0 comments/ 4894 views/ 0 favorites L.I.T. World Ch. 02 By: mikey2much Chapter 02: Proud Pussy Wilburn Black walked toward the shuttle port with mixed feelings about his new position. On one hand he was grateful for the promotion and he felt that he was well able to do the job; on the other hand he did not like what happened to the last man to hold his position with the company. Thinking of Nolan put a bad taste in his mouth, and, if the truth were to be told, a touch of fear in his belly. Wilburn had worked for Nolan for the best part of two years. He had found Nolan to be a hard but fair boss; a man who wanted to get the job done but also wanted his men to be well treated. Wilburn had a hard time convincing himself that he could have been so deceived by Nolan. But there seemed to be no other way to make sense of the meeting today and the events afterwards. It had been a well planned and brilliantly carried out execution, the way Karen Bates had exposed and destroyed the man. Checking his phone, he saw he was a little early so he stopped for a coffee at the shuttle-port canteen. Swiping his phone across the vending machine's scanner, grabbing a box of Sweetnlite coffee he went to the counter beside the viewscreen, shook the box of coffee, and sat it down to give it time to warm. Wilburn loved this view, and came by for a box of coffee every time he passed just to gaze at this viewscreen. Tonight it was especially spectacular because the last of the pods were in place for the launch tomorrow morning, leaving only a scattering of equipment where the three hundred humanoid clone pods and one hundred and fifty supply pods used to sit. Each pod stood nearly twenty meters tall making the prep field look like a city of five story buildings. Tonight it was just an empty field, all the pods having been fitted into the honeycombed interior of the giant cylinder shape that was the transport ship, visible in orbit above. Almost big enough to qualify as a moon in its own right, Transport Ship Seventy Five was bathed in the bluish light of earthshine, six hundred meters long and over two hundred meters in diameter, With the solar sail's control arm sticking up like a dorsal fin and the slope of the storage space for the solar sail itself, the ship looked like a giant whale. Furthering the illusion of fish under water, the small ships working around the giant were invisible until they caught the light just right to reveal them with a bluish flash of reflected earthlight and then they would wink out again. Wilburn sat there watching as his work was packed away to await delivery to a far off world some sixteen light-years away from here and now. Almost as a reminder that time was passing, the sun's light suddenly broke over the horizon of the moon, making the ships all shine with a hot golden color. The number of ships winking in and out of the light was so great that they made the big ship look like it was giving off sparks. Wilburn had adopted the habit, like most of the other 'Moonies', of thinking of the viewscreens as windows. Since he was at least ten meters underground a real window would be useless but it was easy to let yourself believe you were looking out a window, and all the Moonies enjoyed this shared fiction many of them referred to the viewscreens using the term 'window' instead. As far as he knew, there was not one single window on the moon, yet window was a commonly used word. His 'window' tonight was filled with a scene as dramatic as anything any human had ever beheld. The flat lunar plain stretched to the base of a tall jagged mountain range that crossed the plain some eighty kilometers away, though they looked much closer. No vegetation to break up the stark empty beauty of the sharp edged ridges and peaks, no atmosphere to blur the view. Overhead the diamond studded black velvet of space stretched to infinity behind the world's biggest and most expensive sparkler. As breathtaking as it was though, it was all just a fancy background for the drama which he had watched play out today. Looking back at the sequence of events, Wilburn saw that the news of the contamination of the pods was just the opening round, like an artillery barrage on a beach before landing the troops. Nolan, who was hopelessly out-classed from the beginning, had played right into Bate's hands when he called the meeting today, gathering everybody who mattered to his career into one room. Looking back, he remembered thinking that it was unusual for the two ambitious women to voluntarily take a back seat at a conference table. What he had thought was a surprisingly respectful 'lets not crowd the men at the table' attitude, expressed by sitting away from the table over by the door, was really Karen Bates and her security person blocking the only exit from the room. Remembering the stern expression of the old woman, and the almost cocky smile of the younger woman, they had both made it clear they were not people to be trifled with. The calmly confident way the younger woman moved made Wilburn think she had been a cop, or in the military at one time. The way she had winked and given that 'see, you didn't need me after all' look to Bates when Bates had led Nolan into the room naked, made Wilburn think that she could've single handedly 'ganged up' on Nolan. Nolan, the last man to hold Wilburn's job had been trapped from the time he checked his mail this morning. Nolan wasn't stupid. After having worked with the man for two years, Wilburn had formed an impression that Nolan was very smart. He had a long string of successful missions that proved he was a man who was aware and alert to the things around him. But tonight Nolan lay in a cell somewhere, naked and with a torture device embedded in his bowels. They had wiped him out so fast, it was over, before he ever saw it coming. He had been spattered like a bug on Karen Bates' windshield. He checked his phone, sucked up the last of his warm coffee and dropped the container into the degrade unit as he stepped through the door. He didn't want to start this relationship off on the wrong foot by being late. Wilburn followed instructions and went to the security office where he was ushered through and passed along into another passageway, a small narrow tunnel, which he had been unaware of until tonight. Being underground, like ninety-five percent of Moon Base City, made it hard to be sure, but Wilburn thought he might be going parallel to the main passageway to the shuttle-port. He soon arrived at a plain metal door, it carried no adornments of rank, nor did it boast a number, only a solitary button. Wilburn pushed the button, heard the buzzer inside, and nervously waited at the dead-end of an empty tunnel. Sylvia's strong fingers worked the muscles in Karen's neck and shoulders. Karen was in the large bathing tub in the bathroom of the master's cabin; Silvia knelt on a cushion beside the tub. Sylvia's left hand supported Karen's forehead while the fingers of her right hand kneaded the muscles just behind and below the ears. The oily feel of the modified water like baby oil on her hand, Sylvia's fingers worked their magic, relaxing the tightened muscles in her Mistress' neck. Other than the soft sighs emitted by Karen and the gentle splashing of water, the room was silent. The only light in the room was the flickering flames of the four scented candles, filling the damp air with the sweet smell of honeysuckle blossoms. Both women closed their eyes and let the moment rule for as long as it could. The two women enjoyed a few precious minutes of this form of communication that could only be shared by lovers. As their skin touched, their souls intertwined joining their minds on a level so much deeper than words could ever reach. Karen allowed herself to relax for the first time since the chase had begun four earth days ago. When she had discovered the videos from the security cameras and Nolan's involvement with the SCM's, now that was all behind her and she was going to allow herself tonight to unwind and relax. Once they had finished up with Black, Karen had plans for sweet Sylvia. A broad smile spread across her face as she reconsidered, why wait? "Sylvia, get behind me and let me lean back against you, I want to feel your arms around me, holding me tight." "Yes Mistress, I'd love that too." Sylvia stepped into the tub and slid down the backside until her Mistress sat between her legs and leaned back against her chest as she wrapped her arms around the thin childlike body of the woman she loved. The two women lay silent and content enjoying the moment for nearly twenty minutes before Mistress moved Silvia's hand placing it over her sex. No words were needed; Silvia knew what her Mistress wanted. She began to slowly