Piper's Price

by D. A. Maddox

  Michael pulled at his hair until it hurt.

  Fuck!

  When one of the bailiffs started his way, he got up without being told and left.

  Chapter Four

  Intake

  The media was on either side of the walkway that led from the back of the courtroom to the police car. Their cameras flashed, even under daylight. They shouted questions at him. Unlike the judge, they didn’t call him “Mr. McNeal”.

  Was this a difficult choice, Robbie?

  Do you feel you’ve been treated fairly, Robbie?

  Robbie, are you scared?

  The answer to all three questions was “yes”, but he said nothing. He bowed his head low enough that his chin was practically buried in the top of his chest. The bailiff’s grip on his arm was soft and loose. He could break free, if he felt like it. But there was nowhere to go—only forward, through the gauntlet of reporters, to the car that would drive him to prison.

  For being a peeping Tom, he thought. For being a pervert. For being a bad person. A creep.

  At the time, he thought it was the deepest shame imaginable.

  As the bailiff opened the door at the back of the cruiser, he couldn’t help but wonder how Michael had felt, deep down. It had been his idea. He had seemed horrified, overrun with guilt. But was he?

  He’s not my friend, Robbie thought. He manipulated me. He tricked me. Maybe he even tipped off the girls so I’d get busted for sure.

  But as soon as the suspicion dawned in his mind, he dismissed it. Michael would never do that to him. They were friends—and even if they weren’t, what could he possibly have to gain by Robbie going to jail? Not only that, but that kind of underhandedness and betrayal didn’t happen in America anymore, not the way it was now. People were better now.

  Teachers had told him so. His church had told him so.

  There’s a lot you don’t know, he reminded himself, feeling the hand of the bailiff on the top of his head, easing him into the vehicle. Nobody really learns anything until the age of citizenship, when school’s done and work begins. When they take away the safety codes and open all the forbidden channels. And they must have jails for a reason—not just for peeping Toms like me.

  He slid into the seat. Shortly, the car started to move. On either side of it, the cameras were still flashing. Robbie closed his eyes. He didn’t open them until, twenty minutes later, they reached their destination.

  ****

  “I’m going to let you know your rights,” the bailiff said, driving, her voice not unkind and yet bereft of compromise. “Don’t go to sleep on me, Robbie.”

  “No, ma’am,” Robbie said. “I’m awake.”

  “You have the right to personal safety,” she said. “You’re being placed in the protective wing of the prison facility, and you’ll have little interaction with the other inmates—provided you pass the interview. It’s a short stay. You shouldn’t go too stir-crazy. With me so far?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said. “I understand.”

  “Good. That right extends to the provisions of reasonable housing, three healthy meals a day, and the maintenance of your personal hygiene. Nothing that happens during your stay will cause you any permanent or lasting physical harm. You also have the right to an hour of psychiatric counseling—totally optional—after dinner and before lights out, every night you’re with us. Got it?”

  “Permanent?” he asked, keeping his eyes shut. “Lasting?”

  “Nothing too painful, either, provided you’re a good boy and do as you’re told. Regardless, you leave all in one piece. Not a hair on that pretty little head of yours will suffer an injury worth talking about. All disciplinary and corrective measures taken upon your person will be carefully controlled. We’re not savages. Any real unpleasantness you experience in a physical sense will be your own fault, so best to listen carefully and obey without question.”

  “Yes, ma’am. I’m listening.”

  “At any time throughout your incarceration, you retain the right to opt out of the alternative discipline program. Doing so will place you back on the standardized sentencing track—which I really would not recommend for someone so tender in age, so … new to adulthood. They’d eat you alive on the real ‘inside’. So, this is only advice, but it’s good advice: bite your lip and get through it. You’re very lucky to have been given this option.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said. It was hardly a whisper.

