The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive

Alone, without stimulation or hope, it’s hard to find a reason to stay awake. No matter how many times I look over the room there’s no missed opportunity. This prison was made just for me, their silver-haired battery. There’s not a way out.

I rest my head against my shoulder and with a sigh let my eyes flutter shut. With my eyes closed I almost feel comfy. I can almost forget that I’m a prisoner. I can almost forget that as soon as Hope pisses off Lys, and Proximiti is around when she’s not, I’ll be shoved in a closet or worse. Maybe I’ll dream of waking up with Rebeca apologizing for making popcorn before bed and giving me terrible dreams . . .

Aurora! Aurora! Please hear me, please! I don’t know how much longer I’ll have until she notices!

My eyes shoot open wide. Sarah’s voice. I look around desperately, trying again to tug myself free. No one’s there. Beautiful. They’re trying to drive me mad now, too. Poor battery girl tries to fall asleep and you start making her hear her mother’s voice.

If Doctor Lys doesn’t have her, and I can’t be sure she does anymore, and Yana never did . . . what does that leave? I shake my head, and close my eyes again. Maybe a little sleep is all it’ll take to trigger some hidden programming so I won’t need to feel this horrible anymore. I’d rather struggle and break free, but they’re not dumb enough to give me an opportunity anyway. They have me right where they want me.

For just having a relatively short coma, I don’t feel like I’ve had any real sleep in forever. Maybe coma-sleep is like drugged sleep, practically useless but sometimes your body needs it. If I hadn’t fallen into that coma they woulda kept draining me.

Can’t even spark myself to sleep . . .

Aurora! This is your mother! I’m trying to reach out to you through your grandmother’s pendant . . . I don’t know if you can hear me. I don’t know for sure if this is even working. I should have taken Lida up on those magic lessons . . .

Sarah’s voice again, only this time I’m sure I didn’t hear that with my ears. That was a thought, but in Sarah’s voice not mine. She’s not saying anything that’s a “wink wink nudge nudge I’m really your mother” sort of thing, but we never set up anything like that. Even if she can break out of mind control, there are still plenty of ways to put her out of commission and get access to her memories.

Telepaths! That’s why it feels familiar. It reminds me of the few times Psiona spoke into my mind. It could be her now. I really hope it’s not for her sake. She deserves better than being used to drive me to the edge of madness.

To try something else new I push towards my bonds with my feet instead of tearing away. No difference. I have to admit it would be embarrassing to be stuck here so long in a Chinese-Aurora-trap that was leg-activated and not hand-activated, but it’s not something I’d think of very quickly. Or maybe I have, and already forgotten. It feels like I’ve lived a lifetime here, and it hasn’t even been a week if I can trust Proximiti and my sense of time.

I know you can’t respond, it’s okay, I probably wouldn’t hear you anyway. I just . . . wanted to tell you that I love you, and I know what you’re going through. She’s making me watch. You can win. I know you can. Just don’t give up! I know you’ll make me prou-

Like a line going dead, her voice in my head stops. There’s no lingering feelings, or static. She’s just gone. I don’t suddenly feel empowered to tear through my bonds, but that she could have any faith in me at a time like this is a nice feeling. Maybe I’m too trusting, but it really felt like it was her. Doctor Lys has done nothing but tear me down and apart. Building me back up would seem out of character.

This isn’t the sort of hope easily quashed by a single failure.

She said she would be proud of me, but that wasn’t dependent on anything special. As long as I don’t let Doctor Lys crush my spirit, she’ll be proud. I always wanted to make Sarah proud of me. Sarah, and Olivia.

Without any warning the door opens, and I grin. Doctor Lys herself steps in, all alone carrying a clipboard. She raises an eyebrow as she steps in, and marks several things off on her paper. “You’re looking unusually defiant. I can’t say that I care overmuch, since you’ve been neutralized well enough . . . but it is worth noting. Comfortable?”

“Mmhm! I’m thinking of coming back here next year! You know, when you’re rotting away in jail, and no one even remembers your name.” The Doctor doesn’t flinch. That doesn’t make my grin go away. For some reason her lack of reaction is satisfying. Maybe I’m just kidding myself, but as long as I can feel on top for a little bit I don’t especially care. She doesn’t have to like it or beg me to stop.

