The Shot Tower Ch. 02

Please read chapter 1 first so that you will know who these people are and where they are both literally and emotionally.

The Saturday of Memorial Day weekend came soon enough. The afternoon picnic was pure Americana: Softball games, eating, children playing on slides, swings, and teeter-totters. The menu was all-American too: hot dogs, hamburgers, potato crisps (which the Yanks call potato chips), and beer. After 5 PM, families started heading home, and the volunteer cleaners picked up the litter and took the leftovers to the local homeless shelter.

By 5:30, the park was nearly deserted, but about 7 PM, with the sun still pretty bright at that time of year, adults began drifting back in couples, small groups, and singles. Jane, Brian, and I walked back to the park together. When we got to the shot tower, I saw that people were dividing into two groups. One, mostly male, was queued up to go and enter the tower. The other, mostly female, was gathered on the opposite side of the tower. Each group had about 150 people in it. It wasn't hard to guess which were the dominants and which were the submissives.

"Well," said Brian, "I'll see you two on the flip side." With that, he headed off to join the queue waiting to go into the tower.

Jane took my hand, and led me over to the mainly female group. I realized that I was more scared than I thought I would be. I looked around and saw a few other women who looked as nervous as I felt: the other first-timers, I guessed. All of them were around 21 years old give or take a year. I saw no other girls from high school, but Alito was there. I tried to chat with her, but I was so nervous I could hardly speak. She did not seem the least bit surprised to see me there which irritated me a bit. I admit that I had got fizzy by Pam's and the Rodriguezes' stories, but even so I felt slightly offended that they would just assume that I was a slutty submissive, merely because I'd been a little ... what was Jane's word? ... affected by their stories. As I was ruminating on this, I noticed that Jane had walked off to talk with someone else and I soon lost sight of her in the crowd.

Shortly after that a women came through the crowd passing out copies of a waiver form. Each of us was required to sign one. It was a simple document in which I swore that I was acting voluntarily. It also said that I agreed that once I started up the stairs, I had to keep going till I reached the top. I signed it and handed it back to the woman who was collecting them.

Finally, we were told to queue up and we were led around the tower to the entrance. The spankers had by then already gone in and taken up positions along the stairway. My stomach was doing gymnastic flips and for a second I had an urge to run away; but I took a deep breath and told myself that if all these other women (and a few men) had been spankees in the past and come back year after year, it couldn't be unendurable.

I was close to the end of the queue, only about 20 spankees were behind me. There was something familiar about the woman just ahead of me and while we were waiting to go in, she turned around and smiled at me. It was Pam Sneed, who had told me about the original incident that inspired the tradition. She also didn't seem surprised to see me, and again I felt a little annoyed. Seeing how nervous I was, she took pity on me and leaned over to whisper in my ear.

"We're not supposed to tell first-timers any details," she whispered, "so you didn't hear this from me, but here's a couple of tips. If you try to protect your bottom or cover up with your hands, the spankers can stop you, hold your arms and give you four hard extra swats with a paddle. They'll let you rub your bottom, but only when you are on a landing."

"Good grief," I whispered back, more nervous than ever now, "are there any other secret rules?"

Suddenly, the queue began to move and I could see up ahead that the women near the front of the queue were entering the tower.

"There's no more time to talk," Pam whispered back as we moved forward, "just keep in mind that it's all about submission and you'll be fine. Trust me, Marian, I ... understand you."

I didn't get a chance to ask her what she meant by this because she and I had reached the arched entrance of the stone tower.

As soon as I entered, I could hear echoing noise in the shaft. There was a pile of shoes and socks at the bottom and we were told to add our own footwear to the pile.

"You can pick them up again, afterward," Pam whispered to me.

After we had complied, I looked past Pam to the queue ahead us as it led up to the first landing and then turned out-of-sight to go up to the next one. The spankees were walking up the stairs, each about 2 or 3 steps behind her predecessor. There were men along the walls also spaced about every third step, but some were on the inner side — the shaft side — of the stairs. Paddles lay on the steps near the feet of some men, presumably for punishing rule-breakers. They were all clearly enjoying themselves. As each spankee passed a man he would reach out and smack her on the seat of the pants with his hand. I could tell by the way the women jerked in response that these weren't gentle pats. Some of the women were already rubbing their bottoms when they crossed the first landing.

