Author’s Note: There are a lot of slavery-is-legal stories out there, and many of those stories are kind of extreme. This is NOT one of those stories, though it uses an extreme-slavery setting. (A warning: Although explicit descriptions of such torture are only a very small part of this story, they are there.)

Technologically speaking, the time is the near future, but in a world where multiple countries allow slavery. Note that the unnamed country used for this setting does not allow children to be slaves, mainly because the author doesn’t want to get into any pedo story elements. (For purposes of the story setting, slavery is legally allowed from age 16, but all characters in the story are 18 or older.)

Dan, with his truck-owning friend, Mike, standing next to him, waited patiently for the auction house representative to work his way down the corridor to his storage unit.

This was the third time he had bought the contents of a storage unit, something he did mostly for fun, though the potential for extra cash was nice too. Not that the purchases had made lots of money in the past, but he had made a small net profit each time (if you assume his personal time was worthless). However, unlike the previous two times, this one had been bought sight-unseen.

Considering the situation, he mused, at least this one was indoors, out of the worst of the heat.

A local, privately-owned company, Ferman Limited, was being closed because the owner and founder, Charleston Ferman, had died, and his closest living heir was a distant nephew in another country, who wasn’t interested in running the company, wanting to liquidate both Charleston’s personal holdings and business. Before his death, Ferman had been fairly successful, and most accounts rated his personal fortune somewhere between forty and fifty million, not counting the value of his company. Liquidating the company, however, was more complicated.

The company’s patents and intellectual property had been sold off, along with its one assembly plant. However, not everything had been cleanly dealt with. Among other items, it also turned out that Ferman Limited owned roughly two hundred and fifty storage lockers, with no proper inventory list located for the storage units. A local auction house had been contacted and, after sampling the contents of ten of the lockers, had given their best estimate for the cost of sorting, inventoring, valuing and selling the contents, with best guesses that the contents were mostly old hardware, seasonal decorations and office equipment. The nephew had instead opted for blind sales.

The heir had instructed the auction house to simply list the lockers (or more accurately, the contents thereof) for blind sale for $2500 per unit. The only reason Dan had been willing to take the investment risk to purchase the contents of such a locker was a house refund guarantee if a unit was empty or contained less than $1000 worth of goods. Still a risk, but, as he reminded himself, Dan was doing this for fun. (His friend, Mike, had been enlisted to bring his pickup and trailer to haul away the contents with compensation agreed to be $50, lunch and a tank full of gas. Given how much gas the truck could guzzle, it wasn’t all that cheap.)

The representative, along with a security guard, finally made it to Dan’s purchase -- 10’x30’ Storage Unit C12 -- where Dan and Mike had been waiting for nearly an hour.

He read off some boilerplate legalese, Dan signed a form, and the guard stepped up with bolt cutters to remove the lock. The large door was rolled up, and the rep stepped forward to flip on the lights.

Dan was flabbergasted. Three large machines were inside, packed tightly enough that the only free space was a two-foot-wide footpath going down one side to the back.

“Well,” commented the rep, “I think someone just hit the jackpot.”

“No kidding,” whispered Mike.

“Are those ... Those are sleeper units, right?” asked Dan, stepping forward.

“Yup. Hmmm ... Occupied, too,” the rep said, leaning forward to look at a small window on the side. “Actually, I think I need to call over one of the company lawyers. Unless the people inside are slaves, this might get complicated. I know you bought the contents, but ... don’t touch anything until I bring over a lawyer. And a doctor.”

“I’ll just look at the attached paperwork,” said Dan, pointing to three ring binders, one attached to each unit. “Might just be hardware manuals.”

The rep stayed long enough to glance over the first couple pages inside the binders, which did seem to be equipment specs and instructions, not slave registration or ownership papers. Then he pulled out his phone and walked off, leaving the security guard behind.

“Dude, they’re naked,” observed Mike, looking in the small, thick, cloudy windows on the units. “Pretty hot, too.”

“Neat,” said Dan without looking, engrossed in reading the tech sheets. As a mechanical and electrical engineer, he could too easily lose track of conversations and events when learning about new equipment.

