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			DAMSELS UNDER GLASS: THE SERIES
			A Bug's Tale (Charlie's Story) ———————————————— by Van & Courier   ©2000
			Chapter 11

Charlie was not a happy camper.  The damn blanket felt like a colony of ants dancing on her ribs, and her breasts, and her thighs, and her nipples, and her stomach...  She suppressed the urge to shudder and squirm (for the millionth time) ...and her back was aching again, and her shoulders ached, and her knees were numb, and she couldn't feel her toes at all (although the arches of her feet she very much could feel—they were threatening to cramp) ...and her jaw felt locked in place around that damn leather ball (which not only tasted terrible, but has causing her to drool down her chin and into the devil's grinning mouth).  She gazed into the iron fiend's glowing red eyes.  Glad somebody's enjoying themselves, she mused.

She looked at the whips arrayed before her, inventorying the collection, also for the millionth time.  Maybe she's not going to whip me, Charlie considered.  Maybe she just wants to scare me.  After all, by morning I won't be in any condition to appreciate it.  What's the fun in whipping an exhausted, semi-conscious, near-corpse?  The devil grinned at her, skeptically.  Well... okay... that's a little over the top, she admitted. You're right, I'll survive... but Ter...  What's the Red Bitch doing to Ter?  Is she suffering?  The devil said nothing. Okay, right again.  Self pity and pointless guilt are... pointless... Charlie looked into the Devil's eyes and laughed through her gag.  'Pointless!'   You're not pointless, are you Spike?

"Madre Dios!  She's been driven insane!" a voice echoed through the chamber.

Startled, Charlie looked towards the door.  It was open... (Guess I didn't hear it, she decided.  Been busy.)  ...and Jessie and Delores were framed in the doorway.

"She's just tired... I hope," Jessie answered.

Jessie (very much not bound and gagged, Charlie noted) was, like her friend, dressed in jeans, Western shirt, and boots. The redheaded teen turned on the lights and they entered the chamber.  Delores raced to the foot of the devil and began fiddling with the wire brackets restraining Charlie's toes.  Jessie unbuckled Charlie's gag.

"Are... are you okay?" Jessie asked the diminutive captive in a quiet voice.

"Yeah, sure, right as rain," Charlie answered flippantly.  Delores was trying to find the key to the stocks.

"I'm sorry," Jessie said.

Charlie looked up from the pillory, as best she could.  "For what?  Your cousin's the one in charge."  Delores found the key, and in short order the stocks and the pillory were unlocked and opened.

Charlie stirred in position, but found she couldn't do more than lift her head a little.  "Ah!" she complained, grimacing in pain.  "A little help here...?"

Jessie rushed forward and gently helped Charlie lean back onto her knees, then picked her up completely, cradling the naked pixie in her arms like an oversized baby.  "I kidnapped you," Jessie whispered.

"That bitch Drake kidnapped me," Charlie corrected.

"I'm responsible," Jessie insisted.  She stepped to the table with the whips, scattered them to the floor with a sweep of her arm, then sat, Charlie cradled on her lap.

Charlie looked up into the teen's angelic, freckled face and brimming, blue eyes.  "Okay, you kidnapped me, you were responsible... and I forgive you."  Jessie shook her head, fighting tears.  "Look," Charlie snapped.  "If you insist, hand me one of those whips and I'll swat your fanny a couple of dozen times. Then will you let me forgive you?"

Jessie laughed, her eyes still wet.  "Okay, okay, I'm forgiven," she said, and began gently rubbing Charlie's shoulders.

"Oh, oh... " Charlie moaned, leaning catlike into the massage.  "Keep that up and you are definitely forgiven!"

"Where is the other one, the Doctor?" Delores interrupted.  She was standing next to the Harp of Heaven, one hand on the saddle post.  She gave the hand a delicate sniff, then wiped it on her jeans.  "I think she was here."

Good nose, Charlie thought.  "She was, then Red Bitch, uh... Victoria, came and got her.  She said something about going 'upstairs'."

"That is bad," Delores said.  "We cannot go upstairs.  The gates are locked and I do not have the keys.  We will have to leave her."

"No!" Jessie objected.  "I said we're all getting away and I mean it!  There has to be some way to get into the Lodge.  We can go out to the Canyon, and I can scale the wall, and—"

"And fight the Señora and Drake all by yourself?" Delores interrupted.  "All the weapons are locked up, in the steel gun cases... unless you want to take them on with a kitchen knife."

Charlie frowned.  Obviously she was now part of a rather impromptu escape.  "How are you planning on getting away?"

"There's a garage down at the entrance to the Canyon," Jessie explained.  "The Humvee is still there, and we can make for a town or trading post."

"What about a phone?" Charlie asked.