stroke and tease the area getting close but never touching her hidden pearl, skimming the lips of her sex with her fingers as light as butterfly kisses. Silvia's left hand caressed and stroked Karen's breast, while the lucky fingers of her right hand felt her lover beginning to open to them as they began to slip inside the satiny slick folds of her vagina. Silvia let her fingers accept the invitation and began to push inside only to withdraw after only half an inch, still teasing, still avoiding the magic pearl. Silvia felt a true sense of accomplishment when she heard her Mistress' low moan of pleasure as she relaxed and let herself drift on a sea of sensual delights. Karen's scent filled Silvia's nostrils as she nuzzled along the neck of her Mistress, stopping to kiss and lick at her earlobes. All the while her hands were making love to the body they held and were feeling that body respond to their efforts. Mistress now rolled her head back and forth on Silvia's chest as she sighed and sometimes seemed to almost purr like a stroked cat. The slave in Silvia purred with happiness to be able to give these moments to her Mistress. Lying like they were, Silvia could see her Mistress' frail old body; it looked like a young child's body wrapped in an old woman's skin. The arms and legs were impossibly thin; she had lived off-world so long that her body had lost most of its muscle-mass which was used mostly for combating the effects of gravity. Karen's breast, which had seemed so pert back in the belt, now hung heavy on her chest, and this was just moon gravity. Earth gravity might actually kill her. As if she had shared the thoughts that Silvia had been thinking, Karen stirred and began to stand up in the tub. She turned to face the still seated Silvia. "Come here baby," she said as she pulled Silvia's face into her wet sex and held her there as she felt the younger woman's lips and tongue working on her most sensitive parts. Karen continued to hold her head tight against her body even though she could hear her struggling to breathe. Holding her because she needed her so bad, loved her so much and loved her submission, holding her head tight in her crotch until her first orgasm rocketed through her. Silvia was a bit surprised when Mistress didn't let go of her head, but she didn't, so she kept loving on the pussy in her mouth, running her tongue from clit to ass, licking and sucking. Karen could feel two events about to collide, one was her fast approaching orgasm, the other was her legs were about to give out. Using Silvia's head for balance Karen put her leg over the shoulder of her slave. "Silvia baby, cup my ass cheeks in your hands," she said. When she felt Silvia's hands lifting her ass Karen put her other leg over her slave's other shoulder. "Now baby, I want to feel you loving that pussy until I tell you to stop." Feeling her lover's tongue following her command she added, "Oooh, you sweet bitch, you sweet, sweet bitch." Silvia had no trouble supporting her Mistress' weight, she couldn't have weighed more than thirty kilos or so, and she found the position very sexy as she held her mistress before her and ate her pussy. Both her hands were occupied, so she couldn't do anything about her own satisfaction, she could only give to her Mistress, worshipping like a devout slut at the altar of her proud pussy. A pussy that hadn't bowed to the will of a man for nearly sixty years, a lifetime of demanding pleasure instead of giving it, a pussy that now demanded its slave to please it now. Silvia shivered with delight as she loved with everything she could bring to bear. Using her thumbs, she pressed Karen's pussy lips against her tongue as she tongue-fucked her tight muscular cunt, her wet upper lip extended so it touched the now de-hooded clit of her Mistress. Silvia squirmed her hips a bit in the water, yearning for somebody's touch, so close to her release, but not now, she would have to wait. Now she could only give and she did give with all her love and received satisfaction of a sort when she felt the ass in her hands jumping and twitching as her Mistress came for the second time. This one was a hard one that took a few moments to pass. When it was over Mistress said, "Set me down gently, I'm too weak to stand." Silvia stood up lifting Karen in her arms and ducking her head under one leg and turned Karen around, her hands holding her Mistress like she was a wet puppy until the mod water slid down their bodies, the boosted cohesiveness of its molecules making it look like sheets of clear plastic dissolving back into the tub. Silvia stepped out of the tub, her Mistress held like a child before her. She had barely got her Mistress settled when she heard the door alarm ring. Sylvia leaned in to give her lover a kiss just below her ear, under the lobe, her voice a sexy vibration in Karen's ear as she said, "Take your time Baby, I'll take care of Mr. Black for a few minutes." Silvia slipped into a pair of training pants and threw a tee shirt over her head snuggling it down over her small breasts, accentuating her nipple rings. She checked herself out in the mirror, slim, tall, and boyish with a thatch of blonde hair combed over like a man's with a part. Shoulders too wide, arms like a man's, face too square jawed and mannish for her to ever feel 'pretty' yet Sylvia thought for a fifty year old, she made a very sexy package. Her green eyes in the mirror smiled at her with an expression of pride as she locked the braided gold collar around her neck. She was proud to be Karen's slave. "See you in the office, Sylvia said, turning to leave. "Wear a jacket, look official," Karen's voice brought Sylvia to a stop like a jerk on a leash, "don't give him any reason to doubt us. He is important to my plans, so you walk easy." Her voice carried the hard edge of command, and then in a softer voice, "Come here." Sylvia stepped closer to stand beside her Mistress' chair. Karen reached for Sylvia pulling her down to her lips where she could suck the breath of love from her with her kiss. Demanding and insistent Karen's kiss gave so much, yet promised so much more. Sylvia surrendered to her lover, opening her mouth, her heart and her soul, caressing her probing tongue with her own. For Sylvia it ended too soon as Karen pushed her away saying, "Now go and see to our company, and behave yourself, when I decide to show you off, I will have you serve Mr. Black and I dinner in the nude." Karen flashed a quick smile at her lover. "But for now, go and take care of our Mr. Black. I'll be out in a few minutes." Wilburn Black's finger hovered before the button ready to push it again. He was a little unnerved by being at the dead-end of a deserted tunnel, somehow he felt at risk all alone down here with no witnesses to report any wrong-doings. Looking all about him, seeing nothing but empty tunnel, only increased his sense of fear. After what had happened to Nolan, well something like that changed the way you looked at things. He decided to push the button once more and give it two minutes and then leave. Just as his finger touched the button to buzz again, the door was opened by the young security person. "Mr. Black, do come in" the woman warmly greeted him, stepping back and making a welcoming gesture with her arm. "I've been expecting you, please step into the office and I will begin to bring you up to speed." The tall woman turned and walked into an exterior airlock and waited for Black to join her. Barefoot and dressed for lounging she waited in the airlock which opened to the outside, watching Wilburn to see what he would do. Wilburn hurried over to join her, trusting her instincts over his own, which screamed at him not to go into an airlock unless you were dressed for what waited on the other side. The woman seemed to understand what he was thinking because she smiled at him and said, "It'll be alright," and vented the system, blowing the Moon Base City atmosphere out, replacing it with whatever atmosphere filled the domain of Karen Bates. The inner door of the airlock opened and they stepped out into a beautifully decorated room. To be more correct a beautifully but extravagantly large and spacious room. A counter ran alone one wall, and there was a sunken conversation pit with two couches and a table between them. The couches were large enough to serve as bunks, Wilburn thought, trying to justify the wasted space. A viewing screen, four times the size of the one in the canteen, filled one wall with input taken from a security camera showing the area Wilburn had been admiring from the canteen. The pod container ship was easily the brightest thing in the sky, but the light had changed, now instead of fish or sparks, the small sliver dots seemed to