Trendsetters
CW: Corporate America, 34A, Slavery, World Building, Free Use, Enforced Nudity
(A huge shout out to Joe Doe, Mr Smith, Katie Smith, GentlemanMariner and countless others who have been inspiring for decades now all the way back to our mailing list days. I had to finally take a swing at the setting and hopefully explore another corner of this lovely dark and sexy narrative. This is hopefully the first of many.)
Brief: The Director of Research & Development for Optimates LLC finds herself under budget and schedule crunch to prove the efficacy of her latest work in time for a coming trade show, and must navigate corporate bureaucracy and the realities of a post 34th Amendment world to ensure that her work performs for an audience.
--- Part One ---
It’s easy to describe the working world; The carousel’s brass ring, the rat race, the corporate ladder. ‘Races’ and ‘ladders’ feel more egalitarian than the reality, however, of privilege and access dolled up in designer shoes and fancy lapel pins. Senior partners, inside traders, nepotism hires… all have every advantage, while the average worker has to try three times harder for half the opportunity.
“Another thing from my notes- he wants a write up regarding the DLS account so that he can go up the chain with the issues we’ve had working alongside their team...”
Team meetings are rarely the highlight of anyone’s day, from vaunted board rooms to dimly lit cubicles basking in monitor-glow, they’re miserable slogs through slide shows that should have been emails. The dappled mosaic screen of departments and personalities all doing their best… to feign attention while remaining productive at their desks.
This company-wide video conference of Optimates, LLC was no exception.
“...they either didn’t read the documents beforehand or weren’t paying attention and now they’re getting bent out of shape over us not using our main brand ID with their products…”
The colorful array of picture windows on the monitor displayed the team leaders and a few chosen subordinates mixed in amongst executive staff who ran down a punch list of current challenges facing the company. Logistics rambled about their warehouse protocols to get product and parts moved out of their Texas distribution center faster. Then Procurement gave a terse report about the difficulty of finding the Very Specific Parts demanded by the newest product lines. It was all too easy to tune out the conversation if there was more important work to be done.
“...going to have a marketing opportunity in our hands. Take the tour, snap some pictures, tag them on social media for the visibility bump and we’ll see how the rest of the meeting goes…”
The shifting light of the monitor competed with the overhead halogen lamps of the Research & Development office. The department’s lead researcher cupped a hand over her lower face, jotting down notes while she half listened. Her home-manicured nails contrasted the chewed up end of her pen, which had become her latest distraction to curb her nervous habits. From behind her glasses, her hazel eyes occasionally darted up from her pen and pad to acknowledge the camera before returning to her other work, maintaining a vague air of attentiveness.
“...we’re still waiting on the final ruling from the department of agriculture, but it looks like the hearing later this week should go in our favor, so we should be shipping without tariffs by the end of the week…”
Optimates wasn’t exactly a big company, but it had enough faces that the org chart was a bit of a labyrinth, and departments were regularly gutted, merged, then reformed to pivot to whatever the latest changes were handed down from the CEO and the shareholders. Like most modern companies, it was full of middle managers, sales people, and infrastructure folks keeping the gears of business spinning while designers, devs, and front line workers did their best to keep their head down and clock their next paycheck.
“That said, the shareholders seem optimistic about this quarter’s earnings, and they are very excited to see what R&D has in store for our upcoming Houston CIT exhibition. We know you’re going to really wow them, Michaela.”
Kaela almost didn’t catch her name being used, blinking twice before realizing she was addressed. She quickly sat up to look a little more prim, pushing aside her notepad as she smiled for the camera. A quick glance at the preview window of her own camera made her painfully aware of how the messy bun controlling her auburn hair looked on camera, and did her best to not blush over the embarrassment of being caught off guard as attention turned to her.
She put on her best customer service voice and brightened up for the camera, thankfully remembering to unmute herself at the last second, “Of course! Thanks! We’re… we’ve got a lot in the works here to show them. Always giving it our all to showcase the next great thing…”
Her voice tapered off at the end as she plastered a pleasant smile on her face, hoping that was sufficient enough engagement from the R&D department. For a mercy, the lighting in R&D did wonders to highlight her freckled cheeks and gave her a healthy glow on camera. She endured a short beat of silence before the meeting’s moderator continued on, directing attention away to the next item as they started to close the meeting. Kaela stayed ‘at attention’ for the camera’s sake a little while longer before allowing herself to relax, muting her microphone again and resuming jotting down notes.
A text box popped up in her company messenger.
BWard: When’s the next trade show?
It was her systems analyst and technical assistant, Ben. His desk was opposite hers, and she glanced over at him to see that he was equally disengaged from the ongoing meeting.
They briefly made eye contact before she sent a reply.
MValka: About a month and a half out. I didn’t think they were expecting anything fancy this year. I don’t know if we can get away with slimmer models or recolors…
BWard: Think we can have something ready in time for a functional prototype?
MValka: We’ll talk after the meeting.
—
Kaela sat with her arms folded, gently rocking her office chair as she contemplated the lab. While her desk was a practice in controlled chaos (the main feature being a cork board jumbled with technical notes and clippings from old journals celebrating her previous work), the rest of the space was fastidiously clean. Large work tables and tool racks filled the space, along with storage bins containing various projects in different stages of completion and development. A few large machines dominated the far end of the bay, which was the only section of the space big enough for such bulky works in progress.