He perused a few more pages, then noticed loose sheets in the back of the binder. “Hey, here’s the info on the occupant,” he exclaimed, looking over the papers.

“Who is she?” Mike asked.

“Well, she IS a slave. Named Ami, spelled with an ‘i’ ... ummm... 38 years old ... Chinese heritage, born on a breeding ranch overseas. Basic education ... some sex skills training. We’ve got a couple pages of information, hard copy of her ownership license, and a copy of her info chip.”

Dan wandered over to the guard, pulled his attention from the binder, and shook the guard’s hand. “Hi, I’m Dan Forger. If you have a way to contact ... ummm ... the rep ... whatever his name was ... let him know we do have data on the people inside. They’re slaves ... well, one is, at least. We should probably look at the others.”

Dan put the binder back in place on the first unit and sought out binders for the other two. It turned out that all three were slaves: Ami, age 38; Barbi, age 28; and Chambois, age 18. Chinese, Black and Caucasian, in that order. Roughly even ten year separations in both the age of the slaves and the purchase dates, each slave having been purchased when they were sixteen. Their ownership papers showed they had been owned by the company, but listed them as permanent companions to the owner.

Mike speculated that might have been for tax purposes, but none of the three men present understood enough intricacies of the tax code to know if the idea made sense.

Regardless, the guard -- whose name was Vernon, by the way -- made a call to his on-duty supervisor but had no easy way to contact the rep directly, so they all waited. When Dan finally peered through the little windows himself, he confirmed that, yes, they were indeed naked. Comparing the readouts with the instruction books, they all appeared to be in good health too.

Eventually, the rep showed up with a company lawyer, who looked over the identity papers in the binders, muttered questions to himself wondering why Ferman had done this, then sighed and reassured everyone that it only meant a little extra paperwork which could be taken care of the same day. He also expressed relief that they were just slaves, because otherwise it could have led to weeks or months of paperwork, legal filings and possible lawsuits.

The doctor showed up half an hour later and, after examining the readouts, agreed that they seemed to be in good health, commenting that they could stay in the pods for another 20 or so years if need be. Dan thanked him and said that removing them today would be preferable.

Eventually, things were smoothed out. In fact, the lawyer commented that the company records had showed three missing slaves assigned as personal assistants to Ferman, so at least this resolved a small bookkeeping mystery on their end.

After the lawyer and doctor had both signed off on it, the three slaves were safely removed from their suspended animation pods, introduced to their new owner, and ownership had been officially transferred to Dan. They had no clothes, but three ten foot leashes with collars were found in the back corner of the storage unit, so Dan made use of the collars and mostly just looped the leash handles under his belt, requiring the women to stand near him.

The auction house rep agreed to store the pods until the next large auction in a couple weeks, when they would be sold and Dan would receive 92.5% of the auction price. (Well, probably a lot less after taxes. Capital gains taxes can be a real bitch, especially when you’re expecting well over half a million dollars profit on a $2500 investment. Suspended animation pods generally cost between $500K and $2M per unit when new. The pods he now owned were pretty good, high quality units, but they were used, which lowered the expected prices significantly. The auction house rep estimated Dan would take home $500K to $1.2 million after taxes.)

So, after arriving on time for a 10 am appointment to open the storage unit, Dan was finally able to leave with his prizes around 3:30.

Rather than drive directly back to his apartment, Dan offered to trade Mike an ass fuck with one of his new slaves to run a few errands first.

“I dunno,” Mike said slowly with a grin. “Seems to me you already owe me a lot more than an ass fuck with this taking all day.”

“Hey, you agreed to help me load and carry out of honest friendship, plus fifty bucks, and I already bought you a full tank of gas, plus lunch delivery. This right here is negotiation for going above and beyond.”

“Come on, you don’t need all three of them, do you?”

“Do you have any idea what slaves cost?” Dan visibly struggled to keep a grin off his face as he grabbed some of the paperwork to check details.

Dan and Mike both ignored the actual, physical slaves squeezed into the back seats of the extended cab truck.

