Corrective Treatment (7 page)

The nurse placed a tray on the coffee table containing food. Real food. Sliced meats and cheeses, and what looked like wine, but probably wasn’t. She then left the room without a word, moving silently and efficiently and according to the doctor’s will.

“Fancy,” Sophie observed the food dryly. “Trying to impress me, doctor?”

“The sparkling grape juice is to help your blood sugars. The meat and the cheese will provide what your assigned nourishment would have if you had eaten it. This is the kind option, Sophie, though you’ve done little to earn it.”

“So why are you doing it?”

“Because I think you’ve had enough for the moment,” he said. “Your resistance is not conducive to any real treatment. It is not my intention to starve you into submission.”

He was a plain speaker. She liked that. The doctor had little in the way of a hidden agenda, unlike the authorities who habitually spoke out of both sides of their mouths at once and whose eyes gleamed with malevolent intent even as praise spilled from their lips.

“There is little scope for kindness in the treatment,” the doctor reminded her. “I suggest you make the most of this.”

She was very hungry, but she had declared that she was on a hunger strike, and what kind of hunger strike ended just because some cheese was brought into the room? It was with a growling stomach and more than a little regret that Sophie shook her head.

The doctor’s large, powerful palm slid down her back in a soothing motion. “Sophie,” he said gently. “It’s time to eat. You don’t have to fight me. I am not the enemy.”

Maybe he thought he wasn’t the enemy, but he was the one she had to resist.

“It’s not worth it,” he said. “If we have to feed you via tube, it will hurt, and you will be strapped down for hours at a time. It will be punishment on top of punishment, torment on top of torment. If you intend to resist me, you need your strength. Once you start to weaken from hunger, your mind will weaken too.”

“You’re giving me tips on how to resist you?”

“I’m telling you to eat,” he said with a rakish wink, which melted some of her resolve.

“Okay,” she said. “I won’t go on a hunger strike, but your treatment isn’t going to work either. I promise you that.”

* * *

Oh, but she was a rebellious little brat. Richard had half-expected her to come in crying after a night in the cell, but she was more determined than ever to give him trouble. He could respect her for that, while simultaneously wanting to thrash her bottom.

As Sophie started to eat, the nurse returned with a message.

“Doctor, the president is on your telecommunications line.”

“The president,” Sophie said in mocking tones. “Well, better take his call, doctor. Can’t keep the president waiting, can we?”

“Finish your meal,” Richard said, moving to take the call at his desk. He picked up the private receiver and put it to his ear. “Mr. President, how may I be of service?”

“How is the treatment going with the premier’s girl?” There were no pleasantries to the conversation, just the brash, impatient statement. The highest among the upper echelons sounded tense.

“Very well,” Richard lied through his teeth, watching Sophie nibble on a piece of cheese.

“She’ll forget her silly nonsense and recant publicly? I expect true remorse,” the president thundered down the line. “She’s caused more unrest than the typhoon of ‘999999. I have reporters at my door daily. They want to see her repent and recant. They’re talking about insurrection. There have been protests, doctor. People abandoning their duties to march in the streets. We cannot have that. I will not have that!”

“Corrective treatment may not necessarily alter the underlying belief system of a patient,” Richard attempted to explain. “It seeks to modify behavior within lawful parameters.”

“Don’t give me your long words and tedious explanations. I want that girl crying on the next broadcast, and I want a full list of everyone she conspired with. We will root this uprising out wherever they hide and we will restore order. The girl is the key to that. Break her if you have to. Go as hard as it takes, for as long as it takes.”

The line went dead. Richard turned from his desk to see Sophie smirking at him brazenly, her green eyes dancing with mischief.

“There’s trouble, isn’t there,” she said knowingly. “People don’t like what’s happening to me, do they?”

How did she know? Perhaps she’d overheard the president. He’d certainly been loud enough on the phone. Or maybe she’d known all along what would happen when the judges sentenced her. Maybe she’d even planned this. She looked incredibly pleased with herself, that much was certain.

