The Avatar Experiment Read online

  “So it’s an impasse,” Benson said, scowling at Olivia. “You’re just going to throw away the opportunity because you’re afraid. Because you’ve got such a goddamned scarcity mindset.”

  But Alexa wasn’t finished.

  “I think it could work to put Chloe in a film,” she said, “but only if she never knows we’ve done it.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  Chloe found herself in a sun-lit loft in District Zero’s trendy warehouse section, with something amiss.

  As usual, she knew little about the client O had paired her with — this time away from the spa, rather than in it. And that itself was fine; she’d also been given her share of special assignments. What wasn’t quite fine was the man in front of her now — boyish-looking, with casual, messy hair, but somehow not right.

  The same could be said for the room itself. She’d been sent to O satellite locations before, but the moment she’d entered the loft Chloe knew this wasn’t one. The man didn’t live there either, although that was what he claimed.

  Something wasn’t right.

  He said his name was Tony, but it wasn’t. When he’d introduced himself at the door, he’d offered his name like it belonged to someone else. He’d led her into the bedroom — a room too open, even for a loft, to make any sense.

  The bed was lengthwise against the wall, with a wide space in front. It felt conspicuous rather than welcoming; the room was arranged as if waiting for a missing piece of furniture. The skylight was above, and “Tony” had three hover lamps wandering the room at full intensity despite the sun.

  Tony had led her in by the hand, kicking the table leg as if he hadn’t known it was there. He’d told her the wrong way to the bathroom. When Chloe had tested him by asking for a glass of water from “his” refrigerator, he’d gone to get it for her, not knowing it would be delivered by the home’s Crossbrace connection on a hover platter.

  This wasn’t Tony’s home.

  So what was it, and what did his insistence mean?

  Chloe sat on the bed, trying to read the enigmatic situation. She wore a cute white flower-print sundress that zipped up the back. It looked like something her grandmother would have worn back when she was Chloe’s age. It was neutral, to fit the unknown client.

  “Can I get you anything?” Tony looked like he wanted to take her hand again. It was sweet and totally unnecessary. She was a girl for hire, and there was no shame in engaging her — yet Tony was treating her as though she didn’t know why she was here.

  But he wasn’t being kind like Gregory Bordeaux. This was feigned consideration. Something … different.

  “You already got me a glass of water.”

  “Oh. I’m sorry. I meant, can you … like … can I get you something?”

  Now she saw it.

  Tony wasn’t normally nervous. He was bothered by something that usually offered no problems. Was he a rich playboy used to bedding girls on his own, now hiring his first escort? He had emphasized “get” as in “get-down-to-business.” It was cheesy. She could almost hear the few words that could’ve finished his sentence:

  … like an injection of hot beef?

  “I don’t know.” Chloe stood. Her dark-brown hair was tied into a ponytail to go with her sundress’s playful look, but she’d left a clutch of hair loose at each side to frame her slim face with its wide lips and sharp blue eyes. She flipped the ponytail with one hand. If Tony wanted to be cheesy, she could cheese him right back. “Do I need something?”

  “Maybe,” he said, visibly relaxing as she emphasized need in just the right way. “Did that glass of water cool you off? How’s your … temperature?”

  “Well, this was a good idea, Benson.” Parker looked at the boardroom screen. Chloe Shaw and the actor, Vic, stood at three-quarter angles in the loft bedroom as if posing for a press photo.

  “Give it a chance,” Benson said, irked.

  “Your actor’s dialogue is superb. And I love how natural this all looks. How long before our buddy Vic — I’m sorry: Tony — starts waving at the camera?”

  “He’s used to working with visible cameras,” Benson said, moving to the tablet controlling the nano cameras. He pressed on the screen, reverse-pinching its surface with his fingers. The camera zoomed in, pulling Chloe and Vic closer. The shot stabilized. “Give him a minute to adjust. This isn’t exactly something any of us are used to.” He looked to Alexa, as if to remind the others that this weird compromise had been her idea, not his.

