Sara's sister Penny had been grumpy since the middle of the fifty-mile drive south, when she'd lost her cell reception in the middle of texting her friends. She cheered up as the car neared the tiny port, and her bars returned.

Sara sat in the front passenger seat, her eyes trying to take in every sight along the road. They weren't familiar sights -- she had never been this far down the highway -- but this was her last time seeing the mainland, and every part of it seemed to be her home, the only one she had known. There was no room for sadness, though, against the excitement coursing through her veins.

She reached up absently and brushed her fingers through her hair again. It was such a weird feeling. She had kept her hair short for years, but not this short. It was no longer than an inch anywhere, and was stiff enough at that length that it resisted lying flat. It met the requirements for female grooming on the Island. Sara was sure she would get used to it, but it would take some time.

She frantically tried to think if there was anything she had forgotten to say. "Daddy, you have Ms. k... k... Cameron's number, right?"

He smiled patiently, as he exited the highway onto the road into the port. "At home. Drawer in bedside table."

"Don't call her a lot and b... b... bug her, because she probably won't know d... d... d... day-to-day things about what's happening to me, but call her in ss... ss... September to see what the plans are for g... g... getting my meat sent to you."

Her father sighed. "Yes, hon."

"Oh! Daddy, do you th... th... think you'll get m... married again?" They had eaten Sara's mother four years ago, not long after Sara had met Cherise. Sara had served as something of a mother to Penny since then.

He looked at her in surprise. "What brought that on, out of the blue?"

"I guess..." She giggled. "W... W... When you said 'bedside.' And anyway, th... th... this is my last chance t... t... to ask you."

He rolled his eyes. "I honestly haven't thought about it." He looked at Penny in the rear view mirror. "You'll be the lady of the house now, Pen. Should I ask your permission before I go on dates?"

Penny looked up from her phone. "Can I veto anybody I don't like?"

Dad looked uncomfortable. "I suppose. In a way."

"Cool." Penny returned to texting.

He turned the car into the parking lot entrance. "I think this is it."

Sara could see a boat at the pier. It looked big enough. She rose slightly in her seat. "Can't see the n... n... name... Oh! There's Ms. k... k... Cameron."

As she started to open the door, she saw Penny suddenly look directly at her, for what seemed the first time during the drive. Penny looked somehow lost. "This is really for real, huh? I'll never see you again?"

"Well, n... n... not alive. Listen..." She focused on Penny, made sure to hold her eyes. "Daddy's not g... g... going to see me roast. You m... m... m... make sure he sees you w... w... when your time comes."

Penny's eyes suddenly puddled and overflowed. "I will." She reached over the back of the seat to hug her big sister.

Sara hugged her back, and said, "Come on, l... l... let's get out of the k... k... car and do this right." Standing beside the car, she gave her sister a much longer hug.

Sara stood alone on the deck for now, watching the coastline recede. The others had all been standing with her twenty minutes ago as the boat pulled away from the dock, waving at family members. Cherise had been there, which gave Sara the usual flushed, tingly feeling, though there had been a couple of other girls between her and Sara. Like Sara's, Cherise's once long, flowing hair was cut to a one-inch length, yet it looked indisputably feminine, coming down to gently curled points at the sides of her head in front of her ears -- still black as night, and so soft and feathery-looking that Sara longed to stroke it with her fingertips. Sara was sure that Cherise could walk down the street past any number of men and look back to discover they were all following her, hypnotized.

All of the other girls, of course, had cut their hair as well, and Derek, the assistant manager of the restaurant on Purity Island, had some training in hair grooming and would cut all the girls' hair regularly through the summer to keep it an acceptable length. But on the girls other than Cherise, it just looked like an unusual and whimsical fashion choice. Only Cherise looked as though the style was undeniably hers, an integral part of who she was, regardless of the fact Sara had never seen her that way before.

Sara was surprised none of the others had stayed on deck longer after the boat pulled away. Of course, there was the attraction of refreshments down below, but Sara thought the last view of the mainland would...

Oh, right. Sara almost slapped her head at her denseness. All of the others would be coming back in three months. Sara was the only one who would never see the mainland again.

