Part 34
Glass Towers and Rubber Dreams
The view from Elise's penthouse was, by any external measure, breathtaking. Towering above the city, the glass walls of her living room framed the urban sprawl in precise, shimmering lines - a painting crafted not by hand but by ambition, steel, and cold fortune. Below, a thousand lives pulsed through ribbons of traffic, their destinations meaningless to her, their desires irrelevant. The skyline was a testament to conquest, each building a monument to someone’s accumulation of wealth and status, and yet to Elise, it was little more than a reflection of the emptiness she could not name.
She cradled a cup between her fingers, a deep, rich green liquid swirling in its bowl, more decoration than pleasure. She sipped, savoring the sharp, expensive taste, but it did nothing to fill the hollowness clawing at her ribcage. The apartment was immaculate, curated with brutal precision - black marble floors, stark modernist furniture, a handful of carefully chosen artworks spaced just so across pristine walls. There was no clutter, no warmth. Perfection, Elise had long believed, was the ultimate armor. Tonight, the gleam of surfaces only emphasized the vast, echoing absence beneath them.
She set the glass down on a side table, its soft clink reverberating through the cavernous space, and allowed herself a rare moment of weakness - slouching into the buttery softness of an Italian leather sofa, one manicured hand rising to rub at her temple.
The duel.
Nadia.
The wound of it was still raw, festering beneath her otherwise unblemished exterior. She still couldn’t forget, nor forgive, Nadia’s audacity. It was now almost two years ago. Two years since the duel. A first year passed in denial and chastity for her rival. The second year still ongoing, eroding her, unraveling her. Still, she could not let got of it. It was not enough. It was not the risk that had injured her pride - Elise was no stranger to taking calculated risks. Her career had been built on daring moves at carefully chosen moments, propelling her forward when others hesitated. But she was otherwise risk-averse, meticulously controlling every variable she could. She had risked the whipping in the quiz against Claudia, but only because she knew she would win. In Abyss, where wagers held the weight of consequence, she had been cautious to a fault. Sexual risks, personal wagers - those she avoided. And Nadia’s challenge had been an ambush, a gauntlet thrown that demanded she risk something she never would have volunteered: her own freedom, her own sexuality.
Had she lost, Elise would have been belted indefinitely herself, and the very thought left a bitter, metallic taste in her mouth. A fate beneath her. A humiliation so profound it chilled her blood to imagine it. Even now, so much later, she could still feel the phantom sting of the heels’ spikes against her soles, a memory of how she had danced with a fury that burned through every nerve ending, pushing past the pain, past reason, because she could not afford to lose.
Nadia.
The audacity - to challenge Elise publicly, to question her claim over Alexandru, as if they were equals. The thought never left her, like a festering wound that refused to heal. She had a position, a name, wealth. Success. Nadia was a salesperson. How dare she challenge her. They were not equals. But Abyss’ rules allowed for such things. She needed to restore the natural pecking order, to set an example.
Alexandru. Her thoughts drifted. He had looked at Nadia’s ass. Her firm breasts, waist. Her toes. At least she locked away her crotch. Did she think she could flirt her way up to their level? No, retail girl would get nothing, and now she couldn’t even afford an orgasm.
Elise clenched her jaw.
Alexandru. He had been a trophy at first, nothing serious for her, a glittering bauble Elise intended to snatch from Nadia's trembling hands, a demonstration of her natural right to take what she wished. His value was that she could take him away from Nadia. Possession was not about need; it was about proof. And yet, in the strange days following her victory, Elise had found herself… noticing things. The way Alexandru's smile softened when he spoke of dreams. The steadiness of his gaze when he listened, truly listened, to her. She had expected to grow bored with him quickly. Instead, he lingered in her thoughts, not merely as a trophy, but as something she could shape into a new pillar of her existence. Now, they were a couple in all meanings of the word. She was content with him at her side. He was better for her than … being alone.
Part of her stayed with Alexandru - yes, there was a loving affection, especially from his side - but another, deeper part remained with him to ensure Nadia's perpetual denial. The forfeit's cruel elegance bound Nadia’s suffering directly to their relationship: so long as Elise remained with Alexandru, Nadia's belt would remain locked. It was a delicious irony, a slow, permanent form of dominance far sweeter than any immediate humiliation. There was nothing sweeter for her than permanent dominance. It was even sweeter than her wealth.
Elise rose from the couch, heels clicking a slow, deliberate rhythm across the marble. She approached the vast windows and stared at her reflection - tall, poised, immaculate in a severe black dress that clung to her like a second skin, still in it after having come home from the firm. The city lights scattered across the glass, spangling her silhouette in ghostly motes of fire. She lifted one hand, tracing a fingertip down the invisible seam where her reflection's heart would be.
