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Chapter 50 - PC Rising.

“Just hang in there, Justin. We’re going to come and get you . . . We’re going to get Brian for you, Honey . . .”

The boy listened to Debbie’s voice and felt hope bubbling up throughout his entire being. He knew that was a dangerous feeling; hope was notoriously treacherous. He couldn’t help it though. He’d remembered the number, Debbie had known it was him, she was going to help him and, even better, she was going to send Brian for him. It had been so long since the boy had felt this hopeful that it was scary. But despite the many - MANY - times the world had beat him down, the boy still had that Sunshine soul inside him and it refused to die no matter how many times he’d been betrayed.

He only hoped that this wasn't one of those times.

“I don’t mean to criticize, Little One, but I thought the whole point of a phone was to TALK to the person you called. Am I right, or am I right?” Luke commented from his spot perched behind the boy’s back. “I mean, are you actually going to talk into that thing or just hold it in front of your face and nod at it?”

“Here, let me put it on speaker so we can at least all hear,” Rex tried to grab the device, but the boy held on as tight as he could and refused to relinquish the tangible evidence of his hope. “Fine. You do it then,” Rex conceded, pointing at the places where the boy needed to touch the phone screen in order to put it on speaker mode.

Justin followed directions and a moment later Debbie’s voice was booming through the tiny room. “You still there Sunshine? You don’t have to talk, but can you at least make some kind of noise so I know you’re still there and that you’re okay? I thought I heard other voices. Are you safe wherever you are, Sunshine?”

“Shit, turn that thing down a bit. We don’t want everyone in the whole fucking building hearing us,” Luke whispered, trying ineffectively to cover the phone’s speaker with his big hands.

“Who’s there?” Deb demanded? “Sunshine? You got company?”

“Hello, Ma’am. I . . . I’m here with the Little One,” Luke stammered, feeling very uncomfortable and exposed at having to speak to some unseen woman, but feeling pressed to make himself known regardless.

“Little One? Are you talking about Justin? He’s still there right? And he's okay?” Debbie asked, trying to engage whoever she was hearing on the phone in order to keep the conversation, and the phone call going.

“He’s here . . . We’re mostly okay,” Luke didn’t really know if they WERE okay or not. They certainly wouldn’t be if they were caught with this fucking stolen phone. But, for the moment at least, they weren’t being beaten, yelled at or threatened, so in his book, that qualified as okay.

“My name is Debbie. I’m a friend of Justin’s. Who are you? Are you a PC too?” Deb asked, curious as hell about whoever was with Justin and hoping to get the person she was talking with to disclose more information about her lost sheep.

“I-I-I’m called ‘Luke’, Ma’am. Me and Rex are in here with the Little One. We’re all PCs. You . . . You won’t . . . Please don’t tell on us for using the phone, Ma’am. We only wanted to find a way to let the kid contact his Master because Rex said he was looking for him. Please don’t . . . Don’t . . . Fuck,” Luke stopped abruptly, realizing he hadn’t explained himself very well but at the same time he’d already said too much.

“Shit. Why’d you have to tell them about me?” Rex spoke up finally, after having been outed despite trying to remain silently in the background.

“Who’s that? You sure do make friends fast, Sunshine. Who else is there with my kiddo?” Debbie asked, and since she’d basically commanded the boy’s answer, Rex felt compelled to speak.

“Rex, Ma’am.”

“Well, nice to meet you both, Rex and Luke,” Debbie bubbled over with bonhomie even through the tiny medium of the phone line. “But you don’t have to call me Ma’am. Everybody around here just calls me Deb. I’m sorta the surrogate mom for all the boys on Liberty Avenue, and I sure as fuck don’t stand on formalities.  So no more ‘Ma’am’ alright?”

“Yes, Ma’am,” both Rex and Luke answered in unison, causing the boy to actually chuckle a little out loud. He totally got their confusion about the freedom and egalitarianism his Master’s friends routinely offered everyone, including any random PCs they met. The experience was so contrary to everything a PC was taught. It still felt alien, and the boy had been dealing with it for weeks longer than these two. Just wait till they met Brian. That would REALLY throw them for a loop.

