I've never posted any of my stories in this thread before but I am working on something that I would like to get some feedback on before I develop it further and post it.
The story is called "Kim in Nemesisland". The premise is that it will be based on real scenarios in a dungeon mistress's dungeon intertwined with characters from, and allusions, to Alice in Wonderland. Another story I have already posted works on a similar assumption but uses the Tales of the Arabian Nights as its inspiration
http://www.literotica.com/stories/showstory.php?id=421214
The principal character, Kim, is this dungeon mistress's slave girl - other characters will be entirely fictional or loosely based on people I know. However, it is important to me that this story should not just be an in joke and work as a piece of writing for a wider audience. So, this is one of the questions I want to ask. Do readers think basic premise will work?
The other question I am having trouble with is which category to put the story in. I have posted stories in BDSM and Erotic Horror before, though audiences for Erotic Horror are much smaller than BDSM. In other chapters there will definitely be a very clear BDSM content though that is not necessarily reflected in the draft chapters I have pasted below. Some chapters may fit into the Fetish category. Would you recommend putting different chapters in different categories depending on their content or go for one category and stick to it.
The other question I want to ask is, is the world believable. By this I don't mean realistic - I know its not, it is deliberately fantastical, which you are either going to go for or not. The point is more, given the basic assumption, is the world I've created believable and does it take the reader along with it.
I have written chapters 1, 2 and 4 or 5, so there is a gap in the sequence of what I have posted.
Feedback on any of the above, or any general comments on the story would be welcomed. Ta.
Kim’s Adventures in Nemesisland
Chapter 1
A Bizarre Rescue
Kim fought for breath. Her face pressed hard against the pillow of the bed, the weight of a body crushing down on her, a hand over her mouth, cold metal of a knife against her throat.
The hand over her mouth relaxed long enough for her to take in a long gasp of air, like a free diver surfacing and taking in a long blast of life sustaining breath before going under again.
She took in just enough to sob, “No, please don’t, please,” before the hand tightened over her again.
“So, you don’t do anal. You fucking whore. You’ll do what I want. I’ll take what I’ve paid for.”
This was what Kim had always feared about her work in the massage parlour, that, sometime, in amongst the lonely men who couldn’t get a fuck from anybody, the frustrated husbands who couldn’t get enough at home and the old men who fancied a bit of younger stuff she would come across somebody who was seriously deranged and malicious. She put up with most things, she knew she was good at her job and could give her clients a good time. Most of them were harmless and there were even regulars who she genuinely looked forward to seeing. But, lurking under the surface was always the threat that one day she would encounter a truly nasty piece of work. That day was here.
The hand was removed from her mouth, but her face was still pressed against into the pillow until Kim forced her head up for a fleeting moment. There was one desperate card she could play.
“The other girls will hear; you won’t get away with this. Look, I’ll suck you off if you want, but not this.”
The knife pressed harder against her throat, she could feel its razor edge nick her throat and a bead of hot blood against her skin.
“You scream and you’re a gonner, slut.”
Her face was pushed down again and Kim fought for breath. She could believe it. Her face was still throbbing from the punch she got when she first told him that she didn’t do anal sex. Her forehead was still smarting and bloodied from being bashed against the bed-head. She was terrified. The sweat of fear oozed out of every pore in her body as she struggled for breath. She didn’t deserve this, no working girl deserved to be treated like this.
She felt the weight of the hairy body, took in smell of stale sweat and bad breath. She felt the hardness pressing against the flesh of her naked bottom searching for the right spot. She felt a hand against her, exploring her flesh, trying to find her tight little arse-hole. She could feel the hard cock against her being pushed into the crack in her bottom. He had found the right spot now. She had had a bad experience with anal before, an insensitive boyfriend who had made a clumsy and painful attempt without using any lubricant. This is what had put her off offering it to her clients.
Kim braced herself for the searing pain and the humiliation….but it didn’t come.
Instead, there was a dull thud. That one of the other girls must have heard something and come to the rescue was Kim’s immediate thought. Kim’s face was still pushed into the pillow but she could sense movement and other people in the room. She felt her attacker’s body, now an immobile dead weight, being dragged off her aching body. She forced herself over to see her rescuers, expecting it to be Ruby or Tiffany, who worked the downstairs rooms.
What she saw surprised her as much as the shock of the initial blow the psycho had inflicted on her.
She blinked in amazement. What she saw were two figures. Both would have been large enough even without being wrapped in bolsters and blankets, which they were. One had a massive cast iron saucepan in one hand and a wooden sword in the other, the second had a large brass coal shuttle in one hand and an umbrella in the other. It appeared to Kim both the heavy items of household ware had been used on her attacker, who lay unconscious on the floor.
One figure turned to the other, “It’s lucky we came dressed for battle.”
“Contrariwise,” the other said, “I still expect satisfaction from you for breaking my rattle.”
In a daze Kim couldn’t help but smile.
