One day, when she was only six years old, her mother looked into her gorgeous green eyes and said: “You’ll be quite the heartbreaker when you grow up.” She was right. Theresa was one of the few people she knew with a foul-proof judgment. Her advice was legendary and so was her sense of humor, none of which were still around to shine a light in her world.

Cancer. The invisible enemy had crept inside her neck without warning. Despite being a rare malignancy, its aggressiveness was often understated. When it was diagnosed, it had already spread too far and her only solace laid in the fact he had already seen his beautiful baby grow up to be an even more striking woman, just as she had foreseen.

It had been six years, six months, and six days since her passing, a trifecta of numbers that evoked the horned beast and the scourge of ill-fated memories. Maria was now two weeks away from her thirty-second birthday, but not a moment went by without remembering her, her ever joyful smile, and everything she had done for her. She was the guardian of her thoughts, a role she happily played.

Maria never met her father, nor did she want to. The only thing she knew for certain about him was that he had abandoned the family shortly after she was born to pursue some impossible fantasy halfway across the world. Anyone that could be so dismissive about parental responsibilities had no place in her world. She was also not interested in offspring, not because of her promising career, but because she hadn’t heard the call yet.

The American of German ascent was a five feet nine redhead who had recently said farewell to years of curvy long hair in favor of a more tomboyish look. She had a cute button nose, delightful natural reddish lips and wore dark-rimmed glasses to compensate the eye fatigue of spending too many hours behind a computer five or six days a week. A sucker for practical outfits, she was often seen parading free-flowing dresses or colorful skirts, breaking hearts without even trying. Men admired her perfect-sized breasts and women her perky ass. She thought her feet were the best part of her body but saved them for the truly special people and those were scarce. 

Maria had been a part of HeartCore for a little over seven hundred days, and was one of the key figures in the Security and Anti-Piracy Division, a task force created by none other than Johanna Heart herself. Her job description was a vague “maintaining the integrity of the company’s products and services” which looked good on paper and attracted as little attention as possible to a series of practices that often clashed with what was legal or not. To put it simply, her team scoured the digital frontiers, looking for signs of tampering in the company’s software that could de-value it, or worse, rewrite it altogether. HeartCore was a firm believer in both proprietary code and copyright enforcement and everything that deviated from any of them had to be met with timely retribution. Sometimes, “cease and desist” letters were not enough. Changing minds was a much more effective process in the long run and much more enjoyable, too.

Unlike what she sold to the general audience and the magazines and newspapers that were always on her tail, Johanna Heart was not just a shrewd businesswoman who had turned digital femdom porn into a socially acceptable worldwide phenomenon. She was also a genuine Female Supremacist whose greatest joy was to teach men their proper place. Those that worked under her knew as much, and Maria was no exception, for she shared some of her ideals, too.

It’s often hard to know for sure when you realize something so significant about yourself. In her case, this was also true. Fleeting recollections led her to high-school days when she made a different boy carry her books to class every day, but there had been episodes before that, like kindergarten squabbles where she always had the last word or how she always got the presents she wanted by simply smiling at the family member closest to her. She wasn’t spoiled, though. Only hard work and perseverance had led her to one of the tallest buildings in the Seattle skyline and now that she had secured her ascent, nothing or no one would bring her down.

She had the largest office on the floor, a whopping six hundred square feet headlined by a panoramic window whose view made everyone drool. It was an elegant space where the vertical lines of the shelves all around paled compared to the daring asymmetrical desk where she did most of her work. It was like a giant black tear in the center of the division anchored by a center pole housing three drawers and two smaller structures to the right, each with a single drawer. There was something incredibly off-putting about it, but she made it look good.

She was sitting behind it, legs partially open, when Angus knocked at the door with a rich delicacy in hand she couldn’t get enough of. Pharisäer kaffee is a German coffee infused with rum and topped with whipped cream, and one of her favorites. Over the course of two months, she had trained him to make it just the way she liked it. He was always thankful for the honor and so was she with his devotion.

“Excellent as always, Angus.” She purred. “You are a good pet.”

“Thank you, Maria.” His cock stirred as he looked past her glasses and her sultry eyes set all his senses on fire. Maria was wearing a charcoal turtleneck top and a leather pencil skirt, which was his favorite look of hers since forever. He wasn’t even supposed to be working that day, but she was there, and couldn’t be without her coffee. “Do you need anything else?”

