by Louis Woodley
Sister Mary Lucretia was the Headmistress and Chief Inquisitor of St. Sadistic Academy, an establishment known for its prowess of knocking sense into teen girls whether they like it or not. Sister Mary Lucretia took her job quite seriously; after all, the school motto translated from the Latin as Life is painful and we will prove it. The Order was founded for providing guidance to wayward teen girls. Since its inception it had grown so successful that they had a growing waiting list of parents eager to turn their little darlings over to the ministrations of the academy.
The Order was highly secretive about their methods, but trouble-making girls entered and came out college-bound and unfailingly well mannered, and parents at the end of their ropes willingly coughed up the dough to see their brat turned into someone they could be proud of. However, there was a good reason that their methodology wasn't shared with the parents, who might have gotten squeamish. The Order's red habits should have been a hint.
To put it simply, the school thrived on discipline; early, often, and without remorse. The premise was simple: teen girls are inherently sinful and need the sinfulness whipped out of them at the slightest provocation (or even proactively to discourage them from even thinking about doing something). And not a namby-pamby little smack or two; we're talking about a good butt-warming to tide them over until they sinned again. After a while the frequent beatings toughened up the girls' backsides until they were as tough as Kevlar. There was a reason their school colors were red and purple, and their athletes were highly motivated to succeed (or else).
Unlike a prison sentence, which at least has the possibility of parole, once accepted into the academy the girls were essentially held hostage there for the rest of their schooling, providing their parents continued paying for the tuition. Spring semester immediately rolled over into summer school, strictly to keep their daughter's academic progress ongoing (or have a chance to escape and not return).
Besides, the girls had now developed healthy habits such as getting up at 6:00 am to clean their room for inspections, and they needed the academy's special guidance to help maintain them - perhaps a good thrashing if their beds weren't tucked tight enough. So despite their daughter's pleas to escape, parents always agreed their daughters were better off staying exactly where they were.
The school had all the warmth of a Soviet gulag or a Dickensian workhouse. The student handbook was lengthy, but parts were so ambiguously written that the mere act of sneezing in class could be construed as 'willfully interrupting class' should the teacher choose to interpret it so. Not all the teachers were members of the Order, and empathy towards students was at the bottom of the hiring criteria when a teaching vacancy arose. Not surprisingly, they had little turnover since once a like-minded teacher was hired to teach at the academy, you'd have to pry them away with a crowbar to get them to go and teach elsewhere.
Underneath her habit Sister Mary Lucretia had the forearm of a stevedore from her frequent daily applications of the cane and other implements of correction. But she was far from the only one punishing the girls.
Novitiates patrolled the hallways and resided in the dorms, acting as prefects with their paddles always at the ready. Teachers had free reign within certain exceedingly loose guidelines on how to punish their students (and the flimsy excuses they could use to do so). It was hardly uncommon for a teacher to wallop a girl and then send her on to Sister Mary Lucretia's office to finish her punishment off. Assistant Headmistress, Sister Katherine Vitalis, handled a number of the administrative details, freeing the Headmistress to deal with the line of students outside her door.
So who in their right minds would willingly subject their daughters to such a harsh regimen? Basically, the school attracted parents at the end of their tether. Presented to them as a highly successful alternative to the juvenile justice system or a life on the streets, parents leapt at the opportunity to cure their strong-willed child and turn her into a productive member of society. Instead of jail or deprivation she would go to college.
What parent wouldn't willingly open their checkbook at the opportunity and not worry too much about the Order's methods, especially since if they turned down the opening, the school would just move on to the next family on the waiting list?
Of course those truths were glossed over until the parents signed their darling daughter over and went their merry way, convinced that she was in good hands. Only then does the hammer drop and the new reality is revealed. Those good hands were usually holding something to spank their daughter with.
The intake process was a set-up from the beginning. The student would be ordered to comply with Sister Mary Lucretia's commands and informed of the consequences for failing to do so. And then the fun began...
Some girls tried to argue, convinced that Sister must be joking and refused to cooperate. They quickly learned that Sister Mary Lucretia was born without a sense of humor. Others attempted to make a break for it and found out that escape attempts were impossible. Some broke down in tears, appealing for sympathy and claiming to have been misunderstood, but found no pity. Still others claimed they'd rather take their chances with the legal system instead, but their parents had signed them over and the Order had no interest in issuing refunds.
Attempts to contact their parents and begging to be rescued were thwarted. Besides, on the off chance that a girl somehow managed to get a phone call through, it was hardly difficult to convince Mom and Dad that their stubborn/malingering/thieving daughter was lying through her teeth to avoid accountability for her behavior.
