8

On the sixth day, little Orion felt the bite of the whip for the first time. He'd been hit, yelled at, had
rules and derogatory insults drummed into his mind for almost a week. The child was confused, scared,
tired, and hungry. Even when allowed to sleep his sleep was troubled.

He was slapped across the face. That was all, nothing more serious than that. He had failed to call Monkrion "sir". Just a slap, and although it hurt his bruised face, it was not that bad compared to the ordeal thus far.

But it was the straw that broke the camel's back. His lip trembled as he began to cry, and then, taking
the simian completely by surprise, he used his sharp little claws and slashed hard at the monkey. Even when
he'd fought other children he had never slashed that hard.

Monkrion let a yelp of pained surprise as the child's claws laid three deep claw marks in his stomach.

While he was distracted, Orion ran to the wall he had watched the simian take the riding crop from so many times, snatched a rod from it, and threw it at him as hard as he could.

The child got a lucky shot. The end of the heavy metal rod caught Monkrion in the side of the head and
he dropped, dazed, to the floor. Orion, now frightened about what he had done and wanting to get away before
he was caught, took the simian's keys and ran to the door. He managed to unlock the heavy metal doors and
run out.

Monkrion groaned, and shook his head, then growled in anger. The cub had just made the worst
mistake of his life. He ran after the kid before the door could close and lock again, as if it had, he would have
to radio for someone to let him out.

Orion ran. He ran, alternating between all fours, and two feet, throwing terrified glances behind him as
he did. He wove in and out of the other slaves working around the building, ducked behind sheds and privies, and underneath worktables.

Monkrion had contacted with his communicator a few of the guards under his command, and the foursome chased after the boy, running after him, shoving slaves from the way with derogatory curses.

Although the cub ran as hard as he could and tried his best to hide, the adults finally caught up with him.

A hyena guard dragged the boy, kicking and screaming, from underneath a workbench in the metal shop where
the blacksmiths and metalworkers labored.

Monkrion grabbed the cub from the hyena and received a kick in the face. He snarled and threw the boy
to the ground, where he landed in the dirt outside the shop and sprawled several feet away. he picked the dazed
child up to his feet, pinned his hands roughly behind him, and marched him back towards the building. "You
just made a big mistake, worm," he said.

Orion yelled tearfully the whole way to be released, but they went unheeded as he was dragged back to
the hateful room. Once back inside, with the door securely locked and the key safely out of the child's reach,
Monkrion threw the boy up against the wall, the one that had the iron rings and the chains.These were too big for the boy, but Monkrion simply forced both the boy's hands into one shackle and used the other one to secure him to the wall. once again he was on his toes.

The child had been in this position before, and remembered what happened last time, and started to
fight. "Let me go!" he cried in a little voice.

Monkrion kicked him in the leg. "Shut up! you are going to find out what a mistake you just made,
brat!" The simian went to the wall that held the smaller items and took a whip from the wall., his medical examination of the cub had shown he was tough and sturdy and healthy enough to withstand it, and now he would feel it. He brought the long handled weapon back, and let it fall across the child's shoulders.

Orion screamed at the new searing pain, and for a moment was silent in shock. Then the burning set in
and he began to cry.

CRACK! The whip fell again, cutting a slash across the child's back this time, and he screamed again.

"You NEVER strike a taskmaster, you worthless shitbag!" he growled, and struck again. "This is for defying
your betters." And he struck once more. Each time he hit the child, he told him exactly why he was being punished, calling him names he had never heard spoken before. Some in a language he did not even know.

Fifteen lashes. That was how many times Monkrion hit the child with the whip. Vicious treatment for
one so small indeed, and the poor cub was only half conscious when the monkey was done. Even then, he still
sobbed uncontrollably, never having felt such pain before.

Monkrion took his mane and jerked the boy's head roughly back. "This is your first taste of the whip,
Wermieren dung. And it will not be the last. You will never attack me or annoy another taskmaster again, or you
will get the same, or worse. Do you understand me?" The child said nothing and he yanked on his mane.
"Answer me!"

Orion could not. His mind was filled with too much pain and fear to get out an intelligible thought.

Monkrion growled, stepped back, and struck the child once more with the whip, leaving another slash down
his back. Orion screamed and started shrieking, "Stop it! Stop it! Stop hurting me, please stop hurting me,
please stop it, stop it..."

Monkrion nodded grimly at the nearly unintelligible childish pleas. That was the response he wanted.
He grabbed the mane again and said, "You want me to hurt you more?" The child shook his head desperately,
his eyes wide with terror and pain. "Then answer me. Do you understand what I said, maggot?" Orion nodded
immediately. Monkrion yanked back ion the boy's mane. "Answer up!" And he had better remember how he
was to do so or he would endure another few lashes.

"Y-y-yes, s-sir, yes sir, y-yes, s-s-sir, y-yes..." the child babbled.

Monkrion let go of his mane. "And don't forget it!" He curled his lip in disgust at the smell of blood.

Sixteen open lashes criss crossed Orion's back, shoulders, bottom, and legs. it had torn the fabric of the breeches Blackmoor had made him wear. A quick look told him that while they would hurt for a very long time, they were in no danger of killing him from blood loss. They would need to be disinfected though.

But first...

Blackmoor had given him permission to do this. Monkrion took a pair of pliers off of the wall,
grabbed one of Orion's bound hands, and forced the fingers out. Taking one of his claws in the pliers, he squeezed and ripped the claw out.

Orion shrieked and began sobbing again, struggling to free his hand from Monkrion's grasp, but he was
ignored as he repeated this process for all of the claws on Orion's left hand. "Maybe you will think of this the next
time you want to claw someone," he said calmly. "And now, to cleanse you, you miserable worm."

Leaving the kid there, Monkrion opened a cabinet and took out a large medkit, a necessity here. Not
thinking or caring about the cub's pain, he took out a small medical scrub brush that had antiseptic, antibacterial
substances in the handle that oozed from the bristles. He went to the sobbing child and used the brush to scrub
the child's back, scrubbing the blood from the fur although it would certainly bleed more.

Orion started screaming as the simian administered his rough first aid, and pleaded for him to stop. but
he did not. He dropped the boy's trousers to cleanse the lashes on his rear and his legs, then pulled them back
up. once this was done, he released the cub ad dragged him to a corner of the room. There, there was a
wooden box. It had sides that slid in or out to adjust and he shoved the child in, his knees against his chest, his
arms drawn under his chin. He closed the door then used the mechanism, to draw the sides and the top in so
that the boy was crammed into a very small area.

The walls pressing in on him, digging into his slashed back, pressing his body against his chest and
making it difficult to breath, Orion screamed again He sobbed to be let out, but Monkrion did not. He banged
on the box. "You will stay in there without food or water. By then you should have learned your lesson, worm." He left the boy.

The child was left in there for thirty-six hours, and taken out only twice for the simian to cleanse
the whip wounds. This was extremely painful, and it made Orion scream every time. By the last time this happened, he was ready to do anything to make it stop.

When Monkrion finally let the boy out, temporarily crippled from being cramped up so severely for so
long, Orion said nothing. He had wet himself, but did not even notice. He only cried and looked at the floor as he knelt, panting for breath. He was afraid to say anything.

"You earned your lesson, turd?"

Orion did not look up, only nodded immediately.

That was good. But he could not be lenient. He kicked the boy's back lightly. "What?"

Orion screeched and cringed away from him. "Y-yes, s-sir," he stammered.

"Good. Then we can continue with your training." The boy would be there longer than the usual week,
and he would include this in his report to Blackmoor.

Chapter 9

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