Alexis Daimon, A Slave in Space — Erotic BDSM Sci-Fi Novella — Chapter 1 (Serialized)

I still wasn’t quite sure what had happened.

One instant I’d been walking to my car, and then next I’d woken up here.

The problem was, I had no idea what here was. As far as I could tell, I was lying in a near coffin-sized container, padded on all sides. Soft white light shone from an unseen source, but there wasn’t anything to see in the few inches between my body and the top of the enclosure.

I shifted my gaze back and forth as far as possible, but I could not move my head. In fact, I couldn’t move at all. None of my limbs seemed to work despite several vain, desperate attempts to will them into action.

I could see that I was naked. I could feel that, too. A gentle flow of air tickled the surface of my skin causing tiny bumps to prickle and emerge.

So my sensation isn’t gone, that’s a relief.

I blinked—yes, I blinked, that was a good sign—and felt a slight twitch in my left big toe. I tried to wiggle it and thought I felt it shift just a fraction of an inch.

I stopped trying to move, and I let my eyelids flutter shut.

Shouldn’t I be panicking right now? My mind felt muddy and foggy. I was in a box. I couldn’t move.

I could breathe, though. That’s good.

I felt another twitch, this time in my right hand. I focused all my attention there, and to my delight, it did move. I was sure of it this time.

My mind, too, seemed to be getting clearer as a slow feeling of dread crept up through my legs, across my belly, and up to my tightening chest and throat, threatening to suffocate me.

What the fuck?! I thought. Suddenly the panic rushed over me all at once. The adrenaline caused an instant surge of blood flow to my brain, bringing with it a flush of realization and terror.

A humming noise.

Something like cold vapor on my skin.

Some sort of gas filling up the box?

I couldn’t move, but I tried holding my breath. It worked for only a brief moment and then I felt an overwhelming sensation of calm flow over me, covering me like a blanket until everything was black again.

++++

Voices.

Distant voices. Closer now.

Robotic voice. Female voice. Questioning voice.

Images. Blurry and swimming.

Pain.

Dull, throbbing pain in the back of my head.

“Medical assistance will arrive in—" There was a brief pause in the automated female voice, then it continued. “Three minutes. Please relax and do not attempt to move.”

"As if," I said, groaning as I regained some mental clarity. "I must have taken a nasty fall on the sidewalk."

"Alexis Daimon," the voice continued. "Please confirm identity and give verbal confirmation of life."

"Yes," I said, sighing. "I'm Alexis Daimon. And yes, I'm alive." Then, I mumbled under my breath, "Duh."

Medi-bots were fucking creepy, but they were convenient when you needed them. Although most of them weren't equipped with any actual medical equipment, they acted as a sort of triage. They identified victims of accidents and violence, took basic vital signs and recorded identity, then they sent for a real, medical response unit—which were dispatched in order of priority, whatever that meant.

This particular medi-bot one was a standard, original model—a limited artificially intelligent drone that patrolled the area in search of injuries. Good Samaritans were becoming fewer and farther between these days. I wondered how long I might have laid here on the sidewalk before anyone would have called an ambulance for me. But there was always a trade off. I mostly just didn't like the idea of being constantly under the watchful eye of someone—or something, for that matter—twenty-four seven, seven days a week. I got the feeling that injuries and accidents weren't the only things these bots were observing.

I closed my eyes again, and a memory flickered in my mind. A dream? Or—

“You all right, ma’am?”

I cracked one eye just barely wide enough to see a nervous-looking young man standing a few feet away, peering down at me from behind the hovering medi-bot.

“Yes,” I croaked. “I think so. Ambulance will be here soon.”

I hoped they had something strong to give me. The pain in my head was increasing steadily now. It pounded with each beat of my heart. I began to wonder if I was bleeding—I must be—and if I would bleed out before help arrived. But the young man was still standing there and he looked less nervous than before. It couldn’t be too bad, I thought.

“I’m not lying in a huge pool of blood, am I?”

The man’s gaze had wandered out into the street—probably searching for the ambulance, debating whether or not to stay with me until it arrived—but at this he jerked his head back as if half-expecting to see that I was lying in a pool of blood.

His expression relaxed, however, and he shook his head. “Can’t see any blood.”

I relaxed a little, too, and began thinking back to what had happened. It was a good distraction from the pain, and I was sure the medical responders would want to know how this had happened.

The problem I was having wasn’t necessarily in remembering what had happened. No, I was pretty sure I’d simply fallen and knocked myself on the head. The problem was the strange dream I’d had while I’d been unconscious.

It hadn’t felt like a dream.

It had felt very, very real.

But that was impossible.

