Field Survey

*
The Star Fleet Series
Field Survey
by Zack
Copyright© 2001, 2002. All rights reserved.

Part Two 
 

A wagon pulled by two oxen entered Prison Farm Number Four. Two keepers in tan dresses sat on the seat and the back was filled with sacks of seed grain. Sonji sat on top of the sacks. She still wore the straps that the guardsman had put on her back at the jail, and a rope was tied around her neck with the free end held by one of the keepers. It was bothering Sonji to have her hands immobilized for so long, but she didn't have any of the pain that she had experienced in Hodg's wagon. 

She felt her anxiety increase when the wagon stopped. The keeper holding her tether got down and she felt a tug on her neck. Sonji moved to the edge of the wagon; the keeper helped her down and led her into a stone building. 

Inside the building there were two more women. A keeper was sitting in a chair behind a large table. The trusty standing beside her wore a smock made of coarse brown cloth and a tan headband, and she had an iron collar around her neck. 

The keeper holding Sonji's tether said, "This is the new input. Let's get her processed now so the Warden can interview her today." She removed the tether and used a clamp tool to release the clamps and free Sonji's wrists. She unbuckled the belt and said, "Strip." 

Sonji hesitated just a moment as she said to herself, "I'm a slave now. I'd better get used to humiliation." She put her shawl on the table, removed her dress, and put it next to her shawl. 

"Sandals and medallion, too." 

Sonji took off her sandals and put them on the table. As she removed her medallion she pulled on the thong and felt the buzz that meant communication was established. She kept the medallion in her hand as long as she dared and then dropped it on the table. 

The keeper used a strap to fasten Sonji's hands behind her back. The other keeper got out a ledger, a quill pen, and an inkwell. She asked, "Name?" 

The first keeper answered, "Zongee." 

This was written in the ledger. "Offense?" 

"Assaulting a judicial officer." 

"Impressive. Good thing you've fastened her hands. She might have overpowered all of us. What's her number going to be?" 

The trusty entered the room with a semicircular piece of metal in her hand and read the number stamped on it. "628". Then she got a brown smock from a shelf in the corner and wrote 628 on the front and the back with a small brush and a clear liquid. Where the liquid touched the cloth the brown changed to a dirty yellow. 

The keeper said to Sonji, "Open your mouth." When Sonji complied the keeper looked inside. Then she ran her hands through Sonji's hair. 

She turned Sonji so she faced the table and said, "Bend over and put your face on the table". 

When Sonji obeyed the other keeper held Sonji's hair so her cheek was pressed against the table top. The next command was, "Spread your legs." 

Sonji moved her legs to the limit permitted by the hobble strap connecting her ankles. Then she gasped as she felt a finger enter her slit. The keeper doing the probing said, "This is amazing! I feel a maidenhead." 

The other keeper said, "A virgin peasant girl! I'll write this down. She must be a fast runner, or else her brothers are slow." 

Sonji felt a finger probe her other orifice. Silent tears rolled from her eyes as she started to understand that humiliation could always get worse. 

Sonji's hair was released and she was pulled upright. The trusty pulled the smock over her head and under her bound hands. Sonji could see that it was actually just a piece of coarsely-woven cloth with a hole in the middle. It was long enough to reach her knees and wide enough so that the edges just met when the trusty tied a string around her waist. It left her hips and the sides of her breasts exposed. 

The keeper pointed to Sonji's chest and said, "628 is your number. Answer when it is called. You no longer have a name." 

The three women went through a door in the back of the room, pulling Sonji with them. In the next room a small forge smoldered in the corner and there was an anvil and some other apparatus. A keeper put some iron rivets in the hot coals and the trusty worked a bellows; the forge started to glow. 

The other keeper had the iron semicircle with the number on it, and she rummaged in a wooden box and found a matching semicircle, except that this one had an iron half-ring welded to it instead of a number. Both of the semicircles had a radial flange with a hole in it at each end. She said to Sonji, "Kneel beside the anvil and put your head down." 

