Chapter 20: Penance

9th Grade: April 17th - May 9th, 1986

I spent less than twenty minutes on the phone with my dad as we came up with a plan. He was very happy to hear from my mom I was free of the commands Father Xavier had given me, and even more pleased to hear I was interested in going to the Crow Academy, a coed boarding school for teens with the telepathic ability.

Troublesome telepathic teens from all over the continent were sent to the Crow Academy to knock off their rough edges and learn self-control, coexistence and humility. Weekly mental scans for rule-breaking with effective punishments, camp-like living conditions where there was very little privacy, and a massive academic workload made me both horrified and excited.

The headmistress and a few others were immune while the rest of the staff were powerful telepaths with decades of experience dealing with rouges far more powerful than a bunch of spoiled teenagers. They didn’t directly teach you how to use your telepathy beyond controlling it if you didn’t know how to already. The campus was in the middle of nowhere in the upper New York state near Saranac Lake.

It truly sounded awful and the perfect environment for me to serve my penance. Not only would I not be allowed to quit until the end of the term - guaranteeing my completion of 9th grade - the term ended the week before my regular camp started that year. And I would be allowed to leave for the weekends as long as I didn’t transgress any of the big no no’s.

My dad called back an hour later after talking to the headmistress. Considering she was on the east coast, I was surprised he called so late, but at least I learned I could get in on short notice. I would have to cut my weekend short as I had to be there by four o’clock Sunday for orientation and admission to the dorms.

He also had already located two RVs for me to use. The plan was to use them instead of the mansion Friday to minimize the girls’ travel time when pulling them out of school. Since my dad owned the two malls in the area, we’d just park them out in the parking lots.

After contacting Adam and Jessica to let them know the plan, I slept in my mom’s bed with my mom that night, then she dropped me off at the mall in Mehlberg just a little before eight the next morning.

My dad’s people were just finishing wiring the RVs to a power tap on a light pole when I got there. Adam showed up right at eight and Carl Bass and Desiree Alvarado, couple number three, arrived five minutes later.

And thus started my day of cleaning the worst of my flock. We moved the RVs to the mall in Oakley at lunch where my first customers there were Maggie and Josh. I pulled Adam’s faith programming from him while we waited for the men to hook up the power on one while the other RV was out getting its waste tanks purged and freshwater refilled.

I puked after each cleansing, though once I had purged my breakfast after the first two or three, there wasn’t that much. Between the drink, the Gatorade and the water I kept sipping, I kept my energy up, but I didn’t feel good.

Fuck, puke, pull their faith programming, drink Gatorade, shower, rest, gulp some drink, repeat. That was pretty much my entire weekend.

After cleansing Krystal, I realized everyone who I had cleansed, while still friendly, were oddly distant with me. These people were like ... well, not family to me, but we were like an extended family through the commonality the need and the faith they were all embracing to fight it.

And I was their Shepherd. They all looked up to me. I hadn’t realized how much that had meant to me until Krystal literally gave me the cold shoulder as she left. Their faith in me had strengthened me in ways Father Xavier’s programming hadn’t covered.

After the shock of Krystal’s cold shoulder, I took a longer shower than usual while Adam and Jessica ate dinner and I got a bit overheated. After drying my hair with a hairdryer, I went outside to cool off and got captivated by the colors of the sunset. The irony of how this was the beginning of the end of my rein as Shepherd hit me. A part of me was relieved, but another part was saddened knowing I was losing my flock.

As I stood outside in the mid-April chill dressed in only a robe, I stared at the bright orange, red and faint purples of the sunset fingering the cross and coin hanging from my neck. I contemplated all the different aspects of my life they represented: my faith and my father, my heart and my gift ... my girlfriend and my boyfriend. Once this was over, would they too turn a cold shoulder on me like my flock?

I cleared my head of that worry and tried to focus on what I had to do.

Seventeen down, eighty-nine girls to go. I kept telling myself that while the colors of the sky slowly changed.

The door to the RV opened, and my right-hand lady, Eve, poked her head out and said, “Shepherd, she’s waiting.”

“I need my drink.”