“Tweedledum and Tweeledee agreed to have a battle…” she thought to herself as she passed out.
Chapter 2
The White Rabbit
Kim found herself, still naked, crouched, her back against a cold stone wall. It was pitched black, only the barest flicker of light seeped past the perimeter of the thick metal cell door. Her eyes gradually adjusted to the darkness.
The strange events of the last hour spun around her head as she tried to piece them together and make sense of them. She couldn’t. On the verge of being raped in the arse by a psycho in the massage parlour where she worked, her attacker had been disabled by two characters that looked like Tweedledum and Tweedledee from ‘Alice Through The Looking Glass’. The she recalled a fog pass over her as she passed out.
The next thing she remembered was a long descent down a tunnel. Down, down, down she went. Was it a dream? Had the attack traumatised her so much she was delusional? She wondered if her descent would ever come to an end. First, she tried to look down and make out what where she was heading and how far she had to fall but it was too dark to see anything.
Then, she looked at the sides of the tunnel. There were book shelves lining the walls. She tried to take in some of titles as she floated past: ‘120 Days of Sodom’ by the Marquis De Sade, very apt thought Kim; ‘The Golden Bough’ by Sir James George Frazer; ‘A Study of Ritual Hero and Goddess in the Illiad’ by Joan V O’Brien and a copy of the Egyptian Book of the Dead were some of the titles she saw as she drifted past. What an intriguing collection of books she thought, its owner must have some very strange tastes.
Down, down, down Kim tumbled. Interspersed amongst the cupboards and book-shelves there were pictures on the wall. Quirky sketches showing bizarre scenes of bondage and strange rituals in great detail. There was another set of pictures, comic book covers with fetish fairy tale characters.
After descending for what seemed like an age Kim had found herself in this cell. She had no idea how she got there. The cell had solid stone walls and, once her eyes had adjusted, Kim could see that there was no opening in any of them, or in the roof.
Kim could not make sense of anything. Well, she thought, there is nothing much I can do. Perhaps I shall just be left here to rot and centuries later my skeleton will be found and I will become the source of a great murder mystery. She imagined the cell a hive of activity, full of white boiler suited and masked forensic scientists. “Yes, we know that she was a girl in her late twenties. This is interesting; we can tell from a close examination of her pelvic bones that she was a sexually active young woman.” Kim supposed that she would rather her life would not be exposed to that kind of scrutiny but she had to find some way of diverting her mind away from her predicament. She was starting to get distressed when she heard movement outside the cell door.
A window in the cell door was slid back. Kim’s heart jumped a beat. Was she going to be let out? She looked up. A pink nose, whiskers and black beady eyes appeared at the opening. A white pawed hand ran across the whiskered face.
“Oh dear! Oh dear! I shall be too late,” she heard a voice mutter.
She heard the jangling of keys and the metal door creak open.
I don’t believe this, thought Kim, I rather believe I must be in a dream, or a nightmare. She pinched herself. There was a man sized white rabbit in the frame of the door.
“You’re late.”
A thousand questions Kim would like to have asked spun around her head but she could only blurt out, “What do you mean I’m late?”
The white rabbit hopped nervously from one foot to another anxiously looking at his fob watch, tapping its face hard with his knuckle as if this act might miraculously make time move backwards for him.
“Oh, Oh, I’m going to be in so much trouble. I’m late, so, so late. Mistress is not going to like this. She likes everybody to be punctual. Oh, I’m going to be in trouble,” the rabbit muttered to himself.
“Shut up babbling and tell me where I am and what I’m doing here,”
Kim demanded.
“No, no, there’s no time for explanations, I’m already five minutes late. We must be going.”
“I’m not going anywhere until I get some answers.”
“My mistress will explain. Look, please, let’s go. I’m already going to get punished; the later I am the more severely I will get punished. You wouldn’t like to see me punished, would you?” the white rabbit pleaded.
Kim sniffed, “Well, I don’t see why I should care. If it was left to me, and you were a real rabbit, then I should put you in a casserole and eat you. Besides, it’s me who has been kidnapped and imprisoned.”
“Oh please,” the rabbit pleaded. “I don’t know anything. I can’t answer your questions. She might do. We’re already late. Believe me; we don’t want to anger her any more, that’s not good for me or you either. If you want answers please do as I say and come with me.”
Kim decided that she was not going to get any sensible answers from this bundle of babbling idiocy. If she wanted answers then she might get them from this white rabbit’s mistress. The wicked thought crossed her mind that he rather deserved to be punished and she really wouldn’t mind seeing it happen.
“Oh, well, come on then,” said Kim.
“I have to put these on you,” said the white rabbit apologetically as he dangled a collar and blindfold in front of her.
“Oh, well, if you must.”