The keeper put one semicircle under Sonji's neck and the other above it, made sure the holes in the flanges lined up, and used a large clamp to hold everything in place. She moved Sonji's hair out of the way, worked a piece of leather inside the iron circle, and adjusted it so that it covered Sonji's neck and part of her face and shoulder. 

The other keeper came from the forge holding tongs clamped on a red-hot rivet in one hand and a hammer in the other. She put the rivet up through the flanges and moved Sonji's neck so the head of the rivet was on the anvil. A few blows with the hammer flattened the rivet, and the keeper dipped some water from a barrel and cooled it. The clamp was removed, the circle was rotated around Sonji's neck, and the process was repeated. Sonji now wore a slave collar. 

Next the keeper removed the ankle strap and riveted leg irons on Sonji. These were crude, just semicircles of rounded metal with the ends flattened and punched to accept a rivet. They were connected by a chain fabricated from two rods with interlocking loops forged on the ends. Sonji wondered at this and then she realized that this was the easiest thing for a blacksmith to make by hand. 

Sonji stood there, with her wrists strapped behind her back and the warmth of the rivets spreading through her leg irons, and for some reason thought, 'Star Fleet should put THIS adventure on their recruiting posters'. 

A keeper removed the strap from Sonji's wrists and said to the trusty, "Twelve, take charge of 628 until lockdown tonight. Take her to the Warden's office and then show her the routine." 

"Yes, Keeper." 

The keepers left the room and Twelve said to Sonji, "I'll show you something that will help your ankles." She took a piece of string and tied a loop around Sonji's right calf just below her knee, then looped the other end around the leg iron and pulled it up as high as it would go. She did the same on the other leg and said, "You can get some bad bruises if the irons keep bumping your ankle bones." 

Twelve and Sonji entered another building. A blonde in a slave's smock sat at a table reading some papers. Twelve said, "Here's the new input for her interview with the Warden". 

Flixee looked up and recognized Sonji. "Are you Zongee?" 

"Yes, but I pronounce it 'Sonji'." 

"I'm really sorry for what I did. If I had told you I was a convict you wouldn't be here now." 

"I was the one who made the mistake. I'm sorry you didn't escape." 

"We can't talk now. We're both in Barracks 2, so I'll see you before lockdown." 

Flixee got up and knocked on a door and said, "The new input is here, Warden." She turned to Sonji and said, "Go in." 

Sonji entered the office. A gray-haired woman sat behind a desk. She looked Sonji over and said, "This is a pleasant surprise. I had expected that someone convicted of assault would look hard and tough. You will be volunteering for private servitude, won't you?" 

Sonji didn't know what she meant, but something told her not to disagree with this woman. She nodded yes. 

"Excellent! I knew we would get along. That's all, 628." 

Sonji left the office and the building as fast as she could. Twelve caught up to her and led the way towards four barn-like wooden buildings. A narrow trench was located about 30 meters from the first building, and the smell made it obvious what its purpose was. 

Sonji asked, "Can we stop? I have to pee." 

"All right. You stand on two of those boards crossing the trench. Hold my hand. It can be tricky until you get used to the irons." 

Sonji shuffled out on two narrow boards spaced about as far apart as she could spread her legs. She squatted over the center of the trench and urinated. When she finished she shuffled to the other side of the trench. 

Twelve explained, "You can pee in the fields, but this is the only place you can dump. When you're working you get a chance to use this latrine only in the morning and at night, so plan ahead." 

They went into a building. The only furniture was a long waist-high counter. The floor was dirt. Sonji asked, "Is this the barracks? Where are the bunks?" 

"See those chains?" Twelve indicated four parallel chains that stretched most of the length of the building. Each had one end fastened to a ring in a stone block set in the floor and the other end padlocked to a similar ring. 

"At lockdown everyone has their irons around a chain, and the end is padlocked. This makes sure that nobody takes a walk during the night. As the new girl you'll be first on a chain and the last one off." 

