Chapter 8: Dream of Subjugation
The world dissolved into a shimmering haze of fever and memory. The sterile scent of the ship’s lab was gone, replaced by the rich, sun-warmed marble and sacred incense of Themyscira. Diana stood at the heart of the Temple of Hera, bathed in a column of ethereal moonlight that streamed through the oculus far above. The familiar carvings of goddesses and heroes seemed to watch her from the shadows between towering columns.
But the air, thick with the murmured prayers of generations, held a new, discordant note. A buzzing anticipation.
Her mother, Hippolyta, stood resplendent before the great altar, her expression not one of loving pride, but of severe, ceremonial focus. Diana’s sisters flanked her in perfect ranks, not in celebration, but in silent, waiting formation. They were not here to honor her. They were here to prepare her.
“Daughter of Themyscira,” Hippolyta’s voice echoed, devoid of warmth. “The time has come for you to assume your sacred duty. To wear the uniform of our champion.”
A shiver of wrongness, electric and cold, shot down Diana’s spine. This was not how it happened.
Two senior Amazons, Epione and Philippus, stepped forward. Their faces, usually so kind, were masks of ritual blankness. Instead of approaching with the golden tiara and star-spangled armor, their hands went to the clasps at Diana’s shoulders.
“No,” Diana whispered, but the word was lost in the sudden, roaring applause of the crowd. The whispers had become a cheering din, echoing painfully off the marble.
Epione’s fingers found the first clasp. A sharp click.
The ceremonial gown did not fall away to reveal armor. It simply ceased to be, as if it had never existed, leaving Diana standing naked in the sacred space. The moonlight felt like a cold searchlight on her skin. The cheers grew louder, hungrier. Philippus produced not the golden tiara, but a band of polished, unforgiving steel. It was cold as a deep-sea current as it was fitted around Diana’s throat. The snap of the lock engaging was the loudest sound in the universe.
A collar.
Tears of confusion and humiliation burned Diana’s eyes, but her body refused to move. It was as if she were carved from the same marble as the temple.
“Your bracelets, my princess,” Philippus intoned, but she held not the Bracelets of Submission. She held heavy, black iron manacles, linked by a short, thick chain. They were clamped around Diana’s wrists with a finality that jarred her bones. The weight was immense, dragging her arms down.
The cheering reached a fever pitch as the Amazon sisters formed two lines, creating a path from the altar to a side chamber. Hippolyta gestured, not with love, but with the detached grace of a high priestess directing a sacrifice.
“Present our champion. Present Wonder Woman.”
The manacles on her wrists pulled taut as Epione and Philippus led her, not toward the temple’s great doors, but into a shadowed side chamber she had never seen before. The air here was cooler, smelling of metal and old stone dust. The approving roars of her sisters faded, replaced by a resonant, hollow silence that seemed to swallow sound.
In the center of the room, awaiting her, stood a structure of dark iron. It was an X-shaped frame, stark and utilitarian against the flowing marble. It was not a pedestal for a champion. It was a restraint. Diana’s breath hitched, a soft noise of pure denial swallowed by the chamber’s dense quiet.
“This is your raiment now,” Hippolyta’s voice came from behind her, closer than before. “The true form of your submission. The world does not need your protection. It demands your presentation.”
“Mother, please,” Diana managed, but Epione was already guiding her right wrist to the waiting cuff at the end of the frame’s right arm. The cold iron closed around her flesh with a heavy, definitive clank. The mechanism was not a simple latch; it was a lock, intricate and final. Philippus mirrored the action on her left, drawing that arm out until Diana’s shoulders burned with the stretch.
She was spread, vulnerable, her breasts pulled taut and her back slightly arched against the unyielding metal. The dream-logic held her, a willing paralysis more terrifying than any physical force. She watched, helpless, as Epione knelt and secured a manacle around her right ankle, the chain drawing her leg wide. The second cuff closed on her left ankle, completing the brutal geometry.
Every muscle in her powerful body went rigid, then strained against the immutable lock of the frame. Her world narrowed to the points of cold, hard contact: the collar at her throat, the cuffs on her wrists and ankles. She was a specimen pinned in a starfish spread, her sex fully exposed in the cool air, her entire form presented for unseen eyes.