Ben sipped his coffee, weighing his words, “so we’ve got to get something– anything really, from the Works in Progress Pile to Working Demonstration Prototype in barely a month?”
“That’s the long and the short of it,” Kaela sighed. Her chair creaked as she leaned back again, chewing on her pen in thought. “According to Mr. Ross, we’re on the hook to have a viable prototype to demonstrate at the Correctional Industries Trade Show in Houston, which means we need something proofed and tested by the end of next week, and ready to finalize dims and usability the week after. Add in finding some time for a promo-shoot so Distribution and Sales have materials to hype up the announcement...”
Kaela was already in the process of updating the whiteboard calendar between their desks, circling the following two Fridays and doing her best not to fret about this news being dropped at their door on a Thursday! “Enough time for worry, not enough time for action,” she thought to herself.
Ben scoffed in disbelief, “two weeks isn’t nearly enough time to get things through testing, analysis and proofing! Not to mention there is absolutely no way we can get anything in front of the State inspectors to be approved in time!” He brushed his dirty blond hair back away from his forehead, accenting just how much his eyes looked like they were bugging out of his skull in panic. The thirty year old former MIT post-grad looked like someone just told him a final he forgot about is next period.
Kaela stretched her arms in front of her, lacing her fingers together to crack her knuckles in her best attempt at bravery in the face of doom, “well, that just means it’s time to get creative and figure it out! We focus on the projects that are already mostly developed and see what we can get across the finish line with some overtime and grit.”
She straightened her skirt as she stood, striding from their desks to the central work area making her lab coat flare dramatically behind her. Ben stood a few inches taller than her, but when she was on a mission, she carried herself with the confidence far greater than her 5’7” frame would otherwise project.
Kaela confidently plucked a bin down from the racks labeled “posture training guides” and gave a cursory glance over the contents. She carefully dumped out two matching sets of manacles of different sizes, each with open recesses and tooled areas designed for the hodge podge of electronics that spilled out of the bin around them.
“Let’s look at what we’ve got to work with and make some magic happen.”
After extensive review and a few more bins, the two of them stood side by side looking over the final contenders spread out on the work table. The odd collection of electronics, metal & plastic was gathered into four sets. Kaela reviewed each project with a digital tablet in hand to access their full details while Ben confirmed back to her all the pieces that were present and accounted for.
The manacles remained on the table along with the new additions. Another project looked like a series of strange pinch-grippers and metal dishes attached to a series of rubber bladders and hoses. The third contender was by far the largest but seemingly incomplete, sporting a curving central spine with a series of metal arms branching off to either side and some curious loops. The last, and most understated piece looked like a jawbone microphone and earpiece with a small metal pad connected by a wire. The whole device was mounted on a charging station with a few bits of electronics strewn around it.
Ben was gently flexing a piece on the armature, noting pieces that needed reinforcement while Kaela continued her survey of the options before them. Each of these projects had the potential to be flashy enough for the trade show, but she knew it needed to be more than just flashy. Sure, the showcase products had to catch their clients’ eyes, but really they had to function at the caliber of Optimates, LLC and they had to do what the buyers wanted most in the current market.
What they needed was for these tools to break and control slaves.
—
While Ben was busy test fitting components and ensuring these projects had any hope of functioning as intended, it was time for Kaela to take a whirlwind tour of other offices she needed to convince to assist her on this mad endeavor. She swiped her ID badge keycard before returning it to her lab coat’s breast pocket. The lab door buzzed, unlocking for her to push through into the overly air conditioned hallway, then loudly latched shut behind her.
She made her way under the ever-watchful gaze of the security camera trained on the lab entrance, and past the large observation windows that gave visitors a panoramic view of the R&D lab from the corridor. A few twisting turns later, she was buzzing herself into the Technology Department’s developers office.
The room was more subdued than the brightly lit R&D lab. The den of a half dozen tech devs and infrastructure nerds clicked away at their keyboards back-tracked by someone’s Songify playlist. She gave a small wave to the devs who noticed her walking in as she made her way across the office to her target, Darryl Jackson.
Darryl was a handsome man when he allowed himself to be, but in his day to day, he carried himself more like Urkel than Stefan. He slouched back in his office chair, headphone wrapped over his high and tight haircut, beatboxing to himself as he plugged away at some coding project in his cue. Kaela couldn’t help but smirk as she peeked around the edge of his desk and saw he’d started growing in a mustache and a little soul patch, really leaning into that suave he never showed around the office.
He sat up and pushed his headphones down onto his neck, only slightly startled, “damn Kaela, we need to put a bell on you with how quiet you walk. What’s got you coming down in person to our tech gremlin den?”
She always loved to find excuses to drop in on Darryl when her projects required coding collaborations, but this wasn’t nearly as relaxed as her normal visits might be. Her smile softened as she shifted back to business mode, “I wish it was for something better, but I’ve got some rush work coming, and I am going to need to call in a favor or two from you to proof the coding on a few projects that I have to push out in the next two weeks.”
“Yeah? Is this for the trade show they were talking about on the all-call earlier? What have you got for me?”
She nodded, dropping off a manilla binder, “here’s the work order with all the details, but short form; I need to make sure our control app can interface with each of the new accessory systems we’ve had cooking the past year. I think most of the coding is sound, but I could really use your eyes on the fine tuning and integration. The attitude adjuster especially is going to need your talents to make sure its database and analytics work as intended.”
