nightmares but knew they were not. Pushing herself from the boards she discovered she was naked, and that she was free.
Her nakedness could not be ignored. It was stark and total. She had been naked in the visions. Sitting up and absorbing her absence of covering she discovered also a flaw in her freedom. There was an uncomfortable weight on her neck, and a trailing chain…! Her fingers explored a metal collar and the considerable length of links attaching her to a ringbolt in the stone wall. It was a debasing way to be constrained, like a dog! She remembered something about being shamed.
The drink or the drug had left her hazy. It was a couple of minutes before her prison came into focus. It was a square cell. Three walls of stone, one of bars, a barred window high and out of reach. The barred door was a part of the wall which left Corey?s nakedness free to examine by any interested passer by who cared to peer through the bars. Beyond the bars was a view of a sizable courtyard, a lot of sand or dust and a couple of discouraged trees. The air was warm and owed nothing to artificial heat.
There had been a plane… and a journey, and a promise of far away! This was the foreign place. Corey guessed North Africa or the middle East. But what did it matter? What mattered was her condition. Groggily, she got slowly to her feet and went to the bars, glad to clutch them for support. Behind her the chain from her neck trailed obligingly, hindering nothing, save that now she was erect its penal load dragged more heavily on her throat. Holding tight from bar to bar the nude prisoner edged sideways to the door and was sardonically flattered to find she was valued to the extent of three padlocks, top, bottom and centre. The door was very solid indeed. Shaking it, she became aware of her tether as motion brought it into contact with her skin. In fury she saw it would permit her to traverse her cell as though untrammeled by such indignity. The collar round her neck was therefore punitive, a punishment, a reminder of whatever it was she had become.
Escape! The word would hammer constantly. She viewed it now. On the face of it, escape was hopeless. A chained neck plus three padlocks made a mockery… but still! Bribery with promised cash or the barter of her body was probably her only weapon. Corey Gibson returned to sit on the bench and to remember bitterly the plush offices of the Planet Corporation?s Office Complex.
The man was in his thirties, possibly Egyptian, probably her jailor. His soiled uniform was nondescript, signifying little. His mien and stature were unimpressive. But he was male! Hatefully, Corey Gibson?s hand covered her breasts. Her visitor smiled understandingly and turned his attention to her pubic hair. In an angry gesture, Corey gathered her tether and dragged it to the far wall. Leaning against the stone she offered her visitor nothing but her back and bottom.
'Is very nice.' The approval was warm. 'You stay like that all day?'
In a cell like this she could never win. But her responses had become instinctive from her lost status. 'Go away. Leave me alone.'
'I do that, you starve.'
She was hungry. Her mouth was dry from the drug.'Push something through the bars.' It was the bitterness of Miss Corey Gibson that spawned the order.
'I wish to see your cunt. Turn it round. Put hands behind back. Then you get food.'
She was an animal in a Zoo. To be looked or laughter at, or viewed with lust. The hateful cell quadrupled her nudity.
'Send Mr. Aslam.' She demanded curtly.
'He no come. You do not ask.'
Corey sighed in defeat. She could not face the wall all day like a naughty girl in school. Presumably others had seen her nakedness, this oaf might as well have a look too. She turned round and walked half way to the bars. 'Very well.' She said coldly. 'Look at me all you like. I?ll even put my hands behind my back. But please bring some water.'
He was pleased. After scorching her with the longest leer she had ever known he produced keys. It was whilst he was unlocking the door Corey gathered up the slack of her chain.
'You be good white girl I feed you nice, maybe some wine…'
The nude prisoner flung her chain around his neck and heaved. The plate and the carafe skittered across the floor. His hands reached for her, he was choking. Corey Gibson heaved again.
She might have won. Surprise had given her an advantage. But she was seized from behind and thrown sprawling. She gazed up fearfully at two dark and resentful visages, one of which was rubbing a tender neck.
'You bitch. We teach lesson.'
One went for the rope. The other stood guard. She did not move.
'You stand. We tie.'
'Drop dead.'
They handled her with expert ease. The weight of knees on her spine pinned her face down on the floor. They tied her wrists with care. Then roped her elbows so that her forearms were welded as one. They went away, laughing. The sound of the door and its locks was, for Corey Gibson, a knell of doom. Weeping, she stayed where they left her, hurt and shamed and without hope. Her breasts thrust against the stone floor without love. She guessed her nipples inverted, they too would sense despair. But after a space of minutes she struggled to her feet and went to the bench. There was no thought in her mind save that that her elbows were hurting, scorched by their bindings, tugging back her shoulders and her breasts. She tried to wriggle her arms and hands but could not. They were tied tight. She was helpless. The collar round her neck became a greater mockery than before.
It was then her experiments began. Surely she could roll or lay in some manner to ease the nagging pain. It was as though her elbows had become enemies, determined to subdue. She thought, longingly, of the handcuffs of hazy memory. It was when she finally desisted that she wept once more.
After awhile she stood again and paced the floor. It was an act of defiance against her tether and the ropes on her arms. Pain was her only companion in the solitary cell. Corey Gibson used it in resentful fury against all that had happened. Driven by the masochism of anger, the daughter of the Planet Corporation lowered herself to the floor and painfully gathered to her lips the spilt food and water her guards had not bothered to remove. She recognized it as the most debasing act of her life.
It was close to evening before her jailor came again. He did not immediately open the door but stood surveying her through the bars, his grin amused, his eyes genuinely curious. Corey forgot her nakedness and her strained breasts. Most of her consciousness was concerned with pain. She had asked herself again and again what she would offer, or be compelled to give, to get rid of the ropes upon her arms. They were now a part of her, deep in her flesh, a persistent scorching misery. She faced him without shame and said a non-committal, hello.
'You be good girl now?'
She fluttered her wracked shoulders in helplessness. 'I can?t be anything else, can I?'
'What you give me if I untie?'
'If you?ll enable me to escape I can make you a rich man!'
He shrugged in scorn. 'No talk that stuff, is silly.'
'I haven?t any money. I haven?t anything… net here.'
'You got good cunt.'
There it was! Out in the open. Fastidious as she had once been, Corey Gibson knew herself unwilling to face death or injury to preserve her virtue. If the slit between her legs was a weapon she would use it ruthlessly. 'I?d be no good.' She said reasonably. 'I hurt too much, and with my arms tied like this I can?t lay down properly.'
'You lay down. You spread legs wide open. If arms hurt more, that good.'
'You want to shame me, don?t you?'
'Right!' He glowed approvingly at her perception.
'You lay on arms. You spread the legs. Achmed comes in and fucks.'
So this was Aslam?s revenge! She was to be made humble. The bound girl wondered if he was listening beyond the bars where she could not see. Temporizing, she asked: 'I?m helpless. You can rape me easily. I can?t do a thing to stop you?'
'Is better you willing. Is nice you spread legs.'
Achmed?s grin was avidly anticipatory.
Did this oaf know he was being as psychological in her subjection as his master? Or was it that all men secretly desired the willing submission of the open legs? Was the blatant offering of her bare loins some tribute to their potency? Corey did not know. But, looking her jailor in the eye, she said: 'Untie my arms please. I will then do as
