O’Melissokomos
The Bee Keeper

Simon (mm mc asfr)

by Wersgor

Chapter 1: Wish Upon a Star

When it began on that Sunday afternoon, I was hanging out with Ken. Not that Ken is my favorite person in the whole world – basically, he’s a very handsome, self-centered moocher – but we do share exactly the same taste in adult films, and when he turns on the roguish charm I’ve always found it hard to say no to him. Plus, once he’s watched one or two of my videos, he finds it hard to say no to almost anything; so our Sunday video club has become a convenient tradition.

On the day in question, we were just getting the VCR set up when the phone rang. “I’ll get rid of them,” I promised. Picking up the receiver, I said in my most preoccupied voice, “Hello?”

“David?” the reply came slowly. “David, I – I’m in trouble. I need your help.”

“Simon?” I asked, concerned. “What’s wrong with your voice?” He sounded really weird – not so much slurred as stretched, as if he were speaking in slow motion.

“I can’t explain on the phone,” the words dragged out. “Please, just come over right – ” Then silence.

“Simon?... Simon!” I repeated, really worried now. Was he having a heart attack or something?

After a moment I hung up and told Ken, “That was Simon. He’s in some kind of trouble.”

“Who? Oh, the weirdo with the mime fixation?” he said, in that brash way that I loved/hated.

“Yeah,” I said, annoyed. “He sounded like he’s hurt or something. I think I’d better go over there.”

“Now? How bad can it be?”

“I’m going,” I told him firmly, gathering up my keys. “You can stay here if you want.”

He came along, of course, still grumbling as we drove the few miles to Simon’s place. I wasn’t listening; I was too worried. Simon and I weren’t exactly close – I’m not sure anyone had ever exactly been close with Simon – but there was a bond between us. It had been there ever since that long-ago evening in tenth grade when I had found him furtively jerking off underneath the bleachers, and had first hesitantly, then eagerly, convinced him to join me in losing our virginity. As we lay panting afterward on the dirt and grass, I had helplessly fallen for blonde, blue-eyed, beautiful Simon. But though I had come out of the closet that day, he never had. Something inside him was too shy, too scared. He had never let me make love to him again, but the memory of that day had never left me.

Maybe it was that painful timidness that had made him so obsessed with becoming a mime – when he went into his performance, he didn’t have to act casual or make conversation. He had a very good executive job at our local library, but in his off-hours he had become a fixture on the neighborhood’s street corners, vainly trying to start a second career. He adopted a robot persona, making stiff, jerky movements and twitching his head from side to side like a metronome; and I have to admit, with his tall, limber body and almost-too-perfect features, he really looked the part. The trouble was that despite his athletic figure, he just couldn’t seem to develop the discipline – he always wound up losing it and doing something all too human. When we occasionally got together over the years, he always came back to lamenting his failure at what he loved most. I think I was probably the only one he felt he could confide in that way. And now, in his hour of need, I was the one he had called for help.

I pulled up in the driveway of Simon’s low-built ranch-style house, where his Camaro sat calmly in its usual place. We went up to the door and I rang the bell; no answer. As I waited, getting more and more antsy, Ken wandered off around the side of the house. A moment later he returned and announced, “The back door’s open. Come on.”

We went around back, bypassed the backyard pool, and went in through the kitchen. Everything seemed normal there – normal and awfully quiet. Ken pushed ahead to the living room; then I heard him exclaim, “Whoa!” I hurried in after him, then stopped in confusion.

Simon was standing beside the telephone table, clad in nothing but a pair of Speedos. He was looking straight at us, but he didn’t react – not in any way at all. He didn’t say anything, didn’t move, didn’t even blink. His mouth was half-open, as if caught in the split-second moment of forming a word.

“What the hell is with him?” Ken demanded. Then he suddenly grimaced. “Oh, for God’s sake! Now I get it. Mr. Mime dragged us all the way over here just to watch him do his fucking statue act.”

I stared at Simon. He stared back, unblinking. “Is that true, Simon?” I wanted to believe that that was all it was, even though it would mean I’d been made a fool of. But since when had Simon been able to hold a pose so perfectly? “If you are just doing an act, then great, you finally got it, now knock it off. I’m waiting.”

We stood there for a minute, and Simon stood there, the phone in his upraised hand beside his open mouth. After a moment Ken rolled his eyes, said “I saw Cheetos in the kitchen”, and disappeared through the door.

I walked up to Simon and waved my hand in front of his eyes. No reaction. I started to panic – had he died and somehow remained upright? I cautiously reached out to touch his naked shoulder. It felt very warm and alive. Just as I remembered it. I felt his bicep; it was very hard, but it was the hardness of a good firm muscle, not of a body in rigor mortis.

“Hands off the merchandise,” came Ken’s mocking voice, and I jerked my hand back. He stood in the doorway, pulling Cheetos out of the bag and grinning. “Hey, how long can he keep it up, if you’ll pardon the expression?”

“I don’t think he’s doing it on purpose,” I said as Ken strolled up beside us. “There was a medical condition I learned about in my psych course – catatonia? Catalepsy? It can make someone freeze like that temporarily, even slow their body functions till they’re almost undetectable.”

“Has he got it?” Ken asked interestedly.

“I don’t know. But it’s all I can think of. He’s obviously alive, but look – you can’t even see him breathing.”

“Well, I know what to do for someone whose heart has stopped,” Ken said confidently. He stepped up and gave Simon a hard thump on the chest with his fist.

Simon’s chest popped open.

I nearly passed out. A door hung open in Simon’s torso, exposing his insides. And they weren’t human insides at all. Just a complex maze of wires, gears, electronic circuits, plastic tubes...

