For A Brighter Future
Chapter 11: Illusions and Reality
“Aurora . . . Aurora . . .” My hand feels a lot better without glass sticking out. Rebeca’s bathroom has some pads and gauze. I almost feel like a martial artist with wraps around one hand. It’s almost enough to make me punch the mirror again to even out.
Someone has to know who Aurora is. Psiona has to know. I leave the bathroom, and glance over at the glasses on Rebeca’s nightstand. I’m tempted to smash them. They’re so expensive, but something screams they’re impossibly dangerous. I can’t do something so reckless without knowing why. I have to keep some modicum of sanity even if I feel anything but.
Back out in the corridors, I move faster than before. I try my hardest to look like I’m supposed to be doing this. Valerie always said to carry a clipboard, but I don’t have time to find one and Lys would be insulted by the impersonation. Besides, she can see the future. She could see me doing this if she didn’t want me to, but obviously she doesn’t mind.
Every hallway looks the same. Every hallway is too perfect. No one stops me, and a few others pass me by. I wave to the flower girls carrying potted plants. I don’t stop. This is too important.
When I get to her room, I slam on the open pad over and over and over. It doesn’t respond. I reach up and knock, calling out without screaming. It’s remarkably hard to do. “Psiona! I need to talk to you. It’s very important. It’ll only take a minute. You’ve gotta be awake. Come on. Be in there. Please. Open up.”
On the tenth try, the door finally opens. A mousy looking brown-haired girl is standing in the doorway. She’s shorter than I remember Psiona being when we met. She’s also a lot less a redheaded sex goddess.
“Sylvia? What’s wrong? I’m not a very good nurse if it’s your hand. I was taking a nap. I’m going to be very busy for tomorrow from noon until . . . Doctor Lys isn’t sure when I’ll get to take a break. I have a few places to be at once. I really do need to nap.” She has bags under her eyes that almost make me tempted to make a pun that her bottom eyelids must get tired holding them up.
“Psiona. This is about tomorrow. This is all about tomorrow. Can I come in? I promise I just need a few answers to a few questions and then you can go back to sleep. I’ll even help if you need it.” Even if my power feels off, I can still use it. If she doesn’t let me in, I’ll have to. I’ll go insane if I don’t get some answers.
Her eyes quiver. She’s about to say no. I just know it. I try not to look too eager, or force my way in. A security guard walks by behind me, her legs scissoring past almost robotically. I can’t let the tears in my eyes fall. No one cries here. No one shows any negative emotion here. That would tip her off. It would tip everyone off. I don’t know why I’m afraid of this place. It’s a project to make the world better, but I’m terrified.
She sighs, and slouches. Taking a deep breath she holds out her arms, and . . . grows. Her legs and body stretch, as her hair grows, her chest expands, and the clothes draped over her change from pajamas into a charming blue dress just translucent enough to tease without showing the super model body underneath. “Come on in. Sorry, I’ve been looking like a lot of different people lately. It’s been more natural to let the illusion slip when I fall asleep. Didn’t used to be. I don’t know why it is now.”
The hint of fear in her voice is the same I heard in mine. She knows something is wrong, too. Pallas, she knows! I don’t know how much she’s aware of it, but she knows.
I step in, and sigh as the door closes behind me. Cameras are in her room, too. I don’t know if there’s any audio, but I’d be surprised if there wasn’t. Sarah looked into filling our apartment with them until Valerie made the argument she mumbles some embarrassing things in her sleep that any arch nemesis would love to hold over her head. It didn’t help that her daughter was fiercely against the idea.
There was a sexual reason behind it, but I can’t remember. It has something to do with the faceless girl holding me in bed. I don’t know what.
“Aurora. She’s the reason I’m here. I don’t know who she is, but I think . . . I think I think I’m her. Or I’m really her, thinking I’m Sylvia. I don’t know her last name. I only know what she looks like, or what I think she looks like. I know we . . .” Considering I let her suspend me in midair, tear off my clothes, and fuck me using her mind, it’s pretty silly that I’m blushing. That doesn’t stop it. “Fucked. Or loved each other. I don’t know. I think I loved her. Or I am her and she loved me. I’m so fucking confused, Psiona.”
