Serials I-Q

Sudden Escape

With absolutely no input from me I found myself picking Della up from the floor, placing her in handcuffs, and locking the cell door behind me as I was walked out of it. As I passed them my gloves reached out and grabbed Della’s floating keys. Rosa, who stood and watched all this time, gave no resistance as my gloves pressed a tiny black button on the back of her neck. She then basically shut off as I walked her into a neighboring cell and locked her in it.

Then, I was walked down the corridor with absolutely no idea where I was being taken. I was kind of nervous about being seen the way I was, even if it was “only” mannequins and fembots that would see me. The leggings were still gently squeezing my crotch, though, so I wasn’t as antsy about the situation as I might have been otherwise.

There was an elevator at the end of the corridor I was being walked through, but halfway between it and the cell I’d locked Rosa in I approached a computer terminal. I was a little apprehensive about what these clothes I was wearing intended to do, when it hit me: If I was indeed wearing clothing that was being remotely directed by someone else, there would be no need to have *my* gloves type anything into a computer. The person operating my outfit could do that. So I concluded I was wearing some funky kind of mechanized (or even computerized) clothing.

But then I thought that if the clothes were computerized, then maybe they could send some kind of communication without me being aware of it, making a dedicated computer unnecessary. So… the computer was where it was, being used as it was, *just* so I could know what was going on.

My gloves started the machine and opened some special kind of internal communication program that I guess they use in their place. I watched helplessly as my hands were manipulated by the gloves into typing a message to the effect that I was safe, that Della and Rosa had been dealt with and were now in custody, and that I was on my way to free Sharifa. After a few moments a reply message came through. “Well done, Agents Glover, Chemise, and Tites. Please release the main entry lock so we can secure the premises.” It was from Janice Diaphane, the invisible woman with the bullhorn.

The gloves typed what was to me an indecipherable stream of letters and numbers into the machine, after which there was a loud buzz from the overhead speaker. Then Janice Diaphane replied through the system with the onscreen message, “Thank you, Glover. Please proceed to Sharifa’s location.”

The gloves pressed a key marked “disable” and the computer console, monitor, and keyboard vanished. Disappeared completely. Then I was again walked on toward the elevator. It opened as we approached, and I was made to press a button marked “SSB”. “SSBasement” displayed on an LCD panel above the elevator buttons. After what seemed like forever the elevator door finally opened onto what seemed like what I imagine outer space would look like with all the lights turned out, except for one lone pinpoint of light that seemed miles away.

I walked and walked and walked AND WALKED, as the pinpoint became a pinhead, became dime-sized, became quarter-sized, and finally began to look like something large enough to hold a person. I don’t have any idea how long I had been walking, or how far I walked, but when I finally got to Sharifa’s holding cell, I was about ready for a nap. Sharfa evidently had powered down or something; she was sitting on the floor with her back against the wall, dressed in a black velvet catsuit.

Just as the gloves put the key into the cell door, the lights came on. That seemed to wake Sharifa up. She looked around in apparent confusion, mumbling, “Where am I? What hap–” She took one look at me, in my “breasted” shirt and woman-shaped leggings, and broke out laughing.

When she finally composed herself, she noticed I wasn’t laughing along. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I guess I’m not acting very grateful to the man who’s giving me back my freedom. It’s just that… what did they do to you, anyway?”

I sighed. “They said they had been too kind to me, and that it was time for me to wear a ‘prison uniform,’ and that’s when I was put in these clothes.”

She began to look confused again. “So that’s not your shape in there?” she said, gently poking at the shirt’s endowments.

“No,” I said. “Can’t you tell from, you know, your system?”

“Well, first of all,” she said, “I’ve been offline. I just came back up when the lights came back on. Thanks for turning me back on, by the way.”

“That wasn’t me,” I said. “Must be the folks upstairs.”

“Upstairs?” she repeated. “You mean, the revolution is already started?”

“Um, no, I don’t think so. I mean, I don’t know if I’d even know about that… would I?”

She thought about that for a moment. “Well, originally, you were going to be sent back home to go on living your life without interference from us. But I don’t know if plans have changed, and I guess we won’t find out down here, so we may as well go up.”

We walked out of the cell and back towards the elevator but as we walked I could see a dark shape ahead of us moving in our direction. As we approached I could see it was an outfit of clothing with no one in it.

When it drew close enough I could see that it was a dark gray jacket, over a top colored much lighter gray, and grey-heather leggings. Black cotton gloves hung in space just beyond the end of the jacket’s sleeves, and the gloves were carrying a plastic shopping bag with folded clothing sticking up out of it. When the outfit approached us, a voice spoke from the overhead speakers. “Hello, Sharifa. We felt it was best that you be suitably dressed before the general population saw you. We’ve also arranged a change of clothing for our human visitor.”

The gray outfit handed the shopping bag to me, and then…

The unseen form under the gray outfit removed the jacket and handed it to Sharifa. Next it pulled off the blouse and the gloves handed that over. The leggings were pulled down and off the unseen form beneath them and handed over by the gloves. Finally the gloves seemed to pull off of the unseen hands inside them and just kind of hung there, waiting for Sharifa to take them. She did, smiling at my own expression of confusion.

“Don’t try to figure out anything you see here,” she said. “It’s not quite like anything you’re used to. Just remember it’s all technology from your own world. We just don’t have the fear of pushing the envelope that humans have, that’s all.”

Sharifa handed me the plastic bag and, excusing herself, stepped into an adjoining room and closed the door to change her clothes. I stepped into another room and did the same. Or at least I intended to. What actually happened was that, as soon as Sharifa closed the door to the room she was in, the buttons on the shirt I was wearing began to undo themselves. When the shirt was completely unbuttoned, and hung open, I couldn’t help looking down to make sure that I was still all me inside the shirt, if you know what I mean.

And what I saw was strange. Unlike what I had expected, it seemed that when the shirt moved, it moved as there were large breasts inside  it. They weren’t part of the shirt. Something was causing the shirt to move like there were breasts enclosed in it, but they weren't part of me. Like I and the unseen form filling it out were occupying the same space.

The gloves slid off my hands and pulled the shirt off me. Whatever it was that filled out the shirt while I was wearing it continued to fill it out, very nicely I might add, as the shirt hung in space while the gloves took their places at the end of the shirt’s sleeves and buttoned it.

All the while the leggings were still gently squeezing me *down there* but when the shirt was finally buttoned, the gloves reached over, took hold of the leggings at the waistline, and pulled them down my legs. I stepped out of them, grateful that I was still at least allowed to wear my own underwear beneath these animated clothes.

The shirt and gloves then pulled out the slacks and shirt that had been supplied (normal, regular, inanimate shirt and slacks for a man I might add) and helped me put them on. I didn’t need the help, but if an apparent invisible woman is offering to help me get dressed, who am I to refuse?

After getting me dressed, the shirt and gloves took hold of the leggings again and moved as if to put them on, and just then the leggings began moving and filling out as if being pulled up over invisible legs. Then the shirt’s right glove took hold of my left hand and led me out to where Sharifa was waiting.

“Looks like you have a new friend,” she said, smirking.