Larry smirked at the old man, who was now slumping in a nearby chair, seemingly asleep. But he wasn't really sleeping. He was in a trance state, ready to be fed his conditioning, which involved him making as much of the conditioning chemical as Larry needed. But that would have to wait a few moments. Larry was still working on Gloria Reynolds.
"Gloria?" he asked the stripper. "Can you still hear me?"
"Yes," she said.
Larry smiled. He knew that Gloria hated his guts and only worked for him because she had no choice. Well, that was about to change.
"Gloria, how do you feel about me?"
"I hate you. I despise everything about you. But I need you or else I won't be able to pay my bills."
"That's wrong, Gloria. You need me because you love me. You want to please me. Isn't that right?"
"No. I don't love you. I hate you."
"No, Gloria," he said, more firmly. "You love me."
"No."
Larry was getting frustrated. Why wasn't this working? He turned and looked at the sleeping old man, still dressed in his white lab coat. Perhaps he could shed some light on this. The old man was the one that usually did the conditioning, after all.
"Old man, can you hear me?" Larry asked, standing in front of him.
"Yes," he answered sleepily.
"Tell me how to successfully condition someone." He had tried it earlier on Destiny and it had worked, but for some reason, it wasn't working on Gloria.
"You have to lead their minds through your logic. Don't condition them against their will, condition them with their will. And take a few sessions to do it, to make sure it sticks. They have to believe that it's what they want to do, not what you want them to do."
"Hmm, thanks, old man."
"My name is ..." the old man began to say, but Larry cut him off.
"Just sleep, old man."
And the old man fell silent.
Larry stood in front of Gloria again, about to begin her conditioning (again), when suddenly ...
