2017-12-15 - spike - The New Shop 53

Author: spike
Title: The New Shop 53
Date: 15 December 2017

Chapter 53
When we arrived in the back room for the nightly report, the sarge was there waiting for us.

“Hello, sir. Here to help train the dogs?”

“Oh, no. I’m here for something else. You’ll find out.”

I nodded, wondering why.

Joel sat at the computer and the moment his butt hit the seat the Skype alert sounded.

Q’s voice sprang forth. “Ah good, all present. You all understand your duties for the next week?”

I nodded. The others did too.

“Good. Now, Joel. The choice I gave you. Speak it now. I remind you that the next words you utter will be set in stone. Nothing will change that decision.”

Joel sat there, gulped and took a few deep breaths…

“Plucking up the courage, eh?”

“Two years, sir!” He said it in a very rushed way, as if he was afraid he’d stop himself before he could complete the sentence.

“Two? I was expecting one from previous conversations. Why the sudden increase?”

“Oh god, sir. It’s the dog races, sir. I want to take part in as many of them as possible, sir. It looks amazing!”

“Very well, it is set in stone but understand this. You will not participate in every race. Many times you will be expected to assist rather than compete. M… Get the suit. Now, how did your preparations go?”

“Every night last week, I wore the tubes to bed sir. A few restless nights, but I’m accustomed to them now. I’ve got the plug in already, sir. I used the same method we prepared Omega for his, sir. It’s been in a week, sir.”

“Excellent. Has your level been set?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And have you experienced any of the programs?”

“No, sir. M offered me one but I declined, sir. I wanted to be frozen when I experienced my first, sir.”

“Very well. Tonight, you become Beta and for two years that is how you will remain. I have placed the same modification on yours as eleven has on his however. You may wake to find yourself a blank for a few weeks once in a while.”

“Oh god! Really, sir? Thank you, sir!”

“I was hoping you might like that. Now, as dog training commences tomorrow and you’ll be fully suited, cleaned and flushed by then, there seems no point in delaying. Sarge will run the shop for the next week with Omega assisting evenings and weekends and Luke during the week. Sarge has been informed on the correct procedure for the removal of the suit. Alpha will re-join humanity next Sunday. Sarge will then resume dog training for everyone on the second week, the final dogs being suited up then.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Ah yes. As for your dog name, that has already been decided. I name you Zeus when on four legs.”

“I love it, thank you, sir.”

“Good. Now it seems that’s all for tonight. Q out.”

Sarge smirked at Joel. “Don’t worry. I’m here for more than just the store. I have the key to your belt, Joel. First time out of it in three years isn’t it?”

“Hah! I’d not even considered that. God, to be out of that thing for three weeks!”

“Not quite, still in it on Sunday when you’re let out of the dog, boy.”

“How long has it been for you, sir?”

“I gave up on counting after four.” He nodded towards the doorway with M standing in it holding a suit and Joel left the room with him.

And so, with M and sarge helping to suit up Beta, the rest of us went back to the gym for the final wrestling lesson… For most of them at least. By now it was part of the routine and probably the only thing I’d miss when I resumed my place beside Duke, Bandit and Slasher.

Us four along with M and twelve, destined to remain humanoid for one more week to help in training all the dogs.
* * * * *
We got up, went to the gym and all the slaves lined up as usual only this time, we’d laid out their doggy prisons before they got there. They’d all learned to walk in them over the course of the previous week. I knew that because I’d been one of them.

Now it was time to get them running. Teach them all the tricks.

First in the suit, with a little help from Slasher, Moonbeam and Fang.

First, Moonbeam. “Any final words before I shove your arms in?”

“No, sir. I love being a dog, sir. Especially with that tail, I’ve never experienced anything like it and I’ve played a dog before.”

“Now you get to become the dog rather than play it.”

“What do you mean, sir?”

“I suppose it’s different for everyone, but for me, I do. I put my human mind away, every concern, every care or worry… Gone. Just become the dog. The only thing that you care about when on four legs is commands, play, enjoying yourself and during the race, survival, evading us. Put your higher brain to sleep for as long as you’re a dog, you don’t need it anymore.”

“Really?”

“That’s how it is for me. That first time I was out fully, after the ten days I was in it, my brain woke up and my imagination went hyperactive. All those thoughts that’d been ignored flooding in. Amazing experience.”

“I’ll try, sir.”

