From
William Shakespeare’s Hamlet to
Richard Manton’s “Captive,” few themes provide such deep satisfaction as the
tale of well-deserved vengeance. One can witness the popularity of this theme,
by trolling the murkier depths of the Internet, where stories of some richly
deserving, (and usually overbearing) character receives his or her just deserts
in a case of sexual revenge; stories found with startling frequency among the
fantasies of healthy men and women of all persuasions.
Here we
find stories of lovers and strangers, inexorably compelled to perform sexual
acts by means that are sometimes covert, often nefarious, but always highly
effective. In the course of this literature one encounters various methods of
inducing compliance -- ranging from the time-honored techniques of hypnosis, to
the modern joys of biochemistry. It is in this tradition that The Pleasure Machine is offered
Don Julian
Winslow
Copenhagen
An Interlude
You’re
totally wrong, Honey. You’ll consent... without any violence.
Quite the
contrary! You’ll beg me to fuck you.
I just
have to turn on this machine and you’ll be groveling at my feet,
wetting
your panties.
-- Faust
to Claudia, in Milo Manara’s Click 2
His eyes
never left the willowy figure of the solitary blonde at the end of the bar. She
sat bent over an open notebook in which she occasionally scribbled. A cup of
Latte, sitting by her side, waited to cool. He was watching her closely. She
had a sort of preppy look: just another young college girl, in her navy blue
blazer and powder blue cotton blouse, worn with a pair of faded, but
nicely-fitted jeans. His eyes took in her soft hair, caramel-colored and streaked
with white gold. As she bent over her book, it fell forward in an enveloping
cowl, gently curved ends lightly teasing her collar.
He waited,
till he saw her move decisively, finishing off her coffee, and gathering up her
things. Then he tensed, straightening up very slightly. Looking at Gavin, he
gave an almost imperceptible nod. He got up and dropped some money on the
table, just as she slid off the high stool, slung a backpack over one shoulder,
and headed for the door. And he was in position, just two paces behind her by
the time she had made her way to the street. Gavin was already outside, ambling
along on the far right. He quickened his own pace, so that the girl would be
between the two of them for the few crucial seconds they would have to have.
The
unsuspecting girl’s escort fell into place, flanking her, staying just a step
behind. They waited till no one else was close by to close in. He never saw
Gavin slip the stun gun out of his pocket, but he saw the quick move that
brought it to the back of her neck, heard the muffled zap, and smelt the
pungent flare of ozone. It happened so quickly she could do no more than make a
tiny “uumph” as she arched up, and then her body went
limp, just as his hand shot out to come around her shoulders and grip her hard,
so that when she collapsed, it was into his arms. Her head lolled back against
his chest as he scooped her up and held her, half-dragging the unconscious girl
towards the parked car. Anyone who bothered to notice might have thought the
girl was suddenly ill, or perhaps had started drinking a little too early on
that warm spring afternoon.
My name’s
Block, John Block. And I’m a P.I. - Private Investigator, that is, officially
licensed by the great state of New York. But I don’t often tell people that. If I’m at a party or something, I just say I’m in
‘information processing’. As I see it, my business is processing information...
on people. We get it from some; give it to others, the ones who pay. I’m just a
middleman.
When I first opened the agency, we took whatever we could get, but as
time went by we began to specialize. You have to in this business. You see, it’s
important to build your reputation. In the PI business, reputation is
everything. And from early on, the reputation I got was for handling, very
discretely, those troubling, sometimes nasty things which our high-class
clients like to call “intimate matters.” Our agency soon began to specialize in
confidential surveillance work -- spying, usually on bored wives with too much
time on their hands; or on womanizing husbands who couldn’t keep it in their
pants; and once in while sending back reports on some playful girlfriend who
liked to kick up her heels and get a little action on the side, maybe when
boyfriend is out of town. I’m sure that’s why Descartes wanted to hire me,
because of our reputation, although the job he wanted done had a decidedly
different spin to it. In fact, it was the strangest job I’d ever had, and that’s
saying a lot.
Of course I had seen my share of pretty weird clients in my time. With
offices on the upper East Side, I attracted a decidedly wealthy clientele; and
not all of them were too well wrapped. I was used to dealing with eccentrics. Rich
folks have their little peculiarities, maybe not more than most of us, but the
difference is that they can indulge theirs. Even so, the job Descartes offered
me absolutely took the cake.
The most important thing Descartes wanted, was someone
who could keep his mouth shut. He made that perfectly plain to me the first
time we met. It was in a nondescript dive he had somehow picked out. Not the
kind of place where you’d expect to run into a man like Dr. Adrian Descartes. In
fact, it always puzzled me -- why he should want to meet with the hired help at
all, considering he had an army of flunkies to handle such unpleasant tasks. I
figured it was because he liked to know the man he was dealing with. Some men
are like that; they need to know who they’re dealing with, to look them in the
eye. It’s something you can’t do over a telephone.
