Chapter 4

When Sandra got home, she found her mother waiting for her in the living room.

"And? How was it?" her mother asked.

"How was what?" Sandra asked somewhat puzzled.

"Well, your first day in school?"

"Oh, it was fine," Sandra answered. "They gave me something that you have to sign. I have to take it back to school on Monday."

Sandra pulled the paper about ADP out of her schoolbag and gave it to her mother. While her mother started to read it, she quickly went upstairs to put her schoolbag away. She also stepped out of her shoes and removed her socks, and then she went downstairs again on her bare feet. It's how she always walked around at home. She only wished that she also could put some other clothes on. Normally, she would have been wearing shorts now and a t-shirt or tank top. Nevertheless, luckily she could wear her school t-shirt. It sure was better than that blouse that hung in her closet.

When she walked into the kitchen and saw that her mother was busy with preparing their dinner. Sandra asked, "Can I help you with something?"

Her mother looked somewhat surprised at Sandra and said, "Well ... sure! You can set the table if you want."

"Okay," Sandra said, turned around and walked into the living room. She took the necessary tableware out of the cupboards and started setting the table for their dinner.

Sandra's mother was again astonished about how this ADP thing had changed her daughter from one day to the other. Thinking about this made her decide that she and her husband should choose the first option on that paper from school. If it works so good, why not extend it into their home.

While Sandra was setting the dinner table, she was smiling on the inside. She had decided to help her mother this evening and maybe even for the rest of the weekend! It would show her how a good daughter she could be, and maybe they would be so nice to sign the paper with the option that they wouldn't extend the ADP school punishments at home. Not that she would like to get any punishments, but the thought of running around naked at home, with her mum and dad watching her, scared her even more than when she would need to bare it all at school.

The table was almost set, when her dad walked in from work. He looked over at the dining table and saw his daughter setting it ready for evening dinner.

"Hi, dad," Sandra said.

He was a bit surprised by her. Well, first because she was setting the table, and secondly that she said 'hi dad' when he had walked in. So, he jokingly said back, "Hi, daughter."

He went into the kitchen to greet his lovely wife. At 38, she was still a looker, and he was glad he had married her when he accidentally had impregnated her. She was now standing with her back to him, and he decided to slowly sneak up on her and then he kissed her gently in the neck.

She let out a shriek of surprise and he had even managed to make her jump. When she turned around, she started to smile and then wrapped her arms around his nick and kissed him on the lips. She hadn't time for much more, because she had to make the final preparations for dinner. So, she let go, turned around and continued to stir the pot.

The man looked behind him, at his daughter in the living room, and asked, "What did you have to do to get Sandra to set the table for you?"

"Nothing, she just asked me what she could do for me and when I said she could set the table, she just did it."

"Wow," he said. "I didn't think I would see that again!"

"Well, I think we have ADP to thank for this. As sweet as she is today, she hasn't been since she reached puberty."

"So, it's really working! I never thought those kids would accept it. With the things that I heard in the precinct sometimes, I was sure that they would revolt against it."

"She also brought a letter home from school today. We need to let them know if we will be extending the school punishments at home or not. I think we need to agree to it, if it has this kind of effect on her, I think it would be smart to support it at home as well."

Sandra's mother gave the paper to her husband. She had already signed it, but hadn't marked the paper yet. Sandra's father read it, looked at his daughter again and then said, "I think you are right. If this is the effect it has on her, we better support it."

He then walked up to the kitchen table, laid the paper on it, took his pen out of his pocket and marked the first option on the paper and signed it. He gave his daughter a last look and then smiled. "I think we better give it back to her on the Monday morning! I'm sure she is only being so nice because she wanted us to sign the second option on this paper," he whispered to his wife. She nodded her head in agreement. At least, this way, Sandra should be calm for the rest of the weekend.

It seemed her dad was a little smarter than her mum. He knew exactly what she was doing and didn't buy into it. And because he knew that if she would know what they just had decided, she would probably try to persuade them for the rest of the weekend to change it. So he put the paper in the inner pocket of his jacket and hung it away.