“Aurora . . .” Psiona’s eyes glaze for a moment, and she half falls before her legs stiffen, and she regains her posture. “Sorry, I’m not sure I know what you’re talking about. Could you say that again? I . . . can’t really remember. This happens a lot. Especially lately. Doctor Lys’s therapy sessions are helping me feel better about myself, but they leave me so confused, so aroused, so . . . And then I see Miss Cotton and . . .”
Her nipples stiffen under her illusory dress. She could make herself look however she wanted. Does she want me to see her aroused, or is it subconscious? What the hell did those two do to her? It doesn’t matter. I have to focus on Aurora, and whoever she is.
I think I’m Sylvia. I’m the girl on the posters, the girl who can sing and play guitar. That has to be me. Right?
“Aurora. Her name is Aurora. I know you know her. Somehow. She talked about you. That’s why you were familiar when we met. You have to remember her.” I step a little closer, just in time to catch her as she falls forward with fluttering eyes. “Psiona, come on, you need to remember . . .”
She whimpers, and nuzzles into my chest. Her body is so warm, and even though I know how she really looks, she feels so different. Her breasts against me are so full, and her long red hair is definitely real under my fingers. She is definitely very powerful if all of this is just a mental trick. I don’t think anything I’ve ever done is half as impressive, and that includes the set we pulled off down at the park.
Her eyes look up to mine, fluttering and struggling to stay open. “Thinking that name . . . Makes it hard . . . Hard to . . . To think about . . . That name . . . Makes it hard . . . Good girl for Lysssss . . . Chip in my head . . . Can’t fight it . . . Too weak . . . Can’t mind-over-matter something that matters so much . . .”
“That how it is, huh? You’ve got the same problem I had. I’ll help. Just relax . . .” I slide my fingers along her cheek and caress until she stops quivering long enough to rest her head smoothly against my chest. Her breathing slows, shuddering faintly for a moment as I first start to trail along the curve of her ear, but then she settles back down. Mom always told me that the sparks in my heart keep a very even, almost mesmerizing heartbeat. Hopefully, Psiona agrees.
Smooth, velvety mist and sparks slide from my finger, trailing my heat along the curve of her ear, and down inside. Her eyes widen for a moment before melting all but shut, her lips parting in a slow delicate whine.
Sometimes the direct route is the best, and pushing my power right to her brain is a lot quicker than grabbing between her legs. The slickness might lubricate the process, but I think that’s just me hunting for an excuse to reach under her dress. She wouldn’t need to remember that part.
Sssylvia . . . Feels so good . . . So warm . . . Can feel her power inside of me . . . Want to tell . . . Can’t remember long enough to . . . Rora . . . Sister . . . Can’t believe she raped her, that they . . .
A flash of vivid imagination, of that girl from the mirror pinning me down, tearing off my clothes, is impossible to ignore. She raped me? She’s my . . . my sister?! That explains the silver and the auburn, but I . . . it does explain why Chlora and Flora being kissing sisters seemed so logical to me. It makes sense, but it’s not the answer I was expecting to find.
I don’t know what I’d want to find. I’d prefer this wasn’t some creepy plot to hide something from me, but that’s impossible at this point. Someone doesn’t want me to remember who Aurora is, what Aurora is . . .
“That’s it sweetie . . . Don’t talk, just think. Images, words, sounds, colors, tastes . . . you don’t need to worry about it making sense. If it makes sense to you it’ll make sense to me.” This bond is so much easier than it was to make before I found out the truth about Quillspawn. Trying to use that power like she uses hers is so much easier. I can dip right into the font of her mind. I don’t need to pretend it’s a happy accident anymore.
My power dives deeper, and I can feel it sizzling across tender places that control this kind of thought and this kind of thought. For a moment all I can sense are my colors, and I pull them back from her vision centers, or what must be her vision centers. I really need to take more psychology courses.
Her nipples stiffen more against me. Her thighs clench harder. She feels so warm, so fragile against me, but so powerful underneath. Even with her arms dangling at her sides, knees weak, and only my one arm around her, I know there’s no way she could let herself fall.