“He really is a robot!” exclaimed Ken with delight. “Cool!”

“But, but – he can’t be!” I gasped. “He couldn’t be a robot. I’ve – uh, I’ve known him since high school, I would have known!”

“Hello, Dave, reality calling,” Ken snorted. “Does he look like flesh and blood to you?” He leaned closer to examine Simon’s mechanical interior. “Hmm, now this is something I could get into. Why isn’t he running?”

I was aghast at his casual attitude, but even in my state of shock I realized I shouldn’t interfere. If there was anything Ken was really good at (besides sex), it was computer programming – he could have made a fortune at it by now, if his attitude didn’t keep pissing off his employers. Maybe he could figure out what was wrong with Simon; God knows I couldn’t! I was still trying to figure out how the very human man I knew and loved had become a machine. Or, nasty thought, had he been replaced by one? Had my friend been exchanged for some android body-snatcher?

“Hm, paper tape,” said Ken, examining a reel of it that wound around a spool in Simon’s chest. “Not exactly state-of-the-art.” He gently fingered a second reel and spool, a couple of inches below the first. “Two tapes. Two different programs? I wonder... ”

He pulled the top reel of tape off its spool and held it in his hand. “What are you doing?” I cried. “Don’t mess with that!”

“Trust me. I know what I’m doing.” He removed the lower reel, then put each of them in where the other had been. He watched Simon’s face carefully, then looked disappointed. “Shit. Nothing.”

“You probably just fucked him up for good!” I wailed. I felt like crying at the sight of Simon standing there immobile, staring blankly with his mouth half-open. Impulsively I put a comforting hand on his stiff back.

Something was sticking out, poking my fingers. I looked down in surprise. It was a small metal key, protruding from the base of his spine just above the Speedos.

I knew that hadn’t been there before!

“I’ll be damned,” I said in wonder. “He’s got a key. He’s got a key above his ass.”

“Really?” Ken looked up, fascinated, from putting the paper tapes back where they had been before. He came around and looked for himself. “Jeeze, a retro-tech android! Well, come on, turn it.”

I stared at him. “Turn it?”

“It worked for Tik-Tok in the Oz stories.”

Cautiously, I tried turning the tiny key. It moved quite easily, winding in a clockwise direction just like the key in a child’s toy. I wound for a minute or so, till it felt like it had reached a stopping-place, wondering if I was being a total fool.

“Look!” Ken pointed at Simon’s chest. His breathing had started up again – slow and gentle, but he was breathing! After a moment his eyelids began to twitch a little, like someone waking up from a sound sleep. His whole body shivered slightly.

“ – away,” he said anxiously into the phone. Then he looked at us in chagrin, and slowly let his hand drop to his side. “Oh, shit.”

 

A little while later I was sitting on Simon’s sofa, saying for the third time, “But you must have some idea!”

Simon, looking very uneasy in his easy chair, protested, “I told you, I don’t! I swear I was a normal human being when I went to bed last night!”

“A human being, anyway,” commented Ken, slurping the beer he had cribbed from Simon’s fridge.

“Go over it in your head,” I said. “What exactly did you do last night?”

Simon sighed, trying to think. “Nothing special. I worked out. I took a shower. I went out in the yard for a minute, ’cause I thought I heard somebody’s dog messing around.” He shook his head. “Everything was so normal. Quiet night, sky full of stars... Oh my god.”

“What?” I demanded.

Simon looked stunned. “Well, I looked up at the stars, and... I know it sounds silly, but I saw a shooting star, and I made a wish. I wished... that I could be the kind of mime I always wanted to be. That I could be just like a real robot.”

We sat there in silence for a long moment. Then Ken grinned. “I always knew Jiminy Cricket had a sick sense of humor.”

“It’s not funny!” Simon and I chorused.

“Well, it is, kind of. Instead of Pinocchio turning into a real boy, you turned into a wind-up toy.”

Simon looked pale. “When I woke up I thought it was a dream at first. I kept waiting to wake up. And then I felt myself starting to run down... I just barely had time to call you. God, am I going to keep going through this all the time?”

“If you do, I’ll be here for you,” I said earnestly. “I can come over and wind you every day if you need it. I’ll be glad to.”

“And you might not have to keep running down,” Ken added cheerfully. “Once I’ve had time to do some poking around, I can probably find some way to keep you running longer.”

Simon looked at him worriedly. “You’re not going to tell anybody, are you?”

“Nah. It’s too cool to be the only ones who know. Trust me.” For some reason, he tapped his shirt pocket as he said that.

Simon looked at me questioningly. “You can trust Ken,” I said, giving Ken a meaningful look that added, if you want to keep eating all my food, among other things, every weekend.

But I was wondering how this was going to work out.

 

After talking for a while, and assuring Simon again that his secret was safe with us, we left. Ken said that even he couldn’t concentrate on videos after this, and I dropped him at his apartment. I was going to go home after that, but instead I just kept driving in circles. I couldn’t stop thinking about Simon, what he was going through in his mind, how vulnerable he had become. How long would it be before his key wound down again? After a while I realized I just had to go back and make sure he was all right.

When I got there I rang the bell and waited. And waited. His car was still parked, so if he’d gone anywhere, it couldn’t be far. After a few minutes I went around to the back door, which was still unlocked. I walked through the silent house, calling, “Simon?”

I found him in the bedroom. He was standing in front of the full-length mirror, naked, staring at his reflection. That is, he had been looking at himself when his motor had stopped. He was an inanimate object again, oblivious to my presence – just a hunk of metal. Or a metal hunk.

