being a thing

: story version :

play

Copyright 2021 by R. Asu

The forest is dark.

You have travelled for a very long time, and are almost at your destination.

Your nav arrow floats ahead of you.

turn around and abandon your quest

keep following your arrow

As you make your careful way in the dark, the distance on your arrow continues to go down.

You sense there might be light ahead. You shrink behind the trunk of one last tree.

In the dark, your arrow points around the trunk, as if your tech knows that the tree is there.

turn around and abandon your quest

look around the tree trunk

You see two brick buildings, with no windows. There is a gate between them, standing open. Through the gate there is a dark alleyway, with no lights inside.

Barring the gate is a glowing red line on the ground.

turn around and abandon your quest

approach

You walk up to the red line. The entry contract appears in your eyespace.

Permissions to be granted: voice and approach. For 1 day.

Recipient: residents of the city.

Penalty: touch granted to one unknown person, for 3 days.

It seems you can stay without doing anything for twenty four hours. If you stay longer, or violate the rules, one of your permissions will be opened to someone.

Your life has left you with nothing.

You have walked for a very long time to reach this place.

turn around and abandon your quest

step over the red line

As you step across the line, into the dark alley, your tech accepts the entry contract. You become bound to its terms. Everyone in the city can now talk to you, or approach you.

You are standing in the dark alley. Both walls are brick, and close enough to touch.

You have accepted a contract, but you have the right to leave.

leave the city forever

walk in the dark

You walk forward. You begin to realize there is a gap on the left side. As you reach it, you stay behind the corner and peer carefully inside.

You see a small stone courtyard. It is a cold place, with high stone walls looming on all sides. A tall pillar, also of stone, stands in the center, wide as a tree trunk. It is topped by a large lantern, that is not particularly bright.

The place is not inviting, but it seems very private. Part of you wants to enter, and part of you does not.

You have wished for a very long time, that there was a way for things to be different for you.

Maybe there is something behind the pillar.

leave the city forever

enter the private space

You step inside. Strangely, the space makes you feel calm. You don't know why. The stone walls reach far over your head. It feels like you have entered a prison.

As you stand there, a man steps out from behind the pillar with a knife in his hand and before you can react he rushes you and slides the large blade into your belly.

Astonished, you wonder why he would do that, since your pain is off and you are not in danger. Your eyespace is flashing red at you, and your progress bar has come up.

Despite the lack of danger, your shock causes you to fall down. You land hard on your rump, jarring your bones. The man has collapsed as well. Suddenly he is sound asleep on the bricks in front of your feet.

You are sitting on the ground with a knife handle sticking out of your belly.

Your tech tells you to remove it.

remove it

don't remove it

You sit for hours, astonished that you want the experience of sitting there with a knife in your belly. Your tech has to unmolecule the metal blade to remove it from your body. Only then is it able to heal your wound.

After that, you get up, and wander the alleys and plazas of the city, trying to find someone who will talk to you, but everyone you find only tells you one thing.

“Sorry, but we saw. You want to be a victim. That is not what this city is for.”

You have failed.

undo

With your left hand you slide the knife out of you, and drop it onto the bricks next to the man's head. The blade is covered in a thick smear of blood, which is deeply red in the dim light.

The eta on your progress bar has improved from hours to only five minutes. You wait as it fills. Your tech molecules you back together, and then your wound is perfectly healed.

get up and run away from a horrible place

continue to sit in shock

Sitting there, you start to hear footsteps behind you. You turn in fear, and find a woman meandering in from the alley. You sense that she may have witnessed the whole thing, and waited to see what you would do.

She walks towards your feet, and stands there, ignoring the sleeping man. Looking up at her, you suspect she is taller than you. She is dressed boldly, in a black leather jacket, the zipper zipped up. She is also wearing tight jeans, with sturdy work boots, in black.

Her hair is dark and short, her eyes are brown, and her face is very calm.

She leans and reaches out her hand.

