The next morning it took all Mel’s courage to step up to Mr Emery, who was washroom monitor, and say:‘Please Master, would you tell the Headmaster I wish to confess? ’
He just nodded his head. ‘I’ll tell him, girl. ’
Other girls who had heard hugged and kissed her. Cam looked happy while Bolt gave a thumb’s up.
In assembly Mel felt sick and dizzy when her name was called out by Bradawl. Being chained to the confession machine seemed unreal and she hardly noticed the spikes of the breast cages digging into her soft flesh. All she was aware of was the sea of expectant faces staring at her.
But her secret was safe, she told herself over and over. She had defied the truth rack and Judge Gouge to keep it. Nobody in Shackleswell knew. She would just say she had a stupid family argument and ran away. She meant to go to London but ended up here…
‘What do you have to confess, Spring 157? ’ Bradawl asked.
‘I… I’ve been a bad girl. I had a stupid argument with my family and ran away and…’
She faltered. The truth wanted to come out. It was getting in the way of her life. There was only so long she could keep this bottled up inside her. If Shackleswell had taught her anything it was that all shame had its limits.
‘No, it wasn’t a stupid argument. I have a stepsister called Maddy…. that’s short for Madelyn. We’ve lived together since we were young. We were the same age more or less and we even look quite alike. Strangers thought we were real twins. As we got older we used to compare how we were growing… standing together naked in front of a mirror. And then one day we just… kissed… and touched and… Yes, we had sex! I screwed her and it was fantastic! And we did it again… and then our parents caught us. They’re quite religious and they couldn’t accept it. It was terrible. And that’s why I ran away and ended up here! ’
The girls were all gaping at her open-mouthed but it was said and done.
‘I’m not sorry for loving Maddy that way, only for the hurt it caused. Please beat me! ’
The pain of the cane lashes felt so sweet, blotting out her guilt, but they stopped far too soon. She had been hiding behind the pain and degradation she had suffered, but now she was naked in every sense of the word. The truth was out and she had bared her soul. What else could she say next? What was she sure of?
‘I was lost but now I’m Spring 157,’ Mel gasped. ‘A spring is something elastic that can return to its normal shape after being bent, compressed or stretched. It can be used to reduce vibration, concussion, as a power source or actuator. It’s a useful thing so I’m useful. I’m strong…’
Mel began to squat down on the pump impaled within in her. The chains tugged on her nipples and twisted the spiked cages into her breasts but she did not care. She had admitted the worst thing she had ever done. She was dribbling round the pump handle as it rammed into her then dragged on her pussy rings but nothing else could hurt her so deeply again. She could hear the girls urging her on as they pumped their own phalluses and that felt wonderful. They didn’t hate her for what she had done! Here nothing was hidden…
The bells rang and she orgasmed and everybody cheered wildly.
While she hung limp and sweaty between the posts the girls filed up and kissed her.
‘Now I understand,’ Cam said.
‘You had to go one better than me! ’ Bolt said gruffly but not unkindly.
She saw only understanding and compassion in the other girls’ eyes. They accepted her. As Wire had said they were all damaged in someway. In this perverted city perhaps it was not such a sin.
Mel was freed from the confession machine. Her legs felt like rubber and Master Stapler had to hold her upright.
Bradawl said:‘As both Spring’s chain-sisters have already made their confessions and all have achieved satisfactory grades in their classes, as well as having passed all their practical tests, I declare that this trigyn is fit to graduate from Gryndstone. They will leave this morning. ’
A new murmur of surprise went up and Mel felt dizzy. They were graduating right now?
Bolt and Cam were called up to the front of the hall. Their ties were removed, their graduation medals were clipped in their places and Bradawl congratulated them. There was no sign of condemnation for what she had just admitted. They kissed the cocks of all the masters and thanked them for what they had done.
