Cosplayers Of Gor - Part 2 free porn video

Late last year as everyone knows something out of the ordinary happened at Kubla Con, the big annual SF and media convention taking place in Xanadu, a large conference centre in Orlando, Florida. A costuming event run in conjunction with Kubla Con had attracted thousands of people to take part in the show with a rich eccentric sponsor offering big money prizes for the best costumes and presentations. During the event strange changes, weird powers and arcane capabilities were bestowed on many of the attendees. Magic was loosed and many were never the same again. Some fortunate people escaped the chaos unscathed though. Or did they? Note: Xanadu is a shared-universe storyline concept originally created by Bryan Derksen for the Transformation Stories Archive. Bryan says we can play in his yard as much as we like. https://shifti.org/wiki/Xanadu_%28setting%29 -------------------------------------------------------- Cosplayers of Gor - chapter 2. by Albedo. ([email protected]) Three weeks and five changes later Bob's phone chimed one afternoon. He was unable to take the call just then... "MMMuwahh?" "Yeah, nearly finished. Lemme just..." Bob heard more clicks from Charlie's camera then he felt his fingers work at the buckles under his chin holding the slave half-hood in place on his head. The thick padded leather covering his eyes lifted clear and he blinked at the sudden brightness of the photo lights Charlie had set up in his bedroom. Bob wriggled to present his back-braceleted hands to the fixed key mounted on the end of the bed platform, squinting to align the key with the bracelet keyhole. Push and twist and... The bracelet popped open on the first try. Practice makes perfect he thought with satisfaction. "'M finished here, you get the rest?" said Charlie, heading for the door with camera in hand as Bob unlocked the other bracelet and dropped it to the furs. "Mmmm," mumbled Bob, his freed hands already working at the buckle of the gag strap running over his long blonde hair. The half-hood left his nose and mouth free for things like a gag or... Let's not go there... The plug plopped out of his mouth with a sucking sound - it was bigger than he liked and the shape was disturbingly anthropomorphic but he had gotten used to it, somewhat. Bob discarded the rest of his restraints in turn and finally got up, standing on tiptoes and stretching his arms high above his head in relief. He was still wearing the dancing-girl halter and red silk skirts, belled anklets and belled earrings, and a collar of course. There was a rapid-fire burst of clicks from the doorway and he turned, startled, to see Charlie pointing his camera at him, finger on the shutter button. Click click click. "What the--" Charlie put the camera down. "Show you later, but that pose jus' now, classic." Bob scowled. "So are you finished now, you know, completely like you said before?" Click click click. "Ooooh, angry face. Love it love it loooove it." Charlie put the camera down again just as Bob stepped forward, fists balled. "Done now." "I'll get changed then," he said redundantly to Charlie's retreating figure as he started removing the various parts of his slave outfit. It had become part of his routine for some reason that taking off the belled earrings at the end should be the instigation of his change back to normality after he had finished these photo shoots. Male again - but for how long? - and dressed in jeans and a hoodie top, he struggled for a moment to remember what had interrupted them... What was it, uh phone phone phone... The voice message was from the Xanadu Institute, asking him to call back. He punched the reply button excitedly. "Monsieur James?" It was the voice of Belle, Doctor Farnsworth's French maid assistant. "Oui, uh yes?" Bad Bob, he admonished himself. "Docteur Farnsworth would like to see you again at zee Institute, on Friday evening eef you would." Bob was full of questions but Belle was not very forthcoming. She only said he should come prepared to spend a night at the Institute as they wanted to have him sleep over there to give them a chance to observe a change if it should happen. They would explain further when he arrived. Bob went to Charlie's study, a small windowless room converted from a walk-in closet of some kind. Charlie had the camera docked on his computer and was downloading the pictures from this session, shuffling the images into various folders. He glanced back over his shoulder then his thick fingers flew over the keyboard and a series of images appeared on the biggest monitor on his desk, of a slim girl in a dancing halter and red silk skirts standing on tiptoes and stretching her arms high above her head, her long blonde hair falling behind her back down to her butt, a steel collar around her long slim neck glinting in the photofloods. Bob blinked, enraptured at the images, suddenly understanding why Charlie's shutter finger had gotten an extra workout. "Maybe we should do a glamour shoot sometime..." Charlie muttered as he tapped away at the computer. "Nope," said Bob firmly. "We just need some shots to sell this crap, I don't want pictures of 'BeeBee' in the jerkoff folder on the computers of a million dweebs. That's why I was wearing that damn hood after all." "Still gonna end up in a million jerkoff folders anyway," muttered Charlie. "Look." He scrolled through a series of half-edited pictures showing the lithe blonde girl curled on a bed of dark furs, her face half-hooded, drool slithering from her gagged lips, the gleam of a steel collar at the nape of her neck, a chain from under her chin running to a ring on the end of the bed platform, her braceleted fists clenched in helpless frustration at her bondage, her... Bob looked away. Shit, he was getting excited at the sight of the girl in the pictures and he WAS the girl... "Uh, is there any way you can tone them down at bit?" Charlie looked at Bob, one eyebrow raised questioningly. "Well, it's kinda, you know..." he shrugged. "I can't explain it but it scares me a bit seeing me like that, knowing others might see me like that, like... you know, meat." "Yabbut you look like this when you change, or worse. S'why you're wearin' that hood thing, so you, so BeeBee can't be recognised." "It's just, if you can find some pics that will sell the collars 'n stuff OK but not, you know, sell me as well?" Charlie shrugged. "I'll try." Bob left it to him. Charlie'd do his best but Bob accepted he was going to be the reason for a lot of shut-ins to have an orgasm or three over the coming months. It was not a pleasant prospect. They had decided to start selling the stuff left over from the changes directly on the Internet. Apparently there were a couple of Etsy-like places that dealt in items for what Charlie called 'the scene'. It turned out Charlie already had a net presence and a storefront, under a pseudonym of course. Bob had stared half-transfixed half-horrified at the pictures of the cages, the bondage frames, the... stark metal items, he didn't know what they were for and he was afraid to ask... that Charlie fabricated in his spare time in his workshop. The prices seemed high to Bob but Charlie explained they weren't that profitable considering the amount of work and cost of materials involved. "Th'day job earns better. This is sorta a hobby, like needlepoint." Needlepoint, yeah right... Charlie had spent quite a bit of time persuading Bob he needed photographs of what they were selling and someone to model them for that purpose, hence the just-terminated photo session this afternoon. He'd not have to do it again, at least not for a while and unless they ended up with some weird items they hadn't yet obtained from the changes. Bob racked his brains trying to remember everything slave girls in the Gor books wore, there were some odd things he was sure but they didn't come to mind immediately. Collars and bracelets, he already had a couple of those "sirik" chain sets