by Van ©2022
		Chapter 2

Tippi opened her eyes—then immediately closed them again.  The bedroom's overhead light was on... and she distinctly remembered turning it off before she'd climbed into bed.  She'd closed the opaque canvas drapes first, then crossed the bedroom to the door and switched off the light—which meant she'd plunged the place into total darkness, which meant she'd had to slowly, carefully grope her way to the bed without bumping into anything, stubbing a toe, or tripping over something.  Of course, given the bedroom's spartan, institutional decor, there weren't many bumping, stubbing, or tripping hazards to be avoided, but it was still awkward.

Anyhow—inexplicably—the light was now on!  Tippi blinked as her eyes adjusted...  and found Pepper Vespini standing beside the bed and smiling down at her!  The fifty-something beauty was wearing black stretch pants and a black tank-top (with no bra), and her hair was pulled back in a strict ponytail.

"Are you awake yet?" Pepper inquired with a dimpled smile.

Tippi blinked a few more times, then yawned.  "Uh... can I help you?"

"I'll take that as a yes," Pepper chuckled.  "You didn't hear me knock," she explained.

Tippi was now fully awake, and aware that Pepper hadn't actually explained much of anything.  "B-but why are you—Hey!"

Pepper had grabbed the blanket and top sheet, stripped them from the bed, and tossed them towards the wardrobe.  Tippi was now totally exposed... if you didn't count her cute set of pink floral shortie pajamas.

"Coco insists on doing one of her all-night exercises," Pepper explained, "so you'll have to strip."

"W-what?"  Tippi was blinking again.  "S-s-strip?"

"To the skin," Pepper confirmed.  She then lifted a small duffel-bag of black leather and dropped it on the bed.

Tippi stared at Pepper.

Pepper smiled her dimpled smile at Tippi.  "Coco has her way of doing things," she explained (or sort of explained) after several awkward seconds.

Blinking wasn't working, so Tippi bit her lower lip in a manner she knew was devilishly cute and had proven to be persuasive in the past.  "But..."

Pepper was unmoved (or maybe moved but adamant).  "Remember your contract," she grinned.  "Nothing but skin, please."

Tippi heaved a sigh, then pulled her short-sleeve, V-neck top over her head, squirmed out of the matching shorts... followed by her panties... and was, indeed, naked.

"Excellent," Pepper beamed, then unzipped the duffel's main compartment and pulled out a rolled bundle of... some sort of shiny black fabric.

"Is that... spandex?" Tippi asked quietly, staring at the gleaming bundle.

"I believe it's neoprene rubber sandwiched between layers of something like spandex, but I don't know any of the actual brand names involved."  Pepper unrolled the bundle.

"It looks like spandex," Tippi noted, "and a sleeping bag... only... it's thin... and... not quilted?"

"This sort of thing is generally called a 'sleepsack',"  Pepper stated.  "They make them for infants, only the design isn't so restrictive."  She shifted her smile from the sleepsack to Tippi.  "In you go!"

"Do I have to?" Tippi whined.

Pepper smiled and nodded.  "Coco's order."  Meanwhile, she had unzipped the sleepsack.  "Slide your feet down the tubes and your arms into the sleeves."  The tubes were interior channels that would enclose Tippi's feet and legs, separately, and the sleeves were full-length pockets sewn into the sides of the sleepsack.

"I think it's too small," Tippi stated, staring at the open sack.

"It stretches," Pepper purred.  She waited a few seconds... then patted the bed.  "Let's go, darling."

Tippi squirmed onto the sleepsack, then spun on her butt and slid her legs into the sack's bottom half.  It took some effort, but she gripped the sides and completed the process of encasing her feet and most of her legs.  "It's kinda tight and... complicated."  The interior was smooth spandex, as was the exterior, but she could feel panels sliding against each other between the layers as she planted her toes and feet in the pockets.

"The neoprene is cut into shapes," Pepper explained, "and the ends sewn together and to a strip of nylon webbing running up the back.  Coco's design.  Most sleepsacks are simple sheathes."  She pointed to the sack's open interior.  "Your arms go in there... and there."

Tippi managed to start inserting her hands and arms in the sleeve-pockets, as directed, but encountered rapidly increasing difficulty.

