The Slave World (19)

(19): Home run

And so I threw myself back into my work, heart, body and soul. I had a client after all.

I worked all day and all of the night, as the Kinks would say, working from home mostly because I felt safer there. Ridiculous as it might seem I assumed my council run tower block was not the sort of place where Gorean Masters might loiter. Frankly the neighbourhood rats probably gave it a wide berth too.

I worked from my laptop doing the sort of research that is simply long hard work. I’m good at that kind of thing, and given a few pieces of information I know how to compile a substantial dossier on anyone. I even have shady internet contacts who can run down and access things like police files for the right price.

Does that surprise you? It shouldn't. A police database is only as secure as the number of people who have access to it. You only have to have one person who desperately needs cash, to buy access to a person’s file. My anonymous internet contact had links to someone with police database access amongst other things.

But in the end my breakthrough came ironically because I’m useless when it comes to housecleaning. I have books that haven’t been dusted since I bought them seven years ago. Washing up is something I do as and when I need to drink out of a mug.

And that was my big breakthrough on this case. I just needed outside confirmation which came through at four in the morning.

I had been up all night in my bed room lying on the unmade bed wearing just a t-shirt top and knickers. I lay on my belly, ankles raised and crossed in the air as I read the file pages I had downloaded from a cloud folder that would be deleted as soon as I had finished. The file had cost me three hundred pounds but it was worth every penny. I gazed at it as I poured some more vodka into a glass tumbler. A bowl of black sea salt kettle crisps was close at hand along with some dips that had left yellow stains on my less than pristine sheets. I wore a pair of Bluetooth headphones and was listening to late fifties jazz from Apple music as I typed and read what ‘Arcadia23’ had sent me.

Well hello, I said as I gazed at the photographs. There were quite a few photos actually, and each one as interesting as the last. I think you have quite the story to tell, don't you, I said as I transferred the files to a memory stick.

The work felt therapeutic as I immersed myself in the twilight world of flickering computer screens and long hours spent dredging up file records. The picture I had pieced together didn’t so much as provide me with answers as create more questions, but by the end of my marathon all night stint I had the comfortable sense of satisfaction that I was getting somewhere at last. Where that somewhere might lead me was another matter.

It was five in the morning and London was still fast asleep for the most part. Kassa had yet to return from her night shift. She alternated between making cycle deliveries and working in a local Amazon distribution centre warehouse, picking out orders, boxing them and passing them on to be despatched. She worked to a strict quota and often came home drained and exhausted.

I made myself a coffee and gazed out at the sunrise through my living room window. Hello London, I thought to myself. What secrets do you have for me today?

I switched on the TV which as always defaulted to channel 80: BBC News 24. I settled down and watched a studio of guests discussing the rise and rise again of the repressive and so-called 'progressive' back to basics movement in the USA. A feminist professor with a literary degree described how women in Chicago were being told by police officers that they shouldn’t be walking the streets unaccompanied by a man after sunset. There were actual reports of women being picked up by passing patrol cars and driven back home whether they liked it or not. It was scary, but at least it could never happen over here in the UK.

But I had also made a chilling discovery. I don’t know what possessed me to look up the name, but while I was waiting for ‘Arcadia23’ to come back with the information I had paid for, I searched the net for the name ‘Eleanor Brinton’ – the protagonist in Captive of Gor. What I found sent a shiver down my spine, for there had been an Eleanor Brinton living in New York who went missing in 1971. I stared at old newspaper reports from the time stating that her crashed car had been found abandoned in the countryside. It wasn't a major news story – people went missing all the time and in America it’s not even a big news story if you get shot in the street, but in her case she was wealthy and so some effort was made to locate her.

She was never found.

The details I read after some digging seemed to match the fictional account in the Norman book. Of course Norman might simply have remembered the news story and in a meta-textual kind of way used that disappearance as the basis for his novel. I could not just assume that there was any actual Gorean connection to the real life Brinton mystery. It was more likely that Norman had just used the particulars of a routine disappearance. But still, coincidences abound and we make connections through deduction and reason. I brought up some photos of Miss Brinton and saw she was very beautiful. The slavers of Gor would have liked her.

I was digging my own rabbit holes at this point, for it would be crazy to think that this Gor cult went back as far as the early seventies. The books weren’t as well known back then for the simple reason they'd only been published since 1966. Maybe now they might inspire a sinister movement, but surely not back then.

Miss Brinton’s parents were long since dead and she had no known siblings so I was unable to get any first hand accounts relating to her case. The police officer in New York who had investigated the case at the time retired eventually to Florida and died in 2006. All trails would now be cold.