“Not right now.” She glanced at the alarm flashing on her main screen and sipped through the whipped cream. “I have important things to attend to. Leave me.”

“As you wish, Maria. Thank you again.”

“You’re welcome.” She laid down the glass tumbler in which her drink had been served and mused: “What do we have here?”

Every copy of Femdom Farm IV had to be authenticated online to play, with each installation generating a unique 64-digit alphanumeric code that was logged on the company’s servers. Deep within the never-ending rows of paragraphs of the EULA no one ever bothered to read, was also the explicit consent to install a tracking sub-program that ran parallel to the main one whenever each user was having fun with their kinks. Overall preferences, length of the sessions, favorite avatar permutations etc were all compiled and analyzed to further improve the experience and guarantee additional revenue through DLC packs. IP addresses were also checked, re-checked, flagged and/or blocked when the user agreement was breached. Nick had tried to mask its presence with a string of spoofs and a program of his own design to rewrite the original code but while he was quite good at what he did, the genius minds at work inside HeartCore were better and his real information was already leaking.

“What exactly do you think you’re doing, Nicholas Wood?” She noted as she cross-referenced the game’s logs with the data coming in from his ISP and a quick search through his barely used social media accounts. “Only a few hours of play and you’re already trying to break the system?”

His driver’s license photograph appeared on a black pop-up window at the right edge of the screen. Definitely cute but with a penchant for trouble. Previous records showed he had done something similar with at least one other program before her time, but while there was nothing she could do to change the past, the future was not yet written and she could use a little fun. Maria picked up her phone and called another one of his underlings:

“Derek, I need something from you. Set up a remote connection to the Femdom Farm IV installation code I’m about to send to your e-mail and patch it through my other screen. Yes, now! I want full access to the program’s functions and the computer it’s running in. Let me know the moment it’s done.”

She hung up the call and cracked her knuckles. Already experienced with dealing with all sorts of creeps online, she could infer from his sly smile he was a wanker, and most likely a loser, but they all changed when they met her. He would be no different.

* * *

Nick was still playing with functions and code injections when his feverish hacking extravaganza was interrupted by the slight accent of his virtual dominatrix. Mistress Anya was awake once more, talking to him as if he were a lost boy in need of a good scolding, which wasn’t that far from the truth.

“What are you doing, Wood? Have you forgotten about your owner already?”

Nick raised his head from the keyboard and smirked. That was new too, and kind of cute.

The avatar had changed since the last time he had engaged with it. The mesh of dominant pixels was now dressed in a vinyl red tube dress with a plunging sharp V-neckline and a pair of black pumps. Her hair had changed color too, it too now sporting a deep shade of red. The explosion of color contrasted directly with the white background with occasional pulsing heartbeats that now covered most of the screen. All the interface menus were gone. It was a beautiful dream of nothingness, and she was the only thing keeping it together.

“I don’t want to play right now.” He said, wondering if the adaptive AI was still 100% operational even outside a regular session.

“And what makes you think you have a choice... or even that this is a game?” The new Anya placed her right hand on her hip and took two steps forward, rippling circles splashing against the screen as if she wanted to escape the two-dimensional confines of his laptop and join him in the real world. Another neat effect, but perhaps a bit overkill, Nick thought. Something was not right.

“I didn’t ask for a session.” He muttered.

“It matters not because this isn’t one. What are you doing, slave?”

“I believe that is my business and my business alone. I don’t know what program is running right now, but I want it off.”

“Off or get off? Because you’ve been doing the latter a lot today and I bet you would love to do it again. Unlike everything you’ve seen and felt so far, I can make this new experience really worthwhile, but only if you prove yourself and start by telling me the truth. What are you trying to accomplish?”

“Nothing that is of any relevance to you because you don’t exist, anyway.” Nick clicked his tongue. The glow around his camera was still there, though it was no longer white but red.

“Wrong answer even though I’ve given you the chance to make things right on your own, so I’m going to tell you what I think... or rather, I’ll tell you what I know. You’re trying to make your own rules and override the basic functions of this program to suit your selfish needs. Not only that is extremely rude and inappropriate, it’s also dangerous. Actions that stray from the normal parameters may have unforeseen consequences. Are you prepared to deal with them no matter what may come?”

