Glimpses of the Island

All for One

The bare concrete floor felt cold and hard. Ordered to strip, their clothes taken away, then paraded through the hallways and herded into a bare-walled cell, the psychological shock may have made the cold more imaginary than real. Elise held still as the guard closed the irons on her ankles and wrists, resigned to accepting her punishment with a fatalistic calm. She looked up at the man's face when he turned the key in the lock. He glanced back at her, their eyes meeting for only a moment before he moved over to the woman sitting next to Elise. It was hard to read his expression, but her quick impression was one of reluctance.

No longer the center of the guard's attention, Elise was able to look to her right where Mrs. Yates sat on the floor wearing an identical set of restraints. To the left the rest of the class was lined up on the floor, all waiting their turn to be shackled. Collective punishment , Elise recalled the Director's words, because we are all responsible for tolerating one classmates' poor behavior . Was it fair to send them all to what could only be called a dungeon because of a single person's lapse in judgment? It was hard for Elise to answer that question objectively while staring at the steel enclosing her wrists and ankles.

The guard continued to move down the line. No one had tried to resist or even speak up in protest. Not that it would have made a difference. There was another guard at the cell door, plus two more that she could see in the corridor beyond, enough to overpower anyone who didn't comply. With the shackles locked on Elise would be hard pressed to mount an effective struggle against a small child, much less a large man.

The guard in the cell finished quickly. At the doorway he turned back and inspected his work, his eyes sweeping up and down the line. Satisfied, he closed the heavy metal door. Elise could hear the deadbolt slide into place on the other side. In the bright light of the overhead fluorescents she could see there was no way to open the door on her side. There was no other exit; the grey concrete block walls were windowless.

Shut or wide open the door didn't really make any difference. None of the room's current occupants were going anywhere. Elise took a moment to examine her own personal prison in greater detail. Double irons , that's what one of the guards had called them. The bottom piece was a thick, two inch wide strap of steel, about sixteen inches long, with ovals bent into it to accommodate her ankles on the outside, and her wrists in between. A hinged top strap closed over the bottom, locking in the middle between her wrists. The area around her wrists and ankles was lined with a thin layer of some kind of padding so the metal didn't chafe against her skin. A short length of chain welded to the bottom ended in a ring embedded in the floor. She was forced to sit hunched over, arms between her legs, feet and hands on the floor, unable to straighten out her back or her legs. At least there was enough slack in the chain to allow her to lean back against the wall, which did help to ease the tension in her shoulders.

No one had spoken yet. Like Elise the rest of the women tried to find the most comfortable position allowed by the chains. Out of curiosity she tried to slip her hands out but as she expected it wasn't possible. They would all have to be patient and wait until someone came back to release them.

The clenched fists of Mrs. Yates drew Elise's attention. She would normally be the class instructor but after the incident she had included in the group punishment at the Director's order. All for one and one for all , Elise recalled from the famous line of the Three Musketeers, not even the Director's wife is excluded . Of all the women in the prison cell Mrs. Yates seemed to be taking it the worst, which confused Elise.

"This isn't fair! I wasn't out of line, why do I have to be here?" The voice came from someone else in the class. Elise turned away from Mrs. Yates and tried to see who was talking. "I shouldn't be treated this …"

"Shut up!" Mrs. Yates yelled. Elise jumped at the shout next to her. Turning back she saw Mrs. Yates clumsily scooting across the floor so she could face the rest of the class. "Fair? You talk about fair? Was it fair for me to be humiliated in front of my master? Did you hear what he said? I'm a disappointment. I failed him because I didn't teach you, all of you, to take this place seriously. As far as I'm concerned every single one of you deserves to be severely punished. If it were up to me I wouldn't be this lenient." She held up her hands and feet and shook the chain attached to her irons.

Elise tried to calm her down. "Please Mrs. Yates, I don't think…"

"No." Elise stopped when Mrs. Yates interrupted. "It isn't Mrs. Yates, not in here, not like this. I'm not your teacher now. My name is Siobhan, no last name. As long as we are being punished I'm part of the group. No special privileges or status, as you might have noticed?"

Someone else asked, "How long do we have to stay like this?"

"How long? Until someone decides we've had enough. I have no idea how long, an hour, a day, maybe a week." Siobhan shook her head in disgust at the question. "Why do you even ask? Maybe you have a watch, you're going to tell us all how much longer we have to go?"

Elise was scared; there was no way she could last a day much less a week trussed up as she was. Even now the strain on her back and shoulders was beginning to build up. Apparently the rest were having problems too as several murmured complaints. One woman spoke up, "I can't take a week like this. I don't think I can last another hour."