“I heard that, Justin,” Debbie seemed thrilled by the boy’s tiny laugh. “Shit, Sunshine! You don't know how wonderful it is to hear you. We’ve all been so worried about you, Honey. I wish you could tell me what happened?” She paused, apparently hoping that he would expound on his circumstances, but he still couldn’t and his companions failed to speak up either. “No matter, Sweetie. We’ll figure it all out when we get you back. But the best way to help us get to you, Sunshine, is to tell us where you're at. Can you do that, Justin? We’re trying to get the police to trace this call, but it would be easier if we had an address or a name or something more to go on. Please?”

The boy whimpered in frustration. He really would have spoken up then if he could, but he didn’t actually know where he was. He’d been unconscious when the men had taken him from the loft. He didn’t think telling Deb that he was in a scary, dark, cold prison cell would help much, even assuming he could get the words out.

“Aww, it’s okay, Sunshine. Don’t worry. We’ll find you somehow,” Debbie jumped to reassure the boy before he got too upset. “How ‘bout you other two? Do either of you guys know the address there?”

“Sorry, Ma’am . . . I mean, Debbie,” Luke responded for the group. “We’re just PCs. They don't tell us shit. And it’s not like the hell hole we’re in gots a big flashy sign out front invitin’ visitors, you know.” Luke snorted at his own joke. “They brought me here in the middle of the night and what little I could see was nothin’. And since then I only seen the inside of my eyelids, the inside of this tiny-assed cell and the inside of the Handler’s Training Room. Ain't no address on any of them.”

“I just got here today,” Rex volunteered. “And I was only about half conscious at the time so I didn’t get much of a look at the view, Miss Debbie. Sorry,” Rex seemed to have hit on a happy medium between ‘Ma’am’ and the plain old ‘Debbie’ the woman preferred.

“Oh, you poor boys . . . No matter. We’re working on it. We WILL figure this out, Sunshine,” Debbie promised with so much conviction in her own voice that the PCs almost believed her too. “Justin, you just hang in there. We’re getting Brian for you. I promise. Ted just called him and he said to tell you he’s on his way. And the cops are tracing this call to try and find your location. Just hold on . . .”

“No worries, Miss Debbie,” Luke added. “We ain't’ going anywhere. Leastways not till the Handler comes back for another go round. We all three already had our daily beating though, so mayhaps the Handler will let us be till tomorrow . . .”

The boy’s attention drifted while Debbie joked with Rex and Luke, both of whom were slowly loosening up in response to the kindhearted woman's cajoling. For a moment Justin looked at the scene they were making as if seeing it from another's eyes. The three naked boys were all huddled around the small blue flare of the phone like it was some type of futuristic campfire while they joked and chatted, Debbie trying to keep them talking until they could trace the call and then, hopefully, come find them. The boy just hoped it would be soon, so he could finally get back to Brian.

Damn it! The boy missed Brian so much it was almost physically painful. For a moment, that pain completely eclipsed the aches in his battered body and the occasional stabbing jolts caused by his broken ribs. It felt like ages since he'd touched the man he now realized he loved. It may have been only a day and a half since the last time they'd touched, kissed, smiled together, made love, but based on the way the boy’s body was longing for Brian's, it seemed like much, much longer.

Where was the man? Debbie had said they'd called him. She said he was on the way. Shit, the boy really needed him. The thought of seeing him again was the only thing keeping the boy sane. Where was Brian?

“Brian . . .” The boy sighed plaintively, his small cry interrupting the chatter of the others and bringing them all to an uneasy silence.

“Oh, Honey, he's on his way. I promise,” Debbie assured from beyond the unseen other end of the phone call. Then, talking to somebody in the room with her, she ordered, “somebody find out where Brian is . . . Well, call him again! Sunshine needs him now!” Returning to her call, Deb added, “you just hold on, Baby. He's gonna come get you, I know it in my heart.”

