Dark Erotic Fiction

 FIRST MOTHER SHAWNA

                This may be a shock to all, but we humans are not designed to live forever.  When Eastlake’s old slave barn caught fire this point was driven home.  The old overcrowded barn had been a warehouse that was converted to storing Persons of Limited Rights who had been convicted and converted by magistrate and were up for auction.  National Media Group had added cameras and additional lighting for good quality video.  The place was a drafty wooden cave and the electrical load was too much for the wiring.  The fire started when three electric chairs were powered up at the same time.  In a moment the slave barn was a smoldering ruin.  Unfortunately not all of the slaves died immediately.  The few survivors were, Goddess be praised, in deep shock from their burns and not feeling any pain—not yet.  The survivors were euthanized, a small mercy. 

            NMG owned those jail house cameras and made money from showing the screaming women die.  The slaves mostly succumbed to toxic smoke before the flames got them.  Eye witnesses ghoulishly recounted the keening wails of the damned, the smell of burned hair and roast pork, the Eastlake authorities running for their lives as the fire blazed out of control.  Those women died because they were trapped.  Slaves—remember?  Persons of limited rights: they were chained up in locked cages.  There was no working fire sprinkler system in the building.  It was an old World War Two warehouse that had been hastily refurbished when the caseload of conversions by magistrate exceeded the small jail facilities sometime in mid 2001.  The slave barn fire was just waiting to happen.  A total of 627 women and 3 men died because of the fire.  The men died when trapped in the collapsing building.  Fire fighters didn’t even try to rescue anybody until after the fire was out.  Persons of Limited Rights are not human.  There was no escaping for the women—slaves, remember?  Chained hand and foot and locked in cages so they couldn’t escape, only 17 survived long enough to be snuffed as unsalable.

            Too bad.  The Castleman Trust has been quietly running medical research programs.  It’s water under the bridge now and perhaps more merciful that the 17 badly-burned slaves were snuffed.

            County Commissioner Robert Logan-Childe was forced to house slaves in open cages on the fairgrounds.  Money for rebuilding wasn’t there because of irregularities with insurance—there wasn’t any on the old building, nor on the livestock.  Based on average auction prices, Eastlake County lost more than a half-million dollars in sales—and the federal government lost the same amount.

Olive Pit had a solution.

            “We’ve just finished production of ‘Executive Slave Prison’ and the set is usable as a holding pen,” Olive pointed out.  “We can donate the entire thing to the county and use it as a tax write-off.  We need to ask Mr. Wilson about doing that, but if we write up the business proposal he will see it our way.  The county can move in just as soon as Mr. Wilson okay’s it.”

            Ellis Wilson, Junior is the son of the late Ellis Wilson, the creator of the Ellisia theme park in Texas and the former studio head of Ellis Wilson Productions.  Master Ellis okayed the transfer—it was a tax liability and he didn’t need the facilities anymore.  Global Village Video Network and the Eastlake Media Technology College had installed a comprehensive video monitoring system—but it was old equipment which could be written off as well.  Marcus, one of the Castleman Trust attorneys, recommended that the video feeds be sold by the county.  Global Village Video Network didn’t need them for our target audience—at least not most of the feeds—but it was right up NMG’s alley.  Besides, it brought the Castleman Trust favorable publicity.

            Dear Peter was off playing soldier in Georgia with several Pearls from Military Female Slave Detachment 46 and didn’t find out about the transfer immediately.  It wasn’t necessary to tell Peter because he reorganized the Castleman Trust so that we Pearls ran it.  There were free citizens on the Board of Directors for oversight and Peter was important as inspiration, for strategic guidance and that sort of thing—but Pearls run the Castleman Trust.  Persons of Limited Rights built the new Eastlake County Slave Barn, we Pearls came up with the idea to donate it to the county and we Castleman Trust Pearls negotiated some sweet concessions.

            Then men took over the slave barn.

NEVILLE CHAMPION

                Camp Cheer was such a resounding success that the professional Eastlake Bombers minor-league football team announced that its cheer squad would be all slave.  No, that’s not accurate—the Bombers were taking applications for their cheer squad, but they called them “pearls.”  Defensive Enslavement Volunteers was about to spawn a new daughter, a corporation called Professional Persons of Limited Rights, Limited.  This was to be a new organization devoted to the professional woman.  She didn’t really need DEFENSIVE enslavement, but did need management—and protection.  Olive Pitt helped draft the mission statement even though Olive was in the eugenics program and not available to join the professionals, not yet.

                Our first customers were the cheer squad for the Eastlake Bombers.  What a bitchy, back-biting collection of absolute assholes!  They were making catty remarks to each other, all 30 finalists.  The Bombers agreed that only those women who were willing to volunteer for conversion and be owned by PPLR would be considered for the cheer squad.  Tammy and her cheer squad had improved considerably since those days when they had rashly volunteered for conversion—in all possible ways.  Tammie and Debbie had PRESENCE when before they were merely noticeable. 

                Professional cheer squads are athletic teams.  I was swarmed by 60 applicants.  Only one in ten would be on the Eastlake Bombers Cheer Squad.  I told the candidates that before they began.

                “These are the rules.  If you want a chance at being selected you will immediately disrobe and submit to the slave screening.  The Bombers have standards.  You are here because you passed the initial checks.  Now you have to become Persons of Limited Rights.  Those of you who succeed will be bussed down to the bar BQ Ranch for six weeks of intense training.”  If anything, the cheerleader training was going to be rougher than the military training given to the Female Military Slave Detachment 46, “Remember that this is a prerequisite—that you must measure up as a Castleman Trust Pearl before we allow you to train and then try to make the team.  Your training will be in presentation, in sexual pleasure, even in taking a whipping without screaming.  You are entertainment for the masses.  You will wear only sexy clothing—or nothing.  When your team wins, you will have an orgy with the entire team.  When your team loses, you will be punished for their failures. 

                “Those of you who fail to make the cheer squad will be evaluated for other professional positions.  Just because you weren’t chosen for the Eastlake Bombers Cheer Squad doesn’t mean that your life is over.  Any questions?”

                “Yes,” one woman had already ripped off her dress—she wore only a simple slave tunic and beach sandals.  “When can we meet Peter Castleman?”

                “He’s in Georgia training to become a Ranger,” I said.  Technically he was going through Airborne School.  Then he’d go to the Ranger School. He took 24 military slaves with him, but he was in for three months of brutality that even Pearls didn’t normally endure.  Remember that most Persons of Limited Rights are actually Slaves in Name Only.  “His name is Peter Foster.  If he gets a weekend pass Robin will fly him home.  You will see him soon enough.  I think he just became a Bomber’s fan.”

                There was much grumbling as the new Pearls shed their clothing and their free women status.  The program was set for 10 to 25 years: the Professional Person of Limited Rights would be enslaved for a minimum of 120 months and a maximum of 25 years before manumission.  The cheer squad would be replaced in a few years by fresh meat—new faces.  That didn’t mean that the cheer squad would become barbecue!  They’d be trained in other careers when their bodies aged.  I didn’t believe that they’d still look young and athletic and sexy in 25 years, but Peter did.  Peter claimed that they could be cheerleaders for ten or more years.  Peter believed what Lana told him.

                The 60-some women had already been screened for enslavement.  This was their final exam, so to speak.  As all of them had volunteered for conversion, they were slaves in all but name right now.  Any woman who changed her mind and walked out would be enslaved out of sight of the others—and out of that cheer squad program.  They had volunteered and there was no backing out. 

                Angela had been through Ranger School already, so she and a selected team of MFS-46 were handling the initial training—obedience training.  Angela shouted “Any of you stupid cunts start a fight and you will be dropped out of the program.  Get your fucking stinky rags off your scummy bodies and line up right now!

                “Neville, dear,” Angela’s command voice became silky smooth—I got hard just listening to her, “would you please read the enslavement speech to these girls?”

                I informed them that they were now Persons of Limited Rights and required to obey.  They were subject to a strict discipline code with sanctions including dismissal from the program—and being snuffed for things like killing another Pearl or assaulting a free citizen without just cause.  Being dismissed from the program put them in a general slave status.  The room was quiet when I finished until Angela and her team of slave soldiers went into their drill sergeant savage attack Doberman act and snarled at the terrified new slaves.  In seconds all of them were lined up for their RFID chip insertion.  It had been decided by Summer that these girls needed to experience pain—so the chip insertion was done without benefit of painkillers.  Screaming and sobbing, the new pearls were rushed naked across a parking lot lined with paparazzi.  The gauntlet of flashing cameras was intended to humiliate, not impede.  All made it into the two waiting buses and their new life.

                I rode in air conditioned comfort in an RV at the back of our mini convoy to Cougar County.  The new Pearls were cooped up in barely-ventilated misery.  On the way down the new Pearls were indoctrinated.  It was a two-hour trip.  I was amazed again that none had dropped out yet.

                “Professional cheerleaders are not your run-of –the-mill house pets,” Summer had told me.  “They have come up through a school of hard knocks that few other women survive.  These are tough cookies—almost as tough as the old street whores.  They’ve survived three years living under the White Slave Act of 2000 without being converted—until now.  They came into this with their eyes open.  You are going to have the tough job—you will be selecting six of those women out of ten times that number to be the Eastlake Bomber’s Cheer Squad.  They all deserve that honor.  As for the rest, well…”

                “We have to establish the pecking order early,” Angela said.  “Give these women any excuse to think that they are in control and they will foul up.  Every one of them must instinctively submit to you—no other option.  They’re man eaters.  Their every waking thought and their every sleeping dream must be ‘how can I please my master?’  Ask me about a purpose in life.  Go ahead—ask!”

                I did.  Angela told me how her life had been the Army until she was plucked from the Ranger School graduation ceremony and given a summary court martial along with the original squad of MFS-46.  She was sent to the Disciplinary Barracks at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas and subjected to weeks of slave training before Peter took command of MFS-46. 

                “Immediately I realized that my life was not over.  I found out that my enslavement was legal—but I hadn’t done anything wrong.  The Army just sheep-dipped me.”

                “Sheep dipped?”

                “They’ll do that to Peter, soon.  Sever any connection with the official military so that his actions will be deniable.  The Army chose me to be more than a company commander.  All this other stuff that I’m doing as a Pearl is just gravy—once I got used to the idea of being owned totally by a man.  I had been conditioned to obey.  Peter knows how to command.  I’m the most qualified Pearl to run the cheer squad program—at least in the initial phase.  Then it is up to Courtney’s Camp Cheer to run a competition.”

                The trip ended too soon from my point of view because I had been comfortably napping.  The new Pearls were run through a hasty grooming—all of their body hair was permanently removed and they were scheduled for necessary cosmetic surgery.  Half had breast implants.  During the next few weeks those would be replaced—if necessary.  All were in top notch physical condition—naturally—but they could be improved.  As slaves, they had no right to say ‘no.’ They would be modified.  One modification was sterilization implants.  The cheer squad would have no down times due to menstruation—they would be available for sex at all times.  Pulling a train with the entire offensive squad could result in unwanted pregnancy—but not with these women.  The women were going to spend the next several weeks in medical and in sex training. 

                And as the chief sex tester for the Castleman Trust I was going to help them.  There were more than sixty new women and so little time.  Even us studs need rest. 

                “Master, dear,” Martha was my first slave, rescued from Hills Fine Meats by Peter Foster, ”How are you going to handle 63 women at once?”

                “I don’t have to.  I only need to have to personally test the finalists.”

                The first slaves screamed as they endured their first whippings as slaves.  It was to be their life for the next quarter century.  If they survived, that is. 