Darryl narrowed his eyes at her with a playfully raised eyebrow, “if the attitude adjuster is in there, you might not have enough favors banked with me to rush-job it. That thing’s a spicy little piece of hardware. Let’s have a look…”
He pulled the work order out and hmm’d to himself as he read, “accelerometer and proximity sensor calibration mode, positive and negative pressure detection… and… ooo now we’re getting good, miniaturized MEG and EEG systems? Yeah, you’re gonna end up owing me a few favors after this.” It was his turn to smirk, “but you know I’ve always got your back, copper-top... Lucky for you, I’m just wrapping a project up, so in theory this request just got my next billing. When did you say you need this by?”
She could feel a weight lift off her shoulders, and a butterfly stir in her stomach when he used his playful nickname for her, she tried not to think too hard about owing him favors after this when she replied “as soon as possible, preferably no later than Monday so I can start doing practicals next week before final form factors the week after. I’m going to visit accounting to get everyone approved for overtime.”
He nodded and slid the manilla folder onto his ‘in’ pile, “sounds like you’ve got it all figured out, then. I’ll let you know when I’ve got those reviews done and ready for pre-flight.”
“You’re a life-saver, Darryl. I’ll make it worth your while, I promise.”
She turned and made haste for the exit, knowing time was of the essence to get all her dominos set. She didn’t have time for distractions, but she did indulge the thought of treating Darryl to dinner after work maybe as a thank you. The cold A/C and brighter lights of the hallway interrupted her reverie on her way to her next destination, Accounting.
—
Kaela was on a mission, and power walking as fast as her sensible flats could carry her across the complex to the administrative wing. She ran down her remaining objectives to herself as she went; Accounting to lock in overtime approvals, procurement to requisition test subjects, back to the lab for final review. She’d just rounded the corner outside of Accounting when she came crashing to a halt, colliding with a young woman and sending both of them sprawling to the hallway carpet.
“Ow! Watch it!”
Kaela immediately recognized Joanna and felt a stone in her stomach, because she was the accountant responsible for payment processing. The petite clerk rubbed her head as she picked herself up off the floor, her sensible office look thoroughly disheveled by the sudden hallway accident. Kaela scrambled to her feet and started helping collect the files and papers Joanna had dropped, apologizing while the young office worker straightened her blouse and tugged her skirt back down around her knees.
Kaela waited patiently as the brunette fixed her hair back under a hair band and finished putting herself back together. The pause afforded her a moment to check herself over, thankfully absent anything seriously out of order, though she found a small rip in the back of her stockings that must have come with the freshly forming bruise on her knee. She gave the garment a quick tug with her free hand to at least position the tear so her lab coat would keep it properly hidden from behind.
She turned her attention back to Joanna and quietly cursed her luck, sheepishly offering the files back and about to speak when she was interrupted by a voice behind her.
“Everything all right over here?” A dashing young man asked as he rounded the corner. He wore the crisp button up emblazoned with Optimates logo, a member of the facility security detail. His nametag read H. Bachman, and it seemed he and Joanna recognized each other immediately.
Joanna looked thoroughly steamed, but cast a glance up at the security camera the two women were squarely in the sights of, and sighed “No… no, I’m fine… just a little scuffed. Thank you, Hunter.” She shot a sharp look at Kaela, putting her squarely back in her sights, “though I’m wondering if we need a hall monitor to keep from running around here?”
Kaela wasn’t used to the usually mousy accounting clerk being quite so forceful, blinking and putting up a conciliatory hand, “I’m truly sorry, I wasn’t paying attention in my rush and just a bit frazzled trying to get all my ducks in a row today.”
“Is your rush a fire? You need to be more careful! You could have gotten us both hurt,” Joanna still looked annoyed, blushing with her frustration.
Kaela stole a glance at Hunter and quickly put two and two together for herself, “Oh this isn’t anger, it’s embarrassment…”
Hunter scratched the back of his neck while he listened to Kaela and Joanna’s tensions rising again and interjected, “if you all want me to write up a report, I can, but it seems like you’re okay, right?”
The two of them were in their early to mid twenties, as Kaela recalled. She stepped aside to allow Hunter and Joanna to speak directly and not over her, patiently waiting for the mood to settle.
Joanna huffed, but clearly lost some steam from her indignation, “No… no it’s okay. I just… sorry. It’s fine.” She offered what seemed like a genuine smile to the security guard, “No need for a report. Just let’s keep this little moment between the three of us, alright?”
Kaela gave a little nod while Hunter gave the most charmingly earnest thumbs up.
They all stood there a moment longer in silence that only became increasingly awkward until Kaela broke the quiet, “Soooo, Joanna, I don’t mean to hold you up, but I needed to ask you for an overtime approval…”
The accounting clerk tilted her head with a flip of her hair, “Oh? Does Mr. Ross know?”
Kaela nodded, “I already apprised him of the situation, and he should confirm. I need approval for myself, Benjamin Ward, and Darryl Jackson so that we can crunch before the trade show next month.”
Joanna rolled her eyes, “I’d have preferred not getting bowled over for the trouble, but I’ll check and get back to you. Is confirmation by end of day alright?”
“Perfect, that would do fine,” Kaela beamed, another weight off her shoulders as she worked through her checklist.