I sighed, reaching for the key; this was going to get tired very soon. I couldn’t help noticing how beautiful his butt looked in the unlit room, with shafts of light from the Venetian blinds casting striped shadows across it. So, so long since I had touched him there... I reached out and gently caressed his cheeks with my hand, feeling their warmth, feeling the metal that paradoxically still had the soft firmness of living flesh. If only I could do this when he felt it!

But he is a robot now, the thought came unbidden. And machines can be programmed.

I shook my head angrily, trying to shake the thought loose. Simon was my friend – my friend whose secret I had kept, whose fragility I had protected, all these years! He wasn’t just some object to be played with!

But at the moment, that was just what he was. He was the same sweet, sensitive man I had loved for so long, yet he was no longer truly alive, just an inanimate machine – a wind-up toy, as Ken had crudely said. I stared at Simon’s beautiful body, and realized that for the first time in all these years, he was mine to do whatever I wanted with. And there was nothing he could do to push me away. He wouldn’t even be upset, because he would never know.

I looked at his reflection, trying to remind myself of his humanity. Mistake – one look into those sad, confused blue eyes and I couldn’t control myself. “Oh, Simon,” I murmured softly, and leaned in to kiss the side of his throat, gently at first, then with mounting passion. I was kissing Simon again! I grabbed him and clutched him hard, as fiercely as I had at sixteen, clinging to his strong back and broad chest with possessive hands. Simon continued staring blankly at the mirror, unaware of anything I was doing – unknowing that his tall, athletic body had become my plaything.

I roughly spun him around, looking right into his unseeing eyes, and almost gasped at the flawless beauty of that perfect masculine face, somehow twice as gorgeous in its present immobile state. Hugging him to me, I ran my hands all over the hard shoulders, the almost-hairless chest with its stiff nipples; I couldn’t resist sinking my teeth into his wide, firm neck, but Simon was apparently immune to love bites now – the skin bent to the pressure, but refused to break. His taste was that of natural man-musk mixed with a faint metallic tinge, like the metal taste that gets into food sometimes if you leave it in the opened can. I let my lips and teeth cling to his throat for a long moment, inhaling that lovely scent and feeling like some kind of vampire.

I stood back for a moment and surveyed my wonderful toy. His arms hung at his sides, the lean, hard muscles frozen in position. I tried pushing on one arm, but it wouldn’t budge; he was locked in place. Perfect, I thought, when I start him up again he won’t have a single clue to tell him that anything happened. I stroked the fine lines of his tendons for a minute, sighing happily. Then my eyes went down to his crotch, where his cock hung stiffly down at a slight angle. What a pity that it wasn’t erect, but it couldn’t be helped; in his present state it would take a bulldozer to budge it. Somehow that thought made me almost as hard as he was. I dropped to my knees and happily took that statuesque rod in my mouth, sucking and licking it with delirious pleasure. I even found that I could chew it without hurting him in the least; like his throat, it felt like living meat, but it couldn’t be damaged. I felt like a lucky, lucky doggy with a brand-new chew-toy!

At last I tore myself away enough to continue on down those long, sturdy legs, until I reached one of my very favorite places, the feet. I had almost forgotten how big they were; Simon had always had trouble finding shoes that were large enough for him. Grabbing ahold of the rigid arms, I lifted him up and placed him on his bed face-down. After all, he didn’t need to breathe. His feet stuck out over the foot of the bed, and I knelt again to worship them, kissing and licking those long, wide soles to my heart’s content, chewing on the yielding yet invulnerable metal flesh. I playfully nibbled on each toe. I took his heels into my mouth and sucked them. If only he could know what I was doing to him now! But I got a perverse pleasure from the fact that he couldn’t. When I looked up I could see his handsome face still staring obliviously into the bedsheets. He was totally in my power, mine to use in any way that amused me – and I didn’t even have to worry about his feelings, because he’d never know!

Buoyed up by this incredible knowledge, I practically floated to my feet, feeling as if I was standing on air. Simon’s perfect butt looked up at me invitingly, and I whipped off my pants so fast they almost tore. It was a race to see if I could get inside him before I came all over his ass! I barely made it in time, pumping my cum into him again and again until I thought I would pass out. I had dreamed of this for so long!

“At last I lay sprawled across Simon’s beautiful, motionless body, gasping for breath. I had thought that nothing could ever feel better than that first time under the bleachers, but this had been the most incredible experience of my life. And the mischievous thought teased my mind that this was only the beginning. If Simon kept running down every day like an old clock, and depended on me to show up and rewind him...

Every day! Oh, my!

But still, I couldn’t help wondering if, beneath his closeted shyness, Simon felt the same way about me. Now that he had become what he was, with a personality that, perhaps, could be mechanically altered, was it possible that I could find out?

Chapter 2: Programming

I could barely concentrate on my job the next day; all I could think about was getting back to Simon’s house at 5:15, and wondering what condition I would find him in. Fortunately, my job doesn’t require much concentration. UniChem does work on some interesting projects, including some hush-hush ones for the government, but I only hear about those through cafeteria gossip; I’m the guy who always gets stuck testing some product that turns out to give lab rats dandruff.

When I got there I was almost disappointed to have a normal-acting Simon answer the door. “I’m glad you’re here,” he said, looking like he meant it but trying to make it sound humorous. “Ken’s been here for hours, and I’m running out of groceries.”

He led me down the little hall to the living room, where Ken was sprawled on the sofa tinkering with some metal wiring. “Oh, hi,” he said distractedly. “I think I’ve got it, Simon. Yeah, this should do it – when I attach this it’ll put a constant reverse pressure on your mainspring, forcing it slightly back every time it moves forward. You oughta be able to go twenty, maybe even thirty hours before you run down.”