There was no sympathy in Siobhan's reply. "And what do you plan on doing about it? Why don't you take these irons off, stand up, go open that door, and tell the men out there how you don't appreciate being punished, and demand they do something about it? I'm sure they'll give your complaints due consideration."

Her sarcasm aside she had a point none of them could ignore. What could they do about it? At the Facility male authority was paramount and they all had agreed to submit, without limits, to whatever discipline the men deemed appropriate. Even if it meant being stripped and chained in a prison cell, Elise now realized.

In the same basement floor but on the other side of the sprawling main building, Clancy sat in a chair watching his Siobhan and the rest of the class on a monitor in the surveillance room. He reached out to the control panel to switch off the audio but left the video on.

"That's a good woman you've got there, Clancy. You could have done a lot worse." Jeff Clark had retired years ago but still liked to help out, often volunteering to man the video room when one of the regular operators called in sick or needed some time off. "If I'd been a few years younger I might have given you a run for your money with her." Jeff had been the Facility Director when Clancy had first started, and when Siobhan had arrived. "But I doubt she'd settle for anyone but you, so I suppose it worked out for the best."

"You'll get no argument from me. Still it hasn't always been easy. Times like now, when I have to send her in there," Clancy nodded at the monitor, "it breaks my heart. Earlier today I had to walk out of the room so she wouldn't see how much it hurt to have her stay with the group. But what could I do? She knows the rules; she even helped to write some of them. I couldn't make a special case for her."

"You do what you have to, Clancy. You knew it when you took the job. Could you ever have earned her respect if you didn't make the hard calls, like today? You heard what she said, she doesn't blame you." Countless times in the past Clancy had sought out Jeff for his advice. He knew there had been no option but to punish the entire class, Siobhan included, but it did help to hear Jeff confirm it was the right choice.

"I know too well she'd blame herself no matter what happened. She is thoroughly pissed off, that's for sure. At the rest of them and at herself too. When her words pick up that sarcastic bite, look out! Those double irons are sheer misery after an hour or so, but she calls it lenient?" Clancy shook his head before continuing. "Can you imagine what she would have done? They'd probably all be hanging from the ceiling by their thumbs while dangling over hot coals."

Jeff laughed as he watched the monitors. "Exactly. We have to be here to temper the more zealous excesses of that peer pressure we try so hard to encourage. Save the hot coals for something serious, like a curse word after stubbing a toe."

Clancy stood up. "Good ole Jeff, always the voice of patience and reason. Okay, let the watch room know, they get three hours full restraint as they are now, fifteen minutes for an exercise break to recover, and then they can spend the rest of the night ankles only shackled to the floor. No food or drink. Light activity tomorrow, they won't get much sleep. I think that will impress on them the wisdom of keeping wisecracks unvoiced. We'll save the Inquisition for another day, though by tomorrow morning they'll be sore enough to think they've been raked over those hot coals."

Two hours later Elise was ready to strangle with her own hands whoever had gotten them into trouble. Her back and leg muscles were one large ache. She tried to shift around as much as she could but nothing helped. The other women were just as bad off, complaining and struggling in their restraints. Only Siobhan Yates sat quietly, leaning against the wall, hardly moving at all. Since her first outburst she had refused to say anything more.

Copying Siobhan, Elise slid up against the wall and leaned back. She closed her eyes wishing she could accept the punishment with the same stoic attitude as the woman next to her. How do you do it , Elise wondered.

She didn't realize she had spoken out loud until Siobhan turned to look at her. "How? Because I have to. You think I like being punished? My master is a good man, but he is firm about discipline. He doesn't tolerate laziness or rude behavior." She held up her hands and feet, imprisoned in the irons. "This is the consequence of failure. He couldn't ignore what happened. I failed to teach all of you that simple principle. Next time I won't forget." She closed her eyes and turned away.

Elise stared at the irons holding her own wrists and ankles. It was a simple device, an effective tool to make a point. She would not be eager to repeat this experience. But the real lesson was one she would never forget. From now on she had to answer for her actions, good or bad, even if she were only an onlooker. And if they were bad there would be someone to exact a price.

Would her future master do something like this if she failed him? Surprisingly she had no good reply to that question. If she did her best it wouldn't be fair to punish her for a failure she couldn't prevent, but that was only half an answer. If she were clearly at fault, whether from laziness or inattention, then there would be no excuse.

She wasn't perfect; no one was. That's not an excuse , Elise realized. The goal might not be attainable but it didn't mean she shouldn't try. All her life she'd been the overachiever, first in school and then at the hospitals where she'd worked. Concentrate , she told herself, look at the finish line, not the track . Closing her eyes she pushed away the physical pain by concentrating on her one single-minded goal for the future, to be the best for her future master. If, or when, she made mistakes they would not come from lack of trying.