PETER J. FOSTER

I was getting very busy and didn’t pay attention to the news.  Former President Carson had died.  I found out when Governor Rush brought a new girl to the Bar BQ Ranch.

                “Her name was Ruth Rush and she’s my grand niece,” the governor of Texas told me.  “My nephew’s girl.  Her slave name is Freckles and she really fouled up—she trusted the wrong guy and wound up a slave.  She was bought by Jefferson E. Carson and was the latest in a string of redheaded snuff muffins—she was Freckles Number 22.  Freckles was tied to a Jessica 3000 and her ordeal was just beginning when the ex-president began gasping for air.  Freckles, in your own words, what happened next?”

                Freckles described how Jefferson Carson screamed about being unable to breathe—shortly before spewing his dinner all over Freckles and the Jessica automatic spit-roaster and his sound-proofed dungeon.  His face turned purple and he collapsed clutching his left shoulder.  Freckles spent the next thirteen hours on the Jessica until the former president’s Secret Service detail used the spare key to check up on the late Jefferson E. Carson. 

                “She’s traumatized,” Governor Rush’s understatement made me chuckle.  “I was barely able to buy her.  She’s been reported as ‘disposed of’ in the official report. The president died from an aortic aneurysm.  Your girl Summer is the finest slave psychologist in the USA.”

                It’s hard to keep a straight face when someone makes inadvertent but fitting puns.  Summer was a slave who specialized in slave mental health.  She was also my own mental health care provider.

                “There are a few political problems,” Governor Rush told me.  “Freckles will have to remain enslaved until everything dies down.  Your program is ideal.  She can slip unnoticed back into life as a free woman when your organization deems it safe.  When Ruth is ready, IF she is ever ready for freedom, I can trust Peter Foster to do the right thing.”

                “Peter Foster?” Freckles asked.  “I thought you were Peter Castleman.” 

                That’s how Freckles joined my retinue of pearls. 

HATTIE MESSER

I was sick—very sick.  Shawna Murphy was at my bedside and she told me that I was going to be her replacement as first mother or something.  My name is Hattie Messer and I was dying from cancer.  My breasts had tumors in them and the cancer had spread.  Meg and Peg were not yet out of high school.  I had no money, only a few things in a rented trailer home.  I had just lost my job for being sick and I had maxed out my credit cards, all $1500 that they’d advance me.  I had a few painkillers left—and enough over-the-counter sleeping pills to never wake up again.  The Castleman Trust Show looked too good to be true, but there were a few all-slave households in the Hollywood Courtyard trailer park—yes, I said it—trailer park!  I was trailer trash.  The all-slave households told me that Neville was a very good guy and the Castleman Trust Show didn’t tell all the good things.  They did tell me the drawbacks—being a slave meant not having a vote, meant belonging to someone else, meant having to obey them.  I Knew them because my workplace was replacing free women with slaves contracted from the Castleman Trust.  On this side of the railroad tracks being a slave was better than being a free woman.

                So I spent the last of my cash getting three notarized forms to enslave Meg, Peg and myself.  I also signed over the last of our worldly goods.  When I took the pee test I didn’t pass because of my pain pills.  There wasn’t an exemption back then for prescription medications, so I wasn’t eligible to volunteer.  I could have tried seeing a judge or breaking the law, but that would take at least a full week—a week without pain medication.  Neville, the dear, bought me some more pain killers and did what was necessary to PPC me.  At the time I was grateful—but at the time I didn’t have a clue about how much Neville did for me. 

                “Replacement?”

                “Yes.  I am going to die on Halloween next year.  The Castleman Trust has some rules so that a select group of women are not sponging off the program.”  Shawna explained about the eugenics program—and I let out the breath I was holding.  My babies were safe!  They weren’t part of that program, thank the Goddess.  But Shawna was and she was going to die for two reasons—she volunteered for the eugenics program knowing that she couldn’t have children and would not have ten years before her 50^th birthday.  My jaw hit the floor as she explained her background, and her religion.  “Ten years ago I had breast cancer too.  Aren’t my breasts pretty?  The technology was not legal at the time, but I had the cancer removed.  Just like yours.  In a month you’ll be fully recovered and your breasts can grow again.  You’ll have to be monitored for the rest of your life because something might still go wrong.  I have faith that the Goddess won’t let anything go wrong with your treatments.  You’ll take over as First Mother for the next twenty or thirty years and then you’ll have Peter snuff you.”

                “But I don’t know anything about religion!”

                “You have time to learn.  You won’t be facing this alone.  Somebody will have to speak for the Goddess and that would be you.”

                Me?  It was easier to believe that Shawna had lost her marbles.  There are a lot of crazy women in this world.  Slavery makes them more crazy.  Shawna took my bandages off.  I was afraid to look, afraid of what I would see.  Surgery had been just two weeks ago.  My old saggy tits had been a C or D cup—now I had a flat chest.  I expected that.  I didn’t expect that I would have nipples.  Sensitive nipples.

                “Laser surgery,” Shawna told me.  “Lana can explain it better, but the very fine cuts a laser is capable of and micro-surgery techniques allowed the surgical team to remove most of the cancer and spare your nipples.  Lana connected up your nerves and they had only a fraction of a millimeter to grow, so you should be feeling this.”

                I was.  I couldn’t see any scars.  I didn’t feel them.  Of course I was still doped up.  The medical people were weaning me off of pain killers.  I was up and about more, though I still got tired fast.  Shawna told me I’d be strong again, that the gene therapy was hunting down stray cancer cells and killing them.

                “Why isn’t this being used on free people?” I asked.

                “It will be, once we’ve had enough clinical trials on Persons of Limited Rights.  Now don’t tell Peter about this because the poor boy lost his father two years ago.  Peter doesn’t have to know that this treatment has been around since the 1950’s, based on things the Nazis did.  Nobody wanted to be connected with the Nazis, so millions died from cancer.  Peter might not approve of the source,” Shawna frowned, “and he would also be upset that his father might have been saved.  Just between us girls, George Foster had been treated until the treatments didn’t work anymore.  You are not really cured of your cancer.  All we can do is keep treating it.  You’ll always have cancer.  We will just reduce it so that you won’t know that you have cancer.  Nor will anybody else.  We had to remove several of your internal organs.  Your breasts can be as big as mine—but Peter likes small tits.  You have an AAA right now.  I think that an A-cup will be enough, but if you want bigger, we can make them bigger.  But think small for a while.  You are going to be naked most of the time.”

                “I noticed that I still have my hair.  I mean my scalp hair.  I thought that chemotherapy would cause it all to fall out.”

                “We didn’t use chemotherapy.”

                Shawna and I talked more about what was expected of a First Mother.  One thing I needed was empathy.  I had to listen with my heart.  I also had to learn how to have sex—and how to make love.  Shawna let me know that I was a “dead fuck”—her exact words.  I confess—I cried.  Shawna let me know that Neville cared about me and my daughters.  I knew that I would have been dead if Neville hadn’t gotten me enslaved.  So many younger, prettier women get enslaved to die.  I was enslaved so that I could live.  I don’t know how much longer I have, but the medical people need me to live at least ten more years to prove that the gene therapy for cancer works.  Cancer clinics use the five year survival standard.

                “Here’s a dirty little secret,” Lana told Shawna and me.  “Most of the time after cancer is discovered, the patient can live another five or ten years.  Most of the time.  Just treat the symptoms and keep the patient alive and the doctor can pretend to have saved the patient.  When the patient died prior to the five year mark, the script calls for the doctor to wring his hands an moan that the patient didn’t see the doctor soon enough! Get real!  Here we don’t completely cure cancer—humans are born with several cancers.  It is a life-long condition.  Cancer becomes life-threatening when it gets out of control.”

                Shawna said that I was going to be her shadow for the rest of her life.  I was with my daughters almost every night—and frequently was with them in the daytime.  I’m still not used to being naked, but everybody here is.  I called Peter Foster “Mr. Castleman” by mistake—it seems to be a common mistake.  Meg told me that she was going to become a doctor.  Peg wanted to study law under a slave lawyer named Mercy.  I got to meet Mercy and heard her sad story of drug addiction destroying her life and career.  She looks good now, but I saw the photos of when she was converted.  Then there was a cop—not a slave, but an officer of the Child Welfare and Protection Agency, Caroline Umbermort.  I was really frightened the first time because I still feel guilty about my girls.  The Child Welfare and Protection Agency has jurisdiction over the children of Oklahoma until their 21^st birthday—not the 18^th like everybody thinks.  That is why parents can enslave their own daughters until age 21.  Oh, the ‘child’ can be tried as an adult for certain crimes as young as age 12—but for girls age 16 or older they are always tried as adults.  Otherwise they couldn’t be converted by magistrate for their crimes.  It is against the law to covert children to ‘persons of limited rights’ status. 

                My two daughters were going to have to study hard.  They didn’t make very good grades in school—mostly C’s, one or two B’s and several D’s.  I didn’t want to hurt their feelings, but I didn’t think that Meg was going to do more than change bed pans.  Peg write a legal paper?  She’s my beloved daughter but I didn’t want to be HER client.  They did seem to pay more attention to their school work than when they were free.  Of course, there was the punishment when they didn’t do the school work they were supposed to.

                Oh, I was back in school myself.  It seems like a waste of time because I’m going to die from cancer.  Yes, Lana told me that few people actually DIE from cancer—they die from other things.  But sometimes cancer causes those other things that kill people.  Shawna wanted me to learn to read and write better.  What else do I have to do except wait to die?  Then there is the sex training. 

                Persons of Limited Rights are domestic animals—not human beings, not in the legal sense.  This has virtually displaced free women in the sex industries because the only licensing required for a sex slave brothel is a business license—and periodic health inspections.  Prior to the White Slave Act of 2000 the only state that had legal brothels was Nevada.  The other states had illegal brothels.  Reverend Wright was a prominent member of the “Over My Cold Dead Body” opposition to legalizing prostitution in Oklahoma.  The special entertainment licenses brought in revenue and the Person of Limited Rights wasn’t considered human—so everybody was happy.  Everybody but the slave prostitute.  She didn’t count—she wasn’t human.

                Neville told me that most of the prostitutes were lousy lays.

                “Ignorance and apathy,” Neville told the class.  “They don’t know how to fuck and they don’t care.  There are some talented ladies in those brothels, but they’re only a small percentage.  Of course they don’t care.  They have only beatings for incentive.  Sometimes they are fed, sometimes they are starved to death.  Worse, they are usually not allowed to enjoy themselves.  They may have to fake an organism—but can’t have one.  They get punished for having orgasms.  Sometimes the brothel will take a woman who faked an orgasm and hang her.  Then they’ll take another woman who faked her orgasm and spit her for faking it.  Is that any way to run a railroad?”

                The first lesson was in trust, and the second was to enjoy what our bodies could do for us.  I was hesitant about making love to my own daughters—but we are not legally human beings any more. Mercy told us that slaves have freedoms denied to free citizens.  Freedoms that included obedience, public nudity and all the sex anyone could want.  As slaves, we mothers could be as physically affectionate with our adult children as the free people wanted.  It was quite common to have mother and daughter slave couples—or sisters.  It wasn’t as if we women were going to get each other pregnant or something!  I was reluctant to touch my daughters.  I was acting as if I were still a free citizen.  I cheated myself and my daughters of the pleasures that we were entitled to as slaves. 

                “Mom, you are so pretty now!” Peg told me.

                “They cured your cancer?” Meg ran her hands over my naked breasts.  “I don’t feel any scars.  There’s no lumps either.  Can you feel this?”

                Could I!  Meg was gently rolling my nipple between thumb and first two fingers—right out of the sex manual.  Peg kissed my other nipple.

