Jacuzzi

Mind control is a dumb idea. It would never work, especially on such an undisciplined mind as that of Homo sapiens. It was one of their worst ideas, only tried because they had to try everything. But now it's their best idea, the only one that's shown any promise. Never in a million years (literally) did they think this would be the scheme they went with. In a strict theoretical sense, controlling a sapient mind is impossible. It's risky, unethical, and worst of all, inelegant. But this is the dirty real world, and it works. Reality doesn't fret over what's elegant.

And I'm just the tip of the iceberg. All of their abilities come from selective breeding. All the "technology" that went into me—the breather, the conditioning drugs, the specialized midlarva—had to be researched and developed in H. sapiens women. Thousands of them, lined up in long pools in hidden laboratories. Living cranes lower in the dry and raise out the dripping. Most of them kept unconscious, but these were mind control experiments, so some had to be woken up. Not all of them could stay as sane as I did. The experiments are over now, the labs are quiet, and all the women are asleep.

Pants Removal

Anna's still out there, luring girls into basements, unzipping their pants. That's a pretty important part of her job, as it turns out. The spider People are extremely dexterous in general, but none of their appendages are quite right for buttons and zippers. Those devices were designed for human hands. Anna isn't necessarily human. They broke her genetic line off from ours somewhere around Australopithecus. In recent times, they've bred it to blend in with us. Her hands are similar enough.

I've depantsed eight girls, myself. If I thought the hot tub was crowded before, now it's crazy. The squirming tubular organisms take up more volume than the water, which is now milky white. Eight unconscious young women with tubes in their mouths and bulges in their bellies. They're laid out like flower petals, with their knees all meeting at the center, their calves dangling underwater. My big naked girl flower.

I've had my first baby already. He was only a baby for a few days. He was born in the morning, speaking English by the evening, and his childlike mind quickly faded into their indecipherable collective. He's one of them now. Only his size sets him apart. That, and he calls me "Mother".

I've tried to get to know him. "I don't want to hear about 'we'," I plead, "tell me about 'I'."

"I will try." But he can't fight his nature. My second baby is due soon. I'm going to make the most of my few days with him. Next time I hear some human talk about how fast her kids grow up, I'm gonna slap her.

The tub is at capacity. We're digging a pit in the floor for the next pool. Sarah will have it all to herself. She won't be just a protein factory like the others. She'll be like me, an agent. She reminds me of myself. That's because she has the personality to make her a mind control candidate. A sunny disposition and a dark sense of humor. And she's half Japanese. That doesn't matter, I don't know why I thought of that. I feel bad for her. She's tiny. Not an ideal body for bearing young. That won't be her primary purpose, but nobody gets out of breeding duty. I'm afraid it'll hurt her worse than it hurt me.

Or maybe she'll save us both. They thought of hypnosis. They tested for it. They were sure it wouldn't disrupt their control. But it looks like they made a mistake. If I get pulled over, maybe I can tell the cops about the house, get a doctor to check out my spider fetus... I won't be able to think long enough. I'd just mumble incoherently, maybe get arrested. I need a plan that works fast. If I crash this car into the house, it might possibly draw some authority figure's attention to what's inside...

If that's the best I can do, perhaps the hypnosis isn't much of a circumvention after all. But I have to try. Show some defiance. Damage this valuable asset of theirs. That's how they know me. Not by name, but by what I am to them. I'm an asset. A high-functioning mind control subject, a human infiltrator, a gangbang slut for huge spiders.

It's not as easy for me to identify them. Most of the time, I can't tell them apart. Each one is a shining star of unique individuality, I infer. But they seem like a collective consciousness to me. The reason is simple. They think and communicate in their own language really fast. By the time they're ready to formulate an English sentence for my ears, they've already collaborated and agreed upon what to say. I don't get to hear their deliberations, I only get to hear about them.

The only times I can sense their individuality is when they're fucking me. They have their favorite positions and things like that. They'll often jump me in the middle of a conversation, or what seems to me like the middle of a conversation. Whenever they seem to be approaching a conclusion, I've come to anticipate forceful penetration. I have to anticipate it when I'm sitting around the house, too. They come out of nowhere. Not because they're trying to sneak up on me, it just comes naturally to them.

My target body part gets grabbed and lined up with the penis, sometimes leaving the rest of my body dangling. It amounts to about a second's warning before the insertion. Sadness and anger every time. I vaguely feel as if I've given them blanket consent to do this, at some time in the past. Don't think it counts if I can't remember it. But that only matters for another second. My brain slams into gear. The anger gives way to serenity, every time.

I'm not sure what to think of the fact that they enjoy it so much. I see the mirror image of my Receptacle in them. And they don't deny it. But what do I want them to do, hold their noses and cry while they fuck me? Not fuck me? That's one reason I ended up with rival identities, they say. Not knowing what I want.