‘You will have your chance to say goodbye to our graduates in first break,’ Bradawl told the other pupils. ‘Now off to your lessons. ’The rest of the school filed out. He smiled at Mel, Bolt and Cam. ‘You are free until then. You might want to visit the washroom first. ’
It was strange to be wandering about out of class while the rest of the school was at work and even stranger to be without their ties. Mel felt undressed. In the deserted washroom Mel cooled her sore breasts. The stud marks seemed to be fading already and the cane stripes were hardly worth mentioning. They were nothing to a Gryndstone pupil, except that technically she was a Gryndstone pupil no longer. Bolt and Cam were clearly desperate to hear more about her private shame but were also hesitant to ask.
‘It just happened between Maddy and me,’ Mel volunteered. ‘We knew it was wrong even if it was exactly illegal, but we couldn’t help it. It just felt so good. Then our parents caught us. They couldn’t take it. It was the worst thing that had ever happened to me. I felt I’d started it all so I ran. ’
‘That must have been terrible,’ Cam said gently.
‘But do you think it was wrong? ’ Mel asked, looking at each of them doubtfully. Suddenly their understanding was very important.
‘After all my screw-ups who am I to judge? ’ Bolt said, then smiled. ‘So maybe I wouldn’t have said that before I came here, but now I know screwing another girl can be, well, pretty good, I can’t say it’s wrong. As long as nobody made you do it then the moral stuff’s up to you and her. ’
‘But you can’t ignore how it affects your family either,’ Cam said. ‘You know you’re going to have to work that out eventually. ’
‘I know,’ Mel said. ‘It frightens me. ’
‘Some day I’m going to have to make my peace with my family as well,’ Cam admitted. ‘I think confessing is a start. Do you feel better now? ’
‘I think I do,’ Mel admitted.
‘I said this place was too honest,’ said Bolt. ‘Now let’s really get out of here. ’
‘It’s a shame we haven’t time for proper goodbyes,’ said Cam. ‘I was looking forward to our ring on ring night. ’
‘They probably want to get us away before I mess up again,’ said Bolt. ‘Can’t say I blame them. Anyway, it means we get out a day early. ’
At break time Bradawl led them down the playground through a fleshy wall of ringed nipples and bare pubes as the other girls crowded round them. The wonderful warmth and smell of their perfumed bodies was almost overwhelming.
‘Keep in touch,’ Bobbin, Pin and Axle begged.
‘We will,’ Mel promised, feeling dangerously emotional and blinking back tears. Even Bolt looked a little dewy-eyed while Cam did not try to disguise her feelings. Hard nipples pressed into soft breasts as they hugged girls they had lived intimately closely with, strained and suffered beside and made love to on so many occasions. Even those fresh girls they hardly knew would be riding the same phalluses they had used in the weeks to come, which was a strange sort of continuity. Somehow it felt as though she had been at Gryndstone for years and not months. Perhaps it was the quantity and intensity of new experiences that mattered and not simply time that had passed. Mel knew Gryndstone had moulded and shaped her mind and body and her life would never be the same again.
They made their goodbyes and then passed through the green door at the bottom of the playground into Miss Trunnion’s office.
‘Here are our latest graduates, Miss Trunnion,’ said Bradawl.
‘Yes, Headmaster,’ said Miss Trunnion, misty-eyed.
‘Don’t be sad, they must move on. ’
‘I know, Headmaster. ’
Bradawl looked at Mel, Bolt and Cam. ‘Whatever you do next I’m sure you’re going to make Gryndstone proud of you. Only in Shackleswell will you enjoy the freedom to be what you are without shame, to serve with pride and suffer with joy. Here you will always be valued as parts of a greater whole, never forget that. ’
‘No, Headmaster,’ they said together, then they all bent and kissed his cock one last time and said thank you, even Bolt.
Mel recalled how the three of them had first seen Bradawl in this office what seemed like a lifetime ago and how shocked she had been. Now she felt an absurd pang of loss at the thought of leaving his school.
