Chapter 17 The Venus Lock
THE VENUS LOCK, EVE
The doors to the medical center slide open with a soft hiss, and a grey-skinned woman emerges.
Her pristine uniform emphasizes her alien elegance.
Her features are framed by straight black hair pulled back in a professional style, and her expression carries the practiced neutrality of someone who has delivered difficult news before.
“Eve Eden?” she calls, checking a floating screen hovering at her fingertips.
When she makes eye contact with me—the only human…
the only person… in the waiting room—she says, “I'm the doctor here at the Celestial Spire.
You're here for your pre-employment examination. I hope your trip across the galaxy was peaceful.”
I try to stand, but my legs feel unsteady. The images from the lobby keep replaying in my mind: the collars, the leashes, and that man's desperate eyes pleading for help. I force myself to breathe slowly, counting each exhale like I learned in the free meditation classes at Terra Sanctum.
“You're in shock,” Dr. Veil says, immediately coming closer to take my arm. “Where is Rae? She wasn’t supposed to leave you.”
“I saw them. The—” My voice cracks, and I clear my throat, willing myself to stay coherent.
“The humans in the lobby. They were collared…disfigured. A man tried to ask me for help, and I did nothing while he was punished and then… and then…and then… he was fucking lobotomized. And it was all my fault.”
Dr. Veil's expression shifts, and regret crosses her face. “You witnessed the Sapien Spectacle. Very poor timing for your arrival.”
“Poor timing?” I echo. “Those are people. Sentient beings being treated like… like animals…worse than animals. Mutilated people! I can’t stay here. I have to go home. I have to go back to Earth.”
“Stay calm,” Dr. Veil says, and I feel something warm and foreign brush against the edges of my mind.
I stumble backward. “What did you just do to me?”
“Telepathic stabilization,” she explains, raising her grey hands in what might be a placating gesture. “Your panic was reaching dangerous levels. I only touched the surface of your mind, only your autonomic responses. I promise, your thoughts and memories are still all your own.”
“I didn’t consent to that,” I say firmly but without the hysteria that had been building before.
“I only did it to stabilize you,” she insists calmly.
“Don’t do it again.”
“Noted. Next time, I will allow you to have a full meltdown. Please, come inside. We need to discuss your situation woman to woman.” Her tone carries genuine concern, not just a professional obligation. And the way she says ‘woman to woman’ piques my curiosity. The galaxy is a matriarchy after all.
I follow her into the examination room, my legs still unsteady, but my mind clearer. The space is starkly clinical, filled with devices I don't recognize, but Dr. Veil's presence feels less threatening than expected.
“Sit, please.” She gestures to a hovering examination table that molds itself to my form as I settle onto it.
“Eve, I need you to understand something. The laws regarding humans in galactic society have been... evolving rapidly. What you saw today reflects practices that were fully legal just two years ago.”
I study her grey face, looking for deception or manipulation, but I find only honesty. “If it’s illegal now, then why is it still going on? And at this hotel that hired me, a human. Am I really an employee, or are you going to collar me too?”
“Your job is legitimate, and as for the humans and their owners that you saw in the lobby, the human pet world now exists in a grey area. There is one galactic law that states humans are sentient, but about twenty others that refer to humans as commodities. It would be an understatement to say the galaxy is in a state of flux regarding humans.” She activates her holographic display, but her eyes remain on me.
“As for the Spire, it operates under multiple jurisdictions. Your employment contract makes you legally distinct from the... entertainers.”
“Entertainers,” I repeat flatly. “Is that what we're calling slavery now? They were called companions on the ship that brought me over. Why not just call them what they really are—slaves?”
Dr. Veil sighs. “Eve, I can’t change the galaxy, but I can help you process this differently. Many human employees request neural adjustments to—”
“To make me more complicit?” I interrupt. “To stop feeling horrified by seeing my own species degraded?”
“To allow you to do your job without psychological damage,” she corrects gently. “I would not change your knowledge or your values. I would simply partition your emotional responses. This would allow you to understand intellectually, but not suffer emotionally.”
The offer is tempting in its mercy, but I shake my head. “No. Absolutely not. My horror and my disgust are mine and the only sane response to this insanity. If I must stay, then I will suffer every minute, as do my counterparts on leashes.”
