Bug In The System

[imreadonly2]

BUG IN THE SYSTEM

by

Joe Doe


NICHOLE HAD DESIGNED THE PRISON'S COMPUTER SOFTWARE, BUT SHE WAS
TO LEARN THAT THERE WERE STILL A FEW BUGS IN THE SYSTEM.



Nichole knew that she didn't belong in the prison reception area.
But the thrill was irresistible.

She was a computer consultant hired to redesign the prison's
numerous systems. When Alice, the secretary in reception,
complained that her printer wasn't working, Nichole suspected
that it was simply out of toner again.

She could have explained to Alice how to install new toner
cartridges. But she had long ago decided that the secretary
was too old and stupid to train, so instead she told the woman
to go run an errand while Nichole fixed the problem herself.

After walking downstairs and quickly replacing the cartridge, she
concluded that a test was in order. She could merely have printed
a test page, but decided that an actual test of the admissions
program would be more appropriate, since this was the admissions
area.

She entered her own name into the live system:

INMATE ADMISSIONS PROGRAM

LAST NAME: BLUNDERPRONE
FIRST NAME: NICHOLE
CRIME: PROSTITUTION
SENTENCE: 6 MONTHS, HARD LABOR

She hesitated when she got to the portion of the screen marked
"Processing Instructions." After a long pause, she swallowed
and clicked the check-box marked "Maximum Security Intake."

The printer quickly spit out the instructions for her admission.
She tried to objectively review her intake order for print quality
and spacing:

PRISONER NMBR: 338-3834-3887-383
NAME: BLUNDERPRONE, NICHOLE

SENTENCE: 6 MONTHS, HARD LABOR

INTAKE INSTRUCTIONS: CONFISCATE ALL PERSONAL PROPERTY.
STRIP AND SEARCH ALL BODY CAVITIES.
SHOWER, DELOUSE, AND PHOTOGRAPH.
ISSUE CHAIN GANG UNIFORM.

She felt a shiver run down her spine as she read the instructions.
Until this moment, entering her own name into the inmate system
had been something of a forbidden game to her, a careless lark to
pass the time.

It was chilling to see the stark processing order with her name at
the top. How many times had she fantasized about being imprisoned?
How many times had she daydreamed about being stripped of her
dignity by the same type of efficient, routine bureaucracy that
she was an expert in developing?

The order seemed casual, almost trivial. Strip her naked, probe
her, shower her, delouse her. There was no mention of Nichole's
engineering degree from MIT or her MBA from Stanford. Just strip
the little slut naked and throw her in the shower, same as all the
rest. The computer didn't care that Nichole was the one who had
conceived the system and designed the software. She was just an
input record to be processed.

She knew how dangerous her computer systems could be. A few months
ago, a visiting policewoman was accidentally misclassified as a
prisoner when the system confused her badge number with an inmate
number.

The woman had tried to explain the mistake, but the cold, impassive
system that Nichole had devised didn't care. So the policewoman
had been routinely stripped, searched, showered, and deloused.

A few of the guards knew she was a policewoman, but, until the
warden returned to work on Monday morning, they were powerless
to release her. The career law enforcement officer was forced
to shower, eat, sleep, and labor with the other inmates.

Nichole looked nervously at the clock on the wall. It was 4:15 in
the afternoon, and the warden had gone home for the weekend. It
was not a good time for her to be standing in the reception area
holding an order authorizing her strip-search.

The realization sent a thrill through her. All of her life she had
been the good girl, with the perfect grades, the perfect career,
and the perfect life. She had always played it safe and never
rocked the boat, steering clear of the tawdry adventures of her
more daring friends.

Sneaking down here and entering her name into the computer,
however, was anything but safe, and she knew it. It was the
kind of spine-tingling adventure she had consciously avoided
her entire life, and it thrilled her to the core.

She decided a final touch was in order. She took the strip-search
order and put it in the manila folder marked "Today's Arrivals" and
then placed the folder in the in-box on the secretary's desk.

Seeing the folder with the humiliating instructions for her
"processing" sitting so casually in the in-box excited Nichole
more than ever. The idea that a scrap of paper tossed casually
onto a secretary's desk could strip her of identity, clothing,
and dignity was almost unbelievable. After all, Nicole had
CREATED this system.... Could it really be used to strip HER
naked? Could things ever spin that far out of control?

