Sitting in a plane now, tied, with other prisoners, people I have never met before. We are all wearing just a loincloth, clearly a unisex and one-size-fits-all model. The airplane is a turboprop, with noisy engines. Judging from the cabin design, it must be an old military aircraft. Cabin service is as spartan as the cabin itself. No announcements from the Captain, no safety instructions. The only familiar aspect of the boarding was that me and an attractive curvy woman, the last passengers, had to run before the gate closed. Running was not that easy with hands tied to our back and being attached to each other by a rope around our neck. In fact, running was not simply my thing anymore, certainly not under a hot Mediterranean sun, so she made the pace and I was in tow. Weird, finding myself running behind a woman, both of us only wearing a small loincloth! This could get exciting, at least, if she would slow down a little bit, will you, there is no hurry, they will not take off without us – exciting, I said, at least if I would make it to that plane alive! Finally seated, out of breathe, our ankles were tied by a short rope, like the other prisoners, which were also nearly naked. I looked around, trying to follow the conversation around me. And looking around, I saw we were indeed a mixed gender group, with attractive women. Having recovered from the running, I once more figured this could get exciting. I had expected they would have separated men and women, but here I found myself in an ambiguous situation : underway to an execution (they had ascertained me), but in exciting circumstances that made me feel eighteen again! Or, at least, as close as possible I could get to eighteen.
Soon after our arrival the plane took off and made its way south, skimming the wavetops. Clearly the pilot wanted to stay under the radar. The noise of the engines had stopped the conversation. We were underway to a mysterious destination.
***
What had happened before :
The woman who had picked me up at the hotel, had a swift driving style. For not to say reckless, by moments, but I guess she simply had adapted to the driving style of the locals from the island. Speed limit signs were just for roadside decoration, and all that seemed to matter was arriving first somewhere, regardless of the risks, particularly concerning overtaking each other. Those who had lost that race were remembered along the road, by a crucifix with their picture on it. And frankly, there were a lot of them, I estimated one each half kilometer! Too much for comfort! Yet, I imagined that, If something would happen to us on the road, that would be a quick death, compared to what had been promised. Meanwhile, each crucifix reminded me also to my fate to come. But I figured that, as long as I would not really nailed with real nails to a cross, it could all be part of a game, a weird game anyway!
In contrast, the landscape had been boring, arid, fields on which I wondered anything could grow. The only distraction had been my driver’s blue polka dotted dress, and more particularly her sexy legs protruding from under them.
After a while, we reached a kind of enclosed and well-guarded estate. Behind the enclosure lay an entire village, it appeared. To my surprise, there was even a golf course and a runway. We stopped in front of a building, got out of the car, and the woman lead me in.
There was a sort of entrance hall, with a desk. We were awaited by women, one of them, I would learn soon, was the famous Cross Headmistress.
“Well, Martha! I see you succeeded!?” they asked to the woman who had driven me.
“I told you I would, Aline!” she replied.
“First, could you sign a few papers, please?” the woman named Aline asked me.
“Paperwork?” I asked.
“Judicial disclaimers! I case some harm might happen to you!”
“I have a choice?”
“No!” the Cross Headmistress replied, still in a friendly but firm manner.
I signed the papers, and thinking I had registered, I expected I would be assigned some room to stay in. Instead Martha and Cross Headmistress ordered me to a corner of the room and CH instructed me to strip naked completely.
“What!? Here!? Now!?”
“Yes! Here and now!” Cross Headmistress said, “get used to it, to strip in public!”
With some hesitation, I obeyed. They put my clothes into a plastic bag and confiscated my luggage. All they give me to wear was a loincloth, in fact a piece of rope around the waist, and a piece of cloth attached to in front and back.
“Look! This will be on your titulus when you will get crucified!”
LOXURU
Asocial renegade
“Now,” I asked Martha, “can you tell me what is so particular about me, to involve me into that little game of yours?”
“In case you would wonder how you got here, well, as our first invitation has mentioned, we are people who have paid a lot to see other people being crucified. I paid for you!”
“Why!? Why would someone pay for…me…to…?”
“Nothing personal! You have been selected by an advanced computer algorithm. One designed by the company I am CEO of!”
“Let me guess! Palo Alto Analytics!”
“Right on the nail! You see, we do data mining and develop software to process the data. Actually, some political big shots have decided that, in order to keep the world sustainable, the transition is necessary. So we are developing software and gathering data for a mass profiling. You would be category black, a marginal population, about one in two hundred belongs to it, who need to be deleted according to the categorization!”
“Deleted? Scaring!”
“It’s the future! Mankind has to be kept under stricter control and rules if we want to keep the world a sustainable living place for all! Do you know the Chinese People’s Republic social credit system? We expect something similar will be implemented worldwide from around 2050 or so! Unfortunately, some purges will be unavoidable!”
“So far freedom of speech and other rights and liberties!?”
“Governments have no longer the authority and the financial resources to ensure security and sustainability themselves! These tasks will be delegated to private companies! People will officially keep their constitutional rights and liberties, but there will be no more state to guarantee them! The private companies who will run the social credit system will only have to report to their shareholders, for whom rights and freedoms are hampering the achievements of the targets and therefore just an annoying burden in the creation of added value and maximalization of profits!”
“How much did you pay for this game?”
“Does it matter!? Anyway, I earned it back already, even twice. It shows our software works and that will be give sales a boost. Secondly, I made bets that I would succeed in getting you here, and they will earn me more than I have paid for it.”
“Sounds sicky!”
“Not sicker than being a crucifixion forum adept!?”
“Are they really going to crucify me!?”
“Don’t worry, Loxuru, there are worse things in life than being crucified! Working for me for instance! Yes you will, and I will be there to watch it!”
“You could have deleted me, as you call it, by simply having me shot!?”
“True, but since you and me share the same kink for crucifixion, I wanted some fun as added value!”
“Wait a minute! You rank me as a social outcast with twisted preferences, but you signed in yourself for seeing people getting crucified!? That’s hypocrite?”
“Selon que vous serez puissant ou misérable, les jugements de cour vous rendront blanc ou noir, dear Loxuru!”
“What is that supposed to mean!?”
“It says that, whether you are powerful are not, courts will judge you right or wrong! It’s from La Fontaine, a French poet! I may be a CEO, but I have cultural background, Loxuru! And two, CEO’s have the reputation to be twisted characters, so I have a reputation of being twisted to keep up! The only thing I ask is, that you would not disappoint me during your crucifixion! Now it’s time for your welcoming ceremony!”
“Welcoming ceremony!?”
“A whipping! Cross Headmistress will take care for it! CH, I ask two things! One, Please do not wreck him, he is my guest I paid for and I want to see him alive and kicking, up to his cross! Two, will you please whip him suspended by his ankles, for his staring at my legs all the time in the car underway to here!”
“I was only admiring your driving style!”
“Save your smartass attitude for on your cross, Loxuru! CH, he is yours! I ‘ll watch!”