Nadia would not be allowed to vanish into forgetfulness. That would be mercy, and Elise was not merciful. No, Nadia needed to endure - to be a testament to Elise's supremacy. Her defeat had to be sculpted, displayed, eternal.
Rubber.
Her fascination with latex had begun years ago, almost innocuously. An experimental evening during university, a party where she observed a girl in a latex dress - a second, unforgiving skin that shaped and defined, imprisoning while amplifying sensation. It had thrilled and terrified her then, awakening a hunger for control she could scarcely name. She had tutored a student, and finally rubberized her. Abyss had only sharpened that blade. In its halls, latex was not a fetish; it was a sacrament, a declaration of submission, endurance, and power. The artistry of full enclosure, cultivating sweat as punishment and challenge, the silent dignity of rubberized figures moving through the club’s rituals - these had become emblems of control in Elise’s mind, symbols of permanence in a world obsessed with transient pleasures.
She had her own catsuit, which she wore rarely, when she was alone and nobody saw it. When she wanted to remember how it felt, the tightness, the heat, the sweat; what she demanded from the ones she got to submit. A naughty reminder that she was a queen in two worlds. Latex was punishment. It was transformation. Correction. Control.
She imagined Nadia now: arms sealed into internal sleeves, legs pressed together under the tight embrace of a second skin, face smooth and featureless beneath a gleaming hood, her every breath forced to rasp through a tiny valve. Displayed. Pitied. Owned.
It would not happen overnight, of course. Nadia would resist if pushed too hard. No, it must be gradual. Wagers. Minor forfeits. A weekend in a latex suit. A night sealed in a rubber cocoon. A week of sleeping only in an airtight sleeping bag. She wanted her rival to totally submit. Each small step tightening the noose around her freedom, each loss accepted willingly, signed, sealed, documented. She needed to talk to Evelyn.
Elise smiled faintly, the expression not reaching her eyes.
To enclose Nadia in latex was not merely revenge. It was justice. It was a restoration of the natural order, a reassertion of the hierarchy that had been so brazenly questioned.
Yet beneath the layers of calculation and cold resolve, there was another, deeper truth Elise barely dared to name. Beneath the craving for dominance lay fear - a brittle, gnawing fear that she could be replaced, exposed, left vulnerable. That behind the perfect mask she presented to the world was a hollow space too fragile to withstand scrutiny. Loss had touched her before, early and hard, leaving scars she never spoke of. To control others was, in some twisted way, to protect herself.
She remembered the sting of betrayal from old friends who had envied her, the slow erosion of a family that had admired her success but resented the way she outshone them. In the end, Elise had learned to rely only on herself, to build walls no one could scale. To yield, even once, would be to invite disaster. Nadia's challenge had not merely insulted her pride - it had threatened her entire, carefully constructed fortress of certainty. That she had to risk the belt herself, for real, chipped away at the veneer she created carefully, that she could not be touched, that she was above the consequences. Nadia had brought her to face the reality behind the one she constructed and believed in herself. She hated her for that.
If she seemed cruel, it was only because she had no other choice. Mercy was weakness. Weakness invited loss. And Elise had sworn, long ago, that she would never again be powerless, never again be the one left standing alone amid the ruins.
She returned to the sofa and poured another cup, her movements fluid, unhurried. Planning brought a sharp, clean pleasure that the duel's hollow victory had not. She allowed herself to drift deeper into the vision: Nadia stumbling into the club, masked, rubberized, helpless.
The thrill of it tightened low in her belly as she slowly got wet.
Yet, somewhere in the recesses of her mind, Elise caught a whisper - a flicker of herself bound, sealed, silenced. An image of vulnerability so alien, so repugnant, she dismissed it instantly. She was the mistress of her fate, the architect of others' destinies.
Still, the echo of that vision lingered, like the afterimage of lightning behind closed eyes.
She rose again, restless, prowling the length of the room with measured steps. Her mind plotted strategies, contingencies. Nadia would need to be baited, of course - presented with tempting victories, small triumphs that would lull her into confidence before the deeper snare closed around her.
Perhaps a dance duel, with carefully weighted odds. Perhaps a wager on an endurance trial. The possibilities were endless, each more deliciously intricate than the last. She could easily bait her with the prospect of winning an orgasm or at least an edge, as Nadia was unraveling with need, but she needed to be careful to design challenges that she could not actually win. An orgasm for Nadia was the last thing she wanted.
Elise stopped before a framed photograph on the wall - a rare personal artifact. She and a younger sister, years ago, their arms around each other, smiling bright and foolish in some sun-drenched garden. Elise stared at it for a long moment, her expression unreadable.
Loss. It was not a foreign concept to her. She had understood what loss of control could do. But vulnerability? That she refused to know.
