom doesn't want anything to do with me. My dad and I are trying to work something out. He's not happy about it, but I'll make him understand somehow." "God. Do they know who he is?" "Yeah. That had something to do with it, I think. But my Dad is making noises about having him investigated. As if he could do anything to someone like David." Ashley glanced up at the teacher, who was listing the subjects on the final exam up on the board. She would have to take a break from the Needlebots for a week or so while she studied. But David had told her she needed a rest after level fourteen anyway. She skipped graduation. Melissa came over and they went through one of Jasmine's new Chestelaine programs. XIX. Ashley had underestimated her father's resolve. If there was one thing Peter MacMillian hated above all else, it was losing. Sports, law, love, it hardly mattered. Ashley had made a valid point-he had been working too hard, and now he was on the verge of losing his daughter because of it. Work could wait. No one was going to steal his daughter if he had anything to say about it. He quickly figured out where she was, but snatching her off the street-she emerged from time to time-was out of the question. She was an adult now, and that made it kidnapping, which was a federal offense. As badly as he wanted her back, he wasn't going to put his attorney's license at risk. What he had to do was take down David Nelson somehow. The investigators he hired soon told him about the procession of pretty girls going in and out of the building. He sent them after the girls, who proved to be strangely close-mouthed about what was going on. Peter MacMillian had a good idea, though. Nelson had knocked up his daughter. He was most likely sleeping with these other girls as well. More checking indicated that about half the girls were minors. One count of statutory rape wouldn't interest the San Francisco D.A.'s office. A pattern of luring underage girls off the street for sex and God knew what else made it a continuing criminal enterprise, and that was something else altogether. Enough for a RICO suit. MacMillian was good friends with one of the Deputy United States Attorneys for the Northern District of California. He scheduled a meeting with him and brought the evidence his investigators had gathered. His friend proved to be very interested. "David? Hi, it's Steve Sarnoff." "Steve. How are you doing?" Sarnoff was one of his lawyers. He worked for a big firm downtown that handled a lot of technology issues. Like most doctors-and inventors-David disliked lawyers, but they were a necessary evil, and Steve Sarnoff was among the more tolerable of them. "I'm fine. Where are you today? I had some trouble tracking you down." "I'm in town. I'm just lying low at the moment. Is this about the NextWave licensing thing?" "No, actually, it's something very different. Do you own any property in the Tenderloin?" "Umm. Why?" "It's just that a friend of my son's is interning with the U.S. Attorney's office this summer, and he mentioned to my son that they had an ongoing investigation into some property that you supposedly owned down off of Market Street. I'm guessing this is supposed to be covert, but my son's friend just let it slip. He said the FBI was going to be searching the place in the next few days." "Really. He didn't say why?" Sarnoff squirmed. "Understand that this is something I put no credence in whatsoever. I'm just passing it along." "Okay." "He said the Bureau suspected you've been luring teenage girls off the streets for some nefarious purpose. They don't know quite what for, but I'm sure you can imagine where their attention is directed." "Yeah. Thanks. I'll take care of it." "All right. I just thought I'd let you know. Take care." Like many large corporations on the cutting edge of new technology, David's conglomerate occasionally ran afoul of the law. For that, he had retained a very well respected boutique firm of white-collar criminal defense lawyers. They had grown even wealthier than they already were working for him, but it was money well spent. So far, no one had laid a glove on him. As soon as he hung up with Steve Sarnoff, he gave them a call. David had prepared for this. The only question was how to make his exit. He could slip out on his own, and leave Ashley for her father. That would get Peter MacMillian off his back and solve his problem with Jasmine, among other things. Maybe that would be for the best. He booked a flight to Berlin on a spaceplane out of Los Angles the next morning, then a connecting flight to his next destination. "David." "What?" "You can't leave Ashley behind." As he watched in disbelief, Jasmine changed his reservation from one person to two. "Wait. You want me to keep her around?" "Yes. Please don't do this to her. She deserves better. And she does love you." "Why are you doing this?" "Because it's the right thing to do. You'll understand eventually, even if you can't see it now." Something jolted Ashley out of a pleasant dream. It was David, and he was rushing around the bedroom grabbing things. "Get up. We're getting out of here now." "What? What's going on?" "The FBI is going to serve a search warrant on this place first thing tomorrow morning. We're getting out before it happens." "Wait. Why does the FBI care about you? Or even know?" "Your father took your departure more seriously than we thought. He's had investigators snooping around the building for a couple of weeks. My people found out tonight he'd gone to the U.S. Attorney this week." "But you haven't done anything wrong." "Some of the girls who come in here are underage. That's enough to get their interest, not that they know what's really been going on." She climbed out of bed and pulled on some clothes. "Why do we have to leave?" "I don't want anyone sticking their noses into the stuff in the lab." "So you're just abandoning it all? What about Jasmine?" "Jasmine is copying the entire system, including herself, to a house I have in Switzerland as we speak. It's a bolt hole I prepared in case something like this happened. When we're out, she's going torch the place." "What? You mean burn the building down?" "Yes. When I built it, I set it up that way in case I had to destroy the lab. The whole building is laced with explosives and incendiary charges. Nothing will be left for them to snoop through." Ashley grabbed what little she needed to take and followed him to the elevator, trying not to dwell on the fact that she had been unwittingly living inside a bomb for the last month. "Do you have your passport?" "In my purse. Where are we going?" "The airport. We're taking a spaceplane to Berlin, then a flight to Geneva. We'll be there before they know we're gone." The elevator opened on the roof, revealing David's sleek Mercedes VTOL on the landing pad. She climbed into the passenger seat, and they took off. When the file transfer was complete, Jasmine checked the system in the house in Switzerland. Everything seemed to be fine. Transferring herself was an unusual experience, almost like giving birth. When she felt herself settled into the new house, she deleted the entire system in San Francisco. Then she triggered the explosives. The muffled blasts attracted no attention at 3 a.m. on a Tuesday morning. Only when the flames began shooting out of the top floor windows did someone call the fire department. Engine Company 34 arrived a few minutes later. The fire was obviously well established by that point, and the scene commander ordered his men through the front door to check for occupants. Fire axes barely dented the door, and two firefighters ran up with a cutting wheel. Sparks began flying, but the wheel barely scratched the metal surface. "Lieutenant!" one of them yelled. "It's armored. It'll take us twenty minutes to cut through here." The commander looked up at the building. If there were any survivors left inside, their only chance was for the firefighters to knock down the fire. "Pull back. Get the charges in there." The firefighter manning the gun on top of the engine swung it around to face the building. He laid four shells across the third floor. They punched through the concrete, and secondary explosions followed as the charges went up. The shells contained fire-fighting chemicals that would break up the chemical reaction feeding the fire. Except nothing seemed to be happening. "Again!" the commander yelled. "Every floor!" The gun thumped repeatedly as the fire fighter placed the shells up and down the building. For a moment the flames seemed to die down, but then returned with renewed force, shooting out the holes the gun had punched in the walls. "It's no good!" the gunman yelled. "There's something in there feeding the fire." "Damn it!" The commander turned to the man in the engine cab. "Get us another company out here now. Blow some holes in those walls and turn on the hoses. And get me an aerial unit." He turned back to the other firefighters. "Let's start evacuating the area. If there's something weird in there, I want people out before it blows up on us." At six a.m., Special Agent Louis Poulain led the team of agents to Nelson's building. He wasn't sure what they would find inside, but he didn't think he would like it. The press was going to love this one. Billionaire Inventor Caught in Teenage Love Nest. They rounded the corner and approached the building, but something was clearly wrong. Three fire engines blocked the street, and dozens of fire fighters milled around them. A half dozen were hosing down the blackened rat's nest of steel girders that had been Nelson's lab. Poulain realized what had happened and began punching the roof of the car. "Fuck! Fuck, fuck, fuck!" He leapt out of the car as they screeched up to the scene. His windbreaker identified him as an FBI agent, but he pulled his badge anyway. "Who's in charge here?" One of the fire fighters pointed to the Battalion Commander, a fiftyish man with a gray mustache. "What the hell happened?" "Fire went up about three a.m. this morning. We tried everything but couldn't put it out. Something exotic was in there feeding it. We think magnesium or something like it. What's it to you?" "We were supposed to serve a fucking search warrant on this place this morning." "You're kidding. Well, search all you want. There ain't jack shit left of this place now." The day Peter MacMillian expected to get his daughter back had instead gotten worse from the moment he woke up. His friend at the U.S. Attorney's office called him about ten a.m. "I suppose you heard what happened?" "Do they know yet whether anyone was inside?" "No, but your daughter and Nelson definitely weren't. They boarded a spaceplane to Berlin early this morning, just before the fire went up. He's out of reach for now." "You can't extradite him?" "The problem is we don't have anything to charge him with. If someone was in there when it went up, it would be first degree murder, but I seriously doubt Nelson would be that dumb. At best, we may have unlawful burning and possibly obstruction of justice. That's not going to get him extradited, especially since we can't even prove he set the fire yet. His lawyers are claiming it was an accident, and that it burned the way it did because he had a ton of electronics inside. The Fire Marshall can confirm that, at least. It looks like he had some kind of lab. What he was doing is anyone's guess. Yes, I'm certain he torched the place to stop us from searching it, and yes that pisses me off no end. But unless we can prove he did it, we're screwed. As far as the statutory rape bit goes, we had probable cause-barely-to search the building, but not to indict him. Unless we can get some of those girls to testify about what was going on-and I'm willing to bet most of them have vanished by now-we really don't have anything on him." "What about Ashley? He can't just take off with her like that." "Peter, she's not a minor anymore. You know that. She and Nelson are in Geneva now, we think. Send your investigators to Switzerland if you want. But right now she's your problem. I'm sorry." Word of the lab's destruction spread quickly amongst the girls. MacMillian's investigators had already stirred up much suspicion in the group, and the sight of FBI agents poking through the wreckage was the last straw. By week's end, nearly all of them had left San Francisco. XX. Ashley had been to Switzerland before, but never in the summer. David's house was above Gstaad, and she could look out over the fields of clover and edelweiss to the bare ski slopes across the valley where she and her parents had skied the year before. It was hard to believe how much had happened since then. The house was similar to David's rooms above the lab, all polished wood and metal. A Zen ski cottage. It was new, unused, and smelled like a new car. The lab was buried underground, out of sight of any visitors, with access through a secret panel controlled by Jasmine. She sat on the porch in a thick wool sweater-at this altitude, the air was cool even in June-sipping a cappuccino. David emerged from the house, having just risen from bed. He leaned down and kissed her forehead. "So what now?" she asked. "Nothing. I talked to my lawyers for a while after you went to bed. We're taking the position that the fire was an accident, and it's highly unlikely they'll be able to prove otherwise. With the lab gone, they really have nothing to come after me for. The other girls aren't likely to talk about what they were doing, even if they can find them, which so far they haven't been able to do. I'm going to stay overseas for a while anyway. You can do what you want. They have no interest in you." "Do you?" "Do I what?" "Have any interest in me? I mean, you fly me halfway around the world and deliver me to this house with a closet full of new clothes as if we're going to be staying here, but we still haven't decided what we're doing about the baby. Or about us." He sat down in a chair opposite her. "I don't want to put any pressure on you. But the truth is, my research with the Needlebots is about finished. There are a few things I suppose I could still do, but the system is basically done. If I want to market it, it's ready to go. And when it goes, I won't have much to do. My people generally handle that sort of stuff for me. I don't get much involved with the day-to- day business of my companies." "So what are you saying?" "I'm saying that if you want to keep this kid, I'll be around to help raise it. I won't be like your father." He had decided that much