The Time Line by Gerry Taylor This is the nineteenth [ex twenty two] of a novel about gay sex and present-day slavery. Keywords: authority, control, gay, loyalty, slavery, punishment, retraining, sex, submission If you are underage to read this kind of material or if it is unlawful for you to read such material where you live, please leave this webpage now. ============= The Prison Doctor and The Changed Life [the first novel of this series] are now available as full novels in Adobe Acrobat format on http://www.geocities.com/gerrytaylor_78/ ===========
Chapter 19--Scientism
The floggings were to take place on one of the sports pitches. How two slaves could get into a fight over a spade was quite beyond me. But they had, and it had developed into a nasty, punching and gouging match between the two. Fights rarely occur among the slaves and usually over things a trifle more important than spades, usually over the affections of another slave or the falling out of buddies.
I felt like Pilate having on the one hand washed my hands of the whole matter, and on the other, like the most anal-retentive of Masters, insisting that the rules of the Palaces be observed.
Why on the sports pitch? For the very simple reason that one slave was from the Lemon Palace, the other was one of Georgi's from the al-Kadir lands under development. The sports pitches of the Lemon Palaces lay between both.
Komil, the Head of Stable at the Lemon Palace had come to me with the tale. I had told him to take care of it, and once the slaves had been flogged to put each on a water-wheel for a month to cool them down. The two slaves names did not mean anything to me, but then I do not know all of the slaves who worked outdoors.
I thought it had been solved until Georgi Gridov came up to me very humbly and said that he thought that it would be a good idea if I were present for the flogging as it would reinforce the policy of slaves not fighting and that punishment would follow if they did.
Georgi just stood there waiting for my answer and I knew in my heart of hearts that he was correct.
`When and where?' I said.
`This afternoon, Master, at four, when the language classes are over. I will have a buggy ready to collect you.'
Those slaves who have neither English nor Arabic must go to classes during the punishingly hot hours of the Dahran day.
`Okay, Georgi, I'll have Kent drive me there.'
I had taken to having Kent Kialka, my pianist, drive me around the Palaces on special occasions. I felt that it got him out in the air after his hours of practice on the Steinway.
As we drove down from the courtyard to the sports pitches, I asked Kent how his playing was coming along.
`Master, I had Ben order me some CDs of the great Masters of the piano. I listen to what they do and on the one hand, I try to imitate their phrasing, but on the other I try to develop my own technique.'
`Good, Kent. Technique is important. You'll see that where we are going. Two slaves are going to be flogged and in a flogging, technique is also important.'
There was a moment's silence and my driver said very quietly, `Master, you will never have to punish me and less still flog me. I am not a courageous person but I think a flogging would kill me. To punish me, you only have to sit there after any of my performances and not applaud. Simply not applaud. That would be my greatest punishment. I learn everything and play only to please you.'
`Do you not enjoy playing, Kent, and please yourself into the bargain?'
`Master, I do enjoy playing piano more than you can ever imagine. But I do fear you, because I do not know what you have in store for me in the future or even in the present.'
`You have that amount of fear inside you, Kent. Fear is an incentive, but a poor incentive. What about something or someone to love?'
`I have no buddy yet, Master, though I may ask you soon for one. When I play I think of how it will please you, Master, and I think how the sound will please the buddy I would like to have. He works in the kitchens.'
`In the kitchens?'
`Sevil, Master... he is in charge of your wines. He knows a lot about music and we get on well together.'
`A common interest and companionship is very often the first step towards love in the long-term.'
`Yes, Master.'
The flogging frames were set up in the middle of one of the sports pitches between the two properties, and a slave spread-eagled on both with wrists and ankles tied to the four corners of the frames.
Both Georgi and Komil approached me as the buggy arrived. There must have been all of four hundred slaves lined up in a rough rectangle, almost a square of one hundred and fifty feet.
`Proceed,' I said to the Overseers.
It surprised me when Georgi Gridov turned and addressed the entire assembly of slaves. For such a small slave, his voice carried to the furthest corners of the pitch.
`You all know that the Master does not allow slaves to fight among themselves. These two slaves decided to ignore the Master's orders and to fight over a spade. Their punishment will be thirty strokes each of a four-foot camel cane and then one month on a water-wheel in the Lemon Palace grounds. Long live the Master!'
