Fetish Magician 3: A sleepover - part four



"Good, that's sorted. How soon were you planning to start the show again? There's wild speculation about what you plan to do with Keli, Fiona, Jenny and Milly; if you don't start again soon, you run the risk of disappointing them."

"Ok, give me a few minutes to get Fiona and Keli's illusion into place and then we can restart."

By the time the gang were returning to the sofas, I had brought out two different versions of the same illusion.

As they were settling, I called forward, Keli and Fiona to be victims of the next illusion and Priya and Milly to be helpers. I asked each victim to select one of the pieces of kit to be part of and gave my helpers a similar choice of which one to help with.

"We'll start with Fiona, because Keli's chosen apparatus is quicker to set up and we don't want to leave anyone hanging around too long. Milly take down the neck stock and the ankle stock then Fiona can stand in place. Milly quickly detached the two stocks in question and leaned them against the vertical beams to which the back halves of the stocks were attached. Also attached to these beams were two boards at waist and low thigh level. At the top of the beams was a circle of wood with a curtain track round and a curtain hung from that, bunched up to one side.

Fiona, acting courageous to cover her nerves, stepped onto the base of the apparatus and then turned to face the audience, before stepping back, into a place where her ankles were in the cut-outs in the lower stock and her neck was in the central cut-out in the upper stock. Milly was soon fitting the forward half of the lower stock and fitting padlocks in catches from the row of padlocks lined up on the base, so that Fiona was not going to escape. She was just about to do the same thing with the upper stock, when I told her to wait from Fiona to raise her wrists into the cut-outs beside her neck. Fiona was soon restrained at throat, wrists and ankles, with the restraints held in place with padlocks. I then set Milly to attaching the leather straps that hung on one side of the frame, so that Fiona was pressed against the boards behind her.

Getting Keli fitted to her chosen apparatus was a lot quicker, because the neck restraint was hanging from a chain between the two steel tube uprights and resembled an over-size handcuff. With her neck restrained it was a quick process for Priya to clamp her wrists into the cuffs midway up the uprights and her ankles to the cuffs at the base. The top of this apparatus also had a track for a curtain that hung to the side.

Milly's finishing of the last strap and standing back to admire her handiwork, coincided with Priya's stepping back to allow the audience to appreciate the predicament Keli was in.

"Now that we are set up we have the challenge. Who do you think will escape first?"

Various calls from the audience favoured Keli or Fiona. I turned to Milly to ask for her assessment. "I don't think either of them could get out at all, even if they had the keys, because Fiona's padlocks and Keli's cuffs aren't within reach of their hands." I saw a look of horror flicker across Milly's face. "You have got the keys. Please tell me that you've got the keys."

There was a moment of tension when I put on a worried expression and patted my costume only to discover that saris do not come with pockets. Then my expression cleared. "Angela's got them; they were in my pockets when we swapped." All eyes turned to Angela, who rummaged in her pockets and produced two sets of keys. "That's great we know where the keys are, and you can throw them to us if we need them."

"Milly, Priya, it's time to draw the curtains round the backs of the restraining devices so that we are nearly ready." While that was done, I was telling the trapped girls what to expect. "When I say go, we will close the curtains and you have a minute to make some progress, but if you have a problem just shout 'help' and Milly and Priya will step inside the curtains and open them if it is safe to do so and then we can sort out whatever is wrong."

I produced a box, which when I switched it on show a large display showing the number sixty in green seven segment digits.

"Oh yes and another thing, to make the challenge a little harder, Milly and Priya will be put blindfolds on you."

As each of my helpers took a sleep mask that hung from the side of one of the uprights and placed it over the volunteers heads, I heard Milly mutter to Fiona, "More like so you don't see the magic when it happens, so you can't spill the beans afterwards." I let it slide, because she may have been partially right, but I did not want to clue her in on the surprise that was to come.

"Milly, Priya, it is time to draw the curtains on Fiona and Keli, then I'll start the timer." As they drew the curtains on the trapped volunteers, I pressed the button on the timer and the sixty on the box started to reduce. I reminded my helpers that they were standing by in case there was trouble inside the curtains.

When there was only nine seconds to go, the colour of the remaining digit on the timer changed to red. When the digit three appeared, there were simultaneous squeals from the curtained off areas. Milly was the first to react, she put her head through the gap in the curtain and then pulled the curtain across the front open. Priya followed Milly's lead, without checking inside the curtain first.

"What's wrong?" I asked. It was quite obvious to the viewers what was wrong, but I waited for Fiona or Keli to answer while the audience muttered amongst themselves. Keli answered first, "Something touched my foot." Fiona added a quick, "Mine, too."

