Backpacking

Amber burst into tears and the guards escorted the lawyer out of the cell.

-----

They came for her at Dawn. She trembled with absolute fear as the cell door creaked open, a sound she had dreaded hearing all through the terrible sleepless night. Four women trustees walked in, dressed in overalls. In a daze she was led down the corridor to a large room where she was undressed and showered. The women did their best to comfort her, soothing her and pampering her. She barely responded. They told her in faltering English how for this tier of punishment she had to be 'prepared.'

"Prepared?" She asked and they patiently explained

She was to be shaved, oiled and her hair clipped to a severe half inch crop. She knew protestations were useless and stunned, reluctantly submitted. They laid her out on a low bench and with infinite care shaved her pubic mound. As she watched passively the razor systematically scraped smooth tracks through her sparse pubic hair and she suddenly realised how exposed and vulnerable she was going to be.

Her head was clipped, the long blonde hair falling to lie in a golden pile at her feet. Amber managed a thin smile as on her insistence they brought her a cracked mirror, and she surveyed her new haircut. Ironically, she had known she had the shape of head that would carry this off. She had seen it modelled in a fashion magazine and had been steeling herself to try it one day.

This wasn't the day she would have chosen.

They stood her upright and oiled her all over, sliding delicate fingers deftly between her legs and massaging her buttocks, and breasts, until she shimmered in the early morning light from the single thick glass window. They marvelled over her tan lines; admiring the pale skin that had never seen the harsh sun, the dark honey brown skin that had and the sharply delineated dividing line between the two. She was numb, oblivious to it all. Like a doll she simply moved as she was guided. Her mind incapable of processing the unspeakable horror of what was going to happen to her

Sympathetically they dressed her in simple cheap white panties and a light blue gown that fastened up the back and across the shoulders with loose thin weak stitches. It was this garment that caused her the greatest dread; it reminded Amber of the hospital gowns worn when undergoing surgery. There was something unnervingly clinical about it. Finally, they ushered in two guards who led her back out into the corridor.

Passing armed guards every ten metres down the corridors and staircases Amber briefly contemplated making a run for it. Better to die quickly in a hail of bullets, an anonymous death in an insignificant country, rather than to live broken, scarred and humiliated on the internet for eternity, but she was broken now and no longer had the strength or will to do it.

They came to a large doorway. Amber stood waiting for what seemed like eternity. She heard the sounds of a crowd and the pitiful sobbing of the man waiting in front of her, dressed in a similar gown. Suddenly the guards grabbed him. He struggled, whimpering and flailing about pathetically. He collapsed as his spindly legs and bladder gave way and urine stained the front of his gown and ran down his legs. The guards dragged him to his feet with distaste, laughing at the puddle on the floor beneath him. Leather straps with rings were attached to his wrists and ankles and the heavy door groaned slowly open. He was hauled contemptuously away. Amber had a brief glimpse of a heaving crowd. The door closed and she also found her wrists and ankles being strapped into bracelets. A terrifying half hour passed, and the doorway reopened, and she was shoved roughly through it.

She was momentarily blinded by the harsh sunlight and as her eyes adjusted, she saw to her horror it opened directly onto the public square she had visited only a few days previously as a carefree tourist. Hundreds, if not thousands of people were packed around a raised platform in the centre of the square, on top of which stood a solid wooden eight-foot square frame with heavy steel rings attached ominously from its corners.

Buildings around the square had groups of people on balconies and standing in open windows. Amber saw glasses of wine and laughing faces. They think this is a party she thought, sickened.

The crowd suddenly heaved with excitement, and a huge roar went up suddenly, the crowd parted, and the man who had been in front of her appeared. He was naked and being carried face down on a stretcher towards her. He was screaming and blood dripped off the pulped skin of his lacerated buttocks and through the canvas of the stretcher, leaving a trail of red drips along the path created by the crowd. They led back to the platform.

A guard leered at her.

"Rapist; Fifteen strokes! Got it easy. Police chief his cousin." He taunted her.