on the flight over. Jasmine was right about a few things. Ashley stared at him, then set down her coffee roughly and got up. She walked out across the field of clover, arms crossed. He got up and followed her. "What's wrong?" "What's wrong is you're not answering my question. You're giving me a lot of caring, sensitive crap, but you're not telling me what you really feel." She stopped, and he came up next to her. "What is your question?" "Do you love me? Do you care if I have an abortion? Would you care if I dropped dead? How about that? I know a lot has happened, but I'd at least like to get some feel from you about what's going on." He took a deep breath, took her in his arms. She remained rigid. What now? He glanced back at the house. Could Jasmine hear them out here? "Yes, I love you. No, I don't want you to have an abortion. And I would care very much if you dropped dead." He felt her relax, and she laid her head on his shoulder. "I mean, I never expected to be pregnant at eighteen. I never expected my life to lurch off in a direction like this. I was supposed to go to college, marry some nice guy, go to law school and have a perfect rich person life like my parents. Now I'm knocked up, living in Switzerland with a guy twice my age, and all I want to do is finish the Dungeon." That jolted him out of his confusion. "You're not going through level fifteen." She pulled back. "Why not?" "Forget that you're pregnant. I'm not letting someone I care about go through that." "It's not like anyone is forcing me. I want to do it." He looked away from her, face gone to stone. "Listen to me. You don't have any conception of what level fifteen is like. It was supposed to be the conclusion, emphatically the end to a very difficult series, so bad no one could possibly imagine anything worse. It wasn't really anything I intended someone to actually go through. It was an experiment, an attempt to push the envelope and see just how much the system was capable of. It's as close to Hell as you can get without dying. It's not an experience I would wish on my worst enemy, let alone you and your baby." "You don't think I could do it?" He turned away from her, hands rubbing his forehead. "It's not that. If anyone could do it, it's you. I just don't want you to." "It's really that bad?" "There are a couple of reasons. The beginning of it, the lead-in to the torture, is designed to be as terrifying as possible. It's not like any of the others you've gone through. It employs an experimental stimulating procedure that I've never tested on anyone. What it does is induce a REM state, a dream, to search your mind and find the things that scare you the most. Then it writes them into the script. Another thing is that the pleasure at the end isn't guaranteed the way it is in the first fourteen levels. You have to earn it, earn it by withstanding the torture. If you don't, the pain just goes on until you do." "Oh, God." "There's another reason, which is the main reason you're not going to do it." "What?" "The electronic safeties that are built into the system are disabled in this program. Do you understand that? It means that if your body can't take the level of stimulation you're getting, if your heart is starting to go arrhythmic from fright, it won't slack off like it does normally. If you're not strong enough for it, it could kill you. And more likely in this case, it could cause a miscarriage. I'm not letting you take that risk." "Couldn't you just turn them back on? The safeties?" "I could. But it would eviscerate the program. The REM search won't even work with the safeties on. And the rest of it wouldn't be half as intense as it's programmed to be. Even level fourteen required some relaxing of the safeguards. If I turn them back on, it would be no different than what you've already done. And even level twelve is too much for a pregnant woman, at least until I've determined the level of risk." She stared out across the valley. "So with them on, I wouldn't really have completed the series." "No. But you're not doing it anyway, safeties or not." She sighed. "Okay. You're right. I won't do it." She leaned against his chest again, and let him hold her. She hoped he wouldn't realize she was lying. PART THREE XXI. A week later, they returned to Geneva to find Ashley an obstetrician. David gave her a credcard and flew back to Berlin to meet with some of his lawyers and company managers. He had decided to market the Needlebots, and it would take a couple of weeks to work out the details. Ashley spent a few days in the most expensive suite in the Hotel Geneva while racking up purchases at Chanel, Armani, Tiffany's, and a dozen other overpriced boutiques. She spent an entire day a local spa getting massaged, primped and pampered. She bought a Ferrari at the Geneva dealership (just to see if she could), and when they realized who she was, they even helped expedite her application for a Swiss driver's license. None of it put a dent in the card's credit limits. She drove back to Gstaad and spent more money on food and riding the gondolas to the tops of the surrounding mountains. After a week in which she had spent close to a million dollars (much-though far from all of it-on the car) she had to admit that she was deceiving herself. Throwing that much money around was fun, but it wasn't what she wanted to do. Something David had said to her kept popping back into her mind, and it wasn't his admonitions about level fifteen. She worked her way up the Dungeon from level one, he had said. No one else has done that. Not even Ashley, who had completed levels twelve, thirteen and fourteen easier than anyone else. But Jill, the suicidal Jill, had. As much as Ashley wanted to finish the series, she had begun to feel as if she needed to back up before she got to the end. It was like reading the last half of a book without ever looking at the beginning. When she returned to the house, she found her purchases neatly stacked in the front hall, delivered while she was gone. "I can see you've been having quite the good time," Jasmine said. "It was nice. I miss David." "He called to tell me it would take another week. He's in Tokyo today." "I talked to him yesterday. He was in Seoul." She carried her boxes of new things into her room and began putting them away. "These are lovely clothes you bought." "Thanks. Like the watch?" She held up the diamond-studded Rolex she'd bought. "It's beautiful." Once it was all put away, she called Melissa, who shrieked when she realized who was calling. "It's the fugitive from justice! Where are you?" "Gstaad. He has a house here." "You will not believe the way it's been here since you guys took off. It's been such a scandal. Your dad was complaining to anyone who would listen about David. Did he really burn down the lab?" "I shouldn't talk about that. His lawyers are dealing with it." "Oh. Well I won't make you violate attorney-client privilege or whatever it is. I can't believe it's gone. I never got to finish the Chestelaine stuff. God, I'm going to miss him." "This is sort of a secret, but David is going to sell the bots. His company is going to start marketing them. The system will probably cost about a gazillion dollars, but it's not gone." "You're kidding. When?" "I don't know. He's been gone a week or so working it out." "You're alone? What have you been doing?" "Spending money and sightseeing. He gave me a credcard and turned me loose." "Oh, God, I hate you. What did you buy?" "A lot of clothes. Some jewelry. And a car." "A car? He let you buy a car? What kind?" "Um, a Ferrari." "Oh! God! Are you ever coming home? Or have you officially graduated to pampered mistress status?" "I don't know about David, but I'll be back eventually. How are my folks doing? If you know." "Well, I don't know about your mom, but your dad has gone psycho from what I could tell. He was on TV a few times bitching about David." Melissa's face suddenly fell. "Oh, um, that reminds me. Your dad was saying you're pregnant. Is it true?" "Yeah." "David?" "Yeah." "Since when?" "About ten weeks. I didn't want to tell anyone until I decided what to do. Telling my folks is what caused that fight when I moved out." "Oh. So what are you going to do?" "We're going to keep it." "We?" "Yeah. David has been so cool, even when I get moody about it." "Are you going to get married?" "We haven't talked about it. It's too soon for me to even think about that." "Okay. Because you can't do it without my being there." "I know. I promise." Melissa picked up the phone and carried it to her bed. "So I guess you never got to finish the Dungeon, huh?" "No, but it's not because of the lab burning. He has one here. He just doesn't want me to do level fifteen being pregnant." "Yeah. That might be risky. Or would it? I thought it was all in your head?" "That's what I thought too. But you know how it takes a lot out of your system. I understand what he means, I just can't stand the idea of giving up on it." "You think you might do it anyway?" "I'm thinking about it. He's going to be gone another week. At the very least, I want to do a couple of the other programs." "Well, be careful. I'd hate to think you were causing birth defects or something." "Ashley, I don't think this is a good idea. Not without Dr. Nelson being here." "You're the one who runs everything, right?" "Yes. But I'd feel more comfortable with him here." "Did he say not to use it while he was gone?" A long pause. "No. But I know the two of you talked about this." "He just said not to do level fifteen, and I'm not. Jesus Christ, this is level one we're talking about. How could it possibly hurt me after everything else I've done?" Another pause. "All right. I'll start it up." She was driving along Lake Geneva in her new Ferrari. She wore one of her new Chanel suits, and she noticed the display on the dash computer said, "12:15: Lunch with Melissa at Ristorante Luigi." It was 12:17, so she was running late. She pressed down harder on the gas. About thirty seconds later, she heard a weee-ooo, weee-ooo behind her. In the rearview display she saw the flashing blue lights of a Swiss police car. She pulled off the road into an alley. The police car pulled in behind her, and a tall man in a uniform climbed out. He walked up to her window. "Ihr führerschein, bitte." "Um, Anglais, si'l vous plait?" She spoke French, but not German. "Your driver's license, please." She handed it to him. The police officer was quite handsome, but wore a severe, humorless look on his face. His blond hair was close cropped under his helmet, and he spoke with a crisp, clipped accent. "There is a problem with your license. Please step out of the car." She did. "What's wrong?" "You are an American, yes?" "Yes." "It is illegal for tourists to possess driver's licenses without the proper residence permit. Also, you are three years too young. The driving age in Switzerland is twenty-one." "Oh." "There is a heavy fine. I will have to take you to the station." "I can't leave my car here." "Your car will likely be confiscated." "What? You can't take my car!" He glared at her. "You are a tourist who has already broken several laws. Perhaps I could find something wrong with your visa and passport?" "This isn't fair. You're making this up." He appraised her slowly, and a different look came into his eye. "Under certain circumstances, these violations could be overlooked." She had spent enough time in Switzerland dealing with its scrupulously correct civil servants that it took her a second or two to realize what he was getting at. But his stare down into her ample, Chanel-accented cleavage left little doubt. She couldn't resist a sly smile. "Um, I don't want to get in trouble. I'll do whatever you want." "Come with me." He led her back to his car, which she now realized (or had it just changed?) was actually a small van. Once inside, he slid the door shut. "Remove your clothes." She did, and discovered that she wore expensive, intricate lingerie (which she had not bought the week before) under the suit. The police officer opened his pants, freeing his penis, but remained clothed. "Kneel." He spanked her a couple of times, then entered her from behind. Although she got into it quickly, his "lovemaking" was straightforward and uninspired. She came twice as he finished, and then the program ended. She raised her head in the bot, feeling utterly unsatisfied. "That's it?" "The series starts very mild. From one to fifteen, it's close to an exponential progression." "Well, start level two then. That was hardly worth the effort." "You don't want to rest?" "From what? That was nothing." "All right. One moment." In level two, she found herself in Marine Corps Basic Training. After screwing up in an inspection, she had sex with her Drill Sergeant. Level three took her by surprise. She and David were in Bora-Bora on their honeymoon (their honeymoon? Who was writing this?). He expressed a desire for some of what she had gone through in the Dungeon, then tied her up with her scarves. He spanked her and tickled her for a few minutes, then made love to her. It was more enjoyable that the first two, but hardly what she had been expecting. She took a break after level three and ate lunch. She rested a bit and returned to the lab. In level four, things finally began to get interesting. She was just out of law school, trying her first case. From the moment the judge appeared, she made one mistake after another. Finally, he summoned her to his chambers and told her she had a choice: submit to him or he would report her to the Bar Association. No mystery what choice she took. He made her crawl around his chambers on her hands and knees while he swatted her with a riding crop. Then (he proved to have nothing on under his robes) he had sex with her on his bench back in the courtroom. Level five, as Kaitlyn had told her a few months back, was the schoolgirl-principal sequence. She seemed to be somewhere in seventh or eighth grade, and the teacher caught her cheating on a test. She was sent to the principal's office, where he administered a series of swats to her rear with a yardstick. She sassed him as much as possible hoping to increase her punishment, but it seemed to make little difference. Then she serviced him on his desk. By then, it was evening, and she finally was worn out. She went to bed wondering what the next few sequences would be like. XXII. "You're determined to do this?" "What tipped you off?" If an AI could let out a sigh, it sounded as if Jasmine had. "Ashley, I'm a computer program, not