Sinead felt fingers slide into her hair, making a fist just behind the back of her head, and tugging. A delicious low-level sting prickled across her scalp. Her eyes unfocused slightly from the screen as Bimbeau pulled her back upright. She stayed down in trance the whole time. It was safe in trance. Overshadow was no threat to their own hypnotised property.

He started to draw her around in a wide circle, turning on the spot while she was attached to him by his grip, making her walk around by the hair. She didn’t want to lose eye contact with her own reflection, with the thing carefully drawing her further down into trance, but she was drawn away from it all the same.

Staying down in trance, she was now nonetheless a little more aware of her surroundings and her own physical state. The trickle of sticky wetness down her inner thighs excited her in a way she vaguely thought it probably shouldn’t.

The Doctor had now executed a half-turn with them both, and her glassy stare took in work he had been doing while she was so deeply lost in the reflection of her own hypnotised eyes that the passage of time had been completely unnoticed. A small cabinet had been dragged over beside the single bed they’d been issued with. On it - and in it, by the looks of things - was a ramshackle collection of electronics, wires, and the occasional printed circuit, all running from a car battery.

More cables ran from the collection to places they’d been strapped against the bedhead. Medical electrodes dangled from them.

Sinead took all of this in, eyes glassy, without recognising the significance of any of it. Not that she had any idea of Doctor Bimbeau’s history in any case - where would she have found out? He was a minor note in most press reports about the Krafts, and very few stories had made it out even about them.

You’d have to be a criminal investigator specialising in unusual cases to have heard of them.

“You like being hypnotised, don’t you, Sinead?” Bimbeau asked, and his voice was that honey he put on when he wanted her mind to purr and sink deeper.

“Yesss,” she answered. She was startled to hear in her voice just how deeply she agreed. This deep in trance, she was startled to hear any level of emotion in her voice. Wasn’t she beneath that now?

“Well, being brainwashed is better,” she was told. She was sure the word meant bad things. All the same, being told it was better…

She didn’t answer. She accepted the truth of what she was told, but she didn’t answer. Speaking without being prompted was beyond her brain while it was like this.

“Would you like to be brainwashed?”

Sinead wasn’t sure what the appropriate answer would be. She stood there, still staring vacantly at the device. She was supposed to serve the Doctor, she remembered. He had clearly been the one to construct this. And there was excitement in his voice; not even excitement but arousal, even so soon after fucking her…

“Yes, Doctor,” she said, and she was dimly aware that her voice was cheerful and chipper, not the monotone it had been.

“Then lie down on the bed,” he instructed, “and we’ll begin.”

He sounded even more excited now. Sinead concluded that she’d done well.

*

It had been about five minutes since the light went away.

Melissa was still standing, frozen in place, staring at the porthole where the strange light had been, when the door to her cabin buzzed open and they found her. Her hand still held her costume, half-drawn out from her hiding place.

She heard breathing, and her sharp, well-trained senses told her the person who’d entered was almost certainly femail. She listened to the woman behind her as she approached, but she did nothing about it. Said nothing. Could neither speak nor move, so far as she could make out.

It was a strange thing, to find your mind and your body not under your own control. She’d been feeling a little detached, if not happy about the whole experience. But the moment the door clicked open and she realised whoever was doing this had access to a skeleton key, she expected to feel fear, adrenaline, and more, as her secret identity was jeopardised.

But she didn’t - or only the phantom equivalent of it, without the neurochemical emphasis. She felt mild fear because she knew she should.

She wasn’t at all sure she liked that.

The woman’s footsteps stopped just a few paces behind her. She was close enough, certainly, to be able to see at least part of the Swift Fox costume as well as Melissa’s own mostly-naked form, covered only in her underwear.

At least she was in practical, athletic underwear ahead of her planned excursion. If she’d still been in her daytime bikini, chosen to blend in for the party, or some of the lingerie she’d packed as a just-in-case, then Melissa had to hope the embarrassment she’d feel wouldn’t be backed up by neurochemistry or it might be actually painful.

Whoever they were, the woman chuckled, and Melissa felt prickles across her shoulders. If she’d been able to move and respond, she would have bridled at that, but it wasn’t even an option.

“Oh, wow. Superhero?”

Melissa said nothing.

“I’m asking if you’re a superhero,” the woman said, and along with the amusement in their voice there was a note of steel. “And you’re going to answer… Now.”

