by John Benson
The jury filed in solemnly. Lori sweated. She felt a strong need to pee. Why had she thought she could get away with stealing money from a bank? Why has she insisted on a jury trial? Her cuteness may have had an effect on that old Judge, but this jury of nine women and three men were probably just jealous. The fore-lady in particular looked dangerously smug.
"Ladies and gentlemen of the jury," the Judge said. "Have you reached a verdict?"
"We have, Your Honor," the fore-lady said. Smug. Yes, that was it exactly. Smug.
"Will the defendant please rise?" said the clerk. Her lawyer jumped to his feet and pulled her up by the elbow.
"What say you?" said the Judge.
"As to the indictment, fifteen counts of embezzlement against Solaris Trust and Savings Bank, guilty," the fore-lady said.
Lori was numb. She heard it as from a distance, as if it were happening to someone else.
"Thank you," said the Judge. "The jury are excused. The defendant is remanded to the State Hospital for evaluation, to see if slavery is a viable alternative to incarceration. The court is adjourned." The gavel banged down, like it was some fucking auction of something. Lori couldn't believe it.
"Slavery," she said.
"Why not?" the Bailiff said. "Why should the taxpayers pay to feed and house you, if some guy will pay for the privilege? Come on."
"We can appeal the sentence," her lawyer said. "The anti-slavery activists will probably fund it."
"Get the evaluation first," the Bailiff said. "The majority of people flunk it. The good news is, you're probably just going to prison."
The good news. Her life was suddenly over, and that was the good news. She followed the Bailiff docilely out of the courtroom. She caught the eye of the fore-lady. Smug. Absolutely smug.
The technician was a woman with soft brown curls and sympathetic eyes. "Just have a seat," she said. "If you just cooperate it won't take as long, and they won't have to strap you down or anything."
Lori eyed the chair suspiciously. The headset. She'd heart about the alchemy of mind control. "They tell me most people flunk," she said. "Aren't suitable, whatever that means. So then I just go to jail. Don't pass go."
The technician grinned. "That's right," she said. "Our reputation for being able to mess with minds is over-rated. If submission isn't already part of your fantasy life, we can't put it there, and slavery just isn't an option. Let's just put this on your head. Relax, it feels heavy but it doesn't hurt. All we're going to do today is show you a bunch of pictures and measure how they make you feel. Not changing you, just listening. Right?"
Lori tried to relax. The weight on her head was unnerving. "Can I fool it?" she asked.
"I don't know, hon. Have you studied an eastern meditation discipline for at least ten years?"
"Ah, no."
"Then the answer is 'no.' Just look at the pictures and tell me what you see."
"A cat. A tree. A policeman. A little boy." It was more boring than scary. Lori tried to relax.
"How about this, hon?"
A woman wearing only a black teddy and a leather collar. "A slut," said Lori. She yawned.
"And this?"
A woman lying over another woman's lap. Her short skirt was up and she wasn't wearing any panties. The seated woman was hitting her rear with the back side of a big hairbrush. The victim's face was a study of anguish and remorse. Lori felt herself get wet. "Oh, God," she said.
"Bingo," the technician said. "We have ourselves a winner. You pass in spades, hon. A perfect candidate for sexual slavery." She turned the picture off and gently removed the headset.
Oh God. "My lawyer says the activists will finance my appeal," said Lori. Clutching at straws. Oh, God.
"Sure. And did they also tell you that the process would take about three years and you'd be in jail the whole time, and that the functional majority of the Supreme Court right now is a little to the right of Attila the Hun when it comes to civil rights for felons?"
Oh, God. The lawyer didn't care, he'd get paid. She'd fester. Then, probably, get sold to some old pervert anyway. Somebody who liked to hurt. "You'll take away my will to resist," she blurted.
"What?" the technician said. "You think we can turn you into some kind of zombie?"
"Well, yeah," Lori said. Why else would she live with some guy who liked to hurt her, and not try and run away?
"You'll obey him because you'll like what he does to you," the technician said. "Like the way he makes you feel. I should know."
"You are one? A sex slave?"
"Surprised, hon? It doesn't make you into a robot who can't think. What happens is we make you hypersexual. Very easily aroused. Then we take those submissive leanings of yours and deepen them a little. A little is all we can manage, but luckily it's all we need. Once you're acting your fantasies out in real life they'll be self-reinforcing. You're going to experience submission as a very sensual act. One much deeper and more important than simply getting laid."
Lori trembled. She'd never been physically punished before, but she hadn't been laid either. Too afraid of giving up control. Now she wouldn't have any choice. Or, she could put it off for years and rot in the lock-up. Damn.
Some pervert's sex toy. A loss of freedom. But being in prison was a loss of freedom, too. Which was the greater? To be kept away from people behind walls and steel bars, or to be free to walk among them, bound by the invisible bonds of lust and shame? No more trying to make ends meet. She'd be supported. No more struggles to remain chaste, she'd be forced to be a slut. No more freedom to choose. Or, was that, total freedom from the need to make hard choices? It was hard to think. "So now you send me to the Judge," she said. "He sends me back here...."