The man who had administered the punishment walked to the front of the platform brandishing the cane. It was long, viciously thin and streaked in blood. He raised it triumphantly above his head, bending it to demonstrate its cruel flexibility and the crowd roared with animalistic fervour. He theatrically plunged it into a bucket of water to one side of the frame and then wiped it clean with a rag.

He turned to face Amber. Naked above the waist and dressed in tight leather trousers Amber buckled as she recognised the muscular and implausibly hairy police officer who had interviewed her two days before. Her stomach churned as she remembered her insult. Now she bitterly regretted it.

"Police chief! important man! Asked for this one special! Personal. He wet cane in salt water after each stroke! Hurt more!" The guard whispered in Amber's ear with sadistic relish.

An announcement came across the public address system and Amber was prodded forward by two guards. The crowd hushed craning their heads toward her in expectation. She struggled and losing all semblance of dignity, begged, pleaded, and fought to return to the relative safety of the doorway. She staggered drunkenly into the crowd, but they pushed her back derisively. She clawed and kicked out at the guards, but she had nowhere to go. Impassively and inexorably, they herded her forward, and she stumbled on, barely conscious of the jeering multitude of voices, until unceremoniously she was bundled up the short flight of steps to the platform. The crowd gave a deafening cheer and with tears in her eyes she looked around hopelessly at the terrifying scene.

Numerous stalls had been set up around the square. One particularly enterprising stall holder had naked barbie-dolls hung up in a fringe under the awning of his stall, their buttocks striped with a red felt tip pen. Candy canes were abundantly available as were T-shirts, posters and other sick souvenirs and macabre memorabilia.

Ropes were attached to the bracelets on her arms and legs and looped through the metal rings in each corner of the upright wooden frame. Slowly in sequence they were pulled tight, fastened, and then tightened and fastened again until she was strung up, stretched and spreadeagled, to all four corners. In front of her a large TV monitor gave a split screen view of her front and back in chilling closeup. The guards left the platform, and she was left alone with the brutish police chief and his voracious cane. He stood in front of her smiling and swept it through the air savouring the smell of her fear and the horrified widening of her eyes.

He bent forward and she could smell his breath and the sweat of his recent exertion.

"I fuck your arse good now, Pig!"

He walked purposefully behind her and unable to see what he was doing she shivered with fear.

Another announcement was made and with a flurry of sudden brutal movements her gown was ripped off, exposing her naked breasts and the white cotton panties. A gasp went through the audience as the soft delicately pale breasts and rose-pink nipples were cruelly revealed, swaying gently as the ropes flexed. The contrast to her flat tanned torso, pulled taut by the ropes, was starkly clear.

The officer moved forward and using his fingernails to tear through the thin cotton of her prison panties, ripped them off her. They fell shredded below her, their protection now redundant.

A roar of appreciation rose from the crowd.

She hung naked, her white shaved groin shining as the sun caught the oiled surface. The well-defined tan lines accentuated her nudity, mocking her previous public modesty. The cleft between her legs had parted as she had been stretched apart, her inner labia hung raw and translucent, and as the cameras greedily zoomed in, the large TV monitor gave the expectant crowd a fleeting glimpse of the hood hiding her clitoris. A tumultuous, salacious cheer rang out.

The camera view changed and with stark terror she saw the guard raise the cane high above his head. In a blur the cane scythed down to her white naked buttocks. With a searing flash of unspeakable pain, it bit hungrily into the pale soft flesh. The snap of its landing following a split second later. Amber's scream echoed around the square and her body arched and spasmed against the restraint of the ropes, the crowd went delirious with delight. A vicious bright red welt flecked with blood flared across the delicate skin. She saw the cane being dipped into the salt water behind her and the discarded panties were picked up by a big hairy hand and wiped along its surface. On the monitor Amber saw with a shudder that they were now lightly stained with pink.

The figure '1' appeared in the corner of the TV monitor and a voice said a single word in the local language. Amber's body tensed, shiny with the sweat that had started to trickle down her back and breasts and bead on the oiled skin of her groin. The camera panned across her body, gloating over the aftermath of the first stroke.