Her situation was so bizarre that she had got beyond caring. I suppose that being blindfolded by a white rabbit has to be preferred to being fucked up the arse by a psychopath she thought. She would much rather be safe at home, freshly showered in her dressing gown with her cat, Dinah, nestled in her lap and a nice glass of chilled white wine in her hand.
The white rabbit quickly and nervously tightened the leather collar round her neck and attached a chain to it. He pulled a blindfold over her eyes and adjusted it so that she was in complete darkness.
“Follow me,” he said, “I will take you to my mistress; she’s expecting you.”
Chapter 3
Kim’s encounter with the Queen of Hearts
Chapter 4
Kim Talks to a Black Cat
Kim traced her steps back through the darkness of the medieval chamber with its fearsome cage and pit and emerged into a corridor. Here she faced a difficult choice; to her left was one door, facing her was a short passage leading to another door and across from her was a gruesome metal gate with the name ‘Nemesis’ welded onto it that led to stairs and an upper floor. Where should she go next? She had already had two strange adventures and she wished she could end up somewhere normal with normal people and hold a normal conversation.
Kim noticed something. Built in the space under the stairs there was a small cage with a wire mesh door that was padlocked. Kim’s attention had been drawn by a flicker of movement in this cage. As she approached and her eyes penetrated the gloom she could see a shadowy figure inside.
She peered into the cage through the wire mesh. A whiskered face, pointed black ears and a pair of eyes stared back at her. She jumped back in fright. It was strange creature, the shape of a man but with the features of a cat. The ankles and wrists of the black cat, if that was indeed what it was, had been shackled and padlocked to hooks on the walls and floor of the cage. His head hung forlornly and his bushy black and white tail spread out from underneath his back-side where he sat.
There was a tag on the leather collar around the cat’s neck. Kim put her fingers through the wire mesh and tentatively reached for it, hoping that the animal would not scratch or bite her. ‘Nano’, it read. That must be the cat’s name, thought Kim. What a strange name for a cat. She flipped the metal disc around and on the other side was another inscription, ‘Property of Mistress Nemesis’, it read. This was even stranger, thought Kim. What could that mean?
The cat eyed her warily. She wondered if the cat could speak at all. The strange encounters she had already experienced suggested it was worth striking up a conversation with the animal. It was hardly going to be the normal conversation she craved but she was so anxious to find her way out of this world that she would make use of any opportunity to find how she could escape, however strange.
“Hello, my name is Kim. Can you help me? I’ve lost my way,” she asked.
“Well, that’s very careless of you,” the cat replied.
Kim glared at the black cat. Really, this was so infuriating, would nobody here give her a sensible answer. She only wanted to find her way out of this bizarre place and get home. She was about to speak crossly to the cat and tell him off for being so rude and unhelpful when he spoke again.
“Besides you don’t have any ways, all of the ways here belong to Mistress Nemesis. You’ll have to use one of her ways.”
At least Kim had got an answer of sorts, even if it was a strange one. But, the black cat named Nano appeared to know something about this place so Kim thought it was worth pursuing him with some more questions.
“So, who is Mistress Nemesis?” she asked.
“This is all her domain, her kingdom, there is nothing that happens in here that she doesn’t know about or doesn’t control,” the cat replied.
“You mean I have no free will in this place at all? I must have some choices.”
“No, of course not, Mistress Nemesis controls everything here. You’ll meet many characters in this world but they are all doing her bidding. Sometimes they may think they have free will but it will be an illusion. Even when you think you have made a choice it will only be because that’s what she desires. Mistress Nemesis is powerful; she will get inside your head and make you do what she wants. Everybody in this world is in her control, they all serve her.”
Kim contemplated the answer she had been given. The cat was proving to be most helpful and knowledgeable. Perhaps if Kim could find out more about how this world worked she could find a way out. Mistress Nemesis seemed to be the key to escaping from this place, especially if the cat was right about the power she wielded over her domain. The cat seemed to have got over his initial nervousness at being approached by her and was speaking to her openly. She decided to get as much information out of the cat as she could.
“So, this Mistress Nemesis, am I likely to meet her at all?”
“Oh yes, almost certainly, but she takes on many characters, sometimes you might not know. Who have you met in Nemesisland?”
“Well, I’ve met the Queen of Hearts in a chamber with a cage and Nurse Sally in a medical examination room,” Kim replied.
“Oh well, you’ve almost certainly met her then, both of those are personas she takes as she travels through her kingdom. She has many guises. Most of the time she will treat you cruelly, she is capable of inflicting severe punishments on the people who occupy her world, especially if they displease her or fail to carry out her instructions. She will laugh at you as well. Even when you are in the most awful of predicaments it will amuse her. Occasionally, if you serve her well and if you are lucky, very lucky, she will show you some kindness.”
“Well, I think she sounds quite horrid,” said Kim, “I rather hope that I don’t meet her again.”
The cat nodded his head and smiled at Kim. “No, you haven’t understood this world at all. She’s not horrible. When you have been here a bit longer you will understand, you will embrace her, you will do whatever she wants and, however painful or humiliating, it won’t matter because you’ll want to serve her.”