She stood at the penthouse window, a cup of tea untouched in her hand, watching the city blur beneath a silver curtain of rain. But it wasn’t just about Alexandru and Nadia, not truly. He was a symbol, a contest. And Nadia had dared to win once, wrestling control from her. Elise clenched the cup. Once. Losing control. Just once, and that was all it had taken to make Elise feel exposed. Vulnerable. Like back then - Elise had been upstairs, headphones on, pretending to be too busy to drive her sister to the party. I’ll meet you there. Metal on metal, the intersection just down the road. A bad feeling. Not her? Then came the sirens. Then the call. Their parents were at the venue, waiting there; the call reached her instead. She rushed. Ran there. The endless apologies from strangers in uniforms. Everyone said it wasn’t her fault. But Elise had never believed them. She should have known. Should have controlled it. Had she been in the driver’s seat, she would have been in control. That was the moment control became her lifeline.
When she finally turned away, the moment had passed. Her walls were back in place, gleaming and impenetrable. Luxury and success - control - surrounding her. She returned to the window, the empty cup dangling carelessly from one hand, and watched the city pulse and flicker beneath her like a living thing. Tomorrow, the games would begin anew.
She would sculpt Nadia's defeat as an artist shapes marble - not out of hatred, but out of necessity. Out of a need to restore the natural order that had been so carelessly disrupted.
The city breathed below her, indifferent and immense.
And above it all, wrapped in the cold perfection of her glass tower, Elise plotted the slow, beautiful ruin of the woman foolish enough to think she could challenge her and prevail.
The night had deepened, and the city below Elise's penthouse had turned into a shimmering ocean of lights, endless and oblivious. She stood by the wide expanse of glass, her figure a dark silhouette against the gleam, sipping slowly from a fresh cup of green tea. Her mind was no longer clouded by rage or hollow triumph. It had shifted into something colder, sharper: pure design.
Elise tapped a manicured fingernail against the glass, her reflection flickering like a candle. She would not force the next step. No, she would wait, patient as stone, for Nadia's own desperation to bloom. It would come. Chastity was a hunger, a tightening coil that would leave her gasping for release in months, not years. Nadia would beg. Perhaps not openly - at first - but she would seek. Relief.
And when that moment came, Elise would be ready.
The punishment had to be both exquisite and beyond proportional. A simple humiliation would fade. Pain would pass. What she needed was a transformation, a conditioning. Something that Nadia would carry forward, etched into her memory, her very skin.
Rubber.
But not crude, not grotesque. Beautiful. Immaculate. Ritualized.
Elise turned from the window and paced the silent marble floor, her heels marking slow, deliberate steps. It would not do to impose it outright. No, Nadia would have to choose it - or at least, lose it through fair challenge. A wager, then. One tied to Nadia’s own desperation. Perhaps a dance. A test of endurance. Perhaps a time limit, one not easily attainable, tying the dance directly to her rubberization. A trial that would appear achievable but would, under pressure, grind her down. The cruelly beautiful Stilettos of the Languished Arches came to mind immediately.
Twenty minutes maybe. It sounded deceptively short, doable. If it was appearing impossible, Nadia would never take the bait. But in those infernal heels, it would stretch into agony. Nadia, ever the optimist, might believe she could win. And when she failed - when the strain buckled her resolve and she fell - the penalty would fall over her like a second skin. She would record it, of course. Leverage. She would never let her escape.
A rubber suit. A thick, clinging rubber suit she would have to wear outside of Abyss - something subtle enough to be hidden beneath normal clothes, but ever-present. A punishment not just of discomfort, but of secrecy. Constant slickness. She thought back to the Rubber Suit of Resolve. She remembered, it had been used in a duel before. It could be worn long-term. But for how long?
Hours of wear would not suffice. Days would be a mere inconvenience.
Weeks.
Months, if she could manage it.
Time spent sealed away, hour after hour, day after day. Long enough for her skin to forget freedom. Long enough to engrave submission into her. Elise could already imagine Nadia’s squirming, the awkward way she would move, the sweat and heat that would build until every breath became a reminder of her place. She did not yet know the exact form it would take. She would need Evelyn's expertise. The Mistress of Abyss had resources, ideas. Elise trusted her to craft the final punishment with the necessary cruelty and precision.
But the seed was planted.
She would wait. Watch. And when the hunger in Nadia’s eyes outpaced her caution, Elise would offer her a chance at relief - with a price more permanent than Nadia could ever anticipate. She needed to talk to Evelyn. But she needed to be patient. She could only approach Evelyn after Nadia had approached Evelyn for relief.
And when it was done, when Nadia moved through her days in secret bondage of her own making, Elise would watch from afar, serene in her triumph.