Posted by PK on May 05, 2003 at 17:21:44:
"I don't see the point in microwaves," she told him over breakfast. "No fun at all." She was
devouring her omelette with gusto. Phil had made it, of course, Holly wasn't much at cooking
in the morning. Pouring a bowl of cornflakes was her standard, a successful boiled egg was
cordon bleu. Phil had made the omelettes with cheese, tarragon, onion (thinly sliced, of
course) and mushrooms, with grilled smoke cured bacon. He watched her tits respond under
her sleeveless cotton singlet as she gestured with a fork. She caught the look.
"Not inedible, whatever you've heard," she said. "You should.."
"Hol, I've got a seminar on harmonic engineering in half an hour. Hold that for later, okay?"
She nodded compliance and stuffed the last of her food down. "Don't forget to sign your
donor form," she reminded him. "If you get run over by a bus and I don't even get to eat your
balls I'll be devastated."
"I hardly think...oh, all right, chuck it over here."
"Meet me after lunch? I want to have another look at that oven thing."
Phil suppressed a sigh. "Fine. I'll meet you in the pub."
The lecture was brilliant but it was an effort to concentrate. Images of Holly turning on a spit
intruded. They weren't alone in there, other impressions fought with them. Holly asleep at his
side, Holly flaunting herself, Holly panting and screaming. Holly asleep at his side again,
peaceful and warm.
"And you want to take her with you
to the hard lands of the winter."
Where did that come from? He fought to recall the words. Something like :
"You thought the leaden winter
would bring you down forever
but you rode upon a steamer
to the violence of the sun.."
Classic, classics. He couldn't place it. It echoed in his mind and must have something to do
with what was distracting him.
The lecturer had finished his thesis with such a flourish that the lecture hall erupted in
spontaneous applause. Phil had lost track. He joined in without understanding a jot of it, he
didn't want to exhibit his distraction.
The rest of the morning was a waste of time.
"Hey, Phil, joining us for lunch?" It was Eric, a fellow student in his department.
"No, sorry, can't. Meeting Holly."
"Lucky you," said Eric, with the standard male conspiratorial suggestive leer. That was only
polite, of course. Phil wasn't sure whether it was intended ironically and didn't really want to
know. His colleagues viewed Holly with some wariness, she was certainly attractive in an
unconventional way but far too strange for most of them. Privately, he knew, they thought
him a bit odd for associating with her. At times, he couldn't blame them. He'd wondered
about it himself.
Some time ago, Holly had resumed her tale.
"It was me," she said, as if imparting a deep revelation. Phil didn't know what she was talking
about, she had the habit of resuming conversations as if they'd happened moments ago.
"What was you?"
"I was the girl who ate her boyfriend"
"Right," said Phil, trying to catch up. "Of course. I knew that. Who else could it be?"
She bit him playfully. It didn't quite hurt. "You don't believe me?"
"Not for a minute. What did he taste like?" He could play the game as if he knew what he
was doing.
Holly half closed her eyes, shook her head and licked her lips. She kissed her fingers and
aped the affectation of a gourmet. "Indescribable. If you've never eaten your lover..." She
mocked a Gallic shrug.
Phil didn't ask what he'd been like in bed. That would have implied that he believed her, and
suggested jealousy. That game he wouldn't play.
Holly was waiting for him in the pub. With her clothes on; it seemed almost unnatural. His
relationship with her only really functioned when she was undressed, didn't it? Not that there
was anything about her that bothered him the rest of the time, surely. Well, not too much..
She had bought him a pint in anticipation, she was thoughtful like that. "Couldn't get Sam's in
here", she apologised. "Fuller's do?"
Phil took a sip. "Fine," he said, "Thanks."
For the next three quarters of an hour they exchanged easy pleasantries, drank two pints of
beer each and ate a ploughman's lunch. Then Holly slipped off her shoe (she must have) and
stuck her right foot between his legs. He could feel her toes.
"C'mon, lover, let's work out how you're going to eat me," she said, smiling.
Back to the grindstone, Phil thought.
Actually, it wasn't that bad. He just loathed shopping, like any red blooded male, but he could
put up with it if Holly put on another show. It was just the endless indecision, the tedious
trooping around inspecting one sales item after another, having to listen to the salesman's
self-serving pitch, and worst of all being expected to offer his own opinion knowing that it was
likely to be wrong. This time he had a defence. It was a Polaroid camera. If Holly asked him
how she looked in or on this or that device, he would simply show her the photo and ask her
what SHE thought.