“Yes,” Melissa said, and, inside, she regretted it. Not much she could do about it, though. She didn’t feel nearly so detached about being under someone else’s control now. Not while they were actually using that control.

“Does anyone else on this cruise know?”

“No.”

And suddenly there was nothing but amusement in her voice. “Do you want them to know?”

No.”

Melissa couldn’t believe the lack of difference in her voice between the two answers. She’d wanted to scream the second one; it just turned out she couldn’t. Everything came out emotionlessly, tonelessly, just like her body was locked into position without any emotion.

“Hm.” There was a long pause. The woman put her hand on Melissa’s ass, over her panties. “First time getting mindfucked?”

“Yes.”

“Won’t be your last.” She’d kept her hand there like the physical contact meant something somehow. Melissa wanted to tell her it would be, to go further and say that once she broke this control, the woman would regret it.

But unless she was asked a question or told to speak, she couldn’t.

“So if you don’t want them to find out, you’re going to need to be very obedient.”

She didn’t like the sound of that at all, but she knew what she had to do.

The woman slid her hand from one buttock under Melissa, between her thighs, cupping at her mound. “Grind,” she ordered. Melissa told herself to obey, to show how obedient she could be, but to her own horror she realised her body had already begun; it had taken her conscious mind longer to register the command than her compulsion had needed to hear, recognise, and act on it.

She’d never done this before. Not even to maintain her cover. Hadn’t really supposed it might ever be needed. But with her knees, ankles, shoulders, elbows and neck locked in place, her hips sprang into action, rubbing and rolling against the other woman’s palm and her wrist.

It was slow at first, but it turned out her body was perfectly able to register sensations; it was only her mind that couldn’t generate emotions. The more she ground against the woman taunting her, the more aroused she felt - and the needier she seemed to become.

She noticed her breathing quicken first, and then she heard it; ragged, eager gasps for air, her body responding despite her wishes. Still she ground against the woman obediently.

Was she going to have to cum all over her hand? Was this only phase one in a greater plan?

What else would she do if she were ordered to?

She started to moan as the pleasure continued to build, and in spite of her best efforts, her pace picked up. Hunger and excitement were present alongside the strange, trancelike acceptance and willingness to go along.

She should, she knew, be much angrier about this than she was.

“Stop,” the woman said, just as Melissa was starting to prepare mentally to have cum on her captor. Her hips locked back into place instantly, her body again acting before her mind could catch up.

“Take your panties and your bra off,” the woman instructed, “then put your costume on. Mask and everything.”

Melissa obeyed silently. Inside, though, alongside her embarrassment she felt a sudden strange flash of gratitude.

Any witness would see Swift Fox - not Melissa with Swift Fox’s outfit.

The woman was being as good as her word. It wasn’t a promise Melissa would have expected would be kept; she’d tried to push for it solely so she had a chance.

What was coming next?

*

Sinead would have empathised with Melissa’s predicament, but she wouldn’t have understood it. For her, the hypnotic trance the Doctor had induced had been a relief from fear. The fact it had begun as a negative for Melissa just didn’t make sense to the headspace Sinead had been driven into.

Lying back on the bed was a peaceful, positive step for her. She was about to be brainwashed, but Bimbeau wanted to brainwash her, and she trusted and obeyed him as part of her service to Overshadow.

“I really should have restraints,” he muttered. “Next time, I guess. Sinead, I want you to starfish out. Grip the outer struts of the bedhead with your hands. Stretch your toes out as close to the lower struts as you can.”

“Yes, Doctor,” she agreed. The sheets on the bed were silk; luxurious against her bare skin in a way she hadn’t expected from how spartan everything was. She closed her fingers firmly around the cold metal of the bedhead, and the Doctor leaned over her, his eyes making contact with hers.

She stopped moving the moment eye contact was established. It wasn’t that she tensed up; if anything it was the other way around, suddenly her limbs and muscles were so loose that they had no motive energy of their own.

“You’re bound to the bed, Sinead,” he told her, that purring delight filling his words, filling her head. “You can feel the ropes, silky-smooth but so strong, with almost no give, around your ankles and your wrists. Test them for me now.”

Experimentally, she pulled against the soft, unyielding rope around her right wrist. She hadn’t expected to be able to pull free, and she couldn’t. She tried again, clenching her jaw with the effort. She knew Bimbeau wouldn’t be willing to accept just a weak effort, and it was so important to please him.

But try as she might, she still couldn’t break free. “They hold, Doctor,” she reported, her tone positive.