Hunter piped up, “Ohhh you’re over in R&D, right? What have you got cooking up for the trade show? Your tech demo last year for the one belt cuff system was way cool! I keep one in my takedown kit now all the time.” His eyes lit up with renewed interest.
Kaela glanced at Joanna, reading her reaction before answering, “We’re not exactly sure yet. We’ve got a few potential contenders, but hopefully we’ll be doing our testing next week if I can get Procurement to arrange me a testing subject.” She always got a little nervous when folks were enthusiastic about her work that weren’t fellow nerds, doubly so when it came from someone as physically capable of potentially overpowering her.
Joanna hugged her files to her chest as she watched this exchange, listening intently.
Hunter enthusiastically wrapped one hand over the other, “Next week? I’ll have to see if the chief will give me a patrol in your part of the building so I can check it out.”
“What kind of stuff is it looking like? Last year was restraints, are we going to see something new?” Joanna asked. Hunter’s enthusiasm was contagious apparently…
Kaela shrugged in an effort to maintain an air of ambivalence, “well, it depends on which system gets the green light, but a lot of training systems in the works, focused on behavioral modification mostly.” She noted that she had both of their attention a little too eagerly on learning more, “but you are both more than welcome to swing by next week and peek in on testing through the windows. I can’t promise there will be a show worth seeing, though.”
They both exchanged glances, Joanna blushing again, and Hunter seemingly oblivious in his enthusiasm for having someone else as excited as him.
Kaela smiled sympathetically at how twitterpated Joanna seemed, “either way, I really need to get up to Procurement. Thank you again for the help with overtime approval, and sorry for holding you both up!”
With one more hurdle cleared, she made her way for the elevators leaving her awkward juniors behind. Next stop, Procurement..
—
Kaela mused to herself as the elevator rose steadily towards the 5th floor lobby, the glass wall of the elevator bay giving her a view of the open green in front of the business complex Optimates dominated. Her eyes followed some movement out on the campus green. While it was an overcast day, the grounds maintenance crew was out with mowers and weed wackers to trim back the unruly summer growth. It seemed that the work crew was at least partially on break as she noticed a few workers huddled around the back of a beat up truck and a large open-gate trailer full of landscaping equipment.
As she continued watching it became clear that their break was a conveniently timed excuse for them to linger by their truck and take advantage of the free show they were getting from the roadside beyond.
A Department of Involuntary Servitude van crawled along the highway shoulder next to Optimates’ campus. It accompanied a crew doing roadside trash pickup under the supervision of a DIS Warden. From what Kaela could tell, It looked like the landscapers were catcalling the clean up crew made up of mostly women. Even though they were dressed for their job, heavy boots, gloves, and high-vis jumpsuits, they were catching attention, and the Warden seemed more than happy to indulge..
Kaela watched through the 5th floor’s lobby windows as the Warden ordered the roadside cleaners to stop and line up alongside the van. They were directly in view of the catcallers, assuming a shoulder-wide stance with their hands behind their necks for some kind of inspection. Even without being able to hear anything, she could see clearly that these detainees were slaves on hard labor contracts with the state, and they had little choice but to follow the Warden’s commands and endure whatever indignities were thrown at them.
One by one, they road crew slaves stepped forward and did a little turn for the catcallers, and when prompted opened up their coveralls to flash their tits or show their ass. Down the line they each got highlighted until the Warden separated two of them, a young man with messy brown hair and a blonde woman. They each stepped forward and under instruction stripped down until they were only wearing their boots and their collars while the others went back to work collecting trash.
They stood naked along the side of the highway, where they were not only getting the attention from their catcallers, but passing motorists, too, who honked in approval as they passed. The Warden marched the two chosen slaves over to the landscapers, who all had gotten word by then that it was break time. From her vantage point, Kaela couldn’t see what happened behind that trailer, but from the look of it the landscapers were about to get a sweet extra bonus today as their’ crew chief and the Warden talked off to the side.
Kaela took a deep breath and shook herself free of staring, realizing she had her thighs pressed together and had to stop before she started thinking about what those slaves must have been going through down there.
This wasn’t all that strange a sight these days. Pennsylvania had joined the ranks of states participating in the pioneering industry of involuntary service, basically debt and carceral slavery, brought on by the somewhat grim political realities of the post-war era. Optimates home office was located in the sprawling exurbs and rural lands between Philadelphia and Lancaster, where other corporate campuses had cropped up over the last 50 years in support of the growing global demand for pharmaceuticals, military industrial aeronautics, and good old fashioned American innovation.
One of those innovations, of course, was a few states letting financing companies in the deep south accept human lives as collateral for loans, prompting a renaissance of just-adjacent-but-not-quite slavery institutions to come into prominence. It wasn’t slavery, as prohibited by the constitution, so long as it was contractual or by due process… at least until the 34th amendment clarified and expanded the language. Now chattel slavery was once again the norm as an evolution of the prison industrial complex and financed debt industry.
With an incarceration rate as high as the US had to begin with, and the additional potential labor pool created by debtors entering involuntary service, it was only inevitable that corporations would grow and adapt to this new cheap labor pool, and to serve the needs of brokerages, slave markets, training facilities, and private contract holders. In only a few decades, what had been a troubling and quirky bit of financing law had blossomed into an industry indenturing nearly 3 million people a year.