Bradawl departed. Miss Trunnion sniffed and dabbed her eyes with a tissue and then said briskly:‘I have your street clothes here…’
She brought out hangers holding three sets of grey knee-length belted coats, ankle boots, scarves and headbands. Mel had no idea they were handed out to them so soon after graduating.
‘Give me your shoes and try them on…’
They handed over their school shoes and took the coats and boots. It felt rather cloying and slightly scratchy to be wrapped in fabric, Mel thought, although her coat was softly lined. Oddly all the time she had been kept naked Mel realised she had not felt cold. No wonder Chain and Spindle had taken their coats off as soon as they got into the park.
She looked at Cam and Bolt who were hesitantly pulling on their coats. She’d never seen them dressed before, except in dog suits which hardly counted. Now the jiggle of their breasts, the hardness of their nipples and the excitement of their lovemouths was concealed. What a loss of self-expression that was. She would have to judge their mood by their faces alone.
‘We do get a few strangers in town so keep your headbands and scarves on in public,’ Miss Trunnion advised.
They covered their foreheads and collars. Now they were nameless as well.
Miss Trunnion handed them each a small purse. ‘Here are five gyntokens each pocket money, plus the ones you were given in the park. ’
She also had some pamphlets for them. ‘This is the address of your gynhouse and guidebook and maps to the city to help you find your way. There’s no hurry. You don’t have to report until six. Now here’s a guide to the gyncom message board service to keep you in touch with your friends. And this is a list of further education classes and courses you might be interested in after you’ve settled down. ’
‘Further education? ’ Mel asked.
‘You can’t be a serving gyn all you life,’ Miss Trunnion said, sounding wistful. ‘You have to prepare for the future, but don’t let that worry you now. Right, that’s you set up. ’
Suddenly she came forward and hugged each of them. ‘Sorry, but I feel like this every time girls graduate. Please visit us. We like to know how our old girls are getting on. ’
Mel felt something hard under the older woman’s blouse as she hugged her. Nipple rings? Of course, “Trunnion” was a mechanical term…
Miss Trunnion recovered herself and pressed the switch under her desk and the inner door to the mews unlocked.
‘We walk out just like that? ’ Bolt asked in disbelief, looking from her to the door.
‘Aren’t we escorted? ’ Mel said.
‘No, you just go by yourselves,’ said Miss Trunnion. ‘It’s a nice day. Or you could go down to the station…’
‘We’ll walk,’ Bolt said quickly.
‘Goodbye and good luck…’
Hesitantly they walked out of the mews and up the lane beside the school wall until they reached the main road. Cars and people were passing by. Bolt was looking about her as though expecting trouble but nobody stopped them. It felt strange. This was not a closed park but the real world they had not set foot in for months. They could go left or right along the road. It was up to them what way they took. They could pretend the cuffs and collars under their coats were not there. This was freedom. It was a little frightening.
They walked along to stand in front of the school. It looked so innocent from the outside.
Bolt suddenly laughed. ‘They just let us out! After all those chains and straps and bars it was as easy as that! They really believe we’ll do as we’re told! They’re fu… ing crazy! ’She scowled at the school then set off down the road. ‘Come on, let’s get away from here. I don’t want to look at that place ever again. ’
‘Some of it wasn’t so bad,’ Cam said as they strode along.
‘Oh, and what particular screw, caning or tit-pulling were you thinking of? ’ Bolt asked sarcastically
‘I meant having friends around who accepted me… and making love to you in our cage. ’
Bolt had to grin. ‘So I’m great in bed. But apart from that? ’
‘Apart from that we did have some fantastic orgasms. ’
Bolt did not respond. At the junction at the end of the road she studied her map.
‘What are you doing? ’ Cam asked.
‘Finding the shortest way out of this town. When I’m clear I’ll find somebody who’ll give me a lift and then I’m gone. ’
‘Back home? ’ Cam asked.