Holly, unfortunately, wasn't going to take any shortcuts. Phil could understand that, of course.
He was less sure why the salesman was willing to put up with it. Did he realise that they
couldn't afford to buy any of the really expensive stuff? If they rented instead, as they
probably would if they went ahead at all, it wasn't going to net him that much of a
commission. He could only assume that he liked having a customer show an active enough
interest to actually try out the equipment. Either that or he fancied Holly. Probably both, he
decided.
Holly had another look at the Jessica, but didn't spend much time on it, to Phil's relief and the
salesman's obvious disappointment when she declined to have the spit inserted. She'd done
that, and she couldn't do a real run through without being, well, run through. Testing the
gutting blade was obviously out of the question. Phil guessed that she'd go for the double-
ended job - his personal favourite so far - if she went for spitting at all, so time spent here
was time wasted as far as he was concerned.
She displayed a bit more interest in the glass-fronted oven but she had her doubts.
"I like the way it looks but I don't see the point in being microwaved," she objected.
"No problem," said the slasman, not quite rubbing his hands. "There's a conventional heating
element too. Like the BoilBabe, it can be programmed for a lengthy 'warm-up' period so you
can have the sensation of being roasted for as long as you like before you actually start
cooking. Once that really starts, of course, you'll pass out long before you're anywhere near
done. The microwave option just makes sure you don't keep the guests waiting too long after
you've - ah -ceased to take an interest in the proceedings. It's all fully programmable, it's all
there in the instruction leaflet."
"Sounds complicated," she frowned.
"Not at all! There are several preset programmes available, you can pick the one you want
and just use that. Easy as selecting a TV channel using a button on the remote rather than
tuning it yourself. The user programming feature is for exp.. for customers who like to
experiment. Why don't you get in and see how it feels?"
Holly was amenable to that. She slipped off her short dress and sandals, leaving her
underwear on. It was a compromise they had agreed on between bouts of sex the previous
evening, after he proposed the idea of the camera.
"So you'll know what you look like in them," he'd said. She'd liked the idea.
"Of course, it won't be the same if you aren't naked," he'd added hopefully. The thought of
seeing her stripped off on a cooking device, however often he'd seen her naked in the
bedroom, still titillated him.
"I don't think I could do that," she said.
"Why not? You'll be naked when we cook you," he'd asked reasonably.
"That's different," she retorted weakly, somewhat embarrassed by her own reticence, "Only
the guests will see me. They'll all be friends...."
"If you're going to be cooked and eaten soon, what does it matter if a few people see you
with your kit off? Worried about your reputation?"
Holly had no real answer for that, but Phil hadn't pressed the point. Instead, he had waited for
her to trim her rather abundant pubic hair and dig out the scantiest undergarments she could
find. That had got them started again.
The results he saw when Holly climbed into the oven and the salesman shut the door and
started the heater. The thong did technically cover the essential parts, but didn't actually hide
much skin and the bra, such as it was, left little to the imagination. Illuminated in a warm
orange glow, Holly began to sweat. Ladies may perspire, but women being cooked sweat,
trust me.
"Is she all right in there?" he asked, "She's not actually..."
The salesman gave a patronising chuckle. "No, Sir, she's no hotter than she would be in a
sauna. Still, I think that should..."
"Fine, hold on a sec..." Phil snapped a couple of shots. "Okay."
When they let Holly out, she was flushed and smelling quite tasty. "I quite like that," she
admitted. Phil showed her the photos and she was absorbed for a moment.
"Excuse me? Can I try that?"
"Certainly, Madame," said the salesman, turning to the new customer, a shapely blonde in
her early thirties, Phil guessed. "Excuse me a moment," he directed to Holly and Phil. He ran
through the patter and the blonde woman nodded and slipped off her clothes. All of them,
and without exhibiting any signs of inhibition. Phil wondered if Holly would feel upstaged, but
she simply watched with interest for a while. He also wondered if the woman would mind if he
photographed her, or if Holly would. He glanced at Holly and lifted the camera, she nodded,
and he took a few shots. The salesman called over an assistant, an acned youth with an
eager manner, to watch the woman and make sure she didn't burn.
"While she's getting the feel of it, is there anything else you'd like to see?" he asked rather
briskly.