  “The following are rights you absolutely don’t have, so don’t expect them, and don’t complain about it: the right to privacy, the right to secrets, the right to talk whenever you want. Most of your experiences over the next few days will be on camera and under witness. Everything you do or that’s done to you will be carefully scrutinized. You’ll be required to answer honestly any question that’s put to you, no matter how personal—and to shut up unless answering a question or unless given permission to speak. Also, any notions about personal space you’ve had are about to get blown. All effective from the moment you enter the facility. Is that clear?”

  Robbie caught the sob in his throat. He didn’t bite his lip, but he grit his teeth before answering, “Yes, ma’am.”

  She parked the car. She got out. Robbie listened to her come around to his side, to the back. Heard the door open.

  “We’re here,” she said. “Out you come, Robbie.”

  He batted his eyes against the intrusion of light. No media. Good.

  She led him into the building.

  ****

  The Intake hall of the protective wing—which turned out to be its own building, one of several surrounding the much larger one for gen pop—was white and sterile. As soon as Robbie set his feet on the bright, tiled floor, the bailiff reclaimed her cuffs and transferred custody of him to an Intake officer. Then she left, without saying another word, presumably to resume her duties in the courtroom. Directly in front of him, centered on the floor, was a steel frame seven feet high and three wide.

  That’s a metal detector, he thought. The one at the courtroom had been ensconced in oakwood, made to blend unobtrusively with the surroundings. No such aesthetic considerations here. He was a criminal, not to be trusted.

  At least the Intake officer was a guy, forty or so years old, with a neatly clipped black moustache and a receding hairline. Robbie could not help but feel somewhat relieved. It seemed somehow more appropriate that he would be indoctrinated to whatever punishments awaited him by a man.

  There was a table set before the frame. Upon it sat a basket with his name on it.

  “Take off your shoes, your socks, and your belt.” Then, as an afterthought, “No jewelry?”

  “No, sir,” Robbie said, sliding off his dress shoes and his black socks, placing them in the basket.

  “No surgical implants? Good. Everything metal goes in the basket. Your wallet, too. Empty it first, and we’ll put it on the inventory. You get it all back on release.”

  “Yes, sir,” Robbie said, his bare toes curling against the floor. He did as he was told, depositing his belt and wallet and his spare change into the basket with his other things.

  “Okay, step through.”

  Robbie passed under the frame. As he emerged on the other side of it, an electronic whirr drew his attention to the ceiling, where several cameras—as white as the wall, minus the lenses—trained in on him. They moved and swiveled by slow degrees with every movement he made, tracking him.

  “You lose everything else at the end of the hall, and I don’t want to hear no bitchin’ or complaining.”

  Through an open door, Robbie could make out what looked like a bathroom. He didn’t think there were any cameras in there.

  “There’s a partition around one of the showers, if you’re feeling shy. There’s a plastic bag in there with your jail clothes in it. Toss your other shit out separately, one item at a time. And you’re to clean every inch of yourself, got it?”

  I know how to take a damn shower, Robbie thought, mildly surprised at his own
thought-swearing. “Yes, sir,” he said.

  “Use the toilet first. After you’re done, spend special attention to getting your unit clean—especially under the scrotum. You’re to do a soaped finger-job up your butthole as well. If you fail to follow any of these instructions, you’ll be made to go through the whole procedure again—with assistance. Not much fun for me, less for you.”

  Robbie’s mouth opened and shut again. He was shocked. No one had ever spoken to him like that before. Then the actual instruction registered. “You … want me to clean my … my anus?” Color rushed to his cheeks, just saying it.

  “He can be taught!” the officer proclaimed with a chuckle. “Yes, son. You need to get right up and in there, past your glory hole, close up to the prostate as you can without hurting yourself. Go on, now.”

  How will you even know if I do it when I’m behind the partition? Robbie wondered. But as he walked the long hall alone, cameras following his every move, he made a decision to follow the instructions to the letter. He didn’t want to spend five years here. He had to do as they said—everything they said, no matter what.

  They were cops. They’d find out if he disobeyed.