“Excellent,” he said. He started attaching the electrodes to her; one at each temple, one in the very centre of her forehead, maybe half an inch above her brow, one nestled in her thick read hair at the top of her head, and one at the base of her skull.

Sinead wasn’t sure what he was doing, but the end result was one he wanted, and so she was happy for him to proceed. As her head wasn’t restrained, she turned to watch what he was doing, tensing her left arm against the rope to flatten it a little and get a clearer view.

The Doctor closed the connection to the car battery and fiddled with a dial. Something strange started to happen in Sinead’s head; her scalp was tingling, but the tingle seemed to extend deeper. Each electrode became a throughline of electromagnetism to every other, a lattice of energy flowing through her head.

The around her was suddenly happening faster. Bimbeau still had the air of a methodical man as he experimented with his apparatus, but his motions were twice as fast as they had been - or she was seeing twice as slow as she had been.

She could feel the chains of power arcing through her head, and wherever they flowed, something was different; between her temples and her forehead, her vision was somehow different, seeing things with a richer texture; around the top of her head, her own ability to think about and analyse what she felt seemed suddenly warped, as if the inputs didn’t match the outputs.

Her brain was quivering under the energy within, her thoughts and even herself becoming a gooey, uncertain mess.

“Can you hear me?” the Doctor asked.

“I hear you, Doctor,” she answered. It was easy to answer; easier than staying quiet, in fact, as if her thoughts were galvanised by the energy. As if the energy itself laid her open, made her more responsive.

“That’s good. You’re about to be brainwashed, Sinead. You want to be brainwashed.”

“I am about to be brainwashed,” she echoed. “I want to be brainwashed, Doctor.” She was surprised to hear a total lack of uncertainty in her voice as she said that, and even more surprised to realise there was no uncertainty in her mind about it. Whatever the device was doing, it worked really well.

“You will not resist your brainwashing.”

“I will not resist my brainwashing, Doctor,” Sinead echoed, and whatever small part of her had feared, had attempted to rally against this, was silenced.

“You serve Overshadow.”

“I serve Overshadow, Doctor.”

“You want Overshadow to be happy.”

“I want Overshadow to be happy, Doctor.”

“You will always act to make Overshadow happier.”

“I will always act to make Overshadow happier, Doctor.”

“Obedience makes Overshadow happy.”

“Obedience makes Overshadow happy, Doctor.”

The words were echoing through her mind. Like children singing a song in rounds, her thoughts started to echo his words once he’d started; once her thoughts were under way, she affirmed it in voice, and the same idea rolled through her head three times each.

A fragment of another children’s superstition floated through her mind in turn; What I tell you three times is true.

“You will obey even outside trance.”

“I will obey even outside trance, Doctor.”

“Every skill, every talent, and everything you know is in service.”

“Every skill, every talent, and everything I know is in service, Doctor.”

“Obedience to your owners is more important than your own dreams.”

“Obedience to my owners is more important than my own dreams.”

Owners? That wasn’t a term she’d heard before. Did she now have more than one owner? He’d said it quite quietly - was there a chance she’d misheard?

“Obedience makes you happy.”

“Obedience makes me happy, Doctor.”

“You are tailor-made for slavery.”

“I am tailor-made for slavery, Doctor.”

“You do not hesitate to serve.”

“I do not hesitate to serve, Doctor.”

“Your name now is Sinner.”

“My name now is Sinner, Doctor.”

The Doctor sat there a while longer, the room quiet except for the hum of apparatus. From where she lay, her head toward him, Sinner saw him sat deep in thought - no, she decided; not thinking deeply but chasing an elusive memory. Checking to see if anything had been forgotten.

He got up and stepped across to the bed, where he stooped, head near hers, and put his hand on one of the electrodes. But he didn’t disconnect it at once; instead, he dipped his head low against her ear. “Do not acknowledge this aloud,” he said quietly. “Your primary owner is Doctor Bimbeau.”

My primary owner is Doctor Bimbeau, she thought.

“In conflict between Overshadow’s orders and mine, you obey me.”

In conflict between Overshadow’s orders and his, I obey him.

“You will not allow Overshadow to learn this.”

I will not allow overshadow to learn this.

He straightened up, taking with him a couple of the electrodes. The weird sensation in her head was lesser now, but it was also strangely lopsided. She wasn’t at all sure how to process it. “Do you understand your brainwashing, Sinner?” he asked aloud.

