Chapter 37: The Client's Test
The archive footage was a hit. The money hit their account with a soft digital chime that seemed to echo in the quiet flat for days. It bought silence. It bought Catriona a new, expensive wool coat for the library, navy blue and perfectly respectable. It bought Aidan a set of tools he didn’t need. It lay between them at breakfast, a thick, unspoken thing.
A week passed. The normal rhythm reasserted itself: Catriona’s shifts, Aidan’s CAD designs, shared takeaways on the sofa. The bedroom door stayed shut during the day. The replica lived in a locked aluminium case under Aidan’s bed. They didn’t touch. They talked about the weather, about a leaky tap.
It felt like waiting.
The new directive arrived not as a request, but as a scene outline, pre-paid. The subject line was just: ‘Tactile Deception. Live.’
Catriona read it on her phone in the library staff room, between re-shelving returns. Her fingers left faint smudges on the screen. She read it twice, her breath catching somewhere high in her chest. She forwarded it to Aidan with no comment.
His reply came an hour later. Yuki’s booked. Tonight. 9pm.
When she got home, he was in the kitchen, cooking pasta. The case was on the dining table. Yuki’s kit bag leaned against it.
“We don’t have to do this one,” he said, not turning from the hob. “It’s a mindfuck. Different kind.”
“I know what it is.” Her voice was steadier than she felt.
“Do you?” He finally looked at her. His eyes were shadowed. “It’s not about taking it. It’s about not knowing what you’re taking. It’s about your head.”
“That’s what I’m paying for,” she said, echoing his own words from weeks ago. They tasted like ash.
He served the food. They ate in silence. The pre-shoot routine felt sterilised. A shower. Hair brushed. The application of her own make-up—a light foundation, a touch of mascara. She put on the simple black lingerie he’d laid out. It felt like putting on a uniform.
Yuki arrived at 8:55. She wore grey linen trousers and a white t-shirt, looking like an architect. She nodded at them both, her eyes assessing Catriona’s posture. “The psychological premise is clear,” she said, setting up. “The blindfold is the primary tool. Your voices, Aidan-san, and mine, will be neutral. Touch will be identical in sequence. The client wishes to witness the dissolution of certainty.”
She said it like she was briefing for a surgical procedure. Catriona’s skin felt too tight.
The set was minimal. Just the bed. The lamp. Two cameras—one focused on her bound form, one tight on her face. The laptop screen was positioned where Aidan could see it, the live chat box open and empty, waiting.
The client was already in the feed. A single username: Verifier. No greeting.
Catriona lay back. The silk restraints were familiar now, a cold comfort. Aidan secured her. His knuckles brushed her inner wrist, a fleeting point of heat. Then the blindfold. The world vanished.
In the darkness, sound became architecture. The rustle of Yuki moving to the right side of the bed. The creak of the floorboards as Aidan stood at the foot. The snick of the aluminium case opening.
Lube. That wet, smooth sound. Then silence.
“We begin,” Yuki said, her voice calm, centrally located. “You will receive ten penetrations. Five may be the replica. Five may be genuine. You will, after each, state your belief. You will describe the sensation that led to your conclusion. The Verifier wishes to understand the texture of your doubt.”
A hand, cool—Yuki’s—guided a latex-covered pillow under her hips. The exposure was absolute.
The first touch was a shock. A blunt, lubricated pressure at her entrance. It pushed in slowly, a relentless, stretching fullness. It was large. It burned slightly. It felt… real. The familiar, impossible stretch of him. She moaned.
It withdrew.
“Guess,” Aidan’s voice came from the foot of the bed. Flat.
“Real,” Catriona gasped. “It’s you.”
A beat of silence. She heard a soft, plastic click from the direction of the dresser.
“Incorrect,” Yuki said, no inflection. “That was the replica. Describe the sensory error.”
Humiliation, hot and sharp, lanced through her. She’d been so sure. The client typed. Aidan read the text aloud, his voice a monotone conduit. “Detail the failure. Was it warmth? Pulse? Give us the data of your mistake.”
Catriona’s mind scrabbled. “It… it felt alive. The stretch. The pressure curve.”
“The replica is engineered to mimic muscular tension,” Yuki provided. “Your memory is an imperfect guide. Again.”
The second penetration came quicker. This one felt different—slightly cooler, the progression more mechanically even. A toy. It had to be.
“Replica,” she declared, more confident.
From her left, a low, amused sigh. Aidan. “Wrong. That was me.”
She cried out, a sound of pure frustration. The client typed. Excellent. The conflict is established.
It continued. A third, a fourth. She was wrong. Then wrong again. The physical sensations began to blur into a continuous, confusing assault. The careful prep Yuki had done made every entry smooth, every stretch profound. The only variables were the subtlest of things: a fractional hesitation, a minute shift in angle, the ghost of a warmth she might be imagining.
By the seventh, she was weeping silently, the tears soaking the blindfold. Her body was alight, buzzing with a desperate, unmet need. She was a swollen, wet, open thing, and she had no idea what was fucking her.
“Guess,” Aidan demanded.
“I don’t know,” she sobbed. “I can’t… I can’t tell.”
“You must,” Yuki insisted. Her voice was closer now, near Catriona’s ear. “Is it the plastic, or the man? Does it matter?”
The eighth penetration was deep, brutal, bottoming out. A thumb rubbed rough circles on her clit. She screamed.
“Guess!”
“Real! Please, it’s real, it’s you, Aidan, please—”
The thumb disappeared. The object withdrew. “Incorrect,” Yuki murmured. “That was me. With the replica.”
The ninth was a slow, tormenting re-entry. She was babbling. “Replica? No… real? It’s thicker? It’s… God, I don’t know.” She was begging the void. “Tell me. Just tell me.”
The client’s messages scrolled faster. This is the core. The annihilation of discernment. Make her describe the void where knowledge was.
Aidan’s voice, strained now, read the command. “Describe what not knowing feels like. Physically.”
Catriona shuddered, her body clenching around nothing. “It feels… empty and full at the same time. It’s all just… impact. It’s just a shape. It could be anyone. Anything.” The confession was the most degrading part. “I can’t feel you. I just feel… used.”
For the first time, there was a pause. No new text.
“Final,” Aidan said. His voice was tight, ragged. This penetration was different. It wasn’t just a thrust. It was a claiming. A deep, rolling rhythm that spoke of a hunger that wasn’t clinical. A hand gripped her hip, fingers biting in. A low groan echoed in the room—his, unmistakably his.
It was him. It had to be.
But her certainty was gone. She was a vessel for sensation, stripped of meaning.
It stopped. Withdrew.
“Guess.” It was a whisper.
Catriona went still. The tears stopped. In the dark, a terrible clarity descended. The answer wasn’t in her flesh. It was in the wreckage of her mind. “It doesn’t matter,” she said, her voice hollow, clean. “It’s all just cock. And I’ll take whatever you give me.”
The silence in the room was absolute.
On the laptop, the Verifier typed three words. Perfect. Payment released.
Aidan made a sound, a sharp exhale that was almost a sob. He fumbled with the blindfold. It came away. The light was a knife. He was looking down at her, his face pale, his eyes red-raw. He was still fully dressed. Across the room, Yuki stood, holding the replica. Her expression was unreadable.
Catriona looked from one to the other. The question was there, in her eyes.
Aidan didn’t nod. He didn’t shake his head. He just stared at her, his chest heaving.
He never confirmed it.
He simply began to untie the silks, his fingers trembling against her skin, his silence the only answer she would ever get.