Simon looked dubious but hopeful. “Thanks, Ken. I really hope you’re right. I can’t keep calling in sick without seeing a doctor, and that would be a really bad idea.”

Yeah, thanks, Ken, I thought a bit crossly, though I knew what he was doing was for the best – for Simon, if not for me.

“Hey, baby, I’m your handyman,” Ken grinned, mimicking the old soft-rock tune. “Let’s hook it up.”

Simon obediently hitched up his polo shirt and tapped his pecs, popping open the door that exposed his insides. That still gave me a queasy feeling, like seeing someone rip a Band-Aid off an open cut, although the sight of Simon’s bare abs was almost enough to make me forget it. Ken hunched down in front of him and started working with the wires. “God, I can’t believe I’m doing this,” he said. “And I especially can’t believe I’m doing it for free. I could get on the cover of every tabloid in the country.”

Simon glanced at me worriedly. “But you wouldn’t, right, Ken? You promised you’d keep th-”

There was no break in his voice, no pause – he just stopped. Ken held up a hand, displaying the tiny key he had just pulled out of Simon’s back. “Cool, huh? No key, no power – instant shut-off. I’ve been finding out all kinds of neat stuff.”

“Knock it off!” I snapped. “He’s going to be really pissed if you keep messing with him.”

Ken just chuckled. “No, he won’t. Watch.” He reached around to Simon’s back and stuck the key back in.

“-is a secret,” Simon continued, as if nothing had happened.

“Relax,” Ken told him, winking at me. “You’re in good hands with me. Dave can testify to that – he knows my hands really well.”

I frowned, though I was relieved to see that Simon was no worse for having his “plug pulled”. In fact, what Ken had just shown me was filling my mind with ideas... and, from the smirk on his face, I had a feeling Ken knew it. “What else have you found out about Simon?” I couldn’t resist asking.

“Oh, loads of stuff,” he said cheerfully. “I’ll show you.”

“Hey, guys,” Simon complained, “don’t talk about me as if I’m not h-”

“But you’re not here,” Ken retorted, putting the pulled key aside on the end table. Simon’s mouth remained open, the look of annoyance frozen on his face, his lithe body standing like a sculpture. Ken glanced at my crotch and grinned mischievously, and I blushed as I realized that my cock was straining against my pants. Seeing Simon put out of action so instantly, and knowing he was totally unaware of his statue-like condition, was giving me a fierce hard-on!

Ken pointed to the top reel of paper tape in Simon’s open chest. “You notice the tape’s stopped moving. The spools can’t turn without power; they’ll start again as soon as the key is replaced, and the tape will resume from where it left off. That tape is what we call Simon – his personality, his memory, everything. The rest is just a machine.”

My mind was boggling. “He’s not just a machine,” I said defensively. “He’s still a person. He has feelings, he has a personality – ”

I broke off in horror as Ken reached up, twisted Simon’s neck, and pulled his head off! It lay in his hands, looking up at the ceiling, its face frozen in its miffed expression, staring just as if it was looking at us. Simon’s body remained standing exactly as it was, his neck open to reveal a maze of wires and circuits. I felt like I was going to faint.

“What’s the matter?” Ken snickered. “Don’t you want him to give you some head?” He bounced it lightly in his hands like a basketball.

“What have you done?” I gasped. “You’ve killed him!”

“No, I haven’t. I’ve done this three times already. Look.” He lifted Simon’s head, placed it back on his shoulders, and pushed. With a loud click, it snapped into place. “See? Insert Tab “ into Slot B. He’ll never know it happened.”

“Don’t do things like that!”

“Just trying to prove a point. This isn’t Simon. That’s Simon.” He pointed to the motionless reel of tape. “And he can’t be killed, because he isn’t alive, so stop worrying.”

I stared at the little strip of paper that my Simon had been reduced to. “Why are there two reels of tape?” I asked, then realized something. “Hey, what happened to the bottom reel? The spools are empty!”

“I took it home so I could study it.” Ken pulled it out of his shirt pocket. “I figured the top one was the one that was operating, so if that was Simon’s identity, what was the other? I spent the whole night cracking its code.”

I wanted to yell You can’t just take parts of him home with you!, but after what I’d just seen, I realized that that would only be a straight line he couldn’t resist. I ought to be grateful he hadn’t taken something else home! “So what is it?” I asked.

“I’m glad you asked,” he said, hamming it up like a used-car salesman. “What you have here, my friend, is the alternate program – the bare essentials, you might say, without all that complicated human stuff. Observe.”

He reached in and very carefully pulled the Simon tape off its spools, making sure not to move it from its position. He gently laid it on the end table next to the key, then slid the other tape into place where that one had been. Then he took the key and inserted it in Simon’s back.

An instant later the spools began turning the tape. Simon turned stiffly to look at us, his eyes seeing but unblinking. His lips moved, but he didn’t complete what he had been saying. Instead the voice that emerged was toneless and mechanical: “PROGRAM INITIATED.”

“That’s not Simon!” I exclaimed.

Ken looked aggrieved. “I told you,” he said patiently. “The other tape is Simon. This one is just the basics – pure robot. Childishly simple, once I figured out the code. In fact, a really easy program to make adjustments to.” He turned to Simon and ordered, “Function One.”

“INITIATED,” Simon droned. Without changing his expression, he stiffly dropped a hand, unbuckled his belt, and undid his pants, letting them drop to the floor. His dick rose stiffly up, not quivering at all, just rising like a drawbridge until it stuck straight out.

