With a loud, metallic ‘click’ the lock of Claudia’s cage unlocked. The sailor opened the door and grunted “out.” Bowing her head, Claudia shuffled forward on her knees, ducking under the cage door. Silently, she stood, holding her hands out to be cuffed. After two weeks aboard the slave ship, not to mention the days spent in the dungeon following her kidnapping, the former teacher had gotten used to the usual routine.

The sailor grabbed Claudia’s right arm and slipped a cuff around it. She winced, briefly, as the shackle tightened against her skin. He repeated the process with her left wrist. Kneeling down, he methodically did the same with her feet. “Open up!” The slaver barked. The younger woman opened her mouth to accept the large rubber ball her captor slipped between her teeth. He quickly buckled the straps tight, behind her head.

“In line, slave.” The man said, giving Claudia a light push. The young woman didn’t stumble as she shuffled forward, moving as quickly as the leg irons on her feet would allow. She’d grown accustomed to moving about while wearing shackles.

A short distance away, another sailor grabbed Claudia and dragged her in line, behind two other slaves. The flog held in his grip was enough to guarantee none of them tried anything. Meanwhile, the first slaver moved down to the next cage and unlocked the door. When its occupant crawled out and stood up, he went to work, cuffing her wrists and ankles and gagging her, before shoving her into line.

It took a while for the sailors to release all of the girls from their cages. After they had stopped and picked up Natasha and the other girls, the ship had stopped twice more, each time, taking on another load of poor, frightened women, kidnapped and destined for a life of slavery. All but two of the cages now held a miserable, naked captive inside it.

Finally, the last girl was let out of her cage and quickly cuffed and gagged. Swinging their leather flogs, the two slavers got the mass of captive women moving out of the hold. Claudia grunted into her gag as the leather straps slapped across her side. Luckily, the sailor hadn’t put much force into the swing, but it still stung, as she shuffled down the hallway.

To her surprise, the women weren’t being taken onto the deck for exercise or to the crew’s quarter’s for more “training”. They passed by the quarters, and the common area, where a couple off duty crewman were playing cards. Just beyond their, the slaves were led through another door into a large bathroom. A number of shower stalls lined one wall.

“Listen up, ladies!” One of the sailors said in a loud voice. “In a few hours, we’ll be arriving at our destination. Before that, though, we’ve got to make you presentable! You’ve got ten minutes to get yourselves cleaned off.” He grinned. “You might have to share showers with one or two other girls.”

Along with the rest of the women, Claudia shuffled forward, to one of the shower stalls. She found herself sharing it with two other girls, leaving very little room. Tucked in one corner were several bottles of shampoo. With the other two girls, Claudia squealed into her gag in surprise as the water turned on, spraying them with cold water. After a moment, it began to warm a little.

As much as her chains allowed, Claudia grabbed a bar of soap and started to clean herself. She sighed into her gag. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d had an actual shower. A few times during the voyage, the slavers had sprayed their helpless captives down with a hose to clean them off, but to her mind, that certainly didn’t count.

While the women showered, the off duty sailors drifted in, to watch the naked girls. Claudia was intently aware of their gazes on her wet, naked body as she rinsed off the soapy suds, but there was nothing she could do about that. As she had done since her kidnapping, she could only try to ignore the leers as much as possible.

Claudia stepped out of the shower, shivering and dripping wet. One of the sailors stepped forward with a towel and firmly dried her off. If he took the opportunity to feel up her naked, trembling body while he did so…well she was just a slave. Such things were just part of her lot in life.

As Claudia and the other women finished showering and were dried off, they were rounded up by their guards and herded into a line. Claudia’s eyes widened in fear, as she saw two of the men pull out small glass bottles. Opening them, they poured a small amount of colorless liquid onto a cloth.

Chloroform! She thought to herself, a twinge of fear running down her spine. They were going to knock them out. The men advanced on the first two girls in line. The frightened captives squirmed, struggling to avoid being drugged, but with her hands and feet shackled, they had no chance. A chorus of gag-muffled groans of fear went up from the line of women. The sailors drew their flogs and growled threats, to keep their prisoners cowed.

After a few moments, the two girls slumped over, out cold. Instantly, they were picked up by sailors and carried out of the room. The men with the drugged soaked rags moved on to the next girls. Seeing that fighting it was futile, the two glumly submitted and allowed the men to clamp the rags over their faces. A few moments later, they slumped over, bodies limp as they were carried away.

Claudia felt her face go pale as she realized she was next in line. She was going to be drugged again. She trembled slightly as the men wrapped one arm around her naked body, to keep her from pulling away. His other hand gently pressed the wet pad over her. The familiar scent of the drugs flooded Claudia’s nostrils. She moaned into her gag, suddenly feeling very light headed.

“That’s it…” she heard the man whisper, as she drifted off into oblivion. “Just breathe it in…”



“Ugh…” Claudia moaned as she climbed her way back up from the pit of unconsciousness back to the waking world. The first thing she realized, as she came to was she was no longer gagged, or shackled. She was still naked, though, not that Claudia expected anything else from her captors at this point. She could feel the soft sheets of a bed beneath her naked body.

There was a firm pressure around her neck. While she’d been unconscious someone had locked a metal collar around her neck. The collar must have been fitted to her measurements, it fit snugly, evenly around her neck. Four D-rings were fitted to the collar at the front, back and sides.  