“Yes, Doctor,” she said, and with a smile, Bimbeau removed the last of the electrodes, then crossed back to the device to remove the car battery.

“How do you feel?” he asked.

Somewhere in the middle of the process, she realised, she’d woken from trance. There was still a little fear of Overshadow there, but just answering his question then had made her feel happy. Any opportunity to obey made her feel happy now, which made perfect sense. Sinner was tailor-made for slavery.

“I feel good, Doctor,” she said. “May I have an order to obey?”

*

Melissa followed the woman through the yacht’s corridors up to the main deck. She remained silent throughout, her body simply tracking along four paces behind the woman, even when speaking up might have got them both to their destination quicker - the woman didn’t know her way around the ship, and by the end it really showed.

By the time they surfaced on deck the others from the party boat were all up there, standing in three neat rows. Only their relaxed stances and varying states of undress marked them out from a military line-up - that and the fact they were surrounded by beautiful women in dark wetsuits. With her last couple of years learning from one of the world’s top detectives, even in a deep state of trance Melissa counted eleven of them. With the one behind her that made an even dozen.

It didn’t matter. She couldn’t act against them until she broke out of trance or it wore off, and that might take a while. Even if she did, twelve was more than she could handle, and the others wouldn’t be much use.

“Join the short line,” the woman behind her said, and Melissa’s body hastened to obey. It was probably a good thing it did; there was still the chance that if she wasn’t obedient enough, her secret would be out.

Only as she fell into place in one line, behind a 19-year-old blonde beauty in a pair of terrycloth pajamas with a Playboy bunny motif, did it occur to her to wonder if part of her was actually trying to be obedient enough.

If that single throwaway line had burrowed into her head to turn her own mind into a fifth columnist.

The bustiest of the wetsuited women broke away from where she’d been whispering in Chad’s ear and approached her. It wasn’t until she was close enough to speak quietly and be heard above the waves that Melissa realised the woman wasn’t actually intent on her.

“What the hell have you found, Lulu?”

“A heroine hiding on the boat, Mistress.”

Okay. Now Melissa had a sense of who was in charge here. Not enough data to go on, though - Scottish, obviously, by the accent. She wanted to turn to look at the woman properly, but she was in line, so she couldn’t turn too far. The moonlight caught her hair, though - deep red hair, like the heart of a fire, flashing in the moonlight. And the biggest tits of the group.

That couldn’t be why she was in charge, could it?

“Hm.” The redhead turned to face Melissa. “So who are you, hm? Speak up.”

She almost gave her real name before thought came up with action. “M - my name is Swift Fox.”

“Swift Fox,” she muttered. “Never heard of you. Should I have?”

“Not in Scotland,” she said truthfully. That earned a chuckle from the redhead.

“Oooh, I do love it when they’re still sassy,” she said, and the woman behind Melissa - Lulu, presumably - laughed in her turn. “Where do you play, then, little fox?”

There was something about the way she spoke; amused, but confident, and not so much assertive as if she’d already successfully asserted. As if Melissa had surrendered already. “Chicago,” she answered. The woman would already know from the others anyway, surely.

“You’re a long way from Chicago,” she replied. “And the big lad I was just chatting to, he’s not sure why he’s here. Not a smart guy, but am I right in assuming you talked him into it?”

Well, she was quick to put facts together. Melissa didn’t think it was safe to answer that. “Yes,” she said, and cursed herself. There was enough need to obey inside her to get the truth from her even against her best wishes.

“Hmph. And why did you want to come here?”

“I wanted to solve a mystery.”

“Which mystery is that?”

“The kidnapping of Candace Kraft.”

*

Candace felt like someone had punched her in the solar plexus; breathless, stunned, light-headed. “Why?” she demanded hotly.

“To put things right,” Swift Fox told her. “To return her to her husband and daughter.”

That didn’t sound like putting things right. It would make things much, much wronger if she were taken from the Doctor. At least at the moment she was taking care of his place and his people in his absence, ready to lay them at his feet on his return.

That wasn’t what she said, though. “And what business is this of yours?” was what she said, once she’d recovered her composure enough to ask.

The heroine paused before her answer, lips parted. She took long enough, in fact, that Candace actually checked her eyes through the mask, worried she might be breaking free. But instead of the telltale signs of someone fighting the suggestion, it seemed more like she was just trying to find an answer.

“It’s no business of mine.”

“Then why are you here?”

“Forensic Files.”

“You found files on the case?”

“No.”