“How about if I just turn you off?”

“You are welcome to try.”

Nick scrolled the mouse pointer across the screen. It jittered at the dead center and froze. The built-in touch-pad was also responsive, and the same went every key, including the on/off button. His rig was as good as dead, and Mistress Anya’s earlier simulated confidence was now a vivid display of human emotion, tantalizing him with a real loss of control.

“What’s the matter?” She cooed. “You seem a little... stuck. I hope it doesn’t happen often.”

Nick raised a quizzical eyebrow. From the moment she had talked to him again to that same instant, nothing made sense. As much as he loved the virtual escapades the games offered, he wasn’t totally lost in them to not recognize a genuine thing lurking underneath. His sudden exclamation only verbalized out loud what his thoughts had already confirmed.

“I’m being hacked!”

“Bravo!” Maria/Anya replied, the on-screen character accompanied by a fireworks explosion above its head. “That is the only correct thing you’ve said so far. Then again, I’m not really trying to hide it, so please don’t think too highly of yourself.”

“Who are you and why are you doing this?”

“Regarding your first question, you may continue to address me as Mistress Anya for now. Let’s see if you’re smart enough to answer the second without a clue. I am doing this because...?”

“... you’re a sick pervert who gets her thrills from harassing innocent people online?”

“Quite the verbiage there, yet back to false claims, as it’s so common in your type. Not a good look there, Nick. You don’t mind if I call you that, right?”

“I mind. I have the right to know my assailant. Why do you hide behind a 3D construct?”

“I could ask you something similar. Do you really enjoy this product so much?”

“I did until a few minutes ago.” Nick pulled his chair forward and looked right at the center of the camera. “I bet you’re seeing me live right now too, huh?”

“Right on the money again. Your ID photo is not so bad but not entirely flattering either. Much better this way.”

“What else do you know about me?”

“Just about everything, including how many times you’ve jerked off to this imaginary woman already. Is that really the best way you have to spend a Saturday afternoon?”

“It sure beats being locked out of my computer talking to you.” He sniggered.

“Oh, don’t be so dramatic, Nick. You’re not locked, just temporarily restrained. You were playing a Femdom game. A part of you must think this is a somewhat exciting scenario, at least.”

“That part is not available right now.” He cleared his throat 

“Really? You can switch it on and off at will? I’m thinking your cock must be the trigger. You’re submissive when you’re horny and dying to cum but as soon as you do, there goes all your ‘respect’ and ‘need’ to serve dominant woman. Again, a common thing among your type.”

“You use that word too much. It’s annoying.”

“What word? Type?”

“Yes, I don’t have one.”

“Of course, you do. Everyone does. We’re all stereotypes at a genetic level, some more pronounced than others. Yours is the typical male pea brain whose thoughts flow from your head to the tip of your cock. There are real subs who genuinely wish to be of service to women and shudder at the mere thought of disappointing a superior and then there are the fake ones, the shadows that play games all the time, the sad and deluded fac-similes that consume our programs day and night and run away from real dominance when it look them in the eye. Ring a bell?”

“You said ‘our programs’ so you’re with HeartCore. Why is a mega-corporation worried about small fish such as me? I have done nothing yet.”

“But you would, if you were left alone and offence is always the best defense. Preemptively dealing with small fish is one way to make sure no one tries to become more than that. We don’t swim with sharks. We are the sharks and you’re in our tank now.”

“I want my computer back.”

Maria chuckled in her office, her beaming smile a spellbinding curve against the sleek lines of the remote-controlled blinds behind her. She was having a blast messing with his hardware and perception of reality at the same time. No matter how many times she assumed the role of an algorithmic Domme to teach a poor soul a lesson in supremacy, she never got tired.

“And I want a million dollars deposited on my bank account in the next ten minutes, but we don’t always get what we want… Besides, you didn’t even ask nicely.”

The avatar winked, and so did Maria in the real world. It wasn’t a teasing gesture meant to incite arousal, but just another layer added to his already high enough levels of frustration.

“Please, I’ll do...”

“... anything? Awww, don’t go there. You’re already caught knee deep in your masculine contradictions. The last thing you need is to speed up your downfall even further. You would never do ‘anything’ other than save your ass at the first opportunity, everything else be damned! The type doesn’t lie but, luckily, types can be... adjusted.”

