Spoils of War

THE SPOILS OF WAR by Pete Brown. petebrownuk @ yahoo.com

Read all of Pete's stories in groups.yahoo.com/group/petebrownseroticstories

Part 16

I was told to go to the main entrance block and wait, and, freshly showered, in a clean T and shorts with the Gleeson's Gladiators logo and name on them, I jogged over there and stood in the luxurious area. There were thick leather couches and a wide oak-fronted reception desk with a stylish receptionist sitting at it. Magazines and newspapers were available for those waiting, and I went to pick one up - I'd realised that I'd had no idea of what was happening in nthe world since I was enslaved, and the news about the new war on the Arabs had come as a real surprise.

"Boy, put that down!", the receptionist called out when she saw what I was doing. "I don't know what the world's coming to! You'll be trying to sit on the furniture next thing I know. I don't know why the Colonel lets you slaves who're going off to fight wait here with decent visitors - it just encourages you to get uppity and think you can start reading things. And some of our visitors don't like to be close to slaves, either - although you're harmless, they worry that you might turn on them and attack them."

"Oh, I'd never do that. That's ridiculous. Look, just let me glance through the papers - it won't damage them."

"It's 'ma'am' to you, boy! I'm a free woman. Even though you're shipping out, it's not too late to have a guard in here to cane you, you know! And sitting on one of those buses with your backside striped wouldn't be much fun..."

"I'm sorry, ma'am!" Indeed I had been thinking of going and sitting on one of the couches - I mean, you do, don't you, in a reception area? "I'm sorry. Ma'am.... But you're right - I am a gladiator, and I do fight, but there's no way I'd harm a civilian. That's how we were trained in the Corps."

"So you were a marine, boy?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"So's my son."

"So was he enslaved, too, ma'am?"

"No, of course not! He wasn't as stupid as you were. He was already serving down here in South when the civil war broke out, and he wasn't so foolish as to start attacking his own folk..."

"But ma'am, he must have disobeyed orders... Surely the commanders told all Marine units in the country to come here and break the rebellion...?"

"That's as may be. And don't you call us 'rebels', boy! We're free folk, who want our own way of life! But my son had more sense that you evidently did, boy.

It doesn't matter what you're ordered to do, if the order's illegal, you don't obey it. And how could an order to come here and attack your fellow US citizens possibly have been legal? No, it serves you right - if you were knuckle-headed enough to obey illegal orders blindly, then you deserve to be a slave. It's the best thing for you, if you ask me, to keep you safely out of harm's way. A soldier who's stupid enough to do one wrong thing could easily do a whole lot more."

"But ma'am..." I was going to tell her that a grunt marine had to obey, that his whole training made it like that. It was interesting, though, that there were some Marines who were not slaves - I guessed that her son was still in the South, for example, as if he went North, he'd be locked up for disobeying orders. But just then the door opened and Lewis came in, accompanied by one of the guards.

"Are you left handed or right handed, boy?", the guard snapped at me.

"Left, sir". I'm strongly left handed - knives, spoons, pens, tool of any kind... Jerking off, of course.... All have to use my left hand.

"Hold out your left arm, boy!"

I did as he commanded, and he snapped a metal cuff around my wrist. The cuff was loosely attached to a metal rod about a foot long, at the end of which was another cuff, which he promptly fastened around Lewis's right wrist. We stood there, just a foot apart then, kind of closely-coupled together.

"Right you boys - that's you seen to", the guard chuckled. "The Colonel doesn't like to let new boys out by themselves until they've proved themselves to be trustworthy, so shackling you together like this make it real hard to escape - not that you can, of course, with that chip inside you - but some of you new guys have tried it, and the fuss and bother it creates as they hunt you down just isn't worth it. And, of course, it's the Colonel's loss as when they capture you that geld you automatically, and a gladiator without balls just isn't a fighter! Now, wait here until the transport comes, both of you". He chuckled quietly as he said this, pointing at the shackle joining us, knowing that we now had to do the same things.

"I'm not having two of you slaves cluttering up this place!", the receptionist called out. "It was bad enough with one. You two get out there and wait outside."

"Yes, ma'am", Lewis replied, almost automatically, and went to move out. I of course was just towed after him.