There's one that always sleeps in bed with me. Sometimes I'm half asleep when he turns me on my stomach and sticks it in, and I get to relive that sense of shock at getting raped by a huge spider. The monster over my bed. I get to squeal and scream and squeeze fistfuls of sheets. Usually too tired to clean up. I just pull the covers back up when he's done, get them all sweaty and cummy. They do the laundry, anyway.

I used to fight when he tried to turn me over. Mainly to stall for time, so I'd be more ready. He doesn't technically need me on my stomach. He's not fucking me in the ass, most times. He just prefers me in that position. There was a night when I quit fighting. I started sleeping on my stomach. I even leave the covers off of my lower body. I roll them up and stick them under my waist to prop it up. It's cold, but that's okay. I find that the feeling of cool air on my ass is my favorite part. Sometimes it's enough to get me ready.

"Is it Stockholm syndrome?" I asked them, "That makes me enjoy this?"

"No. You are not in captivity."

"I'm aware of your mind control, not letting me leave. I think that counts."

"You are under no compulsion not to leave. You could drive to your family at any time and never see us again, if you desired. The conditioning prevents you from revealing our existence to your kind. The rest of your decisions are yours."

"Really?" I say that to them a lot.

"Yes."

"I've been going along with all this voluntarily?"

"Yes."

"And not knowing it was voluntary."

"Humans seldom reflect on their volition."

"Even when I bring girls here for you?"

"Yes."

"Why would I do that?"

"As far as we know, you have three major motives involved in that decision. The antagonistic motive is sympathetic fear for our victims, which is why you lose your nerve in most attempts to bring them here."

"How would you know that?"

"We inferred it from your facial movements when you arrived home on those occasions."

"Wow, nice job."

"Thank you. Your agonistic motives are sympathy for us, and also sympathetic fear for our victims..."

"Hold on a sec. Is this how you're trying to convince me you're not controlling my mind? By explaining my own motives to me?"

"Yes. Do you recall when you reconciled with your sister?"

"Yeah."

"You explained her motives to her, without the help of invasive mind control, did you not?"

"Oh. Damn. Touché, rapemonster. So, my sympathy for our victims is also motivating me to bring them here? How's that?"

"You believe they will be better off encountering us here in your home than in the future when we come for your kind en masse."

"Makes sense."

The Coming Rape War

They'll play the scary monsters; congregating in creepy factories, hauling victims off at night (but not to the factories). Gas won't work. Soldiers won't work. Humans will have no choice but to blow up their own industry. And then the tide will turn. The People will throw their lives away, swarming in wide open fields, getting mowed down by machine gun fire. Humans will think it's a war; the People will see it as a con. They'll give mankind exactly what he wants: revenge and victory. And when mankind realizes he's given them exactly what they want, they'll be gone. They'll come back as his grandchildren.

They call themselves the People, capitalized, because it's the best word for how they see themselves. Thinking beings, with emphasis leaning toward the abstract and away from their physical bodies. They've bred those bodies into a vast array of forms over the aeons, which has required, and inspired, them to have such an abstract notion of themselves. The spiders are just one species of People, and out there lurk countless other species in every imaginable and unimaginable form. There are reptilian People out there as I think, breeding with humans and planning to take over the world. The resemblance to our conspiracy theories is coincidental. Not even an unlikely coincidence.

Symbiosis, that's their big plan for us. They don't believe any peace or reconciliation is likely between our cultures without interweaving our reproductive destinies. I've tried to argue that a peaceful solution is possible, but "possible" isn't good enough for them. It isn't good enough for us, if we're honest. Nothing is good enough for us. That's why they don't trust us with the planet.

Among their generation, my six spider colleagues will be some of the few candidates for survival. Their clandestine mission will keep them away from the front lines. If they do survive, their mission will end, and they'll supposedly obey me for the rest of their lives. I could make them my slaves, if I wanted. I could line them all up and shoot them. I hope we can keep hanging out, maybe campaign for polyarachnous marriage. Our offspring will be free to live as they please. Like me, they won't be safe among humans. But that's no loss. We can all be happy out here, living the rural life.

Very few humans will share my experience. Most victims will get grabbed, get a black tube shoved down their throats, and then it's lights out for them. They'll wake up about a year later, find out that their bodies helped the People take over.

"Couldn't you have knocked me out, that first time you had me in the tub?"

"We were capable of that, but it would have undermined your trust in us."

"Really."

"While you would have ended up hating us less..."

"I don't hate you."

"You are aware of the system of hate in your mind to which I refer. It is merely dormant at present. This system would be weaker had we knocked you out. However, it would have been linked to a system of suspicion. You would have discovered what we did to you gradually, and it would have put your mind in a state of intrigue. It would have impeded the development of a functional system of trust."

"And putting me through that experience wouldn't have?"

"Less so."

"I find that hard to believe."

"You already believe that idle suspicion can damage trust worse than torture, but you have not internalized that belief."

"Oh." Slam. "Why can't you just inject me with something to make me trust you?"

"Trust cannot be forced into anyone. That is why mind control, in a strict technical sense, is impossible."

"But humans trick others into trusting them all the time."