Her sexual excitement was building, and she tried to look through
the window into the reception area itself. Unfortunately, the
lights were switched off in the other room, and she couldn't see
much.

She swallowed and reached for the doorknob....

She paused before opening the door. It was one thing to play with
the computer in the office; it was an entirely different thing to
stroll into the room where the inmates were actually "processed."

Nichole thought of all of the women who had gone through that
door...and the indignities that they had faced at the hands of
the guards. And she felt some responsibility for it, since it
was her system that facilitated the humiliating treatment those
women received.

Maybe it was time for her to get a taste of her own medicine....

She pressed the buzzer, walked through the door, and turned on the
light, shuddering as the electric door locked behind her.

She had left her purse locked in her desk upstairs, but she had her
key-card clipped to the front pocket of her jacket. For a moment,
she imagined she had left it upstairs and teetered on the edge of
panic. How could she have been so reckless?

She breathed a sigh of relief as she realized that the card was
fastened securely to her jacket. She had nothing to fear.

Or did she?

She was surprised to see that almost half of the room was filled
with chairs sitting in front of the reception area itself. At
first, she thought they were for the prisoners, but then she saw
a separate cage at the side of the room where "overflow" prisoners
could be held.

She went pale. The chairs weren't for the prisoners...they were
for the spectators on the prison tour.

Just an hour before, one of the guards -- a skinny old man named
Harry -- had dropped by her desk with a tour group. Today Harry
was leading a gaggle of residents from the nearby retirement
village on a tour of the prison as part of the "Community Friends"
program.

Harry gave Nichole a flattering introduction that explained her
vital role in developing the prison's systems. "Unfortunately I
won't be able to demonstrate the prison's intake procedure, since
we don't have any new arrivals today," Harry announced, sadly.
"Unless, of course, our lovely Nichole wants to volunteer to show
you fine folks how we do a strip-search around here!"

Nichole felt herself flush at Harry's suggestion. He had teased
her for some time about "stripping her down and having a little
look." But she always gave as good as she got, joking that Harry
was a "dirty old man" who should "stick to shuffleboard at his age."

Every time she mentioned going somewhere in the prison, Harry would
tease her, "You'd better remember your pass, or I'm going to have
to search you." It was a running joke, although she noticed that,
whenever Harry saw her in an "unauthorized" area, his eyes
immediately darted to the key-card she had clipped to her jacket
pocket. The look of disappointment in his eyes was obvious as she
would teasingly point at the card and taunt, "Better luck next
time, old fella!"

A few of the tour members seemed shocked by Harry's suggestion that
Nichole should be strip-searched, but most quickly warmed to the
notion.

"Harry, do you actually strip the female prisoners naked?" one
leering old geezer asked, clearly intrigued by the idea.

"Absolutely naked," Harry replied, calmly. "All female prisoners
are required to strip...and that means to the skin."

Nichole felt herself blushing. Why did the room suddenly feel so
warm?

"Do prisoners ever resist being searched?" another older man asked.

"We always secure the prisoner to the examination table, using
restraining straps, even if they don't resist. The table has a
motor that allows us to easily reposition the prisoner, and it
prevents any arguments during the search itself."

"Are all the prisoners deloused, or is it only done for medical
reasons?" one woman asked.

"All incoming prisoners are required to take a shower and submit to
a thorough delousing," Harry replied. "It doesn't matter who the
prisoner is...I delouse her!"

"Even if you were processing someone like HER?" A man pointed an
accusing finger at the nattily dressed Nichole.

"Especially her!" Harry chuckled. "Just because a woman is
wearing a $2000 suit, it doesn't mean she doesn't need a good
scrub-down and a dose of disinfectant. As my grandpa used to
say, 'Sometimes it's the fanciest yards that have the most bugs
in the bush!'"

Everyone laughed as Nichole blushed crimson. As the group walked
away, she overheard two of the old women render their verdict.

"Did you see how short that little hussy's skirt was?" one of the
old cats hissed. "Somebody SHOULD strip her down bare...it would
be a good lesson for her!"

