By Joshua Ryan

Maybe it was around 8 o’clock when they locked me in. I’d never gone to sleep that early in my life. And who knows how many hours it was till I took that shit? I was totally out of it. Totally wasted by these insults I’d received. But the morning came, signaled by a BANG on the door. A voice yelled “CHOW. Eat it all. NOW.” A little hatch opened in the door, and another dose of workie food dropped into my storage unit.

OK, I was hungry again. So I ate it. Sitting on my “bed,” with the crumbs dropping onto my naked junk. And hair growing on my face that I couldn’t shave off. And a collar around my neck!

I was just finishing my workie breakfast bar when the same voice went down the line saying, “It’s time! Take a shit and fold your blanket! It’s time! Take a shit . . . .”

I didn’t need to shit again, so I folded my blanket and laid it on my bed, hoping that I did it right. Then the door was unlocked. I saw another workie looking back at me. This one’s name was Drum. It was his voice that had been giving the orders. You know those guys that are so buffed out, their clothes don’t fit anymore? That was Drum.

“Step out with your trash and dump it!” he said. I grabbed my trash can with the workie bar wrappers inside and I dumped it in the bin he was rolling down the line. “Back inside!” he said, and he locked me in again. But not for long. “Step out” was the next command.

So we lined up in front of our storage units, and the next thing that happened, Drum taught us stuff. Like how to stand at attention. And how to walk in a line, with your hands behind your back, like you were cuffed up even though you weren’t. That’s the way we were supposed to “march,” with our hands behind our backs like that. Except when they told us to “go nuts to butts,” which I don’t need to explain.

After we’d practiced “the positions” a couple dozen times, he went on to another topic. “Now I’m gonna teach you your forms of address. All civilians and officers, it’s Sir or Ma’am. If officers, ‘Officer’ or ‘Sergeant’ or ‘Lieutenant’– also permitted. In this facility, every sentence must contain these words. If you are addressing a boss workie, such as MYSELF, you will address that workie as Boss. ‘Sir’ is never to be used for boss workies. You will speak when spoken to. Otherwise you will keep your fuckin mouth shut. If you THINK you have a reason to ask a question or communicate some INFORMATION, you will say, ‘Permission to speak, sir?’ Or in case of myself, ‘Permission to speak, boss?’ When issued an order by an officer, boss, or civilian, you will reply to the order with ‘Yes sir,’ ‘Yes ma’am,’ or ‘Yes boss.’ Then you will follow the order. You will now give the appropriate response to what I have taught you about the forms of address.”

A couple guys muttered a confused “Yes boss,” but after a few minutes of screaming from him we were all screaming back “YES BOSS!!!” Drum was a very large man. And he was soon joined by a cop.

“Attention!” Drum ordered. All of us, including Drum, came to attention. The cop ignored everyone and started walking into our compartments, making little snorting sounds as he inspected them. When he was through he found the little bar fag in the line. He jerked a thumb at the compartment behind him. “That your box, workie?”

“Uh . . . yes. I mean yes sir.”

“Did this boss order you to fold your blanket, workie?”

“I . . . yes, I guess he did sir.”

“Blanket ain’t folded, workie. Step forward. I want all these workies to see what happens when they’re makin guesses.”

The kid stepped forward.

“Bend over, grab your knees.”

He grabbed his knees.

“Paddle, boss,” the cop said.

From somewhere Drum produced a wooden paddle, and he hit the kid’s butt with it. He did it slowly and firmly. And with conviction. SMACK. SMACK. SMACK. SMACK. SMACK. SMACK.

“That’s enough, boss. Step back into line, workie.”

The kid was bawling, and it wasn’t easy for him to “step.”

“Carry on, boss.”

“Yes sir.”

The cop walked on.

FUCK! What just happened! I never heard about this shit! Oh man, I don’t wanta get paddled! I’m already standing here naked, wearing a collar!

“Next up,” Drum said. “You’re goin to the showers. Which by the smell of you, you need. But first you’re gonna get some exercise. When I’m through talkin to you, you’re gonna put your hands behind your back and you’re gonna march over to that hallway you came in through. Then you’re gonna turn right, and you’re gonna RUN down to the end of that hallway, with your hands just like I said– behind you! Then you’re gonna turn around and you’re gonna RUN all the way back to where you started. You will do that TWENTY times. I’ll count. After you’ve done your twenty laps, you will RUN to the door that says Showers. You will then LINE UP in front of that door, nuts to butts. You will be parked that way until I’m ready to move you into the showers. Got it?”