Pam reached the bottom step and I saw her start up. The first man, who was standing on the third step, smiled as she reached him and then he leaned forward and gave her a powerful slap on her right buttock. It knocked her right hip forward a couple of inches and I heard her emit a low "umph" sound. But she kept climbing.

I stepped onto the lowest step and realized that I was sweating and my knees were shaking. In another second or two a man's hand would spank my jean-clad rear for the first time in my young life, and I gulped as I moved to the second step. I didn't have the nerve to look at the man, so I looked down and away as I reached the third.

I was lifting my left foot to the fourth step when — Smack! — I felt a strong swat to my right bum. It jerked my hips forward a bit and I reflexively "owh"ed out loud. Two thoughts struck me in the next second as I continued to walk up the steps on autopilot: one, a man's hand covers a lot more surface area that I imagined in my fantasies and, two, the spank hurt more than I had imagined it would.

Smack! A spank from the second man interrupted my thoughts. This one seemed to come up from below and I felt that I was lifted in the air a centimetre. For some reason this angle of attack seemed ruder, more invasive, than the first spank, and I had a sudden urge to whirl and slap the man on his face. I suppressed it and kept going, but my flash of anger must have registered on my face. The third man seemed to take this as a challenge, so he also gave me an upper cut too, but instead of letting his hand bounce away from the smack, he slid it up my right bum, his fingers trailing through the crack of my blue jeans. I was mortified and jerked my hips away from his hand as I continued up the steps.

These men, I thought to myself, they are ... are ... doing whatever they want with me! Taking whatever liberties they want with my bottom. It was one thing to fantasize being controlled by a man, it was quite another to actually experience it.

The fourth smack was on the outside left bun, almost on the side of the hip. The fifth was in the middle but way down low, almost between my legs. Both were hard and I gave out a little gasping "ouch" after each of them. Both of these were in unexpected places and I learned something else about the difference between fantasy and real domination. You can't be surprised by anything in your own fantasy, not really; just like you can't tickle yourself. So, in a fantasy you aren't really under the control of someone else, even if you are imagining someone controlling you. But this gauntlet was different. I really didn't know where each blow was going to land or how hard it was going to be.

As I was to discover, some of the men seemed to understand this and they did things to make even the timing of the spanks unpredictable for the spankees. Some men, for example, would wait until the spankee had passed them and almost reached the next man before they landed their swat. Others did the reverse: instead of waiting for the next spankee to reach them, they would take a step down and swat her only a split second after the swat of their predecessor.

"Well, looky what we have here," the voice of the last man before the landing interrupted my thoughts, "it's a real young'un. Been a few years since we had a teen for this. Glad to see it, though." With that, he gave me a slap right in the middle of my bum and chuckled. He was not to be the last spanker to comment on my youth.

Intensity-Stop

I reached the first landing and turned left to start up the second flight of steps, still a few steps behind Pam. About halfway up a male voice echoed through shaft: "Intensity-stop."

At this, the spankers cheered and I heard some groans of dismay from some of the women. The queue of spankees came to a halt. The man beside me gave me a sharp smack to my left bun and followed it up quickly with one to the right. He continued rapidly spanking me. Ahead of me the man beside Pam was doing the same to her, and I realized what "intensity-stop" meant and why the men had cheered. Pam was not one of those who groaned in dismay. In fact, she immediately stopped, bent forward and rested her hands on her knees, sticking out her bum for chastisement.

The spanking seemed to last forever although it was only about 20 seconds before a voice boomed "Go" and the queue started moving again. But my spanker landed 15 spanks in that time and I was squirming a little by the end. I squeezed my eyes shut as I endured it and I squeezed my hands into fists at my sides to resist the urge to put my hands back and protect my rear. This, I thought to myself, is my first spanking. This is what it's like to ... submit. And then, for the first time that day, I felt the tiniest bit of moisture between my legs.