Sister . . . Electrum . . . Heroine . . . Was Rebeca’s girlfriend . . . good for her . . . then . . . Tunnel . . . In my car . . . Didn’t know she’d left things . . . Probably never stopped fucking me . . . Always loved me taking different forms . . . Probably never stopped fucking Hope either . . . Miss Flora . . . Love her . . . Seen everyone here but Aurora . . . Know she’s here . . . Visited the police as her, the hospitals as her . . . No one tells me why, just how to say, and what to say . . .
Vivid images . . . such vivid images, of Aurora, dressed all in nice tight black, of Flora’s bare green body . . . Eyes, dark eyes, hidden behind sunglasses that slid down . . .
Aurora told me that. I know she told me about that. She was the woman on the bed, only I was holding her. She wasn’t holding me. Something’s wrong in my head, but at least if I focus, and if I pour more of my magic into Psiona’s open mind to strengthen the images, it’s easier to force logic through.
Such hot images of her in Lys’s office. She goes in looking like this, blue dress, red hair, full-figured. Then the doctor commands her to drop the facade a piece at a time, like she’s a stripper or losing a game of strip poker. Always the hair first. Then the dress. Then her height. Then her face. Then her breasts, only after the doctor is done handling them.
Trapped in Miss Cotton’s office, strapped down, those hollow soulless eyes staring into hers. She can’t stop the transmission from the headset, and the giggles are overwhelming. It’s hard to keep up her illusions when it’s so hard to think. It’s so emotionally painful, so gut wrenching, and they make her laugh through it. Every time a little more of her feels smoothed away.
Not just able to see the future . . . she can read minds. Weakly. She can whisper into them too. Whispering into Psiona’s such dirty thoughts, such obedient images, making Psiona touch herself with her power, making her touch Lys . . . making her look like Aurora . . . making her look like Sarah . . . Making her look like The Domina . . . My Sarah . . . Using her on the others . . . Using her on Valerie . . .
Valerie is here! They have Valerie!
Doctor . . . Pretty Doctor Raine . . . Used to love being a robot, but Doctor Lys didn’t want a robot. She wanted to make her fragile, weak . . . Took her mind, made me help . . . Stripped her down . . . Dressed her in a pink dress covered with glittering butterflies . . . made her fit the dress, made the dress fit her . . . then fucked her still wearing it, was going to use her as a tool against Aurora . . . going to use Sylvia to pacify her once the programming sticks . . .
The dress is adorable, and so out of place on Valerie. Her bust held back with gauzy glittery pink is so adorable, and so mouth watering. Seeing her moan and writhe, giggling over twenty years younger as she bucks and whimpers at Lys’s hand between her legs, up under her dress . . . She’s using her, using Psiona, using me.
Something is planned for the concert. Rebeca’s programming, the flower girls’ plants, Psiona’s multiple appearances, Aurora’s lack of one, they’re all connected. She isn’t dead, she’s being used somehow, just like us.
If I could just figure out how.
Proximiti . . . and Hope . . . Building something for Aurora . . . Special just for her . . . Know the room . . . Number forty-seven . . . Building something else, Counter Spell, don’t know what. Can’t think when they look at me. When they look into my eyes. They tell me to look how they want me to look, and then they take me. Pushing me against a wall, tearing off my clothes, making me fall to my knees and use my mouth. It always feels so good. It’s my purpose. It’s always been my purpose. Nothing before that, even if I can remember, it’s just to make my purpose stronger, more irresistible!
Drugs, programming, whatever they’ve done to her is too strong. She said something about a chip . . . I won’t be able to override that. I don’t know enough about tech, and besides, Sarah never had good luck with technology. Something about it always tending to explode . . .
“I’m going to leave you here, okay sweetie? I’m going to leave you here on the nice comfy couch. I need to find Aurora, and save her before it’s too late. She has all of the answers to this, and then all of us can get out of here. All right sweetie? Can you stay here and be a good girl for me?” If anyone finds her I’m found out, but I can’t make her snap right back. I can’t make it so she won’t stumble and moan, not with so much coursing through her brain.