"You mean we have to sleep on the dirt floor?" 

"Yeah, we're out of featherbeds. You'll get used to it. Besides, I don't expect you to be here long. Now, the routine. Wake up is at first light. As soon as the chain is unlocked go use the latrine. Then back in here for morning meal. They bring it in from the cookhouse and serve it at the counter. Then everyone lines up outside in the main yard for roll call. Don't miss it. The Warden makes new work assignments and hands out punishments. Then you go to your work assignment. You quit work about an hour before sunset and come back here. There's a pond you can use if you want to wash all over. You will want to use it, because you're going to be dirty and sweaty. Night meal is served exactly at sunset, and you have to be in the barracks, so use the latrine before then. After the meal everyone goes back on a chain for another roll call and lockdown." 

"What about the noon meal?" 

"That's brought to you at your worksite. It's usually something that doesn't need cooking, like bread and cheese. Now I'll show you where the pond is and you can wash. You smell bad." 

When Sonji returned from the pond Flixee was in the barracks, and Twelve let them have a private conversation. Sonji said, "When I saw the Warden today she said something about private servitude. What did she mean?" 

"You can do public servitude, like work on this farm, or they put you up at auction and whoever buys you gets your I.S. for a year. The money goes to the district, and it can be a lot of money. If there is a year or more of I.S. left on your sentence after the first year you're auctioned again. You didn't know this?" 

"You mean if a man bought me he could do anything he wanted with me?" 

"Well, not anything. He couldn't burn his initials into your butt, for instance. The rule is, no permanent scars or other damage. That includes mental damage. Driving you crazy isn't allowed either." 

"But if he wanted sex I'd have to give it to him?" 

"Sonji, sex is the minimum he'd want. Whoever buys you wants a slave, someone he can control, someone who has to do as she is told whether she wants to or not, someone who can be punished. If all he wanted was sex, he could get it easier and cheaper from a brothel, or a concubine, or even a wife." 

"Have you ever been sold?" 

"Yeah, my last I.S. was for two years. The first year a middle-aged man bought me. He'd tie me up, and spank me, but it was really just play. He only whipped me once, and I had deliberately provoked him. It hurt, but the marks were gone in a week. We had some great sex, and I was sorry when the year was up. The next year a woman bought me, and it was just the opposite." 

"A woman? What did she want?" 

"Well, at first she wanted a body servant, and my tongue was always busy, too. She'd have me give her a massage, or oil her body, or do up her hair. If I didn't do it exactly the way she liked it she'd whip me. Soon she stopped pretending that it was a punishment and she just tortured me for the fun of it. She knew every way there was to cause pain without leaving any marks. Usually she would fasten me in some contorted position and leave me there for hours. Before long I was looking for a way to kill myself. Then I had some good luck. The one time she went too far the court made a surprise inspection." 

"What did she do?" 

"She tied my hands over my head and tied my ankles to rings in the floor. Then she ran a thin iron wire between my legs and pulled it up until it supported all my weight. In a few minutes blood was running down my legs and I was screaming and begging. I don't know how long it was before the inspectors found me, but it took a lot of surgery and almost a month in a hospital before I was repaired enough to function. They let me finish my I.S. doing clerical work. It was almost enough to make me give up crime." 

"Flixee, I can't do private servitude if it means I have to have sex. I just can't!" 

"Sonji, you really don't have a choice. I know the law says you have to volunteer for private servitude, but the Warden has your custody, which means she gets part of the money. She is also the one who determines your work assignments and orders your punishments. Believe me, she can force you to volunteer eventually, so save yourself a lot of pain and do it sooner rather than later. The Warden will call for volunteers the day after tomorrow, and I'm going to step forward. Please, you too." 

They noticed the sun was almost down and went to the latrine. Just after they returned to the barracks vats of stew and baskets of bread were brought in. The slaves lined up at the counter and as they walked down it they were given a wooden bowl filled with stew and a chunk of bread. They sat on the floor to eat it. Sonji thought that it wasn't nearly as good as the food she'd had in jail. 