Comparatively speaking, I hardly felt the next few blows, and when I reached the second landing, I rubbed my bottom furiously as I turned and moved to the next flight.

There were no intensity-stops on the way up to the third landing, but the cumulative effect of all the spanks I'd been getting made itself felt and I rubbed my bottom as I crossed the third landing, bearing left to the next flight of steps. As I passed the window that opened into the shaft something colourful caught my eye. I turned my head and looked just in time to see several bright pieces of cloth falling through the shaft. It took me a second to realize that they were blouses. Somewhere, high above us, the women at the front of the queue were being ordered to take of their tops and toss them into the shaft. One I recognized was the white and blue striped shirt that Jane had been wearing.

The first man on the next flight gave me a whack on the right, but the next man reached out and cupped one of my breasts, as if to brace himself, before smacking me hard with the other hand. Once, again, I had an urge to slap him in the face. Is this allowed? I wondered, Are the men allowed to molest the spankees? In retrospect, that was a pretty silly thing to think, given the circumstances, but nevertheless that was my instinctive reaction. Then I remembered Pam's advice: it's all about submission. I said nothing and kept climbing.

On the fourth landing, even Pam was rubbing her bottom. As she passed the window, I saw her glance out and smile. She seemed to gain energy at that point and her step quickened as she moved quickly to the next flight. I glanced out of the window, too, and saw slacks, jeans, cut-offs and other short pants falling through the shaft along with blouses. I felt a hot flash and a burst of moisture in my privates at the thought of the women above us, stripped to their underpants.

I was recognized, again, by the third spanker up the next flight. It was one of the few women spankers and she spoke with a Scottish accent.

"Och, it's that snooty English lass with her fancy talk," she said, surprised but evidently pleased to see me there providing a target with my bottom. She swung her left hand back behind her and then swept it forward, stiff-armed, to clap hard against my butt. I heard her chuckle with satisfaction as I squealed an 'ow' and staggered forward a little.

Humility Corner

As I moved on, I noticed that up ahead on the wall of the fifth landing was a big, handwritten poster. Humility Corner #1 it said in big letters across the top. Below this were some curt instructions: "Stop. Bend. Ask for Spank (Politely!). Say Thanks."

As I got closer I could see that there were three men standing on the landing. As each woman reached it, she walked to one of them, bent at the waist, and received a smack on the rump. I wasn't close enough to hear what was being said. Since the procedure required the woman to stop for a few seconds, having more than one man available to give spanks, kept the queue moving.

Pam reached the landing and stepped forward briskly to bend at the waist beside one of the men.

"Please give me a swat," she said.

Pam and the woman ahead of her occupied two of the three spots when I reached the landing, so I stepped over to the third man. It was then that I realized it was Don Rodriguez. He was the first spanker I'd encountered so far that I knew and I found it so embarrassing that I looked away as I stopped beside him and bent at the waist.

"Please, Mr Rodriguez, give me a ... a spank," I stammered a little.

"Gladly, Marian," he replied, then adding "I thought I'd probably be seeing you here." With that, he gave me a smack on the centre of my rear.

"Th- thank, you," I gasped as I straightened and continued to the next flight, still not able to look at him.

The next two flights were relatively uneventful but the cumulative effect of all the spanks we'd been getting was being felt by all the women. Many now had watery eyes and some twisted their hips or clenched and unclenched their buttocks as the climbed, trying to twist away the pain. The men seemed to delight in this kind of show and it seemed to me that they especially loved to swat an already churning behind. I was gasping and 'ow'ing now with almost every spank on my tenderized butt.

As I passed through the seventh landing I looked out of the window and saw bras falling through the shaft along with the usual assortment of pants and tops.

Halfway to the eighth landing, my heart sank to see another poster on the wall there. Humility Corner #2 it said. Below that was the command: "Go over the first available lap."

When we got there, I could see that there were again three men on the landing, but this time they were each sitting in a straight-backed chair and each was holding a ping pong paddle. I was reminded of the old barber shop slogan: "Three chairs, no waiting!"

