May 2045
The employees at Allied Accessory Processing Service had worked tirelessly to ready the facilities for today’s VIP tour. Bella Drakenworth’s last few years had been quite the roller coaster, culminating in yesterday’s announcement, where she was named the company’s new CEO. The niece of trillionaire financier Michael Drakenworth, she had made a quick rise to the top of her family’s hedge fund, only to be forced to resign and pay a record 800 million dollar fine for an insider trading scheme which netted the firm 2.2 billion dollars. The next two years, she had built her brand as an influencer, rebuilding her image enough for the family to trust her to run a newly acquired firm.
Though the name may sound generic, Allied Accessory Processing Service provisioned merchandise that was at the very high end of its industry. A supplier to all the major labels that sold human hair accessories, AAPS sourced the highest quality materials which were sold only to the most exclusive customers.
Bella herself wore some of their products. Her hair hung down to her ankles, perfectly thick all the way down, and almost iridescent in the way the perfect, shining, platinum blonde locks reflected the artificial sunlight. In a procedure that lasted over four hours and required six technicians, approximately five heads of human hair, nearly identical to her own had been seamlessly grafted to her own hair, one at a time. The meticulous routine to maintain her perfect hair took her assistants nearly an hour each morning.
She arrived an hour late for the facility tour. At this point, the day’s operations were already in full swing.
Riley Garcia, the Operations Manager of the main processing facility, greeted Bella as soon as she stepped out of her rented Bentley. Her hair was tied up in a bun that added nearly a foot to her height.
“Hope I won’t be needing a hard hat today” she joked.
Riley laughed. “Don’t worry, that’s not going to be necessary.”
They bypassed the lobby through a side door. Bella didn’t want to be seen in her new role until the crew she hired had finished her welcome video, so they skipped all the public-facing parts of the facility.
Riley walked Bella through the loading docks first, navigating the maze of pallets ready to go out. A tall woman with a reddish buzz cut was wrapping a skid with plastic while a thin black woman with a smooth scalp began loading boxes on another one.
“I gotta say, business has been booming like never before. Ever since the HAIR act…”
Bella cut him off. “Yeah, I know about the HAIR act. Anyone receiving government benefits can’t spend money on hair care or hair products. My aunt sponsored the bill in the senate. I should have shorted all the shampoo companies when I found out, but I just had to listen to my lawyer and not do it”.
He continued “Right, of course, you’d know all about it. Well anyway, since the HAIR act became law a year ago, we’ve actually been busier than ever. Most of the hair we buy comes from the subset of the population that isn’t on benefits yet, but may be in a position to need them soon, so all the hair we buy has been well cared for and passes our rigorous quality control processes.”
“Interesting, I thought the people selling to these places were just welfare queens who got caught wasting tax dollars at the salon.” Bella responded.
“Well, uhh… perhaps that may be the case in a few rare situations but I can assure you, we only procure the highest quality specimens.” He responded defensively.
Bella didn’t really care and wasn’t paying attention. “Ok, so, show me where it happens. Lets see where you do the scalping” she giggled as she made a chopping motion.
Riley faked a laugh. “Well, we have a meeting scheduled with…”
“I’m the CEO! Let them wait!” she cut him off “I’ve always wanted to see how these things are made.”
“We’re a bit behind already, but sure, if that’s what you want” he responded, trying to remain professional, and led her through a door. They were greeted by a woman in her mid 20’s in green scrubs. She had pale skin and her head and eyebrows were completely devoid of hair.
“This is Mandy, she’s a lead technician here. She can show you the process.”
“Why are you so bald?” Bell asked rudely.
Riley responded quickly. “One of the benefits we offer employees her at AAPS is free hair removal services, which I believe Mandy took advantage of earlier this morning.”
“Ah, so that’s required of all employees?” Bella asked.
“No” Mandy responded enthusiastically “It’s an optional benefit. We can come in before or after work and have hair removal done once a month. Not everyone takes advantage, but I do, the full package, LoxNil from head to toe. It’s the same stuff they use in prisons, mental institutions and grad schools. Keeps the hair from even starting to grow back for a few months. I’m on food stamps and rent assistance at the moment so, no hair for me until I get that sorted out. Besides, can’t be wasting time with hair when I’m trying to take his job!” She snickered at Riley and she rubbed her smooth head.
“Ok, very eager, so are you going to show me what I asked to see then? I’m got a busy day today” Bella seemed bored.
As she said that, the light above the door next to them turned green. Mandy opened it and let them through. Four girls with long, healthy locks sat in a row of chairs. On the right, a tall blonde entered the room, naked, and sat in the empty chair. A technician with a hairnet over her short curls tossed a cape over her and carefully applied a spray to the girl’s scalp. Each other chair had a tightly-shorn technician either washing hair or applying something.
