Nicole stood uncertainly while Jan unclipped her tape measure from her waistband. “I know most shops won’t bother to do this,” she said, “but if we really want to show off what you’ve got, my dear, we should fit you to a T.” Her teeth flashed a knowing grin. “I’m sure you’ll have no problem leading the crowd without help.”

Nicole was aware of the deep flush on her cheeks, but part of her was adamant that she deserved this, deserved the admiration of the men and the respect of the young women around her. She swallowed, then pulled her loose tee over her head and set it aside so Jan could measure her.

At first, Jan simply stood there for a long moment, inspecting her with a thoughtful look on her face. Then she nodded, and a moment later she snapped into action, her hands roaming over Nicole’s body as she quickly and efficiently took her measurements.

She didn’t stop with Nicole’s chest but also checked her waist, inner leg, and hip measurements, which puzzled the younger woman. After measuring her hips, Jan sighed and rested her palm flat against Nicole’s belly for a moment.

When Nicole gave her a questioning look, Jan clucked her tongue apologetically. “Sorry, honey,” she said. “Woolgathering, that’s all.” She patted Nicole’s abdomen gently. “I was just thinking, you’ll be quite the broodmare for some lucky gent soon.”

Nicole’s embarrassment deepened, not just at the way Jan had expressed herself but also for what she’d actually said. It was sad that some people seemed to feel that way.

(Sadder still that some part of her had twitched excitedly at the idea, as well as the fact Jan was treating her like an equal).

“I just worry,” Jan said. “You’re a fine figure of a woman already. My Nessa, I think she’ll have a harder time being bred.”

It was such an odd way to talk about having children with a lover, but Nicole couldn’t bring herself to say any thing about it - she knew her mom would have found something to say, most likely something irate - and in any case before she could recover her composure, Jan had ushered her into the free changing room and was saying “You just wait there, honey. I’ll bring you some options,” before bustling off.

Stood directly in front of the floor-length mirror, Nicole took a good long look at herself. Her breasts made her smile, something that hadn’t really been the case since they started to grow. They were big enough to be awkward and expensive, even setting aside the attention they got, and she’d always hated that.

Maybe the craving for that attention she felt now was her properly growing up, finally?

She cupped them and pushed them together, considering her cleavage. She felt a sudden rush of power and excitement. She licked her lips, then began experimenting with different expressions as part of the presentation package. After a moment, she pulled out her phone, maintaining her cleavage by wrapping the other hand under her chest and squeezing them together, and she took a photo tentatively.

There had been a brief craze in town, nearly a month ago by then, where photos of this style had become a thing, and some had even been used as social media profile pics. From what she’d heard, others had been passed around for the appreciation of various menfolk, before the women of Bankhaven had started to ignore the protestations of their men against their actions, had started to disregard them more generally.

Nicole had always spent less time on her phone than her friends, and she couldn’t remember ever seeing the ad that Heather Monroe had described as the inspiration for all the photos. She found herself, though, understanding as she snapped photo after photo just how good the others must have felt. And her tits (she had not noticed them becoming tits rather than breasts) were, she was sure, better for it than the others. Heavier. Riper. Fuller.

She moaned softly at the thought of it. High time she got the recognition she had always craved.

“Lovely,” Jan Carter said appreciatively. Nicole jumped - she hadn’t registered the other woman’s return - but found herself smiling. It was recognition, of a sort.

There was a lot of fabric draped over Jan’s arm. “Right,” she said. “I picked out a few options. Let’s try them.” She passed across a bright blue tee, high-collared, but clinging tight once Nicole tried it on; what she had to offer was obvious.

She was looking at herself thoughtfully in the mirror trying to work out what was wrong when Jan ran a finger across her shoulder, tutting when it hit the bump of her bra. “Unsightly line there,” she said. “I don’t know if you dare do better.”

The challenge hung in the air for a long moment. Nicole was her mother’s daughter, though, and she wasn’t going to let a challenge go unanswered. Her lips thin, she pulled the tee off and passed it along to Jan to hold while she unsnapped her bra and set it aside.

With the bra gone the tee seemed to Nicole to no longer be missing what she’d been looking for. She found herself smiling, giddy with euphoria, while a part of her wondered what had gotten into her to dare like this. “I like that,” she said.

“Not as much as some others will,” Jan answered, and Nicole saw the woman’s smile in the mirror and it warmed her. “You’re going to catch some big money executive’s eye looking like that.”

Was that what she was supposed to do? Her mood soured slightly at the idea. Although that was unfair, really, Mandatum was being so good for the town, so it wasn’t like all businesses were run by sleazy executives with ulterior motives.