Mmmm . . . Okay . . . Find Aurora . . . Find me . . . Watch out for . . . Ana . . . White eyes . . . Stops everything, stops time, stops the world . . .
A flash of a face fills my vision just as I start to move, and I almost drop Psiona to the floor. Whimpering, I hold her a little tighter, and move to the couch before carefully setting her down. “You just rest sweetie . . . I’m going to go find my sister. My sister . . . who has a lot to answer for. You just stay here and feel good . . .”
I pull back my hand, and blink at my fingertip feeling just a little wet. It doesn’t feel wet like ink, and it looks shiny and clear. Hopefully if Singularity is still around in my head as a separate entity she’s chipping away at whatever is holding my memory back.
Laying back, Psiona squirms and moans. Her skirt rides up past her thighs, and her pale milky sex is bare and slick. I wish I had time to tease that cute slit of hers until it overflowed. She smells so divine, and her moans are so thigh-clenchingly good, but I really have something I need to do. “Sorry sweetie, I’ll be back soon as I can!”
She doesn’t object, just writhes, and lets her hands slide along her body.
Something feels weird about running to save Aurora from a super villain conspiracy, but it also feels incredibly right. I love her. Even if she raped me, I know I still love her, and that’s all that matters. I run to room forty-seven, and don’t look back.
“Aurora, you’re here! That means Project Dawn must be well under way. How exciting! You’re going to help make the world such a brighter place!”
Rebeca’s voice is the last thing I want to hear right now. Everything is so bright I can’t see. I know it’s clever to make someone’s strength ripped away into a weakness, but that doesn’t mean I can’t get sick of the cliché. My eyes are tired of being a weak spot.
The light dims, turning from a car’s high beams right in the eyes to the light of a starry night with no visible moon. I’m on a rooftop, dressed in the Silver-Girl-inspired uniform that Rebeca made for me. I know this rooftop. It was the one Mom took me to when she first told me I could become a heroine, and she’d even help, as long as I waited until graduation so I’d have time to make up my mind before getting myself in trouble like she did.
Rebeca is there, but it’s not quite Rebeca. She’s not dressed as Hope. She’s dressed in a powersuit, complete with a black jacket, and a powder blue shirt underneath. It strikes me as familiar, but I can’t figure out why.
“How do you like it? This is a virtual simulation. You’re not really here. I’m not even real. I’m a construct that Rebeca wrote based on herself. This whole program has actually been written around your brain and all that time you spent wearing her fun little helmet. You should be proud you had so much to contribute to society.” The fake Rebeca smiles down at me, and offers me a hand. It’s only now I realize I’m laying on the rooftop. “Let me help you up. That can’t be comfortable.”
“Why even program discomfort?” I take her hand, and she starts to pull me up. When I’ve almost got a steady footing she lets go of my hand, and shoves me onto my back. “What the hell?!”
My metal can’t protect me when it isn’t real. My back aches from the fall. Her hands push down on my shoulders before she straddles my hips. “Why program anything at all, Aurora? I’m here because you’re dangerous. Being Aurora is dangerous. So we’re going to change who you are. We’re going to make you just as obedient as those machines. Even locked in a closet, you’re more useful obedient and broken. I’m only doing this to protect you.”
I reach up and try to tear her hands off of me, but she’s so strong. Her grasp doesn’t even budge, and my sparks aren’t real here either. Nothing is real here, but that doesn’t fix anything.
“Everything here is more real than anywhere else, Aurora! You should know that better than anyone. The mind makes things real. Reality is something external being made real through observation. That doesn’t make it more real. This is real because it’s being fed right into your mind directly. It’s code being interpreted and made real by your brain.” She grabs my wrists with one hand, pushing them both down against the rooftop with a grip stronger than steel. “You’re on the same rooftop. Everything is the same. Perfectly the same.”
“Being the same as reality doesn’t make it real! Just because it’s my mind making it, that doesn’t make it real!” Struggling only grinds the roof against me. I can’t win against her, not here. It might be my mind, but it’s her turf.
