The Pledge (F+/F)

Start Date: October 1, 2018
End Date: October 31, 2018
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caquernham
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The Pledge (F+/F)

Post by caquernham »

It was pledge season at Tarrytown College, and sorority chants echoed through the chill air. Few of the young women at the historic women’s college could be seen without pledge pins on their breasts, and Tammy was not one of them. Hers was crimson, and embossed with the letters Gamma-Alpha-Gamma. Her ringlets bounced as she bounded across the quadrangle, dry leaves sticking to the soles of her bare feet.

Up until now, she had been content to spend the semester studying in her room. Joining a sorority was a perfect opportunity to meet new people and come out of her shell. Gamma Alpha Gamma seemed like the perfect fit. It was neither the most prestigious nor the most selective sorority, but it struck her as a group of misfits. Tammy thought she would be right at home among them.

It was on the orders of Cynthia, the vice president, that she participated in the scavenger hunt in bare feet. Cynthia believed it was conceit that drove Tammy to show up to Gamma house in a pair of taupe high-heeled pumps, and vowed to put the uppity little initiate in her place. But despite her shoelessness, Tammy completed the scavenger hunt with aplomb. Cynthia needed a more humiliating way to break the pledge’s spirit.

When Cynthia found out that she worked in the library, she ordered Tammy to steal a key to the archive room in the basement and wear it on a ribbon around her neck for a week. She had to be dedicated enough to the sorority that she was willing to risk her job.

The archive room was rumored to be haunted. It was filled with rare old texts, and was only available to students by appointment. It had a dim atmosphere, which disturbed the imaginations of students and faculty handling the fragile manuscripts. There was a particular tome that unsettled everyone. It was a fourteenth century illuminated manuscript from a monastery in Flanders. It was rumored to be bound in human skin.

Tammy had often stolen glances at the book. It was on a plinth in a thick glass display case, open to a page which showed an illustration of Eve accepting the apple from the serpent. What really unnerved her was that Eve in the illustration, with her long blonde curls, looked just like Tammy. She could never bring herself to stare at the book for too long.

The devilish smile that crossed Cynthia’s face when Tammy showed her the key the following evening made Tammy shudder. It so disturbed her that she began to doubt her choice of sorority. She had made it this far, however, and if she quit, there would be no chance of her joining another. She returned to her room to settle early into bed. Her sleep would be uneasy.

It was interrupted by the dreadful sensation of an entire sock being violently stuffed into her mouth. It was already too late to scream. A pillowcase was over her head. Her hands were tied in front of her with a ribbon.

Her captors hoisted her out of bed. In a few moments, she felt the biting cold of the outside air on her skin. She wore only a t-shirt and a pair of flannel pajama pants. Several awful minutes passed before she was indoors again.

She was dropped on short-pile carpet with a thud. The pillowcase was removed from her head.

“Wake up, sleepyhead” cackled Cynthia’s voice. Tammy’s eyes adjusted to the light to show her four figures, difficult to identify without her glasses. She pieced together what was happening, though. She was a captive of the initiated members, lying helpless on the floor of the archive room, eyes as wide as the full moon. She knew she was in for a long night.

They held her down and pressed the socks deeper into her mouth. She wretched. Her eyes watered. They just kept ramming the wad deeper into her cheeks. Duct tape was pressed over her mouth and wrapped tightly around her head.

Her wrists were untied and gripped firmly. She was unable to resist. Her hands were crumpled into fists and wrapped with tape. The adhesive stung her fingers and her fingernails bit into her palms. The torment was only just beginning.

Her captors made her sit up and forced her arms behind her back. They began to tightly bind her. Rope and duct tape were wrapped liberally around her every extremity. The room was filled with the sound of ripping tape. She smelled booze on her captors’ breaths.

It all happened so quickly. She was dropped to the floor again, making a weak attempt to struggle. She was wrapped head to toe in crisscrossing layers of tape and rope. Everywhere on her body, it dug into her flesh and strained her joints. She could barely move. Her captors still weren’t finished.

She was lifted up to a shelf and tied standing to one of its metal risers. Her head was taped back to it and she was forced to stare straight ahead. Cynthia’s sour face filled her view, close enough to be made out clearly.

“Gotcha, bitch!” She taunted. “Let’s see you escape from that!” Cackles erupted from the figures behind her. “You’re gonna spend the night with the ghosts down here. Tell us if you see any when we cut you out in the morning!”

Tammy sobbed. Never in her life had she been so humiliated. She felt completely exposed. She shook, trying to tear herself from her bonds. She only felt them tighten.