"Hey, Lewis, you don't have to do what that miserable cow said. It was good in there with the air-conditioning, and it's fucking hot out here... We were told to wait in reception, and you should have told her that that's what we were going to do."

"Oh Spike, don't be so fucking stupid! She'd just have called the guard back and ordered us both to be caned. Not that that one would do it - I know him: he's always looking for an excuse to do a bare-assed spanking! Would you fancy having your shorts pulled down, being put across his knee, and having your ass spanked whilst she watched?"

"But we were told...."

"...and she told you to wait outside. And the guards will always believe a free woman, Spike, remember that! Newer get in a position against a free woman down here in the South - they kind of revere women, and if a man hears a slave being 'uppity', as they call it, the best you can hope for is a caning or spanking.... And you don't even want to think about the worst."

"So where are we going, Lewis - they didn't tell me."

"The big TV centre in Atlanta. They do a lot of the shows from there on the second channel, as it's easier to do them live when all the studios and stuff are there. When you fight here, it's taped for later use.

But for a guy's first fight on that channel, they like to do it live, in case you fuck up!"

He broke out into a grin. "But perhaps that's a dreadful pun! I mean, they do it live in case you do something spectacularly wrong, or refuse, or something, so they can crucify you... And that's not a pun! I do hope you 'fuck up', Spike, as that's what they're expecting you to do when you win. But don't fail to fight properly, or to fuck the guy if you win - they have a cross, a big one, and they'll have you on it in no time, and simply lash your hide off."

"Lewis, I don't like this... Fucking in public...."

"Tough, Spike! The alternative's worse, believe me. And what did you do to Stu the other night, or were my eyes deceiving me?"

"Yes, but I was horny...."

"Well that's OK, then! You can fuck another guy in public if you're horny!"

"I didn't mean it like that..."

"It doesn't matter, Spike - you will be horny, really horny, when you go into the arena in three days. The thought of escape isn't the only reason the Colonel has us cuffed together - why do you think the guard asked you which hand you use?"

I looked puzzled, so he said "It's to stop you jerking off! Well, you could use your other hand, I suppose, but most guys don't like doing that.. But actually, he has us shackled like this so that I can be punished if you're not sufficiently horny! Look, we're going to be close - really close - for the next three days. You can't jerk off without me knowing. You can't fuck anyone without me knowing. So when you go into the arena, you won't have had any relief for all that time, and for a young stud like you, who jerks off at least twice a day, that means that your balls will be full of cum, and your dick will be aching! Assuming you win, you'll whip that little G-string off and your dick will be hard as rock, and just totally impatient to fuck ass."

"Hey, Lewis, I've fucked you, remember... I could always do that again...."

"But not in the next three days, Spike! It's more than my hide's worth, if the Colonel ever found out! And there's no way you could do it anyway, with us shackled like this - I guess that in a fair fight you could overpower me and rape me like you did Stu yesterday, but shackled together, you'd never make it.

So you'd better get used to having an almost constant erection, a leaking dick, and aching balls.... At least until the fight's over."

Just at that moment a small van drove up, and the slave driving it opened the window and called out "Are you two for the bus station? Climb in...."

I could tell he was a slave as he had a collar on, and I could see his torso was naked through the open window. But when Lewis and I climbed in (which is actually quite difficult, when you're shackled as we were) we were amazed to see that the only thing inside the van was the driver's seat, which was made of steel mesh, not padded as you might expect. And the slave was totally naked, and there was a cuff running from his ankle to a bolt in the floor! He saw us looking at it, and smiled resignedly "Hey, what did you guys expect - a luxury limo? Just sit against the walls - you're my only cargo this trip, but they keep it clear in here so we can really cram them in if needs be."

"But you're naked, chained down..."

"Sure. I guess they're worried about me escaping: even though I'm chipped as all us prisoners of war were, I could get quite a way in this van if I drove off. So they keep me shackled, so I couldn't really get away from it, and naked, as there's no air-con and it gets hot in here most days... And anyway, how could I then buy gas or anything?"

Lewis seemed uninterested in this conversation, but I went on "But it's inhuman - keeping a guy naked...."