  ****

  Fifteen minutes later, he was wearing a green jumpsuit, #186, over a sleeveless black undershirt and scratchy cotton underwear. There was a hat, too, and plain white socks, but no shoes of any kind. The hat was like a baseball cap, bright red, with the words CONSEQUENCES, LIVE! embroidered at the front. He didn’t put it on.

  Sometime while he’d been washing, his possessions had been claimed from the other side of the partition. He’d managed to stay out of sight from the Intake officer and the cameras throughout the whole process. And yet he had felt very self-conscious, standing naked in a strange place with the entry side of the partition wide open for any who might have passed by. Robbie was deeply thankful no one had, particularly when he…

  Back out in the open, staring into the bathroom mirror over the sink, he gave his hands a second, and much more vigorous, cleaning. His eyes were bloodshot. He wasn’t in any pain, but he felt a little soreness down there when he moved. He hoped he’d done a good enough job.

  Finger-job, his brain auto-corrected. Don’t make such a big deal of it. It’s not like someone else did it to you.

  Hard steps on the cold floor from out in the hall. Robbie turned, expecting to find the Intake officer there waiting for him, probably impatiently. But the Intake officer was gone.

  In his place there stood a female police officer, probably about the same age as the man who had left. She wore her thick, brown hair up in a bun. Her frame was sturdy, robust, her uniform black and short-sleeved, with a Punishment Warden badge pinned under the left shoulder. Warm brown eyes bored in on him, looking him up and down, assessing him, as her hard, black shoes clacked closer in his direction.

  “Greetings,” she said. “My name is Nurse Reyes-Garcia. I am an officer of this correctional facility and the head punishment warden. But to you I am only Matron. You must be Robbie.”

  Robbie nodded, facing her, anxiety needles creeping over his back like centipedes.

  She stopped at the doorway, no more than three feet from him. “Let me hear you say it.”

  “Yes, Matron,” Robbie said.

  “Your number is 186,” she noted. “But I think I will continue to call you Robbie. It is a cute name, a name a little boy might have. You are going to be an obedient boy, Robbie, will you not?”

  “Yes, Matron.”

  “All cleaned up, then?” she asked. “It is very important that my boys are squeaky clean.”

  Robbie wanted to ask where the other officer had gone—but that would have been difficult, even if he had dared, since he had never taken note of the man’s name. Instead, he said again, “Yes, Matron.”

  “Put the hat on, please,” she said. “Let the cameras see you wear it.”

  Robbie had only the vaguest idea what Consequences, Live! actually was, based on the very little bit he had seen two years ago—and he wasn’t, generally, a wearer of hats. But he made no protest, asked no questions. He put the hat on, adjusting the sizing strap until it nestled on his head comfortably.

  She smiled at him. It was a nice smile, filled with compassion. “I think you are going to be just fine, Robbie,” she said. “First impressions are good, very good. You will come with me now to the interview room. We have much to talk about. I shall learn all about you and decide what is to be done.”

  Robbie stepped out of the bathroom, his socks slippery over the tiles.

  She gestured to a hall on the left. Robbie went that way, Nurse Reyes-Garcia following close. More cameras. But, just now, Robbie hardly noticed them. He felt like he was being very kindly and gently marched toward his own execution.

  “Yes,” she said over his shoulder, the words dripping reassurance, “we are going to like each other just fine.”

  Part Two:

  Lessons in Compliance

  Chapter Five

  Interview

  Robbie stopped at the closed door, waiting for Nurse Reyes-Garcia. She gave his bicep a squeeze and carded the door open. It swung inward on its own, revealing a room with mirrored walls, a black stone table with two chairs—and also a large video camera on a tripod. This last was operated by another female officer with straight, raven-colored hair and icy blue eyes that were a stark contrast against her olive skin. She was trim, pretty, somehow fierce-looking—and no more than four or five years older than Robbie himself, at a glance.

  Dangling about her neck was a second camera, also digital but obviously for still shots. She was fussing with the zoom control when they entered, but she stopped as soon as they were inside.