"Oh, poor thing," Pepper cooed.  "And you're trying so hard to be a good girl.  Here, let me help."  She took hold of the sides of the sleepsack and tugged until Tippi's shoulders slid into the sack.  "There."  Then, starting at the foot, she began zipping up the sleepsack's zipper.  This took some time and effort, as the layers of spandex and neoprene had to stretch to allow the gap to close and the zipper to zip.  Finally, the zipper reached its end and Pepper slipped the fob into a dedicated little pocket, closed the sack's wide collar, and secured it with a pair of heavy-duty snaps.  Snap!  Snap!

Tippi gave an initial struggle.  "Gosh!" she gasped.  The sack hugged every square inch of her body, from her neck to her toes, and it was tight.  She tried bending her upper body into a tuck, lifting her legs, and bending her knees, but didn't get very far with her efforts.  The neck was snug, but not uncomfortable and she could breathe easily.

"Coco designed the neoprene panels to complement the major muscle groups," Pepper explained, "so that no matter what you try, they stretch and pull back.  Very clever, don't you think?"

"Uh..."  Tippi twisted and squirmed some more.  "Yeah... I guess so."  She could feel individual neoprene strips sliding, stretching, and opposing her attempted motions, but mainly the thing was just tight.  Bloody tight, she thought, as Eliza would put it.  What she couldn't feel was skin rubbing against anything other than taut spandex... other than her fingers and toes when they tried to wiggle.  The sleepsack's spandex inner layer enclosed/encased all of her limbs separately.

"Coco has much more restrictive and elaborate sleepsacks and bodysheaths in her collection," Pepper purred.  "Maybe she'll show you a few."

Tippi frowned.  "What's the difference between a sleepsack and a... oh!"  Pepper had reached back into the duffel and pulled out—"A b-ball-gag?" Tippi whined.  It had a narrow, black leather strap and the attached black-rubber ball was hollow and perforated and... it was a ball-gag!

"I'm afraid so, dear," Tippi purred.  "Open wide."

"Tippi squirmed and struggled.  "B-but I—No!—Mrrrfh!  The ball was in her mouth and Pepper was buckling it tight at the nape of her neck, under her tousled, short hair.  "Mrrrr!"  Tippi continued squirming her tightly encased body and mewling through the gag.  "Mrmpfhrf!"

Pepper smiled her dimpled smile and gazed down at her captive.  "So pretty," she sighed, then leaned close and combed her fingers through Tippi's hair, restoring some degree of order to her pageboy.  She then fluffed the bed's pillow, lifted Tippi's gagged head and encased shoulders onto the soft surface, then straightened her pageboy, again.  "I don't think I'll use the hood tonight," she said quietly as her fingers combed through Tippi's smooth, straight locks.  "You're just too pretty in your snug little sleepsack with your sad brown eyes above your tight ball-gag."  She leaned close and kissed the tip of Tippi's nose, then stood, gathered the rumpled blanket and top sheet, stuffed them in the wardrobe, together with Tippi's pajamas and panties, then closed and locked the wardrobe door.  Finally, she returned to the bed, picked up her duffel, smiled and blew Tippi a kiss, then padded to the bedroom door.  "Pleasant dreams!" she called back over her shoulder.

Tippi watched as Pepper turned off the overhead light and made her exit, closing the door behind her.  Click!  That was the lock turning, of course.

The bedroom was pitch black.  Tippi squirmed and struggled again, but without enthusiasm.  She knew she was going to remain in the sleepsack's untiring elastic embrace until someone released her.

This is all Eliza's fault, she decided, but knew that wasn't entirely true... significantly true... but not entirely.

Eliza came awake immediately at the sound of the bedroom door being unlocked.  Click!  Coco padded into the bedroom, crossed to the window, and threw open the canvas drapes.  It was dawn.

Truth be told, Eliza experienced an interval of disorientation while all of that was happening... but she was awake now, and Coco was looming over the bed and smiling down at her naked, cord-bound, and cleave-gagged form.  Eliza stared up at her captor.  She was sore all over, from head to toe, and had spent a miserable night.

Again, truth be told, Eliza wasn't in actual pain, and none of her anatomy tingled or felt numb.  She'd been rolling around on the bed for "comfort" through the hours of darkness, and, begrudgingly, she had to admit Coco had done an excellent job of rendering her totally helpless without causing any damage... but she wasn't happy.  She wasn't happy at all.