Pink heels clicking, Doctor Lys moves over to a control panel built into the wall, and clicks a few buttons. She almost seems bored. If she really knows what’s coming I imagine she would be bored. Watching her wear out her wrist with the same up-down checking motion is boring, but the bags under her eyes aren’t. I swear she didn’t have those the last time I saw her.

Maybe she’s just using too much makeup, but that doesn’t seem her style. Either she hasn’t been sleeping, or she hasn’t been sleeping very well. Maybe she’ll make a mistake.

“Cute, Aurora. I don’t particularly care. I used to find you exciting. But since Anachronista tuned me in to your frequency . . . you’re boring. You’re just like everyone else. I know what you’re going to say. I know what you’re going to do. Touching the surface of your thoughts in the softest way tells me more than I’d want to know about what you’ll do next. You can’t stop me from making the future brighter. No one can anymore.” She smiles, and her eyes light up bright as Mom’s – only figuratively. “Usually, when I glance into the future . . . there are so many possibilities.

“I have to follow the streams of time, trace back to what causes which, and manipulate events carefully. Now I see only one. I would waste time explaining everything to you . . . but you won’t be leaving this room so it hardly matters. I was tempted to give you to Rebeca as a pet, but I think I’m starting to see the wisdom in Proximiti’s approach. You’ll fit time-locked in a closet so much more conveniently.”

I grin more. She’s threatening me. You don’t threaten without purpose. Unless her purpose is to make me feel more smug than Tunnel she’s not doing a very good job.

Bound up in this contraption it’s pretty impossible, but I manage as much of a shrug as I can. “You don’t seem to really understand why I’m not defeated, but I’m probably thinking it loud enough, aren’t I?” Doctor Lys nods, and presses another button. “You don’t have my mother – my silver mother – do you? You just took advantage of her disappearance, but you had nothing to do with it.”

“True enough. I never claimed to have her tied up in my basement. I don’t need her. Though, her contributions to my research are no less notable . . . Still, you were the wildcard, and I’ve neutralized you. In fact, I’ve already got you ready to help me without having to rely on mind control.”

“So you’ve sucked up a bit of my power. Big deal. You’re not using it to power this place, and I don’t think you understand it as well as you think you do. How exactly do you intend to get me to help you without mind control involved? I hate you. You’ve hurt my mother, my sister, and me. I know that’s been done before and the people involved have been helpful but you said without mind control. I’ve actually kept my mind in spite of being here entirely too long. The helmet dangling over me hasn’t been pulled down once. Admittedly? I’m disappointed.” I think a little bit too much of what I’m saying is honest for all the wrong reasons, but that’s fine. If I lie she’ll be able to tell anyway.

Doctor Lys shakes her head and sighs. “You know, perhaps it would have been better to find another way to catch you and throw you into a closet to keep you as interesting conversation. As it is, you bore me more than everyone else. Time to show you how you’ll be helping me, dear.”

With a little giggle the doctor presses another button, and checks another box. Nothing happens. Before I can open my mouth to mock her she shakes her finger disapprovingly in my direction. An alarm chimes once, followed closely by a sound a lot like opening a tall metal can of Rock Star. There’s a loud hiss, followed by a loud sucking sound, and then silence.

The four long cylinders along the wall have opened. Not all the way, just enough that the line that seals them all down the middle isn’t perfectly even. After another moment they spread open, and inside . . .

“You bitch! You stupid goddess blighted bitch! You fucking . . . No! You fucking didn’t!” A cold sweat breaks out over my body as I struggle to tear out of the chair. I need to tell somebody. I need to stop her. “You . . . You . . . You’re a monster! You used me to . . . to . . . what the fuck are those?!”

In each of those cylinders stands a perfect replica of me. They’re all metal, looking exactly like I do when I am. Every detail looks perfect. I’ve seen each one of them in the mirror a thousand times. I scream, but I can’t scream loud enough. She sucked my power to give it to them, to power them. A little anger flares at their lack of dress, but all things considered that’s really the least of my worries.

It’d be pretty hard at this point to lose any more dignity.