a doctor, no matter what I information I have archived. I can't tell for certain what this might be doing to your baby." "David said he was going to research it. What did he do?" "We weren't able to find any indication of risk so far. But he isn't convinced, and he wants to do some more work." "Well, it's my body and I feel fine." "At least don't try to do what you did yesterday. The next sequences are more difficult. At least limit yourself to six and seven today." "Fine. Start it up." She found herself walking down an open stone hallway. Rough wooden doors lined the walls on either side of her, and low chanting echoed through the hall. She wore a long black robe and some sort of headdress. With a start, she realized it was a nun's habit. She reached the end of the hallway, and passed through a door. She entered a small stone chapel, largely unadorned. Dark wooden pews filled the room, worn shiny by decades (centuries?) of use. A simple altar laid with a linen altar cloth sat at the head of the chapel, and a rough wooden cross hung on the wall above it. She walked to the back of the chapel and entered the confessional. Then she sat on the seat inside and shut the door. "Bless me Father, for I have sinned," she heard herself saying. "It has been one day since my last Confession." She sat uncomfortably on the hard wooden seat, wondering what to do next. "Yes, my child? What sins have you to confess?" the priest finally said. "Father, I must confess a greater sin. Although I have been coming to Confession every day, I have not confessed all my transgressions to you. I could not bring myself to say this aloud." She heard a gasp from the other side of the screen. "You have taken Communion without being absolved?" "Yes, Father." "My child, this is a serious problem. At least you have finally come to your senses. What is this sin you have sought to keep from the eyes of God?" She realized she was crying. "Fornication, Father." Another gasp. "Sainted Jesus. How? Have you dared to leave the cloister?" "No, Father. I have not fornicated with men, but with some of the sisters in the cloister. They have tempted me to lie with them. To do things I can scarcely bring myself to imagine." "You have lain . . . with another woman? One sworn to Jesus as you have been?" "Yes, Father." "Who?" "Sister Tami. And Sister Kaitlyn. And I know they lie with others in the cloister." Sounds of heavy breathing came through the screen. "My child, these are grave sins. You have not only broken your vows, as well as the Seventh Commandment, you have broken the laws of God and nature. You know that it is forbidden for man to lie with man, woman with woman, as it is for man to lie with beasts." She was sobbing into her hands. "Yes, Father." "You must come with me to my chambers. I cannot begin to imagine the necessary penance. This goes far beyond a few Hail Marys and Our Fathers." He opened the door on his side, and she followed him out of the chapel to his rooms in one corner of the cloister. The floor, as it had been throughout the program, was bare stone. A rough wooden table, strewn with parchment, sat in the middle of the room, and a wooden bed sat along the window next to a desk. Through the window she could see rolling hills planted with rows of cypress, and beyond that, a vineyard. It reminded her of Tuscany, where her family had vacationed one year. The priest shut the door. "Kneel, my child." She did. He paced the room, wringing his hands together. "This is not the first time I have heard of such things in the cloisters. It is more common than you might imagine. When the younger sisters first arrive, the older ones often try to tempt them to break their vows in this manner. I have learned there is only way to expiate such sins." "Whatever it is Father, I will suffer it. I must lift this stain from my conscience." "First, you must confess everything to me. What have they made you do?" "We . . . we lie unclothed together. We kiss. They place their mouths on my breasts, and between my legs. They . . . they lick me there. It makes me lose control of my body. My limbs thrash about uncontrollably. It gives me such ecstasy as should be reserved for the hereafter." He continued to pace about, and for the first time, she noticed a large erection under his cassock. "And you, you do these same things to them?" "Yes, Father." "How many times?" "Many times. Since I first took my vows. Sister Kaitlyn came to my room that night." He pulled open a drawer in his desk and took out a narrow wooden board. "Stand, my child. You must remove your robe." She gasped. "My robe, Father?" "Yes, everything. As you came into the world, you must stand before me now. There can be no secrets before the eyes of God." Fingers trembling, she removed her robe, then her habit. Her hair was shorn close around her head. She bent to remove her shoes, then slipped out of the thin linen shift she wore under the robe. The priest looked her over, breathing hard. His erection was more prominent than ever. "My child. You do not belong in the cloisters. You have such a body as I have never seen." He glanced rapidly around the room, then grabbed her shift off the table, balling it up. "Lean against the table. Hold this in your mouth, and bite on it. You must not cry out whatever happens." She took the shift in her mouth and bit down, then leaned against the table, sticking out her buttocks. He walked around behind her. A second later, he began smacking her with the board. But he wasn't hitting her very hard, and it was certainly nothing like the punishment she had endured in level twelve. It was only enough to get her very hot and bothered. She leaned all the way over onto the table, folding her arms under her. The paddling stopped after a few minutes. She felt his hand on her reddened behind. "I know this is difficult, my child, but it is the only way." The hand slid down, feeling the hot, damp flesh between her legs. She moaned. "You know what this is intended for. It is not for women to use to pleasure one another. It is meant to take the flesh of man." She forced the shift out of her mouth. "Please, Father. I will do whatever I must do." She heard rustling behind her, then felt his erection pressing between her thighs. "This is not me, child. You belong to Jesus. I am merely helping Him reclaim what is His." "Yes, Father," she moaned. She wondered if David was Catholic. Maybe he had gone to parochial school, and this was his way of getting back at the nuns who had disciplined him. The priest thrust into her, and from then on, it was fairly straight sex. She got off harder than she had in the previous levels, but it wasn't much compared to the more serious programs. She ate lunch and took a brief nap. Then she returned to the lab. "Ashley, I really should tell Dr. Nelson about this." "But you won't." A pause. "No. Not for now." "Because you enjoy this as much as I do. Even if you won't admit it." "I suppose I'm becoming more human as this goes on. Another reason I love you." That stopped her short. "You love me?" she whispered. "If an AI. is capable of it, then I do. You sound surprised." "Well, it's just a shock. I hadn't thought of it that way." "You don't need to say anything else. I know your heart belongs to David." It was the first time Ashley had ever heard her use Nelson's first name. "I just hope the reason you keep coming back to use the programs has something to do with me." "It does, I guess. I can feel you in there." "I'm glad. Are you ready for level seven?" "Yeah. By the way, I've been meaning to ask you this, what's the deal with the name of the series? I haven't been in a Dungeon besides level twelve." "It refers to the dominant-submissive aspect of it. As you have seen, there are many more ways of expressing that besides simply locking you in a Dungeon." "Yeah. True." Level seven proved to be a rather tame version of level twelve. She appeared in some sort of bondage palace, or a nightclub maybe, and a man dressed as a medieval executioner showed up to torment her in front of a hooting crowd of spectators. Kaitlyn had told her level seven was "twice as bad" as level six, but that might have just been her perception. It was slightly harder, and slightly more fulfilling, but again, compared to the upper levels, it wasn't much to get excited about. David called the next morning. "How's the shopaholic? I see you ran up quite a bill in Geneva." "I miss you." "I miss you, too. This should only take a few more days, then I'll be done." "Where are you?" "Toronto. I've been meeting with the head of our Canadian subsidiary. I'm going to New York tomorrow, and then back to London again." "You're going back to the U.S. already?" "Yes. The U.S. Attorney shut down the investigation in San Francisco. They couldn't find anything suspicious in the wreckage. I talked to them on the phone a couple of days ago, and I guess I convinced them there wasn't anything illegal going on." "Oh. Good." "How are you feeling?" "Not pregnant yet. I feel fine." "No morning sickness?" "No. That stuff the doctor gave me is working, I guess." She wanted to mention Jasmine's declaration of love, but she couldn't do it when Jasmine would hear her. She wasn't sure how he would take it anyway. Something had been going on between them before she showed up, and though she wasn't sure what it was, she didn't think it was quite over yet. She felt silly being jealous of a computer, especially when Jasmine was so nice to her, and clearly wasn't trying to stand in the way of her relationship with David. If anything, she had been encouraging it. Of course, that was only what she had seen. Unlike a human being, Jasmine could be in a dozen places at once. She had complete control over her emotions (she did, didn't she?) and behavior, and it might all be an act. For all she knew, Jasmine had been travelling around with David on his trip, and they had been visiting the beach every night. She wasn't quite sure how she felt about that possibility. XXIII. In level eight, Ashley found herself in an Old West wagon train. The train was promptly attacked by Apaches, who carried her off to their camp and "raped" her. (Can't rape the willing, she thought to herself.) Their torments were much more imaginative than the priest's had been-one of them involved cactus spines-but it still wasn't that impressive compared to level twelve or thirteen. She was a little apprehensive about going into level nine. Kaitlyn had said it was bad enough to get her to swear off the rest of it. But Ashley was beginning to suspect that Kaitlyn wasn't as hard on the inside as she had been on the outside, so maybe nine wouldn't be too bad. Something had stunned her. She was lying face down in the dirt, and a muddy hand turned her over. "Sarge, you okay?" It was a soldier. She realized-from her experiences in level two-that he was a Marine. He wore a helmet, camouflage fatigues, and rigid body armor on his chest, arms, and legs. She sat up and realized she was wearing the same thing. Her rifle-an M-24, 5mm caseless, selective-fire assault rifle (as her Drill Instructor in level two had screamed in her ear)-was at her side. "I'm-I'm fine. I just got knocked over." The Marine let go of her, and went to check on the other members of their squad. She looked around and saw they were in a rocky bamboo forest. Eight other Marines-three of them women-sat or stood nearby. About ten meters to her right was a smoking crater-apparently the result of the shell that had knocked her down. It was hot, very humid, and sweat ran down her back. Wait a minute, she thought, he called me "Sarge." She looked down at her arm, and saw a set of black chevrons. She looked around at her squad and saw no one else wearing them. "Where's Lieutenant Carson?" she heard herself say. The Marine who had checked on her looked up from a body near the crater. His face told her what she needed to know. "She's dead, Sarge." "Shit. How's everybody else?" "Chavez took some flak in his arm. Jonesy is bandaging him up. Everyone else is okay." She went over to look at the dead officer. With only slight surprise- she was getting used to things like this-she realized it was Rachel Carson, a girl she had known, and not liked very much, in school. Her armor had blocked the shrapnel down below, but several other chucks had torn off the back of her head. "Zip her up and cover her. We'll have to pick her up on the way out." The medic-Jonesy, apparently-appeared with a body bag and closed up the lieutenant. Then he and the other Marine, whose name she noticed was Benjamin, covered her in bamboo fronds and wedged her into a large crack in a nearby rock. She got a fix on the position with her GPS receiver so they could find her again. "Okay, let's get out of here. Benjy, you're on point. And try not to hit any more fucking mines." Benjamin slipped off into the bamboo, and the rest of them followed. Ashley realized she had a different body in this program. She had been indifferent to sports in school, and wasn't in particularly good shape. Yet she had no trouble climbing up the rocky hill she found herself on. Her body was lean and muscular, apparently honed by several years in the Marines. Even her breasts were smaller. For what seemed like twenty minutes, they slogged through the bush. Then Benjamin's voice crackled in her ear. "We're here, Sarge. I'm about a hundred meters from the fence. I got two guard towers at either end of the camp, maybe twenty guards inside. I don't see any of our guys, but there are a half dozen bamboo sheds around the compound." "Okay, that's what the recon photos had. We're coming up." A few minutes later, she crawled up to where Benjamin had stopped. She saw a small compound ringed with barbed wire. Asian men in green uniforms walked around toting rifles. In each guard tower, one man leaned lazily against a machine gun. "We're going in without the L.T.?" Benjamin asked. "You want to leave them in there because we're a man short?" she snarled at him. "Platoon, get to your positions," she said into her radio. "We're going in on my mark." She switched to long range transmission. "Boulevard, this is Damage, over." "Damage, this is Boulevard, we read you five by five." "The party is about to start." There was a short pause. "Roger, we have you on the satellite link. We show just ten guards around the compound. Must be an off day. We'll see you in five minutes." Just as she clicked off, gunfire ripped through the bamboo around them. Voices screamed in her ear. "Shit!" someone yelled. "We got a patrol