Chapter 1
Krampusnacht

"Here they come!" a man shouted, and a murmur of expectation ran through the waiting crowd. Joshua craned his head to see his first view of the procession, but this year, for the first time, he would happily have skipped the parade and hidden away in the basement of his house. He had dawdled and tried not to turn up, and spent a long time in the bathroom claiming quite truthfully that he felt ill, but his parents were having none of that. It's the law, they told him. If you miss the parade you might as well go sit in a cage and wait for someone to come and take you away. If you don't want to miss Christmas you get your butt down there this instant, they had yelled through the bathroom door.

They had also told him all the comforting things that they always said. It is only the bad kids that have to worry. Don't worry, Joshua, it will be fun to see who gets picked. They had ruffled his hair and smiled and Joshua had felt a terrible knot of tension deep inside. They didn't know. They didn't know about the conduct marks in school, because he hadn't brought the forms home for them to sign. He had forged their signatures and handed them back. They did not know about the whole incident with the computers because after he had been caught hacking he had hacked his parents' email and deleted the messages from the headmaster. They had no idea that their son was not the good little boy they were telling him he was, but Joshua knew better.

Still it may be fine. It should be fine. Each year Krampus would choose one boy from each school to miss Christmas. One miscreant who would be carted off in shame and handed back one month later, in January, just in time for the new school year. Just one boy out of several hundred, and he was surely not the worst of them.

In any case, Joshua had tried to stack his hand. Hacking was his thing, and everyone knew that Krampus was just someone dressed up from the municipal authority, and that they probably used the municipal records to pre-select the miscreant. That was why he had broken in using stolen passwords he had recovered on the school systems to alter his records in the authority too. All in all it had been a brilliant hack, and when he had done it he had felt very proud of himself.

Proud too of how he had made a few choice changes to Jez's records. It had not been hard – just increased the number of black marks that already sat against his name. Jez should be the one getting picked, after all the bullying and the thefts, forgotten homeworks, vandalism. You name it. Joshua had been surprised at just how much bad stuff he found on Jez's record, but he had still spent some time embellishing it.

There was no love lost between the two of them, and at least half of Joshua's conduct marks must have been given for fighting with Jez or other misdemeanours inspired by his search for revenge against the boy. That whole episode about bringing a pen knife to school had only been because of Jez threatening him after school.

Being caught in the classroom going through bags was only because he had been attempting to fill Jez's bag with water bombs.

But even those black marks were nothing compared to what Jez had earned, and particularly after he had added the extra thefts into his record. Jez was going down.

Still he was fairly sure he had shafted Jez, Joshua was still worried. It was not like this was some kind of game. Being picked out by Krampus was life changing, even if you were purchased back by your parents in a month. Being picked by Krampus would leave a permanent mark on your record, and at least one permanent mark on your body. All slaves were given a number and a permanent record, and the number would be etched into their body for life.

There was also, of course, the whole matter of what happened in that month – what everyone would know had happened. It was a public shame that few, if any, lived down.

Once a slave, always a slave, so the saying went.

There were screams from the crowd and excited whispers.

Krampus' cart had rounded the corner and Joshua saw it for the first time this year. It was being pulled by two pony boys dressed up specially for the occasion, with reindeer horns and special glowing and polished tack that glittered in the brighter lights of the cart itself. The pony boys pulling the cart would be lifers – those slaves would not be set free in the new year.

On the cart sat Krampus, and Joshua was struck again at just how realistically terrifying he looked. He sported horns, wisps of hair, and dangerous fangs. His mouth was open, and terrifying, whispering words that seemed to magically carry across the crowd as his red glowing eyes bore into the souls of the waiting children.

Every child flinched under that penetrating gaze, but the cart did not stop. The cage he carried behind him remained empty, but he did not take anyone from the far end of the street.

Joshua saw Jez a little way up the road from him and he crossed his fingers, watching as the pony boys laboured to pull the cart forward. Krampus was looking deeply at one boy, and Joshua followed the gaze. Ryan was shrinking back, tears running down his face. Was he going to be chosen? He was shaking his head and whimpering, and then he dropped to his knees, whispering "I am sorry, I am sorry. I will be good, I promise."

And then Krampus looked away and Ryan buried his face in his hands, his body shaking in uncontrollable sobs of relief.

Now the terrible demon like figure turned his stare on Jez, and Joshua felt his heart in his mouth. This was it. This was the moment Jez got his… no! he hardly held Jez's gaze before he let it slip away and Joshua saw Jez smile in triumph, and then… then Jez was looking right at Joshua, and he licked a finger and drew a number 1 in the air.

Joshua looked wide eyed at Jez and then whimpered, because Krampus had stopped in front of him. The boy felt like he needed to pee as Krampus slowly raised his hand to point.

No. No, this could not be!

His father was looking at him in shock, and his mother placed a protective hand on him.

No! They could not have him!

"Joshua," Krampus said, his voice a hiss of menace.

And then his mother was being pulled away, screaming and sobbing, and Joshua, stunned, was being led in a daze towards the cage.

"Christmas is cancelled for you, young man," one of the authority officials told him, and then he and another man began to remove Joshua's clothing.

They pulled off his coat, his boots, his trousers. They mercifully left him in his underwear, but Joshua knew that mercy would not last long. Then they pushed him to Krampus, and he was laid across the demon's knee. There was a swish of air and a crack and Joshua yelped as a hand landed across his backside. The first spank stung but was not too bad, but one swat followed another and another, and soon Joshua was yelping and struggling to be free as he had his first ever public spanking. Half way through the underpants came off and then the slaps hurt all the more and Joshua howled in pain as people laughed.

At last it was done and the naked boy was pushed into the cage, the door locked, and Krampus flicked the reins to the pony boys, starting his long circuit, parading the new freshly spanked slave for all to see.

Joshua looked at Jez through the bars, holding them for support as the cart swayed. He saw the mirth in the boy's eyes, and then he looked away, his cheeks flaming and tried not to notice the jeering crowd and the leering eyes. Tried not to think how many of those watching now would be at the bidding in the morning.

***

"I expect you are all feeling pretty miserable right now," said a man standing in the doorway of the small cell the chosen boys had been taken to. In all there were five of them. One from each district, with Joshua arriving last. When he had arrived two of the boys were talking quietly, squatting in one corner, and the other two were just sitting cross legged on the floor, sobbing. Joshua had cried too on the way here, so it did not take a genius to see that the man was right. Well of course they were all miserable. Christmas was cancelled for all of them. They would be collared up and worked as slaves for one calendar month, right across Christmas, and then sold back to their parents in January, just in time for school. Instead of a month of holidays, festivities, gifts, food and fun, and instead of ice skating and snowball fights and building snow dens, they would be stabled up, kept naked, paraded publicly and… well Joshua did not like to think about the other thing, but they all knew it. No released slave was a virgin.

"You are feeling miserable, but for four of you I can assure you that your slavery is only temporary. Your parents have already posted your redemption costs, and come January you will be back at school little worse for wear. Well you will have your slave numbers of course, and as released slaves there will be one or two restrictions, and there is the matter of misbehaviour – if you are disobedient your slavery will be extended, but in essence four of you can count on this being a temporary enslavement."

Four of them? Joshua looked at the others. Had one of their parents not been able to post the redemption price? They all knew that parents had to buy back the taken boys, but who wouldn't pay up? What kind of parent would not pay to have their son back?

And then Joshua saw the man looking at him. "You don't recognise me, do you, Joshua?"

Joshua squinted at the man, and was about to agree that he did not, but then he did. His mouth dropped open. Jez's dad! He had seen him at a school parents evening once. Maybe once dropping Jez off somewhere too. What was he doing here?

"Ah, that is better. Recognition at last," the man said. Joshua shivered. What was Jez's dad doing here? Did he work here? He realised that he had no idea.