The cane was raised again, and Amber closed her eyes, willing herself not to watch and begging for unconsciousness. Every muscle in her body clenched tight in anticipation of its next violation. In the fraction of a second it took to cut through the air and sink into her tensed buttocks, she imagined she was transported to the comfort of her father's car, being driven safely from the airport, the backpack in her lap, her fingers clawing at the stitches of the friendly embroidered monkey...

-----

Amber awoke with a blinding hangover, a throat like gravel and a confusing assortment of aching muscles. She grabbed a glass of water and painkillers, ran a hand through her long blonde hair and looked over the rumpled sheets and discarded clothes for any sign of Steve or Dave.

She was alone. Had that been part of the deal?

What deal?

She reached down and felt her backside, it tingled angrily in response. Had she really let them spank her? She smiled mischievously, vaguely remembering that at the time she had found it quite exciting. Well, she had been a very bad girl, she supposed!

Shit! She thought, I'm going to miss that plane. She looked for clean underwear and finding none, simply pulled a denim skirt up her long-tanned legs, slipped her T-shirt over her head, wriggled into her short leather jacket, and bundled all her belongings into the backpack that was lying at the foot of the bed.

She stopped and looked at the backpack thoughtfully. Echoes of unresolved thoughts tumbled around in her head. Then she remembered.

Decisively she tipped it upside down over the bed and reaching inside to the zipped pockets, extracted the two packets of white powder that Steve had asked her to hide there the night before. In the cold light of day, she knew it had been a stupid idea.

Hell. Even in the heat of the night, Stoned, drunk and with two eager cocks to play with, it had still been a stupid idea. How on earth had she let them talk her into that?

She ran to the bathroom, emptied the packets down the toilet and flushed. She rinsed out the bags and cut them into strips with a pair of nail scissors before wrapping the pieces in toilet paper and flushing that down the toilet as well. She flushed several more times.

She stuffed her scattered clothing and other belongings into the backpack and managed to reach the airport with mere minutes to spare.

After checking in she started to walk towards the doorway leading to her plane, passing two police officers with holstered automatics and a large dog. They were casually and randomly searching the boarding passengers. She approached, smiling politely. They looked confused and quizzically one asked. "Can we help, miss?" She realised suddenly that they had not intended to stop her, but as she had approached them voluntarily, she felt obliged let them search her bag.

"We look in bag, yes?" One guard asked uncertainly.

"Of course. Officer." Amber said compliantly, not understanding why she had not just walked by. She handed over her backpack.

They emptied the contents out onto a counter and with obvious relish pawed through her underwear, sharing lewd comments in their own language whilst eyeing her speculatively.

"Sorry, I didn't have time to wash them. I didn't have a clean pair; I've just had to do without!" As if to emphasise this statement she shifted her weight from one leg to the other confirming to herself that this was indeed true. Unable to control their reactions, the two men's eyes ran up her legs to the short denim skirt. Amber felt gratifyingly superior. Men were so easy to manipulate, she thought!

Reluctantly they returned to the backpack, searching every pocket, pulling back zips and rummaging deeply into each compartment.

They found nothing.

Confused they spoke excitedly to each other; wondering in their own language, whether she might be a decoy or even a test set by the Airport management.

"All in order, you fly safe now." They waved her through, bewildered by the encounter.

Shortly after the plane had taken off and settled down for the flight, Amber realised how much her dress standards had slipped over the previous week. She couldn't go through customs looking like this! She took the backpack to the toilet and changed into the only items she could find that were marginally more acceptable; jeans, t-shirt and a smarter, albeit crumpled, shirt on top. She even remembered to put on a bra and wore her bikini bottoms instead of panties. She could at least now be picked up by her father's people without disgracing him. Really, she had sunk so low this week she smiled to herself in a guilty, but happy and hazy recollection.

The plane landed and thanks to her father's fame or, some would say, notoriety, the passage through customs was a formality. She hurried to the front of the airport casting an anxious glance to the toilets where she nervously remembered she was supposed to hand over the packets from her backpack: Second cubicle from the end, pass the bag under the partition, wait until it came back under with the money and then leave after ten minutes. Although she didn't still have the packets, she was curious to see who came out of the toilets. A handful of women came and went but only one caught her eye; a hatchet-faced woman with a faint moustache, which she had futilely tried to cover with makeup.