"Such human tricks are tenuous. A false world must be constructed around or within the victim, limiting their ability to reason. Our purposes for you preclude such complications. You will be making important decisions for us and your own kind."

"Right, okay. Why did it have to hurt?"

"The naiads applied local anesthetics. They were as effective as we could make them."

"As effective as you could make them! With all your abilities, you couldn't get the anesthetic right?"

"There is an economy behind our abilities. Each one costs our captives more time in breeding pools."

"Oh."

My own victims, my girl flower, were all mercifully sedated. Sarah will be the first exception.

The trap is way easier than I thought it would be. "Come over to my party house in the woods! I've got a hot tub, I've got booze, I've got weed..." Chicks love it. Sometimes they're wary. Some of them ask if it's some kind of lesbian thing, but I've got the perfect counter: "Nope!"

Sarah's among the wary. "I don't know," she says, "is this some kind of lesbian thing?" It's different, hearing it from her lips. The Receptacle lights up. I've seen eight pussies up close, each time with an air of professional detachment. But now... Now I can't wait to see hers.

"Nope!" I say.

"I'll think about it."

My kid will be reaching sexual maturity right about the time I bring her in. There's something I like about that. I shall give her unto my firstborn. I also think it's kind of gross, but it's pointless to nitpick what's gross about my life.

Reproductively, in a way, the People are less parasitic on women than regular men are. My spider kid carries my entire genome. A human baby would only have half. Each individual spider-guy is two sexes. One sex is expressed through its penis in the form of sperm, and the other comes out of its abdomen in the form of midlarvae. All of the breeding pool dwellers originate in those abdomens. Except for the women, of course. We're the third sex in their system. The first two compose a gene pool, the kind our biological science is familiar with. It enables them to selectively breed themselves at a ridiculously fast pace. Our species gets to provide a genetic ground state, for stability. Kind of sexist, but it's pointless to nitpick about that, too.

My spider friends come from a line that has been breeding with H. sapiens for tens of thousands of years. They've been kept in reserve for just this kind of emergency, where my species meteorically rises in power. Not many genes cross that species barrier, between the first two sexes and the third. But some do. There are some creepily human features embedded in those spiders. Their eyes: twelve of them, set so deep in their cephalothorax that I can barely see them. But when I do, they look exactly human. Their hands: big and armor-plated, but basically human. And as I recently discovered, their dicks.

I find my first clue while I'm surfing the net. I see a picture of an uncircumcised penis. Don't remember why, it's the internet. I'm dumbfounded: Why does this man have a spider-penis? Then, I feel dumb. I didn't know what an uncircumcised penis looks like. I thought the spiders' lumpy, tardigrade-faced dicks were bizarre and alien, but they're just uncircumcised. The only alien things about them are the randomly sized bumps and weird colors, and those are variable. They can change their skin texture and color. It's an adaptation for camouflage, but they do it with their dicks for my benefit. If they flatten out the texture, their dicks should look completely human. I get up from the computer, have to see this for myself.

They aren't easy to find when they're not looking for me. Instinctively, they're always hiding. They know every nook and cranny in this place. I'm looking for minutes on end. What am I doing? I've got three quizzes tomorrow and here I'm wandering all over my giant house looking for spider cock like I've had some deficiency of it. I pull up the tablecloth, and find one. He looks annoyed. I like that.

I get on my back and slide under him like a mechanic. The penis is under the abdomen, a few inches behind the crotch of his last pair of legs. It's enclosed by two bony plates that swing open sideways, like a missile launcher bay. Those plates swinging open has become a familiar sight, a signal that I'm about to lose control of my life for about ten minutes. I wiggle my fingers between them and pry them open. Old Mr. Tardigrade Face. Smaller and softer than I've ever seen it. I take that wrinkled face and pull it back.

The familiar purple helmet of the glans penis. All along it's been there, inside those jagged alien members. Not quite as alien now, but quite a bit more creepy. And quite soft. Powerless.

I don't think about it. I close my eyes and lean in. My lips close around its hairy base. It let it grow inside my mouth. It fills me up, slides past my uvula. The helmet gets pressed flat against back of my throat, but it doesn't stop. It gets harder, putting its own impression into my throat flesh.

Two hands clasp my ears, and I lose control of the situation for about ten minutes.

Why do I keep thinking about the sex? I was coming up with a plan. Shit, the dirt road. I'm almost there. What was the plan? I had a plan.

I park in the driveway and walk inside the house. I sit up in Sarah's bed. That hypnosis candle she was burning. Last time I woke up, it was half-gone. Now it's only one-quarter gone. It unburned itself.

"Dude, you fell asleep," she tells me.

"Oh. I wasn't supposed to?"

"No. Hypnosis isn't normal sleep. You were normal sleeping."

"Sorry, I must have been pooped. Heh. I had a funny dream."

"What about?"

My eyes flutter. "Hanging out with some chicks in my hot tub. Hey, you want to come over tonight?"

"I don't know. Forty-five minutes each way? I've got homework due."

"Do it in the car!"

"Okay."