“So this is the first phase of our patented process.” Riley explained. “The associate here is applying a very weak solvent to the client’s scalp. After that, she will spread a layer of resin over the solvent, then wash away any residual solvent above the resin layer. The resin then takes about four hours to fully dry. Once dried, the solvent will have reduced the size of the roots of the hair so the whole thing can be pulled off with only slight discomfort, while retaining the exact positioning of each hair on the client’s head. We also have other areas of the facility where we harvest some or all of a client’s hair by traditional methods, but the highest graded hair that sells to the most exclusive buyers is harvested through this method.”
The dark-brown haired girl in the middle got up and removed her cape. She had nothing on underneath and didn’t seem fazed to be seen nude by the visitors. The technician draped a paper gown over her and led her to another room. Riley, Bella and Mandy followed them. The technician led the girl into a stall that resembled a public toilet and sat her down, then fastened a series of restraints as the brunette behaved cooperatively. The technician exited the stall and shut the door, setting a timer for 4 hours.
Riley explained to Bella why this was necessary “To ensure the quality of the product, the client has to avoid touching their head for the next 4 hours. She has access to a variety of entertainment in there, as well as food, water, bathroom and hygiene products. This has been a huge cost savings over using the previous method of anesthesia while the resin dried. The restraints pretty much just prevent her from getting up and allow her to touch anything but her head.”
“So do they ever uhh… you know…” Bella made a crude pantomime of masturbation.
Riley shook off the inappropriate gesture and responded. “As all clients are over the age of 18, our AI consoles do include adult entertainment, and we find it often helps with stress relief if…”
Mandy cut him off “We do sanitize the stalls fully after each use, if that’s what you’re asking.”
A different stall door dinged. Mandy scanned her wrist to open the door. Inside, a redhead sat naked and restrained, with the area between her legs noticeably soaked and her gown crumpled in the corner. Her orange locks fell over her back as they were freed from the clamp that had held them in place. The redhead seemed completely unashamed to be seen in that state.
“So yeah… uhh… to answer your question from earlier… pretty frequently.” Riley muttered.
“Are redheads more in demand?” She asked Riley.
The naked girl responded before he could. “Are you kidding, I get so many offers to buy this thing off of me. Would have loved to keep it but I need the cash.”
Mandy led the girl to the next room, marked “Harvesting Studio 1” and Bella and Riley followed her. The room was a small film studio with camera equipment a curved white screen to one side and a dastardly piece of machinery hanging from the ceiling. Mandy instructed the girl to spread her arms and legs while she scrubbed her down with soap and applied an oil to make her skin glisten. She then fixed the girl’s hair into the machinery and walked behind the camera. The cameraman shouted out to the redhead, who stood with her hands to her sides. “Ok, starting in 60 seconds…”
“I love that we make them get naked while this is happening. That’s a nice touch.” Bella grinned devilishly.
Riley responded with a serious answer “It’s for the certificate of authenticity. Buyers of this kind of thing want to see the full body of the person it came from and ensure there was no sleight of hand involved.”
“And read the card in 3…2…” The cameraman instructed.
“Certificate number A 3 E 9 8 2 F F 1 B C 7”
And as soon as she said the final C, the machinery jerked upwards. There was a ripping sound, and the naked redhead lost her balance a bit. Only now she wasn’t a redhead. Her scalp was a bit red, but every single red hair had been ripped out of it in one fell swoop.
The girl’s grimace changed to a smile as she rubbed her sore scalp with glee. “Fuck that stings. Love how it feels though. See y’all in another couple years probably.” She was escorted through another door.
“That was weird. She get off to this kind of thing or something?” Bella joked, fully aware of the fact that she herself was absolutely getting off to this sort of thing. Riley tried to lead her out the door but she asked to watch one more. Annoyed, he obliged, giving her a speech in the mean time about how they had some big plans to develop their own ultra-luxury hair brand and sell the highest-end product directly. She figured he was going to ask her for money, but before he had a chance to, they brought in the next girl. Unlike the previous redhead who had no hair below the neck, this girl had an extremely thick bush around her vulva and under each arm, each slightly darker than her strawberry blonde hair. The technician unfolded extra appendages from the hair-ripping machine and attached them to each patch of hair, as well as a pair of small clamps to the edge of the dried resin over her eyebrows. The girl stood with her arms and legs spread, read the certificate number and barely flinched as an entire body of hair was pulled off of her.
“I didn’t even know we did pubes and pit hair.” Bella said to Riley.
“And eyebrows” Mandy interjected. “It’s a slightly different process, full body hair harvesting requires complete immobilization during the drying time.”
“Oh you’re still here” Bella rolled her eyes at her.