“Hey, she’s up!” Claudia heard a female voice nearby say. With a groan, she rolled over, opening her eyes. She found herself in a spacious room. It was well furnished, with comfortable looking beds, two tables with chairs and a bookshelf. Claudia couldn’t help but notice the small, but obvious camera in one corner of the ceiling, watching the whole room. What caught her eye; however were the half a dozen nude young women in the room, looking at her.

“Hello!” One of the women, a friendly looking blonde woman standing over the bed, said, smiling. “I’m Amber….Amber Mills. What’s your name?”

“Claudia Donavan.” She replied, sitting up. She shook her head, trying to clear it of the last traces of the knockout drugs. “Where am I?”

“Our gilded cage.”  Said, with a chuckle. “Let me introduce you to your new roommates…” She extended a hand and helped Claudia to her feet. One by one, she was introduced to the other slaves. Amber was the oldest of the group, at 33. She was also the one who’d been hear the longest, having been kidnapped with two of her friends during a road trip to a concert six years ago.

The youngest were two French sisters, Adeline and Elaine, both 19, who’d been kidnapped on a school trip along with their teacher and schoolmates, the previous year. They only spoke a little English, but one of the other girls, 22 year old Charlotte had taken some French in college, before she’d been kidnapped by a fake taxi at an airport during the holiday break, and was able to translate.

To her surprise, Claudia didn’t see any of her fellow captives on the boat in the group. “They like to spread the new girls out among the older slaves.” Amber explained to Claudia. “We’re punished as a group. If one girl disobeys, all of us suffer.” She gave a sardonic smile, “It forces all of us to ‘encourage’ you to obey.”

“How do they punish you?” Claudia asked, remembering the punishments the sailors had dealt out to her and the other women at sea. Those had mainly makeshift and haphazard, devised according to the materials onboard and the whim of the board sailors. She shuddered to think of what they might do here…

Amber shrugged. “Depends on the infraction. Sometimes, it’s simply revoking of certain privileges.” She waved her hand to encompass the bookshelves, the beds and the rest of the room. “We’re allowed a few comforts while we’re not working, and so long as we obey. Other times, they might increase our work duties. For more serious crimes, the usual punishment is flogging.”

She was quiet for a moment. “Then, there’s the Dungeon. It’s where they take girls who try to run away or try and fight back. I don’t know what goes on down there. The girls who have been sent to the dungeon are forbidden from telling anyone else, but I know you don’t want to end up down there.”

Just then, there was a stern, loud, knock at the door. Amber glanced over her shoulder. “They’re here. Come on, Claudia,” She said, turning. “It’s time to start your first day of work…” Claudia rose from the bed. All of the other girls were hurrying to the center of the room, where they lined up, facing the door. She hurried to join them.

Just as she got into line, the door opened and a pair of guards came in. They were wearing a uniform similar to the men on the ship, but a dark green, instead of blue. On their belts were the tools of their cruel trade: cuffs, gags, leather flogs, stun guns… As they entered, the other slaves bowed their heads, submissively, holding out their hands to be cuffed. Hurriedly, Claudia did the same.

“Well, well, new girl…” One of the men said, stepping in front of Claudia. “Are you going to give us any trouble?” He reached down to his belt and unhooked a pair of handcuffs.

Claudia shook her head, as the man stepped forward and quickly locked the metal cuffs around her wrists. “No…sir…” she added quickly. The man nodded. “Good to see the boat boys have at least taught you some obedience. Keep it up and your life here will be an easy one…”

The man went down the line of girls, snapping cuffs onto each of them in turn. His partner stood back, by the door, alert for any sign of resistance from the captive women, hand hovering over his stun gun. Claudia wondered if this display of readiness was meant for her benefit, assuring her the security here was more than enough to dash any hope of escape.

The first guard finished shackling the slaves. Reaching down to his belt again, he pulled out a number of short chains, with metal clips at either end. With these, he quickly formed the slaves into a short coffle. Grabbing the first girl’s leash, the man tugged on it. Without a word, the slaves started forward, after him, Claudia in the rear. The second guard fell in line behind her, as they left the cell.

Glancing around, Claudia found herself in a long hallway that seemed to stretch on and on. Spaced every dozen yards or so was a door; to another cell like the one she’d come from, Claudia presumed. The well-lit hallway was carpeted and the walls were papered, it reminded the young woman somewhat of a middling-rate hotel.

The hallway was busy. She saw several groups of slave girls, cuffed and coffled like her, being led out of, or put back into the cells by pairs of guards. More guards patrolled the hall, watching for signs of trouble…  

“Eyes down, slave!” Claudia squealed in surprise as the guard casually slapped her naked backside with his hand. She noticed all of the other slaves shuffled along with their heads bowed. “That’s your warning. Next time will be the flog.” The guard growled. She quickly directed her gaze to her feet. Even so, the young continued to glance around, as much as she dared to risk, curious about the place she would be spending the rest of her life in.

At the end of the hallway, the coffle passed through a set of doors, and into a large elevator. They rose two floors and the elevator doors opened into another long hallway, lined with doors along one side. Claudia guessed this was a service hallway, for moving slaves and things around the facility, without bothering the guests. A few of the doors were open. Claudia glanced through the doors, catching glimpses of expensively decorated rooms, filled with well-dressed men, and more than a few women, being attended by slaves.

The guards brought the coffle to a halt in front of one of the doors. Claudia could hear the sounds of babble coming from the other side of the wooden door. It grew louder as the door opened. A man leaned out of the door and took the lead girl’s leash, and led the girls in. Claudia took a breath to steady herself as she walked through the door. Her new life had just begun…