We met just across the bridge near Fort Lee, along a
strip of highway that was typical Jersey -- anonymous clutter. Tucked between a
gas station and an outlet selling discount shoes was a little shack with its
blue neon “BAR” flickering behind the dirty plate glass window. Descartes’
instructions were, like the man, quite detailed. I liked that. I was to go into
the bar at 11:00 and take a booth in the back, and order a beer. When I asked
how I’d know him, he said not to worry -- he’d know me.
And so it was that I met the crazy Doctor for the first
time, although I didn’t know he was crazy then. In fact, he seemed quite sane:
cool, confident, a man in control. He had changed from suit jacket to a blue
windbreaker, probably thinking he wouldn’t seem too conspicuous in this
workingman’s bar. It didn’t work. He still stood out, looking decidedly out of
place with his classy style, those neatly creased, expensive suit trousers he
wore; the half-open jacket revealing a fine white shirt and hopelessly
regimental tie; the tight knot neatly in place.
The man who sat across the table from me was tall, narrow
shouldered, with a high forehead and thinning but perfectly combed, gray hair. He
was soft spoken, and his face was not unfriendly, but there was a tightness
around his watery blue eyes that gave him one of those no-nonsense, don’t-fuck-with-me
looks. I knew that look, having seen it once or twice before on other faces:
rich and powerful men -- men who were used to getting
their own way, and were coldly ruthless to anyone who stood in their way. That
look told me this was a man to be listened to; a man to be taken very, very
seriously.
Like most influential men, Descartes was used to giving
orders, and to seeing them carried out by an army of yes-men. But now he wanted
to talk about a different matter, something more personal, and he meant to deal
with me directly, although he seemed to find it all... slightly distasteful. I
was used to that. After all, I was only the hired help, but he needed me, and
so he tried a smile and complimented me by assuring me that I had been
recommended most highly by several of his acquaintances. He had been assured
that our firm was thoroughly discrete; that I was a man to be trusted, even in
the most “delicate” situations. It made me sound like a boy scout. I didn’t say
anything. I just nodded, while he went on to tell me that those were very
qualities he needed for the job he had in mind, a job that would involve my
exclusive services. I must personally handle the matter, and for that he was
quite prepared to meet my price.
Now I had
done a little homework and I knew something about this guy. The man is fabulously wealthy; once the head of
one of the biggest pharmaceutical firms in the world. You’d know its name, in
fact, you probably have a bottle with that name on it in your medicine chest
right now. Having more money than any human being could possibly spend, he
packed it all in one day, and went off to retire.
What I didn’t know then, but only later found out, as all the pieces of
the puzzle starting falling into place, was that upon retirement he opened his
own private “clinic” tucked away in the hills of upstate New York. It was a
place where they treated the rich and famous for all the usual addictions, and
quite a few unusual ones as well. Its main attraction was that it was far from
the prying eyes of snoopy tabloid reporters. That clinic was a well-kept secret
-- one that only his exclusive clientele knew about, and then only by word of
mouth. But what even they didn’t know about was the labs he had up there, labs
that kept right on working on several pet projects of his, developing what he
once told me were “biomedical devices”. At first, I wasn’t sure what he meant. But
I soon found out.
Now he
explains that he’s taken a personal interest in one of the research project his
lab is working on. I wait; my face expressionless, interested, politely
noncommittal. My professional face, I call it. I’ve had a lot of practice at
this.
For the
project, they need certain information collected on a group of subjects, women,
all women as a matter of fact, who have been singled out for study. (He never
said why it was only chicks they were interested in; I never asked.) But by now
he has my full attention! He lowers his voice and leans across the table, as if
he’s afraid he’ll be overheard, although the only two hangers-on are at the bar
out front, and they aren’t hearing anything by that time.
This is
one very careful guy. From time to time they will want to have a certain chick
followed, her every movement recorded, he tells me. I nod in understanding. This
something I know a little about. So far, it all sounds very routine; your
typical surveillance job. You know the sort of thing: follow the broad, watch
her closely, take notes, report on where she goes, who she sees, etc. He
understood that that was the sort of thing I did, he asks, suddenly all
innocent-like. This guy is not a very
good actor. I just nod.
At this
point, he says that he has to know if I want the job or not. Just like that! Once
I’ve signed on he expects me to be sworn to secrecy, otherwise, he’ll pay me
for my time, and I can be on my way. He waits.
I’m not
real sure about all of this, and I get the definite feeling this bird is not
telling me the whole story, but I decide I can live with that. It wouldn’t be
the first time a client didn’t come across square with me, at least at first. In
the end they always do. They like to confess, like I was a priest or something.
So, I tell
this guy it all depends on the fee. He asks what I want to serve as a retainer,
and without thinking I come out with double my usual fee. He doesn’t bat an
eye, but counters by doubling that figure for my exclusive services! And there’s
the promise of more where that came from, depending on how long this project of
his lasts. Now I am definitely impressed by Doctor Descartes. Here’s a guy who
plays in the big leagues, and he’s just bought himself his own PI. We shake
hands. And he gives me this little smile.
