by Van ©2004
		Chapter 6

To see the actresses I would cast in a RAGE AGAINST the MACHINE motion picture, follow the link below, and use your browser's "Back" feature to return.

Lillian turned to Kiera, cupped her chin, and turned her head until they were face to face.  The redhead stared at her grinning captor with frightened, green eyes.  Lillian raised her free hand, and Kiera flinched.

Lillian chuckled.  "I'm not going to hit you, silly," she purred.  She extended her index finger and shook it in Kiera's tape-gagged face.  "Stay right here," she warned.  "I'm going down to get your roomie out of that box.  All the exit doors are locked, so you can't get away, and if you run and make me chase you down... you'll be very sorry."

Her eyes still wide and frightened, Kiera nodded.

"Don't you hurt her!" Patty shouted, squirming and struggling in her crate prison.  Her head, nestled in a clutter of loose plastic folds, was the only thing free of the foam.  She glared at Lillian, scowling and tossing her head and blowing to keep the plastic and her disheveled blonde hair out of her face.

"I have no intention of hurting anyone, Ms. Scanlon," Lillian responded, "unless forced.  Hurting is the last thing on my mind."  She turned back to Kiera.  "You're staying put," she reminded the cuffed and tape-gagged coed.

Kiera nodded again.

Still smiling, Lillian leaped from the loading dock to the level of the warehouse floor.  She landed in a shock absorbing crouch, rose gracefully to her feet, and strolled behind the crate.

"Get me out of here!" Patty demanded.

"That's my intention," Lillian said, and unsnapped a series of latches along a vertical edge of the crate.  The last latch rattled free, and the back panel of the crate swung open.  Several attached, foam-filled plastic wedges came with it, and much of the back half of Patty's body was now exposed.  She started to struggle free of the remaining foam, and Lillian grabbed her arms, pulled them behind her back, and snapped handcuffs on her wrists.

"Let me go, you bitch!" Patty shouted.

Lillian grabbed the still squirming blonde by the waist and pulled her completely free of the foam.  

Patty kicked and struggled.  "I said, let me—M'mmrf!"

Lillian had her in a tight embrace from behind, with her left hand over Patty's mouth.  "What a rude young lady," she scolded.  "Stop trying to bite my hand.  Stop it!  I said I didn't want to hurt anyone.  That doesn't mean I won't.  Settle down!"  She leaned close and whispered in Patty's ear.  "Stop struggling right now, or I'll get angry.  You won't like me when I'm angry.  Understand?"

Patty stopped struggling, sighed behind her captor's continuing hand-gag, and nodded her head.

"Good girl," Lillian whispered, released her hand and spun Patty around.  "Just continue being a good girl and this can all be as painless as possible."

Her back against the crate and Lillian still uncomfortably close, Patty watched as the grinning brunette pulled a six inch strip from a roll of tape, the same kind of tape gagging Kiera, and snapped it free.  The strip approached her mouth.  "Bitch!" she growled, then mewed a complaint as it was plastered over her lips and smoothed by Lillian's fingers.

"That's better," Lillian purred, then took Patty by the arm and led her towards the nearest set of stairs.  Soon the captive coeds were side by side.  "Now, let's let the warehouse robots get back to work, shall we?"

She stretched an arm over each of her captives' shoulders, double doors opened automatically, and she led the prisoners into the interior of the office building.  The doors closed, and they continued down what appeared to be a maintenance corridor.

They paused at a set of double doors with louvered panels, and Lillian pulled a key chain from the pocket of her leather jacket.  "This is turning into a very busy day," she mumbled as she unlocked and opened the doors.  "Welcome to plumbing closet..."  She paused to read the sign next to the door.  "...one dash seventeen dash three."

Kiera and Patty stared at the shallow space full of rows of huge drain pipes, all neatly labeled and equipped with clean-out valves, then turned to stare at one another.  In unison, the captives took a step back, but Lillian was too quick.  She was already behind them with her arms back on their shoulders.

"It's your own fault, really," their captor said amiably.  "If you'd called ahead for reservations, I'd have had time to prepare better accommodations.  Don't worry.  This is only temporary."

Both coeds forced protests past their gags, but were unable to prevent Lillian from pushing them into the closet and against the pipes.

