Sub Consciousness (short story)

Sub Consciousness

z119z

© 2014 by the author

Roberto had seen the sign hundreds of times. He had grown so used to it that he didn’t even notice it anymore. He might see it, but he never really looked at it. He supposed he had read it the first time he saw it to make sure he was in the right place, but after that it was just there, one of hundreds of things he saw everyday and accepted as part of the general background, like a light switch in his apartment or a doorknob. You never saw a familiar doorknob. You didn’t think, “Oh, a doorknob. I have to twist this clockwise to open this door.” You just put your hand down, grasped it, and turned it, without thinking. It didn’t register on your consciousness. You didn’t even consciously feel it in your hand. The only time you really looked at a doorknob was when you encountered one where it shouldn’t be—lying on a shelf or attached to a window.

He didn’t know why he was fixating on the sign now, but he couldn’t look away. And its effect on him was curious—it was exciting him, arousing him. The longer he stared at the sign, the more aroused he became. His cock strained against the pouch of his underwear. The pressure and the sudden vision that burst into his mind of his swollen cock forced to point downward between his balls by the tight red nylon cage imprisoning it excited him even more. His face grew hot and flushed, despite the cold draft coming up the stairwell. He held his breath for a long time and then began panting. He moaned quietly to himself as a bright explosion of pleasure flared throughout his body.

The sign was attached to the wall above the stairs leading further underground. It was the familiar black rectangle with white letters and numbers inside small colored circles.  

At least that what’s his mind remembered it should say. But his eyes saw something different. His eyes saw “Sub Way”—two words. And the “Sub” in “Sub Way” was flashing. Subway wall signs weren’t supposed to flash. The letters were supposed to just sit there—quiet, motionless, inactive.

Sub Way. The way of the sub. The thought popped into his head as he stared at the sign. Where had that come from? And what could it mean? What was the way of the sub, and why, suddenly, was it so important to him? Why this overwhelming sense of longing to kneel and submit when he looked at the sign?

The stream of commuters heading for the subway parted and moved around him. A few of them shot him a look of annoyance for being in their way and for blocking the path as they rushed toward the stairs. One man running past jostled Roberto. His shoulder caught Roberto on the upper arm and pushed him aside.

Roberto took a step backward to keep his balance and collided with an older Chinese woman. She glared at him and spat two words in Chinese at him. “Sorry,” he said. Her reply was to snort and glare at him with contempt as she stepped away.

The impact was enough to break his concentration on the sign. He shook his head to clear it and then joined the throng hurrying down the stairs.

*****

It happened again a half-hour later. Roberto was sitting as his desk at Dickson and Allen Publishing, going through his email. A free-lance graphic artist had sent an invoice for her work on a dust jacket. Roberto downloaded the invoice to his computer file for the project and then pulled up the form Accounts Payable had devised for project supervisors like himself to use to authorize payment. He uploaded the invoice to the form and OK’ed the payment. At the bottom of the form was a button for transmitting the form to Accounts.

The button was a black oblong. On his screen it appeared to be about an inch and a half long by a quarter-inch high. Inside, in white lettering, was the word “Submit.” At least that’s what the word should have been. It now read “Sub mit,” and the “Sub” was flashing. Over and over. Roberto stared at it. Sub. Sub. Sub.

“Hey, Berto, you ready for lunch?”

Startled, Roberto looked up from his monitor. For a few seconds the “sub” burnt onto his retinas glowed a bright white and obscured his vision, and he couldn’t make sense of what he was seeing. When his eyes cleared, he found his co-workers Jennifer and Martin standing in the doorway staring at him with concern mingled with curiosity.

“Sorry to disturb your concentration,” said Martin. “What are you working on that’s got you so entranced? We had to knock three times.”

Roberto looked back at the monitor. “Oh, it’s just an invoice.” He couldn’t think why it had been so interesting. He clicked the submit button. “Where’d the morning go? Is it already lunchtime?” He looked at his watch. 12:10. He could have sworn it was no more than 9:15.

“Times flies when you’re having fun doing invoices,” said Jennifer. The three of them laughed. His own laugh sounded a bit forced to Roberto’s ears. Had he been staring at the form for almost three hours?

*****

The afternoon was a nightmare of flashing subs.

The reader’s report on a new manuscript proclaimed it a “sub stantive” addition to the author’s works.

An email from the editor-in-chief warned him about a new project’s “sub standard” prose.

Another invoice included a charge for “sub contracted” work.

Sub ject

in Sub stantial

Sub dued

Everywhere Roberto looked, “sub” seared into his mind. And he loved it. He wanted it. He needed it. It felt so right. It made him feel so good. He nearly came on the subway ride home.

*****

“You’re seeing this everywhere?” Roberto’s next-door neighbor Jesse lifted the wine bottle. “More?”

