Stardate -366.770833 – Royal College of Saint Almsworth – Pre-Intake

   Let me tell you, the one thing worse than a bad nerd is a girl who thinks they’re a nerd. I’ve been to conventions, and seen them wandering around, telling men like me that we’re “assholes” for defending the integrity of the genre we champion. Like they’re worthy of being part of the sci-fi fandom.

   I’ve seen things few people have ever seen. Mostly because sci-fi isn’t that mainstream when it’s good, but whatever. I’ve seen forums on fire off the beaten track of the web, simply because a woman decided to show her face there and claim to be a fan of the genre. I’ve seen normies glisten with tears because I told them the hard truth: that their gender was not welcome in my beloved fandom.

This was what crossed my mind as I sat in my chair listening to some ex-Almsworth grad called Christine or something rattle on about Star Trek to our society, making the mother of all factual mistakes in the process. She was here at the behest of the society founder to talk about how Star Trek had informed her decision to go into IT after uni or some horseshit like that. I couldn’t believe I’d bothered showing up tonight, if this was the sort of person that the society considered to be worthy of giving a speech about Star Trek.

   I mean, honestly, if you’re going to pretend to be a nerd, why not at least get the facts right about what Dilithium does. She had erroneously referred to it as a fuel source, not a way to control the reaction rate of antimatter. What a joke, huh? I mean, she didn’t exactly call it fuel- she made some sort of lame joke that just happened to compare it to a fuel source contextually- but she was still wrong.

   In any case, my patience was wearing thinner by the minute. She was currently discussing how Jazdia Dax was a good example of LGBT representation, and I was feeling like I was going to pop. Dax was the symbiote, not the person. Jazdia was an ancillary component, and her gender didn’t matter. Any real Trekkie would be able to distinguish between the two, but apparently this woman was unaware of this. Then again, she was a woman, and they didn’t know anything when it came to sci-fi. They only pretended to know things so they could stab you in the back.

   I had been a fan of Star Trek since I was six years old. In the intervening thirteen years, I had never encountered any woman who was even remotely on the same level as me when it came to Trek knowledge. Hell, even outside my specialist subject, I was a better sci-fi nerd than pretty much anyone else in the room.

   So, I considered it not just my duty, but an honour to make sure none of them hurt my community. I was doing the world a service, and I never regretted any of the shit I said. Well, not willingly. Sometimes I felt slightly guilty when they cried those crocodile tears and called me an asshole. But that was usually fixed with a few beers at the Student Union. And, if I still felt bad, a marathon of DS9 or TNG usually fixed things pretty quickly. Roddenberry would be proud. Who cared if people avoided me in the corridors, or gave me resentful looks. I did the work others wouldn’t.

   I became distinctly aware at this point that everyone else had left the room, and that the woman who had been speaking was standing in front of me looking concerned.

   “-ou OK? The society meetup is over, everyone’s left already.”

   I smirked at her. “Oh, yeah, I know.”

   She raised an eyebrow. “Really? Because you looked like you were busy wrapped up in some sort of mental gymnastics competition there, with your face screwed up like that.”

   “Indeed I was,” I replied, even more annoyed now. “I was bothered by how little you seem to know. Then again, you are a girl.”

   She momentarily looked shocked, but before I could get any sort of satisfaction from throwing her off guard, she snorted and walked away. “I do not have the mental bandwidth to go and have an argument. Especially after driving an hour to be here.”

   “What?” I sneered. “You scared that I know more than you? Or is it just that you don’t want to be exposed as a fake nerd?”

   She stiffened, and turned around. “Who are you? I mean it, if I’m going to take this shit from someone, I want to know who I’m getting it from. Right now, all you are is a pompous shithead with an arrogance issue.”

   I laughed humourlessly. “I’m an actual nerd. But, if you want my name, it’s Alan Malloy. I’m the biggest sci-fi nerd this side of the galactic core.”

