Chapter 1

 

When, at the behest of the United Nations, penal slavery became the standard punishment for all major crime and replaced the so ineffective prisons all around the world, it became clear that something in between the lower penalties of community service and fines, and actual slavery for a period up to life, was needed, Penal Discipline was dreamed up.

At that time, I had completed a degree in physical education at Queensland University and had majored in sports psychology. I hadn't needed a job. I was the only son, actually the only child of one of Queensland's wealthiest men but I loved all sports (and had the genes and the build to do pretty well at them) and decided that I would become a personal trainer to the best in the state.

That lofty aim soon became supervened by the advent of this new penal slavery and the arrival soon thereafter of the profession of Penal Discipline. And when I realised what this was and what it meant, I knew it was going to be my niche in life.

My father loved flying. His own plane, that is, and just after my graduation, they both died in a crash brought on by a freak storm in northern Queensland. This meant that by the time penal discipline had emerged as a necessary tier of punishment between fines, etc, and penal slavery I had not only graduated but had already become one of Queensland's richest men.

This latter incidentally, (penal slavery, that is) had revolutionised the concepts of crime and punishment. At the point when the General Assembly of the United Nations had finally stepped in and authorised a complete reversal of former attitudes and treaties, crime of all kinds but particularly murder, rape, wife and child abuse, religious terrorism and high-level theft and fraud, not to mention street crime and the rise of criminal gangs everywhere, had become endemic and seemingly unstoppable.

In that one stroke, where almost every nation on this Earth enacted appropriate legislation, perpetrators of high crime became slaves, many for the rest of their lives. Overnight, the crime reports were halved, then halved again and again, as criminals observed the nature of penal slavery.

The first of these was that a slave was not permitted even the smallest rag to hide his or her formerly private parts. He or she went totally naked for the time of their slavery.

Second, they were depilated nude from the face down. This was to shame them further but also to aid in identifying a slave if he managed to escape. Their bodies, including their sexual organs were now totally nude-hairless and thus very, very apparent.

Escape was unlikely however, for as a third element to his slavery, every one of them was 'chipped' with a tiny silicon wafer glued permanently onto his right testicle (right onto it, inside his scrotum) or her clitoris. This acted not only as a GPS locater but also as a means of punishing the slave if he or she erred.

Fourth, they were required to be worked at hard labour for a minimum of fifteen hours per day (from six in the morning until nine at night).

And fifth, they were to be fed only with Slave Chow, a very cheap food in the form of pellets (rather like chook pellets) made from bulk processing tonnes of low-quality but nutritious and properly balanced foods in giant steam cauldrons that not only cooked the food but then pureed and dried it to a thick paste and extruded it in the form of the pellets that were then further dried, bagged and marketed. A couple of handfuls of this together with a litre of water (which allowed the food to re-form in their bellies and then be digested normally), twice a day made for a perfect if totally uninteresting nutrition for them.

From the foregoing it will be realised that penal slavery was a horrible fate and the criminal classes quickly recognised it. This meant that our police resources (and those all over the world as well) could now concentrate on solving the remaining outstanding cases and that meant to an even better clean-up rate.

But not all offences warranted such a draconian penalty. Minor theft, assaults, serious breaches of the traffic laws and the like needed something stronger than a fine or community service but did not merit slavery and the UN quickly approved the intermediate punishment of a sort of half-way slavery coupled with corporal punishment and dubbed it 'Penal Discipline'.

Such offenders were not to be processed and then auctioned off to the general public but were to be allocated to licensed Penal Disciplinarians who would house them in their own establishments and there condition, punish and train them to be better citizens. Yes, they would be stripped naked and depilated and they would be chipped, just as real slaves were, but they would not be sold unless upon evaluation at the end of their term, they were deemed incorrigible, whereupon they might be returned to the court for further sentence.

This was well known to them all and hung like the legendary Sword of Damocles over their heads for the whole time they were with us.

It had finally been decided by the best psychologists the world had to offer that human beings need discipline which, in the past, had come from home and school. But with the advent of the theories of 'letting a child find its own feet in the world' and the banning of corporal and other forms of punishment deemed degrading or insulting or psychologically damaging, parents and teachers had lost the ability to bring up the youngsters in a balanced and loving, but responsible environment and so now especially so far as criminals are concerned, physical punishment, shame, humiliation and ultra-hard work is again in the melting pot of correction.

My parents had been anything but pandering to me. I had had my chores to do and didn't receive my allowance if I didn't perform them to their satisfaction. Despite the fact we had numerous servants in and outside the huge house, I always had to make my own bed and keep my room spotless. They checked on my schoolwork and talked to me constantly about ethics, morals and the principle of noblesse oblige which they both saw as an obligation on their wealth.

I loved them dearly and they, me. I miss them very much but one must move on and after my mourning was over, conferred with Harrison, our butler, on my future.