Kim was struggling with this concept. She had been told that she had no free will and now she was being told that she would have to be servile to the cruel mistress of this bizarre world.
“I’m sure I should not wish to serve such a person.”
The black cat laughed at her.
“I bet you have already given yourself up to her. There are none here that don’t. Did the Queen of Hearts punish you?”
“Yes, she treated me cruelly. She chained me up in a cage, twisted my nipples and used an electric wand on me.”
“And you could do nothing to resist could you? Am I right?”
“Yes, I suppose so.”
“Even when you weren’t restrained you did nothing to escape, did you?
“Well, you’re right, I didn’t”
“And tell me, be honest, when the pain was being inflicted, you wanted it didn’t you? You didn’t want it to stop, did you? I bet you wanted more, didn’t you?”
Kim was shocked. It was as if an express train had stopped her in her tracks. All of this was true.
“And did she have you carrying out tasks for her?”
“Well yes, I guess she did. She told me to punish some slaves and I was her assistant during a medical examination.”
“And you did it all without questioning, didn’t you? You had to, because she wanted you to and you were powerless to resist!”
Kim gaped as the dawn of realisation hit her.
“You are a character in Nemesisland now,” the black cat laughed, “You have been captivated and there is nothing you can do about it.”
“But how can I get out?” cried Kim.
“You don’t. At least not until she lets you go. Anyway, after a little while you won’t want to, you’ll want to stay here. Don’t worry, all of the characters in Nemesisland have been through what you have. Some have accepted their place whilst others still resist. But it’s hopeless, she will control you in the end. She is very powerful. Look at me. It was through doing a task for her that I got turned into a cat. “
“How did that happen?” asked Kim.
“It’s a long story. “
“Oh, but do tell me, I’d like to hear.”
“Well I’ll try and tell it as briefly as I can without missing out any of the important parts. Sometimes Mistress Nemesis lets her characters out of Nemesisland. Some privileged slaves are given missions to carry out for her. I have been lucky enough to be sent on such a mission. You have heard of the Celtic Goddess, Rhiannon?”
“Yes, I have. Well at least from stories and myths.”
“I had to go to an underground labyrinth in the Welsh borders where the Celtic Goddess Rhiannon and her magical white horse and birds were being held in captivity.”
“Ooh, a magical horse, that sounds exciting,” Kim interjected.
“Yes and also very dangerous. She was being held captive by the Roman invaders who were seeking to destroy the powers of the Celtic Goddesses. My task was to rescue Goddess Rhiannon and her horse. Mistress Nemesis provided me with an elixir which gave me the shape shifting powers of the Goddesses. I used this to turn myself into a horse to infiltrate the stables where Rhiannon’s horse was held. But I was caught myself and turned myself into a black cat so I could sneak away from my captors. I did eventually escape with Goddess Rhiannon and her horse but, although my mission was successful, at one point I had succumbed to temptation and seduction so Mistress Nemesis kept me in this cat’s body as a punishment.”
What a strange tale, thought Kim. Perhaps the worlds outside of this place were even odder still.
“But, don’t you mind being a cat?” asked Kim.
“Oh no, not really,” the cat replied. “I have learnt to accept Mistress Nemesis’s judgement in these things. One day, when she is ready and she thinks I have suffered enough, I expect she will turn me back into my human form and release me.”
“I should find it very strange to be a cat,“ said Kim. “Would she turn me into a cat do you think?”
The black cat smiled, a long broad grin, wider than a Cheshire cat’s.
“Beware, she is capable of turning you into whatever she pleases and having you do whatever she desires.”
Kim sighed, “I don’t know if I’m going to like it here, it’s so very weird. If only I could find my out and back home.”
“As I have said, the only ways are Mistress Nemesis’s ways. You will have to follow the path that is laid out for you and when you have finished your journey submit to her judgement as to whether she will let return to your world. Who knows, by then, you might be happy to stay.”
The cat had already been helpful and explained something of the strange world that Kim found herself in. She decided on another line of questioning now, one that might give her some practical help.
“Can you tell me where these doors lead?” asked Kim.
“The door behind you leads to another part of Goddess Nemesis’s realm that leads to a dark isolation chamber. Upstairs beyond the metal door is the heart of her world. It is a forbidding place with dungeons and instruments of torture. Through the door there,“ the cat nodded his head in the direction, “there is a tea party going on.”
“Oh, just like Alice in Wonderland, that sounds fun,” said Kim. “I think I should prefer that to dungeons and torture chambers. Thank you for your help. I hope your Mistress sets you free soon. Goodbye,” Kim called out as she set off towards the next door.
“Goodbye Kim. I’m sure our paths will cross again. Beware, not all tea parties are such fun,” the cat called down the corridor.