She laughs, and gazes into my eyes. I know I should look away, but they’re not Rebeca’s eyes. They’re Sylvia’s eyes, the same beautiful silver-and-violet eyes I fell in love with. Staring into them reminds me of so many countless times, just gazing into her eyes, letting her hold me, doing whatever she wanted, however she wanted it.
I stop struggling, and just bask in her gaze. Sylvia’s gaze . . .
“That’s right, Aurora. You can’t escape. You can’t resist. The real Sylvia wouldn’t even recognize you anymore, but I do. I recognize you so very well. I can even be stronger than you, not just taller than you. I can hold you down, and command you like you always wanted her to do. Just relax, and let it happen. You can’t fight it. You don’t want to. We can be together forever. Safe.” Her voice . . . it started out as Rebeca’s, but it’s changed. It’s Sylvia’s now. Sylvia’s voice, with Rebeca’s words, Rebeca’s tone, but Sylvia’s voice . . .
Almost as good as the real thing.
Mist spreads out around us, blocking out the starlight. I want to fight it, I want to make Mom proud, but I want Sylvia more. I can’t even fight anyway. So I just want to enjoy this moment. I just want to be Sylvia’s again.
She releases my wrists, and I don’t move them from over my head. There’s no way to run. Even if I broke away, she’d appear in front of me and push me back down again. I might be a stubborn knucklehead, but that doesn’t make me an idiot. Mom would understand that I can’t fight this.
“Perfect! You’ve accepted your fate. Only this is going to be a little different than I think you anticipated. Your mother’s unique ability to pop back from anything may not be hereditary, but you still have a bad habit of being conscious at just the wrong time. I’ve been developed specially for you.” She leans closer, and rubs her nose against mine.
I don’t know what to call her. She has Sylvia’s eyes, Sylvia’s voice, but Rebeca’s face, Rebeca’s hair . . . Rebeca’s breasts pressing down against mine.
“Kiss me, Aurora. Kiss me. It’ll be the most intense thing you’ve ever felt in your life, the deepest dream you’ve ever had. The one you won’t wake up from.” She doesn’t give me a moment to consider. Her lips press to mine, as her body grinds down against me. Her warmth may not be real, but it feels real. It feels so good, the way her breasts melt against mine, the way her thigh presses between mine, the way I can almost pretend she loves me.
So I kiss her back. I press my stiffening nipples against her. I clench my legs around her thigh and grind. The pleasure is so real, and a genuine relief. Her lips press harder to mine, before we part our lips as one. Her tongue touches mine, and sizzles with something electric, hot, paralyzing.
I can’t move, only moan as she grinds against me harder, handfuls of my breasts in her hands as she starts to knead. I can barely move to breathe, but I don’t really need to breathe.
Her electric kiss shakes through me, but the only way I can react is to scream.
A sharp pulse of pleasure spikes through my everything and I can’t remember who is even kissing me anymore. Another hits, and I can’t remember how long. My pussy is on fire, a fire that roars hotter when the woman over me starts to rub through my shorts.
She whispers something I don’t understand, and my shorts, and the panties over them, disappear. Her fingers dive deep inside of me, tearing out another scream. It’s hard to remember where we were. We were on a rooftop, but where, I don’t know. I can’t remember the significance. I can’t remember my own name.
It happened before, but that time someone else had it. I try to reach for the place my name should be, and it feels like a pile of zeroes and ones are there instead. Rebeca explained that was the way computers erase data. Nothings erased at first, just missing, until you overwrite. My name is overwritten, carried away like, like . . . I don’t know. It’s so hard to think with her fingers stroking my clit.
It’s so hard to be anything at all when I can’t remember why I’m wearing a cape. I can feel it against my back, I know it’s there, but why. More zeroes and ones. Everything else but zeroes and ones is harder and harder to hold on to.
Names of the colors around me are harder to hold onto. Where she’s touching me is harder to remember. My body is shaking harder and harder, something wet and sticky flowing from between my legs, and I can’t understand any of it. Words are slipping . . . harder to . . . harder to . . . don’t . . . know . . . feels so good . . . Feels so . . . Perfect . . . Zeroes and ones, just . . . zeroes and ones . . . everything else just . . . gone . . .