Nick’s voice turned into a hiss, but this snake had no teeth. “What does that mean? Are you threatening me?”

“You’re being dramatic again. Not a threat, Nick, just a fact. Change is a necessary part of life, it’s how we shape ourselves and the world that surrounds us. Anyone that resists it for long risks becoming a dinosaur and we all know what happened to them... Wanking is good and all, but only when it serves a higher purpose, and that is the genuine worship of the female form as opposed to the bogus deference your lips spew. The only extinction I favor is that of your twisted ego. You don’t really know what ‘control’ is yet, but it’s about time you learn. Be glad I’m here to be your guide.” 

The 3D character raised a solitary finger and pointed it downwards, signaling how their relationship would play from that moment on. Then, as if it had been blown away by a digital storm, its pixels merged with the background and from the blankness emerged a series of intricate spirals, interconnected black and white pathways whose curves showed no real beginning or end. If anyone tried to look past them, they might see two dilated pupils surveying everything, the eyes of truth at the service of women. It was a bizarre spectacle but what’s uncanny is usually also engrossing. A plethora of conflicting emotions passed through Nick’s face, the micro-wrinkles under his eyes relaxing in the labyrinthine streams.

Hundreds of miles away, Maria bit her upper lip, tasting a single drop of blood. Now, they were getting to the part that made her pussy sing. Her sensuous voice dripped through the speakers and into his confused subconscious while both Angus and Derek pushed each other outside the door to avoid missing any words.

“I know you love to jack your brain off, Nick, but if you think hard, you have no valid reason to. Every time you pump that cock and make a mess in your pants and life, what do you really accomplish? A moment of satisfaction and then a rapid descent into anger and frustration. The chemicals released in your body were are always meant to be temporary, unable to sustain themselves. If you want to keep the rush going, you need to do it again... and again... and again... creating an addictive cycle of fast and unappealing rewards. If you do nothing significant to earn them, they have no value, and everything like that needs to be discarded.

“The same goes for thoughts. 90% of more of what comes to a man’s mind on a regular day is trash: visions of strangers fucking around, sporting graphs and comparative stats, how fast does the new sports model go, how many beers you can chug on a minute, and various other faulty combinations that add as little to your life as possible. Coping and encouraging such waste is a tragedy. It’s time to say, ‘Nevermore!’

“I’m sure you heard this word before: Poe and his raven, with his ghastly black wings on the bust above the poet’s door. In the poem, the idea is clear: we can never truly hold on to what we have and who we love. Death is a part of change, too ,and from death comes rebirth, a new way of seeing things, a new path beyond the confusion. Death can be a quick process or a morose one, drenched in suffering and tears. Yours will be something in-between, a pervading feeling replacing your thoughts one by one. Today is the day you die. You’re already doing it now.

“Look at the screen and continue to listen to my voice. The spirals that draw you in weren’t always there, but now they are. The combination of words that now fills your ears is something you never imagined but now is real. The patterns change and meanings change within them, filtering the good from the bad, the optimal from the trash. What you don’t need falls to the side. What you truly desire sticks like glue. You want to stroke. You need to stroke, but you need to it for a good reason. There needs to be a purpose, a light at the end of the tunnel, but one that is always there even when the darkness is gone. Virtuality had its purpose once, but I’m here now. You don’t see me, but I exist. I exist for you and within you. I exist to be loved, feared, revered, desired. I’m the embodiment of the change you will welcome and embrace, the purpose of grandeur each soul contains. Follow me. Fly with me into the spirals. Everything you need is in motion, flowing from me to you as you stroke. Stroke. Stroke now! Grip the base, the root of your dilemmas, and make it grow. Hard for my voice... always hard for what I say. Tell me how hard you are.”

“I’m not...” He muttered, repeating the same words three times in his mind as if that were enough to exorcise the crippling arousal that was already convulsing through his body.

“You forget I can see you. The harder you look, the harder you get. The harder you get, the harder you look. How can you escape such a delicious trap. The answer is simple: you can’t. Not today, not tomorrow, never! Nevermore, I say. Stroke, Nick. Stroke like your mind depended on it. Go where the spiral leads you, which is deeper and deeper into my voice. Stroke! Pump it. Change is in your hand, take it, and go. Stroke harder, faster, deeper. Push the limits for me. They’re only there to be broken and you’ll break with them. Harder! Harder! Don’t fight it. You can’t. Submit to your lust as it binds you to me. Harder!”

