The Slave Viki Chronicles

 A while ago, I wondered if anyone among the readers was interested in writing some adventures of Slave Viki, from On the Banks of the Bighorn. Some people wondered what was known of Viki. So here is the collected Chronicles of Slave Viki.

She is an interesting Character, but I have no time to write of her adventures, either on Gor as an agent of the Kur, or on Earth, working for General Security and Central Information.

The Slave Viki Chronicles, being the appearances of Slave Viki, from her life as an agent of the Kur to her life as a Gorean Slave on Earth, told in excerpts from Banks of the Bighorn.

Banks of the Bighorn Chapter 4

From Juliette Chen’s Narrative.

 I could hear the sounds from the tires change under the Subaru Forester as Patrick turned off the paved highway onto the unpaved dirt road into the town of Town.    The unpaved street was full of  potholes and we slowed on the uneven road surface.  To our left, between the road and the railway tracks, were two old fashioned wooden grain elevators, their paint peeling and looking a little out of true and plumb (Patrick’s words).  Just past them was the stockyards, a few cattle lowing as we went by.  Even with our eyes shut, we would have known they were there by the smell.  The stockyards went on for three blocks while on our right was a succession of small unpainted wood frame houses with weed filled yards and scraggy cottonwood trees in front. All the potholes were full of water from the recent rains.  There was no other traffic on the street, even though it was middle of the day.

On the left, the stockyards gave way to a blank faced building with Montana Range Abattoir and Slaughterhouse painted on its side in fading large block letters, while on the right the houses were replaced by wood frame apartment buildings, two and three stories high, with rickety outside wooden fire escapes.  The road came to an end in a cross street that had a group of trees past it.  

 Just before the T intersection was a small convenience store on the right and a cindercrete block building on the left.  On the top of the one story building was a sign reading Three Moon Saloon.  The Saloon shared a parking lot with the abattoir.  The lot was unpaved, potholed and, except for a couple of old pickup trucks in front of the door, deserted.  Patrick pulled the Subaru in the parking lot and stopped in front of the door.

 “Let’s go in and see if we can get some directions to the Sheriff’s Office, and maybe use the toilet.  It doesn’t seem to look like a place where we would want to eat.”

 It didn’t look like the sort of place where I would want to pee, either.  If Patrick had not been with me, I wouldn’t even have wanted to go inside.  There were double glass doors at the front, one door was propped open with a stick, the bottom glass panel in the other was missing and replaced by a piece of plywood.

 We went in through the doors and down the hall.  I think the thinning carpet on the floor squished under my feet. I was so glad I was wearing my hiking boots instead of shoes. Through some swinging old west style doors was a dingy room smelling of cigarettes and stale beer.  To our right was a long bar, unoccupied by patrons or a bartender, while straight ahead was a stage or platform, with a small drum kit at the back.  Each side of the stage had a lower circular platform with a stripper pole in the middle.  The front and far sides were lined with alcoves, closed with curtains of faded red plush, for privacy I presumed. There were no windows.

 There were five patrons, all men in cowboy hats, seated at the tables.  Towards one table a waitress was hurrying with jugs of cheap lager beer.  She was dressed like what a slutty Hooters waitress would wear, with cowboy boots, short shorts, midriff bare, with a skimpy almost sheer top tied under her breasts. By slutty Hooters waitress, I mean, a regular Hooters waitress would think her slutty.  Her breasts were really ample in an enhanced sort of way.  When she reached the table, she squatted down to put the pitchers of beer on the table, giving all three men a great view down her top.  As she was showing herself off,  I wondered if she had paid cash for the fake tits she was flashing or if she had let the surgeon take it out in ‘trade’.  Not the sort of girl to get married, I judged, or at least not to the original father of her children.

 “Like the crossties of the railroad, and the stars in the sky,” a voice on the PA warbled.

 The juke box came on to some country tune I didn’t know as another similar waitress hurried by with what looked like shots of whiskey.  She did not kneel by the table but leaned across it to pass the two men their drinks.  As she bent forward, I saw that what I had thought were her short shorts were not shorts but a very short skirt.  I also saw that she had got into her ‘uniform’ in a hurry this morning because she had forgotten to put on her underwear.  I felt very uncomfortable and wanted to get out of there.

 “Can I help you Mac?”

 Patrick and I turned around.  The bartender had appeared. Patrick asked if I could use the Ladies Room.  I was trying to be unobtrusive as I signalled to Patrick I didn’t need to pee that badly.

 “No”.  The bartender shook his head. “No”.  

 Patrick can be unreasonably stubborn in my opinion. “Why not?  We will buy drinks if that is what you are driving at.”  Patrick does not at all like to back down.

 “She can’t use the Ladies Room cause there ain’t a Ladies Room.”  It was the first time I actually heard someone make a noise that could be described as a guffaw. It did not sound pleasant or humorous.