swarm around it like bees around a flower. The hypnotic effect of the scene was so great that it took a moment before he became aware of the woman standing beside him seemingly as entranced by the scene as he was. "You know you can work on this stuff night and day for years and it is all just building pieces, you know you never get to feel the pride of the finished thing." Wilburn's voice trailed off as if his train of thought had lost steam. Bates and this woman had come here on a troubleshooting mission, to find and fix a problem. They had accomplished that with the surrender of Nolan, they didn't need to hear him bragging on the results of his work. Sylvia dimmed the lights until the reflected earthshine from the viewscreen was the only light in the room. "Mistress Bates and I sit in here and watch with the lights off. It is the most peaceful feeling, looking out at this barren landscape of such jagged edges and points, a thousand hues of grays and blacks sitting below the starry blackness of space." Wilburn turned to look at the woman, picturing in his mind the two of them here together watching the viewscreen in the dark. The thought forced him to reconsider the bodyguard's importance as a player. He let his eyes go back to the ship in orbit but an image of Sylvia and Karen holding one another here in the dark stayed in the back of his mind. "Somewhere" he said, "sixteen light-years away from here, sixteen years from now, that thing up there is going to fire those pods at the surface of a world where no life has existed before." Wilburn had trailed off into thoughtful contemplation, silence filled the room. Before they had left the space station Sylvia had gone through the records of everyone at the meeting today. When she had given her report to Mistress, of all the personnel, Wilburn Black had been her first choice as most trustworthy. Now, she studied him as he admired the work taking place in orbit above them. Five feet nine inches tall, one hundred and sixty five pounds, balding grey hair, blue eyes, she had all the details. Black was forty-five years old and had worked for the company for the last ten years, three of them here at moon base. He and she were both going to be strong right arms for Mistress Bates, they needed to get along. There were many unanswered questions but overall, Sylvia felt she could work with this man. L.I.T. World Ch. 02 "Mr. Black, let me introduce myself, I serve as a personal assistant to Mistress Bates as well as her bodyguard, Sylvia Hampton." Sylvia held out her hand. Black turned away from the viewscreen and accepted her hand into his firm, solid grip, while he read her face. "Ms Hampton, pleased to meet you," feeling her grip strengthening until it equaled his own, as they shook. His eyes searched her face finding nothing but a simple smile, and then he saw that glint in her eye, like she was laughing at him. He took his hand back. "You said something about 'bringing me up to speed' on what is happening. Is that going to happen now or do we need to wait on Ms. Bates?" "We can start anytime, now would be fine, what do you want to know?" Sylvia crossed the spacious room to a counter running alone the wall and busied herself getting a ten kilo container up onto the counter and opening it. "Why did you handle it the way you did? Why go through the naked thing with Nolan? Why not let the police take care of it? What made Karen Bates want to be in that meeting today?" Wilburn wished that Sylvia would settle down and talk with him, all her activity made it easy for her to mask her feelings about what she was saying. "Let me answer the last question first and then I will answer the first three questions." As she spoke Sylvia filled a smaller container with water and worked on a piece of equipment on the counter, a rich sweet smell filled the room. "Karen Bates was born in North Florida, got her engineering degree there at the University of Florida. She met the love of her life, got married, settled down and had two kids." Sylvia never stopped moving and cleaning over at the counter, the smell was rich in the room, a warm and welcoming aroma. Wilburn knew that smell and it made his mouth water, it was coffee. Sylvia was making fresh, brewed, real coffee. He hadn't had real coffee since, hell it had to be two years before he left earth. Sylvia carried on her one-sided conversation while she unpacked three large cups, "Well, Karen lived the dream for ten years and then Mr. wonderful got caught with a teenage girl. Karen walked away from the marriage and her two sons, started working for the company, volunteered for the asteroid fields. Went off-world and never looked back." She poured two cups full of the dark amber brown liquid. "Mr. Black, I understand that you are a man who enjoys coffee, which means you know how expensive this is, so why don't you come over and fix your coffee just the way you like it." Sylvia took her cup and stepped down into the pit and took a seat on one of the long couches. Sitting the cup on the table she went on with her story. Wilburn put real sugar in his real coffee and real liquid cream, real cream, in his coffee and stirred it gently, almost reverently. The lower gravity made the coffee seem livelier like it wanted to splash out into the room, free of the restraints of the cup that held it. He took his cup and followed Sylvia to the couch and sat down. Carefully taking a sip of the dangerously hot coffee, it was so fucking good. Suddenly in no hurry, he sat and enjoyed his coffee, smiling and sipping; he listened as Sylvia told her story that was supposed to be an answer to his questions. "Not many people know this but Mistress Bate's mother was an outlawed drug addict, she roamed around North Florida, in and out of jails for everything from solicitation to petty theft and drug dealing. Eventually she managed to pull herself from the muck and became a successful artist, you may have heard of her she is pretty famous, Skeeter Bates. She made enough for her and her husband to live a good life and send Karen to the best schools." Sylvia took another sip of coffee "Mistress Bates thinks that her mother's genetic qualities are being passed on. She thinks that there is a part of her personality that 'is' her mother." She looked up at Black. "Do you believe in personality traits being passed on from mother to daughter or son?" Black nodded his head and said, "Yes, I believe that, I've seen it too many times not to believe it happens, but you can't take it for a sure thing. You can't have expectations of traits you are seeking showing up when you want them to. And you can't judge a man because the traits didn't blossom in his life as you might've hoped, you can't hold it against a man because his genetics don't jive with your expectations." "Yeah, you're right about that," she said and took a drink of her coffee. "Mistress Bates has a healthy dose of her mother in her genes, what she calls her 'outlaw blood', she thinks it frees up her mind, allowing her to think outside the box a bit more than most people do. Mistress doesn't think her sons have much of her or her mother's genetic make-up, she thinks they take after their father more than her side of the family. Rita, the murdered girl, seems to Mistress, to be more like her and her mother in spirit. The fact that her father was trying to marry her off makes Mistress think that her son Odell was having trouble controlling her and wanted a husband to watch and control her instead of himself." Silvia stopped talking to take another sip of coffee, and then continued with her tale. "But Rita fought that marriage so hard that her father had to call it off. Rita knew she couldn't stay there any longer so she robbed a company owned store and tried to get off world with the money. Mistress thinks she was trying to get to her; she is the only person that Rita could know that is off world. But the law busted her at the shuttle port in Atlanta and sent her back to Florida where she was sentenced to two years of service to the company. She seems to have a great deal of her grandmother's and great grandmother's genes in her make-up. Or she did before Nolan killed her." Wilburn was still having a hard time adjusting his thinking about Nolan, could he really have been a serial killer back on earth? Thinking of Nolan made him ask, "Where is Nolan, in the jail?" Sylvia ignored the question. "Yeah, Mistress Bate's sons took after their father, Tony the older one, never married and had no children. Her younger son, Odell had Rita, his only child. Odell is a weird sort of guy, he's one of those snake kissing preachers you hear about. He lives back in the swamps and has a devoted following of people who are even more stupid than he