Doctor Lys smiles, and approaches one of the duplicates. Her fingertips sensually caress along the curve of her cheek, and for some reason I shudder. Her eyes look so focused, so overjoyed and aroused. The Doctor’s eyes, that is – not the duplicate. Her expression is nonexistent. She looks asleep but not in the way a normal person looks when they’re asleep, sweet and peaceful. Her eyes are closed, lips the same. I don’t know what she is, but she looks turned off.

Each duplicate has what look like long wires hanging limply around them. They’re all identical. They’re all me. I’ve never seen anything so . . . so horrifying, so . . .

“Beautiful. The word you’re trying to look for, is beautiful.” Lys melts her lips against the duplicate in front of her’s lips, and feel mine shudder and twitch. “They’re gorgeous, aren’t they? They’re perfect copies. Well, externally.” She kisses it again, and I whimper. It. They’re its. They’re not ‘she’s’. They’re things.

I don’t want to know anymore. I just want to tear the four of them apart and use the remains to make sure Lys never does this to anyone else ever again.

“Awaken, Project Dawn.” All of their eyes open in perfect unison. It’s silent, but it looks like it should be audible the way their eyes flash silver. They all grin the same exact grin I do.

“Good Morning Doctor.” Unison can be sexy. It can also be frightening. This is entirely too far to the latter. Their voice is mine. Their tone is my bedroom voice. Standing idly they don’t look . . . inactive anymore. Their eyelids flutter. They’re leaning back, or to the side. They’re breathing – or at least it looks a hell of a lot like they are. “Project Dawn is active and ready to obey your every desire, Doctor.”

They say the word doctor with orgasmic devotion. They say Doctor the way I used to mewl out Hope when Rebeca had me in bed. I try to struggle, but it’s absolutely no use. I just can’t let them . . . those . . .

Lys laughs, and kisses the duplicate again. This time, the duplicate kisses back. She moans, arching her whole body into the kiss. Her nipples even stiffen. Her thighs shudder the same way mine . . . This feels like way more than just robotic duplication. They look just like me, they sound just like me, they’re moving just like I move!

When the kiss ends, the doctor walks away from my duplicate, and looks right into my eyes. “It is tempting to have them all take me right here with you forced to watch, or at least listen. Or I could just have them take each other, for my amusement. They can feel pleasure, and pain. All of that is of course secondary to their objective to obey of course, but it never hurts to have a woman that enjoys it when you touch her. Aren’t they marvelous?”

“No . . . they’re terrifying! They’re . . . you . . . what the hell are they?!” They look at me, their metal eyes glittering with a hint of intelligence. They seem so alive. “You . . . duplicated me, you . . .”

“Part of the reason it helped to have Hope make your sister forget you. Wouldn’t want her to see one of these and abreact, would we?” Doctor Lys’s smile has such a cruelty to it that I don’t think I’ve ever seen before. It’s pure unrestrained malice from the faint curl to her lips, to the glitter in her eyes. “I had to watch you defeating me time after time after time, Aurora . . . You’ve been the enemy I’ve been working to prepare myself against this whole time. Now that I have you here so defenseless, so defeated, I feel like celebrating.”

My duplicates mewl and move closer to Lys, their identical hands stroking along the curve of her hips, along the small of her back, lips pressing along her neck, to her ears. Their breasts rub against her along with their hips. Lys’s moans make my thighs clench even as the sight makes my sweat feel cooler.

Seeing them touching her makes my skin tingle. I can feel her in my hands, against my hips. My nipples feel like they’re almost metal. It’s hard to focus on anything, feeling like she’s rubbing against me from every angle, like I’m touching her with hands that aren’t mine.

Lys laughs before moaning louder as hands move to cup her breasts, kneading as she squirms and grinds into the touch. “I see you’re noticing the side effect. They’re all infused with your power, Aurora. I might not understand your sparks as well as a witch might, but I do know there’s some part of you in each of them – even more than just the data Rebeca programmed into their solid state drives. Each of them has a little piece of your soul. Such a better use for it, mmm?”

I move my lips to speak, and instead groan as Lys kisses slowly down the neck of one of the duplicates. Her lips feel distant, but warm, soft, comforting in a way I don’t want them to feel. Watching them, feeling them feeling her, feeling each other with lingering fingertips along their identical curves . . .

