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Chapter 1: The Request
Freddie Clegg was standing on the loading dock as the cage was rolled out. The cages were an improvement on the crates, he thought. Easier to keep an eye on the merchandise, less risk of damage in transit with the new designs and much more secure. The team had done a good job on building these.
The naked girl inside was probably not as impressed. However, the way that she restrained inside the cage coupled with the results of her training, the trauma resulting from her abduction and abuse at the hands of Clegg’s ‘trainers’, and the drugs that had been administered to reduce the stress of her journey meant that there was little chance of her showing her feelings.
Clegg watched as the steel frame rolled by on its four castors. The girl was held quite firmly, unable to shift within the cage which, in any case, was barely larger than her crouched form. Her head was locked in a padded frame so that she faced the floor. The frame was fixed to the inside of the cage allowing only the slightest movement. Although Freddie couldn’t see it he knew that her mouth was filled with a hard rubber plug that kept her silent and held in place the tube through which she would be fed and watered during the course of her journey.
Her arms were strapped tightly against her sides, clipped to broad leather belts that were padlocked around her waist, thighs and chest. Her wrists were shackled to her thighs, her hands enclosed in the locked, finger-less, gloves that made certain that there was nothing she could do to gain her freedom. Her belts in turn were linked by chains to the frame of the cage fixing her within the confined space and holding the weight of her upper body so that her knees and feet rested only lightly on the bars of the cage beneath her. They too were belted and chained so that the girl hung, immovable and silent within her cage.
As the cage passed, Freddie could see that the girl was also held in place by the twin plugs that were bolted to the rear bars of the cage and penetrated her arse and her cunt. Freddie wasn’t the only one that was watching. Three other girls lay, helpless and silenced, cocooned in plastic wrapping that secured them and, at the same time prevented the occasional abrasions that were otherwise the inevitable consequence of transport. Each of them was stretched out on a metal shelf on racking to one side of the dock. They were watching, convinced – rightly – that their fate was to follow the girl in the cage.
Freddie liked to come down to the dock sometimes. It was easy to get caught up in the mundane, day-to-day details of the business; the accounting, the problems with staff, the competitors. Here, though, was where the business made its money. Secure shipments, quality merchandise, for customers that appreciated the care with which the girls were selected, collected and trained.
It was almost a shame to see this one go, she’d proved to be a quick learner and an accomplished practitioner of the arts that would be such an asset in her new life. There were several of his staff, Freddie knew, that would have liked to keep her around. But, like most of the girls these days, she had been a commissioned collection, a particular girl for a particular customer. You didn’t get the chance to be sentimental about the stock.
Things have moved on, Freddie thought. The business didn’t use auctions so much now. Sure this was a more profitable way of working but he still missed the cut and thrust that came from buyers competing for a particularly attractive piece. “Maybe I need to rethink that side of things,” he said to himself.
The cage was being rolled out onto a truck as a car pulled up alongside it. The driver got out and waved to Freddie as he did so.
“Hi, Harry,” Freddie responded. “How did it go?”
Harry held up his hand, thumb making a circle with his forefinger in a sign of approval. He headed to the rear of the car and opened the trunk. A girl lay inside struggling impotently against the strips of tape that bound her arms, legs and body. Even with her head hooded she had realised that the trunk had been opened and she squealed from behind what Freddie knew was a tape strip gag as Harry leant forward to help her sit up. “Which one was this?” Freddie thought. They had gone through the list of activities at the management meeting last week but he couldn’t for the life of him remember which of their clients the girl was destined for.
It didn’t matter though. The systems would take care of it. She’d be booked in, numbered and tagged. They had got used to handling the volume of business. He couldn’t remember the last time that they had made a mistake.
Harry had the girl over his shoulder, her taped legs kicking as he carried her up the steps from the car park onto the loading dock.
“The ride hasn’t discouraged her, then?” said Freddie.
“No,” said Harry patting the girl’s backside affectionately, “she’s still quite frisky, but that’s all to the good.”
There were more squeals from inside the hood, earning the girl a less playful tap on her backside.
As Harry carried the girl away a voice called to Freddie from the far side of the loading dock. “Mr Clegg, it’s the telephone,” a pneumatic looking girl in a tight skirt and high heels said. “It’s one of the Kushtians. I didn’t get his name, I’m afraid. K – something, I think.”
Freddie waved in acknowledgement. Sarah did a reasonable job, he thought, but sometimes she wasn’t as thorough as he’d like. ‘K- something’ could be anyone in the upper parts of Kushtian society. He wondered if she’d lost some of her secretarial skills as a result of her slave training and sexual conditioning. “Still,” Freddie thought, as he watched her arse wiggle away from him as she walked back into the offices, “you can’t have everything.”
Clegg took the call in the small office beside the loading dock. He recognised the voice at once. The Kalinin of Kushtia, the country’s recently installed head of state, was one of his best customers.
“Kalinin,” Freddie said. “A pleasure. I hope all is well with you.”
“Indeed, indeed,” the Kalinin’s voice came through strongly over the noise on the crackly line.
“How can I help you?” Freddie knew enough of the Kalinin to know that this was unlikely to be a social call.
“Story tellers,” the Kalinin said. “For my son. He spends too much time with the television, too much time with his foolish computer games. He needs more human diversions, his wives do what they can but I suspect he tires of them or that they spend too much time on the politics of the harem. He should have one for each weekday. The weekends, he can spend time with his wives.”
“Story tellers? That’s not a usual request,” Freddie said, trying to think how on earth he might satisfy the Kalinin’s desire. “And five of them?”
“Exactly. And sufficiently beguiling to divert my son.”
Freddie knew what that meant; ideally red headed but if push came to shove, wearing a skirt and still breathing. “Leave it with me, your Excellency,” Freddie responded. “I’m sure we can help.”
He put the phone down wondering where they were going to find five Scheherezade’s. Still he thought to himself, that’s half of the fun.