INTRODUCTION

 

Suffering is an illness caused by attachment. Self-discovery and serenity are the cure and the path to Nirvana.

The Four Noble Truths

From the teachings of the Lord Buddha

 

Beth gripped the bars of her holding cell wondering when their jailers would release them. The Boston Police Department had a catch-and-release policy for non-violent offenders. They just took names and subjected them to an uncomfortable night in jail before letting them go. She was worried about her final exams, worried that she needed to hit the books.

"Elizabeth Lenard...Lenard."

The echo off the metal walls distorted the sound, but it sounded enough like her name so that she shouted, "here....HERE!"

"Don't cooperate with those pigs," one of her more committed cellmates hissed, but Beth ignored her.

"I'm here," she shouted again.

She had done her bit for the cause now it was time for her to return to her real life.

"Grab your stuff, Lenard. We're releasing you."

A second man in a suit stood behind the jailer. He quietly took her arm and guided her down the long hallway. She avoided the eyes peering out from between the bars. Their time will come soon enough, she thought, no need to feel guilty about an early release.

They stepped through a doorway into an enclosed courtyard where a black van stood waiting. The jailer held back as the man in the suit pushed her to the back of the van.

"The Emergency Court has found you guilty of sedition, Elizabeth," he said quietly. "You need to come with us."

The Emergency Court...sedition?

"There's been a mistake. You have the wrong person," she said reasonably. "The police arrested me last night during a student protest. I have not been to court. I'm telling you, there's been a mistake; you need to..."

She didn't get to finish. He slammed her against the back of the van, pulled her arms behind, and snapped on a pair of handcuffs.

"There are too many of you traitors in this town to have in-person trials. The court tried you in absentia and found you guilty. The judge sentenced you to national service for the duration of the emergency, and he gave us the right to question you for 30 days. Next time, maybe you will think twice before turning on your country."

"That's ridiculous," Beth said breathlessly. "Didn't you ever hear of habeas corpus? Let me out of these! The court can't try me in absentia, I'm right here. I have the right to a lawyer and..."

He pushed a ball gag into her mouth and opened the van door. Frantically, she turned back towards the jail; the BPD jailer had already disappeared inside. A second man wearing a blue FBI windbreaker appeared around the side.

"We need to do a body search," the first agent told her. "It's routine."

Beth's eyes widened over the gag. The only cops present were the two male FBI agents. The second man was holding a large pair of cutting shears that he used to cut off her clothes. She must have faded during this process as the next thing she knew, she was sitting naked on her haunches on the van's metal floor with her arms cuffed behind. The agent in the FBI windbreaker pulled her arms back roughly and attached her cuffs to a snap-hook hanging from the ceiling. Lifting her arms forced her off her haunches and onto her knees. The first man crossed her ankles and strapped them together. She heard the engine start through the fog that had descended over her mind.

"We have a long ride ahead of us, Elizabeth. The court has assigned you to the FBI interrogation site on P Street in Washington. It's one of the best; in 30 days you will be begging us to take you to the caves.

"If you cooperate during the trip, I'll change your position every so often. If you don't, I'll keep you like this and add these."

He pulled two metal clamps out of his pocket.

"They go on your nipples. You won't believe how painful they are. The girls who have tested them for me tell me that the pain is, well, very special. So, I advise you not to piss me off."

She looked down at the clamps and felt a wave of fear grip her stomach. It was just a threat. He wouldn't really do that to her...would he? She didn't want to find out.

"You're going to have company, we have two other traitors to pick up on the way, but the gag needs to stay on...regulations, you know."

She didn't know.

He climbed out and closed the door, leaving her bound in strappado in the dark. She recovered slowly from the shock of begin cuffed, gagged, and stripped, moving slowly through stages of disbelief, rage, self-pity, and finally acceptance. After a while, she began to focus on other things to distract herself from her situation. They were somewhere on the Massachusetts Turnpike, she guessed trying to get her mind off the pain. At some point, she realized that she didn't really care where they were, that her guessing game was a distraction, a coping mechanism. She was already beginning to adapt.

Had he said "Washington?"

She tried to remember, but those first few minutes were a horribly jumbled nightmare in her mind. Washington was seven hours away, and he said they needed to pick up others.... Did they really intend to keep her like this for seven or more hours?

She told herself she would get this straightened out when they gave her access to a phone. It was a mistake, a terrible mistake. The government didn't "disappear" people in America even under the Dunford administration.

