Wealth. Opulence. Power. The Fujioka Enterprises tower radiated all of these things, and it loomed over the cityscape like a quiet, menacing behemoth with a thousand blinking red eyes. The passerby that happened to walk or drive past were of two varieties: The first looked up in awe, reveling in that strange ecstasy of small people cowed by greatness, while the second looked down, thoughts of that untouchable wealth turning their bitter eyes away. Both types of people did not belong. Not at Fujioka Tower.
Long lines of geisha robots sashayed their way up the dimly lit stairs gracefully, flanking the sparse group of silhouettes in the entranceway. Men and women in gleaming suits and ornate dresses chittered like many opulent birds. Some of them, coincidentally enough the delegates from OmniTrace Corporation, were escorted by upwards of five to six geishas. The newer corporate officers regarded their attendants with some measure of discomfort; the most experienced (or perhaps the most accustomed) openly eyed and toyed with the geisha robots as they walked into the tower, faces grinning lecherously into the night.
Geisha X96-N, luckily enough, had been paired with one of the former, a baby-faced accountant with heavily gelled hair and a gleaming forehead to match. He looked decidedly uncomfortable. There was a slim leather briefcase tucked under his arm, locked there and nearly crumpled inwards from the tension in his shoulders. His eyes flicked around nervously, lingering on Geisha X96-N for a few moments before flying elsewhere in a flurry of embarrassment.
X96’s visual sensors did a quick scan. The people climbing this long, elegant staircase were easily some of the most powerful individuals on the planet. The heavyset man a mere ten feet away was Fujioka Doryo, one of the Fujioka patriarch’s many grandsons and the founder of a famous biotech corporation. A few steps above him was Kazuo, the illegitimate son of the Fujioka patriarch, owner of Forge Armaments and easily more fearsome than any mafioso on or off the streets. It was rumored that he had once personally attended to a rival. Not only had the crime mysteriously gone unreported, without any formal investigation- but the rumors whispered that Kazuo had dispatched the man by beheading him in his own home.
The OmniTrace delegates were equally as imposing as their Fujioka clan counterparts- Hera Schafer, for example, was well known across the criminal underworld as “Maestro”, and indirectly controlled all drug trafficking in the area. Then there was Mark Steele, a military consultant and former US Department of Defense official who had more than a few senators in his pocket. Their shoes were quiet on the carpeted stairs, but each footstep they took shook the world.
X96 looked around. There had to be sixty geisha automatons in the escort group alone, all of them identical. Shocking splashes of bone white, with delicate features but dead eyes, dainty figures shuffling alongside these rich and powerful people. There was no way to differentiate between them without getting up close to read the serial number on the back of their necks. For all intents and purposes, X22 was lost to the crowd until after the dinner, when they would have the opportunity to sneak away, regroup, and do what needed to be done.
They were in the lobby now. It was all gold and marble, domineering pillars towering over guests and hosts alike. X96 didn’t so much as give the interior a passing glance. It was a relief, really, that the suit had its own programming to prevent-
The realization that Aveline had been trying to suppress that whole time came crashing down upon her. Suddenly, she was hyper-aware of the warm, tight silosteel encasing her, locking her entire body away from recognition in the graceful body of a geisha robot. Sensation danced over her suppressed skin, of which not an inch was visible. Aveline’s heartbeat quickened- she tried huffing through her nose, but the mask refused to yield there. Instead, she breathed through the thick, rubbery gag filling her mouth holding her teeth and tongue captive, and only heard the silenced hiss of her panting being redirected through vents built across her suit. Her voice- it was captive, trapped deep in this female automaton that Aveline had now become. Geisha X96-N. After a few hours, Aveline had nearly forgotten who she was- the geisha had guided her every movement, reshaping her prowling walk into a delicate stride, her slouch into a prim, straight-backed pose, even spoken for her in an airy, meek voice. Hours ago, she had ceased being Aveline. Hours ago, she had become an observer of her own new body.