"Good morning, Eliza," Coco purred, smiling her infuriating, dimpled smile.

Eliza glared up at Coco and made no reply, not even a gag-muffled, decidedly rude reply, and she continued glaring as Coco began untying her coyote-brown, paracord bonds.

This took a while, longer than it had taken Coco to tie her up last night.  It didn't help that Coco took it upon herself to untie the knots joining all the individual coils of cord together and neatly loop and bundle each and every coil as it came free.  How Coco was able to tease all the knots apart so easily Eliza wasn't sure, but then she noted Coco had a pocketknife with a blunt steel spike, and was using it to attack the most stubborn knots.  Now that Eliza thought about it, such things were called "fids," and sailors used them for... rope-stuff.  Coco's pocketknife was a nautical model.

By the way, Coco was wearing a skintight pair of black designer jeans, a black tank-top, no bra, her feet were bare, and her hair was loose about her disgustingly beautiful, perky, and smiling face.

Eliza's crossed wrists had been the first thing Coco tied last night, so it was only logical that they were the last thing she untied this morning.

And now, Eliza was free, if you didn't count her tape-mummified hands and cleave-gagged mouth.  She sat up in bed—Ow!  Ow!  Ow!—and continued glaring at Coco.  Eliza was covered with red, linear cord-marks from shoulders to toes, fossil evidence of her just-removed bondage, but there were no bruises or cord-burns that she could see.

Coco had threaded the coils of paracord together with what Eliza believed was her former crotch-cord, then slung the mass over her shoulder like a bandoleer.  "Take a shower and there will be something for you to wear when you come back," Coco purred.

Eliza glowered at her smiling hostess/captor.  She was still cleave gagged and her fists still mummified, so she couldn't un-gag herself.  And how was she supposed to turn the shower on and off?

Coco was aware of Eliza's dilemma (and probably enjoying it).  "Tippi will help you," she advised, then made a shooing motion towards the bedroom door.  "Chop-chop!"

Eliza turned and stomped (padded) from the bedroom, mustering all the dignity she could while being naked, covered in fading cord-marks, cleave-gagged, and sporting a pair of fist-mummies.  At least the fists were appropriate to her mood.

The bathroom door across the hall was ajar, so Eliza had no difficulty pushing it open.  Steam filled the air, a shower-head was running, and Tippi was under the hot stream of water.  Needless to say, she was naked, wet, and using a bar of soap to scrub herself clean.  She noted Eliza's arrival and smiled brightly.  "Morning!  I'll be right with you."

Eliza glowered (her mood appeared to be stuck on glower) and watched as Tippi finished her shower, used a fluffy white towel to dry herself as she padded in Eliza's direction, then wrapped the towel around her still damp torso, smiling all the while.  If Eliza needed a reason to continue glowering, Tippi's dimples more than sufficed.

"Poor thing," Tippi cooed in sympathy as she took Eliza's tape shrouded hands in her own and examined them, "all gagged and wrapped up.  Don't worry, Pepper left me just the tool for the job."  She led Eliza to the row of sinks and mirrors.  A second neatly folded towel rested between two of the sinks, and resting on the towel was a pair of stainless steel bandage scissors.  Tippi picked up the scissors, readied them for use, then took a firm grasp of Eliza's right fist and, pouting in concentration, carefully slid the blunt tip of the open scissors under the tape and underlying latex glove on the back of Eliza's wrist, and made the first careful cut.

The reason Coco had insisted on Eliza donning the latex gloves before getting her fists taped was now crystal clear: no adhesive-on-skin problem.  Slicing apart the tape sheath wasn't all that difficult, and soon, Eliza was free to flex and shake her no longer mummified fingers and hand.

Eliza glared at Tippi as her friend started on her left hand.  "Mrrrf!" she complained.

"You're welcome," Tippi purred.

Eliza rolled her eyes.  "Mrrrrrf!" she reiterated.

"Oh, the gag," Tippi giggled.  "Hang on.  I'm almost done."

Eliza heaved a disgusted, gagged sigh, waited until her left hand was de-mummified... then reached back and attacked the gag's knot herself.  Eventually, the knot surrendered and she was finally able to get the knotted cloth out of her mouth.  She worked her jaw and licked her lips.