Eve sighed and said, “Are you sure? You’ve already used almost the entire bottle. It can’t be good for you to have so much in one day.”

I said, “If I’m going to fulfill her fantasy, I need the drink. Otherwise, we’re done for the night. Do you want to tell her that?”

Eve paused at the door, then sighed again, turned and went back in.

I glanced at the other RV parked next to that one. Getting two RVs that could hold the required canopy king-sized beds on such short notice had been a stroke of luck. The RV’s weren’t identical or new, but they had what I needed. Showers, a kitchen and a nice big bedroom. As messy as the girls got, we had to have two of them so that one could get cleaned up and aired out while the other one was in use.

Adam came out carrying a glass of the drink my father called “Essence of Life.” This seemingly magical elixir was the perfect pick-me-up for both my flagging sex drive and energy levels.

When I reached for it, Adam pulled the glass back and asked, “Are you sure you’re not going to throw this one up?”

“I’m sure,” I said sternly, holding my hand out.

Handing it to me, Adam said, “Shepherd, you’re putting too much strain yourself. Please let this be the last one for the day. You have all day tomorrow and Sunday morning.”

“Sixteen girls a day, Adam. That’s my quota.”

I gulped down the purplish-pink drink. I usually tried to enjoy the flavor, but after drinking an entire wine bottle sized bottle, I was getting really sick of its taste.

After handing him the glass, I asked, “Who’s in there?”

“Tracy.”

Tracy Page. A straight-laced straight-A student who, because of me, was just as much into girls as she was boys. I could only hope she would be back to normal after getting a dose of what Suzi had labeled Timmy loving.

I asked Adam, “How are you feeling? Still no side effects?”

“Shepherd, I keep telling you I’m fine. Boy, stop worrying about me. You’re the one who’s trying to kill yourself doing this marathon of love of yours.”

I looked at Adam and said, “I just want this over with Adam. I want my old life back. I don’t want to worry if Krystal is going to try and seduce Lorene again, or Christine trying to form a threesome with Suzi and Joey.”

Just saying their names hurt. I turned away and fingered their gifts again, wondering if I’d ever have them both back.

Adam said, “I’ll let her know you’re almost ready.”

I said, “Thank you. I’m sorry if I’m ... not myself.”

As he re-entered the RV, he said, “You and me both, Shepherd. You and me both.”

That hurt too, not that he meant it to. Adam was such a sweet guy. I sincerely hoped he kept his faith. It had brought him so much comfort.

I heard geese in the distance. I looked around the mall parking lot to see where they were, but there wasn’t any sign of them.

The mall. It seemed appropriate to do this there. The mall was where I had purposely sought some of the girls out, and it was handy I had such a close relationship with the mall’s owner.

I hmphed in amusement at that.

I then sighed and decided I might as well get on with it. I turned to head in but recognized a car approaching the RVs from the other end of the lot.

I thought to myself, Nothing like having your mother show up right when you’re trying to get into the mood.

I could see the amused look on her face as she drove up.

After parking and getting out, my mom said, “My, if it weren’t for the hair, I would have sworn it was your father standing there. Is that one of his robes?”

I said, “No. Adam ran and got it for me from the mall this morning.”

I looked down, then swooshed my butt back and forth a few times before saying, “It does kind of look like the ones he wears, though, doesn’t it?”

“But then a robe is a robe. Timmy, don’t you think it’s time to quit for the night? You’ve been out here since eight this morning.”

“Sixteen girls, mom. I only have two left. And I just killed off the bottle.”

“You’ve had an entire bottle?”

“Over ten hours. And yes, I’ve been drinking water and Gatorade too.”

“What did you have for dinner? Pizza?”

“Uh, Adam and Jessica did. I skipped dinner.”

Her expression told me to elaborate.

“I keep throwing up, okay? And it has nothing to do with the drink. I was throwing up before I opened the bottle.”

My mom let out a resigned sigh, and after a moment she said, “Timmy, you’re not invincible. Tomorrow, no more than ten girls.”

“Ten!”