But now awareness bit at her unclouded mind. Aveline struggled to reel her thoughts back in, vaguely catching the outline of the elevator doors she was passing through- she needed to note the security measures, the number of guards, what their procedures were- but every passing second reminded her more viciously of the inflated and lubricated sheathes inserted deep within her, arousing her with every step that the geisha puppeteered her into taking. Without thinking, Aveline tried to reach down, reseat the inserts, but the suit had long since forced her to yield control over her own movements. The hand that she tried to move toward her crotch stayed at her chest, fingers daintily curved in, the epitome of grace and elegance. A blush ran through her face, hidden from view under the frozen Asiatic features that she had recently inherited. She blinked rapidly- but the geisha, the thing that was now her body and calmly standing next to the accountant and two other businessmen along with twelve other geisha robots as if nothing was out of the ordinary, nothing at all, that geisha refused to blink its dead beetle-husk eyes, refused to breathe, refused to twitch. The world pounded, and Aveline was drowning in her own senses. No. She needed to refocus on the operation. Aveline hammered her own mind down into submission, refusing to let her arousal get the better of her. She was a professional, after all.
Aveline barely made out the grunt of voices. One of the OmniTrace representatives was talking, and it wasn’t the nervous client at her elbow. A chuckle, a nudge. “Loosen up, kid. Today’s a celebration! No need to be all tightly strung.”
“I’m fine,” the accountant said quietly. He cleared his throat. “It’s, uh, just these robots. They kind of creep me out.”
“HAHAHA!”
He had a brutal laugh, one that fit what little of his face Aveline could see without turning her head. She racked her head. No bells going off. Definitely the accountant’s superior or something, from the way he was talking, but not a big enough fish that she would have been briefed on him.
“What, you scared of those little things?” He snapped his chin in Aveline’s direction. “They’re tonight’s entertainment, kid. You’re probably gonna get a lot more comfortable with them in a few hours. Ha! Think of ‘em as women, but the way they should be. Servile. And quiet.”
His arm reached out. Inside the exoskeleton, Aveline tensed up, and years of training sent an impulse down into her hands. Unrestrained, they would have caught the man’s wrist and snapped it like a dry twig. But today, the suit was in complete control. Aveline’s knee-jerk reaction didn’t even cause a tremor to emerge on Geisha X96-N’s calm, placid, porcelain white surface.
And then he was there. Grabbing, groping. Aveline bit her mouthpiece angrily, attempting to gnash her teeth together, a snarl rumbling in her throat. The hand was there, unrepentant, invasive, obscene. He was groping her- grabbing her and pulling her closer.
“Heavier than you look, huh darling?” He leered over her, and Aveline could see the oily pores in the man’s skin, the sweat gleaming through to the video-screens built into her mask. “See?” He gave another barking laugh. “Nothing to worry about, kid.”
Aveline tried to shudder. His second hand was now rubbing her encased thigh, roughly scratching at her slit. “They’re pleasure models,” he growled. He glanced at the accountant, then straight into Geisha X96-N’s blank eyes. “They’ll take it from you and like it, that’s what they’re programmed to do. That’s what they are.”
There was a ding, and the elevator doors started to open. The man roughly shoved Aveline away, his eyes turning dismissively forward. The geisha suit’s programming was impressive, but not comprehensive. Aveline might have been able to dance backwards, regain her footing, fall into a loose fighting stance like it was nothing- but especially with the onboard AI in charge, this dainty geisha wasn’t programmed to catch itself from falling. Aveline bit back a yelp as she felt herself tilt back dangerously, down, down-
The accountant barely caught her before her head smashed into the floor. The two other men were in the hall, eyes turned to the other guests, minds already on other things. Above her, the accountant’s face bobbed like a worried moon, eyes wide.
“I’m… sorry about him...” he said, awkwardly trailing off as if he had realized he was talking to a robot. His gaze flitted back to the hallway quickly, then back to her. “Can you get up?”
