The All-Seeing Eye

Jennifer looked around her office, and felt proud of what she had recently accomplished. It had taken years of working her way up the corporate ladder, but she had finally made it to a position in upper management. The long hours she had put in had left little time for anything else in her life. It had been years since she had even thought about dating, but now that she was finally at the top she felt like she could start thinking about men again. She didn't know why, but she found herself looking at the door to her office. It was like she was expecting something, but she didn't have anything major scheduled for a few hours at least.

As she stared at the door for what must have been ten minutes, she found herself disappointed that no one came through. What was taking so long? The strange thought crossed her mind, and made just as little sense as her waiting expectantly in the first place.

That's when the security alarms started going off. She picked up her phone to ask her secretary what was going on and found that it was completely dead. She tried her cell phone but it seemed to be out of batteries and she couldn't find her charger anywhere. Today was going to be a long day, Jennifer could already tell. She moved towards the door, and poked her head experimentally out to see if it was safe to go out. She was surprised to see five men running through the hallways carrying protest signs with phrases like "Free them from their sin!" and "Stop the Whore of Babylon!" on them. The men saw her and ran towards her. She tried to close the door on them, but she was too slow. They pushed past the door and she was stuck in the room with the five men.

"Please don't hurt me! If you're after money I've got plenty I could give you!" she said, reaching for her purse.

The biggest man of the bunch, probably their leader, looked at her in pity. "We're not here for money. We're here to set you free." He raised a strange metallic device and pointed it at her.

She backed up to the wall, and managed to choke out, "Wh-what do you mean set me free? What's that you're holding?"

The man pressed a button, and Jennifer felt a painful burning sensation on the back of her neck that had her on the floor writhing in pain. When the man let up on the button, the pain stopped and one of the men approached Jennifer's crumpled form and pulled something heavy off of her neck before she had a chance to recover or protest.

"There, you're free. Security will be coming for all of us soon, so you should probably escape through the window. We'll try to buy you some more time, but there's only so much we can do."

Jennifer had many questions, but the urgency the man spoke with was almost enough to convince her to trust him. "Even if I believed you guys, how am I supposed to escape from an office window on the 29th floor?"

The leader checked through the door, and spoke quickly. "The monsters keeping you in this den of sin have been feeding you lies. Look out the window, and you'll see the truth."

Jennifer turned to the window beside her, and looked outside. Instead of seeing a view of the city from the 29th floor, she was surprised to learn that the room she was in was at street level.

"Go now! The security team is here already," The man said trying to brace the door against an assailant on the other side.

Jennifer took one look back at the strange rescue party, and jumped out the window onto the soft grass a few feet below. She started running through the city, and she didn't stop until she was reasonably certain that no one had pursued her. (This didn't endear her to any of the drivers that almost hit her as she ran through traffic a few times.)

Out of breath, she looked around and saw that she was near a dive bar. That seemed like as good of a place as any to lie low. She walked inside, got herself a table, and began to try and piece together what was going on. She checked through her purse again for a phone charger, but was frustrated to find that her purse was quite empty. She had no ID, no make-up, no charger, a dead phone and no money. Why was her purse empty? How was she going to pay for anything?

The waiter came by her table, and he seemed tongue-tied when he saw her. He did eventually manage to ask her if she'd like anything to drink. The waiter's bashfulness gave Jennifer an idea.

"I would love something to drink, but I'm a little short on cash." She unbuttoned her top few buttons as she spoke, and made eyes at the waiter. "Maybe you'd be willing to accept some *other* form of payment?"

The young man stammered that that would be okay, after checking around the room to see if anyone was listening.

"Wonderful. Bring me something fruity, and once I've finished up, you can get your *special* payment. And bring a phone charger while you're at it."

The young man nodded and shuffled off awkwardly, leaving Jennifer alone with her thoughts. What had that just been? She could have just dined and dashed, so why had her first thought been to seduce the cute waiter? The only explanation she could come up with was that her dry spell had gone on for so long that it was causing her to act irrationally given the otherwise serious circumstances she found herself in.

The waiter came back with her drink and handed her a charger. She plugged her phone in and turned it on. She was greeted by an unfamiliar lockscreen. The background picture was clearly of Jennifer, although her hair was blond and her make-up was a little more on the trashy side. The text below the clock said "Good evening, Cherry Sinn." As Jennifer stared confusedly at the lockscreen, she was struck by two questions. What was the password for her phone? And who the hell was Cherry Sinn? It seemed like every question led to a new question. She tried a few passwords, but none of them seemed to work so she decided to let the phone charge and save these new questions for later.