Sara was also a little disappointed Ms. Cameron -- Steffi, as Sara kept reminding herself to call her -- wasn't coming along with them. Sara found her very likeable, and was also very grateful to her for approving Sara's request -- in part because Sara had been able to skip final exams and spend the last couple of weeks with her family. Steffi would be returning to Purity Island next year, when the new restaurant opened in Fairhold, another of the trading-post towns on the coast. Sara felt lucky that construction on that site had taken longer than expected. When the two restaurants were both running next summer, the foundation would choose twice as many interns, so that Sara might have had an opportunity to be chosen -- but she would only have had a fifty-fifty chance of ending up at the same restaurant as Cherise.

Sara had asked Steffi why the restaurants, the present one and the upcoming one, were only open three months out of the year. Steffi explained that during the following nine months, everything that had happened, every interaction between restaurant staff and islanders, every comment made by restaurant customers -- there were cameras and microphones all around -- would be analyzed by the foundation's panel of experts to help them determine where the project stood and what might be tried next.

Sara heard, above the rumbling of the engines, footsteps coming up the steps from below. She turned and saw Trish, a psych major, rising up from the boat's depths, carrying a soft drink of some kind in a paper cup, covered with a plastic lid with a straw stuck through it -- carrying an open beverage container on the rocking deck was asking for trouble. Behind her -- Sara sucked in a breath and felt her vocal apparatus close down as always -- was Cherise, holding a couple of crackers with slices of cheese. Ashley came up behind her, though Sara barely noticed.

Cherise looked out at the choppy water and then, making Sara's breath freeze altogether for a moment, looked directly at Sara and smiled, with a puzzled expression. "I thought you didn't get the internship, Sara." Cherise hadn't spoken to her when the entire group was on the deck, but presumably she had been curious all along.

Sara almost fainted. She loved, loved, loved hearing Cherise say her name. It sounded so incredibly sweet, almost like a new, prettier name, coming out of Cherise's mouth. Only seconds later did Sara start to focus on the fact that some sort of response was expected from her. Sara tried to send a stern message to her mouth, but it was hopeless. Cherise gave her that usual look that said, I know you can talk, Sara, what is the deal?

Cherise went on, "Oh! Maybe you got in from the waiting list later? But I haven't seen you at the orientation sessions." Sara hadn't been required to attend orientation. She wouldn't be waiting tables, so she didn't need to learn the menu and the detailed rules of conduct; she could attend classes at the restaurant if she wanted but wasn't required to and hadn't been assigned to any.

Sara's mind spun, wondering how she could answer a question that wasn't yes-or-no. She was relieved when Ashley, who was another sociology major with whom Sara had shared some classes, said to Sara, "Oh, I heard you're coming along as food, right? Not as an intern. You'll be the featured meat at the end?"

Very gratefully, Sara nodded eagerly, happy to have her role understood. If the others still didn't know yet, Ashley could tell them -- or Sara herself could, at any time Cherise wasn't around.

Trish looked at Sara wide-eyed. "Oh, so you're not coming home? You're going to be eaten there? As a restaurant meal?"

Ashley put in, "By the natives, yeah."

Sara wanted to add that the girls would have part of her as well. Impossible to explain that right at this moment, of course.

Jill, an anthro major whom Sara knew vaguely, came up from below and joined them. Trish explained, with some degree of excitement, what Sara was doing on the boat.

Jill looked even more excited than the others. "I wish I'd known you could do that!" She bit her lip in thought for a moment. "I still want to finish the internship and get back, though. I'm graduating next spring." She looked at Sara. "But I'm going to see if can come back the next year and do what you're doing!"

Trish gawked at her. "You want to finish your degree and then not do anything with it?"

Jill said defiantly, "This is doing something. You know they study everything that happens at the restaurant, and everything helps them understand better how to deal with the islanders. I'd be contributing to that! If I'm going to be eaten eventually anyway, why not do it so it helps people learn something?"

Trish nodded. "Okay, yeah, that's a good point."

Cherise smiled again at Sara, and for the second time ever, touched her, this time a friendly pat on the upper arm. Sara had to lean against the railing, feeling faint, as Cherise said, "Well, I'm really glad you got to come."

