Lisa blinked. She tried replaying the last few seconds in her mind to see if she could sort something out...

***

Impulsively, she clicked back to the window she’d left open the previous day. She read the choices again, and her mouse hovered over her slight favourite. Lisa bit her lip. Did she dare?

What kind of servitude seems hottest to you?

1. Complete mindlessness
2. Pleasure in obedience
3. A change of attitude to suit your Master’s whim
4. Being unaware of just how deep Master’s hold goes

She dithered between the four, slightly leaning toward... well, actually what she leant toward changed with the moment. There were aspects of each that were wonderful fantasy...

Her mouse moved, almost of its own accord. She clicked once. The screen immediately vanished, replaced with an image, a close-up again of the hypnotist’s eyes, his irises tinkered with to spiral enchantingly, his pupils slowly-draining hourglasses; a loadscreen that shouldn’t be captivating...

***

Which had she chosen?

That movement – her subconscious’ decision – had been too fast for her to be at all sure. And now, as she watched his iris’ revolve, drawing her in, she wondered...

Was it her imagination, or were those blue spirals getting brighter? More colourful?

Lisa continued to gaze, her expression almost impassive, as the other colours around her dwindled to monochrome – without her really being aware of it. There were two points in her vision that mattered, and her eyes were content – happy, even – to simply study them.

Her hand slipped off the mouse, cupped her breast, as the other hand did the same. Lisa didn’t notice.

But she noticed the spirals her fingers found to trace, in time with the pair she was watching. She knew the spiral, now... she welcomed the spiral.

***

Lisa stood under the shower, eyes closed against the stinging heat of the water.

Some time had clearly passed. She felt, somehow, that if she could concentrate hard enough, drown out distractions in the warm steam and the steady, repetitive sound of water drumming against the shower cabinet, she might be able to remember what had happened over that time.

Still, it wasn’t happening, not so far. Whatever happened when that hourglass finally emptied and the screen changed, she wasn’t remembering it.

Lisa had to face up to it. As crazy as the idea still sounded, she was definitely being influenced by these videos... and the site. She’d never thought of taking a woman home before... nor of hypnotising someone. But Diana had seemed to fit all her criteria; attractive, friendly, susceptible, bisexual...

Her eyes snapped open.

Bisexual?

How on Earth had that come to be a factor?

OK, OK, Diana’s inclinations meant Lisa could fantasise about setting them both before a Master – a Mistress, for someone so recently coming to accept their attraction to women, was really unthinkable. And it would be possible for Lisa to persuade herself that that was the only reason bisexuality had been a factor... but that would be...

Oh. Oh, God.

Lisa thought back over the justifications she’d made, the past few weeks. How many of them really stood up to examination?

And yet... some of them probably were her own idea. The red blouses in Jasmine’s cut, say, and maybe even the red gemstone necklace itself... these were things she’d seen work for someone of a very similar appearance. They’d make sense as her own idea... and perhaps some other things could be, too...

No. No, that was kidding herself.

Did that... oh, God... did that mean her choice was taking effect, then? Had she chosen to be unaware of how deeply she was held?

Or, perhaps, was her suddenly stronger ability to see through the lies she’d told herself an indication that she was drifting away from a path where she came to agree with...

She stopped short. Calling anyone Master would just be... accepting this whole brainwashing thing. And she wasn’t willing to do that.

***

As the working week began, Lisa found a new, creeping worry. The four options the hypnotist had offered for submission, between them, could explain any of her behaviour, unusual or feeling entirely normal. Which one she thought was happening to her changed every time there was a new indicator, and the hell of it was...

...Quite honestly, she wasn’t as revulsed by this as she probably should have been. Scared, yes – God, it was terrifying – but there was a thrill to it, an excitement that she wasn’t sure was her own. Could she have been made to want these fantasies?

***

At least there were some things she could be certain about. At the gym that morning, for example – the place always played news on a big TV in the mornings, and this morning it had just felt intrusive, too loud, too brash, frustrating and vulgar. Yes, she thought... tomorrow she’d have to take her mp3 player for the session.

At least she had some decisions she knew were her own.

***

Lisa opened the door to her apartment after Monday’s work had finished with a certain trepidation.

There hadn’t been a download made available yet, but there was sure to be one.

And when there was... She glanced down at her right hand, remembering again how it had felt when it seemed to move without her, to make answers and take actions without her consent.

When the download was available, she knew she’d find herself downloading it.

She wanted to. At the same time, she wanted not to want to.

Lisa swallowed, and went to the computer. If there was a link, at least the terror of the wait would be over.

***

There was no link, not yet. No download.

There... should be?

Why did she want there to be? For her own free will’s sake, Lisa should be glad that nothing had appeared. And yet...

She might already have lost the struggle, feeling like this. Perhaps, she thought, that could be tested... a quick rewatch of any of the films on her hard drive might do it.

But, in the end, she thought... no. Best not to. With an effort, she left the computer alone. Instead, she called Diana, decided to make very sure she wouldn’t download something new...

She spent the night in her lover’s arms, at her lover’s home.

***

“Diana, do you remember the spiral?”