But the warning came as Kim skipped out of ear shot, too late for her to heed the cat’s words.
The story is called "Kim in Nemesisland". The premise is that it will be based on real scenarios in a dungeon mistress's dungeon intertwined with characters from, and allusions, to Alice in Wonderland. Another story I have already posted works on a similar assumption but uses the Tales of the Arabian Nights as its inspiration
http://www.literotica.com/stories/showstory.php?id=421214
The principal character, Kim, is this dungeon mistress's slave girl - other characters will be entirely fictional or loosely based on people I know. However, it is important to me that this story should not just be an in joke and work as a piece of writing for a wider audience. So, this is one of the questions I want to ask. Do readers think basic premise will work?
The other question I am having trouble with is which category to put the story in. I have posted stories in BDSM and Erotic Horror before, though audiences for Erotic Horror are much smaller than BDSM. In other chapters there will definitely be a very clear BDSM content though that is not necessarily reflected in the draft chapters I have pasted below. Some chapters may fit into the Fetish category. Would you recommend putting different chapters in different categories depending on their content or go for one category and stick to it.
The other question I want to ask is, is the world believable. By this I don't mean realistic - I know its not, it is deliberately fantastical, which you are either going to go for or not. The point is more, given the basic assumption, is the world I've created believable and does it take the reader along with it.
I have written chapters 1, 2 and 4 or 5, so there is a gap in the sequence of what I have posted.
Feedback on any of the above, or any general comments on the story would be welcomed. Ta.
Kim’s Adventures in Nemesisland
Chapter 1
A Bizarre Rescue
Kim fought for breath. Her face pressed hard against the pillow of the bed, the weight of a body crushing down on her, a hand over her mouth, cold metal of a knife against her throat.
The hand over her mouth relaxed long enough for her to take in a long gasp of air, like a free diver surfacing and taking in a long blast of life sustaining breath before going under again.
She took in just enough to sob, “No, please don’t, please,” before the hand tightened over her again.
“So, you don’t do anal. You fucking whore. You’ll do what I want. I’ll take what I’ve paid for.”
This was what Kim had always feared about her work in the massage parlour, that, sometime, in amongst the lonely men who couldn’t get a fuck from anybody, the frustrated husbands who couldn’t get enough at home and the old men who fancied a bit of younger stuff she would come across somebody who was seriously deranged and malicious. She put up with most things, she knew she was good at her job and could give her clients a good time. Most of them were harmless and there were even regulars who she genuinely looked forward to seeing. But, lurking under the surface was always the threat that one day she would encounter a truly nasty piece of work. That day was here.
The hand was removed from her mouth, but her face was still pressed against into the pillow until Kim forced her head up for a fleeting moment. There was one desperate card she could play.
“The other girls will hear; you won’t get away with this. Look, I’ll suck you off if you want, but not this.”
The knife pressed harder against her throat, she could feel its razor edge nick her throat and a bead of hot blood against her skin.
“You scream and you’re a gonner, slut.”
Her face was pushed down again and Kim fought for breath. She could believe it. Her face was still throbbing from the punch she got when she first told him that she didn’t do anal sex. Her forehead was still smarting and bloodied from being bashed against the bed-head. She was terrified. The sweat of fear oozed out of every pore in her body as she struggled for breath. She didn’t deserve this, no working girl deserved to be treated like this.
She felt the weight of the hairy body, took in smell of stale sweat and bad breath. She felt the hardness pressing against the flesh of her naked bottom searching for the right spot. She felt a hand against her, exploring her flesh, trying to find her tight little arse-hole. She could feel the hard cock against her being pushed into the crack in her bottom. He had found the right spot now. She had had a bad experience with anal before, an insensitive boyfriend who had made a clumsy and painful attempt without using any lubricant. This is what had put her off offering it to her clients.
Kim braced herself for the searing pain and the humiliation….but it didn’t come.
Instead, there was a dull thud. That one of the other girls must have heard something and come to the rescue was Kim’s immediate thought. Kim’s face was still pushed into the pillow but she could sense movement and other people in the room. She felt her attacker’s body, now an immobile dead weight, being dragged off her aching body. She forced herself over to see her rescuers, expecting it to be Ruby or Tiffany, who worked the downstairs rooms.
What she saw surprised her as much as the shock of the initial blow the psycho had inflicted on her.
She blinked in amazement. What she saw were two figures. Both would have been large enough even without being wrapped in bolsters and blankets, which they were. One had a massive cast iron saucepan in one hand and a wooden sword in the other, the second had a large brass coal shuttle in one hand and an umbrella in the other. It appeared to Kim both the heavy items of household ware had been used on her attacker, who lay unconscious on the floor.
One figure turned to the other, “It’s lucky we came dressed for battle.”
“Contrariwise,” the other said, “I still expect satisfaction from you for breaking my rattle.”
In a daze Kim couldn’t help but smile.