Some states had held out, of course, Pennsylvania only recently allowed for changes to their state constitution permitting indentures and carceral slave contracts to be fully recognized within the state, and more importantly, for new slave and indenture contracts to be created. But they had long participated through reciprocity laws with pro-slavery states like Illinois, Florida, and Texas per the guidance of the Federal Department of Involuntary Service. Since the legislature in Harrisburg gave in to lobbyists, a whole bevy of industry power players had come to the state to set up shop, including the biggest of slave brokerages, Human Collateral International.
Optimates, after all, had once been a farm equipment manufacturer serving the broad base of agricultural industry needs for livestock management. Now it had expanded its business to manage a more exotic kind of livestock that HCI handled out of the Oaksglen facility near King of Prussia. Kaela was well versed on the matter since her entire career was built on innovations contributing to this field. From electromagnetically controlled tracking collars used around the world to efficient rapid restraint systems for slavemongers moving the thousands of slaves and indentures processed around the country daily, her fingerprints were all over the industry.
For her part, it was mercifully a distant part of life, one she only really needed to interact with through work. Her career had brought her here and the money was good, but some part of her was terrified by the reality those men and women faced in bondage. For the length of their service, they were property at the whim of capricious wardens, industrial slave wranglers, and the ultra wealthy. Hard labor, casual sexual abuse, and constant humiliation at the hands of their “betters” was the accepted state of affairs, and most of the population, feeling safe from ever becoming part of the 1% of the population subject to these laws, blithely or even gleefully accept it.
Kaela needed precisely such a slave-subject for her work to run her prototype testing, which is what brought her to the Procurement Department. Whether it’s new tools, raw materials, or human collateral, it needed Procurement’s approval.
—
Procurement was one of the company’s busier departments, with several logistics agents working to coordinate Optimates global supply chain and a team of administrators overseeing the requisition and approval process for each department. The team often joked that they were the beating heart of the company, keeping the other departments from collapsing under the crushing bureaucracy of modern business. Kaela agreed with that assessment since there wasn’t a single part or tool that she could get without their say so. That day would be no different, except she was there in person to negotiate the rush request she needed.
She stopped in front of a large poster mounted next to the CCO’s personal office. Kaela took advantage of the reflective glass as she checked her bun, tucking away loose auburn strands and made sure the pencil she normally tucked behind her ear was properly returned to her coat pocket. She re-tucked her blouse so her skirt’s waistband was properly in order under her lab coat, and made sure the tear in her nylons was still under control and tucked out of sight. She confirmed in her reflection that her ID badge was prominently displayed on her left breast pocket per company regulation.
She finished primping herself, allowing herself a breath to relax as her eyes shifted focus to the poster within the frame.
It was a blown up print of a Swift Company cover, the mega-business industry magazine. Optimates had been featured in their Rising Stars edition, and the cover highlighted the core of their enterprise, livestock management. In the center of the page was a beautiful naked woman, her back to the viewer, her blonde hair cut in a crisp bob so that the sleek brushed metal collar on her neck could be easily seen. Her hands were bound behind her back by a similarly slick set of shackles, and her ass proudly displayed a large brand seared into her flesh of the Optimates logo. Around the naked woman stood three figures, a swarthy smiling man in a security uniform, a sharp dressed woman with shoulder pads that could double as flotation devices, and a prim, red headed woman in a lab coat.
Kaela remembered the photo shoot, posing with Security Chief Malave and Ms. Jacques from Distribution & Sales, as well as the CEO’s personal slave and spokes-model for the brand. It had been a press junket on the company dime where they flew the group of them out to Atlanta, and Kaela spent the better part of the day with her colleagues being pampered and dolled up for the group shot and individual promo pictures.
The cover sported various interview headlines, including hers - “Meet the brilliant mind behind Optimates innovations! Michaela Valka talks tech, industry trends, and whether she’s a natural red-head!”
“I still can’t believe PR approved that cover… or the way they framed the interview. I’ve gotten multiple rewards for my work and they made me sound like a candy coated spokesmodel.”
She silently fumed as she looked over the cover, thinking about how the photographers tried to convince her to wear something racier and do the whole “sexy scientist” thing for the bit. She had conceded to wearing a push up bra and a tighter blouse to help her compete for attention on the cover, which seemed like more than enough sexiness for her. Needless to say, she had shot down racier suggestions, but her cheeks still burned thinking about how the magazine’s PR manager had pitched the idea of her wearing a mini-skirt with sheer panties to prove she was a natural redhead in one of the article’s feature-photos..
While they were shooting in pairs, she had posed for a shot with the company spokes-model slave, holding up a tablet that clearly was controlling her collar and manacles. It was awkward enough having to play-act her way through the shoot without hearing one of the interns joking about how much hotter it would be to see the “nerd” all trussed up like that. Kaela had put her foot down that day, and both Ms. Jacques and Chief Malave had her back, but she still remembered how flustered she had gotten pushing back on the constant attempts to objectify her. She ultimately had gotten her way, and her featurette picture was quite complimentary, of her standing with the tablet looking thoroughly commanding and in control, so all’s well that ended well.
Now the poster-sized cover hanging in the Procurement office stood as a silent reminder of how she needed to stand her ground and take command of the situation before her. She shook the thoughts of the shoot from her head and brought herself back to the moment. She had to make a big ask and was determined to put her best foot forward.
“Here goes nothing.”
Kaela knocked on the CCO’s door, and immediately heard Mr. Richard Chambers’ creaky, rumbling voice command her to enter.