Meanwhile Tippi was staring at her friend's naked body with apparent concern.  "Coco tied you up," she whispered, taking Eliza's right arm and gently sliding her hand across the cord marks still evident.  "All Pepper did was zip me inside a sleepsack."

"Stop that," Eliza scolded and slapped Tippi's hand away.

Tippi wasn't offended.  She was used to Eliza's occasional crankiness.  "Take yourself a nice hot shower," she advised.  "Then get dressed and meet us in the kitchen.  Pepper said there would be clothes waiting on our beds."  She gave a little shrug.  "That probably means the wardrobes will still be locked and it'll be some sort of 'assistant's uniform' or something."

"Probably," Eliza agreed, then took Tippi's hands and gave them a squeeze.  "Are you okay?  Say the word and we're out of here."

Tippi smiled.  "That's sweet, but... I'm fine."

Eliza released Tippi's hands, turned on one of the sink's faucets, cupped her hands, and took a drink.  Then, she stared at Tippi in the mirror.  "Wait, did you say sleepsack?"

Tippi nodded.  "It was tight... but no rope-marks."

"Whatever," Eliza muttered, padded to one of the commodes, then turned back to face her friend.  "A little privacy?" she demanded.

"Whatever," Tippi grinned, then padded from the bathroom, closing the door behind her.

The clothes waiting in neat stacks on the foot of Tippi and Eliza's beds were identical spandex Capri-pants and tank-tops, all in black.  And they were skintight, to the point the girls were sporting noticeable pokies and camel-toes (which wasn't at all humiliating).  Also, the tank-tops were a little short.  The bottom hems kept riding up and exposing their bellybuttons.  Eliza kept trying to pull hers down, to no avail.  There were no shoes, and their wardrobes were locked, as they'd feared.  Their choice was to go barefoot and clad in sprayed-on black spandex, or prance around naked.  Both opted for the spandex option.

Eliza's longish blond pixie was a bit of a spiky mess, despite the best efforts of her combing fingers, but Tippi's neatly trimmed pageboy fell into place with only a modicum of help.

Breakfast was in the kitchen, with Coco cooking bacon, eggs, and toasted English muffins.  Both Vespini sisters were barefoot and wearing black jeans and tank-tops.  Apparently, while in residence, black was the family color.  Their gleaming brown curls were loose about their shoulders, framing their smiling faces.

Eliza glowered and pouted as she ate, answering questions with monosyllables whenever possible.  Tippi was more pleasant, but took her cue from Eliza and was anything but chatty.

As they ate, Coco explained that her assistants were expected to share in the housework.  Daily exercise was also a mandate, meaning lap swimming in the pool, using the machines in the gym, cross-country runs in the surrounding forest, and/or yoga classes in the studio.

Eliza sullenly shoveled food into her mouth and frowned.  Tippi smiled, ate politely, and nodded her agreement.

Oh-by-the-way, Coco also dropped the bombshell that except when running outdoors, the girls were expected to exercise Greco-Roman Style... in the nude.

This caused Tippi pause... then she resumed eating.  Eliza simply continued glowering.

"I hope your face doesn't freeze like that, Eliza darling," Pepper purred, then shared a giggling laugh with her big sister.  Tippi managed not to laugh, but couldn't stifle the smile that curled her lips.

Eliza rolled her eyes, gathered the now empty plates, stomped (padded) from the breakfast nook, and started loading the dishwasher.

Exercise that day was naked yoga in the yoga studio.  Both sisters and the new Assistants participated, and all four were au naturel.  The session was an hour or more in length, with Coco correcting the girls' style as required.  Afterwards, everybody enjoyed a nice, long, relaxing bask in the dry sauna.

There was no discussion of Coco's art installations, past or present, or anything having to do with her creative process.  "Not today, dear," Coco said whenever Eliza tried to bring it up.  This didn't improve Eliza's mood.  The only thing she (or they, if she counted Tippi) accomplished was dusting and vacuuming.  Also, they learned a few new asanas (yoga poses).  Eliza's podcasts were solidly on hold.

Oh-by-the-way, yoga class revealed than Coco and Pepper had spectacular bodies—not just for 50-something old ladies, but for anybody—and not that that was any great surprise.  Also, the Vespini sisters moved with natural grace... of maybe from years and years of regular yoga practice.

