Ann looked down at her address book
again to make sure she got the number right. She adjusted her glasses and
searched for a nameplate somewhere on the brownstone front she was standing in front of. There was nothing, no name or number anywhere in sight to indicate this was the right place, but it had to be judging from the other buildings surrounding it. That is, unless she took a very wrong turn on
her drive over from the university. Well, only way to find out, I suppose, she
thought, and rang the doorbell.
The door opened a few moments
later.
"Ah, Dr. Grant. I'm glad you
could make it. Do please come in."
Ann greeted her host and looked around
the foyer she had entered. It was elegant and richly furnished, almost Victorian in its decorative excess . . . just like its owner. Dr. Carnelian was dressed in a smoking jacket and matching slacks, the velvet red contrasting sharply with his pale complexion. He'd be a handsomer man, she
thought, if he'd only step out into the sun every once and awhile.
"I'm glad to be here, doctor.
I'm really anxious to see it. I want to thank you again for your
invitation."
"Think nothing of it. You're
doing me a favor in examining it. I'm sure the cabinet is authentic, but I would of course welcome a professional observation. It's this way."
He led her through the house as they
spoke. The hallway was painted a pale yellow and lined with small urns and
paintings along the walls. They showed landscape scenes mostly, though one or two were of beautiful women in poses of artistic splendor.
"These are some beautiful works,
sir. How long have you had them?"
Carnelian paused in the doorway to his
study. "Oh, I've had them a long time. I've always enjoyed art. It's
so much better than real life."
The study was walled with books and
rolled manuscripts, bric-a-brac on shelves and on the fireplace mantle. The
walls were wood paneled and the chairs soft and plush. A mahogany table with ornately carved legs stood off to one side. To Ann the room seemed cluttered, over-crowded with heavy furniture and ugly-looking ornaments. It was like stepping into the 19th Century for a moment, and again Ann was
forcibly reminded of the excesses of the Victorian age.
She caught her breath, then looked
back at Carnelian as he entered. "Then you don't like nature, doctor? That's surprising considering all that landscape art."
He smiled. "Nature to me has
always looked better at a distance. Art perseveres, but nature has tendency to rot. Besides, I prefer climate control. Would you care for a
drink?"
She looked around at some of the
titles on the bookshelves. "No thanks. I want to have a level head for the
cabinet. Do you really think it's T'ang?"
"I'll leave that to you to
judge." He pulled on a rope cord in a corner of the room, and a moment later a uniformed butler stepped in. "I'll take a sherry, George. Well be in the Asia Room."
The butler nodded his head and stepped
back into the hall. Carnelian walked over to a door on the other side of the study and opened it.
"After you, Dr. Grant. You won't
be disappointed."
She stepped through and saw
it.
It was magnificent.
The cabinet was large and had
basically the same dimensions as a moderntelephone booth, but it was black and solid too, decorated with ornate golden scrollwork. It stood in the middle of a room heavily furnished with ornate tapestries, smaller lacquer-work cabinets, and a small army of carved jade ornaments, all Chinese or
Chinese-influenced in origin. But Ann's mind wasn't on any of these. Only the one cabinet had her attention. She walked over and put her hand just over it, not quite daring to touch the ancient lacquer. She slowly circled it, her eyes moving across its complex surface, its patterns of Chinese ideograms, symbols, and pictures. While she was doing so Carnelian stood by the
still open study door and watched his guest. Yes, he thought, she's just that short of perfect already. She's an excellent choice. Dark hair, not too long. Lovely figure, a nice bosom and firm behind, beautiful stockinged legs. The doctor was wearing a blue, semi-tight skirt and white blouse, well-suited to her slim figure. Her face was made-up but not overdone - she was after all an assistant university professor, not a whore - just a light blush over naturally clear cheeks, her petite mouth just barely touched by cosmetics. She appeared younger than her thirty-five years and could easily be mistaken for a student still. Even her glasses looked good on her.
Yes, she'll make an excellent
subject.