“Chambois ... weird name ... French or something? ... she’s the newest one ... sold about two years ago ... and her sale price was ... let’s see... $225,000. See that’s ... wait a minute. $225,000? That’s way out of line with the market ... it’s gotta be a typo. Huh ... nope, same thing on the registration certificate ... Doesn’t make sense. There’s gotta be another reason why ... Anyway, the point is, I’m not rich enough to give $200,000 gifts. Or $20,000 to $30,000 gifts, which is what I was expecting to see. On the other hand, you can get free blowjobs whenever you come over, and you’re not responsible for their care and feeding.”

“Free blowjobs? Well, that DOES sounds pretty friendly.”

“I thought you’d agree. Now, errands? I mean, I have literally no slave equipment at all, let alone food or ... well, I don’t really know what I need. I mean, all I know about slave ownership I’ve gotten from fiction, TV and movies. I have no real world, practical knowledge.”

“Bookstore?” asked Mike.

“Bookstore,” Dan agreed with a nod. Something he and Mike had in common was an appreciation for actual, hard copy books. As convenient as e-books could be for some things, for educational or reference books, nothing beat the ability to quickly flip between desired sections for quick reference like having a real book in your hands.

They decided the weather was a bit too hot to leave the three newly acquired slaves in the truck, either in the cab or back, so he re-attached the leashes and brought them inside with him. Like most large stores these days, there was a designated ‘Slave Parking’ area near the front where owners could temporarily tie up their slaves, like horses tied to a hitching post or young children dropped off in a ball pit.

While Mike went over to check out the new releases in Mystery, Dan went straight for the ‘Do It Yourself’ shelves. The slavery sub-section took up almost two bookcases, and Dan browsed the offerings for almost twenty minutes before emerging with ‘Slave Ownership for Dummies’ and ‘Modern Slavery: Reality vs Entertainment’. Both seemed to take a more no-nonsense, practical approach. Plus, the Dummies book had a basic ‘Must Have’ list of equipment. In the check-out line, he also grabbed a half-size college-ruled blank notebook.

Back in the truck, with the slaves again stuffed into the half-cab’s small back seat, Mike drove while Dan asked questions and made notes in his new notebook.

“All right, you three, answer these questions in order -- Ami, Barbi, Chambois. And I need a hundred percent honest answers, because I don’t know if things might break or cause injury if I buy the wrong sizes because I have bad data. Weight?”

“89 lbs.”

“138.”

“Ummm... 122, I think.”

“You think?”

“Uhhh ... I had surgery before I went into suspension. My weight’s different, but I think it’s 122 now.”

“We’ll hope the store has a scale.” Barbi was the tallest among the three, maybe 5’11” or so, with the largest breasts, thus her 138 lbs. Not huge boobs, but at least D cups. Chambois was pretty skinny and lacked Barbi’s big breasts and strong thighs. And Ami, at 89 lbs, was just tiny, standing barely five feet tall on top of being skinny and flat-chested. “Height?”

They continued for another dozen questions. None of the three knew their vaginal depths or anal plug sizes, so those and a few other things would probably depend on measurements taken in the store.

The Adult Toys Emporium on Sixth Street was the largest adult toys and slave equipment store in the city. Surprisingly, it was locally owned, not part of a chain, but to be honest, they went there because it was the only such store Dan and Mike knew of, though neither of them had been inside before that day.

It took a couple minutes to flag down an available store attendant, then they all started going around the store, searching for one item after another. Dan quickly felt his self-imposed $500 spending limit disappear, so he just put it on credit and hoped he’d get the money from the suspended animation units soon.

First up? Locking wrist and ankle bands. Four per slave, meaning twelve total. Well, eight per and twenty-four total, since he wanted a backup set for each of them. They had to be fitted, but not precisely, since the bands had notches like belts. He skipped the more expensive ones with built-in locks and just grabbed a dozen small padlocks -- or more specifically, three packs of four, with shared/identical keys for each set of four. Overall, that ran almost $240, plus another $60 for all the locks they needed, making it $300. Before tax.

And the list went on:

- He skipped the handcuffs for the time being, instead deciding to rely on the wrist bands and padlocks.