He had been almost as important to me in my growing up as my parents and there were some things I talked to him about and not to them. I could never bring myself to discuss sex with Dad, for example. He was just so dignified and correct that it seemed somehow impossible and so it was to Harrison that I confided my bisexuality. I liked girls but I also admired the athletic bodies of my male friends but while I experimented with girls, I was too scared of public opinion to try it with males. In any case, it was Harrison who advised me on precautions and warnings. And he also warned me of my vulnerability because of Dad's wealth.

And so now I had no qualms at all about discussing with him my dream of using the pavilion out beside our tennis court and pool to house my criminal charges, and the guest house attached to it for the staff I would obviously need to help me.

He was enthusiastic. "I think it's a wonderful idea, James. I take it you will also use the gymnasium you are creating out of the old unused orangery, as well?"

I grinned at him. "Of course. As you know I like gymnastics and you and some of the other staff also indicated they'd like to get their bodies in shape so it will serve us all without having to bother going to the gym in town..."

"No, but you mentioned staff. What would you need, there?"

"To be honest, I don't know. I still have to work out a schedule and then see how it fits with the actual criminals I am allocated."

"Well, I suspect some of our staff may well like to assist you, as would I, when I have the time from my duties as your butler."

"And you will all be very welcome. After all, I know you all better than anyone in the world and we have always got on as if you were in fact a part of the family, which is how I think of you anyway...

"But you realise there is going to be a lot of discipline in our treatment of these lesser criminals? It has been underlined that there is to be a restoration of corporal punishment as an integral part of their, er, treatment?"

"Oh yes, James. Actually, there has been quite a bit of discussion below stairs and both Peter and Craig believe they would enjoy taking part in it."

These two are my chauffeur (well he was my father's and I have just kept him on as such) and mechanic, who looks after all the mechanical maintenance for the house and garden, and gardener.

I looked a little worriedly at him. "We don't want sadists, John. The discipline is to be painful but we are not supposed to derive any sexual pleasure from it."

He nodded. "I know, and I checked out this aspect with them. No, it's more that they have become imbued with the same values your father and mother instilled into you and see this new and so refreshing policy as a major turn-around in world affairs and just want to be part of it."

I breathed a sigh of relief. I really liked all our staff but those two, Peter Williams and Craig Belvedere, I counted as my real friends. They were of an age with me (I was then twenty-four, Peter twenty-two and Craig, twenty-five) and I counted them as sort-of cousins rather than employees, something my parents had smiled upon for they hadn't been snobs, either.

"Great, then once we sort out the details of their accommodation, exercise, punishments and psychological training, we may be in a better position to decide if we can manage them in-house or will need more outside staff as well."

"I'm hoping, James, that we may be able to run it from our own resources for, as you say, we are already a family of a kind and any new employee, would perforce be an outsider."

"I take your point, John, but I think we still need to work out the detail before making any firm decision, okay?"

"Of course."

Before leaving all these preliminary matters, perhaps a description of the house and gardens will be useful. It is situated in Brisbane, the capital of the state of Queensland, in Australia, in the suburb of Bardon, which is quite near the CBD and is comprised of rolling hills and dales.

Our house, which has been in the family since it was built in the middle 1800s, is two-storeyed above the ground but has substantial cellars beneath and a tower that rises another two levels and from the top room of which you can see all over the surrounding suburbs and the city of Brisbane as well.

It is placed in the middle of very extensive gardens that have been lovingly tended by a succession of dedicated gardeners, of which Craig is the latest. The trees are old and beautiful. The shrubs, many of which are also old, include huge rhododendrons and azaleas, hibiscus, orchids, ferns (with a babbling brook running through them. The lawns are green and velvety and weed-free and the whole area is well over two hectares which is five acres in the old scale, so you can see they are both extensive and lovely and I had always delighted in them.

It had always saddened me when I saw the break-up of the gardens of these old mansions (despite understanding the necessity of it sometimes) but ours was still in the form of its original land grant and the title had never been amended from that earliest issue (and signed by Governor Bowen, the first governor of the new colony of Queensland).

The house was built of dark red bricks with a slate roof and had been kept in pristine condition by each generation of my family.

Unlike many families, ours had never suffered from the vicissitudes of fortune and the various trusts, set up by my antecedents had ensure that the bulk of the fortune was self-perpetuating.

This meant that I would be able to use the house and its facilities without very much addition at all. As I said to John Harrison, the pavilion, used in earlier times to stage tennis and swimming parties; and the associated guest house, to put up any overflow of guests who couldn't be fitted in to the guest suites and bedrooms in the house itself would serve very well for our criminals and, if they were needed, any more staff.

 

But enough of all this domestic stuff. You want to hear about the criminals and how we managed them? Right!

First of all, the system required that we Penal Disciplinarians must be licensed and I managed that without any difficulty as they deemed my qualifications and facilities just about perfect.

Next, the system. For Brisbane itself, when there was a trial with a likely outcome that day, we were requested to be on call to the court. By we, I mean the PD (Penal Disciplinarian rostered on duty that week).

The judge or magistrate having found the defendant guilty of the crime, then sentenced him or her, and in these cases, everyone then knew that a guilty verdict meant a minimum of three months penal discipline.