The other woman agreed. "The way the fellas were ogling her, you'd
think she was a movie star. I'd give anything to see the look on
her face when Harry deloused her."

The two women snickered and headed off with their tour group. Then
the phone rang, the secretary reported the printer problem, and
Nichole made the fateful decision to change the toner cartridge
personally.

Nichole looked unhappily at the chairs in the reception area.
Everyone on the tour would have an excellent view. And she
had no doubt that Harry, if given the chance, would force her
to put on quite a show....

She remembered the reason she was there and snapped herself back to
reality. She quickly walked over and checked the cartridge for the
small label printer in the corner. The cartridge looked full, and
she was about to hit the test button when she saw that a label had
already printed and was now sitting neatly in the output tray. She
did a double-take when she read the stark label:

BLUNDERPRONE, NICHOLE
338-3834-3887-383

She was shocked to see the label with her name on it, resting
comfortably in the tray. Then she remembered that she had
entered herself into the system, and the label had printed
out automatically when she had printed the entrance form in
the other room.

Nichole picked up the little piece of perforated paper, detached
it, and slid it behind the clear plastic strip fixed to the black
milk crate sitting on the table next to her. It was a small box,
but big enough to hold a few gallons of milk, or a stack of
printouts....

Or every single solitary stitch of clothing she had on.

She trembled and began to sweat.

But then she told herself not to worry. After all, why should a
silly plastic crate frighten her? The box was designed to hold
the personal property of convicted criminals, not the expensive
clothes of a successful career woman like her.

She giggled softly, amused that a stupid box could inspire such
fear.

But there was no denying the box's sinister purpose. And, for a
moment, it almost seemed to be talking to her:

"LAUGH IT UP, YOU ARROGANT LITTLE YUPPIE, BUT I'LL HAVE THE LAST
LAUGH. YOU WON'T THINK I'M SO HARMLESS WHEN THEY STRIP YOU OUT OF
YOUR FANCY CLOTHES AND GIVE THEM ALL TO ME. YOU WON'T WANT TO GIVE
ME YOUR THINGS, ESPECIALLY THOSE DAINTY, FRILLY UNDIES YOU LIKE TO
WEAR. BUT I'LL TAKE THEM AWAY AND KEEP THEM NICE AND SAFE. OF
COURSE, YOU'LL JUST HAVE TO GO NAKED UNTIL SOMEONE DECIDES TO GIVE
YOU YOUR CUTE NEW UNIFORM....

"ENJOY YOUR EXPENSIVE CLOTHES WHILE YOU STILL CAN. I'M GOING TO
WIPE THAT SMUG LITTLE SMILE OFF YOUR PRETTY FACE.

"YOU MAY HAVE FANCIER CLOTHES THAN THE OTHER CONS, BUT THAT WON'T
MATTER ONCE I GET THEM. I'll STRIP YOU DOWN BUTT-NAKED JUST LIKE
ALL THE REST. WHEN THOSE OLD GEEZERS FROM THE TOUR LEER AND SMIRK
AT YOU IN THE SHOWER, REMEMBER THAT I HAVE YOUR CLOTHES, LOCKED UP
SAFE AND SECURE, JUST A FEW FEET AWAY....

"JUST OUT OF YOUR REACH!"

Nichole was breathing rapidly now, and the room seemed to be
closing in on her. She knew that she had to get away from that
horrible, mocking box as soon as possible.

She returned to the door, unclipped the key-card from her jacket,
and slid it into the slot. Exit from a "restricted area" required
both a key-card and a PIN, and she quickly entered her code number
on the numeric pad next to the card slot.

The "dual security" system had been her idea, and, although she
hardly ever used it herself (since she was in an administrative
area of the prison), she knew that the system offered excellent
protection against a prisoner using a lost or stolen card to
escape.

Nichole hit the ENTER key and was surprised to hear the buzzer
sound. You had three tries to enter the correct PIN before the
system "swallowed" your presumably stolen card -- and she had just
used up one of her turns.

She knew that she had only two more chances and decided that she
needed to pull herself together before she tried again. Taking a
deep breath, she turned her back and walked across the room to
collect her thoughts before returning to the keypad.