“Yes boss!”

“Do it.”

It may sound like fun to be part of a mob of naked men that are running with their junk bouncing up and down, but it isn’t. Of course, it was even less fun for the little bar fag, now the fag with the red ass. Definitely limping. But everything about it, even the sound of ten naked feet slapping on concrete, was gross and disgusting. I just hoped that the cams that were dripping down from the ceiling weren’t recording the whole thing. Although obviously they were. If this ever leaked out . . . . Fuck! I hadn’t realized it, but I didn’t make any agreement about the Program keeping this quiet. If anybody I knew ever heard about my being a workie, even for two days, one day, this horrible minute . . . . ! But right now, I had other things to worry about. Like that paddle. The kid with the red ass was looking green everywhere else.

Drum stood at the end of the hall, watching us, and when the twentieth lap was over he yelled out “Twenty! Showers!” That was a wonderful thing, because all that bare feet on concrete with our junk bobbing around had us sweating and swaying. I thought the bar fag was gonna collapse, but the gay in back of him, the gangly blond dude, sort of helped him get to the end.

“Nuts to butts!” Drum yelled, and we slowly remembered what it meant. So now we were five bodies locked together by arms, sweat, dicks, and asses. Drum unlocked the door that had SHOWERS on it. “March in! Keep in position!” So the locked-up line “marched” nuts to butts into the shower room. Like a caterpillar, only not as smart. In case you’re wondering, I was at the end of the line, and my nuts were in Blondie’s butt, which was warm and sweaty and should have been explored more deeply.

We were halted by a command from Clinch. He’d been waiting for us inside.

“Feet on the line,” he said. “Stand at attention.”

“Showers” was a room with white tile on the walls, like a restroom, and an iron drain in the middle. A few feet from the drain there was a line on the floor. You could tell it used to be red, but now most of it was a dull tan. I guess that’s what hundreds of workie feet can do to a paint job.

We fell out of nuts to butts and got our feet on the line, and we all started doing what you naturally do when you’re a guy and you’re naked in a room with other guys—unless it’s an orgy, but Saturday morning would have been a weird time to get frisky in a training school for workies. In other words, we tried to cover our junk with our hands. “Drop those fuckin hands,” Clinch said, followed by his usual numbed recital of his script.

“This is the shower room. This is where you’re gonna be showered. But first you’re gonna get your hair hygiene. What finally happens with your hair hygiene, that’s up to what your owner wants. You’ll know that after you get sold. My owner is this facility, and I am wearing regulation hair for this facility.” He took off his cap to illustrate the regulation hair for that facility, which was very short and very ugly. Then he put his cap back on. Shit, the guy was a robot. But after all, I thought, that’s what workies are supposed to be. “However, every new workie coming in through this facility, he gets the DWC, the Default Workie Cut. Which is what you’re gettin now in this hygiene treatment. In addition, if our initial inspection missed any lice you were carrying, this treatment will exterminate your lice.”

HUH? LICE? Who has LICE? And what does he mean by “treatment”?

“You will remain at attention while I apply the chemicals.”

CHEMICALS?

He walked to the other side of the room and picked up a can, like a paint can. Then he put on a pair of plastic gloves and opened the can. A bad smell rushed out of it. A bad, bad smell.

“These chemicals can be dangerous to your eyes and mouth. When you receive the chemicals you will close your eyes and mouth and you will keep them closed until further orders.”

He started down the line, pulling green stinking goo out of the can and spreading it on each of the guys in line. He worked it into their hair, he spread it over their faces and their chests and their arms and their legs, he rubbed it into their pits, he covered their balls; then he turned them around and pushed it into their ass cracks. I watched the first few dudes gettin it, and I was sorry I did. Then I closed my eyes and it hit me, the sewer smell, up close and then all over me, and the creeping cold as the slime gradually covered me up, like some giant snail was digesting me. But it didn’t stay cold. A burn started working its way into my skin—biting its way, like I’d been bathing in acid. I wanted to scream, but I was scared to open my mouth or use my eyes to see what was happening to me.

