SIX MONTHS LATER

Suzy lay on her side on the floor of the special closet she had helped Quinn build in a corner of the dungeon. She curled herself into a ball, backing her butt up against the back wall of the closet, putting her hands behind her against the wall, and seeking out the raised markers on the floor that indicated the appropriate positions of her head and her feet. The goal was that Suzy should be lying, as nearly as possible, in the exact same position she had occupied the last time, and the time before that, and the time before. She waited patiently as Quinn tied strings to her fingers and toes, and situated the headphones-without-earpieces on her head.

With everything ready, Quinn knelt down and gave Suzy a quick kiss, receiving a smile and a murmured "Love you" in return. Quinn kissed her again, with a little more passion, while fingering Suzy's sex the way she really liked. Suzy, parting her legs a little wider for the moment, quickly grew wet, enough so that the vibrator, quiet for now, slid in easily. The cord for the vibrator exited the closet through a hole in the wall. Outside, it connected to its power source, with a switch to turn it on and off. Two hours from now, Quinn would flip the switch that would power on the vibrator.

Months ago, Quinn had tied Suzy's wrists and ankles in place the very first time they had used to closet, and after Suzy had allowed Susan to surface within her, Quinn had told Susan that she was in a storage room at the auto body shop of Quinn's father, that Quinn would untie her in a moment but that she must not move, that the strings tied to her fingers would trip an alarm and that the microphone held in place by the headphones would magnify any sound she made.

No such explanation was needed any longer. From Susan's point of view, the experience in the "storage room" was continuous and unending, interrupted on occasion by orgasms and sleep, after which she would awaken refreshed but still in the storage room, unaware that two weeks had passed.

Suzy and Quinn had used the closet a dozen times in the last six months.

Quinn closed the door, leaving Suzy in total darkness. Just outside the door, she turned on the digital music player, which would, for the next two hours, play back the sounds recorded in Dad's auto body shop a few days ago.

Suzy relaxed and let herself drift downward, feeling Susan coalesce within her.

Susan awoke. Immediately she remembered: I must not move. I must not make a sound. She could hear the voices in conversations right outside the door, the pinging of tools against metal, the clanking of parts being moved. The fear within her grew, billowing into terror, in response to the sounds she was hearing, sounds of people, only a few feet away, who must not be allowed to find her. But the fear was contained. The Glow held it in check, not allowing it to touch Susan. All the Glow required in return, all that was needed to sustain it and power it, was that Susan remain still and silent. She always did so. She always would.

She no longer gave any thought to the length of time she had been here. Any past life, before this closet, was out of the conscious reach of her memory. If her concentration on the here-and-now, her focus on her need to lie still, were to lapse, disaster would follow. But she was up to the task. The Glow rewarded her.

She existed in a universe of glory, bathed in the Glow, which the fear couldn't penetrate, though she remained fully aware of the fear's presence.

After a timeless time, there was a sudden buzzing between her legs, deep inside her. The Glow, which had enveloped her entire being, now contracted, concentrating itself in that one place, and flowed outward from it. All of her being, her awareness of self, was between her legs now, and intensifying, impossible to contain.

The orgasm exploded within her, pulsing throughout her body, from its source between her legs out to the tips of her toes and fingers. Yet she never moved.

It faded at last. She didn't try to hold onto it, because she knew it would return. It always did. The cycle had been going on forever. It was eternal.

As always at this point in the cycle, post-orgasm, she felt herself drifting downward as sleep came over her, the bliss of her recent orgasm enfolding her in warmth. To begin the cycle again when she awoke.