Mr. Chambers’ office was a time capsule, a snapshot of what the office must have looked like back in the day when dark wood and white tile were still all the rage. His office smelled of stale cigars and freshly opened whiskey with a faint touch of sweat. Kaela watched him swivel his plush office chair around behind his desk to face the door, his hands fiddling with something just out of sight in his lap a moment before he settled his interlaced fingers on the desktop.
She peeked past his rack-store pinstripe suit coat hanging from the back of his chair to see at least part of what had him sounding so hoarse. A young brunette, probably 19 or 20 by Kaela’s estimation, was kneeling naked save for her collar behind his desk next to his wet-bar, a fresh glass of whisky poured and her head bowed, evidence of her servicing him still wet on her lips.
“What can I do for you, Miss…” Mr. Chambers squinted at Kaela a moment, “Valka? To what do I owe the pleasure of a personal visit from Mr. Ross’ “brilliant” inventor?”
With her best firm and down-to-business vibes, she laid out her case explaining the unexpected time crunch before the Houston Trade Show, the prospects for her department turning out the prototypes they needed to impress their shareholders and clients, and of course the need for a live subject for her to demonstrate the products were viable and effective by the show. She did her best to stay focused on her task at hand and ignoring the way Mr. Chambers stared at her like he was undressing her in his mind. No matter what she thought of his womanizing, he was a businessman and could be swayed by solid practical arguments.
Mr. Chambers settled back into his chair, considering her pitch for a long moment as he ran his pudgy fingers over the thinning combover of gray hair atop his head. The longer he considered, the more nervous Kaela became, but kept that between herself and her rising blood pressure.
He pulled a ledger from his desk and flipped it open, “well, Miss Valka… I do appreciate how thoroughly you’ve considered the matter, and you make a compelling argument.”
She felt the wave of relief come over her with an audible sigh, “Thank you, Mr. Chambers, I -”
He raised a hand to cut her off, “I didn’t say your request was approved.”
The floor might as well have opened up and swallowed Kaela whole, for how hard her heart fell into the pit of her stomach.
“On the contrary, we can’t get what you need in time. An unbroken slave suitable for testing prototypes needs specialty stock and a flagged request with a vendor to make sure the pretty little thing is delivered ready for your experiments.” He shook his head, a hint of his amusement creeping into a smirk, “I’m afraid there’s simply no way we can do it with current budget and time constraints.”
Kaela tried to insist, “Surely there’s something we can do to expedite something? Don’t the exchanges usually have sales and trades over the weekends we could send someone -”
He cut her off again, “And pay top dollar when there’s a crowd over at HCI? Won’t do much better with DLS’ since they only deal in bulk. No, my dear, you’ll have to wait like everyone else for us to put your request through with our vendors to receive a suitable subject in 5 to 12 business days, inventory depending.”
Her lips drew thin in frustration, but she knew she didn’t have much of a leg to stand on if Mr. Chambers didn’t appreciate the importance of this to the company’s prospects in Houston.
“Now you’re such a clever girl, Miss Valka. I’m sure you can make do without needing so much special treatment. If there isn’t anything else, you can submit your requisition request per company policy.” His smirk cracked into a grin at Kaela’s clear disappointment. “Is there anything else I can help you with, Miss Valka?”
She took a sharp breath and firmly answered through gritted teeth, “No, Sir. Thank you for your time and consideration, Mr. Chambers.”
As she turned for the door, he chuckled, “I like the way you call me Sir, Miss Valka. You should do it more often.”
She couldn’t get out of there fast enough and put as much distance between herself and the old letch as possible. Once in the safety and privacy of the elevator, she slumped against the wall and let her head thud against the fabric panel behind her.
Her mind swam with growing anxiety and fell back on the most eloquent expression of human frustration.
“Fuck”
—
Ben was a sweet man, ever reliable and quick with an optimistic word, but the bad news had him on a tear that Kaela hadn’t seen before from her assistant. He paced about the lab as he processed the news.
Kaela was still venting, doing her level best to not stay too worked up, “and of course Mr. Chambers was an absolute creep about it! It’s like he enjoyed every minute of making me sweat in his office.”
“Just what kind of special treatment does he think you’ve been given?” Ben was fuming on her behalf, “I know you’ve busted your ass to get here, and we’ve both given our sweat and blood for the company! Just who does he think he is?”
“An old codger who knows his war buddies have got his back no matter how miserable he is. He was getting a blowjob on company time! With a company asset!” Kaela threw herself down into her office chair, the old springs and pistons protesting.
“And who does he think you are? You’re not some intern coming begging. You’re a department director! Our work down here is what keeps us in the industry! Doesn’t he know how important Houston is for the brand?” Benjamin kept pacing as his righteous indignity grew, setting down his long-empty coffee cup on one of the work tables.
Kaela took a deep breath, trying to bring the temperature down, “there’s nothing we can do about that, at least not for now. For now… we’ve got approval for overtime, we’ve got Darryl working on the coding, and we’ve got a few different projects that could be ready for prime time.”
She watched as Ben started to cool off as well, his hands planted on the edge of the work table as he stared at the back wall of the lab. His shoulders were stooped with tension and she could see his knuckles slowly returning to a more normal ruddy tone than the white death grip he’d had on his mug.
She steeled herself, “we’ll just prove again that we really are the best, and no matter how obnoxious Mr. Chambers is trying to get in our way, we’re going to deliver the best product on schedule like we always do.”