is." Sylvia stood and took Black's empty cup and walked to the counter where she refilled them and this time fixed both cups, handing one to him, she sat down and continued. "Odell said that it was God's will that she should suffer for not honoring her father and marrying the man he chose for her. He left her in jail when he could have easily got her out, he has a lot of pull down there." She took a slow thoughtful sip of her coffee. "That's where Nolan found her, and killed her." Wilburn sipped his coffee, she had fixed it perfectly indicating to Wilburn her strong powers of observation as he had prepared his first cup. "How did Ms. Bates become aware of the death of her grand daughter?" he asked. "Totally by accident, she had discovered the video you saw today and backtracked through Nolan's time in each camp making a list of his victims, Rita's name was not on it. But when they had the recovered remains sent out for DNA testing, they found a match for Rita's DNA along with names for two of the other victims, Brandford and Mayo. That's when they notified Mistress Bates that Nolan had murdered her granddaughter. That's when it got personal with her." Wilburn considered this for a minute and then he tried to summarize what he thought he knew. "So, Ms. Bates starts out looking for information smuggled aboard the pods and finds a serial killer instead, who just happens to have killed her grandchild." Wilburn looked to Sylvia and when she gave him an affirming nod, he continued to think out loud. "So Ms. Bates, one of the bigger big wheels in the company, decides to drop everything and come to the moon, in person, to take care of Nolan. That makes no sense to me, when she could have accomplished the same result with a phone call." "You're wrong there Wilburn, if she had sent the cops to arrest Nolan all of you, his fellow workers, would have come to his defense. You all would have thought you owed it to Nolan to keep his memory alive by asking about him, wanting news of the trial. This way everybody will breathe a sigh of relief that the asshole is gone. Mistress Bates didn't want any questions about Nolan coming up when this is over." Sylvia punctuated the statement by draining the cup of coffee, standing up and taking the empty cup to the counter. "What do you think will happen to Nolan?" he asked again. Sylvia was watching the ships in orbit now as she said almost absence-mindedly, "Nolan is like an orange, only instead of juice, he has truths within him. You know what happens to an orange when it gets run through a juicer? Nolan won't make it through this." She looked to Wilburn and said. "Mistress Bates will take Nolan to the places where he had connections with the locals. She will make an example of Nolan in front of his friends, the people he trusts. When they see the things Mistress will do to Nolan they will lose all confidence in Nolan's ability to withstand the questioning and torture. Everybody will see what happens to those who oppose Mistress Bates, believe me they will be ready to make a deal." "So Ms. Hampton, how long have you served your mistress Bates? Wilburn asked, he had become quite impressed with the younger woman as the conversation continued. "I can answer that," Karen Bates said as she entered the dark room. Her long body hugging gown of a shiny blue fabric sported a slit that ran mid-thigh high, allowing her to cross the room with long strides, revealing a skinny boney leg that would have suited an insect better than a human being. Wrapping a possessive arm around the waist of Sylvia, pulling her close, she said. "I was lucky enough to find Sylvia twenty five years ago. " Karen ran her finger along Sylvia's hairline, gently pushing stray hairs out of her face. "She has been my best friend and closest companion ever since." Her eyes were drawn to the scene on the viewscreen. "Wilburn, what we are looking at is evolution, pure and simple. We are flinging ourselves on the rocks of distant worlds just as we flung ourselves on the rocks of the shore when we left the water all those millions of years ago." Karen released Sylvia with a one word command spoken softly, "Coffee." After letting her hand trail down Sylvia's body as she walked away, Karen offered her hand to Wilburn, as they shook, she said, "I'm sorry we didn't get to talk earlier today, there was just too much going on. And I wanted to be able to talk privately with you." She was interrupted by Sylvia handing her a cup of hot coffee. "Mistress, it's very hot." Turning to Wilburn, "Let me take that," as she took his nearly empty cup and replaced it with another fresh cup, hot and steaming, "and you take this." With the empty cup she went back to the counter and rinsed the cup and poured her own cup of the rare brew. The three of them stood in the darkened room, watching the giant display on the wall, each lost in their own thoughts while they all shared the moment. Wilburn swirled the coffee in his mouth, enjoyed the scene on the giant viewscreen and gave himself a pat on the back for 'having made it'. Here he stood with the most powerful person he had ever met, drinking coffee, alone as friends would do. He felt accepted and approved, a man whose talents had been recognized, his hard works rewarded. He toasted himself with another sip of coffee. Sylvia waited. Acting as though she was watching the ships on the screen, from the corner of her eye she watched Wilburn. In the past when personnel issues came up she tried to stay out of it. As long as the people they hired were qualified to do the job, and willing and able to perform their assigned tasks, they were fine with her. And if they weren't up to the standards, that was tough but they had to go. Before tonight she had never liked a candidate for a position as much as she liked Wilburn Black. Sylvia realized she wanted Wilburn to be part of the team because she judged him worthy of her friendship. She hoped that he too wanted to give a friendship time to grow. She waited to see how Mistress would open the game, and how Wilburn would respond. "Wilburn Black," Karen opened the conversation like she played chess, aggressively. "Been with the company ten years, reasonably successful in your efforts on the company's behalf, always plays it safe." Karen forced eye contact with Wilburn. "You didn't play it safe today, you stood up for what you thought was right, why today?" Wilburn hoped she would go on talking but she waited for his answer. "Nobody else did anything, I had to." "Wilburn, you opposed me twice today, in most cases that would be twice enough to end your career with the company. Instead you have a promotion and you are drinking coffee on my dime and in my home." It looked like Wilburn was going to say something, Karen hoped he was smarter than that. "The bottom line is this. I have a team with at least one person, maybe more, giving shipping information to a terrorist. Sylvia and I both think you are okay but we can't be sure, and you did stand up for Nolan when nobody else did. Where is your loyalty Mr. Black?" "Ms. Bates, when I woke up this morning I worked for a man that I thought was a loyal employee and a good man, you show up and proved to me that he was neither. You let yourself act like some sort of warlord from the dark ages, strip the man naked and torture and rape him in front of his friends. Then you have me take his girlfriend down to visit him where we find him publicly sucking cock, but I can't be sure who is controlling Nolan. Since he has that thing of yours up his ass, I can't be sure if it was really 'Nolan' on his knees with that cock in his mouth, or you doing it, using Nolan's body. You could have set the whole thing up." So much had happened it amazed him as he was adding them up. "I don't know much but I do know company policy. We are opposed to torture, so I called you on it. Lastly, I didn't ask for the job or the coffee you offered me today, and since I am here on your dime, I can leave at your pleasure." Wilburn was so angry that he had trouble saying what he thought, the problem was that he wasn't thinking at all, he was pissed at the skinny old bitch for the things she had done today. "Touché', Mr. Black" Karen looked to where Sylvia stood. "Sylvia thinks you're okay. I trust Silvia, I'm going to let myself trust you Wilburn Black. Do not make the fatal mistake of making me regret this decision." Walking to the counter she said, "Show him what we have," as she passed Sylvia. "Welcome to the team Mr. Black." L.I.T. World Ch. 03 Chapter three Wilburn's Dilemma "Wilburn I need to see your phone," Silvia said holding out her hand., letting her eyes welcome him to the team, as he gave her his phone. She hit a few keys let his phone touch her phone for a super