Chapter 10 : Chrysallis

THE PERFORMER

I wonder what they intend for me? What will my life be like, being enslaved to them? They make me wear a collar and they are keeping me imprisoned but apart from that, they are quite kind, in comparison to my nightmares. They don't shout orders at me, when they tell me to do things they speak quietly, clearly but firmly. Yes, they cane me but from their point of view, I deserve it is because I have not done something I have been told to do or not done it as willingly or as carefully as I should have done. There's always a reason. I can't agree, of course, but when I reflect on the circumstances of the incident, there is always a reason, from their point of view.

Then there is the humiliation of having to charge my collar each night. The socket I have to use is about three feet from the floor of my cell, over by the door. The power cable is quite short, so I have to kneel. I kneel to forge one of the chains that binds me. I do it night after night after night. I thought of trying to electrocute myself on the cable once but it is too thick to tear open and the plug slides into a deep, close-fitting socket. There is no opportunity for my fingers to touch the live contacts. So, I have become complicit in my own confinement, as if it is what I desire, too. Just as Neena said. "You will never ever leave us. Your collar is your friend and will help you" Help me to stay confined. Help me to remain always a slave.

There is no calendar for me to see. Not in the kitchen, not in any of the corridors or rooms I have been in. I have completely lost track of how long I have been here, but it must have been weeks and weeks and weeks. Or even months?

What will Joe think now? Or my parents? What will they think of me? Will they think I have just run away? Will the police look for me? The girl, Neena, shredded my passport and Joe must have noticed that it is missing from our home, by now. He will wonder if I have gone abroad. Could the police find me abroad? Could they find me here? Or am I lost? Lost forever?

I'm still trying to imagine where I could possibly be. The girl Neena told me I was near Moscow. Do I believe her? Why should I? Yet why shouldn't I believe her? There is no point in making me learn Russian if I am in some other country.

Today they took me out of my cell along the corridor and into the Gym. It's a bit like the ones at Inward Bound and at the University. There are large windows which look out onto the grounds. There are lawns and pine trees, with the garden stretching up to an embankment above us. It's all covered with deep snow at the moment, so it must still be winter. Winter: the last date I know was Tuesday 10^th November. Each day seems to be the same, except that there have been parties. I know because I have had to clean up in the kitchen and there has been a lot more to do. Parties. That must mean it is near Christmas or New Year, or have they passed by?

The gym is much larger than the gym at Inward Bound and, I suppose you would say, more professional.

I'm with a man this time. He looks very fit. Very toned-up and solid. As usual, he says nothing in English, but points to each piece of equipment that he wants me to use, one after the other. He says something that I can't understand exactly but it's easy to "get the message". He speaks with an insistent tone. He sounds as though he thinks I understand him; as if my lack of response is simply reticence. It's a one sided conversation. It doesn't seem to bother him at all.

I am taken to the gym almost every day. One day, he makes me run or go through an aerobics routine. The next day, he makes me work out with weights. On "weights days" I have to alternate a heavy work out with a less heavy work out on the next weights session. The training I am being put through seems to be very carefully thought out. They are not just making me work so I suffer or learn obedience or endurance or something. It seems to me that I am being trained for something but I have no idea what. Perhaps it's just aesthetics, but it is changing me. I don't mind the exercise, because I can lose myself in the effort. The harder I work, the harder it is to remember why I'm here. I can escape into a world where there is just me and the feeling of my muscles working. And they a realization comes. The programme is very well thought out. It is well thought out because they have done it before.

There may be particular reasons why they came after me, but I am not the first and I will not be the last. There is a line of ever so many girls (and who knows? Even boys?) stretching back into the past and on after me into the furure!

I'm starting to recognise the Russian names of the machines – Treadmill – Bench Press – Cross Trainer – and so on.

On a "heavy day" he makes me do four sets of lifts for each exercise: eight, six, four and finally two. He chooses weights that I really have to work hard to lift. He encourages me (if that's the word) with taps of his riding crop if he thinks I am slacking but actually I don't slack. Everything is much easier when I am just thinking about the weights.

On a light day, he has me work the same muscle groups but with lighter weights and more repetitions. The programmes work my back, chest and abs, arms, shoulders, legs and abs again.

I'm naked - except for the dreadful collar - but I'm always sweating and breathing hard at the end of it.

The gym sessions have become part of the routine of my incarceration. One day, running and aerobics. The next day weights. It takes ... actually I do not know how long it takes. There is no clock and the Gym trainer does not wear a watch. As I get to manage the weights better, he makes me increase the repetitions on heavy days: eight, six, four, two, edges up to eight, eight, eight, eight and then he increases the weight I have to lift and I start the cycle over again. On light days, the weights are jumped up gradually as I get used to them. Every so often, he changes the programme. I still work the same areas of my body, but using different exercises and weights.

He's keeping a minute record of my progress. He weighs me; measures the circumference of my arms and legs and chest; takes skin fold measurements. In the mornings I have to pee into a glass jug which they take away – to test I suppose.

They sometimes take blood from me - and they keep giving me injections. Every morning. I have no idea what they are for. I hope it's something like vitamins but I don't know what to ask and I don't suppose they would tell me anyway.

They feed me well. Where the food at Inward Bound was chosen to help us loose weight; now I'm eating a lot of protein and carbohydrate. There's not much fat in my diet. With all this exercise, I have no excess weight anymore. My muscles are plainly visible all over my body

As the weeks pass, I'm beginning to see real changes in my body. My arms and shoulders have grown. My tits are much more pert, lifted up by the development of the pectoral muscles underneath.

I suppose that the injections must be part of the body building programme too? Perhaps they're steroids? I don't really know much about that sort of thing but it must be something like that. I can't imagine how I could make this much progress so quickly, just on my own. What are they going to do with me in the long term? If there is a long term.

There are mirrors in the gym. You need them to be able to make sure your posture is right as you work – although I don't have to worry; a tap with the crop on calves or thighs or butt soon corrects a bad position. Mostly I don't really see myself, see Jenny McEwan, I just see this "other person" exercising; someone separate, someone different. Then one day, I see myself as myself for the first time in a long time. I catch sight of my physique reflected in the gym mirrors.

In spite of the fact that my tits are more prominent, the rest of me is becoming less feminine and more ... more androgynous.

The more they work me, the more they inject me, the more I change.

I'm leaving the person I was further and further behind. I wonder if I'm even recognisable to the people who once knew me? Would even Joe know me, if he saw me again?