“Anyway, we have a meeting to discuss our strategy moving forward and I don’t want to keep our stakeholders waiting any longer.” Riley said politely.
After obliging Bella’s request to watch one more, he led her down a hallway while Mandy left to resume her normal tasks. They entered a conference room where three old white men with tablets sat around a table. The one in the middle was Bella’s uncle Michael. He looked displeased to be kept waiting.
“Well well, look who finally showed up.” He said sarcastically.
“Uncle Michael! I’m sorry, I wasn’t expecting you today, if I’d known I wouldn’t have let him give me such a long tour.”
“Sure” He replied dismissively “Well then, since we’re running late, let me get right down to business. You cost me a lot of money with your antics at my fund. You got caught doing things that only an amateur would get caught doing. So I’m going to give you a chance to make it right. This company sells the highest quality hair to all the major luxury brands- Gucci, Chanel, Bieber, Louis Vuitton, Scheinhart Wig Company… and nobody even knows what it’s called. American Allied… something or other. When this company was founded, it was taboo to just buy someone’s hair off their head, so they had to call it something generic. These days, it’s an accepted part of society and everyone’s found new things to complain about. People of our social status put their scalp collections in display in their homes. You should have seen the collection the Zuckerbergs have at their compound in Nunavut. They have a whole room, plus one on the head of every single household assistant. Connoisseurs know about this company. They know where their scalps are sourced. So we’re going to spin off a global luxury brand with first rights to the hair collected here, and you’re not going to like it but the choice has already been made.”
A monitor turned on to reveal a logo. BellaD, stylized to be almost symmetrical, in the color of her hair with gold and black borders.
“Why wouldn’t I like this? I love it, this logo is so me! I won’t let you down Uncle Mike!”
“Great!” he laughed “We’ve already made the arrangements with some of the biggest whales in the business. We’re going to launch the new brand tonight, with an auction that will likely break the record for highest price on a single head of hair. It belongs to someone famous. You know who?”
“Who?” Bella asked, starting to realize what the answer was.
Michael smiled back at her.
“No… you don’t mean… No I’m not going to do that.”
Michael now grew angry. “Now listen here you bum! If it weren’t for my generosity, you and your idiot father would be sharing a trailer with five roommates and you’d wish you could afford to grow hair worthy of this place. Somehow, the one thing you are actually legitimately good at is getting people to talk about you, even if they all hate you. Even farmers in rural Kazakhstan know who you are and think you’re a cunt. You’re going to monetize that.”
“People don’t hate me” She snapped back.
“Honey” Michael replied condescendingly “Your favorability score is lower than President Gronkowski at the end of his second term. People hate you. If you back out of this, I’ll hate you too, and if I hate you, I’ll stop sitting on all the evidence of the many financial crimes you didn’t get caught for while working at my firm. You know you’re terrible at covering this shit up right. You clearly didn’t pay attention in business school. They won’t let you keep that ridiculous hair in prison, you know.”
“Fuck.” She responded “Can I take some time to think about this?”
“No! it’s already almost 1 already, and the jet to New Dubai for the launch party leaves at 5:45, the chopper will pick you up here at precisely 5:30.”
Riley added “Also it takes about an hour to prepare the specimen after it’s collected, so you’ll need to be finished by 4:30.”
“So it can’t be done in time then, you said the resin cap takes 4 hours to set. Can we just do this on another day?”
A red light on the table lit up and a hologram of a man in a lab coat appeared. “Hi, I’m MelvinAI, your chief operating officer, the AZ734 resin compound fully sets in approximately 140 minutes. The reason for the 4 hour drying time is that the patented RootShrink solvent works very slowly, and takes more time to dissolve the hair roots down to a width at which they can be removed with minimal force. The resin matrix will attain full structural integrity after 123 to 136 minutes. Clients have reported moderate to severe discomfort when the harvesting is performed as soon as the resin matrix sets, however, and the FDA®, a Pfizer® company, has recommended a setting time of 300 minutes. Of course, this is only a recommendation. Analysis has shown 240 minutes to be the ideal time to maximize throughput without creating a level of discomfort which would dissuade future clients. The process can be performed successfully with a drying time as low as 140 minutes.”
“So this nerd robot is telling me that I have to do this in a rush and it’s going to hurt more!” She sneered.
“That’s why we told you to be here at ELEVEN O FUCKING CLOCK!” Michael shouted.
“Am I going to have to be paraded around naked in front of all these other people?” she asked
“Of course not” Riley assured her “We have a VIP suite waiting for you.”
“Seriously, there’s a VIP suite?” She asked
One of the men next to Michael spoke up “Oh yes, we do service a growing market of celebrity hair memorabilia. While we are bound by NDAs regarding many of our more high-profile clients, suffice it to say that if you listened to the radio on the way here, you probably heard the voice of at least one person whose hair has been harvested in the very VIP suite you are about to use.”