He knew that his daughter wasn't so bad, but she is just very independent and doesn't like people telling her what to do. He even had seen how she sometimes stuck up for her friends when they were in trouble. He was even proud that she did this for her friends. However, he only wished that she sometimes would listen a little better at home and didn't act so impulsively at times.

The father walked back into the living room and went sitting on the sofa to watch the news on TV. Sandra was done with setting the table, and she came sitting next to him on the sofa. He had almost given her the remote control, so she could change the station, when he thought, "Not tonight, I better test her! Let us see if she will keep this up by not asking me to change the station."

Sandra had seen that her father almost had picked up the remote control, so she could change the station, but it seemed he had decided the TV was now his, and she had to watch whatever that he wanted to see. She didn't say anything and tried her best to keep a straight face while she was watching the news with her dad. It seemed her days of watching soaps was over.

Sandra didn't pay too much attention to the news, until there was something about ADP on it.

"Today, ADP is officially introduced as the new punishment system for minors who can't follow the rules society has set for them. We have the minister of justice with us in the studio to talk about it." The female news anchor turned herself towards an old looking guy and said enthusiastic, "Good day, Sir."

"Good evening," he said very distinguished.

"As we know, the 'Alternate Discipline Plan' has been used by Great Britain and the USA in the past few years. Has it always been successful in those Countries?"

With a very official voice, the man started to say, "It's been successful for about 98%. There have been some incidents where the minors thought they had beaten the system. However, after a revision of the rules, it's again a 100% success story in all those places in the world where they use it."

"Now, some people say it is a very unusual way of punishing minors. Some psychiatrists even say that it can be harmful to them? What is your stand on this?"

"The things we have heard and seen from those Countries that are already using it, shows us that it is exactly the opposite. Crime is down and the juvenile courts have almost no cases anymore. The minors are behaving and all crimes that were done in the past by minors are down by 96%, giving the cops finally the opportunity to go after the real bad guys in their respective countries. And for those few minors, who can't seem to learn to behave, we have started a program, so they can learn how to behave and how to get out of ADP and stay out of it. I would say, it is a win – win situation for everyone. Nevertheless, it is still too early to say if it will work for our youth. I can only say that for today alone, the cops already got 99% fewer calls about youngsters involved with crime. So, I would say that ADP had a very good start. Even so, the next few weeks will show us if it stays this way."

"Well, it sure sounds very promising."

"It sure does!" said the minister with a big smile on his face.

"Creep," Sandra thought when she saw that smirk on the face of the minister.

"Well, we also have Chief Commissioner Browly of the newly instituted ADP cops department with us today. Good day, Sir."

"Good day, Miss!" said a mean looking man with a rough voice.

"So, we heard from the minister that the cops got 99% fewer calls today. Would you say ADP is working?"

"Well, like the minister already said, it is still too early to say if it is a success, but by what I have seen today, I think we finally have found a system to get those minors to follow the rules again. And it was needed badly, because in the past few years, they even started to laugh in the faces of our fine officers when they arrived on the scene. You could say, they were almost running the show and doing all sorts of crazy things without consequences. Now that they know that we have a fine new punishment system backing up our police force, they know they can't do those crazy things anymore. Because if they do, they are punished immediately, as it should have been all those years before. And for the hard cases, we, the ADP cops, have some extra legal means for punishing those minors."

"It's nice to hear that our fine officers can do their job again. And this time with ADP backing them up, where the previous jurisdictional system failed miserably. But Sir, I have a last question for you. When ADP was announced two months ago, there have been some outcries on the Internet by kids who protested, especially after that first message of 'Little Blue Dragon'. How are you dealing with those things?"

"Well, that's also why we have this new ADP department, we are going to focus on all those minors who can't behave. And I can tell you good news about this. We have gone to the schools, of some of those students, today, and they have been punished according to the ADP rules already."

"What punishment did they receive?"

"Well, because they criticized our fine government, they have been put on a full week of ADP. And they have lost all their privileges for the duration of their punishment!" The mean looking cop now looked straight into the camera and went on with, "So, if you see some naked minors running around next week, don't be shy and tell them what you think about them. Don't spare their feelings, they need to learn their place in society before it is too late!"