Chapter 8: No Mercy Initiation
A week passed in a blur of strange, suspended normalcy. They stayed at Thorne’s house, sleeping long hours in the sun-drenched guest room, eating food that appeared without them asking. The profound exhaustion from the night of the ‘field test’ lingered, a deep muscle memory that went beyond physical tiredness. It was a quiet in their heads they’d never known. The constant, gnawing anxiety about money, about purpose, about the next wrong step, was gone. In its place was a simple, bodily certainty: they were here to be used, and that use had a purpose.
Thorne treated them differently now. He was less like a warden and more like a conductor who’d finally gotten his orchestra in tune. He discussed the data with them, showed them graphs of their ‘sync compliance’ spiking during the group session. He called them his primes. His breakthroughs.
The money hit their accounts every Friday. More than the original contract stipulated. A ‘performance bonus,’ Thorne called it.
It was on a Thursday morning, over coffee in the stark kitchen, that he laid out the next phase. “The sync is stable. The physiological adaptation is textbook. Now we test its… transferability.”
Leo raised an eyebrow over his mug. “Transferability.”
“You’ve learned the language,” Thorne said, his eyes bright. “Can you teach it? Can you facilitate the same state in a fresh subject?”
Jake felt a cold knot form in his gut, right beside the warm complacency that had taken root there. “Fresh subject.”
“Two, actually. A new pair. Recruited yesterday. They’re… eager. But raw. Uncalibrated.” Thorne stood, pacing lightly. “They need to be broken in. Gently is inefficient. You two understand the thresholds now. You know what’s required to bypass the somatic panic response. You can guide them through it.”
Leo barked a short, humorless laugh. “You want us to be your… trainers?”
“Facilitators,” Thorne corrected, but he smiled. It was the same smile he’d had when the first stallion had been led in. Hungry. “You’ll be in the rigs with them. The old ones. Not the synchronized pair. Side by side. You’ll demonstrate. You’ll… encourage.”
The cold knot in Jake tightened. He saw it then, the path. From subject, to collaborator, to instrument. He was becoming part of the machine. He looked at Leo, who was staring into his coffee, a faint, cynical smile playing on his lips. He knew Leo was thinking the same thing. The difference was, Leo seemed fascinated by the slide. Jake just felt it happening.
“Yeah,” Jake heard himself say, his voice flat. “Okay.”
The Dual Restraint Rig chamber wasn’t the dungeon. It was a different wing of the estate, all polished steel and gleaming white floors that smelled sharply of antiseptic beneath a subtler, coppery undertone. The rigs themselves were brutalist sculptures of black hydraulic arms and heavy, padded leather cuffs. They stood side-by-side, a narrow console of blinking lights between them.
The two new boys were already there, flanked by Mara. They looked young, maybe eighteen. One was tall and skinny, all elbows and nervous energy, biting his lip. The other was shorter, stockier, trying to look tough with his arms crossed over a chest that was already shaking. They were wearing the same generic grey shorts they themselves had worn on day one.
“This is Kieran,” Thorne said, gesturing to the tall one. “And Ben.” The stocky one nodded once, a jerky motion. “They’ve signed the waivers. They understand the broad parameters. They don’t, however, understand the reality.” He turned to Jake and Leo. “You will show them the reality.”
Mara handed them each a set of black coveralls. No shorts. Just the coarse, utilitarian fabric. As they stepped into them, Jake felt a shift. He wasn’t getting undressed to be vulnerable. He was getting dressed for a job.
Thorne positioned them. Jake was assigned to Ben, the stocky one. Leo got Kieran. The protocol was simple, clinical. They were to help secure the subjects into the rigs, then administer the preparatory aid—a large, cold speculum attached to a hydraulic arm. The speculum was for ‘pre-stretching and internal lubrication monitoring,’ Thorne explained, his voice echoing in the sterile space. It was also, Jake understood, the first true violation, a mechanical handshake from the machine they were about to marry.
Ben was trembling as Jake guided him towards the right-hand rig. “Just breathe,” Jake said, his own voice surprising him with its calmness. “It’s easier if you don’t fight it.”
“Easy for you to say,” Ben muttered, his bravado cracking.
“No,” Jake said, pulling the first leather cuff snug around Ben’s wrist. “It’s not. But I’m still here.” He saw the panic in Ben’s eyes, the same animal terror he’d felt staring at the Clydesdale’s flank. A weird, detached pity washed over him, followed by a sharper, colder impulse. This boy’s fear was a liability. It would make it worse for him.
On the other side, Leo was talking to Kieran in a low, steady monotone. “The data suggests the initial penetration is the key psychological hurdle. Your brain will scream. You have to tell it to shut up. It’s just physics after that.”