“Alright, fuck it, lets go.” she gave a resigned shrug. She was presented with a contract which she quickly scrolled through and waved her finger in the air to sign.
The Procedure, and the voyeur
The VIP room was elegantly furnished and only featured a single chair. The technician was an Asian woman in green scrubs with long, shiny black hair. Her badge said Millie Park. She instructed Bella to remove her clothes and pointed to a silk robe on he wall.
“What the fuck, I’m not just going to get naked in front of you.”
“Of course not. There’s a curtain over there where you can undress and put on the robe.”
Bella got behind the curtain and undressed, making sure the technician wasn’t watching, then put on the luxurious silk robe.
“You must be some sort of executive if we’re paying you enough to keep a head of hair like that.” Bella inquired.
“Not exactly.” she explained as she draped the cape over Bella and began spraying her scalp. “I am a senior technician here, but I am still getting school vouchers for my kids, food, housing and health insurance benefits from the government, so I’m not authorized to pay for my own hair care. My hair actually passes the criteria for collection here though, In fact, the first time I came through this building, it was as a client. The company has a program where they donate hair care products and salon time and harvest my hair when it gets long enough. I’ve got another month with this hair. It’ll be my third time going through the process.”
Bella sneered as the technician massaged solvent into her scalp “So we just give you that stuff for free?”
Millie’s smile melted and she got defensive “Oh, no, the full retail value of all goods and services received is deducted from the payment I receive for my hair. Plus it’s considered a charitable donation for tax purposes. I do still receive a small payout after, but I mostly just like doing it because getting to have hair like this, even if it’s just temporary, makes my roommates so jealous. Plus one of my other jobs is at Taco Bell Platinum, and their hair code requires at least shoulder length hair, so I save a lot on the wig rental fees while it’s long like this.”
Bella was getting annoyed at hearing all the ways this girl was freeloading off the company. “Well, less chit chat, time is of the essence here.”
Millie took a deep breath to keep her hands from shaking and nervously applied the resin to the new boss’ scalp. She worked silently, which Bella appreciated.
Once the resin had set, Millie showed her to the drying room next door. Though her head and shoulders were restrained just like any other client, this room had a reclining massage chair and a robotic gantry connected to a mini-fridge full of assorted beverages. The clock on the wall read 13:19. She’d have just over 3 hours to wait.
She sat in silence, stewing at the indignity of this all, until she got bored enough to turn on the entertainment system.
The holographic entertainment system lit up. An AI assistant named Aileen asked Bella what she’d like to watch. She seemed bored with the list of hit movies and shows it provided and asked for the porn. The display showed her a variety of adult entertainment providers, and a mechanical arm brought over a tray of sex toys, assuring her that they were all brand new and fully charged. She picked out a combo auto-cunnilingus/G-spot massager and slid it under her robe. She watched porn for a bit but the regular porn wasn’t doing much for her.
“Hey Aileen, show me a live feed of harvesting studio 1” She asked the AI impishly.
“I’m sorry, that feed is restricted to authorized employees only.” The AI responded
“I am an employee! I’m the CEO!” she yelled back.
“Client status changed to employee. Retina scan completed. Access granted.” the automated voice replied
The hologram showed her the room where she had just been. A naked girl with D-cup breasts and waist-length blonde hair was waiting patiently as a bald technician she recognized as Mandy primed the machinery. She was given the cue and read the certificate number off. Immediately after, the machinery activated and ripped all the hair from her scalp in a single motion. The girl yelped, then rubbed the bare skin where her long hair had been seconds earlier. Meanwhile, Bella moaned as the silicon toy massaged her cunt.
Next, an athletic black woman was led into the room. She had a voluminous afro that was about 8 inches tall. In an incredibly efficient process, a technician hooked the machinery up to her head, the camera man read the cue, the girl read the certificate number, and the hair was yanked. It took less than 5 minutes from start to finish.
She reached orgasm after watching a couple more girls be stripped of their prized hair, and started to get bored with the pacing.
“Hey, are there archived videos of this?”
“All recordings are archived for 60 months. What would you like to see?”
“Uhh what has that girl who was just in here named? Millie I think? She said she’d done this twice. Show me her last one.”
“Showing archived footage from February 3, 2044, 19:53”
The hologram showed Millie walking into the harvesting studio, waddling with her legs spread and arms held up. In addition to her long black hair, she had impressively ample pubic and underarm hair- straight, wispy and almost a foot long. There was no technician in scrubs this time. She was attaching the machinery to herself, adeptly and efficiently unfolding the arms of the equipment to grab each section of hair without lowering her arms or closing her legs. She read the numbers on cue, and the machinery started, but this time, the hair was being peeled away very slowly, and Millie was visibly grimacing.