Sara nodded again, now completely unable to tear her eyes away from the beloved face. The thought raced through her head: What if I touched her too? But I'll probably end up totally throwing my arms around her and holding her as tight as I can. This isn't the place for that. She wouldn't be ready. I really need to talk to her first.

Bart, the restaurant manager and de facto uppermost honcho of the operation in the absence of Steffi, came up from below. "Okay, I need all of you down below now. You can strip off down there and we'll get you fitted for the decorations you'll be wearing."

Sara's heart seemed to stop pumping altogether. They want all of the girls to discard their clothes -- now! This minute! Sara had known it would happen eventually, and had hoped to talk her way out of it, but now there might not be time.

She had hoped so much that only Cherise would ever see her naked. That was looking like another dream she would have to discard, but not without a fight.

Bart remained at the top of the steps, sweeping his arm to gesture the girls onward as they descended. As soon as Cherise was out of sight, Sara felt the invisible hand of silence release her. Quickly she said, "Mr. W... W... Winchell, k... k... k... can we talk a minute?"

Bart turned to her with an affable smile. "Bart."

Sara nodded. "Bart -- k... k... can I be excused from... that? From ss... ss... stripping? I'm n... n... not really in the same k... category..."

He interrupted her gently. "I know you're not an intern, but the point right now is, you're female. You're not going to walk around on the island wearing clothes. You know what the islanders think about that."

She gestured at the clothes he was wearing, standard island attire for males -- the shorts and sleeveless vest of girlskin leather, the floppy wide-brimmed hat of the same material that was good for deflecting the near-constant rain, the leather moccasins for shoes, and said, "I k... k... could wear something like that. Maybe with a cloth or something r... r... wrapped around my chest to squash my b... b...b... breasts down. N... N... Nobody would know."

"And you know what would happen to you if they did figure it out? I'm told you've studied as much about the island culture as the rest of the girls, so you know impersonating a man is about the worst offense there is. You really, really, really wouldn't want the punishment you'd get for that. Not to mention they'd seize you and rush you off so we'd never see you again. You know the old story about Sherry Patton, right? Fifty years ago? As far as anyone knows she spent the rest of her life on the island in hard labor as a work slave."

Sara wasn't ready to let it go. She would take risks to keep this part of her dream alive. Also, she had never imagined showing her body to strangers and near strangers, most of whom weren't Cherise, and the immediate terror of that seemed to outweigh the theoretical terror Bart was describing. "Isn't it a sh... sh... short walk from the d... d... d... dock to the restaurant? I'm w... w... willing to take a chance."

Bart shook his head. "I'm not. This isn't just about you and your own safety. An offense like that would wreck the whole operation. They'd never trust us again. And no, before you suggest it, you can't just chicken out and go home on the boat. It's staying tied up at Purity for a few days, and you wouldn't be any safer trying to hide out on it than you would be walking around town." His voice grew softer, the usual friendly note coming back to it. "Look, Sara, I can see this is scary for you and you didn't see it coming. But just tell yourself it's something you have to do. It'll be uncomfortable but it won't hurt you." He started down the steps, and beckoned back to her. "Come on."

In the big room belowdecks, the rest of the girls were either naked now or peeling off the last of their underwear. Each was depositing her clothes, folded, in a small cardboard box with her name on it. Derek was saying, "We'll return these to you in September, on the trip home. Laundered, in case you're wondering." There were a few nervous titters.

Sara saw Cherise, standing naked like the rest, and nearly came unglued. Cherise was the loveliest image that had ever been processed by the optical centers of Sara's brain. Her breasts stood out proudly on her chest, with slightly upturned nipples, just the type Sara loved. Her tummy was perfectly flat, with a hint of taut abdominal muscles -- not as defined as Sara's own, but perfectly shaped, curving inward to her navel. Her mound was covered with a perfectly triangular patch of kinked hair, as black as that on her head, likely allowed only recently to grow out as required, yet seeming as if there was no possible universe in which it would not be there. Her perfectly curved legs, her rounded buttocks... Sara was nearly squirting between her legs, and realized, to her further enhanced embarrassment, that she was just minutes from having to discard her panties with a damp coating of sexual juices.