- Fancy bondage gear was going to be way too expensive for the moment, and he felt he could probably build bondage frameworks himself using wood and standard pipes in his own storage unit/workshop.

- Ball gags were a must. He wanted ring gags too, but put it down on his ‘buy later’ list to save money for now.

- Though he wasn’t sure if he’d use them, simple blindfolds were cheap, so he picked up a three-pack for about $10. They were probably just re-labeled sleep masks anyway.

- He relented and got a small case of lube, since the cost per volume was so much better than buying individual tubes.

- He could have easily spent a thousand dollars on butt plugs alone, and he spent more time browsing the options than he should have. Ignoring the selections designed to cause pain, there seemed to be three basic types: those designed to stretch the anus, those designed to accommodate enemas, and those designed to be decorative. For this product category, ‘decorative’ covered a huge range of options, and while he was interested in many of them, he decided to skip them until he had more funds available. The anus-stretching types seemed a bit more practical, in that wearing them theoretically made anal sex easier. Dan limited himself to only three total, none of them very large or fancy and none of which looked like they would be particularly destructive to the sphincter muscles.

- A riding crop. He had no idea if such crops would be cheaper at a ... a horse store? A cowboy store? Or even where to find such a store, whatever they were called, so he bought one at the slave store. Since they were somewhat inexpensive, he also picked up two lacquered wooden paddles, one solid, one with multiple drilled holes.

- Being a gadget junkie, he splurged a little with a home tracking and control system. The three already had expensive identification and disciplinary implants which would let him shock them with adjustable intensity, but the tracking and control system would sync up with the implants and allow better GPS tracking from anywhere in the world, along with location record keeping, adjustable ‘invisible’ fences, and programmable schedules with automatic shocks and alerts if the specified slave wasn’t in the right place at the right time. While the home tracker unit cost $149, it was the ongoing $19.95 monthly service that was going to be expensive in the long run. He figured he’d try it out for the introductory three months free service, and, if he liked it, he’d go for a $200 one-year subscription option instead of paying monthly.

Fortunately, a few items were easily purchased more cheaply at nearby non-specialty stores.

- Nylon rope and chain was easy to find at hardware stores, where the choices were plentiful and inexpensive.

- Reusable enema kits were noticeably cheaper at a nearby pharmacy compared to the specialty slave store.

- Knee and elbow pads weren’t absolutely necessary, but both books highly recommended them. Since the slave store wanted $80 or more each, he got them later at a sporting goods store where they were a quarter the price. (Months later, he regretted buying elbow pads, since he never used them. Knee pads were used almost every day, so at least those were a good purchase.)

Also, the slaves needed some makeup and hygiene products. Frankly, he knew nothing about their needs in this regard, so they all sat in the truck for a few minutes, just discussing such things. He didn’t want to pay for them to be all ‘glammed’ up, but he wanted them to look as attractive as possible for him. Also, from an experience with his ... was it his second girlfriend? ... third? ... Okay, it was with Heidi, so that meant his second girlfriend ... he knew they needed to keep the makeup as lightly applied as possible to avoid massive smears and stains during blowjobs. Non-staining deodorant was a must, as well as shaving equipment, shampoo and conditioner. They’d need more towels too, though he was surprised he had thought of something like that before the need became obvious.

He still wanted to reduce his costs for the moment, so instead of clothes, he picked up a $20 box of a dozen unisex disposable paper clothes, which struck him as vaguely like Roman togas rather than the hospital gowns he had expected. (He regretted the purchase later, since the paper clothes never survived more than a few hours. Simple, washable linen smocks worked much better.)

Food, at least, was simple. They swung by a ‘big box’ grocery store and picked up a carton of ramen and a bag of slave chow. He figured he might let them eat normal human food for special occasions, but for now, economy was the watchword of the day.

One huge worry was dismissed when he learned that their monthly cycles had been suppressed via regulatory implants. Like most men, he knew almost nothing about a woman’s monthly menstruation periods, aside from the fact that they bled and were moody for a few days. The slaves also explained that they each had an implanted contraceptive device which should be good for at least two or more years.

Mike contributed suggestions occasionally, such as: “Where are they gonna sleep? I don’t think your bed will fit all three.”

