Public Caning (story)

Early that morning, we were led out to the main platform. There were nine of us in total, three blondes, five brunettes, and me, the one red head. I was last in the line and I wasn't sure that was a good thing.
The sound of the gathered crowd was overwhelming: men and women all collected to bear witness to our ordeal. I wondered how many of the women ahead of me deserved their sentence but didn't have long to ponder it as we were pushed along and up the stairs.
The first girl stumbled at the top and the crowd burst into laughter. She was quickly righted by the guards who physically resembled us so closely - but not quite.
Finally, we all stood lined in a row so close that we were practically touching each other: bare breasts to bare backs. We were naked but for the stiff, unmoving steel belt that circled our waists. Attached to the belt was a thick rod that spanned the length of our backs up to the heavy steel bar spanning our shoulders, the length of which our arms were extended and our necks and wrists bound. The rod at our backs kept our posture erect, thrusting our breasts and bottoms out, displaying us for hungry onlookers. Although we stood here willingly, although we had accepted our fate, plenty had tried to run at the last moment. The heavy metal that bound us had been added to make escape impossible.
"Each of these human women has made the journey to our world ready to pay for their crimes against their planet. Today marks the beginning of that repayment."
The beginning. We had two months ahead of us as we were paraded through their world, publically displayed, publically punished, publically taught the ways of our new world all while being made an example of. We would lose all privacy in those months, remaining naked and bound at all times, freshly marked skin still raw for the next beating. Two months, but what choice did we have? If we stayed behind on Earth, we would die.
"Once punishment is taken, each woman will be welcomed into our society as an equal…"
I stopped listening, feeling a little nauseous when they called the first blonde up.
"Look at that one," a woman said from somewhere near the stage. "She's going to mark beautifully."
I looked down to find they were talking not about the woman who was about to be publically spanked but about me. The woman caught my eye and grinned, but I looked away. The blonde's sentence was read aloud: she would be caned - we all would. Twenty strokes against her bare bottom and thighs before being displayed for a full two hours in the square bound in a pillory. Birches soaked in brine stood beside each pillory for any who chose to administer additional punishment. She would endure this at each of the ten major cities over the next two months for a total of two-hundred cane strokes plus whatever the crowd chose to administer after her official chastisement.
The girl trembled as she was brought toward the block, tears already streaming down her face. She was quite young, no more than eighteen I'd say, only a few years younger than I for sure.
"Please…" she began.
"You've agreed. Take your punishment and live among us as an equal, free," the man who held the cane said. He then gestured to the guards who nearly carried her the final steps toward the block. It came to the tops of her thighs. Although she resisted, the two men pushed her forward and clicked the rings on her yoke into their places on the block. They then spread her legs wide and bound the cuffs around her ankles to the block. One of the men then dragged the leather strap tight across her low back, effectively pressing her to the block and lifting her bottom high.
The guards stepped back and we all had a view of the young girls bottom spread before us, the pink lips of her sex trembling, her dark back hole just visible between her cheeks. Foreman, as he was known, the man who would dole out the punishment, took his place and swung the cane through the air once, the whippy sound silencing the crowd, calling a cry from the waiting girl's lips. The bulge in his pants was obvious to any who cared to spare a glance.
Without ceremony, he raised his arm and the cane hung there as if frozen in time. I did not breathe a single breath as it whooshed through the air and made contact with the center of the girl's bottom. She didn't make a sound at first, no one did. In fact, it was silent for what seemed an eternity before the stripe began to color and the bent girl made a desperate noise. I saw Forman's lips quiver and, as he applied the next strokes, watched how his cock swelled. I'd not seen many men who enjoyed their work so much as Foreman.
By the time he was finished with the girl, she had to be carried off the stage. After twenty strokes, her bottom looked a fiery red and skin had broken in some places. I felt terrified: I had thirty strokes coming. The doctor had examined the girl twice during her punishment and both times, allowed it to continue. I only hoped mine would be called to a stop before the thirty.
"Bring the next girl," the foreman said, his gaze meeting each one of ours as he said it.
I watched as each girl was led to that block, each bound to it, her bottom raised, presented to Foreman to take her punishment. The doctor had not stopped a single caning and I watched my sisters now bound into the pillories surrounding the stage as the girl before me took the last of her strokes and it was finally my turn.