What had touched there feet was their outer clothes, which now lay on the base of the apparatus. I had my helpers remove the discarded clothes, leaving the girls in their underwear. I told the volunteers that the edge of the curtain had brushed their feet; some of the audience giggled at my lie, but no-one disputed it so that the restrained volunteers heard.

"You aren't doing particularly well, maybe we should give you another minute." There was more muttering from the audience, some had digested the implications and were for or against the expected outcome. Angela gave me a concerned look, but I smiled my most reassuring smile back and she said nothing; she assumed that I had some way of diverting the obvious outcome of two girls restrained naked in front of their friends. "As a concession, when we get down to ten seconds, I'll send Priya and Milly in to help."

Milly piped up, "I don't see what we can do in ten seconds, even if we had the keys."

I replied, "You'll be surprise what can be achieved in such a short time." She gave me a sceptical look, but did not say more.

"OK, close the curtain and Fiona and Keli can have another minute to make some impression on their restraints. Priya and Milly, stand by to enter the curtains to help out when I say go."

As the curtains closed, I pressed the reset button on the timer. I called out, "Three, two, one, go!" and pressed the start button to initiate the countdown.

As the countdown moved through the forties, I told Angela to standby to throw the keys to me, reminding her that the arms she would be using were stronger than the arms she was used to.

As the twenties, became the teens I gave Priya and Milly their countdown to enter the curtain to help the restrained volunteers. "Alright go in," I paused to allow the eleven to tick over to the ten, then said, "Now!"

Five seconds later there were squeals of alarm, these coincided with Keli's and Fiona's underwear being ejected from the gap in the curtains through which my helpers had entered. I heard another pair of screams of surprise as the timer ticked down to two. Angela was frowning at me assuming the worst, but I could not tell if she was blaming me or my helpers.

The timer ticked to zero and made a buzzing noise, which I quickly shut off. The curtains did not open, which seemed a relief to Angela, but instead two costumed figures stepped out from the gap in the curtains.

One figure was dressed in a white dress with a tight bodice and flowing skirts, she also had on a veil. The other girl that exited the curtained area where Keli had been restrained was dressed in grey men's formalwear; jacket over a fancy shirt, trousers, black shoes and a matching top hat, which immediately fell from her head. The two figures, I realised, were intended to be bride and groom costumes. The groom was Fiona and less obviously, because of the veil, the bride was Keli.

I allowed a short few seconds for the girls on the sofas to make the connections that not only had Keli and Fiona escaped and changed costume, but they had also changed which curtain they should have emerged from.

"But what's happened to Priya and Milly?" The costumed couple took the hint and opened the curtains to show that my helpers were now the people trapped in the restraining devices, but also they were tied up and blindfolded in the opposite device to the one they had entered the curtains of less than twenty seconds before. Priya had the most difficulty with her position, because, being shorter than Fiona, she had to stand on tiptoe to keep from being strangled by the neck stock.

I called for Angela to throw me the keys, which I quickly tossed to the volunteers so that they could release my helpers.

When Milly had been released, which took less time than for Priya, she sidled up to me. "I should have guessed, I suppose."

"Why? It's not like anyone else would have expected it, unless they had seen it often enough, which would make you a magician or a hardcore magic fan. By the way that does not count towards your two illusions."

"I guessed it probably didn't; it seemed a bit tame. Am I next?"

"No. Jenny asked me to do something for her; she said it would help with her acting in the play she's in. After that, it's you."

With Priya released from the stocks and leather straps, I announced it was time to move on and that Jenny had asked me a favour. "I don't really understand why she wants what she wants so, Jenny please come up and explain what you want and why, while I go and get the necessary equipment."

Jenny came up and began talking. "You may know I couldn't get her at the beginning of this, because I was rehearsing for the show at the end of term. It's going to be 'Tales from the Arabian Nights'. I originally auditioned for the part of Sheherazade, but once I had not got that part, which I now realise is mostly narrating not acting, they offered me several other parts; genies, demons, heroines and mermaids, which I think will be much more fun to play. Well, my first part in the play is as the sultan's wife before Sheherazade, becomes his wife. The good thing about that part is that I get to snog with Andrew Pooley," I heard what I interpreted as jealous mutterings at this revelation. "Unfortunately, my character gets executed within five minutes, once Andrew has explained that as sultan, he is so paranoid that a wife of his will lead a coup against him that he marries one a night and executes them in the morning. They want me to scream in the wings like I'm really being executed. My thought was if I really experience an execution and survive, I can give the right kind of scream, so I asked Tom if he could arrange something like that. So enjoy my execution and come to see the play to see if I do the screaming right and cheer me on in all my other roles."

While this explanation was being given, I went behind the curtain to gather the bits I needed and the bits she would need if she wasn't going to get hurt in the process. I laid a thin foam mat on the wooden floor and placed a wooden block a little over two feet high at one end and a small cushion on the other side of the block. I stood there with the scimitar-like sword that the rest of the audience had seen before, plunged through the basket that Priya had been hiding in before Jenny had appeared.