The medics arrived, and, as it turned out, did have something strong to give me. It sent a warm, fuzzy ball of pleasure into my belly, and I forgot all about the pain in my head.

“Just lie back, ma’am,” a male voice spoke somewhere in the distance. “You’ll feel much better soon.”

And, as I closed my eyes, I believed him.

++++

“Do not be alarmed.”

An emotionless female voice spoke from some unseen source, echoing loudly.

“You are under the legal custody of the United States government and will be taken into processing shortly.”

I blinked in the bright white light. My joints ached as I tried to roll onto my side. I was lying on the floor now, in a room.

“Please comply with safety regulations and do not attempt to leave the room.”

I was naked again—still?—and I immediately looked around to find something to cover myself, but there was nothing. No chairs. No furniture. No windows. Just white. White walls, white floor, white ceiling. In fact, there wasn’t even a door.

What was happening? Was I in the hospital? Was I having another dream?

Now that I was able to sit up, I could feel something—a weight—around my neck. It almost felt like a string of pearls, and although it was flexible and felt like a necklace, I feared it was nothing quite so benign. I swallowed and felt it resting lightly against my throat.

“Do not be alarmed.”

The voice began again and cycled through the entire message.

I scooted back against one of the stark white walls and closed my eyes.

There was no way this was a dream. Not this time.

I’d heard of this sort of thing happening, of course. People disappeared every day and no one batted an eye. But that’s what you get when the growth of technology begins to accelerate exponentially. Weird shit happens.

Faster than light space travel had come quickly after the breakthrough with advanced narrow artificial intelligence. Millions had left Earth to explore and colonize other planets and moons in a rapidly expanding knowable universe.

The rate at which technology had begun to accelerate was far too fast for any central governing body to keep up with. The result was a new kind of Wild West phenomenon. Not so much total anarchy as it was modern digital tribalism.

Along with the exponential technological growth came exponential wealth generation for those who happened to position themselves appropriately or were lucky enough to be at the right place at the right time. This new class of billionaire was different from anything before. It leveled the playing field and now anyone could walk on to the team. In less than twenty four hours, a fourteen year old living in Boise, Idaho could make half a billion on a crypto bet, buy his own space yacht complete with captain and crew, and be sailing through the Milky Way after sticking a middle finger to Mom and Dad.

And of course, this new Wild West, in combination with an entirely new class of billionaire, produced a new surge in illicit wheelings and dealings. All kinds of drugs, both the newly synthesized and the old classics, were circulating in the Deep Market—what was essentially the black market, but on an interplanetary scale—and slave trading was back in full swing.

Interplanetary sex trafficking was one of those well-known but quietly ignored issues. Most people ignored it out of necessity, though, really. It wasn’t like there was anything anyone could do. Local law enforcement had been a complete joke for the last couple of years, and the military police had bigger problems to worry about.

There were all kinds of conspiracies as well about how the US government was involved, even running its own trafficking ring.

I’d seen a documentary recently about how slaves were being rounded up and captured en masse from countries that lacked the infrastructure to protect their citizens. They were sold for sex work and manual labour. You were much less likely to be abducted from a Western country, they’d said, but it did happen. There were clear signs, but no hard evidence yet. College students going missing, wives and husbands leaving for work in the morning and never coming home. Anecdotes. Cold cases.

I lived in a fairly safe city, but I carried around a small bottle of pepper spray. It had made me feel like I was being proactive about my personal safety. Like that had done me any good.

The recording continued to cycle through.

“You are under the legal custody of the United States government and will be taken into processing shortly.”

A small sliver of hope fluttered in my chest. I was under the legal custody of the United States government, the recording had said. Surely the conspiracy theories weren’t true. I hoped that this was all just some big misunderstanding. Perhaps I had fallen ill and was in some kind of recovery or quarantine. That might account for my strange hallucinatory visions and the way I was being treated. That would be preferable to being sold as a slave.

There was still a chance—

A sharp noise like steam escaping a hot kettle came from somewhere across the room and a door appeared seemingly out of nowhere. A tall man wearing an all-white uniform strode in, his eyes expressionless.

I scrambled to my feet and opened my mouth to speak, but before I could say anything the man held up his hand. In it was a tiny metal device with a single button on it.

I studied this for a moment and then felt a sudden shock—and an audible ZAP—as I found myself writhing on the floor in agony. My vision had gone completely dark with little starbursts of light and my muscles contracted and released involuntarily, causing me to twitch and flop on the ground. Fire burned beneath my skin. Tears streamed from my eyes, and I heard an odd strangled noise that I abstractly knew must be my own voice crying out in pain.