"In the Mine and Canyon they are all locked away, like the weapons," Delores answered.

"By the time Victoria knows we're gone," Jessie continued, "we'll be out of the county and safe, but first we have to find a way to get to your friend and—"

"We'll have to leave her," Charlie said evenly.

"There, you see?" Delores said.  "Even the Little One can see we must—"

"How can you say that?" Jessie asked Charlie, ignoring the anxious maid.

Now Charlie's eyes were wet.  "You think it's easy?" she said.  "You think I want to leave my best friend here, in the clutches of...?"  Charlie bit her trembling lip, unable to continue.  Jessie held her close, her straight, red hair falling over both their faces like a veil.  "If I can get to a phone," Charlie finally managed, "I can have more help here in an hour than the FBI could in a week."  She hopped off Jessie's lap... and immediately collapsed to the stone floor, gasping in pain.  Jessie and Delores rushed to her aid.  "It's... it's my knees," she gasped.  "They're... asleep."

"Pobre chica," Delores cooed, and began massaging Charlie's knees, calves and feet.

Jessie, one arm around Charlie's shoulders, watched for several seconds.  "Enough," she said.  "She'll be okay in a little while.  Let's go find her some clothes."  She gathered the 'Little One' into her arms and the fugitives headed for the door.

"The Laundry," Delores suggested.

Charlie put her arms around Jessie's neck and looked back.  The blanket draped iron devil was, of course, still patiently in prone position, stocks and pillory open, waiting.  'Bye, Spike! she thought, then her gut twisted with guilt.  Teri, she mused, what horrible things are they doing to you?

This is horrible! Teri mused.  Her back ached like it was on fire, and the intermittent rain of stinging slaps on her buttocks, thighs, and the backs of her knees wasn't... helping.  How far is it to this damn bedroom? she wondered.  Then she thought of Charlie, still down in the dungeons, still struggling to keep her short, naked, helpless body away from that horrible iron demon's horrible iron spikes.  Teri felt a lump in her throat and swallowed behind her gag.  Charlie... poor Charlie.

Her captor finally herded Teri into what had to be her elegant, Pueblo-style bedroom.  Bigger than my entire apartment, Teri mused, struggling to look around from her awkward, bent position.  And the bitch is rich!  She could see a collection of Pueblo Kachina dolls set in nichos in the far wall.  Probably worth more than my car, Teri mused, ... when it was new.  Victoria untied the rope enforcing Teri's painfully stooped posture, helped her straighten to a normal, upright posture, then used more of her seemingly limitless stock of cotton rope to tightly and thoroughly bind her prisoner to a straight-back chair.

Next, Teri's gag was replaced with a ring-gag, similar to the one Victoria had used on her cousin, only this model's strap was wide and heavy, and a total of eight buckles festooned the front, four on either side of the ring and Teri's now involuntarily open mouth.  Victoria stepped to a walk-in closet... Bigger than my bedroom, Teri decided.  ...and removed her leather coat, boots, and leather pants, leaving only a pair of black, bikini panties.  It was late afternoon, early evening, Teri noted, and the redhead's toned, athletic body and fair, freckled skin glowed like fine porcelain in the indirect glow of the bedroom's curtained patio doors and large deep windows.  Eyes on her watching captive and a feral smile on her face; her backlit, red hair glowing like a fiery halo; Victoria slowly, gracefully stooped and removed her panties.  Natural redhead, Teri confirmed, her eyes involuntarily gazing at her captor's auburn pubic bush.

Victoria stepped behind Teri, gripped the chair-bound archeologist's head, her elbow clamping the prisoner's chin like a vise, then slowly, deftly stuffed the black, silky panties through the ring of Teri's gag.  Teri whined and mewed, but was powerless to prevent Victoria from tamping the dark wad  into her mouth, trapping her tongue.  "There, there, Doctor," Victoria purred, her left hand over Teri's ring-gagged lips, her own lips inches from the helpless captive's right ear.  "I'll be taking a nap later, and we have to keep you quiet, don't we?"  She then strapped a tight leather flap over Teri's lips, utilizing the eight front buckles.

Teri squirmed in her bonds, mewed through the soiled panties in her mouth, and glared at her nude tormentor.  Victoria smiled and walked towards the suite's quite literally cavernous bathroom, native rock artfully chiseled into the bedroom's back wall.  Apparently the bathroom was lit by skylights or light tunnels, for Teri had no difficulty watching through the open double doors as Victoria turned a tap and filled a large, deep, sunken tub.  Tub filled, Victoria smiled at her captive, and settled in for a nice, long, soak.