 Patrick is sometimes unreasonably stubborn in my view. I love him and want to marry him, but sometimes retreat is better. “What about them? Where do they go?” Patrick motioned to the two waitresses, the one with the big fake boobs and the one without underwear.

 “They’re not Ladies.  If they need to go, they use the Gents. The boys don’t mind.”

 Defeated, and not before time, we turned to leave.  Patrick asked directions to the Sheriff’s office.  He was still polite, his voice still reasonable. When he is upset, he rarely shows it. He says it gives the other side an advantage to show emotion.  He is a successful lawyer.

 While Patrick reviewed with the bartender the directions to the Sheriff’s office, I saw another ‘waitress’ emerge from behind the curtains in an alcove along the back wall.  She was tying up her top, and was followed by a man doing up his belt.  She looked like she had about fifteen years less mileage than the other pair and had a cute face, but I don’t think she was a Lady either.  Definitely not the marrying kind.

 We drove away from the Three Moon Saloon in silence, Patrick and I.  As Patrick navigated a turn that took us away from what I called in my mind Slaughterhouse Row and towards a more treed, leafy part of town, Patrick said, “I think we ended up in what is called the wrong side of the tracks”. Patrick has a droll sense of humour.

 We crossed those same tracks in about another block, Patrick meticulously stopping and looking both ways before proceeding.  Being careful is what makes him such a good climber and lawyer. 

 The right side of the tracks was much more salubrious.

 

On the Banks of the Bighorn Chapter 13

From Viki’s Narrative

 The place on my hip where the kef brand was removed by a special field dressing was itching today. Of course my masters remind me often that just because a brand is removed from a girl’s skin, it does not mean she is free.  I know that. The scar made on my body is gone, but not the one on my mind.  The collar has been removed from my throat, but it has been replaced by the anklet.  Fastened by an app; ironic for a comms specialist.

 My master’s agent on the Lazy F has been sending reports all day on the low power sub-space communicator.  This is bad security and not as safe as he assures me it is. Things were so much more secure when he handed me his reports for transmission on the occasions he visited Town.  He claims the Fricks have no way to monitor the low power broadcasts. I know the high power narrow beam I use to communicate can’t be monitored, while the low power broadcast can be traced, albeit with difficulty.  But what do I know? I’m just the comms expert, ordered to obey his every command, so I do, even the commands to send coded messages to addresses other than those of my masters. He thinks I can’t read his codes. He is the agent; I am just the comms expert. Who do you think is right? Damn, the place where my kef isn’t any more really itches.

From the Banks of the Bighorn Chapter 16

From Viki’s narrative.

 My Master’s agent on the Lazy F has been sending transmissions on his low power broadcast all day.  I believe this is foolish, but I am commanded to obey him.  He is adamant that the Fricks don’t have the tech to intercept his messages, but I am the comms expert and know this to be foolish. In addition he should not be sending so much, and especially not in daylight. He could get caught. But I am a slave, he is free, and I am commanded to obey him.

 The other aspect of his transmissions that worry me, is the coded messages I am commanded to beam, not to my masters, but to a different location.  I know I am commandeered to obey him in all things, but I am worried he is betraying my Master in Montreal, but the agent has commanded me to report nothing of this.  He claims it is for compartmentalized security, yet I smell betrayal.  Yet I obey.

 I find it odd that, since I was returned to Earth, I miss my collar. The anklet and app is just not the same. My hip still itches where the field dressing was used to remove my brand.  The pain of it is still seared into my mind, yet it is so strange, it is not on my hip.  I find myself running my fingers over where it was, like running your tongue over the place where a missing tooth was.

 I miss the cleanness of the air and water on Gor. Montana is, I suppose a close second, but it is not the Counter-Earth.  I grew up in Montreal, yet when I was returned to the city to serve the Montreal Family, it seemed small and dirty to me.  Still it has this advantage over Montana: in Montreal you can find decent coffee, the world’s best bagels and great food.

 The site where my brand was itches horribly.

 

From Patrick Master’s Narrative.

 As soon as I reached Town, I left messages at my work and hers that we would be another week. Both workplaces knew that this might occur, so there will be no trouble. I am enjoying having a slave, especially a woman as exciting as Juliette, to return to.  I need a legal way to keep her, or else this will be nothing but a pleasant interlude.

When I drove onto the ranch, I had not expected that so many collared and about to be collared women would excite me so.  The best part is that it is all legal.  I don’t want to do anything illegal, it is entirely against my nature.  Of course, many of these women may have been abducted illegally elsewhere, but once they were adjusted slaves on Luthan territory, their fate was legal and therefore right. Of all of them, beside Juliette of course, I was most taken with that enslaved Englishwoman from the University of Reading. She was quite luscious.  If only remote working was more advanced, I would consider moving my practice to either the Frick ranch or the Grand Duchy of Lutha.  But even in 2016, we are not quite there. Soon perhaps.