“I did have one other option,” Jan said, and she lifted one of the two bright blue garments folded over her arm, catching the other expertly so that she could hold them both up at once; a bright blue halter top and a pair of hot pants in the same bright blue. The same outfit her mom was currently trialling at the bar, something Jan’s grin made it clear she knew all too well. “Everyone loves a double act,” she grinned.

Nicole bit her lip. “No,” she said at last, although even she could hear the doubt and uncertainty in her refusal. “Not right now, anyhow.”

“Alright,” Jan said, nodding. “I can understand that.”

Nicole wore the shirt home. As she passed the bandstand, she saw Benton Allen and Nessa Carter on the seats in a clinch together. She frowned. It still made no sense to her that the little creep had so many women jumping at him, especially since he’d had no luck at all early on; even setting aside their own confrontation, there just hadn’t been anyone willing to let him buy their favours.

She was still staring at the couple when they broke the kiss. Benton saw her standing there in her new tee and grinned, lifting one hand in a wave.

Nicole scoffed in disgust and stalked away.

When she opened the door to the bar and made her way in, Tamara saw her immediately and her eyes lit up approvingly; she also lifted her hand to beckon her daughter over. As Nicole joined her at the bar, Tamara said “Good to see you thinking about your future, finally.” She smiled to take the sting out of it and continued, “Want to hear something ahead of time?”

By this, Nicole knew from long experience, her mom meant that she’d received an email from the school staff about something being organised. “Sure, Mom,” she answered, settling onto her stool. She wasn’t quite used yet to the way her weight was distributed now that a bra wasn’t involved, but she was enjoying the reactions she got. Thank goodness she’d changed her mind about display ahead of college, she thought.

“They’re suspending senior class,” Tamara told her. “Instead, starting next Monday you’ll get a chance to do work study at Mandatum, all paid for by the company.”

Nicole’s brow furrowed. This was odd, wasn’t it? Companies didn’t normally offer mass programs to just one school. Schools didn’t normally suspend education for their senior class.

But, a voice in the back of her head supplied, even if it was odd it couldn’t be wrong. If it was wrong, they wouldn’t be doing it.

“Weird,” she said. And then, after a pause, “Although, I guess…”

Tamara raised her eyebrows, waiting to hear whatever her daughter had to say. “I guess I’d be interested if I could get a spot in R&D,” she said. “I think they’re doing some interesting stuff.” She wasn’t sure where she’d heard that, but it was definitely lodged in her head from somewhere.

“Well, you’re going to have some fun, then,” Tamara said cheerfully. “Apparently the placement’s open to any student who’s reached their majority, so you should be near the top of their list. Benton told me he was going to make sure you got the best orientation opportunity.”

Nicole nodded tentatively. Something about that was odd too, but she couldn’t put her finger on why…

*

That Monday, two dozen young women of the Bankhaven graduating class gathered in the parking lot of the Mandatum facility on Maple Street. Nicole, Nessa Carter, and Heather Monroe milled around alongside several of their peers. At the far end of the parking lot were several young men from the same class.

There was a sizable gap between the two groups, and nobody in either group noticed; it had become the norm for gatherings in town over about the past month, after a slow drifting apart on the part of the married couples. Almost nobody (except for Charlotte Madison) remarked on the fact there were no unmarried couples left in town who hadn’t fallen apart, and when Charlotte had pointed out, Nicole had laughed and told her she must be forgetting someone.

A half hour later, at 8am, the Mandatum office staff began to arrive. They recognised several, of course, but a few of the technicians and researchers who’d arrived in the past six months had kept themselves apart from the population.

Nicole was surprised to see that two obvious software developers who wore their phones on their belts in almost parodies of holsters were clearly still using another brand, not M-Phones. Hard to see with the others, but she was surprised that they hadn’t made the switch the way town had.

It occurred to her, standing and watching these men and women chatter as they got ready to head inside, that she hadn’t tried to power up her original phone in probably three months. Maybe it would work now.

Not that she’d be happy to give up the performance and quality of her M-Phone. The only downside to it was the weird ads, and at this point she barely noticed them.

One of the women approached the little knot of work-study women with a cheerful smile. “Hi, girls,” she said. “We’ll just get set up and we’ll call you in, OK?” Another was doing the same thing with the boys. Nicole, like the others, nodded, though there were plenty of uncertain glances among the group.

Before they were called in, a large Jeep swept into the parking lot. Errol Allen and his son dismounted and gave quick waves to both groups, though Nicole imagined that Benton Allen’s expression as he faced the boys was probably less of an open leer.