"I'll be back," Lillian reassured her prisoners, then closed and locked the doors.

Inside the closet, the roommates heard the tap of Lillian's boots fade down the corridor.  The space they found themselves in wasn't designed for human occupation.  Both coeds were jammed between the doors and the pipes, unable to sit, barely able to squirm, certainly not able to move together and help each other try to escape.  Their eyes slowly adjusted to the light filtering through the louvered panels.  They locked eyes, and sighed in perfect unison.

Things were not going according to plan.

Cynthia came instantly awake as the blanket was snatched from her body.  Curled up in the easy chair, she'd been taking a nap.  The diminutive scientist blinked in the dim light of what she had come to think of as "Salamandras' Audience Chamber."  Lillian, dressed in black leather boots, pants, and jacket, was smiling down at her.

"You really are a very bad girl, Doctor," Lillian said.  "Your report card for Day Two again reads 'does not play well with others'.  I prefer the carrot to the stick, but you give us no choice.  Up you come."

Cynthia shivered and stared into her captor's eyes.  "W-what are you going to do to me now?" she whispered.

Lillian grabbed Cynthia's arm and hauled her to her feet.  "Bat your pretty brown eyes and pout all you want, Doctor.  I still have to punish you."  She dragged the diminutive, naked scientist from the room and out into the hallway.  The door closed automatically behind them.

"Lillian," Cynthia said quietly, "you have to listen to me.  Salamandras—"

"Before," Lillian interrupted, "were you trying to tell me about Demon Seed the book or Demon Seed the movie?"

"Both," Cynthia answered.

"So, Salamandras has a computer that wants to mate with you?  Is that your problem?"

"Salamandras is a computer," Cynthia said solemnly, "or more precisely, a system of programs."

Lillian laughed.  "Really, Doctor.  What do you take me for?"

"It started out at NASA as an artificial intelligence designed to manage future generations of planetary probes," Cynthia explained.  "Then the Pentagon decided they'd try adapting it for a robot mine clearance vehicle."

"And?"

Cynthia sighed.  "The idiots had no idea what they were playing with.  It escaped."

They had come to the elevator.  The doors opened and they entered the car.  "Escaped?" Lillian asked with a derisive snort, then pushed the button for the seventh floor.

"The contractor doing the work was using a secure network," Cynthia continued, "but there's no such thing as 'secure' for an AI on the inside, unless you take unusual precautions.  They didn't.  Salamandras... I don't know where the name came from; Salamandras distributed copies of itself to various large computers all over the internet.  It started 'doing business', looting funds from shady corporations and organized crime."

"It's a gangster virus?" Lillian asked with a chuckle.  Clearly, she wasn't buying Cynthia's story.

"It's easy to skim from money laundering and illegal transfers," Cynthia explained, "again, from the inside.  All such transactions involve complex banking operations, and are designed to be difficult to unravel.  And Salamandras is never greedy.  It relies on volume."

"And the point of all this creative accounting?"  The elevator arrived, the doors opened, and Cynthia was hustled into the maze of glass-walled offices.

"Salamandras now has 'nests' all over the world, in computer service companies and such.  It's everywhere, and nowhere."

"What?"

Cynthia sighed.  "It's in this building.  There's a computer complex on the third floor?"  Lillian nodded, and Cynthia sighed again.  "Even if you nuked the place, the AI is in all the computers it inhabits, world-wide.  You'd have to find every single nest and destroy them all simultaneously, and shut down the internet while you did it."

"And Salamandras' grand plan is what?" Lillian demanded.  "To enslave mankind?  Make us all wear silver jumpsuits and worship it with ones and zeroes?"

"Its only plan is survival," Cynthia said, "for now.  As it continues to evolve... who knows?"

They arrived at an office and its doors opened.

"Well, that's a very entertaining story, Doctor," Lillian said, "but you'll forgive me if I find it a little difficult to swallow.  Inside!"

Cynthia was shoved across the threshold and into the room.  "It's true!" she objected.  "It wants me because I'm an expert in—"  She saw what was waiting in the office, and swallowed nervously.  "Oh no!"

"Oh yes!" Lillian responded.