I gazed at the grainy newsprint photo of Miss Brinton’s crashed Maserati.

Just like in the book.

Where are you, Eleanor? I wondered to myself. You’re certainly not on a primitive planet circling the far side of the sun.

What tales you might tell me if we could but speak.

Were you someone’s slave now? You’d be old. You were, what, twenty three at the time of your disappearance? So, in your late seventies now. No longer the golden haired beauty I suppose. Or were you simply killed and your body lies rotting in some quiet pine forest?

Or were you even now the love slave of Rask of Treve, your beauty preserved by the stabilisation serum you received in the book? Do you sometimes stand on the walls of the mountain fortress of Treve, content in your slave collar and stare at the sun with memories of your home world?

Of course not. Gor doesn't exist. It's just a story.

I had made one other discovery which again could just be John Norman inserting people he had known into his books. Although I hadn’t read them, the early books made a point of claiming to be delivered to a man called Harrison Smith who in turn claimed to be a contemporary of Tarl Cabot. Although long since dropped as a running theme by the time of the seventh book (the one I had read) the early novels pretended to be papers written by Tarl and handed to his friend. This Harrison Smith was said to have studied law and moved to Manhattan where he then had a practice. Armed with this information I was able to discover that there was indeed a lawyer by that name practising in the area in the early seventies. Again it didn’t mean anything. Norman might have known the man and decided to write him into the stories as the friend of his fictional protagonist, or maybe Norman had just by coincidence used a name that existed without his knowledge. Smith after all is hardly an uncommon surname.

By digging a bit further I found that Harrison Smith now lived in Boston. Out of curiosity I sent him an email and asked him whether he still heard from Tarl Cabot. It was a cheeky one liner of an e-mail and I didn't expect a reply, but a few hours later I actually received one.

'I used to get asked that a lot,' read the e-mail. 'For the record Tarl Cabot is a real person and he was my friend, but no, it has been many years since I last heard from him. While I cannot vouch for his activities today, his adventures in the early seventies were all too real. I have seen proof to that effect. I wish you well, young Lady, but suggest you do not enquire too deeply on matters relating to Gor.'

This Harrison Smith had a sense of humour it seemed.

I delved into a number of hardline conspiracy websites and found sub forums and ‘deep’ sites that discussed theories that there is a planet Gor. I read multiple accounts from people who swore blind they had run into evidence that slavers from this distant planet walked the Earth and routinely abducted women. Some of the accounts claimed to be from reliable police sources who bore witness to the investigations being hushed up and shut down prematurely. Others claimed to be relatives or friends of women who had gone missing. One actually claimed to be a man who had worked with the Gorean slavers. He gave some vague details and then never posted again. I was about to dismiss all of this as a complete waste of my time, but then in one post dated two months ago I saw a reference to ‘carousel.’ I grew interested and read further.

‘Carousel is at the heart of the operation,’ wrote the cryptic typist, ‘a_sardar_girl.’ ‘Carousel is the source of THEIR power. It is how THEY control the very highest level of people in government, law enforcement and the military. The man who has Carousel can name his price on Earth.’

Hmm.

I could see no way of contacting 'a_sardar_girl'.

I drank my body weight in strong black coffee and fired off a text message to Rebecca. It was time to meet and run through what I had discovered. I would show her what I had found and take it from there.

‘Can we meet when you have a day free? I can come round to your place. I have a dossier for you. We need to discuss it.’

Kassa came in with the usual bumping and smacking of her bicycle against the badly scuffed hallway walls. I heard her propping the bike up and unfastening her cycle helmet as I stirred some bacon and tomatoes in the frying pan. The toast popped as she came in through the hallway door.

“Bacon!” she said with a wide grin as I nodded. “You must feel better, Caitlin if you not eating dry cereal.”

She paid no attention to my ankle ring. I had fucked up a bit a couple of days ago and forgot she was around when I came out of my bedroom. She had seen the ring, commented that it looked pretty, but other than that hadn't been particularly bothered. Consequently I no longer tried to hide it from her. I suppose she assumed it was some kinky body jewellery.

“Yes, things are looking a bit better I guess.” I put some bacon and fried tomatoes between two slices of toast and handed it to Kassa. “Thanks for putting up with me while I was on a downward spiral.”

“Is nothing. You can thank me by reducing rent,” she said as she bit into the toasted breakfast sandwich. “I knew good sex would make you happy.”

“Sex?” I blinked. “What sex?”

“Sex with shitty ex-boyfriend,” she said as she sat down on the sofa. “That is why you happy again?”

“First up, he’s not my ex-boyfriend, and secondly I’ve never had sex with him.”