  Parker shook his head. “Creeps have been hiding cameras to watch girls since cameras were invented. It’s not that hard. You have him standing on a mark like a stage actor.”

  “Watch a lot of amateur porn, Parker?”

  “I’ve never been big on artificial sex, Benson,” Parker retorted. “I’d rather do it than watch.”

  “We aren’t doing amateur hour here. But if you want a static shot — and for me to cue Vic to go ahead and fuck her any which way — we can do that, too.”

  Parker shook his head.

  Beside him, Olivia said, “His shitty performance will tip her off. She’s going to realize she’s being filmed.”

  “Vic is a pro,” Benson assured her. “But he’s doing a cinema performance without cameras, without me yelling at him or stopping in the middle … do you know how much stopping and starting we usually do on set?”

  “You can tell him what to do.” Alexa turned to Parker and Olivia. “Just hang in there. Vic needs to take directions from the implant in his ear instead of someone in front of him, and has to stop acting as though he’s on set. But like Benson said, he’s a pro. He’ll get it.”

  Charisma shook her head. “He’d better, or this will be the worst incognito porn scene ever.”

  Chloe ran a finger down her front. She wore nothing under her white sundress, and the fabric was thin. In the light of the frosted glass above, she felt almost naked.

  Her finger ran between her breasts, pressing the fabric on either side against firm nipples. She let the finger trail to her belly button before pulling it away and plucking at the dress’s straps.

  “This dress is really hot,” she said.

  Tony’s cock still hadn’t risen to attention, which made no sense. Maybe he was too anxious. She had to be his type; she’d been told he’d chosen her specifically. He’d have been able to watch her recorded holos, and if this was really his loft (which it definitely wasn’t), he could’ve projected her demo onto the bed. He could have sat at the end and watched Chloe fuck herself with her fingers or any of Houston’s sex toys. He could have lain on the bed, naked with his cock pointing at the ceiling, straddled by her hologram.

  Chloe puzzled over his non-response. Maybe he was an asexual client who wanted to watch her debase herself so he could stare in disapproval — but then why the suggestive dialogue?

  Was she reading Tony wrong?

  Impossible. Chloe never read anyone wrong.

  Tony said, “Maybe you should take it off and come sit on my lap.”

  Jesus.

  Maybe he had a daddy fantasy thing? Because if Tony wasn’t planning to lay her over his knee and give her a spanking, she didn’t know what this was. Delivering a line like that took confidence, but why would a guy with confidence say something so stupid?

  He was terrible at this. There was no other way to put it, and she couldn’t square it with how he looked and carried his body.

  Chloe put her finger to her chin and widened her big, blue eyes as she turned her head slightly downward. The look would appear slightly shocked: just the right touch of naughty schoolgirl to play with, if he wanted to play cheeseball games.

  “If I take off my dress” — Chloe set the back of her hand to the side of her mouth and whispered around it — “then I’ll be naked!”

  “You aren’t wearing any underwear?”

  Chloe’s hand moved to cover her bow-shaped lips. “I forgot.”

  “That’s very naughty of you.”

  “Maybe I need to be
punished,” Chloe said.

  Then she reached down and pulled the sundress over her head.

  “What’s she doing?” said Houston.

  Parker barked a laugh. “I know what she’s doing.”

  Houston repeated his question, speaking directly to Alexa: “What’s she doing?”

  “I don’t know. Getting undressed, apparently.” Alexa turned to Benson and Charisma. “Does Vic have a spanking fetish? Anything like that?”

  “You mean in the scenes he’s done for us?” Charisma asked.

  “No. Maybe. I don’t know.”

  “I know what she’s doing!” Parker sang.

  “I’d need to check, but I think he’s only done straight scenes. We wanted someone Chloe wouldn’t recognize. He’s only shot a handful of scenes so far. He’s never … you know. Gotten slappy.”

  “Anything in his personality profile? Is he into spanking, hair-pulling, schoolgirl fantasy, shit like that? I thought he was vanilla. I wanted someone vanilla.” She shook her head. “Well, with talent like this guy, I can see why Nectar is the premier vidstream and holo company today.”

