Chapter 7: Ballbusting
The freak trio made it as close as they dared.
Ballbuster territory was not so much a clear cut, negotiated area but more of a camp people avoided as far as possible. The camp's tents were arranged in a wobbly triangle with all grass in the middle trampled.
The shortest side of the triangle was taken up by two big, reinforced tents, flanked by an observer platform. Though there was nobody holding watch.
Spit, Eff and Jug approached crawling, to stay unseen under the rising sun.
Eff's nude body before him, Spit kept his ghost ready by his side. It took repeated mental orders to keep the invisible twin from charging forward on its own.
"How do we do this?" asked Jug next to him.
The red haired freak boy stayed close, rubbing his skin on Spit's. He was clearly nervous.
"Ever fought?"
Jug grimaced. "Can't say it counts. I'll stay back and shoot fire, but I'm not throwing any punches."
Spit patted the nude ass cheek in front of him to get Eff's attention. "Yo Eff, do we try to talk it out with them or just attack? There's a lot of those Ballbusters but they don't have freak powers."
Sitting back on his legs, head low, Eff said, "I've only heard warnings about them, but they got big by staying out of trouble. I don't think they're great fighters."
"Maybe..." Spit said. "We can get a closer look first. Maybe our powers tell us more when we're inside."
"Worth a shot."
The trio crawled along the side of a mesh-reinforced tent and tried to spot any activity inside the camp.
The Ballbuster gang was only just waking up. They had three slaves on watch, neither of which took their job too seriously. Aside from the collar and dick cage, each slave wore a thick, heavy ring around their sack that made his balls hang low and stretched.
Spit counted nine men doing morning exercise, plus four more slaves preparing breakfast at a free standing counter. All slaves wore ball-stretchers but after watching the regular gang member's loin cloths, Spit saw that everybody was `ringed' this way.
The trio crawled close enough to be right behind one of the big tents and Spit leaned forward to have a look through a window.
Seven more men were sleeping inside, most of them already in the process of waking up. The eldest in the room stood up and pissed on a boy who could have been the youngest.
"Get up, newbee. The hazing goes on."
While several men had a morning jerk off, two standing ones grabbed the dazed boy and cuffed his hands to a tent pillar, behind his back. In front of the boy was another pillar with a stretcher ring bolted on.
"You want to be a Ballbuster!?" shouted the elder.
"Y-yes sir!"
Snapped into the ring, the boy got kicks to his balls by the gang leader and every men who walked by before exiting the tent. Spit slid back into hiding just as one hard dicked gang member stepped up behind the boy's ass.
His ghost twin looked toward the neighboring tent.
"It's in there, I think," Spit said.
Jug flicked a flame ring into existence and checked where it was bending. "You might be right. Let's have a look."
They crawled around the outside, under the unoccupied observer platform and made it to the second big tent.
Before they made it there, Spit's ghost rushed forward. Spit dismissed the creature but the ghost stepped right out of him again.
Repeatedly dismissing the thing, Spit grunted. Then he was hit by dull punches.
"Sorry," Eff said. "My fields keep slipping out. At least we know it really is in there."
Jug waited outside, only looking in through a window. The other two freaks waited until every Ballbuster had turned their attention toward the completed breakfast arrangement and hopped inside the tent.
It had to be the treasury – a place where the Ballbuster's loot was stored. So they did steal, they just never got caught or reported.
"Yo," said a gentle, sleepy voice. "Did he send you in here?"
There was a slave, guarding the crated, boxes and bags.
A force field flew past Spit, big enough to create a current. The slave was flung back into the tent's scaffolding with a `clonk'.
Spit held still. Was anyone rushing toward them? Had they heard the-
His ghost jumped out of his body and firmly pointed at a small box, half buried under other loot.
The two freaks knelt down and pulled the box out from the pile while Jug moved to a closer window to look in.
"There's so much dust on this," Spit said. "How long has this been here?"
Inside the box was a slowly blinking apparatus with a lot of cables. Papers were jammed into the available space around it. Eff leaved through those papers, murmuring.
"Do you know who Sunbreaker is? I thought they only made solar panels."