Ann didn't notice the butler George
come into the room and hand Dr. Carnelian his drink. She didn't notice how almost mechanical his movements were, how stiff-armed and stiff-legged he was, how robot-like. She didn't notice how he didn't speak to his
master but only responded to a brief gesture from him, ordered to stand and wait by one tapestry, standing there silently, motionlessly. There was no expression on his pale features, paler even than Dr. Carnelian's were. His eyes stared ahead blankly, not even a whisper moving his broad, uniformed chest. He was literally as still as a sculpture, waiting to be commanded. Ann didn't notice any of this. She was completely absorbed in her study of the cabinet. She didn't hear Carnelian approach.
"Is it authentic, do you think?"
Ann didn't look up. "It's
definitely T'ang-influenced, and it's remarkably well-preserved for its age if it is T'ang Dynasty. It's at least a thousand years old, of that much I'm sure."
Then she stopped and looked at her
host, he smiling bemusedly. "Where did you find this? It's museum quality work but I've never heard of anything even remotely like it being
uncovered."
"I obtained it from a private
collection. The previous owner was unaware of its value or antiquity, and he was unaware of how it could be used."
"Used?"
"Well, it is a cabinet, after all,
doctor, and you do put things in cabinets." He leaned slightly against it
with his shoulder, his hand trailing over some of the scrollwork. "Do you think you can open it?"
"Oh, please don't do that." He
moved off. She examined where Carnelian had touched it for damage. "It's fragile. Have you managed to open it?"
"Yes, I have. This cabinet is
the prototypical Chinese puzzle-box . . . . I'll make you a deal, doctor. If you can find the right combination to open it, I'll let you take it back to the university for study. But I warn you, it won't be easy. It took even me a long time to figure it out."
"Are you serious?"
Carnelian looked her straight in the
eye. He told her solemnly, "I'm never completely serious, doctor, but I always keep my promises. The cabinet is yours, if you can open it correctly."
Ann looked back at the Chinese
marvel. "What do you mean correctly?" she asked.
"You'll see." Carnelian stepped
back to let her work.
Ann didnt like Carnelian very
much. He was a prominent physician, an extremely urbane and sophisticated man, but his manners struck her as being decadent . . . almost effeminate, really. There was something unwholesome about him, something morally corrupting, and then there was the mystery. She was as intrigued by a mystery man as much as the next woman, but Carnelian . . . his clients were
supposed to be in the elite of society, but even though he was always invited to the best parties and social gatherings, no one would ever admit to being one of his patients. There was a sinister aspect to him, and while some girls might find that arousing, Ann surely didn't.
She couldn't even tell how old he was
by looking at him. His face was completely unlined, and his eyes . . . he could have been anywhere from his early twenties to his late fifties. Ann just couldn't tell.
She turned away from him and began
again her minute examination of the cabinet. The blackness of it was like
midnight pearl. The gold scrollwork covered every inch of it, twisting in a hundred different designs. The ideograms were ancient Chinese, but she could only translate a handful of them. The more she looked at it the more she was convinced of its authenticity, but at the same time she grew less and less certain of it being from the T'ang Dynasty. She wondered how old the cabinet really was. When she'd heard of the cabinet in the first place,
heard from a friend in the department that a Dr. Carnelian had an ancient T'ang-era artifact in mint condition and wanted it appraised, and after she had met Dr. Carnelian at a society get-together sponsored by her department friend,
she knew she had to have it. And she was glad to be here, for if she could get the cabinet back to the university where she could study it in the close, close detail it deserved, well, that could make her career. She lightly traced her fingers over the long edges and golden patterns, looking for a seam or a hidden button.
She glanced over at Carnelian, who was
watching her in an almost predatory way. "How did you manage to open
it?" she asked.
"With great skill, ma'am," he
replied.
Ann snorted derisively and went back
to work. There had to be a hidden catch somewhere in the frame. There was probably more than one, actually, if Dr. Carnelian wasn't lying and there was
more than one way to open the box, a right way and a wrong way.
She worked on it for more than an
hour, her small hands almost lovingly caressing the ancient box as she searched for a clue to its entry. But the cabinet remained as solid to her as a brick. All the while Carnelian stood by watching her watch the box, with the butler George also in attendance, never moving, perhaps not
even breathing.