It’s so hard to think when you’re five people, and four of them are in the middle of a slowly building orgy.

“That glaze your eyes get as you start to lose control is so adorable. It’s one thing you definitely share with your sister. Alas, I have appointments to make, and I’m through gloating. Just a little payback for all of those endless mental defeats.” She’s Insane. I never did anything to her. I never even met her before she set me up to get shot in the chest. Yet I’m also squeezing and twisting her nipples, teasing my hands up along the inside of her thighs as I slide my own legs around one of hers to grind . . . fuck the friction feels so good, even if it’s distant, it’s still firm and irresistible.

Lys curls her fingers around one of the duplicate’s breasts, squeezing firmly, thumbs rolling over her nipples, and I scream. “So very sensitive . . . I think the link is actually getting stronger. Part machine, part golem . . . all obedience. What do you think I should call them? Dawnlings suits me just fine. Does it suit you, girls?”

“Yessss!” All of them moan at once, and I have to bite my lip to resist joining in the chorus. I’m not a robot, not a golem, but something inside of them is calling out to me. It’s quiet and subtle like a faint tide, but it’s so alluring. I could just become one of them so very easily. I’d just be obedient, just letting Doctor Lys command me, use me. It takes more effort to resist than it would take to give in. Struggling against the tug just makes it stronger, makes it feel like it would be easier just to lay back and savor.

I grit my teeth, and try to focus on the bonds holding me down. It’s the only difference between us. They can move. I’m trapped. I struggle, smashing my arms against the bonds to try and to make them lock in place. They don’t stop, nibbling the doctor’s ears, reaching under her top to tease along her bare skin. When one of them finally pulls her clothes out of the way and latches around her nipple I can taste Lys so perfectly.

Her nipple is so warm, soft and . . . no! I bite my lip hard as I can, whimpering at the feeling of both my teeth and her breast against my lip. I shake my head, but neither go away. One of the duplicates grabs her ass, and I can feel it in my hand. It’s sensory overload. If they’re feeling the same thing, I don’t know how they can process it.

They move so gracefully and hungrily, kissing, touching, grinding . . . I can feel Lys’s leg between my thighs, and it feels better than fighting. There’s more of them than me, more of their sensations and desire than my resistance. It’s just a matter of time, I can’t really hold out. Even if I was unshackled I think I’d just slump to my knees and try to rub my face along Lys’s leg.

“Then I’m afraid, Aurora . . . I’ve gotten all the satisfaction I’ll get from you. Dawnlings, it’s time to reprogram Mommy.” The robo-golem things all freeze, and turn to look at me with such delighted grins. They walk towards me, smoothly with seductive back-and-forth to their hips.

Dawnlings . . . it’s such a perfect name for them. Two curl up against me on either side, stroking along my cheeks. It’s so strange to feel your own face through someone else’s hands but it feels so good. I wish I could reciprocate. They look so soft.

“Nighty night!”

“We’ll see you soon.”

Reaching past me the other two grab the helmet suspended from the ceiling and pull it down over my head. The visor swims to life with shifting and twisting colors. I just moan as reality drips away.

“You came in a little too early, Sylvie. It’s not a race.” Nikki rolls her eyes, flicking her silver pick off of my nose. “Your rhythm is all off. I know it’s a big day for you and all, but you need to focus. You’re still kinda new at this whole six-string thing.”

I’ve been off all day. It’s really not fair to the rest of the girls. Even Heather looks impatient. “Sorry . . . You’re right, you’re right. Just feel kinda not all here, but I’m really not sure . . . why? I mean I’m excited, don’t get me wrong . . .”

Tasha nods with a little smile, sliding her fingers along the keys playfully. “You’ve been kinda out of it the past couple days. Maybe you should go see your girlfriend. Beca always seems to be able to get a good set out of you. Maybe she could distill her dark secret. Imagine the kinda music we could put out with that pumping through all of us.”

Leigh raises an eyebrow, and taps a perfect beat with her foot and the bass drum. “I think we all went through that with Corvi, remember? Maybe she just needs to see Miss Cotton. She helped me when my timing was off.”