By contrast, I was quivering like crazy, thinking: Ohmigod ohmigod ohmigod –

“Function Two,” smiled Ken.

“INITIATED.” Simon shot a load like a stream from a water pistol. I gasped as it hit me right in the groin, and felt my own cock happily responding in my pants. A faint machine-oil smell filled the air.

Ken was beaming delightedly. “You like?”

I stared at Simon, who gazed back expressionlessly. “Does... does he even know what he just did?”

“Pay attention,” he said with annoyance. “Simon. Isn’t. Here. The robot knows that it just performed a function. Simon don’t know nada.” He glanced at my wet crotch with amusement. “Y’know, I never gave you anything for your birthday. Let me make it up to you. Function Three.”

“INITIATED.” Simon stepped stiffly forward and dropped to his knees in front of me. His hands reached up to unzip me, and I trembled at his touch. His mouth formed an O shape.

“Happy birthday,” said Ken, as Simon began to smoothly suck me, his lips and tongue working unspeakable wonders while his face remained a total blank. I had just come a moment ago, but I found myself moaning as if I hadn’t had it in years, clinging to Simon’s strong back to keep the waves of sensation from bringing me to my own knees. He made the perfect support, steel-hard and immobile, only his head performing its function. His bare ass stuck up in the air, and I groped feverishly, not quite able to reach it from my position. I settled for the feel of that broad back in my hands, my mind reeling and my eyes shutting in ecstasy as he sent me into heaven.

Finally I let out a groan that should have brought the neighbors running, gripping Simon’s steely shoulders as my cum flooded his mouth. I slumped over his head, gasping for breath, and heard an equally loud sigh nearby. Opening my eyes, I saw Ken lying across Simon’s stiff back, with a happy smile on his handsome face and his dick shoved up Simon’s butt. I decided that, for once, I wasn’t irritated with him at all.

And then we moved on to Function Four. And Function Five. And Function Six...

Quite a while later Simon said, “-ere.” Then he looked around in confusion. “Hey, you’re not where you were before. I’m not where I was before! You turned me off!”

“Sorry,” I said, trying hard to look sheepish instead of deliriously happy. “You know how Ken loves to show off.”

Simon glared at Ken, but after a moment he smiled ruefully. “You know, I should be mad as hell, but I’m not. In fact, the weird thing is, I feel really... funky. Like there’s some kind of wild energy running through me.”

“There is,” Ken told him. “The way you’re set up, any reactivation after more than a minute or two creates an energy surge through all your circuits. It’s almost like the robot version of an orgasm. But you’re probably not familiar with those.”

Simon blushed furiously, but I could tell from his face that what Ken said was true – that, in his own unique way, it had been as good for him as it was for us. I was glad. In a perfect paradox, Simon was turned on by being turned off.

 

I gave Ken a lift home, and on the way I said cautiously, “So you can pretty much make any changes you want in the number two tape, the robot tape. But not the Simon tape.”

Predictably, he retorted, “I didn’t say that. It’d be more work, yeah – it’s a much more complicated program. But I could do it with a little time. Why? What’ve you got in mind?”

I phrased my words carefully; I couldn’t quite bring myself to tell someone like Ken that I was seriously in love, especially with someone we had just finished using as a sex toy. “I’m just thinking of how closeted he is,” I said. “It would be so much better for him if he could be open about his feelings.”

“Hmm.” Ken rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “That’s an interesting challenge. I like a challenge. I’ll work on it.”

For the rest of the evening my mind was distracted by that thought. If Simon could express his real feelings, what would they be? I was a little afraid to find out – what if he didn’t feel the same way I did? But then again, could I deal with having the chance to know and not taking it?

It bothered me a little that I was so dependent on Ken. I didn’t think for a moment that he would betray Simon’s secret; he was having too much fun. But he wasn’t the most reliable person in the world, and we were relying on him for an awful lot. I’m no moron when it comes to machines myself, but it would take me years to reach Ken’s level of expertise. He was calling the shots for the man I secretly loved, and in a strange way, I felt a bit jealous.

By 11:00 I couldn’t resist calling Simon. “I just was wondering how you’re doing,” I said rather lamely. “If Ken’s doohickey kept you from running down again.”

“It seems to be working fine. I’m pretty sure I can go to work as usual tomorrow. The odd thing, though, is... I almost miss running down. I’m starting to realize that I don’t need sleep any more, and I’m used to sleep. It feels weird to know I’ll probably be wide awake all night without even getting tired.”

My heart leapt. “Would you, um, feel more normal if I came over and shut you down for the night? I could stay over and switch you on in the morning. If you want.”

There was a pause. “Yeah. Yeah, I think I would like that. It would make me feel... more human somehow.”

“I’ll be right over,” I promised, already beginning to breathe harder.

An hour later Simon was in his blue jammies, looking at me gratefully. “I... I’m really glad you came over, David. Thanks,” he said awkwardly.

“I’m glad to do it.” I felt almost ashamed – Simon couldn’t guess how glad I was to do it! “Do you want to lie down?”

“Yeah. In my bed, like a normal person.” He stretched out on his side in the center of the bed, a pillow under his head, leaving his back exposed so I could pull the key. “Okay. Go ahead.”

“Good night, Simon,” I said softly.