Spit frowned. "They made all sorts of stuff. I think our first scanners were from them before we found cheaper ones. Why?"
Eff put the papers down. "This is an experiment. I can't see what for but they are talking about freaks and our brains a lot here."
"Do you think this has been on the whole time?"
They looked at each other – all three of them. Then Spit pulled random plugs until the lights stopping blinking.
He felt calm – absurdly calm.
He couldn't recall ever feeling this relaxed. He could have gone home and spent all day staring at the ceiling.
"Wow," Eff said. "Ever since I got here, I was antsy. I thought it was because I moved to Dreck Hole, but I guess this machine somehow... overexcited me?"
Jug gasped. "You mean you haven't felt like this your whole life?"
"So..." Spit said, "I couldn't stand staying home because of... this thing? Wow, let's talk this through in detail and-"
"H-hey, who are you!?" yelled a man, his morning-voice cracking.
As the two freaks in the tent turned to look at him, he stepped back from the entrance. "G-guards!"
Spit's ghost responded to orders without weird glitches, but wasn't as fast as Eff's power. The Ballbuster was hit by a force field that appeared to break at least his nose and flung him far away from the tent.
"Oops," Eff said. "Looks like my power's back under full control. I overcompensated there."
Five men rushed them as the freak duo left the tent. The guards carried thick bars and they were fast.
The ghost twin was in position and slammed its fist into the nearest face. A smattering of force fields stopped the attackers and made them stumble back.
Spit's ghost kicked and punched its way through two more men.
Meanwhile Jug had entered the scene, half hidden behind a barrel. He conjured a rapidly expanding ring of fire around his wrist.
A ghostly kick into a guard's stomach was followed by three force fields shooting over the crowd and knocking the reinforcing four gang members to the ground as a pile.
Jug's ring sizzled through the air and crashed into the breakfast table where it disintegrated protein bars, meat slabs and fruit slices which sprayed on the remaining men.
"We surrender!"
"What?" Spit asked, reflexively.
"We surrender," repeated the voice. It was the elder from the first tent. "Just... just take anything. We won't fight back."
"Um," Spit said. "We didn't come to take things."
The elder sighed. "Of course. It had to be this way eventually. Fine, I surrender the entire gang."
"W-wha..."
"Do you want to lead us or are you acting as law enforcement?"
Spit and Eff looked at each other. Neither of them saw themselves as gang leaders. "Law... enforcement?"
Again the elder sighed. "There are short chains in the tent behind you. They clip right on the stretcher rings. You'll probably want my money instead of having it confiscated."
"Sure..."
Gesturing at his slaves, the elder said, "Start chaining us up." Then he turned to a young member with a neck tattoo that spread onto his chest. "Omega, help me grab the money."
"Yes dad," said Omega and the two men walked to the farthest tent.
Once the freak trio had arranged themselves by the observer tower, Ballbuster slaves chained the gang together by the stretchers and lastly added themselves.
Spit now had a row of about twenty men at his mercy. Most of them didn't seem too happy. Only one slave was still unchained.
"Master," the slave said, "what do we do with the Newbee?"
Spit followed the slave to the sleeping tent and found the little boy from before, still firmly attached to the pillars.
"Yo, what's going on with you, kid?" Spit asked.
"Finally," the Newbee said. "The Ballbusters wanted me to join but they lied about how awesome it was going to be. I never got to do any cool gang stuff. They just like kicking my balls."
"But you wanted to join," Spit said.
"I thought it was a great idea. I was wrong."
Spit grinned. "But you got in."
"Yeah, but..."
"Slave, chain him to the others. He'll be treated as a full gang member."
"No please, I'll do anythi-"
A loud, screeching sound disturbed the new peace in the camp. From the farthest tent, the leader and his son emerged on a buggy. Crates were strapped to the vehicle's sides.
They made a narrow turn and drove out of the camp, into the sunrise.
The son, Omega, looked back and raised a middle finger with a smile. "Fuck y'all. Have fun being slaves. Me and dad are starting a new gang faaaar away."
Jug facepalmed. "We totally let him slip away."
"Yeah," Eff said with a slight shrug. "Should have kept an eye on him."
