the side of the room with the scary looking, red padded chair. She saw Karn start to follow her but she shook her head.
“It’s all right, Karn. It should…should be over in a minute,” she said dully.
He frowned but sank down into one of the chairs on the other side of the plastiglass barrier to wait for her.
“Very good, Mistress Lilliana,” Mistress Martinet said approvingly.
She shut the door firmly and there was a soft clicking sound, as of a lock sliding into place. Then the plastiglass around the cracks of the door sealed itself—it was almost as though the door had never been there to begin with, Lilli thought with a shiver. She was stuck in here—completely cut off.
“Now, if you’d take off your under-things please, and we’ll just get you settled…” Mistress Martinet said.
Lilli slipped out of her pink panties and sat reluctantly in the chair. She had the sudden urge to jump up from the chair and run to Karn but it was too late, the wheels had been set in motion and there was no going back now.
“What’s that silver box?” she asked, nodding at the forbidding looking rectangular monolith which now seemed to be looming over her.
“Why, that’s the insemination bot,” Mistress Martinet said brightly. “You don’t need to worry about it, Mistress Lilliana. All you have to do is hold still and let it do its job. Now let’s get started, shall we?”
She pressed a button on the back of the chair, somewhere behind Lilli’s head, and suddenly straps came out of the red padded arms and wrapped around Lilli’s wrists.
“Hey!” Lilli gasped, looking down at her immobilized arms. “That’s—”
But before she could finish, straps shot out of the lower part of the chair and immobilized her legs as well.
“Just relax,” Mistress Martinet said briskly. “You’ll make the process much more difficult if you struggle.”
“But why do I have to be strapped down?” Lilli asked in a trembling voice. She was feeling more and more unsure about this—she wished she would have gone with Karn when he said he wanted to talk to her in private.
Speaking of the big Kindred, he was out of his chair and standing on the other side of the plastiglass barrier, watching her with a worried look on his face. She tried to smile at him reassuringly but Mistress Martinet’s next words wiped the expression off her face entirely.
“You have to be strapped down so that the insemination needle doesn’t go astray,” she said.
“I’m sorry, the what?” Lilli demanded.
Just at that moment, a small door in the tall, silver insemination bot opened and a long metal arm slid out of it. At the end of the arm was a thick, bulky, phallic-shaped object, also made of metal. And on the end of that was…
“A needle!” Lilli gasped in horror as she saw the long silver needle shoot out of the end of the metallic phallus.
“Yes, the insemination needle, as I said,” Mistress Martinet said briskly.
“But…but you can’t put that thing up inside me!” Lilli gasped. “What if it stabs me?”
“Oh, it’s going to. But it won’t hurt—much—as long as you hold still,” Mistress Martinet told her. “You see, what happens is this: The insemination phallus enters you until the tip of it is pressing directly against the opening of your cervix. Then, when the bot determines that the alignment is right, the needle shoots out—as quick as a wink—and slides right into your womb. That way when the sperm you picked is deposited inside you, it has a much better chance of making you pregnant.”
“That’s awful!” Lilli exclaimed, her gut clenching in fear. “You can’t do that to me! I’ve talked to lots of girls who got impregnated recently—none of them said anything about a needle!”
“Oh, the needle is optional,” Mistress Martinet assured her. “But your mother decided it would be best to use it to be certain you conceived. It adds a five percent chance of success to the entire procedure.”
“Only five percent?” Lilli gasped. “My mother decided it was all right to let a machine stab inside me with a needle for just an extra five percent?”
Mistress Martinet frowned.
“You’re very lucky your mother cares so much about your chances for a successful conception.”
“No!” Lilli shook her head wildly. “I don’t want this—I don’t care what you or my mother say. I don’t want this!”
She started fighting against the straps, trying to get her arms and legs loose. But it did no good at all—the straps were too strong.