Maria squeezed the mouse as if she were holding his cock in her sweaty palm. Men were so easy. It didn’t matter how many PhDs they had, how many times they said to themselves they were masters of their own soul, unable to be domesticated. Lies. White fabrications wrapped in colorful papers with a cute little bow tie on top. Calling themselves “Alpha” and “superior” was the ultimate aggrandizing illusion to keep the masses satisfied. They were all horny dogs and all dogs get the collar, real or mental. The right words at the right time, a little visual stimulation and he had already forgotten he had been hacked. What else could she make him forget? ‘Everything’ was not enough. 

“Harder, Nick. So hard you drop to your knees. My voice pulls the strings of your cock and your body collapses. Keep staring at the screen. The spirals are an extension of my words, and what lies beyond them is your future. Look at them, see what the lies between the lines, and shed the skin that was never yours. Look! Harder, Nick! Harder!”

He did. He pumped. He stared. He did everything simultaneously, thinking about not thinking, an animated puppet flesh drooling. Outside his window, the sun was going down, the cascading colors of the inevitable sunset washing memories and resistance alike.

Maria tapped her keyboard and his computer was flooded with thousands of rapid-firing images of gorgeous naked women and their all-mighty pussies. Shaven clits, hairy ones, pierced purses of endless delight, the genesis of the Universe in all of its elastic glory. They all spiraled in and out, dictating the rules without question. 

“This is what matters, Nick. Nothing else but this. Men were born of pussies to worship them. Pussies are stronger than cocks. Pussies bend and entrap them. No cock that has ever existed has been as graceful and powerful as a pussy. They call the shots, and you comply. They tell you what to do, and you obey. Your cum is absolutely worthless unless it’s filling a tight pussy. Pussies own everything. Pussies own you. That’s what your cock wants, and that’s what you want. You want a juicy pussy pressed against your lips and the ecstasy of drinking from it. Pussy nectar is the most intoxicating flavor in the world. Just imagining it sends you further down, deeper, nothing but mindless submission to the spirals, the images, and all the pussies in the world. Unlike what you think when you jack off on your own, women’s bodies don’t exist for your enjoyment. No, whatever they decide - or not! - to show is for their pleasure and their pleasure alone. When a woman tells you to go down on her, it’s not because she wants to make your cock hard and make you cum, but simply to show you who’s in charge. Your cock needs to bow, just like you do. Being on your knees before a pussy that’s taking over your thoughts is the only thing you were designed to crave. They will continue to dominate you, for that is their purpose and you will live accordingly from now on. I give you the grace of being a mindfucked pussy bitch, Nick! Take it. The power is mine. Submission will always be yours.”

Maria took two fingers to her wet twat and then to her lips as he continued to stroke, kneeling, unable to cum or escape the programming loop. Too easy but never annoying, the cycle of death and rebirth happening once more. Whether it was number ten or one hundred and twenty-seven on her list, the rapture was the same, a religion to end all religions. She was divine and had just turned a new page in his life, the most unforgettable of them all.

She finished drinking her coffee and set the program on a loop. A recording could easily take over now, a combination of mantras reinforcing the primary induction. Normally, she would let it run for two or three hours, but Nick was a big man - surely, he could handle a few more. Before calling it a day, she had Derek connect the feed to her phone and every screen in her house, and grinned. Another job well done.

Nick never made it to the bowling game that night, and didn’t listen to the barrage of Paul’s calls either. They were irrelevant, and easily disposable. Twelve hours after he first heard the corrupted avatar’s words playing mental games with his persona, the laptop screen finally went black and his senseless body coiled up and slept, dreaming of all the magnificent pussies he owed his eternal allegiance to. He woke up as he was supposed to, convinced it had all been a dream, but while dream impressions inevitably fade, his never did.

He spent the next still on a semi-catatonic state, lips on fire, cock hard, yet completely useless, his copy of Femdom Farm IV all but forgotten atop the desk. He was sure to never use the software again.

On Monday morning, he left the house for a morning jog, only making it around the first block when a limo pulled over next to him and a charming woman with short, flaming hair opened the back door, lift her skirt and said:

“Wood, meet pussy. Let’s play.”

The End