“Good, because you have no means of communication for the next six days apart from your tail and counting with your paw. If you try to spell things out, unless it’s important it will be punished.”

It nodded.

Arms in, nose tubes connected, hood and zip down to the locking point and tail locked in place. Moonbeam was reborn again.

I fingered the other armband. “Sit.” and moved on to help Slasher with Fang.

“Did you see what I said to Moonbeam?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And?”

“I suppose it is a bit like that for me. I’m not sure about putting my mind to sleep like that but I certainly stop caring about anything but being the dog, sir.”

“Good. Arms…”

And another dog complete.

After that, we took four each of the others and within half an hour, we were a kennel rather than a slave compound and the training commenced.

First, allowing them to find their paws again, walking around the gym. Then an increase in pace, walking to heal, jogging to heal and then, by the end of the day, running to heal.

Of course, lots of games of fetch in between. The dogs were instructed on reading the positions of their tails and they were put in their cages. Every bottom cage was full, apart from one. That one, destined for Zeus.

We returned to the laptop.

“I see their training’s moving along swimmingly.” came from it the moment the session was started.

M nodded. “Yes, sir. All of them are running now. Tomorrow, we’ll begin hiding the balls around the place again, reading the sensations from their butts, sir.”

“Good. Because I think six trainers is excessive for the next phase. Eleven and Twelve, display duty tomorrow. M and Slasher the next day, Thirteen and Duke the day after. Only four are required to keep the balls in play.”

“Yes, sir.”

“It also means another hour of pleasure while frozen for all of you.”

M nodded. “Thank you, sir. Oh god I can’t wait. I do keep letting that get away from me, sir.”

“Quite. It doesn’t help that three of you share the same rank and duties. Things will improve when Alpha’s back in control. By now he’ll know not to abuse my slaves.”

“Yes, sir. I bet he even asks to remain in the suit once he’s released from the pod, sir.”

“A wager…? I accept. One hour of your in-credit pleasure against a whole day of it. If he does, you win.”

“Really, sir? Oh god, I hope he does. I can handle losing an hour with those stakes, sir.”

“When the best dog has been identified, as long as it isn’t one of the outsiders, it can stand sentinel in the shop too. Always good to have a dog on display now the interest’s been drummed up.”

“Sir… There is still one experienced dog among them. He doesn’t require training in arse sensations.”

“Rascal? Very good idea. Rascal will join you on display tomorrow. Q. Out.”
* * *
I snapped awake to a voice. I didn’t catch what the voice had said, only that it’d woken me up.

I looked at the counter and tapped.

“What is it, eleven?”

Two taps, six taps. “d.i.d. y.o.u. s.a.y. s.o.m.e.t.h.i.n.g. s.i.r. s.o.r.r.y. I. w.a.s. a.s.l.e.e.p.”

“Me? No. I didn’t even have the microphone on.”

– “You have twenty seconds to comply.”

A… Wait, what? That voice? I hadn’t set anything special for the program yet, it was just a placeholder until something better could be chosen. It was too artificial for general use and now it was… How the hell was the program running? It wasn’t

– “You have ten seconds to comply.”

Oh shit! I tapped again.

“L.e.t. m.e. o.u.t. s.i.r. S.o.m.e.d.s.l..e...j..f”

The shock hit me in the ass with an intensity I certainly hadn’t set. Everything had been set to minimum for initial testing!

“What? What was that, eleven?”

“S.o.m.e.t.h.i.n.g’s h.a.p.p.e.n.i.n.g, s.i.r!

– “Blank. Press the panel by the elevator, you have thirty seconds to comply.”

Blank? I looked at myself in the mirror, my mark of ownership clearly visible. I’m not a blank! Oh, shit! Oh fuck, every slave ident I’d entered as a placeholder. All the other fields including name had been left blank. But how

– “You have twenty seconds, to comply.”

The sarge stared at the lights behind the counter. “What’s happening?”

“I. d.o.n.t. k.n.o.w. s.i.r. M.y. p.r.o.g.r.a.m.s”

– “You have ten seconds to comply.”

“r.u.n.n.i.n.g. D.e.m.a.n.d.i.n.g. I. p.r.e.s.s. t.h.e. p.a.n.e.l. I. c.a.n..t.”

“Yes, twelve, I know, it’s happening to eleven too. I’ll let you both out.”

He rushed over and turned off the case just as another shock struck. My knees buckled and I collapsed onto them.