  “Mornin’, boss,” she greeted Nurse Reyes-Garcia, ignoring Robbie completely.

  “Good day, Officer Kersey. Is everything in readiness?”

  On the table lay a jumble of wires connected to what looked like a heart monitor. Next to that was a small laptop with the screen flipped up.

  “Oh, yeah. Just the autofocus giving me a bit of a headache at the moment. I can do it manually. No worries. You can start right away.”

  Hesitantly, Robbie ventured, “Um … where do you need me to be?” Then added quickly, “Matron?”

  He figured he’d be asked to sit in one of the two chairs. Instead, the senior officer stood in front of him and placed a shushing finger directly over his lips. “I did not give you permission to speak. Do that two more times and I will call in Officer Thompson for discipline. All of this was explained to you in the car, yes? There. I have now asked a question of my own. You may answer.”

  Robbie looked down, studying his feet. “Yes, Matron,” he said through the finger still held to his mouth. “I’m sorry.”

  “Do not concern yourself with asking things. I will tell you what to do.”

  But this is just the interview, he wanted to protest. I’m not even in the program yet. Whatever it is.

  Officer Kersey let the smaller camera dangle, forgotten, as she turned the larger one to point directly at him. “We’re on in twenty. Transferring the feed from the monitor cams now … And five, four, three…”

  Nurse Reyes-Garcia’s eyes never left him, and only now did she draw her finger back. “Remove your jumpsuit, please,” she said. “I wish to see you in your penitent’s tank top and underpants.”

  It was so out of the blue and surreal, Robbie almost laughed. His mouth hung open, his eyes darting between his Matron’s and the camera lens, behind which a pretty young woman was watching him.

  Nurse Reyes-Garcia reached into her pants pocket, drew out what looked like a remote control of some kind, and clicked a button. The mirror wall to his right went black. On its surface appeared a number sequence, counting down from 30.

  “You will have half a minute to comply with any and all instructions given to you by me or anyone I appoint, dear boy. Using all of the time will only make your ordeal take longer. Failure to comply will be met with punishment. S
trip to your tank top and underpants, please.”

  The counter read 20.

  Robbie had expected a strip search—had been secretly dreading it from the moment he first encountered the judge and began to wonder if things might not go his father’s way. Coming in, he’d thought it would happen under the bored administration of the Intake officer. He hadn’t expected to be made to undress—even partially—in front of women. Trembling, he moved his hand to his head, for the cap…

  “Leave on the hat, Robbie. Do only what I tell you. Do all of what I tell you.”

  The counter red 10.

  The jumpsuit had a plastic zipper that ran from collar to crotch. Robbie unzipped it, hesitated until the counter read 5, and then let it drop, hanging his head. His face burned with embarrassment. His Matron was a nurse, and easily in her middle age—it wasn’t such a big deal, he supposed, standing in his underwear in front of her. From behind the camera, Officer Kersey ran her tongue over her top lip. Filming him with his jumpsuit around his socks.

  I shouldn’t be so … damned shy, he said to himself. I’m fit. I exercise. I’ve got nothing to be ashamed of.

  He clasped his hands in front of himself. There was a stirring down there, quite beyond his control, and the last thing he needed was to stand here this way, pitching a tent for any who might be watching.

  At another click of the remote, the Obedience Counter went blank, and the wall to Robbie’s left flashed with a new number. This one was going up instead of down: 197 … 201 … 206 …

  “Smile,” Officer Kersey said to him. “You’re on TV, Inmate 186.”

  207 … 211 … 215 …

  “The program, as you may have guessed,” Nurse Reyes-Garcia said, “is called Consequences, Live! It is one of the shows that becomes available upon reaching the age of citizenship. People do not usually tune in during the interview. It is—oh, how do you say?—a ‘pay per view’ thing. They usually wait until the subject has been officially entered into the program—and then, if they like the young man or woman in question, they may always go back to view this beginning part on the archives.”