Unfortunately, she was mistaken.

 

***

 

Evil festers in some people...always has, always will.

The danger is that these people come together in support of a good cause.

This perplexes ordinary folks and leaves them vulnerable to tyranny.

Taken from the writings of

The Honorable F. Jacob Price,

Chief Justice of the Mississippi Supreme Court

 

The presidential election of 2104 was the most bitterly contested in the nation's history. Both parties railed against America's foreign wars and against the growing threat that some nation would use nuclear weapons to secure the resources it needed. It was Benjamin Aaron Dunford's controversial plan for a national system of deep bomb shelters, however, that struck the right chord with the public. It was the instant fix that traditionally appealed to Americans.

During the campaign, he declared, with pseudo-scientific proof, that the country was in an irreversible death spiral fighting over dwindling resources, and that its survival depended on "self-protectionism." This new "ism" struck just the right chord, and the frightened public elected Dunford with the strongest mandate since FDR and the Great Depression.

Broadly speaking, Dunford's plan was to turn the 12,000 larger caves and caverns of Appalachia, specifically of Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, and Georgia, into habitable shelters. These shelters would be underground towns, fully equipped to produce those necessities needed to sustain life for a long time, connected by a system of electric-train tunnels.

He never said how many people the Appalachia caves would hold or for how long, but the public was happy to look beyond these details. What caused more debate was the reasonable claim that a global race to build bomb shelters would be self-fulfilling, that once there were enough habitable caves, there would be nothing to stop the missiles from flying. Dunford sidestepped this concern with the empty response that "only a liberal would build his house out of straw."

The day after his election, Dunford named his cabinet. It consisted entirely of powerful corporate leaders, like him, who had supported his campaign. He gave them control of the nation's eight-trillion-dollar-per-year federal budget, and in return, they pledged to use their apply their corporate resources to cave conversions. The Appalachia cave system had the dubious distinction of being the largest project ever attempted by mankind.

Over time, serious scientists began to dig more deeply into the project. Most economists and sociologists claimed that the numbers simply did not work, that they simply could not hold, distribute, or produce enough basic human necessities to maintain an American standard of living. Dunford responded to these critics by again calling them liberal nay-sayers. Privately, however, he was also worried and assembled an army of government experts to work the problem. He needed a model for his underground empire that worked, and he didn't care what it took.

Dunford's experts eventually agreed that a viable middle-class could not exist in the caves. Instead, they recommended a modified feudal system. This new economic model would include slaves, peasants, soldiers, and nobles, which they euphemistically called workers, tradesmen, peacekeepers, and leaders. The workers would make up 80% of the underground population and produce most of the food and other necessities. However, to make it work, they could only consume about 40% of what they produced, which would mean oppressing them just as the nobles and military had oppressed the peasants in Tenth Century Europe.

Of course, this controversial report never saw the light of day, but Dunford agreed with its conclusions. He told the country that he was working on a plan that would save every American, but that Americans would need to make temporary sacrifices.

Most people accepted this and accepted the need for mandatory "national service" on an emergency basis. This started slowly by transferred all two million federal and state prisoners to the caves "for the duration" as workers. Eventually, they began to "federalize" whole towns and move the town's "volunteers" into the caves.

Everyone knew this was an abuse of power, but most excused it as necessary. The only open resistance to Dunford's policies came from colleges and universities, who protested with increasing ferocity the loss of their rights.

 

CHAPTER ONE

 

The riot raged around the cop car, but all Megan could think about were her bare nipples pressed against the seat's faux leather. She had fought back fiercely during the melee, and one of the pigs had "accidentally" ripped open her shirt. Thus, the reason her tits were bare. The reason she could not do anything about it was that they had cuffed and hobbled her, making it impossible for her to move.

She wasn't a violent person, and she certainly didn't advocate violence against the police, but this was different. This time the cops had attacked them for no reason. It was almost as if they were punishing them for protesting. When the cop who ripped open her shirt had leered at her tits, she had gone a little crazy and kicked him in the shins with her fashionably heavy combat boots.

In retrospect, that had been a mistake.

The cops always focused on the violent ones, on those who had the temerity to fight back. Her kick had caused them to swarm her. They quickly had her cuffed behind with her ankles hobbled and strapped to her wrists. The spit-gag had been gratuitous punishment for her continued resistance. Finally scared, she had stopped fighting, but they were determined to arrest her. Four of them lifted her off the ground and dumped her in the cop car's backseat.