"The thing is," the man went on, smiling in a way that sent a chill down Joshua's spine,"I was most surprised when I was checking the school records ahead of the choosing to see that my Jez had suddenly acquired so many black marks against his name. Oh I know he is no angel, but I keep an eye on things, and believe me when I tell you that Ryan's record was worse. Ryan was slated to be chosen from your district.

"Of course you would not know that. You would not know about all the shop lifting and other trouble that Ryan has been in. Of course you wouldn't… but when I checked the records I saw suddenly that my son had acquired so many black marks that he would not only have been picked, but he would have lost his balls too.

"Now imagine, young man, just imagine how that made me feel?" dark eyes bore into Joshua's face and he looked down, blushing.

"So of course I started to investigate, and it was not hard to get to the bottom of things. I soon found the computers used to change the records, and the compromised accounts used for that purpose. I also tapped into some surveillance footage that showed me exactly who had made the changes. And you know what? I ran this all past a judge, and he agreed with me that this was far too serious to just pass over. He signed your order. S0."

Joshua looked up, all colour draining from his face and then he backed up against the wall in shock. The other boys present gasped too. S0 was the most serious categorisation of slave, and it came with some fairly dire consequences.

"So that is that. You won't be free, ever. You are a slave for life now. Now, let's take you down to be processed."

Chapter 2
Prancer

Have yourself a Merry Little Christmas. The song is playing, music spilling from an open doorway to the farm office, and the words taunt me. There is nothing merry about this Christmas for me. Not since Krampus took me away.

One month of slavery, and why? I know why. I have been thinking about it constantly since. So yes, I stole some money off the little kids. Yes I may have bullied them just a bit, although I think it was more like we were having a laugh together. I was laughing anyway. Yes I had cheated on that test and got caught, but I still didn't think I could have been the worst boy in the district. It had been a shock to be picked, and mum had seemed just as shocked, and angry too. They had to restrain her as they had stripped me and stuck me in that cage.

One sodding month of sodding slavery. Christmas cancelled and then straight back into sodding school. It was so unfair! I was going to get a remote control dune buggy for Christmas. I know mum had got it, and now that would have been taken away too. Any presents waiting for me would be donated to bloody charity! So unfair.

So here I was, naked and collared and harnessed up at the front of a stupid sleigh, giving sleigh rides to kids around the Fantasy Christmas Park, and as the words of Merry Little Christmas drifted across the snow I felt the sharp cut of the whip falling across my naked back, telling me to start pulling. I leaned forward and heaved, as did the other slaves, and the sleigh started to move, and the worst thing of it all was that I was actually glad of the back breaking effort of pulling a sleigh full of squealing kids and a couple of adults, because standing around waiting in the snow is the worst bit of it when you are kept naked. You have no idea about just how cold that feels, and the effort of pulling the sleigh is the only thing keeping me from dying of hypothermia.

Well not dying. One of the slaves dropped from hypothermia earlier and they took him away and stuck him under a warm shower. That alone made it tempting to collapse myself, but one of the stable hands came over and explained to us just why that would be a very bad idea.

"He is gonna lose his balls now," they told us, and I had been acutely aware of the tight ring around my own balls. S4 slaves didn't get castrated automatically, but castration was a common punishment. If you did not do everything you were asked, and if you did not behave perfectly then your balls were at risk, as had been made clear to me when the automatic castrator band had been put around my balls when we arrived. So yeah, I could pretend to collapse from hypothermia, for the small price of losing my balls before I even had any hair down there.

I knew what that would mean. My voice would never break, and everyone would know forever that I had been a slave, and it would be much more likely I would be sold as a permanent slave or forced to 'volunteer' as one because I would have no prospect of getting a job ever, except as a stupid singer maybe. I would have no sex life, never get married, have no family. And worst of all it would not be me doing the bullying in future. I had bullied some eunuch boys too, and no one cared about that because, after all, they were just property.

So no, I was not going to give them the satisfaction of failing. I pulled on the sleigh until I was long past where I though exhaustion would take me, and yet somehow I still kept going, and at least the work kept me warm as we cantered along the road, kids squealing with pleasure behind.

It could be worse, I thought, and I looked to my side at the boy from district five. Joshua, he had called himself, but he would never speak that name again. The bit in my mouth chaffed and was sore, and they had pulled a couple of teeth to let to sit tight. Molars though, and they had not been my second teeth so it had hurt but it was nothing permanent. Not like Joshua's bit. That was fastened on to the special inserts that had replaced every tooth in his mouth. They looked like teeth, but they were rubbery, soft, harmless, and designed to lock to the bit. My bit came out at night, and we could whisper together softly in the stables as long as no overseer heard us. Joshua's bit would only ever come out long enough for him to suck cock. Otherwise his mouth was sealed for good.

He had a feeder tube cut through his navel. He would never eat again, and they had taken his balls, of course, as well as cutting off most of his penis. He had an angry looking brand on his right bum cheek, and that had been further enhanced with tattoo ink.

We all had butt plugs, but Joshua's looked bigger and more painful and he walked funny with it in, although maybe that was the pain of his recent castration that did that.

Yep, it could have been worse. They could have made me a permanent S0 slave and not an S4. It could have been worse but it could have been a whole lot better.

Some stuff was still there to play for though. One month of slavery would end on January 4th. On January 5th I would be released, allowed to dress in my school uniform and taken straight to school. School did not sound so bad compared to pulling sleighs and stuff for a month, and I was actually looking forward to it, although I knew full well the kind of special reception I would get from my friends – and even more from the people I had bullied – when I got back there.

I was determined, though, that I would walk back into school with my balls.

Well obviously! I mean no one was going to wish those away, were they? I would do everything I could to keep my balls, because that would be kind of a victory in itself. I would be the boy who survived his S4 slavery without losing his manhood.

That was my first and most important wish, but I had three wishes in all when I had first been taken. I also wanted to walk back into school without any brands or marks. That was my second wish. You see, S4 slaves can also be branded or tattooed by their owners. We may only be theirs for a month but in that time we are their property, and so if they choose to mark us then we will have to wear those marks for life.

Well maybe not a tattoo. Tattoos can be removed, although the laser surgery is expensive and I am not sure how perfect it is. All the same, if I were tattooed I could probably get the mark removed – although no time soon. Mum was not rich and I knew she would not pay for the surgery, so I would be stuck with it for a very long time. A brand would be worse though, I thought, looking at the mark cut deeply into Joshua's butt. We had all heard his screaming when he had received that, but it was not just the pain – a brand was going to be with you for life. You could mess it up so it was not clear any more but it would always be there, a scar to tell anyone that you had been a slave.

And that was the thing: any slavery left a record, yes, but only employers and school administrators and police and stuff like that could look at the records, so most people didn't have to know that I had been a slave, but if I had a permanent mark then anyone who could see the mark would know at once I had been a slave, and when this was over I wanted to forget it and I wanted everyone else to forget it. So no brands or tats. Please, God, no brands or tats.

My third wish had already not come true though. So much for fairy godmothers and stuff. If I had a fairy god mother and I saw her now, I would break her wand for getting me into this!

My third wish was to keep my virginity, see. But after they had put the ring around my balls and plugged my butt they had led me and the others, except Joshua, whose processing took much longer, to the stables where we would spend the month, and the first thing that had happened had been that one of the stable hands had dropped his pants and waved his cock in my face, and another hand had pulled me to my knees and held my head, and then the cock had been forced in my mouth.

"If I feel teeth, I take your balls off," he had growled, and I already explained how keeping my balls was important to me, so I had been careful and had learned to suck cock, and even though I thought I was going to suffocate, I had done exactly what he asked until his load had pumped into my mouth and right down my throat, and then he had released me and I had thrown up.