“Yes, and then five on Sunday. And then ten next Saturday. Even your father doesn’t have the stamina to do sixteen girls in one day, and he’s been doing this sort of thing since before you were born.”

Like the teenager I was, I rolled my eyes at how parents loved to remind us of how much more they knew than us.

I countered, “My father isn’t fifteen.”

Running her finger up my bare chest, my mom said, amused, “True ... Oh, if I wasn’t your mother...”

Then she wrinkled her nose at me and smiled.

I smiled back, then hugged her.

When we broke apart, she said, “You’re going to get sick if you hang out here in the cold like this. You better get in there and warm up in the shower.”

I sighed, “Okay. But my next girl is already in there, and my last girl will be here any minute. I’m not going to send them away.”

My mother gave me a warning look, but then rolled her eyes and said, “All right. It’s not like one or two more are going to kill you if you’ve made it this far. But Timmy, I’m serious about not pushing yourself too hard. You said there were only twenty who were in serious need. The rest can wait for the following weekends.”

I sighed and nodded.

She waved me towards the RV, then headed for the other one without saying another word. I watched as she opened the screen door and climbed inside the empty RV. I assumed she was going to check it out.

Entering the one Tracy was in, I found Eve and Adam watching the TV.

I said, “I’ve been ordered by my mother to take a shower to warm up.”

Eve said, “You didn’t tell her you just had one?”

As I walked towards the rear, I said, “Are you nuts? She’d drag me home and start poking chicken soup down my throat to prevent me from getting a cold.”

I poked my head into the bedroom and said, “Trace, I’m a bit chilled and am going to hop in the shower to warm up. I’ll just be a few minutes, okay?”

“Yes, Shepherd.”

My eyes lingered on her naked body stretched out behind the sheer vails around the bed. My mind flickered to the night she and her girlfriends first played out the lesbian fantasy I once had had of them.

My first orgy. There was a painting of that scene hanging up at my father’s somewhere.

I tore myself away from the erotic sight just as my little buddy poked his head out between the folds of my robe, wanting a look for himself. As I shed the robe and entered the tiny shower, I gave my little buddy a couple of pulls, then started the water up.

I didn’t bother putting the robe back on, but I let little Timmy lead the way back into the bedroom. After all, he sort of drove the show.

The room was filled with the scent of lavender and the light of twenty-three candles, some of them burning the lavender incense. I pressed play on the CD player as I passed, and Barry Manilow began singing “Could It Be Magic.”

I had to stop and close my eyes as I started feeling sick. Oh, how I hated that smell and that song.

Once I felt my stomach settle down, I took a deep breath, turned towards the bed, then smiled and approached it, parting the sheer drapes all around it.

Tracy said with anticipation, “Hello, my Shepherd.”

“Hello, my child. Are you ready for your cleansing?”

“I’ve been waiting for months.”

I laid down beside her and carefully stroked her right cheek with my left hand before sliding it to behind her neck and pulled her willingly onto her side and pressed my lips to hers. My other hand slipped behind her and moved from her left shoulder blade to the small of her back before sliding gently down her spine to just above her butt crack.

Tracy’s tongue ambushed mine when I slipped through her parted lips. As her need and passion grew from my hands touching, caressing and tickling her favorite erogenous zones, I slowly rolled us where she was on her back. After several minutes of her hands doing their own explorations, I broke our lips apart and began kissing her chin and then her neck while my right hand carefully pinched her left nipple.

The gasp she made was soon followed by several more as I worked my lips down while manhandling her nips with my fingertips. Then my sucking her tender teats as my right hand circled her womanhood made her anxious, and just my fingers lightly encircling her vaginal lips was bringing her closer to an exciting climax.

I slowed my stimulation, then sped it up before using the moisture I had collected to slicken my fingers’ path up to her clit and encircled it. I alternated between circling her nub and lightly touching it, then I went back for some more of her love juice before dragging my slickened finger up across her clit. With my mouth on her breasts, I quickly fingered her to an explosive and needy orgasm.

As she recovered, I slipped back up to give her light kisses on her neck and cheeks and then held her lovingly as I nibbled her left earlobe and began the gentle stroking of her erogenous points again. Once she was responding once more, I retraced my steps down to her nips, then with a single gentle nip on each teat, I began kissing my way down to her pulsating wet virginal gate.