‘Yeah, Northhampton. My home town, not this place. ’
‘I didn’t know you lived in Northampton,’ Mel said. ‘After everything we’ve done together I don’t really know anything about your pasts, either of you. ’
‘We’ve all heard our confessions,’ Cam said. ‘I think that’s what really matters. ’
Bolt pointed to the left. ‘That’s the way I’m going. ’She looked at them and took a deep breath. ‘You could come with me if you want. It might be… fun. ’
Cam smiled but shook her head. ‘I don’t think so. I’ve still got to sort myself out. I might as well do it here as anywhere. ’
‘Don’t you hate what they make us do? ’
‘I started off hating it but now I’m not sure. Maybe it’s no worse then the things I did to myself and others without any help. Being here is safer than being on the streets. Maybe I need some discipline to keep me in line. ’
Bolt looked genuinely sad. ‘Have they ground you down? Made you into a proper gynaton? ’
‘Maybe they just uncovered what was already there. I didn’t think much of myself before I came here. At least I now know I’m good for something. I’m useful. Don’t worry, I’ll be fine. ’
Bolt looked at Mel. ‘Spring? ’
‘I’ve got to find a public phone and talk to my parents or sister direct. I must find out what she’s doing. Then… I don’t know. A step at a time. Maybe I can visit home on a day off. ’
‘Have they got to you too?
‘I don’t feel brainwashed, but like Cam said, we keep having these amazing orgasms. Something must be working right and I want to know why. Some of it I hate but even that excites me at the same time, like being in a perverted adventure. I certainly feel more alive here than at any time in my life… except perhaps making love to Maddy. Maybe I have got a masochistic streak. Anyway, I haven’t got anywhere else to go. Will you be all right? ’
‘Me? I’ll be fine. No trouble. ’
They looked at each other awkwardly for a moment and then embraced and kissed passionately.
‘Ok, so some of it was fun,’ Bolt admitted huskily.
Reluctantly they pulled apart again.
‘Keep checking with the school,’ Bolt said. ‘I’ll send them a postcard: “Hi, Suckers! ”See if they put that up on the notice board. ’
Mel forced a smile. ‘We will… goodbye… and good luck. ’
They watched Bolt stride off until she was out of sight. ‘So what do we do now? ’ Cam asked.
Mel swallowed a lump in her throat. ‘I want to try to ring home, if you don’t mind. ’
‘I’ve nowhere better to go… and I don’t want to lose my last friend,’ Cam said.
Mel looked at her, fighting back tears once more. They kissed, only pulling apart when they remembered where they were.
They found a phone box, which being in Shackleswell was clean and in working order and Mel made some reverse charge calls. Her parent’s answer phone was on and Maddy’s phone was not picked up.
Mel was dispirited. Cam said:‘Let’s go into town and see what we can get to eat and drink with our tokens. If we’re going to be staying here we should have a look around. You can try phoning again later. ’
They walked along tree-lined streets, past carefully renovated and restored factories.
‘It’s all very clean, isn’t it? ’ Cam said.
‘Do you think they have teams of gynatons out here at night scrubbing the streets? ’ Mel joked, then realised that might literally be true.
They found a pub that had a walled beer garden with seats under sunshades. Nervously they went in to the bar.
The barman clearly recognized them. Their standard costumes must have been like uniforms to a Shackleswell native. ‘And what can I get a pretty pair of gyns like yourselves? ’ he asked with a grin.
He knew they were naked and ringed underneath their coats. However he served them cheerfully enough. A drink and a sandwich were a token each.
They sat outside eating and drinking slowly while trying to get used to this unnatural freedom. It was not even Sunday. They should be in lessons now…
‘Do you suppose we’ll get into trouble for letting Bolt run away? ’ Cam asked.
‘We’ll we weren’t chained to her,’ Mel said. ‘Nobody’s ever said anything about what to do if somebody escapes. They just assumed we’d all behave. We could always say we thought Bolt would meet us later. ’
‘I don’t want to lie,’ Cam said. ‘At least Shackleswell is honest in the way it treats us. That’s why we have the collars and chains. They don’t expect us to like everything they do to us, just try our best to serve and…’
She was interrupted by the appearance of the barman by their table.