In the meantime, the slave had added the boy – and himself – to the chain. They were ready for a slow walk to Stone Burrow. Spit wondered what the reward was for catching an entire gang, even if the leader was missing.
Following his newfound calmness, Spit returned home with a lot of stories. He expected his old position to be unavailable, but that changed shortly after.
The old chief retired, wanting to turn his attention to building a train station for Apex as a full time project.
It didn't take a genius to see who the natural successor was.
One year later:
Serving as Chief Crisp's right hand was different than working under his dad.
Previously, Spit had been mostly independent and only visited his dad at home to report events or ask for advice. But now he spent every available minute with Crisp.
Being the kind and understanding guy he was, Crisp had gotten into the habit of keeping his jaw slack open and drooling constantly onto his chest. Spit usually licked the droll right when it was running along the brick abs.
One occasion where duty kept them apart – and Crisp's drool sadly ran down his mighty legs unlicked – was preparations for the Fuck-o-Drome party.
NewLaw guard Oh was training his successor at the gate. The young hunk in a pink thong had already met the town's administrators and snotted right into Spit's mouth as a greeting.
"Quiet night so far," the new guard said.
Spit shrugged. "The trains were a bit irregular this week. We'll probably get the whole crowd at once in half an hour. Yo, there's someone already."
The short boy with pink hair and a harness was trailed by four harnessed slaves.
"Yo Spit," C said.
"Yo C, who's the new one?"
C gestured his boys to turn and Spit read their names. The new one had `Pitbitch' tattooed on the back of his head.
"Pit? I thought you wanted two for the feet?"
C laughed. "That was the plan, but Pitbitch here likes licking sweaty pits and that gave me the idea. Really though, slaves have multiple uses. Did you think about becoming Crisp's thrall?"
"A lot, but we agree it's a huge step. It makes sense and dad gave his blessings but what if I just want a relationship? Crisp said he's not really looking. He's in love with weightlifting."
C chuckled. "Yeah, that's not hard to see. Well, you don't have to be partners for life, you can just try. But if he really doesn't want to date you, enthralling is a pretty good option."
"As if you knew," Spit said and stuck his tongue out. "You just go right for the slaves."
Their banter was interrupted by a gorgeous boy. "Master Spit?"
"Yes, Fuck Seven?"
Fuck Seven pointed behind him. "We assembled the sign."
"Now?"
The slave shrugged. "Master Zee wants it mounted for the party tonight. We couldn't get it done sooner."
Spit excused himself and followed the slave to the Fuck-o-Drome. Crisp was already waiting, several lines of drool glistening on his unrealistically massive body.
Spit dropped to his knees and ran his tongue up from the calves, past the red dickpouch and the bulging abs to the Big Bull's thick neck, finally plunging his tongue into the gaping mouth.
Together with three other men and ghost support, they lifted a holo-projector to above the door where letters had once named the club.
Ten minutes later, a holo-signboard painted `Fuck-o-Drome' into the sky, together with images of recent parties and advertisements for the opportunity to be scouted by Bubble & Butt.
Spit had ordered Mix 0 – a simple, gentle high that let him experience the dance party as if he was floating across the floor. Lights flashing from below the tiles had a mesmerizing effect on him.
In the middle of the crowd, taking up a lot of space, was Crisp. The chief was grinding his caged dick on a teen boy who had started worshipping the Pump and was planning his own journey to the Big Bull Den.
It was amazing how Crisp could inspire boys with his lifestyle while running a whole town. Really, a shame the huge guy wanted to stay single.
Spit carried a can of mix 12 for his boss. The music was too loud or he would have shouted his thought right there. While watching the Big Bull down the drink, Spit ran his tongue along the sweat drenched abs to catch what drool remained.
He resolved to tell Crisp about his decision first thing in the morning – he was going to be a thrall. Licking the Big Bull was going to be his way of showing love and commitment.
Spit was home.
THE END
Wow, a romantic ending to a trash punk story. Disturbing.
Yes, it's a shorter entry in the trash punk saga, but it wraps up neatly.
Remember to check out the others in the saga of you liked it. There may be another one coming someday if I find the inspiration.