   She went stiff. “I’ve heard of you. You know, you’re pretty infamous in the local sci-fi community for your bullshit. Some of my friends who still live on campus have told me a few horror stories involving you. They told me not to speak here because you might be-”

   My face went red, and I rose to my feet in anger. “Listen, bitch, I don’t need this from you. I keep the fandom safe from phonies like you who come in and hurt people like me. I have seen dozens of you bitches walk into this club and make pretensions to fandom. And I don’t like people making a mockery of my hobby. Sci-fi is for boys, fantasy is for girls. Go hang out with the Tolkien nerds or something, but stay out of my fandom.”

   Before she could say anything else, I left the room and stalked off in the direction of the student union bar. I needed a drink, and I needed one now.

   It was getting dark out, and the temperature this autumn was unusually warm at around fifteen degrees. It was still cold though, so I didn’t want to linger for long. Soon, I had left the study halls far behind, had passed the path that lead to one of the dorms (Dorley or whatever, I didn’t really pay attention at orientation), and was walking into the student union bar. It was pretty empty tonight, with only a handful of patrons present. None of them caught my eye in particular. Most of them were familiar faces, half-remembered from lectures and practicals.

   There was someone I didn’t recognise though. She was sitting at the bar, with two pints of beer in front of her, and a handbag on the chair next to her. She was dressed in a black dress, and was facing towards the door as if she was waiting for someone. Her red hair came down around her shoulders, framing a face that was almost sculpted. In other words, she was well out of my league. And, she was glaring at me in an almost predatory way.

   Whatever. She could glare at me till the cows went home. It wouldn’t stop me from sitting down to have a drink.

   Sitting down next to her, in my favourite seat, I ordered a pint of beer, and pulled out my phone. Several new messages, one from my landlord regarding my mounting backlog of unpaid rent invoices, another from the uni administration regarding my failing academic performance. If I kept this up, I’d have to go home in shame, and wouldn’t that prove Dad right? That I should have taken business instead of computer science. That I should have done what he told me and nothing else.

   Before I had even realised it, my beer was gone, and I was holding an empty glass. Christ, I was nowhere close to being drunk right now. A second beer followed, then a third, and a fourth. I was looking for where my wallet had disappeared to so I could buy a fifth when the redhead slid a beer across the table to me. It was one of the two that had been in front of her when she walked in. I looked quizzically at her.

   “Here. It’s on me,” she said, turning back to her own drink. “I was waiting on someone who never showed, you seem to drink the same brand, so at least it isn’t going to waste. You can pay me back later. ”

   I blinked. This wasn’t usually how things went. “Uh…thanks, Miss…?”

She didn’t smile. “The name’s Stephanie. Drink up, before it goes warm. You should probably call it quits though after this one,”

   Shrugging, I began drinking. Christ, at least some people could show manners in today’s world. It was strange though. The more I drank, the harder it became to think, and the darker the world got. Maybe I was actually drunk. After that, things became a blur. More of a series of stills, as if the world had become a slideshow. A brief flash of me stumbling down a path towards a monolithic building, half carried by someone. The feeling of warm air escaping into the night as a front door opened before me. A woman saying something about a basement. The click of a door closing followed by an electronic buzz. And then, nothing.

Stardate -365.71875 – The Basement – Programme Day 0

  When I woke, I was no longer in the bar. In fact, I didn’t know where I was. I was lying on a thin mattress atop a steel cot. The room was made from bare concrete, brightly lit by ceiling lights, and gated off by a door made from some sort of reinforced glass. The only other furnishing was a metal toilet built into the wall. Fuck, was I in jail? Had I done something while drunk?

I needed to call the family lawyer, Derrick. He’d know how to get me out of here. Last I checked, my phone was in my back pock…

…wait, where was my phone?! Fuck that, where were my clothes? I was clad in some sort of green hospital smock, and unless this was some sort of new procedure for detainees, I was beginning to suspect that this wasn’t a police station.

   Had…had I been kidnapped?

   I ran over to the glass cell door, and tried to push it open, in the hopes that maybe my captors had left it unlocked. No joy. I kicked it. No give. I tried throwing myself against it. Again, solid as rock. I wasn’t that strong or heavy to begin with, so I didn’t expect much anyway. I looked around for anything I could use to break the glass. The bedframe was too heavy for me to shift, and it was chained to the floor anyway. I searched the room for any sort of other way out. Nothing. I was stuck here, and I was increasingly beginning to panic. A camera mounted high up on the wall tracked my every move, a green light blinking next to the lens. Someone was watching me.