 I reached Town at 7:15, which was far too early for anything in a small town to be open except the diner.  I had a quick breakfast but still had time to kill.  Driving around Town,  I passed the Three Moon Saloon, which was a twenty-four hour establishment.  I went in for a drink.

The bartender from four days earlier was there, and one of the waitresses.  She was dancing, not very well, on one of the small round stages with poles to either side of the bandstand.

 “What’ll ya have, Mac?”

 “What do you have for whiskey?”

 “I have $6 whiskey and $42 whiskey, Mac.”

 “That’s quite a gap in quality.” I didn’t call him Mac, although I wanted to.  

 “No gap at all, Mac.  Same whiskey in fact. Difference is how it is served.  For six dollars, I pour it in a glass, which at this time of day is likely to be clean.  For Forty-two dollars, the server of your choice serves it to you for an hour in one of those alcoves.  Of course, right now, there isn’t any choice cause that one is the only one on. Another one comes on at 8:30.  So, $6 whiskey or $42 whiskey for ya, Mac?”

 “Six dollar whiskey, please.”

 “For the please, you get a clean glass for sure, Mac.”  Bartender smiled and poured a measure of whiskey.

 “By the way, where is that girlfriend of yours, Mac? She was looking mighty fine when she was in the other day, if you don’t mind me saying so.”

 “She’s all tied up right now.”

 The bartender nodded.  I wasn’t sure if he took me literally or not.  In this part of the country, he just might have believed me.  If so, he wasn’t shocked.

 The whiskey wasn’t worth the six dollars I paid, so I drank it slowly. Time passed while old country music played over the loudspeakers. I got up and looked at the jukebox.  What was available for my coins wasn’t any better than what I was already listening to for free.  I know there is good country music but none of it was available at the Three Moon.  Another server came on in a crop top and very short shorts.  The stores were still not open. Just thinking about Juliette and Miss Reading University serving me had made me horny.

 I walked over to my friend at the bar and ordered a $42 whiskey. I paid him sixty, telling him the extra was so I didn’t have to drink the whiskey.  I picked the girl who had been dancing when I came in.  She seemed about twenty-one or twenty-two, except for the eyes, which seemed like they had seen things.

 She led me towards the nearest alcove, but suddenly changed her mind and took me to the farthest one.  The curtains, unlocked with a key, then we entered.  There was a mattress with some sort of fake fur on it, and rings at each end.  There were ties and quirts hanging on the walls.

 “You liked like you might want something special.”  She undid her top, and slid out of her short skirt.  She wore nothing underneath.  She looked at me.

“It’s been ten years since I was allowed a nether closure.”

 I looked shocked and started to leave.

 “I’m a lot older than I look, I am nearly thirty-five. I’ve had some special work done.  You should tie my hands. Do you want to use bracelets or rope?”

 I chose rope. There was also a steel collar in the alcove. I snapped that on her throat too, as it reminded me of the women on the Lazy F, especially Miss Reading University. When we were finished, we lay together.  I asked her name, while I made patterns with my finger on her hip.

 “Viki, with a K.  I know Viki always has a K, but I mean only a K, no C.” I traced a K pattern, in a soft wavy typeface, on her hip.  She stiffened but relaxed a little as I continued tracing  K on her hip.

 It was near the time the stores would be opening. I put on my clothes.

 “Aren’t you going to untie me?” 

 “I paid for the hour, you can lie here and think until it is up.”  I thought that might be the sort of thing a Master would do. I was surprised when she replied, “Yes, Master.”

 I liked the sound of that.

 

Viki’s Narrative.

 Who was that man?  He wasn’t one of the cowboys from around here.  He handled me almost like a Master. It made me quite nostalgic for my days as a Mat and Comms girl on Gor after our base was overrun and I was first collared and branded.

 Maybe he was a man sent by my Master in Montreal to check up on me, or maybe a man from one of the other Families? Should I report this too?

No, my days of making up my own mind ended the day I was collared. Just keep quiet and serve, girl, for curiosity is not becoming a Kajira, even an undercover one.

 

Banks of the Bighorn Chapter 19

From Viki’s Narrative

 Ever since Mac the bartender released me from my collar in the alcove, I have been inundated by messages from my Master’s spy and contact on the Lazy F.  All the messages are coded and are to be sent on to his mysterious second contact.  There are no messages to be sent to his employers, my masters, in the Montreal Family. I keep the communicator hidden in my apron when I am serving drinks on the floor. It keeps buzzing, but no messages for Montreal, and lots of messages for the other people to whom he apparently reports.  This is not why my Masters supplied him with Kurii comms technology!  I am off duty here in ten minutes and will have to report to my Masters.  I will be whipped for doing so.  I was ordered by the Family to obey him in every particular, and the agent strictly ordered me to pass on his third party messages by the Narrow Beam Reporter.  I was also strictly ordered to not report this messages to Montreal.  I will be disobeying a direct order and must be punished.  I know that.  If the agent has betrayed my Masters though, and I don’t report that, I will also be punished or even destroyed. I am a slave.  My loyalty must be first to my Master, and then to the orders of another Free Man. I must act and do what is right, because I shall be punished in any case.