She sat down in one of the folding "audience" chairs and tried to
regain her composure. Despite her efforts to think of something
else, she found her attention drawn to the cold and impersonal
medical exam table just a few feet in front of her.

It was unlike any exam table she had ever seen. It had thick
leather straps for cinching the prisoner's wrists, waist,
thighs, and ankles securely in position.

She knew she was in good shape, and she wondered if the thick brown
straps could really hold her. She braced her foot against the side
of the table and pulled as hard as she could on one of the wrist
straps. Though she almost pulled her arm out of the socket before
she gave up, the strap didn't even stretch, much less break. She
looked unhappily down at the table.

If she were strapped in place, she would be totally helpless....

She examined the control panel at the side of the table. In the
current "resting" position, it looked like the female victim
would lie flat on her back while being strapped into place.
Her curiosity getting the better of her, Nichole pressed the
control panel button marked "POSITION A."

The machine hummed to life, and, to her horror, she saw the "knees"
of the machine bend and the legs start to slowly, inexorably,
separate. She strained to hold the machine in place, using both
hands and all of her weight to try to keep the "legs" of the table
from splitting. But the motor effortlessly overpowered her, and
the machine quickly came into position.

She saw that "POSITION A" would arrange the female prisoner in
the classic knees bent, legs spread, feet-in-the-stirrups pose
familiar to any woman who had ever faced that indignity in the
gynecologist's office.

Only this was far worse. At the gynecologist's, the woman at
least had the theoretical possibility of closing her legs. The
straps on this table stripped even that tiny privilege away.
Furthermore, the table forced the woman into the most degrading
position imaginable. With her butt hanging off the end of the
table and her legs split in the most obscene scissor kick, she
would be totally exposed.

Nichole knew that her most intimate places -- even her tender
bottom hole -- would be easy targets for Harry's probing,
greasy fingers....

Harry had teased her for a long time about making her "spread 'em"
on the table, and she had responded that, if Harry so much as put
a pinky on her thigh, she would kick his teeth out. In response,
he'd just smile, and now she knew why.

She had been standing on the floor and had been able to use both
her arms and legs in trying to resist just one of the machine's
extensions. If actually strapped into the contraption, she would
have no leverage at all, and she would be totally helpless to
prevent the smiling Harry from effortlessly moving her into her
"proper position."

She had used every ounce of muscle to resist the machine, and it
had proved irresistible. She would be totally at Harry's mercy.

Actually, it was far worse than that. She would be totally at the
mercy of anyone in the room. The evil machine would leave her
hopelessly spread out and unable to mount even a token defense.
She instinctively clenched her thighs together as she imagined
her predicament....

Shuddering, she imagined the cold, merciless machine slowly
separating her naked thighs in front of the leering crowd.
She would fight and strain, of course, which would only make it
more fun for the onlookers. In the end she would lose and would
be spread out like a 10 peso puta at a Mexican sex circus!

A small fly landed on her hand, and she immediately swatted at it.
She had always hated flies.

She looked down at the table. When she was strapped into position,
of course, she wouldn't be able to brush the fly away. The happy
little intruder would be free to crawl all over her, licking the
sweat off her brow, crawling down her belly, and even exploring the
deliciously musky scents below....

For a moment she felt like she was going to gag and quickly turned
her head away from the cruel machine in front of her. Her gaze
came to rest on the smallish pink cylinder with a rounded end,
lying casually on a side table. She picked it up and flipped
the tiny switch on the bottom of the thing.

It was a vibrator!

At first she was confused to see a sex toy sitting in the middle
of a medical setting. But then she remembered Harry's complaint
that her order entry system prevented the prison from ordering
lubricant, and so he was forced to "stimulate the prisoners
manually" in order to provide sufficient lubrication for body
cavity searches.

At the time, she had laughed at the prisoners' degrading situation,
and, indeed, Harry did admit that he didn't mind "stimulating" the
pretty young ladies who fell into his clutches. But, as Nichole
imagined being slowly and systematically masturbated in front of
an audience, while a machine held her legs spread widely apart,
the bug didn't seem so humorous.

