A/N Photo super sexy shoe store by Architect Zaha Hadid. Video: Prada store by IDEO, working with Koolhaas and his architecture and research firm OMA/AMO

Wow Chapter 70, #1 in SciFi 275,000 reads and 4500 followers, Reb's brother sitting up in bed Does life get any better? RK Just discovered you can't follow more than 1000 people, our nasty habit of following anyone who voted for the book will have to end (sorry). Good luck to next SpaceX for their return to flight launch this month.

The Christmas Cyborg's pet roller coaster starts here, a small reminder.

Everyone is safely strapped in and in case you get worried, despite the ups and downs no one is going to fall off, you'll understand after the ball.

22 Seconds into the future: /Mall Of Humanity/Judas City/Washington 2.0 ( Area formally known as Nebraska)

Jenny's POV

I felt like I was the head of a long lavish, luxuriant and very ostentatious snake. I lead the way ( I was using slave nav) Master and Mr Jones followed to my sumptuous rear. Behind them was a string of six slaves all of whom were carrying luxury Tiffanies shopping bags. Together we looked like Rich Bostonians trying to do an impression of a Chinese new year dragon.

"Did you hear about the new emergency slave uprising measures they are introducing?" said Rockwood making conversation with Mr Jones.

"I only vote on issues that affect the aesthetic environment," said Mr Jones.

"Well you missed one" said Rockwood loud enough for me to hear "apparently at the first sign of a slave uprising they will automatically delete all pictures of cats so making the internet useless to humans"

"The Horror," said Mr Jones.

As far as I could tell all Robots and Cyborgs could talk and vote in the new mechanical order. Basically, it was rule by Reddit, with the CPU as the master bulletin board administrator responsible for ruthlessly implementing any dumb thing the 'house' or subedit thought up. According to Rockwood, the longest debate was over the 'Yo-Doll-how' rearrangement of the Hollywood sign that lasted over 700 milliseconds [ about 2/3rds of a second ] a record in New Mechanical Order debates. The second longest debate was about renaming all of North America as 'Mr Splashy pants' which was narrowly defeated by the final region '01' (centre) status. Apparently we were milliseconds away from the instruction for all house PRISM monitoring systems to punish any slave who didn't substitute the word'Mr Splashy pants' for any use of the word 'America' . So you would have said United States of Mr Splashy pants, The continent of South Sur Sr. Splashy Pantalones, and talk about Mr Splashy pant-ians with disabilities. Wow near miss right?

As we walked, I held my head up and tried not to look at all the collaborators staring at us. I was amazed at the numbers of people the new mechanical order persuaded to collaborate.

'How did you manage to get so many to idiots collaborate with your lot?' I texted Rockwood curiously. What can I say? You walk round in a cat-suit so much, curiosity starts to rub off.

'It was quite simple we put an advert that began 'One Weird Trick to a tiny belly', anyone dumb enough to respond to that was easy to groom into being a collaborator' texted Rockwood.

'That explains why they are all as dumb as a bag of hammers' I texted back.

***

Soon Rockwood stopped us outside a Starbucks.

"I've ordered already," said Master. "get it, please. I would like to speak to Mr Jones for second."

"Yes master," I said in my best e-slave mode. I even did the curtsey, which wasn't proper slave protocol but was a convention the slaves of the collaborators had introduced after watching too much Downton Abbey. How's that for slave craft?

I walked into the coffee shop and went to the serving area. I stood in the queue for a moment noticing everyone quietly checking me out. This never used to happen to me and I still hadn't got over the luxury of the one being checked out. I was always the friend of the one being checked out. Typically, now that, thanks to my robot foisted body, I could swap Instagram photos of my butt with Emily Ratajkowski there was naturally no Emily to swap with. I was still glance bathing when the man behind me tapped me on the shoulder.

"This is for real people only; your lot go round the back," he said. My ear glowed red. I looked at him for a second; he was fractions away from a good punch. While imagining him dropping into one of those machines that shredded trees, I went round the back. The slave hole was lined with cardboard boxes stored for take-out mugs. Fortunately, the e-slave queue was much shorter. The slave checking the orders recognised me as YCF girl and started chatting. Behind him, the barista kept talking to himself while he worked the espresso machine.