The foreman turned to me, his hair slick with sweat now. He made no effort to hide the fact that his gaze traveled the length of me and as it did, fear turned to panic. Without taking his eyes from mine, he nodded once, signaling the guards to bring me. I took a step before they could touch me though and when I did, the crowd fell silent. Foreman cocked his head to the side but the twitch in his eye betrayed his irritation. When the guards came to take hold of me, he shook his head and with a grand gesture, motioned for me to take position over the block. I swallowed, my legs leaden as I walked toward it. I glanced at the people who stood and watched, their faces anticipatory. I glanced at the woman who had made the comment about how I'd mark and saw her hand pressed against her crotch, her gaze riveted on me. I then faced forward, faced the women I'd watched punished now watch me from their humiliating positions and I slowly bent forward, spreading my legs, and offering myself for my caning.
The guards moved quickly then, running the strap across my low back, locking me into place at both wrists and ankles so that I was immobile, my bare bottom offered to Foreman. But I would not know my mistake until the last ten of my sentence of thirty.
He took his time, lining up the cane against my trembling cheeks, telling of what was due me. He even called to have the strap at my back tightened, lifting my bottom even higher.
"I've got a special treat in mind for you," he said. "I hope you're ready. Are you ready?"
I stared straight head, scared as hell but trying my hardest to hide it.
"Well, answer me!" he said, tapping the cane against my bottom.
"Yes, Sir, I'm ready."
"Ready for what?" he taunted.
I knew what he wanted. I'd heard of this before, there was always one he chose, one unlucky girl. "Sir, I’m ready for my punishment. Please cane me, Sir."
With that, the first stroke fell. Inside my head it felt like I screamed to bring down mountains when the burn of it registered, but in reality, I made no sound. Instead, I watched the others watching me take mine. He struck hard and fast, starting at the center, working a pattern: one below the last, one above, one below, one above until the whole of my bottom and the top half of my thighs were covered by searing dark lines of pure fire.
"I've nowhere left to mark," he said from behind me. The doctor came to inspect as well. "I've ten strokes left and not a patch of skin to mark. I'd hate to break her lovely skin. Doctor, do you have a suggestion?"
It was in that moment, in the tone of his voice that I knew it was time to pay for my bravery. My stupidity. The crowd wanted our fear, they craved it. When I'd walked to the block on my own, I'd stolen that from them.
"Proceed as you see fit, Foreman," came the words of the doctor sealing my fate.
"Where are the jailers?" Foreman snapped.
The two women from the preparation facility turned up and took their places on either side of me. They'd done this before.
"Spread her."
I knew then what he meant to do.
"No! Please!"
"Wide."
The women's hands dug into the bruised flesh of my bottom. I felt cool air on my back hole as I was spread wide open to take the last strokes directly upon my anus.
"Please," I tried once more only to feel the smooth surface of the cane come to rest on that very tender, that very private place.
"Be brave, now," Foreman said. "Ten. You'll count each one, you'll thank me for each one and you'll ask for the next. Should you fail, well, you won't fail, will you? Ten is plenty of punishment on this tender little hole."
No, I would say just what he wanted how he wanted it. Ten. I could take ten. I had to. And then it would be over. Until the next time when I would know better to tremble before the crowd.
"Ah!" my fingernails dug into the palms of my hands and I tried to clench my bottom but with my legs spread as they were and the guards pulling my cheeks apart, it was impossible. When one of the guards slapped my hip, I nearly cried but relaxed my cheeks as I was told.
"Not so brave now, are you?" Foreman asked. "I'll give you one more moment to utter your penance or the stroke won't count."
"Yes, Sir. Thank you ,Sir! Another stroke, please Sir."
"You see, she is wholly repentant. Begging for her punishment even," he said to cheers from the crowd.
"Where shall I lay the next stroke then?" he asked.
"Across my bottom hole, Sir," I muttered, utterly shamed.
And so they came. The next nine strokes, each one asked for, each one setting my bottom on fire and when it was over, I too was led off the stage limping between the two guards, but as I was taken toward what I thought to be my pillory, I hard Foreman call out behind me.
"No, not there. Take that one inside."

I swallowed hard, knowing just what that would mean.