  “There’s not a lot of talking in our films,” said Charisma, annoyed. “You’re asking him to perform. Maybe that’s what he’s doing — playing to the cameras.”

  “Tell him to fucking knock it off.”

  Benson spoke into the tablet. “Vic, stop saying stupid shit.”

  On-screen, Vic said, “I’m not.”

  And Chloe said, “You’re not what?”

  Olivia sat back in her chair. Behind her, in one of the clear cells around the boardroom, a bald black man slid his dick into a blond woman’s ass. “How much preamble do we need? Can we just tell him to fuck her?”

  Alexa said, “This is an experiment.”

  Olivia smirked. “And it’s going so great.”

  “I totally know what she’s doing,” said Parker.

  “Tell him to stop talking and follow her lead,” Alexa said, her eyes still on the screen.

  “Vic,” said Benson into the tablet. “Stop talking, and follow her lead.”

  “Tell him to fuck her up the butt,” said Houston.

  Alexa held out a waiting hand. “Don’t tell him that.” Then, to Olivia: “Look, we don’t need the preamble. And we don’t need his shit-ass dialogue. This is supposed to be about Chloe. Let her do her thing. We can make it exclusive content and use it for avatar development. But it’s pushing a line, so roll with the punches.”

  “It’s okay,” said Benson. “The magic’s in post-production.”

  Despite the project’s complexity — shooting a Nectar-quality vidstream with the right lighting and angles without one of the participants being aware she was being recorded — Benson was unflaggingly optimistic.

  Charisma had been so-so on Alexa’s compromise plan, but Benson wouldn’t shut up. He was an artist at heart, driven first by the desire to capture quality erotic content, and only as a distant second by the money. The voyeur aspect of the whole thing, to Benson, was an extra layer of icing on an already delicious cake.

  Parker, leaning forward, said, “Hey, guys … I know what she’s doing!”

  Olivia snapped her head toward him. “What, Parker? You know so goddamned much, what exactly is she doing in there, saying all those stupid lines?”

  Parker smiled. “She’s acting.”

  On-screen, the now-nude Chloe said, “I’m cold. Do you have anything I could rub against to warm myself up?”

  Tony slid off his pants and Chloe saw why she hadn’t noticed its erection yet. His dick was simply too big, hanging too heavy for full hardness. But it was thick and throbbing, growing harder by the second.

  Chloe stroked his cock as she knelt, pushing Tony to the bed. This must be a role-playing thing. And hey, if he wanted to be a hammy actor on a set, she could do that.

  Her bare skin was genuinely cold despite warmth from the skylight. Her nipples stiffened. She touched one with her finger, sending a thrill of pleasure between her legs.

  Her eyes rolled up to meet Tony’s. “See how cold I am?”

  “I’ve got something that will warm you up,” he said, then flinched as if hearing something, He touched his ear.

  “Can I rub it all over me?” Chloe asked.

  Tony said nothing.

  “Can I rub it all over my girl parts?”

  His eyes flicked around as if she’d yelled at him. She still hadn’t figured this out, but she knew her playacting was turning Tony on, so she reached out and rubbed his bare shaft up and down with her hand.

  A drop of clear pre-come pooled at its tip.

  “Even my mouth is cold,” Chloe said, batting her lashes.

  Still, Tony looked nervously down. His hard dick didn’t seem nervous at all, so she slipped it into her mouth.

  “It’s so hot and hard,” Chloe said, taking a break from sucking him off. She held his cock in front of her mouth and rubbed it against her lips, like a lipstick.

  She batted her eyelashes again, wondering if her little performance was getting over-the-top. But Tony’s dick was still rock hard, and despite how his eyes kept flitting to something unseen across the too-empty room, she could feel a telltale twitch under his balls that told her to keep going.

  She rolled her eyes up at him. “Don’t you want to warm me up?”

  “Like how?”