   “What the fuck?” I yelled at the impassive lens. “Where am I? Is this a joke? How the fuck did I get here? What did I fucking do? Am I under arrest? If so, I want my fucking phone call, assholes! You can’t just detain someone without due cause, I know enough about the law to know that! Are you even listening?”

   A familiar voice spoke from near the door. “We can hear you just fine, Alan.”

   I whirled, and was faced by the girl from last night. Stephanie or whatever. She was wearing a loose fitting black skirt, and a striped jumper. What really drew my attention was the taser holstered at her hip, and the tactical baton resting beside it. She looked mildly amused by my outburst, but otherwise her posture radiated hostility.

   “Not sure how much you remember from last night, but my name is Stephanie. If you prefer, you can call me Steph. I’ve been assigned to you as your sponsor during your time here. Do you have anything to say?”

   I walked right up to the glass, and tried my best to look intimidating when she was at least twenty centimetres taller than me and carrying an electroshock weapon. She stood there looking at me as I began to issue my demands.

   “Yeah, I fucking have something to say, Steph,” I snarled, my arms crossed. “I don’t know what the fuck is going on, but this is how things are going to go. You are going to let me go. I am going to go to the police. And you and whoever is helping you do this are going to prison. My family have good lawyers, and they will definitely not bow to any sort of extortion attempts. If you cooperate, I’ll be sure to put in good word for you at the trial.”

   She lifted an eyebrow. “You done, little man?”

   I went red. “I am not little you-”

   She cut me off before I could say anything else. “Good, you’re done. Now, let me be clear. I am not going to let you go. This isn’t about money, or about your family. It’s about making you grow as a person. You’re here for as long as it takes you to become that better person. And when you do get out of here, you are not going to the police. There will be no trial, and your family’s lawyers will never become involved. That’s a given.”

   I stood there gaping as she continued on as if I wasn’t there. She was insane if she thought I wasn’t going to go right to the police and tell them about this shit. I didn’t care what sort of bullshit they tried to force feed me, or how badly they tried to brainwash me, I wasn’t going to let them get away with kidnapping.

“You’re here because you have proven yourself to be a shining example of toxic masculinity. Your behaviour has been largely forgiven by the world outside because of the inability for society to reform your ways. You have therefore been chosen to undergo reform our way. This will be your home for the immediate future. There are only two ways out. You reform, or you wash out and face a future far worse than anything you can imagine.”

   “You’re not serious,” I said, panicked. “What did I do to deserve this? I’m not some sort of fucking rapist, I’m a-“

   “You may not be a rapist,” Steph cut in, her voice steely. “But those are not the sort of men we treat. What you are, Alan, is a lot more mundane. You’re a toxic nerd. More than that, you’re a toxic fan who forces women eager to engage with their fandom of choice out of what would otherwise be a welcoming environment for them, simply because you cannot comprehend a world in which girls like the same things as you.”

   “But-”

   “At last count, there were twenty incidents in the year you’ve spent at Saint Almsworth where you have bullied female students to the point where they have left the sci-fi society you so jealously sheppard. Outside of the society, there have been multiple incidents over the past decade where you have harassed or poorly treated women attending conventions for science fiction fans like yourself. In fact, at least two of those conventions have a ban on your future attendance after particularly public cases of verbal abuse by yourself that invited the attention of the organisers. Your web history- and yes, we have access to all of it- shows that your complete intolerance of women in the same fandom spaces as you extends to even people online who aren’t even in the same postcode as you, let alone on the same continent. All of this is exemplary of the worst aspects of masculinity, which is what we have made our goal to treat. That is why you’re here, Alan. Trust me, we very rarely get it wrong.”

   I swallowed. “But my disappearance will be noticed! I was in a bar! There were other patrons! The society will notice my absence!”

   Stephanie, or Steph, or whatever her name was looked amused at this. “First off, who will notice that you’re gone? You have no friends on campus to speak of, and you haven’t spoken with your family once since coming here last year. Your attendance in classes is spotty at best, and you have never been to a single lecture since your first semester.”