Candace lost her patience. “Explain, little fox.”

“The TV show did an episode about the kidnapping. It’s an unsolved case. She disappeared around the same time as another professor. Later on his name came up connected to some kind of slavery ring, so it seems like she got kidnapped.”

This was the first Candace had heard of it, and her shock lasted long enough that the heroine assumed she wasn’t going to interrupt. “I’ve been looking to make my name properly,” she said. “So I worked the case from first assumptions, and I’m pretty sure this Doctor Bimbeau has to have been basing himself near here. I needed an excuse to get out and investigate first-hand.”

Candace closed her jaw. “Just how smart do you think you are, little fox?”

“I don’t go in for IQ tests. Half of Red Fox’s biggest problems are people who take their IQ tests too seriously.”

She stared at the young woman with new eyes. This wasn’t someone to be taken lightly.

This wasn’t someone at all. This was a slave waiting to find out what she really was.

The Doctor would be delighted when Candace presented him with this problem solved.

“Hm. And why are you in costume?”

“Because she told me to be.”

Candace looked across to Lulu, who shrugged. “She was about to get changed. I tested her a little and got her ripe, then figured she should leave her panties and bring this.”

Candace grinned. “That sounds like you. How did she react to being tested?” Then she chuckled. “No, wait. Don’t tell me. You, Swift Fox, you tell me. What did you think of Lulu’s test?”

*

Again a truth she’d desperately wanted to keep concealed spilled out of Melissa’s mouth. “I was so frustrated when she stopped.”

“Oh? Didn’t she finish you off?” Candace tutted theatrically. “Now, Lulu, why wouldn’t you help her out?”

“We were already running late, Mistress,” she said. “And I had to believe that bringing her to you took priority.”

“Well, you were right there.” She looked back across the regimented lines of hypnotised yacht party attendees, then back to Melissa. “I’m betting you took the time to find out where the lifeboats are?”

“Yes.”

“From you, that’s Yes, Doctor.”

Melissa didn’t like the idea of showing her that respect. “Yes, Doctor,” she said, and how helpless she felt made her squirm inside.

“Lead the way, then.”

She turned and moved toward the lifeboat, her body marching rather than walking. She wasn’t even a military woman, but something about the way they’d been lined up and the way the rules in her head interacted had decided she should march.

As she walked she was suddenly very conscious how much wetness had leaked from her needy, grindy pussy down her thighs and now made the material cling to her body. If she wasn’t permitted to do something about it, given time she’d make it chafe.

The Scottish redhead was shouting orders, and she knew the other captives would be falling in behind her. She was oddly glad her costume’s cape would hide her butt - she was pretty sure, as tight as the costume was, they’d be able to tell she wasn’t wearing underwear, and for someone who could put on a bikini for Chad van Corthard, Melissa was actually pretty shy about her body.

At the same time, the part of her that was treating obeying well and completely as a fun game to be won hoped the others would take her lead and at least try to march rather than shamble. It would be more dignified in their submission.

The invading women loaded her and her fellow captives onto the lifeboat and set out for the island Melissa had planned to investigate. Which added to her list of worries, but it was hardly the biggest one.

So far as she could see, she’d found Candace Kraft. She’d never made any plans for what she’d do if the woman didn’t want to be rescued.

Now she was wondering how in the world to handle this, assuming she ever got free enough to do so.

*

This time when Bimbeau had to present Sinner for inspection, Overshadow had a few new tests.

The Doctor had hoped, when Overshadow made her first surprise inspection, that at least Sinner’s toplessness would disconcert the villainess. The one thing he didn’t want was for Overshadow to be thinking clearly. There was no chance he’d put any kind of trick over on her if she was.

He was beginning to think now that there was nothing that would faze her. When Sinner was presented to her this time, the first thing she did was say “Step forward,” and Sinner, of course, obeyed.

Overshadow opened a drawer in her desk. “Sit down,” she instructed, indicating the high-backed green chair opposite her. Sinner obeyed.

Onto the dark leather blotter on her desk, Overshadow placed a tall white candle. She busied herself about the business of lighting it while Bimbeau and (he was sure) Sinner wondered what was coming. He frowned, uncertain, and then caught a smirk on Overshadow’s face. She’d been watching, it seemed.

“Have you been burned before, Sinner?” Overshadow asked.

“Yes, Commander.”

“Did it hurt?”

“Yes, Commander.”

“Did you enjoy it?”

“No, Commander.”