“Oh, and watch out for the monk. Who wrote the book? It’s his skin.” Cynthia gestured to the display case. “He likes virgins!”

Cynthia pinched Tammy’s breast as the other figures roared with laughter. Then they turned and left Tammy, tied up and helpless, in the spookiest room of the spookiest college in one of the spookiest towns in the state.

Tammy glanced through her tears at the display case. It embarrassed her to admit how much it unsettled her. She thought of herself as a rational person, but there was something disturbing about that book. And now, she would have to spend all night tied up and locked in a room with it. She was trembling.

The lights of the archive room clicked off and Tammy heard the door shut. It was now pitch black. She was furious at the Gammas for doing this to her. She struggled like mad and screamed into her gag. The ropes didn’t budge. The tape stayed put. Her own voice sounded weak and distant. Her heart pounded as she tried not to think about what horrors could be lurking in the dark.

She had no way of telling how much time was passing. The only company she had was the steady hum of the climate control unit. Keeping the air chill and prickly, it buzzed in her ears all night, mocking her pathetic attempts to free herself.

Hours passed before something happened which made her blood curdle. The lights above the display case flickered on. Her eyes snapped shut involuntarily. An image flashed before her of the illustration of Eve. The vision stood before her, clear as day. Someone was running a bony grey finger across the surface of the text, tracing Eve’s hair along the page. Tammy had the distinct sensation that her own hair was being gently stroked. She shook her head as violently as she could; the tape pinched her cheeks and chafed her lips. She gagged on the wadded-up sock.

It couldn’t be, she told herself. Her mind was playing tricks on her. She had been deprived of her senses for too long. She whimpered softly to break the oppressive silence, nudging the sock in her mouth away from her throat with her tongue. She gathered the mental resolve to open her eyes once again. It was pitch dark.

She stood in silence for some minutes, listening to her pulse hammering past her ears. She decided to squirm some more, to keep her blood flowing. She flexed her fingers in their duct tape mittens and twisted her wrists, trying to expose some new arteries to the cold air. She bent her knees and curled her toes, scraping her toenails against the carpet. She moaned into the darkness for her own sake. She told herself that nobody, or nothing, could hear her. Somehow, she didn’t believe that.

She thought she may have dozed off, but she couldn’t be sure. Perhaps that had only been a bad dream, one of those especially vivid apparitions that occur at the onset of sleep. Whatever it was, she could no longer trust her senses.

Suddenly, she felt a sensation which she could never forget. A human hand, hard and bony and icy cold, gently squeezed her left breast. Tammy tried to scream, but all the air had been forced from her lungs. It felt as if her life was being sucked out of her. She writhed in her bonds, with every muscle of her body tensing and throbbing as she tried to struggle free. She felt a corporeal presence press itself against her. A frigid sensation penetrated deep into the core of her body. Something brushed against her cheek. Tammy was frozen with fear, rope and duct tape cutting into her straining muscles like knives. She felt the icy sensation climb up the inside of her thigh. Then, mercifully, she fainted.

She came around to the sound of ripping duct tape. The piercing light stung her weary eyes. She was lying on the floor, still tied up, but with the distinct sensation of her bonds loosening. She heard a voice.

It was Cynthia. She was groveling. “Sorry! We’re Sorry! We are SO Sorry! Oh! Oh! We didn’t mean to hurt you! We didn’t mean it! We’re so sorry!” The duct tape was yanked out of Tammy’s hair. The sock was pulled out and spittle dribbled down her cheek. “We were drunk and not thinking straight. By the time we realized what we’d done, the library was closed. We couldn’t get to you.”

“We didn’t want to call security or the sorority would be shut down,” another voice chimed in. “We were afraid…”

YOU were afraid? Tammy screamed in her head, unable to get the sound out. YOU were afraid for your STUPID SORORITY while I was left TIED UP for HOURS in the DARK??

Tammy’s arms fell limply to her sides. She embraced the ground, pressing her cheek to it and weeping. The events of the previous night felt like a dream. She didn’t know if she could ever explain them. She didn’t know if she could ever be the same.

“The good news is, you’re in!” Said Cynthia. “You’re a Gamma! Just keep quiet about this.”

Tammy muttered curses under her breath. She lay still on the floor as the last of her bindings were removed. She took an unrestricted breath of the cool, stuffy air. The skin-bound book loomed over her on its plinth.
byronweilm
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Post by byronweilm »

The picture doesnt show up anymore. Any chance you can post it again? Ill need to save it on my computer to make sure I dont lose this Thanks.
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