with linked wrist and ankle cuffs attached to a long neck-to-floor chain depending from a separate coolar, there was that rivetted collar from the slave sack incident, what else...? It had turned out the bedroom furs were marketable too although they had to be careful as the local wildlife protection agencies might take an interest, not to mention the folks who monitored endangered species - he knew there were all sorts of animal materials that were out and out illegal to trade in, like ivory and rhino horns and such. He didn't know specifically what kind of furs they actually were but he suspected that a DNA test would return some puzzling results. The animals in the Gor books were definitely not of terrestrial origin, hell some of them had six legs! They had tried removing the furs before he slept and a new set appeared any time he woke up changed so they were another revenue stream if they cared to exploit it. Replacing the bed platform with another futon frame from Goodwill or even just sleeping on a mattress on the floor resulted in the same sort of platform that had appeared in the first change. Charlie reckoned he might be able to sell the surplus bed platforms too but it was more of a stretch to find a market for such large monolithic pieces of furniture. He muttered something about 'modern primitive' and 'brutalist' and put out feelers among some folks he knew in the fetish world who might be into such things. There were three disassembled bed platforms stored in his workshop while he set up another shopfront for them on the Internet. Like the furs there was a worry in case anyone wondered what kind of wood they were made from - they reckoned it would take an expert to notice anything odd about the timber in question and they just had to hope no-one would be that observant or inquisitive. Worst came to worst he could always just sell them as artisanal firewood... * * * * * * * * The Xanadu Institute followed up their phone call with an email with more details and what Bob should bring with him for the overnight stay. It was planned that Charlie would stay back at the apartment overnight to cover any problems if his anticipated change left him totally helpless again for some reason like during the slave sack incident. Charlie dropped Bob off at the Institute in the early evening on Friday. It seemed different somehow, bigger perhaps? The building housing the Xanadu Institute had been an anonymous-looking office complex in a business park on the outskirts of a town about twenty miles from where he and Charlie lived. It now had a fenced-off compound to one side with security guards at a barrier gate and... he counted up. He was sure the office building had been three storeys tall on his previous visit, where had the two new floors come from? And were those gun turrets at the roof corners? A group of people left the entrance as he approached, talking animatedly and waving their arms. Mad Scientists, he assumed given their white lab coats, gauntlets and brass-rimmed goggles. The hair on the head of one of them looked kinda fried - he heard her say "mumble mumble too much liquid oxygen in the pizza mumble mumble..." as they passed him headed towards their parked cars - DeLoreans? Couldn't be, could they... He hefted his overnight bag and entered the lobby regardless. Belle the French maid was standing at the reception desk waiting for him. "Thees way, Monsieur James." He followed her up the stairs, a bad idea it turned out as his jeans got rather tight in the front given the exposure on view oscillating left-and-right just above his eye level. Things quietened down somewhat once they were on the second floor. They met up with Doctor Farnsworth - Doctor? Is that his first name too? Bob wondered - outside a double-door after a long walk down a corridor, too long really if his estimate of how big the building had been from the outside was accurate. Xanadu, he assumed and decided to concentrate on his own peculiar situation instead of spending time trying to figure it out. "Mister James. Good. This way please." Farnsworth was wearing chinos and a polo shirt, it must be Dress-Down Friday. The outfit was still expensive-looking and although no fashion victim himself Bob knew that casual clothes that looked expensive were very expensive indeed. He glanced at Belle, she was wearing the same outfit as before, from her needle-heeled gleaming black stilettos to the white mob cap on her braided-up hair. No Dress-Down Friday for her it seemed. Maybe Xanadu enforces what her outfit looks like, he mused. He had read about some Xanadu changees whose clothing would change to suit their imposed character, ballerinas whose attempts to wear jeans and T-shirts would be subverted as the mundane clothing would turn into tutus and tights. He had his own clothing difficulties due to Xanadu, of course... Inside the room was a hospital-type bed bedecked with weird-looking apparatus, cameras, antennas and other unidentifiable gear. A Mad Scientist type in a white lab coat sat in one corner surrounded by screens and keyboards, oblivious to their entry. Another figure stood up as they entered. Bob raised an eyebrow - the... person? in question was quite small, almost childlike, dressed in a long cloak-like outfit with an all-concealing hood, like a Jawa from Star Wars. The brown material of the cloak and hood was shot through with patterned threads glowing a faint blue colour. Some kind of Xanadu magician? "This is Dream Diver," explained Doctor Farnsworth. "They were altered during the initial Xanadu incident and they have agreed to work with us in your case." The figure nodded silently and Bob nodded back, reluctant to offer a handshake for some reason. "They are mute," added Farnsworth, "and they're a hive entity, multiple personalities in a single body." Bob shrugged. Weird but hey, he was a living example of weird himself some days. As Bob dropped his bag on the bed Farnsworth explained their plans for the night's experiment - the Mad Scientist in the corner pricked up his ears at the word then returned to his observations - and what they expected to happen. Dream Diver was apparently a character from a series of fantasy books, a mental wizard who could enter another's dreams while they slept. Bob had never heard of these books but it appeared a fan of the series had been at Xanadu cosplaying the character and had acquired at least some of their fictional capabilities just as Bob himself ended up as a character from the Gor books occasionally. "Dream Diver will try and observe your dreams and guide them if they can. Their powers are somewhat fickle so there is no guarantee of the results but if you are willing to permit them to do so we can perhaps make some progress in your case." As the small figure sat down again on a chair positioned at the side of the bed Farnsworth continued. "They can at least give us a better record of the dreams themselves. Dream Diver can sometimes produce a visualisation of someone's dream and we may be able to capture it on camera for further study." Bob noted all the qualifications and maybes in Farnsworth's explanation but it was better than his own faint recollections of the odd dreams that seemed to trigger his changes. The explanations of the apparatus around the bed went waaay over his head but there were high-speed cameras, radiation detectors, heat sensors, Doppler radar units and a whole host of other bits and pieces that he was sure Charlie would have loved to get his hands on. Bob used the bathroom to change into pyjama sweats before he came back out and snapped a collar around his neck, initiating the change while the Mad Scientist ran observations. He changed back and forth a few times to provide enough data to to at least partially satisfy the white-coated figure's curiosity and then it was time to sleep. Farnsworth had suggested he slept in girl form tonight in case that made a dream change more likely so he left the collar on before climbing