And then it was over, and I lay motionless on the floor, my body shaking from the exertion, chest heaving as I tried to catch my breath. The muscles in my arms and legs quivered as they relaxed from their involuntary spasms.

The man was standing over me, his face still a blank mask devoid of any emotion.

“That is what happens when you disobey,” he said quietly. “Nod if you understand.”

I nodded slowly, more tears streaming from my eyes as the reality of the situation finally hit me. I was fucked. I had no way to fight back.

“Will you try to run?” The man asked with barely any inflection at the end of the phrase. It seemed like less of a question than a threat. “Shake your head if the answer is no.”

I shook my head slowly, sobbing now.

“You must stop crying,” the man said flatly. Something in his voice made me choke mid-sob.

I looked up at his cold black eyes and instantly knew his meaning. I would not cry. Not unless I wanted to feel pain again.

“Get up,” the man said.

I wobbled slowly to my feet, clutching the wall for stability. I was again very aware of my nakedness.

“Come.”

The man stepped to the side and motioned for me to go through the door into a bright white corridor where I joined a long line of people who looked much like me. They were all wearing collars like mine and their hands were held behind their backs with thin metal cuffs.

Numbly, I felt my own arms being roughly pulled behind me and my wrists clasped together.

I took my place at the front of the line as we moved, slowly to another room. I listened to the strangled screams of the next, unsuspecting victim, and the next, and the next.

This must be processing, I thought absently.

I allowed myself to zone out, to ignore the screams of the others and the soreness I now felt at my neck. Oddly, I felt no pain in my head.

How can that be? I thought idly.

I didn’t know what was real anymore, but I didn’t especially care, either. Perhaps I was still lying on the sidewalk, my skull cracked open, and this was what death felt like.

I walked along in the line for what seemed like hours, but it could have just as easily been a few minutes. I was having trouble focusing, and I knew I was in a state of shock caused by the severe emotional trauma I was experiencing. I would need to snap out of it soon.

Soon…

The hallway finally opened up into a larger room, with a raised platform in the middle and several people milling about quietly.

“Welcome to The Depot,” a familiar female voice said over the sound system. “Bidding will begin in five minutes and will close after one hour. Please look, but do not touch the merchandise. Thank you.”

Merchandise? This was truly sick. They were selling human beings as merchandise. But to whom? Who were the kinds of people making these purchases? Morbidly, I considered how much a piece of "merchandise" like myself was worth.

I was jolted back into the present when a rough hand wrapped around my arm and towed me up onto the platform. I was led onto a smaller raised platform just large enough for me to stand on. There was a podium with a small flat-screen tablet attached to it in front of me facing outwards.

That must be for bidding, I thought with a detached curiosity. How did it all work?

I still felt slightly dazed, and although I was now fully aware of what was happening to me, I was curious as to why I hadn’t begun panicking more. Could it simply be shock? But no, I felt that I must still be under the influence of some kind of narcotic to dull my senses. It would wear off eventually, and then I would have to face whatever horrors awaited for me with my new “master” after this was all over.

I stared stared straight ahead, trying to ignore the people who now strolled casually amongst the other “merchandise” up on the platform with me. The other captives—I now saw that there were about equal numbers of men and women—stood on their own tiny platform like mine. All were, of course, naked, and all wore the same thin metal collar around their necks.
I shivered as I remembered the shock and the pain that had threatened to sear my flesh from the inside. I did not want to experience that again. It definitely made one think twice about making a scene.

Although I was too embarrassed and terrified to make direct eye contact with any of the auction attendees, my curiosity was too strong for me to forego a covert glance every so often.

I tried to focus on something to distract me from my own awareness of my nakedness and vulnerable state. Straining my ears, I decided to try and listen in on some of the conversations. Information would be important if I had any hope of escaping, and since I currently knew very little, it would be prudent to make an attempt at gathering some.

However, everyone seemed to be speaking in hushed tones, or not even at all. Some people seemed to be congregated in small groups or pairs, but the majority were alone. They were all dressed in white.

How very strange, I thought.

As I looked around, I suddenly became aware of a man using the tablet in front of my platform. Was he placing a bid? I stole a glance at him and he caught my eyes, smiling wickedly. I felt my stomach drop like a stone, and I thought I might vomit.

Yes, my awareness was returning. This was real. I was actually being sold at a slave auction—in space—and in less than an hour I would be someone’s property.

To be continued...

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Thank you so much for reading :) This is the first chapter in a serialized, erotic sci-fi novella. I'll be posting a new chapter once or twice a week until it's finished, and then I will compile it into an ebook and give it away for free download here on Steemit!

Please feel free to leave your thoughts, feedback, constructive criticism, etc., below in the comments.

Much love,
~xx~
Dina