And then, just as Ann had three of her
fingers on one intricate pattern and was pressing in with her other hand on the
figure of a bowing woman, she heard a soft click emerge from inside the box.
"Oh!" she cried.
She looked down at her left index
finger. There was a small drop of blood on it. A small needle had punctured her.
Ann started to say something to Dr.
Carnelian . . . and then she stopped. Or, rather, her train of thought stopped.
She kept on looking at the single drop of blood on her finger, a look less of pain than of just surprise on her face.
She had to keep looking at her
finger. Ann couldn't move. She couldn't budge an inch. I'm paralyzed, she thought. Help me, I've been poisoned. Help me!
None of her racing thoughts showed on
Ann's face. Her eyes continued to stare forward down at her hand, her mouth
slightly open in a darling little moue of surprise.
Dr. Carnelian walked up to her and
beckoned to George, who followed with precise robot-like grace. He put one hand on Ann's outstretched palm and another under her chin and slowly straightened her out. She moved easily, with someone guiding her, that was. Ann still couldnt move on her own, and she continued to stare forward with a thousand-yard gaze. Help me, she screamed mentally. Help me!
Carnelian smiled at her and made sure
he was within her line of sight. "I'm sorry, Dr. Grant. You found one of
the wrong ways to open the cabinet. Don't let it disturb you too much, though. You found that needle after only about one hour. I'm sure it would have taken a lesser expert or a layman hours more to do the
same."
He turned to George. "You may
begin removing her clothing," he instructed.
Remove my clothing! Ann
struggled to break out of her frozen state, but her body refused to cooperate. She still had her normal sensations. She could feel everything, was not numb at all; she just couldn't move. Carnelian's butler began unbuttoning her blouse first, undoing each button one at a time. There was no expression on his face at all. He might as well have been wearing a mask for all the apparent humanity in his features. It was only now forced to look at the butler so closely that Ann began to see how very robot-like he was. He undid her skirt, the blouse up a bit, and then raised Ann's arms and slid the garment off.
George began with her skirt next, soon
leaving Ann clad only in her bra and pantyhose, her shoes still on her feet, her
glasses still over her eyes. Meanwhile, off to one side where she couldnt see him, Carnelian continued speaking.
"I learned a long time ago, doctor . .
. or may I call you Ann? Yes, I think that's more appropriate to your station now. I learned a long time ago, Ann, that to indulge one's fantasies is the highest and most rewarding form of art there is. I am living testimony to the value such indulgence can bring."
The butler began undoing Ann's
bra. Her breasts were small but lovely, the nipples perky, a symptom of how physically aroused Ann was becoming even in spite of her fear. They've turned me into a mannequin, she thought. His hands are touching me all over and there's nothing I can do to stop him. Uncontrollably, she began feeling a little damp in her innermost sex. The butler removed the bra and then her
glasses.
"I read about the Hei-pi Cabinet some
years ago," Carnelian went on. "It fell within the purview of my interests . . . dolls, statuary, art. And the occult." He moved a little bit closer to Ann, but she still couldn't get her eyes to move in his direction. George began carefully removing her shoes.
"Early on the Chinese developed a most admirable fascination with automata. The court machinists designed artificial birds that could actually sing and hop from branch to branch in their little artificial trees. They designed robot humans that could serve meals or perform intricate dances, play musical instruments, even carry on complex conversations with their masters. They came up with all sorts of wonders. And, naturally, not to be outdone, the Emperors' magicians began building their own clockwork pieces. The best of their work were so very much alive one would begin to wonder whether they were alive. Centuries of work culminated in the Hei-pi Cabinet."
George had by this time begun rolling
Ann's hose and panties down her legs. She was wet, she to admit to herself. At some level in her mind she was being definitely stimulated by the feel of the butler's hands on her immobile form, her nude body open to Dr. Carnelian's inspection.