"Hey, aren't you a gladiator? They let us watch some of the bouts.... You should worry about being naked! And it's not so bad - it's easier to jerk off when I get 'driver's dick'. And I'm used to it by now. I'd rather be a driver that working away on one of those work coffles, chained by the neck to the other guys."

"And", he went on, "This isn't so very different from the shit I used to do in the Army - I guess it was OK for you guys fighting there in the front line, but I just worked in logistics, handling all your gear and ammo, so driving this van isn't so much of a change."

I began to realise the size of the enslavement that must have gone on, but I couldn't understand how it had happened to him as he hadn't been fighting..

"But surely you weren't fighting down here, when we lost?"

"No, but I was stationed in Missouri. When the war started, they went through our base and all the guys from the South were allowed to carry on as normal, but guys like me, from the North - I'm from Chicago - were rounded up and trucked off to a huge transit camp. Then about a month later they started taking us away in batches, and when it was my turn, I found it was to be a fucking slave: they tattooed my SID, micro-chipped me, put this collar on, and that's the way it's been ever since. They said that having us men down there was just part of the spoils of war."

I could hardly believe that they'd be so inhuman as to segregate soldiers like this, just based on where they were born. I mean, this guy wasn't actually fighting, was he? And I bet that up North guys born in the South weren't jailed or anything. But it was intriguing to think about how all this had happened, so I asked "What about your folks, though? What do they think about you being a slave?"

"I don't know - the one thing we're never allowed to do is use the phone or anything. But I'm not hopeful - a lot of places in the North were hit badly when the oil was cut off: Chicago's a pretty tough in the winter at the best of times! There are terrible rumours about food riots, people starving to death...."

A chill of fear went through me. My parents were getting on, and Maine can be even worse in the winter than Chicago. And with those gloomy thoughts, I kind of sat there silently for the rest of the journey, although Lewis carried on chatting to him about the prospects for fighters from our barracks. I guess it was the equivalent of stable lads talking to punters about the chances of horses in forthcoming races, and I wondered how many bets would be placed on the advice that the driver had got from Lewis about the capabilities of our gladiators Still, it was good to see that Lewis rated me highly - he told the driver that I was booked for the second channel, and the driver turned around to take a second look at me.

"Hey, Dude, cool! You're going to be fucking in public, as well as showing off your butt, then! It must be great to have a job like that, when you're allowed to fuck... The management at my place is really straight-laced, and they even look at the sheets in the slave quarters every morning to make sure we haven't jacked off, let alone fucked. That's why I don't mind being a driver - as I said, I gets lots of opportunity to jerk off when I'm out and about, where they can't see.

I'd assumed we were going to some sort of bus station, but the van drove us to the airport. We didn't get a plane, though: there were now relatively few flights, as President Prexmire had decreed that oil consumption really was to be cut dramatically and that the South was not to become reliant on imports again (even though he'd invaded the Arabs!). But it had proven to be convenient, the van driver told us, to make the terminal buildings the new hubs for the bus network, so that those people who did get long-distance flights could then travel on by bus.

He dropped us off at the sign that said "Luggage And Unaccompanied Slaves", and we went inside to join a queue of slaves shuffling towards a check-in desk. The woman at the counter was just like the receptionist at Gleeson's Gladiators - I saw at once that she had no collar, and so was presumably a free woman - and Lewis hissed at me to remain respectful as there were always a lot of guards around here, and it wouldn't be good to have her call them over.

She keyed in Gleeson's Gladiators on her screen, then Lewis and Spike, and muttered "Yes, a linked pair. For shipment to Atlanta. You slaves are lucky - there's space on the next bus. Here....."

She handed us a couple of bar-coded tags, and snapped "Tie these to your collars..."

Lewis attached his, but she then saw that I was standing there, holding it helplessly. "You're one of those fancy slaves without a collar - it always causes trouble. Put it on your snout ring, idiot!". She sounded cross now.

"Please, Ma'am.... If I did that, it would be very uncomfortable, hanging across my mouth....."

"You should have thought of that before you had that fancy snout ring fitted - a real affectation, I call it! A slave should have a collar, that's what I say!"

I felt the anger rising inside me like a geyser. Did she think I'd willingly have this vile ring through my septum? "I didn't choose this...."