                “I’ve been wanting to do that for years, Mom,” Peg said.  “Meg and I have been taking care of each other.  All the girls do now, but Meg is gentle.  Some girls get too rough!”

                I never guessed that my daughters were that way!  I brought it up with Summer, the slave psychologist.  She was a psychologist and a slave and most of her patients were slaves—oh, that’s not what I mean!  I asked about turning lesbian.  She laughed.

                “I’m sorry, honey, but slaves can’t be lesbians.  We can’t be anything except slaves.  Slaves take any pleasure that they can get.  Besides, as a slave you are free to express love to anybody.  Most of the world is female.”

                “Summer, don’t pour a pound of manure in my hand and tell me it’s sugar!”

                Summer giggled and kissed me.  I felt so confused.

                “Dear, you’ve met Peter’s other slave wives.  His sister Penny?  Susan?  Heather?  Jane?  Me?  I’ve got news for you.  We all love Peter with all of our hearts.  Who would you want to have sex with first of all?”

                “Neville,” I said without hesitation.
                “Why?”

                “Well, because he’s good—and because I owe him.”

                “Good reasons.  Now tell me the people you’ve made love to.”  I soon figured out that most of the people I made love to were women.  “Why do you like them?”

                “They are available,” I said.  “They’re clean, they’re considerate—“

                “So you make love to people and not to sexes.”

                “Summer,” I sighed, “you are pouring manure on me again.”

                “Tough audience,” Summer muttered.  “That’s why Shawna chose you as her successor.  You worry about your daughters being lesbians.  According to the clinical classification charts, Peter’s girls—including me—are lesbians.  Those charts are obsolete of course, written during the 1960’s. We prefer having sex with Peter, but if it is just a boy/girl thing, we’ll pick girls every time.  There’s nothing wrong with that.  Homosexuality is a valid choice for free women—safer, too.  Homosexual women don’t get PPC’d in this state.  We even have homosexual marriages now.  You’re not prejudiced, are you?”

                I laughed.

                “So what if I am.  I’m a slave.  My opinion doesn’t matter.”

                “Bingo!”

                Then I got it.  A slave’s sexual preferences were unimportant.  The Castleman Trust under Peter’s leadership worked hard to make us Pearls happy.  Sexual affection was an important aspect of our happiness because sex was our main avenue of affection.  It wasn’t as if we had anything else to give each other! 

                “As First Mother, you will be one of the voices in Peter’s ear.  Officially a pearl’s opinion doesn’t matter.  Peter listens to everyone because that is how he learns things.  It also makes him a great lover.  You have those qualities, too.”

                I don’t know what the future will bring.  The future hasn’t been written yet.  These past few weeks have been difficult.  I didn’t expect slavery to be a grand adventure, but it is. 

The doorbell rang.  He walked over and opened the door and invited his caller inside.  He left the door open, but didn’t call any attention to it.  He led the caller over to where his wife was seated and spoke to her.  “Jenna, this is James.  He’s a slaver.  He needs to talk to you.”  Jenna looked up with a great deal of fear in her eyes.

“Jenna Wolfbridge, I have a valid request for enslavement for you.  Your recent medical appointment shows that you are not pregnant, and your husband has fulfilled all other requirements, so as of this time you are a person of limited rights.”

Jenna opened her mouth to protest, but Henry spoke before her.  “Jenna, don’t make it worse.  You are now a slave.  If you make a fuss, those who will be dealing with you will use harsh methods to get you to be quiet and cooperate.”  He turned to the door.  “Come on in.”  Jillian, of Jillian’s Slave Training Studio, walked inside.  She was fully dressed, but Henry recognized her.  “Hello.  I didn’t expect the boss to come out for this.”

“I like to participate in all the activities of the studio, to keep my hand in it.  This one sounded interesting.  Thank you for the business.”  She turned to Jenna.  “Hello.  I’m Jillian, of Jillian’s Slave Training Studio, and I’ve been engaged to get you accustomed to your new circumstances.  I’ll take you to the studio, where you’ll be spending some time learning your new role and responsibilities.  If you behave, you will be transported there in your clothes.  Stand up and James here will handcuff you for your trip.”

Jenna rose unsteadily.  James pivoted her by grabbing her shoulder, then cuffed her quickly and efficiently.  After he finished, he turned and left.  Jenna seemed to take a moment to clear her head, then said, “Henry, this is ridiculous.  Get these off of me and we’ll work this out.”

“No, Jenna, we’ll leave them on and you will go with Jillian to her studio for some training.  The amount of time you spend there depends on you.  It could be a few days;  it could be a few weeks.  I suggest you cooperate.  The longer you spend there, the harder it gets.”

“I’m your wife!  You shouldn’t enslave me!”

“You might as well not be my wife right now.  We haven’t had marital relations for over a year.  That’s one thing that slavery will fix, and that Jillian will be able to help you understand.  Now go with her, and be a good little slave, or you will suffer the consequences.”

Jenna took a big breath, apparently to help in the yelling she planned to do, when Jillian slapped her in the face.  “Calm down, Jenna, unless you want to be gagged, ankle-cuffed, stripped, and hauled out of here nude in front of the whole neighborhood.  You have one chance to do this the easy way, and you are about to blow it.  Now shut up and come with me.”  Jenna shut up.  She was stunned by the announcement of her enslavement, being handcuffed, and being slapped.  Jillian grabbed her by the upper arm and towed her out of the house.  As they left, Jillian said, “I’ll call you when the assessment is done, probably tomorrow.”

“No hurry.”

Jillian steered the silent Jenna to her car, opened the passenger door, and helped Jenna inside.  Unless the observer was close by or especially perceptive, they would not have noticed the handcuffs.  Jillian bent down and snapped leg cuffs onto Jenna’s ankles.  “These are attached to the seat.  They will keep you from interfering with my driving.  Some slave transporters have a slave spike instead of an air bag.  That’s a device that spears the body in the passenger seat if the driver’s air bag goes off.  I don’t like them, but that’s the kind of thing you need to get ready to accept, slave.”  Jillian belted Jenna into the seat and closed the car door.  She drove toward the training studio in silence, waiting for the inevitable bursting of the dam of questions or vitriol that would come from a new slave.  It arrived in a burst of tears accompanied by loud sobbing.  The first intelligible words that she produced were “Why?  Why did he enslave me?  What’s going to happen to me?”

When she quieted down, Jillian spoke calmly.  “He enslaved you because you cut him off from sex and bitched at him.  He thought you were having an affair.  Were you?”

Jenna took a deep breath and said, “No, but I was thinking about it.”

“Why did you stop having sex?”

“I got bored, and he wanted it too often.”

“Well, you better not get bored again.  He’ll bore you out whenever he wants.  What will happen to you over the next few weeks is some training at my studio, then returning to your husband’s home as his slave.  He will make a decision after a while about whether to keep you.  Surely you knew he could enslave you?”

“I never thought he would.  He will get rid of me?”

“He might.  You had better please him.  He is rather angry right now, but he took my advice.  Your stay at the studio will be for training and attitude adjustment, not punishment for what you have been doing — and not doing.  Please note that he can always revisit that decision later and punish you as much as he thinks necessary.”

Jenna sat quietly, tears flowing, for a while, then said, “If he doesn’t keep me, then what?”

“He is going to rent a slave from a company I know.  I helped him choose the slave.  I expect he will purchase her regardless of whether he keeps you, so you will have company, and won’t have to be fucked all the time, if that’s your problem.  If he gets rid of you, I doubt he will sell you to a meat company;  most men that would do that would do it right away and not waste money on a slave trainer like me.  He might sell you to a general slave dealer, or to a suck bar.  I know several that wouldn’t be too bad a place to end up.”

“A suck bar?  Where they choke you to death while you suck cocks?  That would be hell!”

“One of those bars would be, briefly.  There are more humane places that don’t kill their suckers, but just abuse them.  Believe me, there are far worse places to be a slave than the better suck bars.”

Jenna shuddered.  She stayed quiet the rest of the way to the studio.  When they arrived, Jillian parked in her private garage and closed the door.  She got Jenna out of the car and led her into the studio.  They stopped for a short time and looked at the activities going on.  Several women were being whipped;  others were engaged in sex with each other.  A few were being instructed in dealing with bondage.  Jillian said, “Welcome to the studio.  Come over here.”  She led Jenna to a post with a heavy iron collar on a chain.  She picked up the collar and put it around Jenna’s neck, then locked it on.  After that, she took off Jenna’s handcuffs and said, “Strip.  Put your clothes in the basket.  Someone will be by in a while to get you, and you’d better be naked when they get here.” 

Jenna stood still as Jillian walked away.  She shook in fear and considered the position she was in — a slave in a slave trainer’s clutches, fastened to a pole by a chain and a heavy iron collar.  She finally took action on her orders and removed her clothing.  She folded it and put it in the basket.  She could barely reach it;  the chain wasn’t very long.  Almost immediately after she finished a blonde slave showed up and said, “So, slave, are you ready for some training?”  Jenna stood there tongue-tied.  The blonde laughed and spun Jenna around to handcuff her.  “You’ll be spending a lot of time in handcuffs, so you’d better get used to it.”  When the cuffs were on, the blonde produced a key from her collar and unlocked Jenna’s collar.  “I’m Brianna, your controller.  Come along.  First stop is a good whipping.”

Where did my daughter go now?

Originally uploaded by muffin421

“Blow me slave”

“Here master?”

“Yes, of course here. That what I said isn’t it. Or would
rather I find a Jessica 2000 for you to ride?”

“But that’s my dad over there.”

“He signed you over to me on our wedding day. He knows you are a slave, and he knows what I like. It’s up to you. Blow me or talk to Jessica. You have 10 seconds to decide.”

Neville Champion

                I had a call to see the woman at an address in the middle class Eastlake Suburb of Hollywood.  That’s right, Hollywood!  Okay—the place was a trailer court and not a real suburb.  But Mrs. Messer called the right number for a two-woman pick-up.  Mrs. Hattie Messer’s twin daughters Meg and Peg were naked and sniffling when I arrived.  Mrs. Messer had the correct notarized forms, four of them.  Two were Conversion by Family Member forms for Meg and Peg.  One was an assignment of her remaining property to the Castleman Trust.  The last one Mrs. Messer held onto.

                “Mr. Champion, I have cancer,” Mrs. Messer said.  “I know that once I volunteer for conversion that you will probably snuff me.  I want my daughters to complete their education.  The Castleman Trust Show is my best bet.  I wish I could live to see my grandchildren, but this is the best I can do.  I don’t want my daughters to wind up in a brothel or working as farm animals, winding up on someone’s dinner plate.  The doctor gave me six months if I undergo treatment and three months without.  I’m not worth much.”

                “Peter doesn’t abandon people, not even pearls.”

                “Pearls?”

                “Persons of limited rights.  PLR is pronounced ‘pearl’ by Ginger of the GVVN.  That’s Global Village Video Network.  Okay, it only covers a five-state area right now, but it’s growing.” I glanced at the sniffling daughters.  “Let me get you an appointment with our doctors and we’ll see what we can do.  If the regular doctors only promised you six months the doctors at the Bar BQ Ranch may be able to do more.  As a person of limited rights, you can be given experimental treatments that could extend your life—and Peter won’t let you suffer.  You may be drugged to the gills for any pain.”

                “I don’t have money for more than a few pain pills,” Mrs. Messer said.

                “I see.  You were going to kill yourself.”  Both daughters wailed.  “Girls, stifle!  I have a better future.  It may be more painful.  Every victory over cancer brings us that much closer to defeating it forever.  It won’t be easy, but you will not die in vain.  Who knows, we might even give you another ten years.  Your daughters still need you and for those two reasons Peter Foster would authorize the funding to treat your illness.  Do you need a moment or can I draw urine samples?”