secure touch only transfer of files. She handed Wilburn his new phone, "a bit of an up-grade on your old one." While Sylvia explained options, Wilburn watched over her shoulder as Bates seemed to come to a sudden stop. She stood motionless for several moments as Wilburn studied her. It was as if she was listening intently to something or lost in thought. Sylvia's voice flowed around him as he pretended to listen, but what was happening with Karen Bates demanded all his attention. As suddenly as it started, it ended. The old woman did a one eighty, and with renewed strength strode back to where he and Sylvia were talking. "Sylvia, pull up the latest files from the forensics team in Florida. Put it on the wall." Karen seemed very agitated, when she said, "Find out where Nolan is now, and get him back here ASAP." Wilburn began to browse through the new files, watching from the corner of his eye as Karen Bates tried to pace about the room. After two laps the pain in her legs was so bad that it forced her to sit, where she silently suffered until the wall filled with images and a video report on Rita Carlton's DNA. In the video a man in a lab coat held a severed thumb in his gloved hand pointing out the nature of the cuts on the bone; he lay down the thumb and pointed toward the monitor on his wall where there was an image of a hand with the path of the cut painted in a transparent red. "The cut ran from the wrist in a straight line to where the thumb would have joined the hand." The man's voice trailed off to nothing as considered who he was reporting to. This was not part of his job, describing in detail the mutilation of a child to their grandmother. Who also happened to own the company that owned the corporation that ran the lab where he worked. With an effort he pulled himself together and resumed his report, "if it had still been attached to the hand." "Which brings us to the nature of the instrument that made the cut," the white coated gentleman picked up a hacksaw blade. "Based on the scarring left on the bone of the thumb, we think it was severed from the hand with a hacksaw or possibly just a hacksaw blade. While I agree that it would have been very horrific for the young lady to have to amputate her thumb this way, it seems to be the only way it could've happened." The scene shifts to a two inch pipe mounted on a concrete block wall with Pipe hanger clamps bolted fast. There are two dozen pairs of handcuffs welded to the waist high pipe. The man in the lab coat was saying, "in my opinion the way the thumb was cut indicates that it was a self inflicted wound. A person locked in a set of the pictured handcuffs would have a hard time swinging an ax or a cleaver, but if she had a hacksaw blade and sawed her thumb off so her hand could pass through the cuffs, then we would find wounds like this." Thinking of who he was talking to, the man tried to dampen any false hope me might be building. "The other question is how did she free her other wrist from the cuffs? There was no other DNA matching hers among the remains, only the one thumb. What I'm saying is that we can't be sure that the escape was successful, maybe she wasn't able to get the other hand free and they buried the body. We've sent a team back to check each set of cuffs for blood or DNA. They'll have dogs and will see if they can find a trail leaving the area but they're not optimistic, its been a long time." Karen fell back against the wall with an audible thud, Sylvia rushed to her side offering support. Wilburn rushed to help but the feather light weight of the older woman made Wilburn's help unnecessary. Only her strength of will gave Karen Bates the strength to stand on her own two feet while she said. "Sylvia, build a fire under somebody but get Nolan here, now. Wilburn, your days of playing it safe are over. I need a commitment from you tonight, you are going to have to help Sylvia interrogate Nolan, its going to take a while and you're not going to like it but it s got to be done. And it has to be done my way. Are you willing to do that?" Wilburn nodded his head as he answered her with a solid, "Yes, Ms Bates." And he meant it too. He sat down and started to read his new files in his new phone, preparing for his role as an interrogator. Sylvia cupped her phone and asked Karen, "Should they leave him in the box?" Karen nodded, "Just tell them to hurry." Karen made it to one of the couches and lay down during the twenty minutes they waited for Nolan. During those twenty minutes Wilburn found that Bates had several 'top priority' investigations going at once. He discovered reports of twenty five hundred of the SCM's were missing from inventory at the R and D facility. The facility was located just to the north of Atlanta Ga. Everybody who had ever had access to the SCM's were being audited, while their neighbors and friends were being discreetly interviewed. Bates had six people in Atlanta, and the locals were providing all the personnel needed. The amount of man hours seemed not to matter at all. Bates had people on the ground from Miami to Baltimore and as far west as Houston. Bates had printed a letter and had it hand carried and posted with thumbtacks on the bulletin boards of grocery stores, schools, churches, anywhere where groups of people might see it. The letter was short and to the point, it asked three questions. One, did they know, or were they aware of, a young person suddenly leaving home with someone they had just met. Two, were they aware of, or had they seen any young women or men doing acts that seemed out of character for them. Acts, possibly of a sexual nature that 'normal people' would not be doing. Three, If you know someone or are aware of someone that fits either of the cases above, Call this number, give names and times, give two other names that would know about this person. Then you will receive one hundred credits, credited instantly to your account. Dial 156 782 4453 or 1 LOST CHILD. The whole thing seemed to be more church related, like they wanted to help the poor child. It was designed to make you feel like you weren't snitching out your friends to the cops. Wilburn pulled up the map with the locations of where they had paid the money. Over three hundred hits ranging from Charleston to the north down to Miami. What stood out was the fact that from the coastal village of Tallahassee southeast throug the maze of small islands and swampy channels, the map looked like it had a bad case of heat rash, it was so covered with the red dots. Wilburn pulled up the list of the names of the disappeared, he let his eyes scan down the page, reading each name, page after page until on page six, mid page he found the name Rita Carlton. Before he could read the whole report the door buzzer went off, Sylvia went to open the airlock and get Nolan. Wilburn relaxed his phone and put it away, he turned to Ms. Bates thinking she might have something to tell him before Nolan was brought in. But she seemed to have gone rigidly stiff, her fist clenched at her side, her facial expressions severe, her eyes hard with hate, watching the spot where Nolan would soon appear. A small voice deep inside his head told him that Bates was over the edge, a very powerful, very dangerous, very crazy woman. What would that make Sylvia, and now after his promise to Bates, himself. Were they both working in the service of a lunatic? Bates watched the airlock, Wilburn watched her, as they waited in silence for Nolan. They heard the rush of air as the old air was pushed out and the new air pumped in, The airlock door slide open and Sylvia walked in, a Power-Lift dolly following behind her, bringing a large blue box into the room. Effortlessly and expertly Sylvia maneuvered the remote control dolly to take the box perilous close to the steps leading down to the conversation pit, crossing the room and coming to a stop centered in front of the panoramic viewscreen. Turning down the static charge relaxed the 'box' into a cloth which draped down over the rounded shape beneath it. Sylvia whipped away the cloth and there Nolan was, bent at the waist his back parallel with the floor. He was naked sitting astraddle a heavy duty sawhorse, his legs folded forward letting his ass hang over the edge, his arms pulled down and back to be shackled with chain running behind his knees. Someone had taped a small remote control to his back and the small red light indicated that it was on. Silvia stepped forward to turn it off, and Nolan visibly relaxed as the dildo inside him stopped deep fucking him. "Oh my god," Wilburn heard himself speak and regretted it immediately, and he pretended to not notice the hard glare Bates threw his way. Nolan had heard it though and now asked, "Is that you Wilburn, is