She stood confidently to punctuate the point, only for her momentum to suddenly be arrested by pressure behind her knee accompanied by a quiet ‘shhrrrip’ of nylon giving out. Her old office chair refused to release the back of her stockings, and she could feel the ragged ladder it just ripped down the back of her thigh and calf.
“God DAMMIT,” she growled, slamming herself back down into her chair to look at the damage, propping her foot up on her desk for a better view.
Kaela’s sudden outburst knocked Ben out of whatever angry momentum he had, pivoting to concern. “Are you okay? What hap-” he stopped asking as the answer became immaterial to his concern, his tongue tied by the sight of Kaela’s lifted leg giving him a stocking-covered peep under her skirt.
She huffed and muttered to herself as she assessed the ragged run in her pantyhose, still partially snagged on her chair. Her skirt hiked up to around her mid thigh in her momentary battle with stubborn nylon and old metal, which hardly registered to her. This was the straw that broke the proverbial camel’s back as she became frustrated enough to take her stockings in hand and yank on the snag hard enough to rip it away from where her chair had anchored to it, exposing an even larger section of her pale thigh and calf to the cold lab air.
Ben stood transfixed by her, bug eyed and silent with a lump in his throat. If the thought crossed his mind to offer assistance or to at least turn away neither manifested as action save for his quietly clutching the end of the work table he stood beside and doing his best impression of an awkwardly turned on piece of statuary.
Ben was the furthest thing from her mind in the moment. Kaela tucked her thumbs into the wrecked garment and lifted her butt off her chair to tug it down, shimmying the waistband to around her knees. Holding the offending nylon in one hand, she lifted her leg and reached down to tug off her flats in a motion that was anything but graceful. Her wardrobe malfunction had become the fresh target of her frustrations, and the remnants of her stockings became the sole focus of her impotent rage.
Whatever glimpses of her inner thighs and what Ben thought were dark blue panties got obscured amidst her legs kicking and hand wrenching the fabric off her feet. She stood in a huff, not even bothering to put her shoes back on as she tugged her skirt back down to cover her knees. It was still quite the show, uncharacteristic of the usually collected and calm engineer who stalked past him to toss the ruined garment in the wastebin by the lab door. With a loud metallic slam of finality, the lid closed and the deed was done.
The object of her ire disposed of, she took a moment to calm herself and slow her heaving breaths before finally letting out a final long exhale to release the last of the anger she’d suddenly been confronted with. Her brief adrenaline dump giving way for clearer thoughts and the sudden realization of what a tantrum she just threw.
She couldn’t look back at Ben just yet, walking back to her desk with her eyes cast down, her voice small as she mustered an apology, “I’m sorry you had to see that. That was out of line and totally uncalled for…”
She made it back to her desk and steadied herself with one hand as she stepped back into her flats.
Ben swallowed with an audible clack as he realized that he’d gone dry-mouthed in the moment. Shaking himself from being so stunned, he started to step closer but hesitated, “It’s alright… I shouldn’t have been getting so wound up either. It’s a lot of stress to deal with…”
“Stress or not, it doesn’t mean I get to go slamming things and making a scene at you.” Her demeanor shifted again, going cold to mask her embarrassment.
Both of them blushed, their eyes cast to the floor, their mutual shame in that moment hanging in the air like a fog that threatened to smother the room.
Ben broke the silence as he walked back to his desk and settled in, “So what do we do now?”
“We make it work, somehow,” she sighed, unable to keep the resignation from her voice.
“Should we go to Mr. Ross and see if he can deal wi-”
Kaela immediately cut him off, “absolutely not.”
Ben was taken aback, looking confused, “Why not?”
She finally made eye contact with him again, “because this is my job and my reputation, and the reputation of this department. If I go to Mr. Ross… it proves Chambers’ insipid little insults valid and makes Mr. Ross look bad at the same time.” She heard herself rationalizing for Ben’s sake, but realized she was convincing herself just as much.
She looked back to the incomplete projects on the table, “we knuckle under, and by Monday… figure out some way to do the testing by the book so everything is good and official, and without giving Chambers the satisfaction of me going crawling back to him for one of his notorious favors.”
The two of them sat in silence for another long moment, Kaela’s gaze fixed on the work tables and incomplete projects, Ben’s eyes in turn drifted towards Kaela’s bare knees until he caught himself and looked away, clearing his throat.
He tapped his fingers on his desk as he thought out loud, “is there any chance you can get a slave transferred from another project if there’s any in holding with Material Management?
Kaela shook her head, “we don’t have any other testing scheduled, and any other slaves we’ve got on the books right now are going to be trained, so they’d give us biased results. We need a fresh slave, preferably without any training and at least semi-reluctant.”
“Hmmm, so probably a carceral slave, yeah? Maybe we can call DIS?”
Kaela waved her hand as if batting the idea away like a fly, “no, no, they don’t do direct sale or leasing. You can only get those contracts through state contracted brokerages like DLS or HCI, and our contract buyers take two to three weeks to process these kinds of requests.”
Ben got up and started pacing again, pausing to lean back against the work tables, “And I am guessing trying to go and hit the markets over the weekend to try and expense it’s out of the question?”
Kaela laughed, “I had thought about that, and I hate to admit that Chambers was right... but everything’s way too expensive over the weekend when there are a lot of buyers, and HCI Oaksglen is a madhouse on the weekends since it's a regional hub.”