“Why’s it going so slow and why is she being so dramatic?”
“Client BB9201FC3EAA was placed in the drying stall for 140 minutes. Per company policy, employees are allotted no more than the minimum drying when taking advantage of the Employee Hair Purchase Plan. As the RootShrink solvent had less time to loosen the roots. The harvesting machinery is programmed to adjust its speed to the amount of force needed to pull the hair roots, so the harder it must pull, the slower it goes. This does lead to significant, but temporary, discomfort.”
Bella orgasmed when she heard that.
Once her heartbeat and breathing returned to normal, she asked for a glass of champagne, then made another request. “Show me the most hair that’s ever been removed from one person.”
“Showing archived footage from January 21, 2045 14:10”
This time, the girl strutted in like a model. Her hair was as long as Bella’s, but darker, and must have required long grafting sessions just like hers. She did not have body hair, so only her scalp attached to the machine. She read the serial number and in an instant, without flinching, she was rendered bald. The severed mane was almost the same size as the former brunette herself. She reached out to stroke her former hair.
“Hands off the merchandise!” A stern male voice yelled from behind the camera.
Bella pushed the toy against her groin.
“Whoa, that’s hot!” she said to nobody in particular.
Another idea popped into her head. “Hey assistant guy, that kiss-ass bald girl from the tour earlier was saying something about how she comes in before work to have all her hair removed, do we have video of that?”
“Archived footage from employee locker room is available, access granted. Showing archived footage from May 19, 2045 06:37”
Mandy and two other female employees were shown in what looked like a shower room. She had already disrobed completely as the other two fumbled to remove their gray, government-issued bras and panties. Mandy had the slightest bit of stubble on her head and groin. The other two had shaggy, matted hair to about their shoulders, one with dirty blonde hair and one with black hair. It was a common sight nowadays, as many women tried to keep their long hair, despite the ban on shampoo products, and the Department of Water Conservation’s ban on more than 10 minutes a week of shower time for people without an exemption. Mandy addressed the other two.
“So this is the employee hair removal studio. It’s just one of many great perks you’re going to get as part of the AAPS family. As we explained earlier, there was a memo sent out this morning about the new CEO being in the building today, and the preparation for this visit means making sure 100% of employees are in full compliance with appearance codes. I know we’ve generally been lenient about that since you two aren’t in client-facing roles, but we’ve gotta enforce the code to the strictest degree possible today, or else you will be terminated for cause, unfortunately. The great news is, the company will make sure you don’t have to spend a penny out of pocket to comply. Since both of you already have a lot of excess hair on your heads, we’re going to need to get that a little shorter first. The clippers are over here…”
She picked up a pair of clippers from a drawer and turned them on, placing them at the center of the dark-haired girl’s scalp and smiling before smiling and mowing a path right down the middle. The clippers got stuck and stopped.
“Hmm let me try another pair. All of these are donated from salons, so sometimes it takes a few tries to find a working one. As long as you keep up with your sessions, you’ll never have enough hair to need ’em again though.”
After a couple tries, she found a working set of clippers and got back to shaving the girl’s head. The other girl fumbled through the drawer and found a working pair and began buzzing off her own curls.
“Do I have to do my pubes too?” the dark-haired girl asked. They both sported substantial bushes and had thick leg and underarm hair.
“Have to? no, but we get enough of the cream to hit everything so you might as well. Doesn’t look like you have razors at home.”
The dark-haired girl put the clippers away. The blonde shrugged and buzzed away her pubic, underarm and leg hair.
“Ok next step” she held her wrist to a sensor on the wall and a small tube came out of a slot “Scan your chip here and you’ll get a tube of LoxNil. You’re gonna want to spread it a little thicker on your scalp since there’s more hair. I try to use about half on top, and spread the rest everywhere else.” Mandy explained as she spread the cream over the faint dark shadow of her scalp, followed by the entirety of her arms, legs and groin.
The girl who had buzzed off her body hair dutifully followed suit, massaging it into her scalp, then her arms and legs as well. The other one was busy reading the label of the cream.
“Says this stuff is supposed to stop hair growth for 3-4 months.” She inquired.
“Ha! well it does say that, but look at the expiration date. 2042” she quipped back “It’s supposed to have an ingredient that prevents hair growth for the next couple months, but most of the stuff we get is old enough that it will only dissolve all the hair that’s already there. We did get a good batch in last year, I went the full 3 months without one hair growing back anywhere, but we’re not always that lucky.” she paused to spread a bit over each eyebrow. “besides, once I get that promotion and I can finally get off the government’s teat, I won’t have to wait long to have real hair again.”