After eating the slaves formed four lines, one for each chain. Flixee went to the head of one line and put Sonji in front of her. Two keepers entered the barracks and one shouted, "Lockdown." 

"What do I do?" Sonji asked. 

"Pick up the end of the chain and pass it back to me between your legs. Then just walk forward, picking up the chain as you go." 

One of the keepers padlocked the chain ends and then walked along and made sure each slave's leg irons were under the chain. The other keeper called out numbers and checked the responses against a list she held. When she finished the roll call the keepers left the barracks and the slaves could lie on the floor. There was a chorus of groans and a rattle of chains. 

Flixee pointed out two shallow hollows in the dirt and said, "One of those is for your hip and the other is for your shoulder. You can use that block of wood as a pillow. If you untie the strings from your calves you'll have more slack." 

Sonji lay on her side and found that she was more comfortable than she had expected to be, but she still spent a restless night. 

The next morning the slaves assembled in the main yard. The morning meal had been bad-tasting gruel. Sonji stood next to Flixee in the front row. In front of her was a raised platform covered by a pitched roof. When the Warden and five keepers walked onto the yard and climbed the steps at the front of the platform everyone became silent. 

The Warden announced, "Today we welcome 628 to our happy company; she is assigned to Labor Gang 2. Now I have an unpleasant task. 238, step forward!" 

A slave with that number on her smock reluctantly moved towards the platform. Two of the keepers moved next to her and held her arms. The Warden said, "It was reported to me that you defecated in a field yesterday. Is that true?" 

"I...I...I couldn't help it. My bowels were loose and..." the woman stammered. 

"I'm so sorry, but you broke a rule and now you must be punished. Twenty lashes." 

The keepers dragged the wretched 238 up onto the platform. Another keeper tied a rope to each of her wrists. The ropes were looped over hooks in the ceiling and pulled until 238 was standing on her toes with her arms spread apart. Her smock was removed and she stood naked with her back to the assembled slaves. 

A keeper swung a wide, heavy strap. It hit the middle of 238's back and a puffy red welt sprang up. 238 groaned. After the third stroke she screamed, and kept screaming until all twenty lashes had been delivered. When the last stroke hit her 238 collapsed, dangling from the ropes on her wrists. She had red and swollen welts from her shoulders to her knees. The other slaves watched silently. 

After roll call Sonji was collected by the leader of her labor gang and led to a field. She was given a hoe and shown which plants were the crop and which plants were the weeds. After she had been hoeing for a while she paused to wipe the sweat out of her eyes. She heard her number called and turned to see a keeper walking towards her. 

The keeper shouted, "You weren't told you could stop working! Two strokes. Bend over." 

Sonji was shocked. She stood motionless until the keeper pulled her hair and forced her head down. 

"Stalling gets you another stroke. Grab your ankles and don't let go." 

The keeper lifted up Sonji's smock and pushed down on her back so that her bare bottom was uppermost. Then she swung a short strap. A red welt appeared on Sonji's skin and she gasped. The next stroke hurt even more. When the third stroke was delivered the pain was so intense that she had trouble holding in a scream. 

This was just the start of a very long day for Sonji. Every keeper seemed to seek her out and hit her with a strap for any reason or for no reason. By quitting time her backside was just one big welt. 

After she got her food that evening Sonji ate it standing up. Flixee saw this and raised the back of Sonji's smock. She gave a low whistle when she saw the condition of Sonji's bottom. "What happened to you?" 

"The keepers just kept hitting me. I don't know what I did wrong." 

There was a sudden hush as the Warden entered the barracks. She announced, "I want to remind everyone that tomorrow you can volunteer for private servitude." 

The Warden walked over to Sonji and said, "I heard that you had a hard time today. It is so, so easy to break a rule without even meaning to, and then be punished for it. Just look at what happened to poor 238. But you promised to volunteer, didn't you? Then you won't be here, and this won't be a concern for you." 