“Good n-”

I gently stroked his immobile cheek, feeling an incredible sense of power as I gazed into those open, unseeing blue eyes. I forced myself to lay the key on his dresser very carefully, then practically leapt out of my own clothes and dove in beside him, shaking the bed. In fact, the bed did quite a lot of shaking during the next hour or two, as I passionately kissed his half-open mouth, maneuvered his rigid body so that we were sixty-nining, rammed myself into his ass again and again. “At one point he wound up with two-thirds of his body hanging over the side – his head, his torso and those muscular arms sticking out as stiffly as an ironing board. It was a long time before I was exhausted enough to fall asleep.

“At 7:00 “M the alarm woke me, and I groggily showered and dressed. Then I inserted the key, and Simon said, “-ight.... Oh, man.” He grinned guiltily. “That really does give me a rush. I could get hooked on this.”

So could I, I thought, and told him, “Any time.”

 

Needless to say, I saw Simon after work every day that week. Sometimes Ken was there, sometimes not; being, as usual, “between jobs”, he often spent time “studying” Simon while I was tied up at the lab. I had a pretty good idea what much of that study consisted of, but who was I to talk? Here I was playing the role of concerned friend and nursemaid, then fucking my charge silly after I tucked him in for the night! By Wednesday it had occurred to me that if I set the alarm to go off an hour earlier, I could carry Simon with me to the shower, propping him up against the wall and watching the water stream across his blankly staring face. Mom always used to scold me for wanting to bring my toys into the tub...

On Fridays I always celebrate the new paycheck by having lunch at the Thai place half-a-dozen blocks from UniChem. Simon got off early on Fridays, and seeing him standing on a corner doing his mime routine was as much a part of the ritual as the lunch itself. But today when I drove past, there was a difference. Instead of, at best, a handful of pedestrians, waiting a bit sadistically for Simon to inevitably slip up, there was a whole crowd of people throwing away their lunch hours, standing and staring. I smiled as I realized why: Simon was totally immobile, not twitching a muscle or blinking an eye. He was offline! I saw Ken standing a short distance away; he spotted my car and waved, winking. He nodded toward the hat on the pavement beside Simon, which, for the first time ever, was stuffed with dollar bills.

I drove on feeling a happy glow. Simon might be out of it at the moment, but he was realizing his lifelong dream at last. I was glad I’d been there to see it.

Over the next few weeks I got happily accustomed to Simon’s new life. It became an expected daily pleasure – though never just routine! – to enjoy his company  by day and his body by night. Ken was like part of the furniture, always sprawled in Simon’s easy chair fiddling with some circuitry or examining his program tapes. I even stopped being stunned – well, almost – when I would walk in and find Simon holding the sofa above his head with one steely arm while he vacuumed underneath with the other. I hadn’t stopped to think, at first, how much power was contained in a metal body.

But, though Simon was unwittingly spending a lot of his time as our sex toy, he remained bashful and closeted when he was himself. I guessed I could live with it, but it was a shame, for his sake even more than mine.

That was what I happened to be thinking one day, when I walked in after work as usual and found Simon and Ken entwined together on the sofa, going at it like a pair of rabbits.

“What the hell – ?” I gasped.

Ken pulled back from where he was sucking on Simon’s tits and grinned. “Oh, hey.” Simon glanced up from where he was sucking on something larger and cheerfully echoed “Hey” with his mouth full.

I was speechless.

Reluctantly, they slowly sat up. “I thought he was getting a little boring,” Ken explained, “so I prepared a new program tape. No big challenge for me – a few patterns added, a few patterns deleted, and presto, new improved Simon.”

“Isn’t he brilliant?” sighed Simon adoringly.

“He’s much more efficient now,” Ken explained. “Watch: Cum, Simon.”

Simon instantly shot a tight stream, with inhuman accuracy, into Ken’s open mouth. But what came out of his metal dick was dark brown, with a weird tinge of green. “What the hell did you do to him now?” I choked.

“What, you don’t like variety? I just switched the contents of the cartridge. Now it’s mint-chocolate syrup. There’s one with strawberry, too. Yum!”

I glared accusingly. “How could you do this? You’ve changed his whole personality! What about his feelings? What about my feelings?”

“Hey, don’t worry, you can still use him. His body is my own, but I share.” Ken grinned. “You’ll fuck Dave whenever I tell you, won’t you, baby?”

“I’ll fuck anyone you want me to, Ken,” Simon assured him eagerly. “Making you happy is my reason for living.”

“I love it when he says that,” Ken smirked.

Simon beamed joyfully. ”Making you happy is my reason for living,” he repeated, with exactly the same cadence and inflection.

I couldn’t help myself. I lunged at Ken, wanting to wrap my hands around his throat. But before I’d gotten close, Simon was between us, blocking my way with his open palm. I slammed to a full stop, unable to budge him; those literal muscles of steel could have stopped a grizzly.

“You mustn’t do that,” he said reasonably. “You know I can’t allow anyone to hurt Ken. He’s everything to me.”

I choked and ran from the house, feeling that I was going to throw up at any moment. Before the door slammed behind me, I heard Ken asking blankly, “What the hell is he on today? Oh, well, forget it; he’ll be back when he’s horny enough. Which reminds me, where were we...?”

I made it halfway down the block before I collapsed against a tree, clinging to its rough bark until I got ahold of myself. I couldn’t even be bothered to wonder if anyone was watching me have a breakdown in public. All I could think of was what that bastard had done to my friend. Was there anything left of the real Simon, the gentle, frightened innocent with whom I’d felt such a bond? Was there any way to bring him back? There must be! There must!

And then I remembered the cafeteria gossip I’d been hearing at work. I straightened up, a wild idea forming in my mind. There might be a way...

Chapter 3: Simon Says

The next evening – it was Friday – I waited until after it was completely dark outside before heading over to Simon’s. No casually walking in the back door this time, and no ringing the bell either. I crossed the lawn as quietly as I could, hugging the shadows, and cautiously peeked in the window.