“Why do you put that on your eyebrows?” the dark haired girl asked.
“Well, it’s just part of the uniform for me!” Mandy proclaimed proudly. “Your haircut is already meets the minimum standards, but people who just do the minimum don’t get promoted around here.”
The blonde girl quickly spread some of the cream over here eyebrows when Mandy said that. The other girl wasn’t as eager. “Oh, so I’m good, I don’t even have to use this stuff?”
“Nope, your haircut is in compliance as-is, but you did already scan your card to dispense the tube, so if it isn’t used, it is considered to be purchased for personal use, and will be charged to your account for $89.99.”
“Aww shit, fine then.” she said with slumped shoulders, opening the tube and slathering it on her scalp. She picked the clippers back up and hastily buzzed off the rest of her body hair before spreading cream all over it. “Fuggit, mise well get my money’s worth.”
The playback ended a few minutes later when everyone wiped off the cream to reveal the bare skin underneath. Meanwhile, it finally clicked with Bella why this was all turning her on so much. Her face lit up with excitement. She knew what she wanted to do next.
“Hey AI girl…” she asked the AI assistant whose name she had already forgotten “Can you replace the people in these videos with other people?”
The voice replied sternly “Per the Omnibus Budget Bill of 2029, it is illegal for AI to create deepfakes of a human being without their consent.”
“That’s fine.” Bella responded. “I consent. Can you put me in that last video. As the girl with the dark hair.”
The hologram spun up again, but this time Bella’s face was on one of the new girls as she undressed.
“Oh but give her my hair… and the body hair from that Asian girl with the really nice pubes and pit hair… oh but make it the same color as mine.”
She watched as her hologram casually discarded her resplendent locks, from head to toe, at this point Bella had tossed the toy aside and masturbating manually.
Each time a video finished, she made another request of the AI
“Wait, why am I fucking around with the locker room, put me in the hair harvesting studio…”
“Ok now put me in the video of what’s-her-name, Miley or whatever, the girl that was just in here…”
“Oh shit that’s hot. Again in slow-mo, and zoom in.”
“What’s the slowest the machinery has ever had to pull? Show me that…”
“Ok, now make that girl me…”
“Could you make it so I try to back out and they send two big security guards to hold me down and force me…”
“Ok, that same one again, but have them rub the Lox cream all over me after, and the good stuff, not the expired shit…”
At this point, Bella had rubbed herself nearly raw, but wasn’t ready to stop. Suddenly, the AI hologram turned off. She looked at the clock. 15:37. She hastily closed her robe as Millie opened the door.
“What are you doing? I’ve still got almost an hour left! Get out of here!” she yelled.
“No” Millie responded, looking at her tablet. “This is coded under the Employee Hair Purchase Program. It says you authorized the AI to classify you as an employee. Company policy dictates that employees are allowed only the minimum drying time when using AAPS property for personal use. As it says on the badge, ‘I pledge to be a good steward of company time and property to maximize returns to the shareholders'”.
“Well, I AM the shareholders, and as I say, come back at 4:30!”
“Ok” Millie sighed “It’s just that, if I don’t get you to the VIP harvesting studio in the next… 3 and a half minutes… I’m going to get hit with a performance metrics failure…”
“Don’t care. Bye!”
“… and part of that process is that I will have to hand over the logs of your session with Aileen to see where the discrepancy arrived. They will need to be unencrypted and investigated. Right now, I’m the only one who has seen what you asked her, although it would require someone with VP-level clearance to delete the logs entirely.”
Bella had a deer-in-the-headlights look as Millie’s facial expression morphed from one of desperation to one of menace.
“… so come with me, right this way… unless you’d prefer I send two big security guards to hold you down and force you.”
Millie unfastened the head and shoulder restraints and Bella stood up, adjusting the silk robe to cover her cleavage.
“Leave the robe here.” Millie commanded with authoritative indifference. Bella sheepishly sloughed it off, now only covered by her unnaturally long locks.
In the harvesting studio, the camera operator awaited, seemingly annoyed at Bella’s pace and eager to begin. Millie fastened the machine to the resin around Bella’s scalp in 10 places.
“Alright, lets go” said the gruff, middle-aged camera operator “I’m gonna count down, and then you’re gonna read the number off the screen. Should be an easy one to remember.”
The machinery held Bella’s gargantuan mane above her head, leaving her whole body exposed. As Millie finished polishing her skin, the cameraman counted down. 3…2…1…
“Certificate number 888888888888. Bella Drakenworth. May 19, 2045” Bella read out. The sound of ferrofluidic actuators and electric motors filled the room.