Roberto nodded yes. “Thanks. I need it after today.”

Jesse mmm’ed sympathetically. “I can imagine. It sounds like your SUBconscious is trying to tell you something.”

“Oh, very funny. Spare me your puns. Maybe I should see a doctor. This isn’t normal.”

“You need to relax, Berto. Here, let me help.” Jesse stood up and walked around to the back of the couch on which Roberto sat. “Put your glass down and lean back.”

Jesse put his hands on Roberto’s shoulders and began massaging them gently. “Just relax, Berto. Close your eyes. Relax. That’s it. Take a deep breath and let it out slowly. And as you do so, just let your whole body relax. We’ve done this before. Your mind remembers what it needs to do. Just relax and let it happen. That’s a good boy. Such a good boy.” Jesse stroked the back of Roberto’s head. He leaned forward and whispered in Roberto’s ear, “Good boy. My good boy.”

Roberto took a deep breath, held it for a moment, and then slumped down into the couch as he exhaled. Jesse gently guided Roberto’s body until his head came to rest on a cushion at one end of the couch. He lifted Roberto’s legs at the ankles and stretched his body out full length on the couch. “Good boy. Deeper and deeper. Let your conscious mind drift away. Let your conscious mind sleep. I am speaking directly to your subconscious mind. Your subconscious mind focuses on every word I say. I control your subconscious mind. I am the master of your subconscious mind. Your subconscious mind belongs to me.”

Roberto’s facial muscles relaxed. His jaw sagged, and his mouth opened slightly. His eyelids quivered for a second and then stilled.

Jesse looked at the prone, relaxed body of his neighbor with satisfaction. The triggers were working so well now. It had taken six months to overcome all of Roberto’s resistance, but it had been a great six months. He loved the challenge, and the results were worth the many, painstaking hours of work needed to subdue and train Roberto.

“Good boy. Such a good boy. Open your subconscious mind to me, and listen only to my words. You love to submit to me. Nothing makes you feel better than submitting to me. You love to obey me. Nothing makes you feel better than obeying me.”

Roberto’s lips trembled before curving into a smile.

“Good boy. That makes you happy, doesn’t it? The thought of submitting to me, of obeying me, makes you so happy.”

“Yes,” whispered Roberto. “So happy.”

“Good boy. Submit and obey.”

Roberto nodded his head.

Jesse reached over and unbuttoned Roberto’s shirt. He spread it apart until the nipples were exposed. Berto had such a magnificent chest, especially since he had shaved off that dense pelt of black hair that used to hide the crisp definition of his pecs and abs. That had taken some work. Berto’s opposition to the idea of shaving his body completely and getting a Brazilian wax job had been stubborn. It took several sessions to implant the idea that his pleasure was so linked to pleasing his friend and master Jesse that he had to obey and remove every strand of body hair. It had been such a treat to unwrap Berto one night and discover that his body was now absolutely hairless. The conscious Roberto’s explanation had been that he had removed all his body hair because it was cooler. The unconscious Roberto had reaped the reward of a hypnotically induced surge of pleasure at Jesse’s appreciation of his now silky smooth body that reinforced his need to keep his body absolutely free of hair.

“Take off your shirt.”

Berto eased his shirt off and tossed it behind the couch. His arms were so beautiful. Jesse loved to touch them, to feel the hard ball of the biceps, to trace the veins running up and down Berto’s arms with the tip of his tongue, especially since the “good boy” had been trained to find that so erotic. Berto now shivered with the intensity of his reactions to Jesse’s attentions—any attention, all attentions—to his body.

And every time he went into a trance, his reactions grew stronger. “The more submissive you are, the better you feel when I touch you. The more obedient you are, the better you feel when I touch you.” Berto had learned that lesson so well. Indeed he had been eager to put it in practice.

Jesse bent forward and sucked Berto’s left nipple between his lips. He nibbled at it with his front teeth and then stabbed at it with the tip of his tongue.

He chuckled at the result. “Good boy, but don’t moan so loudly. The neighbors don’t need to hear you.” Berto was becoming almost too responsive. He would have to dial back Berto’s verbal reactions. The cops would be pounding on the door to his apartment if Berto continued to be that noisy. “Good boy. Just be a quiet good boy. Do you understand?”

Roberto nodded yes. “Sorry, Master. I can’t help myself. It just feels so good.”

“Good boy. We have awakened your inner slut, haven’t we? And it feels so good, doesn’t it?”

Roberto smiled shyly. He loved to gratify all of Jesse’s desires. “Please, Master, will you fuck me?”

“You liked to be fucked, don’t you?” Jesse silently congratulated himself. Another trigger was working. The word “slut” awakened an intense need to be fucked in Berto. He couldn’t help himself now. As soon as Berto heard the word, he was overcome with the desire for Jesse to pound his cock into him. “But there’s no hurry, is there, my little slut? You want me to take my time, don’t you, my little slut?”