That had not been the end of it though. Oh no. Right after that another man had thrown me across a table and then as two of the stable hands held me down, I felt like my new butt plug being torn right back out again and then it was like my butt was being ripped open as one of the men forced his way into my bum.

"Now it is like this," the man had grunted as he thrust into me, making my body rock against the table. "We like to castrate a slave on his first butt fucking. When I cum, someone is gonna lose their balls. " He had let that sink in for a minute, before he went on.

"If you like, we can take Joshua's balls instead. Only we have to take his balls anyway, so if you say yes, we have to take his penis too. So what's it to be, slave boy? Do we take your balls or Joshua's penis?"

I look again at Joshua's penis, nothing but a tiny stump now. Do I regret my choice? Well come on – what would you have chosen? They were going to cut off my balls for God's sake!

Joshua catches my eye just for a second and then he looks away. I turn red, but hopefully everyone will think it is from the exertion of pulling this bloody sleigh.

Nope, there were no illusions I will be a virgin still when I was set free. I tried telling myself that no one would have to know, but that was before some teens I knew from school had paid to have me two days later, right out in the open, in front of everyone. Joshua had watched and I think I saw satisfaction in his eyes, although it is kind of hard to tell. They had been especially rough with me and I had howled in pain and was allowed half an hour in the semi warmth of stable afterwards to recover.

So yes, they would know all about that in school. There could be no denying that.

Still there were two wishes remaining.

At last the sleigh rides were done and we were untethered and led one by one to the stables.

"You know what day it is today, Prancer?"

I shook my head. My name is not Prancer, it is Tristan, but I had been known as Prancer for the last two and a half weeks, so I knew the stable hand was talking to me.

"It's Christmas Eve, and it's time for your present."

I looked up hopefully at that, straight into the stable hand's eyes. What I saw there looked like amusement though. He smiled but the smile did not make me feel warm and safe.

Too right because a few moments later two stable hands had seized me and pushed me again over the low table where I had first been butt fucked. Not again, I thought to myself, although I was getting quite used to this now. My bum had had more cocks in it now than I could count on my hands and toes combined.

No new cock went into me though. Instead the hand who had spoken to me had picked something up, and at once I saw the red/orange glowing end of the branding iron. I struggled and someone swore, but the stable hand just laughed as he pressed the blazing end of the iron into my butt cheek.

"Happy Christmas, Prancer," he laughed as I screamed. Boy did I scream, because you just have no idea how bad it feels to have iron burning into your flesh, and you can hear the skin crackling and you smell it and hear it hiss away. Mostly, though there is just this terrible unbearable pain that tells you that you have to get away, but you can't because you are being held firmly, as the mark of first ownership is indelibly and permanently marked into our flesh.

And all I could think as they took me away and chained me up on my stomach, arms and legs outstretched so that I could not play with my mark and mess it up, was that I only have one wish remaining. Please, please please can I have my one wish.

Chapter 3
Back to School

You have no idea how good it feels to put on clothes again after a month without them. Well maybe you do, but only if you have been taken by Krampus too. If not, then you can only imagine. I always hated my school uniform, but when I put it on this morning it felt like my most favourite thing ever, because it was actually warm, and soft, and it hid my nakedness and that damned brand that was still tender to the touch even though it was almost two weeks since they gave it to me.

It was good not to have a bit in my mouth too, but it is weird how after a month of being harnessed up, it felt like I was missing something important.

The best news, however, was that there was something very important I was not missing. I had done it! I had not screwed up, and not collapsed under the work they gave me all month, and so I had kept my balls. Me and two other boys would go back to our schools today with our manhood intact. My last wish had come true. Maybe there really was a Santa Claus or a Christmas Fairy or something.

I touched myself through my uniform trousers and immediately received a light cuff to the head.

"We will have none of that! You have a day of school to get through before you get free time to have a wank," said the bus driver who was waiting to take me and the other boys to school.

I scowled at the man. It was true of course. I did not get to go home until after a full day at school, but from the moment I put my clothes back on I was technically free again. Not an S4 slave now, although I would always be an ex slave. The damned brand on my bum would remind me and everyone else of that, even if it was not permanently written into my records. Still a freed slave was free, and if I wanted a wank, why couldn't I have one?

On the other hand I did not want to admit to anyone that was what I really wanted. I wanted to pretend that I didn't do such things and didn't care that I had not been allowed to play with myself for a whole month. Just like I wanted to pretend I hadn't been fucked every day of my captivity. And here is the thing: after a month of slavery you start not to care so much, so I scowled and very deliberately started playing with myself again.

"You are a little piece of work!" the man said, shaking his head,"You would think after a month in the stables you would have learned some respect for your betters."

I didn't say anything, but I didn't keep playing with myself until I came either. I wanted to do it, for sure, but I didn't want to do it here and in front of this old fart, so I just followed him onto the bus and sat there quietly as he drove out of the stables and towards the school.

There were four of us on the bus. Four boys from the five districts. Joshua, of course, was never going to be set free. I looked at Ben, who sat miserably at the front. He was the one who had lost his balls, and so they were taking him to hospital for a checkup. Life was definitely not going to be the same for him. I wondered if he would ever have a wank again. Would he ever want one even?

It had not been so long ago that I had discovered the amazing pleasure that my cock could give me, but I don't think I could ever forget how good it feels. I was so happy that it was Ben who had collapsed, given up, lost his balls and not me.

When we reached my school I got up and moved to the front of the bus. The driver winked at me and said to my departing back, "I'll wager I'll be seeing you again, laddie."

***

I finished my lunch, pushed the tray into one of the racks and hurried out of the canteen. People were still watching me, still pointing and laughing, but not so much now as when I had first arrived at school. It had been a long morning of quiet taunts and jibes and people going quiet as I approached. It had been made longer by my missing first break so as to receive a lecture from the headmaster. He had made me stand in his study, hands behind my back as he delivered one of his talks about how I had let myself down and let the school down. Yeah, yeah, I had heard it all before. All the usual stuff about a clean slate and starting afresh in a new year, but I just let it wash over me.

I knew he had to say all this stuff, but he could not possibly mean it. I mean, think about it: if one boy is selected from each school district each year, and ours is the only middle school in the district, then it stands to reason that the chances are at least 50/50 that someone from the school will get selected. Krampus can take older boys from the seniors sometimes, but he never takes elementary school kids. Usually it's a middle school boy, and it certainly was last year and the year before, so how did I really let the school down?

It was the same with the clean state stuff he kept talking about. There were no clean slates. I had been a slave now, and the mark of first ownership was still tender on my bum, so that was not something you could forget about. It was a permanent part of my record. And then what about the other stuff? I mean did he expect to just pretend I was still a virgin? One month of slavery was not just going to be erased with a chalk duster or a click of delete key. I was not nearly as sexually naive as I had been a month ago.

So I listened, nodded when I was expected to, said all my "yes sirs" and "no sirs" and then hurried out when the headmaster dismissed me with a sigh, but not before break was over and it was straight into double maths, which I always hated, but even more now because I wasn't allowed to sit at the back with Kyal, but was made to sit in the desk right in front of the teacher's table. A position that the headmaster had explained to me would be where I would sit for the rest of the year.

Not that it mattered so much about sitting next to Kyal either, because it had been obvious on the way to the canteen that he was being off with me. He walked off with a bunch of the other boys from class, and when I asked him what he was doing over lunch he had responded coolly that he was playing football, but the team was already full.

The team was full? That was absurd for a lunch time kick around. What he was saying was "don't hang around with me," and I knew why. I had kind of a celebrity status – but not in a good way. Some of the kids from the year below had asked if I really had been branded and could they see it. I had told them to fuck off and they had run away laughing. One of the older boys had slapped my shoulder and told me his brother said my butt had been nice and tight in December but by the new year it was like fucking a sponge. I knew his brother was one of the stablehands, so I had aimed a kick at him, but again he had run away laughing.

