It was hot. The sweat was pouring down Kelly Winters' body as she struggled up the path to the high point of Pirate Cay, holding a large rock in front of her with both hands. The sweat would have soaked her shirt, except for the fact that she wasn't wearing one. In fact, she wasn't wearing anything at all.

Kelly lifted her eyes from the rocky ground. Barbara Moore was a few steps ahead of her, equally naked, struggling up the hill with an equally large rock. The girl did have a cute little ass, Kelly had to admit, even though it was dirty and sweaty, just like Kelly's.

The high point of the island wasn't terribly high, but the climb was no picnic when you were carrying a large weight in the heat of the day and it was your fifth trip of the day-at least as best Kelly had counted, though, after a while, one arduous task bled into another-and there were who knows how many more to come.

Twenty five years at hard labor had been their sentence at the trial, if you could call the sham arranged by Frederick "Big Fred" Bascome, the Prime Minister of Providencia, the hell-hole of a Caribbean island nation to which Pirate Cay belonged, a trial.

The judge, a gentleman by the name of Albert Bascome, bore a distinct resemblance to Big Fred, and was undoubtedly a relative of one sort or another. They had been found guilty of theft of the boss' yacht in a desperately ill-advised attempt to escape slavery on Pirate Cay and of second degree murder for killing the Swedish watchman on the yacht, Sune Ericsson.

The evidence for the theft had been undeniable, since they were onboard the yacht, racing madly for international waters when apprehended by the Providencia Coast Guard. Their defense amounted to arguing that they had been escaping involuntary servitude on Pirate Cay.

The prosecution had pointed out that Kelly had been on the island for many years and had made dozens of trips back and forth to various colleges in the US during that time to recruit young women to serve as "companions" to the billionaire who owned the island, a man for whom she had worked in both Providencia and the US for almost a decade.

In Barb's case, they had no such evidence, so they had called her two fellow Pitcher College students, whose failure to return from spring break had led her to Pirate Cay in an ill-fated attempt to further her budding and now aborted journalistic ambitions.

Both Tara Malone and Delia Ortiz had sworn on a stack of Bibles that they had remained on Pirate Cay voluntarily and were very well treated. They showed pictures of their accommodations, the menus from the gourmet meals they ate at the billionaire's table, the beautiful white sand beach, the pool and the fully equipped gym. Tara even testified that she was pregnant with her employer's heir, a fact verified by the doctor who ran the clinic on the island.

As for the murder of Sune Ericsson, his body had never been found; doubtless the sharks had enjoyed a nice helping of Swedish meatballs, so there was no hard evidence that he hadn't fallen overboard in a drunken attempt to have sex with Barb, as the two women had claimed.

However, there were their signed statements, each claiming the other had bopped poor Sune on the head with a heavy iron skillet and thrown him over the railing. They both claimed those statements had been extracted under unbearable naked electrotorture on the parrot's perch, conducted by the Dean of Students at Pitcher College disguised as a Latin American Secret Police Colonel. The judge had found the story quite preposterous and found them both guilty.

Now they were several months into their sentences, which the judge had ordered to be served on Pirate Cay, with strict orders that they not be allowed to slack in their labors. Kelly couldn't imagine that she would survive her time. Even if she did, she would be over 55, a convicted felon, whose only job had been an accomplice to a rich sex trafficker. Hardly the stuff of a comfortable retirement.

Exhausted, Kelly paused for a moment. She yelped when she felt the sharp bite of the whip across the twin globes of her ass. "Keep going, Winters, you lazy cow," shouted Robert, the muscular Pirate Cay flogger and former Royal Providencia Marines Drill Sergeant, who was following the work party to insure against any slacking.

"Look at Moore," he added, pointing the handle of the whip in the direction of Barb, who was trudging upwards. "She isn't stopping. You guys can have a two minute break when you get to the top, but until then, move your fat ass!" he said and cracked the whip across Kelly's buttocks again to emphasize his point. Kelly's ass was hardly fat. In fact, it was quite trim, as was Barb's, hardly surprising given the unceasing exercise they had gotten over the past several months.

Kelly started forward, anxious to avoid any further stinging blows from Robert's whip. The expedition was pointless of course. When they reached the top, their rocks wouldn't be used to construct a shelter or improve the drainage. No, after a brief rest, they would carry them back down the hill again. The only goal was to make their lives as miserable as possible, a goal at which their taskmasters succeeded admirably.

And the worst part was that their taskmasters were not just Robert or the billionaire who owned the island and owned them. No, the boss had delegated their suffering to Tara and Delia, who, needless to say, had it in for Kelly, the person who had lured them down here.

And, while they didn't have a particular grudge against their classmate, Barb, it is commonly observed that the granting of a modicum of power to those who are, themselves, disempowered can easily result in abuses.

As Barb and Kelly made their way downhill, still carrying the heavy rocks that they had lugged uphill, they couldn't help but be maddened by the site of Tara and Delia, clad in the string bikinis, stretched out on the lounge chairs which Barb and Kelly had toted over from the pool, relaxing in the shade of a tall palm tree.

The two convicts laid their heavy rocks on top of a pile of a few dozen other rocks of a similar size. Tara waved them over. Following the procedures established as a long-standing punishment regime, Barb and Kelly sank to their knees and crawled on all fours to the feet of their supervisors, Kelly kneeling beside Tara, whose belly was swelling nicely with the prospective heir to the billionaire's fortune.

Barb installed herself likewise next to Delia, who sighed and remarked, "Christ it's hot, isn't it Tara?"

"I'll say it is, Dee." Of course they were barely breaking a sweat lying in the shade, compared to Barb and Kelly who had been laboring in the full sun. "I'm supposed to stay well hydrated for the little guy, according to Doc." "Guy," was indeed the correct designation, for the sonograms had shown, much to the delight of the boss, that Tara was not just carrying an heir, but a male one, at that.

"Barb, go bring us some iced tea," Delia ordered. Following the established procedure, Barb crawled away on all fours until she was 50 yards or so away from her mistresses, at which point she was permitted to rise and walk to the kitchen to complete her mission.

Meanwhile, Tara stretched out on her lounge chair and sighed. "Damn, Dee, I am soooo horny. This pregnancy just does a number with my hormones. And the Doc says orgasms are good for the baby."

Well trained in her duties by now and not wanting to suffer the kiss of Robert's whip that would be her fate if she failed to please, Kelly crawled next to Tara's prone form and undid her bikini bottom without needing further prompting.

She parted Tara's legs, placed her head between her thighs and began licking slowly up and down her labia. Tara sighed contentedly. "You aren't very good at driving a yacht Kelly, but this is one thing you do know how to do."

A few moments later, Barb returned with two glasses of iced tea. She handed one to Delia and placed the other one beside Tara, who was too occupied with the pleasure coursing through her groin to notice the cool beverage.

Delia took a long sip and pointed down towards her crotch. Barb knelt and untied her bikini bottom.