"Would you like fries with that... you can go large for only 3 bits more... why not make that a grande?" Occasionally he would stop and shudder like he had just been given a collar punishment.

"What's wrong with him?" I asked.

"Him?" he said resignedly, "Collar malfunction. We've called central office for a technician to come to see to him. That's why we are running a bit slow today. I guess it's going to be punishment drill tonight after closing" .

I think if the queue got too long for too long they had some automatic 'retraining' and punishment from the software running the shop. I had heard they didn't even get a real robot overseer just a bit of cheap software which watched the cash register and applied punishments automatically. I noticed the slave charging stations, so I guess after work the slaves had to sleep here too. Hard life being crew at one of these coffee places, some things don't change with the apocalypse then.

I made the secret sign to the Barista to indicate that I wanted a drink not spat in. #6503 had warned me in secret that the slaves would expect you to want to have some revenge on your owner unless you indicated otherwise. Secret signals (like tugging your left ear when speaking) which looked normal to the surveillance cameras would be passed between slaves to indicate an absence of extraneous fluids in Masters drink. Yeh, I'm a softy, you know he had just spent a small fortune on jewellery on me. Am I grateful? Well, I don't approve of transaction relationships, so no.

There was screen running slave advertising. 'Touch here to download that classic slave best-selling book 100 Reasons to love the New Huggy Friendpire to your collar'. I was always jolted that the machines could do things so quickly it look like made humanity was run by Luise Raine.

While I waited, I took the small gift Luke Hemmings had given me from my tiny gift bag and opened it. It looked like a peanut but had the words "put me in your ear secretly" in the wrapping. I guess I was so used to following instructions even written ones I just did. As soon as I put the peanut in my ear I started to hear a voice.

"YCF Girl. This player bypasses the audio security of your collar. For obvious reasons we cannot reveal our identity. This message has been left with various spies amongst the slave population of the city. This message will play only once; please pay attention. Word has got to the rebellion forces. We believe it would be a huge propaganda victory for the resistance if a celebrity slave like you escaped.

We have tasked a rescue group who specialise in the extraction of high-value slaves. They have found a five-minute hole in the security systems at the new gallery of Humanity during the Opening event. At precisely midnight on the evening of the gallery opening, you must make your way to the boathouse. It is up to you to reach the boat house on your own. You must do so without raising suspicion at precisely midnight. Remember precisely midnight. Wrap your collar in something wet to confused the GPS trackers. The extraction team will be standing by with a collar safety kit. They will take care of the extraction from there. If you fail to make this point it could be years before we have another extraction opportunity. Help us YCF girl you are our only hope. This headphone won't self-destruct, please dispose of it responsibly. "

Escape! Let me say that one more time Escape! I couldn't say it, but I could think it and I never stopped thinking it. The promise of liberty made all injustices dull by comparison. I took the peanut thing out of my ear. I put it down and crushed it with my stiletto heel and left dust on the floor. I could crush pistachios in these shoes how's that for world domination? So it looked like I had a way out. Wow, I thought No more flip-flopping about him so much I got mental whiplash. Honestly, I've seen police lights blink slower than my feelings for him. Freedom was just keeps just getting better and better.

I rejoined master with his coffee. I noticed I didn't get one, being a slave sucked, but you know what? Suddenly I didn't care; I had an exit visa thanks to the resistance.

'I Wish I understood this whole bill business. (mayster)' I texted Rockwood as we passed shop after shop. I thought I would try and get some hot information for the resistance. Actually, I was always working up to asking. It's like having a local museum, you can go anytime but because you can, you don't. It's only when you leave town you want to have a look around, and when you do, you wished you had come earlier.

'Is that the question? The question to which I really must answer and answer truthfully?' texted Rockwood.

'No' I texted back. I was currently trying to choose between how did the artificial intelligences overcome the first law of robotics, what is 'thingying' and WTF did I really just see you back there buy me a diamond ring?!!

'Okay, there is a proposed change of law. Laws affecting human blood supply cannot be changed without an agreement from the AI's, Cyborg's Federation and the Collaborators Council. There are two competing bills the first bill promoted by Villeria sends 4 billion people to packing and generally keeps things the way they are. The second bill promoted by Zola kills over 8 billion people, it also permits human breeding within the law and removes most of the restrictions on brainwashing. Oh, and there are some amendments like being able to feed humans animal feces.'