If there was one thing spending so much time with my adopted sisters on the weekends had taught me how to do well, it was cunnilingus. Not that I was an expert, mind you. But pleasuring a girl that way had been one of my favorite fantasies after turning fourteen. That and receiving a blow job.

Which was where this was heading. I was somewhat on autopilot as I reached her sex and began to tease her lips with mouth and tongue. After doing it thirteen times already, my tongue was getting sore. When it was time to lap between her lips, I was struggling to keep the rhythm I had been working under. After a minute, I had to stop and rest. But instead of that causing her to calm down, by hot breath breathing on her lips while my nose was less than an inch from her clit only seemed to stimulate her even further.

And that turned me on. Something new. Something different from the past twenty or so times I had done this. But I knew I had to stick to the script. This was her fantasy now. I had to follow it or all my efforts so far would be in vain.

Soon I had her trying to hump my face as I licked and sucked on her needy clit. Then with a surge of moisture against my chin, Tracy crossed the line. I found myself with my head clamped between her legs while I vigorously wiggled my tongue against her pulsing nub.

Then like a deflating balloon, Tracy slowly relaxed, and suddenly I could breathe again. Tracy tensed up when I gave her clit a final lick, then shivered when I blew across it.

In a breathless voice, Tracy said, “Shepherd, that was so ... that was best I’ve ever had.”

I smiled at her appreciatively, but I didn’t believe what I had done was all that special. She had just always imagined it to be that good.

After wiping my face on the towel at the foot of the bed, I crawled up beside her and once again held her as she recovered.

This time it was her turn to pleasure me like I had her. In almost and identical fashion, Tracy began kissing me, this time I ambushed her tongue like she had mine. When that was over with, she began working her kissed downwards, but she didn’t spend anywhere near as much time on my nips as I had hers.

Oh no. The prize for both of us was down below. Driven by her need, Tracy first licked, then sucked the sides of my cock, then spent some time lapping and sucking on my testicles. I shivered when some of her saliva traveled down my balls, across the perineum and then just collected inside my anal rose.

At that point, the fantasy demanded the rest had to be with me standing up.

After we both got up off the bed, Tracy grasped my uncut cock like it was a handle as she got down on her knees. After stroking my cock a few times, she began tonguing its head inside its foreskin. Little by little, she began to take more of it in before pulling out to suckle on its pulsating tip.

Just as I had done with all the girls, I began adjusting the fantasy at that point. Tracy’s eyes shot up to stare into mine. When that familiar feeling to form, I formed an empathic connection. As our emotions mixed and our needs amplified the others, she continued to stare into my eyes as she used her mouth to fuck my male meat.

I had drunk three gulps of the drink before starting girl number three, fourteen-year-old Tina Edwin. When I had reached this part, I was desperate and had altered the fantasy again.

All the girls were on birth control. I know birth control wasn’t 100%, but all my girls were religiously taking their pills. That was the first thing they did when they woke up, a compulsion I had implanted in them.

So when I skipped the climax of the blow job and went straight to fucking her to two more orgasms before having a third with my own, I thought I had seriously fucked up. But no. I poured on the love through the empathic connection as I build up speed for our final climax, then when it hit, I saw it in her eyes.

And that’s what happened again with Tracy. Just like every girl since Tina, altering the fantasy to meet my needs didn’t affect the outcome.

I suddenly pulled Tracy off my cock, briskly pulled her up off her knees, turned her around, bent her over the bed and entered her pussy from behind. Tracy was a virgin, but sliding into her virginal vagina was unhampered as she had already lost her hymen to a dildo months ago. I pounded her in short bursts, my energy flagging, but managed to help as she fingered herself to another orgasm before moving her up onto the bed properly and climbing on top.

This time I slid in slowly while staring into her eyes. When our crotches met, she was full of the need again, and I started my thrusts. My energy flagged again but needn’t have worried. A quick altering of the fantasy and soon she was on top doing all the work.