“Behold Wonder Woman,” Hippolyta declared, not to Diana, but to the empty room that now felt crowded with judgment. Her mother’s hand, once so gentle, rested clinically on Diana’s abdomen, feeling the tremors of effort and shame running beneath the skin. “This is your purpose. To be seen. To be known. To be bound.”
A traitorous warmth began to pool low in Diana’s belly, cutting through the cold shock. The strain in her muscles was a brutal echo of training, but this was different. This was a surrender that demanded everything. She clenched her jaw, trying to fight the creeping, insistent heat. Her nipples hardened into tight peaks, betraying her.
“Her body accepts its function,” Epione observed, her fingers tracing a line from Diana’s navel down through the coarse dark hair. Diana jerked against the restraints, a feeble, involuntary motion. A low, guttural sound escaped her—part protest, part something else entirely.
“It does,” Philippus agreed, her hand cupping Diana’s breast, her thumb rubbing rough circles over the stiff nipple. “See how she answers. This is the truth the armor hid.”
Hippolyta’s hand slid lower, through the thatch of curls, her fingers parting Diana’s lips with an impersonal expertise. “The body is wiser than the mind. It understands its use.”
Diana threw her head back against the frame, a strangled cry tearing from her throat as two fingers pushed inside her. They were not gentle. They were an invasion, a confirmation. She was soaking wet, her inner muscles clenching around the intrusion in a rhythm of awful, shaming welcome. The slick, filthy sound of it filled the silent chamber.
“Fuck,” she gasped, the obscenity shocking her own ears. Her hips tried to buck, but the frame held her utterly fast, allowing only the slightest, most desperate tremor. “Stop. Please.”
“This is not a plea for stopping,” Hippolyta murmured, her breath hot against Diana’s ear as she worked her fingers deeper, curling them. “This is a plea for more. Say it.”
The pressure built, a storm against the rigid captivity of her limbs. Her vision swam. Every insult, every crude touch from Aresia’s dungeons came rushing back, but twisted now into this sacred profanity. This was a ceremony. This was her making.
“More,” Diana whimpered, the word dissolving into a moan as a third finger stretched her. “Gods, more.”
Her climax tore through her with a violence that felt like a structural failure. It racked her bound body, a seismic pulse of shame and raw release that milked the fingers inside her. She screamed, a raw, echoing sound that was pure animal surrender, her back arching as far as the iron would allow. The cuffs bit into her flesh, a bright counterpoint to the obliterating waves of sensation.
Epione and Philippus held her steady, their hands firm on her trembling thighs, as the spasms gradually subsided into shallow, hitching tremors. The air in the chamber smelled of sex, sweat, and cold stone.
Hippolyta slowly withdrew her glistening fingers. She regarded Diana’s ruined, splayed form with an expression of profound, chilling satisfaction. She brought her wet fingers to Diana’s lips, painting them with her own slickness. Diana, dazed and shattered, tasted herself.
“Good,” Hippolyta said, her voice soft with finality. She wiped her hand on Diana’s stomach. “You see? You are satisfied.”
Diana could only gasp, her chest heaving, the cold metal of the collar a constant, demeaning pressure against her throat.
“This was always the true purpose of Wonder Woman, Diana’s purpose,” Hippolyta continued, circling the frame like a sculptor assessing a finished work. Her tone was didactic, almost gentle. “The costume, the battles, the escapes… they were just preamble. A slow unveiling.”
She stopped, facing her daughter. Her eyes held no mercy, only a terrible certainty. “That’s why your uniform was so revealing—a promise of what you are. That’s why you were captured and bound so many times—a rehearsal for this acceptance. And that’s why now you will eventually choose this life for yourself. When the fantasy of freedom becomes too hollow. You will ask for the collar. You will beg for the frame.”
The words seared deeper than any brand. They connected every humiliation, every defeat, every crude touch from her past into a single, damning narrative. A destiny. Diana shook her head, a weak, repetitive motion of denial. “No.”
“Yes,” Hippolyta whispered, leaning close. “This is your truth. Your body knows it. You came for my fingers like a starving thing. You will come for the world just the same.”
The image of the temple, the faces of her sisters, the feel of the iron—all of it began to shimmer and distort. The cold marble under her feet seemed to liquefy. The approving roars of the crowd faded into a new, persistent sound: the low, resonant hum of machinery.