   She took a breath before continuing, detailing how easy it was for me to disappear as if she was reading a grocery list, her voice level and unemotional.

   “The society you cling to like a safety blanket has been trying to figure out how to get rid of you for months now. The only thing stopping them has been a general hope that your behaviour would somehow improve without intervention. However, that hope has limits, and you were on thin ice already. They will not miss you.”

“And the bar?” I said, feeling like I was on the verge of tears. “Surely the entire room wasn’t in on this. You drugged me, didn’t you? Surely they noticed something?”

   Steph sighed. “No, unfortunately for you, that was accounted for. I gave you what would nominally be called a ‘rape drug’. I dissolved it in the beer I gave you. It made you drowsy and suggestible, but not incapable of moving under your own power. I simply pretended to escort you back to your dorm, and nobody so much as gave us a second look. As far as they were concerned, you were just not able to process alcohol very well.”

   I collapsed to the floor, and stared up at her. She frowned down at me, clearly disappointed.

   “Now that we’ve gotten the unpleasantries out of the way, I’m going to leave you be for a while. You seem to need some time to process your situation. We’ve already delayed the start of the programme to accommodate your arrival, so you’re going to be let out of that cell ahead of the usual schedule. Please don’t scratch your belly, you’ll only hurt yourself. I’ll bring some food soon. Goodbye for now, Alan.”

  She turned to leave, leaving me sitting on the cold concrete floor of the cell. Don’t…scratch my belly? I checked my stomach, and found something strange. There was a small lump, about half the size of a fingernail, and a red welt in the centre. Was this some sort of tracking device? Some sort of tag that would monitor my movements? I quickly checked the rest of my body, and found a needle mark in the crook of my elbow on my left arm. Had they injected something else?

   Who were these people? What was going on?

   Stephanie did indeed return with food, which she left inside the door after asking me to stand back. I considered rushing her, but she kept her taser within easy reach, and I had no desire to get hit with a couple hundred volts of electricity. Whatever the case, the food she bought wasn’t much. A cereal bar, a banana, and a bottle of water. She told me to sit on my bed and avoid any sudden movements as she opened the door, and placed the tray of food inside the door before closing it.

   “Good. At least you’re complying at the moment. Keep it up, and maybe things will be easier for you. It’ll be lights out soon enough, try to get some rest this evening. Tomorrow, you meet the rest of your intake.”

   “You’re kidding. There are others?”

   She nodded. “There are six, including you. You were a late addition, so we've had to accelerate our usual timetable for socialising you with the rest of your cadre. And that’s all I’ll say for now. Eat, drink, sleep. Your new life begins now.”

   Then she left, her shoes clicking on the hard concrete floor as she walked away. I didn’t bother eating the food she left, or drinking the water. They probably had something in them, and I was too messed up to eat anyway. Fucking hell, what did I do to end up here? I collapsed on the thin mattress, and lay there until the lights eventually went dim. If I was going to survive whatever this bitch and her friends had in store for me, I was going to have to be smart.

   Fuck, what would Kirk do in a situation like this?

…

   …probably bang his captor. No, Kirk was not the best role model to employ in this situation. To be honest, I don’t think there was any sort of inspiration I could draw from Star Trek right now, and that just illustrated how boned I was. If a Starfleet officer couldn’t escape from this, what chance did I have?

   “Jesus Fuck, Steph, you went too easy on that asshole. You do want to fix him, right?”

   Steph closed the door of the security room behind her and collapsed into a nearby chair with a groan. “Christine, I know he was a dick to you- trust me, I understand where you’re coming from- but he’s not exactly the worst offender we’ve had in the last four years.”

   Christine turned from the camera display, and stared at her. “Really? I mean, yeah, he’s not exactly violent- at least as far as my digging turned up- but you’ve seen what I found. His behaviour at that society, the shit he’s posted on Reddit, the forums he’s terrorised, the many women who’ve spoken out about his behaviour towards them at fan events…he’s a complete fucking incel.”

   Steph tried to interject, but Christine kept going, gesturing for her to hold what she wanted to say until she was done.