Then, to my shock, I realized that man in the rightmost chair was Brian. From that moment, I hardly noticed the spanks I was getting as I climbed the steps closer and closer to the landing. I was too busy crossing my fingers and hoping that I wouldn't end up over Brian's lap.

No such luck. When I arrived on the landing, the woman ahead of Pam was just getting up from the lap of the man on the left and Pam was draping herself over the man in the middle. Brian had the only unoccupied lap. I was mortified and looked at the floor because I couldn't look him in the face; but I walked over to him, took a deep breath, and lay myself down over his lap.

"Puh- Please give me a swat," I stammered to my host father. Now, I understood why it was called "Humility Corner".

He smacked the paddle down on my left bun and I my body jerked up and stiffened. It stung like a dozen bees at once. I twisted a little on his lap which humiliated me even more, but I couldn't help myself.

"Thank you," I finally gasped and slowly rose to my feet. Still avoiding Brian's eyes, I headed toward the next flight stroking my burning bottom with both hands. I took comfort in the fact that I had now passed the halfway point. There were eight more landings before the top.

The climb to the ninth landing was comparatively easy since hand spanks did not compare to a swat with the paddle, but my rump was so tender now, that even relatively light swats brought grunts of pain from me. I also became aware that I was getting very damp by all the manhandling.

Passing the window on the ninth landing, I watched the colourful rain of clothing floating down from above. I noticed with a shiver that there were knickers mixed into the storm now. But it was much a shiver of arousal as fear. The women at the head of the queue, I realized, must now be bare-naked.

As we neared the 10th landing, I saw Pam suddenly put her hands back to protect her butt from the imminent spank of the man she was passing.

"Here, here, what's this?" the man said, "you know you can't do that, Pam! You'll have to pay the penalty now." He bent to pick up a paddle that was lying on step next to his feet as two other men closed in and grabbed Pam's arms.

"That's alright," a fourth man said, "ya don't gotta hold Pam. She does this every year."

With that, the men let Pam go and, sure enough, she bent forward and stuck out her butt for the paddle. She got four hard swats which must have stung terribly and hers eyes did water; but to my astonishment, after the second smack Pam cupped her hand over her own crotch and began to slowly stroke it up and down as the third and fourth blows landed.

I stood stock-still and stared at her as she resumed the climb until a sharp spank reminded me to keep moving.

When we got to the 10th landing, a man was standing there saying "Tops off, tops off, ladies."

I saw the woman ahead of Pam pull her baby tee off and toss it through the window. Pam took a bit longer to unbutton her shirt, but soon it too was floating in the void. I stepped up to the landing, took a deep breath, and pulled my pink sleeveless with the lace collar over my head and, with a gulp, tossed it out through the window. As I moved to the first step of the next flight I felt as if every man was staring at my white bra. My face turned red, but I also felt excitement and warmth between my legs.

The flight up to the 11th landing was actually the easiest so far. The men were so intense on looking at the lace-and-silk-encased breasts before them that they did not spank very hard.

But the 11th landing proved to be the most embarrassing so far. A man was standing there repeating the same command over and over.

"Lose the bottoms, now, girls. Off with the pants and skirts."

The woman ahead of Pam, unsnapped her plaid shorts and I saw her shoulders heave and heard her give a little sob as she pulled them down and off. After hesitating just a second or two, she tossed them through the window, blinking back tears as she did so.

Pam, on the other hand, didn't hesitate to yank off her jeans as if they were an encumbrance she was glad to be rid of. She tossed them through the window without even looking. To my astonishment, I saw that she was wearing G-string underwear. All the men in the vicinity hooted at this, but Pam didn't seem to mind. Her face was flushed with excitement as she stepped toward the next flight of stairs and the next awaiting spanker.

Then it was my turn. For the first time since I'd entered the tower, I felt an urge to run; but I knew that wasn't allowed and I wasn't about to find out what sort of punishment was dealt out to those who tried. I also figured that if I worked fast, I could get my de-pantsing done with while the men were still ogling Pam's nearly bare buns. I quickly unbuttoned my jeans and yanked down the zipper; then, with my eyes squeezed shut, I pulled them down and tossed them to my left.