into bed. The Mad Scientist in the corner put all of his recording equipment on automatic and left the room before the lights were switched off, leaving Bob and the silent figure of Dream Diver in the subdued darkness. It was hard to get to sleep, not surprisingly given the circumstances never mind being in girl form but eventually he dropped off. Then he dreamt, and startled by the dream he awoke, on the furs, chained to the end of the sleeping platform in his own bedroom back in the apartment twenty miles away. The lights came on, triggered by the alarm system as he rolled over. Hmmm, bracelets, ankle chains, belled anklets, what else... He started the all-too-familiar process of freeing himself from the ring on the bed platform as Charlie knocked on the door. "You decent?" "Yeah." He was wearing a damned veil and silks again and another halter with what looked like small gold discs hanging off it Oh good more gold and heavy earrings Probably gold too, even better and... Charlie lumbered in just as he finished unlocking himself from the bed ring and stood up. The flash from Charlie's camera caught him unawares. "Whatcha--" "That doc character told me to take pictures of what you ended up lookin' like if'n you changed tonight. They wanna compare it with somethin' else they said. Turn round will ya?" Bob turned as best he could in the uneven furs with his ankles still chained and the camera flashed again and again. "Hold out your arms?" Bob complied - the bracelets he still wore on his wrists had more than a foot of chain between them. Flash flash He had a vague dream memory of dancing wildly in a sand circle, silk skirts flying, eyes fixed on a barbarously- dressed bearded figure seated at a rough table... Flash flash "That'll do, probably." The memory faded as reality intruded again. Pee pressure... Bob grabbed a set of keys and scurried for the toilet as his bladder called out for attention as it always seemed to on these occasions, his ankle bells jingling as he took short quick steps, hobbled somewhat by the chain between his ankle rings. By the time he had sat down, wrestled his skirts out of the way, peed, finished up, wiped down, flushed, washed his hands, took off his veil, found the keys he had dropped, removed his collar, bracelets and ankle rings, unlaced his belled anklets, unhooked his halter and stripped off the rest of his silks, removed some ornamental combs silver? maybe from his hair, unclipped his earrings and changed back into a guy and dressed again Charlie had downloaded the pictures from his camera and and emailed them to the Institute marked for the attention of Doctor Farnsworth. "Molly's place for breakfast?" growled Charlie. Bob looked at the clock, it was just after six. This change had come later in the night than usual, possibly because he had been stressed by being the odd "bedroom" at the Institute and unable to sleep easily but it had happened late before for no apparent reason they could determine. "Yeah, breakfast. I love watchin' Molly askin' you about cousin BeeBee and when's she gonna come visit again." Charlie scowled and picked up the open collar lying on the bed platform. "Howsabout she visits today, 'cousin'?" Bob made a break for the door, pursued by the bear. * * * * * * * * Charlie accompanied Bob to their followup meeting with Farnsworth at the Institute that afternoon. Charlie's first encounter with Belle was disappointing for Bob, Charlie being imperturbable as usual. He had hoped the statuesque figure would elicit some kind of reaction from his flatmate but nope. It was still kinda amusing watching Belle having to look up into someone's face for a change. It would be worse if Charlie was wearing heels too, Belle he thought to himself. "What you sniggerin' at?" "N- Nothin, Charlie." They congregated in a small meeting room where Doctor Farnsworth summarised the scientific reports of Bob's change event the previous night. High-speed cameras capable of capturing ten thousand images a second had nothing useful to report - in one frame Bob was lying on the bed, in the next he was gone, the thin top sheet still moulded to his slight feminine body shape before it started to collapse in the succeeding frames. The other cameras showed the same thing. The Doppler radar showed no movement anywhere, the radiation detectors reported no change in background count, infra-red sensors nothing, UV spectrum, radio spectrum, audio nothing nothing nothing. Bob was there and then Bob was gone. Pop, except there wasn't even a noise of displaced air. "Now we move on to the dream," said Farnsworth. "Here we have something of import." He clicked the remote and the screen on the wall lit up. It showed... Bob felt a sense of deja vu as he watched the girl dance sensuously in the circle of sand, lit only by flickering torchlight while men sat around at rough tables, drinking and gesturing. There was no sound but he could somehow hear in his mind the raucous shouts, the clattering of tankards on tables, a drum and some kind of flute providing a musical accompaniment for the girl's dance. She wore a translucent red veil across her face, a collar locked on her slim neck, her long blonde hair pulled back from her face by silver combs at her temples. The steel bracelets secured around her wrists were linked by a long gleaming chain, her belled ankles similarly restricted, enough to provide visual evidence that she was a slave but not enough to prevent her dancing seductively. Her red silk skirts flared as she gyrated, her bare feet stamping in the sand in a counterpoint to the flute and drum, ankle bells jingling rhythmically. The music reached a crescendo and she fell to her knees, head down, chained hands lifted in supplication to someone before her and then... the video ended abruptly. Something was wrong... "This was what our colleague Dream Diver was able to image from Mr. James' dream last night. Some things to note..." "Hold on," said Bob, standing up. "That wasn't, ah..." He rubbed his head in puzzlement, straining to remember then he sat down abruptly as if he had been poleaxed, his mouth gaping open in shock as memory flooded back. Farnsworth and Charlie looked at him while he raised a hand. "Wait..." He took a deep breath. "That wasn't my dream." He shook his head. "I remember some of it now, it's still fuzzy but that's not what I dreamt last night." Farnsworth interrupted. "Dream Diver was quite clear, this is the dream they experienced in your mind while you were asleep, just before you disappeared from the Institute and reappeared in your own bedroom. I understand they can't invent dreams they image, they can only record..." Bob held up his hand. "Yeah, but it wasn't MY dream." He took a long shuddering breath. "It wasn't my dream, it was Alice's dream." "Alice's dream?" Farnsworth raised an eyebrow. Bob stared into the distance, concentrating his thoughts as the memory of his dream became clearer. "Yeah. In my dream, I was the dancing girl, I was looking out into the crowd and..." He caught his breath at the memory of the short-statured male figure sitting at a table next to the dancing circle, "Alice! She was there, watching me. That's the dream in the recording, her watching me dance not my dream." He rubbed his face. "No, it was Alice but it was her role-playing character, the one she was dressed as at Xanadu, Arrass." He concentrated on the memory. "Holy shi- she was bare- chested, no tits, she's a real guy in my dream like I was a girl." The bearded figure of Arrass turned and laughed as one of his companions clapped him on the shoulder in congratulation for having such a talented slave dancing in the circle before him before he fixed his gaze back on the slim gyrating figure in silks and chains, his property, branded and collared and dancing in the torchlight at his command. She would dance in the furs tonight for him too, dressed and chained just as she was... Bob wrenched his thoughts away from the memory of the dream they had somehow shared. Not going there... * * * * * * * * "Eat?" Charlie inquired as he drove the pickup towards their apartment after the meeting. "Wha...?" Bob was staring out the window at the evening darkness. "Food," Charlie said. "Co. Me. Sti. Bills. Suss. Ten. Ance. New. Tri.