Overshadow nodded. “Hold your hand above the flame,” she instructed.

“Yes, Commander.”

The Doctor could hear the uncertainty in Sinner’s voice, but he could also hear her happiness. The pleasure she’d been conditioned to take in obedience was there; while it was certainly not the only thing pushing Sinner to obey, it was a part of it.

He didn’t like how that felt.

Sinner’s hand was perfectly steady, palm down, about two inches above the top of the visible flame. “Can you feel the heat?” Overshadow asked.

“Yes, Commander.”

“On my signal, you will lower your hand, slowly, until I give a second signal. Then you will remove your hand from the flame. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Commander.”

Bimbeau cleared his throat nervously. Overshadow shot him a look and he subsided. There’d been no clear idea what he was going to say; only a vague sense that something should be said.

“You will feel no pain. No sensation at all from the flame,” Overshadow added.

“Yes, Commander.”

Overshadow raised one hand, the back turned toward Sinner (and, lurking behind her and watching uncomfortably, the Doctor), fingers extended above it. She closed her hand into a fist.

Sinner took that for the signal, doubtless correctly. Her hand descended slowly into the flame; her face remained calm and peaceful throughout. It was the man who’d brainwashed her who seemed uncomfortable.

He spoke up after a few moments, watching the flame against the back of her hand. “I, ah, haven’t been able to build anything that might accelerate healing,” he said. “And a pilot needs her hands…”

Overshadow looked at him mutely. Nothing changed for one… two… three seconds, before the villainess opened her hand and Sinner removed her own hand from the flame.

“It seems you’ve done well,” Overshadow said. “But I make the decisions.”

Bimbeau bowed his head hurriedly in acquiescence. “My apologies.” After a moment he remembered, cursing himself for his foolishness. “Commander.”

Overshadow smirked.

“Could you do that with someone more… powerful?” she asked.

“So long as we can restrain them long enough,” he told her. “A fairly mild level of super-strength and adding straps to the bed wouldn’t work.”

Ahead of him he could see Sinner, sitting quietly and calmly, but her good hand was now cradling the hand which had been in the flame. He needed to get her sent to the infirmary just as soon as he could.

“Presumably, that’s a problem that could be solved with other superhumanity.”

It sounded like a statement, but the way she looked at him as it hung in the air made him think it had been a question. “I suppose so, yes,” he said levelly. “That’s something I was beginning to experiment with before this.”

“Ah.” Overshadow smirked. “Again we bring up the life you’re currently missing.”

He flinched. He wasn’t sure whether she was actually amused, or if this was just how she delivered threats when she felt the need to.

“It’s… on my mind.”

“We’re in a strange, uncomfortable place to resolve that,” she said. “But for now, you accept I have the power here, yes?”

He nodded. He didn’t like it, but she did.

“Then set it aside from your mind, and do good work,” she said. “And perhaps there will be a solution.”

She looked away. “Go. Take your conquest to the infirmary, then return to your laboratory.

“I will deliver you someone new to experiment on when I’ve decided who it will be.”

“One of your current army?”

“I have not yet decided.”

The Doctor rose.

“Go with him, Sinner,” Overshadow ordered, before he could. She left nobody in any doubt who was in charge, and he hated it.

“Yes, Commander.”

*

Melissa had sat completely still in the lifeboats as they were piloted onto the island she’d suspected. Inside was a whirl of emotions, but something about her current state meant that her concerns for Candace, no matter how much she tried to keep them in mind, were always replaced before too long by a strangely euphoric pride.

She had been completely correct in her deductions; she just hadn’t carried them far enough.

But whenever she tried to focus on the trouble she was in and formulate a plan, it just seemed to slip away, replaced by that delighted pride.

That had to be something to do with the mental control, surely? Something that made victims lose track of their thoughts would doubtless also make them more docile and easy for captors to work with.

Melissa turned that thought over in her head and realised it held up to scrutiny. She was prouder of that than possibly she should have been, and might have smiled if she’d had any control over her expression, which remained firmly blank beneath her half-face mask.

They’d nearly put in at their destination before she realised that her mind had done the same thing again with a new realisation.

She hadn’t been feeling this to start with - there’d simply been almost no thought in her five minutes frozen and alone. Was this part of the control something that took hold more as people tried to reason their way out of the hold it took?

It had to be. Good, she thought, with a blush of satisfied pride. She was making progress. She’d have her way out of this trap before…

…dammit.