She leaned back in her chair, pinching the bridge of her nose as she wracked her brain for options. This whole situation had her on the back foot, now, and it didn’t leave her a lot of room to get creative.
Ben’s gaze landed back on her knees and inner thighs peeking under her skirt as he contemplated the problem. He briefly lost his train of thought again as she crossed one leg over the other and leaned back in her chair to stare at the ceiling. He found himself parched again and turned away, distracting himself with a visit to the lab’s mini fridge where they kept their lunches and some soft drinks.
He cracked open a can of Pibsy and continued musing, “I know this might be weird, but what are the chances there’s someone we could ask to volunteer? I know we normally do testing on legal slaves, but could we use a different test subject?”
Kaela licked her teeth as she let that idea rattle around in her head, “in theory… maybe? I think that would involve a lot of red tape to ensure consent and the dangers of human testing. I don’t know if that would pass muster with Legal.”
She stretched her arms above her head and let out a squeak of a sigh, her modest chest thrust towards the ceiling a moment before she sat back up and continued, “I’m pretty sure we have to at least use a registered slave that’s properly entered into the system internally for bookkeeping purposes.”
Ben kept drinking his cola to keep his face occupied as his boss stretched, glancing away as she sat back up. He fiddled with the can between his hands as he considered, “well, a lot of folks get formal grades and registries now. Maybe there’s someone around the company who’s registered but free that could serve?”
Kaela blinked and processed that though, her stomach doing a little summersault at the thought of polling her colleagues and convincing one of them to allow R&D to subject them to their devices. “I… doubt we’d find anyone who would volunteer, but that might just give us a way to technically work around the slave being registered in inventory because they’d be on payroll instead…” Her mind raced through options, considering who among the company’s staff would be young enough to be registered properly and even remotely likely to be up for the risks involved.
“You’ve already got some of the overtime approved, right?” Ben offered helpfully, “maybe there can be overtime compensation with a little extra for a volunteer? There’s a few girls down in the Sales and Distribution office that might be down for some extra cash.”
Kaela chewed her pen as she considered, clicking her mouse through a staff directory on her computer while they explored options. “I’m also worried about negatively impacting current staffing and assignments. We have to program in recovery and analysis time, so I don’t know if we can take someone away from their other responsibilities in their normal company time…”
They fell into silence again, the dull hum of the AC and buzz of the halogen lights filling the quiet. Ben drifted back to the tables to continue taking inventory of parts while Kaela pulled up the legal guidelines for employee overtime and volunteering for extra duties along with the registration requirement for testing subjects.
A thought snuck its way into Kaela’s investigations. “I need a subject who is available on company time, and won’t be pulled away from their primary responsibilities, and is technically registered with an SRN that can be entered on the company records…”
Her stomach flipped again as she considered the logistics. The thought chilled her that trying to poll workers and find a viable volunteer would start rumors flying and put other people under pressure to endanger themselves. Sure, there were plenty of folks who had a slave registration number with how ubiquitous the process had become for financing. Even more folks had their government identification keyed on the same style of subcutaneous ID chips that can stand as a suitable proxy according to the company’s legal guidelines. But asking a free person to subject themselves to the potential harms and humiliation of being treated as a testing subject for training tools? She couldn’t imagine anyone agreeing to volunteer.
“We’re going to need to do multi-day trials… first for proof of concept, then efficacy. We should be able to only utilize them during the trial, so it wouldn’t require entering them into overnight inventory if we categorize them correctly. But even still, that’s a lot, and there’s no telling what the after effects of the training regime will be.”
She scratched at her chest through her blouse, her fingers finding the spot just below her left collarbone where her own SCID chip had lived since she was 18. Her stomach flipped again, but with a rising heat in her middle as she considered a possibility that simultaneously terrified her and intrigued her. There was one person she knew for a fact could meet the legal requirements and whose duties wouldn’t be impacted by spending extra time in R&D.
Her mouth was suddenly dry. She could feel her blouse sticking to her back with sweat despite the lab’s air conditioning and her heart started to pound in her ears. She stole a quick glance at Ben’s back, diligently working to get things ready and oblivious to her sudden panic. Could she really do it? Could she ask Ben to oversee the testing and be the test subject herself? She swallowed and covered her mouth as she leaned on her desk, staring at the screen in front of her laying out all the details of what it would take for her to be temporarily reclassified as a slave.
She shook herself out of it and sat up with a full body shiver. She had the weekend to think it over and consider alternatives. For now, she had a backup plan, she told herself, and come Monday, she’d make her final decision.
In the moment, however, she had to deal with the suddenly very damp conditions brewing between her thighs. She stood on unsteady legs and excused herself to go to the restrooms to “freshen up,” doing her best to not rush to the privacy of the bathroom stall, her hands shaking as she hiked up her skirt and pulled down her panties, seeing for herself just how large the dark stain she convinced herself was sweat had gotten.
She bit her hand to stifle the moans and whimpers that threatened to echo in the stall as she fucked herself then and there, pushing herself over the edge to the thought of kneeling, slave naked, in the middle of R&D with Darryl and Ben standing over her.
When her orgasm subsided and her senses returned with her slowing breath, she slumped back and stared at the ceiling. She realized that her decision might be made a lot sooner than she thought.
“Good lord, what am I getting myself into…?”