“So the kid CAN actually talk, huh?” Rex commented, trying to lighten the ensuing silence.

“Oh yeah,” Luke chuckled. “You missed the nightmares earlier, but I can assure you, our Little One’s got a great set of lungs on him and can say quite a lot when he's inclined to. Although it's mostly ‘Brian’ this and ‘Brian’ that. Right, kiddo?” Luke put his arm around the boy’s shoulders and gave a tiny hug, the blue phone glow lighting up their reciprocal smiles.

Before anyone else could tease him, though, the phone in the boy’s hand beeped ominously and a warning message popped up on the screen.

“What's that noise?” Debbie demanded instantly.

“Shit! The battery on the phone is dying. We've only got twenty percent power left,” Rex explained with a groan.

“Damn!” Debbie echoed the sentiment. “No matter, though. We're gonna find you boys somehow. Even if the phone dies. And at least we got to talk with you for a bit and we know our Sunshine’s okay. That's the important thing.”

“Well, Miss Debbie, I suppose ‘okay’ is a relative term,” Luke argued. “We all a bit the worse for wear right about now and we stuck in this tiny, freezing cold room, but since nobody’s beating on us at the moment, I guess you could say we be okay. At least as long as the mofos in charge don't find out we got us a stolen phone in here.”

“I knew it was too good to be true,” Rex lamented, scowling at the phone screen now flashing that the battery was down to sixteen percent. “Of course the battery wouldn't be fully charged. My luck is never that good. I mean, just being able to smuggle the phone in here and actually finding Justin right off the bat was more than I expected to get away with. It was probably too much to hope for that it would work and somebody would find us.”

Justin, however, couldn't agree with the two other PCs who continued to bemoan the treachery of false hopes while Debbie argued with them. The boy had just then realized that, for once, he actually believed in the hope that was still burning inside him. Despite all the prior betrayals he'd suffered. Despite all the times he'd told himself not to trust anyone again, not to give in, not to let himself open up to anyone, the boy actually DID trust that Brian would find him.

Wow! That was quite the revelation! He TRUSTED Brian! The boy trusted that his lover would do everything he could to find him and bring his Sunshine home. He ‘knew it in his heart’, as Debbie had said a minute earlier. It was in his heart and that felt so good. That trust made the poor, half-broken boy feel strong. Strong enough to hold on as long as it would take for Brian to get to his Sunshine.

Which wasn't to say the boy wasn't still scared, of course. He was terrified and angry and in pain and, did he mention, terrified? Especially when the damn phone beeped again and a new warning appeared saying they were down to ten percent power. Sunshine groaned unhappily right along with Rex and Luke.

“Why’s this thing losing power so fast?” Luke complained frowning down at the electronic device.

“Probably because it's cold wherever you guys are,” a muted male voice said from Deb’s end of the phone line - the boy thought it might be Ted. “Cold will drain a phone battery in no time.”

“Stupid phone. Stupid cold-assed little dungeon cell. Stupid fucking Handler and his damn torture center,” Luke continued deprecating everything he could think of in order to vent some of the fear. “Stupid little Twinkie PC - couldn't you have stolen us a charger along with the stupid phone?” He glared at Rex across the blue glow.

“Hey, gimme a break. I didn’t have time to steal a fucking charger too. Besides, even if I had, it wouldn't have fit in my fucking thong along with the phone. You're just lucky I was actually wearing any clothes at all. Usually Bellweather keeps us buck naked 24/7,” Rex shot back, returning Luke's glare with one of his own.

“Hang in there, Sunshine! We’re doing what we can on this end to get you found and get you out of there, Honey,” Debbie restated, trying to intervene in the boys’ bickering and reassure them all. Then she added, to whoever was with her at her end of the call, “where the fuck is that cop? Did he tell you when he’d be here? We don’t have all day, you know. The fucking phone is gonna die at any minute.” Then back to the PCs, “Rex and Luke, if we get cut off, you boys try and stay by Sunshine and make sure he’s okay, please. I’m doing my best but I don’t know where the fuck the police are. I’m sure they’re working on tracing the call though. You boys just stay safe and . . .”