Why of course it wasn't true that she was flogged unmercifully at the slightest provocation. Was that what she'd told them? What a terrible liar their daughter was to fling such false accusations at women dedicating themselves to helping troubled young girls like her.
Obviously such fanciful tales were an attempt to gain sympathy and evade accountability for her misdeeds. Of course, the parents were encouraged to notify the school immediately if she ever managed to call them again; they would shortly be having a 'discussion' with their daughter about violating school phone policies and spreading malicious falsehoods.
Once Sister Mary Lucretia had finished her indoctrination, the new girl would be issued new clothes and bedding, assigned to a room, receive textbooks and school supplies, and then be thrown to the wolves. Her initial lesson in unfairness was being interrogated about the student handbook she hadn't even seen yet.
Naturally she would be unable to answer the questions, and failure naturally resulted in punishment. Some girls would argue about the injustice, which only motivated the Sisters to demonstrate how unfair they were capable of being. The wiser girls quickly realized that they were being set up and that any dissent would only make a bad situation worse for them.
Despite all the chicanery and smoke-blowing, there were several elements of truth presented to the parents. Their daughters definitely would wind up better behaved as a result of their time at the school. But equally important was the fact that, no matter how much of an academic slacker she was in her old life, at the academy she would become highly motivated to succeed in the classroom.
There was a painful price to be paid, whether by ruler, paddle, hairbrush, switch (the school grew several varieties for the girls to cut their own), or a simple trip across a lap, for being the lowest scorer on every homework assignment and test. So the academic competitiveness was cut-throat as all the students strove to at least avoid finishing last; girls that never gave a crap about studying before suddenly parsed her assignments for every gem of knowledge. And let's not even discuss how rigorous SAT preparation and the school spelling bee got.
They dominated the other schools around them in both academic and athletic pursuits. While the girls at the other schools might be jealous of their success, if they could see the red bottoms underneath those shorts they'd understand why their opponents were so highly motivated. It was the finished product that gave the academy its sterling reputation (no matter how ill-deserved). Their graduates came out with high test scores and were subsequently accepted into many fine institutions of higher learning, convincing other parents that this was the school for their miscreant daughter.
But by then most girls had developed Stockholm Syndrome and saw the Order's ministrations as critical to their ongoing success. After a couple of embarrassing incidents where a graduate caused consternation by requesting her college roommate to punish her for motivation, the Order started providing them with an older graduate of the academy to act as mentor.
If a graduate wasn't readily available, they had a lengthy list of like-minded educators willing to provide the special tutoring these girls needed. It is hardly surprising that a good percentage of graduates wound up with a life partner with a 'take charge' attitude. And, down the road, if their own daughters became problematic, they knew just which school to send them to.
The indoctrination of Sharon Green, a new student, illustrates the methods employed by the school. Sharon was a 16 year old who should have been a junior in high school, but a series of poor judgments resulted in her flunking her classes and becoming acquainted with the local law enforcement. As a result she was forced to repeat her sophomore year with little improvement.
At their wit's end, her parents had gotten on the waiting list for the St. Sadistic Academy and had just gotten the call that a spot had opened up due to a girl withdrawing due to a family emergency (the Sisters might have been heartless about caring for their girls but they recognized that sometimes the real world does intervene).
Fearing a backlash, the Greens had never informed Sharon of their plans, so having two burly gentlemen bundling her out of her bed before dawn was an unpleasant wakeup call. And it got worse when they carted her off while she pleaded for mercy and then used some colorful language to describe her parents when she realized she was being farmed out to a boarding school.
Having never heard of St. Sadistic Academy, she assumed she was bound for a place where she could quickly assert that she wasn't going to play by whatever stupid rules they came up with. She was sadly, desperately wrong, as she discovered a couple of hours later upon arrival.
Sharon had no idea that video cameras were recording from multiple angles from the time she was ushered inside the door (for 'quality assurance' purposes). She was stunned when Sister Mary Lucretia ordered her to strip off all of her clothing and stand in front of her. She refused to even consider cooperating, even when she was granted a final opportunity to rethink her position. Oh well, so be it.
Assistant Headmistress Sister Katherine Vitalis was buzzed in; she had grown up on a ranch and had been wrangling steers since she was young. As the oldest daughter she'd also been entrusted to keep her younger siblings in line, and if she felt no remorse over tanning their hides then she had no concerns about bringing a stubborn Sharon to heel.
Knowing why she was being summoned, Sister Katherine Vitalis barreled in like a bronco from a chute, catching Sharon totally unaware. She barely had time to turn her head before she found herself overwhelmed. Years of practice at baring the bottoms of resistant girls stood Sister Katherine Vitalis in good stead.
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