After another orgasm, we cuddled while I was still hard and inside her sopping cunt. The smell of the incense was mixing with the odors of our sweat and her juices all over us and the bed.

Once we were ready, we rolled over where I was on top, and in the same pattern I had repeated fourteen times that day, I started slowly while pouring all the love I could muster into the empathic connection I had formed.

At the peak of our orgasm, I was rewarded by a surge of the power-lust when I saw the surrender in her eyes. Like I had with every girl, I waited upon my shaky arms for her daze to begin to fade to hear her say those magic words.

“I love you, my Shepherd.”

And just like I had the last fourteen times, I scrambled off the bed and rushed into the bathroom to throw up.

When I came out to begin the cleaning of Tracy’s mind, I discovered my mother had joined Adam and Jessica in the kitchen/family room and was chatting about their plans for the next fall.

I hesitated a moment, wondering if my mom was waiting to talk to me before she left, but when she took no mind of me, I just went back to Tracy and cuddled her while I worked.

I repeated the process one more time with Mindy, the last of Suzi’s old girlfriends. None of Suzi’s old friends had been virgins by the time they had entered my flock. In fact, none of the girls I’d cleanse that weekend were. Technically, Tracy had been, but only because Christine and Mindy had satisfied her need orally and with a dildo before I had stopped her progression to full sex with the real thing.

But well over two-thirds of the others were still virgins, and the concept of that was troubling me. While none of them were innocent anymore, I was uncomfortable with taking their virginities like that. It was nearly as bad as making Mindy cheat on Vito, not that they were still together after Mindy’s faith diverted her attention from him. And then there was the business of their hymens. I really didn’t want to have to deal with that.

After Mindy left, I was glad my mom had stayed. I discussed my concerns with Jessica and my mom and was surprised by their recommendation of weakening the faith programming and letting the need to progress them naturally to that point before cleansing them. That wasn’t exactly the solution I was looking for, but they convinced me that if the girls were going to sin, let it be on their terms. This also had the advantage of spreading the cleansings out across the spring and summer instead of doing the mad marathons every weekend like I had planned.

By Sunday, I was completely on board with that. I was so sick of cleansing girls I was struggling to find the will and the love to do it. I had to send the last two girls, Angela Stewart and Shirley Smith, home after failing to cleanse Dawn Santos on the first attempt. I did manage to cleanse Dawn about an hour later, but I was so fucking worn out and emotionally numb, I had to let my mom help pull the programming out for me.

I think I was in a form of shock. Between the emotional numbness, the puking, and the physical stress on my body from all the fucking, I was not in any shape to travel halfway across the country and deal with what awaited me at the Crow Academy.

My mom and I flew there on a private chartered jet. I had never flown before and almost threw up again from being nervously excited over that. My mom had tried to talk me into taking short weekend getaways that would have required us to fly, but those getaways always sounded too much like vacations to me. I didn’t do vacations.

After the excitement of takeoff, I dozed off from the sound and vibrations of the plane strangely reminding me of the long car rides to Silver Dollar City in Branson or Six Flags in St. Louis. I woke up an hour before we were due to land when they served my mom coffee and a sort of crunchy biscuit with cheese baked inside. While we ate, my mom shocked me by telling me how her first time flying was filled with memorable firsts. Her first flight, her first sex in a plane, and the first time she had gone around the world which included her first anal sex. Not exactly the conversation I had expected having with my mother ... ever, let alone while we were eating. Strangely enough, it didn’t bother my stomach, though. I think I was just too hungry to care.

My mom seemed oddly motivated to educate me on such terms during the flight. While I was familiar with a lot of the concepts thanks to Lex, his cousin and my own vivid imagination, I didn’t have the terms for a lot of it. And I didn’t know about a few things such as scat. I think that was the only thing that grossed me out. The rest were just ... curiosities, and somehow I wasn’t surprised when my mom admitted she’d tried most of it at one time or another.

I asked, “Did Dad tell you to tell me about all this?”

“He might have suggested it, yes. But only because that’s what his friend who had attended there said. While they are very strict about sex not being allowed on campus, there is apparently a lot of sexual innuendo that takes place.”

