Choose Your Own Brainwashing, Day 22 (Patreon)

“Isn’t that interesting?” Lee asks. “Usually on calls it’s me sipping water and you pausing for just a moment, but it looks like something different is happening for you today.  And of course right now you’re so completely paused that you’re not even hearing me say these things, and quite possibly when you’re no longer completely paused you might not even recall or realize or remember that this moment happened. And in just a second I’m going to take the glass of water back from you and it will be like you never had it, never drank from it, and never found yourself completely paused. And when I give it back to you, you can have your drink without anything exciting or out of the ordinary happening.” She removes the glass from your unresisting hands and makes sure that there’s still enough water left for a refreshing drink, then says “And release!”

“Welcome! You must be exhausted from your trip, here, drink some water.” She presses a chilled glass into your hand and watches, smiling, as you drink it all.

“I had no idea I was so thirsty!” you say, and accept the refilled glass that she brings you. “I’ll make this one last longer.”

You and Lee spend the next hour or so just chatting, catching each other up on what’s been happening in your lives. M_______ and Lee’s other housemates have gone out for the evening, so it’s just the two of you sharing a home-cooked meal, and if 4 or 5 hours seem to pass in what feels more like 2 to you, well that’s just what happens when you have dinner with a hypnotist.

Said hypnotist has been fidgeting with one of her rings all evening. It’s striking for several reasons – its size (large), its design (black and white spiral), and its function (spinning). More and more throughout the night you find your eyes drawn to it, until finally it’s the only thing you are aware of, the center of your world.

(“So let’s see. Right now you’re experiencing three realities – sitting with me in my kitchen having a meal, kneeling in my basement staring at a spiral you drew yourself, and taking a journey to places unknown on an old-fashioned train. And of course you’re being brainwashed in all three places, and I wonder how it would feel for you if every time I snapped you blinked between those places, feeling more and more under my control each time.”)

SNAP!

The spiral hovers just outside the train window, spinning so fast that your eyes can’t keep up with it.

SNAP!

On your knees, swaying slightly as you chant your mantra staring at a scribbled spiral on a wall.

SNAP!

Lee’s kitchen, and she’s smiling at you eagerly.

SNAP!

The basement wall again, and you can feel darkness pushing you down into

SNAP!

The train window again, a heavy lethargy overwhelming your mind and

SNAP!

The kitchen, and there’s a woman you don’t recognize smiling with delight as your body starts to sink lower and low

SNAP!

The wall

SNAP!

The window

SNAP!

The woman

er and deeper and deeper and with your last thought before completely descending into darkness you pray that the next snap will take you

SNAP!

Where does the snap take you?

1. The wall
2. The window
3. The woman
4. Why not somewhere new?