She could hear the wistful sigh from Heather Monroe as she watched him, and looked sideways at her; Heather had been one of the first to make herself part of Benton’s clique-slash-harem, and nothing the town had seen had suggested that Benton wasn’t availing himself of all three women. She’d just assumed the women must all be okay with that, even if she couldn’t understand for the life of her why they would be.

The Allens went inside moments later, though, and Heather sighed again and shook her head.

They were led into the facility in due course - Nicole was quite surprised to notice that the boys didn’t come in with them but were instead received elsewhere - and found themselves in a room full of desks, each with a laptop on them. To judge by the sleek blue casings and embossed Ms, these were Mandatum laptops. “Time for the aptitude test,” the woman who had led them all in said briskly. “Good luck, everyone.”

Nicole picked a desk, sat down, and immediately the screen lit up. It had a prompt open, asking for her name.

She answered, and then followed up with her address and date of birth. They would already have all this, she thought, from the school, so this was probably a way of matching up data (via the name) and then checking their attention to detail.

WELCOME NIKKI, the screen read as it changed. The diminutive of her name stayed onscreen for five seconds, in which she found herself vaguely affronted.

This was replaced by a series of multiple-choice questions. Nicole sighed inwardly, but her mom had told her to be sure to make the most out of the work study, so she set to work with a will.

It was strangely soothing behaviour, she thought after a while; it seemed like the questions were endless, and there was no indication that any answers were wrong. Instead there was a pleasing moment between each question where the screen filled Mandatum blue.

She answered question after question, beginning with tests of general knowledge and mental arithmetic, then into a series of questions about how to respond to customers in different situations.

Nicole lost track of time as she answered, enjoying the quiet atmosphere of concentration around her as everyone on the work study did their best for the same goal. It was peaceful but productive, something she hadn’t previously realised she would enjoy as much as she did.

“Sorry,” a soft male voice murmured beside her. “I just need to tweak something…”

She felt her grip on the mouse slacken somehow, and the cursor stopped moving across the screen, and Nikki gazed at the cursor, almost unblinking, and whoever it was leaned over her shoulder and made a series of keystrokes. Elsewhere on the screen a window popped up and information was entered, then saved and the window closed, and Nikki barely took any notice.

Whoever it had been put his hand on her shoulder, as if patting her, and squeezed her shoulder just once, and then was gone. Nikki just about glanced across, and saw only his back; fleetingly she thought it must have been Benton Allen, and then she was answering questions again, and the whole encounter was swiftly forgotten.

*

“I got executive assistant,” Heather was saying. “How about you?”

“Same!” Nessa exclaimed cheerfully, all smiles. “But I was expecting that.” Her voice dropped to barely above a whisper as she continued. “Benton told me he’d fix it for me.” She beamed.

Nikki hadn’t looked yet at what she’d been assigned, but she rolled her eyes at this all the same. “I’m hoping for R&D,” she told them. “I don’t know why but I’ve been thinking about that lately. A chance to put my brain to use, you know?”

They nodded, smiling at her, and it occurred to Nikki that she felt closer to them both than she ever had done before. It was a happy feeling, having more friends.

She checked her readout and frowned. “Executive assistant?”

The other two girls squealed enthusiastically and dragged her into a three-way hug. Nikki wondered what had happened. She liked them both, but Nessa Carter had been presented to her as an opposite so often it felt impossible that they had the same results on an aptitude test.

They were going in for orientation after lunch. She’d put her foot down then, she decided. She’d talk this through with them and make them understand she was better than that.

They were a forward-thinking company. She was sure they’d listen to her, if she was only ready to speak up.

*

There wasn’t an opportunity to speak up at first. They didn’t go back to that first room; instead each of them were shown into a small room of their own for orientation. “All your questions will be answered,” she was told by the smiling woman who ushered her in, and a little way down the corridor she could hear a man assure Madeleine Bryant of the same thing. “All your questions will be answered.”

This wasn’t how it was meant to be. She knew that with a passionate certainty. Inside the small room, there wasn’t anyone but herself, a small stool, and a screen stood on a small wooden cabinet. Nikki stood, her arms folded, her lips thin, and waited for someone to come in to talk to.

Instead, after a few moments, there was a girlish giggle from the screen. Nikki glanced across to see a woman standing there, a Mandatum-blue suit jacket closely tailored to her form, a visible absence of any blouse beneath it. Her blonde hair was drawn back into two pigtails, each tied with a bright blue ribbon. Below the jacket she wore closely-tailored slacks in the same blue. It looked businesslike, if daring, from the front, but Nikki was sure the rear view would be much more eyecatching. “Hi!” she said. “I’m Debbie. And welcome to Mandatum.