that you?" The hope in Nolan's voice was pitiful to Wilburn but before he could answer his old boss, the naked man seemed to have knotted up his body in the most severe way possible, the tendons in his neck like ropes stretched to the breaking points, shaking his head and squirming on the bondage horse he was strapped down on. It went on for several long seconds before the man slumped onto the horse limp as a wet rag. "We will ask the questions, not you. You will answer when we ask you a question, otherwise I don't want to hear a word from you." Karen Bates had that fire in her eye, that set to her face, that told everyone 'do not fuck with me, because I 'm willing and able to hurt you'. Wilburn took in the details of Nolan predicament, he was strapped down to the horse and his back and legs were covered in angry red welts, his body had been beaten and carried several dark bruises. His face was covered in crusted cum as well as his ass cheeks; someone had taped his eyes shut with two thin strips of duct tape. Wilburn couldn't let this kind of mistreatment continue to happen, it didn't matter what Nolan had done, he didn't deserve this, nobody did. "Where have you had this man? Why wasn't he in jail like he should have been? Who do you think you are to treat a man this way?" Wilburn was hot and he was getting loud when Bates shut him down with a quite question. Bates stood just in front of Nolan, but she spoke to Wilburn. "Would you like for me to show Mr. Nolan some loving mercy?" "No, I don't want you to show him mercy, if he has done the things that you say he has done, he doesn't deserve mercy. What I want you to do is show him the common respect that all men are due." Wilburn knew that he should keep his mouth shut but he could not let this kind of treatment go without protesting to those who caused it to happen. "This is torture for revenge, this is not justice. And justice is what we want to give those girls and women that Nolan enslaved and murdered." Bates seemed to be considering what Wilburn was saying for a moment, but her eyes never left Nolan when she answered "We're dealing here with relative values, several lives are at stake, not just the life of this piece of shit." She took a moment as if considering how much to reveal and then let an expression of trust flicker across her face before continuing. "This started as an investigation of sabotage and the smuggling of potentially destructive materials aboard our seed pods But now it has turned into an investigation of several murders, countless kidnappings, rapes and slavery. This man knows everything I need to bring it all to a stop." Nolan, was suddenly enthusiastic about working with Bates, "I'll do anything, I am so, so, sorry for what I did. I couldn't help myself before but I'll do better, I promise. Just please, please, give me another chance" He frantically blubbered "No Nolan, you've had all your chances. What I am offering you is a quick death rather than the long slow death I had planned for you. There is a camp in the asteroid belt where the young pilots wait for their turn to bring a rock home. There are no women out there, just thirty to forty single young men with nothing to do but wait." Bates bent down to watch the pain displayed on Nolan's face as she began to send the SCM into a punishing rape pace making a brutal but perfect simulation of a cruel fucking by a big rigidly hard cock. "I think those boys would be glad to have you riding your horse in their latrine like you were tonight for those rock jockeys here. You'll be praying for death within hours of your arrival, but it won't come, I think you'll last for months. I want you to last a long time. How long did Mayo last? You son of a bitch, how long did Branford last before you killed her?" Bates saw her spittle splattering on Nolan's face and heard her own voice as it screamed at him, and was shocked by how hysterical she sounded. She forced herself to shut her mouth and give herself a moment to calm down. The hate she felt for Nolan was an emotional force greater than any she had ever encountered before. She honestly didn't know how to deal with an emotion so strong, having downplayed her emotional side for years. She had apparentlynow found herself unable to maintain self-control. She couldn't afford this weakness now, not when she knew that people thought she was losing it already, she didn't need to offer any more proof. Her legs started to cramp and she was forced to set down on the couch. The pain in her legs helped to distract her from her hatred of Nolan and allowed her to reassert herself and after a moment she had a better grip on both her voice and her self control. Her pain was shared by Nolan, as she ramped up the temperature. Nolan moaned a long low moan, and then began to scream at Bates, "Stop, stop, please stop, I can't take it anymore" but the bound man continued to issue his grunts and moans with an occasional plea for Bates to stop, and Bates sat less than two meters away and ignored his pleas. Silvia and Wilburn had their own tasks but they watched from the corners of their eyes as the drama played out between bates and her emotions. Nolan didn't really matter, he was only a chip in the game. After several minutes had passed, Bates got to her feet, and with obvious pain in her own face, walked back over to the bound man. Bates stood by Nolan's head "Nolan" she said, "all this hate I hold for you is because of what you did to my grandchild Rita Carlton, she was an inmate at the Piney Beach Camp. Up until now I had thought that you had killed her. That's why I wanted vengeance on you and why I broke some rules to get it." Bates's voice was very soft and low, throaty with her emotion. Eyes as cold and hard as black ice raked across Nolan's naked form as Bates slowly circled the horse. She stopped at his head and continued in that same low deadly voice. "That was when I thought you and your gang had killed her, but now it seems that your boys only tortured her to the extent that she was willing to cut off her hand to escape you and your friends." Karen Bates gripped one of the pieces of tape over Nolan's eyes and ripped it off. Nolan screamed as his eyelashes were ripped out, Bates paid it no mind at all as she bent down to look in Nolan's one eye, and in that same deadly soft voice said. "You think I was willing to play rough to avenge my blood? Wait until you see what I'm willing to do to save her." Bates seemed to be locked into a staring contest with Nolan's one wild and fear filled eye, after several seconds she said. "I want to kill you. I want you and everybody like you to be dead. But, I can't afford to kill you because you have knowledge that I need to be able to save Rita's life. That knowledge is the only value that your life holds and I am only going to make this offer once. You give all your knowledge to my people tonight, work with them to find my Rita, and I will only do to you, what you were going to do to her." "What do you mean?" Nolan had already started to think of himself as being as good as dead, with nothing but suffering separating him from his grave. But now, was Karen fucking Bates offering him a way out? "What do you mean,?" he asked again. "You think about what I said Nolan, and while you're thinking, you do what you can to help my people save my grandchild. You think that you've seen my bad side but you're wrong about that, you been seeing my sad side, because I thought that my Rita was dead. I'm getting ready to unleash my bad side though, you may get to see it soon enough." Bates voice stayed the same, low and sincere, almost like she was talking to a friend. She stood up and walked away. Bates came to where Sylvia and Wilburn were standing and said. "Black, you should make another pot of coffee, it's going to be a long night. " Bates focused on Black, "you'll have a lot of late nights now that you're on our team Mr. Black. Silvia and I are dedicated to the job, we expect no less from you." Turning on her heel Karen Bates said as she walked back toward Nolan , "Make a full pot and don't be stingy with your coffee, make it strong Mr. Black" Nolan watched the tall woman approach with bone shivering dread, and all his reasons for fearing her were confirmed again when he felt the SCM start to heat up inside of his body. While his brain knew that he wasn't really cooking, his nerves conveyed the same signals as if he were, and those signals were in the form of pain. He felt his tissues burning, felt the burn of melted body fat as it drained from his ass. Nolan could actually feel his own body as it was cremated, but the cremation never ended. Nolan was in hell, really in hell, just as the bible described it, everlasting fire and pain. "Please, God, kill