“Yes, Mahon-san,” replied the sweet and airy voice. “Thank you for your aid.”
Mahon. That was the accountant’s name. Irrelevant information, but Aveline filed it away all the same as her limbs were slowly puppeteered to pull herself back up. The geisha got back on her feet, as graceful in her recovery as she was in her poise. As her head swung back to the hallway, Aveline got one final glimpse of the retreating back of the man from the elevator. His groping hands flashed in her mind’s eye, and red tinged her vision. It wouldn’t be within mission parameters… but this one, she could afford to deal with for free. One way or another, before night’s end, Aveline would even the score.
-
Alcohol. Aveline could smell it, and X96 didn’t even have a nose to sniff with.
Apparently dinner had gone well. Wine and sake had been poured, in copious amounts, and she could practically feel the inebriation of everybody hanging in the air like a thick cloud. And as the elevator man had said, the geishas were indeed proving to be tonight’s entertainment.
Aveline stood in the back of the room, attentive and stock-still, as thirty men and women reeled on the floor in various states of intoxication. Doryo was fondling three different robot geishas at once, his shirt rapidly unbuttoning itself at a surprising rate, while Schafer had thrown her jacket off and was deep in a kiss with one of the Fujioka translators. Kazuo, predictably, was hovering in the corner, his face as unreadable as those of the geishas littering the room. Thankfully, it seemed as if he was the exception- nearly everybody, Fujioka or OmniTrace, had sunk deep into the revels of the night. It was almost the best scenario possible.
The only issue left was dodging out of the room unnoticed. Aveline scanned the room with her eyes in a vain attempt to identify Safya. There were thirty-seven geishas, fourteen lining the wall like her and the others in various states of disarray across the room, pleasuring or being pleasured by the dinner guests. Aveline gritted her teeth and tried to force out the mental image of Safya impatiently waiting just outside, tense, anxious. She had to bide her time. Kazuo’s sharp stare raked the room, studying each dinner guest like a vivisected corpse. There was no way that she would be able to leave without him noticing.
“Oi Kazuo!”
Kazuo’s eagle stare snapped onto Lucas Hammersten, the CFO of OmniTrace, who was currently drunkenly cradling an empty sake bowl. It was her chance. Aveline prepared to speak the code phrase (“Unhook”) into her gag and regain control over her limbs, then move into position.
“You should... join us,” Hammersten slurred. “Don’t stand there all aloof. Have fun!”
Kazuo looked at the half-slumped man before him, and a flicker of distaste passed over his otherwise inscrutable expression. Then he inclined his head respectfully.
“Thank you, Mr. Hammersten.” Kazuo said curtly, “But I am not one for drinking.”
“Nonsense!” Hammersten beamed, completely oblivious to the menace radiating from his Fujioka counterpart. “At least enjoy some… the company of… of these wonderful serving girls, robots. Wonderful!”
“They are indeed!” Doryo laughed from across the room, each hand buried between a robot geisha’s legs. “Come, uncle, don’t be a prude! Let yourself go for one night!”
Kazuo’s glance swept across the room again like an icy beam. Aveline, who had begun uttering the code phrase, stopped mid-word. Her silenced breath caught in her throat.
“I…” Kazuo’s mouth twisted into something resembling more a grimace than a smile. “I do not prefer the company of robots.”
“Aw, come on uncle!” Doryo roared. “Look at them. Docile, supple, sweet. What’s not to like? They won’t bite, they’re not anything like your Ivy Hartfeld-”
Chatter from the Fujioka half of the room died instantly. OmniTrace reps across the room belatedly realized the ballooning and quieted as well. Doryo, for his part, almost immediately seemed to recognize his mistake, and stuttered to a halt. The only noise in the banquet room was the sound of Mahon, the accountant, who was steadily snoring.
Kazuo regarded his nephew silently. The tension mounted.
“I think you should not say her name again.”