“Tweedledum and Tweeledee agreed to have a battle…” she thought to herself as she passed out.
Chapter 2
The White Rabbit
Kim found herself, still naked, crouched, her back against a cold stone wall. It was pitched black, only the barest flicker of light seeped past the perimeter of the thick metal cell door. Her eyes gradually adjusted to the darkness.
The strange events of the last hour spun around her head as she tried to piece them together and make sense of them. She couldn’t. On the verge of being raped in the arse by a psycho in the massage parlour where she worked, her attacker had been disabled by two characters that looked like Tweedledum and Tweedledee from ‘Alice Through The Looking Glass’. The she recalled a fog pass over her as she passed out.
The next thing she remembered was a long descent down a tunnel. Down, down, down she went. Was it a dream? Had the attack traumatised her so much she was delusional? She wondered if her descent would ever come to an end. First, she tried to look down and make out what where she was heading and how far she had to fall but it was too dark to see anything.
Then, she looked at the sides of the tunnel. There were book shelves lining the walls. She tried to take in some of titles as she floated past: ‘120 Days of Sodom’ by the Marquis De Sade, very apt thought Kim; ‘The Golden Bough’ by Sir James George Frazer; ‘A Study of Ritual Hero and Goddess in the Illiad’ by Joan V O’Brien and a copy of the Egyptian Book of the Dead were some of the titles she saw as she drifted past. What an intriguing collection of books she thought, its owner must have some very strange tastes.
Down, down, down Kim tumbled. Interspersed amongst the cupboards and book-shelves there were pictures on the wall. Quirky sketches showing bizarre scenes of bondage and strange rituals in great detail. There was another set of pictures, comic book covers with fetish fairy tale characters.
After descending for what seemed like an age Kim had found herself in this cell. She had no idea how she got there. The cell had solid stone walls and, once her eyes had adjusted, Kim could see that there was no opening in any of them, or in the roof.
Kim could not make sense of anything. Well, she thought, there is nothing much I can do. Perhaps I shall just be left here to rot and centuries later my skeleton will be found and I will become the source of a great murder mystery. She imagined the cell a hive of activity, full of white boiler suited and masked forensic scientists. “Yes, we know that she was a girl in her late twenties. This is interesting; we can tell from a close examination of her pelvic bones that she was a sexually active young woman.” Kim supposed that she would rather her life would not be exposed to that kind of scrutiny but she had to find some way of diverting her mind away from her predicament. She was starting to get distressed when she heard movement outside the cell door.
A window in the cell door was slid back. Kim’s heart jumped a beat. Was she going to be let out? She looked up. A pink nose, whiskers and black beady eyes appeared at the opening. A white pawed hand ran across the whiskered face.
“Oh dear! Oh dear! I shall be too late,” she heard a voice mutter.
She heard the jangling of keys and the metal door creak open.
I don’t believe this, thought Kim, I rather believe I must be in a dream, or a nightmare. She pinched herself. There was a man sized white rabbit in the frame of the door.
“You’re late.”
A thousand questions Kim would like to have asked spun around her head but she could only blurt out, “What do you mean I’m late?”
The white rabbit hopped nervously from one foot to another anxiously looking at his fob watch, tapping its face hard with his knuckle as if this act might miraculously make time move backwards for him.
“Oh, Oh, I’m going to be in so much trouble. I’m late, so, so late. Mistress is not going to like this. She likes everybody to be punctual. Oh, I’m going to be in trouble,” the rabbit muttered to himself.
“Shut up babbling and tell me where I am and what I’m doing here,”
Kim demanded.
“No, no, there’s no time for explanations, I’m already five minutes late. We must be going.”
“I’m not going anywhere until I get some answers.”
“My mistress will explain. Look, please, let’s go. I’m already going to get punished; the later I am the more severely I will get punished. You wouldn’t like to see me punished, would you?” the white rabbit pleaded.
Kim sniffed, “Well, I don’t see why I should care. If it was left to me, and you were a real rabbit, then I should put you in a casserole and eat you. Besides, it’s me who has been kidnapped and imprisoned.”
“Oh please,” the rabbit pleaded. “I don’t know anything. I can’t answer your questions. She might do. We’re already late. Believe me; we don’t want to anger her any more, that’s not good for me or you either. If you want answers please do as I say and come with me.”
Kim decided that she was not going to get any sensible answers from this bundle of babbling idiocy. If she wanted answers then she might get them from this white rabbit’s mistress. The wicked thought crossed her mind that he rather deserved to be punished and she really wouldn’t mind seeing it happen.
“Oh, well, come on then,” said Kim.
“I have to put these on you,” said the white rabbit apologetically as he dangled a collar and blindfold in front of her.
“Oh, well, if you must.”
Her situation was so bizarre that she had got beyond caring. I suppose that being blindfolded by a white rabbit has to be preferred to being fucked up the arse by a psychopath she thought. She would much rather be safe at home, freshly showered in her dressing gown with her cat, Dinah, nestled in her lap and a nice glass of chilled white wine in her hand.