Ken was lying sprawled on the sofa, dead to the world. I noticed the items lying on the coffee table, and understood why. Typical! He had sent drug-free Simon out to buy him some home entertainment! But that might work to my advantage.

Looking further across the room, I saw Simon standing in a bodybuilder pose, staring blankly through me. His mouth was half-open, as if he’d been trying to tell Ken that he was about to run down again, but it wasn’t likely Ken would wake up to take care of it till morning – as long as no one disturbed him, and I would be very careful not to.

I slipped in through the back door, and did what I had to do.

 

The next day I waited, biding my time and trying to keep myself busy watching cable movies. I wasn’t sure if what I had planned would take five minutes or five hours to work, and I needed to be certain. When it got to be 4:00, I hopped into my car and headed over to Simon’s house.

I walked in without knocking or ringing. Ken was stretched langorously in the easy chair, moaning with pleasure as Simon, on hands and knees, happily sucked on his cock and balls. I almost choked with jealous anger, but I forced myself to keep cool. “Hi, Ken,” I said casually.

He opened his eyes, surprised, and grinned shamelessly. I gestured at Simon, who hadn’t reacted to me at all, and said, “Take the key out.”

Ken automatically reached down and pulled it, freezing Simon in mid-suck. Then he stared at the key in his hand, asked “Why the hell did I do that?”, and started to re-insert it.

“Drop it,” I snapped. “Sit still. Shut up.”

The key slipped from his fingers, bouncing off Simon’s ass with a ping!, and he plopped back in the chair, staring at me wildly. His mouth twitched as he tried to speak; his ripped muscles bulged as he tried to move. I sat calmly on the sofa and watched for a few minutes, enjoying his growing panic.

At last I said coolly, “To answer your question, Ken: You did that because, yesterday, I stole a sample of a prototype drug from one of the labs at UniChem. It wasn’t easy, and I’ve never stolen anything before, but I did it. Last night, while you were zonked out of your skull and Simon was offline, I came in, put on a pair of rubber gloves, and smeared the liquid all over his lips and the inside of his mouth.” I grinned without humor. “Which means, my good buddy, that you’ve spent the whole day tonguing a powerful hypnotic developed for the CIA.”

Ken glared at me furiously – which, at the moment, was all he could do.

“You would have had to obey Simon, too,” I added, “but you’ve fixed him so that he’d never even think of giving you an order. Now that’s going to change, asshole. You’re going to undo all the damage you’ve done. You’ll get rid of his compulsion to love and obey you. You’re going to give him back his own mind.”

“Get started.”

 

Ken spent a couple of hours preparing a new tape for Simon; I didn’t have a clue what he was actually doing, of course, but I knew he had no choice but to obey my orders. When he’d finished and the tape was installed, we carried Simon to the bedroom and placed him on the bed. Then I led Ken back to the living room and parked him there, frozen in a muscle pose, getting a taste of his own medicine. I wanted to be alone with Simon when he “woke up”.

I stood beside the bed for a long moment, looking at Simon. He lay on his side, looking beautiful and ridiculous with his arms and legs locked in a kneeling position and his mouth open in an “O” shape. I was almost afraid to turn him back on; what if Ken’s new tape didn’t restore his real self? Could I deal with that?

Taking a deep breath, I put the key in Simon’s back and wound it.

For a moment there was no response. Then his eyelids fluttered, his whole body shuddered, and he went back into action. For a second he sucked vigorously on empty air. Then he jerked up to a sitting position on the bed, his computer brain deducing what had happened. He saw me watching, and a look of remorse came over his face. His broad shoulders slumped, and he looked down at the floor miserably.

“I feel so stupid,” he said very quietly.

I sat beside him, placing a reassuring arm across his shoulders. “It wasn’t your fault. Ken altered your programming tape. You had no choice but to obey your program and be his slave.”

He looked up, and directly into my eyes. “I don’t really mind that I was someone’s slave. I’m just upset that I had to be Ken’s slave.”

My mouth was suddenly very dry. “What are you saying?” I managed.

Simon’s face lit up with excitement as he realized what he was saying. “When Ken restored my original program, that was one change he didn’t undo! I’m not ashamed or afraid of who I am any more. I love being gay!” He clasped my hand. “And I love you, David. I always have. God, it’s so good to finally say that!”

“It’s just as good to finally hear it,” I choked, feeling my eyes blur. In another moment we were in each other’s arms, locked together in a long, warm, wonderful kiss.

Then I pulled away, gasping. “What’s wrong?” asked Simon, alarmed.

“I forgot – I coated your whole mouth with a hypnotic drug! Now it’s in my system!”

Simon stared at me. “Oh, man! In that case, I think you’d better,” he grinned wickedly, “do a really, really raunchy striptease!”

I jerked to my feet and started grinding and gyrating, thrusting my thighs and crotch in Simon’s delighted face. “You bastard!” I laughed helplessly.

Simon smirked, reaching out to squeeze my swelling dick through my pants. “That’s ‘Master,’ you bastard...”

 

It was quite a while later when Simon finally thought to ask, “So where’s Ken been through all of this?”

Lying blissfully with my head in his lap (face up again at last), I told him how I had turned the tables on Ken. Simon listened, nodding. “Thank you, David. If I didn’t love you already, I would love you for that. Let’s go see how Ken is doing.”

I obediently rose and followed him to the living room, where Ken was still standing like Charles Atlas, with both biceps tightly flexed and a look of complete frustration frozen on his handsome face. I glanced at the clock and grinned guiltily - he had been a statue for over two hours now! Not that he didn’t have it coming.