   “Plus, you’ve seen how bad he’s doing out there. His academic record speaks for itself, let alone his habit of being kicked from every job he’s worked in the last year he’s been at Saint Almsworth. The kid was going to snap at some point, he’s definitely the sort of person who benefits from what we do. He reminds me of who I used to be, at least in part.”

   “OK. Sure. He’s a mess,” Steph said, looking at the camera feed. Alan was lying on his bed, hand over his eyes, not moving. “And yeah, he’s pretty bad. But I don’t think that means we shouldn’t try to avoid using the stick right off the bat. I told him everything he needs to know at this point, and it’s not like I had much time to break it down like Pippa did with me. He’s arrived very late to this year’s intake, no thanks to your glowing recommendation to Bea.”

   “I mean, what the fuck was I meant to do?” Christine asked, waving at the footage of Alan lying prone on the bed. “The guy practically handed his “I’m a prime candidate for Dorley” paperwork to me when he ambushed me after the speech. I couldn’t exactly let someone like that pass under our noses! Besides, he's not exactly sporting a history of violence, not that it makes him less of a threat to himself and others.”

“Fair enough, I guess,” said Steph, shrugging. “I mean, compared to most of Ellen's group from last year? He's a saint. Hell, he's certainly better than at least half my intake. Besides, I’ve been reading his file. I think a lot of this is less about women, and a hate thereof, and more about specific women. Someone clearly hurt him, and it’s definitely tied to his very specific interests. I’ll need to do some more reading to make sure, but I think I know what his levers are going to be.”

   Christine snorted. “This is why you’re the sponsor, not me. After what he said at the society meeting, I’d probably throttle him the first time he opened his mouth. Let alone do extra legwork to help mend him. You did good, in any case. The first girl you sponsored was a fucking nutcase before the programme did its work. He’s a bloody lamb compared to Ellen.”

   “Yeah, he’s certainly taking it better than I thought,” Steph mused, scratching idly at her wrist. “After Ellen, though, pretty much anyone would meet my standards of ‘reacts well to being selected’. And she turned out OK. She's apparently doing well upstairs, better than I'd have expected a year ago. I’m surprised you didn’t bring him in though. It was lucky that I was already waiting for Beth at the Union bar, and that she listened when I told her we’d have to reschedule. If you’d grabbed him on the way out of the room, my girlfriend would be less annoyed, and he’d have had more time to adjust. Well, marginally more time.”

   Christine snorted. “He was lucky that I didn’t knock him unconscious myself and drag him over here after how he talked to me. I thought I'd leave it to Dorley to handle though, given that I'm not even living on campus anymore. Speaking of which, I didn’t spend an hour driving here just to give some sort of “I’m a Trekkie, and I used to study here, here’s my take on Star Trek” speech to a society I attended three meetings of before I left for greener pastures. I came here to see some familiar faces.”

   “What, noooo,” snarked Steph, giggling slightly. “I thought you were here to find another trans girl to sneak into the programme, for old time’s sake! It is good to see you again, though. It’s been ages.”

  Christine shrugged. “Well, I have offered to meet up with you in London for coffee before, and not just the one time. It’s not that far a drive, and I’m sure you could catch a bus if you couldn’t find someone to drive you. Yet this is the first time I’ve seen you in, what, a year?”

   Steph smiled, and leaned back in her seat. “Yeah, well, I’m busy fixing broken men down in the dungeon. How’s Paige? I hear you and her just moved into a new apartment over in London after the lease expired on the old one.”

   “Yeah, Paige is good, better than good,” Christine said, smiling happily. “She spent the first week just getting her lighting setup how she wanted it, and after that it took another full week to get all of her clothes unpacked. I swear, the delivery guys were practically glaring at her by the time they’d unpacked the truck, and then the second truck pulled up. Then we had to unpack everything, and assemble all of the clothing racks, and that took another week in and of itself.”

   “Sounds like her. It’s good to know she’s happy,” Steph agreed, picking up a coffee mug from a nearby table and walking over to the coffee machine. “How are you doing? Bea said you landed some sort of cybersecurity job. She wasn’t too specific on the details.”

