He shook his head in absolute disbelief. There was no doubting that she had been afraid to be punished by him. But she’d enjoyed it somehow. She’d reached a climax. That was very much outside Authority guidelines.
And it meant that he could not be done with her. Not yet.
He had to nudge her slightly over on his lap to reach for the clasp of his belt.
“No!” she whimpered, figuring out what he was doing immediately. But what she wanted was not what mattered. She needed this. The spanking would bruise her if he was not careful. His big hand was much more impactful than the implement he had chosen. The lash would sting her cheeks and enable him to punish her effectively for much longer.
The first cut of the lash made her yowl and grasp at his leg with both hands.
“Holy hell!” she cursed. “That really fucking hurts!”
“It is supposed to,” he informed her calmly. Her bottom was already bright red. She had been warmed up nicely, but apparently the lash pushed her over the threshold for tolerance. He repeated the treatment, heard her scream again. There was a certain edge of desperation he hadn’t heard before.
One more lash was in order. He gave it dead center of her cheeks, creating a bright red flash across the middle of her rear, setting off his previous work to very nice effect.
Her resulting howl was followed by a flood of tears the likes of which he had never seen. She was not just crying, she was crying as though she had not cried in a thousand years, as if every pent-up tear in her body was being released all at once.
Atlas was not sure what to do with her. Once a punishment was over it was his habit to lecture the recipient to ensure that the lesson had been learned, but she was crying too hard to hear a thing. He found himself sitting there with the human over his lap, rubbing her back down to her thighs and waiting for the wailing to stop so he could recommence his discipline.
It took a very long time. Far longer than he thought it would. So long that he took the time to check that he had not actually injured her. There appeared to be no structural issues. Her cheeks were hot and there were light raised stripes here and there, but nothing compared to what could be there. He would have described it as a fairly mild punishment by all standards. And yet on she cried, as if she had been beaten to within an inch of her life.
“Ensign Tessil,” he said, attempting to cut through her misery. “Are you alright?”
How could she answer that?
All the smug triumph and excitement she had enjoyed through the first part of her spanking had turned to misery as she endured Atlas’s lash. The extreme pleasure she’d taken at his knee was then turned to intense pain when the lash came into play. She was more sensitive than ever. She thought she was playing him, but he was playing her instead.
Sobbing over her commanding officer’s knee, Jerri was certain she would never be able to look anybody in the eye ever again. Her ass felt like it was on literal fire.
Being handled by Atlas made her feel very, very small. He was physically massive, and the energy he exuded was intimidating at the best of times. To have it all focused on her in this painful way was overwhelming. She wasn’t sure she could take it, even though she had absolutely no choice in the matter.
She lay there, her head down and the tips of her fingers on the floor. Atlas’s strong body was still beneath her, supporting her, giving her what she needed in some inexplicable and unspeakable way.
Finally she managed to get herself under control. Her tears began to dry up, though the heavy feeling inside remained. Jerri truly hated being punished. She felt terribly ashamed and uncertain as to how to conduct herself.
“When I let you up, you go back to your berth,” he ordered. “And if your logon appears on any electronic device before I tell you it is allowed, then you will feel this all again, and worse. Understand?”
“Yes,” she said, her voice emerging in a little squeak. She didn’t trust herself not to start crying again.
“Good,” he said, standing her up with one last tap to her rear. “Out of my sight now, Ensign Tessil, and be quick about it.”
Chapter Two
He watched her scurry away and assumed that would be the end of things. Ensign Tessil’s punishment had been the most physical of any he had handed down in a long time, but it had also been arguably the most deserved.
He found himself enjoying the memory of the interlude for several days after, especially the manner in which her reddened cheeks had danced beneath his palm in a way that frankly would have qualified as sensual. There were digital markets for the sight he had enjoyed, and though he would never have gone so far as to take footage of such interludes and sell it, if he were that sort of person, he would have come into quite a windfall. Tessil, to put it bluntly, was hot as hell.