Sadist! Teri fumed, aware of her own rather gamy condition (thanks to her involuntary, solo orgy while chained to the Harp and the rigors of her journey from down below.)  She tried not to glare or squirm in her bonds.  It's what she wants, Teri realized.  She must have nodded off at some point, because next she knew, Victoria was standing beside her, wrapped in a huge, brick-red bath-sheet, and was wrapping more rope around Teri's upper body, framing her breasts.  The gloating redhead tugged the loops tight , until Teri's breasts bulged between the taut strands.

 "Such a delightful shade of mauve," Victoria commented, "and it makes them look so big, don't you agree?"  Teri glared at her tormentor in gagged silence.  Victoria traced the taut surface of Teri's breasts with her nails, causing the prisoner to wince.  "It makes them nice and sensitive too, doesn't it Doctor?" Victoria murmured, "but don't worry.  The ropes aren't tight enough to do your precious titties any real harm; however..." (She wrapped the bath sheet around herself and sauntered towards her enormous bed.)  "...if you make any noise during the next few hours, I'll tighten those ropes 'til your tits turn purple... then whip them.  Understand?"  Teri hung her head, and nodded submissively.

Victoria then sauntered to her enormous four poster bed; drew back the dark, hunter green, silken sheets, dropped her bath-sheet to the floor, and slowly, gracefully, reclined.  She gave her chair-bound captive one last, gloating smile, yawned; and snuggled her head against a large, soft pillow.  In less than a minute, Teri could detect no sign that her captor was anything but fast asleep.

Teri groped with her fingers, reaching for the rope binding her wrist.   What had Charlie told her, all those long, hours and days ago, back at BC-131, back when they were both free?  How long has it been? Teri wondered.  'Pull on the loops'?  'Transfer the slack'?  Something like that.  Wish I'd taken notes, she mused, ...but back then, back at 'Charlie's Tree' ...it was a game, a damn game!  Her fingers fluttered and groped.  This isn't a game.  Teri found her fingers could reach nothing, nothing that mattered.  She sighed, then pulled on all her bonds with all her strength.  The chair didn't even creak.  Teri sighed, and watched her tormentor sleep, and watched the light fade through the windows as the sun set.  Victoria stirred and stretched... but didn't waken.  Eventually, after many long minutes... Teri's chin dropped... and the bedroom had two slumbering occupants.

"But nothing fits!" Charlie complained, sorting through the dirty laundry.  She sniffed a pair of panties, frowned, and tossed them back on the pile.

"Just grab something and let's go!" Jessie whispered.

Charlie held up a pair of dirty, khaki hiking shorts.  They were obviously about two sizes too big.  "I suppose if we can find some rope or something I could tie it through the belt loops and—"

"If you don't get a move on," Jessie hissed, "we'll all be getting all the rope we can handle, and more!"

"Please, Señorita," Delores pleaded, "we can find a harness strap for you to use as a belt in the tack room.  Just take the shorts and a shirt and let's go, before we are discovered."

"Okay, okay," Charlie said, stepping into the shorts.  She let go of the waistband to rummage for a shirt—and the shorts dropped around her ankles.  She held up a soiled, wrinkled, Western-style shirt, in black.  "Is there anything in blue?" she asked.  Jessie lunged for the diminutive pixie, but Delores held the anxious teenager back.  "Okay, okay," Charlie said, "don't have a hissy fit."  She shrugged into the dirty shirt (shuddering delicately and wrinkling her nose), then reached down and pulled up the shorts.  Charlie's new ensemble was indeed ridiculously oversized, giving Charlie a decidedly waif-like appearance.  "I feel like an eight-year-old playing dress up," she grumbled.  "What about some shoes?" she asked, looking at her bare feet.

"There are some old boots in the stable I wear to muck out the stalls," Jessie answered.  "Grab a pair of socks."  She looked at Charlie's feet, then at her own.  "Make that two, thick pair.  Now let's go!  We have to get to the garage!"

Charlie was busy buttoning the shirt, a task complicated by having to keep one hand on her shorts to keep them from falling.  "Mucking out the stalls?" she asked uncertainly.  "How clean are these boots?"

Jessie and Delores exchanged an exasperated look, sighed, rapidly sorted through the laundry until they found two pair of hiking socks (mismatched, of course.)  Then, in perfect unison, grabbed Charlie by either elbow and headed for the Lower Garage.

"Hey!  Hey!  Put me down!" Charlie protested.  "I can walk, I can walk!"

"Quiet!" her rescuers hissed in unison.

Teri started from her sleep.  She was naked and tightly bound (of course), an arm had locked her head in a viselike grip, a hand was tightly clamped over her already gagged lips, a pair of fingers were pinching her nostrils together.  She couldn't breath!  She thrashed against her bonds, uselessly.  Her heart was pounding.  Her lungs were on fire!  "If I let you breath," a husky voice whispered in her right ear, "you'll be very quiet... won't you?"