Derek handed Sara a box of her own. "I know you won't need to get your clothes back, but we can hang onto them if you want something done with them."

Sara stared at him, playing back what he'd said to her while she'd been staring at Cherise, and nodded vaguely. She was glad he didn't ask her to specify where she wanted her clothes delivered right this minute -- she had lost the power of speech again. She would tell him later to send them on to Penny. Sara had already left Penny all her other clothes -- Penny was thoroughly used to getting her clothes handed down from her big sister.

A sudden cloud of concern flashed through Sara's mind. She was so accustomed to her vocal trouble that it hadn't immediately occurred to her that it was expanding its grip on her. She had stammered for years, but the only time she shut down completely was when she tried to address Cherise directly. She was otherwise able to speak, even when Cherise was in the same room. But Sara knew it was hopeless to speak to Derek right now, as much as if he had been Cherise himself. Cherise's presence radiated through Sara's consciousness like the heat from a furnace. If it was because Cherise was naked, that wasn't a good sign, because she would remain so all through the summer -- for the rest of Sara's life, in fact.

It doesn't matter, she told herself. Sara knew she would bear any burden if it meant she could be near Cherise. It would obviously, though, be inconvenient.

She brought her mind back to her surroundings and reminded herself that right at this minute, there was something she was required to do.

Sara used each foot to push the shoe off the other foot and put them in the box. Then she closed her eyes, gritted her teeth, and reached down to the hem of her t-shirt, to raise it up and peel it off. Her shorts came off next and, feeling her face nearly explode from the flush, she unhooked her bra and worked her panties down her legs.

Naked now, Sara resisted the almost overwhelming compulsion to cover her sex with one hand while shielding her breasts with her arm. None of the other girls was doing that, though a few looked nearly as uncomfortable as Sara. They were, presumably, all promising themselves they would get used to it.

Derek called out, "Line up in front of this table. I'll take some measurements and get you fitted."

Jill, first in line, was the first to be adorned with soft cloth wristbands, about two inches wide, which sealed closed with Velcro patches; similar ankle bands; and armbands that rested just above her biceps. The last of these required a measurement, as they came in three different sizes. All of them were of a bright yellow-green, almost neon shade. Finally, he measured Jill's neck with the tape measure, searched through a box and extracted a collar, ceramic with a flat glaze of that same yellow-green color. It came in the form of two semicircles, about an inch across, hinged so as to swing closed to complete the circle around Jill's neck. As Derek closed the collar with a click, Jill reached up to feel it, and to feel the latch mechanism in particular. From where Sara stood, it looked like the latch had joined the two semicircles so flush that the circle was unbroken. "How do I get it off?"

Derek showed her another of the collars. "See these studs next to the latch? Feel for those. Press inward on them simultaneously."

Jill spent a moment finding the studs by feel, then squeezed them. The collar opened with a slight popping sound.

From behind them all, Bart said, "The collars are designed so you can get them off in case of emergency, a choking hazard, for example. But aside from that, we want you wearing them at all times, even in the shower, even in bed. We don't want to take the smallest chance of you being seen without a collar. Take yours off and you'll find yourself with floor-scrubbing and toilet duty for a week." That was a chore otherwise performed by two genuine mainland slavegirls brought along for that purpose.

A girl Sara didn't know looked very uncomfortable, biting her lip at the sight of Jill's collar and knowing she was about to be made to wear one too. "There's something I didn't get clear on. Are we really slaves, or just pretending to be slaves?"

Bart responded, "While we are on the island, we respect, observe, and are bound by all of the laws of the island. That means it's not just pretending. As long as you're there you are, like any other woman on the island, really a slave."

The girl gulped. "Okay, I was just wondering. I didn't... well, I mean, I don't have anything against any slave personally. I just... never pictured myself as one. Wanting to be one."

Trish suddenly laughed. "Katie, Katie... You're a college student. You do whatever your teachers tell you and they don't pay you anything for it. You don't want to be a slave? What did you think you already are?"