The cops had arrested her before but never like this. Usually, they just pushed protesters into a police van, took names, kept them in lock-up for a few hours, and let them go. It was humiliating but also validating--protest leaders like her needed street-creds and the only way to get them was to fuck with the pigs and spend a night in jail.

This was completely different. This was personal. She knew it the moment the pig had ripped open her shirt, the moment they had shoved the gag in her mouth.

The rally had been peaceful and the rhetoric relatively mild when the cops had showed up. The students had ignored their disapproving glares, but when she started to speak, they had charged the crowd with nightsticks flying. There was no escape; they had blocked every exit from the quadrangle.

The violent student response was entirely predictable and justified. She had seen her boyfriend, Steve Foster, one of the rally's organizers, trying to leave through the library, but the cops had blocked that way out as well. They were using tasers at this point and pepper spray, which provoked an even more violent student response. Even now, she could still feel the rage boiling inside.

They had no right...no reason to attack! Calm down, she told herself. Take it easy. It's over. The more they abuse us, the more support we acquire.

The soothing words helped. Nothing else mattered right now except her pride. The pigs had seen her bare chest. Not that she had anything to hide, anything to be ashamed of, her tits were perfect. They were the ones who should be ashamed. Yes, the students had fought back, but only after the cops had used violence. This was a classic case of cop-revenge, a police riot. They had targeted her specifically because she had been on the dais at the time of the attack standing behind a huge placard that read, "Fuck Dunford."

Then there was the other reason...they had singled her out because she was pretty. It was happening more often these days; everyone was talking about it. Increasingly, the pigs were targeting hot chicks. It was an outrageous abuse of their power, but it was also understandable. Girls were easier to subdue and there was always the opportunity of copping a feel. It was a power thing...the cops had it and they loved to flaunt it in front of someone like her, someone worth scaring. It was the badge, the gun, the uniform, the power.... It made them feel invulnerable and brought out the sadism that had made them want to be cops in the first place.

BASTARDS...! Fucking bastards!

Copping a feel... Is this where this expression came from?

Whatever...

It was too bad. She had been looking forward to getting laid tonight. Obviously, this wasn't going to happen now. He would most likely be spending his night in the hospital, and she would be spending hers in holding cells with dozens of other students.

The thought of the cells didn't bother her. The real source of her fear was being alone and hogtied in the back of a cop car. She was defenseless and isolated here, and that was not a good place to be when tempers and passions were running so high and hot.

Yes, she had kicked a cop, so what...? He had been staring at her, leering at her tits. Any magistrate would understand why she felt the need to lash out. She had the evidence of her torn short, and scores of witnesses if it came to that. It had been a police riot, plain and simple. The NYPD would want to cover it up. Dunford's federal goons would make sure of it. Dunford didn't need any more bad press on college campus. His name was already a curse word for students.

Dunford...!

She hated the president, hated everything he stood for, hated his condescending expressions, his smug smile, and that stupid lock of hair that he thought made him look young. Mostly, she hated his policies, especially the absurdly named self-protectionism. The construction of the caves was an abomination. Instead of building a massive system of bomb shelters, America should be cultivating relationships with other countries, finding ways to share resources.

This was the only sane way forward for humanity. War was the end, the "final solution" for everyone. Having mankind return to the caves like prehistoric creatures was nonsense. Dunford's policies would start a shelter-race and produce the very result he says is inevitable. The more he isolates the country from the world, the more chance there was of nuclear conflict. This was what every opponent, every sensible and courageous professor in the country was saying.

It was what she had been saying when...

The car's overhead light came on suddenly and a cop slipped in behind the wheel.

"Time for you to go to jail, Megan, to go directly to jail, and not to collect your $100," he said cheerfully. He was speaking far too loudly, obviously excited, hopped up on adrenaline. Bashing heads and breaking bones took a lot of energy, she thought. She was still riding an adrenaline high as well, but hers was defensive.

One of the cops who had put her in the hogtie had found her student ID in her hip pocket. He had been feeling up her ass at the time...another piece of the story for her to tell the magistrate. The NYPD had more than its fair share of thugs in uniform. Everyone knew it. It was the same for all American cities nowadays. It was as if...