I heard Clinch snap off his gloves. I heard him tramp past us and clang the can back in its place. I heard him tramping back. I guess he was giving the treatment time to work! Lots of time.

“KEEP your eyes and mouth COMPLETELY CLOSED. I’m gonna take the chemicals off of you now.” At that moment a mass of cold water hit me and almost knocked me down. I was being sprayed with a fuckin HOSE! Fuck, it was almost as bad as the chemicals. I remembered my first time in the pool, learning how to swim. I panicked; I thought I was gonna drown; I almost did drown. That’s how it felt. Then it stopped; he was goin for the next guy. I realized now I was screaming.

“Shut up!” he told me, dully, automatically.

When it was over, I looked down the line. All of them had lost their hair. All of them were bald. But that wasn’t all. All of them had lost ALL their hair. Chest, legs, crotch . . . . The philosophy boy turned towards me. He was no longer a geeky young man—he was an insect, a bug with a big white head and little staring eyes. Even his eyebrows were gone! And oh my God! My hand went up. My eyebrows had vanished too. No reason to check out the rest of my head—I knew it was bald. But my other hand went down. Yup–my junk was totally bald.

Clinch coiled up his hose and hung it on the wall. Then he walked up to me. “You. Screamer. Step forward.”

Fuck! What now! What did I do?

“Bend over. Grab your ankles.” I could hear him walking across the room again. Then walking back. Then saying, “This is an example for the rest of you. You’re workies now. Keep your mouths shut.”

SMACK! The paddle hit me, and I lurched forward. Then the pain came. SMACK! SMACK! SMACK! Bad pain. Sickening pain. I knew what that bar kid had felt.

“One more thing,” he said, returning the paddle to its perch. “You left a lotta your hair in the drain.” He was right. The big iron drain had a screen on it, clogged with the former hair of five new workies. The puddle of water was gradually seeping through it. “See that trash bin? Wheel it over, pick out that hair.”

I saw the bin. It was big and made out of steel. I slowly, painfully, wheeled it over. I stood with my feet in the puddle and slowly, painfully, bent over and grubbed with my hands for the human hairs, some of them mine, that were sliming the drain. I picked them out, dripping, and threw them into the bin.

“You missed some.”

I grubbed out the hair I had missed.

“Return the bin.”

I returned the bin.

“Back in line.”

I returned to the line.

“All of you,” he said. “Nuts to butts. You’re gonna get your medical exams, so we’re moving you down to the vet’s office. Hands behind you. THROUGH the door. TO the left. March.”

While leaving the Shower Room I discovered that the management had thoughtfully positioned a large mirror on the wall, next to the door, thus enabling us to see what we looked like as freshman workies. The bald heads all looked alike, and it wasn’t easy to recognize which one was mine. Then I knew–that one was mine. I could tell by the eyes. Mike always said I had such lovely eyes. They didn’t look so lovely beneath a bald forehead and a giant bald skull, on top of a neck that was collared like an animal, in a collection of collared animals creeping along on its ten little bald caterpillar legs. At that moment I remembered . . . . Fuck! Tomorrow, the 48 hours would be up, and I’d be returned to society. Which was good, but I’d be returned wearing my DWC! With my head like a doorknob! I’d have to hide in the house–for days. Or longer! How long did he say the “treatment” lasted? Until I was sold! Like an animal! No wonder my medical exam would be performed by a “vet.”

About halfway down the hallway we saw a door that said MEDS. Boss Drum was there to move us into the room where we had to wait for the vet. It was sort of like the typical doctor’s waiting room. There were even some chairs you could use while you waited, but we weren’t allowed to sit on them. We had to line up in front of the closed door to the inner office and just keep standing there with our hands on each other’s shoulders and our dicks in each other’s cracks—all except for me, because now I was first in line and I had to keep my arms crossed on my chest and didn’t have anybody’s crack to hide my prick in. I did have the dubious pleasure of feeling the long thick cock of Philosophy Boy, AKA Blondie, crawling into my ass. He was gay all right, but under the circumstances I thought it was tasteless for him to get me started on a public hardon.

Fortunately there were some things to look at. The place seemed like it had been a doctor’s office for about 50 years. It had battered old wooden furniture and a bookcase full of battered old books—and who uses books anymore? It’s all online. Didn’t this “vet” ever go there? Uh, maybe not.