“Shit, what the hell is going on?”

“Room one, sir. I have to get to room one!”

– “Blank. Press the panel on the elevator. You have twenty seconds to comply. Failure to comply further will result in more severe punishment.”

That one wasn’t something I’d programmed in! Had they been making additions without telling me?

I bolted to the elevator with twelve hot on my tail, pressed the panel and then ran over to the other mirror. When I pressed that, another shock.

– “Unauthorised access. Enter the elevator, blank. You have thirty seconds to comply.”

“I ran back to the other mirror to find twelve still waiting.”

“What the hell is happening? How can I enter the fucking thing if it’s not opening?”

“Someone’s running my program! It’s not ready yet! I hadn’t even filled in any of the database! Sir, please, open the mirror, come upstairs and open room one!”

Sarge rushed over and swiped his card against the panel. We both ran upstairs and he swiped room one too.

I got to the laptop and started the chat client just as another shock struck. It knocked me off my feet.

– “Continued disobedience will result in higher punishment. Enter the elevator and press the panel, you have twenty seconds to comply.”

M’s voice then. “What the fuck is going on eleven! Ow that hurt! It’s having me running around like a fucking blue arsed fly down here and now the lift won’t open!”

I crawled back to my feet as the familiar greeting popped up.

Ssp: Software support. How can I help?

11: Turn it off!

Ssp: Turn what off?

11: My program’s not ready for live testing! Turn! It! Off! That’s an order! And did Q give you permission to modify it?

Ssp: Modify? It’s not running! We’ve only added one section of code, the interface code to allow it to speak and communicate with the hardware there and that was only so it’d work in the simulator.

– “Enter the elevator now, blank! Increasing punishment level to eight. You have ten seconds to comply.”

11: It’s fucking running! It’s been sending M all over the complex and being frozen in the case I couldn’t comply with its demands, I’ve been receiving increasingly severe shocks for the past few minutes. The last one knocked me off my feet and it denied me access up here. Sarge had to swipe me through.”

Ssp: I’ll get two!

11: Well hurry up about itds’oifbngle’;lm;ftr

My arm swept across the keyboard as I was knocked off the chair by another even worse shock. The sarge helped me up.

“It’ll be mayhem down there, sarge. Thank fuck the dogs’ll be fine.”

“Why?”

“Because I only put existing slave idents into the database to give it something to hold, most of them left for Q’s weeks ago, only M, Slasher, me, twelve, Duke and thirteen will be hit by this right now. The dogs all have different idents in their tails, so even Rascal’s escaping this.”

Ssp: two here. I’ve reviewed the log, sir. Nothing is running there or here right now apart from the very basic elevator program that’s been running since the complex opened.

11: Someone’s running it! Check for outside connections! They must be accessing the complex somehow and they must have a copy of my code! They’ve altered it, changed the settings too. Find out how! Please! I don’t think I can take another onwwfejqgejt[wo”

Again. Knocked off my feet. I must’ve been so focussed on the screen I’d filtered the warning out that time.

“I’ve had an idea!” Sarge bolted out of the room.

- “You have ten seconds to comply.”

11: Oh fuck! I can’t take this every ten seconds! What the fuck is… Who…

Ssp: Ten? Who the hell would set something like that to ten?

11: I don’t know do I? Find out!

Ssp: Sorry, eleven. We are trying. We’re investigating now, it may take some time.

Another shock. Oh fuck that was a bad one but I gripped the desk to stop myself being thrown to the floor again. My fingers were shaking when I started typing again.

11: What? How the hell can this be happening?

Ssp: We don’t know!

11: Cut the internet! Where is it? The router? The cable? Anything! You’ll have to contact us by cellphone until something’s in place.

Ssp: I’ll have to ask Q. It might take a few minutes!

11: Fuck! Idifjdgjpij

Ssp: Oh shit. Oh shitting hell. I’m sorry, 11, I’ll be back as soon as I can.

Sarge bolted back into the room.

“Eleven. If you can, stand up!”

“I’ll try, sir.” My knees almost gave out but I managed. There was a change downstairs, as, with a rattle of keys, my core was removed. I collapsed back onto my seat in relief and turned to look at him. He looked almost as scared as I’d been.

He said something.

“Sorry, sir. Without the core, I can’t hear. You’ll have to sign.”

He nodded. “Are you OK to be left?”

“Go, they need theirs removed too, sir!”