“People like me,” she said, taking a sip of juice. “They’re going to be very angry at what’s happened to me. The judges should be careful.”

She spoke like a spoiled little brat who didn’t realize the forces she was playing with.

“There is some unrest,” he confirmed. “But it is not a good thing. People will be hurt, Sophie. Really hurt, if they resist the authority.”

“It’s not my fault that we are ruled by corruption,” she shrugged. “I have done nothing wrong.”

Nothing wrong. She probably believed that, seeing things as she did through the very narrow filter of doing whatever she wanted to do. Sophie was so spoiled she didn’t even realize that doing as one pleased was a luxury only someone like her could dream of.

It was time to lay down the law in no uncertain manner. She did not seem to understand the real danger she was putting herself in, or the full potential scope of her punishment.

Richard walked over to her, lifted her out of the chair with one easy motion, and sat down in it instead.

“Let me explain to you what is happening here,” he said, pulling her between his thighs so she was standing trapped in place, his hands firm on her hips as his eyes locked with hers. “Corrective treatment usually takes a day or two at most…”

“I know,” she smirked. “I had to stay overnight in the worst hotel room ever.”

“But it can take a great deal longer,” he said, watching as the smile began to fade from her face. “I can sign off your treatment at any time I consider you unlikely to relapse into your previous antisocial tendencies,” he said. “This can take two days, or it could take two years… or it could take longer.”

Her eyes widened. “Two years?”

“In the past it was not uncommon for political prisoners to be imprisoned for decades,” Richard said. “But the treatments were not as advanced then, and society was more tolerant of crime and incarceration. At any rate, you will be here as long as I see fit. So forget about hunger strikes, or rebellions. Learn your lesson, Sophie. You will save yourself and everyone else a great deal of pain.”

She looked at him with a grave expression as she weighed what he had said with her commitment to her ideals.

“No.”

“…no?”

“No,” Sophie said. “I believe in what we’re doing. I’m prepared to suffer for it. The longer I’m here, the more people will talk. Everyone in the colony knows I am here. They’re going to have to let me out, doctor. Sooner rather than later.”

She really believed that too. Richard knew there was little point telling her anyone foolish enough to take up against the authority would be crushed like a bug. Sophie didn’t understand that the coddling she was receiving would not be extended to the lower ranks. They would be dealt with swiftly and without mercy. It was about time she got a proper taste of what it truly meant to suffer for rebellion.

Richard pulled her over his thigh, her butt bared immediately by merit of the short length of the dress that barely covered her cheeks to begin with. It took Sophie a second to catch on to what was happening; she certainly hadn’t expected to find herself in that position, he was sure of that. A day of pleasuring her naughty pussy had given her the wrong idea about corrective treatment. It was time to set her straight.

“Listen,” he said. “You have to abandon this rebellion. It will end in much worse than anything I could or would ever do to you. If the authority are not satisfied with your rehabilitation, they will remove you from society entirely one way or another.”

“I don’t care.”

“Then you will be made to care, you brat.”

He started spanking her, his palm landing on her bottom with harsh resolve and great intensity. This was not some job anymore, or even a pleasant interlude with a cute girl. It was a matter of life and death. Sophie had to understand that someone cared about what happened to her. The more she baited the authority, the harder it was going to be to protect her.

She started yowling almost immediately, her squeals sounding at a desperately high pitch. It was just a hand spanking, but she had not been physically disciplined before and she certainly didn’t know how to take it. In under a minute she was bucking and squirming, her legs kicking back and forth furiously with every hard slap that clapped against her now hot pink cheeks.

“You brute!” She twisted around to glare at him and he gave her just enough leeway for her to turn her upper body halfway toward him. It was a good opportunity to monitor the effects of his treatment. Thus far he seemed to be having an impact. Her eyes were sparkling, her face flushed. She was angry, but more than angry, she was aroused. He could see it in every line of her body, in the heat that was evident in every bit of blushing skin. Her nipples were erect. He could smell her arousal, sweet virginal juices flowing over his thigh and making a damp spot where her pussy wriggled.