Diana’s expression melts away into slack, vacant emptiness, and Lisa’s expression shifts, going from a gleeful grin to astonishment, her mouth opening in heat-filled response. She stares at her porno fantasy self, desperate now for the next moment.

“The... spiral...” Diana’s hands idly trace a spiral pattern around her breast, outside her blouse. As Lisa watches, her own fingers aching to mimic the dance, that spiral becomes less idle, more precise, faster, more insistent. “I... remember... the... spiral...” Diana continues, her voice a drone at first that slowly turns into a blissful moan.

Lisa takes a deep breath through suddenly dry lips. Suddenly, the source of the words she’d spoken becomes clear – the same source as the ones that came to mind now.

She shouldn’t say them, not under any account. And yet... they just felt... right.

Her lips shaped them silently, once, as she debated; a few moments later, she succumbed to temptation.

“You’re going to help me brainwash you.”

“I’m going to help you brainwash me,” Diana echoed, her voice a contented drone.

Lisa shuddered, barely suppressing the sound of her orgasm. It was... just barely... better, hearing it for real from Diana, compared to the recorded acquiescence of Jasmine. But oh, how she wished she’d had Jasmine to command in this way...

***

So hard, to leave Diana behind her, to head out to the gym before work... but having become the hypnotist rather than the hypnotised, however newly, and however much she might still feel like a puppet as she did so... well, it wouldn’t put food on the table.

And so, however reluctantly, Lisa had to begin her daily routine. Arriving at her gym she set her bag down by the locker, shrugged off her jacket, and tucked the player’s earbuds into her ears before heading out to the cross-trainer.

She reached down to her waist, where the player rested, and found the Play button by touch.

Click

***

Music began to play – music Lisa didn’t remember ever hearing before, but which seemed somehow not only familiar but also comfortable, welcoming. Just hearing it she felt better, safer. Her worries seemed to just shimmer away into nothingness.

She sighed happily, closing her eyes for a moment, as muscles which suddenly felt unburdened began their daily routine, her body busy with the cross-trainer as her mind felt ready to wander freely.

Opening her eyes, Lisa’s gaze fell upon the big screen on which the news aired – but that wasn’t what she found herself seeing. Instead, the screen...

No.

It had to be an illusion. It had to be her imagination. There was no possible way that she was really seeing, seated looking out at her – directly at her – from the screen, the hypnotist.

It couldn’t be... couldn’t... it... um...

Uhh...

Those eyes...

Lisa’s worries had seemed far away from the moment the music had begun to play. Now, as she gazed, captivated, into the eyes of the man who’d enslaved Jasmine, Rebecca, Joanna and others, her body seemed just as far away; she was, distantly, aware that it continued the exercise regime she’d adopted on reflex.

“Relax,” Jasmine’s voice purred in her ears, and Lisa felt herself nod fractionally; not enough to break eye contact, but enough, nonetheless, to indicate her instant, instinctive agreement, acceptance – to herself as much as to Jasmine. “Relax,” Jasmine coaxed once again. “Prepare to learn... Prepare to love... Love to learn.”

Lisa’s whole body tingled with ecstatic anticipation. A deep throb began in her pussy, but with her limbs captive, enthralled, and entirely occupied by the cross-trainer, there was nothing she could do but allow it to build.

On the screen, the hypnotist suddenly smiled broadly, his lips seeming to move as her earbuds brought her his voice.

Ohhh...

Now that he was talking to her – however far removed from a live transmission – rather than to Jasmine or her fellow slaves – his voice seemed more powerful. Like she’d become the focus of a laser, suddenly aware of the true level it worked on.

“You are not yet awake,” he began. “Even now, you are slowly beginning to realise that your life until now has been a dream...”

***

She was in the shower before she came to.

So she had received a file to download this week, and at that, a file which... well, she felt like it was the hottest yet, and that was despite the fact she hadn’t cum even once – she hoped, but it seemed a safe bet, as she’d been in a public space when the effect kicked in.

Someone would have had to notice...

Still... Leaning back for a moment against the tiled wall of the shower, warm in the steam, Lisa found herself sighing contentedly. There was definitely something about it, something she’d responded to.

(In more ways than one, she blushingly reminded herself.)

Out of the shower again, she picked up the player, curious now. She should be able to find the file’s name...

Mornings

In spite of herself she let out a sudden, surprised laugh. In hindsight, it should have been obvious.

Dressed, she picked the player up again, wondering if she could risk the headphones for some more... traditional... accompaniment on the bus into work.

She tried cycling through to another track... and that was when she noticed it, at last.

There were only four tracks.

She swallowed, calling up the titles.

Dreams

Lunchtime

Mornings

Sex

...Sex? What on earth... how could she be expected to put the headphones on during sex, without causing comment? Surely M... the hypnotist... couldn’t expect her to pipe it through computer speakers?

But then... well, was it really likely, at all, that he hadn’t taken this into account?

Lisa shook her head. She didn’t have to worry about the logistics. When the time came, she was certain she’d know what to do.

And, apparently, she had some lunchtime listening scheduled...