The phone beeped one last time, then the screen went black except for a little swirling cogwheel graphic in the center, and finally even that disappeared along with the comforting blue glow.

“Fuck!” Rex and Luke cried out in tandem.

“Well, shit,” Luke sighed a minute later, sounding totally dispirited. “Figures. Should have known it wouldn't work.”

The boy felt the bigger man’s body slumping back against the wall in the corner of their cell. Rex was grumbling as well. The boy knew it wasn’t good that the phone had died so soon, but he still had that spark of hope inside him, so he couldn’t be quite as dejected as the other two. He sighed, tucked the now useless phone under the edge of the mattress and then crawled closer to Luke, wrapping his own thin arms around the big guy’s waist and leaning his head against the warm chest. He might not be able to offer anything more than his presence but maybe that alone would be reassuring.

And it seemed to work. Luke sighed and hugged him back. The boy freed one of his hands and reached to the far side of the mattress, finding Rex and then pulling the third boy closer too. Luke must have had the same idea. He offered the other side of his chest for Rex’s head. Before long they were all three cuddled together. In the blankness of the pitch dark, they had only touch and sound to comfort them, but at least they were, none of them, alone.

Nobody said much after that. What was there to say? Complaining wouldn’t make things any better and, since their plan had died, the hopeful teasing and camaraderie they’d engaged in earlier seemed empty. They were all lost in their own heads and their own cognition.

Sadly, it didn’t seem that they’d even get to have that to themselves for long. In short order, they started to hear at least one voice along with other noises coming from the hallway outside their cell. All three of them groaned - even the usually silent boy vocalizing his despair at the imminent return of their tormentor. When the metallic clanking of the lock proved that their group was the one that was going to be singled out, they all felt their hopes being further dashed. But, like it or not, they had no choice. They were PCs and this was their reality. At least for the time being.

The three boys pulled apart and started to help each other off the mattress. One by one, they crawled to the center of the room and hoisted their bruised bodies up onto their knees, ignoring how hard the cold cement floor was and how cold and sore they were. Luckily, even though they were moving slowly, the PCs all managed to get into the correctly submissive posture before the door opened and the Handler blustered in, bringing with him the redolence of alcohol fumes. The way the man stumbled and almost fell as he tried to negotiate through the narrow doorway explained why the three torpid PCs had managed to get to their knees before he could get the door open in spite of their slow pace.

The Sapp was drunk.

His prior experience while part of the Handler’s regime made the boy very leery about dealing with a drunken Sapperstein. Regrettably, the Handler spent most of his evenings at least half inebriated. The problem with that was that you could never predict what kind of mood drinking would put him in. Sometimes, you’d get Gary The Party Boy - a happy drunk that just wanted to goof around. But sometimes, if he’d been flouted or annoyed, he could turn into the Angry Drunk from Hell.

The boy was glad that their phone had died when it did, otherwise they might have been found out and their situation would have been even worse - if The Sapp had come in and found the phone when he was three sheets to the wind, the PCs would have been worm bait. So at least there was a bright side to the phone dying when it had, right? Although, at that exact moment, it was difficult to see that there was anything bright or right in the world.

“Hey, hey, hey, boys! Are we having fun yet?” The boy really hated the way the Handler was always asking if they were having fun or talking about how fun his torture would be. I mean, really? Was he a total moron? Like anyone would dare to answer him anyway. “You know, I can think of at least one way we could be having more fun.” *Hehehe* “Now, which of you three beauties wanna come help me have fun, huh?” All three of the boys remained absolutely still and silent. “No volunteers? Okey-dokey . . . I’ll just have to pick then. But, how to do that? You’re all so fucking pretty, you know that? Why is it that you’re all so pretty? Hmmm?”