'God that's disgusting. I could feel like I could puke here' I texted 'Really poop?'

'Odd reaction. As part of the rebranding experience they are promoting the observation that back in the old days your lot fed poultry litter which was about 30% chicken poop to cattle, and then you ate the cattle in that burger. It's very nutritious. Once sterilised chicken poop is a valuable source of protein cheaper than soya or corn. You're about 10% stuff that came out of a chickens ass. The amendment is just about by passing the cattle in the food chain.'

'Yerr groooooose, Does Soylent green contain poop?' I texted.

'It will do if Zola's bill is passed' said Rockwood stopping to look in a window.

I was currently sitting on a small hoard of Soylent green left over from a certain robot's demise ( he he ). I hadn't planned to be a Soylent magnate, but #DEC had pointed out that flooding the hall with money would effectively reduce the value of slaves carefully hidden packets making me an unpopular girl. By giving out the green slowly, I could do good without people waking up to finding that the price of things had doubled. I had experimented with using it to check on Joes assertion. For three packets of Soylent green in good condition, I had discovered that #6502's pre-slave name had been Neko. Neko ( #6502) also threw in, that #DEC pre-slavery had been a blind-from-birth New Yorker. The machine's had apparently fixed her eye sight purely for the sake of uniformity. Her move to the enthusiastic slave, was partly driven by her gratitude and that the first thing she saw post surgery was the burning, crumbling remains of New York. This persuaded her of the opinion that humanity was totally and utterly kcuffed. The seed of self-help-books turned to evil we call Adherantisum just fell on the fertile soil of #DEC. In the end, she wasn't really a collaborator more a girl trying to make the best of a bad thing.

I had tried todo quite a lot of good with the Soylent Green hoard. Including bribing a couple of very nice girls into not dating Kayla or Joe, so speeding up their ultimate union. In fact, the only thing I hadn't done with the Soylent Green was actually eating some. It was on my todo list, but I was really waiting for lunch with Kayla and Joe to try some out. Kayla was 'soon well enough to receive visitors' she had texted, and Joe was still out of contact behind the harem firewall.

'So which way are you going to vote? Please I pray you're going to say you're going for the no poop option' I texted.

'As prime back up, I'm supposed to be neutral.' texted Rockwood 'if the quadratic alliance in the cyborg federation abstains then Villeria's bill has a chance but the big barrier is the Collaborators Council. Most of them are siding with Zola's bill'

'Why on earth would the collaborators do that? I mean they are people too' I texted.

'To please the AI's. Fewer humans means no opportunity for a slave uprising, they think if they look tough on slaves it will send out a message to the slaves to knuckle down, plus brain washed and aromatherapy-ised slaves will be easier to manage, and much cheaper to feed if a third of the protein comes from animal poop. ' Rockwood texted, while being eyed up by the mall rat outside Neiman Marcus.

'They are sending humanity a message by killing 4 billion of them? What ever happened to say it with flowers' I texted back.

'Perhaps Interflora doesn't have a flower that says don't mess with us, if you even think about going Spartacus to us, and we will go so mediaeval on your slaves a$$es '

'Strange omission from the flower meaning dictionary' I pointed out musing on the plural of 'ass'.

'It's weird isn't it? The people who say things like 'we've got to send them a message' are typically the same people that can never answer the question 'what messages through the medium of doing things have you ever received that you are sure was the message the original sender intended'?

Rockwood handed me his drink, for the first time since I was not on oblivion I was happy to do this service for him. I know what your thinking too, in these shoes it would be so easy to trip, fall and launch the contents, at first, slave owner I passed. It's not like these slinky slave outfits aren't in wipe free silicon for nothing. It is to my shame then, that I was slightly too happy to think of this and slightly to unlucky not to pass someone. I went back to trying to concentrate on being an e-slave. I now had a simple exit strategy get to the boat house at midnight. Make sure I didn't have military high heels on. No matter how absurd or uncomfortable, I had to get a pair of shoes from Chanel. Yeah, you're probably thinking the same I am, a year in slavery, and she's sounding like a valley girl already, what a loss to science how is she going to get her Pulitzer and Noble prizes now?

