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It was moments, perhaps longer, that Jenny was out cold. She opened her eyes but saw blackness. Blindfolded. She tried to speak, but her mouth had been gagged with something cloth, maybe of her own. She could hear stomping up and down stairs, cars whirring, screaming. The night was still happening out there. The riots and the fights were still very much the new pulse of the city, of the country. Jenny shook her head to shake the cobwebs. She had a terrible headache.
Her arms were tied behind her back. She was sitting in a chair, likely a similar chair to the one Denise had been tied to when she came in. Denise’s boyfriend, the bastard that smacked Jenny out cold, must have tied her up while she was out. Jenny tried to move her legs but couldn’t. They were tied down tight to the chair legs.
Jenny heard a chain, a single metal chain, slowly scratching along the floor. She heard whimpers. She could feel weight shifting just to the left of her.
Jenny forced herself to look down at whatever was making that noise. She heard jingling coming from the form. As the body came into view, Jenny saw a near-naked girl on her knees, connected by the neck to a heavy metal chain. The girl looked up at Jenny. She was young, barely 18 by the looks of her, but her appearance was not that of a normal 18 year old girl. She was short, barely five feet. Her face was bruised in two places, and her back was criss-crossed with marks. Her naked ass was red. The marks looked fresh. This girl had been beaten in the last hour.
But she looked up at Jenny with hope, still, as if to say that she held the key to figuring out this new space. She was tied in her friends’ apartment, and had been tied by some son of a bitch. Jenny looked around. She and this girl on her knees were the only two in the room. Jenny tried to speak, tried to get the girl to untie her gag. The girl looked like she wanted to help, looked pleadingly like she wanted to help, but forced herself not to. Perhaps this girl had tried to help Denise, and this man had stopped it and physically assaulted her. This man, whoever he was, meant business.
Jenny looked down at the girl again. The girl smiled meekly, as if to say “Hey, this isn’t so bad.” Then, out of nowhere, she spoke.
“I’m Lori,” she said.
“Mmph,” Jenny said.
“You’re Jenny,” Lori stated. Jenny was surprised by this. How did she know her name?”
“I peeked through your wallet,” Lori said. “It’s over there, where he threw it after taking the cash.”
Lori pointed to the couch, where several cards and wallets lay strewn.
“My stuff is over there too, my glasses and my stuff” Lori said. “Not that it matters now.”
Jenny gave a confused face. What did she mean by that?
Suddenly, Lori cowered behind Jenny’s chair. “Shit!” She murmured. Jenny heard footsteps. Then, a shadow appeared in the far hall of the apartment. She heard footsteps and something heavy being dragged.
Then, he appeared. The man who had struck Jenny down, the man who had tied her up, who had beaten the young girl behind her, who had captured Denise and lured Jenny in.
Fuck, Jenny thought as she saw him. Richard, Denise’s ex boyfriend.
“Awake I see,” Richard said, slowly coming into the room. He pulled something heavy behind him on another chain. As the body on the ground came into view, Jenny could see Denise in her new state. Naked and chained and beaten in the same manner as Lori, Denise lay unconscious as she was pulled by the neck into the living room.
“mmpphh!” Jenny screamed into her gag. The young girl behind her cowered and shivered.
Richard smiled. “Big time journalist like yourself should know the score by now. I mean, you were there, weren’t ya? Denise told me you were there when the president threw down. Here,” Richard said, reaching for the television remote on the coffee table. “Lemme show you something.”
The television came on. Richard flicked around. Some stations were just static, others reruns. There wasn’t much for new content up today, apparently. Richard flicked to CNN. A new male reporter was sitting at the desk.
The reporter said, “Today is a day we’ll all remember for a long time, perhaps forever. Today, President Obama stripped away the rights of all women, removing them from their positions as equal citizens of America, and placing them at the feet of the male race. He has done this in order to fix our crumbling economy, but the riots across America have shown the American people may not be ready to transition to this new lifestyle so easily.”
CNN switched to footage of riots, fights, breakouts across the nation. Jenny tried to smile but couldn’t. She was so proud of her fellow females, and her fellow males who didn’t support this change.
“That’s sweet, ain’t it?” Richard said. “Y’all think it ain’t over. That y’all ain’t just cattle now? That’s a sweet notion. I tell you, I’ve been waiting for this day ever since this bitch,” Richard pointed down at the unconscious Denise. “Tore my heart to shreds. Saying I abused her and shit.”
Jenny remembered Richard. He’d been a grade A asshole to Denise. He hit her on occasion, and was often drunk and nasty.
“Anyways, I hear the speech yesterday just like everyone else, and I figure the best thing I can do is come right over here and protect my girl, so that she don’t get hurt by nobody. And lo and behold, here’s her best friend come to the rescue, ‘cept it didn’t really work out that way, did it?”
Jenny tried to move in her chair, tried to scream. Richard walked towards her. He stood just a foot away, and reached down with his hand, cupping her face. His hand slowly reached down to her throat. He began to choke her.
“Here’s the rules,” he said. “As of today, you don’t actually have any rights at all, and you’d better get used to that. You don’t have a name, a job, a place in this world. You’re a worthless, rightless being that used to be called a woman. But that word don’t exist anymore. All you are is a cunt, a whore, a fucktoy, a receptacle. You’re whatever I want you to be, because I got to you first. Your boyfriend ain’t never going to see you again. Your boss ain’t never gonna get another report out of you. You’re mine, Jenny, and don’t you forget it.”
Jenny was having trouble breathing. Richard’s hand gripped harder and harder as he spoke. Tears shot from her wide, scared eyes.
Richard let go of her throat, and slapped her face incredibly hard. Her head shot to the side and she screamed hard through the gag.
“You see Lori, my puppy, down there behind you?” Richard said. “You see her marks, her bruises?”
Richard pointed down to Denise. “You see her marks?”
Jenny looked down at Denise, and noticed the same markings on her back, the same bruises on her face.
“That’s how I like my girls to look,” Richard said. “And now it’s your turn. You’re going to wish you had left the country yesterday.”
Richard left the room for a moment, and came back with another chain. He took something black out of his pocket. Jenny couldn’t see straight from the slap, but then she saw it. A thick, black dog collar. The same one around Lori’s neck, Denise’s neck.
“Think of it as your only real possession,” Richard said, lifting Jenny’s hair and placing the collar around her neck. Jenny heard the sound of the clasp and shut her eyes tight.
“You’re just a slave girl now,” Richard said. “You can forget your name.”
He attached the metal chain to her neck. It was heavy. It held her down.
Richard untied her from the chair. Jenny took this as a sign that perhaps she could fight. She flung at Richard, tried to pull the chain away from him, tried to grab his balls and claw at his face. But her shots were weak, her offense easily defended. She was so confused and angry. Why was he so much stronger than me? She thought.
Richard tired of her resistance, and pulled the chain forward and down, causing Jenny to lose her footing and fall to the ground. Richard let loose with several kicks to Jenny’s midsection, ass, and head.
“Had enough?” Richard said. Jenny didn’t move. She just shivered and whimpered.
“Now,” Richard said. “Let’s begin.”
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