“If you’re watching this, you’ve already taken your first step toward finding the perfect role to fit you. We just need to help you get in line with expectations.”

The bland background behind her suddenly changed; it must have been a green screen. She was instead standing in front of a board meeting at a table. Nikki didn’t know the people behind her, but there were enough familiar elements to their faces that she knew these must be the Allens. “Mandatum is a family company,” Debbie continued. “We want to welcome you into that family.” The image behind her pulled out to show countless other Mandatum employees gathered in the back rooms of a MaxiMart. “And families are built on love and respect and hierarchy.”

That seemed like a strange utterance to Nikki, but she was also trying to work out what about that background image was wrong - it seemed to be moving or flickering in ways that it shouldn’t be - so she didn’t spend too much time questioning it.

There was a pattern emerging out of the background, some kind of graphical trickery turning the image of many employees into a vibrant swirl of Mandatum blue that danced and strobed behind Debbie. It felt strangely familiar to Nikki, though she certainly hadn’t encountered it before. She was staring, had started staring without noticing. Something about it was fascinating her.

Debbie was still talking, and Nikki knew she should be paying attention to what was being said, but there wasn’t time to do both, so unfortunately her orientation was going by without her noticing, slipping through her fingers. She felt comfortable, even if she also felt strangely lightheaded. Everything was going to be fine, she was certain of that.

“How was your first day of real work?” her mom would ask her later, when she got in the door. Nikki, towing behind her a garment bag she’d been issued at the end of the day, considered for a moment.

“Gruelling,” she said. “And a little confusing? I didn’t get to do much yet.”

“You will,” Tamara offered with a chuckle. “Trust me. They’re going to be testing you guys, looking to see who works hard, who steps up, who really gives the company value.”

Nikki nodded. “I didn’t get R&D,” she confided. “They want me to be an executive assistant.”

“That’s good!” her mom declared ringingly. Nikki was sure she remembered her mom being dismissive of that sort of role once upon a time, but she smiled uncertainly. “You have a chance to make a real impression on them.”

That was true. Nikki nodded again. “You think I could cross into R&D later?”

“I think you should do your best where you are. You never know, you might find exactly what you want.” She smiled in approval. “Okay, honey?”

“Right.” Nikki’s smile took a little more strength of its own. “I’m sure I can ace it.”

She went upstairs where she unpacked and hung up the items in her garment bag; a close-fitting waistcoat in Mandatum blue and a short skirt in the same. Her heels, she decided, were not high enough, and she would have to do something about that.

She walked down and out of the bar entirely and headed over to MaxiMart Fashion, hoping it would still be open. If need be, she would go on and check Boutique Emilie - Emma always had good business-suitable footwear that was still highly feminine in stock - but it felt somehow disloyal to shop somewhere that Mandatum didn’t have a stake in. She was honestly happy that after taking the investment her mom had switched to Mandatum’s own brands of soda.

(Something about that felt like an idea she’d picked up somewhere. She could hear it as if someone had said it to her, but the voice she heard in memory was that of Debbie from the orientation, and that definitely wasn’t right. Debbie had talked about Mandatum as a family, and you weren’t disloyal to your family. It just didn’t happen. You wanted your family to thrive and bloom and grow.)

She was thinking along these lines when she heard a single squeal of a siren, the new electric police cruiser almost silent aside from the bloop as it pulled up to the curb. Nikki watched Maggie Shaw and Jennifer Philips emerge from the patrol car, both wearing the bright Mandatum-blue tight fitting blouses… and hot pants in the same blue, it turned out.

They moved out from either side of the car, bypassing most of the Bankhaven residents, their blue uniforms matching the blue worn by so many inhabitants. It was nice, Nikki thought, to see just how well they blended into the community.

The officers moved on, flanking around Olivia Nystrom as they did so. Olivia, who still bucked the trend and wore no blue at all, was out walking her dog.

Nikki wasn’t close enough to hear the conversation but she watched from the other side of the road, wondering what Olivia had done to be singled out like this. Impossible to think of the woman as a criminal, but she was a pet owner and her little dog was aggressive. Possibly something to do with that?

No, it couldn’t be. Of course not. But what it might be then… well. Olivia wasn’t a community minded woman. Perhaps she had withheld taxes, or something similar. To some people, Nikki knew, that could even be a point of pride.

As she watched, Maggie stepped behind Olivia, taking her arms and cuffing them behind her back, before Jennifer guided her into the back seat of the cruiser. The two underdressed officers then got back into the patrol car themselves.