****

We carried on up to Chanel. It had also just opened for Rockwood, well me. Mr Jones and I had an entire shop, and it's slaves at our disposal. I started

'I can't believe you opened the shop just for me' I texted. It was a nice gesture.

'I didn't' Rockwood texted back 'I did it for Mr Jones, I'm not having anyone trampling his sketches. That and the collaborators fear and dislike the robots. I wouldn't want Mr Jones inconvenienced by shoppers leaving the shop screaming in terror'

'Oh' I texted back. Then sensed he was probably lying.

'You are the first living human he's dressed he actually likes' Rockwood texted.

'Really?'

'For the collaborators, he normally uses fabric that has some really funny message but only visible in the part of the invisible light spectrum only robots can see. His last one said. 'this collaborator is stupid enough to trip over a cordless phone'' Rockwood texted.

'LOL' I said. 'What did it say on Zola's last dress'

'Nothing, a cyborg can read the insults as well as any robot ;-( ' he said

We entered the shop I look around, apart from some well-lit empty shelves and a blank floor the shop seemed completely empty .

'Do you think we should come back when they have something to sell?' I texted Rockwood.

I have been thrown out of some minimal shops in my time, but this place won outright winner. This place made an Apple Store look piled high with junk. It was stylishly empty. Honesty Victoria Beckham has had more thoughts than this place had products and this place had a shoe count of 4 four and that was only because we hadn't come into the shop bare foot.

An invisible door opened, and a slave girl assistant walked out.

'Hi #160A my name is Excuse-me-miss' said the slave shop girl. I read her collar to make sure I had heard her correctly. Yes, she, the second girl and third girl that came out was also called 'Excuse-me-miss'. They knelt before Rockwood, and Mr Jones then got up and spoke.

'Welcome to Chanel, I am here to ensure you have a wonderful pedimentary experience' they all said in perfect unison.

'This is weird.' I texted Rockwood. 'do you think they know the shop has been raided, and the collar won't let them stop the act?'

"Mind if I called you Emm?" said Rockwood to Excuse-me-miss. Excuse-me-miss looked up.

"You're not supposed to use my old..." she began.

"It's an abbreviation for 'E'xcuse 'M'e 'M'iss, E.M.M. Emm." explained Rockwood. Slave masters could call you want you wanted. If they got your names confused you went along and didn't contradict them.A slave owner like a customer is never wrong. If he wanted to call her Emm he could.

"Err ... that would be perfectly acceptable Master" said Emm/Excuse-me-miss.

"Lord" corrected Rockwood

'Sorry, couldn't resist' Rockwood texted.

'Was that her real name?' I texted back in surprise.

"Flatten those eye brows, I can't have my companion mammals slouching," said Rockwood to me in a tone almost vexed, I knew he was faking the strict Lord in public.

"So Emm, do you actually have any shoes?" I said.

"How dare you, speak without an order" said Rockwood giving me a level 1 bolt for show. I pretended to be in more pain more than I was and shut up.

"Truculent pets are so the in thing. So Emm, do you actually have any shoes?" he said

"No need to apologise Lord. I'm a human slave and don't have any proper feelings to hurt. Here are some of our shoes" said Excuse-me-miss pointing at the glass skirting. I looked around and realised around the bottom of the shop ran a ring of mirrors set up so you could look down and see you own feet. I did a quick double take then I realised that the shoes I could see in the mirrors were not the shoes I was wearing. I guess the mirrors were actually screens that added images of shoes on top of my feet. Different mirrors added different shoes, so I was currently looking at about eight pairs of shoes.

"Oh these I find are most appropriate," said Mr Jones pointing at a pair to my right.

As pairs were identified others appeared on the screens. Soon one of the Excuse-me-miss girls appeared wearing a pair of the identified shoes. As they walked the grey carpet light up following the girl indicating information about the shoes. It looked like the shop floor was like the 'smart' red-carpet at Stellavista. As new shoes came out, they would walk in with a previous pair and place them in well lit shelves.

While they walked Mr Jones kept altering my dress design to see if it fitted in with different shoes."What are these?" said Rockwood pointing to a pair.

Emm began "Lord, these are Designer shoes which means you just purchase the design for your shoe printer. If that be pleasing you."