Eliza did manage to stop scowling... eventually, but she remained somewhat grumpy.  She was finding the total lack of control to be especially onerous.  Who knew?  Maybe she was learning something about Coco's methods after all.

After dinner, everybody retired to the Vespini mansion's home theater—and of course the place had a home theater—and Coco introduced the girls to the animated series Arcane on Netflix.  Eliza and Tippi were amazed.  The artistry and story-telling were first rate.  They thoroughly enjoyed the first episode.

Afterwards, Coco ordered her young assistants to conduct their evening toilettes and report to their bedrooms.  Not that Eliza and Tippi objected.  They were tuckered out from a long day of domestic drudgery, yoga, and basking in the sauna.

The girls said their goodnights (rather coldly on the part of Eliza) and padded for the patient wing, meaning the patient wing that included their guest bedrooms, the wing that wasn't behind a locked gate of iron bars.  They still hadn't been given a tour of most of the mansion.

Still wearing her skintight "uniform" of black Spandex, Eliza padded from the institutional bathroom to her assigned bedroom.  She'd been mildly apprehensive all day, wondering what prank Coco was going to pull on her tonight, and now the moment was at hand.  She opened the bedroom door and discovered...

(1)  She'd been right to be apprehensive.

(2)  Still wearing her black jeans and tank-top, Coco was standing next to the bed and smiling her infuriating, beautiful, dimpled smile.

(3)  The only sheet on the bed was the white fitted sheet.  The top sheet and blanket were still missing.  However...

(4)  The bed had been accessorized with what Eliza recognized as old-style medical restraints.  A pair of two-inch wide, thick leather belts horizontally stretched across the bed, tight enough to dimple the edges of the mattress.  One was near the foot of the bed and the other just above the middle.  The lower belt had a pair of padded leather cuffs attached, about two-feet apart, and the middle belt had what could be called either a padded corset-belt or an oversized cuff.  Finally, there was another pair of padded cuffs, each attached to the bed-frame by short leather straps and slightly below the middle belt.  All the leather was rust-brown, the padding white, and what hardware she could see was nickel-steel.

The arrangement was obvious.  If someone—Eliza Callahan, for example—was to lay on her back on the bed, the lower cuffs would be in the perfect position to encircle her ankles, the central belt her waist, and the single cuffs her wrists with her arms at her sides.

Eliza shook her head.  "No."

"It's not nearly as restrictive as last night," Coco purred.  "You'll find the arrangement to be quite comfortable, in fact."

Eliza locked eyes with her hostess and would-be captor.  "Why?  Why do you have to keep doing this?  What's the purpose?"

"We'll discuss my philosophy in detail when I think we're ready," Coco stated.  "For now... think of my exercises as building your vocabulary, slowly, giving you time to process each new experience."

Eliza stared (scowled) at the waiting restraints for several seconds.  "I know what your installations look like, and I know you've got your past works and your workshop locked away in the back wings.  Why can't you just give me a tour?"
 
"Clever girl," Coco purred.  "Showing is one thing, but the tactile element would be missing... or at least severely limited.  I insist on practical demonstrations while training my assistants.  And that's all I'm going to say on the subject this evening."  Still smiling, Coco leaned to the side and patted the bed.  "Chop-chop!"

This was night number two of Eliza's blog-quest, and moment-of-truth number two.  She could either cut her losses and quit, of put up with another of Coco's "demonstrations."  At least the hospital restraints looked to be a lot less restrictive than last night's coyote-brown paracord bondage.  Besides... Tippi would never forgive her if she quit.  Actually, she knew her partner might probably be relieved, but it was too soon to quit.

Still scowling, Eliza flopped down onto the bed.

"No, darling," Coco chuckled.  "Naked."

Eliza heaved an exasperated sigh.  "Fine!" she huffed, rolled off the bed to her feet, peeled out of her black spandex capri-pants and tank-top, tossed them aside, and flopped back onto the mattress and the waiting restraints.