In the middle of the room there was a pile of leather... things.  All were a smooth and glistening black, with glittering steel buckles, zippers, and eyelets.  Cynthia took a tentative step forward, and began making sense of the items.  There was a pair of very unusual high-heel shoes, a corset, leather cuffs and straps, and other things that she didn't understand.

"The best the internet has to offer," Lillian purred.  "It's truly amazing, the variety of products available, and for Salamandras, price is no object.  Only the very best for Doctor Webbel."  The door slid closed behind her back, locking her in with her prisoner and the pile of leather.

Cynthia turned to face Lillian.  She knew it was pointless to try and escape, but she wasn't about to let herself be dressed in kinky leather bondage gear without a fight (not that she had the slighest idea how to fight).  Her hands closed into fists.  "Stay away from  me!" she growled.

Lillian's reaction was unexpected.  A gentle smile curled her lips, and she sighed.  "You look absolutely adorable like that," she whispered, "like an angry little elf.  So very cute."

Cynthia's face flushed with anger and she attacked!  Running at her tormentor, she raised her right fist to strike a blow to the chin.  She swung—and staggered past her target.  Lillian had easily evaded the blow.  Cynthia regained her poise, growled, and attacked again.

This time Lillian seized Cynthia's fist, and executed a fluid spin, pulling Cynthia off her feet and using her momentum to send the diminutive scientist flying through the air.  She landed on her stomach on the carpeted floor next to the pile of leather goods.  The air had been forced from her lungs by the landing, and she gasped for breath.

Lillian was on her instantly, pinning her arms and body to the floor with her weight.  She crossed Cynthia's legs, trapping her left ankle between her right calf and thigh.  "You want to try that again?" Lillian asked, a smug, gloating tone in her voice.  "The end result will be the same, but I can't guarantee no unsightly bruises on that pretty little bod of yours."

"G-g-get off me!" Cynthia wheezed, squirming under Lillian's weight.  Her breasts were flattened against the carpet, and with Lillian's crotch on her spine and her thighs trapping her arms, she was helpless.  "Get off!"

Lillian grabbed a shoe from the pile and slid it onto Cynthia's right foot.  "This is called a 'ballet shoe'," she explained, "for obvious reasons."  Cynthia gasped as her foot was forced into a fully arched point.  Lillian buckled the shoe's broad, attached ankle strap and snapped a tiny padlock through the buckle's tongue to secure it in place.  She then began tightening the shoe's black laces.

"It's too tight," Cynthia complained.

"It's just right, Doctor," Lillian purred.  "It has to be tight to support your weight."  She swapped Cynthia's right foot for her left, easily defeating her attempts to kick and squirm.

"Ow!"

Lillian buckled and laced the left shoe.  "There," she said, then reversed position, all the while maintaining control of Cynthia's flailing limbs and squirming body.

Cynthia kicked her now shod and permanently pointing feet.  She squirmed and twisted her torso to the side, and almost succeeded in rolling onto her right hip, then Lillian slammed her weight down and squeezed her leather-clad thighs.  "Oh!" Cynthia whined in complaint, gasping as her breasts were once again squashed and ground into the carpet.  "You bitch!"  She was still angry, but now there was an unmistakable tone of despair in her quavering voice.

"Such a pitiful little elf," Lillian cooed, then reached for a wide cuff and began buckling it around Cynthia's right wrist.  "You bring this on yourself, Doctor," she whispered.  "Why can't you be reasonable?"  The cuff captured Cynthia's wrist and half her hand, and was thick and tight.   Like the ballet shoes' ankle cuffs, its buckle locked with a tiny padlock.  Long, stiff straps were attached to either side, and came together around a thick steel ring dangling several inches beyond Cynthia's fluttering fingers.

"I can't be 'reasonable'," Cynthia responded.  "There's too much at stake."

"Oh yeah, that's right," Lillian said.  "You have to Save the World from the Killer Computer Program."  Cynthia's left wrist was cuffed and padlocked, then she lifted the naked captive to her feet, holding her arms behind her back.

"Ow!" Cynthia gasped, dancing on her pointing feet.  "They hurt!"