--" "Yeah, yeah." Bob shrugged. "Sorry, I'm still chewing on what we got out of Farnsworth's happy band of weirdos tonight." "At least y'know Alice's still around. That's somethin'." "But I don't." Charlie glanced over at Bob, slumped despondently in the passenger seat. He waved his hands. "Oh sure, Alice is still around but she's not Alice, she's her roleplay character Arrass, my 'master' from... anyways, 'Arrass' is having dreams of me as Bibi and it's likely that's what causes me to change. We're sharing dreams somehow and when we do I end up waking up on the furs as Bibi." He held out his hands, a foot wide as if he was still wearing the dancing bracelets from that morning's change. "I was wearin' exactly the same costume she - 'Arrass' was dreamin' about when I woke up today." "Y're guessing there." "Best guess we've got." Bob sat up. "Farnsworth's intrigued though and he's gonna see what his sources can find out. There were a shitload and three-quarters of barbarian swordsmen at Xanadu after all, he's gotta have leads on some of the ones that stayed changed afterwards. Some of them were probably Gor types too, it's not likely me'n'Alice were the only ones doin' costumes like that." "I'll put the word out too," said Charlie thoughtfully. "I'm pretty sure summa the folks in the scene 'round here are into that sorta roleplay. I'll hit up the folks I've been sellin' the collars and stuff to first, it's their kinda thing after all. Maybe they know somethin' or somebody." Bob blinked, excited for the first time after the revelation earlier. They had a plan, they had a way forward, they had... he didn't know how it would end but he felt certain somehow his changes WOULD end. "Hey, I'm hungry," Bob announced. Charlie growled and indicated right, pointing the pickup towards a Denny's they sometimes frequented when the midnight munchies struck. Behind them a plain black SUV with Georgia state plates indicated right and followed their turn, tailing them discreetly as it had done so ever since they had left the Institute's car park earlier that evening. * * * * * * * * The breakthrough came three days and no changes later and from an unexpected quarter. He was in Farnsworth's office two hours after the morning phone call. "Alice, uh, I mean Arrass contacted YOU?" Bob sat back in his chair, stunned at the revelation. Farnsworth made a deprecating gesture. "She contacted the Institute, she did not and probably does not know of me personally. However--" Farnsworth fixed his gaze on Bob in what he probably took to be a consoling manner. "It appears clear from their communications that the Arrass personality and body is all that exists now, Alice is... well, no more." She's dead, Bob thought. Not dead really, changed beyond recognition but dead by any standard he cared to consider. He pictured her in his mind when they had been together and found it odd that he didn't feel as sad as he thought he should have. Grief, it wasn't there somehow. She had been his girlfriend, yeah but they hadn't been as emotionally attached as other couples they had known or hung around with. The gaming stuff was their main connection, the occasional sex just that, heck the pizza afterwards was a half-and-half because he didn't like anchovies enough to share it properly with her. He took a deep breath. Gotta move on, he thought with a pang. There was a pang which was something, he supposed. Another deep breath, Bye Alice, then he nodded. "So what's next?" "They want to meet to discuss the return of, ah--" Farnsworth peered at a printout on his desk, "some property they have misplaced." "Property?" Bob was puzzled, was it the cheapass joke-shop crap he was wearing at Xanadu when-- Farnsworth fixed him with that gaze again. "They mean you." "Me?" He was totally lost now. "The female version of you." Another scan of the printout. "A 'kajira', a female slave currently bearing the name of Bibi, the legitimate property of the Warrior Arrass, to be precise." Farnsworth picked up some other printouts. "They attached the slave ownership documents as a PDF with their email." Bob nearly laughed out loud at the incongruousness of the idea of Gorean slave papers being sent by email as a PDF but he sobered quickly. If Alice, no Arrass was taking this sort of shit seriously then he might be in trouble. Alice knew where he lived, hell she even had the combination for the apartment's alarm system, she had a spare key, would Arrass have it too or know where the key was kept? Arrass could just waltz in one night when he was changed and Charlie was out, when he was chained to the bed, helpless and help himself to... Shit shit shit... Something Farnsworth had said caught his attention. "You keep saying 'they'?" Bob inquired. "Not 'he' or 'she'?" Farnsworth picked up another piece of paper. Bob figured he was the sort of last-generation manager types that liked paper rather than using computers directly. Farnsworth probably got Belle to print out the emails for him. He imagined the figure of Belle in her French maid uniform sitting primly in an office chair tapping away at a keyboard... Farnsworth scanned the sheet and continued. "We had in fact made some progress in our investigations before the email from, ah, Arrass arrived and rendered much of what we had learned moot. Apparently a number of characters from Xanadu of the sort Alice became formed an enclave, or rather amalgamated with an existing group of, ah, 'role players' who owned some property in Georgia near the state border with Florida." Bob had a vague idea of the sort of thing Farnsworth was talking about. The LARPers Alice hung out with sometimes went off for a long weekend to places where some more dedicated role-playing groups owned a permanent site to host events in. Wilderness land was cheap even near urban areas if the purchasers were willing to put up with no running water or internet, no grid power, access via dirt tracks and portapotties or worse. Quite a few LARPers and gamers had good jobs, nerds in tech roles earning serious money and some of them were willing and able to drop six figures on a playground like that. "We were planning to investigate such groups as part of the Xanadu Institute's general remit but as I said, this group contacted us first. We have a small 'mib' team on its way to the location--" "Mib?" "Ah, 'Men In Black'. The Institute employs several Xanadu changees who dress in black suits and wear sunglasses. They--" "Yeah, I saw the movie long time back. They carry out investigations of supernatural and alien shit for you now?" "Yes, we find the mib investigation teams are quite effective and discreet. We have accumulated some information on this role-playing group already though from local tax records, police reports, satellite imagery and a few other sources. They even have a Web site." Farnsworth pushed some papers over to Bob who started reading. The original role-playing group who ran the site seemed to have been swamped by Xanadu changees and taken over by them, looking at the before and after details of the website. The Website's name change was indicative, it was now called the Camp of Schendi - Schendi was somewhere on Gor with jungles and swamps if he remembered correctly so it was likely the original LARP location was not exactly primo farmland. It seemed to be an all-Gorean group now rather than a mix of barbarian type role-players and re-enactors, Conans and Red Sonjas and Aragorns and the like as it had probably been before Xanadu. There was no membership list or other details available so numbers were difficult to assess but it seemed they had the financial backing of someone to keep something like this running. Heck, maybe some of the original