"There's a good girl," Coco purred, then worked her way around the bed, securing the cuffs—tight—around Eliza's right ankle... left ankle... waist... left wrist... and right wrist.  The cuffs wrapped around the anatomy in question, steel staples slid through slots in the padded cuff, a narrower, non-padded strap slid through the staple and jerked taut to secure the cuff—creak!—then was slotted through a locking steel clamp.  Coco used her ubiquitous barrel-key to secure each cuff before she moved on the next—click!—and that was that.  Eliza was on the bed to stay.

The naked prisoner's head was comfortably resting on the bed's pillow, and a preliminary struggle revealed that she did, indeed, have more freedom of motion than she'd had the previous night... or at least a different degree of freedom.  She could no longer roll around on the mattress.  She could, however, lift her cuffed hands and flail them around, but only within a very limited radius.  Her questing, groping fingers couldn't possibly reach the lock and staple-strap-clamp mechanism securing the waist belt, much less the hardware securing her wrist cuffs.  And whatever buckles or other mechanisms were securing the waist belt and wrist-cuff straps to the bed were somewhere below the level of the mattress.  All she could feel with her questing fingers was the steel of the bed-frame and a few inches of smooth, taut leather.

Obviously, the restraints were designed to allow some freedom of motion, but not much... emphasis on not.

Satisfied that she was, indeed, helpless, Eliza heaved another frustrated sigh, and glowered at her captor... not that she'd ever stopped frowning at Coco... all day.

Coco smiled her wicked, gloating smile for several seconds, then stooped and picked up something from under the bed.  It was...

"No!" Eliza barked.  "No way!"

"Yes, way," Coco chuckled.  The object in her hand was a ball-gag!  Its leather strap was the same shade of rust-red as the bed's restraints, and its ball/mouth-plug was hollow, pierced by a dozen or more round holes, and appeared to be made of matte-white silicon rubber.  The strap secured with a conventional tongued buckle of nickel-steel.

Eliza opened her mouth to repeat her objection—"Mrrrf!"—and Coco struck like the proverbial cobra, cramming the ball into Eliza's outraged mouth.  "Mmmpfh!"  Coco then buckled the strap at the nape of Eliza's neck.  The ball was all the way inside Eliza's mouth, depressing her tongue and forcing her jaws apart.  "Nrrrkf!"  Complaining was possible.  "Nrrrrrrr!"  Articulate speech was not.

Coco was standing with her arms crossed under her breasts, smiling down at Eliza.  It was possibly her most gloating and absolutely infuriating smile to date.

"You're so beautiful when you're angry, Tomboy," Coco purred.  "Simpering damsels have their place, as do stoic beauties..."  She sat on the bed and rested her right palm on Eliza's lower chest, below her breasts and above the waist-belt.  "But I find your furious firebrand persona to be very... seductive."

Eliza continued struggling—then froze in her bonds and stared at her captor.  Seductive?

"I have been known to integrate erotic and BDSM elements into some of my installations," Coco stated.  Her hand started moving, slowly sliding along Eliza's torso from the underside of her breasts to the smooth edge of the waist-belt.

Eliza clenched her fists, blinked her eyes a few times, and realized she was panting through her gag... which was causing her chest (and breasts) to rise... and drop... slightly, carrying Coco's smooth, gliding hand with it.

"Nothing serious, of course," Coco purred, "meaning either the eroticism or the BDSM.  No penetration, mutilation, disfigurement, et cetera.  I don't like bloodletting.  You'll learn more as your training progresses."  She lifted her hand and cupped Eliza's right breast... then leaned close, extended her pink tongue, and flicked Eliza's left nipple with its very tip.

Eliza clenched her eyes tightly closed and jerked on her wrist-cuffs, her hands closed in tight fists.  Also, the now slightly wet nipple stiffened in response to Coco's teasing tongue... as did her right nipple.

Coco grinned.  "Now look what I've done," she chuckled.  "I've spoiled the mood.  No more the irate little hoyden with fire in her pretty blue eyes."

It was true.  Eliza was no longer glowering.  She was still panting, and stared up at her gloating captor, wondering what was going to happen next.

Coco surprised her by standing, picking up Eliza's discarded tank-top and capri-pants, then padding to the bedroom door.  She opened the portal and paused in the threshold, still smiling her infuriating, dimpled smirk.  "That's enough indulgence for one night, Tomboy.  Sleep tight."

And with that, she turned off the overhead light, then closed and locked the door.  Click!