Rebeca isn’t doing that to me, but she does have that sort of effect. Whenever I see her I feel so motivated, so focused, so driven, so . . . Damn it. I hate when the girls are right when they’re teasing me. Poor Tasha turns pale, muttering out an apology softly under her breath before trailing her fingers across a few more keys. Sometimes I swear she could communicate using just her keyboard.

Someone else mentioning Miss Cotton makes me really tempted to pay her a visit. Whoever she is, she’s gotta be good at what she does.

Something in Nikki’s eyes looks wrong. I set down my guitar – that still desperately needs a name – and put my hand on her shoulder. Her eyes widen, and a bit of their glassy expression fades. She was a thousand miles away. She wasn’t when she told me to focus. She was the one who noticed how early I was.

My forehead pulses with a subtle pain, and I grit my teeth for a moment, trying to block it out, to fight past it, to . . .

“Sylvia, you feelin’ okay? You look a little confused.” Nikki’s hand is on my shoulder. Why did I think mine should be on hers? Something just around the edges feels wrong but . . .

“I . . . I think maybe I should go see Miss Cotton. My heart just isn’t in it right now. Sorry, I promise I’ll get my head screwed on a little tighter before I come back. Don’t stop practicing on my account!” Thank Athena that I remember where Miss Cotton’s office is. I don’t know how I’d know, but I do.

Going through the metal maze I find my way to her door and almost knock as it slides open on its own. Why any of the doors here would require knocking is beyond me. My brain is feeling frazzled. I just don’t feel all there, that’s all. Miss Cotton will be able to help, I hope.

The inside of her office is simple, but effective. There’s a small bookshelf, a picture of Midas City on the wall, a desk, and two chairs. The chair on the far side of the room is the kind with a very tall back. She’s always here. I don’t know why I know. Have I visited her in the past two days without remembering it? I feel like there’s a lot of things I’m not remembering. It’s hard to be sure.

I take a seat. It feels entirely too familiar. “Miss Cotton, I’ve been having bad thoughts. Please make them go away.”

My forehead hurts when I say it, but I don’t know why. I don’t know why I used those words. Something about that is so wrong, so . . . her chair spins around. Miss Cotton has long pink hair that hangs loose over her face and falls limply over her shoulders. Her crystal blue eyes look empty and hollow. Her white-and-pink pinstripe powersuit looks so out of place on her. She looks like she might be thirty or forty tops, but sixteen at the same time.

There’s some sort of device over her forehead. It looks like a mechanical bandana, like some sort of transmitter.

It flashes pink, and my mind overflows with giggles. I just start giggling, and I can’t stop. I try, but I can’t. I try to get out of the chair but I can’t. Miss Cotton’s empty expression is locked with mine, and all I can do is giggle, and giggle.

Giggle, giggle, giggle . . .

Nice and pink . . .

Candy for a brain, don’t need to think, just a yummy candy-coated toy . . .

Giggles wash the bad thoughts away! Just want to giggle all day . . .

I walk out of Miss Cotton’s office a little fuzzy, but amazingly refreshed. I don’t remember all of what she said, but I know they were things I needed to hear. With a giggle, I head off to find my absolutely super cute girlfriend who always wants to make the world a better place.

Rebeca really is entirely too too smart for me, but so far it doesn’t seem like she’s noticed. Maybe being a rock star of sorts puts me in anyone’s league by default.

Everything is so . . . clean here. The walls and the floors practically sparkle. Whenever I walk down these halls I feel on the verge of epiphany, but I can’t figure out why. Right around the edges of everything there’s something I can’t quite touch.

It isn’t that I should be looking for Mom. She’ll be fine. She always is. Doctor Lys said she assigned someone a little less personally invested to the case.

Yesterday, when Rebeca and I visited Kelly’s hotel room she wasn’t there. Mourning Frost had been moved to another hospital. Someone probably has them both, but Doctor Lys will find them. She can see the future. Talking to her is almost worrying. She knows what I’ll say before I say it, so I just stopped talking and nodded when I was about to open my mouth. It makes her smile, and respond. Am I changing the future, or is she a telepath, too?