"The Emperor Lao Tsung had a
collection of the loveliest and most happily obedient concubines ever assembled in China prior to his reign. The advantage he held over his previous monarchs was his ownership of this cabinet, built for him by an obscure alchemist-craftsman whose name history has failed to record."
Ann had been made completely naked by
then. George had neatly folded her clothes and placed them next to her, with her glasses and shoes resting on top. George had also unfolded her arms and arranged them at her sides, straightening her legs too and facing her head forward. He did this all in complete and utter silence, his
movements so much like the automata Carnelian had just described that Ann began to harbor a dreadful suspicion.
What is he going to do to me, she
thought desperately. She stood as if at military attention, helpless yet strangely enraptured with her trapped state. Carnelian stood in front on her again, nodding with approval with what he saw.
He turned to his butler. "I
believe it's time, George. Put her in the cabinet." As the robot-like servant moved to obey, Carnelian smiled back at Ann. It was a warm, pleasant smile, not at all sinister or threatening . . . and that terrified Ann all the more. "You, my dear Ann," he said, stressing the word 'my,' "are about to receive the benefits provided by the Hei-pi. You will remain
young and beautiful forever, and you will make me the perfect maid.
Congratulations."
No, no, she screamed inside, helpless
to prevent the butler from putting his hands on her bottom and thighs and lifting
her up. He turned around slightly, and Ann could see the cabinet again, Carnelian standing by it. The side he was by was open, two narrow and expertly crafted doors folded back on their hidden hinges. He must have opened it when I couldn't see him before, she realized. She could see that the edges of the doors were jagged, shaped like giant jigsaw pieces that would close seamlessly with one another, their openings hidden in the golden scrollwork. The interior of the cabinet was featureless save for only a
few small round holes lining the bottom of the walls. Ann really couldn't see too much, though, because she still couldnt move her eyes from that mannequin-like gaze. The butler George carefully tilted Ann's legs in first, then straightened her out vertically inside. He positioned her so that she could see forward out of the open doors.
The butler moved away then, prompted
by another gesture from his master. Carnelian stood in front of Ann, one folded
door in each hand. "Don't be scared or worried, Ann. All your fears
and worries are about to go away forever. Your new life will be a simpler
one, I promise you. And I always keep my promises." The last thing Ann saw of the outside world was Carnelian's good-humored face. Then the two doors closed and everything went pitch black.
Oh my God, ohmigod, ohmigod, she cried
silently in the dark.
Carnelian stood there for a moment
still, then walked over and behind the cabinet, reaching around its sides to lightly touch two different and easily unnoticed ideograms. One was an ancient symbol meaning 'white,' the other an equally obscure character for 'soul.' He depressed both keys at once and was rewarded with a brief
yet clearly audible click. He then stood back, asked George to remove Ann's
clothes, and then went off to make a few phone calls. The "changing" process would take some time, and meanwhile he could take care of the last transactions of this evening's business. First Dr. Grant's car, then her friend at the department was to be rewarded, then . . . well, it wouldn't take
much for a man with his resources to make a beautiful young woman disappear without a trace.
It wasn't as if he hadn't done it
before.
Inside the box, Ann waited in
silence. She had heard the click, some mechanism inside the ancient cabinet being activated, but what was going to . . . . Her thoughts trailed out. Ann began to realize she could see the box's interior again, that a soft glow, a bluish light, was beginning to build. The interior walls were shining and getting brighter, and within moments Ann kind of felt like she was trapped in a strange sort of tanning booth. The light didn't hurt her eyes any, but soon her briefly granted vision was gone, the glow blurring everything away. She was unaware, at least at first, of how the rays of light were affecting her body. Had she been able to see, she might have liked what she saw. All of the slight imperfections in her skin were fading away, all of the freckles, moles, and birthmarks. They slowly disappeared without a
trace, her skin left totally blemishless and perfect in their absence. Even the scar left over from her appendix operation a few years ago disappeared.
What's happening? she thought.
What now?