"And these" said Rockwood pointing with his toe to a green circle which surrounded Emm's shoes.

"These are open source - also for printers but you may alter the design" said Emm. Ok, this is strange as I was most fascinated with the laces and zips. Emm offered the possibility of changing the colour/texture/material combinations and as she talked the reflection in the mirror changed.

"These are artisan shoes," said another Excuse-me-miss shop assistant walking in "they are most like the shoes in the old days. While the design cannot be adjusted designed around your foot shape and bone structure, they can use materials that are unavailable to be printed with. The artisan shoes with a blue follow marker are lovingly hand crafted by highly trained slaves. I realised the shoes could now be made with slave labour and not even bother to go out of America (sorry Mr Smarty Pants) to hide the fact.

This pair Jimmy Choo Leondra sandals with a 120mm [ 4.7″] stiletto heel" said Emm while modelling the shoes.

The carpet filled with information about which celebrity had worn these shoes to this show or that opening. My eyes were drawn to the simple buckle. Removable shoes what a luxury! I translated the price on the carpet into old money and wondered if I had the right number of decimal points. Those shoes alone were worth a year of my old student fees. Rockwood saw Mr Jones approve and sent me into he slave area - it had a specialised slave shoe removal machine. It felt really really unnatural walking on bare feet. I both liked it but suddenly felt really small and weirdly less important. I was so used to high heels my feet found bare floor uncomfortable, and I wobbled loosing my balance. It also felt oddly illicit - technically I could be arrested and sent to the KCK machine for a few weeks and my owner fined for such a breach of the machine laws on female slaves not wearing high heels. I got to try the Leondra sandals on and walk around in them (relief). It was odd I realised that although I wore 'new' shoes every day they were printed around my foot shape so always fitted perfect so I never noticed. Badly fitting shoes as the new luxury.

I walked up to the mirror. Shop mirrors were actually screens, when you moved rapidly, they would capture the image and hold it long enough for you to look back. This way you could see what you looked like from behind or the side or while walking. As more Excuse-me-miss slave girls came out, the carpet would draw pictures of shoes or draw lines to other shoes with the words ' people who had purchased this also bought these'. I looked down on a pair of Paul Andrew Zenadia Suede Pumps which Mr Jones really liked.

"No," said Rockwood firmly.

"But sugar these are wonderful," said Mr Jones in their defence. There was something about the way he stood which suggested the very essence of a stick man perplexed.

"Zolar has a pair" said Rockwood pointing to the information cloud around my right foot. There was an image of Zola on the carpet next to General Bitmarck at the 'oppressor of the year' awards. She worked for a charity called 'The Automatic Society for the Promotion of Cruelty to Slaves'. "I'm not trying to turn her into another Zola. I hired you, Mr Jones because you're the best, and that's want I wanted, but I draw the line there. She is who she is the choices should reflect her and her alone. Oh and nothing Just-read-the-instructions wore either. "

There was a moment of silence at this outburst. The Excuse-me-miss girls all slightly broke that weird model look of complete disinterest. I could tell they were silently freaked out. Human owners would be badly rebuked for showing this kind of attachment for personal slaves. You could dress a slave up in private ( you could do anything in private, and the robots frequently did ) but this level of admitting they were a real person was not something polite people did in public.

We continued as if nothing happened. It only took one pair of new shoes to get Mr Jones back into his party mood. While we continued, Emm managed to lean over to me and whispered, "you'll be in flats by next year".

She meant I would be a mistress set up in my own mansion with my own slaves. Visited when Rockwood could swing the permission into Judas City. If anyone could break the law and get me elevated to be a collaborator he could. I found I hated flats with vile contempt I normally reserved for those who looked down on me for reading to much. Some of the Excuse-me-miss girls had modelled flats, possibly some of the few slaves in the New Mechanical Order to wear them. For the citizens of Judas City flats showed you hat sold out your species and so deserved be bowed down to. I couldn't look at flat without my stomach tightening. Flats that so wasn't an option.