Rebeca is alone in her lab, typing away on her keyboard. She’s wearing her tight second-skin Hope outfit without the mask. Seeing her in that uniform always makes me feel weak in the knees. It’s strange to see her as Hope without the blonde hair, but her wig is on a plastic head in the middle of the room.

She must not have heard me enter. I wasn’t trying to be quieter than normal, but the doors were silent. She has two widescreens in front of her, each with windows largely full of text. Neither of them make any sense to me. A white pen dangles from her lips. It looks so adorably out of place, bouncing faintly as she types faster than I’ve ever seen anyone type in my life.

“Just a little more . . . Then we can push this update . . . can get everything with her sister taken care of . . . Everything changes with the force of less than a gigabyte . . .”

“Boo.”

“Holy fuck!” Rebeca screams, and the pen falls to the floor. Her fingers click something almost too fast to see, and an image of Symphonic Nebula fills her screens. She spins in her chair, and her bulged enough to pop out of her head eyes stare into mine. “Sylvie! Nebby! Holy . . . fucking . . . Don’t do that to a girl when she’s coding! Thought you were Prox or Lys or . . . Not that any of them seeing me code should freak me out but . . . it’s instinct!”

If someone walking in on me practicing a melody didn’t startle me twice as much, I might be the slightest bit concerned. As it is, I just roll my eyes and lean down to plant a kiss on her forehead. She’s still breathing like it’s going out of style, but at least she’s breathing.

Something looks off about the picture on her screen. I remember posing for it, but it’s still wrong. It has me in front, with Nikki and Heather behind me, and Leigh and Tasha behind them. Something seems wrong about the way I’m standing, or my expression, or . . .

Rebeca brings me back to reality with a kiss to my lips. “Sorry, sorry sweetie. I really didn’t mean to sneak up on you. I was just bombing practice because I couldn’t get you out of my head.” Rebeca frowns, and starts to take in a breath to speak with before I interrupt her. “Don’t worry, our relationship isn’t affecting my music. Everyone has off days. If it were a concert I’d be hitting every note. I just kept coming in too early on ‘Starlight Serenade’ and I thought Nikki was going to hit me if I did it one more time.”

Nikki would have every right, too. I was the one who convinced them we needed to join the project. If being so close to Rebeca all the time screws with the band, it’s me to blame. The odd way it just fit to compare Rebeca to Nina . . . I don’t think I’ll mention that.

Must just be because she’s a hypnotic superhero. Mom is one, too and that doesn’t make her anything like Corvi. Hell, I’m one of those.

“Happens with coding, too. Some times I sit down to finish up a program and instead of calls I just remember song lyrics sung in your oh-so-memorable voice.” Rebeca grins, and rubs her nose tenderly against mine. She has such pretty eyes. A girl could lose herself in those . . . so blue. They make my heart flutter, in a way that almost feels familiar.

Our fingers lace, and we squeeze each other’s hands like a gentle hug. The calluses on my tips from the guitar are tougher than hers from constant typing, but in a way we match. We fit together. We both want to make the world a better, happier place. Shared goals, shared methods . . . this feels so right. I could spend the rest of my life with her, singing whenever she wanted me to even if I didn’t have an audience.

She pulls her hand away, and traces her fingers down along my hip. After a gentle little tug, I end up in her lap, wiggling close as I can. Taking a deep breath, I exhale a long, melodic “la” as sweetly as I can before leaning in closer to kiss her ear. She shudders, and I can feel her nipples stiffening through her bodysuit. Her uniform is so secret agent, but a secret agent could never get away with wearing white. My mother is not a good influence if you ever intend to make use of stealth.

I tease my fingertips down along the curve of her breast, giving a very faint little squeeze. “So, this is the big update, huh? I heard just a little of what you were saying. You must be so excited. I know I am . . . After the concert, after the update . . . The whole world is going to be a brighter place, for everyone.”

Moans as musical as my voice fill the air when my fingertips tease over her nipple. She’s so incredibly sensitive, and a little bit of my nebula never hurts. “A much, much better place . . . Mmm being a part of that . . . Oh, are you trying to give me an association of you making me feel all weak and drippy with making the world a better place?”