 

Banks of the Bighorn Chapter 20

From the Slave Viki’s Narrative

 Throughout the night I lay in fitful sleep in my small attic room in the Three Moon Saloon.  Above the bar and kitchen, a false roof had been constructed.  The main room of the saloon was high, almost fourteen feet, so there was space above the service areas for small low rooms for the girls, as long as you don’t mind stooping.  Gor taught me to live on my knees anyway, as the price for living. As I wait for a response from my Masters in far off Montreal, regarding my report of possible treachery by our agent on the Lazy F,  I thought on the strange turns that had brought me to this place.

 

Victoria Mary Elizabeth Diana Windsor.  That’s me.  Or it used to be.  Now I am enrolled as Viki in some slaver’s house on Gor, an unacknowledged Planet circling the sun, in the same orbit as our own.

 

Nerd Girl, Tech Girl, Mat and Kettle Girl.  Now in godforsaken Montana in 2016 known as Bessie, although I told that man Patrick my real name.  He reminded me so much of a Master, I could not lie to him.

 

Going by my original name, you might think I came from some posh English family and grew up sipping tea and oppressing peasants. You would be wrong.  Although I do like tea, and one of the drawbacks of Gor for me, aside from ending up as a collared slave, is that they don’t have tea.  They have what they call Bazi Tea, but I don’t call that real tea. Lots of Black Wine, i.e. coffee, but no tea.  Not a leaf.  And by the way, the black wine snobs on Gor are fully as annoying as the ones back here on Earth; I know, I was owned by one for five long months.  The difference is that baristas here on Earth don’t get whipped if the water temperature is out by a degree or two.  Or maybe they do. Who knows what happens in the back rooms of Starbucks!

 

I didn’t grow up in England at all, but in Montreal, Canada, which makes my mother’s obsession with the Royal Family of Britain really weird.  My Dad’s side of the family, the Windsors, had lived in Canada for three generations, and my mom’s family, the Frasers, since 1760.  They came over with the Wolfe at the time of the conquest by the Brits and stayed, deciding to try to make a go of it in Canada rather than starve in Scotland. When I was born on July 29, 1981, my mom took it as a sign and named me after all the queens and future queens she could.  Which did me no good at all growing up in French majority Montreal.  

 

The stupid royal family isn’t even English anyway. They are really a bunch of Germans.

 

I know that because I sure didn’t grow up to be a little princess like my mom wanted. The only thing I retained from the genteel way I was raised was a liking for good tea.  Good tea served in bone china. Which I can’t get here in Montana.  The English mostly use teabags anyway, and I am a loose leaf girl, but on Gor you can’t even get teabags.  Stick to the point, Viki, just because you are talking into a Kurii recording device to keep yourself sane while waiting for a response from Montreal doesn’t mean you shouldn’t organize your thoughts.

 

Okay.  Organized thought is the path I followed instead of being a princess.  I was a nerd girl, history and technology.  I loved both. I dressed like an engineer, untied boots, baggy jeans, baggy shirts.  I read voraciously and studied.  I graduated from High School early, and went off to university at sixteen.  

 

I went to Western, in London, (Ontario).  Western is a heavy-duty computer and engineering University.  Mom was so happy I was going to University in London, until I added the Ontario part.  I majored in Computer Science and minored in History.  I think those were the happiest days of my life.

 

I was scouted by Gorean agents.  Lots of girls are, but it wasn’t my body they wanted, it was my brain. I was pretty much a genius at communications tech and networks, and that is not just me boasting, as I peeked into my file.  Kurii agents here on Earth and on Gor and quite proud of their security, but really it isn’t anywhere near as good as they think. The different factions, and boy there are a lot of factions, mock each other’s security, but they never check to see if their own is up to snuff.

 

They approached me in 2001, when I was just twenty and completing my courses and undergrad thesis. Very subtly they played on my love of space.  All techies love space.  I was shown pictures of our solar system from different angles, not just Earth.  One day they showed me a picture of two (!) planets in one orbit.  They let me feel brilliant and figure out for myself that one of the planets was Earth.  Of course, I was curious about the other planet, the counter-Earth.  I love teddy Bears and loathe spiders.  They knew that from their research.  I was spun a tale of planetary intrigue, of noble Teddy Bears, and loathsome spiders fighting it out on a pristine planet. Too late I learned that the Kur are no Teddy Bears, although the Priest Kings are pretty creepy insects.

 

I was young, I was adventurous, I was naive.  I signed on to upgrade and run a secure communication net on another planet without even checking if I could get decent tea.