And that was how the reaction to my return had been. There were a couple of girls who came up to me and asked if it was really true, what people were saying had happened, and how terrible that was. I might have been touched by their concern, but I was too busy fuming about the fact that everyone was talking about me and my butt, and so I told them to fuck off too, after which they had seemed a lot less sympathetic.

If you got punished in school then you gained some friends, because it all has a certain feel about it, like you are some kind of super villain and hard and everything. Not me though. Not for ex slaves, because that was the thing: I was not some hard guy now. Not in their eyes. I was an ex slave and worse. More people had been in my bum in the last month than had been in the public library, and that too made me very unappealing to the girls, and very much less than a tough guy for the boys. Not a super villain – I was just a bum boy and a cock sucker, two words I was hearing over and over.

So all in all I was feeling pretty steamed up as I left the canteen, which explains why, when I saw George Jones all alone and going into the boys toilets for a pee, I followed him in.

Too late he looked around, and his face was a picture when he saw me. That felt good again. I could see him turn white and start to tremble.

"Hey up, George. How was Christmas?" I asked him, making my voice soft and friendly, even though I knew the smile on my face would be read by him as menacing, which is what I intended.

"It was okay, I guess," George replied, looking nervously past me at the door. Too bad for him, I had already seen no one was coming this way, so I lost no time. I grabbed him by the throat and pushed him up against the urinal, his school uniform pressed against the porcelain that boys peed into.

"Hand it over," I hissed. "You know the drill."

He did know the drill, and he reached into his pockets and pulled out a neatly folded note. I took it and pocketed it. George would not be buying lunch once again today, but I didn't care. George was one of my favourite clients. His parents always gave him way too much money, and he was small even for his 10 years, and pretty timid. Pretty useless, I thought. I was doing him a favour, teaching him how the world works, and as he was spoiled rotten and had way too much money, I was just addressing an imbalance, and doing my bit to make the world more equal.

One more thing though, before I left him. You see George was one of the boys who had snitched on me. He had complained about the bullying and that had gone on my record, so I leaned very close to him.

"Are you going to tell on me again, George? Are you?

George was visibly shaking, and he stammered out a "no" as his eyes filled with tears.

"You know what you are?" George shook his head again. "A cock sucker. That is what."

His eyes went wide, and wider still when I backed him into a toilet cubicle, just in case anyone did come in. Then I unzipped my fly. Enough people had done this to me the last month that I had no qualms about grabbing his head, forcing him to his knees and forcing my penis into his mouth. And now at last I could find the release denied to me for a whole month. I thrust into his mouth, felt his teeth, although he had the sense not to bite, and thrust again. It did not take long. I had all this pent up feeling, and almost at once it spilled out into his mouth.

I had not been orgasming long, and truth to tell, this was the first time I ever did it with anyone else. I guess if I had thought about that I would not have chosen this place, stinking of pee, shooting my first real jiz ever into the mouth of a sobbing trembling and unwilling boy. All my previous playing with myself had involved cumming dry, but now I felt this amazing and terrible sensation as I shot actual jiz into George's throat, and then with a gasp of pleasure, I withdrew, wiped my cock on the boy's shirt, zipped myself up and walked out, leaving the cocksucker sobbing in the toilets. The whole thing had only taken minutes, but it felt good. It felt really good.

***

It was PE after lunch, but I thought I had a cast iron excuse to get out of the lesson today.

"Sorry, sir, I was brought here straight from the stables so I don't have my kit."

Forgotten kit could get you a conduct mark or a detention, but you still got to skip the lesson, and today they could hardly claim that my failure to bring my kit was my own fault. As the other boys started to change into their uniform white shorts, Mr Barclay, the head of physical education, looked at me, smiled and just shook his head.

"Oh no, Tristan, you don't get out of it that easily. You can do it in your underpants."

"But Sir!" I replied, and I was about to point out to him that it was not my fault that my kit was at home, that I had not been home since December 5th. I was about to protest but Barclay held up a hand right in my face.

"No arguments. Think yourself lucky that I am not making you do it naked. It is not like you don't know how that feels."

A snicker travelled around the room and boys were whispering. I turned and glared at them. Kyal was one of them, a huge smirk on his face, but there was nothing for it. I ripped off my blazer and dumped it angrily on a bench and then pulled off my tie, my shirt. I kicked off my shoes and socks and then I glared directly at Kyal as I dropped my shorts, revealing the clean pair of undies that had been brought for me. Not my choice of undies. Not boxers or anything sensible like that but a stupid pair of briefs. They could have been worse maybe, but they could have been a whole lot better.

And then we walked up to the gym for a joint lesson with the girls, which caused a lot more sniggering when they saw me.

We did fitness training "to work off the Christmas flab" but one thing I was at least a little proud of was that I was somewhat better toned than I had been before Christmas. Too little to eat and lots of hard work had made me fitter, and as I did sit ups and press ups, squat thrusts and all the rest, I realised I was now one of the best in the class. By the end of the class I think everyone had noticed, and then Sara even spoke to me.

"You are really good at this," she said, and I was so gobsmacked that Sara had actually said something nice to me, for like the first time ever, that I completely forgot to swear at her, and something inside me kind of felt churned up and I was suddenly aware that I had a little stiffy pointing out of my undies.

"Hey, look, Prancer has a girlfriend," Reuben sniggered and so I trod on his toe, which would have hurt him a lot more if I had been wearing shoes, but it still felt good. I glared at him and he had the good sense to drop his eyes.

After the lesson was done we headed back to the changing room and the showers.

The showers. I had been trying not to think about those. I hung back as other boys quickly stripped and entered the hot water. I thought maybe I could sneak in after they were all done, but Barclay was having none of that.

"How long does it take to remove your underpants?" he asked. "If you are not in that shower when I count to three, you will be in detention."

It was almost worth the detention, but I doubted I would get away with not having the shower even then, so I dropped my underpants and stepped into the shower. Immediately I heard the ripple of sound as everyone got their first look at my brand.

"He really did get branded," and "God I bet that hurt," and "what a little animal," and "wish I could have seen him scream," and "my brother saw it all, squealed like a pig, he said," and everyone was laughing and my face was blazing and I washed myself quickly knowing that every boy was now standing where they could get a good look at my goddamned brand.

I don't cry. Crying is for babies, but I stayed under the shower a little longer than I needed to get the soap out of my eyes, coz you know how that stings and makes them water.

***

School was over at last and I was walking home through the recreation ground when some older boys came over. I knew who three of them were. These were brothers of people I knew, seniors from the upper school. Two of them had fucked me when I was working over Christmas. There was another one in a uniform from another school district.

"So they actually let you out?"

I ignored them, but they matched pace with me, walking either side. One of them put an arm around me but I shrugged it off.

"Did they cut your balls off?" I ignored them.

"Because lots of boys get their balls cut off. I heard the boy in district 3 got his cut off."

I ignored them, but I also thought they must be really stupid. If you got your balls cut off they didn't just send you straight back to school. Eunuchs may be free but they didn't just go back to their old lives, just like that. They had to have medicals and stuff and then half the time they ended up volunteering for slavery coz everyone knows that a free eunuch is just a slave in waiting, so better to choose slavery on your own terms.

I was here, back at school, with an offer of a clean slate, whatever that meant.

Of course I still had my balls.

"Your butt was really tight, you know. Felt so good."

I ignored them. I tried at least. My pace maybe faltered just a bit but I was not going to say anything. Not going to give them the satisfaction.

"You don't know me, do you?" one of the boys asked. My eyes flicked to him before I had time to catch myself. I didn't know him, although something about him seemed familiar. He was the one in the uniform from another district.

"Thing is, cocksucker," he went on. "The thing is, I heard a story when I went visiting the stables. You know why I went?"

I said nothing. Just ignore him.