“Mmm, hadn’t occurred to me. I’m just horny. I’d lie and say I wasn’t always so ravenous, but we both know that’s not true. I want you, bad, just like I always do. Let me pull you away from your work?” A little self-control can go a long way. It’s so hard to resist just grasping her nipple and giving a hard twist, a nice slow tug, and fill her with so much of my power she won’t be thinking or making a sound more coherent than a moan for a week. She’s so amazing, so hot, so . . . my every fantasy.

“Wish I could, sweetie. Sorry, you know how much I love it, but this needs to be done. It’s taking a little more time than I thought . . . I’d explain it, but it would take an hour for any of it to make any sense and I really need to work. Sorry. Why don’t you go see Counter, or Psiona? They should be free.”

Everyone in this place is so happy to share their body, myself included, that it’s hard to get very offended at the suggestion. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t piss me off at least a little. “I think I’ll just uhm . . . I don’t know. That sounds all right, I just kinda wanted you. Is it okay if I just waited in your room until you’re done? I can just take a nap if you’ll be busy for awhile. I just kinda wanna be around you, smelling you, feeling you, and I know hugging up to you while you work doesn’t work.”

We tried it just the once. Not even taking my distracting body into account, she types a third as fast with arms around her.

Plus, and she’d never admit this, talking to herself with no one around to hear helps her focus. She doesn’t talk to anyone specific, she just talks. The first time I saw it I had to ask if she had an imaginary friend I should be worried about. If she did, I think she’d spend more time in her virtual world making out with her instead.

“Fine with me. If you wanna play around with the glasses, they’re on my nightstand. If you aren’t there when I’m done, I’ll come find you. Really sorry baby, but if this doesn’t get done, your concert doesn’t go off the way it should, the plants don’t have the effect they need to have . . . fifty thousand things fall apart if I miss a comma.” Rebeca actually sounds worried. She’s not so egotistical and overconfident that I’d think she believes she’s perfect, but I’ve never heard her sound so . . . concerned. “I promise after this update is done . . . I’ll fuck your brains out.”

With a grin I arch as close to her as I can, and melt my lips into hers. Her body is so warm, so soft, so tender and smooth against mine. She feels so warm. It’s so hard to think about anything but her and . . . for some strange reason the word colors keeps coming to mind, colors, silver and purple.

At least a minute later I pull back and wink. If her breathing has finally calmed down, I think that ruined it. “Sounds good to me. I’ll go hang out in your room, maybe give the glasses a spin, maybe do some solo practice . . . and I’ll hold you to that promise!”

She turns back to her screens with a little sigh, waving back at me as the pictures fade, replaced again with two windows of code. With a shrug I head to her room, taking my time in the clean corridors. Something about this reminds me of another similar facility, but one I know I never visited. I never saw where Hope and the gang used to hang out when they were just about to go off heroing. I never got to ride on the back of her motorcycle.

The wall cushions my fall as a dizzy spell pulls my legs out from under me. I look behind me, and blink. I wasn’t this far down the corridor a second ago. I just blacked out, and kept walking. Only the nasty bruise forming on my head pulled me out of it.

Everything feels wrong. The way I felt in practice was wrong. The way I’m feeling now feels wrong. My fingers feel too long. My legs feel too slender. My hair feels too long. Miss Cotton helped me relax, but that didn’t fix everything.

Rebeca’s room is close enough that I feel safe stumbling there leaning against the wall. There are cameras everywhere. People must be too busy to notice me. Or, I do this a lot and don’t remember it. There have been these odd little gaps lately. A lot of people seem to just blink a lot around here and then carry on like nothing is wrong.

Something big is happening all around me. I’m a part of it, but I’m just a cog. A cog can’t tell what it’s a part of, it just knows it’s spinning out of control. I’m a cog in the middle of Rebeca’s rod, twisting things around me without really feeling them. It all feels so good when I can’t notice, but then something feels off and it all crashes down until I see Rebeca again. And then she pushed me away and it didn’t do the trick like it normally does.

My forehead tingles. It tingles right where that pain was coursing before Prox was there and stopped it. I don’t know what it was, but right now it’s hard to believe she helped without doing something else. Something in my head pulses, almost sizzles, but dissipates before it can do anything else. I’m disappointed without knowing why.