                Mrs. Messer’s urine sample came out hot.  She was on pain killers.  The daughters were not pregnant or on drugs and so I converted them.  Then I called Peter.  A quick discussion, and Peter told me that he’d get back to me.

                “There are three types of conversions,” I told Mrs. Messer.  “You tried to volunteer, but voluntary conversions must pass the drug and pregnancy screen.  Conversion by family member is out because your husband is dead and you are over 21—otherwise only the pregnancy test would .  If you violate a law, even a minor one, you can be converted by magistrate.  I might even be able to get you in to see a judge and have him exempt your drug screen because you are taking prescription drugs.”

                “I’m out of them,” Mrs. Messer said.  “I’ve only got these.  I don’t have the money for the refills.”

                “I’ll take care of that, Mrs. Messer.  Get the two new pearls dressed because it is too damned cold.  I have a solution, if you can put up with me, I’d like to PPC you.  I need to make love to you three times in the next three days and on film.  Matter of fact, I have a professional film studio.  Can you do that?  If yes, then as long as you don’t test pregnant I can convert you.”

                “You’d do that for me?”

                “For you and for your daughters.  I said that they still need you.”  I shook my head. “Let’s get your medicine so you don’t have to suffer.  Then I’ll take you home to my slave wives.”

                “You have slave wives?”

                I told her about Queenie, Rachel and Martha.  “They totally buy into the Castleman Trust ideal.  Queenie and Rachel volunteered for conversion.  Martha was rescued from Hills Fine Meats because Peter had a contract to buy all women who hadn’t reached voting age—to give them a second chance.  I’m ashamed of it, but after Peter saved my sister life, I attacked him.”

                “Your sister is your slave-wife?” Mrs. Messer asked.

                “It’s more complicated than that.  For reasons of genetic diversity, most of the slave wives in the various Castleman Trust branches will have other men’s babies.  I’m not able to produce anything but girls, myself, so Peter is helping out by giving me a son or two.  Besides, slave girls have a high sex drive.  I’m actually glad that Peter helps out from time to time.  It really makes sex with my slave-wives better.  I’m a certified sex skill tester as are my three slave wives.” I was babbling.  “We can have the new paperwork done and you can be converted in three days.  It may take a week or more to see the judge.  Or you can spend a few days in jail.  PPC is the most gentle way to convert you.  Besides, I’m a good lover.  Do you want to give me a chance?”

                Mrs. Messer wasn’t a spring chicken.  She was slightly overweight and in poor shape.  All her parts worked okay, even though there was a large lump in her left breast.  Mrs. Messer’s response was slow because she was doped up.  The first thing we did was shave her—it made for better pictures when I penetrated her pussy with my cock.  Mrs. Messer’s vaginal muscles were not conditioned—but I normally had sex with professional-quality lovers.  A quick shower and Meg and Peg were shaved by Queenie.  I was going to have my hands full.

                The next day I made love to Mrs. Messer again.  Rachel had been training Mrs. Messer as much as she could.  Yes, Mrs. Hattie Messer was still a free woman, but she was already undergoing medical tests in preparation for treatment.  Mrs. Messer blushed when she saw the videos of her and I making love.

                “Do my daughters have to watch?” she asked.

                “They’re slaves, Mrs. Messer.”

                “Please, Hattie.  I will be a slave myself in a short time.”

                “Tomorrow is your last chance to back out,” I told her.  “Your daughters need you.  Ah, Dr. Granger!”

                “Clear the room except for Mrs. Messer and Mr. Champion.”

                Meg and Peg wanted to stay—but they were slaves now.  Dr. Granger explained that Mrs. Messer had aggressive inflammatory breast cancer and that without treatment she would be lucky to be alive in three weeks. 

                “With treatment we might be able to extend your life.  Lana has some genetic medicine she is using experimentally, but that will mean that we must start as soon as possible.  So just after midnight Neville will have to penetrate you again for the camera and we can enslave you by 12:15.”

                “Okay.  Whatever it takes.”

                “We’ll have you in surgery the first thing in the morning, around eight.”

                “Please take good care of my daughters.”

                On January 15^th at 12:15 in the morning Mrs. Hattie Messer became the pearl called Hattie.  She was prepped for surgery and her gene therapy and was drugged and under the knife at precisely eight that morning.  By eleven she was in the recovery room.  Hattie woke up at noon but was feeling no pain.  Or the next week Hattie hovered between life and death, mutilated by surgical removal of both breasts.  Medicine is sometimes more brutal than the worse torture.  On January 26^th Hattie was feeling better, much better.  She still had cancer cells throughout her body, but the gene therapy and other drugs were working.  Hattie was able to sit in a wheel chair and chat with her two daughters for a while.

                “We didn’t get it all,” Dr. Granger told her, “but we slowed things down.  Every day is a gift now.  You are advancing medical science.  How do you feel?”

                “There’s no pain now.  My breasts don’t hurt anymore.  You took out my ovaries, too?”

                “Had to.  You are on hormone replacement therapy.  We hope that you can get back into the game soon, but you realize that you will never be well.  All we can do is keep treating you until you are too sick to do anything.”

                “So what can I do now?  I don’t want to be a burden.”

                “Hattie, you are doing two things. You are helping to defeat cancer and your daughters still need you.  If you feel up to it, we need you to help out the teachers.”

                Hattie was a hero in the fight against disease.  Her sacrifice helped everyone.  Hattie knew that sooner or later she’d be cremated at the Bar BQ Ranch.  The former Mrs. Messer took each day one at a time—and she was the first woman in the Castleman Trust to convert voluntarily strictly for medical research.  Hattie Messer wouldn’t be the last one to do that.

PETER J. FOSTER

                It was a cold October night in 2002 and the elections were ten days away.  You’ll have to excuse my surprise when I was summoned into the movie studio at Ellisia and confronted with both L. W. Rush and Howie Halfwright.  Miss July 2001, Julie Head, was there on her knees.  Also present were Mr. Harrington of the Castleman Trust legal team and Ellis Wilson, Junior.

                “High, Peter,” Howie was dressed in a tuxedo, of all things!  So were the rest of the men.  Me?  Ellisia was one of my homes and I wore my usual costume—my birthday suit.  “I wish I had your balls!  I’d be president.”

                “Too old,” L. W. said.  “Ever since that Reagan fellow anybody over 60 need not apply for the presidency.  It finally came out that Ronnie really was senile—at first, only a little, but he was hospitalized two years after leaving the White House when home care was no longer adequate.  I’m 40 now and one of the reasons I lost the election was that I was said to be too young.  I still have two decades to win the White House and you are going to help me.”

                “L. W., you ran opposed to the White Salve Act of 2000,” I said.  “I voted for you because of that.”

                “Funny how things change,” L.W. chuckled.  “The governor’s race in Texas takes place on the off election years because of Texas history.  For a while we elected our governor every two years.  Now there’s no term limits except that I cannot serve more than two consecutive terms.  Complicated, yes?  I sniffed my bitch wife because she was going to leave me when I failed to get into the White House.  I enslaved both daughters too and tried to correct their behavior, but gave it up when the Alternate Meat Source Inspection Act became law. My daughters were mindless zombies—the trainer wasn’t competent and my neglect of them while they grew up.  So I held a barbecue.  I did everything to position myself as supporting the new slave laws.”

                None of this was news to me.  L. W. had told me the same story months ago.

                “What you are going to do for us,” Julie said, “is enslaving me and make me a Castleman Trust slave.  Then you will lease me to L. W. as his slave wife.”

                “Julie signed a 25 year plus contract,” Mr. Harrington announced.  “She knows about the ‘have Peter’s kids or die’ requirement and everybody is cool with that.  She’s contracted for six—two of yours, one of L.W’s and one from L. W.’s fiancé, Greg.  The other two will be determined later.”

                “Your kid first,” L. W. said.  “I don’t need to snuff her if Julie doesn’t work out.  You’ll just take her back.  The reasons for putting her in the Castleman Trust program are that Greg and I can only have daughters, and for her safety.  The fine for snuffing her without cause is too expensive—and there will be an investigation because of her status.  Julie won’t be abused.  You will brainwash her, of course.  And you will assign enough assistants to her so that she is trained and happy.”

                “It’s all about status,” Howie explained.  “L. W. will have slaves, but not just any slave.  He will have the runner up for Snuggle Bunny of the Year 2001.  Julie will be his slave wife and she will be connected with the Castleman Trust both to protect her and we hope that the Castleman Trust will be a plus in the public eye.”

                “Julie will have four other women with her.  They will train Julie and monitor her education.”  Mr. Harrington handed me the conversion forms.  “We’ve already performed the drug and pregnancy screen.  Get dressed.  At dinner, on television, you will convert her.  Peter, she will keep her clothes on until after the free television crews leave.  Any questions?”

                “Yes.  Will Julie hyphenate her name?  I don’t recommend that she call herself Head-Rush.”

                That brought the house down!

                The actual enslavement was anticlimactic.  Right after announcing that Julie Head, former Snuggle Bunny, was now a slave wife, L. W. sought to cinch the gay vote by announcing that he and Greg Huxley would be married at Ellisia the next morning. 

                “I might buy a whipping girl or two for torture purposes,” L. W. quipped.

                “Wrong audience, L. W.,” Ellis pointed at the women serving.  “These are all pearls managed by Peter.  The citizens seated around you love their pearls and don’t like brutality.  Matter of fact there are twenty abolitionists here.”

                “May this slave speak?” Julie asked.  When L. W. gave her permission, Julie stated that she was going to seek a political career upon manumission—if that were possible.  “I’m 24 now and I will be manumitted in 25 years.  I’ll still be young enough to be a politician.  Experience?  Education?  Master Peter will take care of that.  Being a Person of Limited Rights is the best way for today’s women to have it all—family, education, career.”

                Julie made it sound easy.  Perhaps “Head –Rush “was an appropriate name.

                The other four women were Margaret and her daughter Ivana, Vera and Rose.  Margaret was 40 and had converted her 20 year old daughter to avoid being converted for indebtedness.  Governor L. W. Rush had purchased the pair because Ivana was majoring in political science—and Margaret was a key official of L. W.’s party.  He had been on the look-out for a slave staff and L. W. contracted with the Castleman Trust to educate them.  Vera was hired as a media consultant from the GVVN studios.  Rose had been a secretary in L. W.’s office.  She had volunteered for conversion after being told that she’d be with Defensive Enslavement Volunteers. 

                “I’ll do it as long as I get to meet Peter Castleman!”  Rose was a little disappointed when she met me, but my sister Penny had a long talk with her.  “Well!  I never would have guessed!”

                Greg and L. W. married in a public ceremony at Ellisia—and it was well covered in the media.  Their marriage reminded me of reading about the bad old days when two gay men and two lesbians would marry in a “lavender marriage” and live under the same roof—this was when homosexuality was a crime and a “mental aberration.”  Gay marriage was not legal back then, but there was no law against two married couples sharing households.  So the guys would share one bedroom and the ladies the other.  I did wonder if they were fooling anybody.  I guess so because L. W. won re-election with 75% of the vote.

                Life for the ladies was different from at the Bar BQ Ranch.  L. W. wanted to decriminalize bare-chested women.  The main stumbling block was ‘disturbing the peace’ provisions in city regulations.  Texas is a big, cosmopolitan state with religious fundamentalists and wild-eyed drug-abusing hippie communes.  Some towns were designated clothing optional, but most required women and men to wear shirts, shoes and be “decently attired.”  There were even four towns that required women to cover their hair with scarves!  Oh, yes, slaves were required to be covered in those same towns.

