Chapter 9: Another

(Today)

Two years ago, when Ambuster retired from his chairmanship of the Computer Science Department, it was only natural that Alex Chatris moved up. Nobody even questioned the move.

To the shock of his brother, Ambuster took responsibility for the ten children that he had fathered with the women who were former students – and who were now students again. In an amazing piece of fiction, he wrote in his letter of resignation that he had tried to remain a simple mentor to the girls but they just wouldn't leave him alone. Imagine that! Ten beautiful girls, one per semester, chasing a balding, paunchy old guy. Yeah, nobody else believed it either.

Poor old Ambuster spent most of his time after the retirement buying groceries and taking them to the women. That or buying computers and such for the children. They were a lovely set of children: six boys and four girls, now ranging in age from fourteen to four. The women were back in college at FWU, and doing quite well. Alex made sure that they were all dealing successfully with the course material – without artificial aid. They had all picked up where they had left off when they got pregnant, and were second and third year students.

In the winter that followed, there was the inevitable ice storm that plagued the Dallas-Fort Worth area so frequently. Poor old Ambuster. What was he thinking? Anybody who knows anything will tell you that snow tires on your SUV won't make a bit of difference on an icy road. And the road that he was on had a big long overpass, so it iced up early and was way too slippery for him to be driving so fast. He hit the barricade that could have stopped a smaller car but he had a big, top-heavy SUV, and the darn thing just toppled over the barricade. It fell more than fifty feet to the roadway below, and killed poor old Ambuster dead.

Luckily for those beneficiaries of his life insurance policies, the ten women and their children, he had left them with double indemnity policies in case of an accident. They each collected a nice, round sum of $2 million tax free.

Poor old Ambuster. The world will be a better place now that he's not in it.

Alex found the job of Department Chair slightly more taxing than that of a simple professor. She had administrative functions and university-level meetings that she just could not get out of, even with her special ability.

She had continued to search the local university and high school athletic squads for boys who were mistreating girls. She tried to intervene only when the abuse was systematic and involved a lot of girls. One fellow, from Lake Worth, a suburb of Fort Worth, had arranged a gang-bang involving the entire football squad and his current girlfriend. Alex had called him in and was about to give him the usual dominatrix/dungeon scenario when she discovered that the girl in question had asked him to set up the gang-bang. She did more extensive background studies from that point on.

Alex never noticed that Spats would come down into the doorway of the dungeon and watch the proceedings with great interest. It happened about every two or three months.

Of course, she continued to prowl about the darker depths, too. She searched for new Master PC users and extinguished their MPC use like an exterminator killed roaches. Oh, she knew that some of them might be well-intentioned or just browsing. But why take the chance?

She had narrowed the list of MPC Users within the 500 km radius to eleven. Eleven hidden users all of who had a stable of about two to five girls. The users' accounts were passworded, and the girls whom they dominated were similarly protected. The girls didn't seem to be in any particular distress, though the degree they were brainwashed by their abUser was unknown. Alex guessed that most of the abUsers were men, but that was only a working hypothesis.

Eleven. It was a stable number. She could recognize them by the registration number of the MPC program. There was an occasional visiting User. He or she was always the same person, again based on her recognition of the twenty-five character registration number. He would appear for a few days every two or three months, he would hang around for a few days, and then disappear. She thought of him as 'The Traveler, ' going so far as to put that name her file of MPC users.

The Traveler had many, many subjects. Thousands of them just within the 500 km radius. From his schedule, Alex guessed that he made ten stops on his 'tour' every month, at three days each. That meant he had twenty to thirty stops, assuming that he stopped at each one every cycle. If he had three to five thousand subjects in each city, he would be in control of perhaps 100,000 to 150,000 people. That was simply staggering.

Of course, maybe he was just a traveling businessman who came to the Dallas-Fort Worth area sometimes. She didn't think so, however.

Then in May of this year – May 13, 4:00 pm to be exact – a routine scan of the MPC users in the Metroplex showed a twelfth abUser had moved into town. It was a new registration number, thus a new user. He/she had no subjects in town, currently, but the listing showed as many as a hundred or so in the past – all deceased but one. That was bad. Sixty per cent of the deceased subjects were under the age of ten. That was worse. The User was experienced, since his/her MPC record was password protected.

Alex expanded the radius of her MPC program to 10,000 km, and searched for the abUser's subjects. There were 103 of them, and one of them was still alive. One was indeterminate. What did that mean? She clicked on that one that was still alive, and found that his MPC record was not even password protected. It contained the instruction: 'You will never talk to anyone about me. You will remain calm. You will feel no pain. This will increase the time you have to enjoy life. You know that the only air available to you will come through the narrow straw that leads from the coffin to the outside. Eventually something will cover it, or you will die from lack of nutrition. You can accept that.'

That's horrible! thought Alex. What can I do?

Almost like Winnie the Pooh, she tapped herself on the forehead. Think. Think! If you ever had a good idea, this is the time!

She passworded the MPC record, in case the abUser decided to check on her last victim. Then she asked the program for the GPS location of the subject, who's name was Jerry Hogan. The location was in a mall construction project, northwest of Atlanta, and about ten feet below the surface.

Now what?

Alex made some Internet connections, creating links to several anonymizers overseas. She made sure to include places behind the old Iron Curtain and in the Middle East. When she was ready, she sent an untraceable message to the FBI, Atlanta police HQ, and three local Atlanta TV stations:

There is a man buried alive at location xxx, yyy, zzz. That is NW of Atlanta in the construction project for the Happy Hills Mall. He is buried under 10 ft. of concrete and has a limited airway. Please hurry.

She didn't think that message could be ignored, especially with the TV stations copied.

In the meantime Alex talked to Jerry. He said, "Mistress? Is that you again. I am so glad." The MPC program echoed his words on Alex's screen.

"Yes, it is I. Let's reminisce in the time remaining. What do you remember about me?"

"You are beautiful. You're five-ten, Asian, with black hair and dark, dark eyes – almost black. You are about ten pounds above nominal weight – I hope you don't misunderstand that, but the extra weight is because of your bust. You have large, sensitive breasts, and like to dress in blue spandex. Your favorite costume has cutouts for your breasts and cunt. Mistress X, what else can we talk about?"

Alex typed, 'Think about what your physical condition is. Are you healthy?'

"Yes, I am healthy. Except that you burned off my hands, testicles and penis with acid before placing me in this coffin. It was very painful when you were was doing it, as you know. But for some reason, it is not painful now. I think I am bleeding a little now."

Alex typed, 'Do not die. Your respiration and pulse rate will decrease to the minimal level necessary to support life. You will stop bleeding. You will awake and return to normal when the rescuers find you. They are coming very soon. You will cooperate with the authorities when you see them. You will not be alarmed by your missing body parts. They will grow back.'

"Thank you, Mistress." Apparently he thought he was talking to Mistress X.