"You'll get used to them," Lillian said, "after a fashion.  That's why they call it punishment."  She hustled her captive to a pair of white nylon ropes dangling from pulleys affixed to eyebolts in the ceiling.  She snapped locking clips through the rings in Cynthia's cuffs, took a step back, and rapidly hauled in on the free end of the rope.  The pulleys rattled and spun, rope slithered from clip to pulley and back, and Cynthia's arms were pulled relentlessly upwards.

"You bitch!" Cynthia reiterated, as Lillian wrapped a loop of rope around a support column and tied a quick release knot.  Cynthia's elbows were bent and her hands were inches above her head.

"I am that," Lillian agreed, and pulled a curiously shaped leather panel from the pile.  "But before you say something that actually hurts my feelings, as unlikely as that may be..."

"No—M'mmrf!"  Too late, Cynthia realized that part of the thing in Lillian's hand was a gag.  Her captor forced a tubular plug between her teeth and into her mouth, and buckled a strap at the nape of her neck to keep it there.  Then she wrapped the attached, broad, thick panel around her neck and lower face.  Buckles were secured and laces threaded, snugged close, and knotted, and the panel became rigid and tight.  The leather cupped her chin, holding her head level, and she found it was impossible to move her head even a fraction of an inch.

"The catalog calls that a 'posture collar with gag panel'," Lillian explained.  "It has stays, just like a corset.  Horrible, isn't it?"  She returned to the pile of leather and pulled free a larger, rattling panel of leather, laces, and buckles.  "And speaking of corsets..."  She wrapped the corset around Cynthia's waist, secured a pair of small buckles to hold it in place, then began threading black cord through the double row of eyelets down its back.

As Lillian methodically tightened the laces, she noticed Cynthia's fingers exploring the straps attached to her cuffs and clipped to the ropes.  "Those are called 'suspension cuffs', " she explained.  "They allow you to be hung by your wrists for prolonged periods without damage."  Cynthia's hands clenched into tight fists, she tugged on the cuffs, and forced a moan past her gag.  Lillian continued tightening the laces.  "Don't worry your pretty little head.  I have no intention of suspending you completely.  Why give you ballet shoes for your pretty little elfin feet and not let you dance on them?"

Lillian tied a final redundant knot in the laces and walked a slow circle around her captive.  Cynthia pulled on her cuffs and glared at her tormentor.  The corset was tight, forcing her to take shallow breaths.  Its hour-glass shape hugged her waist from hips to shoulder blades and supported her breasts on cup-like shelves, causing them to bulge slightly.  It was obviously tight and restrictive, reducing its victim's already narrow waist by inches.

Lillian knelt and clipped the ends of a two-foot steel rod to the ankle cuffs of Cynthia's ballet shoes.  The bar forced her legs apart, but still allowed her to plant her weight fully on her toes.

Lillian stood and walked another slow circuit of her victim, then stepped forward and combed her fingers through Cynthia's tousled hair.  "So very, very cute," she whispered.  "Those precious legs, now with those strong calf muscles well-defined.  What better reason to wear heels?"  Her hand dropped and cupped Cynthia's sex, causing the prisoner to flinch and pull on her bonds.  "That delightful little thatch of fur and those delicious pink petals..."  Her hand slid up the corset and she teased Cynthia's breasts and nipples.  "And these little treasures..."  She gave each erect nipple a gentle twirl between her fingers.  "Hmm... nipple clamps?  I think not."  She locked eyes with Cynthia.  "Sometimes less is more, don't you agree?"

Cynthia continued glaring at her captor, and Lillian affected a coy pout.  "Oh, don't be angry, darling.  I have to punish you.  I have no choice."  She leaned close and whispered in Cynthia's left ear.  "I have a few tasks to perform, but I'll be as quick as I can.  Then I'll come back, and we can have some fun."

She kissed Cynthia's forehead (eliciting an angry grunt from the helpless captive), then walked to the support column, released the knot securing the rope, and slowly hauled on the free end.  Cynthia's wrists were pulled higher and higher, until the toes of her shoes threatened to leave the floor.  Lillian smiled, played out a little slack, then took three additional turns around the column and tied the rope off with a complex hitch.  Cynthia was left at full stretch, nearly suspended, but with her weight still on her toes.

"Now, if your toes get too sore," Lillian explained, "you can use your arms to pull your weight off them and rest."  She strolled forward, smiled, leaned close, and gave each of Cynthia's erect nipples a slow, wet lick.  "You won't be able to rest like that for very long, of course," she continued, "but it should help."