                So former Snuggle Bunny Julie Head was normally clothed in public.  Oh, Howie did a special pictorial on the Governor’s Mansion, but by the time L. W. took his next oath of office, L. W.’s household was no longer news.  The only thing unusual was that I had full access for the purpose of training and caring for L. W.’s five women. 

Nye hit almost no traffic in her return trip. She approached her store from the rear, and because it was now past normal retail business hours, she found a parking spot almost directly in front of the rear door to her store. She took the spot without hesitation, figuring it was better to grab this convenient one, rather than gambling on finding one at the front. Entering through the rear door presented only the very minor inconvenience of having to use her key, and that was not worth worrying about. As soon as she entered, she noticed the chair that normally sat behind the desk was missing. Curious as to why it wasn’t there, she looked around, then noticed that the lights were on in the storage area. She paused momentarily, and when heard muffled noises coming from the rear of that area, she put two and two together, coming up with the likely answer that Yana had brought the chair back there for Shadow to sit on while he got a blowjob. Nodding with approval, Nye thought she would remain unannounced until Yana finished sucking him off, and they came back out front. Good girl, Yana, give him a good one.

As Nye walked past the aisle, she glanced down it, looking toward the end where Yana was presumably servicing Shadow. She was quite surprised to see Shadow sitting in the chair, alone, with no Yana in sight. She stepped back out of his line of sight, just in case he looked in her direction, while she tried to make sense of what she had just seen. She stood there for a few minutes, occasionally peeking around the corner, hoping to see Yana’s head bobbing above his lap, but every time she looked, all she saw was him sitting by himself a she watched something in front of him. She was debating whether to go down there and confront Yana when she heard a very loud female voice, crowing in ecstasy. That’s Yana. I’m sure of it. The stupid slut is cumming. I expressly forbid her from cumming, and the little trollop is disobeying me.

Then Yana came the second time. That’s it. Her punishment wasn’t going to be all that bad, but now it will be. That bitch, she’s going to pay for this.

With a plan forming in her mind, Nye exited through the back door, locking it behind her, then walked around the block to reenter through the front door. She made no attempt to enter silently; because she wanted Yana and Shadow to know somebody was in the front of the store. Seconds later, Yana appeared, flushed from her orgasms, and slightly breathless from having run from the back. Nye smiled broadly at Yana when she appeared, giving the slave no indication of her displeasure. “Oh there you are Yana. My meeting got cancelled before I got to the airport, so I got back here much sooner than I expected to. Did the gentleman show up?”

“Yes, mistress, he did. He and his slave are still here. We were in the back. I was entertaining him, as you ordered me to. They should be out here shortly.” It was almost a self-fulfilling prophecy. She no sooner said the words, when Shadow and Jodi strolled into view. They were too far away to politely begin introductions. Given the few seconds with which to do so, Nye’s training kicked into gear, and she took the few seconds available to study the pair as they approached. She gave Shadow a cursory look, seeing a man close to six feet in height, in good shape, weighing no more than one hundred eighty pounds. Probably less, she amended. His age was indeterminate at first glance. Over thirty, but well under seventy. Probably less than fifty, but that was impossible to say. He could be sixty and not showing it. Or he could be forty. She dismissed all that as irrelevant and turned her focus to the slave accompanying him. Her interest on two fronts soared.

The first thing she noticed was that the slave had great legs. Adding to their appeal, they were sheathed in dark nylon stockings, and the five-inch heels she was wearing added the perfect touch. Nye approved. Fabulous legs. More interesting though, was that she walked on the balls of her feet, and was giving off the very distinct impression that she had studied hand-to-hand combat. Knowing what to look for was the key, and Jodi was displaying the signs blatantly, even though she was unconscious she was doing so. Further, she had gorgeous hair; dark and unbound, lustrous and full-bodied. It cascaded down her back to cover her ass. Magnificent. She had a very narrow waist, which Nye estimated at seventeen or eighteen inches, topped by a delightful pair of thirty-four B breasts. To top it all off, she was pretty. But what really caught Nye’s attention were her eyes. Their gray coloring was striking, but not nearly so much as the fact that she used them. Nye knew she was being studied by them and was being evaluated in ways that she had not been, in years. She was being sized up as a potential threat. A threat to whom, I wonder? Then the answer was obvious. A threat to her master, she’s his bodyguard. I love it, what a great idea. Their eyes met, and each knew they were looking at a kindred spirit. They smiled simultaneously, each acknowledging the other as having been studied, evaluated, and classified.

Nye noticed the shimmer of moisture around the slave’s lips. No wonder Yana came so hard and so loudly, I would have too, with that one licking me. Lucky Yana. No, not so lucky; I’m going to punish her unfaithful little ass for cumming without permission. I haven’t whipped her pussy in a while, she’s overdue for a nice pussy whipping. Putting aside the thought of Yana’s upcoming punishment, Nye’s thoughts returned to the sexy slave bodyguard. I wonder if I can get him to have her do me too. That thought brought the concept of “him” back to her mind, and she realized she had to stop fantasizing about his slave and pay attention to business.

He saw her standing by the checkout counter as soon as he reentered the retail section of the store. He immediately began carefully assessing what he saw. She looked like she stood 5’ 4”, or maybe 5’ 5” in her bare feet, but the 5” heels she was wearing would bring her up to just about eye-to-eye with him. Almost, but not quite. She was tall and delightfully slender. Not just slender either, but in good shape. It was obvious she spent time maintaining her body in prime condition. He estimated her age to be in the low to mid-thirties. Then there was the flaming red hair. It was long enough that he approved. It would be longer if she was my slave, but what she has is very nice. Her hair was styled such that it nicely framed her face while it hung beautifully long down her back. The face it framed was very pretty, with fine, almost sculpted features. High cheekbones and a narrow nose perfectly complimented her well-shaped lips. As he drew closer, additional details became evident. A slight deviation in the line of her nose made him wonder if it had ever been broken and not set properly. A line on her right cheek might well have been a fine scar. These miniscule imperfections were totally overshadowed by her overall beauty, but they made him wonder if she had seen a hard life…or been used hard at some time in her life. But they gave her a depth of character in addition to her otherwise compelling beauty.

The tight, fitted white silk blouse brought his attention to her breasts. Not a hint of them being pendulous, despite the very obvious lack of a bra supporting them. He couldn’t be sure because they were covered, but the blouse was tight enough and sheer enough, that it caused her nipples to be well enough displayed, making him believe they were nicely puffy. They would be ideal for nipple clips. Her breasts were on the small side of medium, but perfectly formed. They would fit in his hand very well. Her legs had been the first thing he had noticed, with virtually all of their length visible below the short miniskirt she was wearing. Now, with the rest of her having been closely studied, his eyes returned to her legs. Gorgeous! They would feel so good wrapped around my hips.

Shadow had been studying the woman the entire time as he approached her, and noted with some amusement, her concentration on Jodi. That was fine with him, because it had given him the opportunity to feast his eyes on her, without her seeing him doing it. He misinterpreted the point of her interest however, thinking it was primarily sexual. He was initially mildly dejected by the realization that she preferred women to men, but then chided himself for his base impulse. This is business. She’s plenty hot, but you have more than enough hot slaves to fuck, you don’t need to look at her that way too. As soon as that thought entered his mind, it was rejected, ad replaced by another one. Screw that morality. Ok, sure, this is business, but she’s damn good looking, so what’s wrong with wanting to fuck her?

Nye broke her attention away from Jodi, and turned to Shadow, who, by this time, was quite close. She had not noticed his scrutiny of her and was relieved to find that he wasn’t staring at her lustfully, and fantasizing about enslaving her. She gave him a warm, friendly smile, held her hand out to him and introduced herself. “Hi, I’m Nye Solover.”

He smiled in return. You certainly are.

“I’m glad I was able to get back here in time to meet with you. Thank you for waiting. I trust my slave made your wait enjoyable. Yana told me you were in a few days ago and wanted to discuss something about some of my products. How can I help you?”

“I was looking at a few of the wood items you have on display along the rear wall. Depending on the price, and assuming they suit my needs, for one or two of them I might want to make a bulk purchase. One of the items in particular intrigues me, because I’m not sure I understand how it’s to be used.”

“And which one might that be?” I’ll bet its The Box, everybody asks about that.

It’s a fairly large box with two holes, about four inches in diameter cut into the top. The sides….”

I was right. I would love to sell him ten or fifteen of them. I won’t even ask why he wants that many. Nye interrupted him. “Excuse me for interrupting, but I know exactly the one you mean. A most interesting device. If you will pardon me for a minute, I need to get something from my office, then I can demonstrate for you how it’s used.”

He nodded his acceptance, so Nye moved toward her office, motioning for Yana to accompany her.. When they were in her office, Nye told Yana to get the bag of marbles she needed while she got a file from her desk. When Yana was ready with the marbles, Nye, adopted a girl-to-girl demeanor, and asked, “How was she? Did you play with her after you blew him? Ohhh, she’s so tasty looking, I almost wish I was the slave and I was the one who had to stay behind. Did you make her cum too?”

The flurry of questions and her animated, girlish demeanor were intended to distract Yana, and to make her think that Nye was more interested in a little hot gossip than anything else. It worked. Yana grinned shyly and answered, “Yes, I did play with her, but I didn’t have time to make her cum, you got back too quickly.” That’s true as far as it goes, I would have made her cum. But only after she made me cum another two or three times. You did get back too quickly.

Nye arched her eyebrow, then in a joking manner said, “I assume that also means there wasn’t enough time for her to make you to cum, then. That’s great, that means then that I’ll be the first one she makes cum…delicious, I love it. I’ll just have to convince him to allow that. I’m right, aren’t I? She didn’t make you cum, did she?” Nye ended her question with a laugh.

Thinking she was safe, Yana quickly answered, “Mistress, how could I? You have forbidden me to cum.” Nye didn’t respond, but turned away to go back to her customer. You had the change to fess up and tell me the truth. But you chose to lie. That will make your punishment very much worse you little whore. Very much worse. She went out to make the sale to Shadow, then when business was concluded, she could look to the pleasure of punishing Yana.

She found Shadow in the rear looking at the various devices on display. Without preamble, she went straight to the item he had begun to describe. She picked one up, then holding it up to show him, she began. I call this The Box. I began calling it that when I made the first one and never came up with a better name for it. Let me show you how it works.”

She proceeded to explain that the top was divided into three sections. The center section comprised half of the top surface area and was permanently secured to the rest of the box. The other two pieces, the left and right portions of the top, were each removable. The seam separating the removable and non-removable piece went through each of the holes, so that when the two pieces were removed, only half-circles remained. The holes were placed off-center, situated more toward the back of the box than in the middle. In fact, they were quite close to the back. When she removed the two top sections, she turned them over and Shadow saw that the undersides had the sharp points of tacks pointing downward. She pointed out that the non-removable centerpiece was similarly equipped with tacks pointing into the box. She pointed out small screw holes in the bottom of the box, then began her explanation.

“Normally The Box is left on the floor. The small screw holes in the bottom are for use in securing it to the floor if you want it permanently installed. I usually add marbles, although many different items could be used. Even tacks, if you’re really pissed at her. I find it’s best if you don’t thoroughly cover the bottom, but leave a little room for them to roll around. But not enough room for her to be able to create a clear space. Anyway, after you’ve added whatever you want, the slave steps into the box, putting her ankles in the holes. Then the removable pieces are replaced, trapping her feet in the box. They get secured with these little hooks. She now has to stand on the marbles until you feel like releasing her. The purpose of the tacks is to prevent her from lifting her feet to gain some relief. She lifts her foot, and she jabs herself with the sharp points.”

She put The Box on the floor, emptied the bag of marbles into it, the asked, “Your slave, or mine?”