"Guard!", she almost screamed it out, and at once two guards came rushing over, and as they approached, drew their slave prods and whips from their belts.

"This slave is too dammed uppity - he refuses to attach his routing tag to his snout ring."

"Boy", one guard said at once to me - it was ironic really, as he was only about eighteen, and he was calling me "boy" - you do as the lady says, or my partner and I will take you outside and teach you a little lesson in how to behave when a free woman gives you an order. Now, get that tag attached, boy...."

Well, what could I do? I didn't want to get Lewis hurt, and being shackled to me he'd almost certainly have been hit by the charge from a prod as it went through me. So I took the thing - about the size of a standard luggage tag - and fastened the clip on it through my ring. It was really irritating - it hung down right over my lips, and made it hard for me to speak.

"Track seventeen", the woman rapped. "Now get out of here."

"Spike, you need to be careful", Lewis said quietly as we walked along. "I know it's your first time out, but the folk here are really touchy about the way that slaves behave. You almost got a good prodding there, and possibly a whipping, too. Just keep your cool, OK?"

"But it's so fucking awful, having this thing hanging down over my mouth!", I muttered with difficulty, having to use my right hand to hold the thing out of the way.

"Yes, Spike. But for one awful moment I thought you were going to shout at that woman or something. It wouldn't help, she wouldn't back down - once a slave has been given an order, there's no way a master is going to back down and rescind it - even if it's totally stupid, just do it, then take steps to correct the problem later, OK? Remember how it was with some of those stupid new officers fresh out of training - didn't know a fuck, but you had to obey them, and clear up the shit afterwards. Well, being a slave is just like that."

"Yes, but..."

"No 'buts', Spike. That's the way it has to be. That's why the Colonel sends someone out like me with you inexperienced slaves - he doesn't want you arriving at the other end with your back or your butt in tatters from some over zealous guard's whip. Now the sensible thing to do is this...."

We stopped for a moment, and Lewis unclipped the tag from my nose, and attached it to hang alongside the one from his collar.

"There! See, simple. We could have avoided all those problems back there. You do as you're ordered, then you fix it later. We have to have two tags as they scan them when we board the bus, but as we're shackled together, it's easy this way.... Now, before we go down to the stand, do you need to piss?"

We were up on the concourse now, and I nodded as I knew it would be a long journey, and if there's a rest room, it's always as well to use it at places like airports, isn't it? They'd evidently been busy at this place, though, as in addition to making the "gates" serve planes or buses, a lot of other stuff had been done, too: I quickly noticed that at the gates we went past, there were signs saying "Slaves may not sit on the seats"; the phone booths had signs saying "Use by slaves prohibited under Federal Law"; the coffee shops and bars had signs on the doors saying "Slaves not admitted, whether accompanied by their owners or not"; and then, of course, when we got to the rest rooms, there were now three entrances: "Men", "Women" and "Slaves".

"Hey, Lewis, what about female slaves....?"

"Oh there aren't many of those, Spike - and they mostly don't travel as their owners usually keep them locked up for their sexual pleasure. But don't you worry - if there are any female slaves in here, I'll keep you safe from them... If they even come near you, I'll tell them you like men now..."

"Hey, sarge, that's a lie...."

"Is it, Spike? The way you've been at young Stu...."

"Hey, sarge, it's only because there are no ladies around! But I wasn't thinking about a fast screw in the rest rooms, I was thinking about them looking at me...."

"Oh come on, Spike! Half the nation watches the fights on the second channel, and half of them are women, and they'll be seeing that big dick of yours one way or the other soon - either it will be out, rock hard, as you start to fuck the loser, or it will be hanging down as he fucks you - you have to strip the fighting pouch off, you know, as the string blocks the asshole - or hadn't you thought about that?"

I hadn't, actually, and it was an unwelcome thought. But anyway, as it happens, there weren't any female slaves in the rest room, but had there been, it might have been awkward: just as at the barracks, everything was open and on view - there were no cubicles or anything. Lewis and I went to the trough on one wall that was a urinal, and then as we stood there, we both began to laugh. "Jesus, sarge... I can't get it out and piss properly with my right hand...."

"Nor me with my left", Lewis replied. "Here....."