"I went to see my brother. Well, my stupid ex brother that is. They made him a slave too, and they are not even gonna let him go. An S0 slave if you can believe it!"

Joshua, I thought, and a guilty feeling started to creep through me.

"So you know what I heard when I was there? That the reason they cut his dick right off was because some other filthy little S4 slave wanted to hang onto his own balls. " I tried to stay calm, to look oblivious but there was a tight feeling inside me as he went on. "So I asked them to let me fuck the little sod who chose that for my stupid ex brother, and you know which slave they took me to?"

I knew because now I remembered him fucking me. I remembered he had been quiet the whole time, and forceful and it had hurt a lot, and at the end he had kicked me and walked off. I had note recognised him right away because there had been so many boys, and it had been pretty dark, but I was sure it was him now.

"So here is how it is going to work,"Joshua's brother said, moving in front of me so that I had to stop. "I reckon that from now on you should be my very own cocksucker. I am going to share you with all my friends, because we know you like it, and you sure as hell deserve it."

"Fuck off!" I said and tried to push past, but my heart was hammering in my chest. "Leave me alone."

"Like hell," said the boy and he grabbed me, just like I had grabbed George earlier and pushed me backwards into some bushes. I struggled, but there were four of them in all, all older than me. It was hopeless and they soon had me on the floor.

Then they were pulling my trousers down, and: "Fuck me, they did leave his balls on," and, "well good because I am going to take them off myself with some garden sheers", and "yeah but take a look at this brand!" and "get him on his knees, I gotta take a piss."

And then I was on my knees, my shirt being pulled off too until I was butt naked again, and then there was a big adolescent smelly cock filling my mouth, and a bush of pubic hair in front of me, and suddenly my mouth filled with the brackish taste of hot pee.

That was when I saw red, and I bit down hard. I bit harder than I ever bit anything before and as the boy screamed in terror, agony and rage, I threw myself forward, overbalancing him. I tasted blood and flesh, and spat out blood and flesh as I landed on him, and pummeled hard with my fists, and then I grabbed his hair and with all the unleashed ferocity that had built up over the last month, I took hold of his ears, my thumbs driving into his eye sockets and I smashed his head backwards.

There was a satisfying crack, and blood pooled, and the other boys were pulling me off him as I kicked and screamed in rage at his body that had just gone all still and heavy, and all I heard was.

"Oh God."

I struggled, but one boy held me from behind, none of them wanting to get in front of me as I kicked and screamed.

"Call an ambulance. " "Is he breathing?"

***

So I never did get to go home after Krampus took me. I enjoyed one full school day as a free boy before I was locked back up in a police cell. One lousy day of double maths, science, PE and Geography and that was it.

I slept in the police cell and was up before the juvenile judge first thing in the morning. Mum was there, looking grim, her face the colour of dirty chalk. She looked at me and I saw sadness, but something else. Resignation perhaps, and maybe even a hint of fear. I looked away.

"This was a very serious assault, young man," the judge was saying to me,"they say there could be substantial nerve damage."

Good.

"If he hadn't stuck his dick in my mouth…"

"Quite, quite!" the judge said, quickly interrupting me. "I will say that this was most certainly an assault for which there was ample provocation, and I was very much tempted to make an order for an additional month of S4 slavery."

Was? He did just say was. I looked at the judge and then back at my mum. I could tell I wasn't going to just walk free from this, but I had very much hoped, as I brooded in my cell, that another month of slavery would be all I would get. Crap, if I was not a freed slave I would probably have walked free and it was the dickhead who assaulted me who would be going to the stables. That was the way it should be, but I was a freed slave, so I did not really expect that.

But the judge said he was going to do that. Why did he say "was"?

"Tristan, your assault was a savage one. This boy who assaulted you is still in hospital with concussion. There are real risks of complications, and there is also the possibility he may have lost the sight in one eye. The level of aggression you have shown goes far beyond what the leniency of this court may allow.

"However it was not these facts that eventually convinced me of your fate. No, there was more. No sooner had you been locked up, another allegation was made, and this time of an unprovoked sexual assault by yourself on a boy younger than yourself. DNA recovered from his shirt has been analysed and the results provided to me in the last hour, corroborating the boy's story. CCTV analysis from your school also confirms that you followed this boy into the toilets where he claims the assault took place.

"Did you, or did you not assault George Jones?"

I was sunk. I looked back at my mother and I could see all her rage bubbling under her silent facade. I knew what she would be thinking, and I could see how she was looking at me. Like she really didn't know me. Right now I was not sure I knew myself.

I shrugged.

"Before I ask again, let me explain something. If you plead guilty to this assault then your mother and counsel have proposed a plea bargain. We will accept you as a permanent S1 slave for a guilty plea, but if you wish to deny the charge and are then found guilty of the assault then the sentence will be S0.

"You may not think he difference is great, but let me assure you that it is. If you are an S0 slave you will never speak or eat again. You will have a bit permanently mounted in your mouth and will be fed through your stomach, and if you should step out of line just once, then the compulsory punishment will be death by hanging. Do you understand me?"

I noticed he did not mention castration. Had he forgotten that castration was compulsory for S0 slaves? I had a sick feeling inside that he had not. I nodded to him because he was waiting for me.

"Then I ask you again, did you sexually assault George Jones in the toilets of your school yesterday?"

I nodded again, and hung my head as I mumbled, "yes sir."

The judge nodded, satisfied that this was a guilty plea. I blinked away tears because I could guess what was coming.

"It seems to me that you are a boy who has too much testosterone for his own good. More than your limited abilities allow you to control. You are violent and a sexual criminal, and within hours of your release from slavery, when you were given a second chance by our benevolent state, you squandered that chance. I have no choice but to sentence you to a life time of penal servitude without hope of parole, as an S1 slave, with the additional sentence of compulsory castration."

I felt blood drain from my face, and almost collapsed, but the judge was not finished.

"I also order that your castration will take place when your victim leaves the hospital. Until that time you will be kept in the stables, but as soon as he is fit, young Aaron Christie will be given the opportunity, should he wish to, to castrate you personally."

I looked through tear misted eyes at my mum. She had sat down and seemed to shrivel like a deflated balloon as she buried her head in her hands and wept. From this moment I was not, in any case, her son. I was the property of the state.

"You only have yourself to blame," the Judge was saying, but I didn't agree. It was Joshua's fault. All bloody Joshua's fault. Him and his stupid brother. Joshua,Aaron and George too. I would get them back. I would get them all back for this.

Chapter 4
Revenge

I rubbed my bum as the stable hands left, having just delivered their welcome back present. None of them seemed very surprised to see me, but the bus driver had already explained that when he had driven me to the stables from the court.

"I said I would be seeing you again, didn't I? I can always tell you know. The bad ones. The ones who can't help themselves. No self control, that is what it is. Not enough discipline in schools these days," and on and on he went, and all the time I was glowering in the bus seat, and I couldn't even have a wank to show him what I thought of him and his opinions, because the first thing they did when they took me out of the court was to take all my clothes away again and then fasten a shiny silver chastity cage around my cock.

"That will not come off again until your castration," they had explained. "You have already had your last orgasm, so I hope you enjoyed it."

I had enjoyed it, I thought. It had felt pretty amazing to cum in George's mouth, spitting real juice for the first time, and I had particularly liked the disgusted noises George had made. All the same, if I had known that was my one and only time, I think I would have preferred to have done it with Sara.

I had been led back into the stables and fastened back into my stall as if I had just been out working all day. And then the stable hands had come and taken it in turns to welcome me back in their own special way.

My butt was sore and I was pretty miserable, but still as soon as the hands were gone and the stable door was fastened, I took my chance. We were all fastened up, but the fastenings were actually quite easy to slip. No one was too bothered about run away slaves, because where would a slave run to? The stables were miles from anywhere and built onto a river island. You had to cross the river, either by the road bridge or by swimming to get off the island, and swimming the river in winter was a sure way to die of hypothermia.