Once the boys were locked in—chest, waist, thighs, wrists secured—Thorne brought over the speculum apparatus. It was a sinister, polished steel thing with smooth, curved blades that parted on a central screw. It gleamed under the fluorescent lights.
“Manual insertion is less traumatic with guidance,” Thorne said, holding the device out to Jake and Leo. “You know the angles. You know the resistance. Show them.”
Jake took the cold weight of it. He moved to stand behind Ben, who was straining against the restraints, his head twisted to try and see. “Relax your muscles,” Jake instructed, his voice devoid of warmth. He placed a hand on the small of Ben’s back, feeling the knotted tension there.
Leo stood behind Kieran, spreading a bottle of cool, clear gel over the speculum blades. “This part’s the most intimate,” Leo said, almost conversationally. “After this, it’s just logistics.”
Jake looked over at Leo. His friend’s face was a mask of focused detachment. He gave a barely perceptible nod.
“Okay,” Jake said, more to himself than to Ben. He used his other hand to guide Ben’s cheeks apart. The boy flinched, a sob catching in his throat.
“Please,” Ben whispered.
The word ignited something cold and furious in Jake’s chest. ‘Please’ didn’t exist here. ‘Please’ was the lie you told yourself before you broke. He remembered his own ‘please,’ swallowed in the barn, useless. He leaned in close, his lips near Ben’s ear.
“See how they take it when you don’t coddle them,” Jake growled. The words weren’t entirely his; they were Thorne’s, from some earlier briefing, but they felt right on his tongue. He shifted his grip, tangling his fingers in the short hair at the nape of Ben’s neck, holding his head steady. With his other hand, he positioned the cold, blunt tip of the closed speculum.
He didn’t ease it. He pushed, firmly, steadily, feeling the internal clench of muscle, the rigid resistance, then the sudden, terrible yield. Ben screamed, a short, sharp sound that choked off into a gasp.
On the other rig, Leo was a study in efficient motion. He’d spread Kieran’s cheeks with both hands, positioned the speculum, and applied pressure in one smooth, uninterrupted motion. Kieran let out a choked grunt, his body going rigid.
“Depth to five centimeters,” Thorne called from the console, watching a screen.
Jake began to turn the screw. The blades inside Ben separated slowly, mechanically. Ben was panting now, tears streaking his face. Jake watched the process with a distant curiosity. He could feel the strain through the metal, the living tissue fighting the intrusion. He remembered the feeling. The unbearable stretch. He gave the screw another quarter-turn.
“Good,” Thorne said, his voice humming with approval. “Perfect anatomical dilation. Retract.”
Jake reversed the screw. The blades slid closed, slick now, and he withdrew the instrument. Ben sagged in the restraints, weeping openly.
Leo had already finished, wiping the speculum clean with a clinical towel.
Thorne approached the console. “Prep is complete. Initiating primary penetration sequence. Jake, Leo—observe and report. Your experience is the guide now.”
The low hum of hydraulics filled the room. From apertures in the wall behind each rig, the familiar, sheathed mechanical arms emerged. They moved with a silent, oiled precision the animals never had.
Jake watched the arm approach Ben. The boy was staring at it, his eyes wide with horror, his body trembling violently. The cold, glistening sheath hovered, poised.
“Look at me,” Jake said.
Ben’s eyes flickered to him, desperate.
“It’s just a thing,” Jake said, his voice low and firm. “It can’t hurt you more than you let it. Your fear is the problem. Not the machine. Now breathe out.”
As the machine arm made contact, Jake placed his hand flat on Ben’s stomach, feeling the muscles clench. He applied a gentle, steady pressure. “Breathe out,” he commanded again.
The arm pushed forward. Ben cried out, but he breathed out in a ragged shudder, and his body, trained by the speculum, yielded a fraction more easily. Jake watched, his hand on Ben’s abdomen, feeling the internal displacement as the mechanical member slid deep. He saw the exact moment Ben’s eyes changed from terror to a stunned, overwhelmed shock. The point of no return.
He looked over at Leo. Leo had his hand on Kieran’s shoulder, not comforting, just present. Kieran was biting his own lip bloody, his face a rictus of pain, but he was silent, taking it.
“Cycle beginning,” Thorne announced.
The machines started their rhythm. In, out. A slow, relentless, perfect cadence. Jake kept his hand on Ben’s stomach, feeling the pulses of movement inside him. He watched Ben’s face, watched the shock slowly deaden into a kind of blank acceptance. The boy’s tears kept flowing, but silently now.
Jake felt nothing. Not pity, not pride. Just a hollow, functional satisfaction. He was doing his job. He was facilitating.
Thorne watched them work, his arms crossed, a faint, possessive smile on his lips. He wasn’t looking at the machines or the new subjects. He was looking at Jake and Leo.
