Prologue

 

The silence that envelops me is terrible.

Infrequently now, I am only permitted to hear what the Church, in the form of The Office of Holy Discipline, has decided is appropriate. It wasn't always this way, for up until a year ago, I think, my mind was constantly bombarded with an unending stream of words, repeatedly telling me how to behave and the actions I must take to avoid earning the displeasure of the Church, and thus the retribution of the Office of Holy Discipline.

For the moment I remain kneeling, like the dozens of silent others around me, then slowly, awkwardly, and with flashes of twitching discomfort from the knee-length, rigid shaft projecting down from the thick steel crotch cover of my chastity belt, between my tightly-booted thighs, I and all the rest of the Sisters who are similarly equipped and dressed, obey the same electrical command to rise to our feet. There is no chance of avoiding or misunderstanding it and after only a few hesitations to do so, we all learned our lessons from the terrible shocks that we were disciplined by for our failure to obey instantly. I can see little in the dimness of the Chapel, thanks to the devices and the head piece and veils that I and all the other nuns of my Order are required to wear, and cannot remove ourselves, but turn obediently to the right in unison with my sisters when a trilling, painful pulse of electricity shudders my right breast and its metal-distended and tensioned nipple. A gasp of agony trembles my throat under my permanent, tight, high steel collar, but is stillborn at the back of my mouth; utterly stopped by the large, formed gag pad that has become an intimate part of my body. It too is a permanent part of my ensemble and I will wear it until I die! My cuffed hands jerk automatically, disobediently, at their pitifully short lengths of chain and the rigid bar separating and restricting them. My reactions are instinctual, frantic and utterly useless attempts to tear away the devices locked over, attached to, and into my sensitive and blood-engorged, but untouchable breasts, while yet another wail of pain ripples up my plugged throat. Oh God! Why is the Church permitted to torment us like this?

The outer garments that I and all the other nuns in the Order of the Sisters of Submission are required to wear are deeply-concealing Habits that completely hide our restraints and Control and Discipline Equipment; acting also to inhibit our freedom of motion even more. This is emphasized when the floor length skirts of my heavy, concealing robes swirl weightily around my booted and hobbled legs. Even as completely covered and totally, intimately controlled as we are, members of our congregation are seldom allowed into the outer world and of course no one other than The Church officials, knows the true extent of our inescapable bondage. Our life, such as it is, consists entirely of useless work, unending hours of penitence, enforced prayer and sleep.

More rippling bursts of electricity curdle both of my ballooned and armored breasts, again making me automatically try to scream frantically while I move slowly between the rows of 'kneelers', then down the aisle of the Chapel to the narrow, barred door. However, my progress from the Chapel, like all of the other Sisters imprisoned in this Chapter House, is silent and orderly. We are not permitted to hear the distracting noises of our clothes or our chain's movements and our protests and screams are heard only in the depths of our own minds. Our garments, restraints, and Controller Equipment ensure that none of the 500 women in this Chapter House alone can escape our Habits, despite any help that another may attempt. All of the equipment and clothing we wear is designed for the utmost security and control of our bodies and minds, for the rest of our lives. Just how permanent our new stations in life are has been brought home most terribly to all of us and we are constantly reminded of our slave-like and imprisoned status. At the door, pairs of more senior sisters, neck-leashed themselves to the walls behind them, wait to fasten us together for our walk to our places of labor or torment. Our line shuffles forward with mechanical precision, stopping for a minute, then advancing another couple of paces.