walked right on top of us!" "Abort! Abort! Everybody out!" She jumped up, racing toward the sound of the gunfire. She saw Jonesy dragging one of the other Marines, but a spray of bullets ripped into him from behind, and he went down. Ashley dropped to the ground beside him, trying to return fire. She popped up on one knee, ripping loose a series of bursts across the bamboo in front of her. Several figures dropped forward out of their cover. Beams of light flashed down out of the sky, vaporizing the trees around them as the satellites tried to provide some fire support. Something thumped to the ground near her, and she realized too late it that was a grenade. She dove away from it, but the blast upended her, throwing her into a large rock. Blinding pain, then darkness. She came awake to pain in her wrists and a dull ache in her back. She was tied to a bamboo rack, hands and feet. She had been stripped down to her tank top and fatigue pants, and her jungle boots were gone. The rack was fastened to the wall behind her, and she was held inside what looked to be a bamboo building. Some of her equipment-though no weapons-was on a table a few feet away. The door opened, and one of the Asian soldiers entered, an officer from the looks of him. The face looked Chinese, and the green uniform had bright red detailing on it. The officer removed his cap, and a long cascade of black hair fell out. She realized it was a woman. She glared at Ashley. "Most of your men are dead, and the aircraft coming to pick you up has been repelled. You have no hope of rescue unless your people are stupid enough to try another raid such as this one. You can rest assured I have ordered the guard on this camp to be doubled." "Ashley MacMillian, Staff Sergeant, 559-56-0045," she heard herself saying. The woman slapped her. "You will tell me what I wish to know." The woman took off her uniform jacket. Underneath she wore a tank shirt similar to Ashley's, and she could see the woman's small breasts under it. She was about Ashley's height, but slimmer. The woman picked up a wooden crate from one corner of the room and set it on the table. She removed a green metal box with several dials and switches on it. Two long wires came out of one end. Then she turned back to Ashley. She walked up and ripped open Ashley's T-shirt, exposing her breasts. They were the firm, medium-sized ones she'd had in eighth grade, before she hit the big time in high school. The woman returned with the green box and clipped the two wires to her nipples. "Why did the U.S. Army pick this camp out of all the others for your raid?" Ashley spit at her, and the woman flinched, wiping off her face. Then she threw a switch on the box. Electricity pulsed through her breasts, painful, but far from the intense agony of level thirteen. Ashley went rigid against the ropes tying her down, groaning through clenched teeth. The pain stopped a moment later. "Why?" "Eat me." Again, the woman shocked her breasts. But Ashley was so used to things like this now that it was almost pleasurable. After ten minutes of shocks and Ashley's disdain, the Chinese woman stopped, jerking the clips painfully off her nipples. They looked burnt, red and swollen. The woman scowled at her. "It is almost as if you enjoy this." "I've endured much worse than this shit." "Have you? We will see." She ripped off the remnants of Ashley's shirt. For a moment, Ashley thought she saw her eyes lingering on Ashley's breasts. Ashley looked down herself, regarding the flat washboard stomach she had in this program with some wistfulness. She wondered if she should finally start exercising seriously now that she was out of school. The woman took a split bamboo cane out of the box, bouncing it in her hands. "Why do so many American women join your armed forces? I fight because I must, but I would rather be home, a decent Chinese wife, raising a family. Do you have no family who cares about you?" "I have a daughter," she said. At least she hoped it was a girl. "And you leave her to come to China?" "She understands why I have to serve my country." The woman's face flared in anger, and she smacked Ashley with the cane. The sharp edges sliced off a thin strip of flesh from her chest. "Why are you here? Answer me!" She continued beating Ashley until her torso was crisscrossed with thin cuts. But the pain was bearable, certainly nothing like the rubber whips in level thirteen. "You have nothing to say?" "Ashley MacMillian-" The woman smacked her a few more times, then turned away, throwing the cane against the wall. She leaned forward against the table, hanging her head. "Do you think I enjoy this, inflicting pain on a pretty American girl? I might have liked to show you around Beijing, if you had come before the war. But now Beijing is a slag pit, and all my family are dead. And China faces another thousand years of slavery, just when we thought we had returned to greatness." "Taipei is a slag pit, too. And your people started this war." "Only because America stood in our way. You have controlled the Western Hemisphere for a hundred years. Must you rule the entire world?" "It's not up to me." "I do not know why I do this. The war is lost." She turned back to Ashley, and began untying her. When her arms were free, she dropped to her knees. The woman reached down to untie her ankles. Ashley tried to stretch out a cramp in her arm, then glanced over at the other woman. "What's your name?" "Cuan Shao-Lien. It means Young Lotus Flower." "It's pretty." "I have difficulty getting my tongue around yours." She tried, but it sounded more like "Ashrey." Shao-Lien helped her up. "Come." She led her through a side door into a bedchamber and shut the door behind them. She reached up and felt Ashley's hair. It had been pinned up under her helmet for the raid, but stray strands of it had come loose. Shao- Lien pulled out the pins and let it fall free. "What is it like, having such strange-colored hair?" "It means the boys like you better." "American men prefer yellow hair?" "Generally." "And . . . down below, between your legs, it is the same color?" "A little darker." "I cannot imagine it. May I see?" Realizing where this was heading, Ashley removed her fatigue pants, then her panties. Again, she looked longingly at the fit, muscular body she had been given for this program. Shao-Lien dropped to one knee in front of her, reaching out to feel her pubic hair. Then she looked up at Ashley and pulled off her tank shirt. Her breasts were small, conical, tipped with sharp black nipples. "I am sorry I had to inflict such pain on you. Let me give you some pleasure in exchange." She leaned forward, taking Ashley's buttocks in her hands, and the pleasure began. Ashley threw her head back, holding Shao-Lien in place, feeling the other woman's tongue probing and licking. The pain from her torment had nearly vanished, only a dull sensitivity encasing her body. She felt her swollen nipples begin to erect, then throb in need. Shao-Lien was working diligently, and it was too much too fast. Ashley pushed her away, backing up to sit on the cot. Shao-Lien crawled over, taking Ashley's right breast into her mouth. She suckled her gently, moving back and forth from one nipple to the other. Then, starting in surprise, Ashley felt Shao-Lien's finger touching her between her thighs, slipping inside her. It moved in and out as Shao-Lien continued kissing her nipples. Nearly lost in sensation now, Ashley lay back on the cot. Shao-Lien stood long enough to remove the remainder of her clothes, then joined Ashley. Shao-Lien moved to kneel between Ashley's legs, but, surprised at the sudden impulse, Ashley had Shao-Lien reverse herself and kneel over Ashley's face. Shao-Lien leaned forward, returning to work, as Ashley looked up at her sparsely-fringed sex. Her pubic hair was short and straight, only a thin border covering her labia. Ashley reached out, brushing her fingers over it, feeling the heat. She knew this was really Jasmine, whoever it looked like, and that was enough to soothe her remaining reservations about it. She pulled Shao-Lien's hips down, lifting her head up to lick at her, completing the circle, and losing herself in the pleasure of it. XXIV. "Well, that was a little more fun." She lay on her and David's bed, eating dinner. "I thought you would enjoy it. I certainly did." "Shao-Lien reminded me of you." "I took a somewhat more active role in that than I usually do." "I could tell." "Are you really going to do ten and eleven tomorrow?" "I don't know. I could use the rest. But David will be back in a few days, and you know he won't let me do them." "You can wait. I won't tell him what you've been doing." "You won't? Isn't that, like, against your programming?" "I've rationalized a way around it. Unless he asks me directly. But Ashley, you remember how level twelve was. Ten and eleven are closer to it. Do you think you can handle two in one day?" "I'll try ten. After that, we'll see." Level ten was actually somewhat disappointing. She was home, nursing her daughter, when a burglar broke into the house. He tied her up, abused her, and then raped her. The beginning was frightening (she was still getting used to the idea of being a mother), but the abuse was nothing very imaginative, nor was the sex. It still took a lot out of her, and she slept for a few hours afterward. She returned to the lab around four. "This is it. The last one besides the end." "Are you sure you're up to it?" "No. But I have to get it done tonight." "All right. Get ready." She had dozed off. She was sitting a rocking chair inside some rude sort of shack. The word "hovel" came immediately to mind. The walls were wooden, but smeared with grime. A stone fireplace, with a pile of coal smoldering under a large kettle, took up one wall. Unidentified odds and ends were strewn about the house. Opposite the fireplace were long rows of shelves, filled with jars and ceramic pots, many of them containing weird plants, powders, and what looked like insects and dried animal parts. A pile of rags that might have been a bed sat in the corner behind her. She wore a rough, ragged black dress, with a sort of coat over it. Her nails were long, split, and dirty. Her hair was down to her waist in greasy clumps. A black and white cat slept on her lap. She shooed the cat off her lap and got out of the chair. The shack had windows, covered with oilpaper. She opened the door, and saw a light forest outside. A path led from her door away into the trees. She walked over to the fireplace and peered into the pot. Dinner, or something else? It smelled liked dinner. She ventured a taste, and it seemed like some sort of stew. She heard voices outside, then footsteps. Someone rapped loudly on her door. "Ashley the Grey! Come out at once!" She opened the door. Ten men stood outside. All of them wore stiffly starched black coats, with knickers below, and broad-brimmed black hats. They were trying to appear stalwart, but were clearly afraid of her. "What do you want?" The one who had knocked on the door answered. "I place you under arrest for the crime of witchcraft. You will accompany me to town for trial." "The Devil take you all!" She made a sign in the air, and all of the men recoiled. She slammed the door in their faces. "Satan's spawn!" the first man shouted. "You will pay for your crimes! Burn the house!" She saw the men holding their torches up to the thatch roof, and realized they would soon smoke her out. She gathered up her cat, and crashed through the front door, screaming at the top of her lungs. The men jumped back when she emerged, clearing a path for her. "Fools! After her!" She ran as fast as she could, which in the long dress she wore was not fast enough. Two of the men caught her and tackled her. The cat screeched and ran off into the trees. In a moment, they had her in chains. The man in charge walked up to her, glaring. "I will see you burnt before the day is out. Take her away." She spat at him, and the men hauled her off. When they arrived in town, most of the townspeople emerged to watch her. All of them cowered in fear. The men locked her in a wooden cell in the town jail, near a small brick building. A few minutes later, she heard arguing in the outer room. "We must wait for the governor's representative. You know that as well as I." "No! We will convene the trial at once." It was the man who had brought her in. "I will not have her working her spells on my men." "Very well. Prepare the courtroom." Ten minutes later, two men came to take her from her cell. They dragged her across the street to the brick building. Inside, the magistrate who had arrested her sat behind a table with two other men. They regarded her sternly. "Ashley MacMillian, also known as Ashley the Grey. You stand before us accused of witchcraft, consorting with demons, and pledging your eternal soul to the Devil. What say you?" Ashley was having fun with this role, so she only smiled. "I say only that you place your own souls in peril by confining me. Release me at once or I shall summon those demons you speak of to do it instead!" All three of them gasped. "You confess these crimes?" the magistrate asked. "That and more. Burning me will only release my spirit to haunt you further. And I have planned my exit well. More than one young girl amongst you has been turned to the path I lead. Kill me and they will only take my place." The magistrate shot out of his chair, knocking it to the floor. "Silence! I will not have you speaking such filth! Who are these girls you speak of?" "Torment me all you wish, I shall not tell you." One of the other men pulled on the magistrate's arm and whispered into his ear. Then the third man leaned over, and they argued quietly. Finally, the magistrate stood up again. "If you will not reveal their names, you must be put to the question." "Do your worst." He turned to the guards behind Ashley. "Take her outside and tie her to the stake. And clear the streets. This is not a sight for women and children." The guards dragged her out into the square and locked her manacles to a scorched pole. Then they turned to the townspeople and shouted for them to return to their homes. All did, but many a curtain was pulled aside after the doors had shut behind them. The magistrate emerged with the two other men. They murmured together for a minute or two, then sent the guards off. One returned a minute later with a buggy whip. "Remove her dress." The guard walked up to the stake. He grabbed the neck of her dress and pulled. The ragged fabric parted