The Handler lurched around and around the three PCs, trailing his slimy hands over their bodies, through their hair, pinching a cheek or pulling an earlobe as he passed by. It took everything the boy had not to cringe away from the unwanted touches, but he was afraid if he moved even a hairsbreadth he’d draw attention to himself. So he held himself as still as possible and bit his lip to keep from making a sound.

“I just can’t choose. It’s too hard,” the Handler whined after he’d completed his third circuit of the little group. “Okay. How about we try this . . . Eeney, Meeney, Miney, Moe . . . Catch a PC by the toe.” He tapped each of the three boys on the head as he walked by them, playfully stepping on Luke’s toes as he came to the end of the second line and then giggling at his imagined wit. “If he hollers . . . Fuck him HARDER!” He kicked Rex in the ass to demonstrate how much harder he would be. “Eeney . . . Meeney . . . Miney . . . MOE!” The Handler ended his rhyme with his hand on top of the boy’s mop of blond.  

The boy’s heart sank. This was NOT good. Even though the Sapp had said he was under orders from Bellweather not to touch the boy until the Master had a chance to get there first, nobody really trusted the Handler to stick to that, did they? Especially not if the boy was ‘Moe’. And definitely not a drunken Handler who was now giggling like a maniac and wantonly rubbing his erection against the back of the boy’s head . . .

“See, I told you we’d have fun. I’m already having a ton of fun. ‘Cause that’s a fun game, right? Come on, Moe . . . Let’s go upstairs where we can get more comfortable and have even more fun,” the Handler ordered, bending over to unhook the leg shackles and then grabbing onto a hunk of blond hair which he used to yank the boy to his feet.

The boy tripped awkwardly after the man who was leading him by the hair, crying out every time the Handler jerked him too hard and joggled his cracked rib cage or walked him into the wall or the door. When they were through the cell door, Sapperstein shoved the boy hard enough to throw him against the far wall, where Justin tumbled in a heap to the floor. The Handler just giggled some more, leaving the boy where he’d fallen while he turned around, pulled out the bunch of keys that were on a retractable keychain reel secured to his belt, and busied himself locking the cell door behind him. When he finally accomplished that feat, he spun around so fast that he almost fell over right on top of the boy. Of course, that was followed by more drunken giggling, but eventually the souse managed to right himself, grab hold of the boy’s arm and haul his victim to his feet, all while humming ‘Eeney, Meeney’ to himself.

It took another five minutes or so for the pair of them to negotiate the stairs up to the dreaded ‘Training Room’. The boy had spent more time than he cared to remember in that room, so he was intimately familiar with it and it’s furnishings. Nothing much had changed in the the month since he’d left with Brian either. It was still decorated with various pieces of furniture and accouterments designed to restrain the Handler’s prey - chains secured to various spots on the walls, a St. Andrew’s Cross, a sturdy chrome and leather spanking bench, etc. Even the bed that waited over against the far wall was festooned with chains and straps. And, hanging along the right-hand wall, were a panoply of whips, prods, sex toys, and other devices of torture, all of which were arranged on a pegboard-style display reminiscent of what one would expect to see in the workshop of an avid handyman or an overly-tidy weekend warrior type. Some of the devices even had an outline of the item meant to be hung on each hook painted around where it was intended to reside. Yep, Sapperstein was a very organized drunken sadist.

The Handler towed his intended entertainment across the room and gleefully shoved the boy down onto the bed. “You really are a pretty one, aren't you boy? Those other two, they're both nice, you know, but you . . . I think you're the prettiest PC I've ever had in my care.” The Sapp was almost drooling now as he ran his hands over the crotch of his jeans and ogled the boy cowering at the far edge of the mattress. “Come down here boy,” the Sapp crooked a finger at him, and pointed to the foot of the bed.

The boy shuddered but didn’t really have any options other than to comply. He reluctantly scooted closer. When he was within range, the Handler grabbed hold of the boy’s arm and tugged him closer still. The abrupt motion jarred his injured ribs and the boy cried out, struggling to right himself before he fell and got even more seriously hurt. The cry seemed to just egg on the horny Handler, though. Gary grinned maliciously, reached down with both hands, hooked the boy’s ankles and yanked until the young PC was flipped backwards, landing hard enough that the wind was knocked out of him. For a moment he thought he might black out due to the added pain this caused on top of his already cracked ribs.

