Chapter 1

 

Ali bin Suleiman surveyed his number two main salesroom with a great deal of satisfaction.

It was tastefully decorated. Simply, but with perfect elegance. Two huge crystal chandeliers hung from the three storey high ceiling but their hundreds of tiny lights were dimmed. Hidden spotlights picked out the items on display without the strolling public even being aware of them. All they saw was the forty items of merchandise, each shown off to perfection.

They were ranged on highly polished marble plinths: ten rows in four columns.

They were slaves. Naked female slaves, all of who were the pick of humanity and all displayed in perfect symmetry.

The first column was all Caucasian; white girls all. Those standing on the plinths in the second column were each black while the third were of Asian origin. The girls in the fourth were a mixture of all or any of these races.

But they were also classed according to rows: Row 1 boasted voluptuous, Botticelli-type figures but then they gradually slimmed down and then by Row 10, their bodies had turned into highly athletic figures.

Across the hall, in Salesroom 1, forty prime male slaves were similarly displayed except that in this case, they started as slim young lads in their late teens, then gradually ranged up to massive extremely-muscled giants.

With the females, age wasn't as important as looks, whereas the younger males slaves were eminently better sellers than older, wiser and perhaps stronger items ...

 

By the sixth decade of the new millennium, the world had turned full circle once more. Crime was now met with as severe a regime as ever existed anywhere in the world over the last two millennia and unpaid debts also now meant slavery, either for the debtor himself, or his family or both, depending on the amount of debt and the man's own worth as a piece of merchandise.

This somewhat draconian regime had come about after two centuries of increasing crime of all classes, an almost total degradation of moral values and a rampant worldwide personal debt level that staggered the leading bankers and threatened to totally collapse the world economy.

Crisis meetings of the leading nations came up with a three point plan:

Major crime would henceforth be punished with a combination of slavery and physical punishments which would be designed as far as possible to match the crime.

Massively overcrowded jails would be abolished and current prisoners transferred to the new system.

Instead of bankruptcy, major debtors would lose every last one of their assets, including their own bodies and if necessary, those of their families. They also would be sold as slaves.

There was no opposition. There wasn't a man or woman on the face of the planet who didn't understand that the world was in crisis and that drastic measures were necessary. What is more, they worked! Crime figures plummeted as criminals realised the nature of the punishments which now faced them on conviction. So did debt. The mad spending spree that had engulfed even children now slowed down markedly and if the big chain stores reported a massive drop in sales, no-one was complaining for there was little point in selling if you had no prospect of being paid.

Ali's business was in London. His father had started it but Ali had built on his parent's good business, remodelling the showroom and then, building on his new success, moving to a new purpose-built premises which was now the best slave dealership in the whole of the United Kingdom. Many dealers tried to emulate his example but none had his panache and his eye for detail.

He never bought a slave unless he or she was perfect. With the males, they had to be handsome and well built. He didn't mind if they were young and pretty or big and muscular, as long as they were perfect examples of the male human form.

With the females, they had to be stunningly beautiful. He didn't look twice at even a modestly attractive girl. Her skin had to be as smooth as silk and her body without blemish. He well knew there was a wide range of desires in men who sought a female slave. Some like soft curves with a modicum of fat to blur the lines of their muscles; others liked the more athletic types, even muscle-girls and so he catered for them all - and everything in between.

He didn't train them. He didn't have to. There were literally hundreds of thousands of slaves on offer here, as in every country in the world and in order to serve up only the best there was, he had two agents constantly travelling the world seeking out exotics, as he called them.

Bringing them in to the UK was as simple as declaring them as customs items. Slaves didn't need passports or visas; they were simply items of merchandise and could be transported as such. The method of transporting had been invented back in 2040 and had instantly made long distance travel vehicles obsolete. Aeroplanes, trains, buses and even the family car were now gone. The machines were cheap enough for every house to have one. You simply stepped in, dialled the coordinates for your destination - and in an instant you were there - anywhere in the world!

Of course he did modify them. No-one liked hairy slaves and he had installed a machine that denuded his animals (for that was what they were now considered as) of all unwanted hair.

This matter he considered very carefully, looking over each new acquisition in minute detail as she or he stood before him on the examination plinth in his office. This room was as tasteful as the rest of his huge premises, boasting warm wood panelling, a thick Persian carpet over polished wooden floor and beautiful furnishings. He wasn't seated at his desk now however but in a deep leather armchair, looking up at the girl who stood in naked shame on the marble plinth that was a replica of those out in his two showrooms.