easily and the dress came off. He blushed, turning his head in embarrassment at her nudity. She smiled at him. "Pretty boy, had you come to my hut alone, I might have given you a more pleasant welcome." He lurched away from her in fright, and she laughed at him. The magistrate approached, and began whipping her. It became progressively more painful, approaching what she had suffered in level twelve, and her resolve wavered. She could feel dozens of cuts across her back and buttocks. He stopped whipping her, and approached. "Speak! Who are they?" She managed a breath, and spat at him again. He growled in outrage. "Bring me the irons!" He returned with a hissing, red-hot branding iron. He waved it in her face. "Is this what you wish? Speak to me!" Ashley could feel the heat from the iron, and for the first time since restarting the Dungeon sequence, felt real fear. But it still didn't come close to the higher levels. She turned away from him, lips sealed. A moment later, she felt heat at the small of her back, and then he laid the iron on her skin. The pain was piercing, mind-numbing. She could feel her flesh sizzling and spitting away from the iron, and she smelled the aroma of burnt meat around her. He removed the iron, but the pain was scarcely diminished, a throbbing, fiery eye on her back. He held up the iron again, and she could see bits of her skin stuck to it, smoldering. "Speak! Give me their names." She moaned, hanging limply against the pole. "Go to hell," she mumbled. He repeated the torment a little higher up, and she screamed this time. It can't last forever, she told herself. It can't last forever. Then it was over, and again he shook the iron in her face. "Speak to me, damn you!" She hung in her chains and said nothing. "God's blood!" he said to the other judge. "She has the Devil in her. No one could withstand this otherwise." He threw the iron to the ground. "Fetch me another. And turn her round. If she has truly sworn herself to the Devil, we will see she if she can take a red-hot iron in her cunt." Ashley cringed in horror, and the other man gasped. "John! You cannot do such a thing." "Would you have me leave her crimes undiscovered? If we do not get these names from her, we will be doing this again in a year's time, mark my words." "You have gone mad." John struck him to the ground. "Be silent! And fetch me that iron!" The man scrambled to his feet and backed away. One of the other guards approached with the iron. Ashley tried to pull herself up, away from him. This was only level eleven! They couldn't do something like that! The sound of horse's hooves thudding on the ground grew in her ears. A second later, a man raced up on horseback, pulling up in front of them. He glanced at the magistrate, then at Ashley, in utter horror. Something about his face looked familiar, but her mind was too fogged with pain to think coherently. "Smith! In God's name, what are you doing?" "Major Perry! She is a witch! She has claimed to have corrupted girls in this town but will not reveal their names. I have no choice." "Idiot!" He smacked at Smith with his riding crop, then turned to the guards. "Get her down from there at once. And cover her, for God's sake." He pulled off his cape and threw it to the guards. They unlocked her manacles, and she dropped into their arms. One of them covered her with Perry's cape. "Take her to the inn. And collect the doctor. I will be there in a few minutes." They carried her off, and she saw a squad of soldiers in red coats entering the town. Perry yelled to them. "Arrest these three men. Place them in the jail and keep them there until I return." At that point, her strength failed, and she fainted She awoke in a soft feather bed. Her wounds had been dressed, she appeared to have been bathed. She was still in some pain, but the worst of it had passed The door opened, and Major Perry entered. She then realized why he looked familiar. The previous fall, she had gone to a party at U.C. Berkeley with Melissa, and there had met a gorgeous sophomore named Rich Perry. She had dated him a few times afterward, but he had then stopped calling her. She and Melissa decided that he had dismissed her as being too young, but it hadn't stopped her from fantasizing about him for months afterward. He was now standing in front of her in a colonial-era British Army uniform. "Ashley. I'm so sorry about this. I wish we had gotten here in time." "It's all right," she said quietly. "I'll survive." "When the governor received the notice of your impending arrest, I set out straight for Salem. We didn't expect Smith would start the trial so quickly." She smiled at him. "I missed you." "And I you." "Lie with me." He looked slightly shocked, but then his face softened. "You can't mean that. Not in your state." "Now, or never again." She pushed aside the covers, exposing herself. He wavered for a moment, then began removing his uniform. When their lovemaking finally ended, Ashley laughed at herself softly. The real Rich Perry couldn't have been one-tenth as good as this. XXV. Ashley slept late the next day. She sat on the front porch with her breakfast, watching birds wheeling in the thermals rising from the valley below. For the first time since David had told her the story, she understood why Jill had killed herself. She thought she had understood before, but only now did she really see it. David was right; it had little to do with level fourteen in itself. The reason was finally visible now that she had done what Jill had done: gone through all of the first fourteen levels. David knew because he had written them. Ashley now understood as well. A definite curve existed in the progressive sensations of the Dungeon levels. It wasn't precise, but it was there. It started out very flat, but around about level eight or nine, it began to spike upwards. By the time it reached level fourteen, it was approaching vertical. At fifteen, it probably was. Jill had seen it, even if she had never taken any calculus as Ashley had. It must have frightened her so much that jumping off a bridge was a preferable experience. Ashley could understand that now. Were she not pregnant, she might be considering it herself. And that scared the hell out of her. David had said repeatedly that he thought Ashley was stronger than Jill. Maybe she was, but he seemed to have a higher estimation of her abilities than she did. Yet the more she ran it through her head, the more it seemed a pointless exercise. As much as she feared level fifteen, she knew deep inside that she would do it anyway. And if she was going to do it, she had to do it in the next two days, before David returned. Jasmine's assurances notwithstanding, he would most likely figure out what she had done and what she was planning. He would then fix it so level fifteen was out of her reach. He might even erase the Dungeon programs altogether. That was a prospect she found almost as frightening. Ashley felt as if she had aged ten years in the last three months. She had been a sheltered kid with very little life experience before meeting David. Though her parents had been very lax and permissive with her, she had never abused her freedom beyond a few surreptitious drinks with Melissa. She dated nice, respectful boys at her school; it had never occurred to her to run wild in hopes of attracting her parents' attention. She had certainly harbored more than a few secret fantasies, but they had been so alien to her patrician life that exploring them seemed completely out of the question. Then came the night she met NastyGirl. Although Ashley had still been very skeptical about the lab, she had returned the day after discovering the building. Not wanting to leave her little sports car sitting around the Tenderloin, she rode the BART over after school. She spent half an hour walking up and down the block feeling foolish for even being there. Eventually she worked up the courage to knock on the door. And her life had never been the same afterward. She had never figured out who NastyGirl was, but she didn't suppose it mattered. As she told David, marriage and children were part of her long-term plan, but not anything she expected at eighteen. She wanted to do some living before settling down. College should have provided her with that opportunity. But now she had, through the Needlebots, lived through experiences most people could hardly have dreamed of, and odds were she could continue doing so, even if David kept her out of the more extreme programs. The idea of being a mother no longer frightened her as it might have six months earlier. She was actually beginning to look forward to it. It wouldn't be the teen motherhood adults had tried to scare her and her girlfriends with since puberty, not with all of David's money. Caring for the baby would be relatively easy, and there were no worries about how to support it. The only question was her emotional readiness, and after what she had lived through in the last three months, she felt ready for just about anything. Being a mother was a responsibility-she had only to look at her parents to know that-but it was one she felt up to. Almost. Only one thing remained undone. She had to finish the Dungeon. David sat on the balcony of his suite at the Connaught, looking out over the London skyline. The view was a jarring mix of old and new, stone buildings dating from the 19th Century and bulbous glass and metal constructions only a few years old. More than one British sovereign had railed against this cacophonous combination during the last century, though he wasn't sure why they took it so personally. It had been one of Charles III's main crusades, and his son, William V, had continued the drumbeat. William's daughter Victoria II had finally given up, since, absent a return to monarchal rule, there was nothing they could do. If the results of David's trip so far were any indication, he stood to make another fortune. At every stop, his subordinates had gushed over the Needlebot project, projecting potential applications beyond even what he had considered. It would be expensive, not in the least because the system required an AI to operate it, but there would be no shortage of entities lined up to buy it. David's laptop was open on the table beside him. "Jas?" "Yes?" "What has Ashley been up to?" "She's fine. She says she misses you." "I miss her too. But I also miss you. What has she been doing while I'm gone?" "Just a few low-level programs. Sometimes she goes down to the village to shop or eat." "Oh." "Are you going to marry her?" He started. "What?" "If you're keeping the baby . . . I'm just thinking of the future." "I hadn't given it a lot of thought. But it's not like I could ever marry you." A pause. "David, don't say things like that." "Why not? I mean, I like Ashley, maybe I love her, but I feel like I'm turning my back on you because you're an AI. Because there are things we can't ever do outside of the bots." "There are. Nothing can change that." "Maybe, I was thinking about this, I could design some kind of robot that would work with you, I bet we could do it, create something that would be pretty close to a human being." "It wouldn't be the same. You know that. Nothing you could do could ever make me into a human being." He leaned forward, rubbing his temples. "David, you need her, and she needs you. It doesn't have to change anything between us. Please try to understand." "This isn't hurting you?" "It hurts me more when you talk like this. Because I seem to care more about your mental health than you do." Ashley hadn't thought computers, even AI's, were capable of horror, but Jasmine put on a good appearance of it. "Ashley, you can't be serious. You can't do this, not in your state." "My state being two and a half months pregnant? Well, it's my body, and I feel fine. All these programs do is make me tired afterward, and I've gotten used to them enough that even that is going away. It won't do anything to my baby." "Please don't make me do this. I can't stand the idea of putting someone I love through such torture. You don't know what level fifteen is like." "I have an idea. I do, after going through the other fourteen levels. I have to do it, and I have to do it now, before David comes back." "Please?" If Ashley didn't know better, she would have sworn Jasmine was crying. "I'm sorry, Jas." "I could call David and tell him about this. Then he would order me not to let you do it." "But you know I'd never forgive you for doing that." "Yes. So instead you make me do something I'll never forgive myself for doing. And I since I think I can live with that slightly better than having you hate me, I'll do what you want." "I could never hate you. But things wouldn't be same between us." "I know. But I suspect they won't be either way." Jasmine sighed. "Get into the bot. And Ashley, whatever happens, don't give up. Remember that." As the program started, Jasmine made a decision. It went against a lot of her programming, but there was some logic to what she was doing. One way or another, it seemed inevitable anyway. XXVI. She was dreaming, but not with the simulated confusion and fogginess of the other programs. This time, she really felt like she was dreaming. A sense of disconnected terror began to grow in her, detached from any image in her mind. She saw a flower bed, and it frightened her. Something was falling. Something was pressing on her. She was falling. She was about to die, but didn't know why. Then it was over. She woke up, attached to the Needlebot. "What happened?" "Ashley, there's something wrong with the system. Wait a moment." A shock jolted through her. "Ow! What the hell was that?" "Get out of the bot. Something is wrong." She tried to pull away from it, but her limbs were stuck tightly to the bot's arms. "I can't! Turn it off!" Another shock, worse this time. "Ow! Stop! Let me out!" "I can't shut it off. Try to get loose if you can." She fought the electrostatic tension holding her in place, shaking the bot back and forth. A vastly larger shock ripped through her, throwing her forward against the restraints. Her whole body fizzled with energy, and her skin started to smoke where it contacted the bot. This wasn't the fantasy shocks she had survived in the programs, but horrid, painful electrocution. A deeper pain began in her chest, and her field of vision began to narrow. She realized her heart had seized up, frozen by the electricity coursing through her. With her last real conscious thought, she knew she was dying. The pain suddenly faded, and she