Diana’s eyes flew open.
The sterile, low ceiling of the ship’s cabin pressed down, its pale gray surface humming with the vessel’s quiet life support. She was on her back, secured not to cold iron, but to a padded medical cot. The restraints were simple nylon straps across her wrists and ankles, clinical and secure, but nothing like the ceremonial frame of her dream. Her skin was sheened with a cold sweat that had nothing to do with the room’s temperature.
The phantom sensations of the dream clung to her—the biting metal, her mother’s invasive touch, the shocking, shameful climax. Her heart hammered against her ribs like a trapped bird. She took a sharp, gulping breath of recycled air.
“Well, that sounded like a fun little trip.”
Betsy’s voice cut through the residual echoes of temple chants. She was leaning against the doorway, arms crossed over her bare chest, one boot propped against the frame. She’d removed her gloves. Her expression was a blend of professional curiosity and sheer, impish amusement.
Diana turned her head, the movement stiff. “It was… a memory. Distorted.”
“Sure it was,” Betsy said, pushing off the doorframe and walking into the small room with a fluid, silent grace. Her bare feet made no sound on the deck plating. She stopped beside the cot, her violet eyes scanning Diana’s body with analytical intensity. “Your pulse is still through the roof. Pupils dilated. Respiratory rate elevated. And,” she added, her gaze dropping pointedly, “you’re glistening somewhere a medical scan doesn’t cover.”
A jolt of pure panic shot through Diana. She tried to sit up, but the straps held her firm. She craned her neck to look down the length of her own naked body.
There, on the inside of her taut, muscled thighs, a clear, sticky trail caught the low light. The evidence was undeniable, a visceral map of the dream’s conclusion. Heat flooded her face, a fiercer burn than any battle wound.
“That is… it is a physiological response to stress,” Diana stated, forcing her voice into a regal flatness she did not feel. “An adrenal release. Nothing more.”
Betsy chuckled, a low, knowing sound. “Right. Adrenal release. That’s a new one.” She tilted her head. “You also talked, princess. Mumbled, really. Quite the orator in your sleep.”
Diana froze. The panic condensed into a hard, cold lump in her stomach. “What did I say?”
“Oh, the usual dream stuff,” Betsy shrugged, her eyes never leaving Diana’s. “‘More.’ ‘Please.’ ‘Gods.’ The word ‘fuck’ got some particularly creative use as a verb, an adjective, and I think an expletive of fervent gratitude.” She leaned in closer, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. “You also said ‘Mother, stop.’ Which is… layered. But then you clearly didn’t want her to stop, did you?”
There was no escape. The physical proof was on her skin, and her own voice had betrayed her. The walls of denial, so carefully maintained for centuries, crumbled under the weight of a single, humid dream and Betsy’s merciless observation. Diana closed her eyes, shutting out the sight of the other woman’s smirk. She felt stripped even beyond the curse’s demands.
“The uniform,” Diana whispered to the ceiling.
“What about it?”
“For decades, it was my skin. The symbol.” Diana’s voice was hollow, scraping out of her. “The star-spangled briefs, the corset… it was armor. But it was also a spotlight. It curated a specific view. It said ‘icon’ but it screamed ‘specimen’.”
She opened her eyes, looking past Betsy at the sterile ceiling. “When the internet came, I saw what people did. The art. The… pornography. They would peel the symbol away in their fantasies and just leave the body. My body. They drew me in chains, in cages, in poses of defeat. At first, I was furious. Then I was… curious.”
Betsy said nothing. She simply listened, her earlier amusement replaced by a focused, predatory stillness.
“The desire to be naked… it didn’t start with Circe’s curse,” Diana confessed, the words feeling like pulled teeth. “The curse just made it permanent, took away the choice. But before… the uniform was a prison of expectation. Their drawings, their filthy stories… they were imagining a freedom I couldn’t allow myself. A freedom from the icon.”
She took a shuddering breath. “Sometimes… on patrols, in battles… I would make a tactical error. A hesitation. I would allow a net to catch me, or a energy bind to hold me a moment too long. I told myself it was to assess their technology, to understand my enemies.” A bitter, ashamed laugh escaped her. “I was lying. I wanted to see what device they would use on me. I wanted to feel the cool metal on my wrists, the bite of a constraint. Just for a moment. Just to see.”