The chapter ends with the machines humming, the new boys broken into the rhythm, and Jake catching Leo’s eye across the sterile space. In Leo’s gaze, Jake didn’t see a friend anymore. He saw a reflection of his own hollowed-out competence. They were no longer students of the language. They were its teachers. And the lesson, it seemed, was infinitely repeatable. The thought was neither comforting nor terrifying. It just was. The next phase had begun, and they were already deep inside it.
The next phase had begun, and they were already deep inside it.
Weeks bled together, marked by the hum of machines and the shallow, accepting eyes of the new subjects. Ben and Kieran became fixtures. They no longer cried. They arrived on schedule, entered the rigs with a practiced, weary compliance, and left walking stiffly, their payments clearing with silent digital pings. Jake and Leo’s role solidified. They weren’t just facilitators anymore; they were calibrators. Thorne had them adjust the machine settings based on the subjects’ micro-expressions, the twitch of a thigh, the hitch in a breath. They were tuning human instruments for maximum resonant surrender.
“See that?” Leo murmured one afternoon, his finger hovering over the pressure dial for Kieran’s rig. They stood at the central console. “Right at the peak of the stroke. That flinch isn’t pain. It’s anticipation. He’s starting to like the bottoming out.”
Jake watched the screen. The biometric readout spiked. “Increase by five percent,” he said, his voice flat. “Test the theory.”
Thorne, observing from his usual perch by the wall, gave a slight, approving nod.“Exactly. You’re reading the data live. Beautiful.”
It felt less like science and more like grooming. The thought slithered through Jake’s gut but found no purchase, smothered by the heavy blanket of routine and the ever-growing number in his bank app. He caught Leo’s eye. His friend didn’t look haunted; he looked engrossed. It was a puzzle to him, this mapping of pleasure onto violation. Jake wondered, not for the first time, which of them was more broken.
During a lull while Ben and Kieran were in the post-session observation room, Thorne brought up a new schematic on a tablet. “The next iteration,” he said, his eyes gleaming with a fervor that was almost religious. “The Engram Machine. It doesn’t just simulate the act. It maps the neurological signature of peak… compliance. It etches the response pattern onto the basal ganglia. One perfect session could replace months of conditioning.”
The screen showed a nightmare of articulated chrome, a cradle of articulated limbs and neural sensor arrays. It looked less like a medical device and more like a spider.
“Who’s it for?” Leo asked, peering at the design.
“For them,” Thorne said, nodding towards the observation glass. “The next step in their integration. We’ve prepared their bodies. Now we shape the mind’s expectation, make the response… indelible.”
A cold, clear understanding clicked into place for Jake. This was the real product. Not the study, not the sync. It was this machine. They’d been paving the road for it all along. He looked from Thorne’s fervent face to the schematic, then to the glass where Ben sat staring blankly at a wall. Something inside him, the last stubborn knot of the person he’d been before the estate, tightened. It wasn’t revolt. It was a darker, more curious impulse.
“Put us on it,” Jake said.
The room went very quiet. Thorne’s head swiveled towards him, the fervor replaced by pure, clinical disbelief. “Don’t be absurd. You’re the control group. Your baseline data is pristine, continuous. You can’t be contaminated by an experimental neuro-shaping protocol.”
“Why not?” Leo chimed in, leaning against the console. A slow, challenging smile spread on his face. He’d caught Jake’s drift. “We’re the most calibrated subjects you have. If it works on us, you know it’ll work on anyone. We’re the ultimate stress test.”
“It’s out of the question,” Thorne said, his voice hardening. “The risk to the longitudinal study—”
“They can take it,” Jake interrupted, jerking his thumb towards the glass. His heart was pounding, but his voice was steady. This felt more real than anything had in months. “You said it yourself. They’re conditioned. Broken in. Let’s do it side-by-side. Them on the Engram. Us in the old rigs, synced like before. A full spectrum comparison. You’ll get data you never dreamed of.”
Thorne stared at him, conflict warring in his eyes. The obsession for deeper data battled against his meticulous control. The obsession won. Jake saw it happen. A slow, predatory light returned to Thorne’s gaze. “You’d be willing? To be… remapped?”
“We’re already mapped,” Leo shrugged, the picture of casual arrogance. “Let’s see if your fancy spider can draw a better picture.”
The preparation had a grim, ceremonial feel. The Engram Machine was wheeled into the chamber, its chrome limbs unfolding under the lights with a series of soft, precise clicks. It stood opposite the two original restraint rigs. Ben and Kieran were brought in, their eyes widening at the sight of the new apparatus. There was no fear left in them, just a dim curiosity.
“New protocol today,” Thorne explained, his voice buzzing with contained excitement. “A comparative analysis. You’ll be experiencing a more advanced interface.”