She finished her drink, and when the waiter came around for his payment, they both secreted away to the restroom. Their clothes were soon on the floor, and they were swept away in a whirlwind of passion. The waiter was young and inexperienced, but he more than made up for it in enthusiasm. With every thrust, Jennifer felt like she was close to reclaiming a part of herself that she had denied for far too long. Here, with this man, she wasn't an ambitious new member of upper management, or someone on the run from some unknown group, she was just a woman - no, a slut - getting her brains fucked out. She imagined how she must look to anyone who walked in, and she was sent to new plateaus of arousal. Was this what her rescuers had meant when they freed her? Was she now free to fuck and suck and reject the worries and responsibilities that had characterized her life up until now? That was her last lucid thought before she gave completely into the pleasure. The next thirty minutes were nothing but sensation and instinct, unity and bliss.

When they had finished, Jennifer breathed heavily and looked at her lover in the afterglow. Now that her appetite had been whetted, she felt a gnawing hunger in her. Just one man was not enough to satisfy her. Hell, just men wouldn't be enough to satisfy her. She needed someone else. For the second time today, she glanced at the door with a quiet faith. Surely someone would walk through the door and join them.

The waiter was starting to put his clothes back on, and he said, "Wow. That was amazing. I never knew it could be so good. You really are something else, Cherry."

This took Jennifer out of her reveries and dropped her back in reality. "Cherry? Why did you just call me Cherry?"

The waiter began cursing. "Fuck. I'm sorry, I ruined it." He ran his fingers through his hair. "How stupid could I be - of course none of this would ever happen for real." He began scrutinizing the walls closely. "I'm surprised they'd do anything with the restrooms though, they must be really well hidden."

Jennifer was freaked out by the waiter's words. She got dressed as quickly as she could, gathered up her personal effects and she rushed out of the restroom. She left the bar half walking, half putting her second shoe on. The waiter rushed out after her, shouting.

"Hey, we don't have to end on that note! We can try one more time."

Jennifer almost wanted to turn back, but she didn't know what fate awaited her if she did. She started running again. After a few blocks, her phone began to ring. She slowed down, and pulled it out. The screen said, "Call from Daddy." Jennifer's fingers moved of their own volition, bypassing the previously unpassable lockscreen and answering the call. Was this muscle memory or something else?

"Hello?"

"Hey, Cherry baby. Is everything wrapping up soon, or should I order dinner for one today?" It was a male voice. Jennifer couldn't place it, but it sounded strangely familiar.

"Who is this? And who's this Cherry everyone seems to know? My name is Jennifer," Jennifer said in exasperation.

There was a pause on the line. "Cherry, it sounds like your Collar might be on the fritz. Walk down the hallway until you see someone in a white coat, and tell them your Collar isn't working right. I'm sure you're very confused right now, but if you do that they'll help everything make sense again."

"What do you mean my collar? And I'm not in a building so there's no hallway for me to walk down."

"Oh shit, where are you?"

Jennifer considered whether she should tell this person where she was. "I'm on the corner of 5th and Waltzman."

"Okay, stay there. I should be there in about 15 minutes." Then the line went dead.

Jennifer decided to wait, but the whole time she had half a mind to run away. The thing that kept her rooted on the spot was the promise that all her questions would be answered. Even if that ended poorly for her, she needed to know what was going on.

* * *

Cherry walked back to Lilith Production's modest office building. After her little adventure as Jennifer, she had been given a week off work. She had wanted to go back to work right way, but the production manager had insisted that she take a week off to recover.

Cherry Sinn was one of the most popular Collar porn stars in the world, so there was quite a buzz on social media about her run in with the Aether Luddite cult. Far from hurting her career, the news had increased traffic to her videos by 20%, and she had half a mind not to press charges against the cult. There's no such thing as bad publicity after all.

She got into costume, and went to room 113 as instructed, looking around trying to guess who she was going to be today. It looked like a normally furnished apartment. That's when she saw the sink was spurting water like a fountain. Oh, a plumber scene - this was going to be fun. As she thought this, she felt a pleasant, warm sensation at the back of her neck. Her thoughts became fuzzy and then she began having trouble thinking about anything at all. She was nothing. And then, as she sat there looking at her surroundings wondering where she was, and how she got there the answer came to her.

Mary looked at her broken sink in frustration. Where was that damn plumber? He had said she should expect him sometime between 11 and 2 and it was already almost 3. She almost unconsciously looked at the door, and as if on cue she heard a knock. She opened the door, and was immediately struck by how hot the plumber was. She suddenly hoped that her sink wasn't going to be the only thing he was going to take a look at that day.