A smartly dressed young good-looking man with dark hair stood with her name on a placard. She walked up to him.

"I'm the Reverend's daughter, are you here to take me to my father?" She smiled at the respectable young man, wondering just how respectable he was; he looked very fuckable!

"Yes, I am ma'am. Praise the lord for your safe return! If you could just follow me, I'm parked just outside." He courteously and rather insistently, offered to take her backpack.

He climbed into the driver's seat, and she got into the back. Just as they were about to pull out Amber suddenly remembered she hadn't actually told her father what flight she'd be on, and with a nagging disquiet, she turned to the door in time to see the hatchet-faced woman opening it. She climbed in and sat next to Amber. A small automatic pointing unwaveringly at Amber confirmed the fears that had only just begun to form.

They drove in silence to a part of town Amber had never visited before and climbed up a narrow well-worn staircase, where on the first landing, a door led to a large comfortably carpeted room which she guessed had once been a snooker hall or gym, but now looked like some sort of club.

At one end of the room was a long bar, with rolled down shutters. A couple of dozen tables covered with up-ended chairs were scattered around the room. In the middle was a raised platform, from the middle of which rose a chrome metal pole, rising to the low ceiling. Amber was led around the platform through a door marked 'Private' into a comfortably furnished office. A group of leather armchairs and a sofa had been arranged around a low coffee table. In front of the heavily curtained window sat a burly man with broad shoulders and implausibly hairy wrists at a large solid desk. He was talking agitatedly to an older man in a suit sitting in front of the desk. They stood up as Amber was escorted in.

"Ah Amber, we have some unfinished business, do we not? Please pull up a chair." He asked politely as she was led to the front of the desk. The older man in the suit turned to her and smiled in a slightly menacing way, displaying a missing front tooth. He courteously pulled a chair up next to him and indicated that Amber sit. The good-looking young man with the dark hair and the hatchet-faced woman deposited themselves in armchairs. Two younger men, known only to Amber as Steve and Dave entered, and settled down on the sofa. They all watched Amber closely as she reluctantly sat down

"We seem to be missing a small consignment of merchandise, which was entrusted to you for shipment." Said hairy wrists resuming his seat behind the desk.

The man with the missing tooth, tapped on a calculator and announced a figure to the assembled group. He sat down looking questioningly at Amber.

Amber was shocked, she guessed it was the value of the two packets she had flushed down the toilet. It sounded like a lot of money.

The man with the hairy wrists looked pensive.

"If, of course, God willing, you can tell us where to find these goods and aid in their quick recovery, maybe we can come to some friendly agreement over this small error of judgement." He said in a reasonable voice tinged with implied threat.

"I flushed them down the toilet, I changed my mind. I couldn't do it." Amber hesitatingly admitted, starting to feel uncomfortable.

She had realised that this was probably one of those 'dens of iniquity' her father often referred to in his sermons. These were drug dealers, and this, she realised with a feeling of nausea, was probably a strip club. What had she got involved with?

"You changed your mind? Well, that's all right then. Perhaps you can recompense us for our loss?" Hairy wrists almost sounded reasonable.

"I haven't got anything. How could I recompense you for that stuff?" Amber misread his tone and still thought she could bluster her way out of this. She was determined not to be bullied by this hairy Godless oaf.

"Your father isn't exactly poor, and neither is, er, his flock. Maybe your church would like to help us fallen sinners, Pass the collection plate around a few extra times possibly? Your father does seem to have quite a nice little racket going for him."

"Hallelujah!" Exclaimed the man with the missing tooth, laughing

A chorus of Amen and 'Praise the lord' echoed around the room.

Amber was quite shocked at their obvious irreverence for her father and his church. It was her faith too they were mocking. She was starting now to regret her behaviour of the last week.

The Hairy wristed man suddenly dropped his voice and in a more serious tone asked Amber.