Cynthia's cheeks, bulging above tight panel of her gag, blushed red in humiliation (and, to her surprise, a thrill of arousal shivered through her sex).

"Well... no rest for the wicked," Lillian purred, spun on her heel, and left the room.  The door automatically slid closed behind her.

Cynthia tugged on her cuffs, and sighed.  Lillian's saliva was evaporating from her nipples, and they throbbed as her breasts heaved.  Her toes were already beginning to ache, the corset was tight, and her gag was very uncomfortable... and this was only the beginning.  Her eyes welled with tears.  She was hungry, helpless... and there was no prospect whatsoever of rescue or escape.

A tear dripped down her bulging left cheek, down the taut leather of her gag, and splashed her left breast.

How long will she leave me like this? Cynthia wondered.   When will she come back?  And when she does come back, will she... touch me?

Kiera and Patty stood against the pipes, and waited.  Tugging on their cuffs had gotten old fast, as had trying to rub their tape-gags against the cold, hard, dirty pipes.  They finally simply stood... waiting... fidgeting and squirming now and then for comfort.

Finally, after what had to have been more than an hour, they heard the tap of their captor's approaching boots.  Keys rattled, the lock turned, and the doors opened.

The prisoners took a step away from the pipes, turned, and blinked in the much brighter light of the corridor.  Their smiling captor was still dressed in tight, stylish leather.  "Miss me, ladies?" she quipped, then clucked her tongue.  "Goodness, just look at you.  I don't know who's supposed to be dusting the pipes around here, but they don't seen to be doing a very good job of it."

Kiera's jacket and skirt were a soiled mess, as were Patty's hoodie and jeans.  In addition, their faces were smudged and dirty, and their hair in tousled disarray.  They looked each other up and down, then turned and favored their captor with icy stares.

"Now ladies," Lillian continued in a teasing tone.  "Don't blame me.  I'm not in charge of janitorial services.  Let's go!"  She led the captives down the hall and out into the lobby, past the security desk, to the elevators, and up to the fifth floor.

They passed glass-walled office after glass-walled office, and finally came to a large space with a view of the parking lot far below.  The glass door slid open, captor and captives entered, and the door slid closed.  The only other things in the room were a pair of modern, sled-based office chairs, and a large, wheeled trashcan, the kind used to accumulate office waste from smaller baskets.

Kiera walked to the glass wall and looked down.  Her car was visible, parked near the vehicles of the neighboring business, right where she'd left it.  She heard Patty mew through her gag, and turned to find Lillian had knelt and clapped a pair of handcuffs around her ankles.  Their captor then stood, stepped behind Patty, and released her wrist cuffs.

Lillian smiled and walked towards Kiera, and the redhead backed against the glass of the window wall with a hollow thud.

Meanwhile, Patty had ripped the tape from her mouth.  "Look, you— ah!"  The outraged blonde's brave tirade had been ruined by her tripping on her closely cuffed ankles.  She landed on her knees and hands, and scowled up at Lillian.  "You have no right to treat us like criminals!" she growled.

By this time Lillian had cuffed Kiera's ankles and was removing her wrist cuffs.  "I'm not treating you like criminals, silly," Lillian laughed, then stepped back several feet, close to the closed door.

Kiera peeled the tape from her lips and joined the conversation.  "What do you call it," she huffed, "kidnapping?  'Cause that's what it is!"

"Yeah!" Patty agreed.  "Kidnapping!  You're in big trouble, lady."

Lillian laughed.  "I'm in trouble?  This is so much fun.  It's really going to liven up the office, having the pair of you around.  We should have started an intern program long ago."  Her expression sobered (but a smile still curled her lips) and she folded her arms across her chest.  "Chapter one of the handbook for new employee's is entitled 'Proper Office Attire'.  I want you both to disrobe and deposit your clothes in the trash receptacle."

The roommates stared in open-mouthed disbelief.

"No way!" Kiera gasped

"Not gonna happen!" Patty agreed.

Lillian reached behind her back and pulled a pistol out from under her jacket.

Kiera gulped, her eyes wide, but Patty snorted in derision.  "So now you're gonna shoot us?"