Drake! Teri's oxygen starved brain thought.  It's that bitch Drake!  Teri tried to nod her head, but couldn't.  Her tormentor's grip was too tight.  She tried to scream, but no air could move in her throat, no sound escaped.  Her fingers fluttered.  Her toes scraped the bedroom's thick carpet, soundlessly.

On the bed, oblivious to the desperate, decidedly one-sided struggle in the center of the room, Victoria slumbered peacefully.

"I'll take your pathetic struggles as a 'yes'," Drake whispered, and released the prisoner's nostrils.  Teri exhaled violently, and Drake's fingers clamped tightly closed!  "Softly, quietly now," Drake admonished her victim.  "Not a sound."  She opened her fingers and Teri sucked the life-giving air into her burning lungs.  Drake stood back and watched the bound archeologist pant behind her gag, her tightly bound chest heaving, her constricted breasts bobbing, fear and anger in her eyes... but she was quiet... very quiet.

Drake smiled cruelly, held a finger to her lips, and sauntered coyly towards the bathroom, stripping as she walked.  Soon a trail of black clothing; tank-top, boots, jeans, socks, panties; lay on the carpet, and the nude, grinning brunette was slowly, silently, closing the bathroom doors.

Teri heard a shower running.  She looked at the bed, and watched as Victoria rolled over on her stomach, still fast asleep.  After several minutes the sound of the shower stopped.  After a minute more, the doors silently opened, and Drake emerged, nude (of course) and smiling, her hair damp, a cloud of steam dissipating as she entered the bedroom.

Drake walked to an antique blanket chest near one of the windows.  She knelt and slowly, silently, raised the lid.  One by one, she took out several items and arranged them on the carpet.  Teri recognized three gags: a ball-gag, a gag consisting of a leather wrapped dowel and a harness of straps, and a complicated, steel and leather monstrosity resembling some sort of sadistic dental appliance.  Well... she considered, I think that last one's a gag.  I hope it's a gag.  Drake also produced several coils of wide, ribbon-like, rawhide thongs. What's she gonna do to me? Teri wondered, squirming in her inescapable ropes.  After several seconds, Drake selected the ball-gag and returned the other two to the chest.  She picked up the thongs and slowly, silently closed the lid of the chest, grinned at Teri, and walked to the bed, silent as a ghost.

Drake gazed down at Victoria, watching her sleep.  As if on cue, the slumbering redhead stirred, her cupped hand closing slightly, her slack lips moving as if whispering.  It's... it's not me, Teri realized.  She's going to—

Drake pounced.  The lithe, tan, naked brunette leaped onto the bed, pinning Victoria on her stomach.  Before the redhead was fully awake, the ball-gag was strapped tightly in her mouth, her right wrist captured in a loop of rawhide, her left being wrenched behind her back and her wrists lashed together.  Victoria mewed through her gag and struggled, her white, naked body bucking and thrashing.  Drake laughed, easily winning the battle.

Her left ankle caught in a loop of leather, Victoria was flipped onto her back.  She twisted her wrists in their tight leather bonds and watched, wide-eyed, as Drake tied the thong to a bedpost.  Victoria kicked, but her right ankle was captured as well, then lashed to the opposite post.  The redhead writhed and flopped on her back, her legs held apart, ankles twisting in wide, rawhide loops.  Drake straddled her victim, lifted Victoria bodily by her narrow, white waist, and arranged a pair of pillows under the bound redhead's white, dimpled buttocks.

Teri watched, her eyes wide in amazed confusion.  One of her captors was naked and bound on the bed, hips raised, legs splayed, her red pubic bush and sex on display!  Her other captor was running her hands over the new prisoner's white breasts and erect, coral nipples!  What the hell are they doing? Teri wondered, twisting in her own bonds.  Why are they...?  The light dawned.  They're partners, Teri realized.  They're playing a bondage game... and they're making me watch!

 "I don't know why you're making such a fuss," Drake told Victoria, "I won the toss fair and square."  She looked back over her shoulder, towards Teri.  "Look," she said, a gloating smile curling her thin lips, "we're making the Doctor blush."  Drake shifted to the side, and Teri could see Victoria's face.  Instead of the expected terror, amusement sparkled in the gagged redhead's clear, blue eyes.

Teri could feel her cheeks burning.  She didn't mind in the slightest that her captors were lovers—but tying her up and making her watch?  And then laughing at her?  Sick bastards! she fumed silently.

"Delicious," Drake said with a cruel smile, then turned and buried her face in Victoria's crotch.

Teri twisted in her tight, rope bonds, literally a captive audience.  Bastards!