A tingling sensation had started
in her skin, like a lover's caress that managed to touch everywhere at once. It started at the bottom of her feet, then she felt it in her face and breasts, then it was everywhere, steadily getting stronger. The sensation was not unpleasant, Ann reflected. It was, in fact, quite pleasing. That feels so good, she thought. I can't believe how horny it's making me. It feels soooo good. But I can't, I can't let him win . . . it's doing something to me, and I want it, no, no . . . I have to fight it. It's wrong . . . I'm nobody's maid . . . but it feels so good. The stimulation steadily worked its way into her body, into her mind. It began to focus on her sex, the pressure and the power being forced there more than she could stand. The power touched her almost physically in her clitoris,
penetrating deeply into her vagina. The first orgasm shook every fiber of Ann's being, rocking her to her very soul.
And then it came again . . . and she
came again, only this time the orgasm was so great it made even the first one seem small.
I can't believe it, I can't believe
it!
It feels so good!
Waves of excruciating pleasure began
to course through Ann's body. They began taking their time with her, stretching out longer and longer, leaving her all the more helpless than she originally was. Her body remained absolutely motionless, her eyes remained blank and staring, and not even a quiver emerged to give hint of the struggle going on within her. The wave would build, crest, then tease, holding on without giving Ann the satisfaction she increasingly needed and craved.
I can't. I can't. I have
to fight this. If I give in . . . oh god, that's good . . . no! If I give in, if I give in . . . I am Ann Grant, assistant professor of Asian Studies at . . . at . . . oh my, oh my, it's coming, I can't take it, I have to take . . . yes, no, yes, yes, yesssss. Ohhhh! Ohhhhhhh! The power crested and broke, and Ann broke with it. And then it started again, and again, each wave lasting longer and longer, the resulting ecstasy greater and
greater.
Ann's surrender was complete and
absolute.
As Ann's mind began to melt under the
constant ecstatic barrage, her body began to change. Lines of force lanced
out from the cabinet's interior walls, from the floor and ceiling, the beams passing through her motionless, nude form and dividing her in an intricate gridwork. Her unmarked skin began to shine with its own inner light. She glowed blue, and the very texture of her skin slowly altered. It softened, yet at the same time hardened into a plastic-like surface. Doll-like she became, soft in all the right places, hard as stone everywhere else. Ann's eyes and open mouth shone out with their own radiance; it was as if the inside of her was on fire, with her luminescently blue skin forming only a thin shell over a raging inferno inside. Her hair, both on her head and at her sex, grew deeper in color, blackening till it reached the same exact shade as the black lacquer surface on the cabinet's exterior. Everywhere else, especially along her arms, the hair burned and faded away. She was left smooth and very, very artificial.
Outside, the cabinet stood perfectly
still. Not one sound could be heard from within. It looked the same as when Ann first saw it.
Carnelian came back into the room
after about two hours. Everything had been arranged. He consulted a silver pocket watch and estimated it was about time. He walked over to the cabinet and waited for a moment.
There was a loud click from inside.
He reached out with both hands past a
corner on the cabinet's front left side, depressing three different hidden catches simultaneously. Pressing any one of these alone, or pressing them in any other combination, a needle trap would be activated. The same was true of the hundred or so other hidden catches in the box's surface.
There were a hundred different ways to end one's existence as a mobile human being in the Hei-pi, but only one way to open it safely.
The two hinged doors in front softly
clicked open.
Carnelian slowly reached out in a high
overhand gesture, and a soft, graceful arm from inside the box greeted his palm. "Come out, dear, and let us have a look at you."
Ann stepped out of the Hei-pi
Cabinet. There was no expression in her face, no sign of self-awareness at all. She retained the same mannequin-like gaze she had from before while she was immobile, but her eyes tracked, and they followed Carnelian as he led her out and into the room. She didn't blink. She moved not jerkily, but not entirely smoothly either; her arms and her legs were stiff in their gestures, mechanical in their precision.
"Stand here and do not move," her new
master commanded. She obeyed, not breathing, her eyes again frozen ahead of
her. Ann stopped in mid-stride with her right arm still held out and her left arm swinging back, her legs slightly parted. Carnelian released her hand and slowly circled his new maid. Her hair was darker, and her skin was alabaster, almost marble-white in its perfection and smoothness.