me." Nolan screamed the sound loud and harsh in the closed room. And then he started to shake his head and plead "Please, please please kill me. Kill me please" " I'm afraid I'm as close as you'll ever get to God. I will be the last person that you think of before you cease to exist, I'm going to be the one that kills you Nolan." Bates stopped the burning. "I can roast your sorry ass until you lose your mind or I can kill you in a quick and merciful way. You're mine Nolan, your only hope is to tell us everything you know about everybody we ask you about, if you do, maybe I'll let you live. Afterall, you and your friends never intended to kill those girls did you?" Nolan was crying, and he sounded like a whipped child when he answered through his sobs, "no, no, we didn't want to kill anybody." "Why did you take those girls? You had money and there is enough poor people that I'm sure you could've found any number of girls who would've gave you what you wanted for a handful of credits, or maybe even a few containers of food." Sylvia asked but before Nolan could answer he was cut off by Bates. "You should remember that I can cook your ass anytime I think you're not telling us the truth or are holding back. Nolan I got things that I can do to you that you wouldn't believe, but you can take my word for it when I tell you, you won't like them." "It was the feeling of power, being able to know the women would do like you wanted them to. The fact that they couldn't tell us no, no matter what we asked. It was the power." Nolan was still crying but he was able to talk between the sobs and sniffles. Karen walked toward the viewscreen and pointed at the wall with the pipe and handcuffs, "I want to know the names of everybody who worked or lived around this site." Bates turned toward Nolan, "can you see the screen?" Nolan saw the screen and he knew the place. It was where he and the guys used to keep the new girls shackled, naked their hands behind their back chained to the pipe. He could see them in his mind's eye, their young nude bodies, the fear in their eyes as they begged for their lives. Later after they got the SCM's they didn't need the shackles, why would Bates be going there, it hadn't been used in years. His thoughts were rudely interrupted when the SCM in his ass throbbed powerfully and began to expand. "That is Mack's Place, it's over by Perry in north Florida." He felt another jolt as the SCM drew back inside his ass like it was getting ready to jump or lunge forward. "We used to keep the girls there when we first started collecting, but that was several years ago. We haven't done anything there since," Nolan seemed to be trying to remember exactly how long it had been, "must have been ten years before I came to the moon." L.I.T. World Ch. 03 After Wilburn had got the coffee going he had retrieved his phone and was pulling up the list of witnesses from the Rita Carlton listing he had found earlier. They didn't have a person's name where the form asked for the witnesses, rather they listed 'the Parker family', explaining that Rita had lived with the family and they had all witnessed her walking away with two strangers one afternoon. Several of the witnesses reported that she was crying, as they publicly pawed her breast fondled her body. But in the end, she walked out and climbed into their jeep and drove away. Somewhere between the Parkers and Scocum's store Rita lost her clothes. She had been naked and with two men when they got into a boat and sped away in a southeasterly direction, never to be seen since. Wilburn walked to where Karen Bates stood in front of the bondage horse and its unhappy rider. "You might want to see this Ms. Bates," he said as he passed his phone to her. Bates took the phone and scanned the print, handing the phone back to Wilburn "thanks, when the coffees ready tell Silvia I want a cup." Dismissing Wilburn she turned her attention back to the helpless and hopeless Nolan. "What do you know about a family named Parker, lived over in the Piney Beach Area?" Nolan racked his brain but nothing came, yet he was so afraid to tell that to Bates. He couldn't stand that burning sensation it was just to much pain to endure. But he was afraid to lie. "I honestly do not remember that name. I'm sorry, but I don't know them." It seemed to Nolan that the SCM in his ass was quivering in angry indecision. Bates wanted to zap the creep again but she somehow felt that he was telling the truth. "Of the seventy five employees working at the Piney Beach unit how many were involved with your little slavery business?" Nolan gleefully spewed the names, eager to show how co-operative he was," I only dealt with two men, Whitey Banks and his son Shady. I only went there a few times, they lived outside of town, couldn't get to their house by car, had to take a boat up the river for some four or five miles. When we first started to collect the girls we kept them at his place but the trip up the river became so troublesome as we dealt with the larger numbers of girls, that we quit using it and moved into town to the place where you took the pictures." Silvia started to run backgrounds on both men as soon as she heard their names, by the time Nolan had finished, she was getting the first of her results. She put the data up on the viewscreen as it came in where Mistress could see it. Wilburn had went after the Parker family and had found that they ran a boarding house in Piney Beach and that one of their sons, Andrew Parker, nineteen years old, had been missing for four weeks having disappeared without a trace. Realizing that was the time frame that Rita Carlton's hand had been cut, following up he found that Rita and Andrew had went to the same school and knew each other. He sent the info to the viewscreen. Karen Bates watched as the different pieces of the puzzle appeared on the viewscreen. She realized that Nolan couldn't have had anything to do with her Rita, not that he was innocent, no far from it. He had made slaves of young girls and used them for his pleasure then sold them to rich and powerful men. Nobody involved in this shit was innocent but in a strange way Nolan was less guilty. He had never laid a hand on her Rita, she felt sure of that now. "When you got your promotion and were transferred to the moon base, who took over your little slavery business?" Nolan hesitated a moment too long. Karen turned up the heat to a slow burn and walked away leaving Nolan squirming in misery and screaming. She returned with tape and taped over Nolan's mouth, wrapping the tape around his head several times. Nolan noisily tried to suck enough air through his nostrils but found he couldn't get enough. He bucked against his restraints as he sank into a private hell of burning flesh and suffocation. His one uncovered eye seemed to bounce from side to side frantically, his eye tried to scream his plea for mercy, but nobody was looking at him. Karen went to the coffee pot and poured a cup, calling Silvia and Wilburn to join her. They all took their cups and walked down into the conversation pit and took a seat on the couches. Silvia looked worried as she took her mistress's hand in hers," are you alright?" she asked. "Yes. Love, I'm fine, just tired and my legs are killing me. Hell! My whole body hurts, this gravity shit is murder." Karen smiled as she bitched, leaning back and relaxing into the cushions of the couch, seemingly totally unconcerned by the muffled screams and frantic thrashing and bucking of the torture victim two meters away. Silvia got on the floor and took her mistress's leg into her lap and began to rub them, careful not to rub the long frail limb too hard. The younger woman made no attempt to hide the love she felt for her master as she lovingly stroked first one leg and then the other. Wilburn sat facing the two women as one submitted to the loving efforts of the other, but as loving and sweet as that gesture seemed, the muffled screams and whistling sound as Nolan tried to suck air over the tape on his mouth, kind of soured the moment for Wilburn. He felt like he was one of three inquisitors taking a break for coffee while their subject cooked like a pig on a rotisserie. He was an engineer, how in the hell did he find himself in this place, doing this sick shit to a man he knew and had liked. And yet, there is a girl out there somewhere willing to cut off her own hand to be free of men like Nolan. Those men who were most probably looking for the girl now, were set in place by Nolan, and if they hadn't already found and killed her, they soon would. "Wilburn, get all you can on everybody connected to the parker family's business and find out who worked with the Banks, both father and son, when they were keeping