“No,” Doryo agreed hastily. “I… that was a mistake, forgive me uncle-”
“A mistake I can forgive.” Kazuo tilted his head casually. “As long as it doesn’t happen again.”
Doryo shook his head. “N-no, uncle. Never.”
Kazuo nodded, then looked around at the silent room. “I find myself tiring this late into the night. I shall retire early. Please enjoy the refreshments and entertainment.”
He turned and faded away through a side door noiselessly. Three of his attendants- men in black suits, with cybernetic eyes- followed shortly. The door closed.
Doryo looked around at the room almost pleadingly. “Well,” he said awkwardly, “I suppose it is still a touchy subject for him.” He gazed around, apparently at a loss on what to say next. “The… Yes! As my uncle said. Please enjoy the entertainment! These geishas are top-of-the-line Zen Robotica pleasure models- we had a lucrative deal with them a year back, and they tacked on two hundred units at a reduced- well, never mind. Please, they are fully equipped for- ah, ah, ah,” he stuttered, “Let’s have a demonstration!” He pointed sharply. “You, you. Come here!”
Aveline’s blood ran cold. He had pointed at her.
Her feet moved, quite literally, without her thinking. X96 piloted her body up to the front, alongside another geisha selected from its place alongside the wall, and stood demurely in front of the entire dinner party. Even with her head forcibly bowed, Aveline could sense the eyes of nearly everyone fixed raptly upon her.
“What are your names?”
“X96-N, Fujioka-san,” came her false second voice. The suit curved her neck and head down into a suppliant bow. Behind her emotionless face, Aveline chewed on the gag, brain racing at a hundred miles per hour. What were they about to make her do? How was she going to extricate herself from this in time to meet up with Safya?
“X22-N, Fujioka-san,” said the geisha robot at her elbow.
Her heart dropped.
“Safya?” Aveline mumbled through her gag, in shock. Nobody heard her.
“X96 and X22. Ladies and gentlemen, some of you have already begun to get quite acquainted with your geishas. But please, allow these two fine gems of Zen Robotica to illustrate just how cutting edge pleasure robotics have become!”
Aveline tried to peer out of the corner of the video screens. The geisha standing to her right was completely indistinguishable from all the other robots in the dining room... but if she had heard right… that was Safya standing there, mutely, at her shoulder. The scenario had just gone from good to horrible. If it had only been Aveline- well, Safya would have been able to complete the mission by herself, Aveline was only there for muscle in case things went wrong. But if they both were-
“X96. X22… Pleasure each other. Put on a show for our esteemed guests.”
It didn’t register for a second or two, and Aveline’s limbs were already being pulled into action before she even understood what was about to happen. The recognition seeped in when her view swept around to center fully on X22… Safya.
Blank, doll-like features. White like fine china. And Aveline’s arms, also that same pale shade of newly fallen snow, were pulling this geisha robot, and the person trapped inside, closer. Aveline’s heartbeat quickened. The hiss of her restricted breathing filled her ears.
Then a delicate hand traced the inside curve of her thigh, gently, lovingly. It was X22’s hand, brushing closer, so similarly to the way the man in the elevator had touched her but also so utterly different. More sincere. More… right. Despite herself, Aveline closed her eyes, trying to compose her hot and bothered breathing. Steady that heartbeat. No avail… X22 was hugging even closer to her now. Their hard features connected slowly, with the muted chime of metal on metal, silosteel on silosteel.
Grace. Poise. As they slowly dipped down onto the table, scattering sake bottles and wine glasses, Aveline shivered with acute awareness. Not of the dozens of eyes watching her, the strangers in the room. In a split second, they had become irrelevant. No, her entire focus, every fiber of her being, had shifted to concentrate on the slight but reassuringly solid figure in her arms. That image passed through Aveline’s head- the one that had subconsciously been drifting in the back of her mind, throughout this entire evening of walking around perpetually penetrated and aroused and gagged. That image of Safya, her eyes locking with Aveline’s as the mask descended. Her cute face disappearing under that of another, the translucent mouthpiece entering and restraining her beautiful lips and teeth and tongue under that all-encompassing gag… The silosteel tightening around her caramel skin, wrapping her up in endless subsumption... The deep, lubricated sheathes gently climbing their way up into her, sliding wetly in…
Everything disappeared from Aveline’s mind.