   “It’s nothing that fancy,” Christine replied, sipping her own coffee. “My job title is Network Security Administrator. Basically, I make sure nobody gets in our systems unless they’re authorised to do so. It’s a lot more boring than the sort of stuff I used to manage here at Dorley, but at the very least it’s something I can put on my CV. I wouldn’t have even gotten it if it wasn’t for Bea putting in a good word via Elle. Certainly not with a sociology degree and a year and a half doing cybersecurity for a kidnapping operation.”

   “Hey,” joked Steph. “If you ever get bored, I’m sure Bea would love to have you back. Besides, it’s not as fun here without you.”

   “Steph,” said Christine, smiling. “She couldn’t afford me now, not even if she tried.”

Stardate -364.395833 – The Basement – Programme Day 1

I was asleep, dreaming about a bunch of angry Vulcans in miniskirts chasing me when the lights came on, and the door to my cell unlocked with a buzz. I sat up, rubbing my eyes, and was confronted by Steph, yet again armed with a taser, standing in front of the open door. She was dressed similarly to yesterday, albeit without the jumper. Instead, she wore a leather jacket over a cream top of some variety.

   “You have to eat something, Alan,” she said, looking at my untouched meal. “We’re not drugging your food; you don’t have to worry about that.”

   I clumsily got to my feet and glowered at her. “You spend a night in a cell after some bitch with a taser kidnaps you. You see how much you trust the food not to have some sort of brainwashing drug in it.”

   Steph’s mouth twitched momentarily as if I’d said something amusing. “Funny guy. Unfortunately, comedy isn’t the objective here. Fixing you is. Now, come along. It’s breakfast time, and the others are waiting to meet you. Walk in front of me, and if you make one false move, I will use this taser."

   I got off my bed and walked out into the corridor outside. There were nine cells, including mine, and a doorway at the far end that seemed to be the only way out of wherever this place was. I began to walk, Steph following close behind with her taser drawn. Maybe if I could get that weapon off of her, I could...

   "I should probably warn you at this point that all of the girls down here carry these tasers. We're authorised to use them should any of you get uppity or try to escape. If you've got some notion of grabbing one and turning it on us, they're keyed to our biometrics. The weapon won't even discharge otherwise."

   “What, does it also fire six kinds of bullet and activate by voice?” I grumbled under my breath. Steph chuckled from behind me, clearly having overheard.

   “Well, that is one way of looking at it. I am indeed the law here, even if I forgot to wear my big gold badge today.”

   I stopped and turned around to stare at her. “Did…did you just get my reference?”

   “What? It wasn’t that obscure,” she said, grinning. “Besides, I used to read a lot of comics. Judge Dredd is a British classic.”

   I felt a familiar urge to argue rising inside me, but remembered that I had a taser pointed at me. Not exactly the best move, even if I knew she’d probably just gotten that off Wikipedia or something. It was always a wiki with fake nerds like her. They never actually read the stuff.

…

…Right?

CrazyMinh

Thanks to Alysongreaves for creating The Sisters of Dorley, which this story is based off.

I recently decided to move away from fanfiction for good, having made a commitment to move on to focusing fully on my original stories rather than continuing to write derivative works. However, I think one last hurrah is a good way to cap off that part of my writing career, and thus, I’ve decided to write this story as a send off to my seven year long career as a fanfiction writer.

Mandatory Nihilism, Gauntlet, and this story will be updated as I get around to writing new chapters, but I won’t be abandoning any of them in the near future. I’m just going to be sharing around attention a bit more than otherwise.

Otherwise, I’m always grateful for any criticism or feedback that you might provide. Comments and reviews help me gauge whether a story is getting any attention, and it's always gratifying to hear people discuss what I've written.

I also would greatly appreciate any donations through my Ko-Fi page, as I’m experiencing some financial difficulties, and it would give me some more time to work on my writing. The minimum amount is $5 Australian, but you can pay any amount you'd like to contribute, and it would be very much appreciated. I do have plans to set up a proper patreon at some point, but I need to sort that out when I have slightly more time. I'll probably be offering the same perks for all tiers, but again, I need to sort that out. I'm planning to be more serious about my writing as a career option, so these are things I'm trying to work out.

That’s all from me, enjoy Dorley: The Next Generation!