 

On Gor, there were a number of other shocks for a naïve sexually inexperienced and immature girl.  I didn’t get out of our hidden base at first, but when I travelled or dealt at all with Gorean men (those gorgeous delicious brutes) I learned quickly that jeans wouldn’t do, it was long skirts.  The baggy shirts and hoodies met with approval, but talking through a veil became a pain. They did stabilize me though.  I didn’t ask to be stabilized at twenty. In my work, looking a little older would be an advantage. Now I am fixed at twenty, and no one takes a twenty-year-old pixie seriously.

 

I ran the base for two and half years and all went well until Brinn the Bastard showed up.  Everything was fine until this agent of the Spider Kings showed up and wrecked everything. He never took anything or examined it, just wrecked everything I had built in a fury of barbarian incomprehension.

All my work was wrecked and my life changed pretty radically too.  I went from lady boss of my own show to being naked, collared, and branded in under twelve hours. Little Victoria Mary Elizabeth Diana wasn’t a virgin princess anymore, that was for sure. Brinn didn’t even take care of that himself, he staffed it out to a couple of his brutes. There should have been more consideration given had I been boss of the base, the Talking Talon.  You may be surprised to learn I didn’t pick that name.

 

(Not that I had planned on staying a virginal princess that long, but what with going to Western so young, and focusing on my work, I didn’t have time to take care of that detail).

 

Instead of being debriefed, I was discarded and sold.  The agents of the Spider-Kings can be pretty clueless too. I was assessed as not pretty enough and not hot enough to be anything but a mat and kettle girl. No pleasure slave training for me; not even fit for a paga tavern.

 

So I was sold to the Black Wine snob and was there for five months, making his coffee and keeping the guards happy when there weren’t better girls to do so. Then an agent of the Spider-Kings bought me. For my knowledge? No, I was just a trophy.  Not only was I a captured Kurii agent, but I wasn’t even a hot slave. I was mocked.  It hurt.  Even more than the switch, it hurt.

 

Then some Kurii agents raided my new master’s house and I was rescued.  Was I heck!  I was still in a collar and was branded, so no more being in charge for me.  I could handle simple comms for them though, so I became a mat and tech girl.  Still no decent tea.

 

Then more faction wars.  There was a split in the Kur command. My master was put out of business, and I was taken over by yet another group.  Men from Treve needed someone to work their nets on Earth.  Goreans, even those living on Earth aren’t great with tech and comms.  So I ended up in the house of Livius Druses, in guess where, Montreal.  Decent tea, running water, still in a collar.

 

Then a change in management.  These Goreans on Earth are like mafia families, like the Rizzutos in Montreal when I was growing up. Always fighting for dominance. I was out of comms, as the new masters had a man they were sure could handle things.

 

I was sold to a security group for Goreans.  They decided to make me a spy.  I wasn’t good looking enough for anyone to suspect, they said. So my collar was removed, and my brand erased.  (In the old days on Gor, I helped run the op that stole some of those field dressings).

 

But I’m not free, I wear an unremovable ankle bracelet that reports my location at all times. I miss the men of Gor - those brutes who mastered me - but I am stuck on earth, in Armpit Montana, spying on one of the oldest Gorean families, because someone thinks they may be getting too independent.

 

I arrived using the name of Bessie Windsor.  I am thirty-five and look like a twenty-year-old pixie. I collected reports from an agent on the Lazy F and passed them on to Master Robert Desjarlais in Montreal. Now it looks like he has betrayed us by working with another group as well.

 

Look ma, I ended up a Paga Slut after all, with a queen’s name.

 

Not going to lie, I don’t love being a slave, but getting used by a strong master has its good points.  The problem is the strong Gorean men have ruined me for the flabbier men of Earth.

 

Ping.  There it is.  A message from Master Robert. “Determined that our agent is working with other forces to destroy the Lazy F.  Likely not related to Gorean Families, but an Earth conspiracy. Pack up your low power broadcaster and receiver and your Long distance focused transmitter-receiver.  Get out of the Three Moon now.  Wear normal earth clothes, but not like a Free Woman of the traditional Families.  Check into the hotel under the name of Bessie Windsor. Await further instructions. Acknowledge.”

 

It is bug out time.  On with a light slip, like a slave tunic.  Over that a peasant skirt and hoodie.  Normal shoes. Odd to be wearing something on my feet other than slave slippers.  What would be odder for me is undergarments, but I am not crazy, I am a slave.  That would cause punishment, besides being weird after all these years. Reading between the lines, the Desjarlais Security Group does not want to caught spying on the Fricks, let alone being involved in an attack on them.  Those Fricks are vindictive.  Also cunning, and tenacious. I wonder if the attack is just an earth group trying to steal some land, or some anti-slavery group, or even the weakened Spider-Kings striking on Earth.  That last one is unlikely. The Spider-Kings don’t have that power these days.