With each repetition of the word, Berto writhed on the couch. His fingers tore at the button and the zipper on his jeans. He pushed them down and shook his legs and kicked at the jeans with his feet until they fell to the floor.

Jesse cupped his hand around Berto’s cock and balls. They were tightly enclosed in one of the red nylon thongs that he had trained Berto to wear. The thong was so sheer that every vein on Berto’s cock was visible. Pre-cum stained the cloth over the head of his cock. Jesse stroked the wet spot with his thumb. More pre-cum bubbled out.

“Good boy. You feel so good when you obey me, don’t you, slut?”

Roberto’s mouth opened wide in a long groan. “Please, fuck me, Master.” He lifted his legs and spread them wide, pulling aside the strap of the thong to expose his asshole.

Jesse noted with approval that Berto had shaved the area and then scrubbed it clean and bleached it. Good, the boy was learning proper hygiene and preparing himself for these nightly encounters, even if he didn’t consciously know what happened every night when he crossed the hall and knocked on the door to Jesse’s apartment. Poor Berto. He just loved to be fucked now. Once he heard the trigger word, that was all he could think about. It was getting to be a problem. He had to devise some way to link Berto’s desire to be fucked to a need to first satisfy his own desires to enjoy Berto’s body thoroughly before thrusting his cock into Berto’s all-too-hungry ass. He had to be so careful in formulating suggestions. Berto took them so literally now.

“Not so fast, slut. Stand up and display your body for me. I want to enjoy your body before I fuck you. In fact, the more I enjoy your body, the more you will enjoy your fuck.” Jesse continued talking for several minutes instilling the idea in Berto’s mind that the foreplay that increased his master’s enjoyment had the side-effect of making Berto’s pleasure in being fucked even stronger.

The suggestion began working immediately. Berto’s subconscious drew on his memories of past evenings with Jesse, and he began doing all the things Jesse loved. He bounced his pecs. He flexed his arms and presented them so that Jesse could tongue his biceps. He slowly undressed Jesse and licked and kissed him, gradually working his way from Jesse’s lips and neck down to his groin. He sucked Jesse’s cock slowly and lovingly. His moans of pleasure were a constant accompaniment to his actions.

When Jesse could take no more, he ordered Berto to lie down on his back and raise his legs. Jesse thrust his cock into Berto with a groan. Berto was so tight. He tried to hold back, but his cock quickly developed a mind of its own. His buttocks shuddered as he tried to force his cock even deeper into Berto. When he came, Berto’s cock erupted, blasting jets of cum over his own chest and face.

“Good boy. Very good boy.” It took Jesse a few minutes to find his voice again. He pulled out of Berto and got dressed. Berto lay unresponsive on the couch, totally satisfied and still deep in trance.

Jesse sank down into a chair opposite the couch and took a drink of his wine. It was warm, but he drank it anyway. All that talk and then the sex had left him thirsty. There was more wine in the refrigerator. He would refill his glass after Berto had left. But he still needed to do a few things.

“In a few minutes, I’m going to count from one to five. When I say the number five, you will wake up. You will feel great. Completely refreshed and reinvigorated. You will not remember anything that happened. You will remember only that you came over to talk with me and that we drank some wine. We had a good conversation. Then you left.

“From now on, every time you see the letters “s, u, b,” a lightning bolt of intense pleasure will flash through your body and mind. You love being a sub, you love being my sub. And each time you encounter the syllable “sub,” it will increase your desire to be submissive to me, to obey me, to be my sub.”

Jesse repeated the new instructions three times and then began the wake-up count.

At “five,” Roberto sat up and stretched. He smiled at Jesse, “Thanks for the wine, and the talk. I hope I didn’t bore you with my problems. But you helped a lot. I can’t remember why I was so upset. It seems silly now.”

Roberto picked up his clothes. If he was aware that he was undressed, he showed no sign of it. He felt around in the pockets of his jeans until he found his keys. He tossed them a few inches into the air and then caught them. “OK, I’d better get home and get some sleep. It’s going to be a busy day tomorrow.”

Some of the cum Roberto had spewed over his chest and face had already dried, leaving crusty white trails. A few thick drops meandered slowly down his torso, following the curves of the muscles. Jesse wondered what Berto would make of all that cum when he saw it in the mirror as he brushed his teeth. Berto’s mind was so inventive in finding rational-sounding reasons for the changes in his behavior and for the physical evidence of their nightly sessions.

“Night. See you tomorrow.” Roberto opened the door to the hallway. His clothes were draped over his left arm, and he carried his shoes in his hand. The red thong lay jumbled on top. It was still visibly stained with pre-cum. The last Jesse saw of Berto was his naked backside as he closed the door behind him. A second later he heard Berto unlocking the front door to his apartment.