“May I help you up?”

scramble away and leave

extend your hand

She takes your hand, but grips it too firmly. She pulls you up, but pulls a precise amount that leaves you standing an inch closer to her than you intended. Your eyes are at the level of her nose. You back away, and pull your hand from hers as well. She does not object.

She stands there, hovering over you, ignoring the sleeping man. You feel out of sorts, perhaps because of your shock. By your contracts, she cannot harm you. You cannot harm her either.

leave her and the city forever

ask her, "why did he do that?"

She replies, “Maybe he wanted to.”

You stammer out the obvious. Since he knew it was a permissions violation, he knew his tech would put him to sleep for a year. You add, “It's almost as if he wanted that.”

She hovers, too close. You wonder why you are not pulling away. But you have been alone for a very long time.

She says, “The people who come here want strange things.”

You look down at the man. His clothing is ordinary.

Then there is a surprisingly clear whisper in your right ear.

“What did you want?”

You freeze, realizing she moved to your ear during the exact moment that you weren't looking at her.

leave her and the city forever

misunderstand her question

Still, you find yourself not pulling away. You say, “What? I didn't—”

She presses. “Not that.” She moves one millimeter closer. “Why did you come here?”

She moves a half millimeter closer. She seems very good at millimeters. She presses again. “Why did you enter this place?”

Your shoulders tighten, but for some reason, you don't move.

She steps less than half a millimeter closer.

regret your decisions, and leave her and the city forever

answer her, even as she stands so close

You did not expect things to happen in this way, but you never knew anyone in this place to begin with. And this woman speaks as if she is certain of who and what she is, and all your life you have dreamed of knowing such things about yourself.

You hang your head, and say it, to a complete stranger.

The reason you came so far.

“I don't want to be the kind of thing that I am.”

remain

You cannot believe you just said that to someone.

She waits an uncomfortably long time before speaking again. You suffer her hovering presence, feeling her gaze, and it perplexes you that you remain there.

Eventually she asks the obvious question, and when she does, you sense some form of excitement in her voice.

“What kind of thing are you?”

run away from her and leave the city

find no words to reply with

You look away from her. How can you tell someone everything that you are? How can you tell someone what it is like to be you? How can you tell someone that you are not one of those people who can easily explain themselves?

She waits. Perhaps she hopes you will speak, or perhaps she hopes you will not.

Eventually, she backs off, and gives you a little room.

She says, “Well then. I can help you, but all I can do is make you into a different kind of thing.”

keep your head down, walk away, and never come back

let her make you into a different kind of thing

Very quietly, you say ok.

At first, she seems surprised. But then she recovers, and announces, “Ok, come with me.” She turns away, and heads back out of the strange stone courtyard.

After taking one last look at the man on the ground, you turn away from him. You see the woman stepping into the alley and turning left. You follow her, feeling sheepish. You don't know why you are doing what you are doing. Except that you walked a very long ways to reach the place where you are.

As you enter the alley and turn left, it is dark again. You can barely sense her presence in front of you.

keep following

You are in the dark alley, walking behind her. It turns left and then turns right. And then you begin to see light ahead.

You follow her into a large plaza full of trees and even some people. There are city benches, and lampposts. It is a pleasant area, with lighted shop windows on either side. You see people inside some of the windows as well, sitting at tables or in booths, or standing and talking. A few are looking out to see what is going on.

She, however, leads you to a spot halfway down on the right side. There is a low brick wall there, fronting a courtyard. There is also an iron gate. She pushes the gate open and steps inside with confidence. You follow her in, wondering why you are doing that.

Light enters the courtyard from the plaza. Three brick walls hem it in, several stories high. On its back wall is something you can't fully see, because she is resolutely blocking your view of it by standing in the proper place.

leave

remain

She steps aside to let you see what is on the back wall.

You are shocked by it.

There are two manacles, shoulder width apart, hanging from short metal chains.

One for each wrist.

say, I made a mistake, I have to leave now

nervously pick at your fingers

She sends you a tech contract. It appears in your eyespace.

Permissions to be granted: binding, mild intimate touch, and stay. For 3 hours.

Recipient: her.

Penalty: same permissions for 3 weeks.