 

I scrubbed off the makeup I wear at the Three Moon. In my hoodie, and peasant skirt, with sensible shoes, no one at the Hotel looked at me twice or connected me to the Paga Slave I was two hours ago. The only thing that worried them was that I was checking in with only a small backpack, but paying in advance with the emergency credit card provided by my Master covered that.  No one suspects a clean cut twenty-year old Pixie.  I have a room on the second floor with a view of the street and enough supplies to last three days. The front desk thinks I am a backpacking tourist with some belly flu.  I was warned not to trespass on the range of the ranchers.  No worries.  I am not going anywhere near the Fricks

From the spy Fred’s Narrative

 I could not reach my relay contact today.  All my messages went unacknowledged. Without the intelligence I tried to provide, the Lazy F routed our forces. My employer, my real employer, will be pissed.  It is not my fault though if other people let me down.  I may need to bug out quickly. If so, I will stop in Town and cut up that pixie bitch at the Three Moon.

Banks of the Bighorn Chapter 25

Slave Viki’s narrative.

 

I am very bored here, hiding in my hotel room in Town, waiting for instructions from my Master.  He is trying to make a plan to get me out of this situation before the Fricks discover he was involved inadvertently in the attack on their ranch. Not that he values me, a slave, so highly, oh no.  He just doesn’t want to get caught.

 

So here I sit, hiding in my hotel room, pretending I am a sick hiker, staying out of sight. What do I think on.  Well first, how there is no decent tea in all of Montana!  The girl who brings me room service brings me a mug of warm water with an ancient teabag beside it on the tray.  That is not tea; it is warm tea flavoured water.

 

Yesterday she came with fresh sheets.  It was a nice idea, but I wasn’t expecting her.  My fault, as a good operative should always be aware of possibilities.  I was only wearing the long T-shirt I had found in the room, and my anklet.  The anklet, no matter how high tech and app-controlled is no real substitute for a collar.

 

Worse than being partially undressed (or overdressed for a slave) was that I had the small communicator out.  The rounded six-inch cylinder one. (Gorean men are not subtle).  She formed the wrong idea.

 

“You must be feeling a little better.”

 

“I was hoping it might help improve how I felt, but it did not.”

 

Then she noticed my anklet.  “Oh that’s nice, did you get it on eBay?

 

“No, a man put that on my ankle.”

 

“I think I have seen something like that before, both on girls passing through bound for the Lazy F, and on some of those hippie witches going to join up with the Wyld Wymen.  Those females are all witches and pagans you know.”

 

I nodded, I wasn’t impressed by what I had heard about these wyld wymen.  I had met real Panthers on Gor, so these wyld wymen sound like pussies compared to them.

 

She returned to admiring my bracelet.  “I wonder where I can get one like that.  It is so pretty.”  I thought she was pretty as well.  I put on my special glasses and took a few pictures as she moved around the room, changing the bed and putting out fresh towels.

 

“What is your name? Maybe I can get one of these for you.”

 

“Patricia”

 

“Well Patricia, I will see what I can do.”  I smiled as she left the room.

 

I know I am going to be blamed for the failure of this mission.  It wasn’t my fault, but I am the slave, so I will be blamed.  If I can put Master in the way of collaring a girl right from under the Frick’s noses in their own backyard, It may put a little credit to my account.

 

Patricia is very comely. She will look good in a collar.

Banks of the Bighorn Chapter 30

Slave Viki’s narrative.

 

My orders finally came today from my Master.  I am to leave Town and take a bus to Billings to meet him.  Patricia, the hotel chambermaid, brought me a FedEx envelope this morning with money and a ticket. At first I thought it was crazy that He would come here, so close to the Fricks when we need to find and silence Fred, the agent, we hired to spy on the Fricks.  The whole operation went sideways when Fred turned into a double agent, using the Gorean communication technology Master gave him to attack the Fricks on behalf of someone else.

 

I could have warned of such a danger, but I was not consulted!  I am just a slave, never mind all my experiences in computers and technology, and my time running ops for the Kurii. So why is Master coming to Billings?  Why to consult with the Fricks!  The Fricks have called in Master and his security group to hunt down Fred! He is the best, but what irony.

 

This tells me that the Fricks have totally beaten off the attack and are secure at the ranch, or else they would never have revealed to the other Families that they had been vulnerable.  Now they can boast of their strength.

 

It would never occur to Master that I would take the ticket and the money and disappear.  He is sure that I am a loyal slave.  (Which I am).  He likely thinks though that the connected slave anklet I have would make it easy to find and control me.  As If.  I could easily hack that piece of technology, advanced though it is.  But I am a slave, even if an unsatisfied one.

 

Patricia wants an anklet like mine.  She thinks it is pretty.  Which it is. I will say this for the Goreans, they design all their objects with beauty in mind.  A beautiful anklet does enhance the beauty of a girl, even me. I will recommend to Master that we mail her one.  Once she locks it on, she is ours.  Subliminal messaging will encourage her to seek us out.  The programming in her sleep will be irresistible.  It will amuse Master to steal a woman out from under the noses of the Fricks.  And why would I betray a girl who was friendly to me into the collar? Well, she is discontented here. The collar will release her from her unwanted freedom. And I need to do something to get back into Master’s good graces. This whole Lazy F operation went bad, and I will be blamed, what with being a slave and all.