At last, having been near the front of the Chapel, I reached the narrow portal and stop, waiting to be attached to the nun preceding me. A pair of senior Sisters kneel on either side of the door and when we each emerge, they quickly lock a long chain to the central link of the one hobbling our ankles. This joining length is lifted by the sister on the right from its point of emergence under the hem of the long skirt of the nun who has just emerged from the Chapel, while the one on the left grasps a similar length from the eyelet in the skirt of the following sister, then locks them to each other. Looking down as I must, thanks to the tightly fastened nose chain from my permanent septum ring, I watch again with morbid interest while the two pairs of tightly and inescapably gloved hands grasp the chain emerging from the back of the Habit of the nun ahead of me, just behind her knees, then lock it to the one that emerges from the front of my own long skirt. Behind me, the process is repeated until all of the emerging women are captive. I hate being leashed like this! It is so terribly and intimately controlling! The vibrations of the closing locks and the swinging tugs of the leash chains penetrate far up inside my loins, then I move ahead until I am between the next pair of Sisters standing ready. They lift another line of gleaming links, these emerging through the back of the preceding nun's veil, and it is quickly fastened under my chin to the front ring of my own Collar Of Submission. Again, I move ahead and the next waiting pair pull my wrist separator bar tight to my waist, then adjust the chains from their rings on my hidden inner steel belt to it so that my hands are now held helplessly out to my sides. I am ready to be taken in total security to wherever it has been decided I should go today.

At the front of our coffle of penitents, a senior priest has locked the end links of the three sets of leashes from our hobbles, our Inhibitor Bars and our collars to a central ring and as each Nun emerges after being fully chained he moves further along the corridor. When he does, the first nun is compelled to move forward, and so the spacing is kept uniform. When the final woman emerges, her trailing leashes are also locked to a single ring and another priest controls that; keeping it under a firm tension so that no sister in the coffle can move closer to the ones before or following her. This arrangement is extremely secure and with only two locks, one at the end of the front and back chains, our entire group can be held in a line of silent, separated and isolated women, with none of us able to escape. Once we have all exited the chapel, we are led slowly down a cold, high ceilinged corridor, deaf to the clinking and clattering of our hobble chains and those that connect us to each other, unable to look up, thanks to our thrumming, tight nose leash chains.

My life has not always been this controlled. Things were so different, five years ago.

I am twenty four years of age, and fiercely hate what has been done to me! I long desperately to be freed of this constant control and the bondage that has become my life, but can no more escape it now, than I could travel to the nearest star! The Habit I am forced to wear is very oppressive, covering me from head to toe in a heavy, thick, black, rubber-lined cotton; it being fastened securely over and onto my body; designed so that it cannot be removed nor escaped by the wearer. Of course, it was created specifically for girls and women such as myself, to both conceal our restraint equipment and to further control us. From what little I've been permitted to read, it hearkens back to the most stringent and limiting designs in the Church's history and not only is the costume bulky and heavy, but it also acts to severely restrict free movement, sight, and hearing. The Habit's head piece is designed to, supposedly, keep our attention focused on God at all times, and does that with admirable efficiency, even without the restraints and other equipment we wear hidden beneath its voluminous, flowing folds.

Our walk is, without doubt, an oddly appearing one to any normal person who might observe us, but there are none of those permitted beyond the public rooms of the Chapter House. I must pace slowly along the stone-flagged corridor, feeling my regulation 25 cm long hobble chain snap taut between my wide, tight ankle cuffs with every step I take, keeping me always aware of their presence and restriction. The tight chain from my veil-hidden nose ring ensures that I keep my head bowed submissively at all times, staring down at the swinging and jerking chain from under my chin. It leads to the back of the veil of the nun in front of me, then under it to her collar and the sister following me is similarly a captive. I cannot hear my chains' noises while I walk, or the sibilant swishing of my robes, or the clip-clopping noise of my strange and uncomfortable footwear. Neither is there the sound of happy feminine chat, or any other unauthorized noise, for each woman in our parade of leashed femininity walks with slow deliberation, trying not to trip on her tethers. Each of us has our hands kept spread helplessly wide at the sides of our waists by a thick, gleaming, steel separator bar and this is perhaps the worst punishment of all.

These Separator Bars are never removed from between our wrist cuffs, and those can, now, never be removed either! It is a constant source of misery and restriction and I wept for days after first being fitted with the awful thing, but now, I have almost grown accustomed to how helpless and vulnerable it has made me. Occasionally, I still struggle to escape its restriction, but these attempts are useless, only bringing me hours and hours of forced penitence and isolation in my cell and so I rarely fight the restraint now; willing to do almost anything to avoid a session of correction. Nevertheless, we each have to spend one full day per week in 'Meditation', and I intensely fear the advent of these mandated periods.