All of the girls laughed, and Derek and Bart as well. Finally Katie laughed too. "Well, yeah, okay."

Sara was beginning to accommodate to her nudity. It definitely helped that she was surrounded by a roomful of women equally naked. It wasn't as if anyone was staring at her. As far as she could tell.

One by one the rest of the girls were fitted for their decorations. Cherise's were a beautiful gold color, the collar looking like a pure twenty-four carat treasure. Sara stared at her in awe even beyond the usual.

Sara's own color turned out to be sky blue. She liked it, and hoped she could find a mirror soon to see what the collar looked like on her. It was very smooth with no attachment rings, thin though rounded at the edges, thicker in the middle. Sara had never imagined wanting to be a slave any more than Katie had, but her first reaction to the neckware was that these were the coolest slave collars she had ever seen.

It had taken her a little longer than the others to get her armbands fitted. Derek had blinked at her arms. "Let me see how big those biceps get."

When she tightened up her arm for maximum flex, Derek blinked again and gave an unconscious tiny headshake. "Okay, relax and let me put this on here as loose as I can get it. Just enough so it doesn't start sliding down your arm." He adjusted the armband in place, then said, "Okay, flex that muscle again, see if it pops the band off." Under his breath he muttered, "Should have got some elastic ones."

She made a bulge of the muscle, and felt the armband tighten, like a blood pressure cuff, but it stayed in place. She nodded to him, the best way she could think to say, Okay, that should work. She turned away to look at Cherise again. She told herself she shouldn't, because now there was the danger of a stream of fluids dripping down her inner thighs, unhindered by panties. But she couldn't turn away from that vision.

Derek now lifted a heavy box onto the table, where it landed with a clinking sound. The girls all turned to look. Derek said, "Let's go in the same order as before. I've got two sizes of these..." He extracted an example of the contents of the box, "...but I should be able to find the right one for you without measuring."

All around her, Sara could see the other girls giving the same uncertain look at the apparatus that she knew she herself was. Ashley said quietly, "Uhhhh... Nobody mentioned hobble chains."

Clearly that was what Derek was holding: a heavy chain about twelve inches in length, with metal bands, again in the form of hinged semicircles, of a size that would fit around the ankles.

Another girl Sara didn't know said, "We have to wear those??"

Bart said in an apologetic tone, "Oh, thought somebody would have told you about this. But not once you get inside the restaurant, no. These are only for the walk from the dock to the restaurant, and again in three months when you're going home."

Ashley said, "Look, I mean I'll do it, but I thought we were going to spend the whole time in symbolic bonds." She held up her wrist bands. "Not real ones."

Bart explained, "You're all familiar with the requirement of keeping our presentation on ground that's familiar to the islanders. They are perfectly willing to accept that we let you walk around our own establishment unfettered. That's our prerogative as your owners, and they respect that. But for any slave to walk around out in public without any restraint -- they just can't imagine that. Someday in the future perhaps they'll accept it, but right now they won't. And you can consider yourself lucky that it's down to just the hobble chains. Last year, when the islanders saw our waitresses arrive for the first time, we had the girls also wear handcuffs joined in front, and heavy metal collars. None of the colored decoration, just ordinary slave hardware. Only later did the islanders become familiar with how we were going to dress our slaves inside the restaurant. They're used to it now, so when they see you arrive, that stuff you're wearing..." he gestured at the gaily colored cloth bands, "...won't surprise them. But just for this one short walk today, and the walk back to the boat in September, you'll need the hobbles."

Several girls nodded, mostly accompanied by sighs. Jill asked, "What about the cloth ankle bands?" She raised one foot and tapped her ankle. "Will the cuffs mess them up?"

Derek responded, "I was going to say, slide them up about three inches higher on your leg for now, and back down the way they are now when we get inside. We want the islanders to see them."

All of the girls nodded now, and knelt to adjust their ankle bands. Derek pointed to Jill. "You're up."

Sara wasn't sure if anyone noticed her staring at Cherise. They generally seemed more absorbed in watching the process of hobbling their classmates. But in any case, she couldn't stop. She only wished time would stop so she could see Cherise like this forever.