That was now communicated and I was then invited to move into the dock and strip the prisoner naked and take him or her away to begin his correction. The act of stripping them there and then was seen as a rite of passage to underline to the guilty party his or her transition from free citizen to slave and while he was still not technically yet one of those wretched creatures, they would be soon if they didn't mend their ways.

They had not yet been implanted with the chip so we carried a tiny stun-gun which took the form of a lady's pistol. But it has a number of attributes very different from those on the old-fashioned weapons. The slide on its left side extended a chromed shaft out of its 'barrel' and this ended up with two, fork-like tines at the end. These were sharpened to a needlepoint and could easily penetrate even thick denim jeans or the like. Jabbed into the genital area of a male or female prisoner who resisted me, I now had them down on their knees, screaming in agony at the electric shocks to their most sensitive organs.

That usually had them docile but if not, another jab, perhaps to their necks, soon did.

I then ordered them to strip off every last item of their clothing which the bailiff now collected and would deposit in the Salvation Army box downstairs. If they had been foolish enough to bring any valuables with them, these were also confiscated so most such prisoners wore little clothing and no valuables at all.

All this was watched avidly by every last man and woman in the courtroom for this was high drama indeed.

I then took him out of the courtroom (after bowing to the bench) and down to the court MO's office where the chip was surgically implanted on his or her testicle or clitoris. It was a minor operation: just a tiniest slit on the scrotal wall or skin of the clit; the peeling off of the wax paper on the side of the small, paper-thin chip; and then its application to the gonad or clitoral wall-and a Band-Aid to cover the tiny wound.

The chip was now operative and could be tested which the MO did. I then transferred it to my brooch (that was pinned to the collar of my shirt) and with my number (instead of the court's) and the warning or penal command following, I could now either get his attention or punish him.

I also tested its GPS function on my tablet-and of course, it worked perfectly.

His last treatment was the denuding of his body of its natural hair. This was carried out very efficiently in what is simply called The Booth. It looked a little like one of those old telephone booths except that it had glass walls and roof and a stainless steel floor and slides on the side wall to set the upper and lower limits of the treatment. It was both quick and relatively painless and it only needed the one treatment.

 

Our first subject was a young punk by the name of Joel Smith. He was just nineteen years old and handsome in a craggy sort of way. He was not very bright and worked as a labourer on a building site. But he loved fast cars-other people's, that is. And the magistrate had no compunction in sentencing him to my care.

I mentioned earlier that the term involved a minimum of three months but that could be extended if I didn't think he was reformed. But once he reached six months, if I still wasn't happy with him, I could return him to the court and if that happened, he could end up as a real slave for perhaps five to ten years.

I zapped his balls when he refused to strip-and then again when he told me to get stuffed. The second zap had him obedient-for now, but I was under no illusions as to his reform. I could see in his eyes the determination to resist and I smiled to myself as I thought of his reception once I had him home.

Having acknowledged the court, I then grabbed his arm-and yes, he tried to pull out of my grip but I am very strong and I was a lot bigger than him and so I merely slapped his face-hard, left to right and then back the other way and growled at him, enquiring if he would like another zap to his now naked balls.

That had him a little more compliant but I could see he hated me holding his so muscly upper arm and grinned as I realised he was scared witless that he was going to be raped in my care. He mightn't have been but he would now, since it was something he was clearly morbidly frightened of.

Because he had resisted me, they secured him down to the gynaecological chair in the MO's office and he screamed blue murder as the doctor made the tiny incision in his scrotum.

"What a sissy," I exclaimed. "Just a tiny slit and look at him...?"

The doctor grinned at me. "It's always the big muscle-boys who make a fuss, James. You think he'll be handful?"

"No. Between the zaps to his gonad, the heavy strap to his buttocks, the whip to his cock and balls and the heavy labour on the treadmill and capstan, he'll be like a lamb in a day or so..."

This of course, was for his benefit. He would indeed be suffering all those punishments but I had no illusions he would be cured in the few days we administered them to him. However, just the matter-of-fact way I so casually detailed them had him looking at me in awe-and near terror.

His next destination was the booth and we quickly had him in it, his wrists manacled above his head to the cuffs dangling from the chains affixed to the centres of the top cornices on either side. His body and his feet were left free as the zaps would make him kick out and otherwise twist and work the muscles of his body which would aid the process. If his feet (or any other part of his body) touched the wall however, he would get a violent and horrible shock so he would quickly learn to keep them in due bounds.

I watched in some awe as his moustache and beard, the hairs on his chest and underarms, his legs and thighs, but most of all the thick wiry bush at his loins now simply dropped out to leave him totally and permanently smooth all over.

Once this process was complete, he was much more subdued, even allowing me to grip his biceps muscle and openly feel its well-toned development.

I took him home in the vehicle every one of us PDs had to acquire as part of our licensing. It was a tray-top utility truck with a frame mounted on its tray that displayed the new criminal naked to the public at large as I took him home.