The admission hung in the sterile air, more exposing than her nudity. She had spoken the rot at the core of her legend, the secret thrill under the heroism.
Betsy let the silence stretch, letting the confession settle. Then she moved. Her hand came down, not on Diana’s body, but on the release mechanism for the nylon strap on Diana’s right wrist. It popped open with a soft click.
“So the Greatest Heroine in the World,” Betsy murmured, her voice dangerously soft as she moved to the left wrist, “is a secret bondage slut who gets off on being captured. Who got turned on by her own rape fantasies on the internet.”
She freed the left wrist. Her fingers, bare and cool, traced the faint red line the strap had left on Diana’s skin.
Diana flinched but didn’t pull away. The humiliation was complete, but it carried a strange, terrifying relief. “Yes.”
Betsy moved down the cot, releasing the ankle restraints with efficient clicks. Diana was free, but she didn’t move. She lay there, utterly vulnerable, her confession seeming to hover in the space between them.
Betsy stood at the foot of the cot, looking down at her. The predatory gleam was back, but it was sharper now, honed by understanding. “You’re not a prisoner here, Diana. You’re a volunteer. You finally signed up for the mission you always wanted.”
She turned and walked toward the door, her naked back a canvas of lean muscle. She paused at the threshold.
She paused at the threshold, her fingers tracing the doorframe absentmindedly, the curve of her bare hip catching the dim blue light from the corridor. Without turning, her voice cut through the hum of the ship. "Get up. We're docking at Themyscira in three hours."
Diana's muscles tensed, the aftereffects of the dream still coiled tight in her limbs. The straps had left faint impressions on her skin—not enough to hurt, just enough to mark. She pushed herself up slowly onto her elbows, the medical cot creaking under her weight. "You're releasing me?"
Betsy snorted, finally glancing over her shoulder. "I don't *keep* people, princess. Even ones who enjoy being kept." She tilted her head, the smirk returning. "Besides, you're more fun when you come crawling back on your own."
The words should have stung. Instead, something dark and hungry twisted low in Diana’s gut. She swung her legs over the edge of the cot, her bare feet hitting the cold deck plating. The air prickled against her damp thighs, a reminder of just how thoroughly she’d been exposed—body and soul.
"You haven’t won anything," Diana said, forcing steel into her voice even as her pulse betrayed her.
Betsy turned fully now, leaning back against the doorframe, arms crossed. The motion made her breasts shift slightly, the light catching the hard peaks of her nipples. "Didn’t say I did." She shrugged, the movement lazy, arrogant. "But you’re not running out of here screaming either, are you?"
Diana clenched her jaw. There was no answer that wouldn’t dig the hole deeper.
Betsy pushed off the doorframe. "Meet me at the coordinates I upload to your bracer in one week."
Diana blinked. "You think I’ll come?"
Betsy laughed—short, sharp, utterly confident. "I *know* you will." She stepped into the corridor, the shadows swallowing her bare form as she tossed the last words over her shoulder. "And if you don’t? Well. I found you once. Won’t be hard to do it again."
Then she was gone, the hum of the ship the only sound in the sterile room.
Diana sat there, the weight of the challenge settling like a collar around her neck.
The choice was hers now.
That was the cruelest part.
---
The island emerged from the dawn mist like a half-remembered dream. The cliffs of Themyscira rose sharp and unyielding, the familiar scent of salt and olive trees filling Diana’s lungs as the ship’s ramp lowered with a hiss.
Betsy hadn’t said goodbye.
The ramp lowered onto an empty stretch of beach, far from the main harbor. No fanfare, no guards—just sand and sea and the distant cry of gulls.
Diana stepped onto the shore, the warm grains shifting under her bare feet. The wind tangled in her hair, carrying the faintest hint of incense from the temple high above. Home.
But it didn’t feel like it.
Not anymore.
She turned back just as the ramp began to rise, sealing the ship’s dark interior from view. The last thing she saw was Betsy’s silhouette in the doorway—watching, waiting, already certain of the outcome.
Then the engines whined, and the ship lifted into the sky, leaving Diana standing naked on the sand.
Alone.
Free.
For now.