“I know, I know. I’m supposed to wait for Bellweather,” the Sapp whinged - totally ignoring the boy’s painful gasping for breath - as he started to unbuckle his belt, chuckling to himself in the process. “But, really, how can he expect me to pass up such a pretty little treat? I mean, LOOK at you, Sweetness? You’re the most delicious piece of ass I’ve ever fucking seen. And, you WERE ‘Moe’. It’s like fate telling me I HAVE to fuck you. Right? You don’t mess with fate. You just fuck the Moe fate tells you fuck. Am I right or not? Huh?” The slimeball continued to babble while he fumbled with his zipper, eventually excavating his ugly, uncut dick out of his pants. “Besides, it’s not like Howie will be able to tell if I fucked you or not. I mean, Kinney’s been there already, so you’re not exactly a virgin anymore. Howie will never know if we just have a little funtime together.”

While he argued with himself, the Handler grabbed the large pump-top bottle of lube from the rolling cart he always kept close by and slicked his long, skinny dick up with a couple of quick pumps.

“Bellweather can still have his fun when he finally gets his ass up here. And, you know the way Howie is with his boys - who’s to say you’ll even be around after he gets done with you. He gets SO rough sometimes. And if he can’t control himself, not only will I have to go to all the trouble to dump your body and make it look like a suicide, but I won’t even get a turn at this fine, tight ass. Which would be a real shame, now wouldn’t it?”

When he’d fully talked himself into it, the Handler seized hold of the boy’s calves, yanked savagely until the youth’s ass was pulled right to the edge of the mattress in front of where the man was standing, and then pushed the PCs legs upward, nearly doubling the boy in half. Tears were streaming from the corners of his eyes, not only from the pain of his ribs but also from the dread of what he knew was coming next. There was nothing he could do to stop it, of course, but the boy was horror-stricken at the prospect of being used this way by such a vile, vicious, repulsive man . . .

“Get the fucking door! Damn it! Hold onto his feet. Fucker! I’m going to fucking kill you!” There was an explosion of noise in the hallway outside the Training Room complete with yelling, cursing and what sounded like a large object being slammed into the walls over and over again. The uproar culminated in what sounded like an item of furniture breaking, glass and wood shattering so loudly that it rattled the window next to the bed where the boy was waiting.

“What the fuck is going on?” The Handler screamed, interrupted in the act and not at all happy about it.

He dropped Justin’s legs, spun around and pulled up his pants as he trotted towards the door.

“What the hell is going on out here?” the Handler screeched, tearing the door halfway off it’s hinges as he wrenched it open. “Fucking A! What’s HE doing here?”

Whatever the Sapp found did not please him. The boy could hear the hated man cursing up a storm and berating his employees loudly. There were more bumps and thumps in the hallway and even another loud crash of breaking pottery and glass. Then all was silent again. The boy took the opportunity to crawl back up to the head of the bed, curling in on himself so that hopefully he’d make a smaller target when the irate Handler inevitably returned to the room.

The discussion going on in the corridor was heated but not as loud as before and went on for several long minutes. “Bring him in here, damn it!” the Handler ordered, slamming back into the Training Room and holding the door open so his underlings could drag in whoever ‘he’ was.

The two big brutes that Sapperstein always used for his dirty work sidled through the doorway with a body dragging between them. From where the boy was sitting, he couldn’t at first see who it was they were manhandling, only that the person seemed to be completely out of it. The bruisers struggled to tote their burden past the door - whoever it was seemed like a pretty big guy and it wasn’t easy, even for the two muscle men, to get the awkward load all the way inside. Gary, who was still fuming and tapping his foot at the delay, ordered them to take whoever it was over to the spanking bench. The two thugs hefted the body up and then tossed it negligently towards the padded bench.