LARPers had been at Xanadu and had been changed too. A costume convention like that would have been catnip to the sort of serious LARPers that would set up a permanent playground. Bob quickly scanned the email and the rest of the papers. From what he could gather reading between the lines it seemed Arrass didn't know exactly what was going on with him, he thought Bibi existed in a permanent state like his own changed existence. Arrass wanted to meet with Bob to talk about Bibi, he didn't realise they were the same person. He seemed to believe Bibi was being held by Bob as a slave. Phrases like 'I think of her often, I dream of her often' confirmed in his own mind that Bob's changes into Bibi were driven by Arrass' thoughts and dreams when they coincided with Bob's sleeping patterns. That meant the changes wouldn't stop while Arrass was fixated on the imaginary Bibi being his property. A germ of an idea began to grow in his mind... "Have you replied to this?" Bob held up the email. "No, not yet," Farnsworth replied. "I was waiting to discuss the situation with you before making a decision. I would also like to get a preliminary report from our mib team before progressing." "Ok." He put the paper down. "Right now Arrass doesn't know the real situation, that I'm Bibi only occasionally. Yes?" Farnsworth nodded. "He wants to discuss her with me which is gonna be kinda difficult. He wants her back, she's his property as he sees it. He owns her, I'm depriving him of his rightful ownership of her. The Slavery Amendment doesn't apply, not on Gor where he thinks he is at least mentally, what with that 'Camp of Schendi' shit and the like." Bob scratched his head. "Yet he can still use email and write in English and... well, figure that out later." Bob was starting to get worried. Arrass probably, no certainly knew where he lived. An all-out attempt to recapture 'Bibi' by him and his friends was not out of the question, an attack on the apartment or perhaps while he was out and about to persuade him to relinquish the slave he had stolen, hell it was almost guaranteed given what the books suggested about Gorean Warrior types. Killing him would be in their eyes a sure-fire way to get Bibi back. He shuddered. "Can we get them arrested somehow?" Bob asked. Farnsworth thought for a moment but shook his head. "It's unlikely law enforcement could deal with them in a suitable manner, the threat they pose to you is not something the police would comprehend. They would be likely to pass the case over to us or one of our sister organisations to handle since it is clearly a Xanadu matter as they have with many other situations, and we're not in a position to arrest or detain people unnecessarily." Bob noted the qualification at the end of his sentence. 'Unnecessarily'. There were stories on the Web that the authorities had secret prisons for dangerous Xanadu changees, the dragons and supervillains and monsters like the rumoured Medusas and such. The Institute was probably involved in that kind of stuff if it existed but he could kinda see Farnsworth's point. What Bob was going through wasn't a real threat to anyone but himself, and Arrass and any other Goreans were human, they were American citizens technically speaking with all the legal rights that meant. Heck they probably even had lawyers on call... Farnsworth tapped the paper on his desk. "I recommend arranging a meeting with Arrass as he has requested. He wants to meet with you face to face, that indicates a willingness to not employ force at least in the first instance. Once we have a better understanding of his intentions and capabilities we might be able to help further. I can offer the use of the Xanadu Institute to host such a meeting, neutral ground of a sort." His eyes flicked over to the tall figure of Belle who had been standing motionless in one corner of the room, her hands clasped patiently in front of her. "We can provide security and a civilised basis for discussions between the parties involved." "Yeah, OK." Bob didn't see any other options. "I gotta talk to Charlie about this anyways, in case they do decide to come after me at the apartment." Charlie needed to know about the Alice being Arrass thing soonest, to reset the alarm and change the locks. "And you want to get a report about their compound from your Men In Black first?" Farnsworth nodded. "Very well, Mister James. We'll be in touch." Belle went to the door and opened it as Bob stood up to leave. "Oh, one last thought," Farnsworth said absently as he tided up the papers into an open file folder. Bob turned. "I recommend you don't go outside your apartment if you have changed into a female. I expect your place of residence may already be under observation by Arrass and his companions. The temptation to simply abduct what they see as their 'property' off the street might be too much for any watchers if she should make herself available to them." A cold shiver ran down Bob's spine. He hadn't been planning to go out in girl mode, but Charlie was still after 'BeeBee' to go talk to Molly again... Farnsworth closed the folder and looked up. "Goodbye, Mister James. Safe trip home." * * * * * * * * "So that's the situation," Bob finished, talking to Charlie's back as he knelt at the open cupboard, busily reprogramming the apartment's alarm system. Charlie grunted, there was a beeping noise from the panel inside the cupboard which stopped as he punched a button then he stood up and nudged the cupboard door shut with his foot. "We might be bein' watched 'n followed?" Charlie lifted a toolbox and headed towards the front door to change the lock. "Might." Bob shrugged. "No way of knowing, really." Charlie gave him a sharp look, hefting his toolbox. "There're ways of findin' out though. I c'n get some more bits'npieces, cameras t'monitor the street f'rinstance and there's software that c'n use them t'look for suspicious people hangin' about, read numberplates, that sorta thing." "You know, I sometimes wonder about you, Charlie. Do you moonlight for the CIA sometimes?" "Nah." Charlie started working on one of the front door locks. "I jus' like toys." The lock came apart in seconds. "And I'm a certified locksmith, yeah but these days just knowin' 'bout doorlocks don't pay the rent." He flipped out a business card. "See that list a shit? Premises security, access control, CCTV, card readers, logging systems, perimeter motion sensors, face recognition, the whole magoola." He finished up on the main lock then bent down to the second lock lower down on the door. "Really weird shit like wall-penetratin' terahertz radar I subcontract t'some folks I know." The second lock fell apart as easily as the first one. "Banks and places like that I get called in as a subcontractor myself because I don't have the paper they need t'front up a project. If'n I'd gone into the military when I was younger I'd have alla security covers Ah need for funky stuff but Ah didn't." "So you don't work for the CIA then. FBI maybe?" Charlie stayed silent, his fingers busy swapping out the lock's internals. Okaaaay, though Bob. Charlie finished the job and stood up. "I'll do the window locks later but Alice never had keys for 'em. If'n they try to come in that way the alarms 're set go off whatever. Glass isn't toughened or wired though." He rummaged in his toolbox for a big ring of keys, squinted at them then plucked a couple off the ring and handed them to Bob. "Those're are replacement keys for the front door t'match the new cylinders I just fitted. Gimme the old keys back, I'll recycle them on another job." "Do you think Arrass'll actually try something?" Bob asked. Charlie shook his head as he stowed his toolbox on the hallway shelf beside the others. "I don't think he'll try to break in, not soon anyway. That stick-up-his-ass Farnsworth guy's right though, he'll try talking first. If that don't work for him... yeah, probably. If'n it was me I'd try to take you off the street though, get Bibi back that