Phil was having trouble taking his eyes off the lady in the oven. She had her eyes closed and
her legs immodestly open, and her pubes were shaved. "Ever lose any customers like that?"
he asked.
"Not so far," the salesman responded, giving him a worried glance which he tried to conceal.
"I suppose we should think about liability waivers," he muttered. Phil thought they should
think about not hiring staff incompetent enough to get someone accidentally toasted, but he
kept it to himself. Holly, still in her negligible underwear, had moved on.
"What's this?" she wanted to know. 'This' was a transparent, spherical device that looked
somehow to have been transported from a fifties SF serial. It stood on a short, cylindrical
base and seemed to be divided somewhere below the middle of the globe by a floor of some
dull grey material with holes in it. There were power leads attached to the base and a rather
makeshift looking control panel. The top was closed with a shiny metal lid with valves
studded around it. It resembled something Ming the Merciless might have imprisoned Dale
Arden in.
This, oddly enough, did nothing to brighten the salesman's demeanour. "It's a steamer or a
poacher or whatever," he said, his usual glib patter absent. "It just came this morning from a
new independent company, BlackCat Gizmos or something. It's just a demo model really..."
"How does it work?" Holly persisted.
The salesman sighed. "I suppose you just get in the top half and it steams you. The boiler in
the bottom produces the steam which comes up through the holes in the floor - it's non-
conducting so it won't scald you - and it works like a steam sauna. When you've sweated
enough, the steam heat is increased until you start to cook. Once that happens you can
poach in there for hours or, in theory, close the outflow valves and it's a pressure cooker."
"In theory?" Phil was wary. "Hasn't it been tested?"
"So they say, though I don't know if it's been tried on humans. We haven't tested it
ourselves." The salesman shrugged, offering honest ignorance. "I don't have any experience
with it. I've read the basic description, that's all."
Fair enough, thought Phil and nodded. "I think we'd better give it a miss," he said and the
salesman nodded back with more relief than diappointment.
"I'd like to try it," said Holly. What a surprise.
"Madam, I'm not sure..."
"Hol, forget it..."
"Oh, come on," said Holly, spotting a series of rungs built into the far side. "What can go
wrong?" She climbed up easily and levered up the lid. With a limber motion, she swung her
legs over the lip of the bowl and dropped down inside. She had to squat or sit down to get her
head below the rim. "Turn it on!"
"Famous last words," Phil grumbled. The salesman shot him a sympathetic glance.
After a brief exchange they agreed between them to start the steam at its lowest setting.
"And leave the lid up, or we don't start it," Phil stipulated.
"Spoilsports," said Holly, sticking her tongue out, but she'd got about as far as she expected.
Hot vapour began to rise from the holes in the floor and soon Holly was surrounded by a
thick, warm mist that plumed out of the top of the vessel. Phil shot some photos through the
swirls of condensing steam. Holly muttered something like 'shit!' and started wriggling about,
doing something he couldn't follow for moment.
"Are you okay?" he called.
"Fine," came the slightly muffled reply, then her thong and micro-bra sailed out of the
steamer. Phil picked them up, they were slightly moist. "I just don't want to get those soggy
They're my favourite undies."
It was quite fun watching Holly in the steam bath, unpredictable air currents caused by the
open top made the mists churn and visibility came and went. Phil got some more shots of her
more or less naked. He hoped she was all right in there, but he was sure she'd say if she
wasn't. He smiled at his own concern, and a thought intruded that he'd never resolved or
dislodged. Had she really eaten her last boyfriend?
If all the rest was true, why not? Sauce for the goose, and all that. It just didn't seem quite
real. He'd never actually seen Holly eat anybody. For that matter, he'd never seen her do
anything really violent or nasty. Sure, she was a bit wild in bed and she did have a bit of a
temper sometimes, but less than some women he'd known. She was actually rather good
natured. Still, if the guy had allowed it, even wanted it, would she do it? Quite possibly, he
had to admit, though he wasn't sure. And why shouldn't she? He was about to do the same to
her, or rather she was offering to let him and he'd done nothing to dissuade her.
The salesroom was beginning to steam up, despite the ventilation system.
"I think we'd better turn it off," Phil suggested. The salesman complied and went to get a
towel. When Holly climbed out of the dissipating steam, complaining that she'd just started to
enjoy it, he handed it to her and she wrapped herself in it, not before anyone who cared to
look had caught a brief tantalising glimpse of everything she had. The salesman seemed
distracted and kept glancing over at the blonde woman, who had finished with the oven and
was now touring the room with the spotty apprentice in attendance. Phil and Holly noticed his
preoccupation.