As the body hit the bench, the figure toppled over and slid to the floor. Which is when the boy finally got a good look at the unconscious man.

“Brian!”

“You, shut the fuck up!” Sapp snarled at the boy before turning back to his thugs. “You guys, wanna tell me how the HELL Kinney got in here?”

“I didn’t know it was him when I opened the door, Boss,” Thug Number Two offered stupidly. “He fucking came in punching too. I think he broke my damned nose,” the poor brute moaned, pinching at the very crooked and still bleeding protuberance.

“He just surprised the fuck out of us, Boss. We didn’t expect a rampaging nutcase when we opened the damn door. After he knocked Zeke on his ass, he just barrelled right through me and was halfway down the hall before we caught up to the fucker,” Thug Number One added, using the sleeve of his shirt to mop at the blood trickling down the side of his face from a nasty looking cut above his left eye. “He may be skinny but he packs a hell of a wallop. I had to hit him with that big fucking metal urn in the hall to stop him. He was about to brain Zeke with the umbrella stand when I finally crowned him. But then, when he went down, he took out that whole big hall table . . . Sorry about that.”

“I don’t give a fuck about the damned table, you morons. What I care about is how the hell he found out we have the boy here! And how he got through the fucking gates, damn it! Did you see anybody else with him? If so, we’ve got a huge-assed fucking problem!” Sapperstein ranted, screaming into his employee’s faces, his own face so red that he looked like a tomato.

“The gate is still closed, Sapp. I checked. He tossed the mat from the floorboard of his car over the razor wire and climbed the fucker. His car’s right out front and there’s nobody else around. I checked on the security cameras. I’m pretty sure he came alone,” Thug Number Two assured his irate boss.

“Shit! Let’s hope so . . .” Sapperstein paced back and forth across the breadth of the room, his drunk seemingly burned off and leaving only the ugly. “Okay. This is what we’re going to do. You two take his car somewhere and dump it. Drive it across town, park it someplace shady, wipe it down so there are no prints and leave it unlocked. Hopefully it’ll get stolen, stripped and we won’t have to deal with it. Then get your asses back here. We’re going to have to get rid of him somehow - just in case he did tell somebody where he was going.”

“You want us to throw him in one of the cells for now?” Thug Number One asked.

“Nah . . . Leave him to me. I’ll take good care of him,” Sapperstein offered, laughing diabolically as he aimed one brutal kick at the unconscious man’s shoulder. “Better strap him onto the bench before you go, though. We don’t want him waking up at an inopportune time.”

The boy watched in horror as the two brutes manhandled Brian up off the floor and onto the elevated bench, cinching the straps tightly around his legs and torso and then handcuffing his wrists together behind his back. Brian’s head lolled unsupported off the front of the platform. The boy could see blood welling up from a gash just above Brian’s ear and dripping down, falling from his chin and splattering on the floor. The only remotely reassuring thing was that Brian was still clearly breathing, his shoulders rising and falling regularly, so at least the man was still alive. Although, from the way the Handler was talking, that wouldn’t be the case for long.

Sapperstein gave the two goons a few more instructions and then sent them on their way. He wanted Brian’s car off the property as soon as possible - it was too easily recognizable if anyone was looking for Kinney. The man himself was a lot easier to hide, or so the Handler said. Besides, Sapperstein promised the two leering letches, he had plans to keep Kinney entertained until they got back.

As soon as Thug One and Thug Two had left, Sapperstein turned his whole attention back to the man strapped onto his spanking bench. The Handler seemed to have completely forgotten that the boy was even there. His focus was riveted on his new prey; the man who was now completely at Sapp’s mercy, passed out cold and strapped to the bench so that he couldn’t move even if he had been awake. And the Sapp seemed perfectly thrilled with that arrangement.