You notice that no violence permissions are involved.

You think maybe it would be ok to sign it. Then you think maybe you are losing your mind.

She waits patiently.

leave forever

sign the contract

You didn't come for such a reason, but you didn't really know what you came for. And you feel strange in her presence. You don't know exactly what she is going to do to you, but the contract makes the limits clear.

And so, in your eyespace, you sign it. Immediately, your tech grants the permissions to her. She now has the right to bind you, touch you in mildly intimate ways, and force you to stay where she tells you to. She immediately invokes that last right, and you lose the ability to leave the courtyard without triggering the penalty clause. In fact, you can no longer take more than a couple of steps. It will last up to three hours.

She moves very close to you.

pick at your fingers in her presence

You stand there, picking at your fingers, until you realize she is boldly taking your right wrist in both of her hands.

She pulls your arm to extend it. You have to let her, because of the contract. All her focus is on it, and not on you. She pushes your sleeve up, to expose your forearm.

You allow her to do what she is doing.

Suddenly, she very boldly begins to smooth her hands over the surfaces of your wrist, violating your boundaries, but not violating the contract. You gave her this permission.

You feel very awkward, letting a stranger handle you in that way.

feel very awkward

She is still smoothing the surfaces of your wrist.

You have been alone in the wilderness for a very long time. You are feeling comfort and even intimacy from being touched, but you do not know this woman, and it feels shameful to accept what she is doing. You try to hide what you are feeling.

The intimacy, however, begins to gain a coldness that makes it feel like something else entirely. You begin to sense what she is feeling, and it feels very wrong.

It is possessiveness.

Of your wrist.

you have signed the contract, and can only remain

Without looking at you, she puts one hand on your breastbone, and, still holding your wrist, she forces you back to the wall, below the manacles. You feel the bricks with your shoulder blades.

You know you have agreed to something you shouldn't have. You keep your eyes down. She steps so close that the only place you can put your eyes is the hollow of her neck, where her leather jacket is open.

She is wearing a black choker.

You feel her raise your wrist above your shoulder.

You are letting her put your wrist in a manacle.

You feel ashamed of what you are doing.

remain

The metal of the manacle touches your wrist. You twist your neck to see. The leather of her jacket is stretched taut, and her own wrists have emerged from both sleeves, as she reaches up that high.

You stare in something akin to horror as she closes the iron ring around your wrist. You fear something irrevocable is happening to you, but the contract guarantees that the binding will end in three hours.

The tech moves a few atoms, and the manacle becomes a solidly closed thing. A message in your eyespace informs you that you are now bound.

She is still holding your wrist with both of her hands, even after putting it in the manacle.

You see her… slowly closing her eyes.

As if she feels she has done something sacred.

feel embarrassed with one wrist in a manacle

She ignores you, and sets her cheek against the manacle. She puts her nose against the soft part on the inside of your wrist. She moves the manacle to make room for her nose, or maybe to feel how it is too small to go past your hand.

Then she starts taking a very deep breath. Slowly and luxuriously, as if wanting to immerse herself in a scent.

After a while, she suddenly lets go of your wrist.

Your arm is hanging from the manacle.

feel foolish

Her fingers reach out to your second wrist.

She does the same things to it. You feel very foolish letting her. As she raises it to the second manacle your position becomes uncomfortable. The chains are short, and you must arch your back a bit. Your shoulder blades are pressing the wall again.

After locking the manacle and immersing herself as she did the first time, she then steps back, eyes still closed, but this time she puts her hands together, fingers steepled as if in prayer, and then she touches the steeple to her lips.

And then very slowly, above her steepled fingers, she opens her eyes.

She is looking directly at you.

Both of your wrists are bound.

look everywhere but at her face

Suddenly she drops her arms, and snaps back to her former self. “There,” she says. “Now you're a prisoner. I am quite certain this is a different kind of thing than what you were.”

Her eyes stay locked on yours, as if owning them.

She asks, “Is there anything you want to know?”

You stare, incredulous.

ask her a question

Standing there, feeling strange, you look down. You didn't know about things like this. Sheepishly, you ask, “Why did you want to do this to someone?”