A shout shook the palm trees of the nearby al-Kadir property as some four hundred-odd voices roared out `Long live the Master!' My quiet Georgi was one for drama and spectacle after all. Who would have suspected it? Not I, for one.
Georgi turned to someone in the line behind me and then pointed to the frames and the hanging slaves. A squat and totally hairless slave--hairless save for a close cut on his hair and trimmed pubes, walked out towards the frames with a half a dozen camel-canes in this hand.
It was only when he was half-way to the frames that I recognised Alexei Gritsov, the former Russian army sergeant. Having lost his extensive body hair, his superbly fit body was a revelation of muscle. He looked like a medieval executioner. All he was missing was a double sided axe. As he walked out to the centre of the sports field, I could not see his tackle but his walk was one of firm determination, and without him even landing a single stroke of a single four foot cane, I knew that the two slaves were about to be severely punished.
There was no bowing or scraping by Alexei towards me or anyone else when he reached the frames and dropping a number of canes on the sand. He took up a position to the side of the first slave and brought the cane to the slave's lips to kiss. He then stepped back behind the slave and delivered the first blow.
There was a definite two-second delay between the first blow which had landed and the scream which ricocheted around the sports field. Whatever thought there might have been that this slave would bear his punishment stoically and in silence was dispelled by that scream there and then.
The screams of the slave continued until the fourteenth or fifteen stroke, I presumed Alexei was counting, until the slave's body sagged on the frame and he fainted.
Alexei took one of a number of buckets of water from beside the frame and threw it over the slave's now bleeding back. The four-foot camel-cane does raise blood, and the slave was seen to revive.
A fresh cane was chosen, and Alexei Gritsov was seen to say something to the slave as he offered the slave the new cane to kiss.
The final fifteen strokes were delivered to almost one continuous scream which weakened after the twenty fifth or so stroke, and then was a whimper at the end. I surmised that the slave's voice box could simply no longer handle the voicing of expelled air.
Alexei moved across to the second slave and chose a new camel-cane. He raised it to the slave's lips. There was a total and complete silence on the pitch. The first slave had fainted again, and then there was the sound of piss hitting sand as the second slave could not control his bladder.
As Alexei stepped behind the slave, he was heard to shout `Master, mercy. Master, I'm sorry.' As it was the afternoon, he said it in Arabic which, at least, according to the Palace protocols counted for something.
The slave and his screams lasted until the twelfth stroke when Alexei had to revive him. When the twentieth stroke was delivered, I said in a loud voice, `Enough. The slave asked for mercy from his Master and said he was sorry. As his Master, I am merciful and his punishment by camel-cane is now complete. Both slaves will be on a water-wheel for a month. Now back to your duties, all of you.'
I made a point of placing my hand on the shoulder of both Georgi and Komil so that all could see my approval of their actions and my support of their positions as my Overseers.
I looked across at Alexei Gritsov and nodded my head towards him in approval.
As we drove back on the sand buggy to the Lemon Palace, Kent Kialka was very quiet. He had not said a word since we had left the sports pitch. More accurately, I had not spoken to him which would have allowed him a right of reply.
`Your thoughts, Kent?'
`Master, you have only to remind me of this day and that will be punishment enough for me.'
`Does what you have seen make you fear me even more than you did this morning?'
`Yes, Master,' he replied as I could see the white of his knuckles gripping the sand buggy's steering wheel.
`Kent, stop the buggy and look at me.'
I could see that his eyes were open wider than usual and that he was pale.
`You please me more than you can ever know, not just with your playing, but with your honesty and with how you make Bob happy by simply playing for him as well. What would you say, if I promised you that I would never have you flogged?'
`I...I would be extremely grateful, Master. But I don't know what I could do, or would have to do for you to make that promise.'
`Two things, Kent. Keep playing for me as you are doing and take Sevil as your buddy. He is a little older than you. He is not gay like you are but he needs someone in his life, preferably inside the Palace, who can comfort him at night. He is afraid of me even more than you, Kent. He is afraid that I will sell him or send him back to the opal mine.'
`Thank you, Master. And Master, while I am afraid of you in one sense of what you could do to me, in another sense, I am not afraid of you because you rescued me from the House of Khan.'
`If you have problems with Sevil at any stage, let me know.'
`Master, I will have no problems with Sevil. That much I can promise you now.'
Back at the Lemon Palace, Stan Mercer was waiting for me on the veranda.
`Stan, what's the problem.'
`No problem, Boss, just some test results.'
