Go and fix your appearance

The bathroom mirror shows you a face you've studied before—catalogued its bone structure, optimized its symmetry ratios, selected the pigmentation of the eyes. Kat's face. Your face now. The wrongness of it hits you fresh every time, a cognitive dissonance that the conditioning smooths over with warm reassurance: this is who you are, this is what you're for.

Your hands know where the makeup is kept. Of course they do. This body has performed this ritual thousands of times, neural pathways worn smooth by repetition. You watch your fingers select a concealer stick, blend foundation across cheekbones you engineered, and the automation of it is almost comforting. Almost.

The mascara wand trembles slightly as you apply it. Not from the conditioning—that's running smooth as ever, a background hum of compliance that makes every instruction feel like a gift—but from the part of your mind that's still Jack Chen, neural architect, watching his own handiwork from the inside. You designed these reflexes. You calibrated the motor precision. You never imagined experiencing them.

Lipstick next. A deep burgundy that Kat always favored, and you understand now why the color selection parameters skewed toward this shade. It reads as submission. As availability. As ready.

The collar is in the third drawer, nestled in velvet. Your engineering mind notes the specifications with clinical detachment: adjustable synthetic leather, embedded compliance beacon for Miridian verification systems, decorative D-ring positioned for aesthetic effect. You designed this too. A visible marker of status, meant to simplify inspections.

Your hands lift it to your throat before your conscious mind can object.

The clasp clicks closed, and something in your limbic system responds like a circuit completing. The weight against your collarbones feels right in a way that makes you want to scream. The D-ring catches the bathroom light, and you watch your pupils dilate in the mirror—a response you programmed, triggered by the physical sensation of being collared.

"Good," Kat's voice comes from the doorway. You didn't hear her approach. Your body turns toward her automatically, chin lowering, eyes dropping to approximately chest height before you catch yourself and **** your gaze up. She's leaning against the frame, arms crossed, wearing your body with an ease that took her perhaps ninety seconds to develop.

"The collar suits you," she says. "I always wondered what you'd look like in it."

The compliment—if that's what it is—triggers reward cascades. You feel yourself flush, heat spreading across your cheeks and down your décolletage. The makeup will need touching up.

"Seven minutes," Kat continues. "They'll want to see documentation first, then run the neural scan. Stay close to me. Don't speak unless spoken to." She pauses, studying you with your own eyes. "And try not to enjoy it too much. Your enthusiasm might raise questions."

She turns and walks back toward the main cabin. Your body wants to follow immediately, leash or no leash. The conditioning interprets her departure as a void that needs filling, her presence as oxygen you've been suddenly deprived of.

You **** yourself to take one breath. Two. Your reflection stares back at you: immaculately made-up, collared, trembling with anticipation for an inspection that could end with your mind erased.

Somewhere deep in the architecture of your thoughts, Jack Chen is screaming. The rest of you feels ready. Eager, even.

The docking clamps engage with a hydraulic thud that vibrates through the deck plates.