Well, what do you expect from a vet for workies? Why spend money on the kind of dudes that were lined up behind me? The bar fag. The hopeless philosophy student. A dude with really long hair—no wonder he couldn’t get a real job. And some guy that didn’t look like anything, except he’d contributed about half the body hair to that drain.

I was guessing it didn’t make any difference to anybody, how long we had to wait, because no doctor appeared and there was no sign of life from inside the door I was facing. Dude was obviously late, very late. Again, what can you expect? Maybe he wasn’t even a doctor. Maybe a nurse would be good enough for workies. Maybe the nurse was driving out here from some other job. . . . There were signs posted in various places, the kind of stuff you never read unless you’re an apprentice workie trying not to show wood because of the workie prick that’s drilling your ass. Stuff about what to do in case of fire. Regulations about employee health and safety and where to file a grievance—I assume that didn’t apply to workies. Then there was a reassuring document, hanging in a frame, with a sticker on the top saying “Must Be Posted in a Visible Position.” It was dated two years before, and it certified that Nathan R. Berenson, MD, was qualified to serve as a physician in this state. The lower left corner showed a little picture of a young man in a white coat. He looked OK. He looked like a real doctor. That’s why he was late. They always are.

The line was getting restless—not that it mattered—when I heard some noise behind me and a voice saying, “I’m sorry, boss. Officer Koop wanted me to wash his windows again, boss.” Then Drum saying, “OK, get in there. You got a lotta business.” And after that, the first voice, talking behind my shoulder: “Go in, sit on the stool.” A hand went out, the office door opened–and a guy in a workie suit walked in ahead of me and proceeded to sit at the doctor’s desk. He was switching on an ancient computer when he noticed I was lurking half in and half out of the door. “I said sit on the stool!” he said. “I’ll be ready for you in a minute.” Fuck! That guy in the workie suit must be the doctor! Pants, shirt, cap—the whole outfit, and when I looked in his face, it was the same I’d just seen in that certificate hanging on the wall. Only this time he wasn’t wearing his white doctor’s coat. He was wearing a shirt that said:

 

MY NAME IS

IKE

WORC NO. 19873

AT YOUR SERVICE

 

What had happened, to turn Nathan R. Berenson, MD, into Ike, the workie?

I shuddered. This was horrible. I guessed he was only a part-time vet and he had to spend the rest of his time washing windows and shit. And he didn’t seem very happy about it. I sat on the stool next to the desk, and when he got to wherever he was trying to go on the computer he reached out and grabbed my collar and pulled me close so he could read my number off the front of it. He jabbed the number into the machine and stared at the screen for a while. Then he said “OK” and started reeling off a long list of diseases to see whether I’d had any of them, which I hadn’t, and he did some pulling and tugging on my arm and got my blood pressure, and then he went through all that other stuff they do, including taking some of my blood and rubbing a stethoscope around on my now-hairless chest.

I couldn’t get over it—I was getting a medical exam, from a workie?! It made me want to puke. The guy had clever little doctor hands, and I actually didn’t mind how they felt on my arms and chest, but I couldn’t keep my eyes off that uniform with “IKE—AT YOUR SERVICE” on the front. Fuck it was gross. To have this workie goin over my body, while his big brown eyes told me how miserable he felt, because he would be seeing patients (!) in that workie suit for the rest of his life, unless the state decided to sell him off as a waiter or a janitor or something . . . .   This kind of pity I didn’t need to feel, especially because as low as he was, I was about ten rungs under him, sittin there in front of him with my naked junk draped across his stool and havin him order me to move this way and that way and stand up and sit down . . . . And of course he had to fiddle around with my dick to make sure I didn’t have any problems goin on around there. When it came time for me to piss in a cup I asked him where, and he said, “Stand up and do it right there, only don’t make a mess I have to clean up.” When he grabbed my arm to give me a shot, his shirt brushed across me, and just the touch of that workie suit shriveled my skin. Then I really felt like I was gonna be sick.

But that was the last. “You’re through,” he said, and he went to the door and yelled, “This one’s done, boss!” I went out, Former Blondie went in, and Boss Drum put me in the end of the line, with my dick in the butt of the longhaired dude.

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Metal would like to thank Joshua Ryan for sharing this story!