Would Harry stimulate her just enough to make the search more
comfortable, or would he push the "lubrication" further? Would
she wiggle and moan while he used the vibrator on her? What would
the audience say?

She knew that the two women she had overheard earlier would think
that she was getting just what she deserved.

Harry would draw out the tease endlessly. He would make her wiggle
and squirm and pant and clench, all the while begging for release.
And, when she couldn't stand it anymore, he would smile, flick the
vibrator off, and begin her cavity search.

The table had left Nichole more distraught than the crate had,
and she knew that she had better move away from the table and
the vibrator before she orgasmed on the spot. Her panties were
drenched, her breathing rapid and shallow, her thoughts confused.

She looked across the room to the open stall against the wall. A
nice cool shower would feel good right now.

For a moment, she seriously considered stripping off her clothes
and jumping under the cool, refreshing spray. It was a ridiculous
thought; she didn't go to health clubs because she didn't like
public showers, and here she was thinking about stripping down and
leaping into a huge, curtainless shower in a prison. Not only was
the shower totally open and placed optimally in front of the
now-empty chairs, but also the room had several windows that faced
out into the hallways and adjoining areas.

Anyone passing by would be able to look in the windows and watch
her wash herself. Perhaps the spectator would be a guard on break,
casually having a smoke as he watched the pretty programmer wash
her slender body under the cool water. Perhaps it would be the
construction workers from the new wing. Or maybe it would be one
of the male "trusty" prisoners who sometimes helped her with her
office work.

She swallowed. It wouldn't really matter who it was. She wouldn't
be able to hide, or cover herself in any way. She would be forced
to stand, naked as the day she was born, and soap up while the
spectators ogled her. There would be no shower curtain and no way
to cut the shower short. Prison rules would require her to wash
herself...thoroughly...everywhere....

After she showered, she'd be deloused. She knelt down next to the
innocuous green canister that sat on the floor next to the shower
area and picked up the long hose. The nozzle was on the maximum
setting, which would produce a small, powerful, concentrated spray.
She carefully pointed the nozzle away and pulled the trigger.

SIZZZZZZZZZZZZ!

The force of the spray was so powerful that she almost fell over;
she couldn't imagine that they actually used this setting on naked
women.

No doubt the pressure ensured that the noxious fluid would get into
every crack and crevice....

But the worst part was the smell. The foul fluid stank like a
chemical dump, and she couldn't imagine what she would feel like
after it was sprayed on her legs, her body, and her hair.

She was used to wearing expensive designer perfumes. But it was
clear that, if she ever became a prisoner here, she would be
wearing a less refined scent.

Looking at her watch, she realized that Alice would be back soon.
She walked briskly over to the keypad and prepared to enter her
PIN again.

She had insisted that the users create a new PIN every few weeks,
but now she strained a little to remember what hers was. The
system didn't allow you to reuse old PINs, a feature that the
users hated, but that she had demanded.

But, now that she couldn't remember her number, changing the PINs
didn't seem like such a good idea. She wasn't stupid, but she
hadn't used her PIN since she had changed it last month.

The buzzer indicating her second failed attempt sounded just as
Alice rounded the corner and returned to her office.

Nichole had never gotten along well with this secretary, and, when
the old lady complained that the new system was difficult to use,
Nicole responded by telling the woman's boss that she was just "old
and stupid" and hinting that the former system was not the only
item overdue for replacement.

She still remembered how angry the old woman had become the day
Nichole had demonstrated the way the system worked by entering her
own name into it. Alice had warned Nichole that the prisoner
intake system was not a toy, and that she had better learn to
respect those with more experience than her...or "face the
consequences."

Despite their mutual animosity, Nichole was actually relieved to
see the old bat. She had already entered two bad PINs and knew
she had just one more chance. It would certainly be a lot easier
if Alice would just open the door from the other side.

Nichole tapped on the glass and gestured for the woman to open the
door. Though surprised to see Nichole, Alice moved over to the
door. Her weathered hand was about to turn the latch when she
noticed the new manila folder marked "Today's Arrivals" sitting
in her in-box.