He stopped trying to piss himself and let his hand go free, so I could use my usual left one to tug at the tight shorts and free my dick, then hold it there whilst my piss hosed out. It felt so strange - I mean, you're used to having another guy standing next to you at those open trough things, aren't you - but to have him so close, and him having to hold his hand right down by your dick... Well, it was odd - almost as odd as me having to hold my hand there as Lewis then fumbled to get his dick out.

We went down to gate seventeen then where the sign was saying "Atlanta", and saw the passengers boarding. I went to join the line, but Lewis dragged me back, shaking his head. We went instead around to the other side of the bus where a couple of slaves were loading the bags into the cargo area underneath. It was a warm night, and manhandling all those bags is hard work - both of the guys were covered in sweat, even though they'd only been allowed to wear brief slave shorts to help the keep cool. There was a guard with a leather strap watching them, and we could tell they didn't dare stop working - they just nodded at Lewis and me, but made no attempt to exchange even a few words.

The guard saw us, though, and used a key to open another door, next to the baggage compartment. He had one of those radio-linked scanner things like they use at car hire places, and scanned the two tags that Lewis held out to him, then motioned us through the door. It slammed shut behind us, and I heard him lock it, noticing that there was no handle or anything on the inside at all - we were shut in here until they chose to let us out! And "here" wasn't all that great - for one thing, it was only about four feet high, so we couldn't stand up at all; and for another, it was totally bare - just steel walls and a steel floor, although there were a couple of small windows set in the sides ,which I guessed we could peer out from.

Lewis saw me looking, and just shrugged. "They just define one of the baggage holds as being for slaves", he told me. "They're all like this. Come on, let's make the most of it - we've got a long journey ahead of us.". With that he went and sat against one of the walls, and I had to go and sit next to him, of course.

We leaned together to get some shred of human comfort from that bleak place, and soon felt our virtual prison start to vibrate, as the bus engines were revved up. I've never been particularly bored when on planes or buses, or as a passenger in a car - I like to look at the scenery as we go along. So I didn't think the journey would be too bad, as I could see out of the tiny windows. But only about three feet off the ground, there wasn't much of a view, and the journey did go on and on, and our butts got sore from sitting on the bare metal and we were both soon shuffling around. It was hot down there, too - I guess the folk above were all air-conditioned, but Lewis and I were soon sweating, as although the compartment had ventilation grills, all these did was bring in the hot, humid air from outside.

It wasn't as if the bus went very fast, either - well, it did on the Interstate. But we kept having to slow right down and go very slowly indeed through long sections where there were repairs going on, and sometimes come off it altogether and take normal state roads. We cold see gangs of slaves working away on the ruined sections, just as we had when we were first captured, and Lewis said "Poor bastards! Look at them, Spike - those chains keeping them in coffles. And on a hot day like this, they bake, and come winter, they freeze. And you can just tell that some of the guards are real bastards - look at them, those typical 'rednecks', standing there with their whips, guns and prods...."

"Why don't you think they use machinery, sarge?"

"I don't know, really Perhaps it's to keep the slaves occupied - I mean, there are an awful lot of us! Or perhaps it's to remind the North not to attack again - the more roads and bridges they destroy, the more us northerners will have to toil away...."

As we went past one coffle, I pointed out something odd to Lewis - all the guys were white, or, rather, the coffle wasn't the usual mixture of white guys and blacks. None of them was really, of course - working away nearly naked under the hot sun, every one on a coffle was always deeply tanned, as you'd expect. But these guys looked especially dark and swarthy.

"Oh, I expect those are Arabs", Lewis explained. "They keep them coffled together, as no one understands Arabic. And the guards have to really whip them to make them get to see what's to be done." Even as he said this, I could see, as we were halted briefly, a guard standing there shouting at the poor bastards, who clearly did not have a clue what he wanted. Then, as they continued to stand there, he started to lash out at them, seemingly randomly, with his whip, driving them along the highway by the side of our bus.

The poor guys, I saw, must be treated like this all the time - not only was there now fresh blood running down most of them, but I could distinctly see wounds and scars all over their backs.

"See, Spike", Lewis went on. "That's why you need to be careful of the whip. Look at those guys' backs - they never recover properly. And it would be a real pity if your back, or your butt, got like that!"

End Of Part 16