 

Maybe we will become Chain Sisters.  I am very lonely.  I know I grew up and still am an introvert. It is very hard for me to summon the energy to be with people for longer than an hour or so.  I grew up a solitary child from an English speaking family in French Montreal.  By choice I was solitary.  Being able to work alone is part of what drew me to coding, and to my fascination with long distance communication.  I couldn’t connect with the other Kajirae due to my introversion any more than I could connect with a Master.

 

It is so hard to be with people.  I have been introspective these last five days, alone in my hotel room in this little town where good tea is unknown.  Cut off by my Master’s order from using my computer or phone I have thought a good deal about why I could not convince any of my Masters to send me for training as a pleasure slave.  Closeness is hard for an introvert when it means closeness all the time. So it is difficult, even though I really want to, to be that slave girl, the one who is able to so easily communicate her needs, and desires.  I mean, I have them, but by the time I summon the energy to rub up against a master, some other more extroverted girl is already there. But when I am chosen, I don’t have the training to truly impress, to make the master want to summon me again. But without impressing, I am stuck without training, a mat girl who is good at comms and operations.  

 

I mean, I thrive working alone in the back rooms, but I would like to be taken out for short periods of time and truly used as well.  I burn with slave fires that I can’t express.

 

What I need is a quiet master, a scholar, who would give me a task and leave me alone to complete it.  I don’t want to be sent out of the house to run the streets, the Kur gods forbid. Just set me a task, give me three bowls of Nutri-girl a day and a good tumble in the furs once or twice a day.  Which, apparently, is too much to ask.

 

But here, talking twice a day with Patricia, I felt a real connection, like we could really be friends.  And since I am collared, at least metaphorically when I am on a mission, we can only be friends if she is collared too. So I dream.

 

We had a nice moment yesterday.  I was sitting by the window around noon, when she brought me fresh sheets. I was looking out as a woman when a free woman came down the street.  Her stride seemed a little less than the stride of a free woman.  A slave girl can tell such things. I pointed her out to Patricia, noting the stylish bandana she wore tied around her neck.

 

Patricia told me her name was Janice, that she worked in Hardware at the General Store, and there was a bit of a scandal around her.

 

“A few days ago she was working in Hardware when a man came in looking for something to tie up his pet. Well Mr Williams who handles that part of Hardware was not in that day until noon.”  Patricia lowered her voice.  “That meant Janice had to go behind the curtain.”

 

“The curtain?”

 

The curtain that hides certain goods from general view, especially from the view of decent women and children. They sell fetish stuff back there.  Well this customer wasn’t looking for a collar for a pet he was looking for a collar for a girl!  One of those kinds of girls.”

 

From the way her voice rose and her speech quickened, I surmised that Patricia had thought about those kinds of girls and that ‘fetish stuff’ more than a good woman ought to.

 

“This man judged the size of the collar for his girl, by the size that fit Janice.  And do you know what he did then?  He chose a collar for his girl, and he took it to the counter.  But then he went back and locked the other collar on Janice.  Before she could object, he had paid for both collars and left the store, with Janice just standing there, a collar from ‘behind the curtain’ on her throat.  She was so embarrassed, and they wouldn’t even let her go home and she had nothing to cover it up with.  So shaming!”

 

Patricia sounded really pleased and excited by Janice’s shame. I wondered what Janice felt as she heard the collar lock click.  No girl forgets the first time she hears that sound.

 

“Why didn’t she take it off? Surely the store had a key?”

 

“They wouldn’t give her the key!  They pointed out that the collar did not belong to her – the strange man had paid for it, so they couldn’t give her the key to a collar she didn’t own. She went to the Farrier’s shop, and then the Feed Mill, even the slaughterhouse, anywhere they might have a torch to cut the collar off, but of course they wouldn’t.”

 

“Because the collar didn’t belong to her.”

 

“Exactly. She even contacted the Frick Restraint people in Pittsburgh, who made the collar.  They said she could have a new key, but she would first have to send them the serial number.  And she couldn’t.”

 

“Why not, couldn’t she get someone to read the number off to her?”

 

“No, the serial number is on the inside of the collar, you can only read it when the collar is off.  Janice is stuck, I don’t know what she will do.  She will have to leave Town in shame to get it removed.”

 

I am sure that Patricia will be a good friend and Chain Sister to me.  I need one, I am so lonely.

 

Tonight I get on the bus and travel to Billings to meet my Master. I must get him to send a properly programmed anklet to Patricia; one she can’t remove any more than Janice can remove her collar.

 Banks of the Bighorn Chapter 31

From Patrick Master’s Narrative (edited)

At the top of the cliff, Smith and I loaded the Subaru and drove off.  Smith had me drive, again to keep his hands free and concentration undivided.  These people are good. I would find no opening as I had found with the mercenary contractors.