After the Warden left the barracks Flixee said, "Well, that was a clear enough message. If you don't volunteer tomorrow she'll whip you to a bloody pulp. Please Sonji, she'll break you eventually no matter how much you resist. Don't suffer a lot of pain for nothing." 

"I know you're trying to help, and I thank you. But I just can't do it." Sonji expected more arguments, but Flixee said nothing. 

At roll call the next morning Flixee whispered to Sonji, "This is it. Are you going to volunteer?" 

Sonji shook her head. Flixee shrugged and nodded. The two women standing to either side of Sonji grabbed an arm and forced Sonji's hands behind her back. Another woman wrapped string around her wrists and knotted it. When the Warden asked for volunteers to step forward Flixee pulled Sonji by her hair and forced her to walk to the front of the ranks. The Warden looked at them and smiled. 

* * * 

It was morning of the next day. Sonji, Flixee, and two other women, Kanii and Punee, were in a room not too far from the courtroom where Sonji had been sentenced. All of them were sleeping on straw pallets, luxury bedding compared to what they had at the prison farm. A keeper opened the door to the room and a woman entered carrying a pot of porridge. She put the pot on a table and all of the women but Sonji went to the food. 

Sonji stayed on her pallet because she was chained to the wall. The chain, attached to a waist-high ring and locked to her collar, was just long enough to allow her to stand up or lie down. She had been fastened to the wall since she had arrived yesterday, and she was tired of it. 

Flixee brought her a bowl of porridge and said, "Have you forgiven me for forcing you into this?" 

"Of course I have. I know you meant to help me and I can't explain why this is wrong for me." She changed the subject. "Why am I chained to the wall while you three can move around the room?" 

"Because you're a dangerous woman, convicted of a crime of violence, and all we did was steal. Maybe I should move back, out of your reach." 

"Very funny. What's going to happen to us now?" 

"If it's like the last time I was here, they'll take off our leg irons and give us a medical exam. Maybe even a bath. About two hours before the auction starts we'll be put on display in the auction room." 

"What do you mean, on display?" 

"We'll be tied up so everyone can look over what they'll be bidding on. But all they can do is look. Touching isn't allowed." 

"That's awful. What's the medical exam for?" 

"They write down all of the scars you have, so that when your owner brings you back he can't claim you were damaged before he got you. They look for disease, especially sexual disease, and they put a pebble in your womb unless you have one already." 

"A pebble! What's that for?" 

"It keeps you from having a baby. I thought you peasant girls knew all about things like that." 

Sonji quickly said, "Oh, yes. In my village we use a copper coin instead of a pebble." 

"I've heard of that. Coins are supposed to be better, but pebbles are cheaper. What else do you want to know?" 

"Flixee, I'm so scared. If a man buys me, what am I supposed to do?" 

"The simple answer is that you do exactly what he wants you to do. The problem is finding out what that is. Usually he doesn't give you a complete list of what he wants, and sometimes he doesn't know himself. All I can do is give you some general rules. The three most important are, be humble, be obedient, and be very polite." 

Flixee continued, "Unless he tells you differently, call him Master, and be sure you use it in every phrase. Don't speak unless he gives you permission to do so, or asks you a direct question. Don't ask him for anything. Especially don't ask him to let you loose, unless you want to be tied tighter. You can speak if it's something really important, like for example, you've been in a cage for three days and he has forgotten to give you any water, but say something like, 'Master, your slave will be damaged unless she gets some water'. Don't deliberately disobey him or defy him unless you really want to be punished. Thank him for everything he gives you, whether it's sex, or food, or a whipping." 

Sonji wailed, "I'll never be able to remember all of this." 

"Let me put it another way. You want to make him believe that he is the center of your world, and that nothing is more important to you than pleasing him. Come to think of it, that's true." 

Flixee went on, "Body language is very important. I'll show you. Stand up, Sonji." 

Flixee also stood. She crossed her arms over her chest, looked Sonji in the eyes and said, "How may I serve you, Mistress?" Then she knelt, bowed her head, and said, using the same tone, "How may I serve you, Mistress?" 