Nikki watched, wondering what was going on, as the cruiser made a quick U-turn and drove off with prisoner inside.

It turned right at the junction, heading toward town outskirts on Maple, not left toward the police station on Ash.

Nikki swallowed. She didn’t know what that meant - didn’t know what any of this meant - but it unsettled her.

*

The next day took her back to the Maple Street facility herself. Olivia was nowhere to be seen, of course, and with her mother’s encouragement firmly in mind, Nikki set out to prove herself as a fine executive assistant.

She had been assigned to the same department where Benton was doing his own work study - human resources - and while she sat demurely at the side of her own executive, taking meticulous notes and enjoying Benton’s gaze on her long legs, now properly on display in sheer tights below her Mandatum miniskirt, she saw firsthand just how much a family company Mandatum could be. Lulu McKenna had reported that morning on her pregnancy, and Jerry Donnelly, the exec Nikki had been assigned to, was the one responsible for handling that within the company.

“Come on, Nikki,” he said jovially, going from the meeting table across to his desk, knowing she would scurry dutifully along behind him, “I’ll walk you through activating the Broodmare Clause.” This turned out to be a set of paperwork, contracts, and financial indulgences which made having children highly rewarded for Mandatum employees. “Leave the space for father blank,” Jerry directed her. “We’ll find out who in due time.”

Nikki had naturally assumed the father would be Lulu’s husband, but on that reminder she immediately remembered just how awkwardly things still lay between the two of them. There had been no reconciliation. Cheeks red with her blush, Nikki did as Jerry asked.

She continued to be attentive to his needs, and in moments where he made no use of her, she found Benton a lively and flirty presence enlivening her day. Smiling at his comments, averting her eyes modestly at his gaze, she found herself wondering how it was she had ever disliked him. The recollection of taking his hand from her ass, twisting his arm, and sending him onto his back on the parking lot tarmac was clear in her mind, but it felt all the same like the dream of a madwoman, for certainly it made no sense.

Over the course of the day Jerry went from patting her hand to squeezing her shoulder, from squeezing her shoulder to patting her behind; from patting her behind to, when she brought him a last coffee for the day, running his fingertip over the curve of her chests and cheerfully saying “Too bad you didn’t offer me the cream.”

Each time she blushed, and turned aside, and between her thighs she throbbed with easy, eager desire, even as some part of her protested that this was wrong; but at the same time her acceptance of it and those thoughts it aroused in her considered it all to be perfectly natural.

At the last of them she paused, and after a few moments she shyly unbuttoned her waistcoat and opened it up, letting Jerry slip his hand inside and cup her breast through her blouse, feel the excited hardness of her nipple and the warmth of her skin against his palm which proved that she wore no bra. Her breath caught in the back of her throat; she had to fight against her own impulse to moan excitedly. But that day, at least, it went no further.

*

A day or two later, Nikki saw Liv Nystrom again. She was walking her dog but otherwise, things couldn’t have seemed more different. Gone was the loose, flowing skirt, replaced by tight leggings in dark grey, which in bright Bankhaven summer sun showcased curves and shadows better than a pure black would have. Above that was a clinging tube top in Mandatum blue, and both she and her dog wore matching blue collars.

Her long blonde hair, rather than being worn loose, had been gathered together into a braid which she had wrapped around her hair and secured in place, and her nails glittered Mandatum blue.

If the face hadn’t been the same, Nikki could easily have imagined a different woman was walking the same dog.

She stood stock-still, staring at Liv. Impossible to deny it. She had been one of the dissenters in town, and now she was as advanced in devotion to Mandatum as anyone, just a couple of days later.

She had been in the same place that Nikki was now working, and in less than a week there, Nikki had found herself allowing her exec to grope her tits, fondle her ass, and had been contemplating treating him by worshipping his cock during a coffee break - a great way, she’d thought, to show that she was willing to stand out even among the work study.

Something very like that must be true for Liv - no, Nikki corrected herself firmly, for Olivia. And if so, it was true for Louise McKenna, the first ‘broodmare’ and for her mom, and Jan Carter, and even Maggie Dean and Jenny Phillips who’d picked Olivia off the street and taken her in.

Mandatum was taking over the town by taking over their minds.

She shuddered.

This was bad. This was very bad.

She took off running, hurrying home to tell her mom what she’d realised, but she found herself skittering to a halt again as she rounded the corner. Just as Rocky Wear had been rebranded to MaxiMart Fashion, a new sign had replaced the old Tamara’s logo on the barfront.

This one, in bright Mandatum blue, read Tammy’s.

The woman in there, Nikki - no, dammit! Nicole - thought, was no longer her mom. Not really.