"They are going to hold you tonight at the station and charge you in the morning. Most of us were hoping they would haul your asses off to Riker's, but the brass decided that it would be better to let you cool down at the precinct. I would have thrown you to the animals at Riker's and let them feast, but the guys in charge don't want to push things too far. The holding tanks at the precinct are going to be overflowing tonight. We might not have room for everyone, but we can always find space for the ringleaders and those who fought back, for those who would hit a cop, like you, my dear."

She wanted to answer him, to tell him to fuck off, to say that she had not been doing anything wrong, that he had provoked her into kicking and biting with his lecherous staring. The gag was frustrating. Maybe he was a decent guy, she thought. If she could speak, maybe he would acknowledge the truth of their encounter and relax the hogtie that was arching her back painfully. Then again, he might just be another bastard like the rest of them. It was just hopeful thinking that he had the decency to...

Her father was going to be pissed, she suddenly remembered. One of her friends would call him tonight, and he would be there in the morning to get her out. It would mean another lecture on "perspective and proportionality," his favorite theme, but at least he would be there. At least, she hoped he would be there. Lately, he had been making noises about leaving her to her own fate, saying that he had done everything he could for her and that if she wanted to ruin her life, to spend her college years in jail, there wasn't much he could do to prevent it.

Proportionality...!

Did the fucking Dunford administration act with proportionality when it sent troops into Mexico to expropriate their oil fields? Was it proportional when the Dunford's puppet congress revoked the 22nd Amendment, allowing Dunford to stay in office for a twelve-year term? Was the order to empty all federal prisons and "put criminals to work in the caves" proportional?

No! It was not.

It was academia that was acting with proportionality. If anything, students and their professors were being too easy on the administration. If anything, they were...

The car drove out of the quad onto Broadway. She couldn't see much lying on the back seat, but she could tell where they were from the city's lights and sounds. The 26th Precinct was just a few blocks away. Suddenly, the cop driving made a sharp turn into a dark space and stopped. It was an alley.

"I'm feeling a little randy tonight, Megan, after all that excitement. How about you?"

A spike of fear rose from her stomach and settled in her throat. Would he dare...? She would tell him who her father was as soon as the gag was off. She would explain that... Panicked thoughts came quickly to mind then died like drops of water on a hot skillet.

Why not fuck her...?

Who was going to stop him...?

Who was going to listen to her after...?

He had the power, all the power. She knew instinctually that neither decency nor consequence would stop a man like this. He was the worst kind of bully, one that had courage only when he had the advantage. She shook her head, her incredible eyes wide with fright. He turned and stared at her over the seatback.

"You are quite a piece of ass, you know, Megan. We have a good eye for ripe, young foxes like you. You know what we say in the 26th...? 'Why bother with the skanks when you can latch onto a juicy piece?' Like you! It makes sense, right? ...One of the perks of the job."

She was shaking her head and grunting her protest when he got out and opened the back door.

"Do you want to do it on the ground or in the backseat? I vote for the backseat; it's a little more cramped, but who knows what filth is down there. What do you think?"

She tried to scream for help, but the spit gag made it impossible to make a sound louder than a pig-like grunt. She tried kicking out at him, but the hobble and wrist strap made that impossible as well. He ignored her distress.

"Don't tell me you are a virgin, Megan. I'm sure the rich boys at Columbia are banging a fox like you all the time. One more fucking by a street cop is not going to make any difference to you...unless you are a lesbo. Is that the problem?"

He sat back for a second, pretending to think.

"It doesn't matter to me, of course, I just want a taste of your luscious pussy. I don't care if you prefer a cock or a tongue inside you."

He swung her legs off the seat, and she fell heavily into the footwell. He sat down with his hand resting on her tight ass.

"...Tell you what. You do me right, and maybe, just maybe, I'll just let you go.

"No one is going to notice if you make it to the station or not. All I need to do is remove your cuffs and you can run your tight ass back to your dorm. You can be sitting in class tomorrow morning instead of waiting in a holding tank for your arraignment. What do you say?"

She stared at him for a second then shook her head no. It wasn't that she had anything against having sex with him-yes, he was overweight, but on the other hand, he was almost handsome in a storm-trooper kind of way-she just couldn't bring herself to pay for her freedom with sex. Anyway, it was well known that cops were treacherous. He would probably fuck her then take her in anyway. He stared at her for a minute then smiled and shrugged.

"Okay, if you want it rough, I'm amenable. I'll just fuck you quick, and we will be back on our way. How's that sound...?"

She tried to scream, but again managed nothing more than a grunt.