“Unhook,” she mouthed into her gag.
Suddenly, the suit’s onboard AI relinquished all control of Aveline’s limbs, of her body, and she clutched that geisha underneath her with renewed passion. Aveline could almost sense the shock in Safya’s eyes, hidden as they were behind the lenses of her mask.
Then the rhythm changed. The supple, repetitive stroking that X22’s programming had been acting out gave way to something different, more intense. In a flash of understanding and heightened pleasure, Aveline realized that Safya had unhooked herself as well.
It was at once insidious and innocent an act. Aveline’s senses tingled, heart beating rapidly, and the scope of her awareness expanded again, a gently wafting breeze of anxiety. What if she was compromised? Found out by these powerful corporate officers, all of them literally watching her embrace and lovingly stroke her old friend, her best friend from mere feet away? Eyes, dozens of eyes, watching her every move with interest. Aveline shivered at the realization. Then she was shivering from a different reason- Safya had just let a hard, silosteel finger slip inside her. It explored her sheathed slit casually, almost meandering across her lips before settling right above where her clit would have been. Gentle, repeated pressure. Aveline moaned into her gag. Safya rubbed her harder. Aveline salivated into the rubbery mass in her mouth, trying to suppress her cries. It was in vain- by unhooking, the geisha programming had also lent its voice to speak for Aveline, and now her breathy moans of pleasure were being translated into that soft voice of X96, her voice now.
Pressure under her fingertips. The rasp of silosteel on silosteel. Aveline imagined the smooth skin layered away under that white, blemishless exterior. She bent forward, dreaming of Safya’s kissable lips- could she think of her friend like that?- and running her own faceplate up and down X22’s cheek. Was this wrong? It didn’t feel like it. It felt so right, and for several eternal seconds, Aveline lost all semblance of her iron self-control, becoming nothing more than a lightning rod for pleasure, letting herself submit to her titillation and become a mindless geisha bot, the unit known as X96.
Then Safya was moving underneath her. Grasping her legs, pulling herself under X96. As if she had been waiting for it for her entire life, X96 (Aveline? Was that her name?) pulled herself to a sitting position, legs tucked under her, as Safya slid under her crotch. Safya’s delicate hands were massaging X96’s hips; X96 was now straddling her friend’s, no, the geisha’s head. Was it really Safya? The haze of pleasure melded these things together, both Safya’s endearing features and the unsmiling geisha faceplate sealed over, and it didn’t matter, one hand was now back at her erogenous zones, a thumb sliding inside her as X22’s nose and lips rubbed around her silosteel snatch. X96 let her own hand slide down her midsection, down her gyrating belly and hips and into herself, a touch, then a deep exploration of her inner self.
It swelled up like a tsunami. Distant, unheard over her own cries and Safya’s cries and the waves of pleasure at her crotch that radiated warmth across her whole flesh, but soon it surged across her skin and breath, more intense, overwhelming. It wiped X96’s mind blank of anything else except a bright light, an ever-heightening sensation, an unending crescendo that made her writhe on Safya’s face helplessly, until the wave broke and finally receded, leading Aveline to almost slide down and slump in a decisively unrobot-like manner against Safya’s breasts. Thankfully, a part of her mind was aware enough to mumble “autopilot” into her gag, and the geisha AI kicked back in, smoothly picking up her movements into a less intense stroking. Safya, ever quick on the uptake, followed suit, and soon the geisha automaton-suited spies were back to being backseat observers of their own bodies.
“Damn,” said Hera Schafer into the relative quiet. “I didn’t know they could do that. Count me in.” She gave one of the wall geishas a wobbly gesture.