The puzzled secretary took her hand off the door while a frantic
Nichole continued to tap on the glass. As soon as Alice opened
the folder and saw Nichole's name, she smiled like a cat
discovering a mouse. Putting her hands on her hips and smirking
at Nichole, she shook her head, condescendingly, as if to say,
"I can't believe the scrapes these careless youngsters get
themselves into these days!"

The grinning woman then reached into her desk and pulled out a pink
form with a bright red border. Nichole had designed the form, and
she recognized it immediately.

It was a Disciplinary Request form.

Nichole tried to reassure herself. It didn't necessarily mean
corporal punishment. There were all kinds of punishments in the
prison: work details, loss of privileges, and loss of visitation
rights. Corporal punishment was reserved for the worst offenders.

Alice quickly filled out the form and then rounded the corner and
stepped out of Nichole's view. A few seconds later, Nichole heard
the woman open a curtain that was on the other side of a glass
partition separating the examination room, where Nichole was, from
the room next door. Nichole gasped at what she saw.

The room was large, with an array of folding chairs for spectators.
On one side of the wall was a series of hooks holding an impressive
collection of straps, paddles, and canes. In the center of the
room was a big punishment bench, complete with leather straps and
padded area for the prisoner to lie across.

The prisoner would be strapped into place on her knees, bent at the
waist, with her bottom raised high in the air. A mirrored wall
ensured that the spectators would be able to see the look on her
face when the stripes were laid on.

Alice carefully considered the instruments, finally selecting a
thick leather strap, which she lovingly placed on the bench. Then
she scribbled a quick message on a Post-it note, slapped it on the
front of Nichole's admission folder, and held it up for Nichole to
read:

HARRY,

LET ME BE THE WITNESS ON THIS ONE. I'LL BET YOU $5
MISS FANCY PANTS CRIES LIKE A BABY WHEN YOU TAKE DOWN
HER DRAWERS AND TAN HER BARE FANNY!

I THINK YOUR TOUR GROUP WILL ENJOY WATCHING THIS SASSY
MINX LEARN HER LESSON!

ALICE

The old crone smiled at Nichole, and then rubbed her scrawny fanny
and winced in mock sympathy. Then she winked and turned to walk
away.

Nichole pounded angrily on the glass, and, when Alice paused and
turned, Nichole flipped her the bird. The woman stood there for
a moment, enraged that, even under these circumstances, Nichole
still felt confident enough to make such a defiant gesture.

Alice held up the form and smiled. She pointed to the space where
the number of punishment strokes could be specified. The space was
empty at the moment, but, as Alice turned her back and finished
filling in the form, Nichole knew that it wasn't going to be good.
Her defiance was definitely going to cost her.

The secretary glanced back, gave Nichole a smug, I'll-see-you-later
smile, and left the punishment room. She returned to her desk in
front of the search room, but Nichole knew better than to tap on
the glass and ask for help.

From down the hall, Nichole could hear Harry's nasal voice as he
led his tour group through the visitors' room. The next stop was
the reception area, and she knew that, if she was still standing
there when Harry arrived, the tour group's dream of seeing her
strip-searched would come true.

She thought about all of the older people who had been fired after
she had installed new systems -- and the contemptuous way she
treated older workers who had difficulties learning computers. It
was hardly surprising that the retirees longed to see the snippy
little computer expert stripped out of her fancy clothes and put
in her place.

This retirement group was even older than those over-the-hill
workers; she was practically a child compared to them. And, if
they decided she should be running around as naked as a newborn,
then she would just have to grin and "bare" it. She had no doubt
that the stern seniors would be pleased to see her sassy bare
bottom wiggle under the razor strap.

She thought about Harry. She had teased him for a long time,
taunting him with a flash of thigh or an open button on her
blouse. She had tantalized him with the idea that strip-searching
her was something just out of his reach, a fantasy that he was a
little too old and a little too slow to fulfill.

Wouldn't it be ironic if she ended up being trapped by her own
system? Wouldn't it be something if the old people had one more
chance to win a victory over youth, to see a snotty-nosed little
yuppie cut down to size? In her heart, Nichole knew that she had
it coming....

She also knew that if she could just get out of the room, she would
be safe. She would simply pick up her intake folder, shoot Alice
an evil glance, and walk back to her comfortable office.