Jenny turned to look at what was set out. She seemed disappointed. "What's this? I thought you'd bring out one of those head-chopper things or a guillotine."

"As you may remember, we used a guillotine on Angela shortly after you arrived; it would be redundant to use it again, besides you will be playing an Arabian princess, so an Arabian style of execution is the kind of thing you need to experience. I gather, in my minimal research on the matter, that usually the prisoner was made to kneel and then the executioner just chopped off their head. I'm at least according you the luxury of a chopping block. And before you ask, the head choppers you may have seen used by magicians are not reproductions of genuine execution devices; they're just a magicians' invention so that they could have a beheading type illusion without the space and transportation requirements of a proper guillotine."

"So what's going to happen?" Jenny was trying to act curious, but her voice did not seem to hold its pitch.

"That's easy. You kneel on the cushion here." I pointed at the cushion with the sword. "Then you rest your neck on the block so that your chin is on the other side; if you like we can get Priya and Milly to hold your shoulders down. I swing this sword down severing your neck, although if you prefer, we might get Angela to do it, she's stronger than me at the moment, but I still feel that I am more likely to make a good clean job of the cutting. With your head chopped from your body it will fall onto the mat, which is there so that you don't injure yourself, or end up with bruises. After that we pick you up and give you your head and prepare to torture Milly."

Jenny seemed disturbed by my frank description of the intended course of the illusion involving her. "Won't that kill me and hurt a lot and will I get my head back."

I was beginning to despair of Jenny; she was mixed up about what being beheaded involved. "Of course it won't kill you. I wouldn't suggest it if there was any risk; I don't want to be a murderer, especially in front of so many witnesses, and you don't want to be a murder victim. And you will definitely get your head back and I'll connect it back in place when you asked me to, it'll have to be before I take you home and before Marie's parent get home, but other than that any time when I'm not otherwise busy." I let her consider that.

"As to pain; have you heard anyone complain of pain, when I cut Angela's head off and my own, or when I divided Andrea and Heather into pieces, or when I squeezed Tiff to that high," I held up my hand with my thumb and forefinger two inches apart, "or when I stretched Arty limb from limb?"

"No, but how come there is no pain?"

"Because we wizards work on not causing pain. If we caused pain we would soon run out of people to perform magic on as assistants or volunteers. So, please, kneel on the cushion and put your neck on the block. Do you want Priya and/or Milly to help you stay in position?"

She did not seem to be listening to my question. She asked, "Will there be blood?" as she positioned herself kneeling on the cushion.

"Have you seen any blood?" I answered, then asked, "Are you ready?" once she leant forward and had spent a little time moving her hair from her neck.

"Yes," she said and took a breath to say something else, but never got round to saying it, because she froze in place when she saw from the corner of her eye the blade coming down towards her neck. As she froze she screamed. The severing of her neck happened so fast that I am not entirely sure whether the scream cut off as the blade went through her spine or her windpipe, but it stopped a split second before the sword bit the block and gravity became the main force controlling where Jenny's head went.

Fortunately the first point of contact between Jenny's head and the mat was her forehead; I had a worrying moment when I thought that her head was not rotating quite fast enough and we would have a nose bleed to deal with. The next bounce was on her left temple, then in the hair above her ear and it soon settled resting on her right side, propped up by her ear and her jaw. She tried to speak, but did not get further than her first syllable, because moving her jaw moved her head, which she found disorienting.

"Hold on and we'll get you sorted out." I beckoned Priya and Milly forward to help Jenny's body to stand. This task seemed to be more difficult than I had anticipated; I suspect that with her head lying sideways, she was trying to make movements to get herself back upright, which would have the opposite effect. Once I told her not to try to help, things progressed more smoothly.

With Jenny's body upright and her arms positioned to make a cradle for her head, I lifted the head from the mat, which caused her body to sway alarmingly as she tried to compensate for the motion of her head. It was a good thing that my helpers were still supporting Jenny's body.

I soon had Jenny's head cradled in her hands, so that subject to getting used to the change in balance point and point of view, she was mostly stable. I still sent Milly to accompany her back to her seat, to forestall any major disasters.

While Milly was escorting Jenny to her seat, I asked Priya if she had any ideas what she would like to do to Milly. I encouraged the rest of the audience to contribute suggestions and reminded Priya, although I did not think she had forgotten, that Milly had put a sword through her neck and another one through her head while she was in the sword basket.

It appeared that the audience were not in forgiving mood, because the mildest suggestions were beheading and putting in a box and running spikes through it and her, and ranged as far as chopping her into lots of small pieces and burning them.