It seems she is happy to answer. “It feels wrong to, you see? Even if the tech will set you free in three hours. Ignoring you, holding your wrists and placing them into the manacles… These are things one should not do to a person.”

“I don't know why people choose to let me do this to them. So many people come here, lost and out of sorts, not knowing what they want. Every time someone agrees, I think it strange. But when they offer, I find I like doing things to them.”

She pauses for a moment, as if considering. Then she says one last thing.

“I guess I like making people into toys.”

Those final words turn your heart cold.

suffer a cold feeling

She brings her hands together again, and steeples them at her lips the way she had before. She steps closer. Very close, right in front of you. Her pressed hands feel like a blade between her face and yours.

She captures your eyes with her intense gaze, and then, as you look up into them, she asks, quite seriously…

“Do you think I am evil?”

stare in abject horror at a person who might actually be

It makes no sense. You had expected her to claim she wasn't. You fear you have lost the thread of what you walked to that city for. She wants you to say yes. To begin an argument. But in the age of the tech, people can't hurt each other.

There is no point in the argument.

say nothing

She holds your eyes for a bit more. Then she says four words very slowly.

“No one ever answers.”

Hands still steepled, she turns around as if lost in thought. She strolls calmly out of the courtyard. Beyond the gate, she turns right. On the other side of the low wall, without looking at you, she walks across the front of the courtyard until she disappears behind the building on your right.

You have no idea if she will return.

The gate swings slowly shut, with a clang.

be a prisoner, since you gave up all your other choices

As her horrible question remains in your mind, you barely even notice what you are doing. But as it fades, you realize you are standing there chained to a wall by your own choice. Somehow it seems like it happened in a dream. You had heard that people went to that city to play at being different things, and when the man rushed up and stabbed you, somehow that made sense to you, that the people there would want to do very horrible things like that, since the tech can heal any injury.

But something very different has happened to you.

You are stuck for three hours. There is nothing in the courtyard at all. There is a brick wall on either side of you, and a brick floor. Beyond the low wall, there is the pleasant plaza, full of shops and trees and lampposts.

You cannot sit down on the ground, because the manacles are too high up. The chains are short, giving you almost no room to move.

There is nothing to hide behind.

stand there, wondering what you have done

You feel stupid for what you have done. If anyone knew how far you had walked, only to… let yourself be chained to a wall…

This wasn't what you wanted. You got caught up in the strangeness of that woman, and her way of looking at things.

Out in the plaza, people walk past. You want to hide but there is no way that you can. Some notice you, but they have apparently seen such things before, and so they simply continue on their way.

But eventually, two people stop. You look down, but you have already seen them, and they know you have. It is a man and a woman. In the corner of your eye, you can tell that they are whispering to each other.

And then they move towards the gate.

look down and pray for them to not come in

Your prayers go unanswered.

They are both dressed normally. You cannot tell what their relationship is. Both seem a bit taller than you, and he is slightly taller than her. She pushed the gate open and he followed her in, but they both seem equally interested in you.

Thankfully, there is no way they can discover who you actually are.

They approach, and there is nothing you can do. However, they can't touch you. Their tech would put them to sleep. They have no permissions on you, other than voice and approach, which you had given to the whole city when you entered.

You hadn't expected this either. You can only look away.

endure their attentions

They both step before you. You can only stand there, wrists hanging from the manacles, looking away from them.

The man says to the woman, “Look. Someone wanted to play. Why do people let themselves be victims?”

He is obviously mocking you.

suffer the mocking

The woman answers the man's question. “They like being angry. They want people to do wrong things to them, so that they can be angry about how people who do wrong things. It's like a trick they play on good people.”

It is clear they are both trying to make you upset. You did not want to be a victim. You did not want to be angry at someone.

The man steps a bit closer. You shrink away as best you can.

He asks, “Is that true? Is that why you did it?”

He asks it again.

“Did you want to be a victim?”

deny it

say nothing

You say, “No, that wasn't it.”