Shadow considered the question for a minute, then chose Jodi, stating that he was more familiar with her level of pain tolerance. Upon hearing the decision Jodi removed her heels and stepped into the box. She showed no sign of discomfort, and accepted the imprisonment of her feet with bland assurance. Nye installed the top pieces, and secured them in position. As she was doing that, she put a hand on the inside of Jodi’s leg in an apparent move to steady herself, but as she stood, she took the opportunity to slide her hand along the inside of the length of the leg she was holding. The edge of her hand managed to sink deeply into Jodi’s pussy, nestling there for far longer than an accidental touch. She saw that Shadow was looking at another device, so her hand remained where it was, giving her the opportunity to rub Jodi’s clit. Jodi closed her eyes and sighed softly. Nye smiled in appreciation. She pursed her lips and pantomimed giving Jodi a kiss, then turned away from her, leaving her to deal with her pain until her master released her. She went to stand next to Shadow, hopefully to make a sale of another item.

He was now standing in front of a bin on the floor that contained two-foot long bars in the shape of an isosceles triangle with two-inch sides. One apex of the triangle was a sharp edge. The second apex was slightly rounded, while the third was substantially rounded. Something that looked like the head of a small common nail protruded from the center of the triangle at each end. The nails stuck out about a quarter of an inch. One face of the bar had a round-bottom groove cut along the length for the entire length of the bar, and a half-inch round dowel was nestled in the groove. The dowel also had nails in the center of each end, replicating the look of the triangular bar.

Shadow stood looking down at the bin, then when Nye moved to stand beside him. He gestured at the toys. then confessed he had not quite figured out how they were used. “On one hand, the purpose of the triangular bar seems self-evident. But the dowel seems superfluous, so maybe it isn’t so self-evident.”

Nye chuckled, saying, “You’re gonna love this.” She called out to Yana, ordering her to come, and to bring two rubber bands with her. Yana knew what they were looking at, so she knew exactly which ones to bring. While they were waiting for Yana to arrive, Nye bent down to get one of the bars. Instead of flexing her knees to lower herself, she kept her legs straight and bent at her waist, pulling the already tight miniskirt very tightly across her ass while raising the rear hem delectably high. Shadow admired the result, with more than minor regret. That’s one of the cutest asses I’ve seen in ages. I would really love to see it without it being obscured by that skirt though. Truthfully, I’d love to do more than look, but I don’t think she swings in my direction. That’s really a pity, I would truly love to fuck her.

With the bar in hand, Nye took hold of the end of the dowel, and with apparently no effort, removed it from the groove it was resting in. When it was fully removed she replaced it in the groove, held the bar with the grooved face facing down, and shook the bar. The dowel remained in place.

Shadow looked at Nye, and stated, “Magnets”

“Yup,” she confirmed, “simple and effective.”

She again removed the dowel, placed the bar on the floor with the sharp edge up, then ordered Yana to kneel on the bar. Yana started to protest, but a stern look from Nye silenced her. As she was kneeling, Nye simply placed the dowel behind Yana’s knees then connected the dowel and bar together by placing a rubber band over the nail heads at each end. The tension on the dowel from the rubber bands wasn’t enough to cause any pain on the back of Yana’s legs, but it kept the dowel from moving. Besides, the pain on her knees caused by keeling on the sharp edge was more than enough.

With everything in place, and the pain already evident on Yana’s face, Nye motioned for Shadow to step away and to follow her. She walked to the end of the aisle they were in, then stopped and turned to face him. “Now, watch,” she said with an evil look in her eyes. “Kneeling on those are painful enough, particularly on the sharp edge, as I have Yana at the moment, but its really fun when you make them move. The additional pressure from ‘walking’ with them on her knees will make any slave regret whatever it was she did to earn her punishment.” She looked at Yana, then commanded, “Come.”

She turned back to address Shadow. “The dowel and rubber bands just hold everything together so I can make her ‘walk’ on it. Walking is really painful. Dontcha love it?”

Yana obediently lifted her knee to begin the trek to her mistress. As she did, the bar rose from the floor, remaining attached to her knee thanks to the rubber band and dowel. The flash of pain when she placed her weight back on that knee was readily obvious. By her third ‘step’, she was whimpering each time. Her whimpering grew louder, then became outright sobbing. Regardless, she steadfastly trudged forward on her knees, enduring the mounting pain. When she reached her mistress, she looked up expectantly, hoping to be released from this unwarranted torture. Nye stared down at her for a minute, watching her slave suffer. Yana became increasingly nervous the longer Nye looked at her, because it was unlike her mistress to punish her this way for a simple demonstration of the product. She began to fear that something she didn’t understand was happening. Finally, Nye turned to address Shadow.

“Tell me, when she was playing with your slave, how many times did Yana cum?”

Without hesitation, Shadow answered, “Two. Quite loudly too, she must have really enjoyed it.” Yana lowered her eyes, knowing that no amount of pleading or begging would alleviate the coming punishment. The knee-walk, she knew now, was a mere prelude to something truly painful. She had disobeyed, which was bad enough, but she had lied to her mistress, and doing that was a cardinal sin.

In explanation for having asked the question, Nye explained. “I knew she had cum, I just wasn’t sure how many times. She has earned a punishment for that, but she will really pay for having lied about it. However I’ll wait to punish her until after we’ve finished our business. I doubt you would want to waste your time seeing a slave punished.”

“Quite the contrary. It’s always interesting to see how other owners punish their slaves. I always hope to pick up some idea or technique that I can use. Seeing you do it might be particularly educational since you’re a woman. Another woman will know far more about what’s most painful and effective, I would think.”

Nye preened slightly with that compliment. “You won’t be disappointed.” Yana shuddered at hearing those words.

Ignoring the suffering Yana, Nye began to walk back down the aisle to the display bins where they had begun. Unbidden, Shadow followed along. As they were walking, she asked, “Are there any others you would like to see demonstrated, or have explained? You may use your slave, of course, but for the particularly painful ones, I will be happy to have Yana volunteer.”

Shadow moved in the direction of another bin, then picked up a substantial piece of wood. It was two inches square and three feet long. There were threaded holes at each end, drilled parallel to the long axis. Additionally, there were two belts, one located a short way from the top, and the other was close to the bottom. They were inserted into slits cut through the wood. The slits were much longer than the belts were wide, apparently to allow the belts to be moved along the length of the slit. Clips were slid over both belts on both sides of the bar, preventing the belts from falling out of the slits.

In bins adjacent to the bar he had just picked up, there were other items made from the same two-inch square stock, but in various configurations. Each one had a threaded shaft at one end, with the clear intention that they were to be screwed into one end of the bar he had first picked up. He looked at the bar he was holding, then said, “This looks fascinating.”

Nye laughed. “The idea for this hit me one evening. Came out of the blue. Simple, and endlessly useful. This device, by itself, isn’t painful at all. It’s only what you do with it in addition that causes pain. In fact, it can be used in conjunction with The Box, so if you have no objection, I’ll use your slave to demonstrate it. Ok?”

“Please, be my guest.” Having given his permission, Shadow walked over to Jodi, while Nye selected a few attachments to begin the demonstration. When he got to her, he asked, “How are you doing? Is The Box as good as I hope it is?”

Jodi drew a deep breath. “My lord, this device is quite insidious. When I first stepped in it, it was not at all unpleasant. Now, after only a few minutes, it is considerably worse. Also, my feet have been toughened from my karate training; I can take much more punishment on the soles of my feet than can any of your other slaves. For a slave who has tender soles, this would very quickly be quite hellish for them.”

He nodded, pleased with that answer. “Exactly what I hoped for,” he muttered, mostly to himself.

Nye looked at Jodi closely. “I thought I recognized you, but I couldn’t quite place you. You being nude now is probably the reason, it’s distracting. As soon as you mentioned karate, it clicked into place. You won the state karate championship two years ago, didn’t you?”

“Yes, ma’am, I did. May I express my surprise that you would know that? I don’t recall seeing you participate, and I’m sure I would remember somebody as striking as you. Are you a practitioner of the sport?”

Nye smiled faintly. “Not exactly.” She paused, with a thoughtful look on her face, then added. “I enjoy watching it however.”

Jodi said nothing, but she had been watching Nye move at every chance she could, without making it obvious she was studying her. Not exactly? That’s an evasion if I every heard one. I think you do more than ‘enjoy watching’ it. But why do you conceal your ability?

Oblivious to Jodi’s thoughts or interest in her, Nye showed Shadow what she had brought.

She had screwed what was clearly a pussy hook onto one end. It was the end with the longer belt, and with the pussy hook in place, that was clearly the bottom of the device. At the top of the device, she had attached a “L” shaped arm. The short leg of the L was screwed to the central piece, and extended the height by a foot. The longer leg was on the same plane as the orientation of the pussy hook, but faced in the opposite direction. With the hook in place buried in a pussy, the long arm would then be slightly above the wearer’s head, pointing behind her, away from her body.

She showed Shadow the assembled device, then turned away from him to face Jodi. She was standing in front of Jodi, between the slave and her owner. She wasn’t intentionally blocking Shadow’s view, but she didn’t worry that she was. She stepped into Jodi, almost touching her body with her own. She dropped her hand between Jodi’s legs, then slid a finger into the slave’s very moist pussy. She smiled broadly at that discovery. “Oooo, how delightful, you’re very turned on by all this aren’t you? I would very much enjoy having you for my own.”

She kept her finger buried in Jodi, then gently fucked her with it a few times before withdrawing it while she used it to rub Jodi’s clit in the process. Jodi sighed deeply and audibly.

Nye brought the glistening finger up to her own lips, inserted it in her mouth and sensuously licked it, then closed her lips on it as she withdrew it. She winked at Jodi, while smiling with her flashing eyes as well as her mouth. “Mmmm, delicious.”

Bringing her mind back to business, Nye reached around Jodi to hold the wood device behind her, then slid the pussy hook into place. The metal of the hook was cold, as Nye had made no attempt to warm it. But Jodi was quite ready to receive it, and her body warmed it quickly, leaving her with a wonderful feeling of being pleasantly stuffed. Nye grabbed the lower belt and used that to hold the thing in place and to keep the hook from sliding down. She buckled it tightly around Jodi’s waist. That held the entire assembly for the moment. Moving to the upper belt, she brought the ends over Jodi’s shoulders, one on each side of her neck, wrapped them around under her armpits, then brought the ends together behind her back and buckled them together. When she tightened that strap, it pulled the top of the device snugly against Jodi’s back, firmly securing it from sliding down or from pulling away. Done for the moment, she kissed the tip of the finger she had used to probe Jodi’s pussy, then pressed her finger tip against Jodi’s lips. She softly murmured, “I’ll be right back.”

She went up another aisle, grabbed a pair of wrist cuffs with short chains attached to them, then returned to Jodi. The cuffs were quickly placed on Jodi’s wrists, then using the short chains, Nye pulled Jodi arms upward into a mild strappado. She asked Jodi if they were too tight, and upon receiving the answer, “Not even close,” Nye pulled the slave’s arms much higher. When she got a soft grunt from Jodi, she wrapped the ends of the chains around the bar, then using the clips on the ends of the chains, secured them in place. She stepped away from Jodi. She held her arm outstretched toward Jodi, palm up, at about waist height. “Taaa daaaa!”

Shadow smiled appreciatively. “I like it, a mobile strappado stand.”

Switching into sales mode, Nye began a short presentation.

“You could put her on her knees while she’s wearing this and have her give you a nice blowjob. Or, you could take her for walks…go shopping with her …almost anything. Or just leave her that way for a few hours and let her wander around the house looking fuckable. I find it more fun to do that than to attach Yana to something stationary.”