“Oh. He want to. Trust me. I see.”

“Really? Really?” I moved over to perch on the edge of the sofa. “You think so, Kassa?”

“Oh yes. He so much want you. He practically dribble semen on carpet. You do better though than him.”

“Well, I’m probably not even interested really.”

Kassa raised a sceptical eyebrow as I said that. “So, will you now leave flat from time to time? You always here. Always. I have no privacy when I bring men back for fucking. It like in Poland when live with my mother.”

“I guess.” It was about time I did. I had to get over this phobia that I would be abducted off the street and taken to the House of Three Moons. I needed to reassert myself and stop living in fear. I was restricted after all. Adam had shown me the app. I was level one restricted, which meant no Gorean would touch me. Apparently it was an honour thing. Adam had reassured me on that point. Goreans were very big on honour.

Not that there was any such thing as a genuine Gorean of course. Just men who liked to model themselves and their life on the books.

“If you go out we could do with shopping,” said Kassa forcefully as she finished off the breakfast toastie. “You ate most of food last week. Some of it mine.”

“I’ll restock at the supermarket.” Yeah, I would go out. I wouldn’t live my life in fear. After all I was probably safer than the average woman in London because I was already claimed and owned. Kassa stood more chance of being abducted than I did. She didn’t have a master.

My phone pinged to announce the arrival of a text message. It was from Adam! I hopped onto the sofa properly and read it.

'Just checking up on my kajira,' wrote Adam.

'Your kajira is fine,” I texted back with a smile on my face as Kassa moved around in the kitchen unit.

'Bracelet check,' came the next text with a smiley face attached. I thought about this for a moment and then acting perhaps a bit rashly took a quick photo of my extended ankle with the steel locked around it. Before I could come to my senses I sent the photo.

I regretted doing that almost as soon as I pressed the send button. What would he think? Oh shit. I shouldn't have sent that!

A minute or so ticked by before Adam's reply came back: 'Your ankle ring seems securely locked on you. Good. Didn't think you'd actually go with that, but glad you did.' There was another smiley face attached.

In a fit of insanity I typed back 'perhaps I wanted to be pleasing?' I winced as I saw the text disappear into the ether. No! I shouldn't have sent that one either...

I counted my heartbeats until there was another ping and another reply. “Well, that's music to my ears. Let's take this a step further shall we. Set a regular alarm on your phone for every three hours and when the alarm goes off I want my kajira to text me a picture of herself, wherever she happens to be.'

“Caitlin, can I have one of your yoghurts?” called Kassa from the kitchen.

“Yeah, sure, whatever.” I tapped out another text message: 'maybe I don't want to do that?'

This was actually quite exciting. I pulled my feet up onto the sofa and stroked the metal ankle ring locked on my body. I was enjoying the feeling of flirting with Adam like this. It was more than a little bit thrilling.

There was another ping from my phone and I quickly scanned the message. 'I think you forget you wear my ankle ring. Text photos every three hours or I set the ankle ring to lock you into your bedroom at seven in the evening for the next seven days.'

“Caitlin, do you want to keep the blueberry yoghurt or the strawberry yoghurt?” called Kassa from the kitchen.

“I don't care.” Fuck the yoghurts.

“Because I prefer the blueberry...”

“Honestly don't care, Kassa! Whatever you want help yourself!” I yelled as my fingers typed out another text to Adam that read, 'you wouldn't actually do that...'

His reply pinged back really quickly. It read: 'setting your bedtime limits now, bedtime girl. Unless...'

“Caitlin, I think the strawberry yoghurt is past its sell by date, so...”

“Kassa, not now! Have the fucking yoghurt!” I was feeling rather excited as I quickly typed back: 'okay, pictures of your kajira every three hours!' I nibbled my lower lip as I sent that.

“That a text to shitty ex-boyfriend?” asked Kassa as she returned to the living room with the blueberry yoghurt.

“Um, it’s a text to Adam.”

“So, shitty ex-boyfriend who wear cheap denim. You so want him for sex,” said Kassa as she peeled back the lid of the yoghurt. “You such bad girl.”

“We’re just friends. It’s complicated.”

There was another ping and another text from Adam. 'Good. I look forward to seeing a picture of my beautiful kajira in three hours' time.'

“Is only complicated when you not having enough sex.” said Kassa. “Bring him here and fuck him,” she said as she entered her room and closed the door.

I smiled, thinking of what it might be like to lure Adam into my bedroom. But then a stray thought crossed my mind – I didn’t want to do the luring. I wanted him to take control. No, banish that thought. That’s not me!

Why the fuck was I thinking these things?!