  She pumped harder, twisting her fist around Tony’s shaft. Slick sucking sounds filled the air. “Is there any other way you can warm me up?” Their play was ridiculous, but if it got him off, okay.

  His cock was starting to throb. If she kept going, he’d come all over the place.

  “I could spurt hot goo all over your face,” he said, without a trace of irony.

  Chloe was falling into her role. As awful as it was, the line made her pussy feel empty. She reached down with her other hand and slipped two fingers deep into her wet slit. Her palm pressed against her clit.

  “I’m following your lead!” Tony yelled for no reason, again grabbing his ear.

  “Where do you want me to lead you, then?”

  “I want to come on your face!”

  Chloe, eager to lead Tony wherever he wanted to go, tilted her head back. He stood in a rush, pulled his cock from her grip, then rubbed it with long, powerful strokes.

  He came in great warm spurts.

  Chloe peered up as his heavy breathing slowed; she saw him holding his huge, still-hard cock, its tip dripping onto her chin.

  She wasn’t surprised to realize she’d come herself.

  She was Chloe Shaw — so of course she had.

  Charisma said, “Tell me you got that.”

  “I think so,” said Benson. His demeanor had changed; his smile was gone. The footage was all over the place. Tony had stood before the camera could pull back, and Chloe had tipped her head so all the controlled camera could see was the back of her hair. There were three other nano-cams skipping around the room, but Benson could only direct one at a time. It would have been simple if he’d been able to pause the action and reposition either the actors or the shot, but given that Chloe was unaware this was a scene, that was impossible.

  The resulting footage was utilitarian, with no artistic flair.

  “Not according to what I saw,” said Olivia.

  “The other cams might have a good angle,” said Charisma.

  “I doubt I can use unmanned nano-cam footage.” Benson shook his head. “It looks like something shot with a security camera.”

  “Vic’s cam, then.” Charisma turned to the others. “He has a camera embedded in both corneas. You should see the 3-D POV stuff we can do.”

  “He had his eyes closed.”

  Charisma looked at the screen as if it had wronged her. “He closed his eyes? He’s a fucking porn actor!”

  “Yes,” said Alexa, “but apparently he’s having his mind blown along with his dick.”

  Chloe batted her eyelashes at Tony again. It was the third time she’d done it, but n
ow one of her eyelashes had his come on it. Why mess with what worked? If Tony wanted a cheesy porn character, that was what he’d get.

  “That was soooo sticky!”

  “Do you feel warmer now?” Tony’s hand was back on his cock after a thirty-second hiatus. It had never gone limp, and looked ready for more.

  Chloe looked at it hungrily. She hadn’t realized she’d been rubbing her clit at full-tilt. The orgasm surprised her. She was ready — past her confusion and able to see Tony for the specimen he was: hard, smooth chest, big arms, a face that looked like it had been cut from a block of marble.

  Her pussy was drenched. She wanted to fuck, so it was a good thing he seemed able.

  Chloe stood, her medium-sized tits with their pert, pink nipples full and in need of attention. She used the sheet to wipe clean, then licked a finger to run it down her stomach and between her legs, between the lips of her pussy. “I’m warm everywhere but here.”

  “I’m going to fill you up,” he said.

  “I want you inside me.”

  Tony climbed onto the bed, lay on top of her, and filled her slit with his hard dick. Chloe gasped. Her tunnel gripped him, her pussy lips licking his shaft like a kiss.

  “Oh. Oh … and … ?”

  He’d slipped a hand underneath his thrusting cock, under his swinging balls. She felt a wet finger slide into her ass.

  “Your ass is tight.”

  She clenched her pussy, to show him that everything was tight. He moaned, then slid a second wet finger into her asshole. It was too tight, then the feeling grew pleasant. She’d never done that before, not with a man.

  It was devilish and exciting, thrilling Chloe top to bottom.

  “Do you want to do something dirty?” he asked.

  “I’m not that kind of girl.”

  “Roll over.”

  “Should I?”

  He peered down at her, then mashed his lips into hers, his cheesy act faltering with the onslaught of lust. “Do as I say.”