Chapter 3

"Prisoner D457B prepare for neck restriction," wasn't the announcement that I had been expecting.

"Maybe it fully implements one punishment, before it announces the next one," I reasoned. "Or is she going to get away without the gag?"

While lowering her head back to its previous position, the woman flashed me a small smile. I wasn't sure if she was trying to reassure me or herself. A second later, a white object had appeared around her slender neck. Starting from just below the base of her neck, the object continued up until it touched the bottom of her chin. The white tainted, semi-transparent, material following every contour of her neck. With one inch gaps between them, solid white stripes streaked their way along the length of the object. Making her look as if she was wearing a white leg stocking on her neck, with multiple white seams running down it. It might have looked thin and flimsy, but I was sure that it was in fact very tight and rigid. I assumed that it's purpose would be to restrict the movement of her neck, and to keep it in its current lowered position.

Another one of those repressed memories fought it's way to the front of my mind. Reminding me of the word for this object; she was wearing a neck corset. My memory filled with images from the catalog that an old girlfriend had once brought home. She had wanted to try to spice up our sex life, she had told me. The ones in that catalog were mostly made of leather, but I imagined this one was just as tight and rigid as those. From the distressed expression on her face, this woman certainly seemed to be finding it tight and uncomfortable.

After a few more seconds, I realized that once again she wasn't going to be punished with the mouth restriction. "Maybe they are only punished with that when they speak in the kneeling position," I reasoned.

"Are you OK," I asked.

"Yes Sir, it just takes a while to get used to." Her voice was now quieter than the previous calm voice that she had been using.

"Is there something else that I can call you, other than Prisoner D457B?"

"I'm sure you can call me whatever you want to, Sir."

"That's not exactly what I meant. What is your name?"

"Nereis, Sir."

"Well at least it isn't Julia," I chuckled. I was finding it very hard to believe in a spaceship with humans or human like beings on board, and where English seemed a common language. It would have been too much, if she had told me that her name was Julia or some other everyday name.

My chuckle hadn't been a direct question, so even if she had heard it, it wasn't going to get a response from Nereis.

"My name is Chris," I stated, and then continued as I knew she would be unable to respond, "What exactly does a Guardian Prisoner do?"

"They perform the role of the Guardian of the ship, Sir."

"Well that helped. After all that time, and all I had to do was ask," I thought in frustration.

I let out a small sigh, as I rubbed my forehead with my hand. I was really starting to get tired of asking questions. I needed to think of ones that would get useful answers.

"What are the roles of the Guardian of the ship?"

"Supervising the other prisoners and the general management of the ship, Sir."

"How do I get you and the other women out of the cells?"

"By using the command boards, Sir."

Letting out another small sigh, I explained, "I don't know how to use them. I don't even understand what all those symbols are. Can you help me with them? A kind of crash course on what each symbol means?"

"Sir, you must know the common alpha script. Everyone knows that," for the first time, I could actually hear a faint laughter in her voice.

"Well it seems that is everyone except for me. I'm not sure that script has reached my planet yet."

I could tell that she had wanted to respond, but that stupid direct question rule was stopping her.

"Is there a command that I can give you, that will allow you to talk more freely, and not only be able to answer direct questions."

"You may command me to do whatever you want, Sir. Although I'm not sure how freely I will ever be able to talk to you, Sir."

"Command her to do anything I want," some new voice in the back of my head, screamed out with excitement. I pushed this new voice back, just like I had the other one. I still wasn't ready to accept any of this. It was more likely to be some big practical game that someone was playing on me. That was my favorite theory, although I couldn't quite work out how to explain the materializer; I couldn't call it the ball gag materializer anymore, now that I knew it did neck corsets as well. Even if I was stuck on some prison spaceship, I sure wasn't going to take advantage of my fellow prisoners. I would need their help to plan my escape.

"Keep telling yourself that," the new voice called out.

I was seriously starting to worry about my own sanity. Had I really found the crash site and the horror of it all was just too much for me. I think every mind has a point where some experience is just too much for it to be able to handle. I'm sure there isn't much left after an aircraft crashes. So maybe finding an aircraft scattered across a hillside with just charred body parts remaining, was too much for my mind. My mind had created this dream, experience, whatever you wanted to call it, as a place to escape to. That would explain the voices; well they weren't really voices as such. Just thoughts that popped into my head even though I was thinking about something else at the time, and the last thing I wanted to do was to have those thoughts. I guess that was quite normal actually, so maybe I didn't need to be insane to explain them.

"I just hope this doesn't get her another punishment," I thought, as I prepared to give her a command allowing her more freedom. "You may talk freely to me. Continue to answer my questions but you may also ask questions of your own. You are also free to move around."

"Thank you, Sir. Although I'm not sure if that last command will work. In training we were always taught that we should remain in a respectful stance when you are talking to us. I'd rather not risk punishment, if that's alright with you, Sir."

"So I'm not completely free to order them to do what I wanted," I told myself, partly for the benefit of that voice in the back of my head.

Then I thought about the other women, and how long they had been kneeling in those same positions for. It was worth a try, so in a loud voice, I called out, "All prisoners, other than Prisoner D457B, are allowed to move around their cell freely."

After a few seconds, I started to hear some movement from the other cells. I was thankful that there was no response from that voice. I really had to do something about that voice. I didn't think this ship was big enough for both of us. One of us would have to leave; although I didn't mind if it was myself who left.