“Well, well, well. What do you think about this, Kinney?” the Handler gloated, as he circled the bound figure like a vulture. “My, my. How the mighty have fallen, right? All these years, Brian Kinney was the top dog of Liberty Avenue. The Supreme Stud. The one guy everyone lusted after. Able to pull any trick he wanted and unashamed of the fact. Remember the way you always looked down your nose at anyone you thought didn’t live up to your high and mighty standards? And NOW look at you. You’re not so fucking high and mighty anymore, are you? Who’s the one in charge now, huh, fucker?” Sapperstein exulted, sneering down at his captive. “Me! That’s who! Gary Fucking Sapperstein! The guy you called a troll and pushed away. I’m the one in charge you fucker!” The Sapp crowed, lifting up Brian’s head by his hair so he could spit in the stud’s face, laughing meanly all the while. “Well, Mr. Top of the Tops, how about we see how much you like being on the receiving end for a change, huh? Now we’re gonna have some REAL fun!”

The Handler cackled maniacally as he once more unfastened his pants and moved around so that he was standing between Brian’s legs. The way the man was strapped to the bench, with his legs spread wide, it was easy for Sapperstein to get into position behind his prey. Unfortunately, the goons had strapped the man down so tightly that it was a bit of a struggle to get Brian’s pants undone and tugged down low enough for the monster’s purposes. Gary had to struggle a bit, trying to reach under the dead weight of Brian’s body to get to his fly, and wasn’t really paying any attention at all to what was happening on the bed behind him.

Which was, of course, a fatal error on the Handler’s part.

Because the boy was no longer quailing there in a heap like he had been before. Nope. Sunshine was wide awake now. One minute he’d been trembling and fearful like the cowed slave he was taught to be, and then the next minute - the minute after he saw and heard exactly what the Handler’s intentions were as to Brian - he’d just snapped. Literally SNAPPED. It was almost as if he could hear the noise of the snap ringing through his brain as soon as he decided he wasn’t going to let this thing happen. He was not going to let this vile, horrible man do anything to his Brian.

Without making a sound, Sunshine crept off the bed and stole along the wall, keeping out of the Handler’s line of sight as he moved. Halfway down the wall, the boy came across the big, leather bullwhip that the Sapp liked to use on some of his most recalcitrant stock. Sunshine took the whip down from it’s hook, let the coils unwind at his feet and then, holding onto the handle in his right hand and the body of the whip a few feet along its length in his left, he raised the loop he’d made into the air.

It was only a few steps from there to where The Sapp was standing, still fumbling with Brian’s clothing to try and get his pants down. Brian was now muttering and his head was was moving a little from side to side as if the man was finally coming to. Between the skirmish with the uncooperative clothing, the distraction caused by the rousing man and Gary’s own overriding lust, all of the Handler’s attention was occupied.

He didn’t notice that the boy was now standing directly behind him, or see the shadow of the descending bullwhip, until the leather noose was firmly wrapped around his neck.

Of course, by then, it was already too late.

Sunshine quickly pulled the whip tightly around the Handler’s throat, twisting it in the back so that he could get even more torsion, and pulling the ends as hard as he could. The Handler tried to struggle, grabbing at the cord around his neck and scrabbling at it ineffectively with fingers that couldn’t get purchase on the smooth leather. He would have tried to run or kick his way free, but his sagging pants had dropped down to knee level and were strangling his legs almost the same way Sunshine was strangling his esophagus. But the harder the Sapp struggled, the tighter Sunshine pulled the whip. His body was suffused with adrenaline. He felt stronger than he’d ever been in his life. More sure of his purpose. He was not about to let go.

Within only a minute or two, the Sapp was flagging. He dropped down to his knees, which gave Sunshine even more leverage. The boy drove his knee into the small of the older man’s back and pushed forward while continuing to pull backwards with the whip. He pushed and he pushed, and he pulled and he pulled. Then, with one last dying burst of strength, the Sapp frantically tried to twist away from his attacker, torquing his upper body . . .

Sunshine used that last twist to his advantage, keeping the Handler’s lower body pinned in place with his knee and jerking the noose hard in the direction opposite of which Gary’s shoulders were turning.

There was an audible cracking noise, after which the Handler’s body went limp, sagged to the floor and was still.