Both of them get excited looks on their faces. Then, for the whole three hours, they pepper you with questions. Did someone trick you into it? Were you depressed and just wanted to be more depressed? Did you have a sick fascination with not being in control? You sense they may be looking up psychiatric theories in their eyespaces as they extract answers out of you. Eventually, you realize the only thing you can do is stop responding.

After the three hours, the manacles unlock, and you walk away, leaving the city. They follow you until the edge, but thankfully, no further.

You have escaped the city, and you never go back.

You did not know how to be a victim.

You have failed.

undo

There is nothing you can say. They proved they want to torment you anyway. Even if you knew how to explain it, they are the last people who would care.

They cannot touch you.

You look down.

wait for them to go away

She says false words. “Oh, come on. We care. Maybe we can help you. A person should seek help if they need it.”

He chimes in. “Yeah, yeah. Let us help you.”

It's clear they are lying about that. They obviously wanted to torment you first.

tell them to stop bothering you

say nothing

The moment you say those words, they get very excited, and for the next three hours you learn just how many tricks people have up their sleeves when they have spent their whole lives teasing every person they ever met. When the manacles open, you leave the city and never come back.

You did not know how to be a victim.

You have failed.

undo

He says, with his voice unnecessarily loud, “Wow. What a rude person. Ignoring people who are only trying to help.”

She chimes in, agreeing as if wholeheartedly.

try to get them to go away by apologizing

say nothing

You say you're sorry.

They spend three hours trying to make you feel bad about wronging them. It is miserable. When the manacles open, you leave the city, with them in tow, but thankfully, they stop at its edge and do not follow you into the forest.

You never come back.

You did not know how to be a victim.

You have failed.

undo

For a little while longer, they continue to try to get you to say something. But eventually, they give up. They declare you to be boring. They do this with very loud voices, as they leave the courtyard. They swing the gate shut just hard enough to make an annoying noise, but not hard enough to suggest that you have made them angry. They talk loudly about what a waste of time that was, clearly wanting you to hear. They linger in front of the courtyard for a bit, as if hoping you will finally respond, but then they walk off into the plaza, and disappear from your view.

Thankfully, you are alone again.

keep your head down, and hope no one else comes

You live the life of a victim. Sort of. You hang from your wrists for almost the remaining two hours. You keep your eyes down, to avoid catching the attention of anyone who passes by. It leaves you with nothing to do but stare at the brick floor of the courtyard.

You don't get to look at the pleasant treetops lit from below by the pleasant lampposts, in the pleasant plaza that everyone else gets to enjoy, beyond the low brick wall.

Perhaps the act of keeping your eyes down is what keeps anyone else from hassling you.

keep your eyes down

In your eyespace, there are five minutes left. You hear the gate opening, and you try not to flinch. But then you realize it is her. She has returned.

You feel ashamed of what you have been doing, and you keep your head down.

She walks up very close to you, but says nothing.

She simply stands in front of you, slightly taller than you.

With your wrists in the manacles, you cannot turn your arms into a shield between you and her.

stare hard at the brick floor

Suddenly, the manacles release. Your arms fall, because you didn't expect it. There are still three minutes remaining on the contract.

She, however, catches both of your wrists. She then holds them before your belly. The contract is still in force. For another three minutes, you must let her do what she is doing.

She simply holds them there, looking at them and not at you. You see her larger hands cradling your wrists, her thumbs atop them.

Then she asks you an embarrassing question.

“Did you like being a prisoner?”

tell her you don't know why you did that

She tightly grips your wrists. You want her to let go, but there are two minutes left. You must let her handle them.

She says nothing for a whole minute. It is very awkward, with her holding you in that way that would normally be very intimate. Your body is still grateful for being touched. You don't let her know that.

She tugs your wrists towards her for a moment. Then she speaks, still looking at them.

“Hey, I know. Why don't you give me more permissions now?”

In your eyespace, a contract appears.

read the contract in your eyespace, since she will never know

You see that the contract ramps things up a bit. But only a little.