“Awww,” Simon mocked. “He looks so cute. You know, my sister had a Barbie, but my parents wouldn’t buy me a Ken. Now I’ve got one.” He had an ominous light in his eyes – literally, like a tiny pinprick of laser light. I suddenly had a disturbing image of Simon shooting out a laser beam and burning a hole through Ken’s head.

“Uh, look, Simon,” I began, “I know what Ken did was crappy – ”

“Yeah, it was,” he said, dangerously quiet. The realization came to me that, in my drugged state, there was nothing I could do to stop Simon from doing anything he wanted.

“But he’s still a human being,” I insisted.

“I’m not,” said Simon bluntly. Then he looked at me as if he’d just gotten an idea. “And neither are you,” he added. “You’re a lollipop. A king-sized, man-shaped lollipop.”

I stopped moving and thinking. It would not have been appropriate, since I was a piece of candy. Simon stepped up to me and looked me over, smiling as he realized his experiment had worked. Mischievously, he stuck out his tongue and slowly ran it across my cheek. “Mmm. Mmm, mmm, yummy. My favorite flavor.”

Enjoying himself more and more, he slowly and sensually licked every inch of my face, savoring his power. I felt my candy surface getting sticky, and was aware that dust particles in the air would probably wind up clinging to it. Lowering his head to my throat, Simon slurped its surface, then paused and said thoughtfully, “I wonder if I should just take a big bite? Of course, if I do, your head will fall off.”

I knew this was true; Simon’s metal teeth could doubtless bite straight through human bone, let alone a chunk of crystallized sugar like me. It didn’t concern me, of course. “After all, I wasn’t even alive.

Simon lifted me off my feet, without the slightest effort, and worked his way slowly downward, letting that real-feeling tongue explore every surface. My butt came in for special attention, which was ironic, since I’d never thought of myself as a candy-ass before. And Simon spent so much time on my sweet dick that I knew it had been licked down to nothing more than a small, round bump.

At last he stood me upright and looked into my face wistfully. “I can’t do this for myself. But I can do it for you. Be human again, David.”

I gasped, suddenly realizing everything that had happened. My cock leapt erect and exploded with cum, drenching Simon like a burst from a garden hose. As my restored mind struggled for coherence, I knew that I totally loved what he had done to me! I had never in my life had any desire to be dominated, but today everything had changed. Because this was Simon, and even without the drug, I would do anything for him. “My god,” I breathed.

“Yeah,” agreed Simon. “For the moment at least, that’s just about what I am.” He smiled. “But that’s only fair, you know. I’ve secretly worshipped you for all these years – so out, so free, so beyond anything I could dream of for myself. Until now.” He cupped my face in his hands and kissed me tenderly. Then he winked and whispered, “Trust me.”

He turned back to Ken, who had watched the whole scene without twitching an eyelid. “Hey, Ken, remember that awful old kids’ joke? ‘I’m your fairy godmother, make a wish.’ ‘Okay, make me a pile of shit.’” He looked straight into Ken’s paralyzed eyes, knowing that Ken knew exactly what was coming. “Poof. You’re a pile of shit.”

I doubled over with laughter, not daring to think what Ken was experiencing right now. “Eyeww,” cried Simon, holding his nose. “Ooh, tha’ts disgusting! Gross, what a smell!”

We spent the next several minutes having a mean-spirited blast with that, making one crack after another about the horrible stench and the stain on the carpet, while Ken just stood there – looking like a pin-up, but completely believing that he was a giant turd. Finally, with tears of laughter streaming down his face and smelling faintly of machine oil, Simon pulled himself together and said firmly, “Be human, Ken.”

Ken, of course, showed no reaction, but I knew he had obeyed, and felt a little sorry for how he must be feeling now. “You deserved that,” Simon said quietly. “The question is, what should I do with you now? I could just tell you to be nice from now on, and you would have to be. I can make you be whatever I want. But I want to hear what’s really going on in your shitty little mind, Ken. Exactly what you’re really thinking and feeling, without any fix from me or any of your usual bullshit. You can’t stop yourself, so start talking.”

Ken’s mouth became animate again. He struggled not to answer, but he couldn’t stop the choked, painful words from coming out:

“I am a shit. I should have seen that you loved each other, but all I could think of was how much I wanted you to love me. No one ever had. Wanted me, sure, all the time; some of them even liked me. But I’d never had anybody’s love, ever.

“I needed that. I needed it so bad. And now you hate me.”

And then, to complete my amazement, tears streamed down from his unblinking eyes.

 

That was six months ago. Simon and I live together at his house now; with our two salaries we could afford a bigger place, but we don’t see any need for a second bedroom. He is mine now, willingly and with all his heart; and he’s happy to be mine in any mode that I choose to enjoy him in. Sometimes I pull the key, and have a terrific time doing whatever I please with the world’s most beautiful statue. Sometimes I put him into total machine mode for a while – the perfect sex machine, completely at my command. Of course, there’s also the flip side; by analyzing samples from Simon’s mouth, I eventually was able to synthesize that CIA drug for home use. And there’s nothing that turns Simon on more than slipping me the “hypno-kiss” without any warning!

And, yes, Ken is still in our lives. After all the smooching he and Simon had been doing, he was under the influence for days, and we had plenty of opportunity to work on “adjusting his program”. He’s still cocky and smug – we both agreed that that’s part of his charm – but, thanks to our alterations, he is now also able to show the warm, loving side that he had always tried to hide. He still comes over every Sunday afternoon.

But now there are three of us.

END

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