“Everybody file out,” Candace commanded, and like the others, Melissa rose and fell into line. She realised finally, watching the line move, that the captives weren’t the only ones reduced to obedience; the wetsuited women who’d ensnared them also behaved with that same unhesitating, dreamy obedience. The difference was one of precision; they carried themselves with purpose and they moved in a near-unison so close that total unison must have been achievable.

Clearly Candace - or Bimbeau, depending - had decided total unison wasn’t acceptable. Perhaps it was just unsettling…

They walked off the jetty and continued to follow Lulu up the beach and through a ring of lush vegetation. Between waiting a long time for the party to end, being detained on the yacht for some time, the ride, and now this, dawn was just starting to illuminate their surroundings when Melissa caught sight of electric lights up ahead.

She probably wouldn’t have been able to reconnoitre this island, find this facility, and get back before she was missed, she reflected.

Past the greenery, they emerged into a kind of compound; it looked like a Bond villain lair, and one had probably been used to tell the architect how to approach it. There was a low, large dwelling built into the base of the island’s central mountain; in front of it was a large concrete area laid out for relaxation and dominated by a kidney-shaped swimming pool.

Off to either side were smaller buildings, clearly designed to some purpose but, to her, unrecognisable. Perhaps if she were given time to dig around and investigate any of them, she’d have a clearer picture - but that wasn’t going to happen while she couldn’t act for herself.

This was obviously Bimbeau’s pleasure palace, one he’d presumably built with ill-gotten gains. Melissa was so pleased with that deduction that she dwelt on it without giving further thought to her strategy until the captives were lined up in a row alongside the pool.

…Oh.

Oh this pride loop was really starting to piss her off, and she was no closer to finding a way out.

Candace came along the line and tapped her on the shoulder, then tapped Chad on the shoulder. “If I just touched you,” she directed, “then follow me. If not, you will wait here.”

The other captives remained, and the wetsuit women took up positions around them. Melissa, on the other hand, followed Candace into one of the buildings off to the side, along with Chad.

It took her a while to realise that the woman who’d remained behind her throughout had also followed. Lulu, the name was. She had to be some kind of second in command.

“You will only look at me,” Candace instructed Chad, who frankly didn’t appear to have needed the instruction. Of all the captives, he was the one who seemed least transformed by this hypnotic effect; Melissa had seen him stare at huge breasts with a glassy incomprehension before. “Not at the little fox. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Mistress,” Chad replied, more than a little too eager for Melissa’s liking.

“Good.” Candace nodded approval, then turned to face Melissa. “Cowl off, little fox,” she said.

It wasn’t a command, she told herself. Not really. Not in any way that should matter.

All the same, her thumbs had already hooked under the base of the cowl, lifting from her cheeks. Her vision swam as the eyeholes passed out of her view, to be replaced with the view from under the cowl. It always did, though, so it didn’t disturb her.

What did disturb her was feeling herself let go of the cowl when it was far enough back to fall naturally behind her head. She’d never allowed her face to be seen while wearing the costume before. Not in public.

Even if Candace and Lulu had no idea who she actually was, this felt like a vulnerability she didn’t think she could afford.

“Huh,” Candace said. “I would’ve guessed brunette, but we can work with blonde.”

Work with?

Melissa wasn’t sure what kind of threat that was, but it had to be one.

“Do you know who Swift Fox is?” Candace asked Chad.

“She’s a superheroine, Mistress,” he replied.

The Scotswoman sighed loudly. “I mean do you know her real identity?”

“No, Mistress,” he replied without hesitation.

It felt like it should be a quiet victory for her, but it wasn’t. Candace could overturn it with one sentence.

“If I told you you could learn her identity or fuck me to my personal satisfaction, which would you choose?”

“Whichever you say, Mistress.”

Melissa really wanted to be able to roll her eyes. The horndog had no idea how badly he came across.

“Well, then,” she said, “Lulu, take the young man to my room and prepare him.”

“Of course, Doctor.” Lulu finally came out from behind Melissa, and immediately became evidence for a new theory - that Candace Kraft hadn’t earned that body by clean living, but also hadn’t undergone plastic surgery. Instead she - and the other women on the island - were no longer natural in some other way. Maybe the same process that had messed with their heads.

She was very proud of that snap deduction. Proud enough that by the time she called her mind back to the situation around her, Lulu and Chad had left and Melissa hadn’t even noted which direction they’d taken.