way. Killin'--". "Hey!" Charlie looked at Bob with a serious stare. "It's a solution." He shook his head. "I've read summa those books since this started happenin' t'you. The guy who wrote 'em's fucked-up in the head 'bout a lotta things an' anybody who's followin' that kinda bullshit 'philosophy' as a way to live is serious trouble." He smiled. "One thing though, they're easy to predict. They're an open book," Bob groaned. Charlie rummaged in the refrigerator and tossed Bob a beer while popping another one open for himself. "So when it all goes pear-shaped and you can't agree to hand Bibi over to them at the meeting, then what?" Bob squinted over the rim of his can. "I've got a vague idea 'bout that. Based on the books..." He put the can down. One beer would be enough, he had to stay frosty for the next few days. "How much gold do we have?" Charlie squinted suspiciously over his sudsed-up moustache. "You gonna take out a hit on him first? It'll cost ya even if you hire in some Miami non-union low-lifes to do it for ya. Disney's got the local contractors sewn up tight, they don't work for nobody but the Mouse." Bob wasn't sure if Charlie was kidding or not. He had all sorts of strange connections... "Nah, it's not like that. You've been melting some of it down, yeah?" Charlie nodded. He had a blacksmithing setup in one corner of his workshop, to make security grilles and gates and the like. "Good." He waved his hand. "I've not got everything laid out straight but I figure I might just be able to buy Bibi offa Arrass for cash. We can make some kinda gold coins that'll work for payment." "But Bibi doesn't exist... ummm." Charlie scratched at his beard. "Yeah, I kinda get it. You 'buy' the slave off him, she's no longer his property, he doesn't dream about her, you stay like you alla time. He doesn't try to grab her back or do nasty things to you because he's an honourable Gorean Warrior type who's been paid a fair price yadda yadda. Ummm." Bob didn't interrupt, he desperately needed a second opinion on this plan, to know where the flaws and pitfalls lay and find a way to fix them. They'd only get one shot at this after all. "Lemme think on it. I got an early start tomorrow doin' suite doors for an exhibition 'cross the city, need my beauty sleep." Charlie finished his beer and tossed the empty can expertly into the recycling bin in the corner of the kitchenette. "I need to read up more on summa this shit, where's the resta those Gor books you got?" Bob pointed at the bookshelf in the hallway. "On the left, the paperbacks." "They look kinda beat up, like they been read a lot." Charlie paused on the way out the kitchenette door to pull one off the shelf. He squinted at the cover. "One-handed too. G'night." Bob resisted the temptation to throw his nearly empty beer can at Charlie's wide back. When the pressure pad alarm went off early next morning Charlie lumbered in to Bob's bedroom already dressed for the work day, toolbox in hand. He looked down at the slight female figure lying on the furs, her ankles held wide by a spreader bar, her hands secured by bracelets to the ring on the end of the bed, collared and gagged, her face red and otherwise as naked as the day she was born - which was about five minutes ago, thought Bob squirming in embarrassment. "I got a plan," said Charlie with a truly evil grin on his face. Bob made desperate noises behind his gag. Toilet, toilet. "But you're not gonna like it." He knelt, keys in hand and freed Bob from the bed ring and the spreader bar while he explained what the plan entailed. The gag still filling his mouth enforced Bob's silence until after he had made it to the toilet and emptied his bladder. He unbuckled the gag and pulled it out, trailing saliva down over his breasts as he stormed out of the toilet, still naked but for his collar and not even taking the time to wipe properly. "WHAAAAT?" he yelled, but Charlie was already gone. * * * * * * * * "This is a stupid fucking crazy plan, did I tell you Charlie?" Bob said over his shoulder as he jerked the big suitcase out of the elevator with unnecessary force, nearly tearing a wheel off as it caught on the corner of the elevator door. "Yah, Bob, you've told me. Loud, long and often." Charlie slung a heavy suit-bag over his shoulder. "It'll work though. You just gotta stand there and look pretty while I do the talkin'." Bob stopped as if to reply, then dropped his shoulder and headed towards the prep suite Farnsworth had assigned them for tonight's meeting. There were a couple of guards either side of the door, Men In Black types wearing trademark sunglasses and black button-down suits. The one on the left was a Woman in Black, well she might have been a woman, she was wearing a pencil skirt and heels but she must have been seven foot tall and muscled to suit. Their heads snapped round to track Bob and Charlie as they approached then the door between them opened and the exotic figure of Belle, Farnsworth's French maid assistant gestured for them to enter. It was a stupid fucking crazy plan but Charlie was right. He hadn't thought of anything better himself, well anything practical and better - a tacnuke strike on the Camp of Schendi compound in southern Georgia where Arrass, the Gorean Warrior currently resided would have solved all his problems but... besides, Arrass was Alice, his ex-girlfriend and apart from the fact she would quite happily kidnap, torture and probably kill him to gain her ends he still had a soft spot for her. And not in a swamp in Georgia either. Damn, his feelings for Alice still hadn't totally gone away... Inside the suite was a dressing-room area complete with a well-lit makeup mirror. Bob heaved the heavy suitcase onto a table while Charlie hung his suit-bag up on a convenient hook. Belle pointed to a screen on the wall showing a small meeting room, the display split into four views presumably from cameras in each corner of the room, mounted up near the ceiling. There were armchairs surrounding a low table, cozy rather than businesslike. "Zee ozzers are not 'ere yet. Docteur Farnsworth will bring them to zis room just down zee correedor when zey arrive." Charlie was already getting changed while Bob hesitated, fingers on the latches of the suitcase. He took a deep breath and pushed, committing himself. Get through this and it's plain sailing. He lifted the suitcase lid and gulped. "Wassamater, hey?" Charlie was at his shoulder, already changed into a long black leather coat over a black silk shirt that gaped open, revealing a hairy muscled chest. Charlie was big, sure but the slobby way he dressed normally tended to obscure his actual physical build. Like a lot of really tall people he tended to slouch a lot - "saves me getting creases in my forehead from low doorways" - but a lot of it was just so he didn't intimidate others around him, the "little people" as he sometimes called them. Tonight though he was definitely planning to intimidate. The black leather trousers and buckled knee-high boots added to the impression of strength and domination. Bob had never seen Charlie dressed like this... "You know t'stuff in the case all fits you, I measured you up and got Arnaud to pick out bits the right size from his supply. It fitted all right yesterday when you tried it on, didn't it?" Arnaud was one of Charlie's acquaintances from the local BDSM 'scene'. Bob nodded. "Yeah, that's why I'm in no hurry to --" He waved his hand at the suitcase. Charlie shrugged. "Second time's gotta be easier." Bob gave him a Hard Stare. "Second time I know what's coming." Charlie handed him the slave bracelets and earrings. "Change. You know being a blonde bimbo makes you feel better," Bob cursed. * * * * * * * * Twenty minutes later Bob was cursing continuously as Charlie and Belle worked in tandem to dress him in his outfit for the evening. The agony subsided for a time when Belle stopped tugging and pointed to the display on the wall. "Monsieur?" The top left corner view