Even if a slave did escape they would soon be returned. There was no safe place in the five districts for slaves, and nowhere else in the country either. Rumour had it that some countries abroad would harbour escaped slaves, but you couldn't exactly get on a plane when you were kept naked and with a slave brand on your bum.

So the stable hands did not worry too much about slaves slipping their harnesses, and I knew this already. Now I used that fact to steal my way across the stable to another stall. I slipped my way inside and saw Joshua lying on the floor, curled in a ball, sleeping.

I was tempted to kick him, but I didn't. There was something else I wanted, so I lay down beside him, wrapped my arms around him and whispered in his ear.

"Joshua."

His eyes flicked open and he looked around startled, but I spoke softly, soothing. "Joshua, I have a message for you. It's from your brother. From Aaron."

Now Joshua was wide awake and looked at me curiously. Of course he could not speak. As an S0 slave, they had bolted his bit to the implants they had put in his mouth after they pulled his teeth out. The bit was covered in drool, but no food. I had seen them feeding Joshua by injecting a grey goo directly into his navel where a feeding tube was hidden. I shivered, thinking that S0 was indeed a whole lot worse than S1.

Even though he could not speak, I could sense Joshua's curiosity. I was from a different district and before Krampusnacht we had never met. If I knew his brother's name, Joshua knew that I must have met him. I relied on his making that deduction as I spoke.

"We are getting out of here, Joshua. Your brother sent me back to get you. I only got myself sent back here so I could get you out… you know… to say sorry for my choice before."

We both looked at his crotch. I know, because they made me watch, that they told Joshua it was my choice that he lose his penis. I had chosen my balls over his cock, for all the good that was going to do me now. No, I wasn't going to think about that. Not now.

Joshua sighed and closed his eyes. A small pang of guilt bit me but I ignored the pain of it and looked squarely in Joshua's eyes.

"We are going to escape. You and me. Tonight. We have to wait until everyone has gone from the stable office for the day and then we get out of the stables and make for the lookout we took people to on the sleigh rides. Your brother is going to be there at midnight with a boat, and then we float downstream, right past District 1 and to the port. Aaron got us both a place on a container ship going to the New Territories. You can be free there."

As I spoke I could feel Joshua growing excited, although his eyes were wide. Was that fear? I could not really tell in the dark and with his mouth in a bit. I decided to pretend that it was.

"Aaron said don't be afraid. He said he would talk more on the boat and anything is better than being an S0 slave for life."

I thought about adding "Aaron says, I Love you," but then thought better of that. My run in with Aaron did not convince me he was the type to say such things.

I lay with Joshua, speaking softly, and repeating over and over that everything was going to be alright and soon we would both be free in a land with no slavery. I told him my dad was there and I was going to find him too because I could not live in the five districts anymore as a freed slave. I made up stuff about how we agreed to work together – that Aaron was going to get me out if I came back for Joshua, and how I deliberately got myself sent back for that reason. If Joshua had any doubts he could not voice them, but as time wore on he relaxed into me and we ended up cuddling together. That worked for me as it kept me warm, but I think Joshua really liked the feel of it.

I judged it must be about midnight. I could not be certain as there was no clock in the stable yard or anywhere else that we could look at, but as long as I acted like I knew the time was right then it would be fine.

I unfastened Joshua and then we went to the stable door. That was locked, of course, but I had my plan all in place. There was a window, and I pointed to it and asked Joshua to give me a boost. I scrabbled to the window, and banged the glass pane. It did not budge, so I banked it harder. Still nothing. I had hoped it would knock out easily, as it looked pretty old, but it didn't break so at last I hit it as hard as I could and my fist went through it, a shard of glass catching me and gashing my arm.

I swore, but now at least I was able to remove all the remaining glass and climb through, but not before hoisting Joshua up.

He pointed to my bleeding arm.

"It's ok," I said, although it was not OK. This had screwed up my plan badly, but there was no going back now. "Come on, this way."

And so we ran through the night along a trail we had walked countless times over the last month. We ran to the lookout point at the northern tip of the river island, and before we got there, Joshua grabbed me and gave me a hug, his eyes showing his excitement at being free.

We ran through the moonlit night to the point with the stone look out, and all the way I knew I was leaving a trail of blood, but that would not be obvious in the white snow and slushy ice until morning, and by then it would be too late.

Because here we were, at the look out and Joshua was scanning the river eagerly, and his brow was furrowing because there was no boat to be seen.

That was when I pushed him. I ran hard, my shoulder colliding with his back and he made some kind of noise behind his bit as he fell forwards. He slid down the steep bank from the lookout, and nearly, oh so nearly went into the water, but somehow he managed to clutch at a loose root and arrest his momentum. I slid down after him to try to knock him all the way in, but the element of surprise was gone, and Joshua kicked out at me.

I launched myself onto him and we started to grapple and fight on the ground. I grabbed him by the bit and tried to knock his head against the ground. He kneed me in the balls and I gasped and then he was on top of me, and holding me down and looking in my eyes, his brow furrowed into a question. Even without words I knew what he was asking. Why?

"Because when your stinking fat brother cuts off my balls I want to look him in the eye and tell him… I want him to know… that I killed you. I killed you because it is all your fault. Everything is your fault. You and your fucking brother."

And still he looked confused but I did not care because now I had a hand free and I smashed it into his gut. Joshua gasped, doubled over and I scrabbled free. I grabbed his hair, tried to yank back his head, but my hand was slick from my own blood and he wriggled free. Then he was on me again and we were scrabbling in the mud and snow again, and I got my fingers to his eyes and was going to squeeze when there was a crunch and I fell side ways and as I lost consciousness I vaguely saw Joshua squatting over me, holding a bloodied rock.

***

I did not know anything more that night, nor the next day. I was concussed, delirious, but when I did eventually come to my senses 48 hours later, one of the stable hands in the infirmary was only too happy to fill me in on what I had missed.

Joshua had tried to sneak back to the stables, and he had damned nearly made it. If he had, then I would have been classed the escapee and he would have escaped punishment, but the window had been too high for him to climb into. He had pulled a barrel towards it to climb onto, which again was a good idea, but it made just enough noise that the night watch had investigated and found him, halfway through the window and covered in blood. Not his blood, as it turned out, but mine.

After that they had checked the stables and found me gone too, so then they organised a search, and with lights they soon picked up my trail, and found me unconscious by the lookout, precariously close to the water.

Thinking about it, I don't know why Joshua didn't push me in. I had told him I was going to kill him, but he didn't do that to me. I did not dwell on that.

They did not much care about what exactly had happened. As far as they were concerned we were two escapees who had fallen out with each other and fought, and that was the end of it. The end but for the consequences of course, because we were property so we had both stolen property and we had both damaged property, and those were crimes, so there had been another hearing. It did not matter that neither of us attended the tribunal because slaves are not allowed in court in any case.

And the judgement?

Well for me the judge decided that my S1 plea bargain was now void and I would be registered as an S0 slave. The stable hand had a big smile as he told me that and I just had a terrible feeling of dread deep inside.

How stupid could I have been? How did I think I would get away with it?

But I had thought I would, because the plan was not that bad. Get Joshua to escape, push him in the water and then sneak back to my stall where I would act like I had slept through the whole thing. They would think he had committed suicide and probably punish a stable hand – one of the hands who had fucked me, so it was win-win. Nice plan, but I guess things don't ever work out like you think they will.

I remembered Joshua's bit and felt my teeth with my tongue. Oh God, I did not want to be an S0 slave. I did not want to lose my teeth.

"And another thing," the stable hand added, "the judge said you were too disruptive to stay in these stables – that the other slaves would not work well with you now – so he had you sold. You are going to belong to some rich kid."