"I've just realised who she is," he muttered in a lowered voice. "That's Adele Montefiori or I'm
a Dutchman." Both of them recognised the name of the famous Anglo-Italian courtesan. Phil
stared openly. "Rumour has it she's going to host a party for all her most prominent - ah -
admirers."
Phil gaped. "You can't be serious," he exclaimed. "She's going to..."
The man nodded. "That's what they say. Looks better in the flesh, doesn't she?"
They both stared again at the long-legged blonde until Phil caught himself and glanced
guiltily at Holly. She smirked at him and gave the woman a frank appraisal herself.
"I'd eat her," she said. "Okay, what else have you got?"
"Just the sushi table. Sushi-fondue actually. You carve the flesh raw, but you can sear it in
boiling oil if you like. Here, I'll show you."
The sushi table was nothing if not functionally simple. It was just that, a table of hardwood
with gutters cut into it and a metal collar restraint attached towards one end. At the sides
were several long, sharp looking knives in racks.
"You mean I just lie down on that and let people chop me up?" Holly inquired dubiously.
"Sounds a bit painful."
"And a bit basic," Phil objected. "Only one restraint? What if the vic - er, volunteer starts to
struggle. I mean, involuntarily, of course." The image of people trying to carve strips off a
naked, bloody, struggling woman came to mind and he shuddered.
But the salesman was ready for this. "That's a neural restraint," he said. "The latest in
electronic anaethesia, by induction.The guest of honour feels no pain below the neck. No
voluntary motor control either. The autonomic functions are still there, nothing else."
Holly was no scientist but she got the gist of it. "Motor control? So I can't move? And it won't
hurt?"
"That's right," the salesman beamed at her. "You'll have a sense of touch, but not pain. And
you'll be able to see and hear."
She'd be able to see people eating her. Holly thought about it. "Would I be able to talk?"
"A little, yes. Your voice might be a bit weak, due to the shallow breathing. Your metabolism
is lowered to slow bleeding."
It sounded gruesome to Phil but Holly looked intrigued. "Show me," she said and hitched
herself up on the table. As she wriggled round into position, the towel fell open slightly. Phil
wondered if she knew her crotch was visible or if, at this stage, she cared. Her pubic hair was
trimmed into a neat vertical strip.
"Just don't chop anything off yet," he joked feebly. The salesman offered him the obligatory
thin smile and fastened the collar, which snapped open, round Holly's neck. He pressed a
switch and as Phil started to protest he saw Holly's body twitch and then go still.
"Oh my God," she said in a thin breathless voice. "I can't move! I'm trying to lift my arm and
there's nothing." Phil thought he saw her fingers twitch slightly and he took her hand. There
was no returning pressure.
"Can you feel that?" he asked.
"Yes," she breathed. She seemed pathetically helpless. Phil imagined her lying passive as
people cut raw strip off her, flash fried them and ate them. There was a horrible sort of
fascination to the idea, but he also found it disturbing. Suddenly he felt a powerful urge to
rescue and protect her. Silly, he knew, but he couldn't help feeling it.
"I think that's enough," he said.
When the salesman freed her from the collar, Holly sat up, her towel shifting to cover
different parts of her. She rubbed her throat though the collar had done no actual damage.
"That was weird," she said. "Like one of those nightmares where you try to run and can't. Are
you okay? You look a bit tense."
Phil covered himself with exposition. "That's about right - yes, I 'm fine - it's like the
mechanism that cuts down your body's responses when you sleep. If it fails, you get
sleepwalking. In lucid dreams you seem to become aware of it on some level and that's
when...murph" Holly had wrapped herself around him, her tongue down his throat and one
barefoot leg threatening to trip him in a very interesting way. Unfortunately there wasn't a bed
behind him.
"Perhaps you'd like to think about it," the salesman said in a resigned tone.
When they disengaged from the clinch the salesman had gone and the courtesan was
standing there, waiting politely for them to finish.
"Very nice," she said. "I half expected you to go all the way on the sushi table." Her English
was faintly accented but clear and precise, with a throaty undertone Phil could feel in his
scrotum. She was dressed again, and immaculate, not a hair out of place.
Phil gaped. He wanted to say something sophisticated and suave but all he could manage
was "Ah...hello."