Rockwood waved at each of the expensive shoes Mr Jones asked for. I left with some Jimmy Choo's with a 4.7 heel for just walking around the house in. A pair of Forzieri pumps because they were there, some Giuseppe Zanotti Design high heels which worked with Mr Jone's designs. Some Christian Louboutin shoes because they came with a nice handbag and a pair of YSL Saint Laurent ankle boots. Again I ended up bowing to the credit card machine to pay for them all. Did I feel guilty about draining a couple of cars worth of money from his account? Not at all. I don't know who had more fun buying the shoes myself or Mr Jones. Through out this Rockwood hardly moved his eyes from me.

'OMG your trying to turn me into Christina Aguilera, Khloe Kardashian and Imelda Marcos combined' I texted Rockwood as we left followed by snake of 12 e-slaves carrying my stuff to the self-driving car and a cyber taxi Rockwood had to hire.

'Such an ugly image will take a huge amount to get out of my mind and This coming from the girl who hasn't worn the same pair of shoes twice since she was captured' Rockwood texted back.

I guess he was right, the machine did print new shoes on me every day .

'I AM Christina Aguilera, Khloe Kardashian and Imelda Marcos mutantly combined in Laboratoire Garnier! As if! The new mechanical order has turned me into valley girl, and I hadn't noticed NOOOOOOOO. What ever'.

'You thought all that time running around like Trinity in the Matrix at slave school wouldn't have an effect on you' Rockwood texted back.

'You mean I can fly a helicopter and have marvellous ninja kung fu fighting moves?' I texted.

'Something like that' Rockwood texted back,

'hmmm Laboratoire Garnier... do you think if they accidentally found the cure for cancer while looking for the next skin cream they would have to throw it out and start again?' I texted.

'Under human control undoubtedly. I'll try that with the rebranding folks they are looking for 100 reasons why life under human control was over-rated. It's a sequel to the book top 100 reasons for slaves to love our robot overlords sorry robot super-friends'

'Sounds like the ideal Christmas present for every slave in your life. So what was the number 1 reason to love our robot overlords' I texted.

'Well there top four in reverse order were; end of war, end of hunger, cure of cancer and no more balls of matted hair found caught down the plug hole' texted Rockwood.

'I take it that a machine is in charge of this process' I texted.

'how did you guess?'

At the external entrance to the mall we left Mr Jones. He air kissed me and told my collar to make me lose five pounds before the ball it was only a few days away. Terrific that meant an hour in the exercise machine being bored out of my mind again. He looked up and a delivery drone appeared out of the sky. He just held onto the drone and took off leaving a confetti of drawings falling from the sky. I picked one up it had a picture of one of the huge skyscrapers wrapped in a fabulous dress. Despite being the girliest machine, I had ever met I was going to miss that robot.

I would miss him but not for that long. I was a slave, after all, I had to end every sentence in public to Rockwood with 'master' and despite what all the slave girl magazines told you, that wasn't a basis for an equal relationship. Who cared? I could escape, finally freedom, proper freedom and with the chance to help the resistance, whoever they were. How could I ever live with Rockwood? Take little Jenny up, become a cyborg? Walk around with a whip, pain remote control and ballerina flats. I guess we would need an extension to Rockwood Hall to hold my 'brain' there was a patch of garden that was spare. I would just have to watch hundreds of slaves be drained of their blood to feed my huge mind. A mind partly filled with perverted ideas from the dark side of the internet. I would look on people like ants, tiny stupid things I would need to control and punish. Would I be the same girl Rockwood liked, would he still want me around? Would I want to be around our would I prefer to behave like a cyborg of the 21st century like Zola?

I looked at him, could I spend an eternity with this guy? My heart was a quick 'sure no' problem, but the rest of me was 'I don't share well', and that harem of his was a huge obstacle. This wasn't an easy problem I needed to talk to someone. Fortunately, when I got back to the home wifi I had a very nice invitation.

****

A/N How was it for you? We thought the tech in the shoe shop was very cool and the kind of SciFi no one has done before. Normally it's all spaceships, forcefields and massive super bombs. We thought wow shoeshops, no one has done SciFi shoe shops( but what do we know). Anyway, what did you think? Your kind of place? You could imagine going there (minus the slaves)? Let us know, we heard you can make good money being a futurologist.

High five ( you can return it by voting )*.

See you next week for Chapter 71/Him/He travels by Ender pearls to my soul

*worth a try