Submit to the scan

The scanner's emitter array unfolds like a mechanical flower, positioning itself centimeters from your temple. You feel the field penetration as a subtle pressure behind your eyes—not painful, but intrusive, like fingers rifling through drawers in a room you once thought private.

Okonkwo watches his readout with the detached focus of a man who has seen a thousand neural architectures and remembers none of them. "Companion-class modification suite," he announces, his voice professionally flat. "Registration timestamp three years, seven months. Consent documentation verified. Compliance beacon active and broadcasting correct identification codes."

The scanner hums deeper, and you feel it probing the layers of your conditioning. Reward pathways light up on his display like holiday decorations—you can see the reflection in his visor. The architecture of your own enslavement, rendered in false-color neural mapping. Submission protocols. Arousal triggers. Obedience cascades. All of it documented, registered, legal.

"Sexual responsiveness suite is... comprehensive," Okonkwo notes, and there's something in his tone that might be professional admiration or might be discomfort. "Libido enhancement. Tactile sensitivity amplification. Orgasmic threshold modification." He glances at Lindqvist. "Everything matches the registered specifications."

The inspector makes a notation on her tablet. "Baseline cognitive function?"

"Preserved within legal parameters. No evidence of personality suppression or cognitive impairment beyond standard companion-class ranges." Okonkwo adjusts a setting, and the scanner probes deeper. You feel it brushing against memories, surface-level associations, and your conditioning responds by keeping you calm, keeping you still, keeping you compliant. "No contraband neural modifications detected. No unlicensed behavioral architectures."

The scanner withdraws. You release a breath you didn't realize you were holding.

"Clean," Okonkwo confirms, collapsing his equipment back into portable configuration.

Lindqvist's attention shifts to Kat—to your former body, standing with the easy authority you never quite managed. "Captain Chen. Your turn."

Kat steps forward without hesitation, and watching her move in your body triggers a complex cascade of responses. Recognition. Loss. And underneath it all, the conditioning's interpretation: she is in charge, she is confident, she deserves your submission. The engineering part of your mind screams at the irony.

Okonkwo positions his scanner. The hum fills the cabin again.

You watch from your knees as the device maps the neural architecture you inhabited for thirty-four years. Your original brain, your original patterns, now overlaid with the behavioral modifications you hastily installed—dominance traits, confidence amplification, assertiveness parameters. All of it showing exactly what it should show: the owner of a companion-class modification, with standard baseline cognitive

[function.

No](http://function.No) trace of consciousness transfer. No evidence that the person standing there used to kneel where you kneel now.

"Captain's scan is clean," Okonkwo announces. "Standard baseline with no modifications detected."

Lindqvist nods, making final notations. "Registration documents check out. Travel itinerary is consistent with declared purpose." She looks up, and her pale eyes sweep the cabin one final time. They pass over you without interest—furniture, as expected—and settle on Kat. "We'll conduct a brief physical inspection of the vessel. Cargo holds, engineering access, standard protocol. Should take approximately ten minutes."

"Of course," Kat says. Your voice sounds so natural in her mouth. "I'll accompany you."

Lindqvist's gaze flicks back to you. "The companion remains here. Okonkwo, stay with it."

The pronoun hits you like cold water. It. Not her, not them. It. Furniture. Property. The conditioning processes this as correct, appropriate, and the part of you that's still Jack Chen wants to vomit.

Kat doesn't look back as she follows Lindqvist toward the cargo section. Okonkwo settles into a chair across from you, scanner equipment on his lap, his expression professionally blank.