of the display showed two men in well-tailored business suits sitting down at the table. The one on the left was... Alice. Her face was not so different, like her male twin might have looked if she had one but harder, more angular with a short neatly trimmed beard and moustache, her dark hair cropped in a military-style cut. He could see her muscles even under the well-cut suit jacket, her wide shoulders, her heavy fingers. Arrass not Alice. Bob said a final goodbye to Alice as he stared at the image of the man, Arrass, the Warrior Alice had become. He wondered if she was happy like that, if something like the original Alice still existed in some form within that overtly masculine body then shook his head. Didn't matter, he had to concentrate on his own situation now. Sitting beside Arrass was a taller man, dressed similarly but smooth- shaven, lithe rather than heavily-muscled. His eyes moved around the room as if he was expecting to be attacked at any moment in contrast to Arrass who sat, composed, eyes half-lidded. Farnsworth had negotiated the meeting arrangements, getting Arrass to agree to bring only a single companion on his part with guarantees of safety and freedom to leave unhindered at any time. They were now waiting, not impatiently but like predatory animals, carnivores anticipating their prey appearing before them. Me, I'm what they're here for thought Bob, and he gulped. Whatever happens I can't fall into their hands. He hadn't realised just how hard the Goreans would be in reality. The books were just words, the real thing was different. They looked like the sort of men who would kidnap and even kill to achieve their aims. Charlie stared at the screen over Bob's shoulder then nodded. "Showtime." He moved towards the door. "Belle, you finish up Bibi here. Here's the instruction sheets for the complicated bits and here's some pics of what she should look like when you're finished. Makeup too but it's mostly the eyes'n lipstick. OK? Bring her along as soon as she's ready." He looked at Bob. "I'll go soften them up. I'd give you a fist- bump for luck but--" Bob growled, and then Charlie was gone, the door closing behind him and Bob was left to Belle's tender mercies to complete his transformation. He didn't like the look that appeared on Belle's face as the door snapped shut... Charlie walked towards the meeting room escorted by the Amazonian MiB - he was overshadowed by her which wasn't something that happened to someone as big as he was every day. He wondered briefly about getting her phone number but he decided the risk of being crushed to death between her treetrunk thighs when she orgasmed was too much. What a way to go though. She stopped at the meeting room door and gestured for him to enter. He nodded to the Goreans sitting in their soft low difficult-to-get- out-of-quickly armchairs and sat down in an identical chair opposite the two. The heavy table between them was a further obstacle between the participants in case of attempted violence. Doctor Farnsworth was seated to one side in a similar chair - we're all equals here, see? - with a pad and fountain pen in his lap and an intercom unit on the table in front of him. There was a folder with some papers in front of the Goreans, nothing else. "Gentlemen? If you're ready --" Farnsworth began, but the other Gorean, the one that wasn't a changed Alice held up a hand, his eyes focussed on Charlie. "This person is not the one called Robert James. Where is he?" His voice was oddly accented and he spoke as if English was a foreign language to him. "Correct," said Charlie. "We're here to discuss the ownership of some property. I'm the current owner of that property. Talk to me." He crossed his ankles and waited. The other Gorean started to speak again but Arrass put up his hand. "Introductions first, explanations later." The other man stopped abruptly, it was clear who was in charge. "I am Arrass, currently of the Camp of Schendi. My companion," he gestured to his right, "is Althenius of Cos, currently of the Camp of Schendi." The taller man nodded coldly. Althenius had a real Gorean- type name, he was either a really dedicated cosplayer-type or maybe, just maybe, an actual Gorean created out of thin air by Xanadu. It was not impossible, was it? "My name is Charles." Arrass raised his eyebrow. "Just Charles." Arrass nodded. They knew where he lived and probably knew a lot more about him that he really was comfortable with them knowing but in this meeting he'd keep it down to the bare minimum anyway. Arrass was willing to go along with that, it seemed. Farnsworth harrumphed and uncapped his fountain pen. "Gentlemen. I propose both sides make an opening statement and then we can get down to discussions once each side has explained their starting position to the other." He looked over at the Goreans. "As the party which feels aggrieved perhaps you should go first." Arrass nodded and stood up. "I am Arrass, of the Warrior Caste. My property, a kajira I named Bibi was somehow taken from me. I seek her return. That is all." As Arrass sat down Charlie rose to his feet. Thanks, Arrass. Standing up and trying to dominate me might have been a good idea but I'm bigger than you are, and it's my turn now. "I'm Charles. I recently acquired a slave called Bibi. I want to keep her. I'm willing to make a deal. OK?" He sat down. He felt the Goreans' eyes tracking over his body, evaluating him as a possible enemy, trying to figure out what sort of an opponent he would be if they fought. He crossed his ankles again and leaned back, obviously relaxed in an unthreatening manner. We're not here to fight, guys. Farnsworth had assured Bob and Charlie that violence was not an option during the meeting within the Institute, without going into details. Charlie assumed the Men In Black types outside were armed with something suitably sci-fi in nature. Remembering the movies he just hoped the backblast and collateral damage didn't muss his outfit. His coat was custom-made, his shirt definitely not off-the-peg. Farnsworth made a note on the pad. "Arrass, you say you own the slave Bibi. Do you have proof of that?" "You doubt my word?" Arrass voice was cold, his honour impugned. Althenius sat up, ready to leap to his feet. Farnsworth nodded. "Yes. You have made a claim here, prove it." Arrass looked Farnsworth over, perhaps seeing for the first time past the doctor's mild academic facade. He gestured to Althenius to sit back. "As you say, it is for me to prove my ownership of a slave." He reached forward and pushed the folder on the table over to Farnsworth who picked it up and started leafing through it. "Slave ownership papers, describing the slave in detail," Arrass said with some satisfaction. After Farnsworth finished scanning them he nodded. "These seem to be the originals of the document you sent us previously. May I?" He gestured to Charlie with the folder. Arrass paused, then nodded. Charlie took the folder. He had read the same documents too after Farnsworth had forwarded them but they were playing for time, time for Bob to get ready for the showdown. He studied the top document. It was calligraphed in a dark thick ink on creamy rich paper - not parchment, how unbarbaric of them - in some foreign-looking loopy script, with a stamp of some kind at the bottom beside what looked like signatures. There was a translation attached, complete with notary's stamp from a law office in Jacksonville and printed prosaically on a laser printer by the looks of things. Greetings, yadda yadda, the description of a kajira of such-and-such a height - the weird units given were Gorean, he thought but they had added both American and metric equivalents for convenience. Features, hair colour, eye colour, size of feet, length of fingers, ears pierced, brand type and position on leg, collar size - yup, that looked about right - wrist and ankle ring size etc. etc. Moles, scars, defects in her teeth, the list was quite exhaustive. The only thing