 As we passed Town and turned off to the ranch, I briefly wondered if we could take a short detour to the General Store.  Smith said there was no time, and clearly he was not going to trust me in a crowded street. 

 “What do you want from the store?”

 “Just some property I left there.  No matter, it has likely been unlocked or claimed as abandoned property anyway.”

 As we turned onto the road leading to the Lazy F, we passed a Greyhound bus travelling west.

 

Slave Viki’s Narrative

 I kissed Patricia goodbye at the hotel.  We both cried a little.  She had to finish work so she could not see me off. It is funny how you can get to be such good friends with someone in only a few days.  She made me promise to send her an anklet just like mine.  I promised.

 

“Just like yours, Viki, I want it just like yours.”

 

My master will send her one just like mine.  We have lots in stock.

 

I got to the bus early enough to get the seat I wanted - the pair just behind the driver.  People who want to sit up front usually sit on the right-hand side, where they can see the highway ahead.  The problem with that seat for me is if the driver wants to talk.  And they usually want to talk.  Sometimes about surprisingly interesting and weird stuff, which is up my alley, but sometimes about how lonely they are and how the wife doesn’t understand them, or how they are divorced because the wife did understand them.

 

I sat by the window in the seat by the window behind the driver and put my little backpack on the seat next to me to discourage anyone from sitting there.

 

The bus was over half full, when a woman got on late.  She had a bandana around her throat.  This was interesting.  She looked down the length of the bus. It was clear she did not want to sit in one of the empty seats by one of the men.  What women there were on the bus were sitting in pairs.  Women did not usually travel alone in this country.  I moved my backpack off the seat.  She sat down with a sigh.

 

“Thank you.  I’m Janice.”

 

“I’m Viki.”

 

We didn’t speak after that for a couple of hours.  This suited me.  By then it was dark, many of the passengers were dozing.  The dark gave her confidence; that and speaking to a stranger.  As she poured out her tale of woe, of the cruel trick a stranger had played on her, making impossible her life in that town, I pretended to be shocked.  This role of sympathetic listening stranger is a great one for an operative or agent.

 

Boo hoo for her, I thought.  As if she was the first female to be collared, especially within a half day’s trip of the Frick’s Lazy F.  But I was ever so sympathetic.  I told her about my friend, Robert Desjarlais, who was so good with locks, and how he would help her remove the cruel collar from her throat.

 

She was so grateful I thought she would babble forever, but eventually she shut up  and we passed the last hour of the trip in peace.  At the bus station, I signalled to my Master’s man who was meeting the bus to pick us up at a spot outside the view of the cameras.  This was standard anyway.

 

The car took us to the airport, where Master’s plane was hangered.  As we got out of the car, a needle to her neck and she collapsed. On my knees, I explained Janice to my Master. I also mentioned the possibility of taking Patricia.  The idea of taking women out from the noses of the Fricks pleased my master.

 

Robert Desjarlais and his security group may work for the Council of Families, but he doesn’t like the Fricks much. I think Willard Frick took a girl away from him or something. The Security Group works for the Council like Murder Incorporated used to work for the Mob Commission.  Master doesn’t like the comparison but it is accurate.  

 

I was collared.  It was a relief having the security of a place in the world again.  Having the collar taken off and using the anklet instead is the main thing I dislike about missions for Master.  In the collar, I know who I am, but with it off, I am adrift.

 

I watched as Janice was stripped.  Then my master’s collar was placed on her.  He used the unlocking device to remove the old collar. A girl should never be without a collar.  Janice was foolish to run. Where can a girl in a collar run to, on Gor or Earth?  Who she is, is told by the collar.  If she flees one master, another will replace the collar of the old master with his own. Abandoned Property.  I slept that night, secure in my crate.  I was home with my Master.

From Deviant ART

Vicki working in the Gorean Data Center on Earth. She helps the men of Treve find other girls fit to wear the collar of the masters.

Viki tried to escape from the Talon’s Claw.

Viki had been brought to Gor from Earth to work for the Kur in a computer center. Agents of the Priest-Kings raided the centre and all the workers fled. But Viki was tracked and captured by a warrior. He collared her, mastered her, branded her. She was put to use. When the Kur rescued her, they sent her to Earth to work in finding girls for the slave ships. She had been collared and branded, so she was not freed.

From a valued agent to a data slave. The story of Viki

 

Viki working in Acquisitions

Viki had been recruited to work as an agent for the Kurii on Gor, specializing in data technology. The Kurii did not need help with that, but their human agents sure did. After many adventures, including capture and branding and collaring, Viki was returned to Earth.

Now she trolls social media looking for girls who would thrive in a slave collar. Some girls are so foolish about what they post!

Sadly, Viki is so good at her task, that the Masters keep her hard at it, leaving Viki frustrated and unsatisfied in her own needs.

Always a slave scout, never a satisfied slave.

She is shown talking to Jane Bennet, another scout. They have not met. But someday they will, once Jane is branded and in a collar.