“Innuendo? What’s that?”

“They like to talk about sex indirectly. Like talking about eating a banana but using terms that could easily apply to sucking a man’s ... happy stick.”

I chuckled at her choice of words and said, “Mom, the guys and I do that kind of thing all the time. I think I can handle it.”

My mom said, “I suppose he did have a rather sheltered life like your father. Timmy, I hope you’re up for this. You should have rested today. Your eyes are droopy.”

I yawned and said, “But if I hadn’t, I’d have been worried about them the whole time I was gone. I’m still a little worried about the two I didn’t do. But they’ll live another week. The worst they’d do is break down and have sex with someone.”

“I’ll take care of any issues that come up with the girls. I realize now I should have been more hands-on, but I thought Father Xavier’s people were handing things more than they were.”

“It’s not your fault this happened. I’m starting to finally accept that it wasn’t entirely my fault.”

When she opened her mouth to object, I added, “I purposely was sinning, mom. You can’t tell me that was okay to do.”

She sighed and said, “No, I suppose you’re right. But Timmy, I knew what you were doing. I’ve been around enough teen boys over the years to know that while you were a little ahead in terms of ... content, you always did it with a sense of tenderness. Most boys don’t try and imagine what it feels like to the girl at any age. That’s why I never said anything.”

I said with a touch of anger, “You ... spied on me?”

“Sweetie, I’m your mother and I love you. And I didn’t spy on you on purpose. Sometimes you emitted your fantasies like a telepathic radio station. It’s rather hard to ignore someone shouting in the bedroom next to yours.”

I sighed as my face turned bright red.

“Oh, sweetie, you don’t have anything to be embarrassed about. I enjoyed them. They were ... sweet.”

I looked her in the eyes and said, “Can we please change the subject?”

She smiled and said, “All right. How are you going to handle sleeping in a bunk bed with eleven other boys all waiting for you to fall asleep so they can have their first crack at you?”

I groaned and said, “I’m hoping my ignore me vibe works on them. The twins say it’s empathic so it shouldn’t be against the rules.”

“My suggestion would be to find the one with the biggest chip on their shoulder and knock it off. You might end up having to stay there next weekend to serve your penance for that, but you might be better off in the long term.”

I looked at my mom incredulously and said, “What makes you think I could even do that? I don’t know the first thing about defending myself like that. I’d get into trouble and then be an even bigger target.”

My mom reached over, took my right hand and said, “Timmy, you’re far more capable than you think. The way you can form all those links and manage them without even thinking about them, that’s something your father and I have never seen before. And your father has spent time among some pretty powerful telepaths when he was your age, apparently. Though I suppose he’s not the best judge of relative strength. Every voice he’s met is stronger than him.”

“Voice?”

“It’s the slang term people sometimes use for people like us. Spark is another you might hear. I think that’s more a European term, but I heard it’s popular in New England too.”

“Okay ... Mom, I don’t think attacking someone on the first day is the impression I want to make.”

“Timmy, I know how it sounds, but if this place is as rough as it sounds...”

“What could they possibly do to me to make me feel worse than I did while carrying everyone’s sins? I’ll be fine, mom. I’m a lot tougher than I was a year ago or even six months ago.”

My mom smiled softly and said, “I suppose you are. But you’re not going to have anyone there that’s on your side. You’ve never been alone like this.”

I pulled out my coin and my cross and said, “As long as I have these, I’m not alone.”

“I strongly suggest you don’t show off your coin to anyone. It might just disappear on you.”

I frowned and said, “Surely if someone takes it, they’d be caught. Everyone gets scanned.”

“The students do. I very much doubt the staff do.”

“You think one of the staff might take it?”

My mother shrugged and said, “This isn’t St. Joe, Timmy. Don’t expect everyone there to have the morals you and I do.”

I sighed and said, “Then maybe you should take the coin back with you. I can just put a quarter in the holder.”

She smiled and said, “The holder is what’s important to you to have.”

I nodded.

My mom reached over to her purse and after digging through it, she pulled out a plastic sandwich bag with a knot in it containing a quarter.