‘Excuse me, girls. I know it’s your day off but do you want to earn yourself a few extra tokens? ’ he asked. ‘A couple of our regular games room gyns are off sick and we need some performers to fill in. ’
‘Doing what, Master? ’ Mel asked hesitantly.
He told them.
Mel blinked. They were not being commanded to obey, simply requested, as if their desires actually mattered. It was a choice. They had the power just to say no and walk away. That was real freedom and the idea that they would give up a few precious hours of it was laughable. She glanced at Cam and read the same understanding in her eyes.
‘We’ll do it, Master,’ they said.
The huge dartboard hanging on the wall in the pub games room had the outline of a slave girl picked out in wire in between the normal radiating numbered grid lines. It portrayed her with her back to the board, her head up, her arms drawn out and wrists aligned with cuff hooks on the board rim. Her thighs were pulled up and bent back level with her hips and her knees were bent at right angles.
Mel fitted the outline perfectly, held in place by cuff hooks and narrow metal straps about her elbows, chest, waist, thighs and knees. Further support was given by a right-angled bar projecting from the middle of her board capped by a rubber plug that was lodged in her rectum. She was almost totally immobile and she strained against her bonds with a perverse thrill. A mesh guard over her face was her only protection. She was a living target. The darts themselves had fine short points projecting from rounded sticky pad heads, ensuring they did not penetrate deeply but still stuck to what they hit.
Contoured and numbered wire grids clipped tightly about Mel’s breasts and groin delineated the target areas. Hooks in the grids pulled her labial rings wide, making the wet pink mouth of her sex gape. Numbered wire loops showed that a hit on her breasts scored twenty, her areolae twenty-five and her nipple crowns fifty, while her labia were worth twenty five points, her vaginal mouth, a natural bulls-eye, fifty and her clitoris sixty. That was of course the most exquisite agony.
The players were good and her most sensitive parts were their favoured targets. Mel wailed and slobbered about her gag as their darts feathered her breasts and groin. They only raised pinpricks of blood but the pain combined with her bondage aroused her until she was dripping onto the floor.
When a game was won the board was lowered and the winner claimed his prize between her gaping thighs. Mel was a target for darts and for the players’ penises. Like any gynaton she was there to be penetrated one way or another. By then she was in desperate need and welcomed the hard shafts that filled her aching void and rammed her against the board.
Next to the dartboard was the skittle alley. Cam was suspended over the end as the target for a game of Bat and Skittle.
Her arms were stretched up and outward over her head by a spreader bar linking her wrists. It was hung by a pair of chains, allowing her to sway and twist a little if she struggled but bringing her back to rest facing the bowlers’ end. More chains ran down from the ends of the spreader bar to her ankle cuffs, holding her splayed legs wide with her feet dangling just above the boards of the alley.
The single target skittle was a heavy tapering wooden teardrop with along neck that was thrust deep up her rectum so that it hung freely beneath her. Its neck was carved into half a dozen thick ribs, helping her anal ring clamp about it and hold it inside her. A pair of light chains stapled to the sides of the skittle ran up Cam’s back and over her shoulders to clip onto her nipple rings.
The bat hung between her legs in front of the skittle. It was a flat round wooden paddle just brushing the floor with a long shaft that was plugged into Cam’s vagina. Hooks screwed into its sides secured it to her pussy rings. The shaft was in two sections joined halfway up by a heavy coil spring, allowing it to flex when struck. She used it to protect the skittle and prevent it being knocked out of her anal grip.
The players stood at the end of the short alley and bowled down wooden balls at the skittle and Cam tried to deflect them with the bat. They could shift about the end of the lane trying to get a clear shot at the skittle while Cam twisted round in her chain to protect it. Every strike on the sprung paddle set it bouncing and shivering, twisting it against her labial rings while the upper end churned about and vibrated inside her vaginal sheath. Soon she was lubricating profusely, making the bat handle shiny and dripping onto the floor beneath her splayed legs, joining the stains left by numerous girls who had hung there before her.