`Come in and tell me,' as I indicated the way into the study, and pointed to a chair for my property Overseer.
Bob Conrad was in hover mode and I told him to get me some lime-juice and a beer for Stan who shot me a grin.
`Boss, you know that the two wells have been producing water for the past five years at almost the same pressure all the time. Over the years, the pressure has dropped very, very slightly, but nothing to worry us.'
I liked the sound of the ` us' as it showed the total commitment of Stan to my affairs.
`I did mention to you previously that I thought that sea-water was now being filtered into our supply from the gulf. Well, I can confirm that. If you drink a glass of water coming from the wells, you will not notice the difference but there are four atoms of sodium chloride per million in the water.'
`Is that good or bad news, Stan?'
`Boss, it is excellent news. These test results that I commissioned proved that as we take water out of the deep wells, seawater is coming in from thirty miles away, but filtered by thirty miles of sedimentary rock. What it means is that we have an unlimited supply of pure water. It's a sort of cyclical movement of water. What we cannot figure out yet, is why the pressure is almost the same. But it is.'
`Well done, Stan! Well done! See how your geology degree has been of importance in all of this.'
Stan grinned and flicked his eyebrows towards the ceiling, and reached for the beer that Bob had put down beside him.
`Boss, it's just of a question of the natural sciences scoring a goal. Scientism one, chance zero,' he said with that disarming smile of his.
Bob was still in hover mode. He thrives on information that no one else has. I put my hand on his backside and could feel the warmth of his flesh through the flimsy cotton pants supervisors wear inside the Palaces. I signalled him away to the kitchens.
When Bob had left us, I said `what can I do for you, Stan?'
`For me, Boss, nothing. I'm as happy as a lark in clover. The property team is working well. I am resigned to losing Sabir Temirov.'
`Losing?'
`You know what I mean, Boss. The guy is a mechanical genius. He is lost on just fixing the water pumps and greasing the moving parts of the windmills. He said to me that you wanted him to find a task that he can do. '
`Yes, indeed. I told him to put on khaki pants if he wants. He is good. Better than good in fact. Let me know when he is ready or what he has found for his own thing to do around the Palaces. I actually have something in mind for him. How are Wik and yourself getting on?'
The former bulb grower from Holland and Stan had been a pair of buddies for some time.
Boss, four years ago I would have given my eye teeth for a woman in my bed. Now I have settled for Wik. He takes the sexual tension out of my life each morning with that mouth of his and each evening I please him as much as I can with a good fuck. It is a question of making the best of situations. He's happy. I'm happy. As someone once said, give a man bread and work, and he's happy'.'
I did not correct a favourite slave in his slip of the tongue.
`You know your old orphanage got a quarter of a million again this year? Tommy Saunders showed me the figures.'
`Yes, Boss. That is the one thing that really, really pleases me. The endowment of the chair of geology, well that was very nice, but not really me, if you understand what I am saying. The kids at the orphanage...well that would be my cup of tea.'
`I understand perfectly, Stan.'
I had Jake, the Palace messenger summon Sabir Temirov for me.
Sabir arrived with his young buddy, Mikey Acton, in tow.
`Are you ready to take on an important job for me, Mikey?'
He was standing close to Sabir and I saw him take Sabir's hand in his. His young body gleamed in good health. His penis at half-tumescent.
`Yes, Master. Yes, indeed.'
`Sabir is going to need someone to help me in a project I am going to give him to do. You are here what, just five months? Do you think you can be that someone?
`Yes, Master.'
`How are you pleasing him every night?'
`I suck him, Master, until he is hard and then he fucks me for an hour every night and I try to please him by gripping his cock tightly as he fucks me.'
`Does he please you, Sabir? Or should I change him?'
I could see Mikey white knuckles as he grasped Sabir's hand.
`He pleases me, Master. There is no need to change him, at least not yet.'
Mikey's eyes were boring into Sabir's impassive face.
`Sabir, I want you to examine the staffing of the three Palaces. I think some slaves have not enough to do inside the Households and if the staffing is tightened up, slaves will be freed up to work on the al-Kadir property. The same with the Stables. You look. You decide. You let me know. The Heads of Household and Stables will not want to let any slave go. Each Palace is a government department. None will want to see their staffs reduced.'
`Leave it to me, Master. When do you want the report?'
`Ten days time.'
Sabir nodded and left with Mikey, or so I thought.