What the hell? Eliza wondered, staring through the total darkness at the closed door... and the departed Coco Vespini.  She tugged on her wrist-cuffs—creak!—attempted to roll and/or jerk free of the waist-belt—creak!—and tried kicking her feet—creak!  She didn't bother testing the gag.  Her audience had departed.

This is getting... complicated, Eliza mused, and more involved than I thought.  And she's in charge of... everything.  It's all her agenda.  Eliza tugged on her restraints, again.  Creak!  It's impossible to even influence her agenda.

Eliza lay back against the pillow and stared up at the unseen ceiling.  And what about Tippi?  Last night she got zipped into a sleepsack... so what's happening to her tonight?  Eliza fought the restraints again—creak!—with predictable results.  Tomorrow we need to talk about all this.  Really talk.  I need to be sure she's up for what's happening, that she doesn't want to call it quits and go home.  Tippi's no wimp.  But just because I haven't reached my limit, that doesn't mean she wants to go along with this... stuff.  I need to know she's still up for... whatever this is... and wherever it's going.  I need to be fair... to Tippi.

Meanwhile, Pepper was blowing a goodnight kiss to Tippi, turning off the overhead light, closing her bedroom door, and turning the lock.  Click!

Tippi was lying on her bed in the now total darkness, settling in for the night as best she could.

Pepper had insisted on another of her "exercises" (or maybe they were Coco's exercises).  In any case, Tippi was naked (like last night), and helpless (also like last night); however, no sleepsack was involved.  Pepper had employed rope, and it was white, cotton, braided rope, sort of like your typical cotton clothesline, only soft and... fuzzy.  Tippi suspected it had been chemically treated, or possibly washed in a washing machine with conditioner, several times.  Of course, that was more-or-less the same thing, meaning chemical treatment or the use of conditioner, but... whatever.  Tippi was nervous.

Tippi knew almost nothing about bondage, rope or otherwise, but Pepper had been helpful, explaining as she worked that she was using a combination "box-tie" and "cross-legged ankle-tie" technique.  Soft rope pinned Tippi's upper arms against her torso, passing above and below her breasts, yoked her shoulders, encircled her waist, and lashed her crossed-wrists against her spine and the waist ropes.  Her ankle were crossed and lashed with more rope so they'd stay that way, meaning crossed, and were linked to her upper-body-bonds by two strands of rope, tied off somewhere between her shoulder blades.  She already knew that was called a "hogtie," and there was a lot of slack, almost enough for her to straighten her legs... about halfway.

Standing, hopping, and walking were impossible; however, rolling off the mattress and landing on the floor with a painful thud was entirely feasible.  For that reason, Pepper was "nice" enough to deploy two final lengths of white rope, one to tether the nexus of Tippi's box-tie-bonds to the steel bed-frame's headboard, and the other to tether her crossed ankles to the foot-board.  She gave her prisoner a lot of slack so she could roll and squirm around on the mattress, but getting off the bed was patently impossible.

Finally (bondage-wise) Pepper had kissed Tippi goodnight, full on the lips!  And while Tippi was busy processing that... outrage(?), Pepper had plastered a wide strip of some sort of medical tape across her mouth!  "Mrrrf?"

Tippi had been busy "appreciating" her newly applied rope bonds and had missed Pepper using a pair of bandage scissors to snip a seven-inch strip from the off-white roll of tape.  Again, Pepper was helpful/educational and explained that she was using "Elastoplast," widely considered the best product for tape-gagging damsels, superior to most brands of duct-tape, anyway.

Finally, Pepper stood, smiled down at her "victim" for a few seconds, then made her exit.

And now Tippi was helpless... bound and gagged... and in total darkness.  Wow!  This was Nancy Drew on steroids, as far as Tippi was concerned.  The ropes weren't all that tight, but they were inescapable.  She tested them to be sure.  Also, she was naked!  Nancy Drew was never naked.  In fact, none of the bound and gagged damsels of movies, TV, and literature in Tippi's experience had ever been naked.  Wow!

And it wasn't like she was enjoying herself or anything.  The situation Eliza had landed them in was... interesting... intellectually stimulating... but it certainly wasn't enjoyable.

Tippi closed her eyes and concentrated on going to sleep.  Eventually, her heart stopped pounding and she succeeded... but it took awhile.