The white rabbit quickly and nervously tightened the leather collar round her neck and attached a chain to it. He pulled a blindfold over her eyes and adjusted it so that she was in complete darkness.
“Follow me,” he said, “I will take you to my mistress; she’s expecting you.”
Chapter 3
Kim’s encounter with the Queen of Hearts
Chapter 4
Kim Talks to a Black Cat
Kim traced her steps back through the darkness of the medieval chamber with its fearsome cage and pit and emerged into a corridor. Here she faced a difficult choice; to her left was one door, facing her was a short passage leading to another door and across from her was a gruesome metal gate with the name ‘Nemesis’ welded onto it that led to stairs and an upper floor. Where should she go next? She had already had two strange adventures and she wished she could end up somewhere normal with normal people and hold a normal conversation.
Kim noticed something. Built in the space under the stairs there was a small cage with a wire mesh door that was padlocked. Kim’s attention had been drawn by a flicker of movement in this cage. As she approached and her eyes penetrated the gloom she could see a shadowy figure inside.
She peered into the cage through the wire mesh. A whiskered face, pointed black ears and a pair of eyes stared back at her. She jumped back in fright. It was strange creature, the shape of a man but with the features of a cat. The ankles and wrists of the black cat, if that was indeed what it was, had been shackled and padlocked to hooks on the walls and floor of the cage. His head hung forlornly and his bushy black and white tail spread out from underneath his back-side where he sat.
There was a tag on the leather collar around the cat’s neck. Kim put her fingers through the wire mesh and tentatively reached for it, hoping that the animal would not scratch or bite her. ‘Nano’, it read. That must be the cat’s name, thought Kim. What a strange name for a cat. She flipped the metal disc around and on the other side was another inscription, ‘Property of Mistress Nemesis’, it read. This was even stranger, thought Kim. What could that mean?
The cat eyed her warily. She wondered if the cat could speak at all. The strange encounters she had already experienced suggested it was worth striking up a conversation with the animal. It was hardly going to be the normal conversation she craved but she was so anxious to find her way out of this world that she would make use of any opportunity to find how she could escape, however strange.
“Hello, my name is Kim. Can you help me? I’ve lost my way,” she asked.
“Well, that’s very careless of you,” the cat replied.
Kim glared at the black cat. Really, this was so infuriating, would nobody here give her a sensible answer. She only wanted to find her way out of this bizarre place and get home. She was about to speak crossly to the cat and tell him off for being so rude and unhelpful when he spoke again.
“Besides you don’t have any ways, all of the ways here belong to Mistress Nemesis. You’ll have to use one of her ways.”
At least Kim had got an answer of sorts, even if it was a strange one. But, the black cat named Nano appeared to know something about this place so Kim thought it was worth pursuing him with some more questions.
“So, who is Mistress Nemesis?” she asked.
“This is all her domain, her kingdom, there is nothing that happens in here that she doesn’t know about or doesn’t control,” the cat replied.
“You mean I have no free will in this place at all? I must have some choices.”
“No, of course not, Mistress Nemesis controls everything here. You’ll meet many characters in this world but they are all doing her bidding. Sometimes they may think they have free will but it will be an illusion. Even when you think you have made a choice it will only be because that’s what she desires. Mistress Nemesis is powerful; she will get inside your head and make you do what she wants. Everybody in this world is in her control, they all serve her.”
Kim contemplated the answer she had been given. The cat was proving to be most helpful and knowledgeable. Perhaps if Kim could find out more about how this world worked she could find a way out. Mistress Nemesis seemed to be the key to escaping from this place, especially if the cat was right about the power she wielded over her domain. The cat seemed to have got over his initial nervousness at being approached by her and was speaking to her openly. She decided to get as much information out of the cat as she could.
“So, this Mistress Nemesis, am I likely to meet her at all?”
“Oh yes, almost certainly, but she takes on many characters, sometimes you might not know. Who have you met in Nemesisland?”
“Well, I’ve met the Queen of Hearts in a chamber with a cage and Nurse Sally in a medical examination room,” Kim replied.
“Oh well, you’ve almost certainly met her then, both of those are personas she takes as she travels through her kingdom. She has many guises. Most of the time she will treat you cruelly, she is capable of inflicting severe punishments on the people who occupy her world, especially if they displease her or fail to carry out her instructions. She will laugh at you as well. Even when you are in the most awful of predicaments it will amuse her. Occasionally, if you serve her well and if you are lucky, very lucky, she will show you some kindness.”
“Well, I think she sounds quite horrid,” said Kim, “I rather hope that I don’t meet her again.”
The cat nodded his head and smiled at Kim. “No, you haven’t understood this world at all. She’s not horrible. When you have been here a bit longer you will understand, you will embrace her, you will do whatever she wants and, however painful or humiliating, it won’t matter because you’ll want to serve her.”