She nods slowly, respect reflected in her eyes. “Most humans eventually request the modification. It can become overwhelming.”
“Then let it overwhelm me. I will not drug myself out of it. I only have to watch their suffering as they live it.”
“I understand you completely,” she says, and then her expression grows more serious.
“I’ve seen what human pet owners and trainers can do and what they call ‘discipline.’ I often treat the ones who survive.
That’s why I stay here—to help the humans I can.
Now, before we proceed with the medical exam, I must inform you about your predecessor, Denise. ”
I freeze. “I knew her. What happened to Denise?”
“Not too long ago, a guest abducted her. She was spirited away in the night.” The doctor's fingers dance over her holographic controls. “This is why additional precautions are now required for all human employees. Direct orders from Sovereign Rafe.”
I keep my expression neutral, filing away this discrepancy from what Cal told me. One of them is lying, and I need to find out which one and why. But now is not the time.
“What kind of precautions?” I ask, trying to focus on the here and now. But in the back of my mind I keep thinking: Is Denise a collared companion now?
Dr. Veil turns and takes a small, dark-green case off the counter.
She opens it to reveal a thin, metallic band with intricate circuitry embedded throughout it.
It looks more like alien jewelry than medical gear, and I can’t help but wonder if this is the moment when I become lobotomized and collared.
“The Venus Lock. This is a pheromone suppression device. A new protective measure for humans.”
My pulse quickens. “Protection from what?” I ask, trying to figure out what my pheromones have to do with being abducted.
“Certain species react aggressively to human pheromones. This will regulate your sexual impulses and dampen your pheromone release. In addition, it acts as a tracking device, so if you are unlucky enough to be abducted, our security can retrieve you from anywhere in the galaxy.”
I stare at the device. “So it’s a chastity belt with a tracking device to retrieve your property.”
“It's required under your employment addendum, section 27, paragraph 3. The language was deliberately vague but legally binding.”
“It’s a chastity belt,” I say again in disbelief. And I wonder if my behavior on the Igo had anything to do with this now. But I’m too embarrassed to ask.
“It primarily suppresses pheromones for your safety, but also has behavioral modification protocols which the Sovereigns can activate. But it’s not a chastity belt as you’re imagining it because it can interface with your suite’s companion simulations, although for the moment, that access is restricted.
Overall, I want to reassure you, that this is for your safety.
Denise didn’t have either of these things, and that made her more vulnerable.
Sovereign Rafe is many things, but he never makes the same mistake twice. ”
I hate the logic of it, hate that survival in this place requires surrendering my bodily autonomy. But if the choice is between violation, abduction, death, or worse...
“There’s something else,” Dr. Veil says, pausing with the device still in her hands. “And I want you to understand it before it’s installed, not after.”
Oh Jesus, what now? “Understand what?”
“The Venus Lock doesn’t just suppress pheromones. It regulates sexual response itself. Desire, arousal, denial, release. All of it.”
“You mean it controls whether I can—” I hesitate. Is she really talking about this? “Orgasm.”
“Yes. It can grant orgasms just as easily as it can prevent them, and just as cruelly, it can induce arousal and hold you in a sustained state of sexual need, indefinitely. In addition, it will learn your body. Your stress responses. What motivates you…”
“And who controls it?” I ask with dread, hoping she is going to say she does.
“The Sovereigns.”
No. No. No.
I can’t stop shaking my head. I don’t want this. But what can I do? I can’t go back to Earth. I’m stuck here for at least a few months.
“This isn’t a punishment device, Eve. It’s a conditioning one. It was designed for species classified as volatile, impulsive, or easily influenced by sensation. Humans fall squarely into that category under Imperial metrics.”
“So it’s a pet’s collar around my vagina to keep me safe?”
“In the Sovereigns’ eyes, it serves two purposes: to keep you obedient and to keep you safe.”
Dr. Veil doesn’t say *collared*. She doesn’t have to.
“Finally, I must warn you, the device responds only to what your body feels, not how you think about a situation. Submerged fantasies you never knew you had, may be brought to the surface.”
I am speechless and mortified. I think all about my hidden fantasies that I’ve imagined from the romance novels I’ve read.