I frowned but I did not know if that was a good thing or a bad thing. Probably depended on the kid I suppose.

So that was me, but the stable hand was even more delighted to tell me about Joshua.

"Come over here, and you can see him for yourself."

I got unsteadily to my feet and staggered to the window of the stable infirmary, and looked out onto the yard, and there he was, swinging lifeless in the wind.

"They hanged him this morning. You should have seen it. It was great!"

Epilogue: Joshua

I am Joshua. Joshua. Hold onto that I tell myself. Don't forget who I am. I am Joshua.

I say it over and over but it is not helping because the fear is a big smothering thing again, and I feel like I can't breathe. I am losing myself in it. All I can feel is the terrible fear that threatens to paralyse me. I have never felt this scared. Never. It is like I am being sucked down into an ocean of terror.

Joshua, I am Joshua.

And they are leading me out of the stables and I can see the noose on the gallows and I want to turn and run or hide under the covers of my bed.

My bed. Joshua's bed. That warm safe place. When was I last there? When was I last warm? Forever ago. Why did I ever leave it? Why? Why?

Every day and over and over I wonder why I did it. Why did I have to mess with the records.

Why did I try to shaft Jez. Why did they have to do this to me? Why, why why?

Always cold. Always exhausted, every day I thought that it would not be so bad if I just died. At least I would not be cold anymore. At least I would not be hungry. But now I can see the gallows and I know I am going to die, and I realise that I don't want to die. I really really don't want to die. I want to live. Oh God I want to live.

Tristan told me I could be free and like an idiot I believed him. Why did I have to believe him? But I did. I did and I did and for a little while everything felt like it could be okay again. For a little while I could imagine being warm and free and laughing and sleeping and eating. It was not such a bad thing to want was it? I know my balls are gone, and my penis too. They are never coming back, but it was not so much just to dream of being happy.

And so I broke the rules and I broke the law. I escaped, and they caught me, and I already knew the law but I was so stupid because I thought I did not care. I thought even if I died I did not acre, but I do care. I do.

They caught me, but not before I cracked Tristan's skull. I wish I had pushed him in the water, like he did to me.

No I don't. Because that would be too quick. Tristan would be dead already, but he escaped too so they will kill him or they will do to him what they did to me which is almost the same thing.

Almost.

Almost because I don't want to die, but here they are, leading me up the steps, and the other slaves are looking scared and jittery, and… crap… Jez's dad is here and he has brought Jez to watch. Jez who I hated enough to try to get him sent here.

I look at Jez and he looks at me and he licks his finger and draws another 1 like he did last time I saw him. He has won, and he knows it. I tried to do this to him and instead he – well his dad – did it to me.

Jez is grinning and chattering to his dad, and the other stable hands are talking together and getting money out. They are betting on something. On what? I don't know and I don't care. I don't care. I don't, I don't.

Joshua, I am Joshua. One foot in front of another. Just keep walking. Oh God, I am so scared. Each step takes me closer to the place I don't want to go.

And now I am standing on the trap door. I look down at it and see the square of wood, and wonder stupidly what the hinges look like.

I will never know. I will never see underneath this spot again. I will never see summer again. I will never see TV or my bed or school or anything else because this is the last spot I will ever stand. I look around, wildly, and try to run but they grab me, hold me still, place a noose around my neck.

"Any last words Joshua? Tough, coz the bit is not coming off," laughs the man with the noose. I want to shout at him. I want to scream but I cannot. I look sideways at him and then he says "clear," and the man holding me makes sure he is not stood on the trap door, lets me go.

My hands are tied behind my back so I cannot get the noose off, or else I would. I would pull it off and run away. Run away from this place, but I can't. I can't and I am going to die and I can't believe it and I don't want it. I don't I don't I don't.

Joshua. I am Joshua. Kerunch!

The hangman pulls a lever and I feel the trap door fall away and I am falling with it. My stomach lurches, but almost at once the noose snaps taught and stops me falling. I feel a terrible pain in my neck, but it does not break. Instead I swing and I can't breathe. I try but I can't. I can't breathe. I can't, I can't.

I want to claw at my neck, but my hands are tied. I writhe and twist, because it hurts. I never realised how much it would hurt. I try to find something to stand on, writhing around but my body swings free. If I reach the wood platform I just bounce off it again and so I swing and twist and I hear little gasping noises and I know its me because I can't breathe and I can't breathe and I CAN'T BREATHE!

There is nothing I can do but twist and spin and I can't breathe. I can't I can't.

And Jez is looking and laughing and he has won, and Tristan has won and Jez's dad has won and me? I lost… I can seek blackness flecking my vision, and I am peeing, but I can't stop myself, and Jez is laughing at that too.

I struggle and gasp and the pain is terrible and I just want it to stop, and still I can't breathe.

I am desperate … I need to breathe… I hear a roaring in my ears, like the sea is going to engulf me. The sea of terror has me and I am desperate. Please no. Please. . . I gasp. . . I gasp. . .

I am Joshua… I am…

I…

Chapter 5
Punishment

I remained in the stable infirmary several days. I had cracked my skull, they told me, and the gash in my arm also needed stitching. They let me rest and heal, not because they had compassion for me, but because they said I needed to be delivered to my new owner in good condition.

My new owner. That had me wondering again. Well nothing could be worse than the stables, could it?

But first there was the minor detail of my processing, and after a week the vet declared me fit enough to be processed, and I was put in a cage in the back of a truck and shipped off to the livestock market. They could have processed me right here in the stables, of course, like they did with Joshua, but that was not what the judge had ordered. He had ordered that I be processed publicly as an example to others. The whole thing would be recorded of course, and would be a big hit on the net. I tried not to think about that.

And so at last the time came, and I was shoved out onto a brightly lit stage. There was a big audience and they murmured appreciatively as I was led out, naked and intact, but for my brand, for the very last time.

I was led to the operating table, set at a slight tilt from upright, and strapped into place.

I had been dreading this ever since the judge had ordered it, and I had wondered how it would be, but now I was here and it was really happening, I had some weird feeling of detachment. All week I had been thinking that it couldn't happen. Something had to stop it. Somehow my balls had to be saved. All week I had been hoping the time would go slowly and trying not to think about the moment I would be strapped to the chair, but here it was, the moment had come, and I don't know what I felt.

Somehow it was all too real. I can't really explain what I mean, except that in all your imagination there are things that just don't figure. You don't imagine the smell of sweat and blood and pee and that kind of hospital disinfectant smell too. You don't think about the fact that the air is quite warm, or how the light falls, or how people look. You keep thinking about what is going to happen, but when the moment comes it is just like any other moment of your life. . . only a lot more terrifying. The seconds still pass. Tick, tick, tick. People speak, and you hear them. . . do you see what I mean? You just don't expect it to be ordinary as well as terrible.

And that was what made it more terrifying still, because those ordinary seconds were ticking by, and my crimes were being read out for everyone to hear, and then I saw him: Aaron walking towards me, looking grim.

I heard the announcer explaining that Aaron had suffered permanent nerve damage from my bite, and I smiled just for a moment. That was a small victory.

"What are you smiling at, Prancer?" he asked as he stood in front of me. "I am going to get you good for what you did to me and to my stupid ex brother."

"Your dead brother," I said, with another smile. I was thinking: dead because of me. See, I killed him. It doesn't matter what you do to me, Aaron Christie, because I already got my revenge. I killed your stupid brother.

Aaron snarled and I could tell he was thinking the same thing, so I taunted him. What did it matter if I made him angry? what could he do to me that he wasn't already going to do?

"I heard he pissed himself in terror before he died. That was your fault you know?" Aaron looked towards the announcer and asked, "Can we gag him first."

"Of course, of course my boy," the announcer laughed.

And that was when a trolley was pushed over with the electric drills, clamps and pliers, and a vet came over and forced my mouth open, and pushed the pliers in over my upper front teeth, and then with an almighty wrench, started to pulled them free.