Kim was struggling with this concept. She had been told that she had no free will and now she was being told that she would have to be servile to the cruel mistress of this bizarre world.
“I’m sure I should not wish to serve such a person.”
The black cat laughed at her.
“I bet you have already given yourself up to her. There are none here that don’t. Did the Queen of Hearts punish you?”
“Yes, she treated me cruelly. She chained me up in a cage, twisted my nipples and used an electric wand on me.”
“And you could do nothing to resist could you? Am I right?”
“Yes, I suppose so.”
“Even when you weren’t restrained you did nothing to escape, did you?
“Well, you’re right, I didn’t”
“And tell me, be honest, when the pain was being inflicted, you wanted it didn’t you? You didn’t want it to stop, did you? I bet you wanted more, didn’t you?”
Kim was shocked. It was as if an express train had stopped her in her tracks. All of this was true.
“And did she have you carrying out tasks for her?”
“Well yes, I guess she did. She told me to punish some slaves and I was her assistant during a medical examination.”
“And you did it all without questioning, didn’t you? You had to, because she wanted you to and you were powerless to resist!”
Kim gaped as the dawn of realisation hit her.
“You are a character in Nemesisland now,” the black cat laughed, “You have been captivated and there is nothing you can do about it.”
“But how can I get out?” cried Kim.
“You don’t. At least not until she lets you go. Anyway, after a little while you won’t want to, you’ll want to stay here. Don’t worry, all of the characters in Nemesisland have been through what you have. Some have accepted their place whilst others still resist. But it’s hopeless, she will control you in the end. She is very powerful. Look at me. It was through doing a task for her that I got turned into a cat. “
“How did that happen?” asked Kim.
“It’s a long story. “
“Oh, but do tell me, I’d like to hear.”
“Well I’ll try and tell it as briefly as I can without missing out any of the important parts. Sometimes Mistress Nemesis lets her characters out of Nemesisland. Some privileged slaves are given missions to carry out for her. I have been lucky enough to be sent on such a mission. You have heard of the Celtic Goddess, Rhiannon?”
“Yes, I have. Well at least from stories and myths.”
“I had to go to an underground labyrinth in the Welsh borders where the Celtic Goddess Rhiannon and her magical white horse and birds were being held in captivity.”
“Ooh, a magical horse, that sounds exciting,” Kim interjected.
“Yes and also very dangerous. She was being held captive by the Roman invaders who were seeking to destroy the powers of the Celtic Goddesses. My task was to rescue Goddess Rhiannon and her horse. Mistress Nemesis provided me with an elixir which gave me the shape shifting powers of the Goddesses. I used this to turn myself into a horse to infiltrate the stables where Rhiannon’s horse was held. But I was caught myself and turned myself into a black cat so I could sneak away from my captors. I did eventually escape with Goddess Rhiannon and her horse but, although my mission was successful, at one point I had succumbed to temptation and seduction so Mistress Nemesis kept me in this cat’s body as a punishment.”
What a strange tale, thought Kim. Perhaps the worlds outside of this place were even odder still.
“But, don’t you mind being a cat?” asked Kim.
“Oh no, not really,” the cat replied. “I have learnt to accept Mistress Nemesis’s judgement in these things. One day, when she is ready and she thinks I have suffered enough, I expect she will turn me back into my human form and release me.”
“I should find it very strange to be a cat,“ said Kim. “Would she turn me into a cat do you think?”
The black cat smiled, a long broad grin, wider than a Cheshire cat’s.
“Beware, she is capable of turning you into whatever she pleases and having you do whatever she desires.”
Kim sighed, “I don’t know if I’m going to like it here, it’s so very weird. If only I could find my out and back home.”
“As I have said, the only ways are Mistress Nemesis’s ways. You will have to follow the path that is laid out for you and when you have finished your journey submit to her judgement as to whether she will let return to your world. Who knows, by then, you might be happy to stay.”
The cat had already been helpful and explained something of the strange world that Kim found herself in. She decided on another line of questioning now, one that might give her some practical help.
“Can you tell me where these doors lead?” asked Kim.
“The door behind you leads to another part of Goddess Nemesis’s realm that leads to a dark isolation chamber. Upstairs beyond the metal door is the heart of her world. It is a forbidding place with dungeons and instruments of torture. Through the door there,“ the cat nodded his head in the direction, “there is a tea party going on.”
“Oh, just like Alice in Wonderland, that sounds fun,” said Kim. “I think I should prefer that to dungeons and torture chambers. Thank you for your help. I hope your Mistress sets you free soon. Goodbye,” Kim called out as she set off towards the next door.
“Goodbye Kim. I’m sure our paths will cross again. Beware, not all tea parties are such fun,” the cat called down the corridor.
But the warning came as Kim skipped out of ear shot, too late for her to heed the cat’s words.