"Wow, Flixee, it really gives me a funny feeling to have you kneeling like that. I felt nothing when you were standing." 

Flixee stood up and said, "If you were a man the feeling would be even stronger. Once you know how to do it, you can have a lot of control even though you're a slave." 

"What if a woman buys me? What does she want?" 

"That's easy. She'll want you to give her sex, and she'll want to give you pain." 

While Sonji was pondering that two keepers entered the room. One took Kanii and Punee out of the room and the other came over to Flixee and Sonji. She strapped Sonji's hands behind her back and unlocked the chain attached to her collar. Sonji and Flixee were taken to a small room that had a large vise with circular jaws mounted to the floor. The keeper closed the vise around one of Flixee's irons and used a chisel to cut off the head of the rivet holding it closed. She repeated the process with Flixee's other leg, and then replaced the leg irons with a hobble strap. 

When it was Sonji's turn Flixee took her arm to steady her and said, "I'm glad they have this vise. Otherwise you can get some really nasty bruises when the irons are cut off." 

Sonji's ankles were hobbled and the three women entered another room. Kanii was lying on her back on an examining table. Her knees were spread and strapped to posts extending from two corners of the table. A doctor was examining her, and when he finished Flixee stripped and got on the table. The doctor described the massive scar on Flixee's crotch and a woman wrote comments in a ledger. When the internal examination was finished Flixee was released and the woman examined her body for other scars. 

The keeper removed Sonji's smock and helped her onto the table. Her knees were strapped to the posts. She moved her arms and tried to find a comfortable way to lie on her bound hands. 

The doctor had just started his examination when he said, "This is unusual. A violent criminal who is also a virgin. She won't be one for long, though, so let's make it easier for her." 

He took a scalpel and slit the hymen; then he completed the examination and implanted a pebble in Sonji's uterus. Sonji felt her humiliation was now complete. 

When Sonji and Flixee returned to their room they found Kanii sitting in a large tub of water and Punee drying herself off with a large towel. 

"Wonderful! I really need a bath." Flixee said. 

"We have to share the bath water? Who goes next?" Sonji asked.

"I do." 

"I need a bath too! Why do you get to go next?" 

"Because my hands aren't strapped behind my back." 

* * * 

Sonji and the other three women had been on display for almost two hours. They were standing on a low platform, and each had her hands fastened to a ring in the wooden beam over their heads. Their wrists were crossed and strapped, and they weren't stretched, but after all this time they were uncomfortable. They were all naked, with each woman's smock next to her feet, folded so her slave number was visible. 

Sonji's mind was detached from her body, and she watched everything as if it were happening to someone else. The girl who had blushed when she changed clothes in the presence of her shipmates was somewhere inside, but the Sonji-body on the platform didn't react to the stares and lewd comments of over a hundred strangers. 

A man climbed onto the platform. He clapped his hands loudly several times, and when the crowd had quieted said, "Welcome, Ladies and Gentlemen, to the Brombeg indenture auction. We only have four slaves this session, but they are all choice! Our first offering is number 628." 

A guardsman moved Sonji next to the auctioneer. She was still naked, but her wrists were now crossed and strapped behind her back. The auctioneer said, "628 was convicted of assaulting a judicial officer. Looks dangerous, doesn't she? You'll have to take special precautions with her! Eighteen years old and still a virgin, if you can believe it. Look at that flawless body, that tan skin, that black hair. You could get lost in that bush. What am I bid?" 

The initial bidding was spirited, but the price quickly reached a level that caused all but two bidders to drop out. One was a man with a shaved head and a scarred face, who wore a sword and body armor. The other bidder was Longee. Soon the price became larger than she could pay, and Sonji was sold to the warrior. 

End of Part Two

Copyright© 2001, 2002 by Zack. All rights reserved.
I welcome your comments. Email me at zack_writer@hotmail.com
 
 

16.06.02

story continues in Field Survey

o0o