"And this is where we keep the lab animals."

Jack took out a set of keys, selected one, and opened the door. As his girlfriend Melody stepped through the door, he flipped on the light switch.

The young woman gasped as she saw the occupied stalls. "B-but they're women!" She stared at them with disbelief and bewilderment. There were nearly a dozen of them, bald and naked, their harnessed and bridled bodies held upright and in place by numerous straps leading from their tack to the walls and ceiling. Their faces were blank and expressionless, their eyes wandering aimlessly.

"Correction: ponygirls. Legally, they're classified as animals."

Melody looked at him in shock. "Are you serious? Then what is going to happen to me when I graduate?" It was well known that healthy young women were often forced into ponygirl service.

"Don't worry, honey. I'll take care of you."

She wrapped her arms around one of his and leaned on his shoulder. "I hope so. I don't think I want to be a ponygirl, no matter what anybody says."

She could see thin white scars at various points on their shaved heads.

"Those scars-- is that what you were talking about?"

"Yeah. That's where we've implanted the control units. We're testing ways to remotely control the brain, but there's still a long way to go."

Melody shuddered. "Sounds . . . creepy."

"Not really. Here, let me show you."

He picked up a hand-held unit from a lab table and turned it toward the ponygirl in front of them.

"Now, if I wanted her to become sexually aroused, all I have to do is this."

He punched in a code. Melody could see or hear nothing, but within seconds the ponygirl began to moan and writhe about as much as she could under the restraints. It was a few minutes before her eyes misted over, her body stiffened, and she screamed in ecstasy.

Melody cringed. "Stop it. Please?"

"Okay. That should be enough. Don't want to tire her out." He punched in another code, and the ponygirl relaxed.

The young woman swallowed uneasily. "What else can you make her do?"

"Watch this." His fingers hit the buttons a few more times.

At first, Melody could see nothing. Then the ponygirl's breasts began to swell, followed a minute later by tiny beads of milk at the end of each nipple. As Melody watched in horrified fascination, the flow of milk increased until it was streaming down her naked body.

"Stop! Stop it! I don't want to see anymore, okay?"

Jack sighed. "Okay." He ended the demonstration.

The young woman retreated into a corner of the room. "So this is what you do? Turn women-- I'm sorry, ponygirls-- into submissives playmates?"

"No, it's much more than that. I just showed you the obvious stuff."

"Ugh! Can we go, please?"

"Just a minute, okay? I just want to check something."

Jack went to the end of the room and began looking over a chart on a clipboard. After a minute, Melody overcame her reluctance and joined him.

"What's that?"

"A chart of their progress. Things are moving along nicely."

He hung the chart back on the wall. "Okay, we can go now." He took her arm gently and they started to leave, but then he stopped, causing her to do the same.

"Oh, look. An empty stall. Care to see how it feels?"

Melody shot him a nasty look. "Don't even think--!"

"Oh, c'mon. It'll only be for a minute. Maybe you can help out the others here by telling me what it's really like to be penned up."

His girlfriend gave a heavy sigh, but stood there with her arms folded.

Jack rubbed her arm. "You know, if it wasn't for me, you'd probably be toiling away on a farm somewhere."

He was right. He had pulled some strings to keep her from being sent to some back-to-earth community as a workhorse.

"Oh, all right."

Jack went and got a harness and bridle from the storeroom. "You should probably take your skirt and blouse off, or they might get ruined."

"God, the things I do for you." But she started unbuttoning her blouse, anyway.

She laid her outer garments carefully on a table. She was dressed only in panties, pantyhose, lacy bra, and shoes. Melody looked uneasily toward the door. "No one is going to come walking in, are they?"

"Naw. It's the weekend. Besides, the door's locked."

He put the harness on her body, tightened the straps, and then locked her wrists in the cuffs hanging from the waist belt as Melody stood there stock-still, clearly not pleased at his little game. She squirmed in her leather restraints.

"Yuk. I don't like this at all."

"We ain't even done yet, honey."