It was a good thing nobody knew how deeply her mind had worn itself into this groove. It would be incredibly embarrassing.

Candace made her way across to Melissa, smirking slightly. As she drew nearer she took her wetsuit zipper in one hand and drew it down smoothly. The fabric parted eagerly, drawn apart by the size of her chest, until a substantial cleavage was on display. “Just you and me for the time being,” she said. “So you’re going to be completely truthful and open.”

Melissa felt the command settle into her head, a warm blanket over everything else, heavy and soft but still confining her thoughts. She hadn’t been able to lie under this control anyway, but she knew now there was no way to hold anything back.

“Who are you really?” Candace asked.

“Melissa Wilder,” she said. Her voice was quiet but in the silence of Candace’s attention, every word she said seemed to echo in the space. “I’m a grad student in Chicago,” she continued, feeling the need to be truthful tip the balance. “Criminal psychology.” She swallowed and tried to keep the last bit quiet, but couldn’t. “My Dad’s a precinct commander.”

“In the police?”

“Yes.”

“And you’re following in Daddy’s footsteps?” There was something in Candace’s voice that Melissa couldn’t read. Amusement? Sympathy? Some mix of the two?

“No. I was inspired by Red Fox.”

Candace chuckled. “I think you need a new inspiration,” she said. Tilted her head like she was listening back to what she’d said. Her smile became a grin. “You need a new inspiration,” she said. The tone was almost the same as the first one, but the change to the words alone made it a command. Melissa squirmed at attention.

“And besides,” she said, her voice taking on a different tone; soft, teasing, titillating, slow. “You’ve found me. Your case is closed.”

That wasn’t right, Melissa knew, but her brain was all too willing to accept it. She’d wanted to do something after finding Doctor Kraft. Suddenly that wasn’t relevant; her interest turned away from it just like her attention twisted from plans of escape.

“Almost time for a new phase in your career. But first,” Candace continued. She lifted one hand, ran a fingertip down her cleavage to draw Melissa’s eye. “You must be tired, hm?”

“Yes,” Melissa admitted. It had to be coming up on twenty hours since she’d woken the previous day.

Candace’s finger was still idly stroking up and down the soft inner curve of her breast. “You’d like nothing more than to lay your head here and sleep,” she said, and gave it just long enough for Melissa’s turncoat mind to interpret it as an order before saying “Wouldn’t you?”

The order had processed. “Yes,” Melissa said, though she was sure that hadn’t been true just moments before.

“Well, you soon can,” she said. “And then before you wake up, we’ll see about that new phase in your career.” Melissa didn’t like that at all. “But first, since you’ve found me…”

She drew the zipper the rest of the way down. Melissa found it hard to believe she’d ever thought the woman’s figure might be natural. Whatever mad science gave her a flat belly with tits that practically forced their way out when the zip went down far enough couldn’t be called natural. She’d become someone’s cartoon fantasy made flesh, and however improbable her figure, she was completely real and completely present.

“I decide what happens with your investigation,” Candace told her. “Don’t I?”

“Yes,” Melissa agreed.

“Hmp. I think we can do better than that. Down on your knees.”

“Yes,” Melissa agreed. She was already settling down as commanded, eyes still on Candace. From this angle, looking up to make eye contact was harder.

Candace slipped one hand into the jumpsuit opening just above her crotch, easing the material down. Melissa had already known she wasn’t wearing a bra and it was, now, clear that she also wasn’t wearing panties.

“Who decides what happens with your investigation?” Candace asked, her voice a silky purr.

“You do,” Melissa admitted.

“You can address me as ‘Mistress’ when you speak to me.”

“You do, Mistress.” Part of Melissa writhed against this; part of her seemed delighted. She wasn’t at all sure why or how.

“Now that’s settled, we should really get you singing from this hymnsheet permanently,” Candace said. “But first, put your tongue to work.” And she stepped forward, her pussy almost brushing against Melissa’s nose.

It was a command. She couldn’t resist commands.

“Yes, Mistress,” she said, half-grudgingly, and leaned forward, lips brushing against Candace’ pussy lips before a nervous tongue parted them.

This was the first time she’d ever found herself doing something like this. She was inexperienced, uncertain, and to that moment in time, she wasn’t attracted to women.

Unfortunately for her, it rapidly became a puzzle. The moment her tongue did something right enough that Candace twitched, her head fixated on it. That delicious pride at success filled her, and Melissa rapidly lost track of everything but the drive to get bigger and better responses from Candace.