“Oddly enough, I thought about that. I figure I’ll probably have at least one sleep with me every night, or at least at the foot of the bed. Then I can fit the other two in the middle room.”

“Your library?”

“Yup. I have an old futon and an inflatable mattress. I’ll have to fold up the table and push the chairs back, but there should be enough room. Those will do until I get the money from the sale.”

“Yeah, I guess. But if you want to pawn one of them off for a couple weeks, just know that I’m your friend, and I’m here for you.”

“Gee, thanks.”

“What are you going to tell Jane?”

“Ugh. Been trying not to think about it too much. I suppose I’ve just gotta tell her the truth.”

“I dunno how she’ll take it. Now Zelda would probably take it in stride, but Jane? Good luck.”

“But as you very well know, Zelda lives on the coast now and, last I heard, was dating some pretty-boy fitness instructor, and thank you for reminding me.”

After a few hours of shopping and driving around, the five of them returned to Dan’s apartment; more specifically, Dan’s somewhat small, two bedroom apartment, with one bedroom having been turned into a library.

“Welcome to my abode,” Dan said, waving a hand. “We’ll probably move someplace larger in a couple months, but for now, we’ll be squeezing in.”

Turning to his friend, he asked, “Want your ass fuck now?”

Dropping himself into one of the chairs, Mike said, “Dude, right now, I just want to sit back and relax.”

“Blowjob it is. Hmmm ... Ami, go give my friend the best head you can.”

The small oriental slave nodded and knelt down between Mike’s legs, reaching to unzip his trousers.

“Thanks, dude.”

“I know you have an Asian fetish.”

“Not JUST Asians, but yeah.”

Turning back to the other two, Dan ordered. “Go unload the truck. If you’re not done by the time I have the tracking and control system set up, you’ll regret it.” He waved the bag with the gadget inside at them, then started unboxing it. The other two hurried back downstairs.

The home tracking physical setup only required unboxing, plugging in the power and syncing to his Wi-Fi, then his phone.

It only took him a few minutes to discover that there were way too many software options for him to easily work through right then. Instead he went with a few default options, such as a radial perimeter of fifty feet from the local unit and six foot protection zone around the unit. He moved it to a corner of the living room where the proximity shouldn’t trigger by accident. The system’s linked phone app even supported a link to Dan’s home assistant system, though the voice controls it could use were very basic.

Once the shopping spree results had been unloaded, he enabled the tracking system and warned the slaves to avoid getting near the slave monitor.

“All right, you three. Quick tour. This is my apartment. It might technically have two bedrooms, but as far as size goes, it’s basically large enough for me to live alone comfortably. When the auction money comes in, we’ll move to something larger. This is the living room, and that corner is my work space,” he said, pointing at an elaborate computer setup.

“Kitchen is over here. Hallway,” he said as he led them down the very short hallway. “Closet with linens and such. This room is my library and where I keep my gadget stuff. Yes, I am an engineer as well as a programmer, so I sometimes build random stuff, though most of my tools are in a storage unit I use as a workshop. You can read the books if you have any spare time, but don’t touch the other stuff. This is where we’ll set up a futon and inflatable mattress for two of you to sleep. Bathroom is in there. I added a tankless water heater, so we won’t run out of hot water, but all the same, don’t waste it. And finally, my bedroom. Now, everyone back to the living room.”

After ordering a pizza for himself and Mike, Dan portioned out a cup of slave chow and one instant ramen package each, though Ami had to wait until Mike was finished with her mouth.

An hour later, much to Mike’s amusement, he had the three of them line up, bent over and facing away. It was time to work out how to properly use some punishment implements, with his left hand still throbbing a bit from hitting it too hard with the crop. He blamed TV and movies, which always made slapping a crop into your palm look easy to do as well as intimidating and not at all painful. Dan had never used paddles or crops or anything to spank or punish anyone before. It looked simple, but he had no real idea as to how much each one hurt or how hard he should swing. Which meant a little experimentation was in order.

“Just to be clear,” he repeated, “this is just to test things out. I’m not exactly experienced with stuff like this, so unfortunately for you, you get to be my test subjects. Since it isn’t actually for punishment, I’ll try not to hurt you too much...”