She walked over to the other attachments and lifted another one up. This one was a fairly short straight bar with notches cut into one surface and a clamp of some sort at one end. The notches were spaced about an inch apart and were a quarter of an inch wide and deep. Carrying it, she returned to Jodi, then placed the clamp end of the bar at the top of the device Jodi was wearing, but pointing forward, extending outward over her head. The notched edge was on top. She tightened some thumbnuts on the clamp, then released her hold on the bar. It stayed in place. She pointed to the bar now above, and extending in front of Jodi’s face. “If you put a gag with an attachment ring in her mouth, you can then hold her head upward at almost any angle with a short piece of rope. The rope rests in one of the notches to prevent it from sliding along the bar.”

She returned to the attachments, then selected another one, holding it u to display it. The one she held up was shaped like a T. The vertical leg had the threaded shaft at the bottom, for attachment to the main unit. The horizontal arms had rings set at the far ends, on the underside. She carried it over to Jodi, held it up behind her, showing Shadow how it would look if it was attached. She explained, “This piece allows you to put her arms in a spread-eagle position, and a simple spreader bar on her ankles completes the look. We have another, almost identical piece that is designed for use on the bottom that when used with the upper piece, gives you a true spread-eagle. Truthfully, I don’t like using it all that much, because as I said before, I like having my slaves move around while wearing the device, I think its more fun. But some of my customers swear by it, because they like the immobility. I can’t argue with that either.” She started to walk away, then remembering another point, she added, “The notched bar will work with this piece also, so if you want to hold her head up while she’s spread-eagled, this will do it.”

Shadow nodded slowly, pursed his lips, then half muttered to himself, but loud enough for her to hear what he said too. “Yeah, I like it. This could work well.” He roused himself, then addressing her directly, he added, “I like all of these, they’re ideal for what I have in mind. This has turned out to be a better outing than I expected it would. As I look around, I see a few more items I would like to look at more closely, but its getting later than I planned, and I’m getting hungry. For right now, I want one of each…the kneeling thing, the Box, and the strappado with the pussy hook.” He paused, looked at Jodi, then added, “And that notched bar too.” That brought a smile to Jodi’s face, which reached her eyes.

Nye began moving to assemble the purchases he had named, then decided to question the implications of what he had said.

“For right now? That implies a ‘later’. Yana said you had indicated you might want a few, but she didn’t know what that really meant. May I ask what you have in mind? And how many might ‘a few’ become?” And this was supposed to be’ quite profitable’ for me. When is that going to happen? These few pieces don’t cut it as far as that goes.

He saw no reason not to be open and forthcoming, so he answered her without withholding anything.

“I’m inviting a group of potential investors to a meeting. I’m planning to build an amusement park designed for playing with slaves. The core of the park, the ‘draw’ if you will, will be large devices that no slave owner could reasonably build for himself…or herself”, he added with a nod in her direction. “I want these toys”, indicating the items Nye was holding. “as samples to show at that meeting. These could be perfect additions at some of the park’s other amenities.”

Nye looked at him with a mixture of skepticism and heightened interest. “I have not heard anything about such a park. My knee-jerk reaction is that it could be phenomenal. Not only fun to attend as a slave owning visitor, but the investment possibilities sound quite intriguing also. Before I ask you about those however, lets deal with first things first. How many of these items do you contemplate purchasing?”

Shadow frowned. “That’s a hard number to specify at this early stage. I had never thought of anything like the mobile strappado device until just now, but the idea strikes me that we could set up a stand at the entrance to the park and offer these as rental units. Owners could rent them for the day while they are moving their slaves between the various rides and games. Maybe we set up smaller rental stands inside the park on the theory that owners who didn’t want one when they entered the park might eventually change their mind about having one after they see them in use, but wouldn’t want to go all the way back to the entrance to get one. So, to stock that level of need, I don’t know, thirty? Fifty? If they catch on, that could easily grow to a few hundred.”

Nye interrupted. “The rides and games that you mention. I assume that they will be painful in one degree or another?”

“Yes. In fact, I plan to call this the Torture Amusement Park.”

Nye grinned a feral grin, “I love it.”

Shadow continued. “My initial thought for the Box was that they would be placed in the slave-holding rooms of restaurants. The owners might want to stop for lunch or something, and not have their slaves hanging around while they eat. We will have rooms where slaves can be parked, and having a bunch of these in a room for patron’s use would be a good idea. Same thing for the kneeling bars. Although, the bars may make more sense in front of the rest rooms that will be scattered around the park. If the owner doesn’t want the slave to accompany him, kneeling on one of these is a great way to await the owners’ return. At that level of use, I would guess somewhere in the realm of seventy-five or one hundred of each.”

Nye looked dreamy for a second, lost in thought. “I hadn’t considered using the kneeling bars outdoors. Maybe plastic would be better for that than wood. And the dowel could be lost easily, so the thing should be modified to have the dowel and kneeling bar permanently attached to each other. Maybe the dowel would be hinged, to allow it to drop behind her knees, more to prevent her from rising, rather than to allow walking, as I showed you. We will also need to come up with a way to allow the bar itself to be rotated so the desired edge can be selected, yet not have the entire device walk away in somebody’s shopping bag. I’ll have to give that some thought.”

Shadow didn’t say anything, but her immediate recognition of a need for design improvements to adapt to the new usage they were being put to, impressed him. He was also intrigued by her use of the pronoun “we” in reference to whomever would create the modified design. Is she thinking along the lines of some deeper involvement? Or is she just ensuring herself a place in the manufacture and sale of a revised product?

Nye returned her focus to her customer. “I’m sure I can come up with what you’ll need, but before I do, I will need something from you. Clearly I’ll need a firm order, including a commitment on quantity. I’m not going to commit time and expense to this without assurance of getting the order. Second, I think I will want a guarantee of being supplier-of-choice for additional orders. With the latter, I can work with the price a little more than without it. Lastly, I want to hear a lot more about this park, and get some idea about its intended size and scope. I might have more ideas that you can use, and it will give me a better sense of the eventual size of the orders for these goodies.”

She placed the items on the counter by the cash register, then looked at him. “Now, you said something about investors?”

PETER J. FOSTER

                “Peter, Button needs to recuperate from a mission gone bad,” Colonel Murphy told me.  “She trusts you.  Button feels safe with you.   Besides, Summer is the finest mental health provider around.  Button will stick to your side like she’s grafted there for the next month or two, whatever she needs.  We haven’t been able to get a full debrief from her, so if you can complete that we’d appreciate it.”

                This sounded as if it could be dangerous.  Very dangerous.  I knew Button from earlier.  The reason that assassins are a credible threat is that they by-pass security measures.  Most assassins are not especially formidable fighters—they just pick the time when their target is unprotected, a place where the target has no defender, and use that window of vulnerability to kill.  Button was going to be inside my security system.  No, I didn’t suspect that Button had been sent to kill me—just that she was unbalanced and could. 

                “What is Button’s status, sir?”

                “She’ll be a person of limited rights.  We’re experimenting with female special agents.  They are not really slaves—except that they officially are when their cover requires it.  They are not really free people either.  Like I said, Button trusts you.  She was catatonic until someone mentioned your name.  She asked to see you.”

                They kept Button in a padded cell.  She wore only an adult diaper and a straight jacket.  When I was let in, Button squealed in delight and rubbed herself against me like a puppy.

                “I’m glad to see you, too,” I held her against me.  “Button, I’m concerned about you.  I’ve learned that you had a rough mission and that you are the worse for it.  I need you to tell me that you won’t harm yourself, that you won’t harm my family.           I’m allowed to take you home with me and help you get better.  Actually, just stay with me. You don’t need to get better.”

                “What?” The doctor didn’t give his name.  “The whole purpose behind assigning her to you was recovery!  If you aren’t going to return her to duty, then she can stay here.”

                “Button will recover on her own,” I replied, holding the shaking woman in my arms.  “I will give her a place to recover.  I cannot make her recover—that is something she must do on her own.”

                “Master Peter,” Button’s voice was rough, as if she had been screaming a long time, “I wish to be debriefed.”

                Never mind what Button said. That is classified.  I’m not even supposed to know what Button told me, but it couldn’t be helped.  The doctor gaped at us as I removed the straight jacket and diaper from Button, undressed myself, and took Button to a shower.  Once cleaned up, Button told me everything she remembered over soda crackers and weak black tea.  She wasn’t in shape to eat much else.  The debriefing took several hours.  Normal debriefings can get brutal and take place in an isolated place with a table and chair, very adversarial.  I held Button in my arms while we lay together on a gym mat in the exercise room.  We were recorded.  That evening I was able to fly Button to the Bar BQ Ranch. 

                The next morning Button’s original RFID tag was replaced.  It didn’t appear to have been tampered with, nor was it likely that something had replaced it—we checked.  I explained to Button that I was concerned about her being a Manchurian Candidate.

                “I’d rather die than hurt you,” she swore. 

                “I was worried that someone used you,” I said.  Lana—a former Russian agent—and Summer scoffed at my concern.  They pointed out that Button had been captive only a few hours and had managed to escape on her own.  “Yes, but she wasn’t able to talk until I got there.”

                “That’s not exactly right,” Button explained that she asked for me. 

                “Okay, briefing with just you three and with Angelica.  Let me summon her.  Sergeant Archer just received his orders promoting him to First Sergeant and I’ll let him know what is going on.  Lana, summon Angelica, please.”

                The conference with four women was short.  Lana and Summer were to monitor Button closely.  It would be hard because both Lana and Summer were recovering from having children.  Button would be with me at all times.  Angelica was the slave leader of MFS 46 and would coordinate any activities.

                “I suspect that they let you go,” I told Button.  “I do have faith in your skills, but they didn’t disable you and you were able to escape.  Your blood work showed traces of several drugs and you don’t remember everything that happened to you—“

                “You don’t trust me!”

                “Button, I will not abandon you.  If I have to you will be the first retired slave in REST.”  That is Retired Elderly Slave Trust, a program I developed so that I wasn’t forced to snuff slaves that had just gotten old, slaves that couldn’t be manumitted.  “I would like revenge against them.  They hurt you.  But we don’t know who they were except that they spoke French.  You said that one of them had a Parisian accent, two might have been from Algeria and one spoke like a Montreal man.  An irregular warfare principle is the deliberate delay.  We won’t do anything for the present.  Let them stew.  You tell me that you can identify them if you hear them again.  You didn’t see them.  So we’ll just ID them and leave it at that.  Colonel Murphy told me to take care of you.  In front of the others he also passed me instructions that I am to take no action except to get word back to him if you remember anything else.  I suspect that you may have some false memories that were intended to make us do something your captors wanted done.  IN three days I’ll be making a presentation to the G8 at Quebec.  The EU wants to have its own edition of the White Slave act and I’ve been invited to give a three-hour presentation.  It’s expected that there will be massive protestors.  There are a lot of anarchists in the world.  If you like, I can leave you here sedated—“

                “NO!  I mean, Master, please keep me with you o snuff me.  I need you.”

                That had me worried.  Button never needed anyone before. 

                “I’ll take care of you.  For the next few days you are going to learn my presentation.  It’s warm in Quebec right now, so your nudity won’t be a health issue.  Canada has top-free equality laws, but doesn’t like slaves exposed in public.  There’s another issue—slaves are only tolerated because of NAFTA.  The Canadian government practices transparency.  They don’t recognize slavery but generally ignore it unless the slave owner abuses the slave.”

                “That’s never a problem with you, Peter,” Angelica said.

                “The Canadians regard exposing slaves in public to be abuse.”

                “When you have the ambassador’s family and me up there, we’re often nude in public.”