Of course, that also meant that her adventure would be over before
it began. She would never know whether or not Harry's threatened
strip-search was just a bluff. She would never see the look on the
old men's faces when she pulled down her panties, or hear the catty
remarks of the old women when they watched her shower. She would
never know the sensation of struggling desperately to keep her legs
closed against the power of the machine, or the feeling of trying
to maintain her dignity while Harry humiliated her with the
vibrator.

She would never know the feeling of having her expensive perfume
obliterated by delousing fluid. How many strokes did Alice think
it would take for Nichole to "learn her lesson"? She would never
know.

Perhaps worst of all, she would never know what it was like to see
her expensive clothes sitting in the black milk carton. What would
the cruel box say to her then? Would it tease and torment her as
she slowly handed over each garment? Or would it simply stare at
her in mocking triumph as she slowly stripped down for everyone's
amusement?

There was only one way to find out....

She considered her options. Would the warden release her Monday
morning? After the system had been fully installed, she had
raised her consulting fee to $300 per hour, much to the warden's
displeasure. He didn't understand why he had to pay triple her
agreed-upon rate in order to get that #@*#! computer programmer
to fix the bugs she herself had created. But, since he had no
choice, he had grudgingly accepted the situation.

When Harry had joked about trapping Nichole as an inmate one day,
the warden had immediately seized upon the idea, telling the
startled consultant that, if it did happen, she wouldn't be
released until she'd "fixed her damn bugs" and the system was
stable. It would take a while, of course, since she would be
reduced to working nights and weekends on the antiquated machine
reserved as a "special privilege" for stellar prisoners.

The warden smiled. "And you realize, Nichole, that, since you
were an inmate, I would pay you only 10 cents a day." There was
a twinkle in his eye when he said it, and she could tell that he
was tickled by the idea.

She contemplated the irony of the situation. Her life (up to this
point) was an endless series of complex decisions: which glamorous
career opportunities to accept, which beautiful clothes to wear,
which handsome men to date.

Now the system she had designed would make all of her decisions for
her. The computer would literally strip the beautiful clothes off
her back and replace them with a scanty and humiliating outfit
suitable for her new life on the chain gang. The computer would
decide which minimum wage prison guards would be ogling her when
she was stripped buck naked at the beginning of each day and forced
into the large gang shower. The system would decide whether she
would pick up garbage by the highway, mend roads, or work in the
fields.

Dating would no longer be a problem. Her love life would be
determined by her cell assignment. Would the system assign her
to a caring cellmate who would protect her, or to a cruel bull
dyke who would exploit her and prostitute her out to the other
inmates? Would she be assigned to a cellblock controlled by
guards who would sexually exploit and humiliate her? The system,
which she had, until this moment, thought of as her own, would now
decide all the details of her life for the foreseeable future.

The system would coldly record her strip-searches, gang showers,
punishments, and work assignments as a long string of cryptic
ones and zeros. Her daily degradation would be tracked, filed,
and...ignored. The system wouldn't track her feelings of terror,
shame, and helplessness. That data was irrelevant. Even her
frantic complaints of sexual assaults would be reduced to a
check-box on a standard e-mail complaint form. And the form
would be sorted, filed, and eventually archived to a dusty old
tape.

The system would work exactly as she had intended.

Although she was the system's creator, she would be "processed"
just like another helpless bimbo. She imagined her creation
gloating over her fate:

"YOU DON'T SEEM SO BOSSY NOW THAT I'M IN CHARGE, MISSY. I HOPE
YOU DON'T MIND LONG LINES, COLD SHOWERS, HARD WORK, AND MUSH FOR
DINNER. YOU ENJOYED THE FEELING OF POWER YOU GOT WHEN YOU MESSED
WITH MY INSIDES, BUT NOW THE GLOVE IS ON THE OTHER HAND. NOW THE
PROBING FINGERS WILL BE INSIDE OF YOU!"

The system routinely generated a list of new inmates available
for assignment and automatically distributed the report to the
prison staff. Nichole shuddered as she imagined the resentful
administrators seeing her name listed on the very report she
had designed.