missing, he mused as he flipped the pages of description, was her name but that wasn't a given for a kajira, if he remembered the books correctly. Arrass called her Bibi but the slave papers took no official notice of that temporary attribute. The document ended with Camp of Schendi, Warrior Arrass, the owner of the slave described above, written this day, something about Passage Hands which was translated into the same date as when the Xanadu Effect hit. Charlie figured Arrass was working from memory of Bob's body from the times they had spent in the sack (and in the shower and a few other inappropriate places, he recalled) when he wrote out these papers although it was entirely possible the Xanadu Effect had created them as part of the joke on day one. Then again the female figure Bob changed into was literally Arrass' wet dream imaginings anyway... There was no use arguing the papers were fake since Arrass and the other Goreans believed them to be true and pointing out discrepancies wouldn't help or that they failed to prove any kind of legal ownership of a slave, not in today's world. He nodded, closed the folder and put it down. "Sounds like my Bibi." He put no emphasis on the word 'my' but he knew Arrass didn't miss it. "A few glitches here and there but the essentials are correct." "So, you have my slave." It was a statement by Arrass, not a question. "You used to have a slave who I now own." He shifted in his chair. Round two, coming up. "In the world I live in, this world it is said possession is nine-tenths of the law. On your world, possession is all. The strong take, the weak submit." He could see Althenius getting more and more wound up. Have to watch that one. He assumed Farnsworth had had them searched or scanned somehow for weapons before they came in but he was probably quite well versed in bare-handed fighting. There were ways of getting weapons through a security check too... "I have studied what I could of your world, Arrass. The rules of slave capture state that a slave separated from her Master, as Bibi was, is the fair capture of another if her original Master cannot make claim of her from her captor within a certain period. Is that correct?" Arrass nodded. "It is correct, as you say." He raised a hand. "However such rules only apply in cities and places on Gor where such law can be enforced by a Ubar's will and his courts. This... place is not Gor and the decrees of Ubars, even those of mighty Ar do not apply here. Thus, as you said, 'The strong take, the weak submit.'" OK, that's the stick. Does he have a carrot to go with it, or just a bigger stick? There was a knock on the door and the male MiB came in, pushing a hostess trolley with cups and carafes. It made an incongruous sight but Charlie decided it was only 5 out of 10 on the weird scale given they were in the Xanadu Institute. It wasn't even close to being the weirdest thing he'd seen just today never mind... "Ah, refreshments," said Farnsworth. The MiB put cups and carafes on the table. "The flask on the left has coffee, what your compatriots call 'the Black Wine of Thentis' I believe. Tea is on the right, cream, milk and sugar to your taste. Ice water in the glass jug of course." He nodded to the silent server who turned and left. It was good stuff, Charlie thought as he sipped at his coffee but he'd rather be sitting down to a bucket of Molly's truck-engine squeezings any day of the week. Arrass was drinking coffee too but his eyes remained focussed on Charlie. Charlie didn't understand that "Black Wine" reference Farnsworth had made but it was probably a Gor thing. It showed he had been studying up on it too, making the point to the Goreans that he wasn't totally ignorant of where they were coming from. Althenius had a glass of water sitting before him. He had raised it to his lips a couple of times but not even sipped it. Probably worried the drinks are poisoned or drugged or something. He looks like the sort that might poison someone himself. Farnsworth was drinking tea, taking his time to allow tempers to cool and calculations to be made now the basic positions of both parties had been laid out. Smoooooth. Arrass put down his coffee cup and sat forward in his chair. "A question, Charles." Charlie looked up. "The kajira, Bibi, is she... is she well?" Arrass seemed worried about a mere slave, a crack in the Warrior armour around his soul. Maybe what was left of Alice was concerned about Bob, the alter ego of Bibi? He didn't know how Arrass was reconciling the reality of Bob being Bibi at Xanadu and what happened after. He just had to accept the guy's current beliefs as real to him, as real as Bob's odd existence over the past few weeks had been to Charlie. "Bibi is well." Charlie found himself falling into the archaic formal speech patterns of the man sitting across the table from him. "Although, sometimes she cries out in the night in fear, dreaming of her existence as a slave on Gor." Charlie remembered the expressions on Bob's face when shit had gone wrong, the wracking sobs, the piss- stained furs, the slave sack incident and other times Bob had woken up bound at the foot of the bed as a Gorean slave girl. "I dream of her often," Arrass said quietly. "In those dreams she is... truly my slave." Time to twist the knife... "Bibi has told me of HER dreams, her nightmares, how glad she is to see me instead when she wakes," Charlie retorted. Especially if I'm carrying a toolbox... "I find that difficult--" Arrass shook his head. "No matter." Out of the corner of his eye he saw Farnsworth put the top of his fountain pen back in place with a click. It was the signal that everything was ready. It was time for the knockout blow. Charlie waved his hand. "Why don't we ask her then? She's just outside." Arrass sat bolt upright. "You brought Bibi here?" Althenius seemed even tenser at Charlie's thunderbolt news, his narrow eyes focussed on the door. "Come in please, Belle," Farnsworth said in a loud clear voice. The door opened and Belle strutted in, less deferential than before. She led a leash in her right hand, tugging it commandingly. The female figure on the end of the leash was dressed in a bizarre outfit, her hoof boots making a clopping sound on the hard flooring of the meeting room. Her waist was tightly corsetted in heavy red leather, pushing her breasts up high and proud over her impossibly-narrowed waist. A tall red leather stock collar around her neck pushed her chin up, her long blonde hair pulled back in a ponytail. A red leather bridle was buckled around her head with a rubber bit between her teeth and blinkers on the sides, reins hanging loose before her. A white feather plume on top of the bridle rose high, brushing the door frame as she high-stepped into the room. She wore a stainless steel chastity belt around her lower regions and hips and her arms were secured tightly behind her in a single sleeve, pulling her shoulders back and further elevating her breasts. I hate you Charlie, thought Bob as he came to an unsteady halt beside the table. He felt he was going to fall off the fucking hoof boots, the way they made him stand on tip-toe, his legs ached from the strain, his ribs were creaking from the fucking corset's embrace and what the fucking steel strap locked between his legs was doing to the soft tissues down there was nobody's fucking business. This is a stupid fucking crazy plan. He was too angry to feel really embarrassed about appearing in this fetishistic ponygirl getup but he knew that after this was all over he'd have the pleasure of remembering it in excruciating detail. And Charlie had pictures too, of the dry run last night when he had tried wearing all this pervy gear... Charlie hid a smile - I might get kicked to death by My Little Ponygirl over there if I grinned - as he looked over Belle's handiwork. That corset looked like torture, laced up waaay tighter than last night's rehearsal dressup, ditto for the arm binder, courtesy of Belle he presumed. He reall