***
Only then
do we get to the real story. And quite a story it is! These chicks, the ones he
wants followed, they’re going to be in an experiment, only the thing is -- they
don’t know it! If they did, well, that would ruin the experiment. Anyway, first
they have to be prepared ahead of time. He tells me I don’t need to worry about
that part, except that there’s a certain procedure they must undergo. It ends
up that what’s involved is a kind of implanting one of those microchips, like
the thing they use to track the family pet. This chip they implant, the “actuator”
he calls it, can then be used to pump up a chick’s sex drive; at this point, I
swear, the guy starts to blush, a red flush coming to his cheeks like he was an
embarrassed schoolgirl. He sort of looks away; avoids my eyes. I wait. It
passes, and he goes on rattling on about nanomic webs
and implant codes, stuff I don’t even try to follow.
But while
he’s talking, I’m getting this nagging feeling. Something just doesn’t add up. How
can you plant a chip in somebody’s head without them knowing about it? He doesn’t
bother to enlighten me, not then, and I don’t ask. But I found out later. In
fact, I learned all about Dr. Descartes, and his little “procedure”. The way it
worked was like this.
The chick
would be taken, quickly and quietly, by certain people who were in the business
of doing just that sort of thing. Descartes hired only the best – real pros. These
people would watch the mark, learn her routine, wait for just the right moment.
It had to be when she was alone, perhaps after she had just left a restaurant
after lunch, or even better, after she had had a few drinks. Then they would
pick her up. Just like that. Right off the street. It happened all the time in
the big city, right under the noses of the herd of commuters, some chick would
be abducted, and no one would ever know… till the family got the ransom note.
The good
Doctor’s prize would still be out cold from being zapped with the stun gun,
limp, and totally out of it, when they bundled her into the back of the waiting
van, and took off to circle the block in the slow traffic of midtown. The jab
of a needle in the butt was all they insurance they needed – the chick’d be in la-la land for the hour for maybe 30 minutes,
all the time they’d need.
The thing
was inserted just behind the ear like a vaccine injection. If the chick ever
noticed it at all, she might wonder where she got the “mosquito bite,” whenever
she fingered the small hard spot she found just behind her left ear.
She would
wake up, dazed and bewildered in some public place, maybe on a park bench, near
to the bar or restaurant where she had first been picked up. She would feel
groggy, confused about how she managed to make it to the bench before she
passed out. Perhaps she would feel that she had overindulged; had a bit too
much to drink on a hot summer’s day. Or maybe it was something she ate,
something that didn’t agree with her. A slight case of food poisoning? She
would pull herself together, glance at her watch, and be mildly surprised to
find that more than an hour had passed. She would jump to her feet, anxious to
get on with her life. There would be things to do, and little time to give to
this strange interlude. In time, the puzzling gap would soon be largely
forgotten. The candidate was now primed and ready.
Descartes,
having recovered from his temporary embarrassment, was warming up to his
subject. It seems that this new device they are testing acts directly on the
brain. It activates certain endorphins that
are released into the woman’s system in what he calls a “specific neural
cascade”. The first sign is a heightened sexual awareness, which when followed
by a full dose produces an unbelievable rush of euphoria, an intense feeling of
pure pleasure “closely akin to those a woman experiences when in the grip of
sexual arousal,” -- I swear, that’s what he said! It hits me like a ton of
bricks: this guy can actually turn a chick on with a flip of a switch!
That’s
wild enough, but here’s the real kicker. Turn her on, and she’s like a bitch in
heat. She’ll get the hots for the first guy she sees; she won’t quit chasing
cock till she gets laid! Besides being left with an insatiable sexual appetite,
there are other effects, effects that work more on her mind. With her defenses
weakened, whatever kinky thoughts, or dirty little perversions she keeps hidden
deep in her mind, will come to the surface once she’s under the influence of
Dr. Descartes little toy. She is left “unusually susceptible to sexual
suggestions,” he said.
These
changes in the female’s psyche can be breathtakingly dramatic, surprising to
those around her, and disconcerting to the woman herself. It’s really quite
extraordinary, he says, in that dry, understated way he has. But not to worry,
this change is only temporary, he hastens to assure me, when he sees the look
of concern in my eyes. It turns out that this thin sliver of film is completely
bio-degradable; after a month or two it’s spent, and it dissolves harmlessly
into the bloodstream, leaving not a trace, physically... or psychologically, he
adds.
He tells
me they’ve tested this thing on rats, and it seems to work just fine. But now
they’re ready to test it on humans. They’re still not sure how it will work on
males, but they’re pretty sure how it will work on females, and that’s where
they’re going to start their testing. They’re anxious to get started, and of
course they need someone who can follow instructions to the letter: tail a
person, activate the chip, which is done from a sort of remote control, and
then observe what happens next, and make a full report. That’s where I come in. Sitting across from the crazy, but perfectly
sober Dr. Descartes, in that deserted Jersey bar, it came to me, and not, I
might add, for the first time -- I am in one very weird business!