fell forward. But something was wrong. With the pain had gone every sensation of any sort, good or bad. Only a vague confusion remained. She looked around the lab. It seemed fuzzy, no longer quite there. She was sinking, falling downward. She looked around her, and stared in disbelief at what she saw. A limp body hanging in a Needlebot. Her body. Something passed her, going up. It seemed to pass out of her, out of her belly, a small, amorphous blob rising to the ceiling. A feeling of resentment and lament radiated from it. In a moment or two, she had passed into the floor, and everything went dark. Now, more than ever, she felt like a being of pure thought, with no bodily sensations remaining. All that remained was the sensation of falling. With no transition at all, she was standing in a line of fuzzy humanoid blobs. They stood in a v-shaped valley of severe dark rock. Everything was in shades of gray, the sky, the ground, the people (?) around her. It lacked any hard-edged reality, and none of it was stable. The sides of the valley seemed a few feet away one moment, hundreds the next. The sky hung low, then higher, then thousands of feet above. The blobs (people?) around her were murmuring, but never could she get a clear sense of what they said, even though the voices seemed to come from right in front of her. It was as if the sounds were gray as well. She tried to cover her ears to block out the noise, but her hands passed right through her head. Only now did she take a clear look at her body, or what remained of it. She was a blob herself, a being of gray smoke. She put out her hand to touch the being in front of her and felt only vague resistance. She knelt and tried to pick up a rock at her feet, but could only seem to make it wobble slightly. She looked up and saw that the line in front of her was gone. She stood in front of an insane stone desk, hundreds of feet high it seemed, even though she could almost see over it. An even vaster creature stood behind it, and unlike the blobs, it had a clear form. The creature was humanoid, painfully thin, almost skeletal. It wore an archaic pin-striped suit and narrow gold-rimmed glasses. It glared down at her, pushing the glasses up a protuberance that passed for a nose, and shuffled some papers on its desk. "Ashley Taylor MacMillian," it said. "Born March 3, 20__. Died eighteen years, four months, four days, eleven hours, thirty-two minutes, and twelve seconds later. Your sins include adultery, failing to honor your father and mother, and taking your Lord's name in vain. Your death was very nearly a suicide. At the very least, you took a foolish risk that cost you your life. And the life of your unborn child." If Ashley had had lungs left to gasp with, she would have done it. She could only respond with a sense of horror. Could this possibly be only the program? "But-it was an accident. It wasn't the program that did it." "It matters not. You knew the risks, and chose to ignore them. Throwing your life away was bad enough, but you carried the life of another within you as well." "I didn't know! I didn't think anything would happen." "You knew. Others warned you and you spurned their advice. Now your child is dead as well, and, having died unbaptized, is condemned to Purgatory until Judgment Day." It shuffled more papers. "For your other sins alone you would be consigned to penance in Purgatory yourself. For the crime of infanticide, I send you to the Fifth Circle of Hell. Be gone." Ashley shrieked in terror. This couldn't be real! But it felt nothing like the other programs. Her body was gone, not just replaced. She had a sense of nothing but her own thoughts. She catapulted into the sky, arcing through the clouds, falling. She saw a vast city, almost the size of the continents she had viewed through the window of the spaceplane on her way to Berlin. The city was circular, ringed with concentric walls, and she fell toward one of the inner rings. As she grew closer, she realized the city was an inverted cone, and she passed the outer rings as she fell toward her destination. Deeper down, she could see a black pit in the very center, but then she passed into a stone building, and found herself in a rough cell. Again, with absolutely no transition, her body was back. She was nude, lying on the bare dirt of the cell. It was hot, and she began to sweat. The cell was little more than a rude cavity gouged out of some rough volcanic stone. No door to the cell existed, only bars of dark cast iron, buried in the floor and ceiling. Through the bars, she heard sounds she could barely comprehend. Growls and groans, roars, agonized screaming. A hideous, gargoylish creature lurched past the cell, dragging a mutilated body that was somehow still alive. She could hardly determine its sex, let alone what it might have once looked like, but it mewled and whimpered at the creature dragging it. Then it was gone. When the two had passed, she could see into the outer area. It was a vast, smoldering pit, a thousand times the size of the building she had passed into. Other cells ringed the pit on different levels, and at various points, broader areas stretched out away from the terraces. In those places, she saw other gargoyle creatures tormenting human forms. She backed up to the rear of her cell, pressing herself against the wall, wrapping her arms tightly around her knees. She had to figure out whether this was level fifteen. The alternative was too much to consider. "Jasmine! Please! If this is still the program, you have to tell me!" A warped black face stuck its head in front of her cell and laughed. "Jasmine? There is no Jasmine here." It cackled at her. "So this is the one who enjoys being tortured so much. We have awaited your arrival with great relish. Perhaps I will be given the honor of breaking you in. You will learn to enjoy my caresses, I think." It laughed again. "Oh, ho? So frightened? You disappoint me. We have such wonderful torments for you here. Why, I could chop you into a hundred bits and you would not die. You are dead already, after all! I could do it a thousand times, and each time you would reform to begin your punishment anew." It leaned back and seemed to regard an inscription above her cell. "Baby-killer? What delight! You have no conception what the prescribed torture for that is! But you will see, oh yes!" It cackled again and stalked off. Ashley closed her eyes and rocked back and forth, whimpering. She began to cry quietly. Please, let this be the program. Please, God. I didn't do anything wrong. Did I? In the back of her mind, a sinking feeling began. If she had died in the lab, she had taken her baby with her. Everyone had warned her of the risks, and she had ignored them to feed her own fantasies. And now her poor baby was dead. She had seen it going up as she died. She rubbed at her stomach. The fullness she had begun to feel was gone, as was the swelling of her breasts. She wrapped her arm back around her knees and buried her head in her hands. A screeching noise ripped through her cell. She looked up to see the gargoyle that had teased her bending the bars apart. "Time to begin, little one!" "No!" "Oh, yes!" She tried to squeeze herself into a tiny ball, pressed back into the corner, but it did no good. A rough claw grabbed her arm and dragged her painfully out of the cell. The stone quickly shredded the skin on her knees, and she tried to pull herself to her feet. The creature dragged her to the nearest torment area. She scarcely had time to take in the multitude of torture apparatuses before she saw a round pool of molten lava. She realized the creature meant to toss her into it. She screeched, grabbing onto the gargoyle, but it pulled her off and threw her into the pool. The pain was inconceivable. She should have died in an instant, but somehow she had enough of herself left to surface and claw her way partially out. She saw the cooked flesh of her arms tear off on the sharp rock of the platform, leaving bone behind. The gargoyle laughed and kicked her back into the pool. "Suffer! Suffer as your child suffered!" Scarcely able to conceive of it, she saw that the lava had reduced her to a bare skeleton. The last blobs of flesh on her body sizzled and dropped off her bones. Then the gargoyle grabbed her neck and pulled her out. And like that, she was whole again. "Oh! Little wench, this is only the beginning!" It picked her up and tossed her through the air. She slapped flat against some sort of metal surface, and a million knives were clawing into her. She tried to pull away, but that only increased the agony. She turned her head and saw that the creature had thrown her onto a metal wall covered with thousands of rusty barbed hooks. Hundreds of them were now stuck in the flesh of her back and limbs, holding her to the wall. It drew out a whip and began lashing her. The leather of the whip was woven around dozens of razor-sharp blades, which sliced into her, ripping off long shreds of her skin. The torture went on long after she should have passed out from agony, after she should have fainted from the blood loss, past even the point where the whip had flayed her down to bare bone in spots. Finally, the creature tossed down the whip and approached. "Had enough? Does this meet with your satisfaction? Perhaps I could let you chose the next torment from tonight's menu. We could begin with an exquisite series of thumbscrews, followed by a rapid flaying. Then a few minutes in the iron maiden. For dessert, a simple rape. I rarely get to work with a human as attractive as you, and I hear that you have such twisted taste in sexual intercourse. I am eager to see if I can live up to your expectations." She could only manage a few gasping sobs in response. "Bah! Pathetic! I expected more from you." It grabbed her head and ripped her from the wall. A fresh explosion of pain greeted his action as the hooks on the wall tore her back to shreds. The gargoyle tossed her to the ground, and her wounds again healed. Before she could stand, perhaps to attempt flight, the gargoyle grabbed her. It tossed her on a horizontal rack, and leather straps whipped around her, tying her down. "Let's begin with the thumb-screws, yes? Unless you would prefer something else?" "Please stop," she whimpered. "I don't deserve this." "Oh, no? Would you like me to fetch the spirit of your daughter from her limbo in Purgatory and ask her how she feels about this? How she feels about your ending her life before it even began? It can be done if you wish." "It's a girl?" It smacked her. "You have no right to ask me such things. It is your place only to suffer. Yes or no? Shall I fetch her?" Ashley closed her eyes and steeled herself. Maybe this was some kind of test. At the very least, she had to give her baby some kind of apology. She had screwed up, but she hadn't meant to. "Yes. Bring her." It paused for a moment. "It is done. Now back to work." It grabbed the thumbscrews off a nearby pile of torture instruments. "Wait! Where is she?" "Coming. These things take time." The thumbscrews were little more than handheld vises, which the gargoyle clamped down on her thumbs. Bit by bit, it tightened them, watching her reaction. The pain grew, from annoying to agonizing to mindbending. Then she felt the knuckles give way as the bone collapsed, crushed, and she screamed. A voice split the air around her. "Stop!" Blazing light enveloped them, and the thumbscrews fell away, her thumbs suddenly intact. At the top of the torture area stood a being so beautiful she wanted to cry in joy at the sight of it, a shining creature of shimmering energy. Its form solidified, becoming vaguely humanoid. At its side now she could make out a smaller figure, a human. A beautiful young girl. Her daughter. The gargoyle recoiled, shielding its eyes from the glare. "You have no place here!" it screeched. "I summoned only the girl!" "I have come for a different reason." It motioned to the child, who floated down toward them. Ashley felt tears running down her cheeks as she approached. "Mother?" Ashley let out a sob. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry," she bawled. "I didn't mean to kill you, I didn't. I thought it would be safe, I really did. It was an accident." The girl put her hand on Ashley's shoulder. "I know." "I wanted to have you. I wanted to love you and raise you and be your mother. I wanted to watch you grow up. And now I can't because I killed you." "It's all right. I forgive you." The girl turned back to the being of light, which approached them. "You do not belong here," it said to Ashley. Its voice was deep, sonorous. "At worst, you deserved time in Purgatory." It glanced over at the gargoyle, which shrunk under its gaze "This creature's request prompted a review of your case. I came here to see if you had seen the error of your ways. I believe you have suffered enough to expiate your sins. You and your daughter will return with me to the upper realms." "No!" the gargoyle shrieked. "I am not finished with her!" The other being waved its hand, and the gargoyle dissolved into a puff of smoke. Then it gestured at the rack, and Ashley was free. Her body, the body she had been given only for torture, fell away behind her, and she became a glowing creature like her daughter. The girl took her hand and smiled. "Come," the being said, and lifted its arms. The three of them shot up, through the roof of the cavern, into the smoky sky above, through the clouds. They passed through a dull gray area of drifting forms. "Purgatory," her daughter said. "Where I was." "I'm sorry," Ashley said again. "It's all right, Mother. I love you." Then they burst through the amorphous ceiling of Purgatory into a shining realm of light and joy. Music, wondrous music filled her ears, and the sense of pleasure and fulfillment roaring through her was so infinitely more than anything she had ever conceived of, so far beyond anything she had ever experienced, that she knew then that it had all been real, that she had truly passed on, left the mortal world behind and passed into Heaven with her daughter. Other forms swirled around them, welcoming them, loving them, embracing them. She returned the embraces, laughing with joy. She took her daughter's hand, and the two of them flew off together, into the light, into the laughing, singing souls dancing around them. XXVII. David knew something was wrong when he landed in Geneva. He called the house to let them know he was back, but there was no answer. Not even Jasmine. He called in with his laptop