I was about to go back into the Palace when I felt a presence behind me. It was Mikey Acton.
`Mikey?'
`Master, I just wanted to say thanks. No one has ever asked me to do anything important before.'
My former London mugger was all nervous in his nakedness, not knowing where to put his hands or how to look at me.
`Mikey, you are important to me and to Sabir. I haven't asked you to do anything important yet on your own, but to be better educated in the ways of the Palace and to learn the things you have to learn such as Arabic and swimming. I saw how you wanted to be with Sabir. I know he will teach you a lot, if you have the intelligence to grasp it and learn. You are only what, nineteen? Dahra has been a shock to you over the past five months. But I have this gut feeling that you will be one of the great supervisors of the Palaces. I want you to continue to develop your body, just as much as you are developing your techniques in bed with Sabir, but while he is your boss I want you to have a temporary buddy, just to suck you off each morning and relieve the sexual tension that any nineteen year-old feels. Also, your temporary buddy can be your friend.'
Mikey smiled at that and said, `You bet, Master.'
`Now is there anything else?'
`No, Master.'
`Well, off you go and keep Sabir happy in bed tonight.'
`Yes, Master.'
As the young slave was about to depart, I thought to myself how easy it is to train the young, if you have a firm hand and a clear head of where their training should lead. The young are trusting of authority as they have no better or firmer idea to offer in substitution. Yes, indeed, Mikey Acton would be a fine slave in the fullness of time.
Two days later, Georgi said that he wanted to create some new supervisors for kofilas coming on stream at the al-Kadir property. It was time to move on the Swedish slaves and I had them assembled. I had promised them that they would be heads of kofila or supervisors. I was not about to go back on my word.
I smiled to myself when I saw them lined up at rest' with their hands clasped behind their backs in the late afternoon in the courtyard. Even Thor the young slave who had been owned by Fiona and Jack was there. Though he was now twenty four, in my mind I always thought of him as the young slave of yore, by his looks he was not yet past his teens. I had told Ben, my secretary, to have the Swedes assemble. So he had the twenty two of them assemble, including the young' Thor and Jon Lundt even though Jon is Head of Household at the Aloe Palace. One really has to be careful with orders to Ben.
`Right, Georgi, how many supervisors do you want?'
`Five, Master, is all I need at the moment, and then next week another two with two other kofilas coming on stream.'
`Do you want to choose your supervisors from these Swedes or from others?'
`The Swedes are fine, Master. But you choose, please, you know them better than I do.'
I called out Eric, Thor and the first two of the Swedes who had given their loyalty to me.
I stood in front of Björn and, looking him in the eye, said, `Georgi needs a Supervisor. What do you say, Björn?'
The blond Swede looked at me, his closely cut hairstyle suiting the contours of his head.
`Yes, Master. Thank you.'
`The past is totally past?'
`Yes, Master,' he replied.
`Next week, I am going to need two more supervisors for Georgi's work at the al-Kadir.'
I stood deliberately in front of Olaf, the slave who had caused so much disruption in the past and eyeballed him as they say.
`From among your number, you will chose one who is to be Supervisor and I will chose another.'
I noticed that two spots were getting redder and redder on Olaf's cheeks. He glanced into my eyes and glanced away.
`It will be your choice.'
That statement was as much to the Swedish collective as it was to Olaf Svensson. I left it at that and went over to Jon Lundt and said, `Walk me back, Jon, to the Lemon Palace.'
It is just as important that slaves see who is in favour with me and who is not, as it is for each to know where each one stands with me. I walked slowly as Jon is now aging fast and cannot keep up a brisk pace for long. End of Chapter 19 =========== Contact: e: gerrytaylor78@hotmail.com w: http://www.geocities.com/gerrytaylor_78/ w: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/erotic_gay_stories If not on the YahooGroups mailing list, simply send a blank email to Erotic_gay_stories-subscribe@yahoogroups.com The Dahran series -- a fictional adventure story about the life and times of Sir Jonathan Martin -- comprises the following novels to date: 1. The Changed Life 2. The Reluctant Retrainer 3. The Market Offer 4. The Special Memories 5. The Dahran Way 6. The Dahran Rebuttals 7. The Seventh Desert 8. The Dahran Sands 9. The Time Line These novels are all serialised on Nifty (Gay -- Authoritarian) and on YahooGroups http://groups.yahoo.com/group/erotic_gay_stories