When a ball got past her guard and struck the skittle it was more painful as it jarred inside her rectum. A hard blow would dislodge one of the ribs from her grasp and it would slip one notch out of her sphincter. Blow by blow it would be loosened from her until it dropped out of her rear. As the skittle toppled over it tugged on its chains that jerked her nipples upward. Her yelp of pain signalled the end of the game.
The successful bowler would of course claim his prize of her now unplugged rear as she hung swaying in her chains blinking back the tears.
In other words it was just a normal afternoon in a Shackleswell pub.
‘We’re a real pair of pain slut sex slaves,’ Cam sighed a couple of hours later as they left the pub.
‘We’re gynatons,’ Mel corrected her.
‘Same thing? ’
‘Slaves don’t get days off. ’
A police car drew up by the side of the pavement and PC Colter leaned out of the driver’s window. Beside him sat PC Mattock. Mel’s stomach flipped.
‘Found you, Spring 157,’ Colter said with a grin. ‘Get in, you’re wanted back at the station. ’
Mel gulped. ‘Why, Master? ’
‘You’ll see. On the way we’ll pick up your chain-sister, Bolt 184. You as well, Cam 031. ’
‘We… don’t know where Bolt is,’ Cam said nervously.
‘Oh, we know exactly where she is,’ Colter said casually, ‘she’s doing a runner. Do you think those anti-swearing chips are all you’ve got in your collars? They’ve got locator beacons in there as well. Now you two come with us…’
With heavy hearts Mel and Cam climbed into the back of the police car and it drove off.
As they headed out of town Mel slumped in her seat. Bradawl had not been so naïve as Bolt had thought. They had never really been freed. It had all been an illusion. ‘Will you be able to catch Bolt before she escapes, Masters? ’ she asked miserably.
‘We’re not trying to catch her,’ said Mattock with a chuckle. ‘A lot of new girls escape on the first free day they get and we let them. They need to get it out of their system. They either sneak back later and say nothing or report themselves, feeling guilty, so we give them a spanking to make them feel better. ’
Mel’s head spun as she tried to take this in. ‘Then why are you going after her, Masters? ’
‘Because she’s stopped trying to escape. ’
‘She’s… stopped? ’ Cam said incredulously.
‘Which means she’ll probably need her chain-sisters for a bit of emotional support. ’
Bolt was hunched over with her legs drawn up tight and her head resting on her knees, exposing the dark cleft of her shiny ringed pubes. She was sitting on a weathered outcrop of rock beside a narrow country track that wound up a hill overlooking Shackleswell. She hardly stirred as the police car drew up and Mel and Cam scrambled out and ran up to her.
‘Are you all right? ’ Cam asked anxiously, stroking Bolt’s hair.
‘Has anybody hurt you? ’ Mel added.
Bolt raised her head, revealing confused, tear-stained eyes. ‘I’ve got nowhere to go,’ she said pitifully.
‘You were going home to Northampton,’ Mel said.
‘That’s not home… it’s where I lived… but there’s nobody there who wants me back. I’ve got… nothing! ’
She and Cam sat down on either side of Bolt and hugged her gently.
Mel looked out over the city of Shackleswell, which stood there solid, purposeful and dominating. It was the first time she had seen it like this. Now she knew that slave girls served it at every level, from pubs to assembly rooms, in the streets and the underground. They were essential to its survival and they bound it together. The city machine was built on their sweat and suffering and sustained by their orgasms. The price of being part of it was the total surrender of their bodies to pain and humiliation and the reward was belonging intimately and completely to something greater than themselves that was both frightening and wonderful. She could not escape it now. None of them could.
‘Then you’d better come home with us,’ she told Bolt.
Bolt looked at them and then burst into tears.