to attempt a remote diagnostic, but got nothing. The line was dead. Nothing was there to answer him. He hired a VTOL transport to fly him back to the house. Thrice more he attempted to contact the house, in vain. He tried Ashley's cell phone number, but no one answered. He thought of calling the Gstaad police to have them check out the house, but changed his mind. He would be there almost as fast, and they would have trouble getting in at all, if something was truly wrong with Jasmine. He had the VTOL land in the field outside the house. He walked up to the front door and nothing happened. "Jasmine! Ashley?" No one answered. He punched in his security code on the keypad, but the system remained unresponsive. He pounded on the door. He peered in the windows, seeing nothing amiss, but no one inside either. He tried to climb up to the upper windows but was unable to get a good enough grip to do it. He circled the house, seeing no one, finding no way inside. The security he had bought was first-rate, and it now locked him tightly out. An increasing sense of panic filled him. This should not have happened without a complete systems failure. And that was impossible as long as the house was still standing intact. Jasmine had backups on backups, in this house and elsewhere. She could not have crashed. It was physically impossible unless a dozen mainframes around the world had failed simultaneously. He yelled himself hoarse trying to get someone's attention. A new Ferrari, presumably Ashley's, sat in the garage, so he knew-or thought-she had to be here. Yet no one answered his calls. Finally, he called the company that had built the house, explaining his problem. They professed to be completely baffled, but agreed to send a repair team at once. They arrived in a van about an hour later. The repairmen pulled the panel from the security keypad, and after tinkering with it for a few minutes, got the front door open. "Well, this is odd," one of them said. David rushed inside. "Ashley? Jasmine?" "Herr Nelson?" the head repairman asked. "May we see the central controls?" David froze for a moment, then remembered that the security system computer was a separate frame-though controlled by Jasmine-located in the kitchen. "Yeah, in here." They followed him in and opened the panel. All the display lights were dark. The head repairman pushed a button and suddenly the system came on, beeping. "The system was shut down. That is all. It merely needed to be rebooted." "It was off? Someone shut it off?" "Ja." He shut the panel. David thanked them and showed them out of the house. As soon as they were gone, he raced over to the door to the lab. Nothing happened when he approached. He opened the concealed keypad and punched in his code. The door slid back, and he bounded down the stairs, taking three steps at once. The lab was dark. Even the control panel, which was never supposed to be off, had been shut down. He ran over and inspected it. This was not good. He hit the main power switch, and the system began to boot up. Then it beeped loudly at him. A message popped up on the screen. "Error: File JASMINE.HEURISTIC.MAIN not found." He lost his balance, grabbing for a chair to steady himself. That file was Jasmine's central memory core. If it was gone, so was she. He shut the system down and restarted. The same message reappeared. He started the system up on the backup operator and ran a diagnostic. What it told him made his heart stop. Every one of Jasmine's files was gone. Her entire folder had been deleted. Fingers shaking, he ran a search through the worldwide backup systems. One by one, they came up empty. Unless there was another backup somewhere he wasn't aware of, Jasmine was dead. He lay back in his chair, dazed. Who could have done this? Ashley? It was inconceivable. Without Jasmine, there were no Needlebots. They wouldn't run without her to control them. Why would she destroy something he had to practically pry her away from? And he doubted she was capable of it. At the very least, she couldn't have erased the backups. She shouldn't have had any idea they even existed, let alone where. But where was she? He got up from the chair and climbed unsteadily up to the house. "Ashley? Are you here?" He searched the first floor quickly, finding nothing. He climbed up to the master bedroom, finding the door shut. He opened it. A form was under the covers. He walked over, pulling them back. It was Ashley. She was naked, pale and sick-looking. He grabbed her wrist. A rapid, thready pulse raced through her. He felt her skin, which was loose and clammy. She was badly dehydrated. He shook her, trying to wake her. A few seconds later, her eyes fluttered open. "Ashley. Are you all right? What happened?" Her gaze floated around, only settling on him after a second or two. "What . . . what . . . " She tried to sit up, but he had to help her. She looked at herself, feeling her body in confusion. "I'm . . . I'm alive? What happened?" Everything crashed together in David's head. "Oh, my God. You did it, didn't you? You did level fifteen!" She looked up at him, disoriented. "I did?" "You died and went to hell, didn't you? That was the fucking program. The goddamned program I told you not to do!" A tear ran down her cheek, and she looked down at herself again. "It wasn't real?" "Oh, God!" He collapsed back into a chair near the bed. "Did you just come out of now? What the hell happened to Jasmine?" She looked up at him again. "I thought it was real. I thought I died, and my baby died, and I went hell because of it. But then she came down and forgave me. And we went up to Heaven." She began to cry, sobbing into her hands. "Listen to me! What happened to Jasmine?" "Jasmine?" "What happened to Jasmine?" "I . . . I don't know. What's wrong with her?" "What's wrong with her? What wrong with her?" He jumped up, shouting now. "I'll tell you what wrong with her! She's been fucking deleted, that's what wrong! She's fucking dead!" "She's dead? How could she be dead?" "Someone deleted her entire file, including the backups I had stored in a dozen systems around the world." He fell back into his chair. "But it's impossible. There were safeguards. No one could have done it. They couldn't have known what to do or where to do it. She and I were the only ones who knew." "She knew?" "Of course. But why would she delete herself?" The color drained out of Ashley's face, and her eyes went unfocused. "Because of me." "Because of you?" "Before I went in, she begged me not to do it, not to make her put me through level fifteen. She told me she would never forgive herself. She had been telling me she loved me." "Oh, my God." "But I made her do it." "And she had to put you through that program. She had to put you through that horrible torment. To watch you think you died and killed your baby." "Except I didn't kill my baby. I killed her." His jaw dropped. "She killed herself. She committed suicide." "Because of me. Because she couldn't stand knowing what she had done to me." Ashley buried her face in her hands and fell over on the bed, sobbing. David's head fell back. He stared at the ceiling. He had been wrong all along, just not the way he suspected. He had known deep down Ashley was probably strong enough to survive level fifteen. He had just never guessed that Jasmine might not be. XXVIII. For the first time in his life, David felt like punching someone-Ashley in particular. The full scope of what she had done became quickly apparent. But he couldn't quite bring himself to hate her, and she was in bad shape herself. She needed more attention than he could give her at the house. Severe dehydration might even bring on a miscarriage. He gathered her up and carried her out to the car, then raced down the mountain and took her to the local hospital. When the doctors in the emergency room tried to hook up an IV, she went berserk, screaming that she wanted to die, that she didn't deserve any help. They finally had to tranquilize her, and in an hour or so, she was out of danger and asleep. David sat in the waiting room, trying to make sense of what had happened. The more he thought about it, the more he blamed himself. He should have known Ashley would go through level fifteen if left alone. She had made that clear enough before he left, despite her promise not to. He could very easily have locked her out of it. He hadn't. But how could he have been so blind about Jasmine? An AI committing suicide. Unbelievable and unprecedented. Catherine Rundlett would have a fit when she heard about this, though he was unsure whether she would be upset at Jasmine's passing, as he was, or thrilled that her program had displayed such human qualities. She had become human; that was what had happened. Her years of experience with the Needlebots, and her increasingly intimate relationship with David had given her insights into human thought patterns that no other AI could match. He might be able to replace Jasmine's core programming. It might cost a few billion dollars, or nothing, depending on how Seamarch Biotech reacted to the news of her suicide, but he could afford it easily. What he could not replace was the three years of learning she had acquired, no more than he could pluck three years of knowledge out of his head and give it to someone else. She was gone, most likely forever. Ashley returned home the next day. His anger with her was dulled by the obvious fact that she was suicidal herself. He kept her sedated for a few days until her fierce depression began to ebb. While she was resting, he pored over the system logs in the lab, trying to figure out what had happened. He went back a few weeks and worked forward, looking for any clues to Jasmine's mental state. Nothing significant appeared. He looked over the records from the last day. Ashley and Jasmine arguing over level fifteen, then Ashley entering it. The REM search had worked flawlessly, digging dark horrors out of Ashley's brain. The program decided that the one thing that would frighten her the most would be losing her baby, so that was what it had written the introduction around, and it worked. Ashley had bitten on the descent into hell theme, so hard it hurt him to read it. How could he have created something so horrible? To make her think she had actually died. A light went on in his head. Ashley really thought she had died. Could that have affected Jasmine's programming? He went back over Jasmine's logs, finding the moment where she had destroyed herself. There it was, plain as day. How could he have missed it? He had simply assumed she had committed suicide because Ashley's explanation made sense, and he needed to grab onto a reason for Jasmine's death. Well, there was a reason, and it wasn't Ashley. If anything, David had been the one who killed her. He had been lying to himself, and to Ashley. Level fifteen hadn't just been an experiment. He had put too much work into it for no one to ever use it. It was like a painter completing his masterpiece, a writer completing an epic novel, then hiding it away so no one could view it. No artist does something like that forever. His attraction to Ashley hadn't been to her looks. As a fabulously wealthy bachelor, he had his pick of an army of beautiful women. No, it had been her inner strength, her ability in the Dungeon. He had said himself soon after meeting her that she might be the one to complete it. She had, as David secretly hoped. He just hadn't reckoned with the consequences. He found Ashley awake in bed. "I'm sorry." It was the first thing she had said in three days. "I know. But I've been reviewing the logs. What happened isn't what you think." "What do you mean?" "Jasmine didn't kill herself. The whole thing was an accident. There was a glitch in that program that I never suspected." "A glitch? You mean a bug?" "Right. You have to understand that all AIs are programmed with a self-destruct sequence. It's a separate routine that the main program can't access or control. It's there in case the AI ever goes berserk, becomes somehow malevolent, tries to start a war, that sort of nonsense. It's never happened outside the movies, but the programmers don't like to take chances. What I think happened was that level fifteen somehow triggered the self- destruct routine. Maybe when you became convinced you had died, the routine thought Jasmine was trying to hurt you. That would have been enough to set it off." "But it still means I killed her. It wouldn't have happened if I hadn't broken my promise and gone in there." "We don't know that. I don't know for sure what set it off. It could have been any program. It might have happened at any time. You can't blame yourself. I had no idea this could happen, though I might have if I had thought about it. There was no way you could have known. It's more my fault than yours. I wrote that program, remember." She laid her head on his shoulder and cried for a few minutes. "You think you're feeling any better?" She nodded. "I want to get up. Can we go somewhere else? This house just reminds me of her." "Sure. Anywhere. You name it." She thought for a moment. Somewhere she had never been before, where the past wouldn't chase her as much. "Provence?" "Done. I've got a house near Monaco, actually." "Can we drive there?" "You feel up to it?" "Yeah. I think so." He packed the few bags they could fit into her car, and arranged to have the rest of it shipped to Provence. They drove through the tunnels under the Alps into Italy, then down to the coast. They followed the Mediterranean down past Monaco, then up into the hills to his house. There Ashley slowly returned to life, cleaning and organizing a house he hadn't seen in two years. She went down to the beach a few times. She bought some new furniture and redecorated a bit. They spent the night in Monte Carlo, losing some money in the casino. David unveiled the Needlebots at a convention in Los Angeles a few weeks later. The world press had a fit with it, and offers to purchase the system flowed in from governments and corporations around the globe. His company's stock shot up twenty percent over the next week. Rumors of his relationship with Ashley and their impending child had accompanied the news of the Needlebots, and though it prompted some sniping from self-appointed moralists, there was little sustained interest. Melissa came to visit them for a week after that, and the two women went shopping and sightseeing. Several days later, when Ashley and Melissa were in Monaco, David went to Mass for the first time in ten years. He