“I’ve already removed twelve’s. How do I get down there if the elevator doesn’t arrive?”

“Can you give me a hand, sir? I know how to get the elevator up. Tell them all to be standing by the elevator doors on whichever level they are. Total lockdown forces the elevator back to first.”

He nodded.

I typed “We have to stop this. I’ve had my core removed, the others need it too. I’ll be back in a few minutes once Sarge has the elevator.” onto the laptop.

He got me up on his shoulder and we walked to the end. I was able to support myself by the time we got to the control room.

“Do you know how to release it again, sir?”

He nodded and flipped a panel, beneath it, a keyboard. He entered a password careful to shield my view and turned to me, signing.

“Hit enter when I’m at the elevator.”

“Yes, sir. You’ll need to bring them up, they won’t be able to use the panels without their cores, sir.”

“Good point. I’ll go now, hit the button.”

I did. Instantly every figure on the huge video display froze solid apart from one. The moment he got down there, I hit enter and he swiped the panel.

Inside, two figures. I couldn’t tell which ones, but within seconds, their cores were out and he’d ushered them onto the shop floor and headed to B1.

Satisfied, I rushed back to room one and… shit. The door was closed. No core, no panel, not that it would’ve allowed me even with mine right then.
* * *
“This is a very disturbing occurrence, number eleven.”

“I know, sir. You didn’t experience it, it was terrifying. Frozen in a case with constant threats and shocks for not complying with impossible commands, sir. Any idea what happened, yet?”

Q sighed. “It seems they used a zero day exploit in our security code to gain privilege, downloaded your program and then started running it, what’s more, it’s still running. Fortunately none of your new cores are registered with it.”

“Shit…” I glanced up at the camera and started signing, careful to shield my fingers from the view of it. “Sir, if he’s running a program on his and gained access to our systems using it, it’s possible he’s done more. It’s not safe to talk. Not audibly or within view of a camera anyway, sir. I might be able to help again.”

“Understood. What I say now is only audible via your earplugs and will be for the foreseeable future. Now… Help how?”

“First, can they trace him? If it’s still running from his computer, can the IP address be traced to a physical location?”

“Yes, we can, and yes, we’re going to isolate the thief and bring him in but it’s now more than one physical location.”

“You mean he’s shared the code? Oh god, you don’t think he thinks this is a game, do you?”

“I think that’s a distinct possibility.”

“Is there a way to modify the code in the cores so we can hear what the commands are to our old idents while being protected from the shocks, sir?”

“Yes. More. I can completely disable the shocking mechanism. What did you have in mind?”

“First, I’ll go up to room one, start work on the whiteboard. The company I worked for, I helped to found, sir. We had a lot of advanced encryption in place to protect gamers’ in game identities and the real life money they spent on in-game items. One of the best has a flaw, sir. A deliberate one.”

“Deliberate why?”

“It’ll take a supercomputer years to crack the encryption, sir but the algorithm has a much simpler solution. One the software can detect. It allows you to place a fake backdoor in your code, a door leading to a simulator similar to the one they tested the code on in the first place. This hacker will think he’s slicker than an oil spill when he cracks it. It could then run us ragged to keep him engaged for a few days. Meanwhile, they track him, grab the original hacker, suit him and shove his slave ID into a modified sandboxed version.”

“What?!”

“Put him in the game, sir. The sandbox only allows commands relating to his ID out into the real world. Let his friends torture him for the rest of his life… At least until they get bored and move onto the next thing. I think there’s a way to send a text message to the display of the program, sir. Something like “unlocked slave torture level two.” before he appears. When all activity ends, close the backdoor and train him as a slave as normal, sir. I want that bastard to suffer for what he’s done to us. If it’d happened yesterday, Rascal would’ve suffered too. A couple of weeks ago and everyone would’ve.”

“Yes. I see your point. What’s more, I agree. In the meantime, all handsets to mute, just in case he has placed code to monitor our cameras. You will continue to help train the dogs while being run ragged. Sarge.”

“Yes, sir?”

“You’ll have to handle the shop solo for a few days. Luke and Omega will assist by handing the collected balls to them as they’re running around the complex following commands and pretending to be knocked off their feet by shocks. They can use that time to redistribute them. As Luke has experience as a dog, he can aid in their training too. For Omega, no temp suit this weekend. Human assistant.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good. Eleven. Room one, write that algorithm. Then Sarge will reapply your old core.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Dismissed. Q. Out.”