A sharp pain shot through Bella’s scalp as the follicles were ripped out one-by-one. It felt like the machinery was moving slower than the slowest recording she had seen. The pain was more intense than the time she had gotten her ex-boyfriend’s name tattooed in a place where only he could see it, and almost as intense as the time she got that same tattoo removed. Over a minute passed before the progress bar got to the halfway point. Despite all this, she never broke her smile. Bella had performed poorly at most things in her life. She only got into Stanford because her uncle donated a building, after Harvard and Yale declined the same offer. She was such a bad investment banker that she got caught on only her 15th insider trade. Her golf swing was even more embarrassing. But one thing she knew she could do better than just about anyone alive was pose for the camera. The machine slowed down even moreso than before, barely eclipsing three quarters done at the two minute mark, but her face remained smiling, prideful, iconic. At the very moment Bella started to fear she was reaching the limit of her endurance, the sounds of the machinery stopped, and her head felt 20 pounds lighter. She reached out to stroke what was once her hair, expecting a reprimand that never came.
The Auction
A couple hours later, Bella had finished drafting the announcement that Millie Park had been promoted to VP of sales for the Southwest Region, and prepared to board the helicopter. The piece made from her severed hair was nearly indistinguishable from when it was her actual hair this morning, and it didn’t budge from the gale force winds produced by the helicopter blades. Normally, the latex cap had to be fitted to the wearer’s scalp, but in this case, it perfectly conformed without alteration.
She shared the helicopter ride with her cousin Noah and her uncle’s publicist, Olivia. As the sound-deadening kicked in, they began to converse.
“By the way Liv, I love what you’ve done with your hair!” Bella complimented, noticing that Olivia’s previously dull brown hair had become more bronze and shiny.
“My hair? haha!” she peeled back a corner of the latex cap of the wig to reveal the smooth, hairless scalp underneath.
“Oh wow, that must have cost a fortune!” Bella remarked.
“Oh yeah, more than I make in a year for sure. The Saudis gifted this to me during your uncle’s visit to their Bald Eagle hunting lodge in Wyoming last week. They have so many of these full scalp wigs, they hire house servants just to walk around and display their collection, and they’ve still got a room of spares bigger than my apartment. Your head has to be completely smooth to wear these, that’s why they laser the scalps of all their house servants. Luckily for me I was able to find someone with some clippers and apply some LoxNil.”
Noah laughed.
“Ok, fine, that’s not really how it went down.” Olivia corrected “They made Noah do a shot and a line of blow every time they did and after about 10, they bet him he couldn’t shave my head in under a minute.”
“Ugh, don’t tell that story, it makes me sound like an asshole. And I’m still hung over.” Noah put his head in his hand.
“You’ve got nothing to apologize for. You did what it took to get them to invest with the fund. Plus, their father was so embarrassed with his sons’ behavior, old man said I could take any wig in the house.”
Bella found their story almost mundane. She’d heard worse from failsons of petro-trillionaires. There was one detail that shocked her though.
“Wait, I didn’t know you had to be bald to wear these” Bella responded. “Oh well, guess it’s a good thing someone else is gonna buy this old mop since I won’t even be able to wear it when my hair grows back.”
“Huh? what? No!” The publicist responded, perplexed “You’re the figurehead for a line of full-scalp human hair wigs. You need to wear them to promote the brand. It’s in your contract. That means no hair on your head. Ever.”
“Fuck I should have read that contract.”
“Well fortunately, we’re already in discussion to launch an exclusive line of hair removal products under your brand that are specifically intended for use with full scalp wigs. BellaSmooth is the current name we’re working with.”
“Oh yeah, what’s special and exclusive about it?”
“The packaging.”
“That’s all?”
“Also the price.”
A couple hours later, they were in New Dubai. Bella looked out the window of the car as it drove itself at 140 Miles Per Hour down the HOV lane of the 64-lane highway. It was hard to believe that just 20 years ago, this was a barren nature preserve in the Canadian north. They were headed to the Grand Forest Hotel downtown, a property operated by MarriottHilton PepsiCo, a company her family had a controlling interest in.
No expense was spared on the party. A popular North K-Pop group was entertaining the early arriving guests as they enjoyed their exquisite cocktails and ignored the appetizers made from endangered species. Bella glanced at the items for sale. A couple Monets, a mint condition Charizard, A Ferrari F40, a 5% stake in the London Jaguars, and then the final item, the hair. There were 12 names on the list. Every name on the list was someone she recognized. Influencers, models, athletes, and of course, herself.
She ran into one of the people on that list. Khaleesi Anderson, a former Olympic gymnast turned reality star turned lifestyle brand ambassador. Her trademark orange hair was styled in an intricate web of curls and braids that must have taken her assistants hours.
“Leesi! Fancy seeing you here!” Bella called out.
“I could say the same. Here I was thinking I’d be the featured item on the menu, and the world’s most famous head of hair shows up.” she laughed.