                “We’re usually at the Ambassador’s home in Troopergate, British Columbia.  That is a small town and the people there actually like me.  Quebec is a big city and people in big cities hate everybody.  No, I’ll have to have you wear slave shifts or uniforms while in public.”

                All four women laughed.  My expression caused them to laugh harder.

                “You made me pee all over the floor,” Summer said and they dissolved into another giggling fit.  Women are really form outer space! 

                “We laugh because,” Button gasped for breath, “you would rather be naked too, Peter.  In Troopergate you are often naked in public because the town is clothing optional.  Too many Dukabors there.  By making the town clothing optional, the Mounties don’t have to arrest anybody when they protest naked, as is their wont.  Last summer I did feel self-conscious about touring the fort and museum in my birthday suit, but nobody cared.”

                Three days passed rapidly.  Button was depressed but getting better.  Being busy helped.  She gave part of the presentation.  I noted immediately that she was in emotional turmoil when she handed out flyers to the audience. 

                “That man was one of my captors,” Button told me.  “I recognized his voice.”

                “The Marquise of Toimer,” I said.  “I’m going to inform our bosses, but do nothing.  I want you to stick with me for now.”

                “He’s not going to get away with what he did to me!”

                “Button, he’s not getting away with anything.”  The man could have been framed for all I knew.  “Have you heard the old bull, young bull joke?  No?  A young bull and an old bull were watching a herd of cows from a hilltop.  The young bull told the old bull that he was going to run down the hill and do one of the cows.  The old bull suggested WALKING down the hill and doing all the cows.  Button, we’re going to do all of their cows.  Be patient.”

                The Quebec riot squad had been reinforced by every spare cop in Canada and the meetings were undisturbed, but the streets around the hotel were choked with demonstrators and the news media covered the protests.  I did wonder if the media, a big business itself, was on its periodic anti-big business kick.  Button recognized one of the hotel staff as her Montreal abductor.  It bothered her that she could do nothing.  I took Button’s mind off it the old fashioned way—we made love.  Last year, as part of Button’s training program, Summer had installed some artificial memories.  Button was aware that those were false memories.  One of them was that Angelica and Button had grown up together.  Another false memory was of Button being my high school sweet heart.  Castleman trust slaves can give or receive pleasure from having sex with just about anybody, but they are conditioned to form deep sexual attachments to other women.  Only the bonds between the pearl and her master are stronger-this is because the Person of Limited Rights requires human connection to lead a human existence.   A lesbian relationship with other pearls is one important avenue of affection, not just the physical.  For a while at least Button was able to forget her pain.

                “I don’t want to ruin this,” Button told me at breakfast the next morning.  We ate in our room with the rest of my staff. “I’d rather let them get away with what they did to me than lose this.”

                “That sounds like a fitting revenge to me,” I said.  “They tried to destroy you.  Their failure is your revenge.  Are you happy, dear one?”

                “Peter,” Angelica butted in, “they picked up that hotel clerk.  Get this—he was calling himself Pierre Jambon.”

                “That’s ridiculous,” Button said.  “Obviously a fake name.  Peter Ham.”

                “Well, the Mounties have him.  He is being interrogated.”

                “Do they need us?”

                “No, but they did pass on a thanks for the tip.”

                Intelligence operations are seldom conclusive.  One is dealing with shadows in a shadow world.  It’s enough to make normal people go insane.  Button seemed content to stay by my side as I went about my business over the next three weeks.  But it wasn’t totally wasted.  I had three names to work with and the Slaver Database.  As Mary Sue Smith, Button had been enslaved by an Eric Martin (aka “The Marquise of Toimer”), Pierre Jambon (that WAS his legal name!), and three other guys.  I cross-referenced the four new names in the database and came up with a total of 27 male names and 154 females who had been converted by Person of Personal Contact.  Not converted by means of three compromising photos or videos of three separate sex acts with the same guy—all 154 women had been PPC’d by means of sworn statements from six men that the woman had engaged in vaginal intercourse with one of the men three times during the last 30 days.  I only went back six months.  I only used the 27 names I had uncovered in my brief query.  Mary Sue Smith, Button’s cover name, had become a slave through Conversion by Person of Personal Contact because six men swore that she had engaged in vaginal intercourse with Pierre Jambon.  The dates didn’t match up, but Mary Sue Smith had been declared an escaped slave and a bounty for her return had been issued.

                There was more to it than simply the shady slaver dealings.  Recent—very recent—court cases had ruled that there was only a six month window to challenge an illegal enslavement.  During the first 90 days of the White Slave Act of 2000, from January 1, 2001 to the end of March 2001, there had been more than a million challenges to enslavement filed in federal court alone.  The clock stated ticking on the illegal enslavement challenge window the minute that the new Person of Limited Rights was converted.  By August of 2001 the six-witness standard had changed because fraternities were thought to have been lying about the women they enslaved.  As long as the enslaver wasn’t a past or current member of the same college fraternal order as the five witnesses, a fraternity could still earn itself additional money by swearing that Ms. Mary Sue Smith had sex in that house with the man…and there was no limit on sororities bearing witness for a man who wanted a woman enslaved, provided that the witnesses from the sorority were all free women.  Due to standards of proof, I had no credible evidence that the 27 men were engaged in kidnapping and illegal enslavement.  The 154 women were still alive and I turned their names over to Neville and his Slave Rescue Service for action.  Tell me the odds that all 27 men were fluent in French, were born in places that had a lot of French speaking people (French as a native language) and that some of these people were connected to other criminal enterprises?

                But the two “Algerians” that button identified were subject to another agency’s investigation for drug trafficking.  They hadn’t been convicted of anything, but had been identified by lower-level street pushers as the source of their drugs.  I was in New Orleans on business when I was directed to provide a team to assist a DEA raid on a suspected headquarters—the place used to control drug smuggling operations in six states. 

                “Your girls in Military Female Slave Detachment 46 have proven adept at infiltration,” I was told.  “We just need someone inside to open the door for us, Trojan Mares, if you will.”  The four team members were Angelica, Montana, Michelle and Button.  Using an “old Russian trick” the four pearls would infiltrate as bound slaves—their fetters had been designed to appear secure, but were fake and easy to escape from.  Oh, yes, 9 of the 27 men that I had identified on the list were living or working at the headquarters.  “We got a judge in Oregon to issue a search warrant for the DEA.  We are looking for a ledger that records their drug transactions.”

                “You’ll want to look into this as well” I said as I downloaded my own research onto a thumb drive.  “Drugs are not their only criminal endeavor.  It looks like this French gang does anything for a buck.”

                “DEA doesn’t do slavery,” the man objected.

                “What about Bugsy Malone and his use of heroine to enslave his prostitution work force during the 1930’s?  DEA was founded for cases like that.  You might want to look into it just in case there’s a drug connection.”

                The raid was unremarkable because there were only two casualties—two of the thugs didn’t survive Montana and Michelle.  They had guns and my girls took no chances that these two guards in the security center would raise an alarm.  The DEA raid got inside the mansion and quickly arrested the occupants—over 80 men and something like 300 women.  Most of the women were already slaves when ‘confiscated” and couldn’t give testimony in court—damn it!  Because no shots had been fired during the raid the only brief mention of this mass arrest in the news media and this was due to the indictment of the Marquise of Toimer.  France didn’t lodge a diplomatic protest when the Marquise was arrested and charged with more than 500 criminal counts because much of the evidence was turned over to INTERPOL and resulted in many arrests in Europe—especially in Paris—within 24 hours of the marquise’s arrest.

                “Mercy and Button built the illegal enslavement indictments,” I told the representative from the Federal Office of Persons of Limited Rights Affairs—the federal slavery office.  They keep changing names.   “Mr. Champion is filing for possession of those slaves.”

                “They’ve been sold,” I was told.  “That complicates matters.  A dozen of the women in question were snuffed when their owners were told that there was some question about their legal status.  The women were in a brothel and were snuffed as huffers.”

                “What’s that?”

                “Some men get off on choking a woman during sex.  They didn’t do anything illegal.  We just required the women to appear in court and after the summons was issued to the brothel in question they were removed from the slaver database as dead.”

                “What steps are being taken to preserve potential witnesses? Sir?  If manumitted, the survivors can give testimony that would result in multiple convictions.”

                “That would open up a can of worms,” the man muttered.  “Besides, we don’t want to establish the precedent that slaves can be freed if they’ll testify against their owners.”

                “I can provide testimony,” Button offered.  “I was only using slavery as a cover.  I am a sworn law enforcement officer.”

                Federal cases are complicated.  Federal cases take place at a high level, they are very slow, and often are dismissed before the case comes to trial.  International criminal cases are worse.  When diplomacy and law enforcement collide, justice suffers.  I was just an Oklahoma hick caught up in things bigger than myself.  Fortunately, the Federal Office of Persons of Limited Rights Affairs offered Neville Champion the lives of nearly 600 women confiscated in raids in exchange for not bringing their wrongful enslavement cases to trial.  Neville had to agree that these women would remain Persons of Limited Rights for a period of three years minimum, with a few having to stay enslaved for seven years or more.  In exchange, the Slave Rescue Service was permitted to buy the women for just under a quarter million dollars.  The money was raised through Neville’s abolitionist networks.  By delaying the manumission of these persons of limited rights, their kidnapping cases wouldn’t compete in court with “bigger fish to fry.”  Oh, the federal docket was full from this one raid.  MFS Detachment 46 played a very small role, opening the door so that casualties during the raid were minimal.  Otherwise, we stayed out of the more than 7000 arrests in a major criminal ring.  The documents seized during the raid were enough to gain several thousand convictions—the indicted ones copped a plea. 

                Yes, there were some objections from the women’s families.  Other families opted to enslave their eligible women.  I cannot figure out people!  Nearly all of the women rescued exhibited Post Traumatic Stress Disorder symptoms—and the Castleman Trust had the nation’s best PTSD health care provider—Summer, aka Dr. Kimberly Prince.  The women who were kidnapped and enslaved had been nobodies—pretty, in some cases educated professional women, but basically were not anybody that had clout.  It helped my case when four women removed from Summer’s treatment program committed suicide within 36 hours and thirteen more attempted suicide.  People, you can’t just take a woman who has been kidnapped and then enslaved for weeks or months and manumit her.  Besides, in addition to treating the women for mental and physical injuries suffered during their ordeals, my “use the entire slave” philosophy meant education and professional development.  That’s why some families opted to convert their eligible women to person of limited rights status—to provide those women with a better future.  No, the rescued women were not Slaves in Name Only—they worked very hard at developing themselves. 

                It was at sister Penny’s birthday party held backstage at Ellisia when Button was awarded for her part in destroying the Marquise of Toimer’s criminal empire.  The simple plaque didn’t say much, just Button’s name and a date and a commendation for services in the furtherance of mankind. 

                “When are you returning to work?” Button was asked by the man who had presented the award.  He was not used to dealing with the sight of hundreds of naked people, most of them hot women.  We were in the slave housing area.

                “I think I’ll need a few more weeks.”

                “We need you.”

                “You don’t have enough to do?” I asked.  “What crimes do you need swamping the court system now?”

                “We don’t deal in law enforcement, Peter Castleman.”

                “Sir, his name is Peter Foster,” my first sergeant butted in.  “If you have a need for his services, or that of one of his pearls, you need to ask through channels.”

                “Button isn’t really a slave,” the man objected.  “That’s just her cover.”

                “And as her designated mental health care provider,” Summer added, “I must certify her for a return to duty before you can have her.  But I’m sure that if you brief my master and Button on the situation, they can convince me that she’s ready to return to duty.”

                Poor uninformed underling.  I could identify with him!  I was still an uninformed underling myself.