They were round and fluted and were really short columns carved in the Corinthian style. They were a metre high, this height having been carefully tested by Ali himself to judge exactly the right position for a slave to be viewed in all her (or his) naked glory. A metre forced the viewer standing down on the floor to stare up at his or her subject and this put them in the very best light possible.

Of course special clients could ask for a more personal (and distinctly more intimate) inspection in a private viewing room and then a hands-on examination was entirely possible. Ali's clients, who ranged from the top echelons of the aristocracy, down through bishops to the leaders of business and the arts, well knew the bounds allowed in these rooms for his electronic surveillance system was second to none. And every client was aware that overstepping the limits meant a polite request not to return - and that was a social ostracism equivalent to being sent to Coventry.

The girl currently being inspected was black and had been imported from Western Africa. She was a statuesque beauty with a rather muscular body but a beauty that was absolutely stunning. Her skin had a reddish tinge to its dark chocolate and gleamed with good health. It was also as soft as silk as Ali had already established when he had circled her as she stood up on the plinth. He had noted her fine musculature and smiled to himself as he thought of certain clients that would pay dearly for this beauty.

Her hair was long and flowing: wavy rather than gathered into the tight curls usual in her people and he knew this would be an advantage. He made a note to leave her with her head hair. But then he frowned as he stared at her vulva. Unlike most women these days, it was not even trimmed and flowered in an unruly mass between the junction of her thighs and her belly. It would definitely have to go and as he stared at it he wondered what shape her vulva would be.

Just as he knew of the various likes and dislikes his top clients had for voluptuous or muscular females, so he also knew of their preferences in this part of the female anatomy and in fact kept a cross-referenced database for each client and slave so he could instantly match up his current stock with a client's preferences.

Ali was a top businessman. He not only had the two main salesrooms stocked with a fresh display each day, he also had smaller rooms where his highly trained sales personnel showed off selections to favoured clients.

These rooms boasted a couple of comfortable armchairs with side tables for coffee and canapés (only the very best, served up by his Master chef). The chairs faced a small stage on which the selection would be arrayed as well as a plinth out in front where, one by one, each slave was brought out to stand on, displaying his or her charms while the salesperson pointed them out. Ali's prices were high, but so was the quality of his merchandise (and the skill and urbanity of his staff).

He sat staring up at the black girl for a few more minutes, wondering what name he would give her and how much he might ask for her body. It would be in the hundreds of thousands, of course. Lesser slaves, domestics and gardeners for example, could be bought for a few thousand pounds but the cream, such as this girl, were exquisite pieces fit only to be sold by Ali and a very few of his peers at the top of the slave dealing pyramid.

He wound his tall body out of the chair and moved up to her once more, reaching out to touch the unruly growth at her loins. "Why the hair, slave?" he asked pleasantly enough.

She stared over his head. She already knew enough not to look a free person in the eye unless directed to do so. "It is the custom of my people, Sir," she said softly, hoping her reply would not result in a repeat of her 'welcome' here yesterday.

The welcome was a standard introduction by a slave to his or her new Master's household or business. It always involved pain, more or less depending on the Master's own ideas of the correct amount of discipline necessary to properly control slaves.

In Ali's case, it was a standard ten strokes of the cane, delivered as hard as his chief overseer, David Henry, could deliver, followed by a couple of jabs to the genitals with a laser prodder. That was usually enough to make the new slave understand his or her place as a slave in the dealership but the slightest lapse in appropriate slave manners would result in a far worse punishment which was now shown to each new slave.

They were taken to the DR, the Discipline Room where stood the Triangle, the Cone and the Pole. All were constructed of gleaming stainless steel. The Triangle was aptly named. A metre-long triangle formed from a sheet of the steel bent in half along its length to form a sharp apex and the open ends thus shaped then filled in by triangular pieces which were welded in place. The solid-looking triangle thus formed stood up on a half metre high post and after five minutes perched up on its sharp edge, with wrists locked behind the back to opposite elbows and legs pulled out wide, almost horizontal, the big toes being chained to stanchions set up either side of the triangle, the slave felt as if her body was being cut in two halves. After an hour, she knew it; and after four hours she was just about unconscious from the pain.