He fitted the bridle over her head. Melody reluctantly opened her mouth, and gave a short cry of protest as the bit was wedged deep between her teeth.

"Is 'is 'eally 'ecessary?"

"You wanted to know what it felt like, remember?"

Actually, it was Jack who had talked her into it, but she didn't want to argue with him-- even if she could.

"We might as well do the boots, too."

He lifted each foot, removed the shoe, and worked the high-heeled horseshoe boot on, zipping it up. He then led her over to the stall.

"In you go."

Jack guided the reluctant ponygirl into the small enclosed space, where he positioned her in the middle and proceeded to strap her in, starting from the overhead bridle strap and working his way down to the ankle straps, adjusting and tightening each one as he went. Melody found that she could barely move.

"There. How's it feel?"

Melody's answer was garbled and incomprehensible, so she struggled to show her displeasure, her eyes blazing in annoyance.

"Oh, c'mon. Didn't you tell me you wanted to help me with my research?"

The trapped girl moaned and tried to shake her head no, but could only produce jerky little movements.

"Sure you did. Now here's your chance."

Melody struggled again, harder this time. He had taken the joke far enough.

"Well, it's too late now to change your mind. You're research subject Number 12 now."

The girl said something else which came out as gibberish, but it was obvious she was getting angry.

Jack ignored her. He left, then returned with a spray bottle, a pair of scissors, a can of shaving cream, and a razor, which he set on the table.

Melody gasped, realizing he could be serious. Anger swiftly turned to fear. This was no longer a joke. Her comments of "Oh, God, no! No, 'lease!" could clearly be understood.

Jack took the spray bottle and wet down her hair. Melody began to cry, softly at first, then escalating to loud uninhibited wails as he began to snip away her golden locks.

"Oh, come on," he cooed. "That's no way for a research subject to act."

The young woman bawled as wet clumps of hair tumbled down her shoulders and onto the floor. When Jack had clipped it down to a stubble, he squirted shaving cream all over her head. Melody's body was racked with sobbing.

"Hold still. I don't want to cut you."

The girl was well past self-control. Jack had to hold her head against him as he carefully drew the razor over her soft skull. Five minutes later, she was completely bald. He wiped her head clean with a paper towel, then dabbed at her tears.

"There, that wasn't so bad, was it?"

Melody responded with another chorus of wails and sobs. How could he do this to her? Didn't she mean anything to him, anymore?

"By the way, you won't be needing these." With the scissors, he cut away her bra, the top of her pantyhose, and her panties, yanking the torn pieces out from under the harness and tossing them on the floor, leaving her almost completely naked.

"The research assistants will be in in the morning to prep you, and then Dr. Johnston will insert the electrodes in the afternoon."

Melody slumped in her restraints, giving up all hope. Her body jerked limply with her sobbing. Jack lifted her head gently by her chin and wiped away her tears and snot with her ruined panties, then kissed her on the cheek.

"Bye, honey. See you in a few days."

The soft sounds of her sobbing followed him as he turned out the lights and closed the door behind him. He now had enough research subjects to make the experiment viable.

Two days later, when he returned, her bald head still had the stitches from the operations. She had already acquired the glassy-eyed stare of the others.

"Hi, honey. How are we doing?"

Her reply was a soft whimper. He reached in and stroked her cheek.

"There, there. It's not so bad, is it?" He brushed away a tear that had rolled down her cheek. "Here, let me make you happy again."

He took a remote and punched in a code. Almost instantly, Melody smiled and stood straighter, her gray mood gone.

"That's my girl. A big smile for medical research, huh?"

Melody grinned. The other researchers began to arrive, and Jack spent the next few hours testing all the brain implants in his girlfriend, making her laugh, cry, sing, sleep, dance, get angry, and obey his commands. He made her orgasm, made her tits squirt milk, made her piss and shit on cue.

But deep inside Melody's mind, beyond the reach of the electrodes, beyond the reaches of her researcher-boyfriend, there was still a part of her that knew she was being manipulated against her will, a small part that still knew what it had been like to have free will, a small part that screamed for freedom even as it knew she would never know it again.