Chapter 3 : An Unexpected Encounter

George was pushed into a large room with only two small barred windows set high in the bare concrete wall. The far end of the room was separated from the rest by steel bars creating a prison cell but in the middle four wooden pillars were spaced evenly along the centre line of the room. Against three of them, three other, younger, men were already tied. The fourth pillar now served for him.

The three others were dressed much as he was, one wore a suit, one a shirt and trousers, the other a t-shirt and jeans. All of them were handcuffed with their wrists behind their backs. All of them were gagged; one with tape strapped across his lips, the other two with strips of cloth pulled cruelly tight. George looked around in panic, pulling against the handcuffs and the chains that held him to the pillar; grunting into whatever it was that was gagging him. The others seemed to accept their fate, neither struggling nor attempting to make a sound through their gags. George was puzzled by their quiescence but in time he realised that his struggles were having no effect other than to make his own wrists sore.

It was some time before the door to the room in which he was imprisoned opened again. It was the same two women that had pulled him from the car, but now they were dressed quite differently. They had discarded their jeans and crop tops and now wore matching outfits in a menacing black that gave them the look of members of some sinister secret police force. Both wore peaked caps and sun glasses, tight, short-sleeved shirts, shorts that looked as if they were sprayed on, dark sheer tights and high heeled boots that came to just below their knees. The taller of the two, the blonde, flexed a riding crop between her gloved hands, the other, the brunette, carried a leather leash and collar.

George watched in fear as the women strode across the room. The other men seemed not to acknowledge their presence, keeping their heads bowed, and their eyes to the floor. The two girls walked to the last pillar. The one with the leash used it to slap the man's face before fastening the collar around his neck. She pulled a ring of keys from her belt and unchained the man from the pillar. As soon as she did so, George watched him drop to his knees. The two women took him from the room with a word to any of the others. They stood perfectly still. Only when the women had left and the door had slammed shot with the clang of a fastening lock did one raise his head and stare towards the door.

Time passed. Perhaps a quarter of an hour later. George heard the sounds on keys in the lock of the door. The women reappeared, dragging behind them, now naked, the man that they had taken from the cell earlier. They chained him back to his pillar. George saw in horror that his buttocks were criss-crossed by welts from a severe beating. The tape that had gagged him had been replaced with a red rubber ball gag like George's own. The girl that had pulled him in, unfastened his collar. The other gave him a final cut with her riding crop and the two of them turned their attention to the next man in line, releasing him from his pillar and dragging him from the room.