Richard’s cock hardened, his desire rising. It would be so easy to bend her over the back of the chair and thrust himself inside her. He wanted to fuck her and fuck her hard, but he restrained himself. No matter how beautiful she was, no matter how much she wanted it, how much her body begged for it, it wasn’t his job to fuck her. It was his job to teach her a lesson and try to save her from the tragedy she seemed determined to make real. Sophie did not learn anything from orgasms. She needed hard, sustained discipline.

He wrapped an arm around her waist and pushed up from the chair, sweeping her into the air with one strong movement that made her squeal.

The chair was not merely aesthetically pleasing. It was functional. The padding curved over the thick back of the piece, making it the perfect spot for placing a brat in need of a spanking. He bent Sophie over it and held her in place with one hand on the small of her back as he reached for the implement he had placed on his desk.

The paddle was somewhat archaic in style, made of a synthetic leather that flexed and moved like leather, but would not degrade or crack and did not require the production of bovine animals to create. It was perfectly sized for the feminine rear, long enough to catch both cheeks in a single swat and several inches thick to ensure a good solid area of coverage.

“Doctor!” She screeched his title desperately, but the word was not enough to save her from the consequences of her behavior.

The paddle bit across her cheeks, a
crack
echoing through the room as a thick band of hot pink flashed across her bottom. This treatment he repeated a further five times in quick succession, keeping the same placement, searing her bottom with steady strokes.

Sophie screamed at the top of her lungs, more out of rage and offense than pain, though he was certain her bottom was not at all comfortable.

She burst into tears on the sixth stroke, her wail turning to a plaintive cry that was choked out by the onset of tears. Richard would not have allowed a little sniffling to halt the punishment, but Sophie was bawling with obvious distress that he did not think had all that much to do with her sore bottom.

This was a moment of revelation for the poor girl, who was discovering all at once and much too late in her life that not all discipline could be shrugged off, evaded, or sneered at. As one of the upper echelons, she had been raised with kid gloves, barely touched. It was very possible she had not known that her body could ache and sting in the way it currently was. The intensity of the sensation was overwhelming her.

He released her and watched as she bounced up from the chair, grabbed her ass, and started jigging back and forth from toe to toe, tears streaming down her pretty face. Her green eyes sparked with wild confusion. She really did not know what had happened to her.

Richard felt a rush of pity for Sophie. The poor girl had been raised in a bubble and now she was being thrust into harsh reality under circumstances that would be difficult for anybody. He reached out and pulled her close to him, wrapping comforting arms around her shoulders.

“Shhh,” he soothed, reaching down to rub her cheeks. They were burning hot from the paddle, exuding heat into his palm. He knew the sting would already be fading. A half-dozen strokes was enough to give her a short, sharp shock, not to leave a lasting impression. “It already doesn’t hurt as much, does it?”

“That hurt,” she sobbed against his chest. “That hurt a lot.”

He held her close and rubbed her bottom and before he could stop himself, pressed a comforting kiss to her forehead. It was a natural reaction to try to soothe her a little.

“It was supposed to hurt,” he said gently. “Because what will happen if you don’t listen to me, and you don’t modify your behavior, will hurt a lot more than that. That was only six strokes with a paddle after a warm-up.”

“We’ve always been told our society doesn’t resort to brutality,” she sniffed. “You’re cruel.”

Her reaction showed how innocent she really was. A little spanking was enough to break her down. If he were to use the sort of techniques that had been used historically on those who dissented against their governments, there was real risk of doing permanent harm.

“I don’t like you,” she sobbed, burying her face in his chest and pressing close to him. He was her source of pain, but he was also her only source of comfort. Richard held her as long as she cried, until finally she pulled away, dark lashes sticking to her wet cheeks as she gazed at him with a mixture of disbelief and something else… something softer, perhaps.