The technician sighed. "A few bad weeks of fear and fretting," she said. "Or a few years, if you appeal. Full employment for a pod of lawyers. Or you could just end it now. This session is being recorded, and I'm empowered to accept your voluntary decision to take the procedure. We could do it now. An end to dithering."
An end. To be owned. To be used. That picture of the punished woman had etched itself on her consciousness. To be spanked. "Is it so bad?" she asked. It sounded so damn timid.
The technician's eyes were bright. "It's wonderful. It's terrible. But it is never dull."
Lori wanted to be brave. Do one thing right. "Okay," she said. "What do I do?"
"Just ask," the lady said.
Lori looked through a film of tears. She wanted. Didn't want. "Make me a slave," she said. "It's what I deserve."
The hypnospray hissed, and the injection site felt cold. Lori felt her old life receding into memory. Gone. Gone forever. Her own fault, for what she'd done. For what she was.
"I promise it'll be good for you, hon," the technician said.
Lori surrendered to the warm soft dark.
Voices quarreled in her head. "It's working, it's working," one voice taunted. "They're making her submissive. Being punished will make her horny, and being horny will make her want to be punished."
"Oh, bull," a second vice countered. "It's only working because she's gullible. She could fight it if she wanted to, but all this crap about mind control has her believing she has no choice."
"You're both missing the point," a third voice said. "She's helpless to stop it because it pleases her to be helpless to stop it. The whole idea makes her wet."
"Why don't you all just shut up," said Lori. "What's the use of having voices in your head telling you things if they can't even fucking agree? What am I supposed to believe, anyway?"
"Well," the first voice said. "What do you believe?"
"That it's real," said Lori. "That they know what they're doing, and I can't do anything to stop it."
"Then you have made it so," the second voice tisked.
"Told you," said the third.
Lori fell through the darkness for a long, long time, but when she landed, it was on something soft, like a mound of feathers.
She was on her back in a hospital bed wearing one of those backless gowns, and a nurse was taking her pulse. Lori was hyper-aware of her body. Her breasts. Her puss. The sense of touch had become sharper, and more important. "Well, that part worked," she said. "I feel horny as Hell."
"Glad to have you back among us," the nurse said. "One word of warning. Whatever you do, don't masturbate. You're being monitored. They'll know. And they'll send someone in here to paddle you until you can't stand it."
Adrenaline was telling her to run. But run towards? Run away? "That's mean," Lori said. "Get me all sexed up and then not let me do anything."
"You're being punished," the nurse said. "It's supposed to feel mean." She waved and left.
Lori noticed that the woman had a nice ass. God. Her slit was wet and begging to be touched. But she'd get caught. Punished. Her hand slid down between her legs as if it were controlled by another's will. Oh God. Rub, rub. Wiggle. So good. So naughty.
Two young orderlies rushed in. One carried handcuffs. The other had a paddle. They rolled her on her belly and locked her wrists behind her back. Her heart pounded. They dragged her legs clean off the bed and there she was. Feet on the floor, upper body on the bed, ass in plain view. The paddle moved in hard and fast and her bottom was on fire. But her crotch was crushed against the edge of the mattress, and moving brought friction and friction was pleasure. Lori humped the mattress in tempo with the furious paddle strokes until she exploded and went limp.
"Damn," one orderly said. "She found a way to cum, the little slut."
"That's okay," the other said. "Now that she's not trying to get herself off, she'll focus on her butt and it will hurt worse."
The paddle went back to work, bruising tender hips and thighs. The hypersensitivity to touch was no blessing now, because it gave her only pain. "I'll be good," Lori wailed. "I'll be good. I promise. I promise."
"Damn straight you will," the orderly said.
"Here, give me that," the other said. "Why should you have all the fun?"
The two men traded places. "Please," Lori begged. "No more. I can't take any more."
The paddle renewed its assault on poor naughty tender girl parts.
Lori paced the small room. She'd tried sitting on the bed, but it wasn't very comfortable. A man came in, carrying a paper sack. He didn't seem to be a doctor.
"Good afternoon, Lori," he said. "Question for you. If you could choose, what kind of man would you like to be indentured to?"
"Young, cute, and wealthy," she said. God, her hind end ached.
"Is thirty five young enough for you, dear?"
"Not really. Twenty five would be more like it."
"Most men who can afford such an expensive pet are over fifty," he said. "And I admit nobody ever calls me cute, but I am wealthy. Phil Johnson. I'm the winning bidder in the auction for your services. Here. Put these on." He began taking things from the sack and laying them on the bed. A white blouse. A bra. A short pleated skirt. White socks, and brown shoes. Brand new stuff, still with price tags. Stuff parents try to make their young teens wear. In this context, fetish stuff. She had a man who wanted to punish a girl-child.
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