I won't describe how it felt to have all my teeth pulled and drilled out one by one. You can imagine the pain, and yes, I screamed. Of course I bloody well screamed and begged for them to stop. Of course I did, but there was no stopping them. It took a long time to get all my teeth out and the dental vet was sweating from the effort by the time he started building the soft implants that would replace them. I thought he was done but he came back with a long tube, like a dental suction tube, which he pushed into my mouth. I gagged, tried to throw it up, as he roughly pushed it to the back of my throat, and then as I pulled tautly at my restrains in utter terror, feeling like I could not breathe, I felt a sharp pain as my vocal cords were cut and my oesophagus was sealed with the hot cauterising end.

I gagged again and the machine came free and now the vet was suctioning away blood, and it felt like my throat was on fire, but also it just felt horribly horribly wrong, like I could breathe now but nothing more. some saliva slipped down my throat and I coughed it up. I couldn't swallow. Oh God, I thought, why can't I swallow?

Now the vet inserted my bit, bolted it to the implants and then stepped away.

Aaron had gone away and the watching crowd had been having snacks and watching other entertainment through the whole long procedure, but now it was done, the announcer stood up to explain, as I bit down on my new bit, trying desperately to dull the terrible pain in my shredded gums.

"This bit is designed to be removable if the slave is required to suck cock. However his throat has been permanently sealed and his vocal cords cut so that even with the bit out, he can never speak or eat ever again.

"We will give him a feeding tube later, but first, let us welcome young Aaron Christie back to the stage to geld this slave."

There was a smattering of applause and I could see Aaron coming, looking grimly satisfied.

My eyes were blurry with tears and I know that Aaron had watched me screaming like a girl. He had watched them cut out my vocal cords and close up my throat, and now he was walking towards me and I couldn't even open my mouth. There was bloody drool running down my chin. Drool I was incapable of swallowing, and I know I must have looked pathetic with my red puffy eyes and tear stained cheeks, but as I looked at him I still wanted to tell him, I still wanted to let him know, that I had got his brother hanged.

The announcer adjusted my cock cage then, unlocking it and then relocating it in a position that lifted my penis clear of my balls. When he had done this, Aaron held up the castration ring and I looked at the cruel device that was going to unman me for the first time.

Castration rings fit around the balls but are made of interlocking circular sections, driven by a powerful motor mechanism. The inner section is actually not a ring but an iris device. When the mechanism spins the iris closes and guillotines anything between the rings. An electric current is supposed to cauterise the wound at the same time.

Aaron fastened it around my balls, squeezing the testicles through the ring. He squeezed my balls deliberately hard as he did so and I gasped and my body spasmed within the restraints that held me, feeling like I had just been kicked down there.

"Today, for your entertainment, we have a new product to display. The penal castration device has been specifically designed to make a castration as painful as possible," the announcer explained and then when the device was on my balls, Aaron grinned and pressed a button and I would have screamed if I still could, but instead my whole body went rigid and started to shake as I felt electricity arcing through my balls. I had not been expecting that, and now it was like I was being repeatedly kicked in the balls or like they were slowly frying.

"The device is designed to torture the testicles, stimulating all the nerve cells with powerful electrical currents. However, this does not castrate the boy. Instead, the boy must castrate himself," and as he said this, Aaron took my hand and placed a button in it.

"You don't have to press the button. No one will force you to do so," said the announcer, now talking to me, "but the pain you are experiencing will not stop until you do. Indeed it will get worse and worse, until you decide to end it. Press the red button to end the pain. Press the red button and the constrictor ring will cut your testicles off and make you a eunuch.

My body was shaking and the pain was excruciating. So bad I even forgot about the pain from my teeth as I tried to scream, pulling at the implants in my gums, making them bleed so that more red drool frothed from my mouth. The pain was so terrible I just wanted it to stop, and I nearly pressed the button right away, but then Aaron leaned closer to me and said, quietly:

"Just do it. Go on, make yourself a snivelling girly eunuch."

And because he wanted me to, I resisted. I writhed and sobbed, and so I couldn't see any more through the tears. I made little gasps, the only distressed sound I could manage now and I tried to kick and tear myself free of the restraints, but I didn't press the button. I didn't.

"As you can see, this is setting one. Let's try upping the voltage to level three."

I wanted to vomit but it turns out I could not even do that now, with my throat all closed up. I felt like the world was far away and thought that at least if I could pass out then that would let me off the hook. They could castrate me, but not because I had chosen it. Not because I did what Aaron asked. Another small victory for me. Oh God if only I could pass out.

And then Aaron closed in on me again.

"Press the button now," he whispered, "or I will cut it all off."

And I saw him reaching for a scalpel and I remembered his brother, and I thought I did not want to end up like that. I did not, and still my balls were in agony and I could not stand it any more.

I looked into his eyes and I believed he was going to do it. I could not stand it, and he had won because my finger hovered over the button and then, with a shudder, I pressed it.

There was a click, and for a moment the pain stopped but, as something fell to the floor, the pain changed and I could see the blood seeping past the cauterised wound and my balls rolling on the floor, and the pain seemed to burrow right up into my stomach, as the crowd roared their pleasure and applauded to see the slave castrate himself.

And still I had not passed out. Still there was one more surprise they had waiting for me.

Out of the wings came George Jones.

"George, meet your new slave. All ready for you. We can add his feeding tube later. " George looked me up and down and smiled.

"Hello Prancer, I am going to have so much fun with you."

***

So I expect you are wondering how I wrote this story?

Well Master George took me home without having the feeding tube fitted, and showed me my new kennel. They don't let slaves in the house, his parents told me. It is a huge house though, complete with a paddock, and George says he is going to make me give everyone rides and stuff. He also had his cousin over to fuck me. Some guy called Jez whose dad works for the municipal authority. Jez is bigger than both of us, and George says he doesn't even know if he wants to fuck me but he likes watching Jez do it.

Jez took his time, made sure it hurt, and George laughed and joked with his cousin the whole time, and when they were done, he said to me:

"Oh yes, your feeding tube. You only get your feeding tube when you have written the whole story about how you got here. If you don't do it right you have to keep doing it until I am happy or until you starve.

"Oh and when you are done, I am not going to let you write anything again. When you are done, if you so much as pick up a pen or type on a computer ever again I will have you hanged, get it? This is the last thing you will ever write, the last human communication you will ever be allowed. So make it good, Prancer. Make it really good because I am going to share it on the net so everyone can know what a useless little shit you are and how you really deserve your fate. In fact you have to write that at the end. You have to tell everyone that with the last words you will ever write, and after that you will just be some animal. Okay?"

That was what he told me and I have written this story three times already and it has taken me so long that I am dying from thirst. You can get by without food for weeks, but without water it is three days they say – but I lost some blood in the operation so I don't think I will go three days and it has been nearly two already. If Master George does not like this draft I think I won't manage another one, so I hope he likes it. Jez helped me with some stuff about Joshua. I never realised that Joshua was not really so bad. . . I feel kind of guilty about that. Still he did try to get Jez made an S0 slave, and I know that is almost as bad as what I did. . . almost.

So this is it. My last try. Please Master George. Please let it be enough. Please let me have my feeding tube stabbed through my navel.

Oh yes, the bit I have to end with

My name is Prancer. I used to be Tristan but I don't deserve that name any more.
I am a little shit.
I cut off my own balls because I did not deserve them.
I deserve to be a sub human S0 slave for the rest of my life. If you see me make sure you tell me how worthless I am.
And please fuck me hard because I like to be put in my place.
And punish me all you like because I deserve it.
I deserve to be punished for thinking I was better than Master George.
I cannot speak now because I do not deserve to have a voice.
This is the last thing I will ever say: George wins and I am his bitch.

The End