Truck (part 1)
a body horror original fiction piece in 4 parts. editing credit: twobyetoo
Ignition
Judson inhaled a deep breath and hoisted himself into the cockpit of his truck. The plush leather seat immediately fused to his smooth, hairless, naked body. Thousands of cold microfilament fibers simultaneously suctioned the skin along his neck, back, ass and underside of his legs, breaking through epidermis to fuse directly onto nerves in the dermis layer of his cells. Pain rushed through Jud’s body as the truck roared to life and the connections rooted around and merged, sharp worms wiggling into and stabbing individual pain receptors as the networks took hold. He clenched his teeth and forced open one eye to look at the clock on the dash and read a blurry seven fifty-five as a new wave of agony pushed it shut again. Keeping his body as still as possible to avoid severing the forming connections, Jud gripped the steering wheel with increasing pressure as his fingers went numb.
In addition to the physical touch and pain of the connections, the truck’s processes floated into his mind. He felt every piston firing like a drum while every electric pathway surfed through his thoughts, generating a rhythmic pleasure explosion that intertwined with the pain of his nervous system joining with the truck. He heard an involuntary moan escape from his mouth and felt a bob in consciousness that seemed very close to passing out. Jud felt intense shame and prickling embarrassment as a foggy memory of passing out in the shower 20 years ago climbed out to join him in his moment of ecstasy. He couldn’t remember if he had chipped a tooth or not back then and fought the urge to rub his tongue over his teeth for fear of accidentally biting it as the linking process continued.
As the frequency of connections died off like the final bursting kernels of stovetop popcorn, Jud relaxed his sweating body and felt the cooling wave of conditioned, warm air drying him off completely. He still wasn’t quite used to the smell of singed flesh and burning electronics. As he began breathing more regularly, he remembered the salesman explaining the seat’s ability to pull in some of this moisture and recycle it into the truck’s coolant system and finally opened his eyes again. Eight oh seven. Three minutes longer than yesterday. The thought of getting a tune up, hard wire connected to the truck while going through a sort of MRI machine for four hours, washed fresh waves of rage and dread across his entire body. It hasn’t been a year, I shouldn’t need a tune up yet. Goddamnit. Seething, he slammed a button severing the truck’s docking connections with his garage port and willed the truck to lurch backwards into the street in front of his house. He exploded forward with a massive rev and a quick screech of tires.
8 months ago
“…and that’s why I’m recommending a 99 month finance plan on your new Immersive Truck. We can keep your monthly payments low, to the point where you’ll barely notice the money coming out.” Cliff continued through his rehearsed pitch as his muscled hand wiped across a floating virtual bar graph, enlarging the projection in front of Jud’s face.
Jud stared past the graph and out the window of the office. “I just need to see it again. Be inside of it again.”
“Oh, of course, sir,” Cliff’s grin turned devilish despite his best efforts to remain a calm and trusted avatar of Jud’s mood. “I just need a signature to begin the process.”
From the outside, the truck pulsated and flexed like an oiled, dehydrated, muscular body, hypnotizing Jud as he approached. Blaring lights blasted the midnight blue finish while the chrome that finished every possible edge glinted and sparkled. The tires protruded wider than seemed possible and still fit in a highway lane.
Jud opened the door and climbed into a single seat encased in leather and surrounded by gleaming metal, much more a cockpit than a cab he was used to in previous trucks he’d owned. A steering wheel and clock display were about the only things he recognized. In place of a windshield, LED screens connected the driver to the things they needed to see on the road, front and sides. The front viewscreen had a kind of picture in picture to capture the rear. Speedometer and other gauges attached to his mind through synaptic connection directly to his brain, so he could feel the needs of the truck like getting hungry or needing to hit the bathroom. He had only experienced a VR version of this so far, as each truck can only link with one individual, so a traditional test drive was not an option.
Even without experiencing full immersion, Jud was completely intoxicated. He felt the fuzziness of being mildly high, but he knew he hadn’t smoked today. His vision zeroed in on each piece of metal inside the cockpit and followed the pathways with his eyes, catching his own miniature reflection from time to time. Shining, beautiful metal, gleaming directly into his soul, calling out…
“So, we can begin the calibration process whenever you are ready. First, we pass your body through a hair removal bath, then you get into the Immersive Matrix machine and get synced up. This process takes about four hours, and you’ll need to come in to get re-calibrated yearly. Luckily, our techs are board certified MDs, so we can include your yearly physical in this process and bill insurance as your primary care physician…”
Jud heard Cliff drone on through a long tunnel even though he sensed him standing a couple feet away. He felt himself nod at what he felt were appropriate times, still just staring at all the components of his throne inside the truck. He felt powerful.
...to be continued in Truck (part 2)