the girls at their place. I want to see their place from a drone before sunrise this morning. My name is a big stick, use it how you will to get me my answers. I'm giving you permission to take chances, I'll back you up, even if things don't turn out the way you want. Silvia will help you with a list of people who can help you get things moving up here" Karen Bates stopped speaking for a long moment and then in a softer voice said. "I have to get to Florida, I need to save this child, she is all I have left of my family." Silvia continued to gently massage Karen's small child like leg as she said. "Mistress, how are you going to be able to stand earth gravity if the moon makes your muscles knot up like this? I am so afraid that you are going to push yourself too far if you try to go down to Florida. Please let me go for you." Both love and worry was plain in her voice. "Silvia, dear, help me get to my bed, I just need a little time off my feet and I'll be okay. Wilburn, I'm turning Nolan's SCM off for a while, leave it off as long as he is answering your questions. If not, well I know you are not comfortable with hurting people, but I need you to act like me and force him to tell you what I need to know." She passed a small remote control that had been on Nolan's back to Wilburn, "Use this to make him talk, the more I know about what is happening in Florida, the better my chances of finding my grandchild alive, and I need to know now so I can check the information before I have to act on it." Silvia held her Mistress around the waist, supporting as much of the older woman's weight as possible and started to leave the room when Karen stopped and turned back to Wilburn. "I have listened to you, now you need to listen to me. Somewhere tonight, in the swamps of Florida, my grandchild is suffering through the aftereffects of a do-it-yourself amputation of her own hand, with a hacksaw blade." Karen Bates voice chocked up with emotion forcing her to stop speaking for a moment, "with a hacksaw." she whispered as again the horror of the thought forced her to wait a moment before continuing. "Wilburn, this brave girl is in deep trouble and the only way to save her is to break Nolan, force him to give up friends, betray partners, and loyalties. I know you find this distasteful, but for the sake of my grandchild's life, I am asking you to put her brave innocent life ahead of Nolan's life. Remember the Nolan in the video raping that poor woman that man is the real Nolan, not the man you have come to know since he has been here." Karen stopped for a moment as if in deep thought. "Trust Silvia, let her help you and follow her advice, but between the two of you, we must get results. Silvia and I leave in less then six hours so you have to do what you can tonight, now. We can't wait for Nolan to come around we have to wring what we want from him right now. My grand daughter is dying somewhere and I need to find her." She gave a wry grin to Wilburn when she said, "It may very well kill me to go down there, I accept that I don't mind if it kills me, and I damn sure don't mind if that piece of shit over there dies, just get me what I need to save my girl. Help me save my girl Wilburn." Having finished with what she had to say she nodded to her lover, and with Silvia's silent help Karen Bates went to her room and shut the door. As soon as the door closed behind the two women, Nolan frantically started to try and make enough noise to draw Wilburn's attention, but he needn't have bothered, he already dominated the man's mind. As a matter of fact Nolan was the only thing that stood in the way of Wilburn's happiness. The thought of what was going to happen to the man was bad enough but now to find that he might be the one tasked with inflicting the torture was almost too terrible to consider. Meanwhile Nolan's muffled pleads and trying to thrash about had demanded more air than he could inhale through his partially blocked nostrils, and now he was making that strange whistling noise as he tried to suck air, forcing Wilburn to deal with his dilemma right away. Nolan's one eye locked on him as he walked toward the bound man, fearful yet questioning, like he was unsure of who Wilburn was now. Wilburn found himself wondering about that same question, who was he? What was he? Where did his duties as a righteous man lie, should he oppose Bates over her treatment of Nolan, or should he serve Bates and help her save her injured daughter by torturing Nolan for the information that could save the girl. "I think the question was, who took over your little slavery business when you left to come to the moon? Do you have an answer yet or do you need Bates to ask the question?" Wilburn just realized that he hadn't taken the tape off Nolan's mouth, he couldn't answer if he wanted to. The fact that he cringed just pulling the tape off Nolan's head when it started to pull out his hair was just another thing that proved he was too soft for this job. Nolan knew that Wilburn was the weak link in the chains that held him and he began to work on that weakness. "Wilburn, you know me we were friends, you've got to help me. You can't let them do this to me." Wilburn forced himself to try a sound tough and uncaring when he answered to his old boss. "Nolan, the man I knew, was not a rapist and murderer, I don't think I ever really knew you, not the real you." Wilburn went back to the script, "The question was who took over when you left Florida?" "I don't know, I walked away from all of that when I left for the moon." Nolan was doing a good job of regaining some of his confidence and Wilburn couldn't help but think that it was because he didn't fear him like he did Bates. Just to prove a point he hit the number four button on the remote. The son of a bitch shouldn't have downgraded the risk when he found that the women weren't here. Nolan jerked like he had a power cable shoved up his ass. Wilburn could hear a wet slushing sound as if his organs were being pushed around inside him as the SCM started to rape into his bowels. Wilburn hoped that Nolan would take him more seriously if he seemed to not care about the pain he was inflicting, so he walked away and poured another cup of coffee. He let Nolan suffer through the pain of the violent rape for another couple of long minutes then he pushed the end button. "The question was, who took over when you left the earth?" Wilburn resolved to give the man five minutes on five if he didn't answer this time with the truth. It seemed that Nolan could recognize that Wilburn meant business and when the pain stopped he couldn't talk fast enough. "Whitey and his boy took over, with the boys from the Thomasville correctional and manufacturing center." And Nolan seemed to have broken through what ever barriers he might have had in his mind against giving up his friends. Because he was giving names and locations now as quick as Wilburn could ask the questions, By the time Sylvia rejoined him, Nolan had pretty much painted a big bulls-eye on the Banks, both father and son, and now they were just filling in the blanks with the details that make the difference between success and failure. Karen Bates lay awake watching the view-screen in her mind as the new data filled in the gaps. Her mind making calls, sending instructions and orders to forces here on the moon as well as Europe and North America on earth as well. She looked down on the area, zooming in like the eye of God when something caught her eye. Holding control of so many satellites gave her the power to build a three dimensional holographic representation of whatever she needed to zoom in on for a better view. The ache in her body was such that she could hardly move around the room but with her implants she could view any place on earth like she was standing there in person. Occasionally her eyelid would twitch otherwise she lay motionless on the bed as she sent drones into the bays and up the rivers and streams to attatch themselves to boats at the docks around the area where the Banks lived. Swarms of 'flies' were released over areas to settle and send their views to her. Able to fly and land anywhere, the small robotic drones let her see and hear inside any room she chose and she had chosen as many as the system could handle. Five hundred thousand 'flies' could be released from a single transport drone, so far she had emptied three of them over Perry and the surrounding area. By the time she arrived she would know where to go to find Rita. The men hunting for her grandchild could not hide from her, and once she found them they would realize how serious their mistake was when they decided to go after her family. Judgement day was coming to Florida and Karen Bates would be the judge.