“How’d they convince you do do this?” Bella inquired.
“Oh, it’s been a long time coming.” she said, fidgeting with the nearly imperceptible layer of polymer matrix holding the hair to her head “These guys and gals have been trying to buy my scalp for years and I’ve always said no, but it was time. I’m almost 30 and the surrogate is due to deliver the triplets next month so I’m about to have a lot less free time. This way, I will go to my grave having never had a gray hair.”
“So you’re thinking about keeping it off long term? Maybe you can be a brand ambassador for me!”
“Yeah maybe. But it’s not up to me whether or not I grow my hair back. At high end auctions like this the buyer almost always purchases the exclusivity insurance.”
“Huh?”
“The people here are buying these scalps to be the crown jewels of their collection, and they want them to be one of a kind, so they almost always purchase the exclusivity insurance so they can have peace of mind that you won’t just grow another one and sell it to someone else in a few years. It’s a 25% premium on top of the sale and it goes entirely to you, minus the service fees and the cost of the procedure. You know Astrid Cho, from Star Wars episode 14? She told me that you want to make sure you schedule treatment yourself at a reputable laser hair removal center. The buyer will probably want to be there to watch, but if they tell you they want to use their own facilities, call your lawyer. Especially if its on their yacht.”
“Oh right, yeah, I heard about that.” Bella lied.
Three hours later, the opening items had been auctioned off and it was time to sell the scalps of the rich and famous to the wealthy and depraved. Bella was the Emcee for the rest of the evening. She read her lines off a hologram prompter, touting how BellaD would have stores in some of the world’s most expensive commercial real estate and schedule appointments to only the most exclusive customers. Each auction item was brought to the stage attached to its former owner. First up was adult content creator xXGothBabe420Xx, the fifth most popular streamer on NBCPornHub. She strutted on to the stage nude, wearing her trademark black bob and pubic hair shaped into the Anarchy symbol as the hologram behind her showed the certificate footage of her hair being ripped away. The winning bid was $36,500,000, plus the 25% exclusivity insurance. She feigned embarrassment as a stage hand ripped off her hair, eyebrows and bush for the last time and delivered to the table of a mining tycoon from Vladivostok, who waved the employee away and told him to pack it for shipping without even looking at the item he’d won.
Next up was Jaya Andrews, a respected journalist for the Amazon Post. She took the stage in a tailored business suit but the hologram behind her displayed her nude form to everyone in the room as her depilation was played on repeat, 30 feet tall. Some of the bidders let out a groan when she pledged to donate her share of the sale to those affected by the recent tsunami in Uruguay. The final bid for her scalp came in at 12 Million dollars, plus the insurance.
The next auction was for the scalp of Oscar nominated video game streamer PinkRhea69. If she’d won the Oscar, she would have gone later in the evening. She took the stage wearing nothing but long pink hair and massive pink nipple rings, which was the same uniform she wore during her Oscar nominated performance. A bidding war between two data mining heiresses brought the final price to $53,500,000 before insurance.
A movie star, three influencers, a disgraced former politician, two professional athletes, two recording artists and a famous female spree killer set to be executed tomorrow had their scalps auctioned off. Each time, the buyer purchased the insurance, even the last one. The penultimate auction was for the scalp of Khaleesi Anderson. She took to the stage in a silk kimono and dramatically tossed it behind her, revealing the long orange wisps under each arm and between her legs. After a brief pause for applause, Bella read the prompt and the auctioneer started taking bids. The bidding war lasted almost ten minutes, finally settling at an even 100 million dollars, plus another 25 million for insurance, to the third wife of an American AI mogul.
Finally, it was time. Bella gave the final sales pitch for her new luxury line and read the description of the final item of the night- herself. She looked back to see the hologram of herself, reading her auspicious serial number before the agonizing 3 minute process of ripping her hair out began. The auction couldn’t begin until the first playback of the certificate recording had finished, which only added to the eagerness of the gathered elites. Finally, the auctioneer started the bidding. It took less than a minute for her to eclipse the 100 million mark, and even less to pass 200 million. Past the 400 million mark, two Chinese trillionaires hastily and aggressively outbid each other. To them, half a billion for some hair was no more of an indulgence than an average person treating themselves to an avocado. It wasn’t until the 800 million mark that either of them even began to show hesitation. Finally, the bid settled at 880 million, and the other bidder smashed his plate of food on the floor and waved his hands to indicate he was done bidding as a team of waitstaff hurried to clean up his mess.
Bella was shocked. Even to her, 880 million was a lot of money. At a certain point in the auction, she realized that the insurance would be so prohibitively expensive that the winning bidder would probably opt out. Ten seconds after the bid became final, the winning bidder gave the indication that would not be the case.