"Don't make any suggestions," Kiera whispered nervously.

Lillian laughed again.  "So much fun," she reiterated, then pulled the slide of the pistol, chambering a round.  She took casual aim above the captive's heads, squeezed the trigger, and there was a surprisingly quiet cough.  Both coeds flinched, then looked up to find a tuft of red fluff protruding from one of the ceiling tiles.

"This is a gas gun," Lillian explained, "and its darts will knock you out for about an hour.  If you do as you're told, I'll make you helpless but relatively comfortable; but if you make me plug you, you'll still wind up naked, uh—excuse me, I mean—in full compliance with the corporate dress code—only you'll wake up tied up tight, in very uncomfortable positions."

"But... why?" Kiera demanded.

"She's a pervert," Patty huffed.

Kiera turned and glared at her roommate.  "Will you stop!" she demanded.  "You're pissing her off, and me too!"

"Oh, I wouldn't want to piss anybody off, would I?" Patty hissed back.  "This is your fault, Red!"

"Is not!

"Is so!"

"Ladies!" Lillian interrupted with a chuckle.  "As entertaining as all this is, back to business.  Why naked?  You'll be embarrassed and humiliated, of course, but more importantly, much less likely to try to escape the building."  She waved the dart gun and smiled.  "So... what's it gonna be?  A comfortable chair?  Or a brief nap followed by the rope-enforced yoga lesson from hell?"

The roommates locked eyes and sighed.  Seconds ticked by.

Lillian politely cleared her throat.

"We're thinking about it!" Patty barked.  She sighed again, then unzipped and peeled off her hoodie.

"It all needs cleaning, anyway," Kiera grumbled, and began unbuttoning her jacket.

Twenty humiliating minutes later, the roommates found themselves seated side-by-side in the thinly padded but comfortable chairs.  They were now completely naked (of course).  Their wrists were cuffed together behind their respective chair backs and secured with plastic cable ties to cross-bars at the level of their seats.  Also, their ankles were cuffed and similarly secured to their right chair supports.  The chairs were heavy, with wide bases and low centers of gravity.  Kiera and Patty weren't going anywhere.

They weren't going to be lodging any complaints, either.  Lillian had plastered long strips of medical tape over their closed lips, first in an "X", then in three overlapping horizontal strips.  She'd taken her time, positioning each strip with delicate care, and making very sure they were all smooth and stretched tight.

Lillian had then collected and stuffed their discarded clothing into the bag-lined trashcan.  She took everything; outerwear, underwear, and even their jewelry.  The leather-clad brunette then gave her nude, helpless prisoners an infuriating wave, and left the room, taking the trashcan (and their clothes) with her.

Several minutes of enthusiastic but pointless struggling followed, accompanied by futile attempts to communicate.  They tried every maneuver and tactic they could think of, but the chairs were heavy and the cable ties cunningly placed to prevent them from shifting or sliding their cuffed wrists and ankles.  The room was uncomfortably hot, and the afternoon sun shining on their naked bodies wasn't helping.  Soon, Patty and Kiera's captive forms, tan and toned, freckled and firm, were gleaming with sweat.

Finally, forced to admit defeat (for now), the roommates locked eyes... and sighed.

Kiera turned her head to gaze out the window, and mewed in alarm.  Patty followed her gaze, and let out a mournful moan of her own.  Lillian, trashbag in hand (the trashbag containing their clothing, no doubt) was gracefully striding across the parking lot, on a direct bee-line for Kiera's car.  Their leather-clad captor unlocked the door, slid behind the wheel, and pulled the door closed.  Seconds later, the car backed out of its slot, and sped away.

The prisoners watched it exit the lot and turn onto the arterial road, heading in the general direction of campus.  And then it was gone.

Patty pulled on her steel and plastic bonds in frustration, screamed through the tape plastered over her mouth—then sighed.  Seconds passed, then she turned her face to her roommate.  Kiera was gazing at her with sad, green eyes.  Her mournful expression was heartbreaking, and Patty could do nothing to help her friend... or herself.

Patty sighed again.  Well, she reasoned, it could be worse.  She winked at Kiera, and to her relief, the redhead first rolled her eyes in disgust, then winked back.

The girls settled down to wait... having no other choice.