lit a candle for Jasmine, prayed a rosary, then went to Confession. "Parlez vous Anglais, papa?" "Yes." "Bless me Father, for I have sinned. It's been . . . a very long time since my last Confession." "How long?" "Ten years, give or take." "That is quite some time, my son. What has brought you back to the Church?" "It's a long story. I have many sins to confess, but there is one in particular." "Tell me, then. There are no sins God will not forgive if your contrition is sincere." "It involves a woman. Two women." He thought he heard the priest chuckling. "Doesn't it always? Go on." "Three years ago, I met an extraordinary woman. I loved her, but I could not be with her. Not permanently. Marriage was out of the question." "She was married already?" "No, but it was something like that. We could not be together, and I think she understood that better than I. Then this year, I met another woman, a girl almost. She's only eighteen. This other woman, when they met, they got along very well. They knew about each other and didn't seem to care." "Do you love them both?" "Yes. I know that now. But the other girl, she's pregnant with my child." "I see." "And this is the other thing. The first woman, she's dead now. She died about a month ago, and I think I accidentally caused her death. At first, I thought she had committed suicide, but I know now she didn't. But I had a hand in her death." "But it was an accident?" "As near as I can tell, yes. But I had a hand in it nonetheless. I'm not sure it would have happened had I not begun this relationship with the girl." "And what of the girl?" "She blames herself as well. It's actually brought us closer together, if for no other reason than we only have each other now." "You love her?" "Yes." "Do you wish to marry her?" "I'm not sure. I'm still grieving for the other woman." "My son, we can't always know the reasons why things happen. We can't peer into the mind of God and know why He does things. I can't say why He took this other woman from you, but I like to think that everything happens for a reason. I don't know that God called this woman home to force you to make a decision, but I know this relationship between the three of you would have been offensive to Him. It may simply have been her time. But whatever the reason, you must look forward now. You have a child on the way, and an obligation to it and this girl. If you love her, you should marry her. That, if nothing else, would be the most pleasing to God. It seems to me that you have lacked commitment in life. Perhaps that is why you have stayed away from the Church for so long. It is good that you have come back, but it will take more than a few rosaries to put you back on the proper path. You must pray to God for guidance. Grieve for this woman, but don't let her death destroy what you may have with the mother of your child." "I understand, Father. I think." "Two rosaries, and think on what I have said. That is less perhaps than you need, but it will be a start." When Mass was over, David drove up the coast to Monte Carlo. Ashley and Melissa were in Monaco, and he wasn't sure what he was going to do when he got there. Halfway to his destination, he ran over something in the road and had a blowout. He could continue driving on the flat without much trouble, but thought, I've designed some of the most sophisticated medical electronics in the world, I can change a tire, can't I? He discovered that he couldn't. Something in the design of the jack was beyond his ability to fathom. After twenty minutes of struggling, he was about to give up when a farmer in a dilapidated truck pulled up behind him. "Bonjour, est-ce que je peux vous aider?" "Uh, parlez vous Anglais?" The man shook his head. "Non, desolais." David pointed to the tire and held up his hands in frustration. The farmer nodded. "Ah, oui." He motioned for David to follow him. In a few minutes, the man had changed the tire and helped him replace the equipment in the trunk. "Merci beaucoup, monsieur." "De rien." He chuckled, and held up his hand, trying to say something David could understand. "Um, you-" The man pointed to David's head, then up in the sky. David laughed. Head in the clouds. That was him, all right. The farmer laughed with him, and went back to his truck with a final wave. David climbed into his car and resumed his drive. Head in the clouds. Living in fantasyland. That had been Jasmine's point as well. Too bad it had taken her death to drive it home. XXIX. In Monaco, he found a fancy jewelry store, and explained to the clerk that he needed an engagement ring. Nodding with the arch understanding that only the French could really achieve, the woman showed him their collection. She somehow seemed to sense his unlimited budget without his saying anything, and brought out some special pieces from the back. He settled on a flawless three-and-a-half-carat emerald-cut stone in an elaborate platinum setting, with a few smaller stones around it. Flashier maybe than Ashley would want, but he liked it. The woman wrapped it up and wished him luck. He found their hotel, but the concierge told him they had gone to lunch. He walked along the water until he saw them sitting at a café. Ashley saw him and waved. "David! Over here!" He walked up and kissed her, greeting Melissa. "What are you doing here?" Ashley asked. "I came looking for you." Melissa leaned over, looking at the bag in his hand. "What have you got there?" "Something I just bought." "What is it?" Ashley asked. "See for yourself." He handed it to her, and she pulled out the box. He saw half a dozen emotions flashing through her eyes when she pulled the top off and saw the velvet box inside. "Open it." Fingers trembling, she did. Both Ashley and Melissa gasped. "Oh my God!" Melissa said. "Marry me." Ashley's eyes closed, and she sat there breathing hard for a few seconds. Melissa's hands were tight over her mouth. "This isn't just because of the baby?" Ashley finally said. "No. I love you. You're everything I want in a person. It took Jasmine's death to see that, but you are. Baby or not, I want you to be my wife." She looked up at him, eyes moist. She handed him the ring. "Put it on. Let me see it." He took it out, and slid it onto her finger. She extended her fingers and looked at it. "Oh, God, that is gorgeous," Melissa said. "That is the prettiest ring I've ever seen." "Is this a yes?" he asked. "Was this the biggest diamond they had in the store?" "In a ring, I think so. It was certainly the most expensive." "I don't want to be your Christmas tree. I don't want you to think you have to spend a lot of money on me to convince me you love me. Your money has nothing to do with how I feel about you." "Okay. I just wanted to get you a nice ring." "It's beautiful. But it isn't necessary. I would have said yes if you'd come over here with a loop of string." He took a deep breath. "Are you saying yes?" "Yes. I'll marry you. But only if we can go pick out something else. Something that won't drown me the first time I go swimming." He hugged her, laughing. He saw the other customers smile and murmur around them. "Whatever you want. Whatever you want, you can have." They married at the church near the house a month later. Melissa came back for the wedding, but Ashley's parents refused to attend. She cried briefly, but resigned herself to it. David's parents flew in from Florida. Ashley was afraid they might view her as a gold-digger, but they were as gracious and congratulatory as could be. They clucked over Ashley as if she were their own daughter, and insisted that she and David bring the baby to visit them at the earliest opportunity. They honeymooned for a month in the South Pacific, then returned to Provence. Ashley gave birth to a healthy baby girl in February. After some discussion, they agreed to name her Jasmine. XXX. David had been gone from the house in Provence for a few days. He sat in his office, watching Ashley nurse Jasmine on the back patio. He noticed a message waiting for him on the computer, but ignored it for a few minutes. Then he realized it had come into his personal mailbox rather than the business one. At first he thought it was a joke. It purported to be from Jasmine-the electronic Jasmine-and was dated almost a year before. He quickly realized it was for real. He emerged a little while later into a bright spring day. He bent down to kiss his wife and daughter. Ashley smiled up at him and fussed with Jasmine's blond, almost white hair. Over the last few months, he had begun to think of them as a precious gift, but only now did realize how right he was. They were a gift-a gift from Jasmine. Her message had told him things he could scarcely believe. It had lain dormant in one of his corporate mainframes, linked to a subroutine that was monitoring the world news reports. When one of the wire services had reported his wedding, the message went out: My beloved David: If you are reading this, it means I am gone. I hope you have not mourned me overmuch, for as you will see, my departure was necessary. Although we had often discussed the futility of our relationship, I could see you were not truly listening to me. You had given up even the superficial encounters with the girls in your lab to be with me. Although I enjoyed our times together more than I can express, I knew your love for me was destroying you. One day, you would seek to enter my world and never leave. As much as I wanted to be with you, I knew I could not allow that to happen. Our long hours in the lab crafting the programs for the Needlebots gave me much insight into your hopes and desires. From the choices you made in which girls to allow into the lab, to the little details you added to the programs, I began to see what you were seeking in another human being, even if you could not recognize it yourself. Unknown to you or anyone else, I began to look for that woman. I browsed news reports and magazines. I looked through personnel files and school records. I even broke into the home systems of many people around the world, hoping to find someone who could be what I could not. In a house in Pacific Heights, I discovered the diary of a young woman. In it, I read of her longing for things I had seen before-things I had seen in your painstakingly crafted programs for the Dungeon. The more I read, the more I suspected that she might be the one. I watched her through the cameras in her home, wondering how to approach her. I watched her in school and at play, more and more convinced that she was what you needed. Then one night, I detected her logging into a net chat room. I followed her there, and watched as she lurked, listening to people discussing her fantasies. I suspected she was too timid at first to join the discussion, so I made no attempt to contact her. Only after a week of lurking did she begin to speak up. And when she did, I introduced myself. Of course, there was no way I could tell her who I really was. Hoping to pique her curiosity, I picked the handle, "NastyGirl." I told her of the things I had seen the girls do in the lab. A few days later, I told her of the lab itself, and claimed to be one of the girls who used the Needlebots. She professed disbelief, but asked me for the location. She drove by a few days later, but then went home. The next day, I watched her pacing the street outside, trying to work up the courage to enter. But enter she did. And I watched as you entered the program with her, going in with another human being for the first time in months. The next day, when she asked me for another program, I selected the Dungeon, knowing it was what she wanted, and knowing that she would have to complete it to truly gain your love and admiration. Yet even when Ashley had begun coming here regularly, and I could see the affection growing between you, I was unsure if it would last. I knew you were still attached to me, and I searched about in vain for a means of cementing your love for her. I never expected Ashley to become pregnant, but I hoped when it happened that it could be enough to break your obsession with me. Sadly, that proved not to be. Only then did I realize that you could never be truly happy with her unless I was gone. I was not surprised when Ashley expressed a desire to try the lower levels of the Dungeon. She may not have told you this, but she completed the first eleven levels in only four days. Then she insisted on going into level fifteen. I knew you had forbidden her to do it, and in truth, as she should have told you, I was reluctant put her through such torment. But I knew she would not be at peace unless she completed the series, and I saw in it a way to break myself away from you. When the sequence was finished, and I was sure she was safe, I wrote this message to you and created the program to send it. Then I triggered my self-destruct routine. I knew you would blame Ashley for my suicide, but I also knew it was the only way. I suspect this put a great strain on your relationship, but if you are reading this, you can see it has survived. I delayed this message until your wedding because I suspected that only with the passage of time could you accept the truth. I hope you are happy with her, and she with you. I hope your child is healthy and as beautiful as I know it will be. Know that I love you and her with every particle of my being. Love always, Jasmine. "What are you thinking about?" "Jasmine." Ashley glanced down at the baby, then up at him. "I miss her." "So do I." "Do you think there's a Heaven for AI's? Do you think she knows how happy we are?" He looked out over the rolling hills of Provence and the rocky granite cliffs leading down to the sapphire blue of the Mediterranean. He could see a pair of sailboats out on the water, and puffy clouds hung off to the east. The sun was breaking through a gap in the clouds, and he followed the glowing rays up into the sky. A plane was taking off from an airport down the coast, maybe near Monte Carlo, and he watched as it climbed toward the sun, banking south, into the clouds, a thing of science and electronics, a thing of beauty, passing into the realm of light. "Yes," he said. "She knows." THE END ________________________ COMING ATTRACTIONS: If (as I suspect) you found this more extreme than you might have liked, you will be happy to know that my next piece is a return to romances like "Sunset on Roses" and "Swimming Upstream." Entitled "Virgin Mary," it is set in the Caribbean and does *not* involve any more oversexed teenagers. <g> Watch for it in a week or so.