She says, “The manacles are just a start. Next, you will be in stocks in the plaza, and anyone will be able handle your wrists if they want. There are all kinds of things I like to do to a person who agrees to be a toy for me. The tech can heal any injury. Many of my toys like having these things done to them. But I like doing them only because I know that people should not be played with in this way, even if they agree to it.”

She adds, “Do you understand?”

sign her contract

do not sign her contract

You sign the contract because you like the idea of all kinds of things happening to you. And so you enter the part of your life where you endure many acts, each one more astonishing than the last. You play as a victim for a very long time.

One day, years later, you wonder if you are really doing what you should be doing. You realize that anything you ever wanted to achieve, has slipped from your grasp. You feel bad about what you have done, but you never leave the city again.

You have become addicted to something strange.

You did not know how to be a victim.

You have failed.

undo

All she says is, “Aww. You're no fun.”

The contract is about to expire. One second before it does, she suddenly lets go of your wrists. She has to, or she will be put to sleep by her tech.

But she puts her palms on the bricks on either side of your head.

She has made her arms into a cage for you.

But she cannot touch you anymore.

leave the city

You duck your head under her right arm and squirm out of your cage. You cross the courtyard to the gate, head hung low.

Through the gate and the plaza, and the alley you came in from, and then the outer gate, and you are back on the forest floor. And as you walk away you turn around but the dark alley is empty.

And so you have returned to the dark forest, walking carefully in the moonlight.

You wanted to be a different kind of thing, without even realizing what kind of thing you were. You thought she would show you what it was like to be something different.

But instead, she somehow showed you what you are.

Even if maybe she didn't mean to.

you are a person, and therefore... not a thing

You open the gate and exit to your left, crossing the plaza toward the dark alley where you entered the city.

Once inside there, you peek back, afraid she might be following.

You see her chin.

Alarmed, you look up into her face. Her eyes, inches above your own, seem predatory.

You realize she has been quietly walking an inch behind you the whole time.

stumble back in pointless horror

You stumble back, and she continues to approach, but does not touch you. Normally, she could not do such a thing, but she has approach permission. You gave that to the city. If you leave, she will lose that. Then her tech will put her to sleep for being a stalker, if she continues to do something so strange.

You turn round and retrace the alley. As you pass the gap on your right, you see, in the corner of your eye, that the man is still lying next to the stone pillar. But you continue past, and hurry through the gate at the end, and you step through it, and are on the forest floor again.

keep going to the nearest tree

You cross the forest floor and reach the nearest tree, afraid of what you will see if you turn around. You slide behind the trunk, and turn to confront her.

But she is not near you. She is still inside the city. Standing, predatory, in the dark alley, just inside the gate. Her posture, however, does not exhibit anger that you have escaped her clutches.

It is as if she only wants to make it clear to you, how she will treat you if you choose to go back inside.

turn from her, and go back into the dark forest

Alone in the dark forest, away from that city, you remember that you had travelled there because of a strange feeling of not wanting to be the kind of thing that you were.

But now you wonder if you were worried about the wrong part.

Maybe a thing isn't what you were supposed to be in the first place.

pretend it never happened

learn more about victims

You have decided to pretend it never happened. You wall it off. You never did anything so strange. It was a dream.

You decide to walk into the wilderness until you think of something else to do.

You have chosen not to learn more about victims.

You have failed.

undo

Thank you for playing to the end. If you want more, I have written a science fiction book about the age of the tech and dreadful play, and… many other things.

You just might discover a story like no other.

Room Inside (Her Horribleness)

By R. Asu

Click Here: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09MYV4MHX

But even if you don't buy, if you still learned a little about the plight of victims, that would be enough for me.

Thank you,

R. Asu

be a thing again

You turn around and never come back.

You did not have the courage to learn what it means to be a victim.

You leave the city before the twenty four hours are up. Your tech is released from the entry contract.

You are back in the forest.

You have decided not to know what it means to be a victim.

You decide you have made a mistake. Maybe many. You turn and leave the city and never come back.

You are back in the forest. Your tech has been released from the entry contract.

You have decided not to know what it means to be a victim.

You have failed.

undo