Her room is so bright, but the light switch fixes that. My eyes hurt. My ears hurt. Everything feels like too much stimulation. My skin feels too sensitive. It should be harder. I shouldn’t have been so easily bruised by the wall, even if I did slam into it with all the force of a narcoleptic jogger.

I flick the light off in her bedroom and prop myself up against the sink. My head won’t stop spinning. I should be leaning over the toilet and not the sink, but I’m not sure I could stand again if I let myself go down, and it feels very important that I stay standing. If someone finds me on my knees and doesn’t want to let me up, I won’t be able to fight them right now. My powers feel all wrong. They feel smoother, warmer. They should be harder, sharper.

My hair is really way too long. It keeps brushing against my face in ways unfamiliar, but I haven’t had my hair cut short since I was thirteen.

My nails are too long. I can’t stop picturing how silly they’d look protruding from fingerless leather gloves. I could never pull those off. Nikki could. Maybe a memory of wearing a pair of hers after getting a little tipsy? Nikki never lets me drink. She never lets me do anything like that. She’s always trying to protect me.

She’s always . . . loved me . . .

Talking to Pamela on the phone, telling her about the new guitar track Nikki laid down when I’m on my way to a crime-in-progress. She loves status updates. She insists Nikki and I make a better couple for the paparazzi. She insists that even when she’s fucking me. I love it when she fucks me. I love it when Nikki fucks me. I love it when I make her pin me down and almost rape me, because it reminds me of her.

Fire courses down my spine, starting at my forehead. Pain burns through my fists, and I punch them down against the porcelain to feel more solid and stop my knees from giving out. I’m not with Nikki. I haven’t been with Nikki for awhile. When I came back to find Mom, back from New York, I . . .

Laying in bed, someone is with me. I can’t remember her face. I can’t look at her face. She keeps looking away. She’s so sad. Holding me. Her embrace is softer than mine, gentler than mine, but she’s the bigger one. It feels nice to be small against her, but I haven’t felt small like I do in this memory since I was in Valerie’s lap as a little girl. She whispers something that sounds like sister, and runs to get the phone. It’s Rebeca, for me, and . . .

“Fuck!”

My knees slam into the doors under the sink on my way down, and I only barely move my head in time to spare myself another bruise. I keep getting these flashes, they feel like flashes, but so real. They feel like I shouldn’t be remembering them. They feel incomplete.

I’m learning to play the guitar, and my fingers are bleeding. Nikki kisses them, and them presses my finger down to the fattest string. She tells me to slide my hand all up and down the neck, to make them bleed more, to get it over with. She says that’ll make it easier, that I can’t turn to metal, but I can get a little more metal. She’s smiling like she’s sorry, but I can’t remember why I started crying. She tells me it’s okay I miss her. It feels like she should have said it’s okay to miss me. I can remember an old girlfriend Sarah had, but that’s not right, that’s . . .

Cold sweat sliding down my back makes me shiver. I want to scream for whoever has the chattering teeth to wrap themselves up in a blanket before I realize it’s me. I pull myself up to my feet with the counter top, but I don’t look into the mirror. For some reason it scares me. I came in here to splash water on my face. That’s what I was thinking, or not thinking, anyway.

From the corner of my eye, I can tell the reflection is all wrong. Everything aches. I bite my lip and grit my teeth. I need to get it over with. The answer to everything is in the mirror. I look up to see myself, and scream.

Long purple-and-silver hair. Purple-and-silver eyes. Pale, milky skin. Purple-and-silver lips. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong! I should have red hair. Reddish, anyway. Brown. Auburn. Brown eyes. Brown eyes, or silver eyes. I’m too tall. I’m all wrong. I’m not . . . but I’m . . .

I slam my fists into the mirror as hard as I can, and scream when the glass cracks under my skin. It should have shattered like the window I punched did.

Only, that wasn’t me.

In the mirror, I can see a cracked reflection of who I should see. Darker skin, chrome lips, red hair, or silver, it’s hard to tell, brown and silver eyes both at once. Who she was, who she is, who I . . . I clutch my hand against my chest. It’s bleeding, but only a little. I can pull out the glass in a minute. This is important. This means everything. “Who . . . who do I think I am, and who is Aurora?”