A simple request form submitted through e-mail would allow the
vengeful clerks to turn her into their gofer. She knew the women
in the office had been jealous of her sports car, expensive
clothes, and snotty attitude. She shuddered as she imagined
parading around the office in her scanty prison outfit while
the secretaries teased her:

"Fetch my coat, fish!"

"I told you I needed these sorted in alphabetical order before
lunch! Are you stupid or what?"

"Haul these ten crates down to the store room, jailbird. And hurry
up, or you'll get the strap!"

"Look at the way she's dressed. What a slut!"

"That isn't the half of it. Did you hear what she did to Harry the
other day?"

Discipline requests could be submitted through an e-mail form.
Nichole had designed the system well. Her next humiliation would
always be just a few keystrokes away. And, of course, there would
then be the strip-searches. Convicts were always searched before
and after leaving the office, often in full view of the grinning
administrative staff and even prison visitors. She winced as she
imagined herself being ordered to bend over and touch her toes
while the frat boys in the mailroom chortled at her predicament.

Her system also had a bug that caused certain inmates to be selected
repeatedly for supposedly "random" searches. Her program confused
IQ scores with drug tests, so that inmates with high IQs were always
targeted as high risk. A Mensa member, Nichole had proudly listed her
IQ on her résumé, and she knew that her system would simply carry the
information forward from her employment record to her prison record.

She desperately wished that she had fixed that bug when she'd had
the chance. When the batch program that selected the inmates for
today's "random" searches ran in a few hours, her name would be at
the top of the list.

She closed her eyes and swallowed hard. If she didn't enter the
right PIN, she would be trapped and left utterly at the mercy of
the merciless system she had helped to create. Her clothing,
dignity, and pride would be systematically, methodically stripped
from her. And then it would be time for her punishment.

And time for her first strip-search. The first of many....

Her system would be pitiless, she knew that. But she also knew
that this was her chance to live her fantasy, if she had the nerve.

She made her decision. She opened her eyes, reached up, and,
without entering a single digit, pressed the ENTER key on the
keypad.

The machine buzzed for the third time, and then made a small
gurgling sound as it happily swallowed her ID card.

She felt a chill. There was no way out now. She was now prisoner
338-3834-3887-383.

She stood there dumbly while Harry, smiling, ushered his tour group
into the room. There were some small scuffles as the spectators
vied for the "best seats," but everyone soon settled down to enjoy
the show. Harry snapped his fingers and pointed to the spot on the
floor where Nichole was required to stand.

Nichole, blushing furiously, dared not hesitate. She ducked her
head and obediently scurried into position.

Harry produced a large box and made a big production out of
extracting a rubber surgical glove. He loudly SNAPPED the glove
onto his hand, gave the terrified systems analyst a playful wink,
and then passed the box to an old man sitting in the front row.
The man said nothing, but took out a glove, smiled at Nichole,
and handed the box on to the crone sitting next to him. Nichole
watched in horror as each member of the tour group selected a glove.

"I always said tours should be 'hands-on experiences,' Nichole,"
Harry teased.

He pressed a button, and the exam table happily whirled back into
the "resting position."

Nichole shuddered as she imagined Harry tightening the cold leather
straps around her slender wrists and ankles.

Then Harry would press the button....

She noticed the fly crawling slowly across the table, anxiously
awaiting her arrival. She regarded the little trespasser unhappily
and tried not to think about the disgusting thing crawling all
over her when she was strapped down on the table and helpless.

"Just one more bug in the system," Nichole thought unhappily, as
she started to unbutton her crisp white blouse.



Edited by C. Lakewood

[s4dmaster]

It is a sort of travel inside the protagonist's mind. Thank you very much for this wonderful story.

[Belinda]

Wonderful, so insightful into the sole of a true submissive.

[Johnny Lawrence]

Best story on the board. I'd love to see a sequel, but after this long I guess it's not too likely.

[imreadonly2]

Best story on the board. I'd love to see a sequel, but after this long I guess it's not too likely.

Thank you for the lovely compliment, Johnny. It is much appreciated. Someone actually did write a sequel, although I'm thinking it wasn't me as it isn't in the Lakewood archive and he was pretty good about keeping track of things. It was called ANOTHER BUG IN THE SYSTEM, I think, but that's my only strong memory of it. Yes, you're right, this was written quite a while ago!