“Dude! They’re your slaves. Beat ‘em bloody, if you want,” hooted Mike.

“I’m just ... look, admittedly, I’ve only had a chance to skim most parts of the books, but there’s one section ... For the best conditioning results with new slaves, I need to separate actual punishments from ... from other things. Also, not a fan of blood. When it’s outside the body, that is. Anyway, hold still.”

He started with testing the crop on Chambois’ thighs. The first two strikes were too cautious and didn’t leave any kind of noticeable marks. The third was harder than he intended, producing a reddish, vaguely triangular spot where her buttock met her thigh. Chambois squeaked, jumped a bit, and lurched forward before returning to her starting position. A few more swings, and Dan thought he had worked out how to hit with or without creating angry red splotches.

“Whaddaya think?” Dan asked, turning to Mike.

“Ya gotta hit harder. She only jumped that one time.”

“I’m not trying to make her jump. I’m trying to figure out how hard is hard enough. Haven’t you seen pics of people with welts and bloody asses? I wanna avoid that if at all possible.”

“Ehh,” Mike grunted dismissively and stood up. “Lemme show you how it’s done.”

“Neouuuu,” Dan said, twisting the negative vocalization for effect and holding the crop out of reach. “You just wanna see how hard you can hit.”

“What? It’s not like we could break ‘em with just a crop.”

“But you could make her bleed, and I don’t want to do that. Well, not unless she needs some actual punishment. Even then ... remember, not a fan of blood.”

“Wuss. I can’t believe you need to learn how to spank someone,” Mike said while rolling his eyes for effect.

“Do I need to learn how to use a paddle or crop? No. Do I need to experiment some to figure out how to do it so I avoid ugly welts and blood? Absolutely. Personally, I think a pink or red ass might be attractive, but not if it’s splotchy or bloody. Gonna try the solid paddle first ... hmmmm ... Actually, to get a good comparison between the two, I think swats on alternate cheeks is a good plan.”

“Huh?”

“Watch and see. This is the scientific method in action.”

Mike blew a raspberry.

“Well, kinda sorta,” Dan admitted.

He swung the two-foot-long solid paddle back and forth a few times, then looked over at the slave lineup. “Chambois, hold still. I’m also looking to distribute the force here as evenly as possible with each swing.”

With the crop, he had mostly aimed for her thighs. This time, with a paddle, he swung directly for a single buttock. He didn’t exactly miss, but the hesitant swing wasn’t a center blow either. The follow-up was a much better hit, though neither strike had much force behind them. Finally, he swung twice more with greater force each time, one hit per cheek. Unfortunately, the blow to the nearer cheek failed to land properly.

“What are you trying to do?” asked Mike, holding back his laughter.

“The angle is all wrong when I’m going for just the left cheek by itself. Remember, even distribution of force. Here, rotate a little.” He adjusted Chambois so she was turned slightly facing him.

“Haven’t you ever played baseball or cricket? Boo!” Mike jeered. Dan ignored him.

This time the left side of her butt received a solid thwack!

“There we go. Chambois, you can sit down now. Or keep standing if you want. Just move off to the side. I’m done with you for now.

“Dude, you’re taking ‘methodical’ way too far. Just swing away. And I’m pretty sure you’re supposed to hit both cheeks at the same time.”

“Mike, this is a semi-scientific comparison test, so just hold on. Ami, rotate a bit to your left. Good. Now, I’m going to paddle you a few times on each cheek. First with the solid paddle, then with the one with holes on the other cheek. Gonna do the same to you too, Barbi. Actually, going to hit Barbi harder, since she’s bigger. Hold still.”

Having explained the setup, he proceeded to spank Ami’s left butt cheek three times with the solid wooden paddle, each swat hard enough to push her small body forward a bit. Then he repeated on her other side using the paddle with a dozen holes drilled in it, trying to keep the strength of his swing consistent. Then redid all of it, slightly harder, to Barbi.

“Now, both of you, tell me how they compared.”

“Master, may we touch our asses?” asked Ami.