They guided the new subjects, their movements practiced and efficient. Ben into the Engram, Kieran into the old rig adjacent to it. Jake and Leo took their places in the familiar rigs opposite. The leather cuffs felt like coming home.
“Initialization sequence,” Thorne announced from the master console, his fingers flying. “Engram syncing to Subject Beta’s neural baseline. Primary rigs syncing to Prime subjects’ established harmonic.”
A new sound entered the room: a high-frequency whine, like a mosquito trapped in the skull, emanating from the Engram. Ben’s body twitched in its cradle as the neural arrays made contact with his temples and spine. The machine’s mechanical arms, sleek and needle-tipped, positioned themselves with unnerving gentleness.
The old rigs’ arms descended with their familiar, solid presence. Jake felt the cold, blunt pressure begin. He locked eyes with Leo across the space. This was the old dance. They knew its steps. They breathed in unison, their bodies opening on the same count. The penetration was a deep, stretching fullness, uncomfortable, almost mundane now.
Ben was not so lucky.
The Engram didn’t thrust. It pulsed. It emitted a low-frequency vibration that seemed to bypass flesh and resonate directly in the bone. Then it moved, not in a linear stroke, but in a subtle, corkscrewing motion designed to trigger every nerve cluster in sequence. Ben’s back arched off the cradle. A sound left his mouth, not a scream, but a ragged, shattered exhalation. His eyes were wide, unseeing. The machine was reading him, playing his own raw nervous system back at him as a torturous symphony.
“Fascinating,” Leo gasped from his rig, watching Ben convulse. The machine’s rhythm was fucking up their own synced pace. “It’s not… it’s not following a mechanical script. It’s following him.”
“He’s not ready,” Jake grunted, the words torn from him as his own rig piston-fired deep. He saw it, clear as the data on Thorne’s screens. Ben’s body was a bowstring pulled past its tensile limit. “Thorne, abort it. He’s going to—”
It was already happening. The Engram, seeking the peak compliance signature, escalated its input. A particular limb adjusted its angle, targeting the sacroiliac joint with precise, inhuman pressure.
There was a sound. Two of them, really. A wet, visceral pop, like a knuckle cracking deep underwater, followed instantly by a sharper, sickening snap of ligament. Ben’s entire body seized, a violent, electric rigidity that lifted his hips clear off the cradle. His mouth opened in a silent, endless scream.
And then he came. A raw, pulsing jet that had nothing to do with pleasure, a purely neurological firework triggered by systemic trauma. It splashed across the cold chrome of the Engram’s invading arm.
Kieran, witnessing it from the neighboring rig, let out a sharp, panicked cry and began to struggle wildly against his own restraints. “Stop it! Stop it!”
“Leo, now!” Jake yelled, his own cycle halting as he hit the emergency release on his cuffs. The hydraulics hissed. He stumbled free, his legs unsteady.
They moved in sync, as they always did. Jake went to Ben, Leo to Kieran. But not to help.
“They can take it,” Jake snarled, his voice low and furious, echoing his own earlier words back at himself, at Thorne, at the whole fucking situation. He positioned himself behind Ben’s still-seizing form in the Engram cradle. He placed his hands on the boy’s heaving hips, now misaligned, wrong. He pushed down, hard, forcing the ruptured joint back into contact with the machine’s probing limb.
Ben’s scream found its voice, a high, terrible wire of sound.
Across the room, Leo did the same to the struggling Kieran. He wrapped an arm around Kieran’s chest, pinning him back against the rig, and used his other hand to force his hips forward onto the penetrating arm, holding him there, eliminating any buffer of space. “You wanted the data,” Leo hissed into Kieran’s ear, his tone curiously flat. “Here it is.”
Another snap, this one from Kieran’s rig. A softer pop, then the same rigid seizure, the same traumatically induced release. The smell of spent adrenaline and copper filled the air.
Silence, except for the hum of the machines and the ragged, wet breathing of the two broken subjects.
Jake looked at his hands, then at the chrome limb of the Engram, slick now with Ben’s release. He reached out. He dipped his fingers into the warm, spent fluid. He looked at Leo, who was doing the same, drawing his fingers through the mess on Kieran’s machine.
Without a word, they both smeared the substance back onto the cold, invasive metal. Jake worked it into the joint seams of the Engram’s arm. Leo wiped it along the shaft of the old rig’s sheath. It was a pointless, visceral act. A grotesque anointing. Making the machine part of the biology it had just shattered.
Thorne stood frozen at the console, his face pale, his hands suspended above the controls. He was not looking at his ruined subjects. He was staring at Jake and Leo, his primes, his breakthroughs. His eyes held a dawning, terrible awe. They had not just facilitated the experiment.
They had become its uncontrollable heart.